About whether one would deliberately obstruct a barrel and put it to his shoulder to discharge it . . .

I am reminded of when my Dad, who owned a .45 over/under muzzleloader got a ball stuck half way down one of the barrels. He was, at the time clueless as to how to get it out. Finally, after some thought, he decided to attempt to discharge it.

HE DID NOT SHOULDER THE WEAPON.

He took the gun to our back yard range. He propped it so that it would discharge into the backstop and then sand-bagged it in. Using 20 some odd feet of wire, laying on his stomach, he pulled and the gun discharged.
I can't rememberif the ball came out the barrel. What I do remember, is that the partthe nipple attaches to, (it screwed in from the side), was blown clean off the barrel, and to this day, the over/under is a single shot.

Afterwards,he purchased a worm to retreive stuck projectiles, but I don't think he ever needed it.

I just wanted to make the point, that if Toby wanted to blow up hisSavage, it isn't a necessary requirement to shoulder the weapon in order to discharge it.

Happy Hunting, Phil