The governor having been rowed to the island, examined the
fortifications, read the journal, and looked at the iron-pipe gun, and
afterwards reflecting upon these things came to the conclusion that it
would be safer and better in every way to let Bevis have the use of a
good breech-loader. He evidently must shoot, and if so he had better
shoot with a proper gun. When this decision was known, Mark’s governor
could do nothing less, and so they both had good guns put into their
hands.
In truth, the prohibition had long been rather hollow, more traditional
than effectual. Bevis had accompanied his governor several autumns in
the field, and shot occasionally, and he had been frequently allowed to
try his skill at the starlings flying to and fro the chimney. Besides
which they shot with Jack and knew all about it perfectly well. They
were fortunate in living in the era of the breech-loader which is so
much safer than the old muzzle-loading gun. There was hardly a part of
the muzzle-loader which in some way or other did not now and then
contribute to accidents. With the breech-loader you can in a moment
remove the very possibility of accident by pulling out the cartridges
and putting them in your pocket.
Bevis and Mark knew very well how to shoot, both from actual if
occasional practice, and from watching those who did shoot. The
governor, however, desirous that they should excel, gave them a good
drilling in this way.
Bevis had to study his position at the moment when he stopped and lifted
the gun. His left foot was to be set a little in front of the other,
and he was to turn very slightly aside, the left shoulder forwards. He
was never to stand square to the game. He was to stand upright,
perfectly upright like a bolt. The back must not stoop nor the
shoulders be humped and set up till the collar of the coat was as high
as the poll. Humping the shoulders at the same time contracts the
chest, and causes the coat in front to crease, and these creases are apt
to catch the butt of the gun as it comes to the shoulder and divert it
from its proper place.
There is no time to correct this in the act of shooting, so that the
habit of a good position should be acquired that it may be avoided. He
had, too, to hold his head nearly upright and not to crane his neck
forward till the cheek rested on the stock while the head was aside in
the manner of the magpie peering into a letter. He was to stand
upright, with his chest open and his shoulders thrown back, like Robin
Hood with his six foot yew drawing the arrow to his ear.
Bevis was made to take his double-barrel upstairs, into the best
bedroom--this is the advantage of the breech-loader, take the cartridges
out and it is as harmless as a fire-iron--where there was a modern
cheval-glass. The mirrors down stairs were old and small, and the glass
not perfectly homogeneous so that unless the reflection of the face fell
just in the centre a round chin became elongated. Before the
cheval-glass he was ordered to stand sideways and throw up the gun
quickly to the present, then holding it there, to glance at himself.
He saw his frame arched forward, his back bent, his shoulders drawn
together, the collar of his coat up to his poll behind, the entire
position cramped and awkward. Now he understood how unsightly it
looked, and how difficult it is to shoot well in that way. Many good
sportsmen by dint of twenty years’ cramping educate their awkwardness to
a successful pitch. It needs many years to do it: but you can stand
upright at once.
He altered his posture in a moment, looked, and saw himself standing
easily, upright but easily, and found that his heart beat without
vibrating the barrel as it will if the chest be contracted, and that
breathing did not throw the gun out of level. Instead of compressing
himself to the gun, the gun fitted to him. The gun had been his master
and controlled him, now he was the master of the gun.
Next he had to practise the bringing of the gun to the shoulder--the act
of lifting it--and to choose the position from which he would usually
lift it. He had his free choice, but was informed that when once he had
selected it he must adhere to it. Some generally carry the gun on the
hollow of the left arm with the muzzle nearly horizontal to the left.
Some under the right arm with the left hand already on the stock. Some
with the muzzle upwards aslant with both hands also. Now and then one
waits with the butt on his hip: one swings his gun anyhow in one hand
like an umbrella: a third tosses it over his shoulder with the hammers
down and the trigger-guard up, and jerks the muzzle over when the game
rises. Except in snap-shooting, when the gun must of necessity be held
already half-way to the shoulder, it matters very little which the
sportsman does, nor from what position he raises his gun.
But the governor insisted that it did matter everything that the
position should be habitual. That in order to shoot with success, the
gun must not be thrown up now one way and now another, but must almost
invariably, certainly as a rule, be lifted from one recognised position.
Else so many trifling circumstances interfere with the precision
without which nothing can be done, a crease of the coat, a button, the
sleeve, or you might, forgetting yourself, knock the barrel against a
bough.
To avoid these you must take your mind from the game to guide your gun
to the shoulder. If you took your mind from the game the continuity of
the glance was broken, and the aim snapped in two, not to be united.
Therefore, he insisted on Bevis choosing a position in which he would
habitually carry his gun when in the presence of game.
Bevis at once selected that with the gun in the hollow of his left arm,
the muzzle somewhat upwards; this was simply imitation, because the
governor held it in that way. It is, however, a good position, easy for
walking or waiting for ground game or for game that flies, for hare or
snipe, for everything except thick cover or brushwood, or moving in a
double mound, when you must perforce hold the gun almost perpendicular
before you to escape the branches. This being settled, and the governor
having promised him faithfully that if he saw him carry it any other way
he would lock the gun up for a week each time, they proceeded to
practise the bringing of the gun up to the shoulder, that is, to the
present.
The left hand should always grasp the stock at the spot where the gun
balances, where it can be poised on the palm like the beam of weights
and scales. Instead of now taking it just in front of the
trigger-guard, now on the trigger-guard, now six or seven inches in
front, carelessly seizing it in different places as it happens, the left
hand should always come to the same spot. It will do so undeviatingly
with a very little practice and without thought or effort, as your right
hand meets your friend’s to shake hands.
If it comes always to the same spot the left hand does not require
shifting after the butt touches the shoulder. The necessary movements
are reduced to a minimum. Grasping it then at the balance lift it
gently to the shoulder, neither hastily nor slowly, but with quiet ease.
Bevis was particularly taught not to throw the butt against his
shoulder with a jerk, he was to bring it up with the deliberate motion
of “hefting.”
“Hefting” is weighing in the hands--you are asked to “heft” a thing--to
take it and feel by raising it what you think it weighs.
With this considerate ease Bevis was to “heft” his gun to the shoulder,
and only to press it there sufficiently to feel that the butt touched
him. He was not to hold it loosely, nor to pull it against his shoulder
as if he were going to mortice it there. He was just to feel it. If
you press the gun with a hard iron stiffness against the shoulder you
cannot move it to follow the flying bird: you pull against and resist
yourself. On the other hand, if loosely held the gun is apt to shift.
The butt must touch his shoulder at the same place every time. Those
who have not had this pointed out to them frequently have the thick or
upper part of the butt high above the shoulder, and really put nothing
but the narrow and angular lower part against the body. At another
time, throwing it too low, they have to bend and stoop over the gun to
get an aim. Or it is pitched up to the chest, and not to the shoulder
at all--to the edge of the chest, or again to the outside of the
shoulder on the arm. They never bring it twice to the same place and
must consequently change the inclination of the head at every shot. A
fresh effort has, therefore, to be gone through each time to get the
body and the gun to fit.
Bevis was compelled to bring the butt of his gun up every time to the
same spot well on his shoulder, between his chest and his arm, with the
hollow of the butt fitting, like a ball in its socket. One of the great
objects of this mechanical training was that he should not have to pay
the least attention to the breech of the gun in aiming. All that he had
to do with was the sight. His gun, when he had thus practised, came up
exactly level at once.
It required no shifting, no moving of the left hand further up or lower
down the stock, no pushing of the butt higher up the shoulder, or to
this side or that. His gun touched his shoulder at a perfect level, as
straight as if he had thrust out his hand and pointed with the index
finger at the bird. Not the least conscious effort was needed, there
was nothing to correct, above all there was not a second’s interruption
of the continuity of glance--the look at the game. The breech was level
with the sight instantly; all he had further to do with was the sight.
With both eyes open he never lost view of the bird for the tenth of a
second. The governor taught him to keep his eyes, both open, on the
bird as it flew, and his gun came up to his line of sight. The black
dot at the end of the barrel--as the sight appears in the act of
shooting--had then only to cover the bird, and the finger pressed the
trigger. Up to the moment that the black dot was adjusted to the mark
all was automatic.
The governor’s plan was first to reduce the movements to a minimum;
secondly, to obtain absolute uniformity of movement; thirdly, to secure
by this absolute uniformity a perfect unconsciousness of effort of
movement at all; in short, automatic movement; and all this in order
that the continuity of glance, the look at the game, might not be
interrupted for the merest fraction of a second. That glance was really
the aim, the gun fitted itself to the gaze just as you thrust out your
index finger and point, the body really did the work of aiming itself.
All the mind had to do was to effect the final adjustment of the black
dot of the sight. Very often when the gun was thus brought up no such
adjustment was necessary, it was already there, so that there was
nothing to do but press the trigger. It then looked as if the gun
touched the shoulder and was discharged instantaneously.
He was to look at the bird, to keep both eyes on it, to let his gun come
to his eyes, still both open, adjust the dot and fire. There was no
binocular trouble because he was never to stay to run his eyes up the
barrels--that would necessitate removing his glance from the game, a
thing strictly forbidden. Only the dot. He saw only the dot, and the
dot gave no binocular trouble. The barrels were entirely ignored; the
body had already adjusted them. Only the dot. The sight--this dot--is
the secret of shooting.
The governor said if you shut the left eye you cannot retain your glance
on the bird, the barrels invariably obscure it for a moment, and the
mind has to catch itself again. He would not let Bevis take his eyes
off it--he would rather he missed. Bevis was also to be careful not to
let his right hand hang with all the weight of his arm on the stock, a
thing which doubles the labour of the left arm as it has to uphold the
weight of the gun and of the right arm too, and thus the muzzle is apt
to be depressed.
He was not to blink, but to look through the explosion. Hundreds of
sportsmen blink as they pull the trigger. He was to let his gun
smoothly follow the bird, even in the act of the explosion, exactly as
the astronomer’s clockwork equatorial follows a star. There was to be
continuity of glance; and thus at last he brought down his snipes right
and left, as it seemed, with a sweep of the gun.
The astronomers discovered “personal equation.” Three men are set to
observe the occultation of a satellite by Jupiter, and to record the
precise time by pressing a lever. One presses the lever the hundredth
of a second too soon, the second the hundredth of a second too late, the
third sometimes one and sometimes the other and sometimes is precisely
accurate. The mean of these three gives the exact time. In shooting
one man pulls the trigger a fraction too soon, another a fraction too
late, a third is uncertain. If you have been doing your best to shoot
well, and after some years still fail, endeavour to discover your
“personal equation,” and by correcting that you may succeed much better.
It is a common error and unsuspected, so is blinking--you may shoot for
years and never know that you blink.
Bevis’s personal equation was a second too quick. In this, as in
everything, he dashed at it. His snipes were cut down as if you had
whipped them over: his hares were mangled; his partridges smashed. The
dot was dead on them, and a volley of lead was poured in. The governor
had a difficulty to get him to give “law” enough.
He acquired the mechanical precision so perfectly that he became
careless and shot gracelessly. The governor lectured him and hung his
gun up for a week as a check. By degrees he got into the easy quiet
style of finished shooting.
The two learned the better and the quicker because there were two. The
governor went through the same drill with Mark, motion for motion, word
for word. Then when they were out in the field the one told the other,
they compared their experiences, checked each other’s faults, and
commended success. They learned the better and the quicker because they
had no keeper to find everything for them, and warn them when to expect
a hare, and when a bird. They had to find it for themselves like Pan.
Finally, they learned the better because at first they shot at anything
that took their fancy, a blackbird or a wood-pigeon, and were not
restricted to one class of bird with the same kind of motion every time
it was flushed.
Long before trusted with guns they had gathered from the conversation
they constantly heard around them to aim over a bird that flies straight
away because it usually rises gradually for some distance, and between
the ears of the running hare. If the hare came towards them they shot
at the grass before his paws. A bird flying aslant away needs the sight
to be put in front of it, the allowance increasing as the angle
approaches a right angle; till when a bird crosses, straight across, you
must allow a good piece, especially if he comes with the wind.
Two cautions the governor only gave them, one to be extremely careful in
getting through hedges that the muzzles of their guns pointed away, for
branches are most treacherous, and secondly never to put the forefinger
inside the trigger-guard till in the act of lifting the gun to the
shoulder.
For awhile their territory was limited as the governor, who shot with
Mark’s, did not want the sport spoiled by these beginners. But as
September drew to a close, they could wander almost where they liked,
and in October anywhere, on promise of not shooting pheasants should
they come across any.
Volume Three, Chapter XVII.