The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-03-20

by the wife of the loser, who evidently fell
that her husband, under great menta
stress, was capable of lapses of memory
However, he took her down to the wharf
next day and showed her the water in
which the coin fell and she was satisfied
Such corroborative evidence could not be
doubted
For several days the boatman has been
lndustriously dragging hooknet over the
place and was successful in finding every
thing that has dropped in the bay there
Tor years except the money. The man
would throw his drag overheard and pa
tiently haul in to find that no sack of gold
had come to his net. This he repeated I'M
til the patience of the loafers on the wharf
was utterly exhausted. Finally his indus
try was rewarded by his drawing up a
buckskin purse half full of iron washers,
articles not wholly foreign to blacksmith
shops.
While the finder was sitting in his boat
bordering over the possible phenomenon
of chemical action which turned gold to
iron after few days submersion in salt
water the wrecking scow pulled into the
slip, and diver, dressed in his best suit of
glass and rubber clothes, went down to the
bottom of the bay
The dredger in vain protested that it was
his claim they had jumped, but the wreck
ers kept pumping atmosphere down where
their submarine shipmate was prospecting
for the lost mine. Finding words of no
avail the boatman threw overheard the
hook-net and caught his rival, whom he
hauled up to the surface in very angry
and very demoralized condition. The diver.
OF course, was unable to make any audible
remarks from the great copper helmet that
imprisoned him, but the language he was
using inside of his clothes Whistled out
through the escape-valve at the back of his
head like steam from a dangerously over
charged boiler. His alright rubber shirt
and trousers were inflated with the COM
pressed bad words until he foated on the
surface, cork-like, and threatened to soar
up above the shipping like a bifurcated
balloon.
He Rugged energetically at the little
circular bay-window over his face, and as
soon as he had freed his person from the
fifteen or twenty atmospheres that encom-
passed him, he said things that were posi-
lively awful to hear. He talked until the
skipper of the scow shut him off, and in,
by closing the bullseye and dropping him
down to the bottom again. The boatman
began to worry the diver by dragging the
hook around, stirring up the black mud as
though school of inkfish were operating
down in the water. The other prospector
came up his ladder hand over hand and
threatened to go for policeman, all
dressed as he was, but was persuaded to
remain in his natural element, and finally
went down to the mine he had jumped.
The other fellow cast in his net again.
but the diver below cut the line, and the
fisher of men and money lost his apparatus.
He drew his sheathknife and sprang over
to the rubber airtube of the pump and tried
to cut off the divers wind. The spectators
then took part in the contest and threat
ened to throw the excited boatman over
board if he persisted in his mad intention.
He put his knife away, went back to his
boat, and amused himself probing around
in the water with long pole stirring up
the mud until the diver, unable to see
through the black, thick liquid, knocked
off work. To-day he will make another
effort to find the coin, enrich himself, and
free the blacksmith from suspicion of
having shown the wrong place.