courage to sweat for gold sailed away. Others went out upon their
claims to build cabins and lay sluices. I found them whip-sawing
lumber, building cabins, and digging ditches. Each day the news grew
more encouraging, each day brought the discovery of a new creek or a
lake. Men came back in swarms and reporting finds on "Lake Surprise,"
a newly discovered big body of water, and at last came the report of
surprising discoveries in the benches high above the creek.

In the camp one night I heard a couple of men talking around a
campfire near me. One of them said: "Why, you know old Sperry was
digging on the ridge just above Discovery and I came along and see
him up there. And I said, 'Hullo, uncle, what you doin', diggin' your
grave?' And the old feller said, 'You just wait a few minutes and
I'll show ye.' Well, sir, he filled up a sack o' dirt and toted it
down to the creek, and I went along with him to see him wash it out,
and say, he took $3.25 out of one pan of that dirt, and $1.85 out of
the other pan. Well, that knocked me. I says, 'Uncle, you're all
right.' And then I made tracks for a bench claim next him. Well,
about that time everybody began to hustle for bench claims, and now
you can't get one anywhere near him."

At another camp, a packer was telling of an immense nugget that had
been discovered somewhere on the upper waters of Birch Creek. "And
say, fellers, you know there is another lake up there pretty near as
big as Atlin. They are calling it Lake Surprise. I heard a feller say
a few days ago there was a big lake up there and I thought he meant a
lake six or eight miles long. On the very high ground next to Birch,
you can look down over that lake and I bet it's sixty miles long. It
must reach nearly to Teslin Lake." There was something pretty fine in
the thought of being in a country where lakes sixty miles long were
being discovered and set forth on the maps of the world. Up to this
time Atlin Lake itself was unmapped. To an unpractical man like
myself it was reward enough to feel the thrill of excitement which
comes with such discoveries.

However, I was not a goldseeker, and when I determined to give up any
further pursuit of mining and to delegate it entirely to my partner,
I experienced a feeling of relief. I determined to "stick to my
last," notwithstanding the fascination which I felt in the sight of
placer gold. Quartz mining has never had the slightest attraction for
me, but to see the gold w