FOREST AND STREAM 
131 
For Forest and Stream . 
MY PETS. 
* * T T is not good that man.should be alone,” says the Holy 
1. Writ. The idea usually conveyed by these words 
is of the necessity for the companionship of woman to 
effect the perfect mundane happiness of man. But that 
view alone is either too broad or too narrow. It is often 
out of the power of- a man to command the society of those 
of the sex with whom association would be agreeable, 
and circumstances may be unfavorable to the enjoyment 
of social contact with his own at the times wdien most he 
needs it. Therefore rather than “to be alone” which we 
are told, “is not good,” he is not to be blamed if lie seeks 
for “company” in tlie brute creation, and should he find it, 
so much the better. Who can say that a sense of loneli¬ 
ness is not greatly softened, if not relieved, by the presence 
of an affectionate dog? In a like manner but lesser degree, 
a cat, bird or squirrel may supply the need. 
Now if there is one time more than another when it is 
not good for one to be alone, that time is meal time. Good 
manners as well as good appetite and good digestion are 
promoted and stimulated by pleasant company at the table, 
none of which are to be despised. You who have never 
lacked the sweet fellowship of the home circle with its 
thousand warm impulses and genial influences, can never 
appreciate, as I appreciate, the companionship of pets like 
mine. Sickness, age and death have since boyhood robbed 
me of those who could have made the breakfast table a 
scene of pleasant daily reunion. Day after day, for weeks 
and months have I broken my bread in solitude, and have 
learned at last to find that companionship in my dogs and 
cats which was in other ways denied me. 
On my left hand sits my dog “Jack,” his face full of in¬ 
telligence, and his mild brown eyes gazing at me with 
peculiar expression, for he has brought me the daily paper 
which the carrier threw into the hall just now, and knows 
he will be rewarded. His hunting^days are over now, and 
having become one of the household his kennel has de¬ 
scended to “Nip,” the beautiful liver and white setter pup 
which crouches at my feet. I had a hound named * ‘Jerry’’— 
short for Jerome—but I gave him away. He was sired by 
his daddy and anathematized by the whole neighborhood 
whenever the church bells rang, whereat he howled dis¬ 
mally. 
The puppy has already breakfasted, and now bestows 
his whole attention upon the pretty Maltese and Angora 
kittens which are frisking around the room. He would 
enjoy greatly to have a romp with them but knows that 
any advance on his part would be certainly misconstrued 
by Maltie’s mother, between whom and himself a mutually 
perfect understanding has not been yet establislie d. The 
old lady has taken up her position on a chair near the fire, 
and seems to be wholly absorbed in meditation and obli¬ 
vious to all that is going on around her. But don’t you 
believe it! Her kitten is having a game of football with a 
cork which it has found, and I am letting my coffee grow 
cold in admiration of its graceful movements. Now under 
this chair, now under that, tossing up the cork and catch¬ 
ing it, and exhibiting in one minute more lines of beauty 
than Hogarth ever dreamed of. At last the cork flies across 
the room, the kitten after it. Unconsciously the puppy 
takes a step or two forward, and at the same instant the 
old cat, hearing a mouse in the closet, suddenly jumps 
clown and makes a rush for the door. This startles the 
kitten, whose back flies up with a warning spit, and the 
guilty pup in his frantic efforts to. escape the retributive 
claws which he expects every moment to feel, tumbles over 
old Jack who has lain down for a doze, and their united 
voices add to the uproar, and make the old clock on the 
mantel ring again. 
When quiet lias been restored, I dive into the contents of 
the paper and soon am so absorbed that Jack becomes dis¬ 
gusted with my neglect, and manifests the fact by a series 
of short impatient nasal sounds between a grunt and a 
sniff, which failing to produce the desired effect, he “sings 
out” in a manner that sets the crockery dancing, and makes 
the windows rattle. I chide him into silence, and giving 
him a morsel bid him seek our cumniere (from Cork). In 
other words he is told to “shut up and go to Biddy!” Ver- 
bum sap. He has “been there” before. To the kitchen 
door he waddling goes, and stands—not upon the order of 
liis going, but—upon his hind legs, and paws wildly at the 
latch. Alas for the paint! In a rash moment of thought¬ 
lessness the door which once had been white, was grained, 
and now, owing to a long series of miscalculations on the part 
of the dog, presents a truly unique appearance. It looks 
indeed as my aunt aptly observes^now and then, ‘ ‘like the old 
scratch!” To tell the truth there is hardly a door in the 
house which does not bear witness to Jack’s determination 
to enter it. Constant attrition for years has produced lono- 
deep wavy parallel channels extending from the door 
knobs downward to the sills, wherever his precious old 
claws travel harmlessly; and experience has taught him 
that perseverance will surely bring some one to the' door 
who will turn that odious knob and let him in. A latch 
however, he can manage very well. So bang goes the door 
open and out goes Jack, followed by the pup, which yells 
with anguish as the door, pulled too by a rubber band 
closes on his tail. 
To me,- listening, come these words in Celtic accents 
borne upon the sausage laden atmosphere. “A ha! y’ould 
blaggard. Is it tearin the dure agin, yez are? Bad 
cess t’tlie likes iv yez! Fhere ’s me shtick, till I 
knock dusht out iv yez! Taranayges! but I’ll break 
ivery boan in yer body!” To a stranger it might seem that 
nothing short of immediate annihilation awaits the poor 
animals, but we know better, and looking out of the win¬ 
dow a few moments later, I observe them busily engaged 
in stowing away a generous meal, while Biddy surveys 
them from an open door. All right, my pets, I could not 
leave you in better hands. IT. 
-- 
For Forest and Stream. 
HOW TO SHOOT AT LONG RANGE. 
NUMBER THREE. 
I N our last letter we described a long range target rifle. 
If it be made according to the requisites there given, 
by any of ouj good rifle makers, the errors of the instru¬ 
ment itself will;'be too small to be noticed. But it must be 
remembered that a rifle is useless without ammunition, and 
! accuracy of shooting depends quite as much upon that as 
upon the rifle. Before the days of breechloaders, using 
fixed cartridges, the rifleman had this matter under his own 
control, and if he wants to make accurate shooting he 
should keep it so still, and not trust to cartridges loaded by 
careless persons, witli varying charges of perhaps inferior 
powder, and projectiles of different weights. 
For short range shooting these differences are not import¬ 
ant; but, depend upon it, when you come to long ranges, 
where all errors of the rifle are greatly magnified at the 
target, you cannot make accurate shooting without powder 
of uniform strength, same quantity in’eacli charge, and pro¬ 
jectiles of uniform weight. To get this you must either 
use a muzzle loader, or cartridges that every man can load 
for himself. My own preference, after having tried almost 
every kind of rifle, is for a breechloader for accurate shoot¬ 
ing. One reason is that you can perfectly clean the inside 
of the barrel after each shot, and know that it is clean. In¬ 
asmuch as it is a necessity of accurate shooting that the 
conditions of each shot shall coincide with that of the pre¬ 
ceding ones, this is a matter of importance. 
The other reason is, that perfect accuracy cannot be at¬ 
tained unless the axis of the projectile is coincident with 
that of the rifle; in other words, it must have a tight fit. 
No loose expanding bullet will shoot as true as one mechani¬ 
cally fitting the grooves. In the old-fashioned American 
muzzle loader this fit was obtained by patching the ball and 
the use of a “starter” at the muzzle. But by inserting the 
projectile at the breech it can be made to take the grooves 
perfectly, and without trouble or loss of time in loading. 
If the rifleman decides to use a breechloader he must either 
use the Maynard, whose cartridges are made to re-load, or he 
must procure shells that can' be re-loaded, and a pair of 
bullet-moulds for his Remington, or whatever pattern he 
may prefer. 
English practice has settled the relative proportions of 
powder and projectile nearly as follows:—Sufficient momen¬ 
tum to overcome the disturbing effects of wind at long 
ranges cannot be got with less weight of projectile than 400 
grains, and from this to 530, (the weight of the usual Eng¬ 
lish small bore projectile,) gives the best results. The ten¬ 
dency in England has been to increase the charge of powder 
from GO grains, which was a not unusual charge ten years 
ago, up to 90, the weight of projectile remaining the same, 
580 grains, or a little less than six times the weight of the 
powder. My preference is to diminish the weight of the 
projectile a little, say to 450 grains of lead and use 80 grains 
powder. This gives less recoil and does equally good work. 
In fact, it is as large a charge as a ten pound rifle should 
carry. Instead of increasing the charge of powder, our 
effort should be to diminish the friction. As the use of 
breechloaders allows of mechanically fitting projectiles, we 
may shorten the length of barrel. A 24 inch Maynard will 
do as accurate-shooting at any range as a 80 inch muzzle 
loader with expanding ball. The metal saved in length can 
be put into thickness, where it will do more good. A 
shorter barrel evidently will give less friction than a longer 
one. It is to be hoped that our scientific gunmakers will 
make a series of. exhaustive experiments to determine the 
proper length of barrel of a breechloader using mechanic¬ 
ally fitting projectiles, and at the same time test the truth 
of Captain Hea’s plan of confining the rifling to within six 
inches of the muzzle only. 
But to return to our subject, what we are trying to attain 
is, that the conditions of each shot should coincide with 
those of the preceding ones. We should use powder of 
uniform quality. My own preference for short barrel and me¬ 
chanically fitting projectile is Hazard Electric, of rather 
coarse grain. Buy enough at a time for one season’s shoot¬ 
ing, mix altogether and put in a tight tin canister. Get a 
small pair of apothecaries’ scales, and weigh each charge 
with its cartridge'. No accurate long range shooting can be 
made if this point be neglected. Cast your projectiles of 
lead hardened with one-part £of tin. Pass all through a 
swage, which should be ordered with the moulds. Jacket 
each projectile with a piece of tough bank note paper. No 
system of shooting naked lead, either with or without 
greased caunelures gives the same accuracy as can be gained 
by covering the projectile with paper well greased. Weigh 
the projectiles and divide them into groups varying not 
over two grains from each other. Use for shooting at 
one range one group only. Having your cartridges care¬ 
fully made up after this manner and marked, so as to know 
those of different weights apart, be careful always to swab 
your rifle with a greased rag before each shot, always keep¬ 
ing it as bright as a mirror. 
Any one who reads what we have written may think that 
we are advising a great deal of unnecessary trouble and 
nicety of manipulation. But if any thing is worth doing at 
all it is worth doing well. Is it not better to take a little 
trouble and care to get ready and feel that you are all right, 
rather than to rush to the rifle range knowing nothing about 
what you are doing, and perhaps after making several bull’s 
eyes, getting a miss or richochet, because your cartridge 
had been carelessly filled? If any one does not think as we 
do, they will be convinced after seeing the practice of the 
Irish team. T. O. C. 
—-- «♦» » • ---- 
For Forest and stream . 
PINNATED GROUSE FOR NEW JERSEY. 
I TRUST that the timely letter of “Homo,” inyourVol. 
2, No. G, will meet with the response from the differ¬ 
ent Sportsmen’s Clubs and Protective Societies that the 
subject deserves. 
The re-production in West Jersey of the pinnated grouse 
has long been a cherished project of sportsmen of my ac¬ 
quaintance. Individual efforts have been made in that 
direction, but various causes, the difficulty of obtaining and 
transporting birds, the bad faith of agents, the w T ant of 
proper protection, have rendered them futile; but at no 
time has a doubt existed of the fitness of the ground or the 
perfect feasibility of the enterprise, could the birds be ob¬ 
tained in efficient numbers and defended from trappers 
and pot-hunters. I live within a few miles of ground where 
they were formerly abundant. I know men who have 
killed them on that ground within twenty-five years. I 
have been at some pains to question these parties as to the 
particular localities in which grouse were chiefly found and 
the causes which led to their extirpation. Their answer to 
the latter question will be found in that part of “Homo’s” 
letter, in which he says:—“The total extinction of this 
noble specimen of the grouse family in the east can be at¬ 
tributed directly to the lack of proper protective laws 
in their behalf; the shooting of the young birds was 
allowed at any time, and the persecution began as early as 
June and continued each year until the pinnated grouse now 
cannot be found nearer than the great grass plains of our 
western States.” 
According to my informants a practice prevailed among 
the “Arabs,” who then infested this region, more wanton 
and destructive than all the rest. In early spring, during 
the love season, the grouse being in considerable “packs” 
and the males remarkably pugnacious, many and continued 
combats occurred for the favor of the fair onqs. The pecu¬ 
liar sound emitted by the male bird, known as “blowing,” 
was a sure guide to the pot-hunter. At night-fall he built 
within easy shot of the rendezvous a brush house or 
“blind,” and at early dawn awaited the coming of his 
victims. This was certain and their extermination inevi¬ 
table. Unless he exposed himself to their view the game 
. would not take flight, but continued to fight each other and 
to spur even the wounded and dead until the last one had 
bitten the dust. In my boyhood I have heard an old man 
say he had “killed fifteen of a mornin’.” 
Upon the Atsion tract, formerly belonging to the Rich¬ 
ards’ family, the grouse had an extensive range. This 
estate, traversed by the New Jersey Southern Railroad, con¬ 
sists of nearly forty thousand acres, and is now the prop¬ 
erty of Maurige Raleigh, Esq., of Philadelphia, a liberal- 
minded gentleman, who, I am quite sure, would afford 
every facility in his power toward the success of the pro¬ 
ject. Above Atsion, on the line of the New Jersey South¬ 
ern and about two miles from Woodmansie Station, is a 
tract of land known par excellence as “the Plains.” It is 
miles in extent, the ground being rolling and in many 
places even hilly. It is covered with a growth of scrub- 
oak and stunted pine which, according to tradition, has 
not changed in appearance or size within the memory of 
man. Here also grouse formerly were abundant, and ow¬ 
ing to the difficult nature of cover maintained their exist¬ 
ence to a later period than on any other ground in the 
State, the pines in many places being so thickly covered 
with cones or “apples” as to be almost impassible and pro¬ 
verbially destructive of clothing. It is now generally con¬ 
ceded that they are extinct. 
It rests with the several clubs and societies to say if this 
noble game shall be reproduced. The ground which they 
formerly inhabited is unchanged in its features by the lapse 
of time; the birds can be obtained by a proper effort; the 
law-is already passed which protects them for six years, 
and I can safely say as a member of the “West Jersey 
Game Protective Society,” that it will co operate most 
heartily to effect a “consummation so devoutly to be wish¬ 
ed.” If we can make this addition to our list of game 
birds, what sportsman would not be prouder of his dozen 
grouse killed near his own home than of the hundreds he 
might slaughter in the distant west, where he can neither 
use or give them away; or who, in that ecstatic moment 
when he shall drop his first pinnated grouse on Jersey soil 
will not thank “Homo” for the letter which has afforded 
him the shot. W. C. IT. 
Winslow, N. J., March 23, 1874 
—The simplest method of sharpening a razor is to put it 
for half an hour in water to which has been added one 
twentieth of its weight of muriatic or sulphuric acid then 
lightly wipe it off, and after a few hours set it on a hone. 
The acid here supplies the place of a whetstone by corrod¬ 
ing the whole surface uniformly, so that nothing further 
than a smooth polish is necessary. 
--- - —. 
—The sportsmen of Manchester, New. Hampshire are 
about forming a club for the protection of game and the 
enforcement of the game laws. 
•--— 
—Two dogs kill thirty-five sheep, and wounded several 
more, in half an hour, on JohnFarnum’s farm at Lanes® 
boro, Mass., last Wednesday. 
