The gazette-times. [volume] (Heppner, Or.) 1912-1925, 1915-04-08
BY MABEL ALBERTA SPICER.

IX~ NEEN DclUIC ne UCSu q hoPPs
IA little pig playing about the farm
with other happy little pigs, cows,
horses, barnyard fowls, a shepherd dog
and a plain yellow cat. He had wallowed
in the mud and reveled in savory slops
reeking with a dozen different odors.
Today he was a very much bored little
pig, imprisoned within a city backyard,
in company with a family of Guinea pigs,
an Indian monkey, a Shetland pony, a
Malayan cockatoo, a ~Pekingese spaniel
and a Persian cat. He slept on a cushion
and grunted over an insipid diet of milk
and rice. And all this had come upon
him because Farmer Jones had given him
to DR.. Van Loon on a bill. The doctor
had thought it would be a fine joke to
present the little country pig to his daugh-
ter, who was so proud of her rare ami
mails.
These fine pets treated the good-na-
tured little Curly Tail as an intruder.
The Guinea pigs disclaimed all kinship
with him. The monkey swung gleefully
by his fine long tail from his tree and
pulled the foolish little tail of the pig
whenever he came within reach. The
pony spurned him utterly. The cockatoo
hung, head down, from her perch and
pecked at him. then shrieked with de-
light. The Pekingese snapped at his
heels. The Persian puss, when out of
temper with the others, who knew how
to defend thmselves, took it out on Curly
Tail with a saucy slap.
All this would not have been so bad
had not Miss Betty scrubbed him each
morning with soap, then sprinkled him
with scent and tied a pink ribbon about
his neck. That was more than any self
respecting pig could stand for.
This morning he stood on the newly
cut grass and gazed longingly through a
crack in the fence at the mud in the
alley. What would he not give for a good
wallow, He was a very handsome little
fellow, all pink and white with one black
ear. But his desire at this minute was
to make himself as black all over as that
one ear. How surprised Miss Betty
would nave been to learn that, for she had
distinctly read in her Nature Study that
pigs are clearly by instinct, that it is a
desire to wash that makes them plunge
into mud puddles and wallow up to their
ears.
AS he peered through the crack, ii sud
denly widened and the %grocer's boy came
into the yard. Curly Tail darted past him
and out INTO the alley. He bolted be-
tween lub lttt Ol lue SIOtGI > HOl St,
which fled in fright in one direction while
the little pig dashed off in the other.
Across hard streets, along muddy alleys,
through vacant lots with tempting pud-
dies he fled, till confronted by a high
blind fence. Close by was a friendly
opening, just large enough to allow him
to pass, but much too small to admit his
imaginary pursuer.
Once within the sheltering Enclosure,
he dropped from exhaustion. And joy!
he dropped into mud! Not the 0dorifer-
Gus, highly-scented mud of a sty, but mud,
nevertheless, soft and oOzy, that flowed
up over his sides, making a delicious,
cool bed.
He must have been asleep a long time
when he was rudely awakened by shouts
and the footing of horns. A line of boys
perched along the top of the fence. With
in the Enclosure thousands of men and
women were shouting, blowing horns and
waving banners. Most of them were sit
tig or standing in tiers of seats on either
side of a cleared space, where grotesque-
ly-attired youths were rushing about
madly with a big oval ball. Half of these
contestants wore blue, the other half red.
Their clothes were very clumsy appear
ing, and their noses and legs did not look
as if they belonged to human beings.
Their strange antics Curly understood
to be devices for getting possession of the
most desirable mud. 1t had rained the
night before and the ground was soft and
sticky. But what curious methods they
used. Upon the blowing of a whistle the
players would pass the ball from one to
another, run a few steps, then fall and
nave a fine wallow, rise again and repeat
the performance to the wild cheering of
the surrounding thousands. Perhaps they
were trying the ground to see where the
mud was deepest.
This game was to decide the champion
ship. There was only three minutes more
and the score was a tie, but, of course,
Curly Tail understood nothing of this.
He did not even know the ball on which
the attention of so many was conferred
was a pigs skin. If he had, he might
have hid.
All he knew was that small boys had
frightened him out of a comfortable bed
~, IA -- a.. - - -