Gold Hill daily news. [volume] (Gold Hill, N.T. [Nev.]) 1863-1882, 1870-07-20

Dollar!" The only store that had no
announcement will no doubt have an
Imaginary fire tonight and he ready
for business tomorrow with naming
posters and q large stock of damaged
Foods. Providence Is evidently down
On the dry goods business. or there
could be such q confederation oil
catastrophe. s,o,
The strangest thing about these fireS
Is the secrecy with which they are con-
Quoted. There r no alarms, no en-.
pines. no streets In all uproar, no half
Burned buildings. no excitement OF
any kind; but the proprietor quietly
closes his store Mt night, goes to bed.
sleeps the sleep of the honest trades
man, comes down to business next
morning, astonishes the nelghborhood
BY the placarled information that his
stock has been ruined by the deyouring
flames. and proceeds to lose fifty cents
OH every cash transaction with M i'll
difference approaching absolute reck-
~lessness..
Another remarkable feature is the
disregard, almost amounting To Il deli
ance, of the principles laid down In
the first four rules Of arithmetic. For
instance, the ordinary price Of q pair
Of gloves Is 81 80, but when "sold nc
half price in consequence OF fire.
81 70; thus totally ignoring the Just
rights of addition, subtraction, multi
pilcation and division, and proving
in~contestibly that the half Is sometimes
greater than the whole.
The malicious rumor that one firm
In this city keeps a private hose for the
purpose of damaging goods by water,
knowing that the weakness OF the
sex tor bargains will enable them to
dispose of such wares at q higher
figure and more rapidly than could
otherwise be done, Is so evidently the
invention of a rival dealer that l re-
ligiously refrain from circulating the
statement and will only add that the
store IN question Is on Kearney street,
near Pine, and that orders from coun-
try dealers who consclentiously object
to watering their own stock will be
promptly attended to.
Nothing so conclusively proves the
truth of the old adage, that "Misfor-
tunes are blessings In disguise, as the
fact that the more our merchants sufier
from fire and flood, the more they
flourish ; for they have apparently
waxed fat on disaster, and plethorized
their purses by calamity.
Writing seriously, the transparency
Of these deceptive devices, In addition
to the poverty of inventive talent
shown in lying, ought to be severely
reprehended, quite as much as the low
commercial morality that Induces the
announcements.
I have Just been through tile Fire
Marshal's Report for the year ending
June 20th, in order to ascertain the
actual number Of fires and amount OF
loss sustained by our dry goods dealers
during the past twelvemonth. and was
really astonished to find that there had
only been two sufferers doth insuredN,
involving q loss in the first instance OF
S3l. and In the other of 1900.
Ftres In San Francisco.
The report Is n very interesting one,
and contains much valuable informa-
ton, statistical and otherwise. From
July /, 1859, to June 80, 1870, 2sl
alarms were turned in; of which IL
were false, s bonfires and . attempts
The total loss reached $4l6,0l3, and
the amount paid for insurance, $23s,'
642. July Is most prolific In fires
ascribable no doubt to the glorious
Fourth and It's accompaniment Of fire
crackers. The largest loss at any one
fire was $sl, $50, and the smallest, g.
| The number of buildings totally de-
stroyed was Al; considerably damaged,
Il; slightly damaged (under 5000,
12l; fires confined to one building,
1913; fires and no damage to buildings,
| 20. The average loss to each inhab-
| liant, estimating the population ri
| 17O, $50, was g. %, which Is less than
any of the five previous years, during
| which an account has been kept, and
shows o great reduction from ls86-61,
when It amounted to 81 8R per head,
The number of buildings In the city Il
computed Mt 1869, an increase OF
1850 during the twelvemonth, and the
proportion Of fires as l to each 81,
which Is also q reduction, especially
on lS87-6S, when the chance of being
burned out was / to 45. lncendiarisn
was the cause Of 80 fires, occasiontne
a loss of 81, 94S, on which the insur'
ance companies paid S44,925. Twenty
one arrests were made OH the charge
Of arson, and five persons convicted o.
that crime. The number Of lives LOST
by fire, including lamp explosions,
clothing taking fire, ETC., was ten, o.
whom four were women. The average
time Of imprisonment for each person
convicted of arson throughout the
State) was four years, four months and
eight days.
The Lottery Wheel.
1t will be remembered that the Trus
tees of the Mercantile Library Offered
a premium Of $500 for the best mode.
Of q wheel to be used In the distriDu
ton of prizes on the first of next Sep
TENDER. On the first of July fifteei
models had been sent in, and q com
mittee composed Of practical men ant
skilled engineers was nominated tt
pass these machines in critical review
| After a patient and exhaustive triaI
they adopted the invention of Mr.. NJ
D. Laswell as being best suited for tho
required purpose. 1t consists of dia'
mond shaped sphere, made Of glass
strongly bound by metal bands. ant
by means Of various cranks, shafts ant
other mechanical devices rotates with
an eccentric motion that only one
versed In mechanics could properly
describe. The ticket receiver Of which
this Is q model, will have a diameter
Of five feet, one inch. being ten times
rs much as the volume Of the tickets
compressed into a compact mass. and
the audience will have q good and fail
view Of the process of mixing. Crockel
Of Sacramento has the contract for fur
nishing the tickets, which arc to be o.
bulls hide, and are expected to weigh
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