Wood Rangers: The Trappers of Sonora. Reid Mayne
up – was a sailor of gigantic height, of colossal proportions, and Herculean vigour. He was a Canadian by birth. He carried in his arms a young child that was cold and motionless, as if dead. A slight trembling in its limbs, however, proclaimed that there was still life in it.
“What the deuce have you got there, Bois-Rose?” demanded the officer of the watch.
“With your leave, lieutenant, it’s a young child that I found in a boat adrift, half dead with hunger and cold. A woman, quite dead, and bathed in her own blood, still held it in her arms. I had all the trouble in the world to get the boat away from the place where I found it, for those dogs of Spaniards espied it, and took it for one of ours. There was a terrible devil of a coast-guard kept all the while firing at me with as much obstinacy as awkwardness. I should have silenced him with a single shot, had I not been hindered in looking after this poor little creature. But if ever I return – ah!”
“And what do you intend to do with the child?”
“Take care of it, lieutenant, until peace be proclaimed, then return here and find out who it belongs to.”
Unfortunately the only knowledge he was able to obtain about the infant was its name, Fabian, and that the woman who had been assassinated was its mother.
Two years passed during which the French privateer did not return to the coast of Spain. The tenderness of the sailor towards the child he had picked up – which was no other than the young Count Fabian de Mediana – did not cease for an instant, but seemed rather to increase with time. It was a singular and touching spectacle to witness the care, almost motherly, which this rude nurse lavished upon the child, and the constant ruses to which he had recourse to procure a supplement to his rations for its nourishment. The sailor had to fight for his own living; but he often indulged in dreams that some day a rich prize would be captured, his share of which would enable him to take better care of his adopted son. Unfortunately he did not take into his calculations the perilous hazards of the life he was leading.
One morning the privateer was compelled to run from an English brig of war of nearly twice her force; and although a swift sailer, the French vessel soon found that she could not escape from her pursuer. She disdained to refuse the combat, and the two vessels commenced cannonading each other.
For several hours a sanguinary conflict was kept up, when the Canadian sailor, dashed with blood, and blackened with powder, ran towards the child and lifting it in his arms, carried it to the gangway. There, in the midst of the tumult, with blood running over the decks, amidst the confusion of cries and the crash of falling masts, he wished to engrave on the child’s memory the circumstance of a separation, of which he had a strong presentiment. In this moment, which should leave even upon the memory of an infant, a souvenir that would never be effaced, he called out to the child, while shielding it with his huge body, “Kneel, my son!”
The child knelt, trembling with affright.
“You see what is going on?”
“I am afraid,” murmured Fabian, “the blood – the noise – ” and saying this he hid himself in the arms of his protector.
“It is well,” replied the Canadian, in a solemn tone. “Never forget, then, that in this moment, a sailor, a man who loved you as his own life, said to you —kneel and pray for your mother!”
He was not permitted to finish the speech. At that moment a bullet struck him and his blood spouting over the child, caused it to utter a lamentable cry. The Canadian had just strength left to press the boy to his breast, and to add some words; but in so low a tone that Fabian could only comprehend a single phrase. It was the continuation of what he had been saying – “Your mother—whom I found—dead beside you.”
With this speech ended the consciousness of the sailor. He was not dead, however; his wound did not prove fatal.
When he came to his senses again he found himself in the fetid hold of a ship. A terrible thirst devoured him. He called out in a feeble voice, but no one answered him. He perceived that he was a prisoner, and he wept for the loss of his liberty, but still more for that of the adopted son that Providence had given him.
What became of Fabian? That the history of the “Wood-Rangers” will tell us; but before crossing from the prologue of our drama – before crossing from Europe to America – a few events connected with the tragedy of Elanchovi remain to be told.
It was several days after the disappearance of the Countess, before anything was known of her fate. Then some fishermen found the abandoned boat driven up among the rocks and still containing the body of the unfortunate lady. This was some light thrown upon the horrid mystery; but the cause of the assassination long remained unknown, and the author of it long unpunished.
The old steward tied black crape upon the vanes of the chateau, and erected a wooden cross on the spot where the body of his beloved mistress had been found; but, as everything in this human world soon wears out, the sea-breeze had not browned the black crape, nor the waves turned green the wood of the cross, before the tragic event ceased to cause the slightest emotion in the village – ay, even ceased to be talked of.
Chapter Six
Sonora
Sonora, naturally one of the richest provinces of Mexico, is also one of the least known. Vast tracts in this State have never been explored; and others have been seen only by the passing traveller. Nevertheless, Nature has been especially bountiful to this remote territory. In some parts of it the soil, scarce scratched by the plough, will yield two crops in the year; while in other places gold is scattered over the surface, or mixed with the sands, in such quantity as to rival the placers of California.
It is true that these advantages are, to some extent neutralised by certain inconveniences. Vast deserts extend between the tracts of fertile soil, which render travelling from one to the other both difficult and dangerous; and, in many parts, of the province the savage aborigines of the country are still masters of the ground. This is especially the case in those districts where the gold is found in placers.
Those placers are not to be approached by white men, unless when in strong force. The Indians repel all such advances with warlike fury. Not that they care to protect the gold – of whose value they have been hitherto ignorant – but simply from their hereditary hatred of the white race. Nevertheless, attempts are frequently made to reach the desired gold fields. Some that result in complete failure, and some that are more or less successful.
The natural riches of Sonora have given rise to very considerable fortunes, and not a few very large ones, of which the origin was the finding a “nugget” of virgin gold; while others again had for their basis the cultivation of the rich crops which the fertile soil of Sonora can produce.
There is a class of persons in Sonora, who follow no other business than searching for gold placers or silver mines, and whose only knowledge consists of a little practical acquaintance with metallurgy. These men are called gambusinos. From time to time they make long excursions into the uninhabited portions of the State; where, under great privations, and exposed to a thousand dangers, they hastily and very superficially work some vein of silver, or wash the auriferous sands of some desert-stream, until, tracked and pursued by the Indians, they are compelled to return to their villages. Here they find an audience delighted to listen to their adventures, and to believe the exaggerated accounts which they are certain to give of marvellous treasures lying upon the surface of, the ground, but not to be approached on account of some great danger, Indian or otherwise, by which they are guarded.
These gambusinos are to mining industry, what the backwoodsmen are to agriculture and commerce. They are its pioneers. Avarice stimulated by their wonderful stories, and often too by the sight of real treasure brought in from the desert – for the expeditions of the gambusinos do not always prove failures – avarice thus tempted, is ready to listen to the voice of some adventurous leader, who preaches a crusade of conquest and exploration. In Sonora, as elsewhere, there are always an abundance of idle men to form the material of an expedition – the sons of ruined families – men who dislike hard work, or indeed any work – and others who have somehow got outside the pale of justice. These join the leader