The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1890-01-11

cut Is scarce and must be economical, so
the ever accommodating bowldcr pile is
faced up" with "a neat wall, laid with
out mortar, but with some care and
skill The bel rock is under our feet
We are undermining the bank and keep
ing the stream turned in as much as
possible to the part undermined. The
gravel for foot or six inches is pretty
hard, and the stones here are harder and
closer packed than those nearer the sur
face. There the gravel is lighter, Many
of the stones are light and rotten; blow
with the pick dashes them to pieces This
streak lust above the ledge and for few
inches in the crevices of the ledge is our
pay streak" where ages on ages ago
some stream ran, depositing, as all
streams do, the heavier gravel on the
bottom and the lighter above. Occasion
ally the pick strikes a firmly imbedded
bowlder hard and square on its point, in
such way as to send the vibration like
a shock along the iron, up the handle
and into ones arm and crazy bone.
Our bank of dirt is about eight feet in
height. A few inches of the top is a
dark mold, below that are three or four
feet of "hard pam" below the "hard
pan" light sandy gravel and rotten bowl
ders, and near the ledge is the pay
streak. This order of formation has
varied as we have worked up and into
the bank. At first, near the rivers edge,
there was only mold on a very light alu-
vial sand. This was readily washed oil
and paid 81 or s. per day. A little far
Their back we struck the edge Of the red
ter. Farther still came the deposit OF
light sandy gravel, and lastly came in
the accused "hard pan"
Our claim, on being first prospected,
was reported to pay three cents to the
pan from the top down. We believed it
at first, not having learned that three
cents to the pan from the top down"
means the biggest kind Of luck. If you
get an average Of half a cent pan from
the top down, and the dirt would wash
easily, we should make money. 1t was
hard even for an "honest miner" to give
10 a. ItoIib VI ~ I'looD'Ib 'iIiiiS 100
than "thrce cents to the pan" But
"hard pan" is our foe. "Hard pan" is
the essence of brickbats. It's consistency
is about that of chalk. 1t seems the
finest kind Of sand ccmented and pressed
together. 1t can be carved into any
form with knife. 1t takes as much
time to work off square foot of hard
pan as ten square feet of soft gravel
When, after half days labor, we sue
coed in getting down "A cave, it goes into
the ground sluice in IA few great Jumps,
which must be battered to pieces with
our picks before the water will slowly
dissolve them into mud. And it doesn't
hold "color" of gold. The work in
the ground sluice goes on hour after
hour. Pick and shovel and scrape,
scrape and shovel and pick, the water
meantime tumbling and roaring over
the bank and making it difficult for us
to hear one anothers voices. The sun
climbs higher and gets hotter. The
water pail is frequently visited. The
backs Of the gray shirts are wet with
perspiration. In an easy, companion
able claim, where the partners are all
good fellows and on good terms and not
too insane in the matter of getting an
enormous quantity Of dirt through the
sluices each day, there may be more or
less brief suspensions from the work,
when all hands lean on their shovels
and talk politics. or horses, or last nights
poker game, or have n short service of
tobacco smoke, with the usual solemn
preliminaries of cutting the plug and
filling pipes. But if the majority of the
company" are a mean, grabbed, close
listed lot, the misery goes on without
cessation.
A queerly assorted group are we thus
laboring together. Jack OWNS impelling
hope and lfe's idea ia to earn enough to
pay his passage home to Philadelphia
and buy him a suit of clothes. A decent
suit he has not earned these five years.
He would be the terror and distress of
his relatives if ever he got back, for with
him s. in his pocket over expenses and
sobriety are IN impossbility. McFadden
dreams of n cabin, n COW, some geese
and goats, a horse and a wife, and is in
a fair way of realizing them all. He
saves most of his earnings, gets drunk |
wisely only on holidays, pays his debts
regularly, hates the English, lives in that
little black, brownish cabin up yonder,
does all his cooking in two tin pots, sleeps
in one pair of ancient blankets and |
most disreputable bed quilt, and 50 will
cover the cost of all his domestic fittings |
and utensils. Bill Furnca, French Ca
madam, has drifted here into this hole in |
the foothills very much as he drifted into |
the without aim or object in life |
save present enjoyment. He is Il good |
worker and works because he was brought |
up to it and can't help it. He is "A good |
boatman, "A good logger, a skilled wood |
cutter, dcvotee of poker and generally |
a successful one, an entertaining scamp, |
full of wit and originality, quick to take |
in the pcculiarities and eccentricities OF |
others, something of dandy, as far as
iandyism can be INDUCED in this out of |
the way place, and a born scamp, glib of |
tongue, unreliable, and socially the best |