COMPETITIVE PRACTICH IN THE GARRISON ARTILLERY. 557 
Again, in Annual Report of School of Gunnery for 18938, page 17, 
para, 22— 
“ Practice with D.R.F. was better than with P.F. throughout.” 
During his preliminary course of training, rarely lasting more than 
three weeks, a company commanding officer has a great deal to teach 
his men, many of whom are employed during the rest of the year. 
Battalion and company drill, carbine exercise and physical drill must 
be perfected, some time must be devoted to repository exercises and 
single gun drill; is it to be wondered then that when fire discipline is 
taken in hand the P.F. is shirked and, in view of the Competitive 
practice, all available time given to the D.R.F. 
(3.) Under the present system, one day makes or mars a com- 
pany, it is classed and judged almost entirely by its Competitive firing ; 
sufficient importance in consequence is not attached to the remainder 
of the annual practice, including shooting with the P.F. 
Dealing now with the regulations as to the selection of competing selection of 
gun detachments and gun-layers by the chief umpire. aoe 
Before 1893 a company commander selected his four best gun- meta aaee 
captains, his four best layers and made up his four best detachments by the Chief 
for Competitive practice. Une 
In 1893, as mentioned above, this was changed as far as gun-layers 
went, and out of the four used, the chief umpire now selects two and 
the company commander the other two out of all the paid gun-layers. 
This regulation has, of course, one very beneficial effect, it obliges a 
commanding officer to bestow great attention on the training of all his 
layers, and especially on the weakest. 
On the other hand it has, I respectfully submit, the following 
disad vantages :— 
(1.) It introduces a powerful element of luck into the com- 
petition. 
Out of the, say, one hundred men available in the company, I defy 
any man living to produce twelve, let alone eighteen gun-layers of any- 
thing lke equal capacity and it makes every difference in the world to = 
a company’s chance of success at practice if the two best or the two 
worst are chosen. I will illustrate this by what occurred last year to 
my own company. 
in 1895 I produced for Competitive practice 14 gun-layers, these 
might be classed as follows :— 
Class (1.) 1 man — absolutely reliable. 
Class (2.) 5 men — very reliable. 
Class (3.) 5 men — fairly reliable. 
Class (4.) 3 men — uncertain. 
Out of these I selected the first enumerated and one of Class (2), 
the chief umpire happened to select two more out of Class (2), so that 
out of my six best layers four were selected, “ two by honours to begin 
with.” 
