tion, to give it an exceedingly hard 
surface but a tough interior. No 
amount of shooting will cause any 
upsettage, and the mechanism will 
wear out many barrels. 
S contrasted to this, many of our 
less modern breech mechanisms, 
and a few of the foreign ones, are 
made of a soft, easily machined steel 
to enable manufacture to be speeded 
up and cost decreased. These steels 
are not heat treated. Most of them, 
however, have a good elastic limit. 
While breech actions of this kind of 
steel are perfectly safe, yet they do 
not wear like the special heat treated 
steel. A common defect is to have the 
breech bolt acquire a permanent set 
back after several thousand rounds 
have been fired, increasing the head 
space, so that very often a cartridge, 
on being fired, will have its case 
stretched to an undue extent, and the 
case separates—splits in two circularly 
about half an inch in front of the 
head. When this occurs the breech 
action is worn out. 
LL of the working parts of this 
Mauser breech action are most 
beautifully machined, and in addition 
have been most carefully polished and 
adjusted with the finest valve grinding 
compound so as to give the most per- 
fect fit and smoothness of operation. 
The trigger pull has been hand adjust- 
ed to give a pull of 3% pounds which 
has not the slightest suspicion of creep 
or drag. The trigger, safety, and bolt 
handle are all checked to prevent any 
possible slip of fingers in operating or 
firing. The upper surface of the re- 
ceiver has been matted to prevent any 
possible reflection of light interfering 
with a perfect vision of the sights when 
aiming. 
Progressing again towards the butt 
of this rifle, we find a new model of 
Lyman type of aperture rear sight. 
This aperture is close to the eye, just 
far enough away so that the eye stands 
in no danger of being injured when the 
rifle recoils. The result is that in aim- 
ing the aperture is seen as a quite large 
but thin circle which does not interfere 
with the view of the target or sur- 
roundings, thus making aim at run- 
ning game a very easy matter. More- 
over, one quickly comes to seemingly 
disregard this rear sight in aiming, 
and to apparently align the front sight 
only on the game, with enormous re- 
sulting simplicity and quickness of aim. 
S a matter of fact, however, one 
cannot fail but align the rear 
aperture accurately with the front 
sight and the game, although not con- 
scious of doing it, and thus extreme 
464 
accuracy results owing to the very long 
sight radius. Looking still at this 
sight, we see that this aperture is 
readily and positively adjustable for 
both elevation and windage, and that 
the adjustments read to minutes of 
angle, roughly a change in point of 
impact of 1 inch at 100 yards, 2 inches 
at 200 yards, and so on. Of course, 
very few well informed sportsmen or 
practical shots attempt to change their 
elevation or windage when shooting at 
game. They have their sights accurate- 
ly adjusted for some particular range, 
and for other distances hold over or 
under the game. But the point is that 
without a most accurately adjustable 
and recordable rear sight it is almost 
impossible to ever get a rifle sighted 
for any distance with exactness, and 
the ammunition bill chargeable to sight 
adjustment and targeting is usually 
large enough with crude sights to pay 
for the improved sight many times 
over. Moreover, without properly ad- 
justable aperture sights sportsmen 
practically never develop real nail- 
driving marksmanship. 
PERU the thing which would 
first impress the novice when he 
took up one of these fine rifles would 
be the stock of beautifully figured Cir- 
cassian walnut. Not only is the wood 
decidedly superior in figure, beauty of 
lines, and strength, but it is shaped 
and designed to be a perfect fit for the 
man for whom it is made, so that when 
this man throws the rifle to his shoul- 
der he will invariably find the sights 
aligned with almost perfect accuracy 
upon the object at which he is looking. 
Forearm and pistol grip are sharply 
checked. The forearm is large enough 
to give a firm grip for the hand, so 
that the bottom of the forearm is down 
in the palm of the hand supported by 
the bones of the forearm, not perched 
up on the fingers, with every bone and 
joint of each finger contributing to the 
tremor. The pistol grip is a real grip, 
not merely an excrescence on the under 
side of the stock, but pushed up near 
to the trigger guard so that when the 
hand grasps it a real backward pull 
can be obtained without effort, and yet 
the trigger finger need not contribute 
to the grip, but stands limber and re- 
laxed for its delicate work of trigger 
squeeze. 
aps comb of the stock is quite high 
and thick so that the side of the 
face finds full and perfect support 
against it, and the eye is held steady in 
the line of aim while sighting. The 
butt-plate is of steel, sharply checked 
so that it will not slip on the shoulder, 
and also so that it may occasionally, if 
need be, be used as an aid to climbing 
rough and steep mountains without 
chipping. This butt-plate is full man- 
sized, 5% inches long by 1% inches 
—_) & 
wide, the size and shape seen on the © 
finest shotguns. 
trap door, and imbedded in the walnut 
stock under it are a_ short - jointed 
cleaning rod, a brass cleaning brush, a 
small one-drop oil can, and a supply 
It has an opening and ~ 
of cut flannel cleaning patches, all — 
ready for emergency cleaning if one 
should be forced to stay over night 
away from his camp supplies. 
HERE is a leather gunsling too, not 
the usual strap, but a real shooting 
gunsling with adjustable loop so that 
it can be used in that most accurate 
of all shooting positions, the standard 
military prone position. The sling 
swivels are strong and noiseless, and 
do not twist or tangle. 
When I came to fire one of these 
rifles I obtained one group in which 
all the shots could be inclosed in a 
2.2-inch group at 100 yards, and an- 
other with ten shots inside a 1.7-inch 
circle at the same distance. The 
average thus was slightly less than 
2 inches. Two inches at 100 yards is 
equivalent to 6 inches at 300 yards, and 
the average machine-made quantity 
production rifle using cartridges de- 
signed twenty or thirty years ago, 
makes about a 4-inch group at 100 
yards, or 12 inches at 300 yards. 
HE various vital spots on a big 
game animal, to hit which usually 
assures one’s getting his game without 
needless suffering, are generally taken 
to be about 6 inches in diameter. 
Therefore, with these Modern Amer- 
ican Rifles one can come pretty near 
commanding his game up to 300 yards 
if he be a good shot, whereas with the 
older rifle the distance will not be much 
over 150 yards at which he can make 
absolutely sure. 
E have, therefore, in these rifles 
weapons which are more accu- 
rate, reliable, durable, and beautiful 
than rifles were formerly made, with 
which the sportsman can make sure 
hits more readily and farther away 
and faster; which, by reason of their 
superior ammunition, give vastly in- 
creased killing power. This is the 
Modern American Rifle; the weapon 
for sportsmen who can afford it and 
who wish to take every precaution to 
assure the success of their shooting 
trips; or for the intrepid explorer who 
separates himself for months and by 
hundreds of miles from any possible 
source of supply or repair. Such types 
of superior weapons have ushered in a 
new era in the art of gun-making. 
