Rogue River courier. (Grants Pass, Or.) 1886-1927, 1902-08-01
to vanish within a year.

W NunlAl Wllllu year.
Colonel Enrique. de Ibaretta, of
Spain made his start from San Antonio
in Bolivia with party singularly
well equipped-equipped, indeed as If
for conquest rather than for explora.
tion. He had fiotilla of Indian ca
noes, each holding IL men, and with
him We're six Argentine, two Bolivian
and one Spanish companion, all we'll
fitted by knowledge and experience for
the work Of carrying out the task of
forcing passage through the River of
Death. The canoes were covered
with heavy sails aud skins, which
were pierced with loopholes for rifles.
When the expedition reached Lagu-
ma Pitano, less than 300 miles from
the place where they had started, 1t
was September. 1t had taken them
more than three months TO get there,
and yet the mysterious land had
scarcely been entered. And the men
were then in such extremities that
Ibaretta saw that they could not hope
to get out alive unless help reached
them They were encompassed by
sayages. Food was reduced to min.
imum. In this crisis Colonel Ibarretta
called for volunteers to break through
the silent, hidden Gordon of foes and
try to reach Formosa, on the Para
guayan boundary, to get help.
OF those eight men nothing has been
learned to this day, with the oxcep-
tion Of two, who were found wander
ing in the thickets with barely
strength enough left to tell even the
briefest story. They had been hunted
headlong from mile to mile. The
forests were instinct with death
wherever they turned. Six Of the
fugitiyes were killed before day had
passed.
Awe holds the man who enters the
brooding silence Of I'll Gran Chaco's
primeval places. For in the forests,
great with centuries on centuries of
unchecked growth, there is neither
sunlight nor freedom Of winds or sing
ing of birds. The waters roar sui
lenly. The air is heavy with mois-
turc, and neither In the morning or
the afternoon does daylight find its
way through the enormous, fantastic
masses Of the eternal forest. Gloom
and gloom agnin-never less than
twilight in the brightest places and AZ
black M night in the darkest--shrouds
the path of the intruder.
A hush 80 great that IL burdens the
sense as with physical oppression
reigns hour after hour, day after day,
week after week. Like the terrifying
hush before Il great storm, It rests on
the land and makes It place of fear.
The birds fit through IL silently.
Silently and like shadows the wild
beasts creep.
Only now and again is that hush Of
dread broken. A terrible cry, wall
that rises and falls and floats away
awiully, rcsounds through the dim
nislcs. Then the Indians hastily mur.
mur incantations-for this, they be-
lieyc, is the cry of lost soul, wander.
ing wandering, in torment eternal
through the land Of the devils Of the
woods II is vain for explorers TO tell
them that the cry Is that of bird
fairly well known to science. II is a
damned soul, utterly damned, so they
are convinced.
Souls damned and suffering the pur.
gntory Of ice, too, are the grotesque,
frightening, shrouded forms Of ice
that stand on the slopes Of the Cordil-
lerns in that land. Strange figures
are these, from three to six feet high,
being kept from melting by the shad-
ow Of the snow w-cappod mountains in
the day and by icy winds that blow
down like hurricanes in the night
Nieve Ponitentes, " the Indians call
them, shuddcring when they see them
from afar
So, too, they shadder when once in
a while a sudden, tremendous crack
ing and splintcring echoes with start.
ling suddenness through this land OF
foreboding silence Even white men,
armorod against superstitiousl fear,
feel their nerves start when that
silence Of the grave is broken thus,
though they believe It TO be due only
to the sudden hurling downward OF
some ancient tree But the Indians
know IL TO be otherwise. IT, is the
devil OF tho woods, they say with