The Luck of Roaring Camp | Page 8

deposited before a mock altar, Stumpy stepped before
the expectant crowd. "It ain't my style to spoil fun, boys," said the little
man, stoutly eying the faces around him, "but it strikes me that this
thing ain't exactly on the squar. It's playing it pretty low down on this
yer baby to ring in fun on him that he ain't goin' to understand. And ef

there's goin' to be any godfathers round, I'd like to see who's got any
better rights than me." A silence followed Stumpy's speech. To the
credit of all humorists be it said that the first man to acknowledge its
justice was the satirist thus stopped of his fun. "But," said Stumpy,
quickly following up his advantage, "we're here for a christening, and
we'll have it. I proclaim you Thomas Luck, according to the laws of the
United States and the State of California, so help me God." It was the
first time that the name of the Deity had been otherwise uttered than
profanely in the camp. The form of christening was perhaps even more
ludicrous than the satirist had conceived; but strangely enough, nobody
saw it and nobody laughed. "Tommy" was christened as seriously as he
would have been under a Christian roof, and cried and was comforted
in as orthodox fashion.
And so the work of regeneration began in Roaring Camp. Almost
imperceptibly a change came over the settlement. The cabin assigned to
"Tommy Luck"--or "The Luck," as he was more frequently called--first
showed signs of improvement. It was kept scrupulously clean and
whitewashed. Then it was boarded, clothed, and papered. The
rosewood, cradle, packed eighty miles by mule, had, in Stumpy's way
of putting it, "sorter killed the rest of the furniture." So the
rehabilitation of the cabin became a necessity. The men who were in
the habit of lounging in at Stumpy's to see "how 'The Luck' got on"
seemed to appreciate the change, and in self-defense the rival
establishment of "Tuttle's grocery" bestirred itself and imported a
carpet and mirrors. The reflections of the latter on the appearance of
Roaring Camp tended to produce stricter habits of personal cleanliness.
Again Stumpy imposed a kind of quarantine upon those who aspired to
the honor and privilege of holding The Luck. It was a cruel
mortification to Kentuck--who, in the carelessness of a large nature and
the habits of frontier life, had begun to regard all garments as a second
cuticle, which, like a snake's, only sloughed off through decay--to be
debarred this privilege from certain prudential reasons. Yet such was
the subtle influence of innovation that he thereafter appeared regularly
every afternoon in a clean shirt and face still shining from his ablutions.
Nor were moral and social sanitary laws neglected. "Tommy," who was
supposed to spend his whole existence in a persistent attempt to repose,

must not be disturbed by noise. The shouting and yelling, which had
gained the camp its infelicitous title, were not permitted within hearing
distance of Stumpy's. The men conversed in whispers or smoked with
Indian gravity. Profanity was tacitly given up in these sacred precincts,
and throughout the camp a popular form of expletive, known as "D--n
the luck!" and "Curse the luck!" was abandoned, as having a new
personal bearing. Vocal music was not interdicted, being supposed to
have a soothing, tranquilizing quality; and one song, sung by
"Man-o'-War Jack," an English sailor from her Majesty's Australian
colonies, was quite popular as a lullaby. It was a lugubrious recital of
the exploits of "the Arethusa, Seventy-four," in a muffled minor,
ending with a prolonged dying fall at the burden of each verse," On b-
oo-o-ard of the Arethusa." It was a fine sight to see Jack holding The
Luck, rocking from side to side as if with the motion of a ship, and
crooning forth this naval ditty. Either through the peculiar rocking of
Jack or the length of his song,--it contained ninety stanzas, and was
continued with conscientious deliberation to the bitter end,--the lullaby
generally had the desired effect. At such times the men would lie at full
length under the trees in the soft summer twilight, smoking their pipes
and drinking in the melodious utterances. An indistinct idea that this
was pastoral happiness pervaded the camp. "This 'ere kind o' think,"
said the Cockney Simmons, meditatively reclining on his elbow, "is
'evingly." It reminded him of Greenwich.
On the long summer days The Luck was usually carried to the gulch
from whence the golden store of Roaring Camp was taken. There, on a
blanket spread over pine boughs, he would lie while the men were
working in the ditches below. Latterly there was a rude attempt to
decorate this bower with flowers and sweet-smelling shrubs, and
generally some one would bring him a cluster