The Huttig news., 1909-03-13


 appa1lng.
 Remained but to purchase the ticket. And this at first was diff euliy. for neither Don Carlos rancho nor "a lonely log cabin gilded by the avs of the declining sun" nor-alas- Dead Mans gulch. are to be foung Ii on E9 folders of any railroad. Ye here Karl showed himself to be man of resource and worthy of great enter prise. He bought a ticket clear tc he coast, and set out with the grave sermination to choose his place of debar&ation from the car window Thus it happened that on a windy day in March Don Quixete Of the Mar ket, soujreless and clad incredibly rode out of the picturesque little Ne' Mexican town of Medilla upon a rock ing old Rosinante for which he haC paid four prices, bearing across hi saddle bow the long brassmounte rife of the Schutzenverein. Upon hi: brow was the black frown of dire dis comfort and of high purpose, but II his heart welled up the all pervadin joy of attainment. Would but tn Fates be kind!
 A road was their instruments - kindly, devious road that avoided alik the baseball park just outside of town the farmhouses along the river. an
 he nearby grove, where at that yer, moment an unmistakable Sunday school picnic was rioting in il finite ice cream Out over rocky suuescorohed hills, and through dusty barren valleys, the road led him. anc Fancy peopled their desolate solitude. with all the puppets of our latter lay romance. The uptossed dus of the road was redolent of blood an battle; the lowing of distant catflt was clamorous of midnight raid an deadly stampede; gold glistened il each crystalline pebbe. And when string of steers passed over the brov Of neighboring bill, the heart Karl Engel was uplifted as at sight uncovered treasure. and he fingered his "lasso" with longing and-doubt.
 A roadside cross, carved on 9 boulder 50 years before, hy devou MeXicans. who thought thereby tc commemorate some soon forgotten scalp-lifting, then caught Earls eye Instantly he dismounted, and after a pious prayer for the repose of these unsbriven souls, spent rapturous hour iii lingering the time-worn in scrirtion and speculating upon the tn maltuous day it recorded. To him that bit of rock pictured whole troops of swarihy villains in velvet, dark eyed maiden radiant with all allure ments. and heroic cavalier whose plunging steed bore double burden from out the smoke of battle
 The road heckoned. Just over the crest of a rock-strewn ridge, it brought him suddenly upon a wind mill, solitary, gigantic, mysterious. The cattle. for whom it's office was to pump water were far abroad in the hills; no human habitation was in sight; the murmur of the faint noon day wind in the motionless sails whis l pered dark tales of murder and of mas sacre. Unguided, Rosinante sough l the water-trough; Karl Gismountet stfffiy. and after slaking his owr thirst, fell to munchtng crackers anc sardines that he had regretfully sub stituted for the unpurehasable glories of pemmican and jerked buffalo tongue. Then strolling warily about he came suddenly upon thing which hrnnoht him nm cborf oro,, n,nnt h e. I and saucer-eyed. A small thing, too. Tact would have described it as the ashes of a campfire built about a dead yucca. the bones of a calf that had been roasted thereon, the empty shell of the cartridge that had been expended to slaughter the beast and pair of cast-off boots Fancy told another tale: of the lonely home of an adventurous pioneer; of demoniac war-whoors at dead of night; of yell ing savageS ieaping in glee around the flames that aared about their victim at the stake Fascinated, Don Quixote tiptoed gingerly closer; furtively he slipIed m his pocket, as a memento, the empty shells furiously he vowed vengeance on the first misguided red skin that ventured to cross his path.
 Alluring the road led on over hill and dale, ridge and arroyo. A mile or so beyond the enchanted windmill Don Quisote pulled in his Rosinante with a jerk. for unmistakably he heard the sound of footsteps approaching on horseback" A moment and then a sol itary horsea'an appeared trotting down the read toward him, and his heart beat fast for joy. II might have been Alkali Ike: it might have been Chick asaw Charlie. perhaps even Billy the Kid; but, after all, Karl decided for Deadwood Dick. Fact, indeed knew the rider for old man Johnstons ten derfoot nephew. gaTbed in the remark. able attire affected by his kind-harn- ful and unnecessary chaparejos, the widest of wide sombreros, and the reafl-handled, nickel-plated revolver, whose very shadow is tabooed Per haps he, too, in his small-souled way was Don Quixote-further exemplify ing the truth of MT Oscar Wilde's par. adox that literature is not the criti-