first, the bird will travel only about I 3 inches. Con- 

 sequently this extra allowance of I 3 inches is the most 

 that we have to reckon on, not the almost unhmited 

 margin that the Editor seems to imply. Calculation shows 

 that just to kill a bird (i.e., just bring it within the killing 

 circle) going 40 miles an hour, we may shoot 9 ft. 9 m. 

 in front of it and no more. The stringing out of the shot 

 gives about another foot, or even less ; smce the stretching 

 of the 30 in. circle into an ellipse of 30 in. x 43 in. in- 

 creases the space between the shot, especially in the part 

 of the ellipse that strikes last. It seems to me, though 1 

 may not be domg him justice, that the Editor has not 

 quite appreciated the fact that the distance that the bird 

 travels in about the sixth of a second is covered by the 

 shot in less than a sixtieth. 



The Editor also raises the que^ion of the penetration 

 of these late arrivals. It is an intere^ing point and one 

 that can be finally settled only in the way he sugge^s, 

 viz. : by adtual experiment with pads on a revolving 

 target. Of course, if we knew exadly the hi^ory of each 

 shot in the 1 2 ft. string at 40 yards, we could easily make 

 the necessary calculation ; but this we do not know, and 

 R. H. Housman thought that the rear guard were, from 

 various causes, reducing the difference of velocity between 

 themselves and the van. 1 should be sorry to set my 

 opinion again^ his. In fad I have no doubt he is right. 

 But, looking at the fad of the regular increase of the 

 stringing-out at the various di^ances up to 50 yards, I 

 do not think the effect can be important. And therefore, 

 it seems to me that the simple calculation based on 

 apparent loss of velocity in the lagging pellets will be 



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