50 INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION, 1876. MACHINE-GUNS. The machine-gun, although of comparatively recent date as a weapon of practical use in military operations, cannot be regarded as a new invention, or even as a novel idea in the science of mechanism. At no period in the history of firearms did the genius of invention rest content with the completion and successful trial of any single weapon; for no sooner was such success assured than mechanical ingenuity seized upon the idea, and endeavored by all manner of strange devices to increase and multiply the destructive effect of the newly-discovered power. This constant effort to combine in one weapon the force of many kept pace with and adapted to its own use the discovery of each new principle in the development of firearms; so that the history of machine-guns maybe said to have commenced with the crude match locks of olden times, and to have continued uninterruptedly to the perfection of the modern breech-loader. Machine-guns, under the names of ribaudequitts orgnes, organ- or tube-guns, were known in the early days of artillery,—a gun com posed of four breech-loading tubes of small calibre placed on a two wheeled cart having been used in Flanders as early as 1347. Mention is also made of a machine, used in Italy in the fourteenth century, which consisted of a carriage having one hundred and forty-four small bombards ranged upon it, in rows of twelve each, so that thirty- six balls could be fired at once. Four-tubed guns were also used by the Scotch during the civil war in 1644. All of these guns were of a clumsy construction, uncertain in range, and so slow in delivering their fire that th<?y were regarded as of very little value; and although much improved during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, they were gradually superseded by the intro duction of field-artillery, which until that time had not been in actual use, owing to the difficulty of constructing carriages strong enough to resist the recoil of the guns and at the same time possessed of the lightness and mobility requisite for a field-piece. 'Little more is heard of machine-guns during the two centuries fol lowing, until the Crimean War woke up the spirit of destructive inven tion. Among the hundreds of warlike implements which immediately appeared were several varieties of compound guns mounted on frames and Wheels, and loaded and fired by various complex devices. None of these inventions, however, were considered suitable for active service; but as they undoubtedly possessed some of the essen tial features of a perfect machine-gun, the interest in them was not allowed to subside. The War of the Rebellion in America following