The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 6, 1903, Page 14

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14 ——s e Vi A — Sagebrush SKetches ! This Is the | Twelfth of These Clever Articles by Thomas Fitch.) fortunes of the e to their possessors elsewhere those who practiced or the striped suit than the toga of nd would have entalled rather than general h begets and is usu- g deaf th and The paresis exte results to th ens the upright- articipate the exterior de served and there were [ his ge, accom n, and of or- debauching as cribes to Nero bition of men the act and county a low ebb in his for- to a relative to take rtz m in Nevada. e wned by & corporation s shases were selling at $8 each isco Mining Stock nsiderable body of ore One afternoon the it was present when the re body which the picks dis- usly rich and ex- the plain duty of make public the t to communicate it to , yhose trustee he was. S0 he ascended to the y collected bedding, i food, wines, liquors owered them down the accompanied by a mnote stating that the men and make themselves would be kept , during which time on; that each man 0 as a gratuity, and silies of those Imprisoned that an accident to the was the cause of their de- rk they being accomplished the superin- t up and detached the out some necessary nery, closed and locked youse, and placed a trusted 1. That night he rode on the railroad station forty caught the train and the at noon was in Sen Fran- His relative was 2 man of large irces and within three days they Ju y bought up two-thirds of in the mine. Then the im- e released, work was the bonanza was developed thin one month the stock had ed from $8 to $600 per share, and raying scoundrel—for he e—was worth $7,000,000, dmitted to soclal and munion with all the other tes of the Comstock. t operator” in charge of a d the money of its stock- o mining corporations to en- able them to continue development work in advance of the collection of assessments. If the company “struck it rich,” something happened to the ping machinery and the shaft filled water. The “operator” and his de bought in the stock, then the mine was pumped out, the bonanza un- covered and more millionaires were created T trustees of the companies created & tion and contracted with themselves to crush all the ore at a high price per ton. The rich ore was mixed with poor ore and the poor ore with bedrock and the stock of the milling company paid dividends while the stockholders of the mining companies pald assess- ments. Two humble adventurers in the lag- ceny line resorted to more primitive methods of obtaining other people's property. They were employed in the assaying and meiting room of one of B ® men w principal mining milling corpora- the big mills and they practiced pinch- ing and pocketing gold nd sliver amalgam, a few pounds at a time, un- til in the course of a year's time they had stolen and carried away over one hundred thoysand dollars’ worth. How to market their goods was a problem. Comstock bullion had an identity of its own and any offered for sale outside of the regular channels would arouse suspicion and ‘might result in detec- tion. In this dilemma they took Ras- cal Number Three into partnership. Rascal Number Three had a few thou- sand dollars capital. There was a bank- rupt mining corporation called the Hornet that owned an abandoned mine and a dismantled five-stamp mill in a decayed ining district about forty miles from where the stolen bullion was hidden. Rascal Number Three was a skiliful metallurgist.and miner. Ye bought up the Hornet stock for a trifie and took possession of the prop- erty. With a far night journey he transported the bullion in a spring wagon to the old mill. Then he re- opened the Hornet mine and with the ald of the two thieves refitted the mill and began crushing the ore. There was sp silver in the Hornet ore and the actual yleld the conspirators ded a portion of the stolen bullion it all was marketed. While this , progress, the continual yleld from the Hornet gave its stock & mar- ket value and it was fed to the public ually advancing prices. It was a that the three clever rascals leaned up & hundred thousand dol- lars each. When General James H. Nelson was Commussioner of the General Land Of- fice I wrote him as follows: “Sir—I find in the advance pages sent me of your forthcoming annual report a statement that the Truckee River takes Its rise in Pyramid Lake, runs southwesterly and empties into Lake Tahoe. The re- verse is the case. As Lake Tahoe is 1500 feet higher than Pyramid Lake the difficulty that would be experienced by the Truckee River in changing its course to accommodate itself to your report would probably be less than your department would experience in changing the report to accommodate itself to the course of the river. With the highest assurances of distingulshed conslderation, I am,” ete. And the Commissioner changed the report, but his dignity would not suffer him to reply to ihe letter. “What do you ask are my chances,™ said an Independent candidate for Sheriff. “Really, I cannot accurately say. It will take 750 votes to elect me, and all I can be certain of is that I will be the next Sheriff of Ormsby County, or else there are 963 of the biggest liars in the world living right here.” The liars were there—946 of them. “I'd like to ask yez a question, sir,” saild a tall Hibernian to the candidate who was orator of the evening. ertainly,” replled . the speaker. “What is it?"” “It Is reported of yez that ye sald last night that yez considered a naygur was the aiqual of an Irishman. Did yez say that?” “I did not,”. was the reply. “If yez didn’t say it thin, what have ve to say about it now? An’ do yes think that & naygur is as good as an Irishman?"” The candidate paused. The fifteenth amendment had just been ratified gnd there were 400 colored men in the cotn- ty whom he did not wish to offend. On the other hand, the Irish vote was equally large. “Are you an Irfshman?™ sald the can. didate. “I am sire, and proud of it.” was the reply. ““Well, go and get & negro and come THE SUNDAY CALL, upon the stand with hins, se that I examine both of you, and I'll give my best judgment.” can yo Curlous are the ways of & man with & mine. Once upon a time, having ac- cidentally a few months’ time and a few thousand aouars to Spare, I con- cluded to rid myself of both by a trip to Europe. In Paris I received a let- ter from a banker in a mining town where my home had been, inclosing a quitclaim deed to him of a one-third interest in the Kempton mining claim, and saying that if I would sign it I could draw on him for $500. I did not know of any such claim, or of owner- ghip of any mining claim in that dis- trict, and I did not think it safe to take the money, so I wrote him brief- ly, declining the offer, giving no rea- son for my declination and stating that I would soon be back. Some months afterward on my return to my former homte the same gentleman called on me, told me that the mine was look- ing better and offered me $3000 for my interest. I said I would look into it and let him know In a few days. I visited the district where the mine was, searched the records and found my name along with those of one Kempton and one Hamilton signed to & notice of location of the Kempton mining claim. I aid not know either of these gentle- men and Inquiry developed the fact that they had sold their two-thirds interest to my banker friend some months before and that Kempton was dead and Hamilton had left the Terri- tory. I iInterviewed the banker and stated the facts to him and agreed to accept $5000 for any interest I might have in the mining claim, pro- vided he would sign an agreement that I had sold with the understanding that I 414 not know whether 1 was the per- son whose name was in the location or whether it was another of the same name. He accepted my offer and pald the money. E Years afterward a man came inte my office and invoked my services In some litigation in which he was in- volved and suggested that he had once turned a lot of water on my wheel by locating me in a mining claim It seems that my locator had backed a litigant in & case where I had been em- ployed on the other side and he was a witness and was severely handled and his friend lost the case und he remem- bered it, and when they were out pros- pecting and discovered the Kempton they concluded to locate me therein, so that in the event of troubls they would have a lawyer. The following is from an advertise- ment in the Prescott (Arizona) Miner of August, 1879: BTEPHEN G.' MARCON. (Jack of all trades.) ‘Attorney at law, veterinary surgeon and general contractor; will practice in all the courts, draw deeds and all pa- pers, cleans vaults, whitewashes fences, digs wells, saws and chops wood. Translates French, German and Span- 1sh papers. Works by the day, hour or job. Office at residence on Goose Flat. Give me a call. The offices of United States Marshal and United States Attorney In a Ter- ritory are not very lucrative and resort has occasionally been had to question- able methods for Increasing their rev- enues. One diligent and rapacious Marshal In Arizona trained three Wal- lapal Indians as detectives. When the train stopped for half an hour for din- ner at a station in Arizona one of these savages would approach a second-class passenger or & brakebeam tourist and say to him: “You like make half a dol- lar? I give you half'a dollar you go to store across street and buy cne bottle whisky. Saloon man no sell to Injin. ‘When you come back I give you half- dollar more and take the whisky.” The tenderfoot who avalled himself of the offered opportunity was, upon the completion of the transaction, arrested immediately by a Deputy Marshal for selling liquor to an Indlan. His indict- ment followed in due course. The proof was plenary and conviction followed. Each conviction resulted in adding $100 or more to the assets of the Federal officers out of Uncle Sam's pocket, until the Judge presiding after four or five convictions with the same set of wit- nesses, remarked: “Mr. Clerk, how many morg of such cases as these are there on "the calendar?” “Eighty- three.” “The Marshal has been indeed diligent in the discharge of his duties,” said the court, “but I cannot permit his zeal to bankrupt the United States treasury. Mr. District Attorney, you will enter a nolle prosequi in all the other cases and an order that the de- fendants be discharged.” “Is the ledge permanent?™ asked the cautious investor of the prospector who was trying to sell his clalm. “Perma- nent?™ was the answer, “well I should smile. If you had Niagara for the wa- ter power and the Territory of Arizona for a dumping ground and hell for a blast furnace you could not work that ledge out in a milllon years.” Governor Torres of Sonora and Gov- ernor Safford of Arizona were in the habit of extraditing public offenders on each other’s demands, without the for- mality of & resort to Washington tor papers. It was accomplished by the stmple but sufficlent process of seizing the criminal In an unconventional way and depositing him on the other side of the line, where officials were walting for him. An Arizona merchant told to another dealer a large bill of dry goods and clothing, which were packed In bales by the vender for transportation by mule train. Arrived at their destina- tion 100 miles away, the bales were un- packed and found to contain only worm-eaten dried apples. The swindler in the meantime fled to Hermosillo. When the usual informal requisition was made Governor Torres replied that the villainous opposition press of Mexico had been sharply criticizing his official administration, especially in the matter of extraditing criminals without papers, and he would be compelled to discontinue the practice for the present. But his great and good friend, Gov- ernor Safford, should not therefore be powerless to punish’ offenders against the laws, and if his great and good THAT NIGHT HE RODE on HORSEBACK TO “TAE RAILROAD/ STATION friend would kindly indicats what amount and kind of punishment the fugitive ought to receive he (Governor Torres) would see that it was inflioted upon the rascal. Governor BSafford wrote in reply that he thought about three months’ imprisonment at hard labor would be right. Torres gave the culprit for good measure four months’ practice in street cleaning in the chain gang and the rascal never knew and nobody else was ever able to ascertaln for what offense he Waa pun~ ished. A new Mayor of a newly Incerporate ed city is about as important & funo- tionary—in his own opinion—as can be found anywhers, and the smaller the city the larger the Mayor. When the construction of the BSouthern Pacifie road was in progress across Arizons there was chosen as Mayor of “The an- cient and honorable pueblo of Tucson™ & public-spirited little gentleman known to fame as Bob Leatherwood. The Western Union Telegraph Com- pany completed its line to Tucson a few monthg In advance of the completion of the rallroad and the citizens, under the leadership of Mayor Bob, organized an impromptu celebration, consisting mainly of “setting them up™ for each other. Early In the day Mayor Bobd sent off telegrams of congratulation te the Governors of California, New York and other States and the Mayors of S8an Francisco, New TYork, Chicago and other cities. In the evening answers to these dispatches arrived and were read by Mayor Bob to the crowd In the Fashion Saloon, where the main cele- brating was conducted. A pair of un- principled wags obtained some receiv- ing blanks and suborned the new tele- graph messenger boy, and when the genuine dispatches began to give out faked dispatches were concocted and delivered. A telegram purporting to come from President Arthur congratu- lated the Mayor of Tucson on the con- nection of his city with the Federal capital by wire. Then came a telegram from Lord Beaconsfleld to the lllustri- ous Mayor of Tucson, saying: “H Majesty the Queen desires me to ex- press her personal and o al delight at being in touch with you, and hopes that the harmonious relations between Tucson and London may never be dis- turbed.” Finally, about midnight, when the crowd surrounding Leatherwood car- ried crimson paint brushes and were all telegraphically hilarious, the fol- lowing telegram was received and rea “ROME, March, 1381 “To his Excellency Robert Leather- wood, Mayor of Tucson: His Holiness the Pope extends his heartfeit congrat- ulations to your Excellency at the es- tablishment of telegraphic communica- tion between the anclen{ and honorable pueblo of Tucson and the holy see. His Holiness the Pope ventures to hope that the wires will prove links to biad to- gether the hearts of the people of the two citles. His Hollness the Pope de- sires me to Inguire of your Excellency where in hell is Tucson. = “ANTONELLY' .

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