Old Yeller: Chapter 10 Summary & Analysis

It is hard and uncertain work for Travis to keep track of how many hogs he’s tagged and to be sure that he’s gotten all his family’s hogs—but he takes a piece of each hog’s ear with him to keep a count. When the count reaches 46, he figures that he’s caught them all. One afternoon, however, Bud Searcy pays the family another visit—he says that there are a bunch of hogs Travis missed out on in a nearby area full of bat caves. Travis has never been to the area before, but he feels confident about going to locate and tag the missing hogs.

As Travis and Old Yeller set out into the Hill Country, Travis takes in the sights and sounds of the nature all around him. Old Yeller locates the hogs with little trouble; as Travis hurries toward the pack, he can tell that they’re in an angry mood. Travis runs off toward a nearby tree, yelling for Old Yeller to bring the hogs over to him—but at a deep cut-bank between Travis and the tree, the hogs stop under an overhang that has created a shallow cave. Travis decides to get on the bank above them and go about his usual process from up there.

The tagging goes well enough until, suddenly, the dirt bank breaks beneath Travis’s weight, sending him crashing down in a wave of sand directly on top of the angry hogs. Travis is terrified—though he can’t see or hear for all the sand, he stands and begins to run. He is not fast enough, though, and a hog gores him in the leg with its huge tusk. Travis falls down, screaming. Old Yeller rushes to the rescue, darting between Travis and the hogs. The hogs rip into Old Yeller with their tusks while Travis scrambles far away. Alone in a grove of prickly pear trees, Travis rips open his pant leg and looks at his gored calf—the gash is a bad one that goes straight to the bone, yet Travis is in too much shock to feel any pain. He makes a tourniquet for himself and stands back up—but rather than heading for home, he hurries back to Old Yeller.

When Travis finds Old Yeller, the hogs have left the dog alone—but Old Yeller is in bad shape. When Old Yeller sees Travis, he drags himself toward him, wagging his tail even though he is cut up and covered in blood. Travis begins to cry as Old Yeller starts licking Travis’s wound. Travis can see that Old Yeller’s belly has been ripped wide open and that some of his entrails are hanging out. The sight is so terrible that Travis wants to run away. Instead, he steels himself, pets Old Yeller, and gets to work. He ties up Old Yeller’s wounds with strips from his shirt, then eases Old Yeller under the collapsed rock slab and hides him behind a large tree stump. Travis promises old Yeller that he will be back for him. As Travis runs home to get help for his dog, Old Yeller howls mournfully.