Evening star., 1902-08-09


saw the horse lowering his head to drink.
My glance went further up, and above the
horses head were a pair Of familiar. deep
broad-brimmed sombrero.
Good LordI' l exclaimed In OPEN
mouthed astonishment. rs that you. Boyd?
1 thought they had stood you up against a
wall and filled you full of lead
His hand went up to a little fringe of
hair covering his upper lip There wasn't
much there, but he moved his two fingers
caressingly over the place meant for a
mustache to grow, and, with smile quiv-
ering about the lips, said:
'Hellor'
Great Scottr' I reiterated ''but I
thought they had done you up, sure!'
Then he laughed-a quick, jerky laugh,
with abrupt ending.
And the revolution?"
HUH tn revolution he grunted, and
then he laughed again. That was the
durndest, all-ffred revolution you ever did
hear about. Come. get yer duds on, an III
tell you all about it."
An Interesting Story.
I made haste to dress myself while he sat
there astride the horse Indian like, answer
ing my questions only in grunts or mono
syllables. l led the way to my abode, and
arriving there he dismounted, and unsad-
ding the horse we turned him into the yard,
and 1 led the way into the house.
For tn sake of Moses What a lay
outr' he exclaimed for the first time show
ing surprise a he glanced around at Don
Sinforoso's straight backed chairs against
the walls. vases In the corners and pictures
on the walls. land have you got anything
Z drink with it?'
There's some sugar, yard full of lines
and some cold water in the jar" said 1.
"Nothin' else? Well then, give me the
lines an sugar. an tn cold water though
the natives do say it's bad on the nerves.
/ thought perhaps, he would open up and
tell about the revolution if ne had the
something else, SO ] sent my Indian, my
man of all work. over to Fosforitos with
the bottle.
Boyd sank down into the hammock
stretched across the middle of the room
and sitting astride 1t as he would horse,
with his spured boot heels resting on the
brick floor, he let himself back with his
hands ClaSped behind his head, fixing his
eyes on the wOrM-eaten beams overhead
recently refreshed with a coat of blue white
wash.
Hers your drink said l. taking the bot
tie from the Indians hand, as he came back
on the run, Now tell me about the revclu-
ton"
1T was an election" said ne, g,liping
down the contents of the glass 1 handed
him, "a hot one too
And the major said 1.
Some of the cane juice went down the
wrong way. Boyd was attacked with a
sudden fit of coughing, and between the
choking gasps. with the tears in his eyes,
he said, Buckskin-maj jor-pockmark -
and finally. 'Oh, he was birdl TIL last
| saw of him he was runnin' an l guess
he's runnin' yet" And then 1 gave him
another drink to clear the cough out of his
throat, and he warmed up to telling his
story.
You see, it was this way he said. 1--WE
had to get candidate, or else We couldn't
have no election. We got hold of an old
greaser that had been a general once and
we made him our candidate for president
OF course, he understood that when he got
to be president he was to make the major
minister war. He was little PLAYED out
but the major got him interested, and then
we started in electioneering We had to
commence small. so we picked out a town
way over on the frontier of Honduras. It
had about six cOckeyed, barefOoted soldiers
in it for a garrison and we got them to
vote for the ole general the first thing
The way we did It, we just took them by
surprise and then lined them up in the
plaza. OF course they thought we were
goin' to shoot 'em. and then we trots out
the ole general. He rides up in front of
them on his ole plug, an fiourishes his
sword, an makes speech bout liberty an
death. He was a daisy at maxim speeches
that ole feIler was, an he told them SOL
diers how oppressed they was how they
hadn't been paid since they could remember
which was pretty nigh all true. Then tn
major, he steps up an wavin' his sword
shouts, Hurrah for tn general"
A Hot Election.
well, them soldiers began t tumble that
they wasn't goin' t get shot, an they were
50 glad they began t holler like blue biazes,
an so our ole general was elected in that
town Then We took the outfit an put them
in our ranks an marched on t. the next
town. We captured the few soldiers there
and served them the same way and they
just elected our general unanimously.
after that We took a hull lot O. more
towns. Some had garrisons and some We
couldn't find no garrison, nor nothfn, but
We just kept agoin' a-takin' everything we
came across till We struck Santa Rosa
Santa Rosa is a big town, but by the time
we got there we had a pretty big army. An
they had pretty big army of their own
too, but when they saw US a-comin' they
just turned down their guns an hollered
hurray for ole CruZ-that was our general
you know.
'Well, we got lot Of arms at Santa
Rosa, an two cannon, an I was detailed to
take them two cannon and form an artil-
lery corps. We were all right then, but
ole Cruz lost a lot o time organizin. He
was stuck on organiZin'. He had US catch
everything in sight what had britches on
they had t fight for liberty or death. Of
course, them fellers prefer liberty every
time to death-they had no notion Of want
In to die-an with the army we already
had the Santa Rosa soldiers. an all the
felers We could catch, we got up a thun-
derin' big army. But ole Cruz lost too
much time organiZin'.
Finally ole Cruz got organized, an tell
you 1t was fine sight so see that army
march out of Santa Rosa, with our grizZled
ole chief at its head in his new uniform, an
me with my artillery. We had to go ahead,
cause, you know, these fellers won't fight
no matter how much they prefer liberty
to dyin'-they won't fight unless their Off
GERS go ahead, an then they will fight all
right.
Eve were now goin' t. march on t the
capital an lick everything on the way. But
We didn't find blessed thing t. lick till We
got t a place called Palencia. 1t was
curious ole place on a hill, with more hills
all around it. a sort Of castle like, with a
church, fort and great interior court
all built together. We took possession Of
it without much ado, an then we learned
that we had the hull government outfit in
front of us.
ut looked as though we were goin' T.
have L stand a siege, an the general or
dered lot of cattle driven into the cattle
yard so We might have somethin' t eat.
The enemy opened on US with their artil-
lery. You could see the puff OF smoke on
hill about two miles off. Then you would
| hear the report and after awhile, chuck
bang, somethin would come down into the
dirt somewhere near us like big cobble
stone
They kept up this sort O. shootin' for