The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-08-10

and With the courtesy OF Broadway
fianeuf he asked US if we would not like TO
step up stairs and see private layout.
The men are paid on the 18th OF each
month, and before next morning their
money is all blown in.
Cost of Living.
The cost of living here is not high. TIL
best of steak is only 10 cents pound; sir
lOin roasts, 1919 cents; eggs, Is TO so
cents. Green vegetables are plentiful,
coming from Greeley, Canon City and
Florence; plenty Of fruit from Grand
junction, celebrated for small fruits. Po-
tatoes are sold by the hundred. During
the strike they rose in price from s. TO 81
a hundred. Flour also went up, and eggs
and sugar were very scarce Beer costs s.
bottle; one small glass, Is cents. Coal
is scarce and high, wood plentiful.
Here are the names OF the prominent
joints where the miners throw away their
hard earned WAGES: The Ranch, Clipper.
Gold Dollar. Big Dog, Black Bills, Topic.
Novelty Becaer's and DOlan'S and Mike
Whelan's. Some of these are roulette and
faro rooms, where green baiZed tables are
presided over by smooth faced, cold eyed
gentlemen, who turn the wheel or the
cards with an immobility which any self
respecting sphinx might do well TO copy.
In one Of these rooms l saw a gray haired
miner in rough brown velveteen coat
stagger up to the faro table, fling down
50 bill. with laugh and Z hoarse That's
the way my money has been going for the
last 40 years. - II j. needless 10 add that
the 50 speedily went the way OF their pred
eceSSors.
Iffe's Dark Side.
Many of these places are dancehouses.
The dancehouse OF mining camp has a
favor all its own. There is barroom in
front, filled with loungers and miners. At
the back, rallied off, is space for dancing,
with a raised platform for the musicians.
Here the poor, painted tough girls, in
tawdry finery, go through their dances in
a perfunctory, mechanical fashion. They
get cents for each customer they take 20
the bar, and if they are so fortunate as To
get a miner TO open a bottle of beer up
stairs in one of the cubby holes called
boxes" they receive % cents on each bot
tie opened. What becomes of these girls?
They eat opium and die.
Perhaps the most distinguished of these
resorts is that of the great and only Mike
Whelan. As rule, these dancehouse pro-
but Mike IS scarcely more than a STRIPPING,
with a gentle, delicate face, fine eyes and
a voice like the whoop of a Comanche In
dian. Mike sings-nay, more, he extern
porizes-and fits the words of his madri-
gals to the characteristics OF his various
customers. It's a great card, and his place
is thronged nightly by men who are any
ious 10 hear their follies and those of their
f-;r
Mike also has introduced to the art loving
public of Cripple Creek a terpsichorean
measure, which he terms 1.-THE redhot
quadrille, - for which he sings the calls in
the same farreaching, terrifying, steam
calliope voice.
A Battle Might BE Fought.
Bull Hill, where the battle would have
been fought, does not directly command
and overlook the camp of Cripple Greek.
1t is several miles away and is an extraor-
dinarily impregnable position for men
on the defensive 1t was patrolled by a
regular picket line, and if a tourist
CHANGED Is stray near he received peremp-
tory warning to keep off the grass or be
shot. The strikers carried dynamite up
in the most open fashion, and no secret
was made of their intention Ito blow the
deputies TO h-N' should they undertake
to scale the hill. The intrenchments were
made of timbers, stumps, stones, rocks,
anything at hand. 1t was named Fort
Dean by the miners-Fort Bluff by the
scoffers.
But L do not believe it was a bluff
There is no question but that if the depu-
ties-many of them courageous, reckless
men-had been given the word TO march
up Bull Hill there would have been fright
full blOodshed.
what did you intend to do with the
deputies?" was a question 1 put to a
miner.
He looked grizzly at me as he replied,
''There was powder for them if they got
by the dynamite"
Personal Experience.
HIr. Harry Woods, a prominent citizen
Of Victor, told me of his capture by the
strikers. They surrounded the house at
10 o'clock, he said, and told me 1 must
go with them. l looked at their win