80 SOUTH AFRICA. 



rifling, which naturally retains and packs the 

 fouling to an inordinate degree, difficult to over- 

 come satisfactorily. 



Upon the whole, this rifle is the very last 

 weapon I should care to be armed with when in 

 conflict with an African buffalo, or even an angry 

 lion. A campaign can alone test its value as a. 

 military weapon. It would seem that extreme 

 range and the flattest possible trajectory are only 

 obtainable at the cost of destructive friction. 

 Extreme range is a matter of no importance to 

 the sportsman who, if well advised, will never find 

 it pay to make a habit of firing at game distant 

 more than two hundred and fifty yards, and as an 

 actual fact will only occasionally kill much over 

 one hundred and fifty yards, no matter what sort 

 of rifle he uses. As regards penetration, any good 

 rifle of "5/7, '5OO, or -450 is quite up to require- 

 ments, and the same remark applies to smooth- 

 bore guns of from 10- to i6-gauge loaded with 

 hard, close-fitting spherical bullets, assuming the 

 gun to be sufficiently solid to use with an effective 

 charge of powder. 



Some years ago, when specially bent on a 

 buffalo hunt, my battery consisted of one M.L. 



