Rations for an "Osaka Baby"

In this picture we see a number of Japanese artillerymen placing one of the 500-pound shells on a small track, by means of which it will be drawn along the little narrow-gauge railroad to one of the immense siege guns. These enormous shells, when directed at the forts, tore gaping holes in the parapets, and, according to the testimony of General Stoessel, they had a terrible effect both on the solid rock and masonry and on the morale of the Russian soldiers, who saw the "impregnable" forts melt and crumble away under this awful bombardment. The mortars from which these shells were fired had a bore of eleven inches, or twenty-eight centimeters. The shells were designed to burst on contact. They were loaded with a high explosive, the invention of the Japanese, Dr. Shimose, and corresponding in its terrific effect to the American maximite, the English lyddite and the French melinite