More comments:

1) Good catch by user kuduae regarding the tang safety; I assumed it was a folding tang peep sight, which was a factory option. This is the first tang safety I've seen on a pre-WW2 M-S rifle.

2) Like CptCurl, I am also impressed by the repair work on the "Duffle Cut" on the forend. Presumably the checkering was re-cut after the repair to match the rest of the pattern. I looked at the rifle long and hard before concluding that it was not a factory cut, primarily because of the location and the black spacer, and also because there would be no good reason to have a two-piece stock on a non-takedown rifle.

Cheers,
Peconga in Boise, Idaho USA