ABSTRACT

The present age has been so remarkably fertile in warlike inventions, that it may truthfully be said that the progress made in fire-arms and war-ships within the second half of the nineteenth century surpasses everything that had been previously accomplished from the time gunpowder came into use. The subject of fire-arms embraces a very wide ground, as will appear if the people consider the many different forms in which these weapons are constructed in order best to serve particular purposes. The military fire-arms are of so many different forms and patterns that they can deal with but a selection from the various services. Incident to the discharge of all fire-arms, great and small, is a phenomenon of which the people have to speak, because it is one which in the mounting of heavy ordnance especially has to be taken into account. But the greatest necessity for modern fire-arms is a smokeless powder or other explosive.