Arizona republican., 1903-08-21
I went to Esmeralda early.


 the Winnemucca and other fine claims, and was very wealthy. I fared stump tuously on bread when flour was $2OO barrel and had beans every day when none but bloated aristocrats could afford such grandeur. But I finished by feeding batteries to a quartz mill al $l5 week and wishing I was battery myself and had somebody to feed me. My claims in Esmeralda are there yet.
 I suppose I could be persuaded to sell. I went to the Humboldt district when it was new I became largely interest ed in the Alba Nueva and other claims with gorgeous names, and was rich again-in prospect. I owned a vast mining property there. I would not have sold out for less than $400,00O at that time-but 1 will now. Finally l walked home-some 200 miles-partly for exercise and partly because stage fares were expensive.
 Next I entered upon an affluent career in Virginia City. And by a judicious investment of labor and the capital of friends became the owner of about all the worthless wildcat mines there were in that part of the country.
 ASSESSMENTS RUINED HIM.
 Assessments did the business for me
 
 one dividend and the proportion of in
 come to outlay was a little against me. My financial thermometer went down to 32 degrees Fahrenheit, and the sub scriber was frozen out. l took up ex- tensions on the mainland-eXtensions
 that reached to British America in one direction and to the IsthmuS of Pana- | ma in the other-and l verify believe l would have been rich if I had ever | found those internal extensions. But | didn't. I ran tunnels till I tapped the Arctic ocean, and I sunk shafts till broke through the roof of perdition. but those extensions turned up missing ev- cry time.
 l am willing to sell all that property and throw in the improvements. Per haps you remember the celebrate North Ophir? I bought that mine. It
 was very rich in pure silver. You could | take it out in Jumps as big as filbert But when it was discovered that those Jumps were melted half dollars, and hardly melted at that, a painful case of "saltin'" was apparent, and the un- dersigned adjourned to the poorhouse again.
 I paid assessments on Hale and Nor
 cross till they sold me out. and l had | to take in washing for a living-and the next month that infamous stock went up to S7, 900 foot. I own millions and
 millions of feet of affluent silver leads in Nevada-in fact, I own the entire un- dercrust of that country. nearly, and if congress would move that state off my property so that I could get at it, l | would be wealthy yet. But no, there she squats-and here am I. Failing health persuades me to sell. If you know of any one desiring a permanent
 investment I can furnish him one that
 will have the virtue of being internal. MARK TWAIN'S MINING I have been through the California
 mill. with all its "dips, spurs and an- g!es, variations and sinuosities.' I have
 worked there at all the different trades and professions known to the cata- logue. I have been everything from a newspaper editor down to q cowcatcher ! on a locomotive, and I am encouraged
 to believe that if there had been more occupations to experiment on l might have made a dazzling success at last and found out what mysterious design Providence had in view in creating me. But you perceive that. although I am not a pioneer, I have had a sufficiently variegated time of it to enable me to ! talk pioneer like a native, and l feel like a Forty Miner. Therefore, l cor dially welcome you to your old remem- bered homes, and your long deserted firesides, and close this screed with the sincere hope that your visit here will be | a happy one, and unembittered by the sorrowful surprises that absence and | lapse of years are wont to prepare for | wanderers; surprises which would come in the form of old friends missed from their places; silence where famil- jar voices should be; the young grown l old change and decay everywhere; | home a delusion and disappointment ; strangers at the hearthstone; sorrow | where gladness was; tears for laughter; | the melancholy pomp of death where l the grace of life has been!
 l With all good wishes for the Return ed Prodigal, and regrets that l cannot partake of a small piece of the fatted calf (are and no gravy), I am, yours | cordially-Mark Twain