The Outpost Vol 1 - The Royal Highland Fusiliers

106 THE OUTPOST.
The New Musketry Tables.
IT may be safely affirmed that these tests of
marksmanship present no insuperable
difficulty to any man who has earnestly bent
his mind to the instruction he has already
received, and who has attained a fairly good
standard of proficiency in Miniature Shooting
and other preliminary work.
Every soldier must go to the rifle-range with
firm detemlination to do his best, and he must
never lose his confidence and self-reliance. He
should get to know his own rifle, and study its
little ways as to any slight variations, say in
trigger-release, elevation, or side-throw. It
certainly happens very occasionally that a rifle
shoots inaccurately through some faulty fitting
or adjustment of the fore end, bands, barrel,
bolt, or sights, but the chance of a soldier
getting such a fau1ty weapon is very remote
indeed. Every man must, therefore, strive to
acquire confidence in his rifle as in himself.
\Vhen firing he must not get flurried or
excited, but quietly note the result of each
round he fires, and calculate what alteration
may be requisite to ensure an improvement in
his next shot.
On the range, it must always be remembered
that powerful and potentially dangerous
weapons are being used, and every man must
go about his work in a cool and self-possessed
manner, observing every precaution according
to the Range Regulations. The newspapers
often contain notices of the results of silly fooling
with loaded amlS, and it is to be-sincerely hoped
that no accidents of fuis kind will ever stain the
records of the 17th H.L.I.
The study of the changes in ammunition and
the improvements thereby obtained is as
interesting as the study of the development of
the military rifle itself, so a few observations
may not be out of place as to the two patterns
of ammunition that may now be used,-the
Mark VI. and the Mark VII.; and also as to the
effects of fixing the bayonet on the Short
Lee-Enfield rifle.
It is perhaps needless to specify the peculiarities
of the earlier and now obsolete types of
the .303" cartridge, but I might mention the
Mark Ill., with its soft solid lead nose which
caused the bullet to expand on striking animal
tissue, and thus deliver a paralysing knock-out
blow. This bullet was designed twenty years
ago, for use against savage tribes only, by
Captain Bert Clay, at that time on the staff of
the Indian Government Ammunition Factory
at the town of Dum-dum, near Calcutta, and
this is the origin of the curious term" dum·dum
bullet" that we so often hear used to describe
any soft lead or hollow-nosed projectile which
is meant to open out on impact.
The Mark VI. cartridge with its reinforced
base, 30 grains of cordite, and finely proportioned
bullet wifu gently sloping, or, to use
the correct term, hemispheroidal head, was
introduced at the time of the Boer War. It
develops the moderate Chamber-pressure of IS
tons per square inch, and gives improved longrange
target results.
In I908 the quest for a flatter trajectory, with
all its military advantages, led to the development
of the powerful Mark VII. cartridge with
38 grains of tubular cordite, giving 20 tons per
square inch of chamber pressure, and firing a
light sharp-pointed bullet designed on the
model of the " spitz-kogel" of the Germans,
which was introduced by them for the Mauser
in I905.
\Vhen bayonets were fixed on the old-style
rifles such as the Enfield muzzle-loader, the
Snider, the Martini-Henry, and the earlier
models of the Lee-Metford' and Lee-Enfield, a
high aim had to be taken, as the weight of the
bayonet simply held down the muzzle when the
shot was fired.
On the introduction of the Short Lee-Enfield
rifle in I904 it was found that with the Mark VI.
cartridge no alteration in aim was required
when the bayonet was fixed. This curious
behaviour of the rifle fairly puzzled the experts
at the B.S.A. works, at Enfield Lock, and at
Hyi:he, for some time, till instantaneous