The record-union., 1897-12-06
LIFE ENDS WITH HIS JOB.
An Americans Handiwork to be
Crowned With Death.

AAS~A -
He can't for the life of him finish that
job. He has had seven years of labor,
and, according to all ancient and modern
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 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 vo1ley 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
1850, figuring on his present and past
rate Of execution.
San Luis Potosi prides itself on that
hall. When it is completed it is to be
the eighth wonder of the world. There
shall be none beside it. A dozen OF the
most skillful stone masons the State OF
Pennsylvania could turn out were i'm
ported seven years ago to do the orna-
mental carving on its front. They were
we'll 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
funny, dreamy, southern city, with It's
limpid eyed senortas, it's fragrant cigar
illos and it's insidious pulque, not all un-
enjoyable They flirted with the bru-
Eette beauties, they blew the scented
smoke of the baby cigars through their
American noses and they tucked glass
after glass of the spirit of the cactus
under their loose 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
SuHer6O the loss Ny lilSAI VI SiS'SAA
twelfths of it's 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
citizen, and he must die. But the carv-
ing on the new City Hall? The Ameri-
canos companions had fled. He alone
in all San Luis Potosi could go on 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
workman went at his task with much
the same idea of prolonging it as ami
mates the gifted space writer who elab-
crates a paragraph into a page.
He works not with mad haste, nor yet
with passionate application. but with an
attention to detail which in it's result is
pleasing to the critical eye of the art
loving Mexican, while it yet gals his
spirit, which cries aloud for the life of
this deliberate Americana. The work
man lights his pipe and climbs slowly
to his platform on the edge of the great
white wall, and with chisel and ham,
nIer calmly and carefully chops away at