Forty-one Thieves: A Tale of California by Angelo Hall (best books under 200 pages .txt) 📖

were up and the family sought an extension of the lease, the rent went up to one pound an acre. This was pretty hard; but by frugality and perseverance the family still prospered. At the end of the second forty-nine years the rent demanded was five pounds an acre. Think of it—twenty-five dollars a year! That was too much to endure, so my father, then a young blacksmith, was sent over to Canada to buy land. He bought three farms of a hundred acres each, one for himself, one for his brother, and one for their father, paying four dollars an acre. Here again the rich man had the upper hand. For this same land had been sold by the British Government to capitalists for twenty-five cents an acre. Of course, my people had no money to pay cash down, but they quit Scotland nevertheless. They came over in 1832, in a small sailing vessel, which took four weeks to make the passage. Then came another struggle. The land was very productive, but money was scarce and crops brought hardly anything. But at least the Mason family had enough to eat. Finally, after many years, the mortgages were paid off, and the family established."

The doctor paused, and Mat thought he saw a reason for Scotch grit. He contrasted such a history with the get-rich-quick methods of California!

"America," continued the doctor, "is the land of opportunity. With good health and industry the poor man can succeed." And he looked at Mat significantly.

CHAPTER XII The Golden Summer Comes Again

The golden summer had come again. To old man Palmer, living alone on the top of Fillmore Hill, the great snow banks stored high upon the mountains meant abundance of water for mining. The strange flowers of California, yellow and red, grown familiar now after many years, made their appeal to him. With the returning summer he welcomed the yellow bird with red crown and black wings. He loved the exhilarating air and the glorious sunshine. But I am afraid the golden glow of morning suggested gold.

He was cleaning up several square rods of bed-rock in the ancient river bed on the hill-top, and the dirt was rich in gold. Every morning early, leaving his breakfast dishes unwashed, he carefully shoveled this dirt into his sluices, and watched the water carry mud and sand away. Once in a while he would shut off the water to examine the rich amalgam at each cleat across the trough, removing that which was saturated with gold and replacing it with fresh mercury. This clean-up was going to be especially good, and he was glad to be alone.

Treasure like this would tempt his lawless neighbors. He wanted no such rogues round as they had at Angels Camp, Calaveras County, where, according to his last copy of "The California Democrat," the post-office had been robbed of a thousand dollars, including one hundred dollars' worth of postage stamps. Postage stamps! He laughed to think to what straits thieves had come in Calaveras County.

Then he thought of his own hard-earned treasures, safely locked up in the Hibernia Bank of San Francisco and with D. O. Mills of Sacramento. Some day kindred back in Connecticut would have cause to praise his frugality and self-denial. Sometimes he thought of his blasted romance and of the poor woman in San Francisco who scrubbed floors for an honest living. Ah, well, life is hard. His own years of toil were nearly over, as he knew by unmistakable signs. Perhaps this rich clean-up would be his last. And so it was; though nearly two years elapsed before a merciful Providence released the old man from this world where thieves break through and steal the fruits of our labors.

The Woolsey boys, young men now, with the strength of the hills in bone and muscle, were the old man's chief reliance. They could see that he was failing, and felt sincerely sorry. They noted with what grim determination he stuck to his work. The tenacity inherited from a hundred generations of strong men, farmers, sea-kings, warriors, nerved his old arms and kept strong the will within him.

One day about the first of August, in the early afternoon when the sun is hottest, they found the old man within doors, washing dishes.

"Sit down, Mr. Palmer," said John, the older of the boys, "and we will do the dishes for you."

"Well, boys, go ahead. I know what famous pot-wrastlers ye be. I can't compete with you." And he gladly sat down, to examine a legal document the boys had brought him. For one Dupre, who had a rough farm at the bottom of the cañon and sold the old man vegetables, had sued him for damages, because the dirt washed down from Palmer's diggings had covered up a few square rods of grass land. The damage was slight, but the Frenchman was thrifty, and had sued for a round sum. Palmer was quite willing to pay actual damages, but he had refused to be robbed. A compromise had finally been made, and Dupre agreed to withdraw his suit upon the payment of fifty dollars. To this contract the old man now affixed his signature, in a very shaky hand.

"There, I'm glad that's settled," said he. And a moment later he had fallen out of his chair upon the floor.

Miner's paralysis! Even the Woolsey boys knew the symptoms. They lifted the old man up and put him on his bed, gave him whiskey, and then consulted as to their next duty. They could not leave him there alone upon the mountain-top; nor was it an easy matter to descend to the bottom of the cañon for help.

"You stay here, Charley," said John, "and I'll go for Dr. Mason."

"That won't do, Jack. It will be five o'clock before you can cross the cañon, and dark by the time you reach North Bloomfield. Alleghany City is the place to strike for. Get Dr. Lefevre over there. They say he can cure paralysis if any man can."

"It's no easy trip to Alleghany, either," said John thoughtfully. "The cañon of Wolf Creek is as bad as the cañon of the Middle Yuba. And there's Kanaka Creek beyond."

"Then again, whichever way you go," responded his brother, "you ain't sure of finding the doctor. Better take the old man with us and make for Alleghany, I guess."

This seemed the most feasible plan. So they saddled Palmer's sure-footed horse, put his sick master into the saddle, and started down the trail across the cañon of Wolf Creek. It was a long, hard trip. To the Woolsey boys, holding and steadying the old man, the cañon had never seemed so deep. At last they reached the Plumbago Mine, on the opposite height, where they borrowed two mules to carry them the rest of the way. It was easy going now as far as Chipp's Flat. Late in the evening they climbed the steep trail from Kanaka Creek to Alleghany City, took their charge to the hotel, and hunted up Dr. Lefevre.

So began a long, hard sickness, the first serious sickness Robert Palmer had suffered since his arrival in the gold fields. For days he lay helpless. As soon as he was sufficiently recovered to take notice of his surroundings, he begged to be moved from the noisy hotel, with its sickening smells, to the cabin of an old friend named Lee, who lived some distance from the main street.

There are not more than half a dozen streets in Alleghany City, the principal one being the road along the mountain-side, which, leaving the village, climbs up over an ancient stream of lava, and crossing the summit of the mountain plunges down to Forest City. Dr. Lefevre was the only doctor in the two "cities," and spent much of his time crossing the high ridge that separates the two. He often wished that the miners, in pursuit of gold-bearing gravel, had dug a passage-way through the ridge, as they had done on the opposite side of Kanaka Creek, where there was a tunnel from Chipp's Flat to Minnesota. But on this side of the creek they mined for quartz. However, the miners were good patients, and some day the doctor hoped to return to France with the gold his skill had earned him.

With a Frenchman's zeal for science and thoroughness, he was a most excellent physician. By the first of October, Robert Palmer was cured. To the doctor it seemed almost a miracle; and he cautioned the old miner kindly:

"Mr. Palmer, one can never tell about this malady. To-day you are well, thanks to your remarkable constitution and a Frenchman's art. Next month, perhaps"—and he shrugged his shoulders.

"If you have any business matters to settle, monsieur, any affair of the heart, any will to make, you had better attend to such things while the good Lord gives you strength."

Robert Palmer heeded this advice; and so, a few days after, when he had returned to his house on Fillmore Hill, he wrote the following remarkable document: