El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1900-10-04
THE LLAMA'S CURSE
A Story of Tibctan Magic


The waiter brought us drink aud the
change out of Tom Martins half SOW
ereign. l pushed the latter over to-
ward him with my left hand. and with
the right raised the water bottle to
dilute my whisky
Your change, Tom" said l.
Yes, of course" said Tom. who was
absorbed In the story he was telling
me. He put out his hand as II to pick
the money up, but seemed to remember
something. for he drew his hand back
suddenly.
Good heaven" said he. and I had
forgotten that
He took out his handkerchief, wrap
ped it around the forefnger of his
right hand and then. with the fore
finger so covered. gently scraped the
money toward him. piece by piece. and
earnestly looked at each coin
Now, look here. Tom" said !. this
is a very pretty story that you have
been telling me, but don't try and give
it an air OF reality by a performance
ike that"
You can believe It or not. just as
you like" said Tom. "but l tell you.
along this way some day. I have seen
It once and-I left 1t on the table.
You don't catch me touching any coin
while I am certain that one is in cir
culation- But let me. conclude what I
was telling you
.'Urga is one Of the most peculiar
places you could think OF. and one of
our first duties was to present our
q, II.r, H. 80
get n palanquin. for IL was only meet
that Europeans of our importance
should go in state. and it was while en-
route that we suddenly came to the
praying mill This was 4 sort Of
roundabout with huge wooden posts
sticking out at the side. which every
Buddhist passing was supposed to take
hold of and push the mill round ut
least once
What caused Phil to do what he
did then 1 don't know, but something
seemed to impel him to get out OF the
palanquin. make n run over to the mill.
catch hold OF one OF the wooden posts
and commence to push 1t around at its
topmost pace. The square where the
mill was erected was pretty well filed
with people. and when some OF those
saw what had been done they came
rushing toward us. shouting and ges-
ticulating. Phil had undoubtedly COM
United a sacrilege. and 1 was fearful
for his safety. These fanatical Mon
golians. once their religion is assailed
in any shape or form, would certainly
have no mercy upon the assailant.
Phil came hurriedly back to me,
Jumped into the palanquin and order
ed the bearers to get on. But they
were struck dumb with terror. The
mob came for us, smashed In the doors
Of the palanquin, dragged us out, and
for two minutes there was the liveliest
fight on record going on We got the
worst of it and. bruised. bleeding and
insensible. were carted or to prison.
We were taken before the grand
llama. and then and there he ordered
us to be sent across the Siberian from
tier with the utmost dispatch. The
next day we were hurried along under
an escort OF soldiers, and it was not
long before we arrived at the frontier,
the town OF Miamatshin. which really
is the Mongolian portion OF Kiakta-
We We're taken along to the yellow
posts which marked the actual frontier.
and there the soldiers of the llama
stopped. We were removed from the
palanquin in which we had been car
ried and were commanded to sit down
4 few yards from the posts Not 20
feet away were the black and white
posts OF the Russians, and IL was in
deed something to gladden. our eyes to
see the brown coat and the astrakhan
fez OF the Russian Cossack who stood
there on sentry.
.'Our guards spread themselves out,
then there came forward Buddhist
priest. who began 70 talk to us in a
Jargon which. OF course, we could not |
He finished at length and
produced from his robe a wire on
which were threaded some hundreds |
Of brass cash which the Chinese al |
ways carry. He took two of the cash |
Pr the wire and laid them in front of |
us Oh the ground.
Then the priest began waving his |
arms about. and the Mongolians took |
out their hand prayer mills and began |
turning them for all they were worth. |
The voice of the priest then rose on |
the air. He said three or four words |
and spat deliberately at each of the |
coins which had been put on the |
ground before us.
That was all. The priest departed,
the soldier escorted us to the posts, the |
sentry presented his rifle and |