20 AUGUST 1870, Page 3

We give the following curious evidence that the mitrailleuse is

only a revival of an old invention, from " Grose's Military Anti- quities" (1801), vol. ii., p. 165 :—" A patent was granted by King Charles I. to William Drummond, of Hawthornden, in 1625, for the sole making and vending, for the space of twenty-one years, of the following machines and warlike engines invented by him ; the

patent is printed in his works The third is a sort of machine of conjugated muskets, by the assistance of which one soldier or two are enabled to oppose an hundred guns, which machine, from its effect, is called the thundering chariot, and vulgarly the fiery waggon."