Iron County register., 1898-04-28
TEE Old SILVER TRAIL.
BY MARY E. SncNEY.
IcOPyhght 1896. by J. B. Lippincots Col
CHAPTER X.-CoSr1sUED.

tIne missing man, and Donald Bartels
never more icily calm, began his un-
equal contest in the spirit of Travis at
the battle of the Alamo. OF words he
must build his only bulwark. talking
against time. He began his address to
the jury with careful description of the
locations of the two mines, describing
with minute particularly the Mascot
lode, its dip and trend, the width be-
tween foot and hanging wall and the
character OF its ore. He waxed elo-
qdent in the story of Harvey NeiPs
.cng time of toll on the bleak hillside.
through storm and sunshine, summer
and winter, handicapped by poverty
and even more by his boyish inexperi-
ence, bravely keeping on even when az
times scarce so much as {. slice of bacon
remained between him and starvation.
So pathetic was his word picture of this
weary time of working and waiting
that couple of mining men on the iury.
who had perhaps suffered similar ex-
perlences in that same gambling game
with nature, were visibly affected, their
taces Frightening sympatheticallyw whe n
the speaker went on to tell of the rich
strike which at last had promised mete
reward for all that had gone before
SkiIlfully the clever speaker SKINNED
the surface of the troublous times with
The miners afterward, paying shrewd
tribute to the avowed aims of the union
wh1e at the same time delicately up
hc-dIng the man who would not dis
charge faithful and efficient work.
man at the behest of any man, prefer
-Ilng to run the gauntlet of recrimina-
t'on and enmity rather than be recreant
10 MS conception of an employers duty:
summarizing the whole matter as mere
ly an unfortunate MISUNDERSTANDING
which, in retrospect, should be consid-
cred really creditable to both sides.
FROM this he went on to show how the
Mascot vein had developed in richness
with depth until envy had cast
ITS evil eye upon a neighhor's pros
perlty, showing how the Grub
stake mine had been relocated, the
trend of its side lines SO changed
that n larger section of the Mascot's
rich territory might be covered by the
intersection of the two lodes-if If
could be said that there were two lodes.
For he would undertake to prove, the
speaker went on to declare, that never
Lad any mineral been discovered in this
so-called Grubstake lode until after this
relocation; they would show that the
present management of the Grubstale
mine, mining men of acknowledged
skill and experience, had sunk a shaft
upon ground revealing no smallest vein
of mineral, ground utterly barren, and
experiment of which the merest tyro
in mining could scarcely be guilty
without the set purpose which became
apparent when from that unpromising
shaft drift went creeping out to the
westward, a drift which to the I'M
initiated must have seemed no less des-
titute of rational design than the work
AT the outset, since it followed no lead,
the method in which madness only be-
coming clear when that drift cut into
tiny fault or fissure which had pre-
viously been uncovered in the Mascot
hanging wall. Then it was that the
~G1ubstake claimed a true fissure vein
naking q turn at this point into the
Mascot's rich ore body, although even
then they had not ventured to reveal
their purpose by cutting into the
Mascot workings, preferring rather to
adelve in the wealth they had opened up
beyond, where they might work un-
detected for the time. They could show
that a man employed as foreman on
the Mascot at the time this small fault
in the hanging wall was uncovered, had
had full direction of the Grubstake
workings which led to the latter dis
scovery, so-called, a man Influenced no
less by personal enmity toward his late
employer than through zeal for the man
who now paid him wage to do such
dirty work. From this he went on to
quote the decision of the supreme court
of the United States in the Amy-Silver-
smith case, as determining the extra
lateral rights of the mine owner, ar
guing that even if through ignorance
or willfuI blindness to the truth this
fault in the rock which constituted the
sGrubstake's only real claim to discov-
cry, could be considered true vein, its
direction, running as it did across the
side lines of the Mascot, effectually
barred the Grubstalle owner of any
-eXtra-lateral rights whatever in that
so-called discovery. In relocating the
claim, plainly the intent had been to
bring the richest portion of the Mascot
territory within the Grubstake side
lines: but nature had been so inconsid-
crate as to put that little slip in the
hanging wall just a few feet too far
toward the east, and thus the Grub
stake drift, for obvious reason, planned
to enter the Mascot territory at such
point Us would not intersect the Mascot
workings, had first come into ground
so unexpectedly lean that the enterpris-
ing manager had been forced to go be-
yOnd his side lines for the rich pick
ings he was after. The speaker quoted
further from the case of the Iron Silver
versus the Elgin Mining company. in
which the supreme court had explicitly
declared that if the locator does not
make the explorations necessary to
ascertain the true course of his vein
and draws his end lines ignorant1y, he
must bear the consequences. The
owner of the Grubstake, the speaker
declared, his voice vibrant with sar-
casm, had perhaps made the mistake of
bis life when he had failed to jump the
Mascot out and out; but it was an IN
stance of short-sightedness almost un-
raralleled in the history of a gentleman
whose peculiar methods had contrib
uted so much of the spice Of variety to
the mining annals of Colorado. And
from This he passed on to the mining
history of the state, to the first discov-