AND AMERICAN RURAL SPORTS. 
47 
Extracted from Silliman’s Journal. 
PERCUSSION POWDER. 
Gunpowder made of chlorate of potash, sulphur, and 
charcoal, is much stronger than that made of saltpetre. 
Welter filled small bombs with this powder, buried them 
in the ground, and then caused them to explode. They were 
constantly broken into pieces of the size of a horse-ches- 
nut, while those exploded with common gunpowder, under 
circumstances precisely similar, were broken into much 
larger pieces. As a material for priming, to be fired by 
percussion or otherwise, this powder has serious inconve- 
niences. It soils and corrodes the lock very rapidly, a de- 
fect which cannot be easily remedied, and the use of it is 
very much abandoned. 
A preference is therefore given to a powder composed of 
ten parts of fulminating mercury, and six of common 
priming powder. The fulminate is ground upon a marble 
slab with a wooden muller, after having been moist- 
ened with thirty per cent, of water; six parts of common 
powder are then added, and the grinding continued. A 
firm paste is thus attained, which being properly dried, is 
divided into grains, one of which is sufficient for a prim- 
ing. — t finn. de Chimie, Sept. 1829. 
COMMON SALT A REMEDY FOR ANIMAL 
POISON. 
The Rev. J. G. Fischer, formerly a missionary in 
South America, says he u actually and effectually cured all 
kinds of very painful and dangerous serpents’ bites, after 
they had been inflicted for many hours,” by the applica- 
tion of common salt, moistened with water, and bound 
upon the wound, “ without any bad effect ever occurring 
afterwards.” 
“I, for my part,” says he, “ never had an opportunity 
to meet with a mad dog, or any person who was bitten 
with a mad dog. I cannot, therefore, speak from expe- 
rience, as to hydrophobia, but that I have cured serpents’ 
bites always, without fail, I can declare in truth.” Fie 
then cites a case from a newspaper, in which a person was 
bitten by a dog, which in a few hours died raving mad. 
Salt was immediately rubbed for some time into the 
wound, and the person never experienced any inconveni- 
ence from the bite. 
Mr. Fischer was induced to try the above remedy, from 
a statement made by the late Bishop Loskiell in his history 
of the Missions of the Moravian Church in North America, 
purporting that certain tribes of Indians, had not the least 
fear of the bite of serpents, relying upon the application of 
salt as so certain a remedy, that some of them would suffer 
the bite for the sake of a glass of rum. — Jour, of Roy. 
Inst. 
TO RESTORE TIIE ELASTICITY OF A DAMAGED 
FEATHER. 
A feather, when damaged by crumpling, may be 
perfectly restored by the simple expedient of immersing it 
in hot water. The feather will thus completely recover 
its former elasticity, and look as well as it ever did. This 
fact was accidentally discovered by an amateur ornitholo- 
gist of Manchester. Receiving, on one occasion, a case of 
South American birds, he found that the rarest specimen of 
it was spoilt, from having its tail rumpled in the packing. 
Whilst lamenting over this mishap, he let the bird fall 
from his hands into his coffee-cup; he now deemed it 
completely lost, but, to his agreeable surprise, he found, 
that after he had laid it by the fire to dry, the plumage of 
the tail became straight and unruffled, and a valuable spe- 
cimen was added to his collection. — lb. 
DESTRUCTION OF LIVE STOCK BY WOLVES 
IN RUSSIA. 
In the government of Livonia alone, the following ani- 
mals were destroyed by Wolves in 1823. The account is 
an official one. 
Horses, - - 
- 1,841 
Goats, - - - 
- 2,545 
Fowls, - - 
- 1,243 
Kids, - - - 
183 
Horned cattle, 
- 1,807 
Swine, - - - 
- 4,190 
Calves, - - 
733 
Sucking pigs, 
312 
Sheep, - - 
- 15,182 
Dogs, - - - 
703 
Lambs, - - 
726 
Geese, - - - 
673 
{Revue Eneyc. Sept. 1830. 
From the London Sporting Magazine. 
ANECDOTE OF A DOG. 
A faithful Dog followed the hearse of its master to 
a burial-ground two miles from London. Nothing could 
prevail on it to remain in the house of the deceased when 
the body was removed from it. A number of persons as- 
sisted at the funeral, some of whom (the family) the ani- 
mal was accustomed to. With none of them would it re- 
