TOLD BY THE HORSE ARTILLERY.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXI, Issue 29, 3 February 1900, Page 2 (Supplement)

TOLD BY THE HORSE ARTILLERY.

At Woolwich (Writes Mr. B. Fletcher ( Robinson in "Cassell's Magazine" for' December) I recently had a talk with' a driver of the leaders of a gun in ~| battery. He was not a big man, njyfriend the driver, but very smart arid dapper. His knowledge of Indian life seemed to be large and peculiar," and his remarks on men and manners showed observation.

"What I says is this, sir," he said, ! staring at me very hard, as if he i thought I had a mind to contradict I him. "There's nothing in the armies I of the Continong that can touch the f 'orse gunners. Maybe you've seen us | at reviews pass the saluting point at : I a gallop. "i'is a fine sight, tho'l saya | it. Well, the German Emperor, -fie' | saw us go by last time he was over, i ■-. an' now 1 'ear as how he's introduced * | the gallop for the 'orse artillery in'- I his own blooming march-pasts* where if the duffers had never gone faster noi> §

a. trot before." • v .. .A "I suppose it's a difficult job to drive the lead in a gun team," I said. "It's not the driving, sir; it's the choosing of youf way when: you're ; travelling over rough ground! just as fast as you can split," that's the'ticklish business. The driver of. the middle pair has nought to do but,sit; still, but the wheelers again, whioh - are the strongest animals, in ' th.Q team, want a lot of handling on ;a v, steepish slope with the gun pressing behind. Yet, bless you, the pace jnS the old country ain't nothing likq. what we do in India. Those lashing, great 'walers,' as we call the Australian horses imported there, do shifty the guns a treat. I remember .once'v! how an prficer, fresh from home.he ■. was and an A.D.C. to some swell, or? other, was as nigh -wiped out by our ~ battery as makes no matter. It hap* ■ liened this way. There was a big review, and we had just started to, gallop past the .saluting point wiien,; lo and be'old, out trots the youngster, on a pony and tries to cross our! front, reckoning from what he'd.seen; at 'oine that he'd plenty of time. ; ai}d.|; to spare. Almost before he : kiiejy, „ what was happening the six guns" came tearing and jumping down upon; him, travelling like a blooming express; and though he stuck in h)s; spurs and scooted for all he ,wwv wgrth, he didn't clear us by more than two strides. I tell you those'; looking on thought he was gone iqt: certain. I'd bet he wouldn't try-that" game on again with the Royal Horse. Artillery." "Any accidents?"- . - ~ , : . "Accidents? In course we have a few, and it's a bad job when one does happen. If one of the leading .pair falls when the battery's at the gallop, it's safe to be a nasty business. Blow ■ me if I haven't seen the six 'orses--piled up like a blooming pyramid; with the gun on the top and a couple of drivers with, cracked skulls at theY bottom. Ugh! I can see it-all before me now—l knew the men well."!

"I suppose there will be.nq more Light Brigade affairs—no more ohar{jv ing Of guns in front by cavalry/'T queried. . ' '

For answer the driver beckoned toa. very tall and melancholy gunne'if who was passing, and; with -a wink' at me, a thumb jerk, and a sotto voqe "eddicated man this 'ere," he ;intro- • duced us. . : J:;f|

"The battle of the future, sir," said'; the melancholy one -in a' painfully^ correct and formal manner, "will without doubt commence with an artillery duel. Columns of attack such t as .were used by the French at Waterloo woufyl, if Avithin decent range of a battery, be blown to pieces before they had advanced two hundred yards,As for cavalry, they would .be totally, destroyed. It would.be an impress f sive, instructive, and sanguinary specL' tacle." .

The gunner gazed over my.head i:with half-shut eyes, ;as if- revelling fc in the scene he had created.,: ;': ' : "We should use shrapnel first," he presently resumed. . "Shrapnel is another word for .a shell filled witbbullets which by means of a fuse ft exploded some hundred yai*ds in front of the object fired at. As a shell it then disappears;; as a cloud of bullets, it continues. The effect on a body of men in close order would be mag* nificent. Each gun of the batterywould fire some six shots a minute. • If any escaped the shrapnel, and goi-T----to within three hundred yards, we\\ shouh' use case. A ease shot, I may . add, is a tin. filled with bullets thatbursts open at the muzzle of the gup, allowing the bullets to spread some> what in the fashion of a charge of orflinary small shot. At a short dis» tance the effects would be more im«.V ; pressive even than those of the shrapnel. I should like' to mention.' that not long ago -four guns, of my battery fired for five minutes at 2ff targets at a range of 2,500 yards." The. targets Avere left in the condition oi sieves; nothing- could have lived undei that terrible hail."