The Sierra citizen., 1854-03-25
Hoaxing a Passenger.

Stage-0rlverS nave from Time luHe-
mortal been original characters and prac-
tical jokers. Very great is the astonish-
ment of green 'uns on hearing the marvel
GUS stories of the Jehu on the road
between Marysville and the Northern
mines. AS matter of course he is looked
upon as an infallible oracle in all matters
pertaining to the region of big strikes, to
which the uhsophisticated one is trying
to make his way.
A friend of ours who is we'll acquainted
with the peculiar phraseology of the house
of e-wlittle gave us the following account
of the way Jehu sold all inquistive Yam
kee. But here is the stage-d.iyers story
verbatim.
"Yeou Jest orter bin here, Bob, when
the green 'uns arrived by the last steamer.
There was one old feller-and that's the
queerest part ont, how them old cocks
can be SO green-his hair was whitish and
sorter frizzled up to his skull, and his nose
stuck right eout in der middle of his face
like a small sized carrot, kinder comm to
. pint, smart man tew, cause he failed up
on Kennebec for twenty thousand dollars
and absquatulated. But as was a sayin'
he was queer lookin' chap and the al
firedest Yankee to ak questions you ever
seed--never seed the likes on i'm myself
he wanted to kneow everything. He had
hearn tell of great many GURUS things
in Californy, and among the rest about
the sugar-pine he wanted to see sugar.
pine dre'ful bad, so l pinted one eout
tu him, when he wanted to kneow
why they were calm on it sugar-pine
80 l told him all about it and some
more. | told him they called it sugar
pine because that was the name ont, and
that was the right name, cause it was
more'n two-thrds sugar, and the best of
sugar at that; that people didn't use no
other sort, and wouldn't if they could, and
that they extracted it by splitter the tree
up, and bilin' ont down, and that good
stout, able-bodied man could bile down
one hundred AID sixteen pounds day,
besides maxim pail of merlasses. Yeou
ort O. seen his eyes bug eout when he
hearn tell O merlasses. He begun lickin'
bis chops, and act'ly throwd away a chaw
of toba co which he had been chawin' on
all day, an would you believe it he
swallered the hull yarn knots and all, and
said he'd be darned ef he didn't go right
into the sugar business.
Then he begun askin' on me about In
gins, whether there was many OH EN-
about and whether they had ever been
arter me. l told him that there didn't use
to be many about, but that in Lower Cali
forny there were some drefful bad lngins,
and that the F;llibusters had bin drivin
on 'em out, and they had come up here
and killed off most on the Diggers. Then
he wanted to kneow how l could tell when
they were about, and l told him by the
smell on en- that the old ones smelt
amazin' strong in hot weather, and that
we would soon come to a place where |
thought he could smell 'em himself. In
about half an hour stopped right at the
foot of hill and commenced snuffin', and
purity soon the great ugly mug of the old
Yankee was stuck out at the window
you smell 'em? Sniff! sniff! Smell
what says he? Ingins' says /, and l
shouldn't wonder nor there is some on
'em skulkin' in the bushes meow. The
old chap kept snui1in' and peekin among
the bushes, all the time lookin' for his
pepper-box, an | KEEP askin' him if he
couldn't smell the pesky critters meow?
But he said he had cold and could Mt
smell; but he kept snuffin all the way to
the next stoppin' place, and warpin' his
nose about tryin' to get the scent jist like
the snout of an elephant lookin' for pea
nuts, and Qnakin' like a sinner at camp
meeting; but when he found out that L
had been foolin' on him, he was orful mad,
an his nose and ears looked as if he was
taken the arysiphlus."