The caprices of all the visitors to the country are not, however, so harmless; it is not long since a party of young men, headed by one notorious for his love of fun, and what are called practical jokes, chartered a _chatta_, or covered cargo boat, of from 25 to 30 tons, and having put two carronades on board of her, set sail for the laguna, and while there amused themselves by bearing down, after nightfall, on the villages and towns on its banks, and bombarding them with the guns, taking care, however, not to do harm or to kill any one, either by not shooting the guns, or if there was a ball in one of them, by aiming it a little over the houses, so as not to damage them. On the noise made by the guns being heard, and the flash seen so close to them in the dark nights, the whole male population of the place would turn out in haste to repel the attack of this supposed band of tulisanes, arming themselves with any sort of weapon, and getting the women and children out of harm's way by sending them off--and probably an urgent despatch would be forwarded by the gobernadorcillo of the village to the governor of the province, if he lived within some few miles of him, requesting assistance--or detailing the flight of the robbers, who, on seeing the determination and force of the villagers prepared to defend their hearths, had not ventured to attempt landing, but had sailed away without having been able to do any damage to the pueblo.
These midnight bombardments were repeated so frequently as to lead the local authorities to make great efforts to put down the daring troop of robbers who bearded them at their very doors at the town of Santa Cruz, near which the Governor lives, and kept the country people, who had begun to talk about them, in a state of constant alarm.
Notwithstanding all their efforts to discover the hiding-place of the band, nothing could be found out about them, no one ever imagining that the party of gentlemen in the chatta could be at all mixed up with them--in fact, the well-intentioned alcalde of the province, hearing that such a party was visiting the lake, sent off a _ministro_ to give them information about the desperate band of tulisanes who were lurking in the neighbourhood, and advised them to be upon their guard against an attack; for which attention they of course thanked him, and assured the envoy that it was for that reason only they had provided themselves with the two formidable looking pieces of ordnance which he saw in the boat.