A MURDEROUS NIGHT ATTACK.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 701, 22 August 1870, Page 3

A MURDEROUS NIGHT ATTACK.

* If, reader, you are robust and young, and hare a taste for hard work, and that agreeable process ususally termed " roughing it," go to South America, inrest in land— not near the large towns, where your yearly gains will be swallowed up in the dissipations

■ of a week ; but become a pioneer, and seek the fertile plains on the Indian frontier, and i you will be indulged to the very top of your bent ; for there the labour of your own hands must raise the roof which shelters you, and all your vigilance and courage will be required to live under it in safety. It is needless to say that you must dispense with the luxuries of life, for even the necessaries i will not be given. Bread itself will become , a« memory of the past, and ship's biscuit a i very present and hard reality. Each day ! you will find it imperative to " return to your I muttons" for dinner, and that meal will s probably have been preceded by the api petite inspiring occupation of killing and i cooking the meat in question. I had but lately come from England to join Dick Merton, my former chum and pro- , tector at a public school, and my fast friend . always. Our joint and very modest capital had been invested in a league of land, bought j for an old song on account of its defective title (it was claimed, with some thousands r besides, by the Pampa Indians, who made entry upon it — gave notice to quit by brandishing lances at vs — and levied a dis- ' tress upon our horses, and upon us ,(;00, in ! the most European and legal manner); also . in a few sheep, having the lathy appearance, and almost the speed, of greyhounds ; and, lastly, in the materials for our house, of which, as we had ourselves been the archit ect, builders, and clerks of the work, we ' were not a little proud. It was built of sunf baked bricks, and consisted of one tolerably large room, with a flat roof and parapet, , accessible from the inside by means of a j ladder. Around it, at about thirty yards , distant, we had dug a deep dry ditch, crossed by a drawbridge, and intended as a protection against surprise by our enterprising '. neighbours the Indians, The latter dusky gentlemen, had hitherto behaved themselves 1 very much as such, and had confined their throat-cutting propensities to certain stray [ sheep, instead of gratifying them at the cxi pense of the owners. But ugly tales were i still told of their doings round about vs — of : white men taken whilst riding in sight of ; home, and tortured ; of cattle driven off, [ and sheep speared in very wantonness of mischief — which were not reassuring, and which caused us to keep a particularly sharp 1 look-out, especially when, as now, the Indian [ moon (their favourite time of attack) 1 gave light enough to point the way to! [ plunder, but not to guide the aim of the 1 defenders. Dick Merton, changed indeed since the days when his word was law among 1 a select circle of Pall Mall dandies, lounged up to where I was standing. His costume [ was simple in the extreme, but consisted merely of a sufficiently aged pair of leather 1 unmentionables, and a red flannel shirt — the [ whole being surmounted and relieved by a very long black beard, and a very short but 1 equally black pipe; but through rough attire , and surroundings, the indefinable je ne saisl quoi of gentility was as clearly recognisable [ as when he was sowing his rather extensivfr \ crop of wild oats upon home soil, and before " that memorable Derby, which induced him, I after settling with duns of every description, I from fashionable tradesmen to " honour- ' able " welchers, to embark himself and the j leavings of his property, and dwell among sheep and savages, until he could return with fresh grist to carry on the civilised [ mill. i " Can you see anything stirring in the > camp ?" said he as he came up; " those horses are making a confounded row in the . corral. I saw Johnson the Yankee this • morning, and he said that Indians had i crossed the river; and he guessed we'd I better keep our wits well iled, that the dusky ' varmin didn't look in when we warn't ready i for visitors." Now, horses were our surest safeguards against surprise. Dogs we had ; too, but they roused us up so frequently by . barking at nothing more formidable than a ; stray deer or fox, that, reminded of the gentleman whose amusement it was to cry : " Wolf 1" we lost all faith in them; but our , little half-wild Fampa horses had a truer i instinct, and their warnings, given by stamping upon the ground, were not be disregarded ; with safety. "I can make out some object moving about half a mile to the southward," ; said I, after a long look-out on the plains. " They are mounted men, by Jove I" ex- , claimed my companion; " and riding hard i this way too. Stand here with your rifle, , Alfred, while I slip cartridges into the others. At that pace they will be here directly." And so they were. Almost before Dick had reached my side again, two " Guachos," their usually swarthy faces livid with fear, sprung , from their horses, which, covered with blood, sweat, and foam, showed how sharp had been ; the ride, and rushed over the drawbridge, i They told us, as soon as terror would allow them, that three hundred Indians were in hot pursuit, and would Boon be on the spot, and , besought us for the love of the Virgin, to ' give them shelter, as to ride out again into , the camp upon their foundered horses would be certain death. Dick, . rather to my Bur- > paise, for I did not then know what disi tinguished liars the natives as a rule are, ; calmly lit his pipe, and then ordered our i visitors, in a somewhat doubtful Spanish , idiom, to make themselves *' -scarce." "Unless," he said politely, "you can tell a i plain tale, senores, without ließ, yamos " [be off]," and adios" [God be with you]. Upon this we learned, after much cross-question- ! ing, that they had been to buy horses (" To steal them, more likely," interjected Dick) : at the the station of a rich. Spaniard, Don Ramon Garcia, who lived about four leagues from us ; and that when they reached the top of a gentle rise in the ground, and had a view of the house, they had seen, to their horror and dismay, a large body of the dreaded Indians, who were attacking— for they heard shots — Don Ramon's estancia. "Whereupon," said the spokesman, with teeth chattering, "we rode hard to ypur abode, well knowing that the brave Englishmen would not deliver us up; but let us i mount your fleetest horses, senorea, and ride

for life. Soon they will beTiere ; and who can withstand the fierce bravos ?" If this be true," said Dick, turning to me, " and I believe it is, for these cowardly scoundrels' faces are proof that they have seen something, the sooner we prepare to fight the better. Of course, they were not attacking Ramon's place; he has a fort strong enough to resist a thousand of them, and plenty of men and arms as well. Most likely, they have made a dash to carry off any one who might be strolling at a distance from the house, or to drive off the horses; and it is equally likely that we shall have them here soon, where there's a better chance for a night attack. In any event, we must be prepared for them. Naturally, we can't run away, and leave all we have in the world to be destroyed, as these valiant gentlemen propose." My chum's calmness infused confidence into me, and, though dreadfully nervous— for it was my first fight, and a kind of internal fluttering sensation warned me that, like Viola, " I lacked something ef a man " — I set about our preparations with a good show of self-posses-sion. The natives— both of late arrivals and our own two men, who had often boasted of what they meant to do and had already done in the way of fighting Indians — were quite useless. They besought us piteously to flee, and so hampered us, that Dick's patience evaporated, and having lavished a series of hearty kicks amongst them, he consigned them forcibly to nether and more sultry regions, kindly offering horses for that or any other journey they might wish to make. They dare not, however ride away even from the coming danger; and presently, to our great relief and delight, we saw them scramble through the ditch, and into pur solitary field of maize, where, as we learned afterwards, they lay concealed, with their face 3 buried in the ground, like ostriches, until the storm should blow over. Our preparations were very simple — a box of cartridges was opened (for we were provided with those inestimable peace and life-pre-servers, breech-loading rifles), and placed ready to hand, together with a bottla of whisky and a jar of water; the door and window, our weakest points, were secured as strongly as possible ; and then, sheltering our bodies behind the parapet, we peered cautiously over, and strained our eyes to get the first glimpse of an enemy. Nothing i« so daunting as suspense to a young campaigner, and I felt my heart thumping against my libs with excitement, and a sort of nervous dread that I should not play a man's part in the struggle we expected. But Dick's voice, calm, low, and with a slight drawl in it, reassured me. |"To be continued.]