We possessed every known engine, from the harpoon thrown by the hand to the barbed arrows of the blunderbussand the explosive balls of the duck-gun. One of the conductors of this novice held a rusty blunderbuss pointed towards his ear, and the other a very ancient sabre, with which he carved imaginary offenders as he came along in a sanguinary and anatomical manner. I stood by for an instant, glorying in the thought that he could not hear me the next, I saw what it was he was reaching up for - a bell-mouthed blunderbuss - and I knew the little devil for the impostor that he was. References in classic literature? I was in full career, when I heard the cough right overhead, and jumping back and looking up, beheld a man's head in a tall nightcap, and the bell mouth of a blunderbussat one of the first-storey windows.
A short musket of wide bore and flaring muzzle, formerly used to scatter shot at close range.