The Silver Caves: A Mining Story

THE “LAST CHANCE.”

Matters had come to a crisis with Len and Max, when Sandy McKinnon arrived at the camp, with a letter of introduction from a friend in Denver.

These two young men had not been at all fortunate, so far, and, like the rest of the community, were sorely discouraged. They had wavered for some days between deserting the place and another alternative, the nature of which they kept to themselves, for they knew that they might not only be laughed at, but perhaps prevented from carrying out their plan, were it announced.

The camp I refer to is now a flourishing town, the center of many small side-villages on the northern slope of Sierra San Juan; but twenty-five years ago, when my story occurred, it was at the point of collapse, and perhaps would never have recovered had not what I am about to relate occurred; and you must bear with me while I explain the circumstances that led up to its revival.

The beginnings of the town had been made half a dozen miles higher up Panther Creek, almost at its source, in fact; but after digging numberless prospect-holes and driving three fairly long tunnels, everybody voted that locality a failure, and came down to the present town-site where paying mines had since been worked for two or three years.

The two young men had become the owners, some time before, of one of these early tunnels (that one nearest the source of the Creek), through taking it as payment of a joint debt because nothing better was to be had. It was called the Last Chance, and the boys accepted the name as significant, and proposed to risk what means they had left in giving the mine a new trial.

About 200 feet down stream was a second tunnel, the Aurora, owned by two men who were friendly to our heroes, one of whom, named Bowen, was famous for his reckless yet good-natured exploits of bravado.

Some distance still farther down the cañon, on the same side (the right-hand wall of the narrow gulch, looking down stream), was the third old tunnel, the Cardinal. This last was the property of a thorough scallawag, despised and avoided by all respectable citizens, and only kept from being a positive criminal by his natural cowardice. The enmity of this man, whose real name was lost in the nick-names “Old Bob” and “Squint-eye,” had been incurred by the boys through their exposing a fraud by which he had once proposed to sell to a stranger named Anderson, as a productive mine, this very property--the Last Chance--although he neither owned it nor believed it worth anything.

It was not strange, therefore, that, while trying to avoid general curiosity, they were especially anxious to keep their intentions secret from Old Bob.

And just at this juncture came Mr. Alexander McKinnon, straight from Glasgow, and hoping to do something at the camp which might teach him how silver mining should be carried on, and perhaps open a way to make his fortune. Placing all the chances of failure, and their poverty, fairly before him, they offered to let him into their new partnership, to be called Brehm, Bushwick & Co., on very liberal terms, and he accepted.

So they fitted him out with the kind of clothing, tools, and general outfit which were needful, purchased enough provisions to last a fortnight, after which they could come to town for more, and to-morrow the three were to start bright and early to their new home and the Last Chance.

When the rising sun of the next morning had begun to tinge the snow-peaks with rose-color, but hours before his beams could scale the mountain wall of this deep valley and flood it with warmth and light, our hopeful adventurers were awake and busy with breakfast.

Sandy showed himself a much more skillful cook than either of his American friends, and was warmly applauded.

“There’s a difference between fend and fare weell,” he remarked, sententiously, when they told him of some of their troubles in this matter; “by which I mean,” he added, as he saw their puzzled faces, “that shifting for a meal is bad policy beside knowing how to have plenty of good food and how to prepare it. It’s poor economy, I’m thinkin’, to half-starve one’s self. ‘Lang fasting hains’--that’s saves, ye ken--‘nae bread.’”

McKinnon dropped more and more into broad Scotch as he became better acquainted, and his fund of old saws, into each of which whole chapters of worldly experience had been boiled down, were a constant source of enjoyment to his partners.

Breakfast out of the way in a hurry, the three burros (Mexican donkeys) hired to carry their luggage were brought around, the little sawbuck saddles placed upon their backs, and cinched to them with a tightness that made them groan and grunt lustily; then the load of each was placed between the forks, or hung to the four horns of the saddle, surmounted by the long-handled tools, and securely lashed on by ropes and thongs of twisted rawhide, which never break or stretch, and rarely get loose from the “squaw-hitch.”

The whole baggage made about six fair burro-loads, and these were to be carried in two trips. It was not necessary for them to burden themselves with a great amount of furniture or provisions, since the former could be left locked up in town, and the provisions could be replenished when they ran short. Besides, the lads expected to catch an abundance of trout and perhaps shoot an occasional deer or mountain sheep, an expectation in which they would not have been disappointed had the extraordinary affair which happened later left time for hunting and fishing.

The trail was a steep and little-used pathway up the mountain, through dense woods, where it straggled about to avoid rocks and fallen logs. It was built up, shelf-fashion, around projecting knobs, crossed fierce torrents upon narrow bridges, and was full of sharp turns, miry holes, and bad going of every description. Here and there an opening in the forest gave a magnificent view, far out over the foot-hills, for the elevation, toward the head of the creek, was more than four thousand feet above the valleys and fully ten thousand feet above the sea.

Beyond the woods the party found itself on the brink of a deep gorge, at the bottom of which Panther Creek tore down in a series of cascades. The torrent ran four or five hundred feet below, and above them the mountains rose to invisible heights. Along this cliff-face the narrow trail had been carried irregularly and often very dangerously, but the hardy little beasts picked their way cautiously up and down, and never sank too deep in a bog or got too far over the edge of a precipice.

Finally the trail reached the edge of the creek, near its head, and here was a ford, beyond which it led through the willows and over the Aurora’s dump to the Last Chance, whose cabin, perched on a bench, or terrace, was gained by a stiff climb up a zigzag in the face of the rocky bluff.

The burros were turned loose in a small meadow above the cabin, and after a hearty supper the tired boys quickly made beds of boughs and blankets, and slept as their long tramp entitled them to do.

FURNISHING A NEW HOME.