Lastly, the Creusot factories received orders for guns of the latest pattern: four 155 centimetres long, with a range of about 10,000 metres, which the Boers call 'Long Toms,' and two batteries of 75 millimetre field-guns.
These cannon (model 95) were furnished with all the latest improvements. They fire very rapidly, and the brakes, situated on either side of the piece, absorb the recoil, the carriage being the fulcrum, and the trunnions the points of contact with the piece. They have a range of about 7,000 metres. They are loaded by means of cartridges, the whole charge enclosed in a single metal case. When efficiently served, they will fire from fifteen to twenty shots a minute.
We have advanced indeed since the year 1881, and the cannon made in the Transvaal itself, with cartwheel axle-trees riveted and braised together![#]
[#] This is preserved in the museum at Pretoria, side by side with a mitrailleuse labelled 'Meudon,' given to the President by the Emperor William.
A large stock of Mauser, Martini-Henry and Steyr rifles (1887 pattern), with plentiful ammunition, was also bought by the Boer Government.
The weapon most in favour is the Mauser rifle of 1891, calibre 7.5 millimetres. It is sighted up to 2,000 metres. It has a magazine containing five cartridges. The movable straight-levered breech-block has a safety-bolt.
The cavalry carbine, also much appreciated, is a reduced model of the rifle. The mechanism is the same, and it also has a magazine holding five cartridges, but the movable breech-block has a bent lever. This carbine is sighted up to 1,400 metres.
These two weapons are of great precision, but I have heard it objected since my return that the wooden grip which covers part of the barrel causes an unequal heating and cooling of the metal between the covered and uncovered parts, giving rise to occasional explosions or distortions. Personally, I saw no instance of this.
The Martini-Henry rifles, carbines, and muskets are sometimes preferred by the older Boers. They are of an obsolete pattern, and have an insignificant range of only 800 metres for carbines and muskets. They are 11 millimetres in calibre, and their leaden bullets have no casing of harder metal. To some persons they have the advantage of disabling a man more rapidly and effectually at a short range than bullets of smaller calibre.