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Manton may almost be styled the inventor of the 

 double-barrelled gun, for before his time sportsmen 

 invariably shot with single barrels, and regarded the 

 double guns in the same light as Colonel Thornton, 

 " as trifles, rather knick-knacks than useful." Strangely 

 enough, we seem on the eve of coming back to the 

 single barrel ; for there can be little doubt, I think, 

 that the double gun will eventually be superseded by 

 the single magazine gun, which will give the sportsman 

 a rapidity and accuracy of fire far in advance of anything 

 the annals of shooting have hitherto recorded. 



I have more than once in these pages referred to 

 the Diary of Nicholas Assheton, of Downham, a typical 

 sporting Lancashire squire of the early part of the 

 seventeenth century. And on looking over his Journal 

 I find one or two entries which prove how terribly 

 cumbersome the firearms of his day were, and what 

 poor sport shooting must have been before the weapons 

 were handy enough to allow of a man's killing his 

 game on the wing : 



" November 14^/2. Shott at a moorcock, struck feathers 

 off and missed. 



November 2^th. Had some sport at moor game with 

 my piece, but killed not." 



Once, however, he chronicles with evident pride the 

 fact that he "shott two young hinds." The long-bow 

 was a far deadlier weapon in the hands of a skilled 

 archer, both in sport and war, than the clumsy firelock ; 

 and it is a remarkable fact that for accuracy and 

 rapidity of shooting, no military firearm could compare 

 with the old long-bow of Crecy and Agincourt and 



