A low trajectory is very desirable in shooting at long range. To secure this, many fine archers ruin their scores by using a bow too strong for their muscles. The best way to secure a low flight is to perfect yourself in loosing, and to use a bow well suited to your strength. Mr. H. A. Ford, the celebrated English archer, whose score at the Double York Round of 1251 has never been equaled, is said to have ruined the tendons of his drawing fingers by the use of a 57 pound bow, though he was a very tall and exceedingly powerful man. A 4.6. arrow with a 48 pound bow, and a 4.9. arrow with a 50 to 54 pound bow, will be found about right.
Nothing affects the trajectory more than to hold the bow full drawn too long before loosing.
A 60 pound bow held two seconds at a full draw, will not cast as low an arrow with the same elevation as a 49 pound bow loosed instantly and smoothly. It might seem that in order to give an arrow the rotary motion of a rifle-ball it would be necessary to put the feathers on spirally. We have seen this done, but it is a mistake. An arrow was shot into a target distant 100 yards, and chanced to touch a long iron spike which projected from the rude target easel we were using. This spike had a very sharp corner which cut a groove in the stele of the arrow as it passed, which groove, upon examination, was found to run spirally around the shaft three times in six inches, or once in two inches.