The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1893-07-30
.THEEISS OFDEATH.
A STORY OF TIE EAR WEST.
From the san Francisco can

horses head as an awkward griuEo might
have been, Strange, too. he could not
move. He could not even sit up. Those
cursed rocks, His back had received a
severe wrench, that was certain. And
then, that odd feeling Of numbuess in his
legs
The sun was beating DOWN INTO his
eyes. and over all the barren hills and
the wide sand wastes Of the river there
was a dazzle of heat that was binding
There lay his broad soalbrero lust little
distance from his hand. Heavens, how
il panied him to move and after all he
had not reached it. And he could not
even turn his back 10 the sun. Well.
well! if one cannot turn his back TO the
suns RAYS. one can at least endure them.
A man docs not cry out like a child when
he is hurt. Pablo lay back silently upon
the rocky ground, pulling his matted
black hair low down over his forehead
That, at least, would give some prCtec-
ton
Then he tried to remember what il was
that had occurred. He had left the
Ortega ranch house in the morning TO
ride over the low hills to the Guyana
river. searching for cattle. Ramon had
told him. he recalled now, to beware lest
the pinto should stumble with him in a
bad place. and he had laughed the warn
ing to scorn What if thepinto did stun
bic? Was he not Yaquero enough to
keep his seat when a horse fell2 And
anyway, there were few better horses
upon the range than the pinto True, he
Old stumble now and again, as he ambled
up and down the mountain slopes, but
there was never a beast of surer foot in
ali the region when wild cattle were in
view and when he was hot on the chase
And SO he had ridden the pinto, and the
pinto had fallen with him. He remem-
bered il all now 1t was early morning
when he had left the ranch house and
they had gone along well enough until
nearly noon. He recalled distinctly that
he had begun rolling cigarette, whist
ling softly the while as do Spaniards
when idle, and he had. thought as he
poured out the tobacco from his buck
skin pouch that the cattle had assuredly
gone a long way from home to look for
pasture. That was where he had turned
of from the Pine Mountain trail TO take
short cut down to the GUYANA short
CIT known to but few of the vaqueros on
the range 1t was foolish of him to have
thrown his foot out of the stirrup, as he
did to light his cigarette, but all good .
vaqueros grow careless through the fam
iliarity with horses, and who was to
know that The pinto would take it into
HIS perverse equine head to stumble
Just there?
But the pinto had stumbled Yes; it
all came back to him. II came back, OH
very distinctly. The quick pitching for
ward OF che hOrse-his own instructive
effort 10 recover his balahce-the luuge
of the pinto. as the brute felt the great
cruel spur sink deep into its side-a SEN
satiOn as of fiyine-the sun revolved into
a million whirling points OF light, and
then darkness.
And now he is lying there helpless in
the sun with his back broken. With a
slfudder the gravity of his hurt came to
him. That intense agony when he moved,
making him cry out like a woman and
that numbness in his legs could be &C
counted for IN no other way. 1t seemed
as though the lower part of his body was
dead and only his brain lived, working
more actively than it had ever worked
before
Yes, it all came back to him-aH the
details of his awkward fall, and a great
many Other't things besides. He had no
notion that one human life, lived as the
generality Of men live out their lives,
without malice and without emotions
stronger than the animal has, could hold
iR it so much of wrong TO the lives of
others.
And now, having lived to die. Dying
Is not hard, senior. All things that have
life die somehow. somewhere-thOugb no.
lie
heat cooking bis brain, and thus to die of
hunger and ofthirst and of heat, enduring
the agony of thousand deaths before the
end camel To lie so close TO human help
and yet so far from human help as would
be man upon another world
Few OF the Yaqueros knew the trail
upon (which Pablo had fallen, and none
would think of looking for him there.
NaYIthey would think that he had found
shelter at one of the cattle camps upon
the Guyana, continuing his search furth-
er and further into the wild hills, and it
migNJ be days before he was even missed.
it b not hard to die-and yet, o God!
how tile strqng vitality of man fights for
ltSsRxlstence To die, 10 sink into delir-
ium, TO suffer, half conscious, the horrors
Of unconsciousness! That IS what APP
palled Pablo,
but, bark! Was it cry that
he heard echDing through the rocky,
canBonsl He raised his head, pushing
back tbe matted hair from his eyes He
o9pAspse his hands yet, and his neck was
t4s5s eFroken. The hurt was lower than
49, Again and again he shouted, yell
HSHnadlyin'h his despair-and the echoes
Came back to,hlm as the wells of demons
cGanetO the wicked at the last Then, 81
lenee,' %Nho spoke therel Curse you,p
he muttered Come in front of me that
Inlay see you. Why do YOU mock mef1
49, Ntt2 SAAAJ q hNiAOAOs WIS ublO. man
SpaniaPd and half Indian. stolid and
little given 10 thinking. Let him but
ride all day after cattle, rolling cigarettes
and whistling softly TO himself, with
plenty Of tortillas and frijoles night and
morning, and a sandea IN the season, with
now and again a Sunday visit to the
senoritas at the mission and to the priest.
and he had asked nothing more. Thought
was as far from him as from the horse he
rode, 1t may be even, that it was furth-
err
land -now-well; one has but to lie help
less on his back in the sun upon a lonely
Iu0untaiR trail to find that his brain can
move, though his body cannot. be he
newer so unused to the process of think
ing A man is but a man. senior, though
he sink sometimes to the stolidity of the
brute.
Silence again. He laughed aloud.
presently. Why, he had but been talking to
himself. The heat grew more intense
yet even the sun could not dry the cold
weat that covered him.
Anal There was q sound at last, a
slow, rhythmic singing sound that filed
the still air all about him-a sound that
was yet in harmony with the silence.
Slowly, painfully Pablo reached down for
the revolver that he always carried at
ms DeIt#-reached down and found it gone
1t had been thrown from its holster in his
faIh and he could catch Just the CLEAN of
; 20 an