OCR Text |
Show GOLD DUG FROM A CELLAR. When fifteen Austrians, with strong backs and dull heads, can say farewell to Ogdcn, after being in this vicinity four or five years, 'with bands of gold belted to their waists, there must be better opportunities op-portunities for making money than the average American is willing to concede. The fifteen strangers, had they remained in the old country, might have accumulated enough to have paid their funeral expenses at the time of death, and even that is doubtful, but they come J here, accept positions which the average laborer of American birth i disdains to have, and, in the time between a presidential election, save ! $21,730, the most prosperous having accumulated $2,600. That money ' will make them men of influence in Austria and, incidentally, arouse the young men of that country to emulate them by departing for the land of gold. How many common laborers, born and reared in this country and working on railroad construction at $60 to $70 a month, as these foreigners have, can show a bank account of $2,500 obtained in the last four years? Perhaps not one. There is a reasonable excuse for this failure, and that is the inability of Americans to live in hovels and dug-outs and stint themselves of all luxuries and deny themselves all diversions, and yet not one of these Austrians has had less peace of mind or less vigorous constitutions because of the abstemious habits or the deprivations. . Hundreds of American railroad laborers tbrow away their money in riotous acts, and at the end of each year find themselves penniless and, too often, broken down in health because of their dissipations. Were they to houso themselves poorly and live frugally, and, above all, avoid excesses in pleasure, they would be better off in the world's goods and in body and mind. By the way, this example of wealth-getting proves that Utah is somewhat of a land of good fortune. There are countless thousands of gold seekers who go into the wilds of Alaska and other mining regions, lured there by the tales of wealth to be obtained, who return to civilization with far less than these Austrians are carrying with them across the Atlantic. Utah has its gold fields quite as attractive as those of the Idit-arod Idit-arod or Fairbanks, but the gold is found in a different formation in the fields, the factories and even out in the railroad construction camps. |