Chapter VI

TAKING APART, CLEANING AND PUTTING GUNS TOGETHER.

_To Take the Gun Apart._—With the muzzle-loading guns now in common use this is an operation so simple as to be scarcely worthy a mention. If the gun is an old-fashioned breech-pinned muzzle-loader, the first thing is to push out the small wire pins or bolts which pass through the stock, under the barrel, and through the barrel-loops. The next thing is to draw the breechpin screw; this lets the barrel out of the stock. If it is desirable to unbreech the gun, it is done by clamping the breechpin in a vise, and then turning the barrel by hand until it is screwed off the pin.

The patent-breech muzzle-loader comes apart the same way in every particular, with the exception that there is no breechpin screw to draw; the barrel can be easily lifted from the stock by simply raising the muzzle and unhooking the patent breech, so soon as the pins or bolts before mentioned as holding it down have been removed. The unbreeching is done at the vise much the same as in the other case.

To take apart the ordinary breech-loader, begin by setting the hammer at half-cock. Open the lever, then draw the bolt, starting it with a tap from the handle of the screwdriver. Next detach the fore-piece, and the barrel will come out without further resistance. Instructions to take down and assemble different kinds of breech-loading guns will be found in