“Twenty ounces, enough to take you home.”
“How did you succeed?” I asked.
“Struck it rich, took out twenty-five thousand dollars worth, Jim twenty
thousand, and the rest of the party about the same and we have only
scratched over our claims. The dust is down at the city.”
“When shall we make a start?” I asked.
“In the morning.”
Then we turned in for sleep.
At an early hour Jim was busy loading the sleds with supplies. “I’m
blessed if you have eaten as much as a canary bird,” he remarked to me.
“The boys will have to run up and bring down the rest.”
I had purposely said nothing of my wonderful experience, waiting until I
could tell Simeon privately, which I did showing him the skeleton hand
and the black book in confirmation.
“I don’t know where you picked up these things,” he said, “but one thing
is certain you are off your chump.”
“But I have the gold.”
“Where?”
“Buried there.”
“Take the pick and dig it up.”
“What do you say to that,” I asked as I pulled out a bag, “and that and
that and that.”
“Jim, we are a fine lot of duffers, come in, this new chum and the cat,
mind you the cat, have beaten every man on the Bonanza and Eldorado.”
Jim came in and stared, he could not speak, then he whispered, “How many
has he got?”
“Only forty bags.”
“But the gold is not mine,” I said.
“Not yours, then whose is it?”
“The dead man’s.”
“And you will not keep it?”
“No, if the book contains a will.”
“And you are a lawyer’s clerk?”
“I could not keep it,” I repeated firmly,
Simeon turned me around and around and then said. “I believe you, if you
live you will make a man, you have got the timber in you, shake.”
The gold was carried out and loaded on a sled while I put Klondike in a
bag. We reached Dawson City and after some weeks delay secured a steamer
for St. Michael’s, from that point we sailed to Vancouver. At the latter
place I ascertained that the value of the find was one hundred and
ninety-five thousand dollars. The dust was deposited in the Bank of
Montreal. Then Simeon and I went in quest of a man who could read the
writing in the black book. At last an officer from a Russian man-of-war
was found. He translated the message. Here is the translation:—
“My name is Vospar Plonvisky, I was born in Warsaw of noble Polish
parents. The Russian authorities arrested me as a member of a secret
society and banished me to Siberia. There I remained for twenty years.
Again and again the black knout (cat in English) cut my flesh to the
bone for trying to escape. Finally I made my way to sea in an open boat
and reached Alaska. The accursed Russian was there. I was seized on
suspicion and sent into the interior to look for mines with several
officials. Our voyage was up a great river. One night I stole the boat,
which was well supplied with provisions and firearms, and sailed away up
the river. After several weeks I came to the rapids, where I abandoned
the boat, then I packed my provisions into the interior, keeping to the
west. My intention was to make my way to Canada, when I reached a small
stream, near this spot I found a small stream the bed of which was
yellow with gold. I resolved to gather a vast store, hide it and then
proceed on my way. After I had collected the gold I hid it in the cave
where my bones rest. Then my last sickness came upon me. I grew weaker
day by day. I realize that I am dying, my last act is to write this and
creep into the cave I make a solemn vow, it is: If a Russian should find
me and touch me or my gold, I swear by the memory of the black knout
(cat), that I will return and curse him and his children and his
children’s children. To the man of any other nation the gold is a free
gift.”
I sold the gold to the bank and handed a cheque for five thousand
dollars to Simeon.
“Not a cent,” he said, “I have enough and to spare.”
Then I gave him five hundred to hand to Jim. One week later I was in
Toronto. It was Saturday night when I arrived. When the cab drew up at
Edith’s home I saw that the drawing room was a blaze of light. Then my
heart sank, I had not had a word from her since I left on the quest. I
felt that she had broken her promise to me and married Fred Reingold.
With a trembling hand I rang the bell. I ignored the servant and walked
in with Klondike in my arms. The next instant Edith was in my arms. Her
first words were:
“Did you get any of the letters or telegrams?”
“Not one.”
“Did you see the notices in the newspapers?”
“No, what notices?”
“Notices for you to come back. Father did not lose his fortune. It was a
mistake in the telegram from Chicago, the margin was on the right side
and all was explained when the broker wrote. Father nearly recovered and
is very well.”
“What of Fred Reingold?” I stammered.
“Married six months ago to Bessie Loudon.”
“I have got the gold,” I said.
“And we don’t want it,” Edith answered.
In our library, under a glass case, stands the skeleton hand holding the
Greek Testament. Now and then I point out this hand to the new baby
whose name is Simeon.
THE SKELETON MINE.
A Tale of South Africa.
I was one of the first prospectors in the Transval to search for gold
and a precious dance it lead me. At that time but few Englishmen had
ventured into the Boer country and such was the jealousy with which they
were regarded that it was impossible to secure any information which
would assist in the search. Footsore and weary I tramped from farm to
farm, content to obtain a supper of mealies and the toughest of tough
South African mutton. There were rumors on every hand that gold existed
but to locate it was quite another matter. It has since transpired that
in my wanderings I passed over some of the richest gold bearing deposits
in the world but so unlike the gold bearing fields of California and
Australia is the Rand that the most experienced miner would never have
dreamed of the richness of the claims. I was not searching for quartz
but the poor man’s field, placer mines. To add to my perplexities my
money ran short and I could only replenish my purse at Cape Town. I sank
so low that I was compelled to sell my horse and from that hour I was on
a level with a Kaffir in the estimation of the Boers. The white man who
approaches a farmhouse in the Transval on foot must be prepared for
abject humiliation. Fortunately I had acquired some knowledge of sheep
in Australia else I believe that I should have starved. When all else
failed I became a sheep doctor and vended a compound whose virtues would
have done credit to the most widely advertised patent medicine nostrum.
One long to be remembered evening I arrived at a Boer’s house situated
twenty miles from any other habitation. When I asked for supper and a
night’s lodging the door was slammed in my face and in the worst of
German I was ordered to begone. Physically I was incapable of complying
with the command and mentally I had not the slightest intention of
departing. In an outhouse, devoted to storing mealies, sheep skins and
harness, an old man was sitting on the doorstep compounding a mixture,
which I recognized as a sheep remedy. I approached him and gave him to
understand that I was possessed of a remedy which would work wonders in
such cases. He was all attention instantly and the result was that in a
few minutes an excellent meal was spread in the house, to which I was
invited. Then I proceeded to mix a number of simples, which the man
possessed, and finally I poured into the simmering mass, with the
greatest care and ostentation, a few grains of borasic acid, which I
fortunately possessed.
The following day I was the most surprised man in South Africa when I
learned that my preparation was working a marvellous cure. I was invited
to remain with the Boer the balance of the season as an honored guest.
Day after day I tramped the hills, returning at night as wise and as
rich as when I set out. There were unmistakable indications that gold
should be found in the vicinity but the stubborn fact remained that I
could not find it. I had given up all hopes and only remained to recruit
my strength previous to setting out on my long journey to the coast when
the following remarkable circumstances transpired.
I slept in a great four poster bed of proportions ample for a race of
giants, and as I was deposited between two feather ticks in the old
German fashion, the weather being the reverse of cold, my dreams were
not the most pleasant and my rest not untroubled. But for offending the
good housewife I would have asked for a sheepskin on the floor.
One sultry night, after a long day’s walk, I found myself tossing and
restless and unable to get even a forty wink nap. For hours I thus lay
lamenting my fate and regretting having abandoned the land of the Golden
Fleece for the land of King Solomon’s mines. At a late hour I fell into
a disturbed sleep. I awoke with a start and listened attentively. All
was quiet in the house and yet I felt certain that some one was
preparing to leave the place. How long this impression remained I am
unable to say. I am by no means certain that I again fell asleep, and
yet I am compelled by that which followed to acknowledge that it is
probable that such was the fact. Whether dreaming or waking, I saw a
venerable old man, dressed as a German peasant, walk quietly out of the
front door, cast a suspicious glance around, as if to ascertain whether
he had been observed and then slip out into the darkness, where he
disappeared.
So realistic was the scene that the following morning I inquired whether
a friend of the family had paid them a visit after I had retired.
The answer was, “No.”
Two nights later I saw precisely the same thing happen again but as on
the former occasion I could not decide whether I had been dreaming or
not. The appearance of the venerable old man was indellibly stamped upon
my brain. I saw distinctly that he was very old, that his beard was as
white as a lamb’s fleece and that he was dressed in an antiquated garb,
seen only in the most secluded parts of Germany, in which country I had
spent several months attending a school in my boyhood days. The next
night I determined to remain awake but was not successful and again I
saw the old man depart. His constant re-appearance had at last a
powerful effect upon me. I decided that the next time, whether asleep or
awake, I would follow him. With this resolve upon my mind I retired the
next night and soon fell into a heavy sleep, due, no doubt, to my former
wakefulness. Once more I awoke, or imagined that I awoke, with the
well-defined conviction that some person was preparing to leave the
house. Cautiously I crept out of bed and as the old man left by the
front door I slipped out by a side entrance. I remember distinctly
saying to myself: “This is certainly not a dream; there is the man
walking slowly over the veldt and here I am watching and ready to follow
where he may lead.”
Follow him I did. My strange guide never once looked behind him after he
had left the house but proceeded directly to the hills, which ran along
the north of the farm and were distant some two miles. He gradually
quickened his pace and finally I was compelled to run to keep him in
sight. After he entered the hills he turned and doubled on his track in
the most provoking manner and frequently I not only lost sight of him
but barely escaped meeting him face to face, so sudden were his turns
and so unexpected his re-appearances. Why I was following him I could
not tell. In fact I was possessed of but a single impulse and that was
to follow. The old man never halted or hesitated but finally entered a
narrow valley, at the end of which rose a precipitous cliff. At that
point he suddenly disappeared. When I reached the spot I found that
beneath an overhanging rock an excavation had been made at some time in
the past, as there were no signs of recent work. The pit was thickly
strewn with fallen leaves, and as it was but a few feet in depth, I let
myself down into it in the hope of discovering some passage by which the
old man had disappeared. My foot struck something which was evidently
metal. It proved to be an antiquated shovel with a short handle. The
night was a bright one and at the time the moonbeams streamed directly
into the place. I could discover no means of retreat save by the way I
had entered and it was impossible for my strange guide to have returned
by that route and passed me unnoticed, unless he possessed the power of
rendering himself invisible. To probe the matter to the bottom I
commenced digging. The ground was exceedingly hard and my progress
correspondingly slow. I threw out several shovels of earth and then
climbed up the bank and examined it. I came upon a nugget, worth at
least five pounds, then another and another, but all smaller than the
first. All of my mining instincts were aroused and I forgot the strange
circumstances under which I had been led to the mine. Again I entered
the pit and set to work with all my energy and again I was handsomely
rewarded. The fever of greed seized upon me and I worked as if my life
depended on the result. The seventh time I began digging but the first
thrust of the shovel brought it in contact with some hard substance. I
stooped down and found that I had uncovered the complete skeleton of a
man. An indescribable terror seized upon me. I had been mining in a
grave. I am not superstitious but for the first I clearly realized the
uncanny circumstances which surrounded my discovery. I imagined that I
heard vague whisperings in the air and that a rumbling sound came
swelling up the valley. I lost my presence of mind, threw down the
shovel and ran for my life. I would have sworn that a legion of nameless
fiends were at my very heels, so insane was my fright. When I emerged
from the hills the moon was shining calmly and the sense of peace and
repose brought me to my senses. I walked rapidly to the farmhouse, which
was in sight, crept in and without undressing threw myself on the bed. I
was soon asleep nor did I awake until the housewife called me to
breakfast.
When I discovered that I was dressed I was amazed. I remembered
distinctly going to bed the previous evening: but had no recollection of
having got up during the night, until by chance I put my hand in my
pocket and drew out one of the nuggets. Then it all came back to me with
a vividness which was startling in its intensity. There could be no
doubt of the mine for the gold in my pockets was worth fully one hundred
and fifty pounds.
I resolved that I would keep my discovery a secret and continue to work
the mine which had yielded such handsome results in a single night. Then
I repaired to the hills and began my search. Half an hour convinced me
that I retained not the slightest clew as to the location of the mine.
Day after day I continued the search but in vain. No trace of the valley
could I discover and finally I was compelled to admit that a doubt
existed in my mind as to whether the gold had been found by me or had
been placed in my pocket by some kind fairy.
To have found and lost such an exceedingly rich deposit was exasperating
in itself but the uncertainty which enshrouded the whole business made
me doubt my own sanity.
One evening as I was sitting in the house brooding over the problem the
Boer’s wife opened a great clothes’ press, removed several articles of
wearing apparel and laid them on the floor. My attention was immediately
attracted to an old coat.
“Who owns the suit of clothes?” I inquired.
“They belonged to grandfather,” was the answer.
“Is he dead?” I queried.
“Dead more than twenty years, in fact before I was married and came to
live here, for he was my husband’s father.”
“Did you know him?”
“Yes, but I was only a little girl at the time.”
“Why have the clothes been kept?”
“Before he died he gave orders that they were not to be used and his
wishes have been respected. My husband has told me that he was a man of
many peculiarities and as it was due to him that we have the farm we
cherish his name and respect his wishes.”
“What were his peculiarities?”
“One was that he paid several visits to the Cape and when he returned he
always brought with him a bag of money, but to the day of his death even
his son, my husband, did not know how he came to have it. With this
money he bought land and cattle and sheep and thus became rich. Had he
lived he would have been the richest Boer in this part of the country.
Then his death was a mystery and a mystery which has never been cleared
up. He had grown to be old and feeble and he did no more work, but
nothing could keep him out of the hills. If anyone followed him he flew
into a great passion and cursed him roundly. My husband feared that some
accident would befall him in his wanderings and the fear was at last
realized. These clothes were his best and he prized them very much, for
he said that they had brought him ‘good luck.’ It was for that reason he
wanted them kept, no doubt. One day he went away to the hills and he
never came back. The whole country joined in the search but no trace was
ever found. He was not able to walk a long way and could not have
wandered any distance and that was what made his disappearance the more
strange. Some were of the opinion that he was carried off by the
Kaffirs, some that he had been murdered, for it was well known that he
always had gold in his pocket. Whatever befell him no one knows.”
I took up the coat and hat and could have sworn that the man I had
followed to the hills was dressed in precisely the same garments. Could
it be possible that after all these years I had found his grave? Had it
been his ghost which I had seen night after night issuing from the house
and making its way to the lonely grave in the hills? Had his wealth been
derived from the sale of the gold which he had dug out of the pit?
Admitting these facts, why had I been chosen to solve the mystery? Was
it possible that a sympathy existed between the dead and gone Boer miner
and the needy prospector, myself? These questions I was unable to
answer. My common sense revolted at such conclusions and yet, argue as I
would, the gold was in my pocket to prove their truth.
There remained another explanation, it was that I had not been awake
during the periods in which I saw the old man. I had developed into a
somnambulist and had got up in the night, imagining that I was following
an old man and while in that state picked up the gold found in my pocket
in the morning. Unfortunately this theory did not account for the
previous existence of my ghostly guide. I realized the uselessness of
attempting to explain to my Boer friends the peculiar circumstances of
the case and in consequence kept silent. From that hour I abandoned my
search for a mine, which was alike a mine and a grave, the location
being only known to ghosts or somnambulists.
A MAORI LEGEND.
A New Zealand Story.
I spent a week in a pah down in the hot lake country, the King’s land,
New Zealand, a short time before the destruction of the Pink and White
Terraces. One night as I lay in my thatched hut, with the boiling water
singing and simmering on every side, an old Maori wise-man paid me a
visit and told me the following story.
“A thousand moons ago my people came over the sea in great canoes from
the islands. Then the Maori was like the white man of to-day, restless
as the wind, ever roving to and fro from land to land. The canoes came
ashore down at the coast and it was beside these lakes that the pahs
were built because the fern root grew here in the warm, damp earth and
the Great Spirit made the water boil, in which to cook it. Then our wise
men said, ‘Here is our home and this land was made for the Maori. Here
shall be found that which we so long have sought.’ All would have been
well if our people had listened to these words. After a time there
spread from ear to ear the story of a wonderful lake, hid away up in the
mountains. No man could tell where the story came from, for no man could
be found who had ever seen the lake. The mountains, or the lakes, or the
boiling springs, or the pink hills, may have whispered it at night into
some ear. It may have been a dream, but it came and at last that no man
doubted it. Many a Maori set out to find the wonderful lake and wandered
among the mountains, which grew blacker and blacker and higher and
higher as he went on, but one and all came back telling of great
streams, of jagged rocks, of dark caverns, but never catching a glimpse
of the lake.”
“Then our wise men held a council in the great pah, and day by day they
studied and thought. At last it was decided that a venerable old man,
who had never eaten of human flesh, should go forth alone into the
mountains in quest of the lake. Much we wondered as he departed, for
with him he took only a staff and no fern root or anything to eat. We
bade him good bye with sorrow in our hearts, for we felt that we should
never look upon his face again, and that his bones would bleach upon the
mountain side, with no pah to covert them, but there they would lie for
all time to come, a warning to men who went in search of the wonderful
lake. Days went by and the wise man was given up for lost, when he came
down the mountain side and all of our people went out to meet him. When
they asked him if he had found the lake he bowed his head upon his
breast and smiled, and the people, young and old, gathered about him
with many questions, but answered he never a word. One and all saw that
a great change had come over him. A mild light beamed in his eyes and a
smile ever played about his lips. Kindness and sympathy covered him as
with a mantle of sweet fern and all felt that he was good to look upon.
From him there went out a power for good never felt in Maori land
before, and the people knew that to him had been given a sign which
would lead them to happiness. Yet some there were who scoffed and said
it was a trick of the wise men, that he had been hidden in the hills and
no good would come of it. From that day the wise man went about doing
good and to all he said, there be three things:
“Eat not of human flesh.”
“Help one another.”
“Be content with your lot.”
“A few followed his counsel and found peace, but the many went on their
way, blind in their own conceit. The quiet of the valley and its simple
fare were to them as bitter herbs. They wandered away to other islands
and over the land to the north and south. They fought and ate each
other, and the message of the wise man became to them and to their
children but a dream. Once a year, at spring tide, when the moon was
full, the wise man left the pah with two young men and went into the
mountains and to the lake. Each time they returned on the seventh day
and from that day to the day of their deaths their faces shone as did
the face of the wise man, and they went about saying:
“Eat not of human flesh.”
“Help one another.”
“Be content with your lot.”
“What they saw, what they heard at the lake, no man knew. Year after
year only three went out and returned. At last the hour came when the
old wise man fell sick and death sat by his side. Then he sent for my
father’s father, who was an old man, and to him confided the task of
leading each year the young men into the mountains, telling him also of
the first visit and what would come of it. This is the story which he
told to my father’s father:
“I went into the mountains, trusting, that was all. If for me to see the
lake would be good for my people then I knew that the way would be
pointed out, so I journied on and on and though without food for the
whole day, I felt no hunger. As night came near I descended into a
valley in which plenty of ferns were growing and the water boiling in a
small spring. I gathered my fern roots and cooked them in the spring.
The next day I faced the mountains again. I had gone but a little way
when I saw before me an immense bird pluming itself on a shelving rock.
I had seen the skeletons of such birds many times, but never a live bird
before. Its plumage was dazzling white and its arched neck shone like
the wattle in the sunshine. Its tufted head was more than twice the
height of a man’s head from the ground and although the bird was a long
way off I felt that its eyes were soft and full of tenderness. As I
approached the white bird walked away, stopping each minute to pick some
green morsel, for its stride was enormous and in the twinkling of an eye
it could have mounted into the clouds, hanging over the mountains. All
day long I followed the bird, turning and twisting, going forward and
coming back again until I lost all reckoning of the pah, but something
whispered in my ear that it was to be. At night I always found ferns for
food and a hot spring so my wants were provided for. On the third day
out, as night drew near, I came very close to the bird, almost close
enough to touch it, when it stepped through some great ferns with leaves
of silvery whiteness, such as I had never seen before, and when I had
followed it the bird had disappeared. I raised my eyes and there at my
feet was a circular lake, girt about by immense mountains, with cliffs
rising from the water higher than twenty Kauri pines. Looking behind me,
the way I had come, I saw the silver ferns but in the background a wall
of rock through which no opening was visible. Much I wondered, but being
tired and hungry I gathered some of the ferns, but no hot spring was at
hand as before. I stepped to the lake, touched it with my hand, it was
almost boiling. That night I slept beneath the silver ferns. The next
morning when I awoke there was no sign of the white bird but a little
boat lay on the sand before me containing three seats and three paddles.
After eating some fern root I stepped into the boat and paddled out.
Then, for the first, I saw that the lake contained a single island,
lying in its centre, but this island was not like any other island. It
had three equal sides, on it was neither tree nor shrub. I soon made my
way to its shore. There was only one landing place, a narrow ledge upon
which I drew up the boat. By some natural steps I went up and found on
the top a circular, shallow basin full of boiling water. The basin was
formed of a dazzling white stone with alternate bands of a soft yellow,
which I had never seen before, but which I now know the white man calls
gold. From the centre to the outside these bands ran round and round and
it was only a question of time when they would cover the whole island. A
great attraction had the pool for me. I sat down by its side and watched
the blue water run over the rim and splash its way down to the lake,
leaving behind little bands of white and yellow, and as I sat there the
steam coming up in the centre sang a song in the Maori tongue. The song
was:
“Eat not, eat not, eat not of human flesh.”
“Help one, help one, help one another.”
“Be content, be content, be content with your lot.”
“I knew that I was to tell these things to my people and I never forgot
them.”
“Then I lay down and fell asleep, how long I slept I know not. When I
awoke the sun was gone and the great cross blazing in the sky and yet
the pool sang the same song and the water ran over the rim and down into
the lake. Once again I looked into the basin and then my heart grew
still. As I looked down I saw away and away a group of islands with a
blue sea all around them running into little bays and long arms, and
under a part of one island was a great fire burning and sending up
boiling water. Away out in the ocean I saw another island, with an
opening in the centre, through which rushed flame and smoke. This island
was the chimney for the fires burning below me, on which our pahs were
built. On our islands I saw many Maoris, some good, many bad with fierce
fires burning in their hearts. And the voice of the spring said, ‘Behold
your brothers, but the day is near at hand when great canoes will come
over the waters with white wings and a white man will come in the canoes
and in his heart burns still fiercer fires and he will make war upon
you; not with spears but with things which vomit fire and carry death a
long way off. He will kill the Maoris and take the land and in a few
years your people will be no more, but to you is given a trust. In the
full moon, once in the year, bring hither two wise Maoris and let their
ears hear my song. Then shall they go to their brothers and speak the
truth. If your people listen, one island shall be preserved for them and
the black men shall not all die.’”
“Returning to the shore, I found the moa standing by the bunch of ferns
and following it for two days I was once more in sight of the pah. There
I told the story of the mysterious lake and the pool to the wise men and
when the full moon came the next year three Maoris went forth in quest
of the lake. They were guided by the white moa and they too heard the
pool sing and saw into its depths. Season after season three men went
and came and repeated the song of the pool. The scoffers asked, ‘Where
are the white men with fire in their hearts, and where are the big
canoes with white wings?’ And the ferns grew and faded into brown and
rotted on the damp earth. But at last the white man came and the wise
men knew that the day was at hand. With the white man came also wise
men, who, while they pointed to the sky above and told us of the Great
Spirit, stole the land from under our feet. And we saw that a great fire
burned in their hearts, but it was not the fire of war but a yellow
flame, which could only be quenched by a treasure they called ‘gold.’
These wise white men heard of the lake in the mountains and the pool
with its yellow bands and much they searched the mountains but found it
not. Then they heard of the journey of the three Maoris each rainy
season, led by the white moa. They watched and when the Maoris set out
they followed and thus it was that they found the lake. Three white men
had followed the three Maoris. While the Maoris were standing beside the
lake the white men seized the boat and paddled as fast as they could to
the island. The moa stood on the shore and nodded its head up and down
as much as to say, ‘You shall see.’ Two white men clambered on shore,
the other remaining in the boat. Once beside the pool the white men saw
not its beauty, they heard not the song, for their eyes were filled with
the yellow metal and their hearts with greed. They were blind to the
blue waters, the purple mountains, blind and deaf to all but gold. Then
they set to work and dug up the yellow rim and the little channels over
which the water ran, and, where once all was beauty and song and the
whisper of the Great Spirit, only desolation was left. All day long they
toiled and carried the gold and loaded it into the boat and so blind
were they that they did not see that the boat grew no deeper in the
water. All day the moa nodded its head, all day long the Maoris
wondered. Then a great sleep fell upon them. The water in the lake was
sinking down, down, down, carrying with it the little boat. It sank away
as silently as a bird in the air, without a gurgle or a splash. The
fountain sang and flowed and the yellow bands ran out and down and over
the two men binding them fast to the rock. When they awoke they were
pinned fast. They writhed and twisted and screamed for their companion
in the boat but he was a thousand feet below, paddling, paddling, not to
the island not to the shore, but around and around. Then through the
jagged rocks, away below came a great roar as of a mighty river lashing
itself into fury on the black stones. When this sound fell on their ears
they set up a pitiful cry which came over the lake to the Maoris and
made their hearts sad. Then the fire died out of the white men’s hearts
and the green leaves of the ferns, where the Maoris stood grew into
wondrous beauty in their eyes and the plumage of the moa shone like
burnished silver. Their cries for help died away in the rushing waters
below. The fountain stopped, the blue water sank down to the black
river, leaving only a jagged hole, crusted as far as they could see with
gold, but now they loathed the yellow metal and blamed it, instead of
their own hearts, for all the evil which had come upon them. Out of the
pool then came a faint blue wreath, spreading about them, embracing them
and creeping like a cloud over the island. Then the hot steam gushed
forth. Madly they writhed and gasped for breath but hotter and hotter
grew the steam. The sun went down and night came on. Under the green
ferns the Maoris lay down and slept. When the sun came up the pool had
ceased to vomit steam. Two skeletons on the island were bleached as
white as snow on the mountain tops. A skeleton in the boat, with a
skeleton paddle in his hands was paddling in a never ending circle
around and around.”
“The moa nodded his head and led the way back to the pah and from that
day to this never a moa has been seen in New Zealand. Amid the mountains
lies the wonderful lake but it will never be found until the yellow
fires have burned out of the hearts of the white men.”
THE GARDEN GULLY
MINE.
“You ken Bendigo,” said my companion, looking out of the corner of his
eye at the bottle sitting on the table before us.
“Right well,” I answered. We had dropped in at the Criterion, Swanson
street, Melbourne, for an evening.
“Weel,” continued Sandy McLeod, “it’s a long time agone but I’ll never
forget it.”
“Forget what?”
“The Garden Gully, did you ever hear the story?”
“No, I’m a new chum, as you know.”
I poured out a glass of Falon’s sparkling, at the sight Sandy smacked
his lips. Sandy was a colonial solicitor and apparently an unprofitable
mine to work for a story, so I bided my time. The glass of wine began to
mellow his heart, for he abruptly exclaimed, “Men on gold fields are
crazed with greed, but a good-looking woman sends them stark mad. Even
I, Sandy McLeod, was once mad.”
“It was only a passing craze,” I suggested.
“Not a bit of it, mad for months, mad when awake and doubly mad when
asleep.”
“What cured you?”
“A nip of the same dog,” and then he burst into a laugh. “One more glass
and then I will tell you the story.”
Settling back in his chair, he began in a voice, mellower than I dreamed
that he possessed:
“Teddy O’Flynn, yes O’Flynn with a big O, as he used to say, had a
little cabin on the Bendigo field, and behind the cabin was a little
garden in the gully. It was the only garden on Bendigo at that time and
we all knew it to a man. No deep shafts then, only a spade, a pick, and
a tin dish, and thirty thousand miners on the field. That garden grew
roses and English roses too, at that. I can see them now and it’s near
on fifty years ago. They whispered to every man Jack of us of home, dear
home. When we went up there and leaned on the palings of a Sunday, back
we were in our native villages. Teddy O’Flynn was not the man to
cultivate roses, save the ones which blossomed on his nose and they were
always in full bloom. Teddy had a foster daughter, the queen rose of
Bendigo, and as the roses bloomed so bloomed Rosa, for that was her
name. While the roses were in bloom on Saturday afternoon Rosa made a
round of the camp. She never sold the roses but she made each miner a
present of one, and the miners not to be outdone, made her a present of
a pinch of gold. She had to pinch it herself between her rosy little
finger and thumb. Rosa took up the camp in a regular way so that in time
we all got a rose and were satisfied.”
“Teddy O’Flynn had never studied books and yet he was a bit of a
philosopher, and an Irish philosopher at that. Teddy never worked and
yet he ate and drank of the best on Bendigo. Perhaps the pinches which
Rosa made had something to do with Teddy’s good fortune. The miners were
content, Teddy was happy, and Rosa—well the whole camp was in love with
her.”
“And you fell in love with her too,” I ventured to remark.
“I never denied it.”
“At that time there were but two lawyers on the field, Phalin Shea and
Sandy McLeod, that’s myself. Part of the time we dug on the lead, for we
both held claims, but when a dispute arose Phalin was retained by one
client, and McLeod by the other, then we fought it out before the Gold
Commissioner and honors were generally equally divided. The Shamrock and
the Scotch Thistle, they used to call us. The best of friends we were,
though we often nearly came to blows. Rosa distinguished us from the
other miners by calling us gentlemen. Phalin and I were regarded as the
favored suitors but that did not prevent the other men from striving to
secure such a valuable claim. One evening I was at O’Flynn’s cabin and
the next night Phalin was at the same place and basking in the same
smiles. To all of our vows Rosa returned the same answer.”
“What would become of Teddy O’Flynn if I married?” We each promised to
allow Teddy a pension for life. Rosa well knew that Phalin and I could
not scrape up a hundred pounds, but like all miners, we were willing to
bank on the future for any number of thousands. Rosa was most impartial
and fed each on the same manna. Our infatuation increased month by month
and when the rainy season came on and no roses remained Teddy proved
equal to the occasion and regularly borrowed half a sovereign from each
when we called at the cabin. Phalin may have lent the money out of sheer
Irish good-will but I know that Sandy McLeod, in his heart regarded him,
Teddy, as a golden fleece. How the contest would have ended I cannot
say, but unfortunately Teddy suddenly conceived the idea of becoming
rich. That decided our fate. His plan was to sink a shaft in the garden
in the gully and open up a gold mine. Naturally we expected that Rosa
would protest, but on the contrary she declared that the plan originated
with her own sweet self. She had dreamed that there was an immense
deposit of gold hidden away beneath the English roses. Teddy had only to
dig and he would find the treasure, but no person was to assist him and
the work must be done at night. Only Phalin and myself were taken into
the secret. Teddy went to work and day after day poured into our ears
the history of his progress. As the garden lay far removed from the
Bendigo lead and no indications existed that gold would be found, in our
hearts we secretly felt that it was a clever device, upon the part of
Rosa, to keep her foster parent out of the public and at the same time
set him to work. The mining had been going on for about three weeks when
one afternoon Phalin and I each received a note from Rosa asking us to
call that evening at the cabin. We were punctual to the minute, but each
was somewhat crestfallen on discovering the presence of his rival. Teddy
O’Flynn was laboring under an excitement which he in vain attempted to
conceal. After a substantial supper and a glass of hot toddy, Rosa drew
the curtain of the four pane window and then told us the story.
Teddy had struck upon one of the richest leads ever found on Bendigo.
The earth was literally packed with gold. Then Teddy took up the
running.
“I tell yez I’ve struck it.”
We both grasped him by the hand, for Teddy had suddenly become an
important factor, a factor we instantly saw must be counted upon and
conciliated. Rosa was now sole heiress, it might be to millions. Not
that we loved her any more ardently, that was impossible, but fortune
had suddenly turned the wheel and we keenly felt the change. All we
could say to Teddy was, “Rich, rich.”
“Just loaded down with the yellow beauty,” he exclaimed. “Come down and
see the jade. She’s led me many a fine caper from the old sod, up here
among the kangaroos and the wallaby and the bears wid no tails and the
dirty hathen nagers, but I’ve got her down in the gully, and it will be
sailing away to the blessed shores of St. Patrick that Teddy O’Flynn
will be, with a mighty big O.”
“Come with me this blessed minute.”
We hurried down to the gully. Once on the spot we saw that Teddy was
original in his mining. He had cut a series of short trenches which grew
deeper and finally terminated in an irregular hole, into which we all
crowded, though unable to stand upright, so low was the pit. Teddy lit a
candle and pointing to the pick said to Phalin, “dig, dig,” then he gave
me the shovel. The ground was very hard, of a dull yellow color and
interspersed with small grey, broken quartz crystals. We filled a
wash-tub which Teddy deftly lifted to his head and balanced with his
hands, then marched out and up to the cabin. In the kitchen we began to
pan out the contents of the tub with the aid of some water and a tin
wash-dish. Teddy stood aloof leaving Phalin and McLeod to do the work.
The earth was literally full of coarse gold. In all of our experience at
Ballarat and Bendigo we had never seen its equal.
“I want yez gintlemen to float a Company,” said O’Flynn.
“What shall we call it?”
“The Saint Patrick.”
“No,” said Rosa, “I dreamed it out and I must name it.”
“What shall it be?”
“Call it the Garden Gully.”
Then and there it was christened and baptised in the wash-tub.
“How much shall we float it for?” inquired Phalin.
“Fifty thousand pounds at a pound a share. Give all the boys a chance.”
The following morning the notice was on the door of the Commissioner’s
office and within two hours every rod of land for half a mile on each
side of the cabin had been staked out. The camp went mad, hundreds of
good claims were abandoned and as promptly jumped by the unlucky. Before
the sun went down Phalin and I had more cases than had ever fallen to us
before in our lives. When questioned about the Garden Gully we related
the story of the wash-tub. That day every share was sold and half a
crown paid down. For two days it was almost impossible to get near the
cabin. The earth swarmed with miners but not a spec of gold was found.
On the morning of the third day Phalin and I found our huts besieged by
an angry mob. During the excitement Teddy had been transformed into
Teddy O’Flynn, Esq., a personage who held high carnival at the Golden
Fleece and who, during that time, had ordered and helped drink one
hundred bottles of champagne at twenty dollars a bottle. The situation
was serious. Phalin and I were marched up to the Golden Fleece where
O’Flynn was secured and the trio, followed by thousands, proceeded to
the Garden Gully where Rosa was mounting guard over the entrance to the
mine. She was armed with an antiquated musket and resolutely kept the
men at bay. A fierce light burned in her blue eyes which enhanced her
beauty a thousand fold. At our suggestion two miners were let into the
pit to secure some wash-dirt. Our lives hung upon the issue. If the
miners did not find gold our fate was sealed. Phalin, McLeod and Teddy
would dangle from the limb of the nearest gum tree within ten minutes.
The dirt was brought out and panned off in the presence of the mob. I
shall never forget the silence which fell upon the men till my dying
day. When the miner turned and flashed the gold in the pan in our faces
a cheer for O’Flynn broke forth, and such cheers as Bendigo had never
heard before. The very hills rang again and again. Rosa was the heroine
of the hour. Dirty and greasy miners clasped her in their arms and
kissed her with frantic joy. O’Flynn and his solicitors were escorted in
a triumphal march back to the Golden Fleece where Teddy made a speech
and ‘shouted’ for all who cared to drink. In the confusion Phalin and I
made our escape. The next day shares in the Garden Gully advanced to two
pounds each. A week later the mine was turned over to the share holders
and work commenced. Teddy O’Flynn was entertained that night at a
banquet at which it was declared that he was the gold king of the land
of the Southern Cross. At midnight Teddy sank a limp mass under the
table and was carried to bed with the honors of a dead Pharoah.
For a few hours the Garden Gully realized the wildest dreams and then
just as suddenly stopped. Not even the colour could be found. Shares
dropped to a shilling and no takers. The gold Commissioner ordered an
investigation. During the inquiry it was clearly shown that the mine had
been salted. The plan had been to first dig the hole and then charge a
gun with powder and coarse gold and fire it into the earth. Rosa, who
was innocent of the fraud, testified that at night she had heard many
shots and that O’Flynn had explained that he had been shooting at
kangaroos, which came to gnaw the rose bushes. When confronted by the
evidence, O’Flynn refused to confess maintaining a dogged silence, save
that if the mine was salted Rosa and his solicitors were innocent. The
money received was returned to the share holders, except a few hundred
pounds which O’Flynn had squandered. O’Flynn was committed to stand his
trial.
The following night Phalin and I repaired to the little cabin where,
much to our surprise, we found Rosa, apparently in the best of spirits.
When we asked her for an explanation she said:
“I tell you there is plenty of gold in the Garden Gully and it was not
put there by Teddy O’Flynn. I saw it again last night in my dreams. It
is down deeper and runs away out there,” pointing toward the range.
“Will you dig for it or shall I do the work myself.”
We suggested hiring two miners.
“No,” she said, with a toss of her pretty head, “it must be found
without any outside help and Teddy set free.”
Instantly we both agreed with her. We would have agreed to any
proposition falling from the same lips. Without a moment’s delay she
produced two miner’s caps, into the peaks of which she thrust two
candles, then marched us out to the pit. The candles were lighted. Rosa
took a seat on the tub, we seized the pick and shovel and began to dig.
Rosa chatted and laughed, the hours flew by, at midnight she brought us
a lunch and two bottles of ale, but it was not until near dawn that our
taskmaster called a halt. Rosa explained that during the day she would
wash some of the dirt and report the result the next night. Worn out and
completely exhausted Phalin and I staggered to our huts. Not a word was
exchanged as we stumbled down the path. Our hands were covered with
blisters, our clothes bedaubed with yellow clay, our faces streaked and
seared with soot and grease from the dripping candles. Two such
melancholy objects could not be found in all Bendigo. Each was
determined not to yield. It was a contest of Scotch grit and Irish
pluck. All day long we slept or nursed our lacerated hands, each
recuperating for the second struggle. We were animated by no hope that
gold would be found, a more powerful influence was at work and bade us
continue the struggle. At night we were again at the cabin. Rosa
reported “No gold.” Then we renewed our labors, with the same hardships
and the same results. For eight nights in succession the struggle went
on. Our legal business went by the board, rumor said we were drinking
ourselves to death and appearances confirmed the rumor. On the ninth
night imagine our surprise when Rosa informed us that we had struck the
lead and in proof exhibited fully an ounce of the yellow metal. No miner
ever gazed upon a great nugget which he had found, with joy equal to
ours. It was a drawn battle. When will it end? was the query in our
minds. Rosa gave no sign but served an excellent supper, prepared to
celebrate our success. It was then arranged that Rosa was to pay the
gold Commissioner a visit the following morning and inform him that the
lead had again been found in the Garden Gully and that consequently
Teddy O’Flynn had committed no fraud and should be released. Our offices
was opened that day, but no attention was paid to our reformation so
great was the excitement. An investigation of the mine proved the truth
of Rosa’s statement. Once more the tide turned in favor of Teddy O’Flynn
and for the second time he became the gold king of Bendigo. Teddy had
sold the Garden Gully for a rich mine and it was rich. The shareholders
demanded the return of their stock, paid in their money and gave Teddy a
second banquet at the Golden Fleece, with the same results, save that
Teddy went under the table at ten thirty instead of at twelve, a
weakness attributed to his confinement in the caboose and consequently
condoned by his friends.
Three days later Phalin and Sandy McLeod each received a note from Rosa
requesting them to be present at the cabin at eight p.m., and also
stating, in post script, that it was an important occasion, therefore we
were to be dressed in our best. Phalin inferred from the word
‘important’ that he was the lucky man, while I drew the same inference
from the same word. Walking on the air, for our happiness made us
oblivious of Bendigo, its dust and its wretchedness, we approached the
cabin at the same time, punctual to a minute. We passed compliments of
the day and then surveyed each other. Phalin was dressed in a pair of
black trousers, a white shirt and a collar, a yellow vest, but no coat.
Sandy boasted an antideluvian dress coat, blue trousers and a red shirt.
We were met at the door by Rosa, clad in a white muslin gown, with a
great bunch of roses at her belt. I had never seen her look lovelier. So
great was my happiness at securing the prize that the words died on my
lips. Phalin was equally overcome and for precisely the same reasons.
Teddy received us with genuine Irish hospitality and a glass of whiskey.
Entering the cabin we were face to face with a young English curate who
had been sent up from Melbourne as a missionary. It was evident that the
hour had come, we were confronted by our destiny. The curate remarked in
a languid drawl, “This is a happy occasion.” Rosa smiled her sweetest.
Then she went out to the kitchen and came back blushing and leaning on
the arm of Dennis McCarthy, a young Irish miner.
“My dear friends,” she said, “I have bid you to my wedding. Dennis is
the lucky man, we pledged our troth in dear old Kerry.”
The ceremony proceeded and each kissed the bride. It was the first and
last time. How we spent the next hour I shall never know and Phalin can
furnish you with no fuller particulars. I have a confused recollection
of Rosa, the curate, Teddy, a bunch of roses and McCarthy, that is all.
At last we got away, heaven only knows what we said. Once out on the
path we stalked along in moody silence. When we came to the Golden
Fleece we both turned in, entered the private parlor and ordered
whiskey, straight. Two hours later we were sent home by the landlord in
barrows. When I awoke the next morning I found myself in Phalin’s hut
and in Phalin’s bed. Phalin found himself in my hut and in my bed. How
the thing happened we have never been able to explain. The following day
when we met we concluded to enter into partnership and the sign reads to
this day, Shea & McLeod, solicitors.
“No, we have never married.”
“What about the Garden Gully?”
“The mine is running yet and has paid the shareholders many handsome
dividends.”
“Rosa?”
The day following the wedding, the bride, McCarthy and Teddy took a
special stage for Melbourne en route for the old sod. A week later my
partner and I each received a letter, precisely the same, written in
Rosa’s best hand, containing a certified cheque on the Bank of
Australia, drawn in our favor, for five hundred pounds.
THE GREEN DOOR.
A Night in Melbourne.
A winter night in Melbourne; it had been raining all day, the wind from
the south blew chill and raw. As I wandered down Great Bourke street I
saw, drawn up in a line some fifty men standing in the gutter. Each man
had his eyes fastened on a green baize door directly in front of them,
as if their last hope depended upon its opening. The men were of all
sorts and conditions, the sundowner from the back blocks, the
costermonger without a barrow, the new chum who had deposited with his
gracious uncle, the professional free lunch rounder and the decayed
gentleman. One wretched creature in particular drew my attention. At one
time, some time, heaven knows how long distant, he had been a gentleman.
The fragments of a Prince Albert coat were buttoned tightly up to his
very chin. I should have said pinned, for every button was gone. His
hands blue with the cold were clean and there was something in his very
attitude which said, ‘I am not to this manor born.’ I beckoned to him
and when he came up I said, “Come with me my friend.” He followed at my
side but spoke not a word. Entering a private room in the Coffee House I
called for a glass of hot beef tea. While he was drinking the tea
greedily but shivering between each gulp I ordered a hot dinner. He ate
the dinner with the voracity of a starving man. Then I handed him a
cigar. I closely watched him and saw, written on his face an unsatisfied
longing. “What is it?” I said.
“Opium,” came in a hoarse tremolo from his throat.
“I have it,” I said drawing a half ounce bottle of laudanum from my
pocket. I had purchased it for a prospective trip.
“Quick, six glasses,” he whispered.
The waiter brought the glasses. My strange companion placed them in a
line and then said, “Divide it into six parts,” pointing to the
laudanum.
I complied with his request. He seized the first glass, drained it and
closed his eyes. Taking up the _Herald_ I waited. After the lapse of
five minutes I turned to my guest, his eyes were wide open, almost
staring, while the ghost of a smile played around his mobile mouth.
“What is your name,” I asked.
“John Lilburn,” he answered slowly, as if he were struggling to recall
his own name.
“Where from?” I queried.
No reply, only a puzzled expression on his face. Then he croaked out,
“Time for number two.” Immediately he swallowed the contents of the
second glass and again closed his eyes. This time the interval was not
so long. A tinge of colour stole into his thin cheeks, his hands ceased
to tremble, the creature began to look like a man.
“How long have I been here?” he inquired, as if surprised at his
surroundings and the complaisant mood in which he found himself. Then
his eyes fell upon the glasses and he nodded his head as much as to say,
“I see it all now.”
“You came with me from in front of the green door,” I replied.
“What does the green door signify?”
“Supper,” he answered, “supper for all who stand in the line at eight
o’clock and are sober.”
“A good Samaritan on Bourke street, a Christian in a new quarter and in
a strange guise.”
“That depends upon your standpoint of view,” murmured my companion. “The
man conducts, side by side, a drinking place and the restaurant. In the
restaurant, every night for half an hour he cares for some of the
finished product turned out by his other establishment.”
“Has he turned you out as finished?”
“I never drink,” he said, a trace of hauteur coming into his manner.
“Worse,” said I, pointing to the glasses.
“My last remaining friend,” was his reply, and he raised the third glass
to his lips and drank it off with the dignity of a gentleman of the old
school. He brushed back his tangled hair with a nervous energy, his very
presence grew upon me, then he unpinned and threw back his coat exposing
his bare chest, for he wore no shirt, arose and paced the room with a
decided step which betokened a man used to command. The homeless beggar
had vanished and in his stead stood God’s noblest work.
“I beg your pardon,” he said, “but whom have I the honor of meeting?”