The Kootenai herald. [volume] (Kootenai, Idaho) 1891-1904, 1898-08-20
EYES AND MARKMANSHIP.
Superiority of Northern Races Over
the Latins In This Particular.

The Saxon and the Celt, the Teuton
and the Norseman-which merely is to
say the blue-eyed people-possess ca
pacity for craftsmanship none of the
Latin races ever may hope to attain. 1t
isn't a Spaniard's fault that he cannot
fire a bullet straight He can't help it.
He was born than way. He has a racial
defect in far vision. The trouble is seated
in his eyes, and against blue-eyed an
tagonist he must always be the loser
when it comes to scoring at a target
at fairly long range. Neither can the
Indian or the negro shoot so as to make
anything. They mean well. but they
won't do.
What it is about The blue-eyed man
which renders his far-sight superior to
that of his dark-eyed cousin oculists are
not agreed upon. They have not salts
factorily determined whether his advan-
tage is derived from pigment which
clarifies the vision or whether the shape
of his lenses is somewhat different, fur
nishing him greater range of sight and
a more magnifed picture of distant OBJ
ects, but Regarding the fact itself they
have long since ceased contention.
All the historic marksmen of record
from Natty Bumpo to Captain Bogardus
have blue or hazel eyes. Look over
the long list of western killers who
fourished in the frontier days, now passed
away, and you will recall that the in
vincible ones, those who were quickest
on the trigger and who never missed their
man, were blue-eyed. Billy the Kid,
Wild Bill, Bat Masterson and Jesse
James-good men and bad, sheriffs up
holding the law and desperadoes defying
it-had eyes as blue as the unlocked sky
of June. The Tennessee mountaineers
who from behind Jackson's cotton bales
poured so witherin a fire into Packen-
hams scarlet-coated veterans that even
that intrepid soldiery could not endure it
and fled from its fiery breath as from
before the mouth of furnace were blue
eyed rifemen.
Every regimental officer of experience
and every gun club man knows that the
records Of target practice will show tn,
blue-eyed man well in the lead over then
dark-eyed fellows, and the longer the dis
lance the more marked become the dis
parity.
When General Shafter has fully dis
embarked his forces upon Cuban soil
when the ping of the Mauser gives answer
to the hiss of the long bullet of the Krag
Jorgensen the world will no doubt be af
forded another object lesson of the ina
bility of the Latin to shoot straight TIT
Spaniards have the arms, but not tn
main-their "Aeneid" would perforce be
gin differently from Virgirs.
The Spaniard-and the Cuban as well
for the same reasons a cutter and
2 slasher. He favors cold steel in battle
e and with cutlass or machete becomes a
E close range a formidable foe. 1t is t.
' Spain that the world owes the invention
of fencing, an art not yet 300 years old
e which transformed the medieval swor,
r into a shield and buckler as we'll as spea
e and dagger. The Italian, who also can
e not shoot, perfected the system, and
e today the master fencer of the world.
would seem that the dark eye has indee,
its own superiority of vision, as clos
) range. Take note that the master bill
e lard players-those whose excelling del
: icacy of touch is at once a joy and
e marvel to look upon-are dark-eyed mer
as are the fencers.
e But the battles on Cuban or Puert
Rican soil are not to be fought wit
: steel. There the blue-eyed troops VIII
t sprang from the northern races will max
e war against their swarthy foes at riff
= range, and they should have the bette
' of it by inalienable birthright.