
Jury 6, 1907.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
15 


a gauge of 14 will recoil more than one of 22; 
so that, after all, the above charge might do 
equally well for both. The proportion for a 
12-pound gun to be doubled, 18 pounds trebled, 
24 pounds quadrupled, etc, with one trifling de- 
viation, viz., the larger the gun the less should 
be the proportion of shot, as the larger and 
longer the caliber the more powder may be 
damaged in going down it. Much more may be 
fired, but not always with ease to the shoulder.” 
An ounce and a half measure would hold 334 
drams of powder, even if it were struck level, 
so that, allowing % dram for priming, there 
would be, when brim-full, about 3% drams to 
1% ounces of shot. This was the exact load 
recommended by Frank Forester for a 14-gauge 
percussion gun of 8 pounds weight; and it 
seems enormous for a 22-gauge, especially if 
the measure were “bumper-full” of shot. The 
strain upon the breech of so small a bore must 
have been very great, even allowing for the 
fact that the powder with a flint-lack began 
burning slowly. 
Under the heading of shot Hawker says, 
“Many select their shot in proportion to the 
size of the bird, when it ought to depend more 
on that of the caliber. For instance, a common- 
sized gun will shoot No. 7 better than any 
other shot, and although a deviation, accord- 
ing to circumstances, may be sometimes neces- 
sary, yet I am confident that had you, for a 
whole season, no other sized shot in your pos- 
session, you would. (taking everything from 
mallard and hare to quail and jacksnipe) find 
that you had shot with more universal success, 
killed more game, and brought down your birds 
in a handsomer style than you had ever done 
while whimsically following other plans. For 
my own part I should scarcely ever, with a 
small gun, use any other shot, except for killing 
snipe in February and March, when other birds 
should not be fired at. In this case I should 
use No. 8. If I went out solely for the purpose 
of shooting wildfowl with a small gun, I should 
of course prefer No. 3 to No. 7. The reason 
why small shot answers. best is that it lies more 
compact in the barrel and consequently receives 
more effectually the force of the powder than 
large shot, which can only have this advantage 
in a proportionately large caliber. Thus it is 
that a grain of small shot from a small gun 
will kill far better, in proportion, than one of 
large, and it shoots so regular a surface that a 
bird at forty yards could very seldom get away.” 
(The sizes of the above shots, in the list he 
gives, are No. 8—6co pellets in an ounce; No. 
7—341, and No. 3—135.) By “small guns” he 
meant all except those of 12 pounds’ weight and 
upward, made specially for shooting wildfowl. 
Of Eley’s shot cartridges, in which the pellets 
were inclosed with wire netting and packed in 
bone dust, he writes “for long shots in an open 
country, or at wildfowl, I cannot say too much 
in favor of them; but for general shooting 
they increase ten-fold the difficulty of killing 
the object when very near, and spoil the birds 
when hit.” 
As to the distances at which guns would kill, 
Hawker says that, ‘provided a gun is held 
straight, a bird should scarcely ever escape at 
40 yards, and at 50 yards the chances are three 
to one in favor of killing with a good aim.” 
(By this he probably meant aiming high to 
allow for the drop of the shot beyond 4o yards.) 
“T have seen fifteen double shots at partridges 
fairly killed in succession, provided one be in- 
cluded which towered and fell at so great a 
distance that it was not bagged. We shall 
surely err by firing, when at forty yards, at least 
5.or 6 inches before a flying bird.” Killing 
game in good style he defines to be fixing the 
eyes on the object and firing the moment the 
gin is brought to the shoulder. 
There’ is not the least appearance of exag- 
geration in any of Hawker’s statements; and in- 
deed the whole book impresses the reader with 
its evident truthfulness. It seems therefore 
fairly certain that, although the art of boring 
to produce any required pattern is now under- 
stood as it never was before (having been ac- 
quired since the invention of choke-boring). 
yet the guns made during the first quarter of 
the nineteenth century (by such artists as Egg, 
Lancaster, Manton, Purdey, ‘etc.) threw the shot 
with such regular and close patterns, and with 
such force, that game was habitually killed at 
what we now consider long ranges. 
In a work on guns written sixteen years ago 
by a gentleman who signs himself “Purple 
Heather,’ and who was then using the best 
modern breechloaders, mention is made of his 
first gun, a 16-bore by Nock, of which he says, 
“Ror ordinary game shooting in this country I 
should never wish‘for a more effective gun.” 
He afterward had an old gun by Joe Manton, 
which had 32-inch barrels of 22-gauge and 
weighed 6% pounds. “It was a hard-hitting 
and evenly-shooting gun. Each barrel averaged 
about 110 pellets in a 30-inch circle at 40 yards, 
when loaded with 2% drams of powder and 
7-ounce of No. 6 shot.” (This is close shoot- 
ing for the best modern “improved cylinders” 
when loaded with only 7-ounce.) : 
“Purple Heather” afterward bought a fine 
specimen of one of the old muzzleloaders made 
by Samuel Smith—a gunmaker who used to 
live in Princess street, London. It was of 
14-gauge with 28%4-inch barrels and weighed 714 
pounds. It shot with great force and made 
remarkably regular patterns. When tried at 40 
yards, loaded with 234 drams of powder and 1% 
ounces of No. 6 shot, the average of four shots 
from each barrel was: Right, 158; left, 170. 
If we consider that the fine-grain powder 
used in these old guns gave greater muzzle ve- 
locity than equal measures of that made for 
breechloaders, the above figures show that the 
patterns could hardly be surpassed in the pres- 
ent day for all-round work. A_ full-choked 
eun has so small a killing circle at ordinary 
ranges that it is only useful for shots at 40 
rards and upward; but the above-mentioned 
weapon, being of cylinder bore, would have a 
killing circle of 26 or 28 inches diameter at 
20 yards. J. J. Meyrick. 
BupLEIGH SALTERTON, South Devon, England. 
[To BE CONCLUDED. | 

Legislative Results. 
Norwicu, N. Y., June 29.—Editor Forest and 
Stream: The Merritt-O’Neil concurrent resolu- 
tion to amend Section 7 of Article VII. of our 
State constitution died in the committee on rules 
in the Assembly, and in the judiciary committee 
of the Senate. This resolution passed the As- 
sembly and Senate last year, and was known as 
the “water storage grab,’ to permit the building 
of large dams and reservoirs, at public expense, 
in the Adirondack Park, so the paper trust, lum- 
bermen, mill owners and water power seekers 
might make private gain. Last year the Senate 
passed it by 38 votes for and 9 against, while the 
Assembly gave 90 votes for and 33 against It. 
Assemblyman Merritt’s retaliatory bill to let 
persons go at will upon unimproved lands was 
defeated in the Assembly, May 28. This bill was 
aimed at owners of private parks in the Adiron- 
dacks and would have given the public a legal 
right to trespass, hunt and fish at pleasure on 
private property, and would have virtually an- 
nulled all trespass laws. When this bill was be- 
fore the Assembly Mr. Merritt was asked: “Do 
you think it is constitutional?” and he replied: 
“Oh, I reckon the constitution can stand it.” 
His other retaliatory bill to limit all private 
parks in the Adirondacks to 640 acres seems not 
to have gotten out from the committee to which 
it was referred. Perhaps Mr. Merritt found out 
it would harm his friends, the paper trust and 
other lumbermen, who now own large tracts of 
land in the Adirondacks and so did not further 
urge its passage. 
Senator Knapp’s concurrent resolution to 
amend Section 7 of Article VII. of the constitu- 
tion so as to permit the sale of State lands out- 
side of the limits of the Adirondack Park was 
killed in the Assembly, May 22. This bill is 
second only .to the Merritt-O’Neil water stcrage 
measure in its evil tendency to destroy State 
forest lands, and had been passed by the Senate. 
Like the Merritt-O’Neil constitutional amend- 
ment it would be of much benefit to the water 
storage and wood pulp interests, and like that 
measure was introduced by a man from the north 
country, Senator Knapp, of Clinton county. In 
effect. this bill would reduce by one-third the 
forest preserve and would make this co-exten- 
sive with the limits of the Adirondack Park. 
The forest preserve includes the counties of 
Clinton, Delaware, Essex, Franklin, Fulton, 
Greene, Hamilton, Herkimer, Lewis, Oneida, 
Saratoga, St. Lawrence, Sullivan, Ulster, War- 
ren and? Washington, and no State land in those 
counties can be sold. The Adirondack Park is 
a much smaller section within. the forest pre- 
serve, and is subject to the additional restriction 
that land in the park must remain open to access 
by all persons, subject to the limitations as to 
hunting and fishing as prescribed by the forest, 
fish and game laws. 
While the finest stretches of woodlartd are in 
the park proper there are large areas of valuable 
timber outside the park and inside the forest 
preserve. At present these are protected from 
the lumbermen by our State constitution, The 
object of the Knapp bill was to open a ready 
way toward the appropriation of this timber for 
the usual private purposes, to say nothing of 
the water power within the same limits. The bill 
had another “joker” in an innocent looking pro- 
vision which fixes the limits of the Adirondack 
Park at its present boundaries, and would make 
any further extension of the park impossible ex- 
cept by a further constitutional amendment. 
The Fuller-O’Brien bill, authorizing the State 
Water Supply Commission to devise plans for 
the progressive development of the water powers 
of the State, passed the Senate June 5, upon re- 
cent recommendation from Governor Hughes, 
after having been defeated by the Senate May 
29, was passed in Assembly June 11 and is now 
in the Governor’s hands. Both the Senate and 
Assembly also passed Senator Agnew’s bill of 
a like nature. The Fuller bill is more compre- 
hensive, outlines a policy and is thought to more 
fully meet Governor Hughes’ idea than does the 
Agnew measure. . 
The Dominion of Canada has lately contracted 
with the Ontario Power Company, on the Cana- 
dian side of Niagara Falls, for a large amount 
of electrical power, to be furnished twenty-four 
hours each day, every day in the year; will build 
transmission lines and sell it, at $16 to $24 per 
horsepower by the year, to those who need it. 
New York State can generate electrical power 
and sell it at a moderate price to help build up 
manufacturing and other interests in our State. 
Another Merritt-O’Neil bill to incorporate the 
Long Sault Development Company, for generat- 
ing electrical power by the use of the waters of 
the St. Lawrence River, passed the Assembly and 
Senate. Governor Hughes asked to have it 
amended so'this company will pay the State for 
its franchise. This was done and the company 
is to pay $10,000 for the first year, $15,000 for 
the second year, $20,000 for’the third year, and 
25,000 or more annually thereafter, according to 
the amount of power developed. ; 
Senator Armstrong’s bill appropriating $500,- 
ooo for the extension of the forest preserve has 
passed both branches of the Legislature and is 
now with the Governor. 
_ These results have been accomplished by honest 
influence, an honest Governor, and work done 
by the Board of Trade of New York city, and 
the Association for the Protection of the Adiron- 
dacks, with the help of Forest AND StrREAM and 
other publications. 
The average man is an honest man. He wants 
to be honest with you and with me; he wants 
us to be honest with each other, and he wants 
all men to be honest with the State. Show him 
the honest side of any question and he is glad 
to go with it. CLARENCE L. PARKER.’ 
Customs Ruling on Pistols. 
THE contention of a firm importing automatic 
pistols from Europe that these weapons should 
be admitted to this country at 75 cents each and 
25 per cent. ad valorem, has been overruled by 
the customs officials and the weapons assessed 
at 45 per cent. ; 
All the game laws of the. United States and 
Canada, revised to date and now in force, are 
given in the Gamie Laws in Brief. See ad. 

