Show 1ffu l G MY 1fl WITH THE PLACER MINERS A Glimpse of Cripple Creek in 1896 and Talks with the Men at Work k By Hamlin Garland Copyright 1S95 S S McClure Co CRIPPLE CREEK Sept lThe new Cripple Creek is a Bwarmingt shapeless Inchoate nmss of bricks and mortar Last April the old town was swept away and the principal street is just now being re built in brck The residence portion of the new town has moved toward the west cjid like the old town Is made up of the same hlggledy mixture of small Tvoodeu shanties slab huts tents cabins of papple trees and firs and wagon covers cov-ers The new buildings of the business Etreets are of brick and very solid and su sanual but the great mass of resi rtens live in temporary tentlike struc tures scattered over the graygreen slopes of the Hills without form or grace Seen from its divide the town seems like a Jiandf ul of toy blocks flung on the smooth grass The whole camp seems to me to have lost flavor some way It is rapidly becoming be-coming commonplace It is filled just now with ordinary workmen from tho states masors and hod carriers and carpenters and the gambler and the cowboy are liaraly in evidence On the hills cow bells tinkle mules ray dogs bark The sound of hammers Is incessant down on the main street and me swarm among the stacks of brick and umber thick as flies around sugar Jur > r s Notwithstanding the crazy prices for 1lal i state and the charges for rooms B1d houses it appears to me that the nos jf top people of Cripple Crook are only oarists or adventurers staving 11 I town a lev days They hardly seem to one o be decided about living there juany or those who are settled appe to lak the money to get away I can L raaife myself believe the town is a perma nent one tach Clay brings swarms of wildvoiced I arl Inroccn eyed young farmers and workmen from the past with six dollars in Udr pockets > They stay a few days trying for work then turn face to the east agan and others take thoir place TIE gambling dens and saloons were chara tertsncally the first structures to get finished and they have been runnLij Jull time for some vfeks The betting is not erv excving being mainly in small Bums Here also the young man from the States wno ants to be a little bad in Cripple Creek has had a strong influence It is possible to ramble m nickles now Ei < rythinr is being scaled down in price i esoerit frit of rooms and that will drop I 0111 The town is over advertised maij ot the woriuncn say The talk Abou r < buiJn has brought men swarm in In lT Everything is overdone Tell men to keep away Theres no work here One of the < first places I revisited was the placer up above the town to the north If I were ever tempted to hunt cola it would be placer mining For there you are able to dean up and find out just where you stand at any moment and suspense is short lived There Is a dramatic Interest in the pannings out of pay dirt As the wily water slips away from the black sand and shining grains and small lumps of gold begin to appear It quckens the blood even of one not given to gambling Last year I wandered about on the Mesa talking with the miners and watching earn man as he cleaned out his little rocker and washed away the sand watched him till he poured on his small phial of mercury quick they call It to gather up the all but invisible metal line as batted flour I found just as many working there ths year bat not one of all the many who were working there in S3 They come and go restlessly Ihey were a little less hopeful than last year The paystreaks are all worked to sometimes a fellar hits it an then agin he dont Oftener he dont Its Rood luck to make a dollar a day and we i pay twcntyflo cents out of every dollar L as royalty to the cuss that says he owns Ti the ground Still its better than doing nothing an bummln your way F This was practically the word of all It l paid harely enough to buy meat and flour and yet It beats bummin the streets lookitr for a free lunch counter The towns ben well advertised oy the fire and all and it swarms with men out o I woit This Is no camp for a poor manany I way said another Hits jist thisa I S way Youre bleeged to have money to Ii defend your claim in the first place I These shysters who malce a business of I fllhi contests agin yc air plum sure to pile onto yeh seven deep purvidln yer claim Is worth anything Then it takes Ziigh priced machinery and so It goes A poor man aint in it knee high to a yallar d 3g Most cf these men are Missourians and all of them have had vast experience One had washed gold in California in the fifties and in Montana later Here in the Black Hills < n the seventies I I tried farmin awhile in eastern Colo redo and now Im athinkm of tryln the Hahecs Peak country He said in con cluson Always hoping to strike It somewhere Another had been everywhere the last speaker had been and also in South America Amer-ica All of them had a wistful selfwere I I t L AiOr Mirter 1t crk F tthe records of many battles One man had 1he form of a gladiator and a soft mild slow voice which made me forgot what he was sang so full of grace and gravity was his tone In a low drift a couple of boys were working drawing the paydirt out of the Ohole in a big broad pan with a wire for fa handle One of them was from Penn bvlvania and the other a native of Colorado Colo-rado Doth wire plump hearty and pro Ivfane and they ate tobacco like veterans of the war of 1812 One callwi the other Uncle and as r they gravelv put heads together over their O 3 pan Their intentness was comic They isad only been at work four days but iFliad i made three dollars apiece for three j i of the days They felt no need of econo i l mizmg on tobacco They will finally drift away like all the rest and others will take 1bor F r places t > The city Is building out over the placer I t and the washing for gold will son be I Fdone the land will be sold for building Iota All around the toilers were set their I wagon covers and tent and little shanties k I and at times their wives and children came out to peer eagerly into the pans read to join in tho joy of a good showing or to comfort the toiler if luck was bad i f The men dlb silently for the most part t with little communication of any sort ffeTbey pierce down through the rich loam ITof the sward till he bedrock is laid bare i then they drift out along the line of I feany pay streak they might strike Once in a while they strike a little nugget but 1 ot often They rack away at their little machines without enthusiasm and with Just enough of hope to keep them worl > inn in-n point of fact Cripple Creek is settling < 3own into a rich mining camp where the 3incs are concentrated Into few hands It offers less and less chance every day for the man with small means I types the great outside world in this The 1e fellers eat of the little fellers Also 4here are many mines developed to the point of producing but not being worked Slners used t gull the eastern capital t by bred manaserSt The schemes i s q c whereby the eastern tenderfoot is roped I into bu ing a hole in the ground are exquisite ex-quisite and marevlous pieces of verbal mechanism little mixed mec1nism The figure got a Utte but the truth remains Why said one promoter I tell you you can sell em anything back there Boston now why I sold thirtysix thousand thou-sand dollars worth In three days man stopped me on the street to buy You dont say Yesser I cleaned out every share I had with me in them three towns New York Boston and Philadelphia You dont want to make producers out of your mines Develop em till yer reach a fine showing whole lot in sight then sell yer stock The thing may pinch out I on yer or it may develop a contest In I these beautiful schemes there Is little chance for the poor miner The wealth I of the earth should go to the common miner in a larger degree than I does I Probably he is not a strong man but he cant help that he does the best he can and should be rewarded I I should like to see him strike it rich somewhere some lonely spot where no smart lawyer or great syndicate could i IIrh I One tithed the other Laicle antI its They Gravely Put Heads To grcther Over Their Pan Their L tentness IVae Comic i I I come between him and his shining sand There is only where one place that I could conceivably happen and that is in heaven But if there 15 a discount upon upn Cripple Creek if It is losing Interest fnd destruction of wickedness and growing humdrumthere is no discount on Cripple Crip-ple Creek scenery The day was like April the wind cool fresh the prairie grass set with wind flowers the sky radiant radi-ant pure ai a maidens eyes and the mighty ranges to the west and south ma iestlc as ever and more alluring than ever for they are beginning to have the further charm of familiarity P SSome local poet m Victor rubs it into Cripple Creek in the following fashion Victor it may be explained is a rival town some five or six miles over the hisWNTED WANTED TO KNOW A stranger from the distant east Begrimed with travel stain One day got off at Cripple town From a early morning train A near hotel he quickly sought His hunger to allay And after breakfast caught the clerk And talked to him this way For weeks and months Ive read about I The Independence mine The wonders of its treasure vauls The walls with gold that shine Im curious now to view it And think Ill take a stroll v Now what direction shall I take To reach that mineral hole The sadeyed clerk with X ying glance Repressed a rising tear And answered with a faltering voice Its six miles east of here Just take the next suburban suuran That goes to Victor see I And youll find the Independence In that locality The stranger disappointed Was silent quite a while But broke the stillness painful With conundrums of this style Well what about the Portland Thats hereabouts I spose One of your famous Cripple mines A everybody knows Ill take a walk and look at that While Ive nothing else to do But the clerk just faintly murmured That mines at Victor too The stranger paused a moment Then gave it to him raw Well Wheres your Battle Mountain And the hill entitled Squaw The clerk turned pale and gasped for breath Keeled over on the floor And the subsequent proceedings Interested him no more The stranger grabbed his gripsack i And hastened to the tin The chances are hell not be caught In Cripple Creek againSIXTOPICA SIXTOPICA There is just as much truth as poetry in this skit and Cripple Creek winces at it a little KLEPTOMttIAGS ARE LISTED Big Stores Collect the Names of Those Who Should lie Watched It will doubtless be astonishing to those who have not studied the question to learn that kleptomania has grown so much during the last few years that dry goods merchants have so to speak formed a cooperative union of selfprotection I against the evil Shoplifters are easily dealt with and disposed of as they are generally of the class who can be punished punish-ed to the full extent of the law but the kleptomaniac is usually a woman of refinement re-finement good family and possessed of ample means which permit of the gratification grati-fication of her most extravagant needs Strange a the assertion may seem it i is so true and has assumed such proportions propor-tions that in the majority of stores there i Is a book kept in the private office of the firm in wiiich are written the names of rr rea eo the women who are known to be thus I afflicted and when they a caught in I the act a bill for the goods stolen is sent to the husband father or the person who I has made himself responsible for the things taker I was found necessary to I do this after two or three arrests had been made and the culprit found upon I investigation to belong to some well known family I was not only necessary i i for the protection of the merchants 1 against loss by the theft but it was also more Imperative from the fact that these I I exposures endangered his business After I such an arrest and the consequent publicity pub-licity the family of the accused were very loth to trade at that particular store and I the withdrawal of such patronage meant loss of thousands of dollars to the proprietor pro-prietor This explanation was given me by the superintendent of one of the largest department de-partment stores wtoere after a thorough canvassing of the principal retail stores in the city I found that it was no mere Kossit as to the existence of this book 1 bok and the fact that nine out of ten employed women detectives not only for the conviction con-viction of shoplifters and pickpockets but to watch the moro wealthy offenders who were afflicted with what Is called a nervous nerv-ous disease In the medical books kleptomania I klepto-mania These women ae obliged to be very clever bright and Intelligent as they must learn to know these kleptomaniacs j by sight and to discriminate between the professional and the afflicted if they de I tect a stranger in the act of purloining the firms goods New York Herald THE ctnvxiXG OF HERDS AXD REPTILES REP-TILES The writer observed a remarkable Instance In-stance of this method of protection among birds some years ago In the White mountains A sudden urn in the road showed a heron alighting on a limb of a tree about twenty feet from the ground where it had evidently been feeding in a swampy ledge To have flown away would have been too exposing so it simulated a leafless twig by extending its neck upward up-ward and assuming a perfectly rigid ap pearance In this position i remained while the observers gathered about to look at i the only semblance of life being the sharp gleam o the eye that told the story of this matchless mimic and dissembler dis-sembler Reptiles particularly the lizards will play possum on slight provocation One of the latter which the writer suddenly sud-denly came upon was a large black fel low with a lavendar colored metalllclike breast The stroke of a switch in his immediate im-mediate vicinity so alarmed him that he whisked off his tail about two inches from I the tip a movement supposedly to attract the attention of the enemy the tip jump ing about and writhing like a worm for nearly a minute In the meanwhile the lizard had made its escape and in good time would grow a new tail but the ruse of throwing the tail did not deceive us and soon the brilliant fellow was routed out of its fancied security and finding that escape was Impossible it dropped its is legs and head and assumed the position of death with all its limbs relaxed a position which It held until it believed the danger had been removed NEW ALUMINUM UTENSILS Complete Kitchen Outfits on the yew American Cruisers Are of This Metal For domestic utensils aluminum seems destined to be in increasing demand according ac-cording to the Philadelphia Press They are so pretty so light and so easy to keep clean and they cost just enough more than other kinds to make them attractive at-tractive to those who need not be particularly par-ticularly economical Complete kitchen outfits from coffee pot to frying pan are now manufactured J is certain that water can be boiled quicker in an aluminum alumi-num pot or Dan than in a vessel of any other metal for two reasons the aluminum is made very thin and it is an excellent conduotor of heat For excelent heat covered cov-ered dishes designed to retain the heat aluminum Is the best metal we have The cookrooms of the government cruisers San Francisco and Montgomery are each supplied with 60gallon steam jacketed1 kettles Hotels and eating houses will not be long in adopting these utensils of aluminum if their claims for durability are justified bv further use I is a remarkable feature of some of these utensils that they are cast and not stamped A teakettle can be cast only the sixteenth of an inch in thickness that will stand an amount of banging and denting which would II lead anyone not familiar with the facts to suppose that it was made of rolled or stamped metal Among the odd uses to which aluminum alumi-num is being put may be named slate pencils which are simply bits of aluminum alum-inum wire that marks a slate a well a If made of the slate itself and which do not break or wear out horseshoes which are said to last better than iron and of course the lightness is a point in their favor founding boards for musical instruments giving forth a sound of a character different from that called metallic and more musical than the wooden sounding boards in common use printers type giving a metal that is indestructable as compared castir compar-ed with readily the soft alloys in use and that Though aluminum has so many varied I valuable qualities that its use is sure to extend still there is no prospect of a reduction in the cost of obtaining it The metal exists in great plenty When some cheaper means of releasing releas-ing it from the earth are found i will be in still greater demand ElrEOTRiTC TAXDEar INVENTED I One Constructed in Ftnnea Capable of Forty Miles nil Hour I An electric tandem the invention of two Frenchmen MM Aucoc and Dar racq is just now creating a great sensation sen-sation in bicycling circles in Paris The machine is an ordinary tandem rigged with an electric motor and compact com-pact storage battery I weighs about twenty pounds and generates two horse power The motor turns at a speed of 3000 revolutions a minute but the problem I of gearing i down in its attachment to the axle has been successfully accomplished I complished The motor is able to drive the machine without aid from the riders I rid-ers but pedals are provided as in the regular tandem for the wheel is found to run much more steadily with them The man in front steers as in ordinary ordi-nary tandem riding while the rider on the second seat regulates the speed and acts a engineer The storage battery bat-tery at present in use is able to carry the machine at a speed of over forty miles an hour for about an hour and a half without a change The inventors devised the machine expressly to pace contestants in time contests and long road races In France the cost of hiring pacers in the professional races is very considerable and twentyfourhour contests become extremely expensive to the management manage-ment that is conducting them The electric tandem is estimated to cut down the expense about half This machine has been so successful that French bicycle manufacturers are looking forward to the construction of I a storage motor in the near future that may be fastened to ordinary single bicycles and will give effective help iI climbing hills or when bursts of speed are needed by tired ridersNew York World I I PROBLEMS My little one was restless And his face was flushed and bright As he said in pouting murmurs bright I His babyhood prayers tonight So I crept to his bedside softly There were tears on his lashes deep I Which he bravely hid with his fingers His own little sorrows to keep And I said Come tell me about it i lAd I will kiss i all away But this is sure enough trouble And it comes most every day But mother can help you dearest I am sure now tell me all Well its cos I cant work them zam e What they puts up on the wall They calls them plus and minus And they writes them just this way X thats plus and means addition And subtraction is minus they say Is that all that gives you trouble And my arms gves closer touch I Now add if I give you two kisses I gve And you give me two how much Why two of course No no dear Im afraid youre a little dunce How can two two be two pray Cos we does i both at once An I can splain that plus a minus That worried me s today Plus is jus putting together An minus is taking away And the tired eyes closed gently And wrapt In dreams he lay Aye Plus i jus putting together A minus is taking away Ah dear little dreamer I wonder If after lifes problems we say A mothers dear arms shall enfold us And her lips kiss the worry away For all of its hopes loves and longings Are summed up In thy childish lay Plus is jus putting together An minus is taking away Memphis Social Graphic 0 |