The Portland daily press., 1890-11-17
the MEXICAN MULE.
A Dissertation Inspired by M.
Scnwatka's Experience.
Mexican Letter.

mond be compared with the fire Of the
opal.
A BLOOD CURDLING WAY.
On the mountain trail this distinct
species of mule was never known to fall,
although he has an exasperating and
blood curdling way of stumbling along
over it that would raise the hair on end
of a bald headed man. Many time !
have watched the mule was compelled
to ride with view of discovering his
methods of trying to scare me to death,
as payment for past injuries. Often
times the trail would lead past dizzy
heights or cliffs, where one could look
sheer down far enough to be dead.before
he reached the bottom should he fall,
and every few feet along the trail, Of a
foot to a foot and half in width, ii
would have tumbled in foot or so and
again taken up the original inclination
of the mountain, or about that of the
leaning tower of Pisa. Here the mule
would always be sure to stick one foot
and stumble little bit, but always re-.
gain its equilibrium at the next step.
having clearly done it Intentionally, and
for no other purpose than pure cussed-
ness. One can imagine the cool Alpine
zephyr that is waited up the dorsal
vertebrp with sufficient force to blow
the hair straight up OIL end.
If you have touched the beast during
the last three or four days with the whip
or dug into its sides with the spurs when
it was absorbed in melancholy refec-
tons, it will be sure to remember it when
you are climbing over the comb of cliff
5000 feet high, and at the least move
ment of your feet or twitching of your
fingers it will throw its head high in the
air like hound ON the scent and 90
stumbling over every pebble and blade Of
grass on the dangerous way, evidently
trying to make you regret that you had
tried to punish SO delicate creature. At
any other time you can turn double
somersaults on its back, or act like q raw
ing maniac, and it will not increase its
funereal march a foot day as result
of your actions. Whenever trail leads
exceptionally near a cliff, before it turns
on the reverse grade down or up hill, the
Mexican mule never fails to go within an
inch of the crest and let hind leg over
with slight culver as it turns around.
All these mountain trails are full of little.
round, hard stones about the size of mar
bles and larger, hidden underneath car
peting of pine needless These are liable
to make mule stumble if two feet are
on stones at once; but this is very rare,
although they always go sliding over
them onsthe sleeper trails.
1t is wonderful how these rotund rocks,
hidden under the pine needles on the
trail or off Of it, will throw human be-
ing PROSTATE if he dismounts few min.
utes to take walk on a slope and stretch
his stiffened limbs. OF course the mule,
under Roadway, walks over them before
it can stop. Hobnails in shoes, nor
anything of mans make, help to avoid
them.
A PLEASANT PASTME,
There is another pastime in which the
Mexican mule delights, and in which
you won't. 1t likes to deviate enough to
go under every low branched tree on the
trail, and SO universal is this trait of
character that the trail seems to lead
from one low tree or vine to another.
just as the mules seem a mind to make
it. The lodging of limbs and branches
among the pines, expresses and oaks in
the highlands was not so bad, but down
in the tierras calientes, or hot lands,
where brambly mosquito and thorny
vines were tearing crescents out of your
clothes until you looked like group of
Turkish ensigns, it was much more
monotonous.
The beast was compelled to ride had
one ear cut off near the head and looked
topheayy in the extreme. AS mules
ears make up goodly portion of it, as
seen in elevation from the saddle on its
back, was always frightened when he
approached a cliff on the unabridged side
and instinctively leaned in to counter
poise the heavy weight that I thought
might drag us over the precipice. He
was Familiarity known by the party as
sold Steamboat" "Old Lumber Yard"
and other names indicating his charac-
teristics, but he was large and so was I,
and he fell to my lot. When first saw
his abbreviated auricular appendage, as a
member Of the society for the prevention
Of cruelty to mules, felt incensed when
I heard that it had been lost by the cut
of a whip in the hands of previous dri-
yer; but before we had been acquainted
week I had transferred all my sympa-
thy from the mule to the man, whoever
he may have been. On the level ground
he was slower than the cook, who took
fifteen minutes to wash spoon, but on
perilous path Of half a foot in width
IN dizzy precipice the way he could box
the compass with the lone ear, so as to
catch some faint sound atwhich he could
get frightened at this inopportune time,
made me wish could cut off the other
ear at the third cervical vertebr@.-