The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, April 24, 1904, Page 5

Secor . . linee mparis tit Wha Dey ve in L] ¥ f life we ann € - € w h in the rime his later career, his huge . X gents gair charge for cor Miod guickly erous beast cut sergeant whe the object of his eepecial attack turned again and then the brown ks wavered and & wild panic broke Joose The cap sh commands to which were atta is not good to hear, but this unexpected sort of attack had deoralized all discipline The bandstand and the stc surrounding bristied with men the captain stood his ground. when at last the enemy turned or he, too, dodged and sought with his mer Having w hat he consid complete victory, Diablo wit the end of the plaza to « the confusion he had wro enemy’s ranks, proclaim h umph with loud noises that were bellows than the of his kind Evidently he was s to rest or men no f his laurels, for wher sembled in ranks, he hostile demonstratior behind the walls disappe th mur town ha Next da he appeared again, but in a more peaceful mood. The first ser- t approached him with a wisp of and this Diablo accepted as a offer Later he came over cks and mingled with the some were for re- jefeat of the day before, e majority were glad to accept the Diabio offered nce began. t men in brow not such bad fellows their presence with a not to be ous strife. It his combative- was prompted for personal glory for now that e bar nd while Di- 0 saw forms were a accepted ness of as much r mc as by patriotic he wae accorded all the respect due to a warrior of his ber, he geemed to think no more of his fighting com- patriots in the nearby hills. Not long after this the native fami- lies of San Ramon began to return to their deserted homes, bringing with them their household goods. They, too, were beginning to learn that the Yankees were pretty decent fellows, and comparatively harmless, except in fight. Perhaps Diablo would have removed even this latter then ne comwd judge experience. He ers had lost arned something of ) ts from the ret 1 been bri f insurgent colonel He ts he gave of the right f wa rtu tin es of frien bear vl upon all with r hands Toward all paternal. his world- were espect of them } It was the soft spot ir m hours she was found buntain, mak- mes to the Vs. Had ve been in vas fou ving her from under a He k followed on her the whole they found her, he d trotted back to Diablo was his eye wher left an onths passes, and, except for inters with various and Americans, ded enough to s against cer- , life in San aceful enough. It was s rumored that the in- guerrilla leader. Tino, was g down from the north that the monotony of the tedious garrison life was broken. Then began the hikes into the neigh- boring hills. Several times the boys had slight skirmishes with Tino's men, but no great harm was done to either bsent- til it w surgent side. A few prisoners were brought n and an American corporal was wounded, but Tino’s game just then was to lie Jow until the rainy season. One evening the officers were gath- ered at mess, when a native boy came silently delivered a letter to the el himself. He opened it, read it then hastily excusing himself rose left room. It was quite dark he made his way across the plaza and entered the house of a local mer- a rich mestizo known to be fa- vorable to the American cause for busi- ness reasons The colonel was met at the door by the mestizo himself, who conducted him into a rear room of the house. There, seated in a large cane chair, was a second native, also a mestizo, whose yellow face was none the more attrac- tive for a long, stringy, black mus- tache. As the two men entered he rose and bowed. Dis ees Colonel Lala,” said the mer- chant, and bowing he left the military men together. The two seated them- selves close together and spoke in low tones, the American listening mainly, but occasionally nodding hig head. Finally the native drew from an inner pocket of his civilian white drill coat a paper, thereby exposing the finely striped white and blue uniform coat of an insurgent officer. He hastily rebut- toned the outer coat and spread the paper before the colonel on a small table. The two men were still examining this paper when a noise below caused them to raise their heads. In the rear of the room was a trap door of light bamboo, covering Stone stepway that descended to the basement. Sud- denly there came a loul crash with a splintering of glase: from between the cracks of the floor rcse the smell N .50 rire NATIVE, A Scm. I CRUCFIX ana smoke of burning straw. 'TI'he two men sprang to their feet. The com- d, then suddenly the trap door flew .pen with a gust of smoke and an excited and badly frightened native boy dashed up and out of the house, shouting “Incendlio! Incendio!” (Fire! Fire!) Hardly had he disappeared when there followed a clatter on the stone stairway, and in the opening, enveloped in a stream of smoke, rose the horns and face and pointed beard of what to some might have seemed a fearful apparition. But lhhl- colonel knew Diablo when he saw im. Not so the native, apparently. With a scream he threw himself before a crucifix hanging on the wall. “Salvami D Salvami Dios!” he called frantic Diablo had flung himself into the room in a second. He paused for an instant. then rose on his hind legs and motion below incre 1ly. came down with a roar on the kneel- ing native, rolling him over on the floor. Then the big creature jumped over the prostrate body of the scream- ing man, bounded through the door- way, into the front room and out of the entrance of the house, disappear- ing in the darkness outside. The whole iIncident occupied less than a minute. His first surprise over, the American officer, restraining his laughter with much difficulty, helped the native to his feet. who rose with a face that was pasty white. The dis- turbance below had ceased, Inquiry revealed the fact that a lamp had been upset in a pile of straw, which hap- pened also to be the bed of Diablo, but the basement of the house being all of stone, the fire had gone out of itself. As the mestizo merchant furnished this information, the native whom he had introduced as Lala had recovered his composure, and he even made a lame attempt at a smile. He and the American again seated themselves at the table and resumed their study of the paper. But the colonel could not help noticing that his companion’s white trousers had torn in the seam, and through the rip was exposed a strip of red cloth. Next day Diablo was missing. He was hunted for for miles about, but unsuccessfully. The search was abandoned in the afternoon on orders that every man prepare himself for HHE ZTHAIE, the march at once. 1t was some hours before sunset when the company fell in and marched out of town toward the river, the colonel with them. Out- side of town they were joined by a na- tive in a blue coat and red trousers— the cavalry uniform of the insurgents. Then the boys knew what was in the wind. In half an hour they struck the river and followed its bank up into the tow- ering mountain crags that piled up in the interior. The ground rose and be- came difficult to traverse, while the river dropped below them. At last the command to halt was given and every man lay down. Only the colonel and the native remained standing. They were examining some nipa thatches that barely showed through the foliage on the bluff still further up. Again the men climbed on, split into two parties now, the captain and colonel going with one, the two lleu- tenants with the other. The men were quivering with nervous expectation. Once more the captain’s party halt- ed, now just above the nipa thatches. They could see men walking among the huts; men who wore striped white and blue uniforms. They waited. The first lieutenant’s party had gone on a detour, Suddenly there came a splintering crash of a volley from below. Men in white and blue uniforms rushed helter skelter ¢ut on & narrow road along the side of the bluff, only to be fired upon by the men in brown above them. “At 'em, boys!” shouted the captain, and down the Americans dashed in among the panic crazed insurgents, most of whom were without guns, It was all over in no time—ten insur- gents killed, some wounded and fifty prisgners, a few escaped among the crags. The Americans entered the hid- den village. Of their own number none was hurt. Stretchers were made for the wounded and the march back by the trail began. The captives scowled flercely at the yellow man in red trousers. The sun was setting and cast a red glow over the tops of the jutting crags. Over the river below the shadows grew a deeper blue. On one side of the de- scending trail rose a sheer bluff; on the other, sixty feet below, roared the river. The marching men were in shadow now. Above the irregular top of the bluff was sharply outlined in the red et L STENGIIVG QN 775 WRILZ.Y gunshine. Suddenly the first sergeant cried out: “Look, fellers, above!"” All, even to the native prisoners, looked. On the top stood the form of a huge goat, even his horns and beard plainly silhouetted with the rest of his body against the blazing sunset sky. They cheered to him, but he did not move. They called by name, first the Americans, then those who had given it to him, his first friends, the natives, The misfortunes and fortunes of war were forgotten for the moment — they all wanted Diablo to come down. Finally the black shadow moved, then sank into the dark space below. By shading their eyes with their hands they saw him coming down the face of the bluff as only. his kind could come. Even the wounded prisoners in the litters cheered. At last he stood only fifty feet above them on a rocky ledge. . He paused; grave, dignified, his tremend- ous bulk evenly balanced on the jut- ting stone. Again they called, but he stood immovable. thoughtfully re- garding the men below him. A pris- oner volunteered to crawl up and coax him down and was allowed to start. But he was saved the trouble. Suddenly the two fore feet of the buck rose, his body reared, curved gracefully over, like an expert diver’s, then fell. With a spring he bounded outward and downward, landing only a few yards away from those below. Agajn his fore feet arose, and with a roar, almost as a bull bellows, he shot forward. 'There came a scream from a human throat and the astonished soldiers saw a whirl of hoofs, horns and red cloth go bounding over the ledge into the swirling river. “Down to the bank! Save them! Save them before they get into the rapids!” yelled the captain, and they all rushed in a mass, men in brown and men in white and blue, down the trall to the strip of beach below. Only the colonel and the captain remained with the wounded on the trail. “They're gone,” said the captain. The colonel said nothing, The men ran along the streak of gravel in' excited groups, endeavoring to ald the twd struggling figures out in mid stream. One of the insurgents plunged in and swam for the goat. “Save the ‘hombre!’. Save the ‘hom- # ! lllCoronEL il Laza. bre!"” shouted the first lieutenant, mixing his English and Spanish in the excitement. But a voice above them roared out—the colonel's: “Damn the ‘hombre!” Save the goat!” The native reached the swimming animal, but a warning cry from the men ashore told him of his danger. The increasing current carried the thres down—down—down toward the narrowing gorge. A yell from ashore, then a gleam of bright red shot up in the foam. Then came a hoarse bel- low, the monstrous head and horns of Diablo rose once and disappeared in the whirlpool beyond. The prisoner had reached a rock and held on. A moment more and he, too, must go. But a man in brown uniform with one end of a long bam- boo pole in his hand and the other end held by the crowd ashore, swam out and was then pulled In with the ex- hausted native in his grasp. Up on the trail the two veteran offi- cers observed all. “Colonel,” said the captain, “the devil certainly carried his objections to red trousers a long way.” The old colonel looked thoughtful for a moment. “Captain,” he sald at last, “T think you are mistaken, sir. I wasn't the red trousers; it was what was In those red trousers.” (Copyright. 1904, by Albert Son- nichsen.) Migration and Matrimony Fable for the Foolish —_———e— 4 ITHOUT intending any un- necessary disrespect to that ancient and more or less venerated institution, the matrimonial state, it might be said that in some respects it resem- bles the righteous flea which no man pursueth—with very gratifylng success. Matrimony, like the other venerable and time-worn institution to which we have referred, is geldom to be found where we look for it. More than one man has been compelled to lay in a supply of sackcloth’ and ashes because of his too confident pursuit of both these elusive species. This was the experience of Harold, whose career we will now unfold, if it is not too badly creased. -Harold had an excellent reputation as a matrimo- nial hoodoo in the town of Stubbins- ville. If any ambitious girl in the place happened to be dreaming of do- mestic bliss with an oleander in a blue tub on the front porch she immediately changed her mind when Harold hove 2n sight, and began to consider the Joys of life in a nunnery. It is impossible to give any adequate reason for this deplorable state of af- fairs. It must be accepted, like the north pole and the ideal candidate for the Presidency and the absolutely hon- est man; we have never seen any of these things, but we know that they must exist somewhere. It's the same way with Harold's influence on the matrimonial expectations of the female portions of the population of Stubbins- ville. No one knew why it was bad, but the fact remained in the stubborn manner peculiar to unpleasant facts like debts and bulldogs in watermelon patches and other limitations of the liberty of free born American citizens. It was certainly not Harold's fault that he was such a blight. From his earliest manhood he had been an as- piring candidate for matrimonial honors and if there was a girl in Stubbinsville s,whom he had not in- vited to come and go hand in hand with . him down the stream of life it was because she could outrun Har- ald. He was constant, in season and out of season, knocking at all the doors on his beat and finding.-most of them locked. It was no fault of his that he was not married three or four times a week, and if all of his ex- pectations could have come within a thousand miles of realization he would have been married so long ago that he would have got over telling his friends what a bright thing Har- old Jr. said last night. The first time that Harold essayed the running broad jump to the matrimonial realm he was met by the old gag about ap- preciating the honor and all that sort of thing, but that a previous engage- ment would prevent the acceptance of his flattering offer, and so on, and 80 on. However, the young lady In question assured him that she would try to be a sister to him. Harold was more or less cast down by this unexpected ending to his manly efforts, but he was not dis- couraged. He remembered the old saying which originated with the snake editor of the Eden Times that the rejection of contributions implies no lack of merit, and determined to have another try at it. The next time he was a little more diplomatic and opened up the campaign by sounding the young lady on her general attitude toward matrimony. When he was assured that she had no partic- ular prejudice against the state as such, although she had never tried it herself, he made the proposition to her that they organize a trust and pool their holdings. The young lady was evidently more or less surprised; in fact, she did not seem to have con- sidered that Harold held enough % 3 / ¥ stock to make “a securities company worth while. However, she let him down as easily as she could by assur- ing him that when all the other men in sight were dead or married she might have time to consider his offer. It was the same all the way down the line untll Harold began to think that he was béing squeezed by a cor- ner in the matrimonial market. All the girls who were on the floor seemed to have all they could handle and Harold wasn’t able to dispose of any of his holdings, even at a great saarifice. Meanwhile he was growing old and whatever one may think about the truth of the assurance that there are always a few more fish of good quality in the market, it is an undoubted fact that in the course of time the bait tends to become a trifle stale and disfigured. It had become a standing joke with the eligible female persons of Stubbins- ville by this time that Farold was .o be knocked down as often as he was set up and it became a kind of & game with them. Some of them were col- lecting proposals from the poor unfore tunate and every time they got to- gether at afternmoon tea and gossip fights they would exchange records and the winner would receive a prize. One girl had seventeen proposals from Har- old in one month and had the promise of two or three more when he could get around to her. Harold had started out with the idea that a man in an orchard should be careful to select only the choicest peaches. As he progressed down the different rows and found all the desir- able fruit growing too high for him he changed his mind and was willing to take anything he could reach. But the case here was as bad as on the first trees that he struck—all were clinging too tightly to the parent bough for Harold and he could not find even one small overripe peach on the ground. ‘When any dropped he always happencd to be down at the other end of the row and some one else invariably came along and picked it up before he could get in sight of the tree. At last, in sheer desperation. he be- thought him that there were other orchards in the world, where a persist- ent gentleman might be ab’s to do something without a laddez. So he an- nounced that it was al up with him in. Stubbinsville and proceeded to hie him to far Rhode Island to see what he could do in a fleld where the ground was not so closely worked. What Zol- lowed is a sad comraentary on the taste of Stubbinsvill:, or of Rhode Isl- and. He who has the courage to read this moving tale may’ take his choice. At any rate, Harold hadn’t been in the new orchard a weex before he had gathered a peach from a tree two hun- dred years old. To add to the discom- fiture of the Stubbinsville contingent this particular peach which had fallen into Harold's basket had a goid lining and an attachment of railroad bonds and ofl stocks that made the best Stub- binsville variety look like a last year's crab apple. Harold lives in ease and in a Fifth- avenué mansion and now when he goes back to Stubbinsville he gives away five dollar bills with the same ease and grace of manner with which he used to give himself away. It should be noted further that the Stubbinsville girls are wondering how it was that they were so slow to find out Harold’s good points and are inventing new terms of feminine profanity to apply to them- selyes when they reflect on how easily and how many times they might have been Mrs. Harold. All of which goes to show that while a prophet may be without matrimeny in his own country he has only to step over the State line to find and profit too. Copyright, 1904, by Albert Britt.