248 
tails to take the fly and curled like scim- 
iters in the bow as we rode campward 
through the gathering night. 
We had pushed up the W hispering and 
it was noon. Our friend, the guardian, 
was finishing a camp and bemoaning the 
loss of his kettle which, with the rise 
of water, had blissfully and noisily 
bumped its way to the sea. And of 
course we were comparing pools and 
their virtues as only men can do on an 
uncertain river. My canoeman bespoke 
his mind as only a Scotchman can, and 
a Scot convinced to the point of utter- 
ance is beyond all superlatives. What 
the guardian lacked in conviction he 
made up in adjectives of tested and un- 
questioned vintage. And strange as it 
may seem the two fish in question were 
confined to the respective pools in cpies- 
tion. An unfinished sportsman's camp is 
of small moment compared with a sal- 
mon argpmient of merit, so the guardian 
cached his tools and launched his own 
canoe while we pushed off in his wake. 
It was two o'clock, and, according to 
many books and authorities, two o'clock 
in mid-summer, in mid-stream, in blind- 
ing sunlight is no time to fish for salmon. 
But in due course we approached the 
pool, strong and deep, curled about a 
giant ledge above which the water was 
feather-white and in which, with a 
twenty-six pound anchor, we rode like a 
top. It had been strong poling and the 
Scot, moving up to the center of his 
canoe, for otherwise in strong water will 
FOREST AND STREAM 
the anchor rope swamp it, sighed deeply. 
Below us, with the bow of his canoe id- 
ling on the shore where the trees shaded 
him, the guardian puffed contentedly and 
gave directions as guardians are wont 
“Put on some old dammer of a fly, the 
biggest thing you have,” which again 
was heresy at noonday, “and cast over 
toward that fast water.” If there was 
Twenty-eight and twenty-one pounds 
June, 1922| 
anything the Scot and I agreed on in 1 
common it was where to cast. At the , 
first drop the largest single fly I owned, 
a Silver Doctor from the wilds of the 
Grand Cascapedia, swung out and was 
sucked under. 
Afterwards one always wonders if one 
first sees or feels the result of a fish 
taking. One must be careful at all times 
to watch for the bulge which so gener- 
ally accompanies the rise ; but in this 
case anyway the line went under still 
further, the tip bent as automatically I 
straightened the rod and the reel began 
to hum. 
Now it is customary on most occa- 
sions to step on the land to play a fish 
and as the Scot turned to retrieve his 
anchor, which feat he accomplished with 
the anchor rope meanwhile held between 
his teeth, and the thump of a paddle till 
he has bearing with his pole, I shouted i 
to him to drop below the fish and keep 
it out of the rapids. It was deceptive 
water where the line showed, glasslike 
and strong enough to swamp anything ' 
but a carefully handled canoe. 
Just at that moment, eluding the 
guardian's canoe, the salmon swept down 
into the rapids, where for the first and 
only time he showed himself. 
Meanwhile the line had caught about 
a branch and over a hundred yards had 
left the reel, the white cuttyhunk seem- 
ing childlike in the light. Of course, 
we had the anchor up by this time and 
{Continued on page 272) 
HOW TO TAKE CARE OF A RIFLE 
IN ORDER TO GET THE BEST RESULTS FROM A WEAPON IT SHOULD 
BE CAREFULLY GUARDED AGAINST DESTRUCTIVE ELEMENTS 
By A L. BRAGG 
A FIRST-CLASS rifle of Ameri- 
can manufacture will last a life- 
time if it is given the proper care, 
but it is no small task to keep a 
rifle in good condition and preserve the 
original shooting qualities of the barrel. 
During the time a gun is in actual use, 
one must be on the lookout continually to 
guard the mechanism and the barrel 
against injury from the action of de- 
structive elements. Oftentimes a per- 
fectly good rifle-barrel is spoiled in a 
few days’ time on account of the shooter 
neglecting to take into consideration the 
importance of giving the weapon the 
proper care. It requires a good under- 
standing of the dangers to which a rifle 
is subject and a thorough knowledge of 
the preservation of the rifle-bore to en- 
able one to avoid the many pitfalls that 
are met with in taking care of a rifle, 
especially those using cartridges loaded 
with smokeless powder and metal-jacket- 
ed bullets. Probably in no other case is 
the old adage, “An ounce of prevention 
is worth a pound of cure,” more ap- 
plicable than to the task of caring for a 
modern rifle. 
F rom the cleaning standpoint there 
are three classes of rifles, namely, 
black powder rifles, rifles using smoke- 
Equipment for cleaning a rifle 
less powder and lead of lead alloy bullets, 
and rifles using smokeless powder and 
metal- jacketed bullets. In the first class 
the task of cleaning resolves itself into 
removing a powder residue, the second 
evolves the problem of dealing with a 
powder and a primer residue, and the 
third, which is the most difficult to deal 
with, combines a powder, priming and 
metal fouling residue. Each of these 
three classes of guns demands a distinct 
treatment for the cleaning of the rifle 
bore. In cleaning guns, however, it 
should be remembered that all powder 
residues are more easily removed from 
the bore if the work is done immediately 
after the last shot is fired and the fouling 
is still warm from the last discharge. 
The longer a barrel is left uncleaned, the 
more difficult the task becomes. 
The residues of black, semi-smokeless 
or lesmok powders are easily soluble in 
water. In cleaning guns using these 
powders, it is only necessary to run a 
damp cleaning-patch through the barrel 
a time or two and then complete the pro- 
cess by wiping the bore out carefully 
with a dry cloth. When the bore of the 
gun has been restored to a dry and clean 
condition, it should be well oiled and the 
gun is then ready to be laid away. On 
account of the large amount of residue 
left by the black or semi-smokeless pow- 
ders and the small amount of fulminate 
required in the primers to fire these 
powders, primer fouling is not taken in- 
to consideration in cleaning guns of this 
class. 
Rifles of the second class present a 
different problem to deal with. Here we 
find but little fouling from the powder 
and considerable rust-attracting residue 
from the priming — due to more nearly 
perfect combustion of the pow’der and 
the increased strength of the primer. 
