The Arizona copper camp., 1920-09-11
HERE'S A YARN
OF DAYS LONG
Ago GONE BY

ana Dy one man at least would not ES
traded for New York, the biggest city
in the world, is testified to by Albert
Denie Brewer, sergeant in charge Of
General Skaters escort, reconnois-
| sance, May, 1882, in the field. Ser
geant Brewer is home from New York,
and he has given the Copper Camp
scribe some impressions gained dur
ing his travels and Impressions of his
old home after thirty years of absence
from the scenes of his childhood,
youth and romance 1t has been some
years, and the ruthless, relentless
flight of the years have made some
changes But let Brewer tell you the
story in his own words:
"The writer has been asked to give
some impressions from a visit to the
old home after thirty years absence
from the scenes of childhood,
| youth and romance. Much of the
tragedy and comedy and sadness for
the old mother whose eyes were ever
kindly, with an eager gladness toward
| the setting sun from whose direction
she kept the watch-fires burning for
the wandering sons. Since many
years she sleeps in the quiet nook un-
der hickory tree in Duane. Kaleido-
scopic have been the changes wrought
upon the face of nature, as well as the
physical upheaval, leaving the old
haunts unfamiliar. Virgin forests
have gone down, so that not soli-
tary sentinel remains reminiscent of
youth in its heyday, when the world
was young. The bright eyes and rosy
! cheeks of the maidens are now but an
almost forgotten dream as it seemed
to me but yesterday.
1--WE of the west seem to keep
young; we do not seem to dread the
inexorable edict of the years as our
less favored brothers and sisters of
/ the land OF SHOWS and ice and tempest.
Old, decrepit men and women, lowed
with toll and the strenuousness of
life's battles, who were my school
children fOrty-fiVe and fOrty-siX years
ago, met me and we talked over the
old problems of life from viewpoints
garneded from widely divergent fields
OF experience. The tragedy of the
years was centuated-meeting trem-
ulous old men and women where
had featured in my minds s-eye the peo-
pie OF my early memories of half a
century ago. My Investigations ex-
tended largely into the sylvan dells of
long. ago, into the woodlands and
among the flora and fauna, rather
i than to the great thoroughfares.4 One
night, at my sons apartment or West
Forty-ninth street, New York city, was
quite enough of the big noise, and the
remainder of my stay in the metrop-
Oils was done by connecting to mod
/ est villa on Long Island, near where
! Teddy sleeps. | have just one argu-
ment to those whose life is in the
| great maelstrom of the metropolis. A
| few years ago, was in the employ of
/ Mr.. Hartman and met him in Mexico
| | knew at that time that my tangible
| Hartman has been dead some years,
and the writer, who is an Arizonian
| first, last and all of the time, since
April, 1882, is to all intents and pur-
poses very much alive. Why, really,
brother, l wouldn't trade one of our
old rocky gorges for the whole of
Manhattan if had to live there. From
the old and happy days of the war
like redskins-wh whisky straight in a
tin cup, the comradeship of Red Sam
pie, Tex, Big Dave, Billy Delaney and
the balance of the bunch, Arizona has
/ evolved and evoluted until she is a
/ scream.
"The first night that l landed in
! Ray, my finances were denoted arith-
i metically as a minus quantity, and 1
strayed into Joe Lings hostelry and
was handed out an English pot roast
which was about the finest product of
the public kitchen met up with for
some years and waited for my SEN
tence tearfully, and the man said,
Fifty CENTS and l was saved
1T is great and instructive to see
a thousand miles of cornfields and to
pass near enough to Big Cheese Will
ards ranch Oh the Kaw river to spit
on it; to see Babe Ruth bat one from
the Polo Grounds to Boston and to
ride down on the old Hudson on a
moonlight night in June, tut one
yearns for the waters of the Hassa-
yampa, the cheerful liar, the hydro
phobia skunk, the music which thrills
and tells you to get ready for the rat
tier is near, for you know, boys, ours
is great democracy and in the great