‘•They are reliable, boys’: yon can count on
queens Vic and Bess cv< ry lime!”
Bick Stapler wa.s discussing his young pair
of 'larylaml BinNong hounds, and Tom j’ol
hill, Jim Stapler and oihers of us were in
terested listeners for wo v»re astride our
steeds ami heading for the, river flats southeast
of Bellvilh’, bound for a fox race. .Jim thought
the young dogs were too fleet, and largely
sj oilt the fun. He rather preferred the old
fashioned ways of J >ad and Spot and Logan
and Brown the old line deer hounds in the
pack before whom and lln ir lineage for thirty
years the Staplers, the Jotu ses, the I’olhills
and oihers, had killed many a buck. Jim also
to th< young dogs’ tongues, but Dick
nndßvery crito ism with,‘ but they are re
liable, Jmi you '.in count on them ( very
time.” l orn Polhill thought that while the
pair of queens were “chained lightning let
loose” after 11m fox was up, and while Spot
was a “searcher,” it was f afest to listen al
ways for Dad s tongue on the trafi. “The old
man always gets there,” said he. Judge
Tracy reminded us that the lime was when
“dat dog Ifallas er mine, which he has been
dead for several years, was no slouch ’isself
atter a fox. Dallas alius kunwed where de
fox or cat (he was powerful alter a cat) was
gwinc ter r.in, and .Inn ’e turn Dallas’ud
cut ’cross, an’ unh-s brer fox was niightycun
ning he’d git pi'-kt up. Dallas was a dog in
ciis work. NN i h I had ’im now since de guv’-
ment pays three dollars fur cat hides!”
Thin th«- <onversation went round by turns,
and it had come my time when wo rounded
the corner of Jelk’s plantation and entered the
deep dark wood near the Withlachoochec. As
I had nothing to oiler, a silence fell upon the
p trly for a moment or two. 