does. He says, now, that he's going to stick to
straightforward mining and leave prospecting alone; but he's said that
every year for the past ten years at least, and if there's anything
certain about Tom it is that when spring comes and he finds himself once
more with money in his pocket, he'll be off again hunting for his
lead-mine."

"Sure to. Well, Phil, let's sit down somewhere and eat our lunch. We
mustn't stay here too long."

"All right. Here's a good place behind this big rock. It will shelter us
from the east wind, which has a decided edge to it up here."

For half an hour we sat comfortably in the sun eating our lunch, all
around us space and silence, when Joe, rising to his feet, gave vent to
a soft whistle.

"Phil," said he, "we must be off. No time to waste. Look eastward."

I jumped up. A wonderful change had taken place. The view of the plains
was completely cut off by masses of soft cloud, which, coming from the
east, struck the mountain-side about two thousand feet below us and were
swiftly and softly drifting up to where we stood.

"Yes, we must be off," said I. "It won't do to be caught up here in the
clouds: it would be dangerous getting down over the rocks. And besides
that, it might turn cold and come on to snow. Let us be off at once."

It was fortunate we did so, for, though we traveled as fast as we dared,
the cloud, coming at first in thin whisps and then in dense masses,
enveloped us before we reached timber-line, and the difficulty we
experienced in covering the small intervening space showed us how risky
it would have been had the cloud caught us while we were still on the
summit of the ridge.

As it was, we lost our bearings immediately, for the chilly mist filled
all the spaces between the trees, so that we could not see more than
twenty yards in any direction. As to our proper course, we could tell
nothing about it, so that the only thing left for us to do was to keep
on going down hill. We expected every moment to see or hear our little
creek, but we must have missed it somehow, for, though we ought to have
reached it long before, we had been picking our way over loose rocks and
fallen trees for two hours before we came upon a stream--whether the
right or the wrong one we could not tell. Right or wrong, however, we
were glad to see it, for by following it we should sooner or later reach
the foot of the mountain and get below the cloud.

But to follow it was by no means easy: t