COWS
THERE was a feller which had a cow, and the cow had some burs in the tossel of her tail, and the feller he tried for to pick them out. He put his fingers through the tossel, like they was a comb, and jest then the cow she got afraid and started for to walk away. The feller he couldnt hold her, and he couldnt get his fingers out, so he had to go too. He said “wo,” and “steddy, now,” and “no occasion for to hurry,” and evry thing which he culd think of, but the cow she just kept right on, a goin round and round the field, and him a follerin.
Pratty soon a big savvage bul dog it come, and after it had showed its teeths and looked on a while it fell in behind the feller and follered too. So they kept a goin, the old cow and the feller and the bull dog, the dog a smellin the mans legs and makin up its mind where to take hold. The feller he didn’t know whether he would rather have the dog bite him or bite the cow, but he kept a sayin “wo, bossy,” and “good doggy,” mighty polite.
Bime by a other man he see them and he brought a bucket of slop and set it down, and when they got round to it the cow she stopt for to have some, and when her tail was slack the fellers fingers come loose all right. Then he turned round to the dog, which was settin down a grinnin, an he shooked his fist at the dog, the feller did, and said: “You worthless brute, you must take them by the tail, like I have told you 100 thousand times! If its a goin to take a half a year for me to teach you how to drive a gentle cow like this Ile sell you, for what ever I can get.”
But it was the man that brought the slops dog.
Some cows is hooky, but the mooly she buts, and thats why I say beware the awfle avilantch!
Uncle Ned he says why dont I write about Mister Jonnice, which has the wood leg. I ast him why Mister Jonnice wasent made Presdent for loosin his leg so many times for his country, and he said: “He isnt eligible, for he wasnt borned of American parents. His father was Conshience and his mother was Truth, and when he was a little feller like you he lived with her at the bottom of a well. So he dident cometo this country till one day he was axidental drew up in a old oaken bucket. Johnny that man inherits from his mother. He is so truthfle that when he says a thing is so, why, it wouldnt be any more so if he rwote it down in red ink and swore to fore a bald headed notary. He is so truthfle that he faces east when he wants to tell a lie north west. Do you remember that story of his about the bear? He was one day goin through the woods when a big black bear arose itself up before him and began for to hug him real cruel. Mister Jonnice he said: 'Why, darling, this is a unexpected hapiness. When did you get in?’
“Then he threw his 2 arms around the bear and squeezed it so tight that when he let go it lay down and turned so white with sick that Mister Jonnice toted it to a circus and sold it for a polar.
“A other time Mister Jonnice was attacted by a lion which came a rushin at him with its mouth wide open and all its teeths on parade. Mister Jonnice he just stood still and lifted his wood leg up and stuck it strait out toward the lion, and the lion went on every side of it like a bottle around a cork. So the immoral spirit of that monark of the desert winged its way to a other and bitterworld fourth with. Mister Jonnice says that was the first step in his honable career as a lion tamer. I guess the second is still to be took.
“Such, my boy, is Mister Jonnice, but the jasky foozle is a other animal. It inhabbits the crags of the Gangee river and its fluty warble is heard along with the song of the whipperwil when the natf niggers pay poker in the gloaming. Its one tooth is white as the soul of a unborn babe and the shine of its eye is like moon beams on the water of deep Galalee. When it arises its golden locks above the horizon a lovely shadow is flung athwort the land and the chickens go to roost a singing their sweetest songs. It is a six legger, and each leg has a brass hoof, so the sound of its feetsteps is like chimes of church bells on a Sabath morning in Normandy. But beware, Johnny, beware the jasky foozle when summer is green, for it is crueler than the butcher buisnes and pizen as the grave! When it points its nose your way your mother wants to see you mighty bad and your legs should be ship shape for to perform their office.
“Much more might be said, but I see old Gaffer Peters a comin over to have a smoke with me, and I guess I bettergo out behind the barn and plant some coco nuts.”
I guess if there was a fight tween the jasky foozle and the rhi nupple dinky and some others of them fellers which Uncle Ned and Jack Brily and Mister Gipple tells about it would be mighty hard for to say which was which, and a picture of one would do for them all.
One day Mister Pitchel, thats the preacher, he seen a picture which shocked him, cause it repsented a drunk man, but my father he said: “Well, dont men get drunk, what you growlin about?”
Mister Pitchel he said did my father aproove every thing in art which is true to nature, and my father he said: “Mister Pitchel, you have knew me all my life for a onest man which pays his debts and votes the straight Repubcan ticket, like he is told, and loves his neibor as his dog, and wears a stopipe hat quite frequent. Yet you ask me sech a question as that! As I under stand it, the feller which is always objectin to naturlness in art is always a sweepin the horizen with a spy glass and a bendin his self doubble over a microscape for to find some thing to objeck to. He wants to snuffle or to blush, cause if he dont he willbe sick.”
Uncle Ned, which is a batchelor, he said he guessed folks like that was mostly women.
Then my father he said: “I havnt got a word to say about any but the he ones, for Johnny has pointed out in his writins that woman is the noblest animal which roams the plain and roars like distant thunder. But, Edard, the he ones is decendents of them old Puritans which come to this country when it was little, because in their own they wasnt let sing hyms through their noses. They landed on Plymuth Rock when it was jest as easy to step a shore on the grass, and they expect us to cellebrate it. They liked rocks, particklar to fire at other folkes. They used to lick the Injens, too, cause the Injens looked sort of naturel, and came to prayer meeting in their breech clouts, jest as they was created.
“Edard, them Puritan 4 fathers of ourn were a gam doodled bad outfit. When ever one of them had loaded up his old bell mouth blunder bust with led enoughf for to sink a shot goose, and had got it rightly pointed at a Injen which mebby wanted his land back, he shet his eyes up a minute, the Pu did, and, said: 'O Lord of Love, I am about to discharge a sacred duty, andif any fo to religion gets his self in the way let my light so shine that it will shine right through his benighted innards, and thine shall be the glory, but Ile take his blanket and his beads my self. Yours truly, Worm-o-the-Dust Muggins.’”
Then my father he kicked Mose, which is the cat; and Bildad, thats the new dog, jumpt through the window. And thats all I know about cows.