The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1908-02-27
Dry WASHING in the Desert.
Gold Hunting After the Old Mexican Plan

The desert country of the Southwest
is rich in legends of lucky strikes made
by dry washers And the dry washer is
not laundry utenSil designed for use
where water is too scarce to be used
other than internally. 1t is the sole
mechanical invention with which the
native Mexican is credited, a means of
taking placer gold from the sand in
which wind supplies the place of water.
Given a good head of water and the
man with the hydraulic giant will wash
fortune from auriferOus gravel that
carries few cents worth of gold to the
square yard. The fellow with the pan
must find so cents worth or better IN
the same area to make wages, but the
dry washer regards the ground as bar
rem if he does not find dollars worth
of the yellow metal on his RIFLES after
screening the same amount of sand.
There was old man Cushenberry,
whose haunt was south of Casa Donna,
that curious volcanic plateau which is
visible for a hundred miles around
Yuma. He was in his chronic condi-
ton of hard luck when shOvelful of
sand left the rifles of his primitive dry
washer clogged to overf1oWlng with
dust and nuggets.
L
600, and in the following six months he
had spent every cent of it in an inef-
fectual effort to raise water from the
Colorado for more extensive operations.
He never found another pocket.
Down around Yuma, when you talk
of dry washing, they will also tell you
of the ditched hobo. A Southern Pa
cific brakeman elected him from side
door Pullman, and he sought the water
front, which was an institution then,
celebrated from the DalleS to the
Yaqui country.
"The Front" was narrow strip OF
shore just below the old Government
corral, where by ancient usage was es-
tablished the commonwealth OF the
dead broke. Everything was owned IN
common. They had Mayor and an ull-
written code, enforced by kangaroo
court. In earlier days no loss OF caste
attached to residence on ''The Front;
today's insolvent was frequently to-
morroW's magnate. Gradually, how
ever. the hobo element came to be pre-
dominant, and the city marshal abated
the sanctuary as nuisance.
But TO return to the ditched hobo
He told the Frontiers d hard luck story
that would a few years ago have insur-
ed aid, comfort and Incidence. The
tanning of the Apache and the extern
sion of the Santa Fe and the Southern
Pacific had, however, made them ia
miliar with his kind, and his case Was
promptly disposed of. A grubstake was
made up and he was advised to accom-
pany a couple of men who were just
starting Oh a dry washing expedition
up the river.
That same day the outfit uncovered
ledge that was shot and speckled with
free gold, and the hobos share brought
him $4,000. All hoboland preserves
traditions of the period of plenty that
followed. incidentally not one of the
trio that struck the lode was alive
year later.
But as to the dry washer and the man
who operates it. The tourist who cross
es the sand and alkali wastes in Pull
man, or is whirled in an autombile to
the bonanza to look at the good thing
the Superintendent has framed up for
him sees neither.
The desert prospector is the brother
of silence, silence SO profound and
pervasive that when "A vagrant wind
raises level jet of sand and moves it
yard or two the silken swish of its tran
sit is audible for furlongs.
The scamper of the horned toad fills
the void corridor of the ear, the foot
fall of the sad eyed burro is persuasive.
Only at night, when the coyote lifts
lean muzzle to the bland moon is the
stiffness shattered as infinite deSOlation
finds voice.
Another sound there is that speaks of
mans presence. In the heart OF the
waste, miles from the railway and
equally remote from wood and water,
there may be heard recurrent popping
that is not to be coufounded with the
Earring rataplan of the stamp mill.
1t is like the pop-pop- popping of
gasoene launch, and the teuderfoot
might fancy that the ship of the desert
had been brought up to date and equip
ped with those mysterious appliances
of which the motor enthusiast loves to
discourse.
Approach the sound and you will
come upon the man and his machine
a sun Drowned and solitary man, the
corners of his eyes Wrinkled like an APP
pie that has been frozen and thaWed by
the instructive contraction of the lids
against the glare of refracted rays.
He is the last of the placer miners,
the survival OF type displaced by the
hydraulic giant that levels hills and fills
valleys by magic that would disturb
the rest of the mighty wizard, Michael
Scott.
The water ways, from the frozen tun-
dra of the north to cienegas of the
south, have long since given up their
store of yellow metal. The pan, the
longtom and the fume exploited them,
after which the hydraulic recovered
fortunes from tailings or from gravel
too poor to work by the more expen-
sive method.
But the desert is rich in auriferous
gravel. There are thousands Of square
miles in the Mojave and the Colorado
that yield placer gold in such quantities
that, given water, the output of Cripple
Creek and Tonopah would be made to
look like grub stake proposition.
Water is not, but there is wind. The
dry washer is merely rude bellows of
the familiar blacksmith pattern. 1t
forces current of air through sheet
of muslin set on an inclined plane and
crossed at right angles by sticks of
wood called rifles.
The gravel is made to run down this
muslin incline, while the Bellows lift it
over the rifles. The gold, being heavy,
is caught and held under the cross
pieces; pebbles and sand are elected at
the bottom.
Various forms of the dry washer