A FRESH START
In the evening they camped on the banks of the Green River, here a
stream of but small size, except when the melting snow swelled its
waters into a torrent. At the spot where they halted a rivulet ran into
the stream from a thickly-wooded little valley. It was frozen, but
breaking the ice with their axes they found that water was flowing
underneath. They had observed that there was a marked difference in
temperature on this side of the mountains, upon which the strength of
the southern sun had already in many places cleared away the snow.
"It is a comfort to be able to sit by a fire without the thought that
red-skins maybe crawling up towards you," Sam Hicks said heartily, "and
to sleep without being turned out to stand watch in the cold.
"You say the country ahead is bad, chief?"
"Bad lands both sides of Green River. Deep canons and bare rock."
"Well, we need not follow it; it don't make any difference to us whether
we get down to the fort in a fortnight or six weeks."
"None at all," Harry said. "We have agreed that when summer fairly sets
in we will try that place I hit on just as the Utes came down on us. It
is the richest place I have ever seen, and if the Indians will but let
us alone for a month we ought to bring back a big lot of dust; and if we
do, we can sell our share in it for a big sum, and take down enough men
to thrash the Utes out of their boots if they interfere with us. By our
reckoning it is the end of March now, though we don't at all agree as to
the day; but at any rate, it is there or thereabouts. That gives us a
good six weeks, and if we start in the middle of May it will be time
enough. So I propose that we strike more to the west, or to the east,
whichever you think is the best, chief, and try and pick up a few more
pelts so as to lay in a fresh stock of goods for our next trip."
"Bad hills everywhere," the chief said; "better go west, plenty of game
there."
"No fear of Indians?"
"Indians there peaceable; make good trade with whites. Ten years ago
fight, but lose many men and not get much plunder. Trappers here good
friends with them. Traders bring up powder and cloth and beads. Indians
no give trouble."
For the next six weeks, therefore, they travelled slowly, camping
sometimes for two or three days on a stream, and then making a long
march until they again came to water. The beaver traps had been left
behind, but they were fortunate enough to come upon several beaver
villages, and by exercising patience they were able to shoot a good
many, getting in all some fifty skins. Tom used to go out in the evening
and lie down to watch the beavers at work, but he would not take a gun.
"I could not shoot them down in cold blood, uncle. It is almost like
looking at a village of human beings at work. One can shoot a man who is
wanting to shoot you, without feeling much about it, but to fire at a
man labouring in the fields is murder. Of course, if we wanted the flesh
for food it would be different."
"I did not see you refuse that beaver-tail soup we had last night, Tom."
"No, and it was very good, uncle; but I would very much rather have gone
without it than shoot the beaver the tail belonged to."
"Well, Tom, as we have all got guns, and as none of us have any scruples
that way, there is no occasion whatever for you to draw a trigger on
them. They take some shooting, for if you hit them in the water they
sink directly, and you have got to kill them dead when they are on land,
otherwise they make for the water at once and dive into their houses and
die there."
They killed a good many other animals besides the beaver, including
several wolverines, and by the time they got down to the fort in the
middle of May they had had to give up riding and pack all the animals
with the skins they had obtained. None of these were of any great value,
but the whole brought enough to buy them a fresh outfit of clothes, a
fresh stock of provisions and powder, and to give them a hundred dollars
each.
The evening after the sale was effected Tom wrote home to his sisters,
giving them a brief account of what had taken place since the letter he
had posted to them before starting for the mountains, but saying very
little of their adventures with Indians. "I am afraid you have been in a
great fright about me," he said, "but you must never fidget when you
don't get letters. We may often be for a long time away from any place
where we can post them, or, as they call it here, mail them, though I
certainly do not expect to be snowed up again for a whole winter. Owing
to the Indians being hostile we did not do nearly so well as we
expected, for we could not go down to hunt in the valleys. So after
getting a fresh outfit for our next journey our share is only a hundred
dollars each. I did not want to take a share, for of course I was not of
much use to them, though I have learnt a lot in the last six months, and
can shoot now as well as any of them, except the two Indians.
"However, they all insisted on my having the same share as the rest.
Uncle wanted me to take his hundred dollars and send them home to you
with mine, but I told him that I would not do so, for I know you have
money enough to go on with, even if your school has turned out a
failure. So I think it would be as well for us to keep our money in hand
for the present. There is never any saying what may happen; we may lose
our horses and kit, and it would be very awkward if we hadn't the money
to replace them. As soon as we get more we will send it off, as you know
I always intended to do. I have still some left of what I brought out
with me, but that and the two hundred dollars would not be more than
enough to buy an entirely new outfit for us both.
"I hope you got the five hundred dollars uncle sent you. He told me he
sent it off from Denver, and it ought to have got home a few weeks after
I left. It is horrid to think that there may be letters from you lying
at Denver, but it serves me right for being so stupid as not to put in
the short note I wrote you from here before I started, that you had
better direct to me at Fort Bridger, as I shall almost be sure to come
back to it before I go to Denver. I like uncle awfully; it seems to me
that he is just what I expected he would be. I suppose they all put in
equal shares, but the other men quite look upon him as their leader.
Sometimes when he is talking to me he speaks just as people do at home.
When he talks to the men he uses the same queer words they do. He is
taller than father was, and more strongly built. What I like in him is,
he is always the same. Sometimes the others used to get grumbly when we
were shut up so long, but it never seemed to make any difference in him.
"I told you when I wrote from Denver that he was called 'Straight
Harry,' because he always acted straightforwardly, and now I know him I
can quite understand their calling him so. One feels somehow that one
could rely upon his always being the same, whatever happened. Leaping
Horse is a first-rate fellow, and so is Hunting Dog, though of course he
does not know nearly as much as the chief does, but he knows a lot. The
other three are all nice fellows, too, so we were a very jolly party.
They know a tremendous lot of stories about hunting and red-skins and
that sort of thing. Some of them would make all you girls' hairs stand
on end. We are going to start off in two or three days to hunt up a gold
mine uncle found three years ago. The Indians are going, too; they will
hunt while the rest of us work. It will be quite a different journey to
the last, and I expect it will be just as hot this time as it was cold
last. We may be away for four months, and perhaps we may not come back
till the snow sets in, so don't expect a letter till you see it."
This was by far the longest letter Tom had ever written, and it took him
several hours to get through. He had the room to himself, for the others
were talking over their adventures with old friends they had met at the
fort. His uncle returned about ten o'clock.
"Where are the others?" Tom asked.
"In the saloon; but they are not drinking, that is, not drinking much. I
told them that if they were to get drunk one of them would be sure to
blab as to where we were going, or at any rate to say enough to excite
suspicion among some of the old miners, that we knew of a good thing,
and in that case we should get a lot of men following us, and it would
interfere with our plans altogether. A party as small as ours may live
for months without a red-skin happening to light on us, but if there
were many more they would be certain to find us. There would be too much
noise going on, too much shooting and driving backward and forward with
food and necessaries. We want it kept dark till we thoroughly prove the
place. So I made them all take an oath this morning that they would keep
their heads cool, and I told them that if one of them got drunk, or said
a word about our going after gold, I would not take him with us. I have
given out that we are going on another hunting party, and of course our
having brought in such a lot of skins will make them think that we have
hit on a place where game is abundant and are going back there for the
summer."
Two more pack-ponies had been added to the outfit. They might be away
for five or six months, and were determined to take a good supply of
flour this time, for all were tired of the diet of meat only, on which
they had existed for the last six months, having devoted by far the
greater part of the flour to the horses.
When they started next day they turned their faces north, as if they
intended to hunt in the mountains where they had wintered. They made but
a short march, camped on a stream, and long before daybreak started
again, travelling for some hours to the west and then striking directly
south. For two days they travelled rapidly, Tom going out every morning
with the Indians hunting, while the others kept with the pack-horses.
Ben had now quite recovered from the strain which had crippled him for
the first three weeks of their march down to Fort Bridger. They were now
fairly among the Ute hills, and at their third camping-place Harry said:
"We must do no more shooting now till we get to our valley. We have got
a supply of deer-flesh for a week at least, and we must be careful in
future. We heard at the fort that several miners have been cut off and
killed by the Utes during the winter, and that they are more set than
ever against white men entering their country. Everyone says those
rascally Saints are at the bottom of it. We must hide our trail as much
as we can. We are just at the edge of the bad lands, and will travel on
them for the next two days. The red-skins don't go out that way much,
there being nothing either to hunt or to plunder, so there is little
fear of their coming on our trail on the bare rocks, especially as none
of the horses are shod. On the third day we shall strike right up into
their mountains."
"Are you sure that you will know the place again, Harry?"
"I reckon I could find it, but I should not feel quite certain about it
if I had not the chief with me. There is no fear of his going wrong.
When a red-skin has once been to a place he can find his way straight
back to it again, even if he were a thousand miles off."
"You said when we were talking of it among the hills, uncle," Tom said,
as he rode beside him the next morning, "that Leaping Horse and you each
took two shares. I wonder what he will do with his if it turns out
well."
"He won't do anything with it, Tom. The chief and I are like brothers.
He does not want gold, he has no use for it; and, besides, as a rule,
Indians never have anything to do with mining. He and Hunting Dog really
come as hunters, and he has an understanding with me that when the
expedition is over I shall pay them the same as they would earn from any
English sportsman who might engage them as guides and hunters, and that
I shall take their shares in whatever we may make. I need not say that
if it turns out as well as we expect, the Indians will get as many
blankets and as much ammunition as will last them their lives. You can't
get a red-skin to dig. Even the chief, who has been with us for years,
would consider it degrading to do work of that kind; and if you see an
Indian at mining work, you may be sure that he is one of the fellows who
has left his tribe and settled down to loaf and drink in the
settlements, and is just doing a spell to get himself enough fire-water
to make himself drunk on.
"The Seneca would be just as willing to come and hunt for us for
nothing. He would get his food and the skins, which would pay for his
tobacco and ammunition, and, occasionally, a new suit of leggings and
hunting-shirt, made by an Indian woman, and with this he would be happy
and contented. He doesn't mind taking money in return for skins, and he
and Hunting Dog had their full share in the division at the fort. When I
last talked to him about this business, he said, 'Leaping Horse doesn't
want money. Of what use is it to him? He has got a bagful hidden at
home, which he has been paid when he was scouting with the army, and for
the skins of beasts he has shot. It is enough to buy many horses and
blankets, and all that a chief can want. He is going with his friend to
hunt, and to fight by his side if the Utes come; he wants none of the
gold.' I explained the matter to him, and he said carelessly: 'Leaping
Horse will take the two shares, but it will be for his brother, and that
he may send it to the girls, the sisters of his friend Tom, of whom he
spoke one night by the fire.'
"Hunting Dog is like Leaping Horse, he will take no gold. I have told
the three men how matters stand. Of course, it makes no difference to
them whether the Indians keep their share or hand it over to me, but at
the same time I thought they ought to know how we stood. They said it
was no business of theirs; that as I was the discoverer I had a right to
sell the whole thing if I chose, and that they thought I had done the
friendly thing by them in letting them in as partners. So you see it is
all right and square. It is like enough, too, that we shall find some
other lodes, and of course there they will come in on even terms with
us. So they are pleased with the look-out, and know well enough it is
likely to be the best strike they ever made in their lives."
They kept near the edge of the bad lands, as had they gone farther out
they would have been obliged to make long detours to get round the head
of the cañons made by rivers running down into the Colorado. They had
filled their water-skins at the last stream where they had camped, and
had taken with them enough dried wood for their fires. These they lit
each night in a hollow, as from the upper slopes of the Ute hills a view
could be obtained for a great distance over the flat rocky plateau. Tom
was heartily glad when the two days' journey was over. Not a living
creature had met their eyes; there was no grass on which beasts could
exist, no earth in which prairie-dogs could burrow; even birds shunned
the bare waste of rock.
"It is a desolate country," he said, as they sat round the fire; "it
would be enough to give one the horrors if one were alone. It is hot
now, and in the height of summer the heat and glare from the rock must
be awful."
"It is, Tom; many and many a man has died of thirst in the bad lands.
And what makes it more terrible is, that they can perhaps see water a
thousand feet below them and yet die from the want of it."
"When we were camped on the Green River, uncle, you said that no one had
ever followed it down."
"That is so, lad. One knows whereabouts it goes, as men driven by thirst
have followed cañons down to it; and in some places it runs for many
miles across low land before it plunges into another cañon. Then it cuts
its way for two or three hundred miles, perhaps, through the hills, with
walls two or three thousand feet high. No one, so far as I know, has
gone down these big cañons, but it is certain there are rapids and
whirlpools and rocks in them. Two or three parties have gone down
through some of the shorter cañons to escape Indians, and most of them
have never been heard of again, but one or two have got down some
distance and managed to escape.
"No one has followed the course by land. They could not do so unless
they carried all their provisions, and drink and food for their animals,
and even then the expedition would take months, perhaps years to do; for
every spring from the hills runs down a cañon to the river, sometimes
fifty miles, sometimes a hundred long, and each time the party came upon
one of these they would have to work up to the mountains to get round
it. It is over a thousand miles in a straight line from the place where
the Green River first enters a cañon to where the Colorado issues out on
to the plains, and it may be quite twice that distance if one could
follow all its windings. Some day when the country fills up attempts
will no doubt be made to find out something about it; but it will be a
big job whenever it is tried, and may cost a lot of lives before the
cañons are all explored."
In the morning they started westward for the hills. The greatest care
was observed on the march. They took advantage of every depression, and
when obliged to pass over level ground moved at a distance apart, as a
clump or string of moving animals would be made out at a distance from
which a solitary one would be unnoticed. By noon they had left the bare
rock, and were travelling up a valley clothed with grass and dotted with
clumps of trees. In the first of these they halted.
"We will stay here until it begins to get dusk," Harry said, "and then
move on as fast as we can go. If we don't lose our way we shall be there
before morning."
There was no moon, but the stars shone brilliantly, and the mountains,
with their summits still covered with snow, could be seen ahead. The
chief went on in front. Sometimes they proceeded up valleys, sometimes
crossed shoulders and spurs running down from the hills. They moved in
Indian file, and at times proceeded at a brisk pace, at other times more
slowly; but there was no halt or sign of hesitation on the part of their
leader. At last, just as morning was breaking, the chief led them into a
clump of trees. He moved a little distance in, and then reined in his
horse and dismounted.
"Does my brother remember that?" he said to Harry, pointing to something
on the ground.
"Jee-hoshaphat!" Harry exclaimed; "if that ain't my old pack-saddle!
This is the very spot where we camped, boys. Well, chief, you are
certainly a wonder. I doubt whether I could have found my way here in
the daytime. Half a dozen times to-night it seemed to me that you were
going in the wrong direction altogether, and yet you bring us as
straight to the spot as if all the time you had been following a main
road."
"Bully for the chief!" Jerry said warmly. "I am blamed if that ain't a
fust-rate piece of tracking. Waal, here we are at our journey's end.
Can we make a fire?"
"Make small fire, but must put screen round."
"Very well; we will leave the fire to you, and we will unpack the
critters. There is a bundle of dry wood left, so we sha'n't have the
bother of looking for it now."
Before lighting the fire the two Indians stretched some blankets some
six feet above it, to prevent the light falling upon the foliage; then
by their directions Sam cut a dozen short poles, and fixed them in a
circle round the fire. Half a dozen more blankets were fastened to the
poles, forming a wall round the fire, which the chief then lighted. The
nights were, at that height above the sea-level, cool enough to make the
heat pleasant, and there was just room for the seven men to sit between
the blanket wall and the fire.
"Do you mean this to be our permanent camp, Harry?"
"What do you think, Leaping Horse?"
"Wait till me go up gold valley," the Seneca said. "If can't find a good
place there better stay here; if go backwards and forwards every day
make trail Indian squaw would notice."
"That is so, chief; but by what Harry says it is a mere gully, and the
horses will have to range."
"Horses must feed," the chief said. "If we find a place up there, make
hut, take saddles and outfit there. Tie up horses here, and let them
loose to feed at night. No regular track then. But talk after sleep."
"It will be broad daylight by the time that we have finished our meal,"
Jerry said, "and I reckon none of us will be wanting to sleep till we
have got a sight of Harry's bonanza."
As soon as they had finished their meal, the mining implements, which
had been carefully hidden among the rest of their goods when they
started from the fort, were brought out. Among these were a dozen light
pick-heads and half a dozen handles, as many shovels, a flat iron plate
for crushing ore upon, and a short hammer, with a face six inches in
diameter, as a pounder; also a supply of long nails, to be used in
fastening together troughs, cradles, or any other woodwork that might be
required; three or four deep tin dishes, a bottle of mercury, a saw, and
a few other tools. Three of the pick-heads were now fastened to their
handles, and taking these, a couple of shovels, two of the tin basins, a
sledge hammer, and some steel wedges, and the peculiar wooden platter,
in shape somewhat resembling a small shield with an indentation in the
middle, called a vanner, and universally used by prospectors, the five
whites and Leaping Horse started from their camp for the spot where
Harry had found the lode. It lay about a mile up a narrow valley,
running into the larger one. A rivulet trickled down its centre.
"I reckoned on that," Harry said. "Of course it was frozen when we were
here, but I could see that there was water in summer. You see this
hollow runs right up into that wood, and there is sure to be water in it
for the next three months anyhow."
They had gone but a short distance up when they stopped at a spot where
the streamlet widened out into a pool.
"Let us try here," Jerry said, "and see if there is any sign."
Half a shovelful of sand was placed in the vanner with a small quantity
of water, and while Harry and Sam proceeded to wash some gravel roughly
in the pans, Tom stood watching Jerry's operations. He gave a gentle
motion to the vanner that caused its contents to revolve, the coarser
particles being thrown towards the edges while the finer remained in the
centre. The water was poured away and the rougher particles of gravel
and sand swept off by the hand; fresh water was then added, and the
process repeated again and again, until at last no more than a spoonful
of fine sand remained in the centre. A sideway action of the vanner
caused this to slope gradually down towards the edge. At the very bottom
three tiny bits of yellow metal were seen. They were no bigger than
pins' heads. It seemed to Tom that this was a miserably small return for
five minutes' labour, but the others seemed well satisfied, and were
still more pleased when, on the two pans being cleaned out, several
little pieces of gold were found, one of which was nearly as large as a
small pea.
"That is good enough," Ben said; "it will run a lot richer when we get
down on to the rock."
At two other places on their way up they tried the experiments, with
increasingly good results.
"There is some tall work to be done here with washing," Harry said. "Now
come on to the vein. I only saw one of them, but there must be a lot
more or you would not find so much metal in the sand. However, the one I
saw is good enough for anything." They went on again to a point where
the rock cropped boldly out on both sides of the valley; Harry led them
a few paces up the side, and pointed to some white patches in the rock.
"That is where I chipped it off, lads, three years ago."
The face of the lode, discoloured by age and weather, differed but
little from the rock surrounding it; but where it had been broken off it
was a whitish yellow, thickly studded with little bits of dull yellow
metal sticking out of it. Tom was not greatly impressed; but he saw from
the faces of his companions that they were at once surprised and
delighted.
"By gosh, Harry, you have done it this time!" Sam Hicks exclaimed. "You
have struck it rich, and no mistake. I thought from the way you talked
of it it must be something out of the way, but I am blamed if I thought
it was like this."
"Stand back, you chaps," Jerry said, lifting the heavy sledge hammer;
"let me get a drive at it. Here is a crack. Put one of them wedges in,
Ben."
The wedge was placed in the fissure, and Ben held it while Jerry gave a
few light blows to get it firmly fixed.
"That will do, Ben; take away your hand and let me drive at it."
Swinging the hammer round his head Jerry brought it down with tremendous
force on the head of the wedge. Again and again the heavy hammer rose
and fell, with the accuracy of a machine, upon the right spot, until the
wedge, which was nine inches long, was buried in the crevice.
"Now another one, Ben. Give me a longer one this time."
This time Ben held the wedge until it was half buried, having perfect
confidence in Jerry's skill. It was not until the fourth wedge had been
driven in that a fragment of rock weighing four or five hundredweight
suddenly broke out from the face. All bent eagerly over it, and the
miners gave a shout of joy. The inner surface, which was white, but
slightly stained with yellow, with blurs of slate colour here and there,
was thickly studded with gold. It stuck out above the surface in thin,
leafy plates with ragged edges, with here and there larger spongy
masses.
"I reckon that is good enough," Jerry said, wiping the sweat from his
forehead. "Ef there is but enough of it, it is the biggest thing that
ever was struck. There ain't no saying how rich it is, but I will bet my
boots it's over five hundred ounces to the ton. It ain't in nature that
it is going to run far like that, but it is good enough for anything.
Well, what is the next thing, Harry?"
"We will break it up," Harry said, "and carry it down with us to the
camp. If the Utes came down on us tomorrow, and we could get off with
it, that would be plenty to show if we want to make a sale."
It took them a long time to break up the rock, for the quartz was hard,
and was so bound together by the leafy gold running through it that each
of the four men had several spells with the hammer before it was broken
up into fragments weighing some twenty pounds apiece. As soon as this
was done the men collected earth, filled up the hole in the face of the
rock, and planted several large tufts of grass in it, and poured four or
five tins of water over them; then they smeared with mud the patches
where Harry had before broken pieces off.
"What is all that for, Jerry?" Tom asked.
"It is to hide up the traces, lad. We may have to bolt away from here
to-morrow morning for anything we know, and before we come back again
someone else may come along, and though we shall locate our claims at
the mining register, there would be a lot of trouble if anyone else had
taken possession, and was working the vein when we got back."
"It is not likely that anyone else would come along here, Jerry."
"Waal, I reckon that is so, but one ain't going to trust to chance when
one has struck on such a place as this."
The Seneca had been the only unmoved person in the party.
"What do you think of that, chief?" Harry asked him.
"If my white brother is pleased Leaping Horse is glad," he replied. "But
the Indian does not care for gold. What can he do with it? He has a good
gun, he does not want twenty. He does not want many hunting suits. If he
were to buy as many horses as would fill the valley he could not ride
them all, and he would soon tire of sitting in his lodge and being
waited upon by many wives. He has enough for his needs now. When he is
old it will be time to rest."
"Well, that is philosophy, chief, and I don't say you are wrong from
your way of looking at it. But that gold means a lot to us. It means
going home to our people. It means living in comfort for the rest of our
lives. It means making our friends happy."
"Leaping Horse is glad," the chief said gravely. "But he cannot forget
that to him it means that the white brother, with whom he has so long
hunted and camped and fought bad Indians, will go away across the great
salt water, and Leaping Horse will see him no more."
"That is so, chief," Harry said, grasping the Indian's hand warmly, "and
I was a selfish brute not to think of it before. There is one thing I
will promise you. Every year or so I will come out here and do a couple
of months' hunting with you. The journey is long, but it is quickly made
now, and I know that after knocking about for twenty years I shall never
be content if I don't take a run out on the plains for a bit every
summer. I will give you my word, Leaping Horse, that as long as I have
health and strength I will come out regularly, and that you shall see
your white brother's friendship is as strong as your own."
The Seneca's grave face lit up with pleasure. "My white brother is very
good," he said. "He has taken away the thorn out of the heart of Leaping
Horse. His Indian brother is all glad now."
The quartz was placed in sacks they had brought with them to carry down
samples, and they at once returned to the camp, where, after smoking a
pipe, they lay down to sleep; but it was some time before all went off,
so excited were they at the thought of the fortune that seemed before
them.
In the afternoon they took one of the pieces of stone, weighing, by a
spring balance, twenty pounds, and with the flat plate and the
crushing-hammer went to the stream. The rock was first broken with the
sledge into pieces the size of a walnut. These were pulverized on the
iron plate and the result carefully washed, and when the work was
finished the gold was weighed in the miner's scales, and turned the
four-ounce weight.
"That is nearly five hundred ounces to the ton," Harry said, "but of
course it is not going to run like that. I reckon it is a rich pocket;
there may be a ton of the stuff, and there may be fifty. Now let's go up
and have a quiet look for the lode, and see if we can trace it. We ought
to see it on the rock the other side."
A careful search showed them the quartz vein on the face of the rock
some fifty feet higher up the valley, and this showed them the direction
of the run of the lode. It was here, however, only six inches wide
instead of being two feet, as at the spot where it was first found. Some
pieces were broken off: there was gold embedded in it, but it was
evident that it was nothing like so rich as on the other side. A piece
of ten pounds was pounded up, it returned only a little over a
pennyweight of gold.
"About twelve ounces to the ton," Harry said. "Not bad, but a mighty
falling off from the other. To-morrow morning we will follow the lode on
the other side and see if we can strike an outcrop."
The next day they found the lode cropping up through the rock some
thirty yards from their great find. It was about nine inches wide. They
dug it out with their picks to a depth of two feet so as to get a fair
sample. This when crushed gave a return at the rate of twenty ounces.
"That is rich enough again, and would pay splendidly if worked by
machinery. Of course the question is, how far it holds on as rich as we
found it at the face, and how it keeps on in depth? But that is just
what we can't find. We want drills and powder, as picks are no sort of
good on this hard quartz. Supposing it goes off gradually from the face
to this point, there would be millions of dollars in it, even supposing
it pinched in below, which there is no reason in the world to suppose.
We may as well take a few of these chunks of rock, they will show that
the gold holds fairly a good way back anyhow."
A few pieces were put aside and the rest thrown into the hole again,
which was stamped down and filled up with dust. The party then went back
to dinner, and a consultation was held as to what was next to be done.
"Of course we must stake out our claims at once," Harry said. "In the
first place there are our own eight claims--two for each of the
discoverers and one each for the others. Hunting Dog will not have a
share, but will be paid the regular rate as a hunter. Then we will take
twenty claims in the names of men we know. They wouldn't hold water if
it were a well-known place, and everyone scrambling to get a claim on
the lode; but as there is no one to cut in, and no one will know the
place till we have sold it and a company sends up to take possession and
work it, it ain't likely to be disputed. The question is, What shall we
do now? Shall we make back to the settlements, or try washing a bit?"
"Try washing, I should say," Jerry said. "You may be some time before
you can sell the place. Anyone buying will know that they will have to
send up a force big enough to fight the Utes, and besides they will want
someone to come up here to examine it before they close the bargain. I
vote we stick here and work the gravel for a bit so as to take enough
away to keep us till next spring. I reckon we shall find plenty of stuff
in it as we go down, and if that is so we can't do better than stick to
it as long as there is water in the creek."
"I agree with you there, Jerry; but it will never do to risk losing
those first samples. I am ready to stay here through the summer, but I
vote we sew them up in deer-hide, and put two or three thicknesses of
skin on them so as to prevent accidents. Two of us had best go with them
to the fort and ask the Major to let us stow them away in his magazine,
then, if we have to bolt, we sha'n't be weighted down with them.
Besides, we might not have time for packing them on the horses, and
altogether it would be best to get them away at once, then come what
might we should have proofs of the value of the mine."
This proposal was cordially agreed to, and it was settled that on the
following morning Harry himself should, with Hunting Dog and two
pack-horses, start for the fort, following the same route they came,
while the rest should set to work to construct a cradle, and troughs for
leading the water to it.