MY FIRST BOAT RIDE 

 hunting boat then as well as he did when he 

 gave me my first boat ride. Among the earliest 

 recollections of my boyhood hunting with a gun 

 are a fev/ of my first shots, in 1869 Father 

 bought a nev/ hzavy number ten double-barrel 

 muzzle-loading shot gun. Breach-loaders were 

 not so numerous then as now. it was so heavy 

 that I could not hold it to load or shoot. Yet I 

 was anxious to shoot it once. One day 1 v/as 

 out in the woods near the house gsthering hick- 

 ory nuts and the dog treed a black squirrel, 

 father was home and I got him to let me shoot 

 it. lie put in a light load as the squirrel was on 

 a small tree and not very high up. Then put- 

 ting his thumb around a small bush and letting 

 his fingers open, lying the gun on his fingers 

 against the bush, which made a good rest, he 

 soon initiated me in the mysteries of handling a 

 gun. He told me to look along the barrel until 

 1 saw the squirrel, then to pull the trigger. This 

 I did. Bang! The recoil knocked me down. 

 V/hcn I got up my nose was bleeding quite free- 



65 



