The time was, when guns were so imperfectly constructed, that the recoil and friction of the charge against the barrel destroyed more than half the force generated by the explosion of the gunpowder; and this loss of force having been obviated, by finely polishing the interior of the barrel, as well as by improving the metal of the gun, has rendered English guns superior in their performance to those manufactured in any other country. Breeches of a conical form offer the greatest resistance to the action of aëriform bodies in a direct line; this is the principle of what is best known as “the patent breech:” to speak of which would be a waste of time, as nothing more is required to support its superiority than the fact, that in well constructed artillery of every country, the interior form of the breech or chamber is more or less conical. Thus we see that by adopting the crutch gun, we have to give up one of the oldest and most universally acknowledged principles in lessening recoil--namely, the conical form of the breech--and to adopt the very reverse of this: namely, the old right-angled, flat-faced breech, upon which recoil can exert its utmost force with the certainty of its reaching the shoulder of the unfortunate user. Secondly, to enable the gun to be loaded with a cartridge which shall keep its place, a complicated arrangement is necessary. On inspection of the barrel, it will be perceived that a cavity has been formed larger than the bore of the barrel, and that this in some cases only tapers toward the further end. This cavity exactly receives the cartridge, and the gunpowder is inflamed in a space much larger than the barrel, which it has afterwards to pass through. The charge of shot is also started in a larger space than that which it afterwards has to traverse, and the column must of necessity become contracted and elongated before it can escape from the barrel. The first consideration is at what cost of force is all this effected? Thirty per cent. would certainly be a shrewd guess; and who is there conversant with the nature of gunpowder hardy enough to gainsay the fact? I here present the reader with the measurement of a pair of barrels--bore 12, diameter of the cavity 10, or two sizes difference,--tried at the celebrated trial of Breech versus Muzzle-loading fire-arms, which took place in April last, in the court at Cremorne. The following are the results of the trial:--