You might think, after this demonstration of the lengths to which Senator Nixon went to accomplish a set purpose, and after witnessing the success which attended his efforts, that a poverty-stricken individual like myself, who had had the hardihood to conduct a newspaper campaign in the Senator's own home town against his financial and political activities, would judge it the better part of valor to emigrate from the State. Well, I didn't. I stayed right on the spot. That I would hear from Washington later I had no doubt, but I stuck, just the same, until my business interests called me away. I wasn't wrong in my deductions. Within a few months thereafter there came a visit to my office in Reno by a postal inspector, who was apparently "sicked on to the job," and but for the quick intercession by telegraph of United States Senator Francis B. Newlands of Nevada with the Postmaster General at Washington, I am certain that potent influences even at that early day would successfully have "started something." But of this more at another time, I am ahead of my story. CHAPTER VII RAWHIDE Because Rawhide, the new Nevada gold camp, was born during the financial crisis of 1907, I couldn't see any future ahead of it from the promoter's coign of vantage--not "through a pair of field-glasses." It requires capital to develop likely-looking gold "prospects" into dividend-paying mines, and I could not imagine where the money was going to come from. Eastern securities markets were in the doldrums. Time money commanded a big premium. Prices for all descriptions of mining stocks had flattened out to almost nothing. Investors were at their wits' end to protect commitments already made. Financiers everywhere were depressed. A revulsion of sentiment toward speculation had set in, seemingly for keeps. Only a hair-brained enthusiast of the wild-eyed order could hope at such a time possibly to succeed in the marketing of new mining issues. A financial panic has no terrors, however, for gold-seekers. The lure of gold is irresistible. Money stringency serves only to strengthen the natural incentive. By the first week in January, 1908, fully 2,000 people were reported to be in Rawhide. At the end of January the population had grown to 3,000. The camp easily held the center of the mining stage in Nevada.