of the house, and yet--here I sit planning a dangerous
adventure into Alaska at a time when I should be at home."

My throat ached with pity whenever I received a letter from my mother,
for she never failed to express a growing longing for her sons, neither
of whom could be with her. To do our chosen work a residence in the city
was necessary, and so it came about that all my victories, all my small
successes were shadowed by my mother's failing health and loneliness.

* * * * *

It remains to say that during all this time I had heard very little of
Miss Zulime Taft. No letters had passed between us, but I now learned
through her brother that she was planning to come home during the
summer, a fact which should have given me a thrill, but as more than
four years had passed since our meeting in Chicago, I merely wondered
whether her stay in Paris had greatly changed her character for the
better. "She will probably be more French than American when she
returns," I said to Lorado, when he spoke of her.

"Her letters do not sound that way," he answered. "She seems eager to
return, and says that she intends to work with me here in Chicago."

Early in March, I notified Babcock to meet me at Ashcroft in British
Columbia on April 15th. "We'll outfit there, and go in by way of
Quesnelle," I added, and with a mind filled with visions of splendid
streams, grassy valleys and glorious camps among eagle-haunted peaks, I
finished the final pages of my proof and started West, boyishly eager to
set forth upon the mighty circuit of my projected exploration.

"This is the end of my historical writing," I notified McClure. "I'm
going back to my fiction of the Middle Border."

On a radiant April morning I reached the homestead finding mother fairly
well, but greatly disturbed over my plan. "I don't like to have you go
exploring," she said. "It's dangerous. Why do you do it?"

Her voice, the look of her face, took away the spirit of my adventure. I
felt like giving it up, but with all arrangements definitely made I
could do nothing but go on. The weather was clear and warm, with an
odorous south wind drawing forth the leaves, and as I fell to work,
raking up the yard, the smell of unfolding blooms, the call of exultant
"high-holders" and the chirp of cheerful robins brought back with a
rush, all the sweet, associated memories of other springs and other
gardens, making my gold-seeking expedition seem not o