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MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS OF 
that although certain broad principles of tactics seem to come out, very little 
detailed illustration can be given from the last campaigns. 
The tactics of field artillery are governed chiefly by three considerations :— 
Mobility. 
Efficacy of fire. 
Shelter from the enemy's fire. 
Before attempting to estimate the position in which we now stand, and to 
deduce the principles on whicli the employment of the arm should now be 
founded, it will be convenient to take a very cursory view of the progress of 
artillery, or rather to notice certain landmarks in its history which have for 
a longer or shorter time influenced its application in the field. 
Until quite the end of the sixteenth century, the heavy and rude construc¬ 
tion of the carriages, the length of the guns required to develop the power 
of the ill-made powder, the long trains of wagons with ammunition, rendered 
artillery of little use in the field. Tactics were then of the most simple nature. 
If the guns could be dragged into a position in the line of battle by the hired 
or pressed transport of the country—the only means of locomotion available— 
and a few rounds fired from them, it was all that could be expected. A 
second movement was rarely practicable, and in the event of retreat the guns 
were generally captured, and I dare say the generals were not sorry to see 
the last of them. 
The first attempt at a really movable artillery was made by Gustavus 
Adolphus, early in the seventeenth century. He introduced light iron guns 
drawn by two horses, and first made cartridges, by whicli means he obtained 
a much greater rapidity of fire—guns having been previously loaded with 
loose powder, by means of a ladle. This was a distinct advance in artillery, and 
led to some development in tactics. Guns were now divided, and placed in 
the centre and on the flanks of the line. 
It was not, however, till the latter part of this century (the 17 th) that a 
special corps was raised in any country. Until this time the gunners had 
been cosmopolitan. Their art was considered a purely mechanical one, they 
were apprenticed to it in limited numbers, and their services were at the dis¬ 
posal of any prince who needed them. This evidently tended in large measure 
to the ill repute of the arm. 
Louis XIY. first raised a regiment for artillery service, and from this time 
in all the countries of Europe artillery materiel progressed until the time was 
ripe for the next great step whicli influenced tactics. This was the introduc¬ 
tion of horse artillery on the detachment system by Erederick the Great, in 
1759. The idea, however, was slow in taking root, and it was only after the 
Erench revolution that the use of horse artillery became general. Through 
this, and the improvements in materiel , mainly due to Gribeauval, in Erance, 
artillery was ready for the system of handling brought to the greatest per¬ 
fection by Napoleon, and continued with little modification to our own times, 
of which the main characteristic was the rapid assembly of large masses of 
artillery for a decisive effort, the bringing an overwhelming fire to bear on 
the vital point. 
The immense development of mechanical science in the latter half of this 
century, and the invention of rifled guns, have now brought us to another 
landmark, probably more important than any that has preceded it. How 
