Rifle fire

“ Perception and trigger-pressure were instantaneous with the flash of its discharge. A running, stooping figure pitched headforemost before the stab of flame from the rifle.
Immediately a vicious fire from the German parapet answered this impertinence. The slayer lay still as death, listening with painfully acute perception to the ugly phat! of bullets in the earth around him. A bomb fell, burst with a deafening report and a blinding flash of flame so close that he marvelled at his escape. By an effort of will he choked down the cough that the fumes provoked.
Rifle-fire at night is infectious. ”

“ Here and there a red fire glowed where the guards were posted; now and then a shower of sparks leaped up into the air as a fresh log was thrown upon the ashes; and a bright flame would glisten on the barrel of a rifle and make ruddy the dark faces of the watchmen. ”

“ The rattle and splutter of rifle fire swelled to what one might have thought an alarming nearness when the road twisted in towards the firing line, or a falling away of the ground or change in the wind allowed the sound to carry better, dropped away again to no more than a distant crackle as a belt of wood shut it off or the road ran wide out from the battle line. ”

“ In the distance I heard the roar of the big guns. As their noise grew louder the strumming of the machine guns mingled with it and their staccato was always distinguishable even amid the ear crushing thunder of the high explosives. Then came the rat-a-pat of rifle fire, foolishly insignificant in point of noise compared to the cannon, but cruelly deadly, as any one who has seen war knows.
Artillery is terrifying, but after all it is cold steel in the hand-to-hand, bestial fighting that slays. ”

“ In the fire-trenches there is no talking save in whispers, but every now and then the almost uncanny silence would be punctuated by the sharp crack of a rifle, the tut-tut-tut of a mitrailleuse, or, from somewhere in the distance, the angry bark of a field-gun. ”

“ The captain of the guns, knowing that the terrible rifle fire was coming from the thickets, deluged the woods and bushes with shells and shrapnel, but the riflemen lay close, hugging the ground, and although a few were killed and more wounded, the vast majority crept closer and closer, shooting straight and true in the moonlight. ”

“ The rifle sends one pellet of death, the shot-gun sends a dozen leaden messengers, each shrieking for a life.
Three men on the towers fired almost simultaneously from the shot-guns, whose scattering fire raked and tore through the bushes. ”

“ The rifle cracked, a little dart of flame that was scarcely distinguishable in the eerie and terrible glow of the fire spat from the muzzle and the horse shot forward with a strange effect of diving into the dead pine needles. There was no need to shoot twice. The noble heart of the animal was pierced through with the wicked lead. ”

“ A bullet would not reach from the forest, but from little hillocks and slight ridges in the open where a brown breast was pressed close to the earth came the flash of rifles, some hidden by the dusk, but the flame showing in little points of fire that quickly went out. The light of the moon failed somewhat, and the savages in ambush were able to come nearer, but now and then a sharpshooter behind the wall, firing at the flash of the concealed rifle, would hear an answering death cry. ”

“ It was not unnatural for a man to suppose that they were being fired at him. From early morning until dusk squads of men were shooting, singly or in volleys, on two ranges. The crackling noise of rifle fire seldom died wholly away. By climbing the hill on which M. lived, we came close to the schools of the machine gunners, and could listen to the stuttering of their infernal instruments. ”

“ From a score of places, representing so many different points of the compass, rifles gushed fire, the sharp cracks of the weapons rang out in the stillness, and the thud and pingeing of rifle balls were everywhere. ”

“ The great ranging power of the rifle will also frequently afford opportunities of concentrating fire from a wide frontage on to important localities, and of directing an effective oblique or enfilade fire against portions of the enemy’s line. ”

“ This fact is all the more emphasized in the present world war, in which the rifle fire is employed principally in trench warfare at near-by ranges, and where all the wounds which involve the resistant structures of the body show the characteristic features usually described as those of explosive effects. ”

“ The rising sound of the reports told plainly of the swinging muzzle, and officers and men dropped flat in the mud and waited till the sweeping bullets had passed over their heads. Men may work on and 'chance it' against rifle fire alone, but the sweep of a machine-gun is beyond chance, and very near to the certainty of sudden death to all in the circle of its swing. ”

“ Most of their guns were out of action, their ammunition was nearly all expended, they were under a rifle fire that scourged the guns with whips of steel and lead, that cut down any man who moved from the shelter of his gun’s shield. Such guns as were left, such men as could move, continued to fire as best they might at ranges that kept getting still shorter and shorter. ”

“ So now this is the queer position of affairs: we fire a pistol shot off at 12 midnight to-night by arrangement, and they reply with some shots over our heads, after which things continue to hum as before. You have no idea how pleasant everything seems with no rifle bullets or shells flying about. ”

“ Shell fire was about all we got here, but there was plenty of that. The rifle and machine-gun bullets that came our way were not numerous enough to cause any concern although we did lose a few men in that way. ”

“ Rifles laid in notched boards placed in the parapet may be sighted and prepared for night firing, or a wire stretched just outside of the loophole on which the barrel of the rifle can rest when in the proper firing position to cover certain points, enables the soldier to fire effectively at night when it is too dark to aim. ”

“ Since this is the case where the rifle is concerned, one may guess what the artilleryman's feelings are like when his gun has to fire the first shot, for the cleaning of a field-gun, even after firing blank ammunition, is no light matter. ”

“ Fire-arms of this kind have a much greater range than any other, because the rifle of the barrel gives a spiral direction, instead of a rotatory direction to the ball, which by that means makes the greater resistance at the first inflammation of the powder, giving time for the whole charge to take fire, before the ball is out of the bore. ”

“ Though it is necessary to get a sure aim before firing, it is not necessary to dwell on it before doing so. Every second between having taken true sight and the giving fire is a second lost, or worse than lost; for the longer the rifle is held to the face, the greater the tension of the muscles and nerves, and the likelier are both to shake and give [299] way. ”

“ I ought to have galloped right past it, as I could, no doubt, very easily have done; but I foolishly pulled in to get a shot before it got in amongst the mimosa trees towards which it was heading. When I raised my rifle to fire, the red glare of the setting sun was full in my eyes, but I thought that as I pressed the trigger the foresight of my rifle was just on the black patch above the gemsbuck's tail. ”

“ You gave me the rifle to fire and I fired it. My neck hurts, and I'm going back to the waggon."
There must have been good metal in that old rifle, or it would surely have exploded. About an inch from the end of the barrel was a bulge as large as a hen's egg. ”

“ This is most important in thick stuff. If one develops the habit by constant practice of pushing the rifle forward with the left hand while the right hand pulls back the bolt and then vice versa draws the rifle towards one while closing it, the rapidity of fire becomes quite extraordinary. ”

“ There is a peculiar sound or thud when a bullet enters a human body, different from that which it makes when striking other objects—a sound, once heard, not easily forgotten. I ordered two men to take the wounded man a few yards to the rear, down the incline, out of the line of fire, where they left him in the shade of some bushes and saw to it that he had his canteen handy, and then they took their places again in the firing line. When the wounded man was removed I picked up his rifle, took off the bayonet and affixed it to mine, thinking I might need it if we came to close quarters. ”

“ No gun of ours answered. The dead and dying lay all about and none could attend them: A rifle was a rifle.
This continued for an hour, at the end of which time we poked our heads up and saw their infantry coming on in columns of mobs, and some of them also very prettily in the open order we had ourselves been taught. Every field and hedge spewed them up. We stood, head and shoulders exposed above the ragged parapet, giving them "Rapid-fire." They [37] had no stomach for that and retired to their holes, leaving many dead and grievously wounded. ”

“ Every rifle was taken care of that way. Right now Tom Pace and Dan Paray were hurrying around gathering rifles to clean them, load them. No rifle must miss fire, or throw a bullet an inch off aim—because that might be the rifle whose aim was right. ”

“ In all the rifle or musket practice that I have ever seen or heard of, the men are made to fire at a target of about three feet diameter, placed before a bank or mound of earth, which receives all the missing bullets. ”

“ So firmly do I believe this that I generally take the rifle from my shoulder between each shot. Even aimed rapid fire is of no great value as compared with better aimed slower fire. The first bullet delivers to an animal's nervous system about all the shock it can absorb. If the beast is not thereby knocked down and held down, subsequent shots can accomplish that desirable result only by reaching a vital spot or by tearing tissue. ”

“ There was many a league in whose solemn depths a human foot had never yet penetrated, and whose echoes had never been awakened by the shot of the rifle. There they lay as silent as at "creation's morn," and the denizens of the woods waxed strong and wandered at will, without fear of the deadly bullet whistling from behind the tree or mossy rock. ”

“ Men who have heard a high-power bullet splitting the air do not forget the sound, which is as quickly recognized a second time as the rattling of a diamond-back.
Immediately following it came the crack of a rifle, and guided by this I saw, above the prairie grass four hundred yards away, the head and shoulders of a man. ”

“ Here and there little puff balls of smoke would rise—white clouds no bigger than a man's hand—tremble and dissipate; their appearance followed at an interval by the far, spiteful crack of a native rifle. ”

“ One hears the zip-zip of the bullets, the boom of the great guns, the tang of our sharp French artillery, and in all this infernal experience of noise and stench, the screams of dying horses and men joined with the fury of the gun-fire, and rose shrill above it. No man may boast of his courage. ”

“ But suddenly the gunners were aware of a strange and terrifying sound rising above the thunder-claps of their own guns, the diminishing whinny of their own departing shells, the long roll of gun-fire on their flanks, the sharp tearing crashes of the enemy shell-bursts—a [571] sound that grew louder and louder, rose from the hissing rush of a fast-running river to a fiercer, harsher note, a screaming vibrating roar that seemed to fill the earth and air and sky, that drowned the senses and held the men staring in amazement and anticipation of they knew not what. ”

“ A cloud of smoke hung over me for a second, and, throwing my empty gun on one side, I put my hand behind me for a spare rifle. I felt the welcome barrel pushed into my hand at the same moment that I saw the infuriated head of the elephant with ears cocked charging through the smoke! It was the work of an instant. I had just time to cock the two-ounce rifle and take a steady aim. The next moment we were in a cloud of smoke, but as I fired, I felt certain of her. The smoke cleared from the thick bushes, and she lay dead at SIX FEET from the spot where I stood. ”

“ Some of the housewives who are more skilled in the use of firearms than my mother or myself, kindle a blaze by flashing a little powder in the pan of a gun, allowing the flame to strike upon the tinder, and thus be carried to shavings of dry wood. It is a speedy way of getting fire ”

“ A head bends low; a left eye closes; the right, brown as a hawk’s and as fierce, glares, from beneath corrugated brow, along a barrel that rests as though in a grip of steel. The keen report of a sporting rifle—not loud, but crisp and clear—rings through the silent wood, and there is a heavy fall and a groan. ”

“ It was almost unendurable to have our rifles in our hands—the barrels frequently hit by the enemy's bullets—and to have to stand still unable to use them—by order; but of course it would have been fatal to have opened fire. ”

“ The shell-fire grew more and more intense. The air was thick and choking with smoke and chemical fumes, and vibrant with the rush and shriek, of the shells, the hum of bullets, and the ugly whirr of splinters, the crash of impacting shells, and ear-splitting crack of the guns' discharge, the 'r-r-rupp' of shrapnel on the wet ground, the metallic clang of bullets and steel fragments on the gun-shields and mountings. ”

“ Fire!”
There was a stunning roar of three hundred and fifty rifles, and a deadly screech of bullets. But the smoke rolled out, the haste to reload was intense, and none could mark what execution was done. ”