THE EQUIPMENT OP EIELD ARTILLERY <, 
561 
stood, and “ segment ” must be taken to mean some form of segment, 
bullet, ring or double-wall shell. 
34. On the Continent the double-wall shell is giving way to the The annular 
ring segment shell: the former is not found in the equipments of Austria, sS. ent 
Russia, or Italy, and it will doubtless soon disappear from those of^ ^ ZF> 
France and Germany. The ring shell indeed reminds one somewhat 
of our own segment shell which invented to fulfil a too ambitious role , 
and wedded'to a fuze'totally unfit to display its best effects, has been 
somewhat hastily hustled out of the service, though most of the reports 
on it in actual warfare have been favorable*. It appears very desirable 
to give this kind of shell a pointed head, which might be hardened 
or cast in chill to enhance its penetrative power ; indeed from a 
50-pr., constructed according to modern ideas, very great penetrative 
powers might be expected, when a segment shell from the old 12-pr. 
B. L. (with a muzzle velocity of 1239 f.s.) gave “good results when 
used against troops behind a thin wall.” There is however one 
drawback to the sharp point:—if the shell is fired at long ranges 
against troops it has a tendency to bury itself in the ground ; this is 
counteracted in some degree by the flat trajectories we can now 
obtain, e.g., the angle of descent of the present 16-pr. at 2600 yards 
is 8° 38', while that of the new 13-pr. at 2600 yds. is 7° 2', and that 
of the Russian 12-pr. 7° at 2330 yds. This tendency, it may be 
remarked, renders our present shrapnel shell a very unsuitable 
percussion projectile, as the bursting charge in the base would be 
calculated to drive the bullets into the ground. It thus appears 
desirable in a percussion projectile to have a preponderance of the 
bursting charge in the head. If then we take the Austrian ring shell 
(Plate IV.) as a basis to work upon, if we gave it a steel body, a pointed 
head, a guncotton burster, and an additional column of segments, we 
arrive at the result shown in Fig. 5. The size of the segmental rings 
(or annular segments) is somewhat diminished, but this could be com¬ 
pensated for by using in their construction a heavier metal than cast- 
iron. Instead of a shell of this kind, experiments might point to the 
adoption of a bullet shell (something similar to the Italian shrapnel) 
as our percussion projectile, the spherical bullets being calculated to 
range further than the segments. A fuze in the base of the projectile 
would be necessary with this shell. 
35. Such a projectile would be of the greatest use against the de- Proportion 
fenders in the preliminary stages of the attach , to be used with full annular °seg. 
charges against earthworks, walls, buildings, and shelter trenches, and ment sheU ’ 
with reduced charges to search out hollows and bombard villages and 
woods. Doubtless, if the country were open, time-shrapnel and case 
would be the only projectiles used on the defensive , but cover of some 
sort always exists, and, where cover is, the percussion shell at once 
comes into play. In all the minor operations of war opportunities for its 
use would constantly arise. These facts are recognized by the con¬ 
tinental powers that have recently revised their ammunition equipment, 
* See “ Treatise on Ammunition,” under heading “ Segment Shells,” pp. 148 & 297, et seq. 
