NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 47 



The Modern Sportsman 's Gun and Rifle ; including Game and 

 Wildfowl Guns, Sporting and Match Rifles, and Revolvers. 

 By J. H.Walsh (" Stonehenge"), Editor of 'The Field.' 

 In two volumes, 8vo. Vol. I., Game and Wildfowl Guns, 

 pp. 459. With numerous illustrations. London : Horace 

 Cox, « The Field' Office. 1882. 



Theee must be few sportsmen at the present day who have 

 not experienced considerable difficulty in making choice of a 

 new gun. The improvements which have been made in breech- 

 loaders since the introduction of the Lefaucheux pin-fire gun 

 have been so numerous and so varied, that it is no easy matter 

 to decide upon the respective merits of the different actions ; 

 indeed only those who have paid close attention to the subject, 

 and have carefully examined and tested the so-called novelties in 

 guns as they have appeared, can consider themselves competent 

 to express an opinion in the matter. 



Mr. Walsh's long experience in this respect, coupled with the 

 admitted efficacy of the tests which he has devised and applied, 

 and which have been exhibited at the various ' Field ' trials of 

 guns, has specially qualified him to. write authoritatively on the 

 subject; and his opinion, therefore, as set forth in the work 

 before us, must deservedly carry weight. 



As a text-book on game and wildfowl guns, this volume 

 should be read by every man who shoots, whether he is in search 

 of a new gun or not ; for it contains an illustrated history of 

 guns for the last twenty years, showing the successive im- 

 provements which have been made, the details of which are 

 most instructive. 



To give some idea of the ground which is covered by this 

 treatise, we may state that, following the definition of a shot-gun, 

 the author points out the requirements of a sportsman's gun for 

 his varied purposes, explains its construction, and the trials of 

 safety \>y what is called "proof," and efficiency by shooting at a 

 target. He describes the lock in all its details, with the various 

 modifications of it which have been designed from time to time, 

 and discusses fully the important subjects of choke-boring and 

 regulating. Guns with hammers and those without them are 

 fully considered, and subsequent chapters deal successively with 

 cartridges, powder, wads and shot, and the not unimportant 



