New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1856-06-02
~ From the Cincinnati Commercial.
The wild Womnn-Hcr Strange Appear
ance-Thc Story of Her Cnpture-Romanee
| Hnal H1rnaa :

STE w llu WOlnaD OF WaCllta Mountains" MIR.
JW % Northcott, her captor, introduced into the
| room where she is prisoner. We saw tall grace
fully formed, young white girl, scantily but neatly
clothed, standing with stout rope about her waist
and attached to bed post. The first impression was
similar to that of being in the presence of fierce
maniac. She stood at the foot Of the bed partially
hiding behind it, and rocking slowly but with nervous
uneasiness, from one foot to the other and staring
fixedly upon US with great, bright unwinking eyes
so widely opened that ring Of white surrounded the
pupils which with the wild and intense glare of the
orb, gave it strange and frghtful expression Be.
meath the eyes were deep circles, showing long con-
1 tlnued and excessive excitement or exerton, men
1 tai or physical, Her hair was long and thick,
1 hanging in heavy matted masses and wiry tan
| gels about her face, neck and shoulders, and
IN color dark brown. Her complexion was fair,
even delicate, and her features decidedly hand
some. Her mouth is small and finely formed
the lips thin and red but tightly compressed and her
| teeth even and white. But there was not, that we
could discover any trace of humor in her face, and
| we were informed by her captor that he had never
seen her smile. There is not line in her face to in
dictate any human passion, the only organ of express
sion being her eye, and that does not SEEK
ever to have known human sympathy.
The woman employed by Mr.. Northcott to be at
tendant of his pet he calls her. says that she has
seen the girl look pleased, to be amused,
but her lips never cured in smile, and nothing like
q laugh ever found utterance. We need hardly say
that she does not talk. The only sound she makes
| with her mouth is a kind of mumbling moaning,
grumbling, with which, when hungry Or thirsty, she
expresses desire to e, or drink. But sometimes,
her attendant says she looks with the most animated
curiosity at her (the attendant) and Mr. Northcott
when they talking in her presence, and seems to
wonder how they make such noises with their mouths
but they have not succeeded in inducing her to mi-
tate them. Her nose is handsome, and her profile
we'll cut and striking, but the only indication of char
acter in it is a kind of untamed audacity. There is
nothing like timidty in her looks only the discom-
posture mingled with defiance which CLEANS in the
eye OF o panther. The appearance of q maniac,
| which, to our glance, she when we entered her
| apartment, gradually passed away, and there a
softer expression and something like gentle glow of
| intelligence in her still vivid eye. Becoming more
composed she Shutdown and her nurse at request,
brushed back the tangles of her hair, showing her
| cheeks and forehead These were fair The cheek
thin but its outlines quite womanly and her brow
and temples show intellectually of no mean COM
mon order. Whatever she is or may have been, she
is by nature gifted with capacities of high intel
ligence.
STORY OF HER CAPTURE.
The story of her capture, related by Mr. Northcot,
is quite remarkable In the Spring Of 1855 Mr.. N,
with party of eight gold hunters, was sojourning in
the Wachita Mountains on branch of the False
Wachita river camped near extensive and almost
impenetrable thicket. They were gold seekers hay
ing been attracted thther by false alarm that there
was gold in that region, which readers will re-
member had much newspaper circulation, and, as
nearly as could be calculated, their camp was three
hundred miles distant from the frontier settlements Of
Texas, and in what's familiarity called the Camanche
country. One night in March, it was his turn to
watch, and there bright, unclouded moonlight.
In the middle of the night he figure approach
ing that seemed to be Camanche, and he lay close
and at full length on the ground. The figure ap-
preached walking briskly, and passing within twenty
yards of him, entered the hcket and he saw by the
moonlight, that it was no Indian, but young woman
dressed in q robe of skins. He was amazed beyond
conception and told his companions Of his discovery
but they hooted at the idea and commended that be
had seena Camanche, and that they would no longer
be safe in that locality and so next day they packed
their mules and hurried off for Texas, in spite of
treaties. They were all green in the lore of back
woodsmen, but he had spent twenty years on the
frontiers and knew what he about.
So strong an impression lid this incident make on
his mind, that late this winter he enlisted llalf-a
dozen hardy fellows to accompany him, and set forth
trip to the Wachita Mountains, on a hunt after
the wild woman. So many difficulties encoun-
tered, and the weather so severe, that all of his
companions but one backed out He pressed forward,
however, Ind early in March reached the encamp-
ment where he had the enter the thicket.
The first thing in order was to search the thcket,
and they were not long in finding kind of den, a
little cave, or rather long and narrow aperture
among the rocks, which he was convinced must be
her hidng-place With this conviction, he waited
and watched for her two days and nights, when she
came forth He says that he had been afraid to
the den, and that his first care was to stop up
the mouth of it, and wait for her to come back.
after few hours she returned and took alarm on
observing that her door in the rocks was closed
her, aud after running about one hundred and fifty
yards. she turned about, if confused in her fright
and fled towards the He to meet her, with
asse in his hand, and as she approached, worried
by he dogs he threw it her neck and called off
the dogs, and she, giving spring, jerked him to the
ground, and at the second leap threw herself, the
having by that time fastened ahont her throat
and choked her. He then tied her. during which
operation she uttered such horrid screams that the
hair stood up his head and he had the most sngu
lar and awful feelings he ever experienced.
After securing the girl, he entered her den and
found there large quantities of nuts berries and ROOTS
such as could be gathered and digged in the Vicn-
ity. The principal fruit kind Of large red ha,vs
which were thereabout very abundant and she had
kind of nest to sleep in while everything indicated
her utter solitude. The garment She wore was of
skins, queery tied together with bits of leather and
also with kind of grass The skins were those of a
large ANIMAL neither bear nor buffalo, Mr. Northcott
says and the hunters could not tell exactly from what
kind of beast they taken. 1t was his opinion
that she had found animal dead that she might
have been attacked by and have mastered some beast
But there is an air Of mprobabity about this that
the strange and almost terrible reality of the woman
herself does not quite dspel and we have not room
here and now to argue the point The garments were
50 strong, says Mr.. NJ that they protected the female
from the teeth of his dogs For five days after her
capture his pet refused to taste food but then patook
of red haws. She was then taken three hundred
! mlles intervening between her den and the nearest
civilized settlements in Grayson county, Texas with
! rope around her waist, the ends of which were in
the hands OF himself and his comrade while the dogs
| followed after. AS as he could procure it, he
had hack so fixed to make of the body kind of
| cage. in which he confined her, and conveyed her
| safely until he finally got her on steamboat
| She arrived here on the steamer Hickman. For a
time she rejected all prepared food but now she will
eat almost any thing that is offered that is not very
salt or very sweet Mr. Nortlcott says his great OBJ
ect now is to civilZe her, to learn her to talk and tc
hear her story, for he thinks he is sure that she has
talked at some day, and that she has dim notion Of
having long ago been with folks similar to those she
now finds herself with He is impressed from oh
serving her that his is the fact, and thinks that the
presence Of civilized faces and being in houses ETC.
etc, has caused dormant memories to family revive
He disavows any intention to make speculation Out
of her. and says that he will only take money from
visitors that he may use it for her benefit. He shrink
| from no examination on the subject, and has called
several physicians to look at his strange pet. IT th
is hoax, and it is wonderful that we are not ab
to give it full credit, the girl, (whose age is perhaps
twenty-five or twenty-three years. looks the charac
ter she is made to personate so consummately, tina
the like was never before heard Of or dreamed. w
would have it thoroughly understood hat this is M
exaggerated puff Of a Snowman, but plain and sobe
narrative of that which we saw and which was in TIN
utmost apparent good faith related to u.s. and which
seems to be a veritabe realization of romance
|
THE PIN AND THE NEEDLE.-A pin and needl
being neighbors in work basket, and both ben!
idle began to quarrel, idle folks are apt to do.
81 should like to know said the pin, what yo
are good for, and how you expect to get through tn
! world without head ?"
10 bn1 of hand =, AL