Adventure Magazine Cover, October 1911 — page 97: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Through Perilous Peru Poughkeepsie, New York, although he also made mention of Corinth. Between the two and having in mind the eight tongues, several of his stories and St. Paul’s theory as to all Corinthians, I incline in favor of the latter place. But of the dead nil nist bonum, and no one appreciated McRea’s good traits more than myself. I am afraid that he met with a very misem able death. COMPELLED TO KILL THE DOG FOR FOOD NTIL this time I have made no mention of one of the most self-sacrificing mem- bers of our party, but about this time he began to occupy the center of the stage. Before leaving Huanuco Sefior Don Jorge Durand, of the well known hacienda-holding family of that name, presented me with a handsome Great Dane named “‘Alicran.” This dog had become the pet of the party and somehow had managed to exist through all our troubles in very fair condition. In fact, 1 am not sure but that the sufferings of a dumb and hunger-stricken pet are more pathetic than those of a human being and I am confident that more than one man threw scraps to Alicran which he had much better have kept for himself. But when the seventeenth of October came and we had been seven days without food of any kind except a handful of lard each day and the palm-tips, we decided to sacrifice our poor companion. In our des- perate condition it seemed an easy thing to dispose of the question by vote, but when we had all come to the same conclusion it was a much different thing to choose a man for the execution. Even when Lewis, as the one in the most critical condition, finally volunteered to shoot Alicran for us, we found that we could not stay to see it. So we mournfylly patted the poor beast on the head and went away from camp until a shot told us that the job had been done. In all this time the natives had been rely- ing on their coca-leaves and, though growing daily more morose and despondent, had not openly mutinied. But with the killing of the dog they came to us and demanded some of the meat. While this resulted in our getting only three meals on half rations, it may have obviated trouble, though we were careful never to allow our rifles out of our hands. 1043 I NOW realized that it would be madness to wait any longer for the packers, so I put to a vote the matter of returning or going forward. We finally decided to push on at all hazards. The object of the expedition was yet to be accomplished and to turn back spelled failure. Some one once said that there are two kinds of men in this world—the man who produces results and “the man with the good excuse,” tion would have been a good enough excuse on sight, yet the revolving-chair man at home who listens to your report doesn’t always appreciate the difficulties. Perhaps he has never been hungry. aving made up our minds to continue, we assembled our packs, thumped the car- gadores into life and started out again on the eighteenth in an effort to reach the summit of the last range, which we finally achieved at ten o’clock on the morning of the twen- tieth. Although I had several times thought of trying out the properties of the coca-leaf on myself it was not until the morning of the nineteenth that I used it. I had been losing strength fast during the two days previous and had been very sick on the day following our three meals of dog-meat, so that with the arrival of the nineteenth I could hardly stand on my feet. Shortly after breaking camp I found it an almost impossible task to work up the hillside with the others and slowly dropped back from my position at the head of the file. LEFT BEHIND TO DIE Q)XE after another they passed me, Brown, Fleming, McClure and Lewis, interspersed among the cargadores, each one murmuring a word of encouragement and then clinching his jaws and stumbling ahead, fully conscious, I am afraid, of the fate which awaited me if I did not keep up and yet entirely justified in leaving me be- hind. I am glad to say that I did not re- proach them, for even then I realized keenly that in the utter absence of food it was a case of each man for himself. Furthermore, there was nothing they could do, which fact each knew as well as I. Feeling, after a time, that my legs would no longer support me, I sank down in the middle of the trail and gave way to despair. All of the party but one, a cargador, had © and though our condi- MICLOOKS CO