The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1892-09-02

beard of goat. If the people ever
wanted any of the wild woods breed
they sot trap for 'em, ketched 'em,
picked 'em clean of the extra har, put
clothes on 'em and set 'em to work."
"Why," asked l, "did they give each
boy bunch of horsehair when they
turned him loose?"
"Waal, because the people down thar
are tender hearted like, an not one of
'em would turn child loose 'thout
given him the means of maxim a ivin.
The hosshar were for maxim snares.
Out'n the hosshar they tuck and made
snares to ketch catfish. AS soon as a
Missourian is weaned he begins to snare
catfish, and SO pervides most of his ivin.
He strikes out for the river jist as a
young duck makes for the nearest pud-
die.
"When they are turned loose to run
with the woods breed they take up with
some drove of the hairy ones that is led
by an old buck and so git good trainin.
Each drove makes its nest in big hol-
ler sycamore tree or log; then turns to
and lives on the fat O the land. They
eat the roots of the yearth, the fruits of
| the trees, sich as roots, berries, paw
paws, persimmons and the like, while
for meat they have the fat cats of the
ole Mississippi"
"Do parents often take their children
back to the settlements" asked one of
our party.
"Parents don't trouble themselves
bout whose children they git. When
they want any they go out into the river
bottoms, set trap and ketch 'em. l
wur ketched time O the war. Then
they bout made a clean sweep of the
woods tribes. They wanted all the men
they could get, so sot traps all round
the bottoms.
"Tll never forgit the time when me
and two others wur trapped. We wur
out in the woods diggin roots when all
at once we smelt new smell. 1t wur
sich good smell that all our mouths
began to water. We slobbered like so
many hounds. What it could be that
smelt so fine we did not know. We
tuck the scent and follered it up on the
keen run. In bout mile we come to a
queer lookin little house. In thar was
the stuff that smelt so good. We dived
in and began fllin ourselves with the
good smellin stuff, when down fell a
door and we wur Gagged.
| eyer see, gents, when they wanted to
ketch up any Nv us wild Missourians,
they made pen just like bar trap,
baited it with corn bread and sot it.
When the wind wur right one of the
woods breed could smell corn dodger
nigh ON to three miles.
"Waal, when the trap fell we tore
round like mad, but couldn't escape.
Long bout sundown some soldiers come
and tuck US out'n the trap. They tuck
us and put us inter the upper story of a
bloekhouse bout fifty feet high. Thar
they left us in the dark.
"Waal, we soon seed that eff we had a
rope we could git away. So then we be-
gan pickin ourselves-pulling out the
long har that covered our bodies--to
make rope. 1t wur an awful sore job.
After all of us had been clean picked
we tried the rope and found it bout ten
feet too short. Then told my two pards
that they might take har enough out'n
the top of my head to finish the rope.
They tuck the har, and in less'n ten
minutes we wur all at liberty.
"Now, gents" said Buck, ''as some of
yez may think Pm lyin bout this bust
ness, I'll jist show yez whar my mates
got the har to splice out that rope"
Then taking off his sombrero Buck
showed that the whole top Of his head
was as smooth as q peeled onion.
HWaal," continued Buck, "after we
got out'n that thar blockhouse we cut
and run for bout five hours acrost
stretch of country we knowed nothin
| about, for we wur lost when we struck
inter fields and fenced groundi besides,
we thought all the houses we seed wur
blockhouses.
'Bein now naked we had to keep
movin to keep warm, so we travelled as
fast as we could all that night, When
| the sun got up we sot on q bluff bank
above the blessed old Mississippi, that
seemed a mother to us. Thar we enjoyed
the sun like so many turtles on log.
Gas we sot ON the bluff we looked
down upon the river and thar on the
side next to us we seed a goodish sized
catfish laying a-sunnin itself near to
| shore. The cat wur bout twenty-five
feet long-too big fur to snare-so we
looked about fur some other way of
ketchin him.
"a few hundred yard above we saw
big rope stretched across the river. 1t
wur ferry rope, but then in our wild
state we didn't know as it belonged to
anybody. We went up thar and tuck
the rope, no one bein bout thar. One of
us had to swim the river to cast the rope
loose from tree on the opposite side.
We'd got'r have the rope because it had
on it at one end q big iron hook,
"Next we wanted some kind of good
live bait. While lookin bout for bait
long comes little niger boy drivin
COW. We ketched him, and lashin him on
to the hook fioated him down, swimmin
like frog, to whar the big catfish wur.
The cat snapped the little mig up like
fash and swallered him down.
"All hands of us tuck the rope over
our shoulders, and maxim dash inland
hauled the big cat high and dry. We cut
the fish open at once and tuck out the
little nigger all alive and kickin. When
we unlashed and turned him loose he
went off as timber as an eel, an the fust
thing he did was to hunt up his ole COW
and drive her along jist as gentle as if
we hadn't had the loan of him and used
him for few minutes. He had but one