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MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS OF 
as to be practically invulnerable to horizontal fire at moderately long 
ranges. 
6. F. That with our present knowledge of naval architecture, it is 
impossible so to arm a ship that it shall be equally impervious to artil¬ 
lery fire in every part; the weight of iron armour being too great for 
flotation. 
7. G. That if an armour-plate be struck in reverse (as in the case 
of a shot passing through the deck, or open port, on one side of a 
vessel, and striking the far side), a comparatively weak projectile will 
break away the armour-plates, and in so breaking them do far more 
damage than a similar shot either racking or penetrating them directly. 
8. II. That one shot opening a large jagged hole in a plated ship's 
bottom, where she is unprotected, would probably disable her, or at any 
rate do more damage than several punched holes above the water-line. 
9. 1. That a shot which would just penetrate an iron plate if it struck 
it at right angles, would fail to do so should it strike at an acute angle. 
10. J. That iron-clads cannot fire their guns at a very considerable 
angle of elevation; and that even if in future they are so constructed 
that their guns shall be capable of great elevation, their elevated firing 
will probably be far less accurate than their horizontal fire. 
11. K. That no instrument is in use, or from the nature of the cir¬ 
cumstances can ever be in use, which will as accurately and instantly 
follow the motions of a ship, and read off the corresponding eleva¬ 
tion, &c. for the gun, from a low battery, as will an instrument placed 
in a very high battery, reading off the range with the assistance of the 
varying angle of depression. The greater the height the greater the 
angle of depression, and consequently the greater the correctness of 
the estimate of distance. 
(The instrument known as the “ Malta instrument " can be so sighted 
and marked that an officer in a battery can follow the motions of a ship, 
and constantly read off, without the slightest calculation, the angle of 
elevation required for the guns in the battery, without referring to the 
distance in yards or anything; but there is not one of these instruments 
in Gibraltar so sighted, and very few “ Malta instruments 99 of any sort). 
I proceed to compare the advantages of guns situated in 
Comparison very high and very low sites, together with their disadvan- 
of P^UTl S1 n VGfV ^ ( i/ ' o 
High and very tages relatively, each to each, and for the purposes of corn- 
low batteries, parison, suppose two 9-inch guns a and w ; the gun a placed 
in position on the terreplein of the Signal Battery—a height 
of about 1220 ft., and about the centre of the Rock—-the gun <o some¬ 
where in the neighbourhood of the Saluting Battery, immediately below 
the gun a, but as close to the water-line as possible. On this comparison 
being instituted, I shall compare both guns, a and «, with the merits 
and demerits of a similar gun 0, situated in some intermediate position 
—say below Ferdinand's Battery (620 ft.) on the Queen's Road, and above 
the level of the Alameda. Tha,t the positions of guns a and w are as 
nearly extreme as can be, will be granted, while that of gun 0 is a 
mean, taken if anything rather low; because, as I have stated, I have 
not determined any minimum altitude for the high line of guns, and I 
might err in placing it as low down even as the Queen's Road. My 
