matter
how late it was, or how the teacher had threatened him, he would drop
books, lunch, slate and all, and spitting on his hands and rolling up
his sleeves, would bound away after it, yelling like a wild Indian. And
some days, so fascinating was the chase, Jim did not appear at the
schoolhouse at all; and of course Madge and Stumps played truant too.
Sometimes a week together would pass and the Keene children would not be
seen at the schoolhouse. Visits from the schoolmaster produced no
lasting effect. The children would come for a day or two, then be seen
no more. The schoolmaster and their father at last had a serious talk
about the matter.

"What _can_ I do with him?" said Mr. Keene.

"You'll have to put him to work," said the schoolmaster. "Set him to
hunting nuggets instead of bird's-nests. I guess what the boy wants is
some honest means of using his strength. He's a good boy, Mr. Keene;
don't despair of him. Jim would be proud to be an 'honest miner.' Jim's
a good boy, Mr. Keene."

"Well, then, thank you, Schoolmaster," said Mr. Keene. "Jim's a good
boy; and Madge is good, Mr. Schoolmaster; and poor starved and stunted
motherless Little Stumps, he is good as gold, Mr. Schoolmaster. And I
want to be a mother to 'em--I want to be father and mother to 'em all,
Mr. Schoolmaster. And I'll follow your advice. I'll put 'em all to work
a-huntin' for gold."

The next day away up on the hillside under a pleasant oak, where the air
was sweet and cool, and the ground soft and dotted over with flowers,
the tender-hearted old man that wanted to be "father and mother both,"
"located" a claim. The flowers were kept fresh by a little stream of
waste water from the ditch that girded the brow of the hill above. Here
he set a sluice-box and put his three little miners at work with pick,
pan and shovel. There he left them and limped back to his own place in
the mine below.

And how they did work! And how pleasant it was here under the broad
boughs of the oak, with the water rippling through the sluice on the
soft, loose soil which they shoveled into the long sluice-box. They
could see the mule-trains going and coming, and the clouds of dust far
below which told them the stage was whirling up the valley. But Jim kept
steadily on at his work day after day. Even though jack-rabbits and
squirrels appeared on the very scene, he would not leave till, like the
rest of the honest miners, he could shoulder his pick and pan and go
do