Manuals never give all the goodies. There is a whole lot of things to consider when deciding what IS and what ISN'T the gun to use for a particular game animal, dangerous or not.
A hard cast 500 plus grain bullet will penetrate end to end in an american Bison, a Brahma bull or Angus, asian or african buffalo at 1500 fs, and have many times over. I have loads I test on big rounds of Lodgepole pine, 3 ft in diameter and some of them go through the first log and into a second one.
I wouldn't go out dangrous game hunting with a levergun by ANY stretch of the imagination, I've had several over the last 50 odd years and the have ALL jammed at one time or another. Roll one over on it's right side while racking a round and it's liable to fall out on the ground. Or short stroke it and have a REAL mess on you hands I think it's totally stupid to even think a levergun is a DGR, but everyone makes choices...some good ones, some bad ones.
It's up to ME to decide WHAT rifle I will use for WHAT game I go after and it's MY responsibility for my own bacon...and so it is with others. Make the wrong choice at the wrong time and YOU pay the consequences...the rest of the "stuff" is just that...STUFF. It has less to do with the cartridge and more to do with the rifle and it's mechanical limitations or the nut holding it.
Hey, it's YOUR skin and YOUR toy and you gotta be real about it. Kinda like bringing a knife to a gunfight...unless you are VERY good with a blade and very close, guess who wins...samo-samo with a levergun.
For all you hairy legged he-sheep, if you want a lesson in why the Marlin has pressure limitations, just take one apart, take off the barrel and look at the threads and look at all the pieces and parts, the bolt, the way it locks up, how the lever works etc...real hard. It works well at the design pressures for it's designed game...but for the stuff with teeth or very big feet and a trunk I want a bolt gun and all the stomp I can get...and something that will work when I'm upside down and backassward.
Luck
