Esmeralda, July 23d, 1862.  My dear Bro.,—­No, I don’t own a foot in the “Johnson” ledge—­I will tell the story some day in a more intelligible manner than Tom has told it.  You needn’t take the trouble to deny Tom’s version, though.  I own 25 feet (1-16) of the 1st east ex. on it—­and Johnson himself has contracted to find the ledge for 100 feet.  Contract signed yesterday.  But as the ledge will be difficult to find he is allowed six months to find it in.  An eighteenth of the Ophir was a fortune to John D. Winters—­and the Ophir can’t beat the Johnson any.....

My debts are greater than I thought for; I bought $25 worth of clothing, and sent $25 to Higbie, in the cement diggings.  I owe about $45 or $50, and have got about $45 in my pocket.  But how in the h—­l I am going to live on something over $100 until October or November, is singular.  The fact is, I must have something to do, and that shortly, too.....

Now write to the Sacramento Union folks, or to Marsh, and tell them I’ll write as many letters a week as they want, for $10 a week—­my board must be paid.  Tell them I have corresponded with the N. Orleans Crescent, and other papers—­and the Enterprise.  California is full of people who have interests here, and it’s d—–­d seldom they hear from this country.  I can’t write a specimen letter—­now, at any rate—­I’d rather undertake to write a Greek poem.  Tell ’em the mail and express leave three times a week, and it costs from 25 to 50 cents to send letters by the blasted express.  If they want letters from here, who’ll run from morning till night collecting materials cheaper.  I’ll write a short letter twice a week, for the present, for the “Age,” for $5 per week.  Now it has been a long time since I couldn’t make my own living, and it shall be a long time before I loaf another year.....

If I get the other 25 feet in the Johnson ex., I shan’t care a d—–­n. 
I’ll be willing to curse awhile and wait.  And if I can’t move the bowels
of those hills this fall, I will come up and clerk for you until I get
money enough to go over the mountains for the winter. 
                                   Yr.  Bro. 
          
                                        Sam.

The Territorial Enterprise at Virginia City was at this time owned by Joseph T. Goodman, who had bought it on the eve of the great Comstock silver-mining boom, and from a struggling, starving sheet had converted it into one of the most important—­certainly the most picturesque-papers on the coast.  The sketches which the Esmeralda miner had written over the name of “Josh” fitted into it exactly, and when a young man named Barstow, in the business office, urged Goodman to invite “Josh” to join their staff, the Enterprise owner readily fell in with the idea.  Among a lot of mining matters of no special interest, Clemens, July 30th, wrote his brother:  “Barstow has offered me the post as local reporter for