Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/269

 *test or another escaped scot free. There had never been a judicial execution in the territory, and, under the technicalities of law, there did not appear much chance of any being recorded for at least a generation. It needed no argument to make plain to the dullest comprehension that that sort of thing would do good to no one; that it would end in perpetuating a bad name for the town; and destroy all hope of its becoming prosperous and populous with the advent of the railroads of which mention was now frequently made. The more the matter was talked over, the more did it seem that something must be done to free Tucson from the stigma of being the refuge of murderers of every degree.

One of the best citizens of the place, a Mexican gentleman named Fernandez, I think, who kept a monte pio, or pawnbroker's shop, in the centre of the town not a block from the post-office, was found dead in his bed one morning, and alongside of him his wife and baby, all three with skulls crushed by the blow of bludgeons or some heavy instrument. All persons—Mexicans and Americans—joined in the hunt for the assassins, who were at last run to the ground, and proved to be three Mexicans, members of a gang of bandits who had terrorized the northern portions of Sonora for many years. They were tracked by a most curious chain of circumstances, the clue being given by a very intelligent Mexican, and after being run down one of their number confessed the whole affair, and showed where the stolen jewellery had been buried under a mesquite bush, in plain sight of, and close to, the house of the Governor. I have already written a description of this incident, and do not care to reproduce it here, on account of lack of space, but may say that the determination to lynch them was at once formed and carried into effect, under the superintendence of the most prominent citizens, on the "Plaza" in front of the cathedral. There was another murderer confined in the jail for killing a Mexican "to see him wriggle." This wretch, an American tramp, was led out to his death along with the others, and in less than ten minutes four human forms were writhing on the hastily constructed gallows. Whatever censure might be levelled against this high-handed proceeding on the score of illegality was rebutted by the citizens on the ground of necessity and the evident improvement of the public morals which followed, apparently as a sequence of these drastic methods.