THE LITTLE GOLD MINERS OF THE SIERRAS,

as the hills had not heard since he was a schoolboy.

He had found the “color.” ‘Two colors! three,
four, five —a dozen!” The boy shouted like a
Modoc, threw down the brush and scraper, and kissed
his little sister over and over, and cried as he did so;
then he whispered softly to her as he again took up
his brush and scraper, that it was “for papa; all for
poor papa; that he did not care for himself, but he
did want to help poor, tired, and crippled papa.”
But papa did not seem to be excited so very much.

The little miners were now continually wild with
excitement. They were up and at work Monday
morning at dawn. The men who were in the father’s
tender secret, congratulated the children heartily and
made them presents of several small nuggets to add
to their little horde.

In this way they kept steadily at work for half the
summer. All the gold was given to papa to keep.
Papa weighed it each week, and I suppose secretly
congratulated himself that he was getting back about
as much as he put in.

Before quite the end of the third month, Jim
struck a thin bed of blue gravel. The miners who
had been happily chuckling and laughing among
themselves to think how they had managed to keep
Jim out of mischief, began to look at each other and
wonder how in the world blue gravel ever got up there
on the hill. And in a few days more there was a well-
defined bed of blue gravel, too; and not one of the
miners could make it out.

One Saturday evening shortly after, as the old man
weighed their gold he caught his breath, started, and
stood up straight; straighter than he had stood
since he crossed the Plains. Then he hastily left the
cabin, He went up the hill to the children’s claim
almost without limping. Then he took a pencil and
an old piece of a letter, and wrote out a notice and
tacked it up on the big oak-tree, claiming those
mining claims according to miners’ law, for the three
children. A couple of miners laughed as they went
by in the twilight, to see what he was doing; and he
laughed with them. But as he limped on down the
hill he smiled.

That night as they sat at supper, he told the chil-
dren that as they had been such faithful and indus-
trious miners, he was going to give them each a
present, besides a little gold to spend as they pleased.

So he went up to the store and bought Jim a red
shirt, long black and bright gum boots, a broad-brim-
med hat, and a belt. He also bought each of the

I7¥

other children some pretty trappings, and gave each
a dollar’s worth of gold dust. Madge and Stumps
handed their gold back to “ poor papa.” But Jim was
crazy with excitement. He put on his new clothes
and went forth to spend his dollar. And what do
you suppose he bought? I hesitate to tell you. But
what he bought was a pipe and a paper of tobacco!

That red shirt, that belt and broad-brimmed hat,
together with the shiny top boots, had been too much
for Jim’s balance. How could a man.— he spoke of
himself as a man now—how could a man be an
“honest miner” and not smoke a pipe?

And now with his manly clothes and his manly
pipe he was to be so happy! He had all that went
to make up “the honest miner.” True, he did not
let his father know about the pipe. He hid it under
his pillow at night. He meant to have his first smoke
at the sluice-box, as a miner should.

Monday morning he was up with the sun and
ready for his work. His father, who worked down the
Gulch, had already gone before the children had
finished their breakfast. So now Jim filled his bran-
new pipe very leisurely; and with as much calm
unconcern as if he had been smoking for forty years,
he stopped to scratch a match on the door as he went
out.

From under his broad hat he saw his little sister
watching him, and he fairly swelled with importance
as Stumps looked up at him with childish wonder,
Leaving Madge to wash the few tin dishes and fol-
low as she could with Little Stumps, he started on up
the hill, pipe in mouth,

He met several miners, but he puffed away like a
tug-boat against the tide, and went on. His bright
new boots whetted and creaked together, the warm
wind lifted the broad brim of his somédrero, and his
bright new red shirt was really beautiful, with the
green grass and oaks for a background —and so this
brave young man climbed the hill to his mine. Ah,
he was so happy !

Suddenly, as he approached the claim, his knees
began to smite together, and he felt so weak he could
hardly drag one foot after the other. He threw down
his pick ; he began to tremble and spin around. The
world seemed to be turning over and over, and he
trying in vain to hold on to it. He jerked the pipe
from his teeth, and throwing it down on the bank, he
tumbled down too, and clutching at the grass with
both hands tried hard, oh! so hard, to hold the world
from slipping from under him.