Page:Pictures of life in Mexico Vol 2.djvu/128

104 of its ever again being brought into effective operation as a tobacco plantation.

During the interval however, the besieged party had been running hither and thither to collect their scattered forces; and now with the owner of the estate as their leader they advanced with bitter animosity and fierce impatience against the invaders. A second and a longer continued engagement was the result. The former had armed themselves with hoes and poles and rakes while a few had produced knives and old muskets; their opponents being provided with similar weapons from the first. They fell upon each other headlong; poles, and hoes, and bludgeons flew into the air, and alighted on the heads and shoulders of enraged combatants; and broken heads, loud execrations, bleeding limbs, and impatient groans became the order of the day. Several worthy belligerents lay upon the ground, wounded and overpowered; and much serious mischief would, doubtless, have been done, only that the muskets were all but useless; and the arms that wielded the bludgeons—belonging to Mexican Indians and half-castes—were none of the strongest.

While the affray was yet at its height, a