"That's my hand exactly!" said my friend, with an inward chuckle of satisfaction. I expressed some curiosity to know in what respect the matter of grindstones suited his hand so well, when, looking cautiously around, he drew near, and informed me confidentially that he had struck a "good thing" in Washoe. He had only been there a month, and had made a considerable pile. There was a dreadful scarcity of grindstones there, and, seeing that miners, carpenters, and mechanics of all sorts were hard up for something to sharpen their tools on, he had secured the only grindstone that could be had, which was pretty well used up when he got it. But he rigged it up ship-shape and Bristol fashion, and set up a grinding business, which brought him in from twenty to thirty dollars a day, till nothing was left of the stone. Now he was bound to Placerville in search of a good one, with which he intended to return immediately. I wished him luck and proceeded on my way, wondering what would turn up next.
It was not long before I was stopped by another enterprising personage; but this was altogether a different style of man. There was something brisk and spruce in his appearance, in spite of a shirt far gone in rags and a shock of hair that had long been a stranger to the scissors. What region of country he came from it was impossible to say. I think he was a cosmopolite, and belonged to the world generally.
"Say, Colonel!"—this was his style of address—"on the way to Washoe?"
A SPECULATOR.
"Yes."
"Excuse me: I have a little list of claims here, Colonel, which I would like to show you;" and he pulled from his shirt-pocket a greasy package of papers, which he dexterously unfolded. "Guess you're from San Francisco, Colonel? Here is—let me see—
200 feet in the Pine Nut,
300 feet in the Grizzly Ledge,
150 feet in the Gouge Eye,
125 feet in the Wild-Cat,
100 feet in the Root-Hog-or-Die,
50 feet in the Bobtail Horse,
25 feet in the Hell Roaring;
and many others, Colonel, in the best leads. Now the fact is, d'ye see, I'm a little hard up, and want to make a raise. I'll sell all, or a part, at a considerable sacrifice for a small amount of ready cash."