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.
