Salutations!

[desperance]

Because I've been reading so much Patrick O'Brian, where ships are constantly firing off salutes to the flag or the governor or an allied fortress - and get quite huffy if their salutes are not returned promptly and appropriately, why aren't you firing back, you bastards? - I did some idle research. As you do.

So, a question for you: without googling or wiki'ing or any other variety of looking it up, what is the maximum number of guns fired in a royal salute, and why is it that number of guns? Make it up, by all means, but I want reasons...

Comments

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

On that occasion, because of the death, they then had to fire a whole new salute in honour of the deceased. Sadly, since they hadn't expected it to occur right then (if it had occurred after the initial salute had finished, they would have been permitted to fold it into the following day's salute), they didn't actually have enough charges to hand.

The result being, the salute was incomplete, and the following day, they had to do a triple salute: the first salute, the added one for the deceased, and then the one they'd have done anyway that day.

(It was at about this time that Britain decided it was time to stop colonisng new territories.)

[silly-swordsman.livejournal.com]

they didn't actually have enough charges to hand.

I have to admire the resourcefulness of the artillery commander, even though his quickly thought-out solution was declared unsatisfactory. Still, not only did the deceased get a proper salute, one day delayed, but also a squad of Royal Marines shouting "BAM!" in unison.