When you desire to reload a muzzle-loader, put the hammer of the loaded barrel at half-cock, and if the right barrel has been discharged, set down the butt so that the hammers are towards you, and the contrary way if the left barrel is to be loaded; in this manner you will avoid bringing your hand over the loaded barrel, and in case the other charge should go off you would lose the end of your thumb, perhaps, but save most of your fingers.
From the foregoing rules, which apply mainly to muzzle-loaders, it will be seen how much safer are breech-loaders; with them the entire charge can be withdrawn on entering a house or getting into a wagon, and there is absolutely no danger to fingers or thumb in the process of loading. And in carrying the weapon on long tramps in the woods, where it is frequently removed from boat to shoulder, from shoulder to boat, and from wagon to case, and when it has to be ready at any instant, with the muzzle-loader the only possible precaution is to leave the nipples without caps, which are to be carried in the vest pocket, and must be removed after every vain alarm; while with the breech-loader, the charge itself is not inserted till needed.
With these few suggestions, which are applicable not merely to the kinds of sport treated of in this volume, but to every species of shooting, we leave the young sportsman to his own resources and to the knowledge that he will acquire in the field, hoping that he may find something in them that will aid him to kill reasonably often the game he points at, and to avoid the dreadful misfortune of injuring a friend or companion.
CHAPTER XI.
DIRECTIONS FOR BUILDING A BATTERY.
A battery, or sink-boat as it is called in some parts of the country, is a narrow box with a platform around it, so arranged that the weight of the shooter will sink it so nearly level with the water that the ducks will not notice it when it is hidden among the stand of stools that are always anchored around it. The box is almost square, narrowed a little on the bottom and at the foot, twenty-two inches across at the head, eighteen at the foot on the top, and four less on the bottom; the two end pieces are of one and a half inch oak, the sides of three-quarter inch white pine. It is fifteen inches deep, except at the head, which shoals up to six inches, beginning about two feet abaft the end. This is done in order to enable the sportsman to look over the edge of the box without getting a cramp in his neck, and besides to reduce the flotation of the battery as much as possible, which is a most important thing to effect. The narrowing of the bottom is for the same purpose of diminishing the buoyancy, for as it has to be sunk to the level of the water if the weight of the sportsman will not bring it down sufficiently, iron weights, or what is far preferable, iron decoys, have to be placed in it or on it, and weights in the box are always in the way.
Two oak carlings are cut out six feet long, one and a quarter inch thick, and two and a half wide in the middle, tapering off to one and a quarter at the ends, with a bow or spring of an inch from the center to the extremities. Nail these firmly on each end an inch below the top of the box, and to them fasten the platform, which is made of planed stuff ten feet long, and to each end of which a batten is nailed as well as a short additional carling in the middle, projecting from the side of the box. Fill in the head and foot of the platform with short pieces, so as to make it compact, and take especial care to have it fit tightly around the box. As it is made of three-quarter inch stuff, there will be left a quarter of an inch all around the box to which, when the other work is done, a narrow piece of lead is nailed that can be raised to keep out the water in rough weather. Two boards, or what is better, two frames covered with duck, are hinged together by leather hinges. These are one foot wide each, and as long as the platform, and are hinged to it on both sides. A foot-piece made of two boards is hinged to the foot in the same way. To the head it is customary, on Long Island, to fasten a fender of the width of the battery and wings, and eighteen or twenty feet long. It is made of duck nailed to thin wooden slats, is tied on to the battery when in use, and taken off at other times. In other parts of the country it is customary to dispense with the fender and substitute a head wing of three boards hinged on like the foot and side wings. A single board, fourteen to sixteen inches wide, can be used at the foot in place of the double foot wing. Sometimes an additional row of lead is put on about the middle of the platform as an additional breakwater.
The battery is anchored at both ends. From the head of the fender a sort of bridle, a short rope tied into the two corners, is fastened at the center or bight to the anchor rope. A small grapnel or light anchor is used at the head, as it is important that it should not drag, while at the stern, to a rope led through a hole in the foot board, a stone is fastened. This is arranged in this way as it is occasionally necessary to haul it in and throw it out again on a change of wind. The entire surface of the battery, wings and all, is to be painted a dull blue, as near the color of the water as possible. The necessary iron decoys, to bring the whole structure down to a level with the water, are set upon the platform, and the stand of stools, not less than a hundred and fifty, and double that number is better, are placed around the battery, mostly at the foot and towards the left side if the shooter is right-handed. A bottom board of half-inch stuff, with half-inch cleats under it, is put in the bottom of the box for the gunner to lie on, and all is ready for the exercises to begin. A sink-box made on this plan will stand quite a heavy sea, but care must be exercised in taking it up that the wind does not get under the fender when it is being hauled aboard the sailing vessel, that is ordinarily used in this kind of shooting, for if it does, and it is blowing at all hard, the fender, box, platform and all will be lifted out of the water and tossed skyward. Wear dull-colored clothes, never a red shirt, and a cap in battery shooting. And first and last, remember never to rise to shoot before the birds are well into the lower portion of the stools. More birds are lost by getting up too soon to shoot than from any other cause.
