The state capital., 1891-09-12


If the robber is alone nobody need
lose much wealth in hold-up, howev-
er. The robber will not throw himself
off guard to search the pockets of a lot
of passengers. 1t is his business to
keep them covered with his gun, and
he depends upon their terror to induce
them to give up what he would not
search for. 1t requires an artistic op-
orator and one with supreme audacity
to go through whole stage load of
people and clean them out to the ulti-
mate nickel, but California can proud
ly boast of having produced such art
lists. One way of doing the trick is to
pretend that another robber is con-
cealed in the brush close by.
Jim, you keep these galoots covered
while go through 'em," remarks the
road agent, in cool, matter-of-fact
way, after he has ranged the fright
ened passengers in a row with their
hands above their heads. And then he
goes through them without undue
haste, making facetious remarks as he
brings up the plunder.
The lone highwayman of Shasta,
y
neat method of taking care of passen-
gers when they were numerous enough
to be troublesome. His outfit consist
ed of siX-shooter ana a bundle of
barley sacks. He stopped the inward
bound stage within the town limits of
Redding, and put a barley sack over
the head of every man in the crowd.
Just as he had finished that part of the
| Job the outward bound stage drove up
and he stopped that and bagged the
heads of all hands. Then a farmer
happened along, and he was treated
similarly. A citizen of Redding, driv-
ing for doctor, fell into the trap and
| joined the barley-sacl1 brigade, and
then came the schoolmarm of the dis
trict, who was told to stop and sit still
in her buggy, which she did. The lone
robber explored the pockets of the
crowd, broke open the express boxes,
and quietly slipped away into the
woods, and the bagged victims didn't
dare to move until the schoolmarm
began to laugh at their ridiculous as
pect, and told them the robber had
gone.
In the hands of q road agent entirely
great fence picket is as mighty as
two-shot scatter gun. The Gilroy stage
was toiling up long hill at dusk some
years ago when the driver saw some
thing white futtering just ahead, and
his leaders stopped with their breasts
against a rope sire tched across the
road. A handkerchief was fluttering
from the center of the rope. The
driver put on the brake, and then
somebody standing by tree at the
side of the road told him to throw
down the box. He glanced toward
the person who spoke and saw a
masked man pointing something at
him. He threw down the box, the
masked man cut the rope and told him
to drive on, and the stage went on its
way. The next day the officers found
the broken express box, the rope, and
an old fence picket in the road, but they
never found the masked man.
The express box is the main attrac
tion for the road agent, and sometimes
it is an affliction to his soul. In the
natural order of things it ought to con-
tain wealth, but the heartless express
companies sometimes load it with
bricks and cause great loss of time
and anguish of spirit to an industrious
and painstaking robber. When rob-
berries were the rule and safe trips the
exception in California, the express
companies invented the dummy box
and worked it off frequently on the en-
terprising agent, but the joke didn't
last long. The agent acquired the
habit Of bursting the box in the pres
ence of the driver and then profanely
requesting him to hand out the other
box, and no blanked foolishncss AS
| the drivers weren't hired to be shot,
| they discouraged the use of the dummy
box, and it was abandoned by all the
we'll regulated lines, although it was
worked in occasionally on some anna
teur robber. When Budd Philpott was
driving the Lakeport stage a robber
| held him up. and Budd chcerily tossed
| out an empty box belonging to the
Great Western mine, and drove along
with the Wells-Fargo box safely slowed
under his feet.
| The scheme of building an iron box
into the body OF the coach worked for
| a Ulfne, DuG t1e rOdu agents uedb uudI
game by sending the driver and pas
sengers along the road afoot and
breaking into the box at their leisure
with cold chisels. AS they usually con-
cluded the evenings entertainment by
setting fire to the coach and burning
up one thousand dollars worth of the
| company's property, besides running
| away with the horses. the stagemen
| concluded that the iron-box scheme
didn't pay.
Going through the mail sacks used to
| be tedious job for road agent, and it
didn't often pay for the time wasted.
Besides, it doubled the number of pur-
suers by setting all the United States
| marshals on the hunt for the robber,
and when caught it landed him in the
| United States court and insured a
heavy sentence. Nevertheless great
deal of money is sent by mail, and, for
the convenience of road agents and
other thieves who may desire to take
the chance of being caught, Uncle Sam
| invented the registered letter and its
especial pouch. No other reason for
! the invention Of the registered letter
| svstAn1 can he irsaapinad repistered