Page:The lady or the tiger and other stories, Stockton (Scribner's 1897 ed).djvu/86

76 'possum's a mighty different thing from a 'coon, when ye come to eat him. A 'possum's more like a kind o' tree-pig. An' when he's cooked, he's sweeter than any suckin'-pig you ever see. But a 'coon's more like a cat. Who'd eat cats?"

I was about to relate some city sausage stories, but I refrained.

"To be sure," continued Martin, "there's Col. Tibbs, who says he's eat 'coon-meat, and liked it fust-rate; but then ag'in, he says frogs is good to eat, so ye see there's no dependin' on what people say. Now, I know what I'm a-talkin' about; 'coons aint fit fur human bein's to eat."

'What makes you hunt 'em, then?" I asked.

"Hunt 'em fur fun," said the old fellow, striking a lucifer match under his chair, to re-light his pipe. "Ef ye talk about vittles, that's one thing; an' ef ye talk about fun, that's another thing. An' I don't know now whether you'd think it was fun. I kinder think you wouldn't. I reckon it'd seem like pretty hard work to you."

"I suppose it would," I said; "there are many things that would be hard work to me, that would be nothing but sport to an old hunter like you."

"You're right, there, sir. You never spoke truer than that in your life. There's no man inside o' six counties that's hunted more'n I have. I've been at it ever sence I was a youngster; an' I've got a lot o' fun out uv it,—more fun than any thing else, fur that matter. You see, afore the war, people used to go huntin' more for real sport than they do now. An'