The Houma courier. (Houma, La.) 1878-1939, 1897-12-11
PYLE FAMILY PIC.

led to Its Undoing.
The Pyle family live on the Coyle
farm, in northern Pennsylvania. Out of
3 litter Of pigs born on the farm vas one
that was very small. It was entirely
black The children of the family took
a liking to the black runt and made a
sreat pet Of it. AS it gJt ol6sr 1t fol-
lowed the children wherever they vent
and they taught il a. number of amusing
tricks. One thing they were fond Of
having the pig do was to hsnt apples
which they would hide in different
places about the yard. One day they
buried an apple in one corner of the
yard, and sent the pig in search of it.
The pig was a long time in getting the
apple, but finally worked its way to the
corner of the yard and rooted the apple
up and ate it. Subsequently another
apple was buried in another part of the
yard. The pig, in searching for it, went
straight to where It had rooted up the
first apple, but, not finding me there,
finally located it and dug it up. Apples
were thus buried about the yard in diff
ferent places. and the pig found them
all, but always went first to the place
where it had found the apple on the
first occasion, and so on until it had
visited every previous hiding place in
succession before it hunted up the new
one.
A hired man one day said he would
put an apple where the pig wouldn't
find it, and wouldn't try to get it even
if it did find it. He tied weight enough
to an apple to sink it and threw it into
a duck pond on the premises, where the
water was about two feet deep. The
pig went the rounds of all the former
hiding places, and then went grunting
and squealing toward the pond. Reach
moment and then jumped in, dived to
the bottom, and came back with the APP
pie in its mouth.
Whether some one thought the pig
vas too highly accomplished to spend it's
day in rural isolation, and, consequent
", removed it to more appreciative
circles, or whether a bear, unimpressed
by porcine genius, had walked off with
it and eaten it, was not known at. the
time, but the day after the pig per-
formed It's feat at the duck pond it dis
appeared. No trace of the missing pet
could be found, and there was great
lamentation il the house of Pyle.
Three years afterward Farmer Pyle
was in the town of Woodruff, Steuben
county, N. Y, on business. Among a
number of hogs in the pens of a farmer
he was visiting wal a boar that pleased
him, and he bought it. It was small and
black, but OF good breed. 1t was for.
warded to Pyle, and he got it in due
time. It was driven into the yard
where it stopped, looked critically
around the premises for a minute or so
and then, with a grunt of satisfaction
trotfed to n corner of the yard, where
III rooted feV seeOp4s. TnEn4trrUcsc
toanofs er part of the yard, rooted, AMI
then went to other spots here and there
roofing a moment at each of them
Suddenly it trotted to the duck pond
and, jumping in, dived beneath the wa
ter When it reappeared and swan
ashore it looked disappointed, bu
Farmer Pyle and his family didn't
They knew that they had recovered
their pet Of three years before and tina
It hadn't forgotten its home or it
tricks.
hat was the SOFT OF memoir TN
Pyle family pig had. It was too bad it
memory was so good, too, for it led t
the pigs untimely death. One day TIL
pig was doing itE apple trick, when
neighboring farmer, who had stopped
in to see the funny act, stole the appl,
from the pig and ran with it. Thit
made the pig terribly mad, and
chased the farmer so hotly that h
droppedthe apple and jumped the fence
More than three months passed befor'
that farmer had occasion to visit tn
Pyle place again, and the moment tn
pig saw him it bristled up and went TO
him. 1t got the farmer in a corner be
fore any of the family could interfer
and the farmer had to fight to defen'
himself. He gave the pig a tremendou
kick, which sent it %sprawling and brok
of its fore legs at the shoulder, AM
the phenomenal memory of the Pyl
family pig had to be eclipsed forever b.
q rife bullet.-N. Y. Sun.