Yes agreed that the extended range is poppy cock and really is glossy marketing bullshit at best, but auction house are paid to move merchandise, so one must take things in stride.

The bottom line is that the rifle is an absolutely beautiful work of art. Had it been me doing the original commissioning of this fine work, I might have not selected a high intensity and rimless cartridge in a double but to each their own.... When one thinks about it, given the holder of such a marvellous piece is likely the client vs the PH, why not? One must realize and appreciate that does put greater dependency onto the PH should those teeny tiny ejector pawls fail in the event that more than two shots are called for and that would worry me.

I am NOT anything more than a novice DG hunter with extremely limited experience that can literally be counted on a single finger, but I do know that my 1st .500 NE shot hit high on the left butt cheek and exited mid height out the base of the neck diagonally on the right side and that buffalo didn't so much as twitch an ear in reaction to the hit. On the following 4th morning, we caught up to the buff face to face at 30 - 35 yards and I put in a total of 3 shots head on in the brisket, blasted a neat little hole just above the left eyeball, and drove two more textbook perfect shots broadside 1/3 up the right front leg before the buff decided to go down. I would probably still be shooting had the trackers not yelled at me "stop stop, he's down, he's down". I backed up my own shots and I believe that this is the way things are meant to be. One can't do that if the double won't break open because it doesn't like high intensity aka high pressure rounds or if one can't eject spent casings properly.

p.s. When my get my mount back from the taxidermist, I'll get him an eye patch ( the buff) and proudly post his picture on the forum.