“An old shot will shine on range and allowance. His eye will measure distance as though with a tape-line. He will estimate velocity as with a registering instrument. He makes his cheek an index of the wind, and before his gun is at his shoulder he has decided with unfailing skill where the aim must be, and there he plants the load. If the bird does not fall it is the gun’s fault, not his. “By the binocular vision these difficulties, which are so trying to the novice, are the more readily overcome. The eyes take in the flight of the bird, and convey the rate of speed at which it flies. The full distance of the whole perspective of the landscape is made palpable to the sense, and the finger responds to the call, which is made all the more quickly and all the more truly because of the certainty which the eyes impart.” CHAPTER XXXVIII. ON USING THE PISTOL. _Natural Talent._—The number of persons who are really good shots with the pistol is smaller than one would be apt to suppose after considering how many weapons of this kind are in every-day use. They are almost as common as pocket-knives, and some of them are capable of shooting reasonably well at considerable length of range, and yet not an average of one man in five hundred, who owns a pistol, could be found, perhaps, who could put fifty per cent. of his bullets through a hat set up for a target ten paces away. The fact is, the pistol, while capable enough, if well made, is the most difficult of all our fire-arms to manage, so far as relates to good performances. There are men who can take a good revolver and shoot a chicken’s head off every time, ten or fifteen paces, but of such men there are not very many. And none of them have ever communicated how they happened to become such fine shots with the pistol. In some cases they had practiced a good deal, but not more than had hundreds who were but comparatively poor performers. To come squarely down to the point at once, the peculiarity which made them good shots with the pistol was a “born-gift,” as in the case of the best shots with the shot gun. Any man who practices with the pistol, in accordance with the established rules governing its use for best results, may soon become a fair shot, but it calls for more than mere practice to make him an excellent shot.