Curious Trees, and still more Curious Plains—An Interesting Discovery, followed by a Sad one—Fate of Travellers in the Mountains—A Sudden Illness—Ned proves himself to be a friend in Need and in Deed, as well as an Excellent Doctor, Hunter, Cook, and Nurse—Deer-Shooting by Firelight.
During the course of their wanderings among the mountains our hero and his companion met with many strange adventures and saw many strange sights, which, however, we cannot afford space to dwell upon here. Their knowledge in natural history, too, was wonderfully increased, for they were both observant men, and the school of nature is the best in which any one can study. Audubon, the hunter-naturalist of America, knew this well! and few men have added so much as he to the sum of human knowledge in his peculiar department, while fewer still have so wonderfully enriched the pages of romantic adventure in wild, unknown regions.
In these wanderings, too, Ned and Tom learned to know experimentally that truth is indeed stranger than fiction, and that if the writers of fairy-tales had travelled more they would have saved their imaginations a deal of trouble, and produced more extraordinary works.
The size of the trees they encountered was almost beyond belief, though none of them surpassed the giant of which an account has been already given. Among other curious trees they found sugar-pines growing in abundance in one part of the country. This is, perhaps, the most graceful of all the pines. With a perfectly straight and cylindrical stem and smooth bark, it rears its proud crest high above other trees, and flings its giant limbs abroad, like a sentinel guarding the forest. The stem rises to about four-fifths of its height perfectly free of branches; above this point the branches spread out almost horizontally, drooping a little at the ends from the weight of the huge cones which they bear. These cones are about a foot-and-a-half long, and under each leaf lies a seed the size of a pea, which has an agreeably sweet taste, and is much esteemed by the Indians, who use it as an article of food.
Another remarkable sight they saw was a plain, of some miles in extent, completely covered with shattered pieces of quartz, which shone with specks and veins of pure gold. Of course they had neither time nor inclination to attempt the laborious task of pulverising this quartz in order to obtain the precious metal; but Ned moralised a little as they galloped over the plain, spurning the gold beneath their horses’ hoofs, as if it had been of no value whatever! They both puzzled themselves also to account for so strange an appearance; but the only solution that seemed to them at all admissible was, that a quartz vein had, at some early period of the world’s history, been shattered by a volcanic eruption, and the plain thus strewn with gold.
But from the contemplation of these and many other interesting sights and phenomena we must pass to an event which seriously affected the future plans of the travellers.
One beautiful evening—such an evening as, from its deep quiet and unusual softness, leaves a lasting impression on the memory—the two horsemen found themselves slowly toiling up the steep acclivity of a mountain-ridge. Their advance was toilsome, for the way was rugged, and no track of any kind assisted them in their ascent.
“I fear the poor horses will give in,” said Ned, dismounting and looking back at his companion, who slowly followed him.
“We are near the summit,” answered Tom, “and they shall have a long rest there.”
As he spoke, they both dismounted and advanced on foot, leading their fatigued horses by the bridles.
“Do you know,” said Tom, with a sigh, “I feel more used up to-day than I have been since we started on this journey. I think we had better encamp and have a cup of tea; there is a little left yet, if I mistake not.”
“With all my heart, Tom; I, too, feel inclined to rest, and—”
Ned paused, for at that moment they overtopped the highest edge of the ridge, and the view that burst upon them was well fitted to put to flight every previous train of thought.
The ridge on which they stood rose several hundred feet above the level of the plain beyond, and commanded a view of unknown extent towards the far west.
The richest possible sweep of country was spread out at their feet like a huge map, bathed in a glow of yellow sunshine. Lakes and streams, crags and rocks, sward, and swamp, and plain—undulating and abrupt, barren and verdant—all were there, and could be embraced in a single wide-sweeping glance. It seemed, to the entranced travellers, like the very garden of Eden. Water-fowl flew about in all directions, the whistling of their wings and their wild cries being mellowed by distance into pleasant music; and, far away on the right, where a clear lake mirrored each tree on its banks, as if the image were reality, a herd of deer were seen cooling their sides and limbs in the water, while, on the extreme horizon, a line of light indicated the shores of the vast Pacific Ocean.
Ere the travellers could find words to express their feelings, a rock, with a piece of stick and a small rag attached to it, attracted their attention.
“We are not the first who have set their feet here, it seems,” said Ned, pointing to the signal.
“Strange!” muttered Tom Collins, as they turned towards the rock; “that does not look like an Indian mark; yet I would have thought that white men had never stood here before, for the spot is far removed from any known diggings, and, as we know fail well, is not easily reached.”
On gaining the rock, they found that the rag was a shred of linen, without mark of any kind to tell who had placed it there.
“It must have been the freak of some Indian hunter,” said Ned, examining the rock on which the little flag-staff was raised. “Stay—no—here are some marks cut in the stone! Look here, Tom, can you decipher this? It looks like the letter D—DB.”
“DB?” cried Tom Collins, with a degree of energy that surprised his friend. “Let me see!”
Tom carefully removed the moss, and cleared out the letters, which were unmistakeable.
“Who can DB have been?” said Ned.
Tom looked up with a flushed countenance and a glittering eye, as he exclaimed—
“Who? Who but Daniel Boone, Cooper’s great hero—Hawk-eye, of the ‘Last of the Mohicans’—Deer-slayer—Leather-stocking! He has been here before us—ay, brave spirit! Long before other hunters had dared to venture far into the territory of the scalping, torturing, yelling red-skin, this bold heart had pushed westward, fearless and alone, until his eagle eye rested on the great Pacific. It must have been he. I have followed him, Ned, in spirit, throughout all his wild career, for I knew him to be a real man, and no fiction; but little did I think that I should see a spot where his manly foot had rested, or live to discover his farthest step in the ‘far west!’”
Ned Sinton listened with interest to the words of his friend, but he did not interrupt him, for he respected the deep emotions that swelled his heart and beamed from his flashing eye.
“We spoke, Ned, sometime ago, of historical associations,” continued Tom,—“here are historical associations worth coming all this way to call up. Here are associations that touch my heart more than all the deeds of ancient chivalry. Ah! Daniel Boone, little didst thou think when thy hawk’s eye rested here, that in a few short years the land would be overrun by gold-diggers from all ends of the earth!”
“But this flag,” said Ned; “he could never have placed that here. It would have been swept away by storms years ago.”
“You are right,” said Tom, turning over the stones that supported the staff—“halloo! what have we here?”
He pulled out a roll of oiled cloth as he spoke, and, on opening it, discovered a scrap of paper, on which were written, in pencil, the words, “Help us!—for God’s sake help us! We are perishing at the foot of the hill to the southward of this.”
No name or date was attached to this strange paper, but the purport of it was sufficiently clear so, without wasting time in fruitless conjecture, the young men immediately sprang on their horses, and rode down the hill in the direction indicated.
The route proved more rugged and steep than that by which they had ascended, and, for a considerable distance, they wound their way between the trunks of a closely-planted cypress grove; after passing which they emerged upon a rocky plain of small extent, at the further extremity of which a green oasis indicated the presence of a spring.
Towards this they rode in silence.
“Ah!” exclaimed Ned, in a tone of deep pity, as he reined up at the foot of an oak-tree, “too late!”
They were indeed too late to succour the poor creatures who had placed the scrap of paper on the summit of that mountain-ridge, in the faint hope that friendly hands might discover it in time.
Six dead forms lay at the foot of the oak, side by side, with their pale faces turned upwards, and the expression of extreme suffering still lingering on their shrunken features. It needed no living witness to tell their sad history. The skeletons of oxen, the broken cart, the scattered mining tools, and the empty provision casks, shewed clearly enough that they were emigrants who had left their homesteads in the States, and tried to reach the gold-regions of California by the terrible overland journey. They had lost their way among the dreary fastnesses of the mountains, travelled far from the right road to the mines, and perished at last of exhaustion and hunger on the very borders of the golden land. The grey-haired father of the family lay beside a young girl, with his arm clasped round her neck. Two younger men also lay near them, one lying as if, in dying, he had sought to afford support to the other. The bodies were still fresh, and a glance shewed that nearly all of them were of one family.
“Alas! Ned, had we arrived a few days sooner we might have saved them,” said Tom.
“I think they must have been freed from their pains and sorrows here more than a week since,” replied the other, fastening his horse to a tree, and proceeding to search the clothes of the unfortunates for letters or anything that might afford a clue to their identity. “We must stay here an hour or two, Tom, and bury them.”
No scrap of writing, however, was found—not even a book with a name on it—to tell who the strangers were. With hundreds of others, no doubt, they had left their homes, full of life and hope, to seek their fortunes in the land of gold; but the Director of man’s steps had ordered it otherwise, and their golden dreams had ended with their lives in the unknown wilderness.
The two friends covered the bodies with sand and stones, and, leaving them in their shallow grave, pursued their way; but they had not gone far when a few large drops of rain fell, and the sky became overcast with dark leaden clouds.
“Ned,” said Tom, anxiously, “I fear we shall be caught by the rainy season. It’s awkward being so far from the settlements at such a time.”
“Oh, nonsense! surely you don’t mind a wetting?” cried Ned; “we can push on in spite of rain.”
“Can we?” retorted Tom, with unwonted gravity. “It’s clear that you’ve never seen the rainy season, else you would not speak of it so lightly.”
“Why, man, you seem to have lost pluck all of a sudden; come, cheer up; rain or no rain, I mean to have a good supper, and a good night’s rest; and here is just the spot that will suit us.”
Ned Sinton leaped off his horse as he spoke, and, fastening him to a tree, loosened the saddle-girths, and set about preparing the encampment. Tom Collins assisted him; but neither the rallying of his comrade, nor his own efforts could enable the latter to shake off the depression of spirits with which he was overpowered. That night the rain came down in torrents, and drenched the travellers to the skin, despite their most ingenious contrivances to keep it out. They spent the night in misery, and when morning broke Ned found that his companion was smitten down with ague.
Even Ned’s buoyant spirits were swamped for a time at this unlooked-for catastrophe; for the dangers of their position were not slight. It was clear that Tom would not be able to travel for many days, for his whole frame trembled, when the fits came on, with a violence that seemed to threaten dislocation to all his joints. Ned felt that both their lives, under God, depended on his keeping well, and being able to procure food for, and nurse, his friend. At the same time, he knew that the rainy season, if indeed it had not already begun, would soon set in, and perhaps render the country impassable. There was no use, however, in giving way to morbid fears, so Ned faced his difficulties manfully, and, remembering the promise which he had given his old uncle at parting from him in England, he began by offering up a short but earnest prayer at the side of his friend’s couch.
“Ned,” said Tom, sadly, as his companion ceased, “I fear that you’ll have to return alone.”
“Come, come, don’t speak that way, Tom; it isn’t right. God is able to help us here as well as in cities. I don’t think you are so ill as you fancy—the sight of these poor emigrants has depressed you. Cheer up, my boy, and I’ll let you see that you were right when you said I could turn my hand to anything. I’ll be hunter, woodcutter, cook, and nurse all at once, and see if I don’t make you all right in a day or two. You merely want rest, so keep quiet for a little till I make a sort of sheltered place to put you in.”
The sun broke through the clouds as he spoke and shed a warm beam down on poor Tom, who was more revived by the sight of the cheering orb of day than by the words of his companion.
In half-an-hour Tom was wrapped in the driest portion of the driest blanket; his wet habiliments were hung up before a roaring fire to dry, and a rude bower of willows, covered with turf, was erected over his head to guard him from another attack of rain, should it come; but it didn’t come. The sun shone cheerily all day, and Ned’s preparations were completed before the next deluge came, so that when it descended on the following morning, comparatively little found its way to Tom’s resting-place.
It was scarcely a resting-place, however. Tom turned and groaned on his uneasy couch, and proved to be an uncommonly restive patient. He complained particularly when Ned left him for a few hours each day to procure fresh provisions; but he smiled and confessed himself unreasonable when Ned returned, as he always did, with a dozen wild ducks, or several geese or hares attached to his belt, or a fat deer on his shoulders. Game of all kinds was plentiful, the weather improved, the young hunter’s rifle was good, and his aim was true, so that, but for the sickness of his friend, he would have considered the life he led a remarkably pleasant one.
As day after day passed by, however, and Tom Collins grew no better, but rather worse, he began to be seriously alarmed about him. Tom himself took the gloomiest view of his case, and at last said plainly he believed he was dying. At first Ned sought to effect a cure by the simple force of kind treatment and care; but finding that this would not do, he bethought him of trying some experiments in the medicinal way. He chanced to have a box of pills with him, and tried one, although with much hesitation and fear, for he had got them from a miner who could not tell what they were composed of, but who assured him they were a sovereign remedy for the blues! Ned, it must be confessed, was rather a reckless doctor. He was anxious, at the time he procured the pills, to relieve a poor miner who seemed to be knocked up with hard work, but who insisted that he had a complication of ailments; so Ned bought the pills for twenty times their value, and gave a few to the man, advising him, at the same time, to rest and feed well, which he did, and the result was a complete cure.
Our hero did not feel so certain, however, that they would succeed as well in the present case; but he resolved to try their virtues, for Tom was so prostrate that he could scarcely be induced to whisper a word. When the cold fit seized him he trembled so violently that his teeth rattled in his head; and when that passed off it was followed by a burning fever, which was even worse to bear.
At first he was restive, and inclined to be peevish under his illness, the result, no doubt, of a naturally-robust constitution struggling unsuccessfully against the attacks of disease, but when he was completely overcome, his irascibility passed away, and he became patient, sweet-tempered, and gentle as a child.
“Come, Tom, my boy,” said Ned, one evening, advancing to the side of his companion’s couch and sitting down beside him, while he held up the pill—“Open your mouth, and shut your eyes, as we used to say at school.”
“What is it?” asked the sick man, faintly.
“Never you mind; patients have no business to know what their doctors prescribe. It’s intended to cure ague, and that’s enough for you to know. If it doesn’t cure you it’s not my fault, anyhow—open your mouth, sir!”
Tom smiled sadly and obeyed; the pill was dropt in, a spoonful of water added to float it down, and it disappeared.
But the pill had no effect whatever. Another was tried with like result—or rather with like absence of all result, and at last the box was finished without the sick man being a whit the better or the worse for them. This was disheartening; but Ned, having begun to dabble in medicines, felt an irresistible tendency to go on. Like the tiger who has once tasted blood, he could not now restrain himself.
“I think you’re a little better to-night, Tom,” he said on the third evening after the administration of the first pill; “I’m making you a decoction of bark here that will certainly do you good.”
Tom shook his head, but said nothing. He evidently felt that a negative sign was an appropriate reply to the notion of his being better, or of any decoction whatever doing him good. However, Ned stirred the panful of bark and water vigorously, chatting all the while in a cheering tone, in order to keep up his friend’s spirits, while the blaze of the camp-fire lit up his handsome face and bathed his broad chest and shoulders with a ruddy glow that rendered still more pallid the lustre of the pale stars overhead.
“It’s lucky the rain has kept off so long,” he said, without looking up from the mysterious decoction over which he bent with the earnest gaze of an alchymist. “I do believe that has something to do with your being better, my boy—either that or the pills, or both.”
Ned totally ignored the fact that his friend did not admit that he was better.
“And this stuff,” he continued, “will set you up in a day or two. It’s as good as quinine, any day; and you’ve no notion what wonderful cures that medicine effects. It took me a long time, too, to find the right tree. I wandered over two or three leagues of country before I came upon one. Luckily it was a fine sunny day, and I enjoyed it much. I wish you had been with me, Tom; but you’ll be all right soon. I lay down, too, once or twice in the sunshine, and put my head in the long grass, and tried to fancy myself in a miniature forest. Did you ever try that, Tom!”
Ned looked round as he spoke, but the sick man gave a languid smile, and shut his eyes, so he resumed his stirring of the pot and his rambling talk.
“You’ve no idea, if you never tried it, how one can deceive one’s-self in that way. I often did it at home, when I was a little boy. I used to go away with a companion into a grass-field, and, selecting a spot where the grass was long and tangled, and mixed with various kinds of weeds, we used to lie flat down with our faces as near to the ground as possible, and gaze through the grass-stems until we fancied the blades were trees, and the pebbles were large rocks, and the clods were mountains. Sometimes a huge beetle would crawl past, and we instantly thought of Saint George and the dragon, and, as the unwieldy monster came stumbling on through the forest, we actually became quite excited, and could scarcely believe that what we tried to imagine was not real.
“We seldom spoke on these occasions, my companion and I,” continued Ned, suspending the stirring of the decoction and filling his pipe, as he sat down close to the blazing logs; “speaking, we found, always broke the spell, so we agreed to keep perfect silence for as long a time as possible. You must try it, Tom, some day, for although it may seem to you a childish thing to do, there are many childish things which, when done in a philosophical spirit, are deeply interesting and profitable to men.”
Ned ceased talking for a few minutes while he ignited his pipe; when he spoke again his thoughts had wandered into a new channel.
“I’m sorry we have no fresh meat to-day,” he said, looking earnestly at his friend. “The remainder of that hare is not very savoury, but we must be content; I walked all the country round to-day, without getting within range of any living thing. There were plenty both of deer and birds, but they were so wild I could not get near them. It would matter little if you were well, Tom, but you require good food just now, my poor fellow. Do you feel better to-night?”
Tom groaned, and said that he “felt easier,” in a very uneasy voice, after which they both relapsed into silence, and no sound was heard save the crackling of the logs and the bubbling of the mysterious decoction in the pot. Suddenly Tom uttered a slight hiss,—that peculiar sound so familiar to backwoods ears, by which hunters indicate to each other that something unusual has been observed, and that they had better be on the alert.
Ned Sinton’s nerves were of that firm kind which can never be startled or taken by surprise. He did not spring to his feet, but, quick as thought, he stretched forth his long arm, and, seizing his rifle, cocked it, while he glanced at his friend’s eye to see in what direction he was looking. Tom pointed eagerly with his thin hand straight across the fire. Ned turned in that direction, and at once saw the objects which had attracted his attention. Two bright gleaming balls shone in the dark background of the forest, like two lustrous Irish diamonds in a black field of bog-oak. He knew at once that they were the eyes of a deer, which, with a curiosity well-known as peculiar to many wild animals, had approached the fire to stare at it.
Ned instantly threw forward his rifle; the light of the fire enabled him easily to align the sights on the glittering eyes; the deadly contents belched forth, and a heavy crash told that his aim had been true.
“Bravo!” shouted Tom Collins, forgetting his ailments in the excitement of the moment, while Ned threw down his rifle, drew his hunting-knife, sprang over the fire, and disappeared in the surrounding gloom. In a few minutes he returned with a fine deer on his shoulders.
“So ho! my boy,” he cried, flinging the carcase down; “that was a lucky shot. We shall sup well to-night, thanks to curiosity, which is a most useful quality in beast as well as man. But what’s wrong; you look pale, and, eh? you don’t mean to say you’re—laughing?”
Tom was indeed pale, for the sudden excitement, in his exhausted condition had been too much for him; yet there did seem a peculiar expression about the corners of his mouth that might have been the remains of a laugh.
“Ned,” he said, faintly, “the—the decoction’s all gone.” Ned sprang up and ran to the fire, where, sure enough, he found the pan, over which he had bent so long with necromantic gaze, upset, and most of the precious liquid gone.
“Ha!” he cried, catching up the pot, “not all gone, lad, so your rejoicing was premature. There’s quite enough left yet to physic you well; and it’s in fit state to be taken, so open your mouth at once, and be a good boy.”
A little of the medicine, mixed in water, was administered, and Tom, making a wry face, fell back on his couch with a sigh. Immediately after he was seized with, perhaps, the severest shaking fit he had yet experienced, so that Ned could not help recalling the well-known caution, so frequently met with on medicine vials, “When taken, to be well shaken,” despite the anxiety he felt for his friend. But soon after, the trembling fit passed away, and Tom sank into a quiet slumber,—the first real rest he had enjoyed for several days.
Ned felt his pulse and his brow, looked long and earnestly into his face, nodded approvingly once or twice, and, having tucked the blankets gently in round the sick man, he proceeded to prepare supper. He removed just enough of the deer’s skin to permit of a choice morsel being cut out; this he put into the pot, and made thereof a rich and savoury soup, which he tasted; and, if smacking one’s lips and tasting it again twice, indicated anything, the soup was good. But Ned Sinton did not eat it. That was Tom’s supper, and was put just near enough the fire to keep it warm.
This being done, Ned cut out another choice morsel of deer’s-meat, which he roasted and ate, as only those can eat who are well, and young, and robust, and in the heart of the wilderness. Then he filled his pipe, sat down close to Tom’s couch, placed his back against a tree, crossed his arms on his breast, and smoked and watched the whole night long.
He rose gently several times during the night, however, partly for the purpose of battling off his tendency to sleep, and partly for the purpose of replenishing the fire and keeping the soup warm.
But Tom Collins took no supper that night. Ned longed very much to see him awake, but he didn’t. Towards morning, Ned managed for some time to fight against sleep, by entering into a close and philosophical speculation as to what was the precise hour at which that pot of soup could not properly be called supper, but would merge into breakfast. This question still remained unsettled in his mind when grey dawn lit up the peaks of the eastern hills, and he was still debating it, and nodding like a Chinese mandarin, and staring at intervals like a confused owl, when the sun shot over the tree-tops, and, alighting softly on the sleeper’s face, aroused him.
Tom awoke refreshed, ate his breakfast with relish, took his medicine without grumbling, smiled on his comrade, and squeezed his hand as he went to sleep again with a heavy sigh of comfort. From that hour he mended rapidly, and in a week after he was well enough to resume his journey.
Powerful Effects of Gold on the Aspect of Things in General—The Doings at Little Creek Diggings—Larry becomes Speculative, and digs a Hole which nearly proves the Grave of many Miners—Captain Bunting takes a Fearful Dive—Ah-wow is smitten to the Earth—A Mysterious Letter, and a Splendid Dish.
We must now beg our reader to turn with us to another scene.
The appearance of Little Creek diggings altered considerably, and for the worse, after Ned Sinton and Tom Collins left. A rush of miners had taken place in consequence of the reports of the successful adventurers who returned to Sacramento for supplies, and, in the course of a few weeks, the whole valley was swarming with eager gold-hunters. The consequence of this was that laws of a somewhat stringent nature had to be made. The ground was measured off into lots of about ten feet square, and apportioned to the miners. Of course, in so large and rough a community, there was a good deal of crime, so that Judge Lynch’s services were frequently called in; but upon the whole, considering the circumstances of the colony, there was much less than might have been expected.
At the time of which we write, namely, several weeks after the events narrated in our last chapter, the whole colony was thrown into a state of excitement, in consequence of large quantities of gold having been discovered on the banks of the stream, in the ground on which the log-huts and tents were erected. The result of this discovery was, that the whole place was speedily riddled with pits and their concomitant mud-heaps, and, to walk about after night-fall, was a difficult as well as a dangerous amusement. Many of the miners pulled down their tents, and began to work upon the spots on which they previously stood. Others began to dig all round their wooden huts, until these rude domiciles threatened to become insular, and a few pulled their dwellings down in order to get at the gold beneath them.
One man, as he sat on his door-step smoking his pipe after dinner, amused himself by poking the handle of an axe into the ground, and, unexpectedly, turned up a small nugget of gold worth several dollars. In ten minutes there was a pit before his door big enough to hold a sheep, and, before night, he realised about fifty dollars. Another, in the course of two days, dug out one hundred dollars behind his tent, and all were more or less fortunate.
At this particular time, it happened that Captain Bunting had been seized with one of his irresistible and romantic wandering fits, and had gone off with the blunderbuss, to hunt in the mountains. Maxton, having heard of better diggings elsewhere, and not caring for the society of our adventurers when Ned and Tom were absent, had bid them good-bye, and gone off with his pick and shovel on his shoulder, and his prospecting-pan in his hand, no one knew whither. Bill Jones was down at Sacramento purchasing provisions, as the prices at the diggings were ruinous; and Ko-sing had removed with one of the other Chinamen to another part of the Creek.
Thus it came to pass that Larry O’Neil and Ah-wow, the Chinaman, were left alone to work out the claims of the party.
One fine day, Larry and his comrade were seated in the sunshine, concluding their mid-day meal, when a Yankee passed, and told them of the discoveries that had been made further down the settlement.
“Good luck to ye!” said Larry, nodding facetiously to the man, as he put a tin mug to his lips, and drained its contents to the bottom. “Ha! it’s the potheen I’m fond of; not but that I’ve seen better; faix I’ve seldom tasted worse, but there’s a vartue in goold-diggin’ that would make akifortis go down like milk—it would. Will ye try a drop?”
Larry filled the pannikin as he spoke, and handed it to the Yankee, who, nothing loth, drained it, and returned it empty, with thanks.
“They’re diggin’ goold out o’ the cabin floors, are they?” said Larry, wiping his mouth with the sleeve of his shirt.
“They air,” answered the man. “One feller dug up three hundred dollars yesterday, from the very spot where he’s bin snorin’ on the last six months.”
“Ah! thin that’s a purty little sum,” said Larry, with a leer that shewed he didn’t believe a word of it. “Does he expect more to-morrow, think ye?”
“Don’t know,” said the man, half offended at the doubt thus cast on his veracity; “ye better go an’ ax him. Good day, stranger;” and the Yankee strode away rapidly.
Larry scratched his head; then he rubbed his nose, and then his chin, without, apparently, deriving any particular benefit from these actions. After that, he looked up at Ah-wow, who was seated cross-legged on the ground opposite to him, smoking, and asked him what was his opinion.
“Dun no,” said the Chinaman, without moving a muscle of his stolid countenance.
“Oh! ye’re an entertainin’ cratur, ye are; I’ll just make a hole here where I sit, an’ see what comes of it. Sure it’s better nor doin’ nothin’.”
Saying this, Larry refilled his empty pipe, stretched himself at full length on his side, rested his head on his left hand, and smoked complacently for three minutes; after which he took up the long sheath-knife, with which he had just cut up his supper, and began carelessly to turn over the sod.
“Sure, there is goold,” he said, on observing several specks of the shining metal. As he dug deeper down, he struck upon a hard substance, which, on being turned up, proved to be a piece of quartz, the size of a hen’s egg, in which rich lumps and veins of gold were embedded.
“May I niver!” shouted the Irishman, starting up, and throwing away his pipe in his excitement, “av it isn’t a nugget. Hooray! where’s the pick!”
Larry overturned the Chinaman, who sat in his way, darted into the tent for his pick and shovel, and in five minutes was a foot down into the earth.
He came upon a solid rock, however, much to his chagrin, a few inches further down.
“Faix I’ll tell ye what I’ll do,” he said, as a new idea struck him, “I’ll dig inside o’ the tint. It ’ll kape the sun an’ the rain off.”
This remark was made half to himself and half to Ah-wow, who, having gathered himself up, and resumed his pipe, was regarding him with as much interest as he ever regarded anything. As Ah-wow made no objection, and did not appear inclined to volunteer an opinion, Larry entered the tent, cleared all the things away into one corner, and began to dig in the centre of it.
It was fortunate that he adopted this plan: first, because the rainy season having now set in, the tent afforded him shelter; and secondly, because the soil under the tent turned out to be exceedingly rich—so much so, that in the course of the next few days he and the Chinaman dug out upwards of a thousand dollars.
But the rains, which for some time past had given indubitable hints that they meant to pay a long visit to the settlement, at last came down like a waterspout, and flooded Larry and his comrade out of the hole. They cut a deep trench round the tent, however, to carry off the water, and continued their profitable labour unremittingly.
The inside of the once comfortable tent now presented a very remarkable appearance. All the property of the party was thrust into the smallest possible corner, and Larry’s bed was spread out above it; the remainder of the space was a yawning hole six feet deep, and a mound of earth about four feet high. This earth formed a sort of breast-work, over which Larry had to clamber night and morning in leaving and returning to his couch. The Chinaman slept in his own little tent hard by.
There was another inconvenience attending this style of mining which Larry had not foreseen when he adopted it, and which caused the tent of our adventurers to become a sort of public nuisance. Larry had frequently to go down the stream for provisions, and Ah-wow being given to sleep when no one watched him, took advantage of those opportunities to retire to his own tent; the consequence was, that strangers who chanced to look in, in passing, frequently fell headlong into the hole ere they were aware of its existence, and on more than one occasion Larry returned and found a miner in the bottom of it with his neck well-nigh broken.
To guard against this he hit upon the plan of putting up a cautionary ticket. He purchased a flat board and a pot of black paint with which he wrote the words:
“Mind Yer Feet Thars A Big Hol,” and fixed it up over the entrance. The device answered very well in as far as those who could read were concerned, but as there were many who could not read at all, and who mistook the ticket for the sign of a shop or store, the accidents became rather more frequent than before.
The Irishman at last grew desperate, and, taking Ah-wow by the pig-tail, vowed that if he deserted his post again, “he’d blow out all the brains he had—if he had any at all—an’ if that wouldn’t do, he’d cut him up into mince-meat, so he would.”
The Chinaman evidently thought him in earnest, for he fell on his knees, and promised, with tears in his eyes, that he would never do it again—or words to that effect.
One day Larry and Ah-wow were down in the hole labouring for gold as if it were life. It was a terribly rainy day—so bad, that it was almost impossible to keep the water out. Larry had clambered out of the hole, and was seated on the top of the mud-heap, resting himself and gazing down upon his companion, who slowly, but with the steady regularity of machinery, dug out the clay, and threw it on the heap, when a voice called from without—
“Is this Mr Edward Sinton’s tent?”
“It is that same,” cried Larry, rising; “don’t come in, or it’ll be worse for ye.”
“Here’s a letter for him, then, and twenty dollars to pay.”
“Musha! but it’s chape postage,” said Larry, lifting the curtain, and stepping out; “couldn’t ye say thirty, now?”
“Come, down with the cash, and none o’ yer jaw,” said the man, who was a surly fellow, and did not seem disposed to stand joking.
“Oh! be all manes, yer honour,” retorted Larry, with mock servility, as he counted out the money. “Av it wouldn’t displase yer lordship, may I take the presumption to ax how the seal come to be broken?”
“I know nothin’ about it,” answered the man, as he pocketed the money; “I found it on the road between this an’ Sacramento, and, as I was passin’ this way anyhow, I brought it on.”
“Ah, thin, it was a great kindness, intirely, to go so far out o’ yer way, an’ that for a stranger, too, an’ for nothin’—or nixt thing to it!” said Larry, looking after the man as he walked away.
“Well, now,” he continued, re-entering the tent, and seating himself again on the top of the mud-heap, while he held the letter in his hand at arm’s length, “this bates all! An’ whot am I to do with it? Sure it’s not right to break the seal o’ another man’s letter; but then it’s broke a’ready, an’ there can be no sin in raidin’ it. Maybe,” he continued, with a look of anxiety, “the poor lad’s ill, or dead, an’ he’s wrote to say so. Sure, I would like to raid it—av I only know’d how; but me edication’s bin forgot, bad luck to the schoolmasters; I can only make out big print—wan letter at a time.”
The poor man looked wistfully at the letter, feeling that it might possibly contain information of importance to all of them, and that delay in taking action might cause irreparable misfortune. While he meditated what had best be done, and scanned the letter in all directions, a footstep was heard outside, and the hearty voice of Captain Bunting shouted:
“Ship ahoy! who’s within, boys!”
“Hooroo! capting,” shouted Larry, jumping up with delight; “mind yer fut, capting, dear; don’t come in.”
“Why not?” inquired the captain, as he lifted the curtain.
“Sure, it’s no use tellin’ ye now!” said Larry, as Captain Bunting fell head-foremost into Ah-wow’s arms, and drove that worthy creature—as he himself would have said—“stern-foremost” into the mud and water at the bottom. The captain happened to have a haunch of venison on his shoulder, and the blunderbuss under his arm, so that the crash and the splash, as they all floundered in the mud, were too much for Larry, who sat down again on the mud-heap and roared with laughter.
It is needless to go further into the details of this misadventure. Captain Bunting and the Chinaman were soon restored to the upper world, happily, unhurt; so, having changed their garments, they went into Ah-wow’s tent to discuss the letter.
“Let me see it, Larry,” said the captain, sitting down on an empty pork cask.
Larry handed him the missive, and he read as follows:—
“San Francisco.
“Edward Sinton, Esquire, Little Creek Diggings.
“My Dear Sir,—I have just time before the post closes, to say that I only learned a few days ago that you were at Little Creek, otherwise I should have written sooner, to say that—”
Here the captain seemed puzzled. “Now, ain’t that aggravatin’?” he said; “the seal has torn away the most important bit o’ the letter. I wish I had the villains by the nose that opened it! Look here, Larry, can you guess what it was?”
Larry took the letter, and, after scrutinising it with intense gravity and earnestness, returned it, with the remark, that it was “beyant him entirely.”
“That—that—” said the captain, again attempting to read, “that—somethin’—great success; so you and Captain Bunting had better come down at once.
“Believe me, my dear Sir, Yours faithfully, John Thomson.”
“Now,” remarked the captain, with a look of chagrin, as he laid down the letter, folded his hands together, and gazed into Larry’s grave visage, “nothin’ half so tantalisin’ as that has happened to me since the time when my good ship, the Roving Bess, was cast ashore at San Francisco.”
“It’s purvokin’,” replied Larry, “an’ preplexin’.”
“It’s most unfortunate, too,” continued the captain, knitting up his visage, “that Sinton should be away just at this time, without rudder, chart, or compass, an’ bound for no port that any one knows of. Why, the fellow may be deep in the heart o’ the Rocky Mountains, for all I can tell. I might start off at once without him, but maybe that would be of no use. What can it be that old Thompson’s so anxious about? Why didn’t the old figur’-head use his pen more freely—his tongue goes fast enough to drive the engines of a seventy-four. What is to be done?”
Although Captain Bunting asked the question with thorough earnestness and much energy, looking first at Larry and then at Ah-wow, he received no reply. The former shook his head, and the latter stared at him with a steady, dead intensity, as if he wished to stare him through.
After a few minutes’ pause, Larry suddenly asked the captain if he was hungry, to which the latter replied that he was; whereupon the former suggested that it was worth while “cookin’ the haunch o’ ven’son,” and offered to do it in a peculiar manner, that had been taught to him not long ago by a hunter, who had passed that way, and fallen into the hole in the tent and sprained his ankle, so that he, (Larry), was obliged to “kape him for a week, an’ trate him to the best all the time.” The proposal was agreed to, and Larry, seizing the haunch, which was still covered with the mud contracted in “the hole,” proceeded to exhibit his powers as a cook.
The rain, which had been coming down as if a second flood were about to deluge the earth, had ceased at this time, and the sun succeeded, for a few hours, in struggling through the murky clouds and pouring a flood of light and heat over hill and plain; the result of which was, that, along the whole length of Little Creek, there was an eruption of blankets, and shirts, and inexpressibles, and other garments, which stood much in need of being dried, and which, as they fluttered and flapped their many-coloured folds in the light breeze, gave the settlement the appearance—as Captain Bunting expressed it—of being “dressed from stem to stern.” The steam that arose from these habiliments, and from the soaking earth, and from the drenched forest, covered the face of nature with a sort of luminous mist that was quite cheering, by contrast with the leaden gloom that had preceded it, and filled with a romantic glow the bosoms of such miners as had any romance left in their natures.
Larry O’Neil was one of these, and he went about his work whistling violently. We will not take upon us to say how much of his romance was due to the haunch of venison. We would not, if called on to do it, undertake to say how much of the romance and enjoyment of a pic-nic party would evaporate, if it were suddenly announced that “the hamper” had been forgotten, or that it had fallen and the contents been smashed and mixed. We turn from such ungenerous and gross contemplations to the cooking of that haunch of venison, which, as it was done after a fashion never known to Soyer, and may be useful in after-years to readers of this chronicle, whose lot it may be, perchance, to stand in need of such knowledge, we shall carefully describe.
It is not necessary to enlarge upon the preliminaries. We need hardly say that Larry washed off the mud, and that he passed flattering remarks upon his own abilities and prowess, and, in very irreverent tones and terms, addressed Ah-wow, who smoked his pipe and looked at him. All that, and a great deal more, we leave to our reader’s well-known and vivid imagination. Suffice it that the venison was duly washed, and a huge fire, with much difficulty, kindled, and a number of large stones put into it to heat. This done, Larry cut off a lump of meat from the haunch—a good deal larger than his own head, which wasn’t small—the skin with the hair on being cut off along with the meat. A considerable margin of flesh was then pared off from the lump, so as to leave an edging of hide all round, which might overlap the remainder, and enclose it, as it were, in a natural bag.
At this stage of the process Larry paused, looked admiringly at his work, winked over the edge of it at Ah-wow, and went hastily into the tent, whence he issued with two little tin canisters,—one containing pepper, the other salt.
“Why, you beat the French all to nothing!” remarked the captain, who sat on an upturned tea-box, smoking and watching the proceedings.
“Ah! thin, don’t spake, capting; it’ll spile yer appetite,” said Larry, sprinkling the seasoning into the bag and closing it up by means of a piece of cord. He then drew the red-hot stones and ashes from the fire, and, making a hot-bed thereof, placed the venison-dumpling—if we may be allowed the term—on the centre of it. Before the green hide was quite burned through, the dish was “cooked,” as Yankees express it, “to a curiosity,” and the tasting thereof would have evoked from an alderman a look, (he would have been past speaking!) of ecstasy, while a lady might have exclaimed, “Delicious!” or a schoolboy have said, “Hlpluhplp,” (see note 1), or some such term which ought only to be used in reference to intellectual treats, and should never be applied to such low matters as meat and drink.
Note 1. Hlpluhplp. As the reader may have some difficulty in pronouncing the above word, we beg to inform him, (or her), that it is easily done, by simply drawing in the breath, and, at the same time, waggling the tongue between the lips.
The Rainy Season, and its Effects—Disease and Misery at Little Creek—Reappearance of Old Friends—An Emigrant’s Death—An Unexpected Arrival.
Captain Bunting, after two days’ serious consideration, made up his mind to go down alone to San Francisco, in order to clear up the mystery of the letter, and do all that he could personally in the absence of his friend. To resolve, however, was easy; to carry his resolution into effect was almost impracticable, in consequence of the inundated state of the country.
It was now the middle of November, and the rainy season, which extends over six months of the year, was in full play. Language is scarcely capable of conveying, to those who have not seen it, an adequate idea of how it rained at this period of the year. It did not pour—there were no drops—it roared a cataract of never-ending ramrods, as thick as your finger, straight down from the black sky right through to the very vitals of the earth. It struck the tents like shot, and spirted through the tightest canvas in the form of Scotch-mist. It swept down cabin chimneys, and put out the fires; it roared through every crevice, and rent and seam of the hills in mad cataracts, and swelled up the Little Creek into a mighty surging river.
All work was arrested; men sat in their tents on mud-heaps that melted from below them, or lay on logs that well-nigh floated away with them; but there was not so much grumbling as one might have expected. It was too tremendous to be merely annoying. It was sublimely ridiculous,—so men grinned, and bore it.
But there were many poor miners there, alas! who could not regard that season in a light manner. There were dozens of young and middle-aged men whose constitutions, although good, perhaps, were not robust, and who ought never to have ventured to seek their fortunes in the gold-regions. Men who might have lived their full time, and have served their day and generation usefully in the civilised regions of the world, but who, despite the advice of friends, probably, and certainly despite the warnings of experienced travellers and authors, rushed eagerly to California to find, not a fortune, but a grave. Dysentery, scurvy in its worst and most loathsome type, ague, rheumatism, sciatica, consumption, and other diseases, were now rife at the diggings, cutting down many a youthful plant, and blasting many a golden dream.
Doctors, too, became surprisingly numerous, but these disciples of Esculapius failed to effect cures, and as their diplomas, when sought for, were not forthcoming, they were ultimately banished en masse by the indignant miners. One or two old hunters and trappers turned out in the end to be the most useful doctors, and effected a good many cures with the simple remedies they had become acquainted with among the red-men.
What rendered things worse was that provisions became scarce, and, therefore, enormously dear. No fresh vegetables of any kind were to be had. Salt, greasy and rancid pork, bear’s-meat, and venison, were all the poor people could procure, although many a man there would have given a thousand dollars—ay, all he possessed—for a single meal of fresh potatoes. The men smitten with scurvy had, therefore, no chance of recovering. The valley became a huge hospital, and the banks of the stream a cemetery.
There were occasional lulls, however, in this dismal state of affairs. Sometimes the rain ceased; the sun burst forth in irresistible splendour, and the whole country began to steam like a caldron. A cart, too, succeeded now and then in struggling up with a load of fresh provisions; reviving a few sinking spirits for a time, and almost making the owner’s fortune; but, at the best, it was a drearily calamitous season,—one which caused many a sick heart to hate the sight and name of gold, and many a digger to resolve to quit the land, and all its treasures, at the first opportunity.
Doubtless, too, many deep and earnest thoughts of life, and its aims and ends, filled the minds of some men at that time. It is often in seasons of adversity that God shews to men how mistaken their views of happiness are, and how mad, as well as sinful, it is in them to search for joy and peace apart from, and without the slightest regard for, the Author of all felicity. Yes, there is reason to hope and believe that many seeds of eternal life were sown by the Saviour, and watered by the Holy Spirit, in that disastrous time of disease and death,—seed which, perhaps, is now blessing and fertilising many distant regions of the world.
In one of the smallest and most wretched of the huts, at the entrance of the valley of Little Creek, lay a man, whose days on earth were evidently few. The hut stood apart from the others, in a lonely spot, as if it shrank from observation, and was seldom visited by the miners, who were too much concerned about their own misfortunes to care much for those of others. Here Kate Morgan sat by the couch of her dying brother, endeavouring to soothe his last hours by speaking to him in the most endearing terms, and reading passages from the Word of God, which lay open on her knee. But the dying man seemed to derive little comfort from what she said or read. His restless eye roamed anxiously round the wretched hut, while his breath came short and thick from between his pale lips.
“Shall I read to ye, darlin’?” said the woman, bending over the couch to catch the faint whisper, which was all the poor man had strength to utter.
Just then, ere he could reply, the clatter of hoofs was heard, and a bronzed, stalwart horseman was seen through the doorless entrance of the hut, approaching at a brisk trot. Both horse and man were of immense size, and they came on with that swinging, heavy tread, which gives the impression of irresistible weight and power. The rider drew up suddenly, and, leaping off his horse, cried, “Can I have a draught of water, my good woman?” as he fastened the bridle to a tree, and strode into the hut.
Kate rose hurriedly, and held up her finger to impose silence, as she handed the stranger a can of water. But he had scarcely swallowed a mouthful when his eye fell on the sick man. Going gently forward to the couch, he sat down beside it, and, taking the invalid’s wrist, felt his pulse.
“Is he your husband?” inquired the stranger, in a subdued voice.
“No, sir,—my brother.”
“Does he like to have the Bible read to him?”
“Sometimes; but before his voice failed he was always cryin’ out for the priest. He’s a Catholic, sir, though I’m not wan meself and thinks he can’t be saved unless he sees the priest.”
The stranger took up the Bible, and, turning towards the man, whose bright eyes were fixed earnestly upon him, read, in a low impressive voice, several of those passages in which a free salvation to the chief of sinners is offered through Jesus Christ. He did not utter a word of comment; but he read with deep solemnity, and paused ever and anon to look in the face of the sick man as he read the blessed words of comfort. The man was not in a state either to listen to arguments or to answer questions, so the stranger wisely avoided both, and gently quitted the hut after offering up a brief prayer, and repeating twice the words—
“Jesus says, ‘Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out.’”
Kate followed him out, and thanked him earnestly for his kindness, while tears stood in her eyes.
“Have you no friends or relations here but him!” inquired the stranger.
“Not wan. There was wan man as came to see us often when we stayed in a lonesome glen further up the Creek, but we’ve not seen him since we came here. More be token he didn’t know we were goin’ to leave, and we wint off in a hurry, for my poor brother was impatient, and thought the change would do him good.”
“Take this, you will be the better of it.”
The stranger thrust a quantity of silver into Kate’s hand, and sprang upon his horse.
“I don’t need it, thank ’ee,” said Kate, hurriedly.
“But you may need it; at any rate, he does. Stay, what was the name of the man who used to visit you?”
“O’Neil, sir—Larry O’Neil.”
“Indeed! he is one of my mates. My name is Sinton—Edward Sinton; you shall hear from me again ere long.”
Ned put spurs to his horse as he spoke, and in another moment was out of sight.
Ned decides on visiting San Francisco—Larry pays a Visit, and receives a Severe Disappointment—The Road and the City—Unexpected News.
Few joys in this life are altogether without alloy. The delight experienced by Larry O’Neil and Captain Bunting, when they heard the hearty tones of Ned Sinton’s voice, and the satisfaction with which they beheld his face, when, in their anxiety to prevent his falling headlong into “the hole,” they both sprang out of the tent and rushed into his arms, were somewhat damped on their observing that Tom Collins was not with him. But their anxieties were speedily relieved on learning that Tom was at Sacramento City, and, it was to be hoped, doing well.
As Ned had eaten nothing on the day of his arrival since early morning, the first care of his friends was to cook some food for him; and Larry took special care to brew for him, as soon as possible, a stiff tumbler of hot brandy and water, which, as he was wet and weary, was particularly acceptable.
While enjoying this over the fire in front of the tent, Ned related the adventures of himself and Tom Collins circumstantially; in the course of which narration he explained, what the reader does not yet know, how that, after Tom had recovered from his illness sufficiently to ride, he had conducted him by easy stages to the banks of the great San Joaquin river, down which they had proceeded by boat until they reached Sacramento.
Here Ned saw him comfortably settled in the best room of the best hotel in the town, and then, purchasing the largest and strongest horse he could find, he set off, in spite of the rains, to let his comrades know that they were both safe, and, in Ned’s case at least, sound.
“And, now, with reference to that letter.”
“Ay, that letter,” echoed the captain; “that’s what I’ve bin wantin’ you to come to. What can it mean?”
“I am as ignorant of that as yourself,” answered Ned; “if it had only been you who were mentioned in the letter, I could have supposed that your old ship had been relaunched and refitted, and had made a successful voyage to China during your absence; but, as I left no property of any kind in San Francisco, and had no speculations afloat, I cannot conceive what it can be.”
“Maybe,” suggested Larry, “they’ve heard o’ our remarkable talents up here in the diggin’s, and they’ve been successful in gittin’ us app’inted to respansible sitivations in the new government I’ve heared they’re sottin’ up down there. I wouldn’t object to be prime minister meself av they’d only allow me enough clarks to do the work.”
“And did you say you were all ready for a start to-morrow, captain?” inquired Ned.
“Quite. We’ve disposed of the claims and tools for fifteen hundred dollars, an’ we sold Ah-wow along with the lot; that’s to say, he remains a fixture at the same wage; and the little we meant to take with us is stowed away in our saddle-bags. Ye see, I couldn’t foresee that you’d plump down on us in this fashion, and I felt that the letter was urgent, and ought to be acted on at once.”
“You did quite right,” returned Ned. “What a pity I missed seeing Bill Jones at Sacramento; but the city has grown so much, and become so populous, in a few months, that two friends might spend a week in it, unknown to each other, without chancing to meet. And now as to the gold. Have you been successful since I left?”
“Ay,” broke in Larry, “that have we. It’s a great country intirely for men whose bones and muscles are made o’ iron. We’ve dug forty thousand dollars—eight thousand pounds—out o’ that same hole in the tint; forby sprainin’ the ankles, and well-nigh breakin’ the legs, o’ eight or tin miners. It’s sorry I’ll be to lave it. But, afther all, it’s a sickly place, so I’m contint to go.”
“By the way, Larry, that reminds me I met a friend o’ yours at the other end of the settlement.”
“I belave ye,” answered Larry; “ivery man in the Creek’s my fri’nd. They’d die for me, they would, av I only axed them.”
“Ay, but a particular friend, named Kate, who—”
“Och! ye don’t mane it!” cried the Irishman, starting up with an anxious look. “Sure they lived up in the dark glen there; and they wint off wan fine day, an’ I’ve niver been able to hear o’ them since.”
“They are not very far off,” continued Ned, detailing his interview with the brother and sister, and expressing a conviction that the former could not now be in life.
“I’ll go down to-night,” said Larry, drawing on his heavy boots.
“You’d better wait till to-morrow,” suggested the captain. “The poor thing will be in no humour to see any one to-night, and we can make a halt near the hut for an hour or so.”
Larry, with some reluctance, agreed to this delay, and the rest of the evening was spent by the little party in making preparations for a start on the following day; but difficulties arose in the way of settling with the purchasers of their claims, so that another day passed ere they got fairly off on their journey towards Sacramento.
On reaching the mouth of the Little Creek, Larry O’Neil galloped ahead of his companions, and turned aside at the little hut, the locality of which Sinton had described to him minutely. Springing off his horse, he threw the reins over a bush and crossed the threshold. It is easier to conceive than to describe his amazement and consternation on finding the place empty. Dashing out, he vaulted into the saddle, and almost galloped through the doorway of the nearest hut in his anxiety to learn what had become of his friends.
“Halloo! stranger,” shouted a voice from within, “no thoroughfare this way; an’ I wouldn’t advise ye for to go an’ try for to make one.”
“Ho! countryman, where’s the sick Irishman and his sister gone, that lived close to ye here?”
“Wall, I ain’t a countryman o’ yourn, I guess; but I can answer a civil question. They’re gone. The man’s dead, an’ the gal took him away in a cart day b’fore yisterday.”
“Gone! took him away in a cart!” echoed Larry, while he looked aghast at the man. “Are ye sure?”
“Wall, I couldn’t be surer. I made the coffin for ’em, and helped to lift it into the cart.”
“But where have they gone to?”
“To Sacramento, I guess. I advised her not to go, but she mumbled something about not havin’ him buried in sich a wild place, an’ layin’ him in a churchyard; so I gave her the loan o’ fifty dollars—it was all I could spare—for she hadn’t a rap. She borrowed the horse and cart from a countryman, who was goin’ to Sacramento at any rate.”
“You’re a trump, you are!” cried Larry, with energy; “give us your hand, me boy! Ah! thin yer parents were Irish, I’ll be bound; now, here’s your fifty dollars back again, with compound interest to boot—though I don’t know exactly what that is—”
“I didn’t ax ye for the fifty dollars,” said the man, somewhat angrily. “Who are you that offers ’em!”
“I’m her—her—friend,” answered Larry, in some confusion; “her intimate friend; I might almost say a sort o’ distant relation—only not quite that.”
“Wall, if that’s all, I guess I’m as much a friend as you,” said the man, re-entering his cabin, and shutting the door with a bang.
Larry sighed, dropped the fifty dollars into his leather purse, and galloped away.
The journey down to Sacramento, owing to the flooded state of the country, was not an easy one. It took the party several days’ hard riding to accomplish it, and during all that time Larry kept a vigilant look-out for Kate Morgan and the cart, but neither of them did he see. Each day he felt certain he would overtake them, but each evening found him trying to console himself with the reflection that a “stern chase” is proverbially a long one, and that next day would do it. Thus they struggled on, and finally arrived at the city of Sacramento, without having set eyes on the wanderer. Poor Larry little knew that, having gone with a man who knew the road thoroughly, Kate, although she travelled slowly, had arrived there the day before him; while Ned had lengthened the road by unwittingly making a considerable and unnecessary détour. Still less did he know that, at the very hour he arrived in the city, Kate, with her sad charge, embarked on board a small river steamer, and was now on her way to San Francisco.
As it was, Larry proposed to start back again, supposing they must have passed them; but, on second thoughts, he decided to remain where he was and make inquiries. So the three friends pushed forward to the City Hotel to make inquiries after Tom Collins.
“Mr Collins?” said the waiter, bowing to Sinton—“he’s gone, sir, about a week ago.”
“Gone!” exclaimed Ned, turning pale.
“Yes, sir; gone down to San Francisco. He saw some advertisement or other in the newspaper, and started off by the next steamer.”
Ned’s heart beat freely again. “Was he well when he left?”
“Yes, sir, pretty well. He would have been the better of a longer rest, but he was quite fit to travel, sir.”
Captain Bunting, who, during this colloquy, had been standing with his legs apart, and his eyes glaring at the waiter, as if he had been mad, gave a prolonged whistle, but made no further remark. At this moment Larry, who had been conversing with one of the under-waiters, came rushing in with a look of desperation on his countenance.
“Would ye belave it,” he cried, throwing himself down on a splendid crimson sofa, that seemed very much out of keeping with the dress of the rough miners whom it was meant to accommodate—“would ye belave it, they’re gone!”
“Who are gone, and where to!” inquired Ned.
“Kate an’—an’ the caffin. Off to San Francisco, be all that’s onlucky; an’ only wint little more nor an hour ago.”
The three friends looked at each other.
“Waiter,” said Captain Bunting, in a solemn voice, “bear-chops for three, pipes and baccy for six, an’ a brandy-smash for one; an’, d’ye hear, let it be stiff!”
“Yes, sir.”
A loud laugh from Ned and Larry relieved their over-excited and pent-up feelings; and both agreed that, under the circumstances, the captain’s order was the best that could be given at that stage of their perplexities. Having ascertained that there was not another steamer to San Francisco for a week, they resolved to forget their anxieties as much as possible, and enjoy themselves in the great city of Sacramento during the next few days; while they instituted inquiries as to what had become of their comrade, Bill Jones, who, they concluded, must still be in the city, as they had not met him on the way down.
Gold not All-Powerful—Remarkable Growth of Sacramento—New Style of bringing a Hotel into Notice—A Surprising Discovery—Death of A Mexican Horse-Tamer—The Concert, and another Discovery—Mademoiselle Nelina creates a Sensation.
It is said that gold can accomplish anything; and, in some respects, the saying is full of truth; in some points of view, however, the saying is altogether wrong. Gold can, indeed, accomplish almost anything in the material world—it can purchase stone, and metal, and timber; and muscles, bones, thews, and sinews, with life in them, to any extent. It can go a step further—it can purchase brains, intellect, genius; and, throwing the whole together, material and immaterial, it can cut, and carve, and mould the world to such an extent that its occupants of fifty years ago, were they permitted to return to earth, would find it hard to recognise the scene of their brief existence. But there are things and powers which gold cannot purchase. That worn-out old millionnaire would give tons of it for a mere tithe of the health that yonder ploughman enjoys. Youth cannot be bought with gold. Time cannot be purchased with gold. The prompt obedience of thousands of men and women may be bought with that precious metal, but one powerful throb of a loving heart could not be procured by all the yellow gold that ever did or ever will enrich the human family.
But we are verging towards digression. Let us return to the simple idea with which we intended to begin this chapter—the wonder-working power of gold. In no country in the wide world, we venture to affirm, has this power been exemplified so strikingly as in California. The knowledge of the discovery of gold was so suddenly and widely disseminated over the earth, that human beings flowed into the formerly-uninhabited wilderness like a mighty torrent, while thousands of ships flooded the markets with the necessaries of life. Then gold was found to be so abundant, and, at first, so easily procured, that the fever was kept up at white-heat for several years. The result of this was, as we have remarked elsewhere, that changes, worthy of Aladdin’s lamp or Harlequin’s wand, were wrought in the course of a few weeks, sometimes in a few days.
The city of Sacramento was one of the most remarkable of the many strange and sudden growths in the country. The river on which it stands is a beautiful stream, from two to three hundred yards wide, and navigable by large craft to a few miles above the city. The banks, when our friends were there, were fringed with rich foliage, and the wild trees of the forest itself stood growing in the streets. The city was laid out in the form of a square, with streets crossing each other at right angles; a forest of masts along the embarcadero attested the growing importance and wealth of the place; and nearly ten thousand inhabitants swarmed in its streets. Many of those streets were composed of canvas tents, or erections scarcely more durable. Yet here, little more than a year before, there were only four thousand in the place!
Those who chanced to be in possession of the land here were making fortunes. Lots, twenty feet by seventy, in the best situations, brought upwards of 3500 dollars. Rents, too, were enormous. One hotel paid 30,000 dollars (6000 pounds) per annum; another, 35,000 dollars. Small stores fetched ten and twelve thousand dollars a year; while board at the best hotels was five dollars a day. Truly, if gold was plentiful, it was needed; for the common necessaries of life, though plentiful, were bought and sold at fabulous prices. The circulation of gold was enormous, and the growth of the city did not suffer a check even for a day, although the cost of building was unprecedented. And this commercial prosperity continued in spite of the fact that the place was unhealthy—being a furnace in summer, and in winter little better than a swamp.
“It’s a capital hotel,” remarked Captain Bunting to his companions, as they sat round their little table, enjoying their pipes after dinner; “I wonder if they make a good thing out of it?”
“Sure, if they don’t,” said Larry, tilting his chair on its hind legs, and calmly blowing a cloud of smoke towards the roof, “it’s a losin’ game they’re playin’, for they sarve out the grub at a tearin’ pace.”
“They are doing well, I doubt not,” said Ned Sinton; “and they deserve to, for the owner—or owners, I don’t know how many or few there are—made a remarkable and enterprising start.”
“How was that?” asked the captain.
“I heard of it when I was down here with Tom,” continued Sinton. “You must know that this was the first regular hotel opened in the city, and it was considered so great an event that it was celebrated by salvos of artillery, and, on the part of the proprietors, by a great unlimited feast to all who chose to come.”
“What!” cried Larry, “free, gratis, for nothin’?”
“Ay, for nothing. It was done in magnificent style, I assure you. Any one who chose came and called for what he wanted, and got it at once. The attendance was prompt, and as cheerfully given as though it had been paid for. Gin-slings, cocktails, mint-juleps, and brandy-smashes went round like a circular storm, even champagne flowed like water; and venison, wild-fowl, salmon, grizzly-bear-steaks, and pastry—all the delicacies of the season, in short—were literally to be had for the asking. What it cost the spirited proprietors I know not, but certainly it was a daring stroke of genius that deserved patronage.”
“Faix it did,” said Larry, emphatically; “and they shall have it, too;—here, waiter, a brandy-smash and a cheroot, and be aisy as to the cost; I think me bank’ll stand it.”
“What say you to a stroll!” said Ned, rising.
“By all means,” replied Captain Bunting, jumping up, and laying down his pipe. Larry preferred to remain where he was; so the two friends left him to enjoy his cheroot, and wandered away, where fancy led, to see the town. There was much to be seen. It required no theatrical representation of life to amuse one in Sacramento at that time. The whole city was a vast series of plays in earnest.
Every conceivable species of comedy and farce met the eye at every turn. Costumes the most remarkable, men the most varied and peculiar, and things the most incomprehensible and unexpected, presented themselves in endless succession. Here a canvas restaurant stood, or, rather leaned against a log-store. There a tent spread its folds in juxtaposition to a deck-cabin, which seemed to have walked ashore from a neighbouring brig, without leave, and had been let out as a grog-shop by way of punishment. Chinamen in calico jostled sailors in canvas, or diggers in scarlet flannel shirts, or dandies in broad-cloth and patent-leather, or red Indians in nothing! Bustle, and hurry, and uproar, and joviality prevailed. A good deal of drinking, too, unfortunately, went on, and the results were occasional melodramas, and sometimes serious rows.
Tragedies, too, were enacted, but these seldom met the eye; as is usually the case, they were done in the dark.
“What have we here?” cried Captain Bunting, stopping before a large placard, and reading. “‘Grand concert, this evening—wonderful singer—Mademoiselle Nelina, first appearance—Ethiopian serenaders.’ I say, Ned, we must go to this; I’ve not heard a song for ages that was worth listening to.”
“At what hour?” inquired Ned—“oh! seven o’clock; well, we can stroll back to the hotel, have a cup of coffee, and bring Larry O’Neil with us. Come along.”
That evening our three adventurers occupied the back seat of a large concert-room in one of the most crowded thoroughfares of the town, patiently awaiting the advent of the performers. The room was filled to overflowing, long before the hour for the commencement of the performances, with every species of mortal, except woman. Women were exceedingly rare creatures at that time—the meetings of all sorts were composed almost entirely of men, in their varied and motley garbs.
Considering the circumstances in which it was got up, the room was a very creditable one, destitute, indeed, of ornament, but well lighted by an enormous wooden chandelier, full of wax candles, which depended from the centre of the ceiling. At the further end of the room was a raised stage, with foot-lights in front, and three chairs in the middle of it. There was a small orchestra in front, consisting of two fiddles, a cornopian, a trombone, a clarionet, and a flute; but at first the owners of these instruments kept out of sight, wisely reserving themselves until that precise moment when the impatient audience would—as all audiences do on similar occasions—threaten to bring down the building with stamping of feet, accompanied with steam-engine-like whistles, and savage cries of “Music!”
While Ned Sinton and his friends were quietly looking round upon the crowd, Larry O’Neil’s attention was arrested by the conversation of two men who sat just in front of him. One was a rough-looking miner, in a wide-awake and red-flannel shirt; the other was a negro, in a shirt of blue-striped calico.
“Who be this Missey Nelina?” inquired the negro, turning to his companion.
“I dun know; but I was here last night, an’ I’d take my davy, I saw the little gal in the ranche of a feller away in the plains, five hundred miles to the east’ard, two months ago. Her father, poor chap, was killed by a wild horse.”
“How was dat?” inquired the negro, with an expression of great interest.
“Well, it was this way it happened,” replied the other, putting a quid of tobacco into his cheek, such as only a sailor would venture to masticate. “I was up at the diggin’s about six months, without gittin’ more gold than jist kep’ me in life—for, ye see, I was always an unlucky dog—when one day I goes down to my claim, and, at the very first lick, dug up two chunks o’ gold as big as yer fists; so I sold my claim and shovel, and came down here for a spree. Well, as I was sayin’, I come to the ranche o’ a feller called Bangi, or Bongi, or Bungi, or some sort o’ bang, with a gi at the end o’ ’t. He was clappin’ his little gal on the head, when I comed up, and said good-bye to her. I didn’t rightly hear what she said; but I was so taken with her pretty face that I couldn’t help axin’ if the little thing was his’n. ‘Yees,’ says he—for he was a Mexican, and couldn’t come round the English lingo—‘she me darter.’ I found the man was goin’ to catch a wild horse, so, says I, ‘I’ll go with ye,’ an’, says he, ‘come ’long,’ so away we went, slappin’ over the plains at a great rate, him and me, and a Yankee, a friend o’ his and three or four servants, after a drove o’ wild horses that had been seen that mornin’ near the house. Well, away we went after the wild horses. Oh! it was grand sport! The man had lent me one of his beasts, an’ it went at such a spankin’ pace, I could scarce keep my seat, and had to hold on by the saddle—not bein’ used to ridin’ much, d’ye see. We soon picked out a horse—a splendid-lookin’ feller, with curved neck, and free gallop, and wide nostrils. My eye! how he did snort and plunge, when the Mexican threw the lasso, it went right over his head the first cast, but the wild horse pulled the rope out o’ his grip. ‘It’s all up,’ thought I; but never a bit. The Mexican put spurs to his horse, an’ while at full gallop, made a dive with his body, and actually caught the end o’ the line, as it trailed over the ground, and recovered his seat again. It was done in a crack; an’, I believe, he held on by means of his spurs, which were big enough, I think, to make wheels for a small carronade. Takin’ a turn o’ the line round the horn of his saddle, he reined in a bit, and then gave the spurs for another spurt, and soon after reined in again—in fact, he jist played the wild horse like a trout, until he well-nigh choked him; an’, in an hour, or less, he was led steamin’, and startin’, and jumpin’, into the corral, where the man kept his other horses.”
At this point in the narrative, the cries for music became so deafening, that the sailor was obliged to pause, to the evident annoyance of the negro, who seemed intensely interested in what he had heard; and, also, to the regret of Larry, who had listened eagerly the whole time. In a few minutes the “music” came in, in the shape of two bald-headed Frenchmen, a wild-looking bearded German, and several lean men, who might, as far as appearance went, have belonged to almost any nation; and who would have, as far as musical ability went, been repudiated by every nation, except, perhaps, the Chinese. During the quarter of an hour in which these performers quieted the impatient audience with sweet sounds, the sailor continued his anecdote.
“Well, you see,” said he to the negro, while Larry bent forward to listen, “the Mexican mounted, and raced and spurred him for about an hour; but, just at the last, the wild horse gave a tremendous leap and a plunge, and we noticed the rider fall forward, as if he’d got a sprain. The Yankee an’ one o’ the servants ran up, and caught the horse by the head, but its rider didn’t move—he was stone dead, and was held in his seat by the spurs sticking in the saddle-cloth. The last bound must have ruptured some blood-vessel inside, for there was no sign of hurt upon him anywhere.”
“You don’ say dat?” said the negro, with a look of horror.
“’Deed do I; an’ we took the poor feller home, where his little daughter cried for him as if she’d break her heart. I asked the Yankee what we should do, but he looked at me somewhat offended like, an’ said he was a relation o’ the dead man’s wife, and could manage the affairs o’ the family without help; so I bid him good mornin’, and went my way. But I believe in my heart he was tellin’ a lie, and that he’s no right to go hawkin’ the poor gal about the country in this fashion.”
Larry was deeply interested in this narrative, and felt so strong a disposition to make further inquiries, that he made up his mind to question the sailor, and was about to address him when a small bell tinkled, the music ceased, and three Ethiopian minstrels, banjo in hand, advanced to the foot-lights, made their bow, and then seated themselves on the three chairs, with that intensity of consummate, impudent, easy familiarity peculiar to the ebony sons of song.
“Go it, darkies!” shouted an enthusiastic individual in the middle of the room.
“Three cheers for the niggers!” roared a sailor, who had just returned from a twelvemonth’s cruise at the mines, and whose delight at the prospect of once more hearing a good song was quite irrepressible.
The audience responded to the call with shouts of laughter, and a cheer that would have done your heart good to listen to, while the niggers shewed their teeth in acknowledgment of the compliment.
The first song was “Lilly Dale,” and the men, who, we need scarcely say, were fictitious negroes, sang it so well that the audience listened with breathless attention and evident delight, and encored it vociferously. The next song was “Oh! Massa, how he wopped me,” a ditty of quite a different stamp, but equally popular. It also was encored, as indeed was every song sting that evening; but the performers had counted on this. After the third song there was a hornpipe, in the performance of which the dancer’s chief aim seemed to be to shew in what a variety of complex ways he could shake himself to pieces if he chose. Then there was another trio, and then a short pause, in order duly to prepare the public mind for the reception of the great cantatrice Mademoiselle Nelina. When she was led to the foot-lights by the tallest of the three negroes, there was a momentary pause, as if men caught their breath; then there was a prolonged cheer of enthusiastic admiration. And little wonder, for the creature that appeared before these rough miners seemed more like an angelic visitant than a mortal.
There was nothing strikingly beautiful about the child, but she possessed that inexpressibly sweet character of face that takes the human heart by storm at first sight; and this, added to the fact that she was almost the only one of her sex who had been seen for many months by any of those present,—that she was fair, blue-eyed, delicate, modestly dressed, and innocent, filled them with an amount of enthusiasm that would have predisposed them to call a scream melodious, had it been uttered by Mademoiselle Nelina.
But the voice which came timidly from her lips was in harmony with her appearance. There was no attempt at execution, and the poor child was too frightened to succeed in imparting much expression to the simple ballad which she warbled; but there was an inherent richness in the tones of her voice that entranced the ear, and dwelt for weeks and months afterwards on the memory of those who heard it that night.
It is needless to add, that all her songs were encored with rapturous applause. The second song she sang was the popular one, “Erin, my country!” and it created quite a furore among the audience, many of whom were natives of the Green Isle.
“Oh! ye purty creature! sing it again, do!” yelled an Irishman in the front seats, while he waved his hat, and cheered in mad enthusiasm. The multitude shouted, “Encore!” and the song was sung for the third time.
While it was singing, Larry O’Neil sat with his hands clasped before him, his bosom heaving, and his eyes riveted on the child’s face.
“Mr Sinton,” he said, in a deep, earnest tone, touching Ned on the shoulder, as the last sweet notes of the air were drowned in the thunder of applause that followed Mademoiselle Nelina off the stage; “Mr Sinton, I’d lay me life that it’s her!”
“Who?” inquired Ned, smiling at the serious expression of his comrade’s face.
“Who but Nelly Morgan, av course. She’s the born image o’ Kate. They’re as like as two paise. Sure av it’s her, I’ll know it, I will; an’ I’ll make that black thief of a Yankee explain how he comed to possess stolen goods.”
Ned and the captain at first expressed doubts as to Larry’s being able to swear to the identity of one whom he had never seen before; but the earnest assurances of the Irishman convinced them that he must be right, and they at once entered into his feelings, and planned, in an eager undertone, how the child was to be communicated with.
“It won’t do,” said Ned, “to tax the man right out with his villainy. The miners would say we wanted to get possession of the child to make money by her.”
“But if the child herself admitted that the man was not her relative!” suggested Captain Bunting.
“Perhaps,” returned Ned, “she might at the same time admit that she didn’t like the appearance of the strangers who made such earnest inquiries about her, and prefer to remain with her present guardian.”
“Niver fear,” said Larry, in a hoarse whisper; “she’ll not say that if I tell her I know her sister Kate, and can take her to her. Besides, hasn’t she got an Irish heart? an’ don’t I know the way to touch it? Jist stay where ye are, both o’ ye, an’ I’ll go behind the scenes. The niggers are comin’ on again, so I’ll try; maybe there’s nobody there but herself.”
Before they could reply, Larry was gone. In a few minutes he reached the front seats, and, leaning his back against the wall, as if he were watching the performers, he gradually edged himself into the dark corner where the side curtain shut off the orchestra from the public. To his great satisfaction he found that this was only secured to the wall by one or two nails, which he easily removed, and then, in the midst of an uproarious laugh, caused by a joke of the serenaders, he pushed the curtain aside, and stood before the astonished gaze of Mademoiselle Nelina, who sat on a chair, with her hands clasped and resting on her knee. Unfortunately for the success of Larry’s enterprise, he also stood before the curtain-raiser—a broad, sturdy man, in rough miner’s costume—whose back was turned towards him, but whose surprised visage instantly faced him on hearing the muffled noise caused by his entry. There was a burly negro also in the place, seated on a small stool, who looked at him with unqualified astonishment.
“Halloo! wot do you want?” exclaimed the curtain-raiser.
“Eh! tare an’ ages!” cried Larry, in amazement. “May I niver! Sure it’s draimin’ I am; an’ the ghost o’ Bill Jones is comed to see me!”
It was, indeed, no other than Bill Jones who stood revealed before him; but no friendly glance of recognition did his old comrade vouchsafe him. He continued, after the first look of surprise, to frown steadily on the intruder.
“You’ve the advantage o’ me, young man,” said Bill, in a stern, though subdued tone, for he feared to disturb the men on the stage; “moreover, you’ve comed in where ye’ve got no right to be. When a man goes where he shouldn’t ought to, an’ things looks as if they wasn’t all square, in them circumstances, blow high or blow low, I always goes straight for’ard an’ shoves him out. If he don’t shove easy, why, put on more steam—that’s wot I say.”
“But sure ye don’t forgit me, Bill!” pleaded Larry, in amazement.
“Well, p’r’aps I don’t, an’ p’r’aps I do. W’en I last enjoyed the dishonour o’ yer acquaintance, ye wos a blackguard. It ain’t likely yer improved, so be good enough to back yer top-sails, and clear out.”
Bill Jones pointed, as he spoke, to the opening through which Larry had entered, but, suddenly changing his mind, he said, “Hold on; there’s a back door, an’ it’ll be easier to kick you through that than through the consart-room.”
So saying, Bill seized Larry O’Neil by the collar, and led that individual, in a state of helpless and wondering consternation, through a back door, where, however, instead of kicking him out, he released him, and suddenly changed his tone to an eager whisper.
“Oh! Larry, lad, I’m glad to see ye. Wherever did ye come from? I’ve no time to speak. Uncle Ned’s jist buried, and Jim Crow comes on in three minutes. I had to pretend, ye know, ’cause it wouldn’t do to let Jim see I know’d ye—that wos him on the stool—I know wot brought ye here—an’ I’ve fund out who she is. Where d’ye stop?”
Larry’s surprise just permitted him to gasp out the words “City Hotel,” when a roar of laughter and applause met their ears, followed by the tinkle of a small bell. Bill sprang through the doorway, and slammed the door in his old comrade’s face.
It would be difficult to say, looking at that face at that particular time, whether the owner thereof was mad or drunk—or both—so strangely did it wrinkle and contort as it gradually dawned upon its owner that Bill Jones, true to his present profession, was acting a part; that he knew about the mystery of Mademoiselle Nelina; was now acquainted with his, (Larry’s), place of abode; and would infallibly find him out after the concert was over. As these things crossed his mind, Larry smote his thigh so often and so vigorously, that he ran the risk of being taken up for unwarrantably discharging his revolver in the streets, and he whistled once or twice so significantly, that at least five stray dogs answered to the call. At last he hitched up the band of his trousers, and, hastening round to the front door, essayed to re-enter the concert-room.
“Pay here, please,” cried the money-taker, in an extremely nasal tone, as he passed the little hole in the wall.
“I’ve paid already,” answered Larry.
“Shew your check, then.”
“Sure I don’t know what that is.”
The doorkeeper smiled contemptuously, and shut down with a bang the bar that kept off the public. Larry doubled his fist, and flushed crimson; then he remembered the importance of the business he had on hand, and quietly drew the requisite sum from his leather purse.
“Come along,” said he to Ned Sinton, on re-entering the room. “I’ve see’d her; an’ Bill Jones, too!”
“Bill Jones!” cried Ned and the captain simultaneously.
“Whist!” said Larry; “don’t be makin’ people obsarve us. Come along home; it’s all right—I’ll tell ye all about it when we’re out.”
In another minute the three friends were in the street, conversing eagerly and earnestly as they hastened to their quarters through the thronged and noisy streets of Sacramento.
Deep Plots and Plans—Bill Jones relates his Misadventures—Mademoiselle Nelina consents to run off with Larry O’Neil—A Yankee Musician outwitted—The Escape.
As Larry had rightly anticipated, Bill Jones made his appearance at the City Hotel the moment the concert was over, and found his old comrades waiting anxiously for him.
It did not take long to tell him how they had discovered the existence of Nelly Morgan, as we shall now call her, but it took much longer to drag from Bill the account of his career since they last met, and the explanation of how he came to be placed in his present circumstances.
“Ye see, friends,” said he, puffing at a pipe, from which, to look at him, one would suppose he derived most of his information, “this is how it happened. When I set sail from the diggin’s to come here for grub, I had a pleasant trip at first. But after a little things began to look bad; the feller that steered us lost his reckoning, an’ so we took two or three wrong turns by way o’ makin’ short cuts. That’s always how it Is. There’s a proverb somewhere—”
“In Milton, maybe, or Napier’s book o’ logarithms,” suggested Captain Bunting.
“P’r’aps it wos, and p’r’aps it wosn’t,” retorted Bill, stuffing the end of his little finger, (if such a diminutive may be used in reference to any of his fingers), into the bowl of his pipe. “I raither think myself it wos in Bell’s Life or the Royal Almanac; hows’ever, that’s wot it is. When ye’ve got a short road to go, don’t try to make it shorter, say I—”
“An’ when ye’ve got a long story to tell, don’t try to make it longer,” interrupted Larry, winking at his comrade through the smoke of his pipe.
“Well, as I wos sayin’,” continued Bill, doggedly, “we didn’t git on so well after a bit; but somehow or other we got here at last, and cast anchor in this very hotel. Off I goes at once an’ buys a cart an’ a mule, an’ then I sets to work to lay in provisions. Now, d’ye see, lads, ’twould ha’ bin better if I had bought the provisions first an’ the mule and the cart after, for I had to pay ever so many dollars a day for their keep. At last I got it all square; packed tight and tied up in the cart—barrels o’ flour, and kegs o’ pork, an’ beans, an’ brandy, an’ what not; an’ away I went alone; for, d’ye see, I carry a compass, an’ when I’ve once made a voyage, I never need to be told how to steer.
“But my troubles began soon. There’s a ford across the river here, which I was told I’d ha’ to cross; and sure enough, so I did—but it’s as bad as Niagara, if not worse—an’ when I gits half way over, we wos capsized, and went down the river keel up. I dun know yet very well how I got ashore, but I did somehow—”
“And did the cart go for it?” inquired Captain Bunting, aghast.
“No, the cart didn’t. She stranded half-a-mile further down, on a rock, where she lies to this hour, with a wheel smashed and the bottom out, and about three thousand tons o’ water swashin’ right through her every hour; but all the provisions and the mule went slap down the Sacramento; an’, if they haven’t bin’ picked up on the way, they’re cruisin’ off the port o’ San Francisco by this time.”
The unfortunate seaman stopped at this point to relight his pipe, while his comrades laughingly commented on his misadventure.
“Ah! ye may laugh; but I can tell ye it warn’t a thing to be laughed at; an’ at this hour I’ve scarce one dollar to rub ’gainst another.”
“Never mind, my boy,” said Ned, as he and the others laughed loud and long at the lugubrious visage of their comrade; “we’ve got well-lined pockets, I assure you; and, of course, we have your share of the profits of our joint concern to hand over whenever you wish it.”
The expression of Bill Jones’s face was visibly improved by this piece of news, and he went on with much greater animation.
“Well, my story’s short now. I comed back here, an’ by chance fell in with this feller—this Yankee-nigger—who offered me five dollars a day to haul up the curtain, an’ do a lot o’ dirty work, sich as bill stickin’, an’ lightin’ the candles, an’ sweepin’ the floor; but it’s hard work, I tell ye, to live on so little in sich a place as this, where everything’s so dear.”
“You’re not good at a bargain, I fear,” remarked Sinton; “but what of the little girl?”
“Well, I wos comin’ to that. Ye see, I felt sure, from some things I overheerd, that she wasn’t the man’s daughter, so one day I axed her who she wos, an’ she said she didn’t know, except that her name was Nelly Morgan; so it comed across me that Morgan wos the name o’ the Irish family you wos so thick with up at the diggin’s, Larry; an’ I wos goin’ to ask if she know’d them, when Jolly—that’s the name o’ the gitter up o’ the concerts—catched me talkin’, an’ he took her away sharp, and said he’d thank me to leave the girl alone. I’ve been watchin’ to have another talk with her, but Jolly’s too sharp for me, an’ I haven’t spoke to her yet.”
Larry manifested much disappointment at this termination, for he had been fully prepared to hear that the girl had made Bill her confidant, and would be ready to run away with him at a moment’s notice. However, he consoled himself by saying that he would do the thing himself; and, after arranging that Bill was to tell Nelly that a friend of his knew where her sister was, and would like to speak with her, they all retired to rest, at least to rest as well as they could in a house which, like all the houses in California, swarmed with rats.
Next night Bill Jones made a bold effort, and succeeded in conveying Larry’s message to Nelly, very adroitly, as he thought, while she was standing close to him waiting for Mr Jolly to lead her to the foot-lights. The consequence was that the poor child trembled like a leaf when she attempted to sing, and, finally, fainted on the stage, to the consternation of a crowded house.
The point was gained, however; Nelly soon found an opportunity of talking in private with Bill Jones, and appointed to meet Larry in the street next morning early, near the City Hotel.
It was with trembling eagerness, mixed with timidity, that she took the Irishman’s arm when they met, and asked if he really knew where her sister was.
“Oh, how I’ve longed for her! But are you sure you know her?”
“Know her!” said Larry, with a smile. “Do I know meself?”
This argument was unanswerable, so Nelly made no reply, and Larry went on. “Yes, avic, I know’d her, an’ faix I hope to know her better. But here’s her picture for ye.”
Larry then gave the earnest listener at his side a graphic description of her sister Kate’s personal appearance, and described her brother also, but he did not, at that time, acquaint her with the death of the latter. He also spoke of Black Jim, and described the circumstances of her being carried off. “So ye see, darlin’,” said he, “I know all about ye; an’ now I want ye to tell me what happened to ye after that.”
“It’s a sad story,” said the child, in a low tone, as if her mind were recalling melancholy incidents in her career. Then she told rapidly, how she had been forsaken by those to whom she had been intrusted, and left to perish in the mountain snow; and how, in her extremity, God had sent help; how another party of emigrants found her and carried her on; how, one by one, they all died, till she was left alone a second time; and how a Mexican horseman found her, and carried her to his home, and kept her there as his adopted daughter, till he was killed while taming a wild horse. After that, Nelly’s story was a repetition of what Larry had already overheard accidentally in the concert-room.
“Now, dear,” said Larry, “we haven’t time to waste, will ye go with me to San Francisco?”
The tones of the rough man’s voice, rather than his words, had completely won the confidence of the poor child, so she said, “Yes,” without hesitation. “But how am I to escape from Mr Jolly?” she added; “he has begun to suspect Mr Jones, I see quite well.”
“Lave that to me, darlin’, an’ do you kape as much as ye can in the house the nixt day or two, an’ be lookin’ out for what may turn up. Good day to ye, mavourneen; we must part here, for fear we’re seen by any lynx-eyed blackguards. Kape up yer heart.”
Nelly walked quickly away, half laughing at, and half perplexed by, the ambiguity of her new friend’s parting advice.
The four friends now set themselves to work to outwit Mr Jolly, and rob him of Mademoiselle Nelina. At last they hit upon a device, which did not, indeed, say much for the ingenuity of the party, but which, like many other bold plans, succeeded admirably.
A steamer was to start in three days for San Francisco—one of those splendid new vessels which, like floating palaces, had suddenly made their appearance on these distant waters—having made the long and dangerous voyage from the United States round the Horn. Before the steamer started, Larry contrived to obtain another interview with Nelly Morgan, and explained their plan, which was as follows:—
On the day of the steamer sailing, a few hours before the time of starting, Mr Jolly was to receive the following letter, dated from a well-known ranche, thirty miles up the river:—
“Sir,—I trust that you will forgive a perfect stranger addressing you, but the urgency of the case must be my excuse. There is a letter lying here for you, which, I have reason to know, contains information of the utmost importance to yourself; but which—owing to circumstances that I dare not explain in a letter that might chance to fall into wrong hands—must be opened here by your own hands. It will explain all when you arrive; meanwhile, as I am a perfect stranger to the state of your finances, I send you a sufficient quantity of gold-dust by the bearer to enable you to hire a horse and come up. Pray excuse the liberty I take, and believe me to be,
“Your obedient servant,
“Edward Sinton.”
At the appointed time Larry delivered this epistle, and the bag of gold into Mr Jolly’s hands, and, saying that no answer was required, hurried away.
If Mr Jolly had been suddenly informed that he had been appointed secretary of state to the king of Ashantee, he could not have looked more astonished than when he perused this letter, and weighed the bag of gold in his hand. The letter itself; had it arrived alone, might, very likely would, have raised his suspicions, but accompanied as it was by a bag of gold of considerable value, it commended itself as a genuine document; and the worthy musician was in the saddle half-an-hour later. Before starting, he cautioned Nelly not to quit the house on any account whatever, a caution which she heard but did not reply to. Three hours later Mr Jolly reached his destination, and had the following letter put into his hands.
“Sir,—By the time you receive this, your late charge, Mademoiselle Nelina, will be on her way to San Francisco, where you are welcome to follow her, and claim her from her sister, if you feel so disposed.
“I am, Sir, etcetera,
“Edward Sinton.”
We need not repeat what Mr Jolly said, or try to imagine what he felt, on receipt of this letter! About the time it was put into his hands the magnificent steamer at the embarcadero gave a shrill whistle, then it panted violently, the paddles revolved,—and our adventurers were soon steaming swiftly down the noble river on their way to San Francisco.
San Francisco again—A Terrible Misfortune—An Old Friend in surprisingly New Circumstances—Several Remarkable Discoveries and New Lights.
There is no time or place, perhaps, more suitable for indulging in ruminations, cogitations, and reminiscences, than the quiet hours of a calm night out upon the sea, when the watchful stars look down upon the bosom of the deep, and twinkle at their reflections in placid brilliancy.
Late at night, when all the noisy inmates of the steamer had ceased to eat, and drink, and laugh, and had sought repose in their berths, Edward Sinton walked the deck alone, meditating on the past, the present, and the future. When he looked up at the serene heavens, and down at the tranquil sea, whose surface was unruffled, save by the long pure white track of the vessel, he could scarcely bring himself to believe that the whirl of incident and adventure in which he had been involved during the last few and short months was real. It seemed like a brilliant dream. As long as he was on shore it all appeared real enough, and the constant pressure of something to be done, either immediately, or in an hour, or to-morrow, kept his mind perpetually chained down to the consideration of visible, and tangible, and passing events; but now the cord of connexion with land had been suddenly and completely severed. The very land itself was out of sight. Nothing around him tended to recall recent events; and, as he had nothing in the world to do but wait until the voyage should come to an end, his mind was left free to bound over the recent-past into the region of the long-past, and revel there at pleasure.
But Ned Sinton was not altogether without anxieties. He felt a little uneasy as to the high-handed manner in which he had carried off Nelly Morgan from her late guardian; and he was a good deal perplexed as to what the important affairs could be for which he had so hastily overturned all the gold-digging plans of his whole party. With these thoughts mingled many philosophic inquiries as to the amount of advantage that lay—if, indeed, there was any advantage at all—in making one’s fortune suddenly and at the imminent hazard of one’s life. Overpowering sleep at last put an end to Ned’s wandering thoughts, and he too bade the stars good-night, and sought his pillow. In due course the vessel cast anchor off the town of San Francisco.
“There is many a slip ’tween the cup and the lip.” It is an old proverb that, but one which is proved, by frequent use, on the part of authors in all ages, to be a salutary reminder to humanity. Its truth was unpleasantly exemplified on the arrival of the steamer. As the tide was out at the time, the captain ordered the boats to be lowered, in order to land the passengers. The moment they touched the water they were filled by impatient miners, who struggled to be first ashore. The boat into which Ned and his friends got was soon overloaded with passengers, and the captain ordered her to be shoved off.
“Hold on!” shouted a big coarse-looking fellow, in a rough blue jacket and wide-awake, who was evidently drunk; “let me in first.”
“There’s no room!” cried several voices. “Shove off.”
“There’s room enough!” cried the man, with an oath; at the same time seizing the rope.
“If ye do come down,” said a sailor, sternly, “I’ll pitch ye overboard.”
“Will ye!” growled the man; and the next instant he sprang upon the edge of the boat, which upset, and left its freight struggling in the water. The other boats immediately picked them all up; and, beyond a wetting, they were physically none the worse. But, alas! the bags of gold which our adventurers were carrying ashore with them, sank to the bottom of the sea! They were landed on the wharf at San Francisco as penniless as they were on the day of their arrival in California.
This reverse of fortune was too tremendous to be realised in a moment. As they stood on the wharf; dripping wet, and gazing at each other in dismay, they suddenly, as if by one consent, burst into a loud laugh. But the laugh had a strong dash of bitterness in its tone; and when it passed, the expression of their countenances was not cheerful.
Bill Jones was the first to speak, as they wandered, almost helplessly, through the crowded streets, while little Nelly ever and anon looked wistfully up into Larry’s face, as he led her by the hand.
“It’s a stunnin’ smash,” said Bill, fetching a deep sigh. “But w’en a thing’s done, an’ can’t be undone, then it’s unpossible, that’s wot it is; and wot’s unpossible there’s no use o’ tryin’ for to do. ’Cause why? it only wastes yer time an’ frets yer sperrit—that’s my opinion.”
Not one of the party ventured to smile—as was their wont in happier circumstances—at the philosophy of their comrade’s remark. They wandered on in silence till they reached—they scarce knew how or why—the centre plaza of the town.
“It’s of no use giving way to it,” said Ned Sinton, at last, making a mighty effort to recover: “we must face our reverses like men; and, after all, it might have been worse. We might have lost our lives as well as our gold, so we ought to be thankful instead of depressed.”
“What shall we do now?” inquired Captain Bunting, in a tone that proved sufficiently that he at least could not benefit by Ned’s advice.
“Sure we’ll have to go an’ work, capting,” replied Larry, in a tone of facetious desperation; “but first of all we’ll have to go an’ see Mr Thompson, and git dry clo’se for Nelly, poor thing—are ye cowld, darlin’?”
“No, not in the least,” answered the child, sadly. “I think my things will dry soon, if we walk in the sun.”
Nelly’s voice seemed to rouse the energies of the party more effectually than Ned’s moralising.
“Yes,” cried the latter, “let us away to old Thompson’s. His daughter, Lizette, will put you all to rights, dear, in a short time. Come along.”
So saying, Ned led the way, and the whole party speedily stood at the door of Mr Thompson’s cottage.
The door was merely fastened by a latch, and as no notice was taken of their first knock, Ned lifted it and entered the hall, then advancing to the parlour door, he opened it and looked in.
The sight that met his gaze was well calculated to make him open his eyes, and his mouth too, if that would in any way have relieved his feelings.
Seated in old Mr Thompson’s easy-chair, with one leg stretched upon an ottoman, and the other reposing on a stool, reclined Tom Collins, looking, perhaps, a little paler than was his wont, as if still suffering from the effects of recent illness, but evidently quite happy and comfortable.
Beside Tom, on another stool, with her arm resting on Tom’s knee, and looking up in his face with a quiet smile, sat Elizabeth Thompson.
“Tom! Miss Thompson!” cried Ned Sinton, standing absolutely aghast.
Miss Thompson sprang up with a face of crimson, but Tom sat coolly still, and said, while a broad grin overspread his handsome countenance, “No, Ned, not Miss Thompson—Mrs Collins, who, I know, is rejoiced to see you.”
“You are jesting, Tom,” said Ned, as he advanced quickly, and took the lady’s hand, while Tom rose and heartily welcomed his old companions.
“Not a bit of it, my dear fellow,” he repeated. “This, I assure you, is my wife. Pray, dear Lizette, corroborate my statement, else our friends won’t believe me. But sit down, sit down, and let’s hear all about you. Go, Lizette, get ’em something to eat. I knew you would make your appearance ere long. Old Thompson’s letter—halloo! why what’s this? You’re wet! and who’s this—a wet little girl?”
“Faix, ye may well be surprised, Mister Tom,” said Larry, “for we’re all wet beggars, ivery wan o’ us—without a dollar to bless ourselves with.”
Tom Collins looked perplexed, as he turned from one to the other. “Stay,” he shouted; “wife, come here. There’s a mystery going on. Take this moist little one to your room; and there,” he added, throwing open a door, “you fellows will all find dry apparel to put on—though I don’t say to fit. Come along with me, Ned, and while you change, give an account of yourself.”
Ned did as he was desired; and, in the course of a lengthened conversation, detailed to Tom the present condition of himself and his friends.
“It’s unfortunate,” said Tom, after a pause; “ill-luck seems to follow us wherever we go.”
“You ought to be ashamed of yourself;” cried Ned, “for saying so, considering the wife you have got.”
“True, my boy,” replied the other, “I ought indeed to be ashamed, but I spoke in reference to money matters. What say you to the fact, that I am as much a beggar as yourself?”
“Outward appearances would seem to contradict you.”
“Nevertheless, it is true, I assure you. When you left me, Ned, in the hotel at Sacramento, I became so lonely that I grew desperate; and, feeling much stronger in body, I set off for this town in the new steamer—that in which you arrived. I came straight up here, re-introduced myself to Mr Thompson; and, two days after—for I count it folly to waste time in such matters when one’s mind is made up—I proposed to Lizette, and was accepted conditionally. Of course, the condition was that papa should be willing. But papa was not willing. He said that three thousand dollars, all I possessed, was a capital sum, but not sufficient to marry on, and that he could not risk his daughter’s happiness, etcetera, etcetera—you know the rest. Well, the very next day news came that one of Thompson’s best ships had been wrecked off Cape Horn. This was a terrible blow, for the old man’s affairs were in a rickety condition at any rate, and this sank him altogether. His creditors were willing enough to wait, but one rascal refused to do so, and swore he would sequestrate him. I found that the sum due him was exactly three thousand dollars, so I paid him the amount in full, and handed Thompson the discharged account. ‘Now,’ said I, ‘I’m off to the diggings, so good-bye!’ for, you see, Ned, I felt that I could not urge my suit at that time, as it would be like putting on the screw—taking an unfair advantage of him.
“‘Why, what do you mean, my lad?’ said he.
“‘That I’m off to-morrow,’ replied I.
“‘That you must not do,’ said he.
“‘Why not?’ said I.
“‘Because,’ said he, ‘now that things are going smooth, I must go to England by the first ship that sails, and get my affairs there put on a better footing, so you must stay here to look after my business, and to—to—take care of Lizette.’
“‘Eh! what!’ said I, ‘what do you mean? You know that is impossible.’
“‘Not at all, boy, if you marry her!’
“Of course I could not refuse, and so, to cut it short, we were married right off and here we are, the representatives of the great firm of Thompson and Company, of California.”
“Then, do you mean to say that Thompson is gone?” Inquired Ned, with a look of horror.
“Near the Horn, I should think, by this time; but why so anxious?”
“Because,” sighed Ned, sitting down on the edge of the bed, with a look of despair, “I came here by his invitation; and—”
“Oh! it’s all right,” interrupted Tom; “I know all about it, and am commissioned by him to settle the affair for you.”
“But what is the affair?” inquired Ned, eagerly.
“Ah! my dear boy, do try to exercise patience. If I tell you everything before we go down to our comrades, I fear we shall have to send a message to say that we are not coming till to-morrow morning.”
Tom rose as he spoke, and led the way to the parlour, where bread and cheese were spread out for them.
“The only drawback to my felicity,” whispered Tom to Sinton, as they entered, “is that I find Thompson’s affairs far worse than he himself was aware of; and it’s a fact, that at this moment I can scarcely draw enough out of the business to supply the necessaries of life.”
There was a slight bitterness in Tom’s tone as he said this, but the next moment he was jesting with his old companions as lightheartedly as ever. During the meal he refused, however, to talk business, and, when it was concluded, he proposed that they should go out for a stroll through the town.
“By the way,” remarked Ned, as they walked along, “what of Captain Bunting’s old ship?”
“Ay!” echoed the captain, “that’s the uppermost thing in my mind; but master Tom seems determined to keep us in the dark. I do believe the Roving Bess has been burned, an’ he’s afraid to tell us.”
“You’re a desperately inquisitive set,” cried Tom Collins, laughing. “Could you not suppose that I wanted to give you a surprise, by shewing you how curiously she has been surrounded by houses since you last saw her. You’ll think nothing of it, now that I have told you.”
“Why, where are ye goin’?” cried Larry, as Tom turned up a street that led a little away from the shore, towards which they had been walking!
Tom made no reply, but led on. They were now in that densely-crowded part of the town where shops were less numerous, warehouses more plentiful, and disagreeable odours more abundant, than elsewhere. A dense mass of buildings lay between them and the sea, and in the centre of these was a square or plaza, on one side of which stood a large hotel, out of the roof of which rose a gigantic flag-staff. A broad and magnificent flight of wooden steps led up to the door of this house of entertainment, over which, on a large board, was written its name—“The Roving Bess Tavern.”
“Dear me! that’s a strange coincidence,” exclaimed the captain, as his eye caught the name.
“Tare an’ ages!” yelled Larry, “av it isn’t the owld ship! Don’t I know the mizzen-mast as well as I know me right leg?”
“The Roving Bess Tavern!” muttered Captain Bunting, while his eyes stared incredulously at the remarkable edifice before him.
Bill Jones, who, up to this point, had walked beside his comrades in silent meditation, here lost presence of mind and, putting both hands to his mouth, sang out, in true stentorian boatswain tones, “All hands ahoy! tumble up there—tumble up!”
“Ay, ay, sir!” roared half-a-dozen jack tars, who chanced to be regaling themselves within, and who rushed out, hat in hand, ready for a spree, at the unexpected but well-known summons.
“Major Whitlaw,” said Tom Collins, springing up the steps, and addressing a tall, cadaverous-looking Yankee, “allow me to introduce to you your landlord, Captain Bunting—your tenant, captain. I dare say you have almost forgotten each other.”
The captain held out his hand mechanically and gazed at his tenant unbelievingly, while the major said—
“Glad to see ye, cap’n, I guess. Wanted to for a long time. Couldn’t come to terms with old Thompson. Won’t you step in and take a cocktail or a gin-sling? I’d like to have a private talk—this way.”
The landlord of the Roving Bess Tavern led the captain to what was once his own cabin, and begged him to be seated on his own locker at the head of his own table. He accepted these civilities, staring round him in mute wonder all the time, as if he thought it was a dream, out of which he should wake in due course, while, from all parts of the tavern, came sounds of mirth, and clatter of knives and forks and dishes, and odours of gin-slings and bear-steaks and pork-pies.
“Jist sit there a minute,” said the Yankee, “till I see to your friends bein’ fixed off comfortable; of course, Mr Collins may stay, for he knows all about it.”
When he was gone, the captain rose and looked into his old berth. It had been converted into a pantry, so he shut the door quickly and returned to his seat.
“Tom,” said he, in a low whisper, as if he feared to break the spell, “how did they get her up here!”
“She’s never been moved since you left her,” answered Tom, laughing; “the town has gradually surrounded her, as you see, and crept out upon the shore, filling up the sea with rubbish, till it has left her nearly a quarter of a mile inland.”
The captain’s eyes opened wider than ever, but before he could find words again to speak, Major Whitlaw returned.
“They’re all square now, gentlemen, so, if you please, we’ll proceed to business. I suppose your friend has told you how the land lies?”
“He certainly has,” replied the captain, who accepted the phrase literally.
“Wall, I reckon your property’s riz since ye wor here; now, if you give me leave to make the alterations I want to, I’ll give you 1000 dollars a month, payable in advance.”
“You’d better tell Captain Bunting what the alterations you refer to are,” suggested Tom Collins, who saw that the captain’s state of mind rendered him totally incapable of transacting business.
“That’s soon done. I’ll give it ye slick off. I want to cut away the companion-hatch and run up a regular stair to the deck; then it’s advisable to cut away at least half o’ the main deck to heighten the gamin’ saloon. But I guess the main point is to knock out half-a-dozen windows in the hold, for gas-light is plaguey dear, when it’s goin’ full blast day and night. Besides, I must cut the entrance-door down to the ground, for this tree-mendous flight o’ stairs’ll be the ruin o’ the business. It’s only a week since a man was shot by a comrade here in the cabin, an’ as they rushed out after him, two customers fell down the stair and broke their arms. And I calc’late the gentlemen that’s overtaken by liquor every night won’t stand it much longer. There isn’t a single man that quits this house after 12 p.m. but goes down that flight head-foremost. If you don’t sanction that change, I guess I’ll have to get ’em padded, and spread feather-beds at the foot. Now, cap’n, if you agrees to this right off, I’ll give the sum named.”
Captain Bunting’s astonishment had now reached that point at which extremes are supposed to meet, and a reaction began to take place.
“How much did you propose?” he inquired, taking out a pencil and an old letter, as if he were about to make notes, at the same time knitting his brows, and endeavouring to look intensely sagacious.
“One thousand dollars a month,” answered the Yankee; “I railly can’t stand more.”
“Let me see,” muttered the captain slowly, in an under tone, while he pressed his forehead with his fore-finger; “one thousand dollars—200 pounds sterling—hum, equal to about 2400 pounds a year. Well,” he added, raising his voice, “I don’t mind if I do. I suppose, Tom, it’s not much below the thing, as rents go!”
“It’s a fair offer,” said Tom, carelessly; “we might, perhaps, get a higher, but Major Whitlaw is in possession, and is, besides, a good tenant.”
“Then I’ll conclude the bargain—pray get pen, ink, and paper.”
While the major turned for a moment to procure writing materials, the captain looked at Tom and winked expressively. Then, a document was drawn up, signed, and witnessed, and then the captain, politely declining a brandy-smash, or any other smash whatever, left the Roving Bess Tavern with his friends, and with 200 pounds—the first month’s rent—in his pocket.
It is needless to remark, that his comrades congratulated him heartily, and that the worthy captain walked along the streets of San Francisco chuckling.
In a few minutes, Tom Collins stopped before a row of immense warehouses. There was one gap in the row, a space of several yards square, that might have held two good-sized houses. Four wooden posts stood at the corners of the plot, and an old boat, turned keel up, lay in the middle of it.
“I know it!” cried Ned Sinton, laughing in gleeful surprise; “it’s my old boat, isn’t it? Well, I can scarcely credit my eyes! I saw it last on the sea-shore, and now it’s a quarter of a mile into the town!”
“More than that, Ned,” said Tom Collins, “the plot of ground is worth ten thousand dollars at this moment. Had it been a little further south, it would have been worth ten times that sum. And more than that still, the Irish family you lent the boat to—you remember them—well, they dug up a bag from under the boat which contained five thousand dollars; the honest people at once gave it up, and Mr Thompson rewarded them well; but they did not live to enjoy it long, they’re all dead now. So you see, Ned, you’re just 3000 pounds richer than you thought you were this morning.”
“It’s a great day!” remarked Larry O’Neil, looking round upon his comrades, who received all this information with an expression of doubting surprise; “a great day intirely! Faix, I’m only hopin’ we won’t waken up an’ find it’s all a dhrame!”
Larry’s companions quite agreed with him. They did not indeed say so, but, as they returned home after that stroll, talking eagerly of future plans and prospects, the ever-recurring sentiment broke from their lips, in every style of phrase, “It’s a great day, intirely!”
More Unexpected Discoveries—Captain Bunting makes Bill Jones A First Mate—Larry O’Neil Makes himself a First Mate—The Parting—Ned Sinton proves himself, a Second Time, to be a Friend in Need and in Deed.
“It never rains but it pours,” saith the proverb. We are fond of proverbs. We confess to a weakness that way. There is a depth of meaning in them which courts investigation from the strongest intellects. Even when they are nonsensical, which is not unfrequently the case, their nonsense is unfathomable, and, therefore, invested with all the zest which attaches, metaphysically speaking, to the incomprehensible.
Astonishing circumstances had been raining for some time past around our bewildered adventurers, and, latterly, they had begun to pour. On the afternoon of the day, the events of which have been recorded in the last chapter, there was, metaphorically speaking, a regular thunder-plump. No sooner had the party returned to old Mr Thompson’s cottage, than down it came again, heavy as ever.
On entering the porch, Lizette ran up to Tom, in that pretty tripping style peculiar to herself, and whispered in his ear.
“Well, you baggage,” said he, “I’ll go with you; but I don’t like secrets. Walk into the parlour, friends; I’ll be with you in a minute.”
“Tom,” said Lizette, pursing up her little mouth and elevating her pert nose; “you can’t guess what an interesting discovery I’ve made.”
“Of course I can’t,” replied Tom, with affected impatience; “now, pray, don’t ask me to try, else I shall leave you instantly.”
“What an impatient creature you are!” said Lizette. “Only think! I have discovered that my maid, whom we hired only two days ago, has—”
“Bolted with the black cook, or somebody else, and married him,” interrupted Tom, with a look of horror, as he threw himself into any easy-chair.
“Not at all,” rejoined Lizette, hurriedly; “nothing of the sort; she has discovered that the little girl Mr Sinton brought with him is her sister.”
“What! Kate Morgan’s sister!” cried Tom, with a look of surprise. “I knew it; I was sure I had heard the name before, but I couldn’t remember when or where; I see it now; she must be the girl Larry O’Neil used to talk about up at the diggin’s; but as I never saw her there, of course I couldn’t know her.”
“Well, I don’t know about that; I suppose you’re right,” replied Lizette; “but isn’t it nice? They’re kissing and hugging each other, and crying, in the kitchen at this moment. Oh! I’m so happy—the dear little thing!”
If Lizette was happy she took a strange way to shew it, for she sat down beside Tom and began to sob.
While the above conversation was going on up-stairs, another conversation—interesting enough to deserve special notice—was going on in the parlour.
“Sure don’t I know me own feelin’s best?” remarked Larry, addressing Ned Sinton. “It’s all very well at the diggin’s; but when it comes to drawin’-rooms and parlours, I feels—an’ so does Bill Jones here—that we’re out ’o place. In the matter o’ diggin’ we’re all equals, no doubt; but we feels that we ain’t gintlemen born, and that it’s a’k’ard to the lady to be havin’ sich rough customers at her table, so Bill an’ me has agreed to make the most o’ ourselves in the kitchen.”
“Larry, you’re talking nonsense. We have messed together on equal terms for many months; and, whatever course we may follow after this, you must sup with us to-night, as usual. I know Tom will be angry if you don’t.”
“Ay, sir, but it ain’t ‘as oosual,’” suggested Bill Jones, turning the quid in his cheek; “it’s quite on-oosual for the likes o’ us to sup with a lady.”
“That’s it,” chimed in Larry; “so, Mister Ned, ye’ll jist plaise to make our excuges to Mrs Tom, and tell her where we’ve gone to lo-cate, as the Yankees say. Come away, Bill.”
Larry took his friend by the arm, and, leading him out of the room, shut the door.
Five seconds after that there came an appalling female shriek, and a dreadful masculine yell, from the region of the kitchen, accompanied by a subdued squeak of such extreme sweetness, that it could have come only from the throat of Mademoiselle Nelina. Ned and the captain sprang to the door, and dashed violently against Tom and his wife, whom they unexpectedly met also rushing towards the kitchen. In another moment a curious and deeply interesting tableau vivant was revealed to their astonished gaze.
In the middle of the room was Larry O’Neil, down on one knee, while with both arms he supported the fainting form of Kate Morgan. By Kate’s side knelt her sister Nelly, who bent over her pale face with anxious, tearful countenance, while, presiding over the group, like an amiable ogre, stood Bill Jones, with his hands in his breeches-pockets, his legs apart, one eye tightly screwed up, and his mouth expanded from ear to ear.
“That’s yer sort!” cried Bill, in ecstatic glee. “W’en a thing comes all right, an’ tight, an’ ship-shape, why, wot then? In coorse it’s all square—that’s wot I say.”
“She’s comin’ to,” whispered Larry. “Ah! thin, spake, won’t ye, darlin’? It’ll do ye good, maybe, an’ help to open yer two purty eyes.”
Kate Morgan recovered—we need scarcely tell our reader that—and Nelly dried her eyes, and that evening was spent in a fashion that conduced to the well-being, and comfort, and good humour of all parties concerned. Perhaps it is also needless to inform our reader that Larry O’Neil and Bill Jones carried their point. They supped in the kitchen that night. Our informant does not say whether Kate Morgan and her sister Nelly supped with them—but we rather think they did.
A week afterwards, Captain Bunting had matured his future plans. He resolved to purchase a clipper-brig that was lying at that time useless in the harbour, and embark in the coasting trade of California. He made Bill Jones his first mate, and offered to make Larry O’Neil his second, but Larry wanted a mate himself, and declined the honour; so the captain gave him five hundred pounds to set him up in any line he chose. Ned Sinton sold his property, and also presented his old comrade with a goodly sum of money, saying, that as he, (Ned), had been the means of dragging him away from the diggings, he felt bound to assist him in the hour of need. So Kate Morgan became Mrs O’Neil the week following; and she, with her husband and her little sister, started off for the interior of the country to look after a farm.
About the same time, Captain Bunting having completed the lading of his brig, succeeded in manning her by offering a high wage, and, bidding adieu to Ned and Tom, set sail for the Sacramento.
Two days afterwards, Ned got a letter from old Mr Shirley—the first that he had received since leaving England. It began thus:—
“My Dearest Boy,—What has become of you? I have written six letters, at least, but have never got a single line in reply. You must come home immediately, as affairs here require your assistance, and I’m getting too old to attend to business matters. Do come at once, my dear Ned, unless you wish me to reprove you. Moxton says only a young and vigorous man of business can manage things properly; but when I mentioned you, he shook his head gravely. ‘Too wild and absurd in his notions,’ said he. I stopped him, however, by saying that I was fully aware of your faults—”
The letter then went rambling on in a quaint, prosy, but interesting style; and Ned sat long in his room in old Mr Thompson’s cottage poring over its contents, and gradually maturing his future plans.
“It’s awkward,” soliloquised he, resting his head on both hands. “I shall have to go at once, and so won’t have a chance of seeing Bunting again, to tell him of poor Tom’s circumstances. He would only be too glad to give him a helping hand; but I know Tom will never let him know how hard-up he is. There’s nothing else for it,” he added, determinedly; “my uncle will laugh at my profitless tour—but, n’importe, I have learned much.—Come in!”
This last remark was addressed to some one who had tapped gently at the door.
“It’s only me, Ned; can I come in? I fear I interrupt you,” said Tom, as he entered the room.
“Not at all; sit down, my boy. I have just been perusing a letter from my good old uncle Shirley: he writes so urgently that I fear I must return to England by the first homeward-bound ship.”
“Return to England!” exclaimed Tom, in surprise. “What! leave the gold-fields just as the sun is beginning to shine on you?”
“Even so, Tom.”
“My dear Ned, you are mad! This is a splendid country. Just see what fortunes we should have made, but for the unfortunate accidents that have happened!” Tom sighed as he spoke.
“I know it,” replied his friend, with sadden energy. “This is a splendid country; gold exists all over it—not only in the streams, but on the hill-sides, and even on hill-tops, as you and I know from personal experience—but gold, Tom, is not everything in this world, and the getting of it should not be our chief aim. Moreover, I have come to the conclusion, that digging gold ought to be left entirely to such men as are accustomed to dig ditches and throw up railway embankments. Men whose intelligence is of a higher order ought not to ignore the faculties that have been given to them, and devote their time—too often, alas! their lives—to a species of work that the merest savage is equally capable of performing. Navvies may work at the mines with propriety; but educated men who devote themselves to such work are, I fear, among the number of those to whom Scripture specially speaks, when it says, ‘Make not haste to be rich.’”
“But there are other occupations here besides digging for gold,” said Tom.
“I know it; and I would be happy and proud to rank among the merchants, and engineers, and such men, of California; but duty calls me home, and, to say truth,” added Ned, with a smile, “inclination points the way.”
Tom Collins still for some time attempted to dissuade his friend from quitting the country, and his sweet little wife, Lizette, seconded his efforts with much earnestness; but Ned Sinton was immovable. He took passage in the first ship that sailed for England.
The night before he sailed, Ned, after retiring to his room for the last time in his friend’s house, locked his door, and went through a variety of little pieces of business that would have surprised his hosts had they seen him. He placed a large strong-box on the table, and cautiously drew from under his bed a carpet-bag, which, from the effort made to lift it, seemed to be filled with some weighty substance. Unlocking the bag, he proceeded to lift out handful after handful of shining dollars and gold pieces, interspersed here and there with massive nuggets. These he transferred into the wooden box until it was full. This was nearly the whole of Ned’s fortune. It amounted to a little more than 3000 pounds sterling. Having completed the transfer, Ned counted the surplus left in the bag, and found it to be about 500 pounds. This he secured in a leather purse, and then sat down to write a letter. The letter was short when finished, but it took him long to write, for he meditated much during the writing of it, and several times laid his head on his hands. At last it was completed, put into the box, and the lid screwed down above it. Then Ned read a chapter in the Bible, as was his wont, and retired to rest.
Next day Tom and Lizette stood on the wharf to see him embark for England. Long and earnest was the converse of the two friends, as they were about to part, probably for ever, and then, for the first time, they became aware how deep was the attachment which each had formed for the other. At last the mate of the ship came up, and touched his hat.
“Now, sir, boat’s ready, sir; and we don’t wish to lose the first of the ebb.”
“Good-bye, Lizette—good-bye, Tom! God be with and bless you, my dear fellow! Stay, I had almost forgotten. Tom, you will find a box on the table in my room; you can keep the contents—a letter in it will explain. Farewell!”
Tom’s heart was too full to speak. He squeezed his friend’s hand in silence, and, turning hurriedly round, walked away with Lizette the instant the boat left the shore.
Late in the evening, Tom and his wife remembered the box, and went up-stairs to open it. Their surprise at its rich contents may be imagined. Both at once understood its meaning; and Lizette sat down, and covered her face with her hands, to hide the tears that flowed, while her husband read the letter. It ran thus:—
“My Dearest Tom,—You must not be angry with me for leaving this trifle—it is a trifle compared with the amount of gold I would give you if I had it. But I need not apologise; the spirit of love in which it is given demands that it shall be unhesitatingly received in the same spirit. May God, who has blessed us and protected us in all our wanderings together, cause your worldly affairs to prosper, and especially may He bless your soul. Seas and continents may separate us, but I shall never forget you, Tom, or your dear wife. But I must not write as if I were saying farewell. I intend this epistle to be the opening of a correspondence that shall continue as long as we live. You shall hear from me again ere long.
“Your sincerely-attached friend,
“Edward Sinton.”
At the time Tom Collins was reading the above letter to Lizette, in a broken, husky voice, our hero was seated on the taffrail of the ship that bore him swiftly over the sea, gazing wistfully at the receding shore, and bidding a final adieu to California and all his golden dreams.
Our Story comes to an End.
Home! What a host of old and deep and heart-stirring associations arise in every human breast at the sound of that old familiar word! How well we know it—how vividly it recalls certain scenes and faces—how pleasantly it falls on the ear, and slips from the tongue—yet how little do we appreciate home until we have left it, and longed for it, perhaps, for many years.
Our hero, Ned Sinton, is home at last. He sits in his old place beside the fire, with his feet on the fender. Opposite to him sits old Mr Shirley, with a bland smile on his kind, wrinkled visage, and two pair of spectacles on his brow. Mr Shirley, as we formerly stated, regularly loses one pair of spectacles, and always searches for them in vain, in consequence of his having pushed them too far up on his bald head; he, therefore, is frequently compelled to put on his second pair, and hence makes a spectacle, to some extent, of himself. Exactly between the uncle and the nephew, on a low stool, sits the cat—the cat, par excellence—Mr Shirley’s cat, a creature which he has always been passionately fond of since it was a kitten, and to which, after Ned’s departure for California, he had devoted himself so tenderly, that he felt half-ashamed of himself, and would not like to have been asked how much he loved it.
Yes, the cat sits there, looking neither at old Mr Shirley nor at young Mr Sinton, but bestowing its undivided attentions and affections on the fire, which it enjoys extremely, if we may judge from the placid manner in which it winks and purrs.
Ned has been a week at home, and he has just reached that point of experience at which the wild life of the diggings through which he has passed begins to seem like a vivid dream rather than reality.
Breakfast had just been concluded, although the cloth had not yet been removed.
“Do you know, uncle,” remarked Ned, settling his bulky frame more comfortably in the easy-chair, and twirling his watch-key, “I find it more difficult every day to believe that the events of the last few months of my life have actually occurred. When I sit here in my old seat, and look at you and the cat and the furniture—everything, in fact, just the same as when I left—I cannot realise that I have been nearly two years away.”
“I understand your feelings, my dear boy,” replied Mr Shirley, taking off his spectacles, (the lower pair,) wiping them with his handkerchief putting them on again, and looking over them at his nephew, with an expression of unmitigated admiration. “I can sympathise with you, Ned, for I have gone through the same experience more than once in the course of my life. It’s a strange life, boy, a very strange life this, as you’ll come to know, if you’re spared to be as old as I am.”
Ned thought that his knowledge was already pretty extended in reference to life, and even flattered himself that he had had some stranger views of it than his uncle, but he prudently did not give expression to his thoughts; and, after a short pause, Mr Shirley resumed—
“Yes, lad, it’s a very strange life; and the strangest part of it is, that the longer we live the stranger it gets. I travelled once in Switzerland—,” (the old gentleman paused, as if to allow the statement to have its full weight on Ned’s youthful mind,) “and it’s a curious fact, that when I had been some months there, home and all connected with it became like a dream to me, and Switzerland became a reality. But after I came back to England, and had spent some time here, home again became the reality, and Switzerland appeared like a dream, so that I sometimes said to myself, ‘Can it be possible that I have been there!’ Very odd, isn’t it?”
“It is, uncle; and I have very much the same feelings now.”
“Very odd, indeed,” repeated Mr Shirley. “By the way, that reminds me that we have to talk about that farm of which I spoke to you on the day of your arrival.”
We might feel surprised that the above conversation could in any way have the remotest connexion with “that farm” of which Mr Shirley was so suddenly reminded, did we not know that the subject was, in fact, never out of his mind.
“True, uncle, I had almost forgotten about it, but you know I’ve been so much engaged during the last few days in visiting my old friends and college companions, that—”
“I know it, I know it, Ned, and I don’t want to bother you with business matters sooner than I can help, but—”
“My dear uncle, how can you for a moment suppose that I could be ‘bothered’ by—”
“Of course not, boy,” interrupted Mr Shirley. “Well, now, let me ask you, Ned, how much gold have you brought back from the diggings?”
Ned fidgeted uncomfortably on his seat—the subject could no longer be avoided.
“I—I—must confess,” said he, with hesitation, “that I haven’t brought much.”
“Of course, you couldn’t be expected to have done much in so short a time; but how much?”
“Only 500 pounds,” replied Ned, with a sigh, while a slight blush shone through the deep bronze of his countenance.
“Oh!” said Mr Shirley, pursing up his mouth, while an arch twinkle lurked in the corners of each eye.
“Ah! but, uncle, you mustn’t quiz me. I had more, and might have brought it home too, if I had chosen.”
“Then why didn’t you?”
Ned replied to this question by detailing how most of his money had been lost, and how, at the last, he gave nearly all that remained to his friend Tom Collins.
“You did quite right, Ned, quite right,” said Mr Shirley, when his nephew had concluded; “and now I’ll tell you what I want you to do. You told me the other day, I think, that you wished to become a farmer.”
“Yes, uncle. I do think that that life would suit me better than any other. I’m fond of the country and a quiet life, and I don’t like cities; but, then, I know nothing about farming, and I doubt whether I should succeed without being educated to it to some extent at least.”
“A very modest and proper feeling to entertain,” said Mr Shirley, with a smile; “particularly when it is considered that farming is an exceedingly difficult profession to acquire a knowledge of. But I have thought of that for you, Ned, and I think I see a way out of the difficulty.”
“What way is that?”
“I won’t tell you just yet, boy. But answer me this. Are you willing to take any farm I suggest to you, and henceforth to give up all notion of wandering over the face of the earth, and devote yourself steadily to your new profession?”
“I am, uncle; if you will point out to me how I am to pay the rent and stock the farm, and how I am to carry it on in the meantime without a knowledge of husbandry.”
“I’ll do that for you, all in good time; meanwhile, will you put on your hat, and run down to Moxton’s office—you remember it?”
“That I do,” replied Ned, with a smile.
“Well, go there, and ask him for the papers I wrote about to him two days ago. Bring them here as quickly as you can. We shall then take the train, and run down to Brixley, and look at the farm.”
“But are you really in earnest!” asked Ned, in some surprise.
“Never more so in my life,” replied the old gentleman, mildly. “Now be off; I want to read the paper.”
Ned rose and left the room, scarcely believing that his uncle did not jest. As he shut the door, old Mr Shirley took up the paper, pulled down the upper pair of spectacles—an act which knocked the lower pair off his nose, whereat he smiled more blandly than ever—and began to read.
Meanwhile, Edward Sinton put on his great-coat—the identical one he used to wear before he went away—and his hat and his gloves, and walked out into the crowded streets of London, with feelings somewhat akin, probably, to those of a somnambulist. Having been so long accustomed to the free-and-easy costume of the mines, Ned felt about as uncomfortable and stiff as a warrior of old must have felt when armed cap-à-pie. His stalwart frame was some what thinner and harder than when he last took the same walk; his fair moustache and whiskers were somewhat more decided, and less like wreaths of smoke, and his countenance was of a deep-brown colour; but in other respects Ned was the same dashing fellow that he used to be—dashing by nature, we may remark, not by affectation.
In half-an-hour he stood before Moxton’s door. There it was, as large as life, and as green as ever. Ned really found it impossible to believe that it was so long since he last saw it. He felt as if it had been yesterday. The brass knocker and the brass plate were there too, as dirty as ever—perhaps a thought dirtier—and the dirty house still retreated a little behind its fellows, and was still as much ashamed of itself—seemingly—as ever.
Ned raised the knocker, and smote the brass knob. The result was, as formerly, a disagreeable-looking old woman, who replied to the question, “Is Mr Moxton in?” with a sharp, short, “Yes.” The dingy little office, with its insufficient allowance of daylight, and its compensating mixture of yellow gas, was inhabited by the same identical small dishevelled clerk who, nearly two years before, was busily employed in writing his name interminably on scraps of paper, and who now, as then, answered to the question, “Can I see Mr Moxton?” by pointing to the door which opened into the inner apartment, and resuming his occupation—the same occupation—writing his name on scraps of paper.
Ned tapped—as of yore.
“Come in,” cried a stern voice—as of ditto.
Ned entered; and there, sure enough, was the same tall, gaunt man, with the sour cast of countenance, standing, (as formerly,) with his back to the fire.
“Ah!” exclaimed Moxton, “you’re young Sinton, I suppose?”
Ned almost started at the perfect reproduction of events, and questions, and answers. He felt a species of reckless incredulity in reference to everything steal over him, as he replied—
“Yes; I came, at my uncle’s request, for some papers that—”
“Ah, yes, they’re all ready,” interrupted the lawyer, advancing to the table. “Tell your uncle that I shall be glad to hear from him again in reference to the subject of those papers; and take care of them—they are of value. Good-morning!”
“Good-morning!” replied our hero, retreating.
“Stay!” said Moxton.
Ned stopped, and turned round.
“You’ve been in California, since I last saw you, I understand?”
“I have,” replied Ned.
“Umph! You haven’t made your fortune, I fancy?”
“No, not quite.”
“It’s a wild place, if all reports are true?”
“Rather,” replied Ned, smiling; “there’s a want of law there.”
“Ha! and lawyers,” remarked Moxton, sarcastically.
“Indeed there is,” replied Ned, with some enthusiasm, as he thought of the gold-hunting spirit that prevailed in the cities of California. “There is great need out there of men of learning—men who can resist the temptation to collect gold, and are capable of doing good to the colony in an intellectual and spiritual point of view. Clergymen, doctors, and lawyers are much wanted there. You’d find it worth your while to go, sir.”
Had Edward Sinton advised Mr Moxton to go and rent an office in the moon, he could scarcely have surprised that staid gentleman more than he did by this suggestion. The lawyer gazed at him for one moment in amazement. Then he said—
“These papers are of value, young man: be careful of them. Good-morning—” and sat down at his desk to write. Ned did not venture to reply, but instantly retired, and found himself in the street with—not, as formerly, an indistinct, but—a distinct impression that he had heard the dishevelled clerk chuckling vociferously as he passed through the office.
That afternoon Ned and old Mr Shirley alighted from the train at a small village not a hundred miles out of London, and wended their way leisurely—for it was a warm sunny day for the season—towards a large, quaint, old farm-house, about two miles distant from the station.
“What a very pleasant-looking house that is on the hill-top!” remarked Ned, as he gave his arm to his uncle.
“D’you think so? Well, I’m glad of it, because that’s the farm I wish you to take.”
“Indeed!” exclaimed Ned, in surprise. “Surely the farm connected with such a house must be a large one?”
“So it is,” replied the other.
Ned laughed. “My dear uncle,” said he, “how can I manage such a place, without means or knowledge?”
“I said before, boy, that I would overcome both these difficulties for you.”
“You did, dear uncle; and if you were a rich man, I could understand how you might overcome the first; but you have often told me you had no money in the world except the rent of a small property.”
“Right, Ned; I said so; and I say it again. I shan’t leave you a sixpence when I die, and I can’t afford to give you one while I am alive.”
“Then I must just leave the matter in your own hands,” replied Ned, smiling, “for I cannot comprehend your plans.”
They had now reached the gate of the park that surrounded the fine old building of Brixley Hall.
The house was one of those rambling, picturesque old mansions, which, although not very large in reality, have a certain air of magnitude, and even grandeur, about them. The windows were modern and large, so that the rooms were well lighted, and the view in all directions was magnificent. Wherever the eye turned, it met knolls, and mounds, and fields, and picturesque groves, with here and there a substantial farm-steading, or a little hamlet, with its modest church-spire pointing ever upwards to the bright sky. Cattle and sheep lowed and bleated in the meadows, while gentle murmurs told that a rivulet flowed along its placid course at no great distance.
The spot was simply enchanting—and Ned said so, in the fulness of his heart, emphatically.
“’Tis a sweet spot!” remarked his uncle, in a low, sad tone, as he entered the open door of the dwelling, and walked deliberately into the drawing-room.
“Now, Ned, sit down—here, opposite that window, where you can see the view—and I’ll tell you how we shall manage. You tell me you have 500 pounds?”
“Yes, uncle.”
“Well, your dear mother left you her fortune when she died—it amounts to the small sum of 200 pounds. I never told you of it before, my boy, for reasons of my own. That makes 700 pounds.”
“Will that suffice to stock and carry on so large a farm,” inquired Ned?
“Not quite,” replied Mr Shirley, “but the farm is partly stocked already, so it’ll do. Now, I’ve made arrangements with the proprietor to let you have it for the first year or two rent free. His last tenant’s lease happens to have expired six months ago, and he is anxious to have it let immediately.”
Ned opened his eyes very wide at this.
“He says,” continued the old gentleman, “that if you can’t manage to make the two ends meet in the course of a year or two, he will extend the gratis lease.”
Ned began to think his uncle had gone deranged. “Why, what do you mean,” said he, “who is this extraordinary proprietor?”
“He’s an eccentric old fellow, Ned, who lives in London—they call him Shirley, I believe.”
“Yourself, uncle!” cried Ned, starting up.
Dear reader, the conversation that followed was so abrupt, exclamatory, interjectional, and occasionally ungrammatical, as well as absurd, that it could not be reduced to writing. We therefore leave it to your imagination. After a time, the uncle and nephew subsided, and again became sane.
“But,” said Ned, “I shall have to get a steward—is that what you call him? or overseer, to manage affairs until I am able to do it myself.”
“True, Ned; but I have provided one already.”
“Indeed!—but I might have guessed that. What shall I have to pay him? a good round sum, I suppose.”
“No,” replied Mr Shirley; “he is very moderate in his expectations. He only expects his food and lodging, besides a little care, and attention, and love, particularly in his old age.”
“He must be a cautious fellow, to look so far forward,” said Ned, laughing. “What’s his name?”
“His name—is Shirley.”
“What! yourself again?”
“And why not, nephew? I’ve as much right to count myself fit to superintend a farm, as you had, a year ago, to think yourself able to manage a gold mine. Nay, I have a better right—for I was a farmer the greater part of my life before I went to reside in London. Now, boy, as I went to live in the Great City—which I don’t like—in order to give you a good education, I expect that you’ll take me to the country—which I do like—to be your overseer. I was born and bred here, Ned; this was my father’s property, and, when I am gone, it shall be yours. It is not much to boast of. You won’t be able to spend an idle life of it here; for, although a goodly place, it must be carefully tended if you would make it pay.”
“I don’t need to tell you,” replied Ned, “that I have no desire to lead an idle life. But, uncle, I think your terms are very high.”
“How so, boy?”
“Love is a very high price to pay for service,” replied Ned. “Your kindness and your generosity in this matter make me very happy and very grateful, and, perhaps, might make me very obedient and extremely attentive; but I cannot give you love at any price. I must refuse you as an overseer, but if you will come to me as old Uncle Shirley—”
“Well, well, Ned,” interrupted the old gentleman, with a benign smile, “we’ll not dispute about that. Let us now go and take a run round the grounds.”
It is needless, dear reader, to prolong our story. Perchance we have taxed your patience too much already—but we cannot close without a word or two regarding the subsequent life of those whose fortunes we have followed so long.
Ned Sinton and old Mr Shirley applied themselves with diligence and enthusiasm to the cultivation of their farm, and to the cultivation of the friendship and good-will of their neighbours all round. In both efforts they were eminently successful.
Ned made many interesting discoveries during his residence at Brixley Hall, chief among which was a certain Louisa Leslie, with whom he fell desperately in love—so desperately that his case was deemed hopeless. Louisa therefore took pity on him, and became Mrs Sinton, to the unutterable delight of old Mr Shirley—and the cat, both of whom benefited considerably by this addition to the household.
About the time this event occurred, Ned received a letter from Tom Collins, desiring him to purchase a farm for him as near to his own as possible. Tom had been successful as a merchant, and had made a large fortune—as was often the case in those days—in the course of a year or two. At first, indeed, he had had a hard struggle, and was more than once nearly driven, by desperation, to the gaming-table, but Ned’s advice and warnings came back upon him again and again—so he fought against the temptation manfully, and came off victorious. Improved trade soon removed the temptation—perhaps we should say that his heavenly Father took that means to remove it—and at last, as we have said, he made a fortune, as many had done, in like circumstances, before him. Ned bought a farm three miles from his own, and, in the course of a few months, Tom and he were once more walking together, arm in arm, recalling other days, and—arguing.
Lizette and Louisa drew together like two magnets, the instant they met. But the best of it was, Tom had brought home Larry O’Neil as his butler, and Mrs Kate O’Neil as his cook while Nelly became his wife’s maid.
Larry, it seems, had not taken kindly to farming in California, the more so that he pitched unluckily on an unproductive piece of land, which speedily swallowed up his little fortune, and refused to yield any return. Larry, therefore, like some men who thought themselves much wiser fellows, pronounced the country a wretched one, in reference to agriculture, and returned to San Francisco, where he found Tom Collins, prospering and ready to employ himself and his family.
As butler to an English squire, Larry O’Neil was, according to his own statement, “a continted man.” May he long remain so!
Nelly Morgan soon became, out of sight, the sweetest girl in the countryside, and, ere long, one of the best young fellows in the district carried her off triumphantly, and placed her at the head of affairs in his own cottage. We say he was one of the best young fellows—this husband of Nelly’s—but he was by no means the handsomest; many a handsome strapping youth there failed to obtain so good a wife as Nelly. Her husband was a steady, hard working, thriving, good man—and quite good-looking enough for her—so Nelly said.
As for Captain Bunting and Bill Jones, they stuck to each other to the last, like two limpets, and both of them stuck to the sea like fish. No shore-going felicities could tempt these hardy sons of Neptune to forsake their native element again. He had done it once, Bill Jones said, “in one o’ the splendidest countries goin’, where gold was to be had for the pickin’ up, and all sorts o’ agues and rheumatizes for nothin’; but w’en things didn’t somehow go all square, an’ the anchor got foul with a gale o’ adwerse circumstances springin’ up astarn, why, wot then?—go to sea again, of coorse, an’ stick to it; them wos his sentiments.” As these were also Captain Bunting’s sentiments, they naturally took to the same boat for life.
But, although Captain Bunting and Bill did not live on shore, they occasionally, at long intervals, condescended to revisit the terrestrial globe, and, at such seasons of weakness, made a point of running down to Brixley Hall to see Ned and Tom. Then, indeed, “the light of other days” shone again in retrospect on our adventurers with refulgent splendour; then Larry sank the butler, and came out as the miner—as one of the partners of the “R’yal Bank o’ Calyforny”—then Ned and Tom related marvellous adventures, to the admiration of their respective wives, and the captain smote his thigh with frequency and emphasis, to the terror of the cat, and Bill Jones gave utterance to deeply-pregnant sentences, and told how that, on his last voyage to China, he had been up at Pekin, and had heard that Ah-wow had dug up a nugget of gold three times the size of his own head, and had returned to his native land a millionnaire, and been made a mandarin, and after that something else, and at last became prime minister of China—so Bill had been told, but he wouldn’t vouch for it, no how.
All this, and a great deal more, was said and done on these great and rare occasions—and our quondam gold-hunters fought their battles o’er again, to the ineffable delight of old Mr Shirley, who sat in his easy-chair, and gazed, and smiled, and stared, and laughed, and even wept, and chuckled—but never spoke—he was past that.
In the course of time Ned and Tom became extremely intimate with the pastor of their village, and were at last his right and left-hand men. This pastor was a man whose aim was to live as his Master had lived before him—he went about doing good—and, of all the happy years our two friends spent, the happiest were those in which they followed in the footsteps and strengthened the hands of this good man, Lizette and Louisa were helpmates to their husbands in this respect, as in all others, and a blessing to the surrounding country.
Ned Sinton’s golden dream was over now, in one sense, but by no means over in another. His sleeping and his waking dreams were still, as of old, tinged with a golden hue, but they had not a metallic ring. The golden rule was the foundation on which his new visions were reared, and that which we are told is better than gold, “yea, than much fine gold,” was thenceforth eagerly sought for and coveted by him. As for other matters—he delighted chiefly in the sunshine of Louisa’s smile, and in fields of golden grain.
The End.