Produced by Justin Gillbank, Mary Meehan and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
THE WEDGE OF GOLD
BY C.C. GOODWIN,
EDITOR DAILY TRIBUNE
1893
TRIBUNE JOB PRINTING COMPANY SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH
CONTENTS
I. The Mineral Kingdom
II. Indications
III. Making Money at $4 per day
IV. Smiles and Tears
V. The Voyage
VI. Bonanzas
VII. A Dinner Party
VIII. Ways that are Dark
IX. How Miners are Caught
X. Enchantment
XI. Going to Epsom Downs
XII. Westminster Abbey
XIII. Two Kinds of Sorrow
XIV. Tears and Orange Flowers
XV. Sinister Successes
XVI. A Trip to Africa
XVII. On Their Travels
XVIII. The Soul in Clay
XIX. The Wedge of Gold
XX. The Occident and the Orient Meet
XXI. Shipping a Quartz Mill
XXII. A Lost Trail Discovered
XXIII. Back to England
XXIV. Dealing in Mining Shares
XXV. A Wedge of Gold Indeed
XXVI. Fever Visions
XXVII. Selling Stock Short
XXVIII. Convalescent
XXIX. Springing a Trap
XXX. Grand Opera
XXXI. Marriage Bells
XXXII. Fruition
THE WEDGE OF GOLD.
CHAPTER I.
THE MINERAL KINGDOM.
The splendor of the world is due to mining and to the perfectness ofman's ability to work the minerals which the mines supply. The fields ofthe world give men food; with food furnished, a few souls turn to thecontemplation of higher things; but no grand civilization ever came to anagricultural people until their intellects were quickened by somethingbeyond their usual occupation.
How man first emerged from utter barbarism is a story that is lost, butwhen history first began to pick up the threads of events and to weavethem into a record, the loom upon which the record was woven was madeof gold. One of the rivers that flowed through Eden also "compassed thewhole land of Havilah, where there is gold; and the gold of that land isgood."
"Tubal Cain was an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron."Abraham and Jacob bought fields with money, and when Pharaoh sought tomake Joseph next in power to himself, he took the ring from his fingerand put it upon Joseph's finger; and he put a chain of gold aboutJoseph's neck. Thus the grandchildren of Adam, in Holy Writ, wereartificers in brass and iron, and when civilization in Egypt began tomake an impression upon the world, its sovereigns had already discoveredthe omnipotence of gold.
Assyria, that came next to be the concernment of mankind, had men whocould perfectly fuse gold and glass, and their work is still an objectof wonder to the world. Their queens wore raiment which was woven fromthreads of gold.
The splendor of the Hebrew nation culminated when the roof of theirgreat temple was laid with beaten gold, and when all the magnificentfurnishings within the temple were wrought from gold and silver andbrass.
The invincible Greeks had chariots and javelins of iron, helmets of goldand brass, and now as their tombs are rifled there is found beside wheretheir bones went back to dust the metal implements with which theywrought, and the imperishable coins with which they carried on theircommerce.
The power of Rome came when her artisans learned how to fashion the shortsword, and her soldiers learned how to wield it, and her splendor camewhen, through conquest, she brought under her dominion the gold fieldsof Spain and Asia, and learned the power which money carries with it. Hercivilization began to recede when the money supply began to fall off, andwhen it became too precious for the masses to possess it, then the racedegenerated until the men were no longer fit to be soldiers, the womenlost the grace to become the mothers of soldiers, and darkness settledupon Europe.
England remained little more than a rendezvous for wild tribes untilher people learned mining and began the study of how to reduce the metalswhich the mines supplied, and her advancement since can be rated exactlyby the progress she has made in bringing the metals into effectiveforms and combinations. When first the rude Saxon acquired the art tomend the broken links in a knight's armor, and how to temper one of theold-fashioned two-handed swords, it was possible to comprehend, that fromthat germ would expand the brains that would by and by construct a steelship or bridge; when the first rude spindle was fashioned, all thecommencement necessary to create and work the world's looms was made.
Out of these accomplishments, commerce was born; foreign commercerequired ships, and so the ships were supplied; with commerce wasdeveloped a financial system, and soon it was discovered that after allthe chiefest power of the world was money; that the swiftest way to winmoney was to perfect machinery so that out of raw material forms ofbeauty and of use could be wrought, and thus in regular chain the majestyof England expanded from the first day that an Englishman was able toconvert from the dull iron ore something which the world would want,until ships laden with her wares reached all the world's ports, and tobarbarous lands she became an iron nation more terrible than the firstiron nation.
The world's highest civilization does not come from the fruitful fields,but from the darkness of the deep mines. Power and independence come withthe digging and working of the baser metals; full civilization waits uponthe production of enough of the royal metals to give to the people wealthin a form that enables them to command the best attainable talent andforces to serve them, and enough of leisure to enable them to put forwardtheir best efforts.
Below the surface of the story which makes this book is a deeper story ofwhat may be performed by brave hearts when they leave the fruitful fieldsbehind them and turn with all their hearts to woo the desert that turnsher forbidding face to them at their coming, and holds, closely hiddenwithin her sere breast, her inestimable treasures.