The daily morning journal and courier., 1903-05-22

lar out on each side; or when carrying human freight, two men, or a couple of women, or three or four boys bestride him at once. When hardly able to move. either from excessive burdens or lack of food, his energies are stimula- ted as long as possible by twisting his stub of a tail or his sensitive ears; or by the boy who rides him. who selects a nice soft spot somewhere on the anil malls flank or fore shoulder and works away at it with a rusty nail or scrap of iron or tin, till the hide is worn away, the raw flesh exposed and bleed ing, and then to continue nagging the wound
 Not less to be pitied are the street.
 car mules and horses, which are beaten necessarily, no matter how hard they pull, or how desperately they exert themselves-lash, lash, goes the long, heavy whip over their suffered backs, up grade and down, from dawn till midnight. An extra man is hired for
 the express purpose of whipping the animal, who stands beside the driver and tppears to be about the most in- dustrious person in Peru.
 The most blood-curdlingly cruel thing that has yet come under my ob- servation is the manner in which are obtained the so-ealled ''pig-skins" that so commonly serve for bottles and casks. They are not the hides of pigs, but those of sheep, and, horrible to re- late, are pulled off the living animal, the poor sheep being actually sqinned alive, or more correctly speaking, skinned dead, for of course he does not long survive the operation. The modus operandi is as follows: The beasts are driven, one by one, to the appointed place and firmly tied to stake. Then the hide is neaty cut around the neck and down the middle, without touching the flesh,. or severing the ar- teries or hurting the animal much; af- ter which hooks are fastened into the loosened skin, rope being attached to each hook; strong men take firm grip on the ropes and pull backward, pull ing and pulling until the hide is torn off clean to the tail. It is said that during this frightful torture the cries of the poor sheep are almost human i'll their expression of agony, and that the bloody, quivering mass sometimes lives several minutes. The only excuse for the barbarous practice is that the skins are much more flexible and durable when thus taken off alive than when the animals are dead.
 A youthful army officer who was in- troduced to our party by the resident consul has been exemplifying some of the traits of his race in marked manner. He was immediately taken" by our Yankee young lady, and, re- doubtable warrior though he desired to be considered surrendered uncondi- tionally at first sight. "Our little Col onel," as we called him. was hardly more than a boy, and like the rest of his class. was a scion of aristocracy. It is not uncommon to find captains in their teens" in the Peruvian army, and all the officers are sons of the first families, quite separate and apart from the common soldiers, who are hat-
 breeds called "Cholos," and the militia " bands, which are mostly made up of negroes. He wore the usual toggery, without which a Peruvian officer is never seen, at home and abroad, at weddings and funerals, ito mill and to
 meeting"-consisting of gaudy scarlet
 trousers with a broad black stripe
 down the outside of each leg. @ black
 Jacket heavily braided and loaded with
 brass buttons, red cap profusely
 adorned with gold braid, and sword
 that persisted in slipping around and
 nearly tripping him up every time he
 crossed the parlor floor. The persons
 who make clothes for the Peruvian
 army evidently expect them all to
 grow, for the trousers are invariably
 so loose and baggy that the seat" ap-
 pears near to where the knee ought to
 be, and the knee midway between that
 member and the ankle, making the side
 stripes look like wriggling black ser
 pents. But the jackets are so short
 and small, with a tendency to ride up-
 wards, that the rear buttons which are
 supposed to mark the waist-line occu-
 py prominent position near the shoul-
 der blades.
 The little Colonel was very demon
 strative in his love-making so far as sighs and "sheep's eyes" go. but found himself wonderfully hampered by the
 restrictions of local etiquette, The ob- ject of his devotion could speak little Spanish and he not a word of Engish,
 and of course he could never see her at ! all without the presence of her mother. l But when the latter's back was turned as was sometimes purposely done when convenient mirror would re- | fleet the scene, he would instantly throw himself into the attitude of the \ typical grand-opera lover, with head ! on one side, eyes fin fine frenzy ruin" 1 and both hands pressed to the region ! of his heart, to the infinite amusement ! of tLe on-lookers.
 One day he astonished us by pleas