The method of using the pocket sextant is next shown, and the officers are taken to a plateau with strongly marked slopes, a base is measured, triangulation made by means of the sextant; and the artificial features filled in.
Contours at 25 feet vertically apart are now sketched in chain dotted lines, and several sectional lines taken by means of the level, clinometer, compass, and a scale of hypothenuses, and the various angles of inclination written on the sketch. The scale of shade is explained, and the officers taught how to apply it to the sketch of ground so contoured, and the sketch finished up as directed in the memorandum by the Council of Military Education.
Major-General Napier’s pamphlet on reconnaissance is given to each officer, and four or five miles of road reconnoitred, sketched, and reported on.
A sketch on a small scale of as large a tract of country as time and weather will permit of is next made, triangulation done with the sextant or theodolite, and lastly, a rapid eye-sketch, without instruments, of some hilly ground.
Some work on field fortification, chiefly the chapters describing the defence of buildings, villages, and positions, also some work on surveying, is read.
At the conclusion of each course all sketches and reports, with a return showing the number of hours’ attendance of each officer, his attention and progress, are forwarded to the Council of Military Education.
[ADVANCED CLASS FOR ARTILLERY OFFICERS AT WOOLWICH.]
The necessity of more advanced attainments both in the science and practice of gunnery was pointed out by the Commissioners in 1856, but nothing was done till Colonel Lefroy urged the matter on the Council of Military Education in 1862, and in November, 1863, regulations were issued for the establishment of Advanced Classes of Artillery Officers at Woolwich.
A Director of Artillery Studies was first appointed in 1850, upon the recommendation of Field-Marshal Sir Hew Ross, G.C.B., R.A. (then Adjutant-General of Artillery). His duties were to take charge of and direct the studies of the young officers of artillery on first joining at Woolwich, to assist them in their professional pursuits, and read with them military law, military history, treatises on artillery, fortification, etc.