Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1871-11-17
TRIED AND TRUE.


O ~AAho AsOAs
Another True Story of California Life.
In the year 1851, there was among the
early American settlers of California two
brothers named Thompson, who having
come thither from the Eastern States at the
beginning of the gold excitement, three
years before, and labored conformity for the
more generous favors of fortune, without
commensurate result, decided at
last to separate for time; the one to 20 to
the mines and work for the fraternal part
nership, while the other remained in the
| city and improved such chances as ordinary
business should offer. BY such an arrange
ment two promising fields would be worked
at once, and its wisdom was equally obvi-
GUS to both young men; but when it came
to the question of which should assume the
hardships and perils of a miners life,
neither exhibited an alacrity TO name him
| self for the adventure. 5000
| To decide this delicate point, they drew
! lots, by which formula of fate the elder
| Thompson was doomed to become the
miner, and accordingly procured an outfit
and prepared to leave the city. Before
| taking the latter step, however, the miner
| elect chose to bring a little romance of his
California life to a climax by wedding a
young eastern woman, who, like himself,
had left home TO WOO fortune on the Pacific
coast, and although he could not take her
with him into the wild, cOmfortless
life of the mines, the satisfaction of
feeling that he had at least secured her
for himself, and had beloved brother
in whose care to leave her, gave him
more courage and inspiration for his depar-
ture than might have been possible to him
as bachelor. Welded he wac, then, and
after the honeymoon of heroic brevity he
consigned his bride to the protection OF his
brother, and bravely marched away with
pick and shovel to the gold fields of the
north. Eager as he naturally was to dig
his prize from the earth and hasten back to
the greater prize left behind, he was yet
firmly resolved to deny himself, wife,
brother and home, until he could indeed
be the bearer of some share of wealth.
So when his first essay in the mines did
not prove wholly satisfactory, he went stur-
Oily onward into the Indian country, and
amongst the red men added hunting and
trapping to his mining pursuits. Thence
still moving still further northward, he
reached Fraser river when the excitement
about the auriferous yield of that locality
was at its height, and there succeeded in
digging no less than 200 ounces of the pre-
cious dust, which he at once sent to his wife
and brother in San Francisco.
From them he had thus far heard moth
ing on his travels, for it had been agreed
that they should not write until he should
be in some place reached by regular mails;
but now he was impatient to learn how
they regarded his present, and felt sure that
they would devise some means of forward
ing their written oongratulation. The feel
ing was in vain, however, no letter came;
and, after months of waiting, the finally in
dignant Thompson wrote to a friend in
San Francisco with enquiriess respect
ing the silent ones. The answer came that
they had recently disappeared from the city
together, having apparently in their posses
sion considerable sum Of money, obtained
no one knew exactly how, The miner of
course knew whence the money came
but such intelligence of its seeming effect
upon those whom he had held dearest
in the world appealed TO his apprehension
in a most sinister sense. He believed
that he was doubly betrayed; that his wife
and brother had basely and heartleSsly
practiced the blacklist treachery against him,
finally using the gold he had sent to help
them beyond his reach. HeartbroRen and
desperate the poor fellow thought no more
of any goodly fortune for himself, but cared
only for such wandering, wild adventure
and savagery as should divert him from all
retrospective and tender thoughts.
He joined an expenition to the Great
Slave Lake, as it is called, and remained in
the wilderness beyond reach of mail or mes
senger for several years. Returning finally
to Victoria, or Fraser river, he went with
another expedition to Idaho, and there and
in Montana he was lost until as late as 1866.
From the latter year until 1868 he was
resident of Salt Lake City, going from
thence to the once famous White
Pine mines of Nevada, about eigh-
teen months ago. Fortune smiled not up
on his generally listless efforts he had a
life of comfortless vagabondage, and the
twenty years of his absence from San Fran
cisco wrought such lines in his face and
whiteness in his hair as forty happier ones
could not have produced. Some two weeks |
ago the broken, hopeless, and embittered |
man visited mining camp not far distant |
from the town Of Eureka, Nevada, for the |
purpose at joining a company fitting out a
trip to Arizona, and there; says the Eureka |
Sentinel, telling his story, he was fated to
be delivered at last from the delusion Of |
twenty miserable years. In the eXpe-
dition preparing for Arizona was another
man Thompson, who, though neither re-
cOgnized nor recognizing at first, proved to
be no other than our miners recreant !
brother. When the poor vagabond discov-
cred this, despite his wrongs, he fell upon
his brothers neck and cried like a child; |
and not only did that brother receive and /
return the caresS without shame but he
took the earliest opportunity to reprove the |
other for leaving his wife and brother to
suppose for nearly a score of years that he
was dead.
The gold had been received, but without
or line to tell whether it came as
a living mans gift or dead mans legacy.
No letter from the miner had ever reached
wife or brother, though they had sent one
TO him. The wife had felt at last obliged
10 conclude that her husband was dead;
.he gold he seut her had been his
living gift, and with the money she
bought valuable farm near San Jose,
where. wearing the weeds of widowhOod,
the still lives. As for the brother, he spent
PORTIONS of the last fifteen years in pursuit
If some trace of the miner, hoping at least
o find his grave and sanctify it with fra
ernal tear; but now that he actually saw
he living man before him, nothing
vas left for them but a rushing journey ]
o certain valley farm near San Jose, ,
where the best, truest and staunchest would
It once become the most surprised and hap
best little woman in the world. SIRE this"
concludes the story, 'there has been meet s
n.y." The decline of life will pass in ease, {
comfort and happiness for man who for !
wenty years believed himself the victim of j
Voman's perfidy. y