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LIBRARY 
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 Received 
 /tfcatsioii No. *70? Class No. 
 
 A 
 
THE 
 
 SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 A NEVADA BOOK 
 
 BY 
 
 FEED H. HABT, 
 
 EDITOR OF THE AUSTIN (NEVADA) REVEILLE. 
 
 . 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO: 
 HENRY KELLER & CO, 
 
 1878. 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1878. 
 
 BY HENRY KELLER 6- Co. 
 
Some books are lies f rae end to end, 
 And some great lies were never penn d. 
 E en ministers, they ha e been kenn d 
 
 In holy rapture, 
 A rousing wind, at times, to vend, 
 
 And nail t wi Scripture. 
 
 BURNS. 
 
DEDICATION. 
 
 To each and every person who may purchase 
 
 it, and pay cash for it, this volume is 
 
 respectfully dedicated, by 
 
 THE AUTHOR 
 
 
 
INTRODUCTORY, 
 
 LIKE othei arts and sciences, keeps pace 
 with our education, refinement, and culture, 
 t> and is fast becoming familiarized to the Amer 
 ican people. Though I have classed it with the 
 arts and sciences, and although there is something artistic in the construc 
 tion of a good lie, and notwithstanding that a good, square, solid lie is a 
 scientific triumph, still, I am of the opinion that lying should more properly 
 be considered as an accomplishment. A "gentlemanly accomplishment," 
 it was once designated by a Nevada newspaper. And yet, I have seen 
 men who possessed the accomplishment in the highest degree of perfection, 
 and still were not gentlemen. That, however, does not prove or premise 
 that gentlemen cannot lie. 
 
 In the days of the Father of his Country if we are to believe a little 
 story about an adventure he is said to have had in connection with a 
 cherry tree, and which story is still extant lying was looked upon as 
 wrong. But that was before the time of the steam-engine, the electric 
 telegraph, daily newspapers, stocks and stock-brokers, and other modern 
 improvements. To-day, to lie, and lie well, is meritorious, and besides, 
 there s money in it, which of itself is sufficient to make it commendable. 
 I am personally acquainted with some of the most prominent citizens of 
 the Pacific Coast, who have made colossal fortunes simply by lying, or to 
 speak with gloved words by doctoring the truth about stocks and mines ; 
 and those men are respected and looked up to, courted and flattered, called 
 smart, and good business men, when the unadorned English of it is that 
 they are only good liars, and have made their lying pay. 
 
 T71 
 
8 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 It is hardly worth while to say anything about political liars, because 
 every one knows that lying is part of a politician s trade, and will continue 
 to be, in spite of the Scriptures, earthquakes, and Civil Service Reform, as 
 long as politicians are human. There may be politicians who cannot lie 
 by word of mouth, but they lie in the silent tomb. In other words, the 
 race of truthful politicians is extinct ; or if there are still living men who 
 will not or cannot lie to get office, it is because they are not office-seekers. 
 
 This purports to be a book on lies and lying, but it does not treat of the 
 lies of politicians, stock-brokers, newspaper men, authors, and others, who 
 lie for money; neither does it touch on the untruths of scandal, mischief, 
 or malice, but only on those lies which amuse, instruct and elevate, with 
 out harm. It is a record of lies told in a club known as the Sazerac 
 Lying Club, whose objects, as its name implies, are lying. A chapter is 
 devoted to the rise, progress, and history of this club, interspersed with 
 these lies. The book contains a number of sketches of odd characters in 
 Nevada, and local narratives of life in Austin, written by the Author, and 
 published from time to time in the columns of the AUSTIN REVEILLE, of 
 which paper the writer has for several years been editor, and which have 
 been clipped from the files of that journal, and made to do service in pad 
 ding out this book to a sellable size. 
 
 The book has been compiled and prepared in the intervals of daily 
 editorial labor, and no claim of literary merit is made for it. The major 
 ity of the clipped sketches have been widely copied by the press, which 
 circumstance has had weight in causing him to believe that they possess 
 some little merit in a humorous sense ; but of that, as well as the other 
 material herein contained, which has never before appeared in print, the 
 reader must be the judge. This is not a " no cure no pay " book, and 
 booksellers are instructed, under no circumstances, to return money to per 
 sons who pronounce it a fraud. If his wishes in this matter are strictly 
 carried into effect, the bookseller will at once proceed to bounce the 
 dissatisfied customer, and reason with him to the fullest extent of his 
 muscular ability. All of which is respectfully submitted by 
 
 JHE 
 
Origin of tlie 
 
 In the year 1873, I was employed in an editorial capacity on a 
 small daily paper, the "REESE RIVER REVEILLE," published in the town of 
 Austin, State of Nevada. This was a sort of general utility position, com 
 prising all the branches of interior journalism, from writing an advertise 
 ment about a lost dog up to heavy dissertations on leading topics. But the 
 main object was to get items of local news. 
 
 Austin is a small, interior mining town, ninety miles, by a rough road, 
 from the Central Pacific Railroad, having its communication with the 
 outer world carried on by means of mud-wagons, called by courtesy stages ; 
 and, it can readily be conceived, a quiet place, in which anything of a start 
 ling nature in the line of news seldom transpires. 
 
 There was no difficulty about the leaders or other editorial matter ; 
 a pair of sharp shears, a raid on the exchanges, and texts from the tele 
 graphic news daily supplied to the paper, would readily furnish them ; but 
 to make up respectable local columns was a constant strain on the mental 
 capacity and legs of the writer, and he had almost said, " on the imagin 
 ation," but a strict moral training in early life, etc., caused him to con 
 fine himself strictly to facts. 
 
 The First President. 
 
 Situated on the main street of the town is a drinking saloon, bearing 
 the sign of "The Sazerac," after the famous brand of brandy of that 
 name. This saloon was the resort of a number of choice spirits other 
 than those kept behind the bar old forty-niners and California pioneers 
 for the most part who during the long winter evenings sat around the 
 stove, smoked their pipes, fired tobacco juice at a mark on the stovepipe, 
 and swapped lies and other reminiscences. I had long had my eye on the 
 place as one liable at any time to pan out the text for a local, and would 
 drop in there nearly every evening and listen to the conversation, in the 
 
 [0] 
 
10 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 hope of picking up from it the hoped-for item ; but the stories were gen 
 erally so outrageously devoid of all semblance of truth or appearance of 
 probability that, as a consistent journalist, whose mission and duty it was 
 to present the public with cold, bald-faced facts, I was unable to reconcile 
 my conscience to the " writing up " and publication of the yarns. On one 
 of these visits I found the old crowd in the saloon, sitting around the 
 stove as usual, but the orator of the evening was a new man one well 
 known in the town, although this was his first appearance at the re-unions. 
 He was sitting in front of the fire, in an arm-chair tilted back, and 
 the heels of his boots resting on the top of the stove, his feet shutting en 
 tirely from view two-thirds of the company. One of the most remark 
 able things about this man, next to his legs of course, was his feet. They 
 were fearfully and wonderfully made, and their owner had repeatedly 
 refused liberal offers for their use as battery stamps in a quartz mill ; but 
 had on one occasion consented for a valuable consideration to stand during 
 a fire on the top of three cases of dry goods to protect them from damage 
 by water. Of his legs I will speak hereafter. 
 
 Mr. George Washington Fibley, which is not his true name, but by 
 which I designate him, through dread of the law of libel, was telling the 
 assemblage a yarn about a pile of silver bars he had seen in one of the 
 Pacific Mexican ports. It appears that before my entrance the discussion 
 was concerning silver bullion, and Mr. Fibley to use the language of one 
 of the gentlemen present was "jest raisin the rest of em out of their 
 boots." His story was evidently an outrageous exaggeration there could 
 be no doubt of that ; for all the silver ever produced by the famed 
 bonanzas of the Comstock, if heaped up, would not make a pile seven 
 miles long, forty feet high, and thirteen feet wide, and it was in the 
 neighborhood of these figures that Mr. Fibley placed the dimensions of 
 the stack of silver he was describing. The story did not impress me at 
 the time as being worthy of publication as a local item ; and I went out 
 of the saloon, thinking what a magnificent liar this man was, how he had 
 mistaken his vocation,and what a splendid journalist that elastic and tow 
 ering imagination might make of him. 
 
 The next day was fearfully stormy such a storm of snow and wind 
 as is only seen in the mountains and "local" was as scarce as honest 
 savings bank presidents. I was almost in despair about filling the local 
 columns, and mechanically went to the door, opened it, and looked out into 
 the storm for inspiration. The street was deserted, all was bleak and 
 blank, and I was on the point of going back into my sanctum to meditate 
 on the most painless method of death by suicide, when the narrator of the 
 preceding evening crossed the street. 
 
 Just then the office devil howled " copy ! " 
 
 I seized pencil and paper, and the following was the result : 
 
ORIGIN OF THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 11 
 
 ELECTED PRESIDENT. The Sazerac Lying Club was organized last 
 night, our esteemed, prominent, and respected fellow-citizen, Mr. George 
 Washington Fibley, being unanimously chosen president of the organiza 
 tion. There was no opposing candidate; his claims and entire fitness for 
 the honorable position being conceded by common consent of the Club." 
 
 The above appeared in the paper that evening, and created consider, 
 able amusement, not only among the Sazerac frequenters, but for all those 
 who knew the subject of the item. 
 
 There was trouble 
 next day. Mr. Fib- 
 ley read the para 
 graph about his ele 
 vation to the Presi 
 dency of the Club, 
 and was exceedingly 
 wroth; and in the 
 course of the after 
 noon he rushed into 
 the sanctum to de 
 mand an apology, 
 or a retraction, on 
 some similar foolish 
 ness. Happening to 
 look through a window, I CQulcl see him coming. He had ridiculously 
 long legs, and walked with a cane and an extraordinarily long stride, 
 which increased when he was angry in proportion as his indignation 
 grew; and when he was real, downright mad, as on this occasion, they 
 seemed to stretch the width of an average street at every step. At such 
 a time he appeared to be nothing but legs and head as if an effort 
 had been made to split his body in two, and had failed through the 
 cutting instrument striking an obstruction at his chin. He was mad this 
 time, sure enough ; I could tell it by his walk ; and as he entered the 
 office door there was blood in his eye and rage in his face. In his right 
 hand he held a roll of manuscript of nearly the diameter of a stove-drum, 
 and his cane was raised threateningly on high. My eyes were fixed prin 
 cipally on the cane ; but as he strode into the door-way he thrust the 
 manuscript at me, and exclaimed : 
 
 " He who steals my purse, steals trash ! " 
 
 " Stop ! stop ! Mr. Fibley," I interrupted, thankful that hostilities 
 had opened in so mild a form. " Never mind your purse, nor your good 
 name, nor that communication in your hand. It was all a mistake. I will 
 apologize." 
 
 "See that you do, sir, and amply, or by Jehosaphat " and then he 
 tucked his roll of paper under his arm, and without another word walked 
 
 ; IIe who steals iny purse, steals trash." 
 
12 THE S A ZEE AC LYING CLUB. 
 
 out, but looking back as he closed the door, and giving his legs r body, and 
 paper a threatening shake more emphatic than speech. 
 
 I had promised to apologize. Writing an apology is not a pleasant 
 task for an editor. His soul revolts at it. When one has said that the 
 minister ran away with the deacon s wife, and it turns out that it was not 
 the deacon s wife, but the deacon s wife s mother who accompanied the 
 minister in his flight, it is rough to be compelled to apologize to the old 
 lady on her return not that ministers ever run away with deacons wives 
 mothers, but just to suppose a case, for the sake of illustration. When 
 you have written up a public ball, and said that " Mrs. Smithers, wife of 
 our respected fellow-citizen, Hon. Thomas Jefferson Smithers, who did him 
 self and the county so much credit in the Legislature eleven years ago, 
 was charmingly dressed in green tarletan, and had her hair in curls," 
 when the fact of the case is that she looked like the last rose of summer, 
 and was dressed in a yellow silk, and had her hair done up in a wad on 
 top of her head, it is mortifying to the editorial heart to have to take back 
 the green tarletan and curls in the next issue of the paper. These, how- . 
 ever, are but chips of the cross a country editor has to bear. 
 
 But I had said that I would atone in the REVEILLE for the slight cast 
 upon Mr. Fibley s fair fame, and it had to be done. I did it, and the re 
 traction, verbatim et literatim, read as follows : 
 
 "APOLOGETIC. An apology is due from the REVEILLE to Mr. George 
 Washington Fibley. We said in yesterday s issue that he was elected 
 President of the Sazerac Lying Club. This was an error ; he was de 
 feated." 
 
 Mr. Fibley was satisfied, his ruflled feelings modified, and from that 
 time forward we were the best of friends. 
 
If art II. ; 
 
 UNCLE JOHN. 
 
 "Uncle John" Gibbons is a stage-driver, and a perfect type of his 
 class. He belongs to an order of men rapidly passing away, and who 
 now number but few. Uncle John drove stage in "York State " when he 
 was a boy a great many years ago, and before that State was gridironed 
 by railroads ; and he has driven stage, as a natural profession, ever since. 
 He immigrated to California in its early and golden days, a young man, 
 
 b u t a 
 fi r s t - 
 class 
 stage- 
 driver. 
 In those 
 times 
 
 he 
 
 d rove 
 
 for the California Stage 
 Company, the great monop 
 oly which then controlled 
 the land travel of California 
 as completely as the Central Pacific 
 Railroad Company does now. When 
 the Washoe silver mining excitement 
 broke out, and the Pioneer line of 
 stages from Sacramento to Virginia City was put 
 on, Uncle John was the first driver on one of 
 the mountain routes, driving six horses and a Con 
 cord passenger coach across the Sierra Nevada. 
 
 " Staging was staging in those days," and such 
 staging is known no more on the Pacific Coast. A broad grade over the 
 steep and precipitous mountains a marvel of engineering skill from 
 
 [131 
 
14 THE S A ZEE AC LYING CLUB. 
 
 whence the traveler looked dizzily down thousands of feet into the lit 
 tle valleys set in the heart of the Sierras, or gazed at the bottom of 
 some dark, deep cafion, with a foaming torrent, roaring, flashing, rush 
 ing on its course, the coach, meanwhile, rattling along the grade at the 
 highest speed of six big American horses, the wheels at times appear 
 ing to the passengers as if running on the very verge of destruction, 
 and as if but a fraction of an inch nearer and the edge would crum 
 ble away beneath the weight and hurl the coach and its load of human 
 ity crashing into the depths below. Freighting, in those days, was 
 done by means of wagons, popularly known as "prairie schooners." 
 These consisted of one immense forward wagon with towering sides, fol 
 lowed by from two to four "back-actions," or other smaller vehicles 
 if they can be so called attached like cars to a steam-engine. The loco 
 motives of these trains were teams of from twelve to twenty mules, every 
 mule s harness being provided with an iron bow set over the animal s 
 shoulders, on which was fastened a chime of sweet-toned bells. The road 
 was at all times crowded with these teams, and passing them was one of 
 the greatest dangers encountered by the mail-stage. The teamsters were 
 as accommodating as it was in their power to be, and even those members 
 of the fraternity who were not naturally of an obliging disposition were 
 always willing to do their utmost to let the stage pass, being influenced 
 by a popular superstition that "everything must make way for the mail," 
 under severest penalties of the law. The coaches ran day and night, with 
 changes every eight or ten miles, the harnessing and unharnessing being 
 done with an astonishing celerity, so that the stage might run on time and 
 the all-important United States Mail suffer no delay. Notwithstanding 
 the dangers which beset the stage, but few accidents occurred on the Pi 
 oneer Line during its existence ; though many a timid traveler has been 
 frightened out of a year s growth by the crack of the driver s whip as he 
 sent iiis team spinning, at what seemed a reckless, break-neck pace, down 
 some steep grade, while to the passenger peering over the side next to 
 the brink, it looked as if the wheels were running in dangerous proximity 
 to nothingness. 
 
 When Uncle John had one of these passengers riding on the box 
 with him, and the timid one clutched nervously at the railing of the seat, 
 or otherwise displayed signs of fear, he would reassure him by saying : 
 
 " Don t be scar t ; the Pioneer Company s rich and responsible, and 
 if you git killed they ll pay you all you re worth, without buckin or 
 sweatin a lia r " ; and he would crack his whip with an emphasis that 
 sounded doubly loud in the clear, still air. 
 
 A more kind-hearted set of men than these stage-drivers never lived. 
 Ready at any minute, on a freezing night, to surrender wraps sorely 
 needed by themselves to any woman who complained of cold fatherly, po 
 lite, and carefully attentive to ladies in their charge (though sometimes 
 gruff and coarse to male passengers who had not experience or policy 
 
"UNCLE JOHN." 15 
 
 enough to get on their blind side) watchful of the lives entrusted to their 
 skill and steady nerve apparently reckless, but in reality vigilant with 
 hand, ear, and eye they composed a class as distinct in itself from other 
 men as the Caucasian is from the Mongolian. Hundreds of stories are ex 
 tant of their wit, their bravery, their skill, and their kindness but this 
 book purports to be a chronicle of the Sazerac Lying Club, and must not be 
 diverted from its object to the relation of stage-drivers yarns, however 
 interesting. It has a higher mission and a nobler purpose. 
 
 The building of the Pacific Railroad drove the Pioneer Stage Line 
 out of existence, and as the railroad and its concomitant civilization ad 
 vanced, Uncle John receded. He first went on the " Overland," the stage 
 route across the continent ; but the railroad, in its eastern course, running 
 parallel with its line of travel, varying from twenty to one hundred miles 
 north, kept pushing Uncle John further arid further from its track, and 
 when at last the final spike was driven in Utah, and the Overland Mail 
 was no more, Uncle John betook himself to the mountains, where stages 
 were still the only mode of travel, and where there was little likelihood 
 of the innovating railroad penetrating during the rest of the old stage- 
 driver s lifetime. 
 
 For several years past, Uncle John has " drove stage " from Austin 
 to Belmont, a mining camp some ninety miles to the southward. Every 
 day of his life except when laid up with the rheumatism, which period 
 ically attacks him Uncle John is on the box, starting at daylight in sum 
 mer and completing his task in the evening ; but in winter, frequently not 
 reaching his destination till midnight, or even daylight next morning. 
 In summer, over the hot alkali deserts and parched mountain ranges ; in 
 winter, through cold an^ ice and snow and wind such as constitute the 
 almost arctic severity of that season in the mountains, Uncle John is ever 
 at his post, calmly fulfilling the destiny which made him a stage-driver, 
 and which will keep him one till Death puts on the brakes and he " pulls 
 up" at the "Home Station" at the end of his life s "route." He never 
 leaves his box, except when rheumatism knocks him. Then he wraps his 
 feet in barley sacks, gets him a cane, pulls his broad-brimmed hat down 
 over his eyes, takes his place at the stove, and joins the Sazerac Lying Club. 
 
 The most widely circulated lie ever told in the Club was related by 
 Uncle John, and was one of the first Sazerac lies ever recorded in print. 
 It appeared in the REVEILLE as follows : 
 
 Uncle John and the Sage-Hens. 
 
 When it came his turn at the regular called session of the Sazerac 
 Lying Club last night, Uncle John Gibbons stated the circumstances that 
 caused the detention of the Belmont and Austin stage the other day. He 
 
1G THE 8AZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 said that while crossing Smoky Valley, a short distance this side of the 
 Bait-marsh, he observed what he at first supposed to be a heavy bank of 
 dark clouds descended on the valley. [A phenomenon by no means un 
 usual in this section, and termed by the Shoshone Indians " Pogonip."] 
 As the stage approached nearer to the object, however, he became con 
 vinced that the mass was composed of living creatures. From here we 
 will tell the story in his own words : 
 
 " The team was gittin kind of scary, but I held em level, and as I 
 kept gittin nearer I saw the thing warn t nothin but a flock of sage-hen ; 
 BO I jest threw the silk at the leaders, and yelled fire and brimstone to the 
 wheelers, calk latin to slash the team squar through the flock without any 
 trouble. But, boys, thar was more sage-hen obstructin of that road than 
 I had reckoned on ; and when them thar leaders struck into them thar 
 sage-hen they was throwed back on their ha nches jest as if they had 
 butted clean up ag in a stun wall. As far s you could see there warn t 
 nothin but sage-hen ; you could about see the top of the pile of em ; but 
 there was no more estimatin how thick it was through than estimatin how 
 old a hoss is by twistin its tail. Thar I was banked up by a lot of insig 
 nificant sage-hen, and the United States mail detained in the big road by 
 feathers as you might remark. Wai, to make a long story short, I un 
 hitched one of the wheelers and straddled him and rode back to the sta 
 tion for help. 
 
 " Thar was a feller from town doin some prospectin on one of the hills 
 near the station, and when I got to the house this here prospector was 
 sittin by the fire, hevin come down to borrow some matches. I stated 
 the situation in a hurry, and the hostler and the cook they saddled up some 
 of the stage stock and got a couple of axes, intendin to go back with me 
 and chop a road through the sage-hen. But this here prospector he spoke 
 up and says he : 
 
 " See here, boys, says he, don t you think we could blast em out 
 quicker n we could chop through em ? 
 
 " And the hostler and the cook spoke up and said they thought so, too. 
 
 "And then this here prospector he went up on the hill and got his drills, 
 and his sledges and a lot of giant-powder cartridges and some fuse, and 
 the rest of the blastin apparatus, and then the whole raft of us started 
 back for the place where the stage was ; and when we got thar well I 
 wish I may be runned over by a two-horse jerk-water if there was a sage- 
 hen in sight as far s a man could see with a spy-glass. 
 
 " I hope you fellers is contented now you know what kept the stage 
 late the other night." 
 
 The above lie was copied first in one paper and then in another, till it 
 finally crossed the Atlantic and reached Germany, and a German paper 
 getting hold of it put it into the language of its readers in print. The 
 
"UNCLE JOHN." 17 
 
 name of this paper was the Carlsr/mer Zeitung, and it set forth the case as 
 follows : 
 
 $n Sluftin, s Jet>aba, s Jorbameri?a, befteljt ein herein, beffen gtted e ift, 
 gegenfeitig Siigen aujutaufd)en. erfetbe ftefyt uuter $Regierung=Sd)ut5 unb 
 ba SSerein^Dhtglieb, toeldieS bie befte unb unto er nun ftigfte itge jit erjaljlen 
 uermag, toirb mit einem gotbenen Sftebaifloti im SSertfje toon 50,000 Xfyalern 
 befrfjenft. 
 
 SDie ($ef<i)enle toerben jafyrlid) toon enter Sommiffion, ernannt t>om @tatt> 
 fatter u SBofton, toetd^e ifyre immermafyrenbe 8iung in ber SBwtbeSljauptftabt 
 9eto*g)or! abfyalt, gemadjt. 
 
 2)ie Siige, loctc^e b. 3. ba spramtum er^ictt, tuurbe oon s Merme(t=^8etter, 
 ,g>errn 3o!jn ^tbBon, erja^tt. @r fagte, mafyrenb ec untangft mit ber 
 d^aife bag Rou^ertlal fren^te, ftogeri cine eerbe (^dnfe auf, fo ja^lreic^, 
 fie ben 3Seg blocftrten unb fogar ba Xage(id)t tjerbunfelten ; urn nun bie 
 33(oc!abe ju eben unb ber !onigtirf)en ^oft ft)ieber fortju^elfen, toar e not^toen* 
 big, filr ein eer (Sapeur unb ^Bergleute naif) ben 3tegierung=33arraclen u tele- 
 grapljiren, tuetc^e einen punnet burd) bie SOfcaffe (^cinfe brad)en, unb ber s f oftloa* 
 gen fitter feine SSege fort. 
 
 In due course of time a German resident of Austin received from a 
 relative in Fatherland a copy of the paper containing the above curious 
 and truthful story, and showing me the marked paragraph, explained its 
 purport. To verify his translation I took it to a German friend, and 
 him requested to render it into English, which he did, and as a result handed 
 me the following : 
 
 " In Austin, Nevada, America, there is a society whose objects are com 
 petitive lying. It is under Government patronage, and the member of the 
 Association who tells the best and most unreasonable lie is awarded a gold 
 medal worth fifty thousand thalers. The awards are made annually by a 
 commission appointed by the Governor of Boston, and which is in perpet 
 ual session at the seat of National Government in New York. The lie 
 which took the premium this year was told by Uncle John Gibbonich. He 
 said that while riding post across the Valley of the Smoke, there arose 
 from the earth a flock of geese so numberless that they blocked the road 
 and shut out the light of day. And in order that the blockade might be 
 raised, and the royal mails pass on their way, it was deemed useful to tele 
 graph for a corps of sappers and miners from the Government barracks, 
 who mined a tunnel through the mass of geese, and the post proceeded on 
 its way." 
 
 NOTE The sage-hen, so-called, is a bird of the grouse family, inhabiting Nevada, 
 and feeds on the sage-brush which, in the main, constitutes the vegetation of the " Sil 
 ver State." From this circumstance it derives its name. 
 
 The bird is unknown in Germany, of course, but in order to reach 
 the comprehension of his readers, the editor of the Zeitung converted it 
 into geese. 
 
18 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 An April Fool Joke. 
 
 How Uncle John once got even on a man who had April-fooled him 
 a year before was thus recorded in the REVEILLE at the time : 
 
 A HOT COIN. In the Sazerac Saloon, this morning, Uncle John Gib 
 bons could have been seen heating a four-bit piece in the drum of the stove. 
 He watched the coin carefully, now and then turning it over to make sure 
 that it would get warmed through. While that half-dollar lay baking in 
 the stove-drum, a distinguished member of the Sazerac Lying Club was 
 hastening to the saloon for his morning cocktail, never dreaming of guile 
 or the first of April. As he entered the door the coin was about cooked, 
 and Uncle John took it up carefully in his hand, which was protected 
 with a heavy buckskin driving glove. Then he called to the brother 
 member who was in search of his matutinal refreshment, and taking him 
 aside, whispered confidentially in his ear : 
 
 " See here, George, I m most dead for a drink, but I can t ask up this 
 crowd of beats, cause I ve only got four bits. You take this four bits 
 and treat me." 
 
 Ever willing to accommodate, George closed down his hand on the 
 piece ; but he did not keep it down. In about the seventeenth part of a 
 second from the time he grasped it, that half-dollar went crashing through 
 the glass in the front door, and George was snapping his fingers and hop 
 ping around as though he had just got up from sleeping with a tarantula. 
 Ever and anon he stopped jumping, and looking at the fac simile of the 
 American eagle which was branded on the palm of his hand, raised it 
 towards high heaven, and solemnly vowed that lie would get even on the 
 man that " fixed " that half-dollar for him, if he had to live seven thous 
 and years to do it. 
 
 Wanted it on the Surface. 
 
 At one of the meetings of the Club a member stated that it was a 
 well-known fact that a ghost appeared nightly in one of the levels of the 
 North Star Mine, and that all the men working on that level had seen his 
 ghostship. Uncle John Gibbons was present, and expressed his doubts 
 about it in fact he didn t believe in ghosts at all. " Well," said the 
 speaker, "the ghost is there, and if you ll go down I ll show him to you 
 any night." Now Uncle John knows all about horses, and harness, and 
 buckboards, and Concord wagons, and such traps, but he never was in a 
 mine in all his life, and would as soon enter the mouth of hell as the 
 
"UNCLE JOHN." 19 
 
 mouth of a shaft, and he fairly shuddered at the thought of going under 
 ground to interview a departed spirit. " I m afeared of mines," he said, 
 " and don t want to drop down none o them thai* straight holes ; but I 
 tell you what I ll do : You trot your ghost out into the big road, and I ll 
 harness him up, and drive him tandem all day with Brown Bill and Dick. 
 I aint afeard of anything with a bit in its mouth." 
 
 Failed to Hatch. 
 
 A trick that was once played on Uncle John is worthy of record : 
 He had a favorite hen at the stage barn, which showed a disposition to 
 set. So he placed her on fifty-three eggs, and after five weeks of antici 
 pation, concluded it was time for some results, as she was worn down to a 
 shadow, and ne er a cheep of a chicken had been heard in that barn. So, 
 to save her life, he removed her from the nest. An examination of the 
 eggs revealed the fact that every mother s son of them was boiled as hard 
 as the hinges of perdition. It was a mooted question whether the Club 
 rung in the boiled eggs on the old stage-driver, or whether he set the hen 
 on them himself, in the hope of raising boiled chickens. The members 
 asserted the latter ; but Uncle John said it was a base aspersion on an hon 
 est man s character. 
 
< < 
 
 Ifart III. . 
 
 OLD DAD. 
 
 " He was always called Old Dad, " said an intimate of his one day, 
 " I knowed him in Californy in c fifty, when he was young and spry as a 
 chicken, and as likely a lookin cuss as you could see in the mountings, 
 and they called him 4 Old Dad then." 
 
 " Dad " is a perfect type of the California pioneer. He immigrated 
 to California from his native State Virginia with the first rush of gold- 
 seekers to the then new El Dorado. Like the majority of the Calif or- 
 nians of his time, he was rich and poor by turns ; and now that the " flush 
 days" are gone, never to return, he is, like nearly all the pioneers, rich 
 only in reminiscences. " Dad " came to Austin in Avhat was called the 
 " Reese River excitement of sixty-three " the first discovery of the 
 mines of Reese River district, which were then supposed to be fabulously 
 rich and marvelously extensive, capable of affording employment and for 
 tunes to a large population. As with all new mining camps, its resources 
 were overrated, and in the natural course of things the district found its 
 level; and though not the "second Comstock" which all mining dis 
 tricts are, in the excitement of their discovery, supposed to be it is yet 
 one of the most staple and prosperous on the Pacific coast. "Dad" 
 points proudly to his record as a pioneer, claiming that he enjoys that dis 
 tinction in a double sense. 
 
 "A California pioneer and a Reese River pioneer; it s such men as 
 me that opens a country to civilization, and paves the way for them ten 
 der fert to come in from the States on the railroads and make all the 
 money, while us pioneers who stood the brunt, and bore the hardships, 
 and lived on slapjacks and sage-brush straight we, why we get the soup 
 that the eggs was boiled in." 
 
 When " Dad " arrived in California, " the plains across," he took up 
 his residence in Nevada County, in that State. There, to use his own 
 \\ nnls, lie engaged in mining and speculating, under which head may prop 
 erly be Classed the financial operation herewith detailed: 
 
"OLD DAD. 11 21 
 
 Buying a Clown. 
 
 "Old Dad" related his "experience" in the circus business in the Saz- 
 erac Lying Club one night : 
 
 It was in the early days of Nevada County, California. Money was 
 more plentiful than mosquitoes on the San Joaquin; gambling was as 
 common as praying at camp-meeting, and whisky as free as water. But 
 the boys pined for a little excitement, and "Dad," who in those days was 
 a moneyed prince, concluded to give it to them, arid at the same time 
 make a nice little clean-up for himself. "Dad" had a partner, and to 
 him he communicated his plan, which was to build an amphitheater a short 
 distance out of town, send a hunter into the mountains to trap a bear, 
 (bears were numerous in the Sierras) procure a bull, and have a regular 
 old-fashioned bull-and-bear fight on the Mexican plan, and charge two dol 
 lars a head admission to view it. The partner fell in with the project ; 
 the amphitheater was built, the animals procured, and a day set for the 
 fight, the announcement of the " entertainment" throwing three counties 
 into the wildest excitement. 
 
 It appeared that in order to have the show .go off in strict accordance 
 with Mexican custom and rule, it was necessary to have a colored man to 
 act the part of clown. The American colored men knew nothing about 
 bull-fighting, and it was found impossible to persuade one of them to act 
 the part, and the projectors of the show were in despair. They had bears, 
 bulls, and Mexican bull-fighters, but no clown. Finally they found a Cen 
 tral American negro who understood the business, but he was known as 
 such a tricky customer that it was not considered safe to employ him and 
 pay him any money to bind the bargain, for fear he would run off without 
 fulfilling his contract. As this was in the days of negro slavery, the show 
 men determined to buy the negro, and own him out and out. He had no 
 master, and belonged to no man but himself, so it was determined to pur 
 chase him of himself. In pursuance of a bargain which was struck up, 
 the negro was taken before a lawyer, by whom a bill of sale was drawn 
 up, in which the Central American sold himself to the show proprietors 
 for the sum of $500. He could neither read nor write, but affixed his 
 mark to the document, and the sale was consummated. On the day of the 
 fight a procession was formed, headed by the negro, tricked out in red flan 
 nel drawers and a spangled shirt, a brass band, and the Mexican bull ex 
 perts, which marched to the amphitheater in the outskirts of the town, fol 
 lowed by a concourse of three thousand men. To make a long story 
 short, the bull-and-bear fight was a failure. The bull, maddened at the 
 sight of the clown s red flannel drawers, made a lunge at the unfortunate 
 colored individual, and tossed him over its head, spoiling him for service 
 
22 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 as a clown for many a long day ; to save the negro s life the Mexicans 
 were forced to kill the bull, and the door-keeper ran away with the gate- 
 money, amounting to some $G,000. As the bull had rendered the negro 
 useless to them, the showman made him a present of himself back to him 
 self ; and there was not another bull-and-bear fight in Nevada County for 
 three weeks. 
 
 A Sly Fox. 
 
 The following creation of " Dad s " fertile imagination was recorded 
 in the columns of the REVEILLE as it here appears, and had the distin 
 guished honor of being copied in one of the New York illustrated week 
 lies, and of being illustrated by " our artist on the spot." 
 
 At the Sazerac Lying Club seance last night the gentleman from Vir 
 ginia related the following : 
 
 "Back in the Shcnandoah Valley, very many years ago, when the nar 
 rator was a young man, fox-hunting was one of the most popular sports, 
 in which he frequently took part. There was one old fox which for a 
 period of several years had continually evaded the fleetest and keenest- 
 scented hounds, the scent invariably being lost in the vicinity of a house 
 situated in the woods, and far removed from any habitation, and which 
 was used as a storehouse for pelts. At last, one day, the dogs started the 
 old fox, and away he went in the direction of the house, with a pack of 
 young hounds in full cry after him, but on Hearing the house he disap 
 peared, leaving the hounds and hunters nonplussed, as usual. While the 
 hunters were gathered in and about the house, discussing the frequent 
 mysterious disappearances of the fox, an old veteran hound came limping 
 up, and entering the door, set up a vigorous barking, and tried to jump up 
 on the wall. His singular actions attracted the attention of the hunters, 
 and, an examination being made, the old fox was found suspended by his 
 tail to a nail in the wall, keeping perfectly still and looking, unless closely 
 observed, like the pelts with which the walls were hung. This plainly 
 showed that the old fox, when too closely pressed, had taken refuge in the 
 house, and hung himself up on the nail by his tail, which was the reason 
 for the dogs always losing the scent at that particular place." 
 
 A Stout Man. 
 
 The subject of debate at the regular session of the Club was strong 
 men. Old Dad took the floor, and told about the strongest man, of his 
 inches, he had ever seen. They were mining over in Marshall Canon. The 
 shaft was 1MO feet deep, and they hoisted the dirt in a car as large as is 
 u--d in a steam hoisting-works, but there was only a windlass at the top 
 
"OLD DAD." 23 
 
 of the shaft to hoist the car with. The windlass-man was a little bit of a 
 fellow only weighed ninety-one pounds but it was noticed that he never 
 weakened, and always hoisted the loaded car to the surface without an 
 apparent overtaxing of his strength. One day the boys in the bottom put 
 up a job on him. They loaded the car with wet clay, and batted it down 
 hard, and piled it up in a mound over the top of the car. Then the men 
 four of them got on the car, and sung out to the windlass-man to hoist. 
 " She commenced mountin that shaft just as easy as if a ninety-horse 
 power engine was a hoistin her out, and every bit of the machinery greased 
 within an inch of its life." " When we got to the surface," said Dad, " we 
 was as ashamed as a dog caught suckin eggs. Thar was that little fellow, 
 as cool like and as ca m as one of them icebergs, never sweatin a ha r nor 
 puffin a puff, and a-turnin the windlass-crank with one hand ; and as the 
 boys stepped off the car he said, kinder quiet like : Boys, can t yer put a 
 load on the car some time ? I ve got the dyspepsy, and the doctor told me 
 I must take exercise. " 
 
 The topics discussed in the Club are always seasonable ; no stale, flat, 
 and unprofitable themes contract the powers or impair the usefulness of 
 the organization. At the same meeting, as soon as Old Dad had finished 
 his Samsonian story the subject of climate was introduced. The snow and 
 mud and winds, and the general uncertainties of the climate of this re 
 gion, were duly cursed and commented on ; and the special lie of the even 
 ing being announced as in order, the member known as " The Traveler " 
 rose and said : 
 
 " Talk about climate ! Give me a tropical climate a region of per 
 petual sunshine ! The West Injys is the country for me ; I ve bin thar. 
 Why, Mr. President and gentlemen of the Club, in them islands Natur has 
 so arranged things that a feller don t have to do a stroke of work to get a 
 livin ; the necessaries of life just drop down inter his mouth, as it were, 
 like the manner onter the children of Isrell on the forty-mile desert, and 
 the only man what ever starved to death thar was a feller who was too 
 dog-goned lazy to open his mouth for the nourishment to enter. Thar s 
 the bread-fruit ; it grows spontan ous like, as they call it, all ready baked 
 as brown as a meersham pipe and hot and smokin and light as a feather, 
 and all a man has to do is to lay down on his back under one of the trees 
 and let the food drop inter his mouth. But then the bread-fruit aint no- 
 whar along of the sago. Sago s the truck it s meat and drink and clothin 
 and shelter. All a man of family has to do is to take his folks and camp 
 under one of them sago trees, and I ll tell yer, Mr. President and gentle 
 men, how he s fixed : The branches of the trees grows like the rafters of 
 a house, and the little leaves weave inter each other jest like shingles, and 
 the big leaves drop down from the end of the branches and make walls. 
 Thar s his house ; and the ceilin is jest kivered with sago, which drops 
 down reg lar every mornin of its own accord inter a dish on the dinin - 
 
24 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUJt. 
 
 room table. It rains every night, and the water actin on the sago makes 
 a liquid that just knocks the spots clean off n the best kinder coffee, and 
 the sun cooks it up on the roof and it drops down off n the leaves inter 
 nice China cups made out n cocoanut shells, and the little nigger boys, that 
 air delighted to be yer servants for the honor of the thing, bring the cups 
 in and set era on a marble-top table alongside of yer gold-mounted ham 
 mock set with di monds and other precious stones. Sago, Mr. President 
 
 and gentlemen of the Club, sago " 
 
 " Sago off on your ear with that yarn," interrupted a stranger, who 
 had entered at this point in the narrative, and was taking whisky-straight 
 
 at the bar. 
 
 As by a common impulse, the Club rose to its feet to resent this out 
 rageous interruption ; but observing that the stranger had two whistler 
 six -shooters in his belt and the handle of a fourteen-inch bowie-knife stick 
 ing out of his left boot, they sat down again. And the President s voice 
 was tremulous with emotion as he declared the Club adjourned, and re 
 marked, in response to the stranger s invitation to "jine" him, that he 
 would take the least bit of sour in his n. 
 
 Passover. 
 
 On one occasion, a Hebrew fellow-citizen presented a member of the 
 Sazerac Lying Club with a cake of unleavened, or Passover bread. This 
 being exhibited at the next meeting of the Club, led to a discussion on 
 the origin and uses of the Jewish holiday of Passover. Uncle John as 
 serted that the holiday was kept by the Jews in commemoration of the 
 deliverance of Moses from the bulrushes, and his being "passed over" to 
 Pharaoh s daughter ; but the " Theological Member " told him to " shut 
 up " talking of something he knew nothing about ; and if the President 
 would maintain order and enforce the rules, he would tell them what 
 Passover bread was for. Mr. Fibley said he would, and the " Theological 
 Member " turned himself loose in a narrative, of which the following is 
 the substance, as nearly as I am able to reproduce it from memory : 
 
 "When Pharaoh was Khedive of Egypt he was building government 
 buildings by contract, and the Israelites were working for him making 
 brick by the day. Like all government contractors, he neither furnished 
 a good article nor treated his employees with justice. 
 
 "The Israelites struck for higher wages and eight hours a day, and or 
 ganized a trade union and elected a man named Moses as President. Mo 
 ses was in the clothing business ; and because he didn t know anything 
 about labor the Israelites thought lie would make a i^ood presiding officer 
 of a labor organization. 
 
 " When the Israelites struck, old Pharaoh hired a new set of hands, and 
 they (the Israelites) concluded to go on a prospecting trip into Canaan 
 
"OLD DAD." 25 
 
 District, where there was represented to be a big milk and honey ledge. 
 Owing to the snow blockade on the Suez Canal the market was bare of 
 yeast powders, and the mill that made the self-rising flour had f-hut down ; 
 and as the Israelites were afraid the claims would all be located if they 
 didn t get there quick, they started off with a few sacks of flour and 
 mixed their bread in the flour sack and baked it on a hot rock. 
 
 " After they had crossed the creek Pharaoh missed some picks and 
 shovels, and thinking the Israelites had stolen them, he swore out a search- 
 warrant and sent a sheriff s posse after them. The sheriff s party missed 
 the ford and were drowned, and to this day the Israelites eat unleavened 
 bread in commemoration of the event." 
 
 The Club boasts, not only a Theological, but a Medical Member, and 
 as soon as the former had finished, the latter arose and delivered himself 
 of the following, which, whether it be original or not, is worthy of pres 
 ervation : 
 
 " Once when I was a practicin over in Syerra County, Calif orny, a 
 feller got caved on by a bank and got his skull fractured clean out of shape. 
 They picked him up and brung him to me, and I made a diagnosis of his 
 case, and found that his brain, which was exposed, was full of dirt and 
 bits of rock. There wasn t nothin to do but to take it out and clean it ; 
 the idear of a man goin around with the action of his brain bein inter 
 fered with by three or four pounds of clay and gravel was clear out of the 
 question, and I set too much store by my medical reputation to consent to 
 any such doin s. I took out the brain and put it in a tin pan, and while I 
 was washin of it the patient seed a feller across the street what he had 
 some bizness with, and went over to have a talk with him. He forgot to 
 come back after his brains, and I didn t see him ag in for two months, 
 when one day, bein in the jinin county, I seed him. I hailed him and 
 told him them thar brains was up at my office, and if he wanted em lie 
 better come and git em. 
 
 " Don t want em, said he. 
 
 " Why not? said I. 
 
 " Wai, you see, said he, l I m runnin for office now and I don t need 
 em ; got no use in the world for em ; fact is, they d be an incumbrance, 
 under the circumstances. " 
 
 This lie met with the hearty approbation of the Club, the President 
 especially manifesting his approval by ordering another whisky-straight, 
 and drinking it off at a gulp, with a "Here s to you," as he looked across 
 at the Medical Member. . There was a general replenishing of tobacco 
 quids, and as Mr. Fibley declared a recess of five minutes, the members, 
 not to waste time, started an informal discussion on the hardships and 
 privations many of them had undergone in the pioneer days of California, 
 Old Dad more particularly thrilling the assembly -by recounting his adven 
 tures by flood and field. 
 
2G THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 The last one to speak was the Fighting Member. Referring to a story 
 told by his distinguished colleague, he recounted the following : 
 
 Rough Experience. 
 
 " Oh, that aint nothin to the time I was with Kit Carson." " You 
 with Kit Carson!" exclaimed several members. "Yes, me and Kit 
 crossed the plains in forty-seven. We was camped up in the Sierra Ne- 
 vadys, and one mornin we thought we d go out and hunt some meat for 
 breakfast. We found b ar signs, and had just got on the track of the var 
 mint, when there come up one of them hell-roarin big snow-storms 
 like they have in them mountings, when it snows a foot aminnit. It cov 
 ered up our camp and we couldn t find our grub, and was four days with 
 out a thing to eat, and we d have starved to death only for my going to a 
 farm-house close by and stealing some chickens. I tell you, I was so 
 thirsty that my feet cracked open, and besides, I suffered awful from 
 cold through falling into a lake, tryin to reach for some water-lilies. We 
 was most famished for water, and had to chew bullets to get a little moist 
 ure in our mouths. We saw considerable game, but our ammunition got 
 wet, and besides, I liked to burned my hand off trying to light a fire with 
 some powder so s to cook a mountain sheep that I shot with my six- 
 shooter. I don t even believe the Donner party had a worse time than 
 we did, and I ve seen some pretty tough times myself. Why, when I 
 first came to Californy, around the Horn in fifty-two, we struck a storm 
 comin up the Chagres River, on the isthmus, just this side of Panamar . 
 Just here the President s gavel fell, and he said that much as he dis 
 liked to do so, he felt that the welfare of the Club demanded that he must 
 enforce the rule requiring that members should not contradict themselves. 
 " Does anybody here present doubt what I ve been teliin ? " said the Fight 
 ing Member, reaching for the back part of his waistband. " Not a doubt," 
 responded the Club unanimously. And then the meeting was declared ad 
 journed. 
 
: ffatt W. 
 "ST U B." 
 
 Of the many odd characters in Austin, 
 one of the most peculiar is Stub. Like Uncle 
 John .Gibbons, Stub is a stage-driver ; but 
 there is caste even among stage-drivers, and 
 Stub s caste is to Uncle John s as a " buck- 
 board " is to a Concord coach. Uncle John 
 is a four, six, eight, or any number horse that 
 can be hitched up driver. Stub s ambition 
 never soared higher than "buck-boards" and 
 "jerkies." Stub runs an " express " between 
 Austin and lone, the latter being a mining 
 camp, about fifty-five miles distant from the 
 former. He makes one round trip a week, 
 carrying the mail and driving a two-horse 
 " buck-board." A buck-board is a contrivance 
 consisting of a narrow spring floor set on two 
 axles, usually with a seat in the center for the 
 driver ; but in some cases, where passengers 
 are carried, it has two seats, one forward and 
 
 one aft. Buck-boards are used principally for carrying the mails over 
 deserts, and are in common use for that purpose in Arizona. On account 
 of their lightness, they can, with the aid of a good team, be made to get 
 over a great deal of ground in a very short time ; but they are the meanest 
 things to ride on that ever were invented, and the man who is so unfortu 
 nate as to be compelled to take a few hours journey on one, finds himself 
 at the end of it with every joint in his body dislocated. 
 
 "Staging aint what it used to be," and buck-boards have taken 
 the place of coaches on nearly every stage-route in interior Nevada, the 
 population being so small that the travel is too light to afford coaches and 
 four or six-horse stock. 
 
TILE SAZERAC LY1NU CLUB. 
 
 " Staging tiint wliat it used to be." , . 
 
 Stub s route lies for the most part through Reese River Valley, in 
 which are situated a number of ranches or farms. The valley is a bleak, 
 barren-looking stretch of country, covered for the most part with sage 
 brush ; but the soil is capable, by irrigation, of producing cereals in abun 
 dance and the finest potatoes in the world. The hills surrounding it are 
 covered with the nutritious bunch-grass, and afford a range for large 
 numbers of cattle, while in the valley itself there grows in places a plant 
 called white sage, which, after it is touched by the frost in the autumn, 
 is a very sweet and nourishing food for cattle. Such a thing as housing 
 or feeding stock is all but unknown in Eastern and Central Nevada. The 
 section abounds in cattle-ranges, as they are called, and thousands of neat 
 stock are constantly running over them, getting fat in summer, and " rust 
 ling" for a living, or dying from cold and exposure in the winter. This 
 cattle interest and the patches of irrigated land are what make the ranches 
 in the valley. The irrigation is obtained by systems of ditches from 
 Reese River, a narrow stream which rises in the mountains at the head of 
 the valley, and is fed by springs and snows, and, traversing its entire 
 length, empties into the Ilumboldt, near Battle Mountain, on the Central 
 Pacific Railroad. It abounds in trout, and in the trouting season is largely 
 resorted to by anglers from Austin. To the trouting of Reese River I owe 
 my first acquaintance with Stub. The people who go there to fish gen 
 erally make up large parties, with a full camping outfit, and provisions 
 enough to last a month. Their advent on the river is hailed with delight 
 by the Indians, crows, and coyotes; for camp-life in the reality don t 
 begin to be as good a thi?!g as it was in the anticipation, and the camp 
 ers almost invariably start home sooner than was intended, leaving 
 the banks of the river lined with half-consumed cans of fruits, preserved 
 
29 
 
 meats, and other edibles. Some of the surplus edibles is usually expended 
 in hiring Indians to catch fish, so that the party may return home and ex 
 hibit good baskets ; but, as a rule, the guileless native demands coin for 
 his services, knowing that, in the natural course of events, the remnants 
 will fall to his lot, with none to dispute his right but the beasts and birds 
 of prey. 
 
 But I am digressing from Stub. 
 
 One summer, having a week s vacation from my editorial labors, I 
 concluded to spend it in a fishing trip to Reese River, and to go to that 
 stream in a crowd by myself, and put up at one of the ranches in the valley. 
 In pursuance of this plan, I requested Stub to interview some of the ranch 
 ers, and obtain for me accommodations. Executing commissions is Stub s 
 strong suit. Every time he drives out of Austin his mind is charged with 
 numerous messages for the ranchers, or for people at lone and Ellsworth, 
 and his express loaded down with small packages for delivery. The 
 women at the ranches depend on Stub for their needles and thread and 
 worsted, and fruit and candy for the childen, and a thousand and one 
 other articles which they have no way of getting except through Stub. 
 The men commission him to bring them tobacco and newspapers ; to get 
 mowing-machine knives sharpened, saddles mended, and impose on him a 
 multiplicity of errands that would confuse any other person. At every 
 house along his route, some man, woman, or child runs out, and with a 
 hail, says: "Stub, bring me some fine cut"; or, "Stub, I want a piece 
 of muslin"; or, "Stub, go arid see Jones and get my saddle"; or, 
 "Stub, call on Smith and tell him I ll drive them cattle in next week"; 
 or, " Stub, go and see the doctor, and tell him baby aint no better, and he 
 better send some more of that mixture." All these errands and commis 
 sions are remembered and faithfully performed, for Stub is faultless in 
 attending to such duties. On his return trip, Stub informed me that he 
 had secured the needful accommodation, and, naming the place, said : 
 " They ll take you in and treat you on the squar , and the fishin s as good 
 thar as any place on the stream, except you go clear to the head." 
 
 The next trip of Stub s Express, outward-bound, found me a passen 
 ger on the buck-board. There were two other passengers besides myself 
 one male, and a garrulous old lady, who smoked a clay pipe, and drank 
 whisky from a bottle with as much gusto as any member of the Club. She 
 was an old acquaintance of Stub s, and, like him, a pioneer of Eastern Ne 
 vada ; and the two knew, or knew of, every man, woman, and child in 
 Austin, Belmont, lone, Ellsworth, and Reese River Valley ; and the way 
 they discussed their friends, and handled and soiled and destroyed char 
 acters, and smoked pipes and drank whisky, sent the jack-rabbits scam 
 pering in affright to their holes. 
 
 One of Stub s peculiarities is that he laughs. He laughs at everything 
 that is said to him a loud, long laugh that sounds more like the neigh of 
 
30 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 a horse than anything else. Stub is deaf as a post, and laughs so as to 
 show that he is appreciative. It makes no difference whether it is a joke 
 or :i catastrophe, Stub laughs as heartily at one as at the other. Tell him 
 a joke about a man s mother-in-law getting killed, and he will laugh ; or 
 relate to him a frightful mining accident that has just occurred, and 
 he laughs just the same. The old woman would tell how so-and-so up at 
 Austin was no better than she should be, and Stub laughed ; or that Gardly, 
 the dry-goods man at Belmont, was on the verge of bankruptcy, and Stub 
 laughed ; or that Tim Green s wife, up at lone, was at the point of death, 
 and her with half a dozen children who would be motherless, and Stub 
 laughed with just the same peculiar horse-laugh that he would bestow 
 on the funniest joke. 
 
 Further particulars of this fishing trip can be best detailed by extracts 
 from an account of it written up for the REVEILLE on my return, and 
 which I present herewith : 
 
 Stub s Express. 
 
 Stub s Express is one of the institutions of this section. Perhaps 
 everybody in town don t know Stub, but everybody in Reese River Valley 
 does. Stub s Express consists of a two-seated buck-board wagon and Stub. 
 We embarked in the buck-board in front of Dinsmore s store, the other 
 freight consisting of a feather bed, a mowing-machine, a roll of leather, 
 three butter barrels, a threshing machine, a paper of needles, a case of coal 
 oil, an old woman, a plough, a small quartz-mill, another passenger, and 
 Stub. The team consisted of two stout little ponies, which seemed to be 
 acquainted with Stub, and when he would throw the whip and say, " Git 
 up, you consarned critters," they knew that Stub meant business. 
 
 A journey up Reese River Valley is not one of the most eventful 
 affairs in life. The landscape in general is of that barren and uninterest 
 ing nature which characterizes the greater portion of Nevada. It consists 
 of a great expanse of sage-brush and grease -wood, with an occasional 
 ranch at long intervals, on which the waving grain and small cultivated 
 patches relieve the monotonous barrenness, and remind the traveler that he 
 is still in an inhabited country. 
 
 After leaving Silver Age Ranch, the journey over the dusty road, with 
 nothing to direct the attention from the dry plains and hills, became very 
 monotonous. 
 
 Almost the first question asked was : " Shall we get anything to eat 
 on the road ? " " Certainly," said Stub, " git dinner at noon " ; and then, 
 sotto voce, which I did not hear, " if you ve brought it with you 
 not otherwise." When noon came, we looked in vain for a resting place, 
 and loud were the lamentations of the old lady at finding herself deprived 
 
"STUB." 31 
 
 of the usual meal. As if to sharpen our appetites, Stub, without any 
 provocation, told us the following yarn : 
 
 " Once when I was up in Montanny, me and four other fellers struck 
 some pritty fair diggin s up in a gulch in the mountings, about 220 miles 
 from anywhar. We didn t have much grub and couldn t afford to leave 
 the diggin s to go after some, cause the water was gittin low and we 
 wanted to put in every minnit on the claim, so s to take out all the dust 
 we could afore snow flew, and winter was a-comin on pritty close. Thar 
 was any quantity of game in the country, but we didn t hev a dog-goned 
 thing to shoot it with, and many and many a mornin hev I laid in my 
 blankets as hungry as a she-wolf, and seen millions of grouse a-flyin over 
 my head, and the deer and antelope was so thick they used to tramp over 
 us as we lay in our blankets. Down below our camp, at the foot of the 
 gulch, was a little spring whar a drove of deer used to come for water at 
 night, and seein this, we fixed up a job to git fresh meat. Durin the day 
 time we built a fence round the place, leavin the bars down whar the 
 deer used to come in for water, and that night we laid in the brush clus 
 by, and when the deer came in, we just put up the bars and we had em 
 kerrelled. After that, whenever we wanted any fresh meat, we d jest go 
 inter the kerrell and lass a doe or a fawn and butcher it, and we was fixed 
 for meat for several days to come ; had deer-meat to sell, in fact." 
 
 The rest of that dreary ride is impressed on my memory by the recol 
 lection of the pangs of hunger endured ; and when late that night the 
 buck-board stopped at its destination, and I attacked my first meal since 
 daylight, I was thoroughly satisfied that Stub had qualifications for the 
 Sazerac Lying Club other than his Montana adventure. 
 
 After a hearty supper of homely and wholesome fare, to which my 
 long fast enabled me to do full justice, an hour was pleasantly spent in 
 discussing agricultural topics. This subject struck me where I lived, and 
 we learnedly exchanged notes about the proper time to pull hay, the best 
 mode of cutting potatoes, and the latest improvements in digging barley. 
 The family was much impressed with my farming lore, and the lady of the 
 house suggested that I should be a splendid hand to feed the pigs and 
 chickens. Merit always commands recognition. 
 
 A Neglected Education. 
 
 The owner of the ranch was a Missourian ; his wife was also a AJissou- 
 rian, and several male relatives and all the hands about the place were 
 Missourians. They had all immigrated from Missouri to California at an 
 early day, and their customs and manners were of the backwoods. The 
 day after my arrival the entire family and the hired hands became ab 
 sorbed in the engaging operation of killing and dressing a hog, and it 
 
:<J THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 seemed to bo expected that, m a mutter of politeness, I should at least bo 
 a spectator of the proceedings. The circumstance of the hog s customary 
 death possesses in itself no significance, and its relation is really not abso 
 lutely necessary to insure the success of this book ; but it will servo as an 
 introduction to an occurrence which at the time, and since, impressed me 
 as being very ludicrous. 
 
 When supper time came, a largo party of us were seated around the 
 table- the rancher, his wife, the male relatives, the farm hands, a number 
 .>f l:uls and lasses, and myself. Every member of the company, with the 
 e\eeption of myself, was Missourian either by birth or parentage, and con-/ 
 geqnentlythey were wise in many things of which I was in dense ignorance ; 
 and perhaps vice versa. One of the things which they all could do, and I 
 could not, was hog-killing. The principal dish on the table was pork the 
 meat of the unfortunate slaughtered that evening ; and the conversation, 
 !>v a natural fitness, turned on the best method of dispatching and dress 
 ing the animal. I remained silent, taking no part in the conversation, for 
 fear of committing myself and exposing my ignorance. During the dis 
 cussion, which had taken on a lively turn, the rancher s wife, who pre 
 sided at the head of the table, "tendin to the tea," spoke up, and said : 
 
 "I ve heern tell that thar be people as can t kill a hog." 
 
 This seemed to be a direct shot at me, and I could feel myself blush, 
 actually blus/i, in the consciousness of my neglected education. It seemed 
 as if the eyes of the entire company were centered upon me, and that 
 there was nothing for it but a full, free, and frank confession. Casting 
 my eyes downward and looking squarely on the piece of pork on my 
 j.late, almost expecting that it, too, would be startled at my ignorance, I 
 faltered out: 
 
 "Mrs. Brown, I I don t know how to kill a hog." 
 
 " Lor sakes ! " exclaimed the old lady, and her hand dropped as if 
 nerveless from the handle of the tea-pot. Then she raised both her fat 
 arms on high and I have never seen on another human countenance such 
 a vivid expression of mingled pity and contempt as was depicted on hers 
 and while an awful and impressive silence reigned around the table, she 
 sighed deeply, and said : 
 
 u Lor sakes! what wan your folks a-thinkiif of when they raised 
 you ? Why, thar aint a gal on this ranch as can t kill and dress a hog! " 
 
 The only reply I could command at the time was, that I was born an 
 orphan, and had not had the advantages of a Missourian education. 
 
 " Wai, you air to be pitied, sure enough," said the mouth-piece of the 
 family; and I fancied that during the rest of the evening she ga/.ed at me 
 continuously with a motherly expression of commiseration. I turned the 
 conversation on the best method of sowing straw and sundry other agri 
 cultural topics, in which, I hope, I showed myself to be more at home than 
 on the hog question. 
 
"8 TlTli." 33 
 
 A Dead-Letter Office. 
 
 On the return trip of Stub s Express I was the only passenger, :m<l 
 Stub entert Mined mo with various reminiscences of the early days of (lie 
 section and in "pointing out the country." In the hills in sight from the 
 v.-illcy there had been at an earlier date several mining excitements that 
 is, supposed important discoveries of mines which, being heralded from 
 camp to camp and from town to town, had brought about an exeitement, 
 and a rush to the new diggings. These "stampedes" had resulted in tin; 
 hurried building of towns, the establishment of mail routes, and all tin 
 various preparations for the founding of mining cities, many of which, 
 like mushrooms, come up in a night and go down to oblivion in an equal 
 space of time. Such had been the fate of the camps in the range of mount 
 ains bordering Reese River Valley, and at the time of which I write they 
 were all deserted by human beings, and the houses which had made them 
 towns had been hauled away to build up other new camps. Passing a 
 certain mountain peak, Stub pointed his finger at it, and said : 
 
 u Over yonder thar is the old Washington Dcestrick. It was a, 
 lively camp in its time. They had croppin s that was jnighty rich wiih 
 silver, but the ledges didn t pan out wuth a cuss. They built a town thar, 
 and was goin to have a city hall, and a couple of dance-houses-, and HC\ < -n 
 or eight quartz-mills, and a daily mail and express, and- mebbo they even 
 figgcred on a church and a school-house, but the mines petered out kind 
 of sudd in like. I was in thar one day, and the boys was play in poker at 
 four bits ante and shove the buck, and whisky was a flowin like this here 
 Reese River and that very next mornin the camp went down like a stun 
 in a pond, and you could buy the best corner lot in the place for about two 
 dollars in money. They did git a post-office established thar, and it s on this 
 here mail-route yet, but I don t run over thar, though the contract calls for 
 it. The postmaster was the last man to leave the place; he got twelve dollars 
 a year and he wanted to stick to a Guv ment situation, but he got killed 
 one day by a tree fallin down a-top of him. Some herders goin through 
 thar found him a-lyin dead on the ground. Thar was pritty nigh all of 
 him thar, cause the tree kivcred the body so the coyotes couldn t git at 
 all of him. They buried him with his clothes on. The key of the post- 
 office was in his breeches pocket, and when they buried him they buried 
 the whole postoffice, and it s a dead-letter office now." 
 
 Stub as a Fiddler. 
 
 Stub s forte that is, his chief delight is in playing the fiddle. He 
 only knows two tunes, but he subjects them to all the variations that cat 
 gut and horsehair can extract from them. Give Stub his fiddle and a, 
 3 
 
34 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 company of young folks at a ranch on the river, and let them get up a 
 dunce, with Stub to furnish the music and call the figures, and he is in his 
 element of glory. If Stub happens to be in town when there is a public 
 ball, and is allowed to call the figures for a quadrille, he is in the seventh 
 hruven of delight. On such occasions Stub "dresses up." Usually, he 
 presents a shabby appearance, and carries the odor acquired from sleep 
 ing with his horses. But when there is any dancing going on, he is trans 
 formed into absolute gorgeousness. The pride of his heart is a velvet 
 vest of many colors, made by a tailor to Stub s special order, and after a 
 model of his own designing. Stub is proud of this garment, but the par 
 ticular part of it which he thinks should challenge the admiration of all 
 beholders is a narrow strap which buttons on each side of the collar, and 
 on which is pinned a golden horse. Arrayed in this vest, a linen duster, a 
 pair of pants turned up at the bottoms, carpet slippers and clean white 
 socks, and on his head a curly chestnut wig, Stub is a sight to behold, and 
 just about that time would not change places with the Czar of all the Rus- 
 sias. He seldom joins in the dance ; but there was an occasion when he 
 ventured on the floor, and while trying to execute some very artistic and 
 elaborate pigeon-wing, came to grief. His wig came off, and there was 
 exposed to the vulgar gaze a head as bare of hair and as shiny as a bill 
 iard ball. Stub didn t laugh for full five minutes. 
 
 Stub s Birthday. 
 
 Once upon a time Stub had a birthday. As the day approached, he 
 concluded to celebrate it by a dance that should astonish the natives. In 
 pursuance of this plan he prepared an advertisement for insertion in the 
 REVEILLE, and brought it to the oifice for publication, saying he had "writ 
 it all out of his own head." The advertisement was as follows : 
 
 HUEEAH FOR_STUB S DANCE ! 
 
 STUB WILL HAVE A GRAND BALL 
 
 at International Hotel of Austin, Nevada, on 
 the night of his Birthday, which will be on 
 the 
 
 26th of May, 1876. 
 
 Stub gives a general invitation to all the 
 ^ Ladies and Gents of Austin, and also through 
 out the whole country, for all hands to come. 
 
 Ball Room Directors: 
 
 For President, . 
 
 Officer of the Hall, . 
 
 Floor Directors, ( ? 
 
 Floor Managers, , 
 
 For Inspector, . 
 
 For Door Tender, . 
 
 Special invitation for all the ladies is given by Stub to 
 be on hand. Good Music in attendance. 
 
 ap26-td STUB, Proprietor. 
 
"STUE." 35 
 
 The places in the above which are marked thus, , were in the 
 advertisement as it appeared in the paper filled with the names of the 
 principal business men of the town. Strange to say, they were not at all 
 flattered by the honor done them ; and on the following day several of 
 them called on the editor with clubs, and remonstrated with him. 
 
 The dance came off according to announcement, and was a comical 
 affair. Stub was so anxious to secure a large attendance that he had given 
 nearly every man in town a complimentary ticket. He had gone to an 
 expense of a couple of hundred dollars for hall-rent, music, printing and 
 advertising, etc., and there was not to exceed ten dollars taken in at the 
 door, although the attendance was very large. The ball was, financially, 
 a failure ; but socially, from Stub s standpoint, it was a grand success. To 
 give an idea of Stub s style, I reproduce an item published in the RE 
 VEILLE about this time : 
 
 STUB AS A CALLER. Stub has had a great deal of experience as a 
 caller of the figures in quadrilles, and most of them are original and pecu 
 liar to himself. Stub will call at the grand ball to be given by himself at 
 International Hall on the 26th instant, and those who attend may expect 
 to have their ears regaled with some novel directions. The story is told, 
 that, some time ago, at a dance at lone, there was a young lady on the 
 floor who wore a red calico dress with a brown stripe down the back, and 
 Stub, who was calling the figures, yelled out : " Balance to that line-back 
 heifer ! " If there is one thing more than another that Stub is noted for, 
 it is the exquisite refinement of his language. 
 
 At his birthday dance Stub fully sustained his reputation as a unique 
 and original master of unpolluted English. 
 
 Stub s Name. 
 
 How Stub came to be dubbed " Stub " is a matter that is shrouded 
 in impenetrable mystery. His real name is Charles Burns, but he has been 
 called Stub for so long a time that he would not answer to Charles Burns 
 if that name was shouted in his ear through a speaking-trumpet or a, tele 
 phone. He is very reticent about the acquisition of his non-baptismal 
 name, and refuses to be interviewed on the subject. It is related of him 
 that he once went all through the town of lone looking for himself. Let 
 ters for lone and other places on his route are frequently handed into the 
 office of his express, (which is in one of the principal stores) for personal 
 delivery by the driver. These are put into a way-sack, and at each ranch 
 or stopping-place Stub sorts them over, and picks out and delivers such as 
 may be destined for that particular place. On one occasion there was a 
 letter in the sack directed to " Charles Burns, lone," and it is asserted 
 
36 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 ih:it Stub went to every saloon and every residence and boarding house 
 in the town, and inquired of the inmates if they knew a " feller " named 
 Charles Burns. At last a man who happened to remember Stub s original 
 patronym said : " Charles Burns ? Why, Stub, that must be you." 
 
 44 Well, I ll be dog-goned if it aint ! " said Stub, 4t but why can t 
 people write to a feller by the name he goes by ? " 
 
. 
 
 A bare record of the Sazerac Lying Club s doings as extracted from 
 the minutes would be too monotonous for family perusal, so I have thought 
 it better to make a choice selection of them, duly crediting each one to 
 its author, and carefully guarding against the insertion of a truth. Not 
 that such an adulteration ever occurred, for no member was known to be 
 guilty of such a transgression ; but my own regard for facts might unwit 
 tingly lead me into the pit-fall of interspersing the best stories of the 
 Club with some of my own. 
 
 Matters had been very quiet in the Club for some time, but a member 
 confidentially informed me that when the boys got paid off they would 
 make Rome howl. Consequently an exciting session was to be anticipated 
 that evening. They expected, he said, to initiate a new member, who was 
 prepared to take his solemn oath that he saw a man fall 3,000 feet down an 
 incline without touching its sides, top, or bottom, and that when his fel 
 low workmen reached him he was lighting his pipe with his candle, which 
 he had held in his hand, and which was not extinguished during the de 
 scent. The investigating committee had reported favorably on the man s 
 application for admission, because they thought that was something like a 
 reasonable lie. It should be remarked, that, by a rule of the Club, no mem 
 ber is allowed to tell a lie which might not have been true had such an oc 
 currence taken place. 
 
 On the evening in question, I was on hand early, but although it was not 
 yet seven o clock the Club had already organized, Mr. G. Washington 
 Fibley, the President, occupying his usual position in the chair. As it was 
 the opening night of the session, after calling the roll, the President ad 
 dressed a few remarks to the Club as follows : " Fellow-members of the Ly 
 ing Club I have noticed that it has of late become the custom with certain 
 newspapers to propose for membership in this Club every scrub liar that 
 turns up. This betrays a gross misapprehension of the objects of this noble 
 order. As you are all aware, the objects of this Club are mental culture 
 
38 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 and mutual improvement ; we do not lie for greed or gain, nor do we tol 
 erate that class of liars who by word of mouth deceive their fellow-men 
 for selfish or for wicked ends. No, members of the Club, while we per 
 mit a range of thought extending far away into the most distant depths 
 of the realm of the impossible and the improbable, we do not stoop to the 
 lie of deceit; we ask no man to place implicit belief in our lies but if 
 any man does so believe, he sustains no injury. There, hanging on yonder 
 wall, is the picture of that noble man and illustrious patriot, G. Wash 
 ington, Esq., in the very act of tackling the cherry tree. He could not 
 tell a lie about who cut down that tree ; but, my fellow-members, does any 
 man here present, who possesses ordinary human reasoning, believe that 
 if G. Washington had heard a man tell about catching an eleven-pound 
 trout, he wouldn t have raised him a pound or two, even if he had never 
 seen a trout in all his born days? The first lie of the evening is now in 
 order, and I hope members will restrain their narrations within the bounds 
 required by our constitution and by-laws." 
 
 These remarks being duly applauded, the President, by virtue of his 
 rank, was called on for the first lie. This is a synopsis of what he said, 
 and it is on the records under the title of 
 
 Oozed Into Him. 
 
 While on a recent journey to San Francisco, he shared a section iii 
 the sleeping car with one of the Comstock bonanza kings. The monarch 
 occupied the upper berth, and the President of the Club the lower one. 
 When the latter arrived in San Francisco he felt a peculiar heaviness in 
 his body and limbs, his arms and legs especially being so weighty that he 
 was hardly able to control their motions. He visited a prominent physi 
 cian, who, after diagnosing his case, told him he displayed symptoms of 
 metallic poisoning, and advised him to go to the Ilammam, a bathing 
 ilishment of that name, and get "retorted." He accordingly went to 
 that institution and took a Turkish bath ; and when his pores began to 
 open, silver oozed out of his body, like quicksilver going through a rag. 
 Altogether, he cleaned up a bar valued at $417.92 and a fraction. He 
 says the silver must have oozed into him from the bonanza king in the 
 berth above, that night on the sleeper. 
 
 The admiration that this story aroused was almost enthusiastic, and 
 when the applause had subsided, a member, hitherto unknown to general 
 fame, broached the subject of 
 
 Cleopatra s Needle. 
 
 lie said that he had seen the obelisk at Cairo, (Illinois) and declared 
 that it was over two hundred feet long, and had an eye which even a camel 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 39 
 
 could go through ; at which statement the oldest member of the Club 
 handed in his resignation. " There ought to be a limit to all things, and 
 a story of a needle of that size was too much even for a lying club. Might 
 he ask the size and shape of Cleopatra, and who in thunder Cleopatra was, 
 anyway, that she required such a needle a that?" The President in 
 formed the indignant member that Cleopatra was a colored woman who 
 nursed General George Washington when he was an infant ; he (the Presi 
 dent) was well acquainted with her, and had lived in the same town with 
 her in Old Virginia. 
 
 This indorsement from the President calmed the ruffled feelings of 
 the oldest member, and Cleopatra s Needle naturally suggested to another 
 gentleman present 
 
 A Fossiliferous Lie. 
 
 He had been reading that newspaper paragraph which tells that a 
 snail from the Egyptian Desert was found to be alive after having been 
 glued for four years to a tablet in the British Museum ; but said he, 
 "There s nothing remarkable about that. It isn t a circumstance to an 
 experience of mine. Once, while mining in the limestone over in White 
 Pine, I blasted out a fossil snail, which I kept for a cabinet specimen, and 
 one day it crawled out of the cabinet and bored itself back into the lime 
 stone where it had been imbedded for thirty thousand years before com 
 ing into my possession." 
 
 The impartial reader is left to judge whether the English or the 
 American lie is the most entitled to credence. 
 
 Reading communications being next in order, the President arose and 
 said that a gentleman residing in Virginia City sent in the name of an ap 
 plicant for membership, and that his qualifications for admission were as 
 follows: The applicant was riding on the Virginia and Truckee Railroad, 
 between Virginia and Carson, when a lady from Ohio asked him if he had 
 ever seen another railroad as crooked as the V. & T. " Certainly," replied 
 he ; " back in the Pennsylvania coal regions there is a railroad so crooked 
 that on some of the curves they are obliged to uncouple the rear car to 
 prevent its colliding with the locomotive." The lady bowed, and said 
 that would do very well for crookedness ; but she was heard to remark to 
 her husband that if the bonanzas in Nevada were as big as the liars, it was 
 no wonder there was a heavy discount on silver. 
 
 This lie was received in solemn silence, followed by a murmur of con 
 tempt ; and on motion of Uncle John Gibbons the application was unani 
 mously rejected. No other communication having been received, and the 
 proceedings growing somewhat tame, the President asked if any one could 
 name the author of the following, which he had seen in a San Francisco 
 paper : 
 
40 THE 8AZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 "While the P. M. S. S. Orizaba was on a recent voyage from Portland, 
 Oregon, to San Francisco, during the recent gales, the vessel was carried 
 on the top of a big wave as high as Mount Davidson, and came down with 
 such force that the hull was buried eight feet deep in the sand at the bot 
 tom of the ocean. She stuck fast, and the sailors had to go down over 
 the side and shovel her out before she could proceed on her journey." 
 
 As no one could place this magnificent specimen of nautical fiction, 
 and several members pleaded prior engagements to a poker party, the 
 Club adjourned, subject to the call of the President, 
 
 The Catfish. 
 
 "Has any member anything to offer under the order of business, 
 Welfare of the Club ?" said the President, laying his pipe in the stove- 
 hearth, and taking a "plug" of "sweet navy" from his pocket and biting 
 off a piece. 
 
 " Mr. President, give us a chaw," remarked Mr. Thirsty. 
 
 " Sartingly," replied the Chair, as he handed the plug to him of the 
 arid name, " but did the gentlemen present hear my observation about 
 the order of business?" 
 
 " I heerd it," returned Mr. T., " and will take it up in due course as 
 soon as I have disposed of the business in hand ; I believe it was Solomon 
 who said, No man can do two things to onc t. " Then he carefully and 
 deliberately bit off a " chaw " of the " navy," handed the plug back to the 
 President, "posed" his feet on the stove, and proceeded as follows: 
 
 "Mr. President, you and all the members here present knows that 
 there is a proposition on foot in this here town to plant catfish in Reese 
 River. I don t s pose thar s a gentleman now sittin round this here stove 
 what isn t acquainted with the catfish ; they is not indigen-oous to this 
 country, but we all knowed them in our childhood s days of innocence 
 back yonder in the States. The history of this movement about which 
 I make reference to wit, the plantin of catfish in Reese River is about 
 the size of this : When the railroad was built from the States out here, 
 thf people what had been out here since forty-nine begin to have a hank- 
 erin for the luxuries of their youth. It s a Avell-settled principle, Mr. 
 President, that anything we was fond of in the eatin line, when we was 
 boys, tastes better when tasted through the vista of years than the most 
 luxurious livin a hash-house can afford when we have become men of the 
 w<>rld and drained the cup of luxury down to its very dregs. I want to 
 know if there is any whisky these days in this here country what tastes as 
 sweet and contains as active a intoxicatin principle as the clear juice of 
 the grain we used to git back home when we was jest emergin into man 
 hood ; is thar any cider seen now-a-days as is half so sweet as we used to 
 git it suckin it through a straw in the days gone by? No, sir; not much! 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 41 
 
 "Well, as I was a-sayin , the people of this coast, when they was placed 
 in easy communication with the States, commenced to hanker for the 
 good things of their youth, and the result was a natural one, cordin to the 
 laws of supply and demand. There was a demand for certain things in this 
 country, and people in the States commenced a-shippin of that class of 
 articles to this coast over the railroad. The consequence was winter 
 apples, ches nuts, big oysters, eels, travelin lecturers, catfish, and various 
 other articles what this country don t produce of its own accord. Some 
 fellers they brought out a lot of catfish and planted em in the Sacramento 
 River, and the cats they growed and increased and multiplied the earth, 
 so to speak, till thar was a surplus of em in Californy. Now when Cali- 
 forny has got more of a good thing than she wants herself, she sells the 
 surplus to Nevada, at a pretty considerable figger of profit ; and these fel 
 lers what was runnin this catfish business, they advertised for sealed pro 
 posals from anybody who had any streams they wanted stocked with them 
 kind of fish. This comin under the eye of the enterprisin citizens of this 
 here town, they made up a purse and ordered a lot of the fish for plantin 
 in Reese River. This is the history of the case, and it remains for the 
 members of this here Club to discuss the subjeck." 
 
 A profound silence reigned for a few moments after Mr. Thirsty had 
 concluded his remarks ; and then a member, who has been seven times de 
 feated for the Presidency of the Club, on account of his disposition to cast 
 doubts on the veracity of members, knocked the ashes out of his pipe, 
 rested his elbows on his knees, and his head between his hands, and said : 
 
 "Gentlemen, I ve got my doubts about the feasibility of this here 
 project. S pose they git the fish and put them in the river, how is they 
 goin to git a livin ? Thar s nothin in thar for them to eat, and the 
 whole fit-out will die of starvation." 
 
 " Sho ! " exclaimed Old Dad ; " catfish will eat anything, from a 
 shingle-nail up to a horse-shoe. Why, when I was back home my father 
 bought a catfish from a nigger for a picayune, and when we come to open 
 it thar was a gold watch and chain worth two hundred and ninety dollars 
 and a note of hand for sixty- three dollars, twenty-seven cents, ag in the 
 richest man in the county, inside of it." 
 
 " I s pose your father got on a horse and searched the county to hunt 
 up the owner of that watch and chain, didn t he?" sneeringiy asked the 
 Doubter. 
 
 " Not much," angrily returned Dad. " Look at me, and then tell me 
 if you s pose my father was a nat ral-borned fool. No, sir not much ; he 
 kept the watch and collected the note and the interest on it, which had 
 been runnin seven years." 
 
 "Niggers is great hands for ketchin catfish," remarked the Presi 
 dent, at this stage of the proceedings. " When I was a boy back yonder, 
 we had a nigger on our place what could beat the oldest man in the coun- 
 
42 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 try at enticin of catfish. You all know that thar s a good many ways to 
 ketch catfish, but this here darkey done it by charmin of em." 
 
 " Charmin of em ! " exclaimed the entire Club, in chorus. 
 
 " Yes, sir, charmin of em, that s what I said," resumed the Chair. 
 
 " You see this here darkey had a most pecooliar whistle, and he used 
 to charm em with a whistle, and many and many s the time I ve seed him 
 do it. Our place was close to the river bank, and us boys used to go down 
 thar and dig a big hole about ten feet away from the stream ; then Ave d 
 dig a ditch runnin from the river into the hole, and another runnin out of 
 the hole into the river. "We d fix gates to both ditches, and when we got 
 all ready we d shet the gate leadin out of the hole, and open the one 
 leadin into it, and let the water run through it and fill up the hole. Then 
 the black boy he d squat on a log and whistle, and the catfish would jest 
 come a-sailm in through that ditch inter the hole ; and thar they d stay as 
 still as a mice, with their heads a-stickin out of the water, arid list nin to 
 that whistle as interested-like as if they was at a circus and it was the 
 fust one they had ever seed. When thar was as many fish hi the hole as 
 the seats could accommerdate, one of the boys he d run down and shet the 
 gate leadin from the river, and another he d lift the gate leadin from the 
 hole, and of course the water would commence dreenin out of the hole. 
 But them thar bull-heads would stay right thar with their heads out of the 
 water, never noticin nothin but that whistlin , till the first thing they 
 knowed their tails struck gravel. They d want to take the back track 
 then, but twar nt no use ; they didn t have swimmin room, and us boys 
 we d jest light inter the hole and capture every dog-goned one of em, and 
 what we couldn t eat fresh up to the house we d pickle down for the win 
 ter, besides havin enough material from the insides to manure fifteen or 
 twenty acres of taters." 
 
 " A valuable nigger," observed the Doubter, when the President had 
 concluded. 
 
 * " Yes, he was vallerble," replied the President, " but we never got no 
 money out of him. The neighbors concluded that if that thar nigger was 
 allowed to keep on, thar wouldn t be any more catfish left in the stream in 
 a little while, so enticin him out for a coon hunt one night, they hung him 
 to a lim , and pinned a paper on his coat sayin , in big letters, A Warnin 
 to Whistlin Niggers. " 
 
 " Mr. President, have you said your say on the catfish ? " inquired a 
 member who to all appearance had been asleep during the foregoing nar 
 ration. 
 
 " I ve said my say," replied the Chair. 
 
 " Wai, Mr. President, and gentlemen, thar s more than one way of 
 doin the same thing, as you all will acknowledge, and now, with the N con 
 sent of the Club, I ll tell how we used to ketch catfish back whar I used 
 to live." 
 
 " Does the gentleman have consent ? " queried the Chair. 
 
SOME LIES AND O THEE WISE. 43 
 
 " He do," returned one of the members. 
 
 " The gentleman has unanimous consent, and he will proceed on the 
 catfish question," announced the Chair. 
 
 " Back in the States whar I used to live, the country was alive with 
 ground-hogs, catfish, and niggers. We use to set the niggers to ketchin 
 the ground-hogs, and the ground-hogs to ketchin the catfish. A ground 
 hog is a animal which some people calls a porkypine, and they ll make a 
 dog think he s stuck his nose inter a yaller-jacket s nest ; they re stickier 
 than them prickly pears what grows in the deserts around this section of 
 country. Wai, the niggers they d ketch a ground-hog, and us boys would 
 take a hook and tie about three yards of line to it, and stick it inter the 
 ground-hog s back and chuck him inter the river, and while he was swim- 
 min around and strikin out for dry land, a catfish would come up and open 
 that thar mouth of his n, and down would go Mister ground-hog inter that 
 fish s insides. He is a energetic cuss, is the ground-hog, and loves his lib 
 erty just like a human, and when he found hisself inside that fish, he d 
 commence lightin out for freedom ; he d cut his way through that thar 
 catfish in about thirty-three seconds. Of course, no fish ain t goin to 
 stand a hole the size of a ground-hog in his body, and tain t human natur 
 that it could live up under it, and pritty soon the fish would come belly-up 
 on the water, and we d go out in a skift and yank it in, and the porky- 
 pine as some people call it he d go sailin down stream to do the thing 
 over ag in with another fish, and when we had all the fish we wanted, we d 
 row the skift up to the ground-hog and grab the piece of line, and snail 
 him inter the boat and give him to the niggers, for their share of the ketch." 
 As the above narration drew towards a close, the Doubter s eyes be 
 gan to twinkle and his lips to twitch, and every member present knew in 
 stinctively that there was something on his mind. There was. Address 
 ing the Chair, he said : 
 
 " May I ask the gentleman who preceded me a trifling, unimportant 
 question ? " 
 
 The decision of the Chair being called for, it decided to suspend the 
 rules and allow the question to be asked. 
 
 " All I want to know is, how much bigger and heavier that ground-hog 
 was when he had got through catchin catfish, than he was when he com 
 menced." 
 
 The preceding gentleman didn t think he could answer the question, 
 but would like to know what the skeptic was driving at by asking it. 
 
 "Oh, nothin much," was the reply, "only I thought he must have 
 swelled considerable from eating so much catfish, and I was a-wonderin 
 whether the darkeys what eat him didn t git about as much catfish to 
 their meal as they did ground-hog." 
 
 Here the President s gavel fell. Rising to his feet, and taking his 
 quid out of his mouth and sticking it on the under side of his chair-seat, he 
 said: 
 
44 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 " Gentlemen of the Sazerac Lying Club : You may, perhaps, have 
 noticed that, during the discussion this evening, I have permitted a wider 
 latitude than is actually rulablc under our Constitution and by-laws. I 
 have did it on this occasion in the hope that the gentleman what is contin- 
 i 1-ly castin doubts on the remarks of members might receive a rebuke what 
 would make him forever after hold his peace ; but I see it is leniency thrown 
 away, and from this on, any member of this here Club what asks a frivo 
 lous question for the purpose of impeachin the lie of a brother member, 
 shall be considered as having been stuck for the drinks for the crowd. 
 With these few remarks I now declare the Club adjourned for the evenin , 
 and if any member has the wherewithal in his clothes, and feels inclined 
 to make a jingle on the counter for that purpose, we will proceed to hold 
 an informal session at the bar." 
 
 No member showing a willingness to make the jingle, the barkeeper 
 said he guessed he would stand the " night-caps " if they would take them 
 "straight," and not bother him to fix mixed drinks; to which proposition 
 they all hastily assented, and, headed by their presiding officer, filed to the 
 bar and denominated their stimulant. 
 
 An Affectionate Fish. 
 
 On the evening succeeding that on which the proceedings above nar- . 
 rated were had, the Club assembled around the stove at the usual hour, 
 and the roll being called, the President opened the meeting with a few 
 remarks, as follows : 
 
 "Gentlemen of the Sazerac Lying Club: We had a very edifying 
 meeting last night one which reflected the utmost credit on not only the 
 members engaged in the debate, but on the Club at large, and which 
 demonstrated to my entire satisfaction that as liars we are unapproach 
 able; that interest in our organization is still maintained, and that not 
 withstanding that there is a prospect that death may one day enter our 
 charmed circle and carry off its brightest ornaments, we still feel that the 
 eyes of the world are upon us, and that we have a bounden duty to per 
 form in keeping up the standard of American lying. The subject under 
 lisc-ussion last night, as many of you may remember, was catching fish 
 catfish in particular. Gentlemen, there is nothing which affords so wide 
 a range for the talents of the liar, which offers more opportunities for 
 economizing the truth as the subject of fishing. Therefore, should mem 
 bers decide to continue the discussion under that head, the Chair will not 
 only not interpose no objections, but will personally see to it that mem 
 bers are not annoyed with interruptions from any source, either within or 
 without the pale of this Club." 
 
 The Chair, as it concluded the above remarks, hitched up its waist- 
 l).-ind, threw its coat-tail aside so as to display the ivory handle of its six- 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 45 
 
 shooter, and bent its eyes on the Doubter, who shrank and cowered under 
 the searching Presidential gaze. 
 
 " Gentlemen, are you ready for business ?" asked the Chair. 
 
 " We are," replied the member who never makes any remarks except 
 to answer the President s queries, call for " the question," and vote aye 
 and no ; but always tells on the outside what splendid arguments we had 
 in the Club last night. 
 
 " Then proceed," observed the Chair. 
 
 Old Dad rose up, and scratched his head, and then sut down again, 
 saying : 
 
 " I pass." 
 
 Then a newly elected member squirted a stream of tobacco juice on 
 Uncle John s rheumatic foot, and said : 
 
 " Mr. President and gentlemen, speaking about fish and other ani 
 mals, don t you know thar is some animals as knows as much as a 
 human ? " 
 
 "Some humans," interrupted the Doubter; but a glance from the 
 Chair caused him to subside. 
 
 " Yes," continued the new comer, " some brutes knows a heap ; and 
 not ojily that, but they is capable of feeling attachment and affection. 
 You all know how lovin a dog or a horse can be to his master ; but taint 
 often you hear tell about an affectionate fish. Is it, Mr. President ? " 
 
 The Chair said: "Not very." 
 
 " Wai, when I was a boy, I once run acrost a fish what was stuck 
 after me worse than a boy after playin hookey. I was visitin over at an 
 uncle s of mine what lived about fourteen miles from our house ; and one 
 day, when I was down to the crik, I seed a perch in the water. It was 
 a awful pritty fish, with red speckles all over its back, and as shiny as a 
 Carson dollar. I was goin to run up to the house for a hook and line, 
 when it stuck its head up out of the water, and looked at me kind of 
 knowin like. It didn t seem to be a bit afeared of me ; and when I stuck 
 my finger down to rds it, it snapped and nibbled at it jest like you ve seen 
 a pet rooster do. I had a hunk of bread and lasses in my pocket [I 
 always used to go heeled with bread and lasses those days, for fear of 
 accidents, jest as I go heeled now with a six-shooter, as you might observe 
 by lookin close] and I broke off some crumbs, and give em to the perch, 
 and he eat em out of my hand as tame as a kitten. Then I put my hand 
 under him, and lifted him out of the water, and stroked him down the 
 back, jest like you would a dog ; but he never fluttered, but lay there kind 
 of peaceful like, and lookin up inter my eyes, as though he liked that sort 
 of business. Wai, after a while I put him back inter the water, and went 
 up to the house, and told about it ; and my grandmother on my father s 
 side, who was stoppin at my aunt and uncle s, said I had a gift ; that she 
 once knowed a man who had a gift like that, who went to the Sandwich 
 
46 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 I viands, and charmed rhinocerouses, so that they could drive em like 
 L-Tses in the king s carriage ; and he d a got rich at it, only the cannibals 
 c:it him up. His gift was only for dumb animals, and didn t have no effeck 
 on cannibals. Wai, I used to go down to the crik every morning, and 
 feed that perch ; and when he d hear me a-comin , he d commence splashin 
 the water for joy and gladness. Finally, one day, my folks sent for me in 
 a hurry to come home, and I had to take the back track and leave my 
 fish. Gentlemen, you can imagine the affection of that fish for me when I 
 tell you he follered me home. Yes, sir, actually traveled forty-three miles 
 afoot to our house ; and when I got up one mornin , thar he was, with a 
 willow stuck through his gills, hangin on to the latch of the front door." 
 
 " Was he still alive ? " asked the Doubter. 
 
 " Certainly not," was the reply ; " do you s pose a fish could travel 
 fifty-four miles afoot, and stand up under the strain ? No, sir, he was 
 dead ; but a finer tastin fish than that affectionate creeter was when he 
 was fried, you never eat in your life." 
 
 The Doubter wanted the Chair s permission to ask how the narrator 
 identified the perch which hung on the latch with the one in the stream ; 
 but was unanimously and by a large majority ruled out of order, and the 
 Club declared adjourned. 
 
 Applications for Membership. 
 
 " Mr. Seccertary, be there any applications for membership ?" inquired 
 the President, at the conclusion of the roll-call. 
 
 " Yes, sir," replied the Secretary ; " here is two applications on my 
 desk." 
 
 " The Seccertary will read." 
 
 " Here is one from a feller in San Francisco, who says he s a news 
 paper editor, and therefore duly qual " 
 
 " Hold ! " exclaimed Old Dad ; " them newspaper fellers can t lie." 
 
 " I beg to differ with the gentleman," remarked the Doubter; "I was 
 readin of an account in a paper this mornin relatin of a occurrence 
 whereby a young lady run a needle into her foot a great many years ago, 
 and after she had got married and her children had got married and had 
 children, that thar needle one day came out of the top of one of her grand 
 children s head a leetle bit rusted, of course, but the same identical 
 needle. Now if that aint a lie, I d like to know what you call it." 
 
 " Sho ! " said Dad ; " that s a common occurrence ; why, back in the 
 States I knowed a woman what swallowed a " 
 
 " I move the previous question, and call for the decision of the Chair 
 on the newspaper man," interrupted the Doubter. 
 
 u Gentlemen," said the President, clearing his throat and winking at 
 the barkeeper, who understood the hint, and proceeded to fix it up, with a 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 47 
 
 little sour in it, " gentlemen, this here question of the admission of news 
 paper editors into this here Club, is one of the gravest as has ever dis 
 turbed our deliberations. It has been held by competent authority that 
 editors can t lie. For myself I m not prepared to speak on the subjeck ; 
 but in giving my decision on this here point, I will simply refer members 
 to article hunderd and nineteen of our constitution and by-laws, which 
 expressly forbids and prohibits the admission of professional liars into 
 membership in this here Club. Them s my sentiments, and the Secretary 
 will proceed with that there other application." 
 
 The Secretary, who had just had his "pedro" caught, arose from the 
 table, and holding the remaining cards up towards the Chair, said : 
 
 " I hold in my hand an application for membership from a gentleman 
 as signs himself Honorable Ananias Truefact. He s a stranger in town, but 
 has jest caught my pedro nevertheless, and this is him settin at this here 
 table." 
 
 " Are his qualifications for membership stated in writing in his ap 
 plication ? " queried the Chair. 
 
 " No," replied the Secretary, "but he has informed me in confidence 
 that he was borned with an impediment in his speech which positively 
 prevents his tellin the truth." 
 
 The question was put on the admission of Mr. Truefact, and carried, 
 with but one dissenting vote. That one was cast by the Doubter, who in 
 explanation of his vote stated that he didn t " take no stock in natural 
 but only in cultivated liars." 
 
 The New Member Speaks. 
 
 On the announcement of the vote, the newly elected member was in 
 vited to enter the charmed circle, requested to sign the constitution and 
 by-laws, and questioned by the Chair as to his ability to comply with the 
 rule requiring newly elected members to " set them up for the boys." 
 
 The stranger did not look like a Bonanza King, or a bloated bond 
 holder or monopolist, or an aristocrat, and as he arose to answer the 
 Chair s query as to his financial status, admitted that appearances were 
 against him, which they surely were. His boots were down at the heel, 
 his shirt (he wore no coat) full of holes, his hat battered and bent, and the 
 seat of his pants patched with a quarter-section of a flour sack. 
 
 " G-g-gentlemen," he said, " I m-m-must admit th-a-at I m imp-p-p- 
 c-c-cunyus, b-b-b-but n-n-nev r desp-p-pise a man b-b-b-cause he wears a 
 r-r-r-ragged coat." 
 
 " We don t," spoke up Uncle John. " Stranger, its allowable in this 
 here Club for a new member to have his treat paid for by a old member by 
 proxy. I ll be your proxy on this glorious occasion ; step up, boys, and 
 nominate your pizen." 
 
48 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 The Club here took a recess for the disposal of the poison, and that 
 ceremony being over, were again called to order by the Chair, and as 
 soon as the members were settled in their seats, Old Dad called for a lie 
 from the new member. 4 
 
 " G-g-gentlem n and M-m-mister P-p-president," stuttered Mr. True- 
 fact, " I ain t m-m-much on the lie ; b-b-but I ll relate a oc-c-c-cur-rence 
 what t-t-took p-p-lace onc t when I was a b-b-b-boy, in th earlier and 
 p-p-p-purer d-d-d-days of this here Rep-p-p-public. You may some of yer 
 p-p-perhaps have n-n-n-noticed that I ve got a imp-p-p-ediment in my 
 sp-p-peech. It was in the c-c-c-city of B-b-b-bosting, and I was a 
 g-g-g-goin along one d-d-d-day out in the outsk-k-k-skirts, when I s-s-s-seed 
 a b-b-b-bildin a-f-f-f-fire. T-t-t-was a tr -m-m-m-mendous b-b-big b-b-b-bild- 
 in , m-m-mor n t-t-Uwo hund-d-dred f-f-feet high, and 1-1-large otherw-w- 
 ways in prop-p-portion. T-t-her w-w-warn t n-n-n-nobody b-b-b-but me in 
 s-s-sight, and I s-tart-t-ted t-t-ter g-g-g-give t-t-t her al-1-larm b-b-by hol-1- 
 lerin f-f-fire, and " 
 
 "And I spose the buildin burned to the ground before you could get 
 the word Fire out of your mouth ? " interrupted the Chair. 
 
 " T-t-that s j-j-j-just it," returned Ananias, ; b-b-but d-d-d-does t-t-the 
 r-r-r-rules o f t-t-this Cl-l-lub p-p-p-per-nvin-mit t-t-th C-c-c-chair t-t-to ant-t- 
 ticipate a m-m-m-mem-b-b-ber s H-l-lie ? " 
 
 A Picnic. 
 
 
 
 The President decided that the rules were capable of such a construc 
 tion when the member stuttered, and announced that the Club would now 
 proceed to business under the head " Motions and Resolutions," where 
 upon a hitherto obscure member rose and said : 
 
 " Mr. President and gentlemen of the Club, you is all aware that the 
 Fourth of July are almost upon us that glorious day which witnessed 
 the birth of him who was first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts 
 of his countrymen. I need not recount to you the history of that there 
 man, or is it absolutely necessary that I should here repeat to you that 
 touching and beautiful story about his cutting down the cherry-tree, and 
 owning up to it like a little man, when he was as good as caught in the 
 act, and knowed there was nobody else on the place what was liable to 
 have got away with the fruit-tree. It is a story familiar to you all, and one 
 which is impressed in letters of living fire on the heart of every true 
 American. But in this connection, Mr. President, I wish to suggest that 
 this Club ought to celebrate the anniversary of the Fourth of July in some 
 fitting and appropriate manner; and, as we can t raise the money for 
 fire- works, I move you, sir, that this here Club have a picnic. The Pest- 
 house is now empty of patients, and anybody can hev the use of the 
 buildin ; I would therefore renew my motion that this here Club hev a 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 49 
 
 picnic on the Fourth of July at the Pest-house grounds, and that that thar 
 buildin , in the absence of shade from which this locality is known to be 
 suffering be used as a depositary to shelter the refreshments from the 
 sun s rays." 
 
 " Do I hear a second ? " asked the Chair. 
 
 " I second the motion," replied the member who answers all the 
 questions of the Chair, and votes aye and no for the other members. 
 
 "And I," spoke up Mr. Thirsty, " move that the Chair appoint a com 
 mittee to wait on the saloons and solicit contributions of refreshments for 
 the use of the Club at the proposed picnic." 
 
 The Aye-and-N"o Member called for the question and voted aye, and 
 the Chair declared all motions before the house carried, and the Club 
 adjourned for the evening. 
 
 No Picnic. 
 
 When the Club assembled on the evening following the meeting above 
 recorded, the President announced that he regretted to state that, owing 
 to the sudden appearance of a case of small-pox, which now occupied the 
 Pest-house, and an evident indisposition on the part of the saloon keepers 
 to furnish the requisite refreshments, the Club would dispense with the 
 picnic which had been resolved on at the last meeting. 
 
 Old Dad said he didn t like picnics, "no way." 
 
 Uncle John remarked that he was afraid of wood-ticks, " which was 
 powerful plentiful down there to the Pest-house." 
 
 The President remarked that picnics especially picnics without fluid 
 refreshments were a relic of the barbarism of by-gone ages. 
 
 Mr. Truefact got so far as to say that " p-p-pic-n-n-n-nics w-w-was a 
 
 insti-t-t-tu " when he was interrupted by the Doubter, who hinted that 
 
 he had had all the picnics he " wanted in his n " in the early days in Cali 
 fornia. 
 
 "Will the member be kind enough to relate his experience?" said 
 the President. 
 
 The Doubter took a fresh chew of tobacco, straightened up in his 
 chair, crossed one leg over the other, and proceeded to relate : 
 
 An Unpleasantness with a Bear. 
 
 " Onc t in Californy I think it was along in fifty me and five or six 
 other fellers was minin up on the south fork of the Yuba. Thar wasn t 
 much in the way of amusements them days, as the boys worked pritty 
 stiddy, makin hay while the sun was a-shinin leastways, them as had 
 good diggin s. Of course, thar was faro and Spanish rnonte for high 
 
50 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 stakes, and draw-poker for a big ante, and maybe an occasional fight or 
 shootin scrape, or that kind of recreations; but such divarsions as picnics, 
 and camp-meetin s, and goin to church, and school exhibitions, and con 
 certs, and theaters, and them kind of rational amusements, such as is so 
 common these days, was unknown in the mines in Oaliforny in them early 
 days, long in the fall of forty-nine and the spring of fifty. 
 
 " Up in a ravine in the mountings, bout three miles above our cabin, 
 thar was one of the prittiest springs I ever laid eyes on, with willers all 
 round it, and grass till you couldn t rest. Some of the boys what was in 
 clined to put on airs used to go up there Sundays and take a wash, and 
 they got to talkin one day bout what a gay place it would be for a pic 
 nic, purvidin thar was only some gals and other necessaries for such a in 
 stitution. 
 
 " One of my pardners was a feller named Pike they called him that 
 cause he come from Pike County, Missoury. He was one of them fellers 
 what aint afraid of nothin what walks or talks, but the quietest, silentest 
 critter you ever seed, and he had so little to say, even when he was drinkin , 
 and was always so good-natured and smilin like, that a stranger would a 
 thought thar warn t no sand in him, and he wouldn t fight nothin . But 
 he allers carried a big bowie in his boot-leg and a dragoon six-shooter in 
 his shirt, and would fight a rattlesnake and give it the fust bite. He 
 warn t quarrelsome a bit, but was powerful tender on his honor, and if a 
 man would objek to his way of dealin the keards, or allow that his folks 
 wasn t one of the fust families of Missoury, Pike was liable to start in and 
 make a starter for a graveyard. Thar couldn t nothin excite him ; I s pose 
 he could have cut a man s head off without ever crackin a smile, and I actu 
 ally b leeve you might a turned a cannon loose alongside his ear, and he 
 wouldn t a started, but jest turn round and say, in that quiet way of his: 
 
 " Stranger, does your gun kick ? It makes a powerful loud report. 
 
 "Wai, to come down to the picnic, when Pike heard the boys a-talkin 
 on the subjeck, he spoke up and says, says he : Boys, s pose we have a 
 picnic next Sunday, instid of goin to town on the usual hurrah ? And 
 some of the other boys says : S posen we do ? Wai, we talked it all 
 over and concluded that a picnic wouldn t be a bad go ; and afore we went 
 to bed that night we had concluded all the preliminaries, as you may say. 
 One of the boys was to go to town and git the fluids and a few decks of 
 cards, another was to cook a. pot of beans and bake a batch of bread, and 
 the rest of us was to stand in and do all we could to help the thing along. 
 
 " At last the Sunday came along when we was to have the picnic. 
 Some of the boys had been out the night before and borrowed a burro* 
 belonging to some Mexicans what was minin down the river a piece, and 
 though they was as quiet as possible about it, they did have to fire one 
 shot, but only wounded the Mexican, and he didn t die for five days. 
 
 *A Mexican donkey. 
 
SOME LIES AND THEE WISE. 51 
 
 They staked the burro out near the cabin, and next mornin bright and 
 early we tumbled out and got ready for the picnic. We got a aparayho* 
 and put it on the burro, and packed on the whisky, and the bread, and the 
 beans, and the cards, and a f ryin -pan and coffee-pot, and such other things 
 as might come needful, and when everything was ready we started up the 
 ravine drivin the burro ahead of us. 
 
 " Boys, sometimes when I think of the disastrousness of that picnic, it 
 makes me feel as if I d like to go off some place and bag my head. But 
 never mind ! 
 
 " Wai, we got to the spring at last, and the fust thing to do was to 
 unpack the animile and git things in shape for a camp. Some of the 
 boys went out to i rastle for some dry wood for a fire, others gathered 
 and heaped up a lot of dry leaves, and me and Pike went to work to ar 
 range the refreshments. The joltin of the pack on the burro comin up 
 the ravine had disarranged the refreshments some, and I was tryin 
 to save some of the whisky into the coffee-pot from the broken demijohn, 
 and Pike wajs a-fishin some of the decks of cards out of the beans and 
 a-scrapin of them off, when Pike, he turned round and smiled, and says 
 he in that quiet way of his, jest as easy and natural like as he d say, Boys, 
 let s take a drink, and without ever crackin a smile, says he : 
 
 " GRIZZLY BA R ! TAKE A TREE ! 
 
 "And he got up and walked to a tree in his reg lar, natural gait, never 
 showin no signs of excitement, and climbed up the tree as though he was 
 a-goin up stairs in one of them elevators you hear about in them fust-class 
 hotels down to Frisco. 
 
 " I was too fur from a tree, and the ba r was too clus to me that s 
 the whole history of the case and hap nin to throw my eye over my 
 shoulder, thar he was, right behind me, not over three feet off, a genuine 
 grizzly, and you fellers what has lived and mined in the Serry Nevadys 
 knows what that means. 
 
 " One of the boys had brung along his double-bar led gun, and it was 
 layin on the ground clus to me, and I thought if I could only reach that 
 thar gun I d have something like an even show with the bar. The other 
 boys was up in the trees, waitin to see the circus open, and hollerin to me 
 to grab that gun. I knew she was loaded chock up to the muzzle with 
 slugs and old nails and other rubbish, and if ever I got in -the first shot on 
 the ba r I d have the best of the unpleasantness ; so, throwin myself back- 
 ards, and turnin a hand-spring, I landed on the ground right alongside 
 the gun. You better bet yer boots, boys, I wasn t slow in takin aim ; but 
 the consarned ba r was bout as quick as me, and before I could turn loose 
 he made a bounce at me, and grabbed the bar l of that thar gun atween 
 
 *Aparejo A sort of cushion used by the Mexicans and native Californians as a 
 pack-saddle. 
 
THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 his teeth, with the muzzle pintin down his throat. I was skeer t some, but 
 I knowed enough to pull both triggers to onc t, and the way that old gun 
 kicked lifted me out of all reach of danger, and separated me and the ba r 
 about forty-five feet. When I come to, which was in about a minnit, I 
 raised up and looked for the ba r, expectin to see nothin but little bits of 
 him scattered on the ground. But I didn t. Thar he set, setten up on his 
 ha nches, and retchin kinder violent like, and pritty soon he began to puke 
 up slugs, and old nails, and door-hinges, and other trash that had been 
 loaded in that double-bar led gun. Pike, he come down out of the tree 
 and looked at the animal s tongue and felt its pulse, and remarked that it 
 was the sickest grizzly ba r he ever seed, and Jim Stackpole he held its 
 head so s it could vomit easy, and the rest on us got the pack ropes and 
 some lariats, and commenced tyin up the ba r to make a prisoner of him. 
 " We didn t have no picnic, cause when the gun kicked me I upset the 
 beans, and the cards was all tramped out of shape by the ba r, and the 
 whisky, barrin a few drops, had all run out on the grass from the busted 
 demijohn ; and we didn t feel as cheerful anyway as men ought to feel to 
 make a picnic a success. 
 
 " When we got the ba r tied up, we packed him on the burro, and took 
 the back track, and on the way home we met some fellers what was huntin 
 a ba r for a bull-and-ba r fight up to Nevada City, and don t you know, 
 Dad, (turning to that individual) that s the very same ba r you had in that 
 bull-and-ba r fight up to Nevada City, of which you was tellin about at a 
 previous meetin of this Club ? " 
 
 " Very likely," said Dad, " I remember noticin that the ba r on that 
 occasion seemed kinder sick like." 
 
 At this point the barkeeper announced that it was time to shut up for 
 the night, and he hoped that in adjourning the stuttering member would 
 take the usual thing, and not try to order some new-fangled drink, as this 
 house didn t propose to run till daylight for no set of stiffs that ever herded 
 a stove. 
 
 Mr. Truefact took the " usual thing," and the other members likewise 
 took theirs " straight," and the Club was declared adjourned for the even- 
 
 Rogers s Dog. 
 
 * Thar s good duck-huntin over in Smoky Valley," said Uncle John, 
 as he settled himself in his seat to take part in the discussion, in the 
 Sazerac Lying Club, at a recent meeting of that organization. 
 
 " I like to hunt ducks," remarked Old Dad, "but this here do- of 
 mine" (patting the animal on the head) "aint much on retrievin ducks no 
 more ; but he s lightnin on rabbits and kioties, or anything as runs on 
 four legs." 
 
 " He aint no better at that than Rogers s dog is," observed the 
 President. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 53 
 
 "What can Rogers s dog do that, nobody else s dog can t?" sneer- 
 ingly asked the Doubter. 
 
 " Well, gentlemen," said the Chair, " if you ll come to order, and that 
 member behind the stove will quit snappin spittle off n that quill tooth 
 pick into my eye, I ll tell you what Rogers s dog can do that nobody else s 
 dog can t." 
 
 The censured member stuck his tooth-pick over his ear, and remarked 
 that he didn t know she was shooting that far, and the President pro 
 ceeded : 
 
 " Rogers, he took his dog and his gun and went down into the valley 
 the other day, to see if he couldn t drum up somethin to shoot. You all 
 know his dog, and that it s a sizeable pointer. Wai, Rogers and the dog 
 they beat around in the sagebrush for quite a while without seein a hair 
 or a feather, and was both on em gittin kind of disgusted like, when up 
 jumps a kioty right square in front of the dog. Rogers is a sportsman and 
 a hunter, he is, and he wasn t goin to waste his ammernishon and pros-ti- 
 tute his skill for the killin of a mean, cowardly, sneakin , ornery wolf ; so 
 he jest sicked the dog on the animile and told him to seize him. Now, 
 you all know that a kioty won t stan up to a dog unless he s cornered, and 
 if he s got runnin room he ll run, and bein willin to give the devil his 
 due I will say it for a kioty that when he sets out to run he does the 
 business right squar up to the handle. Wai, this here kioty, he looked 
 up and he seed Rogers s dog, and heered Rogers tellin of the animal to 
 4 seize him, and he had sense enough to know that thar was liable to be 
 trouble in that neighborhood pritty soon. So he jest turned tail and 
 commenced to light out, and Buster which is Rogers s dog s given name 
 he lit out too, and away they went over the ground and through the brush, 
 it bein nip and tuck atwixt them, but the kioty havin slightly the best 
 of it on account of gittin a little the start in the beginnin . They must 
 hev run that way for about a mild, with the dog s nose plum up agin the 
 tip of the kioty s tail and not darin to snap for fear of losin ground, 
 when the kioty thought he saw the hole what he occupied as his own fam 
 ily residence, and without stoppin to make sure, he shot into that thar hole 
 like he was shot out of a gun. Buster was a-goin so fast, he wasn t no- 
 ticin no holes and he couldn t stopped himself if he had, and in he goes 
 after mister kioty. Now, gentlemen, it so happened that thi^ here hole 
 wasn t a kioty-hole at all, but jest a squirrel-hole ; but the kioty was so 
 scart he wasn t particular, and Buster wanted that kioty so bad he didn t 
 stop to notice the difference ; and thar they was, both in the hole in the 
 ground, and Rogers a-comin up as fast as he could, and wonderin what 
 had become of his dog and that kioty. He don t believe in ghosts, cause 
 he never saw a real out-and-out ghost, but ghosts is a subjeck open to a 
 good deal of argyment, howsomever. As he didn t s pose for a moment that 
 them animals had gone inter the squirrel hole, and as he couldn t see em 
 in sight, he sorter concluded they must be absconded some way super- 
 
54 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 nat ral like, .and after huntin around in the brush for a couple of hours, 
 he concluded to go home, as he was powerful dry, his whisky hevin give 
 out, and likewise some hungry. The place whar he missed the dog was 
 on one side of a little risin ground what makes a little low hill in the val 
 ley, e.ytendm over a couple of miles to the slope on the^ther side. Wai, 
 gentlemen, to come to the p int, when Rogers got over in this other ^sk%>e, 
 he heer d a kind of scramblin noise, like as if it was underground, and 
 he couldn t make out to account for it no way. But jest as he got to the 
 foot of this low hill on the other side, he seed somethin pop out of the 
 ground, and in about a minnit thar was somethin else came shootin out h 
 that hole. Them somethin s, gentlemen, was that kioty and Buster, which 
 Rogers he recognized in a minnit, notwithstandin that every bit of his 
 hair had been rubbed off as clean as if it had been shaved with a fazor. 
 The kioty was plum give out, but Buster was jest gittin his second wind, 
 and he bounced that air wolf and held it down till Rogers could come 
 up and beat it to death with rocks." 
 
 "Now," said the President, looking sternly at the Doubter, "can any 
 gentleman here present tell me if he knows on another ninety-four pound 
 pointer dog as can pursoo a kioty four miles and a half underground 
 through a squirrel-hole ? " 
 
 " I can t," spoke up the Doubter ; " no more do I s pose I could tell 
 about anybody s kioty as could squeeze that many miles in front of a dog 
 through a openin and underground passage like that thar squirrel-hole." 
 
 The Chair looked as black as a thunder-cloud, and was reaching its 
 hand around to the back part of its waistband, when the Secretary, one of 
 whose duties it is to prevent bloodshed and smooth over the ruffled waters 
 of any dissensions which may arise in the Club, spoke up, and said : 
 
 " Mr. President." 
 
 " The Seccertary has the floor," said the President, as he removed his 
 hand from his hip and wiped his nose with his coat-sleeve, at the same 
 time smoothing the wrinkles from his troubled brow. 
 
 "Mr. President," resumed the Secretary, "your account of that there 
 dog of Rogers s reminds me of a incident I once knowed to happen to 
 a cat." 
 
 "The Seccertary will relate," was announced from the Chair 
 
 Thereupon the Scribe proceeded to narrate as follows : 
 
 The Fate of a Cat. 
 
 " It gits pritty cold in this country sometimes, but it aint a patchin 
 to what it is back in the State of Wisconsin, whar I come from. It gits 
 so cold thar that I ve knowed it to freeze a river four foot solid in a single 
 night. Well, durin one of these cold spells our folks had a cat, and that 
 air cat turned up missin one mornin . My folks set a good deal of store 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 55 
 
 by the animile, and my little sister was afflicted more particular than the 
 rest of us. But twarn t no use ; the cat was gone, and all the huntin in 
 the country didn t have no effeck in findin it. Thar was a pond close to 
 the house, and we finally decided that the cat had somehow got in thar 
 and the ice had froze over so quick it had froze her fast afore she could 
 git out. And we wasn t very far out n the way ; for when that pond be 
 gin to thaw and the ice to break up in the spring, we found the cat, and, 
 gentlemen, whar do you suppose we found the animile?" 
 
 The Doubter answered that he supposed the Secretary expected the 
 Club to believe that they had found the cat in the pond ; that it had been 
 imbedded in the ice all winter, and when they gave it a little brandy and 
 warmed it up by the stove, it ravenously devoured seven pounds of beef 
 steak. 
 
 "Not much," returned the Secretary; "we found the cat, when spring 
 opened, down in the bottom of the well, which it had fell in ; and though 
 slightly soft, the corpse was in a good state of preservation, considerin the 
 circumstances. It was one of them kind of cats what didn t have no nine 
 lives ; otherwise, we might have found it in the pond, under the circum 
 stances foreshadowed by the skeptical gentleman on the other side of the 
 stove." 
 
 Whereupon the Club adjourned for the evening. 
 
 Deacon Toughly. 
 
 Deacon Toughly belongs to that class known in Nevada communi 
 ties as the " Old Boys," which signifies that he is a Pacific Coast pioneer, 
 and arrived in California in the golden days, when whisky was four bits a 
 drink, and flour and other necessaries sold at rates in proportion. Why, 
 where, when, and how he acquired the cognomen of "Deacon" I have not 
 been able to learn, though I have made diligent inquiries of his friends, 
 and tried to worm it out of the Deacon himself. Nobody in Austin ever 
 saw him inside of a church, and he never had more than a mere bowing 
 acquaintance with the preachers ; likewise he was given to elaborate pro 
 fanity at times, having a remarkable aptitude in the construction of novel 
 oaths and expletives. His manner was always fatherly and dignified, but 
 his marked disregard for cleanliness detracted somewhat from the dignity 
 he constantly assumed. He may have acquired his deaconship from the 
 following circumstance : When, if greeted by a friend or acquaintance, 
 he was asked, "How s times, Deacon," his invariable reply was : 
 
 " My son, these here times reminds me of that air good old hymn we 
 use to sing back yonder when I was a boy, 
 
 " Shoo (shew) pity, Lord ! O Lord, forgive, 
 Let a repenting sinner live. " 
 
 The exact connection between the words of the hymn and the state of 
 
56 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 business in Austin was something which no fellow could find out ; but it 
 is, perhaps, possible that this display of knowledge of religious literature 
 was what earned for Mr. Toughly the title of " Deacon." 
 
 The Deacon had done a great deal of prospecting in his day, and at 
 the time of which I write was enormously wealthy in his mind. That 
 is, he owned a lot of remotely situated mines which he believed to be fab 
 ulously rich, but which he could not have disposed of for ten cents an 
 acre. He had no source of income, yet he managed to live, and was never 
 known to ask anything in charity. His home was a little stockade cabin, 
 with a dirt roof and a dirt floor, to which he only retired at night when 
 the last light in town was extinguished, or in the day-time to prepare his 
 simple meals, the greater portion of his time being spent in the streets and 
 saloons. And the happiest moments of the Deacon s life were when he 
 was comfortably settled in front of the stove in a saloon, with a crowd of 
 "old stiffs" about him listening to the relation of his experiences. On 
 such occasions the old gentleman was a whole lying club in himself. 
 
 Deacon Toughly was tall, but slightly stoop-shouldered, and his gen 
 eral make-up and appearance were not by any means imposing, and had it 
 not been for the dignity which encompassed him, and his well-known ca 
 pacity for taking up extensions on the truth, he would not have been a 
 person to attract more than a mere passing notice. He had a pair of 
 small, sharp, black eyes, which, however, owing to a habit of blinking his 
 eyelids, were seldom visible ; his head, save a few straggling gray hairs on 
 top, and a lock on each side, falling down to his cheeks and hiding his 
 ears, was destitute of hirsute covering, and as smooth and shiny as a new 
 school-globe. His forehead was decorated with a pair of steel-bowed 
 " specs," which the oldest inhabitant did not remember ever having seen 
 the Deacon looking through, and that is why I designate them a decoration. 
 His shirt was always dirty, and he on all occasions wore a paper collar 
 that had been turned wrong side out, the right side having probably been 
 utilized by some citizen of Austin other than the Deacon, who had cast 
 the collar aside when too much soiled to longer contribute to his own per 
 sonal adornment. A greasy and tobacco-stained vest, a rusty, snuff-colored 
 coat that had once been black, a pair of pants turned up at the bottoms 
 so as to make them somewhat in accord with the length of the wearer s 
 legs, a dilapidated white plug hat, a stout stick, and a stream of tobacco 
 juice running from each corner of his mouth, completed the Deacon s 
 costume. 
 
 Deacon Toughly had never attended the re-unions in the Sazerac ; he 
 had his favorite houses, and this saloon was not one of them. But when 
 the Sazerac Lying Club began to be "agitated" in the REVEILLE, he read 
 the accounts of its proceedings in that sheet, and accosted me on the street 
 one evening and questioned me regarding that organization : 
 
 " Look here, my son," he said, " what s all that you re puttin of in the 
 paper about that air Sazerac Lyin Club?" 
 
80 ME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 57 
 
 I assured the Deacon that there was such an institution in Austin as 
 that to which he referred, and pointed with niy finger to the Sazerac 
 Saloon, informing him that it was in there that the nightly lying sessions 
 were held. 
 
 " And them there fellers think they can lie f " questioned the Deacon, 
 with emphasis. 
 
 " They most assuredly do," I replied. 
 
 " Wai, my son, I ll drap in there some night and jest go em a rattle ; 
 you never heer d me tell how, when I was a boy, I tamed a lot of grass 
 hoppers and harnessed em up for a team and hitched em to a little wagon 
 and made em haul, did ye ? " 
 
 I confessed that I had never experienced that pleasure. 
 
 " Wai, then, my son, I ll tell it to ye now." 
 
 Just then I saw a man down street who I thought would be looking 
 for me in a couple of hours, and begged the Deacon to excuse me for a 
 moment, and rushed off before he had time to frame a reply. 
 
 True to his word, the Deacon one evening dropped into the Sazerac, to 
 " go them fellers a rattle." When he entered, the usual crowd was sitting 
 around the stove, but business had not yet commenced, and several of the 
 members were dozing in their seats. The Deacon first walked up to the 
 bar and remarked to the barkeeper that it was a " fine evenin , but jest the 
 leestest mite cold." 
 
 The barkeeper concurred, and inquired of the Deacon if he wouldn t 
 partake of a little stimulant. 
 
 " Don t keer if I do. my son," replied Deacon Toughly, " it s not 
 adzactly my time of day for drinkin , but bein as the air s a leetle sharp 
 on the outside of the house, a leetle stimulatin beverage mought brace me 
 up a bit." 
 
 A bottle and glass were set out on the bar-counter ; the Deacon filled 
 a glass to the brim, and holding it up and blinking at it furiously, said : 
 
 "My son, here s hopin you may live a thousand years." 
 
 This said, he tossed off the liquor, and then stooping over the counter, 
 and bringing his lips close to the barkeeper s ear, he " whispered " loud 
 enough to be heard by all in the room : 
 
 " See here, my son, be there anything in this here Sazerac Lying Club, 
 or aint it only one of them joshes they gits up in the REVEILLE some 
 times?" 
 
 The reply was, that the Club was an actual, positive, solemn fact. 
 
 " Wai, I ve a noshun of tryin my hand with them fellers," resumed 
 the Deacon, in the same loud whisper. 
 
 By this time all the members of the Club were thoroughly awake, and 
 the attention of all was riveted on the Deacon. Old Dad pressed on Uncle 
 John s rheumatic foot, causing him to utter an exclamation that would 
 have done credit to Deacon Toughly himself ; the President poked the 
 
58 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 Secretary in the ribs, and Mr. Trucfact winked a stuttering sort of a wink 
 to the Doubter, who drew up a chair and invited the Deacon to " sit by." 
 
 " Thank ye, my son, thank ye," said the Deacon, as he took the prof 
 fered seat. Then pushing his specs up a little higher on his forehead, and 
 blinking at the rate of two hundred revolutions a minute, he said : 
 
 "Gentlemen, be this the Sazerac Lying Club ?" ~ 
 
 Mr. Truefact started to reply, but before he could frame the first syl 
 lable of the first word he wanted to utter, Old Dad broke in with : 
 
 " I reckon you ve struck the wrong streak of gravel this .time, Deekin ; 
 thar isn t a gentleman sittin round this here stove as could lie, if he tried 
 for a week." 
 
 " I m satisfied, my son, puffickly satisfied ! " exclaimed the Deacon. 
 " I ve hed my doubts about this here Sazerac Lyin Club, but now I m satis 
 fied, puftickly satisfied that it do exist in dead, squar , sober earnest. I 
 did intend comin over here to go you fellers a rattle, and I wouldn t mind 
 doin it yit, but I m a leetle bit doubtful of myself a leetle bit doubtful." 
 
 " You can stand in with the boys, and take your chances like the rest 
 of us," spoke up Old Dad. 
 
 " Wai, my son, I ll stand in, as ye say ; so here goes : 
 
 " Onc t on a time " 
 
 " Hold on, thar, Deekin ! " exclaimed the President. "Mr. Seccertary, 
 what order of business is we workin under now ? " 
 
 " The Lie of the Evening," responded the Secretary, as he slapped 
 down a queen and took the other man s jack of trumps. 
 
 "All right, Deekin, go ahead," remarked the Chair. 
 
 The Deacon "Stands In." 
 
 Deacon Toughly brought his chair round facing the President, so as 
 to get a blink at that official, coughed three times to clear his throat, and 
 proceeded to narrate as follows : 
 
 "When I come acrost the plains in forty-nine we had a powerful 
 hard time ; the stock got runned down, and the most on it give plum out. 
 Consekently, afore I struck the borders of Utah Territory I was left afoot, 
 my horse hevin passed in his checks, and the train I was travelin with 
 hevin lost all their animils but one yoke of cattle through dyin or bein 
 
 stampeded by the dog goned, dod-rotted of In- 
 
 jins ; - - their - ornery souls to ation." 
 
 The Deacon was here interrupted by the Chair, who informed him 
 that a rule of the Club positively prohibited an indulgence in profanity in 
 the deliberations of the Club. 
 
 " I aint much used to swearin ," apologized the Deacon, " but when I 
 think of them Injuns, blast their " 
 
 A rap of the President s stick on the stove warned the Deacon to de 
 sist, and he resumed the thread of his narrative. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 59 
 
 " As I was sayin , my son, I was left afoot, and I didn t hev no 
 money to throw at the birds nuther ; likewise not much what the preach 
 ers call earthly goods what I could swap for a horse. I left home kind of 
 sudden like, and in course, bein as I was goin to Calif orny, whar the gold 
 was strowed around thicker than chawed chestnuts, (leastways I thunk so 
 them days, bein young and green) I didn t carry along a very big load of 
 the effecks what my father had in the States. Consekently, when I got 
 to the Mormon settlements, I was busted flatter n a cold slap-jack, and no 
 means of continerin the journey to the gold diggin s The man what had 
 the one yoke of cattle, he grve me the privilege of walkin alongside the 
 train till we d strike some place whar thar was sumthin like civilization, 
 but he kept a-warnin of me that he had a fam ly of his own back in the 
 States to support. Wai, one night, bout sundown we camped on the 
 edge of a Mormon settlement, and while I was a-b ildin a fire with some 
 brush and thinkin of some way to trade a Mormon out of a horse, one 
 of the Mormons belongin in the settlement come up to look around and 
 see if he could observe any broke down stock he could trade us out of for 
 little or nothin and recooperate it and swap it or sell it for a big figger to 
 the next passel of emigrants as come along that way. Seein as how we 
 didn t have nothin wuth tradin for, the Mormon got to talkin to us, and 
 I let out that my fix was such as I couldn t travel much furder unless a 
 horse was to drop out of Heaven right alongside of my tracks, bein 
 as I was already powerful footsore. 
 
 " The Mormon spoke up, an he says : 
 
 " Pard, us Latter Day Saints bean t much in the habit of hirin Gen 
 tiles, bein as its agin our creed, and positively forbid except in cases of 
 needcessity, but if I could strike up a fa r bargain with ye, I d take the 
 chances on hirin ye to help dig a ditch. 
 
 " I axed the cussed sinner as called hisself a saint, and actooally was 
 that fool enough to think he was, what he d call a fair bargain on the ditch 
 business. 
 
 " Wai, he said, (countin over his fingers like he was figgerin in rith- 
 matic) if you want to go to work at helpin me at diggin that ditch, I ll 
 give ye thirty dollars a month, in trade, and your board. 
 
 " Thirty dollars a month and board was powerful big wages them days 
 for a young feller jest from the States, and I was half thinkin the best 
 thing would be to stay thar with them Mormons and git rich workin for 
 wages, and not take any chances on Californy. But, howsomever, that 
 trade business was somethin I didn t exactly understand, and not wishin 
 to be exposin of my ignorance I didn t ask no questions, but jest said to 
 the Mormon : 
 
 " Pard, its a whack ! 
 
 " So, gittin my few traps together out of the waggin and sayin good 
 bye to the man who had let me walk alongside his ox-team, me and the 
 
GO THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 Mormon started for his ranch. As we was walkin along I spoke up and 
 I said to him : 
 
 " What kind of trade be you goin to give me for wages? 
 " l Wai, says he, l you kin hev your choice of ruta-baga turnips, or 
 sorghum syrup, or pun kins. I kind of begin to understand what was 
 his meanin of trade by this time, and was some dis pinted, but didn t say 
 no thin , only that I d see after a while which of them produce thar was 
 the best market for. 
 
 " Them days, the Mormons didn t hev no money, and the most of em 
 didn t know what money was like when they seed it. If one of em was 
 to git hold of a silver half-a-dollar from a emigrant he d think it was as 
 big as the hind-wheel on one of them big prairy schooners, and he d take 
 it down cellar and bury it for to keep for a hair-loom in the family. There 
 warn t no money mongst em, and they did most of their business by this 
 here trade system. 
 
 " I didn t hev no use for ruta-bagas, or sorghum syrup, or for pun 
 kins, but I could trade em off, and keep a-tradin and go on transactin busi 
 ness till I got hold of somethin I could swap for a horse and a little flour 
 and bacon and a few matches, so as I could continner my journey to Cali- 
 forny ; cause I d come to this country to git gold, and didn t want to stay 
 thar mongst them Mormons and git rich in vegetables, and, maybe, in the 
 course of time hev several or more wives on my hands." 
 
 At this point in his narrative the Deacon stopped, and simultaneously 
 every member of the Club straightened up in his chair. Corrugating 
 his brow and blinking indignantly at the Chair, the Deacon said : 
 "My son, I hope my story aint gittin teedjus?" 
 " Not much, Dee kin what made you think that ? " returned the Chair. 
 " Wai," resumed the Deacon, "I thought I heerd a snore." 
 " Twarn t me" "nor me" "nor me," spoke up the members, one 
 after another, all except Mr. Truefact, who was trying to stutter out those 
 words, when the President cut off his part of the debate by saying : 
 
 " Deekin, I m surprised at you, thinkin that any member of this here 
 Club would go to sleep on you, when you was a-tellin of such a int restin 
 story." 
 
 The Deacon apologized for his suspicions by saying that his hearing 
 was not what it was in days gone by, and resumed his lie : 
 
 "As I was sayin , I hired out to this Mormon for thirty dollars a 
 month, in trade and board, hopin one day to git a horse and jump the 
 country. 
 
 " It was one of them grasshopper years in Utah, when the hoppers 
 was swoopin down on the country and eatin up the last green thing on a 
 ranch inside of a single night. They hadn t got to this here Mormon s 
 ranch yit, but he knew they was comin , and which way they was trav lin 7 , 
 and his objeck in hirin me was to help him stand off the hoppers. He 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. Gl 
 
 had an ijee, which was to dig a big ditch around his ranch, and when the 
 grasshoppers come, to git out all his wimmin and childrin and the hired 
 hands, and fight the insecks inter this ditch, and turn his chickins in 
 among em. 
 
 " I caught hold of his ijee, and he showed me how it was as much 
 int restin to me to keep off the hoppers as twas to him ; so bein as if 
 they ate up all the craps, whar was my trade he was goin to pay me ? 
 
 " Wai, we got that ditch finished two days afore the grasshoppers 
 come in sight, but you bet we could see em comin , and lookin like a 
 great big black cloud, what was hidin the sun and makin the air as dark 
 as if it was jest comin on night. We could see em before they got to 
 us, but when they got thar we was ready for em. 
 
 " The Mormon, he had all his family out, guardin the ditch at the 
 side whar the hoppers was comin , and they was all heeled with a big 
 bunch of willers tied to a stick, so as to bat at the insecks and fight em 
 inter the ditch and the chickens was all on the ground waitin for the 
 trouble to start, and cluckin and crowin and lookin up inter the sky, jest 
 like they knowed what was comin . 
 
 "My boss was somethin of a family man, hevin sev ral wives, and 
 consekently a few children, which, bein as they re Mormons in that coun 
 try, nobody don t make no objection to. And when all the wives and all 
 the children and me and the boss was all out on the ground together, with 
 our brooms, we made quite a spectable outfit, what was enough to scare 
 the grasshoppers and cause em to slew round to the next ranch, purvidin 
 they had as much sense as a last year s bird s-nest, which, in course, grass 
 hoppers aint. 
 
 " When the hoppers come near enough for the queen hopper to see 
 that thar was somethin green on the ground, she give the order to light, 
 and the whole raft of era commenced droppin t ords the ground." 
 
 [The Deacon was so absorbed in his story that he did not notice a 
 s norous sound that filled the room, and failed to observe that every mem 
 ber of the Club was, to all appearance, sound asleep.] 
 
 "But we was ready for em, and commenced fightin em off and 
 knockin em inter the ditch as soon as the front ranks got in reach. 
 
 " The chickens was thar, too ; thar was a band or bout two hundred 
 layin hens and sev ral roosters, to say nothin of a lot of pullets, and they 
 jest waded inter them thar grasshoppers. 
 
 " Ilappenin to git tired, I stopped beatin a minnit to git my wind, and 
 see how them chickens was makin it with them hoppers. 
 
 " My son, you may b leeve it or not, jest as you like cause this is a 
 free country but right thar afore my eyes them chickens was turniri inter 
 grasshoppers. 
 
 " Yes, sir, sure s you live, they was eatin so many of them thar hop 
 pers that they didn t have time to die-jest in em, and they was absorbin 
 
G2 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 of the elements of them hoppers and turnin inter great big grasshoppers, 
 big as a layin 7 hen, right afore my very eyes. 
 
 " I give the alarm, and the fam ly quit fightin the hoppers what was 
 in the air to look at the hoppers what had been chickens ; and when the 
 man seed what was going on he said he didn t care nothin bout the chick 
 ens cause the grasshoppers was concentrated anyway ; and so, cordin to 
 his orders, we all pitched in and killed them grasshoppers what but a short 
 time before was hens. 
 
 "Now, gentlemen, I d like your opinion on that lie, which, how- 
 somever, it aint, bein a sollum, actooal, positive fact." 
 
 The only reply was a concerted snore, from the entire Club, so deep 
 and loud that it seemed as if it would lift the ceiling off the room; which, 
 as Old Dad avers, did actually move up a couple of inches. 
 
 Deacon Toughly arose from his seat, and blinked at each member of 
 the Club in turn. Then he struck his cane violently on the floor, and his 
 eyes opened, and he absolutely glared upon the sleepers ; and when his 
 terrible wrath found vent in words, he said : 
 
 " I wish I may be into - in a minnit if I was twenty years 
 
 younger if I couldn t whip every scrub as belongs to this here 
 
 dod-rotted, dod-blasted, - little old one-horse Lyin 
 
 lub with one hand tied behind me, the hull dod-blasted raft of 
 
 em from A to izzard." 
 
 Echo answered but a snore ; several of them, in fact. 
 
 And the Deacon stalked out of the Sazerac, and never again entered 
 its portals during the remainder of his stay in Austin. He don t live in 
 Austin now. He left here for San Francisco to sell his mines, failing in 
 which he secured an engagement as a " frightful example " to. a street 
 vendor of a marvelous soap, that would take grease out of cloth in the 
 twinkling of an eye ; and for all I know he is still the center of an admir 
 ing crowd on some San Francisco street corner, while the soap-vendor dis 
 plays the wonderful effects of his compound on the lappel of his (the Dea 
 con s) coat, and illustrates by the contrast between the clean oasis, and the 
 other portions of the garment, the detersive qualities of his wares. 
 
 Rejected. 
 
 When the Deacon was out of the room, and the door closed behind 
 him, the Club awoke as by a common impulse. 
 
 " A little warm, aint he ? " remarked the President. 
 
 " I wouldn t be as hot as him, no, not for all the mines in Lander 
 Hill," observed the Secretary. 
 
 There was a general expression of sentiment on the Deacon s case, 
 all of which was to the effect that, though a good and an original " cus- 
 ser," he couldn t take a joke worth a cent, and his lying qualities were 
 very far below par. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 63 
 
 The question being put on the election of the Deacon, he was unan 
 imously rejected, and the Chair, returning the Secretary s pipe, which 
 he had borrowed for this occasion only, announced that the Club stood 
 adjourned for the evening. 
 
 A Communication. 
 
 " If the Club isn t got no objection, I d like to read a little communi 
 cation," said the President, at a recent meeting of the Sazerac Lying 
 Club. 
 
 Every member of the Club, with the exception of Mr. Truefact, re 
 sponded in a moment by saying, " read ahead, old man," and while Mr. 
 T. was struggling to signify his acquiescence in words, the Chair took 
 from his pocket a newspaper, and unfolding the sheet, said : 
 
 " Gentlemen, I want to read a communication contained in this here 
 paper ; I want you all to lissen to it and not be interruptin of me, and 
 when I conclood I want you all to give an opinyon on the merits of the 
 case and decide if you believe it, even if tis printed in a newspaper," 
 whereupon he proceeded to read as follows : 
 
 " A rancher in this vicinity planted some parsnips on his ranch, and 
 while the vegetables were growing they threw oait such enormous roots 
 that when they were ripe he found it impossible to pull them by the or 
 dinary method. As an experiment, he rigged a four-fold purchase to one 
 of the plants, and when by this means he succeeded in pulling it, its exit 
 was followed by a strong flow of water, and the fortunate rancher found 
 that he had developed a valuable artesian well. " 
 
 " That aint nothin ," exclaimed Dad, before the Chair could complete 
 the sentence, " I pause for a reply." 
 
 "D-d-did y-y-you ev-v-v-er s-s-s-see s-s-such a oc-c-c-c-ur-r-rin-ince ? " 
 spoke up Mr. Truefact. 
 
 " I don t believe a word of it," growled the Doubter. 
 
 " Oh, shet up, you fellers," resumed Dad, " and I ll convince you that 
 that thar communication as was jest read by the Chair don t amount to a 
 hill of beans. 
 
 " The most of you s bin in Calif orny, and you know it gits away with 
 the world for big vegetables, and all that sort of bizness. Why, when I 
 was farmin in the airly days in Sacramento Valley, we used to plant 
 beets, so s we could make sure of water to irrigate the craps in the dry 
 seasons. Some years thar s plenty water in Californy, but they has bout 
 as many dry years as they has wet ones, and when thar comes a drought 
 the hull face of the country s burnt up like a Arizony desert. Wai, we 
 used to plant these here beets, and when we didn t have no water we d 
 jest rig a block and tackle to the branches of the vegetable, and put from 
 four to six yoke of cattle to the other end of the string, and commence 
 
G4 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 proddin and punch in and yellin at them oxen, and they d yank out that 
 thai* beet and a stream of water measurin from fifteen to twenty miner s 
 inches, and we d* chop the beet up inter cord-wood and pile it away for 
 winter." 
 
 " Why that aint much different from the newspaper yarn the facks 
 in the case bein bout the same," sneeringly remarked the Doubter. 
 
 "S posin it aint?" returned Dad; "don t it corroborate what the 
 paper says, and show to a sartainty that such things aint impossible ? " 
 
 The Doubter said he couldn t see it ; but the Chair interposed and 
 prevented an exhibition of feeling among the members by putting his 
 hand on his hip, and saying : 
 
 " Gentlemen, don t forgit that you be gentlemen." 
 
 But there was not that fraternity of feeling which the Chair said it 
 would like to see existing among members of so high-toned, moral, and 
 respectable an organization as the Sazerac Lying Club. He was sorry to 
 see a disposition among members to question the veracity of each other s 
 lies, and as he didn t believe there could, under existing circumstances, be 
 a free interchange of opinion, and a fitting communion of sentiment, and 
 as the congeniality which in the past had so happily marked the Club s 
 discussions seemed " a little off " this evening, he would declare the Club 
 adjourned, and hoped members would drown whatever feelings of rancor 
 they might possess, in the flowing bowl, at his expense. 
 
 And the rancorous feelings were duly drowned. 
 
 Indisposed. 
 
 Before calling the Club to order, at a recent regular meeting, the Presi 
 dent pointed to a strip of red flannel which was bound around his neck, 
 and explained to the members that he was troubled with a sore throat. 
 It was not an ordinary sore throat, but he experienced a feeling as of 
 some obstruction having lodged in his swallowing department. 
 
 "P-p-p rap-p-s its one of-f-f y-y-your 1-1-1-lies s-t-t-uck c-c-cross-w-w-ays," 
 remarked Mr. Truefact. 
 
 "Mebbe he was tryin* to tell the truth," said the Doubter to Old 
 Dad, sotto voce. 
 
 " Nothin of the kind, gentlemen, nothin of the kind ; no insinooations 
 if you jjlease. The affliction under w^hich this here Chair is now sufferin 
 is easily accounted for ; it arises from an act of improodence on the Chair s 
 own part. I went to bed last night without takin of my yoosual c night 
 cap of a little stimoolant, with some sugar into it, bein as such negleck 
 allers makes a diff rence and affects my physical constitooshun for the 
 worser. If the Club is ready for bizness we will dispense with callin the 
 roll, and proceed with 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 65 
 
 "The Lie of the Evening/ 
 
 "Did you fellers see or hear anything of that whirlwind to-day?" 
 asked Dad, as a preliminary to the " regular lie." 
 
 " I noticed somethin of a disturbance of the atmosphere," remarked 
 the Chair. 
 
 " She was pritty bad up on Lander Hill," observed the Aye-and-No 
 Member. 
 
 "I was out-doors all day," said the Doubter, "and seed sev ral small 
 whirlwinds, but none of em big enough to amount to much." 
 
 " I didn t expect you to know anything about it," said Dad, (address 
 ing himself to the Doubter) " you never do happen to see anything that 
 other people sees. But I ask this here Club as a body if they knowed 
 there was a big whirlwind in town to-day? " 
 
 All the members present, with the exception of the Doubter, said 
 they "knowed." 
 
 " Wai, then," resumed Dad, " none of you didn t see the worst part 
 of it. I was over to Marshall Cailon doiri some assessment work on an 
 old claim I located over thai* in sixty-three, and I happened to look over 
 to rds a ranch that s close by, and I see that whirlwind comin over the 
 hill from town. It was gainin and gainin every foot it traveled, and was 
 comin straight for whar I was workin , and I made up my mind it was 
 about time for me to git. So I got. I went straight for that ranch as 
 fast as I could travel, but the whirlwind kept gainin on me, and kept 
 growin taller and taller, and by the time I struck the door of the house 
 on the ranch the top of the whirler was clean out of sight, and the foot of 
 it must have been as much as a hunderd foot through. Whirlwinds is a 
 common enough thing in this here country, and you ve all on you seed 
 lots of em, but I don t think any of you s ever seed one like this as I m 
 tellin about. When I got to the house I was out of its track, and thar 
 was a red-headed woman standin in the door, skeer t so bad she couldn t 
 talk straight, and I told her if she had any children or other portable arti 
 cles lyin around loose, she better corral em quick, cause whirlwinds aint 
 no respecters of persons. But she said she didn t have only one baby, and 
 that died of the measles over in Californy two years ago. Gentlemen, 
 you ve all seen these here whirlwinds pick up pieces of paper, and shingles, 
 and small children, and loose wagon-wheels, and such trifles, and it stands 
 to reason that if a common, ordinary whirler can pick up such things as 
 them, a bigger one can carry off bigger things, can t it?" 
 
 The Philosopher said that such a hypothesis was strictly in accord 
 ance with the rules of logic, besides being in accordance with the inexora 
 ble laws of cause and effect. 
 
 "Certingly, certingly," continued Dad. "Wai, you see, this here 
 5 
 
66 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 whirler was a good deal bigger than ordinary, and as it come swoopin 
 along the ground, me and the woman being out of its track, and conse- 
 kently out of harm s way it was makin straight for a cow that was 
 grazin* on a little grass patch close to the house " 
 
 " D-J-d-did it c-c-c-carry up t-t-he c-e-c-ow?" interrupted Mr. Truefact. 
 
 " Who said so, smarty ? " returned Dad, angrily. " No, it didn t carry 
 up no cow; it missed the cow by about a sixteenth of a inch, and tackled a 
 great big quartz-wagon that had been abandoned in the cation on account 
 of the tire on the off hind-wheel comiu off. And it jest lifted that thar 
 wagon. Me and the woman stood thar lookin at it, and it commenced to 
 mount and mount, whirlin around like a cork in a eddy, and a-trav lin a 
 lively gait to the top of the great big column of dust. And all this time 
 the whirler was a-goin to rds the summit of the range, and the last me 
 and the woman see of it, it was crossin the range and goin straight for 
 Smoky Valley, whar I s pose it busted and dumped the wagon." 
 
 " Wai, I ll be blowed !" exclaimed Uncle John, who had come into 
 the room and taken his seat during the course of the preceding narration. 
 
 All eyes were instantly turned on Uncle John, with a look of wonder 
 ing inquiry ; and the Chair inquired if it might take the liberty of asking 
 the cause of the exclamation of surprise on the part of Uncle John. 
 
 "I d jest as lief explain as not," said the old stage-driver ; "you see, I 
 thought it was a yearth quake. As I was drivin the stage along over the 
 road in Smoky Valley this afternoon, at a pi nt bout two miles this side of 
 the salt-marsh, thar suddently come a shock of the yearth, which lifted 
 the coach clean off the road, with five passengers, the mail and express, 
 and nine bars of bullion. We all thought it was a yearthquake ; but since 
 hearin Dad tell about the whirlwind and the wagon, thar s a natural con 
 clusion to be come to regarclin of the cause of the trouble. It must hev 
 been that thar wagon strikin ground what shook up the yearth in Smoky 
 Valley, so s to make things that warm for the stage. Thar aint most 
 nothin but can t be accounted for, when you know the circumstances as 
 caused it." 
 
 When Uncle John had concluded, Dad cast a triumphant glance at 
 the Doubter, who muttered something about Uncle John not being any 
 better than other folks, even if he was a stage - driver ; but the Chair 
 poured oil upon the troubled waters by the relation of a reminiscence of 
 
 How the San Francisco Vigilantes 
 Originated. 
 
 " Mr. Truefact," said he, addressing himself to that individual, " don t 
 you know you ve got a mighty bad habit of anticipatin the lies of members 
 of this here Club? Now I actually b leeve that if it hadn t been for you 
 interruptin of Dad when he was tellin bout that whirlwind, that cow 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 67 
 
 would hev went up in it over the range inter Smoky Valley, instead of 
 that air wagon, and we d had Uncle John tellin of a shower of meat, like 
 the newspapers say they hed back in Kaintucky a short time back. Yearth- 
 quakes isn t uncommon in this country, but showers of meat is; so jest see 
 what a phenomena (I b leeve they call it) a little interruption can spoil! " 
 
 The Philosopher explained that " phenomenon " was the correct word 
 to use in such connection. 
 
 " Wai, I know what I mean, anyway," observed the Chair, with an 
 indignant look at the Philosopher ; " and my remarks about interruptions 
 can be taken by one member jest as well as another. But to resume : 
 
 "Now, Mr. Truefact, p raps you re not aware of it, that jest such a 
 man as you was the starter of the Vigilance Committee in San Francisco 
 in the early days." 
 
 Mr. Truefact endeavored to stutter his surprise at such a statement. 
 
 " Yes, sir, jest such a stutterin cuss as you started the Vigilantys to 
 work. It come about in this ways : 
 
 " In the airly days in San Francisco thar always used to be a terrible 
 big rush to the Post -Office when the steamers come in cause the pio 
 neers, bein young them days, was in angziety to git letters from their 
 folks to home, and to git little billy-duxes from the gals they left behind 
 em in the States when they come out here to pick up gold by the bushel 
 off the top of the ground, with no trouble only the stoopin over for it. 
 But you all know how that was yourself, and that when we got whar the 
 gold was, it took some powerful hard work to git sight of a color ; that is, 
 in most cases, bein as I ve knowed men to take out as much as six hun 
 dred dollars to the pan, and a long ways to bed-rock, to say nothin of 
 what s bin taken out with rockers, and toms, and sluice-boxes. 
 
 " Wai, as I was a-sayin , thar always used to be a great rush to the 
 Post -Office when the steamer come in from the States; and so s thar 
 wouldn t be no confusion, every man as was expectin letters was com 
 pelled to take his place in a long line, and stay thar till his turn come to 
 git to the winder whar they handed out the letters. I never lived much 
 in Frisco myself, but I ve heern tell from the boys what used to go down 
 thar to git a chance to spend their dust, that sometimes a man would be 
 bleeged to stay two hull days in that thar line afore his turn would come 
 at the winder. I s pose they used to carry grub in their pockets to last 
 em the shift. Likewise I ve heern tell that many a man made a home- 
 stake those days by standin in the line till he got up pritty close to the 
 winder and then sellin out his chance for all the way from an ounce up 
 to five hundred dollars to fellers as had more money than time and was in 
 a big hurry for their letters, and then resoomin his place ag in at the tail 
 end of the line, and sellin out ag in when he got close up like you ve 
 seen fellers sell their chance for a shave on a Sunday mornin in a barber 
 
 , only the figgers isn t so big. 
 
68 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 "One mornin the steamer come in bout ten o clock, and thar was the 
 usual rush to the Post-Office, and long afore the winders opened thar was 
 strings of men reachin way off for as much as a dozen blocks, ev ry man 
 waitin his turn t;> ask for letters. The fust man to git to the M to Z 
 winder was a Slavonyon, (Sclavonian) which was mighty thick in Cali- 
 forny in the airly days, hevin come in with the first rush. This here Sla 
 vonyon kep 1 a fruit-stand down on the wharf close to the office, and conse- 
 kently got thar one of the fust. He hed a name as long as a shovel-handle, 
 and stuttered so bad he couldn t even sneeze without stammerin . When 
 the winder was shot up, and the dark stood thar ready to hand out letters, 
 this here Slavonyon started to say his name, and commenced a-stutterin 
 and a-stammerin , but he couldn t make it. He hed his rights, like any 
 other man as wasn t a nigger or a Injin or a Chinaman, and so the crowd 
 didn t kill him then and thar, but kep on patient like, waitin for him to 
 purnounce his name. Twelve o clock come, and he hedn t managed to 
 purnounce only the fust letter, which was a V, and the dark was a-holdin 
 of the V letters in his right hand, a spittin on his left thumb, ready to sort 
 over the bundle for this Slavonyon s letter. But the clock stroke twelve, 
 and a post-office dark is like time and the tide don t wait for his lunch 
 for no man and down come the winder. 
 
 " The crowd was pritty riley by this time, and a merchant what had 
 a lot of goods on the steamer, and didn t know how much profit to charge 
 on em till he d got his letters about ern, offered the Slavonyon a thousand 
 dollars in good, clean, bankable dust for his chance ; but the Slavonyon 
 wouldn t lissen to no offer of money, and when the winder opened ag in 
 he resoomed tryin to purnounce his name. But twarn t no go ; and when 
 six o clock come and the office shet up for the night, he d only got as fur 
 as the fust syllable of that forty-rod name of his n." 
 
 " This was more n the crowd could stand, and that night they held a 
 citizens meetin on the plaza and adopted resolutions that the city s safety 
 was in danger, and pinted a committy to take that Slavonyon out and 
 hang him. Cordin ly, the committy went down to the Post-Office, whar 
 that Slavonyon was standin with his face agin the M to Z winder, waitin 
 for the office to open next mornin , and snatched him bald-headed up to the 
 City Hall, and runnin a beam out from the roof of the buildin , they hung 
 him as dead as a nit. 
 
 " This was the starter of the Vig lance Committy, and hevin their 
 blood up from the hangin of this stutterin Slavonyon, they waded in and 
 hung and druv out all the other dangerous characters out of the State. 
 And now, Mr. Truefact, let this be a warnin to you in the future ! " 
 
 " Yes, let it be a warnin ," said the Aye-and-No Member solemnly. 
 
 Mr. Truefact rose to his feet and commenced working his lip?, as if 
 striving to give utterance to the emotion which was evidently working 
 within him; but the Chair brought its cane down on the stove in so em 
 phatic a manner that it woke up the Philosopher, who had fallen asleep 
 
80 ME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 69 
 
 during the relation of the history of the Vigilantes. Then looking sternly 
 at the struggling stutterer, the Chair announced : 
 
 "No explanation is necessary from Mr. Truefact nor no other mem 
 ber, and I declar this here Club adjourned for the eveuiri ." 
 
 The Chair s fiat in the matter of adjournment is, by a rule of the 
 Club, unquestionable and undebatable, and the members sadly arose from 
 their seats, and as the barkeeper began to turn down the lamps, they de 
 parted through the door in a mournful procession. 
 
 A Lie-Brary. 
 
 On calling the Club to order, the Chair announced that, as the subject 
 of a library for the Club had been broached, he would like to hear an ex 
 pression from the members as to the most feasible plan of raising the money 
 for the purpose whether by assessment, or by voluntary contributions 
 from the members. During the discussion which arose on this point, there 
 was considerable feeling manifested by the springing of the question as to 
 who should act as Lie-brarian, each member claiming that he possessed the 
 peculiar qualifications necessary for that office ; and the Chair, being ap 
 pealed to, decided that, as the Club in itself constituted all the lie-brary 
 required, and each member was a natural born lie-brarian, further debate 
 was unnecessary on the subject, and the Club would keep on in the old 
 groove, relying, as before, on the newspapers and religious tracts for 
 inspiration. 
 
 This discussion being ended, the Chair announced that the Philoso 
 pher had recently been making some scientific experiments, and if he (the 
 Philosopher) had no objection, the Club would like to hear from him as 
 to their object and the degree of success attending them. Whereupon, 
 the Philosopher took the floor, and related the details of 
 
 A Scientific Experiment. 
 
 The Philosopher stated that he had recently become impressed with 
 the idea that there was some reason in the theory that the discharge of 
 gunpowder created conditions in the atmosphere which resulted in rain, 
 and had therefore set his mind to work to perfect a machine which, at small 
 outlay, should accomplish this end. In pursuance of this plan, he pur 
 chased a quantity of detonating powder, gunpowder, blasting powder, 
 nitre-glycerine, and gun-cotton. His idea was that by mixing these vari 
 ous explosives he would create a compound which, while occupying a small 
 space, would exert a greater force than a much larger bulk of either oper 
 ated with singly. Procuring an old quicksilver flask and some fuse, he 
 started for Birch Creek to make his first experiment. Arrived on the 
 
70 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 ground, he placed his explosives in the flask, which he set on top of a high 
 mountain, and attaching a fuse about a mile in length he went to the other 
 end of the fuse and touched her off. Pretty soon he thought he heard 
 something, and he did. The mountain was lifted just fourteen feet from 
 its foundation, by actual measurement, and it came down with such force 
 as to jolt him off the rock on which he was seated. In a few moments 
 a cloud appeared in the sky, which each moment grew heavier, until in a 
 little while the weight of the water it contained was too great for the at 
 mosphere to bear up, and it came down with a thud. After the experi 
 menter had noticed how the entire bed of the canon was washed out, and 
 saw four or five hills jumbled up together in the valley below, he realized 
 that he had created a cloud-burst instead of a shower. The experiment had 
 satisfied him, however, that his principle was correct, and he was convinced 
 that the fault of the machine was that its effect was too concentrated that 
 it must scatter more. He announced to the Club that he intended to re 
 sume his experiments at the first favorable opportunity ; but the Chair 
 said he hoped the member would not insist on continuing. He (the Chair) 
 believed in the theory, and thought it might be accomplished if a man 
 would go to Death Valley or the heart of Africa to try the experiments. 
 But here in this inhabited land it was dangerous; there was a liability that 
 in attempting to create rain the experimenter would desolate the country 
 with cloud-bursts ; and he, (the Chair) for one, would frown down and 
 rebuke in his sternest tones any further attempts at interference with the 
 ordinary course of nature s affairs. 
 
 The other members unanimously coincided with the President s view 
 of the case, even the Doubter declaring that there was already more water 
 in the country than was actually needed for home consumption ; and as 
 for him, he had got along without it for years, and thought he could keep 
 on doing without it till the cold finger of death beckoned him to his heav 
 enly home. 
 
 Whereupon, the Philosopher said : " A prophet is not without honor 
 save in his own country, and that he had thought the tendency of the age 
 was to seek for more light through the revelations of science. But as for 
 him, he d like to know what show Darwin, or Herbert Spencer, or Draper, 
 or Tyndall, or " any of them scientific cusses " would have in a Club like 
 this, and he did not know but he had a big notion to resign. 
 
 "Small favors thankfully received, large ones in proportion," sarcas 
 tically remarked the President. 
 
 " Yes," returned the Philosopher angrily, " you d like me to resign so 
 that you fellers could go on deridin science, and tellin of yarns which is 
 in contradiction of all scientific truth, and puts to the blush any man who 
 has read and studied and sought to probe into the depths of the illimitable 
 that he might yank out therefrom some great and startling fact that would 
 inure to the benefit of our posterity for ages and ages yet to come. But 
 I won t quit ; I ll jest keep on settin here, listenin to your outrageous- 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. n 
 
 ness, and your contradictions of science, jest so s I may act as a check upon 
 the miserable fallacies you re in the habit of puttin forth to the detriment 
 and injury of the good, the noble, the true, and the great, which aint found 
 in nothin but the revelations of science." 
 
 " Does the gentleman desire that Mr. Truefact a brother member, 
 and as good a man of his inches as ever made a track on top of the green 
 yearth does he desire that he shall git the lock-jaw?" sternly inquired 
 the President. 
 
 A glance at the Stuttering Member revealed him with his arms ex 
 tended and his mouth wide open, with jaws firmly fixed, and eyes protrud 
 ing from their sockets. 
 
 " You see, gentlemen," continued the President, " Mr. Truefact, in 
 attemptin a reply to the Philosopher, has got stuck on one of them big 
 words made use of by the gentleman in that th ar unparliamentary lan 
 guage of his n to rds the Club. Swaller it, Mr. Truefact, swaller it, if you 
 can t git it out," 
 
 By a motion of the hand, Mr. Truefact indicated that he required 
 some fluid with which to wash it down; and the Club went into Commit 
 tee of the Whole to lead him to the bar, where Mr. T. soon recovered suf 
 ficiently to announce that he would take it "straight." 
 
 The other members, also, renewed the assurances of their distin 
 guished consideration, and the President, after warning the Philosopher 
 against the use of unparliamentary language in future discussions, declared 
 the Club adjourned for the evening. 
 
 Artificial Incubation. 
 
 " We was discussin of science the other evenin , when brother An 
 anias Truefact come near to gittin the lock-jaw, and would a got it, too, 
 if it hadn t been for remedies bein handy." 
 
 Thus spoke the Secretary, as the sound of the words " I m here, you 
 bet," from the member whose name came last on the roll, died on the air. 
 
 "Yes," said the President, "and I hope, Mr. Seccertary, that you aint 
 goin to forgit yourself so far as to go out of the strict line of your dooty, 
 as laid down in our Constitution and By-laws, and ring in no jaw-smashin , 
 confusin words onto this here Club." 
 
 " Not much," replied the Secretary ; " that aint my style. Still, at 
 the same time, as I may here remark, I m somethin of a stoodint of sci 
 ence myself. Has any of you gentlemen read in the papers about that 
 thar preacher over to Reno as has throwed up preachin the Gospil to go 
 to raisin chickens by hatchin of em himself, bein as it pays better ? " 
 
 Several members responded that they had read concerning the matter 
 to which the Secretary referred ; and then that official, addressing himself 
 to the Chair, said : 
 
72 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 " Now, Mr. President, I want to ask you if you think this here thing 
 can be did?" 
 
 The Chair announced that it had no knowledge of any provision in 
 the By-laws of the Club which compelled the presiding officer to commit 
 himself for or against any particular theory that might be advanced ; but 
 at the same time, for his part, he preferred chickens that had been pro 
 duced in the natural and old-fashioned way. 
 
 " Wai," resumed the Secretary, " I don t believe it can be did, cause 
 I ve tried it myself, and it wouldn t work. 
 
 "As I was standin in the door of my cabin a few weeks back, this 
 here member as calls hisself the Philosopher, and slings dictionary around 
 like as if he was the man as made it, come along, and we got to talkin 
 about hatchin chickens in what they call the artifishal way. I didn t take 
 no stock in the thing, but he said it could be did as easy as rollin off a log. 
 So I ask t him how they did it, thinkin that what one man could do might 
 be did by another, and I couldn t lose nothin by tryin of it, and might 
 afore long have chicken three times a day for jest buym the eggs. Wai, 
 he said, the eggs must be exposed to a certain temperature them s his 
 words, not mine and in the course of the proper time they would go 
 through the pro-cess of incubation, aiid when the chicken was done it 
 would, cordin to the natural law that everything in this here world has a 
 instink to struggle for existence come bouncin out n the shell like it was 
 shot from a gun. He said he b leeved a good way would be to get a egg 
 and put it in a bottle and cork it up tight, so s the chicken couldn t git 
 away when it was hatched, and to keep the business at a hundred and 
 thirty degrees of heat by one of these common, ordinary thermometers, 
 such as you can see round most any place. 
 
 " Now, gentlemen, my eddicashun aint bin neglected so s I can t read 
 how cold or how hot it is by the thermometer ; and as I m a man what 
 himself is somewhat given to reas hin from cause to effeck, I pritty soon 
 dropped on it how I could run the thermometer up to a hundred and 
 thirty. 
 
 " I told the Philosopher I was goin to try of this here experiment, 
 and tell him how the old thing worked, and I m tellin of it to him this 
 minnit." 
 
 " I s pose you succeeded in achievin a scientific triumph, and in dem- 
 onstratin the fact that an incubatin heat applied to a egg must, of necessity, 
 and strictly in accordance with immutable laws, incubate something didn t 
 you?" inquired the Philosopher. 
 
 "Yes," replied the Secretary, "it incubated somethin , but let me con- 
 tinner my story. 
 
 " Procurin of some Salt Lake eggs ranch eggs is dear, but Salt 
 Lake eggs is good enough for om lets and tryin experiments I put one 
 of em inter the bottle, and set it on a box, and rammed the cork in tight. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 73 
 
 Then to fix the thermometer up to the right figger was the next question. 
 I found by holdin a lighted match up ag in the quicksilver in the little 
 glass ball in the bottom of the thermometer, I could run her up to a hund 
 red and thirty pretty quick, but I couldn t be standin thar holdin a match 
 for three weeks. But I got a bright idee. 
 
 " I hired two In j ins, and divided em into a day shift and a night shift. 
 Then I pasted a piece of white paper on the wall long side of the hundred 
 
 and thirty -mark cause Injins can t read figgers, as you all know and 
 
 then I lit a candle and showed the Injins how the quicksilver would run 
 up to that thar paper, instructin of em to take away the candle when it 
 tried to crawl up higher, and put it back when it dropped down lower. 
 After drillin of em a while they dropped on the bizness, and onc t they 
 got their hands in they could keep her rangin about a hundred and thirty 
 quite reg lar. 
 
 " Wai, I kep those Injins at this bizness for three weeks stiddy, one 
 on the day shift and the other buck on the night shift ; and when the time 
 come when thar ought to be a chicken or a addled egg under the old system 
 of hatchin with hens, I went to look for my chicken, but it wasn t thar." 
 " May I ask the gentleman a question ? " interrupted the Doubter, at 
 this point. 
 
 " Certainly," responded the Chair. 
 
 " Wai,* resumed the Doubter, " Mr. Seccertary, how did you git that 
 thar egg into that thar bottle ? " 
 
 "Jest oiled her and crammed her in," was the reply. 
 "Ah, I see," interposed the Philosopher, " by so doin you brought the 
 constituents of the egg under a certain compression, as it were, thereby 
 destroyin of its incubatin capacity." 
 
 " I don t know nothin bout what you re talkin about," said the Secre 
 tary to the Philosopher, " but I do know mighty well that the experiment 
 produced somethin as wasn t in the bottle when I put the egg in thar." 
 
 " Ah, now we re comin at one of the results of science ! " exclaimed 
 the Philosopher triumphantly. " What was it, Mr. Secretary, that the ex 
 periment produced in the bottle, as wasn t in thar when you put the 
 egg in?" 
 
 "Yes, what was it?" cried the entire Club in chorus. 
 " It loas a powerful bad smell" replied the Secretary, with emphasis, 
 and as he spoke he drew from his pocket a bottle. Extracting the cork, he 
 held up the bottle and said : 
 
 " Those as don t b lieve it can smell for hisself." 
 But the Club needed no evidence beyond that which came into their 
 possession simultaneously with the drawing of the cork. It was the ev 
 idence of their own senses that is, of one of their senses, the sense of 
 smell ; and as the odor from the bottle began to permeate the air of the 
 room, there was a general stampede of the Club for the door ; and the bar 
 keeper stood not on the order of his going, but cleared the counter at one 
 
74 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 jump and went out of the door as if he had important business with a man 
 in the street, and only the sixteenth part of a second to go. 
 
 After the members of the Club had induced the Secretary to come out 
 side for a minute, and they had talked with him, and argued the case, and 
 remonstrated with him for about an hour, and he had been carried home 
 on a mattress by his friends, the barkeeper said he guessed he would take 
 the adjournment into his own hands to-night, and thereupon declared the 
 Club adjourned. 
 
 And as the members moved away from the door, the President told 
 the Philosopher that this was all his fault, and he might, between then 
 and the next meeting, consider himself a standing committee on disinfect 
 ants. 
 
 A Martyr. 
 
 At the meeting succeeding the one last recorded, the Secretary ap 
 peared with his head swathed in bandages, and a very woe-begone expres 
 sion on so much of his countenance as was not covered by sticking plaster 
 and blue marks. 
 
 " Mr. Secretary," said the Chair, addressing itself to the scribe, " pears 
 to me as if you must hev been engaged in a animated argument with the 
 crank of a windlass." 
 
 " Looks like he d been run up into the sheaves in a h istin works at 
 some of the mines, yanked round up thar a few times, then drapped a few 
 hundred feet down the shaft and come into contact with the piston of a 
 steam pump," observed Old Dad. 
 
 "Mebbe he s bin examinin of a thrashin machine while it was a-goin , 
 to see what constituted its active principle," suggested the Philosopher. 
 
 " Gentlemen," spoke up Mr. Thirsty, " you s, all of you, clean out of 
 the way. Pll tell you what our worthy Secretary looks like he looks 
 like a man as hasn t had a drink for upwards of two mortal hours ; and 
 actin on that hypothesis, I move you, Mr. President, that afore calling this 
 here Club to order, we all adjourn in a body to the bar and partake of a 
 little ref reshin stimulant me standin the expense." 
 
 And the Club adjourned as requested. 
 
 When the members resumed their seats the Secretary rose to a ques 
 tion of privilege. 
 
 " State your question of privilege," said the Chair, " and if you ve got 
 anything ag in any member here present, you better wait till you git inter 
 fightin condition afore makin a detailed statement of your grievances to 
 this here Club." 
 
 " Mr. President and gentlemen of the Club," answered the Secretary, 
 " I only wish to state that in gazin upon this here noble form which now 
 stands afore you, you re lookin at a martyr to Science." 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 75 
 
 "I b leeve, Mr. President," here interposed the Doubter, " that the 
 meanin of a martyr is one of them fellers what gits the worst of a fio-ht 
 aintit?" 
 
 "Somethin to that effeck," replied the President, " but I must put a 
 end to personal explanations and take up the regular order of bizness, 
 which is under the head of reports of committys ; be thar any com- 
 rnittys ready to report ? " 
 
 " As cheerman of the Committy on Disinfectants," replied the Philos 
 opher, " I beg leave to submit a report." 
 
 " Does the gentleman have leave ? " asked the Chair. 
 
 " He do," replied the Aye-and-No Member, unanimously. 
 
 " The gentleman will proceed with his report." 
 
 The Disinfectant Report. 
 
 "Wai, then, Mr. President and gentlemen, cordin to the instructions 
 of the Chair, which pinted me on this committy at the last precedin 
 meetin 7 held previous to this one, I hev made a investigation of the sub- 
 jeck of disinfectin . On consultin the authorities, I find that one of the 
 most powerful and at the same time most innercent and rejuvenatin of 
 stuff for disinfectin purposes is whisky." 
 
 "Taken in nardly, I s pose?" interrupted Mr. Thirsty. 
 
 "That s cordin to the circumstances," resumed the Philosopher; 
 "thar be cases whar it s bin known to hev a grat fyin effeck by rubbin of 
 it in through the pores of the skin." 
 
 " I d like to know," angrily interrupted the Chair, " if the gentleman 
 knows what he s talkin about ; he was pinted a committy on somethin to 
 remove the bad effecks of ancient eggs from this here room, and here he s 
 reportin on stimulants. Do you know, sir, that you re so fur out of order 
 that you ll hev to step round powerful lively to git in ag in?" 
 
 The Philosopher humbly explained that he supposed whisky was good 
 for most everything, and the Club by unanimous consent sustained him in 
 that opinion, and politely requested the Chair to "shut up." 
 
 And the Chair said he always gave way to the verdict of the major 
 ity but that there was not a member of the Club who could get away 
 with him single-handed ; and then he asked : 
 
 "What s the next order of bizness, Mr. Seccertary?" 
 
 The Secretary replied that, so far as he was concerned, the order of 
 business was to go home to bed ; for he was suffering so with the head 
 ache that he was liable to tell the truth at any moment. 
 
 This the Chair decided to be a sufficient excuse for absence ; and he 
 hoped that all members who might at any time be similarly afflicted would 
 not endanger the integrity of the Club, and strike a fatal blow at the prin- 
 
76 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 ciples on which it was founded, by continuing to take part in its delibera 
 tions while in such an irresponsible condition. 
 
 The Secretary was thereupon excused, and took his departure for his 
 virtuous couch. 
 
 Pioneer Prices. 
 
 "Has any member anything to offer for the Good of the Order ?" 
 asked the Chair, after the Secretary had taken his departure. 
 
 "I don t know of anything, unless some of us orders the drinks," ven 
 tured the Aye-and-No Member, who felt that it devolved on him, and him 
 alone, to answer this question. 
 
 "The gentleman has unanimous consent to adopt his own suggestion," 
 decided the Chair. 
 
 The Aye-and-No Member duly made his jingle on the bar, and when 
 the members returned to their seats he made his maiden speech in the 
 Club. He said : 
 
 "Gentlemen, times aint what they used to be in the airly days. I re 
 member when I was minin on the north fork of Feather River, I had a 
 sack that full of dust and that long that I could treat the house and pay 
 four bits a drink easier than I can treat this Club and put up only two 
 bits a drink now." 
 
 "Yes, prices have degenerated since then," sighed the Chair, as he 
 sadly drew out the "draft" of the stove, and blew his emotion into the 
 ashes. Then, running his coat-sleeve across his nose, he said : 
 
 " Why, many s the time I ve paid a dollar in dust for jest one plug of 
 tobacker." 
 
 "Yes," spoke up Mr. Thirsty, " but what you had to pay for tobacker 
 and whisky, and them necessaries, warn t nothin compared to what you 
 was charged for the luxuries. Jest think of flour at a dollar a pound ! 
 And for such a thing as green truck why a load of vegetables was worth 
 more as a claim what was payin an ounce a day to the man ! You know 
 the boys in them days used to think that if they didn t git some kind of 
 vegetables to eat onc t in a while they was liable to git the scurvy ; and 
 I ve knowed some fellers gittin of it, too, and a powerful tough sickness 
 it is, fust thing you know. These days, when we can git the best Kain- 
 tucky whisky they can make in San Francisco for two bits a drink, right 
 up here in the mountains, and taters is as plentiful as grasshoppers in 
 Missoury, we don t stop to think how it was them times, when everything 
 was so high." 
 
 " But thar was more money to the man than there is now," inter 
 rupted the Doubter. 
 
 "Yes, that s so, sure enough. A twenty-dollar piece warn t bigger 
 nor a bit them days," replied Mr. Thirsty. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 77 
 
 " But, as I was sayin , things was high. When I was livin up at Dead 
 Man s Flat, in Siskiyou County, some of the boys concluded to send down 
 to Frisco by express for some ingyuns. Ingyuns, as some of you might 
 be aware, was one of the biggest luxuries them days, bein as they was 
 skase in the country and good for keepin off the scurvy. Finally the 
 ingyuns come along by express C. O. D., and us boys what had made up 
 the pool to send for em, went down to the express office, and I weighed 
 out the dust to settle the bill, and it warn t no small dab of dust either, 
 you can jest bet your life. Wai, we took the fruit up to my cabin, and 
 the boys got around and we divided them squar and even, thar bein one 
 odd one over, which we put on One-eared Sam s pile, bein as ho was 
 crippled, hevin hed his ear bit off in the dog-gonedest, gamest, rough-and- 
 tumble fight you ever seed. After the boys had gone, I counted my 
 ingyuns and found I had nine of em, weighin about three pounds apiece, 
 and I commenced figgerin on the cost of em. They cost three dollars a 
 pound in Frisco, and the express freight on them was seven dollars a 
 pound, and the more I kep figgerin on what them ingyuns cost for one 
 of em, the madder I got, and finally I got so mad at myself that I went 
 to town and got drunk, and got to buckin at monte, and the fust thing I 
 knowed I was strapped as flat as a shingle. 5 
 
 "I wish," said the Chair, "that our worthy Seccertary didn t have 
 such a head put onto him, cause we might got him to figger how much 
 each one of them ingyuns cost." 
 
 " I aint much at figgers myself," said Mr. Thirsty, " but bein as I lost 
 nine thousand dollars at monte, and was out sev ral dollars in the fust 
 place, I ve bin figgerin ever sence that them thar nine ingyuns costed 
 about a thousand dollars each, sayin nothin of fractions." 
 
 "I s pose," sneered the Doubter, "if it hadn t bin for them ingyuns 
 you might have beat the monte game." 
 
 " I might if it had bin on the squar , which some of the boys told me 
 when I got sober it wasn t. 
 
 " But these here remeniscences makes me dry ; let s liquor up, and 
 then I m goin to adjourn." 
 
 And they all liquored and the Club adjourned. 
 
 The Club Goes Behind the Record. 
 
 The following sketch, which appeared in the deliberations of the Club 
 under circumstances hereinafter related, was written by Dan De Quille, 
 author of " The Big Bonanza," and first appeared in the columns of the 
 Virginia (Nevada) Enterprise: 
 
 He was a little old man with a restless black eye, and an equally restless 
 jaw, the latter being constantly employed in the mastication of "fine cut," 
 
78 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 while the former found business in more directions than there are points 
 to the compass. Iron-gray locks projected from under his slouched wool 
 hat, and a beard of the same color straggled far down over the front of 
 his blue woolen shirt. His tongue was about as active as his eye ; his voice 
 was shrill and piercing, and all his assertions were of the most positive 
 description. 
 
 He carried a small bundle in a handkerchief, and shortly after taking 
 his seat in the cars at Reno, for this city, he turned to the passengers near 
 est to him and said : 
 
 " Boys, there are some curious ups and downs in this country. One 
 day you see a man s breeches half-soled with a flour sack, and the next he 
 is a millionaire, rolling in his coach and four, lolling back and smoking a 
 Havana cigar a foot long. There is a flip, a flap, and a flop, and he is 
 back into his old breeches, driving a bull team. 
 
 " Three days ago I was not only well-to-do, but fixed for life, as I 
 thought ; but bang ! she went, and I was flat on my back again. Not my 
 fault not a thing I could foresee and guard against jist a reg lar dispen 
 sation of Providence, as you may say. Never heard of such a thing before 
 in my life." 
 
 "Bottom drop out of yer mine?" asked a passenger. 
 
 " Mine be blowed ! No, I had a ten-pin alley, and was doing a land- 
 office business jist a-coinin money, as you may say when all went to 
 smash in an instant." 
 
 " Burn out ? " said a listener. 
 
 " Burn out ! No, worse than that blowed up ! " 
 
 4 - Blowed up?" 
 
 " Yes, blowed up ! It was the most terrific explosion, and one of the 
 most curious you ever heard of. Some fellows come in one morning to 
 roll a game for the drinks my first customers that morning. 
 
 " My Chinaman, Hop Sun, set up the pins for em. One of the men 
 took up a ball one of the biggest he took a short run and let drive I 
 can see him now. The ball no sooner struck the alley than there was a 
 report that shook the whole building, tore up the planks, and shattered the 
 glass in the windows. Each bound made by the ball down along the alley 
 was followed by the same kind of report, and the same kind of reck and 
 ruin. The ball reached the pins and made a c ten-strike, but at the same 
 instant there came such an explosion as shook the whole town. All the 
 pins were shivered to pieces, and splinters from them filled the wall and 
 the roof. Nothing was left of my Chinaman but the soles of his shoes, 
 about a foot of his tail, and a few strips of his blue cotton blouse. Not 
 enough of him could be found for the coroner to sit on he was liter 
 ally exterminated by the shower of splinters from the alley and the pins." 
 
 " What caused the explosion ? " asked some one. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 79 
 
 "Well, you see, they had a certain kind of a club in my town that 
 they wanted me to jine. I refused, tellin em I wasn t qualified, and 
 couldn t conscientiously become a member. This got the club down on 
 me, and some of em slipped into my place at night and greased my alley 
 and all the balls and pins with nitro-glycerine. Blast sich a town as Austin, 
 and sich an organization as the Sazerac Lyin Club, anyhow ! By their 
 doin s I am ag in a poor man ag in a wanderer, roamin the wide world 
 without a dime. Will any gentleman present please let me have the price 
 of a square meal and a night s lodgings ? " 
 
 The above was submitted by the Chair, who requested the Secretary 
 to read it, and at the conclusion of the reading there was not a dry eye 
 in the room. 
 
 "What do you think of that, gentlemen?" asked the Chair. 
 
 " I think it a slander on this here Club, and that there ain t a word 
 of truth in it," answered the Doubter. 
 
 "And I m of the pinion," said Mr. Thirsty, "that it s a bigger lie 
 than was ever told in this here Club." 
 
 " What should be done to the man who perpetuates such a outr jus 
 insult on this here Club as that ? " asked the President. 
 
 "Elect him a member," responded Dad. 
 
 "Gentlemen/ observed the Chair, "you must remember that it s 
 ag in accordance with the most positive rules of our Constitution and 
 By-laws to elect a editor a member of this Club." 
 
 " Let s go behind the record, then," returned Dad, " and elect him a 
 member by unanimous acclamation." 
 
 "That would be a bad president, sir, a bad president," remarked the 
 Doubter. 
 
 " Look a here," said the Chair, while an angry frown darkened his 
 forehead, " I thought I d stated to this here Club on many previous occa 
 sions that any personal allusions to this here Chair was always out of 
 order, and would be considered as liable to lead to serious consequences. 
 What do you mean, sir, by a bad President? Haven t I always tried to 
 do the squar thing since occupyin of this here chair?" 
 
 The Doubter hastened to apologize, and to explain that he meant it 
 would be a bad prec-e-dent for the Club to go outside of the Constitution. 
 
 "Ah, I see," said the Chair blandly, "the gentleman means a bad 
 pre-ce-dent. We must make excuses for the way his eddication was 
 neglected when he was a boy. But what is the will of the Club about 
 lectm this newspaper feller as wrote that article, as you ve jest heerd 
 read, to be a member of this here Club ? " 
 
 " I renew my motion for his election by acclamation." 
 
 "Do I hear a second? asked the Chair. 
 
 " I second the motion," replied the Aye-and-No Member. 
 
80 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 "Then," announced the Chair, "I declare the newspaper feller duly 
 lected as a member of this here Club, and the Secretary is instructed to- 
 notify him of his election as a member of this here Club, and to send him 
 the bill for his nitiation and monthly dues ; and Mr. Seccertary, you might 
 say in a kind of a postcript to hurry along the coin, as the boys is power 
 ful dry." 
 
 When the Chair had finished, the Doubter arose and wanted to know 
 if the Club proposed to "take off the bridle" and "let down the bars 
 for the admission to membership of all the newspaper liars who might 
 
 apply. 
 
 "Why," said he, " we might as well let in stock-brokers to onc t, and 
 hev done with it. But if we let in the newspaper liars even, what show s 
 a lot of old pioneers goin to hev alongside of them when it comes 
 tolyin ?" 
 
 The Chair explained that the present case was an exceptional one, 
 and that hereafter no newspaper man would be admitted as a member on 
 any sort of provocation whatever. 
 
 " They be good liars," he said, "but the trouble is, they be too good, 
 on account of their hevin had more practice at it thanwe uns, and I don t 
 b leeve in encouragin competition what is liable to drive us fellers out of 
 the field as a lyin club." 
 
 There was a general concurrence by the Club in the sentiments above 
 expressed, and, on motion of the Aye-and-No Member, the Club adjourned. 
 
 Mr. Bottomfaet/s Boy. 
 
 Mr. Bottomfact is a member of the Sazerac Lying Club not hitherto 
 introduced to the reader of these chronicles. The reasons for omitting 
 previous mention of this gentleman are many, the principal ones being 
 that he is not a good liar himself, and lacks the qualifications necessary 
 to a thorough appreciation of the lies of others, and by unanimous consent 
 of the Club is voted a dreadful bore, in which particular the reader may 
 think he resembles this book. To sum up his characteristics it is only 
 necessary to repeat the opinion of one of the members of the Club con 
 cerning him : 
 
 " He s so matter-of-fact, he d b leeve the devil was askin him to drink 
 whisky instead of liquid brimstone, if old Cloven-Foot askt him to jine 
 him at the bar, and he can t talk bout nothin but that boy of his n." 
 
 This description fits Mr. Bottomfact to a nicety. He is so confiding 
 and innocent that he believes anything he is told, and never for a moment 
 even thought of questioning the truth of the most outrageous lies told in 
 the Club, accepting them all as perfectly true and eminently reasonable. 
 He was usually an interested listener, seldom taking part in the debates,. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 81 
 
 but when he did speak it was always to relate some marvelous exploit of 
 " that thar boy of his n," though on one occasion he related how he had 
 lost his fortune by purchasing a salted claim in California, on the strength 
 of appearances. The full name of Mr. Bottomfact s son and heir is George 
 Washington Bottomf act, but in speaking of him his father usually calls him 
 " my boy Wash." Mr. Bottomfact s hobby is that " my boy Wash " is a 
 genius, and that he is destined to make his mark in the world ; and lie 
 never misses an opportunity of inflicting his " weakness " on the Sazerac 
 Lying Club. The least allusion to a boy is sufficient to set him going on 
 "Wash," and his long harangues have frequently seriously interfered 
 with the Club s debates, and either put all the members to sleep, or driven 
 them out of the house. Consequently, all the members were very cautious 
 about touching on the subject of boys, which was usually scrupulously 
 avoided. But one unfortunate night a member happened to relate a lie 
 about a boy, only six years old, who knew the multiplication table by heart, 
 and could read the first three chapters of the Lord s Prayer, and this put 
 Mr. Bottomfact in his element and set him going on his favorite theme. 
 
 "Talk about smart boys!" he said, "thar aint none on you ever 
 seed a smarter boy than my boy Wash. Why, here he aint been goin to 
 school nigh onto two year, and the teacher s puttin him to writin comper- 
 sitions a ready. Jest look a here." 
 
 Then Mr. Bottomfact drew from his pocket a roll of paper, and pro 
 ceeded to unfold it, and the members were getting ready to depart, but 
 were arrested by the voice of the Chair, who requested them to wait and 
 see what " old B leeve-it-all " had to offer, and not pass a hasty judgment on 
 something with the merits of which they were unacquainted. Accord 
 ingly, the Club resumed their seats, and Mr. B continued : 
 
 " This here, Mr. President and gentlemen, is a compersition my boy 
 Wash writ up to the school, and I think it s one of the best things I ever 
 heerd on the subjeck. What I want to ask is, that the Seccertary be in 
 structed to read it to the Club, and if they find it satisfactory as I know 
 they will that it then be deposited in the Arkives of this here Club, and 
 voted to be printed in the REVEILLE." 
 
 " I m willin , if the paper don t charge a cent for it," said the Doubter. 
 " Wai, gentlemen," decided the Chair, " if nobody aint got nothin 
 better to offer for the consideration of this here Club, I ll order the Sec 
 certary to read." 
 
 No objection was offered. 
 
 " The Seccertary will purceed to read, and he is instructed to give 
 the compersition to the REVEILLE for publishing requestin of the editor 
 to print it jest as it is, spellin and all, and not make no hifalutin altera 
 tions." 
 
 And the Secretary then proceeded to read as follows : 
 
 6 
 
82 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 Snaix. 
 
 [BY GEORGE WASHINGTON BOTTOMFACT.] 
 
 " The snaik is a animal what is all tail but his heel. He dont hav no 
 legs, but walkes on the ground on his stummick. They is a grate menny 
 kinds of snaix, but rattil snaix and snaix what is in butes is bout the only 
 kind of snaix in these parts, ceptin water snaix, which aint pizen and 
 cant bite. I onct knod a boy whos muther told his farther thet if he 
 didnt let up hed have snaix in his butes, and Jimme, which is that boys 
 name, he Inked in his pars butes and didnt find no snaix, caus they must 
 a dide in there, caus Jimme he sed tha smelt like sumthin hed crorled in 
 ther and dide. Ther aint no snaix in Austin, ownly them bute kind, and 
 I never see nun of them ; but out in the mountings they is rattil snaix 
 two plentifle. Rattil snaix isnt afeard of a man, but tha is skeert of a 
 hors-hare rope. My father he knod a man what wunst went out pros- 
 pektin, and he lade a hare rope rownd his blankits, and when he waiked 
 up in the mournin tha was as menny as 15 hunderd snaix stickin of tha 
 heds over that rope and a waitin of him to cum out. His dorg et them 
 all up and saved his life, and rattil snaix tha aint good to ete fur a man. 
 Tha is a grate menny kind of snaix as I hev heerd tell on wich I haint 
 never seed. Won of them kind is corled a bo-constructor, caus it bo s 
 up its back when it gits mad, and tys his selfe inter bo-nots. Tha grows 
 in Nu York and them uther f orrin countrys ever so menny miles from Aus 
 tin, and tha has them in surkises. Tha aint no boy in Austin as ever seed 
 a surkiss. I kno a boy what his farther keeps a sloon, and he sez his par 
 sez he is orfle glad no surkiss kant cum to Austin caus they brake the 
 town and noboddy dont hav no munny left to spend for the drinks. 
 I heerd a man say that if we had a raleroad maybee the surkiss and 
 the bo-constructor and the elefint would cum to Austin. But I never 
 seed a ralerode, no more didnt no other boy in Austin, ceptin three cr 
 fore who is bin to skule in Californy, but a Austin boy dont git no chance 
 to see surkisses and ralerodes and trees, and them kind of wonderfull 
 things, ceptin the locuss trees, and they was brot here by sum mens. A 
 boy onct told me that a ralerode could run faster nor 3 quarter-hosses, but 
 I dont believe that, caus tha aint no animal not even a zebray could do 
 that, and tha just put that in the skule books like sum of them uther lys, 
 to skare us boys so we will be goode wen we dont want to. This is all I 
 kno about snaix." 
 
 " What do you think of that for a compersition ? " triumphantly 
 asked Mr. Bottomfact when the Secretary had concluded the reading of 
 the above. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 83 
 
 " I think, Mr. Bottomf act," said the Chair, " that, while it s a fust- 
 class literary effort for a boy of your Wash s age, it aint got no bizness in 
 this here Club. The objeck of this organization is lyin ; and, not sayin 
 that thar aint no lies in Wash s compersition, still, what he says bout the 
 jim-jam snakes hes a great deal of truth inter it. Thar fore, Mr. Bottom- 
 fact, I decide that in future you won t be allowed to ring in Wash and his 
 compersitions onter this here Club, and I would advise you to jine some 
 lit rary society, whar sich things is better appreciated." 
 
 Mr. Bottomfact seemed very much crestfallen over this decision of 
 the Chair, and did not ask anybody for the loan of a chew of tobacco for 
 full five minutes, and in a short time he arose and said that he guessed he 
 would go out and hunt up Wash. 
 
 As the door closed on Mr. Bottomfact s retreating form, Mr. Whisky 
 said he had a " good notion " to make a motion for the expulsion of " that 
 air Bottomfact." 
 
 " He aint no count, no way ; he can t lie wuth a cuss, and nobody 
 never knowed him to treat the house yit." 
 
 The Chair said that as for himself he had never recognized Bottom- 
 fact as a member of the Club, but merely as a spectator at the meetings ; 
 and in his (the Chair s) opinion a formal expulsion would be tantamount 
 to recognizing Bottomfact as a member. 
 
 " Cause how can you expel a man unless he s a member ; and if a fel 
 ler aint a member, how can you expel him? That s what I d like to know." 
 
 The members unanimously "gave it up," and Mr. Thirsty said he 
 would not press the motion for expulsion ; but " had the members of this 
 Club ever heard what the Governor of North Carolina said to the Gov 
 ernor of South Carolina?" 
 
 " I know," hastily exclaimed the Aye-and-No Member ; " he said, It s 
 a long time atween drinks. " 
 
 "That s jest what he said, and that s jest what I say," returned Mr. 
 Thirsty. " S pose, gentlemen, that we sashay up to the bar." 
 
 And they all "sashayed." 
 
 A Saline Atmosphere. 
 
 At a point in Smoky Valley, some forty miles distant from Austin, 
 there exists a deposit of salt, in what is commonly called a salt marsh. 
 Similar deposits are found in numbers of the valleys or deserts in 
 Nevada and Utah. The particular salt marsh in Smoky Valley has for a 
 number of years been the source from which the silver reduction mills of 
 Austin and Belmont have obtained their supply of salt for the chlorination 
 of ores a process absolutely necessary to their successful working, and 
 which can only be practiced on a large scale by the aid of salt. 
 
 The method for a long time in vogue in gathering this salt was to 
 
84 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 shovel it up from the marsh as it was deposited on its surface by the 
 natural evaporation of the water which holds it in solution. This was 
 a tedious process, only practicable in good weather, and the salt thus 
 obtained contained many impurities. The parties owning the marsh finally 
 adopted a plan whereby the process of evaporation was hastened and a 
 better article of salt obtained, and to this is due the lie which Uncle John 
 related in the Club on the subject, and which is here recorded. 
 
 The improved mode of salt gathering may be thus described : A bed 
 of hard clay was found a few hundred yards from the marsh, and in this 
 a number of tanks or vats were cut. A pump and steam machinery were 
 placed at the marsh, the pump being connected with the tanks by a pipe, 
 from which the saline water was discharged into the tanks, and there 
 allowed to evaporate by nature s process. 
 
 The salt-works lay close by the road which Uncle John s stage daily 
 passes over, and each evening during their construction he would report 
 their progress, and explain their principle to the Club. At last the works 
 were finished, and running successfully, and the subject of salt and salt 
 marshes dropped out of the Club s deliberations, till one evening a member 
 happened to say : 
 
 "Uncle John, how s them salt-works getting along?" 
 
 "Bad, rather bad," was the reply ; "that is, bad for the salt company, 
 which are losin a considerable of salt, but good for the ranchers and some 
 other people." 
 
 " How s that, Uncle John ? " 
 
 " Wai, you see, the pipe leaks." 
 
 "What of that?" 
 
 And in reply Uncle John related thus : " The salt water that runs 
 through that leak evaporates as soon as it strikes the air, and the wind 
 which is always blowin in the valley ketches up the salt and carries it 
 over the valley in clouds. For a mile each way from the marsh the air s 
 so thick with salt that half the time I can t see the stage team, and it jest 
 keeps rainin salt all the time. When the ranchers in the valley wants 
 salt, they jest set an open sack out in front of the house, and in less than 
 twenty minutes it s filled chock up to the mouth with the finest kind of 
 cookin salt." 
 
 " Very singular," remarked the Doubter. 
 
 " Not at all," returned the Philosopher. " It is only in accordance with 
 a natr al law of evaporation and specific gravity, that when thar s salt in 
 water, the water dries out and leaves the salt, and when the salt s in the 
 air, it comes down on the ground, on the principle of what goes up must 
 come down. Don t you see? " 
 
 " Don t the men what owns the marsh shovel up the salt as lays on 
 the ground?" asked the Chair. 
 
 " They d like to," replied Uncle John ; " but the stock camps round 
 thai- and eats it up afore they can get a chance to shovel it ; and losin 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 85 
 
 salt s cheaper than hirin men to herd fifteen or twenty thousand head of 
 cattle away from it, sayin nothin of sheep and horses." 
 
 Mr. Truefact was trying to say that the story was wonderful, when 
 Uncle John took the word out of his mouth and said : 
 
 " Yes, it is wonderful ; but I ain t told all of it yit. That thar salt 
 air is the surest cure for rheumatism I ever seed." 
 
 "Did it cure you?" asked the Doubter. 
 
 " No ; I aint hed the rheumatiz sence that leak started, but I know it s 
 a sure shot. There is a feller has got a ranch over in Monitor Valley, and 
 he tried the hot springs over thar, and used up four bottles of my horse lini 
 ment,* and it didn t do him no good. He was so crippled up he couldn t 
 use his arms and legs, and couldn t talk straight ; and that thar man he 
 walked thirty miles to the marsh, and sot down in that thar salt shower, 
 and in seventeen minnits after the salt fust struck his lungs he held four 
 jacks ag in an ace-full, and stood his wife s mother off in a two-hour talk 
 ing match." 
 
 The Chair here remarked that Uncle John was going outside of the 
 subject-matter of his lie, and inquired : 
 
 "What has four jacks ag in an ace -full got to do with curin the 
 rheumatiz ? " 
 
 "Nothin particular," replied Uncle John; "only four jacks ag in an 
 ace-full, specially when thar s money in sight, is a healthy hand, and it 
 takes a healthy man to hold em, and I only mentioned the circumstance 
 to show that the man didn t have no more rheumatiz ; cause if he had, 
 he d bin layin round home cussin and howlin , instid of playin poker with 
 the boys." 
 
 The apology was deemed sufficient, and Uncle John remarked that 
 talking about salt had made him dry, and inquired if the gentlemen of the 
 Club would jine him. 
 
 The gentlemen all jined. 
 
 Fixing a Dog. 
 
 It was at the time of year that, under a city ordinance existing in 
 Austin, an annual tax on dogs is collected. By a provision of the law, 
 each dog must be provided with a tag attached to its collar, and all ca 
 nines found at large without such tag are arrested and impounded, and 
 after a few days of grace for its owner to redeem it in, the unlucky animal, 
 if not redeemed, is shot. The dog question being the current topic, it 
 was being discussed by the Club. The exploits of the city dog-catcher were 
 criticized, and, by a natural sequence, the thread of the argument merged 
 into kettling and other outrages on dogs. The most approved hitch for 
 fastening the kettle to the dog had been elaborated on, the cruelty of tur 
 pentine denounced, and the merits of fire-crackers argued ; various mem- 
 
86 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 bers had related their experience in that line, and Mr. Truefact had just 
 started in to try and tell a funny dog-kettling incident which occurred in 
 Pioche, and had stuttered as far as, " Mr. P : p-pres-s-id-d-ent ; d-d-down 
 
 t-t-to P-p-p-pioche ," when a stranger walked into the room. Pie did 
 
 not wait for an invitation to be seated, but sat right down in a vacant chair 
 in the midst of the group that constituted the Club. This intrusion was 
 not by any means relished by the members, and there were mutterings of 
 a storm of indignation, and stage whispers that "some people didn t have 
 no more manners than a hog," and " whar I come from, people used to 
 wait till they was invited," and other remarks of that nature. But the 
 stranger did not seem to heed these disparaging utterances, but tilted his 
 chair back, cocked his feet on the stove, and took a paper of fine-cut from 
 his pocket and took therefrom a chew, and, without the formality of ad 
 dressing the Chair, said : 
 
 "I b leeve you fellers was talkin about kittlin* of dogs, when I 
 come in." 
 
 The President observed that if, in speaking of " fellers," the stranger 
 referred to him, he wanted it understood that he called himself a gentle 
 man, and that people who did not desire a fight on their hands must 
 address him as such. 
 
 " Fellers, indeed ! " exclaimed the Doubter. 
 
 The entire Club arose to its feet as by a common impulse * but the 
 Chair interposed and said : 
 
 " Hold on, gentlemen, he looks like he might be a pretty good liar, 
 and let s give him a chance. Thar s many a rose as is born to be cast 
 afore swine, and many a jewel as don t shine till it s cut down to a fine 
 p int. Let s give this man a chance, notwithstanding he calls us fellers." 
 Then turning to the stranger he said : 
 
 " Stranger, go on with your rat-killin , and let s hear what you ve got 
 to offer on the subjeck of kittlin dogs." 
 
 The stranger said he meant no offense by speaking of the mem 
 bers as " fellers " ; but he had been in the country a long time, and was 
 not used to putting on airs. However, as he had heard them talking of 
 the various methods of annoying canines, and as it was a subject on which 
 he considered himself well posted, he had taken the liberty of chipping in. 
 
 "Wai, you ve chipped," observed the Chair, "now make your play, 
 and let us see if any of us can call you. And if none of us can t, why, 
 then, you re a member of this here Club, which is the Sazerac Lying Club, 
 which mebbe you might have heerd of afore." 
 
 The stranger replied that he had never before heard of the Club ; but 
 when it came to lying, he could hold his own with the oldest man in the 
 country. He then "chipped" as follows : 
 
 " Over in Virginny City, in sixty-four, I see the dog-gonedest thing 
 about fixing a dog. The animile was one of those big, yaller curs, and 
 some feller had fixed a giant powder ca tridge to his tail, fuse, cap, and 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 87 
 
 all. I was a-standin in front of the big hotel, smokin a four-bit cigar that 
 Kettle-belly Brown had just treated me to in the Sawdust Corner, when 
 along come Mr. Dog, trottin ahead as though he didn t have no giant pow 
 der ca tridge fastened to him plumb up ag in the terminus of^his spinal 
 column. Jest as he passed me I see a puff of smoke, then a flash, and then 
 an explosion that shook up the big hotel like a Shoshone wickiup in a 
 whirlwind. As soon as I got my wind, and rubbed the dust and splinters 
 out of my eyes, I began lookin around to see if I could see any pieces of 
 that yaller dog." 
 
 "Did they find any of him?" eagerly interrupted the Doubter. 
 
 " Never you mind," replied the stranger ; " this is my dog story. 
 Find any of him ! Why, bless your soul, they found all of him. There 
 he was, on the sidewalk, not six inches from where he stood when the 
 shot went off, a-playin with his tail, and snappin at the sparks that was 
 stickin to it." 
 
 "You re electid!" enthusiastically exclaimed the Chair, when the 
 stranger had concluded the above lie. 
 
 "Thank ye kindly," said the stranger, "but that thar aint no lie; 
 but as I m a member of this Club, I ll make out to tell you a lie one of 
 these days." 
 
 "Yes, I d like to see you try your hand at lyin ," remarked Old Dad. 
 " I think after you had some experience that way, you might make out to 
 tell a pretty solid lie, on an average." 
 
 At this point Mr. Thirsty arose, and called the Chair s attention to 
 the fact that the new member had not yet complied with the rule in refer 
 ence to members initiating themselves. 
 
 The Chair thanked Mr. Thirsty for the suggestion, and informed the 
 new member that under the rules he was required to put up for the drinks 
 for the boys. 
 
 The new member replied that he had not come prepared for any such 
 emergency. " But," said he, smiling at the dispenser of liquids behind the 
 bar, " if the bar-creetur don t mind takin my face for the drinks, I aint no 
 objection to treatin the crowd." 
 
 The bar-keeper, who had listened to the stranger s lie about " fixing " 
 the dog, observed that, as he (the stranger) seemed to be such a truthful 
 man, he would trust him for the drinks if he would promise to pay the 
 next time he came in. 
 
 The stranger promised, saying : " You better bet your boots that thar 
 bar-keep s a judge of human natur. I never told him so, but he knows by 
 my looks I m Old Reliable himself." 
 
 And by the name of " Old Reliable " was this member thereafter 
 known in the Club, at the sessions of which he was a constant attendant 
 from this time on. 
 
88 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLU11. 
 
 Uncle John s Dog. 
 
 When the members of the Club, after the interview with the bar 
 keeper, had resumed their seats, and the Chair announced that " we would 
 now re-open under the head of dogs," Uncle John took the floor. He said 
 he was not much of a dog-sharp, but had seen some powerful smart dogs 
 in his time. He once knew a dog that could tell a newspaper from a piece 
 of beef with his eyes shut, and in his boyhood s days he had seen in a 
 circus a dog that could beat a man at seven-up, and give him two points 
 in the game. 
 
 "Dogs over here in the sagebrush," said Uncle John, "knows more than 
 dogs does in Californy, cause they ve got a better chance to learn things 
 and post themselves. Over to Californy a dog s time is mostly taken up 
 fightin the fleas, and they haint got no time to waste on their education. 
 You ve all of you lived in California some time or other, and you knows 
 how it is yourself about fleas. I had a dog thar once, and he was about 
 as good a dog as ever made a track, but the fleas bothered him that bad 
 that he d go into the river and stay thar a week at a time to git shet of 
 them. But the fleas they didn t mind that, but used to swim off to shore 
 and camp on the bank, and wait for that dog to come out, and then they d 
 bounce him ag in, and stick to him closer than a gal to a feller that she s 
 clean gone on. Finally the thing got so bad that that thar dog was actooally 
 thinkin of suicide. I hed a double-bar Pd shotgun in the barn whar I used 
 to keep the dog, and that poor animile would, every once in a while, go 
 smellin at the muzzle of that gun, and a-feelin of the trigger with his 
 paw, like as if he was figgerin how he could have his head at the muzzle 
 and his paw on the trigger both at the same time. But he was a short 
 dog leastways he wasn t long enough to reach that fur. Finally the 
 hostler in the stage barn he took pity on that thar dog, and he fixed him 
 up a collar with a lot of long iron spikes stickin into it, with the pints 
 outside, and that worked two ways. The dog could scratch hisself with 
 the spikes, and when the fleas would come Iightin down to tackle the dog, 
 they d strike on the spikes and stick there ; and when the collar got full of 
 fleas, the hostler he d take em off one at a time, and chop their heads off 
 with the ax, and feed em to his chickens." 
 
 " Is that all?" asked Old Reliable, when Uncle John had concluded. 
 
 " All ! Did you expect I was goin to say the hostler killed the chick 
 ens and fed em to the fleas, or the fleas eat up the dog, or any such im 
 probable lie like that ? No, sir, not much ; though I didn t calkerlate to 
 stand off that thar lie of yours about the giant powder." 
 
 Old Reliable attempted to explain that his story was " gospel truth," 
 but the bar-keeper commenced to turn down the lights, and thus the de 
 bate was shut off for the evening. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 
 
 A High Fever. 
 
 " I miss the cheerful countenance of our stutterin friend, Mr. True- 
 fact," said the President, casting his eyes over the members before calling 
 the Club to order. 
 
 " Mr. Truefact s a little under the weather," responded the Secretary, 
 in reply. 
 
 " What s the matter of him bin pressin his tausey too heavy ag in ? " 
 inquired the Chair. 
 
 " That aint what s the matter of him this time," returned the Secre 
 tary ; " he s laid up with a pritty bad dose of mounting fever." 
 
 " That thar mountain fever s a tough thing," said Uncle John, " but it 
 aint a patchin to rheumatiz when it gits a good hold onto a feller." 
 
 " I don t know about that," observed the Doubter, " I had mounting 
 fever so bad onct that they had to carry me out doors and lay me on the 
 ground so s the heat of me wouldn t set the blankets afire." 
 
 " That was a hot fever, sure enough," spoke up Mr. Thirsty, " but 
 taint much alongside of a fever I onct knowed a boy to have back in the 
 States. He was the all-firedest cussedest boy as ever I seed always rob- 
 bin hen-roosts and orchards, and a-suckin of other folks s milch cows, 
 and them kinds of devilment. He used to suck eggs and drink milk when 
 he wasn t the leestest bit hungry, jest to be doin of somethin ; but one day 
 he got his dose, and it come pritty near curin of him. He d eat up a hull 
 lot of eggs one mornin , and drinked a power of milk, and long about 
 noon he was the sickest boy ever seed in that section of country. His 
 folks sent for the doctor, and when he got to the house that thar boy was 
 in a rip-rarin, ragin fever, and jest a-burnin up by inches. The doctor 
 talked to the folks, and felt his pulse, and axed what he d bin eatin for 
 breakfast, and the folks said they didn t know, cause he always was eatin 
 of somethin as didn t agree with him and laid heavy on his stummick. 
 Then the doctor looked at his tongue, and said the fever was mostly inside, 
 and he guessed he better give him a emetic. So he went down in his 
 suddle-bags and got out some truck, and while three or four of em held 
 him, he rammed the stuff down the boy s throat. Twarn t mor n a few 
 minnits till the boy begin to git pritty sick, and afore long he commenced 
 throwin up, and for about half an hour he throwed up nothin but the 
 nicest lookin custard you ever seed in all your borned days. Now I d 
 like you to show me a mounting fever as is so hot that it ll bake a custard 
 in a boy s insides what will swaller a lot of eggs and milk." 
 
 " Pritty warm ; pritty warm," remarked the President, at the conclu 
 sion of Mr. Thirsty s remarks. 
 
 " Yes, it s hot," observed Old Dad, " but not so hot as I ve seen it in 
 Californy." 
 
I 
 
 90 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 A Hot Country. 
 
 " You don t mean to say it s hot in Californy, do you ? " hastily spoke 
 up the Doubter. " Why, down in Southern Utah it s as much hotter as 
 Californy, as a Eureka smeltin furnace is alongside the North Pole. Why, 
 ine and a lot of fellers was prospectin in Southern Utah onct, and it was 
 so hot we didn t used to build any fire when we camped, but jest cooked 
 our grub by the heat of the air. We used to buy eggs of the Mormons, 
 and we had lots of bacon ourselves, and we jest used to put the eggs and 
 bacon on a hot rock in the shade, and they would fry brown in about three 
 minnits. We didn t dare to put em in the sun, cause if we did the grub 
 would sizzle to a coal afore you could bat your eye." 
 
 " Sho ! " exclaimed Old Reliable. " That aint nothin to Arizony ! 
 Why, I ve seen horned toads and lizzards git sun-struck in the shade down 
 thar. Hot ! Why, you fellers don t know nothin bout hot. What would 
 you say if I was to tell you that it was so hot down thar that the only way 
 they could git to tell anything about how hot it was, was to splice two 
 thermometers together, and even then the quicksilver would spirt over the 
 top of the top thermometer, sometimes." 
 
 " Wai, I don t know what the rest of the Club would say," observed 
 Uncle John, as if replying to Old Reliable s question, " but as for me, I d 
 say that s about as big a lie as any of the oldest members of this here 
 Club ever told, and I can t help sayin that its doin mighty well for a new 
 member, and I aint a bit surprised at your callin yourself Old Re-fo e-able 
 himself ; for you re able to lie with the best of us" 
 
 The Chair Speaks. 
 
 On calling the Club to order, the Chair arose, and said if the gentle 
 man over in the corner would quit plaguing " that thar dog of Dad s," he 
 would make a few remarks. The member designated ceased teasing the 
 dog by sticking a broom straw in his ear, and the dog lay down on the 
 floor with his nose between his paws; silence reigned in the Club, and the 
 expectant members bent their heads in an attitude of earnest attention 
 towards the President, to hear the words of wisdom which they felt sure 
 would fall from his lips, like the gentle dew of heaven on the morning 
 mushroom. 
 
 The Chair said he felt it his duty to congratulate the Club that recent 
 events have brought to light the fact that some of the greatest men of the 
 United States are, or were, liars, and eligible to membership in the great 
 and glorious Sazerac. 
 
 " Gentlemen," he said, " you re all twenty-one years old, free-born and 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 91 
 
 white, and the majority of you know how to read. Of course, you all 
 read the newspapers, and you know about this here affair of Grant sayin 
 that the late lamented Charles Sumner was a nat ral-born, constitutional 
 liar afore he died. Sumner is dead and buried, true enough, but, gentle 
 men, it s a consolin reflection to us, as good, squar , honest, consistent, and 
 conscientious liars, to know that a man as has been set down as one of the 
 greatest statesmen of these here times was, when he was alive, as one of 
 us that he could lie like a house afire. S posin , howsomever, for the 
 sake of argument, that Grant s bin lyin about Sumner, then the state of 
 the case is thuswise : A ex-President of the United States stands before 
 you in the attitood of a liar. Take either horn of this here bull, my fel 
 low-members, and in any case it sticks out like a sore thumb that some 
 body s lied, and that somebody one of the great men of this here country. 
 I tell you, gentlemen, this here Club has a cause for congratulatin of it 
 self, when it stops to consider that the greatest of great men can lie." 
 
 At this point the Chair was interrupted by Old Reliable, who remarked 
 that " when it comes to lyin , the best of em s on it." The Chair rebuked 
 the interrupting member, and observed that if he did not know that Old 
 Reliable had not " settled for them last drinks," he would impose the fine 
 the rules inflict on a new member as a penalty for interrupting the Chair. 
 Then resuming the thread of his discourse, he said : 
 
 " There are a record of one man in the United States, who, so the 
 hist ries claims, couldn t tell a lie, which his name it was George Washing 
 ton same as mine and Mr. Bottomfact s boy s front name." 
 
 The Doubter here said something about G. W. s namesakes not re 
 sembling him much in one particular ; but the Chair, without deigning to 
 notice the slur, asked the Club if any of them had ever heard the story of 
 George Washington and his little hatchet. 
 
 There was a unanimous response in the negative, and several mem 
 bers expressed a desire to hear the story, which the Chair consented 
 to tell. 
 
 The Champion Lie. 
 
 Pointing his finger to a picture on the wall, he said 
 " Up yonder thar is the picture of George Washington, Esquire, some 
 times called the Father of his Country, cause he was first in war, first in 
 peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen. When this here George 
 Washington was a chunk of a boy, he lived on a farm, and one day his 
 old man went to town and bought him a hatchet for a birthday. When 
 George got the hatchet he went pirootin round the ranch, cuttin and 
 slashin at everything in sight, and one day he got into the orchard and 
 tackled a cherry tree that the old man set a heap of store by cause it 
 was a new kind of cherry as didn t grow no pits. Young George he 
 clapped eyes on this here tree., and commenced slashin at it, kind of 
 
92 THE 8AZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 absent-minded like, and the first thing he knowed he d busted his hatchet 
 clean through the middle of it, and it was a sure thing thar would be no 
 cherries without pits on that ranch that season. When the old man come 
 home from town and seed the tree cut down he was as mad as a hornet, 
 and commenced rampagin round askin of the niggers who was the feller 
 what had chopped that cherry-tree. George was in the barn hackin 
 away at an old board, and heerd his dad askin of these questions, and he 
 knowed, bein as he was the only boy on the place as had a hatchet, that 
 the old man had him dead to rights. So he rushed out n the barn, and 
 drnppin at his father s feet, sung out : Father, forgive me this onc t ; I 
 did it with my small ax ! The old man couldn t stand this ; it was too 
 much for human natur to bear, and he busted out cryin and said, Bless 
 you, my children, like they does in the theater shows." 
 
 The Club s eyes were moist (and their throats otherwise) when the 
 Chair had concluded the above affecting narration, and a deep silence 
 reigned in the room for some moments. The Doubter was the first to re 
 cover his composure and his voice ; when he had done so, he said to the 
 Chair : 
 
 "Mr. President, do you b leeve that thar yarn ?" 
 
 " I must b leeve it, cause it s handed down in hist ry," was the reply. 
 
 " Wai, as for me, I think it s the dog-gonedest biggest lie as was ever 
 told in this here Club, and I d like to hear the sentiments of the gentlemen 
 here present on the subject." 
 
 "We ll take the sentiments of the Club then," announced the Chair. 
 
 The question was then put to the vote. As stated by the Chair it 
 was thus : " The question now before this Club is : Are the story about G. 
 Washington and the cherry-tree a lie, or are it gospel truth ? Those in 
 favor of its bein a lie, will say Aye, and those opposed, contrary wise." 
 
 The response was a unanimous Aye. 
 
 Thus did the Club, at one fell blow, demolish one of the great truths 
 of American history. 
 
 The Quadruplex System. 
 
 The Western Union Telegraph Company are now using the quadru- 
 plex system over the Virginia and Salt Lake circuit, by means of which 
 four messages may be sent simultaneously over a single wire. The wire 
 over which this system is in use passes through Austin, and has of late 
 given considerable trouble to the operators. They have been unable to 
 find any break, and a close examination of the wire has failed to reveal 
 any cause for the difficulties, which for some time past have been experi 
 enced in the transmission of messages over it. The mystery is now solved, 
 however. In the Sazerac Lying Club, at the last session, Old Dad inter 
 preted the cause of the trouble. After describing the quadrup ex system, 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 93 
 
 he explained that the strain on the wire was increased beyond the wire s 
 carrying capacity. He said he was out at Dry Creek the day before, and 
 that in that vicinity the wire was just humping itself, and groaning and 
 straining and dropping words off in chunks. He examined the wire and 
 found a knot in it, and came to the conclusion that a quadruplcx message 
 had struck the knot and got tangled up, and stuck at that point. He tried 
 to straighten the wire out, but a section of an account of a battle between 
 the Turks and Russians struck him on the ear and knocked him down, and 
 he concluded that it was not advisable to fool with the thing. He had in 
 formed the manager of the telegraph office in town, as to the cause of the 
 difficulty, and stated to the Club that a man had already been sent out 
 with a crowbar to pry out some of the biggest words and smooth the knot 
 down, so that the words could pass each other. 
 
 Mosquitoes. 
 
 "Has any gentleman anything to offer?" asked the Chair, when the 
 members were all comfortably settled in their seats, a few evenings after. 
 
 " I can t offer to treat," said Old Reliable, " cause I aint got no bullion 
 in my clothes, and the bar-keep aint quit lookin crosswise at me yit, on 
 account of that thar nitiation fee of mine ; but as the boys has been talkin 
 bout warm weather, can t some of the members tell us somethin about 
 skeeters which goes together with hot weather ? " 
 
 " I don t know much bout skeeters, myself," spoke up Old Dad, " but 
 they do say that in Jersey the skeeters is so big they light down onto the 
 face of the country and scoop up young calves and small children. But I 
 was never in Jersey myself." 
 
 "I s pose," said the Philosopher, "that in speakin of skeeters, the 
 gentleman refers to that well-known American bird, the mws-keeter." 
 
 "That s the animal as is bein referred to," decided the Chair. 
 
 " Skeeters ain t bad in this country," remarked Mr. Thirsty, " owin 
 to the altitood and the light air, which doesn t agree with them. But up 
 north in Idaho, they is wuss than rats in Sacramento. Why, I knowed a 
 man as was camped out in that country onc t, and durin the night a band 
 of skeeters come down and eat the shoes clean off n his mule s hoofs." 
 
 "You re sure you aint made no ra;stake, Mr. Thirsty," said the 
 Doubter ; " cause I ve heerd that lie afore, and the way it was told to me, 
 the mule eat the shoes off of the skeeter s hoofs." 
 
 The Chair bent a look of sternness on the Doubter, and asked him if 
 he was aware that such frivolity was a discourtesy to the Club at large.^ 
 
 " Don t you know, sir, that skeeters don t hev shoes, and to be throwin 
 out of insinooations that they does, is to cast the suspicion of doubt onto 
 the remarks of the gentleman as preceded you? You be a old enough 
 member of this Club, and the Chair lias cussed you often enough for you 
 
94 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 to know by this time that castin doubt onto another member s lie is plum, 
 dead, square agin the rules of this here Club." 
 
 The Doubter, with much meekness, replied that he did not desire to 
 cast doubts on Mr. Thirsty s statement, but the mosquitoes he referred to 
 were the kind that Old Dad had mentioned as infesting the wilds of New 
 Jersey, and he did not know but it might be the custom of the people of 
 that country to " lass "(lassoo) the " varmints " and break them to harness 
 and, of course, in that case, they would have to be shod 
 
 The Philosopher said that the Doubter s supposition was a perfectly 
 natural one ; but, speaking of mules, had any member here present ever in- 
 vestigated the characteristics and studied the mental traits of 
 
 The Mule? 
 
 The Chair said that, for himself, he had once met with a blasting ac 
 cident, and since then had been strongly disinclined to fool with explo 
 sives. Uncle John remarked that once, when a man tried to sell him a 
 mule, he consented to examine the animal. He got the man to drive the 
 animal into a corral, and then got on top of the roof of a barn and exam 
 ined it with a spy-glass. 
 
 The Philosopher here observed that he did not mean to refer partic 
 ularly to the leg-power of a mule; that subject had already been exhausted 
 in the newspapers, and the American people are perfectly familiar with it. 
 Said he : 
 
 "Mr. President and gentlemen, what I m tryin* to git at is this : I ad 
 vance the propersition that mules don t never die. You all think you ve 
 seen a dead mule, don t you ? But you never did. They lay down and 
 look like as if they was dead, but it aint so. Sometimes they re turned 
 into newspaper editors, and book agents, and other kind of animals as has 
 cheek; but the active principle of the mule is somethin as never dies. 
 Why I know a mule as is now puttin in its reg lar ten-hour shift workin 
 on a whim on a mine over in Humboldt County, that you couldn t no 
 ii:ore kill than you could the snakes a man sees when he s got the jim- 
 jams. The fust account any hist ry gives of this here mule, he was put up 
 for a breastworks at the battle of New Orleans, and the Britishers didn t 
 dare to come near enough to shoot at him with a cannon. One cannon- 
 ball did accidentally come pritty close to him, and he let out at it with 
 his off-hind foot and sent it scootin back amongst the English troops, and 
 it went clean through three regiments of soldiers, and the wind of it 
 knocked one of them high-you muckamuck English lords clear out of his 
 saddle. This here mule was brung to Californy in the airly days, and 
 Grant the same as used to be President he got hold of him by winnin 
 of him at a horse-race. When Grant went back to the States, he took 
 that thar mule with him, and took him all through the war; and I ve 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 95 
 
 heerd it said that Gin ral Grant has been heerd to say that if it hadn t bin 
 for that thar mule, the chances was the South would hev bin victorious. 
 After the war was over, Grant sold the mule to Governor Stanford, who 
 was buildin of the Central Pacific Railroad them days ; and that mule was 
 Mowed clean out of sight one day by a nitro-glycerine explosion. The 
 man as found the mule, when he come down, was on his road to the Black 
 Hills ; and when he got out on the plains he traded it to a Gov ment con 
 tractor, who sold it to Gin ral Ouster, and it was all through that battle 
 what Custer was killed in, and come out without a scratch. Gentlemen, 
 that mule has a history. It went to Africa with Stanley, has bin through 
 a tidal-wave on the coast of South America, taken a hand in the famine in 
 China, was saved by a scratch from a Mississippi steamboat explosion 
 cause he was at the Centennial at the time and has been more or less 
 connected with every calamity as has happened durin the present cen 
 tury and thar don t nobody know to a certainty as he isn t one of the 
 pair of mules what old Noah druv inter the Ark when he was a-savin 
 of two of each kind of animiles for seed, when he saw that cloud-burst 
 a-comin. " 
 
 " Can you show the papers for that ? " asked the Doubter, when the 
 Philosopher had concluded the mule s biography. 
 
 The Chair rose right up in its seat, and frowned its darkest frown 
 upon the Doubter, and requested that gentleman to state if he was court 
 ing forcible expulsion from the Club. 
 
 " The idear of one member askin another gentleman if he s got the 
 papers to support his remarks at one of these meetin s ! It s the most 
 outrageous thing as has ever occured in this here Club ; and no matter 
 how much I may think of you as an old pard of my own, and one of my 
 best friends, my duty is plain, and I ve got to enforce the rules, even if I 
 knowed we wouldn t never be friends no more. The gentleman as asks 
 for papers to be produced, is fined the stimulants for the crowd ; and this 
 here Club stands adjourned for the present evenin ." 
 
 A Clear Atmosphere. 
 
 At the meeting following the one recorded above, when the Chair 
 announced that "lies is now in order," Old Reliable opened the evening s 
 exercises by remarking that during the discussion at the preceding meet 
 ing, in referring to the effects of this climate on the health of mosquitoes, 
 something had been said about the "lightness" of the air. lUs a fact 
 well known that in mountainous countries, owing to the rarefaction of the 
 atmosphere, the range of human vision is very wide. A hill or other ob 
 ject which in less elevated localities would be distant from the 
 observation say a couple of miles, and which appears to be about that d 
 tance away, may in reality be from seventy-five to one hundred mile 
 
96 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 tant. There are places in Nevada where mountain peaks are plainly dis 
 cernible at a distance of over two hundred miles. The fact in regard to 
 the clearness of the atmosphere, and the extent to which the vision can 
 reach, is commonly known to the people of Nevada ; and it was in refer 
 ence to this that he spoke of the "lightness" of the air. 
 
 "I b leeve somethin was said on that subjeck," said the Philosopher, 
 "but has the member as referred to it ever bin in Colorado?" 
 
 Old Reliable answered that he had never visited the particular State 
 in question. x 
 
 "Then," said the Philosopher, " he don t know nothin about light air. 
 Why, up on some of them high peaks of the Rocky Mountains, when the 
 weather is clear, a man can stand and see the ships comin in through 
 the Golden Gate at San Francisco, purvidin he s lookin westward." 
 
 Old Reliable drew a sigh that seemed to come from the innermost 
 recesses of his boots, as he said : 
 
 " That raises me clean out. What I was goin to remark don t begin 
 to come up to the remarks of the previous gentleman." 
 
 "Let s have it, anyway," demanded Uncle John. 
 
 "No," said Old Reliable, "Hay down my hand and quit. For onct 
 in my life I ve got to holler enough. The gentleman as knows all about 
 them scientific things has got me in the door, and my hand sinks down 
 inter absoloot insignifercance." 
 
 " Cheer up, cheer up, Mr. O. R.," said the Chair, sympathizingly ; 
 " there s as good fish in the sea as was ever yanked out of it. Let s hear 
 your little lie ; and this here Club will be the judges." 
 
 Thus implored, " Mr. O. R." proceeded to recite his little tale, which 
 was as follows : 
 
 "I d heern tell so much about the light air in this country, and how a 
 man could see a deer on top of a mountain a hundred mile off, that I 
 made up my mind to try somethin . The other mornin I climbed up onto 
 the summit of Mount Prometheus to take a peep and see what I could see. 
 The mornin was clear, not a cloud bein in the sky, and when I began to 
 look over west, the fust thing I seed was Virginny City, strung along the 
 side of old Mount Davidson jest as nat ral as life. I thought at fust it was 
 a mirage, cause Virginny is a hundred and eighty miles from here in a air 
 line ; but I soon seed that the thing was as real and honest as the Metho 
 dist Church steeple, whkh was a pritty considerable distance off, as you 
 may know, but didn t s< em mor n twenty foot away from me. Wai, I 
 got to lookin around to sec what was goin on in Virginny. I seed the 
 quartz wagons goin through the streets, and the minin superintenders 
 drivin around with their spang-up teams, and all the population bowin 
 and scrapin to em ; and I seed a couple of fellows havin a shootin scrape 
 on C street, and all the p licemen runnin down to Chinatown to arrest the 
 Chinamen for firm fire-arms inside the city limits ; and I seed the ladies 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 97 
 
 steppin across the street and holdin up their dresses and most of em 
 had on striped stockings. I couldn t hear the steam whistles on the histin 
 works at the mines, but I could see when they tooted em, and I could see 
 em changin shifts at some of the mines, and the night-shift comin up on 
 the cage and the day-shift goin down. But the most important thing I 
 seed was in the court-house. I looked into the county jail, and I seed 
 a feller what was in thar for stealin a bronco horse, sittin in cell Num 
 ber Four film off his irons. He was red-headed, lied a wart on his nose 
 and checkered pants and a Calif orny gray shirt. I come down as quick 
 as I could, and told the sheriff up here to the court-house, and he sent a 
 telegraph to the sheriff over at Virginny, tellin of- him to look out for cell 
 Number Four. Pritty soon he got a answer, and the Yirginny sheriff said 
 that cell Number Four was a awful criminal and had jest escaped by blowin 
 up the court-house with nitro-glycerine, and him and a man as was in for 
 murder, and who was actin as deputy sheriff, was goin out in a couple 
 of days soon as a reward was offered to hunt up that feller what had 
 escaped from Number Four." 
 
 " I call for the decision of the Chair ! " exclaimed the Doubter, when 
 Old Reliable had concluded. 
 
 The Chair decided as follows : 
 
 " Gentlemen, in the humble opinion of this here Chair, the Nevady 
 lie is ahead of the Colorado lie. The Colorado lie only showed the ships 
 comin into the Golden Gate at Frisco, but we all knows a ship is a big 
 object, and can be seed a long distance off ; but when a atmosphere exists 
 as will make a man able to see clear through a brick wall a hundred and 
 eighty miles off, I say that it s a pritty clear case." 
 
 "A clear case of the jim-jams," growled the Doubter. 
 
 " I thought I d told you afore about indulgm in personalities to rds 
 members," said the Chair, angrily, addressing himself to the Doubter; 
 " but, howsomever, I would suggest to our friend as tells about what he 
 seed up on the mounting, thet he goes up thar ag in, and watches for that 
 feller what escaped, and p raps he ll see him streakin it across the country, 
 and can corral him, and come in for that thar reward." 
 
 Old Reliable replied that he would wait till the reward was offered, 
 and might " take a hand in that game " if the amount was big enough to 
 make it an object to a gentleman to exert himself to the extent necessary 
 to climb the mountain and look for the escaped prisoner. 
 
 Fish Lies. 
 
 The debate for some little time after the occurrence of the proceed 
 ings narrated above seemed to lag for want of material, and things looked 
 favorable for a dull and spiritless session. The President yawned, and 
 the Secretary actually " threw off," so that the other man might make 
 
 7 
 
93 THE S A ZEE AC LYING CLUB. 
 
 high, low, jack, pedro, and the game. The members smoked their pipes 
 and chewed on their quids, and were seemingly wrapped in their own 
 thoughts, or sleeping the sleep of the just, and dreaming the happy hours 
 away ; and it seemed as if all the life had suddenly gone out of the Club. 
 At last Old Dad came to the rescue. He knew that the subject of fishing 
 is one which affords so wide a scope for the talents of the liar that the 
 mere mention of fish or fishing was enough to excite the Club to action, 
 and to cause the old fire to again burn in the eyes of its members. Stamp 
 ing his foot on the floor to attract the attention of the Club, (though he 
 apologized for the action by saying that he actually thought his foot must 
 have gone to sleep) he said : 
 
 "Gentlemen, you ve all on you done more or less fishin , and no 
 doubt every man of you thinks he s the best fisherman as ever made a 
 track along a stream. I m a pritty good fisher myself, and can yank as 
 many trout out of one hole providin they re in thai* as the next man ; 
 but from all I can hear, and from what s been told me, thar is a fisher as 
 discounts any of us." 
 
 " Whar does he live?" inquired the Doubter. 
 
 " Over to Virginny City and in that neighborhood," was the reply. 
 
 "What s his name?" asked Mr. Thirsty; "he s got to be a pritty 
 good fisher if he can git away with me when I m at myself." 
 
 " Oh, you ve all heard of him," said Dad, after keeping the Club in 
 suspense while deliberately cutting a pipe-full of tobacco from a plug of 
 that article, and filling his pipe. 
 
 " Who is he ? Who is he ? " asked a number of members simulta 
 neously. 
 
 Dad struck a match and lit the pipe, and then taking several long whiffs, 
 he looked up at the curling smoke and said : 
 
 " This here fisher is p raps the greatest fisher in the world. As I ve 
 said, you ve all heard of this fisher. Mr. President, the fisher to which I m 
 makin reference is the great Comstock fissure" 
 
 A look of blank amazement came over the faces of the Club, and it 
 was at least a minute before the Chair could subdue its feelings and find 
 words in which to rebuke Old Dad for what it characterized as his levity. 
 
 " I m sure," said the Chair, addressing the culprit, " that you re the 
 last man in the world that I d have thought would have undertaken to 
 catch this here Club on a sell." 
 
 Dad said he had not meant to hurt anybody s feelings ; and sooner 
 than that anybody should feel aggrieved over his little joke, the Club 
 could "sashay" to the bar at his expense. 
 
 Thus was the bloody chasm bridged over with kindly feeling, and tne 
 era of conciliation again resumed its sway in the Club. 
 
 When the members resumed their seats, Mr. Thirsty took the floor, 
 saying : 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 99 
 
 " Gentlemen, speakin of fishin , I ve got a little fish story myself." 
 
 "Propel!" said the Chair. 
 
 And Mr. T. "propelled" as follows: 
 
 " I was up Reese River fishin last week, and a very curious occur 
 rence occurred to me. I d fished along up and down the bank all mornin , 
 without hevin any luck wuth tellin of, and was gittin kind of disgusted 
 like cause the fish wouldn t bite, and my bottle was as dry as a powder- 
 horn, I myself bein pritty much in the same condition. I was trampin 
 along the bank, droppin my hook in here and thar whenever I saw a 
 likely place, more jest to be doin somethin than expectin to get a bite, 
 when I come to a big, deep hole, whar the water was clear as a lookin - 
 glass. Peepin over the bank, I seed the biggest trout I ever laid eyes on. 
 It was a-swimmin round in the pool, and there was up ards of four hun 
 dred little trouts follerin it around, like a lot of chickens follerin of the 
 old hen. 
 
 " The mother of all the trouts in Reese River, by thunder ! says I to 
 myself. 
 
 " Wai, I baited my hook, and sneaked my pole over the bank, and 
 drapped the line inter the pool ; and the fust thing I knowed, I got the 
 most all-powerful bite " 
 
 "Was it a skeeter?" interrupted the Doubter. 
 
 "Skeeter be blowed! No; it warn t no skeeter, but jest that big 
 fish, the mother of all the trouts in Reese River. I jest braced myself, 
 give one yank, and landed that old trout high and dry on the grass be 
 hind me." 
 
 "Did you bring it home ?" hurriedly asked Uncle John, who has a 
 weakness for fish, and hoped to come in for a portion of the trout. 
 
 "No, I didn t fetch it home," returned Mr. Thirsty; "it went ag in 
 my conscience to do it. When I looked back inter that thar hole, thar 
 was them little fishes a-swimmin round and round, and a-takin on orful, 
 cause their mother was gone. Gentlemen, you all know I m a kind- 
 hearted man, and I couldn t stand by and see the distressful actions of 
 them fish ; so I jest took the hook out of that nineteen-pound trout, and 
 chucked her back inter the water. You jest ought to seed them little 
 trouts when the old she-one struck the water ; they felt as glad as if forty 
 bushels of worms and a lot of grasshoppers had drapped down on them 
 from heaven. The old gal she jest throwed herself over on her back, and 
 the young ones they begin to suckle her, jest like a lot of kittens ; and 
 when I left thar she was feedin some of the smallest ones with one of 
 them thar nursin bottles." 
 
 " Your heart s a heap bigger than your appetite for trout," said Uncle 
 John, sarcastically. 
 
 " Mebbe that s so, and mebbe it aint," returned Mr. Thirsty ; " but, 
 gentlemen, I actooally believe that in chuckin of that thar fish back inter 
 
100 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 the stream, I ve been a public benefactor. If, as I m inclined to b leeve, 
 she was the mother of all the trouts in the river, why it f oilers as a nat ral 
 consequence that if I d have killed her, all the other fishes would hev died 
 for want of a mother s care ; and then what would all you fellers do for 
 fishin ?" 
 
 " Eat mackerel," growled Uncle John. 
 
 The Chair here interposed, and stated that while it did not take much 
 stock in Mr. Thirsty s fish, the discussion between him and Uncle John 
 had extended to the utmost limit of propriety ; and, for fear of accidents, 
 he would now declare the Club adjourned for the evening. . 
 
 A Conundrum for the Club. 
 
 The members were all in their seats, and the Chair was just in the 
 act of taking his chew of tobacco out of his mouth, that he might the 
 better have the use of his voice in calling the Club to order, when a 
 stranger entered the room. 
 
 The new-comer walked straight to the bar, and then, facing toward 
 the Club, nodded to the Chair, and said : 
 
 " Come up, gentlemen, and wet your whistles." 
 
 Each member of the Club jumped to his feet and started for the bar 
 to accept the stranger s invitation ; but the Chair rapped on the stove 
 with its stick, and demanded order. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said he, "you re actin like a lot of hogs; don t you 
 know the rules of this here Club about the members drinkin with stran- 
 gers?" 
 
 Mr. Truefact, who appeared in the Club this evening for the first time 
 since being attacked with the fever, attempted to stutter out that as he 
 understood the rule it was never to refuse to drink with anybody; but 
 the Chair shut off debate from the convalescent fever patient by saying : 
 
 " If we d wait for you to interpret the rules, we d die of thirst afore 
 we got a chance to drink." 
 
 Then, again addressing himself to the Club, he said : 
 
 " Gentlemen, this here thing must be put to a vote, and I caution you 
 that there must be unanimous consent. All those as is in favor of drinkin 
 with this gentleman, please say * Aye contrary-minded, No. " 
 
 A prompt "aye" from every member present attested the "unani 
 mous consent." 
 
 " Gentlemen," said the Chair, "you have so decided, and we ll purceed 
 to drink with this here stranger. All promenade to the bar." 
 
 The members promenaded, and as they stood ranged along the bar, 
 each, glass in hand, awaiting the signal from the President to chorus, 
 " Here s luck," the stranger said : 
 
 "Gentlemen, why am I a musician of the first order?" 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 101 
 
 The President said this was not a conundrum society, and on behalf of 
 the Club he gave it up. 
 
 "Because," continued the stranger, I have waked to ecstacy the liv 
 ing lyre (liar)." 
 
 " Can t see the point," said the Doubter, swallowing his liquor and 
 walking away from the bar. 
 
 " Best thing I ever heard in my life," said the Chair. 
 
 "I s pose you mean the invitation to drink," whispered Uncle John 
 to the President. 
 
 The Chair trod on Uncle John s foot, for the purpose, as it (the Chair) 
 afterwards expressed it % of cautioning Uncle John not to " give away the 
 business." But it happened to be Uncle John s rheumatic^foot that was 
 trodden on, and the old man said some bad words, and hopped around on 
 one leg. This gave all the members something to laugh at ; and the stran 
 ger thought they were laughing at his conundrum, and said : 
 
 " Thank you, gentlemen, you re the most appreciative lot of cusses 
 1 ever saw. Bat I can t stop ; I ve got to go up town and ask a man why 
 an old maid is like a buzz-saw running at four thousand revolutions a 
 minute." 
 
 " Give it up," said the Secretary, from the little round table over in 
 the corner. 
 
 " Then I take down the pot," said his opponent. 
 
 This gave rise to a dispute between the Secretary and the man he was 
 playing with, the latter contending that the former had given up the game, 
 and the Secretary insisting that it was the conundrum he meant to give 
 up ; and during the confusion the stranger escaped. The disturbance 
 which arose in the arbitration of this matter by the Club caused the stran 
 ger and his conundrum to be forgotten, and prevented its merits being 
 discussed, as it otherwise would have been. The President decided the 
 Secretary s dispute by ordering the pot confiscated to the use of the Club, 
 and the money appropriated to the purchase of the " drinks for the crowd." 
 
 " Further Business." 
 
 After the ceremonies of confiscation and appropriation, the members 
 resumed their seats, and further business was transacted as follows : 
 
 Uncle John related that where he used to live in the States there was 
 a dog-breeder, who, by means of crossing various kinds of dogs, finally 
 became possessed of one so small that when ten feet off she could not be 
 seen except by the aid of opera-glasses. The man had been in hopes of 
 getting the thing down so fine that he would grow rich by the sale of 
 dogs of a suitable size for microscopic watch-charms ; but he failed on 
 that. When this animal became a mother, she gave birth to seven bull- 
 pups, each of which weighed eleven pounds at birth. 
 
102 THE SAZEEAC LYING GLUE. 
 
 Nobody expressed any doubts of the truth of this story ; but the 
 Doubter was heard to mutter : " Seven times leven s seventy-seven. 
 Seventy-seven pounds of bull-pup, and the mother no bigger n a peach- 
 pit!" " 
 
 When Uncle John had concluded, the Chair asked if anybody could 
 " call that." There was no answer to this question, but Mr. Truef act said : 
 "S-p-p-osen w-wee t-t-talk b-b-bout g-g-g-gras-s-s-hop-p-p-pers ? " 
 
 " S posen we do," assented several members. 
 
 Then the discussion was opened under the head of " grasshoppers." 
 
 All the old stories about grasshoppers eating mules and stopping 
 railroad trains and bridging over rivers were related, and recorded by the 
 Secretary, and it looked as if nothing new on the subject was to be ad 
 vanced, and one member had even essayed to make a motion to adjourn 
 by saying that the times were too dull and money too scarce for good, 
 square, honest, lying, when Old Reliable interrupted, and said he hoped 
 the gentleman would withhold his motion for a moment. This request be 
 ing acquiesced in, Old Reliable cocked his feet upon the stove, borrowed 
 the President s pipe, and spoke as follows : 
 
 "Mr. President, and gentlemen of the Club, what I am about to re 
 late aint no lie ; it s a true and actual positive fact. Once, when I was 
 in Salt Lake, during one of the grasshopper years, they had br iled chicken 
 marked on the bill of fare at the restaurant I boarded at. I m sort of 
 partial to yaller-legs, and I told the waiter to bring me half a br iled 
 chicken, which he did, as soon as the cook had fixed it up in shape. I 
 proceeded to eat the bird, but noticed a kind of peculiar taste to it. So I 
 questioned the waiter about it ; and, gentlemen, what do you suppose I 
 had been eating?" 
 
 " Grasshopper ! " cried the entire Club in chorus. 
 
 " Not much ; it was jest chicken. You see it was so long since I had 
 eat chicken that it tasted kinder peculiar to me." 
 
 "Sold, by thunder!" was all the President said; but those words 
 fitly expressed the sentiments of the entire Club. 
 
 " Speakin of chickens," said Old Dad, when the Chair announced 
 that the Club was again ready for business, " speakin of chickens reminds 
 me of somethin " ; and then he related a narrative, the substance of which 
 was as follows : 
 
 Back in the Shenandoah Valley, when he was a boy, the whole coun 
 try was covered with Methodist preachers and " yaller-leg" chickens. The 
 former used to visit the people who owned the chickens, generally accom 
 panied by an umbrella and a pair of saddle-bags, and when any one of them 
 took his departure many less chickens lived on that farm than when he 
 arrived. His uncle was the possessor of a yellow hound, which had been 
 taught to chase and catch the feathered bipeds when any were wanted 
 for the table, and the animal got to know the preachers so well that when- 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 103 
 
 ever a man appeared on the farm with an umbrella and a pair of saddle 
 bags, he would not wait for orders, but would make a straight break for the 
 chickens, a number of which he would catch and carry to the house. To 
 save their poultry his uncle had either to turn Presbyterian, or kill the 
 dog ; and he chose to change his creed. 
 
 Dad concluded the hour had grown late, and the Chair said he 
 "reckoned they had better adjourn," and was about to declare the even 
 ing s session at an end, when another stranger entered the room. He was 
 ragged and dirty, and as he passed the bar he looked imploringly at the 
 bar-keeper. That individual pretended not to see him ; and the strano-or 
 walked right up to the stove, lifted his coat-tails, placed his hands behind 
 his back, and braced himself so as to catch the warmth on the reverse por 
 tion of his anatomy, while the obverse faced the Club. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said he, "was any of you fellers ever in this new minin 
 country, the Black Hills ? " 
 
 There was no answer. 
 
 " I was thar nigh onto twenty year ago," continued he of the rags and 
 di? v "but was druv out by the Injuns, and they come mighty nigh nailin 
 my skelp, too, you bet your life." 
 
 "What kind of a country is it for timber and water?" asked the 
 Chair, who felt that it devolved on somebody to notice the stranger. 
 
 " Timber and water ! Blazes ! Thar s a water stream every hundred 
 yards, bunch grass at every step, and more and bigger pine timber to the 
 squar foot than to the squar mile in the Sary Nevadys, and just alive 
 with game at that. All a man needs in that country to git a livin with is 
 a shotgun and a sack of salt. Now ef any of you gentlemen s got a few 
 dollars to invest in a good prospector, and a miner sence forty-nine, jest 
 put yer trust in me. Gimme an outfit a ridin animal, a pack animal, a 
 Henry rifle, tools, and about two hundred dollars wuth of pervisions and 
 I ll go to them thar Black Hills and locate every one of you a claim that ll 
 pan out to make yer all richer than Rosschild and Creesus put together. 
 Does any of you gentlemen wish to invest?" 
 
 Echo answered "nary invest," and the President thereupon declared 
 the Club adjourned. 
 
 The Club Perpetuated. 
 
 The President arose from his chair in front of the stove, and sighed. 
 His classic features had a care worn look, and all the members present men 
 tally noted that their beloved presiding officer seemed sad and cast down ; 
 and Mr. Thirsty was heard to mutter in an undertone that the Chair looked 
 as solemn as he (Mr. Thirsty) did on the occasion that he met with a mis 
 fortune by swallowing a fly in his whisky. 
 
104 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 The Chair simply said : "Gentlemen of the Club, jine me at the bar." 
 
 And the Club jined. 
 
 The Chair informed the bar-keeper that he would take " the same old 
 thing"; and as he poured the fluid from the bottle into the glass, it was 
 noticed that he made his allowance considerably in excess of the usual 
 "three fingers" that he filled the glass nearly level with its brim. The 
 bar-keeper looked at him reproachfully, and remarked something about 
 there being a wholesale liquor store down town, and the Chair took the 
 hint, and said, in an apologetic tone : 
 
 " I need a big snort, to brace me up ; I m rastlin with a mighty 
 problem." 
 
 " A bar-glass level-full of straight whisky at one gulp is a mighty prob 
 lem for any white man to rastle with," returned the bar-keeper, in a sarcas 
 tic tone of voice. 
 
 " Yes," meekly replied the Chair ; " like assimulates to like, and I m 
 sendin of this here mighty problem to meet the mighty problem as is now 
 agitatin of my brain." So saying, he swallowed the whisky, as the bar 
 keeper had described the process in advance, "at one gulp" ; and as soon 
 as he had regained his breath, he said : 
 
 "Gentlemen, let us resume." 
 
 " The way to resume is to resume," remarked the Philosopher. 
 
 " I hope members won t indulge in no triflin* to-night," said the Chair, 
 with the tears welling up into its eyes from the effects of his overdose of 
 stimulant "we hev on hand the most important business as has ever come 
 afore this Club ; so please resume your seats and come to order, and I ll 
 state the sittywation." 
 
 The members, whose curiosity was now thoroughly aroused, hurriedly 
 resumed their seats ; and the Chair, having secured order, arose and said : 
 
 " Gentlemen of this here Club : As I hev stated afore, we hev most 
 important business afore us to-night. You are goin to be called on to de 
 liberate the gravest question as has ever come under the consideration of 
 this here flourishin organization from the minnit of its commencement to 
 date. I, as I hev said, hev rastled with the problem, but it knocks the 
 spots off me. In fact, I give it up. I onc t heerd a man say that in a 
 multitude of counselors thai* is safety ; and I m goin to submit this here 
 question to the whole Club, not feelin like takin the responsibility of de- 
 cidin it single-handed, which, howsomever, I hev power to do under our 
 Constitution and By-laws, bein as I m President." 
 
 " State your p int of order," interrupted the Aye-and-No Member, who 
 was evidently growing impatient. 
 
 " If you re goin to state this question, you better come up here and 
 do it, and you be President instead of me, and I ll step down and out into 
 the obscurity of private life," returned the Chair, in a reproachful tone, 
 and with his eyes bent on the Aye-and-No .Member. 
 
SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE. 105 
 
 " Mebbe I could do it as well as some folks as I knows on, and not be 
 all night beatin round the bushes at it, either," snappishly returned the 
 official voter for the Club. 
 
 " Gentlemen," said the Chair, in a sad tone, " you all know me well 
 enough to know that at any other time I should resent the remarks of the 
 galoot as has preceded me. But this is no time for quarrelin , and, consid- 
 erin that we hev important business on hand, and that this is the fust de 
 bate in which the gentleman has took part, I overlook his unpoliteness to 
 his presiding officer on this occasion. Now to the p int. The Seccertary 
 will please read this, which explains itself, and durin the readin let every 
 member sit still as a mice." 
 
 So saying, the Chair handed the Secretary an envelope, from which 
 that official extracted a sheet of letter paper, and read from it as follows : 
 
 AUSTIN, Nevada, Nov. 20th, 1877. 
 
 To THE PRESIDENT AND MEMBERS OF THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB 
 Gentlemen : As you may be personally and officially aware, I have, in 
 my capacity of editor of the Daily Reese River REVEILLE, been divers 
 and sundry times called upon to record in my valuable, widely circulated, 
 and strictly family journal, some of the proceedings of the Club of which 
 you have the distinguished honor to be President and members. This cir 
 cumstance has caused the fame of the Sazerac Lying Club to spread 
 abroad over this land of liberty, and even across the great waters to the 
 effete monarchies of the old world, and all up and down the earth, and to 
 the ends thereof. Yes, Mr. President and gentlemen, your fame and re 
 nown have spread like the exhalations of the upas tree, or a Chinese um 
 brella, or a Chicago girl s feet, or a church scandal, or anything else that 
 has a habit of spreading ; until at last it has even reached unto San Fran 
 cisco. 
 
 I am in receipt of a communication from a firm of San Francisco pub 
 lishers, requesting me to endeavor to obtain access to the archives and 
 records of your Club, and to extract therefrom such matter as I, in my 
 judgment, may select, the same to be published by the said firm in the 
 form of a book, that the Sazerac Lying Club may be perpetuated unto our 
 children, and our children s children, and to other generations yet unborn. 
 My object, therefore, in thus addressing your most honorable body, is to 
 obtain the permission as herein set forth for the purpose above stated, and 
 to enable me to comply with the request embodied in the preceding. 
 
 Respectfully, 
 
 EDITOR REVEILLE. 
 
 p. S. The publishers state that their object in desiring to publish the 
 book aforesaid is not for mere speculative purposes, or to make money ; 
 but simply that a light may be given to the world that shall guide the 
 step of youthful innocence in the walk of virtue, and lead the tottering 
 feet of age through a path that shall be a fitting close to an eventful life- 
 
 " I vote aye ! " shouted the Aye-and-No Member when the Secretary 
 had concluded the reading of the above. " I want to be perpetuated to 
 rising may I say self-rising? generations." 
 
 " Gentlemen," said the Chair, solemnly, " this is not a matter to be 
 
106 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 decided in a minnit. We must deliberate on it calmly, deliberately, dis 
 passionately ; without fear or favor ; with charity towards all, with malice 
 towards none, and irrespective of age, sex, or previous condition of servi 
 tude. I would like to hear a expression of the sentiments of the Club on 
 this here subjeck." 
 
 Mr. Thirsty spoke up and said, for his part, he didn t want to be " cre 
 mated " ; he had read in a paper recently an account of the cremation of 
 a woman in Pennsylvania, and concluded it must hurt. 
 
 " N-n-not c-c-c-rem-m-ma-t-t-ted, b-b-but p-p-p-p-p-erp-p-p-p-et-tuat-ted, 
 you d-d-d " 
 
 Before Mr. Truefact could finish the sentence given in part above, 
 the Chair called him to order, and explained to Mr. Thirsty that he had 
 not heard the word aright that it was perpetuation and not cremation 
 that was under discusssion. 
 
 Mr. Thirsty replied that if " the rest of em " could " stand it," he 
 could. 
 
 A running discussion now ensued, in which every member of the 
 Club took part. There was great diversity of opinion as to the proper 
 course to pursue, the Doubter strenuously protesting against the grant 
 ing of access to the records. He became so heated in the course of the 
 argument that it became necessary for him to retire to the bar to recuper 
 ate his wasted energies ; and Uncle John took advantage of his absence 
 to move the previous question. 
 
 The question was put; the Aye-and-No Member hurriedly voted 
 "Aye," and the Chair decided that the previous question was carried 
 unanimously, and that the Club had resolved as with one voice to give 
 access to its archives and records, that material might be selected therefrom 
 to constitute matter for publication in a book, to be known as " THE SAZ 
 ERAC LYING CLUB." 
 
 The Doubter, who returned to the stove just in time to hear the de 
 cision of the Chair, immediately tendered his resignation, which was ac 
 cepted by his being fired out by unanimous consent. 
 
 Uncle John then offered a resolution that reporters should not be 
 admitted at future sessions of the Club, and that all future records of pro 
 ceedings be chucked into the stove as soon as recorded. This was unani 
 mously adopted, as was a resolution by Old Dad, that the sessions of the 
 Sazerac Lying Club be conducted with closed doors, NOW AND FOREVER 
 
 AFTER. 
 
fart 
 
 FRONTIER SKETCHES. 
 
 Marcus. 
 
 The subject of this sketch was never a member of the Sazerac Lying 
 Club, although he possesses, in a marked degree, the peculiar qualifications 
 for eligibility to membership in that organization ; and had he resided in 
 Austin since the formation of the Club, would have been one of its most 
 prominent members, and proudest ornaments. His full and true name is 
 Marquis de Lafayette Shoults, but since his residence on the Pacific Coast 
 he has been generally known as Marcus Schultz, and commonly called 
 " Marcus." He is a native of Missouri, and emigrated from that State to 
 California some twenty-five years ago, coming " the plains across " in an 
 ox-wagon. From the time of his arrival in the Golden State until his emi 
 gration thence to Nevada, in the year 1862, Marcus was generally notorious 
 throughout the mining camps of California as a queer and original char- 
 acter ; and to-day he is known as such, or known of, in every mining town 
 in Nevada, Utah, Idaho, and Montana, but more particularly in far Eastern 
 and Southeastern Nevada, in which sections he has resided for ten years 
 past. 
 
 Like all who went to California in the first rush, Marcus went there 
 to seek his fortune. He failed to find it, and has long since given up the 
 search. He is not wealthy, nor is he ever likely to be so ; but no Roths 
 child or no Bonanza King is happier or more contented than he. He be 
 longs to that class of men who deem that the world owes them a living, 
 and that they are bound to have it ; and if Marcus gets his regular meals 
 and stimulants, and a few rough, comfortable clothes to wear, without be 
 ing compelled to work for them, he asks nothing more of the world or its 
 people. It is related in a sort of traditional way that when he first arrived 
 in California he sought his fortune through the avenue of manual labor ; 
 but that was so long ago, that, even if the story is true, there is now no 
 means of verifying it, and it would be hard to convince the majority of 
 
108 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 those who know him that it has a.ny foundation in fact. But that for 
 twenty-five years on the Pacific Coast he has lived and flourished without 
 work, is sufficient evidence that he possesses talents of a peculiar order. 
 The reader is not expected to understand that Marcus is a deliberate 
 fraud ; for he is not such. By his odd ways and original sayings he has a 
 faculty of making everybody his friend, and in whatever town he may be 
 living, there are few who have any means to spare but who see to it that 
 he does not lack for the necessaries of existence ; and the free and open 
 hospitality so common in the mines prevents him from suffering for that 
 liquid comfort which is now the chief consolation of his life. 
 
 When he left Missouri to go to California, the portion of the former 
 State in which he was "borned and raised" was little better than a wilder 
 ness ; so it can readily be conceived that his ideas were somewhat crude, 
 and that he did not possess the education, refinement, and culture now so 
 characteristic of the natives of the State of Missouri. To quote his own 
 words, he had only a " common classical education" But contact with 
 the world, aided by a naturally sharp wit, and a faculty for observation, 
 made him as good a judge of character and reader of human nature as 
 though he had deliberately devoted his whole life to the study of those 
 subjects. He has failed in these particulars somewhat of late years, owing 
 to the too frequent putting of "an enemy into his mouth" ; but there have 
 been times when, by some sarcastic, but at the same time ludicrously witty 
 remark or repartee, he has made men in high social or political position 
 squirm as if they had been bitten by a tarantula. He used to be quick to 
 detect hypocrisy or toadyism, which qualities he hated with his whole 
 heart; and many a hand-shaking, smiling candidate has he made to feel as 
 if he wished he had never been born. Not by abuse, or blackguardism, 
 but simply by some comical allusion which would instantly bring its object 
 into ridicule. He used to say : 
 
 "These here office-seeking cusses can stand all the blackguardin 
 you ve a mind to give em ; you can abuse em all you want to, and they 
 won t kick ; call em the meanest names on earth, and they ll ask you to 
 drink ; insult em, and they won t even talk back : but laugh at em, or 
 make other people laugh at em, and they ll weaken like a dog on a desert 
 and forty miles to water. They can t stand ridicule no mor n a man can 
 live on the smell of a dish-rag for nineteen days." 
 
 In his palmy days Marcus was a man full of resources, and possessed 
 a great deal of a certain energy. He has roamed over the deserts and 
 mountains on foot and on horseback from Arizona to Montana, always in 
 search of the " better camp," and his efforts for a " stake " have to a 
 limited extent at times been crowned with success. His means for the 
 acquirement of money was principally through cards, or gambling of some 
 sort, in the tricks of which he was an adept, in the earlier portion of his 
 career. He never deemed it wrong to cheat at cards, and when caught 
 in the act would own up like a man, and tell the cheated one : 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 109> 
 
 " This here s a world whar every man in it is tryin to git the best of 
 somebody else. Some does it by smooth talkin and lyin , others by 
 merchandising and others by keards. I m one of them last, and if you 
 can t pnrtect yourself and keep off advantages, you aint got no business 
 to try conclusions with a man that s made the subjeck a study. We all 
 has to pay for our experience, and these here lew dollars what I ve beat 
 you out of is only the price of one lesson." 
 
 In his earlier and purer days, Marcus was something of a dandy, and 
 when he made a raise would get himself up regardless of expense. On 
 one occasion, in Austin, when he had accumulated quite a sum in the 
 business of banking, (he was banker of a rondeau game a game played 
 on a billiard table with a number of small ivory balls, the banker getting 
 a certain percentage for keeping the game) he went to a tailor and or 
 dered an expensive and elaborate suit of clothes, made strictly in accord 
 ance with his own peculiar ideas of style. In his views of dress, Marcus 
 somewhat resembled the Chinaman, who, in buying Melican boots, buys 
 the largest size in the store, so as to get as much leather as possible for 
 his money. There was a time in the mountains of California when the 
 "shanghai" coat was the prevailing mode for "dressed up," and Marcus 
 always clung to this style. On the occasion in question his coat was of 
 fine broadcloth, reaching nearly to his heels, silk-velvet vest of a gorgeous, 
 pattern, pants of a large plaid, stuck into a pair of high-heeled, stub-toed 
 boots, the bottoms of the heels being tapered down to the size of a silver 
 half-dollar piece, one of these coins being fastened by a screw to the bottom 
 of each. A white shirt with a big " specimen " gold pin, and a broad- 
 brimmed slouch hat, completed his outfit. When thus arrayed he pre 
 sented a somewhat Imposing appearance. He was large of stature, and 
 of full figure, with something of an aldermanic development of body, 
 which, added to an assumed important strut in his daily walk, and a dicta 
 torial speech, was calculated to impress a stranger with the idea that he 
 was one of the magnates of the town a mining superintendent at the 
 
 very least. 
 
 The writer of this well remembers the day on which Marcus first 
 appeared in the gorgeous array above described. It was a Sunday morn 
 ing, and Mr. Shoults walked into a barber shop, which was crowded with 
 men waiting their turn for their Sunday shave. He stepped directly to a 
 lono- mirror which was fastened to the wall, and which reflected his full 
 length, and surveyed himself therein. Then, as if talking to himself in 
 
 the glass, he said : 
 
 "Marcus, you re the best dressed man as ever stepped across tne- 
 bound ry lines of the State of Missoury." Then, turning and addressing 
 the crowd in the shop, he said : 
 
 "Gentlemen, if I was to go back to Rails County, Missoury-whar I 
 come from to this country-the people for two hundred miles round wouL 
 flock to our house to see the best dressed man in the State. Back thar 
 
110 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 they never seed a man dressed up as fine as I am, cause most of the people 
 thar wear tow-linen shirts till they grow up, and then if they git one suit 
 of linsey-woolsey homespun in a year, they think they re fixed for life. 
 And look at me, in broadcloth and fine linen, and money in my clothes to 
 throw at the birds ! Why, I s pose, fixed up as I am now, I could go back 
 to Missoury and marry the best and richest gal in the State by jest crookin 
 of my finger at her." 
 
 But the days of Marcus splendor have gone by ; it is ten years since 
 he has had a " shanghai " coat, and a white shirt, and a specimen pin ; but 
 he is as happy and cheerful in a pair of blue overalls, " stogie " boots, and 
 a California gray flannel overshirt, as he used to be in his purple and fine 
 linen. As illustrating his liking for good clothes, the following anecdote 
 is related : 
 
 It was when Marcus had started down hill, and had got pretty well 
 along towards the foot. Winter was coming on, and he had no overcoat, 
 and it was in the bleak climate of White Pine, in which a heavy overcoat 
 is an actual necessity for at least eight months in the year. 
 
 A gentleman hearing Marcus remark that it would not be long till the 
 winds whispered an inquiry into his ear as to what he had been doing all 
 summer, and where was his overcoat, volunteered to purchase and present 
 him with that necessary garment. Of course Marcus did not refuse the 
 kind offer, and the two started across the street to a store to select the 
 article. On the way over, the gentleman asked Marcus what kind of a coat 
 he would like. 
 
 " Somethin warm, and at the same time becomin . I go about as 
 much on style as I do on comfort," was the reply. 
 
 "Don t you think a blanket coat would fill the bill?" 
 
 The blanket coat is a very commonly worn article of attire in the 
 mountains, but is much more comfortable than elegant. Marcus wanted 
 something better and more expensive, and replied that he did not think he 
 should like a blanket coat, and would prefer one of broadcloth. 
 
 " But," said his friend, " a blanket coat is about as comfortable a gar 
 ment as can be worn in this climate." 
 
 " Yes, I know it s comfortable," was the reply, " but the truth is, I 
 never could play cards out of the sleeve of a blanket coat." 
 
 He got the broadcloth. 
 
 The Bank Exchange. 
 
 Marcus has been a business man in his time, having once been the 
 proprietor of a "first-class" saloon. It was in a little placer-mining camp 
 in Montana, named Indian Creek, but more commonly called " Hog ern." 
 The camp was new, and there was, as is usual in such cases, a considerable 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. HI 
 
 floating population though the actual resources of the place were not 
 
 adequate to the support of one hundred persons, all told. One day Marcus 
 
 came to the writer, who was working for wages in the diggings, and said : 
 
 " I want you to come up to my saloon to-night, and paint me a sign." 
 
 " My saloon " was a new revelation ; and as for painting a sign, that 
 
 seemed entirely out of the question in a place where there was not a brush 
 
 or a drop of paint to be procured. But, as has previously been stated, 
 
 Marcus was a man of resources, and assured the sign-painter that he need 
 
 feel no uneasiness as regarded the materials for the proposed work. 
 
 When evening came, no difficulty was experienced in finding the 
 " saloon," for there were not to exceed a dozen houses in the camp, at 
 best, and the loud tones of Marcus voice, which could be heard from one 
 end to the other of the little street, soon indicated the precise locality of 
 his establishment. 
 
 The "saloon" was in a little log cabin, with a dirt floor, a wide door 
 in front, and no windows. The furnishing consisted of a couple of rude 
 benches, a rickety table covered with a dirty blanket, two barrels on which 
 rested a board, which answered the purpose of a bar, a pair of dilapidated 
 gold scales, and a few bottles with lighted candles stuck in their mouths. 
 The stock in trade consisted of a couple of greasy decks of cards and a 
 gallon of cheap whisky, subdivided into four bottles, respectively labeled, 
 Whisky, Gin, Brandy, Sherry displayed ostentatiously on the " bar," and 
 fenced in with a row of dingy glasses. After extending to the sign-painter 
 a hospitable invitation to " take somethin ," Marcus went to the rear of 
 the saloon and produced a board and a number of charred sticks. " I put 
 in half a day makin of these paint-brushes," he said, " and I want you to 
 go to work and paint me a sign on this board, to stick up in front of the 
 saloon." 
 
 There used to be in San Francisco a very popular drinking saloon 
 known by the name of the " Bank Exchange." At one time it was the 
 principal and most generally patronized saloon in that city, and its fame 
 extended into the most remote mining camps. The name was as popular 
 as was the establishment, and was adopted as a saloon title throughout 
 California, and subsequently in the other mining States and Territories 
 mainly settled and developed by original Calif ornians ; and to such an ex 
 tent was it carried, that it is doubtful if there is, or has been, a town or 
 mining camp from Arizona to Montana, and from Oregon to Colorado, 
 in which there has not been a " Bank Exchange Saloon." 
 
 What more natural, then, than that Marcus should choose the name 
 " Bank Exchange " for his establishment ? 
 
 And that was the name the artist painted on the pine plank with the 
 charred sticks. And when" the sign was completed, and fastened in place 
 across the front and over the door of the log cabin, Marcus pronounced 
 it a work of true artistic merit, and defied the world to produce its su 
 perior in the way of a saloon sign. 
 
112 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 The " saloon " actually flourished for a few days, and Marcus was 
 kept busy dealing out his stock, which he was compelled to frequently re 
 plenish by means of water and fresh purchases of whisky a gallon at a 
 time. He felt that he had " struck it " at last, and was on the high road 
 to fortune, and was elated accordingly. But a reaction came, and he was 
 plunged into the lowest depths of despair. 
 
 It was soon demonstrated that the diggings would afford work and 
 pay to but a small number of men, and when this fact became unquestion 
 able, there was a " stampede " for some other new camp, and the Bank 
 Exchange was left without customers, or so nearly so that there was no 
 longer any money in the business. Marcus, erstwhile so busy in dealing 
 out poor and watered whisky at two bits a drink, now put in his time in 
 bewailing the decadence of the camp, patronizing his own bar, and berat 
 ing the Territory of Montana as a country not fit for a white man and a 
 gentleman to live in. He was not the man to stay by a dead or dying 
 camp, and when it became evident that Hog em was gone in, Marcus 
 determined to join the other rats that were leaving the sinking ship, 
 and seek fresh fields for his talents, this determination necessarily resulting 
 in the closing of the Bank Exchange. He had tried to sell out, but nobody 
 wanted the property ; and when all efforts in that direction had failed, he 
 concluded to shut up shop and leave the place. When he had made up his 
 mind to this course, he went behind the bar, and addressing himself to 
 two or three old soakers who were lounging on the benches, said : 
 
 u Step up, gentlemen, and finish the stock in this here establishment." 
 
 The invitation was accepted with alacrity. 
 
 Marcus set a glass before each of the " gentlemen " ranged in front 
 of the bar, and with his hand on the last bottle of whisky (labeled sherry) 
 in the saloon, thus held forth : " Gentlemen, I come here to Hog em to- 
 do bizness ; I brung capital here ; but you see how the camp s gone down.. 
 In the last ten days I ve sunk twenty-one hundred dollars in this bizness,, 
 and this here bottle s the last of it. Help yourselves, gentlemen ! " 
 
 The "gentlemen" helped themselves, and Marcus joined them; and 
 when the bottle was emptied, he upset the bar-counter, chucked the gold 
 scales into a corner, and said : 
 
 " Good-bye, gentlemen, and good luck to you all. I m off for a better 
 camp." Then he went out of the door, in front of which his horse stood 
 saddled, and mounting the animal, turned once more to the "gentlemen," 
 who had assembled at the door to see him off, and casting his eyes and 
 pointing his finger at the sign, said : 
 
 " Gentlemen, you all know I ve lost twenty-one hundred dollars in 
 this bizness in the last ten days, and I want to tell you all, right here, that 
 I think the Territory of Montany s a fraud. Why, gentlemen, I d rather 
 run an ice-cream cart in the State of Nevady than a first-class saloon in 
 the Territory of Montany ; and I m now on the back track for the sage 
 brush. Good-bye!" 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 113 
 
 So saying, he put spurs to his horse and was off. 
 
 The truth of the matter was, that Marcus started the saloon without 
 any capital whatever, getting credit. for such stock and furniture as he 
 purchased, and during his flush time he had taken in several hundred 
 dollars, which was nearly all profit. This money (in gold dust) he carried 
 sewed inside of his shirt when he left Hog em. But his object in declaring 
 and reiterating that he had lost $2,100 in tile-business was to prevent any 
 of the impecunious individuals of his Hog em acquaintance from asking 
 him for a loan. 
 
 How They Got Grub. 
 
 Several years ago, before the building of the Pacific railroads, and the 
 consequent introduction of railroads into Utah Territory, Marcus and a 
 companion, who shall be here called Mr. Brown, were traveling through 
 the Mormon settlements in Northern Utah, en route to Montana. The 
 two men were on horseback, and had a pack-horse for the transportation 
 of their provisions, blankets, and camping outfit. They had traveled many 
 hundred weary miles over mountain and plain, and not having had a very 
 large supply of provisions to start with, were on short rations most of the 
 way, and when they reached nearly the northern borders of Utah their 
 stock was completely exhausted. They were traveling through the Mor 
 mon settlements, where provisions were easily procurable for money or for 
 barter ; but they had neither one nor the other to offer in exchange for the 
 articles they needed. Riding along the road one day, when they were 
 down to their last allowance of bacon and flour sufficient for a meal, Brown 
 suggested that at the next settlement they came to they swap the pack- 
 horse for the needed provisions, pack them on one of the saddle-horses, 
 and "ride and tie" with the other saddle-horse the rest of the journey. 
 To "ride and tie" is for two men with one horse between them to take 
 turn about at riding and walking. This plan Marcus instantly and strenu 
 ously opposed. He said he was not "stuck after walking, anyhow," and 
 urged that the saddle-horse could not carry as large a quantity of provi 
 sions as the pack-horse ought to bring in the exchange. He admitted that 
 it was positively necessary that a supply of provisions must be obtained 
 that day ; but as for him, he would rather live on sage-brush for the bal 
 ance of the journey than to part with one of the animals. 
 
 The two men rode along in silence for some time, each absorbed in his 
 own thoughts, and each probably trying in his mind to devise some means 
 to procure the necessary food, when the houses of the settlement appeared 
 to view in the distance. Reining tip his horse, Marcus halted, and, point 
 ing to the collection of houses, said : 
 
 "Yonder is the settlement. Ill ride ahead and see how the land lays, 
 and you lead the pack-horse, and come along slow." 
 
114 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 "What do you propose to do?" asked Brown. 
 
 " Oh, I ll ride in thar, and make myself at home with them Mormons, 
 and talk sweet to the women folks ; and if we don t git the grub we want, 
 they ll give us a squar meal, anyway. You be sure and ride along slow, 
 and give me a chance to git my work in." 
 
 Brown assented to the plan, but he had only slim hopes that Marcus 
 would succeed in wheedling the Mormon women out of the required pro 
 visions ; for hp knew that the Mormon settlers were very suspicious of 
 Gentiles, and also exceedingly avaricious, and that it was part of the creed 
 instilled into them by their leaders never to assist a Gentile, and never to 
 have any dealings or business transactions with them, unless they (the 
 Mormons) were sure of getting the best of the bargain. Marcus spurred 
 his horse into a "lope," and soon reached the settlement; and alighting at 
 the first house in his road, dismounted, and knocked at the door. 
 
 The door was opened by a young, pleasant-faced Welsh woman, with 
 a baby in her arms, and Marcus asked her for a drink of water. She 
 hastened into the house to procure him the water, leaving him standing at 
 the door, and soon returned with a tin cup filled with water. Marcus 
 took the cup, and while he was drinking, the baby in the woman s arms 
 set up a piteous wail, which attracted his attention to it, and he noticed 
 that its head was a perfect mass of sores. 
 
 " What s the matter with your baby, ma am ? " he asked. 
 " I m sure I don t know, sir," she replied. " These sores came and 
 covered its head all over, and the poor wean haven t had no rest nor com 
 fort since. There beant no doctors among we people, and naught I can 
 try seems to do it any good. Does thee know anything I could do for 
 the wean ?" 
 
 "No, I aint no doctor," replied Marcus, "but back here a piece, 
 trav liu with me, is one of the finest and smartest doctors on the Pacific 
 Coast, and what he don t know about doct rin aint wuth talkin about. 
 You see, ma am, he s got a big band of cattle what he s takin up to Mon- 
 tanny to sell for beef, and me an him is ridin ahead horseback, and the 
 droviers is behind with the cattle. He s a very rich man and don t prac 
 tice any only to accommodate his friends ; but bein as he s a little con 
 sumptive himself, me and him is travelin ahead for his health. He can 
 cure your baby, but you mustn t offer him no money, for he s that high- 
 toned he d git insulted in a minute. Thar he is ; that s him comin now," 
 and Marcus pointed to Mr. Brown, who was slowly riding up, leading the 
 pack-horse. 
 
 " Will you ask him to do something for my wean ? " said the woman. 
 " Certainly," replied Marcus, " but don t you say nothin to him, cause 
 then he ll know you ve found out he s a doctor. Leave it to me, ma am, 
 and I ll git him to fix your baby up as sound as a new dollar." 
 
 Mr. Brown had now approached within call, and Marcus said : 
 " Step this way, Doctor Brown." 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 115 
 
 Mr. Brown was puzzled to account for Marcus reason for applying 
 the title Doctor " to him, but felt that it had some connection with the 
 plan to procure grub. Therefore, he said nothing in reply to the call, but 
 determined to await events. He rode up to the door, and as he dismounted, 
 Marcus said, in a loud tone of voice : 
 
 " Doctor, step in here and look at this lady s baby, and see if you 
 can t do something for it." 
 
 Dr. Brown s appearance was not calculated to impress the beholder 
 with the belief that he was a man rolling in wealth. Long travel through 
 all kinds of weather had played sad havoc with clothes not originally of 
 the best, and sleeping on the ground and other hardships had not given 
 to him the cleanly aspect which even a Mormon woman might expect 
 the " finest and smartest physician " on the Pacific Coast to present. 
 But well-dressed men were not common in the Mormon settlements in 
 those days, and the Doctor s ragged attire and unkempt condition did not 
 impress the woman unfavorably, or cause her to doubt the statements of 
 Marcus concerning him. 
 
 She politely invited the Doctor into the house, and laid her infant 
 across her lap, with its head toward him, that he might the more readily 
 inspect it. 
 
 The only thing Dr. Brown could think of for the moment as the 
 proper and professional thing to do under the circumstances, was to grasp 
 the child s wrist, look wise, and feel its pulse. Then he looked at its head. 
 And such a head ! It was one mass of scabs, and its appearance was ab 
 solutely revolting, and the Doctor was forced to turn his eyes away from 
 it, in fear that it would sicken him. In thus turning away his eyes, they 
 encountered a table on which stood a number of tin pans filled with new 
 milk ; and he was struck with a happy idea. It seemed eminently proper 
 that such a disgusting spectacle as that child s head ought to be covered 
 from sight, and he at once conceived a plan for so concealing its hideous- 
 ness from view. 
 
 " Madam," said he, turning to the woman, " have you any fresh 
 milk in the house ? " 
 
 " A plenty a plenty of it." 
 
 "Have you likewise some wheat flour?" 
 
 " Oh, yes, sir ; a plenty." 
 
 " Bring me some fresh rnilk and some wheat flour, then." 
 
 The woman hastened to comply with these orders, and in a few mo 
 ments set before the Doctor one of the pans of milk and a wooden platter 
 filled with flour. 
 
 Dr. Brown, with the flour and milk, mixed up a compound of the con 
 sistency of thick paste, and whittling a paddle out of a piece of wood, 
 plastered the child s head over with the mess, and entirely concealed the 
 sores from view. The stuff, which must have had something of a cooling 
 
116 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 effect, seemed to relieve the infant s pain, and it quit the crying it had 
 up to that time kept up ever since the Doctor s entrance. 
 
 " Thar, I told you ! " exclaimed Marcus, addressing himself to the 
 woman. " I knowed he could cure your young-un in a minnit and a half 
 by the watch." 
 
 The woman evidently believed that the Doctor had applied a sover 
 eign remedy to her child s cranium, and began to utter expressions of 
 gratitude, and wound up by inviting Marcus and the Doctor to stay to 
 dinner. This invitation was unhesitatingly accepted by the two travelers, 
 as was the permission to put their animals in the corral, and give them 
 some hay and a feed of grain. 
 
 While the woman was preparing the meal, Marcus and Dr. Brown 
 went out, the former to attend to the horses, and the latter to prepare some 
 "powders." Among the cherished possessions of this worthy pair were a 
 few lumps of white crushed sugar, contained in a cylindrical tin box, such 
 as butter is packed in for the use of prospectors. It was the last sugar 
 they were destined to see until Gentile settlements were reached ; as the 
 Mormons knew not sugar in those days, sorghum syrup which was plen 
 tifully produced in Utah answering their purposes for " sweetening." 
 This sugar the Doctor proposed converting into " powders," but Marcus 
 entered a feeble protest against its being so wasted ; but the Doctor suc 
 ceeded in convincing him that it was absolutely necessary that the child 
 should have medicine. 
 
 While Marcus was looking to the comfort of the stock, Dr. Brown sat 
 on the ground in the corral, and, with the tin box for a mortar, and the 
 handle of a knife for a pestle, was crushing the sugar into powder. He 
 felt some misgivings as to the course they were taking with the woman 
 and her baby, and suggested to Marcus that it would hardly be the fair 
 thing to accept anything more than the meal and the horses feed for serv 
 ices of such little value. 
 
 " Thunder ! " exclaimed Marcus, " they ve got grub to throw at the 
 birds." 
 
 Then he explained that he had learned from the woman, while await 
 ing the Doctor s arrival, that she was wife number five of a Welshman who 
 owned six little ranches at different points along the stream which ran 
 through the valley in which this settlement lay ; that he had a wife at each 
 ranch, and visited each one at stated intervals. This husband, lie had 
 learned, was wealthy in live-stock and produce, and he urged that from 
 such a rnan it was not wrong to accept enough food to enable them to con 
 tinue the journey. He then requested that all matters pertaining to the 
 procurement of provisions be left to him, and, this being agreed to, he 
 again entered the house. 
 
 When Dr. Brown had completed the pulverization of the sugar, he 
 took from his pocket a note-book, from which he tore a number of leaves. 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 117 
 
 Dividing these into pieces of a suitable size, he placed a portion of the 
 sugar in each, and folded it up as he had seen apothecaries put up " pow 
 dery." When his task was completed there were upwards of one hundred 
 of the powders, and he gathered them up and returned to the house. 
 
 As he approached the door he heard the child screaming at the top 
 of its lungs, and on entering, observed that the poor little thing s head had 
 turned completely black. A closer inspection soon revealed the cause 
 of this sudden change in color, from white to black. 
 
 The flies were very numerous, and, attracted by the sweet mixture on 
 the child s head, a myriad of them had settled on it. When once a fly 
 lit on the mass, there it stuck; and the result was, the little one s skull was 
 covered with flies. 
 
 The Doctor directed the mother to procure some warm water and a 
 soft cloth, and wash the mixture from the child s head. This done, he ap 
 plied a fresh coat of the paste, and directed the woman to cover it with a 
 soft wet cloth. This being complied with, the infant soon became quiet, 
 and the flies were unable to settle on its poor, disgusting, sore little head, 
 and in a short time it was calmly sleeping in a cot in a corner of the room. 
 
 The woman was delighted with the success of Dr. Brown s treatment, 
 and grew profuse in expressions of gratitude; and when the Doctor 
 handed her the bundle of powders and told her to administer one every 
 two hours, she so far forgot the caution Marcus had given her as to say 
 that if there was anything on the place he would accept in payment, she 
 would give it to him. 
 
 Dr. Brown thanked her, and said he had quit practicing medicine 
 " for pay " many years before, and only rendered medical services now as 
 an act of kindness. Marcus, however, had already interviewed the 
 woman on the grub question, and spoke up, saying : 
 
 " Doctor, I don t know but we re a little short of some things ; and as 
 this here lady won t take pay for nothin , and we ve got to have em, any 
 way, or else wait till your cattle comes up, we might as well take em, 
 and done with it." 
 
 Dr. Brown replied that as the commissary department was entirely 
 under the control of Marcus, and as the question of subsistence stores was 
 too trivial for his (the Doctor s) consideration, the entire matter was left 
 to his (Marcus ) discretion. 
 
 Nothing more was said on the subject for the time being, and soon 
 the hostess announced that dinner was ready. And the two travelers lost 
 no time in getting to the table, where they seated themselves, and did 
 ample justice to the first square meal they had eaten in over five hundred 
 miles of horseback travel. 
 
 When the rneal was concluded, the travelers expressed an -intention 
 of soon resuming their journey; and then Marcus and the woman con 
 versed on the provisions question. 
 
 "We don t need much of anything," said he. "A little flour, and 
 
118 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 some bacon, and perhaps a little butter and a few taters, and some cheese. 
 
 The grateful woman placed her cellar at the disposal of Marcus, and 
 he was not at all backward in making his selections, so he soon had the 
 pack-horse loaded with flour, bacon, and the other edibles mentioned, to 
 the full extent of the animal s carrying capacity. In fact, the pack-horse 
 fairly staggered under its load. 
 
 The packing completed, the Doctor gave the woman directions con 
 cerning the treatment of the infant s head, cautioning her not to let the 
 paste harden, but by constant washing with warm water, and renewals of 
 the application, keep the head constantly covered with moist milk-and-flour 
 paste. The woman promised strict compliance with this order, and the 
 additional one, to be sure and give a powder every two hours, and bade 
 the Doctor and his traveling companion a grateful adieu, and the two 
 travelers went on their way rejoicing. 
 
 The incidents above related occurred in the spring of the year. In 
 the fall of that year Marcus again passed through the Mormon settlement, 
 where this had occurred, on his return to Nevada from Montana. Dr. 
 Brown also returned to Nevada, but by another route. 
 
 When the two met in White Pine, for the first time since they parted 
 in Montana, Marcus informed the Doctor that he had passed through that 
 settlement and stopped and had a talk with that Welsh woman. Pie 
 averred, and offered to take his oath to it, that when the child whose head 
 had been treated was shown to him, its head was covered with a profuse 
 growth of hair at least a foot in length ; that the woman had assured him 
 that the child had commenced to mend from the moment of taking the 
 first powder, and had continued to improve, until at the end of a few 
 weeks it was entirely well ; and its hair commenced to grow, and had con 
 tinued growing at the rate of an inch per day. And further, that she had 
 given some of the powders to the mother of another of her husband s 
 wives, who by their use had been entirely cured of a severe case of inflam 
 matory rheumatism, and concluded by asking kindly concerning the health 
 and welfare of Dr. Brown, and showering blessings on his head, and 
 wishing her " man " could only see him to thank him for the -salvation of 
 their child. 
 
 Not Worth Killing. 
 
 The adventure herewith related is one which befell the author of this 
 work some eleven years ago, and though it appears in this book of lies, it 
 is as one grain of wheat in a bushel of chaff, as the account here given 
 is strictly true. 
 
 I was on my way on foot to the Salmon Basin diggings (called also 
 Lemhi mines) in Montana Territory. Many miles of weary and footsore 
 travel over mountains and deserts, and through a wild and almost unin- 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 119 
 
 habited country, had brought me into Eastern Idaho, and at the time of 
 meeting this adventure I was some forty or fifty miles north of Snake 
 River. 
 
 [I cannot be particular as to the exact distances after so great a lapse 
 of time.] 
 
 My equipment consisted of the clothes on my back which were 
 coarse, ragged, and travel-stained a pair of blankets which I carried in a 
 roll slung over my shoulder by a rope, and in which were enclosed a few 
 pounds of flour, a small sack containing ground coffee, a small piece of 
 bacon, a box of yeast powders, a little salt tied in a rag, a tin plate, and 
 some matches. The rest of my outfit consisted of a pocket knife and a 
 tin cup, the latter slung to a leather belt around my waist. Thus equipped, 
 I was on my way to seek my fortune in a new camp, situated over 1,200 
 miles from the point from which I had started. 
 
 The Salmon Basin diggings were placer gold mines, about the extent 
 and richness of which marvelous tales had been told and circulated 
 throughout the mining camps of the Pacific Coast; and at the time of 
 which I am writing there was in progress a movement towards them pop. 
 ularly called a " stampede " that is, people were rushing in there from 
 all directions. The diggings, however, cut no figure in this story beyond 
 answering mere introductory purposes. 
 
 One evening I arrived at a station on the Salt Lake and Montana stage 
 road, along which my route had lain after leaving Salt Lake. At this sta 
 tion, which was called the Junction, two roads met. One was the regular 
 traveled stage road from Salt Lake City to Helena, Montana, and the other 
 the Holliday road to the same point ma Bannock and Virginia City, and 
 which merged into the traveled road at this point. The Holliday road 
 north from the Junction had been abandoned, and the only travel on it was 
 occasionally by Mormon trains bound with produce for Bannock and other 
 points in western Montana. 
 
 The station at the Junction stood out in an open plain, and consisted 
 merely of a barn for the horses, and a shanty for the hostlers. I do not 
 distinctly remember, but it may have been a " home station," in which case 
 there was also a larger house for the accommodation of the drivers whose 
 " routes " ended here, and where meals were furnished to the stage passen 
 gers. 
 
 On my arrival, I laid my blankets on the ground a short distance from 
 the station, and, unrolling them, took therefrom my provender and cook 
 ing traps, built a fire with some brush, and proceeded to prepare my simple 
 meal. The tin plate served me as bake-oven and frying-pan, and the tin 
 cup as coffee-pot and drinking vessel. My method of cooking was thus : 
 Filling the tin cup with water, I set it on the ground ; then opening the 
 sack in which my flour was contained, I made a depression in the flour 
 with my fist. Into this I dropped a pinch of salt, and a small quantity of 
 yeast powder. Then, kneeling beside the sack, I poured water from the 
 
120 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 cup into the depression in the flour with my right hand, while with the left 
 scraping flour from the sides and stirring the mess I was forming. When 
 the proper consistency was attained, I gathered the dough and kneaded it 
 in my hands. Then, greasing the plate with a piece of bacon, I patted 
 the dough down on it in a rude loaf, and, drawing some coals from the fire 
 with a stick, I set the plate on them, and thus baked the loaf. The coffee 
 was prepared by setting a cup of water on some coals, and when the 
 water boiled, dropping the proper allowance of coffee into it, and after 
 allowing it to boil a few seconds, taking the cup from the coals and setting 
 it on some ashes, where it could keep warm and " settle " at the same 
 time. When the bread was done, it was taken from the plate and laid on 
 the ground, and the plate made to do duty in frying the bacon. 
 
 I am thus minute in describing my cooking operations that the 
 reader may better understand what follows. 
 
 After disposing of my meal, I went over to the station and asked 
 permission of an hostler to spread my blankets in the haystack that night. 
 This was ungraciously refused, the man giving the excuse that I might set 
 the hay on fire. That I should have done so was out of the question, for 
 I had already built my camp-fire at quite a distance from the station, or 
 stack, which he could not help seeing, and would have no use for fire in 
 the vicinity of the hay. However, I did not argue the matter with him, 
 but went back to my camp-fire, spread my blankets on the ground, and 
 turned in. 
 
 Next morning, while I was preparing my breakfast, the man of whom 
 I had asked permission to sleep in the hay, and another whom I had not 
 before seen, came to my fire, and, after bidding me good morning, in a 
 pleasant tone, asked me which road I intended to take. 
 
 I replied that my intention was to continue on the stage road. 
 
 One of the men then asked me where I was bound for. 
 
 " Salmon Basin," I replied. 
 
 " You are going to take the longest road, then," he said. 
 
 I requested an explanation, as I knew nothing of the Holliday road, 
 and supposed there was but one road, and that the stage road. 
 
 He then, assisted by occasional suggestions from his companion, ex 
 plained to me that by traveling the Holliday road I should save sixty 
 miles of travel. 
 
 I knew enough of the geography of the country to realize that he was 
 telling the truth though I did not doubt him and that the Holliday 
 road must be a shorter cut to my destination. 
 
 " But," I said, " are there any stations on the road, or is there any 
 body living along it? " 
 
 In reply, he stated that the road was abandoned, but that there were 
 good camping places at easy stages of travel, besides the deserted stations, 
 in which I could take shelter for the night when reaching one of them. 
 
 " How are the Indians on that road? " I asked. 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 121 
 
 He answered that I need have no fear of Indians, as there were very 
 few of them in that vicinity, and those were peaceably disposed. 
 
 I afterward learned that these men at the station knew that two white 
 men had been killed by Indians on this Holliday road but a few days be 
 fore. What their object was in endeavoring to induce me to take that 
 route, I have never been able to conceive; for it is hard to believe that two 
 civilized beings would attempt to induce a fellow-creature, alone in a wild 
 country, to take the chances of death and capture at the hands of In 
 dians, except through pure, heartless wantonness. . 
 
 I had no reason to suppose that the men were actuated by any sinister 
 motive in advising me about the roads, and a saving of sixty miles was 
 a great object for a man in my situation. So, packing my blankets and 
 slinging them over my shoulder, I thanked the men for the information 
 they had imparted, bid them good-day, and started out on the Holliday 
 road. 
 
 I will here digress to state that the Bannack and Snake Indians, por 
 tions of which tribes inhabited and roamed the section through which I 
 was traveling, had for some time been very warlike, and it was only the 
 presence of soldiers in the country that kept them at all within bounds 
 and protected travel on the roads. The redskins had suffered frequent 
 severe chastisements at the hands of the troops under the command of 
 General Connor, and were so far subdued that they would not attack 
 armed parties, but continued to murder and rob in isolated cases, where 
 the attacked parties were incapable of adequate resistance. 
 
 On the evening of the first day out from the Junction I arrived at one 
 of the deserted stations on the Holliday road. It was situated in a beauti 
 ful, grassy canon, through which ran a pretty little stream, its banks fringed 
 with willows and quaking aspens. The station consisted of a large barn 
 structure, built of rough planks, and at one side of it was a long, narrow 
 house, or cabin, with a shed roof sloping from the roof of the barn. To 
 sleep under cover was a luxury which of late I had not had many oppor 
 tunities of enjoying, and I entered the cabin which had served as hos 
 tlers quarters when the stage line was running and proceeded to arrange 
 for quarters for the night. At one end of this cabin there was an excava 
 tion about four feet in depth, which had probably served the purpose of a 
 cellar when the cabin had been occupied, and along one of the walls was 
 fastened a board, which had been used for a shelf. Unrolling my blankets 
 on the floor in the front part of the cabin, near the door, I took out my 
 provisions and laid them on the shelf, and then went outside to build a fire 
 with some chips from a large pile which lay near the door. While thus 
 engaged, I noticed a movement of the willows on the bank of the stream, 
 and presently there emerged therefrom two Indians. 
 
 They were Bannacks, and handsome fellows withal. They were tricked 
 out in garments of fringed buckskin, with their hair decorated with feath 
 ers and bits of brass, and each carried the blanket which is every Indian s 
 
122 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 inseparable companion. For arras, one had an army musket, and the other 
 a bow and a quiver of arrows, and each wore a knife slung at his waist. 
 
 Their sudden appearance from the willows nearly took my breath 
 away ; but before they reached where I was kneeling, in the endeavor to 
 Light a fire, I had managed to partially recover my composure. But I was 
 dreadfully frightened ; though I did all in my power to avoid the betrayal 
 of any signs of fear or surprise, and when they reached me I made out to 
 utter the salutation common in addressing an Indian : 
 
 " Hello, Jim." 
 
 " Hello, Jim," they both echoed in chorus. 
 
 They then both entered the house, and I arose and followed them in. 
 One of them jumped into the hole at the rear end of the cabin, and the 
 other stood on the edge, and for a few moments they remained thus, grin 
 ning at me and conversing in their own language. 
 
 This gave me a few moments for thought, in which I realized that I 
 was in a bad scrape. If the Indians were disposed to be hostile, they had 
 me at their mercy ; and the odds were that, finding me alone and incapa 
 ble of resistance, they would not be disposed to extend to me any great 
 amount of merciful consideration. With the exception of an insignificant 
 jack-knife, I was unarmed. At one stage of my journey I had possessed a 
 Colt s five-shooter, but had dropped it in the water while jumping across 
 an irrigating ditch in one of the Mormon settlements, which had rusted 
 it so that the cylinder refused to revolve, and I had traded it to a Mor 
 mon for some flour and bacon. And as I stood there smiling in return to 
 the grins of those Indians, the only thought I could summon was : 
 
 " Oh, if I only had that five-shooter ! " With a revolver I could hold 
 my own against both Indians, and if I could only exhibit such a weapon, 
 they, with their crude arms, would never dare to attack me in close quar 
 ters, and if they attempted to shoot me at a distance, I could fortify my 
 self in the house, and having some provisions and they none, could hold 
 out longer than they could on that kind of a siege. 
 
 As I stood in the cabin, with these thoughts passing through my mind, 
 the Indian in the cellar vaulted out on to the earth floor, an^l deliberately 
 walked to the shelf on which lay my provisions, and picked up a remnant 
 of a loaf of bread left over from my morning s baking at the Junction, 
 and breaking it in two, gave one half to his companion and walked laugh 
 ing out of the cabin. The other Indian then lay down on my blankets, 
 and proceeded to eat his portion of the bread. 
 
 He had a pair of green blankets, and the color of mine was red a 
 hue particularly dear to the Indian heart. He felt of the texture of my 
 blankets, and then of that of his own, and looking up into my face, said : 
 
 " You like him schwap ? " (swap). 
 
 The only thing I could think of to say was : " How much schwap ? " 
 meaning how much boot he was willing to give me, as mine were the best 
 blankets. 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 123 
 
 " No got any how much," he grunted in reply. 
 
 Then he joined his companion outside, and they walked to the wil 
 lows by the stream, and disappeared in their thickness . 
 
 I hardly dared to hope the savages had left me. I knew the Indian 
 character pretty well, and that treachery was its predominant trait. They 
 had no assurance that I was unarmed ; I might have a revolver in my 
 shirt in which manner that arm is frequently carried by mountaineers 
 and prospectors and they might have concluded that it was unsafe to at 
 tack me then and there, and had pretended to leave, but intended to come 
 back at night, and either kill me in my sleep or set fire to the station and 
 burn me alive. 
 
 My predicament, however, did not destroy my appetite. I had footed 
 a matter of thirty miles that day, and, despite my fears and danger, was 
 intensely hungry. It would be bad enough to be killed by Indians, away 
 out in the wilderness, metaphorically a thousand miles from anywhere ; but 
 it could but add to the pang of death to die on an empty stomach ; so I 
 set about preparing my evening meal. By the time I had eaten my fru 
 gal fare it was growing dark, .and as the Indians were not in sight, there 
 was nothing for it but to turn into my blankets. I was terribly tired and 
 needed rest ; for, if the Indians did not molest me, I must travel on the 
 morrow. I thought I was too frightened to sleep, but I would lie down 
 on the blankets and rest, and keep a sharp lookout for the Indians, and if 
 attacked would at least die with my eyes open. 
 
 The air had grown cool, but I hesitated about closing the door of the 
 cabin, for fear I could not keep sight of the Indians should they approach ; 
 but while debating in my mind what was best to do in this respect, my 
 eyes fell on a piece of a board which lay on the cabin floor, and the sight 
 at once inspired me with an idea. Picking up the piece of board, I closed 
 the door which opened toward the interior of the cabin and placed it 
 slanting against the door, so that one end rested under the rusty and 
 catchless latch and the other against my left hip as I would lie in my 
 blankets. I then lay down and adjusted the board ; and it was but a few 
 moments till my fears were overcome by my fatigue, and, notwithstand 
 ing the peril, I slept. 
 
 I must have been slumbering thus a couple of hours, when I was 
 awakened by the end of the board pushing against my hip. Like a flash 
 I assumed a sitting posture, and, trembling and perspiring with fear, while 
 the beating of my heart was as audible as the ticking of a clock, bent my 
 eyes on the door. 
 
 The door had been pushed open a space of about two inches, and 
 gleaming through the interstice was a pair of glittering Indian eyes, shin 
 ing like twin stars. 
 
 I felt that my hour had come, and again the wish for my unfortunate 
 five-shooter was my uppermost thought. 
 
 But wishes were futile ; and as the savage gazed, and his eyes seemed 
 
124 THE S A ZEE AC LYING CLUB. 
 
 41* 
 
 as if they were burning into mine, my hand encountered an object in the 
 pocket of the overalls I wore. 
 
 It was a tobacco-box. 
 
 A tin tobacco-box, with a strong, loud-snapping spring to the cover. 
 
 By mere impulse I drew this box from the pocket, and first raising the 
 lid, then shut it down with all the power of my strength. The spring gave 
 a loud snap as the lid closed. In the dark, and under the circumstances, 
 the sound was like that made by the cocking of a pistol. 
 
 Mr. Indian thought so too, and lost no time in getting away from 
 the door. 
 
 My hip was not disturbed again during the night. I slept fitfully, 
 and with the first streak of dawn through the cracks of the cabin, I was 
 up and outdoors, hurriedly preparing my breakfast, and anxious to resume 
 my journey as quickly as possible. 
 
 While thus engaged, the willows by the stream moved, and out there 
 from came the two Indians. They approached me smiling, and running 
 their hands through their long hair, as if making their morning toilet, and 
 coming to the fire squatted down over it ad shivered, and said : 
 
 " Heap cold." 
 
 I replied in terms: "Heap cold." 
 
 When my breakfast was cooked, they watched me eat it ; and when I 
 was through, one of them said : 
 
 " Heap hogadi ; tower heap gib em me." 
 
 "Hogadi" is Indian-English for hungry, and "tower" is the nearest 
 they can come to saying flour under which head they include food of any 
 description. 
 
 As they showed such a disposition to be polite, I emptied the rem 
 nants of my breakfast into their hands, and gave them the coffee-cup with 
 its remaining contents, and proceeded to do up my blankets, preparatory 
 to taking up my line of march. 
 
 It did not take the Indians long to consume the food ; and this done, 
 one of them climbed up on the roof of the cabin, and thence crawled up 
 the roof of the barn to the comb, spread himself on his breast, and, shading 
 his eyes with his hands, looked intently down the road in the direction 
 which I had come the day before. Meanwhile, the other went out into the 
 road and lay down, placing his hand to his ear, and the ear to the ground. 
 
 I did not know what to interpret from these maneuvers ; but soon the 
 Indian on the roof came down, and the one in the road arose, and they 
 both came toward me. 
 
 " Heap waggin," said the one who had been on the rpof. 
 
 I caught the idea in a moment. There was a train of Mormon wagons 
 on the road, a short distance behind, and the Indians, with their delicate 
 sense of hearing and far-sighted eyes, had become aware of the fact. 
 
 " Yosh," (yes) I replied. " Heap waggin, me waggin " pointing my 
 finger at my breast to indicate that I belonged to the train, and leaving 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 125 
 
 them to infer that I was traveling ahead to spy out the road, which was at 
 times the custom by a man on horseback. 
 
 My pack was now ready, and I slung it over my shoulder and started 
 ahead through the canon. The Indians followed behind in a dog trot, but 
 I kept close to them, and with my hand, inside my shirt, as if holding a 
 weapon, eyed them closely. The three of us continued on in this way for 
 a distance of about three miles, till the mouth of the canon, where it 
 opened into a wide valley, came in view ; then they suddenly turned and 
 trotted off on the back track, and were soon lost to view in the windings 
 of the canon. 
 
 And that was the last I saw of my two Bannack braves. 
 
 I trudged along through the valley, which was nothing more than a 
 desert, with prickly-pears (cactus) for its only vegetation, congratulating 
 myself on my lucky escape of the night before, wishing my journey was 
 ended, or that I had never undertaken it, and occasionally building up a 
 beautiful air-castle, such as many a fortune-seeker, on his way to a new 
 mining camp, has builded, and will build, so long as there are mines and 
 men to seek them, when I observed a great cloud of dust in the valley. 
 My first thought was that the dust might be created by a train of wagons ; 
 then, that perhaps it was soldiers, as I know that troops were moving about 
 the country. But I was soon enlightened as to the cause. A short time 
 sufficed to bring me near enough to the object to see that the dust was 
 occasioned by a large body of mounted Indians moving across the plain. 
 
 Here I was, afoot and alone, one insignificant human being, in a great 
 valley, with upwards of two thousand Indians moving down upon me. I 
 suppose I ought to have felt very important, but I didn t. I felt as if I 
 wanted to run; but that would have been folly. The Indians could see 
 me as plainly as I could see them, and plainer. They were mounted, and 
 I was afoot ; it was a long distance to the hills, and on their fleet ponies 
 they could overtake me before I could reach the hills, and even if there, 
 they could kill or capture me without resistance on my part. So there 
 was nothing for it but to keep right on in the road and meet them, and 
 take the chances on what might turn up. I trudged along, each moment 
 bringing me nearer to the savage horde, and as I walked I counted on my 
 capture as sure when I should reach the cavalcade. I knew the Indians 
 tortured all prisoners, without exception, and I pictured myself tied to a 
 tree as a target for the young Indian idea to learn how to shoot close to a 
 man s heart without hitting it, or lying on the ground and serving as a 
 cushion for the old squaws to sit down on, or sitting in a lodge on a buffalo 
 skin, acting the part of doll-baby for the pappooses to stick arrow-points in 
 to hear it holler. I did not dream of any Poeahontas running to my res 
 cue to save me from the fury of the cruel chief, her father. Pocahontii don t 
 exist among the Indians in these degenerate days ; and the prettiest young 
 squaw takes .as much delight in the torture of a prisoner as does the most 
 hardened brave, and all these facts I knew. But, whatever my thoughts 
 
126 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 and fears, the only course to pursue was to keep right on and face the 
 music. The gap between the Indians and myself gradually closed, and 
 soon I stood face to face with the chief. As I approached, the entire body 
 of Indians halted. 
 
 As it stood there on the open plain, the cavalcade was a magnificent 
 sight. Upwards of two thousand Indians, in their fringed and beaded 
 buckskin and feathers, and with painted faces, all mounted, with the ex 
 ception of a few blear-eyed old hags who were leading the ponies of favor 
 ite squaws. Piled on the backs of some of the ponies were packed the 
 tanned deer-hides which formed the lodge-coverings, and the skins which 
 served for beds ; and slung at the sides of the animals, with one end trail 
 ing on the ground, were the lodge-poles. On the ponies thus laden, sitting 
 on top of the packs, were the young squaws and children, and on other 
 horses rode the braves, some seated in saddles and others bareback. 
 
 As the body of Indians halted, I advanced toward its front ; and as I 
 approached, I was greeted with the salutation, uttered in as plain English 
 as I myself could speak : 
 
 " Good morning, Captain." 
 
 Replying in kind, and feeling reassured by the peaceful greeting, I 
 surveyed the man who had addressed me. He was mounted on a magnifi 
 cent, coal-black, American horse, decorated with gorgeous barbaric trap 
 pings, and what with the height of his horse, my own embarrassment, and 
 his stature which was extraordinarily tall he seemed to me a veritable 
 giant, as I stood before him on the ground, gazing up into his face. The 
 very first impression I formed of him was that he was a renegade white 
 man, who had worked his way into authority in the tribe, and no Indian 
 at all. He had handsome Caucasian features, of a regular mold, and 
 lacked the aquiline nose and high cheek-bones characteristic of the Indian 
 race. Besides, the tones of his voice, and his pronunciation of English 
 words, were as much as possible unlike Indian utterance. He was clad in 
 Indian costume buckskin pants and hunting-shirt, ornamented with beads, 
 deep fringes, and beaded moccasins. His hair, which was black, fell to 
 his shoulders; but his complexion, though naturally dark, and tanned to a 
 still deeper hue, was not the tawny red color of the Indian skin. I thought 
 then, and still think, that I had never looked upon a more magnificent 
 specimen of physical manhood than this pretended Indian ; for that he 
 was a real Indian I can never believe. By his side, mounted on a pony, 
 sat a very pretty, girlish-looking squaw, and resting across the pack which 
 served her for a saddle, was a wicker frame, such as the Indian women 
 carry their children in, and out from it peeped a cunning little face, with 
 rosy cheeks, and keen black eyes, and soft, silky hair, very much unlike 
 the coarse hair of the full-blooded Indian. 
 
 When I had answered his salutation by replying : " Good morning, 
 sir," he asked me where I was bound for. 
 
 " To Salmon Basin," I replied. 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 127 
 
 " What made you take this road? " he asked. 
 
 1 then related to him the circumstances which had transpired at the 
 Junction, whereby I was induced to take the Holliday road. 
 
 Applying to the men who had persuaded me to take this route an 
 epithet reflecting on their maternity, he said : 
 
 "Are you aware that in persuading you to take this road they were 
 sending you to your death? " 
 
 During the conversation my timidity had departed, and I had gained 
 confidence that I would be allowed to pass on without molestation ; but 
 when he said these words my courage failed me, and I could distinguish 
 a tremor in my voice and feel a quaking of my limbs, when I answered 
 that perhaps they did not know the Indians were bad on that road. 
 
 Noticing my agitation, he said : "Don t be afraid I won t harm you, 
 nor will I let my people touch a hair of your head. But the Indians are 
 not bad on this road, because they have no interest in being bad." 
 
 He then explained that the band of Bannacks which he headed was 
 then on its way to a stream known as Ross Fork a tributary of Snake 
 River where they were to meet the United States Indian Agent and re 
 ceive from him annuities in the shape of flour, blankets, arms, ammunition, 
 cooking utensils, soap, beads, tobacco, boot-blacking, patent medicines, 
 condensed milk, pickled oysters, canned jellies, and the various other nec 
 essaries and luxuries which the Great Father at Washington is in the 
 habit of occasionally bestowing upon his red children. 
 
 "And," said the chief, "it aint worth our while to kill an occasional 
 traveler and thus make trouble in the securing of our annuities." 
 
 I then recounted to him my adventure of the night before in the canon 
 with the two Indians. He smiled while listening to my narration, and 
 when I had concluded, he said : 
 
 " Do you know why they did not molest you ? " 
 I answered in the negative. 
 
 " Because," said he, " YOU WERE NOT WORTH KILLING." 
 
 Just about this time, I did not have a very exalted opinion of myself, 
 
 to think that I should be so insignificant that a couple of miserable Indians 
 
 did not think me worth the killing. But I ventured to ask him why they 
 
 considered me so valueless. 
 
 "Because," said he, "it is evident that you possessed nothing which 
 could tempt their cupidity. You had only your pack, and they had seen 
 the contents of that, and there were too many chances involved for them 
 to attempt to kill you for the sake of seeing you kick. They did not 
 know but you might be armed; they knew that wagons were a short dis 
 tance behind, and presumed that you belonged to the trains ; also, that it 
 must be known that you were on the road, and that if they should kill you 
 and you be missed, the fact might cause an investigation to be made by 
 the agent, which might interfere with the prompt issuance of our annui 
 tiesand then they would incur my displeasure. But, on the whole, if 
 
128 THE SAZERAG LYING CLUB. 
 
 you had been worth killing, I don t think they could have resisted the 
 temptation to take the chances on attacking you." 
 
 After this explanation, my heart throbbed in thankfulness for the 
 good luck that had rendered me not worth killing. 
 
 While the conversation between the chief and myself was going on, 
 several of the old squaws who were afoot crowded around me and kept 
 continually tugging at my pack and ejaculating : 
 
 " Tower lead ! " 
 
 I had not sufficient flour to last me to the end of my journey ; and as 
 for lead, all I possessed in that line was three or four bullets, which I car 
 ried to put in my mouth to stay thirst while crossing stretches of country 
 where the distances were great between water. The chief saw that I was 
 annoyed by the persistent begging of the women, and shot out at them a 
 few Indian words, which caused them to shrink back dismayed. Then 
 rising in his stirrups, he placed his hand at the side of his mouth, and 
 turning his horse so that he faced his followers, uttered some words in a 
 voice so loud and distinct that he must have been heard very plainly by 
 every one of them. 
 
 As he finished speaking, the band of Indians opened ranks, leaving 
 an aisle through its center, from one end to the other. Then again ad 
 dressing me, he said : 
 
 " Pass right on through my people ; none of them will harm you. 
 Good luck to you, and may you make your everlasting fortune in the 
 mines, and never again have such a close game with Indians as you had 
 last night." 
 
 Thanking him for his courtesy, and bidding him adieu, I started on 
 through the lane made by the movement of the Indians in obedience to 
 his order. They all eyed me closely, but none offered to molest me; and 
 as I passed between their ranks, I thought of the Children of Israel as 
 they crossed dry-shod over the Red Sea, with the waters bounding them on 
 each side, and considered whether after all there might not be more or 
 less truth in that phenomenal yarn. At all events, I breathed freer when 
 the last Indian was passed and I was again trudging along the road on my 
 way to the ne\v diggings, with none to molest or make me afraid. 
 
 The First Fourth in White Pine. 
 
 The spring of the year 1868 witnessed the inception of the great 
 mining craze known as the " White Pine Excitement." At the time of 
 the discovery of the then rich mines there, Austin was the nearest town 
 to the district, and it was from that place that White Pine was first settled. 
 The discoverers of the mines were Austin prospectors, and on making 
 their find brought their specimens here for assay and testing. I was liv 
 ing in Austin when the first ore from the Hidden Treasure and the famed 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 129 
 
 Eberhardt mines was brought in. It was not necessary that a person should 
 be an expert to determine that the rock was rich. A man who had never 
 in his life seen a silver mine, or never before handled a piece of silver ore, 
 could tell at a glance that it was metal. It came pretty near being pure 
 silver, some of the "horn-silver" specimens being so heavy and metallic 
 that they could be converted into bullion by the simple process of melting 
 in a crucible. Ever on the alert for a new camp, I had no sooner seen 
 these specimens than I determined to go to White Pine. And to White 
 Pine I went. It is situated 120 miles from Austin, and I made the trip on 
 horseback in two and a half days; but there was nothing in the journey 
 in the way of incident that could interest the reader of these pages in its 
 relation. 
 
 The mines, which were destined afterward to make such a stir in the 
 world, were contained in a high mountain called Treasure Hill, whose peak 
 rises to an elevation of 9,000 feet above the level of the sea. At the foot 
 of the western and southern slopes of this mountain lies the town of 
 Hamilton. It was then called " the Caves," owing to numerous caves in 
 the dolomite of which the geological formation of the locality consists 
 and a few ambitious miners even went so far as to call it " Cave City." The 
 city I found, on my arrival at the Caves, consisted of three or four stone 
 cabins, a tent in which a couple of gentlemen from Austin had started an 
 establishment combining store, saloon, restaurant, lodging-house, post-office, 
 and express office, a few tents used for dwellings, a number of prospect 
 ors open-air camps, and about seventy-five inhabitants. There was also 
 a city on the mountain, at the mines, to which the description given of 
 Cave City is likewise applicable. 
 
 At the time of my arrival there was considerable rivalry as to which 
 of the two camps should be the future metropolis of White Pine. The 
 mines were marvelously rich, and the prospects were that they were exten 
 sive ; and it was evident that the district was destined to receive a large 
 population ere long so, of course, it must have a city. The hill people 
 based their claims for metropolitan prominence on the fact that they were 
 "squatted right down on the top of the mines." The Cave fellows knew 
 the city would be at the foot of the mountain, because there was not a 
 drop of water on the hill, and no likelihood of there ever being any found 
 in that limestone formation. Besides, it was a straight pull of three miles 
 up the mountain to get there ; and again, there was not as much room for 
 a large city on top of the mountain as there was at its foot, where the 
 slope gradually spread out, and ended in a level plateau. Time proved 
 both parties to be right. Cities sprung up on both sites, and, though their 
 existence was short, they were " lively camps " while they lasted. " The 
 Caves " was located for a town-site, and named Hamilton, after the man 
 who made the location. Treasure City kept its original name through the 
 varying fortunes of White Pine, and keeps it yet but it is only a name. 
 
 The opening of the month of July, 1868, found the rivalry described 
 9 
 
130 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 above existing in bitter intensity, and so strong was this feeling that a man 
 who owned a town-lot in one survey hardly felt like speaking to the pos 
 sessor of a similar piece of real estate in the other. The Fourth of July 
 was approaching, and the propriety of celebrating that clay in a manner 
 befitting the patriotic founders of two great cities began to be broached. 
 The inhabitants of each town held a public meeting, at which committees 
 of arrangements and officers of the day were appointed, and resolutions 
 adopted that each town would hold a celebration on its own hook, inde 
 pendent and entirely oblivious of even the existence of the other. Better 
 counsels prevailed, however, when on " counting noses " it was found that 
 there was not a sufficient number of men in each camp for two celebra 
 tions, and that the only way in which an air of respectability could be 
 secured to the occasion was by fusing the forces and holding a joint cele 
 bration. A compromise was effected, by the terms of which Treasure City 
 was to have the poet of the day and the chairman to preside over the lit 
 erary exercises. Hamilton was to have the other offices, and the meeting 
 and the "ball in the evening" were to be held in that town; but it was 
 stipulated that the citizens of Hamilton were to march in procession up to 
 Treasure City, meet the citizens of that metropolis drawn up in line to 
 await their coming, and escort them in procession back to Hamilton. 
 
 At the meeting held in Hamilton to perfect arrangements for the cel 
 ebration, it was my fortune to be appointed a member of the Committee on 
 Flag, Music, and Ball in the Evening. It was the most difficult position 
 with which an admiring constituency have ever honored me during the 
 whole course of my checkered career. I may say it was a position of im 
 possibilities but some fellow has said nothing is impossible. It was just 
 because there was nothing in the way of material from which to fulfill my 
 duties as committeeman that made the position such an impossible one. 
 
 As to the flag, there was not such an article to be had nearer than 
 Austin, and that was 120 miles distant, and the time lacked only forty- 
 eight hours to the morning of the Glorious Fourth. 
 
 The " ball in the evening " was an easier matter than the flag, though 
 even that was attended with many difficulties. There was a man called 
 "Pike," who could play one tune the "Arkansaw Traveler" on the 
 violin, and call a few of the simpler figures of an easy quadrille ; but there 
 was danger that he would succumb to the "spirits " of the glorious occa 
 sion before Night cast her sable mantle over the earth, and he be thus in 
 capable of disseminating melody for the revelry. This danger was over 
 come by appointing a sub-committee to follow in Pike s wake during the 
 day we celebrated, and to prevent him, even by the use of force if necessary, 
 from imbibing more than three drinks of whisky an hour. The combined 
 female population of the two camps numbered but two, and they both be 
 longed in Hamilton. They could " stand in " on the round dances, and 
 help fill out one quadrille set, and such other sets as might be formed on 
 the floor could be " stag " dances that is, dances in which only men take 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 131 
 
 part. ^ So the committee could see its way clear on the music, and the 
 "ball in the evening" questions ; but the flag was the poser. 
 
 Add nothing to nothing and you ve got nothing, is a logical conclu 
 sion from the axiom, " Take nothing from nothing and nothing remains." 
 There was not an American flag in the district, and the best rider in the 
 camps could not ride to Austin to procure one and return in time for the 
 Fourth. What would a celebration of the Fourth of July amount to 
 without an American flag? was the question that agitated the minds of 
 the pioneers of White Pine, and nearly drove the Committee on Flag, 
 Music, and Ball in the Evening to hard drink. But an attempt must be 
 made. The committee could manufacture a flag, if they could only pro 
 cure material with which to build it; and the said committee passed a res 
 olution, resolving each member thereof into a sub-committee to scour the 
 camp for flag material. The stuff for the stars and the white stripes was 
 easily procurable, because there was a quantity of drillings at the store, 
 which was used for "lining" houses and making tents. We might even 
 find some red shirts, which we could cut up for the stripes of that color ; 
 but how and where to obtain the blue for the field was the grand puzzle. 
 
 In my capacity as sub-committee on searching for flag material, I 
 came across an aristocrat who had a quilt on his bed. This article was 
 lined with red calico, and was confiscated forthwith, thus doing away with 
 the necessity of calling for donations of red shirts. The evening preced 
 ing the Fourth arrived, and a thorough search of both camps by the com 
 mittee had failed to discover and procure any textile fabric of a blue color; 
 and the committee sat in solemn council, debating the propriety of mak 
 ing the field of the flag out of a gray shirt, and taking the chances that 
 the vivid imagination of the beholder might give it a blue hue, as the em 
 blem of our liberties floated from the ninety-foot pole which the Com 
 mittee on Pole had already erected and fitted with halliards. While this 
 important matter was under discussion, a courier arrived at the council 
 and announced that a family of Mormons had just arrived and were mak 
 ing camp in a little ravine below our embryo city and there were four 
 girls and an old woman in the outfit, too. This was glorious news. Four 
 girls and an old woman could not fail to have among their aggregate pos 
 sessions a blue dress, or some other garment of cerulean hue ; besides, the 
 four girls to say nothing of the old woman would fit in splendidly in the 
 " dance in the evening." The committee immediately passed a resolution 
 that I was the best-looking member, and instructing me to forthwith wait 
 on the Mormon family and interview them as to their possession of " some 
 thing blue," and if found, to not only make a note on t, but to purchase it 
 instanter, without regard to cost. In pursuance of these instructions, I 
 wended my way to the spot where the family of Saints and Saintesses 
 were camped, which was but a short distance from the collection of huts 
 and tents that we called " town." It was dark when I arrived there, but 
 a big sage-brush fire was burning, which rendered surrounding objects dis- 
 
132 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 tmct. The father of the outfit, assisted by a couple of lads, was engaged 
 in constructing a habitation for his brood, by driving poles into the ground 
 in a circle and enclosing them with bits of carpet, horse-blankets, and 
 pieces of cloth ; poles laid across the top of the upright poles, and covered 
 with brush, constituted the roof. The mother and girls were at work 
 around the camp-fire, preparing supper. 
 
 Approaching the fire, and advancing to where the old lady was kneel 
 ing in front of it, holding over it a long-handled frying-pan, in which were 
 some slices of bacon, I raised my hat from my head, made my best bow, 
 and said : 
 
 "Good evening, madam." 
 
 The old lady was very large, fat, and ungainly. She was so busy with 
 her cooking that she had not noticed my presence in the camp till I ad 
 dressed her as above stated. Whether it was my handsome features or my 
 good clothes that so forcibly impressed her, I know not, but when I spoke 
 to her she started as if somebody had called " fire ! " in her ear through a 
 fog-horn ; and in attempting to get up from her knees and assume a position 
 of dignity befitting the reception of so evidently distinguished a stranger as 
 myself, she lost her equilibrium, and keeled over on her back at full length 
 on the ground, while the frying-pan described an arc of a circle and landed 
 in the brush about twenty feet behind her, in its flight shedding a shower 
 of slices of sizzling bacon, one of which struck the oldest girl on the back 
 of her neck, and slid down inside her dress. The girl set up a yell that 
 would have done credit to Sitting Bull when urging his warriors on to 
 victory with the war-whoop of his tribe, and I commenced to take up the 
 line of a masterly retreat. I was intercepted, however, by the pater fa- 
 milias, who confronted me with an uplifted ax, and demanded to know 
 what I had been doing to his " folks." Tremblingly I explained my mission ; 
 and while I was talking, the old woman and the girl with the hot bacon 
 down her back recovered their composure, and the entire family gathered 
 about me, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, and stared at me as if I was the 
 first handsome man they had ever seen. When I had concluded, the man 
 said : 
 
 " Mother, aint you got some blue stuff among the traps you can let 
 this gentleman have?" 
 
 " Le s see," replied " Mother," " that thar blue gownd of Brigamette s 
 we traded off to them Injuns would have been jest the thing. Heberine, 
 what s gone of that blue apron of yourn ? " 
 
 Heberine, who was one of the daughters, replied she had " tored up" 
 the blue apron into strips to tie round " Orsie s " foot when he was " snake- 
 bit that time back yander." 
 
 "Say, inarm," spoke up the girl who had undergone the"moxa" 
 operation with the bacon, " don t ye mind we brung along thet thar big 
 blue veil of yourn, that you used to wear going to Conference to Salt 
 Lake, so s the sun wouldn t spile your compaction ? " 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 133 
 
 " Sure enough ! Sure enough ! " exclaimed " Harm; " " whar is it? " 
 
 " Down in the bottom of the big hair -chest," answered one of the 
 smaller girls, in a piping voice, and shrinking away as if she had said 
 something awfully wicked, and I was an ogre who was going to eat her 
 for it. 
 
 The entire family then "adjourned" to a hair-covered trunk that 
 stood on the ground by the wagon in which they had made the journey 
 from Utah to White Pine, and after the unknotting of sundry ropes and 
 the cutting of various strips of raw-hide which bound it, the trunk was 
 opened, its contents taken out and laid on the ground, till at last, by the 
 light of a fagot, held by one of the boys, my expectant eyes beheld that 
 "big blue veil." 
 
 A bargain for the purchase of the " blue stuff " was soon concluded. 
 The old lady said she had owned the veil for a long time and did not like 
 to part with it ; she had " brung " it from the States when they first " jined 
 the Mormons," and it was to her a souvenir of happy days gone by ; but 
 if I did not mind paying five dollars for it I could have it and welcome ; 
 and that ought not to be too high a price in a new country, where the 
 mines were so rich that the silver was sticking right up out of the top of 
 the ground, so she had heard. 
 
 I paid the five dollars, took the veil, and hurried back to town, and 
 hunted up the members of the committee ; and that night was put in by 
 the Committee on Flag, Music, and Dance in the Evening, in manufac 
 turing an American flag for the celebration of the first Fourth of July in 
 White Pine. 
 
 While the committee were seated on the floor of my tent, sewing on 
 the flag by the light of a number of candles, it was resolved to invite the 
 Mormon family to be present at the literary exercises to be held on the 
 morrow, and also at the ball in the evening ; and that the committee should 
 wait on them in a body and tender the invitation. Accordingly, early the 
 following morning, the committee visited the camp and extended the in 
 vitation in due form. 
 
 In response, the mother said : " I d jest as lief the gals would go, but 
 thar aint one of them got a shoe to their foot." 
 
 This was a very embarrassing situation. The boards which composed 
 the floor of the ball-room were unplaned and full of splinters, and it was 
 impossible that the girls could dance on it in their bare feet, and it was not 
 a supposable case that women s or girls shoes could be found in the stock 
 at the store. However, the committee said they would " look around," and 
 if they could find suitable shoes, would buy each of the girls a pair, and 
 the old lady said they could go up town and look for the shoes, but she 
 wanted it understood right there that the girls were to dance only " square " 
 dances ; for round dances were against their faith, and they had not " apos 
 tatized " from the Mormons just yet, if they had come amongst the Gen 
 tiles to try and better their worldly condition. 
 
134 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 The promise about the " square " dances was given, and the commit- 
 tee went back to town to seek the shoes. They succeeded in finding in 
 the store a sufficient number of men s cowhide brogans to shoe the Mor 
 mon girls, and thus was another difficulty overcome. 
 
 The morning of the Glorious Fourth broke bright and beautiful. The 
 day was ushered in with a salute fired from anvils, and the flag was hoisted 
 to its place on the pole midst the shouts and cheers of the multitude and 
 as it floated up there, ninety feet above ground, it was a pretty respecta 
 ble flag, and the beholder would never have guessed the materials of which 
 it was composed, or that it was not a regular, Simon-pure, store flag. 
 
 At the appointed hour the male inhabitants of the future city of 
 Hamilton formed in line of procession two and two and marched up the 
 trail to Treasure City. There was not a brass band at the head of the 
 procession, but two of the best whistlers in camp walked in front and 
 whistled " Yankee Doodle " till the steep ascent and light atmosphere 
 took away their breath. Arrived on the hill they were met by the citi 
 zens of Treasure City, who, after the formalities of reception were gone 
 through with in the nearest " saloon," ajso fell in line, and the combined 
 forces of the two towns marched in procession back to Hamilton. 
 
 On the return to Hamilton the literary exercises were inaugurated. 
 They consisted of an oration by the orator of the day, a poem by the poet 
 of the day, and the singing of patriotic songs by the congregation. 
 
 At the conclusion of the exercises, a White Pine Pioneer Society was 
 formed, and a resolution adopted that the flag then flying from the pole 
 outside should form a part of the Society s archives, that future genera 
 tions might know the difficulties, hardships, and privations with which the 
 pioneers of White Pine District and the founders of the city of Hamil 
 ton had been beset in their endeavors to properly celebrate the anniversary 
 of the nation s independence. 
 
 This stage of this narrative is probably as good as any other at which 
 to record the fate of the flag. 
 
 As times began to get lively and people poured into Hamilton, the par 
 ties owning the store where the archives of the Pioneer Society were de 
 posited, added a lodging-house to their establishment. This department 
 consisted of tiers of bunks ranged along the sides of a room in the rear of 
 the store, each bunk being furnished with a coarse, straw-filled tick, two 
 pairs of blankets, and a rude pillow. These bunks were rented out to 
 weary travelers and hopeful pilgrims to the new mines at the reasonable 
 rental of two dollars per night, with the privilege of a free cocktail at the 
 bar on arising in the morning. One night an aristocratic capitalist from 
 San Francisco put up at the lodging-house, and had the effrontery to de 
 mand a pair of sheets on his bed. The proprietor of the establishment 
 was almost struck dumb with amaze at this outrageous request ; but then 
 the man was a capitalist, and was from San Francisco, and it might be 
 against the interest of the mining resources of the district for him to be- 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 135 
 
 come offended. He might get mad and go back to San Francisco without 
 having purchased a mine. The landlord had no sheets, and there were, 
 in all probability, none to be had in the camp ; but he was equal to the 
 emergency. He went to the archives of the Society of White Pine Pi 
 oneers, and took therefrom its only archive to wit, the flag and tore it 
 in half and spread the two pieces on the bed to be occupied by the high- 
 toned capitalist. The dismembered flag of our country did duty as bed 
 sheets for many months afterward, and the particular bunk in which they 
 were laid was kept in reserve for the occupancy of San Francisco capital 
 ists, who were charged half a dollar extra for its use, because it had sheets 
 on it. The last that I saw of the starry emblem which had thus been pros 
 tituted to such base uses, a couple of Shoshone squaws were wearing each 
 a piece of it over their shoulders for a shawl. 
 
 Before entering on a description of the "ball in the evening," it is 
 necessary, in order to aid the reader to the better understanding of some of 
 the incidents connected therewith, which I am about to attempt to describe, 
 that descriptive mention be made of the " hall " in which this social event 
 was held. The said hall was an incomplete house, one of those mushroom 
 board houses such as are usually constructed in new camps. It was in 
 tended to be used as a store, and was in dimensions about 40 x 20. The 
 floor was laid on posts set in the ground, and as the ground sloped off 
 abruptly from the front to the rear of the lot, the back part of the build 
 ing was some six feet above the ground, while at the front it was but a 
 step from the floor to the ground. Only the sides of the building were up, 
 the ends and roof not yet being completed, so that it merely consisted of 
 a floor and two board-sides. It was intended that the building should be 
 ceiled and lined with cloth, and the material for this purpose had all been 
 sewed together into one large piece. This canopy was spread over 
 the top of the two standing sides, making a roof, and the end surplus was 
 dropped down over the rear opening, making a rear wall, the front of the 
 building being left open on account of lack of material. Pike, fiddle in 
 hand, was seated on a little three-legged stool in the rear end of the hall, 
 next to the unsubstantial and deceptive wall. His guard had kept him 
 tolerably sober, and he fiddled, away at the "Arkansaw Traveler" and 
 called the figures with an energy worthy of the day that was being cele 
 brated. There was a large attendance at the ball, the Mormon girls and 
 their brogans being on hand, and taking part in all the square dances. The 
 costumes of the men were not full-dress, being principally gray shirts, over 
 alls, and " stogie " boots ; but everybody seemed to enjoy the occasion, 
 till an unforeseen and calamitous incident cast a pall of gloom over the 
 festivities, and broke up the affair. The watch on Pike had been relaxed, 
 and during the intervals between the dances he visited the tent next door. 
 The constant worship at the shrine of Bacchus unsettled the musician s 
 nerves and unsteadied his brain. The dancers were in the midst of a 
 quadrille, when suddenly the music grew faint in sound, and the " calls " 
 
136 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 ceased. The fiddler had suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. Won 
 der and curiosity were depicted on every face in the ball-room, but the 
 overturned stool, which had been the orchestra stand, and notes of the 
 " Arkansaw Traveler" welling up faintly from the rear of the building, told 
 the awful tale. Pike, in an effort to put some artistic variations, had leaned 
 back against the treacherous cloth wall, lost his equilibrium, and dropped out 
 of sight through the wall to the ground below. A number of men rushed 
 out to the rear of the house to recover the orchestra, but when they got to 
 him he was just passing into a peaceful sleep, his right hand spasmodically 
 working the fiddle-bow, which lay across his left shoulder, and the expiring 
 notes of the " Arkansaw Traveler " dying on the air. All efforts to arouse 
 him were fruitless, and as he was the only man in the camp who could 
 fiddle, the " ball in the evening " was at an end. 
 
 Shortly after the Fourth of July, 1868, the big rush to White Pine set 
 in, and from that time till the autumn of 1869, all was excitement in the 
 new district. Town lots, which could have been bought during July, 1 868, 
 for merely nominal sums, were valued in September of that year high in the 
 thousands, many selling as high as $25,000 a lot 25 x 100. The mines were 
 panning out big, and money was the most plentiful article to be seen in 
 the two cities. Buildings went up in a night, streets were laid out, banks 
 and express offices established, stores opened with immense stocks of goods; 
 the streets were blocked with freight teams and crowded with people ; 
 and it was exultingly proclaimed on every hand that " forty-nine " had 
 come again, and the old flush days of California were about to be repeated. 
 The Fourth of July of 1869, compared with that anniversary of the year 
 preceding, was like the transformation scene in a spectacular play in a 
 theater, or, better, a veritable fairy tale. Where the handful of coarsely- 
 clothed prospectors had marched in procession the year before, now 
 marched a grand pageant military companies, a fire department, with 
 handsome and costly and beautifully-decorated engines and hose car 
 riages ; a car of state, containing bright-faced and gaily-attired girls, repre 
 senting the various States in the Union ; brass bands, streamers, brightness, 
 and beauty ; and where but one short year before had waved the solitary 
 home-made flag, the starry emblem now kissed the breeze from a hundred 
 staffs. The line of the procession of the year before, over a mere trail 
 through the brush, with a few poor tents and cabins only marking the site 
 of the town, was now a broad street, with handsome two and three-story 
 structures of brick and stone, built compactly on each side. A thousand 
 women and children gazed on the procession from the upper windows of 
 stately structures; and at the "ball in the evening" there were hundreds 
 of richly dressed and jeweled women, in contrast to the two Gentile 
 women and the four Mormon girls in their homespun dresses and charity 
 brogans, that had graced with their presence the " ball in the evening " of 
 the Fourth of July a short twelvemonth before. 
 
 White Pine went down almost as rapidly as it came up. The mines 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 137 
 
 petered and the bubble bursted. To-day, Hamilton and Treasure City are 
 both insignificant and nearly depopulated camps ; the few who remain in 
 them have clung on, hoping on, hoping ever, for a strike in the mines that 
 shall bring a return of something like the good old times of the early 
 days. Their hopes will in all probability never be realized ; though both 
 places have a reasonable prospect that sufficient mineral wealth will be 
 developed in the deep workings which for several years have been ener 
 getically pushed in Treasure Hill, to make them prosperous small mining 
 camps. But they will never again see the rush, the excitement, the money, 
 the wild speculation, and the rapid gain and loss of fortunes that charac 
 terized their career for a year succeeding the "First Fourth in White Pine." 
 
 Under the Gallows. 
 
 In the course of the journey during which the incident detailed under 
 the head "Not Worth Killing" transpired, I arrived at a mining camp 
 known as East Bannock, sometimes called " Grasshopper Creek." I reached 
 the edge of the town at night, when all the lights were extinguished ; and, 
 knowing it to be what was called a " vigilante town," I did not care to 
 enter it during the night. It might not be healthy for a stranger to be 
 caught prowling around East Bannock at night, and he might experience 
 considerable difficulty in convincing any of the watchful inhabitants who 
 might be abroad of the honesty of his intentions. I therefore concluded 
 to camp at the outskirts of the town that night, and enter it in the morn 
 ing. I accordingly spread my blanket on the ground, lay down, and was 
 soon sleeping the sleep of the tired. 
 
 When I opened my eyes in the morning, the first object they encoun 
 tered was a gallows. I did not know it was a gallows at first, but was soon 
 enlightened as to the true nature of the beast. The night preceding had 
 been very dark, and when I made my camp I did not notice the instru 
 ment of execution of the death penalty, and had laid my blankets directly 
 under the cross-beam, and between the uprights, and there I had slept. 
 There was a small piece of rope dangling from the center of the cross-beam ; 
 but still it did not strike me that the machine was a gallows. I lay there 
 in my blankets, looking up at it, and wondering what it could be, until at 
 last the sun began to mount in the heavens, and I arose. ,As I looked 
 about me, I observed, a short distance to the right, what appeared to be a 
 small cemetery a row of head-boards and small, grave-like mounds, sit 
 uated on a little knoll. The first thought was that it must be the town- 
 cemetery, and I wondered that a town of the size of East Bannock should, 
 at its age, (it was then probably four or five years old) have so small a 
 graveyard. In new mining camps, about the first work of public utility 
 performed is to lay out a graveyard, and there is almost invariably some 
 public-spirited citizen who contracts to provide occupants for it. In most 
 
138 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 mining camps, a graveyard can boast at least twenty graves before it is six 
 months old, the majority of the occupants being obstinate men who thought 
 they had a better title to a town-lot or a mining claim than the man who 
 had established the precedence of his claim with a bullet, or men who had 
 unfortunately held the opinion that they were better fighters and surer 
 shots than the individuals who had convinced them of their error with a 
 six-shooter. However, I walked over to the cemetery, and approaching 
 the first head-board, read thereon the name, " Henry Plummer," and the 
 date of the aforesaid Plummer s death. 
 
 The whole thing was now plain to me this was the private grave 
 yard of the East Bannock Vigilantes. 
 
 The story of the execution of Henry Plummer and his band of " road 
 agents " was familiar to me then. I had heard it in Nevada, and at inter 
 vals, at different places all along, during my journey to Montana. It is 
 not very fresh in my memory now, as I have forgotten some matters of 
 detail ; but the story substantially is about as follows : 
 
 Plummer had been City Marshal and a prominent local politician of 
 Nevada City, California ; but, if my memory serves me, killed a man 
 there, and escaped to the then Territory of Nevada. He did not linger 
 long in the sage-brush, however, for fear of arrest by the California au 
 thorities, but made his way " up north," as the section now comprising 
 Montana and Idaho was then by a general term designated. There had 
 been some placer-mining discoveries in British Columbia, and it was to 
 that country that he first went ; but as other mines were found to the east 
 ward, in what is now Montana and Idaho, Plummer followed the " rushes " 
 till he at last brought up in Bannock, under which designation a large sec 
 tion of the eastern portion of the present Territory of Montana was then 
 known. I am not familiar with much of his career during the earlier por 
 tion of his residence in Bannock, except generally that it was a wild and 
 desperate one. 
 
 The Territory of Idaho was formed and divided off into counties, and 
 county governments organized. Each county covered a large area; for 
 the country was new, and the population small and scattered. Of one of 
 these counties the one in which East Bannock was situated (it is now 
 in Montana) Plummer was chosen sheriff. He had married, and apparently 
 reformed, and abandoned the life of a desperado, and was looked upon as 
 a good citizen for a new country. He was known to be a determined, and 
 was thought to be a brave man ; and having had some experience in a po 
 lice capacity, was deemed just the man for the position. 
 
 The country was infested with cut-throats and highwaymen, jocularly 
 called "road agents." These "agents" stopped the stages and robbed 
 and murdered passengers, killed men on the trails and roads for pure 
 wantonness, and committed murder, robbery, and outrage on every hand, 
 and with the utmost impunity ; and not an arrest was made, or an effort 
 put forth to bring one of them to justice. Every man was his own law, 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 139 
 
 and his pistol the only peace officer to which he could look for protection. 
 The agents were banded together, and usually went in gangs, and no man 
 was safe from them, even in the towns. They would enter a camp, and 
 after filling themselves with liquor, would "take the town" ; that is, they 
 would be masters of the situation, do as they pleased, and maltreat and 
 abuse peaceably disposed persons as their humor moved them. In short, 
 they ruled the country, and had everything their own way, apparently 
 safe from all danger of arrest or punishment. 
 
 This state of things could not last forever. The patience of the law- 
 abiding and peaceable men of the country was exhausted, and a Vigilance 
 Committee was quietly and secretly formed. At first they made no move 
 to visit punishment upon any of the suspected or notoriously bad charac 
 ters, but quietly busied themselves, each man acting as a detective, in 
 posting themselves as to the ramifications of the road agents organization, 
 finding out their haunts and learning their mode of operations. During 
 the course of these investigations it was learned, and the discovery created 
 the utmost surprise among the Vigilantes, that Henry Plummer, the Sheriff 
 of the county, was the head and front of the road agents organization. 
 He personally took no part in their exploits, but knew all their plans, and 
 received a certain share of their spoils. He posted them when there was 
 gold dust on the stages, and when he learned that a man or a party of men 
 were traveling with large sums of money or batches of dust, he informed 
 the agents as to the route taken, and consulted with them as to the best 
 method of accomplishing the robbery and disposing of the victims. Be 
 sides this, he protected them from arrest, and aided them to get out of the 
 country if the facts implicating them were so plain and glaring that his 
 failure* to arrest them if they stayed would tend to betray his connection 
 with the gangs. 
 
 A watch was put on Plummer, and the Committee satisfied them 
 selves that he saw there was no chance for a mistake about his connection 
 with the road agents ; and on a certain night, which had been agreed on, 
 he was arrested. Plummer had not dreamed that he was suspected, and 
 the arrest was a complete surprise to him. He blustered considerably at 
 first ; but when he saw that the Committee had indisputable evidence of 
 his guilt, he " weakened," and offered to tell all he knew. This offer was 
 rejected, as enough was known to show that he was undeserving of mercy. 
 He was placed under a strong guard that night, and a detachment of the 
 Committee proceeded to arrest others of the road agents. 
 
 If I remember the circumstances aright, several of the gang were 
 Mexicans, who, learning that a vigilance committee had been formed and 
 was after the road agents, took refuge in a stone cabin situated on the out 
 skirts of the town of East Bannock. This cabin was visited by a detach 
 ment of the Committee, who demanded the surrender of the occupants. 
 The Mexicans made answer by firing a volley on the Vigilantes, without, 
 however, hitting any of them. The Vigilantes then set fire to the cabin, 
 
140 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 and when at last the heat grew so intense that they could no longer remain 
 inside, they made a rush on the party of Vigilantes, but were all shot down 
 before they could do any mischief. Thus one portion of the gang was 
 disposed of. 
 
 In the meantime, another party of the Vigilantes had arrested several 
 Americans who were known to have been active participants in the robber 
 ies, murders, and outrages ; and others who were suspected managed to 
 effect their escape. I do not remember the exact number arrested, but it 
 was somewhere between six and ten. 
 
 In the days of vigilance committees in California, it used to be the 
 custom, before executing the law of Judge Lynch, to give the accused a 
 sort of trial, at which he was allowed to bring forward any evidence tend 
 ing to establish his innocence which he might be able to procure. But this 
 plan was not pursued in Bannock, and never in Montana, that I am 
 aware of. 
 
 When the Committee had arrested all the known road agents they 
 could find, a gallows was erected just outside the town of East Bannock, 
 a resolution condemning the men to death having previously been passed, 
 and the prisoners were conducted to the place of execution, and there 
 hung by twos and threes, with the exception of Plummer, who, on account 
 of his former prominence as a politician and county officer, was granted 
 the courtesy of an execution all to himself. 
 
 It is stated that when Plummer became satisfied that the Vigilance 
 Committee were determined to hang him, he cried like a child, and begged 
 piteously for his life, but all in vain. There had been too many men mur 
 dered and mutilated, and life and property had been rendered too insecure 
 for mercy to be shown to the man who, while holding an office of public 
 trust, and one created to give protection to the people, had aided and 
 countenanced the murderers and robbers. The hour of vengeance had 
 come, and the people had arisen in their might to demonstrate to the ruf 
 fians and cut-throats that their sway was at an end ; that they would no 
 longer be allowed to ride rough-shod over peaceable and law-abiding men ; 
 and even while Plummer, with the rope around his neck, was pleading, and 
 begging, and promising, the box on which he stood was pulled out from 
 under his feet, and in a moment he was strangling and dangling at the end 
 of the rope. 
 
 The gallows on which these men were hung was the same under 
 which I had camped the night I arrived at East Bannock, and the little 
 mounds with the boards at their head on the knoll at one side were their 
 graves. 
 
 The formation of the Bannock Vigilance Committee was, I believe, 
 the foundation of the great Vigilance Committee which in a short time 
 extended in its ramifications over the entire Territory of Montana, which 
 was soon afterward created. Springing out of the necessity for self-pres 
 ervation, and starting off with the performance of a necessary act, it at 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 141 
 
 last grew to be a curse, where at first it was a blessing. Bad men, to keep 
 suspicion away from themselves, joined the Vigilance Committee, which 
 came to be an oath-bound organization of the strictest secresy. There 
 were good men also in its membership, nearly every merchant and business 
 man in the Territory joining it ; and it was even hinted that United States 
 Marshals and Judges, Sheriffs, Constables, and District Attorneys were en 
 rolled on its muster. It soon, however, fell into the control of the villains 
 and adventurers, many of whom, for plunder, or to gratify malice and 
 revenge, made accusations against innocent men and to be accused before 
 the Vigilantes was equivalent to being condemned. Sentence was passed 
 in secret, and the accused was given no opportunity to be heard in defense, 
 but the officers of the organization on whom devolved the duty of exe 
 cuting the sentence immediately proceeded to put it into execution. The 
 unwarned wretch was surprised at night in his cabin, or on a road or trail, 
 or even late at night in the streets of the towns, by a body of masked men,, 
 by whom he was overpowered, gagged, blindfolded, bound, and carried 
 to the tree used as an engine of execution. There one end of a rope was 
 tied around his neck, the other thrown over a limb of the tree, the victim 
 hauled up and the rope made fast, a placard on which was written the 
 crime for which he was executed being generally pinned to his breast. 
 Murder was not the only crime for which men were executed. Horse or 
 cattle - stealing, passing bogus gold-dust, or highway robbery, also met 
 the punishment of death. But in the later days of the Vigilance Com 
 mittee the mere suspicion or accusation of these crimes was sufficient to 
 hang a man. 
 
 I remember hearing a story in fact, it was generally current in Mon 
 tana at one time that the Vigilantes seized and hung a boy on suspicion 
 of having stolen some work cattle, and while he was dangling from the 
 rope the missing cattle, which had strayed, walked into the corral in which 
 the boy was hanging. 
 
 Some of these Vigilantes themselves at last met with their just deserts 
 at the end of a rope, pulled on by their fellow members of the Committee. 
 There was one of these who went by the name of " Frenchy." He was a 
 thief, a murderer, and a villain ; but he gained admission to membership 
 in the Vigilance Committee, which for several years he used as a cloak for 
 his crimes. He was known as a Californian, and many members being 
 from the Eastern States, Frenchy was relied on to furnish information 
 concerning the antecedents of such Californians as came under the ban of 
 the Committee ; and it was afterward suspected that he gave evidence 
 against men of whom he had never before heard or had never before seen, 
 simply that he might appear to be well posted. If he took a dislike to or 
 held a grudge against a man, he denounced him to the Committee as hav 
 ing been a horse-thief in California or Nevada; if a man refused to be 
 blackmailed by him, he lodged an information against him before the Vigi 
 lance Committee, charging him with some crime, and in most cases the 
 
142 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 charge was equivalent to conviction, and resulted in execution. In some 
 instances, all that was necessary to bring the executioners of the Vigilantes 
 down on a man was that he should have money. In such cases the " stran- 
 glers," as they were called, would pounce on him at night, or follow him 
 out into the country when he started on a journey, overpower him and 
 hang him, take away his money or live-stock, and then report to head 
 quarters with a trumped-up charge against him, and aver that they found 
 it necessary to hang him to prevent his escape. Frenchy was particularly 
 at home in this class of cases, acting the part of a detective to find out 
 men who were going to travel with long sacks of gold-dust. At last 
 Frenchy Legan to be suspected by the more respectable members of the 
 Vigilance Committee, and a watch was set on his actions ; and it was not 
 very long till he was caught. One dark night, Frenchy fell in company 
 with an old man from one of the outside mining camps, who was known to 
 possess considerable money. The Vigilante spy and informer soon placed 
 himself on friendly terms with the stranger, and the two visited the saloons 
 and dance-houses, and dissipated until the old man became intoxicated. 
 Frenchy then inveigled him into a dark street, and knocked him senseless, 
 and proceeded to rifle his pockets. The pair had been followed during the 
 night by a party of Vigilantes ; and while Frenchy was engaged in rob 
 bing the old man, they rushed in on him, and captured, bound, and gagged 
 him before he could make a move or utter a cry. 
 
 It was always swift work with the Vigilantes. After they had once 
 suspected Frenchy, many things about him became plain, and facts were 
 obtained showing his villainy ; and now that he was caught in the very 
 act, no time was lost in executing vengeance on him. He was conducted 
 through out-of-the-way streets and over lonely trails to the execution tree 
 in Dry Gulch, on the outskirts of the city, and was there given a short 
 shrift and a long rope. I heard, several years afterward, that during the 
 preparations for execution Frenchy got the gag out of his mouth, and 
 screamed out that he was a Californian, and implored any Californians 
 who might be in the party to help or save him, for the sake of geography, 
 as it were. But if there were in the party any gentlemen from the Golden 
 State, they said not a word in his behalf, nor attempted to put forth a hand 
 to save him. And next morning the people of the good city of Helena be 
 held the body of the late Frenchy dangling from a tree, and on his breast 
 a placard bearing the words : 
 
 A MURDERER AND A THIEF! 
 Swore Away Men s Lives. 
 
FRONTIER SKETCHES. 143 
 
 Hoist by his Own Petard. 
 
 As the story goes, another prominent member of the Execution Band 
 of the Montana Vigilantes also met his death at the hands of his former 
 comrades. He had helped at the execution of so many that hanging 
 men grew to be a passion with him ; and it was said that he only knew 
 happiness when he was pulling a rope over a limb, with a man fastened 
 to the other end by the neck. Finally, this fellow gave offense to some of 
 the other Vigilantes, and a party of them talked the matter over, and de 
 cided to hang him. He knew too much about some of them, or had failed 
 to divide some plunder fairly, or they had come to dislike him. I don t 
 know the exact reason for his execution, only that they strung him up ? 
 and that there was a sort of grim humor to the story. 
 
 The party were at Fort Benton, the head of navigation of the Mis 
 souri River, which was quite a busy little city in those days, on account 
 of the travel and freight from the East ; and numerous steamers which 
 plied the river from St. Louis, St. Joe, and Omaha, tied up and unloaded 
 their cargoes there, for transhipment by mule and ox-teams to various 
 points in the Territory. Fort Benton is situated on a sand-flat on the 
 bank of the river, a regular desert waste, and the view on all sides, as far 
 as the eye can reach, is nothing but sand, without a tree or shrub to re 
 lieve the barrenness and desolation. This fact gave rise to some difficulty 
 in the hanging of the doomed Vigilante ; and the stranglers, in their di 
 lemma, went to him and requested him to devise a plan for hanging him 
 self. The matter was worked in this wise.. Hunting up the victim and 
 taking him aside, one of them said to him : 
 
 " We have got a fellow we want to string up, and don t know how to 
 manage it, as there s not a tree, or anything big enough to hang a man on, 
 growing within miles of this place. How would you manage it ! " 
 
 " Manage it ! " exclaimed the unconscious victim, " you just leave 
 that to me, and I ll fix you up the loveliest contrivance that ever raised a 
 man off the ground. Leave it to me, will you?" 
 
 The party consented to leave the construction of the " lovely contri 
 vance " to their candidate for a noose, and he proceeded to business at 
 once. Procuring three stout poles and some baling-rope, and a stouter 
 rope for a noose, he packed them on a horse, and mounting his own horse 
 he drove the pack-horse before him, and rode out on the plain to a point 
 secure from observation from the town. Here he unpacked his gallows 
 material, and with the baling-rope tied the three poles together fast at one 
 end, and setting the other ends on the ground, spread them out in the 
 form of a tripod. He then made a running noose with the other piece of 
 rope, and fastened it to the top of the tripod, hanging inside of the poles. 
 This done, he returned to town to hunt up his friends and invite them out 
 to an inspection of his ingenious work. 
 
 It did not take long, and having got them together, he said : 
 
144 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 " Come on, boys, and go out and look at her; she s just the sweetest 
 thing in that line you ever laid eyes on." 
 
 In response to this polite invitation, the "boys" mounted their 
 horses and rode out to view the " sweet thing," the victim accompanying 
 them. 
 
 They had intended to hang him at night ; but such a splendid oppor 
 tunity for the work was now presented that they concluded to take advan 
 tage of it ; and as they rode along they communicated with each other by 
 whispers, and a plan was agreed on to hang their man before they re 
 turned to town. The gallows was handy, and they had him secure and 
 safe from observation, and it seemed like tempting Providence to let this 
 chance slip and take the chances of something happening before night to 
 put him on his guard, so that he might get away. 
 
 Arrived at the tripod, the party dismounted, and after they had 
 viewed it a few moments, the leader asked its architect how it worked. 
 
 "Easiest thing in the world," replied the victim of misplaced confi 
 dence; " you see, you walk your man in under here (pointing to the space 
 under the noose) ; slip this thing over his head (pointing to the noose) ; 
 then three of us each pick up one of these poles and shift its end inwards 
 towards the center, and that raises the height of the machine, and draws 
 the noose tight, and your man has nothing to stand on. Did you ever see 
 anything smoother than that ? " 
 
 " Suppose you get under, and let s see how it works," said the leader. 
 
 " Me get under it ! What for ? It s the simplest thing in the world, 
 and a baby could understand it." 
 
 " Get under there ! " exclaimed the leader, in a stern tone, drawing 
 and cocking a six-shooter, and pointing it in the victim s face. 
 
 Simultaneously the other men drew their pistols, covered the fated 
 wretch, and said, " Get under there!" 
 
 The face of the gallows-builder turned pale, and his limbs began to 
 quake with fear. 
 
 "Oh, boys ! you don t mean it. You re only joshing me, I know; but 
 those pistols look wicked, and make me nervous. Put up your guns and 
 go back to town and take a drink with me, and we ll fetch that fellow out 
 here to-night and give him a lively send-off." 
 
 The only reply was the nearer approach of the muzzles of the six- 
 shooters to his head, and the words : " Get under there ! " 
 
 The poor devil begged, cried, and implored, but to no purpose ; and 
 at the very point of the pistols which surrounded him on every hand, he 
 was forced inside the tripod and the noose slipped over his head, and he 
 was duly hung in strict accordance with his own directions for the hang 
 ing of the other fellow. There he was left hanging, and a few days sub 
 sequently, after the carrion birds had made several hearty meals from it, 
 his body was discovered by some men from Fort Benton, who cut it down- 
 and buried it. 
 
Ifart 
 
 I<ife i 
 
 One day, while out in search of an item, I asked a fellow -citizen, 
 "What s the news?" " Nothing startling," he replied. Nothing start 
 ling ! That man would never do for a newspaper reporter in a small in 
 terior town. Nothing startling, indeed ! Why, as he made the remark, 
 two dogs were preparing to sign articles for a prize-fight right in front of 
 his store ; a wagon loaded with wood could be seen in the distance, which 
 was sure to pass his way during the day, if something did not break down. 
 Two women, whom he knew to be mortal enemies, were approaching each 
 other on the corner above ; a doctor was hurrying across the street, and a 
 man who always kicks up a fuss and gets arrested when drunk was just 
 entering the door of a saloon a block below. If that fellow -citizen had 
 had the soul of a reporter within his bosom or in any other part of his 
 body where a reporter s expansive soul can find lodgment he would have 
 got out his jack-knife, picked up a chip, and, sitting down on the first con 
 venient dry goods box, have whittled, and waited for something startling. 
 Nothing came of all the incidents, however. The dogs signed a peace 
 protocol and formed an alliance to bark at a passing horse ; the load of 
 wood was delivered lower down the street, the women merely swept their 
 skirts aside from each other as they passed, the doctor only wanted to bor 
 row ten dollars of the man on the other side of the street, and the fellow 
 who makes a noise when he gets drunk simply went into the saloon to in 
 quire what time the Battle Mountain stage started. 
 
 It is such disappointments as these that sour the reportorial milk of 
 human kindness, and force the country newspaper man to fill up his col 
 umns with incidents evolved from his own imagination incidents that 
 are invariably tinged with the humor born of worldly wisdom, and the 
 practical as opposed to the sentimental view of men, life, and things. I 
 have before explained the origin of the Sazerac Lying Club ; and to the 
 same want of "local" the following actual occurrences owe their appear 
 ance in print : 
 
 10 
 
146 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 High-Toned Folks. 
 
 A short time ago, a prominent citizen of Austin, criticising something 
 which had appeared in the REVEILLE, complained that a majority of the 
 characters introduced in our local sketches were people of rather a common 
 order ; that the language employed in the dialogue was coarse, and only 
 such as is in use among the lower classes. This, he urged, was likely to 
 make people outside of Austin think that there were not any aristocratic 
 residents here, and that the Austinites on the whole were rather a common 
 crowd. We accepted the criticism gratefully and gracefully, and there 
 and then resolved to watch out for any little domestic incident transpiring 
 among the " Upper Ten " that could be worked into a sketch. We had 
 not long to wait. 
 
 A gentleman residing in this city, through whose veins courses the 
 blood of a long line of ancestors, entered the portals of his palatial mansion 
 just as the glorious orb of day was sinking to rest behind the western 
 hills. He was met on the threshold by the partner of his joys and sor 
 rows, who greeted him with a kiss of welcome. He entered the house, 
 and throwing his weary form upon the luxurious sofa in the drawing- 
 room got right up again and howled. 
 
 The delicate fabric on which she had been engaged in embroidering 
 the armorial bearings of her husband s noble house had three needles in 
 it ; she had thrown it on the sofa in her haste to greet her lord, and he 
 had sat down on all three of the needles. 
 
 Instead of saying, "Dearest, thou art careless," as the reader has a 
 natural right to expect, he just stood up on his toes and cursed till the 
 air was blue. 
 
 She, on her part, instead of putting her hands on his shoulders and 
 gently pushing him down on the sofa and saying, "Be calm, thou light of 
 me soul," which any person with a grain of sense must concede was the 
 proper thing for her to do under the circumstances, in a tone more in 
 sorrow than in anger, told him if he didn t " shut up this minnit," she 
 would faint. 
 
 " Faint and be d rowned ! " said he. 
 
 And then she called him an old brute and an unfeeling wretch, and 
 told him he could go to the restaurant to get his supper ; for she wished 
 she might fall nine thousand feet down a shaft if she cooked a mouthful 
 for any such old nincompoop as him that night. 
 
 And he went down town after his supper, and as he stood up against the 
 bar while his appetizer was being concocted, he said to the bar-keeper: "I 
 put it to you, as a man and a brother, if a man jumps eight feet and howls 
 like a coyote, just because he has sat down on three insignificant cambric 
 needles, can he with truth and propriety be designated an Hmfeelin" 1 
 wretch ?" 
 
 The bar-keeper said he thought not. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 147 
 
 A Seared Citizen. 
 
 Mr. Thompson has just laid in his winter s wood, and a few evenings 
 ago, on returning from his work in the mines, brought home some giant 
 powder cartridges for the purpose of blasting up the big logs into stove 
 size. He deposited the explosives on the kitchen table, intending to use 
 them in the morning ; but after he had gone to bed the thought troubled 
 him that he had not exercised sufficient caution ; and that he should have 
 placed the dangerous articles in the cellar, or in some corner out of the way 
 of " that boy Jim." But, being tired and sleepy, he felt a natural indispo 
 sition to get up and remove them to a place of absolute safety, and con 
 cluded to risk all chances for the night, and rise early in the morning so 
 as to put them out of Jim s way before that mischievous young gentleman 
 was out of bed. 
 
 Falling into a troubled sleep he had visions of explosions, saw the air 
 filled with fragments of his house, his beloved daughter Clarissa sailing 
 straight for the moon on a joint of stovepipe, the wife of his bosom shoot 
 ing through the air carrying her severed head under her arm, and Jim 
 the pride of his latter days sitting astride of the piano-stool, with the 
 baby s arm in his hand, and grinning like a fiend as he put that innocent s 
 thumb to his nose, and disappeared from view behind the summit of Lan 
 der Hill. 
 
 When he awoke in the morning it was with that sensation of weari 
 ness which usually follows a night of exciting dreams, and as he lay in bed 
 in that drowsy condition, between sleep and awaking, which all of us have 
 experienced at some time or other, Clarissa seated herself at the piano in 
 the parlor to practice an operatic piece. Bracing her feet firmly on the 
 pedals of the instrument, and fixing her eyes on the music, she raised both 
 hands on high to get a good ready, and then came down with both fists on 
 the keyboard with the vigor of a thousand music masters. 
 
 Crash ! Bang ! Rattletybang ! Crashytecrash ! 
 
 The air of the opera swept through the house in a hurricane of noisy 
 melody, and Thompson shot out of bed as if he had been blown from a 
 cannon. 
 
 "Great heavens, Maria!" he screamed to his wife, "we re blowed 
 hellwest and crooked ; quit your dog-goned snoring and say your prayers ; 
 Jim s got hold of the giant powder and we ll all be blowed to a thousand 
 fragments in sixteen seconds by the watch ! " 
 
 Maria merely turned over and yawned, and said : " Shut up, you 
 cussed, excitable old fool ! It s only Clarissa practicing the uproar of Tra- 
 vitroovatore, or some such stuff, on the planner, and the instrument s all 
 out of kilter owing to the dry climate." 
 
 The prominent citizen dressed himself and sadly wended his way to 
 the nearest saloon to hunt up a man to tune the piano. 
 
148 THE SAZEEAG LYING CLUB. 
 
 Story of an Ear. 
 
 Just for a change he thought he would spend one evening at home. 
 His astonished wife met him at the door and asked him if he had forgot 
 ten anything. 
 
 "No, pet," he replied, "I just thought I d come home and keep you 
 company to-night ; you must be lonesome sitting here all alone." 
 
 The wife was delighted ; it was almost a new experience to have her 
 husband at home at night, and she thought that at last her appeals against 
 pedro for the whisky had taken root in his heart. Placing another stick 
 in the stove and giving the damper a turn, she rushed into the bedroom 
 and brought forth his slippers and dressing-gown, and turning over the 
 pillow of the sofa, said : 
 
 " Here dear, lie down you must be tired and I ll get you a book, a 
 new novel I ve just borrowed from Mrs. Ginx, who borrowed it from Mrs. 
 Smithers, whose aunt is well acquainted with the author s brother-in-law, 
 and it s just perfectly splendid." 
 
 " Well, pet, after all there s no place like home," said the husband, as 
 he stretched himself on the sofa, "bring along your book." 
 
 He was in a gracious mood, and after turning over a few of the leaves, 
 said : " S pose I read aloud to you, sis ? " 
 " Oh, do, that s a dear, it ll be so nice." 
 Pretty soon he came to a paragraph something like this : 
 " Standing in the archway, with the brilliant light from the chande 
 lier playing about her golden hair, she looked a picture of marvelous 
 beauty. The proudly poised head set on the queenly neck ; her deep blue, 
 liquid eye shining in tearful sympathy on the dyspeptic poodle that 
 crouched moaning at her feet ; her tiny ear, looking like some creamy- 
 white, pink-tinted shell of ocean 
 
 " By* the way, dear," said the husband > cutting short his reading, " that 
 description reminds me of your ear ; you have an ear like a shell." 
 
 It was the first compliment she had received from him since the 
 early days of their marriage, and a blush of pride suffused her face as she 
 asked : 
 
 "What kind of a shell, darling?" 
 "An abalone shell," he replied. 
 
 She had never heard of an abalone shell, but did not want to display 
 her ignorance ; so she silently made up her mind to hunt it out in the 
 " Condensed Treatise of Conchology " that ornamented the center table. 
 Next morning, as soon as her husband had left the house, conchology was 
 in order. She found that it was described as a shell about the size of an 
 ordinary wagon-wheel. She nursed her wrath during that day, and when 
 her husband came home at night, she met him at the door with the towel- 
 roller and now his ear is as big as an abalone shell, but it looks like a 
 piece of pounded beef. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 149 
 
 Musical. 
 
 This is a musical community. Through every night, far on into the 
 small hours of the morning, may be heard the sweet squeak of the fiddle, 
 the enchanting tones of a piano with a cold in its head, the dulcet strains 
 of the accordeon and concertina, the harmonious melody of the hand-organ, 
 and the thrilling tones of the bass drum, occasionally set off and elaborated 
 by the martial strains given forth by a brass band. Singing is usually 
 added to the charming collection of sounds, which, from the peculiar 
 acoustic properties of the canon in which Austin is situated, can be heard 
 throughout the town ; and in what should be the still hours of the night, 
 voices can be heard trying to outscreech a Chinese bagpipe, to the tune of 
 " Little sweetheart, come and kiss me," or, " Who will care for mother 
 now," which tunes, by the way, don t harmonize very well with the bag 
 pipe s tune, which is a mile and a half long, and only contains three notes. 
 All this is very pleasant for people who have murdered whole families and 
 can t sleep, and instead of soothing the savage breast it sets the Indians 
 in the camps on the surrounding hills to howling as if every mother s son 
 of them was laboring under an attack of the cramp colic. Then the cats 
 and dogs add their voices to the melody, and unmusical people lie abed 
 and listen, and wonder how many cases of murder and suicide will be 
 reported next morning, and reflect how easy it would be for them to bring 
 in a verdict of justifiable homicide if they happened to get on a jury to 
 try a man for killing two or three of the musicians. 
 
 Turning Over a New Leaf. 
 
 A prominent citizen, who had fallen into the habit of lying in bed till 
 a late hour in the morning, made Tip his mind to turn over a new leaf. 
 He told his wife that it was a shame for a man in the prime of life to be 
 wasting the most beautiful hours of the day in bed, and gave her injunc 
 tions to awaken him at six o clock the following morning, and to insist on 
 his arising, and to be sure not to let him fall asleep again. Then he pic 
 tured in glowing colors the beauties of the morning how he would go 
 forth from the house and take a morning walk among the sweet-smelling 
 sagebrush, and drink in the pure and health-giving morning air, and lis 
 ten to the music of the birds, and come home vigorous and refreshed, with 
 that appetite for breakfast which only healthful exercise can give. Next 
 morning his wife awakened him promptly on time. 
 
 " Thunderation, can t you let a fellow sleep?" he growled, as he 
 turned over for another snooze. 
 
150 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 His wife was not to be discouraged, and persevered in her efforts to 
 arouse him, reminding him of his directions given the evening before 
 After considerable yawning, and stretching, and growling, the citizen man 
 aged to get up and dress himself. Then he started out for his walk. When 
 he got to the first saloon he concluded to go in and take a cocktail a man 
 needed some little stimulant when he broke over old habits and got up so 
 early. Just one cocktail, and not another drop before breakfast. When 
 he got inside the saloon two men were engaged in an animated argument 
 on the Eastern Question, in which he became so interested that he forgot 
 all about his walk until it was time to go home to breakfast, and every 
 time one or the other of the disputants would get the best of the argu 
 ment, he would " treat the house." When the citizen got home the break 
 fast was cold, his legs unsteady, and his voice thick, and he spoke to his 
 wife with a Russian accent. When she asked him how he had enjoyed 
 his walk, and if he didn t know breakfast was cold, and what made him 
 look and act so queerly, he said : . 
 
 " Bin gaged in a nanimated scushion er Rooshin war and tookernex- 
 tracocktailertwo." 
 
 His wife was surprised at the facility with which he had learned a 
 foreign language, but expressed herself in effect that early rising and 
 walks before breakfast were not as conducive to health as lying in bed till 
 breakfast was ready. 
 
 Poker and Polities. 
 
 They were talking politics and playing bean poker twenty beans for 
 a quarter. There were three of them, all Democrats, and for convenience 
 we will call them Smith, Brown, and Robinson. Smith was dealer, and 
 while he was giving out the cards, Brown and Robinson were discussing 
 the overwhelming corruption among the officials of the land and shoving 
 cards up their sleeves. The cards being dealt, Brown, who sat next to the 
 dealer, passed, at the same time remarking : 
 
 "As I was sayin , the fearful corruption which runs through every 
 branch of the public service is horrifying to every true patriot ; the blush 
 of shame mantles my cheek when I think of Grant, the President of the 
 United States, lending himself to all kinds of thievery and jobbery, and 
 surrounding himself with a horde of blood-sucking robbers what are drain 
 ing the very life-blood of the people." 
 
 " It s perfectly awful I chip," chimed in Robinson, as he neatly dis 
 posed of his hand, and got four kings out of his sleeve. 
 
 "I pass out," said Smith. 
 
 " Just look at Belknap, and Babcock, and Blame, and the rest of them 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 151 
 
 fellows I raise you twenty beans," continued Brown, as he deftly got 
 from his sleeve the four aces which were there concealed. 
 
 "Yes, and think of Bristow and them mules le s see: I call that 
 raise, and go you twenty better," returned Robinson. 
 
 " That sizes my pile. Just go back a few years in this Administration, 
 and ponder on the Credit Mobilyer, the back-pay steal, the risin of the 
 President s salary, and the use of money to carry elections in New York; 
 such things as them were never heard of in Andrew Jackson s time or 
 when the Democrats was in power. I call you what have you got?" said 
 Brown. 
 
 " I ve got pretty nigh an invincible here s two little pair of kings," 
 said Robinson, as he laid his hand on the table. 
 
 "Oh, I can just rake them here s four bullets, 1 said Brown, as he 
 reached for the pot. 
 
 " Great snakes! " exclaimed Robinson, " you re a nice pill to be talking 
 about the corruptions of the Administration, aint you ? If I couldn t 
 play poker honester n you, I d never talk about other folks. You and Mr. 
 Smith continue the game while I go out arid rustle some more soap." 
 
 Wanted a Puff. 
 
 44 Throw your eye over that ! " shrieked a voice behind us. And then 
 a chunk of rock was slammed down on the table on which we were 
 writing, just barely missing the "funny-bone" of our arm. Our first 
 thought was that it was one of those fellows come to inquire " who wrote 
 that article," and we were about to reach for our trusty mitrailleuse, when 
 the voice said: "How s that for richness?" and then we knew instinct 
 ively that it was a prospector come to display a specimen of a rich find. 
 We picked up the piece of rock, scanned it carefully, and then asked our 
 visitor where it came from. " You can say it s an entirely new deestrick," 
 he replied, " never afore trod by the foot of a white man. I call it the 
 Fortunate William. You see, I go by the name of Lucky Bill ; but that s 
 too common and vulgar-like a name to slap onto a mine." The specimen 
 was composed principally of granite, with here and there a speck of quartz, 
 and looked as if it would assay about six bits a ton. " What do you think 
 she ll go? 1 asked our visitor, as we concluded our examination of the 
 specimen. We told him we were not a good judge of ore, and could not 
 form an estimate of the value of the rock he exhibited. " Wall," said he, 
 " I am a judge of ore ; I ve prospected every camp from Arizony to Mon- 
 tany, and I can jest tell you that that air rock won t go a cent under ten 
 thousand dollars to the ton." Then he told us the location of the district 
 in which his ledge was situated, declared that the vein was a " well-con- 
 
152 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 fined ledge," sixteen feet wide by actual measurement, free-milling ore, 
 wood and water plentiful, and that he honestly believed it to be the second 
 Comstock ; and concluded by requesting us to " give her a h ist in the 
 paper," as he wanted to "attract the attention of capitalists." Then he 
 unbuttoned his shirt, and, thrusting his hand under the bosom, rummaged 
 around till he found a dilapidated cigar, which he handed to us, saying : 
 * Thar, take that, and set her up as high as your language will go." We 
 declined the cigar, (because it was such a poor one, and mashed besides) 
 saying t,hat we did not expect remuneration for representing to the world 
 the mineral resources of Nevada, and particularly of this section. " All 
 right," he said, as he returned the cigar to the place whence he had taken 
 it ; " but I want you to understand that I aint one of them ducks what 
 wants editors to puff their mines for nothiri* ; thar aint nothin mean 
 about me, and if you want the cigar you re welcome to it." We again 
 declined the proffered gift, and he left, after extracting from us a promise 
 that we would " set her up high." 
 
 A Sunday-School Story. 
 
 " Yes, my boy, to be virtuous is to be happy. It gladdens your old 
 father s heart and causes it to swell with pride when he beholds your name 
 published in the REVEILLE as having attained the maximum figure awarded 
 for deportment in your school. Keep on in the pursuit of knowledge ; 
 refrain from the vile practice of playing hooky; do not allow the example 
 of bad boys to induce you to throw spit-balls at your teacher ; never, never 
 swear ; and you will grow up worthy of the name handed down to you by 
 your Puritan ancestors. Bring me my slippers, my son, and I will hear 
 you recite your lessons, and see what progress you have made." 
 
 Johnny stood one hundred in deportment on the last roll of honor of 
 the Austin Public School, which shows that he is a very good boy ; and 
 when he dropped a dozen tacks into his father s slippers, it was done in a 
 fit of abstraction. He had worked out several abstruse mathematical 
 problems on his slate since then, and his mind had been so absorbed that 
 he forgot all about such a trivial matter as a few tacks in his father s slip 
 pers. He did not intend to be around when the old man put on the slip 
 pers, but the circumstance of the tacks having slipped his memory, he 
 brought and laid them at his father s feet in all the confiding innocence of 
 unsuspecting youth. 
 
 "As I was saying, my son Ooch! Owch! Gewhilikens! Thun- 
 der nlightnin ! Hellfire nbrimstone ! What nthunder sthat ! " 
 
 "Did you step on a pin, sir?" 
 
 " c Step on a pin ! I ll pin you, you young rapscallion of thundera- 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 153 
 
 tion, you ! Come out here in the wood-shed, and I ll show you what I 
 stepped on." 
 
 Then Johnny s father took him out in the wood-shed and talked to 
 him, and the boy in the next house took his fingers out of the jar of jam 
 in the pantry, and remarked, " Jersey District and the Black Hills, aint he 
 a-catchin it, though ? " And Johnny remarked that he " wouldn t never 
 do it no more." 
 
 Moral The fact of a boy s name being on the roll of honor is not a 
 sure sign that he is truly good. 
 
 A Toothache Cure. 
 
 Night before last, a prominent citizen was awakened from his peace 
 ful slumbers by the pain of a raging tooth, and his sympathizing wife told 
 him to go into the pantry and get some cloves, and put three or four of 
 the spices in the hollow of the tooth. He tried to find the cloves in the 
 dark, but the attempt was attended with unfortunate consequences. He 
 knocked over a pan of dough which had been placed on a chair in the 
 kitchen, and after he got his feet out of the sticky mass and was proceed 
 ing to the pantry, he suddenly sat down in a bucket of slops. He is a 
 good-tempered man, but this circumstance ruffled him and wet the nether 
 portion of his night garment. But he was determined to have those cloves. 
 He got to the pantry, and, following his wife s directions, reached for the 
 little crock in the right-hand corner of the third shelf. He was not dis 
 couraged because he pulled down a pitcher of yeast and a keg of brine. 
 It is true, these liquids wet his hair and ran down his spinal column ; but 
 he didn t mind that he had the crock. Then he reached down into it 
 for those cloves, and his hand went into something soft ; he didn t know 
 whether it was preserves, or mustard, or tar, or jelly, or mud, but it was 
 something very sticky and soft ; and he called in a voice of suppressed emo 
 tion for his wife to bring a light. He called pretty loud, as he thought 
 his wife was asleep ; but she answered the call promptly, and when she 
 reached him with the lamp, her remarks were to the effect that he was a 
 nice-looking object. She had not complimented him in many years of their 
 married life, and her words touched him. " Yes," he said sadly, " I m in 
 a hellofafix." 
 
 After getting some of the jelly out of his hair, and the dough scraped 
 off his legs, and the brine washed out of his eyes, she said she guessed she d 
 just look for those cloves herself "a man couldn t be trusted to do any 
 thing" There was riot a clove in the house, and when she went back into 
 the bedroom to tell him he had better go to a dentist and have that grinder 
 
154 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 snaked out, he said the bitter experience of that night had cured his tooth 
 ache. 
 
 There is no cure for pain equal to diverting the thoughts with pleas 
 ant experiences. 
 
 No Quarter. 
 
 A man who looked as dilapidated as the last rose of last summer 
 went into a Main Street saloon this forenoon, and, with confidence in 
 human nature and himself depicted in his every movement, strutted to the 
 bar and told the gentlemanly dispenser of stimulants to trot out some of 
 his best whisky. The bar-keeper obeyed the order with alacrity. Million 
 aires in rags are sometimes to be found in a mining country, and the man 
 of bottles and glasses had learned by experience never to despise a man 
 because he wears a ragged coat. The stranger poured out and swallowed 
 a glass of that best whisky. Then he went down into his pocket for a 
 quarter, as the barkeeper and the bystanders supposed. But he didn t 
 bring up anything but a piece of a pocket-handkerchief that looked as if it had 
 spent seven years in the coal-bins at one of the Eureka smelting furnaces. 
 Wiping his mouth and eyes with the rag, he drew a deep sigh, and said 
 to the mixer of drinks : 
 
 "Have you heard about this terrible war in Europe?" 
 
 " Oh, that s too thin," replied the barkeeper, " hand out a quarter for 
 that whisky, you old fraud." 
 
 " Patience, patience, my friend," he said, " can you tell me why I am 
 like the barbarian Turk when he gets a Russian soldier in his power ? " 
 
 " No, I can t," snapped the exasperated purveyor of liquors. 
 
 u Well, I ll tell you. It s because I show no quarter." 
 
 The barkeeper reached under the counter for his trusty six-shooter ; 
 but ere he could bring it to bear, the man who showed no quarter had 
 vanished like the baseless fabric of a vision. 
 
 The War and Poker. 
 
 The hands were running small, and interest in the game was flagging, 
 and a discussion on the Russo-Turkish war relieved the tedium of " ace- 
 high " and single pairs, varied as occasion required by the utterance by 
 the players of the technical terms of the game. It was Smith s deal, and 
 as he dealt the cards from the pack he remarked that it was wonderful 
 how the Turks had held their own at Plevna. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TO WAT. 155 
 
 "Yes," said Brown, who was "next the dealer," "them Turks is fight 
 ers from the ground up ; I Chipka." 
 
 "And I pass," observed Jones, who was next in say. 
 
 " Speaking of Chipka Pass," observed Tompkins, who was last in say, 
 " it did seem at first as if the Russians was goin to warm the Turks thai* ; 
 but you see the Turks was on their own dunghill, and that give em a big 
 advantage. I have my redoubts about this hand, but will call you, and 
 raise you five." 
 
 " I Pasha out," said Smith, as he threw his cards on the table. 
 
 The discussion was now narrowed down to Brown and Tompkins. 
 Then the dealer asked Brown how many he would take, and he said be- 
 Kars it was Tompkins, he wouldn t be mean, and would take one ; and 
 when he was helped, Tompkins asked the dealer to reinforce his hand 
 with four cards. Then Brown called up his reserves, and moved on the 
 pot with five beans, and Tompkins remarked that he would raise the siege 
 twenty. 
 
 "Aint you Russian it?" asked Tompkins, as he put up the twenty, 
 and raised Brown the size of his pile. Brown rallied, and met the charge, 
 and then they showed down their hands ; and Tompkins had two pair of 
 deuces, and Brown likewise had two pair, aces at the head, and when 
 Tompkins took the pot prisoner Brown said he would have to go into 
 winter quarters, cause he was " froze out." 
 
 Misplaced Confidence. 
 
 " Suppose," he said to the bar-keeper, " suppose you had four hundred 
 and twelve dollars twelve and a half cents, and, holding the position you 
 do, drawing a stated salary and having free access to the money-drawer, 
 you would have just the amount of idle capital represented by them fig- 
 gers, wouldn t you ? Now when a man has idle capital what does he do 
 with it ? Why, he invests it where it will earn something for itself, don t 
 he ? Now, in casting about for some place to put it where it will do the 
 most good, he naturally lights on a savings bank, as being something com 
 bining safety with profit, and he walks up to the cashier, planks down his 
 soap and says, Give me a bank-book ! And he walks out, feeling that his 
 idle capital is in a safe place and no longer idle, but producing something. 
 Now this is what you would do with that supposable four hundred and 
 twelve dollars and a half but being a bar-keeper you might invest it in a 
 diamond pin, but we re supposing you don t want your capital to remain 
 idle and the next morning you wake up and come down town and pick 
 up the newspaper, and the first thing that strikes your eye is that your 
 savings bank s "busted, and the President s gone on a pleasure trip to the 
 
156 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 Sandwich Islands, and you re a ruined community. Now, the natural re 
 sult of all this is that you re a victim of misplaced confidence, aint it ! " 
 
 While the harangue detailed above was being delivered, the bar 
 keeper stood pensively turning a towel around the inside of a glass, and 
 answered never a word until the last question was put ; when he set down 
 the glass on the bar, gave it a twirl with his fingers, and, looking the cus 
 tomer straight in the eye, said : 
 
 "My friend, you needn t unreel any more of that rope; I might as 
 well tell you right here that if you expect to spar me out of a drink on 
 that kind of lip, you re the worst victim of misplaced confidence between 
 here and the north pole." 
 
 " I might a knowed it ; sweetness wasted on the desert air," was all 
 the impecunious one said, as he turned sadly away and started out to " try 
 the next house." 
 
 The Biggest Man in the State. 
 
 At a store in town, yesterday, a large lot of goods, consisting princi 
 pally of heavy groceries, was being delivered on the sidewalk from a 
 freight wagon, when a strapping young fellow, about six feet in height 
 and muscled in proportion, came along and asked if they wanted help. 
 The clerk, who was superintending the unloading, is rather a light-waisted 
 looking individual delicate looking, in fact but has had considerable ex 
 perience in handling groceries, and has got a knack of chucking around 
 sacks of flour and barrels of sugar with a perfect looseness. 
 
 " Are you pretty stout ? " said he to the applicant for work. 
 
 " Stout! I m the biggest man in the State why jest look at me ! " 
 
 " Yes, you look pretty stout," replied the clerk, " but you ll have to 
 work with me. 1 
 
 " Work with you ! " said the biggest man, and he curled his upper 
 lip, and cast a glance of withering scorn at the slim proportions of the 
 clerk, "work with you! Jest peel yourself and start in, till you see how 
 quick I ll wear you out." 
 
 They went to work, and the way that clerk slung bags and boxes up 
 to the eighth and ninth tiers, and kept the store truck on a keen jump, was 
 a sight for sore eyes. The biggest man in the State weakened early in the 
 action, and, with the perspiration pouring in streams from his brow, sat 
 down on a ham and watched the clerk as he tossed things right and left. 
 
 "What s the matter?" said the clerk, "I hope you ain t tired al 
 ready; I m only a delicate, sickly sort of a cuss, and Z ain t tired yet." 
 
 " Sick be damn d ! " retorted the biggest man, " you re nuthin more 
 nor less than a donkey engine. I can hold my own agi n muscle ; but I ll 
 be dog-goned if I can stand off steam." 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TO WN. 157 
 
 " Young man," said the clerk, in solemn tones, " remember that the 
 race is not always to the swift nor the battle to the strong ; and never 
 again go around blowing that you re the biggest man in the State." 
 
 A Cure for Hiccoughs. 
 
 A young gentleman who attends the Austin public school had been 
 told that a sudden shock or fright would cure the hiccoughs, and the other 
 evening, while he was studying his lesson for the morrow by drawing a 
 picture of the schoolmarmon his slate, his respected progenitor was seized 
 with a fit of hiccoughs. The old gentleman was tilted back in his chair, 
 with his feet resting on the top of the stove, and the young hopeful con 
 cluded to try the cure on him. Just as the old man was " rastling " with 
 a heart-breaking hie, the boy jumped up and yelled " Fire ! " The old 
 man was just getting out " cuh cuh ! " but he never got it out. He gave a 
 jump which tilted over the chair, and in endeavoring to regain his lost 
 equilibrium his feet flew up against a table, upsetting it and a student lamp 
 which stood on it, and his head landed in the ashes on the stove hearth. 
 The old lady, hearing the racket, came running in from the kitchen, and 
 tripped over the old man s prostrate form, knocking down a what-not with 
 a lot of glass and China ornaments. When that boy s father arose from the 
 wreck, and shook the ashes and splinters of glass out of his hair and 
 clothes, he was cured of the hiccoughs, but there was a look of sternness 
 in his eye ; the boy says he knows it was a " stern " look feelingly " stern,- 
 as he can testify. He says fright is a splendid cure for the " hiccups " ; 
 but that the " stern " look it occasions is three hundred thousand times 
 worse than the " hicccups." He can t play tag now, as he says his mother 
 has forbidden him, and he sits on the edge of the seat at school, and lies on 
 his front when in bed, and silently murmurs that the old man can hiccup 
 his consarned old head off before he will ever again try to cure him. 
 
 The Sausage. 
 
 Reader, did you ever stop to mentally analyze the constituents of 
 pork sausage ; or when that article has been set before you, crisp and 
 smoking from the frying-pan, have you trusted to luck and the theory that 
 " where ignorance is bliss, twere folly to be wise " ? Has it ever occurred 
 to you that just about the time pork sausage begins to ripen, somebody s 
 dos is missing? These are thoughts which should commend themselves 
 
158 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 to all, and questions which every head of a family should propound to 
 himself about this time ; for pork sausage is in season. We know of no 
 sure test to detect the presence of dog in sausage. One of the oldest 
 expedients is to whistle to the sausage, and if it tries to wag itself, there 
 is dog in it. But if the dog has been put into the sausage-cutter tail first, 
 the vitality of that member has been affected, and the test won t work. 
 Some persons rely on the presence of hair in the sausage as a means of 
 detection ; but this is merely circumstantial evidence, and therefore entitled 
 to but little weight. The most approved method of determining the exact 
 constituents is Taid down by Dr. Doggonimoff, chief surgeon of the Rus 
 sian army in Bulgaria, in the following formula : Set a frying-pan on a 
 hot fire and lay the sausage gently in it ; then prod each link suddenly 
 with a fork to see if it will emit any bark. Let them fry till done brown, 
 then dish up and cram them down your mother-in-law s throat, and if you 
 have any in excess of her carrying capacity take them to some deep 
 mining shaft and dump them in. If, when they strike the bottom, a yelp 
 is heard, as if somebody had trod on a dog s tail, then there is canine in 
 them, and the test has worked to a charm. 
 
 Why They Quit. 
 
 A certain gentleman of this city has long been paying attention to a 
 young lady, the daughter of a well-to-do rancher in one of the adjacent 
 valleys ; and his feelings were fully reciprocated by the lady, as .she has 
 frequently informed several of her. lady acquaintances that she felt " a lit 
 tle sweet on Jim." 
 
 The other day, Jim paid a visit to the ranch where his Dulcinea abid- 
 eth, in accordance with an invitation to " come over and stop a few days." 
 The roads were very muddy, and when our hero arrived at the ranch he 
 looked like the last remnants of a cloud-burst. The lady sympathized 
 with the woe-begone appearance of her admirer, feeling flattered that he 
 should endure all this for her sake, and exerted herself to her utmost to 
 make him comfortable, preparing an excellent supper, and giving up her 
 own apartment, so that he might rest comfortably after the fatigues of the 
 day. In the morning, before Jim was astir, the young lady requested the 
 hired man to go into the room and get Jim s boots, and scrape off the mud, 
 and make them look presentable against he should be ready to arise. The 
 hired man did as directed, and brought what he supposed to be the boots 
 into the kitchen, where the lady was preparing breakfast. Noticing a pe 
 culiar odor, the lady glanced at the man, when, horror! he was blacking 
 not Jim s boots, but his socks. She ordered the man to return the pedal en 
 velopes to the room, and sprinkled chloride of lime all over the house ; and 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 159 
 
 when Jim arose he commenced to intently examine the thermometer, and 
 wonder what had caused the weather to turn cold so suddenly. He ate 
 his breakfast without appetite, saddled his horse, and came to town ; and 
 now he says he don t go a cent on a girl whose warmth of affection is up 
 to ninety-eight degrees at night and falls to zero in the morning. 
 
 Two men were shoveling snow from the roof ; they were absorbed in 
 their work, and did not notice the people who passed over the sidewalk on 
 which they were throwing the snow. First came along a little girl ; she 
 tripped along gayly, humming to herself the words of that beautiful song, 
 " Oh, how I love my teacher." Just as she got to " Oh, how I love my 
 
 gracious ! " two shovelfuls of snow came kerchunk on her innocent head, 
 
 and she sputtered and spit, and thought there was a snow-slide. Then 
 there approached a lady fair. She was tied back and had overshoes on, 
 and was saying to herself : " Twenty yards for the dress; fourteen for the 
 overskirt ; six dozen buttons eight and eight s sixteen, and nine s thirty- 
 three no le s see Owch ! " A bushel or so of snow had been emptied 
 
 down her back, and she wriggled and squirmed as though an army of fleas 
 was making a forced march down her spine, and hurried home to change 
 her clothes. The next was a pillar of the church a God-fearing man, who 
 never allows his lips to utter guile. He got a shovelful of snow square in 
 the face, but he only rolled his eyes heavenward, and remarked something 
 about the place of future punishment, and uttered the name of his Saviour. 
 Three or four small boys were buried up by the snow which descended 
 from the roof by the shovelful, but that little matter is hardly worthy of 
 mention. They will probably be found when the big thaw comes. 
 
 She was fixed up in her prettiest, and had just started out to make 
 her calls, determined to let her lady friends know that other people could 
 wear new bonnets as well as themselves. The man who was going to wet 
 down the street with the hose turned on the water just as she passed his 
 store. For a moment she did not know whether it was a cloud-burst or 
 the second deluge; but when the man humbly said, "Excuse me, madam," 
 her emotion found vent in words. " Excuse you ! " she said. " Yes, I ll 
 excuse you when you go down in your clothes and bring up seventeen dol 
 lars for a new bonnet ; when you pay four dollars for this dress ; when 
 you yield up eleven dollars and a quarter for this polonaise ; when it ceases 
 raining down my spinal column; when you purchase me a box of bronchial 
 
160 TILE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 troches and a bottle of cherry pectoral and six patent mustard-plasters ; 
 when you recognize my claim to nine dollars damages for injury to my 
 best and holiest feelings, then I ll excuse you." The man told her to 
 make out a bill of items and he would settle it, if he had to sue her hus 
 band for his store bill to raise the money. 
 
 The price of fresh oysters in Austin is twelve and a half cents each. 
 They were out walking, and she remarked that she had observed in the 
 REVEILLE that there were fresh oysters in town. 
 
 " Do you read the papers carefully, my dear ? " he asked. 
 
 She said she read all the fashion news, and all the murders, and the 
 recipes for making cup custard and "floating-island," and the divorce 
 cases; but she would just like to know what all that had to do with oysters. 
 
 " Well, you see, my dear," said he, " there s a terrible contagion broke 
 out among the oysters, and the newspapers are advising people not to eat 
 them ; it appears that the bivalvular structure of the animal s diaphragm 
 has become affected by a species of parasitical conglomeration, which, re 
 acting on the vitality of the muscular forces of the alimentary canal, pro 
 duces a paralysis of the oyster s nervous and digestive functions to such 
 an extent as to render it unfit for human food." 
 
 She said he was the best husband in the world to be so careful of her 
 health, and she would go home and tackle the cold pork and cabbage left 
 from dinner, as she felt rather faint. He saw her home, and then went to 
 the restaurant and had two dozen raw and a bottle of ale ; and as he 
 planked the money on the counter in payment therefor, he remarked that 
 fresh oysters were a necessary luxury, but it was like swallowing silver 
 coin to eat them. 
 
 A respectable-looking old gentleman, just arrived from the Eastern 
 States, was around town to-day, trying to find a man named Smith. There 
 are several members of the Smith family in Austin, so the old gentleman 
 experienced some difficulty in finding the exact Smith he wanted, and we 
 are not positive that he has found him yet. Probably possessed of the 
 somewhat prevalent idea that boys know everything, the old gentleman 
 accosted one, and addressing him as "my son," asked him if he knew 
 anybody in this town by the name of Smith. 
 
 "Smith?" said the boy, "which Smith do you want? Le s see 
 there s Big Smith and Little Smith, Three-fingered Smith, Bottle-nose 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 161 
 
 Smith, Cockeye Smith, Six-toed Smith, San Joaquin Smith, Lying Smith, 
 Mushhead Smith, Jumping Smith, Cherokee Smith, One-legged Smith, 
 Fighting Smith, Red-headed Smith, Sugar-foot Smith, Bow-legged Smith, 
 Squaw Smith, Drunken Smith, El Dorado Smith, Hungry Smith, and I 
 don t know but maybe one or two more." 
 
 "My son," said the gentleman, "the Smith I am in search of pos 
 sesses to his name none of the heathenish prefixes you have mentioned. 
 His name is simply John Smith." 
 
 " All them fellows is named John," screeched the boy, as he drew his 
 six-shooter and ran to the other side of the street to get a good shot at a 
 passing Chinaman. 
 
 The old gentleman mused for a moment, and then walked into a 
 blacksmith shop and asked to see a city directory. 
 
 He was seedy and battered, and he looked " powerful " dry. He en 
 tered a Main Street saloon, and approaching the bar, said to the barkeeper : 
 
 " It s a good ticket, aint it ? " 
 
 "First rate," replied the bar-keeper. 
 
 " You betcher life, them s my men ; Hayes n Wheeler for me. Rah 
 for Hayes n Wheeler! Set out some o yer Publican whisky, barkeep! " 
 
 "My friend," replied the bar-keeper, "you re a little off; this is a 
 Democratic house." 
 
 " Thunder ! " exclaimed the soaker ; " the Dimmycrats aint got no 
 body to holler fur yit, and I m as dry as a powder-horn, and not a cent 
 twixt me and eternity." 
 
 " My friend," said the obliging barkeeper, " while differing with you 
 in politics, I cannot resist your appeal help yourself to some of this"; 
 and he set out a glass, and the bottle of lightning kept for the special use 
 of "stiffs." The "stiff" poured out a glassful of the stuff, and emptied 
 it into his throat; and when he got through coughing, and wiping his eyes 
 on his coat-sleeve, said : 
 
 " I aint got no money ; but if I was the Comstock ledge, I d bet my 
 self ag in a Lander Hill razor-blade that them, durned Black Republicans 
 don t git away with the ensooin election." 
 
 An old lady of this city, whose daughter reads a great many dime 
 novels, hearing some person conversing about the Centennial, said her 
 Maria ought to know all about it, for she " just keeps the whole family 
 biisted buying them Tencent-ial novels." 
 
162 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 By a sort of freemasonry existing between natives of Missouri, they 
 recognize each other as being from the same country " back thar." One 
 of them came across the plains in forty-nine ; and the other is a grasshop 
 per sufferer, and has just got through the blockade on the railroad ; but 
 they know the same Jim Joneses, and Sal Smiths, and Nate Thompsons, 
 and Si Perkinses, and Marier Tompkinses, and other Mary Annses, and 
 Bills, and Jacks, and Sols, and Hi s. It was nine o clock last night when 
 they sat down by the stove in one of the principal saloons, and at two 
 o clock this afternoon they were still telling how Jim Jones married Mary 
 Ann Perkins and had a whole raft of young uns, and how Jim "tu k to 
 drink," and stole horses, and died with snakes in his boots; and how 
 Squar Thompson he found a lead hill on his farm and sent his boys and 
 girls to " collidge " ; and Marier this ran away with Bill that, and divers 
 and sundry similar reminiscences. In vain the bar-keeper carried them 
 glasses of water ; in vain were pictures of coffins held up to their gaze 
 in vain spectators muttered that the worst death in the world is to be 
 talked to death. They are still at it, and it is expected that by to-mor 
 row morning the forty-niner will be found cold in death, with the grass 
 hopper sufferer, prostrate and dying, whispering in the ear of the corpse. 
 
 The talking match mentioned in Saturday s paper continued until 
 yesterday morning, when it was brought to an end by the merciful inter 
 position of outsiders. The forty-niner fainted twice during the night, 
 but was restored to consciousness by his head falling against the hot stove. 
 The grasshopper sufferer never showed the least sign of weakness, and 
 when the forty-niner was dragged off by force, the sufferer was muttering, 
 * An Si Wallace he got killed in the war, and Bill Pearce married the 
 
 widder, and the oldest gal she run away with " but two stout men seized 
 
 and held him, while several others bore the forty-niner from the scene. 
 
 A prominent citizen, as he calmly watched his hat wafted toward 
 Emigrant Canon by the zephyrs, this afternoon, remarked : 
 
 " Thar goes my wife s new bunnit ! * 
 
 " Why, that ain t a bonnet," remarked a bystander. 
 
 "The blazes it airit!" replied the citizen, "d ye s pose I m a Ross- 
 child and can buy my wife a bunnit and myself a hat both in the same 
 month, and it two weeks to pay-day, yit ? " 
 
 It is evident that some woman in town won t get any new bonnet till 
 pay-day. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 163 
 
 It is a well-known fact that caterpillars are numerous so numerous, in 
 fact, that they are everywhere. They invade houses, crawl into the frying- 
 pan and teakettle, play tag on the piano-cover, have games of hide and seek 
 in gentlemen s pants, and run races on ladies striped stockings, taking a 
 stripe for a race-course. Last evening he called on her. They sat on the 
 porch and drank in the beauties of the gorgeous sunset. Their souls were 
 in the far away, and she was saying how she wished to be transformed 
 into a butterfly, to fly through ethereal space and bathe her wings in the 
 golden-tinged moisture of yonder cloud. They might have sat thus in the 
 gloaming, engaged in sweet converse, until the shadows of night darkened 
 the earth, and none can tell how much romantic thought she would have 
 spoken, had not their conversation been brought to an abrupt termination 
 by her feeling something crawling up her leg. She made a wild grab at the 
 costly merchandise which concealed her beauteous limbs ; and then, in 
 tones of agony, exclaimed : " It s smashed ! " It was only a caterpillar, 
 but she had to go in the house and wash her hands and put on a clean pair 
 of stockings ; and the young man went home, more in sorrow than in 
 anger, and wondered why a girl should think a butterfly such a beautiful 
 object, and yet get sick and scared at the flattened body of a butterfly 
 without wings. 
 
 The publisher of the National Protestant, a religious paper published 
 in New York, has heard of the editor of the REVEILLE. He knows we are 
 a Christian, and ever ready to lend a helping hand to the cause of religion. 
 If he were not aware of this, he would not have made the very modest 
 request embodied in a postal-card which we received from him this morn 
 ing. He requests us to subscribe to his paper, canvass the town and rustle 
 up other subscribers, and furnish his paper with contributions from our 
 " able pen." The remuneration which we are to receive for these services 
 is the reward of an approving conscience. We should like to oblige the 
 publisher of the Protestant, but we are engaged in other work at present ; 
 we are bending our energies to the propagation of the Gospel among the 
 Shoshones, and are endeavoring to organize a tract society, and are devot 
 ing our fortune to the purchase of grub and clothes, so that we have 
 neither time nor money to spare for the National Protestant. 
 
 To show the power of mind over matter no stronger argument is 
 needed than that which we heard advanced by a boy this morning. Said 
 he to another boy: "You needn t be puttin on no airs if yer is got 
 a boughten sled ; I m in the third reader and you can t spell cat without 
 spellin of it with a <k. " 
 
164 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 The " Colonel " was warming his coat-tails by the stove at the Saz- 
 erac. His nose bore evidence of successful culture, and glowed with that 
 rich ruby hue which only a steady and prolonged worship at the shrine of 
 Bacchus can produce. There was a " dry " look about the corners of his 
 mouth, which was readily noticed by the sympathizing bar-keeper, who 
 good-naturedly asked the Colonel if he would not take a little stimulant. 
 
 " Certainly, certainly, sir," he replied promptly, as he briskly stepped 
 up to the bar. Pouring out a tumbler level full of the fluid, he tossed it 
 off, and as soon as he could regain his breath, assumed a deprecatory tone 
 and thus addressed the bar-keeper : 
 
 " This, sir, is my sixty-fourth drink to-day. I must put on the brakes, 
 or the first thing I know I shall degenerate into excess. Moderation, sir, 
 moderation, the grand secret of health, has been the rule of my life. If 
 I had but one more drink at this moment, Richard would be himself again." 
 
 The subsequent remarks of the bar-keeper indicated that, for all he 
 cared, Richard might remain impersonal till the day of judgment. 
 
 His complexion denoted him a full-blooded member of the race that 
 inhabit that section of God s footstool " where Af ric s sunny fountains roll 
 down their golden sands," and the rest of his tout ensemble was that of an 
 overloaded pack-mule. On his back a bundle of blankets, surmounted by 
 two pairs of boots ; slung in front of him, a huge bundle ; on one side a 
 carpet-sack and a frying-pan ; on the other a valise and a coffee-pot ; in his 
 right hand a stick, and in his left a basket. Halting in front of the court 
 house, he hailed a man sitting on the stoop of that building, and said : 
 " Say, boss, which am de best hotel in dis hyar town ? " The person ad 
 dressed told him that the International was reputed to be the best house 
 of entertainment in Austin. With a grin that opened a cavern in his face, 
 and made it look as if his head was splitting in two in the middle, the over 
 laden man and brother resumed his line of march, saying, as he stepped 
 forward : " Yer see, boss, I aint bliged ter pend on dese hyar hotels ; if 
 der commodations don t suit dis hyar chile, I travels so s I can organize 
 myself inter a fust-class hotel at a moment s notice, wid an elevator, hot 
 and cold water in every room, barber shop in de basement, and all de 
 modern improvements." 
 
 A diminutive chap, about four years of age, walked into Sower s 
 store, this morning, and inquired for a sled. A bystander asked him what 
 he wanted with a sled, telling him there would be no snow this winter. 
 
 "How do you know?" asked the youngster, "you aint God." 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 165 
 
 " What s the news up your way ? " asked a down-town woman of an 
 Upper Austin woman in a Main Street store to-day. 
 
 " Oh, not a thing in the world," replied the one questioned ; "you see, 
 we re awful quiet, peaceable people up our way, and of course I stay to 
 home so much I don t know what s going on, anyhow, cause I have so 
 much to do to tend to my children, and the sewing, and washing, and 
 cooking ; but they do say that Mrs. Bustem has got a brand-new silk dress, 
 and nobody knows how she got it, and her husband only a common chlo- 
 rider, and hasn t had a crushing in four months, and his last rock didn t 
 pay for milling ; and that Mrs. Gabble and Mrs. Tattle has had the worst 
 kind of a fight, and when Mrs. Tattle made a grab at Mrs. Gabble s hair it 
 was false, and all came out, and two-thirds of it was jute; and Mr. Squeezem 
 chucked his wife out of doors cause she lammed the servant girl for letting 
 him kiss her in the wood- shed ; and that Mr. Sinchem drew a six-sbooter 
 on Mr. Bilkem for saying his wife said that his wife couldn t have no new 
 bonnet this fall, cause her husband was poorer than Job s turkey, and 
 couldn t pay ninety cents on the dollar if his creditors was to come down 
 on him to-morrow and sell him out at forced sale. Oh, I tell you, we re 
 awful peaceable people up our way ; only it s tedious living in a neighbor 
 hood where there aint nothing going on." 
 
 In the REVEILLE reporter s wanderings about town last night, he 
 heard a lady talking across the street to a neighbor, thus deliver herself 
 on the subject of scandal : 
 
 " Of all the things I do hate in this world, it s a scandalizing woman. 
 Now there s Mrs. Jingletongue, that everybody knows isn t a bit better 
 than she ought to be, and whose two daughters cut up so shameful that 
 no decent woman ought to speak to them, and whose husband gets drunk, 
 and they do say he owes for the grenadine she puts on so many airs in 
 over her betters. If I was to say mean things about people like she does, 
 I would pull my tongue out by the roots, the nasty, scandalizing, stuck-up 
 old cat." 
 
 A miner working in one of the mines of Lander Hill bought a new 
 bedstead, the other day. His wife set it up in the bedroom, and the 
 miner and the partner of his joys and sorrows occupied it last night for 
 the first time. During the night he dreamed he was working in a drift, 
 when suddenly he heard a timber snap. Looking up, he saw that the mine 
 was caving in, and almost certain death staring him in the face. His only 
 hope was to reach the shaft. Fear lent speed to his footsteps, and he 
 
166 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 reached the shaft in safety. Horror ! the cage was not there ! Behind 
 him he heard the snapping of timbers and the rumble of great masses of 
 falling earth and rocks, every second approaching nearer. If he could but 
 ring down the cage he was safe, and grasping the bell-wire he gave a des 
 perate pull. There was a piercing scream, a snapping and crashing and 
 rumbling, and he felt himself going down, down till he stopped. The 
 slats of the new bedstead had broken. 
 
 " Am I dead ? " asked the miner, hardly awake and conscious. 
 
 " I wish you were," said his wife, " you ve pulled out every bit of 
 hair I had in the world, and I ll have to go through life bald-headed ; for 
 false hair is going out of fashion, and besides it s almost impossible to get 
 a shade to match." 
 
 A prospector passed up Main Street this forenoon, and halted his out 
 fit at the watering-trough in front of the REVEILLE office. Said outfit con 
 sisted of a little two-wheeled cart the body of the cart being composed 
 of rough pine boards and a pony about as big as an ordinary sized jack- 
 rabbit. At the end of the cart hung a blackened tin coffee-pot and a bat 
 tered tin pail, and piled in the box were blankets, picks, shovels, and grub, 
 the whole affair betokening that it was a prospector s. Approaching the 
 owner of the horse and cart, we asked : 
 
 "Whither bound?" 
 
 "Don t know," he replied, sententiously. 
 
 " Where are you from ? " 
 
 "Over yonder," he replied, pointing his finger toward the direction 
 of Washoe County. 
 
 "Prospecting?" we asked. 
 
 " Spect so," he replied. Then glancing up at the sign in front of the 
 REVEILLE office, he remarked : 
 
 "I d just like to see the shape of one of you newspaper fellers that 
 could pump my true-inwardness dry." 
 
 We gave him up. 
 
 Some little girls were playing tag on Court Street last evening, when 
 one of them, who had been "tagged" seven times in succession, got tired, 
 and proposed to change and play house. 
 
 "What kind of house will we play?" asked another. 
 
 " Oh, play calling," replied the first speaker. " Mary, here, she can 
 be Mrs. Brown, and set on the step, and me and Julia will call on her, and 
 ask her how she is, and how her husband is, and if baby s got over the mea- 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 167 
 
 sles, and tell her how nice she looks in her new wrapper, and hope it won t 
 hurt her much when she has that tooth filled. And then we ll say, Good 
 bye, Mrs. Brown ; come and see us some time or other, and bring the chil 
 dren and your sewing; and you re such a stranger, we don t see half 
 enough of you. And then me and Julia, we ll c urtsey, and walk off a 
 piece, and I ll say to Julia, Did you ever see such a horrid old fright as 
 she looks in that wrapper ? and then Julia, she ll say, l The idear of any 
 body having false teeth filled ! and then I ll say, Yes, and what a homely 
 lot of dirty little children them young ones of her n is. Let s play it ; 
 what do you say ? " 
 
 There was unanimous consent, and the play went on. 
 
 A man sat for an hour and a half in a Main Street saloon this morn 
 ing, without saying a word to anybody, and then he arose, faced the bar 
 keeper, spread his arms, struck an attitude, and said : 
 
 " Peace, white-robed Peace, again spreads her wings over distracted 
 Eu " 
 
 But the bar-keeper interrupted him, and said : 
 
 " P. U. or S. U. ! You got a drink on the Silver Bill day before yes 
 terday, played the Chinese question on me yesterday, want to ring in 
 Peace in Europe to-day, and the chances are that to-morrow you ll be try 
 ing me on a disquisition on the non-existence of a material Hell. But it 
 won t do ; I won t have it. More coin and less hyperbole is my motto 
 from this on." 
 
 And then the man went into a corner and ruminated, and after a 
 while he stealthily approached the bar-keeper, and whispered in his ear : 
 
 "P. U. or S. U. means put up or shut up, don t it ? " 
 
 " You couldn t have hit it nearer if you had guessed for a thousand 
 years," said the barkeeper. 
 
 And then the man said this was a cruel and unfeeling world, where 
 one s best and holiest feelings were trifled with to an extent that rendered 
 life hardly worth the living. 
 
 We are in receipt from a friend in Virginia of a novel French con 
 trivance, called the " Centennial Telegraph." It consists of two tin tubes, 
 with one end covered with parchment, to which is secured a string con 
 necting the two tubes. It is operated by one person placing the open end 
 of one of the tubes close against his or her ear, and the party at the 
 other end of the string places the open end of the other tube to his or her 
 
168 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 mouth, and whispers such words as are desired to be communicated to the 
 party at the other end of the line. While the persons operating can dis 
 tinctly hear and understand all that passes over the line, nobody else can 
 hear a word that is said. The string which forms the telegraph line is 
 about fifty feet in length, but can be shortened at will. This is a very 
 useful invention, and supplies a want long felt by hen conventions and 
 ladies sewing circles. By its means two ladies can sit in opposite corners 
 of a room which is filled with company, and exchange their sentiments 
 about the other women present, without those who are being talked about 
 having the least idea of what is going on. It is a great improvement on 
 whispering, which is often in danger of being overheard. It will also be 
 found useful as a means of communication between husbands and servant 
 girls. 
 
 We were sitting where we could watch all his movements. He came 
 up the street with an unsteady gait, his legs now and again acting contrary, 
 one foot trying hard to cross the path of the other. At last he reached a 
 railing that stood by an open cellar-way, and here was a haven of rest for 
 his weary and Fourth-of-July-racked soul. He grasped the railing to 
 steady himself ; then gradually his head sunk down on the rail, and there 
 was a bending of the knee-joints. Slowly, carefully, he slid down the cel 
 lar stairs ; the bottom step was reached ; one long drawn sigh, ending in a 
 deep bass snore, and, away from the gaze of men and the City Marshal, 
 the tired soul was at rest a rest so perfect that all the firecrackers on earth 
 could not have recalled him to the scenes of unrest of the day after the 
 Fourth. He was there this morning, lying on his back, with the bright 
 sun shining on his upturned face, and several blue-bottle flies sipping the 
 sweetness from his parted lips. Reader, that man was once a little boy, 
 and went fishing on Sunday, and robbed orchards and birds nests, just 
 like many and many another innocent boy; and had it not been for the 
 demon of whisky, he might have grown up to be a member of the Legis 
 lature. 
 
 A tall, gaunt-looking individual, who at first and last glance would be 
 taken to belong to the noble brotherhood of bull-punchers, walked up to 
 the bar in a Main Street saloon, this forenoon, and laying down a smooth 
 quarter, called for whisky. The bar-keeper set out the bottle, and the 
 customer, crossing his legs, placing the forefinger of his left hand firmly 
 on his coin, and grasping the neck of the*bottle with his right hand, asked : 
 
 "Is this here stuff strained?" 
 
 "Strained!" said the bar-keeper, with an astonished look, "strained 
 of what?" 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 169 
 
 "Look a here, mister," returned the ox-manager, "I ve got an ajid 
 mother back in Missoury ; I cum out here to make a stake for the old gal, 
 and I haint got it yit. Besides, I was brought up relijus, and my old 
 marm told me never to die till I was perpared to face the music. I aint 
 perpared to die ; and what I want to know is, if the snakes is strained out 
 of them air whisky." 
 
 The bar-keeper assured him that the snakes were strained out, and he 
 poured the glass level full and threw down the liquid as if it was mother s 
 milk. 
 
 Now that the ground is covered with snow, the boy and his sled are 
 as inseparable as a young lady and her newest beau. If the baby swal 
 lows concentrated lye, or runs a clothes-pin up its nose, and Johnny s 
 mother says, " Run, quick, Johnny, and bring the doctor before that 
 clothes-pin gets into the baby s brain," he has to drag his sled out of the 
 woodshed and slide on it to the doctor s office ; and if he should get spilled 
 over a bank and delayed, the baby is liable to die before the doctor can 
 reach it. If there is company at dinner, and it is suddenly discovered 
 that " there aint a bit of butter in the house," and Tommy is dispatched 
 to the store to get some, with an injunction to " hurry up," he must, of 
 course, haul it home on his sled ; and if he happens to meet another boy 
 he is sure to have a race, in the excitement pf which he forgets all about 
 the butter, and either comes home with it distributed on the seat of his 
 pants, or it has slid off the sled into the snow. Of course, Johnny or Tom 
 my gets licked for these little misfortunes ; but the licking diminishes not 
 his love for his sled, which is part of himself so long as the snow stays on 
 the ground. 
 
 Music, besides having power to soothe the savage breast, has the qual 
 ity to make a sleepy man get up and howl, and wish he was deaf. For in 
 stance : Last night the air was just running over with music. Piano, vio 
 lin, French horn, guitar, Chinese fiddle, flute, Chinese bagpipes, accordeon, 
 violoncello, hand-organ, toot-horn, musical box, bass-drum, and harmonica, 
 and vocal renditions of "Pull down the Blind," "Hear me, Norma," "The 
 Piute Death-Song," [by the Medicine Man] "Lannigan s Ball," the "Slave s 
 Lament," "I wish she was my Mother-in-Law," operatic selections, and 
 " Old Dog Tray," all being banged, and scraped, and pounded, and ground, 
 and tooted, and howled simultaneously, and shedding harmony on the air 
 thicker than the buzzing of flies round a fat infant. The acoustic proper 
 ties of the canon in which this town is built are such that sound is carried 
 to a great distance very distinctly ; and a man lying in his bunk in his 
 
170 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 cabin on the summit of Lander Hill could take in every note of the grand 
 musical combination in question. Too much music hath charms to make 
 a man savage. 
 
 He caught pedro a good many times during the night, and was a " little 
 off " when he got home ; but he felt good he felt poetical. As he entered 
 the bed-room some familiar lines came into his head, and on the impulse 
 he commenced to recite. Said he : 
 
 " Oh for a lodge in some vast wilderness, some boundless contiguity 
 of " 
 
 At this point he was interrupted by his wife, who remarked : 
 
 " I should think you belong to lodges enough ; here you are a Mason, 
 and an Odd Fellow, and a Knight of Pythias, and a Red Man, and an 
 Ancient Hibernian, and a Pioneer, and an Irish-American, and a Fireman, 
 and if you join any more lodges there won t be nights enough in the week 
 to go around. And riding them goats, and climbing them greased poles, 
 and sleeping in them coffins unsettles your nerves, and you come home ex 
 cited every blessed night." 
 
 He thought he was getting off pretty easy, and promised her he would 
 not join any more lodges. 
 
 County Assessor Spires discovered a mouse in his office in the court 
 house, yesterday. Instead of getting up on top of his high desk-stool and 
 gathering his skirts about his ankles and screaming, he took down the 
 assessment-roll and let it drop on the mouse. As this was only a one- 
 hundred-and-f orty-two quire book, it merely stunned the animal ; and as it 
 lay on the floor unconscious, he pounded it on the head with the bullion- 
 tax book and Vol. 1 of the Compiled Laws. Then he went out and got a 
 broom and shovel to remove the corpse, and just got back to the office in 
 time to see the mouse s tail disappearing in a hole in the base-board. The 
 remarks addressed to the retreating mouse can be found in almost any 
 orthodox prayer-book, but not connected in the exact sequence in which 
 Spires framed the words. 
 
 A gentleman having charge of a mine in this vicinity recently invited 
 a friend to visit and inspect the mine. They descended the shaft and 
 passed through various workings, the superintendent explaining matters 
 as they went along, till they came to the bonanza of the mine. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TO WN. 171 
 
 " Here, you see," said the superintendent, " is where we first struck 
 it. We run that cross-cut from yonder drift through solid granite, with 
 out a streak of quartz, as you saw ; then we encountered a small seam of 
 vein-matter, and sunk that little winze ; here we are ; now look ; here s the 
 foot-wall ; there s the hanging-wall, and here we have our ore. The streak s 
 kind of narrow right here, but we ll go up this chute in a minute, and 
 
 He thought his friend was listening very intently, and was surprised 
 that a stranger to mining matters should take such a deep interest ; for 
 during the entire explanation the friend had not said a word. Turning 
 around, he saw that his friend was not with him ; and retracing his steps 
 to look for him, he found him stretched out on the bottom of a drift, fast 
 asleep, and snoring the tune of Old Hundred, as if he were practicing for 
 the bass in the opening chorus at the Centennial. 
 
 There is no doubt that the Germans, as a class, are a very enterpris 
 ing people. In most cases they come to this country poor, and by dint of 
 hard work, perseverance, and economy, establish themselves in business, 
 which with good management gradually expands, till in the course of a 
 few years they are wealthy and influential citizens. As their wealth in 
 creases, they engage in new and more extensive enterprises, always using 
 their capital to advantage, and making every dollar of it count. We 
 are reminded of this by the fact that a German gentleman of this city, 
 who was born in the region of the historical Black Forest, and who came 
 to Austin poor, and by industry and economy has accumulated as much as 
 three hundred dollars, is about to return to the land of his birth, with the 
 intention of purchasing the Black Forest and opening a lager-beer garden 
 therein. We do not care to mention names in this connection, as it is ad 
 visable that Bismarck and Bill Three should not be made aware of the 
 gentleman s intention till the purchase is completed. 
 
 Before they were married he used to tell her that she was the sunshine 
 of his life, the one bright star of his existence. The scene shifts. They 
 are married. The sunshine of his life and the bright star of his existence 
 leaves a pail of water standing in the middle of the kitchen floor. Tableau : 
 All is dark in the kitchen ; he moves cautiously, to avoid contact with the 
 stove; a wild crash, as of a bursting torrent; he staggers to his feet, rubs 
 his shin, groans, and utters some Scripture quotations. A flash of light 
 breaks upon the scene ; she comes, clad in robes of white, and bearing a 
 candle. She speaks : 
 
172 THE S A ZEE AC LYING CLUB. 
 
 " You ornery old fool, you ll catch your death of cold standing there, 
 as wet as a dish-rag." 
 
 The sunshine of his life has gone out, the bright star of his existence 
 has faded, and he mournfully asks : 
 
 " Was there ever a woman that had as much sense as a yaller dog ? " 
 
 Curtain falls, while he puts on dry clothes and anoints his shins. 
 
 A little boy who lives in this city spent a few weeks on a ranch last 
 summer, where he witnessed the branding of a number of cattle. The 
 operation seems to have greatly impressed him, and he has been continually 
 talking about it ever since his return from the ranch. A few days since 
 his mother smelt something. The odor seemed to come from the kitchen, 
 and on entering that department of the domestic economy, she beheld her 
 beloved son engaged in the operation of branding the family cat with the 
 kitchen poker. He had the cat securely tied, and with the red-hot poker 
 was endeavoring to trace his full name on its body. Had he not been in 
 terrupted but been allowed to carry out his original design, the name 
 would have gone clear around the cat, longitudinally, and its hide would 
 have been pretty much all brand. The lady released the cat from the 
 torture, and took her hopeful son into a bed-room to talk to him about 
 the wickedness of cruelty to dumb animals ; and when she got through 
 with him he thought lie had been branded, and wondered whether the cat 
 wished it had a soft pillow on its chair, like he did. 
 
 A prominent citizen of Austin, who is suffering with a severe cold, 
 was advised to put a mustard plaster on his breast. He was not much 
 posted on mustard plasters, but he knows a good deal more about the prop 
 erties of mustard now than he used to. He bought a bottle of mustard, 
 mixed the contents with water, spread the mixture on a pocket-handker 
 chief, got into bed, and laid the plaster on his breast. In a few moments 
 he fell asleep and slept soundly for a couple of hours, when his slumbers 
 were disturbed with horrid dreams of fires and coal-oil . explosions. He 
 dreamed that while kindling a fire with coal-oil, the can exploded and set 
 fire to his breast, and in the midst of his agony he woke up to find that it 
 wasn t only a dream there was considerable reality about it. He made 
 a wild grab at the plaster, and flung it across the room ; and yesterday he 
 was going around with his spine arched up like a Reese River cow s in a 
 snow-storm, so as to keep his undershirt from rubbing against his breast, 
 and ever and anon he was heard to mutter, " Behold, how great a matter 
 a little fire kindleth." 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 173 
 
 There can be no doubt that the exhortations of Moody and Sankey 
 are extremely powerful, and that the means used by them for the conver 
 sion of sinners are effectual; for they have actually converted a bull- 
 whacker. The convert is a man who drove an ox-team in this section for 
 many years, who has just returned from a visit to his friends in the East, 
 having left this place last fall for that purpose. We met him on the street 
 this morning, and among other sights which he related having seen, he 
 mentioned Moody and Sankey. 
 
 "Did they convert you?" we asked, jokingly, not for a moment sup 
 posing that a bullwhacker could be converted. 
 
 " You bet your life they did," he replied. " When first I went to hear 
 them I went for the fun of the thing, but when I heard the preaching and 
 singing it made an impression on me ; I began to consider that I had a 
 soul to save ; I went every day to hear them, and before three days had 
 passed, I wish I may be damn d eternally if they hadn t made a Christian 
 of me." 
 
 A seedy customer entered a restaurant this morning, and ordered 
 "the best in the house"; and after finishing a hearty meal, told the pro 
 prietor of the establishment to " charge it." The indignant proprietor said 
 never a word, but his actions talked louder than any words could speak ; 
 one lunge of his strong right foot, and the customer landed on the side 
 walk. Turning around, and facing the hash-dealer, he said : 
 
 " My friend, Seligman used to go to school with my brother; and when 
 your action in excluding me from your house is made public, it will raise a 
 storm of indignation that will convulse this broad land, and threaten a so 
 cial revolution." 
 
 He commenced quickening his steps, when the proprietor called out : 
 
 "Jim, fetch that stomach-pump here, quick." 
 
 And in the twinkling of an eye his form had vanished into the dim 
 distance. 
 
 A prominent citizen, desiring to beautify the yard in front of his- 
 residence, procured some slips from some trees on the premises of a friend,, 
 and planted them. The directions given were to attach each slip to a 
 potato and plant it in rich soil. These directions were followed, but the- 
 result was, that the slips died and the potatoes flourished like a green bay 
 tree. The potato vines are now in blossom^in the midst of a luxurious 
 growth of alfalfa, and are much admired by visitors to the gentleman s 
 residence, few of whom suspect their real character. When ladies ask, 
 " What kind of plants are these ? " the answer is, " Solanum tuberosum? 
 which is botany for potato ; and the fair inquirers elevate their eyebrows 
 
174 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 and say, " How beautiful ! Never saw anything like it before ; must be of 
 tropical origin." And then the host says, " Certainly; it is very generally 
 cultivated in Ireland and other tropical countries." 
 
 In addition to the ordinary games played by boys in other places, the 
 boys of this city have a game created by their surroundings, and therefore 
 peculiar to this and other communities where the conditions are similar. 
 When marbles are out of season, when it is no longer top-time, when kites 
 have lost their charm, when there is no snow for sledding, and the weather 
 is too hot to play tag or horse, then the little boys play mining. Under 
 a bank on one of the upper streets, last evening, we observed a number of 
 little fellows engaged in this play. With bits of wood they were digging 
 an incline into the bank, and when they came to a piece of rock they sep 
 arated it from the earth and put it in one of those thin wooden boxes used 
 for packing strawberries, and when this was full the smallest boy would 
 carry it off a piece and empty it on the dump. In reply to the question, 
 "What are you all doing here? the little carman said: "Dittin out 
 wock for de mill." 
 
 A gentleman who runs a ranch not many miles from Austin was in 
 town last Sunday, and during the day indulged in divers and sundry games 
 of " pedro " for the drinks, and when evening came he was feeling pretty 
 comfortable, but somewhat oblivious. As the church-bells commenced to 
 ring for divine worship, our rancher concluded that going to church and 
 hearing a sermon would be a good way to taper off; and accordingly he 
 made his way to the sacred edifice, entered, and seated himself in a pew. 
 During the sermon the minister gave a glowing description of heaven and 
 its delights, describing it as a city paved with gold its ways covered with 
 beautiful foliage, and the air redolent with the perfume of orange blos 
 soms ; but in the midst of the description, the congregation were startled 
 by our rancher, who, nudging his next neighbor and winking knowingly, 
 whispered in a whisper that was heard throughout the church, " I ve been 
 there ; theirs Calif orny" 
 
 A fellow-citizen hunted all over the house for his spectacles. He kept 
 on repeating to himself, "Don t let your angry passions rise"; then lie 
 kicked over the rocking-chair, and said "dammit." That didn t bring the 
 spectacles; so he went into the kitchen, and told his wife she had "better 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 175 
 
 keep an eye on them brats, and not let them be packing off everything use 
 ful there was in the house." "A man couldn t even call his soul his own" 
 in that domicile, he said, and here " them cussed young-ones " had carried 
 off his spectacles, and perhaps even now had started a Lick Observatory 
 with them in the back-yard. 
 
 " Why, you old fool," replied his patient and loving wife, " there s 
 your spectacles right on top of your clumsy old nose." 
 
 " Well ! I wish I may be transplanted into glory," was all he said, 
 or words to that effect. 
 
 She was from the country, and she went into a Main Street store and 
 asked to look at some stockings. 
 
 "What number, ma am?" inquired the polite clerk. 
 
 " Only one pair this time," she answered, " but if I like them I may 
 buy some more next time I come in." 
 
 "I mean, what number do you wear?" explained he of the yard 
 stick. 
 
 " What number do I wear ! Young man, aint you ashamed of your 
 self to ask such a question ? Do you suppose jest cause I live in the 
 country that I go scooting around with one stocking ? The number I 
 wear is two, of course. Do you think I m a heathen, and do I hobble 
 around like a woman with only one leg ? " 
 
 Then the clerk managed to make her understand that he wanted to 
 know the size of the stockings she required, and she said she guessed about 
 eleven inches would do for the foot, and as to the rest it didn t matter 
 much. 
 
 In a certain restaurant in this city, the proprietor has refrained from 
 putting up the stove, his idea being to freeze out the flies. The tempera 
 ture of the room don t appear to have as much effect on the flies as it does 
 on the human patrons of the restaurant ; and at the breakfast hour this 
 morning numerous shivering individuals sat at the tables with their forms 
 encased in blanket overcoats, their feet in Arctic overshoes, and their hands 
 in seal-skin gloves. When the waiter went around among the boarders to 
 get their orders, one man said, "Bring me a blanket on toast " ; another 
 said he would take some flannel cakes for his feet ; a third wanted a broiled 
 buffalo robe ; and still another called for a red pepper smothered in coals. 
 But one man was reasonable. Said he : "Bring me anything and every 
 thing you ve got ; I owe seven months board, and I ll bet another month s 
 that no freeze-out game can t win with me." 
 
17G THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 "Do you take trade dollars at par?" asked a stranger of a bar-keeper 
 in a Main Street saloon this morning. 
 
 " Certainly ; take anything," replied the accommodating tumbler- 
 slinger. 
 
 " Well, then, give me some whisky," said the stranger. 
 
 The bar-keeper set out the bottle and glass, and the stranger poured 
 out and swallowed his drink, and started for the door. 
 
 "Hold on there, where s that trade dollar?" said the bar-keeper. 
 
 " Oh, I haven t got any trade-dollars," replied the stranger, " I only 
 asked if you took them at par for information." 
 
 A shade of sadness stole over the bar-keeper s face as he discovered 
 that somebody had borrowed the pick-handle he keeps under the bar for 
 such emergencies and the soda-water bottle that swished through the air 
 only came within about six feet of where the stranger had stood the mo 
 ment before. 
 
 One of the County Commissioners having sent a supply of provisions 
 to an " indigent," was shortly after accosted by the individual with : 
 
 " You sent coffee, but not an ounce of sugar." 
 
 "Sugar!" exclaimed the county dad, "what in blazes do you want 
 to do with sugar ? " 
 
 " Sweeten my coffee, of course/ replied the indigent, " how in thun 
 der do you suppose I m going to drink coffee without sugar ? " 
 
 " My friend," returned the Commissioner, " you don t appear to be 
 aware that Rothschild, and A. T. Stewart, and the Marquis of Lome, and 
 Boss Tweed, and Flood & O Brien, and Dives, and Julius Caesar, and 
 Billy Sharon, all got rich by economy on the sugar question. Had any of 
 these men indulged in sugar in their coffee, there wouldn t one of them 
 have a slick quarter to-day. Economy is wealth, my friend, and if you 
 can t drink coffee without sugar, you ll have to do without coffee." 
 
 A prominent citizen, on entering the parlor of his residence, yester 
 day, found lying on the center-table a beautiful bouquet, pinned to which 
 was a card bearing his name. Looking about cautiously to assure himself 
 that no person was in hearing, he pressed the flowers to his Roman nose 
 and exclaimed : 
 
 "Who has sent me them beautiful flowers? " 
 
 " That s just what Pd like to know," said his wife, as she crawled out 
 from under the sofa, " and I d pull every hair out of her head by the roots,, 
 if I did the hussy ! " 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 177 
 
 The neighbor woman, who came in and rubbed his head with arnica, 
 said, as she went out : 
 
 " Oh, no, of course not ! How could you ever think of such a thing? 
 I aint one of them women what goes around telling everything I hear; 
 you may be sure I won t mention it to a living soul." 
 
 But, somehow or other, by last night the entire neighborhood knew all 
 about it. 
 
 -A teamster was driving a ten-mule team, hauling a load of wood, up 
 Main Street to-day, when the leaders started at a passing wagon and 
 swayed around toward the sidewalk. Instead of cracking his blacksnake 
 and using profane language to his animals, as most teamsters would do 
 under similar circumstances, the driver merely remonstrated with them. 
 Taking the nigh mule by the bridle, he led it around so as to straighten the 
 
 team, and whispered in its ear : " your soul to 
 
 nation, if you ever do that again I ll shoot you right here in the street." 
 The threat seemed to have an effect on the mule, and it made no attempt 
 to repeat the performance for the next three blocks 
 
 At the ball last night the floor was quite sticky, owing to its having 
 been newly waxed and the wax not being evenly spread over and worked 
 into the boards. A prominent citizen who was present suffered consid 
 erable inconvenience from this circumstance, and had half determined to 
 refrain from dancing during the remainder of the night, when he was 
 struck with a happy thought. Approaching his wife, he asked her to 
 waltz with him. Surprised at such an unusual condescension from her 
 husband, who generally when he attends a ball dances with every lady 
 present except his wife, the lady asked him the cause of such unexpected 
 gallantry as he displayed to her on this occasion. "Oh," said he, looking 
 down at her feet, " I want you to waltz with me so as to spread this 
 grease over the floor." She didn t dance with him. 
 
 The setting of the sun last evening presented a truly magnificent sight. 
 The western sky was o erspread with waving, billowy clouds, rendered 
 transcendently beautiful by the glow of color from the reflection of the 
 retiring god of day. Here, a faint blush of rose tint ; there, a gorgeous 
 purple ; beyond, a cloud fringed with a glitter of golden color, or enriched 
 with the subdued hue of amber. It was a sight to move the soul of n 
 12 
 
178 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 painter to its innermost depths ; and to the poetic mind it brought the 
 thought that even then, far down in the peaceful valley, the reflection of 
 the dying day might be casting a halo of glorious light about the head of 
 a red-headed girl milking a brindle cow, and that in the vast and varied 
 economy of nature, even a red-headed girl may have her -uses. 
 
 We were accosted on the street by a small boy last evening, who thus 
 addressed us : ^ 
 
 " Say, mister, will you put somethin in the paper ? " 
 
 " What is it you wish inserted in that family journal, the REVEILLE, 
 my son ? " we said in reply. 
 
 " Well," he said, " some of the boys up to the public school is a-cuttin 
 the other fellers out of their gals." 
 
 Poor little boy ! In the freshness of his innocent youth he little knows 
 that getting cut out of a "gal" by another "feller" is a sorrow not con 
 fined to school-boys alone. He does not dream that boys of a larger 
 growth know the deep poignancy of sitting on the fence and seeing another 
 "feller" escorting their heart s idol home from church. That boy has 
 more to learn than is taught in schools. 
 
 An Austin young lady, who " follows the fashions," read in one of 
 the fashion magazines that the "classical" outline of feminine attire is 
 produced by the following process : " A strong elastic is attached to one 
 garter, just above the knee, carried over and fastened to the other gar 
 ter; thus the length of the steps taken by the wearer is regulated, and the 
 classical folds of the costume remain undisturbed." Not to be "behind 
 the age," our young lady rigged the elastic as directed; and an old lady 
 acquaintance, whose house she passed while her limbs were thus fettered, 
 remarked to her daughter : 
 
 "Wai, I declare! I ve knowed Mirandy sence she was an infant, and 
 I never knowed afore that she was pigeon-toed." 
 
 Passing down Main Street, this morning, we overheard the following 
 colloquy between two little boys, neither over four years of age : 
 
 First Little Boy (anxious to display his knowledge of Mother Goose) 
 " Little Tommy Horner, sittin in a corner, catin a piece of Chris " 
 
 Second Little Boy" Oh, shore, I know that." 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TO WN. 179 
 
 First Little Boy " But I seen him a-eatin it." 
 
 Second Little Boy " That ain t nuffin ; I seen him stuck in his fum." 
 First Little Boy " Le s play tag." 
 
 Both those boys will be eligible as members of the Sazerac Lying Club 
 when they grow to be men. 
 
 He had some six bits worth of gold dust in a small glass vial, and he 
 said it was some he had taken out of the Black Hills twelve years ago. 
 
 " Why didn t you stay there and get more ? " 
 
 " Oh, the Injuns druv us out, but thar s slathers of gold in that coun 
 try, you bet." 
 
 "Going back there?" 
 
 " No, thar s too much of the yaller thar. Ye see, thar s goin to be a 
 stampede, and they ll rush in thar and take out so much gold that the de 
 mand won t be ekal to the supply, and the discount on gold will be so big 
 that it won t pay a man to prospect fur it. As a business fur steddy fol- 
 lerin , both gold and silver minin s gettin to be stale, flat, and unprofiter- 
 ble. Whisky-straight, ef yer please." 
 
 We have heard a number of people complain that this has been a 
 dull day ; but we have failed to see it. A freight team arrived ; several 
 loads of wood passed up Main Street ; seventeen dogs were all barking at 
 once at a cow, on Court Street ; a woman stubbed her toe against a plank, 
 on Union Street ; a man dropped a four-bit piece through a crack in the 
 sidewalk, on Cedar Street ; a clothes-line full of clean linen was blown 
 down, on South Street ; a cat had fits, on Overland Street ; two little boys 
 had a fight, on Sixth Street ; a cow ate up a whole garden, on Pine Street ; 
 and there was a whirlwind on Virginia Street. If the day was dull with 
 all these stirring events, we would like to see what some folks call a lively 
 one. But some men would say times were dull if their grandmother was 
 to fall three thousand feet down a mining shaft. 
 
 A four-year-old hero related to us the details of a desperate encounter 
 which a party of boys and girls had with a lizard on the hillside this morn 
 ing. It is so thrilling that, in order to keep the printers in copy till the 
 telegraph news comes in, we give it to our readers : 
 
180 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 " I seed the lizard first, and all the girls was afraid. I frowed a great 
 big stick at him, and he wun up on a wock and laid down dead. Then a 
 little girl hit him with a wock, and didn t hit him, and I went up and poked 
 him with a stick, and he got alive again and wun away, and we all wun d 
 after him and he wun in a hole, and I fell down and skinned my nose, and 
 one of the girls she lost her shoe and her mother spanked her when she got 
 home, and we re all goin up this afternoon to kill that lizard." 
 
 One of the most beautiful sunsets on which it has ever been our lot 
 to gaze decked the western sky last evening. It appeared as an open sea 
 viewed from the shore, the fleecy cloudlets which flecked the surface seem 
 ing like the white caps of old ocean. So remarkably brilliant was the 
 scene that it attracted general notice, and Main Street was filled with peo 
 ple, who gazed enraptured on the glorious sight, one lady becoming so 
 enthusiastic as to declare that she would give seven dollars and five bits 
 for a dress as gay-colored as that. How true it is that the beauties of na 
 ture stir within our breasts the noblest and most exalted thoughts and 
 aspirations ! 
 
 Last night was truly a glorious night. The sky was cloudless, and 
 the round-faced moon shed its refulgent rays o er mountain and valley, 
 while bright Venus stared down on the Citizens Mill like the headlight of 
 a celestial locomotive. The air was still as death, but cold enough to 
 freeze the nose off the statute of the Greek Slave ; all nature was hushed, 
 and no sound disturbed the stillness save the rattle of the stamps of the 
 Manhattan Mill, and the cooing of three or four dozen gentle tomcats. It 
 was a night to awaken all the finer feelings of the human breast, and to 
 cause the reflective mind to ponder on the infinite mysteries of nature and 
 the cost of a livery team for a moonlight ride. 
 
 A young gentleman of this city called on a lady friend last evening. 
 At the time of his visit she was engaged in darning stockings, having an 
 egg in one of them to keep the hole in shape, or for some similar purpose. 
 When the caller made his appearance, she hurriedly dropped her work on 
 a chair and invited him to be seated ; and, although he does not cover a 
 great deal of surface when he is seated, he managed to sit down on the 
 stocking and the egg and the darning needle all at once. Then he got up 
 and darned the stocking and the egg and the needle ; and when the pain 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 181 
 
 had subsided a little and he got the egg wiped off his pants, he said it was 
 one of the richest and at the same time most pointed experiences he had 
 ever met with in the whole course of his long and eventful career. 
 
 An individual of the genus " tramp " accosted a brother last even 
 ing on Main Street with, " Say, Jimmy, let s take a walk." 
 
 "Walk! what do I want to walk for?" asked the other. 
 
 " For exercise, to give yer an appertite." 
 
 " Appertite ! Appertite ! Well, that s good ! Why, consarn it, I ve 
 got appertite to throw at the birds ; I waste more appertite on the. desert 
 air every day than would surfice for all the bloated millionaires in town 
 for a week. If yer can walk me up to a squar meal then I ll walk, but 
 otherwise I prefer standin on this yere corner and watchin the chances 
 for a drink." 
 
 A cruel parent in this city placed some spikes, point upwards, in the 
 gate in the fence fronting his residence. He forgot to tell his daughter 
 about it, and she never noticed the spikes till the young man who comes 
 around to inquire how her mother liked the sermon at church last Sunday 
 intimated that somebody had done a darned mean trick. Then she took 
 in the situation ; but the breach in his clothes was too wide to be bridged 
 over by mere words, and he will accept of no explanations till he can find 
 some cloth to match the pattern of the pieces he left on the spikes. Thus 
 were two loving hearts and one pair of pants sundered by the act of this 
 hard-hearted father. 
 
 An upper Austin man refuses to allow his daughter to attend church 
 any more. A few Sundays ago the preacher said in one of his sermons, 
 " Love thy neighbor" ; and the daughter followed the injunction and fell 
 in love with a young man who lives in the house adjoining her father s, 
 who only earns sixty dollars a month and board as engineer of a wheel 
 barrow in a livery stable, and sits up till three o clock in the morning 
 playing pedro. The father says if the preachers can t preach any better 
 doctrine than for the girls to love every scrub who happens to live in the 
 next house, he would rather his daughters would grow up without the 
 consolations of religion. 
 
 TYb 
 
182 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 A well-known Austinite, while on a recent visit to San Francisco, 
 went into a barber-shop to be shaved. The workmen in the shop were all 
 colored men, and when one of them had shaved him and was about to 
 commence dressing his hair, the Austinite pointed to the few straggling 
 hairs on the top of his head, which just save him from positive baldness, 
 and told the barber to distribute them around on his head to the best ad 
 vantage. 
 
 " Yes," said the man and brother, stepping off a step, and cocking his 
 eye on the lonesome looking hairs, " we is got to be ecomnomical wid dat 
 air ha r." 
 
 A young lady walking along Court Street, this morning, was caught 
 in the center of one of those whirlwinds which spring up so suddenly, and 
 which are now so prevalent. She braced her feet firmly to the ground, 
 and the whirlwind toyed with her store clothes, the effect being very 
 pretty, and resembling two candles surmounted by the American flag, 
 being spun around at the rate of seventeen hundred revolutions a minute. 
 When the dust had cleared away, she commenced ejecting the granite 
 from her mouth, and said it was only to be expected that when a whirl 
 wind wanted to tackle anybody it would go for a poor, weak woman ; it 
 was the way of the world (wind). 
 
 Marriage works many changes in men. Before marriage he would 
 lift her across the muddy places for fear she would get her little tootsey- 
 footseys wet, and would insist on carrying her fan home from the ball, for 
 fear it might tire her to carry it herself. After marriage he looks on with 
 supreme indifference when she steps into a mud-hole, and tells her he 
 thought her feet were big enough to bridge across it, and wants to know 
 if she thinks a man is a Chinaman that she asks him to carry bundles 
 through the streets. She is big enough and ugly enough to carry them 
 herself. This state of things does not prevail in Austin, however. 
 
 The magnificent appearance of the sky was a common subject of 
 remark last night. Not a cloud marred the clear blue of the heavens, the 
 stars bhone with unusual brilliance, and the beauteous moon shed its soft 
 light upon the earth, gilding the pile of bricks in the brickyard like re 
 fined gold, and casting a halo of glory about the head of a red-headed 
 girl as she whispered the parting good-night to the idol of her heart up 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 183 
 
 in Upper Austin, besides effecting a great saving of candles in the resi 
 dence of a prominent citizen, who has nine marriageable daughters and 
 who has just been sold out on stocks. 
 
 She had just returned from a visit to a married couple, and as she 
 threw her hat on the sofa, she turned up her nose, put on a look of disgust, 
 and said : " If there is anything on this earth that is hateful, it is to see 
 married people kissing and hugging and gushing before folks." Her little 
 brother crawled out from under the sofa, where he had been hunting a 
 stray marble, and, addressing his sister, said : " You and George is all the 
 time kissing each other before me ; but you isn t married yet, and then I 
 s pose I m too small to be folks." That little boy told another little boy 
 next morning that it wasn t always a sign when your ear burned that 
 somebody was talking about you. 
 
 A man who believes that this is an era of conciliation and a year of 
 compromises was out on Main Street this morning, trying to borrow fifteen 
 dollars. One man told him times were too hard; another said that all his 
 money was in stocks ; another wanted to know if he was popularly sup 
 posed to be a member of the Rothschild family, and still another said he 
 wouldn t loan fifteen dollars to a bonanza king. The would-be borrower, 
 as he turned sadly away from the last "refuse," said there must be some 
 mistake ; the era of good feeling had not yet arrived, and the lamb had bet 
 ter keep its usual distance from the lion for a year or two longer. 
 
 An Austin man, who was visiting in one of the adjacent valleys re 
 cently, tells the following. He stopped for the night at a ranch, and while 
 sitting in front of the house with the rancher s daughter, the planet Mars 
 rose up over a high peak, looking for a time like a fire on the mountain. 
 The Austinite contemplated the sight in silence for a few moments, and 
 then broke into a rhapsody on its magnificence, when the girl interrupted 
 
 him by saying : 
 
 "Stranger, that thar aint nothin but a star; we see it round here 
 frequently. You town folks ought to come out and live on a ranch, and 
 you can see more stars than you can shake a stick at." 
 
184 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 There was a mining accident yesterday, which, while it was not 
 attended with any loss of life, was disastrous, from the fact that an entire 
 mine was demolished and obliterated at one fell swoop. The miners had 
 sunk an incline in the hill in the rear of the court-house, and had com 
 menced drifting from the bottom of the incline, to follow the ledge up to 
 the Indian carnp, when suddenly, and without warning, incline and drift 
 caved in, burying the unfortunate miners out of sight. They scratched 
 out with their hands, and mined iately located and commenced to open 
 another mine. Age of the superintendent, six years. The other miners 
 are still of spankable age. 
 
 Early this morning, the hills surrounding Austin were hid from view 
 by a dense pogonip, but as the sun struggled through the mist over the 
 summit of Lander Hill, the wall of cloud that enveloped Mount Prom 
 etheus rolled up like a huge drop-curtain, revealing the upper slope of the 
 mountain clad in a mantle of snow. It is such a sight as this that brings 
 the human heart in close communion with nature, and instills into the 
 soul the consciousness that there is another and a better land beyond the 
 vail of cloud and mist and fog that shuts from view the roads to Belmont 
 and Eureka. 
 
 A predatory cow made a raid on a clothes-line in Upper Austin last 
 evening, and before she was detected had succeeded in eating two frilled 
 skirts, three lace-trimmed chemiwhatyoucallems, and several pairs of 
 striped stockings. As the cow stumbled down over an embankment, an 
 angry woman could have been seen at its top, waving a broom in the air, 
 and with an expression on her countenance which said, in language as 
 plain as words could express it : 
 
 " What wouldn t I give if I could cuss like a man ! " 
 
 The story is told of an old lady who asked one of our physicians how 
 a certain patient of his was getting along, and when the Doctor informed 
 her that the person in question was convalescent, she said : 
 
 " That s rough. Back yander, in the States, I knowed two wimmin and 
 a crippled boy to die of convalescent. On one of the wimmin it broke out 
 all over her in a rash, and it struck in and she died afore you could bat 
 your eye. But she made a beautiful corpse. They make nice corpses 
 when they die of that, don t they, Doc ? " 
 
 The Doctor said he believed so. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 185 
 
 It s " strange, but true," that the industries of a locality exercise a 
 marked influence on the dreams of the inhabitants. To illustrate : Mr. 
 Happytite ate a can of lobster, half a ham, and two loaves of bread, just 
 before going to bed, the other evening, and he dreamed that he was fall 
 ing down a shaft seven thousand feet in depth, that the cable had parted, 
 and the cage was coming down after him at the rate of three thousand 
 miles a minute. Now, if that man had lived in Cincinnati, he would un 
 doubtedly have dreamed that he was a hog, and was being salted down for 
 use in the navy. 
 
 They were lovers, but trouble had arisen between them, and he was 
 about to bid her farewell, never, never again to speak to her while life 
 lasted. He had but a few words to say at parting, but in these were 
 included a request to return the presents he had given her in happier days, 
 the most valuable of which was a gold chain and cross. " Not much ! " 
 said the maiden, as he preferred the request for the return of the trinket ; 
 and pointing to an embroidered motto which hung in a frame on the wall, 
 and read, " Simply to thy cross I cling," she observed, " them s my senti 
 ments exactly." And she clung. 
 
 A woman went into a Main Street store this morning, and purchased a 
 pick-handle. No question was asked her by the polite clerk, and he did 
 not even intimate a desire to know if she was going prospecting. But 
 she volunteered the information that she intended to make her husband 
 and that carroty-headed old cat understand that she was not dead yet, 
 even if she did have a consumptive cough, a weeping eye, false teeth, a big 
 bunion, and symptoms of the hip complaint. There is one man in this 
 town who will hear the tocsin of war sound pretty soon. 
 
 Business is dull with the doctors as well as with other people. A 
 prominent physician sat for several hours on a rock to-day, intently watch 
 ing a house on the opposite side of the street. When an acquaintance 
 parsed and asked : " What are you camped there for, Doc ? " his only reply 
 was : " The man who lives in that house got a present of a box of green 
 cucumbers from a friend in California, this morning," and he resumed his 
 gaze at the door, with an evident determination to be on hand at the first 
 indication of family suffering. 
 
186 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 The following touching lines were written by a little girl in the Austin 
 public school, only eleven years old, and with warts on her hands and 
 deaf in one ear. For touching pathos and deep sentiment they are equal 
 to anything ever written by Byron or Captain Jack Crawford : 
 
 Oh, the flies, the flies, the horrible flies, 
 Creep o er your nose and tickle your eyes, 
 Glide up your neck and crawl on your head, 
 The flies, oh, the flies, I wish they were dead ! 
 
 A few days ago, a stranger at one of our restaurants asked for a nap 
 kin at dinner. The landlord refused to give him one. 
 
 "But," said the guest, "that man at the other table has one." 
 " That man is a regular boarder, and has just got back from San 
 Francisco, and I have to pander to him for a day or so ; but it won t be long 
 before he will be wiping his mouth on the table-cloth, and cleaning his 
 nails with a fork, like the other gentlemen. No, stranger, we don t allow 
 any style here as a regular thing, but we can t help ourselves sometimes." 
 
 Paradise Valley is a farming section of Humboldt County, reached 
 from Winnemucca over a stretch of desert and sagebrush. A traveler 
 visiting the valley a short time since stopped at a farm-house, and his host, 
 pointing out the country, said : 
 
 " This is Paradise, and the next valley beyond here is Eden." 
 
 " Yes," returned the traveler, " and it s hell between here and "Win 
 nemucca." 
 
 It is by such remarks as this that Nevada gets its reputation for pro 
 fanity. 
 
 A sure cure for a boy s toothache is to start with him to the dentist s 
 office. The tooth will cease to ache when he gets in sight of the dentist s 
 sign. We witnessed a case in point this morning. The boy said he hoped 
 he might never die if his tooth ached one teeny little bit ; but his mother 
 insisted that the tooth was as decayed as a frozen potato as though the 
 boy didn t know about his own tooth. A wild shriek of agony that rent 
 the air in the vicinity of the dentist s office, a few moments afterward, 
 testified that the fearful forceps had done their awful work. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 187 
 
 A prominent citizen of Upper Austin was advised to take a " rum- 
 sweat " for a severe cold with which he was suffering. The directions were 
 to seat himself on a cane-bottom chair, incase his form in blankets, and 
 let his wife place a vessel containing rum under the chair, she to light the 
 spirit, and he to remain on the chair and let the fumes which should arise 
 play about his manly form. The experiment was tried a few evenings 
 since ; but the citizen did not remain on the chair more than two seconds 
 after the match was applied to the rum, and now he is unable to sit on a 
 cane-bottom or any other kind of a chair, even with his clothes on. 
 
 A New York advertising agency sends the REVEILLE an offer of ten 
 shares of the capital stock of a certain gold and silver reduction company, 
 and two cases of gin, in exchange for $136 worth of advertising. We 
 now hold more corporate shares than we can pay assessments on ; and as 
 for gin, there is a spring on a mountain near here that flows pure Holland 
 gin at the rate of forty-two gallons a minute. If the agency will offer us 
 a yellow dog and a dozen bottles of hair restorative in exchange for ad 
 vertising, it may perhaps be able to make terms with us. 
 
 He was being questioned by the assessor as to his personal property. 
 "Got any jewelry?" said the official. 
 "No/ 
 
 " No watches, chains, or silver plate ? " 
 "No." 
 
 "No diamond studs?" 
 " No, nor mares either." 
 
 The assessor thought he saw a man running up the street to pay his 
 poll-tax, and he went to meet him. 
 
 "Are them Mormon eggs, Mister?" asked a woman, in a Main Street 
 grocery-store this morning. 
 
 "No, ma am," said the polite store-keeper; " since the exposure of the 
 dreadful Atrocities at the Mountain Meadows, and the revelations of the 
 cruelties practiced by the Mormons, we have, as a matter of principle, qui 
 importing eggs from Utah." 
 
 "I don f t care nothing about that," she replied; " but lately them Salt 
 Lake eggs has been running about eight bad to the dozen." 
 
188 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 An Austin young lady said good night to her beau, at the front 
 door, last night, and went into a room where her sister sat reading Mark 
 Twain s book, "Tom Sawyer." 
 
 " What are you reading, sister? " she asked. 
 
 " Tom Sawyer." 
 
 " I don t care a cent if he did ; I guess I ve got a right to kiss Jim 
 if I want to, and Tom better mind his own business." 
 
 It was a new revelation to " Sister." 
 
 The season for hauling wood and charcoal being about to set in, a 
 saloon-keeper, who is up to the times, has invented a new drink, which he 
 calls " Coalburner s Ecstacy and Teamster s Rejuvenator." One drink of 
 it makes a man forget all his earthly troubles ; two drinks make him think 
 he s a smarter man than Brigham Young ; the third causes him to fancy 
 himself General Crook on the war-path against the Sioux ; and the fourth 
 is calculated to land him in the august presence of Justice Logan, with the 
 danger of thirty dollars worth oi "painful duty" staring him in the face. 
 
 An Austin young gentleman, who has been an intimate friend of a 
 family in this town for several years past, was forbidden the house by one 
 of the young ladies of the family, had the dog set on him by the old 
 woman, and got struck in the back of the neck with a dead cat thrown by 
 the youngest boy, simply because he asked the young lady whether this 
 was her fourth or fifth eighteenth birthday. The young lady had previous 
 to his question joyfully remarked to him: 
 
 " I m eighteen to-day; just think of it ! " 
 
 " I believe you re traveling the straight road to hell," said a pious 
 church member to his wife, in the presence of witnesses, last night. 
 " Finery and furbelows are vanities of the spirit as well as of the flesh ; 
 besides, stocks are down, and I lost six dollars and six bits playing pedro 
 for the drinks night afore last, and you ll have to wait till next fall before 
 you can get that spring bonnet, unless you can find some other dog-goned 
 fool to pay for it." She said she would go home to her mother if she only 
 had money enough to pay her fare to the interior of York State. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 189 
 
 A poor man applied to a citizen for relief to-day, and was referred to 
 the woodpile. The unfortunate individual declined to tackle the saw and 
 ax, on the ground that Friday is an unlucky day, and that he would rather 
 starve to death than take chances of spoiling his luck. He said he had a 
 rich aunt back in the States, and would cut off his finger-nails or wash his 
 face before he would risk losing her fortune at her death by commencing 
 an industrial enterprise on an unlucky day. 
 
 A little boy was noticed standing on the sidewalk on Main Street this 
 morning, and crying bitterly. 
 
 " What s the matter, sonny ? " asked a gentleman who was passing. 
 
 " Matter ! Matter enough, I should say ! Dad s got busted on stocks, 
 mother s got the neuraljy so bad she couldn t cook breakfast, sister s run 
 off with a bullwhacker, baby s swallowed my top, and I ve got a short bit 
 so far down this here crack in the sidewalk that a feller with sixteen eyes 
 in his head couldn t see one edge of it. Thatis what s the matter! " 
 
 An Austin gentleman, who served through the war of the rebellion, 
 told his wife that the 30th of this month will be Decoration Day. 
 
 " I hope, then/ she said, " you will decorate me with a new bonnet." 
 
 "My dear," he replied, " this is a year of compromises ; I ll compro 
 mise on ten yards of calico." 
 
 The spirit in which this offer was met has convinced him that the era 
 of good feeling has not yet arrived, and he thinks he will adopt a policy 
 of conciliation. 
 
 A correspondent asks us if it is in violation of the rules of the Orders 
 of Good Templars or Red Cross to eat mince-pie. We don t know ; but 
 we saw a young man resting himself on the curb on Main Street the other, 
 evening, who said he had been eating mince-pie, and it didn t agree with 
 him. We have seen exactly the same effect produced by whisky ; but this 
 young man assured us that he belonged to the Red Cross. We never 
 knew before that mince-pie could make a fellow so tired. 
 
 A gentleman walking along Main Street in company with his wife, 
 last evening, was lost in admiration of the beauty of the sky, and was 
 uttering such exclamations as: " How beautiful !" "Aint she perfectly 
 
190 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 gorgeous ! " " What a grand and magnificent sight ! " " How beautiful 
 are thy works, O Nature ! " when his rapture was interrupted by his 
 better half ejaculating: "Oh, dry up, and come in here and plank out 
 three and a half for a pair of shoes for Johnny." 
 
 An Austin young lady was complaining to a gentleman friend that 
 some work which she was compelled to do was very tiresome, from the 
 fact that she had no assistance in it and it took nearly all her time. 
 
 " You ought to have a change of shifts," said the gentleman. 
 
 He is now wondering what made her mad, and she has ceased think 
 ing that he wandered from the subject, since she has learned the significa 
 tion of the word shift, in mining parlance. 
 
 Two little boys on Main Street : 
 
 " Say, Johnny, is yer goin to church to-night ? " 
 
 "No; are you?" 
 
 " Bet yer life I is; there s a whole lot of folks goin to be confined, 
 and I want to see what it s like." 
 
 We suppose the little boy had reference to the fact that a number of 
 ladies and gentlemen were to be "confirmed." 
 
 How man s boasted superiority fades before the reflection that the 
 howling of one little, insignificant dog can upset the nerves of all the old 
 maids within sound of its voice, and cause stern-visaged men, who would 
 face an empty cannon without blanching, to kick off the covers, and sit 
 upright in bed, and curse and swear till the air of the room is one sheet 
 of blue flame ! There was that kind of a dog in the Pound last night, and 
 it kept up its doleful wail for seven hours without stopping to take breath. 
 
 " My husband is my idol," observed Mrs. Rubyrock to Mrs. Battery- 
 stamp, at a recent hen convention in this city. 
 
 " Well," returned Mrs. B., " if he s any more idle than my old man 
 I d just like to see the shape of him. Why, my husband is that lazy that 
 if he saw a twenty-dollar piece a-laying in the big road, he d lay down along 
 side of it and go to sleep till I came along to pick it up for him." 
 
 The other woman said that was not her ideal of what a man should be. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 191 
 
 The stars shone brightly, last night, and the pale light of the moon 
 shed a luster on their humble cottage, as, leaning on her husband s arm, 
 she stood in the open door, and casting her eyes heavenward said : 
 
 "Dearest, how beautiful the heavens look ; oh, how I love to gaze up 
 into the blue vault and watch the tiny, twinkling stars, which shine like so 
 many jewels in Oh ! you nasty, careless brute ! " 
 
 He had pulled the door to, and her thumb was in the crack. 
 
 A little boy, chasing grasshoppers on Main Street this morning, 
 pounced on and picked up a bee by mistake for a hopper. The boy let go 
 before the bee did, but as the bee soared away heavenward, the boy com 
 menced to cry, and when asked what ailed him, he whined out between 
 his sobs: 
 
 " I picked up a hot grasshopper, and it burns wuss n bein spanked 
 with an old slipper with fourteen holes in the sole of it." 
 
 In a Main Street saloon, last evening, we overheard a miner telling 
 one of his friends that his wages had an ornament on them. 
 
 " How s that ? " asked his friend. 
 
 " "Well, you see," replied the miner, " a fellow I owed a little money 
 to, put a garnishment on my wages, and I looked in the dictionary and 
 found that the definition of garnishment is an ornament, or ornamenta 
 tion." 
 
 A charcoal teamster stopped his team in front of a popular Main 
 Street saloon this morning, and went into the saloon to get a drink. The 
 bar-keeper happened to be playing a game of billiards at the rear end of 
 the saloon, and there was nobody behind the bar ; and when the teamster 
 saw his own image reflected in the big mirror on the wall back of the bar, 
 he turned away, and said he wished he might be blowed if he was going 
 to drink in any saloon where they had a nigger for a bar-keeper. 
 
 We overheard the following dialogue between two small boys, on 
 Main Street, this forenoon : 
 
 "Johnny, you s on the roll of honor this time, isn t yer ? " 
 
19i? THE SAZERAG LYING CLUB. 
 
 " Bet yer life. 
 
 "It s the fust time since you ve bin goin to school, isn t it? " 
 " Yes, but yer better bet yer boots, I went through like a dose of salts 
 this time." 
 
 We received this morning from a Philadelphia publishing house a 
 printed list of questions about Austin, with a polite request that we would 
 write answers to the questions and return the list to the parties sending 
 it. One of the questions was : " What are the manufactures of Austin ? " 
 The only reply we could truthfully make to this question was : " Silver 
 bricks and children. 7 
 
 A cynical young man, who has been taking items on clothes-lines, 
 declares that the reason the ladies put lace and embroidery on their under- 
 fixin s is that they may hang them on the line as an evidence to the woman 
 in the next house, or across the street, that they can afford ju$t as good 
 clothes as anybody, and are not so poor as to be obliged to wear under 
 clothes made of 000 canvas, like some folks they know of. 
 
 There is no living creature so helpless as is man. We were led into 
 this train of thought by seeing a colt scratch its nose with its off hind-foot 
 to-day ; and the chapter thus opened in nature s book led us along the 
 thread of reflection till we thought how man, with all his boasted power 
 and superior intelligence, cannot scratch his own back, or see for himself 
 whether a boil on the back of his neck is coming to a head. 
 
 She was obliged to lift her dress as she crossed Main Street, as the 
 street was muddy and she had on striped stockings. They were yellow 
 stripes and green, and looked like a lot of crawling snakes ; and a promi 
 nent citizen gazed on them in horror as he remarked, " Jehosaphat, I never 
 had em that bad before," and right there he registered a vow that he 
 would join the Murphy movement at its next meeting. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 193 
 
 A German gentleman residing in this city has received a letter from 
 his aged father in Germany, stating that the American potato bugs, which 
 are visiting that country, are already able to converse fluently in the Ger 
 man language. The visitors are thought so much of in the German Em 
 pire, that the government has had their pictures taken, and distributed 
 in every household in the rural districts. 
 
 "What s flour to-day?" she asked in a Main Street grocery store. 
 "Eight dollars, ma am," replied the polite store-keeper. "Flour s riz, aint 
 it ? " she asked. " Yes, ma am, flour s gone up." " What makes flour 
 raise?" she questioned. "Yeast, ma am," he replied. She went out, and 
 going to another store ordered a sack of flour, and told the store-keeper 
 that that man over to the other store was too smart to live long. 
 
 Two little boys were quarreling in front of the court-house this morn 
 ing, when one said to the other : 
 
 " Your father aint got no wood contract, like mine has/ 
 
 " I don t care if he haint," replied the other ; " your mother aint got 
 no carbuncle on her neck, neither ; and mine has." 
 
 This was a clincher. 
 
 A prominent citizen remarked, in a Main Street saloon, this morning, 
 that this town is so distressingly quiet that it must be an immense labor 
 for the reporter of the REVEILLE to think up lies to put in the paper. 
 While we repel with scorn the insinuation that we would give publication 
 to a lie in the columns of the REVEILLE, we admit that facts on which to 
 base local items are as scarce as preachers at a horse-race. 
 
 The earlier birds of the season, such as caterpillars, stink-bugs, mos 
 quito-hawks, and grasshoppers, have given way to large brown beetles, 
 which are now quite numerous. When one of these insects lights on 
 the back of a young lady s neck, the neighbors all say : 
 
 "The presumption of that hussy! The idea of her trying to sing 
 
 Italian opera!" 
 13 
 
194 THE SAZEEAO LYING CLUB. 
 
 Last evening was a beautiful one ; the sky was clear, the stars twin 
 kled brightly, and the crescent-shaped moon, as it rose over the hill-tops, 
 cast a mellow light on the Indian wickiups, reflecting the profiles of the 
 beautiful squaws against the star-lit sky, and giving them the appearance 
 of ghostly forms arisen from the dead to taunt mortality with the fickle 
 ness of earthly life. It was a poor evening for stage-robbers and cats. 
 
 A wee little bit of feminine humanity was taken to a certain church 
 in this town, last Sunday. It was her first visit, and she kept as still as a 
 mice, but took in all the surroundings with wide-eyed wonder. When 
 she got home, somebody asked her what she had seen at church, to which 
 she replied : " I seed a man wiz his night-down on ; but he didn t doe to 
 s eep." 
 
 A single lady, whose sands of life are beginning to run low, while 
 recounting to a friend one of the sorrows of her early life the loss of the 
 only lover she was ever blessed with was told by the friend : 
 
 " Never mind, there are as good fish in the sea as ever were caught." 
 " Yes," replied the disconsolate one, " but it takes fresher bait than I 
 am to catch them." 
 
 The young gentleman that called on a young lady the other evening, 
 and was invited into the kitchen, asserts that he had no intention of steal 
 ing the chair he was sitting on. He says he didn t know the varnish wasn t 
 dry, and he thinks it s trifling with a man s noblest feelings, .and making a 
 direct attack on his heart-strings, to allow him to ruin a pair of eight-dollar 
 store pants in such a manner. 
 
 A Boston lady, who had recently arrived in Austin, told a young man 
 who works in the mines that she could indulge in the ecstacy of osculation 
 with an adult male of the genus homo with feelings of gratification anal 
 ogical to quaffing the nectar of the gods ; and after he had consulted the 
 authorities he was mad at himself because he had not kissed her. 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 195 
 
 She was a young lady from Reese River Valley, and her beau treated 
 her to ice cream in one of the restaurants. She tried to eat the cream 
 with a knife and fork, and because she did not succeed, said it was the 
 most " unsatisf yin truck" she "ever seed," and asked the waiter if he 
 wouldn t please warm it up a little. 
 
 A young lady who went on an excursion to the country, yesterday, 
 had both her pleasure and a beautiful pull-back dress ruined, just because 
 a little boy hollered " snakes ! " And then the little boy went home and 
 told his mother that " that air gal s" legs were painted. The poor little 
 innocent had seen striped stockings for the first time in his young life. 
 
 A lady passed down Main Street this morning, tied back so tightly 
 that she could only step about three inches at a step. A man of horsey 
 mien and air, who was standing on the sidewalk, eyed her intently for a 
 few moments, and then turned to a bystander and asked " if that critter 
 was hobbled ? " 
 
 A prominent citizen, who had just eaten three dozen Eastern trans 
 planted oysters, which cost $1.50 per dozen, told his wife he had been 
 eating silver. She said that "back thar in Missoury, where she came 
 from," anybody, to smell his breath, would suppose he had been eating 
 whisky. . 
 
 A man who found a chicken in one of the eggs set before him in a 
 Main Street restaurant, this morning, called the waiter s attention to that 
 fact, when the waiter grumbled out that some people are never satisfied ; 
 they growl when you board them for eight dollars a week and throw in 
 poultry for breakfast. 
 
 Two dogs had an argument over a bone on Main Street this forenoon, 
 and all the other dogs thought there was an alarm of fire. In three min 
 utes from the time the first yelp sounded, Main Street was a raging sea of 
 dogs, tli rough which teams were unable to force their way. Traffic on 
 the street was suspended while the blockade lasted. 
 
196 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 Two little boys were playing in front of the REVEILLE office this 
 morning, and one said to the other : " My mother s got a guitar, and yours 
 aint ! " " The blazes she aint ! " replied the other ; " my mother s had the 
 catarrh for three years, and it makes her snort like a wind-broken horse 
 going up hill." 
 
 A man on one of the back streets, last night, who saw a red-headed 
 girl running for the doctor, mistook her for a shooting-star, and wished 
 seventeen wishes before she was out of sight. The mistake was a natural 
 one, as shooting-stars are very plentiful these nights. 
 
 A prominent citizen, who had been taking spring medicine, reading 
 that there was a general movement of the Russians, remarked that he 
 could sympathize with them, as he knew how it was himself. 
 
 A little boy was talking to another little boy about cats, on Main 
 Street this morning. Said he : 
 
 " Cats is got nine lives, and you ve got to kill em nine times afore 
 they s dead. You can t pizen em, cause they like pizen, and the only way 
 my dad says you can pizen a cat is to chop his head off, and throw him 
 down a shaft, and pile rocks atop of him so he can t climb out." 
 
 A floating newspaper paragraph says that Mrs. Denison, the authoress, 
 has made enough money out of "That Husband of Mine" to purchase a 
 Washington residence. There is a woman in this town who has made 
 enough money out of that husband of hers to purchase a set of furs on the 
 installment plan. She did it by going through his pockets while he was 
 asleep. 
 
 " Boys, let s all take a drink," said a man in a Main Street saloon this 
 morning, and immediately there was an overturning of chairs in the vicin 
 ity of the stove, and a scurrying toward the bar ; but when the stranger 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TO WN. 197 
 
 put the finishing touch on his oration by uttering the words, " of water," 
 the " boys " returned sadly to their seats, and resumed their discussion on 
 the evils of Chinese cheap labor. 
 
 An Upper Austin woman, who heard that a Cedar Ravine woman had 
 been talking about her, told all her acquaintances that she intended to spit 
 in that hussy s eye the first time she caught sight of her, and when they 
 met, she walked right up to her, put her mouth close up to the " hussy s," 
 and kissed her right on the lips, and said : 
 
 " Oh, my dear, I m so glad to see you ; and how s all the children, and 
 has baby got through teething yet ? " 
 
 An Austin man who deals in stocks through a San Francisco broker, 
 received a note from the broker the other day, which read : " Stick to 
 your Julia ; she will do to tie to." Of course, his wife found the note in 
 his pocket ; and now the man is putting in regular ten-hour shifts in ex 
 plaining that Julia is the name of a mining stock. But she will be satis 
 fied with nothing short of documentary evidence, and he has had to send 
 to San Francisco for the stock certificates. 
 
 A young gentleman of this town called upon an Upper Austin young 
 lady, a few evenings since, and requested the loan of one of her old shoes, 
 saying he had invited a party of ladies to go sleigh-riding, and was 
 unable to procure a sleigh. By the time he recovers from his -injuries a 
 genial sun will haYe melted the snow from the hill-tops, the grass will be 
 springing fresh and green, and he will be preparing to negotiate the pur 
 chase of a straw hat and linen duster. But the doctor says his wounds are 
 not necessarily fatal. 
 
 Charles Napier, an English scientist, prescribes a vegetable diet as a 
 cure for intemperance. He says that if the lovers of strong drink will 
 eschew all meat, and masticate cabbages and turnips for the space of six 
 months, all desire for alcoholic stimulants will depart from them. That 
 this will work has been demonstrated in Austin. A resident of this city, 
 
198 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 having read Mr. Napier s suggestion, confined himself to a diet of cabbages 
 and turnips for six months, and at the end of that time he had no further 
 desire for strong drink. He had a splendid funeral, and the doctors said 
 he died of cholera. 
 
 A prominent citizen went into a store on Main Street this morning, 
 and purchased a broom. The clerk asked him if he should send the article 
 home in the store s delivery wagon. 
 
 " No," he replied, " I might as well pack it home myself ; but don t 
 you know, whenever my wife sends me to the store to buy a broom it al 
 ways reminds me of the time when I was a boy going to school ? " 
 
 " How is that ? " asked the clerk. 
 
 " Well, you see, when I was going to school and I used to cut up any 
 didoes, the teacher used to give me his jack-knife and send me out to cut 
 birch switches for him to whale me with. See the point ? " 
 
 The clerk said he thought he saw it. 
 
 The occasions when silver bullion is shipped from the Express Office 
 in this city open a social problem which commends itself to the consider 
 ation of the scientist and the attention of the student of human nature. 
 Prominent citizens will congregate on the sidewalk where the bullion is 
 piled, awaiting loading on the stage, and will pick up and " heft " the 
 heavy bars, with scarce any apparent exertion. And yet when the wife 
 of any one of those same prominent citizens tells him to " bring in an 
 armful of wood, you lazy brute," he swears, by all the gods above, that 
 stooping and lifting give him a crick in the " spine of his back." 
 
 The extraordinary weather of this morning is dangerous to our insti 
 tutions. It threatens to introduce the umbrella in our midst. The last 
 man who ventured on our streets with an umbrella was promptly shot, but 
 his corpse was not mutilated, like that of his predecessor. Since the com 
 pletion of the Central Pacific Railroad the manners and customs of an 
 effete Eastern civilization have one by one encroached upon our isolation, 
 driving the old pioneers further and further back into the fastnesses of 
 the mountains; and now that showers in March threaten to foist the 
 deadly umbrella on an unwilling people, men look into each other s faces 
 and ask: "What is this consarned country coming to, anyway?" 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 199 
 
 One of the most glorious mornings that ever dawned upon the Toi- 
 yabe Range was that which ushered in this day. The air was as soft as 
 the young man who thinks that all the girls in town are stuck after his 
 moustache, and as mild as boarding-house coffee ; the skies were as clear 
 as that a year s desertion constitutes good grounds for divorce in this 
 State, and the sun shone as brightly as the spick-span new twenty-dollar 
 piece that a man hates to change in paying for a two-bit plug of tobacco. 
 It was one of those mornings when all Nature smiles, and the responsive 
 heart of the bar-keeper gives down its milk of human kindness, so that 
 Nature is not the only thing that smiles. 
 
 A certain gentleman of this city had for a considerable length of time 
 been " keeping company " with a young lady, and on the occasion of her 
 birthday, recently, sent her as a present a beautiful album. The lady was 
 not at all satisfied with the gift, as she had expected something which 
 would be significant of matrimonial intentions on the part of the gentle 
 man an engagement ring, or something in that line. She confided her 
 dissatisfaction to her bosom friend, and said she thought her beau might 
 have sent her " something binding." This remark the bosom friend com 
 municated to the gentleman in the case, who was equal to the emergency, 
 and immediately sent the dissatisfied lady a present of seven pounds of 
 cheese 
 
 " Is it a crime to shoot cats?" asked a prominent citizen of an emi 
 nent jurist, in the International Restaurant, this morning. The lawyer 
 said he could not answer till he had searched the statutes and ascertained 
 what bearing the common law had on the subject. Though not a lawyer, 
 we think we can satisfactorily answer the citizen s question. In our opin 
 ion it is not a crime to shoot cats, providing you hit them square between 
 the eyes, and stun them so that they will lie still till you can get to them 
 and chop them into small bits with an ax. We do not hold that walking 
 into a sitting-room, and turning the contents of a six-shooter into a cat as 
 it peacefully slumbers in an old maid s lap would be strictly within the 
 law ; but we contend that the murder of a cat that is attending a musical 
 rehearsal in the still watches of the night under your bedroom window is 
 within the pale of the Constitution. 
 
200 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 There is a Boston lady in tins town who is a great stickler for refined 
 language, and who has a perfect horror of vulgarisms, in which she includes 
 many familiar terms. Recently a successful chlorider, who resides in Upper 
 Austin, gave a swell dinner, to which this lady was invited. After dispos 
 ing of a couple of pounds of roast turkey she passed her plate to the host. 
 
 "Some more turkey?" queried he. 
 
 " No, thank you," she returned, " but please be so kind as to introduce 
 a spoon into the interior recesses of the frame of the turkey, and extract 
 for me therefrom some of the insertion." 
 
 "Some of the what?" gasped the unfortunate man. 
 
 " Why, some of the stuffing she means, you illiterate old fool," sug 
 gested his wife. 
 
 " Oh ! " And then he fainted and was borne on a shutter to his cham 
 ber, where he now lies in all the dreadful delirium of brain fever. 
 
 In a large city there are industries and modes of obtaining a liveli 
 hood which in smaller places are impracticable. An instance of this came 
 under our observation during our recent visit to San Francisco. Walking 
 along Kearny Street one day, in company with a city friend, we noticed a 
 remarkably and extraordinarily ugly woman, and called our friend s atten 
 tion to her. 
 
 "Yes, she is frightfully ugly," he replied; "but she makes it pay 
 makes big money at it." 
 
 "Makes it pay! Makes big money at it! How?" we asked in sur 
 prise. 
 
 " Well, you see," was the reply, " the town s chock full of garroters ; 
 and wealthy men hire this woman to walk home with them nights, to 
 frighten away the garroters and hoodlums." 
 
 Such an industry were not possible in Austin, on account of lack of 
 material no garroters and no homely women. 
 
 The most surprising and at the same time exasperating accident that 
 can befall a young lady is to have a sled shoot out from under her while 
 she is coasting down hill, and leave her sitting in the snow in solitary con 
 templation of the heavenly bodies. It is at such a moment as this that her 
 soul is filled with bitterness and her mind with the contemplation that this 
 is a cold, cruel, and heartless world particularly the cold part ; when ro 
 mance or sentiment find no place in her thoughts, and she takes nothing 
 on trust. A young lady who was one of a coasting party met with an ac- 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 201 
 
 cident of this nature last night, and when her companions, on their return 
 up the hill, found her sitting in the snow, and sympathizingly inquired if 
 she was hurt, she replied : 
 
 " I have not investigated as to that as yet ; but that I am mad, and 
 disgusted with coasting, is the cold bottom fact of the business." 
 
 A rancher brought his family into town for a holiday a few days 
 since, and leaving them at a hotel, went out and took a bath, purchased 
 and put on a new suit of clothes, and otherwise improved his personal 
 appearance. When he returned to his family s apartments at the hotel, 
 he was a transformed man in appearance. His children failed to recognize 
 him, and when he attempted to kiss his wife she threw a wash-pitcher at 
 him, and told him she would scream if he did not leave the room "this 
 minute," and would tell her husband when he came home, anyhow. He 
 was obliged to go out and get a friend, to go with him to his wife and 
 identify him ; and when she finally became convinced that he was really 
 her husband, she said that if she had known his true complexion before 
 her marriage to him she would never have married him in the world. She 
 thought he was dark, and here, after taking a good, square wash, he had 
 turned out to be light. She was a blonde herself, and believed in con 
 trasts in marriage. 
 
 An aged man, with the snows of many winters upon his venerable 
 head, and his body bent under the accumulated weight of years, was hit 
 plump in the eye with a snow-ball yesterday afternoon on Main Street. 
 There was something of the fire of his youth in his uninjured eye, and 
 tears and redness in the other, as in his virtuous indignation his form 
 towered erect and he shook his fist at the retreating bad small boy, and 
 exclaimed : 
 
 "I wish I may be into in a minute if I wouldn t make you 
 
 think an earthquake had landed athwart your ear, if I had you within 
 reach of this good right hand, you young cub of the devil ! " 
 
 But when the gamin derisively placed his thumb to his nose, and 
 spread his fingers like a fan, it was more than human nature could bear ; 
 and the poor old man, whose sands of life were running so low, went into 
 the nearest saloon, and in tearful accents requested the bar-keeper to fix 
 him a hot Scotch, and " be sure to put lots of sour in it." 
 
202 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 According to some medical authorities, more quarrels arise between 
 husband and wife from their sleeping together than from any other cause. 
 It is held that the eliminative nervous force of one person is absorbed by 
 sleeping with a person of absorbent nervous force, and that the absorber 
 will sleep, while the eliminator will be restless, nervous, and sleepless. The 
 electrical qualifications of the cerebro-magnetic concatenations, the one 
 being a positive and the other a negative pole, so disturb the nervo-vitality 
 of the eliminative functions, that two persons possessing these attributes 
 in an opposite degree are uncongenial in magnetic equilibrium ; and thus 
 quarrels in bed between husband and wife are the inevitable result. We 
 have frequently noticed this phenomenon in our own experience, and the 
 only remedy we can suggest is for husband and wife to each sleep with 
 somebody else. 
 
 Several years ago, in this city, a gentleman prominent in bull-punching 
 circles was arrested for some slight infraction of the laws, and taken be 
 fore a justice of the peace, by whom he was found guilty and sentenced 
 to pay a fine. The ox-steerer was very indignant at the result of his case, 
 and very bitter against the judge for the severity of the sentence, which 
 he claimed was greater than the circumstances justified. Revenge ran 
 kled in his heart, and he determined to get even on the judge, and this is 
 how he did it. He named the off leader of his team after the judge, and 
 whenever he was driving the team past his enemy s office he would run 
 up to the off leader and sock the goad viciously into the poor animal, 
 and cry : 
 
 " Git up, you Judge Blank, you son of a , 
 
 your heart into ation." 
 
 When the judge would go to the door of his office and gaze down 
 street and see that man s ox-team coming up, he would retire to the pri 
 vacy of his back room and stuff his ears with cotton. 
 
 The Austin Post-office has been doing a rushing business to-day in 
 the distribution of valentines, of which a very large number have passed 
 through the mail. The scene at the Post-office during the day has been 
 exciting in the extreme. The varied expressions of hope, despair, joy, or 
 chagrin on the faces of the applicants for letters was enough to move the 
 stoutest heart. The most touching incident of the day was when a young 
 man who had applied the fifty-fourth time at the window for- "a volum- 
 time for me," at last received the coveted missive. It was enclosed in a 
 richly-embossed and perfumed envelope, and as he broke the seal his hand 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TOWN. 203 
 
 trembled and his eye shone in joyful expectation. He unfolded the valen 
 tine. Alas for bright hope ! It was a picture of a man with a small head 
 and exaggerated feet, and the words "Brainless Fop" printed in large 
 capitals, under the picture, seared his brain like letters of living fire. The 
 bystanders thought he would faint, but he didn t. He only raised his hand 
 on high, and said : 
 
 "I ll bet forty-five to fifteen I can lick the stuffin out of the dog- 
 goned, ornery, consarued critter what sent me this volumtime." 
 
 We draw the curtain on this painful scene. 
 
 Tramps abound in Austin at present. They are depredatory, larce 
 nous, and burglarious ;. and it would be well for owners of portable prop 
 erty, such as hot stoves and steam-hoisting works, to keep a lookout on 
 their goods, wares, and merchandise. A few evenings since, some of these 
 pedestrians entered a saloon and broke open the till in the bar-counter, 
 and the same evening a robe and overcoat were stolen from a livery sta 
 ble. When the tramps come around residences, pretending hunger and 
 asking charity, invite them to an interview with the wood-pile. If they 
 accept the invitation, it shows that they are willing to work for a living ; 
 and after they have sawed and split eight or ten cords of wood into stove 
 size, it would be as well to offer them something to eat- If they refuse to 
 tackle the wood-pile, then they are the tramp, in all his native cussedness. 
 In this case set. the dog on him, or stand him up against the fence and 
 pour hot water down his back, or get a six-shooter and make a true fissure 
 lead ledge in his carcass. This last is the most effectual method of deal 
 ing with him ; and if you lodge three or four bullets in his brain, or in 
 crease the weight of his heart by the addition of a couple of pounds of 
 slugs and horse-shoe nails inserted therein, he will not be liable to trouble 
 you again. The best protection of all, however, is to keep your doors 
 locked. 
 
 A stranger passing through Churchill County recently, had the mis 
 fortune to lose his team of mules, they having become alkalied by the 
 water of that section. The mules died within a few miles of Stillwater, 
 the county seat, and one of the solid men of that place went over to where 
 the stranger was camped, to sympathize with him. He drove over a span 
 of mouse-colored mules, of about the dimensions of jack-rabbits, and, in 
 order to help the unfortunate traveler out of his plight, offered to sell them 
 to him at about twice their value. The man examined the mules, inspected 
 
204 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 their teeth, and twisted their tails to test their kicking powers. Then he 
 said to the Churchillian : 
 
 " Can these mules draw well ? " 
 
 " Draw ! " exclaimed the man of the desert. " Draw ! Stranger, 
 you aint much of a judge of hoss-flesh. I use these here mules for plowin , 
 and I m bleeged to hitch em to two plows. If I only used one plow 
 they d yank it through the land so fast that the friction would burn up the 
 face of the yearth so s thai* wouldn t nothin grow on it. I should say 
 they could draw." 
 
 The stranger said he guessed he wouldn t buy the mules, as they were 
 too energetic for his purpose, because he wanted to travel slow, so as to 
 view the scenery. 
 
 " Put some perfumery on my moustache," said a young man to the 
 barber, who was putting on the finishing touches, in a popular Austin bar 
 ber shop, yesterday afternoon. 
 
 "Must be going to make a call," said the polite tonsorial artist. 
 
 " Yes, going to drop around to see some folks," was the reply. 
 
 " Going to see some of your many young lady friends, of course," in 
 sinuated the knight of the razor. 
 
 Then the young man rose up out of that barber chair, and said : 
 
 " See here, my friend, do you suppose I put perfumery on my mous 
 tache because I m going to see a man, or a boy, or an old woman, or a baby 
 in arms? Do men gather grapes of thorns or iigs of thistles?" 
 
 The barber said grapes were out of season, and figs were dear in this 
 country on account of the freight ; but long observation in his profession 
 had convinced him that perfumery on a moustache possessed a certain sig 
 nificance in most cases; but there were instances where the man who 
 wanted the hair on his upper lip strongly scented knew to a certainty that 
 the girl he was going to see that night was in the habit of eating onions 
 for dinner. And the customer laid down a quarter to pay for his shave, 
 and said that the barber business must afford a magnificent field for the 
 study of human nature. 
 
 Initial Conversation. 
 
 In the play of " The Mighty Dollar," the Hon. Bardwell Slote econo 
 mizes his conversation by using only the initial letters of certain words, 
 and when the play was introduced in San Francisco, the populace caught 
 up Mr. Slote s plan, and initial conversation became a common thing in 
 that city, as a species of slang. Like all other fashions, sayings, and doings, 
 which reach Austin after they are played out everywhere else, this pra<r 
 
LIFE IN A MINING TO WN. 205 
 
 tice has got here. An Austin store-keeper, who visited San Francisco some 
 
 time ago, has got it on the brain, and inflicts it on his friends and customers 
 
 at every opportunity. 
 
 Yesterday, an old lady from the country walked into his store to make 
 
 a purchase, and he, observing her from the office, called out to a clerk : 
 " Here, Augustus, S. A. lively and wait on this lady." 
 " Gustus S-A d to wait on me last time I come in, and kept me wait 
 ing about two hours," remarked the lady. 
 
 " That s just it, ma am, and that s why I told him to S. A. lively 
 
 (stand around lively). T. is M. (time is money) just as much with us MS 
 
 with you, ma am." 
 
 " I don t want no tea of no kind, but I want two pounds of your best 
 
 coffee at your lowest cash rates." 
 
 " That s it, ma am, C. T. in this establishment." 
 
 " I told you I didn t want to C. no tea, but coffee." 
 
 " Oh, I mean C. T. coin talks in this establishment." 
 
 " It does, does it ? Well, then, I ll just G-O-P-H across the street, 
 
 where I can get all the credit I want to." " 
 
 And as she went out, the storekeeper muttered : 
 
 " G-O-P-H let s see, yes, that means goph (go off) and she s S. U. 
 
 (slid out), and I m a D. O. G. (danged old galoot) for L. A. K. (losing a 
 
 customer)." 
 
 Caring for a Baby. 
 
 A woman from the country came into town the other day on a shop 
 ping expedition, bringing her baby along with her. She carried the infant 
 into a store at which she is in the habit of trading, and setting it in a 
 chair asked one of the clerks, who happened to be the only person in the 
 store at the time, to look out for it for a minute, while she ran up to the 
 drug store to buy a few articles. Without giving the clerk time to frame 
 a speech in acceptance of the trust thus reposed in him, she bolted out of 
 the store, and he, a lone, lorn bachelor of the most correct habits and 
 principles, was alone with that infant. The sense of responsibility he 
 felt crushed him as if the fat woman in the circus had sat down on him ; 
 he gazed on the babe, as it lay placidly sleeping in the chair, and the 
 thouo-ht came over him, what if just then the child let out a yell that went 
 rippling and cavorting through the store as if the rumbling of an impend 
 ing volcano was shaking up the hams and sides of bacon and boxes of 
 lard and candles and canned fruit. 
 
 " Oh, oo ittle pootsey tootsey," said the alarmed clerk, " don t oo ky, 
 oo muzzer will be back in a minute." 
 
206 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 This only caused the cherub to increase the vehemence of its yells, 
 and to grow black in the face with the intensity of its emotions. 
 
 " Shut up, you consarned, ornery, squalling, nasty little brat. Do you 
 want people on the street to think I m trying to murder you ? " 
 
 But the baby refused to listen to argument, and opened up a fresh 
 series of yells, with variations. 
 
 " Look on this manly breast, thou sweet cherub ; tell me if you see 
 there any outcroppings of the consolation thou most desirest. I am pow 
 erless to help thee. Thy mother will return ere long. Still, I pray thee, 
 still thy lamentations." 
 
 Another howl, louder and more prolonged than any that had preceded 
 it, was all the answer that mite of humanity vouchsafed. 
 
 " Dod rot and dog-gone a baby anyhow ! Shut up, or I ll be the 
 death of you ! " 
 
 And in the agony of his despair the clerk sat down on the lovely 
 babe. He sat there on that infant three hours before the mother returned; 
 and when, looking through the window, fee saw her coming down the 
 street, he got up and went to his desk and commenced to post his books. 
 As the mother entered the office she apologized for her long absence ; but 
 said she had got into an argument with another woman as to whether 
 polonaises would be cut bias and gored, or whether they would be knife- 
 pleated and scalloped, and had forgotten all about the child. 
 
 " But how had baby behaved itself, anyhow?" 
 
 " Quietest baby I ever saw in my life," replied the clerk ; and then he 
 excused himself and went out. The woman picked up her baby, which 
 was mashed flat, and she had to take it to a blacksmith shop and hold its 
 mouth to the nozzle of the bellows, and have some more breath pumped 
 into it ; and she says if her husband don t buy a shotgun and kill that 
 clerk she will sue for a divorce and go home to her mother. But the 
 clerk has not yet returned. The latest news concerning his fate is that 
 he was footing it across Death Valley, and striking out at his best pace 
 for Mexico, with whick country there is no extradition treaty for sitting 
 down on babies. 
 
fart WML. " i 
 
 INDIANS AND CHINESE 
 
 Indians and Chinese are usual constituents in the population of every 
 Nevada town. The principal tribes of Indians in the State are the Piutes, 
 Shoshones, and "Washoes. The Washoes live in the western portion of 
 Nevada, near the California line, and are prob 
 ably an offshot of the California Digger Indians, 
 whom they resemble somewhat in stature and 
 feature, and whose counterparts they are in 
 squalor, filth, and dullness of intellect. The Sho 
 shones occupy the territory east of a given line 
 from the center of the State to a point near the 
 Utah boundary, out of which limits they sel 
 dom venture. The Piutes, being numerically the 
 strongest and most powerful, besides much su 
 perior to the others in both mental and physical 
 attributes, roam where they please, their lines 
 extending into Idaho and Oregon on the north, 
 nearly to Arizona on the south and east, and west from the eastern base 
 of the Sierra Nevada to the Territory of Utah. There are certain places 
 in Idaho and Nevada which serve as head-quar 
 ters for the various subdivisions under the lesser 
 chiefs, or "captains"; but, except at particular 
 seasons, when dance festivals (called fandangos) 
 are held, or excursions are made to the hills for 
 the purpose of gathering the crop of pine-nuts 
 which forms a large part of their winter subsist 
 ence, they hang about the towns as do the Sho 
 shones in their own territory. There are other 
 lout insignificant tribes in the southern portion of 
 the State, and the eastern part of Nevada and 
 Western Utah is inhabited by the Goshutes. 
 This tribe, which was once warlike and power 
 ful, is now almost extinct, and numbers but a few hundred souls, it having 
 
208 . THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 been almost exterminated by the troops tinder command of General P. E. 
 Connor, in 1864-5, as a punishment for and to check their attacks on emi 
 grants and stages on the Overland road. At one time, all these tribes 
 warred with each other ; but now the hatchet is buried forever. They 
 have occasional tribal troubles on account of the Piutes stealing horses or 
 squaws from the weaker tribes, and there are frequent quarrels among 
 them caused by whisky and gambling but these are as likely to occur 
 among members of the same family as with neighboring tribes. In the 
 majority of cases, the differences are submitted to the arbitration of some 
 white man whom the Indians conceive to possess authority justices of 
 the peace, sheriffs, town or city marshals, and frequently the editor of the 
 local paper. It is a common occurrence for Indians to call at the REVEILLE 
 sanctum with statements of their grievances, and a request that I "heap 
 put em in paper." They fancy that a publication of their wrongs in a 
 newspaper is a sure method of obtaining redress. 
 
 In the towns, the Indians perform various menial offices. The men 
 chop wood and dig, act as street scavengers, dish-washers in the restaurants, 
 and in divers other capacities of simple labor ; the squaws do washing, and 
 some of them make very good house servants. The money they obtain in 
 this way is used in personal adornment and playing poker an amusement 
 to which all Indians, male and female, are passionately addicted. 
 
 There is a strong antagonism between the Indian and the Chinaman, 
 principally felt by the Indian, and the races have frequent quarrels, in 
 which the Indian, owing to the Chinaman s superior cunning, usually 
 comes off second best. The Chinaman lives in quarters, apart from the 
 portions of the town occupied by the whites, the streets of which look like 
 a slice cut from China ; and to Chinatown the Indians resort for a miser 
 able compound miscalled whisky, which is furnished them by the keen 
 "Johns" at an enormous profit. They are dependent for the gratification 
 of their alcoholic tastes almost exclusively on the Chinese, as it is seldom 
 that a white man will supply liquors to them, being restrained by the strict 
 State laws prohibiting it. Therefore, Lo, who hates John with a bitter 
 hate, cannot afford to quarrel with him ; for, though he despises the China 
 man much, he loves liquor more. As this purports to be a Nevada book, 
 and as the Chinese and Indians form so large an element of Nevada s pop 
 ulation, I here introduce a few sketches of incidents in connection with 
 those races, many of which were published from time to time in the 
 REVEILLE. 
 
 The Indian, stripped of the romance with which he is clothed in the 
 imagination of those whose estimate of him is based on norels, poems, and 
 histories which treat on the "noble son of the forest," stands forth merely 
 a crude, dirty, vicious savage. This is his best aspect. Until subdued by 
 force he is cruel and treacherous, with a nature little better than the wolf 
 that prowls the plains. He is cunning, and politic to the extent that when 
 he is whipped, and feels himself in the power of a superior race, he grovels 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 209 
 
 and toadies to that superiority accepts its cast-off clothes, does its chores 
 for a consideration, and copies its vices. Its good traits he seldom or 
 never learns or practices. An Indian is a coward. Liquor or excitement 
 may render him desperate, but true bravery is something foreign to his 
 nature. He will only fight when he has the best of it, and even then he 
 skulks, and shoots from shelter ; and it is seldom that he will battle man to 
 man with the whites, except when cornered then he turns at bay like any 
 other wild beast. He is a stranger to the feeling of gratitude, and if a 
 favor is done him he can conceive no other motive for it than fear. Do 
 an Indian a kindness, and he is sure you are afraid of him. I have seen 
 members of nearly all the .tribes of Indians between the Rocky Mountains 
 and the Pacific Ocean, and this description applies to one equally with the 
 other, except in some isolated cases in Montana and British Columbia, 
 where intermarriage with whites arid the teachings of the Catholic fathers 
 have taken some of the wolf out of them. But even the best of those 
 classes are not the equals in moral attributes of the lowest grade of white 
 men. Nobody who has ever been brought in direct contact with the 
 Indians as they are, ever knew or heard of one of them performing an act 
 of magnanimity or of charity. Among themselves, in their own social 
 life, they are brutes. They compel the women to carry all the burdens 
 and to perform all the labor, and when the females grow old they are neg 
 lected, starved, beaten, and abused, and frequently stoned to death to get 
 them out of the way. Cleanliness they know not of, and the proudest 
 looking Indian that ever stalked in fringed buckskins and beads, with 
 painted face, and hair adorned with army buttons, is covered with vermin, 
 from which he never makes an effort to free himself. 
 
 The Indians in Nevada, having been cowed and subdued by frequent 
 chastisements by the military and settlers, after for several years pursuing 
 a cruel and diabolically torturing warfare, are now merely a collection of 
 nomadic loafers. They have head-quarters of subdivisions of the tribes at 
 certain points but few consenting to live on Government reservations 
 and from these they roam the country, some picking up a precarious sub 
 sistence in hunting jack-rabbits, sage-hens, and such other small game as 
 the country affords, and others hanging about the mining towns and the 
 towns along the line of the Central Pacific Railroad. A few are induced 
 to work on ranches at certain seasons. In the main they dress in clothes 
 which have been cast off by the whites, but a few of them wear robes 
 made by sewing together the skins of jack-rabbits. 
 
 The town Indians subsist by begging at the kitchens of residences, 
 hotels, restaurants, and miners cabins, and the majority of them pass their 
 time in sleeping in the sunshine or gambling at cards. With all, gambling 
 is the chief aim of life whether it be at Indian poker or monte, by day on 
 the street corners, or at night in their miserable wickiups, or playing mar 
 bles "for keeps" among themselves, or with small white boys. Some of 
 the men work at odd jobs, such as cutting firewood, scavenger work, wash- 
 14 
 
210 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 ing dishes in restaurant or hotel kitchens, and other odd chores, while 
 many of the women do rough washing for families and perform various 
 easy menial services. The women are much more industrious than the 
 men, but all their earnings go to their lords and masters, to furnish them 
 with gambling capital. 
 
 The women of the Piute tribe are, except in isolated cases, virtuous ; 
 but in the other tribes they do not know the significance of such a word. 
 Among the Piutes a lapse from virtue is punishable by death, by burning, 
 or by stoning ; but in the other tribes, the husbands, so-called, pocket the 
 proceeds of the women s prostitution, and shame is a feeling which neither 
 man nor woman of them ever experienced. 
 
 There is a humorous side to the Indian character, however ; and it is 
 in the endeavor to portray this, that the sketches which follow are embod 
 ied in this work. 
 
 The Chinese. 
 
 The Chinaman is a problem. He is all over the Pacific Coast, in every 
 State and Territory which comprises that region, and forms the most un 
 desirable and disturbing element of the population. His good qualities 
 are very few, and may be summed up in three words : Industry, frugality, 
 and patience. His vices are legion, and comprise, in part, dishonesty, 
 cruelty, filth, idolatry, and opium smoking. He has no home ties, and 
 seeks none ; he lives in a hovel in the villages and towns, and, crowded 
 like sheep in a pen, in filthy buildings in Chinese quarters in the large 
 cities. His women are all prostitutes, brought from China as slaves. 
 To steal is his creed ; to lie, his religion. I will not say that there are no 
 Chinamen whatever better than this picture ; but where there are such, they 
 form notable exceptions to a general rule. John, like Lo, has his humor 
 ous side, and an attempt to depict it is the cause of his introduction in 
 these pages. 
 
 The Origin of the Fandango. 
 
 The fandango, or dance, is a species of thanksgiving festival, held in 
 accordance with instructions from a source which will be mentioned below. 
 The Shoshones and Piutes, unlike Fennimore Cooper s and Ned Buntline s 
 Indians, have no belief in a "Great Spirit" or " Happy Hunting Ground." 
 Their idea of a hereafter is a place where there are millions of fat crickets 
 always roasting, and thousands on thousands of ponies roaming around on 
 grass-clad hills, with red blankets strapped to their backs ; and the being 
 they worship, and in whose honor these festivals are given, is a traditional 
 Indian, whose history the medicine-man gives as follows : 
 
INDIAN S AND CHINESE. 211 
 
 " Heap sun-ups, maybe long time ago," a mountain in the Goose Creek 
 range suddenly became very much disturbed. It rocked violently to and 
 fro, sending forth loud noises resembling exaggerated human groans. The 
 Indians, who at that time flocked in large numbers to that locality to 
 gather pine-nuts, were greatly terrified at the actions of the mountain ; 
 but they could not flee they were chained to the spot by a sort of fasci 
 nation, and all their efforts to tear themselves away were fruitless. They 
 huddled in groups at the foot of the mountain ; the men pale with fear, 
 and the women and children wailing and crying. 
 
 The mountain continued to labor for many days ; when, at last, one 
 night, when the sky was of inky blackness, a bright ray of light shot up 
 from its peak, and in a few seconds the entire sky was illumined by a daz 
 zling light of rosy hue. The assembled Indians with one accord cast their 
 eyes to the peak of the mountain, when there slowly emerged therefrom 
 the figure of an Indian. The figure was about ten feet in height, and 
 straight as an arrow. It was clad in buckskin, richly embroidered with 
 beads ; its ears and nose were decorated with bead rings ; the head was 
 surmounted by the pinion of an eagle, and around its waist was a belt 
 containing upwards of three million (according to Indian count) glass 
 beads. For full ten minutes the figure stood gazing at the astonished and 
 terrified Indians, when, fixing an arrow in his bow, he discharged it at a 
 range of hills opposite him. A flash of light like the trail of a meteor 
 followed the discharge, and in a moment the range, which was before 
 barren, was covered with pinons, laden down with luscious pine-nuts. 
 Another discharge of an arrow at the stream which rippled at the foot of 
 the mountain, and the river was almost overflowing with fish. The figure 
 then pointed its finger significantly at the large rock on which it was 
 standing, and slowly disappeared into the mountain, whicli then ceased its 
 shaking and rumbling ; the light went out, and a solemn silence came over 
 the scene. 
 
 The next morning, Salamahowich, a mighty warrior, who was then 
 chief of the tribe, ascended the mountain, and stepping on the rock on 
 which the figure had stood the night before, it suddenly gave way with 
 him, and in a moment he found himself in the interior of the mountain. 
 The description of the place in which he found himself, as given by 
 the medicine-man, is beyond our powers ; but he gave us to understand 
 that the floor " all the same half-dollars," (meaning silver) and the roof 
 " heap all same him," pointing to a cluster of icicles dependent from a 
 porcli, by which we suppose he meant it was covered with stalactites. 
 While the chief was lost in admiration of the magnificence of his sur 
 roundings, the figure of the night before emerged from a recess in the cave, 
 and bidding the chief to seat himself, he told him that he was the Savior 
 and Guardian of the Shoshone tribe, born but the night before, and that 
 the mountain" was his mother. He commanded the chief to take word to 
 the tribe, and to tell them that so long as they obeyed a certain code, which 
 
212 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 he laid down to the chief, but which is too long for repetition here, so long 
 would he be their guardian and protector. Among other things, he de 
 manded that a constant guard should be kept at the mouth of his cave ; 
 that no human being should be permitted to enter it ; and that at a sound 
 which he would strike on an immense boulder of pure silver, which stood 
 near the mouth of the cave, signal fires should be built directing the tribe 
 to hold a dance in his honor. 
 
 It is doubtful if any white man could find the locality of the mount 
 ain, or even if he would be permitted by the Indians to enter the region ; 
 so ambitious prospectors need not trouble themselves about it ; but when 
 fires which flash seven times seven times are seen on the mountains, it may 
 be set down for certain that the big Indian is hitting his boulder, and then 
 follows a grand fandango, which is religiously observed without regard to 
 season or weather, oftentimes being held during a fierce snow-storm, or on 
 nights when the thermometer is so low that the mercury tries to crowd 
 itself out of the bottom of the instrument. 
 
 A Fandango. 
 
 I was one of a party who made a visit to one of the spring fandangos 
 of the Piute tribe of Indians. The Indians were found encamped in a 
 circle formed by piling up brush, and at the time of our arrival, dancing 
 having not yet commenced, the children of the sagebrush were distributed 
 within the circle in various picturesque groups. The camp seemed to be 
 subdivided into smaller camps, in some of which games of cards were in 
 progress ; in others, the braves were sitting around a small sagebrush fire 
 engaged in conversation, the light of the fire giving a subdued glow to the 
 various-colored blankets and the painted faces of the Indians, and form 
 ing a picture such as I have seen painted of gipsy life. Other groups 
 consisted of families, the women sitting or lying quietly on the ground, 
 and the infants in their beds of rabbit-skins ; and here and there a pair of 
 tiny red feet could be seen peeping out from under the skins, catching the 
 warmth of the sagebrush fire. On the outer edge of the circle a number 
 of half-grown boys and girls were at play, running and jumping through 
 a fire ; and their glad shouts and frisky motions showed that they were 
 happy in their rags, and felt not the lack of comfort and shelter which are 
 indispensable to the children of the white man. The first dance being 
 called, a number of bucks formed a circle around a small cedar which was 
 set up in the center of the circle of brush, and commenced a slow, monot 
 onous chant, placed shoulder to shoulder, and moved with regular step 
 around the tree, keeping time to the chant with their feet. Gradually the 
 circle became enlarged, squaws and children falling into it and taking up 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 213 
 
 the refrain of the chant, till, at the time of the departure of the party 
 about nine o clock p. M. about fifty Indians were engaged in the dance. 
 The dance, or fandango, as the Indians call it, is held in celebration of the 
 approach of spring, being a sort of thanksgiving for the disappearance of 
 the snow and cold, and the advent of mild weather. It is a solemn busi 
 ness for Mr. Indian, and he goes at it in dead earnest, not a smile or laugh 
 disturbing his countenance during its progress. The feature of the even 
 ing was an Indian dressed in a harlequin custume, which some white man 
 had worn at one of the masquerades given in town. The wearer felt him 
 self a big Indian, and was an object of merriment to the other Indians and 
 of awe to the children, who followed him around as thougli he were a 
 whole circus in himself. 
 
 The inauguration of a fandango is occasionally foreshadowed by a 
 migration of the tribe to some more desirable place, where the festivities 
 can be held in comparative seclusion. I once witnessed the breaking up 
 of a camp for this purpose. About six o clock in the evening a great 
 commotion was observable, bucks, squaws, and pappooses all being at work 
 pulling down the wickiups and packing the horses with the household 
 goods. Viewed from the opposite hill, the preparations for departure 
 presented a picturesque sight. The ponies standing patiently to receive 
 their burden of high-colored blankets, provisions, cooking utensils, and the 
 miscellaneous traps that go to make up an Indian household ; pappooses 
 in all stages of raggedness tumbling about on the ground ; squaws taking 
 down the dirty and ragged odds and ends which serve for the covering of 
 an Indian house ; bucks riding furiously over the steep hill-side to get the 
 horses together all set off against the grayish background of the hills 
 with the sinking sun casting a glow on the scene that made bright color 
 look brighter, and dirty bits of cloth look clean. It was a pretty picture 
 at a distance; a near approach would have destroyed the romance and 
 picturesqueness, besides offending the nostrils and endangering the clean- 
 liness of the spectator. About eight o clock the cavalcade began to move, 
 the braves and favorite squaws and children, who were mounted, taking 
 the trail around the hill above the Clifton grade, and the blear-eyed old 
 squaws, with burdens on their backs, taking the shorter cut over the 
 mountain ; and by the time it was fairly dark there was not an Indian left 
 in the town or its immediate vicinity. 
 
 "Indian Al." 
 
 Indian Al is a California Digger, who was brought to this city when 
 quite young, and educated with white children of his own age. During 
 his boyhood he was taught to read and write, and was kept neatly dressed, 
 
21 4 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 and at one time gave promise of growing up an intelligent and respectable 
 man. But when he reached man s estate the wolf cropped out; he threw 
 off the restraints and clothing of civilization, encased himself in rags, al 
 lowed his hair to grow, procured a blanket, went to an Indian camp on 
 the hill and fraternized with the Shoshones, becoming as one of them, and 
 acquiring their tongue readily. He naturally gravitated to whisky, and a 
 short time after his lapse from civilization became a recognized nuisance 
 of the town. Shortly after the completion of the Central Pacific Railroad 
 he removed to Battle Mountain, and since then has lived in the different 
 camps along the line of that road between Reno and Elko. I saw him a 
 few weeks ago at Carlin, when he told me that he had given up drinking 
 and gambling, and stopped associating with the Indians ; but his appear 
 ance contradicted his statements. Two days ago he put in an appearance 
 at Austin. He is -the biggest liar on the continent, and told some wonder 
 ful tales of his travels to both Indians and w T hites, even excelling Uncle 
 John of the Sazerac asserting that he had been all over Europe, to China, 
 Japan, Australia, and the Sandwich Islands. The Shoshone squaws at 
 once fell in love with him, by wholesale ; they loved him for the lies he 
 told, as Desdemona did Othello ; and, clustering around him, would swal 
 low the biggest of his yarns, with the utmost confidence in their truth. 
 There is a Shoshone Indian in town from Belmont, who until Al s arrival 
 was the admired of all admirers among the squaws. Pie is a handsome 
 young fellow, and, tricked out in a red shirt and plug hat, has been strut 
 ting around with half the young Indian ladies of the vicinity at his heels. 
 With these two gallants on the street at the same time, there could be but 
 one result ; and it soon came in the shape of a quarrel between them, dur 
 ing which Indian Al drew a huge knife on his rival. The former was ar 
 rested, and now occupies a cell in the City Jail. Here his education serves 
 him in stead, and with the stub of a pencil he whiles away the dreary 
 hours inscribing on the wall the words, "The course of true love never did 
 run smooth." It is perhaps necessary to say that this is strictly true. 
 
 This Al got into an argument with a store-keeper the other day, dur 
 ing which something was said about keeping books. 
 
 " Do you keep books ? " asked he. 
 
 " Yes," said the white man, " I keep my own books." 
 
 " It s a bad practice," returned the Indian ; " more men have got 
 broke in this country by keeping books than from any other cause. You 
 should confine your operations to a cash basis." 
 
 The white brother weakened, and the argument closed. 
 
 Belmont Johnny, Al s rival, also soon came to grief. A few days ago, 
 he went to the City Marshal, and related a tale of wrong and injury suffi 
 cient to move the stoutest heart. Johnny s particular affinity was a squaw 
 named Topsey, a fat and rollicking Shoshone maiden ; but another mem 
 ber of the Piute tribe succeeded in inaugurating himself into her affections 
 and estranging them from Johnny, and on the wings of night fled with her 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 215 
 
 to the fastnesses of Hot Creek, on the Battle Mountain road. Johnny s 
 sorrow was genuine when he asked the Marshal to " send em paper, and 
 heap bring em back," and tears came into his eyes as he depicted Topsey s 
 ingratitude. 
 
 " Yesterday me give him fibe dollar, me give him pair shoe, and buy 
 him silk dress." 
 
 " A silk dress ? " asked the Marshal, " how much did you pay for the 
 silk dress?" 
 
 " Me give three dollar," replied the sorrow-stricken red man. 
 
 The Marshal informed Johnny that the law was powerless to redress 
 his wrongs, and that his only remedy for the injury wrought upon him was 
 personal vengeance. 
 
 "All right," said Johnny, "you no put em jail-house, me catch em 
 Topsey, maybe- so me catch em back silk dress." 
 
 The Courting Season 
 
 That " in the spring a young man s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of 
 love," applies with particular force to the noble red man of the sagebrush. 
 Both the Shoshone and Piute tribes of Indians have a regular courting or 
 love-making season, which generally begins about the first of April and 
 lasts until the spring fandango, at which wives are chosen, and such mar 
 riage ceremony performed as the Indians employ. Owing to the inclem 
 ency of the present spring, the fandango has been postponed, and the 
 Indians have not yet commenced making love on the street corners, a thing 
 not unfrequently seen in this town. No Indian or even white man 
 would feel like courting in the open air with the thermometer below the 
 freezing point, and the wind sending the snow rushing through the streets 
 at the rate of sixty miles an hour. But, after all, this courting-season busi 
 ness seems like a pleasant custom, and it might even be adopted with 
 profit by the whites. How much cheaper and more systematic it would 
 be for Charles to call on Araminta, and open the conversation by saying : 
 "My dear Miss Araminta, the courting season has opened, and I have 
 come to ask if you will permit me to pay my devoirs to you during the 
 said season," than for him to be going up to the house every night for six 
 months, or a year, maybe, with his pockets full of gum-drops and peanuts, 
 and sitting in a corner and looking foolish, and letting Araminta s baby 
 sister lick the blacking off his boots, and her little brother borrow (and 
 keep) his jacknife. And then, after all this trouble and expense, to have 
 her tell him that she had formed a previous attachment, and never, really 
 and truly, ever dreamed that his attentions meant anything more serious 
 than friendship. But she could love him as a brother, and all that sort of 
 
216 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 thing. If custom had allowed Charles to state his case at the outset, he 
 would have been saved all the expense for the gum-drops and peanuts, and 
 the humiliation of having his suit rejected ; and Araminta would have 
 been saved the painful duty of saying those little, but difficult words, " No, 
 sirree; not if I know myself." 
 
 An Elopement. 
 
 Owing to the excitement of the election and the occupation of our 
 space by matters connected therewith, we have been unable until to-day 
 to make mention of an elopement which took place last week. 
 
 Out of regard for the feelings of the families concerned, we refrain 
 from mentioning names, which, however, are well known in this city. The 
 couple had long loved ; and, a short time since, the gentleman requested 
 the hand of the lady in marriage, from her stern and cruel father, and was 
 kicked down a long flight of steps for his presumption. Nothing daunted, 
 however, by this cruel rebuff, the young man continued his attentions, 
 and although frequently treated to showers of hot water by the maternal 
 parent of his adored, and interviewed by the family dog to the extent of 
 three pairs of pants, he still continued his attentions. The object of his 
 affections viewed with heart-breaking sorrow the persecutions of the idol 
 of her soul, but was powerless to prevent them, as she was kept confined 
 in a cabin in a secluded part of the town, and kept from all communication 
 with the unfortunate young man. Last week, however, the young man 
 discovered the whereabouts of his beloved and managed to communicate 
 with her, when she expressed a willingness to fly with him. 
 
 On the appointed night the lover was on hand. The night was pitchy 
 dark, and a gentle rain pattering on the roof prevented the stern parent of 
 the girl from hearing the stealthy footsteps of her lover. Approaching 
 the cabin, he drew his trusty pocket-knife, and soon picked enough of the 
 mud which filled the interstices of the logs of which the cabin is com 
 posed, to enable the prisoner to crawl through. As the last flicker of her 
 dress passed through the " chink " she fell into his arms, and throwing her 
 on his shoulder he flew to the hills. 
 
 When the old man awoke, next morning, the elopers had a wickiup 
 of their own erected ; and as the excited parent approached, with his bow 
 and arrow cocked, and fire gleaming from his eye, the now husband threw 
 his protecting arm around the waist of his bride, and defied the old duffer. 
 The husband settled the matter, however, by the payment of three ponies, 
 a deck of greasy cards, and a flannel shirt. A grand banquet of entrails 
 was given at the slaughter-house, and as soon as the squaw gets over the 
 honeymoon, she will be again ready to do washing by the day. 
 
INDIAN S AND CHINESE. 217 
 
 An Unhappy Medicine-Man. 
 
 The squaw over whom the medicine-man has been howling so much, 
 to the annoyance of our citizens, has gone to her last account. Yesterday 
 afternoon, observing that matters on the hill south of town bore a some 
 what unusual appearance, we walked to a wickiup, where a large number 
 of Indians had congregated. The wickiup consisted of a piece of drilling 
 stretched over a few bent poles, and beneath this canopy was a ghastly 
 sight. Stretched on the ground was the dead body of a squaw, her fea 
 tures almost unrecognizable as those of a human being, on account of being 
 covered with dirt and clotted blood. In a circle around the corpse were 
 seated about twenty Indians, who with grave and serious faces rocked to 
 and fro and sang a monotonous chant. Within this circle were seated a 
 number of squaws, who were crying and tearing their hair, while at the 
 head of the corpse was seated the medicine-man, a gray-headed, miserable- 
 looking old wretch. His arms were folded across his breast, and his body 
 swayed to and fro in time to his continuous groaning. It is stated that 
 when an Indian medicine-man fails to effect a cure, the Indians accuse 
 him of having bewitched the patient ; and immediately after the death of 
 the patient they put the doctor to death, so that he shall not have an 
 opportunity to bewitch others. Last night there was no fire or light of 
 any kind in the Indian camp, and it was as still as the grave ; and there 
 can be no doubt that the red men were up to some deviltry. They prob 
 ably buried the squaw and put the old medicine-man to death. Stoning 
 to death is the method used in these cases, and in all probability the old 
 fellow js mashed up as fine as sausage-meat by this time. He seemed to 
 understand what was in store for him, and was as miserable and woe 
 begone a specimen of humanity as can well be imagined. As to the In 
 dian who beat the squaw to death, nothing will be done to him, as he is a 
 brave, and the woman was his wife, which gave him a perfect right to 
 kill her. 
 
 The REVEILLE sanctum was honored, this forenoon, by a visit from the 
 chief justice of the Piute tribe of Indians Judge John, as he calls himself. 
 The Judge is the most intelligent Indian we have ever met, not even ex 
 cepting Indian Al, and seems to be pretty well posted on matters and 
 things. After informing us that the old men of his tribe prophesy that 
 there will be severe storms throughout the whole of the present month, 
 he proceeded to question us about the news. He asked us what was going 
 on at Virginia, Carson, Eureka, Hamilton, Salt Lake, the Black Hills, 
 Montana, and the United States, about the affairs of all of which he ex 
 hibited a knowledge remarkable for an Indian. He asked us our views of 
 
218 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 the coming Presidential election, and who we thought would be Grant s 
 successor, and wound up by giving us his opinion of the Chinese question. 
 Said he : 
 
 " Chinaman no good he come here, heap work, no spend em money ; 
 but take em all money way over big water. Injun my tribe no like 
 Chinaman ; heap down on em. Too many Chinamen come San Francis 
 co, Virginny all United States ; heap work for little money ; whita man, 
 whita woman, and Injun no got work. Bimebye heap kill em Chinaman ; 
 send em back home." 
 
 He explained that the Indian, unlike the Chinaman, spent his money in 
 the stores for gloves and clothes and food, thus keeping it in the country ; 
 and he argued from this that while the Chinaman is an injury to the 
 country, the Indian is a benefit. He stated that he is a second cousin of 
 Naches, son of old Winnemucca, and that he has a brother who can read 
 and write English well. Like all the Indians of the present day, Judge 
 John has ever been a steadfast friend of the whites, and would rather win 
 all the money in an Indian poker game than harm a hair of a white man s 
 head. 
 
 An old Piute Indian departed for the happy hunting ground, via old 
 age and general debility, from the camp back of the City Hall, last night. 
 It is not the custom of the Piutes to bury their dead ; and in this instance 
 they merely carried the body a few rods from the camp and deposited it 
 on the ground. The City Marshal, learning that the late Lo was lying 
 exposed on the hillside, commanded Al to have it properly buried. Al 
 made no objections to this order; but five other Indians standing by, 
 whom he requested to assist in the funeral, positively refused to do so. 
 Upon this, the officer threatened that unless they proceeded forthwith to 
 bury the dead Indian, he would arrest them and have them fined four 
 million dollars each. This threat had the desired effect, and the funeral 
 commenced. They wrapped the body in a robe of rabbit-skins and tied it 
 up with ropes, making a bundle the shape of a ball. This they dragged 
 over the hill to an old shaft, into which they dumped it without ceremony. 
 In reply to a question as to the cause of the Indian s death, a dusky 
 maiden, who was an interested spectator of the funeral, replied : " Heap 
 too dam old." 
 
 The Piutes and Shoshones of this vicinity have inaugurated a grand 
 rabbit-drive in Reese River Valley, which will last five days. The valley 
 is teeming with rabbits, and the method pursued by the Indians insures the 
 slaughter of thousands. Their mode of procedure is nearly the same as 
 that of the Irish soldier, who captured a prisoner by surrounding him. 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 219 
 
 The Indians select a piece of ground which they know to be the resort of 
 their game, and, each man being armed with gun or bow and arrows, form 
 a circle. Inside of this ring the women and children are placed, and the 
 space is gradually contracted, the squaws and pappooses meanwhile beating 
 the brush with sticks to start the rabbits. The bewildered little animals 
 rush hither and thither, finding no escape from the wall of hunters, and 
 being hemmed in on every side, and gradually driven into smaller space ; 
 until, when the supreme moment arrives, the Indians turn loose their guns 
 and arrows on the confused and affrighted creatures, slaying large numbers 
 of them at each discharge, and the women and children even killing many 
 with their sticks. Captain Charley, a Piute, who is chief-engineer of this 
 drive, says that after it is over there will be a joint fandango of the Piutes 
 and Shoshones, at which his son, "Liar," will "make heap big talk." 
 Charley s son was dubbed Elias by some white man ; but the Indians can 
 not pronounce the word Elias, the nearest they can come to it being " Liar," 
 and by that name is he called and known. 
 
 In a couple of weeks the Piute and Shoshone Indians of this section 
 will assemble at Mammoth to gather the pine-nut harvest. A short time 
 before the ripening of the nuts, which grow in great profusion on the hills 
 in that vicinity, the Indians will meet to the number of more than a thou 
 sand. They go from Austin, Belmont, Stillwater, and other places within 
 a circuit of 150 miles, and have a grand fandango, lasting upwards of a 
 week ; and when the nuts are ripe the squaws collect and roast them for 
 winter use. When the harvest is over, the Indians return to the haunts 
 of civilization, where they live comfortably through the winter on this pine- 
 nut bread, with the addition of such kitchen refuse as they can get. En 
 trails roasted in the ashes, and cakes made of crickets and pine-nuts mixed 
 together, form a royal feast for an Indian ; and when seated in his wickiup, 
 enjoying this savory mess, he doesn t care a continental about civil service 
 reform, is perfectly indifferent whether gold goes up or down, and abso 
 lutely neutral on the great question as to the eternity of hell. 
 
 A Piute passed down Main Street yesterday, whose appearance ex 
 cited the attention of the white beholders, the jealousy of his male com 
 panions, and the admiring glances of the Indian maidens who were sitting 
 on the curbstones pursuing investigations in natural history in their hair. 
 He was mounted on a sleek pony, and was attired in a flaming red flannel 
 shirt, two pairs of new blue overalls, a stiff-brimmed Peruvian sombrero, 
 and a yellow linen duster, whose ample folds spread gracefully over the 
 
220 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 back of the pony, almost hiding that animal from view. As he rode along, 
 he seemed to be aware that he was the admired of all admirers, and car 
 ried himself with an air of conscious pride, occasionally bestowing a con 
 temptuous glance on some less fortunate Indian whose clothes were held 
 together by bits of hay rope, or vouchsafing a patronizing glance on the 
 dusky maidens of his tribe. Grant would have been required to give about 
 eleven horses, sixteen squaws, and a barrel of whisky to have changed 
 places with that Indian. But Indian happiness is as short-lived as that of 
 his white brother; and it is sad to think that this noble red man, so happy 
 yesterday, may have struck an Indian poker game last night, and to-day he 
 may be a total wreck, with nothing to cover his manly form but an old 
 plug hat and a lariat. 
 
 As is well-known to those conversant with the Indian character, the 
 Indians none of them know their ages. Before the advent of the whites 
 in this country their computation of time did not extend beyond moons ; 
 though many of them now understand what a year is, and are able to com 
 pute time by years. Yesterday, an old Indian on Main Street was asked 
 how old he was, and replied he did not know. 
 
 " Do you savvy what a year is ? " he was then asked. 
 
 " Yosh," he replied, " me heap savvy ; most Injun he only savvy moon." 
 
 " Why Injun no count how old by moon ? " asked the red man s ques 
 tioner. 
 
 " Him too goddam lazy count em," returned the brave. 
 
 It is difficult to judge of an Indian s age by his appearance. The 
 exposed life they lead ages them fast, and an Indian at fifty looks as old 
 as a white man does at eighty. This particularly applies to the women ; 
 a squaw at thirty is an old hag. A young squaw begins to lose her youth 
 ful looks in a couple of years after marriage, and grows old in appearance 
 so rapidly that a person who had not seen her in the intervening two 
 years would not recognize her as the same woman at the end of that time. 
 Very few Indians live to an old age, and we are of the opinion that the 
 average age to which they live is not over thirty years. 
 
 A couple of days ago, a squaw died out at Yankee Blade, and the 
 Indians buried her and her infant together, without taking the trouble to 
 make a corpse of the latter. It is the custom with the Piutes and Sho- 
 shones to consign the dead mother and living child when the latter is too 
 young to help itself to a common tomb. In this instance they dug a 
 hole, threw the woman into it, and laid the infant on her breast, covering 
 them both over with brush. In explanation of this, one of the tribe said : 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 221 
 
 "Baby no good; no got milk; bimeby heap cry; die pooty soon 
 anyhow." 
 
 It would be impossible to convince an Indian that he is doing wrong 
 by thus abandoning a helpless infant to the coyotes and carrion birds ; it 
 was the custom of his fathers, and he can see no crime in it. A white man , 
 does not like to interfere, for to try and rear the child would be a hopeless 
 task, and besides, the Indians would feel greatly aggrieved if any one med 
 dled with this pleasant custom. 
 
 The Piutes have established a new settlement on Union Hill, at the 
 head of Cedar Street. The houses are composed of pieces of house-lin 
 ing discarded by the whites, old gunny-sacks, strips of blanket, and any 
 remnants that -the Indians could pick up around town. One aristocratic 
 red man secured a piece of lining large enough to line the Boston Mill, 
 and has erected a mansion of magnificent proportions. It is in this that 
 the nightly festivities are held. A fire is kept burning throughout the 
 night ; and by the light of its flickering flame the noble sons of a fast-fad 
 ing race probe the mysteries of Indian poker, tell of the heroic deeds of 
 their fathers in scalping emigrants and defenseless stage-drivers, and roast 
 the entrails cribbed from their white brother s slaughter-house. Here may 
 be seen the stalwart brave stretched upon his gaudy blanket, smoking the 
 cigarette of peace, and ruminating on the possible supply of cast-off grub 
 on the morrow ; while seated in the shadow is a gentle Hiawatha, mourn 
 ing the loss of her last string of beads, and rocking to and fro, wearily 
 singing the death-song of her tribe; while the pappooses are scattered 
 around promiscuously. 
 
 A daughter of the forest, with a rabbit-skin robe wrapped closely 
 around her noble form, was meditatively meandering along Main Street, 
 this forenoon, and stepped on a slippery place on the sidewalk, and sud 
 denly sat down with a bump that shook the planks. As soon as she had 
 recovered from the shock she cast a glance of indignation at the specta 
 tors, and uttered an ejaculation which indicated that her knowledge of 
 the English language had not been derived from a very refined source ; 
 and arranging her ruffled dignity and other clothes about her, she said to 
 the most boisterous of the spectators, "You heap dam smart!" and 
 marched off as though she didn t care if the world dropped down a hole 
 in three minutes by the watch. A prominent citizen, who slings big words 
 and is very precise in his conversation, remarked that people ought to put 
 ashes on the sidewalks, as it was too bad to see a poor Indian female 
 " prostituted " to the ground in that manner. 
 
222 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 " There," said a prominent citizen on Main Street this morning, point 
 ing to an Indian who was carrying a sack of pine-nuts, " there you see the 
 bounty of Nature to her children, the wise provision which she makes for 
 these untutored savages, who, living in a country to the eye barren of all 
 that is necessary to sustain life, yet find on these sterile hills the means 
 of subsistence in the nutritious pine-nut. The pine-nut," he continued, 
 "grows only in countries possessing characteristics such as we find in Ne 
 vada ; and just look at it, how, by a generous Nature, it is planted here and 
 flourishes to ripeness for the benefit of the aboriginal inhabitants." 
 
 " Ye s," remarked a bystander, " but if Nature wanted to be so 
 
 powerful particular about furnishing grub for these Indians, what made 
 her plant the red cusses in such a God-forsaken country as this in the first 
 place?" 
 
 The other man said that the forces of Nature were so immutable, 
 and cause and effect were so hidden in the deep recesses of mystery, 
 that science had never been able to penetrate them, and he guessed he 
 couldn t answer that question till he had consulted the authorities. 
 
 The Indian children, less fortunate than the white juveniles, are, ex 
 cept in a few isolated instances, unable to procure the luxury of a sled. 
 They take great delight in coasting, but to them to even wish for a sled 
 is to launch out in the direction of the unattainable. To make up for this 
 deprivation they have invented a cheap and simple contrivance for coast 
 ing, which, though less comfortable and more dangerous than a sled, en 
 ables them to pursue the sport after a fashion. Their coasting apparatus 
 consists simply of a barrel stave, and a piece of rope or stout cord passed 
 and fastened through a hole in one end of the stave. They stand with 
 the right foot on this stave, facing the string, which they hold in their 
 hands, and by its means guide their craft ; and giving themselves a start 
 by pushing the left foot on the ground, go scooting down the steep track 
 in the position taken by a boy skating on one skate. They get frequent 
 falls and many bumps, but the little wretches are as tough as a pine knot, 
 and are heedless of the mishaps which befall them. Necessity is as much 
 the mother of invention to the redskin as she is to his white brother. 
 
 A short time ago, a couple of Piute Indians went to a store on Main 
 Street and purchased the entire stock of playing cards contained therein. 
 They took them to their camps, and having secretly marked each one, came 
 back to the store, and putting on that look of misery which only an Indian 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 223 
 
 knows how to assume, whined out that they were "heap broke," and 
 offered to sell them back for one-fourth of what they had paid. The paste 
 boards were purchased on these terms, and were subsequently sold, a pack 
 at a time, to the Shoshone Indians. The Piutes knew that the Shoshones 
 made their purchases at this particular place ; and the guileless Shoshone, 
 unaware of the manipulation, bought and played poker with the wily Piute, 
 
 without a suspicion that all was not as Governor Bradley would say 
 
 " on the dead squarV The result was, the Piutes won all the money the 
 Shoshones possessed, and now there is weeping, and wailing, and gnash 
 ing of teeth, and sackcloth and ashes, in the camp of the Shoshone. 
 
 Belmont Johnny, and Topsey, his affinity, the principals in the Sho 
 shone riot night before last, have buried the hatchet, shaken hands across 
 the bloody chasm, and let the dead past bury its dead. In other words, 
 having both got sober, they have made up the quarrel. They were walk 
 ing Main street together last evening, Topsey all smiles, and Johnny with 
 his head swollen to twice its natural size, and bruised and cut up so that 
 he was hardly recognizable. Topsey, being interviewed, gave an account 
 of the affray of the preceding night, as follows : 
 
 " Johnny heap dlink wiskakee ; heap git mad cause me talk other In- 
 jin ; heap blake my dless ; me git mad. Me knock him down ; heap kick 
 him head ; heap git eben, you bet." 
 
 She further stated that Johnny won ten dollars at poker that day, and 
 had given her a pair of shoes as a peace-offering, and that they had made 
 it up, and were again good friends. Where do the Indians get their 
 whisky ? 
 
 A game of marbles between a white boy and an Indian youth attracted 
 quite a crowd in front of Horton & Sawtelle s, yesterday afternoon. The 
 sympathy of the crowd was, of course, with the white boy; but, either 
 through good luck or skill, the son of the forest got away with the bag 
 gage ; and as the shades of evening closed over the scene, and the sun 
 began to scoot behind the hill, the red boy pocketed the white boy s white 
 alley. With a sigh that seemed to be drawn out of his boots, the last 
 boy brushed the dirt from the knees of his Sunday pants, and went home 
 and read in his Sunday-school book about the fate of the wicked little boy 
 who played marbles on Sunday, who lost all his marbles, ripped the seat 
 of his breeches, got the delights whaled out of him by a big boy, and got 
 an additional dose from his dad as a punishment for letting the other boy 
 lick him. Truly, the way of the transgressor is not soft. 
 
224 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 Printers rollers the rollers with which type is inked on the press 
 are composed of glue and molasses. We don t know the exact ingredients 
 of printers ink, but it probably contains lamp-black, turpentine, epsom- 
 salts, coal-tar, and assafoedita. The combination of the glue and molasses 
 forms a composition which an Indian squaw will eat with as much delight 
 as a white boy will muzzle a jar of preserves. After being used a certain 
 length of time the rollers become impregnated with the ink, and the com 
 position is torn from the stock on which it is fastened, and thrown away. 
 Then is the opportunity of the gentle maidens of the sagebrush. They 
 gather up the discarded material, and squat on the ground, and hold a 
 roller-composition festival. It is the molasses in it that attracts them, and 
 they deceive themselves into the belief that the stuff is a new kind of 
 jujube-paste, a substance which it much resembles in appearance. 
 
 There was a close struggle between the wind and Mr. Indian, this 
 afternoon, for the possession of the latter s blanket. The red man wrapped 
 the blanket closely around his noble form, and the wind tore away at it 
 like "all furiation" ; but the son of the forest finally obtained the victory 
 by sitting on it the blanket, not the victory. Indians fear windy weather 
 far more than snow or cold, as their wickiups protect them in a great meas 
 ure from the two latter. But when a howling wind gets to rampaging and 
 cavorting through the ragged edges of the flimsy wickiup, his house and 
 home are likely to come rattling down on him in the winking of a cat s 
 tail. Captain Tom, a representative specimen of the Piute race, sought 
 shelter in the REVEILLE office during the gale of this* afternoon, and, as he 
 listened to the howling of the wind, remarked : "Him wind dam humbug; 
 heap bustem wickiup." 
 
 Somebody dropped some quicksilver on the sidewalk on Main Street, 
 to-day, and an Indian tried to pick it up. First he made a grab at it with 
 his thumb and forefinger, and was astonished when he found he couldn t 
 pick it up. He was determined to have that quicksilver, anyhow ; so he 
 unwound a handkerchief from his hat, and, spreading it on the ground, got 
 a chip and scraped the quicksilver into it. A look of triumph shot from 
 his eagle eye as he gathered up the four corners of the handkerchief ; but 
 it was replaced by one of horror and disgust when the metal ran through 
 the fabric like water through a sieve. Looking at the metal, as it lay on 
 the ground, in a puzzled sort of way for a moment, he launched a vicious 
 kick at it, and uttering the ejaculation used by a keno-player when some 
 other fellow makes keno, he turned on his heel and left the quicksilver for 
 some other untutored son of the forest to experiment on. 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 225 
 
 Sam, the Indian who cleans the streets, has met with a severe bereave 
 ment in the loss of his oldest wife, who departed this life night before last, 
 at her residence in the Indian camp on the hill back of the City Hall. Sam 
 is grief-stricken over the loss of his helpmeet, and shed tears profusely 
 while telling of it. Said he : " Him woman keep me heap long time ; me 
 so sorry she die ; other wife too young ; no got much sense ; don t keep 
 me so long as old woman." Although he has got a young and pretty wife 
 to console him for his loss, and although the deceased sharer of his sor 
 rows and bearer of his burdens was old and homely, Sam seems to feel 
 very bad over her death, and to not entertain a very great affection for 
 the living wife, who is the best-looking Piute squaw in that portion of the 
 tribe resident here. 
 
 A squaw in a millinery store, purchasing a new " bunnit " to wear at 
 the fandango, which shortly comes off at Stillwater, was what this reporter 
 beheld last evening. She was as fastidious and as hard to please as a 
 white woman is when engaged in a similar pastime, and tried on, and looked 
 in the mirror to see how it became her, nearly every hat in the establish 
 ment. Having made her selection, she rolled it in her handkerchief, and 
 putting it under her arm, marched out of the store, saying to herself in 
 the Indian tongue: "I d just like to see the shape of the copper-colored 
 woman that can put on more style than I can at that fandango." 
 
 The sudden advent of cold weather caught Mr. Indian napping, he 
 not having yet put his house in order, and exchanged his linen ulster for 
 a beaver overcoat lined with sealskin. The old man and his wife and his 
 son and his daughter, likewise his aunt and his mother-in-law, turned out 
 of their wickiup early this morning, and the whole family might have been 
 seen shivering over the bonfires built on Main Street of the rubbish swept 
 out from the stores. Last week, the noble son of the forest elevated his 
 nose and uttered an unseemly ejaculation when offered work; to-day, he 
 goes around pleading for a chance to chop a little wood, saying : " Heap 
 cold ; me heap dam hungly." 
 
 Judge John is a venerable sage of the Piute tribe, whose face is fa 
 miliar to the majority of the people of Austin. The Judge usually wears 
 a dilapidated plug hat, but when he came into the REVEILLE office this 
 morning his head was destitute of that adornment, its place being supplied 
 by a dirty and tattered cloth. 
 15 
 
226 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 "Where s your plug, John?" inquired our devil, addressing himself 
 to the Indian and pointing at his head. And the red man made answer 
 thus : 
 
 " Me flug him heap git old ; maybeso heap pooty quick heap blake 
 (break) ; me put him my wickiup so keep him for Sunday. Sunday heap 
 my head put em on flug; heap put em on style all same Jludge Logan." 
 
 The fine weather has encouraged the Indians to resume playing mar 
 bles, and numerous groups of them were to be seen about the streets to 
 day engaged in that absorbing sport. To an unaccustomed eye, it looks 
 strange to see a lot of grown-up men, ranging in age from twenty to forty 
 years, playing marbles with all the glee and interest of ten-year old white 
 boys ; but we are used to it in this country, and it excites no comment. 
 In such a matter as play, the Indian is but a child, and it is a common 
 thing for adult Indians and fathers of families to indulge in the sports of 
 small white boys. Tops, marbles, and sleds are favorite pastimes with the 
 Indians, and, next to food and whisky, are looked upon by them as the 
 grandest products of the white man s civilization. 
 
 The provident Indian covers his hat with a dirty handkerchief to pro 
 tect it from the snow. The improvident Indian hasn t got either hat or 
 handkerchief. The provident Indian is the one that is successful at poker. 
 When the red man gambles, he plays for all that s out. As " the boys " 
 say, " he s blooded " ; and when luck is against him, he plays off hat, coat, 
 boots, horse, wife, everything. When he has had a run of bad luck, and 
 the weather is as severe as that of to-day, he lays down behind a woodpile 
 and takes his solemn oath that he will never touch another card as long as 
 he lives; but soon recovers from his fit of despondency, and hunts a job 
 to earn money with which to again woo the fickle goddess. 
 
 An aged squaw, who had evidently struck a bonanza of discarded 
 clothes, strutted proudly up the center of Main Street this forenoon. Over 
 her ragged dress she wore a tattered under-garment of the feminine persua 
 sion, what edges were left of it being richly embroidered. We don t know 
 the name of the article, but do know that it was not a gentleman s shirt. 
 The head of the aboriginal female was decorated with a hat that once was 
 new, garnished with feathers, flowers, and ribbons, all tattered and torn, 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 227 
 
 and her feet were encased in a pair of miner s boots. Under her arm she 
 carried a yellow cur, and as she strutted through the street she was the 
 observed of all observers, and seemed conscious and proud of the attention 
 her appearance attracted. 
 
 The horse trough on Main Street, just above the REVEILLE office, is 
 where the Indians who live and have their being in and about Austin per 
 form their ablutions. The washing is confined to their faces, hands, and 
 hair ; their bodies are never washed from the moment of birth until they 
 are summoned to the happy hunting ground. Taking a bath would be 
 considered by a Shoshone or Piute as an unwarrantable waste of water, 
 which at least shows that they feel the touch of nature which makes a good 
 many people kin; as now and again, during the course of the white man s 
 career, he meets with instances where white men and women take a simi 
 lar view to the Indian on the bath question. 
 
 Some people think it very funny to chaff a squaw, and sometimes, 
 when the squaw talks back, they don t think it quite so funny. A case in 
 point occurred in town the other day. A group of men were standing in 
 front of a popular Main Street saloon, when a squaw leading a pappoose 
 came along. One of the party hailed the squaw with 
 
 " Hello, Sally, whose baby is that ? " 
 
 The daughter of the forest stopped and eyed her questioner, and then, 
 pointing her finger at him, said earnestly : 
 
 " Him your pappoose." 
 
 There was considerable laughing from the bystanders, but they were 
 not laughing at the squaw. 
 
 Captain Tom entered our sanctum, this morning, and informed us that 
 he "maybeso heap go Carson, see Governor Bradley; maybeso heap 
 catchum beef," and requested us to furnish him with a paper. By virtue 
 of the authority vested in us, we drew up a paper for the worthy Captain, 
 commending him to the good will of all white men, who are therein di 
 rected to furnish Tom and his family with whatever cast-off clothes or 
 victuals they may need. The document is adorned with eleven gilt and 
 five red seals, and its imposing appearance will command the awe and re 
 spect of every Indian in the country. Thomas inclosed the document in 
 the lining of his plug hat, fully satisfied that it was carte blanche to beg 
 in any part of the civilized globe. 
 
228 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 Human nature is the same the world over, and an Indian child takes 
 as much pleasure in a doll as does a white one. We were amused this 
 afternoon by observing a little Indian girl, apparently about three years old, 
 who had found the head of a china doll, probably cast away by some 
 white child, which she was fondling and nursing and talking to after the 
 manner of ordinary doll-mothers. Frequently we see on the street little 
 mites of Indian girls with miniature baskets, containing rag pappooses, on 
 their backs, which answer the same purpose to them as the most expensive 
 and elaborately-gotten-up doll does to a white child. 
 
 The sun has shone brightly to-day, and the daughters of the forest 
 took advantage of the circumstance to squat on the street corners where 
 its rays could strike them squarely, and get out their fine-tooth combs and 
 sticks of cosmetic, and shine up their luxuriant locks and make it warm for 
 insect life. At noon to-day, they could be seen scattered all over the north 
 side of Main Street, and all busily engaged in some occupation. Some 
 were playing cards, some making gowns, some spanking their pappooses, 
 and others stringing beads. They seem to be a happy set, and the summit 
 of bliss is reached by them when they have full stomachs and can find a 
 streak of sunshine to bask in. 
 
 Everybody has heard of the costume of the Georgia major, which 
 consisted of a collar and pair of spurs ; but a young Indian appeared on 
 Main Street to-day in a costume almost as scanty. It consisted of a 
 jacket and a piece of buckskin string. The appearance of the young ab 
 origine created a great deal of merriment among the people on the street, 
 but we noticed that most of the ladies either turned up a side street or 
 only looked at him from behind their pocket-handkerchiefs. The child 
 was too young to appreciate the attention he attracted, but his father 
 seemed proud that his offspring was so generally noticed by the white men. 
 
 On Saturday night last, a Piute, with disheveled hair, distended eyes, 
 and a general look of wildness, rushed into Sower s store r and throwing 
 down a dollar, excitedly exclaimed : 
 
 " Gimme deck cards and four bits candles ! " 
 
 We knew by his excitement and eagerness to obtain the articles that 
 a big poker game must be in progress on the hill, so we questioned him 
 regarding it. 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 229 
 
 "Yes," he replied, "heap big poker game; me heap loser; play em 
 all night maybeso get even ; hell ! dam ! " and grabbing the cards and 
 candles he struck a bee-line for the camp on the hill. 
 
 A sqjj^v sat down on the curb in front of the Post-Office, this fore 
 noon, and unrolling a bundle of calico, commenced to manufacture a dress. 
 In less than an hour it was finished ; and putting it on over her old clothes, 
 she pulled out a pin here, a peg there, and untied a string in another place, 
 made one step, and, presto ! the old clothes lay in the gutter. Gathering 
 up the rags just shed, the noble daughter of the sagebrush cast one look of 
 triumph on the spectators, and skipped gracefully off in the direction of the 
 Indian camp, as proud as a Saratoga belle at the first ball of the season. 
 
 Captain Breckenridge, sub-chief of the Piutes, called on us in our 
 sanctum yesterday, and requested that we would " put em in noo paper 
 that he was in town, come Stillwater four days." The reason he assigned 
 for desiring this notice inserted was, that he wanted Naches, the chief, to 
 know he was here ; and some white man in Winnemucca would read the 
 paper and tell it to Naches. Breckenridge told us all about his visit to 
 San Francisco to see General McDowell, and said that city "too many 
 people, heap, lots people," and he even hinted that there are more people 
 in that city than there are in Austin. 
 
 We did not attend the grand ball given by the Piutes to the Sho- 
 shones in Crow Caiion last night ; but Captain Steve informs us that it 
 was a grand success, and that Pine-nut Jane was the belle throughout the 
 early part of the evening ; but that, unfortunately, she became involved in 
 a game of Indian poker with Horned-toad Sally, in which she lost her gor 
 geous attire on a queen-full, and her place as belle was taken by the afore 
 said Sally. Steve says everything passed off peaceably. " No dlinkum 
 whisakee.; .no fightum." 
 
 No class of our population takes more kindly to the sport of coasting 
 than the Indians ; and during the time when the fun is at its height, the 
 sled of the red man may be seen moving, with democratic familiarity, 
 close to that of his white brother. The white man coasts noisily ; the In- 
 
230 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 dian quietly. The first goes with a shout ; a " hi-hi," or a toot-horn ; the 
 latter never utters a sound until the end of the track is reached. He sits 
 on his sled oblivious to all earthly things but the sport in which he is en 
 gaged, his face beaming with pleasure and excitement, but by no sound 
 does he betray how thoroughly and entirely his soul is filled with the en 
 joyment of the moment. 
 
 Yesterday morning, while passing down Main Street, we observed a 
 squaw seated on the sidewalk dandling her babe. The infant was not to 
 exceed a week old, and all the covering on it consisted of a breech-clout ; 
 but, though the air was raw and sharp, it did not seem to suffer in the 
 least from the cold, but crowed as merrily as if its father owned the big 
 bonanza, and it was clad in purple and fine linen, and a patent India-rubber 
 what-you-call- em . 
 
 A resident of Austin has an Indian employed in chopping wood at 
 his residence, and that the aforesaid is an aborigine who goes through the 
 world with his eyes open is evidenced by what is as follows narrated : 
 
 Yesterday (Sunday) the Indian refused to chop any wood, and when 
 his employer asked him the reason of his refusal, he replied : 
 
 " Heap no work Sunday ; all same whita man, heap play poker." 
 
 Jim evidently recognizes Sunday as a day of rest in its full sense. 
 
 Not more than a dozen Indians .are left in town, and the absence of 
 the noble red men and their consorts creates a blank not easily filled. For 
 washing, chopping wood, and various other menial services, the sons and 
 daughters of the forest are able and reliable citizens, and those who de 
 pend on them to perform such services sadly deplore their absence ; but 
 the pine-nut crop must be gathered if every restaurant in town has to close 
 its doors and if every woman has to die at the wash-tub and lose her 
 piano practice. 
 
 Owing to the near approach of the Fourth of July, the Piutes are 
 disinclined to leave Austin and go to Stillwater, as requested by a mes 
 sage from Brcckenridge, their sub-chief. They say they are doing pretty 
 well here, and that it they go to Stillwater, " maybeso heap hungry." 
 
 There was never a small white boy that looked forward to the Fourth 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 231 
 
 of July with more joyous anticipation than does an Indian, and he would 
 rather sacrifice his chances of salvation than miss the opportunity of tak 
 ing a hand in the celebration of that day. 
 
 Belmont Johnny, a Shoshone Indian, hailed us on the street yester 
 day, and asked us if we knew how to " mark stamped cards." Of course 
 we immediately denied the possession of any such wicked knowledge ; but 
 the guileless Indian thinks a newspaper editor knows everything. How 
 ever, we asked Johnny the object of his question, and he explained that 
 he wanted to get some white man to mark a deck of cards for him, and 
 teach him to read them by the backs. 
 
 "And what then, Johnny?" 
 
 And in reply he said : 
 
 " Me heap break every Piute son of gun in Austin." 
 
 The Indian did not use the word "gun" as above quoted, but we 
 substitute it for the word he really did say, as a figure of speech, as it 
 were. Johnny speaks English plainly, and has acquired to its full extent 
 the white man s facility of forcible expression. 
 
 The noble red man has found a new sphere of usefulness, and in defi 
 ance of the Civil Rights Bill has trenched upon a field hitherto given over 
 exclusively to the colored man. We refer to the art of whitewashing, in 
 the practice of which we to-day saw a stalwart brave engaged. He han 
 dled the brush with all the dexterity of his African prototype, and his ad 
 miring squaw, who sat on the ground watching him, remarked to a by 
 stander : 
 
 . " Maybeso bimebye, him heap paint, all same white man." 
 
 We can imagine no greater misery than to be a non-English-speaking 
 Indian in such weather as the present. Put yourself in his place, and im 
 agine yourself the inhabitant of a residence composed of old gunny-sacks 
 and containing more holes than house, and then depict to yourself the 
 affliction of being unable to curse the weather in a string of good, round, 
 North American oaths. The Indian language contains no words capable 
 of expressing a man s true inwardness under such circumstances. 
 
232 THE SAZERAO LYING CLUB. 
 
 Sacramento is excited over a red-headed squaw, who is looked upon 
 there as a great curiosity. She would not be a curiosity in Reese River 
 Valley, where young Indians with hair of all the shades that hair assumes 
 can be seen at any time. Only the other day we saw a squaw sitting on 
 the curbstone on Main Street, who had true blonde hair and a pull-back 
 dress. In reply to a question as to the paternity of the half-breed, one of 
 her companion squaws simply said : " Heap coalburner." 
 
 The rage with the white boys at present is kites, and of course the 
 Indian boys follow suit, and imitate to the best of their crude ability. The 
 kite is a new revelation to the Indian, but he takes to it naturally never 
 theless. The kite used by the Indian boys is a clumsy affair at best just 
 a piece of paper tied to a string, and it will not fly ; but the red urchins 
 get lots of fun out of it and play with it by the hour, fondly hugging the 
 delusion that they are flying a kite. 
 
 In front of the Cosmopolitan Saloon, yesterday afternoon, three stal 
 wart Piutes were engaged in a game of Indian poker, the stakes in which 
 were chewing-gum. Each Indian would bite off a piece from the wad of 
 gum in his mouth and place it in the " pot," and the one holding the high 
 hand would rake down the three pieces and put them in his mouth. The 
 sons of the forest were as deeply absorbed in the game as if the stakes had 
 been thousands. 
 
 The love-making season has opened among the Indians, and house 
 keepers find it almost impossible to secure their services for the various 
 kinds of labor to which they are accustomed. A lady of this city, this 
 morning, sent her little boy to find an Indian to chop some wood. After 
 an absence of several hours the boy returned and laconically reported : 
 
 " Can t get one ; all off huntin squaws." 
 
 A picture of happiness, supreme and complete, is an Indian lad with 
 two hats on his head, a man s boot on one foot, a woman s gaiter on the 
 other, and a flag of truce fluttering in the wind from a breach in his rear 
 entrenchments, as he skips along trying to fly a white boy s discarded kite, 
 and both ignorant and unmindful of the philosophy of the tail. 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 233 
 
 Some squaws found a battered umbrella in the street this morning, 
 and they thought it was a ready-made wickiup. A brave who sat smok 
 ing a cigarette on a goods box, watching the dusky maidens as they squat 
 ted under the umbrellageous shade, remarked to a white brother standing 
 near: 
 
 " Injun squaw all same white squaw ; heap scared sun freeze him face, 
 no look pooty." 
 
 The snow was falling thick and fast, and a member of one of the 
 first Piute families sat shivering under the shelter of an abandoned char 
 coal sack, which served him for a blanket. As the REVEILLE reporter 
 passed him, Lo the poor Indian raised his noble head, and cocking his left- 
 eye up toward the obscured sky, remarked in piteous tones : 
 
 " Heap dam cold to-day." 
 
 An Indian came into our sanctum, to-day, to tell us about the eclipse. 
 He said the Indian word for an eclipse of the sun is " annonguiyaipe," 
 which signifies, literally, buried "All same you dead and cold and covered 
 up in the ground." 
 
 People who imagine that the Indian cannot be civilized and educated 
 would acknowledge themselves mistaken were they to see an Indian youth 
 knuckling down close to a china alley, and hear him cry " Fen kicks ! " 
 and " Knuckle down close, you son-of-a-cloudburst t " 
 
 Some white men tackled some Indians in a game of Indian poker to 
 day ; but the son of the forest rung in a cold deck and cleaned up all the 
 money on the blanket, and then the pale faces said he was a son of some 
 thing else than the forest. 
 
 The Indians have evidently heard of Pleasanton s blue-glass cure. 
 Yesterday afternoon, a sick Piute was sitting in the sun on Union street, 
 clad only in a pair of blue overalls and a pair of blue-glass goggles. 
 
234 THE SAZEEAG LYING CLUB. 
 
 Hans. 
 
 There is a barber shop in Austin conducted by Germans, and in their 
 employment is a Chinaman whom they have dubbed " Hans." He is an 
 observing Celestial, and, like all of his race, apt in learning American cus 
 toms and phrases. The Chinese are notoriously imitative, and about the 
 first thing American that they learn is to swear. Their native vocabulary 
 has no words of such strong emphasis as the Nevada oath, and conse 
 quently the acquisition of a language containing words that enables a man 
 to give a full expression to his true feelings, is one of the greatest boons 
 the Mongolian has gained by the contact with our superior civilization. 
 Hans is doubly fortunate in this respect ; for, in addition to his knowledge 
 of nearly all the leading American expletives, he has a fair^tore of the 
 most elaborate German oaths and by-words, and can swear grammatically 
 in the two languages, with dialectic variations. He is quite a philosopher 
 in his way, and loud in denunciations of the leading vices and sins of his 
 race. .Among other things he abhors opium-smoking. The habit is a 
 curse to any people, and contact with the Chinese has corrupted a large 
 number of the young men and women of the Pacific Coast to the adoption 
 of this terrible, degrading, mind, body, and soul-destroying evil. It is 
 practiced almost universally by the Chinese, and is spreading among the 
 whites to such an extent that stringent legislation and strong prohibitory 
 laws have been found necessary to check its demoralization of our youth. 
 Knowing the strong opinions entertained by Hans on this subject, and 
 having myself seen its effects in the lack-luster eyes and wretched faces 
 of those whites who were addicted to the habit, I one day questioned 
 him as to the effects of the use of the drug on his countrymen. His reply 
 was prompt, terse, and to the point. Said he : 
 
 " Chinaman smoke opium one year, he all same monkey, all same white 
 man " ; a comparison I did not appreciate, but which served to show that 
 a frank answer is not always flattering. 
 
 Hans is also opposed to the female slavery practices of his country 
 men. The Chinese who immigrate to America are seldom accompanied 
 by their families. They do not come here to remain, and therefore have 
 no home ties. The majority of the males are brought to this coast under 
 a system of coolieism, which, although not actual slavery, is the next thing 
 to it. But the women who come are absolute slaves, having a high value 
 as chattels, varying with age, physical attractions, and condition. They 
 are imported by the wealthy Chinamen of San Francisco if not directly 
 by the great " Six Companies," which control all the Chinese in America 
 and the purpose of their importation is the vilest that can be conceived. 
 Hans is about the only Chinaman whom I ever heard denounce this in 
 famous system. He says it is " too muchee bad ; sell woman all same 
 Melican man sell mule " ; and ho expresses a determination never to own 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 235 
 
 one of his countrywomen by this method. Talking about matrimony, he 
 said : 
 
 " Me get lich, me go Chiny, make love nicee tiptop Chiny girl ; heap 
 marry him, all same white man." 
 
 But when asked if he would bring his wife to this country, he replied: 
 
 " Not by dam sight. Some dam tiefee Chinaman stealee him and sell 
 him." 
 
 Once, a Chinaman passing the shop where Hans is employed, and see 
 ing him engaged in putting a shine on a customer s boots, derisively called 
 him something which sounded like " Tu-na-ma-hing highlowjackaudthe- 
 game," which Hans afterward explained was Chinese for bootblack. Hans 
 immediately replied in good, solid English, " Go to blazes, you rat-eating 
 scrub!" and in a tone that indicated the utmost contempt for everything 
 wearing pig-tails, " Me no washwoman Chinaman." 
 
 Hong Sing claimed that Sam Hing owed him two hundred dollars; 
 Sam Hing said he didn t, and both Celestials agreed to leave the matter to 
 the arbitration of the heads of the different wash-house companies in town, 
 who consulted together and pronounced a verdict that Hing must go down 
 to the graveyard and solemnly cut off a rooster s head that he was not in 
 debted to Sing in the above named amount, decreeing likewise that Hing 
 should pay Sing $2.50 for taking the oath a sort of notary s fee, as it were. 
 In accordance with this verdict the parties litigant, in company with a 
 number of other Chinamen, armed with knives, bludgeons, and six-shooters, 
 repaired to the graveyard, where Hing decapitated the fowl over the grave 
 of a departed countryman, and solemnly asseverated that he didn t owe 
 Sing a dog-goned cent. Sing paid Hing the $2.50 for taking the oath, and 
 then foolishness was about to commence ; but the City Marshal, who was 
 on the watch, stepped in and read the riot act, and disarmed the party, 
 capturing a number of six-shooters, knives, and iron bars. Had it not been 
 for the interference of the Marshal, there would have been bloodshed, 
 and Hong Sing s bones would have been put in condition for shipment to 
 the Flowery Kingdom. He remarked to the Marshal that " maybe so you 
 no come, me no more washee." 
 
 Owing to the high license levied on banking games by the State laws, 
 the Chinese of Austin no longer play their national game of " Tan," but 
 have substituted therefor the good, old-fashioned, North American draw- 
 poker. Each night, when the hour arrives for business, a Celestial stands 
 on the single street of Chinatown, and, in a voice which can be heard 
 
236 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 throughout the quarter and the neighborhood surrounding, proclaims that 
 the game is open to all comers. The proclamation is uttered in the Chi 
 nese language, and literally translated is as follows : 
 
 " Hear ye ! Hear ye ! The poker game of the Chinese quarter, in and 
 for Lander County, State of Nevada, is now open ; free for all, without 
 regard to age, sex, or previous condition of servitude. Come one, come 
 all white, black, yellow, and copper-colored and take a hand in the 
 game of the barbarian." 
 
 When the crier has concluded, the Chinamen rush into the house 
 where the game is played, and business commences. There is scarcely a 
 night that white men may not be seen, side by side with Chinese, deep in 
 the mysteries of poker ; and, though the white players cannot translate 
 the words of the proclamation, they know by the sound and by instinctive 
 feeling that it is a solemn announcement of the opening of the game. 
 
 Out at the Chase Mine, New York Canon, the miners have been greatly 
 troubled by mountain rats. They have been a particular source of annoy 
 ance to the Chinese cook, and he had vowed by all the gods of the Flowery 
 Kingdom to wreak a bitter vengeance on the first marauding rodent which 
 should fall into his clutches. Last Saturday, while busily engaged in cut 
 ting meat for the morning s hash, he heard a rustling noise, and looking 
 round, saw what he supposed to be a rat s head protruding through a crack 
 in the floor. Seizing a carving-fork, and gliding stealthily up to the ob 
 ject, he plunged it into its body, and, with a yell of triumph, uplifted the 
 impaled animal, exclaiming, "Me catchee dam lat! " The miners, hearing 
 his cries, rushed into the kitchen ; but paused on the threshold, for they 
 smelt a smell. About this time, the Chinaman smelt something too, and 
 exclaiming, " Hi yah, me smellee hell ! " dropped the fork, and broke from 
 the room. The animal which he had impaled was one of the genus known 
 scientifically as Mephitis Americana, vulgarly termed a skunk. 
 
 A Chinaman with a terrapin attracted a crowd on one of the street 
 corners, at noon yesterday, and various were the conjectures as to what 
 kind of a bug it might be. One called it a mud-turtle, another an ostrich, 
 and one man was even bold enough to pronounce it a whale. The Indians, 
 who composed a portion of the crowd, were greatly puzzled over what 
 was to them an entirely strange bird ; and one noble red man, in reply to 
 an inquiry as to his opinion of what it was, said, "Maybe-so him father 
 tarantuhi ; him mother horn-toad." The Chinaman stated that he had a 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 237 
 
 dozen of them, for which he asked one dollar apiece ; and when one of the 
 crowd tried to cheapen the animal he said : 
 
 " Yesterday me sell em one dollar quartan; man keep saloon buy one, 
 and woman like one put him in cage all same -bird. Me got too many; 
 sell him one dollah belly cheap." 
 
 All Chinatown was drunk last night, owing to the copious potations 
 of rice brandy indulged in by the Chinamen at the dinner in honor of the 
 opening of the new store of the Fat Chung Company. During the night 
 the Chinamen got up a game something on the principle of " Simon says 
 thumbs up," the penalty of losing being that the loser must take a drink 
 of China brandy. White men were allowed to take part in the game, and 
 one of them, as soon as he dropped on it that the loser had to take a drink, 
 commenced "throwing off," and got "stuck" every time. His dodge 
 was soon detected by the Chinamen, and before the white player had lost 
 games enough to get up a respectable drunk, he was indignantly u barred 
 out " of the game, and ignominiously " fired out " of the house. 
 
 A Celestial maiden named Sing Loy passed in her checks, in China 
 town, yesterday afternoon, from the effects of a dose of opium adminis 
 tered with suicidal intent. Jealousy was the cause which led the maiden 
 to commit the rash act which terminated her earthly career and shut her 
 off forever from breathing the rarefied atmosphere of this altitudinous re 
 gion. She was the wife, or chattel, of " Doc," a Chinaman. The bereaved 
 " Doc " is almost inconsolable over his loss, as the woman cost him $400 
 when she was new. Her remains were borne to the silent tomb in a job- 
 wagon this forenoon, being followed to the grave by a solitary heathen, 
 who, when asked the occasion of so light-waisted a funeral, replied : 
 
 " Chinawoman takee medicine, heap die, no Chinaman go funelal. 
 Him sick, heap die, plenty Chinaman go funelal." 
 
 Yesterday being the last of the Chinese New Year, the heathen gave 
 a grand jubilistic blow-out, and made night hideous with the notes of the 
 one-stringed fiddle, the gong, the tom-tom, the Chinese bag-pipes, and other 
 ear-splitting instruments of their native land. At midnight the entire 
 population of Chinatown united in singing the Chinese national hymn, 
 which sounded like the expiring howls of three thousand poisoned dogs, 
 
238 THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 with variations by several hundred feline musicians. The music and the 
 firing of bombs and crackers was kept up almost until daylight ; and many 
 a man who before was indifferent to the Chinese question, arose this morn 
 ing from his restless couch and expressed a determination to sign a peti 
 tion for the immediate abrogation of the Burlingame treaty. 
 
 The Chinese are firm believers in necromancy, fortune-telling, arid 
 kindred arts. The visions seen while under the influence of opium are by 
 them interpreted into meanings. Several Chinamen in this city make a 
 profession of fortune-telling. Their method is to take a smoke of opium, 
 from the effects of which they have visions, from which they interpret 
 whether certain sick persons will die or get well, or whether certain indi 
 viduals will win or lose in gambling games in which they propose to engage. 
 They have a small ivory figure to assist them in he interpretations, which 
 represents a certain god who never sleeps, eats, or drinks, and never dies. 
 If the seer s prognostications are verified, he is a smart fellow ; if not, the 
 blame is laid on the god, whom they charge with being bewitched, and he 
 is thrown away and a new ivory god purchased in his stead. 
 
 A few nights ago, a Chinaman was coming up on the stage from Battle 
 Mountain. He was thinly clad, having no warmer clothes than a regula 
 tion Chinese blouse and trowsers, and being destitute of blankets. % The 
 night was fearfully cold, and the Celestial suffered severely ; but for a long 
 time he bore the hardship with the meekness and patience so characteristic 
 of his race. He tried to sleep, and snuggled down on the floor with his 
 head under one seat and his feet under the other ; but the pitching and 
 rolling of the stage over the cut-up and frozen roads bumped him unmerci 
 fully, until at last even his Chinese stolidity gave way, and he rose from 
 his uncomfortable position on the floor, and seating himself on the front 
 seat, said to the other passengers : 
 
 " Hell dam ! Thissee lodgee house no good." 
 
 Even the Indians have their grievances against the Chinese. Captain 
 Thompson, the Piute oracle, came into the REVEILLE office this morning, 
 and inquired if it was the intention of the whites to drive the Chinamen 
 out of town. It was explained to him that the white people desired to 
 
INDIANS AND CHINESE. 239 
 
 get rid of the Celestials, but by peaceable means. This did not seem to 
 suit Thompson, and he indignantly exclaimed : 
 
 " ISTo good ! Why no whita man heap kill dam Chinaman ? China 
 man heap all same bad." 
 
 When asked in what particular the Asiatics were so bad, he said : 
 "Him Chinaman too dam schmart (smart) all time heap cheat em 
 Injin play poker." 
 
 The 21st instant is the Chinese festival of something or other, when 
 they decorate the graves of their dead with roast pigs, cups of tea, rice, 
 confections, slips of red paper, and other Chinese edibles. As in this 
 country a license tax is affixed to almost everything, John got it into his 
 collective head that he would be required to take out a license to feed his 
 dead, and a delegation of him waited upon the City Marshal to inquire 
 "how muchee licee." The officer gave them permission to hold their fes 
 tival without money and without price, and on the date mentioned the 
 graves will be decorated in accordance with Chinese custom. This will 
 offer to the numerous tramps now in Austin a most magnificent opportunity 
 for a moonlight picnic if the coyotes don t get there ahead of them. 
 
 A Chinese merchant came into the REVEILLE office this morning to 
 purchase some paper, and while waiting for the boy to bring the paper, he 
 asked us if we had heard of the " big Chinaman fight in Virginriy." On our 
 replying in the affirmative, he heaved a deep sigh, and said : 
 
 " Him Chinaman allee same dam fool ; him got littlee money ; then 
 him fight, and give allee him money to dam lawyer for makee talk ; then 
 him lawyer he too muchee talk, and Chinaman him bloke, and go washee 
 for money for give him big-mouf lawyer." 
 
 This particular heathen don t seem to entertain a very high opinion 
 of the legal fraternity. 
 
 A delegation of the Chinese residents waited on the City Marshal to 
 day, and preferred a request that he lock up the members of the Sazerac 
 Lying Club in the City Jail until after the souls of the dead Chinamen had 
 had a chance at the food they intended to pile on the graves of those de 
 parted Celestials to-day. The Marshal could find nothing in the city char 
 ter and ordinances authorizing such a proceeding, and the Chinamen con 
 cluded to stuff the pigs and chickens with nitro-glycerine and garlic. 
 
240 
 
 THE SAZEEAC LYING CLUB. 
 
 Two Chinamen entered the telegraph office this morning, and inquired 
 the cost of a telegram to Hongkong or Nagasaki, as they said that some 
 cousins of theirs were passengers on the ill-fated steamer Japan. The 
 operator informed them that the cost would be in the neighborhood of $100, 
 when one of them exclaimed : 
 
 " Me no send em ; bundled dollah too much for dead Chinaman ! " 
 
pONTENTSx 
 
 FRONTIER SKETCHES, 
 
 INDIANS AND CHINESE, 
 
 LIFE IN A MINING TOWN, 
 
 OLD DAD, 
 
 ORIGIN OF THE SAZERAC LYING CLUB, 
 
 STUB, 
 
 SOME LIES AND OTHERWISE, 
 
 UNCLE JOHN, - 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 107 
 
 207 
 
 145 
 
 20 
 
 9 
 
 27 
 37 
 13 
 
 16 
 
 CMT