“Horrible, horrible. The Coloma stage, with a full load of passengers, has just run off the Coloma street bridge.”
“Of course there was a great rush on the part of the crowd to the corner below for the purpose of witnessing the horrible accident, and among them was Anderson, the actor, in the lead. Upon their arrival at the corner they saw the stage, with its load of passengers, on its way up Coloma street, and it at once occurred to them that the stage never could have gotten across the bridge without running off at the further end of it.
“Well,” says Anderson, “durned if I don’t get even with old Syd, if I have to live in Hangtown the rest of my life.”
He watched his opportunity and it soon came.
It was late in the fall and raining. In the large gambling house called the Trio Hall, sitting around a great sheet iron stove one afternoon were a number of men enjoying themselves, and among them was Syd.
All at once the front door was violently opened and in rushed Anderson, the actor. He was hatless, and, from all appearances, was in the full enjoyment of a full-fledged case of “jimjams.” He stepped to the stove and with his foot kicked open the door, at the same time drawing from under his coat a large powder horn, which he threw into the stove, exclaiming:
“Let’s all go together, boys.”
A few minutes afterwards Syd, with a few others, ventured to look into the door, and there stood the actor with his hat upon his head, who, with a pleasant smile, inquired of Syd if the stage had run off the bridge again.
