THE ROYAL ARTILLERY INSTITUTION. 
348 
MOUNTAIN ARTILLERY MATERIEL. 
The gun , Us nomenclature ancl object , 
1. The materiel of the Austrian mountain artillery, pattern 1863, 
consists of 3-pr. rifled mountain guns, ammunition, lading gear, gun 
implements, mule equipment,* and other articles. 
The denomination of the mountain rifled gun is derived, as with field 
guns, from the weight of the cast-iron round shot nearest approaching in 
diameter to the 3-pr. rifled projectile. 
The 3-pr. rifled gun is exclusively intended for mountain warfare. In 
the construction of the piece, and in the organization of the whole materiel , 
two points have been held in view; that, while the effect of the projectiles 
shall be adequate to the exigencies of mountain warfare, the mules laden 
with guns and ammunition, shall be able to traverse mountains with 
facility. 
The rifled mountain gun fires at low angles as a gun, and at high angles 
as a howitzer. 
I. The gun. 
The piece. 
2. The outward form of the bronze gun (Eig. 1) consists of two 
truncated cones connected by a curved surface; the lesser truncated cone 
extends from the muzzle to a distance of 7 /,- 2 in rear of the trunnions, the 
greater, from thence to the end of the breech. 
The gun has the usual muzzle swell, copper vent bouche, cascable, and 
trunnions with shoulders. The axis of the trunnions is 0"-993 below the 
axis of the piece. The diameter of the vent is 0"*26, the bouche being 
set in at an angle of 7°. 
The bore (Eig. 1) consists of the smooth-bored cylindrical powder 
chamber a } with an hemispherical end; and of the bore proper b } rifled 
with six grooves, each of which has the form of an eccentric arc. The 
form and disposition of the grooves is shewn in Eig. 2, which represents 
a section of the bore at the muzzle, as seen from the front of the piece. 
The dotted line is the generating circle of the cylinder, the full lines represent 
the grooves. The bottom cd , of each groove is a circular arc whose 
centre does not coincide with the centre of the generating circle of the 
cylinder forming the bore. The diameter of that cylinder is 2"-916, the 
maximum depth of groove is 0"*13, the width 1"*452, and the windage 
0"'065. 
* The word in the original here translated “mule,” is equivalent to “beast of burden,” this 
rendering obtains throughout the following pages. 
