376 



RECREATION. 



sired in hunting. Even in India and Af- 

 rica to-day the 8, 10, 12, and 14 gauges are 

 favorites for large, fierce game. 



The army, within the last year, has been 

 entirely equipped with the small bore 

 Krag Jorgensen. I doubt if even the most 

 recent volunteer regiments use the Spring- 

 field 45. So the poor showing in marks- 

 manship is undoubtedly due to the use of 

 the small bore. 



Our National Guard would be ashamed 

 of such a score, yet they have but one or 

 2 days of practice a year, and that, too, 

 with the 45. 



With such statements to confront, I am 

 surprised at the persistence of the small 

 bore advocates. Perhaps when the 45 

 came into popularity against the 58, 60, 

 and 68, these same small bore champions 

 may have been as valiant defenders of the 

 then small bore 45 as they are now of the 

 30. But I tremble for them should the 

 day come when the 30 becomes universally 

 popular. I do not know what next small- 

 er caliber would become a goal for these 

 vacillating champions to defend. 



E. E. Stokes, Brooklyn, N. Y. 



AN OLD-TIMER OX THE 30-40. 



Dawson, Y. T. 

 Editor Recreation: 



A week ago I received a dozen copies 

 of Recreation, some a year old and one 

 as late as April, 1900. I have had a treat 

 reading them. I prize them more highly 

 than the largest nugget I have seen in a 

 sluice box this year. 



It amuses me to see such a wide differ- 

 ence of opinion relative to small caliber, 

 high power guns. The 45-70 was all right 

 10 years ago; so was the flint lock 100 

 years back. 



I admit the 30 caliber does not strike 

 the sledge hammer blow that- the big 

 45 or 50 gun does. Guns taking metal 

 patched bullets are not so long lived as 

 the old style weapons. But the 30-40, with 

 soft nose bullets, will kill anything that 

 walks with four feet on this continent, and 

 at twice the range that a 45-70 will. I have 

 used nearly all makes and calibers and 

 have hunted from Texas to Montana, and 

 from the Missouri to the Pacific coast, and 

 for the past 3 years in Alaska and North- 

 west territory, so I speak from experience. 



In the latter 70' s I thought there was 

 no beating the 45-120 Sharps, or even the 

 44-105 Sharps. In '83 and '84 I was hunt- 

 ing in Middle Park, Colo., where game 

 was plentiful and tame. There I gave up 

 the big gun and took to a 44-40 '73 model, 

 Winchester. I still believe it is the best 

 gun for brush shooting, being short, light, 

 and compact. 



But what good are they on the plains, or 

 in this country where game ranges high 



on the bald hills and, in winter, is hard 

 to approach? 



While in this country I have used 30-30, 

 .303, and the 30-40 Winchester. Tht 2 

 smaller ones are not in it with the 30-40, 

 but are far ahead of all black powder 

 guns. As to the 30-40, there is no room 

 for an argument. 



Mr. Wells, of Cora, Wyo., says, in 

 Recreation, that he would shoot his 45-70 

 up to 1,800 yards against any smokeless 

 gun ever made. He makes me laugh. I 

 should like to meet Mr. Wells, and think 

 I could convince him that a 30-40 is all 

 right. He, like a few others, has got into 

 that old 45 rut, and perhaps will go to 

 the end of it before he finds it out. 



I lived in Wyoming during '85-6-7 and 8, 

 and hunted over the greater part of it 

 when game was plentiful. I had splen- 

 did shooting at Jackson's Hole, and at 

 Shirley Basin on the Snaski and Savory. 

 But in those days any kind of gun was 

 good enough to kill camp meat. 



I am heart and soul with Mr. Woga- 

 man, of Quincy, Ohio. The pump gun is 

 all right. It is not the gun that makes 

 the hog, but the hog that makes the gun 

 an exterminator. I think the 12 gauge 

 Winchester lever gun is the champion of 

 all field guns. 



In one year more I expect to go back 

 to civilization for the remainder of my 

 days. I should then like to enter into this 

 gun chewing contest. But by that time 

 perhaps all guns will be obsolete. Pos- 

 sibly all we will have to do then will be 

 to pull a string and have venison, all 

 cooked and buttered, shot at us through 

 a pneumatic tube. 



J. B. Hubnick. 



MY GUN AND HOW I LOAD IT. 



It is a Remington hammerless, 12 gauge, 

 28 inch right cylinder bore, left full choke; 

 barrels of ordnance steel, which are rec- 

 ommended by makers to withstand heavy 

 loads of nitro. For brush shooting, the 

 cylinder bore is just the thing. Should 

 I get an occasional long shot, the other 

 barrel will stop the bird as far as any gun 

 made. As I shoot a good deal, I am thor- 

 oughlv accustomed to this gun. Later in 

 the fall, I go deer hunting, and take the 

 best gun I can find, which is no other than 

 this same Remington, with the addition of 

 a set of rifle sights and an auxiliary or in- 

 serted rifle barrel, also of Remington 

 make, using a 45-90 cartridge. With this 

 gun I have better success than with any 

 other, partly for the reason that, using but 

 one gun, I am perfectly familiar with it, 

 and again because it is accurate and prop- 

 erly loaded. 



One of my earliest recollections is of my 

 older brothers experimenting with buck- 



