Part 18 (2/2)

”Isn't this great!” exclaimed Jed, as he halted his horse on a ledge of rock and looked at the scene below him.

”The mountains for mine! Every time!” exclaimed Gabe, fervently.

”Farming is all right, but it's too low down. You can't see enough. Look at this view! It makes a man grow big in spite of himself!”

”Then Will had better look out,” advised Jed, with a smile. ”If he grows any taller his legs will reach the ground on either side of his horse, and he won't be able to get in ordinary rooms.”

”Yes, and if you keep on getting stout, you'll have to get two horses to carry you,” retorted his brother.

The little party was in jolly humor. It was a fine day, they had a good supply of food with them, a comfortable tent, and best of all, they were actually about to begin their hunt for gold.

The boys were anxious to start digging at every place they made a halt, but Gabe pointed out that it would be foolish, as the nature of the ground was such that no gold could be expected there.

”I'll tell you when to get out the picks and was.h.i.+ng pans,” he said.

”We're getting closer, and I shouldn't wonder but by night we'd get to a place where we can make a try clean-up.”

How anxiously the boys wanted that time to come! They closely scanned the trail on either side, for Gabe had told them some methods of recognizing when they were near pay dirt, and they wanted to test their new knowledge.

”Just think! We're actually going to dig gold!” exclaimed Jed. ”I used to think it was wonderful to dig potatoes, but when I turn out a few yellow nuggets I'll think I've really begun to live.”

”Digging potatoes is a heap sight surer, sometimes, than digging gold,”

remarked Gabe, ”only it isn't so exciting.”

The trail became wilder now, for it was one seldom traveled. The horses had to proceed slowly, and, as it was getting well on in the afternoon, Gabe decided they would make a camp.

”Is this--do you think it would be any good to dig for gold here?” asked Jed eagerly.

”Well, you might try a little surface or placer mining,” replied Gabe.

”That looks like a good place to dig,” he went on, pointing to a gravelly spot, about a hundred feet from where he had decided to pitch the tent. ”You boys can be miners for a while until I get camp in shape.

But don't be disappointed.”

Eagerly unpacking their picks, shovels and was.h.i.+ng pans, the boys hurried over to where the old miner had indicated. As the method they were about to use may not be familiar to all of my readers I will briefly describe it.

The kind of gold they hoped to find is known as free gold--that is, it exists in little grains, sometimes only as large as a pin point or a pin head, and, again, the size of a walnut. It is mixed in with the dirt or gravel, and is usually washed to its resting place by some flood. Other gold is held in ores, or hard rocks, which must be crushed and specially treated before the precious metal can be extracted.

The kind of mining the boys were about to undertake is very simple.

Acting under Gabe's advice, they first loosened the top soil with their picks. This they threw aside, as it was not very likely to contain gold, which, being quite heavy, would be washed by the rains below the surface.

After digging down a little way, the boys came to some fine gravel.

This, Gabe had told them, might contain fine grains of gold, but to determine that point they had to wash the dirt. For this purpose the simplest means are common iron pans, circular and rather shallow.

Another method is by a wooden ”rocker,” which will be explained later.

Filling their pans half full of the gravel, the boys let water run in from a near-by mountain stream. They now had a mixture of very moist mud. This they agitated in the pans by a peculiar circular motion, the object of it being to cause the heavier grains of gold to sink to the bottom of the pan. Repeated applications of water, and shakings of their pans, soon washed out most of the gravel in the pans, which were tilted at a slight angle to permit this. At length there was only a little fine dirt left in the bottom of the pan.

”I think I see something yellow!” exclaimed Jed, greatly excited.

<script>