294 



BAD GUNPOWDER. 



he command a good supply of gunpowder, he 

 would, I am convinced, greatly extend his conquests. 

 After some examination, he pronounced it to be 

 genuine ; and I then found that he questioned, or 

 at least, suspected, that it might be adulterated. 

 A previous traveller had attempted to practise upon 

 the Negoos, by representing as having been made 

 in Shoa, some gunpowder he had brought with 

 him from Europe, and who had been detected by 

 the knowledge of a little fact, which it had been 

 presumed, that the clever monarch was not aware 

 of. The saltpetre obtained in Shoa, although very 

 plentiful, abounds with another salt, that not 

 decomposing by explosion leaves a residium of 

 white globules which, besides fouling the barrels of 

 the guns, deteriorates, considerably, the exploding 

 effects of the powder ; so much so, that an ordinary 

 charge for a common musket, is two or three large 

 handsful, and it is nothing unusual to see the 

 ram-rod, after loading, projecting twelve, or even 

 eighteen inches beyond the muzzle. The presence 

 of this salt occasions the powder to be of a very 

 light grey colour, not unlike wood-ashes. From 

 not possessing any chemical tests, I was unable to 

 decide its mineral character, but I supposed it to 

 be the nitrate of soda. 



Besides the gunpowder, I had taken with me, 

 not as a memolagee, but as a present for the 

 Queen, a beautifully worked black lace veil, 

 which had been made for a very different per- 



