Part 10 (1/2)
Wolff, who was a big, heavy man, very slow of speech, said in his halting, broken English
”Mulcahy, dere is de ghost of dat last man you shot in California.”
Mulcahy turned, shot a glance back towards where Wolff's eyes were directed, and fell forward on the table. When he lifted his face it was drawn and the color of ashes; his eyes were full of horror. It was a terribly dramatic scene.
Shortly after this Mulcahy took a partner, a man named Friese. They found a great deal of gold.
The last time I saw Mulcahy was in 1876, at East London. I was then working on a surf boat, and in pa.s.sing under the stern of a steamer, the anchor of which was being weighed, I noticed a yellow bearded man leaning over the rail. His face was not turned towards me; nevertheless, I felt I could hardly be mistaken as to his ident.i.ty. I called out his name; he turned, and I saw that it was Mulcahy, right enough. He recognized me at once, and apparently was delighted to see me. We conversed for a short while, but my boat was soon worked away on the warp, out of earshot. I afterwards heard that Mulcahy had taken several thousand pounds sterling with him to Cape Town, and that there he purchased a liquor-shop in a low quarter of the city. Shortly afterwards he died insane.
The tunnel at the saddle having to be abandoned on account of our striking a ma.s.s of loose rock through which it was impossible to drive without more expensive appliances than we possessed, Wolff left the service of the company. I was anxious to leave too, because alluvial gold had been struck in rich patches on and near the saddle. But Simpson made a point of my remaining for a few weeks longer in his employ, for the sake of protecting the company's supposed interests.
I wished to peg out, on my own account, the site where my tent stood, but this I could not do so long as the claims of the company were held in my name. On the very day the company suspended operations all the vacant ground on and about the saddle was pegged out. Most of those who ”rushed” the vicinity were New Zealanders from Hokitika. The site on which my tent stood was appropriated by a man named Cunningham. When ground was required for mining purposes, any one tenting on it had to remove.
Within five minutes of Cunningham's first pick-stroke, he struck the ”lead.” On merely turning over the surface sods the nuggets could be picked out like plums from a cake. The bedrock was soft soapy shale; there was no ”wash” in the ordinary sense of the term. Loam, with which small, angular fragments of quartz were mixed, covered the bedrock to a depth of about six inches. But this bedrock turned out to be scored by a small gutter or channel a few inches deep and about eighteen inches wide, which ran for about twenty feet through the middle of the claim.
The surface soil gave no indication of the existence of the channel.
The bottom of this channel was literally paved with nuggets. The stuff it contained gave an average of over four ounces to the pan; it had to be harrowed to Mulcahy's spring, there to be cradled. Within a few weeks the claim was worked out, for there was no gold to be found outside the channel. But the gold won by Cunningham was worth over 4,000. The legs of my bunk had actually been sunk in the richest part of the ground, they must have literally been touching some of the nuggets. This was but one of the several occasions upon which I all but grasped the skirts of Fortune.
Soon a water-race was brought in from the opposite side of the valley on the southern slope of the saddle a distance of about four miles.
Then ground-sluicing operations began. I again took service, this time with a party of New Zealanders. I never knew how much gold was found by them, but the amount must have been considerable. I was not permitted to be present at any ”wash up,” but in the stages just previous to that climax I used to see nuggets lying thickly about whenever the water cleared. No one, even though he were one of the partners was allowed to pick up gold before the end of the ”wash up,” all had to come into the pan.
My best friend among these men was a gigantic Swede who was called Peter. He had another name, but, as he said himself, it would be necessary to take a pinch of snuff before you could p.r.o.nounce it properly. Ordinarily the most good-natured of men, Peter became an elemental savage when hungry. If then spoken to his only reply would be a snarl quite likely to be followed by a blow. However, as Peter ate, his normal placidity gradually returned. When fully satisfied he would say leaning back with a smile and a sigh of satisfaction.
”Now a little child might play mit me.” To show how little surnames counted for in those days I will mention a trifling incident. My tent mate among the New Zealanders went by the name of Bill. One Sat.u.r.day afternoon I remained at the tent, the other members of the party having gone down to the Lower Camp; a native brought up a parcel containing a blanket and addressed to ”Mr. William Bogis.” I sent the boy away, saying that I did not know of any one bearing that name. Next day Bill was swearing at the storekeeper for not having sent up a blanket he had bought. I innocently related what had happened, and then Bill swore at me. ”Mr. William Bogis” had been my tent-mate for several weeks and I was unaware of the fact.
In 1889, when traveling from Kimberley to Johannesburg by coach, I picked up an old newspaper at a wayside hotel. In it was a paragraph giving an account of how a prospector named William Bogis had been blown to pieces in a shaft somewhere in Northern Bechua.n.a.land. I have no doubt this related to my old mate.
A very curious character at Pilgrim's Rest was a man named Fabayne, whose dwelling-place was a cave under a cliff about half-way up the creek on the northern side. Fabayne was well-connected, his father was a Church dignitary, a dean, I fancy and was evidently well off; for he allowed the scapegrace son 200 per annum, paid quarterly. Fabayne was a university man and an accomplished scholar, but he had gone the pace at an unusually rapid rate. When I knew him he was a hopeless drunkard.
Whenever Fabayne drew a 50 installment he would place 45 in the hands of the keeper of a certain bar, and 5 with a butcher whose shop was in the vicinity. He would then get drunk and remain so as long as the 45 lasted. During the continuance of his spree it was his custom to remain on the bar premises night and day, and to stand treat to all and sundry. It was understood that the bar-keeper was to fire him out as soon as the deposit became exhausted. This usually happened in about three weeks. He would then return to his cave.
The 5 was meant to keep him in food and clothes until the next installment fell due. He used to fetch a sheep's pluck every day and make soup of it in a billy. The butcher used his own discretion in the matter of clothes, but when Fabayne grew more than ordinarily ragged I fancy the bar-keeper contributed towards his outfit, a thing he could, under the circ.u.mstances, well afford to do.
A complete inventory of the belongings of this strange being would have included a pick, a shovel, a pan, and an old sluice-box, none of which he ever used, also a blanket, a big knife, a billy, and a Greek Testament. The cave, although draughty, was comfortable and fairly dry.
Now and then I shared it with Fabayne; generally on those occasions when I sold my tent. He was a charming companion, not alone was he exceedingly well-read, but he was sympathetic and helpful to a degree.
I have many a time seasoned my mealie porridge with his pluck soup, and found the seasoning good.
When ”getting off” after one of his quarterly sprees, Fabayne's habits were apt to be trying to one like myself, without an allowance, and who had to work hard and constantly to keep body and soul together. For instance, he would sometimes sit half the night through, at the mouth of the cave, declaiming Sophocles. I could not understand a word he uttered, but his elocution was good, his voice was well modulated, and the sonorous periods of the choruses from the ”Antigone” and the ”Elektra” were effective by virtue of their mere sound.
This sort of thing was all very well up to about nine o'clock; after that, however, it became annoying. But it was impossible to stop him. I used to pelt him with fairly heavy stones, and although I must sometimes have hurt him rather severely, he took no notice. Fabayne admitted that he was deliberately drinking himself to death; trying to argue him out of this intention proved to be of not the slightest avail.
I recall a wedding which had a sequel very characteristic of its environment. A certain digger his name has escaped me, although I knew the man well married a rather pretty girl. The ceremony took place in a little church that had recently been built near the Middle Camp, and in which the Rev. Mr. B used occasionally used to officiate. This church stood on a small knoll, a straight pathway leading steeply up to it from the creek.
By common consent every one within sight struck work and a.s.sembled close to the church for the purpose of giving the bride and bridegroom a cheer on their emerging. I should say that from thirty to forty men lined the pathway on each side. Nearly every one had provided himself with an old boot for the occasion. After the knot had been tied the happy couple pa.s.sed down the hill between the lines of their cheering friends. Then, at a given signal, we all let fly the boots in a volley taking care, of course, that neither bride nor bridegroom was. .h.i.t. Then one man picked up a fairly heavy boot from where it had fallen and deliberately hurled it at the bride, striking her on the back. The perpetrator of this outrage was, needless to say, a discarded suitor.
The bridegroom turned round, took off his coat which he handed to the bride to hold and rolled up his sleeves. He knew quite well who had thrown the missile. A ring was at once formed, and the fight began. It only lasted, however, for three rounds. The bridegroom was victorious; he escaped without a scratch. The other man was, as he richly deserved to be, severely punished. It was, however, just as well for him that this was the case, otherwise we would have ducked him in the muddiest tail race within reach. As the victor marched off with his proud mate he received an immense ovation. I regret to have to record the fact that the officiating parson was taken down to Tom Craddock's bar and there made very drunk indeed.
When I camped near the Big Rock on Slater's Claim there lived, on the flat where the creek widened out under Gardiner's Point, an American named Knox. He was a tall, swarthy man of immensely powerful physique.
Originally a sailor from, I think, Martha's Vineyard, he had deserted from his s.h.i.+p in the early days of the diamond-fields.