Florida and the Game Water-Birds of the Atlantic Coast and the Lakes of the United States / With a full account of the sporting along our sea-shores and inland waters, and remarks on breech-loaders and hammerless guns

by Robert Barnwell Roosevelt

The guns were classified according to their weight. The breech-loaders, which used one quarter of a drachm more powder, showed about an equal recoil; the recoil differed surprisingly, ranging from 44 to 76 lbs., and was no indication of the power with which the shot was driven—a greater number of sheets being pierced where the recoil was under the average. The patterns produced by the muzzle-loaders varied from those of the breech-loaders less than they did from one another, and far less than that of one barrel differed from that of the other; in fact, the right-hand barrel seems to have shot much the best, and some of the guns that excelled at 40 yards fell far behindhand at 60 yards.

In penetration, which is a more valuable quality in a gun than even pattern, the breech-loaders took the lead; one pierced through 40 sheets and another through 39 sheets, so that the vaunted superiority of the old gun in this particular was found not to exist. It was further noted that a great improvement in this particular had taken place in the breech-loaders since the trial of the year previous, which improvement has been going on steadily since. The trial also proved that, although the breech-loaders required an extra amount of powder to give them force, it caused in them no additional recoil, and was objectionable in so far only as it entailed extra expense and weight of ammunition. The muzzle-loader was left, to offset its numerous inferiorities, nothing more than a claim to diminished weight of gun and ammunition, and a trifling saving in expense; in force and pattern it was equalled; in safety and handiness it was far surpassed by its competitor.

These trials were continued afterwards, but none were or could be more conclusive than the first which I have given, and there is no need of troubling the reader with them. Indeed, it would almost seem unnecessary to give time and space to the consideration of the superiorities of breech-loaders over muzzle-loaders at this day, so universally are the former accepted in the better informed localities, but in so extensive a country as ours, there are parts which are late to learn and hard to be convinced. To-day, while the muzzle-loader has nearly disappeared from the Northern and Eastern States, it still holds its own in the South and far West, and there are at present as many of them in service throughout the length and breadth of our land, as there are of breech-loaders.

One change that was early made in the cartridges was to do away with the pin and substitute a central fire, and so much was this change admired, that pin-fire guns have almost gone out of use. Nevertheless, I have never been convinced that this was any improvement, and believe, that if the pin-fire gun had come into general use before it was introduced, it would not have been accepted. However, admitted facts cannot be ignored, and to-day the pin-fire system has been almost as fully and far less intelligently relegated to the past, as the muzzle-loader itself. I am also no admirer of the snapaction, which has to a certain extent been substituted for the lever, on the ground that, while the lever never gets out of order, the spring of the snap often breaks. I may say, that no guns could have been more severely tried than mine that were manufactured by Lefaucheux, one of which was the second that was ever permanently used in this country, and that they have never given out in their working parts, while the oldest and most hardly used has never given out at all, although shot in all weathers and under very trying circumstances.

Indeed I go farther and insist that there have been no important improvements made in breech-loaders since the original Lefaucheux pattern until the introduction of the hammerless guns. These are still imperfect, but they will probably be soon perfected, so that the last serious danger from a breech-loader will be removed, that of premature discharge in the field. Were it not for this discovery, it is my belief that sportsmen would yet give up the central-fire, and return to the pin-fire, there being no advantages in a central fire, while there are several disadvantages. The principal of these consists in the fact that no one can tell whether it is loaded or not, and a secondary danger lies in the loading of the cartridges, which has already cost several lives. As yet, however, the hammerless gun is not entirely safe. It is thrown back to full cock in opening, and when closed with a hard snap it will sometimes jar off. This happens very rarely, but often enough to make the gun dangerous.

It will foul about the working parts of the breech when it is used hard without cleaning, so that the springs will not act, and a premature discharge may follow, and it sometimes catches on the edge of the bent in the tumbler without slipping into it. As soon as these defects are absolutely remedied, the graceful and convenient hammerless gun will take the place of all others. I know very well it is claimed that these, and all other defects have been removed by the introduction of the safety block, which interposes before the tumbler, and thus between the strikers and the cap, and I do not intend to enter into an argument which would lead to no practical result. There are men ever ready to take certain risks in order to be ahead of their fellows. Let such disregard the advice, which common sense suggests, and make experiments, from which they cannot be dissuaded, and by which others may profit. I would, however, say that I am sustained in my objections by so high an authority, as “Stonehenge,” but am willing to admit that even as they are, I think a hammerless gun is safer than a central fire, for they avoid one of the greatest risks which the sportsman runs, that of the trigger catching on a twig as he is going through the bushes. Those who have used them sufficiently to get accustomed to them, say that they can shoot better with them than with the old gun, a fact which they attribute to the absence of the hammers.

CHAPTER III.
BAY-SNIPE SHOOTING.

The various writers on the different kinds of sport in our country have generally devoted their attention to upland shooting; to the quail, woodcock, English snipe, ruffed grouse of the hills, dales, and meadows, to the prairie-chicken of the far west, or to the larger game—the ducks, geese, and swans of our coast; and the few suggestions to be found in Frank Forester’s Field Sports, or Lewis’s American Sportsman, are of little assistance in discussing the mode of capture of their less fashionable and less marketable brethren called bay-snipe. I shall inevitably make mistakes and omissions. The later works on water-fowl shooting are limited to the consideration of ducks, geese, and brant, as though bay snipe belonged to the upland. But I consider them nearly as much of a water-bird as the black duck, for, like the latter, they are shot mostly at pond holes in the marshes or from sedgy points.

The birds that are shot along our shores upon the sand-bars or broad salt meadows, or even upon the adjoining fields of upland, are among sportsmen termed bay-birds or bay-snipe; and although including several distinct varieties, present a general similarity in manners and habits. They are ordinarily killed by stratagem over decoys, and not by open pursuit; different varieties frequent the same locality, so that many species will be collected in the same bag; they are for the most part, except the upland birds, tough and sedgy, and at times hardly fit for the table; and they arrive and may be killed at certain periods in vast numbers.