The copper country evening news. [volume] (Calumet, Mich.) 18??-1907, 1897-11-06
HIS GRIM PROSPECT.
AMERICAN STONE MASON'S LIFE
ENDS WITH HIS JOB.

The Handiwork of Years In Mexico to BE
Crowned With Death by Shooting - He
Had Killed IA Citizen-A Military Guard
Watch Him.
He can t for the life of him finish that
iob He has had seven years of labor,
and, according TO all ancient and mod
ern laws, he is entitled to seven years
OF rest. But he doesn't want to rest
He doesn't crave "a surcease of toll. He
doesn't ask for holiday
He works TO live, and the only reason
he is permitted to live is because he
works, because his work is necessary to
the completion of thing of beauty.
which is destined to be a JOY forever to
the good people of San Luis Potosi and
their descendants after them. When his
labor is finished, his handiwork will be
crowned by volley of bullets fired
straight at his heart by file of the
most expert marksmen in the Mexican
city
That's why he doesn't hurry. That's
why the decoration of the town hall,
on which millions and millions of dol
lars have been spent, grows so slowly
Careful computers say that this artisan
will probably finish the job by the year
1860, figuring on his present and past
rate of execution.
San Luis Potosi prides itself on that
hall. When 1t is completed, it is to be
the eighth wonder OF the world There
lon - - 81.
most skillful stone masons the state of
Pennsylvania could turn out were inn
ported seven years ago to do the orna-
mental carving on its front. They were
well up in all branches of their art and
the exterior of the hall grew beautiful
and more beautiful under their educated
guiding fingers.
The Pennsylvanians found life in this
sunny, dreamy, southern city, with it's
limpid eyed senoritas, its fragrant
cigarillos and its insidious pulque, not
all unenjoyable They fiirted with the
brunette beauties, they blew the scented
smoke OF the baby cigars through their
] American noses and they tucked glass
, alter glass of the spirit of the cactus
under their loose fitting outing shirts.
One Fourth of July the American
eagle and the Mexican eagle came to-
| gether They mixed it up. After the
clawing contest was finished and the
| revolver smoke had cleared away it was
| found that the "greaser" population OF
San Luis Potosi had been decreased by
one, and that the American colony had
suffered the loss by flight of eleven
twelfths of its members The other
| American stood stupidity staring at the
deceased Mexican, and when the police
came to the saloon he made no resist
ance to arrest
| He should be shot He had killed a
citizen, and he must die But the carv-
ing on the new city hall? The Ameri-
cano's companions had fled. He alone
in all San Luis Potosi could 20 Oh with
( the work Well. be it SO. He should
continue the decorations, and when he
finished death should be his. The pen
atty was deferred, not RENTED. A
( pleasant prospect for an American
Hardly an incentive to heroic exertion
or even moderate speed. And so the
] WOThludu WCut db LIS tdsh Will muCh
the same idea of prolonging 1T as ami
mates the gifted space writer who elabo-
rates paragraph into page.
| He works not with n-ad haste, nor
| yet with an attention to detail which
in its result is pleasing co the critical
I eye of the art loving Mexican, while II
yet gals his spirit, which cries aloud
for the life of this deliberate Ameri.
cano. The workman lights his pipe and
| climbs slowly to his platform on the
edge of the great white wall and with
chisel and hammer calmly and carefully
chops away at gargoyles and puts arts
tic touches on the griffins' heads Far
below. in the lazy Mexican street, "a file
| of San Luis Potosi soldiers stand with
guns, ready to intercept any attempt to
escape which the stone mason may make.
New York Herald.