The White Pine news. [volume] (Ely, Nev.) 1906-1910, 1909-08-28
NO NECESSITY
TO EXAGGERATE
THE TRUTH Is GOOD ENOUGH TO
BOOM NEVADA MINES, SAYS
WRITER WHO CALLS ON MARK
TWAIN.

The articles that have been appear
ing in some of the Nevada papers
relative to the enormous strikes and
lodges that are found in some of
our new camps reminder the writer
Of Mark Twain's story of the CAL
istoga Springs.
A number OF years ago when Mark
was prospecting Nevada and Calf
oruia his eyes CHANGED to read a
ing writer from San Francisco to the
Saturday Evening Post, in reference
to gold being found in the water of
Calistoga Springs. Mark wrote thus
wise: 81 have just seen your dispatch
from San Francisco in the Saturday
Evening Post about gold being found
in solution in Calistoga Springs, and
about the proprietor having extracted
1900 ounces of gold of the utmost
~fineness from two barrels of water
during the past fortnight, by a pro-
cess known only to himself. This
will surprise many of your readers,
but it does not surprise me, for 1
once owned those springs myself.
What does surprise me however, is
the falling off in richness of the
water. In my time the yield vas 81
a dipperful. l am not saying this
to injure the property in case a sale
is contemplated. I am saying it
in the interest of history. IL may
be that the hotel proprietor's pro-
cess is an inferior one. Yes, that
may be the fault. Mine was to take
my uncle Ct had an extra one at
that time on account of my parents
dying and leaving him on my hands)
and fill him up and let him stand
fifteen minutes to give the water a
serted him in an exhaust receiver
which had the effect of sucking the
gold out through the pores. / have
taken more than $11, 900 out of that
old man in less than a day and a
half.
II should have held on to those
springs but for the badness of the
roads and the difficulty of getting
the gold to market. l consider that
the gold yielding water is in many
respects remarkable, and yet no MOI C
remarkable than the gold bearing
air of Catgut canyon up there toward
the head of the Auriferous range.
This air or this wind, blows steadily
down thru 500 miles of the richest
quartz groupings during an hour and
a quarter every day except Sunday
is heavily charged with eXpuiSitely
fine, impalpable gold. Nothing preei-
pilates and solidifies his gold so
readily as contact with human flesh
heated by passion. The time that
Williams was disappointed in love
he used to sit outdoors when the
wind was blowing, and come in again
and begin to sigh, and | would fex-
tract over a dollar and a half out
of every sigh. He sighed right along
and the time that John Harbinson
and Alex Norton q%uarreled about
H~arbinson's dog they stood there
swearing at each other, and they
knew how, and what they didn't
know about swearing they couldn't
learn from you and me, not by a
good deal, and at the end of every
three or four minutes they had to
stop and declare a dividend. If they
didn't their jaws would clog UP SO
they COUNT get big, nine-syllable
ones out at all, and when the wind
was done blowing they cleaned up
just a little over $1,000 a piece, l
know these facts to be absolutely
true, because / got them from a man
whose mother / knew personally. |
do not suppose a person could buy
the water privilege at Calistoga now
at any prize, but several good loca-
tons along the course of the Catgut
canyon g~old-bearing trade winds are
for sale. They are going to be
stocked for the. New York market.
They will sell. too; people will swarm
for them as thick as Handbook veter-
n in the SOUTH
Some ofLthe literature that has
been dispensed about Nevada mines
and mining is just ABOUT as truth
full as Mark Twain's tales and facts