X66 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[May 30, 1908. 
street, lie gave Joe a letter to a man by the 
name of Antone, in Pisagua, and said he would 
hide 11s until our ship sailed, and. bidding 11s 
good-bye. closed the door and left us in the 
dim star light. 
Some of the fellows began to murmur about 
having to walk, but it was no time to srand and 
argue, the dogs had scented us and one after 
another were joining into a chorus of un¬ 
earthly howls that momentarily increased until 
1 expected to see the armed guards come down 
the street in pursuit of us. 
Joe started off as guide to lead us. and the 
procession followed. We passed the condensing 
works and left the town behind; but Joe, in¬ 
stead of going up the mountain, kept close 
along the beach, and before we had gone a mile, 
the shore became so steep that it was impos¬ 
sible to proceed further. Any step might send 
us down the rocks to be tossed and crushed in 
the surf at the shore. IIere we came to a halt, 
and on hands and knees retraced our steps until 
standing was safe and held a council of war. 
What were we to do? Joe certainly did not 
know the way in spite of his assertions that he 
did. He had not followed Charlie's instruc¬ 
tions at the start, for he told us to go straight 
up the mountain until we reached the plain 
above and then follow the sea. 
“Come on fellows, follow me, I know the 
way better than this,” I said, for I realized 
something had to be done and done quickly. 
As long as Joe was leader I was contented to 
follow; but when he failed, I used my own judg¬ 
ment. I had studied the face of the cliff from 
the ship many and many a time, and had made 
up my mind how to get to the top. So with 
Joe at my elbow and the rest following in line. 
I led them back to the condensing works and 
started straight up the cliff, following the zig¬ 
zag course of a crevice that looked as if it had 
once been the bed of a stream. 
It was hard climbing, our feet slid back with 
every step, the loose sand and gravel rolling 
under our shoes. The dim, uncertain starlight 
was deceptive, for in some places the ground 
was light and in others dark. One would look 
like a ridge and the other a gully, yet when we 
got there it would be all level ground, and other 
places where it looked smooth we would stumble 
into small, unseen gullies and over unseen 
ridges. It tried the endurance of all, and we 
had not gone a mile before we had to stop and 
let Bill and Albert rest. When the fellows be¬ 
gan to look back and see the village lying a 
dark mass at their feet and the anchor lights of 
the ships seemingly not a stone’s throw away, 
they began to get uneasy. 
“Vich von is the W.’s light?” asked Joe. 
“Dere it is, next to de last out dere. See it 
next to dat bright light?” said Hans. 
“Yes, the bloomin’ craft is too mean to burn 
much oil,” chipped in Albert and the rest of us 
gave her like compliments. We were glad we 
were clear of her, and every little while one or 
two of the men would look back and burst out 
into a torrent of profanity, accompanied by a 
shaking of the fist at the innocent light on the 
bark’s fore stay that looked like a star far be¬ 
low 11s. 
After another climb straight up, the top of the 
mountain seemed further off that ever, and the 
lights in the bay were still directly under us. 
When they saw this the fellows began to get 
uneasy and suggested that we go north up the 
coast so as to get out of sight of the ship. I 
argued and argued in vain with them. They 
had no more sense than a lot of sheep, and I 
either had to go along the coast with them or 
continue to climb straight up by myself. 
Remembering the old saying that in unity 
there is strength, I went with the crowd, but 
kept telling them my arguments in favor of go¬ 
ing straight up. True, it was easier to walk 
along the face of the cliff than to climb up it; 
but in the gully we were making pretty good 
headway, and I wanted to continue there. Go¬ 
ing north, we gradually left the lights in the 
bay behind us, but the top of the mountain still 
towered a long way above our heads. 
About four miles north of Caleta Buena the 
mountainside ran out in a steep promontory 
into the sea, and its sides stood almost vertical. 
As we neared this point climbing became more 
difficult with every step, exhausted with their 
efforts, all hands sat down to rest again.. 
“If we don’t get to the top pretty soon,” said 
I, “it will be daylight and then they can see us 
from the ship; there’s no place to hide here, and 
we'll be like flies on a wall, and you bet the 
Old Man will have his glasses on the mountain 
as soon as it is daylight.” 
“Why, what’s the matter with the way we are 
going?” asked Albert. “We have made more 
headway since we started along the coast than 
we did before.” 
“Yes,” I answered, “it seems so, but you’ll 
find you’ve got to get to the top before you get 
to that point or walking will be impossible. It 
is getting steeper and steeper all the time, and 
when you come to climb up now you wjll find 
it much harder than if you had gone straight up 
in the gully as I wanted to do.” 
But they would not be convinced, until as we 
progressed, we found it got so steep it was 
dangerous to proceed. The mountain went 
down in a regular landslide from where we were 
to the sea. Then it was go up or nothing, and 
after a short spell of climbing almost on our 
hands and knees, the others soon admitted their 
mistake. However, there was no time to go 
back to the gully now, we must get to the top 
from where we were. Joe was leading, I next, 
followed by Hans, Albert and Bill, in the order 
named. Not only did the darkness make climb¬ 
ing difficult, but the ground was loose and stony, 
making it necessary to use our hands as well as 
feet in climbing. This work soon told on old 
Bill, and we were continually stopping to let 
him rest, until he got so he would only walk 
about five minutes and then want to sit down 
for ten. Joe told him we could not keep up 
that kind of work or daylight, which was fast 
approaching, would find 11s not yet over the 
mountain. We had all agreed to keep together, 
but when Bill sat down and refused to go any 
further, we threatened to go on without him, 
and for a reply he began to cuss us. . 
“Go it if you like,” said he, and followed 
it up with some vile language directed at us. 
So we went back to him and divided our 
crackers and sausage and Joe gave him a dol¬ 
lar in native money from the five dollars 
Charlie had furnished 11s when we started. We 
tided to reason with, him, but it was no use, he 
was tired and ugly; so leaving him, we hurried 
on as fast as we could, slipping and sliding back 
with every step. One or twice we stopped and 
shouted down, asking Bill if he would not come 
on, that we would wait for him; but he refused 
to reply except once, \vhen we heard him 
cursing. 
I was getting very tired in the knees myself 
now, but Joe seemed as fresh as ever. I stuck 
to his heels with determination, and for a couple 
of hours we had the hardest climb I ever had 
in my life. Albert was the next to flag, and 
finally poor little Hans began to pant and fall 
behind. But he was game, so Joe and I waited 
for him to catch up. Finally Joe himself showed 
signs of distress, and while he and Hans satj 
down for a rest. I pushed on. for I seemed to| 
feel it was not very far to the top of the moun-j 
tain, yet to look at it, a black ridge across the! 
sky above it seemed miles away. When 1 had! 
gone half a mile or so, I suddenly came to level 
ground and saw the land rising in a gentle slope 
a short distance ahead to the very top of the 
mountain. So I shouted down, “Hey. Joe! 
come on up; here’s the top right here! I’m on 
it!” and I could hear the stones rolling down 
as they scrambled up, followed by Albert, who 
had also heard me say the top was not far away. 
None of us were tired then, the walking on 
level ground was easy after the climb we had 
had. We took a pull at our water bottles that 
we carried in our hands and started up the slope 
for the top. As we crossed the level ground, 
we passed close to the black, yawning mouth of 
a cave with a derrick at its mouth and knew 
then where we were. We had often looked up 
from the bark's deck, when heaving in cargo, at 
this cave, which, we were told, was a silver 
mine, and wondered what kind of an affair it 
was. If it had been day time and I had been 
doing anything else except running away, I 
should have liked nothing better than to have 
gone into the mine and see*n how they worked 
it. But as it was, we hurried on up the slope of 
ground. We passed a number of the miners’ 
huts and were nearly scared to death when five 
or six heads rose up out of the ground and 
jabbered something in Spanish at us. “Pisagua! 
Pisagua!” said I. and one of them pointed north. 
They were sleeping in holes for all the world 
like graves with their blankets laid over the top, 
and we had to walk carefully among them, so 
as not to step into one. 
Upon gaining the summit of the hill, we saw 
a broad tableland stretching as far as we could 
see in the uncertain light preceding dawn. 
There were, as Charlie had said, three distinct 
trails leading north. So crossing the first, we 
ran across the sand to the second, but what was 
my astonishment to find it was no path at all 
but a strata of light-colored earth with not a 
footprint visible. We followed it, however, lor 
about a mile and then lost all traces of it. 
Which way to go then we did not know, so de¬ 
cided to stay where we were until daylight, so 
we could see where we were going. 
[to be continued.] 
Canoeing. 
A. C. A. Membership. 
NEW MEMBERS TROPOSEI). 
Atlantic Division.—Henry J. Wernst, no 
Fourth Ave., Newark, N. J., by George V. 
Strahan. 
Central Division.—Horace B. Meacham, War¬ 
ren, Pa., by E. A. Phillips. 
Eastern Division.—Arthur G. Clark, Andover, 
Mass., by Henry A. Bodwell. 
Western Division.—James J. Hooker, 216 East 
3d street, Cincinnati, O.. by Lucien Wulsin. 
NEW MEMBERS ELECTED. 
Atlantic Division.—5516, John M. Palmer, Jr., 
4 Washington Terrace, West 186th street, New 
York city; 5523, Frank D. Cure, 55 Overlook 
avenue, Belleville, N. J. 
Central Division.—5517, Grover M. Parker, 78 
James street, Buffalo, N. Y.; 5518. H. J. Dixon, 
Warren. Pa.; 5519, Lucius C. Litchfield, 164 
Crescent avenue, Buffalo, N. Y.; 5520, E. M. 
Olin, care of Westinghouse Electric & Manufac¬ 
turing Co., East Pittsburg, Pa.; 5521, Robert M. 
Tennant, care of LTnion Switch and Signal Co., 
Swissvale, Pa. 
Eastern Division.—5524, Edward T. Erickson, 
30 Pearl avenue, Arlington, Mass. 
Western Division.—5522, Charlie Tisell, 1707 
7th street, Rockford, II. 
APPLICANTS FOR REINSTATEMENT. 
Atlantic Division.—George F. Henshaw, Thos. 
H. Baskerville. 
Eastern Division.—Walter D. Eaton. 
