The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-02-16
MORE WAYS OF KILLING A CAT

The Kentucky sleight of hand man may
 have secured $1O worth of skunk belts.
 But what was that compared with the
 regular, and fat. living which "Polecat
 Levi" once locally famous character
 In Shelby county, used to make by the
 more conservative method?
 "Polecat Levi'' was a very small, very
 black man with an eye as keen and as
 beady as that of any of the wary war
 mints' he hunted His ancestors may
 have been bushmen of Central Africa
 who married into the pygmy tribe of the
 Congo forests. His dogs were as small
 as Pekinese, but as alert as Airedales
 His metal hook brought him more money
 than hemp breaker could make in the season when the hemp nerds blazed
 at night like the canlpires of hl-
 vouacked army.
 In summer time Polecat Lewis skunk
 hook became ''turl1le'' hook with which
 he probed under watergaps and shelving
 lodges in the creeks with unerrng in-
 stinct that guided his hand as surely as the terriers guided his spade to the in
 habited skunk den. While men of his
 race less astute earned their living by labor Polecat Levi lived like a Congo U, II.
 noisseurs will tell you, contains in it's
 various cut the favors of mutton, beef, veal and chicken. The terriers rested during the summer. Even the keenest of their kind cannot smell logger head turtle under three feet of water. Only
 Polecat Levi was equal to that and the secret of his peculiar ability was unre- cvealed to men or dogs It enabled the skunk hunter to maintain a virtual mo-
 nopoly in mud turtles during the off sea son when belts were worthless. man can eat only few turtles a week, but
 as few persons can find them and many
 would eat them .turkle meat'' as a spe-
 cialty is profitable to the merchant who is sure of his source of supply The
 creeks which carved fantastic figures in the landscape were the sure source of
 supply. The hook was an unfailing in-
 strument. Where the shadows of the sycamore leaves dappled the shallows the
 ling eyes while the unlovely looking, p'es toothsome turkle' was yanked from
 his fancied security.
 But the largest and most f1avory mud trutle that ever supported a family of leeches does not compare with black skunk as a thing of value. In addition to the pelt the skunk who has lived well
 and is corpuent yields quantity of fat which is rendered into oil that possesses magical curative qualities. There are few afflictions, short of the amputation of leg above the knee, from which an old time negro cannot get relief by using skunk oil as liniment. In addition to being a seller of belts, Polecat Levi was to his people an expensive but reliable improvement upon the drugstore and the family physician combined. As 3iNNf Inostician, he reached in al, caseSf ever dissimilar, the same con 1xl9l The patient suffered from a skunk oil. If the patient did not *ens,f lit was because he did not buy ans stss{ enongh skunk oil. A man who is M sBf | not. of course, have the means S pa for a sure cure. Such matters ass pr | the knees of the gods Tho p1 nifs can prescribe for bodily Illness, # Iiil l for financial distress It is p* 7E1e lthat PoIecat Levl would have
 1 if he is lIvins would live QQ0 veal l if it were nof (h8f ! kunk oil is so<