able fragments. The
leaden fragments occasionally show a simple fractured surface, such as
is illustrated on a larger scale by the broken shrapnel bullets shown in
fig. 96, p. 485. More commonly, however, the fragments, if of any size,
appear torn, and if small, are mere spicules. These if of lancet shape
often bury themselves in the skin only, while larger ones may penetrate
deeply or even perforate. Thus, of a group of three officers standing
near a stone on which a bullet struck, all were spattered about the
face; most of the fragments lodged in the skin, but one perforated the
concha of the ear and bruised the mastoid area, while others caused
small jagged cuts. In another instance, both thighs of the patient were
spattered after perforation of the clothes, and a large fragment lodged
beneath the skin of the penis. A case in which larger fragments
perforated and simulated type wounds has already been referred to on p.
44.

[Illustration: FIG. 34.--Normal Lee-Metford Bullet]

The above remarks apply, for the most part, to Mauser bullets only,
because my experience of that projectile was far wider than of the
Lee-Metford. The only deformed Lee-Metford bullets that I saw removed
from the body were of the 'slipper' variety, exactly corresponding to
the similarly altered Mausers, and with no fissuring of the mantle. I
saw none so freely deformed as the Mausers depicted in figs. 28, 29, 31,
and 32.

In spite of diligent search on several battlefields, I was unable to
collect many forms of Lee-Metford ricochet, although I found many
undeformed bullets. I insert here, therefore, some illustrations I
obtained through the kindness of Colonel Hopton, Director of the School
of Musketry at Hythe, which are of interest, and in some degree
substantiate the impression I formed in South Africa as to the greater
stability of the Mark II. Lee-Metford bullet (fig. 34). I am aware that,
as meeting a smooth target at right angles, some of these are not
strictly comparable to the Mauser bullets forming the subjects of the
preceding illustrations, which struck stones, and these mainly by their
sides (if we except figs. 31 and 32), but they sufficiently exhibit the
characters on which I wish to insist. That they support my opinion is
the more probable as, with the exception of the type included above, I
am under the impression that the large majority, if not all, of the
Mauser bullets which struck stones fairly with their tips were broke