Show the prospector e c t 0 r and his burro bunro by will C higgins you look as sad today said the prospector to his burro as the man who placed his chips on the red to win with the ball falling into the green or the girl who fell into a mud hole after dressing in white in order to look real sweet and pretty when meeting her steady at the park entrance but neither of them looked as sad as the man who dropped a wad of in the development of a gash vein out in the razor back range a few years ago of course this failure was to be expected and the man had no more chance of winning out than a scrub pony has in competing with a kentucky thoroughbred racehorse and yet he was as enthusiastic and as strong in tho the belief over the future outlook for his property when he began its development as a newlywed newly wed couple are that their first offspring will eventually occupy the presidential chair and more no one could tell him anything for he knew it all As a matter of fact he had once been employed with a burro pack train and when the season was over he imagined that he was a full fledged and experienced mining man so sure was he that he had worked from the ground up and was as chock full of mining lore as a piute diute is of protein after feeding time that he bought a small outfit after nis last payday pay day and hiked out for razor back in the belief that he was sure to find another king of the hills or a second edition of the queen of sheba both of which were great mines in their time after a week out he discovered some really high grade ore in a fissure in a malapi formation and he made more fuss over his discovery than a bull pup tackling his first wild wila cat and although old timers in the district who had opened up pay mines in the porphyry and lime gently insinuated that this deposit was probably nothing more than an overflow he would not believe them he made a gentle touch on his eastern friends however and when he had his hoisting plant installed and in operation it was not many days before he found that his body of ore had pinched and that there was no more at depth than mineral show of finding pay beauty roses there was to grow american valley and so he in the deserts of death quit in disgust and has ever since been repeating the oft as knocking mining by seated falsehood that more money has always been put into the industry than has ever been taken out but if he had used even burro sense he would have waited before blowing his wad until he had ascertained beyond a question of doubt that his prospect was really worth a dollar spent in its development for you know not all prospects have the earmarks ear marks of mines any more than all whiskey is good enough to be used even in case of snakebite snake bite the failure of this man continued the prospector reminds me of an experience i 1 had while prospecting in the black jane mountains back in the eighties when I 1 first went into the district I 1 found a man who had pitched his camp in a wash and was mining in the conglomerate while this sedimentary was forming a flood must have swept down from the hills above eroding strong mineral ledges and terming a horizontal deposit of about two feet thick in the new made ground th that at was heavily mineralized and even carrying rich values in places above this was another covering of sand and gravel and uncounted years had piled its debris on the top of this conglomerate mass until it was at least fifty feet thick in time the whole new made ground became practically a solid mass and later on a cloudburst created a roaring torrent which swept through the accumulated conglomerate cutting a channel through it and exposed the two feet n of f what appeared to be a zone of pay mineral I 1 had had experience in formations of this character and warned the man as to the futility of his labors and his hopes but he was not to be convinced and was as sanguine of ultimate success as the country lad is that he will get a run for his h is money on wall street and so I 1 left him and made my camp up in a canyon close to a contact between porphyry and quartzite here there were strong ledges and droppings crop pings and I 1 had not been there two weeks before i had located one of the best claims I 1 ever saw As a matter of fact I 1 afterwards sold the property to a strong syndicate for for I 1 was no hog and was will willing ing t to 0 give an investor who was taking the big chance an opportunity to make a killing after I 1 had given possession to the claims I 1 had located I 1 thought of the poor devil in the wash and thought I 1 would happen down his way and see how he was getting along on nearing his camp I 1 thought i heard a groan and when I 1 pushed aside the flap of his tent I 1 found him on his cot and a more pitiable looking object I 1 never saw before he was reeking in blood and insensible I 1 applied simple restoratives restora tives and within a few hours he was able to tell me how he came to be in such a condition satisfied that he had a bonanza he hao had X worked hard bard and had spent every penny he possessed io in i o buying provisions and sup plies two months after I 1 had tried to persuade him to discontinue operations inthe in the conglomerate he had cut through the sedi formation into the base of a cliff which was as barren of mineral as a hop toad is of humor it was not until then that he realized his mistake and he was so discouraged cou raged and was so dead broke and down and out that he had attempted to end his life with a revolver shot through the head he had only inflicted a severe wound however and was perishing from starvation when I 1 found him I 1 took good care of him for a few days and helped him back to the nearest camp where he eventually got a job of mucking declaring that he would never go out prospecting again until he had learned to distinguish between a ledge or vein in place and a simple mineralized deposit in a wash 1 I want to tell you old long ears concluded the prospector if more men were able to tell the difference between a permanent and a dump of waste there would be fewer failures in mining and there you are and then some |