The Indian Chief: The Story of a Revolution

"Let no one approach the body!" he said in a voice which made the bravest recoil, and kneeling on his right, while the missionary placed himself on the left, he prayed.

Curumilla had disappeared.

Those who tell us that the Count de Prébois Crancé was an adventurer, I will merely ask what Hernando Cortez was on the day before the fall of Mexico?

In politics, as in everything else, the end justifies the means, and success is only the consecration of genius.

NOTE

Several of our friends have remarked to us with truth that the work of justice we have attempted in this work would be incomplete if we insisted on concealing our characters under their pseudonyms. We will, therefore, obey our friends' wishes. Who does not remember the heroic episode of Count Gaston de Raousset-Boulbon's life? The incident that terminated it was, in spite of the political preoccupations of the moment, considered a public calamity.

It is the expedition of this great soldier, who only lacked a lever to overturn a world, that we have attempted to describe. Don Louis is the count. By the side of Consul Calvo, General Yanès, and the Commandant Lebourgeois-Desmarets, a sinister trinity fatal to the count, the first two through a mean hatred, the third through jealousy, also grin the ignoble and gloomy faces of Colonel Campusano and Cubillas, those subaltern agents, the buzzards who were less hideously ferocious than the men who urged them to action. Now let us mention hap-hazard the names of the few men who remained faithful to the count at all risks. In the first rank we will name Monsieur A. de la Chapelle, editor in chief of the Messager de San Francisco, a private friend of Raousset, who left him at his death the duty of avenging his memory, and whom friendship inspired to write so fine a book; then Lenoir, Gamier, Fayolle, and Lefranc, of whom the last three fell bravely before Hermosillo; O. de la Chapelle, brother of the journalist, that chivalrous chief of the Cocosperians; lastly, the Mexican captain, Borunda, whose chivalrous pleading would have saved the count, had not his death been resolved on.

Twelve years have passed over the drama of Guaymas, and the hour has arrived to do proper justice to the heroic victim of that unjustifiable assassination. We, one of his obscurest friends, will be pleased if our book, so incomplete as it may be, aids to any extent, however slight, in effecting this rehabilitation so eagerly expected by all honest hearts. We will add in conclusion, that the narrative has been undertaken without any notes being prepared beforehand, and written under the impression of ineffaceable memories, rather with the heart than with the pen.

GUSTAVE AIMARD.THE END

1

See "Gold-Seekers." Same publishers.

2

See "The Tiger Slayer." Same publishers.

3

Enemy whom I adore, of Spain the second Helen, oh that I were born blind, or you born without beauty! Accursed be the day and hour when my star caused me to be born! Breasts that nourished me, better to have given me death. You will pay —

4

See "The Trappers of Arkansas."

5

We must be pardoned for laying such stress on the character of the young chieftain of Guetzalli, who has doubtless been already recognised, and whose name we are now authorised, to our great delight, to reveal. After the hapless end of the Marquis de Pindray the colony of Cocospera unanimously chose as his successor Monsieur O. de la Chapelle, a young man whom his eminent qualifications recommended for all suffrages. It is he who figures in our story under the pseudonym of de Laville. Monsieur O. de la Chapelle died at an early age. This premature end was deeply felt by all his friends, among whom the author, though he knew him but very slightly, is happy to call himself, and to testify it by showing the heroic part he played in the glorious expedition which forms the subject matter of this work. – G.A.

6

Wild boar.

7

Fact.

8

A little over £2000.

9

We are delighted to be able to state that Captain Borunda, in spite of the brilliant offers afterwards made him, would not consent to part with this ring. – G.A.