Elko independent. [volume] (Elko, Nev.) 1915-current, 1915-04-10
TERRIBLE
MEANSOF
CAUSING
De- A I \
(By William G. Shepher. United Press
staff correspondent

LONDON, March "a, by mail to
New York-Two hundred Yaqui In.
dians once marched into Madero
camp In Mexico. armed with bows
and arrows, and asked to be allowed
to fight. Madero's army was patchy
enough as 1t was, but he didn't want
the services of the Indians.
But We will fasten guncotton on
the ends of our arrows" explained
the chief
Nothing doing" said Madero's Of
ficers. and the Indians marched back
to the mountains.
The American army experts along
the Rio Grande laughed at the story
OF the bow-and-arrow Indians.
But today the great military lead
ers Of Europe would pay fancy prices
for the services OF those Yaquis. Good
bow-and-arrow men are at a prem
ium. They are hard to find and they
are greatly needed. The French have
tried bows and arrows all along their
trenches, and. though the men were
inexperienced in the use of the pre-
historic weapon, they attained some
highly successful results. A YaQui
Indian who could drop an arrow just
where he pleased could win the Le-
gion of Honor badge.
The point is that trench fighting
Rnocked the science of war to bits.
After the armies had burrowed to-
ward each other until they were nose
to nose, they found that their mar.
Velous long range rifles were practic-
ally useless. The trenches were so
close together that the artillery could
not hit the enemy's trench without
risking the destruction of It's own.
The great twentieth century weap-
ons failed. How to get death into
the other fellows trench became the
big problem.
1t was gravity, not gunpowder, that
was needed. You couldn't shoot an
explosive into the other trench; you
must drop 1t in. 1t was the prehis-
toric method of fighting; the cave
man style of throwing weapons or
rolling them down hill. Some of
Napoleon's old mortars were brought
from the museums of Paris and put
into use. Bows and arrows were Sc
cured from the archery clubs OF Par
is. The arrows were tipped with gun
cotton. Hand grenades were pur-
chased by the thousands.
The arrows proved the most dead
ly OF all. The mortar bombs and the
hand grenades were not nearly so ef-
fective as the French expected. 1t
remained for the English Tommy to
figure out why the guncotton arrow
was most effective.
."Blanktey-blank these hand gren.
ades," said the Tommy. they don't
do their job"
Whereup he took a tin can which
he had empued Of strawberry jam,
filed 1t full Of guncotton, fastened
n fuse to 1t, lighted the contraption
and threw It across to the German
trenches. 1t exploded with terrific
effect. After that the Tommies made
their own bombs out Of jam tins. And
then the explosive experts discovered
that they had overlooked a bet. The
Tommies explained 1t to them.
"our tin can bombs blow 'cn, to
bits with pieces of their own bodies"
said the Tommles. You load up
bombs with ipeces OF steel that are
supposed to fly around in the air. but
you are only wasting weight. Our
suncotton explodes and It turns every.
thing around It into a flying death
Why, we've seen Germans killed by
the flying pieces OF other Germans
bodies" ss.. -"
SO now the latest idea in this pre-.
bistoric form Of warfare is to get as
much loose guncotton into the enc.
my's trenches as possible. Arrows
do the Job in Arst class fashion.
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