The Abbeville messenger. (Abbeville, S.C.) 1884-1887, 1886-01-26
GUARD FOR PRISONERS.
THE FAMOUS NIGGER HOUNDS OF
THE SOUTH.
An Exhibition of Their Wonderful Noses at
n Georgia Convict Camp.
From the Atlanta constitutional

ttrom the Atlanta constitutional
While at Oldtown I saw a race be-
tween a convict and the hounds. 1t
came about in this way:
MIR. Williams claimed, and he was
backed by Capt. James, that any con-
vict could be selected out of a hundred
and sent off to circle through the woods,
passing through a dozen squads of con
victs; that, an hour later, he could put
his hounds on the convict's track. and
they would thread him through the
squads of convicts, never be shaken from
his individual track, and finally bring
him up.
remarked hat I could understand
how the hounds might carry a convict's
track through n crowd of outsiders
from some scent of the camp. but not
how they could separate one convict
from another.
"There may be a hundred convicts,"
he said, ''clothcd precisely alike, and
wearing precisely the same shoes. They
may feed together on precisely the same
food. and sleep in hunks that touch
each other under precisely the same
cover. And yet each one of them has a
scent that marks him just rs distinctly
to my hounds from his fellows, as his ap-
pcarance marks him under your deliber-
ate study"
"And do you expect me to believe
that the dogs can catch this scene from
the flying touch of his thick shoes on
the hard ground2"
Undoubtedly. And further. He
may stop in a squad and change shoes
with a convict, and the dogs will still
follow him. On the hardest ground, his
scent will be plain to them, though his
shoe soles are half an inch thick. When
he runs through the woods, where his
clothes touch the bushes, they will trail
him heads up, in full cry, fifty yards,
running parallel, but away from where
he ran"
"Do you mean that You can take fifty
%convicts, all clad in convict suits, let
them run through the bushes, her SEND
the convict the dogs arc trailing through
the same bushes, and the scent of his
body left on the yielding twigs as his
clothes brush them, will lead the hounds
through the mazc?"
eyes, fifty yards away, they will run
it parallel ut full speed. To prove this
l will start a convict. I will let others
follow him through the woods. I will
let him make a semicirclc in the woods
with fifty yards radius. When the
hounds come to this, instead OF follow
ing the curve they will scent the oppo-
site side of the circle, fifty yards away,
cut across to it, take the track up there,
and follow it,"
-Agaunt convict, long of leg and flank,
was selected for the run. He was told
to put off quickly, circle in the woods,
take a swift run over the fields, roads,
and through every squad of convicts he
could find in his way. This he did.
The hounds were hen loaing about the
stockade yard. as listlcss o lot of dogs
as ever were seen:
81 am tempted" said Mr.. Williams,
'to let the convict ride a horse for a
mile or two after he has run awhile. ]
have had dogs trail a convict on horse
back four miles, and then take the track
where he jumped from the horse"
BY this time the flying convict was a
small spcck or the broad fields, and in
a moment more had melted into the
horizon and was gone, as if, indeed, he
had found that liberty for which his soul
painted and had gone as the strong
winged birds 60 when they vanish in the
blue ether.
In an hour we mounted our horses.
The hounds were still loafing about in
the sunshine. Suddenly Mr.. Williams,
squaring himself in his saddle, blew
three quick, short blasts on the cows
horn that hung at his side. AS if by
magic, the hounds awakcd and charged
Mt his s~addle-cager, baying, frantic.
"Nigger!" he said sententiously. Like
the wind they were off, nose to the
ground, tails up, circling like beagles.
Larger the circle grew, the hounds silent
as spectres, eyes and nose eating the
earth for its secret. ''They will pass
over the tracks of convict squads, but
will open on the first single track they
find. If it is the wrong track we will
simply sit still. They will run it a hun
dred yards or SO, and, noting u silence,
will throw it off and search again.
When they get the right track, we will
halloo and start after the hound that has
it. The Others will join HIM, and the
race is opened"
at last a red hound, %careering like
mad across the field, halts suddenly,
tumbles over himself, faces about. noses
the ground eagerly, lifts his head,
"A-a-o-o-o-w-u!" and is eff like an
arrow from a bowstring. "That's the
track" shouts Williams, and after the
bowling hound we 20. The other
dogs join in pell nell at first, then each
hound true to the track, in full cry and
at a rafting gait. Away off to the left
Cant. James calls attention tn q movino