The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1918-09-26


thus Of the prospector: Mature was
his nurse and playfellow. For him
she would let slip between the leaves
golden shafts Of sunlight; she would
send wandering breezes to visit him
with the balm Of bay and resinous
gum; to him the tall woods nodded
Familiarity and sleeplly, the humble
bees buzzed and the rocks cawed a
slumberous accompaniment"
The prospectors who discovered oil
or nearly all the great mines Of the
Slerras and the Rockies had no
knowledge Of geology or of the chem
istry Of minerals; they cast aside all
such as useless mental scrap with
the saying You can see no further
into the rocks than the pick goes"
Even in this day Of improved tools
the prospector's working outfit con-
sists Of little more than a pick, shovel
and pan for washing gravel; little
else, for their one little burro has
other burdens to carry, blankets and
food for the two men he follows faith
fully into purple dusky canyons, to
rocky heights, to the deserts edge.
There is no hurry in the prospec-
tors day, no unwaiting trains, no
itinerary, no factory whistles call, no
ordered time of labor. In pleasant,
watered little valleys to be found even
high up on mountain TANKS, camp, at
agreeable intervals, will be pitched,
the burro rested and fattened on
plentiful, rich grazing; deer or bear
shot, its meat dried In the moisture
less mountain air; a thumbed copy
Of DICKENS, or maybe LoNGrELLow,
read again by the camp fire.
Yet they find much. The prospec-
tor who lazily followed a canyon
whose stream grudgingly filled his
canvas sack with gold dust, bothered
by the black sand so heavy that 1t
reluctantly separated from the heav-
Ter gold as his pan was dipped and
shaken in the stream, came at last,
as he knew he would, to the quartz
cropping from which through the ages
wearing water had dragged particles
Of free gold. But he profited moth
Ing from the Comstock lode, which
gave to the world two hundred mill
ions in gold and silver. Probably he
did not much lament his lost wealth.
He would have been troubled to have
given up his vagrant Joys for con-
Germ in the monster enginery which
with pneumatic or electric drill,
blasts Of dynamite, roaring hoist
works, laundering stamp mills. whirl-
ing, grinding steel, loosened, broke
down, hoisted. crushed, ground a
mountain Of ore, concentrating the
bothersome black sand from which
chemists took gold and silver.
The prospectese who located a crop
ping of Rocky Mountain ledge car
rying free gold sold 1t gladly enough
for trifle, and were curious, prob
ably, rather than regretful when they
learned that the ledge turned into
one Of the greatest copper mines In
the world. They remained free from
the tangle Of high finance, from po-
liucal turmoil and disappointment,
from foiled-or fulfilled-social am
/ billion. Their burro yet carried for
them an ample store Of bacon, coffee,
sugar and corn meal, they tramped az
much or as little as they liked, and
they had no master. II they located
mine they would. when 1t suited
their fancy, bond 1t TO an impersonal
corporation whose experts would re-
port on its probable value. If they
received one ten-thousandth part of
that as their reward 1t was enough
for them. 1t gave them month Mt
some grand hotel in Denver or San
Francisco: they saw plays, heard op-
era, impaired digestion with city food,
wilted under city air. Then they
gladly answered again the lure of the
mountains, the better companionship
Of truer friends. trees, mighty rocks,
wild streams whose falls sing sweetly
at night when they read the loved
stories or poems-or sleep, free. I'M
troubled; sovereigns Of their hours.
We hope that the old fashioned
prospector need not 60.