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The rattle of the Nordenfeldts sounded like a continuous roar of thunder, and the stream of fire from their muzzles itself illuminated the darkness of the night with a fitful glare. The gunners got the range almost immediately, and those on board the flagship could see that the water was lashed into foam round the launch by the pelting rain of missiles.
We knew afterwards that they had also got one of their 5-barrelled Nordenfeldts to work for a while. Nobody in our ranks, I think, was actually aware of the fact at the time, so indifferent was the aiming and so bad the handling of the gun. Still, the crucial stage of the first action was not over.
Infantry captured artillery by frontal attacks delivered in line of quarter columns, and mounted infantry skirmished up to the wheels of an armored train which carried nothing more deadly than a twenty-five pounder Armstrong, two Nordenfeldts, and a few score volunteers all cased in three-eighths-inch boiler-plate. Yet it was a very lifelike camp.
The enemy had unexpectedly retired during the night, and the entire commando was now on the hill, gazing at the plentiful harvest reaped by our Nordenfeldts. Thither I also went. British ambulance men were busy collecting corpses. It was a mournful sight; it seemed to me as if war really meant nothing else than butchering men like sheep, quietly, methodically, and without any pomp or circumstance.
Infantry captured artillery by frontal attacks delivered in line of quarter columns, and mounted infantry skirmished up to the wheels of an armoured train which carried nothing more deadly than a twenty-five pounder Armstrong, two Nordenfeldts, and a few score volunteers all cased in three-eighths-inch boiler-plate. Yet it was a very lifelike camp.
"I see," replied Bob, concentrating his attention on the preparations being made around for testing the machine-guns and larger weapons with which the vessel was armed, long cylindrical shot, ribbed with brass bands, being piled by the side of the various batteries, and nicely-made cases of cartridges placed ready for the hoppers of the Nordenfeldts and Gatlings. "How awfully jolly!"
On the occasion of the Jameson incursion, the Transvaal had in readiness extensive parks of the most modern quick-firing Maxims and Nordenfeldts of various calibres, and breech-loading field artillery of the Krupp make. The Orange Free State hurried to their assistance with similar artillery, each burgher armed with a Martini-Henry rifle.
The French cruiser had so far taken no notice of the sudden annihilation of her second torpedo-boat by the air-ship, but as soon as the latter made her way astern of her she seemed to scent mischief, and turned one of her three-barrelled Nordenfeldts on to her. The shots soon came singing about the Ithuriel in somewhat unpleasant proximity, and Arnold said
The half section of guns old Nordenfeldts had arrived without a crew, but a couple of officers and one or two N.C.O.'s and men who had once been Territorial gunners took the matter in hand with great alacrity. Mobility was their chief trouble.
Maxims and Nordenfeldts, the heavy cannon, and the field-pieces captured from us a month before, hurled shot and shell incessantly among them, while the rattle of the Boer rifles was continuous. Still, fair progress was made, and with less loss than might have been expected in such strife.
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