STOCK. 29 



will put lead, in proportion to their weight ; so that, 

 on holding each of them flat on the left hand, with 

 the end of the featherspring about half an inch from 

 the little finger, he will find a sufficient equilibrium 

 to make the gun rest perfectly steady ON the hand. 



I have proved, that this degree of balance answers 

 best, as a but too much loaded is apt to hang on the 

 right hand in bringing it up, and vice versa, on the 

 left, with a gun which is topheavy. 



All stocks should have a good fall in the handle, 

 and not be, as some are, nearly horizontal in that 

 part. This has nothing to do with the general bend 

 or mounting of the stock, but is merely to keep the 

 hand to the natural position, instead of having, as it 

 were, the handle wrenched from the fingers, while 

 grasping it. This is the only point on which we 

 are beat by those execrable gingerbread guns, which 

 some of the foreigners have the effrontery to compare 

 with ours. 



If a stock, in every respect, suits you as to coming 

 up to the eye, &c. &c., the way to have one precisely 

 like it is to leave with your gunmaker a thin piece of 

 board, made to fit with the greatest accuracy to the 

 profile of the bend, all the way from the breeching 

 to the upper part of the but. By being made to fit 

 into this, your new stock must be like the old one. 

 But if you trust to a set of memorandums that are 

 often mistaken, or, in the hurry of business, not half 

 attended to, you may have as many new stocks as 



