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Mining By Hog Power

Mining By Hog Power image
Parent Issue
Day
13
Month
December
Year
1895
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

"I was riding throngh the raountains in Triniry county a few days ago," said a prominent mining man yesterday, "when I bappenod to take a trail that j led byold Burlap Johnson 's cabin. Yon kuow he has always been called Burlap Johnson because he was never known to wear a pair of boots, but always kept ! his foet sewed up in burlaps Jike canj vas paoked hams. I took dinner - cold I corn bread and bacon - with him, and (hen sat down for a smoke. ' ' ' Wouldn 't yon jest as soon do your smokin ontside, podner?' be asked. " 'Cortainly, ' said I, 'but yon don 't object to the smoke of a cigar, do you?' I was rjatnrally surprised, for he was already puffing away at an old corucob pipe. " 'No, course not, seein as I've smoked cigb on to 50 years, bnt I keep my hogs at work. ' "My curiosity was aroused, bnt I said nothing. He took down a doublé barreled muzzle loading shotgun and his powder horn. Then he went out to a shed and got a pau of shelled corn. He sat down on a bench at the cabin door, ramrned down a couple of charges of powder and poured a handful of corn into each barrel. Ho pnt on a percussion cap, pressed it down with the hammer, cocked botb barrels and blazed away at the side hill across the little gulch. The roar had not died away till a drove of hogs came running, grunting and sqnealing, and commenced to root the sidehill for the corn. Whenever they Blacked np in their work, the old man fired another charge of corn. " 'That's a mean trick.'I said. 'Why don't you feed it to thern in a trongh?' " 'Feed it to 'em?' he repeated in amazement. 'Then they wouldn 't work. Besides, they don't need it. ' " 'What do you want to inake them work for, and why do you "waste corn on them if they don't need it?' " 'Why, man alive! They do as much work as tour men would. They root up the dirt, and when the rain comes I sluice it. ' "Then I understoocl that he was

Article

Subjects
Ann Arbor Argus
Old News