Los Angeles daily herald., 1889-08-13
A WILD GERMAN.
He Hunts Buried Money I'm a
Graveyard.

Graveyard.
The police were notified last night Of
the peculiar actions of a crazy German
and two Mexicans, who visited the Cath
olic cemetery on Buena Vista street on
Sunday night and had stated their inten-
ton of returning again last night. The
Germans mania consisted of a fanatical
belief in his powers of finding buried
money among the graves of the dead.
He had obtained admission to the GEM
etery by means of some excuse or other
given to the sexton, but had
acted so strangely as to lead
those who saw his performances
to believe that species of Voodooism
was being carried on. Hearing of the
crank's peculiarities, a couple of reporters
determined to investigate the matter, to
see whether the German would return as
he had promised, and accordingly about
10 O'Clock last night they scaled the rail
ings round the graveyard on Buena Vista
street, and hid themselves behind a vault
on the main avenue.
About fifteen minutes later sounds Of
approaching footsteps were heard, and
presently the three fanatics came to q
halt right in front of the vault behind
which the reporters were hid. The two
Mexicans were outposted to guard the
approaches, and the crazy Dutchman
pulled out of his capacious pockets
bottle of holy water and Bible. He
first made the sign of the cross upon the
foreheads of his believers and then upon
himself, after which he made circle
upon the ground large enough for him to
stand within.
A candle was produced, and charm
composed of piece Of paper with hiero-
glyphics upon it WAS buried in the earth.
Then the candle was lighted, and the
high priest knelt down and read chap
ter from Exodus. Just as he
was in the midst of his devo-
tions, one of the reporters injudiciously
stepped from behind the vault so as to
see better what was going on, and was
confronted with the appalling spectacle
OF tombstone smoking cigarette. This
delusion was caused by one of the Mexi-
can outposts, who had stationed himself
behind tombstone, nothing but his
head being visible.
OF the two the Mexican, perhaps, was
the more scared, and he Immediately
rushed back to the German and in
formed him Of what he had just seen.
The crank, however, Immediately blew
out his light. and instructed the Mexican
to keep quiet, as his prayers were being
answered-that which he had seen be-
ing friendly spirit coming to show him
where the money was buried. The Mex
ican got worse scared than ever at this
information and his teeth audibly chat
tered.
The reporters in the meantime escaped
into the shade of friendly group Of
trees near by and awaited developments.
They came sooner than expected, for a
huge pslecat disturbed the Germans
incantations, backed up close to where
the crank knelt and made its presence
suddenly known by most unpleasant
method. This broke up the whole per-
formsnce, but the German WAS heard. as
the party moved away, demonstrating
with the scared Mexican for having
broken the spell by speaking out loud.
He stated his intention of revisiting the
place tonight, but it is more than likely
that he will be in the padded cell of the
County Jail at the time he expects to
make his next attempt.