The Lake County star. [volume] (Chase, Mich.) 1873-current, 1874-02-19

~ Tale of the CalifOrnIa Mines.
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There was q company up the gulch
above us. Portuguese were these-a
quiet and unobtrusive set Of men,
with dogs and shot-guns and the
quaintest little cabins In the world.
Brown men, sailors mostly, with ear
rings In their ears, and their shirt
bosOms open; clannish people, silent
and respectful. Then there were
other companions below, not unlike
our 0wn-a hundred men or more on
this little mountain stream. Trees
above us In eternal green, chaparral
along the fierce and steep old noun
tain side, that pitched almost per-
pendicularly ON either side of the
stream upon us, from which whistled
the partridge through the day, and
called the gray coyote at night. No
other sounds than these, but the rat
Ting of the stones In the cradle or the
tomb, and the pick and shovel on the
rocks. No doctor, no law, no law
yers, no thieves. Forty miles to the
nearest trading camp. All things we
brought from there across q wall of
everlasting snow, upon our backs
bread, and bacon and beans, and
beans and bacon and bread, the whole
year through. At last the dreaded
scurvy came. Men suddenly fell i'll,
lost the use Of their limbs, fell help
less on our hands. No help; nothing
would do them good but change of
nIoco oud d;at Vya co,,Id not 20 rrx,
them out across the snow. This was
dreadful. You could not have seen
those strong, brave men stricken
there helpless, dying day by day,
without hope, and been silent.
There were six of them and the
worst case in the six was that of the
man with the leather nose; all brought
together, all lying looking helplessly,
sadly into each others faces, think
ing of other faces, other scenes, in 9TH
erllands. At last an old sailor suggest
ed, as a last resort, remedy he had
seen save aship's crew In some land in
the tropics. We could try that. 1t was
to place the men, stripped nude as
nature, up to the chin In the earth,
and leave them there through the
night, till the loose and warm rich
soil should draw the poison from
their bodies.
There was reason in this. Besides
we had some evidence that 1t would
save our men; for once when a party
of Indians attacked us, we won the
fight, and, following them a little
way, found an Indian buried up to
tho eyes in the earth. They had
done this in the hope of saving him,
to try and heal his wound, and they
are good physicians.
We dug six pits in the shadow of a
pine, in the loose and warm alluvial
soil; and there, as the sun went
down, we stood the men up to the
chin, and filed the earth in about
them.
1t was q lovely moonlight night,
balmy and peaceful as paradise.
Not sound save the doleful howl OF
wolf in the crags above. Even i'm
this condition the grim Russian was
the center of interest; but he was
silent as he was helpless.
Oregon Jake was there, assisting Us
much as he might, in his awkward
and loose way, In the singular eXper-
iment and effort to save the lives OF
the stricken men. But he was not
gifted with any special gravity OF
bearing, and the grOtesque picture be-
fore him with all its sadness, had its
comical feature. He went up to Gin
ger and began to talk as he looked
now and then at the Russian over his
shoulder. He laughed as he did so.
The buried man heard him, lifted
his head with an effort, and cried
out in ghostly, graveyard voice:
"Knock him down, Ginger! Knock
him down."
Ginger, true to his helpless friend,
knocked him down on the spot.
Again the feeble head of the help.
less man settled over on the soft soil.
He closed his eyes with the most per.
feet satisfaction, and then smiled till
his white teeth looked like minia-
ture cemetery.
After awhile the tired miners be-
gan to retire, and with a silent prayer
for the success of the experiment, left
it to time. The invalids were cheer
full, and now with little hope chat
ted gaily enough together, but looked
strange beyond description-the six
shaggy heads just bursting through
the earth, like Banquo's, there in a
row, in the fitful moonlight. II
looked like men rising from the
earth and coming up to judgment.
The voices sounded weird and ghost
ly, too, as of another world. After
awhile one by one they fell asleep,
and all was still save The bowling oil
the wolf on the bluff above. grew
frightened like. / think the others
did too. And one by one we stole
away and left them there, as the
night went on, and sought our hunks
inside the cabins and threw us down
in our clothes, and slept. 1t was an
experiment for life or death.
What n strange stupor OvercOmes
men sometimes at night who have
been working hard all day. Singu-
lar that we should have left those six
men there at midnight in the black
shadows, with only here and there a
ray of moonlight to relieve the scene.
Strange that we could not keep
awake.
The experiment was failure. The
wolves came down i'm the night and
ate off every head level with the
ground.
THERE is an interesting trial in
progress Mt Kalamazoo, Michigan.