The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-09-01


and caverns Of quartz certain PARTICLES of
gold. Ages roll on; glaciers. avalanches,
earthquakes, and landslides; gulches are
formed; the top of the chimney or pocket
is worn and torn and washed down into
and along the gulches. The gold miner Of
the old days came by. He washed out
the gold from the gulches and went his
way. Then came Thompson, and after
him came all the patient army of pocket
hunters, men who follow the PARTICLES of
gold dust up, up, up, till they can find
no more particles in the gulch or in the
dirt of the hills on either side. Then they
know they have passed the pocket.
They then go back, locate 1t on one side
or the other, and then patiently trace the
gold to its place of original formation.
You sometimes find a fortune a perfect
''pocketful of gold" hatful of gold,
lodged in the little chimney top; sometimes
only few hundred dollars, oftener you
do not find it at all, or, what is most eN-
asperating, you find that the beehive has
been found before and robbed of all its
honey. And this much for a subject that
deserves a volume, but must put Up with
a paragraph.
Thirty years went by. Gamblers Gulch
had been the richest place of all 1t was
so called because gamblers when hard up
used to go up there and wash out
stake simply with a pan. Thompson had
been hunting for years and years for
| lniS fountain nedO. he ndu money OLlDcu
| the hill on which his cabin stood He
had bored right and left, east and west.
north and south. Sometimes it was no
| ticed that he missed coming down 10 the
| store for his usual bag of supplies at the
| end of the week. once he had to beg
! for credit, a rare thing for him. Had he
not long since laid aside firearms we
might take comfort in the idea that he,
| in such straits, perhaps shot and ate
| one or two of his little large-eyed moon
| light friends. for he surely was often
| hungry to the verge of starvation now
in these his decrepid days
! He grew bent and his face was pinched
and thin His chest grew narrow and
his shoulders shrank close together. He
shrank all around, all everything. ev-
/ erything but his feet. These were nearly
| bare now. You could see his toe-prints
| on the dusty path as he went and came
| for water at the beautiful Shasta spring.
One frosty night in the rail- the boys in
| the saloon were startled almost out of
their wits. Peelhead Smith threw down
a full" although there was a double
pot" and the Turtle Dove, with a six
| shooter in his lap, had "straddled" Peel
| heads blind, and he was as sure Of rak-
| ing down as he was of coming to the
| center" when called"
There stood Thompson. Was he alive?
Was it his ghost? 1t looked like a ghost.
His big shoes were yawning His white
| toes shown through like the teeth of a
| grlnning clown. Not a word. The fiddle
came slyly out from under his arm. 1t
| lay lovingly along his large, bony wrist
and began slow and timid like, as if
afraid:
| Sweet, sweet, sweet, o, great God Panl
Never such music since the great world
began.
The sun on the hill forgot to die;
The lilies revived and the dragonny
Came back to dream on the river.
| 1t was such a moonlight night The
men melted out of the bar-room one by
one, and sat down facing Gamblers Gulch
Hill, the moon settling and settling low
and slow over the shoulders to the right
till finally IT fell behind an old empty
Chinese wash house with some of the
shakes torn off and then the silver leaves
sifted through and played pretty games
of chess on the pavement at their feet.
How still
And then suddenly came again that
music from the hill. How glad they were.
Each man drew a long breath of relief
Then he is not dead" was the thought
of each, with a mental promise to go up
| early in the morning and tell the poor
penitent that he was forgiven, and that
| he was the best of them all after all
| But what was that piteous, plaintive air?
| They had never heard the man play that
before.
That's Home, Sweet Home,'" whis-
| pered the Turtle Dove an educated old
/ gentleman, as he dug some wax out from
under his finger nail with a broken
match.
! At last the settling moon reached timid-
! ly through a broken board low down on
4 the old Chinese wash house, and in token
/ of surrender to darkness, laid a sword of
| silver at their feet and then Home,
| Sweet Home" was heard on the hill no
| more forever
! The next morning a great four-mule
| dray drove into town, on its way up to
the little graveyard from the Redding mar
BILE works.
IT saw the dogonest tracks in the road.
| big enough for a bear, and the toes in the
| dust" said the man with the dray to the
| barkeeper, as he hastily wiped his NOUS
tache on the back of his hand and then
faced about and fired a stream Of profanity
| at the mules.
The bystanders looked at one another.
! Then all on the run they went painting
up the hill together. The bar was left to
serve itself.
1T was a bear and he has got away with
the honey" cried the barkeeper at the
head.
Never such laconic men as these min
ers. There was the pallaged pocket in
his very dooryard, and the golden lining
here and there to show what horde it
had held, almost on the surface and right
at his feet
And that was all
The new, spruce conductor at Redding
who got his place temporarily through
the strike, told the eager miners now an
old man with a heavy gunny bag had
hammer and little crowbar had climbed
into the cars that night.
And what did he say?" demanded Peel
head.
well, asked him if he had been pros
pecting and he said 'Yas.'
Been out good while?' says 1.
-" 'Ya-a-s, says he, bout thirty-two
years. Ticket for Boston, please
WOOed in the Wet.
Allen Lester Fowler, a south side Chica-