After picking out nearly
all the pebbles, I placed about forty pounds' weight of the residue in
the gunny bag and humped it down to the spring. Load after load I
carried down. It was then too late to do any panning, so I stumbled
down the mountain side in the gathering gloom.

Next morning I recommenced my humping. Early in the afternoon I panned
out all I had carried down. I found nearly half a pennyweight of gold
in the heel of the dish. This was a splendid prospect. It was evident
that the ground was rich. On the following days I took a prospect from
a different spot on the saddle, with a similar result. I should,
perhaps, explain that the finding of "rough" gold in a new place is
always an event of considerable significance. Fine gold, or, as it is
called, "color," does not count; it is to be found everywhere.

Here, then, was payable gold; that is to say, it would have been
payable had there been water in the neighborhood. The prospect I had
taken was an extremely rich one. What was to be done? After long
consideration I decided to excavate a reservoir on the hillside in the
vicinity of the deposit, and trust to its being filled with rain. The
month was October; thunderstorms were due. So far, however, the season
had been exceptionally dry.

With the assistance of a couple of boys, hired for the purpose, I moved
my tent and other belongings up to the saddle. My commissariat
arrangements were simple mealie-meal and sugar, being all I required in
the way of food. Bush tea grew all over the mountain; I could pluck
sackfuls of it within fifty feet of my tent.

I marked out the site for my reservoir just below the gravel deposit,
at a spot where the fall of the hillside was about one in fifteen. Then
I sank an approximately level trench, the upper end to be flush with
the bottom of the reservoir, and the lower running out to the surface
of the ground. In this I placed a long wooden box which was open at the
lower end, and had a small flood-gate working in a vertical slide at
the other.

I then excavated my reservoir, working longer hours than I have at any
other time. When completed it was thirty-five feet long, ten broad, and
four deep; but of course the holding capacity was much greater than
these dimensions would imply, owing to the excavated ground being
banked on the lower side, thus forming a dam wall.

I was quite alone, but I seldom felt lonely. I worked so hard that I
slept soundly from the moment I fin