Under the control of Sir William Symonds the improvement in the form and qualities of our ships, begun under the surveyorship of Sir Robert Seppings, continued to progress. Ship dimensions increased, and now bore a more correct relation to the dead-weight of armament, stores, and crew, which they had to carry. All classes from cutters to first-rates carried a more generous beam, and gained by the novel feature. Sounder rules were devised, partly as the result of a succession of sailing trials, for the pitching of masts and the methods of stowing. In short, naval architecture entered upon a new and promising era. Foreign observers recorded the progress made. Instead of being servile imitations of the products of French and Spanish models the vessels which flew the English flag became objects of admiration to all the world. [Illustration: A TUDOR SHIP OF PERIOD 1540-50 From a Cottonian MS. in the British Museum] CHAPTER II THE SMOOTH-BORE GUN On the question of the date at which the discovery of gunpowder took place writers have held the most divergent views. The opinion of the majority has been that its properties were known in the remote ages of antiquity, and this opinion has been formed and confirmed by the accounts given of its origin by most of the medieval writers. The Chinese claim to have known it long before the Christian era. And from hints in classical literature, and on the broad ground of probability, it has been inferred by some authorities that the explosive properties of gunpowder were known to the ancients. The wonderful property of saltpetre, they argue, must certainly have been known to the wise men of old: its extraordinary combustive power when mixed with other substances. Melted alone over a hot fire saltpetre does not burn; but if a pinch of some other substance is added, a violent flame results. In many fortuitous circumstances, they say, saltpetre must have been found in contact with that other essential ingredient of gunpowder, charcoal. And such a circumstance has been pictured by one writer as occurring when camp fires, lit upon soil impregnated with nitre (like that in parts of India), were rekindled; the charred wood converted into charcoal forming with the nitre a slightly explosive mixture. Other investigators maintain that gunpowder, which claims a spurious antiquity, is really an invention of the Middle Ages. Incendiary compositions--Greek fire, and other substances based on the properties of quicklime, naphtha, phosphorus, etc.--were undoubtedly known to the ancient world. But explosive compositions, based on saltpetre as the principal ingredient, were certainly not known in all their fearful power. The silence of history on the subject of the projection of missiles by explosive material, says a recent authority,[38] is eloquent; the absence of its terminology from such languages as Chinese and Arabic, conclusive.