Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 December 1874 — Good Shot. [ARTICLE]

Good Shot.

Last week Mr. David Swing, of Cascade, concluded that lie would demolish a few hundred ducks and geese who had contracted the habit of squatting in his cornfield. He had no gun, so he stepped over to Mr. Smith’s, his neighbor just opposite, and borrowed one. Mr. Swing was a believer in the time-honored maxim, “ put in plenty of powder and drive the pellets hard if you would kill,” and so he took that gun and proceeded to load it. He first measured out a handful of powder and poured it in each barrel, then added another handful for good measure. Some of the powder spilled out and he inverted his flask and held it over the muzzle for a minute or two. Then he rammed down a newspaper into each barrel and followed up those with an awful charge of shot. Two more newspapers went down the cavity and then the charge was complete. Thus prepared Mr. Swing started out, but the ducks and geese had evidently received a premonition of what was in store for them; none were to be found, and very sadly and very much disgusted Mr. Swing returned the gun to its owner. In half an hour after the latter saw a tremendous flock of ducks pitch down in a pond hardly fifty yards distant from the fence back of his barn. He crawled up very cautiously to the fence, rested his gun upon the lower rail, took dead aim andpullcd the trigger. What followed immediately after Mr. Smith does not distinctly remember He has a dim recollection that he crawled up to shoot some ducks; that he was in the act of pulling something when an explosion took place that shook the country for miles, and rattled the bells in the church steeples. When Mr. Smith came to he found himself in the front room, surrounded by an anxious circle of friends while the doctor was feeling his pulse. The fence was blown away entirely, likewise one side of Mr. Smith’s face, while the gun has not been found. One hundred and five ducks were killed outright, and shot enough was deposited in the adjoining fields to start a lead mine. Smith’s ears are still ringing with the report, hut he swears that Swing’s ears will ring still louder as soon as he is able to use his crutches. Swing believes that there is trouble brewing and is ready to sell out his farm and join the grasshopper sufferers of Nebraska. —Dubuque Herald.