loo TAXIDERMY AND MODELLING 



not be large. A strong rifle, calibre about '450, for deer and 

 so on ; a small, light, single rifle, about "320, for rabbits, rooks, 

 etc. ; a strong, hard-shooting 1 2-bore, C.F. bored for long paper 

 cartridges or Kynoch's brass " Perfects " ; and a double '410 

 collector's gun for small birds : with these four guns the collector 

 is well set up, but all must be, though not necessarily very 

 expensive, yet of sound quality and undeniable power. The 

 question of the exact patterns must be left to the discretion 

 of each sportsman ; but, if only one 1 2-bore is procured, let it 

 be hammerless and a cylinder, in addition to being bored to kill 

 up to fifty yards with a long cartridge. For a cylinder to be 

 made to do this is not a hard task for any good gunmaker, 

 and is within the writer's experience, who, having a full-choked 

 gun, had it altered to a cylinder, with the result that the pro- 

 portion of kills to misses or " featherings," in strong or fast- 

 flying birds, was exactly reversed, both man and gun shooting 

 better and stronger, and the kills between forty and fifty yards 

 being certainties with the increased charge when well on the 

 bird. Needless to say that a very light gun will not take these 

 heavy charges without " kicking," which, if not dangerous to 

 the gun, is certainly not conducive to clean killing by the 

 sportsman, whilst the strongly-built gun will not only take its 

 maximum charge without flinching, but will take the ordinary 

 paper cartridges with smaller charges for ordinary purposes. 



The same gunmaker (Clarke, of Leicester), who so success- 

 fully and carefully rebored the 1 2-bore, makes the double C.F. 

 •410 collector's gun — a handy little weapon, which, though it 

 will kill a rabbit if the right place be hit, takes so small a charge 

 as not to damage little birds. 



If, however, the collector lives on the coast, or has the 

 necessary time and money at disposal, his " battery " will no 

 doubt be augmented by the punt-gun with the necessary gun- 

 ning-punt, and by these means he will, as Sir Ralph Payne- 



