Feb. s, 1910.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
211 
siderable difficulty, we turned the animal over 
and went through a similar process of examina¬ 
tion. No remarks were made, and at last we 
set about skinning the creature. This was done, 
until from nose to tail the carcass was divested 
of its covering and—well, there was just one 
bullet hole in the bear.” 
THE TOP RAIL. 
Orin Belknap wonders if I ever “glimpsed” 
a Hawken or a Gove rifle, and I consider I 
have been fortunate in thoroughly examining 
a few made by the former and many of the 
latter’s works of art. It was my further good 
fortune to have known the late Carlos Gove 
so well, and to have gained the confidence of 
Governor, his old spaniel, to such an extent 
that I was a welcome companion of the old 
man on several occasions when he did his last 
rest shooting among the cottonwoods along 
the South Platte River. Perhaps even Mr. 
Belknap may be surprised when I tell him 
that Mr. Gove, then grown feeble from age, 
though still loth to admit it, was hardly equal 
to the task of carrying the rifle with which it 
was his delight to shoot, and that I, though 
young and strong, found the ancient piece no 
light burden, for its weight was forty-nine 
pounds. This was his “big gun;” another 
favorite weighed a mere trifle by comparison—- 
twenty-six or twenty-nine pounds, I have for¬ 
gotten which. Both were fitted with full 
length, telescope sights, about an inch in 
diameter, and were awkward to carry, as well 
as heavy. Then there were the ammunition 
kit and our lunches, and what with the walk 
at each end of the trolley ride, we made a day 
of it whenever the desire to shoot grew strong 
in the old riflemaker’s heart. 
Both of these rifles had browned octagon 
barrels and stocks that appeared ridiculously 
slender by comparison. “The cannon”—as we 
called the big rifle at George Schoyen's gun 
shop when Mr. Gove was out of hearing—he 
never held to his shoulder when he fired. A 
bench rest with windage and elevation ad¬ 
justing screws, was used, and after the cross¬ 
hairs were fixed on a certain mark on the tar¬ 
get, Mr. Gove rose and touched the set trig¬ 
ger. The rifle slid back a few inches on the 
rest, a deafening roar followed, and a great 
cloud of smoke rolled away. Then the old 
rifleman sat down on his camp stool, looked 
through the glass and shook his head as an¬ 
other man would have done to signify a bad 
shot. Then through the glass I looked at 
the card which served as a target and which 
was placed on the backing on the bank of the 
river, 200 yards away; if he was not, I was 
always satisfied with the shot. It was un¬ 
usual for him to make a group of ten shots 
every one of which could not be enclosed or 
touched by a circle the size of a silver dollar; 
in other words, as good and often better shoot¬ 
ing than is done by the famous rest shots at 
Walnut Hill. I have a couple of the groups 
made by him, and these have been compared 
with other groups made under similar con¬ 
ditions by the nation’s best rest shots. By 
string measure there is little to choose between 
them, yet Mr. Gove’s last groups were made 
when his eyesight was so much impaired that 
he could not have seen to shoot offhand at 
any distance. 
So confident was this one-time famous rifle¬ 
man in his own skill as a rifle maker and 
shooter that he backed himself in many 
matches for large sums of money. It was 
popular to shoot for a stake in those days, and 
I have heard it said that he won a number of 
matches in which the stakes were from $500 
to $2,000 in gold. These were all decided by 
string measure, a method that now obtains 
only in a few places where rest shooting is in 
vogue, and which is not so well known by the 
present generation as the practice of aiming 
at a standard bullseye. Each marksman desig¬ 
nated his own target center, and when a shot 
was fired, the distance from the center of his 
crossmark to the center of the bullet hole, in 
inches and fractions, constituted his score, and 
the total score was the sum of these measure¬ 
ments. With muzzleloaders having coarse 
sights, it was not uncommon to make a cross 
an inch or more distant from the black spot 
aimed at, to allow for the variation between 
the line of sight and the line of fire. I have 
fired Kentucky rifles in the backwoods after 
being told by their owners to “aim a leetle low 
and a leetle to the right,” or otherwise, to find 
that, held where told, the bullet would reach 
the desired mark. Under modern methods 
these rifles would have been sighted to strike 
center at point-blank range, but their owners 
were so accustomed to shooting them that it 
became force of habit to allow for the varia¬ 
tion referred to, if this variation existed, as 
was frequently the case. 
* * * 
The following, from a veteran sportsman of 
Brooklyn, may recall similar memories to read¬ 
ers’ minds. I know it does to mine. Here it is: 
In looking over your Top Rail stories to-night 
an incident that occurred when I was a boy of 
sixteen came to my mind which for keenness of 
disappointment has never been exceeded in my 
life, and I have just this year turned the half 
century mark. It all happened in the dear old 
Emerald Isle where every boy loves a gun and 
dog principally for the reason that the carrying 
of a gun is quite a serious affair and may be at¬ 
tended by dire consequences should a minion of 
the law heave in sight and you were without 
the proper credentials to show that the local 
magistrate had considered you duly qualified to 
carry a fowling piece. But to my story. 
Coming home on a vacation late in August, 
when the young ducks were considered large 
enough to kill, I was met at the railway station 
by old Owney. Owney was a man of all work 
around my father’s country place—more coun¬ 
try than place. He was a born poacher if ever 
there was one, and after he had tucked snugly 
away some good tobacco that he always ex¬ 
pected when I arrived, he started in to tell me 
on the drive home about the wonderful flight 
of ducks that passed every morning right by an 
old tree that overhung the river just where it 
flowed into one of a chain of lakes. 
There was very little sleep for me that night 
and what there was was largely filled by visions 
of wild ducks by the million, so at 3 o’clock in 
the morning or as early as daybreak, I was 
posted under that old tree watching and wait¬ 
ing for the ducks which I was sure must come 
after the glowing description of my old friend 
of the night before. But no ducks appeared, so 
there I stood with the old double barrel muzzle- 
loader, disappointed and disconsolate. It was 
as still as death, not a breath of air was stir¬ 
ring, but hark, from across the river in the 
rushes that bordered the stream, surely I heard 
a slight quacking noise, very faintly, though. I 
can remember so well how I balanced the gun 
in my left hand and struck the shaky old breech 
a smart tap with my right hand. Instantly up 
came their heads from above the rushes where 
they had been feeding. Quick as a flash I 
poured one barrel right into them—most un¬ 
sportsmanlike—and without pause covered the 
flock with the other and blazed away. I could 
see a number lying there and knew I had made 
a killing, but how was I to get them? 
The river was very deep there. In the midst of 
my dilemma I saw old Diver, a halfbreed dog of 
the spaniel variety, which belonged to a neigh¬ 
bor, coming right toward me, attracted by the 
two shots, and being interested in that kind of 
business he wanted to know what was going on. 
How delighted I was! What luck! I lost no 
time in encouraging him to go across, and I 
could see from my coign of vantage on an old 
stump that he was laying them out in a goodly 
row on the other bank, but they were safe now, 
and when he arrived back at my feet you can 
readily imagine how many expressions of “good 
dog,” “fine old fellow,” etc., were lavished on 
him. 
Well, I hung around for two weary hours until 
the farm hands came across in the boat, when I 
immediately launched the craft again and re¬ 
turned with seven as handsome ducks as ever 
gladdened the heart of man or boy. On my way 
home I took a circuitous route through the vil¬ 
lage and I assure you those ducks were well in 
evidence. For some reason or other the streets 
seemed to be strangely deserted that morning, 
and I did not meet anywhere near the number 
of people that I would have been glad to have 
had a chat with. However, it was at home that 
I looked for the grand acclaim as a mighty nim- 
rod. Well, I arrived home, and throwing the 
birds down casually near where my sister Lizzie 
stood, I was asked where I shot them. I re¬ 
plied : “Oh, over in the river by the lake.” “In¬ 
deed !” replied my sister; “let me see—you killed 
seven. Well, seven at a shilling apiece is seven 
shillings, and when you pay Mrs. Coyle for those 
ducks I think your pocket money will be a little 
short for your vacation time.” 
It was just as she said. I had shot the biggest 
part of poor old Polly Coyle’s ducks, and though 
I have had some experiences since, th s was the 
“unkindest cut of all.” 
Grizzly King. 
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