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il the mass has been burned out. So quickly does the fire travel through the tube or case that it will go a mile in four seconds. The experiment was tried, a small Gomez fuse one hundred feet long being coiled up in a tub of water, and its two ends brought over the side. An accurate stop watch could not indicate any lapse of time s full of fine powder should be put in the top of each barrel or bag through the whole mass of the powder, and that from the cabin, where it was to be set on fire, Gomez fuses should be run through all these boxes of fine powder so placed. By this means every box of powder would be exploded at substantially the same instant of timends were to be placed in a receptacle filled with powder. When this powder in the receptacle should be fired, it would instantly set fire to the whole mass. The Gomez fuse to be used for this purpose was bought and furnished. Clockwork devised and ordered to be used to explode the powder-boat Louisiana, but not used for that
with great care, and after numerous experiments, to insure safety and certainty, the slow matches, six in number, which were to be distributed in as many places. In the event of the electricity failing the clocks were to be the next dependence; it was, therefore, necessary to so distribute them that in case the vessel was boarded from the shore they could not be conveniently reached; and also to lead the flame rapidly to many points. This it was proposed to accomplish by the aid of the Gomez fuse train, which is incomparably quicker in its action than the flame of gunpowder, approximating electricity. From each clock and each slow-match this train was to be laid through the exterior layers of bags in the deck-house and into each hatch; and, in order to secure this simultaneous ignition in many places, the fuse train from each of the clocks was to be grafted into the other fuse train from each of the other clocks at all points of crossing. By the report of Admiral Porter it