CHAPTER XXV. 



A FARMER HUNTER — HIS VIEWS. 



1am a farmer by trade and a raccoon liunter 

 for sport, and nothing but a fox hound for 

 me, and the better his breeding is the bet- 

 ter I like it. I don't care how much noise 

 he makes if he is fast. I like a good tonguer. 

 I only have four hounds at this writing. I have 

 caught 27 'coon and 10 opossum. On the night 

 of Xov^mber 9th, some friends of mine went out 

 'coon hunting with me. They had three 'coon 

 dogs and I had four, seven hounds in all. We 

 went about two miles south of where I live to 

 where Ave sometimes hunt the 'coon. The first 

 thing when we got there the dogs struck a trail 

 and treed on top of a hill with an old coal entry 

 just below it. 



We got up to the tree all right and could 

 hear one of the dogs barking '^treed" about one- 

 half mile south, so I left the boys to attend to 

 that tree and I went to the lone hound. He was 

 barking up a large black oak in the corn field. 

 I soon spied an eye up the tree and shot hiui out 

 and down came Mr. 'Coon. I looked up in the 

 tree again and saw two eyes. The little 20-gauge 



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