124 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[Sept. 5, 1889. 



Explorations in Arizona and New Mexico.— Dr. L. 

 Stejneger, of the U. S. National Museum, Curator Dept. 

 of Reptiles, left Washington Sept. 2, for Arizona and New 

 Mexico, where he will make collections of birds and 

 reptiles. The Doctor will first go into the San Francisco 

 Mountains, in central Arizona, and work south. _ He ex- 

 pects to be engaged about three months upon this work. 

 The field to be gone over is quite rich in objects of natural 

 history, and Dr. Stejneger will probably add much de- 

 siderata to the collections of the museum. Dr. C. Hart 

 Merriam, of the Agricultural Department, is now in the 

 same field collecting mammals and birds. Prof. F. W. 

 Knowlton, of the U. S. National Museum, is also work- 

 ing in the same territory collecting plants. 



Range of the Wild Turkey.— Plainfield, Mass. — Re- 

 ferring to your investigations respecting the range of the 

 wild turkey to the northward and eastward, let me say 

 that I have just learned from tradition that "Gobble 

 Mountain," in Chester, took its name from the quantity 

 of wild turkeys which were once found there. Chester 

 is in the northwestern part of Hampden county, which 

 projects into Hampshire county. This is the furthest 

 limit of Gallopavo's habitat which I have heard of in this 

 direction. — Chas. Hallock. 



Wild Pigeons.— Calais, Me., Aug. 26. — After some 

 years we are this summer having some of our old ac- 

 quaintances in the way of wild pigeons. Several flocks 

 have been about, and I hope they may again become 

 abundant.— Geo. A. Boardman. 



"That reminds me." 

 278. 



SEVERAL years since the skipper and myself pulled 

 down to Great Marsh before sundown to get a lew 

 shots at black duck, which were striking in quite plenti- 

 fully. The skipper set the stools, while I busied myself 

 in shoving my boat into the edge of the marsh and cov- 

 ering her with sedge so that the birds might not sight me 

 as I lay in her. As soon as he had finished the stools the 

 skipper pulled away to a favorite blind, and by that time 

 I was ready for business. The dusk was set in and we 

 had had no shots, and I had been intently watching for 

 any birds which might fly over, when I glanced at the 

 decoys and saw that the skipper had set more than he 

 said he had. That is. I thought he said seven, and surely 

 I counted eight. My first impulse was to cover that 

 extra bird, and my gun was at my shoulder before I hap- 

 pened to think that possibly it might be that he was mis- 

 taken, and that if I filled his decoys full of shot he might 

 not be filled with happiness; and besides, the laugh 

 would never be over with the boys. I wavered a minute 

 between an impulse to "turn her loose" on the outside 

 bird, but he was so quietly resting on the water without 

 a quack or perceptible motion to be noticed through the 

 dusk, that I had not the sand to take the chance of its 

 not being a decoy. No duck had lit, and this extra one 

 might easily be a decoy set by the skipper in excess of 

 the seven he had told me he placed. To solve the pro- 

 blem I gently rocked the boat in the marsh. Whir ! 

 Bang! Up got a black duck and off over the marsh he 

 whistled, followed by my right barrel, but too late. The 

 duck must have swam up from some distant part of the 

 marsh, and so quietly that I had not seen him till he was 

 among the decoys. I didn't say anything about my bril- 

 liancy to the skipper. He had no delicacy of feeling, 

 and would laugh. F. P. L. 



279. 



In our engineer corps was Col. Sam H., a very modest 

 and refined gentleman of Irish persuasion, and possess- 

 ing considerable ability, but so much addicted to the 

 "rosy," that he frequently found himself on the super- 

 numerary list. He was acting in the capacity of drafts- 

 man, in which department he possessed considerable 

 skill. Col. Sam stood patiently at his drawing board 

 from morning till night day after day. On one occasion, 

 being invited by some gentlemen to join them the follow- 

 ing morning on a fishing expedition, I thought I would 

 give Col. Sam a holiday, so I asked him to take a seat in 

 my buggy. He gladly accepted, as he had not had a 

 smell of the woods for some months. We started at day- 

 break, and having driven some six miles from the town 

 of Monroe, Louisiana, to the banks of a pretty stream in 

 a swamp, the party of six or eight bivouacked for break- 

 fast. Having built a fire, boiled a coffee pot, and broiled 

 over our cold meats of various kinds, we ate our break- 

 fast with keen relish, and then prepared for fishing. 



I had provided a fishing line for Col. Sam, and when 

 all were busy in preparations I produced it and handed it 

 to him. Now Col. Sam had probably never cast a hook 

 in water in his life, nor pulled a trigger. He gazed at 

 the line in embarrassed surprise, then exclaimed, "Me 

 feesh! I — ah— I left me glarsses. I carn't see to bait me 

 ho-o-o-k!" So Col. Sam loitered about the woods until 

 noon, when the party assembled at the camp-fire with a 

 goodly store of black bass, goggle eye, bream and jack- 

 fish, wriggling fresh from the water. They were soon 

 transferred from their native element to hot lard in a fry- 

 pan, when their bright and glistening skins speedily 

 became crisp and brown. Then Col. Sam exhibited his 

 prowess as a fisherman in a manner to excite the envy of 

 all dyspeptics. We continued our sport in the afternoon 

 until the gathering gloom in the swamp admonished us 

 to get out to the "big road" before it became too dark. 

 Then hitching up our "teams" we rattled back to town 

 in merry mood. This was the first and only time that 

 Col. Sam ever essayed to play fisherman. " 



Memphis, Tenn. COAHOMA. 



Forest and Stream, Bos 2,833, N. Y. city, has deseriptive illus- 

 trated circulars of W. B. Lemn^weil's hook, " Wild Fowl Shoot- 

 ing," which will he mailed free on request. The book is pro- 

 nounced by "Nanit," "Gloan," "Dick Swiveller," "Sybillene" and 

 other competent authorities to be the best treatise on the subiec* 

 extant. 



Names and Portraits oe Birds, by Gurdon Trumbnll. A 

 book particularly interesting to gunners, for by its use they can 

 Identify without question all the American game birds which 

 tney may kill. Cloth, 230 pages, price $2.50. For sale by Forest 

 and Stream. 



PATTERN AND PENETRATION. 



SCOTT, 10-BOFvE. 



THE Scott gun was the make of weapon put to test 

 when the screen was put in use on the afternoon of 

 Aug. 7. The particular arm on trial was the property of 

 a gentleman well known among the duck shooters of the 

 Long Island inlets, and the large 10-gauge Scott which 

 he offered for trial has often done good service across the 

 waters of the Great South Bay. It can hardly be said 

 that it acquitted itself in any very satisfactory shape be- 

 fore this shooting screen. Two sets of cartridges were 

 prepared, intended to run as nearly even as the two 

 makes of powder would permit, and they were loaded by 

 the Schultze powder agent in this country so as to insure 

 the best possible showing for the white explosive. 



The day was a very fair one for the trial, a 5 o'clock 

 lifting wind affecting the flying shot but little, and the 



SCOTT GUN, BLACK POWDER, RIGHT BARREL, 126 PELLETS. 



pellets had a good chance to make the best pattern of 

 which they were capable. Of course, with such charges 

 of powder behind large shot, and chilled shot, too, the 

 penetration ran heavy, and it became explainable how an 

 arm of such poor pattern might yet make a good record 

 if only the shooter put in plenty of charge, for with such 

 a striking force a single shot would drop a pretty fair- 

 sized waterfowl. The gun was well held, since out of 

 five shots fired from each barrel at each distance with 

 each sort of powder, the average distance in inches be- 

 tween the centers of the aimed and struck circles ran as 

 follows: 



Black Powder. Schultze Powder. 



Right Barrel. Left Barrel. Eight Barrel. Left Barrel. 



40yds 5in. 4in. 5in. 4in. 



60yds 5J£in. 4in. 4in. 3in. 



In not a few instances the advantage gain in the pat- 

 tern sheet by shifting from the center aimed at was very 

 slight, showing that the aiming of Supt. Moss, who did 

 the firing, was good, and that the gun put its shot as far 



neatly balanced with the black, so far as force was con- 

 cerned, as the penetration runs very even, with the advan- 

 tage slightly with the white powder. 



The testing of this gun was an illustration of just how 

 the Forest and Stream gun test is to do its w-ork. It 

 was not intended that trial be made only of sets of 

 guns gotten up as show pieces by the various makers 

 just to display the top notch work of any particular 

 make. These trials are interesting as measurers of what 

 arms ought to do, but beyond this sort of test there is the 

 trials of the arms in the hands of the general run of gun- 

 ners. Just as in our trajectory test of rifles we asked for 



SCOTT GUN. SCHULTZE POWDER, RIGHT BARREL, 124 PELLETS. 



stock rifles, taken out of a lot, and not fettled up for a 

 special test; so in shotgun work, and even more so than 

 in rifles, we wish to see what the average gun is doing. 

 In almost every instance the gun shoots better than the 

 holder holds, but this is no reason why a man should 

 bring along a lOlbs. gun and fire away a big load of shot 

 at each trigger pull simply to do the work which an 81bs. 

 arm properly loaded would accomplish. 



In this instance it is not to be supposed that the Scott 

 works will consider the performance of this gun as typi- 

 cal of their entire output, no more fo than the Colt works 

 consider our recent trial of a pair of Colt arms as show- 

 ing what that make of aims ought to do. Yet the owners 

 of those Colts, just as the owner of this Scott, each con- 

 sidered himself the owner of a pretty good weapon, and 

 was ready to back it with his money and time in a trip 

 after game. They were successful in dropping their 

 birds, rather in spite of than because of , any extra aid 

 given by the arms carried. Put to the cold, exact test of 

 a number of figured shots at the paper target, the guns 

 do not figure out largely. Yet in the hands of their 



SCOTT GUN, BLACK POWDER. LEFT BARREL, 115 PELLETS. 



as it was able about the point of aim. The average for 

 the five shots fired in each instance, from each barrel at 

 each distance, and with the two sorts of powder, shows 

 as follows: 



Black Powder. Schultze Powder. 



Aimed Circle. Struck Circle. Aimed Circle. Struck Circle. 



Right Left Right Left Right Left Right Left 

 Barrel. Barrel. Barrel. Barrel. Barrel. Barrel. Barrel. Barrel. 

 40yds.. 101 99 106 104 81 69 83 74 

 60yds.. 43 50 49 56 38 44 43 46 



In noting the averages it should be borne in mind that 

 the opened cartridges showed an average of 276 pellets in 

 each one, so that reckoned by percentage there was not a 

 single average which reached 40 per cent.of the quantity of 

 shot fired, and at 60yds. not even 20 per cent, was reached. 

 The advantage was slightly with the black powder in 

 both distances of the test. Coming to a comparison of 

 penetration, the large quantity of black powder, running 

 up to 132grs. of explosive behind 585grs. weight of shot, 

 showed itself in the hard hitting. The white powder was 



SCOTT GUN, SCHULTZE POWDER, LEFT BARREL, 103 PELLETS. 



owners, hopeful zeal took the place of close pattern, and 

 fair success was met with across marsh and meadow. 



The Scott gun tried was a heavy, serviceable arm. 

 Shooter Moss said he could not detect any special differ- 

 ence in recoil between the two powders, and this may 

 have a significance in looking at the penetration figures. 

 In one shot the wad over the Schultze powder at 40yds. 

 came down the range and through the paper screen along 

 with the metallic contents of the charge. 



Our figures in the record so thoroughly cover the story 

 of the gun's doings, that we will lea^ e them, together 

 with the selected best patterns, to tell the story of the 

 test. In the cuts it should be borne in mind that A in 

 each instance is the point of aim, while Cis the center of 

 the struck circle for greatest pattern. 



Claremont, JST. J., Aug. 7, 1889. 

 test made at eorest and stream gun-testing screen. 

 Gun— Scott hammer. Cost, $— . No. of gun, 15,981. "Weight, 

 lO^lbs. Length of barrels, 33in. Gauge, 10. Right bar- 

 rel, full choke. Left barrel, full choke. 

 Weather— Clear. Direction of wind, 5 o'clock. Force of 

 wind, 4 miles per hour. Thermometer, dry, 75°. Do., 

 wet, 67°. Humidity, 66° . Barometer, 30.1 in. 

 Charge, as given by holder of gun : 



BOTH BARRELS. 



Shell— V. S. C. Co.'s Climax. 

 Poioder, Brand — Dead Shot. 

 Powder, Quantity— 1% drs. 

 ( Make— Tatham. 

 Shot J Quantity— IX oz. 

 Size— 6 Chilled. 



