overlooked or neglected during the preliminary training. As our own
soldiers will have to contend with the same conditions, I may mention
some of them.

One of the first things we discovered was that while all the
small-arms ammunition issued was made pursuant to uniform
specifications, furnished by the War Office, a large percentage of it
was manufactured in new, hastily equipped factories, by partially
trained workmen, and while it was apparently near enough to the
standard to pass the tests exacted by the inspectors, only an
extremely small proportion would function properly in machine guns or
other automatic arms. A few of the old standard brands, made in
government arsenals or by the prominent, long-established private
manufacturers, could be depended upon at all times, but,
unfortunately, these brands were comparatively scarce and hard to get.
At least seventy-five per cent. of what we received was the product of
the small, new and ill-equipped factories, established under the
press of war demands, and, while it appeared to work satisfactorily in
the ordinary rifles, both Enfield and Ross, it was utterly useless for
machine guns. The difference of a minute fraction of an inch in the
thickness of the "rim" would break extractors as fast as they could be
replaced, while various other irregularities, so small as to be
undiscoverable without the most accurate measurements by delicate
micrometers, would cause stoppages and the breaking of different small
parts. And, at that time, spare parts were almost unknown, so it
required the utmost ingenuity on the part of the gunners to improvise,
with what materials could be found on the spot, and with the very few
tools at hand, many of the small but all-important parts that go to
make up the interior economy of the guns.

All automatically operated firearms are, of necessity, very delicately
balanced mechanisms. Whether gas or recoil operated, there must be
just sufficient power obtained from the firing of one shot to overcome
the normal friction of the working parts, eject the empty cartridge
case, withdraw a new cartridge from the belt or magazine, load it
properly in the chamber and fire it; continuing this action as long as
the trigger, or other firing device, is kept pressed or until the belt
or magazine is emptied. Ammunition which does not give the proper
amount of pressure or cartridges which, through faulty manufacture,
cause an undue amount of friction, either in