Improvements which are now making in the manufacture of wrought iron, may render this the preferable material for the smaller pieces of artillery; but the best informed military men deem it objectionable for the heavier cannon, both on account of its cost and the imperfection of its manufacture.

Even should the latter objection be removed, its cost must prevent its general application to the construction of siege artillery.

Charlatans in military science, both in this country and in Europe, bring this subject up every fifteen or twenty years as a new _invention_, and flaming notices of the _improvement_, and predictions of the revolution it is to effect in the art of war, are circulated in the newspapers to "gull" a credulous public; and after some fifty or one hundred thousand dollars have been squandered on some court-favorite, the whole matter ends in the explosion of the "_improvement_," and probably the destruction of the "_inventor_," and perhaps also of his spectators.

Let us be distinctly understood on this subject.

There may be _inventions_ and _improvements_ in the manufacture of wrought iron, but there is nothing _new_ in its _application_ to the construction of cannon, for it has been used for this purpose as long ago as the first invention of the art.
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