Browning Arms Company

There's a well-known photograph by an unknown photographer of the imposing marble staircase of the Car Rezonico in Venice.

This is the Palazzo in which the Victorian poet Robert Browning died in 1889.

It's thought that the sombre, bowler-hatted figure climbing the staircase is Browning himself, darkly ascending to the light-filled window.

If so, this is one of the few photographs we have of Browning.

It was taken in the year of his death.

Stairways of all kinds lead us upwards and downwards, in and out of the light, between one space and another.

In this ascending and descending, we recognise an obvious yet powerful metaphor for the passage of life.

and in the gentle closing of one person's eyes by another, we also acknowledge the closing of a light-filled window onto the world, and into an unfathomable mind.

The grackle, the blackbird with orange under wings with whom we had already made friends by the brook, chereth, whose bell-like notes sounded from tree to tree, the dainty sunbird, cineres ossoi, whose metallic sheen flashed in and out of the tamarisk trees, the delicate-hued Moabite sparrow, the aristocrat of his family, who ran up reeds and tree trunks like the familiar tits at home.

We were too early to see the flights of birds of passage on their way south to warmer climes, and which before and after the winter months pause in the thickets of the Jordan basin and fill the air with music, which includes the notes of the cuckoo and the nightingale, and recalls, however irreverently, Browning's Ode to Be in England Now That April's Here.

We had hoped to see the busy jerboa, a jumping mouse with long hind legs like a microscopic kangaroo, but circumstances were for the present against us, chiefly the noise of our cavalcade.

He is a friendly little beast and easily tamed, and though familiar with him in confinement, we should have liked to see him under happier condition.

Madaba.

Who fished the Murex up? What porridge had John Keats? R.

Browning.

After fourteen hours in the saddle we were thankful to dismount at the friendly door of the presbytery at Madaba, where by kind permission of the Latin patriarch in Jerusalem we were admitted to enjoy the hospitality of the parish priest, a Piedmontese and his assistant, an Arab, both speaking excellent French as well as Italian, the official language of the patriarchal clergy.

There is Citadel now makes a .308 semi-automatic rifle.

It kind of looks like a Browning bar.

And that like a Browning bar, they start at dealer cost.

I'll put the dealer, the dealer costs a thousand dollars a gun, you know, at least.

Right.

And of course, we don't allow.

We don't talk about that.

If you don't, if you don't see something that you like on there, there's certain brands like Ruger and Browning.

The grackle, the blackbird with orange under wings with whom we had already made friends by the brook, Cherith, whose bell-like notes sounded from tree to tree, the dainty sunbird, Cineressosoe, whose metallic sheen flashed in and out of the tamarisk trees, the delicate-hued Moabite sparrow, the aristocrat of his family, who ran up reeds and tree trunks like the familiar tits at home.

We were too early to see the flights of birds of passage on their way south to warmer climes, and which before and after the winter months pause in the thickets of the Jordan Basin and fill the air with music, which includes the notes of the cuckoo and the nightingale, and recalls, however irreverently, Browning's ode to be in England now that April's here.

We had hoped to see the busy jerboa, a jumping mouse with long hind legs like a microscopic kangaroo, but circumstances were for the present against us, chiefly the noise of our cavalcade.

He is a friendly little beast and easily tamed, and though familiar with him in confinement, we should have liked to see him under happier condition.

Madaba.

Who fished the murex up? What porridge had John Keats? R.

Browning.

After fourteen hours in the saddle, we were thankful to dismount at the friendly door of the presbytery at Madaba, where, by kind permission of the Latin Patriarch in Jerusalem, we were admitted to enjoy the hospitality of the parish priest, a Piedmontese, and his assistant, an Arab, both speaking excellent French, as well as Italian, the official language of the patriarchal clergy.

Okay.

Yeah, they, a very similar thing happened to my, my dad's Browning Citori.

From the factory, they put on a s- uh, spray polyurethane, um, coating, which was a shame because, like Bart said, the, the wood was beautiful.

Really high quality walnut.

Do your research.

Go through what kind of stain.

You know, pre-'64 Model 70 stain or Winchester stain looks different than Brownings made in the late '60s that have blonde wood.

You don't want a, you don't want [laughs] a blonde stock on the Winchester and you don't want pre-'64 stain on the Browning.

I didn't get to you on the phone to ask you about that pistol of Bob Battle's that you'd tagged as the murder weapon until just after sunrise.

What I learned from you was that the rifle that had posed with the dummy warrior was an old-fashioned Belgian-made Browning with a smooth bore, which could use revolver ammunition.

But the fatal slug did match the test slug from Bob's revolver.

What I told you was that ballistics can lie.

Here's the short section about marksmanship and something I've seen that I'll call the gun version of a dick showing contest.

One of the best wing shooters I know operates with an old Browning with a missing front bead, a cracked stock, and a bulge in the barrel.

I saw him embarrass a guy from a gun club swinging a custom-fitted competition gun, largely because he just plain had better shooting mechanics and had spent a lifetime shooting only one gun.

The shotgun you're carrying matters less than fit, familiarity, and handling.