The Portland daily press., 1869-10-30
DAILY PRESS.
SATURDAY. Morning, October 80, 1869.
Life in the White Pine silver Mines.
CORTLAND.

A correspondent of the Boston J0urndi
writs from Nevada:
The White Pine district has a population OF
SO1O made nm of all nationalities. Although
the demand lor remunerative labor has been
constantly increasing, the population during
the past six months has been gradually Ie-
ereasing, being now twenty-five per cent: less
than last March. The rush OF last winter
has long since subsided.
OF this population nearly one bali, or four
thousand, claim a home at Hamilton. Great
improvements have been made ih its buildings
sihce lhe warm weather OF a hundred days
ago came on, and since lumber made of tie
nut pune, which gives its name 10 these noun
tains, has fallen from $50 TO si25 per
thousand. Still II Is a crude town. having onIy
one street graded down and provided with
sidewalks. On this are several we'll built
structures, Of which the best are offices OF
the omnipresent Wells, Fargo & Co, and the
Bank OF California. Here also are the lead
inc groceries, clothing stores kept by the In
eyftable black whiskered Jew, res aurants and
boardiDg-houses. More frequent than all are
the liquor saloons.
All day long the main thoroughfare Is
thronged. There are long trains Of mules
and oxen loaded with freight Of every kind
from Eiko-mill maehin ary and whiskey, pro-
visions and whiskey, dry goods and wniskey.
The teamsters, who are here called bull
whackers," wear old soldier overcoats, crack
their long, raw-hide whips, AMI in their use. Of
unheard-of oaths, show that with them pfo-
family is one OF the fine arts.
Then there were miners on a spree; foot
packers without a cent, who had shouldered
their blankets and luggage all the way from
Elko; painted Jezebels, out of every mining
camp and slum from Montana to Mexico;
Shosone Indians and a sprinkle of China
men.
There was not, however, the strange ex-
citement and hustle of five months ago, for
while the completion of the crushing mills,
now numbering fifteen, gives twice the work
for laborers above what was needed IN April,
yet the population has diminished. Prospec-
ors have gone home, and the crowd on the
street has either been starved out or gone to
work. A clergyman, who certainly ought 10
know, informed me that the moraly, good
order and decency among this newly-gathertd
people of late had greatly improved. l was
glad to know this, and took the liberty to
suggest that health of the community would
not be endangered by still farther improve
ment.
Taking a walk with real estate broker,
lots are pointed out thirty feet by one hun
dred, which six months ago were sold for
$4,000 (god currency,) and corner lots OF the
same size Tor $1,000. They would not bring
half that sum to-day. 'Real estate on the
brain has had its day in Hamilton, and prop
erty, both under the surface and above 1t, is
henceforth to be estimated by more severe
and practical standard. Fortune played some
droll freaks during the mania.
A Massachusetts man came here from San
Francisco, ten months ago, penniless. Twice
since he has been independently rich, but to-
day is just where he began, "dead broke" A
native of New Hampshire, well known ON the
Pacific coast as journalist, retires with bet
ter luck, though nothing more than he richly
deserves, making sixty thousand dollars from
the sale of real estate.