ade the unlighted streets by the glimmer of their own
lanterns; innumerable cows contest the right of pedestrians to the board
footways and what of pavement separates the mud-holes; an
ice-manufactory supplies coolness to water peddled about in barrels; the
officials outnumber the capacity of the jail; the ferry-facilities vary
from an unstable leaky bateau to a dirty, open-decked dynamite
steamboat, whose night-service is subject to the lung-capacity of the
traveller hallooing for it, and the fares to necessities and
circumstances; the fine brick improvements are flanked by frame
tinder-boxes; the offal of the city has not a single relieving sewer:
yet it is a beautiful, healthy place, and the chief city of the greatest
mineral-district in the world.

Our travellers breakfasted on delicious mountain mutton and vegetables
fresh from surrounding farms. Their host secured three men and a canoe
to carry them up Elk River to Colonel Bangem's camp, at the cost of one
dollar a day and "grub," or one dollar and a quarter a day if they found
themselves, with the moderate charge of fifty cents a day for the canoe.

When the time arrived for starting, the Professor was missing. Bells
were rung, servants were despatched to search the hotel for him, but he
was not to be found. The Doctor grew impatient, but restrained himself
until an uncoated countryman, who had just walked into town and was
ready for a talk, told him that he "seed a feller, thet wuz a stranger
in these parts, with a three-legged picter-gallery, chasin' a water-cart
a right smart ways back in the town, ez I come in."

"That's he," said the Doctor. "He is crazy after pictures. I'll give you
a dollar if you bring him to the hotel alive."

"Is he wicked?" asked the man.

"Generally," answered the Doctor, whose eyes began to twinkle; "but you
get hold of his picture-gallery and run for the hotel: he will follow
you. I often have to manage him that way."

"I'm minded to try coaxin' him in thet a-way fer a dollar. You jist take
keer uv my shoes, an' I'll hev him yer ez quick ez Tim Price kin foot
it, if he follers well an' hain't contrairy-like, holdin' back."

Tim Price relieved his feet of their encumbrances, and started. When his
tall, gaunt figure had disappeared around the corner, the Doctor grew
red in the face from an internal convulsion, and then exploded past all
concealment of his joke.

"If you gentlemen," he said to the by-standers, "want to see some