A FROLIC IN SOUTH AMERICAN WARFARE.
TN the interesting Recollections of a Service in Colombia, Bolivar is described as escaping in a canoe from a party of Spanish cavalry who had surprised him resting in a village on the banks of the Oronoco. One of his pursuers gallantly swam his horse after him ;
and, says our author,
"Never staying to ascertain if his comrades backed him, came close up, when Pornandez, who wag always inclined for frolic, said to me, ' Let us pull him on board and &el) him.' He called to us to surrender ; and we threw his lance on one side, and pulled him into the canoe by the collar, leaving the horse to swim back if he pleased. The poor fellow was ter- ribly frightened at the denouement of his adventure, and begged earnestly for his life ; but he was ordered to be givers up to the Indians, who soon despatched him after we had gained the little intelligence he could afford us." Vol. II. p. IG.
Such was the frolic of taking an enemy "to keep," in South America !
The desire to be exuberantly fine betrays the newspaper scribes into strange blunders. The Times, speaking of Corder, who lies under a charge of murder, says that his demeanour, and general conduct in jail, " has been perfectly decorous, and quite in unison with the awful situation in which he is placed, and the barbarous crime with which he is accused."
Thus, we learn from the Times, that a decorous demeanour is quite in unison with the barbarous crime of murder !
Previous page
