The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1870-03-10
From the buffalo Express.
THE ROUGH.
Mark Twain Describes that Individual in
all his uory

all his glory.
\ curious feature about California life was
the breed of despcradoes she reared and
fostered on her soil. and afterward distribute
ed over adjacent territories through her vig-
lance committees, when she had had enough
of their exploits. These men went armed to
the teeth with monstrous revolvers, and pre- y
ed upon each other. Their slightest misunder-
standing were settled on the spot by the bull
let; but they very rarely molestcd peaceable
citizens. They robbed and killed people for
three or four years. and then ''died with their
boots on as they phrased it; that is, they
were killed themselves-almost Invariably
and they never expected any other fate. and
were very seldomsd
Sam Brown, of Nevada, killed sixteen men
in his time, and was journeying toward Es-
meralda to kill seventeenth. who had
stopped the breath of a friend of his, when a
party of law abiding citizens waylaid him
and slaughtered him with shot guns. Mourn
ers were exceedingly scarce at his funeral.
1t is said that Sam Brown called for drink
at the bar of the Slaughter House. in Carson
City, one morning. Ga saloon so nicknamed
because so many men had been killed in it
and invited stranger up to drink with him.
The stranger said he never drank, and wished
to be excused. By the custom of the country
that was deadly insult, and so Brown very
properly shot him down. He lett him there
and went away, warning everybody to let
the body alone, because it was his meat,
he said. And it is said also, that he came
back after q while and made coffin and
buried the man himself-though | never
could quite believe that-without assistance.
Virginia City was full Of desperadoes, and
some of the pleasantest newspaper reporting
| | ever did was in those days, because re-
ported the inquest on the whole lot of them.
nearly. We had a fresh one pretty much
every morning. Those were halcyon days |.
l don't know what halcyon days are, but
| that is the proper expression to use in this
| connection. [ believe.
| Jack Williams was one of the luckest of
the Virginia City desperadocs He killed a
good many men. He was kind-hearted
man and gave all his custom to poor under
taker who was trying to get along. But by
and-by somebody poked a double-barrelled
| shotgun through a crack while Williams
was sitting at breakfast, and riddled him at
such rate that there was hardly enough of
him left to hold an inquest on-and then the
poor undertaker's best friend was gone, and
he had to take in his sign. Then he was
| Williams was taken away from him. and Of
| course ne had to give it up.
| It is said the first twcnty-siX graves in the
cemetery at Virginia City were those of men
who died by the bullet And the first six in
another of those towns contained the bodies
Of Il desperate and five of his victims-ind
/ there in the bosom of his family, made dear
| to him by the ties Of blood, he calmly sleeps
unto this day.
| At the Rocky Ridge station in the Rocky
Mountains, in the old days of overland stages
and pony expresses, ! had the gorgeous hon
| or of breakfastng with Nh. Slade. the prince
| of all the desperadoes; who killed twenty
six men in his time; who used to cut off his
| victims ears and send them as keepsakes to
their relatives; and who bound one of his
victims hand and foot and practsed on him
with his revolver for hours together-a pro-
ceeding which seems almost inexcusabe I'M
til we reflect that Rocky Ridge is away off in
the dull solitudes Of the mountains, and the
poor desperadocs have hardly any amuse-
ments. Mr.. Slade atterward went to Mon
| tana and began to thin out the population as
usual-for he took great interest in trimming
the census and regulating the yote-bus
| finally the vigilance committee captured him
and hanged him, giving him Just fifteen
minutes to prepare himself in. The paper
said he cried on the scatfold.
! The vigilance committee is a wholesome
regulator in the new countries, and bad char
actcrs have lively dread Of IT, In Montana
one of these gentlemen was placed on mule
and informed that he had precisely fifteen
minutes to leave the country in He said
| Gents, if this mule don't balk, Ivell an
| Swer.n
| But that is sufficient aboutthe despcladoes.
| merely wished to make passing mention
OF them as Il Californian production.