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concentrated nitric acid. The resultant substance was gelatinous and highly 
inflammable. M. Pelouze proposed to utilize the invention by preparing 
the substance in a form which would serve for artillery cartridges. He 
considered that if the cartridge were thus made it would be entirely 
consumed at the discharge of the piece, and there would no longer be any 
danger from burning fragments being left in the bore and causing premature 
ignition when a new cartridge is inserted. 
M. Pelouze does not appear to have carried out this application, or to 
have prosecuted his researches to any important result; but his remarks 
attracted attention among chemists, and when Schonbein announced that he 
was in possession of a secret method of making an explosive cotton, there 
appeared other claimants to the honour of the discovery and to the possession 
of the secret. Amongst the rest was M. Otto, Professor of Chemistry at a 
college in Brunswick; and a gun-cotton of his manufacture proved to be 
very similar to SchonbeiAs. The acid he at first used for making it was 
produced by the distillation of ten parts of dry saltpetre and six parts of 
sulphuric acid, but afterwards at the suggestion of other chemists he used a 
mixture of nitric and sulphuric acids with much better results. He made 
public all that he knew, and his cotton was fired for experiment from light 
pieces of artillery."* 
It is not surprising that more than one person should have succeeded in 
making an explosive substance of this nature, when we consider that the 
ingredients are susceptible of some variation; the use of cotton is not 
indispensable; flax, straw, rags, sawdust, or any other form of the substance 
called ligninef may be substituted for it, and cotton is only selected for 
secondary reasons, such as the greater convenience for preparing and 
applying the finished material. It has already been mentioned that 
Braconnet employed woodshavings and linen fabrics in conjunction with 
nitric acid to make xyloidine in 1833, and it only required the addition 
of sulphuric acid in proper proportion to make a near approach to gun- 
cotton. 
The year 1816 may however clearly be taken as the starting point for 
any historical essay on gun-cotton itself. In most of the countries of 
Europe official enquiries were instituted to determine whether it might not 
immediately be used for artillery or small-arms. In England there was not 
(so far as I am aware) any official inquiry, but there was no want of interest 
in the discovery. In January 1847, a few months after Schonbein had 
exhibited it to the British Association, Professor Braude gave a lecture 
upon it at the Royal Institution, a patent was taken out shortly afterwards 
to protect the invention, and Messrs Hall, owners of the large powder mills 
at Eaversham, made arrangements for manufacturing gun-cotton on a large 
scale. 
An abstract of Professor Branded lecture is given in the Annual Register 
for 1847. He traced the invention back to Braconneks discovery, gave 
some illustrations of the great power possessed by the new substance, and 
compared the advantages and disadvantages attendant upon its use; among 
*= Journal des Armes Speciales; 3e s<$rie: tome l er . (1847). 
f Lignine is the encrusting matter which is deposited in layers on the cellular membrane of 
plants.—Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1854, Vol. V. p. 72. 
