dence of low velocity was the lodgment of
an undeformed bullet. There is little doubt, moreover, that the general
tendency of wounded men was to minimise the range of fire at which they
were struck, and again that in the majority of cases in this campaign it
was quite impossible to determine whence any particular bullet had come,
since the enemy was seldom arranged in one line, but rather in several.
Again, smokeless powder was generally employed. Beyond this, in some
cases where there was no doubt of the short distance from which the
bullet was fired, the wounds were due to 'ricochet' of portions of
broken-up bullets. The following instance well illustrates this. A
sentry fired five times at two men within a distance of six paces,
knocking both down. One man received a severe direct fracture of the
ilium, the bullet entering between the anterior superior and inferior
iliac spines and emerging at the upper part of the buttock. The entry
and exit apertures were large but hardly 'explosive,' as a subcutaneous
track four to five inches long separated them. Besides this both men had
other lesser injuries; thus in the second two perforating wounds of the
arm existed. The latter were not unlike type Lee-Metford wounds, and
were regarded as such until a few days afterwards when a hard body was
felt in the distal portion of one track and removed. This proved to be a
part of the leaden core only, and the similar wound had no doubt been
produced by a like fragment, the bullet having broken up on striking the
stony ground.

_Trajectory._--The comparative flatness of this depends on the
construction of the rifle and the propulsive force employed, and varies
as does velocity with the nature, excellence, and amount of the
explosive, the correctness of the principles upon which the bullet is
devised, and the mechanical perfection of its manufacture. Its
importance naturally consists in the manner in which it affects the
possibility of covering objects on a wide area of ground and thus
creating a broad 'dangerous zone.' A bullet fired on level ground from
any one of three of the rifles referred to later (Lee-Metford, Mauser,
Krag-Joergensen), sighted to 500 yards and fired from the shoulder in
the standing position, will cover some part of an erect man of average
height during the whole extent of its flight. A body of men within that
distance is therefore in a position of extreme peril in the face of a
good shooting enemy.

The impor