Mr. Maurice Thompson has excited all the grown-up boys who loved in their
younger days to draw the bow, by his graceful articles on archery for
young men and women.
[Illustration: Fig. A.]
I want to tell the boys who are wide awake how they may, without too much
labor and with but little expense, make their own bows and arrows and
targets, having _their_ fun, like their elders, in this health-giving and
graceful recreation.
In the first place, after you have made your implements for the sport,
you must never shoot at or towards anyone; nor must you ever shoot
directly upwards. In the one case you may maim some one for life, and in
the other you may put out your own eye as an acquaintance of the writer's
once did in Virginia.
To make a bow take a piece of any tough, elastic wood, as cedar, ash,
sassafras or hickory, well-seasoned, about your own length. Trim it so as
to taper gradually from the centre to the ends, keeping it flat, at
first, until you have it as in this sketch--for a boy, say, five feet in
height: (Fig. A)
This represents a bow five feet long, one and a quarter inches broad in
the middle, three-fourths of an inch thick at the centre, and a half-inch
scant at the ends in breadth and thickness.
Bend the bow across your knee, pulling back both ends, one in each hand,
the centre against your knee, and see whether it is easily bent, and
whether it springs readily back to its original position. If so your bow
is about the right size. Cut near each end the notch for the string as in
this figure: (Fig. B.)
[Illustration: Fig. B.]
Bevel the side of the bow which is to be held towards you, so that a
section of your bow will look like this figure: (Fig. C.)
[Illustration: Fig. C.]
The back or flat part is held from you in shooting, and the bevelled or
rounded part towards you. Scrape the bow with glass and smooth it with
sand-paper.
To shape your bow lay it on a stout, flat piece of timber, and drive five
ten-penny nails in the timber, one at the centre of your bow, and the
others as in figure below, so as to bend the ends for about six inches in
a direction contrary to the direction in which you draw the bow: (Fig.
D.)
[Illustration: Fig. D. (A and B are six inches from the ends.
The bow is bent slightly at C.)]
Your bow is now finished as far as the wood-work is concerned, and you
may proceed to wrap it from end to end with silk or colored twine,
increasing its elasticity and improving the appearance. The ends of the
wrap must be concealed as in wrapping a fish-hook. Glue with Spaulding's
glue a piece of velvet or even red flannel around the middle to mark your
handhold. The ends may in like manner be ornamented by glueing colored
pieces upon them.
A hempen string, whipped in the middle with colored silk, to mark the
place for your arrow nock to be put, in shooting, will make a very good
string.
For arrows any light, tough wood, which splits straight, will do. I use
white pine, which may be gotten from an ordinary store-box, and for
hunting-arrows seasoned hickory. These must be trimmed straight and true,
until they are in thickness about the size of ordinary cedar pencils,
from twenty-five to twenty-eight inches in length. They must be feathered
and weighted either with lead or copper, or by fastening on sharp
awl-points or steel arrow-points with wire.
I used to make six different kinds; a simple copper-wrap, a blunt leaden
head, a sharp leaden head like a minie bullet, an awl-point wrapped with
copper wire and soldered, and a broad-head hunting-arrow.
To make a copper wrap, wrap with copper wire the last half-inch of the
arrow until you get near the end, then lay a needle as large as your wire
obliquely along the arrow as in this figure: (Fig. E.) Continue the
wrapping until you have weighted the arrow sufficiently; draw out the
needle and thrust the end
[Illustration: Fig. E.]
of your wire through the little passage kept by the needle, and draw it
tight thus: (Fig. F.)
[Illustration: Fig. F (Before wrap was drawn through.)]
[Illustration: Fig. G. (After wire was drawn through.)]
A blunt leaden head is made by pouring three or four melted buck-shot
into a cylinder of paper, wrapped around the end of the arrow, slightly
larger at the open end, and tied on by a piece of thread. The wood of the
arrow must be cut thus: (Fig. H.)
[Illustration: Fig. H.]