The Press., 1884-12-11
PLAYING FOR CORN.

It was a WesS.St. Paul man who came into The Day office and told the story. 'sI noticed, he said, "that you printed some thing lately about the remarkable intelli- gence of hen belonging to man out on the Manitoba road, and thought I'd come in and tell you of bigger case of intelli- gence even than that hen showed. Its about hog I own You see I got that hog in a singular way. In side show of one of the circuses that came along last year they had an educated pig, one of them pigs that picked out cards and plays eucher with any one in the audience, you know, and it was here that the side show man got into some trouble and had to throw up his business. His stock waS sold and I bought the pig. It seemed likely kind of a shoat and got it to fatten up. It ran out all summer and this fall put it in a pen with dozen other hogs and began to feed 'em on corn in the ear. For while they got on we'll, every one of 'em gaining in weight, and then something funny hap pened.. Maybe you won't believe what I am going to tell you, but can bring some of the best men in West St Paul to prove it. was looking at the hogs one day and it seemed to me that the circus hog was gaining flesh faster'n tho others. The rest of lem looked kind Q thin and peak ed and he looked mighty solid and meaty couldn't understand it and the more studied over it the more puzzled l was.
 Well, it went on that way for week or two, and the circus hog kept getting latter and fatter and the other leaner and leaner, and knew there was something wrong. I couldn't make it out, so I thought I'd watch 'em. I noticed that when the corn was thrown into the pen the hogs would go for 1t and every one of lem would grab an ear in his mouth and rush back to the place where their bedding was. Hogs gen. orally do that, and wouldn't have thought any thing of it if hadn't happened to look in on 'em to see how they were feeding. By gosh I was never so astonished in my life e! Them hogs wasn't eaten the corn at all The corn was all piled up in corner and all seven hogs gathered to- gether playing cards I knew ill minute what had happened The boys had been sneaking away from the house all summer their mothers kind Q down on card playing-and had been playing cards in the pen before we put the hogs in, in the fall. That circus hog, roofing round in the straw had found the pack where the boys had left it, and he'd been learning the other hogs how to play! He'd led 'em ou unt1I uo u got eu playlng TOT corn. Of course, being an old hand at the game, he could just skin 'em alive. I kept still and saw them play hand or two. It was seven up they were playing and the way the circus hog got away with them was a caution. Save his jack every time when he had it, and caught it every time it was out with the others. We'll, he won seven ears of corn every lick, and it wasn't half an hour before he'd get the whole feed It was curious to see the others stand by and watch him eat. They just looked long ingly at every mouthful, but they didn't pretend to interfere with him. Of course I knew what made the other hogs so thin 1 and the circus hog 50 fat. You bet I took him out of there and put him in pen by himself I hadn't the heart to take his cards away, though. threw them in to him, and he spends most of his time now playing solitair. Curious, isn't it?