St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1894-01-27
An Old Roman Of uaTiposa.
BY FLORENCE FINCH-KELLY,

Mariposa is q wreck of the gold fever
The merest skeleton of its former self
its lies there in the gulch between tn,
chaparral covered foothills and remem
bers the time when it was lusty and WIG
orous, in the full flesh of feverish youth
and had murder every morning fo
breakfast.
All around it the gashed and scanned
and scared and furrowed earth bears
testimony to the labors of those stirring
times when men dug fortune from thu
ground in a day, and spent it in the towr
at night.
The people live in the past. The first
man with whom you talk will make YOU
hear the sound of barroom fights and pis,
tol shots down the street, and the rolling
chorus Of "Forty -rine," and make vivid
for your eyes the piles of gold dust upon
the gaming tables, the hundreds of gold
weighted miners that came trooping into
town on Saturday night, and the placer
mines down the bed of the creek, as pop
ulous then as city street, though
utterly deserted now. And every man and
woman above middle age with whom you
talk will do the same for you with new
characters and incidents, until your STAY
In the town becomes rolling panorama
of the gold days and you feel as if you
were yourself living through their excite
ments and had gotten their deliriums in
Jour veins.
At least that was what was happening
to me as | sat on a bench in front of a
little house whose narrow porch was
flush with the sidewalk of the main
street. My hostess, herself an old timer,
the first woman in the town, began the
entertainment as we sat there in the
early afternoon, SHILLING peas for dinner
and breathing deep draughts of the
honey-scented air that blew down the
hills from thousands of pink-fowered
manzanita bushes. She told how she
and her sister had alighted from the
stage in Mariposa that evening so MANY
years ago, when they were both "iust
slips of girls" the very first women in,
that region fprS<ttes and miles arx.7d:
end how thc zr@u, hupdreSsa.Asess:.''A,s't': g.,
who had not seen the form of woman
II months, save Indian squaws, came at
the news that two women were in town
and begged her father to be allowed lust
to look at them; and how the two of
them, hand in hand, came shyly out and
She men crowded around with looks of
respectful alteration and then passed on
to let others look, though one stoned
long enough to fall On his knees and kiss !
the hem of her dress; and how the whole
great crowd of men suddenly started up.
Is if by one impulse, the hymn, sNearcr,
My God, to Thee"
Then along came newspaper man
q bit of the present mingled with the
past. lie was there reporting murder
trial for his San Francisco paper.
"Better come to this afternoons ses-
sion of the trial" he said. "The priso-
ner isn't much, but his father is the
most interesting old chap I've run across
since I've been on the Coast I'll tell
you about him as we walk over.
"lt's brutal, CHASTITY case, the news
paper man said, land to my mind the
only mystery about is the prisoners
father. He is a fne-lookng old man.
With the manner and head of an old
Roman. He has the reputation of being
he straightest and squarest man in the
county, and how lie ever came TO be the
atler OF such a goodfor nothing scum
It the earth as the prisoner can explain
MY in the supposition that he isn't. {
"Ihe old man is one of the pioneers in
larlposa and they tell me that he was {
ne OF the nerviest men that ever drew a {
I'm In this town. He killed his man in
lose days, jurt as lots of other good t
en- did, but it was in self-defence and a
verybody was glad that the town was v
q of the man he dropped and so moth |
70 was said about it. There was q V
oroner's jury, which gave verdict of {
liclde, and explained their finding on
le ground that it was suicidal for anv a
ian to draw on Dan Hopkins and then v
I've Dan the chance to shoot first, I
Inc old man was universally known n
be SO honest and square in all his "
sallngs and so upright and honorable "
every way that the sons depravitv tt
emed all the blaeker by contrast. lie
10 stood by the young fellow from the Il
st OF his wickedness, so everybody k
ys, and has always shown toward him g.
Of only the greatest affection. He has d
'ver lntimated even to his best friend ST
at the young man was anything but B
Q best and most dutiful son that had IL
er lived. He has kept him supplied i,
Ith money, SO that the fellows only Sc
ason for the petty shievery he had W
y pure love for stealing. He has al
10 his fines when he has been arrested
9 shielded him from public CONTEMPT m
q done everything possible to make it iv
~ for him to be honest and respecta- d.
?. But the boy has steadily gone on. IT
ey say, from bad to worse, and now w
has capped it all with this crime an
ach, in willful and unprovoked bru, 81
ity, was worthy of criminal ct,