The new North-west. [volume] (Deer Lodge, Mont.) 1869-1897, 1883-03-02
THE TEXAS HORNET,
An Engineers Experience In the Lone Sta,
State.
Neao York Times.

Neao York Times.
1t has long been q curious and accepted
fact that in natural history that bass-viol
playing is fatal to the performers back hair,
and that parrots are more than usually dis
posed to profanity when employed in q
! clergyman's family; but that the telegraph
had anything to do with the multiplication
Of rabbits has hitherto been unknown. Yet
this seems to be the case, according to the
tsstimonsy Of several Texan, and therefore
unimpeachable, papers, which have recently
and conclusively shown that since the intro
duction Of the telegraph along the line of the
Rio Grande, FROM Laredo to Fort Rinsgold,
the jackass rabbit has increased TO such an
extent that he threatens to overrun the
country. The jackass rabbit of that section
has heretofore been upright and peacesble in
his habit, and although not Of much use ex.
cert to furnish the local dogs with occas-
sienal healthful exercise, and to supply the
native mincemeat vendors with all able sub
stitute for their usual wares during the
periodical cat famines which sometimes
sweep the State, was universally accorded to
be as free from guile as 1t is possible for a
Texan to be. During the day he crouched
innocently in the shade of the mesquit, the
Spanish bayonet and the prickly pear, and at
sundown elevated his majestic ears and as.
sumed that devout attitude which has
always struck travellers with dumb surprise
as being proof positive that there were ex-
ceptions to the generally accepted rule that
nothing could pray on the Rio Grande.
Upon the military telegraph line being built
by Lieutenant Greeley, now of Arctic fame.
this was all changed. The line was run by
that officer in 1875 from Fort Clark to Fort
Brown, and passed through q small but
thickly settled community of well-disposed
rabbits a few miles below Laredo. For
several years no outbreak occurred, but this
is perhaps due to the fact that the line did
not work well. Lieutenant Greeley, although
an able telegraph engineer. had unfortun.
ately been educated In Washington, where
the Texan hornet Is unknown. He therefore
used in the construction of his line an insu-
later which met the approval Of the most
advanced Washington electricians, but which
unfortunately contained large and comfort
able cavity between the can and the shaft
Four days after the line was completed 1t
ceased working. Battery power was added
in vain, and investigation showed no break
in the continuity of wire. The insulation
was evidently wrong, however, and 1t took
Lieutenant Greeley three weeks to ascertain
that the border hornets, laboring under the
impression tina: the line was built for their
exclusive benefit, had filed every individual
insulator with mud and had established
communities in every post throughout the
entire circuit. This put Lieutenant Greeley
into frame of mind peculiarly Texan, but
he finally went patiently over his work
again, this time taking good care that the in
sulators were solid as o cannon-ball. The
hornets got in some fine work on the scien-
ti6c party during this process of reconstruc-
tion, but once ousted, gave no further elec.
trical trouble. Now, however, comes the
riot and suffusion Of jackass rabbits, which,
though not as stimulating to personal
activity as Lieutenant Greeley's elected hor-
nets, are said to be vastly more destructive
to property. It seems that from the formerly
staid and self-contained village near Laredo
have swarmed untold thousands of maniacal
rabbits to devastate the border to such an
extent that the inhabitants are unable longer
to cultivate tobacco, red pepper and garlic,
and are compelled to exc out q miserable
existence on crackers and whisky. It is
difficult to account for the phenomenon on
known electrical principles, but 1t is certain
that 1t is Lieutenant Greeley's line with the
improved insulator which has caused the
trouble, and it therefore behooves the
authorities at Washington to recall him at
once from the North Pole and set him to ex.
anining this new and most perncious phase
of telegraph engineering In Texas.