Show the prospector and his burro by will C higgins its up to you to make the ante said the prospector to his burro but I 1 think you had better pass as your stack of chips is getting low and your mind seems to be so muddled that you do not know the dit difference between a pair and three of a kind all of which leads me to the belief that you would make a very poor prospector or that you would rather take a chance at the roulette wheel than to exercise your frazzled intel intellect act at a game of poker of course I 1 am aware of your belief that any old skate would make a good prospector which belief is on a par with your choice for nourishing provender which varies from ham wrappings to coffee stand garbage a diet which if persisted in would be sure to warp the judgment of anyone whether man or beast so that it would be different to classify a piece of really good float from country rock and I 1 want to tell you that a real prospector is a masterpiece ter piece beside whom a novice would look like a poorly executed counterfeit for in stance if you are really interested in our conversation I 1 would like to call your attention to the new camp over the range in sick sally canyon this canyon continued the prospector has been gone over and over for many years by a horde of roughnecks rough necks and barroom bums who thought there should be mineral there but who never succeeded in finding anything more than stringers once in awhile an eastern investor of the wall street stripe would be induced to make an investment there by the goldbrick gold brick type of mining men and these always quit after making a first payment and after having the property examined by a mine promoter who had a few wildcats in another canyon to dispose of and ana so sick sally canyon lay desolate and uninviting for a long period of years before an old pal of mine dick spindle happened a along ong and camped one night at a spring in one of the forks of the main gulch he was bound for the skookum pass country where he had found some good float the year before but decided to take a rest for a few days so that his two burros who were rather jaded and tender footed might recuperate while he prospected around for a bit not that he expected to find anything worth while for the canyon had a bad name for miles around rather than lay about camp however he began prospecting near the spring and he laughed within himself when he discovered upon what measly showings supposedly shrewd investors had squandered their bundles of long green and wondered within himself why capital coul could d not just as well be interested in some of the really good prospects which abounded in such profusion throughout the mountain ranges he followed the trails made in the easy places by so called prospectors of years before but noticed that no attempt had been made to scale the rough places or to investigate nearly inaccessible spots near the mountains crest the next day therefore with a sowbelly sandwich in his pocket and a canteen of water on his back he started out bright and eary early and by ten had made the ascent to the top of the first rugged peak here he noted a change in the formation and the rock instead of consisting of lava flow intermixed with conglomerate gave way to a regular birdseye porphyry while higher up there appeared to be a contact with lime continuing his tiresome journey upward he was soon rewarded by finding pieces of good bloking float some of which were ae arf large as his head land and which when broken open sparkled with tiny particles of native gold by noon near the head of a box canyon which could not be seen from below he came to the contact and discovered a huge ore cropping that looked like a young chinese wall in disguise he knew at first glance that he had found a fortune but he get excited as many a young tenderfoot prospector would have done no none whatever for he merely filled and lit his old cob pipe and reclining under a clump of junipers juni pers calmly contemplated tem plated his great discovery after resting awhile he began his descent to his camp and slept that night as soundly as a washwoman wash woman who had worked all day and danced half the night for he was not any more excitable than a lookout look out at a f faro aro game the next day he took pick and shovel sample sacks and found his way back to the box canyon by a mitan easier route all day long he picked and shoveled knocking great pieces of honeycombed quartz from the ledge and taking samples of erosions ero be bebow ow the vein vein from time to time he mortared the rock and made small hor horlings ho the results showing gold in appreciable quantity the next day he staked out a group of ten claims and within a week had his monuments up and his location notices properly placed this done he hiked out to the general store in the little camp of buccaro Buc karo where he made known his discovery to the proprietor an old friend of his and a man of influence and strict integrity this man communicated with some eastern friends who immedi immediately atey sent out a mining engineer of excellent standing and who was not so peevish about his reputation but that he could recommend a good prospect when lie he saw it this engineer saw the possibilities bili ties of a good mine at once in spindles find and quickly closed a deal whereby his people were to develop the property equip it and pay dick for a half interest inside of a year an aerial tram furnished transportation from the mine high up in the cliffs to the new mill just below the spring in sick sally canyon the mine had been opened until ten years supply of ore was in sight and when the stamps began to drop and the yellow gold hung in great gobs on the plate the whole district took on new life and several more promising discoveries were eventually eventual y made for several years the dick spindle mine has been producing and paying dividends and sick sally canyon is now on the map in letters as big as those used in getting up a stud horse poster if 1 I want to tell you old long ears concluded the prospector the real prospector is in a class by himself A barroom bar room bum may make an important discovery now and then if by accident he should fall asleep on a ledge as big as a house and as rich as a diamond broker but it takes the genuine blown in the bottle prospector to go into an old district and find a genuine bonanza where others have failed and there you are and then some |