Now arises the question of expense, as these pistols are expensive.
If economy is necessary, then the only way is to get one of the American single-shot pistols and add wood to the back of the stock, so that the grip comes further back and the trigger is thereby further from the hand and allows the trigger finger to be extended.
Then either cut down the barrel to lighten the pistol forward, or have flutes made in the barrel to take weight of the metal off, and put lead in the stock.
I have described the ideal way of learning to shoot a pistol but of course any single-shot pistol which does not have too heavy a recoil will do to learn with, so as to become a fair shot.
With the long reach to the trigger of the French duelling pistols the trigger finger can be held outside and along the trigger guard (as with a shotgun when walking up birds). With the trigger so far back, as it is in American single-shot pistols, it is difficult to introduce the finger into the trigger guard whilst holding the pistol with one hand, and one gets into the dangerous habit of keeping the finger inside the trigger guard.
I will not describe these various single-shot pistols, as (in my own case) I find shooting them does not do me any good, but teaches a cramped style.
The pistol which is no longer made, but can perhaps be picked up, is a regulation French duelling pistol, full size, which shoots, instead of the .44 duelling charge, a bulleted cap of .2 calibre, with fulminate only, and a round bullet, and is exploded by a cross bar on the hammer which has a flat striking surface. This flat bar strikes across the whole face of the cap, indents itself into the cap, and having an undercut surface extracts the empty cap after it is fired, as the pistol is cocked.
The pistol has no recoil and hardly more noise than an air gun.
The manufacture would be resumed if there were enough demand for such pistols, and in my opinion they ought to be made as they are infinitely preferable to modern .22 calibre pistols.
