The Highland weekly news. [volume] (Hillsborough [Hillsboro], Highland County, Ohio) 1853-1886, 1883-12-12
Life ina Mining Camp.


tt is hard TO keep separate the fantas-
tic and the sad, I'm one's Impressions
hard TO decide which has more pathos
the camp deserted or the camp newly
begun, the picture of disappointment
over and past or chat of enthusiastic
hopes, nine out of ten of which are
doomed TO die have sometimes
thought that the newest trcst, most
sanguiue camps were saddest sights of
ALL
The expression Of q fresh mining
camp, at the height of it's "boom,' is
something which must be seen to be
comprehended.
The camp is in the heart of a fir for
est, perhaps, or on the stony sides of q
gulch. Trees fall here, there, every
where, day and night Nobody draws
breath till he has got a cabin, or a
bough hut, or a tent over his head. AS
if by magic, there grows up a sort Of
street, a dozen or two board shanties,
with that cheapest and silliest of all
shams, the battlement front, Haunting
its ugly squares all along the line.
Glaring signs painted on strips of cot
ton sheeting, bleached and unbleached,
are nailed over doors. In next to no
time there will be a 'mint" an ''eN-
change" "bank," "Vienna
! bakery a "Chinese laundry a "hO-
tel and 'livery stable Between
each night and morning will blossom
out crops of "real estate offices, and
| places where "mining properties are
| bought and sold D" claims located,
| proved, bought and sold, ' surveys of
! mining claims made, etc. crops also,
alas, of whisky saloons, with wicked
names and luud red curtains, danger
and death signals.
The stumps are not taken out OF the
I preteuse of q road, neither are the
/ powders; nobody minds driving over
/ them, or over anything, in fact, so he
gets quick to his ''claim or to the
tract i'm which he is feverishly 'pros-
/ pecting. If a brook trickles through
the camp, so much the better; it can do
4 double duty as drain and well. Luck
lest they who drink highest up, but tthey
who drink lowest down do not mind.
The women, if women there are, are
fierce and restless, like the men, They
make shifty semblauces of homes out of
their ,One-roomed cabins. 1t is not
worth while to have things comfortable,
or keep them in order, for there is no
/ knowing whether the camp will turn
out to be q good one or not; and to.
morrow they may pack up their chatlels
and move on. At the faintest rumor Of
bigger 'fnd" in another camp, the
men to whom they belong will be off
and they must follow. They stand in
their dOorways, idling, wondering, wait
ing, gOssipiug and quarreling. The only
placid creatures are the babies, whose
simple needs of sun, dirt and being le
alone are amply provided. They are
happy, and they only, in all the camp
1t is a strange life, unnatural un
wholesome, leading to no good, com
fortress to q degree which many of thOsD
who lead it would not endure a day
except for the hope Of great gain, whict
fires their very veins. The worst of /
is that the life is as fascinating as it j
unwhOlesOme. "Once miner always
miner is a proverb which is little les
than an exact truth. The life is simpl
{ q gamester's life, with the wide cart
for q hazard table, andthe instances ar
rare in which a person who has one
come under its spell ever breaks away
1t is no uncommon thing in ColOrad
to meet an old gray-haired man VIII
has been prospecting and mining all hi
life, and has not yet made a dollar, bu
is buoyantly sure that he will ''strk
, it, soon. .-AHautic MONTHLY