THE GUN AT HOME AND ABROAD 
forty years back. Rifles of this type, as well as the ammunition for them, 
were produced in this country in response to the demand of recent years, 
and they are ideal weapons for stalking rabbits, or shooting young 
rooks, or for teaching boys to shoot. Their accuracy is really marvellous, 
and they provide the best possible introduction to serious rifle shooting. 
VII 
There remain a few threads to be picked up to complete the tale of 
firearms, in which the development of the types in most general use has 
hitherto been followed. Thus, the specially large guns for wildfowling 
have not so far been touched upon. For this purpose the use of shoulder 
guns of 10 bore, 8 bore, and even 4 bore, has been developed along lines 
similar to those of the 12 bore; these guns have reaped the full benefit 
of the perfecting of breechloading hammerless actions, and of choke - 
boring. They are invaluable to the man who specializes in wildfowl shoot- 
ing, in which the capacity to use a charge of large shot numerous enough 
to give a fairly close pattern at any distance up to 100 yards is a great boon. 
The limit to the size of such guns is only the power of the user to carry 
them and to withstand the recoil. Though the number of wildfowl on our 
coasts and fens has diminished lamentably in the last 100 years, the 
keenness of the gunners is quite as great as ever it was. 
If the light harquebus is the lineal ancestor of the ordinary gun, and 
the musket of the heavier pieces for killing wildfowl, the punt gun finds 
its early analogy in the wall -piece, which required two men to manipulate 
it, and was often mounted on a swivel, for convenience of handling on a 
rampart. The punt gun is usually a single-barrelled piece, weighing 
100 lbs. more or less; it may have a bore of 1| inches, and carry a charge 
of 1 J lbs. of shot. These powerful weapons, unlike the wall-piece, have to 
be taken to the birds; the proper mounting of them in a boat is therefore 
of the greatest importance. On land, it is unsportsmanlike to fire at birds 
which have not risen, or to shoot into the “ brown ” of a covey flying in 
close formation. All such rules have their limitations, and this one does 
not apply in shooting wildfowl. In their own haunts by the sea, birds once 
fired at cannot be followed, so that there is no second chance; while their 
custom of clustering together often offers no alternative to a “ family 
shot,” especially when they are pursued at night. Their shyness, too, 
makes the power of killing at a long distance essential. Hence the small 
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