REPORTS ON THE BELGIAN ARTILLERY. 
227 
The value to both field and siege artillery of regularly established Poly- 
gones cannot, J think, be over-estimated. It is not merely in carrying on 
practice on broken ground, under varying conditions, that the advantage of 
a Polygone is found; but in the fact that such practice can there be carried 
on under the careful supervision of officers selected for their practical ex¬ 
perience, and trained by the constant observation of practice to the greatest 
accuracy of judgment. To an artillery using time fuzes, and therefore less 
able to correct its errors by observation of the bursting of its shells, the 
superintendence of such skilled officers appears even more necessary than to 
an artillery using only percussion fuzes. 
The Polygone of Brasschaet is very confined in its area; the necessity for 
economy limits below what is desirable the amount of ammunition expended; 
but yet it is not difficult to believe what Belgian artillery officers say-—that 
the establishment of this Polygone with its School of Practice has doubled 
the fighting value of the Belgian artillery. 
Value of 
regularly 
established 
Polygones. 
