No other topic was discussed
but the rich strike, and nobody thought or dreamed about anything else.
Every man brought away a specimen, ground it up in a hand mortar, washed
it out in his horn spoon, and glared speechless upon the marvelous
result. It was not hard rock, but black, decomposed stuff which could be
crumbled in the hand like a baked potato, and when spread out on a paper
exhibited a thick sprinkling of gold and particles of "native" silver.
Higbie brought a handful to the cabin, and when he had washed it out his
amazement was beyond description. Wide West stock soared skywards. It
was said that repeated offers had been made for it at a thousand dollars
a foot, and promptly refused. We have all had the "blues"--the mere
sky-blues--but mine were indigo, now--because I did not own in the Wide
West. The world seemed hollow to me, and existence a grief. I lost my
appetite, and ceased to take an interest in anything. Still I had to
stay, and listen to other people's rejoicings, because I had no money to
get out of the camp with.
The Wide West company put a stop to the carrying away of "specimens," and
well they might, for every handful of the ore was worth a sun of some
consequence. To show the exceeding value of the ore, I will remark that
a sixteen-hundred-pounds parcel of it was sold, just as it lay, at the
mouth of the shaft, at one dollar a pound; and the man who bought it
"packed" it on mules a hundred and fifty or two hundred miles, over the
mountains, to San Francisco, satisfied that it would yield at a rate that
would richly compensate him for his trouble.
Pages:
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67