The St. Charles herald. [volume] (Hahnville, La.) 1873-1993, 1885-04-18
FOOL GOLD.
Bill Nye Tells How He Went After For
tune and Didn't Get 1t.


tune and Didn't Get 1t.
1t is singular how soon plain, unas-
Stunning tenderfoot becomes an expert
enced miner and mountaineer-in his
mind-and how soon he begins to con-
verse about difficult and dangerous
terms in mining. He begins in two
days to talk about blossom rock, sur
face indications and float, Inside of a
week he converses freely on the subject
of ''colors, milling ore, refractory ore,
contact copper stains, carbonate for
nations, dips, spurs, variations, ASSESS
ment work, ore on its dump, ore in
sight, mill runs, true assures, mineral in
place, pyrites of poverty, sulphates of
disappointment" ETC., etc.
One summer day / went out into the
mountains with hope springing eternal
in my breast. did not tell any one
what my scheme was, but 1 fully in
tended to wrest a comfortable fortune
from the bowels of the earth. AS l
write these lines, learn that the afore-
said bowels remain intact
There were two of us in the expedi-
ton, and our bedding consisted mostly
of two patchwork quilts. Old hardened
miners do not travel through the noun
tains with patchwork bed quilts, unless
they desire to promulgate their fresh
and guileless natures.
We labored under the delusion that
hunting for gold and hunting for black
berries was good deal similar, but it
is not. Nothing could be less ditto.
We hunted for two weeks before we
found anything that looked like gold,
and our supply of toothsome viands
was beginning to get low. How well
| remember the beautiful day that l
found my first nugget in the bed of an
old stream in a wild and rocky gulch
There was little water standing in
slight depression of the gravel, and
in this little puddle lay my nugget
1t was pebble as large as robins
egg, literally full of yellow, gilt
tering metal, that made my heart Jump
around in my throat in most tumult-
uous manner. | examined the little
pool of water more carefully and found
another larger and even richer nugget.
l was crazy. | began to feel arrogant
and purse proud. l knew what it was
to look down on the poor sat down
on big boulder and tried to look
upon my former associates in the same
way that did before prosperity had
come upon me. | began to invest my
money where it would be safe and still
yield me fair interest.
By and by began to get hungry. l
went down to camp and ate a little
fried salt pork that had been left over
from the midday banquet. l showed
the bonanza to my partner, and told
him that he had better take the gold
and go into town for more grub. He
did so. Two days passed and | toiled
on. My partner did not return. A
horrible fear came upon me. Perhaps
he had taken the proceeds of my mug
gets and meandered away to some
other cline. | could not endure the
uncertainty, and started out for town.
He was not there. He had fled. [ in
CURED everywhere, but could learn
nothing of him till / went to an outfit
ting place, where one of the clerks said
that man answering to the descrip-
ton OF my partner had been there a
few days before and had tried to trade
some fool gold for grub" he said. And
the boys had told him to leave town in
side of thirty minutes or they would
hang him, and probably he had
skipped.
Then asked him what fool gold''
was, and he told me. 1t is generally a
streak ofyellow mica that runs through
pebble and under water looks like
gold, only little too bright. He said
that from the number of these nuggets
that had been brought in that season
he judged that the fool killer must have
been drawn on a jury somewhere and
prevented from attending to routine
business.-BiH Nye, in N. Y Mercury.