The Blackpool Herald. — 1879-05-02 (Blackpool, Lancashire, England)

GUNNERY EXTRAORDINARY. Our modern artillerista are credited with enter. taming the ridiculous idea of facilitating the operations of mountain batteries by converting mules into gun-carriages instead of mere gun-carriers. The story goes that the Ordnance Select Committee assembled one morning to test the feasibility of the time saving-plan. A mountain gun was strapped fast to a cradle resting on a packsaddle, so that the muzzle pointed over the mule's tail. The animal was then led into the marshes, followed by the committee and sundry officers and civilians interested in artillery experiments. On arriving at the ' butt the gun was loaded, the mule turned till his tail-end threatened the earthen mound, a piece of ' slow match tied to the gun vent and ignited, and the result impatiently awaited. Fizz I went the match, back went the astonished animal's ears, and then he deliberately turned himself round—a movement never anticipated by the experimentalists, who found their interest in the affair suddenly intensified by considerations regarding their personal safety. The secretary threw himself flat on the ground, the committee dispersed in divers directions, and the illustrious visitors executed impulsive stragetic movements with more speed than dignity. Then came a bang! and away went the shot in one direction while the mule turned a summersault in the other, and prone on his back kicked defiantly against it unseen assailant. That comical bit of gun-practice had been anticipated in actual warfare. In one of Sheridan's engagements with the Indians, his men taken unawares by the redskins had no time to remove their mountain howitzer from the mule's back, so they accepted the alternative and blazed away, sending mule and gun tumbling to gether down hill upon the Indians, who took fright and fled the scene. One of them, captured a few days afterwards, was asked why he ran away? Ha replied, "Me big Injun ; me not afraid of little guns or big Funs, but when white man fires whole mules at Inputs he don't know what to do."  was a wife. This contretemps seems to have turned her sweetheart's love to hate, and the unhappy man appears to have become imbued with the terrible idea that her deatrWould at once conceal her frailty and his own baseness. That the deed had been meditated sometime previous to its commission was evident from several incidents which occurred prior to the murder, and which were recalled to mind afterwards. On the Sunday before he imbrued his hands in the blood of his victim, he was sitting on a turf wall near his father's house talking to several companions. Some of them thoughtlessly jeered him about his sweetheart, inquiring when the wedding was to "come off." He became angry at this, and, lifting up a sharp stone, he said he would knock his sweetheart's brains out with it if she was present. His comrades, of course, looked upon this as a mere idle threat ; but. the sequel showed that he was at least capable of taking her life. On the following Saturday night, the 20th of June, 1817, Nrittall retired to bed in his father's house as usual, where he apparently remained till the ensuing morning, when the whole neighbourhood Was aroused by the startling rumour that Ann White had been murdered, and her body thrown into the well near her father's house. An old man, who well remembers the occurrence, states that Sunday morning, the 21st June, 1817— whenithe body of the [unfortunate young woman