. Whenever these plugs are removed
for the purpose of fitting the shells for service, they are not to be
thrown away, but preserved for future use. If by any accident the
shell should be damp in the interior, they are to be heated and dried,
on the grillage prepared for that purpose.

107. The number of shell to be kept fitted at the Navy Yards will be
determined by special directions from the Bureau.

In fitting shell to receive the bouching, great carelessness has been
observed. The hole should be tapped with a full thread, and the proper
shoulder left at the bottom to prevent the bouching from being driven
in by the shock of firing and causing premature explosion.

108. All shell shall be filled with musket-powder of the highest
initial velocity. The shell must be filled, and the powder well shaken
down, leaving only room for the insertion of the fuze. A wooden plug
the size of the lower part of the fuze will always determine this. The
very common, but slovenly, practice of filling the shell, and then
pouring out a quantity sufficient to allow the fuze to be inserted, is
expressly prohibited. Shell have also been returned with the powder in
the vicinity of the fuze compressed into a solid mass, owing to the
fact that sufficient room had not been left for its insertion. No
shell shall be fuzed unless it has been filled.

109. The date when shell are fuzed or filled, as well as that on which
any of these arrangements are changed, or the shell are examined
before issue to vessels, together with the initials of the officer
superintending these operations, should be legibly written and pasted
on the shell, or stencilled on the box.

110. The Ordnance Officer, or the Gunner of the Yard, is to see the
shell supplied to all vessels properly conveyed on board, superintend
the stowage, and furnish the Commanding Officer with a statement
showing the number of each description of shell and fuze, and a plan
of their stowage.

111. The condition of the shell, and especially of their fuzes, is to
be frequently and carefully examined into, taking out a fuze
occasionally so as to detect any injury which may arise from moisture,
and to have such as may be found damaged replaced by the spare fuzes.

Boat shell and their spare fuzes are also to undergo a similar
examination.

Shell have been sometimes returned with their fuzes entirely destroyed
by moisture!!

112. It has been found recently, on drawing the charge of a 12-pou