The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1908-06-19

Before the days of steam dredges
to hoist and wash the gold bearing
gravel from river bottoms, and of
mighty hydraulic plants to break
down and sluice the gravel of old
river beds, in the days of old, the
days of gold, the days of 40, in short
the pocket miner was looked upon
with disesteem by the men Of pick
and pan.
The miner who loosened pay dirt
with his pick, shovelled it into his
barrow and wheeled it to the side
of running water, there to pan it
out, was the legitimate worker; his
wages were not always large, but
they were remarkably regular, con-
sidering the character of his work.
He did not attempt to steal from
nature any of her secrets; he made
few test washings of the gravel OH
his claim and if he was satisfied
with the promised wage set up his
camp and went to work. Now and
then :. nugget would duly gleam out
of the melting mound of earth in his
pan as he lifted it from fresh dip
in the water, bonus nature threw
in to reward faith and industry.
This, before the day of heavy and
expensive machinery, was the work
of thousands of individuals on the
bars, flats, creeks, gullies, gulches of
the western slope of the Sierra Ne
vadas-the romance period of Ameri-
can gold mining.
But not all of those young adven-
turers who swarmed to every dip in
the foothills where for ages casual
or regular flow of water had deposited
flakes and granules of gold worn
away from some distant out-cropping
ledge of quartz were content with the
slow, regular wage returned by the
pan, the rocker, the roughly built
sluice box.
Where those countless millions of
minute particles came from nature
had hidden stores of bulky nuggets,
thick layers of virgin gold-such
weighty masses of the metal as all
miners dream of but few search for.
Pockets of solid gold. There were
men who sought for such secret
stores-pocket miners.
They were the drones, the dream
ers, the highly imaginative. An
ounce day, worth from SIT to $40,
made no appeal to them; they would
have fabulous treasure of the metal
revealed by one lucky stroke of the
pick. The dreams of few came true.
Some thought they had learned signs
which led to pockets, knew the for
nation whereof the strongboxes were
built, and wasted their Stakes" and
their frequent borrowings from the
pan men, their strength and some
times their lives, in pursuit of pockets
which seldom opened to them.
1t was a saying among the pick
and pan men that most pockets were
found by accident and that no finder
ever profited in the end by his bo-
nanza. 1t is probable that the pock-
cts recently found near Williams
Creek in Oregon were accidentally
discovered
The text books tell nothing of the
signs by which pocket ledges may be
known; they are examples of natures
architectural whimsies, and as if half
ashamed of the lighter mood in which
she designed them she leaves no clue
by which her departure from normal
building may be traced.
An elderly gentleman, California
pioneer, delighted many of his friends
and aroused contrary emotions in the
minds of others by olossoming into
verse later in life than the customary
bloom period for flowers of song.
One of his friends whose early ounce
day had grown into some tons of
the metal, transmitted into delectable
stocks and bonds, remarked upon the
literary event: Il knew Jack would
do some fool thing, for | mined with
him Oh the North Fork in so and he
was always looking for pocket -
New York Sun.