CRACK SHOTS 97 



of recoil, and the momentum of the shot, at the same discharge, 

 which is a thing that cannot be done by the chronograph, 

 because that instrument only records the time (not the striking 

 velocity) of the thing that hits it and breaks connection, and 

 that thing is the fastest pellet instead of the average of all, or 

 the total of the pellets. Powder-makers can still further 

 reduce recoil ; that is, if they are encouraged by a general 

 demand for those powders that give the least recoil for an 

 equal power of shot impact. 



The author was reminded not long ago by the Rev. W. 

 Serjeantson of an occurrence of thirty years ago. Three guns, 

 of which he and the author's were two, were shooting together 

 over dogs, and twice on the same day, after a brood of grouse 

 had risen, the author, having been fully occupied in shooting, 

 asked the keeper which way the rest of the brood had gone. 

 His reply was on both occasions, " They have all flown one 

 way." That is, there were six up and six killed, which sounds 

 much more commonplace than it really is, because, as it so 

 seldom happens that three guns do shoot together over dogs, 

 when by chance they do so there is a very good excuse for 

 two barrels to be let off at the same bird, but of course only 

 when the birds rise all together, as they did on these occasions. 



The most sporting bird the author has made the acquaintance 

 of is the Virginian quail. Three guns advancing to a point 

 at these birds would not often get six birds at the flush of the 

 covey, although, on an occasion when they rise at twice, two 

 guns have got five, as happened once when, with Mr. Hobart 

 Ames, who is President of the Shovel Trust in America, the 

 author was shooting over his and Mr. H. B. Duryea's cele- 

 brated setters, one of which could easily have earned in 

 America $oo a year at the stud if his owner had not preferred 

 to shoot over him. But it is not at the rise of the covey that 

 these birds are difficult. As soon as they are flushed they fan 

 out and take to covert, and their twisting second rise, with the 

 scrub between them and the gun, makes them very difficult. 

 Mr. and Mrs. Duryea are both remarkably good quail shots ; 

 the author could not say which is the better, but he believes 

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