The Art of Shooting Flying: familiarly explain'd by way of dialogue. Containing directions for the choice of guns for various occasions. An account of divers experiments, discovering the execution of barrels of different lengths and bores. With many useful hints for the improvement of young practitioners, entirely new.

Bookseller Notes

First edition of this East Anglian shooting manual. 'A little tract published by a watch and gun maker in Norwich, who explains his method of shooting flying by means of a dialogue held with a young sportsman who came to purchase a gun' (Schwerdt). The dialogue, between Friendly (the customer) and Aimwell (Page, the gunsmith) unfolds to include advice on specific weapons, gun maintenance, and tables of shot/distance. Perhaps predictably, Aimwell has much to say about the supposed superiority of Spanish weapons; he strongly favours English guns. The highly enterprising Page closes the work with an advertisement for his wares; 'pocket watches [...] clocks of all sorts, for houses, turrets or steeples [...] brass jacks...] to roast meat hanging [...] birding guns [...] all sorts of machines for strengthening the weak or lame, or making extension of broken limbs'. A very successful horologist, whose clocks command high prices even today, Page was the subject of a glowing article in The European Magazine and London Review (1782): 'Mr. Thomas Page [...] was born in the year 1713. At an early period of life he shewed a talent for the polite arts, when his father (to whom he was apprentice) indulged him in every branch of science that could tend to render him the compleat mathematician: he went through a course of experimental philosophy with the late Dr. Desaguliers, and several other eminent persons, and was for many years a pupil to the late Mr. Timothy Buck, under whom he made such proficiency, that about the year 1740, he wrote a treatise on the broad sword, which met with public approbation. He then began business for himself at Norwich, which he carried on singly for many years, but is now in partnership with his son-in-law, Mr Christian, and lives in the Upper-Market-place. It is needless to add, that a generous and discerning public resolved that his abilities should not go unrewarded, and that he is now, justly, at the head of his profession, being employed by most of the noblemen, gentlemen, &c. in the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk.' This was a review of Page's The Use of the Broad Sword (1746), a treatise on fencing in which he had promoted his martial wares.The marginal annotations have been largely cropped, but enough sense is recoverable to demonstrate enthusiastic use. Large passages are underlined, and the work has been closed with a jaunty ms colophon: 'festina lente'.With the terminal blank, which is mentioned (but unconfirmed) by ESTC. The tract was published in London in the following year. Of this Norwich edition, ESTC and WorldCat together record Oxford, BL, Cambridge, UCL, NLS in the UK, and twelve copies in the North America)