=14.= Two mines fired at Krems in 1873 with L. L. R. of 12 ft. in earth weighing 100 lbs. per cubic foot and charged, one with 173 lbs. gunpowder, the other with 58 lbs. dynamite (kind not stated), gave crater radii, respectively, of 12.75 and 10.25 feet. Lebrun’s formulas applied to these give to gunpowder and dynamite the ratio 1 : 1.688. Two powder-mines and one dynamite-mine, each of 12 ft. L. L. R., were fired at Willet’s Point in 1878. The powder-mines were each charged with 200 lbs. cannon-powder and the dynamite mine with 82 lbs. dynamite No. 1. No. 1 powder-mine gave a crater radius of 15½ ft. No. 2 powder-mine gave a crater radius of 15¼ ft., or a mean of 15⅜ ft. The dynamite-mine gave a crater radius of 14½ ft. The relative values of cannon powder and dynamite resulting from the application of the same formulas to these mines is 1 : 1.997.[11] =15. Choice of Explosive.=--From these experimental mines it may be concluded that for forming craters in ordinary earth dynamite is not quite so efficient as double its weight of good gunpowder. For breaking up hard rock, blowing up strong masonry, and especially in demolitions where tamping is usually defective, this ratio does not hold; but the relative effect of the high explosive increases continually with the lack of tamping and the intensity of the local blow desired, until a point is reached at which the effect of gunpowder is almost imperceptible, while the high explosive does efficient work. This property of the high explosives renders them extremely valuable for use in hasty demolitions, such as blowing up palisades or barriers, destroying guns, etc., etc. Owing to their varying values in different conditions the choice of explosive to be used in any particular case must evidently depend upon the circumstances attending it. In underground explosions both gunpowder and high explosives give out noxious gases which penetrate the soil, and which entering a gallery in sufficient quantity would suffocate the miners. Of these gases the carbonic oxide given off by some of the high explosives is probably the most dangerous to human life, and if mixed with the proper proportion of air forms an explosive mixture, resembling in this respect the fire-damp of the coal-mines. Whether in practical mining operations it would ever be retained in the soil in such quantities as to produce this effect remains to be seen. Some of the high explosives, on the other hand, seem to produce relatively small quantities of noxious gases. The gases produced by gunpowder, while suffocating in their nature, have the advantage of always making their presence known by their odor.