Show V 15 SA NITA olt DV IN elsket jr PRic mARD R 8 ay RIX JV Wll fX of all contemplate tor for a moment the scene upon which the events I 1 am about to narrate took place the pam pas of patagonia limitless leagues of harsh grass of 0 chora of g anite pebble and ot of black basaltic rock upon the atlantic rim of these mighty plains a few sheep and cattle farms exist a few settlements 3 mck a E a s santa cruz and gal legos egos to in the far inte interior ali ri S few indians lead their nomadic life otherwise the pampas throughout all theft enormous extent are given over to bird and beast and upon them Is carried out a peri emual warfare shuge huge condors measuring as much ag a eleven eleve 11 feet across their wings hawk like clil mangos and co ranchos pumas hoary dogs Ala magellan gellan wolles carrion eaters and creatures of prey exist la in almost inconceivable number traveling through this country one Is forced farced to ta realize the struggle for life let the camper leave his bridle upon the ground for the night and all the leathern parts of it will have been deou devoured red by morning this is the work of the hoary dogs LW or the magellan wolves it Is easy for a murderer to get rid of all trace of at big vict victim lying 11 upon the pampas A shot at twilight lying stripped of its clothes and two hours after dawn dayn there will aill be nothing save rave a few bones to tell that the deed has been done ascensio brunei the wild man of santa cruz was by birth a swiss but in very early years his parents Smi emigrated grated to argentina and while still a young man he broke away from them and with bis his brother whom I 1 knew but whose name I 1 forgot worked his way south until he came at last to the santa cruz provance provi aoe of patagonia here for gome some years he and his brother whom hom we will call henri worked as peones deones cattle herding and sheep tending but growing in time weary of the unexciting nature of their calling al at length set up as tamers of horses now a horse tamer in patagonia 1 carries on his business by traveling from es tancia to es tancia when he arrives at a place where the owner has some horses which he wants broken the tamer camps and re mains until he has finished his con tract the business ascensio ct and henri 4 pursued for a long period Ase ascensao enslo was a marvelous rider and his services and those of his brother were in considerable request all over the south go so some months and even years went by during which many hundreds of animals passed through the hands of the brunels brumels and they became the owners of a comparatively large troop of horses Asee ascensio listo though a savage and merel ess rider never during all this time gave a glimpse of the ferocity which underlay bia his character at length the two brothers happened in the natural course of their nomadic profession to come to the est tancia ancla es this fine pane word may mean anything from a large residence to a mud hovel with a roof of tin of a farmer who had recently settled in the country and who was the husband of a very pretty wife a dark beauty of it was q rumored a rather uncertain temper the farmer gave the brothers a hore bore hor bor e breaking contract and for some weeks all went sell ell t ie one evening rhen hen the farmer tired from a long day in the saddle had just come home ascensio brunel brunei entered and having it is said put him off his guard by making some simple little request murdered him in cold blood the actual details of this ascenc 0 s first mur der are hard to come by henn henri whom I 1 met near ultima casa never told the same geory twice running and the only other witness the wife of the murdered man passed tl rolel some terrible experiences and I 1 nevea nevel heard her authentic story the nidin fact remains ascensio murdered the farmer in order that he might carry off his wife which he be did besides driving the whole stock the cattle sheep and horses of the dead man into the heart of the 41 wilderness A ild erness here for a time the two brothers dwelt with the unhappy woman until at last ascensio meled with nith henri it was not for the first time and henri went to sleep thinking it would have all passed over in the morning he was wakened maker ted at dawn by a voice shouting to him and saw at once pat that during the night ascensio Ase enslo had driven away all the horses and had also removed the ft oman ascensio then said he had decided to part co corn in pany with his brother for good and all that at first it had been in his mind to kill him in his sleep but for their mothers sake he had relented he ile added that he had hao shifted the horses and stock to a safe distance and that if henri fol lower he would unhesitatingly shoot him down he ile then rode away without more words A ag AS henri had bad neither horse nor weapons he did not follow indeed all his efforts were directed toward getting out of the wilderness alive living laving chiefly upon berries he wandered for many days finally to arrive an emaciated wreck at the est es tancia ancla of an argentine herdsman the latter tended him and when hen be he was as recovered gave him sufficient provision to take him to the nearest V settlement vilere he duly arrived proved innocent of the murder his brother had committed he went lack to the life of a peon and shepherd and so he passes out of this history for good the next act in the drama opens with the ar in the coast settlement at punta arenas of the 0 woman whom ascensio had forced to accompany ac compan him into the wilderness she had a frightful tale of cruelty to relate culminating in a fortunate escape it appears that ascensio ahad bad become subject to fits of passion so frightful that they were akin t to 0 madness and indeed madness of a kind had al ready declared itself in him the tehuelches of patagonia bold hold the well known ellef common to many branches of the indian race fiat that when they die they pass to the happy hunt ng grounds on the grave of a warrior they 1 h ey slay lay his doga dogs and horses within itchey it they place pla saddle sadde and food and for nine nights r f they kin kindle d 1 great alres fl resby q by tho the light of which the 1 I 1 i ll 11 ILA N A k 4 it 4 ap k t fie A 4 44 e nwe A 4 r 4 t 14 ir 1 1 1 9 A rte arte I 1 i I 1 1 W 3 ev 41 e r t r X 4 t j i re V ghost may find his way upon his long dark jour ney after that they light no more fires aa as they consider that the dead man has had time to finish his journey whether ascensio grew deranged deranged suddenly or whether it v as a slow and gradual process no to one can ever know yet the fact remains that he came to believe in the religion of the indians with some variations and startling effects ot of his own belie believing steg as he did that death was only a road by which man passed into a longer and more enduring though not necessarily an eternal we life he conceived the idea of building up a fortune for himself in that future life in ascensio aseensio s diseased bhain there arose the idea that whatever he slew in this world would be his property in the nett next on that point he was a maniac on all others perfectly sane now began the series of thefts which made brunel brunei s name known from the rio negro to the magellan straits one after another he raided the horse farms near the coast drove away as much of the stock as he could and shaking off his pursuers in every instance escaped into the wildest parts of the pampas so tor for a long time for years indeed ascensio aseensio brunel brunei the wild man alan of santa cruz lived his life beyond the reach of the short arm of the ar gentine law Coma sarlos hunted him various juedes de paz declaimed about him and the garri eon son of cavalry in chabut bolted their beet beef and started again on the track of the thief and then suddenly one morning the news flew across the countryside that the wild man alan had been captured it was true the way of it was as fol lows in the lery iery heart of patagonia upon the banks of aliver a river called the mayo lived and indeed still live a tribe of indians the tallest and perhaps the strongest people on earth they are hunters ard horse breeders wonderful riders and good men they worship horsemanship and have haie a number of strange rites which they practice at the birth of a man child in order to insure that be he shall t rn out a good rider into the nature of thoe rites we need not go they are very cruel I 1 merely mention them that you may understand nhat ft hat a task the wild man set himself when he decided to steal a bun hun dred mares from men such as these peerless rid era ers trained in every phase of horsemanship much of whose lives Is spent in searching for strayed horses and who can nde ride a hundred miles a day without fatigue it appears that the herd of mares that ascensio stole were feeding in a vega or marsh that stretches on the southern banks of the mavo aavo no one was watching them and as they were vere well used to their pasturage it seemed unlikely that they would stray therefore when shortly after dawn an indian lad came galloping to the toldos holdos with the ne vs that the mares had di disappeared appeared the men of the tribe were soon on horseback and rid ing upon their trail hard on the trail the indians rode all day and before sunset they were aware of a man clad in skins driving the mares before him swiftly some of the pursuers do cie ed in on him while others rode to cut him off by a or rift in the pampas which lay across his path had it not been for this the wild man would never in all probability have been taken As it was he galloped down the sheer wall of it but only to find himself cut off by the indians who had been detached from the main body by the cacique for the purpose riding in upon him the indians flung their heavy bolean dores the weapon of three rawhide thongs each weighted at the end with a ball of stone which entangled the legs of the wild man a horse and brought it crashing to the ground on the ground the indiana indians captured the wild man snarling and biting n Q j 1 ahey I hey did not slay the wild man but bound him upon a horse and conveyed him over three bun hun dred miles of pampas to gallegos where they handed him over to the authorities in due form orm he ile was thrown into prison and the indians ind ians departed fa toe their wilderness home once more in the YAr argentine gentine republic there Is no capital punishment so that after his trial the sentence that would be passed upon the wild man was tain penal servitude for life but it never camo cami to a trial for it was not long before the warders of the prison awoke one morn ing to find their prisoner gone he ile had cut bis his way out through the walls of wood stolen a horse that had been tied by some late visitor before the door of a house in the main street through the night until at dawn he uund jund him self far out upon the pampas all along this belt of country from dal ri allegos legos to santa cruz are scattered farms set along the coast at frequent intervals the wild man turned north and on the second day of his escape caught and stole a horse from one of these farms and so rode on up the coast while the ordinary traveler dismisses the horse which has borne him gallantly and hell with nith a pat and a kind word the wild man each time he procured a fresh mount returned to his tired and weary beast and killed it and then one night before the indians had I 1 even heard of hs his escape from jail once more he raided their mares and droe away aray a great troop of them his intention doubtless was to get them to some suitable spot and there kill them thereby gratifying his own peculiar and bloody minded beliefs and at the same time revenging himself upon the indians the instant they discovered their loss the indians rode on the trail of the mares but this time ascensio drove them like a madman as indeed he was the sun run was already toward the west when they spied him at last he ile was nearly naked tor for he had flung away the clothes which had been supplied to him hiria in the jail and waa was mounted upon a gigantic horse As he rode he t a cry of a lion and the frenzied and terrified tern fled mares galloped wildly in fronton fron tot him the sun sank and the chase continued one by one the tehuelches dropped away until at last the wild man and a single indian alone remained now the moon was in the sky and by its light the indian saw the wild man alan slacken his pace and with features convulsed with rage and hate turn at bay the indian grew afraid and paused they looked at each other for 3 moment and then the wild man laughed aloud and turning hia his great yellow horse rode slowly to the west while the indian returned to his companions whom he rejoined on the following day near the cordillera of the andes an adaven german settler had squatted with bis his tarn fain lly fly and had built himself a small house or hut but one night the german was awakened by a knock ing at the door and opened it to find end a man a clad in skins facing him the man appeared to be emaciated and was certainly of the most extraordinary appearance hia his whole face being blackened by an almost growth of hair the man demanded food whereupon the ger man invited him to enter and taking a trying frying pan commenced to cook gome some meat As he bent over the fire ere the wild man with senseless and brutal cruelty shot him through the back and helping himself to various provisions left the house and the dead man lying in it the news of this crime and of others which followed close upon it aroused the whole dis brict neither man nor woman could feel safe while the wild man lived and at last a body ot of armed settlers ran the criminal to earth in a house which he had entered for purposes of plunder he ile never left that house alive but tell fell on the threshold riddled with bullets yet not before he be had left his mark upon more than one ot of his assailants 1 |