on
ore, which almost always accompanies the gold. Frank's and Roswell's
eyes sparkled as they saw so much of the yellow particles, even though
it looked almost as fine as the black sand.

[Illustration: THE BOYS STOOD ATTENTIVELY WATCHING THE OPERATION.]

"How will you separate them?" asked Frank.

"Now ye'll obsarve the use that that cask is to be put to," replied
Tim, "if ye'll oblige me by filling the same with water."

This was done, when Tim flung about a pound of mercury into the cask,
after which he dumped into it the black and yellow sand. As soon as the
gold came in contact with the mercury it formed an amalgam.

"This will do to start things," said Tim. "When we have enough to make
it pay, we'll squaze it through a buckskin bag."

"What is the result?"

"Nearly all the mercury will ooze through the bag, and we can use the
same agin in the cask. The impure goold will be placed on a shovel and
held over a hot fire till the mercury has gone off in vapor, and only
the pure goold is lift, or rather there's just a wee bit of the mercury
still hanging 'bout the goold; but we'll make a big improvement whin
Jiff comes back. The filing of this claim ain't the only thing that
takes him to Dawson City."

"What do you think of the deposit here?"

"I b'lave it's one of the richest finds in the Kloondike counthry, and
if it turns out as it promises, we shall go home and live like
gintlemen the rist of our lives."

CHAPTER XVII.

A GOLDEN HARVEST.

Tim McCabe and the boys wrought steadily through the rest of the day
and the following two days. Inasmuch as the summer sun in the Klondike
region does not thaw the soil to a greater depth than two feet, it was
necessary to pile wood upon the earth and set it afire. As this
gradually dissolved the frozen ground, the refuse dirt was cleared
away, so as to reach paying earth or gravel. The results for a time
were disappointing. The gold-hunters secured a good deal of yellow
grains or dust, and ordinarily would have been satisfied, but naturally
they were greedy for more.

There came times of discouragement, when the boys began to doubt the
truth of the wonderful stories that had reached them from the Klondike
region, or they thought that if perchance the reports were true, they
themselves and their friends had not hit upon a productive spot. Tim,
when appealed to, had little to say, but it was of a hopeful nature. It
would have been unnatural had he not been