The Brookhaven leader. [volume] (Brookhaven, Miss.) 1883-1891, 1883-03-15
Western Imagination.

II Jules Verne wishes an enduring
renown as an Imaginative writer he
should come to this country and sit at
the feet of the Western miner and hunt
er. They can. in the vernacular, give
him points. In seeing visions and in
dreaming dreams they have a fertility
of resource which remains unparal l..
Not long since we were told of West
ern miner who crawled into a cave in
some lonely mountain. Now most men
would have simply lied about the size
of the cave, its stalactites and subter-
ranean lake. But the imag nation of
the Western brother scared above such
ha"kneyed themes. He electrified his
gaping friends with a tale of a marvel
Gus image seated in the cave, the figure
of man, composed of gold, silver and
copper, wear ng a helmet. Nor was
this sufficiently mystic and wonderful.
He went on to tell of a bright flame
issuing from the mouth of the image.
Then he probably remarked that he
would "take his straight and ex-
pressed his ability to knock out any
other liar in one round.
But the golden gas. ct has been ex-
tinguished by the appearance of q
"clif-dweller in New Mexico. 1t ap-
pears that ONE three weeks ago several
men were hunting in the vicinity Of The
ancient cave dwellings near Espanola,
n. NJ. They saw fit to enter one of
these caves for the purpose of eatin g
lunch. The local chronicler, whose ac-
count is nearly as remarkable as the ap-
part on, states that they drank both
beer and champagne. Now had they
remained faithful to the usual whisky of
the West they would have encountered
nothing worse than snakes. But their
unhallowed mixture of beverages led
to an appalling result ''At the en-
tran to the cave stood a wild, weird,
unearthly looking being" Now comes
his description. ''Our informant. a
cool-headed, self-poised man, and a
mountaineer OF two scores of years
standing, AYERS that he was not whit
under eight feet in height. His head,
which was bare, was elongated and rose
the hair-line." This would appear to
be an account of a mountain with no
pay streaks above timber line. but it
isn't ''His eyes were preternaturally
large and shone with a light whose
vividneSs sent queer thrill to
every startled hunter of the
little group who looked into their
fame-llt depths" Now, that we
consider really affecting, especially the
"queer thrill and "the t'ame-lit
depths" "His hands and feet were
also enormous. The upper part of his
body was clothed in short wraps, con-
sisting of skins dressed by some art now
unknown. He carried club of enor-
nous size; the smaller end, sharpened,
seemed iron tipped. But just az our
interest rises to the boiling point. we
are told that "he bounded away up the
almost perpendicular face of the noun
tain and disappeared" Then the writ
er gravely oes on to remark that this
appearance is incomprehensible unless
somewhere in impossible mountain
fastneSses the remnants of the preh s.
toric clitf-dwellers exist" 1t is stated
that the "first impulse of one of the
hunters was to shoot the c.iff-dwel'er,
but he refrained, and his self-denial
can not be too highly extol,ed."
1t is evident that the progress of civil
izat.on has not proved an unmixed good
to the West The replacing of 'tangle-
FOOT with beer and champagne and the
introduction of Jules Nerne's works
must be held responsible for these re-
markahle apparitions. 1t is cold day
when the limo ent brother from the
Far West is unable to produce tale of
craven images, wild cltf- -dwellers, biz
yards, or incal, ulably r.ch mines. ~
y Tribune.