292 CHOKE-BORES. 



\ 



counting out just fifty to the charge, same target and 

 distance, and twenty -nine struck the foot square. 



Tonks was safe ; I was satisfied ; sent Fred the tar- 

 gets and their history ; back came his answer by re- 

 turn of mail, " Buy that gun, and send it to me 

 5Mre. " I did so, and that same act was a means of 

 causing choke-bores to spread, as they never had 

 spread before, even throughout the civilized tvorld. 



My own gun T tried on the 6th of the same month, 

 and found it to average from 55 to 60 pellets of No. 

 4 in the target — the highest 66. At 50 yards, 40 

 pellets of similar charge struck same sized target. I 

 no longer insisted on the muzzle-loader. 



In the fall of that year I went West again, and with 

 my friend Fred and a man named Doty, of Henry, 

 Illinois, started on another duck-shooting expedition 

 down the Illinois and Mississippi rivers to the sunk 

 lands of South-eastern Missouri. I found it quite 

 difficult at first to do good shooting with my gun, as 

 did also Fred with the pigeon-gun, and for many days 

 on the Illinois both guns were left untouched on the 

 boat in which we travelled, Fred making use of his 

 " Secor" and I using one of a pair that belonged to 

 Doty. Sometimes Doty had use for both his guns, and 

 began to poke fun at me because I couldn't shoot my 

 own ; so one evening I persuaded him to try it for 



