The next day, starting from our claims by way of a perfectly good wagon road down the canyon a ways, Frank took me by a tortuous climb, off the road, to near the top of the mountain. He pointed out the spot where the assay had been obtained. When I began to examine the shallow trench, he said, quickly, “It took all the ore in sight to make the assay.” Twenty steps farther on we reached the summit where we could look down on Crescent a mile below. And then we stepped out onto a very good wagon road. On inquiry, he said, “It’s the same road we left back there in the canyon.” I asked him how come we made that rough climb? Frank said, “You know, it’s about as much as a man’s life is worth to be caught showing up that strike to a tenderfoot.” This was an eye-opener—the first clear signpost on a long and uncertain road. At another time, later, Frank and I paid a saloon keeper in Nipton, the railroad station, twenty dollars to drive us over the Crescent district, for the full day. We visited our claims first, got dinner in Crescent—then to a saloon where drinks were 50 cents each, whether whiskey, beer, or water. The bartender simply counted noses or glasses, as it were, and summed up the charge. There were about twenty saloons in the camp, and our “host” deemed it his duty to visit them all. I am sure he dumped the $10 I paid him on twenty glasses of water for me. It was a spot where you couldn’t afford to shake your head and say, “No thanks.” When asked to drink, it was wise to call your drink. The main object of the drive—on my part, anyway — the thing we had paid twenty dollars for, was to visit a highly newspaper publicized mine two miles south of Crescent, where it was shamefully claimed immense bodies of rich gold ore running into the millions, were blocked out. But the desert twilight caught us still drinking Adam’s ale and the Indian’s “fire water.” Our driver knew his business all right—and I suspect Frank knew from the start that we would never fetch up at that mine. Nothing, absolutely nothing—but the truth—was barred in that camp. I shall now leave the desert momentarily, and write candidly about my earlier “mining” experience. This, and other notations here—until we get back to Crescent—are throw-ins, kindred situations not contained in the printed’ article.