Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-12-29
KILLING AND DYING.
Some Men Take Very Little Punish
ment, While Others Never Get
Enough.
One Nm Shot six inns, Fur Tim g Through
the Body, rursu.s ami Kills His
Slayer-Tha kpif. w. the Gun.
Special Correspondence o, the aazst..

Special Correspondence OF the Gazet.e
SAN ANTONIO. TEX. Dee. 26.-The
frontier surveyor filled an armchair
planted on the sidewalk in front of she
Menger hotel. he sat in an easy atti-
tude, with head slightly thrown back
and one hand hanging lisilessly upon his
knee. He was in the Retrospective
mood that IL bred by full stomach.
Between his lips was Mexican cigar OF
great length aud blackness, and of q
strength sublime. Not a stones throw
away squatted the building known In
song and story as the alamo. A
radiance. From the cool surface of the
river little breeze sprang, wandered
coylr over the paving and tionted in
through the windows of the parIor in
which piano was responding to skilled
fingers while girls contrsIto was Civ
ing the softest strains of 'Old Madrii. -
We had been talking of the way in which
Bowie, Crockett and Travis ed, and
the surve, or had tersely remarked that
they d displayed admirable pluck but in
fernuily poor judgment. From the dis
cussion of the fiual disposition of the re-
mans, the conversation drifted TO KILL
ings in general, deeds of daring, of as
sa-s.nation, of violence in all forms so
well known to the frontier. A slenderly
bu 1t. light-hsired young fellow, with
long narrow blue eyes, d quiet manner
au q large solitaire PIN, had been tell
ing us of some of the eccentricities of
bullets he had known in the course of an
extended experience in Arizona and
elsewhere. 1t was suggested that after
all the invention of man and the fruits
of his restless desire to Kill his fellow the
knife was still
THE MOST DEADLY WEAPON,
producing more fatal results with less
nuise aud in q much more neat. clean
aud scientific manner. The Colts re-
volver OF forty-hve caliber, it was con-
tended, was beautiful! instrument, and
fully capable OF throwing its pellet OF
lead through aud through four year
Old steer st ninety Yards, but Its shock
was not sufficient to instantly disable a
determined adversary and render him
harmless, AS cattle owning me IN Der
of the group observed, cit didn't make
a man sick quick enoughA'' In these
concur. As u weapon of offence or de-
fence he had small use for the revolver.
II the use of firearms were compulsory
he would choose q ten-gauge cylinder
bcred shotgun, with four and one-half
drachms of powder, two pink edged
wads and fifteen rblue whistler buck
shot. His preference, however, was for
the knife with the transverse handle,
nntlN lad hn ri
dirk - This little bit of metal, he sail
was lnconspicuous, was easily carried,
Gould not possibly be wnrded off and was
altogether poem of murder. With one
he would guarantee to stop John L. Sui
liyan in an enthusiastically portion of q
round and never turn 9 hair.
"But want TO say,'' he went on,
"that there are men aud men. Some of
them will stand very little punishment,
while others never get enough. 1 have
known q miner TO walk block and ask
for drink of water after being shot
through the heart, aud have known au
extremely powerful Irish drayman to
sirken and die from 6 scratch with q PEN
knife. This is partly the result OF phvsi-
cal organization and partly the result of
pride or lack OF pride. When party to
an affray k.e;s his head and stands
killing we'll, he Is ordinarily said to have
plenty of nerve In some cases it Is to
his credit; sometimes be can't any more
help it than can help the Rio Grande to
run up stream.
"Here and there, in pretty nearly
every state of the Union aud in pretty
nearly every couutry of the western
hemisphere, l have seen physical cour-
age, or bravery, or nerve, or what you
may Choose 20 call it in all OF its forms,
and they are as various as the courses of
the stars. From the iInpulsive Latin,
who goes off like powder in pan. TO the
phlegmatic Swede, who fights because
he had as soon do that as anything else,
they have been tested in my sight. AZ
a summary or these things that l have
seen prefer the ng!o-Saxon American
to the entire bunch. Tha: reminds me,
as the saying goes. desire to prefaf8.
what is to follow by the statement that
il isevery word Of 1t literally true. 1 shall
eXaggerate nothing. Indeed, as the
story Is little short of the marvellous,
shall eudeavor to keep inside the actual
facts.
NEARLY ten years ago I had charge
OF party that WAS surveying q portion
of the route from Laredo, Tex, to :he
City of Mexico, over which the Mexican
National narrow gauge now runs. The
country was very troubled. The COM
moner Mexicaus viewed the coming of
the Americans with an aversion they
were al no pains TO conceal. Their dis
like not infrrquently took the form OF
overt violence. Consequently, in Sc
lecting the men TO form the corps. was
Obliged 10 look rot alone to their COM
potency. but to engage such as thought
could be depended upon i'll case of an at
tack. l promise you that it as great
outfit that at last left Laredo for the in
terror of the Cactus republic. There
were thirty in all, not man OF them
over thirty years or under twenty
FIVE, well bred. well educated aud
thoroughly unattached. believe that
was the ouly family man in the party.
In securing such personnel had less
IsaRble than you might think, because,
th6 in vasion of Mexico by American CAP
ital had attracted hordes of adventurous
young spirits, of all trades and profess
sions. who lined the border from one end
to the other.