But when we began beating him at targets, he took all his shafts home
and scraped the paint off them, putting back rings of blue and yellow,
doubtless to change his luck. In spite of our apparent superiority at
some forms of shooting, he never changed his methods to meet
competition. We, of course, did not want him to.
Small objects the size of a quail the Indian could hit with regularity
up to twenty yards. And I have seen him kill ground squirrels at forty
yards; yet at the same distances he might miss a four-foot target. He
explained this by saying that the target was too large and the bright
colored rings diverted the attention. He was right.
and scraped the paint off them, putting back rings of blue and yellow,
doubtless to change his luck. In spite of our apparent superiority at
some forms of shooting, he never changed his methods to meet
competition. We, of course, did not want him to.
Small objects the size of a quail the Indian could hit with regularity
up to twenty yards. And I have seen him kill ground squirrels at forty
yards; yet at the same distances he might miss a four-foot target. He
explained this by saying that the target was too large and the bright
colored rings diverted the attention. He was right.
