Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1903-08-06

able.
Without waiting to see how No. 8
would act with Tony by her SIDE,
Watts turned, climbed out of the dig
gings and walked rapidly along the
trail to the mess-house.
The hungry foreman had just set
himself down to a steaming dinner
when there came a noise as of thun-
der from the diggings below, inter-
mingled with yells and shouts. He
sprang for the door, where a clear view
of the three giants was afforded. Dam
that Dago!" he exclaimed, as he gave
a quick glance at the scene below, and
grabbing his hat, started on a run
down the trail.
The worst had happened. The ut
most confusion reigned in the dig
gings. Old No. 8 had gone Wild and
was having things all her own way.
A little block of wood had in some
way escaped the strainer at the head
OF the pipe that lay along the noun
tainside like a serpent stretched from
the reservoir to the diggings, and con
ing down, was carried to No. 8. The
block was too big to pass through the
giants nozzle. The defector was given
a sudden wrench and ere Tony knew
1t, and circling round and round on it's
pivot the monster was out of his
hands. Tony lodged down instantly
and lay fiat on the bedrock to escape
the great nozzle as it swung over
him. He dared not run. His minute
frame would have been caught in that
powerful stream and hurled a broken,
unacceptable mass far out in the
diggings.
The great stream was being thrown
wildly first against the bank, then
round through the tops of the pines
that lowered above the ridge to the
right. The limbs of the trees were
stripped by the giant as though struck
by a tornado Then as the giant swung
round the ss~eam was thrown across
the gulch 600 yards away, and whirl-
ing on dashed across the diggings
again. The men on the bedrock sour
ried for shelter. They crept behind
powders and lay fiat to avoid the hiss
ing stream that zane hurting over
them and dashed its avalanche Of wa
ter against the mountainside with
every revolution of the giant nozzle.
The pipers at giants No. ! and 2 brave
ly stood at their posts. To have
would have set the remainder Of the
battery wild.
Three times around and old No. 3
changed her tactics. She ducked her
nozzle downward and the white shaft
ceased it's Kissing. The men in the
diggings were safe. But alas for poor
Tony! AS the giant scraped over him
all held their breath. But Tony rolled
his diminutive frame into a shallow
crevice. The giant passed over him,
pressed against his back, mashed his
face against the hard, slate rock, but
never broke a bone. At this critical
juncture Watts reached the throttle on
the pipe line and shut the water off.
He then came storming down into the
diggings.
Tony, his face cut and bleeding, and
trembling in every limb, meekly met
the wrath of the foreman. After re-
lieving himself of his anger and max
ing elaborate use of his entife stock of
profanity, in which he cursed the
whole line of Colorado e~x-governors
from the time the state was annexed,
he put Tony to "bucking" powders in
the diggings. Tony wanted to explain,
but he dared not. He knew the cause
of it all, but the cause" had been
blown from the giants nozzle, so
Watts never knew the truth.
1t vas most humiliating for Tony to
handle a sledge and wheelbarrow, but
it was even more SO to undergo the
sneering remarks and retorts of the
diggings gang. He was silent, sullen,
almost sulky, but always busy. He
seldom spoke a word, but worked like
a beaver from end to end of his shift.
Small as he was he could handle more
rock than any other man in the dig
gings. He kept himself aloof and as
ISOLATED with none of the e 1t was
supposed that Tony was an Italian,
thcslgh so far as his brogue was con-
cerned he might have been taken for
anything from a Mexican Greaser to
al 1celander. There we're a number
of Italians amongst the crew, and be-
lieving Tony to be a fellow country
man they n by one addressed him in
their native tongue. Tony would only
look at them blankly and exclaim:
mo savvy! Yes, l can understand
you, mol" This was sufficient to sat-
isfy each of them that Tony was not a
Dago.
There was n desire paramount in
Tony's mind: that was to redeem him
self with Watts and nee more be al
lowed a try at old No. 8. He brooded
constantly over his first days misfor-
tune, but how to explain the matter to
the gruff foreman was beyond Tony's
power to figure out.
One day when both he and Watts
were in apparent good spirits Tony
asked permission to handle No. 3 for
o time. What Watts told him wouldn't
do to print. 1t was brief, but 1t was
forcible enough to wilt Tony's de-
sire and Danish all his hopes of aver
becoming piper at giant No. 3.
About a month after Tony's arrival
he awoke n night to hear some
thing that nearly curdled his blood.
Just how he came to awake he never
knew, but the first sounds that caught
his ear brought him to his senses with
a start. Two Of the Italians who
worked beside him each day, occupied
a bunk near his OWE. They were talk
ing in their mother tongue and in low
tones. .Tony's ears were Dago in an
instant. The Italians were unfolding
& murderous plot to rob the bedrock
ace and the siuices. From the drift