COON HUNTING

COON HUNTING
My old friend, Tupelo C Claiborne 111, was a “mighty hunter before the Lord”. He had his own pack of Coonhounds since he was 5 years old, but he thought that his hounds lacked a bit of venom and were seldom “in blood”. This may have been something to do with the quarry – put a coon under pressure and its’ instinct is to climb the nearest tree. Hounds then claim knowledge of its’ presence, by “marking” at the base of the tree: The racoon then sulks as they do and figuratively speaking picks up its’ ball and goes home. ‘Tupe’ thought that he was getting too much of this sort of thing so he consulted his grandmother and Mr Hett, the farm manager and Hon 1st & K-H.Granny Claiborne was a mighty power in the land and when invited to visit the County Prison farm she took Tupe with her (“educational”). Tupe was very impressed by the ‘Warden’s’ kennel of Track Hounds. He thought that they were a mighty fine kennel of dogs and tried very hard to persuade Granny Claiborne to use her charm with the Warden to get one for his kennel. Granny Claiborne used her undoubted charm with the prison authorities, with the result that “Lucifer” appeared one morning at Tupe’s kennel:- “a mighty fine dawg” in Tupe’s opinion, who just needed a bit of training. “Old Moses” worked on the garden staff at the family estate and it was easily arranged that he would help out. Mose and his long family lived in a wooden cabin down by the creek at the back of the estate. It was arranged that each day at the end of work, Mose would tie a string on a deceased coon and set off through the woods to his cabin and his long family. Lucifer would fasten on to the scent of the coon and hunt out the line to the bottom of the chosen tree. So it came about on the night of Lucifer’s arrival, Tupe, with Lucifer and Mr Hett, set Mose away with the deceased coon and, soon, his deep baying was echoing through the thick woodlands of the Claiborne estate. Tupe listened to his new hound with great satisfaction, until Mr Hett came up and spoke. “Hey Tupe”, he said, “Y’all hear that dog?” “Sure do” said Tupe, “he give voice real good”, “he sure do” said Mr Hett – “thing is, that dawg don’t sound to me like he’s huntin’ any coon trail” – and no more he did.“Hot shit! ” said Tupe, “that dawg’s hunting old Mose! We better git along to Mose’ cabin”. And so the crowd of hunters set out lickety split along the banks of the “crick” to the cabin where Old Mose lived with his long family. The hunters had made good time in pursuit and arrived at the cabin just in time to see Mose going in the front door with Lucifer close behind him. The long family were piling as fast as they could out of every opening in the back of the cabin – the “long family” made a long and vocal trail which was barked at enthusiastically by Lucifer. Mose was standing amongst the long family tail on a loading stand amongst the tangle of the “long tail”, when Tupe came in sight the old man raised a dignified and magisterial hand at him. “Mis’ Tupe” he said, “I’s truly sorry suh, but after today I ain’t trailin’ no more coon skins for you, no suh!” As Tupe said later, “you couldn’t hardly blame the old man – He was a damn good gardener, but you couldn’t blame him for it was not Lucifer’s fault that he just loved to trail a man, that’s what Prison Hounds
Top of Form
Bottom of Form