, and his
ears turned distraught from the groaning clank of unwieldy iron tubs,
swinging up through skeleton shafts, to the sputtering plunk-plunk of
drill engines and the booming roar of machinery.

"Hard to keep up with, eh? God bless us, it certainly _is_ hard to keep
up with!" cried Madeira. "Drive into the enclosure there at the
Howdy-do, Pet, Throcker will be expecting us. I telephoned him. Yes,
sir, this is the place to see what zinc means." Madeira was leaning
forward again, one arm about his daughter and the other arm fathering
Steering. "This is the place to understand what can be done by seeing
what has been done." He seemed to want to fire Steering with the idea
that just such another astounding development could be wrought out down
there in the Canaan Tigmores, and though Steering was aware that he
would soon be at a crisis where he would need an austere strength of
judgment, uncoloured by enthusiasm of any kind, he could not help
responding to the aura of enthusiasm into which he was entering. The
great plant of the Howdy-do mine disseminated enthusiasm in shaking
vibrations. Milled enthusiasm stood about in cars, ready for the
smelters. Enthusiasm roared and whirred from the concentrating mill
where wheels were turning and bands were slipping; where a tub,
ore-laden, was jerking and clanking through the hoister shaft; where men
on an upper platform were shovelling the dump from the tub into great
crusher rolls; where the rolls were grinding and pounding, and the water
was fashing and gurgling down the jigs. The whirr of it all, the whizz
and bang of it, the whole effect of it all, was, to any man interested
in the development of ore, a great forward impetus that swung him far
out, limp and dizzy.

"Waiting for you, Mr. Madeira!" cried a man, who fairly shone with
enthusiasm, and whose voice tinkled gladly as he came across to the
hitching rail where Miss Madeira had stopped her horses. "Mighty glad to
see you, Miss Sally--Mr. Steering, glad to meet you, sir. Here you,
Mike! come and look after these horses. Miss Sally, I'm a-going to have
to take you round to the tool-house for some covers, please ma'am." The
accommodating and friendly mine-boss of the Howdy-do led Madeira's party
to a shed opposite his mill and there outfitted them with rubber coats
and caps, talking to them all the while in that tinkling voice, with the
glad note singing in it.

"God bless my soul, Throcker, how much did the last bla