The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1894-07-21
A LONE FISHERMAN.
Tranquil Fishing, Donkeyback, His
Years of Adventure Round.

ears OF Adventure 1SJUuQs
'sThc picture Of man sitting on q
burro in mid-stream, in the heart of
the southern Sierras. miles from any
where, has nothing remarkable in it, /"
said the naturalist; "but when You con-
slider the burro as asleep, and the rider
holding a fishing line with one hand
and well-thumbed copy of Edipus
with the other, which he is reading
through clouds of smoke from a we'll
filed pipe, the scene takes on another
phase.
''Snch man met one day in the
great river of verdure known as the
Arroyo Seco. that winds away from
Los Angeles up through the San Gabriel
valley, entering the Sierras at Pasadena
and for mile. passing through region
"'Senor - began.
"'sebastian,' he replied without
looking up. )
"Senor Sebastian / continued, 4
regret, in these solitudes, to be obliged
to inform you that you are infringing a
patent right Of mine
"'How SOP retorted Senior Sebastian,
glancing up from the book, which he
now dropped into the pocket of his cor
duroy coat.
"'In this: I was the originator If
fishing on horseback
".Ah!' said the senior, you may be
the inventor. but / am the improver.
seeY And for the first time / noticed
that the line was fastened to n hole in
the tip of the burro's ear. III you have
ever Observed said the fisherman, the
habits of the burro, or we will say his
head, you will have noticed that the
ears are always moving back and forth.
It's just the motion / want IN fishing,
SO adopted it, and See
''As he spoke tho line stiffened out,
the burro's ear, or, to be exact, his
right ear, bent forward suddenly, and
the burro himself awolxe with start
".Watch him. said the fisherman
The burro's eye had first settled on me
in an inquiring way, then realizing
that something was Juggling at his car,
he drew the member up to the hori-
zontal, at which the trout, for such it
was, left the water with q bound, and
in its return drew the ear down again.
The burro now seemed to concentrate
all his energies in the contest. and the
ear gravitated between the upright and
the horizontal You see,' remarked
Senior Sebastian again, the burro plays
the fish, and L. suiting the action to
the word, pull him in And, with the
air of the philosopher he was, the
speaker unlocked the trout, dropped it
into pocket of his coat, and having
impaled fresh worm and cast the line,
the fisherman felt for his Gdipus. and
the burro fell asleep.
81 deem it. continued the senior,
after relighting his pipe, the privilege,
if not the duty, Of man to take life at
the normal angle, or as near it as pos
sible; in other words, take solid COM
fort have seen the hard side of i.
right in sight of these mountains. l
came here forty years ago, when the
whole country was sheep ranch. /
walked across the Mojave desert in Au-
gust, and see now they find men dead
who have tried it Yes, was after
gold and adventure, and got both.
4" 1t came about in this way and the
senior. getting no further bites, rolled
up his line and joined me on the trail
up the arroyo 4 was living in Santa
Fe in the fities, trading mostly, and
one night man rushed into the saloon
where was and said man was dying
and wanted to see a priest was
Catholic and the next best thing, so
went along. You know where the old
palace is to-day in Santa Fe? Well, he
took me down street back of that,
and in an old adobe found q man, a
half breed, with death in his face. He
had been stabbed in brawl an hour
before, and was SO near gone that
didn't have the heart to tell him was
not a priest He sent the others out
of the room, then babe me lock the
door, and with his mouth to my ear
told me to remember what he said He
had been bad man, had killed sew
eral men, ind wanted to do something
to expiate his crime. SO told his secret
to the church He told me to pull off
his belt, which l did, and in it was
row of some of the biggest chunks
OF gold l ever saw in this coun-
try. In another part was an old piece
of sheepskin, and on it map, rude.
but good enough, of these very noun
tains. lie said that he and two others
had discovered a valuable placer in the
mouth of canyon where you could
pick up pieces like those, and confessed
xIs.< l. - -
control of it all. The murder was
done on the desert at Coyote Springs.
and after he had covered the bodies in
the sand he started back to the placer
He got there at night. Said he: 4
don't know how it happened. but the
next knew found myself in herd