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FOREST AND STREAM LETTERS 
BIG GAME RIFLES 
“pvON’T send a boy to do a man’s 
work” is a saying common on 
New England farms. This can be ap¬ 
plied to a gun as much as to anything 
else. 
I love a good gun. At the same time 
I realize that although my big forty- 
five may be my favorite, it is hardly 
the gun that I would take with me 
on a rabbit hunt. Nowadays the ten¬ 
dency of the large manufacturing con¬ 
cerns seems to be to try to turn ouc 
an all-around gun, one that can be 
used for every kind of shooting. 
Frankly I do not believe that this can 
be done. 
When one goes big game hunting it 
is usually with the definite purpose of 
killing a moose, caribou, bear, or elk. 
It is sure to be hard work and when 
finally, after careful stalking a chance 
for a shot comes, how seldom it is of 
a spot which we know to be vital. 
Generally it is at a spot of fur 
or hair showing between the trees. 
Whether it is the shoulder or the rump 
you do not know. You do not dare 
move to that stump from which you 
could perhaps see. It is a choice of 
shoot or wait perhaps days for an¬ 
other chance. 
No one wants to shoot at and wound 
a big animal without securing it. 
There should be a severe penalty for 
that kind of hunting. No true sports¬ 
man would ever think of doing it. It 
is here that we have the advantages 
of the big calibers. A big bu let, 
wherever it hits, whether it is a %-jtal 
spot or not, makes a big hole. A big 
hole means the loss of a quantity of 
blood and blood is the surest tracking 
sign that there is. Loss of blood also 
weakens the animal so that it will 
travel slower and for a shorter dis¬ 
tance. If, on the other hand, the bUlet 
had been small, no matter how fast 
it might be traveling, it would not 
make a large hole. True, the bullet 
itself might travel farther into the 
flesh, but if it were the rump it would 
make very little difference. 
The advocates of the small t^res 
will tell you that these high speed bul¬ 
lets will penetrate to a vital spot no 
matter where they hit. This is true, 
and it is one of their worst faults. I 
shall quote from two articles published 
in the same number of a certain sport¬ 
ing magazine. There are similar facts 
recorded in any such magazine you 
might happen to pick up. It is their 
repeated occurrence which emphasized 
this fact to me. Big game is big 
game and should be treated as such. 
The animals themselves are not usually 
dangerous but they are generally hard 
to kill. So, when hunting big animals, 
take a big rifle and not a pea shooter. 
If this doctrine were followed there 
would be fewer stories that end in that 
really tragic statement, “I hit him, but 
he got away.” 
“I have shot a six-point bull elk, 
four shots which a dinner plate would 
cover all passing through the elk’s 
lungs, yet he lived an hour and had to 
be shot again.” 
“After waiting about half an hour 
I heard a noise some distance to my 
right and saw a buck emerge from 
the timber, running swiftly, but in my 
direction.” He ran up to within a 
hundred yards of me and stopped, 
looking back in the direction he had 
come. I took careful aim and fired. 
One bound took him behind some 
bush out of sight. As he did not ap¬ 
pear on the other side I ran over 
there and found him dead, shot through 
first back of the shoulders.” 
The writer of the first quotation 
was using a rifle of the 256 calibre 
and the second one of the 44-40. Some 
will say that these are picked cases. 
They are, but they can be duplicated 
out of any magazine which has stories 
of hunting. 
I was once talking with a man who 
was extremely interested in guns. He 
had never done much real hunting, but 
he had his ideas and a great number 
of rifles. We talked for quite a while 
and then he brought me a small calibre, 
high velocity gun and said that it 
would be his choice for moose. I told 
him what I thought and he tried to 
convince me by quoting ballistics. 
They meant and still mean nothing to 
me. He said that he could prove to 
me that his gun did more damage than 
mine by shooting into a cake of laun¬ 
dry soap. It was the nearest thing 
to flesh which you could get, he said. 
We went out with two cakes. He 
fired into his at fifty yards and cer¬ 
tainly made a nasty hole in it at the 
back. Then I fired into mine and we 
went to look. There was no cake to be 
found. There was no more argument, 
although some explanations were at¬ 
tempted. 
Of course you can kill a caribou 
with a .22, if you are lucky. But that 
does not mean that it is the best cari¬ 
bou gun. Neither does the fact that 
a 45-90 will kill a rabbit make it a 
rabbit gun. 
No man can tell another what gun 
he is going to make his choice. Each 
has his favorite. But in picking out 
your big game rifle don’t forget that 
old saying with which we started, 
“Don’t send a boy to do a man’s work.” 
HUNTING PYTHONS INTHE 
PHILIPPINES 
A FEW years ago while floating 
down a great river of the Philip¬ 
pines I came upon a gorged python 
lying on the bank. Before the python 
has entirely digested its kill it is in a 
stupor and helpless; a hunter is due 
little credit for a kill while the snake 
is in that condition. My boatmen 
were anxious to secure the bile, be¬ 
lieved to be a most efficacious remedy 
for all ills; so I fired a couple of shots 
into the reptile, causing it to roll into 
the water, where its head was severed 
by a swift stroke of a sharp machet. 
Inside the snake we found the body 
of a four-pronged buck, weighing at 
least one hundred and twenty-five 
pounds. 
It might be well to mention that a 
python, no difference how large, does 
not really swallow an object but pulls 
itself over its meal, an act requiring 
hours or even days if the kill be large. 
When I returned to my station I 
related my experience in the officers’ 
mess, to become the butt of every 
snake story my comrades could devise. 
Later when I was transferred to 
another island, I found that my cap¬ 
tain possessed a python in captivity 
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