A TERRIBLE WEAPON OF WAR.

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 397, 7 November 1868, Page 2

A TERRIBLE WEAPON OF WAR.

Dr Gale, the celebrated blind inventor, who not long ago discovered a simple method of rendering ordinary gunpowder inexplosive, has invented an ammunition gun of the most destructive character.—" The principle of working the invention is very simple. The weapon forms a kind of skeleton lirearm. The stock, barrel, and hammer, are in their accustomed places, but where the common revolver has its circular breach for the reception of cartridges, Dr Gale's gun or pistol contains a blank square-shaped spaco for the reception of a horizontal metal slide of very simple yet ingenious construction, enclosing the cartridge. As the cartridges are fired one by one, the slide by a self-acting mechanical action passes on through the hollow space in the stock, until the last cartridge having been used, a fresh slide, filled with cartridges can be instantaneously employed. In this way one hundred and forty shots per minute have been actually fired by Dr Gale in preser.ee of the Duke of Cambridge. Each slide contains ten or more cartridges, and is entirely distinct irom the firearm. The process of reloading the slides is extremely simple and safe, a child being enabled to perform the task with ease, and to keep the' firer fully supplied with ammunition. Of the value and efficiency of the invention there has been expressed but one opinion. The llinina Journal declares it calculated not merely to increase the fame of Dr Gale, but "to prove of enormous advantage in the science of warfare," a sentiment echoed by nearly every practical scientific writer. The Morning Herald, assuming that the weapon would discharge sixty shots per minute, says that, armed with weapons on the Gale principle, f a single regiment of infantry would literally and absolutely pour forth a veritable storm of bullets ; for, assuming such a regiment to be eight hundred strong, it could certainly throw forty-eight thousand bullets in the face of its enemy in a single minute of time ; and as few men would relish facing a body of weapons which gave him sixty shots a minute as his own particular chance of death, with a reasonable probability of ah extra and large percentage of chances against him as his comrades fell, we only hope that this invention may be an additional link in that chain of destructive powers which may in the end make war too dreadful a game for nations to play at.' Taking however, one hundred and twenty shots per minute each man, the discharge of the eight hundred soldiers would be O6\GOO per "minute,, or 5,760,000 per hour! Could anything more descruc- ! five, more terrific, he imagined than [this apparent hell-storm of d.ath? | A regiment thus armejl would almost | be enabled to annihilate an entire army 1 of opponents." — John Plnmmer's Story I of a Blind Inventor.'

A very distressing occurrence took place recently at Goldsborough. A little boy aged about two and a-half years, the son of Mr Malloy of the Inter-National Hotel, was missed from his home at about half-past six o'clock in the evening. On inquiries being made it was ascertained that nobody in the township had seen him since five o'clock. Becoming alarmed, Mr Malloy with a few friends, instituted a search, and about eight o'clock discovered the child floating in a waterhole, near the Police Camp, quite dead. Nothing to show how the child got into the waterhole was found, but the general surmise is that while playing about its edges he must have slipped in, and as nobody saw himfall in,< or heard his screams, no assistance could be rendered, and the poor little fellow was drowned.

An American paper states that Colonel Chivington, of St Joseph, Nebraska, having recently married his son's widow, her friends have published " a card," in which they say : —" The criminal act of John M. Chivington, in marrying our daughter, Mrs Sarah A. Chivington, the widow of Thomas M. Chivington, was unknown to us, and a thing we very much regret. Had the facts been made known to us of the intentions, some measures would bavo been taken to prevent the consummation of so vile an outrage, even if violent measures were necessary. We are informed that gold has been struck by M'Go wan and party, on a Terrace south of Hatter's Terrace. It appears the gold was struck in the roof of their tunnel, and the prospect obtained is considered very satisfactory. All this is evidence confirmatory of the opinion generally expressed of the continuance of the North Lead towardjs Waimongaroa.