VOLUNTEER AND SERVICE NOTES.

Press, Volume LVI, Issue 10268, 10 February 1899, Page 2

VOLUNTEER AND SERVICE NOTES.

•» "Weekly Pres_ and Referee." (By Bcllseye.) I learn that the proposed Peninsula Mounted Rifle Corps has not been accepted by the Government*. I think this is a great mistake, as if there is any necessity for a mounted rifle corps anywhere, it is on Banks' Peninsula. This is admittedly the weak point in our chain of defence. There are so many harbours and landing places on the Peninsula, that if an enemy ever attempted to land it would undoubtedly be in one or other of these harbours. Now it is a fact admitted by all military authorities, that a few men who know the ground, and are posted at points of vantage, can harass a landing party, and indeed make it so unpleasant for it that the project might even be ziven up. The Peninsula men are, as - "x>dv. splendid horsemen and enthusiastic rifle shots, indeed I know that several who had given their names as members of tl>» imposed corps are quite "top notchers" with ♦he rifle. If this corps had been formed and they had been granted the use of the Maxim gun. there is no doubt that a mobile defence would have been made, which would be worth more than half-a-dc_en forts as outlying points for Christchurch. But the "nighty ones have decreed that this shall nob be. so that it is unnecessary to waste space m shewing the utility of the proposed corps. There was a concatenation of circumstances in connection with the Wairarapa Association Meeting, which should certainly not be allowed to escape the notice of volunteers. That popular officer and rifle shot. Lieu-tenant-Commandant Kirk, of the Petone Navals. who is also Mayer of Petone, celebrated his birthday on the first day of the meeting, and on the second day he won the "Petone" Match, with the fine score of 43 at 700 yds, and got second to his Club-Captain, W.*H. Ballinger, for the aggregate prizes. Not a bad record, and a good augury for the During the battalion march on Thursday I hexrd several uncomplimentary remarks or. the manner in which the men carried their rifles at the slope. In hardly one section were the rifles dressed, while each mac ■wined to have .his own idea as to how tho

' rifle should beheld. It would be well for soclion commanders to study this point, as it spoilt what was otherwise a first-class performance. There is little doubt that uniformity in such work as this will attract the, attention of the new adjutants. It is not the new companies that err so mucii in these little points, for they shew by their attention to details that their instruction has been up-to-date. Hitherto each German infantryman has been provided with 150 rounds of ammunition, but the regulation on this .point has been modified, and henceforward he will carry only 120. while captains of companies are enjoined to empty their company tirnmu-nition-chests whenever they receive the order to advance. The following are the ideas governing the supply of ammunition in the field : As far as possible, all ammunition will be taken from the bodies of the killed and wounded, and whenever a reinforcement is sent to the front it takes with it extra ammunition to supply the needs of the men already engaged in the firingline. Should a firing-line require a supply of ammunition ,and no reinforcements are being seat forward, the troops of the second line, who are not engaged, detail carriers to bring up the necessary number of cartridges. Thus twenty men are sufficient to distribute the contents of a company ammunition-chest along a firing-line, there being in every chest ten cases, each of which is borne by two men by means of straps. Whenever the contents'*of a chest are exhausted the battalion commander sends it to the munition sections in rear to be reple.nished.—Admiralty and Horse Guards' Gazette. M. Marc Lanury, in the columns of a French Service contemporary, lauds the foresight, of the Japanese Government in constructing two transports, destined to follow the fleet and take the wounded on board aiter an engagement, each vessel being able to provide 292 beds for patients. Whether the addition of these tw\> siiips to the Japanese navy is to be construed as ominous of a war deemed near at hand is debatable, but the step itself is one which other naval powers would do well to follow, the question of the care of the wounded after a naval engagement having been hitherto completely overlooked. Unavoidably, accommodation for them on board ships-of-war is i , far too restricted, and the general idea seems I to be that after a battle they might be sliifted on bonr-d marl steamers previously i requisitioned tor that purpose. M. Marc , i Landry points out, however, that any sysj tent which has not been carefully prepared in time of peace, is only too likely to break down under the -train of war, and that iv such a case the losses after a great naval battle will bo comparable to those Avhich certain military expeditions have suffered in the tropics through the neglect oi hygienic precautions.—Adniiraltv and Horse Guards Gazette: ' " Many warm discussions have been carried on from time to time in the columns of our Continental Service contemporaries as to whether the lance be really the "queen of weapons" it is declared to b._ by enthusiastic partisans or, as its opponents 'assert—for there seems to be no via media in this matter —the most a\v*kward and cumbersome weapon with which a cavalryman can be armed. The latest contribution to the controversy crops up incidentally in a French military journal, in the course of some articles in praiso of the sabre, in which the _.writer, significantly remarking that as German cavalrymen. are armed with the lance, it behoves the French trooper to know how to meet it with the sabre, says that the length of the lance, which gives it so formidablo an appearance, makes it all the easier to parry, and that a cavalryman who knbws how to handle his sabre, and can keep his head cool, will easily get the better of a lancer in any encounter. He asserts that, during the campaign in Russia, the Cossacks, knowing how oasily tho lance could be put aside, habitually used their weapons defensively to parry the "points" of the French troopers, and he quotes General Dragomiroff as having, in his study of lance v. sabre, arrived at tho following conclusions: First, that in the use of amies blanches success doe 3 not depend upon their lengta, but on fhe deter- ' mination of the fighting-man'to get within striking distance of his enemy with his weapon; secondly, that the success of an attack depends upon the impetuosity of the forward movement; thirdly, that the longer tho weapon the more- difficqlffe-its management, and consequently that length of weapon, which is disadvantageous when fighting on foot, is stall more, so when fighting on horsoback. Frederick the Great, continues the writer of tho articles in question, on receiving a report that it was necessary to change the sabres of the Prussian cavalry as being two inches shorter than those of the : enemy, simply answered: "Let-.our troopers get two inches closer." Probably the truth lies to this extent midway between the enthusiastic advccato3 of the.lance and their opponents that, while in _ns_illed hands it is at or.cc cumbersome and ineffective, in the ' hands of trained men, thoroughly familial' with its use, it is the mo?t formidable and effective arm of the cavalryman, and it undoubtedly is the one which produces the greatest moi'Sl effect. —Admiralty and Horse Guards' Gazotta. The increase in the number of infantry battalions in the German. army, foreseen as it has long been by well-informed persons, is, it would appear, about to take shape and form. Forty-three new battalions of infantry will probably be raised, involving, roughly, an increase in the existi ing standing army of 22,500 men, apart from the officers. This will mean, says the Times Berlin correspondent, a capital expenditure of some 20,000)000 marks on barracks, exercise grounds, rifle ranges, and other requisites,and an addition of 14,000,000 marks to the annual military budget. A further increase in the fort artillery and -field railway regiments, as also in the numbers of the battalions of the field ' telegraph and message companies, is also announced as impending.. These changes, says Herr Eugen Richter in his Freisinnige Zeitung, are not warranted by any equivalent change* in the neighbouring nations. Though the Hamburgischer Correspondent has made some rather feeble insinuation that 'no such changes are contemplated, it is j none the less more than probable that they will be—possibly have already been— planned by the military authorities. Some time during last September the War Minister, General yon Gossler, on being challenged as to a report "of contemplated

changes in the army, said: "I do not think \ that any changes in the infantry regiments J will be "made. But this, as Herr Richter \ grimly objects, took place before the new • elections, and while as yet the new Navy Bill had not been passed.—Admiralty and Horse Guards' Gazette. By the Admiralty's orders perfect models are made in paraffin wax of every new battle ship befclre it is laid down, and these models are tested in a tank at Haslar. The models are from! 12ft to 24ft long, and the tank is 400 ft lorjg and 20ft wide. The models are made of wax, because it is a material which does not absorb water or change its weight. So alterations can be easily made. Also, the materal can be melted up and used Again. The American naval authorities also have models of all their hulls constructed, but these are much more elaborate, being constructed of white pine, and fitted with rudders, false keels, propeller shafts, and all etceteras.