The Portland daily press., 1898-06-23

idea was to approach the band in way
that seemed accidentaI-as if he were not
looking at them or thinking of them.
Most hunters of every kind know this
trlck. Timid animals, SO long as they
tnlnk they are unnoticed, will let man
approach very near them before they take
to tight. With the two horses feeding
along near him, sometimes turning to the
right, sometimes to the left, without
seeming to have the wild band in view,
he kept closing the distance between
them From time to time some of the
wild horses would lift their heads and
look. Then Pablo, who seemed to know
in time what they would do, would be
seen moving to one eide or the other. but
not advancing. When the wild horses
began to feed again he would move
toward them.
In about six hours he had got within
q quarter of a mile Of them. At this
point the stallion that led the band trot-
ted out toward him to investigate. For
an hour Pablo remained in one place,
stirring about little, lying down, get
ting up, turning round, pulling up grass,
all with so slow and even motion that
the stallion, watching him suspiciously
from 200 yards away, took no alarm and,
after trying to entice the two hobbled
horses to him, trotted back to the band.
You probably know of the shyn ,ss OF
Wild horses, the most difficult animals to
approach in the world. What / saw Pablo
Metanarmo do would seem incredible If
told anywhere but in the country where
it occurred. On the Venezuelan pampas
there have been two men, at least, who
have been known to do this-and prob
ably others that I have not heard of.
Paplos Metonarmo, leaving his two horses,
walked straight toward the wild band.
Ale the horses at this lifted their heads
and gazed at him, but not one moved.
He walked as If he meant to pass through
the band, not turning his head. His
course took him close to one of the horses.
could not with a field glass at two
miles away see how he did it. But the
other horses all drew together round the
stallion except one, but that one the
Zambo held by lasso. The spell was
broken, and the rest of the band was off
like the wind. The two hobbled horses
tried to follow them, as horses will
always do in a stampede, and the cap
tured horse struggled hard, but the lasso
choked him down. 1t was only for a
well away, and the horse. the one that
Pablo had come for quieted down and
the zambo, rounding in the hobbled
horses, came back to the grove with all
three.
''Pablo looked like a man who had
gone through battle. AS soon as he had
secured the hcrses tying the recaptured
one to tree, he threw himself on the
ground and slept for ten hours without
once stirring. 1 watched, with my rifle
between my knees, while he slept, for l
thought there might be jaguars in 1.-THE
wood. Then he awoke, we got our
breakfast of jerked beef and coffee, and
we went back to the ranch.
AFTER seeing the zambo catch a horse
I am as much at G loss to explain how
he could do it as any of the llaneros, who
ascribed it to diabolical power, or, rather
do explain it in one way, and that is
first, an absolute knowledge of the
nature of the horse, by me ms of which
he made his first approaches to the baud
without alarming it, and then by mes
merism pure and simple. All that Pablo
Metanarmo knew in the matter was tina
he could do this thing, and that he wa
in the condition of wilted rag when al
last he had caught the horse. -