436 
R.A.I. PRIZE ESSAY, 1876 . 
guns; (3) must never fire on artillery if there is anything else within 
effective range: and it is convenient to deal with them at this place, as 
being distinct propositions not particularly dependent on one or the 
other school. 
As to No. 1, when we come to consider how intensified has become 
the definition, both in time and space, of the absolutely critical portion 
of the ordinary attack or defence, since the enormous development of 
the powers of the breech-loading rifle, it will appear somewhat too 
easy-going to content ourselves with simply a “ good effect,” but we 
shall claim, for the arduous circumstances of the other arms, the very 
utmost that can be wrought by the artillery at the critical spot and the 
critical moment; nor will the telling up of a long tale of loss inflicted, 
on the enemy in general, afford compensation for the defeat of a par¬ 
ticular operation on which the success of the whole may be dependent. 
As to No. 2, it will occur to most minds that there may be occasions 
when, if it be infeasible to reinforce the much-worsted batteries, it will 
be wiser to withdraw what remains of them and keep it for further 
uses, than to leave it to be “ finished ” by the superior force of the 
enemy, for the sake of roundness of tactical principle. 
No. 3 has been generally disposed of already by the later artilleristic 
writers, who demonstrate that, as at each particular phase of an engage¬ 
ment the action of one particular arm of the enemy acquires the more 
critical influence, it is on that arm—whichever it may happen to be at the 
moment—that the artillery must direct its fire, if it would give timely 
assistance to its allied arms. Prince Kraft has, indeed, supported the 
original injunction by laying down the position that “the decision , 
either in attack or defence, always lies in the overthrow of the other 
arms; this once achieved, the enemy^s artillery is thereby rendered 
innocuous.” But this appears, on investigation, to be rather a theo¬ 
retical definition of ultimate purpose than a practical exposition of the 
methods necessary towards its achievement. No doubt, any one of the 
three arms, if deprived of the support of the other two, has very little 
prospect of successfully opposing a force more complete in its com¬ 
ponent proportions; but the alliance of the three arms should be far 
too intimate, their mutual assistance far too ready and well-timed, to 
allow of the enemy attempting to dispose of one arm after another—to 
deal with independent parts instead of a combined whole; and he who, 
seeking only to inflict loss on his opponents infantry, should allow the 
opposite side to establish a preponderating superiority in artillery, 
would find himself very awkwardly situated for the next moves of the 
game. 
These maxims should therefore be regarded rather as a manner of 
cutting the Grordian knot, suitable to the occasion of such as were 
confident in their own superiority of force, and merely required from 
this arm a particular definite action; but they are not solutions, useful 
to those who come afterwards, of the problem, “how to apply the 
available artillery so that it shall most conduce to the success of the 
whole.” 
And as to the treatment of the wider questions, introduced above 
from out of contemporary literature, of the character of modern artil- 
