With one exception, nothing is left to the imagination of the soldier.
He forms visible "fours," he lunges at visible and very resistant dummies at bayonet drill, and he shoots at a visible target. The only part of his training that is left to his imagination is the actual flight of the bullet from the rifle to the target.
Theoretically he knows that it has a curved trajectory, but no recruit, and very few trained men, would think of firing from the prone position at 500 yards with squad drill going on anywhere between 300 yards and the target. The possibility and safety of this was demonstrated very effectively on Sunday afternoon at the Rifle Range.
Marksmen from various units were served out with "tracer" ammunition in the proportion of three tracer bullets in every five rounds Starting at the thousand yard range, then on to 500 and 200 yards, they fired' between six and seven hundred rounds of mixed ammunition at a meuiey of moving targets at the butts—walking men, crouching men, heed and shoulders, a field gun, etc. There was a large crowd of spectators, many old shots among them. who watched with great interest throughout the practice The traced bullets were fired m full daylight and appeared as very distinct white puffs from the muzzle to the target, showing the extraordinary height-to which 1 bullet ascends in its flight of a thousand yards. Even at £00 yards it was made plain that troops even in the standing position between the firer and the enemy were quite snite from being hit provided that the firing was reasonably accurate.
A visit to the butts after the firing showed that about 25 per cent. of the rounds fired were effective, and when it is remem bered that a third of the total number was fired at tv thousand yards at targets that were barely visible to the un practised eye the value of the shooting may be appreciated. Colonel Gordon and Major Stewart directed the demonstration, and the fire control was under Lieut. Birdwood.
The value of a percentage of tracer ammunition at musketry meetings was made apparent, only very few of the: volunteers can ever be ina position to view such a demonstration as that of Sunday to advantage.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.