I 
THE RIFLE OF A PAST HALF CENTURY 
5 
increased to 6 drams, thereby losing accuracy, but 
multiplying velocity. 
Twelve months’ experience with elephants and 
buffaloes decided me to order a battery of double- 
barrelled rifles. No. lo, two-grooved, with 6 drams 
of fine grain powder, and spherical-belted bullets. 
These were most satisfactory, and they became the 
starting-point for future experiments. 
Shortly before the Crimean War, the musket was 
abolished, and about 1853 the British army was 
armed throughout with rifles. The difficulty of a 
military rifle lay in the rapid fouling of the barrel, 
which necessitated a bullet too small to expand suffi¬ 
ciently to fill the grooves ; this resulted in inaccuracy. 
If the bullet were properly fitted, it became impos¬ 
sible to load when the barrel began to foul after a 
few discharges. 
At that time I submitted a plan to the authorities 
which simplified the difficulty, and having left the 
pattern bullet at Woolwich, it quickly appeared with 
a slight modification as the “ Boxer bullet.” My 
plan designed a cone hollowed at the base. The 
bullet was a size smaller than the bore, which en¬ 
abled it to slide easily down the barrel when foul. 
The hollow base fitted upon a cone of boxwood 
pointed at the insertion, but broad at the base, which 
was larger than the diameter of the hollow in the 
bullet. It may be easily understood that although 
this compound bullet was smaller than the bore of 
the rifle, a blow with the ramrod after loading would 
drive the conical bullet upon the larger diameter 
