The lVestley Richards Firm, 1812-1913. By Leslie B. Taylor. (Shakespeare
Head Press, Stratford-upon-Avon. 3s. 6d. net.) —Centenaries demand a chronicle, and certainly the well- known firm of Westley Richards have taken their share in the making of history, so far as guns and rifles are concerned. A hundred years ago gunmakers made shot guns rather than rifles ; since then deerstalking and big-game shooting have led to immense energies being expended on the manufacture of sporting rifles, and the firm of Westley Richards has made a great name with its inventions and developments of arms of different patterns and calibres. The top-lever action, the falling block rifle, which was the precursor of the Martini, and the solid-drawn cartridge, which is still used all over the world, are some of the better-known of the Westley Richards achievements in rifle manufacture, and, indeed, the reader of Mr. Taylor's memoir of the earlier managers of the firm, and the chapters devoted to the work of their successm would get a very fair idea of the history not only of rifle shooting, but of other sporting gunnery. He might he surprised to discover that there are thirty to forty different patterns of double-barrelled shot guns needed for the supply demanded from a good gunmaker in a twelvemonth, and that the list of double rifles numbers nearly eighty.
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