"But they can't! Few can. Now, do you think you could impart the knowledge; teach something of the skill you have in shooting? Because if you can we shall make you both instructors. What do you think about it?"
[CHAPTER VII]
The Match
Brigadier-general Harding, grizzled, grim, but possessing that human quality without which no commander of men is entirely successful, gazed into the level, steady, smiling brown eyes of the boy who stood straight, tall and every inch a soldier before him.
"Anyone who understands shooting at all ought to be able to tell what he knows and how he does it," Herbert answered. "Shooting is a good deal like anything else that's lots of fun; you've got to love it and study it and have good eyes and then practise. And then, too, there's the gun. You've got to have a perfect gun to make A-1 scores and to do any fancy shooting."
"Well, that's a good gun, isn't it?"
"No; not very. I guess they make them so fast and so many of them that the boring tool wears and the rifling is not the best. Then, too, the sights may not be perfectly centered—you've got to look to that. The stock, too, is queer; it doesn't fit like a gun should."
"I have been led to suppose that this is as good as a rifle could be."