"Sworn, 10th November, 1827, before me, Rd. Edmonds."
"This gun is worked by machinery balanced on pivots giving it universal motion, by one man, with the facility of a soldier's musket. On one side a man puts in a copper charge of powder; on the opposite side a man drops a ball in a bag down the gun, as it stands muzzle up. The gunner, who sits on the seat behind the gun, points it and pulls the trigger. The firing causes it to run up an inclined plane at an angle of 25° for the purpose of breaking the recoil; it runs down again with its muzzle at the port, requiring no wadding, swabbing, cartridge, or ramming, but runs in, out, primes, cocks, shuts the pan, and breaks the recoil of itself; and by three men can be fired three times in a minute with accuracy. The gun-carriage is a tube 3 feet long and 3 feet diameter, made of wrought-iron plate 1/4 of an inch thick, centered on a pivot to the deck, with the gunner's seat attached, from which he looks through the case. As the gun requires no tackle, and but a man on each side to work it, only a space of 5 feet 6 inches is required from centre to centre of ports, therefore a single-deck ship will carry a greater number of guns than are now carried on a double-deck ship, be worked with one-third of the hands, and be fired five times as fast as at present. A frigate would mount fifty 42-pound guns on one deck, with 150 men, and would discharge in the same time a greater weight of ball with greater precision than five 74-gun ships."[135]
"Hayle, Cornwall, 21st February, 1828.
"My Lord Cochrane,[136]
"With great pleasure I read in the papers the announcement of your arrival again in England, and am much gratified to find a person of your superior natural and practical talents, so rare to be obtained, to whom I may communicate my views.
"I have proposed to Government to build an iron ship, and a gun on a new principle, which are to undergo an investigation, and have lodged a drawing of the ship and a model of the gun with my friend Mr. Gerard, a gentleman who returned with me from America, and who will present to you this letter with the above-mentioned drawing and model.
"I have had an iron boat made for the purpose of sending it to London, to show the method of constructing ships on this plan, roomy, strong, and cheap. Also a wrought-iron ship with a steam-engine on an improved principle, which in a few days will be laid on the stocks at the Hayle Foundry iron manufactory."
Though Lord Cochrane was just the person to be interested in such schemes, it does not appear that he took any part in them. At that time he was at work on his own particular ideas for marine propulsion.
"London, February, 1828.