The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-03-28
ossIAN L1NDLEY.s PET coon.
Il Is Fond Of Good Things to Eat end to
Drink-To Make a Coon Pie.

saying that nobody ever had so much fun
as he has had since the day in June last
when the coon was captured Mrs. Lind
lev, Ossian's mother, is equally positive
that no woman ever had so much trouble
with fOur-footed pet or a two-footed pet
for that matter. as she has had since that
coon became a member Of the Lindley
family.
The Lindleys live on what is known as
the Green clearing, a farm that was cut out
of the woods on the ConKllng brook many
wears ago, about a mile back in the big
woods from the narrow clearing that runs
I'D the banks OF the West Ca The
house is one of the few good frame houses
located off the West Canada, and it has
door knobs on the outside doors instead of
iron latches, as most farm houses have up
this way.
Ossian is boy of IA. One day last June
he was fishing down on the Conkling brook,
and got so interested in it that he did not
notice how late in the afternoon it was
until the sun went down. Thea he started
home in hurry, and got SO tired running
in about ten minutes that be had to sit
down on log to rest.
While sitting there his eve fell on an I'M
usually large elm standing on low bit of
ground on the further side of the brook.
Following the trunk with his eye, he no
tced after q little while that one of the
largest branches was dead, and moreover
had big hole in it. lie was just thinking
that the hole would be a fine place for a
squirrels nest, when something much larger
than squirrel appeared at the hole, crawled
out, and made its way down the trunk until
it happened to see the boy. Then it scam
pered back.
Ossian went home, and the next after
noon set a big box trap at the foot of the
tree and baited it with the remains of the
trout the family had had for breakfast.
That was very good bait for many sorts of
animals found in the north woods, and it
was etfectual in this case. In the morning
there were three very funny looking half
grown 'coons in the trap, and Ossian had a
terrible tug Of it, but no end of fun getting
the trap home, for he had to drag it on an
old hand sled.
When his father came in for breakfast
flor the trap was visited at daylight he told
Ossian that two Of the 'coons would Just
serve to make a good pie for dinner while
the third could be saved for Christmas or
Thanksgiving. So two of them were killed,
and Mrs. Lindley boiled them and made a
thick gravy with cream and poured the
gravy and the boiled 'coons into big milk
pan that had been lined with biscuit crust,
and put cover of crust over all and baked
it in the oven until it was delicate brown
all over the top.
About the time the baking was done
Ossian came in from a half days work
repairing fences along the edge of the
woods where the breezs blew the smells of
balsam and spruce and hsmlock around him
continually. Ossan was hungry, and
when he smelled that baked pie he stood on
one foot and drew the other up to his knee
IN the ecstacy of delight and said:
"Ma'am, amt you nice? You bet you
are.n
Ossian's mother thinks him a very fine
boy, and so he is. If he wasn't the other
coon would have been in PIE long since.
In order to tame the coon that was to be
pet, Ossian put it in big dry goods box,
brought from Odit's store, and there he fed
1t with potato and odds and ends of meat
and fish and frogs and lettuce and bread.
The little beast ate everything greedily.
One day the boy had in his hand q piece of
bread with some wild strawberry preserves
on it. While he looked at tho coon tie
bread fell into the box. 1t astonished the
boy very much to see the coon eat the pre-
serves first and then the bread. That gave
him the idea that it liked sweet things, and
SO he got saucer Of molasses for it. 1t
swallowed that much faster than it had
ever done anything before.
In his hurry to get another saucerful for
it, OsSian went to the house the coon was
kept in the barn. without fastening the
door of the box. Going to the molasses jug
in the pantry he put the saucer on the
floor, and, picking up the jug, began pour
ing out the molaSses. At that moment the
coon appeared and jabbed its nose into the
black stream and grunted with delight
The coon had followed him to the house to
get more molasses and with success.
Having proved its IF SO tame aud willing
to follow its master, the coon was not
fastened in the pen that day, but was simply
carried out to the barn and left there
10
The coon was carried to the barn at about
10 o'clock. 1t was on Saturday, and Mrs.
Lindley was making doughnuts and pies for
Sunday. That is tee regular thing for Her
kimer county wives to do, but Mrs. Lindiey
was making an unusual spread, because
friends We're expected next day. Mrs. Lind
ley, as fast as her doughnuts were fried,
spread them on the dining-room table to
cool, and after little, when the pies were
baked, placed them in the windows on the
cool side Of the house. 1t was hot work
frying doughnuts and baking pies in such
weather, as every good lou ,ewife knows,
and nobody could blame Mrs. Lindley for
going into the parlor when it was all done
to look over the Boonville Herald that had
arrived the night before and had in it all
the news from the country side.
While she sat there ii the big rocking
chair tanning herself she heard through the
open window the hollow thud of pie that
had been knocked out of the window and
had landed bottom side up on the veranda
floor. Very much astonished she ran out
to see what had happened. There WAS the
youog procyon totor helping himself to pie
with great satisfaction. She said "scat,n
and the coon fled. Only one pie had been
destroyed, and after cleaning up "the mess
the nasty thing made of it" Mrs. Lindley
went back to her paper.
Then the coon came back to its pastry
This time he climbed in the window, nibbled
at the other pies there, and then seeing the
doughnuts thought them moro attractive
aud straightway jumped on the table.
such a time as he had there! The crisp
sweet crust on the doughnuts was precisely
to his taste, and when he had eaten so much
that his belly all but dragged on the table,
he squatscd down in the midst of his feast
and licked the dainty cakes nearest him.
IN this condition Ossiau found him. He
looked SO very comical that the boy sat
down on the nearest chair and laughed till
the tears came, and even Mrs. Lindley,
Vexed as she was to see the ruin wrought
with her good things, had to laugh.
FROM that time on Mrs. Lindley's chief
OBJECT In life was the keeping of tho coon
out OF the house. The Kitchen doorways
were provided with screens, and Stats were
nailed over the kitchen windows. But that
would not Co. Somehow the young rascal
learned that the door knobs had only TO be
turned to open door and when the kitchen