Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 270, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 November 1913 — HUNTING THE HEAD HUNTERS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

HUNTING THE HEAD HUNTERS

YOU never can tell about your next door neighbor. For instance here is Dr. L. W. Luscber sitting peacefully in his office. You wouldn’t think tat a casual glance he was a “Soldier of Fortune.” says a writer in the Kansas City Star. Well, he isn’t —as the term has, come •to be used to describe every wanderer ■who strayed beyond the bounds of his native country. Let a track laborer return from Mexico and he’s a “soldier of fortune*’ The same goes for ia Cook’s tourist But there used to be real soldiers of fortune who had real adventures In unreal countries. Richard Harding Davis made a fortune writing about them, but most of them have been written out. Perhaps there is a new crop growing up in strange countries waiting to come home with new stories. However, there aren’t many of them these dull days that have new stories to tell. That’s why it is surprising to find Doctor Luscher sitting peacefully in his office and chatting about the times, he used to chase, headhunters in Formosa with native Chinese troops. It was so unexpected. You wouldn’t judge Doctor Luscher to be the sort of a man who plunged through dank jungles and over bleak mountains to run down the head hunting savages of an untamed country. The doctor seems to be too courteous to take part in anything of that sort. Still, he's not so young as he used to be and there is no telling what an adventurous soul he used to be when he slept under tropical stars. There must have been a powerful spirit of unrest within him, for it is known that he has served under four flags before he settled down to a staid prac l tice here. Served Under Four Flags. Doctor Luscher was present when American troops moved against Indians on the plains, when Cubans met Spaniards and when mongrel met mongrel in, Honduras. Also he has seen the Chinese troops charge with gongs and flags and devils’ heads against deadly aim of waiting and grinning French soldiers. He has seen the headhunters skipping through the tangled bush and has been fortunate enough to have dodged divers spears aimed at him. All 6f*these thlngs are written in his memory, which goes to show that you never can tell about ypur neighbor. Really you wouldn’t Suspect it of the doctor as he sits peacefully in his office *n the Argyle building at Twelfth afrfl McGee streets. An article published in the Star last Sunday told how Japan is openleg a military campaign against the headhunters on Formora. The headhunters are of Malay descent and were probably caston the coast of Formosa by storms at sea. Since man can remember they have been undesirab’e, with their head hunting and cannibal practices. China used to own the- island, but it was sick and tired of it when Japan came along in 1895 and took it In as a war prize. Japan has its own troubles with the natives who have only vague and indistinct ideas of mode of behaving toward “their fellow men. They eat their enemies and they haven’t a friend on earth. Altogether they are a wicked race, but they have been making both ends meet, after a manner of speaking, by hiding away in the topa of the rugged mountains of Formosa. It was into these mountains that Doctor Luscher went with 700 Chinese soldiers in 1886, Immediately after China had been counted out In the Franco - Chinese war. Doctor Luscher had been the only medical man with the Chinese army in the war. having organized a hospiUfl corps of fifty men.

The headhunters had been killing the Chinese camphor wood cuttera In the mountains. Reports had been drifting down to the government, but China was so busy trying and falling to whip Prance with magic charms and incantations that it didn’t have time to get aftur the wild tribes. It was great eport for the headhunters, swooping down on the helpless Chinese who wen* gathering camphor wood in/the forest and butchering them. At last China found time to start after the savages after peace prtth Prance had been established.

Doctor Luscher was with the force sent into the mountains to pacify the tribes. There were 700 Chinese, unskilled in the use of arms, against thousands of savages in the jungles and in the mountains. There was fighting whenever a head showed through the undergrowth. The Chinese cut roads through the jungles and began the ascent of a steep mountainside where a band of the headhunters fortified themselves. “We came upon the headhunters in the basin of an extinct volcano crar ter,” Doctor Luscher said one day laßt week. “The crater was about a half mile across and we threw a line of men around on the rim. Then we waited. It was tiresome waiting and we aroused a little interest in shelling them with a few light machine guns we had dragged along. But it was no use. "The headhunters Vere too fast and they scattered and we simply couldn’t kill them off. Besides, the Chinese were about as ignorant as the headhunters and not nearly such natural fighters. Our officers were literary gentlemen, but all they knew about war was hearsay. Once in a while at night one of our men would be killed with a spear. Awed Them With Firecrackers. “It happened that our Chinese soldiers had brought along a quantity of fireworks for their own amusements. They had dragged the packr of rockets, firecrackers, Roman candles, nigger chasers and colored fire over the mountains and through the jungles patiently and without complaint. “I claim credit for the suggestion. The headhunters had never seen fireworks. The Chinese general agreed. We touched off every kind of fireworks a native Chinaman could devise and threw them into the crater among the headhunters. The entire basin was a glorious spectacle of shooting flames of many colors. Nigger chasers chased headhunters and ptawheels spun In glorious circles in and out among the wild men, who were getting wilder every moment. It was a wonderful sight. There were blinding flashes of colored fire and wonderful sprays of multi-hued flame. The poor, bewildered headhunters had never seen anything like it and naturally they surrendered when they thought all the supernatural powers of evil were turned loose against, them. They came out and lay - before us in abject supernatural fear. They wanted protection. “Then we took them in and back to the settled country and dressed them up like Chinamen and tried to civilize them. They wouldn’t stay civilized, and I don’t know what did become of them—so many things might have happened to them over there.”

TYPICAL HEAD HUNTERS