226 
FRANK FORESTER’S FIELD SPOUTS. 
minted on the prairies, since it has been rendered current, and 
its value proved by British officers and spoilsmen, especially by 
my old friend and school-fellow, Charles Augustus Murray, 
whose exploits with his double-barrelled ounce-ball rifle, still 
survive among the Red-skins of the far West, having gained 
him as wide a celebrity there, as his clever fictions have pro¬ 
cured for him in the civilized world. 
I am well aware that the lines I have last penned, will, m 
all probability, call down upon my head a burst of dissent, per¬ 
haps of anathemas, from the gents who make elaborate strings 
of half, and perhaps quarter inches, from the rest, or even off¬ 
hand, with long small bore rifles, fitted with patent loading muz¬ 
zles , telescope sights, and all the last improvements of the Im¬ 
proved American Rifle. I am aware that these amateurs make 
marvellous shooting at the target; but I know also that target 
shooting with ball is as different from Field or Forest shooting, 
as Pigeon shooting from a trap is different from game shooting. 
For the former, in both instances, iron nerve, good eyes, and 
long practice, are all that can be desired,—for the latter much 
more is wanting; and there are hundreds of men, who would 
shoot almost nowhere at a target, who shall beat your crack string 
shot, year in and year out, into fits, in the woods or on the 
prairie, as also may be predicated with regard to the trap. 
The patent loading muzzle is of course out of the question as 
regards war, or the chase, unless in still hunting, where a man 
expects to get but one or two shots a day. Such intricate and new¬ 
fangled apparatus, can rarely be put to account in real service. 
The two-grooved rifle, with the belted ball—the belt fitting 
the grooves—by which the application of force to the bullet in 
loading, and the consequent wear and tear of the muzzle, are 
rendered unnecessary, is a most beautiful and effective weapon, 
even in the ordinary cheap form of it, which is carried by her 
Majesty’s Rifle Regiments, and the flank-men of the Light 
Infantry companies. 
Its range is prodigious ; and I have been credibly informed, 
by those who should have known, that the practice of the Rifle 
