terruptedly across the now leveled plain to the _embarcadero_,
where a newer structure arose. A more vivid green alone marked the spot
where the crumbling adobe walls of the _casa_ had returned to the
parent soil that gave it. The channel was deepened, the lagoon was
drained, until one evening the magic mirror that had so long reflected
the weary waiting of the Blue Grass Penelope lay dull, dead,
lusterless, an opaque quagmire of noisome corruption and decay to be
put away from the sight of man forever. On this spot the crows, the
titular tenants of Los Cuervos, assembled in tumultuous congress,
coming and going in mysterious clouds, or laboring in thick and
writhing masses, as if they were continuing the work of improvement
begun by human agency. So well had they done the work that by the end
of a week only a few scattered white objects remained glittering on the
surface of the quickly drying soil. But they were the bones of the
missing outcast, Spencer Tucker!

The same spring a breath of war swept over a foul, decaying quagmire of
the whole land, before which such passing deeds as these were blown as
vapor. It called men of all rank and condition to battle for a nation's
life, and among the first to respond were those into whose boyish hands
had been placed the nation's honor. It returned the epaulets to
Poindexter's shoulder with the addition of a double star, carried him
triumphantly to the front, and left him, at the end of a summer's day
and a hard-won fight, sorely wounded, at the door of a Blue Grass
farmhouse. And the woman who sought him out and ministered to his wants
said timidly, as she left her hand in his, "I told you I should live to
repay you."

LEFT OUT ON LONE STAR MOUNTAIN.

I.

There was little doubt that the Lone Star claim was "played out." Not
dug out, worked out, washed out, but _played_ out. For two years its
five sanguine proprietors had gone through the various stages of mining
enthusiasm; had prospected and planned, dug and doubted. They had
borrowed money with hearty but unredeeming frankness, established a
credit with unselfish abnegation of all responsibility, and had borne
the disappointment of their creditors with a cheerful resignation which
only the consciousness of some deep Compensating Future could give.
Giving little else, however, a singular dissatisfaction obtained with
the traders, and, being accompanied with a reluctance to make further
advances, at last touched th