e foot-hills, and behind them more mountains,
which seemed to rise like the great green billows of an angry sea. On
one side stretched the blue of the distant forest-covered ranges, upon
the other the azure of the encroaching ocean, which, finding a way
between the encircling hills, insinuated its creeping tides into the
town itself. And overhead spread the blue sky, for the sky above Timber
Town was blue nine days out of ten, and the clouds, when they came,
performed their gloomy mission quickly and dispersed with despatch, that
the sun might smile again and the playing of the people continue.

No nest in the forest was ever more securely hid than was Timber Town
from the outside world. Secreted at the end of a deep bay, that bay was
itself screened from the ocean outside by an extensive island and a
sandspit which stretched for many a mile.

Inaccessible by land, the little town was reached only by water, and
there, in that quiet eddy of the great ocean, lived its quiet, quaint,
unique existence.

In such a place men's characters develop along their own lines, and,
lacking that process of mental trituration which goes on in large cities
where many minds meet, they frequently attain an interesting if strange
maturity. In such a community there is opportunity for the contemplation
of mankind ignorant of poverty; and such a happy state, begotten of
plenty and nurtured by freedom, has its natural expression in the
demeanour of the people. It was not characteristic of Timber Town to
hoard, but rather to spend. In a climate bright through the whole year,
it was not natural that the sorrows of life, where life was one long
game, should press heavily upon the players.

But we come upon the little timber town at a time of transition from
sequestered peace to the roar and rush of a mining boom, and if the
stirring events of that time seem to change the tranquil aspect of the
scene, it is only that a breeze of life from outside sweeps over its
surface, as when a gust of wind, rushing from high mountains upon some
quiet lake nestling at their feet, stirs the placid waters into foam.

So through the wild scene, when the villain comes upon the stage and the
hidden treasure is brought to light, though the play may seem to lose
its pastoral character, it is to be remembered that if tragedy may
endure for the night, comedy comes surely enough in the morning.

* * * * *

THE TALE OF TIMBER