cle of a rushing yellow river that to
his fancy seemed tinged with gold, were momentary excitements, quickly
forgotten. But when, one morning, halting at the outskirts of a
struggling settlement, he found the entire party eagerly gathered around
a passing stranger, who had taken from his saddle-bags a small buckskin
pouch to show them a double handful of shining scales of metal, Clarence
felt the first feverish and overmastering thrill of the gold-seekers.
Breathlessly he followed the breathless questions and careless replies.
The gold had been dug out of a placer only thirty miles away. It might
be worth, say, a hundred and fifty dollars; it was only HIS share of a
week's work with two partners. It was not much; "the country was
getting played out with fresh arrivals and greenhorns." All this falling
carelessly from the unshaven lips of a dusty, roughly dressed man, with
a long-handled shovel and pickaxe strapped on his back, and a frying-pan
depending from his saddle. But no panoplied or armed knight ever seemed
so heroic or independent a figure to Clarence. What could be finer than
the noble scorn conveyed in his critical survey of the train, with its
comfortable covered wagons and appliances of civilization? "Ye'll hev to
get rid of them ther fixin's if yer goin' in for placer diggin'!" What
a corroboration of Clarence's real thoughts! What a picture of
independence was this! The picturesque scout, the all-powerful Judge
Peyton, the daring young officer, all crumbled on their clayey pedestals
before this hero in a red flannel shirt and high-topped boots. To stroll
around in the open air all day, and pick up those shining bits of metal,
without study, without method or routine--this was really life; to some
day come upon that large nugget "you couldn't lift," that was worth as
much as the train and horses--such a one as the stranger said was found
the other day at Sawyer's Bar--this was worth giving up everything for.
That rough man, with his smile of careless superiority, was the living
link between Clarence and the Thousand and One Nights; in him were
Aladdin and Sindbad incarnate.

Two days later they reached Stockton. Here Clarence, whose single suit
of clothes had been reinforced by patching, odds and ends from Peyton's
stores, and an extraordinary costume of army cloth, got up by the
regimental tailor at Fort Ridge, was taken to be refitted at a general
furnishing "emporium." But alas! in the selection of the cl