CHAPTER XXII.

BONANZA AND BORRASCA.

There are always some companies in “borrasca”—out of luck; in barren rock—while others are in “bonanza”—in good luck; working large bodies of rich ore. In a year or two, those who are to-day at work in barren quartz may have a rich body of ore, while those who are to-day in rich ore may in a year or two be delving through barren rock in search of a new bonanza.

When a company has for a long time been engaged in the unsuccessful search for ore, their stock very frequently falls to a very low figure and few care to buy it at all, when of a sudden they come upon a great body of rich ore. A rumor of this reaches the surface, and those who have money to invest buy—“take in”—a few shares at a venture. The officers of the company and their friends in San Francisco—who are daily informed by telegraph of all that is going on in the mine—begin to quietly gather in all of the stock that they can find, and soon the secret is out and the stock at once bounds upward to a high figure. Everybody then becomes wild to possess a few shares of the stock. Men who would not touch it when it was selling for a mere trifle, now rush in and pay the highest prices. Some appear never to think of buying stock until they see the whole community excited about it and recklessly bidding for it; they then rush in and pay the highest figures. It is like piling bricks one upon another till the whole column begins to topple and finally tumbles to the ground. When stock goes down in this way it nearly always goes as far below as it has before been above true merit.

Many men who are good judges of mines make large purchases of stock in mines that are in borrasca—that are out of ore and appear to be out of luck, biding their time for profit. They have confidence in the mine from the position it occupies on the Comstock lode and from its having had rich bodies of ore above. These, they will contend, were never rained down into the mines from the heavens, but came up from the regions below; therefore in the regions below, whence came the rich ore already found, there must be more of the same kind. To find it, say they, is a mere matter of time.

In November, 1870, an immense bonanza was found in the Crown Point mine, Gold Hill, at the depth of 1,100 feet. Four months before the discovery of this bonanza, that is, in August of the same year, the stock of the mine was selling at three dollars per share; in May, 1872, the stock was selling at one thousand eight hundred and twenty-five dollars per share. The same bonanza extended south into the Belcher mine, the stock of which was selling for one dollar and fifty cents per share in September, 1870; in April, 1872, it sold for one thousand five hundred and twenty-five dollars per share. At this time, however, there was a grand stock excitement and the stock of many mines in which there was little if any ore sold at very high figures. The masses had come into the market as purchasers and were blindly buying right and left; they were all industriously engaged in adding bricks to the pile, stocking them up higher and higher, as idiotically strong in the faith that they were building for all time as were the builders of Babel. Finally down went everything in a grand crash. During this excitement there was an increase in the value of the mines on the Comstock, in about two months, of over forty-five million dollars.

[Illustration: THREE FAMOUS MINES.]

It frequently happens that when a company have been a long time in search of ore it is at last found at a time when the officers and leading men have but a small amount of stock in their possession. They then not only keep their strike a secret, but in case of anything leaking out through their men they bear their stock in the market, throwing in all the shares they dare venture for the purpose of breaking down the price in order that they may buy in a great amount at a low figure. Sometimes they succeed in this, but it often happens that the “outsiders” are too well informed in regard to what is in the mine, when there is a general scramble for the stock and it at once goes up with a rush. Not a few persons nearly always make money in stocks by observing the simple rule of buying them when they are down so low that nobody appears to care to touch them, paying for them in full and then holding them for developments in the mines, and it seldom happens that there is not a time within two years when they can sell for twice or three times the price originally paid. If there should be no strike in the mines in which they hold stock there may be valuable developments in adjoining mines, which sends up the price of the stocks of all the mines in the neighborhood.

While work is being done in a mine there is always a probability of something being found, sooner or later. When a company whose claim is well situated on the lead has been a longtime out of luck not a few will buy stock in their mine, because they consider that it is about time for the luck of the company to change.

The Mexican silver-miners have an aphorism, in the infallibility of which they have unbounded faith. It is as follows: “As many days as you are in borrasca (barren rock), so many days shall you be in bonanza”—rich ore. Such faith have they in this maxim, that in Mexico they frequently go to work in a mine that has ceased to be productive with no other contract or understanding than the simple one that they are to be allowed to work as many days in the “bonanza” as they spend days in finding it. Such a contract as this was once made on the Comstock lode. It was at the time when the upper or first line of bonanzas was opened in the Ophir, Mexican, Gould & Curry, and other leading mines.

Otto H. Frank was at that time superintendent of the old Central mine. He was anxious to find a bonanza in his mine, but found only barren quartz in all of his drifts and cross-cuts.

Some Mexican miners were very desirous of getting into the mine. They “felt it in their bones” that they could find a bonanza. The terms they proposed to Superintendent Frank were simply these: “As many days as we are drifting in search of the bonanza, so many days shall we be allowed to extract ore from the bonanza.”

Mr. Frank thought it all over. He had failed in his search for a bonanza; what was proposed by the Mexicans seemed fair enough; he would let them try their luck, anyhow, to get a bonanza.

So the bargain was struck:—“So many days in borrasca, so many days in bonanza.”

The Mexicans went to work in high spirits. Mr. Frank also was quite cheerful, as he thought those “knowing cusses” from the mines of Mexico would drift into a big body of ore the first week, when he would step in the week after and turn them all out before they had done more than get a taste of the bonanza. But they didn’t strike it the first week, nor the second, nor the third. The fact is they didn’t strike it the first month, nor the second, nor the third. Indeed, at the end of six months they had found no bonanza.

Now it was that Superintendant Frank began to be frightened—began to curse all Mexican mining aphorisms and rules and regulations. Should the Mexicans now strike a bonanza, what kind of a bonanza, he reasoned, would it be by the time it came into his hands? In six months those Mexicans would have it completely skinned and gutted. He might as well have no mine. He now began to suspect that the fellows knew exactly where to drift to open out in a bonanza of vast size and incalculable richness—probably nearly all silver—but were only drifting about on the outside of it in order to get more time inside. He began to hate the very sound of those words: “As many days as you are in borrasca, so many days shall you be in bonanza.”

Being greatly worried about the bargain he had thoughtlessly made, Mr. Frank went to see old man Meer, an old Castilian who had but one eye, but who was the greatest “ore expert” that ever set foot upon the Comstock—whose one eye bored into the rock further and faster than any diamond drill. He told Meer about the bargain he had made and the fears and suspicions he entertained, asking him to go into the mine, give it a thorough examination, and tell him if there was a bonanza anywhere about. Old Meer went into the mine, traversed all the drifts, cross-cuts, and coyote-holes, boring into the rock at all points with that eye of his.

When they came out and again and stood upon the surface at the mouth of the tunnel, in the broad light of day, Mr. Frank turned to Meer and said: “Well, what do you think?”

Meer uttered only two words, but those two words lifted a great load off Mr. Frank’s breast. Old Meer simply said: “_Nada bonanza_,” and “no bonanza” it proved.

The Mexicans worked on for another week or two, when they became disheartened and gave up their contract, and with it, doubtless, some portion of their faith in their favorite saying: “So many days as you are in borrasca, so many days shall you be in bonanza.” They had toiled more than six long, weary months and the result was—“_nada bonanza_.”

[Illustration]