CHAPTER LI
GALLERY AUTOMATIC PISTOLS
Rifles and pistols though greatly improved in some respects are now progressing too much in one direction.
The inventor"s sole idea seems to be to get the most powerful cartridge possible.
They have now reduced the rifle to a small bore with an extremely heavy charge and therefore the rifle has to be made very heavy to be safe from bursting.
This may be very necessary for war but it is a great disadvantage for the many other purposes a rifle is used for.
The new rifle is unsuitable for dangerous game shooting. People think that as such game is shot at very long ranges and that the further off the game is shot the better the sportsman.
I am constantly asked, "When deer stalking, how far off do you shoot a stag?"
They expect the answer to be, "A thousand yards or so."
When I say, "as close as I can possibly get, generally from about fifty to seventy yards, I never shoot at deer beyond two hundred yards" they form a very low opinion of my skill.
With bears and wild boar seventy yards is a long shot, from ten to forty is the usual distance.
Often these animals are in rapid motion. I stand up to shoot, there is no lying down on the face and aiming for ten minutes.
Modern "improved" rifles are quite unsuited for this.
The long distance they carry is a great drawback and makes them very dangerous to use in a populous country and for the beaters.
Their small calibre does not knock down an animal instantly like a big bullet does. They have too much penetration and are apt to hit two or more animals with the same bullet.
A charging animal a few yards off may do a lot of damage after being hit by a small bore rifle. There have not been fewer, but more, fatal accidents from wounded lions and buffalo in Africa since these small bore, high power, rifles have come into use.
The heavy weight of a double high power rifle is of a prohibitive weight for snap-shooting.
The recoil also is so great that aim cannot be instantaneously taken for the second shot.
In the black powder days sportsmen"s requirements were not subordinated to military requirements.
Express rifles were used by deer stalkers in Scotland and the typical U.
S. rifle for grizzly bears was the .44 Winchester repeater which shot a small charge of powder.
For big game shooting accuracy is not needed beyond two hundred yards but a big bullet giving a knock down blow and a rifle capable of firing several shots in succession with great rapidity. Rifle to be light and handy as a shotgun.
Needing a smokeless rifle answering to the above requirements, I first tried gallery ammunition in a .303 rifle, double rifle.
I found the weight of the rifle was too great and the calibre too small.
I then tried a .400 double rifle, lightened very much and shooting a small charge of smokeless powder, I got the weight down to that of a double 12-bore pigeon gun.
Then I discovered there was danger of getting a full charge cartridge into the rifle by mistake and bursting it. The difficulty was solved by having a special chamber and a straight cartridge of large calibre, and small powder charge of cordite. No high power cartridge can be got into the chamber of this rifle, as they are all bottlenecked so there is no danger of shooting the wrong ammunition. This double rifle is light and handy, very accurate up to one hundred yards and all it hits it knocks down like Thor"s hammer.
Unfortunately, the automatic pistol also has been "improved" on modern rifle lines.
The utmost possible power has been put into the cartridge and the pistol has to be heavy and clumsy to stand this and it has a big recoil and a terribly loud report.
As it is, at the first shot, all within hearing scuttle underground like rabbits, under the impression that an air raid is on.
A full charge automatic pistol is such a nuisance in a pistol gallery, owing to its deafening noise, that n.o.body cares to use one there, and if he did, he would very soon be asked by the other shooters to desist.
Inventors vie with each other as to who can produce an automatic pistol having the most powerful cartridge, just as rifle inventors do.
What is wanted is not a more powerful automatic pistol, the present ones are far too powerful, but a weak power, large bore one with an extremely light charge corresponding to the duelling pistol, that is to say, one shooting a round bullet of .44 calibre with a very small charge of smokeless powder.
Such a pistol would be an ideal weapon for shooting galleries and would popularize pistol practice, _then_ pistol shooting would be a pleasure instead of a penance, when shooting has to be done indoors.
The automatic pistol inventors should experiment as follows:
The external lines should follow the Gastinne-Renette duelling pistol as nearly as possible.
The calibre and cartridge the same as it is (_i. e._, .44), the bullet being of lead, and spherical.
The magazine of a size to _take only this cartridge_, as otherwise, if a heavy charge cartridge were introduced by mistake and fired, it would smash and perhaps burst the pistol. An automatic pistol made for the light charge would have too weak a recoil spring to withstand a heavy charge.
The duelling pistol cartridge has the bullet seated far down it, and there is a lot of spare useless length in the cartridge.
In the automatic pistol I am advising to be made (the Winans model), the cartridge should be, though of .44 calibre, very short, the round bullet crimped in the end of it, like the .22 bulleted cap cartridges.
The cartridge being so short and the magazine made to fit, the usual high power cartridges would be too long to go into it by mistake.
The sights should be those of the duelling pistol.
I think such an automatic pistol would be much superior to any existing automatic pistol except for military purposes.
As there would be no danger of putting in a higher power cartridge the pistol could be lightened and balance better, all the weight possible being taken off the barrel and fore end, the barrel fluted, etc., so that the balance would be even better than in a duelling pistol, owing to its shorter barrel.
It may be found that the barrel could be lengthened, so as to be longer between the sights, without spoiling the balance.
As the gallery charge is so light, the recoil would be all expended in operating the mechanism--there would be no recoil left against the hand.
Most of the difficulties in designing automatic firearms are having to withstand the enormous pressure of modern cartridges. If you go back to a light pressure in the cartridge, all these difficulties vanish and all parts can be made light.
Such a pistol ought easily to beat all existing rapid-fire revolver records, as good scores as those under duelling conditions should be made, in fact I think better scores, as there is no necessity to raise the hand after the first shot.
With a Winchester .22 automatic rifle I can put the ten shots in three seconds into a two-inch bull at twenty yards, the only time spent is in getting the aim for the first shot, the other shots can be put in as fast as the trigger can be pressed, as there is no recoil, and therefore no time spent in getting a fresh aim for each shot. The .22 Colt long barrel automatic pistol (see Plate 4) fulfills most of these conditions, but a .44 gallery charge automatic pistol would be better.