The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1890-09-04
a HEROIC ROOSTER.
He 10 Death on Rats and Terror -
Hawks,

AT no time, no matter what season
of the year it might have been, has
any one passed John Carley's barn. on
the Sackett Pond road, during the past
two years, says q letter to the New
York Sun, without seeing from half =
dozen to dozen big rat skins nailed
on the side of it next to the road
These skins are all taken from rats
killed by q rooster that bosses the
poultry harem on the Carley farm,
The breed of this rooster is not known.
as he was one of brood Of 3-weeks-
old chickens that Carley bought three
years ago from a neighboring farmer.
flow long the rooster had been a
RATHER before his owner discovered the
fact is not known, but one day. when
the rooster was about a year old.
Carley was walking along by the barn
yard and heard great cackling
among his hens, with which noise tho
loud squealing of rat was mixed up.
Carley stepped to the fence to see what
the trouble was all about, and saw the
rooster Juggling away like mad at .
rats tail, which he had evidently
caught in his strong bill as the rat was
scurrying iuto hole under the barn.
The rooster gave two or three strong
jerks at the tail, and succeeded in pull
ing the rat out of the hole. Quick as
flash the rooster swung the rat above
his head and brought it down with all
his might against a stone in the fouu-5
dation of the barn. He gave the rat
three whacks like that and then tossed
it among the barn-yard litter, as dead
as a stone and limp as a dish-rag.
Within short time after that twenty.
three dead rats, evidently killed in the
same way that this one had been that
Carley saw dispatched by the rooster,
were picked up at intervals in the
barn-yard. Then when any one on
the farm went near the barn-yard they
got to looking at the projecting stone
on the barn foundation. If there was
fresh scattering Of blood on it they
knew the rooster had killed another
rat. Then they took to skinning the
dead rats and mailing the pelts on the
barn to display the proves and skill
of the big rooster to the public, and
from that day he has always had fresh
scalp OF two to add to the collection
oFoAy nay VI 81.
If any one should pay visit to this
famous chicken just now he would
find the great ratter somewhat bare of
feathers about the neck back,
and wings, one of the latter being
also badly crippled. This rather dis
figured condition of the rooster is the
result of what Farmer Carley calls
''the incest tussle he ever see." 1t
seems that during the last week very
large chicken-hawk had been hove ring
over the farm, with an eye continually
on Carley's barn-yard. One day last
week Carley saw the hawk drop down
from great height directly into the
barn-yard. The farmer started on the
run for the yard, and when he reached
it he found that the rooster, believing
himself equal to any occasion hadn't
hesitated to pitch in and attempt the
same tactcis on the hawk that had
stood him in such excellent service
as ratter. He had the hawks neck
firmly inclosed by his powerful bill,
and, as Carley declares, she was swat
tin the hawk down ag'inst the stone
like an old woman might whack the
dust out of door mat
The hawk was nearly as big in body
as the rooster and had an immense
spread of wing, and the rooster soon
found that he hadn't tackled the light
wasted, squeaking rat The hawk
thrashed its wings about and clawed
with his talons, aud the ROSTERS feath-
ers flew around like dead leaves off a
tree. But the big chicken had the grip
Of his iron jaw on the hawks throat
and he kept it there in spite of the
punishment he was receiving, and by
and by the hawk, being unable to
breath, grew weaker and weaker and
the rooster whacked out what life there
was in him.
Carley is having the dead hawk
mounted and will keep it as the great
est scalp his rooster has taken up. to