The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-01-05
Sport of Tar Heel Noun taineers
in Fighting Them.
ARE EXCITING CONTESTS
Arrangements for the Bouts-The Men
and Their Wagers Of Mules
and Other Property on
the Outcome.

North Carolina deputy collector of rev.
enue, or ''revenuer," as they are called
by the mountaineers, was pulled off
last week at Sims Fork, near the Blue
Ridge mountains. I was up in the
mountains looking for notorious
moonshiner when / heard that a typ
zeal North Carolina bulldog and wild
cat fight would be pulled off the next
day at the Fork. had never seer
anything of TIE kind, although L mad
frequently heard the boys TALKING
about the sport and 1 determined for
once in 10 years to lay aside business
affairs and to see for myself so on
the next morning. accompanied by
some half a dozen newly made ac-
quaintances, l did so.
ON the road over the mountain,
some seven or eight miles, we were
joined by number of mountain eers
until our cavalcade numbered % or
80. Some were mounted on mules. 9TH
ers on little mountain horses, sure
footed as goats, while still others
STROBE along on foot, keeping pace over
the narrow pathway or trail to the
goal. AT the fork of the mountain we
reached the Fork a struggling village
composed of a dozen log cabins with
a bigger one as a common center in
which was kept the postoffice and gen
eral country store, where crackers and
cheese and mountain dew were dis
pensed.
Everybody in and about the Fork
was up and about. gaping about or
talking with the visitors, who number
ed about $50 people. In the center Of
the square a pen of upright tim beI1s
about 80 feet square, four feet high
on three sides and - feet at the other.
had been erected. On the higher side
of the pen, about five feet above the
ground, a narrow shelf was stretched
across, and in the center was a stake
with loose ring fitted into a notch
above ground.
"Off to one side were three small
cages, in which three tremendous cat
amounts, almost as big as panthers,
reclined or paced to and fro splitting
and snarling with rage. Tied to stakes
driven in the ground were Is or 20 fe-
rocious, full-blooded bulldogs all
standing, straning at their leasSes in
their endeavors to get at their enc
mics. Half an hour after our arrival
big red-headed mountaineer named
Poler. the owner of a big cat a mon
ster in size and ferocity, managed to
chain about 20 feet long, and attached
at the other end to a strong collar
about the catamount's neck. AS soon
as the chain was fastened the cage
was pulled away until the chain was
taut, when another nountaiueer stand
ing on the. high fence, pushed open
the door with a long pole and quickly
retreated. Out sprang the catamount.
He was an old experienced fighter,
- 1, =
The catamount quickly sprang upon
the shelf stretching across the higher
wall and crouched to await the ad-
vance of an enemy.
Pretty soon a lank mountaineer led
up an immense bulldog, brindled and
covered with scars. Bets were made,
everybody stalking something, from a
horse down to his gun. When the bet
ting stopped the brindle bulldog was
shown the cat and told to Go fur he
UNI With lips drawn hack, showing
rows of long, keen teeth, the bulldog
Warily approached the cat. Not a
sound escaped his lips, but his yellow
orbs contested in ferocious glare with
the yellower eyes of the catamount
BY the time the dog got within five or
six feet of the wall against which the
catamOunt was stretched upon the
shelf, l could see the wildcat stretch
iner bis laos for a cpripr op5 in , 500
ond he snr.nr o,,t ur;tb a soraar, of
rage and III so,,,r e1v -, 49, ha,,, -
tha doc Quick &C he n,nvar,e,ts ~,'oro
he onlv gave ono lopg iii, ,,,it, 80
foraclaws beforn tho h,,,ldo. u.ni.1na
over ava n,r4l,, 10 ono 80 s,;z;,,ar - y
c,t b1, tba sida NJ faH, ,saan,,as ~
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fahti,,a IN 70 tbiS tive r,as Is" ,a,1ia
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and srit+inos If tta ,,,i1ao ..e 81 IN, t.ls
low, 49, aero,.1, '''ra, oli' t,iS
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ntIs,t ~ u tn', ' t,s
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nrai,, foir, aon 80 us aito Wa
Tba h,,11dncs ~, t,,is 49,, upon me ctlell.
t,,.,.;b,a 'f'17 .ilt'e pl eseiiteo