The commonwealth. (Greenwood, Miss.) 1896-1923, 1913-01-31

You have been a good loser; I'll put In with
you and play a hundred thousand against your
claim" a
The prospector lost the claim.
Now | win play you for your services tomor-
row to show me whore the claim is and where to
open the ore. For that ! will consider that you
have FIVE thousand on the table"
The prospector lost that.
The next day he traced out the lines OF the
claim for the winner, who organized a company,
with a stock Of one million. the shares Of which
went for sixteen dollars eschi
Millions were taken from the mine within a
few years. 1t became one OF the most famous
In the entire Rocky Mountain country.
In the early days of the Comstock Lode, In
Virginia, Nevada, some men made money so fast
that they did not know what to do with II. Those
who were not making 1t spent their time devising
ways and means to talk the others out of a por.
tion Of their wealth. Gamblers we're in full evil
dence, and there were some big stakes: but 1t
remained for a bunch Of MeIicans to play for the
largest stake on record In ths United States
without the use OF cards.
One OF the many claims, located In the midst
OF the district, had not shown any ore. Even the
men who had millions hesitated to sink a shaft
on 1t. The people we're In a fever of excitement
The Mexlcans owned practically nothing. N fact,
the ''greasers' could not get a look In" Alto.
ECAHEA 4 Wn uAy AinNShIA Hih AAspAhs .
Then 1t occurred to some bright genius to
capitalize the labor Of the Mexicans. Gathering
a bunch OF them together, It was proposed. that
they sink o shaft on one Of the wellknown
claims, which was twelve hundred feet In length.
For each foot you sink. we will give you u
one-foot surface interest In the claim" they we're
told" provided you sink TO ore"
In other words. II they abandoned the work at
any time before reaching ore. they would get
Rpfhszv c~I tha ourpnnn rvn-Id kay1 thn nhaRt
1t looked like a cheap way to prospect.
The Mexicans~ pow-powed and iabbered at one
another for half q night and then started TO
work.
Everybody laughed. TheN were comparatively
poor men. They could Ill afford the expense they
were undergoing. They drilled by hand, fought
the hard granite. and gradually lowered that
shaft. They bailed water that flowed In so fast
that 1t threatened to drown them, but they stuck
to the work-witha desperation.
At three hundred feet they uncovered the rich
est portion of the world-famous silver deposit.
and. from tbs vein they opened, more wealth was
taken ont than from any other portion Of that
richest single mile Of ground In the world.
The Mexicans' share was one-Quarter. Nearly
one hundred million dollars came out OF the hole
they sank! 1t was a gamble pure and simple.
They played for high stakss-and won.
In the Occur dAlene. Of Idaho, when that min
ing region was the center OF the earth, there were
some big games. The story Ia told OF one man
~ho conceived the idea that he could make
money in gambling faster than he could take 1t
out Of tine ground. II was SO much easier. With
what cash he had, after selling his mine, he could
count up TO one hundred and Atty thousand
dollars.
He had evolved a woTkerful system. N-
Il simply can't lose,' he told hts friends.
His plan was to play steadily for sixteen hours
daily. and, by a complicated series OF bets. to
retrieve when he lost.
Everything went along swimingiy for the FIRST
few days. At times he was 10 much az twenty
i've thousand to the good.
Nine days after he started top lay he suddenly
found that he was Just where ne had started
he had one hundred and nifty thousand dollars
when the cards came a certain way. which would
involve, according TO his system, betting the en-
tire amount Oh a single turn" He played tha
queen, to win, and the tickle creature played false
TO him.
Women are the csnse Of all trouble, anyway"
he muttered, as he rose from the table. II ought
to have known better than that, for that was the
queen Of npades. and ] should not have made that
bet except when all the queens except the queen
Of hearts was out"
II was the irony Of fate that, when the queen
of hearts came out Of the box, II so happened
that It won.
In the days when Cheyenne. Wyoming. was the
headquarters for the csttlemsn OF the northwest
gambling ran wide open. When the cowboys
came to town they made things hum. Money
grew on trees. The gaming spirit was In the air.
A dealer standing behind a roulette table one
night suddenly motioned the proprietor. A few
moments later he was paid on. II 10 customary
TO pay . gambler his salary at the end OF each