of battle,
to load and fire as rapidly as possible, and thus to waste the greater
portion of his shots, whereas the primary object at such a time is to
induce the deliberation which alone can insure efficiency. It must be
obvious to any one who reflects upon the matter, that in reality the
whole question of efficiency in battle must hinge upon the one point of
precision of fire. It is well known that in actual service not more than
one shot in six hundred takes effect, and, except for the moral effect
of the roar of the musketry and the whistling of the balls, the
remaining five hundred and ninety-nine might better have been kept in
the cartridge-boxes. Upon raw troops, for the most part, this moral
effect is sufficient to decide the question, with the addition of a
comparatively small number of killed and wounded. But veteran troops are
not disturbed by it. They know that a ball which misses by a quarter of
an inch is as harmless as if it had never been shot, and they very soon
learn to disregard the whistling. When they encounter such a fire,
however, as the English met at Bunker's Hill and at New Orleans,--when
the shots which miss are the exceptions, and those which hit, the rule,
no amount of discipline or courage can avail. Disciplined soldiers are
no more willing to be shot than raw levies; but having learned by
experience that the danger in an ordinary action is very trifling in
comparison with its appearance to the imagination of a recruit, they
face it with a determination which to him is inconceivable. Make the
apparent danger real, as in the cases we have cited, and veterans become
as powerless as the merest tyros. With the stimulus of the present
demand, it is probable that Yankee ingenuity will erelong produce some
kind of rifle so far superior to anything yet known as to supersede all
others; and indeed we have little doubt that such would already have
been the case, but for the fact that comparatively few of our most
ingenious mechanics are also expert riflemen, and none but a first-rate
shot can thoroughly appreciate all the requirements of the weapon.

Since the Crimean War, the Governments of Europe seem to have become
awakened to the fact, that, however important and desirable it may be to
secure the best possible implements for the soldier's use, it is
infinitely more so that he should know how to use them. In the hands of
a marksman the rifle is an efficient weapon at half a mile's distance;
but t