The Sun.
London, England, 1870-09-17 00:00:00

THE SHREWSBURY ELECTION.

The Speaker's writ for the Shrewsbury election was re-
ceived yerterday morning. The nomination will take place
on Tuesday, and the polling on Wednesday. The candi-
dates are Mr. Douglas Straight, Conservative, and Mr.
Cotes and Mr. Lloyd Jones, Liberals. It is thought
doubtful whether Mr. Jones will go the poll, there having
been no canvass on his behalf. The friends of both Mr.
Cotes and Mr. Straight are very sanguine.

THE CORK TOWN COUNCIL AND THE
FRENCH REVERSES.

At a meeting of the Cork Town Council, yesterday
Alderman O'Sullivan moved a vote of sympathy with
France, and expressed his unfeigned surprise at the
reverses of the French army. The motion was allowed to
pass unopposed. A deputation waited upon the Council
to request a grant of money to the fund for the relief of
the wounded French soldiers ; but the Council refused the
request on a point of order, though strongly pressed by
Mr. O'Sullivan to make the grant.

THE GATLING BATTERY GUN.
[CENTRAL PRESS TELEGRAM.]

The experiments with the Gatling battery gun were
commenced at Shoeburyness on Wednesday: and termi-
nated yesterday, so far as the first programme was con-
cerned. The main features of the gun may be summed up
as follows :—lt has as many locks as there are barrels'.
The locks also have when the gun is in operation a reci-
procating motion. The forward motion of the locks places
the cartridges in the rear end of the barrels, and closes
the breech at the time of each discharge, while the return
movement extracts the cartridge shells after they have been
fired. When the ten-barrel gun is being fired there are five '
cartridges at all times in the process of loading and firing,
and at the same time five of the shells after they have
been fired are in different stages of being extracted. These
several operations are continuous when the gun is in
operation; in fact, as long as the gun is supplied with
cartridges (which is done by means of feed cases in which
they are transported). The several operations of loading,
firing, and extracting the cartridge shells are carried on
automically, uniformly, and continuously. The locks
operate on a line with the axes of the barrels, and
are not attached to any part of the gun, but as the gun is
made to revolve, they play back and forth in the cavities
in which they work like a weaver's shuttle, performing
their functions of loading and firing by their infringement
on stationary inclined planes or spiral projecting surfaces.
It can be loaded and fired only when the barrels are in
motion, and may justly be termed a compound-machine
gun, since the ten barrels, each being furnished with its
own loading and firing apparatus, forms, as it were, ten
guns in one. In the course of a few days the official
report cf the operations of the " original mitralleur,"
as it is termed, will be in the hands of
the public. Meanwhile the following casual details may
not be uninteresting. On Wednesday the small Gatling
gun, of forty-two one hundredths of an inch calibre, was
tried. This gun has ten steel rifled barrels, and is
made of any proper calibre to suit the musket cartridges
usedlby different governments. It was fired at the high
rate of about three hundred and fifty shots a minute. On
Thursday the one-inch gun was tested. This is the third
or largest gun of the system, and is made with six (some-
times with ten) barrels, and discharges solid lead balls
half a pound in weight. It also uses a canister
cartridge, which contains sixteen balls. It also dis-
charges explosive balls with great effect. At this test it
discharged 255 half-pound balls in one minute and eighteen
seconds, and riddled the target at 1,400 yards. On
Thursday the small gun (No. 1) was again discharged at
1,400 yards, and made excellent target firing. About
375 shots a minute. It was also fired at dummies repre-
senting a company front, on uneven ground, the men
being disposed in irregular order. There were 136 dum-
mies, representing men, 99 of which would have been
killed. The average hits was four in each man.
On Friday the small gun was again fired at various
ranges, from twelve hundred down to four hundred, at
targets and at dummies. The firing was at about the
same rate and speed as before, making the same targets
and producing the like destructive effect among the
dummies. We shall not anticipate the official report, but
all on the ground seemed to agree that they had seen the
operation of a weapon of unprecedented power.