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Show TOBY AND THE BEAK. A MANEUVER OVER WHICH THE WISE OLD NATIVES DIFFERED. Toby Was the Smartest Bear Dog In All the Woods, and His Owner Wouldn't Have Sold Him For Si OO, but He Wasn't Cnt Out For an Acrobat. "I had a dog named Toby when 1 was living up in the Pennsylvania lumber lum-ber woods, " said George W. Reynolds of the National Lumber compaay. "He was a bear dog. Bears, as every one knows who ever lived among them, hate dogs beyond everything else, two legged or four legged, and will frequently give up a good chance to escape from a pursuing pur-suing hunter just for the satisfactiou ol waiting for the dog that is yelping behind be-hind him and taking a fall out of him when he comes up, a fall that usually ends the dog's career, especially if it is a dog not especially trained to hunt the bear. ' 'This dog Toby of mine was famous all through these woods. He was acknowledged ac-knowledged to be the most accomplished accomplish-ed dog when it came to getting the best of bear that had ever been in that country, coun-try, and if any hunter didn't catch a bear when Toby was along it wasn't the dog's fault. Once Toby was borrowed by a man named Crowley, who knew where a couple of bears were hanging out The dog routed them out and drove them plumb to Crowley, who could easily eas-ily have shot them both, but instead, when he saw them coming, he cut aud ran. Tim Bull, who had gone along with Crowley on the hunt, said that Toby just stood still and gazed in amazement amaze-ment after the flying hunter. Crowley, seeing that the bears had got away, soon came hack. The dog showed his opinioi of Crowley by bristling up and growling growl-ing savagely and threateningly at him for a few seconds. Then he quit and went home. Ever after that Toby would snap and growl at Crowley whenever he saw him. "One day I was looking over a logging log-ging job I had contracted for and discovered discov-ered signs of bear along the creek. Next day Toby and I went out to see what we could do with the bear. We soon struck the trail, and Toby located the bear in a small patch of laurels, from which he soon routed bruin. He brought the bear to bay in a little open space in a piece of chestnut timber. There was no necessity of the bear turning at bay, but he evidently wanted to get a whack at Toby. I could have easily sent a bullet bul-let through the bear, but having the utmost ut-most confidence in Toby's smartness, and seeing that the bear was anxious to put his smartness against the dog's, I concluded to let him have the chance and to enjoy the sport of a few minutes' maneuvering between the two. "It was fun. Toby worried the already al-ready ugly old chap with tricks and quiok movements until the bear was wild with rage. Do what he might, he couldn't get a blow or a bite in on Toby, while Toby got a nip at the bear at almost al-most every turn. This amusing dance lasted for. ten minutes, and I felt so proud of my dog that I declared there and then that it would take a good deal more than a $100 bill to buy him. "Some wise old natives of those woods assured me afterward that what this bear finally did was a premeditated act, deliberately and successfully carried out as planned. Others declared that it was an afterthought of the bear's, I myseli held and hold y,t that it was entirely an accident, because I will not admit that there ever was a bear smart enough to get the better of Toby by design. "After sparring and rushing fruitlessly fruitless-ly at the dog for ten minutes the bear put Lis back against a tree and breathed hard for at least a minute. Then it suddenly sud-denly dropped to all fours and hurried toward another tree a rod or so away. Toby followed, and as the bear started to climb the tree seized it by one of its hams. Although the dog must have set his teeth deep in the flesh, the bear did not stop on his way, but climbed on as if nothing waa worrying him. The dog held on and was lifted from the ground as the bear climbed. The higher the bear went the tight ir Toby appeared to hang on to its rear, and presently he wa9 swinging in the air 1 5 feet from the ground. "The sight was so funny that I just tumbled on the ground and roared. The bear stopped when about 15 feet up the trunk of the troe, clung there for a moment, mo-ment, and then let loose. Hecamedowr like a pile driver. When he struck at the bottom of tho tree, Toby was between be-tween him and the ground. There was a faint yelp, and that was all. Three hundred pounds of bear had flattened 40 pounds of dog out of all kind of j shape. The catastrophe was so sudden ' and unexpected that before I could re- I cover from the painful surprise it gave me the boar had disappeared in the laurels. lau-rels. There never was a smarter bear dog than Toby, but he wasn't cut oui for an anrnhnfc. Thorn is where ha marta his mistake. There never was a smarter dog than Toby, nor was there ever a deader one when that bear got off of him." New York Sun. |