All the Indians were well pleased with what Sam told them; they said it was “good talk.” Sam looked about him for a man fit to be made chief of all the Piutes living about the two towns, and finally selected himself as being the person most worthy to receive that high and honorable position. Soon after that he one day marshalled all of his people in procession, and with the American flag proudly floating at the head of the motley throng of men, women, and children, gaily marched them about the streets of Virginia City. They were the raggedest lot of recruits ever seen. To observe the dignified bearing of the old warriors and the grave expression of each countenance, was ludicrous beyond measure. They thought they were being adopted into the American nation, and therefore considered it a duty to conduct themselves in a grave and becoming manner on such a momentous occasion.
The use of a balcony on the principal street in the city was obtained, and from this, Sam Brown and several Piutes, also one or two white men, addressed the common herd below.
This completed the inauguration of Sam Brown as chief, and he was now ready to begin the work of civilizing his subjects. The first thing in order with Sam was the building of a school-house. He owned a lot somewhere in the suburbs of the town, and on this he determined to rear a proper structure, Sam had worked as a carpenter in Oregon, and felt equal to the task of building the school-house himself, if he but had tools and lumber. However, to the man who is a born reformer and philanthropist, whose soul thirsts continually to improve[improve] and benefit his species, no obstacle is so great but that by dint of untiring patience and perseverance it will finally overcome.
Sam stole a chest of carpenters’ tools and had made considerable progress in the gradual removal of a lumber-yard, when unsympathetic eyes took cognizance of his philanthropic labors, and, failing to appreciate the purity of his motives, threw him into a prison, the fate, alas! of many great reformers in all ages. Samuel Brown, the civilizer, now abides in the Nevada State Prison, where he has time to consider the vanity of all philanthropic endeavors, and to mourn the obtuseness of the average human intellect in respect to the motives that inspire the soul of the reformer to do noble deeds and undertake arduous labors.
To this day the proposed school-house has not been built and to this day the Piutes remain uncivilized.
CHAPTER XL.
A VISIT TO THE MINES.
Having rambled far and wide among the Piute Indians, I shall now ask the reader to accompany me in a ramble far below the light of day, to the underground regions of the silver-mines. During our trip through the lower levels of the mines I shall endeavor to explain all that is seen.
As all of the leading mines in the Comstock lode are opened and worked after the same general plan, a description of one mine will suffice for all. In singling out a mine, a description of the machinery and operations in which shall stand for all, I select the Consolidated Virginia as that in which is to be found all of the latest and most approved machinery, and in which all operations are conducted in a systematic and scientific manner. It will also be more satisfactory to the reader if he knows that what he is reading applies to a certain mine the name of which is known to him.
In giving a description of the various operations of mining, and of the machinery used, I shall find it necessary in but two or three instances to go outside of the Consolidated Virginia mine. In these cases I shall name the mine in which is to be seen what I am speaking of.