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was of a tawny hue; whereas all the natives whom they had yet seen were black. This caused them to surmise that he might possibly be of European origin; and as he stood before them, evidently labouring under strong excitement, and apparently striving to speak, yet uttering no sound, one of them offered him bread, at the same time pronouncing its name. The poor fellow mechanically seized the proffered food, and endeavoured to repeat the word. After reiterated efforts, and as many failures, a sudden thought seemed to strike him. His eyes brightened, he cast away his spear, and stretching out his arm, with eager gestures, invited their attention to something marked thereon. On examination, this proved to be two letters, W. B.,' rudely pricked out and stained, sailor-fashion. These they sought to decipher. 'W,' said they for William. He smiled and nodded. 'B' for Burges. He shook his head. Brown, Bruce, Ball -every name commencing with the second letter of the alphabet that they could think of, was tried, with the like result; till at length, as by a mighty effort, their strange visitor burst into speech, and exclaimed, with a genuine English accent: W. for William, B. for Buckley.'

Then they knew that it was one of their own countrymen who stood in that wretched guise before them.

On Batman's return to Port Phillip, he was informed of this discovery, and being a man of kindly disposition and feeling heart, he at once assumed the protection of the white savage. His first care was to shave and clean his protégé a process which appears to have considerably lessened the duskiness of the latter's complexion. The kangaroo skins were dispensed with, and a more civilised costume substituted; but it was long ere he could walk in shoes without much discomfort. His first shirt-sewn by Miss Batman-was of Brobdignagian proportions, consisting of an incredible quantity of linen; and when he was set on horseback to accompany his protector, it was discovered that the stores of the settlers could not furnish stirrups sufficiently large to accommodate his huge feet.

By slow degrees, the reclaimed man recovered the use of his native language, and was enabled to communicate his history and adventures. It must not be supposed, however, that his reminiscences assumed the form of a connected narrative; on the contrary, they were extracted from him, not without difficulty, at various times. To the last, he was sullen and reserved, usually answering in monosyllables; and not unfrequently he manifested great anger on being questioned of his past life. He is also said to have varied considerably in his account of some particulars; but his habitual taciturnity, and imperfect command of language, probably caused him to be misunderstood by the retailers of his conversation.

His history, divested of the romance wherewith it has sometimes been clothed, is as follows:

William Buckley-for such was indeed his name was born at Macclesfield, in Cheshire, in 1780. In early life, he followed the occupation of a stone-mason; but his great height-which is stated at six feet six inches-and stalwart proportions attracting the notice of a recruiting sergeant, he was easily induced to exchange the trowel for the musket, and accordingly enlisted in the 4th regiment. He had served but a short time in his new capacity, when he robbed one of his comrades; for which offence-such was then the severity of our laws-he was sentenced to transportation for life. This occurred in 1803, in the twenty-third year of his age; and it thus happened that he became an unwilling member of Colonel Collins's abortive expedition to Port Phillip. When the order for removal to Tasmania was issued, Buckley, and two others, named respectively Pye

and Marmon, feeling doubtful of their ultimate fate, effected their escape from the camp, as previously stated; and the vessels sailing shortly after, nothing more was heard of them.

What became of Pye and Marmon has never been satisfactorily ascertained. Buckley himself always evinced great dislike to being questioned about them, and seemed to regard the inquirer with much suspicion. It appears that the course taken by the fugitives was around the head of the bay; and Mr Wedge, in his report to the Geographical Society of Tasmania, dated 1835, says that Buckley assured him, that in their flight, Pye became exhausted, and was left behind at the Yarra River; and that Marmon quitted him at Indented Head, with the avowed intention of returning to the camp. But there are many different versions of this affair. Sometimes Buckley averred that they were killed by snakes, and at others that they had lost themselves in the bush, and were never seen by him after. But the Australian wilds furnish no indigenous fruits capable of affording sustenance to man; and it is generally believed that hunger, and the difficulty of procuring food, induced a repast at which humanity shudders. Be this as it may, no vestige of their remains has ever been discovered.

After parting from his companions, Buckley appears to have remained alone some time. One day, however, disgusted alike with his solitary life, and the precariousness of his means of subsistence, he wandered on the beach, anxiously endeavouring to descry some vessel, which happily might rescue him from his vast prison. His shoes had long since abandoned his feet, which now therefore left their imprint on the soft sand. As he strolled listlessly along, he picked up a fragment of a spear, and with this he waded amongst the rocks in search of shell-fish, now his principal food. Whilst thus engaged, he was observed by three native women, who, creeping stealthily down to the beach, imagined that they beheld in him their lost chief Murragark, whom Buckley appears to have resembled in size and stature. The illusion was increased by the circumstance of his carrying the broken spear of the deceased warrior; and the colour of his skin excited but little surprise, being readily ascribed to the potent influence of the grave.*

The Delilahs of the forest having, in a manner, captured this ungainly Samson, brought him, nothing loath, to the men of their tribe, who, in fact, had seen his footprints on the sand, and were already in search of him. He was immediately surrounded by a mob of yelling savages, and doubtlessly imagined that he was destined to be carved into collops for the gratification of his epicurean captors; but again his resemblance to the great chief befriended him. They examined his feet and hands-they eagerly scrutinised the spear, of which he had fortunately retained possession; and when they discovered on his side a scar, similar in appearance to one which had marked the body of Murragark, they deemed the evidence of his identity complete. Buckley, meantime, mistook their very animated gestures for so many tokens of their pleasure at his fleshly condition. A long conversation ensued, during which the name of Murragark was incessantly repeated. It ended, very much to his satisfaction, in their feeding, instead of eating him; and he was given to understand, by signs, that thenceforth he was never to quit his savage entertainers.

Accordingly, although treated with great respect,

*The superstition here alluded to is very prevalent amongst the Australian aborigines, who imagine that the whole of the white population are their deceased brethren. For a supposed unpleasant, and not a little dangerous, to be mistaken for a restored friend, they testify great affection; but it is very departed enemy.

he was scrupulously watched by day and night. He was never suffered to fatigue himself with the exertions of the chase, nor to perform that infinitesimal amount of labour to which the natives of Australia unwillingly submit. His gunyah was reared for him, and his larder stocked with unwonted extravagance, by his savage friends. The daintiest morsels of the kangaroo, and the most juicy of opossums, the sweetest portions of the wombat, the whitest grubs of the mimosa, and the largest of gum-balls, were his. His also the largest eggs and the finest fishthe richest berries and the most delicate roots. The rarest pigments were devoted to his use, and the warmest skins were added to his wardrobe.

Thus, from a state of abject misery and utter loneliness, Buckley was suddenly elevated to a species of savage royalty, and held in reverential awe as the restored Murragark. For some time, the only perceptible fluctuation of public opinion was the occasional outburst of cannibal propensities, when his wild subjects seemed to survey his colossal form with much peculiar admiration.

Buckley's domestic comfort was also duly considered, and a dusky, but buxom young widow was assigned to him, by the general consent of the tribe, as his lubra, or spouse. For a time the pair enjoyed the utmost felicity of which two such strange turtledoves were capable. But this lasted not long; for, according to Buckley, the honeymoon was scarcely over, when his hut was one night invaded by sundry native gentlemen, who, claiming a prior right, forcibly carried off the bride. Much violence does not appear to have been offered, nor were the husband's feelings greatly lacerated by this stroke of fortune. He acknowledged, indeed, that his lubra went very willingly, and that he did not 'make a fuss about the loss.' But the natives seem to have taken a widely different view of the affair; for, irritated probably at this practical disparagement of their own judgment, at the lady's faithlessness, and the injury inflicted on their white friend, they speared both the frail one and her lovers.

But if Buckley's first companion was insensible to his charms, there were other hearts more tender and more true. A gentle damsel, of the same tribe, of her own accord visited his solitary home, and sought to soothe and please the forsaken stranger. Nor were her efforts unsuccessful. Buckley, at various periods, had many wives, but he always expressed himself in more favourable terms of his second partner than of any other. On the sea-shore, near Point Lonsdale, is a natural cavern, in the limestone rock, which is said to have been the abode of the wild white man and his mate during this portion of his eventful

career.

It has been doubted whether Buckley had any children. By those who knew and conversed with him, this point is diversely stated; some declaring positively that he was childless, but others, and the majority of evidence is on this side, speak of sons and daughters. When reclaimed, in 1835, he had with him two lubras, and a boy and girl; but he always spoke of these as adopted children.

Many other particulars were at sundry times extracted from him, and have been worked up, by Mr Morgan of Hobart-town, into a long and interesting narrative. In it are numerous details of native feasts and fights, of huntings and corrobborees; but, as might be expected, there is a great paucity of actual events. Occasionally, he seems to have lost a portion of the influence he ordinarily exerted over his black friends. Whether their faith in his involuntary personation of Murragark sometimes became weak, or was overpowered by hunger, we know not; but he averred that for some years he constantly expected death. The young men, he said,

were for killing him; but the elders of the tribe always interfered to save his life. He appears to have taken matters very coolly; and if he possessed, he certainly never attempted to exert the magic of civilised intellect, nor sought, by the communication of useful arts, to improve the condition of his savage associates: on the contrary, contented apparently with the gratification of his animal appetites, he willingly sunk to the dead and dreary level of Australian barbarism. Like his untutored friends, he fed on raw or semi-roasted flesh, clothed himself in the skins of beasts, and acquiring the native dialect, ceased even to think in his mother-tongue, until, as we have seen, he had totally forgotten its use. Once or twice, he said, he saw ships enter the bay; but he does not appear to have made the slightest effort to attract the attention of their inmates, nor in any way to extricate himself from the degrading position into which he had fallen, until Batman firmly planted his foot upon the soil.

Such was the poor lost creature whom, after thirtytwo years of savage life, the early colonists of Port Phillip restored to civilised society; and, it is proper to add, that his own delight, when he was enabled to comprehend the change, was unbounded. Nothing,' says Mr Wedge, 'could exceed the joy he evinced at once more feeling himself a free man, received again within the pale of civilised society.'

However he may have been deficient in other qualities, ingratitude was clearly not one of Buckley's faults. Both Batman and Wedge concur in stating that he exerted himself greatly in maintaining amicable relations between the natives and the colonists. To the former gentleman-his constant friend and patron-he was much attached; and when informed of his death, it is recorded that he threw himself on the bed and wept bitterly.'

Buckley's subsequent career is soon told. A free pardon was, at his own urgent desire, procured for him from Colonel Arthur, the governor of Tasmania; and he was appointed native interpreter, with a salary of L.50 per annum. In this capacity, his services were in great request; and when Sir Richard Bourke came down from Sydney to survey the new colony, Buckley was selected to accompany him in his tour through the country. But his position soon became uncomfortable. Serious disputes broke out between the settlers and the native population. The latter committed many robberies, and at length speared two of their white neighbours, whose graves, on the Flagstaff Hill, near Melbourne, are still religiously preserved. We have no record of offences on the other side, but doubtlessly the whites were not blameless. Buckley, who could not forget the kindness of his old friends, refused to interpose between the contending parties, declaring that the hostility of the blacks was solely attributable to the misconduct of the colonists. Fearing, therefore, that he might relapse into barbarism, Batman resolved to send him out of Port Phillip; and accordingly, in 1836, he was induced to embark for Hobart-town, where he resided during the remainder of his life. figure and strength obtained for him the post of constable, which he held many years. Subsequently, he was employed as assistant-storekeeper at the Immigrant's Home, and, later still, as gate-keeper of the Female Nursery.

His

In his sixtieth year, Buckley, again venturing on matrimony, contracted a union with the widow of an immigrant. In 1850, the Tasmanian government bestowed on him the insignificant pension of L.12 per annum; and in the following year, Victoria having been separated from New South Wales, and erected into an independent colony, its legislature voted an additional annuity of L.40.

Endowed by nature with an iron constitution,

which his wild life no doubt materially assisted to strengthen, Buckley enjoyed vigorous health almost to his latest hour. His death was occasioned by accident. In January 1856, he was thrown from a vehicle, and received such severe injuries in the fall, that in a few days he breathed his last sigh, at the advanced age of seventy-six.

LONG BALL-PRACTICE. TEN years ago, large guns and small were the simplest things imaginable. A tubular orifice driven not quite through the length of a metallic bar; a very much smaller tube bored at right angles to the aforesaid, near to its closed extremity, thus serving as a touch-hole-and, behold, a gun! The axial bore might be a little tube, it might be a big tube, without disturbing our ideas in the least degree as to what should constitute a gun. Except in reference to that particular sort of gun known as the rifle,' the philosophy of firearms, as they were in England some twenty years ago, is soon exhausted. Since that period, extraordinary developments have arisen in the construction of firearms, all of them very beautiful, and some of them very curious. A few special cases have been touched upon by us in these columns already. For example, on the occasion of the Russian war, we presented our readers with rudimentary knowledge of a department of conchology not much studied even in these days of sea-side ramblings and marine aquaria. Martial conchology we would be understood to signify, explanatory of the difference between common and shrapnel shells, together with several other matters of the sort. We also said our say anent that very curious specimen of no-tailed war-rocket devised by Mr Hale. Colt's pistols and Minié bullets have also passed under our review; so now, keeping well au courant in the projectile art, we purpose acting as master of the ceremonies to certain other candidates for public approbation in the man-killing, wall-splitting, gunpowder-consuming line.

rapidity than Colt's. The American pistol requires to be cocked by the thumb, like any ordinary firearm; when cocked, the line of aim is clear, and discharge may be effected by as light a touch at the trigger as the shooter may desire. The English revolver required-we speak of the past-no special cocking, the trigger-pull acting that part. Necessarily, a trigger-pull performing this function must be somewhat dead and heavy; so that at very close quarters the English pistol undoubtedly possessed advantages over its American competitor, yet Colt's revolver was better adapted to the taking of steady aim. An officer, whose name at this instant we forget, was surrounded at the battle of Inkermann by six Russians; possessing one of the self-cocking English revolvers, he shot four, and testified to the manufacturers that had there been a necessity for cocking the pistol by thumb in the ordinary way, his life would have been taken. Still the dead triggerpull incidental_to_cocking was in some cases disadvantage. It has been obviated. The British revolver may now be caused to discharge itself by mere trigger-pull as formerly, or it may be cocked by thumb and exploded like any ordinary firearm.

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The revolver principle has succeeded well in the construction of pistols, as we have seen. Has it answered in respect of cavalry carbines and infantry muskets? No, it has not; and we think there is but little chance of its thus succeeding. By this we would wish to be understood as expressing our belief that although tolerable weapons of the carbine and musket classes admit of being made by adoption of the revolver principle, still much better weapons of the same classes admit of construction by adopting other types. This for several reasons. Firstly, inasmuch as a cavalry carbine has to be shouldered and discharged with one hand, it should be light; and seeing that inasmuch as one barrel must be necessarily lighter than five or six, though they be only rudimentary barrels, as we find them in revolver pistols, therefore, ceteris paribus, a one-barrelled carbine must be best. But a functional objection Banishing for a moment all names and designa- exists to the adoption of the revolver principle by tions, let us look at the requirements of the projectile any kind of firearm larger than a pistol; and we beg art of war; and, firstly, of small-arms. The simplest the reader's attention to it, inasmuch as the remark classification of these is into pistols, cavalry carbines, applies with still greater force to artillery. By and muskets; by which latter term we will under-increasing the calibre of a gun, the strength of its parts stand all infantry firearms, whether rifled or non-relative to gunpowder, decreases in a rapidly increasing rifled. In each of these three, there have been great ratio. Wherefore it happens, that, though in pistols improvements during late years; to some of which we the breech-joints necessary to carry out the revolver shall advert. principle may be made practically tight, there comes a maximum bore at last, with which such tightness is impossible. Developing still the size of our ideal gun, there comes finally a bore beyond the diameter of which, though no joints are involved, the mere cohesive strength of material used forbids the manufacturer to go; for, curiously enough, it is a welldemonstrated fact, that after a given thickness of material, varying according to the cohesive strength of material employed, no mere addition to thickness adds to strength or power of resistance. Slightly anticipating another part of our subject, we may here indicate that the limit of strength for cast iron, fashioned into long pieces of ordnance, capable of projecting with safety solid balls, corresponds with about eight inches diameter. True, cast-iron longguns are now made of ten, and even eleven inches diameter, but they are only strong enough to be used for projecting shells or hollow shot.

Firstly, in respect of pistols, the revolver principle has fairly beaten all others out of the field. As to the antiquity of that principle, there may be now seen in the Tower of London a revolver firearm made for the special use of Henry VIII. If that bluff monarch, with tender conscience and delicate sensibilities, had fired the weapon pretty often, it might have fared better with a few of his queens. Our meaning is, that the arm would have inevitably gone off at the wrong end, so roughly is it constructed. Indeed, not all the latest improvements of flint-locks could enable the manufacturer to turn out a perfectly reliable revolver; to the successful construction of which the detonating or percussion principle is absolutely necessary.

Having all the useful phases of revolving firearms well under view, we do not hesitate to say that Colonel Colt was the first person who succeeded in turning out of hand a revolver perfectly efficient and reliable, adapted for all the exigencies of war to which a pistol can be applied. For many years this celebrated weapon maintained a distinguished precedence over all others, notwithstanding that an English firmDeane and Adams-constructed revolving pistols which admitted of being discharged with greater

Though the revolver principle seems barely compatible with the necessities of a cavalry carbine, yet in no description of firearm is the want of some efficient breech-loading contrivance more pressing. Even with all the facilities of loading which the conoidal expanding principle has given, as exemplified in the Minié and Enfield rifled muskets, still, the

operation of charging a cavalry carbine by the muzzle, and on horseback, at all, is most inconvenient. Various attempts have been made to obviate this inconvenience; some answering well enough with low charges, others with high charges, in careful hands; but very, very few complying with all the requisitions of common cavalry practice. In the improvement of carbines, no less than of pistols, our American cousins have been foremost. The cavalry carbine of Colonel Greene is a breech-loader. It is charged with an ordinary paper-cartridge, and has the remarkable peculiarity of causing the explosive force of the charge to contribute to the tightness of the joint. We hardly know whether we shall succeed in rendering intelligible the manner by which this is done. Firstly, the piece, though one-barrelled, has two triggers; one being pulled, liberates the barrel, which now admits of being pulled out of a catch, and turned towards the operator's right, in such manner that a paper-cartridge holding powder and ball admits of being slid in; the use of a common cartridge indeed being a great point gained. The cartridge is neither bitten nor broken; but the act of replacing the barrel in its catch forces a sort of pointed perforated steel tooth-something like a snake-fang, though straight -into the very middle of the cartridge, which is thus ready to be fired as soon as a percussive blast rushes through the tubular orifice of the fang. This is accomplished by the very ingenious contrivance known as the Maynard primer, and universally employed now in all American non-revolving military small-arms. If we turn aside from our main object to describe such a collateral thing as the Maynard primer, we shall never have done. The reader will therefore be so good as to excuse our stating more on that head than the general principle subserved. The Maynard primer is a little magazine of some fifty or sixty percussion patches brought successively, by the act of cocking, quite over the nipple, so that the niggling act of capping the piece is obviated. From the Maynard primer let us now go back to the piece itself, and trace out the destiny of the cartridge. Though placed within the barrel, it does not touch the latter, but is surrounded by a sort of tightly sliding, short internal chamber, larger anteriorly than posteriorly, and terminating on the latter aspect by a sharpish edge. The interior of the sliding-chamber is, in point of fact, a truncated cone; its exterior being cylindrical, and tightly fitting the barrel, save where the posterior face of the chamber is ground away to a bluntish edge, the latter bearing upon a flat plate of iron. Now, owing to this configuration, it follows that when the powder within the cartridge explodes, a backward pressure will be exerted upon the short sliding truncated conoidal chamber, the posterior cutting edge of which will be thrust against the flat iron bearing. We have been thus particular in describing the construction of Colonel Greene's carbine, because of its approval in British military circles, and its partial adoption by the British cavalry.

Sharpe's is another American invention in the way of breech-loading carbines. In charging this firearm, an ordinary paper-cartridge is also used, of which the posterior aspect is ripped off in the act of closing the breech-opening. The objectors to Sharpe's American rifle affirm that it nips off an uncertain quantity.

And now, before passing on to the consideration of muskets, some few matters must be taken for granted as lying within the sphere of the reader's cognizance, otherwise we shall never get to the end of our tale. Firstly, we will assume that every reader-except a lady-reader perhaps-is aware of the fact that gunbarrels are either rifled or non-rifled. Secondly, that except for fowling, no person one shade more civilised than a Dahomey grenadier will ever use a non-rifled,

alias small-bored, small-arm again. Thirdly, that all civilised rifle-balls are, and have been these few years past, more or less like sugar-loaves in form.

Before passing to fourthly, pause we a while to contemplate our Hibernicism. To speak of a ball shaped like a sugar-loaf, is indeed startling; but surely bullet is no better. One may say projectile, but it is abominably pedantic, and conoid is hardly to be recommended. Cousin Jonathan's inventive genius is not only strong in gun-making, but in the coining of new words out of the old tongue. He calls the sugar-loaf shaped balls to which we have been adverting, pickets. ` A very good word it is too. We shall adopt it, and commend it to the favourable notice of all dictionary compilers. Fourthly, we take it for granted that everybody knows how a rifle-picket spins through the air, point foremost; whereas a ball proper, fired from an ordinary non-rifled gun, simply rolls whilst flying through the air, as a marble might roll upon the ground. Fifthly and lastly, as it seems, we will assume every reader to be aware that whereas the bullet of a common gun fits the bore loosely, a rifle-picket, ball, or other projectile must-at least at the moment of discharge-fit its barrel with all possible accuracy and tightness; a rifle bore is, in point of fact, a hollow screw, and the projectile within it is a solid one.

Two distinct principles of facilitating rifle-practice suggest themselves that is, breech-loading, and expanding pickets. Of these, the Prussians have adopted a variety of the first in their celebrated needle-gun. Ourselves, the French, and Austrians, have adopted varieties of the second, one or the other of which is now perhaps in course of adoption by every civilised nation. The self-expanding picket system consists in fashioning the picket in such a manner that dropping loosely into the gun at the time of charging, it becomes expanded and tightly fitting by the force of gunpowder discharge, either directly applied, as in Lancaster's celebrated ovalbore sporting rifle, or indirectly, as in the Minié rifle and the Enfield weapon now adopted by our own service. Into the base of the Minié picket an iron thimble is inserted, which, receiving the blow of explosive discharge, is driven far up into the middle of the leaden picket, which it consequently expands; sometimes too completely indeed, for instances are not unfrequent of the thimble shooting quite through the picket, which latter remains as a leaden tube, lining the gun-barrel. Liability to the accident here adverted to is a weak point of the celebrated Minié weapon, which has mainly led to the substitution of the Enfield rifle in our military service. In this latter weapon, a hard wooden plug is substituted for the iron thimble.

The first requisition for a military rifle is, in the opinion of non-military people, extreme length of range; but there are qualities in subservience of which length of range becomes a secondary consideration, and must, if necessary, be abandoned. A good military small-arm must be able to shoot often without fouling. This is essential; otherwise the arm, however long its range, is a failure. Now, the conditions for imparting a maximum rifle-range are perfectly well known; they are, maximum length of picket, involving minimum of calibre. In sporting rifles, these conditions are carried out to the extent of diminishing the calibre to half an inch bore. In the construction of military rifles, so small a diameter is not thought expedient. To shew how little advantageous an extremely long range of rifle-shooting is regarded by military judges, the Enfield rifle, which carries more than 1000 yards with accuracy, is only sighted up to 700 yards. There is something ad captandum in the idea of an extremely long range, which may beget wrong impressions. The public have heard a

good deal about rifles which will shoot further than the Enfield. True; but the Enfield rifle, for reasons mentioned, was limited as to the dimensions of its bore. The public, too, have been startled by the vast penetration of a certain rifle-picket; but the inventor omitted to state the all-important fact, that the projectile was made of hard metal, not lead, and therefore could never have been successfully employed in military service.

The greatest popular misapprehension exists as to rifled ordnance. To adapt the rifle system to ordnance at all is a problem of great difficulty; but for the sake of argument, we choose to regard it done. Well, once impart the rifle-spinning motion to an artillery projectile, instead of the ordinary rolling motion, and it is incapacitated for all purposes save one-to go straight at its object in one direct unbroken flight. What more can be reasonably expected of cannon? the reader will possibly ask. Much, very much. If a cannon-shot had the invariable task assigned it of going straight at the object, a rifled piece of ordnance would always assuredly be best. But cannon are expected to be versatile things; and the versatility of their adaptations adds much to their deadliness. A non-rifled projectile admits of being gently bowled out of a gun, when it hops along very much like a cricket-ball. This is called ricochet practice, and is very destructive. Taken all in all, it is worth more against men, and ships, and even fortifications, than direct firing. Once let a rifle projectile touch ground or water, and its original line of flight is gone: whirling on one side, it is almost useless. Again, the very deadliest applications of cannon to mankilling are the projection of grape and canister shot, and shrapnell shells-all repugnant to the rifle system.

If all gun-projectiles were round, made solid of similar material, and filled with proportionate charges, the largest balls would range furthest. Thereforeexcluding the rifle principle-the range of ordnance, ceteris paribus, would be directly proportionate to their calibre. But ceteris are non paribus. In proportion as the calibre of a gun increases, the largest possible charge of gunpowder decreases, and also the weight of projectile; so that a cast-iron gun of more than 8-inch bore can hardly be used with safety for the projection of solid shot. Nevertheless, there is a craving for larger cannon strong enough to project solid shot; and, strangely enough, the proposition by which this is sought to be accomplished is no less than the one of returning to the hoop-and-stave system of ordnance manufacture, or, at any rate, a modification of it, as employed in the earlier days of cannon manufacture. In this direction the Americans, under the guidance of Treadwell, are working; so is Mallet in our own country. The latter gentleman has come prominently before the public of late in connection with the built-up 36-inch iron mortar, which, although no very long range has yet been got out of it, has succeeded well enough to establish the soundness of the principle. We stood on the 18th of December last not more than 100 yards distant from the spot where one of the monster shells of this mortar fell, and plunged so deeply into stiff clay-land that the longest shell-probes failed to reach it. The depth to which each of these shells probably sinks after a flight of 16,000 feet may be over twenty-five feet. Of course, on an experimental occasion like that adverted to, the shells were not charged; but the effect of their mere dead weight and impetus is something marvellous. Hissing through the air, they fall each with a dull loud explosion almost louder than the discharge of the mortar itself as heard by one standing close to it. Huge lumps of clay are now shot aloft, and stones fly about in all directions. Presently, when these

fragments have cleared away, and the observer looks upon the spot of impact, a veritable crater is seen, black and yawning. For a depth of some eight feet, a huge ragged pit is seen to be delved out, extending from the lower part of which is a hole proportionate to the size of the shell. What this shell, if charged, would accomplish, may be left to the imagination. One can form a good notion of what 480 pounds of powder would do if ignited some twenty feet or more below the earth's surface. As regards the construction of Mr Mallet's mortar, it resembles that of ancient stave-cannon, with the following difference: The staves of ancient cannon were all in one circular row, as also the hoops which surrounded them; whereas the staves and hoops respectively of Mr Mallet's compound mortar are in more rows than one; and as for the hoops, each concentric layer is slipped hot over the one underneath, whereby, on cooling, contractile force is exerted, and made to count for strength in the general structure of the gun.

PROCEEDINGS IN BREAKNECKSHIRE.

I AM very much afraid that the Mudbury Coursing Meeting has ruined that eminent metropolitan man of business, our friend Mr Robert Jones.* He is dogbitten, and, what is worse, horse-bitten, and there is no little apprehension entertained by his country friends of his going turf-mad. Nothing I could urge could prevent him from driving his trusty quadruped Seaman over to Rasperton, fourteen miles away, to see the steeple-chases in the neighbourhood of that town. I could not accompany him myself, having other agricultural business to attend to; but he did me the favour to say, that he could get on very well without me, if I would only lend him my horse and gig.

I should like Sloggard, his junior partner in the oiland-colour line, to have seen Mr Jones as he left my door on Friday last, equipped for this expedition. I am much surprised if he would not straightway have scraped together all he could, and bought the head of the firm out of the business while it was still a flourishing one. A broad-brimmed but far from Quakerish-looking hat; a green cut-away, blossoming into a red scarf, with a silver horse's foot by way of petal; a piece of a buff-waistcoat; a white pair of what you could scarcely call continuations, they so immediately terminated in a couple of enormous riding-boots-the whole viewed through the dim obscure of the smoke of a cigar-made up the sum of what is known in the City as Jones and Company. Perched upon three driving cushions, with his elbows squared, and a long whip flying by his side, he might have sat for a type of the gentlemen who figure most brilliantly in the Insolvent Court. There was a smack of overtrading and reckless expenditure in the very tones in which he observed, Let her go!' to the groom at Seaman's head, as though my favourite brown had been a female. He came back, indeed, from the scene of dissipation in a far differentBut I am anticipating; let him tell his steeple-chase experiences after his own fashion.

I had no difficulty whatever-thanks to your accurate directions and Seaman's exemplary conduct in arriving at Rasperton; and I put him up, according to your advice, at The Weasel Asleep.' I got there at twelve o'clock-only thirty minutes before the first race was advertised to be run, so that I thought I would invest a shilling in a conveyance to take me to the course. The flyman, however, to whom I applied charging the modest sum of a

* See Journal, No. 216.

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