fort-Smashing Howitzers.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 22, 19 March 1915, Page 2 (Supplement)

fort-Smashing Howitzers.

Since the great German howitzers crushed like egg-shells the famous steel forts at Liege and Antwerp, these weapons have l>een regarded as the most destructive instruments participating in the war. Everything is huge about a howitzer. It weighs fifteen tons, fires shells weighing 7601b., and its lift, barrel ejects a projectile for a distance of ten miles.

The tremendous weight of the howitzer makes it very difficult to transport, for it cannot be hauled over bridges which will not withstand a load of fifteen tons, and these masses of steel have a habit of falling through roads, on account of their terrific weight. They have to be moved across country very slowly. Tn fact, they are dragged from point to point by mechanical vehicles, a* horses could not possibly move them. To facilitate the movements of howitzers over rough ground, their wheels are encircled by linked steel plates called girdle-;, which enable the weapon to drag "■self over uneven ground like a huge

caterpillar. These slabs of metal also act as cushions when the gun is fired. The thick, stubby barrel of the howitzer always points skywards, for it sends shells up into the air like rockets, so that they will drop on to the object aimed at. When the 7601b. projectile is sent on its way the recoil is tremendous, but it is swallowed up by a complicated arrangement of compressed aircvlinders. The weight of the gun and the fact that its carriage is anchored to the ground also enable the weapon to withstand the shock of firing without toppling over on its gun-crew. SILK FROM"SEAWEED. Dr. L. Sarasin has succeeded, according to "La Nature," in making artificial silk from the "slime" of the seaweed which is thrown up in immense masses' on the coasts of Normandy, Norway. Scotland, and Canada . An English company is said to be exploiting the process, for which a great future is predicted.

who was the first pilot to make a flight from the deck of a warship (the ill-fat-ed Hermes), does not wait for weather conditions to be favourable, or chances of danger to be reduced to a minimum. I He flies when it is necessary to fly, and ' takes the risk. Even when he is unable to fly, he again takes risks with a sporting dash, and goes off, as he has done, on a motor car to attack and round-up Uhlans. Indeed, the sporting note is the actual difference between the German aviator and the British. Not only do our men go up on machines and in weather that would give our enemy's fliers a very bad attack of "'cold feet,"' but while they ■ are on their flights they still act in a thoroughly national and sportsmanlike v.ay. It is a point to note that when Squadron-Commander Spencer Grey, 1 A.N.A.S.. and Flight-Commander Charles Herbert Collet, R.M.A., R.N.A.S., Hew to Cologne in the unsuccessful attack on the Zeppelin sheds, when Comj leander Spencer Grey, Flight-Lieuten- : am R. L. (i. Marix, and Flight-Lieu- ; tenant S. V, Sippe flew to Dusseldorf I and destroyed a Zeppelin, as well i'S ' during the successful flight Tind attack made by Squadron-Commander W. Briggs and Lieutenant Sippe on the Zeppelin sheds at r'riedrichshaven, not one bomb was dropped on any of the touns flown over. This does not seem remarkable, but it is, because the British fliers had every right to drop bombs. The towns were fortified—like Paris — and they may be bombarded. The British, did not choose to bombard them because they did not consider the killing of non-combatants quite •.lie game; it wasn't sporting. The British will not even use the steel arrows which the airmen of the other nations drop from great heights,-and which, wl.en they strike a person, pin him to the ground. Here, too, they think it hardly sporting. They have and will blow up railways, ammunition trains, cavalry squadrons, etc., where necessary, the while they run the gauntlet of "Archibald," the huge anti-aircraft gun which spits shrapnel at them with deadly accuracy, but they show a keen aversion to killing non-combatants. It seems sentimental—a sickly attitude through German eyes —but the fact remains that they have gained their "individual ascendancy'" without sacrificing the sporting spirit for which the raco is renowned. BRITONS SCORE BY DOTNG THE | "DIRTY WORK" THEMSELVES. ! Moreover, the British airmen enter into their craft in a practical way that is foreign to tin 1 autocratic German mind. As an International expert once said. "They are not afraid of being (lily." The German officer walks deliberately about his machine, fearful that a careless speck of petrol or grease will contaminate his gentlemanly caste. The British—such a Briton, for example, as Squadron-Commander Wilfrid Briggs, who damaged the sheds and their contents at Friodrichshafon, was wounded, brought down, and captured—does not mind grease at all, as long as he can learn. I havo often seen Commander j Briggs in old and grimy clothes 'messintr about' with his machine. He talks little, but works much. True, he gets ! extraordinarily oily: but the work that ! man has done for practical, scientific I aviation is enormous." That is the sportsman again. He is not above his work. As the cricketer does not send bis servant in to bat for him. so the British aviator does not order his man in p"o the dirty work. He knows that by iloin." if himself he scores. Finally, bound un with their sense of sportsmanshin. their utter fearlessness, and their daring, there is always the

inherent cense of seamanship in their Mood. They have in their very fibres the craft and the traditions of all the captains of old. They have a natural genius for the sea and for seamanship. A man like Lieutenant Collet, a true British type, a man so reserved that he U known in the aerodromes as " The Silent Aviator/' a man so modest that he will run away rather than he surrounded by a crowd of adoring spectators; a man like this is an instinctive seaman, which, means that he is also an instinctive aviator. Lieutenant Collet can not only shape a course by the compass, but he can shape one without it. His training and his inheritance of the sea (he comes, as many of our fliers do, from a family that has given generations to the "First Arm") enable him tn choose and guide himself by landmarks, or by lights, or even, if these are obscured, by the stars. He could fly his way without map from Hendon to Constantinople, if he were called upon to do so: and he can steer himself over unknown tracts of country with ease, where another pilot would be hopelessly lost. He is but one of many of bis typo and skill. The British Flying Arm is made up of men who are seamen and fliers and sportsmen, too. That is why they have trained their "individual ascendancy." The German may have the finest machine in the world; hut the British have the finest aviators. When the British set a machine worthy of their merit, thev will conquer and rule the air as they have conquered and ruled the seas.