Show fighting bob the man who has never had anything to do with game chickens bant give a rooster credit for what there is in him one of the right blood likes a battle and the right sort of a trainer can teach him tactics which you would think only human being could learn down in L thirty years ago we had the champion fighting cock of the state he was picked up in the country by a chicken buyer and no one knew his breed he was big and solid and after he had been taught to save his wind and to use his spurs he cleaned out everything which could be put down before him his longest battle lasted only soven minutes and the number of cocks he knocked out in two or three minutes would fill a moving van he was in his zenith and the half dozen of us who owned him were in financial clover when a tin peddler drove into the village one night and began to banter us to sell he offered us 5 10 for fighting bob but we would not have taken ave made a big offer for a second class bird he said as we laughed at him second clas f where is the one to whip him eight in this wagon he can lick the outer that rooster in five minutes bet you two to one go a beetle slow boys a beetle slow ive got a fightlin figh tin bird there and dont you forget it but hes got a ho wont fight with the lights on if he would id bet you ten to one if your bird could only fight in the dark we might make a match how in the dark wall aposen we autem in a box stall in the barn the lamp will throw some light but be dark anuff for january Ji nuary as I 1 call him to feel his oats well cem up together fur half an hour and if you terror ant licked by that time you kin take my if yur bird licks mine wall ill bet two to one ho dont we were wild for a fight and we scraped up 50 and bet it against that our bob would lick the stranger he had good eyesight and as we had the privilege of putting gafas gaffs on him we felt that he could take care of himself against anything the peddler got his bird out of the wagon keeping him covered with a piece of cloth and by and by the pair were placed in a stall near the back end of the barn all of us withdrew to the lantern hanging in front in a couple of minutes we heard a sort of who who followed by a cackle of alarm and a flapping of wings and we nudged the peddler in the ribs and our sympathies pa thies all right boys all right he replied give em three minutes more and then see which is on top at the end of five minutes we carried the lantern down and opened the door our bob lay there dead as a herring and standing over him was an owl almost as big as a goose that was the bird the peddler had rung in on us and as we looked from one to the other in our amazement ho said kinder sony for yon gents but you aror oror sold me that ero rooster when I 1 offered you 30 for him |