The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-03-06
HINTS ON TAKING AIM.
The Sense of Touch Much n Fac
tor the Sense of Sight.
From Forest and Stream.

From Forest and Stream.
The matter of aiming a shotgun or
a rifle at a moving object is not ana1o-
gous to the use of the bow and arrow
at ALL other than a few remote general
principles. says the Forest and Sire m.
The matter is peculiarly mystified by
reference to a boy throwing a stone
without taking aim, revolver smooth. z
from the pocket, or gun shooting srom
the hip, or in hitting balls thrown in
the air.
Let us dispose of these matters first
before considering the ma tier of TAX
ing aim. The boy attains skill in throw
ing stone in the same Kramer that
a writer attains skill in using a y n
and ink-by pratice. The hand acquires
a certain subordinate intelligence of
it's own which in the medical or psy-
Geological world is called reflex action.
The same Ia ored ana iwhWard . d,
attempts of the student in penmanship
embarrass the first attempt of the stud
ent in the art of shooting The right hand
of most men, constant praJice, 20 W4lC h
may be added the pre- disposition inn
posed by inheritance, is the master
hand. Let any right handed man at
tempt to throw a stone with his lett
hand, or to write a line, or in fact
attempt anything with II which r.
quires manual dexterity, and the result
will be puerile and ridiculous in nine
cases out of ten. In short, the left
hand, holding and guiding the gun
barrel, is the hand which has nearly
all the responsibilities in assisting the
eye in taking aim. From its utter
inefficiency it cannot respond with any
degree of accuracy in the first at
tempts a shooting, hence the first at
tempts of the shooter are not devoted
so much to the art of shooting as to
the development of manual dexterity
in a weak and awkward limb. The
shooter in nearly all cases is uncon-
scious of the real reason of his poor
success.
Shooting a revolver from the pocket
is generally done at close quarters
and requires only an ordinary sense Of
direction, just as one standing close
to barn door could kick it to a GER
tainty at every trial.
Shooting from the hip is another
misleading comparison, for the reason
that very open gun is always used
in game shooting, and the distances
are in most instances Verv short.
Shooting objects in the air is largely
a repitiuon or the same shot over and
over again to infnity. There is the
same flight, the same speed, etc, so
that in time becomes almost a mus
cular act.
There are so many abstruce prob
lens involved in game or trap shoot
ing that the ordinary shooter doesn't
know what causes his i'll success He
cannot see the load of shot as the
boy can see the stone, or the archer
the arrow, so he is ever cropping in the
dark.
Inc gun does not become a part of
the body, in a shooting sense, as
stated by one of your correspondents
The body swing right and lett, up and
down, and to a certain degree may
act rs If they were a whole, but TIE e
is always large field of accommo-
datlons in when the hands and eye
take part Independent of the movement
of the body. The gun and body may
move in unsion till the muzzle covers
the target or oNIng .o1v tnen. il the
muzzle does not point right there is an
"a tA'tu @.i''UtSf 1t which
the eyes, hands and shoulders take an in
telhgent part. This is illustrated in a
way by the use of the eye. The head
turns on the neck and the eyes turn in
their sockets, thus, while they are a
part of the body, they have powers OF
accommodation independent of it,
Now, in shooting at moving objects
there is no arbitrary rule which governs
| how to shoot right left, up, down and
| straight away. The shooter may take
| some shots in which gun and body
move as a whole, while other shots are
made with a rapid readjustment with
the hands and eye. Neither is shooting
| at a moving object a mechanical act
A shooter may go quickly after a fiy-
| ing bird and discover that his gun is
out of proper alignment. He chances
along the barrel, readjusts it instantly
! arc CO. "eCtfN. - DoiptS Vt = eN At
is all done so quickly and delicatly that
| an ordinary onlooker would not dis.
| cover that anything went wrong at all
| The "'10. nv habit. l. nlaced to the
shoulder cheek and hands in the same
! position o. erv tine n'' k..tNo Snn L
Grand he becomes habituated to certain
! - Ire > ca ron q with il %
any one of these get out of adjustment
and he feels it instantly mus tnf
sense of touch in time becomes quite
as much of a factor as the sense NJ
sightThe shooter knows where the muz.
| zle of the gun is nointing Whioheve,
way 1t may be swinging, both from q
SIC sense y
sight and a consciousness from the
sense of touch. Some men never
objects because they never develon,
the left hand to any degree OF
skillfufulness, because they have
detective eyesight. or because the,
never can work hands. sho de-, eyes an.
body in proper combination and CO
ordination.-Forest and Stream.