The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1870-01-31

asssss
lsaasl1 $500
,ver % convenient, because when you get
mad you can snatch club and 50 out and
AXE satisfaction out Of . Chinaman. The
native American negro is getting 80 inso-
Ient now that the patriot from Ireland
cannot take little recreation out OF him
without getting into trouble. 50 the China
man will afford needed relief.
MODEST vILLArHY.
AS evidence that Cinnamon are satisfied
with small gains, + will remark that they
drill Eve holes in the edge of gold coins
(drill clear through from edge to edgel,
and save the gold thus bored out. and MI
up the hole with some sort of metallic COM
position that does not spoil the ring OF the
coin. Their counterfciters put nine parts
good metal and only one part base metal in
their bogus coins and SO 1t is very lucra-
tive in the long run, and the next thing to
impossible to detect the cheat. 1t is only
greedy, bungling, Christian counterfeitera
tina. blunder into trouble by trying to
swindle their fellow-creatures too heavily
pEsPERADoEs.
Another curious feature about California
life was the breed Of desperadoes she
reared and fostered on her soil and after.
ward distributed over adjacent Territories
through her vigilance committees when she
had had enough Of their exploits. These
men went armed to the teeth with mon
strous revolvers, and preyed upon each
other. Their slightest misunderstanding
were settled on the spot by the bullet; but
they very rarely molested peaceable citi.
gems. They robbed, and gambled, and
killed people for three or four years, and
then ssdied with their boots on" as they
phrased it that is, they were killed them
selves-almost invariably--and they never
expected any other fate, and were very
seldom disappointed.
SAM BROWN.
Sam Brown, of Nevada, killed sixteen
men in his time, and was iournoying to-
ward Esmeralda to kill seventeenth, who
had stopped the breath of friend of his,
when party of law-abiding citizens way
laid him and slaughtered him with shot
guns. Mourners were exceedingly scarce
at his funeral. It is said that Sam Brown
called for drink at the bar of the Slaugh-
ter House in Carson City one morning 10
saloon so nicknamed because so many men
had been killed in it) and invited q 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 o
deadly insult, and so Brown very properly
shot him down. He left him lying 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 awhile and made coffin and buried
the man himself-though I never could
quite believe that-without assistance.
Virginia city was full of desperadoes,
and some of the pleasantest newspaper re-
porting ever did was in those days, be-
cause I reported the inquests on the entire
lot of them, nearly. We had q fresh one
pretty much every morning. Toward the
last it was melancholy to see how the mate
rial was running short. Those were hal
cyon days. I don't know what halcyon
days are, but that is the proper expression
to use in this connection, believe.
JACK WILLIAMS.
Jack Williams was one of the 1uckicst of
the Virginia city desperadoes. He killed
q good many men. He was kind-bearted
man, and gave all his custom to poor I'M
dertaker who was trying to get along. But
by-and-bye somebody poked double-bar-
relied shotgun through crack while Will
Hams 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 unfortunate underta-
ker's best friend was gone, and he had to
take in his sign. Thus he was stricken in
the midst of his prosperity and his happi-
ncss-for he was just on the point Of get
ting married when Jack Williams was TIA
ken away from him, and of course he had
to give it up then.
CEMETERIAL CURIOSlTIES.
It is said that the first twenty-six graves
in the cemetery at Virginia city were those
of men who all died by the bullet. And the
first six in another of those towns contained
the bodies of Desperate and five of his
yictims-and there in the bosom of his fam
lily, made dear to him by ties Of blood, he
calmly sleeps unto this day.
MR.. SLADE.
At the Rocky Ridge station in the Rocky
mountains, in the old days of overland
stages and pony expresses, / had the gor-
geous honor Of breakfasting with Mr.. Slade,
the prince of all the desperadoes; who kill
ed 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 prac-
tced on him with his revolver for hours to-
gether-a proceeding which seems almost
until we reflect that Rocky
Ridge is away off in the dull solitudes of
the mountains, and the poor desperadoes
have hardly any aImusements. Mr.. Slade
afterward went to Montana and began to
thin out the population as usual-for he
took great interest in trimming the census
and regulating the yote-but finally the
vigilance committee captured him and
hanged him, giving him just fifteen mi
nutes to prepare himself in. The papers
said he cried on the scatfold.
The vigilance committee is O wholesome
regulator in the new countries, and bad
characters have lively dread of it. In
Montana one of these gentlemen was placed
on his mule, and informed that he had pre-
cisely fifteen minutes to leave the country
in. he said, Scents, if this mule don't
balk, fve'll answer"
But that is sufficient about the despera-
does. I merely wished to make passing
mention of them as @Californian produc-
ton. ....
Playing on P7ayers-GOnffdence Game
SpOiled-Defeat OF tho Unfortunate
Youth.