Show the prospector and his burro by will C higgins how prone we are said the prospector to his burro to belittle the motives ability and work and efforts of the mine manager or superintendent who has either resigned or has been removed from his position and yet in a majority of cases the mai nia isger nager ot superintendent who has willingly given up his job or who has been requested to resign has done as well as possibly could be done under conditions by which he is surrounded it looks to me therefore as if it was unfair as well as unjust to besmirch the character and ability of a retiring mining official when as a matter of fact lie he is not at all deserving of criticism with the chances in his favor that he had really performed miracles with what he had to do with while the failure in mine operation could be blamed entirely to company directors who had failed to furnish the necessary means for mine development and equipment and who were willing to cover their own de by charging failure to the man who was in charge at the mine you say that my chatter is evidently couched in a vein of truth as you have often seen a new manager installed amidst great acclaim while a few months later on oil the same man with every one of his five senses in first class working order is sent down the hill surrounded by such a cloud of gloom and silence that one would hardly recognize in him the individual who began his duties so short a time before with all tile the earmarks and brands of a conquering hero and yet this man was just as good when lie he quit as when lie he began his service and was probably a much better mine manager than was his successor all of which goes to show that when a mining man quits his job his reasons for so doing should be thoroughly understood before lie he is criticised criticized or his ability questioned as this same man a few months later may have made a wonderful success where others have failed and this calls to mind tile the experiences of a friend of mine who after being discredited by his former employers and practically blacklisted black listed throughout the mining districts of this west ern country was finally able to show what lie he could really do once lie he had a fair show and a really good property to expend his ability and energies upon this friend of mine continued the prospector was a man of 0 excellent ability who had had years of experience in mine management for twenty years lie he was with the hilltop company beginning with the hilltop when it was barely more than a prospect he developed the property upon such a systematic and scientific scale that it had paid over six million in dividends before a change in ownership occurred with very strong testimonials and recommendations from his former employers my friend iad no difficulty in obtaining new employment and in a short time was given position as manager for the podunk company which had been engaged in mine development for or nearly ten years and which had never in all of these years shipped a pound of ore let e alone a carload perkins for this was my friends name was given a banquet at the mine boarding house when he took over t the e management and speeches were made and toasts proposed by the board of directors during the entertainment perkins felt mighty good that night but in the morning when he made an inspection of the com banys property his heart sunk into his boots for operations from the start had been under the direction of a son of one or of the owners of Blather smiths clothing emporium who knew nothing about mining but who was way up on percentage and was therefore fully qualified to open a mining property just as it should be opened the wreck of tunnels shafts dinzes and up raises however would have driven even a hobo miner crazy and as for ore not a foot of work had been done on or near a vein if one existed in the neighborhood and as for efficiency in mine operation it was as conspicuous for its absence as was the existence of ore on or anany in any portion of the com banys property perkins made a noble struggle however and was getting some order out of chaotic conditions and had some show of finding some ore in a blind vein he had discovered when to his astonishment he was summarily canned one day without hardly a moments notice the charge being made by the Blather smith crowd that he was incompetent and a failure perkins felt pretty badly over the outcome I 1 of his new employment and had great diff difficulty culty in securing similar engagements anywhere in that section as he had been maligned and abused by the podunk company antii every friend he had excepting his dog had virtually turned against him through the recommendation ommen dation of the president of the ilie old hilltop mine perkins was finally able to ind find f a position with a company that had been quite a heavy producer as well as a regular dividend payer until the in the mine had been cut off by a fault perkins entered upon his new employment under a load of aspersion and calumny for the report had been maliciously spread far and wide that lie he had been a complete failure with the podunk peo people ale and that lie he never had been any good anyway he swore to himself however that he would maxe make good and in his hia inner consciousness he knew that lie he had never deserved the indignities with which he had been so copiously showered and so he went to work with a will and with the determination to discover the throw of the fault and to re find the from which dividends had formerly been paid and so he worked and toiled in and out of season until one day his workings broke into a body of ore richer and larger than had ever been dreamed of and when the news of the wonderful discovery spread over the country everyone who knew him were loud in their assertions that they had always said that there never was a bettel mining man in this intermountain region than perkins and he was given the glad hand wherever he went 1 I want to tell you old long ears concluded the prospector it Is not always that a really able man can make good for he may no not have a proposition of real merit to work on it may be that his company lacks money for development or that he is following directions laid down by the board of directors and which if obeyed would be as far from the uncovering oi of a bonanza as it is from here to the sawtooth mountains As a matter of fact conditions might be such that successful operation would be ib utterly impossible and this being so it would be unjust and utterly wrong to condemn the man or to give it out that he was incompetent and unsuccessful and there you are and then some |