the Boers in the South African War led to the revival of the idea of
"dispersing" guns instead of "concentrating" them. It would be more
accurate to say that military thinkers had, after the introduction of
the quick-firing gun, challenged every received principle, and amongst
others the employment of artillery in masses, which, as a result of the
war of 1870, "had become almost an article of faith." The idea was to
make use of the increased power of the guns to gain equally great
results with the employment of less material than formerly. Thus the
dispersion of guns is bound up with the passive defensive. The first
editions of the British _Field Artillery Training_ and _Combined
Training_, strongly influenced as they were by South African experience,
did not legislate, even in dealing with defence, for "dispersion" in the
Boer manner, but only for adaptability (see _Field Artillery Training_,
1902, p. 15). In the Boer War, whilst the Boers nearly always scattered
their guns, almost the only occasion upon which their artillery played a
decisive part was at Spion Kop, where its fire was concentrated upon the
point of assault. At Pieter's Hill, the fire of seventy guns covered the
British infantry assault in the Napoleonic manner. On the whole it may
be accepted as a general truth that guns are safe, and may be locally
effective, when dispersed, but that they cannot produce decisive effect
except when used in masses. It must, however, be clearly understood that
a "mass" in this sense means a large number of guns, under one command,
and susceptible of being handled as a unit, so far as the direction and
effectiveness of their fire is concerned. _This being secured_, and on
that condition only, it does not matter whether the actual gun positions
are scattered over a few square miles, or are closed in one long line
and using direct fire--they are still a mass, and capable of acting
effectively as such. While there are undoubtedly grave dangers in using
the indirect method too freely, technical improvements in laying,
telephones, &c., have had much to do with the possibility, at any rate
under favourable circumstances, of a concentration which may be
described as one of shells rather than of guns, and the reader is
reminded in this connexion that the work formerly done by the gun is now
performed by the shell.