g somewhat horny-handed, he seized pick
and shovel and went to work in earnest. The pan-out was astonishing. He
flew back to New York laden with the glittering proofs of wealth; gave a
whole page of the _Tribune_ to his tale of the golden fleece; and a rush
to the new diggings followed as a matter of course.

Denver and Auraria were rival settlements on the opposite shores of
Cherry Creek; in 1860 they consolidated, and then boasted a population
of 4000, in a vast territory containing but 60,000 souls. The boom was
on, and it was not long before a parson made his appearance. This was
the Rev. George Washington Fisher of the Methodist Church, who accepted
the offer of a saloon as a house of worship, using the bar for a pulpit.
His text was: "Ho, everyone that thirsteth! come ye to the waters. And
he that hath no money, come ye, buy and eat. Yea, come buy wine and milk
without money and without price." On the walls were displayed these
legends: "No trust," "Pay as you go," "Twenty-five cents a drink," etc.

Colorado Territory was organized in 1861, and was loyal to the Union.
Denver was still booming, though she suffered nearly all the ills that
precocious settlements are heir to. The business portion of the town was
half destroyed in 1863; Cherry Creek flooded her in 1864, floating
houses out of reach and drowning fifteen or twenty of the inhabitants.
Then the Indians went on the war-path; stages and wagon trains were
attacked; passengers and scattered settlers massacred, and the very town
itself threatened. Alarm-bells warned the frightened inhabitants of
impending danger; many fled to the United States Mint for refuge, and to
cellars, cisterns, and dark alleys. This was during the wild reign of
Spotted Horse along the shores of the Platte, before he was captured by
Major Downing at the battle of Sand Creek, and finally sent to Europe on
exhibition as a genuine child of the forest.

Those were stirring times, when every man had an eye to business, and
could hardly afford to spare it long enough to wink. It is related of a
certain minister who was officiating at a funeral that, while standing
by the coffin offering the final prayer, he noticed one of the mourners
kneeling upon the loose earth recently thrown from the grave. This man
was a prospector, like all the rest, and in an absent-minded way he had
tearfully been sifting the soil through his fingers. Suddenly he arose
and began to stake out a claim adjoining the gr