Hold 'em Boy!

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Prior to the 1970's Northeastern North Carolina was a quail hunting haven. Hardwoods, uncut hedgerows and ditch banks surrounded the peanut and bean fields giving adequate habitat for the prized game birds. My father, Peter Rascoe, jr., his father Peter Rascoe, and his uncle Duke Perry were avid quail hunters.  As a boy, my dad would grab the Belgium made 16 gauge that his Uncle Duke took from a blown out house during the Battle of the Bulge and would run down to the hardware stores his father and uncles owned where they would pile in a model T and drive to the farm during lunch time to hunt. Back in those days all the stores closed over an hour for lunch, and the merchants all wore coat and ties. There was always a hunting coat and a shotgun leaning against the wall to be easily grabbed at lunch. Then it was "hunting coat" and tie for a quick walk  around the edge of the fields for a bird or two. The last day father and son hunted together, my grandfather shot ten times and came out of the brush with eleven birds.
I can vaguely remember my dad's two english setters, Cotton and Patch, but I often kick off a conversation to hear the stories about them. Cotton and her son Patch made many a round on our farm and Ben Mayo's over in Edgecombe County.  Rascoe and Mayo would often turn the two dogs loose, mix a drink and sit in an old WWII Willys Jeep to wait for the setters to sniff out a covey. When they saw the dogs freeze with their tales up and point up on the birds in the bush, they would drive the jeep up to them, get out with their double barrells - all the time saying in a deep slow voice, "Hold 'em... Hold 'em Boy"!