Show I I SHPUEN CRANE WRIESOf njAS His Yhimsical Impressions of San Antonio Interesting Incidents I In-cidents of the Frontier Tales of the Alamo I BY STEPHEN CRANE Special Correspondence I San Antonio Tex Jan 6Ah they said you are going to San Anton An-ton I wish I was Theres a town for youFrom From all manner of people businessmen business-men consumptive men curious men and wealthy men there came an exhibition ex-hibition of a profound affection for San Antonio It seemed to symbolize for them the poetry of life in Texas There is an eloquent description of the city which makes I consist of three old ruins and a row of Mexicans sitting sit-ting in the sun The author of course visited San Antonio in the year 1101 While this is undoubtedly a masterly literary effect one can feel glad that after all we dont steer our ships according ac-cording to these literary effects At first the city presents a totally modern aspect to the astonished visitor vis-itor The principal streets are lanes between rows of handsome business blocks and upon them proceeds with Important uproar the terrible and almighty al-mighty trolley car The prevailing type of citizen is not seated in the sun on the contrary he is making his way with the speed and intentness of one who competes in a community that is commercially in earnest And the victorious derby hat of the north spreads its wings in the holy place of legends ON THE ASHES OF AMBITIONS This is the dominant quality This is the principal color of San Antonio Later one begins to see that these edifices edi-fices of stone and brick and iron are reared on ashes upon the ambitions of a race I expresses again the victory vic-tory of the north The serene Anglo Saxon erects business blocks upon the dreams of the transient monks He strings telegraph wires across the face of their sky of hope and over the energy en-ergy the efforts the accomplishments of these pious fathers of the early church passes the wheel the hoof the heelHere Here and there however one finds in the mam part of the town little old buildings yellow with age solemn and severe in outline that have escaped by a miracle or by a historical importance import-ance the whirl of the modern life In the Mexican quarter there remains too much of the old character but despite the tenderness which San An I the Indians by fighting the French and both the Indians and the French occasionally occa-sionally polished their armor for them with great neatness and skill RAN SHORT OF INDIANS During interval of peace and interval inter-val of war toiled the pious monks ejecting missions digging ditches making farms and cudgeling their Indians In-dians in and out of the chur h Sometimes Some-times when the venerable fathers ran short of Indians to convert the soldiers sol-diers went on expeditions and returned dragging In a few score The settlement settle-ment prospered Upon the gently roll Ing plains the mission churches with their yellow stone towers outlined upon the sky called with their bells at evening a multitude of friars and meek Indians and gleaming soldiers to service ser-vice in the shadows before the flaming candles the solemn shrine the slow pacing chanting priests And wicked and homeless Indians hearing these bells scudded off into the blue twi lisht of the arairie The ruins of these missions are now besieged in the valley south of the city by indomitable thickets of mesquitoe They rear their battered heads their soundless towers over dead forms the graves of monies and of the Spanish Span-ish soldiers not one so much as flourishes flour-ishes a dagger RAVAGES OF TIME Time has torn at these pale yellow I structures and overturned walls and towers here and there defaced this and obliterated that Relic hunters with their singular rapacity have dragged down little saints from their niches and pulled important stones from arches They have performed offices of destruction of which the wind and the rain of the Innumerable vears was not capable They are part of the general gen-eral scheme of attack by nature The wind blows because it is the wind the rain beats because it Is the rain the relichunters hunt because they are relic hunters Who can tath om the ways of nature She thrusts hear spear in the eye of tradition and her agents feed on hIs locks A little guidebook published here contains pUblshed one of these Good friend forbear orations ora-tions But still this desr > erate massacre massa-cre of the beautiful carvings zoes on and it would take the ghosts of tne monks with the ghosts of scourges the phantoms of soldiers with the phantoms phan-toms of swords a scowling spectral party to stop the destruction In the meantime these portentious monuments monu-ments to the toil the profound convictions convic-tions of the fathers remain stolid and unyielding with the bravery of stone I I until it appears like the last stand of an army Many years will charge them before the courage will abate I which was injected into the mortar by I the skillful monks LITERARY ASPJRANTS I is something of a habit among the newspaper men and others who write here to say Well theres a good market for Alamo stuff now Or perhaps they say Too bad Alamo stuff isnt going very strong I now Literary aspirants of the locality lo-cality as soon as they finish writing i about Her Eyes begin on the Vlmno Statistics show that 69710 writers or the state of Texas have begun at the Alamo Notwithstanding this fact the Alamo remains the greatest memorial to courage cour-age which civilization has allowed to stand The Quaint and curious little building fronts on one of the most populous I pop-ulous plazas of the city and because of Travis Crockett Bowie and their comrades I com-rades i maintains dignity amid the taller modern structures which front I i I is the tomb of the fiery emotions of Texans who refused to admit that numbers and Mexicans were arguments argu-ments Whether the swirl of life the crowd upon the streets pauses to look or not the spirit that lives in this building Its air of contemplative silence si-lence is as eloquent a an old battle flnsrThe The first Americans to visit San Antonio I An-tonio arrived in irons This was the year 1800 There were eleven of them They had fought 150 Spanish soldiers I on the eastern frontier and by one of I those incomprehensible chances which so often decides the color of battles they had lost the fight Afterward Americans began t filter down through Louisiana until in 1S34 there were enough of them to openly disagree with I the young federal government in the City of Mexico although there was not I really any great number of them I Santa Ana didnt give a tin whistle for the people of Texas He assured I himself that be was capable of managing man-aging the republic of Mexico and after I af-ter coming td this decision he said to I himself that that part of it which I formed the state of Texas had better I remain quiet with the others In writing writ-ing of what followed a Mexican sergeant ser-geant devils says The Texans fought like deisIET MET SANTA ANA There was a culmination at the old mission of the Alamo in 18C6 This structure then consisted of a rectangular rectangu-lar stone parapet 190 feet long and about 120 feet wide with the existing church of the Alamo in the southeast corner Colonel William R Travis David Crockett and Colonel Bowie whose monument is a knife with a peculiar pe-culiar blade were in this enclosure with a garrison of something like 150 men when they heard that Santa Ana was marching against them with an army of 4000 The Texans shut themselves them-selves in the mission and when Santa I S t r L I i f1Wti1 1 I III 3itT tltL 3 i I ilu MUIu CHUHCH OF THE ALAMO tonlo feels for these monuments the unprotected mass of them must get trampled into shapeless dust which lies always behind the march of this terrible century The feet of the years will go through many old roofs Trolley cars are merciless animals Troley are amas They gorge themselves with relics They make really coherent history too like an omelet I a trolley car had trolleyed around Jericho the city would not have fallen it would have exploded ploded Centuries ago the white and gold banner of Spain came up out of the se and the Indians mere dots of black on the vast Texan plain saw a moving glitter of silver warriors on the horizons hori-zons edge There came then the long I battle of soldier and priest side by side against these stubborn barbaric hordes who wished to retain both their gods and their lands Sword arid crozler made frenzied circles in the air The soldiers varied their fights with r Ana demanded their surrender they fired a cannon and inaugurated the most appealing conflict of the conti nent Once Colonel Travis called his men together during a lull of the battle and said to them Our fate is sealed S Our friends were evidently not informed of our perilous situation in time to save us Doubtless they would have C here by this time if they ha expected any considerable force pf the enemy Then we must die THREE WAYS OF BEING KILLED He pointed out to them the three ways of being killed surrendering to the enemy and being executed making a rush through the enemys lines and I getting shot before they could inflict much damage or of staying In the Alamo and holding out to the last making themselves into a huge and terrible porcupina to be swallowed by the Mexican god of wa All the m t I t ve one adopted the last plan with their colonel This minority was 3 man named Rose I am not prepared to die and shall not do so if I can avoid it He was some kind of a dogged philosopher i philoso-pher Perhaps he said Whrr the use There is a strange m erte courage In the manner in hich he faced his companions with this sudden and short refused In the midst of a general exhibition of supreme bravery No he sold He bade them adieu and climbed the wall Upon Its top he turned to look down at the upturned faces of his silent comrades After the battle there were 521 dead Mexicans mingled with the corpses of the Texans te The Mexicans form a certain large part of the population of San Antonio Modern Inventions have driven them toward the suburbs but they ae still seen upon the main streets in the Jtio of one to eight and in their distant quarter of course they swarm A small percentage have reached positions posi-tions of business eminence The men wear for the most tart widebrimmed hats with peaked crowns and under these shelters appear ther brown faces and the inevitable in-evitable cigarettes The remainder of their apparel has become rather Americanized Amer-icanized but the hat of romance is still supreme Many of the young girls are pretty and all of the old ones are ugly These latter squat like clay images and the lines upon their faces and especially especial-ly about the eyes make it appear a if they were always staring into the eye of a blinding sun FOOD THAT IS HOT Upon one of the plazas Mexican vendors with openair stands sell food that tastes exactly llki pounded fire brick from Hadeschle con cane f > males enchiladas chie verde frijoles In the soft atmosphere uf the southern night the cheap glass bottles upon the stands shine like crystal and the lamps glow with a tender radiance A hum of conversation asctndo from the stroll ing visitors who are at their social shrine The prairie about San Antonio is wrinkled into long km hills like Immense Im-mense waves and upon them spreads a wilderness of the persistent mesquite meS-quite a bush that gr < n s in defiance of everything Some forty years ago the mesquite first assailed the praises about the city and nm from van ius high points it can be ston to extend to the joining of earth and sky The individual in-dividual bushes du irt grow close together to-gether and roads and bridle paths cut through the dwarf foiest in all directions direc-tions A certain class of Mexicans dwell in hovels amid Hw mesquite In the Mexican quart of the town the gambling houses a crowded nightly and before the serene dealers lie little stacks of suvem dollars A Mexican may not 1e able to raise enough money to buy hef tea for his dying grandmother but he can always stake himself fcr a game of monu Upon a hillock of the prairie in the ovtrkirts of tlv city is situated the government military post Fort Sam nouston Theie are four beautiful yellow and blue squadrons of cavalry two beautiful red and blue batteries of light artillery and six beautiful wh ta and blue companies of infantry Officers of New cers row resembles a collection port cottages Thore are magnificent lawns and gardens The presence of so many officers of the line beside th gorgeous members of the staff of the commanding general imparts a certain brilliant quality to San Antonio society The drills upon the wide parade ground make a citizen proud |