AUTOMATIC SIGHTING. 
137 
engaged without difficulty by a battery command. This, although 
often very desirable on account of the different arcs of fire of groups, 
is at present only possible in the case of groups having separate 
position-finders. Great economy should also result. A large propor¬ 
tion of orderlies, dial numbers, telephone operators, range-finding 
observers, etc., would disappear and the number of expensive electrical 
communications would be largely reduced. Even fire commanders 
might occasionally be dispensed with, the senior battery commander, 
who would probably have leisure enough, at all events before action, 
performing his functions. To enable him to do this, however, his post 
must allow him a good view of the whole command and its approaches. 
To sum up, automatic sighting seems to offer the one hope of a 
rational, economical, and efficient system of fire direction for coast 
artillery. 
Rational, because it allows of division of responsibility and labour, 
and does not expect of one man performances which are beyond any 
one man’s powers. 
Economical, because its directness and simplicity allow of working 
with greatly decreased 'personnel and an absence of much of the costly 
materiel now installed; also because with the increased effect obtained 
from guns a smaller number will be required. (It is assumed that all 
R.M.L. guns are withdrawn; no amount of R.M.L. guns can by any 
possibility be considered equivalent to one 6-in. Q.E. gun, with a 
moderate command, fitted with automatic sights, when the disparity 
between the cost of stores, weight of metal, and number of men 
required to produce the same volume of fire is considered). 
Efficient, because it allows more rapid and more accurate fire than 
any other system. It must be remembered, that what is required of 
Coast Artillery guns is, that they shall not only be hitters, but quick 
hitters. If it ever comes to real earnest with them, there will be a ship, 
perhaps several, trying to get to close quarters ; if the ships get there, 
where the superiority in numbers of their light Q.E. and machine guns 
can tell, and the difference m accuracy between shore and ship is not 
so much felt, it means infinitely greater loss on shore, if not worse. 
There was a time when cover and protection for shore guns appears 
to have been considered of first importance. This period produced 
those unwieldy monsters on disappearing and other mountings, which 
are good, under favourable conditions, for a round in every three or 
four minutes if they are in working order. The best protection from 
the enemy's fire is to hit him oftener and harder than he can hit us. 
We can do this even when greatly outmatched in number of guns (if 
we do not trust to obsolete and useless weapons) because we have 
generally command and always a fixed platform, and because while a 
very large proportion of his shells that hit our works do no damage at 
all, everyone of ours that hits him does probably a good deal. Guns 
that can be trusted to make an enemy’s ship or ships sheer off, riddled 
and shattered—with luck, disabled or sinking—in the course of a few 
minutes, possess the best and the only true protection from fire, and 
