"salting"

[George Thompson]

This emendation isn't conjectural: I mistyped the first sentence -- it should read  A new and unprecedented scheme \of\ knavery . . . , not "to knavery".

I did look it over before sending -- it seems that it's the 2-keystoke words that I am most likely to screw up.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.

----- Original Message -----
From: George Thompson <george.thompson at nyu.edu>
Date: Friday, September 10, 2010 6:36 pm
Subject: Re: "salting"
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU

> We English majors -- some of us, anyway -- would call this a
> conjectural emendation, and it's an excellent one.
>
> I was reading this from a microfilm, not from the EAN database.
>
> GAT
>
> George A. Thompson
> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
> Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Date: Friday, September 10, 2010 5:59 pm
> Subject: Re: "salting"
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
> > George,
> >
> > I just looked into EAN.  I assume, since you wrote "garbled" and not
> > "unreadable", you have the whole last sentence, which reads:
> > "When the lucky spot is pointed out to the gold hunter, and it is
> > "panned" as the term goes, particles of gold salted in a proper way,
> > of the course discovered, as the land is bid for accordingly."
> >
> > My guess is that the meaning is "[particles of gold] are of course
> > discovered, and the land is bid for accordingly."
> >
> > EAN has this from the Rhode Island American, Oct. 18, 1832 (two days
> > later than the Morning Courier & New-York Enquirer, which was a
> > little closer to the South); and the Salem Gazette, Oct. 26, 1832.
> >
> > This is presumably about the Georgia Gold Rush of 1829.  I think
> > someone of Hawthorne's family went South and lost his investment
> > (although I don't know whether he bought into a salted mine).  The
> > publication in the Salem Gazette is perhaps not surprising.
> >
> > Joel
> >
> > At 9/10/2010 05:08 PM, George Thompson wrote:
> > >My many fans will be disappointed to find that there is nothing at
> > >all indecent about this posting.
> > >
> > >Salting. -- A new and unprecedented scheme to knavery has been
> > >invented in the gold regions of the South. . . .  It consists of
> > >sprinkling judiciously a few penny weights of gold in places which
> > >have all other signs of containing the precious metal, except the
> > >gold itself.  When the lucky spot is pointed out to the gold hunter,
> > >and it is "panned" as the term goes, particles of gold salted in a
> > >proper way [are found].  ***
> > >Morning Courier & New-York Enquirer, October 17, 1832, p. 2, col.
> > >3  [The end of the last sentence quoted is garbled beyond
> > >explication.  The article concludes with an instance of a man who
> > >paid heavily for land that had been salted, and after more than a
> > >year's effort, had found only a few dollars worth of gold.]
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
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