CANNONADE

Cannonading is therefore used in a vessal of war to take, sink, or burn the ships of an enemy, or to drive them from their defences ashore, and to batter and ruin their fortifications.

Since a large ship of war may be considered as a combination of floating batteries, it is evident that the efforts of her artillery must in general be greatly superior to those of a fortress on the sea-coast: I say in general, because on some particular occasions her situation may be extremely dangerous, and her cannonading ineffectual. Her superiority consists in several circumstances, as, the power of bringing her different batteries to converge to one point; of shifting the line of her attack so as to do the greatest possible execution against the enemy; or to lie where she will be the least exposed to his shot; and chiefly because, by employing a much greater number of cannon against a sort than it can possibly return, the impression of her artillery against stone-walls soon becomes decisive and irresistible. Besides these advantages in the attack, she is also greatly superior in point of defence: because the cannon shot, passing with rapidity through her sides, seldom do any execution out of the line of their flight, or occasion much mischief by their splinters: whereas they very soon shatter and destroy the faces of a parapet, and produce incredible havoc amongst the men, by the fragments of the stones, &c. A ship may also retreat when she finds it too dangerous to remain longer exposed to the enemy's fire, or when her own fire cannot produce the desired effect. Finally, the fluctuating situation of a ship, and of the element on which the rests, renders the efforts of shells very uncertain, and altogether destroys the effect of the ricochet, or rolling and bounding shot, whose execution is so pernicious and destructive in a fortress or land-engagement; both of which, however, a ship may apply with great success. See RANGE.

The chief inconveniency to which a ship is exposed, on the contrary, is, that the low-laid cannon in a sort near the brink of the sea, may strike her repeatedly, on or under the surface of the water, so as to sink her before her cannonade can have any considerable efficacy.

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