THE THEORY OF SHOOTING 



MANY scientific calculations have been made with a view 

 to improving the shooting of sportsmen, or at least of 

 interesting them. Two, which are in theory unassailable, have 

 appeared very often indeed in the unanswerable form of figures 

 and measurements, and nevertheless they are both misleading, 

 and even wrong, in the crude form in which they have been 

 left. One of these is based on the calculation that the shot and 

 the game can only meet provided a certain fixed allowance in 

 front of moving game is given. The calculations are quite 

 correct, but they have no application to sport, for the simple 

 reason that they neglect to calculate the reduction of the 

 theoretical allowance in front, supposed to be necessary, but 

 not all imperative because of the swing of the gun. In other 

 words, the gunner, however expert he may be, does not know 

 exactly where his gun points at the instant the tumbler falls, 

 let alone the instant the shot leaves the barrel. Between the 

 instant of pulling the trigger and the shot leaving the 

 barrel a swinging gun will have moved some unknown 

 distance, and this represents additional unobserved allowance. 

 An inch of this movement at the muzzle of the gun 

 becomes an allowance of 40 inches in as many yards of range. 

 It will be necessary to refer to this unconscious allowance 

 again directly, because it has a bearing upon the second oft- 

 stated proposition. 



It is this : mental perceptions in various individuals range 

 from quick to slow, and besides this the muscular action due to 

 mental orders and nerve impulses also range from slow to 

 quick. Both these well-known facts are constantly asserted to 



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