SPECULATIONS IN NEVADA MINES.

MINING SPECULATIONS.

THOR'S EXPERIENCE.

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SWINDLERS IN NEW YORK AND BOSTON. THE AUHOW HE WAS CAUGHT. -THE HOOK AND THE WAY TO BAIT IT. LIMITED INVESTMENT. — THE ADVENTURER'S STORY. — FACTS AND FIGURES. THE ROMANCE, AND THE SUBSEQUENT REALITY. — ONE HUNDRED PER CENT. A MONTH. — IRISH DIVIDENDS. EXPLOSION OF THE BUBBLE. THE VICTIMS AND THEIR FATE. — NANKEEN TROUSERS IN WINTER. - AN ADVENTURER'S EXPERIENCE IN LONDON. HOW HE CAUGHT A CAPITALIST. HELD BY THE GLITTERING EYE.

AMONG the various mining operations, there are many in which there are tunnels, and levels, and shafts of a metaphoric as well as of a literal character. This is peculiarly the case in our great cities: copper mines on Lake Superior, gold mines in Colorado and California, silver mines in Nevada and Utah, iron mines in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, have been exploited, in many instances, much more successfully in New York and Boston than at the places where they are located, or supposed to be located. In many instances, the mines which are sold have no existence whatever; millions of dollars have been paid in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and other cities, for mines which had no existence, or next to

none.

Some years ago, it was my fortune to become infected with the silver mining fever. It was at a time when speculators frem the far West and the Pacific coast were abundant, and their operations upon the credulous and unsophisticated natives of Manhattan Island were wonderful to behold, and became disagreeable to remember. What poor innocents we were! I had had some experience with gold mines, and other mines, and I knew, or ought to have known, that honesty did not abound among their manipulators to any alarming extent.

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SELLING A SILVER MINE.

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Most of those who came to New York with mines for sale were men of pleasing, though rough exterior, and their tongues were as flexible as the hair-spring of a watch. They could talk the ears from a donkey without moving a muscle; and the strangest part of it was, that the donkey would, generally, lose his aural appendages without knowing it: he would listen, and would deliberate, and, like the woman who deliberates, he would be lost. His hand (on the supposition that a donkey possesses hands) would go down to his pockets, and he would place the money-whether honestly or dishonestly acquired nobody knew into the hands of the beguil ing speculator; and the speculator thereupon would retire to the fastnesses of his hotel, and waste the substance of the verdant New Yorker in riotous living.

I was introduced to one of these adventurers, who owned a silver mine of wonderful richness. Figures were exhibited, and a plan of the mine was spread before us: it was a gorgeous parchment. The mine, with its dips, and spurs, and angles, was carefully delineated.

There was a picture of a crushing mill in full operation, and there was all the machinery portrayed on that parchment for running a first-class mine. A dozen of us were invited to meet the speculator the next day in a cosy little office where we could see specimens from the mines.

The speculator was there at the appointed hour. We came, we saw, and he conquered: there was a fortune before us.

"Gentlemen," said the speculator, "this is the finest mine within forty miles of Frogtown." Frogtown was the name of the city nearest to the great mine; I believe he called it the Revenue mine- good name, that, to enterprising men who wanted to increase their revenue.

"Gentlemen," he continued, " before this mine was discov ered a good many people around Frogtown talked of moving away, but as soon as it was opened nobody wanted to leave. The population has increased a thousand per cent. in three months, and it will continue to increase quite as fast; in a year from now we will have a population of fifty thousand,

and we can employ three thousand men at least in and around the Revenue. I won't sell the whole of it, gentlemen; you have not money enough in New York to buy the whole of this mine; but what I want is to raise money to develop it. There is a mine there worth a hundred millions of dollars, at the very least; but you see it may be worth millions of dollars, and at the same time it will want money to develop it."

"I don't exactly understand," said I, "why you came all the way to New York to get money if the mine is so rich."

"Why, the thing is very plain," said he; "the people that came there have a use for all their money. Money is readily worth twenty-five per cent. a month at Frogtown, and it is hard to get it at that; men can do so much better there.

"I have in mind, now, a man who came there over six months ago with two thousand dollars; he has invested it in such a way that it is returning him four thousand dollars a month. Any man who knows anything about the business there, will readily put in his money where it will make him a fortune: it is the best place in the world for investing money."

"That does not answer the question," said another: "why can't you get the money in some place near Frogtown, from people who know about your mine, and know how rich it is? and, any way, if you have so valuable a mine, why do you want to raise money?"

The Frogtown adventurer smiled a sarcastic smile, as if amused at the ignorance of the questioner. The smile was brief, but convincing, and gave full weight to the statement which followed it.

"Suppose now," said he, "that you are in a house where you had a clear title to anything you discover. Going through the cellar of the house, you find an iron chest: you strike that chest, and you are sure you hear money rattle inside of it. You attempt to lift it, but find it too heavy: now what do you want to do? Plainly you want to open the chest; but it is firmly locked and is very solid. You look around for some implement with which you can break it open, but nothing of the sort can be found. There may be other men standing around,