Serpentine powder had another drawback,—it required very careful ramming home. “Thrust the pouder home fair and softly,” says Whitehorne.[428] “The powder rammed in too hard and the wad also,” says Bourne in 1587, “it will be long before the peece goeth off.... The powder too loose ... will make the shotte to come short of the mark.... Put up the powder with the rammer head somewhat close, but beat it not too hard.”[429] By beating it too hard the interstices between the particles through which the flame permeated the charge were diminished in size, and if beaten sufficiently hard the mixture tended to become a solid which burned away without exploding. Finally, the combustion of serpentine, at the best, was so slow that a large volume of its gas escaped wastefully through the vent.
These evils were in some cases much lessened, and in others quite got rid of by the gradual introduction of corned powder, which is mentioned in 1429 in the Firebook of Conrad von Schongau,[430] and was in use for hand-guns in England long before 1560. Corned powder (1) deposited less fouling than serpentine; (2) it was less susceptible to damp, especially after the introduction of glazing;[431] (3) it did not resolve into strata in transport; (4) it gave out less dust; (5) it was much less affected by hard ramming; (6) owing to the larger interstices between the grains,[432] it burned so quickly that there was little or no waste of gas through the vent, and it was consequently so strong that 2 lbs. of corned did the same work as 3 lbs. of serpentine powder.[433] It was, in fact, too strong for cannon for a long period: Chemistry had outrun Metallurgy. “If serpentine pouder should be occupied (used) in handguns,” says Whitehorne, “it would scant be able to drive their pellets[434] a quoit’s cast from their mouths; and if handgunne (_i.e._ corned) pouder should be used in pieces of ordnance, without great discretion, it would quickly break or marre them.”[435] Here we have the cause which necessitated the general retention of serpentine powder for cannon until the first half (or middle) of the sixteenth century, after which it is heard of no more except for secondary purposes, such as priming, &c. We must not overlook the importance of Whitehorne’s remark. He was an educated man of sound, practical sense, who had been a student of Gray’s Inn, and whose experience was not confined to the English Artillery, for he had seen service in the Low Countries. What he says is a sufficient safeguard against inferring too much from Schongau’s mention of corned powder in 1429. It came slowly into use for hand-grenades and small arms in the fifteenth century; but no country then possessed cannon strong enough to stand its explosion, and it did not come into general use for another century.