n equal charge of powder.

I had a piece of wrought iron five-eights of an inch thick, and six
feet high by two in breadth. I fired at this at one hundred and
seventy yards with my two-grooved four-ounce rifle, with a reduced
charge of six drachms of powder and a ball of pure lead. It bulged the
iron like a piece of putty, and split the centre of the bulged spot
into a star, through the crevice of which I could pass a pen-blade.

A ball composed of half zinc and half lead, fired from the same
distance, hardly produced a perceptible effect upon the iron target.
It just slightly indented it.

I then tried a ball of one-third zinc and two-thirds lead, but there
was no perceptible difference in the effect.

I subsequently tried a tin bill, and again a zinc ball, but neither of
them produced any other effect than slightly to indent the iron.

I tried all these experiments again at fifty yards' range, with the
same advantage in favor of the pure lead; and at this reduced distance
a double-barreled No. 16 smoothbore, with a large charge of four
drachms of powder and a lead ball, also bulged and split the iron into
a star. This gun, with a hard tin ball and the same charge of powder,
did not produce any other effect than an almost imperceptible
indentation.

if a person wishes to harden a bill for any purpose, it should be done
by an admixture of quicksilver to the lead while the latter is in a
state of fusion, a few seconds before the ball is cast. The mixture
must be then quickly stirred with an iron rod, and formed into the
moulds without loss of time, as at this high temperature the
quicksilver will evaporate. Quicksilver is heavier than lead, and
makes a ball excessively hard; so much so that it would very soon spoil
a rifle. Altogether, the hardening of a ball has been shown to be
perfectly unnecessary, and the latter receipt would be found very
expensive.

If a wonderful effect is required, the steel-tipped conical ball should
be used. I once shot through fourteen elm planks, each one inch thick,
with a four-ounce steel-tipped cone, with the small charge (for that
rifle) of four drachms of powder. The proper charge for that gun is
one-fourth the weight of the ball, or one ounce of powder, with which
it carries with great nicety and terrific effect, owing to its great
weight of metal (twenty-one pounds); but it is a small piece of
artillery which tries the shoulder very severely in the recoil.

I have freq