THE GUN, AND HOW TO T T SE IT. 113 



good shot can, and does not unfrequently, bring down bis 

 object at 1000, and even at 1500 yards. Artillery have 

 been silenced with it before they could come into grape- 

 range ; and such is its appalling force and penetration, 

 that at the bloody battle of Inkerman, the Minie bullets, 

 falling into the serried columns of the Russian foot, were 

 found, in many instances, after the fight was ended, to have 

 pierced three and four men in succession, inflicting ghastly 

 and fatal wounds on all. 



To this otherwise formidable weapon, a breech-loading 

 principle has been adapted in Europe; but it is as yet 

 slow, incomplete, and in one, which seems hitherto to be 

 admitted as the best weapon of the kind, the Enfield rifle, 

 liable to clog after firing, so as to render it difficult or 

 impossible to load. 



We now come to the various American patent arms, 

 recently invented ; and one of these I consider as, beyond 

 all doubt, the best rifle ever invented, and destined to 

 supersede all others, both for the chase and for actual 

 warfare. I mean Peny's breech-loading rifle. 



I have already had occasion to speak of the revolving 

 and breech-loading principle, as applied to fowling-pieces, 

 and have given my conviction that no advantage is to be 

 gained by the adoption of either. On coming to consider 

 the same principle, as applied to the rifle, we must dis- 

 tinguish between that weapon as required for military and 

 for sporting purposes ; the qualifications of the two being 

 widely different. 



For the former purpose, it is often necessary to fire a 

 maximum number of shots, at a vast range, in a continu- 



