A, M AG A ZINE TRIBUNE INSTITUTE BOOK SECTION MAG A ZINE TRIBUNE INSTITUTE t>ART V TWELVE PAGES BOOK SECTION rWELVE PACrES PART V. TWENTY-EIGHT HOLDUPS WITH AN a EMPTY GUN flere's Highwayman By JOSIAH M. WARD Illustration Who Swore Never to by WILL CRAWFORD A Story to Prove That ' 01 or Injure Man or the New York Type of Woman, andWhoKept Holdup ManHasMuch Bis Word and His to Learn Before He jServe for Seven YearS Can Rank Profession- ally With Black Bart The Prospector HF WAS .« failure, There was no worthy freed himself doubt of that. Just one of the many having of the euetody of box and bag. "Drive on." West in the flush men who went The men who were aent out from OroviDa days of mining with the cxpectation to rescue the box and the bag found in th" rifled box the cf wresting a fortune from the stubborn hills following bit of doggerel ver?e, and baek written, one may surmise, while the robber w. of Nevada and California going in who had lyii r wait for the stage: I om« ) iive at ease.one of those Here I lay me down and a to sleep, * home to which he could -retftrn patient, To walt the comtn_ morrow j there for him. Be could Perhaps sncceas, perhaps defeat trusting wife waitlng And everlastinjr sorrow. work for wage* baek there in his Illinois home Tet come what wtll.ri] tn N w, My condition can't be woreet *own. What he sought was the big gamble And If there's money ln that hem, He was a prospec- T_ money for my purse. in minihg.thc bonanza. BLACK BART. » O ft. .-,; but somehow all the mines he ataked And thus Black Bart, staga robber, waa turned out to be barrancas. A prospector, ushered Into fame. howc er, Is ever lured from one barren hole The descriptlon of him fnrnlshed by the tn another. Always he has feith in his lattBt driver of the Russian River stage tallied wit'' the find. and he C"cs on year after year palched. description of the robber of the Ororii!" tarched and hungry.seeking the pot, of gold stage, including the note about a hollow voice. By the last robbery he obtained a sum of mone" of his rainbow. 11 is a lonesome _ th cnd marked "considerable" in the report of (he if. r- .' reeds ecrecy. expresa company given for publication. Thia Wl--- ;.ii his money ia tfone, his credit ex- meant, decoded, about $5,000. Black Bart ..;.! hc can find no one to jrrubstake had now rohbed the United States mail, and his second exploit drew forth 1"" v il! irn *" some voutine cmployment him an offer of $300 from the Federal government aml earn a fund for another prospc-ting trip. for his arrest. $200 from the postal authori . niai apt t<> brood, to become mis- ties and $300 from the Wells Fargo Company As .,,,.).. ,pic, to envy thc good fortune of others. robbery succceded to robbery, each drew a duplication of these 6ntil the sum a ..;,- there in the pot of gold at the offer.*, total reached $18,000. where it. was left as a stand ra ubow. One more one more pf [hc trip, ing offer. Twenty-five successful robberie- a| and it his. foliowed. The twenty-eighth, attemptcd Charles i'- Bolcs, thc failure I am writine November 3, 1883, proved his undoing. H- had gone once too often to the well. Coli ,. was pro pector in Nevada in the bo- stant success had in deep, dark, damp made Black Bart carelesr. digging An odd peculiarity was his seeming deter ..-; -,i< $ i day for him. ile bad his up* mination to earn the second title lie bad he _0wn bul his upy werc few «n<! when stowed upon himself. that of P O 8. Thia waf a little over ... down he worked for a new stake. private joke which hc chucklerl. for he was awarc he hc founti cmployment about e.xpress perfectly that was no iialiy poct. After nearly every robbery n hit o: .'..- u and railwaj stations. lie was a fairly doggerel was found in thc- shattcred treasufc clcrk, and express and railway clerkn box, in which he made some humorous allusion to the .c always shifting. Many. yes, many, ma.de attempts to capture him and defied the owners of thc p'tle in mining stocks, others quit to go express company. saying he wac trying to get a slice of the riches of a stock, "you Lhe mining centers and few, losing white-haired, Bonanza Kings." In those day le company money and disappeared. Boles. the expression "white-haired" was the equiva too proud to piifer. He abhorred a petty lent of our "silk-stockinged." The , thief. He had been a soldier in the disastrous twenty-eighth robbery w«- committed on Civil War and had a code of honor. Besides, the road near CopperopoJU, Calaveras County, thc Sonora to Milton thcrc were his wife and their little girl. stagf being held up. It contained no passengers. ll. name ough an error in a pay roll the After obeying the order to throw out the '' "Bol« became "Bolton." The error suited treasure box the driver was told to deseend him. He was willing to liye as Bolton until from his seat. He did so, and for nearly half he struck it rich in mining. Then he would an hour watched Black Bart's efforts to open 'the box, which was bound in iron. At blossom as a heavily out in his true colors gentleman last he opened it and quickly threw amalgam, of education, and while the world was hailing gold dust and coin into a sack. him as Bolton, the ncw bonanza king, he would As he was making up his load an Italian 'an »h in a cloud of n... stery to reappear in the boy carrying a gun approached, unperceived by Black Bart. The driver beckoned him to little Illinois town as B0I93 the multi-raillion- aire, How approach, wtgwagging caution. The boy he would quietly gloat as he basked obeyed, the driver took the and blare-1 in the gun reflected glory of his millionsl And how away at the robber as he was disappearing pleased would bc his uncomplaining wife, in the bushes. He ran rapidly out of sigbt, but his was Often while sitting by his camp fire in the hat brurhed off by the overhang- mountains thoughts of her goodnesa and for- ing bushes, and he lost a silk handkerchief. The sack, the contents of which were valued at beararice filled hia and from his mind, taking $4,800, he hid under a log. In this sack was Pack . gmall, bulky volume bearing the title the waybill, certifying the contents of the box. Holy Bible he turned to the flyleaf, whercon and this bill bore bloud stains. Black Bart 'Mwritten in a fine feminine hand: had been wounded. To Beloved Here let me insert, out of its sequence, the My Husband, unknown peculiarity of Black Bart's robberies. Charles E. Bolea. Bolea.Mary The gun with which he held up stages vtfai The book he carried with him everywhere, no never loaded. For seven years he had worked maiter how emall he had to make his pack. a bluff with an empty gun. The gun he car¬ ried wiien There were 773,746 words in it, the aweeteat he held up the Sonora stage was not loaded. Think of the nerve of the man! °* all of whii.h was one the word.Mary. There are more So things powetful than guns. the long, dreary, disappointing year* One of them is a clew. The handkerchief that dragged by. Boltom the prospector continued Black Bart dropped in his fiight bore the to pack his grub and pick over the rugged laundry mark FOX7. Hume employed Harry N. Morse, former Sheriff of Alameda "iountair.s or across desert wastes, was always County, but now head of a large detective agency in doomed to and re- Take a Chance on His Gun disappointment inevitably Would You Being Empty? San Francisco, to find the owner of the laundry torned to civilization to become Bolton the mark FOX7. cl«k. It was a tantalizing existence, and *«* was no raor© tantalising eight in it than Capture and Confession ^ treasare boxea of the com- repcated the clerk at the laundry heavy expresa baaineaa foresight and acuman ever came to a fat treasure box. For his money supply waa lar interest, dropped his sight to the sinister the Inside of the coach indicated that there WJpOXT?" * office on Bush Street between and . were both men women was Kearney Wny chock full of gold gold in coin, gold his mind he ignored it He waa a failure. He becoming lesa. looking gun. and aboard. 'It !n "You he the box to be alive on that Montgomery, to which place Black Bart's laun¬ hullion, gold in amalgam, gold in rich was past the productive period of life. Though The habit of secretivenesa had grown upon win," remarked, tossing good pleasant spring day side of the road. in 1878. The man on the seat with the driver dry had been traced by Morse. "That is the -ewelry. Tossed of constitution, there waa no denying him, and when he needed suppMes he walked out upon the to and from stage coach, vigorous "Drive masked man then ordered. was moved to mark of Charles E.