"We've learned queerer things than we ever imagined or dreamed of,
already, Uncle Eb," Neal answered.

Meanwhile, Cyrus and Dol had begun to discuss the size of the escaped
coon.

"I should think it measured about two feet from the tip of its nose to
the beginning of the tail, and that would add ten or eleven inches.
Probably it weighed over thirty pounds," said the experienced Garst.

"A fine tail it had too!" answered Dol; "all ringed with black and
buff--not black and white as the books say. There was hardly an inch of
white about the animal anywhere. Its thick gray hair was marked here and
there with black; wasn't it, Cy?"

"Rather with a darker shade of gray, bordering on black. I think old
Tiger can testify that the creature had capable teeth; and it possesses
a goodly number of them--forty in all; that's only two less than a bear,
an animal that might make six of it in size."

"Whew! No wonder it's a good fighter!" ejaculated Dol.

"But the funniest of the coon's or--to give the animal its proper
name--the raccoon's funny habits is, that while it eats anything and
everything, it souses all meat in water before beginning a feed. That's
what it would have done with our bit of pork,--dragged it to a stream,
and washed it well before swallowing a morsel.

"I caught glimpses of a raccoon chasing a jack-rabbit in this very
section of the woods, last year," went on the student, seeing that Dol