RIFLES FOR BIG GAME 



tions up to three hundred yards, as you once needed 

 to when you used the old black-powder Springfield 

 load. 



They are working up to great calibers again in 

 European artillery, but in rifles we are working all 

 the time toward smaller calibers for sporting 

 weapons. The rifle velocities of today are some- 

 thing enormous, tremendous, terrific. There has 

 just come out a little .25 caliber American rifle 

 whose muzzle velocity goes over three thousand feet 

 per second. It is but a few years ago that we 

 vaunted our .30 caliber rifles of twenty-three hun- 

 dred feet velocity; and those same .30 calibers with 

 a bullet weighing two hundred and twenty grains 

 were thought quite sufficient to stop any big game 

 on the American continent as they are today, for 

 that matter. 



For some time one of the most popular African 

 rifles for lighter work has been the .256 in bolt 

 action. That is a mere baby of a gun, smaller even 

 than the old American squirrel rifle. Yet it has 

 killed many elephants, lions, and rhinos, and it is 

 very accurate and useful in open shooting such as 

 they have in hunting the antelopes of Africa. Of 

 course, its killing power depends upon the tremen- 

 dous velocity of the little bullet. Any good hunter 

 will tell you, however, that this rifle is not to be 



