G u n p o w d e r .
performance not to be furpaffed for elegant concifenefs, and’
comprehenfive brevity. Thefe rockets a£t with great force, for
I have heard of one that paffed through the body of a bullock,
and afterwards killed a man. If 1 remember right, they are
alfo ufed in lieges. Fire arrows are ufed either to burn
Ihipping, or to fet on fire befieged towns. Thefe. were frequently
ufed in Europe from early times. Thole in India were
difcharged from a bamboo ; after they had' flown a certain way,
they divided into feveral different darts or ftreams o f fire, each
o f which took effeit, and could not be extinguilhed; this-
fpecies is now loff, but was known in the- wars between the
Saracens and the Grecian empire. Le feu gregeois, or the
Greek fire, was the deftru&ion of the Saracennic . fleet before
Conjlantinople, in 718. It was milfile, and difcharged feveral
ways, fome of which was by darts or javelins. We will admit
the early application of gunpowder for warlike purpofes, and
will alfo admit that the difcovery of that fatal fecret was dif-
covered in India and in China ; but excepting in the inftances-
we have induced, it is never ufed but for fire-works on feftive
occafions, in which the Indians excel all the world.
W e will alfo allow, that it was found out very long before
the days of Roger Bacon. That great man made the difcovery
in England before the year 1292 (the time o f his death). He
even hints at the application that might be made o f it in battles
and in lieges ; but above a century elapfed before it came into
military ufe. Polfibly the knowlege of gunpowder might have
reached him through the writings of the Arabs ; he was deeply
verfed in their books. The Arabs received it from their countrymen.
try men who had early invaded, and were minutely acquainted
with the manners and practices of India.
T h e Sanjkrit, or fcripture book of the Hindoos, mentions an
engine called Shetaghnee, or. the- weapon, that would kill, a S h e t a g h n e e .
hundred men at once. I do not believe it to have been a cannon,
but one of thofe divifible arrows conftructed on a. vaft fcale.
I fhall conclude with remarking, that both the author, o f the
Hindoo. Sanjkr.it, and our great Milton, agree in. afcribing the invention
of gunpowder, and its application to warlike, purpofes,-
to fpir.its. The former fays,, that the war which was waged,
during a hundred years, between Dewta and OJfoor, the good
and the bad, was/carried on by means of. the infernaLengines ;
but the war between our eeleftial beings was at once decided; fo
unequal was the artillery of: Satan, againft the thunderbolts of.
the A lm ig h ty .
A t Goalparah, in Lat. 26" 10', the Burr'ampooter enters the G o-a l p a r a h .:.
province of Bengal. There the Europeans have Tailors, who,
by means of that great river, carry on a confiderable trad©:
with, places very remote. Irregular chains of. mountains run
from hence, due fo,uth,,and finilh near thefea.in different, parts-
of the diftriit of Chittigong, and are backed by the immenfe
foreft of Meckley to the .eaft; all to . the weft is the.level Bengal.
Before this river reaches the fea, it. makes three, great curva- u n t o n - o f t h e
tures, pafles near Dacca, a.nd is after united with the Ganges a n d .G a n g e s . .
by different branches. It-now. very, near approximates that
river, in a magnificent bed of four or five miles in breadth.
It now takes the name of the Megna, and a little before, it
reaches the bay of Bengal, falls into the Ganges, and lofes its ■
very;