782 
FOREST AND STREAM 
That “Ver-mont” Hund 
Yawcob Purchases a Coon-Trailer, Failing to Come up to Verbal Specifications in a Pinch 
“For the love of Mike, what have you got 
there ?” 
The big, good-natured Teuton came lumbering 
up the street leading a very ashamed and de¬ 
jected looking sad eyed canine attached to a 
shiny and glittering chain. Likewise there was 
appended one of those brass-studded collars the 
magazine artists put on all dogs, irrespective of 
breed, usefulness or size. Eke, shone also, the 
glittering license-tag duly required by a city 
needing “oil” for lubricating the machine poli¬ 
tical. 
Said Yawcob: “She vas ein hount—hund. He 
vill ketch scoons, rabbits, und oder Vermonts. 
I just buyed him off a feller. She say it was a 
vunder!” 
“Pedigreed, I s’pose?” asked my chum. 
“Oh, I don’dt know,” was the reply, as the 
shivering and apologetic canine was yanked up 
for closer inspection with a compelling force 
that lifted him about a foot off terra firma. 
“Der feller say she vos over mit disdember, 
r-r-r-ing vurm, und vleas; aber it say noddings 
aboudt petty-grease!” 
'“A pedigree, my Teutonic friend,” followed up 
my chum, assuming the forensic attitude of a 
bombastic professor at a Chautauqua, “is a family 
tree applied to the canine species. For instance, 
his dam—” 
“Oh, ja, I see,” said the owner. “A feller the 
street down he say: ‘Vere you git that dam dog?’ 
vot iss a dree inspector?” 
“No,” persisted the expounder. “You do not 
get me clearly. A pedigree is the parental, grand- 
parental, great-grand-parental, and great-great- 
grand-parental symposical and historical, regis¬ 
tered, family brochure of the canines of the dog- 
species.” 
Yawcob scratched his head and looked du¬ 
bious. 
Continued Charlie, striking an attitude like 
Ajax defying the lightning, “And if that chump 
who sold you that poor excuse for the naturally 
articulated skeleton of a four-flush— I mean 
four-legged candidate for a sausage factory, didn’t 
furnish the purchaser of said subject for ani¬ 
mated debate, with a fully engrossed copy of the 
beast’s family tree and washing, I’ll give you 
one— ‘sired by fate, and d - d by every onel’ 
Can you remember that in case you want to sell 
him to some high class sportsman?” 
“Oh, ya, I guess me yesss,” came the hesitat¬ 
ing reply: so it was that Yawcob “hung one on 
us,” and finally persuaded us to take him (also 
Freetz and the dog) out coon hunting. 
“We might just as well take that trio out in 
broad daylight,” grumbled Charlie, but when I 
mentioned a certain Senegambian, Jasper by 
name, who owned a real coon-dog, and also knew 
the rough country after dark, as only an owl, or 
a—well, a chicken roost hunter like Jasper could 
know it—chum decided to submit and let nature 
take her course, sagely remarking, “If we could 
By Will C. Parsons. 
only lose that bunch the first ten minutes out, 
we might get one run anyhow!” 
It took diplomacy to pry those two Dutchmen 
loose from the armament they seemed bound to 
carry on that expedition. But from selfish and 
self-preservatory reasons Charlie and I renigged 
unless that pile of powder-spitting junk was left 
behind. We moved to amend the motion by 
arming the pair with a couple of lanterns, on the 
theory that where there was light, there was 
hope—that they did not break their necks! 
Chum and I carried flash-lights, and a mighty 
good thing they are too! Half a dozen roman 
candles were also taken but we did not tell the 
others about them! 
Jasper possessed a single barreled muzzle 
loader, about seven feet from port cochere to 
gable, and if by chance there was any shooting 
to be done that night, Jas was elected. He was 
also to tote a short handled camp ax—not that 
we intended to cut down any of the grand old 
trees; but an ax of that kind sometimes comes 
in handy when B’rer Coon sits tight on a limb 
that is too large to readily “wiggle-” 
At 6 o’clock p. m. of a dark and drizzly day, 
the four of us, with the newly acquired pup 
assembled at the trolley station. Jasper was to 
be picked up at Stop One. 
“Come here, Misery!” commanded Charlie, as 
the dog, in trying to dodge a truck load of 
trunks, knocked an old, and bundled lady-shopper 
off her pins. 
“Vy, ‘Miseree’?” asked Freetz, who was puffing 
a long pipe until he had the shed blue with smoke. 
“Why!” answered my chum, “‘Misery loves 
company’ and-—that pup sure does!” 
And so “Miseree” was his name. 
We picked up Jasper, his dog, gun, and the 
combined personal flavor of all three at the re¬ 
quired stop and trolleyed swiftly northward, 
where the hills, the ravines and the cornfields 
called us. 
When the conductor asked Yawcob for 
“Miseree’s” fare, the Dutchman nearly threw a 
fit. 
“Vy, pay fare for dot hund? Same as she vas 
mein brudder?” 
“Sure!” snapped the man of the punch and 
rake-off, as he snipped a ticket tha f read, “one 
dog: first class, with owner.” 
“Excuse me,” he continued as the car took a 
curve and he “balanced all” to keep from going 
out through the front door and knocking the 
slats out of his motorman, “I didn’t at first re¬ 
mark the family resemblance. If this smoker 
gets any more crowded you’ll have to take Tow- 
zer on your lap.” 
“Her name ist ‘Miseree,’ ” corrected Freetz, 
who at all times could be relied upon to horn in 
where angels fear to blow. 
“Well, he, she or it, looks the part,” snapped 
Brass Buttons, as he reeled down the aisle to 
where the through passengers sat in solemn and 
uncommunicative rows. 
We piled out ( Piled out is good) at the end 
of a long trestle. The night was as black as 
a stab in the dark, while a steady, steamy drizzle 
beaded our clothing, and collected on Yawcob’s 
countenance, until his face looked like an in¬ 
verted Christmas tree, with all the candles burn¬ 
ing. 
Of course, Jasper’s dog jumped on to “Mise¬ 
ree” just as soon as the twain had hit the grit. 
“Miseree” attended a masterly retreat to save 
his rear, and wound his shiny chain ’round his 
master’s legs. We were on a hill; the ground 
was slippery and the two dogs and the swear¬ 
ing Teuton went down the bank in one hetero¬ 
geneous collection of feet, fangs and fury. 
“Miseree” was. willing to quit, and couldn’t: 
Yawcob wanted ’em both to quit, while Jasper’s 
hound just reveled in a pot-pourri of miscella¬ 
neous nips—now leg (human) and again leg 
(canine). That dog was just like a chap at a 
blue-gill hole: he was sure getting bites! 
When we finally separated the mess into its 
original elements one coon-hunter looked as if 
he had taken a bath in a sand blast, with mud 
substituted for the cleaning agent. 
Jasper and his victorious dog disappeared in 
the gloom while we were trying Hague treaty 
and total disarmament methods on the wrathy 
German: and then from far down the black 
ravine, where it debouched into a field of shocked 
corn, rail-fenced and tree fringed, came the long- 
drawn and melodious bugle of the hound on 
trail. 
“Wo-o-o-o, ahwo, ah woo, ah wo-o-o-o-o.” 
Lighting the two oil lanterns, the cavalcade 
started on a break-neck rush toward the sound, 
now swelling, now dying, almost to the whisper 
of an echo. 
“Miseree” had been unchained, and had plucked 
up courage enough to prowl at least ten feet 
from the ghostly gleam of the lanterns. 
Came soon, a most unearthly series of staccato 
canine yelps; came also a wild dash through the 
brush with an attending sound like a saleslady 
ripping off a yard of calico for a customer who 
is in a big hurry. 
Passed two dark shapes, one leading the other 
by two jumps. Came a rattle of claws against 
bark, and a redoubling of “Miseree’s” strident 
battle-cry! 
At the foot of a big beech stood the dog, 
reaching up as far into the gloom as his anatomy 
would permit. High in air showed two green¬ 
ish lights. 
“Oh, ho,” chortled Yawcob, as he danced about, 
stepping on every one’s feet as he capered, “oh, 
ho! nit not? Vat? Dot ‘Miseree,’ she vos no 
goon dawk? Und der man say, she vos goot 
fer rabbits und odder Vermonts! Diss new stomp 
tax fer the revenuers ain’dt got de spondulicks 
for buying dot feller. Vat?” 
All this time “Miseree” was circling that beech 
trunk, toothing it like a beaver. When he could 
get his breath between gnaws he would lift his 
