COMMENDED ESSAY, 1895. 367 
acquainted himself with their capabilities, and would have determined 
on his course of action under any circumstances likely to occur, and 
that therefore he would be ready to take part in a manning of the 
whole fortress. 
The value to be derived from these occasions from a fighting point 
of view, would depend on whether the co-operation of the Navy could 
be secured as well as that of the Royal Engineers and of the Infantry 
in the garrison, so that the programme might include attacks both by 
sea and land. If this were granted, much useful work might be done 
and valuable lessons learnt. It would be a matter for regret indeed if 
such an opportunity were not made the most of, for only when all the 
Batteries were manned would an attack on the fortress with any 
semblance of reality im it be possible. 
If however there were no other result than that the whole of the 
Artillery of the fortress was posted for once exactly as it would be in 
time of war, this alone would be sufficient to justify its being mobilized. 
CotontaL ARTILLERY. 
There is no reason for dealing separately with the case of the 
Colonial Artillery, as it all comes under the head of either Regular, 
Militia or Volunteer Artillery, and to which therefore a system of 
training for the Coast Artillery in Hngland would be equally applicable. 
Certainly in the self-governing colonies there is no force of Imperial 
Artillery to form a nucleus and to provide a permanent staff of special- 
ists. Its place would therefore have to be taken in this respect by the 
Colonial Artillery itself; and as its numbers are in all cases small, and 
would have to be largely increased on the outbreak of war, there is all 
the more need for this small body to be made thoroughly efficient. 
The Coast Artillery in all the colonies exists, it is believed, only in the 
immediate neighbourhood of the guns which it has been raised to man; 
so that in the facilities which it would enjoy for carrying out its train- 
ing it would have a great advantage over a large proportion of the 
Auxiliary Artillery in England. It should have no difficulty indeed 
under these circumstances in providing itself with a staff of specialists, 
if assisted in the first instance by instructors from Home. 
In the Crown Colonies, where Imperial troops are stationed, the 
circumstances are similar to those in England, and therefore call for no 
special arrangements. In some of the colonies the attempt has been 
made to make Artillery act in the double capacity of Field and Garrison 
Artillery. This arrangement may have been a practical one when it 
was first made, but it is certainly so no longer in these days of guns 
and mountings of complicated construction and of an elaborate system 
of Coast Defence, when the work of Coast Artillery claims an 
undivided attention. 
SUMMARY. 
The main conclusions arrived at are: 
(1) That the more important Batteries should be manned by their 
garrisons every year, and that the times of training of the different 
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