Mohave County miner. [volume] (Mineral Park, A.T. [Ariz.]) 1882-1918, 1911-11-04


voice like a caliope shouted: stop
that G-d-band and give that baby
a chance!"
That finished the business. All
over the house were men shouting
like mad, the tears running down
their cheeks the while, for they had
seen no children for months and they
had upon them that heart-hunger
which men in civilization can never
comprehend.
And because of the absence Of
women and children, the wild beast
in many a soul in the hills came forth.
There was no restraint upon them
and even a quartz mill runs away
sometimes when the governor on the
engine ceases to act.
Many drank, many gambled, many
were killed in quarrels; many became
boisterous and reckless, and lives
were thrown away. which. under the
restraint of good women's eyes, might
have II ade great names. II is said
that the great Blucher of Prussia,
riding over a dead-covered battlefield,
said to an aide who was half overcome
by the horror and pity of it: Control
yourself General! When the winds
and the deep-sea waves engage in bat
tie, the shore next morning is piled
deep with sea weed and other debris
of the storm. 1t is natures way;
these. too, are but debris of the storm
o ~ sterd' y"
The graves on the tops and flanks
of the Sierra are still the marks on
the shore where that debris was
thrown.
In another way character was form
ed there. The resourcefulness which
out of the rude surroundings develop
ed TO high manhood and suberb
citizens Zip: which with the means at
hand accomplished mighty results;
the resolution which hid suffering in
mems own hearts, as did the Spartan
boy the fox until the boys vitals we're
torn out, and no one knew that he
was suffering urtil his death made it
| plain; the transition which slowly
strangled the brightest ever nursed by
mortals until they all went out: the
self-sacrifces which were made, those
making them wearing all the time
I the smile of contentment and peace,
and giving up what was sweeter than
life itself as the tired child drops its
toys: acts of generosity and charity to
make the angel of mercy weep for
Ioy,-these and kindred features made
up the unseen tradedy that was enact
ed there, unseen but leaving its
shadow on those heights.
What was visible was the JOY and
enthusiasm that reigned. What songs
were sung, what stories were told,
how vastly the vocabulary of the Ian
guage was enla ged, to produce words
TO fit all occasions-the echoes or the
ghosts of them roll like phantom
drums through those hills still
Let no one think those camps were
not schools of patriotism. All the
papers from the lower cities were read
and re-read: the magazines from the
east were devoured, the new litera-
ture of California that rang out in the
words of Bret Harte, of "Caxton": of
La Conte; of Barstow; of Bartlett; of
! Stout: of Coolbrith; of O'Copnell; of
Marshall, and the others were house
hold words in the camps. And the
! letters by the semi-monthly steamers
why talk about patriotism, when a
| letter comes to a young man from his
mother, or from the daughter of some
other mother five thousand miles away,
he not only loves his country but loves
the stokers that fed the coal to the
furnaces in the ship that brought the
letter.
And from among those men there
grew up a race of scientists that had
few instructors save as they set the
hieroglyphics which nature had en-
! bossed upon the rocks and trees and
hills, to words, and in their souls
made histories of them, and through
those histories caught the secret of
the labors that had been going on
there through the ages; the work of
the earthquake, the glacier, the winds,
the heat, the cold. the sunbeams-all
the agents which the Infinite employs
in rounding a world into form.
And another character of men was
developed there; strong men of affairs,
captains of industry, who when they