RIFLE-PRACTICE ON PLAINS. 205 



thing* is on such a large scale, and there is such a 

 glare of bright sunlight, that some time is required 

 to enable them to judge of distances." * In fact we 

 may add to that, that taking a few trial shots occa- 

 sionally at objects placed at unknown distances, is the 

 only way in which a new-comer can bring" himself 

 into accord with the novel conditions to which he has 

 become subject. These apparent differences in the 

 perspective, which might perhaps pass unnoticed among 

 persons who as non-sportsmen might never have the 

 fact forced upon their observation, are everywhere felt 

 by riflemen unaccustomed to the plains regions, the 

 moment they try their hands at shooting on wide plains. 

 We beg respectfully to call the attention of the 

 British War Office, and of all soldiers, to this fact; 

 troops taken out from home will infallibly find their 

 shooting greatly affected by it at first, and until they 

 become acquainted with these new conditions and have 

 adapted themselves thereto, the difficulty is likely to 

 be permanent. In all wide, treeless plains, where there is 

 nothing to assist the eye in forming an estimate by 

 comparison with adjacent natural objects in the land- 

 scape, this difficulty will be sure to arise, whether the 

 country be of a flat character or not; the same thing 

 for instance occurs in mountain regions, when the 

 shooter tries his hand there for the first time. We 

 mention this with such insistence because of the 

 exceedingly bad shooting made by our troops in the 

 late war in the Transvaal, f upon ground which we 

 have since carefully studied; and we can have no 

 doubt that there was a good deal of the optical illusion 



* An Expedition to the Zambesi, by David Livingstone, 1865^.309. 

 f The Boer war took place in 1881. 



