.. Genesis of a pair of Joseph Lang (built 1973) and associated lessons learned ..
A friend of mine who had a pair of Lang joined me on a duck shoot
in western Hungary in the late 1980's. He had the left peg to me
which turned out to be a very hot and difficult peg.
The ducks came down in a S-curve before splashing into the water.
He banged and banged and all of a sudden his banging ceased.
After the drive I asked him why he stopped shooting despite the
ducks still coming in. He told me that his Lang gun went out
of order. The hook holding the forepart was loose.
He was using a handguard - a piece of leather covered
steel-sheet - plus gloves. He did not realize that the
barrels became so hot that the soldering melted.
Lesson learned: No handguard and at best thin gloves -
from carpincho or roe-deer - to know when its too hot to continue
and/or change to another gun.
He had the loose hook fixed and moved upwards to the next London tier, buying a pair of Boss single trigger at Boss/London.
An Austrian cabinetmaker bought the pair for 20 KE.
The new owner, a fast and proficient shot, properly clad
in a hunting suit by an English tailor, but a man with
sometimes hair-trigger temper.
A harmless dispute of him with an artisan for a peanut-amount
escalated and he used a word/sentence not very well thought-out.
A non-involved retired policeman considered his sermo a
threat and filed a denunciation.
Police visited him and confiscated all his guns and rifles.
He ordered a lawyer to appeal and went up the levels up to
the European court. All in vain.
An expert from the police valued the confiscated stuff and
he got a refund of 15 KE for the Lang pair, his gun license
gone.
(So no WW II alike German/Russian/American confiscation).
Lesson learned: If you are a gunowner in a country
without a 2nd Amendment, your voice should be calm,
the language you choose kind and gentle, like the one
from a retired Alt-Philologe.
That has been 5 years ago and I have been wondering what has
happened to the Lang pair, as this is not a daily commodity
here.
The pair appeared now in a local auction, normally dealing
in the bottom tier of the market.
Start price 3,4 KE, hammer price 4 KE, with the vendors commission 3,2 KE for the vendor, i.e. police HQ.
So what started with 20, then down to 15 and now down to 3,2.
One may ask what happened to the significant deltas of this
downwards spiral..
Simple answer .. "Gone with the wind", like asset-based-securities of Lehmann-brothers or the Madoff-papers or
more recentyl here the Viennese Wienwert-papers.
Thus a pair London-Best reduced to a metallic brick-and-mortar,
sic transit gloria mundi...
The admin ordered him a 5-year calm-down period, after which he
could now once more apply for a gun/hunting license.
When asking him if he will do it, his answer has been NO, the
area he lives and hunted, once a haven for small game - even
hosting before WW II British crown prince Edward (later shortterm
king) - is void of game.
....
Felix Neuberger
(I did NOT buy the Lang pair)

Last edited by felix; 03/12/18 02:15 PM.