Atm, 14, 1890.] 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



69 



FIRST DAYS BEHIND THE GUN. 



TAKE away the beautiful hamnierless gun with its 

 autonmtic ejectors and its perfect fit, with its 

 smokeless ; powder,, its chilled shot and machine-loaded 

 cartridges; take away the silken haired dog with his 

 almost human intelligence and four-fifths broken at his 

 birth, and give me back the old, long, single-barreled 

 gun, feeling like an old-fasbioned "soap stick" with 

 a brick tied on the end; give me back the old "G. D." 

 caps and hornet's nest wadding, and give me back along 

 with them the bounding heart of the first days behind 

 the gun. Away with the buzzing quail, the twittering 

 wing of the noble woodcock; the grouse bursting from 

 the laurel brake with obstreperous wing and the wild 

 duck whizzing down the wind; the bounding deer and 

 the gently cantering antelope, and give me back the 

 robin in the old dark cedar, the highbolder in the old 

 gumtree, the gray squirrel in the old hickory, and the 

 eleven years of age with which I started out. 



Fondly memory plays over the days when nobler game 

 was plenty, before the cheap breechloader, the market- 

 shooter, and the numerous railroads robbed the fields 

 and woods of all that made them attractive; but to me 

 the happiest days were not those in which I shouldered 

 the well-balanced double-barrel and wandered with the 

 stride of early manhood over hill and dale, with the old 

 dog rollicking gaily over the frosty stubble or threading 

 the tangled swamp, but the days when I was too young 

 to be trusted with a gun, but managed to get one all the 

 same. 



My first experience in shooting was with a piece of lead 

 pipe pounded shut at one end, with a touch-hole bored 

 with a fork and mounted by lashing with strings" upon a 

 stick. An uncle of about my own age and I used to 

 "hook" ammunition from an older uncle and raid the 

 "chippies" down by the brook. The excitement of hold- 

 ing this on a "chippie" at 20ft., while my uncle touched 

 it off with a piece of punk has so far had no parallel in 

 all my wanderings in this vale of tears. 



The difficulty of getting this lead pipe straight enough 

 to make sure of a bird on a fencepost at five paces led to 

 the substitution of a piece of hollow iron some lOin. long 

 that formed the outside of the handle of an old-fashioned 

 grindstone. This was stopped with melted lead at one 

 end and a touch-hole filed in it. I can hear its echo yet 

 through the woods and along the hills, and see the chip- 

 pie falling from the old cedar fence, and the catbird flut- 

 tering wounded out of the elder brush, where he was so 

 busy eating that he let us come within six paces of him. 



But our delight was soon lost in a feeling of wild un- 

 rest, and nothing would do but to steal the older uncle's 

 gun when he was gone to town. Long practice on his 

 ammunition made this step quite easy. A great day was 

 that when we first got out of sight of the house with it 

 and down among the dark cedars. It had been the 

 height of our ambition to kill a robin, but with our own 

 gun it had been impossible. But now the prize was 

 within our grasp. The strategy expended on that first 

 robin would have saved me in later days many a deer 

 which I have lost by carelessness or over-confidence. 

 And no deer ever caused such sensations as that first 

 robin as he came fluttering out of the top of a tall cedar. 



Scarcely any milestone on the path of life has ever 

 looked so big as the day when I was first allowed to have 

 a gun of my own. I was scarcely eleven years old when 

 my father, finding that I was determined to go out shoot- 

 ing in some way or another, concluded that it was best 

 te let me go and have somethiug safe. He had been a 

 sportsman himself when young, and knew the impos- 

 sibility of restraining the inborn love of the field in a 

 youngster. After a vast amount of caution he allowed 

 me to go out alone with the new gun. The caution was 

 quite needless, for the gun was longer than I was, so that 

 it was impossible to shoot myself with it. It was an old 

 relic of the Revolution, altered to a percussion lock, and 

 bought purposely, as I afterward suspected, to dampen 

 my youthful ardor. I had almost to climb on a fence to 

 load it, but it seemed as light as a feather. It kicked 

 like a mule, but I would have enjoyed a battering ram if 

 it would only kick out in front far enough to reach a 

 robin, which was then the height of my ambition. Half 

 the time it would not fire the cap, but" the robins in that 

 day sat still until after repeated snapping it did go off. 

 About half the time it caught on the half-cock notch, but 

 I had only to keep on pulling. It seemed to make no 

 difference where the hammer was started. It's sweep 

 was so great in either case that the principal danger was 

 that the bird might accidentally take a notion to leave 

 after I had pulled the trigger, and get away before the 

 hammer reached the cap. The only caps we had then 

 were the " G, D," (popularly supposed to stand for the 

 two words generally used to make them go), and the 

 splinters used to fly into my fingers, but I never felt 

 them. Often the hammer would fly back to half-cock, 

 half blinding me with the gas from the big hole in the 

 burnt out nipple, but it only sharpened my eye for the 

 next robin. 



In those days we carried powder in a bottle and shot 

 loose in our pockets. The amount of the charge was a 

 matter of small moment, and no two successive charges 

 were alike, a good gun being supposed to have a special 

 virtue that made it kill under any circumstances when 

 well aimed. Hornet's nest was deemed the most effec- 

 tive wadding, though paper, tow and even grass were 

 used. Once in a while a chap had some cut wads in 

 imitation of those used by what was generally known as 

 a "Yorker." But as the end of the ramrod was always 

 too small and headed with a small pyramid of dirt, and 

 the wad cut out of wretched pasteboard and old. slimsy 

 bootlegs, it nearly always turned sideways in the gun, 

 and the old standby of paper or hornet's nest had to be 

 called in after all to push it down. One of the funda- 

 mental principles of the times was that too much powder, 

 by which was meant anything over 2drs. for a 12-bore, 

 made the shot scatter too much, and half the time the 

 gun was loaded so as scarcely to pierce the skin of a full- 

 grown squirrel. Another one was that it took "big shot 

 to kill." The favorite sizes were No. 4, or rather 4's for 

 robins and 2's for rabbits and squirrels. On the other 

 hand there were some who thought that "small shot cut 

 sharper," and that big shot "will ball in the hair." But 

 by "small shot" was meant nothing smaller than 6's, and 

 the great majority thought that anything smaller was fit 

 only for "Yorkers," who were supposed to know nothing 

 about shooting, and were always supposed to be badly 

 beaten when they went out with any of the native ex- 



perts. In fact it was generally considered quite acciden- 

 tal if a city chap killed anything. All manner of fun 

 was made of them when they came out into the country 

 with a snake-like shot belt around the waist, a copper 

 powder flask hung over the shoulder with a green string, 

 and a fish-net gamebag.Jwhich was always supposed to go 

 home empty unless stuffed with leaves or filled with 

 game bought of some native expert. Although few of 

 them actually came from New York, such a sportsman 

 was always called a "Yorker." 



One hundred yards was then the regulation distance, 

 for a good gun to shoot and "kill a hundred yards" was 

 as regular a guarantee on the sale of a gun aB "coming 

 six in the spring" was on the sale of a horse, Guns were 

 supposed to have intrinsic virtues given by some 

 occult quality of the metal, and guns made in the same 

 way differed as two heads of the same shape differ in the 

 quality of the contents. This was not because of the diffi- 

 culty of boring two barrels exactly alike, but was some 

 mysterious virtue iu the metal, as in fine razors. Guns 

 were then tested by the nearest shot they would place to 

 the pinhead that held the paper. The idea that the 

 scattering of the shot was accidental occurred to few of 

 the country folk of that day. Provided the "game shot" 

 was not dropped in loading, and the loader was not too 

 lazy or too stupid to pick it up and put it carefully in, a 

 good gun never failed to throw one shot to the center. 

 A. difference of one-hundredth of an inch in the distance 

 of the shot from the pin that held the paper determined 

 the match, and the gun was graded accordingly. A 

 reputation for a gun thus won was never changed, except 

 by a small circle of the extra wise who insisted that the 

 ability of the shooter always determined the match, be- 

 cause every gun, like a rifle, threw one shot to the center. 



Shall I ever forget the excitement in the little hamlet 

 where I used to spend my vacations, when it was an- 

 nounced that a "Yorker" had arrived with "a hundred 

 dollar gun." As the "Yorker," followed by a rat-tailed 

 pointer, whose satin skin excited as much contempt as 

 his master, disappeared in the swamp nearby, a conclave 

 was held at the country store. It was decided that no 

 gun could cost that amount of money, and that if it did 

 it would not kill as well as a gun costing only ten dollars 

 and made of good old-fashioned soft iron. In fact "pat- 

 ent breech" guns, as all the better classes of double bar- 

 rels were then called, were of little account anyhow. A 

 patent breech was a gun in which the nipple for the cap 

 was in the screw plug in the side of the barrel forward of 

 the breech-plug. Grave doubts were entertained of the 

 shooting qualities of such guns which were supposed to 

 be gotten up to sell guns to "Yorkers" at a big price and 

 were of no use for practical work. 



But when the man who owned a "smooth-bore rifle" 

 came around every one else had to subside. A "smooth- 

 bore rifle" was not an uncommon thing then. It meant 

 a worn out relic of the times when there was some big 

 game still left in the land and was cut out smooth so as 

 to shoot shot. Its long, heavy barrel, crescent-shaped 

 scoop in the stock and other elements of clumsiness made 

 it an object of reverence in the eyes of the country folk. 

 It was supposed to combine the advantages of a rifle with 

 those of a shotgun, throwing the shot for a certain dis- 

 tance in a ball which then expanded and did the work of 

 a shotgun fired at that point. What the man with a 

 smooth-bore rifle could not kill was not worth the kill- 

 ing, and every one was ready to bet that he could bag 

 more game with it than a dozen "Yorkers" could. 



But the light even of this great person had to pale be- 

 fore that of the man who m his day had shot a "cut 

 rifle." There were a few such, far between, old and 

 gray-headed, and they took care not to exhibit their 

 rifles at the target. Their eyes were too old to shoot a 

 rifle now and they hunted only in the memory of the 

 glorious past. The old rifle was kept at home secure 

 from the gaze of the vulgar herd, but in the country 

 store at night to hear them tell of the squirrels' heads 

 they had knocked off at a hundred yards, or rather 

 "twenty rods," when they were young and their eyes 

 were good was one of the rarest of treats. But the king 

 of the lot was the man who had seen the last deer in the 

 neighborhood. It was ever so long ago of course, but he 

 had shot at him and wounded him, and though the 

 "darned fellow what owned the dogs" had laid claim to 

 him, he was sure he had killed him. Though "the other 

 feller drawed the hide," he had nevertheless got his share 

 of the meat, and the bare fact that he had tasted venison 

 made him a great man in the eyes of the listeners. 



What an excitement there was in the hamlet when a 

 "helldiver" (we spoke the name with awe, wondering 

 whether it were wicked or not) appeared on the millpond. 

 A hippopotamus could hardly have made a greater com- 

 motion. Half a dozen guns were quickly brought out, 

 and the bird generally dodged them all. On one occa- 

 sion after one had dodged about a dozen charges of shot 

 propelled by powder that would hardly have stuck shot 

 into a pumpkin at 30yds., I opened fire as the game rose 

 above the surface. I didn't deserve any credit for it, be- 

 cause in my excitement I had balked with the trigger 

 several times before and failed to pull it off before some 

 one else had fired and the bird had dodged. But this time 

 he happened to rise just where I was looking for him, 

 and I pulled the trigger before he had fairly settled upon 

 the surface. At the report of my gun his head dropped 

 over from a stray shot behind the eye. That was one of 

 the greatest days of my life, and the airs I put on in the 

 store that night would make my fortune now in any 

 branch of business if I could only imitate them. The 

 contempt I felt for the ordinary breed of shooters would 

 have been enough to run an ordinary "wing-shooting 

 champion" factory. 



The various theories of shooting in those days would 

 fill a volume. It was thought impossible for any one to 

 become anything of a shot unless he commenced when a 

 boy. Wetting shot was universally believed to make it 

 shoot closer, saliva being especially efficacious in this 

 respect. Most people thought all guns shot better when 

 very dirty; and in truth some did shoot better, for they 

 were so full of holes that they would hardly shoot at ail 

 until the holes were filled up. The longer a gun and the 

 closer its resemblance to a crowbar the better it was sup- 

 posed to shoot; an idea that doubtless came from its re- 

 semblance to a "smoothbore" rifle. Powder had to be 

 rammed hard to shoot strong, and rough barrels shot the 

 strongest btcause they held the shot back and made the 

 powder exert itself more. The only safe way to carry a 

 gun was with the hammer on the cap, and many thought 

 that shot should go slow so as not to flatten on the hide 



of a squirrel. Another reason for using big shot, as they 

 were supposed to be slower than small shot. This idea I 

 found quite prevalent later in life among the deer hunt- 

 ers in the backwoods, where it was a maxim with many 

 that a swift ball would flatten on the hide and that a 

 "slow and strong ball" was the thing. 



It seems to me now incredible that these times were 

 only thirty-five years ago in the upper half of New 

 Jersey, and only forty miles from New York, and only 

 ten miles from a railroad running trains to the city every 

 hour. And yet those days were aboutthe best, all things 

 considered, that I have ever spent with the gun. It is not 

 wholly true that knowledge brings happiness. It brings 

 a pleasure of a certain kind, but quite as of ten takee away 

 pleasure of another sort. The mystery that surrounded 

 guns and their actions, and made them an object of 

 reverence to the child's eye, is gone and nothing is in its 

 place. The bright and ever soaring fancy of childhood 

 was a factor in the enjoyment of field sports that can 

 never be replaced. Though the most enduring of all 

 pleasures, it is in childhood only that they have their 

 deepest intensity, and he who has never known what it is 

 to lie awake all night in anticipation of getting a rabbit 

 the next day has missed the best part of the sportsman's 

 life. The jar of the leaves beneath the spring of the 

 squirrel in the distant hickory raises a far wilder tumult 

 in the blood of childhood than in later days the crash of 

 brush and the thump of hoofs on the ground as the deer 

 springs from his bed near by. And never since have I 

 known such sensations as those I felt when I first heard 

 the throbbing wings of the ruffed grouse echo through the 

 deep hemlock timber, or the paralyzing shock in which 

 gun and everything else were forgotten, as with roaring 

 wing he burst from the ground before me and swept like 

 a cannon shot through the dark green of the laurel brake, 

 leaving me engulfed in wonder and awe while the very 

 earth seemed to tremble with the heavvbeat of his wing. 



T. S. Van Dyke. 



California. 



CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 



CHICAGO, 111., Aug. 9.— It seems that there is trouble 

 with the chicken crop in at least one section of 

 Dakota, and that it is partly due to the omnipresent fiend 

 w T ho shoots before the season opens. Dakota chickens 

 killed in the first of August ! It must be noble sport to 

 shoot the little fellows. The following letter is from the 

 Register of Deeds of Codington county, South Dakota, to 

 Mr. Paxson, who is in the same offices with Mr. E. S. Rice, 

 manager of the Standard Cartridge Co., and is relative to 

 a Dakota chicken trip which Mr. Rice was figuring on 

 taking. It may be interesting reading to many who con- 

 templated going to Dakota this fall. It reads as follows: 

 "Watertown, S.D., Aug. 5, 1890.— Yours of recent date 

 received. I am of the opinion that it will not be a 

 pleasant trip for Mr. Rice and his friend, unless the 

 weather changes. The beat is almost unbearable, and the 

 lawless cusses have already been getting in their deadly 

 destruction regardless of law. A party of us intended to 

 start on the afternoon before opening day for a two- 

 weeks' outing, and intended Mr. Rice and his friend to be 

 with us, but the weather has been such that we have 

 given it up. Prairie fires are running and vegetation of 

 every description is severely scorched. It looks now as 

 though shooting of all kinds would be a failure in South 

 Dakota, although the prospects were grand a few weeks 

 ago. Should things brighten up and a chance for sport 

 be given us I will telegraph Mr. Rice, but will not do so 

 unless I think the trip would be a pleasant one. Hope we 

 may be able to telegraph 'come.* — W. O. Fraser." 



It seems strange that men can still be found to-day who 

 persist in violating the chicken law, but there are some 

 fellows born with the chicken-thief instinct strong within 

 them. We do not need to go to Dakota to find a promi- 

 nent instance of this. We have got a man right here in 

 this city, a man whose name has appeared in these col- 

 umns, usually in connection with unduly large scores of 

 game or fish killed, a man who is a member of Mak-3aw-ba 

 Club, and who is quoted and written up in the daily and 

 "illustrated" papers as a ' 'prominent sportsman," who has 

 for some time been killing chickens down on Mak-saw-ba 

 Club grounds and other farms near by. This is known 

 to members of the Mak-saw-ba Club, who are only wait- 

 ing till they can get a legal as well as a moral certainty 

 to act upon. This man has often said that he would 

 "kill a chicken whenever he wanted to." He has some 

 land of his own, and he is of that firm belief so deeply 

 rooted in the rural mind, that he can do just as he wants 

 to "on his own land." He is supposed to regard Mak- 

 saw-ba grounds as his own land also. The offenses of 

 this "prominent sportsman" are practically known, and 

 after a while the boys hope to be able to get a case against 

 him. He will then, to use a homely simile, "get it in the 

 neck," with the result, it is hoped, of permanently knock- 

 ing him out of the arena of all sportsmanlike concerns. 



Reports come up from a La Porte, Ind., man, a sort of 

 constable it is said, that there were lately marketed at 

 that place sixty-three ducks, all of which had been killed 

 by one party or his associates, country market-shooters 

 on Mak-saw-ba marsh. That's fine for the boys to think 

 about, too. Doubtless most of these were young wood 

 ducks. It is thought to be impossible to punish the 

 offenders. They live near by, and slip down on the 

 marsh when they think none of the club members are 

 about. Indiana has the game warden "system." It's a 

 great system. 



It may be remembered that last fall, or rather last sum- 

 mer, reports were sent in of very early shooting at jack- 

 snipe in this region. It is possible that it will begin 

 nearly as early this year, although last season very good 

 bags were made by Aug. 15. Last week and this great 

 flocks of yellowlegs have been seen flying over the Calu- 

 met Lake country. Billy Mussey says he is going out 

 after these, and confidently expects to have golden plover 

 and jacksnipe shooting before long on the Kankakee. 



There are three coveys of prairie chickens on the farm 

 of a certain gentleman of the city, within thirteen miles 

 from town. It is probably more discreet not to be ex- 

 plicit. There has been a very good chicken crop this 

 year in Illinois, and such grounds as have been guarded 

 should be well stocked this fall. I have not learned from 

 my friend Mr. Yalentine Hicks, of the Rising Sun Game 

 Park Association, but hope that he and his company are 

 faring well and his preserves doing nicely. E, Hough, 



Practical Gunsmith on action work aDd barrels D. B. L. G, 

 seeks position. Address J. T„ this office.— 4dv. 



