Daily camera., 1899-08-02
ARTILLERY TACTICS.
Still Pursued by Two Farm Horses
That We're In the War.
They Are "BatteYy Broke" aAd Per-
sist In Going According to MAli-
taYy Instruction. in
Their Work.

Horses in the artillery are required
to know just three things. When they
know these three pieces of information
they are called battery broke" and they
are relieved from all obligation to know
another thing during their careers.
The first item in the education of the
artillery horse is that when he is stand
ing still he is to stand still, regardless
of everything, until he gets the next or
der. The next point is that wAen he is
ordered to go, then go he shall for all
there is in him. The third point is, that
when halted he shall swing around in
the direction from which he has come
and stand stock still, and that he is the
prettiest Of all, for it goes to the tune of
battery front into action" When a
horse in the artillery knows those
three things he's battery broke" and
he never needs to know any more. If
there is need of few other bits of mis-
cellaneous information the horse looks
to the artilleryman TO know them.
The simplicity of all this is what
raised hob on the farm. The command
ing officer of the farm had bought a
Fair of condemned horses at an army
sale. Fine, big, heavy beasts they were,
and there is seldom too much the mat
ter with the horse when the army comes
to sell him, SO there is many a good bar
gain to be had in that way SO long as
one doesn't mind the ~. s." and the
condemned brand on his bit of stock.
] his farmer maybe didn't know the
difference, or perhaps he forgot to
make sure, and there was nobody a I the
sale to tell him that these were battery
broke" horses that knew only three
things and would never know more nor
less.
The farmer had out his pair in a big
field, where he was busy about some of
the tasks which keep farmers busy at
this time of year. They were hitched
up TO good big farm wagon. which
took up about as much room as the
caisson and timber did in the light bat
terry in which these horses had served,
but II didn't begin to weigh anything
like as much, and 1t was just easy for
those two horses. All went well, so
long as ii was a question of using the
first idea those horses had. The field
was big one, and they were stopped a,
one end of it. There they stood. The
farmer chirruped at them to follow him
along the row he was setting ont. When
that was without result he yelled Get
up!' with trimmings. The order was
not military, but the trimmings seemed
ant, ,ut. .,.l L
the artillery. Still the order for the for
ward march had not come and the
horses were too well trained to budre.
AT last the farmer came running up
with a whole lot of almost genuine ar
tillery language and grabbed the whip
and lashed the horses. He did not hurt
them-they w.. -. tough for that
but he did convey the impression that
the time had come to bring their second
idea into play. They started for the
other end of the field full tilt, as they
had been taught to go under all circum-
stances. and with the fine scorn of what
may be IN the way which characterixes
the artillery. Along toward the other
end OF the field it seemed to strike them
that things were not altogether as they
used TO be in the old battery; there
We're no drivers to keep the pace up and
TO use language. But they found
farm road which worked them around
the field nearly to where they started.
This brought them back to the farmer,
and the way in which he was swearing
made them feel natural once more.
Therefore when he got close enough to
them to enforce his order, although
'whoa!" was not quite the same thing
ms halt" they wound up in inc shape;
they swung the farm wagon clear
around with good imitation of battery
front into action. But the wagon was
so much lighter than the piece to which
they were used that damage resulted.
The contents of the wagon were shot
out upon the advancing farmer and left
him buried under a heap. The wagon
body was hurled far away through the
air and came to grief by striking the
trunk OF tree, the wheels went off on
independent careers, and most of the
harness came to grief. But the horses
stood shock still awaiting the next or
der. They had run through the list of
their small accomplishments and they
wer content, for they were battery
broke."-N. Y. Sun.