
allow firing from the prone or sitting 
or kneeling positions. The constant 
cutting off of 100 or 200 yards of rifle 
range is no mean task especially in 
hot weather when most outdoor shoot- 
ing is done. 
RIARS or weeds and some forms 
of field grass will sometimes grow 
nearly a foot in a week and it is dis- 
concerting to make a pilgrimage out 
to one’s private range and find it 
grown up so badly that it would take 
nearly an afternoon’s work with a 
scythe to make the range usable. 
Accurate rifle shooting is impossi- 
ble, or at the best, highly improbable 
after a couple of hours’ strenuous 
physical exertion. Consequently any 
shooter will discover that if his prac- 
tice range is laid out so that he can 
shoot across a hollow or depression 
in the ground, a plowed field, or a 
_ stony hillside, or if his firing point is 
‘ 
% 
or spotting telescope. 
\ 
arranged on an earth embankment 
two to four feet high, it will save him 
a tremendous amount of annoyance 
and labor in clearing away obstruc- 
tions from in front of his rifle muzzle 
Even a couple 
of stalks of timothy or wheat, if moved 
back and forth across the range by 
_ the wind, are a troublesome nuisance, 
and may easily be the means of caus- 
ing wild shots or misses. The only 
objection to a range across a hollow 
is that air currents sweep up and 
down the depression and such disturb- 
ances are not always observable at the 
firing point or at the target. 
It is a great deal easier, however, 
to stick up a wind flag than to bear 
down hard on the handle of a scythe. 
The average shooter must depend 
on his own efforts for his target shoot- 
ing. He lacks the assistance of a de- 
the well-appointed professional course 
tail of marines or a troop of boy 
scouts to man the pits. And his pock- 
etbook is not always so generously 
filled that he can afford to hire some- 
one to mark his targets for him. 
Therefore some method must be used 
that will enable the shooter to locate 
each bullet hole as soon as he fires, 
to do it without changing his position 
on the firing line, and to do it economi- 
cally. 
The answer is the spotting tele- 
scope. This glass, a collapsible ’scope 
about a foot and a half long when ex- 
tended, is set up on a little collapsible 
sawbuck stand beside the shooter. A 
glance through it shows at once the 
location of each bullet hole. If the 
targets are put up so that the light 
is allowed to shine through the target 
from the rear this problem is much 
simpler of solution and a high pow- 
ered or fairly expensive glass is not 
so necessary. _ 
The distance at which bullet holes 
may be seen depends upon existing 
conditions, among which are the angle 
front or rear at which the light 
shines on the target; whether the 
bullet strikes on the white or black 
portion of the paper, the presence or 
lack of it, of mirage, the caliber of the 
bullet, the clearness of the atmosphere, 
the contrast beween target and back- 
ground and the time of day. 
HE average spotting telescope will 
show .22 caliber bullet holes at 
50 yards almost any time and at 100 
yards about half of the time. They 
can be seen at 200 yards under espe- 
cially favorable light conditions. A 
good glass will show .22 bullet holes 
up to 100 yards most of the time and 
at 200 yards more than than half the 
time. When the glass falls down is 
when the mirage is very heavy, when 
it is exceptionally dark in late evening 
or when it is raining hard. Thirty 
caliber or larger holes should be seen 
up to 200 yards and they may be seen 
up to 500 yards under most excep- 
tional conditions and with a very fine 
glass. 
HE importance and value of the 
spotting telescope is well known 
to several thousand target riflemen 
but it is not known to several million 
hunters who use rifles, many of whom 
do a surprising amount of unofficial 
target shooting at home-made targets 
or at stones, clods of dirt or blocks 
of wood. 
The real value of target work with 
rifled firearms is not, as many sup- 
pose, in making occasional good scores, 
but in the familiarity with firearms 
which one acquires and in the real 
pleasure which comes with more accu- 
rate and consequently more successful 
shooting. 
The most enjoyable form of semi- 
target shooting may not be at proper 
targets at all. I enjoy hitting, or try- 
ing to hit, stones and other objects 
set up several hundred yards away 
against a safe hill or mountain as 
much or more than any other form of 
shooting I do. This is the logical prac- 
tice with a hunting rifle, most of it 
is offhand, and it gives not only a mas- 
tery of the rifle but a thoroughly prac- 
tical knowledge of the trajectory over 
hunting ranges, of the cartridge one 
is using, and of the sight settings re- 
quired to make a hit under different 
conditions. 
After a hunter has once convinced 
himself of the ranges at which he is 
likely to hit an object of a given size 
(Continued on page 247) 
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