Photo at left shows me loading the Steyr-Mannlicher 1895 carbine with 8x50R surplus ammunition loaded on clips.  The clip is essential to the operation of the arm, without the clip it is just a fancy single-shot.   When the fifth round in the clip is stripped by the bolt the clip then drops out of the bottom of the magazine housing.  If it gets stuck either due to being bent or dirt in the magazine, the spent clip would be forced out when a fresh clip is inserted.

The standard load for the 8x50R service ammunition was a 244 grain full-metal-jacket round-nose bullet.  Velocity was around 2000 feet per second.

This is a view of the packaging, cartridge case headstamp and bullet base markings of some 8x50R ammo that I purchased from SARCO in Stirling, NJ back in the early 1990s.  I had originally thought it to be of Greek or Bulgarian origin due to the Cyrillic marking on the package.  However, the package has what appears to be the logo for CZ from (former) Czechoslovakia.  It is a little hard to distinguish in this image but on the cartridge headstamp there appears at the 12 o'clock position a lion symbol, at 6 o'clock appears an "M inside a circle" mark.  I assume that the 35 at 9 o'clock is the year of manufacture and the VI at 3 o'clock is the month.  Who knows?  Anyone?
 

Recoil with the original 8x50R service ammunition is bearable, no doubt owing to the relatively low velocity of the heavy bullet.  I hear that rifles using 8x56R (the M30 cartridge) are rather brutal on the shoulder.  As one can see by this photo, the Stutzenkarabin shoots pretty high at 100 yards.  I was sighting below the target and the hits were above the bull.   Not too surprising considering that the minimum battle sight setting is 300 meters and these heavy bullet loads have a rather high arching trajectory.  Still, not a bad grouping for a carbine with a 19" barrel manufactured in 1916 and using ammunition from 1935, eh?
 
 

To get around the problem of a high trajectory at close range the Austrians came up with an interesting solution.  This is a photo of an original M1895 bayonet.  Note that the barrel ring on the crossguard has an auxilliary front sight that is higher than the sight on the barrel of the carbine.  With bayonet fixed the point of impact is lowered considerably so that one would get more hits in close fighting.