The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 55, May, 1862

Ceylon, Cave of Memoora, 3-1/10 "

Upper Bengal, Tirhoot, earth simply, 1-6/10 "

Patree in Guzerat, best sweepings, 8-7/10 "

In each case the salt is mixed saltpetres.

Artificial.

France, 100 lbs. earth from

plantations afford 8 to 9 oz.

Hungary and Sweden, from

the same, 1/2 to 2-3/10 per cent.

It may be calculated that the flesh of animals, free from bone, carefully decomposed, will afford ninety-five pounds of saltpetre for one thousand pounds thus consumed.

In the manufacture of saltpetre, the earths, whether naturally or artificially impregnated, are mixed with the ashes from burnt wood, or salts of potash, so that this base may take the place of all others, and produce long prisms of potash saltpetre.

In this country there are numerous caves of great extent in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Missouri, from which saltpetre has been manufactured. Under the most favorable conditions of abundance of labor, obtainable at a low price, potash saltpetre can be made at a cost about one-fourth greater than the average price of India saltpetre, and those sources of supply are the best natural deposits known on this side of the Rocky Mountains. Where there is an insufficient supply of manure in a country, resort to the artificial production of saltpetre is simply a robbery committed on the resources of the agriculturists, and it is only during the pressure of a great struggle like that of the wars of Napoleon, that the conversion into saltpetre of materials which can become food for the community would be permitted.

Hitherto, in peaceful times, our supply of saltpetre has come from India through commercial channels; but twice within a few years this course of trade has been interrupted by the British Government, and the price of a necessary article has been greatly enhanced,—leading reflecting minds to the inquiry after other sources whence to draw the quantity required for an increasing consumption. On the boundary between Peru and Chili, in South Peru, about forty miles from the ports of Conception and Iquique, is a depression in the general surface of a saline desert, where a bed of soda saltpetre, about two and a half feet thick and one hundred and fifty miles long, exists. The salt is massive, and, occurring in a rainless climate, it is dry, and contains about sixty per cent. of pure soda saltpetre. In Brazil, on the San Francisco, the same salt is found extending sixty or seventy miles,—and again near the town of Pilao Arcado, the beds being about two hundred and forty miles from Bahia, but at present inaccessible for want of roads. The Peruvian native saltpetre is rudely refined in the desert, and then transported on the backs of mules to the shipping-port. As found in commerce, it is less impure than India saltpetre; and it might be usefully substituted for the latter in the manufacture of gunpowder, were it less deliquescent in damp atmospheres. For chemical purposes it now replaces India saltpetre, but the larger consumption is perhaps as a fertilizer of land, in the cool and humid climate of England, the low price it bears in the market permitting this consumption.

We have found that the various saltpetres of natural production, or those obtained in artificial arrangements, are converted by the use of potash salts into potash saltpetre, and among the products so changed is natural soda saltpetre. Now to us in this country, so near the sources of abundant supply of soda saltpetre, this substitution becomes a matter of great interest. We possess and can produce the alkaline salt of potash in almost unlimited quantity, and, excepting for some special purposes, it is consumed for its alkaline energy alone. When soda saltpetre in proper proportion is dissolved and thus mixed with potash salt, an exchange of bases takes place, and no loss of alkaline energy follows. The soda in a quite pure state is eliminated from the soda saltpetre, and will serve for the manufactures of glass and soap; while the potash, taking the oxygen compound of the soda saltpetre, produces, as a final result, a pure and beautiful prismatic saltpetre, most economically and abundantly.

Instead of working on a hundred pounds of earth to obtain at most eight or nine pounds of saltpetre, a hundred pounds of soda saltpetre will afford more than one hundred and nine pounds of potash saltpetre, when skilfully treated. Here, then, we have, by simple chemical treatment of an imported, but very cheap salt, a result constituting a source of abundant supply of potash saltpetre, without the loss of the agent concerned in the transformation.

We have traced slightly in outline the formation of saltpetre to the action of ozonized oxygen on nitrogen compounds, in the atmosphere, or in the earth,—the conditions being the same in both cases. If we pursue the study of this action of ozonized oxygen farther, we shall not restrict its combining disposition to these compounds, but prove that it has the power of uniting directly with the nitrogen naturally forming part of the pure air. While nitrogenized bodies are present, however, in the atmosphere, or in the humid artificial heaps of saltpetre plantations, the action of ozonized oxygen is on these, and the nitrous compounds formed unite with the bases lime, soda, and potash, also present, to form saltpetre.

Under all the conditions necessary, we see the permanent gases, oxygen and nitrogen, leaving the atmosphere and changing from their gaseous to a solid dry state, when they become chemically combined with potash, and there are 53-46/100 parts of the gaseous matter and 46-54/100 parts of the potash in 100 parts of the saltpetre by weight.

Having now found what saltpetre is and how it is formed, let us advance to the consideration of it as a source of power.

Through the exertion of chemical attraction the gaseous elements of the atmosphere have become solid in the saltpetre; and as we know the weight of this part in a cubic inch of saltpetre, the volume of the gases combined is easily ascertained to be about eight hundred times that of the saltpetre. Hence, as every cubic inch of condensation represents an atmosphere as large as the cubic inch of saltpetre formed, we may roughly estimate that the condensing force arising from chemical attraction in this case is 800 times 15 lbs., or 12,000 lbs.!

Strictly speaking, only about four-tenths of a cubic inch of potash holds this enormous power in connection with it so as to form a cubic inch of saltpetre, which we may handle and bruise, may melt and cool, dissolve and crystallize, without explosion or change. It contains conserved a force which represents the aggregate result of innumerable minute actions, taking place among portions of matter which escape our senses from their minuteness and excite our wonder by their transformation. Closely similar are these actions to the agencies in vegetation which build up the wood of the tree or the material of the coal destined to serve for the production of fire in all the applications of steam which we have briefly noticed in illustration.

In availing ourselves of the concentrated power accumulated in saltpetre, we resort to bodies which easily kindle when fire is applied, such as sulphur and finely powdered charcoal: these substances are most intimately mixed with the saltpetre in a powdered state, and the dampened mass subjected to great pressure is afterwards broken into grains of varied size, constituting gunpowder.

The substances thus added to the saltpetre have both the disposition and the power of burning with and decomposing the nitrous element of the saltpetre, and in so doing they do not simply open the way for the energetic action of the gases escaping, but, owing to the high temperature produced, a new force is added.

If the gases escaped from combination simply, they would exert for every cubic inch of saltpetre, as we have here considered it, the direct power of 12,000 lbs.; but under the new conditions, the volume of escaping gas has a temperature above 2,000° Fahrenheit, and consequently its force in overcoming resistance is more than four times as great, or at least 48,000 lbs.

Such, then, is the power which can be obtained from a cubic inch of saltpetre, when it is so compounded as to form some of the kinds of gunpowder; and the fact of greatest importance in this connection is the control we have over the amount of the force exerted and the time in which the energy can be expended, by variations in the proportions of the eliminating agents employed.

We have used the well-known term Gunpowder to express the compound by which we easily obtain the power latent in saltpetre; and the use of the term suggests the employment of guns, which is secondary to the main point we are illustrating. As the enormous consumption of power takes place during peaceful times, so the consumption of saltpetre during a state of war is much lessened, because the prosecution of public and private works is then nearly suspended.

The value and importance of saltpetre as a source of power is seen in the adaptation of its explosive force to special purposes. It performs that work well which we cannot carry on so perfectly by means of any other agent, and the great mining and engineering works of a country are dependent on this source for their success, and for overcoming obstacles where other forces fail. With positive certainty the engineer can remove a portion of a cliff or rock without breaking it into many parts, and can displace masses to convenient distances, under all the varying demands which arise in the process of mining, tunnelling, or cutting into the earth.

In all these cases of application we see that the powder contains within itself both the material for producing force and the means by which that force is applied, no other motor being necessary in its application.

Modern warfare has become in its simplest expression the intelligent application of force, and that side will successfully overcome or resist the other which can in the shortest time so direct the greater force. In artillery as well as infantry practice, the control over the time necessary in the decomposition of the powder has been obtained through the refinements already made in the manufacture, and the best results of the latest trials confirm in full the conclusion that saltpetre is a source of great and easily controlled power, which can act through short or extended space.

Under the view here presented, it is evident that saltpetre is indispensable to progress in the arts of civilization and peace, as well as in military operations, and that no nation can advance in material interests, or even maintain strict independence, without possessing within its boundaries either saltpetre or the sources from which it can be drawn at all times. In its use for protecting the property of a nation from the attacks of an enemy, and as the means of insuring respect, we may consider saltpetre as an element of strength in a State, and as such deserving a high place in the consideration of those who direct the counsels or form the policy of a country.

Has the subject of having an exhaustless supply of this important product or the means of producing it been duly considered?

* * * * *

WEATHER IN WAR

It is not very flattering to that glory-loving, battle-seeking creature, Man, that his best-arranged schemes for the destruction of his fellows should often be made to fail by the condition of the weather. More or less have the greatest of generals been "servile to all the skyey influences." Upon the state of the atmosphere frequently depends the ability of men to fight, and military hopes rise and fall with the rising and falling of the metal in the thermometer's tube. Mercury governs Mars. A hero is stripped of his plumes by a tempest, and his laurels fly away on the invisible wings of the wind, and are seen no more forever. Empires fall because of a heavy fall of snow. Storms of rain have more than once caused monarchs to cease to reign. A hard frost, a sudden thaw, a "hot spell," a "cold snap," a contrary wind, a long drought, a storm of sand,—all these things have had their part in deciding the destinies of dynasties, the fortunes of races, and the fate of nations. Leave the weather out of history, and it is as if night were left out of the day, and winter out of the year. Americans have fretted a little because their "Grand Army" could not advance through mud that came up to the horses' shoulders, and in which even the seven-league boots would have stuck, though they had been worn as deftly as Ariel could have worn them. They talked as if no such thing had ever before been known to stay the march of armies; whereas all military operations have, to a greater or a lesser extent, depended for their issue upon the softening or the hardening of the earth, or upon the clearing or the clouding of the sky. The elements have fought against this or that conqueror, or would-be conqueror, as the stars in their courses fought against Sisera; and the Kishon is not the only river that has through its rise put an end to the hopes of a tyrant. The condition of rivers, which must be owing to the condition of the weather, has often colored events for ages, perhaps forever. The melting of the snows of the Pyrenees, causing a great rise of the rivers of Northern Spain, came nigh bringing ruin upon Julius Caesar himself; and nothing but the feeble character of the opposing general saved him from destruction.

The preservation of Greece, with all its incalculable consequences, must be credited to the weather. The first attempt to conquer that country, made by the Persians, failed because of a storm that disabled their fleet. Mardonius crossed the Hellespont twelve or thirteen years before that feat was accomplished by Xerxes, and he purposed marching as far as Athens. His army was not unsuccessful, but off Mount Athos the Persian fleet was overtaken by a storm, which destroyed three hundred ships and twenty thousand men. This compelled him to retreat, and the Greeks gained time to prepare for the coming of their enemy. But for that storm, Athens would have been taken and destroyed, the Persians having an especial grudge against the Athenians because of their part in the taking and burning of Sardis; and Athens was destined to become Greece for all after-time, so that her as yet dim light could not have been quenched without darkening the whole world. When Xerxes himself entered Europe, and was apparently about to convert Hellas into a satrapy, it was a storm, or a brace of storms, that saved that country from so sad a fate, and preserved it for the welfare of all after generations of men. The Great King, in the hope of escaping "the unseen atmospheric enemies which howl around that formidable promontory," had caused Mount Athos to be cut through, but, as the historian observes, "the work of destruction to his fleet was only transferred to the opposite side of the intervening Thracian sea." That fleet was anchored on the Magnesian coast, when a hurricane came upon it, known to the people of the country as the Hellespontias, and which blew right upon the shore. For three days this wind continued to blow, and the Persians lost four hundred warships, many transports and provision craft, myriads of men, and an enormous amount of matériel. The Grecian fleet, which had fled before that of Persia, now retraced its course, believing that the latter was destroyed, and would have fled again but for the arts and influence of Themistocles. The sea-fights of Artemisium followed, in which the advantage was, though not decisively, with the Greeks; and that they finally retreated was owing to the success of the Persians at Thermopylae. Between the first and second battle of Artemisium the Persians suffered from another storm, which inflicted great losses upon them. These disasters to the enemy greatly encouraged the Greeks, who believed that they came directly from the gods; and they made it possible for them to fight the naval battle of Salamis, and to win it. So great was the alarm of Xerxes, who thought that the victors would sail to the Hellespont, and destroy the bridge he had thrown over that strait, that he ordered his still powerful fleet to hasten to its protection. He himself fled by land, but on his arrival at the Hellespont he found that the bridge had been destroyed by a storm; and he must have been impressed as deeply as Napoleon was in this century, that the elements had leagued themselves with his mortal enemies. After his flight, and the withdrawal of his fleet from the war, the Persians had not a chance left, and the defeat of his lieutenant Mardonius, at Plataea, was of the nature of a foregone conclusion.

It is not possible to exaggerate the importance of the assistance which the Greeks received from the storms mentioned, and it is not strange that they were lavish in their thanks and offerings to Poseidon the Saviour, or that they continued piously to express their gratitude in later days. Mankind at large have reason to be thankful for the occurrence of those storms; for if they had not happened, Greece must have been conquered, and all that she has been to the world would have been that world's loss. It was not until after the overthrow of the Persians that Athens became the home of science, literature, art, and commerce; and if Athens had been removed from Greece, there would have been little of Hellenic genius left for the delight of future days. Not only was most of that which is known as Greek literature the production of the years that followed the failure of Xerxes, but the success of the Greeks was the means of preserving all of their earlier literature. The Persians were not barbarians, and, had they achieved their purpose, they might have promoted civilisation in Europe; but that civilization would have been Asiatic in its character, and it might have been as fleeting as the labors of the Carthaginians in Europe and Africa. Nor would they have felt any interest in the preservation of the works of those Greeks who wrote before the Marathonian time, which they would have regarded with that contempt with which most conquerors look upon the labors of those whom they have enslaved. That most brilliant of ages, the age of Pericles, could never have come to pass under the dominion of Persia; and the Greeks of Europe, when ruled by satraps from Susa, would have been of as little weight in the ancient world as, under that kind of rule, were the Greeks of Ionia. All future history was involved in the decision of the Persian contest, and we may well feel grateful that the event was not left for the hands of men to decide, but that the winds and the waves of the Grecian seas so far equalized the power of the combatants as to enable the Greeks, who fought for us as well as for themselves, to roll back the tide of Oriental conquest. We might not have had even the Secession War, if there had been no storms in the Thracian seas in a summer the roses of which perished more than two thousand three hundred years ago.1

The modern contest which most resembles that which was waged between the Greeks and the Persians is that war between England and Spain which came to a crisis in 1588, when the Spanish Armada was destroyed by the tempests of the Northern seas, after having been well mauled by the English fleet. The English seamen behaved well, as they always do; but the Spanish loss would not have been irreparable, if the weather had remained mild. What men had begun so well storms completed. A contrary wind prevented the Spanish Admiral from pursuing his course in a direction that would have proved favorable to his second object, which was the preservation of his fleet. He was forced to stand to the North, so that he rushed right into the jaws of destruction. He encountered in those remote and almost unknown waters tempests that were even more merciless than the fighting ships and fireships of the island heretics. Philip II. bore his loss with the same calmness that he bore the victory of Lepanto. As, on hearing of the latter, he merely said, "Don John risked a great deal," so, when tidings came to him that the Invincible Armada had been found vincible, he quietly remarked, "I sent it out against men, and not against the billows." Down to the very last year, it had been the common, and all but universal opinion, that, if the Spaniards had succeeded in landing in England, they would have been beaten, so resolute were the English in their determination to oppose them, and so extensive were their preparations for resistance. Elizabeth at Tilbury had been one of the stock pieces of history, and her words of defiance to Parma and to Spain have been ringing through the world ever since they were uttered after the Armada had ceased to threaten her throne. We now know that the common opinion on this subject, like the common opinion respecting some other crises, was all wrong, a delusion and a sham, and based on nothing but plausible lies. Mr. Motley has put men right on this point, as on some others; and it is impossible to read his brilliant and accurate narrative of the events of 1588 without coming to the conclusion that Elizabeth was in the summer of that year in the way to receive punishment for the cowardly butchery which had been perpetrated, in her name, if not by her direct orders, in the great hall of Fotheringay. She was saved by those winds which helped the Dutch to blockade Parma's army, in the first instance, and then by those Orcadian tempests which smote the Armada, and converted its haughty pride into a by-word and a scoffing. The military preparations of England were of the feeblest character; and it is not too much to say, that the only parallel case of Governmental weakness is that which is afforded by the American history of last spring, when we had not an efficient company or a seaworthy armed ship with which to fight the Secessionists, who had been openly making their preparations for war for months. The late Mr. Richard Rush mentions, in the second series of his "Residence at the Court of London," that at a dinner at the Marquis of Lansdowne's, in 1820, the conversation turned on the Spanish Armada; and he was surprised to find that most of the company, which was composed of members of Parliament and other public men, were of the opinion that the Spaniards, could they have been landed, would have been victorious. With genuine American faith in English invincibility, he wondered what the company could mean, and also what the English armies would have been about. It was not possible for any one then to have said that there were no English armies at that time to be about anything; but now we see that those armies were but imaginary bodies, having not even a paper existence. Parma, who was even an abler diplomatist than soldier,—that is, he was the most accomplished liar in an age that was made up of falsehood,—had so completely gulled the astute Elizabeth that she was living in the fools' paradise; and so little did she and most of her counsellors expect invasion, that a single Spanish regiment of infantry might, had it then been landed, have driven the whole organized force of England from Sheerness to Bristol. Those Englishmen who sneer so bitterly at the conduct of our Government but a year ago would do well to study closely the history of their own country in 1588, in which they will find much matter calculated to lessen their conceit, and to teach them charity. The Lincoln Government of the United States had been in existence but little more than thirty days when it found itself involved in war with the Rebels; the Elizabethan Government had been in existence for thirty years when the Armada came to the shores of England, to the astonishment and dismay of those "barons bold and statesmen old in bearded majesty" whom we have been content to regard as the bravest and the wisest men that have lived since David and Solomon. Elizabeth, who had a beard that vied with Burleigh's,—the evidence of her virgin innocence,—felt every hair of her head curling from terror when she learned how she had been "done" by Philip's lieutenant; and old Burleigh must have thought that his mistress was in the condition of Jockey of Norfolk's master at Bosworth,—"bought and sold." Fortunately for both old women, and for us all, the summer gales of 1588 were adverse to the Spaniards, and protected Old England. We know not whence the wind cometh nor whither it goeth, but we know that its blows have often been given with effect on human affairs; and it never blew with more usefulness, since the time when it used up the ships of Xerxes, than when it sent the ships of Philip to join "the treasures that old Ocean hoards." Had England then been conquered by Spain, though but temporarily, Protestant England would have ceased to exist, and the current of history would have been as emphatically changed as was the current of the Euphrates under the labors of the soldiers of Cyrus. We should have had no Shakspeare, or a very different Shakspeare from the one that we have; and the Elizabethan age would have presented to after centuries an appearance altogether unlike that which now so impressively strikes the mind. As that was the time out of which all that is great and good in England and America has proceeded, in letters and in arms, in religion and in politics, we can easily understand how vast must have been the change, had not the winds of the North been so unpropitious to the purposes of the King of the South.