MILITARY PROJECTILES. 537 



The description of the scene thus brought to view is too 

 dreadful to be here described. 



3. The third species of ordnance which we shall de- 

 scribe are Howitzers. They are intermediate in their 

 construction between the cannon and the mortar, and 

 are designed to combine, as far as they can be combin- 

 ed, the purposes of both. Like the mortar they are 

 used for discharging the various kinds of shells, and 

 they comprise a much greater extent of aim as they can 

 be pointed at any angle of elevation. They are much 

 more portable also. They can, in addition to this, be 

 used like cannon for the discharge of solid balls. In 

 fact, a shell is often discharged at a low elevation, so as 

 to act at first by its impulse like a solid ball, and after- 

 wards by its explosion. 



4. The fourth species of ordnance is the Carronade, 

 designed for throwing cored balls as they are called, 

 that is, hollow and empty. It is found that when a 

 ball passes through a ship's side with great velocity, it 

 makes a smooth and well denned hole. If on the other 

 hand it passes with a slow motion, it tears and splinters 

 the planks and beams in such a manner as to produce a 

 much greater injury. To reduce the force then by 

 which the ball would strike, by diminishing the weight, 

 while the size remains the same, is the object gained by 

 the carronade. It is much used in naval warfare. 



We cannot here enter at all into a description of the 

 endless variety in construction and use which portable 

 fire-arms assume. For they do not differ at all in prin- 

 ciple, whatever is the object for which they are design- 

 ed, whether to become weapons of the infantry in the 

 field of battle, or the means of health and recreation to 

 the sportsman, or a protection to the traveller from the 

 highwayman's attack, or the instrument by which the 

 duellist may gratify his unhappy revenge. 



The rifle, however, deserves a notice, both on account 

 of the beauty of its theory, and the excellence of its 

 practical operation. One of the greatest causes of error 

 in aiming a common musket or fowling piece, is, that the 

 ball generally receives, on leaving the piece, by unequal 

 friction against the sides of the barrel, a rotatory mo- 



VOL. i. NO. xxn. 48* 



