New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1875-08-29
The Aftesinn Well.

Max Adeler has the following: Thev bav
been boring an artosian we'll out at the irol
foundry. and for some time the work seemed
to 60 along very nicely. The boring wal
| done with two.inch auger fixed in the enc
| of an iron rod, which was twisted around by
I q wheel worked by two men. One day
after they had gone down gOod many
would not come. They were afraid to use
much force lest the anger should come of
and stay in the hole, and so as the boring
went along we'll enough they concluded To
keep on turning, and to trust to the force Of
the water, when they struck it, to drive
the loose dirt up from the hole. When
they had gone down about three hundred
and fifty feet, they began to think it queer
that there were no signs of water; but they
bored hundred feet further, and one day.
just as they were beginning on another
hundred. there was an excitement in at
Murphy lives next door to Che foundry,
and ON the day in question bis boy came
running into the house and told him
/ to come into the garden quick, for there
was come kind of an extraordinary animal
with sharp nose burrowing out of the
ground. Murphy concluded that ic must
be either potato bug or grasshopper that
had been hstched'in the spring, and he took
when it came up. When Murphy reached
the spot there certainly was some kind of q
creature slowly pushing it's way up through
the sod. Its nose seemed to resemble q
sharp point like steel. Murphy dropped
some poison on it, but it didn't appear to
mind the stuff, but kept slowly creeping up
from the ground. Then Murphy tslt 1t.
and was astonished to find that it felt ex-
actly like the end of q fork prong, He sent
the boy to call Perkins and the rest of the
neighoors. Pretty soon q large crowd COL
lected, and by this time the animal had
emerged to the extent of q couple of inches.
Every body was amazed to see that it
looked exactly like the end of large anger,
anG Two or three timid men were so scared
ct the idea of such Q thing actually grow
ing out OF the earth that they suddenly got
over the fence and lett. Perkins couldn't
account for it, but he suggested that may
De somebody might have planted gimlet
there, and 1t had taken roo! and bloseOBned
out into an anger; but he admitted that he
never heard Of such q thing before.
Murphy said that if that kind of thing
would work. he probably might 90 into the
business regularly, and raise axes by. plant
ing hatchets, and guns by sowing pistols.
The excitement increased SO that the men
who were boring the artesian well knocked
pit and camo over to see the phenomenon.
IL was n0tlco0 that IS soon as they stopped
work the anger ceased to grow, and when
they arrived they locked at it for minute, 4
and one of them said:
''Bill. do you recognize that augers'
Il think do,D said Bill.
well, Bill, you go and unhitch that
Wheel from the other end Of the rod"
Bill did %. and then the other man asked |
he crowd to take hold of the anger and |
'ull. They did, and out came $50 feet of |
ron rod. Tho sdgeF had Slid off to the side,
armed upward and come to the surface in !
larphys garden. Then the srtesiah well |
res abandoned, and Brown, the fohndry !
naH, bought . steam pump and began to |
ct water from the river.