288 
MEPPEN EXPERIMENTS, 
slightest warning. Prom that time to the present, our wrought-iron guns have 
maintained their character for safety, while steel guns have always been attended 
with the risk of bursting. I do not lose sight of the enormous improvement which 
has of late been introduced into the manufacture of steel, and I have no doubt that 
in ten years’ time steel, which is once and a half or twice as strong as wrought- 
iron, will be the material for our guns; all I would say for the present is that the 
time has not yet arrived for the wholesale manufacture of steel guns. More im¬ 
portant than the improvement in the manufacture of steel, has been the improvement 
in gunpowder. About the time we made the experiments to which I have just 
referred, a discovery was made in America which was taken up by the Russians, 
and resulted in the prismatic powder used at Meppen. We, too, have carried out 
long and painstaking experiments, resulting in our large pebble powder, which, 
from its absence of sharp edges and corners, will stand transport better than the 
prismatic powder. The following fact proves its value :—When I was in the 
Royal Gun Factories, ten years ago, proving the first Woolwich Infant, we used 
130 lbs. of the powder then in use, and we had a pressure on the gun of about 
60 tons (and that was not a proof charge, which was 150 lbs.) The consequence 
was that when we came to examine the gun the next morning, we found a flaw in 
the tube, as you may remember ; well, but so greatly has powder improved since 
then, that the 80-ton gun was fired the other day with 850 lbs. of our present 
service powder, and the pressure realised was only 22 tons, and we knew before¬ 
hand, from the modified powder employed, that we should get that result. Prom 
the great improvement, therefore, in the manufacture of gunpowder, resulting in so 
much greater mildness of its action, I should imagine that breech-loading appliances 
might be found sufficiently safe, simple, and durable for the purpose; and it is 
satisfactory to know that we are making experiments in that direction ; but as for 
steel, I repeat that I do not think its time has yet arrived. But we all kuow how 
enthusiastic is Captain Browne, and how very energetically he rides his hobby. 
He is now astride of the Krupp gun, and probably, if he envies anybody, it is that 
Hutch officer who sat upon the gun while it was fired, at the risk of being blown 
to a thousand pieces. (Laughter and applause). 
Colonel Le Per Taylor, R.A., Secretary of the Institution, here asked permission 
to explain that he alone was responsible for the alteration in the title of the lecture, 
and that Captain Qrde Browne had therefore had no hand in hauling down his flag. 
Captain Orde Browne, in replying, said :—Sir John Adve has mentioned, as one 
objection to the Krupp gun, its cost. Now, I was very careful to keep steel out of 
the question, and as cost is especially connected with the material employed, I do 
not think the argument applies to the case; at all events, I question if a wrought- 
iron breech-loading gun would cost anything like so much as one of steel. I saw 
the working of the 38-ton gun at Shoeburyness, to which Sir John Adye refers, and 
it struck me that we had on that occasion got very near the limit of manual power. 
The No. 2 especially required to be a very powerful man. When I spoke of the 
71-ton gun as easy to work by hand, I referred to the fact that it fired at the rate 
of a round in four or five minutes, while with the 80-ton gun nothing of the kind 
has ever been done. Indeed, the 80-ton gun has been much longer in existence, 
but I do not think that rapid firing has ever been attempted. I might, it is true, 
have taken the smaller Krupp gun, and compared it for rapidity with the 38-ton 
gun, which certainly works very well; but my argument rather applied to the rapidity 
of guns exceeding a certain size , when the difficulties increase. As to the bursting 
of a gun on board the German training ship, I do not see any ground for pleading 
that the bursting had anything to do with the breech arrangement, unless you may 
urge that with breech-loading the shot has less windage. I may quote, on the other 
