k to his own claim, where he
filled the receptacle with some of the earth he had thrown out.

"Go pan that," he advised us kindly.

We raced to the water, and once more stirred about the heavy contents of
the pail until they had floated off with the water. In the bottom lay a
fine black residue; and in that residue glittered the tiny yellow
particles. We had actually panned our first gold!

Our friend examined it critically.

"That's about a twelve-cent pan," he adjudged it.

Somehow, in a vague way, we had unreasonably expected millions at a
twist of the wrist; and the words, "twelve cents," had a rankly
penurious sound to us. However, the miner patiently explained that a
twelve-cent pan was a very good one; and indubitably it was real gold.

Yank, being older and less excitable, had not accompanied us to the
waterside.

"Well, boys," he drawled, "that twelve cents is highly satisfactory, of
course; but in the meantime we've lost about six hundred dollars' worth
of hoss and grub."

Surely enough, our animals had tired of waiting for us, and had moved
out packs and all. We hastily shouldered our implements.

"Don't you want to keep this claim next me?" inquired our acquaintance.

We stopped.

"Surely!" I replied. "But how do we do it?"

"Just leave your pick and shovel in the hole."

"Won't some one steal them?"

"No."

"What's to prevent?" I asked a little skeptically.

"Miners' law," he replied.

We almost immediately got trace of our strayed animals, as a number of
men had seen them going upstream. In fact we had no difficulty whatever
in finding them for they had simply followed up the rough stream-bed
between the canon walls until it had opened up to a gentler slope and a
hanging garden of grass and flowers. Here they had turned aside and were
feeding. We caught them, and were just heading them back, when Yank
stopped short.

"What's the matter with this here?" he inquired. "Here's feed, and water
near, and it ain't so very far back to the diggings."

We looked about us, for the first time with seeing eyes. The little
up-sloping meadow was blue and dull red with flowers; below us the
stream brawled foam flecked among black rocks; the high hills rose up to
meet the sky, and at our backs across the way the pines stood thick
serried. Far up in the blue heavens some birds were circling slowly.
Somehow the leisurely swing of these unhasting birds struck from us the
feverish hurry that had lately