Uncle Jim’s Gun. 
When the Doctor entered the old shop that 
had once been occupied by busy workmen, but 
which now served as a storage place for Uncle 
Jim’s miscellaneous hunting and fishing traps 
and a loafing place for a few of his cronies, he 
found Uncle Jim cleaning his gun. The Doctor 
dragged the chair that fitted his big body best 
around to the side of the stove, from which he 
could have a clear view of Uncle Jim’s work, 
and then settled down with a contented giunt 
for a good time with his pipe and the man 
whom he most dearly loved to hear talk. 
For several minutes be watched the work 
intently and without a word. Uncle Jim had 
a tin wash-basin half filled with a mixture of 
hot water and vinegar, into which he had 
lowered his gun barrels until the nipples were 
under the surface. Then with a long hickory 
ramrod, around the end of which he had 
wound a wad of tow, he alternately drew the 
mixture into the barrels and then forced it out 
again into the basin. He continued to change 
the water in the basin until it finally came from 
the nipples clear, and then he had finished the 
first part of his job. 
On a lap stone he had a lot of finely 
powdered glass that he used in the second 
stage to polish the inside of the barrels. As a 
last step he oiled the barrels and locks with a 
kind of fine, clear oil that he kept in a small 
bottle hidden away in the deepest recesses of 
his workbench. If he were very anxious for 
luck, he told the Doctor, or if the old gun had 
not been behaving well, he might as a final 
precaution cork a small black spider in each 
barrel. 
The gun itself was of considerable interest to 
the Doctor, who had heard something of its 
shooting qualities when backed up by its owner. 
It was a muzzleloading Chesapeake Bay duck¬ 
ing gun that had been in Uncle Jim’s posses¬ 
sion for nearly forty years. It would never scare 
game by reflecting the sun from any part of its 
surface, for from the muzzle of the long barrels 
to the heel plate of the broad, thick stock it 
was one dull brown color. Even the waxed- 
end wrapped round the grip to prevent the 
stock’s falling in two and the little tacks driven 
into the wood all around the locks had become 
so worn by time and weather that they might 
have belonged to the gun when new. Through 
the hundreds of polishings with powdered glass 
the barrels at the muzzle had become as thin 
and almost as sharp as the blade of a knife. 
Uncle Jim had a story of a man who once 
borrowed the gun on a cold day and who had 
come home in the evening with all the ends 
of the fingers of one hand cut off. Each time 
his numb fingers slipped off the ramrod when 
loading, the muzzle of the gun took off another 
slice. He never asked for the gun again. 
The Doctor was something of a strategist in 
his handling of Uncle Jim. His main object 
was to get as much as possible out of Uncle 
Jim with the least effort from himself. So his 
first question, “Will it shoot?” was expected 
to bring a prompt response. 
“Shoot? I should say she will shoot!” Uncle 
Jim replied with decision. “Why, you remem¬ 
ber that steep little field that Norrie Housel 
has just above his barn. Well, Norrie wanted 
to plant that field with buckwheat one summer 
and he borrowed the old gun to shoot the seed 
in; it was too steep to sow in any other way. 
You may believe me or not, but that buckwheat 
did not come up for two years, and then it 
came up on the opposite side of the hill on an¬ 
other man’s farm. Norrie said that his mistake 
was not to load a little heavier and shoot from 
the other side. She not only kills, but she 
tears the game. Still I am a little particular 
not to shoot too often up hill, for I find that 
that strains her, and not to shoot at anything 
as small as a red squirrel, because when I 
draw too fine a sight she tries to kick. Then 
when I have a very long shot to make I push 
on the old gun a little. She likes a little help 
at such times.” 
“I suppose then if she, as you insist on calling 
your ancient arm, shoots so well, you have 
made some remarkable shots with her,” was the 
Doctor’s next leader. 
Uncle Jim had to think a minute or two be¬ 
fore he “allowed” that one of the shots that had 
^iven the most satisfaction was at ducks. 
“Commy Tomlinson and I were hunting along 
Mitchetree’s Island one day in the fall when we 
saw eight big mallards light and swim inside 
the bushes on the edge of the island. Commy 
said that I should cross over and take a shot 
sitting and he would sneak close enough to get 
a shot when they flew out. When I had finally 
crawled to where I could see them, I found 
they were all sitting in a bunch on the edge of 
the bank. I trained on the middle of the bunch 
and cut loose, and, as true as you are sitting 
in that chair. Doctor, I killed every duck. 
Commy didn't like it much, but I was greatly 
tickled to see how the old gun remembered her 
early training. You see, she used to kill ducks 
by the dozen down on the bay. 
“The greatest number of head I ever killed 
with her at one shot,” Uncle Jim continued, 
“was down in Smith’s bottoms. A farmer had 
been hauling drift wood for a week from the 
river bank and had been feeding his team each 
day along the old road that ran through the 
woods. I just happened along as a flock of 
pigeons lit on and around the feed box that he 
had been using. They were after the oats and 
corn scattered around, and were actually five 
or six deep on the box. Well, I backed off far 
enough to give the shot a good chance to 
scatter, and when the smoke cleared away T 
thought I had killed the whole flock. Some of 
them, of course, got away, but I picked up 
thirty-five dead and wounded birds. 
“The longest shot I ever made was at a 
pheasant on Birch Island—an old drummer. 
He had fooled me for several years. His 
drummin.g log was just in the edge of the 
woods on the creek side. The log was the big 
trunk of an old button wood, and the pheasant 
stood out on top in plain sight. But if he was 
in plain sight so was the gunner, and when 
one got within two hundred yards of him he 
started across the creek for the mountain. One 
fall it was very dry and the channel on the in¬ 
side of the island completely dried up. As I 
was passing there one afternoon in October I 
heard him pounding away, and I decided to 
sneak up the channel and see how close I 
could get to him. When I looked over the 
bank from the point nearest to him. I could see 
him, but actually he did not look bigger than 
a robin, and when he drummed he looked like 
brown smoke. After watching him awhile. I 
took a good, long aim and fired. When I 
jumped to my feet I heard a great thumping in 
the leaves over at the old log, and when I ran 
over, I found that the drummer Was my meat. 
I was loaded with No. 3s, and one shot had 
hit him in the head. I found afterward that 
from where I had shot to the log was just 
ninety-two steps. John Roller, who came up 
to see what I had shot at, said that the pheasant 
must have been scared to death at the awful 
roar of the gun, for nothing but a rifle could 
kill a pheasant at that distance.” 
Uncle Jim was now in a reminiscent mood, 
and needed only a suggestion now and then. 
The Doctor’s next query was about big game 
which Uncle Jim said he did not hunt because 
it was too much work to drag in after it was 
killed. 
“I went with John Else one day in winter to 
help kill a big bear that he had been chasing 
around on the River Mountain. We followed 
the bear all day. and in the evening tracked it 
into a patch of laurel that was completely 
covered with snow. We slept that night in 
John’s hunting cabin, and at daylight were back 
at the laurel patch. John had two big black- 
and-tan hounds that would follow anything he 
sent them after. I had the old gun half full of 
powder and buckshot and expected to down 
that bear in his tracks if he came in sight. John 
posted me on a high rock near the patch and 
then sent in the dogs. Eor a few minutes all 
1 could hear was a little noise from the dogs 
as they sniffed around in the laurel. Then all 
at once both dogs let out a roar, the laurel be¬ 
gan to crack, and up over the patch in the 
direction the bear and dogs were going the 
snow flew in a cloud. Between the bear and 
the dogs I never heard such a noise in my life, 
and I said to m3'self that if that bear let me 
alone he need fear nothing from me. Eortu- 
nately for my reputation he went out on the 
lower side of the patch, where I could not see 
him, and got clear away. John was dreadfully 
disappointed, but after I had shot the two loads 
of buckshot out of my gun without ruining her 
or me, I made up my mind that I would never 
again hunt any game bigger than a fox or a 
’coon.” 
“You said awhile ago. Uncle Jim, that the old 
gun kicked when she received careless hand¬ 
ling. Flave you ever had an accident with her?” 
