Take a bottle of sight-black and paint both sights over with the liquid. I have seen men try to compete, with their sights in a shiny state, which made it impossible for them to make good shooting on a white target with black “bull.”
For game shooting, or for military purposes, of course, a “dead” white (ivory for choice) tip to the front sight is preferable, or my patent military front sight, which answers the purposes both of a light on dark, or dark on light sight.
With a pistol the first thing to consider is safety. It is, owing to its shortness, one of the most dangerous of firearms to handle. Even an expert must exercise great care; and in the hands of a beginner or a careless person it may be fearfully dangerous. I have had many very narrow escapes in teaching men how to shoot; it is not even safe to be behind them; they will turn round with the pistol at full-cock, pointing it at you, and say: “I cannot understand why it will not go off; see! I am pulling as hard as I can at the trigger.”
It is indispensable to have a safe background. Some people think that if the target is fastened to the trunk of a tree it is all safe, since the bullet will not go through the tree. This may be so if the tree is hit, but the bullet will, most likely, go past the tree when the beginner fires; or, what is just as dangerous, graze the tree and go off at an angle. Also, in shooting with round bullets, and light gallery ammunition, the bullets may rebound from a hard tree and come back on the shooter. This I have actually seen happen.
A good background is a high sandy bank, a thick pile of fagots, or, if not closer than fifty yards, a high brick or stone wall. The target may be stood some fifteen yards away from the wall to prevent danger of a bullet coming back on the shooter, and then the shooter can be far enough from the wall, if the wall is a background. If a lot of shooting is done, it is not very good for the wall, and if many shots hit the same spot they may gradually make a hole. Iron butts are expensive, especially for the large surface required by a beginner; at twenty yards, a beginner could not in my opinion safely shoot at a background less than twelve feet high and some ten in width. Even then there should not be any one beyond it within half a mile, lest he should happen to let off by accident. Shooting out to sea is safe, if one keeps a good lookout for boats; but the glare from the water is bad. A sand or chalk pit is a good place to shoot in, or one can shoot against a high chalk cliff. It is dangerous to shoot anywhere where people cross unexpectedly, as from round the corner of a building.
The great thing is that the pistol should never point in any direction where it would matter if it went off by accident. This rule should be observed even with an empty pistol, because so many “I-did-not-know-it-was-loaded” accidents occur.
Having got a butt, the learner should take a firm, narrow wooden table and place it some ten yards from the target. This target is preferably a “Bisley fifty-yards target,” four-inch bull’s-eye. The Bisley cardboard targets are cheap; and, by pasting white patches on the white and black on the bull’s-eye bullet-holes, one target can be used for a long time. I refer to the fifty-yards target because this four-inch bull’s-eye is very easy to hit at ten yards’ range. The Bisley revolver “bull’s-eyes” count, at all ranges, seven points; the concentric rings counting one point less, each, till the outermost one, which counts two points. The highest possible score, therefore, for the six shots is forty-two, or six times seven. It is best to shoot at this very big “bull” at ten yards, as making “bull’s-eyes” encourages the beginner; and, as he gets more proficient, the two-inch twenty yards “bull” can be substituted. This I think preferable to going back farther from the target as your skill increases; also it is safer, for the nearer the shooter is to the butt the wider his shots would have to be for him to miss it; whereas, if he goes back to fifty yards he may easily shoot over a very high butt.
Place your empty pistol on the table, the weapon lying on its left side with the muzzle towards the target. The table is preferably a narrow one, so that, during the process of loading, the muzzle points to the ground beyond the table and not to the table itself, an accidental discharge being thus immaterial; a foot wide is about right; the length does not matter, so long as it will hold your field-glasses, cleaning things, and cartridges.
Position.—The position for shooting which I am now going to describe, is the one in which I shoot and the one which I have found from experience suits me best. This position, however, will have to be modified according to the build of the shooter; a stouter or shorter-necked man than myself might have to stand more sideways.
Stand facing the target; the right foot pointing straight for the target, or perhaps a shade to the left (if the ground is slippery, this gives you a firmer foothold); the left heel distant from six to nine inches to the left of the right foot, according to your height (my distance is eight inches), and about an inch farther back; the feet turned out about as much as is natural to you when standing.