90 
might he employed in reducing fortresses. Their efficiency 
in our hands has been very recently shown against King 
Theodore’s troops at Magdala. It does appear strange that 
a weapon which combines so many desirable qualifications 
should be so long neglected, whilst guns, which are so much 
more cumbrous and expensive, should receive so much 
attention. 
The want of precision in the flight of the rocket has 
doubtless been one reason which has prevented it from 
being employed more extensively. This deficiency has been 
in some degree removed by the improvements introduced 
by Mr. Hale, who suggested that a number of oblique per- 
forations. should be made near the neck of the rocket, 
through which the ignited composition could escape, and 
thus impart a rotatory motion to the tube of the rocket. 
Mr. Nasmyth’s ingenious contrivance for effecting the 
rotation of the rocket from the commencement of its flight 
would doubtless be a very great improvement, but there are 
certain considerations connected with the efficient employ- 
ment of rockets which render it very undesirable that that 
branch of the service should be encumbered with any appa- 
ratus, especially mechanism, which could be easily rendered 
useless by accident or design; and to protect the wheel- 
work from rifle bullets by iron casings would render the 
apparatus too weighty for active warfare. At present 
rockets are a light and simple artillery which can be rapidly 
manoeuvred, they are not liable to derangement of parts, 
and they afford a small target for the enemy’s riflemen. 
The question which occurred to me whilst reading Mr. 
Nasmyth’s communication was this — Is there any mode of 
imparting precision of flight to a rocket without adding any 
machinery liable to derangement or materially increasing 
the weight of the present apparatus ? 
The first scheme which suggested itself was to replace the 
present Y-rest with a long rifled tube, and to enable this 
