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American Artillery. ANON. (Circular from the Committee oi1 Public Information, April 2o, IgI8.)--To-day the two dominating factors in the struggle for world supremacy are still the bayonet and heavy artillery. Without the support of either success is impossible. Big guns play a major part in deciding battles, now as in the day of Napoleon. For this reason it is interesting to know something about the different kinds of big gun being made for our army in France. Artillery may be divided into two classes--mobile artillery, which includes all guns used in the field, and seacoast artillery, which is used in fortifications on fixed mounts. It is the mobile artillery which we are vitally interested in at the present time for offensive work on the French front. This mobile artillery is divided into three distinct types--guns, howitzers, and mortars.
The first of these are long-range rifles distinguished by high muzzle velocity and long barrels of from 3o to 5 ยฐ calibres ; that is to say, the length of barrel ranges from thirty to fifty times the diameter of the bore, giving a range of from 6ooo to 3o,ooo yards with a low angle of fire. These guns are classified as wheel mounts, antiaircraft (truck mounts), emplacement mounts, and railway mounts. The wheel mounts are subdivided as pack artillery (mountain guns transported on i3ack mules) ; field guns, drawn by horse teams and attached to rumbles; motorized field guns, drawn by big ammunition trucks; tractor-drawn guns of large calibre; and the so-called horse artillery, drawn by horses, with all cannoneers mounted, for fast field work in support of cavalry.
The wheel-mount guns include the famous French 75 (3 -inch) and 4.7-inch guns, which have created such havoc among their German opponents and ,which have been responsible for breaking down the greatest mi~litary offensives of the Germans in the past. three years. The 4.7 are of greater range and calibre, but of practically the same type as the 75 mm. Next in order, according to size, come the 5-inch and the 6-inch seacoast guns, such as our allies have withdrawn from the fortifications and mounted on improvised wheel mounts, for use as mobile artillery.
The second class a{'e the anti-aircraft guns, for which purpose
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