§ LORD CHARLES BERESFORD (Marylebone, E.)asked the Secretary of State for War, Whether, having regard to the rapid progress of invention in high explosives, and the reported adoption of Mâlinite as the explosive charge of all shells in the French Navy, he will at once form a Committee of Experts in Explosives, with a view of testing the safety, and trying the relative disruptive properties, of the high explosives known to exist at present, as compared with gunpowder, more particularly with regard to their effect on a target representing the unarmoured ends of a ship of the Admiral class?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE (MR. E. STANHOPE) (Lincolnshire, Horncastle)We are proposing to the Treasury the formation of a Standing Committee of Experts to test and advise upon explosives. This will, I think, completely meet the wish of my noble and gallant Friend, and it is a proposal to which we attach great importance.