The School of Recreation (1696 edition) eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 159 pages of information about The School of Recreation (1696 edition).

The School of Recreation (1696 edition) eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 159 pages of information about The School of Recreation (1696 edition).

Observe in charging your Rocket, at every quarter of an ounce of Ingredients or thereabouts, you ram it down very hard, forcing your Rammer with a wooden Mallet, or some weighty piece of Wood, but no Iron or Stone, for fear any Sparkles of Fire fly out and take your Combustible Matter; so fill it by degrees:  If you design neither to place Stars, Quills, or small Rockets on its Head, you may put in about an Inch and a half of dry Powder for the Bounce, but if you are to place the fore-mention’d things on the Head of a great Rocket, you must close down the Paper or Paste-board very hard, and prick two or three holes with a Bodkin, that it may give fire to them when it Expires, placing a large Cartoush or Paste-board on the head of the Rocket, into which you must put the Stars or small Rockets, Paper-Serpents, or Quill-Serpents; of which I shall speak more hereafter.

Note further, That if you would have your Rocket sparkle much, you must put some grosly bruised Salt peter into the Composition; but then it must not lie long before it be let off, for fear it give and damp the Powder.  If you would have it leave a blue Stream, as it ascends, put fine beaten and sifted Sulphur into it, but of neither of these more than a third part of Charcole; and in this manner greater and lesser Rockets are made, but the lesser must have more Powder and less Charcole than the greater, by a fifth part in six.

Golden Rain, and Golden Hair.

For Golden Rain, or streams of fire, that will, when at height, descend in the Air like Rain:  Take large Goose-Quills, take only the hollow Quill as long as may be, fill it with beaten Powder and Charcole; as for the Air Rocket only add a little Powder of Sulphur.  Being hard filled to a quarter of an Inch, stop that with wet Powder, called Wild-fire; place as many as you think convenient on the Head of a great Rocket, pasted on in a Rowl of Paper, so that it may not fall off till the Rocket bursts, there being a little dry Powder in it to force the end when the stream of fire ceases, at which time they taking, will appear like a shower of Fire of a golden Colour, spreading themselves in the Air, and then tending directly downwards.  This is to be considered when you stand directly, or something near under them; but if you are at some distance, then they will appear to you like the Blazing Tail of a Comet or Golden Hair.

Silver Stars, How to make them.

To make Stars that will expand in Flame, and appear like natural Stars in the Firmament for a time:  Take half a Pound of Salt-peter, the like quantity of Brimstone, finely beaten together, sifted and mingled with a quarter of a Pound of Gunpowder so ordered:  Then wrap up the Composition in Linnen Rags or fine Paper, to the quantity of a Walnut, bind them with small Thread, and prick holes in the Rag or Paper with a Bodkin, and place six or ten of them on the Head of a great Rocket, as you did the Quills, and when the Rocket expires, they take fire and spread into a Flame, hovering in the Air like Stars, and descend leisurely till the matter is spent that gives them light.

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The School of Recreation (1696 edition) from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.