The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-11-25
LASS0ING A BEAR.
1T IS A FEAT WHICH IS NOT EASILY
ACCOMPLISHED.


From the sun Francisco Cali
Hasit ever fallen TO your lot, senior, 20 lasso
bear alone aud single-handeda dare say
that it has not. dare say more than that.
Even had the opportunity been given you
would not have taken it, be you never so
expert in the sports that become u good
vaquero.
1t is one thing to throw a galloping
steer and to press the red-hot iron upon its
sizzling flesh, leaving the brand before the
astonished brute has gathered its senses
after the fall A little child may do that.
L have seen little children, too small even for
the stirrups, do it in my country.
1t is the horse, my friend, that downs the
steer. 1t is almost the horse that throws
the rope, for it is the horses Judgment that
leads it to stop suddenly at exactly the
proper moment to secure the success OF the
cast. No man has betuer ally than his horse.
1t Is quite another thing TO lasso bear,
though the horse will do its part, too, in
that more perilous venture. The horse will
always do its part, given confidence in its
rider, though its knees culver and its great
frame shakes like a pine needle in a strong
| wind from very terror.
Three men may lasso a bear. o, three
men may do it easily, senior. There is only
rope about the brutes neck. another about
| It's foot and third about one of the psws
The horses control the monster, moving
this way and that and tumbling the bear
about and tangiing it in the ropes like rea-
| sonaole beings until the strong rawhtdes are
wound round aud round the bulky mass,
and until it Is helpless
AS A FISH IN THE NETS MEsHEs.
But Tor one man! There is the whirr of
| the RATA, and let it strike never SO surely,
| In an instant the bear is on the rope and is
coming inch by inch toward the man and
| the horse.
The monsters, senior, are 80 marvelously
| quick. 1t is bold man, then, who stands
his ground to fight and a holder horse.
| The embrace of the great bear is death to
| man and horse. and life is life, my friend.
The priests tell US there is something af-
| terward-but who knows9 The good man
| is content with what is already his, and the
bad man fears the nameless IN
| known. That is why no man courts death,
senior, and he woos death at first hand who
throws lasso upon grizzly.
And yet Ramon Ortega has done that. A
dare devil7 grant you that. But even a
coward has in him the admiration that all
men feel for reckless daring.
Q, yes: will tell you about 1t, but not
| now. There Is a place for all things-and
had meant this time to keep my promise to
relate the story of how Ramon, following
the bears to their den, had gone in single
handed and slain the monsters that were
feeding fat upon the carcasses Of his yearling
| steers.
1t was that summer that Ramon had
| driven his cattle into Potrero la Carpa.
Every body down about there will remem-
| Der the time, away back In the early '70S.
when the rain fell not during all the
| days Of the fall and spring, and when
the sun, burning always, dried up the springs
and the rivers and left the young calves to
| die because their starved mothers, gaunt
| and thin, could no longer give them to suck.
| Starvation conQuers even mother love, my
| friend, when the mothers blood is dried up.
All that spring, when the rains came not,
and when the grass sprouted only to dry up
and wither and blow away, Ramon went
about the hills seeking new pasture for his
herds, and at last, breaking through a bar
1 rier Of thick chemiscal rode out one morning
| upon the long red ridge that leads down by
easy slopes upon the open grassy glRdes and
low. rolling hills of La Carpa
1t was a paradise for a stockman, the
country upon which he had stumbled. In
the center of a long, winding canyon a
little clear stream, bank full even in that
dry time, rippled down toward the great
| rocky gorge that barred access to the vale
| from the shining sand wastes of the Guyana
valley, and upon either side stretched miles
and miles OF low hills. knee deep in alfleria
| and bunch grass.
To the south, far away beyond the grass
| lands, were lofty peaks covered with pines
| to the SUBMITS, and on the other side the
| grass came to where he stood, touching the
close barrier Of brush that shut in the land
and, even as he stood there, his good horse,
worn and weary. stopped its head TO crop
such feed as it had not known for months.
| 1t was a goodly land.
a fhaR he 10 rcllY pce lie
| live oak spread Its shades upon the grass
and, even as he looked, half dozen deer,
| disturbed for the first time by mans
presence there, broke cover and went
bouncing over the slopes, to disappear In
some side canyon, and to stand, great-eyed
and shivering, to watch the actions of the
foe they had known from birth, yet had
| never seen.
Tho beauty of it all was borne in upon
him, and the silence-but he did not listen
long. Ramon Ortega is practical man.
Turning bis horse, he rode back down
through the brush, his rawhide chapperejos
shielding him from its sharp points. and
within a week he had broken a trail
through and established his camp down by
the running stream and had his cattle feed
ing upon the rich grasses of Potrero la
Carpe.
But Ramon found evil in his paradise
| We all do senior, sooner or later. Perhaps
that is why the human heart must die be-
fore it eau obtain perfection.
And there is evil enough, Madre de Dios,
yes! when the bears
TAKE A YEARLING A WEEK,
and when not a calf can stray from the
herd and be found again alive. Ramon
Ortegs was not the man to be driven away
from good pasture by bears.
Good pasture is scarce enough at the best
of times. 1t is to be doubly treasured when
IL ia found in dry year-and man can
always fight Who fights wins in this world,
senior, even against the bears.
And so it came that Ramon, when his
camp was we'll settled, and when he had
leisure to look about hin-and. too, after
half dozen yearlings had been found lying
dead here and there upon the range. with a
forequarter or hind one partly eaten away
began to think Of hunting down the de-
stroyers Of his herd.
Ii was not a matter for deep cogitation.
this bear hunting. The brutes are bold
enough, and they will hunt the hunter about
as often as not. 1t is merely question OF
getting in the field first and Of giving the
first surprise.
Ramon rode out upon the range, here.
there and every where, day after day. He
hunted to kill. you see, and so he poisoned
the carcasses Of young steers left lying