Tombstone epitaph., 1920-01-04
MUST THE PROsPECToR GO?

less readers lest the picturesque character affec onay. if first introduced into American fiction by Bret iartc should become memory only. He is gen character. not much attercd exaggerated as he has been pictured by sympathetic artists through the Sun.
 If no other sufficient has been advanced wh, the Phllsnc hand of conservation should be withheld from this kindly. romantic figure one was given when Senator Pittman. arguing against government owner ship development and control of the nations natural resources. said:
 II believe that you would have development of the minerals in sight. and you would never find any minerals that lying hidden under the ground think you would drive away from the west the prospcc tor. peculiar individual that circumstances have dcvel oped in that country. and without whom mines would have been found You will drive him to south America, you will drive him Siberia. China. Africa. to everywhere else where there Is reward for ndvldua. suffering and initiative.
 IL may seem even inclusive for the Western say that without the lrospector you will never find any minerals and maybe had he spoken with more considered thought he would have restricted his list of minerals to gold and silver. ox even to gold alone
 The pro>pcrtor hunts for gold. in dry gravel over which rivers III the dim past. III the beds of living streams ill lodges of god-bcaring quartz. gold. the vis bic. arahc yellow metal. is what he seeks He little gold in combination with other metals: in quartz he gold than be garnered by silnpl, pr"cc>>-'' free" or native" gold as he calls it.
 Your pro>pcctor is d lover of nature. dreamer. a poet. Hartc writing of the Luck of Roarin. Camp ut lc might have written thus of the proscctor: Ma his and payfclow. For him she would let slip between the leaves golden shafts of sunlight Sh" would send wandering brcczcS visit him with the balm of bay and rc>inouS gum: him the tall woods nodded famarly and slcepy. the brnbebccs buzzed and the rocks cawcd d SlumbcrouS accompaniment.
 The pi">lectors who discovered all nearly all ot the mines of the Scras and the Rockies had they aside all such useless mental scrap with the ''Iou further into the rocks than the
 pick goes. Even ill this day of improved tools the pros pectorS working outfit consists of little than a pick shovel and pan for washing gravel little else fo tlYir one little burlo has other burdens to carry.
 There is no hurry in the plospcctors day. no un- waiting trains. itinerary. factory whistles call no ordered time labor In pleasant. watered little valcy to be found even high up mountain Hanks at aglce able intervals will be pitched the bu1o rested and fat tened on plentiful rich grazing: deer or bear shot Its meat dried n the nolsturecss mountain air thnblcd copy of Dickens maybe Longfcow. read again by tc camp fire.
 Yet they find much. The prospcctor who laziy fol- lowed canyon whose grdglingly filled his sack with gold dust. bothered by the black sand and heavy that reluctantly separated from the heav fer gold his pan dipped and shaken in the stream at last. he knew he would. to the quartz crop ping from which. through the wearing water had dragged particles of free gold But he proftcd nothing from the Comstock lode. which gave the world two hundred millions in gold and silver. Probably he d not much lament his lost wealth. He would have been troubled to have given up his vaglant joys for concern in the monster englncry which with pneumatic or eer tc drill blasts dynamite roaring hoist works. thun derng stamp mills, whilng grinding steel. looscncd broke down. hoised crushed, ground mountain of concentrating the bothersOme black sand from which chemists took gold and silver.
 ! The prospectors who located cropping of Rocky Mountain ledge carrying free gold sold it gladly for tflc. and curious probably rather than regretfu when they learned that the ledge turned into of the greatest copper mines i'll the world They remained free
 from the tanglc of high finance from political uro and disappointment from feilcd-or fulfilled-socla ambition. Their burrO yet carried for them ample store of bacon coffee and meal: they tramp cd much little they liked; and they had nc master If they located mne they would, when il suited their fancy, bond it to impeIsonal corporation whose experts would report its probable value. Ii they received ten-thosandth part of that thei reward, 1t was enough for them It gave them mont at some grand hotel in Denver San Francisco; they saw plays. heard opera, impaired digestion with city food, wed under city air. Then they gladly answered again the lure of the mountains the better companions ship of truer friends trees, mighty rocks wild , whose falls sing sweety at night.
 ! We hope the Od-fashOned prospcctor need not go