FIREARMS. (See GUN, 230.) A new has been invented by Mr. M. Cass, of tica, N. Y. This gun is loaded at the breech with ball cartridge, bers for twenty-six charges. It is also capped at the same time that it is charg ,,ed. These twenty-six charges can be "fired in about three minutes without using any particular haste. The car tridge is introduced in the barrel of the gun through the breech-pin, which is constructed something in the manner of a common faucet, being turned one quar ter round by a small lever underneath the barrel, and thus admitting the charge, which is thrust forward from its chamber by a small ramrod operating from behind by means of another small lever.
A new breech-loading musket has been invented in Prussia, which may be short ly described thus :— " The musket has no lock, and is load ed at the stock end of the barrel. The barrel is slightly rifled, but the grooves are perfectly straight,and not spiral, as in the American gull. The common charge
is one-half of that used in the old per cussion gnu, and is said to carry the ball to its mark nine hundred yards. None of the powder is wasted, the fire being communicated from the side of the bar rel, and not from the breech. This is effected by an ingenious contrivance. The part of the cartridge next the ball is filled with an explosive substance similar to that in a percussion cap. This is made to explode by the contact of a piece of steel about the length of an eight-penny nail, which passes from the outside of the barrel through the cartridge. The gun is called the "nail firer." It can be discharged by a common soldier eight times in a minute, and need not be taken from the shoulder to be reloaded.