Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-10-11

between chosen divisions of soldiers, the
tournament, racing, etc.
Many of the poor sell everything they
possess in order to secure pocket money for
the occasion. In most foreign countries,
and especially in Spanish America, it is
quite the correct thing to visit pawnshops,
wherein may be picked up many choice and
curious souvenirs, such, for example, as
diamonds in antique settings, golden spoons,
silver candle sticks, splendidly embroidered
shawls, silver-plated spurs, prayer-books
bound in mother of pearl, etc. A few weeks
after Diez ocho, when the short time has
elapsed during which these may be re-
deemed by their owners (and they seldom
are redeened), is the best time Tor pawn
shop purchasing.
BALMACEDA ONE YEAR AGO.
The funniest part of this patriotic season
IS the preliminary spree which always pre-
ceeds the regular celebration by just two
weeks, and is supposed to appropriately
LEAD up to 1t. This extra jollihcatlon Is
known as Diez Y ocho chico-"Little Eight
cen and is continued from one to three
days. Though participated in BY all classes,
from the President down to the humblest
peon, 1t Is not considered quite as swell as
the later celebration.
spent last Diez ocho chico in Santiago
only one little year agol Then the hero
OF the hour, surrounded by his happy fam
lily, was the now despised Balmaceda. The
troubles that eliminated in his melancholy
suicide were already begun, but nobody
dreamed that they would end in war. At
the races last year, and the subsequent dress
parade on the fashionable drive, the Balma-
ceda coach, containing the President. his
handsome wife and two young daughters,
were the observed of all observers; and the
rabble who lately shouted with ioy at his
death were as ready then to rend the air
with vivas in his honor. With that ire
sPonslble element it is lie roi est mort;
vive lie roi."
THE DICTAToR's FORTUNE GONE
One year ago the late President was not
only popular and happy man, but a very
rich one, and that poverty could ever over
take him or his seemed entirely out of the
question; yet he died so poor that all the
money he possessed had been given him by
his wife from her private fortune to assist
his flight. The widow and her children are
left not only penniless, but homeless, for
the victors wantonly burned and sacred their
house, as we'll as that of Balmaceda's
aged mother.
In this third city of the Republic, the
patriotism of Diez ocho chico has been
rampant for four and twenty hours, and still
canuons are booming and bands are playing
viva Chile" and carriages dashing to and
fro carrying gaily dressed people with glad
faces. The fashionable resort of Conception
Is the Alameda Lombardy poplars grow
thlcklv, In long rows from end to end of the
Alameda On either side of the first line of
noble trees, rows of tents have been set
some made of boards covered with cloth,
some of old carpets, and others of canvass.
These molly houses are occupied during
Diez v ocho by thousands of country peo-
pie, all dressed in their best-whole neigh
borhoods together, bent on having week of
thorough enjoyment.
THE HOLIDAY MENU OF CHILE.
Should you call for meal at one of these
hostelries you would find the menu about as
follows: Soup made of chopped CLAIMS,
beef Kidneys cabbage and onions; the lungs
of fat pigs, broiled; boiled sea crabs, gar :.
nished with the grilled entrails of pigs;
roasted ''sea urchins," served in their pur-
pie shells; fried fish, with sauce prepared
from oxfeet; roast turkey stuffed with
onions, spices, red peppers and coryanders;
fried peas, pepper salad, bread, cheese and
yerba mate-the tea of Paraguay, slipped,
boiling hot, through a silver tube the size
of straw. You can take the whole course,
standing, for the modest sum of
about So; or, if more economically in
clined, you may find a cheaper al
tentative on the back side of the same tent,
where, for % cents, you can join the family
dinner of boiled meat and vegetables, all
eating from the same wooden bowl; and an
extra medic (6 cents) will secure you two
or three glasses of wine with which to wash
it down. Every tent is ballroom and a
saloon, as we'll as hotel, where two or
three young women sing the plaintive airs
of the cuaca, accompanying their voices with
guitars; while couple after couple come SOL
emnly forward, twirl their handkerchiefs |
and dance, and the bvstanders keep time by
the clapping of hands. Casks, barrels and
bottles of wine are strewn all about; and so,
while some skip 'the light fantastic" others
drink; and they in turn drink and dance
again, until all become too top-heavy for
further effort. The wine being the pure
juice of the grape, it produces no i'll effects
but temporary stupor, which soon wears
of. FANNIE B. WARD.