Helena weekly herald. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1867-1900, 1885-10-08
No. ~
A WILD BOAR HUNT.
HARPoONlNG PIGS FROM THE BACK
OF a MULE, IN HONDURAS
A Dangerous Encounter-A Guide Up =
Tree-Charging Upon . whole
Drove of Enraged Brutes-
Routed at Last.


The ubiquitous guide made discovery
which turned his yellow face to an ashen
hue. and brought him from the stream,
where he had gone for water, yelling:
@Chanca del monte, Chanca del monte"
A slender-legged hog was trotting about
fifty PAGES in the frightened mans rear. It
had a couple of glittering white tusks on
either side of its jaw, which il proceeded To
whet ON the roots of a walnut tree in which
Rafael took shelter.
"Climb, climb, senors!" he exclaimed, as
soon as he was safely out of reach: "tnere is
a-plenty of them coming. Take up much
powder and much shots. or they will keep
US treei until we starve'
But the seuors did not mean TO be treed
at all They recognized in the animal the
hog against which the harpoons were to be
used, and Insteal Of leaping into tree they
got into the saddle and unstrappsd the
spears which were beside the guns on the
mules backs ready for the march.
patter OF little feet in the forest told
that Rafaels plenty of them were coming,
and Davys spuFred at once toward the
brute, which was still grunting at the foot
of tie walnut tree.
when it saw me coming" said Mr..
Davys, as he told the story III the Gibson
hOu-t inbhN OttH aAAtiuobtAs II 60heSA
toward me- AMI it took all the strength in
my left hand to keep my mule from turning
tail and boiling, but kept her head well to
il, and as the boar closed with us my blade
caught him at the base Of the skull and
shaved away the skin along his spine clean
to the tail It was awkward work for a
green hand. and If the mule had not SHE'D
violently to one side the rush of the pig
would have certainly broken his
foreleg The first taste of the harpoon
seemed to make the brute furious,
and with the blood stream
ING down his side he came back at me,
gnashiag his tusks with a noise like the rat
tie of a pair of bones at the minstrels. This
time j missed him altogether, and his sharp
teeth took couple Of square inches Of skin
from my mules off fore leg. But at the
third charge gave him the harpoon square
in the eye. He reared mp on his launches
and fell over backward, taking the lance
out of my hand in his fall.
by this time Smith had closed with the
leaders of the drove, which had broken
cover when they heard the struggle going
on, and i saw there was no time 70 get out
of the saddle and pick up my spear,
so / tore my gun out OF the fasten-
ings which held it TO the saddle be-
hind me, and put a charge of buck
shot into The throat of a bristly boar who
was goring Smiths mule in the rear. After
that had all | could do to take care of my
self. The little beaSts-none of them bigger
than an ordinary bull-dog-came at me
like a whirlwind. AMI for ths next ten
minutes | expected to be thrown into the
middle of them. The mule was doing ner
level best to unseat me, and all the indica-
tions pointed to her being brought to the
ground with broken legs. The skin was
torn from her shanks in ribbons, and il
had gone down il would have been all day
with me.
~Smith soon saw that the case was too
serious to trust to the harpoons any longer,
and, after sticking one through the neck,
he threw the spear away and joined me in
thinning the drove out with his rifle. This
was much quicker work, and after we had
bowled over six, and wounded several more,
the whole party became panic-stricken and
raced away in the woods like so many
deer.
"When the coast was clear Rafael came
down from his perch. He looked at the
dead hogs and then at US. with an expires
sion OF reverence on his face. 'El norte esta
diablo,' was all he said.
"For a man who knows how to handle a
lance or harpoon, pig-stickiny may be
good sport; hut, for my part, | would not
venture into the midst of a drove Of Central
American hogs with a harpoon as my weapon
for a clean title deed to the whole country"