254 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Feb. 15, 1908. 
so it was. In 1892 I bought a “New Navy,' 
and one day that year, while visiting my father 
at his home near one of our cities, I got it to take 
a shot at a rabbit in the orchard. I missed 
Bre’r Rabbit twice and he ran through the open 
meadow toward the cottage of a neighbor, soon 
stopping to look and listen. This was a big, long 
shot, but I fired and got him. That night our 
neighbor came over with a bullet which he said 
had gone through the side of the house, a closet 
door, the foot of a bed-stead and torn up a 
counterpane. He suggested that I be more care¬ 
ful. This was letting me off so easy that I 
thanked him for his moderation and invited my¬ 
self to return with him to see if it was all true. 
Well, I saw the bed and the door; that was 
enough. I did not dare to ask, “Was the closet 
wall plastered?” 
A few years ago I was buying cattle in the 
Republican valley, and had this revolver with me. 
One wintry morning, after having left the town 
where I was stopping at about six o’clock, some 
three or four miles out, a coyote ran across the 
road in front of me, went down into a ravine, but 
came out on the other side, and took his stand 
behind a small sunken pile of cut weeds on the 
edge of a stubble-field. It was quite a distance, 
but I took a quick shot for fun, and, seeing that 
he was wounded, put the horse in pursuit. I 
found him in the stubble, not far from the weed 
stack, exhausted. Some farmers took the carcass 
into town, and when I came back there, the skin 
had been taken off and salted for me. This 
coyote was nearly a hundred yards away.- He 
was shot through the ribs. 
It seems to me many do not realize how 
dangerous a good pistol cartridge is in point of 
carrying power. Penetration through seven- 
eighths pine does not mean so much to me. I was 
once riding down a shallow canon, when a .45 
went through the leather leg of my chaps, 
through my boot leg, and, after a moment, fell 
down in the boot. That hurt so I nearly fainted, 
but I turned in a jiffy and went up on the divide 
to see who did it. About a quarter of a mile away 
was one of our boys, a friend of mine. He had 
shot at a jack-rabbit, grounded it, and had just 
ridden up to pick it up. I don’t remember hear¬ 
ing that shot, but I had a bruise on my leg like 
one from a hammer-blow that was black and blue 
for a fortnight. It was not a very uncommon 
thing for us to find a wounded steer or heifer, 
even sometimes a dead calf; and I have since 
concluded that they were probably injured by 
stray bullets. 
Gradually I began to think, as the result of 
occasional “shooting about,” that a smaller cali¬ 
ber would answer all the needs of a - 45 , s0 f ar 
as a weapon of defence against human kind was 
concerned. I still have my old brace of - 45’ 3 
which I sometimes carry hunting; and keep my 
belts and holsters, which the boys got from Cali¬ 
fornia and gave me for Christmas presents, as 
souvenirs; but the cartridges are heavier, and 
that used to seem quite a difference, particularly 
on hot days. I had bought a single-action in the 
early eighties; one with a 5}4-inch barrel; later 
I got another with its barrel cut 6 x / 2 inches. They 
are both good, and the actual difference in 
shooting is imperceptible, still I have a little 
more faith in the longer one. 
As I wrote at the beginning, revolvers have 
always interested me; so, I have bought and 
tried a number of different kinds, styles and 
calibers. Some of these I have disposed of, but 
I still have, besides those just mentioned, two 
“New Service” .45, 6 l / 2 - and 7j/£-inch; two “New 
Navy” .41, 6-inch; two old-style Colt .38, with 
4 y 2 - and 6-inch barrels—these are the best, in my 
opinion, of the double-actions .for quick work; 
two Military and Police, 5- and 4-inch, one with 
a square handle, also one “Marine Corps” model. 
Any one of these is good enough to aim with, 
and might be quite as good to point with, if one 
had not become used to the grip of the other 
kind. Still, the fact remains, in my case, there is 
nothing of any consequence to be done with a 
double-action that can not be done with the 
other. 
I do not consider it valuable to get ninety-nine 
out of a hundred deliberate shots, but if I can 
merely point the pistol, and get, say five out of 
six, or even the two first, in rapid succession, 1 
feel as though it will answer the purpose. Of 
course the first mentioned accomplishment de¬ 
mands and develops great steadiness of nerve, but 
the latter makes up for that in effect, by giving 
possibly a weaker man an equal fighting chance. 
It seems to me the first thing is to get used to 
your pistol, so that you can hold it where you 
point it. Instinct helps in pointing, and practice 
aids instinct. When you are used to it, and can 
put your shots where you want them, you can 
then acquire speed, and control distance; but it 
takes a lot of time, and is bound to help out the 
ammunition factories. You always use the same 
regular load of powder, so that you become ac¬ 
customed to the recoil. Factory loads work the 
best and last longer, although good home-mades 
are good for several weeks; after that, the grease 
having got into the powder, seems to hurt it. I 
want a smooth handle, because, unless I use 
gloves, if I shoot much, the checking hurts my 
hand, and I can not do as well with gloves. By 
shooting often and quickly at objects far apart 
you become handy sooner or later, so that you 
■can occasionally get a rabbit running, a bird fly¬ 
ing; by practice on horseback, in vehicles, or in 
boats, you get used to them, too; while a well- 
developed pointing instinct makes fair work in 
twilight or darkness possible. 
A man, to “make good” with a pistol, as a 
weapon of defence, must select one that will, 
when it hits squarely, knock a man down; then 
he must learn to get there first. On the other 
hand, men who talk and write of high-power 
rifles would be amazed at and incredulous of the 
efficiency and reliability of long-barreled re¬ 
volvers in the hands of those who know how, 
when shooting game along runways or from 
horseback. Wm. Ford. 
The Closed Time on Grouse. 
Glens Falls, N. Y., Jan. 30 .—Editor Forest 
and Stream: In common with many others I 
have been interested in the reports of the scar¬ 
city of ruffed grouse that have appeared in your 
columns. There seems to be no doubt that the 
birds are very scarce and in danger of extermina¬ 
tion in some sections. 
There has been much talk of a revision of 
the game laws at Albany and we might reason¬ 
ably expect that the grouse would receive the 
protection it needs, but if the report of this 
proposed law, as it appears in the newspapers, 
is correct, we are doomed to disappointment. 
The law as reported shortens the season two 
weeks and limits the bag to twenty in a season 
and four in a^day. The two weeks off are good 
as far as they go, but this bag limit is about the 
poorest attempt to do nothing and have it ap¬ 
pear like something that has ever come to my 
notice. It sets the limit where nineteen out of 
twenty hunters during the present scarcity could 
not pass it if they tried, and the public is sup¬ 
posed to look on it as a measure of protection. 
If the twentieth man who had the time and skill 
to exceed the limit should wish to do so, who 
would detect him? He might not even know 
himself at the end of the season unless, he kept 
count. 
The new law as proposed on hares and rab¬ 
bits, closing the season on Nov. 30, is an injus¬ 
tice to the rabbit hunter, but would save a few 
birds that would be shot after the season closes 
by these hunters. 
If the reports of scarcity are to be credited 
this grouse law is entirely inadequate to the 
occasion. A closed season will have to come 
sooner or later, and the later it comes the longer 
it will have to be. At the end of another open 
season many a good cover will be entirely ex¬ 
hausted, and in view of the habits of these birds 
and the gradual destruction of their natural 
haunts it is unlikely that they will ever be found 
there again. It is the presence of these birds 
in accessible covers that makes grouse shoot¬ 
ing the popular sport it is, and when it becomes 
necessary to make long {rips into the backwoods 
sections to find them their popularity will be 
a thing of the past. If there are any sports¬ 
men who favor a close season on these birds 
they should make a plea for. it at once to Com¬ 
missioner Whipple and use their influence to 
see that no such half-hearted substitute as that 
proposed should be put through. 
C. B. Pope. 
The Season in Delaware. 
Wilmington, Del., Feb. 1 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: The shooting season in Delaware, 
which closed on the 31st of December last, was 
one of the best we have had for years, particu¬ 
larly in Sussex county. A favorable breeding- 
season gave the quail a good start, and when the 
shooting opened good reports came from all 
sides. Both quail and rabbits were plentiful, 
and we hope the next season will give just as 
much sport, as a good many birds have been left 
over. The activity of the Delaware Game Pro¬ 
tective Association resulted in several seizures 
of unlawful consignments. The law in Delaware 
is unique and is intended to stop the sale of 
game by inflicting its penalties on the dealer, the 
man who buys it to sell again, and in spite of 
the difficulties of securing this kind of evidence 
we were this year successful in getting a con¬ 
viction on this score. 
Situated as Delaware is at about the northern 
limit of game-plenty in the eastern States, we 
are particularly anxious to preserve in our little 
State the existence of Bobwhite against the 
depredations of market hunters and severe win¬ 
ters. 
Almost nothing has been seen-of the Chinese 
pheasants released several years ago, and the 
supposition is that they have been killed or have 
wandered away. J. Danforth Bush. 
All the game lasvs of the United States and 
Canada, revised to date and now in force, are 
given in the Game Laws in Brief. See adv. 
