
JULY 29, 1915] 

proposals from individuals and themselves to initiate 
proposals. 
All possible means will be used to enlist the interest 
and secure the co-operation of persons directly en- 
gaged in trade and industry. 
(8) It is contemplated that the Advisory Council 
will worl largely through Sub-Committees reinforced 
by suitable experts in the particular branch of science 
or industry concerned. On these Sub-Committees it 
would be desirable as far as possible to enlist the 
services of persons actually engaged in scientific trades 
and manufactures dependent on science. 
(9) As regards the use or profits of discoveries, the 
general principle on which grants will be made by 
the Committee of Council is that discoveries made by 
institutions, associations, bodies, or indviduals in the 
course of researches aided by public money shall be 
made available under proper conditions for the public 
advantage. 
(10) It is important in order to secure effective 
working that the Advisory Council should be a small 
body, but it is recognised that even if full use is 
made by the Council of its power to work through 
reinforced Sub-Committees, its membership may be 
found inadequate to do justice to all the branches of 
industry in which proposals for research may be made 
or to the requests of other Government Departments 
for assistance. It is therefore probable that it will be 
found necessary to strengthen the Council by appoint- 
ing additional members. 
The first members of the Council will be :—The 
Right Hon. Lord Rayleigh, O.M., F.R.S., Mr. G. T. 
Beilby, F.R.S., Mr. W. Duddell, F.R.S., Prof. B. 
Hopkinson, F.R.S., Prof. J. A. M’Clelland, F.R.S., 
Prof. R. Meldola, F.R.S., Mr. R. Threlfall, F.R.S., 
with Sir William S. M’Cormick as administrative 
chairman. 
(11) The Advisory Council will proceed to frame a 
scheme or programme for their own guidance in 
recommending proposals for research and for the 
guidance of the Committee of Council in allocating 
such State funds as may be available. This scheme will 
naturally be designed to operate over some years in 
advance, and in framing it the Council must neces- 
sarily have due regard to the relative urgency of the 
problems requiring solution, the supply of trained 
researchers available for particular pieces of research, 
and the material facilities in the form of laboratories 
and equipment which are available or can be provided 
for specific researches. Such a scheme will naturally 
be elastic and will require modification from year to 
year; but it is obviously undesirable that the Council 
should live “from hand to mouth” or work on the 
principle of “first come first served,’’ and the recom- 
mendations (which for the purpose of estimating they 
will have to make annually to the Committee of 
Council) should represent progressive instalments of a 
considered programme and policy. A large part of 
their work will be that of examining, selecting, com- 
bining, and co-ordinating rather than that of originat- 
ing. One of their chief functions will be the preven- 
tion of overlapping between institutions or individuals 
engaged in research. They will, on the other hand, 
be at liberty to initiate proposals and to institute 
inquiries preliminary to preparing or eliciting pro- 
posals for useful research, and in this way they may 
help to concentrate on problems requiring solution 
the interest of all persons concerned in the develop- 
ment of all branches of scientific industry. 
(12) An Annual Report, embodying the Report of 
the Advisory Council, will be made to his Majesty by 
the Committee of Council and laid before Parliament. 
(13) Office accommodation and staff will be pro- 
vided for the Committee and Council by the Board of 
Education. . : 
NO. 2387, VOL. 95] 
NATURE 

605 
MODERN MUNITIONS OF WAR.} 
I.—GuNS AND PROPELLANTS. 
LEVEN months of war have now passed, and 
certain lessons have made themselves perfectly 
clear. The teaching of the first six months of the 
war was tersely summed up by General French when 
he said last February, ‘‘The problem set is a com- 
paratively simple one—munitions, more munitions, 
always more munitions,’’ the special munitions meant 
in this case being the high explosive shells that from 
the time the war assumed the conditions of a field 
siege after the battle of the Aisne became a necessity 
for any advance. 
By ‘“‘munitions’’ are meant practically everything 
required by the Army, and it will be well first to con- 
sider the wonderful changes which have taken place 
in guns and propellants, and which in this war have 
made artillery probably the most important feature. 
Napoleon, himself an artillery officer, was fond of 
using massed batteries in much the same way as 
artillery is being used in the present war, but what 
artillery meant in those days and in these can perhaps 
be best grasped by remembering that the old Victory, 
which was our most heavily armed ship in the Napo- 
leonic days, had a broadside of 52 guns, which, when 
fired simultaneously, would have thrown about 60 per 
cent. of the weight of the metal contained in one shot 
from the 15-in. guns of the modern super-Dread- 
noughts. We must also remember that in the Crimean 
War the old smooth-bore 68-pounders, using a charge 
of 16 lb. of black powder, were the largest guns ashore 
or afloat at the time, whereas now we have the 15-in. 
guns of our super-Dreadnoughts, weighing close on 100 
tons, from which a charge of 400 Ib. of MD cordite 
hurls a projectile weighing 1925 lb. with accuracy to a 
distance of fifteen miles, or with high angle firing 
to double that distance. 
The changes commenced in the “fifties of the last 
century, when we adopted the idea of rifling ordnance 
so as on firing the gun to give the projectile a spin 
as well as forward velocity, this being found to add 
to the range and accuracy of fire, and in order to do 
this satisfactorily the guns had to be increased in 
length. 
The rate at which the size of the big naval guns 
grew may be gathered from the fact that at the Siege 
of Alexandria in 1882 we had the 8o-ton guns of 16-in. 
calibre, whilst by 1886 we had afloat the 110-ton 
guns with a bore of 16-25 in., using a charge of 
960 Ib. of powder. It was soon found, however, that 
the lengthening of the gun when using the form of 
gunpowder then employed caused .a strain on the 
breech and gave but a low muzzle velocity, this being 
due to the rapid burning of the powder. Attempts 
were then made to slow the combustion of the powder 
by increasing the size of the grain, and with the 
increase in the size of the guns the powder gradually 
grew to the large pebble powder, consisting of 13-in. 
cubes. Unfortunately the desired effect could not pos- 
sibly be obtained by alterations of this character, as 
it is required of a perfect powder that when the charge 
is fired in the breech of the gun, the combustion shall 
commence comparatively slowly, so as to overcome 
the vis inertiae- of the projectile without throwing 
too great a strain on the gun, and the combustion 
of the powder should then increase in rapidity so as 
to supply gas more and more rapidly to increase ihe 
pressure and momentum of the shot, which should 
leave the muzzle of the gun with the maximum 
velocity. 
With such forms of powder as cubes or other large 
en i eerie hen A er 
1 Abstracts of three lectures delivered at the Royal Sociéty of Arts on 
July 7, 14, and at, by Prof. Vivian B. Lewes. 
