[William B. Daugherty, Legal Lights at Pioche, Reno Evening Gazette, August 26, 1891]

LEGAL LIGHTS AT PIOCHE,

Who Practiced and Played When Fees and Stakes Were High.

            "How time flies," said the doctor. "It's now twenty years since the good old days in Pioche, and it doesn't seem so very long ago." And with this followed a talk with the visitor on the times gone by, in which the two relics of a past age, and a fast one, too, recalled incidents with a gusto that made them smack their lips as do boys over plums in a pudding. What a host of prominent lawyers were gathered there during the days of lavish litigation over the bonanza mines, in the palmy days of Pioche. The best legal talent of the coast was there, or brought there as occasion required, and the fees they received were very large, but not excelled by the liberty with which they spent them.

AMONG THE LAWYERS

Were Ashley, Pitzer, Thornton, Kelley, Perley, Bishop, Sabin, Rives, Hardy, Foster and others, and, imported, when required, were Garber, Messick, Ellis, Wren and many others, who all found profit in attending court. And how well they lived during that time. The market contained nothing too good for their epicurean palates, and the best clarets and champagnes washed down the French dishes. The morning cocktail effervesced with Heisdieck, and the cigars were all imported and cost the smoker 25 cents each. No 5-cent beer sign hailed the tippler then, for it was rank treason to charge less than 25 cents a drink, and the man who would have dared to talk of charging less would have been boycotted. And then the royal gaming indulged in sounds now like a romance of '49 or Monte Carlo.

THE CLUB ROOMS

Of Russ Scott were run with royal extravagance. The sideboard was overflowing with the best, and nothing was too good for his patrons. One evening a player at the faro game, being hungry, asked for oysters. Russ sent to a restaurant to bring all the oysters they had in the shell, and the order was filled at once, and two sacks, fresh from San Francisco by express were delivered at the sideboard at a dollar a dozen, and every habitué of the place invited to fill up on raw oysters and champagne. But Russ could afford it, for his patrons were opulent and played high. On one occasion a distinguished attorney in attendance at court, on a trial where his retainer was $20,000, blew in at his game $14,000 in a few nights' play. Singular to say, there was one who did not play. But when court took a

RECESS ON SATURDAY NIGHT,

He would retire to a favorite resort of his and drink and smoke without retiring during the time intervening until Monday morning, when with copious drafts of seltzer he would go to the barbers, have his head (a very bald one) rubbed vigorously, and at 10 o'clock A. M. when court opened, he was there with most impressive dignity to proceed with the case, no matter at what point dropped. He knew law as doctors know medicine. He simply sized up his clients' wrongs and at once applied a remedy, as a nurse would a poultice. No delving in musty reports for him, for he had helped in making them and his opinions were considered conclusive. Then why did he indulge in such a manner? He said "for rest," and it seemed reasonable, for his brain was stupified during the time and ceased all action. He is hale and hearty to-day, and as rich as a Jew. He was one of the rare successes, who took the tide at its flood, when it led on to fortune, but in his case it was one of very fair sailing, and every old-timer knows who is meant.