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NA TURE 



[April 9, 1885 



Magnetic Disturbance 



There was a considerable disturbance of the magnetograph 

 recorded here on March 1 5, and had the photographic curves been 

 developed on that day, we should probably have predicted the 

 occurrence of the aurora seen during the evening. The earth- 

 currents, which are necessary concomitants of magnetic disturb- 

 ances, were probably intense enough to cans 3 the disarrange- 

 ment of (he cable tests referred to by Mr. Willoughby Smith. 



G. M. Whipple 



Kew Observatory, Richmond, Surrey, April 7 



The Samsams 



From a note in last week's Nature it appears that during 

 his recent explorations in the Malay peninsula M. Delouell 

 claims to have discovered the "hitherto unknown" Samsam 

 people. Allow me to state in reply that I have long been aware 

 of the existence of these half-caste Malay and Siamese communi- 

 ties. They will be found duly recorded and described at p. 642 

 of my ethnological appendix to the " Australasia " of the Stanford 

 Series, published in 1S79. They appear to lie now mostly 

 Mohammedans, speaking wdiat is called a mixed Siamese and 

 Malay dialect, and otherwise forming an ethnical transition 

 between these two races. A. H. Keane 



University College, Gower Street, April 4 



Meteor 



Last evening (April 3) I saw a fine meteor at Sh. 21m. G.M.T. 

 (± 1111.). I was walking along the street at the time and look- 

 ing at Algol, and so only caught sight of it during the last few 

 moments of its apparition. Its path as observed was from a So" 

 North 5 2° to o 76° South S 4', when it disappeared behind 

 houses. It seemed quite twice the brightness of Jupiter, and 

 about 3' diameter; colour, chrome yellow; duration, three 

 seconds. It left no visible train. H. Sadler 



Clapham, April 4 



STEEL GUNS' 



THE whole of this part of the Proceedings of the 

 Naval Institute is occupied by detailed accounts of 

 the steps taken to prepare the way for the establishment of 

 Steel Gun Factories for the United States. We are in- 

 formed that, while the rest of the world has advanced 

 with the progress of the age, the artillery of the United 

 States has made no step forward. Artillerists and advo- 

 cates for providing adequate means of defence have 

 laboured under many difficulties during the last twenty 

 years, while regret is expressed that personal interests 

 have entered so largely into the discussion of a question 

 of such magnitude. In the House of Representatives it 

 was declared that the fortifications of that country were 

 in an absolutely worthless condition for all purposes of 

 warfare. 



Early in 1882 communications were opened with the 

 owners of the chief foundries and steel works of the 

 United States, but no firm could be found which had ever 

 made steel guns. 



At length the President of the United States was 

 authorised and required to select six officers of their army 

 and navy to examine and report respecting the neces- 

 sary navy-yards and arsenals. Accordingly, the President 

 named six officers (April 2nd, 1S83) to form the Board of 

 Gun Foundry, and one of their number, Lieut. W. H. 

 Jaques, U.S.N., was elected secretary to the board. Their 

 report was dated February 16th, 1S84. The Board found 

 it necessary to seek information in Europe, and make 

 visits to England, France, and Russia, in order that they 

 might reply satisfactorily to the Act of Congress. There 

 they were well received, and had every facility afforded 

 them in making their inquiries. The aim of Lieut. Jaques, 

 U.S.N., in his communication to the Naval Institute, was 



1 Proceedings of the United States Naval Institute, vol. x. No. 4, 1884. 

 (The Establishment of Steel Gun Factories in the United States, by Lieut. 

 W. H. Jaques. U.S.N.) 



to show the necessity of steel gun factories to the United 

 States, to extend the information collected, and to provide 

 a book of easy reference to the details of modern ord- 

 nance. He has produced a work which ought to warn 

 and instruct us. 



The Board in their Report give an account of the intro- 

 duction of the coil system of building up guns in England ; 

 of the cost of the system to this nation ; of the forty- 

 pounder Armstrong, adopted for the navy in 1S59, and of 

 the constructing of one hundred of the no-pounders 

 before any experiments with them had been concluded. 



Of four guns under trial, three showed a separation on 

 the outside between the trunnion-ring and the coil behind 

 it. The fourth showed a separation all round, but to less 

 extent. All the guns expanded in the shot chamber and 

 part of the powder chamber, and the bores were elongated. 

 Much of these defects, no doubt, arose from excessive 

 friction between the lead-coated projectile and the gun, 

 •which caused an unnecessary stress upon the gun. 



The first visit paid by the Board was to the Elswick 

 works. They remark : " The establishment at Elswick is 

 thoroughly equipped for heavy work, and has produced 

 the largest guns in the world. . . . The shops are supplied 

 with an abundance of fine tools," page 583. They have 

 a hammer of thirty-five tons. " The advantages of the 

 Whitworth manufacture are also recognised, and a forging 

 press is being introduced." 



They next visited the Woolwich Royal Gun Factories, 

 which are stated to have had in 1873-4 a capacity for the 

 production of 6,000 tons of guns of various calibres per 

 year. " The transition state in which the Board found the 

 Woolwich gun factories is due to the change from muzzle- 

 loading to breech-loading, and the substitution of homo- 

 geneous metal for the wrought coil" (page 589). The 

 Board give a list of the chief tools in the Arsenal, as 

 boring machines, planing machines, &c. There are four 

 travelling cranes of 60 tons, six of 30, and six of 25 tons 

 capacity. There are also : one steam hammer of 40 tons, 

 one of 12 tons, one of 10 tons, two of 7 tons, besides 

 man}- smaller ones. The steam power in the Royal Gun 

 Factories is supplied by forty boilers of 40-horse power. 

 " The plant at Woolwich, because of its transition state, 

 contains very little worthy of imitation in planning the 

 erection of gun factories in the United States." 



The Board next visited the works of T. Frith & Sons, 

 Sir John Brown & Co., C. Cammell & Co., and Sir H. 

 Bessemer, all of Sheffield, and Lieut. Jaques gives full 

 accounts of the most recent furnaces and methods em- 

 ployed there in working steel, illustrated with many beauti- 

 ful plates. He also gives an account of the manufacture 

 of compound armour, under the patents of Wilson & Ellis ; 

 as well as of the trials of armour plate made at Spezzia, 

 and of granite forts protected by iron plates at Shoebury- 

 ness in 1883. 



" The new departure in the system of gun construction, 

 described farther on in this report, will demand from the 

 Sheffield steel manufacturers increased effort. Up to the 

 present time the only portion in the construction of the 

 Woolwich gun that required steel was the tube. . . . The 

 new construction requires that steel shall be used through- 

 out, and the castings for thejackets for guns now in hand 

 at Woolwich can hardly be supplied from Sheffield " 

 (page 630). 



It is remarked that in one important establishment 

 preparations were being made for the introduction of a 

 large press, to take the place, or supplement, the work ol 

 the hammer. The Sheffield steel manufacturers are en- 

 tirely sceptical as to the advantage or practicability of the 

 compression of steel in the liquid state, and although they 

 concede the efficacy of forging under hydraulic compres- 

 sion, they consider it an objection to the process that a 

 much higher temperature will be required for the press 

 than for the hammer. 



Sir Joseph Whitworth's works at Manchester were 



