Lords Sitting of 23 February 1905

ADDRESS.
The King's Answer to the Address of Tuesday the 14th instant reported; and Address and Answer to be printed and published.

PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.
The LORD CHANCELLOR acquainted the House, That the Clerk of the Parliaments had laid upon the Table the Certificates from the Examiners that the further Standing Orders applicable to the following Bills have been complied with:—Cardiff Railway [H.L.]; Charing Cross and Strand Electricity Supply Corporation [H.L.]; City of London Electric Lighting Company [H.L.]; Cordoba and Rosario Railway [H.L.]; East Cowes Gas [H.L.]; Entre Rios Railways [H.L.]; Gosport and Fareham Tramways [H.L.]; Hastings Harbour District Railway (Abandonment) [H.L.]; Metropolitan Electric Supply Company (Acton District) [H.L.]; Metropolitan Electric Supply Company (Various Powers) [H.L.]; North Metropolitan Electric Power Supply [H.L.]; Truro Water [H.L.]; West Cumberland Electric Tramways (Extension of Time) [H.L.]; Workington Harbour and Dock [H.L.].
And also the Certificate that the Standing Orders applicable to the following Bill have been complied with:—Clyde Navigation.
The same were ordered to lie on the Table.
Clacton-on-Sea Commissioners Bill [H.L.]. Read 2a, and committed. The Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
Hastings Harbour Bill [H.L.]. Read 2a, and committed.
Mansfield Corporation Bill [H.L.]. Read 2a, and committed. The Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
Municipal Corporations (Merthyr Tydfil Scheme Confirmation) Bill [H.L.]. Referred to the Examiners.

RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.

  NAVY (ESTIMATES).
  Estimate for the year 1905–1906; with explanation of differences;
  Statement of the First Lord of the Admiralty explanatory of the Navy Estimates, 1905–1906.

  HOUSE OF COMMONS (VENTILATION).
  Report and recommendation by Dr. M. H. Gordon.
  JUDICIAL STATISTICS, ENGLAND AND WALES. 1903 (PART II. CIVIL JUDICIAL STATISTICS).
  Statistics relating to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, the House of Lords, the Supreme Court of Judicature, County Courts and other Civil Courts, edited by Sir John Mac-Donnell, C.B., LL.D., a Master of the Supreme Court.

  COLONIES (GENERAL).
  Further Papers relating to the proposed adoption of a metric system of weights and measures for use within the Empire (in continuation of [Cd. 1940], February, 1904).
  Presented (by Command), and ordered to lie on the Table.

  MOTOR-CAR ACTS, 1896 AND 1903.
  General Order made by the Local Government Board for Ireland, entitled "The Heavy Motor-Car (Ireland) Order, 1905."

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (IRELAND) (GENERAL ORDERS.
  General Order entitled "The Union Accounts Order, 1905."
  Laid before the House (pursuant to Act), and ordered to lie on the Table.

  SERVICE OF MILITIAMEN BILL [H.L.]
  THE EARL OF WEMYSS: My Lords, I beg to give notice that on the Second Reading of the Militia Bill I shall move the following Motion, "That in the opinion of this House it is contrary to sound policy to tamper with the Militia forces, and alter, as is intended, its conditions and terms of service."

  SEAMEN'S AND SOLDIERS' FALSE CHARACTERS BILL [H.L.]
  House in Committee (according to Order).
  Bill passed through Committee and reported without Amendment to the House.
  THE UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (The Earl of DONOUGHMORE): My Lords, this Bill, excepting for one small drafting Amendment in Clause 3, is exactly the same as that which your Lordships passed last year, and I would, therefore, ask your Lordships to negative the Standing Committee.
  On Question, Standing Committee negatived, and Bill to be read 03a to-morrow.

  THE NEW SERVICE RIFLE.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH,who had given notice to call attention to the new service rifle and to move to resolve, "That in the opinion of this House whatever convenience a shortened rifle may afford to mounted troops it is inexpedient that the whole of His Majesty's Forces should be armed with the recently approved short rifle," said: My Lords, I feel that I am making a great demand upon your tolerance in referring to the subject of the new rifle now, I think, for the third time in the last ten months; but I asure your Lordships I do so because I am honestly convinced that a grave and costly blunder is about to be perpetrated, and I am really anxious that you should help me in, at any rate, causing the War Office to hold their hand before they finally adopt this weapon. Gutta cavat lapidem, and I do trust that the drip of my persistence may have some effect in wearing away the stony prejudice and rocky non possumus attitude that the War Office have adopted towards all the propositions that have been put forward by those, either soldiers or sportsmen, who have really some practical knowledge of what a rifle should be.
  The question of the rifles divides itself naturally and easily into three parts. First, there is the question of improvements that have been made in the rifle, improvements which are admitted by all,
  1020
  and which were not to be found in the long rifle as it was used in the South African War. Then there are a series of, as I think, defects, which are common to the two rifles. But, after all, I wish to impress upon you that it is not proposed to introduce a new rifle. To all intents and purposes you are simply going to continue the old rifle with a shortened barrel. Lastly, there are the series of considerations that arise from the adoption of the shortened barrel, and the arguments to be brought forward for and against that change.
  Now, taking the improvements first, I can deal with them in but a sentence or two. You have, in the first place, the new backsight. The new backsight is a very good backsight, and one that I think His Majesty's forces are very fortunate to have acquired. Some of my military friends say that it is too good a backsight, and that it is useless giving the soldier a wind-gauge on a good backsight because he will not know how to use it, and would, therefore, be much better without one. My answer to my military friends on that point is that the sooner they teach the soldiers to use the new backsight the better, and if they use the facilities given them for improving their shooting by this backsight we shall be very much benefited in any future war. Then there is the improvement introduced of loading the magazine from a charger, by which, at a single motion, five cartridges are introduced into the magazine. We who have criticised the magazine rifle from its introduction have always maintained that a magazine rifle should be loaded by a charger in that way, so, at any rate, that is one thing we have got after this fourteen years struggle. Lastly, there is what I think ought also to be regarded as an improvement, and which is really involved by the use of the charger, namely, the abandonment of what is known as the dust-cover, which was quite a superfluity and was no good for the purpose for which it was intended. These, I think, everybody admits to be improvements, but they do not involve any great expense. I imagine that these improvements could be applied to any one of the existing long rifles now used by His Majesty's forces for about, I should think, 7s.—3s. or 4s. for the backsight, and 3s. or 4s. for the alteration necessary

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  to make the charger; at any rate, the cost of substituting the new backsight for the present one, and enabling the magazine to be loaded by a charger, would not be great, and would not involve any large amount of new manufacturing plant.
  Now, my Lords, I come to what I hold to be defects which have existed in the action and stock of the rifle from the very beginning, and which now, though you are by way of introducing a new weapon, you have deliberately determined to continue in that new weapon. In the first place, there is the weakness involved by the stock being in two parts. There is no other military rifle in the world which has this arrangement except the French Lebel rifle. I think most of you who are accustomed to using sporting rifles and guns would think it a very extraordinary thing to use a rifle the stock of which was in two parts fastened together with a screw going through the weakest part of the stock. The next thing I come to is the complicated bolt, with its very weak fastening. We have admittedly the most complicated bolt that is in use in military weapons, and the one that has the weakest fastenings. Go to any gunmaker you like and he will tell you it would not be safe to increase the strain thrown on the bolt of the British rifle, whereas the bolts of foreign rifles would certainly bear 25 per cent, more strain than that which could be borne by the British bolt. What is the reason for that? It is because the fastening of the British bolt is made at the end of the bolt, whereas in the foreign forms of bolt the main fastening is made at its head in the breech of the rifle itself. Two lugs fit in and lock the bolt tight at the place where the strain is greatest, namely, at the breech end of the barrel. Your great rifle-makers here in England are all now manufacturing magazine rifles of ·360 or ·375 bore, which take a heavier bullet and also a larger charge of explosive than is used in the ·303. Ask any one of them whether they would use the British rifle-action for such a weapon and they will tell you no. They will tell you that they will go to the Mannlicher or the Mauser for the pattern of the weapon. Then a small change has been made in the safety
  1022
  catch; but I invite any one of your Lordships to look at the new rifle with its present safety catch and tell me whether it is a comfortable one to use. I think the answer will be that it is a thumb-injuring and nail-breaking sort of article. I would ask you also to compare it with the safety catch to be found on the Mannlicher or Mauser rifle, which has a flap lying at the back of the bolt; it is moved from right to left easily, and certainly, however cold your fingers may be, it is evident at a glance whether it is on or off. Then, my Lords. I say we make another mistake in clinging to our clumsy, cumbrous, flimsy magazine. I think the British magazine is an excrescence and an eyesore on any rifle. I can quite understand, before you adopted the charger method of loading, that a big magazine was a good thing. The rifle was used with a cut off as a single firer, and the magazine was to be reserved for emergency. With the charger we have dropped that theory altogether. The rifle is fired straight from the magazine. You cannot load a magazine with ten cartridges from a single charger, and I say the size of the magazine ought to be measured by the number of cartridges you can put into it at a single motion. As it is now, if you want to fill your magazine with ten cartridges, you have to take, first, one little packet of five cartridges in the one charger, and press that into the magazine. You have to move the charger with your hand. You then have to take another little packet of cartridges in another charger and press that into your rifle, and then your magazine is full. I maintain that it is possible to keep up quite as rapid a fire if you have a magazine that holds only five cartridges. I am quite confident that there would be no loss in rapidity of firing by adopting that system, and then you could have your magazine safely stowed away in the forehand of the rifle, the same as in the Mauser, liable to no injury and offering no impediment to its handling.
  I think that, perhaps, the strongest argument against the perfection of the British type of rifle is the fact that no other nation has adopted it. All over the world nations are choosing rifles. The bigger nations have special patterns

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  of their own. The less civilised and the smaller nations have to, and do, adopt the inventions of other countries. They naturally give great pains to the choice. They carry out many experiments before they adopt a particular weapon. You will find that of all these nations not one has adopted the British rifle. You may say, "Oh, well, after all, foreign nations do not know much about it." Then I say, go to the British gunmaker, the British marksman, and the British sportsman. A great deal of the sporting shooting is now done from these very magazine rifles; and I am sure you will find that for one sporting rifle that is made on the British pattern, twenty or twenty-five are made on the Mannlicher or Mauser pattern. In the same way, if you go to the great target marksmen, though I admit that some of the Lee-Enfield pattern are used for target work, I think you will find that the majority of the great British marksmen do use rifles made on the Mauser or Mannlicher patterns in preference to the British one. I think these are strong arguments in favour of my theory that even the action of the British rifle is not all that it might be and could be improved.
  Up to the present moment I have, of course, been dealing with matters which appertain to the notice I have put on the Paper, though they do not appertain to the Motion. My point is this, that you have decided to adopt a new weapon only to this extent, that you have taken your old weapon with a shortened barrel. All the faults, if there be faults, in the old system of magazine and in the old system of bolt are retained, and I do say if you are going to spend this large sum of money in re-arming the Army, you ought to have considered thy question whether you could not improve the rifle, not only in the barrel, but also in the stock and action. I leave that part, and come now to the question of the short barrel. What was the genesis of this short barrel? It had its origin in the place which has been the origin of many troubles to us in the past, and I am afraid may be also the cause of troubles in the future—South Africa. In South Africa it was found that the British mounted soldier armed with a carbine was absolutely unable to cope with a mounted Boer armed with a
  1024
  long Mauser rifle. That was not wonderful. A carbine, so far as it goes, is no doubt a very pretty little weapon, and up to 600 yards may be very good; but, of course, it could not compete with the long rifle in South Africa. So our cavalry adopted the long rifle and used it, and a way of carrying it on horseback was extemporised. It was carried rather after the fashion of a lance—the stock dropped into a small shoe, and the top part of the barrel fastened by a strap to the arm of the soldier. That, I believe, was successful, and I understand that the cavalry soldiers in South Africa were very well satisfied with their long rifle and with the way that it was carried. But, my Lords, it was decided that it was absolutely necessary, in order that the rifle should be carried comfortably by the cavalry, that it should be a short rifle. It was supposed that a convenient way of carrying the rifle could not be discovered unless it was a short one. I can quite understand that it is easier to carry a short rifle on horseback than a long one, but here is an extraordinary thing. This rifle has now been introduced for two years; it has been in the hands of a considerable body of troops for certainly eight or ten months, and yet at the present moment the method of carrying the rifle on horseback has not been discovered.
  THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (The Earl of DONOUGHMORE): Yes, it has.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: The noble Earl the Under-Secretary of State for War says it has. Well, is it to be carried in the new long bucket?
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I do not know whether we are thinking of the same bucket; but it is to be carried in a bucket which is different from the old one.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: The new long bucket, which is a big and clumsy contrivance, necessary on account of the length of the rifle, once more involves the rifle being attached to the saddle of the horse instead of to the man. Now, I do not care who disputes it, however

  1025
  great the authority, but for service purposes the rifle of the cavalry soldier should be attached to himself. When a man is thrown from his horse it is well that he should have some weapon with him—a sword is no use to a man on foot. If it is decided to carry the new rifle in a bucket attached to the saddle you will be very much injuring the effectiveness of the soldier to whom you give that rifle. We had some little discussion on this point in your Lordships' House last session. I think the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, Earl Roberts, whom I now see on the Cross Benches, told us, while, I think, expressing concurrence with our view that the rifle should be attached to the soldier, that his idea would be that the rifle should be carried one way in peace time, namely, in a bucket attached to the horse, and in another way in war time, namely, attached to the man. I know it is very audacious and impertinent of me to set any opinion of mine against that of the noble and gallant Earl, but I do appeal to you as impartial men to say whether it is not wise that soldiers should be accustomed to their accoutrements in peace time, whether the whole of the training of a soldier in peace time should not be to make him ready for war?
  I have carried many different rifles, in many parts of the world, on horseback, and you cannot make it a very comfortable or pleasant thing to carry a rifle a horse. It must mean a certain amount of discomfort and difficulty. That being admitted, surely it is desirable in ordinary training during peace time that you should accustom your cavalry soldier to that amount of discomfort which is to be inflicted on him in war. Therefore, I say that if once you admit that you have to carry your rifle in time of peace in a bucket for convenience or beauty's sake, whereas in war time you must carry it attached to the soldier, then I say you have condemned the bucket system altogether, and ought not to have considered it. As a matter of fact, by shortening the rifle you have made it impossible to carry it in the way in which it was carried in the South African War. The lance attachment method, as it was called, cannot be used with the short rifle because the rifle is too short, but there are methods of carrying it. I have
  1026
  seen one myself. I have no interest in this particular method, and I do not say it is perfect; but it seems to me there is a great deal to be said in favour of it, or in favour of an improvement by the adaptation of it. It is an attachment which has been invented by Colonel Patterson. With that attachment the rifle is carried in a sling at the left side of the man. Just below the cantel of the saddle a metal clip is placed. The rifle hangs on the soldier's left side, and when he mounts the horse he presses the small part of the stock into this clip. The whole weight of the rifle is thrown on to the clip. On the right side the sword is fixed to the saddle, so that the weight of the sword, on the one side is balanced by the weight of the rifle on the other. I have seen that equipment tried. I had a corporal of a cavalry regiment, in my own garden, and tried the equipment in every way that I could. He got off on the right side and also on the left side; he fell off on one side and then on the other; and he fell over his horse's tail. Noble Lords laugh. I would point out that he did it on purpose. So far as I could see, however the soldier might fall, the rifle always came away from the attachment on the saddle and left him perfectly free, the rifle itself remaining attached to the man. I know that attachment has been tried at various military centres in England, and I believe that, on the whole, the decision has been against it. It has been said to be weak in places and to damage the small part of the stock of the rifle round which the clip is fastened. Well, I should like to ask the noble Lord the Under-Secretary if he could give me the report which Lord Kitchener has made upon this equipment.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I have not got it here.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: Well, I may tell the noble Earl that this attachment has been already largely adopted in India, and that no less than 26,000 Patterson equipments have gone to India arid are in use there. I think that is a strong argument, I am not saying in favour of the Patterson equipment, but in favour of the view that it is possible to discover a method by which the rifle can be

  1027
  carried comfortably, or fairly comfortably, on a horse by the soldier, and yet when he is thrown from his saddle the rifle shall remain attached to the man. That, it seems to me, is what we have to aim at if we wish to get the best possible weapon attached in the best possible way to a cavalry soldier. And I may say that with this particular form of attachment it does not in the least matter whether the rifle is a long or a short one.
  The next point put forward in favour of this rifle is that it is, on account of its shortness, much lighter than the existing one. The short rifle is one pound four ounces lighter than the old rifle, and really to hear the advocates of the new rifle speak you would imagine that this extra lightness had been obtained by the shortening of the rifle. I am going to give your Lordships the exact figures, as to the amount of lightness that has been obtained in that way. The thirty-inch Lee-Enfield barrel, ready for mounting, weighs two pounds twelve ounces. Five inches is taken off this barrel; that is to say, one-sixth. Well, one-sixth of forty-four ounces is just over seven ounces. Therefore, if you take a sixth off the barrel you save seven ounces in weight; but the part of the barrel that you are taking this off is the part near the muzzle, which is the lightest part; so that, as a matter of fact, the amount saved in weight by shortening the barrel is just six ounces, or three-eighths of the total lightening, which, apparently, is all set down to the shortened barrel. As a matter of fact, the greater I portion of the lightening of the rifle has been attained in a totally different way. The stock has been lightened by boring away the wood, the dust-cover has been done away with, and, as I understand, the rifle barrel itself has been pared down. Whether that is a very wise tiling to do I do not quite know. My point is that you have no right to claim that the lightening of the rifle is due to shortening the barrel, because that only accounts for six ounces out of one and a quarter pounds which the rifle has been lightened.
  Then it is said that this rifle makes an extraordinarily good weapon for snap-shooting, because it is short. In the first place, I would point out that when you
  1028
  come to snap-shooting for military purposes it means that you are shooting at, say, between 200 and 800 yards, and then you would find nobody standing up and shooting from their shoulder. They would all be taking the best cover they could possibly get, and in that way obtaining a rest for their weapon. I think you will all agree with me that the handiness of a weapon for snap-shooting does not depend on its length. It depends on its balance, and, whether it is a gun or a rifle, the handiness of it for snap-shooting does not depend primarily on the length, but on the general way in which it comes up and the general balance of it. I think any of you who will take up this rifle will say that it is not exactly what you would call a very well-balanced rifle. I think you will find, as those gentlemen who took it down on the 11th of this month to Bisley found, that there is considerably too much weight forward to make it in any sense a particularly well-balanced, handy weapon. The mere fact of shortness certainly does not make it better for snap-shooting, especially when you consider the form of the foresight, which is about as little adapted for the purposes of snap-shooting as the sight of any weapon could be.
  This brings me to the question of the sights. I have said that the backsight is a very good sight, but, my Lords, I look upon the foresight as being an extraordinarily bad sight. In the first place, you have arrived at a sort of crescent-shaped excrescence, which is there no doubt for the purpose of protecting the foresight. It certainly protects it from injury from outside, but also most successfully protects the foresight from the light falling upon it, and I defy any man in a bad or failing light to make good shooting with it; and when you come to the question of hurried shooting you would find a man apt enough to take one of these horns and use that as the foresight instead of the real foresight, which lies between the two. Again, you cannot get over the unanswerable criticism that by the reduction of the length of your barrel you bring your foresight and your backsight so close together that you infinitely increase the difficulty of shooting. You cannot bring back the backsight nearer the eye, because

  1029
  you would then get a blurred backsight. It is well known that the longer the radius you can get between the backsight and the foresight the more you reduce the variation of error caused by the unsteadiness of the man or the fault of his aim. For these reasons I cannot see that there is much to be said for the short rifle from the point of view of the man who has to aim with it.
  Again, there have been certain changes made in the rifling of the rifle in order to maintain the old velocity. There are two small changes. In the first place, the lead from the chamber into the grooving has been shortened. The result of that is naturally to cause the bullet to go with less ease into the grooves and so set up a greater expansion of gas behind it. I am certain that the result will be a greater amount of erosion in the first part of the barrel, and you will have more and quicker damage done to the rifling at the breech end of the rifle than you have at present. In the last fourteen inches of the barrel the rifling has been deepened from ·005 inch to ·0065 inch. I do not want to go into the question of what effect that may have on the ballistic qualities of the rifle. I think it will make it much more difficult to clean the rifle. Already it is difficult enough to clean one of these small bore rifles in which the new explosives are fired, and I think by deepening the groove towards the muzzle you will experience great difficulty in thoroughly cleaning the groove. A rifle should be always cleaned from the breech, and therefore whatever you push through the early part of the rifle from the breech will be very apt not to reach the bottom of the groove towards the muzzle, and you will find that that will have its effect also.
  Now I come to the ballistic qualities of this new barrel. There is no necessity for me to argue about it or to bring forward any proofs, because I have all the proof I want from what is said by those who are responsible for the rifle. All that is claimed for the rifle is that it has ballistic qualities equal to those of the rifle which it is replacing; that is to say, while the muzzle velocity in the Lee-Enfield barrel amounted to 2,000 foot-seconds, that
  1030
  same muzzle velocity is retained in this new rifle. It seems to me that that alone is sufficient condemnation for the adoption of the new rifle for the whole of the Army. Why should we stick to results which were attained fourteen years ago? Rifles in other countries are attaining velocities up to 2,800 foot-seconds. The last German result was 2,845 foot-seconds with a bullet of 156 grains. It is well known both in Germany and France that these great velocities have experimentally been obtained, and I say that before we adopt a new rifle for the whole of our Army we ought to go into full experiments to see whether we, too, cannot get these high velocities.
  I put the ballistic qualities of a perfect rifle for military purposes under four heads—(1) a low trajectory; (2) a long range; (3) force of impact; and (4) accuracy; and the reason why I put accuracy last is that any well-made rifle barrel will give you quite sufficient accuracy, and indeed more accuracy than any but very expert shots can get the benefit of. With regard to trajectory, every hundred yards that you can bring within the fixed sight distance increases the effective power of your troops, and makes it easier for your soldiers to shoot properly and straight. I gave the noble Earl last year some trajectory tables which bear out that now, certainly up to 600 yards, you do not get above the, level of the head of a man with the last new weapon, the last new explosive, and the last new bullet. That is a tremendous advance. That is the sort of thing we should aim at. Then I say extreme range is of the greatest importance. I know that at extreme range you cannot hope for accurate shooting. There is no question of firing at individual men or even at individual bodies of men. An army armed with a rifle that carries 300 or 400 yards further than that of its opponents would have a tremendous advantage. I will tell you why. It would have an advantage because it would be able to plant an enormous number of bullets into a particular area, the result being that it would by that means force the enemy to deploy very much sooner than he otherwise would. I think it is perfectly evident that the sooner you can force

  1031
  your enemy to deploy, the better it is for defence.
  I know it is said that in this; country it does not matter so much about our having these long-range weapons, because if we are attacked here we shall be attacked in a country which is full of small enclosures and in which, hedges abound. I believe it is just as important for us to have the long-range weapons as it is for anyone, because, after all, supposing that we are attacked we shall have to take up prepared defensive positions; all the obstacles will have to be cleared away in front of those prepared defensive positions, and therefore exactly the same conditions will obtain as in a more open country. It is evident from our experience in all our distant small wars that the longer range we can get the better it will be. I want to know something about these trials of which we have heard so much. Lately a report was put in from Hythe which gave the figure of merit obtained by the new rifle in competition with French, German, and Italian rifles and with the old long rifle. I want to know more details about how those trials were conducted. I want to know whether they were conducted with rifles fired from fixed rests; what sights the rifles were provided with; whether the new British sights were fixed to all the rifles, so that they were all fired under similar conditions, or whether each had the sight belonging to its own pattern; and, lastly, whether any trial was made with what I may call an improved long rifle, because that, I think, is also very important.
  If the trials were made from fixed rests I think they lose very much of their value, because in the case of rifles fired in that way the effect of the short distance between the backsight and foresight is greatly diminished. Again, for a practical military weapon you should have the trial from the shoulders of the man firing it. What you want is to see how the rifle is going to behave in the hands of an expert man. Rifles are very strange instruments, and they have little idiosyncrasies of their own, and those of us who have shot with a rifle well know how much one's shooting varies according to the rifle one is using. Therefore, I say that a trial from a fixed rest is not a sufficient trial. What you
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  want is to try a rifle from the shoulders of the man, and under conditions such as would prevail in the field. That brings me to the trial which was reported in The Times newspaper on Monday. It seems to me to have been an extremely satisfactorily conducted trial by seven men, who would be admitted to be capable and expert shots. They used three of the new short rifles, they each used their own long rifles, and they used three of the old long rifles fitted with the Peddie wind-gauge sight. The result of these trials was that the long barrel fitted with the wind-gauge sight came out first; the long barrel as used without the above came out second, and the new short rifle came out third, and that was at ranges of 200, 600, and 800 yards. I should like to read your Lordships the heads of the conclusions arrived at by these gentlemen after the trial. They were as follows—

  1. "That the new rifle is badly balanced, the-weight being too much at the muzzle end.

  2. That far from being likely to prove a better snap-shooting arm, it would be easier to fire quickly with the long rifle at any given object because the sights of the short rifle are not adapted to quick-firing, the front sight being too small and greatly interfered with by the enormous protecting flanges on each side

  3. "That the recoil was considerably heavier than in the long-barrelled rifle, and would greatly add to the difficulties in teaching recruits on the range and render it more tiring.

  4. "That the accuracy of the rifle as a weapon of precision is appreciably diminished, for all experienced the same difficulty in keeping the series of shots within the small limits of angle obtainable with both the long-barrelled rifles employed.

  5. "The trials lasted nearly all day, and as evening approached (but before sundown) all noticed the great flash of flame from the short barrel, whereas with the long rifle no flash could be seen."

  I do not know whether that last conclusion was justified or not, and I am not going to found any very strong argument upon it. What I hold is, if it is true, that the fact of the flash in a bad light is certainly not advantageous to the man firing the rifle. It shows where he is. But there is this stronger point, that if there is a flash of that sort it shows there is a large amount of unconsumed gas being wasted, and, therefore, you are not getting the full benefit of the charge you are using, which seems to me a very strong argument against this particular

  1033
  rifle allow these conclusions to speak for themselves.
  Then there comes this further point that by cutting your rifle short you deteriorate your weapon when the bayonet is fixed. You lose five inches in length for the short rifle with the bayonet fixed to it is five or six inches shorter than that of any other rifle used by a military Power. I know it will be said that that is very easily got over. All you have to do is to lengthen the bayonet. I hope that is not a plan that will be adopted for dealing with this particular difficulty. In the first place, you will probably find yourselves again brought face to face with twisting and doubled up bayonets, and next you will find a great deal of deterioration in the shooting power of your weapons, because you cannot get over this fact, that directly you fix a bayonet on a rifle pro tanto a change is made in its shooting power and the conditions are altered, and the longer the bayonet the greater the variation.
  Now I come to the question of cost. This is going to be a most expensive amusement for our country. We have been told that these new rifles are to cost in Government factories £3 10s. and in private factories £4 10s. These are high prices for rifles, and surely they are high prices for a rifle which is not a new rifle, but an old one with a new barrel attached to it. We were told last year that the reason of this high price was that the manufacture of a new rifle involved a quantity of new machinery and apparatus. So far as the barrel is concerned, no doubt a certain amount of new apparatus is required, but with regard to the main part of the rifle, to three-fourths of the rifle, there is no new machinery required, because it is exactly the same weapon, manufactured under exactly the same conditions and to exactly the same pattern. It is said that it costs £2 5s. to convert a rifle, and that the total cost of re-arming His Majesty's Forces with this new weapon will be something like £3000,000. For this, as I say, you are not going to get new weapon; you are not going to get a weapon that is even going to fulfil the objects for which it is adopted, because I do not believe it will be any more convenient for the cavalry to carry
  1034
  than the old one. If you are to arm the cavalry with this new short rifle instead of with the carbine, I, for my own part, do not, raise any objection; but, because you are going to give the cavalry a better weapon, that is no reason why you should force the rest of His Majesty's Forces to have a weapon which I do not think is quite so good as, and which, at any rate, is not better than, the one they have got. I do hope your Lordships will support me in the Motion I have made. All I want you to do is to express an opinion which will check the issue of these rifles to our infantry and our Navy. A great many of them have been made. I admit that the position of the cavalry with this, rifle will be much better than with the old carbine. Let them have it. But it is unnecessary and inexpedient to throw a heavy charge on the nation to rearm His Majesty's Forces with a weapon which at the best, is no better than the one they now have. I beg to move the Motion standing in my name.
  Moved, That, in the opinion of this House, whatever convenience a shortened rifle may afford to mounted troops, it is inexpedient that the whole of His Majesty's Forces should be armed with the recently-approved short rifle.—(Lord Tweedmouth.)
  EARL ROBERTS: My Lords, I was under the impression when I came to this House that the question at, issue was whether the long or the short rifle was the most suitable for our Army. I did not know that the question was to be raised as to how that rifle was to be carried. As the noble Lord has mentioned that matter and has referred to me, I can on that point satisfy him that I am absolutely with him as to the necessity of the rifle being carried on the man's back, or, at any rate, attached to the man in some way or another. When I spoke last year I had tried in vain to get some arrangement by which the rifle could be attached to the man. Experiments had been tried over and over again at Aldershot, and one after another had condemned what I think the noble Lord calls the Patterson equipment. That, I believe, was due to some fault of the clip. But so anxious am I still

  1035
  that some arrangement should be found by which the rifle may be carried attached to the man in some way or another that I have been in communication with Lord Kitchener on the subject; and he tells me that, although the attachment is not absolutely satisfactory, he is convinced that it is the right way in which the rifle should be carried.
  I did at that time relate to your Lordships why I first became convinced that the man must have his rifle attached to him. It was in Afghanistan, where I found that when a horse was killed or fell and the man was therefore dismounted he was separated from the only weapon he could use on foot. I myself directed that a sling should be attached by which the carbine—which he had in those days;—should be carried at a man"s back. I am certain we must have some attachment by which the rifle can be carried, not in a bucket on the horse, but by the man. When the man is on horseback he uses his sword and when dismounted he uses his rifle, and it is essential he should have that rifle with him, or he will be without means of defence. I will give a short account of how and why the shortened rifle came into existence. The origin was not, as the noble Lord thinks, in South Africa. Poor South Africa answers for many shortcomings, but the short rifle was thought of many years before the war was contemplated.
  I am sure that all soldiers, and everyone interested in the efficiency of our Army, must be grateful to the noble Lord for bringing prominently to notice a matter on which that efficiency so materially depends. No one, if I may say so, has a better right than the noble Lord to initiate a discussion on this important subject, for not only is he himself an expert rifle shot, but he has on more than one occasion shown considerable knowledge of rifle manufacture. It was as Mr. Marjoribanks in the House of Commons that the noble Lord in 1890 brought forward a Motion criticising the proposed change from the Martini-Henry to the Lee-Enfield rifle. The noble Lord then based his objection to the new rifle on its cost, the smallness of its bore, its system of rifling for the peculiar kind of ammunition it had been decided should be used for it, its system of breech
  1036
  action, and its complexity and method of working. As a matter of fact, my Lords, the rifle in which the noble Lord found so many faults proved in practice to be a most admirable weapon, and when writing from South Africa in 1900 to the Marquess of Lansdowne, then Secretary of State for War, I expressed the following opinions with regard to its utility—
  "There is no need, 1 think, to be anxious as to the Lee-Metford rifle; our men arc quite satisfied with it, and the Boers show their appreciation of it by using it instead of their own Mauser whenever they get the chance. It can. however, I believe, be improved upon without in any way impairing its shooting power, by shortening, lightening, and adding a clip. The Lee-Metford has stood the test of war in a marvellous manner. It has been in the hands of Irregular troops who, in many instances, have not taken proper care of it, and yet, in no instance that I have heard of, has there been any complaint as to jamming, miss-fire, or inaccurate shooting."
  Nothing, my Lord", could, I think, be more gratifying or more encouraging to the members of the Small Arms Committee than to find that their labours had not been in vain, and that the rifle, on the construction of which they had devoted so much time and care, had proved eminently satisfactory on service.
  I trust that the noble Lord will excuse me if I express a hope that the objections he now raises to the shortened rifle may prove as groundless as those he pronounced against the introduction of the Lee - Metford rifle fifteen years ago. That rifle, indeed, underwent the same troubled course as the shortened rifle is now going through, and it was several years before any decision was arrived at as to whether the Martini-Henry rifle should be superseded. Several more years were then spent in perfecting the rifle. It underwent trial after trial to make certain that it was in all respects suitable for military purposes. Shortcomings were discovered and remedied, but finally an Army Order was issued doing away with the Martini-Henry rifle and adopting the Lee-Metford in its place. Then, my Lords, came the attack in another place to which I have just alluded.
  If I shall not be trespassing too long on your Lordships" patience I will explain to you as shortly as I am able how and why the shortened rifle has

  1037
  come into existence. The Lee-Metlord rifle was introduced in 1889. Six years afterwards the Chief Inspector of the Small Arms Factory proposed that a new pattern carbine with bayonet should be prepared to supersede the long rifle, on the grounds that, as the carbine then in the service fired the same ammunition as the rifle, was equal in accuracy, superior in handiness and portability, it would be a better arm than the rifle. The Army Board considered the proposal and refused it on the ground that the length of the barrel was insufficient to ensure the entire combustion of the charge.
  In 1898 the question was revived" and the then Commander-in-Chief (Lord Wolseley) stated that he was not prepared to entertain any proposition for shortening the rifle, although he would like to see it lightened. It was decided to try if this could be done, and the following arms were prepared: (a) Service long rifle reduced in weight from 9 lbs., viz., to 8 lbs. 5½ ozs.; (b) ditto reduced in weight to 8 lbs. 6 ozs.; (c) a short rifle, reduced in weight to 7 Ibs. 12½ ozs. and with the barrel shortened by 6¼ inches; (d) a short rifle the same length as the carbine, weight 8 Ibs. 7 ozs. These four rifles were submitted to a Committee, constituted as follows—viz.: President, Colonel Ian Hamilton; members, Col. The Hon. F. Stopford, and Col. W. N. Lockyer; Secretary, Captain Lloyd. This Committee was formed to consider and report upon the question as to the best practicable method of modifying the design of the present service magazine rifle so as to produce a lighter weapon.
  Of these four anus the Committee chose (c), namely, a short rifle reduced in weight to 71bs. 12ozs. and with the barrel shortened by 6¼ inches, and asked for another similar to this one, but still further lightened, for trial. Twelve of each pattern were ordered, but the outbreak of the South African War prevented the matter being further investigated, and nothing was done until the receipt of the following telegram from me, dated Pretoria, October 10th, 1900, to the Secretary of State for War—
  "As a large number of rifles will have to be made, I would suggest that they should be of the pattern recommended by the Committee of
  1038
  which Colonel Ian Hamilton was president, as I understand this pattern rifle is about to be adopted for the Native Army in India. The new rifle must certainly be loaded on the clip system, and the only question is whether the calibre might not be advantageously still further reduced."
  A new Small Arms Committee had, in the meantime, been formed, and had taken up the question of improving the long service rifle. In their Report, dated July, 1900, they raised the question, amongst others, whether in preparing a new pattern of rifle it should have a shorter barrel and longer bayonet in order to be suitable for all services. A decision on this Report was postponed for my return from South Africa, and the Committee continued experiments with a lighter form of long rifle with charger equipment and new sights.
  This rifle, together with one five inches shorter, was submitted by the Committee to the Director - General of Ordnance, who, in forwarding it on to the Adjutant-General on January 8th. 1901, minuted as follows—
  "Experiments at Hythe with the barrel shortened six inches have shown that the shortened rifle shoots equally well up to 1,000 yards. Lord Roberts telegraphed from South Africa that future rifles should be with shortened barrels. At the same time there was a general feeling among the cavalry in South Africa that they were handicapped by having the carbine, which has a barrel nine inches shorter than the service rifle, and the Inspector-General of Cavalry asked for a longer carbine. It is hoped that the rifle now submitted will meet the requirements of both cavalry and infantry, and thus enable them both in future to be armed with the same weapon. Longer and shorter bayonets were also submitted."
  The Adjutant-General chose the short rifle and short bayonet, and I concurred in the choice on January 10th. 1901. One thousand of the shortened rifles, as well as long and short bayonets, were then ordered for trial.
  This, my Lords, is the story of the shortened rifle up to the time it came to be selected as the one likely to prove most suitable for universal use in the Army, provided that its efficiency in all respects passed the proof of exhaustive trials. These trials were carried out during 1901, under the following instructions—
  All trials are to be carried out in comparison with service rifles. Volley firing will not be

  1039
  used. Every firer will be allotted a service rifle and a shortened rifle. Every practice will be executed first with the shortened rifle and at once afterwards with the service rifle (or vice versa), in order to secure similar conditions of light, wind, and atmosphere. Firers should not be changed during the trials unless unavoidable. The sub-heads of report are to be adhered to and numerical order kept. All firing trials will be reported on in such detail as may be necessary, but deductions from these trials should be embodied under the various sub-heads which apply to them. The sub-heads should be carefully studied, in order that all points to be reported on may be observed during each trial."
  "Although the magazine of the shortened rifle will hold ten cartridges, only five will be loaded into it at one time, except as directed in trial No. 8 (c).
  "Firers must be trained in charger loading with dummy cartridges before carrying out trials in rapid fire. The shortened rifle will be loaded by charger in all trials.
  "Rapid practice will not be carried out until all deliberate trials have been completed.
  "Reports to be on foolscap, typewritten if possible, and on one side of the paper only.
  "As many sighting shots as are needed should be allowed in trials where they may be required.

  TABLE OF FIRING TRIALS.
  "1. Deliberate fireat 200, 500, and 800 yards at regulation targets. Position—any. Seven shots per rifle at each distance. Results to be recorded as in annual course of musketry. Registers to be kept and retained for reference.
  "2. Snap-shooting practice under the same conditions as practice 10, Provisional Course of Musketry, Table B, 1902. Seven shots per rifle.
  "3. Vanishing practice under the same conditions as practice 9, Provisional Course of Musketry, Table B, 1902. Seven shots per rifle.
  "4. Moving practice under the same conditions as practice 14, Provisional Course of Musketry, Table B, 1902. Eight shots per rifle.
  "Trials 2, 3, and 4 to be carried out twice; each trial on a different day. Results to be shown as averages. Registers to be kept and retained for reference.
  "5. Fire at objects large and small, coloured to harmonise with background at varying distances up to extreme range obtainable locally, in bright and dull light, and in falling evening light. This trial is intended especially to afford comparison between the bead and the Service Barleycorn foresight, and to test hood sight protector. Results to be shown in any convenient form.
  "6. When range is obtainable, fire at about 2,000 yards at a prepared area of ground, either of close cut rolled turf, or sand, or at a large canvas screen laid horizontally, the area not to be less than fifty yards by fifty yards. A target for aiming purposes should be placed on
  1040
  the prepared area of ground or screen. Fifteen rounds per rifle. Results to be shown as percentages of hits to rounds fired. Dial sights to be used. Registers to be kept and retained for reference. Arrangements to be made locally.

  RAPID FIRE.
  7. Trial with fixed bayonet to test the method of bayonet attachment and the result on shooting. 2nd Class target at 200 yards. Thirty rounds rapid fire. Five selected firers. Applicable to shortened rifle only.
  "8. (a) Rapid fire for one and a half minutes at a 2nd Class target at 200 yards. (b) Rapid fire for three minutes at a 1st Class target at 600 yards, (c) Repeat (d), commencing with a full magazine in the shortened rifle and recharging it with ten cartridges.
  "Results shown as averages. Registers to be kept and retained for reference.
  "In these trials note especially if the hood interferes with rapid alignments of sights, especially when D sight is raised at 600 yards."
  In order, my Lords, to satisfy you that both in the construction of the shortened rifle and in the manner in which the trials were carried on the officers concerned were in no way trammelled by orders from the War Office, I must ask your leave to read extracts from a letter I received a day or two ago from the officer who was Commandant at Hythe and a member of the Small Arms Committee for the greater part of the time these duties were being carried out. Colonel Pennington writes—
  "The correspondence (The Times February 3rd) pictures the Committee as a body oppressed by instructions from the War Office which injuriously limited their field of action and tied them to a narrow issue. This is incorrect and misleading. During my first six months I was in doubt on certain points, and thought it my business to express my views to General Brackenbury. General Brackenbury entirely convinced me that we were dead on the right lines. Trials later on fully confirmed this. The Committee was in no way unreasonably tied down or limited. It was asked to deal with the whole question in the only manner which was practicably possible—The Committee would most certainly have condemned the short barrel had it not given complete satisfaction, and had they not considered it an improvement on the long barrel. The War Office is accused of conducting trials with a view to suit a foregone conclusion. This is almost too foolish to reply to. All trials were suggested by me personally and were amplified by suggestions made by the Committee, who, being nervous about the short barrel, suggested the widest possible trial. The scheme for trials was then accepted by the War Office not directed. My sole idea in framing the Hythe and Army trials was to leave nothing undone to discover defects. The Hythe Staff, as a body, commenced

  1041
  trials with a bias in favour of the long barrel. I believe no trials could be more thorough, more truly comparative, or more practical. The Committee could not have, taken up the question of a new type of rifle. It was urgent to deal with the defects in our rifle which the war had brought to light, the chief one being absence of charger loading. The short barrel came up in the connection and was eventually accepted on its merits."
  During these trials certain shortcomings were observed in the shortened rifle, and in December twelve more rifles, modified accordingly, were tested at Hythe in comparison with twelve Lee-Metford rifles. The Commandant at Hythe reports that these trials were conducted with rigid impartiality, the short and long rifles being fired alternately, so as to ensure absolutely similar conditions. These trials proved the shortened rifle to be equal to the service rifle in accuracy.
  As a further test, my Lords, and to ascertain the opinion of infantry soldiers, it was decided to issue 1,000. shortened rifles to the Army at home for trial, and on March 17th, 1902, a programme for these trials was approved. The trials were carried out at Aldershot, Dover, Portsmouth, and Curragh, Dublin, and Cork, by the various regiments stationed at those places, and by the Royal Navy, and in November of that year the Small Arms Committee reported that they did not regard any further trials as necessary, and that as a service weapon they considered the short rifle superior to the long rifle. My Lords, it was on receipt of this decided opinion, given by the War Office"s expert advisers, that I, as the Commander-in-Chief, recommended to the Secretary of State for War that the shortened rifle should be introduced into the service to replace both the Lee-Metford rifle and the carbine. In July, .1903, reports were received from Somaliland that the short rifle which had been issued for trial in that expedition had stood the test well. It was said that—
  "The men like it and shoot well with it."
  I have now explained to you, my Lords, the reasons for the proposed change, and I have enumerated the measures taken to enable us to arrive at a correct conclusion as to the fitness of the selected weapon for general use in the Army.
  Up to the time, my Lords, of the recent appearance of the correspondence in The Times dealing with deficiencies supposed to have been discovered in the new rifle, I had no idea that it had been thought to be in any degree faulty. Since the appearance of that correspondence, I have used every effort to discover whether there, are grounds for the objections brought forward by those who, for the most part, are experts as to the requirements of a match-shooting rifle rather than to those of a service weapon Lord Kitchener, to whom I telegraphed on the subject, replies—
  "As far as I have been able to test it, the new rifle fulfils requirements. In my opinion it is a better balanced, handier, as well as a lighter weapon, and more suitable for a man on the Indian frontier than the long rifle."
  And yesterday this further telegram was received from Lord Kitchener—
  "The 7th Division at Meerut has been practising with the new rifle since the 11th. and ail ranks speak highly of it."
  This testimony, my Lords, as far as it goes is satisfactory, but in view of the doubts raised in the minds of the public and the Army as to the value of the new weapon, and as it is essential that our soldiers should not be required to take the field armed with a rifle in which they do not entirely believe; and as 1 am at least as anxious as anyone can be that they should have the best rifle that can be procured, I most earnestly hope that His Majesty"s Government will consent to such further tests as will definitely solve the doubts which now exist.
  To this end, my Lords, I would suggest that a certain number of civilians (if possible, the very same gentlemen who so patriotically went to Bisley a few days ago to ascertain whether the theoretical complaints advanced against the new rifle were well founded), should shoot against a similar number of soldiers at Hythe, each party firing with the long and short rifle alternately up to a distance of 2,000 yards, and also a certain number of rounds of snap shots at short ranges. The programme must, of course, be prepared so that the trial may be carried on as far as it is practical under service conditions, in order that the qualities claimed for a short and light rifle may be practically illustrated. This, I think,

  1043
  could not fail to enable the country to arrive at a definite conclusion as to whether the long or the short rifle is the best weapon for military purposes.
  THE EARL OF ERROLL: My Lords, I do not share the very gloomy view taken by the noble Lord who introduced the Motion now before the House. I maintain that the superior lightness and handiness of the new rifle constitute a very great improvement on the old rifle, and I venture to say that this improvement has been acquired without any loss either of range or accuracy. It is admitted that it is the best weapon for the cavalry, and I venture to think it will prove a boon to the infantry soldier on service. The idea has got abroad that it is an unserviceable and an altogether bad weapon. This opinion has been fostered by the Press.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: I beg the noble Lord"s pardon; I have never said it was a bad rifle. I wish it to be quite understood that I have never said that.
  THE EARL OF ERROLL: I beg the noble Lord"s pardon. In the very temperate speech he made he did not condemn this rifle as a bad one. What I am referring to are the comments that have been made in the Press, and which seem to point out that this rifle is a really bad weapon, and that the Government has been accused of giving a weapon to the Army which places the soldier at a great disadvantage in comparison with soldiers of other countries. I do not hold this opinion at all. It is generally taken for granted in the Press that the cutting off of five inches from the rifle must necessarily reduce the accuracy and the range, and the alteration in the groove has been altogether ignored. In judging of a military rifle there is one point which I think we should never lose sight of, and that is the great difference there is between match shooting and service conditions. For shooting at Bisley a rifle has to be carried perhaps a few hundred yards, while on service men have to carry their rifles long marches and often make an attack immediately afterwards. It by no means follows that a rifle which is a good rifle for match shooting is necessarily a good rifle on
  1044
  service. The cardinal requirements of a rifle for service are handiness and lightness, consistent, of course, with sufficient accuracy to give the soldier confidence in his weapon. Target shooting at home under comfortable conditions is very apt to make us forget this fact. We do not want a match-shooting rifle. What we want is more of a sporting rifle, and I venture to think that if anybody picked up this rifle he would much rather take it out stalking than the long rifle which the infantry have at present.
  For these reasons I attach very little importance to the trial which took place a few days ago at Bisley. If these seven match-shooters had marched twelve or fourteen miles first, and had then made an attack across a heather and crawled up to the position from which they were to shoot, I think their opinions would carry much greater weight. Another reason why I think these conditions were not quite fair was that as far as one can see these gentlemen had never practised with a short rifle before, and I think that it is only just to the rifle that it should be tried by persons who have had considerable practice with it. Men always find the drag-pull-of a difficulty at first, though it is almost universally approved of when they have become accustomed to it. I was down at Windsor yesterday, and I questioned some of my old regiment on this new rifle, and they were all warm in its praise. Last year the Blues shot a match against the Coldstream Guards, the Blues using the short rifle and the Coldstream Guards the long rifle, and the Blues won the match. It is true that there was a return match afterwards which they did not win. I have not got the figures, but I was assured that there was very little in it one way or the other. This, I think, proves anyhow that the short rifle is not an unserviceable weapon.
  Turning to the statement of those gentlemen who shot at Bisley the other day that this rifle is badly balanced, I certainly cannot agree with them. I think if you take up the two rifles and put them to your shoulder you will find that the short rifle comes up very much better than the old one. The only way for your Lordships to judge of that is to try it yourselves. I wrote to a friend of

  1045
  mine who is in charge of an infantry battalion asking his opinion about this rifle. Whilst being unable to speak as to the shooting of the rifle in his own regiment, which has not been supplied with it, he says—
  "My officers who have been recently at Hythe are warm in praise of its use and accurate shooting. I have handled it and it is a most handy and simple weapon. I fancy the wood casing will require care for fear of damage by falls, and the backsight must also be put down or it will break off. It is extremely light, and I am in favour of it. I do not think the short distance between the backsight and the foresight will affect accuracy of shooting. I have one beside me now and I do not think there can be a better weapon."
  This is the expression of opinion of an officer who is at present in command of a battalion. He is a good sportsman, and has seen service in all parts of the world. With regard to snap-shooting, I rather agree with the noble Lord that the sights are a little difficult, but I think that could very easily be remedied. I notice that the noble Lord said nothing about the recoil. I think he admitted last year that the recoil was so small as to be absolutely no detriment to the rifle at all. As to the flash, I have no experience of that. I think the noble Earl the Under-Secretary of State for War will be able to explain it. There was something said in The Times the other day about Colonel Hutton, who had been on the Small Arms Committee, shooting with a long rifle. I have seen that rifle. It is very long and heavy, and I do not think that those gentlemen, if they had made the march that I have suggested, would have approved of it from its weight. Besides, it is in no sense a military weapon, because it has no sights on it at all. I venture to think the opinion of military experts, backed up by the trials which the noble and gallant Earl the late commander-in-Chief has told us of, and further confirmed by the experience of the rifle in Somaliland, should carry greater weight than the opinions of this self-constituted and irresponsible body of gentlemen who went down to Bisley and in one afternoon solved the whole problem, which, I think, we will all allow is very difficult and very complex.
  THE EARL OF LONSDALE: My Lords, we have heard many descriptions
  1046
  of the new rifle, and everybody seems to agree that it is a good one; but I understand that it is not a question whether the rifle is a good one, but whether it is a serviceable one, and I think it would be of very great benefit to the country if we knew to what extent the Government or the War Office are responsible for the new arm. I am sure no body of men are more anxious to benefit the country than the experts at the War Office. It may be the case that they have only under order enough rifles to supply the cavalry. If that be so, that is almost an answer to the noble Lord who moved the Motion now before the House, for surely it would be simple enough, if that be the case, to let the cavalry try the rifle and postpone the issue of the rifles to the infantry till a later date.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: My Lords, even had there been no debates raised on this subject last year by the noble Lord opposite, I should not have been surprised at a debate such as we have had this afternoon being raised at any time. All re-armaments bring into public notice with considerable prominence the views of two schools of thought. There is, first of all, the school of thought which I would venture to call the Army school—military opinion, which has its views as to what sort of weapon is required for the Army. Then there is the second school, the school which regards a weapon chiefly from a sporting point of view, from the point of view with which, I think, rather naturally, it would be regarded by the majority of your Lordships. This particular school has another wing attached to it consisting of those whom I should respectfully call target experts. Whenever rearmament has been proposed we have invariably seen a considerable contest between these two schools of thought. I was reading the other day a debate which took place in your Lordships" House on March 1st, 1867. It was initiated by the noble Marquess whom I see opposite. Lord Ripon. He asked certain questions with reference to what was then the new rifle—the Schneider—and the Under-Secretary quoted in his answer the military opinion which at the time was supplied to him by the then

  1047
  Commander at Aldershot, Sir James Scarlett. Sir James Scarlett said—
  "I consider the present pattern an admirable weapon and perfectly efficient when well made and well handled."
  That is the same sort of answer that we have to give to-day, and it satisfies the critics no more than Sir James Scarlett's opinion did then, for I find that Lord Dalhousie, who followed, expressed considerable dissatisfaction with the rifle. I cannot help saying, by-the-by, that Sir James Scarlett was evidently a strong-minded soldier, who was not afraid of saying what he thought, for in the latter part of the extract quoted he said—
  "My only regret is that the correspondents who furnish information on military matters to the Press do not first make themselves acquainted with the subjects on which they write."
  In 1871 there was a similar discussion with reference to the Martini-Henri, which was then being introduced, and in 1891, when the Lee - Metford was brought forward, the same critics who are now so strongly criticising the new rifle expended considerable energy in criticising the Lee-Metford. The noble Lord opposite, Lord Tweedmouth—I daresay he remembers it—initiated a debate in the House of Commons which has already been referred to by the noble and gallant Field - Marshal, and he attacked the Lee-Metford up hill and down dale, if I may put it so, and expressed his love for the Mauser rifle, a love we know he strongly feels. He informed the Secretary of State for War, Mr. Stanhope, that he could obtain these for £3, and I think he even went so far as to recommend that we should adopt these rifles, and your Lordships will probably remember that last year the noble Lord mentioned Mausers again, and quoted the price at from £2 16s. to £2 18s.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: That was consistent.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Yes, an excellent example of the growth of the evil of "dumping" into this country. Mr. Stanhope, in reply, quoted the Adjutant-General of the day, who stated that the Mark II. weapon was
  1048
  a thoroughly satisfactory one in every way, but the noble Lord was still not satisfied, and he raised the subject again in the following year. And now, my Lords, we have the same controversy. Why do these two schools always differ? I claim that their views are divergent because their needs are divergent. They regard the rifle from an entirely different point of view. What, my Lords, are the needs of the sportsman? A sportsman needs a rifle of supreme accuracy; an ordinarily accurate rifle does not suit him. It is not only necessary to hit your beast but you have to hit him in the right place. Weight does not matter to the sportsman very much. An extra pound more or less is immaterial, because he does not carry his rifle; he employs a man to carry it for him.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: That does not apply to me.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Then I congratulate the noble Lord. He is a very exceptional Scotsman. It does not matter a bit to the sportsman whether or not the rifle is complicated. There is a comfortable gun room upon the hill, with all modern appliances for cleaning the weapon and carrying out all repairs that it may require. What, my Lords, are the needs of the target expert. It is again of primary importance to him that he should have an accurate weapon. A few inches in accuracy at a thousand yards may make all the difference between success and failure. A few extra pounds in weight one way or the other do not matter to him. He has only a few yards to walk to the firing point. It does not matter if the mechanism is complicated; he has the most skilful gunmakers in the world always at hand ready to carry out small repairs, which, of course, are far more frequent in a complicated weapon than in a simple one. It does not matter to him if the weapon is delicate, for he does not go out shooting in boisterous weather.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: Oh!
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Well, does he?
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: Yes.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Ah, Yes; but under an umbrella. How different his needs are from the needs of the soldier on active service. It is quite true that the soldier needs an accurate rifle. In this possibly I go further than the noble Lord, but I am ,quite prepared to take his admission that as long as it is a good accurate rifle it is good enough for the soldier. But, my Lords, he has other needs quite as great as the need for accuracy. First of all, there is the question of weight. I maintain that to the soldier a single pound is of cardinal importance. He has to carry his rifle for long marches, sometimes for forced marches, in all temperatures, in all climates, in Canada, in India, and in the Far East, and he has to carry at the same time a great many other things. I claim, therefore, that it is of cardinal importance that you should consider the weight of a rifle when selecting one for the soldier.
  Again, my Lords, a delicate rifle is of no use to the soldier. The Army needs a strong rifle that will stand knocking about from its master, who is, after all, rather a robust practitioner, not over skilful in mechanical niceties. He needs a handy weapon for snap-shooting, for shooting et moving objects, for a mêlée, for hand to hand conflicts such as you do not meet with upon the plains of Bisley. Therefore, I claim that there are cardinal necessities which must be considered in selecting a rifle for the Army that never come into the heads of Your sportsmen or your target experts, but which must be given full value by your Lordships in deciding such a matter as this. I might mention in passing that our late foes in South Africa, I am told, found the long rifle not quite so handy as they liked, for I believe many rifles which we had lost and which they had taken into use were found lying about, subsequently, and that almost invariably a great deal of the wood under the barrel had been cut away in order to increase the handiness of the rifle. I only mention this in passing as a testimony from those whom we are always having quoted to us as great rifle experts.
  I maintain, my Lords, that the only true test--and in this one can welcome the support of the noble and gallant
  1050
  Field-Marshal-of the rifle for the Army is one made under service conditions. We have had such conditions in Somaliland, and the fact that there is a practically unanimous voice in favour of this rifle and against the old rifle surely should be allowed to have considerable weight in this matter with your Lordships. The noble and gallant Field-Marshal has made it perfectly clear that the attack which has been made upon us of adopting this rifle for the cavalry and subordinating the interests of the infantry is an unfounded one. He has also made it perfectly clear that there was no doubt in the minds of the military authorities in 1901 when this rite was recommended for adoption, and I think it right to inform your Lordships that there is a similar absolute absence of doubt in the minds of our military advisers at the present moment. There is no hesitation in the mouths of my colleagues on the Army Council in saying that this is the rifle that they want for the Army.
  Now, my Lords, I come to some of the detailed criticisms which have been put forward by the noble Lord opposite, and I will do my best to follow such an expert as he is into the very minute details into which he has entered. I would only like to say one thing with reference to the policy of foreign nations. The noble Lord states that no one has adopted our rifle. That is true, but a foreign nation that has re-armed since we commenced re-arming has adopted, not only a short rifle, but a rifle shorter than our short rifle, I mean the Swiss. I admit that the Swiss have not a large army, but they are a nation of marksmen, and have always been held before us as such, and are we not permitted to say that this is perhaps a sign on the other side as to the way things may trend? There is also the United States. In 1898 the United States adopted a short rifle. It is quite true they have stopped the issue, but, if you read the extracts from the American newspapers, you will find that they have stopped the issue not because they are dissatisfied with their rifle, but because they are dissatisfied with their bayonet. As far as we know-of course we have no official reports; but as far as the American newspapers tell us-the United

  1051
  States have stopped issuing their short rifle because they are dissatisfied with their particular bayonet.
  Now, my Lords, the noble Lord, in the first sentence of his speech, spoke with considerable feeling, complaining that none of the improvements suggested had been adopted by the War Office. He did not use the word " pig-headed," but I think he considers us pig-headed because we have not adopted some of his improvements. But three minutes afterwards the noble Lord congratulated us on having adopted charger-loading, of which he has been an advocate for years past. Adopting his advocacy of charger-loading is a very bad way of refusing ever to adopt any improvements that are suggested to you. We are often told that second thoughts are best, and in this matter I prefer the noble Lord's second thought.
  Now with regard to the accuracy of this short rifle. The noble Lord asked about the trials. I was not present at the trials and I find a difficulty in answering all his minute questions. My impression is-I think I am informing the noble Lord rightly-that those trials were carried out not from a fixed rest-if I understand properly what a fixed rest is. I think they were carried out from the shoulder but on a tripod.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: With a rest.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: But they were not in a vice. But, my Lords, I would like to say one word with reference to the results of some further trials which were placed in my hands yesterday, and which I think will prove very satisfactory to your Lordships. I would make one remark with reference to this return, and that is that the comparison in it between the short rifle and the foreign rifle is a fair one because it is a trial of one rifle. We have great difficulties in carrying out trials with foreign rifles owing to the difficulty of getting ammunition. The comparison between the long rifle and the short rifle is not a fair one. The short rifle trial is a trial of one rifle, but the long rifle trial is the ordinary trial of twelve rifles. Therefore I do not think that that comparision is a fair one.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: Had the long rifle the new sights?
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I think not, but I shall be able to say something about that presently in another connection. I have here the results of a number of trials-some nineteen or twenty in all-which have recently been carried out in connection with experiments upon a different point, and therefore I may perhaps claim that they are less open to suspicion upon this point. They had been carried out with a number of different bullets with which we had been experimenting. They were all new rifles, very carefully selected, six of each sort-six against six. Of course, in the figures that I will quote to your Lordships, the same bullet and the same ammunition will have been used in each rifle where one is set up against the other. They were 20 shot diagrams at 600 yards. With the present bullet the long rifle gives a figure of merit of 93⅓ in. and the short rifle 7⅓ in., or 2 in. in favour of the short rifle; second trial, 9⅗ in. long rifle, 8 in. short rifle, a difference of 1⅗ in.; third trial, 81¾ in. long rifle, 8⅔ in. short rifle, which is practically the same, being a difference in favour of the short rifle of 1/12 in.
  LORD WENLOCK: Will the noble Earl say whether the sights were I identical?
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Certainly not. I am quoting the old rifle against the new rifle as issued to the troops. I have seventeen or eighteen further trials with which I will not trouble your Lordships, but the total result is 8⅖ in. for the long rifle and 7⅘ in. for the short rifle, a difference of ⅗ in. in favour of the short rifle. I do not want to press that further than to say that these trials distinctly show that the short rifle is not worse than the long rifle, and that in the majority of cases it comes out better than the long rifle. Therefore it is not straining the result to say that the short rifle is not the worse of the two.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: But you cannot compare them unless you put the same sights on the rifles.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I think it is a perfectly fair comparison; it is comparing the rifle as issued to the troops, and I say that we will have a better rifle than the long rifle with which they went to South Africa. I do not want to put it further than that.
  THE EARL OF WEMYSS: May 1 ask as to the extreme range?
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I am coming to that; I was speaking only as to accuracy. Now, my Lords, I come to the recoil. I know the noble Lord opposite does not attack us on this point; he is my ally in this respect, and I am very glad of it. A great deal has been said about recoil, and I think it right that the proper figures should be mentioned. These are not War Office figures. The experiments were made by the Gun-makers Association of London. Whereas the recoil of the long rifle was 11.9 foot-pounds the short rifle was 13.4, so that the short rifle was about 1⅛ pounds more.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: You mean tons.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I think not; I copied the expression from the report. At any rate we will not discuss whether it is pounds or tons. The figures are 11.9 and 13.4. I wonder if your Lordships are aware of what is the recoil of the guns with which you yourselves go out shooting. The Gunmakers Association assure us that it is 24; therefore the short rifle with 13.4 is not a very serious thing as compared with your guns with 24, while the old Express rifle which your Lordships used before the small rifle came in was 45.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: I beg the noble Earl's pardon, but he was right and I was wrong. The recoil is pounds. I was confusing recoil with pressure. which is always given in tons.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I am glad to hear that I was correct. Now as regards the point raised in the letter which is being quoted from The Times of last Monday with regard to flash. I fully admit that flash so far as regards present ammunition. It is not a very grave defect,
  1054
  because though a flash enables you to see where your enemy is, you cannot tell how far oft he is. It is very difficult in the dark to tell how far off a flash is. However, I am glad to be able to inform your Lordships that for a long time we have been carrying out experiments with what is technically known as " M.D. cordite," which is the cordite used in big guns; we have been trying to adapt it to small arms, and our experiments are already sufficiently satisfactory to enable me to say that we have every hope of shortly being able to introduce the use of M.D. cordite into small arms. From a great number of experiments that we have carried out with the short rifle, and even with the Maxim gun, which is always a considerable offender in the matter of flash, we find that with M.D. cordite, there is no flash in the short rifle or in the Maxim; therefore this defect, I admit at once, can be easily met without altering the length or the rifle.
  Now, my Lords, as to muzzle velocity. The noble Lord stated that the muzzle velocity of the two rifles was the same. As a matter of fact the short rifle is 30 lbs. more.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: Feet, you mean.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I am sorry, but I have pounds down again.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: It is 30 foot-seconds.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Anyhow, the figures are 2.000 and 2,030, or slightly in favour of the short rifle. Our present bullet we claim is capable of carrying a higher pressure than it does at present, but this higher pressure invariably raises complaints as to kick. But with the same bullet the trajectory is the same in the two rifles.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: I have not disputed it.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: No, the noble Lord has not disputed it, but lots of people have. If anything, that of the short rifle is a little flatter. There is one curious thing as regards muzzle velocity which I should like to mention.

  1055
  Experiments were carried out on the 21st of this month at Enfield, using a long barrel with rifling as for the short rifle, and the result was 21 foot-seconds more than the muzzle velocity of the short rifle. It is quite true that foreign rifles are getting a higher muzzle velocity, but they do it with a smaller bore, and also, I am informed, with a lighter bullet.
  Then as regards range, a question raised by my noble friend at the Table. Both our rifles were sighted to 2,800 yards, whereas few foreign rifles are over 2,200 and none over 2,400. I have all the figures here as to foreign rifles, but I do not wish to weary your Lordships with them, but it might be interesting to note that the Japanese rifle is sighted to 2,187 yards-that represents the equivalent in kilometres-and the Russian rifle to 2,096 yards. Therefore in sighting our short rifle to 800 yards farther, we are not very far behind foreign nations.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: I beg the noble Earl's pardon; the distance to which the rifle is sighted does not in the least guarantee or prove the distance the bullet will carry. We want to know how far the bullet will Larry, not the distance to which the rifle is sighted.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: But would not foreign nations sight their rifles to the distance they think necessary -as far as they want them to carry?
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: That is not the question I want answered. I want to know the absolute fact.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: We have had no experiments that I know of on that point, but if we have I should be very glad to place the results at the disposal of the noble Lord.
  THE EARL OF WEMYSS: Has the rifle been fired at 2,800 yards?
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I do not know, but again I should be very glad to ascertain. I should think it had, otherwise I do not think it would have been sighted for the distance. Now I come to the question of the sights. Before I deal with that, I may say that a paper has just been put into my hands stating
  1056
  that the rifle has been shot with good results at 2,800 yards. Now with regard to the foresight, I was wondering. whether the noble Lord would repeat his complaint of the foresight, because what did he, say in 1892? He then threw doubt upon the advisability of the foresight not being protected; he suggested to the Secretary of State in the House of Commons that it was liable to be knocked off. Now, when we have given the foresight protection and prevented it being knocked off, the noble Lord comes down upon us like a cartload of bricks and complains that we are throwing a shadow over it. I confess that in this matter I think the noble Lord is very difficult to please. Now, my Lords, I come to a more important point-the point of bayonet fighting. This is a matter which has caused considerable controversy. It is argued that this rifle being five inches shorter than the old rifle will place men at a considerable disadvantage as compared with the old rifle in a bayonet melee. Theoretically it is a very pleasant idea that the longer rifle and the longer bayonet give a man an advantage, but curiously enough our experience is all the other way. In 1888, when the short bayonet was originally adopted, very extensive trials were carried out. The method of procedure was as follows. Two of our best instructors were taken, one was given a long bayonet, and the other a short bayonet, and they were made to fight. After they had fought a certain number of times, they were made to change weapons, and fight again. The result was invariably that the short bayonet won twice out of three times. That is obviously because the shorter rifle is a more handy weapon, and that with a I short weapon you can move more quickly. There are also other points in favour of the short bayonet not in connection with the rifle, with which I will not trouble your Lordships. It is, however, a notable fact that at the present moment the Japanese rifle and bayonet together are three and a half inches shorter than the Russian rifle and bayonet, and, on the theory that the longer rifle and bayonet give you such a tremendous advantage, in almost every mêlée that has occurred during the present war the Russians ought to have killed every Japanese,

  1057
  and I hardly think that that is a sort of thing that the newspaper reports tell us has happened. The noble Lord admits that the argument against the short bayonet could be met by lengthening the bayonet, but as that matter is not now under discussion, I will not follow it further.
  Now I come to some of the minor criticisms of the noble Lord. He complains of the stock being in two parts-I hope I understand his criticism rightly-and that this will allow the screw to work loose, and that the accuracy of the rifle would thus be compromised. I would only suggest with great humility that the remedy is not to allow the screw to work loose, and to screw it up if it does work loose. Then with regard to his criticism of the bolt. He attacked the bolt twelve years ago, but it has since satisfactorily stood the strain of the Tirah campaign, of the Egyptian campaign, of the South African campaign, of the China campaign, and of Somaliland, and we see no reason to desert our old friend. The same argument applies to the noble Lord's criticism of the magazine. The noble Lord stated in 1892 that the magazine was one which was liable to break down when brought into actual service. It is, I believe, a maxim of life that you should never prophesy unless you know, and on this occasion I am afraid the noble Lord prophesied without knowing. There is also the undoubted fact that a 10-cartridge magazine does not empty so soon as a 5-cartridge magazine, and we adhere to the 10-cartridge magazine. We know that the Boers used invariably to load up their magazines after they had fired a few shots if they had an opportunity for so doing, and the same course of action is open to the British soldier. We have had no complaint that the rifle is difficult to clean.
  As regards the other small points, such as, for instance, the necessity of setting up new machinery, I am informed that a lot of new machinery has had to be set up, but I have not the details with me. In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Lonsdale, it is quite true that our present contracts when completed would do little more than supply our mounted troops, for
  1058
  whom, I am sure the noble Lord opposite would agree, a short rifle is essential.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: It is better than the carbine.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Very well, the noble Lord will not admit it. But long before these contracts are out we shall have received the result of extensive trials which are now in progress under service conditions, and I can assure your Lordship that if modifications are found to be necessary we shall not hesitate to say so and to recommend them to your Lordships. In connection with these trials I am prepared to make what perhaps I may call a sporting offer. If any of our friends the target experts would like to join in a trial I should be very glad to arrange it, and I would suggest something like the following conditions, viz., the trial to be carried out with a long rifle one day and a short rifle the next; the trial to consist of a twenty mile march in the most boisterous weather we can get, and to end with a half mile "double" over the shingle at Hythe (that is a very fair service condition); then the rifle to be shot, the number of rounds and the particular targets to be subsequently agreed on. I shall be interested to know whether after this march and this "double" those who participate in the trial still maintain that they like the long rifle better than the short, or that they prefer shooting with a long rifle to shooting with a short rifle. As a purely personal opinion, I should prefer that this offer were accepted by the seven marksmen whose trial is spoken of in the letter in The Times of last Monday.
  At present, on the reports that we have, and in the opinion of our military advisers, we have no justification for doing what the noble Lord by his Motion would have us do, namely, to stop existing contracts. The keynote of the whole matter is-and I hope your Lordships will remember it -that the best weapon for target work or sporting purposes is not necessarily the best weapon for the Army. Our military advisers had no hesitation in 1901; Somaliland has come since then, and our military advisers have no hesitation Low. Your

  1059
  Lordships have heard the telegram from Lord Kitchener which was read out by the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, and I am sure your Lordships will feel bound to give the strongest possible consideration to the words of the telegram that "the rifle is more suited for war on the Indian frontier than the long rifle." Operations have been frequent on the Indian frontier, and we are constantly being reminded that they are likely to occur there again. I earnestly hope that your Lordships will not take up the directly non possumus attitude suggested by the Motion of the noble Lord, and absolutely refuse to allow any progress to be made in the re-arming of the Army with a rifle which, after all, the Army has chosen for itself.
  THE EARL OF WEMYSS: Before my noble friend Lord Spencer addresses your Lordships I should like to say a word. The Under - Secretary of State for War said it was impossible to give a long rifle to the cavalry. Now, my Lords, why has the whole of this question arisen? We have had a very interesting discussion about sights and weights and everything else, but I would ask my noble friend whether, if it were not that at last the light has dawned on the War Office, after fighting against it for forty years, that the carbine is unsuited in the present day for cavalry, should we have ever had this new rifle? I very much doubt it. The point never arose until the question of the carbine for the cavalry being done away with came up, and that only arose because you sent our cavalry out to South Africa with a weapon absolutely useless as compared with that to which they were opposed; they were under fire for about 2,000 yards or 1,500 yards before they could return it. Their carbines would Shoot up to about 1,000 yards, while the weapons of their opponents would carry 2,500 yards, and some of them even up to 3,000 yards; therefore I am correct in saving that the cavalry were sent out with an absolutely useless weapon, and that much life was lost in consequence of their being, under fire for so long before they could return it. The result is that the carbine has been condemned and the cavalry are to be armed with a rifle; so that the question is what rifle should that
  1060
  be? My noble friend said just now that it was impossible for the cavalry to carry a long rifle. Why? Forty years ago the most perfectly mounted cavalry force ever seen—the Hampshire Mounted Horse under Colonel Bower—carried the rifle in a way which elicited from the late Commander-in-Chief these words. I may say that I last year produced photographs showing how the rifle was carried. The noble and gallant Field Marshal Earl Roberts then said—
  "I admit that the photograph shows a pleasant way of carrying a long rifle; moreover I think it is in that way it will have to be carried in peace time."
  That is to say, carried in a bucket, attached not to the man but absolutely to the horse. Carried in a way, which, instead of interfering with the man when riding, enables him to ride over fences or anywhere, without convenience, and that acts as a buck-jumping saddle and prevents his being kicked off if need be. My noble friend the late Commander-in-Chief also said—
  "It is an admirable way of carrying a rifle in peace time, but not in war."
  But what is war? He means in the face of the enemy. But when they are in face of the enemy the troops would take their rifles out of the bucket and carry them in a sling round their shoulders. There is no difficulty in that. The question, therefore, is reduced to this—whether it is a wise or necessary thing, putting aside the questions of accuracy and the improvement of the weapon, because you are going to give the rifle instead of the carbine to the cavalry, to arm the whole infantry and cavalry with a new rifle and spend at least £3,000,000 upon what I hold to be an unnecessary arm. I venture to think it would be more practical and more sensible to give the cavalry a long rifle and to carry it in the way I have suggested, than to spend £3,000,000 of money, and give every sort of abstract reason why this new rifle is better than the old rifle, when you would never have thought of having this new rifle at all had it not been for the question of substituting something for the carbine for the cavalry. I think we are indebted to my noble friend for bringing this question before the House, and on the broad issue—not on the question of sights or of weights, or

  1061
  of powder—but on the broad issue that the expenditure is unnecessary, I hope the Motion will be supported. You ought to give the cavalry a long rifle, and have it carried in a way which everybody who has seen it admits to be excellent. For years I have tried to get the authorities of the War Office to look at this method of carrying a rifle, but none of them have done so, and now they are adopting a newfangled idea by which the rifle is to be carried half on the men and half on the animal. I think the whole thing is a mistake, and therefore I shall heartily support my noble friend.
  EARL SPENCER: My Lords, I am quite aware that your Lordships are always surprised if a Member of this House rises to speak on a subject about which he is supposed to know very little. I venture, however, to address you to-night, not as a sporting shot with a rifle, not altogether as a target expert, but as one who has had at any rate some experience in this matter, and I will tell your Lordships what is that experience which justifies me in supporting the Motion of my noble friend. When President of the National Rifle Association in succession to my noble friend beside me, I was appointed by the War Office in 1867 and 1868 and served on an important Committee for nearly two years, on the subject of the new rifle for the Army. I had already had considerable experience of shooting, having been one of the first Volunteers to go to Hythe. Before going to Hythe I doubt whether I could have hit Buckingham Palace at fifty yards, so that I owed a good deal to the Hythe course of instruction. After that, I did a considerable amount of shooting with various Volunteer corps; I drilled Volunteers in rifle shooting myself, and during that time they were more successful at Wimbledon than they have ever been since. I shot in a great many matches, not with a sporting or match rifle, but with the old muzzle-loading Enfield rifle, then with the Schneider, and subsequently with other rifles, so that I can claim to have had considerable experience both of shooting personally and of teaching others to shoot. While serving on the Committee to which I have referred, I went through a long period of inquiry on the subject of these rifles; we had an enormous number of
  1062
  rifles before us, though I forget exactly how many. Two of the members of the Committee were connected with the Volunteers and rifle shooting, one besides myself being Mr. Edward Ross, whom your Lordships will doubtless remember and admire as a most distinguished shot. The other members were military men, Colonel Fletcher of the Scots Guards, who served as chairman, two other military men, and a Royal Artillery Secretary. I may say that a friend of mine who happens to live in Northamp-tonshire and I are now the only survivors of that Committee with which I worked. I quite admit that our work and recommendations on that Committee are now antiquated and out of date, for a rifle, like a ship, has a very short life and is soon over-ridden by new ideas, but I think that much information that I gained during that inquiry justifies me in criticising the action it is now proposed to take. I always feel proud of having been a member of the Committee which recommended the Martini-Henry rifle, because, although it has now been superseded for some fifteen years, it provided for the Army one of the very best arms then in existence, and for nearly twenty years that rifle was used with great success. That Committee was appointed also to consider the question of magazine rifles, but these rifles had advanced only such a very small way in 1867-8 that we practically did not go into that matter, so that I do not speak with any experience on that point. I must also admit that at that time I was strongly against the bolt system, preferring the block system. I had an experience which perhaps justified me in holding that view, because while I was carrying out an experiment for the Committee to see whether the rifles would bear the rough usage of war, one of the bolt rifles blew up on my shoulder, the whole of the bolt going by my head, and I suppose I was never nearer to sudden death than then. I believe that experiment and accident greatly influenced the Committee in recommending the block system. But I am not going to argue in favour of that system now. I am quite aware that the bolt system has been adopted, and I believe successfully, and that the dangers we felt then

  1063
  as attending its use have been overcome by practice, and that under war conditions, which is the greatest of all tests, the bolt system has not been found deficient.
  I want, my Lords, to refer to two points on which the noble Earl opposite has spoken. He seemed to throw a little doubt on the authority of men who came forward as sportsmen. But my noble friend does not urge that the experience of sportsmen completely exhausts the arguments in favour of one rifle or another. He does feel, however, and I agree, that the experience of sportsmen like himself with various rifles has an important bearing on rifle-shooting generally, whether in sport or with the Army. We often hear, too, some almost sneering remarks—I do not use the word offensively—with regard to Bisley and Wimbledon. I was closely connected with the meeting at Wimbledon, and I think that those who make such slighting references forget what those two great meetings for rifle-shooting have done for the Army and for the rifle in this country. If it had not been for the shooting at Wimbledon we should never have had so good an arm in the Army as we have had. That is a point that ought to be borne in mind.
  I am afraid the noble Earl has not had much experience of shooting. I have had rather more, for I once shot for the Queen's Prize at Wimbledon with a military rifle, so that I know very well the conditions under which shooting takes place. I do not for a moment say that those conditions would outweigh the actual service conditions in the Army, but still they are important. One of the most trying conditions in the great matches at Wimbledon and now at Bisley, is the requirement to shoot in the most violent storms. I certainly have never heard of shooting from under an umbrella. Anybody who has shot at Wimbledon would ridicule the suggestion of the noble Earl; in fact, the idea as to that being one of the conditions under which shooting is conducted is absolutely absurd.
  My Lords, we can quite admit that the noble and gallant Field Marshal has disposed of one argument which has been used in the course of the debate, namely,
  1064
  that the question of the short rifle was raised by the South African War. We will admit that. But speaking not as a sporting man—I have done very little deer-stalking myself—but as one with some experience of shooting with a military rifle in matches, I say there is nothing which makes a greater difference in rifle-shooting than the range between the backsight and the foresight. I have tried shooting with a short rifle, and it is-almost impossible to do so with great accuracy. The difference it makes is enormous, and I think that that consideration alone is of great importance. You may ridicule extreme accuracy, but I think that when you have in Your Army some of the best shots in the world you should seek to put into their hands a rifle which will enable them to make the most accurate shooting. Time aftertime, in South Africa and elsewhere, these experienced shots have done great service to the country by the marvellous accuracy of their shooting; therefore, I do not think you ought at all to minimise the importance of accuracy, and accuracy of shooting with all men, whether they are good or bad shots, is enormously affected by whether a long or a short rifle is used. The question of weight is one which need scarcely be considered when it is remembered that in this case the shortening of a long barrel to a short barrel only reduces the weight of the arm six ounces.
  I do not want to trouble your Lordships at great length to-night, but I should like to say that with regard to cartridges I can conceive that it would be of enormous importance not to have two kinds of cartridges used on service. If you have two kinds of cartridges the wrong kind may come up just at the moment when you are in need of ammunition. Therefore the question of cartridges is of vital importance—of far more importance, I should say, than having the same arm. I cannot see the force of the argument of the noble and gallant Field Marshal. If you have the same cartridge it will be an enormous advantage.
  Now, my Lords, we have to consider what the Government are doing. I understand that what the Government propose will cost about £3,000,000. That is a very large sum. But what will

  1065
  it effect? It will not give you a better arm than the long rifle. We do not say that the short rifle is a bad arm, but according to the arguments of the noble Earl the Under-Secretary of State and of the noble and gallant Field Marshal, the short rifle—though we admit it is better than the carbine—is not a better arm than the long rifle. Why, then, should you go to this enormous expenditure to put into the hands of the infantry an arm which many people think a worse arm than the present arm, and which, according to those who advocate the short rifle, is at any rate not a bit better than the rifle now in use? That, I think, is a point we ought to bear in mind.
  I do not dwell on the question of recoil. My noble friend, who knows so much about the subject, has admitted that recoil in this short rifle is a small matter. A heavy recoil is doubtless very serious, but we do not say that recoil is a serious point here. The question of flash is of more importance, because the very existence of flash shows that the whole power of the powder has not been developed and brought to bear on the bullet which is to be propelled. The point on which I wish to lay particular stress is that for this enormous expenditure you will not get a better rifle. We believe that with very slight changes the long rifle could be enormously improved and that it might be made very superior to the rifle now in the hands of other armies. We quite admit the desirability of putting this rifle into the hands of the cavalry, as there is no doubt that the present carbine is very deficient.
  Now, my Lords, I leave the case as it stands. I should have left it absolutely alone, but I thought that in a debate of this character I ought to make a few remarks. The case has been ably put by my noble friend, and I sincerely trust that your Lordships will not blindly follow the Secretary of State for War in sanctioning so enormous an expenditure for so small a gain.
  THE MARQUESS OF RIPON: My Lords, I rise not for the purpose of continuing the debate, but simply with a view to pointing out a curious mistake made by the noble Earl in his reference to me.
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  The noble Earl treated me as a critic of the Schneider rifle. If there is one thing in connection with my proceedings as the head of a public department with which I am well satisfied it is that I was the Secretary of State who introduced the breech-loading rifle into the British Army, and that I selected the Schneider rifle as the pattern to be used. I was shortly afterwards removed to the India Office. My noble friend the Duke of Devonshire succeeded me, and he it was who actually issued the rifles. My object was not to attack the Schneider rifle, which is, so to speak, my own rifle, but to elicit, what I did practically elicit, from His Majesty's Government, namely, the excellent practice which that rifle had always made.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I should perhaps have described the noble Marquess as a critic of the Government, not as a critic of the rifle.
  THE MARQUESS OF RIPON: But I was not criticising anybody.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (The Marquess of LANSDOWNE): My Lords, we have had a most interesting and instructive discussion, and I do not think that anybody can complain of the manner in which the subject has been dealt with either by the noble Lord on the Front Bench opposite who introduced the Motion, or by my noble friend beside me who spoke on behalf of the War Office. I think we are indebted to them for the clearness with which they handled a difficult subject, although there were moments when we found ourselves in some doubt as to whether we were thinking in tons or in pounds or in that still more elusive quantity, foot-seconds of muzzle velocity. What we have now to consider is the course we can most conveniently adopt with regard to the Motion on the Paper. The Motion is of a very decided and peremptory character. if it is carried by the House it may be either operative or inoperative, if it is operative it will have the effect of interfering abruptly with the proceedings of the War Office, and of throwing upon this House and of taking away from the War Office the responsibility for dealing with the

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  supply of rifles to the British Army. On the other hand if it should remain inoperative I am afraid the result would not be consonant with the dignity of your Lordships' House. I wish therefore to ask your Lordships whether we are really in a position to commit ourselves to the very decided and conclusive view expressed in the Motion of the noble Lord? Surely, my Lords, this is a question which can be decided by experts and only by experts, and although there are no doubt some Members of this House, and I certainly give a high place among them to the noble Lord who moved the Motion, who have a right to consider themselves experts, I take it that what I may call the rank and file of your Lordships' House do not pretend to have any expert knowledge of these matters. We come then to this, that the Secretary of State for War has behind him a very great weight of expert authority. No one could listen to the full statement of my noble friend, or to the observations of the noble and gallant Field-Marshal on the Cross Benches, without becoming aware that this question had been fully and repeatedly examined, and that the Secretary of State's advisers had formed a very strong opinion, to which they adhered. On the other hand, my Lords, there is no doubt a considerable body of public opinion- of expert opinion -which holds a different view, and I am certainly not going to under-rate the importance of such statements as those which have lately appeared in the public Press or have been made by the noble Lord opposite this evening.
  How, then, is it possible for your Lordships' House to take upon themselves to decide when these doctors disagree? No doubt there are some points upon which we are perfectly competent to form an opinion. For example, no one will deny, I think, that for a military rifle accuracy is not the all-in-all to be aimed at. There are other qualities for which we ought also to look. I think my noble friend was perfectly right when he argued that this subject should be considered not merely from the point of view of the sportsmen or marksmen. The military rifle will have to be put into the hands of soldiers, often of young soldiers, perhaps of
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  soldiers who have not had a very lengthy training. It is surely of the utmost importance to give them a weapon which shall be simple and handy, and one which they themselves like to use. While I say that, I must protest against the statement of the noble Earl that my noble friend in his speech cast anything like a sneer upon those most valuable institutions, Wimbledon and Bisley. I am sure all of us agree with the noble Earl opposite in acknowledging the great debt which the country owes to those competitions, and the great obligation we are under to those who, like the noble Earl, were concerned in the original institution of those most valuable meetings.
  Then, my Lords, other things being equal, it is surely not unreasonable to say that the lighter weapon is obviously a more convenient weapon than the heavier. Again, we may take upon ourselves to say that a single weapon is better for the whole Army than two weapons, and that one cartridge-which I believe we have-is better than a variety of cartridges. But, my Lords, my noble friend claims on behalf of this new short rifle that it possesses these attributes, and, in addition, the merit of equal or even greater accuracy. My noble friend is certainly not open to the imputation of having under-rated the importance of accuracy. I thought he put accuracy rather higher than did the noble Lord who moved the Motion; for he, if I remember rightly, treated the quality of accuracy as fourth in rank of the four essentials which he enumerated.
  But, my Lords, my noble friend's statements, full and convincing as they were, are met by a distinct challenge, and it is scarcely for us to deliver judgment. What, then, is the reasonable course for us to adopt? Surely it is that which I understood my noble friend to suggest, namely, that this challenge should be taken up, that further trials-under conditions which will render those trials exhaustive and complete-should be made, and that if the result of those trials should throw any doubt upon the value of the short rifle the responsible department should govern itself accordingly. . No harm will be done in the meantime, because I understood my noble friend

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  to say that the whole of the short rifles now under order, or in process of manufacture, will be required for the mounted troops, or for the reserve of mounted troops. We may, therefore, with a clear conscience proceed with the completion of those orders which an now actually in existence. As to the conversion of the existing long rifles into short rifles, to which the noble Earl referred-a conversion which he truly says is an expensive operation-I understand that no conversions are at the present moment in progress; and that none are intended in the near future.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: In the very near future?
  THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: And that none are intended in the very near future. I maintain, therefore, that your Lordships may safely leave the matter where my noble friend has left it, without committing yourselves to a Resolution so binding upon the House, and so absolutely uncompromising as that which the noble Lord has moved.
  A NOBLE LORD: Can the noble Earl say whether the War Office Committee which recommended this rifle, were in any way tied down by instructions as to the length of rifle necessary, or had they quite a free hand?
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I .do not quite recognise to what date the noble Lord refers. It was made quite clear by the noble and gallant Field-Marshall that the idea of the short rifle was put forward in 1895 by the Chief Inspector of Small Arms.
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (The Earl of SELBORNE): I was asked what we were doing with regard to the Navy. The rifle is not a weapon for
  seamen at all; their weapon is the big gun; so that the question of the rifle is one of very second-rate importance to them, and we have not found it necessary to raise any question of a change of arms at present.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTH: My Lords, I am afraid some of Your Lordships will think me very unyielding, but I do not think that I can accept the offer that the noble Marquess has made. I do not see that I should be in any way advantaged by accepting it. If I withdraw this Motion, and leave the matter in the position that the Government are to go on as they like, on the understanding that there are to be further inquiries into the behaviour of the rifle, well and good; but if I press this Motion to a division, as I am thinking of doing, the Government will still be bound to do exactly the same thing. After the debate which has taken place to-night, and after the discussion in the Press, it is perfectly clear that the War Office and the Government would not think of continuing the manufacture of these weapons without taking further steps to reassure the public mind. If the noble Marquess were in a position to undertake, that in the meantime no further rifles should be manufactured except for the cavalry, and that any further issue of the rifles should be postponed for a considerable time, there might be something in it. I do not wish to put the Government or the War Office into any state of discomfort, nor could I do it if I wished; so that for my own satisfaction, and in order, at any rate, to record the opinions of a certain number of Members of this House, I shall be obliged to ask you Lordships to divide on this occasion.
  On Question, their Lordships divided:—Contents, 22; Not-Contents, 55.

  CONTENTS.

  Bedford, D.

  Portsmouth, E.

  Raglan, L.

  Somerset, D.

  Spencer, E.

  Reay, L.

  Sandhurst, L. [Teller.]

  Ripon, M.

  Gordon, V. (E. Aberdeen.)

  Stanley of Alderley, L.

  Tweedmouth, L.

  Chesterfield, E. [Teller]

  Brassey, L.

  Wandsworth, L.

  Dartrey, E.

  Burghclere, L.

  Welby, L.

  Ilchester, E.

  Chelmsford, L.

  Wemyss, L. (E Wemyss.)

  Kimberley, E.

  Monkswc11, L.

  Halsbury, E. (L. Chancellor.)

  Lathom, E.

  Abinger, L.

  Vane, E.. (M. Londonderry.) (L. President.)

  Lonsdale, E.

  Allerton, L.

  Mansfield, E.

  Belper, L.

  Salisbury, M. (L. Privy Seal.)

  Mar, E.

  Cheylesmore, L.

  Northesk, E.

  de Ros, L.

  Marlborough, D.

  Onslow, E.

  Dunboyne, L.

  Portland, D.

  Roberts, E.

  Estcourt, L.

  Selborne, E.

  Kenyon, L.

  Anesoury. M.

  Shaftesbury, E.

  Kilmarnock, L. (E. Erroll.)

  Bath, M.

  Stanhope, E.

  Lawrence, L.

  Lansdowne, M.

  Verulam, E.

  Muncaster, L.

  Winchester, M.

  Waldegrave, E. [Teller.]

  Oranmore and Browne, L.

  Westmeath, E.

  Ravensworth, L.

  Pembroke and Montgomery, E. (L. Steward.)

  Robertson, L.

  Rossmore, L.

  Clarendon, E. (L. Chamberlain)

  Churchill, V. [Teller.]

  Saltoun, L.

  Albemarle, E.

  Cross, V.

  Sinclair, L.

  Brownlow, E.

  Esher, V.

  Stewart of Garhes, L. (E. Galloway.)

  Dartmouth, E.

  Hill, V.

  Denbigh, E.

  Hutchinson,V.(E.Donoughmore

  Windsor, L.

  Hardwicke, E.

  Knutsford, V.

  Wolverton, L.

  House adjourned at half-past Seven o'clock, till To-morrow, half-past Ten o'clock,