Bridgeton pioneer., 1885-09-03
NUGGET-HUNTING.


Australia. California, Mexico, and
British Columbia, related to a San
Francisco Call reporter few days ago
several instances of lucky discoveries.
IAN old Dutchman brought the
plodding method of his race to the
work of gold-digging in Australia. All
of his companions had boldness and
dash; but few had the stolid persistence
in the face of bad luck that this Dutch
man possessed. He had been plodding
along for several months digging a
tunnel. Heavy dull clay was all about
him. Not a promising sign beckoned
him on. He seemed to get more set
tied i'll his determination to work the
tunnel to the end the more unpromising
it looked. He had been working on in
the face of discouragement for several
months. One morning he was making
his way into his tunnel, and before he
had gone fourteen feet his heart sank
within him. There in front of him was
his tunnel caved! The path that he
had laboriously dug into the hill was
clogged with tons of earth. But the
quality of his character asserted itself
Most men would have volleyed oaths
at his i'll luck, and packed their kit and
left The miner moved more slowly
than before, but he started to work
again in the same tunnel. He crawled
into his tunnel, and with his pick and
shovel set to clearing away the hill of
earth that blocked his path. He had
not struck more than a dozen blows
with his pick before the sharp iron
point struck something solid. Me-
chanically he bent forward and cleared
away the earth, and there before him
was big nugget, as nuggets go,weigh-
ing fourteen ounces. He crept out of
tine tunnel, Dringing his precious mug
get with him, and when he got into
the fresh air and heard the birds sing
ing, he sat down and wept. No one
begrudged the Dutchman his luck.
"a nuggety country that has been
only partially worked is just as good
field as virgin soil," continued the
miner. ''The spots that have not been
touched may be the very nests of the
precious metal. 1t is dangerous to
leave a single foot of ground unwork-
ed. The fortune of lifetime might
thus be passed and lost forever. There
was poor, shiftless fellow, with a
wife in rags and children in squalor.
The whole family used to 60 into the
diggings together and shift about till
they had got enough to buy something
to eat. They kept sinking lower and
lower. But one day they struggled in
to the diggings, not having energy
enough to push on abreast of the
workers. They fell to picking a little
pillar that had been left standing in
the midst of the diggings, all about it
having been worked. do not think it
could be more than three feet across,
and certainly not more than six. 1t
was spot that had been neglected as
the diggers had pushed their drifts
ahead. The squalid family began work
on this solitary pillar; all they hoped
was for few grains to feed them for
the day. As the man continued list
iessly, the sunlight was caught up by a,
speck in the pillar th Aglistened aAd
flashed. The eyes of the poor fellow
saw it; he thought his work for the
day was done. He knelt down to clean
away the dirt from the bright spot. As
he did so the shining metal grew to
larger proportions. Immediately the
whole family was around it in eager
haste to uncover it. The further they
cleared the soil away about it the fur
ther it seemed to recede After work.
ing two hours with growing astonish-
ment they saw the full outline of their
prize one of the largest Jumps of gold
ever found. That was the luckiest
find ever made.
1.-The Mount Moliagul nugget was
found in most peculiar place" re-
sumed the miner. There was an un-
usually rich diggings in the vicinity of
Mount Moliagul, Victoria, that made
hundred men rich. 1t had been thor
oughly worked in every direction, and
it was thought that every grain of gold
in the neighborhood had been collect
ed. The crowd that once made the
camp scene of busy life dissolved as
quickly as it had been collected, leav-
ing the shanties to the mercy of the
weather, which soon made them pict-
uresque ruin. OFF toward the east
there was a solitary tree stump, stand
ing on pillar of earth that had not
been cut away by the gold-hunters be-
cause of the old roots of the tree that
spread through the soil. 1t was not
more than ten feet in circumference
that had been left by the dggers. One
camp, and stopped over night on the
site of the old camp. The stump
struck one of them as singular feat
ure OF the old diggings, and, being
skillful miner, he knew that one part
OF nuggety country was as likely to
hide the precious metal as another. 1t
occurred to him that the ground under
the stump was as likely to prove rich
as the portions of the neighboring
fields that had yielded so much gold.
He resolved to work the little mound
the next day. His companion, howev-
er, was anxious to be off to the latest
diggings, where the excitement was
at the highest pitch. But the first
miner who had resolved to explore the
solitary patch of the deserted diggings,
persuaded his partner, and together
they set to work on the old stump.
They began by undermining one side
OF the stump, but before they had dug
in three feet they discovered an enor-
NOUS nugget, one of the most valuable
that had been found in the whole dig
gings. They continued their labors
Il