FOREST AND STREAM, 
[May 18, 1896 
If there were any real danger of a general bursting, shut 
ting the eyes tightly, or making distorted faces, or turn- 
ing the head, would be no protection. 
In this connection it is prop°r to advise the using of a 
first-class pistol only. The saving of a few dollars in 
purchasing a cheap and poor pistol is poor economy in- 
deed, There is too much risk for the trifle saved. 
Begin Correctly. 
There are many men who have shot a pistol more or 
less for many years who improve but little, for the rea- 
son that they started wrong and persevered in the wrong 
manner in which they started. They simply shoot with- 
out giving the matter any thought. Their methods at 
last were not any improvement on their methods at first. 
Others, seeing no improvement in their skill, become dis- 
couraged. The possibility of so holding that the recoil ia 
reduced to a minimum, or investigating to determine by 
what fault of the hand or trigger finger the errors arise, 
never seems to occur to them. And yet it is necessary 
1. POSITION. 
carefully to learn the causes of errors if they are to be 
corrected. Some errors are peculiar to one man, some to 
another. One will shoot to the right, another to the left, 
another here and there, so that the personal equation is a 
constant factor. There is no hard and fast rule, by which 
all can be governed. No arbitrary formula can be laid 
down. Each one can note his own errors and investigate 
their cause with a view to correction. 
The Position. 
In shooting at the target, the shooter generally assumes 
the position shown in Fig. 1, or one approximating to it. 
It does very well for target practice. For the practical 
purposes of pistol shooting, however, the effort should be 
to shoot well from any natural position of the body. 
Freedom and ease and quickness are superior to stiffness 
and slowness. 
The arm should be slightly bent at the elbow, so that 
the recoil will be taken with more elasticity than it could 
be with a straight, stiff arm. 
As all eyes have not the same focus, nor all men the 
same physical conformation, each man will modify this 
shooting position to best suit his own powers. Neverthe- 
less, the expert pistol shot can skillfully handle his 
weapon in the most free-handed and unstudied mancer. 
It is not essential to good performance that he assume a 
stiff and formal pose in the practical use of the weapon. 
By practice, the expert learns to shoot his pistol as freely 
and easily as the wing shooter handles a shotgun. 
The Grasp. 
The important matter of learning how to handle the 
pistol in general, and in particular how to grasp it cor- 
rectly when firing it, should be learned at the outset. A 
wrong manner of grasping the handle will be a serious 
check to progress, and also will be a constant difficulty in 
making a good performance. It will perpetuate a fault. 
There is a right way to hold a pistol and many which are 
wrong. 
Figs. 8 and 4 show the correct manner of grasping it. 
Fig. 2 shows a wrong way, one commonly employed by 
the novice. 
From the beginning:, the novice should endeavor to 
grasp the pistol correctly and precisely alike every time 
till a correct grasp becomes habitual. Any variation in 
the grasp is sure to result in undesirable variations at the 
target, if sufficient powder is used to make a recoil. A 
loose, careless grasp will invariably result in bad execu- 
tion. The novice rarely grasps the pistol twice alike. 
To make the matter clearer to the beginner, in respect 
to recoil, it will be necessary in this connection to touch 
briefly on the theory of it. 
If the hand were so placed as to resist the recoil at a 
point directly in. a line with the axis of the barrel, there 
would be no upward jump of the pistol, as the force of 
the recoil and the resistance to it would both be in the 
same right line. Bat the grasp of the hand on a pistol is 
below the line of fire, leaving what is practically the arm 
of a lever between. The recoil thus is in a line higher 
than that of the resistance to it, and the two forces so act 
that the pistol flies upward at the moment of discharge. 
If the hand is held as in Figs. 3 and 4, the resistance ia so 
nearin the line of the axis of the barrel and the line of recoil 
that the disarrangement caused by the latter is reduced 
to a minimum, and is no insurmountable factor against 
the best results, except in such instances as pistols are over- 
loaded. 
It is apparent that it is much more difficult to concen- 
trate a firm resistance to the recoil when tbe hand is as in 
Fig. 2 than it is as in Figs. 3 and 4. It in Fig 2 not only 
has room for greater play in the hand at the moment of 
recoil, but it makes a greater strain and movement in 
the wrist at the same time, the hand turning upward 
with it. 
To hold the pistol correctly, grasp the handle firmly, with 
the hand snug up, as in Figs. 3 and 4, so there is no room 
for motion between the pistol and the hand when the recoil 
comes. With all the precaution which the novice can 
compass, there will be a certain upward motion from the 
recoil even when the pistol is grasped correctly, a motion 
upward in the hand and in the wrist. The novice will 
note that the hand plays very freely and easily upward on 
the wrist, and it requires quite a training to hold the wrist 
firm as well as to grasp the pistol correctly, but it all 
comes right with practice. 
After one has learned to hold the pistol properly and 
learned precisely what factor the recoil is in one's shoot- 
ing, allowance in aiming must be made accordingly. For 
this reason, for short ranges, the fore sight in revolvers is 
longer than the rear sight, thus depressing the muzzle to 
make allowance for the upward jump at the moment of 
firing. 
Nearly all pistols, even those which are of the same 
kind and alike, act differently one from another with the 
same loads when used by different men; so that the man- 
ner of aiming one pistol with satisfactory results might 
have different results with another. Slight differences of 
trigger pull, etc, , all have their importance. 
The beginner should not confound a firm grasp with an' 
overstrained one. There is a degree of tension at which 
the hand and arm can be held firmly with moderate exer- 
cise of the will; if the nerves and muscles are forced to a 
higher strain, they do not coordinate properly and there is 
then more or less tremor. In shooting large loads, how- 
ever, the hand must be trail ted to a tight grasp. 
Whatever may be the explanation of it, whether it be 
reflex action or what not, the hand by experience and 
proper training acquires a useful education of its own. 
In handling any object it requires a special schooling to 
do so skillfully. In everyday life one is so accustomed to 
seeing it perform. its functions at will that it seems to re- 
quire no training, but it in fact performs well from long 
training. Once it attempts new efforts its inefficiency is 
apparent. To comprehend this statement more fully, let 
a novice attempt to draw with a pencil a perfectly straight 
line or a circle, or to eat rice with chop sticks, or perform 
on a piano, etc. , and then observe how quickly and easily 
the educated hand of the expert accomplishes any of 
those acts. 
In the art of pistol shooting, by practice the hand and 
arm seem to acquire a sense of direction of their own. If 
the pistol is not properly in the grasp, the educated hand 
readily detects it. The sense of direction is evidenced in 
other acts. Tbe carpenter with accurate blows drives 
nails with a hammer, hitting them accurately on the 
head at every stroke. The wood-chopper gives no thought 
to his axe as he swings it blow after blow, and yet he 
drives it into the tree with hair-breadth precision. The 
baseball pitcher is a wonder in accurate delivery. 
When the hand of the pistol shooter is so trained that 
the mind is free from studiously noting and directing it 
in its holding and firing, it is then at a stage when quick 
shooting can be practiced with more or less efficiency, 
and quick and reasonably accurate shooting with the re- 
volver is the only kind of pistol shooting of any practical 
value. The revolver is a weapon of defense as society is 
organized in time of peace, and its use is at a time when 
the interested parties are commonly in active motion. 
An assailed party, who would require his assailant to 
stand stiffly while he stiffly and slowly took aim and fired, 
would be slow in making a success. It is therefore self- 
evident tbat the freedom of action and skill which come 
from good training are a necessity in the practical use of 
the revolver. 
Many of the best shots hold the thumb along the side of 
the frame, as shown in Fig. 4; this grasp in a measure 
guards against a side movement when the forefinger is 
pulling the trigger, and also at the moment of recoil. 
Still it is not an easy grasp and requires some practice to 
apply skillfully. The most natural grasp is as is shown in 
Fig. 2, and is the one most commonly in use. 
Sighting:. 
The manner of sighting is very simple. The shooter 
aims so that the fore sight is in a straight line from his 
eye, looking through the notch of the rear sight and at 
the object aimed at. The same straight line in theory 
runs from the eye through the notch of the rear sight, 
thence through the tip of the fore sight, thence to the 
object. In theory it is simple, in practice it is not with- 
out its difficulties. 
The shooter should learn to stand steadily on his feet. 
There should he no swaying of his body. He also should 
learn to hold his hand and arm steady. 
The most difficult part is to pull the trigger without 
disarranging the aim. The education of the forefinger, 
the trigger finger, is a matter of importance. It is not 
easy to pull the forefinger steadily and truly when the 
rest of the hand is at rest. Let the novice aim an un- 
loaded revolver at some object and carefully note the 
motion of the muzzle of it when he pulls the trigger. 
The muzzle is almost certain to jump side wise one way 
or the other, or upward, indicating that the finger did 
not make a straight pull backward, but that it made a 
side or upward pull of more or less force, which took its 
own direction when the trigger became disengaged, 
A great deal of good training can be obtained by care- 
fully aiming and snapping the unloaded revolver as if in 
actual firing at a mark. The aherrations in the pull-off 
can be noted and corrected in so far as they are the fault 
of the hand and forefinger. 
Much practice is necessary to so train the forefinger 
that it will work truly and independently while all the 
other muscles are passive or acting in another manner. 
To appreciate the difficulty of it, let the novice attempt 
to hold his closed hand perfectly still, with no wrist or 
other movement, while he steadily opens and closes his 
forefinger. Any little movements of hand or wrist, how- 
ever slight, make a vast difference in the results at the 
bullseye. 
It is an easy matter to train so as to be able to hit close 
around the bullseye, but such is a mere trifle compared to 
the training necessary to shoot to the center, and yet for 
purposes of utility, offensive and defensive, one is nearly 
as efficient as the other, all else being equal. 
Nervous people, by training and self -discipline or will 
power, learn to hold with remarkable steadiness, though 
they can never hope to equal the precision of the shooters 
whose nerves are so steady that they can hold a rigid 
unvarying arm on the center. Some men seem to have a 
rhythmic swaying of the body with a corresponding move- 
ment of the pistol arm to and fro, and yet by practice 
they so time the pull of the trigger as the pistol sways to 
the bullseye that they make a good showing. They, 
however, are sure to get in a wild shot sooner or later. 
All tbe spectacular features, such as the whirling of the 
revolver on the forefinger, cocking and shooting it as it 
comes into tbe hand, may profitably be omitted. It is a 
dangerous act, and moreover adds nothing to the better- 
ment of the shooting. So of the style affected by some of 
the "bad men" of the West in removing the trigger, 
trusting entirely to cocking with the thumb and per- 
mitting the hammer to fall by slipping the thumb off it. 
This manner was supposed to have an advantage in its 
quickness, and quickness was considered indispensable in 
personal encounters, as a moment's time might serve to 
effect important changes. Many of these methods were 
mere personal eccentricities, and the shooter at best could 
not do any better with his fantastic methods than can be 
done in the regulation manner with a self-cocking 
revolver. 
In aiming, nearly all shooters aim with one eye, the 
other being closed. It w rarely that a man oan aim well 
with both eyes open. Few people have eyes which focus 
alike or are equally strong. 
When the aim is established, the trigger should be 
pulled with a firm and steady pull, nev^r a jerky one. 
When this manner is thoroughly acquired, the finger will 
act in the pull-off quite as quickly as if it were nervously 
j j rked, with the further advantage that it is in the cor- 
rect line, alike every time and with no disturbance to the 
aim. Any fault in the pull- off, as before mentioned, 
should be noted and corrected by aiming and snapping 
the unloaded pistol. 
Regularity in practice is necessary to make the shooter 
dexterous in aiming and firing. On the other hand, 
practice can be overdone. If prolonged too much, there 
is a great strain on the nerve forces and too much fatigue 
