THE JAPANESE CRACK SHOT.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4565, 6 November 1875, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE JAPANESE CRACK SHOT.

The London Daily Telegraph says:—"A lion on the ground this year will be the Japanese officer who has been astonishing Hythe and Aldershot by making bull's-eyes from the shoulder at 1000 yards. Some say he is an Englishman who was naturalised at a tender age in Japan ; others again declare that he cannot speak a word of any European language. He is, at all events, a marvel of marksmanship ; and when, at the Ohiawick garden party, a distinguished person said to the Japanese ambassador, 'I hear you have a wonderfully good shot iu this country,' his Excellency replied, with the modest and dignified terseness of a Japanese gentleman, 'He is a good shot;' which answer meant more than a whole string of superlatives." The same journal records the following anecdotes about the said gentleman from a vast number which are going the rounds of the camp as substantially true: —" At Hythe, Major Muretta was pitted against one of the most celebrated musketry instructors in the camp, an officer who can, to use a familiar phrase, ' face the target,' that is, can say where he is going to place his shots, and then do it. The Japanese major saw everything that the English lieutenant was able to perform, and immediately proceeded to cut him out in a manner that amazed all beholders. At Ash, near Aldershot, he was purposely misinformed as to the distance of a range, tho number of yards as given him being 800, whereas in reality it was 1000. Major Muretta said nothing, but calmly sighted his rifle, and firing, hit the bull's-eye. This he did again and again, and when he was told that he had been deceived in the distance, his reply was that he was not deceived at all."