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To bring a canon over land

If you have To bring a canon, one needs a hundred
pioneers or more to flatten the tracks by levelling ditches
& others obstacles, such as trees, stone mounds
& similar things to make gabions on the way. Once one is close to
the place one wants to batter, the gunner goes at
night to reconnoiter the most convenient place to mount the
battery & if he does not see well, one gives a false alarm in order
that those on the inside throw torches. Very often, one batters where it
is strongest so that the assailed do not repair there, disregarding the
battery. Usually, there are not many garrets & other defenses in
that place. And when a breach is made at the strongest part & the
cannon removed, it will surprise the assailed. One approaches
fortified townsat night, but to poorly
fortified towns, pioneers bring gabions and
carry once these are placed, one puts some boards or planks
behind the gabions to keep the pioneers safe, while behind,
they fill the gabions with some earth by means of their
shovels. And while one does this, one raises some false alarm
on another side. And before, one has shot a volley at the defenses.
The gabions The pioneers carry the
boards to make a level ground or a platform of four
fingers or half a foot thick, and
one sets them into the earth. The platform is five or six
cannofeet larger than the cannon's wheels
on each side m if there is only one cannon. But if
there are more, the platforms touch. The distance which is between the
pieces is the width of two gabions. As long as the battery
lasts, the gunners sleep & eat close to a cannon. In
small spaces, one does not bother to dig trenches to reach the pieces
but one puts plenty of gabions that are high and runs to them. In large
places one digs trenches. There are always in trenches or behind
barricades some companions-in-arms on guard duty to defend
the pieces. One keeps the small powder magazine, of three or four
kegs, separately.



Know the magazines of France for the
artillery.



It is good if the platform is slightly inclined toward the front because
the piece is more quickly mounted for battery & withstands the shot
better & batters more fiercely.



Fowlers are those with a
reinforcement in the space which contains the powder, and the
ball can only a roll up to the opening of the said
chamber. These do not penetrate so much &are irritating to load but
they do not heat up as quickly.



A steel touch-holeis
put in the canons in the manner of a screw so it will not be damaged
during shooting like the others very quickly will be. But these screws
are prone to blow off & cause damage to the gunner. There
is nothing for it but to use a proper touch-hole.



A touch-hole at the level of
the breach is the best because in this way the cannon hardly pushes
back.

