Still there are drawbacks about this style of mining. The work does not progress as rapidly as the present rush and hurry and turmoil of the American people seem to demand. Two weeks ago the perilous undertaking of sinking this shaft to a depth of ten feet in a perpendicular direction was begun, and although we have shipped several mule loads of the choicest grub, consisting of bacon in large packages done up in corn-colored overshirts and XXX Nebraska flour, yet the top of Mr. O'Tool's head is visible to the naked eye from a considerable distance as he stands in the shaft. Occasionally the Count De O'Toole fancies that he has been bitten by a tarantula, and the stockholders of the Calamity Jane Consolidated have to ship a large lunch basket with a willow cover to it and a cork in the top in order to counteract the poison that is rankling in his system. THE NOCTURNAL COW. |With the opening up of my spring movements in the agricultural line comes the cow. Laramie has about seven cows that annoy me a good deal. They work me up so that I lose my equanimity. I have mentioned this matter before, but this spring the trouble seems to have assumed some new features. The prevailing cow for this season seems to be a seal-brown cow with a stub tail, which is arranged as a night-key. She wears it banged. [Illustration: 8283] The other day I had just planted my celluloid radishes and irrigated my turnips and sown my hunting-case summer squashes, and this cow went by trying to convey the impression that she was out for a walk. That night the blow fell. The queen of night was high in the blue vault of heaven amid the twinkling stars. All nature was hushed to repose. The people of Laramie were in their beds. So were my hunting-case summer squashes. I heard a stealthy step near the conservatory where my celluloid radishes and pickled beets are growing, and I arose. It was a lovely sight. At the head of the procession there was a seal-brown cow with a tail like the handle on a pump, and standing at an angle of forty-five degrees. That was the cow. Following at a rapid gait was a bewitching picture of alabaster limbs and Gothic joints and Wamsutta muslin night robe. That was me. The queen of night withdrew behind a cloud. The vision seemed to break her all up. Bye-and-bye there was a crash, and the seal-brown cow went home carrying the garden gate with her as a kind of keepsake. She had a plenty of garden gates at home in her collection, but she had none of that particular pattern. So she wore it home around her neck. The writer of these lines then carefully brushed the sand off his feet with a pillow sham and retired to rest.