The No. 2 engraving pattern originally had no game scenes; only flourishes of scroll of each lock plate. The No. 2 then evolved to a single bird inside a circle border; while an oval border was used on a No. 3 gun to accommodate two birds. But before production of the No. 2 and No. 3 models ended, these circle and oval borders were eliminated entirely and the single bird on the No. 2 was now surrounded by flourishes of scroll as were the two birds on the No. 3. But there are many grading anomalies in pre-1913 Smith gun production and it is not unusual to see an engraved gun with a recorded grade lower than what is indicated by the features on the gun itself. I've seen several and most recently, a gun clearly engraved to at least A-2 quality, but recorded as an A-1 grade. We'll never know the reasons why this is so, but the resulting speculation makes for lots of interesting discussion.
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