Showing posts with label 1916. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1916. Show all posts

Friday, January 19, 2024

Saturday, January 19, 1924. The Most Dangerous Game.


The Most Dangerous Game appeared in Colliers:


“Off there—somewhere—is a large island,” said Whitney. “It’s rather a mystery.”

Rainsford peered through his glass. “Can’t see it.”

“OFF there to the right—somewhere—is a large island,” said Whitney.” It’s rather a mystery——”

“What island is it?” Rainsford asked.

“The old charts call it ‘Ship-Trap Island’,” Whitney replied.” A suggestive name, isn’t it? Sailors have a curious dread of the place. I don’t know why. Some superstition——”

“Can’t see it,” remarked Rainsford, trying to peer through the dank tropical night that was palpable as it pressed its thick warm blackness in upon the yacht.

“You’ve good eyes,” said Whitney, with a laugh, “and I’ve seen you pick off a moose moving in the brown fall bush at four hundred yards, but even you can’t see four miles or so through a moonless Caribbean night.”

“Nor four yards,” admitted Rainsford. “Ugh! It’s like moist black velvet.”

“It will be light enough in Rio,” promised Whitney. “We should make it in a few days. I hope the jaguar guns have come from Purdey’s. We should have some good hunting up the Amazon. Great sport, hunting.”

“The best sport in the world,” agreed Rainsford.

“For the hunter,” amended Whitney. “Not for the jaguar.”

“Don’t talk rot, Whitney,” said Rainsford. “You’re a big-game hunter, not a philosopher. Who cares how a jaguar feels?”

“Perhaps the jaguar does,” observed Whitney.

“Bah! They’ve no understanding.”

“Even so, I rather think they understand one thing—fear. The fear of pain and the fear of death.”

“Nonsense,” laughed Rainsford. “This hot weather is making you soft, Whitney. Be a realist. The world is made up of two classes—the hunters and the huntees. Luckily, you and I are hunters. Do you think we’ve passed that island yet?”

“I can’t tell in the dark. I hope so.”

“Why? ” asked Rainsford.

“The place has a reputation—a bad one.”

“Cannibals?” suggested Rainsford.

“Hardly. Even cannibals wouldn’t live in such a God-forsaken place. But it’s gotten into sailor lore, somehow. Didn’t you notice that the crew’s nerves seemed a bit jumpy today?”

“They were a bit strange, now you mention it. Even Captain Nielsen——”

“Yes, even that tough-minded old Swede, who’d go up to the devil himself and ask him for a light. Those fishy blue eyes held a look I never saw there before. All I could get out of him was ‘This place has an evil name among seafaring men, sir.’ Then he said to me, very gravely, ‘Don’t you feel anything?’—as if the air about us was actually poisonous. Now, you mustn’t laugh when I tell you this—I did feel something like a sudden chill.

“There was no breeze. The sea was as flat as a plate-glass window. We were drawing near the island then. What I felt was a—a mental chill; a sort of sudden dread.”

“Pure imagination,” said Rainsford.

“One superstitious sailor can taint the whole ship’s company with his fear.”

“Maybe. But sometimes I think sailors have an extra sense that tells them when they are in danger. Sometimes I think evil is a tangible thing—with wave lengths, just as sound and light have. An evil place can, so to speak, broadcast vibrations of evil. Anyhow, I’m glad we’re getting out of this zone. Well, I think I’ll turn in now, Rainsford.”

“I’m not sleepy,” said Rainsford. “I’m going to smoke another pipe up on the afterdeck.”

“Good night, then, Rainsford. See you at breakfast.”

“Right. Good night, Whitney.”

THERE was no sound in the night as Rainsford sat there but the muffled throb of the engine that drove the yacht swiftly through the darkness, and the swish and ripple of the wash of the propeller.

Rainsford, reclining in a steamer chair, indolently puffed on his favorite brier. The sensuous drowsiness of the night was on him.” It’s so dark,” he thought, “that I could sleep without closing my eyes; the night would be my eyelids——”

An abrupt sound startled him. Off to the right he heard it, and his ears, expert in such matters, could not be mistaken. Again he heard the sound, and again. Somewhere, off in the blackness, someone had fired a gun three times.

Rainsford sprang up and moved quickly to the rail, mystified. He strained his eyes in the direction from which the reports had come, but it was like trying to see through a blanket. He leaped upon the rail and balanced himself there, to get greater elevation; his pipe, striking a rope, was knocked from his mouth. He lunged for it; a short, hoarse cry came from his lips as he realized he had reached too far and had lost his balance. The cry was pinched off short as the blood-warm waters of the Caribbean Sea dosed over his head.

He struggled up to the surface and tried to cry out, but the wash from the speeding yacht slapped him in the face and the salt water in his open mouth made him gag and strangle. Desperately he struck out with strong strokes after the receding lights of the yacht, but he stopped before he had swum fifty feet. A certain coolheadedness had come to him; it was not the first time he had been in a tight place. There was a chance that his cries could be heard by someone aboard the yacht, but that chance was slender and grew more slender as the yacht raced on. He wrestled himself out of his clothes and shouted with all his power. The lights of the yacht became faint and ever-vanishing fireflies; then they were blotted out entirely by the night.

Rainsford remembered the shots. They had come from the right, and doggedly he swam in that direction, swimming with slow, deliberate strokes, conserving his strength. For a seemingly endless time he fought the sea. He began to count his strokes; he could do possibly a hundred more and then——

Rainsford heard a sound. It came out of the darkness, a high screaming sound, the sound of an animal in an extremity of anguish and terror.

He did not recognize the animal that made the sound; he did not try to; with fresh vitality he swam toward the sound. He heard it again; then it was cut short by another noise, crisp, staccato.

“Pistol shot,” muttered Rainsford, swimming on.

TEN minutes of determined effort brought another sound to his ears--the most welcome he had ever heard—the muttering and growling of the sea breaking on a rocky shore. He was almost on the rocks before he saw them; on a night less calm he would have been shattered against them. With his remaining strength he dragged himself from the swirling waters. Jagged crags appeared to jut up into the opaqueness; he forced himself upward, hand over hand. Gasping, his hands raw, he reached a flat place at the top. Dense jungle came down to the very edge of the cliffs. What perils that tangle of trees and underbrush might hold for him did not concern Rainsford just then. All he knew was that he was safe from his enemy, the sea, and that utter weariness was on him. He flung himself down at the jungle edge and tumbled headlong into the deepest sleep of his life.

When he opened his eyes he knew from the position of the sun that it was late in the afternoon. Sleep had given him new vigor; a sharp hunger was picking at him. He looked about him, almost cheerfully.

“Where there are pistol shots, there are men. Where there are men, there is food,” he thought. But what kind of men, he wondered, in so forbidding a place? An unbroken front of snarled and ragged jungle fringed the shore.

He saw no sign of a trail through the closely knit web of weeds and trees; it was easier to go along the shore, and Rainsford floundered along by the water. Not far from where he landed, he stopped.

Some wounded thing--by the evidence, a large animal--had thrashed about in the underbrush; the jungle weeds were crushed down and the moss was lacerated; one patch of weeds was stained crimson. A small, glittering object not far away caught Rainsford’s eye and he picked it up. It was an empty cartridge.

“A twenty-two,” he remarked. “That’s odd. It must have been a fairly large animal too. The hunter had his nerve with him to tackle it with a light gun. It’s clear that the brute put up a fight. I suppose the first three shots I heard was when the hunter flushed his quarry and wounded it. The last shot was when he trailed it here and finished it.”

He examined the ground closely and found what he had hoped to find—the print of hunting boots. They pointed along the cliff in the direction he had been going. Eagerly he hurried along, now slipping on a rotten log or a loose stone, but making headway; night was beginning to settle down on the island.

Bleak darkness was blacking out the sea and jungle when Rainsford sighted the lights. He came upon them as he turned a crook in the coast line; and his first thought was that be had come upon a village, for there were many lights. But as he forged along he saw to his great astonishment that all the lights were in one enormous building—a lofty structure with pointed towers plunging upward into the gloom. His eyes made out the shadowy outlines of a palatial chateau; it was set on a high bluff, and on three sides of it cliffs dived down to where the sea licked greedy lips in the shadows.

“Mirage,” thought Rainsford. But it was no mirage, he found, when he opened the tall spiked iron gate. The stone steps were real enough; the massive door with a leering gargoyle for a knocker was real enough; yet above it all hung an air of unreality.

He lifted the knocker, and it creaked up stiffly, as if it had never before been used. He let it fall, and it startled him with its booming loudness. He thought he heard steps within; the door remained closed. Again Rainsford lifted the heavy knocker, and let it fall. The door opened then—opened as suddenly as if it were on a spring—and Rainsford stood blinking in the river of glaring gold light that poured out. The first thing Rainsford’s eyes discerned was the largest man Rainsford had ever seen—a gigantic creature, solidly made and black bearded to the waist. In his hand the man held a long-barreled revolver, and he was pointing it straight at Rainsford’s heart.

Out of the snarl of beard two small eyes regarded Rainsford.

“Don’t be alarmed,” said Rainsford, with a smile which he hoped was disarming. “I’m no robber. I fell off a yacht. My name is Sanger Rainsford of New York City.”

THE menacing look in the eyes did not change. The revolver pointing as rigidly as if the giant were a statue. He gave no sign that he understood Rainsford’s words, or that he had even heard them. He was dressed in uniform—a black uniform trimmed with gray astrakhan.

“I’m Sanger Rainsford of New York,” Rainsford began again. “I fell off a yacht. I am hungry.”

The man’s only answer was to raise with his thumb the hammer of his revolver. Then Rainsford saw the man’s free hand go to his forehead in a military salute, and he saw him click his heels together and stand at attention. Another man was coming down the broad marble steps, an erect, slender man in evening clothes. He advanced to Rainsford and held out his hand.

In a cultivated voice marked by a slight accent that gave it added precision and deliberateness, he said, “It is a very great pleasure and honor to welcome Mr. Sanger Rainsford, the celebrated hunter, to my home.”

Automatically Rainsford shook the man’s hand.

“I’ve read your book about hunting snow leopards in Tibet, you see,” explained the man. “I am General Zaroff.”

Rainsford’s first impression was that the man was singularly handsome; his second was that there was an original, almost bizarre quality about the general’s face. He was a tall man past middle age, for his hair was a vivid white; but his thick eyebrows and pointed military mustache were as black as the night from which Rainsford had come. His eyes, too, were black and very bright. He had high cheekbones, a sharpcut nose, a spare, dark face--the face of a man used to giving orders, the face of an aristocrat. Turning to the giant in uniform, the general made a sign. The giant put away his pistol, saluted, withdrew.

“Ivan is an incredibly strong fellow,” remarked the general, “but he has the misfortune to be deaf and dumb. A simple fellow, but, I’m afraid, like all his race, a bit of a savage.”

“Is he Russian?”

“He is a Cossack,” said the general, and his smile showed red lips and pointed teeth. “So am I.”

“Come,” he said, “we shouldn’t be chatting here. We can talk later. Now you want clothes, food, rest. You shall have them. This is a most-restful spot.”

Ivan had reappeared, and the general spoke to him with lips that moved but gave forth no sound.

“Follow Ivan, if you please, Mr. Rainsford,” said the general. “I was about to have my dinner when you came. I’ll wait for you. You’ll find that my clothes will fit you, I think.”

It was to a huge, beam-ceilinged bedroom with a canopied bed big enough for six men that Rainsford followed the silent giant. Ivan laid out an evening suit, and Rainsford, as he put it on, noticed that it came from a London tailor who ordinarily cut and sewed for none below the rank of duke.

The dining room to which Ivan conducted him was in many ways remarkable. There was a medieval magnificence about it; it suggested a baronial hall of feudal times with its oaken panels, its high ceiling, its vast refectory tables where twoscore men could sit down to eat. About the hall were mounted heads of many animals--lions, tigers, elephants, moose, bears; larger or more perfect specimens Rainsford had never seen. At the great table the general was sitting, alone.

“You’ll have a cocktail, Mr. Rainsford,” he suggested. The cocktail was surpassingly good; and, Rainsford noted, the table apointments were of the finest—the linen, the crystal, the silver, the china.

They were eating borsch, the rich, red soup with whipped cream so dear to Russian palates. Half apologetically General Zaroff said, “We do our best to preserve the amenities of civilization here. Please forgive any lapses. We are well off the beaten track, you know. Do you think the champagne has suffered from its long ocean trip?”

“Not in the least,” declared Rainsford. He was finding the general a most thoughtful and affable host, a true cosmopolite. But there was one small trait of .the general’s that made Rainsford uncomfortable. Whenever he looked up from his plate he found the general studying him, appraising him narrowly.

“Perhaps,” said General Zaroff, “you were surprised that I recognized your name. You see, I read all books on hunting published in English, French, and Russian. I have but one passion in my life, Mr. Rains. ford, and it is the hunt.”

“You have some wonderful heads here,” said Rainsford as he ate a particularly well-cooked filet mignon. ” That Cape buffalo is the largest I ever saw.”

“Oh, that fellow. Yes, he was a monster.”

“Did he charge you?”

“Hurled me against a tree,” said the general. “Fractured my skull. But I got the brute.”

“I’ve always thought,” said Rains{ord, “that the Cape buffalo is the most dangerous of all big game.”

For a moment the general did not reply; he was smiling his curious red-lipped smile. Then he said slowly, “No. You are wrong, sir. The Cape buffalo is not the most dangerous big game.” He sipped his wine. “Here in my preserve on this island,” he said in the same slow tone, “I hunt more dangerous game.”

Rainsford expressed his surprise. “Is there big game on this island?”

The general nodded. “The biggest.”

“Really?”

“Oh, it isn’t here naturally, of course. I have to stock the island.”

“What have you imported, general?” Rainsford asked. “Tigers?”

THE general smiled. “No,” he said. “Hunting tigers ceased to interest me some years ago. I exhausted their possibilities, you see. No thrill left in tigers, no real danger. I live for danger, Mr. Rainsford.”

The general took from his pocket a gold cigarette case and offered his guest a long black cigarette with a silver tip; it was perfumed and gave off a smell like incense.

“We will have some capital hunting, you and I,” said the general. “I shall be most glad to have your society.”

“But what game——” began Rainsford.

“I’ll tell you,” said the general. “You will be amused, I know. I think I may say, in all modesty, that I have done a rare thing. I have invented a new sensation. May I pour you another glass of port?”

“Thank you, general.”

The general filled both glasses, and said, “God makes some men poets. Some He makes kings, some beggars. Me He made a hunter. My hand was made for the trigger, my father said. He was a very rich man with a quarter of a million acres in the Crimea, and he was an ardent sportsman. When I was only five years old he gave me a little gun, specially made in Moscow for me, to shoot sparrows with. When I shot some of his prize turkeys with it, he did not punish me; he complimented me on my marksmanship. I killed my first bear in the Caucasus when I was ten. My whole life has been one prolonged hunt. I went into the army—it was expected of noblemen’s sons—and for a time commanded a division of Cossack cavalry, but my real interest was always the hunt. I have hunted every kind of game in every land. It would be impossible for me to tell you how many animals I have killed.”

The general puffed at his cigarette.

“After the debacle in Russia I left the country, for it was imprudent for an officer of the Czar to stay there. Many noble Russians lost everything. I, luckily, had invested heavily in American securities, so I shall never have to open a tearoom in Monte Carlo or drive a taxi in Paris. Naturally, I continued to hunt—grizzliest in your Rockies, crocodiles in the Ganges, rhinoceroses in East Africa. It was in Africa that the Cape buffalo hit me and laid me up for six months. As soon as I recovered I started for the Amazon to hunt jaguars, for I had heard they were unusually cunning. They weren’t.” The Cossack sighed. “They were no match at all for a hunter with his wits about him, and a high-powered rifle. I was bitterly disappointed. I was lying in my tent with a splitting headache one night when a terrible thought pushed its way into my mind. Hunting was beginning to bore me! And hunting, remember, had been my life. I have heard that in America businessmen often go to pieces when they give up the business that has been their life.”

“Yes, that’s so,” said Rainsford.

The general smiled. “I had no wish to go to pieces,” he said. “I must do something. Now, mine is an analytical mind, Mr. Rainsford. Doubtless that is why I enjoy the problems of the chase.”

“No doubt, General Zaroff.”

“So,” continued the general, “I asked myself why the hunt no longer fascinated me. You are much younger than I am, Mr. Rainsford, and have not hunted as much, but you perhaps can guess the answer.”

“What was it?”

“Simply this: hunting had ceased to be what you call `a sporting proposition.’ It had become too easy. I always got my quarry. Always. There is no greater bore than perfection.”

The general lit a fresh cigarette.

“No animal had a chance with me any more. That is no boast; it is a mathematical certainty. The animal had nothing but his legs and his instinct. Instinct is no match for reason. When I thought of this it was a tragic moment for me, I can tell you.”

Rainsford leaned across the table, absorbed in what his host was saying.

“It came to me as an inspiration what I must do,” the general went on.

“And that was?”

The general smiled the quiet smile of one who has faced an obstacle and surmounted it with success. “I had to invent a new animal to hunt,” he said.

“A new animal? You’re joking.” “Not at all,” said the general. “I never joke about hunting. I needed a new animal. I found one. So I bought this island built this house, and here I do my hunting. The island is perfect for my purposes—there are jungles with a maze of trails in them, hills, swamps--”

“But the animal, General Zaroff?”

“Oh,” said the general, “it supplies me with the most exciting hunting in the world. No other hunting compares with it for an instant. Every day I hunt, and I never grow bored now, for I have a quarry with which I can match my wits.”

Rainsford’s bewilderment showed in his face.

“I wanted the ideal animal to hunt,” explained the general. “So I said, `What are the attributes of an ideal quarry?’ And the answer was, of course, ‘It must have courage, cunning, and, above all, it must be able to reason.“ ’

“But no animal can reason,” objected Rainsford.

“My dear fellow,” said the general, “there is one that can.”

“But you can’t mean——” gasped Rainsford.

“And why not?”

“I can’t believe you are serious, General Zaroff. This is a grisly joke.”

“Why should I not be serious? I am speaking of hunting.”

“Hunting? Great Guns, General Zaroff, what you speak of is murder.”

THE general laughed with entire good nature. He regarded Rainsford quizzically. “I refuse to believe that so modern and civilized a young man as you seem to be harbors romantic ideas about the value of human life. Surely your experiences in the war——”

“Did not make me condone cold-blooded murder,” finished Rainsford stiffly.

Laughter shook the general. “How extraordinarily droll you are!” he said. “One does not expect nowadays to find a young man of the educated class, even in America, with such a naive, and, if I may say so, mid-Victorian point of view. It’s like finding a snuffbox in a limousine. Ah, well, doubtless you had Puritan ancestors. So many Americans appear to have had. I’ll wager you’ll forget your notions when you go hunting with me. You’ve a genuine new thrill in store for you, Mr. Rainsford.”

“Thank you, I’m a hunter, not a murderer.”

“Dear me,” said the general, quite unruffled, “again that unpleasant word. But I think I can show you that your scruples are quite ill founded.”

“Yes?”

“Life is for the strong, to be lived by the strong, and, if needs be, taken by the strong. The weak of the world were put here to give the strong pleasure. I am strong. Why should I not use my gift? If I wish to hunt, why should I not? I hunt the scum of the earth: sailors from tramp ships--lassars, blacks, Chinese, whites, mongrels--a thoroughbred horse or hound is worth more than a score of them.”

“But they are men,” said Rainsford hotly.

“Precisely,” said the general. “That is why I use them. It gives me pleasure. They can reason, after a fashion. So they are dangerous.”

“But where do you get them?”

The general’s left eyelid fluttered down in a wink. “This island is called Ship Trap,” he answered. “Sometimes an angry god of the high seas sends them to me. Sometimes, when Providence is not so kind, I help Providence a bit. Come to the window with me.”

Rainsford went to the window and looked out toward the sea.

“Watch! Out there!” exclaimed the general, pointing into the night. Rainsford’s eyes saw only blackness, and then, as the general pressed a button, far out to sea Rainsford saw the flash of lights.

The general chuckled. “They indicate a channel,” he said, “where there’s none; giant rocks with razor edges crouch like a sea monster with wide-open jaws. They can crush a ship as easily as I crush this nut.” He dropped a walnut on the hardwood floor and brought his heel grinding down on it. “Oh, yes,” he said, casually, as if in answer to a question, “I have electricity. We try to be civilized here.”

“Civilized? And you shoot down men?”

A trace of anger was in the general’s black eyes, but it was there for but a second; and he said, in his most pleasant manner, “Dear me, what a righteous young man you are! I assure you I do not do the thing you suggest. That would be barbarous. I treat these visitors with every consideration. They get plenty of good food and exercise. They get into splendid physical condition. You shall see for yourself tomorrow.”

“What do you mean?”

“We’ll visit my training school,” smiled the general. “It’s in the cellar. I have about a dozen pupils down there now. They’re from the Spanish bark San Lucar that had the bad luck to go on the rocks out there. A very inferior lot, I regret to say. Poor specimens and more accustomed to the deck than to the jungle.” He raised his hand, and Ivan, who served as waiter, brought thick Turkish coffee. Rainsford, with an effort, held his tongue in check.

“It’s a game, you see,” pursued the general blandly. “I suggest to one of them that we go hunting. I give him a supply of food and an excellent hunting knife. I give him three hours’ start. I am to follow, armed only with a pistol of the smallest caliber and range. If my quarry eludes me for three whole days, he wins the game. If I find him “—the general smiled—” he loses.”

“Suppose he refuses to be hunted?”

“Oh,” said the general, “I give him his option, of course. He need not play that game if he doesn’t wish to. If he does not wish to hunt, I turn him over to Ivan. Ivan once had the honor of serving as official knouter to the Great White Czar, and he has his own ideas of sport. Invariably, Mr. Rainsford, invariably they choose the hunt.”

“And if they win?”

THE smile on the general’s face widened. “To date I have not lost,” he said. Then he added, hastily: “I don’t wish you to think me a braggart, Mr. Rainsford. Many of them afford only the most elementary sort of problem. Occasionally I strike a tartar. One almost did win. I eventually had to use the dogs.”

“The dogs?”

“This way, please. I’ll show you.”

The general steered Rainsford to a window. The lights from the windows sent a flickering illumination that made grotesque patterns on the courtyard below, and Rainsford could see moving about there a dozen or so huge black shapes; as they turned toward him, their eyes glittered greenly.

“A rather good lot, I think,” observed the general. “They are let out at seven every night. If anyone should try to get into my house—or out of it—something extremely regrettable would occur to him.” He hummed a snatch of song from the Folies Bergere.

“And now,” said the general, “I want to show you my new collection of heads. Will you come with me to the library?”

“I hope,” said Rainsford, “that you will excuse me tonight, General Zaroff. I’m really not feeling well.”

“Ah, indeed?” the general inquired solicitously. “Well, I suppose that’s only natural, after your long swim. You need a good, restful night’s sleep. Tomorrow you’ll feel like a new man, I’ll wager. Then we’ll hunt, eh? I’ve one rather promising prospect——” Rainsford was hurrying from the room.

“Sorry you can’t go with me tonight,” called the general. “I expect rather fair sport—a big, strong, black. He looks resourceful—Well, good night, Mr. Rainsford; I hope you have a good night’s rest.”

The bed was good, and the pajamas of the softest silk, and he was tired in every fiber of his being, but nevertheless Rainsford could not quiet his brain with the opiate of sleep. He lay, eyes wide open. Once he thought he heard stealthy steps in the corridor outside his room. He sought to throw open the door; it would not open. He went to the window and looked out. His room was high up in one of the towers. The lights of the chateau were out now, and it was dark and silent; but there was a fragment of sallow moon, and by its wan light he could see, dimly, the courtyard. There, weaving in and out in the pattern of shadow, were black, noiseless forms; the hounds heard him at the window and looked up, expectantly, with their green eyes. Rainsford went back to the bed and lay down. By many methods he tried to put himself to sleep. He had achieved a doze when, just as morning began to come, he heard, far off in the jungle, the faint report of a pistol.

GENERAL ZAROFF did not appear until luncheon. He was dressed faultlessly in the tweeds of a country squire. He was solicitous about the state of Rainsford’s health.

“As for me,” sighed the general, “I do not feel so well. I am worried, Mr. Rainsford. Last night I detected traces of my old complaint.”

To Rainsford’s questioning glance the general said, “Ennui. Boredom.”

Then, taking a second helping of crêpes Suzette, the general explained: “The hunting was not good last night. The fellow lost his head. He made a straight trail that offered no problems at all. That’s the trouble with these sailors; they have dull brains to begin with, and they do not know how to get about in the woods. They do excessively stupid and obvious things. It’s most annoying. Will you have another glass of Chablis, Mr. Rainsford?”

“General,” said Rainsford firmly, “I wish to leave this island at once.”

The general raised his thickets of eyebrows; he seemed hurt. “But, my dear fellow,” the general protested, “you’ve only just come. You’ve had no hunting——”

“I wish to go today,” said Rainsford. He saw the dead black eyes of the general on him, studying him. General Zaroff’s face suddenly brightened.

He filled Rainsford’s glass with venerable Chablis from a dusty bottle.

“Tonight,” said the general, “we will hunt—you and I.”

Rainsford shook his head. “No, general,” he said. “I will not hunt.”

The general shrugged his shoulders and delicately ate a hothouse grape. “As you wish, my friend,” he said. “The choice rests entirely with you. But may I not venture to suggest that you will find my idea of sport more diverting than Ivan’s?”

He nodded toward the corner to where the giant stood, scowling, his thick arms crossed on his hogshead of chest.

“You don’t mean——” cried Rainsford.

“My dear fellow,” said the general, “have I not told you I always mean what I say about hunting? This is really an inspiration. I drink to a foeman worthy of my steel—at last.” The general raised his glass, but Rainsford sat staring at him.

“You’ll find this game worth playing,” the general said enthusiastically.” Your brain against mine. Your woodcraft against mine. Your strength and stamina against mine. Outdoor chess! And the stake is not without value, eh?”

“And if I win——” began Rainsford huskily.

“I’ll cheerfully acknowledge myself defeat if I do not find you by midnight of the third day,” said General Zaroff. “My sloop will place you on the mainland near a town.” The general read what Rainsford was thinking.

“Oh, you can trust me,” said the Cossack. “I will give you my word as a gentleman and a sportsman. Of course you, in turn, must agree to say nothing of your visit here.”

“I’ll agree to nothing of the kind,” said Rainsford.

“Oh,” said the general, “in that case--But why discuss that now? Three days hence we can discuss it over a bottle of Veuve Cliquot, unless——”

The general sipped his wine.

Then a businesslike air animated him. “Ivan,” he said to Rainsford, “will supply you with hunting clothes, food, a knife. I suggest you wear moccasins; they leave a poorer trail. I suggest, too, that you avoid the big swamp in the southeast corner of the island. We call it Death Swamp. There’s quicksand there. One foolish fellow tried it. The deplorable part of it was that Lazarus followed him. You can imagine my feelings, Mr. Rainsford. I loved Lazarus; he was the finest hound in my pack. Well, I must beg you to excuse me now. I always’ take a siesta after lunch. You’ll hardly have time for a nap, I fear. You’ll want to start, no doubt. I shall not follow till dusk. Hunting at night is so much more exciting than by day, don’t you think? Au revoir, Mr. Rainsford, au revoir.” General Zaroff, with a deep, courtly bow, strolled from the room.

From another door came Ivan. Under one arm he carried khaki hunting clothes, a haversack of food, a leather sheath containing a long-bladed hunting knife; his right hand rested on a cocked revolver thrust in the crimson sash about his waist....

RAINSFORD had fought his way through the bush for two hours. “I must keep my nerve. I must keep my nerve,” he said through tight teeth.

He had not been entirely clearheaded when the chateau gates snapped shut behind him. His whole idea at first was to put distance between himself and General Zaroff; and, to this end, he had plunged along, spurred on by the sharp rowers of something very like panic. Now he had got a grip on himself, had stopped, and was taking stock of himself and the situation. He saw that straight flight was futile; inevitably it would bring him face to face with the sea. He was in a picture with a frame of water, and his operations, clearly, must take place within that frame.

The hunters sharp eyes stopped before they reached the limb where Rainsford lay...

The hunter’s sharp eyes stopped before they reached the limb where Rainsford lay tensed for a spring; a smile spread over the brown face.

“I’ll give him a trail to follow,” muttered Rainsford, and he struck off from the rude path he had been following into the trackless wilderness. He executed a series of intricate loops; he doubled on his trail again and again, recalling all the lore of the fox hunt, and all the dodges of the fox. Night found him leg-weary, with hands and face lashed by the branches, on a thickly wooded ridge. He knew it would be insane to blunder on through the dark, even if he had the strength. His need for rest was imperative and he thought, “I have played the fox, now I must play the cat of the fable.” A big tree with a thick trunk and outspread branches was near by, and, taking care to leave not the slightest mark, he climbed up into the crotch, and, stretching out on one of the broad limbs, after a fashion, rested. Rest brought him new confidence and almost a feeling of security. Even so zealous a hunter as General Zaroff could not trace him there, he told himself; only the devil himself could follow that complicated trail through the jungle after dark. But perhaps the general was a devil——

An apprehensive night crawled slowly by like a wounded snake and sleep did not visit Rainsford, although the silence of a dead world was on the jungle. Toward morning when a dingy gray was varnishing the sky, the cry of some startled bird focused Rainsford’s attention in that direction. Something was coming through the bush, coming slowly, carefully, coming by the same winding way Rainsford had come. He flattened himself down on the limb and, through a screen of leaves almost as thick as tapestry, he watched. . . . That which was approaching was a man.

It was General Zaroff. He made his way along with his eyes fixed in utmost concentration on the ground before him. He paused, almost beneath the tree, dropped to his knees and studied the ground. Rainsford’s impulse was to hurl himself down like a panther, but he saw that the general’s right hand held something metallic—a small automatic pistol.

The hunter shook his head several times, as if he were puzzled. Then he straightened up and took from his case one of his black cigarettes; its pungent incenselike smoke floated up to Rainsford’s nostrils.

Rainsford held his breath. The general’s eyes had left the ground and were traveling inch by inch up the tree. Rainsford froze there, every muscle tensed for a spring. But the sharp eyes of the hunter stopped before they reached the limb where Rainsford lay; a smile spread over his brown face. Very deliberately he blew a smoke ring into the air; then he turned his back on the tree and walked carelessly away, back along the trail he had come. The swish of the underbrush against his hunting boots grew fainter and fainter.

The pent-up air burst hotly from Rainsford’s lungs. His first thought made him feel sick and numb. The general could follow a trail through the woods at night; he could follow an extremely difficult trail; he must have uncanny powers; only by the merest chance had the Cossack failed to see his quarry.

Rainsford’s second thought was even more terrible. It sent a shudder of cold horror through his whole being. Why had the general smiled? Why had he turned back?

Rainsford did not want to believe what his reason told him was true, but the truth was as evident as the sun that had by now pushed through the morning mists. The general was playing with him! The general was saving him for another day’s sport! The Cossack was the cat; he was the mouse. Then it was that Rainsford knew the full meaning of terror.

“I will not lose my nerve. I will not.”

HE slid down from the tree, and struck off again into the woods. His face was set and he forced the machinery of his mind to function. Three hundred yards from his hiding place he stopped where a huge dead tree leaned precariously on a smaller, living one. Throwing off his sack of food, Rainsford took his knife from its sheath and began to work with all his energy.

The job was finished at last, and he threw himself down behind a fallen log a hundred feet away. He did not have to wait long. The cat was coming again to play with the mouse.

Following the trail with the sureness of a bloodhound came General Zaroff. Nothing escaped those searching black eyes, no crushed blade of grass, no bent twig, no mark, no matter how faint, in the moss. So intent was the Cossack on his stalking that he was upon the thing Rainsford had made before he saw it. His foot touched the protruding bough that was the trigger. Even as he touched it, the general sensed his danger and leaped back with the agility of an ape. But he was not quite quick enough; the dead tree, delicately adjusted to rest on the cut living one, crashed down and struck the general a glancing blow on the shoulder as it fell; but for his alertness, he must have been smashed beneath it. He staggered, but he did not fall; nor did he drop his revolver. He stood there, rubbing his injured shoulder, and Rainsford, with fear again gripping his heart, heard the general’s mocking laugh ring through the jungle.

“Rainsford,” called the general, “if you are within sound of my voice, as I suppose you are, let me congratulate you. Not many men know how to make a Malay mancatcher. Luckily for me I, too, have hunted in Malacca. You are proving interesting, Mr. Rainsford. I am going now to have my wound dressed; it’s only a slight one. But I shall be back. I shall be back.”

When the general, nursing his bruised shoulder, had gone, Rainsford took up his flight again. It was flight now, a desperate, hopeless flight, that carried him on for some hours. Dusk came, then darkness, and still he pressed on. The ground grew softer under his moccasins; the vegetation grew ranker, denser; insects bit him savagely.

Then, as he stepped forward, his foot sank into the ooze. He tried to wrench it back, but the muck sucked viciously at his foot as if it were a giant leech. With a violent effort, he tore his feet loose. He knew where he was now. Death Swamp and its quicksand.

His hands were tight closed as if his nerve were something tangible that someone in the darkness was trying to tear from his grip. The softness of the earth had given him an idea. He stepped back from the quicksand a dozen feet or so and, like some huge prehistoric beaver, he began to dig.

Rainsford had dug himself in in France when a second’s delay meant death. That had been a placid pastime compared to his digging now. The pit grew deeper; when it was above his shoulders, he climbed out and from some hard saplings cut stakes and sharpened them to a fine point. These stakes he planted in the bottom of the pit with the points sticking up. With flying fingers he wove a rough carpet of weeds and branches and with it he covered the mouth of the pit. Then, wet with sweat and aching with tiredness, he crouched behind the stump of a lightning-charred tree.

He knew his pursuer was coming; he heard the padding sound of feet on the soft earth, and the night breeze brought him the perfume of the general’s cigarette. It seemed to Rainsford that the general was coming with unusual swiftness; he was not feeling his way along, foot by foot. Rainsford, crouching there, could not see the general, nor could he see the pit. He lived a year in a minute. Then he felt an impulse to cry aloud with joy, for he heard the sharp crackle of the breaking branches as the cover of the pit gave way; he heard the sharp scream of pain as the pointed stakes found their mark. He leaped up from his place of concealment. Then he cowered back. Three feet from the pit a man was standing, with an electric torch in his hand.

“You’ve done well, Rainsford,” the voice of the general called. “Your Burmese tiger pit has claimed one of my best dogs. Again you score. I think, Mr. Rainsford, I’ll see what you can do against my whole pack. I’m going home for a rest now. Thank you for a most amusing evening.”

AT daybreak Rainsford, lying near the swamp, was awakened by a sound that made him know that he had new things to learn about fear. It was a distant sound, faint and wavering, but he knew it. It was the baying of a pack of hounds.

Rainsford knew he could do one of two things. He could stay where he was and wait. That was suicide. He could flee. That was postponing the inevitable. For a moment he stood there, thinking. An idea that held a wild chance came to him, and, tightening his belt, he headed away from the swamp.

The baying of the hounds drew nearer, then still nearer, nearer, ever nearer. On a ridge Rainsford climbed a tree. Down a watercourse, not a quarter of a mile away, he could see the bush moving. Straining his eyes, he saw the lean figure of General Zaroff; just ahead of him Rainsford made out another figure whose wide shoulders surged through the tall jungle weeds; it was the giant Ivan, and he seemed pulled forward by some unseen force; Rainsford knew that Ivan must be holding the pack in leash.

They would be on him any minute now. His mind worked frantically. He thought of a native trick he had learned in Uganda. He slid down the tree. He caught hold of a springy young sapling and to it he fastened his hunting knife, with the blade pointing down the trail; with a bit of wild grapevine he tied back the sapling. Then he ran for his life. The hounds raised their voices as they hit the fresh scent. Rainsford knew now how an animal at bay feels.

He had to stop to get his breath. The baying of the hounds stopped abruptly, and Rainsford’s heart stopped too. They must have reached the knife.

He shinned excitedly up a tree and looked back. His pursuers had stopped. But the hope that was in Rainsford’s brain when he climbed died, for he saw in the shallow valley that General Zaroff was still on his feet. But Ivan was not. The knife, driven by the recoil of the springing tree, had not wholly failed.

Rainsford had hardly tumbled to the ground when the pack took up the cry again.

“Nerve, nerve, nerve!” he panted, as he dashed along. A blue gap showed between the trees dead ahead. Ever nearer drew the hounds. Rainsford forced himself on toward that gap. He reached it. It was the shore of the sea. Across a cove he could see the gloomy gray stone of the chateau. Twenty feet below him the sea rumbled and hissed. Rainsford hesitated. He heard the hounds. Then he leaped far out into the sea. . . .

When the general and his pack reached the place by the sea, the Cossack stopped. For some minutes he stood regarding the blue-green expanse of water. He shrugged his shoulders. Then he sat down, took a drink of brandy from a silver flask, lit a cigarette, and hummed a bit from “Madame Butterfly.”

GENERAL ZAROFF had an exceedingly good dinner in his great paneled dining hall that evening. With it he had a bottle of Pol Roger and half a bottle of Chambertin. Two slight annoyances kept him from perfect enjoyment. One was the thought that it would be difficult to replace Ivan; the other was that his quarry had escaped him; of course, the American hadn’t played the game—so thought the general as he tasted his after-dinner liqueur. In his library he read, to soothe himself, from the works of Marcus Aurelius. At ten he went up to his bedroom. He was deliciously tired, he said to himself, as he locked himself in. There was a little moonlight, so, before turning on his light, he went to the window and looked down at the courtyard. He could see the great hounds, and he called, “Better luck another time,” to them. Then he switched on the light.

A man, who had been hiding in the curtains of the bed, was standing there.

“Rainsford!” screamed the general. “How in God’s name did you get here?”

“Swam,” said Rainsford. “I found it quicker than walking through the jungle.”

The general sucked in his breath and smiled. “I congratulate you,” he said. “You have won the game.”

Rainsford did not smile. “I am still a beast at bay,” he said, in a low, hoarse voice. “Get ready, General Zaroff.”

The general made one of his deepest bows. “I see,” he said. “Splendid! One of us is to furnish a repast for the hounds. The other will sleep in this very excellent bed. On guard, Rainsford. . . .”

He had never slept in a better bed, Rainsford decided.


Basmachi rebels besieged Khiva, the capital of the Khorezm People's Soviet Republic, which is now part of Uzbekistan, in a rebellion that had been smoldering since 1916.


Thursday, January 18, 2024

Friday, January 18, 1924. Corn husking bee, Transiting Mexican Federals, Convalescing Commie.

 

A corn husking bee, January 18, 1924.


The news recalled 1916.


Mexican troops looked to be about to get US transit.

Calvin Coolidge gave a press conference.  He addressed that topic, and others.  On the transit, he stated:

An inquiry also about the passage of Mexican troops across American territory. It is my information that New Mexico and I think Arizona have given consent of their Governments to the passage of Mexican troops, but that the Acting Governor of Texas thought that such passage through Texas territory might incur some danger. Of course, the opinion of the Governor there would be respected, and unless the local authorities, I mean by that the Government, state authorities, want to give their consent, our Government would notify the Government of Mexico that it seemed expedient to have troops pass through Mexico. Whether that would be refused, or changed at all, when the Governor gets home, I don’t know. It may be that the Acting Governor simply didn’t want to take the responsibility of making an affirmative decision, and is awaiting the return of the Governor.

Interesting how it was viewed as a state first matter.

One of the other topics addressed was the Teapot Dome Scandal.

While Trotsky was convalescing on the Black Sea, getting a little respite from being an agent of murderous armed agency, Stalin denounced him in a blistering speech.

1924  Douglas bank closes in failure, part of a waive of bank failures.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society. 

Thursday, July 20, 2023

Friday, July 20, 1923. Pancho Villa slain.


José Doroteo Arango, better known as Francisco "Pancho" Villa, was gunned down along with his assistant Daniel Tamayor, his unfortunate chauffeur Migel Trujillo and bodyguards Rafael Madreno and Claro Huertado in Hidalgo del Parral. Bodyguard Ramon Contreras survived the attack, killing one assailant.



The fatal trip into town in his Dodge sedan was to pick up payroll for his ranch employees. Details of the killings remain unclear, but it is widely suspected Plutarco Elías Calles and President Alvaro Obregón had a role in the killings, and that they were brought about by Villa's murmurings that he might reenter politics.  Jesús Salas Barraza took responsibility for the murder, with it being attributed to resentment over Villa whipping him in a feud over a woman, but it's generally felt that this was to divert attention from the plotters. Barraza served three months out of a twenty-year sentence for murder, and went on to become an officer in the Mexican Army.  Most of the surviving assassins also ended up in the Mexican army.



Telegraph service to Villa's hacienda of Canutillo was interrupted briefly, apparently in a move to cut communications lest his followers there start an uprising.

Villa left a complicated personal life in his wake.  His longest lasting spouse, Luz Corral, was not living with him at the time, and Austreberta Rentería was in residence at his hacienda as his wife.  Court challenges would uphold Corral as his legal spouse, and she would inherit his estate.  He had at least four living children at the time of his death.

Villa was an extremely odd character who had served brilliantly as a cavalry commander in the initial stages of the Mexican Revolution, but who was unable to adjust to the changes in military technology that had altered how cavalry had to be used.  He's the best remembered Mexican Revolutionary by far, although politically not a terribly effective one.  His decision to rail Columbus New Mexico in 1916, in retaliation for Woodrow Wilson allowing Carranza to transport his troops across Texas and back into Mexico, nearly lead the US into war, and provided an embarrassing episode in which a US expeditionary force was unable to run him down.  The Punitive Expedition, as it was known, did however serve to prepare the US for entry into World War One.

Perhaps Villa's violent life and death make the gathering of "prominent young girls" in a pageant in Seneca Falls depicting the progress of women, in which they were depicted as ancient warriors, a bit ironic.


 Warriors. Agnes Lester, Marjorie Follette, Emily Knight, Elizabeth Van Sickle, Carol Lester, prominent young girls of Seneca Falls, as warriors in the Drama depicting the Progress of Woman to be given at the reception at Seneca Falls, N.Y., on July 20, 1923.

The bodies of Villa and his men, laying dead in their Dodge, depicted the true face of war, which is not very glamorous. Women in liberal western societies, but only in liberal western societies, would "progress" into combat over the next century, but it's not an existential progress, but a retrograde trip into barbarity.

Casper's paper for the same day reported the end of the second dusk to dawn flying record attempt in Rock Springs.

Speaking of violence and women, the Casper paper was reporting a Cheyenne rancher was charged with violation of the Mann Act in the far western part of the state.

There were strikes in Port Arthur, Texas.

Thursday, February 2, 2023

Lex Anteinternet: A normal winter. How it used to be.

Lex Anteinternet: A normal winter.: A normal winter. That's exactly what we're having.  The weather here has been normal. And in Central Wyoming, that means multiple be..

After I posted the item above, it occurred to me that part of the complaining people do about winter is because they've so been able to defeat natural conditions in their daily lives and then, although only rarely, nature comes along and reminds you it's dominant for the most part. So far, our means of defeating it only do so in fairly average conditions.

Now, these are fairly average conditions, but people aren't used to them.  And there are some things you can't get around.  Six foot drifts on the Interstate highway, for example, are one such thing.

Anyhow, this caused me to recall that there was a time when people just basically endured these things.  It's always easy to say that, but it's true.

Thinking back to when I was a teenager in high school, and fewer people lived on the mountain, it was the case that the county used to annually simply inform people that the mountain road was not its first priority. So if you lived up there, they'd get around to the road after they'd cleared every other country road.  It was last.  If you didn't like it, don't live there, was the message.  People still complained, but not as much, and they didn't receive much sympathy either.

Ranchers, much like now, really didn't expect to get plowed out at all.  During the famous Blizzard of 1949 there were instances in which aircraft were ultimately flown over some ranches to see if the occupants of them were in trouble.  They didn't have phones or their lines were down.  Having known some of the ranchers who experienced that when I was young, their reaction was surprise.  They didn't expect anyone to send out an airplane, and they didn't figure they'd be regarded as imperiled for the most part.  There were excepts that year, I should note, which resulted in the Wyoming Air National Guard dropping hay for cattle.

This blog started off with the pre World War One era. What about these environs, then?

Cars already existed, and the predominant car of the era, the Model T, would actually have been a fairly good car for the conditions.  It has high clearance, thin wheels, low gearing, and it was fairly heavy for its size.  Therefore, it was a good car, to some degree, for snow.  

It wasn't a four-wheel drive, of course, and the snow we've been getting has been phenomenal.

Snow removal wasn't a thing anywhere before Milwaukee started doing it in 1862.  For the most part, most municipalities didn't do it, however, until the automobile era.  Quite a bit of plowing originally was done with draft horses, and this continued on until after World War Two to some extent.  When streets started to be plowed I don't know, and it's a little difficult to tell, without going through piles of old newspapers to find out.  The oldest example I could find was a municipal truck plowing snow in Washington, D.C. in 1916, which is frankly earlier than I would have guessed.

You don't have to have paved roads to have roads that are plowed, but it helps.  In 1916, Washington had paved streets.  Photographs of Casper show it having maintained dirt roads in the early 1920s.  I'm sure that by the 1930s, they were mostly paved.  What I don't know is when the city started plowing the snow.  A photograph that's online from the Wyoming State Archives shows the Wyoming Highway Department's first snow plow, when it was purchased, which has a date of 1923, just one hundred years ago coincidentally enough.  It's probably safe to assume the State didn't plow any highways prior to that.  Another photo from the same source shows the local high school's snowplow, which is mounted to a tractor, and has a date of 1930.  All in all, plowing the streets and highways must have come on during the 20s and 30s.

Older newspapers also show that in the 20s, the State simply closed more highways than it does now. Some highways are still closed for winter, but at least in the early 1920s the State simply closed, for example, the highway between Shoshone and Thermopolis.  Of course, you could, at that time, still make that trip by train.

That brings up this, which we've addressed before.  Prior to World War Two, 4x4 vehicles were a real rarity and tended to be confined to industrial operations or logging. Ranchers didn't have 4x4 vehicles, and regular people certainly did not.  For that matter, early 4x4s were a real slow moving off-road affair, and they wouldn't have been very useful for most people.  It was the U.S. Army that really started the development of the road capable all wheel drive vehicle and it took World War Two to really make them common.  Even after the war, it took a long while before very many town residents owned a 4x4.

This meant that once winter came, winter travel in and out of towns became much more limited.  Sure, in the 20s, when the weather improved, you could venture out, and people no doubt did. But busting drifts and the like became a post-war thing, and wouldn't have really become common until the 1960s for town residents.  Ranchers, for that matter, kept more employees at the time and some of them were stationed in the remoter areas of larger ranches so that they could take care of necessary chores during the winter.  In some instances, that meant that cowhands were stationed in remote cabins all winter long, and were checked on rarely, if at all.  And they spent the winter there without television or the internet, or for that matter, electricity.

Of course, the other thing this meant is that people whose livelihoods were in town, lived in town.  People didn't live on small acreages outside of town, for the most part, if they had jobs in town.  If you needed to be in the office, you needed to be within a reasonable distance, which often meant walking distance, of the office. For that matter, people with industrial employment tended to live near it.

The point of all of this, other than things were different then?  Well, they were different then.

They were different, for that matter into the 1980s.

And maybe folks need to have a little patience now.

Thursday, April 29, 2021

April 29, 1921. "16 Raiding Villistas Not Guilty"


News hit in Cheyenne that a jury in Deming had acquitted some accused of crimes during the Columbus raid. As noted yesterday, this wasn't the first trial, and in fact this one was remarkably late.  Indeed, so late that a person really has to wonder about the justice involved in holding prisoners for six years before going to trial.  And we learn from this article that these sixteen men had been tried and convicted previously, and then pardoned, and the rearrested on new charges.  A pretty questionable set of events.

It was news in other venues as well.


The long delay may have worked in these prisoners favor as well as obviously evolving views on their role in the raid. Those tried rapidly were tried in the heat of the immediate events, which as we know included these men, received much less favorable results.

President Harding had spoken the day prior and that was front page news everywhere, including on the USS Arizona.



On another note, grocery prices for this day in 1921.

Wednesday, April 28, 2021

April 28, 1921. Jury Acquits Defendants on the Columbus Raid

Jury Acquits 16 Mexicans of Columbus Raid Murders

So read the headlines of the New York Times on this day in 1921.

This is an aspect of the raid, which started off the day by day habit here, i.e., posts in "real time", a century removed, that we still haven't broken.  We probably should have considered it before.

Villa declared the raid a success in that his forces took over 300 longarms, 80 horses, and 30 mules, from Columbus and Camp Furlong by way of the raid.  While that may be so, he directly lost 90 to 170 dead, thereby paying a steep price for low returns it its considered that the raiding force had been made up of 484 men.  Sixty-three of his men were killed during the raid and the remainder died of their wounds thereafter, explaining the imprecise tally.

Some were captured and tried rapidly, with six being sentenced to death.

Other captured men, however were tried later on with differing result, but the overall results are, unfortunately, quite unclear to me.  It hadn't occurred to me that any were tried at all, as I would have regarded Villa's army as that, an army, albeit an irregular one.  Prisoners from armies aren't tried and aren't executed for simply participating in a military action, irrespective of the action itself being illegal.

Indeed, that logic later caused at least one prisoner to have a death sentence commuted to a life sentence. But there were at least three trials and many of the men tried were those who had been taken prisoner by the Army following the launching of its expedition into Mexico.  As far as I can tell, some death sentences were carried out.  A shocking number of the prisoners simply died in captivity due to the horrible condition, in part, of the county jail in which they were held.  We have to recall here that the 1918 Flu Epidemic was ongoing.  

As things moved along there came to be a fair amount of sympathy for the prisoners, some of whom  were in bad physical shape, and many of whom had only vague connections with what had occurred.  Soldier witnesses for the trial ended up being deployed to France so conducting the trials became difficult.  One defendant was only twelve years old and was released.  

Other than the citation to this headline, I can't find any evidence of trials occurring as late as 1921, but apparently they did.  By this time, it was probably too late to really convict many.  In this trial, apparently there were twenty defendants, and sixteen were found not guilty by the jury.

Should any have been tried at all?

Well, some appear to have been tried because of direct murders of civilians, something that's illegal in any war.  That's another matter. But the wisdom of trying soldiers, at least one of whom was a conscripted Carranzaista who was sent into action on that day without ammunition, is and was questionable.  What to do with them no doubt was also problematic, something we've learned again in recent years due to our wars with the Taliban and Al Queda.


On this same day President Harding, who seems to have been photographed with visitors nearly every day, posed with Pop Anson and Anson's daughters.  Adrian "Pop" Anson had been a professional baseball player and later a vaudeville performer.  In his vaudeville role, he performed with his two daughters depicted here, Adele and Dorothy.  Anson would have been about 68 at the time this photograph was taken, and both of his daughters were in their 30s.  Anson died the following April at age 69.

The dog was Laddie Boy, an Airedale.  He was the first White House dog to be followed by the press.  He wasn't even one year old when photographed here, and would outlive his master.

Thursday, May 21, 2020

The Mexican Revolution. . . where we're at in terms of century delayed time.

Yesterday we ran this item:

Lex Anteinternet: Venustiano Carranza assassinated . . .: .

Venustiano Carranza assassinated . . .

on this day in 1920, by officers who had betrayed him, pretending to offer him a safe lodging for the night in the town of Tlaxcalantongo.  Sometime during the night, their forces surrounded the house and then opened fire into ito.  Oddly, the assassins then telegramed Obregon to inform him that "we are at your service" but also asked for permission to bring Carranza's body to Mexico City for burial.  Obregon replied with the comment "It is very strange that a group of officers who vouched their loyalty and honor should have permitted him to be assassinated instead of complying with your duty."


And it goes on from there.

So, where are we at on this story that we've been following for years and for which there are now 306 entries on this blog.

The story starts with the revolution against Porifirio Diaz in 1911

Well, not really.  Diaz, who had been a lieutenant of Mexican revolutionary and then president Benito Juarez, served as President of Mexico three times with his last period of dictatorial service running form 1884 until May 21, 1911.  An odd statement to an American reporter about being willing to hold elections in 1908 lead to one and ultimately he proved unwilling not to run, as he'd promised, with his running meaning an assured reelection..  That lead to the rebellion in 1910 we now call The Mexican Revolution, lead at first by the improbable Francisco Modero.

Diaz at age 77.

On this date in 1920, Diaz had been dead five years.  He'd died of natural causes at age 85 in France.

In 1911 he took to his exile and was succeeded by Francisco León de la Barra y Quijano, whom Mexican conservatives called the "white president" due to his purity.  He only served until November.

León.

During his short administration León had to attempt to deal with the growing revolution against him and the growing right wing extremism in his army.  He wouldn't succeeded, but he did succeed in outliving the revolution  He was still living in 1920 and had a career as a diplomat ahead of him.  He ultimately retired to Spain, but even there was used unofficially in this capacity as a go between between France and Spain.  He died in 1939 of natural causes.

Modero.

León's successor was Modero who was a weak president from November 1911 until he was killed in a military coup on February 19, 1913.  His death threw the country back into civil war.

The fallen Huerta.

His successor was the successful head of the coup, Victoriano Huerta.  Huerta was able to topple Modero, but he couldn't quell the revolution, and he went into exile in July 1914.  Going first to Europe and then the United States, he died an alcoholic in 1916.

His successor, Francisco Sebastián Carvajal y Gual, served for only a month before also going into exile, a victim of Huerta's failed effort to reclaim Diaz's position in Mexico.  His story was happier, however, as he met his wife in exile in the United States and he ultimately returned to Mexico in 1922 to resume his legal practice, which he occupied until his death by natural causes in 1932.

And then came Carranza.

So, so far we've seen the assassination of two of the real revolutionary presidents of Mexico, the odd but admirable Modero and the determined and not so admirable Carranza.  And we've seen the exile of three of the right wing pretenders, two of whom had died by natural causes.

Not dying by natural causes up to this point were thousands of Mexican soldiers who had fought on both sides of the Mexican Revolution, and in some cases literally on both sides.  Included in that number was Emiliano Zapata, the greatest of the Mexican revolutionaries, who was its best post Modero hope.

And the revolution was getting increasingly extreme. Having gone from a hope for democracy with Modero it was coming to increasingly reflect the extreme left wing politics of revolutions of its age, something that would have ill consequences for Mexico in coming years.

Indeed, a real oddity of Mexico's post Maximillian politics in general, up to this point, is how radical it was even when seemingly combined with conservative elements.  If Diaz sometimes dressed like Napoleon, his politics, he in some ways was like him.  He was a political liberal but one who did not trust the democratic process.  Ultimately he governed as a moderate liberal with a focus on stability.  Even today he is credited with having laid the foundations for modern Mexico.  His real fault was in not trusting democracy and running for reelection in 1910, when he promised not to.

Had Diaz held to his initial promise, Modero would have been elected in 1910.   Whether Diaz stepping away from politics voluntarily would have necessarily resulted in a Mexican army that would have accepted the election is another question, and one we will never know the answer to.  Had that occured, Mexico would have stepped into being a true democracy in 1910, something that would take another century to occur.  Diaz's failure to trust his own people lead to a revolution in which propelled radicals to the top.  One of those radicals was Carranza, who ended up sharing that lack of trust with Diaz.  He sought to dictate the results of the upcoming 1920 Mexican election, which in turn lead to his bloody end in May, 1920.  That put Obregon in the position of being the assured ultimate next president of the country, with extreme radicals rising up right behind him.

Thursday, April 16, 2020

April 16, 1920. Carranza seeks to repeat history. . .

by transporting his troops across Texas to go into action in northern Mexico.


It was exactly that action in 1915, which allowed Carranza to transport his troops across Texas to go into action against Poncho Villa's, that lead to the 1916 raid by Villa on Columbus New Mexico.  Villa, not illogically, concluded that the United States should be chastised for intervening in the Mexican civil war in that fashion.


The irony was that Carranza personally disliked the United States and had never been its friend.  Wilson's 1915 action had been a mistake.  Carranza was asking him to repeat it. At the same time, Mexican revolutionaries in Sonora had invaded neighboring Sinola.

It was Arbor Day.

Agriculture Secretary Meredith making the principal address at the Arbor day exercises in Washington D.C.


Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Paths of Glory

I just reviewed 1917 here the other day, although that review won't appear here until tomorrow, and the viewing of which caused me to recall the trench scenes of this film, Paths of Glory.

Paths of Glory is a black and white film directed by Stanley Kubrik and featuring Kirk Douglas as a French lawyer serving as an officer during the Great War.  The movie is a fictionalized account of an actual event in which French soldiers were tried for cowardice for their actions during a 1916 advance.  More than half the movie concerns their fate in French legal proceedings so the film is both a legal drama as well as a war picture.

Considered an anti war drama in typical reviews, the film contains one of the best filmed depictions of trench warfare ever made, surpassed only recently by the depictions in the English movie 1917.  The film was regarded as so critical in this regards that the French managed to put pressure on United Artists not to release the film in France for nearly twenty years.  Release in Germany and Switzerland was delayed so as to not offend the French, and the film was not released in Spain until 1986.  U.S. military establishments would not show the film.

In modern terms the film is mild as an anti war film compared to films on the Vietnam War.  And the degree to which any antiwar film is successful in conveying that message is always debatable.  At any rate, as a drama and a depiction of World War One trench warfare, the film does well.

In terms of material details, the film is a good one, accurately portraying uniforms and equipment of the French Army of the Great War.

Tuesday, November 5, 2019

History Repeating Itself On the Border

I'm not really going to comment in depth about this story, but rather comment on something completely tangential to it.

First, the headline from the Washington Post:

Nine members of Mormon family with U.S. citizenship killed in attack in northern Mexico; Trump offers military support
Put in Wilson in place of Trump, and this story could have appeared in a 1919 issue of the Post, or certainly a 1916 issue.

This is an awful tragedy.  It appears to be a case of mistaken identify visited upon a group of people in a most violent way.  Chances are, we're only reading about it in the U.S. because those killed were dual citizens of the United States and Mexico and had extremely close connections with the United States. Had they been simply regular Mexican citizens we'd likely not be reading that much about it.

None of which diminishes the tragedy.

Mormons have had a fairly long presence in Mexico.  We last read about that here in the context of Mormon agricultural communities in Mexico coming under distress during the Mexican Revolution.  Poncho Villa seems to have uniquely disliked them for some known reason.  Maybe it was because they were closely connected with the U.S, maybe its because their religion was strange to him even though he was an irreligious man, maybe its just because they were different, or maybe it was because Villa was basically unstable.  At any rate, many of them fled to the United States during that period, although some remain.  I'm uncertain about these folks, but they were in the right Mexican state to have been descendants of those earlier colonies.

Anyhow, this blog has focused intensely on the 1915 to 1920 time period, and its often ran real time century delayed items from the 1916 raid on Columbus, New Mexico forward. Those have slowed up a lot recently (and readership has accordingly dropped off), but something like this reminds us, in a very tragic way, that the past is still with us.  Indeed, the present is merely a developed past.

Sunday, July 7, 2019

So you were a Wyoming National Guardsmen (or one from anywhere else) and now it's Monday July 7, 1919.

What now?

My M1911 Campaign Hat, which serves as my fishing and hunting hat, hanging by the stampeded string on the chair where I type out a lot of this stuff.  Probably a lot of M1911s were seeing similar storage about this time in 1919.

You might have joined a pre war National Guard unit in your hometown, if it had one, or you might have enlisted when the call came, which was quite common. If you lived in a small town like Casper, and Casper was very small in 1916, you would likely have done the latter, as Casper didn't have a Guard unit until 1917.

And that call for Guardsmen came on June 19, 1916 for Guardsmen.

So you became a Wyoming National Guardsmen in the infantry branch.  All Wyoming Guardsmen were infantrymen.

From there, it was some training locally, briefly, before you went with  your unit to Ft. D. A. Russell in Cheyenne, where you received more training and you were equipped, if you weren't already.  Or, actually, you expected to be sent there, but the Army, quixotically, refused to allow the Guard to train there and you therefore ended up at a camp at Frontier Park in Cheyenne.*

You learned how to fire a bolt action rifle, perhaps for the first time in your life even if you were familiar with firearms (and if you were from Wyoming, you were), as this was the age of the lever action, before bolt actions became a popular sporting arm.**  If you were an officer, or an NCO, you might have learned the ins and outs of the brand new M1911 pistol, just introduced into service, and quite a bit different from revolvers that may have otherwise been familiar with.***  And then there were automatic weapons, which you certainly weren't familiar with.

And you marched and drilled and marched and drilled.

By and large things went pretty well, but at least one of your fellow Guardsmen, Pvt. Dilley, disappeared under mysterious circumstances, never to return.  He was an exception to the rule, however.




Just after that you entrained at the railroad station in Cheyenne and shipped out to New Mexico, following a celebrated departure from the residents of Cheyenne.



And there  you remained for the next several months, a bulwark with other Guardsmen against Mexican incursions that didn't come. the Regular Army, of course, was now far down into Mexico, and truth be known very soon the Wilson Administration would be struggling for a way to disengage from that mission and pull them out.  In the mean time, you patrolled the border, which was not a safe job, and you trained.

National Guard infantry (9th Infantry, Massachusetts National Guard)  on the border in 1916.

You got back in the state on March 4, 1917.  You were mustered out of service on March 9, but the way things worked at the time, you wouldn't have made it home right away.  You had to process out, and wait for arrangements for train travel to whatever station was last on your route.  If you were lucky, that train ran right to your hometown. But for quite a few, that station was quite distant, and that meant that hopefully somebody was waiting for you with a wagon, or at least a horse, at that station.

On March 15, 1917, you likely made it home, if you lived in Central Wyoming.  So if you were from Douglas, or remote, small, but booming, Casper, you arrived home on this middle of March day.


So it was back into service.

Once again you mustered and went to Cheyenne, this time fleshed out with new troops who were signing up to be part of the country's effort in the Great War. The belief was that for the most part it would be the Navy, not the Army, that did the heavy lifting, and in fact a few of your colleagues who had served on the Mexican border, preferring not to miss the action again, joined the Navy.  War was declared in April.  In May the state was still raising troops.

Shortly thereafter you shipped out with your fellow Wyomingites to North Carolina, where you were to be trained, you supposed, on trench warfare.  On August 15, 1917, due to a curious legal oddity, you were officially conscripted into the Army.

It was not to be.

In early September the news came that your unit was being busted up.  Some of you were going into machine-gun companies, some into transport companies, and some into the field artillery.  No infantry, although a machine-gun company would be pretty darned close.  The machine-gun companies didn't' seem to come about, but the transport and artillery units did.  We'll say for our story here that you were one of the men who became an artilleryman.  If so, you made it to France later than your transport colleagues, and it'd take you additional months after the Armistice to make it back home as well.  Those Guardsmen you knew who went into transport were home months ago now.

Howitzer of the type used by the 148th Field Artillery, of which many Wyoming National Guardsmen became a part.

You would have made it to France on February 10, 1918, and you went to the front on July 9.  Soon thereafter you were firing missions in support of the American effort at Château-Thierry.


Your unit, unlike the 115th Ammunition Train that your fellow Wyoming Guardsmen were in, was kept on in the Army of Occupation after the Armistice.  This gave you a little time to see some parts of France and some of Germany while they were not at war, if not in good shape.

Finally, in June your unit was ordered home.  You boarded the ship in France.  At Camp Mills, New York the unit was released from the Army rolls.  You were still in, however, and went to Ft. D. A. Russell out of Cheyenne with those Guardsmen from the West, men from Wyoming, Idaho and Colorado.

There you were discharged from the Army on June 26. You stayed at Ft. Russell for a couple of days, however, while your paperwork was processed.

And then you boarded a train in Cheyenne that, in a bit of a roundabout route, and a series of transfers, took you all the way home to Casper a couple of days later.  Your service was celebrated everywhere you stopped.  By the 29th, you were back home in Casper.

Not the Casper you left, however. That Casper was gone.  The war had changed it forever.  It was much larger now.  And it was a refinery town in a major way, with a giant refinery on the west edge of town that operated night and day, as all refineries do, in an unyielding fashion.  It dominated the town.

So now you were home, but that home was much different than the one you left.  And just after you came home a couple of notable events happened.

The first was that state prohibition arrived.  That may not seem significant, but with you just arriving home on the 29th, and state prohibition going into effect on July 1, you or your friends probably planned for a night downtown at the bars, and there were a lot of them, on the 30th.  One last night where the beer flowed freely.  It had flowed very freely in Casper before you left, and certainly wine had made an appearance in France. So a night on the town.

That probably meant that you slept in on July 1.  Not a day to go looking for work.  July 2 might be, but it's only two days away from the big July 4 celebration, and this year that celebration was to kick in on July 3.  So you probably  held off on July 3, 4, and 5.  The 6th was a Sunday and you probably went to church with your family.

And then, on Monday July 7, it was out to find a job.

But where and doing what?

The options in the town were plenty in 1919, but they were all dominated by oil production now.  That no doubt would have figured in your reasoning to some extent.

_________________________________________________________________________________

*There's no rational basis for the Army's decision, but in this period there was a fair amount of tension between the Regular Army and the National Guard.  Indeed, that tension would last as long as the Vietnam War.

**Which isn't to say that bolt actions weren't around and in use.  For American civilians the bolt action that was by far the most common was the Krag Jorgensen, surplus from the U.S. Army where it had been briefly the standard rifle prior to the M1903.  Surplus bolt action Navy Lees were also around but much less common.  Sporting bolt actions, mostly of European manufacture, were available but rare.

***Semi automatic pistols were also a recent innovation for most civilians, with revolvers being far more common.