Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1817 edition. Excerpt: ...from his calculations, a rule which may, by a very brief and simple arithmetical process, afford all the information and accuracy generally necessary for practical purposes. His first experiment was with a fourpounder, having the breech, and as much of the gun as is usually within the sides Of a vessel, in a water-tight box, and the muzzle stopped with a tompion: the box and gun were then submerged three feet in the Hudson: the gun was fired by dropping a live coal through a tin tube which penetrated the box immediately above the vent of the gun, and rose above the surface of the water: the ball was found to have struck the sand at the bottom of the river, at the distance of fortyone feet from the muzzle. The gun was uninjured. This experiment satisfied him that guns might be placed in a ship, below her water-line with their breech on board, and their muzzles in the water, without any more danger of their bursting, than there is when they are fired in the air. This gave him the idea of arming ships with guns to be fired in this way. He proposed that the muzzle of the gun made for the purpose, should recoil through a stuffing box, and be followed by a valve which would exclude the water when the gun was not protruded. An elegant model on this construction is now in the possession of bis family.. He next tried the same piece with a pound and a half of powder, and fired it by means of one of his water-tight locks when it was entirely in water, three feet below the surface: the ball penetrated eleven and a half inches into a target of pine logs, which had been prepared for the purpose, and placed beneath the water at the distance of twelve feet from the piece. His next experiment was with a Colurabiad carrying a hundred pound ball, fired at...