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PUNT-GUNS 171 
where the fowler whose gun threw from 1} 1b. to 2 lb. of shot 
would refrain from doing so. Thus we may imagine that the 
small punt-gun fowler under such circumstances would be the 
only one to obtain fowl, yet at the same time we must not 
neglect to remember what the situation would be like if the 
reverse was the case. No matter; our remarks here are simply 
given so as to illustrate how a fowler should arrange so as to 
have a gun suitable for his intended fowling grounds, by first 
ascertaining what quantities of fowl are likely to be met with. 
In wildfowl life, however, we are subject to occasional altera- 
tions from the ordinary run of things. This is so ; nevertheless, 
it is always wiser to take as your example the general rule 
than to keep plodding after the exceptions which so rarely 
occur. It can be well advised that, if fowl are, generally speak- 
ing, known to frequent your ground in small lots, a small 
gun will return more satisfaction and better sport. Pleasure 
will be found, only, in the use of a large gun when fowl are 
numerous. We, of course, leave the novice fowler to strike his 
own medium where thought necessary. 
We now come to the question of how a punt-gun is best 
loaded in practice, at the muzzle or the breech? Muzzle- 
loading swivel guns, for a very long time after present-day 
breech-loaders were invented, were considered by expert punters 
to be by far the better weapons. The reasons for this were 
that breech-loading guns seemed to fire too light a charge when 
compared with muzzle-loading guns of similar weight; and, 
again, the advantages of more convenient loading claimed of 
the breech-loading gun were not thought by experienced fowlers 
to be of so much account, chiefly because quick loading is 
not a szwe gua non in a punt-gun; it was also argued, that 
change of shot size was never needed, as the fowler loaded his 
gun, in nine cases out of ten, fully knowing what kind of fowl 
he was likely to meet with. Then it was further advanced that 
in a muzzle-loading punt-gun there was less chance of anything 
