TRAPPING IN ALABAMA. 291 



time I arrived. But when I got to Cameron there was no express 

 matter for Woodcock. 



Five days later while I was standing on the depot platform at 

 Cameron waiting for the eleven o'-clock express train, along came 

 a freight train, stopped and put off my camp chest. Now, the 

 express charges on this chest was something over ten dollars on 

 180 pounds. 



The next season I concluded that I would not give the express 

 company another rake-off, so started my camp outfit by freight 

 for Madison, Alabama, four weeks before I started, so as to again 

 be sure that it would be there when I arrived. Mr. Ford met 

 me at the station nine miles from his place with a conveyance to 

 take baggage and camp outfit to his place. And boys, imagine my 

 feelings when I was again told by the station agent that there 

 was nothing there for Woodcock. About a week later, I got the 

 goods. So boys, take the hint and start the outfit well ahead if 

 you wish to get it on time. I have had other similar expediences. 



On our way back to Mr. Ford's place the day he met me at 

 the station, he called my attention to several different places along 

 the road to mink tracks in the ditches and in the road. I thought 

 that it would be no trick at all to take three or four mink each 

 night, but I was not reckoning on the disadvantages I had to con- 

 tend with. 



This section of the country is very thickly settled with colored 

 people, and each family keeps from one to three dogs, which are 

 out searching for food all the time. These people never think of 

 feeding their dogs. Nearly every night these colored people are 

 out hunting in droves of five or six, and with six or eight dogs. 

 They think it no more of a crime to steal a trap, and anything 

 found in the trap, than they would consider it a' crime to eat a 

 baked 'possum. A trapper must keep a good lookout when setting 

 his traps to see that there is no "dark object" anywhere in sight. 

 If there is, you may expect that that particular trap will be missing 

 the next time you come that way. 



In setting a trap, the first thing to do is to select a place where 

 the trap is to be set, then look carefully around to see that no 

 "dark object" is in sight; then go into the bush and get the trap, 



