THE RIFLE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume V, Issue 269, 30 May 1855, Page 4

THE RIFLE.

In his report to the Czar, Prince Menschifcoff attributes his repulse on the sth very much to the English rifle. From General Canrobert's reports of the siege it also appears that, when the French rifle had got within 300 yards of the batteries of Sevastopol, the Kussian artillerymen were compelled to use iron shutters to the embrasures. Yet hitherto the seH-su/Fieiency of our military men, high and low, has succeeded in preventing the universal employment of this noble weapon, and we cannot suppose that, of the 8,000 great souls who were so faithful and so true to the pride of England on the sth, so many as one thousand were untied with it. They who know thoroughly its use and power are quite certain, from the configuration of the

ground, and the respective positions of the R u sian advance and the English defence, that had every one of our immortal 8,000 been arm d with it, they would not have lost a single man by the bayonet, nor very many by the musket while, of those who were neither killed n O y wounded by shot or shell, probably every man would have disposed of five Russians at the least—indeed, of every Russian within his range No one who knows anything of the battle of New Orleans, no one who has ever seen the Tyrol and knows what the rifle did there, wfll doubt this.

It takes a little longer to leavn the use of the vifle than of the musket, and the soldier who is not so taught it hs to become enamoured and proud of his weapon, from a conviction of the power that it gives him, will not, perhaps, learn to appreciate and cherish it until he has stfyjr man after man of his enemies fall before h\Jh The Czar, {however, is not going: to wait until boards " have reported," "official forms have been complied with," or stupid prejudices of routine, precedent, and self-satisfied conceit have been humoured and overcome. He, we learn by the news of this week, has lost no time in ordering regiments of riflemen to be formed at once, and before next summer their balls will be in many an English heart.

Notwithstanding all this there is little prospect of getting the musket utterly discarded and the rifle universally substituted amongst ourselves, unless the will of the public can he evoked in the matter, just as it was regardinothe soldiers'clothing, their stocks, the hospital and medical departments, and other shortcomings and abuses which by k that means have found remedy.

A military man ought naturally to be the best judge of the best weapon for a soldier's use, and ours would be good ones, we dare say, were they not enthralled by the system to which they belong. How misleading must be the influence of that is clear from considering that the whole object of enlisting, feeding, clothing, and forming a recruit is that he should he able, when called upon, to through an ounce of lead straight at an enemy from an iron tube, while our "military men have stood up to the last for giving a soldier a weapon that could not bj any possibility enable him to do this, and for rejecting a weapon that could. It is now to be hoped that the public will at once unmistakeably insist upon it, that all our men be every one armed with an excellent rifle with a Swiss or American stock, and taught to shoot with it as the Swiss and Americans do; that the ball be no heavier than 32 to the pound ; and that this be done as fast as gunsmiths here, in America, and in the Low Countries, can make them. There is no way of achieving this result but by the serious and decided action of the public refusing any excuse or delay, and insisting upon immediate execution.

The English rifleman of to-day ought to be exactly ;vhat his ancestor the English bowman was of yore. Hear what Froissart says of that terrible weapon, and of those who used it.

The number of Englishmen at the battle of Jnkermann was S,OOO, and of Bussians actually engaged not less than 48,000. These were exactly the relative forces of the French and English at Poictiers, the latter composed of 4,000 bowmen, 2,000 knights, and the rest infantry, who were posted on difficult grounds along a read strong with hedges and stunted bushes, which they lined on both sides with archers, and which was commanded by ground in the rear still more difficult, and impracticable for horse, on which were posted the knights, all on foot, wiih archers before them. There was but one opening in the hedge, and only wide enough for four men on horseback. The twoj marshals of France advised the King that a).\ the army should attack on foot, except 300 of the ber.l-anned knights, who were rapidly tv carry this opening, and break in upon the archers, " de romp re et ouvrir ces archers," the rest of the army " vitement suivre a pied," and throw itself upon the 4,000 English gendarmerie and infantry. Here, we see, everything depended upon the archers. Had they been pierced by the charge of cavalry the immense body of the French army would in 10 minutes have thrown itselt upon the 4,000 English gendarmerie and have overwhelmed it. The description that Fmissart gives of this attack is remarkable. The two marshals themselves led it. It never got through the archers —only a few knights succeeded. One marshal was killed, the other wounded, the horses rushed hack madly on the

' =z:==:===ZZ^^\h a»d threw them into coninfantry com m e U Froissart , B wguds , we fllsi°,H^ elude that in a quarter of an hour *f£ tSTX band of the best chivalry of T«nce in complete armour, got within the F nf the English bow, not a dozen of them raDg .live For there, he says, were archers of v&«Uni " vites et legers de traire tous ensemE si epaissement que nul ne se osoit m lonvoit mettre en leur trait." And in another s!ce after describing their extraordinary skill, 1 'ivs "the French could do nothing against ben whatever-had no means of escaping ,iieii the division under the Duke of Normandy «,s brouclit to a standstill, which the archers then slaughtered as fast as they could draw the b"lsTow the rifle is a weapon incalculably more { rt werful than the bow, skill in its use is infitftely more easy of acquisition, and it can be used by a weak man just as efficiently as by a stroll"- one. The ground at Inkermann exposed the attack of the Russians in such a manner, that not one ball from a rifle could possibly have foiled in hitting some one or other. The steady coolness of the English character qualifies them before all other men for its use: and had. our illustrious 8,000 men have been armed with it at Inkermann, and used it as their ancestors did the bow at Poictiers, we leave any one to judge whether they would have given a worse account of the barbarians before them than their ancestors did of the finest and noblest army which Fiance ever set on foot. — Examiner.

Married. —On the 23rd instant, at Christclmrch, by the Rer. O. Matthias, Thos. Walker Wilkinson, Warren Farm, to Elizabeth, youngest daughter of the late James Eeeve, Esq., White House, Higham-on-the-Hill, Leicestershire, England.