418 
ARTILLERY IN COAST DEFENCE. 
the name (or number on the list) of that vessel; so that the Fire 
Commander, referring to his list, will be able to see at a glance the 
general idea of the form which his attach should take. To enable the 
Section Commander to do this, an officer of the Navy, or other person 
competent to recognise foreign vessels by their appearance, will pro¬ 
bably be attached to his staff; this does not, however, relieve officers 
from the necessity of studying the appearance and characteristics of 
such vessels ; in fact, such study should be looked upon as an important 
part of their duty by all officers who may have to take part in the 
defence of a coast fortress. 
The question of the rate and order of fire to be adopted is decided 
more by considerations that come under the head of Fire Control than 
by those coming under our present heading. The following points 
should, however, here be noted :— 
A given number of shots penetrating soft armour will probably do 
an equal amount of damage whether they strike successively or simul¬ 
taneously. The damage done to a ship protected by hard armour by 
a given number of shots will probably be much greater if they strike 
the armour simultaneously than if they strike in succession. The 
simultaneous explosion of several heavy shell between decks may be 
expected to produce much more disastrous effects than would be caused 
by the same number exploding singly. The “ racking ” effect on the 
ship generally will certainly be greater if the projectiles strike at the 
same instant. 
For these reasons guns are in almost all cases fired in salvos by 
groups, the only exceptions being when ships are lying off at long 
range and the action is likely to last a long time, and when at the 
commencement of an action a few trial shots are fired to obtain the 
necessary corrections. The groups may either fire independently, “Inde¬ 
pendent Group Fireor in succession, “ Succession Group Fire/'’ The 
former gives the greatest volume of fire in a given time, and slowness of 
loading by one group will not delay the others; as a general rule it 
would be used when laying by quadrant elevation and training arc, 
while Battery group fire, commencing with the leeward group, would be 
resorted to when using sights to avoid interruption of the laying 
of one group by the smoke of another. As regards the rate of fire, 
this would naturally be slow and deliberate at the longest ranges, 
increasing in rapidity as the range decreases, and the projectiles have 
more effect; while against ships forcing a passage past forts, the fire, 
as they approach the part of the channel where they will be at shortest 
range, should be as rapid as possible consistent with accuracy. 
{To be Continued.') 
