STEEP TRAILS 



Mining discoveries and progress, retrogres- 

 sion and decay, seem to have been crowded 

 more closely against each other here than on 

 any other portion of the globe. Some one of 

 the band of adventurous prospectors who 

 came from the exhausted placers of California 

 would discover some rich ore how much or 

 little mattered not at first. These specimens 

 fell among excited seekers after wealth like 

 sparks in gunpowder, and in a few days the 

 wilderness was disturbed with the noisy clang 

 of miners and builders. A little town would 

 then spring up, and before anything like a 

 careful survey of any particular lode would be 

 made, a company would be formed, and expen- 

 sive mills built. Then, after all the machinery 

 was ready for the ore, perhaps little, or none at 

 all, was to be found. Meanwhile another dis- 

 covery was reported, and the young town was 

 abandoned as completely as a camp made for a 

 single night ; and so on, until some really valuable 

 lode was found, such as those of Eureka, Austin, 

 Virginia, etc., which formed the substantial 

 groundwork for a thousand other excitements. 



Passing through the dead town of Schell- 

 bourne last month, I asked one of the few lin- 

 gering inhabitants why the town was built. 

 "For the mines," he replied. "And where are 

 the mines?" "On the mountains back here." 



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