The New Bloomfield, Pa. times. (New Bloomfield, Pa.) 1877-188?, 1881-07-12

OF the SncrementO " asked lSutn.
"The very same. My objective point
was place now famous in the annals of
that period, called Bldwell's Bar OH
account of rich bar In the Feat -
river, full of golden sand, which IS
discovered by General Bidwell .he
place was many miles from the
country was sparsely settled aid not
know soul (for even ups were
scarce in those early days nd so my
courage and my legs gava ,ut together.
Pulling off my be Is about five o'clock
one sultry day, / Jared my blistered feet
to the cool evening breeze, and creeping
into a clump of young manzanitzas, fell
asleep, hoping that / would never again
wake this side of the stars. did, how
ever, conscious that my toes were
being licked in Il gentle fashion, and
discovered that it was being done by u
young brown setter dog, about as
hungry looking and generally dilapidat-
ed as | was myself.
Where he came from l never knew,
but looking into his half human eyes,
we speedily entered into sort of dumb
compact to trudge on together. found
that the poor fellow | never could call
him brute) had sore knee, inflamed
and bleeding. tore a strip Off from
my last handkerchief to bind it up, and
in place of the Coed Samaritan's oil and
wine, gave him my last scrap of cold
bacon. 1t is strange, but forlorn as L
was in those days, recall them with
tender pleasure almost unaccountable.
If i had been raised Brahmin, would
have believed that some immortal spirit
of unfailing cheerfulness and unending
resources was imprisoned in that dogs
body.
Did you ever read the fairy legend of
the White Cat who, after she had per-
suaded the young prince, her lover, to
cut Off her head and tail and throw
them in the fire, suddenly stood before
him woman, as fair as Aurora? Fritz,
for that was the name by which 1 called
the dog, looked at me with Jennie's
brown eyes, half roguish, half thought
full, and together we resumed our
journey. Nor would L have followed in
the wake of the young prince, even if L
had known the result would have been
similar, for Fritz, the dog was invalua-
BILE just as he was. All lonesomeness
was gone now that he rarely ever left
my side, and although our shadows had
grown less by the time we reached the
Bar our immaterial entities were in
prime order for anything in the shape
of adventure. Have never seen any
gold dug? Then I'll not at this late
day spoil your first impression of
miners camp by describing mine as 1
approached Bidwell's Bar L may say
though that one might have supposed
an earthquake or tornado had just been
at work there, tearing up the hundreds
of thousands of cubic feet that had been
moved and removed by mortal hands
in their frantic and persistent search for
gold.
The Bar, was world in minia-
ture. Almost every nationality was
represented there, and almost every
feature of human kind hut humanity.
Armed with pick, pan and shovel, /
like hundreds of others, began to dig
and burrow and wash dirt. But my
labor and its results would not balance,
for somehow my little leather bag of
gold dust grew no heavier, toll as 1
would. Wages being good 1 stopped
digging and hired myself as camp
scullion. did every kind of iobbing
within range of a miners wants.
Washing dirty flannel shirts and cotton
overalls, patching leather trousers and
cooking fiapjacks is not the most digni-
fled and flower-strewn path to fortune,
you must know, and to boy whose
ideas of ,chivalry, independence and
deeds of knightly valor were purely and
intensely Byronic, such a fate you must
acknowledge was a sort of poetic justice.
My aim, though, was TO earn enough
money with which to buy a certain
claim of which knew, and that had
in advance labeled bonanza
. might have succeeded, but L was
prostrated by malarial fever, and for
days and weeks lay unconscious at the
tender mercy of few Welsh miners
with human hearts. My little hoard of
money and my energy melted away
together like spring snow. But for
Fritz I'd have died of disappointment
alone. He had adopted the never say
die motto, and as often read in his
glorious eyes the sentence You great
old coward. AT him again = as a tender