J -A/-.,;/
 
 ROBERT ERNEST COWAN
 
 A <v
 
 THE LOST MINE OF 
 THE MONO 
 
 A Tale of the Sierra Nevada 
 
 BY 
 C. H. B. KLETTE 
 
 Cochrane Publishing Company 
 
 New York 
 
 1909
 
 Copyright, 1908. 
 
 BY 
 
 C. H. B. KXETTE.
 
 PS 
 
 PART I 
 
 The Mystery of the Mountain
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 i ARRIVE AT THE; SHEEP RANCH. 
 
 WHAT frail, intangible threads sometimes serve in 
 this world to convey impressions over the tides of time ! 
 As an instance, Sutcliff was down to-day, like a breath 
 from the hills, in an attempt to interest me once more 
 in the lost mine. But it was not his appearance wel 
 come as that always is, that has brought to mind this 
 beautiful October day all those half-remembered, half- 
 forgotten details of that story of the Mono, and our 
 incredible connection therewith, bridging as it were the 
 past and the present, the seen and the unseen. For 
 long hours before since the earliest morn in fact, 
 had my memory been occupied in the turning of its 
 pages, and brought about by what frail prompting do 
 you think? A subtle, immaterial something in the 
 mellow radiance of the sun in its play over our rifled 
 vineyards, and in the subdued intonation in the murmur 
 of the wind that springs so balmily from the north-west 
 the last of our trades, and stirs into a dreamy and 
 half-melancholy life the long collonades of russetting- 
 poplars that rise here and there upon the landscape, 
 white-stemmed, high into the glory of our skies. Noth 
 ing more. 
 
 5
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Not that it was October in which the adventure con 
 necting us for all time with the tale took place. It was 
 much earlier in the year in fact, June, I think. But 
 in a general way October in the valley is but little dif 
 ferent from June in the high Sierra. There is in both 
 that same soft glamor to the sunshine, that same ca 
 ressing touch to the breeze. What is wanting to make 
 a similitude already striking even more so is a dash 
 of greater crispness to this October air, to make it more 
 suggestive of the nearness of the frost imps which 
 seem forever to hover about the mountain tops. For 
 away up there among the peaks summer s sojourn is 
 at best fleeting, lost in fact in the contending embraces 
 of the springtime and the autumn. Barely have the 
 snows disappeared from among the granite boulders 
 above the timber line, barely have the crisp grasses of 
 the glacial meadows, splashed with the lilac of the daisy 
 and the scarlet of the Indian pink, had time to flourish 
 and seed, when through a dark, crystal - clear, starlit 
 night comes the nip of frost to tell of the approach 
 again of winter and its encloaking down of snow. 
 
 This was years ago, in the middle eighties, to be 
 precise. Some years before Waring and myself had been 
 classmates at college, where we took an engineering 
 course together. A steady correspondence during the 
 subsequent years had ripened the acquaintance thus be 
 gun into a regard much warmer than is usual. It was 
 in response to an oft-reiterated invitation to visit him 
 at the ranch that I came, my desires a little quickened 
 perhaps in that the invitation held promise of a trip into 
 the back mountains ; and having come, and met Naomi, 
 to most keenly regret not having accepted his invitation 
 earlier in our acquaintance. 
 
 6
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Shepherds Rest, as Waring s home was rather neatly 
 named, was situated on the banks of a broad, shallow 
 watercourse a short distance from where it debouched 
 from the hills to trail a sinuous course over the plain 
 far out into the mists of distance. Back of it arose the 
 hills, where at almost any season of the year the War 
 ing flocks were to be discerned in their slow trailings 
 across their face; hills that were brown and bare, yet 
 unspeakably beautiful in their silence and loneliness ; 
 their winding gorges touched with a deepening purple. 
 Before it spread the level pasture lands of the plains, 
 a lone butte or table alone breaking the monotony of 
 view, to where the wheat-fields of the middle valley 
 spoke of another phase of our civilization that each suc 
 ceeding year reached further into this voiceless haunt 
 of nature. The white ranch-house itself, and its attend 
 ant stables and bunkhouse, were snugly ensconced in 
 a clump of bluegums and peppertrees, a dark blur 
 upon the landscape visible for miles around; the low, 
 rambling, weatheirworn shearing-shedls, and the mal 
 odorous dipping-pens, beneath some cottonwoods on the 
 opposite bank, forming an effective picture in contrast. 
 Such in a few words was Roger s sheepranch, where 
 he had been born and raised, and had come to love 
 nature with a depth of feeling that but few understood. 
 
 I remember he was alone when I arrived, the exact 
 date of my coming, owing to business pressure, having 
 been more or less a matter of doubt. His reception of 
 me was cordial to a degree, and he seemed unable to 
 to do all that his heart would dictate for my comfort. 
 He placed me to an appetizing lunch in a low-ceilinged 
 room which opened on two of its sides upon a broad 
 veranda, where the cool dusk made by the clambering 
 
 7
 
 The Mine of the Mono. 
 
 vines and the overarching trees, and the somnolent calm 
 of the noon of the summer day, were in pleasing con 
 trast to the glare and heat upon the visible plain beyond. 
 
 " It is too bad," was his oft-repeated deprecation, 
 "that mother and Naomi are not here to assist in re 
 ceiving you. They are on a call at the Ferral ranch, 
 you know. We must do the best we can under the 
 circumstances and console ourselves with the thought 
 that they will be back during the evening." 
 
 Later we withdrew into an adjoining room that was 
 half parlor, half library, where several cases lined the 
 walls, containing a number of books and many valuable 
 Indian relics, the gatherings evidently of years. A 
 number of unfinished sketches in oil were scattered 
 about, together with scores of photographs, for 
 Roger was not only an artist of no small calibre, but 
 a camera-fiend as well. The impressions were mostly 
 of the mountains, a particularly clever piece in oil be 
 ing a view of the Deerhorn Meadows in evening glow, 
 where the Butte in the background hung in a haze that 
 was realistic to a degree. 
 
 Singularly enough my attention from the first was 
 attracted to a piece of quartz profusely interlaced with 
 free gold. It was quite a large specimen, rich beyond 
 anything T had ever seen, very white and very pure, and 
 placed with a boy s eye for effect upon a cushion of 
 purple plush beneath a glass half-globe. Altogether it 
 was a very conspicuous object. Yet I remember so well 
 that it was none of these but an air of strange familiar 
 ity which drew me to it from the first. It was so like 
 a piece I had seen but a short time before at my cousin 
 Ida s home in a distant part of the state, whither I had 
 made a flying visit in the vain hope of meeting my
 
 The Lost Mim of the Mono. 
 
 uncle on a business matter, that for a moment I won 
 dered whether it was not by some unexplained chance 
 one and the same. 
 
 " Where did you get this ? " I asked. 
 
 " That," he answered, " is from the famous lost mine 
 of the Mono." 
 
 " Indeed." For I had heard of it. " How came you 
 by it?" 
 
 " It was given my father years ago by an Indian 
 herder as a mark of his especial esteem." 
 
 Reading my interest he resumed a moment later : 
 
 " The poor old fellow is dead now, killed under 
 rather peculiar circumstances, I thought. I see you 
 would like to hear the story. I have not the least ob 
 jection I assure you. It is short and I will furthermore 
 go straight to the marrow." 
 
 I assented. 
 
 " It was while we were in the mountains a few sum 
 mers ago that he came one day to my father with the 
 plea that he be permitted to visit his rancheria. This is 
 by no means an unusual request from the Indian herds 
 men ; and as the distance was but a few miles, my father 
 gave a ready consent enough, possibly feeling that he 
 might as well do so with grace, as had the request been 
 denied the old fellow would have sulked, and the chances 
 are eventually gone anyway. A week passed, and no 
 Indian appearing another was sent out with instructions 
 to hunt him up. This fellow, with an Indian s idea of 
 despatch, showed up two days later with the story that 
 the chief had some days before gone on a hunt with a 
 white friend, a stranger who had appeared at the 
 rancheria a day before. That same evening Sutcliff 
 who, by-the-way, is one of several I have invited to ac- 
 
 9
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 company us on our trip, reported the finding of the 
 body of the old Indian among some rocks in a gorge in 
 the near vicinity of Spirit Mountain. He had been 
 stabbed to death." 
 
 Interested I maintained my silence. 
 
 " We notified the tribe on the Fork and there was 
 much wailing, for the old fellow was a chief or a high 
 something among them and much respected, not to say 
 revered. And I fear that with him has died the secret 
 of the location of this famous lost mine." 
 
 "Why so?" 
 
 " It seems the secret was never the common property 
 of the tribe. Only the reigning chief and the next of kin 
 to him knew of it. And I remember this one once told 
 my father, when he was being rather closely questioned, 
 that it had come to that pass that he alone of all his 
 people knew just where the lead lay. He had a very 
 great regard for my father, and I know he did not lie 
 to him." 
 
 " Could the old fellow not be made to divulge his 
 secret ? " 
 
 "You do not know the Indian nature, Paul, I see, and 
 least of all this old fellow s. Our races mingle, it is true, 
 but an impassable chasm lies between us just the same. 
 Only those who become one of them the squaw-man in 
 short, stands the least chance. You understand, of 
 course, that the ordinary inducements in the way of a 
 bribe do not obtain here." 
 
 " I can very well understand that. And who killed 
 him?" 
 
 Waring shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " That riddle has never been solved to my satisfaction. 
 But if I may judge, not by one of his tribe. You see the 
 
 10
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 whites as a rule do not interfere where any disagreements 
 lie strictly among themselves, so that a show of dip 
 lomacy or secrecy is not necessary. In fact when one 
 of their number becomes so rampantly bad that he comes 
 to be generally feared, he is quite frequently hunted like 
 a beast of the forest by his own people, and on his death 
 the white man is told openly thereof. There is no at 
 tempt at secrecy. The only mourners are his nearest 
 relatives, and the mourning is short. In this case, how 
 ever, the mourning was protracted, and so affected the 
 entire tribe that it left little room for such a construction 
 here." 
 
 "And the white man ? " 
 
 " Disappeared as mysteriously as he had come, as far 
 at least as I am able to say. I remember once asking 
 one of our Indian packers whether suspicion did not in 
 some way rest upon him, but he only looked grave, and 
 gave a negative shake of his head in answer. No; he 
 stands above their suspicion, that is plain. There was 
 unquestionably a third and secret figure in the deal." 
 
 " On what do you base that belief? " 
 
 " Simply on the facts as I have given them. Sutcliff 
 and I did indeed in a spirit of investigation climb to the 
 ridge above, searching for whatever evidence we could 
 find. But it was mighty little we found, I must say; 
 only a few confusing foot-prints, then already half-ob 
 literated, and we gave up in despair." 
 
 I lit a cigar and, seated comfortably in a large wicker 
 chair on the north veranda, where the breeze from across 
 the stubble-field came to us tempered by a number of 
 spreading fig-trees, recounted what I knew of the history 
 of the other specimen. 
 
 " He too got it from an Indian," I said, explaining 
 
 II
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono, 
 
 my uncle s connection, " one whom in some way he 
 had favored once." 
 
 It was not a long story, yet from the beginning, 1 
 noticed, it held a special interest for him. As I pro 
 ceeded his face assumed a far-away expression as if in 
 thought he was threading the past; all the while, how 
 ever, as I soon found out, not losing a single detail, 
 small or large, of my narration. 
 
 " Tell me," he interrupted suddenly, with the air of 
 one who has arrived at a satisfactory explanation of 
 what had been a somewhat puzzling problem, " is he a 
 man of middle age, rather sturdily built, straight as a 
 mountain pine, yet with a face giving the impression 
 of premature ageing, hair and moustache almost white, 
 and eyes, dark and liquid, that seem to read your very 
 soul ? " 
 
 I half rose from my seat in surprise. 
 
 " You could not possibly have described him better," 
 I returned, reseating myself and giving another puff 
 from my cigar, my interest in turn receiving additional 
 impetus. 
 
 Then I have met him," he continued simply. 
 That is not surprising since there is not a district 
 worth mentioning from Siskiyou to San Diego that he 
 does not seem to know like a book. The question is 
 only, where ? " 
 
 " In the Flats." 
 
 "And when?" 
 
 " I think it was two years ago, the year I left college 
 to recuperate in the mountains." 
 
 I remained silent, for I felt that he would resume 
 the thread of his narrative without mv aid. 
 
 12
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 "And the circumstances ? " I asked at last, grown im 
 patient. 
 
 " Were commonplace enough. Yet, I remember every 
 circumstance of that meeting as if it was only yester 
 day. Perhaps it is because it was in the spring, for that 
 is the season when I am most sensitive to impressions. 
 Eye, ear, nostril, every sense is most keenly alive, and 
 not a flash of light, dash of color, or trill of nature s 
 music escapes me. But whatever the cause, that meet 
 ing is, I feel, rather unduly impressed upon my mind."
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE MEETING AT THE FLATS. 
 
 I REMEMBERED Waring as a good hand at telling a 
 story, given possibly just a trifle too much to the 
 picturesque and dramatic and as I listened now with 
 my eyes half-closed I came to release my imagination 
 from the leash of my will, to allow it to follow in the 
 train of the story free and unfettered; with the result 
 that I saw with an unwonted clearness every action and 
 surrounding of what was to me a rather interesting 
 episode. 
 
 " It was about this time of the year," he began. " I 
 was just down from the cool heights of the summits and 
 remember only too well the merciless nature of that 
 summer sun as it poured its light in a white, blinding 
 mist into the broad mountain valley and the one tor 
 tuous thoroughfare of the place. For nearly a week, 
 I was told, it had blazed with just such fervency, until 
 the chaparraled slopes of the ridge to the west, tufted 
 with an occasional clump of pines or a lone oak, had 
 browned visibly, and all the unnumbered little streams 
 which a fortnight before while on our way up had 
 given life to every gulch, had stilled their murmur;
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 chains of stagnating pools, about which the half-wild 
 cattle of the hills stood congregated, alone marking their 
 one-time courses. 
 
 " But the witchery of the hills, the glare of the sun, 
 nay, the growing heat itself,. seemed matters of small 
 importance to the inhabitants of the Flats that morning. 
 For while it was still spring it was also harvest time, 
 paradoxical as this may seem. You have never been 
 there, have you? Well, you should know that the place 
 is not altogether self-sustaining, and that since the late 
 autumn of the previous year, half-hid in the snows of 
 winter, it had hibernated, so to speak, and subsisted 
 upon what the accidents of the past season had brought 
 it. At the time which I am trying to describe for you 
 it sought like a well-regulated ant-hill, and while the 
 warm sun of circumstance shone, to granary as bounti 
 ful a harvest as came possible in the fresh era of prosper 
 ity which had just dawned with the birth of spring and 
 the reopening of the mills and mountain pastures. 
 
 " It was hot even for that early hour. The usual 
 breeze of the day had not yet risen with any certitude, 
 a tantalizing puff only breathing upon you now and 
 then, and in the wake of the fitful traffic the dust that 
 lay fetlock deep upon the road rose in stifling clouds, 
 to fall where it rose. The heavy lumber wagons of the 
 mountains passed up and down, powdered gray with the 
 dust of the hills if from below, or red with that of the 
 upper grades if from above. Indians of both sexes, 
 and of every age and condition, the bright tints of whose 
 garb gave color and a certain vivacity to the scene, 
 haunted the trails and the marts of trade ; while 
 before the busy blacksmiths, Westfall s, and Down- 
 ing s, the outfits of dogs and mules and packs of several 
 
 15
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 dallying sheep-men stood in confusing little groups. I 
 remember also seeing the stage and four with the 
 mountain mail and its daily quota of Yosemite tourists 
 swing down the red, dusty grade among the straight 
 bull-pines, the horses on the jump in obedience to the 
 sharp crack of the whip in the hands of the dustered 
 driver, and draw up with a jerk before the big, white 
 hotel for a fresh relay and an indifferent meal. It 
 looked as if it was the unalterable circumstance of the 
 distance which prescribed this last, few suspecting the 
 proprietor of the stage line and the owners of the turn 
 pike to be potent while silent factors in the management 
 of the hotel. But the meal once over, and philosophy 
 following on the heels of a sated appetite, it was gener 
 ally charged as one of the minor ills of life and soon 
 lost in the contemplation of a quiet afternoon s drive 
 through the deep-green forests that crowned as could 
 be seen from the broad, airy piazzas the sweeping 
 slopes to the east, the advance of the mountains proper, 
 immovable as the very foundations of the earth, and 
 eloquently silent in the tenuous, pearl-gray mists of 
 summer. 
 
 " I myself had ridden over early that morning by way 
 of Heron Valley with my train of mules, having passed 
 the night at Sharp s on the Fork, and these were now 
 hitched to the bars, or nosing about the watering 
 trough in front of the Laramore store. I had com 
 pleted my purchases and was tightening the cinches 
 of the animals preparatory to loading them when my 
 attention was called to the gentleman I speak of. He 
 had mounted his pack upon his burro in tolerably neat 
 order, but somehow now, in a moment of abstraction, 
 
 16
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 the mysteries of the diamond-hitch on the instant seemed 
 to perplex him." 
 
 Roger allowed himself a moment for reverie before he 
 resumed. 
 
 " I hesitated but a moment before I went to his as 
 sistance. 
 
 " Allow me. 
 
 " His was a face very strongly marked, bronzed as it 
 was by the sun, furrowed by time, and aged I can 
 find no term more expressive of the action by some 
 deep-seated mental or psychical struggle. His cheek 
 bones were flushed with the hectic of a disease which 
 after a prolonged aggressive war with the vitality of a 
 generous nature had obtained the master-hand, and was 
 now undermining with ever-increasing rapidity the 
 foundations of an iron constitution. The lips, thin and 
 dry, as if sapped by the heat of some inner fire, formed 
 the mouth of a man of untiring good-nature, and a 
 rather, I thought, vacillating disposition. Now, any one 
 of these characteristics alone would have proven suffi 
 cient to have drawn attention to him, and left an im 
 pression. But it was the eyes that left with me that 
 haunting sense, so intense in their placidity were they, 
 so measureless their calm ; a calm born of persistent 
 thought centred upon the inner man, and of the assur 
 ance succeeding a subsiding doubt. I question in fact 
 whether the first glance had not left with you, as it did 
 with me, doubts as to the sanity of their light. They 
 not only possessed the power of seeing that which ob 
 structed the view, but seemingly also the power to see 
 through and beyond. This placidity had become their 
 habitual expression; for while they lighted up with a 
 more comprehensible intelligence on being interrogated,
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 and seemed to be fully alive to all their surroundings, 
 this intelligence vanished the moment the source of in 
 terest was removed, and was replaced by the expression 
 I have sought to describe. Such in short was the ap 
 pearance of the man, an outer appearance sure to at 
 tract attention anywhere, let alone in so insignificant a 
 place as the Flats. 
 
 " I had but to re-arrange the blankets and the folded 
 square of canvas that sheltered the pack, and to lash 
 them as securely as the experience of years had taught 
 me, which seemed more than the little beast was ordinar 
 ily accustomed to, for he groaned dismally and switched 
 his tail as if to assuage certain sufferings, whether real 
 or feigned is not always to be determined with accuracy, 
 and my self-imposed task was completed. 
 
 " I see you are adept at the business, he said, his 
 eyes lighting up with that more comprehensible light. 
 I admire proficiency. 
 
 " Now, there was nothing in the words ; but in their 
 delivery and in the voice itself, there was a charm 
 strangely attractive to me. It has often been a matter of 
 wonder to me since, as I believe myself to be of too posi 
 tive a nature to be lightly influenced. The few attach 
 ments of my life are, as you know, the outgrowths of 
 years of intimacy. I can only attribute it to the sway of 
 some occult power, or at least to the presence of some 
 finer matter than usually surrounds us. Upon the 
 mountain-top, as you will find, we are much more sus 
 ceptible to heat and cold, and to every emotion of our 
 nature, than in the valley below. May not the aura of 
 a life etherealized by years of thought have been more 
 palpable to even my grosser nature than those of lives 
 less so? 
 
 18
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Which way do you travel ? I asked suddenly, my 
 feelings for the moment getting the better of my 
 breeding. 
 
 "He pointed to the south-east, where in the distance 
 the dark form of Spirit Mountain loomed grandly with 
 its flank of snow, as he answered : 
 
 " By way of the Valley into the Basin. 
 
 " I regret it, said I, but my way takes me by the 
 lumber-mills, and over the divide into the Summit 
 Meadows, where I camp to-night. I could wish that our 
 paths lay more together as I would, I know, much enjoy 
 your company. 
 
 " He smiled as he answered me : 
 
 " You flatter me, my friend. Yet, I too, must express 
 regret. However, since fortune is so unkind to-day, 
 let us hope that at some future time she will be more 
 propitious. 
 
 " He had mounted into his saddle and now turned to 
 me with an outstretched hand. 
 
 " Goodby, Mr." 
 
 " ( Waring, Roger Waring. 
 
 " Good-by then, Mr. Waring. We shall meet again. 
 I sincerely hope so. Good morning. 
 
 " I watched him with interested eye ride down the 
 road, followed by the burro at a cross-footed pace and 
 with careening pack, ford the stream at the foot, and 
 disappear in the green of the forest beyond. 
 
 "This was in June of 1880 or 1881. The middle of 
 September had come, and with it the first fore-runners 
 of a beautiful autumn, before we withdrew from the 
 never-ending charm of the higher mountains. Of the 
 interim I had passed by far the greater part in the saddle, 
 riding for days at a time alone with my train of mules. 
 
 19
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Nor did I confine myself to any one trail. I wanted di 
 version, and sought it in a trial of nearly all. While my 
 favorite one was the route by the Summit Meadows, on 
 several occasions I came down by the Scarlett Mill back 
 of Heron Valley. Once I came down by Wawona. I 
 even tried the intricacies of the lesser Shuteye. Finally, 
 on my last trip, I passed a night among the giants near 
 the Soquel Mills. But in all my devious rides through 
 the mountains that year I never again came upon my 
 friend, the old gentleman." 
 
 20
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE START FOR THE MOUNTAINS. THE STORM. 
 
 THE day was hot, but with sundown there came a 
 breeze from the west and I passed the night in ideal re 
 pose. I had been led to a belief that I would be called 
 early and in this I was surely not disappointed, for with 
 the first peep of day, short as that June night was, I 
 heard. the male portion of the household up and around. In 
 the sleeping quiet I heard also an occasional crow and an 
 ever-increasing babel from the adjacent barnyard, and 
 from far away in the direction of the quaint Table 
 Mountain, the lugubrious hooting of a prairie owl. I 
 sprang from my bed, to leisurely dress. Having de 
 scended, I for some time stood out upon the porch below 
 where the soft light of the approaching day and that of 
 the sinking moon were in a gentle conflict for supremacy, 
 drinking in the beauty of the dawn, and with deep re 
 spirations enjoying the morning air. Then tempted forth 
 by the quiet, and the delicate tint to hill and hollow, I 
 took down the little " twenty-two" from its place in the 
 hall, and with Jack the collie already my fast friend 
 started out for a turn over the mint-strewn plain, prom 
 ising Roger to return at the first toll of the breakfast 
 bell. 
 
 21
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 It was not long in coming, and I at once retraced my 
 steps, to find Ling, the accommodating celestial, whose 
 dual function it was to herd the little band of bucks and 
 do the simpler cooking of the now much-diminished 
 household, pouring the coffee, and Waring already 
 seated at table. 
 
 I had barely taken place myself when a shout came 
 from without. 
 
 " That s SutclifF," explained Roger, rising and step- 
 ing to the door, where he waved a hand in greeting. 
 
 "Good for you, boy," I heard a boisterous but good- 
 natured voice exclaim a moment later ; " I see you are 
 standing in for an early start. Well, that s right. We 
 want to get through that suburb of Hades, Oro Fino, as 
 early in the day as we can find possible." 
 
 " I reckon yer friend s come," I heard another drawl 
 a voice peculiar in that there was no inflection, either 
 rising or falling, in what was said. " I beared someun 
 apepperin up the crick with the twenty-two." 
 
 I looked out curiously from my seat and saw a man, 
 clad in a suit of freshly laundered blue-jeans, six feet 
 two in height and of a corresponding thinness lean his 
 gun against the white palings where a few late jacque 
 minots filled the air with their fragrance, and then divest 
 himself of a variety of articles no mortal but himself 
 could possibly have found use for on a trip such as was 
 proposed. 
 
 " Yes, he s here." 
 
 " Glad to hear it," put in he who I felt assured was 
 SutclifF, and who I shortly discovered desired nothing 
 half so much as a good outing. " There is nothing now 
 to interfere with our having the time of our lives." 
 
 22
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 1 was introduced to Sutcliff, who extended a hand in 
 hearty amity. 
 
 " I want you two to be friends," said Roger simply. 
 
 " We are from this moment," Sutcliff exclaimed, 
 clasping my hand firmly, the lines of his mouth set 
 gravely, and his black, penetrating eyes upon mine. 
 
 Then turning in search of him of the blue jeans, he 
 continued : 
 
 Allow me to introduce my friend, the handiest man 
 in seven counties, Silas Stayton." 
 
 Silas, more an oddity than his friend, was less demon 
 strative in his hand-shake. 
 
 " Shoot anythin ? " he asked by way of greeting. 
 
 " I am sorry to say, no," 1 laughed. " I had a shot 
 at a coyote I found near the corral, and which I sus 
 pected of harboring designs against Ling s flock, but 
 that was all." 
 
 "I think it only fair to warn you against Si as a freak," 
 Sutcliff continued a moment later. " My word for it, 
 you will have ample evidence of the truth of what I say 
 before you are many days older. Ten to one, Roger, our 
 friend returns to the wiles of the metropolis with one or 
 more of Silas s everlasting wooden spoon souvenirs. 
 Take me up ? " 
 
 " Gad, how long have you been running this sure- 
 thing proposition ? " asked another voice this from the 
 back porch, muffled in the folds of a towel which the 
 owner of the voice was applying with vigor to his visage 
 in completion of his morning s ablutions. 
 
 Sutcliff laughed. Even Silas was moved to smile 
 gravely at this hit at one of his foibles. 
 
 " This is Ballard, Paul," Roger explained as the third 
 party appeared in the room followed by a half-grown 
 
 23
 
 The Lost Mitie of the Mono. 
 
 sheep-dog, "a friend recently from the city. And now 
 that you are all here and have broken the ice of first ac 
 quaintance, let us sit down and breakfast." 
 
 The buttress which supported the crest of Table 
 Mountain alone shone in the glory of sunrise as the 
 wagon and four bearing our equipment, and followed 
 by a couple of led mules, drew up before the open gate 
 amid the playful barkings of the dogs, and we clambered 
 in, with much bubbling good nature taking our seats. 
 Then, with a considerable show of life on the part of 
 our team in general, a decided intractability on the score 
 of the off-leader, and as pronounced an inclination on 
 the part of the mules in the rear to pull in an opposite 
 direction, we bade farewell to the ranch and its hospi 
 tality and plunged for the hills over the rolling lands be 
 tween. Upon a high point some distance on, where the 
 road crossed one of the further ridges, and where we 
 came to a halt to rehook a loosened tug, I turned for one 
 last look to the rear, to see against the dark background 
 of the clump of gums the white forms of the ladies with 
 handkerchiefs a-fluttering their adieus, and a little to 
 the right the form of old Ling, preceded by the collie, 
 Jack, in his slow wend across the stubble-field for the 
 corral on the low bank across the broad sandy creek-bed. 
 Then a turn in the road hid all from view. 
 
 Shortly after, we entered the hills with their scattered 
 oaks, where the senses found much to interest them. 
 Copse after copse was vocal with the twitter of many 
 linnets ; every dell, still tinged with the green of the 
 browning clover, rang with the song of the meadow 
 lark. Here and there a red-winged woodpecker would 
 fly past us with the certitude of an important errand, to 
 a moment later vary the discordance of its chattering 
 
 24
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 with the equally unmusical euphony of its tapping on 
 some hollow limb. 
 
 On reaching the underbrush of buckeye and chaparral 
 quail showed up plentifully, covey after covey crossing 
 our path in flight or uneasily sentinelling the rocks on 
 either side. Now and then, too, a cottontail bounded to 
 cover; or a hare whisked through the tarweeds and 
 rested not in its flight until the protection of an inter 
 vening ridge had been placed between it and the threat 
 ened danger. 
 
 Imagine, if you can, the ecstasy of that ride to me, 
 fresh from the prison of city life and all its dwarfing 
 conventions. Our vehicle had been selected with an eye 
 primarily to the comfort it afforded. Its seats were deep 
 and wide, and backed at an obliging angle, so that to sit 
 in them and enjoy the sensation of rolling over the 
 country was really a pleasure to be envied. As the sun 
 topped the trees and peered in upon us with a growing 
 ardor, the canvas curtains were let down and my cigar- 
 case passed around. Then, too, Sutcliff proved, as I 
 knew he would, a prime entertainer. Raised as he was 
 in those hills he had their history at his tongue s end. 
 Every ranch we passed; every mountain looming so 
 grandly blue before us ; nay, every mile of the road had 
 it seemed some experience connected with it, which that 
 morning we had copiously retailed out to us. 
 
 About ten o clock we began to descend into the Oro 
 Fino country. Here for the first time we felt the heat, 
 and I concluded that Sutcliff s expression of the early 
 morning, while picturesque, had more of fact than fancy 
 in it. The breeze had died away or, if not, the high 
 mountains on either side at whose common base we 
 traced the broad, sandy, alder-fringed bed of the creek, 
 
 25
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 most effectually stilled it. The dust of the narrow road 
 bed, whirled into the quivering air by the wheels of our 
 conveyance, enveloped us in a stifling cloud, where for 
 quite a period it kept an even pace with us, finally to sub 
 side in a long trail in our rear. Half-unconsciously all the 
 gay life of the morning had withdrawn to the shade, from 
 whence only at long intervals came the solitary chirp of 
 some bird disturbed in its cover by our approach. All 
 was dust, glare and heat. 
 
 At the further end of the gulch a little before noon we 
 halted for dinner, and to feed, water and rest our animals. 
 We had covered some fifteen miles of the road since 
 starting, and had a good twelve more in prospect before 
 reaching the camp of the evening. The first few of 
 these we found were quite a drain upon the spirits of 
 our animals as they led up and up, and ever up, to the 
 backbone of the ridge dividing the waters of the Gulch 
 from those of the Fork. To in some degree ease their 
 burden, two or more of us usually followed or led afoot ; 
 which was agreeable enough as we were then reaching 
 an altitude where the oak forest grew denser and the air 
 was pleasantly cool. 
 
 About four o clock we rounded the point on the shed 
 from which is had the first glimpse of the dark, straight 
 bull-pines which tuft the broad tumbled canyon of the 
 Fork, in the softening effulgence of the afternoon cir 
 cling in sweeping lines down from the north. Here the 
 road turned sharply, to maintain as even an elevation as 
 the topography of the country permitted. In the fore 
 ground to the left a cone-shaped mountain, black with 
 its own shadow and a broken growth of arrowy conifer, 
 rose to the view ; while opposite the east was sealed to 
 the eye of man by a long ridge clothed likewise, and 
 
 26
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 broken only where the waters of the Black Laurel had 
 worked a tortuous passage to the Fork. Far back of this 
 gorge, miles in the distance, in hazy outlines arose our 
 goal, the Mountain of the Spirit as the Indians in gen 
 erations past had named it. Its broken crest just then 
 was lost in strata of silvery storm-clouds, through which 
 at times as they broke asunder the fields of snow upon 
 its shadowed slopes gleamed ghastly white and cold. It 
 was a scene notable for its magnitude of proportions and 
 magnificent distances, and its effect upon us became 
 apparent in the sudden silence that fell upon our party. 
 
 Silas was the first to break it. 
 
 "Reckon we re in for a sprinkle," he remarked, 
 gravely eyeing the gray masses of vapor which we were 
 fast approaching. 
 
 " I fear you re right, Si," Sutcliff returned, "or the 
 experience of years counts for naught. These storms are 
 an everyday occurrence at this time of the year." 
 
 "Around the mountain, yes ; but it s rare they reach 
 the Fork." 
 
 " Right again. I see you are a close observer. Cradled 
 upon the summits they are borne westward upon the 
 winds of the morning to be whirled capriciously about 
 the mountain through the day, and at even retire to the 
 places of their birth, the spires of the Minarets. Now 
 that s poetry. But seriously, the genius of the country 
 must be in a mood gloomier than usual to-day." 
 
 Ballard, to give his dog a run, here sprang to the 
 ground, followed by Stay ton with the guns, for the 
 quail were again showing in the chaparral. At this point 
 the road was paralleled on one side by a primitive 
 " brush-fence," forming the finest possible harboring- 
 place, which the two skirted, one on either side, to 
 
 27
 
 The Lost Miiie of the Mono. 
 
 neatly drop the birds as they arose. The "pup," a gift 
 of Sutcliffs, was a bright little fellow enough, but 
 wholly without training. Nevertheless the instincts of 
 the race were there, and many a bird was retrieved 
 that afternoon only with its aid. With this instinct, 
 however, as quite frequently happens, ran a character 
 istic that stamped it as an opinionated canine, with a 
 firm belief apparently in a division of the spoils of the 
 chase, for at times it failed to appear with its quarry; 
 when it was amusing to the point of side-aching laugb/- 
 ter to follow Ballard scurrying in chase among the 
 brush, at the cost of much profanity, a considerable abra 
 sion of the cuticle, and a gaping rent or two in his 
 garments ; Stayton all the while with a stoic s indiffer 
 ence winging the birds as they arose. 
 
 This Stayton was what Marryatt would have de 
 signated as an "original." If common report was to 
 be believed, he had been born in the backwoods of 
 Michigan; but Si was a man of very few words and 
 left much to conjecture. Tall beyond the ordinary, he 
 stood without an ounce of superfluous flesh. Yet, when 
 it came to work, the trying kind of the mountains, he 
 could discount anything I have ever seen in human 
 form. 
 
 He gave character to our party. His long, pointed 
 beard, which he fingered, twisted, and pulled in his per 
 plexities, was his secret pride ; his hair was thin and 
 straight and showed a spot in the rear where the cut 
 icle shone as brown as his visage. This one ceased 
 to wonder at when once acquainted with his habit when 
 "beyond the pales of civilization of wandering in shade 
 and shine without head-covering of any kind, and, what 
 seemed stranger still, without the least injury to him- 
 
 28
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 self. Not but that he possessed headgear, a dusty ar 
 ticle usually, and much begrimed with perspiration, it 
 must be confessed; but this he generally hung away or 
 jammed into the depths of a packsack on first pitching 
 camp, there to remain until we were ready to start 
 for other fields. On this trip I remember it was 
 hung on a low, broken limb of an immense fir, where 
 over it later Sutcliff in a spirit of mischief fastened the 
 backstay of the tent, thus securing it against any pos 
 sibility of loss or misplacing. This was at the Cherry- 
 Creek Meadows. He was slow and measured in all he 
 did, but to offset this he was never idle ; so that at the 
 close of the day as a quite usual thing he had ac 
 complished as much, if not more, than the average 
 run of mortals. 
 
 " He s a born genius." Ballard had explained to me in 
 a sweeping assertion earlier in the day. " He can lay 
 it over anybody at most anything. He hauled Waring s 
 wool to the station this shearing, and to see him handle 
 the single-line was a caution. Then he s eccentric to 
 beat the devil. Why, here for a month past he s been 
 hoarding every blest old oyster-can, big and little, he 
 could lay his hands on, and a week ago lay off a day 
 to clean up and solder handles on the whole cheese." 
 
 " How odd," I interrupted, excusably possessed with 
 the idea that Ballard was drawing upon his imagina 
 tion for my edification ; whereas, as I found later, he 
 was confining himself strictly to the truth. " What on 
 earth did he do with them ? " 
 
 " Why, supplied the neighborhood with all the tin- 
 cups it could possibly need in the next ten years." 
 
 "And the profits?" 
 
 " Were as that," returned Ballard sententiously, 
 
 29
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 snapping his fingers, " for he never charged a red cent." 
 
 " How strange." 
 
 " Did you see any of his work at Shepherds Roost ? 
 his soap-stone paper-weights, or some of the spoons 
 Sutcliff gave him the dig about at breakfast?" 
 
 " I think not." 
 
 " Well, it don t matter ; your wants will be supplied 
 in this line in due course. He can no more withstand 
 the sight of a piece of wood or a bit of stone without 
 wishing to sock his knife into them than my sheep-dog 
 here can a plunge into a handy puddle. And he s a 
 dandy at basket-weaving, and but the devil, take him 
 all around he s a corker." 
 
 And Ballard, who was a smallish, dissipated-looking 
 man of forty, with a red moustache, weak eyes, and 
 sporty inclinations, gave a sigh of despair at his inabil 
 ity to do the inventive and imitative talent of his friend 
 justice. 
 
 Meanwhile, as we passed over the road which wound 
 among the tall, symmetrical pines well-planted in the 
 tansied, boulder-strewn gulches, Sutcliff dilated upon 
 the various points of interest as they appeared. 
 
 " Yonder lies Gray s," he observed, pointing with his 
 whip to a dun-colored clearing halfway up a bluish- 
 green ridge some miles to the north which appeared 
 in an opening among the tufted tops of the conifers. 
 " If nothing happens to interfere we shall pass there 
 by sunrise to-morrow. Then here, more to the right, 
 around that baldish ridge is where the Black Laurel 
 comes in. That canyon is one of the roughest in these 
 mountains. More to the south here, do you see that 
 rocky scar on the face of that slope? that s the Figure 
 7. You see the resemblance? Those slopes are dense 
 
 30
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 with scrub-oak and manzanita, and are quite a haunt 
 for bear. It was in there in fact, that the old Indian 
 I was telling you about this morning had his tussle 
 with the bear a year or so* ago, and which came so near 
 seeing his finish. Then that glint of silver way up on 
 the rim of the ridge in that depression on the right is 
 the Falls of the Slick Rock. Years ago, long before the 
 appearance of any whites here, that neighborhood held 
 a special significance for the Indians which it has lost 
 since. You see, the rush of waters where they leave the 
 brow for their wild leap and bounds down the gulch has 
 glazed a concave half-circle in the granite as smooth and 
 slippery as a mirror. It was a custom of the Indians to 
 bring their witches here for trial, male and female. The 
 ordeal consisted simply of the passage of the torrent. If 
 made in safety, the accused stood innocent of the charge ; 
 where on the other hand, if swept over the brink to de 
 struction he was as surely guilty. Thus, if you were 
 strong-limbed and cool of head your chance of life was 
 better than that of your weaker brother which is, and 
 has been since the days of Adam, the way of the world. 
 Might is right to-day much as it was then in spite of 
 many fictions to the contrary. There s a pretty stretch 
 of country back of those falls." 
 
 It was while rounding the base of the cone upon our 
 left that the skies became overcast. About the same 
 time the air grew deliciously cool and still as if the spirit 
 of the legend was abroad breathing in long and regular 
 pulsations through the forest. Where there was the 
 sound of dripping water among the gray, mossed boul 
 ders massed in the dusk of the ascending ravines, the 
 overarching foliage of the ash and buttonwoods stood 
 bright against the deeper green of the background of 
 
 31
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 mountain, where the outlines each moment grew less 
 and less distinct in the shadow of the brewing storm 
 and the fast-declining day. To the far north above 
 a low-lying, sun-showered ridge, a band of clear was 
 visible piled high here and there with dun-edged cloud, 
 whose fading radiance became the measure to us of the 
 sun s declination. From thence, also, a little later came 
 a murmur which I at first asserted was the softened 
 roar of the Fork, but which the rest of the party, better 
 schooled in the signs and sounds of the mountains, said 
 was the long-drawn soughing of the wind on its way 
 down the canyon ; and that they were right I was forced 
 to concede when shortly after distant mutterings of 
 thunder followed. 
 
 In less than fifteen minutes the storm broke upon us 
 in all its fury, preceded by a cloud of dust and pollen, 
 and twisted and tortured the bowing forest until it 
 moaned in very protest. Cones and branches splintered 
 and crashed among the trees, and travel beneath them 
 assumed a fresh feature that of actual danger. Dur 
 ing the half-hour of the duration of this preliminary 
 gale we made but little headway. Then followed a 
 dead calm, through which we a moment later heard 
 the patter of the approaching shower, accompanied by 
 a louder, intermittent roll of thunder, in the wake of 
 a zig-zag of lightning. Ballard and Stayton hastily 
 clambered under cover as the great raindrops began to 
 fall about us. snipping up little cloudlets of dust, and 
 beating to earth in a pungent odor the mist of powd 
 ered balsam which had hung among the pines since the 
 last cleansing rain. 
 
 In my life, short, and only half-run as lives go, yet 
 crowded with experiences much above the ordinary, I 
 
 32
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 have been through many storms. But for true sub 
 limity I have never met with one to equal this. Dark 
 ness overtook us while yet a mile from our destination, 
 a darkness that was opaque in its intensity. Here the 
 first of Silas s little fore-thoughts came into play in the 
 shape of a candle-lantern. Its gleam in the depths of 
 that vast forest was faint and insignificant indeed; just 
 as, I often feel, the individual life we all cherish so 
 highly, must appear to God as he gazes out from his 
 height into the depths of this world of his creating; 
 but it served as a beacon to be followed slowly and care 
 fully. 
 
 But it was the spectacular play of the lightning fol 
 lowing the first downpour, and which lit up as with the 
 light of day, and with a suddenness and recurrence that 
 was blinding, the lofty aisles and the blended outlines 
 of the surrounding heights, which enabled us to cross 
 in safety the intervening gullies over the uncertain 
 plank bridging, and to find and follow the blind road 
 which led to the descending grade from which we had 
 our first view of the swirling torrent of the Fork, the 
 crumbling bridge that spanned it, and, in the dusk be 
 yond, where the old squaw who was the guardian of 
 the place had her abode, the flicker of a candle and the 
 warm glow of a hearth* through the open doorway of 
 a cabin. 
 
 Fifteen minutes and all thoughts of the storm and 
 its discomforts were almost completely banished from 
 our minds. Our animals in the meantime had been 
 comfortably stabled, and our wagon safely backed under 
 the cover of an outhouse two circumstances that added 
 greatly to our enjoyment of the evening. In the vast 
 fireplace of the old, deserted cook-house a roaring fire 
 
 33
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 had been kindled, and by it Sutcliff and Ballard pre 
 pared a hasty supper. Later the quail shot that day 
 were prepared and set to stewing for the next day s 
 meals; and our blankets brought out and spread upon 
 the floor preparatory to our retiring. 
 
 " I fear you will find your bed rather a hard one," 
 deprecated Sutcliff, as squatted upon his own he drew 
 off his boots in the dusk of the subsiding fire. " But 
 to-morrow you shall have one worthy the envy of the 
 President himself." 
 
 Before retiring I went to the door for a last look 
 out. The storm had spent itself, and the moon peering 
 over the eastern ridge poured its mellow light upon a 
 scene that for calm and beauty I have never seen sur 
 passed. A few light clouds still hung above, while 
 below, in the uncertain shift of light, against the broken 
 background of forest shone the bleached and ruined 
 roofs of the old mill and its attendant outhouses. The 
 skeleton-work of the bridge too, stood stark and ghost 
 like in the light. To the south the rear-guard of the 
 storm was retiring back to the summits with a diminish 
 ing pyrotechnical display and muttering of heaven s ar 
 tillery. All nature was assuming its ordinary aspect of 
 peace and quiet. I glanced toward the cabin of the old 
 squaw. There, too, all was silent. Its lights were out. 
 
 34
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 AT THE SHAKE-MAKERS CLEARING. THE HALF-BREED. 
 
 THE next morning our course led up the eastern 
 bank of the Fork a little short of half a mile, where it 
 struck up the mountain for Gray s over one of the 
 most fatiguing trails in the Sierra. Knowing the ar 
 duous nature of the climb ahead, Sutcliff had arranged 
 to make it in the early morning while our party was 
 fresh from a night s repose, and while the mountain 
 side lay in shadow. 
 
 The stars were still discernible here and there as 
 after a hasty breakfast we packed our animals we had 
 reached the limit of wagon-roads and took up this trail. 
 It was a broad and open one, a little-used sled-road, 
 climbing, at angles that made one hesitate, up and over 
 ridges, and along slopes clothed in manzanita and black- 
 oak, and a tangled mat of a brown, resinous tansy, over 
 which old Gray occasionally hauled shakes from the Lip. 
 As we arose the scene below gradually unfolded; first 
 the dark, cone-shaped mountain opposite, its apex aglow 
 with the fire of day ; then the still dusky canyon between, 
 and as yet uncertain of outline, half shrouded in shreds 
 of filmy mist ; and lastly the far, faint levels of the plains 
 bathed in the blending glories of sunrise. The deep 
 
 35
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 diapason of the Fork too, which throughout the night 
 had filled the throbbing air with its roar, became more 
 and more defined, until as gradually it was lost in the 
 distance and the absorbent music of the day. 
 
 We had barely gotten well upon our way when Si, 
 who was in the lead, came to a stand to critically study 
 the ground at his feet. 
 
 " Hey, there ; what s the trouble now ? " shouted Sut- 
 cliff from the rear, where with rifle across his shoulder 
 he was prodding a dilatory pack-mule with a fallen 
 bramble. 
 
 " Thar s someun on the trail ahead," returned Si, 
 pointing to a foot-print in the softened soil. 
 
 " By gum, but he s an early bird," remarked Sutcliff 
 admiringly. 
 
 " He s a she, " corrected Si. 
 
 " No. Then is the circumstance only the more remark 
 able. Who can the nymph be ? " 
 
 But Silas was again silently pushing on up the trail. 
 
 At the expiration of a little more than an hour we 
 came to the bars of the lower pasture-gate, where we 
 rested for a few moments to allow our animals to re 
 gain their wind. It was upon this bench of the 
 mountain, sloping gently from above us to the point 
 where we stood, where it pitched abruptly, as we have 
 seen, to the Fork, that Gray s was situated, only more 
 to the left in the heart of the clearing. A very few 
 minutes now sufficed to bring us in full view. 
 
 The first golden beams of the rising sun slanted upon 
 the scene, .the rough, weather-beaten log-house out 
 upon the open point where it overlooked Heron Valley 
 far below ; the steep-roofed barn, teeming with pigeon 
 life, its massive, lichened eaves near-touching the 
 
 36
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 ground; the railed upper-field, green with rippling tim 
 othy, where the points of the pines, walling its eastern 
 bounds, fell in long, grey-blue shadows upon it. Seen 
 from our point of view in the shadow of the forest, where 
 the brown mold exhaled an inspiration at every step, 
 and the cream-bloom of the deer-brush hung heavy with 
 the weight of shimmering raindrops, it was as charming 
 a picture of peace and beauty as my eyes had rested 
 upon in years. 
 
 At the yard-gate, a rude contrivance hinged to a mam 
 moth stump upon one side, we came to a halt. A thin 
 column of smoke ascended leisurely from the throat of 
 a capacious chimney, to mingle with the crystal-clear 
 air of the mountains ; while a square in neutral tint upon 
 the shadowed front of the cabin told of an open door 
 way, still further proof that the family was up and 
 around. 
 
 In response to a shout from Sutcliff a savage dog 
 charged us, bounding back and forth on the inner side 
 of the enclosure and evidently eager to tear us limb from 
 limb. We quite properly, I thought, hesitated, and Sut 
 cliff even loosened his revolver in its holster. The brute s 
 spiteful snarls apparently jarred unpleasantly also upon 
 the nervous system of a thin, ridgy sow, which until 
 then had lain at easy length in the warm sunshine 
 beset by a half-score of pigs of conflicting ages, but 
 which now arose with disquieted grunts and swung 
 around the fence into the brush of the canyon, the litter 
 at her heels following with high-pitched squeals of 
 protest at the untimely interruption. 
 
 There came to us the murmur of voices in consulta 
 tion, and the grating of stools upon the house-floor. 
 Then through the rear door-opening the head of a man 
 
 37 
 
 2t\-% O 
 oJLUJLy
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 verging on four-score years protruded in reconnaissance. 
 At the sight of us a small, driedup body followed; to 
 gether taking up a position on the doorstep in the light 
 of the sun. 
 
 Now right back of the house, or rather what was one 
 side of it, a little stream of water, led in a miniature 
 flume from the fir-dusk of the canyon back of the tim 
 othy-field, spread over the ground, moistening a rod of 
 wild, pannicled grasses interspersed with shoulder-high, 
 blue-spiked lupins, and a scattering of flame-hued pop 
 pies. It was against this picturesque background, and a 
 further one of wooded ridge, that the weazened figure 
 of the old man stood, clothed in a greasy suit of brown 
 jeans, his bare feet encased in slippers down at the heels, 
 the snow-white of his beard and hair markedly contrast 
 ing a visage indescribably furrowed by a long life of 
 hardship, and set with dim, bleared eyes, now turned 
 upon us in a stare that was half-imbecile, I thought. 
 
 "How do ye do, sir?" accosted Ballard in the tones 
 of ordinary speech. 
 
 Sutcliff laughed. 
 
 " You ll have to limber up, Craig," he explained. " The 
 old fellow s grown as deaf as the logs of his hut with 
 in the year." 
 
 Ballard essayed again. 
 
 " Hello, there, old man," he now shouted in tones 
 that made the clearing ring, " how are you ? " 
 
 " Back there, you rascal," the old man returned with 
 a startling irrelevancy, and paying, as was expected, 
 no heed to our words. " Back, I tell you." 
 
 He stepped down among the unheeding fowls of the 
 yard, seized a convenient fence-picket and started in a 
 feeble pursuit of the brute ; which hied him under the 
 
 38
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 house in fear, later appearing on the other side to main 
 tain a desultory show of hostility. 
 
 " Gentlemen," he said deprecatingly, " this dog 
 which meets you with snarls and bites is none of mine. 
 He is my son s. I have nothing but will meet you, 
 like myself, with the heartiest good-fellowship. This is 
 as it behooves a man to be who is at peace with all the 
 world and its Creator. But, gentlemen, you are early. 
 I was told to expect you, but you are early." 
 
 He held the gate open for us, scrutinizing each of us 
 closely as we filed in. 
 
 " We ll trouble you for a drink of water, old man," 
 said Sutcliff, accompanying his words with a gesture 
 expressive of carrying a cup to his lips, a sign the old 
 man seemed to understand, for he entered the cabin to a 
 moment later reappear with a long-handled dipper. 
 
 Sutcliff laid a hand in gentle protest upon the breast 
 of the old shake-maker as he insisted upon showing us 
 the way to the spring. 
 
 "No, no; we know the way." 
 
 Nevertheless he followed. 
 
 At the spring he turned to me. 
 
 " You are early, my boy ; and yet I fear you are too 
 late," he whined in the high-keyed voice of old age, 
 gazing into my face with a light in his eyes of such 
 intense concentration that I stood transfixed for a mo 
 ment, while a shiver of dread passed up and down my 
 spine. 
 
 I glanced around, and noted Sutcliff touch his head 
 significantly with his fingers. 
 
 None of us were athirst, Sutcliff s plea being a sub 
 terfuge only to afford us an opportunity of meeting the 
 old man of the mountain, and so allay a growing curios- 
 
 39
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 ity on the part of several of us. Nevertheless we made 
 a pretense of assuaging one at the spring, where the 
 water was not as undenled as it might be ; a host of 
 water-spiders skimming its surface in their reckless, 
 haphazard way, and the sedge upon its bank literally 
 swarming with small, green-coated frogs just emerged 
 from the short-clothes of the tadpole. 
 
 As we returned to the cabin, old Gray disappeared 
 into the dusk of the interior, in whose uncertain light a 
 middle-aged squaw in red stood gazing out upon us over 
 the shoulder of a man of perhaps thirty years of age, 
 whose lighter complexion spoke of an admixture of 
 white blood. 
 
 Ballard was the first to note them. 
 
 " Hey, there s old Jule," he cried, " and by gum, 
 Si, it was her you ve been following the blessed morn 
 ing, you sly old fox. And that half-breed son of the 
 old guy too. Hello, Joe." 
 
 Half-reluctantly the half-breed stepped to the door to 
 return our greeting, rather surlily I thought. 
 
 Ballard approached for the purpose of surrendering 
 the drinking-cup, and incidentally, as I surmised from 
 his air of feigned indifference and his manner of whist 
 ling lowly to himself, of obtaining a closer view of 
 the interior and its contents. 
 
 Now, I remember the circumstance with a smile al 
 ways, in the shelter of the doorway a large, tawny 
 house-cat lay sunning herself, comfortably crouched, 
 and with her eyes closed in feline meditation. Dis 
 turbed suddenly from behind by a movement on the 
 part of the squaw and seeing a stranger, followed by a 
 half-grown and inquisitive sheep-dog, within an arm s 
 length at the moment of such interruption, she arose 
 
 40
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 with the agility of a lynx, swept the floor for a moment 
 with her tail, and gave other tokens of her unfriend 
 liness. But Ballard was too preoccupied to note, and my 
 cry of warning came too late. The animal sprang upon 
 him with outstretched claws. Utterly astounded by the 
 suddenness of the attack, Ballard staggered back with 
 an imprecation and a howl of pain. The squaw tittered 
 audibly, and the ill-favored visage of the half-breed 
 broadened with a grin. Even, as the truth must be told, 
 among ourselves we found it quite impossible to re 
 strain a smile. In an instant the spitting feline had 
 sprung to cover, followed closely by a billet of wood 
 hurled by the now thoroughly exasperated Ballard. Then 
 followed an amusing rain of expletives as he gently 
 rubbed the afflicted part, to the like of which it has never 
 been my lot to listen. It rose and it fell ; it ceased and it 
 was resumed; until just as Sutcliff s convulsive peals 
 ended in one irrepressible yell of delight he came to a 
 pause with the same abruptness and cadence he might 
 have displayed had he just rounded a prayer with a fer 
 vent amen. He then picked up the dipper and handed it 
 to the now thoroughly sobered squaw. 
 
 " If the old fellow spoke the truth, " he remarked, limp 
 ing toward us, " this devil too must be the son s. " 
 
 "Are you out hunting? " queried the half-breed a mo 
 ment later, stepping out into the open, and in better 
 humor evidently at the sight of our friend s discomfiture. 
 
 " Well, that s hard saying," returned Sutcliff , to whom 
 the remark had been more particularly addressed. " Out 
 for a good time at any rate. Any game about ? " 
 
 The half-breed shook his head. 
 
 " At least not about here, " he added. 
 
 "Where then?"
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " About the Jackass and the Squaw s Teat, they say. " 
 
 "They? Who?" 
 
 " Old Chipo for one, who is down after a load of 
 stock salt. He says Carpenter s men killed several deer 
 on the way up. " 
 
 " That s news. " 
 
 " But you know the law . " 
 
 " Oh, we ve not a word to say against the law, Joe, " 
 returned Sutcliff easily. 
 
 The Indian grinned. 
 
 " But tell me, " said Sutcliff suddenly, as if with the 
 turn the conversation had taken the idea had just come 
 to him, "how comes it in a region like this, abounding 
 as it does with such ideal cover, that the game is so 
 sparse ? " 
 
 The other paused for just a moment before shrugging 
 his shoulders in what seemed to me a feigned indiffer 
 ence as he returned : 
 
 "Why do you ask me?" 
 
 " Would you care to hear what I think ? " 
 
 The Indian again shrugged his shoulders, with the air 
 of one bored by the turn the conversation was taking. 
 
 " That the game is simply hunted out of the country. " 
 
 " By whom ? " was asked. 
 
 "The Indians, of course. Who else should?" 
 
 " For what purpose then ? " 
 
 " To lessen the chance of discovery of the lost mine of 
 the Mono which is said to lie about here somewhere. " 
 
 The half-breed sobered instantly, and his gaze hung 
 long upon our features with an earnestness not to be mis 
 taken. 
 
 " So you too, " he remarked a moment later resuming 
 
 42
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 his affected indifference, so you too are being misled 
 by this nonsense. " 
 
 " What nonsense ? " 
 
 " Why all this child s talk about a lost mine. " 
 
 Sutcliff chuckled in a cynical way as he answered : 
 
 " We have some solid basis on which we pin our faith. " 
 
 The half-breed echoed the words. 
 
 I nodded in the affirmative. 
 
 " We have some of the rock, you see, " I explained. 
 
 He now eyed me intently and in silence, as if with the 
 words I had assumed a new interest to him. 
 
 " For all that, " he said at last, turning away as if to 
 close the conversation, " you are wrong. How about the 
 herders and vaqueros ? " he continued, suddenly turning 
 about again with a renewed interest. 
 
 " Why should they be molested, " returned Sutcliff, 
 "when their presence relieves you of half of your 
 work?" 
 
 " You are sharp," interrupted the other in high dis 
 dain. 
 
 " That in the first place," continued Sutcliff, ignoring 
 the remark. " In the second the herder as a usual thing 
 has eyes for nothing but his flock, and the buckero is nar 
 rowed down to the powers of his mount. But the hunter 
 is to be feared. Lovers of nature they are almost with 
 out exception, and drink in all there is of beauty about 
 them. He can tell you the particular species of a tree 
 as far as his eye can reach; he knows every curve of 
 ridge and ravine. He hears every forest sound, from 
 the chirp of bird and squirrel to the deep boom of stream 
 and fall. To him the fragrance of fir and flower are de 
 lights too little known to the world. He is the man to be 
 
 43
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 feared at every step. Hey, there, Ballard, how does this 
 peroration strike you ? " 
 
 The half-breed turned and spoke a few hasty words 
 in their native tongue to the scarlet-gowned female, she 
 the while looking out upon us with a stolid interest. At 
 the same moment old Gray re-appeared, to invite us in to 
 breakfast, an invitation we declined with mixed feelings 
 as can very well be imagined. It took some little effort 
 to impress him with the fact that we had already broken 
 our fast, how frugally we omitted to mention, and that 
 we intended to lunch as soon as we reached the Deerhorn 
 Meadows. Seeing us inflexible he desisted ; but it was 
 with such a look of disappointment that we half repented 
 of our decision. 
 
 While we were re-adjusting the packs preparatory to 
 again taking the trail the old man grew garrulous and 
 plied us with questions, relative and otherwise. In the 
 short time of our visit he showed himself, beneath an ex 
 terior deceptive in the extreme, a man of very remarkable 
 parts. He took an inordinate interest in our replies it 
 struck me, and had the squaw bring out an old, cracked 
 slate with a pencil attached by a string that he might the 
 "better understand them, our verbal ones proving an in 
 sufficient means. 
 
 As for the half-breed, he was an interested actor in the 
 scene throughout. He said not a word but hung about 
 like a bird of ill omen, and with an air of restlessness he 
 could not hide, devouring every syllable that passed from 
 one to the other of the group. Nothing escaped him. 
 And when on the other hand we put a question or two 
 relative to the lost mine, more out of an idle curiosity 
 than in the hope of learning something of a definite or 
 tangible nature, his unrest, I thought, assumed positive 
 
 44
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono, 
 
 anxiety. He paced back and forth like a tiger caged 
 and sought by every surreptitious means at his command 
 to hasten our departure. I noted that his strange be 
 havior had drawn upon him the observant eye of Sutcliff 
 also. 
 
 But the mind of the old man was too much a wreck, if 
 in truth he ever had anything not purely the creation of 
 his fantasy to offer. Not a grain was there of practical 
 information for us to gather. In the medley of his talk 
 there appeared only one ever-recurrent thought, which 
 shaped itself into the oft-repeated " too late, too late. " 
 
 There came a simple smile upon his features as we 
 finally bade him good-by. With me he seemed to be 
 particularly reluctant to part. He took my hand again 
 and again with one of his, patting me in a fatherly way 
 upon the shoulder with the other. With an effort I 
 broke away to follow my companions who had already 
 started, pursued, I felt rather than saw, by a look of the 
 most intense longing, and the piping words which 
 haunted me for months after, " too late, too late. " 
 
 Turning some little distance up on the trail for one 
 last view of the homestead resting so quietly below in 
 the yellow sunlight, I saw him about to enter the cabin, 
 the son in excited expostulation behind, and the squaw, 
 but a speck of red, still observing us. 
 
 " There s a character for you, " said Sutcliff paren 
 thetically, as he opened the upper pasture-gate in the 
 green dusk of the conifer woods. 
 
 " Do you figure the old guy knows anything of the 
 lost mine ? " asked Ballard, resting upon his rifle on the 
 upper embankment and guiding the animals into the 
 narrowing grade, which here took a sudden turn. 
 
 " Not unless old Wolupa saw fit to confide in him, 
 
 45
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 which, knowing the Indian nature as I do, I very much 
 doubt. " 
 
 " And yet it may be so, " Roger remarked. " That 
 half-breed to me has the air of one hanging about in the 
 hope of hearing something to put him on the right scent. " 
 
 " Or of putting you off, " added Sutcliff thoughtfully.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE; DEERHORN MEADOWS THE SIGNAL FROM THE BUTTE. 
 
 We were now in the heart of those immense forests 
 which are the pride of the Sierra, a labyrinth of lofty, 
 pillared aisles, silent as those of a vast cathedral, and 
 heavy with the breath of the firs and the subtler incense 
 of a thousand flowers. The beauty of it all as we passed 
 beneath, the magnificent proportions everywhere pre 
 vailing, whether in rock, tree or mountain; the infinite 
 variety of coloring; the hushed, memory-waking music 
 of the streams ; and above all the peace and harmony 
 pervading every feature, stirred me deeply, and some 
 how I gradually came to a more comprehensible and de 
 finite conception of the idea of an omnipresent God. It 
 is only in the silent places of the world you will find 
 that this becomes possible. 
 
 One point upon that trail will always hold a special in 
 terest for me, the point to the right of the winding, och- 
 rous road where I had my first view of a Lambert pine, 
 one of a particularly fine group rising straight to heaven, 
 a mighty shaft, purple-scarred, in support of the tasselled 
 canopy overhead. I stood, a pigmy, in silent veneration 
 beneath it for many moments, my eye scaling its great 
 height foot by foot, until it marked the penciled branches 
 
 47
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 against the blue of the sunny sky, flecked here and there 
 with a light cumulus born of the storm of the evening 
 before. I was only recalled to earth by a shout from Bal- 
 lard, followed by the request to come on by the members 
 generally of our party. The road was here much more 
 gradual in ascent, and we reached the Lip with no 
 further serious inroads upon our stock of breath. Here 
 we had our first view of the Basin proper. 
 
 It is a saucer-shaped depression on the broad northern 
 flank of Spirit Mountain, and a spot replete with natural 
 charm. A finer stretch of conifer forest than here rears 
 itself in a beauty bordering on the divine, is certainly no 
 where to be found. From its central depths it extends in 
 every direction in dark unbroken sweeps to the Lip, which 
 circles with a charming uniformity to the right, where 
 through a narrow gorge the Black Laurel drains the re 
 gion of its waters. 
 
 One feature of this ideal spot is sure to strike one. At 
 a casual glance it will seem as if all the known world is 
 comprised in its deep-green woods and the immensity of 
 sky overhead. Only from one point, well up on the south 
 ern slope, do we have a glimpse of something more, a 
 vision far to the east, framed in the low depression of the 
 Gap, of misty peaks washed in in the faintest of ochres 
 and siennas, checkered with passing shadows of pale 
 violet-grays. The ridge, however, which all around 
 sweeps with such a charming regularity arises abruptly 
 in the south in the crags of Spirit Mountain, and on 
 the east in a striking Butte, both timbered to their sum 
 mits, yet presenting bold, scarred fronts to the north and 
 west which were then still white here and there with 
 the enamel of winter snows. 
 
 Upon the borders of the Deerhorn Meadows we came 
 48
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 upon the camp of the Ferrals, who were pasturing a band 
 of a couple of thousand sheep in the Basin. We found 
 it tenantless. Its fire had burnt down to a thin spiral 
 of blue smoke, and set somewhat at random about the 
 sodden ashes we found their various camp conveniences. 
 
 Sutcliff went straight and lifted the lid alternately of 
 the dutch-oven and the bean-pot, to gaze approvingly 
 upon the healthy dough just reaching the point of bak 
 ing, in the one, and the simmering, savory contents of 
 the other. 
 
 " Those Ferrals are boys after my own heart, " he re 
 marked complacently, replacing the lid of the latter, and 
 standing his rifle against the trunk of a tree, " for they 
 profit by experience. They have not repeatedly climbed 
 that trail without having learnt its lesson." 
 
 " And that is ? " I laughed. 
 
 " That you can not do it without working up an abnor 
 mal appetite. They are expecting us and have guarded 
 against surprise. " 
 
 While we assisted in unpacking the animals, Sutcliff 
 replenished the fire with an armful of wood of the proper 
 size for immediate coaling, and made such other pre 
 parations as the baking of the loaf dictated. The wood 
 was damp and smoked stubbornly, but by dint of an in 
 dustrious use of his broad-brim he brought it to life and 
 shortly to burn merrily. Then he foraged the camp for a 
 plate, which he heaped with the steaming beans, and ate 
 with such evident relish standing by the fire that we felt 
 the pangs of hunger within us increase a hundredfold 
 within a moment of time. 
 
 In fact the strife between duty and inclination as re 
 garded Ballard was short-lived. He at once dropped the 
 work he was completing to unearth the only other clean 
 
 49
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 plate the camp contained at the moment, and was soon 
 assisting Sutcliff at the feast, on the opposite side of the 
 fire. I, less accustomed to the ways of the mountains, 
 wavered longer between my sense of propriety and the 
 cravings of nature. But the humor of the situation was 
 irresistible. Seizing a skillet, the only available utensil, 
 which stood handy, I ladled a generous share of the com 
 pound of bacon, onions and beans into it, and with it be 
 tween my knees, seated upon a log which I first kicked to 
 the fire, I, too, became a happy factor in the scene. 
 
 Roger proved himself more self-denying and persisted 
 in helping Silas with the packs. There was no earthly 
 reason for supposing that Stayton, was less hungry than 
 the rest of us. But in the short day of our acquaintance 
 I had already seen enough to have me conclude that many 
 of his actions were deliberately calculated as schoolings to 
 the flesh ; that in fact much of his deliberation was due to 
 no other cause. With an exasperating attention to the 
 smallest detail he completed the unpacking. Unsaddling, 
 he first solicitously rubbed down the perspiring back of 
 each animal with a saddle-blanket before turning it out in 
 to the freedom of the meadow. The last, our leader, and 
 a mare of independent nature, he staked out just beyond 
 the entangling reach of a growth of willows. He was 
 halfway back to camp when on a sudden he returned to 
 reset the stake-pin, having decided that the spot was too 
 boggy, and the grass too watery, to afford anything like 
 the measure of comfort to the beast he was looking for. 
 
 With the same deliberation of manner he left for 
 the creek a moment later, a tin cup in one hand and our 
 sooty coffee-pot in the other, his intention being to fill 
 the latter at the stream, and incidentally to rid himself of 
 the dust which so plentifully begrimed his visage and 
 
 50
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 clung to his beard. It must have been, as Ballard ex 
 plained laughingly, a " dry-wash," or something near 
 kin to one, as the only noticeable change in his appear 
 ance on his return, as he placed the coffee-pot upon the 
 coals spread for the purpose, was a slightly clearer mark 
 ing to the lines about his ears and the corrugations of his 
 neck, showing the limit of encroachment of the elusive 
 element. Giving his long, sandy beard one last twist with 
 his fingers to wring the moisture from it in a scattering 
 shower, he ran his hands through his hair, as much I 
 thought to dry them as to bring his thin, straggling 
 wisps into some semblance of order. 
 
 We did not pitch our tent as we were as yet unde 
 cided as to a site for a permanent camp. Nevertheless 
 things generally were unpacked and readjusted and put 
 in as near shipshape as was possible in the face of this 
 indecision. An ovenful of biscuits was set to baking 
 by Sutcliff ; and a potful of beans to boiling by Silas, 
 who desired a mess, he said, in which his individual 
 right stood less in dispute than it did to the one he had 
 just helped dispose of; whereat Ballard expressed sur 
 prise and desired to be informed of a claim that could 
 possibly prove more valid than that he then enjoyed, in 
 asmuch as possession was nine out of any hypothetical 
 ten points of the law, and he had unquestionably passed 
 the property beyond human intervention. Lastly a 
 spoonful of " sour-dough " was pilfered from the Ferral 
 stock for the " rising " of our own. 
 
 It was in the midst of these various preparations that 
 the younger Ferral came into camp. 
 
 " Hello, there, Sut, " he shouted effusively," hello, 
 Roger, hey, there, Craigie, and, as I live, Stay ton 
 too, well, who d have thought of meeting such a bunch ! 
 
 5 1
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 how are you all ? And this," espying me, " is our 
 expected friend. Glad to know you, and hope you will 
 have a jolly good time. How are all the folks, boys? 
 I ve been trying for an hour or more," he explained, 
 rinsing his hands in an inch of soapy water in a basin 
 which stood in a levelled spot between two encircling 
 roots, first having stood his gun against a tree, " to 
 get away, but the sheep are uneasy this morning and 
 won t bunch worth a damn. Faggerty won t have a dog 
 about, you know, which does not improve matters any. " 
 
 " Where is Faggerty ? " queried Sutcliff. 
 
 " Out with the band. He ll be in shortly." 
 
 "AndLen?" 
 
 " Oh, he ll be in shortly, too. He took his rifle early 
 this morning for a run to the Gap to see how the feed 
 stood, " Ferral continued, drying himself upon a towel 
 much in need of a laundering. " But say, Si, how were 
 the beans ? " 
 
 Stayton complained dryly, and I fear not without 
 some justice, that not enough had fallen to his share to 
 base an opinion on that would stand. 
 
 Ferral laughed. 
 
 "Oh, I guess they were all right," with a glance at the 
 empty kettle. " We killed last night in spite of the 
 storm," referring to a carcass shrouded in a wool-sack 
 swinging from a cross-arm between two trees. "And 
 it was not a toothless old ewe either," he kept on, 
 laughing. That was the proper thing under the ad 
 ministration of Carpenter & Co., under the shadow of 
 the Pin-Cushion," with a meaning wink at Roger and 
 Sutcliff, " but under the reign of Ferral & Ferral it is 
 different. What a gay old time we had that summer 
 though. Faggerty tells me their camp alone used up 
 
 52
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 over thirty mutton in the few months they were in the 
 mountains. But Faggerty does not always confine him 
 self to the truth. Either that or he and Stamford fed all 
 the old squaws upon the Fork that summer. 
 
 Rattling on at this gait he uncovered the juicy wether, 
 and with the heavy hunting-knife which he took from his 
 belt severed a quarter from the body; hewing with the 
 weapon where a bone interfered as efficaciously as if it 
 had been a cleaver made for the purpose. 
 
 It must have been about eleven o clock that we first 
 noticed the fire. I remember I had wandered from camp 
 with my sketch-book in hand, and seated at the foot of 
 an immense cedar across the meadow was sketching in 
 the forest-opening and the sun checkered arcades beyond : 
 and beyond these, the over-topping Butte, still some miles 
 in the distance yet overwhelmingly impressive in its 
 softened grandeur. When I first looked up and saw 
 that something of interest was taking the general atten 
 tion, Len Ferral was standing by my side, rifle upon 
 shoulder and a brace of gray-squirrels in his hand. 
 Roger was making his way from camp, followed at a 
 little distance by Sutcliff. Further back stood Ballard, 
 and in camp the younger Ferral and Silas. All eyes 
 were turned in one direction. Following that direction 
 with my eye I saw upon the apparently inaccessible crest 
 of the Butte a column of smoke arise at the moment, and 
 slowly spread in a dense, white cloud toward the shim 
 mering summits of Spirit Mountain. 
 
 Sutcliff was startled I could plainly see, but it was for 
 a moment only. A life of years in the mountains had 
 accustomed him to surprises of every kind, and it took 
 him but a moment to regain his wonted control of him 
 self. 
 
 53
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " After all what is there so remarkable in a fire in the 
 mountains ? " he asked. 
 
 " Nothing, " Roger returned, " but its location, and 
 that is startling. " 
 
 " I wonder who could have lit it, " mused Len Ferral 
 quietly. 
 
 " That is hard saying. Perhaps a sheepman, or some 
 herder, " said Roger. 
 
 But Len shook his head. 
 
 " I think not, " he said in his composed way. 
 
 "And why not?" 
 
 Sutcliff turned his face as if in expectation of the an 
 swer. 
 
 " Because I have just returned from around the foot 
 of the mountain. There is not the sign of a trail there 
 made later than last fall. " 
 
 " Well, that settles it as concerns the herder," con 
 ceded Sutcliff, resuming his survey. " But how about 
 the sheepman ? " 
 
 " Do not understand me to say that a sheepman did not 
 start it, " returned Len, a little piqued at the other s brus- 
 queness. " What I mean is that the ordinary indications 
 do not point that way. At least he did not climb from 
 this side. After last night s rain I would surely have 
 come upon his trail. As it is, the only sign of life I 
 came upon was the hoof-print of a burro, which seems 
 to have wandered in through the Gap. " 
 
 Sutcliff was plainly puzzled. 
 
 "It must be a party of Indians signalling to others in 
 the hills," he at last ventured to say. 
 
 But it was now Waring s turn to shake his head. 
 
 " Sutcliff," he began, with such unusual seriousness 
 in his voice that Sutcliff eyed him from top to toe, to 
 
 54
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 laugh straight in his face, " it means something more. A 
 peculiar sensation I have at my heart tells me so. " 
 
 "Your heart be d d. It s your liver. A touch of 
 dyspepsia, nothing more. Or else but no, you do not 
 indulge. Now, had it been Ballard here I should have 
 had no trouble in explaining it away as the effect of that 
 jug of forty rod he brought away with him yesterday 
 from Oro Fino. " 
 "But seriously . " 
 
 " What do you think ? " Sutcliff asked, turning abruptly 
 to me, still seated at the root of the tree. 
 
 Now, strange to say, wholly unfamiliar as I was with 
 the life of the mountains, I too had a vague feeling pos 
 sess me that the true interpretation of the scene before 
 us lay not in any of the several explanations advanced. It 
 was nothing I could hope to prove to the objective sense; 
 it was more the conviction of a subtle subconsciousness. 
 
 " At the risk of being rated a dyspeptic also, " I re 
 turned with a smile, " I must stake my opinion with that 
 of Roger. It does mean something more I am sure. " 
 
 Something in the quiet yet positive nature of my 
 reply seemed to carry weight. Sutcliff fixed his eyes 
 upon me for a moment in a profound contemplation of 
 my visage, then turned away with a puzzled shake of 
 the head. 
 
 " Come ; there is but one way of solving this mystery, " 
 he said a moment later, returning to where we stood, 
 " and that is by a climb of the mountain. Do you feel 
 yourself able, " he continued, addressing himself particu 
 larly to me, and with a vague shadow of doubt in his 
 voice, " to undertake the climb to that point to-morrow ? " 
 " Why, sure ; I am in perfect health. " 
 Then turning to Waring : 
 
 55
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " We have figured on an ascent of Spirit Mountain all 
 along, " he said, with a wave of his hand toward the rug 
 ged peak. " Let s include a climb of the Butte ; or even, 
 as the scheme finds favor with Carrington, wholly drop 
 our original plan ? " 
 
 " There is no deprecation necessary, " returned War 
 ing ; " the idea pleases me quite. " 
 
 " Then I make the further suggestion that from here 
 we move this afternoon to the Cherry-Creek Meadows. 
 They are nearer the mountain, higher, and in the morning 
 will give us a better start." 
 
 To this Waring also acquiesced. 
 
 But Len demurred. He had, he said, looked forward 
 to an evening spent in camp with us, and he would not 
 now be disappointed. We should not go. 
 
 Sutcliff hesitated. But the advantage of the two miles 
 in the morning which the contemplated move would bring 
 us was not to be lightly lost. He was quick at sugges 
 tions. 
 
 " Why not let Faggerty run his band up there this af 
 ternoon? and you spend the night with us? How did 
 you find the feed at the Gap ? " 
 
 Ferral shook his head. 
 
 " Short. It should have at least another week s 
 start. " 
 
 " Then let it be as I suggest. Otherwise I should 
 have advised packing up and moving with us. " 
 
 It was so arranged and the two returned to camp a 
 few moments later, leaving me to work out my sketch, 
 with Waring to bear me company. 
 
 When we, too, an hour later returned in response to the 
 younger Ferral s halloo and announcement that dinner 
 was ready, we found that Faggerty had put in an appear- 
 
 56
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 ance, and was at the moment crouching over the coals 
 puffing assiduously at his briar-root, which he had just 
 lit with a fire-brand, still held in indecision awaiting the 
 outcome of his efforts at a smoke. We found also that 
 extensive preparations had been made for an after-dinner 
 target-shoot. Such an array of ammunition, of calibre 
 large and small, I had never seen short of a dealer s em 
 porium. 
 
 " What do you think of a man, " asked the younger 
 Ferral, squatted at his meal, a daintily-browned chop be 
 tween his fingers, in answer to a comment of mine 
 prompted by the display, " who comes up here for a ten- 
 day s hunt with only four cartridges to his name ? " 
 
 " Who of this crowd can possibly be guilty of such 
 shortsightedness ? " I laughed as I took my place at the 
 board. 
 
 " Why, Si. He brought his everlasting old Sharp all 
 right, but, just think, only four cartridges. " 
 
 " That is not surprising, coming from Si, " remarked 
 Waring. " From any other source we might have had 
 grounds for anxiety." 
 
 About three of the afternoon, just as Faggerty left to 
 intercept his band as it broke from its uncertain nooning, 
 we resaddled, packed our animals, and started for the 
 meadow which lay a mile and a half further up in the 
 direction of the low saddle between the two mountains. 
 It was a favorite pasture-ground of the sheepmen as the 
 surrounding ridges abounded in extensive thickets of 
 cherry-brush, interspersed with vetches, peavines and 
 thimble-berry. Owing to its high altitude and the con 
 sequent earliness of the season there, we found it in all 
 its vernal beauty. Not a hoof had been there that year 
 previous to our coming. 
 
 57
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Upon our arrival there the time passed agreeably 
 enough in preparations for the morrow, more particu 
 larly in the cleaning of our arms, which had grown dusty 
 upon the hill-roads ; in reloading emptied cartridge-shells ; 
 and by Ballard, Sutcliff and myself in stripping a copse 
 of young fir of its tender, fan-like boughs, and spreading 
 them with method, and a knack born only of experience 
 I found out, beneath our blankets ; the same when com 
 pleted forming a bed, the virtues of which are not to be 
 too highly lauded. Then after an early supper an hour 
 was spent in curious inquiry about the forest. The sun, 
 low in the heavens, shone with that softened glory which 
 is peculiarly our own upon the brushclad slopes and their 
 sentinel pines as we returned. The broad, green meadow 
 with its boulder-strewn confines was losing outline in the 
 falling shadows of evening. The breeze which through 
 out the day had vibrated the woods into paeans of soul- 
 stirring song had sometime before faded away in a long- 
 sustained morendo. One by one the songs of the birds too 
 became hushed, and the mountain day was done.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 OUR UNWELCOME VISITOR. A STRANGE DISCUSSION. 
 THE SEANCE AND ITS OUTCOME. 
 
 The crowning event of that evening I will not soon 
 forget. 
 
 A shade of ennui had become apparent in the manner 
 of our leisurely lounging about camp. Waring, stretched 
 at ease upon his blankets, was poring over the pages of 
 a book; yet his interest in it was not such but that both 
 eye and ear were open to the attractions of his surround 
 ings. Silas and Len were out on the meadow looking 
 after the horses for the night; and to the rhythm of the 
 driving of the stake-pins as they were reset, my pencil 
 came to move in unison in the finishing of my sketch of 
 the morning. Ballard, the younger Ferral, and Sutcliff, 
 squatted upon some saddle-blankets, were deep in a game 
 of cards. But Ferral alone showed interest in the game 
 perhaps it stood in his favor, an occasional word only 
 coming from the lips of the other two. Sutcliff in fact wa& 
 more than usually abstracted of mood, and I caught him 
 several times, while the cards were being shuffled, make 
 a half-turn and glance over his shoulder toward the Butte, 
 where the mysterious fire of the day twinkled redly in 
 the gathering gray of the night. His thoughts to all ap- 
 
 59
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 pearance were centred there rather than upon his playing. 
 As the dusk deepened I desisted in my work and fell to 
 admiring the massiveness of several sugar-pines some dis 
 tance away, whose tops still glowed in the evening light 
 against the gray of the eastern sky where the silver disc 
 of the full moon shone in the low depression of the Gap. 
 
 Then suddenly I became aware of a sound alien to any 
 of those to which my ear had become attuned, the approach 
 of stealthy footsteps. At the same moment Sutcliff looked 
 up, a surprised exclamation, half imprecation, breaking 
 from him. I turned, and against the glow of the west 
 saw silhouetted the form of a man approaching through 
 the brush. Sutcliff had already recognized him ; for me 
 it required a closer approach into the open to know in him 
 the half-breed we had met in the morning. 
 
 " Where, under the shining sun, do you come from ?" 
 asked Sutcliff, too surprised to wholly hide the, to him, 
 unwelcome nature of the visit. 
 
 The Indian gave some explanation about night having 
 overtaken him on his return from a jaunt to the Chi- 
 quita, and how, in his haste to reach the Gray clearing 
 he had somehow drifted from the trail, until utterly at 
 sea he had accidentally come upon our camp. Unable to 
 understand the reason of his coming myself, I watched 
 the lines of Sutcliff s countenance for some ray of light 
 it might afford me, and I saw at once that the narration 
 found no credence with him. 
 
 " Lost be damned," he muttered in an aside to me a mo 
 ment later. " It s a plagued sight easier to lose old Ling 
 in his kitchen than one of these fellows in the mountains. 
 Have you had your supper ? " he asked, turning to the 
 Indian. 
 
 " I m not hungry," the half-breed answered simply. " 1 
 always carry some bread and jerky with me." 
 
 60
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Nevertheless Sutcliff placed before him the remains of 
 our supper, and upon these the wanderer fell without cere 
 mony. 
 
 A few moments later Faggerty too appeared, having 
 hovered unseen upon the flanks of his charge until, with 
 an air of contented repose, it had settled itself for the 
 night upon a ridge about a mile below camp. With pipe 
 in mouth and the half-blanket of brown vicuna held 
 snugly about his shoulders, his gray, grizzled beard so 
 completely covering his face as barely to afford space for 
 two gray and very bright eyes, and a red and somewhat 
 bulbous nose, he came out of the gloom of the forest 
 like a spectre of the Sierra and took up a position by the 
 fire in silence. 
 
 There now was an air of animation about camp wholly 
 wanting a few moments before. We settled ourselves 
 for the fuller enjoyment of the evening. Logs of gene 
 rous proportions were heaped in great quantities upon 
 the fire ; which soon flared up and illumined the trunks 
 of the surrounding pines, and deepened into inkiness the 
 shadows playing among and above them. Then Sutcliff 
 passed a small flask of some choice spirits around, and 
 I my refilled cigar-case. 
 
 For an hour or more the conversation was of a light, 
 bantering nature, in which the younger Ferral, Ballard 
 and Sutcliff, again his normal self, particularly excelled, 
 though we all dipped an oar occasionally. Gradually, 
 however, the various threads focused themselves almost 
 as if guided by some unseen hand, and, of all subjects 
 for discussion in a mountain camp, it settled upon psy 
 chology. Psychology? Well, no. Psychology is a 
 science, to be discussed in a scientific way. Our dis 
 cussion bordered more on a medley as very few of us 
 
 61
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 had given the subject even the most cursory attention, 
 and would have found no mention here but for the fact 
 that it led up to the one event of the evening which had 
 relation to our tale. 
 
 For a few moments it was without order or sequence, 
 each relating his ideas, beliefs, and experiences as 
 suited him best. Then by a direct question Sutcliff un 
 consciously restored a semblance of order. 
 
 "What do you know of the soul, Roger?" he asked 
 during a pause in the conversation, and with a smile 
 of skepticism upon his lips. 
 
 For some reason Waring was looked upon by all 
 present as an authority on the subject, possibly because 
 of the fervor with which he had championed the cause. 
 
 For a moment it looked as if the gathering was 
 doomed to disappointment. 
 
 " But very little, to be frank," he replied rather curtly, 
 a little offended I thought at our friend s brusquerie 
 and evident unbelief. 
 
 " Nevertheless," interrupted Len Ferral with a quiet 
 diplomacy, "you are not so soulless but that you feel 
 you have a soul." 
 
 : That s just it," Waring was moved to answer with 
 a smile. " And feeling that way I have given the matter 
 some thought and hold certain theories in consequence." 
 
 " Come, then, let s hear them," again suggested Len, 
 settling himself more comfortably for the better enjoy 
 ment of the impending discourse. 
 
 " Well, I don t mind, I m sure." 
 
 Then after a moment s thought: 
 
 " You all believe in the Atomic Theory of course ?" 
 
 We all did, judging from the general affirmation ex 
 pressed. 
 
 62
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " In that admission, and irrespective of whether the 
 atom be divisible or not, you are conceding the first pre 
 mise of my stand, namely, the existence of matter in 
 a form, or series of forms rather, other than that to 
 which we are ordinarily accustomed to. For my firm 
 belief is that soul is but an emanation of matter, mat 
 ter of a nature so fine as to be invisible to the human 
 eye. Now, let us not forget that the moment we admit 
 of this belief we are leaving the purely abstract behind 
 and have entered the realm of the concrete. For matter 
 is matter in whatever form we find it, and concrete. 
 
 " I will go a step further. Not only do I believe the 
 soul, coupled, remember, always to spirit of course, the 
 incomprehensible, God-given spark, the highest quality 
 of the triune man, to be etherealized matter, but that that 
 matter is ceaselessly etherealizing further ; that it retains 
 the human form, and ." 
 
 " Why that ? " here interrupted Sutcliff. 
 
 " Because throughout the realm of nature I recognize 
 a continuity of purpose. Man s form is not the result of 
 chance but the result of law. Nor does the purpose of 
 his creating end with death." 
 
 " What makes you think that? " 
 
 "An appeal to my common sense. Step out into the open 
 of that meadow yonder and let the stars answer you. 
 Standing there and looking upward, can you for a mo 
 ment doubt but that their grand mystery will some day 
 stand revealed to you and me and all the world ; and more 
 particularly to the ardent soul panting for its wisdom? 
 I for one have a greater faith in God." 
 
 " But matter has weight," suggested Sutcliff, giving 
 the argument a slight turn. 
 
 "And so has the soul, so has of necessity everything 
 
 63
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 that is created. Did I not just say that we have entered 
 the field of the concrete? Those very atoms if they ex 
 ist at all are as subject to weight as any of these 
 mountains by which we are surrounded." 
 
 " Do you mean us to understand that the soul can be 
 weighed ? " asked the younger Ferral in open wonder. 
 
 " I do, the means once provided. And let the won 
 der be not that it weighs so little but that it weighs so 
 much. Do not forget that it is not so very long ago 
 that the idea of weighing the elements was scoffed at. 
 Yet not only is this done to-day but an even more im 
 ponderable fluid is being meted and curbed, namely 
 electricity." 
 
 " The thing sounds absurd just the same," remarked 
 Ballard. 
 
 " Only in view of our present means and knowledge. 
 Once the existence of the soul is more universally, and 
 I may add more intelligently, acknowledged, and the 
 attention of mankind becomes more centred upon the 
 subject, I have every faith in the world that the thing 
 will not only be found possible but that it will be done. 
 The great trouble is, we let our senses too often play us 
 false. We forget that they are limited in their ca 
 pacities. We forget that everything mundane is com 
 parative, no matter what it is. That is an unchange 
 able characteristic of the finite. We forget if we 
 think at all, that there is but one absolute point in all 
 the world, one superlative in all the Universe, God him 
 self. Stop to reason. What means an inch, a foot, a mile, 
 in distance that has no end ? What an hour, a day, a year, 
 in an eternity? These are all arbitrary terms born of man 
 and his needs. And what possible conception of size 
 and weight can we have in the face of the fact that as 
 
 64
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 small a thing as a flea stands intermediate between the 
 largest and the smallest known of animal life? Ab 
 solutely nothing. Just so in this matter. The animal- 
 culae brought to light by the use of the microscope, and 
 of which it takes, Heaven only knows, how many to 
 make a point discernible to the naked eye, have weight 
 just the same as has yonder Butte, though both are be 
 yond our present means of intelligent weighing." 
 
 " Do you know," I interrupted, carried away by the 
 plausibility of Waring s argument, and for the moment 
 obtaining a fleeting glimpse of even greater possibilities, 
 " that this may mean that the future could to some ex 
 tent be foretold ? " 
 
 The Universe is as God made it, not as it may seem 
 to us. As I have said, He is the one superlative point, 
 and views all existence at a glance. He is all-permeat 
 ing, all-embracing. For Him there is no future, as there 
 is no past ; there is only, as Lytton has said, "an ever- 
 present now" I leave it to your good sense to say 
 whose is the truer view ; man s, lost in the shadows of 
 earth, or His, from the pinnacle overlooking all life? 
 whose the more comprehensive estimate, ours, lying, 
 we feel, so much nearer the great Fountain-head of 
 Wisdom, or the barbarian s, on the lowest round of the 
 human ladder? " 
 
 There was profound silence. 
 
 " What then are we to understand by the term 
 future ? " at last asked Ferral the elder. 
 
 " I do not go far astray, I think, in saying that the 
 popular idea and acceptance of the word is the unformed 
 in nature. My conception is somewhat different. The 
 future to me is simply that portion of Creation, and in 
 the use of this word I include the entire Universe, the 
 
 65
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 ordained field of man, not yet within the pales of the 
 knowledge of the individual. The moment any portion 
 of this unknown world comes within the range of our 
 understanding, it becomes what is known to us as the 
 present, the past, and a fact. Now, the future, that is 
 our future, is as much a fact to God and, in proportion, 
 to the higher intelligences as the present is to us. For 
 as we grow up in the various spheres of life, we become 
 more and more Godlike; and as we become more and 
 more Godlike we find that we have somehow absorbed 
 more and more of the attributes of the Most High; 
 among others these of all-permeation and the all-encom 
 passing. And the fact remains that while we are so 
 journing here, all the spirits who have for ages past 
 gone before are, each according to his understanding, 
 enjoying the light of His presence at this very moment; 
 proving, I hold, that, while not a part of our present, 
 there is a general present of which this life is 
 part, and, which is because of this connection if for no 
 other reason, a fact. You understand? And it 
 is, let me add, in every way as natural a life, and lies 
 as much within the domain of natural law as any part 
 of that life now within our grasp. The rugged peak 
 that for ages raised its height in an unknown land 
 existed none the less to the world at large because for 
 a time it lay beyond the human ken." 
 
 "Why then are the lines so absolutely drawn?" 
 queried Sutcliff after another pause. 
 
 "Are they? That is a mooted question with me. I 
 believe it rather a matter dependent upon the individual 
 choice. If the light shines for you, and you persist in 
 turning your back upon it, whether from ignorance or 
 willfulness, whose fault is it that you see not the splendor 
 
 66
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 of the sun. God courts investigation; he does not pro 
 trude his secrets upon us. It is our spirit of skepticism 
 that proves the obstruction always. We look too much 
 to the past and too little to the future." 
 
 " We are to infer, I take it, that the line of demarca 
 tion you allude to is that between the seen and the un 
 seen at death, in short?" asked Faggerty with a ju 
 dicial air, turning to Sutcliff. 
 
 "Assuredly." 
 
 " That is but the limit of your senses, the line of those 
 who have eyes yet see not, and have ears and yet hear 
 not, " resumed Waring. " Believe me, to the spiritually 
 inclined the line is much more elastic, varying each day 
 in fact with the wisdom gained. Intelligence and love 
 mark the boundary. Faith buoys us up and on; and to 
 the beauty, to the content of heart and serenity of mind 
 born to them there is nothing on earth to compare." 
 
 " What are we to understand by the expression you 
 have just used, the higher intelligences?" 
 
 " The souls of those who have gone before. Under 
 stand my conception of heaven is not orthodox. My 
 idea is one of ceaseless development through an eter 
 nity of time, an endless perfecting with no hope of ulti 
 mate perfection. And strange, this thought is the great 
 solace of my life. For the thought that the time will 
 come, however remote at the present moment, when we 
 will have absorbed all of wisdom there is about us, is 
 abhorrent to me, and is only to be measured in its hope 
 lessness by the one of annihilation. I enjoy the thought 
 as I enjoy naught else, that there is always something to 
 learn ahead." 
 
 " But if human, why do you emphasize by calling them 
 higher? " 
 
 67
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " Because of this. The one thing patent to all on 
 earth is growth, first material, then mental and moral, 
 and lastly spiritual. The theory of evolution is based 
 upon it. We see it in the plant and animal life about 
 us. But in the body, the material that is, there is a point 
 where the development ceases and disintegration begins. 
 Not so with the mind and soul. The old adage says that 
 we are never too old to learn. Even death puts no bar. 
 Here again we have the law of continuity. Mind is the 
 kernel within the soul and is imperishable. And why? 
 Because it is the home of the spirit, that spark of living 
 fire breathed into us at birth by a loving God, the ego, 
 which as it expands requires a cloak less and less ma 
 terial." 
 
 " The thought is certainly elevating. Then you must 
 think communion with the dead possible ? " 
 
 " To some, yes ; depending upon the stage of their 
 mental, and their moral and spiritual activities, particu 
 larly the last. This has been proven beyond cavil. Why 
 not? Thought is a prepulsive force set into motion by 
 the will, which, like sound, starts the lighter waters of 
 the ether into waves, to leave an impress upon natures 
 attuned in unison, and intelligent enough to interpret 
 its meaning. I believe in affinity of mind as well as of 
 matter. I believe, that from the moment mind first 
 worked through the gross material to the point of self- 
 consciousness in man, it forms an unbroken chain 
 throughout the Universe with the present. I believe 
 that along this channel comes all of wisdom that is 
 vouchsafed us. The two points the extremes, are 
 seemingly irreconcilable owing to a great disparity; but 
 there is one point upon that chain where the difference 
 is not so marked. That point is death. There the af- 
 
 68
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 finity is closest. And that has always been the point 
 in dispute." 
 
 " What reason have you for your claim that at this 
 point the change is slightest?" asked Len Ferral, 
 poking a burning log absent-mindedly with his heel, 
 and starting a glorious shower of sparks far up among 
 the interlacing branches. 
 
 " Is the change greatest in you between the hours of 
 retiring at night and your awakening in the morning, 
 or between the days of your childhood and old age? I 
 repeat, I have faith in the Law of Continuity. I can 
 not believe that the change wrought by a moment of 
 time even though that moment marks the transition 
 we call death, is so radical as to rob us of all means 
 of communicating with those we love on the opposite 
 bank of the Styx. Growth is comparatively slow, as is 
 apparent everywhere. We find no radical deviation 
 anywhere in nature. I maintain, that our means of com 
 munication only have been changed; that instead of the 
 organs of speech and hearing, and our sense of touch, 
 we are forced to the use of other and higher means, 
 less understood and, therefore, more liable to misap 
 prehension. The means are there, however, and the 
 gulf is to be bridged." 
 
 "And the means are ? " 
 
 " The use of the higher senses. Man, you know, is 
 here endowed with the physical or objective senses, 
 supposed to be five in number. I say supposed, be 
 cause it is a matter of dispute whether man is not pos 
 sessed of more. Personally I believe, he is, but they are 
 not purely objective. We may well call them the 
 Transitional. The function of the physical sense is to 
 receive and convey to the mind the suggestions and im- 
 
 69
 
 The Lost Mine or the Mono. 
 
 pressions of the outer world. Now, I have endeavored 
 to make plain that the absorption of the wisdom stored 
 throughout the Universe is progressive, just as it is 
 here on earth ; and for the absorption of these higher 
 truths, which is wisdom, and for the intelligent under 
 standing of this higher life, the soul is equipped with 
 senses peculiarly its own. We have them here with us 
 in the so-called subconscious faculties. We are aware 
 of their existence in a way, but hardly as actualities. 
 Nevertheless, they are. The faculty of perception which 
 permits you to see the truth or fallacy of a proposition 
 is as much a fact as is the sense which permits you to 
 distinguish form and color. It is the corresponding 
 sense of the soul. In its highest development it is but 
 a step removed from what is known in common par 
 lance as "second sight " or clairvoyance. Then there is 
 that supersensitive sense of hearing known as clair- 
 audience. And who of us at some time or other has 
 not heard of or met with the high-strung nature lhat 
 feels the approach of friend or foe some time before the 
 actual appearance? These are simply so many words 
 sent along the wires I speak of as possible of establish 
 ment. Life is complex. We do not weigh gold as we 
 do iron, nor diamonds as we do clay. We change our 
 method to accord with what we have to do. Just so 
 must we do throughout life. The finer the truth to be 
 received, the finer must be the instrument to receive it." 
 
 " But how are we to go to work ? That is the next 
 question." 
 
 " We must first of all learn to acquire a faith in man s 
 higher destiny. We must turn toward the light. We 
 must rid ourselves of that hardness that marks the man 
 of little faith. We must go commune with nature so 
 
 70
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 that her magic influence may work its charm. We 
 must at times at least turn away from the things of 
 earth to those on higher planes, to things spiritual. We 
 must seek out the beauty which everywhere prevails. 
 We must do everything which we feel will conduce to 
 our moral elevation. We must do God s bidding in all 
 things, be they large or small, and at all times ; which 
 simply means, as Christ taught, do your duty. Let us 
 not go to church but two hours a week, but let us bask 
 in His presence and that of higher things twenty-four in 
 the day." 
 
 " But, man, are we to become hermits out and out ? " 
 laughed the younger Ferral. 
 
 " Not at all. Nor does anything I have said imply 
 this. I say, enjoy yourselves here upon earth by every 
 legitimate means at your command. That is God s wish 
 or else he had not put you here and filled the earth 
 with beauty. But let it be legitimate, by which I mean 
 in accordance with the Higher Law. And believe me 
 that in following out this course you are only preparing 
 yourselves for a fuller appreciation of this earth life. 
 Virtue is its own reward always. Any apparent in 
 congruity lies simply in the trouble with so many of 
 us, a want of balance. We are always at the one ex 
 treme or the other. The man of business has no time 
 but for the chase of the almighty dollar; the man of 
 leisure none but for the realization of his dreams of 
 pleasure. There is no sphericity. If we would but pre 
 face the day with a thought to consequences, we and 
 the world would be much better. Less of wrong would 
 prevail, and less of remorse. And our lives would round 
 out in the process."
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 "And what is your idea of the nature of this life ? " 
 asked Len after a short pause. 
 
 That it is one of sensation just as much as is 
 this, a strict continuance of it in fact, but with all of 
 blatant evil and wrong eliminated. Recall to mind each 
 of you the moment of your keenest pleasure I am 
 sadly mistaking if you do not find it to have been one 
 of mental or moral elation, and let that mark for you 
 the ebb of the possibilities of the life beyond death. You 
 have but to desire it for you to follow there any trend 
 toward the light of your moral or mental nature. Our 
 every aspiration toward the ideal remains the same. If 
 you find pleasure here in the pursuance of a branch of 
 art, it will remain with you to continue that pleasure in 
 definitely and only intensified unnumbered times, in the 
 world to come. If you admire the grace pictured in the 
 human form, that appreciation will not be denied you 
 either. With the lust of earth cut out, the emotion with 
 which you will approach the subject will be chastened 
 into one bordering on reverence ; the emotion Heine can 
 be conceived to have felt when he rested a reverent 
 hand on budding womanhood and was inspired to write, 
 Thou art like a flower. Perversion there is impos 
 sible. That is due to the double polarity of life on 
 earth." 
 
 " What on earth do you mean ? " 
 
 This. Who of us at some moment or other has not 
 felt that two natures possess him? the one, the evil, 
 tying him to earth and its grovelling; the other, the 
 good, prompting him on to better things, and whisper 
 ing of the limitless possibilities within him? That is 
 what I mean. I hold that the body is a battery charged 
 in some way, and attracted and influenced by the other 
 
 72
 
 TTie Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 and greater batteries about him in things material, and 
 that the soul is another and finer instrument, attracting 
 through the sentiments to the higher order of things. 
 Between these contending forces we vacillate; what we 
 know as duty calling us upon the one side ; that more at 
 tractive siren, inclination, beckoning on the other. Per 
 version is the consequence. And in this dual nature of 
 our lives I plainly see the dove-tailing which connects 
 our life upon earth with that beyond our present sphere, 
 really, I believe, one and the same. At death we sever 
 the earthly circuit; its bonds no longer attract us except 
 ing in so far as the soul wills, and our thoughts and de 
 sires forever turn upward and heavenward. 
 
 " Now, understand me when I speak of the severance 
 of the ties of earth I mean the ties material. The bond 
 of love binding soul to soul, whether inhabiting the body 
 or out of it, still holds, for that is a tie supernal. 
 You have heard about true marriages being made in 
 heaven ? Well, here is where they come in. But such 
 bonds are not necessarily those existing between sweet 
 hearts, or man and wife. The love of a parent for a child, 
 or the child for its parent ; or the love of a brother for his 
 sister, or a sister for a brother, all are as cogent. These 
 are simply so many variations, eddies you might liken 
 them to, upon the bosom of that great current, Love, 
 which makes the Universe one grand whole, and along 
 which kindred minds may hold intercourse, no matter 
 what distance lies between. 
 
 " In conclusion let me say that this is but a mere out 
 line I am giving you. There are many little incidental 
 byplays which go to modify the conditions I am essay 
 ing to describe for you, just as in our daily life much 
 happens to disturb the even tenor of the ordained course. 
 
 73
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 But they prove a bar to the novice only; the adept 
 brushes them aside and bares the string, so that the mel 
 ody he would play rings out to the world pure and clear." 
 
 He paused. 
 
 " It certainly is a wonderful life, this of ours," com 
 mented Len with a sigh, settling himself to greater com 
 fort against the bole of the pine against which he re 
 clined. 
 
 " There is another mode of communication open to 
 those less sensitively organized, " Waring continued a 
 moment later. " I mean that of the trance. The medium 
 enters at will into a trance state during which the soul 
 withdraws, and the spirit or control from beyond the 
 borderland desirous of communicating with earth takes 
 possession of the thus temporarily-vacated body, and 
 through the use of the everyday organ of speech makes 
 his or her wishes known. It is quite a common means." 
 
 " So I understand. But tied down to the ranch as I 
 am, opportunity has never been offered me to investi 
 gate upon my own account," said Len, who seemed 
 greatly interested in the discussion. 
 
 " It is an unsatisfactory means, I should say," I inter 
 rupted, " since the medium, as I am told, carries away 
 no impressions of the after life." 
 
 " True. Or they are, at least, very dreamlike. But, 
 by way of analogy, what impression of life as we see it 
 can a babe be supposed to carry with it after a so 
 journ here of an hour or less? It takes time for im 
 pressions to grow to the point of retention." 
 
 " Impressions are instantaneous." 
 
 " They are comprehensible only where order exists. 
 And order exists only in the mind capable of understand 
 ing the principles underlying the life of which those im 
 pressions are a part." 
 
 74
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " But you seem to forget that there is still a differ 
 ence," laughed the younger Ferral. " We are not babes." 
 
 Waring laughed. 
 
 " What did I attempt to impress upon you earlier in 
 my argument? That things mundane are comparative 
 only. The mentally matured stage upon earth is the in 
 fantile in the world to come." 
 
 " Have you had experience along these lines ? " asked 
 the half-breed, interested. 
 
 " I have," returned Waring simply. " Several times 
 I have been more than ordinarily successful in results 
 while acting the role of a medium." 
 
 "And here I ve been chumming with you for years 
 without the least intimation that your inclinations ran 
 toward this outlandish channel, Roger," said Sutcliff, 
 with serious mien, eyeing our friend comprehensively. 
 
 " It is a phase of my life I say but very little about, 
 knowing the popular prejudice. That nearest the heart 
 of man is generally more or less in the nature of a re 
 ligion, and is not to be bared to the jeering eyes of the 
 crowd." 
 
 " I understand," I returned. " You might then have 
 scruples against a semi-public display of your powers. 
 I was about to suggest a seance in camp. The con 
 ditions are certainly all you could wish." 
 
 Waring hesitated, and for a moment it appeared that 
 a refusal was in order. But all were in favor of the 
 project, one half for the diversion it would bring, the 
 more serious-minded hoping for a successful issue of 
 the experiment. Waring succumbed. 
 
 By a motion he requested the hand of his nearest 
 neighbor on both his right and left, by a further signal 
 signing the others to complete the chain thus begun. 
 
 75
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 So we formed a ring about the fire, which had con 
 siderably abated from its first fiery fury. Even the 
 half-breed was persuaded to join, though somewhat 
 against his will. 
 
 As I have said, one half had entered into the game 
 for the fun that was to ensue, and with the spirit of 
 mischief uppermost, and this spirit manifested itself 
 quite freely in the earlier stages of the experiment. But 
 soon the serious portion of us affected it, and a hush 
 of expectancy fell upon all. For a few moments no 
 result followed, and we were nerving ourselves for 
 the disappointment to come when a slight, involuntary 
 twitching passed from the one to the other of us. It 
 was very like a light battery shock. Others in quick 
 succession followed. Turning my eyes curiously upon 
 Waring I found his closed, and the muscles of his face 
 working convulsively. 
 
 Suddenly he cast the hands he was holding from him 
 with an unintentional violence, rose quickly to his feet, 
 and, with head erect and hand moving in imposing ges 
 ture, two traits wholly foreign to him, he poured 
 forth in stentorian tones, and in a language unknown 
 to me, a volume of excoriating invective upon the half- 
 breed. For several minutes this continued, each moment 
 growing in dramatic power, the entire party of us firing 
 with the terrible strength manifested in tone and move 
 ment. Then he suddenly ceased, trembled spasmodi 
 cally, and then slowly opened his eyes like one just 
 awakening from sleep. 
 
 " If you can make sense of that," he remarked quietly, 
 pressing his eyelids with his finger-tips as he settled 
 back to the normal man, "you can do more than I can." 
 
 There was a surprised silence for several minutes; 
 
 76
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 for with whatever thought we had each approached the 
 incident which had just closed so strangely and unex 
 pectedly, there now prevailed but one feeling, and that 
 was an unshaken faith in the genuineness of it all. 
 
 As usual it was Sutcliff who was the first to speak. 
 
 " It is a lingo beyond me," he remarked with a shrug 
 of the shoulder. 
 
 "And me," assented the younger Ferral. 
 
 " What did you make of it, Faggerty ? " asked War 
 ing, turning to the frowzled herder of the Ferrals. 
 
 Squatted by the fire, his knees in close proximity to 
 his bearded chin, his fingers tightly interlocked about 
 his ankles, and his eyes in thought upon the fire, Faggerty 
 was smoking with more than his usual assiduity. His 
 ideas of life had just been disturbed by the related inci 
 dent to their very foundations. For forty years he had 
 laughed to scorn all thoughts of a life beyond this; had 
 worshipped with much parade at the shrine of the ma 
 terial, and more particularly at the shrines of two gods 
 of his own erecting, Burns and Ingersoll. For like so 
 many of the thoughtless he had caught but the super 
 ficial, and had failed to discern the deep spirituality 
 breathing in the works of at least the former ; it being 
 a restriction of nature that a man can grasp but so much 
 of another s nature as he himself possesses and can re 
 spond to. For the first time since their installation they 
 trembled upon their pedestals. He smoked on oblivious 
 of the question that had been put to him. 
 
 But a repetition of the appeal awoke him to his sur 
 roundings. 
 
 " Indian." he answered laconically. 
 
 I learnt on later inquiry that Faggerty had spent many 
 years in the mountains, and mingling much with the 
 
 77
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Indians on the Fork as well as elsewhere, he had come 
 to be master of their language to quite an extent. 
 
 " Indian ? " we echoed incredulously. 
 
 " Mono," he affirmed with a shake of the head. 
 
 " I just caught enough, boys, of the pesky palaver to 
 satisfy me that I am right," he explained a moment later. 
 "It was something about a murder committed in these 
 mountains years ago. But, here; where is the half- 
 breed? Ask him; he should know." 
 
 We turned in a body to the point in the circle where a 
 moment before our unwelcome guest had stood. 
 
 But to our amazement Joe was gone.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 WE CUMB TO THE BUTTE. 
 
 WHEN I awoke the next morning it was to find my 
 ears assailed by a fearful volley of oaths, punctuated at 
 intervals by another sound, the nature of which in my 
 then half-stupefied state of mind I failed to recognize. 
 Raising my head I found the day just breaking and a 
 hush upon the dusky forest that is simply indescribable. 
 Excepting the profaning ones mentioned not a sound 
 broke in upon the silence but the faint, distant roar of the 
 Black Laurel, which filled all the Basin and yet seemed 
 in no wise to impinge upon the stillness. I found, too, 
 a bright fire burning where only the red embers of our 
 campfire had lain on retiring the night before, and that 
 the younger Ferral was up and around. More; I found 
 that the string of expletives came from him, and that 
 he was most oddly occupied in kicking the only coffee 
 pot the camp boasted of possessing about its precincts. 
 
 "Hello, there, Sam Ferral," I heard Sutcliff shout 
 from his blankets, intuitively recognizing the danger 
 threatening his camp-conveniences, and assuming an ex 
 cited sitting posture, " are you gone demented ? " 
 
 The interruption was most timely. With one last 
 swing of the foot which happily missed its mark, 
 
 79
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Ferral paused, picked up the object of his assaults, held 
 it up on a level with his eye, and burst into a laugh. 
 
 " What a fool man is at best," was his philosophic 
 comment. 
 
 " What on earth was the matter, Sam ?" asked Sut- 
 cliff, as he now leisurely drew on his boots. 
 
 "Matter?" with a slight return of his ire. "Why 
 the cussed thing toppled over just as the water was at 
 the point of boiling. Matter enough that, eh ? " 
 
 " But say, Sam," spoke up Waring with an exasper 
 ating sangfroid from another part of camp, where he 
 lay snuggled cosily in his bed-clothes, " I m surprised 
 at you, to say the least. A man with your experience 
 ought to have known better than to set a pot on the apex 
 of a pyramid of burning sticks." 
 
 " Too true," retorted the other. " But do we always 
 profit by experience? Do we not in fact tempt fate at 
 every turn? Does the singed moth forever shun the 
 candle? Nay, are you not a living example to the con 
 trary yourself? But a short year ago I remember Miss 
 Rivers giving you the go-by, when you were heart 
 broken, and lost flesh; and here on your return from 
 your last term at college we find you as deeply enmeshed 
 as ever." 
 
 There was a hearty laugh at Waring s expense at this. 
 For where ordinarily reticent about matters affecting 
 his heart, in an unguarded moment he had let slip 
 enough of a strange infatuation that possessed him for 
 a pretty face and form he had had a passing glimpse 
 of on a crowded street of the City for the boys to build 
 surmises on that came perilously near the truth. 
 
 " That was a great idea of Waring s though," inter 
 rupted Len Ferral composedly from the warmth of his 
 
 80
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 blankets some moments later, his fingers interlocked be 
 neath his head. " I mean that of returning for another 
 course. He ll be a civil engineer of note some of these 
 days, mark my word." 
 
 " He ll never be a civil engineer in God s green world," 
 affirmed Sutcliff, placing the refilled coffee-pot by the 
 fire. " He s too uncivil by half. You ve never had him 
 lay it out to you like a Dutch uncle as I have time and 
 again or you had not erred so profoundly." 
 
 "But it was always with good and sufficient reason, 
 you will have to allow," laughed Waring. 
 
 " Allow hell !" 
 
 The thing is," I now interrupted, straining my eyes 
 to descry if possible the bird across the meadow which 
 had a moment before suddenly thrilled the morning quiet 
 with a strain of liquid music, " the thing was in the 
 carrying out of your idea, Roger. We all have our mo 
 ments of inspiration, but how few of us ever put into 
 practice or execution the brilliant suggestions which 
 sometimes attend such moments." 
 
 " I ve an idea," broke in Sutcliff as he deftly turned 
 a flap-jack over the fire, " that it is time to rise and get 
 ready for breakfast an idea, while not brilliant, I hope 
 to see you put into execution." 
 
 With a laugh we arose and lounged over the fire to 
 warm ourselves, watching with pleased eyes the pre 
 parations for breakfast. 
 
 " Come, you ll find soap and towel down by the creek. 
 Off." 
 
 " This," I remarked a moment later, again hanging 
 over the fire, for the air was sharp at that early hour, 
 and rubbing my hands up and down my trousers legs in 
 my enjoyment, " this is living. Somehow we folks of 
 
 81
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 the City hug an idea that the country simply vegetates, 
 where the truth is that you get the very cream of life. 
 Now, yonder tints of the rising sun upon the mountain, 
 are they not enough to please the eye of the most ex 
 acting? It is simply grand, with that dark stretch of 
 slumbering forest at its foot." 
 
 "And is there not a charm unspeakable," interrupted 
 the irrepressible Sutcliff, buttering his pan for another 
 cake, "even in Ballard s snoring, which one can well 
 imagine would be lost under other surroundings, say a 
 room ten by twelve? Hey there, Craigie, arise in your 
 might and glory and come to grub." 
 
 Ballard now appeared yawning cavernously, with hair 
 unkempt and eyes half closed. The temptation to dally 
 over the fire was not to be withstood, and for some mo 
 ments, with palms open to the blaze and legs outstretched, 
 he dodged the rising smoke, now wafted to every point 
 of the compass in turn by a rising breeze from the Gap. 
 Being persuaded to perform his morning s ablutions too, 
 he soon returned, when we all sat down to breakfast. 
 
 The sun was just coming into view as we finished. 
 Then Waring and myself went out into the meadow to 
 re-stake the horses, leaving Ballard to the tender mercies 
 of Sutcliff and the younger Ferral, who remained behind 
 to "clean up camp." On our return we found all in read 
 iness for the start. A lunch of bread and canned meats 
 had been prepared by the thoughtful Silas, and the 
 question now up for decison was that of the distribution 
 of arms. This, however, was a matter quickly settled. 
 
 " I will take my Winchester," said SutclifF as he 
 strapped his cartridge-belt about him and sheathed the 
 bowie he was never found without ; "a deer might show 
 up, or, who knows, a bear. By-the-way, Ballard, have 
 
 82
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 you ever seen a grizzly or cinnamon in all his forest glory, 
 feeding, say, in a manzanita-thicket, or demoralizing an 
 ant-nest? No? Well, dog on me, if we don t give you 
 the chance before you return to the stultifying influences 
 of that cesspool of iniquity, the City. You just follow 
 us some day; eh, Waring? We will very likely have the 
 opportunity of showing you some of the footprints he 
 leaves on the sands of time, if not a sight of old bruin 
 himself, before the day is over. I once came upon one 
 that measured fourteen inches across, and the big toe 
 was off too. Say, talk about sport ! If a good bear-hunt 
 don t take the cake I give it up. Of all the boys about, 
 I think Morrow the coolest thing at the business. Here 
 one morning three years ago he fell in unexpectedly 
 with a whole family in a tamarack-grown gulch under 
 the Pin-Cushion. Instead of taking to his heels as any 
 ordinary man would have done, and I for one would not 
 have blamed him were it not for the suicide of the move, 
 Jack gave a whistle of surprise and then began to pump 
 his Winchester like the very Nick, until the old she-bear 
 and the two yearlings were done for, and the old he-one 
 had taken to the brush. That was a morning s sport for 
 you. Carpenter just delights in telling the story." 
 
 Ballard and I took the rifles we had brought with us; 
 Silas, the old Sharp, and I have no doubt the full com 
 plement of ammunition which the evening before had been 
 the subject of so much ironical remark. In addition to 
 the large Colt s revolver he always carried, Waring con 
 tented himself with the little twenty-two, as it was light 
 and he hoped to fall in with a covey or two of mountain 
 quail or possibly a grouse up on the mountain. 
 
 Faggerty had some time before departed into the forest 
 to intercept his band, which he knew would break camp 
 
 83
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 early and work up in our direction, we could in fact at 
 the moment hear the distant tinkling of the leaders bells, 
 and we had but to bid adieu to our friends, the Ferrals, 
 when we stood ready for the start. 
 
 The choice of route we left to Sutcliff, and he now led 
 straight for the mountain. This necessitated a descent 
 of perhaps half-a-mile into a shadowy canyon, in whose 
 depths we crossed a stream, the banks of which were 
 dense with a vegetation almost tropical in its luxuriance. 
 Then our ascent began. It was gradual enough at first, 
 lying through an open forest scattered with low-lying 
 thickets of snow-brush, above which the trunks of the 
 pines arose in innumerable columns in support of the 
 sun-kissed canopy overhead. 
 
 We moved slowly, Ballard and myself a little in the 
 lead, yet taking our pace from Sutcliff and Waring, who 
 were better acquainted with the arduous nature of the 
 work ahead and were guiding us accordingly. 
 
 We had barely travelled a mile when Ballard came to 
 a sudden halt. 
 
 " See there," he whispered hoarsely, turning and point 
 ing up the mountain-side. 
 
 A fine buck was browsing amongst the brush barely a 
 hundred paces from where we stood. He was as yet un 
 aware of our advent upon the scene for our approach had 
 been quiet, and what little air was astir came more from 
 our right and wafted all scent of our presence away. 
 
 Sutcliff s eyes sparkled at the sight and his fingers 
 twitched nervously about the guard of his rifle. But he 
 was too much the sportsman not to consider the shot as 
 individually Ballard s and he now whispered him : 
 
 " Here s the chance of your life, Craig. Take a good 
 aim, not too long, mind you, fire, and he is yours. Dog 
 
 84
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 on me if there isn t the finest antlers I ve seen in years." 
 
 Ballard turned and raised his rifle. But what was it 
 that so suddenly possessed him? His frame began to 
 tremble as in a fit of ague, and the muzzle of his weapon 
 vacillated in a manner that was remarkable if nothing 
 more. Try as he would he seemed unable to regain con 
 trol of himself. Finally in sheer despair he grounded his 
 rifle and turned to Sutcliff with features ashy pale, and 
 with the perspiration exuding from every pore. 
 
 " For Heaven s sake," he cried in desperation, "you 
 shoot, Sutcliff." 
 
 But Sutcliff was in the midst of a spasm of uncontrol 
 lable laughter, and before he could recover himself suffi 
 ciently to follow the request the buck had taken the alarm 
 and was bounding away over the brush and through the 
 woods at his best speed, so that the parting shot he gave 
 him, while a good one, had no other effect than that of ac 
 celerating his departure. 
 
 Sutcliff now seated himself upon a rock and, with rifle 
 across his knees, indulged in another fit of laughing, a fit 
 so prolonged and hearty that from ashen-pale Ballard s 
 face turned a shame-faced red. 
 
 " What the devil was the matter," inquired the poor 
 fellow. " I swear I never felt that way before." 
 
 " No, no ; I guess not," laughed Sutcliff, stamping his 
 foot in his glee, " no, I guess not. Why? Because you 
 never met a buck before among his natural surroundings, 
 boy. Dog on me if I ve had as much fun in a year ! No, 
 no, Craigie. If ever you return to that centre of fraud 
 and machination, the City, tell the inquiring public that 
 among the ailments of your younger days you once had 
 a touch of buck-ague." 
 
 We resumed our way. At the distance of about three 
 
 85 f
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 miles from our point of starting the trail grew steep and 
 rugged. The straight reddish-purple trunks of the sugar- 
 pines and the brownish-grey of the firs, between which 
 we had many charming foregrounds presented us in the 
 sappy greens of the low deciduous growth, still retained 
 their magnificent proportions, but the ground was more 
 broken, the streams sang in sharper keys, and tumbled 
 boulders began to strew the slopes at frequent intervals. 
 Wild cherry intertwined the snow-brush, and here and 
 there a phlox or lupin gave a dash of color to the green 
 tangle of fern and wild thyme growing among the rocks, 
 or carpeting the dim trail which we were pursuing. 
 
 A change in vegetation due to altitude is much more 
 quickly to be observed than when that change is due to 
 difference of latitude only. In other words, we might 
 pass over several degrees of latitude without noting the 
 differences in the flora of a country that a thousand feet 
 of altitude might bring. So, when after half-an-hour 
 more of climbing we came to another bench, an even 
 more marked change became apparent. The forest scat 
 tered, and the trees lost in size. Boulders, gray, rounded, 
 and streaked a thousand shades of tawny browns and 
 yellows by the percolation of the waters of early spring, 
 strewed our path on every side. Scrub-oak and chinka 
 pin, graced with an occasional clump of blue-brush 
 another of that extensive family the so-called California 
 lilacs choked out the more valuable underbrush of the 
 lower levels. 
 
 Here I noticed for the first time that our little party 
 had been deserted by Silas, how far back on the trail I 
 had no way of telling. It proved, however, as I made 
 the desertion known, a matter of unconcern to both War 
 ing and Sutcliff, who were better acquainted with the 
 ways of this human oddity. 
 
 86
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " Don t waste a thought upon him," was Waring s lone 
 comment, as he was about to resume the trail. " He is 
 no tenderfoot." 
 
 Here, too, a moment later Sutcliff came upon the signs 
 of a doe, and while he and Ballard went reconnoitering, 
 Waring and myself continued slowly on our way. 
 
 As we skirted the side of a wooded canyon that lay a 
 thousand feet below us and re-echoed to the subdued 
 roaring of a hidden torrent, and while clambering over 
 some brush which opposed our way, Waring s mountain- 
 trained ear caught the note of alarm of a mountain-quail 
 just ahead. Signing me to silence and immobility we 
 awaited its appearance. In a moment we were greeted 
 by the sight of the mother-bird in the lead of her callow 
 brood, clucking and making as much ado as could well 
 be, the male bringing up the rear. The ground upon 
 which we stood was the disintegrated granite, very yield 
 ing beneath the feet, and I found it necessary to cling 
 with one hand to the scrub-oak in the clefts of some 
 rocks in order to maintain my balance, holding my rifle 
 with the other. In the attempt to secure a better foot 
 ing beneath him prior to picking off the male bird, the 
 stones beneath Waring s feet gave way; the mother- 
 quail gave one quick note of alarm, and while the par 
 ent-birds took swift flight, the chicks on the instant, and 
 as if by magic, disappeared in the low-lying brush. 
 
 " It is just as well so," said Waring with a sigh of 
 relief. " It was really too interesting a sight to dis 
 turb." 
 
 Then turning and pointing down the canyon he 
 said : 
 
 " It was in here that we came upon the body of old 
 Wohipa, the Indian; that is, a little higfier up, just under 
 
 87
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 that rock you see projecting there, and over which he 
 seemed to have been hurled." 
 
 We now clambered through an opening upon our 
 right, and having regained the crest once more fell in 
 with Sutcliff and Ballard, whose reconnoitering likewise 
 had been in vain. 
 
 Rock formations now became the dominant feature 
 of the landscape. Our path lay over the comparatively 
 open surface of a ridge or rib of the mountain which 
 led clean to the summit. Where the sterile soil lay in 
 sufficient depth to sustain life at all, it generally com 
 prised the oak-brush so often referred to, chinkapin, 
 and a dwarfed manzanita, thickets of which we met acres 
 in extent. Here and there a bunch-grass would sparsely 
 dot the white, blinding surface of the open stretches, 
 varied occasionally by the addition of a mariposa lily, a 
 yellow lupin, or a rose-colored fox-glove. The timber 
 scattered more and more, and its now gnarled appear 
 ance spoke eloquently of the battle for a bare existence 
 that was being waged here through the centuries with 
 the frost geni that hover about the mountain throughout 
 the year. The wind grew cold and penetrating, and 
 chilled me to the bone. And as for the silence, ever 
 growing deeper as we advanced, it here reached the point 
 of savage brooding, and its effect upon the general 
 spirits was plainly in evidence, for not even Ballard had 
 a word to say. 
 
 It was now about ten o clock, with still a thousand 
 feet and more of an ascent ahead before we could reach 
 the crest and the burning pine, then being fanned into 
 living flame and plainly visible from our point of obser 
 vation. Neither Ballard nor myself had partaken as 
 heartily of breakfast as had the others of the party be-
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 cause of ignorance of what lay before us, and of the 
 necessity that exists of laying in very often in anticipa 
 tion of an appetite as of appeasing any existing one. 
 This fact, coupled with the bracing atmosphere we were 
 inhaling and the strenuous exercise we were under 
 going, had developed in us a ravenous hunger, whose 
 incipiency we had felt already some miles in the rear. 
 We now made our wants known. 
 
 We withdrew to a copse of young fir in a depression 
 on our right where a little meadow disclosed itself, and 
 here, seated upon the brown carpet of needles, we 
 opened the lunches and fell to with the heartiest gusto. 
 A very few minutes sufficed for their disappearance, 
 when, first quaffing of an icy stream that gurgled near, 
 and where I gathered a few scarlet columbines among 
 the whitened rocks, we once more stood in readiness, 
 this time for the final spurt. 
 
 As I have said, the greater portion of our way so far 
 had been up a sinuous rib which led clear to the sum 
 mit of the mountain. But our further progress up it 
 at this point was debarred by a sudden increase in pitch 
 bordering on the perpendicular, and the interposition 
 of a rocky surface, hard and polished as a mirror. The 
 only feasible route visible from our point of view was 
 up the moraine in which we found ourselves. And 
 that, to say the least, was far from promising. It 
 seemed about equally to consist of brown brush-oak and 
 loose fragments of white granite, both of which were 
 lost in the upper reaches in drifts of glistening snow. 
 To add to the danger this debris was not made up of 
 the rounded boulders which hitherto had strewn our 
 path, but was sharply pointed and edged, just as it had 
 slid from the walls on either side when it became de- 
 
 89
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 tached through the action of the frost or some other ele 
 mental agency. The prospect was enough to dampen 
 the ardor of the best of us. 
 
 Yet strange to say such was not the effect upon us. 
 On the contrary we felt ourselves buoyed by a hope 
 we could not understand, in such utter disproportion 
 was it to the task we had in hand. 
 
 " Courage," cried Waring, springing forward, rifle 
 in hand, his voice ringing with an unwonted excitement 
 and his eyes aglow with a strange light, courage, 
 boys. We do not return until our feet have touched 
 yonder summit. Follow me: I will show you a way." 
 
 It is said that distance lends enchantment to the view. 
 How then when distance fails in its office of robing the 
 scene in gorgeous hues, as in this case, and you come 
 face to face? We found the way even worse beset than 
 we had anticipated. Every step of Waring s forward 
 I expected to be his last and a retour inevitable. But 
 strangely enough every step forward, whether to the 
 right or to the left, was ever the right one. Was he 
 being led by an unerring instinct, or by some unseen 
 hand? A thousand feet thus of the most stupendous 
 climbing, over obstacles enough to discourage the 
 boldest, and we gained the lower edge of the field of 
 snow. Here our progress again became comparatively 
 easy as it sustained our weight with ease. A few mo 
 ments more and, worn but triumphant, we stood upon 
 the highest pinnacle of the Butte. 
 
 90
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE ENCHANTED NOOK AND ITS TENANT. 
 
 UPON the summit we dropped our arms and sank ex 
 hausted upon the ground. For fully five minutes, too 
 occupied in our momentary discomfort of body, not a 
 word passed between us. 
 
 But it was not in the nature of Sutcliff to remain 
 silent long. 
 
 " Well ? " he questioned as he sat silhouetted against 
 the blue of the sky, the broad brim of his hat hugging 
 his temple, and his crimson neckerchief flying in the wind. 
 "What do you think of it? Vegetating? Well, I 
 reckon not. There s no denying one thing, however, 
 whatever other thoughts may come, and that is that it is 
 blamed hot work. But no matter. If a search of 
 health, mountain air, and scenery has brought you here, 
 my friends, behold them in exhaustless supply before 
 you." 
 
 It was indeed so. Charms the most varied, and, there 
 fore, the more indescribable, lay around us in a superb 
 panorama. Far below to the west stretched the dark 
 sea of bristling pine which that morning and the day 
 before we had traversed. Beyond, according as they 
 were near or far, the broken ridges of the foothills arose 
 
 9 1
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 in shades of smoky blue; and yet further away, the 
 smiling, straw-tinted plains veins of the palest blue 
 marking their wooded streams, stretching far to the 
 north and south; and to the west, a hundred miles as 
 the crow flies, to where a dash of the faintest gray 
 marked the hills of the Pose, the Cantua, and the two 
 Panoches. 
 
 To the east the scene was of another type and even 
 more imposing. The broad, deep canyon of the Chi- 
 quita there swept down in a dark, majestic curve to 
 where the titanic walls of the Kaiser directed it into the 
 gorge of the San Joaquin. In the haze of the further 
 distance rose the serrated peaks of the Jackass, and the 
 sublimer Minarets. But I fail most signally to describe. 
 
 The spot upon which we stood was a very wilderness 
 of granite cut into many fantastic shapes by wind and 
 weather. But little timber stood around and that little 
 was much gnarled and distorted. One of these monarchs, 
 dishevelled, and blasted years before by a lightning 
 stroke, stood in the last stages of decay. The largest 
 there, and black and grim, it was fast being consumed 
 by fire. As I watched it I saw Sutcliff beneath its 
 flaming branches reconnoitering, but I felt myself too 
 fatigued at the moment to bear him immediate company. 
 
 But a hail from him brought us instantly to our feet. 
 
 " There is something peculiar about this," he explained 
 on our approach. " This tree has been fired intentionally 
 and with the express view of attracting attention. 
 Whether ours or not I can not, of course, say ; but some 
 one s." 
 
 " What makes you conclude this ? " asked Ballard. 
 
 "A process of simple reasoning. For instance here 
 are impressions made by feet other than our own. And 
 
 92
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 note, they come from a certain point on the brow of the 
 mountain, and return as directly to it. There has been 
 no hesitation. Now, what are we to conclude from this 
 simple fact but that the party came for a fixed purpose, 
 that purpose to fire the tree, and why fire the tree if not 
 to attract attention ? " 
 
 " Your reasoning is good," returned Waring, serious 
 ness in his voice. 
 
 " The question remains, whose attention was it he 
 wished to attract ? " 
 
 " I can not say, of course. But the fact as indubitably 
 remains that he has attracted ours." 
 
 Sutcliff stood in deep thought for a moment. 
 
 " Come," he said with a sudden arousing, " there is 
 but one way out of the puzzle. Let us follow the foot 
 prints." 
 
 He shouldered his rifle and slowly followed the im 
 pressions to the eastern brow. Here he paused. 
 
 They are quite fresh," he remarked ; "made since the 
 storm." 
 
 Then he began the descent. It was by no means as 
 arduous as had been the ascent up the western slope. 
 Though nearly as steep, there seemed here more of a 
 natural pathway; often, it is true, leading over rocky 
 faces and spurs on the mountain, where the trail became 
 labyrinthine and we lost the guiding impressions for the 
 time, always, however, to come upon them again on 
 the softer ground that invariably opened up beyond. 
 
 Halfway down Sutcliff came to a sudden stop. 
 
 " Say, am I mistaking, or is there the slightest pos 
 sible film of smoke rising from that timbered bench be 
 low us ? " 
 
 We gazed intently. 
 
 93
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " You are not," spoke up Waring. " There certainly 
 is a smoke rising." 
 
 "And that glimmer of blue among the pines ? Dog 
 on me, it s a lake. There must be someone camped there. 
 Come on, boys," he now shouted, wildly bounding down 
 the declivity at the imminent risk of a broken limb, 
 followed by Ballard. Waring and myself, while quite 
 as excited, followed with greater care. In a very few 
 minutes we were at the base of the incline, and once 
 there we looked around. 
 
 It was one of the most beautiful nooks my eyes have 
 ever rested upon, comprising a flat of some six or seven 
 acres in the shape of a perfect horseshoe and over 
 shadowed by as fine a forest as ever stood, in the cool 
 of whose overhanging branches a breeze stirred into a 
 gentle and seductive life a luxuriant tangle of ferns 
 and thimbleberry. On three of its sides arose great 
 granite domes whose clefts, and the miniature canyons 
 between, also, were densely wooded with the pine, the 
 fir and the aromatic cedar. On the fourth the straight 
 side, it lost itself in an abrupt drop into the canyon 
 of the Chiquita, affording there a vista beyond of dis 
 tant peaks in gray and white that was sublime. 
 
 But what surprised us most was to find a little lake 
 gemming its bosom. 
 
 " I always suspected the existence of such a body in 
 here though from the lay of the country," said Sutcliff, 
 lost in admiration. 
 
 It was but shortly past the hour of noon, yet the 
 shadow of the mountain above us already fell across the 
 glade in slowly-lengthening points. In another half- 
 hour the entire place would lay beyond the reach of the 
 sunlight. 
 
 94
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " Jove, but it s a pretty spot," ejaculated Sutcliff. 
 " But, say, where did that smoke come from we saw 
 from above ? " 
 
 An interested search was instituted, and our surprise 
 was complete when after a short quest we came upon 
 a small log-cabin with a shake roof, an open doorway, 
 and with a pale smoke issuing from a chimney rudely 
 built of sticks and stones, at the foot of the western 
 dome, where a little stream of crystal clearness sang 
 its way over a pebbly bed. 
 
 " Is the place haunted do you think," exclaimed Sut 
 cliff lightly as he led the way to the open door, where 
 he knocked upon the sill of the threshold. 
 
 No answer came from within, but a chipmunk scur 
 ried by us with a chirp of affright and a spasmodic flip 
 of his tail. 
 
 " May we enter then ? Silence gives consent." 
 
 Without more ado he entered and we followed. All 
 was dark within. But a sunbeam entering through a 
 chink in the wall showed where an opening had been cut 
 for the double purpose of letting in the light and air. 
 This Sutcliff, the sense of mystery growing upon his 
 nerves, hurriedly opened, and by the aid of the flood 
 of sunlight that entered we looked around us. It was 
 a chamber that was not larger than ten by twelve, and 
 a fireplace, in which a cedar log lay smoldering, took 
 up one entire end. A table stood at the other, and 
 beneath it a rough bench. By the side opposite the 
 window a cot had been constructed and upon it lay a 
 man, dead, as the pallor and rigidity of his features 
 denoted. Yes, dead ; and our surprise was the greater 
 when in him I recognized my uncle, and Waring the 
 stranger he had met two years before in the Flats. 
 
 95
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 ANOTHER STRANGE EPISODE. WE RETURN TO CAMP. 
 
 " FOR God s sake let me out of here," exclaimed Sut- 
 cliff springing for the door. 
 
 As you can very well imagine it was a moment of 
 general mental paralysis, when to receive a suggestion 
 was to follow it. Mechanically, therefore, it was that 
 we followed Sutcliff, to stand for some moments in ir 
 resolution without. And various the emotions that 
 seized upon us there. Shaken in every fibre of his be 
 ing, yet holding a steady control over himself through 
 sheer exercise of will, Sutcliff moved about uneasily, 
 punctuating every few steps with a perturbed shake of 
 the head, followed uncertainly in the rear by Ballard, 
 who trembled like a mountain aspen. Waring, while 
 silent and pale was at the same time cool and composed ; 
 and myself felt a vague sense of uneasiness which had 
 several times that morning, and in varying degrees of 
 intensity, possessed me, depart and a calm, mild and 
 warming like a breath of early summer, permeate my 
 whole being. 
 
 I looked around with a sense of elation I had never 
 felt before. I seemed to see with a preternatural clear 
 ness. The shadow of the mountain enfolded the floor 
 of the glade, the crests of the domes and the pines alone 
 
 96
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 bathing in the sunlight. The stream by the side of the 
 cabin rippled softly and unendingly; the breeze of the 
 afternoon dallied with the tall ferns and the luxuriant 
 mat of thimbleberry beneath the oaks and buttonwoods on 
 its broken banks, among whose branches a lone robin 
 appeared and made the solitude of the place only the pro- 
 founder by the contrast its occasional song afforded. 
 The supreme beauty of it all touched me as I had never 
 been touched before. 
 
 Sutcliff went to the brook, and stretched at length 
 drank of its waters, followed by Ballard. 
 
 This has become the mountain of mystery, Waring," 
 he remarked on his reapproach, proffering me the goblet 
 which he had then taken from his pocket, opened and 
 filled, and which I drained to the last drop. " Old Wo- 
 lupa first, and now but it s no use talking; it simply 
 beats my time." 
 
 "And mine, too, if the truth is to be told," returned 
 Waring, passing his hand over his brows as if to restore 
 a little order to the riot of thought then reigning within. 
 
 "And what do you make of this ? " Sutcliff continued 
 a moment later with a sudden accession of interest, 
 pointing to a heap of mold which had the appearance 
 of having just been turned. 
 
 We drew nearer. I believe that for a moment Sut 
 cliff did not quite take in the full significance of the ob 
 ject, possessed as he was with the thought that it was 
 the mouth of a shaft. But its careful regularity, and 
 the thoughtful care with which the walls had been cut 
 and smoothed, impressed me at once. Tt was a newly- 
 dug grave. The pick and the shovel that had been em 
 ployed in its making stood up against the nearest cor 
 ner of the cabin. 
 
 97
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Sutcliff, with another shake of the head, turned away, 
 while Ballard mumbled a few words which I interpreted 
 to mean our immediate departure. 
 
 But Waring by this time was again master of himself. 
 
 " No," he said firmly ; "not until we have given him 
 burial. That he wanted such is plain enough, even if 
 common decency did not demand it. Now, courage and 
 follow me." 
 
 The few moments of respite had done their work of 
 at least partially restoring the general equilibrium, and we 
 now entered with an air of conviction to give the room 
 a closer scrutiny than we had found possible in that 
 first moment of bewilderment. Several cooking utensils 
 stood upon the hearth-stone and in the ashes of one cor 
 ner of the fireplace, while the rough, mud-chinked walls 
 were hung with various articles of wearing apparel, a 
 rifle, and several cheap prints in colors. Carpeting the 
 earth-floor by the cot s side lay the pelt of a great 
 mountain-lion. Upon the table stood a cup and saucer 
 just as when pushed backed after their use, a candle 
 stick with the candle burnt down to the socket, a flute, 
 some music, paper and writing materials, a diary and 
 several books. These last took Waring s immediate at 
 tention. Burke s "On the Sublime and Beautiful," 
 Locke s " On the Working of the Human Understand 
 ing," " The Unity of Truth," and Drummond s " Natu 
 ral Law" were the titles of a few, and would have given 
 some insight into the character of the man stretched 
 there upon his cot had other evidence been wanting. 
 But intuitively we that is Waring and myself, 
 seemed to read the whole story. Death to him had been 
 a welcome and expected guest, for no sign of a struggle 
 showed upon his countenance or in distortion of body. 
 
 98
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Stretched his length, with the blanket turned down at 
 the waist, he looked but for the pallor of his features 
 and the iciness of his touch as if steeped in profound 
 slumber only. His hands lay loosely interlocked upon 
 his breast as if at the last moment they had been ex 
 tended in an embrace until, nerveless, they had fallen 
 there, never to move again. His countenance wore a look 
 of unspeakable calm, an air of joy one might almost 
 say, and which, strangely enough, seemed a reflex of 
 the emotions which at the moment possessed me, standing 
 there in his dead presence. In a few words, the final 
 dissolution had been a release to a soul wearying of its 
 sojourn in its house of clay. 
 
 It took the united efforts of our party to wrap him in 
 his blanket and lower him into the grave which he had 
 prepared for himself. Then, with heads bared to the 
 heavens, and with truly none of that depression of 
 spirits which so ordinarily accompanies such ceremonies, 
 we covered him with the cool, moist earth. What a 
 strange, life-giving sensation was this of ours which 
 gave us as never before to understand that our friend, 
 and my uncle, had not died but simply gone before. 
 
 And now we come to an occurrence stranger than any 
 so far recorded. While Sutcliff and Ballard were com 
 pleting the filling in of the grave, Waring and myself 
 again re-entered the cabin, this time to inventory its 
 contents. I had taken down the rifle and had lain it 
 upon the table with several other articles, intending to 
 take them with us upon our return, and, with my thoughts 
 far removed on the strange occurrences of the day, was 
 fumbling with the diary I have mentioned when a letter 
 dropped out from between its pages. There was nothing 
 unusual of course in this, but imagine my surprise and 
 
 99
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 stupefaction when, on the point of returning it to its 
 place of keeping, I found it superscribed to Roger War 
 ing. 
 
 Yes, Roger Waring; and surprises it appeared were 
 not to cease, dated but two days before; the morning 
 in short on which we had driven forth from Shepherd s 
 Rest and not one of us could have told with certainty 
 just where the evening of that or any of the succeeding 
 days might have found us. For, as you know, we had 
 mapped out no itinerary beforehand. We had departed 
 from the ranch with no particular goal in view, and 
 most certainly with no intention of climbing this Butte, 
 yet here was a letter in a secluded nook of a mountain 
 comparatively little known addressed to one of our party, 
 and with a certain air of assurance awaiting his com 
 ing. And he had come; that was the strangest part 
 of it. And, tracing backward, by what a flimsy chain 
 of circumstances had he come? It can easily be realized 
 that the incident threw us into a chaos of thought from 
 which at the moment there seemed no extricating. 
 
 Nor was our bewilderment lessened in any degree 
 by its text, for it read as follows : 
 
 " My young friend : 
 
 " Rose, my angel wife, tells me that you and your 
 friends start this morning on a trip of pleasure for 
 the mountains. You have no fixed point in view, 
 but she will guide you to the Basin. To-morrow 
 you will enter it, and I must climb to the crest of 
 the mountain and fire the dead pine by which I am 
 to obtain your attention. When you find me 
 I will have been dead but a few hours ; yet bury me ; 
 it is her wish as well as mine to see the poor clay 
 100
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 she so loved on earth decently laid away beneath 
 the surface. 
 
 " The last duties to the dead completed, you will 
 take with you my rifle and flute, my books, my diary 
 and papers. My rifle send to my son, Walter Car- 
 rington, Pleasanton, Yolo Co. ; my books to Mrs. 
 Eve Early, Alameda; and my diary and papers to 
 Ida, Rose breathed to me that your thoughts are 
 centered in each other, and we are content. My 
 flute you will retain as a souvenir from one who 
 sought to do his duty to the world, how imperfectly, 
 the pages of my diary will tell. Read them, and 
 may you profit from the lessons they may contain. 
 
 " And now adieu. With death between, Rose and 
 I will still guide, as in life here, the hearts, the 
 minds and the fortunes of our children. 
 
 THOMAS CARRINGTON." 
 
 Were these the ravings of a mind gone mad, we 
 asked ourselves again and again. So much, on the face, 
 appeared the purest hallucination. Yet it might not well 
 be, in the face of all the testimony we had had at every 
 step of that day s strange progress. True, there was 
 much we did not understand; but is there not much on 
 the other hand, in this world we do not understand, or 
 can ever hope to understand? A perusal of the diary 
 and papers no doubt would afford us light to much that 
 was enigmatical to us now. But for that we must bide 
 our time; the present was all too short. With an effort 
 we gathered the various articles mentioned in the 
 strange missive to lay them together upon the table. 
 
 We had barely finished when Sutcliff entered, followed 
 by Ballard. 
 
 101
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " Come," he said hurriedly, "we must be off. The sun 
 is sinking fast and we have a long trail ahead." 
 
 Just then he caught sight of our strange array. 
 
 " What are you going to do with these ? " he asked. 
 
 " Take them with us in compliance with his wishes," 
 returned Waring soberly. 
 
 " Wishes," echoed Sutcliff ; "whose wishes ? " 
 
 " The dead, Carrington s uncle the man you have 
 just buried. But here, read for yourself." 
 
 Roger handed him the note, I will always maintain 
 for the moment s quiet amusement the study of our 
 friend s countenance during its perusal would afford 
 him. But if so his pleasure was short-lived, for Sut 
 cliff almost immediately began to shake his head as was 
 his way when sorely perplexed, and returned the writ 
 ing but half-read, I thought, or at least but imperfectly 
 understood. 
 
 " Here we are, Waring," he remarked in a shame 
 faced way ; "dog on me if I can make head or tail to it. 
 I repeat, it beats my time. But we can argue that out on 
 the trail ; we have no time to waste now." 
 
 We distributed the various articles amongst us with 
 the view of not overburdening any one individual. The 
 books I divided between Ballard and myself. The flute 
 Waring un jointed and thrust into the bosom of his shirt. 
 The diary he, too, retained. Sutcliff was asked to take 
 the music which Waring desired to preserve also, 
 and to relieve Waring at times of the rifle, the convey 
 ing of which in connection with our own over the rough 
 trail was in truth no small matter. Thus equipped we 
 stood ready for the return. 
 
 Loitering for a few moments, bareheaded, over the 
 grave I took one last look around. The lake lay smooth 
 
 102
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 as a mirror reflecting with a miraculous clearness the 
 environing pines, and the blue, cloudless ether overhead. 
 The spot lay by this time in complete shadow, the 
 domes alone being tipped with the gold of day. To the 
 east where the sudden shelving into the canyon of the 
 Chiquita afforded that sublime prospect, through the 
 hushed atmosphere of the afternoon, the many peaks 
 beyond arose in pale violet-grays and ochres, half hid in 
 high, imposing cloudbanks of immaculate white. It was 
 a scene to fill one with wonder and a veneration of God, 
 and I fell to conjecturing by what possible chance it was 
 the hermit had been led to choose a site surrounded by 
 such incomparable scenic beauty. 
 
 Then we started. 
 
 The ascent of course we found more fatiguing than 
 the descent of noon, and the sun was but an hour high, 
 as Sutcliff asserted, with palm open at arm s length 
 measuring between the orb and the horizon, when we 
 gained the summit. 
 
 "All s well so far, boys," he said cheerily, for a mo 
 ment pausing to regain his breath. " If by sundown we 
 reach the meadow where we lunched to-day, why, the 
 rest of the way is easy enough. Now then." 
 
 He led the way over the snow, following the footprints 
 of the morning, and our descent began in earnest. It is 
 unnecessary to go into details. Suffice it to say that 
 after a struggle of nearly an hour we gained the bench 
 below just as the sun, a glowing ball of fire, set in a 
 violet mist over the far Panoche hills. Around us, like 
 sentinels in glowing bronze, the scattered fir-groups 
 stood in the white waste of granite ; while above, in the 
 sunset fires reflected from the west, the field of snow and 
 the broken walls of the summit burnt rosily. The wind 
 
 103
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 of the day had died! away, and the air was hushed and 
 still, and full it seemed to me of secret life and promise, 
 fresh as I was from the peace and the beauty and the 
 hope of that death beyond the mountain. Again it was 
 beautiful beyond words. 
 
 A little further on, in the dimming light of encroach 
 ing night, I had the good fortune to drop a couple of 
 mountain quail, and Sutcliff made a remarkably fine shot 
 at a tree-squirrel. With these additions to our already 
 wearisome loads we continued on. It was dusk when 
 we came to the spot where we had seen the deer in the 
 morning, and thoughts of old Silas and his delinquency 
 reverted to my mind; and the moon had risen and was 
 silvering the woods as we crossed the stream at the foot 
 of the ridge upon which our camp lay and we took up 
 the final ascent. Ten minutes more and completely 
 worn after a day of the most astounding character, as 
 you can well imagine, we reached the meadow, checkered 
 with a delicate tracery of light and shadow, where our 
 animals grazed. 
 
 104
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 SUTCLIFF GIVES US EVIDENCE OF THE EXISTENCE OF THE 
 IX)ST MINE. 
 
 WE had hoped to find old Silas in possession and a 
 smoking meal awaiting us. But instead all was dark ; he 
 had not yet returned. But Sutcliff, always a man of de 
 cisive action, hastily divesting himself of his burden, gath 
 ered a handful of pine-needles and a half-dozen of the 
 long, resinous cones of the sugar-pine, and in less time 
 than it takes here to relate it had a fire blazing to cheer 
 our wearied souls. 
 
 Ballard and myself, too fatigued to stand, sank help 
 lessly upon our blankets, while Waring assisted Sut 
 cliff in the silent preparation of our simple meal. The 
 bean-pot was placed by the fire to simmer; some bacon 
 was sliced very thin and grilled to a delectable crisp 
 in the skillet, and a full pot of tea set to steep. Then 
 a fresh supply of fuel was heaped upon the fire, and, 
 with the dutch-oven containing our bread within easy 
 reach, we sat down to satisfy the cravings of the inner 
 man Sutcliff, Waring and myself, for Ballard was al 
 ready in the arms of Morpheus. 
 
 For what seemed to me an unusual period silence 
 held between us, each confined to his own thoughts. And 
 
 105
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 what wonderful food they were that evening can well 
 be imagined. But before very long, his appetite sated 
 to some extent, Sutcliff interrupted. 
 
 " Say, Carrington, when you and Ballard return to 
 the City you can without fear of being called pre 
 varicators, report having passed through the most aston 
 ishing experience that ever befell mortal in these moun 
 tains. Or perhaps it would be just as well if neither 
 of you uttered a word. For no one would believe you, 
 you know, not even that most credulous creature be 
 neath the sun, your grandmother. Nor is it to be won 
 dered at if you will but stop to consider a bit. What 
 would you think," with an amusing, cynical smile upon 
 his lips, "of the man who started to fill you with a 
 story of how he and a party of friends had started forth 
 upon a certain day for the mountains on a trip of 
 pleasure; how the next day they had entered the Basin; 
 how barely had they entered than their attention was 
 called to a mysterious fire upon the brow of the Butte; 
 and how quite as a matter of course they resolved 
 to climb the mountain? They do so; and here led by an 
 incident natural as life itself they follow the footprints 
 of a human being and come to one of the swellest little 
 nooks in all America. A lake ; trees ; a brook of pellucid 
 clearness ; a view of distant peaks ; a little cabin ; an 
 open doorway; smoke issuing from the chimney in a 
 thin flim of blue. Inside a man upon his cot, dead 
 but two or three hours ; books and papers upon a table, 
 and among them a letter, a letter addressed to one 
 of the party and awaiting his coming. He has come; 
 he opens it, to find what has come to pass foreshadowed 
 days before. It speaks to him of guardian-angels 
 plural number, Waring, one in this world and one in 
 
 106
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 the world to come. It makes requests; it bequeathes; 
 it no, no, Carrington, if you value your liberty at 
 all, keep mum or they ll corral you in some asylum for 
 the feeble-minded." 
 
 This somewhat lengthy comment was delivered with 
 such an unusual air of seriousness by our companion 
 that both Waring and myself, knowing his volatile 
 nature, laughed outright. 
 
 " That was not so bad," I remarked admiringly, re 
 membering how little credit for discernment I had given 
 him. 
 
 " This guardian-angel business," said Waring 
 thoughtfully, after a few moments of silent reflection,. 
 " is the one thing I can not understand of all this day s 
 unusual occurrences. I could understand one well 
 enough, but two ." 
 
 And he shook his head in perplexity. 
 
 " And that allusion to thoughts kindlily reciprocated. 
 Who is Ida, pray ? " 
 
 " One of the sweetest of girls, Roger ; my cousin, to 
 know whom is to love her." 
 
 " But you forget that I do not know her." 
 
 To this, of course, I could but shrug my shoulders. 
 
 "And say," continued SutclifT after still another 
 pause, and with the air of one who has had an incident 
 suddenly recalled to mind, "what do you think of this ? " 
 
 He placed his metal plate upon the ground beside him 
 to more readily take from his shirt pocket an article 
 which he handed to Waring. My^ pulses stopped their 
 beating. It was a bit of quartz, white and sparkling in 
 the moonlight with free gold in lacings of generous 
 proportions, the very counterpart of the specimen I 
 had seen in Waring s collection. 
 
 107
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 "Where on earth did you get this?" asked Roger, 
 rising precipitately and stepping to the fire for a closer 
 scrutiny. 
 
 " Over the mountain. It is the lost Mine of the 
 Mono. My blamed head has been so full of that over 
 shadowing incident of the grave that I quite forgot to 
 tell you. But while you were in the cabin the last time 
 I came upon this lying by the cabin door." 
 
 " Was there more of it ? " I inquired, as Waring re 
 sumed his seat and handed over the rock for my in 
 spection. 
 
 " Yes, quite a heap ; enough at least to make plain to 
 me that the old man was on to the lead." 
 
 Yet strangely enough the news brought no elation 
 with it. In the face of the lesson we had just been 
 taught in the life of one who so tranquilly could face 
 death as had my uncle, what were material advantages? 
 
 " No doubt," said Waring, referring back to the point 
 in Sutcliff s first interruption, " his papers will explain 
 much that is dark and a riddle to us now." 
 
 He arose as we echoed the belief and stood over the 
 fire in profound meditation for a time. Then, still in 
 reverie, he took up the flute, jointed it, and blew a few 
 rippling arpeggios. It was soft and mellifluous in tone, 
 and its music carried dreamily among the fir woods. 
 The horses for the moment ceased their grazing to 
 prick up their ears, as was evident from the sudden 
 cessation of the regular pulsation of the leader s bell ; 
 and an owl which had at uncertain intervals disturbed 
 the quiet of the night with its weird hootings, paused 
 to listen. He then played a few old and well-known 
 melodies mostly in the slower movements, and just 
 suited to the moods we were in. 
 
 1 08
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Whether owing to extraordinary qualities in the in 
 strument or that Waring found himself particularly 
 inspired, hours passed unheeded, and the mid of the 
 short summer night drew near. I remember I dozed 
 over the coals. When I awoke to my surroundings 
 it was to find Silas standing over me, a hand upon my 
 shoulder. At easy length on the opposite side of the 
 fire lay Sutcliff in profound slumber, with Waring 
 squatted upon the ground beside him still playing, the 
 arm supporting the flute resting upon his knee, and his 
 eyes cast dreamily upon the flickering embers. My awak 
 ening appeared to break the spell that was upon him, 
 for he rose to slowly put the instrument away; a mo 
 ment later returning and arousing Sutcliff before the 
 dews which were falling about the meadow should chill 
 him. I crept to my own blankets, and without wait 
 ing to disrobe stretched myself in luxurious ease be 
 neath them. And so, with a strange comingling of 
 visions of Naomi, the nook in the mountain, and the 
 placid face of my dead uncle, the few remaining night- 
 hours passed away. 
 
 109
 
 PART II. 
 
 The Mystery Solved
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 WE RETURN TO THE BASIN. 
 
 WITH the morning came a change in our program. 
 I returned to the plains, and Waring, as my host and 
 entertainer, accompanied me; first promising the three 
 we left behind that he would return the moment he had 
 seen me safe to the station and aboard the train that 
 was to bear me north to break the news of my uncle s 
 death to his family. But at Oro Fino, acting no doubt 
 upon a suggestion from somewhere, for flower, bird 
 and breeze held missions for him always, he decided to 
 accompany me further; even to my cousin s home; feel 
 ing, and quite rightly too, that his position in the matter 
 was rather that of principal, and that that fact should 
 rob of intrusion whatever of this characteristic his de 
 cision might under other circumstances have been at 
 tended with. So at the point named he wrote a hasty 
 note apprising Sutcliff and his companions of his sud 
 den change of mind, and entrusted it to the care of a 
 passing teamster, with instructions to forward it by 
 Indian messenger from the Fork. 
 
 From the ladies at the ranch our story met with much 
 astonishment, not to say open incredulity. With Ida it 
 was different. Hers is the temperament of a mystic,
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 and it became apparent at once that there had been no 
 secrets between father and daughter. At her home 
 quite a little surprise lay in store for us when it devel 
 oped that my cousin was no other than the cherished 
 idol my friend Waring had been worshipping in secret 
 for a year and more: the chance passerby upon one of 
 the streets of the City, the fleeting glimpse of whose 
 bright eyes and attractive person had made such a last 
 ing impression upon his susceptible nature. 
 
 I remember on our arrival at the house being shown 
 into the music room, the servant then disappearing in 
 search of her mistress. We presented no cards and had 
 mentioned no names, it being my wish, for reasons of 
 my own, to hide our identity for the moment ; so that 
 she had no knowledge, unless intuitive, of our prox 
 imity. 
 
 Ida was my favorite cousin and a girl to be proud of. 
 She had all the beauty and the certain elegance of her 
 mother ; the same unfathomable blue eyes ; the light 
 hair over a brow, high, and as smooth and pure as 
 marble; the same clear-cut profile; the same lithe form, 
 whose slightest movement somehow always suggested 
 to me something that was higher than earth. To be 
 frank, it was rather a proud moment for me to be able 
 to introduce so much grace as kin of mine ; to say noth 
 ing of the satisfaction I felt on the other hand of blaz 
 oning Waring s many commendable qualities to my 
 cousin. 
 
 T recognized her light footstep in the hall, and the 
 next moment she stood in the doorway. At the sight of 
 me she began to tremble from head to foot, and clutched 
 wildly at the door-frame for support. For a moment 
 T could not understand her distress, and the next my 
 
 114
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 attention was taken to other things. For at the sound 
 of her approach Waring had turned, a movement that 
 became a start of surprise, and which recalled Ida to 
 herself, and to the fact that we were not alone. 
 
 That she on her part recognized Waring, and with 
 pleasure, she acknowledged by a heightening color, and 
 the smile of welcome which lit up her blue eyes as he 
 bowed over her extended hand. As if by a miracle all 
 the fears of that first moment had disappeared. But it 
 was for a moment only. 
 
 " You have come," she said an instant later, with a 
 slight return of her pallor, her eyes reading mine, 
 " you have come to tell me that my father " 
 
 " Is at peace," I ended for her, feeling that she ex 
 pected the worst. 
 
 She gave a quick cry of despair and was about to 
 fall. I made a move to support her but Waring anti 
 cipated me, caught the fainting form and bore it gently 
 to a couch. I went out of the room in search of a re 
 storative. When I returned he was down on one knee 
 by her side pushing back with a lingering touch the 
 straying films of hair, and watching with concern for 
 the return of the rose-flush to cheek and brow which 
 was to tell of her return to consciousness as well. In 
 the look which he turned upon me there was something 
 which told me that he was on the eve of a better under 
 standing of Sutcliff s allusion to guardian-angels in the 
 plural number. 
 
 For reasons made plain by the foregoing, his visit 
 North was prolonged much beyond his first intention ; 
 so that when at last he did return it was to find that the 
 mountain party had beaten him in by several days. Of 
 that party, I found out later, none had in the interim
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 returned to the nook in the mountain. Horses, I knew, 
 could not have drawn Ballard there (gold might have, 
 but Sutcliff had kept the secret of his find from him) ; 
 and Silas had met with a knowing smile and shake of 
 the head every detail of that day s adventure, until Sut 
 cliff had given up in disgust and pique. As for making 
 the attempt alone, the thought of the danger of that 
 trail, and the solitude of the glen with its deserted cabin 
 and rounded mound, somehow did not seem to place the 
 idea in a particularly pleasing light to him. Upon his 
 return Waring at once hunted up his friend and arranged 
 for a return at the earliest possible moment. 
 
 For a time it looked as if fate was to intervene a 
 finder to prevent the contempleted move. Duties that 
 were not to be cast lightly aside demanded their atten 
 tion from the first. There was first of all the annual re 
 arranging of the camps for the better occupancy of the 
 various flocks, the period of whose return from the 
 mountains was now fast approaching; broken panels 
 to repair; corrals to erect; wooden tanks and long lines 
 of leaky watering-troughs to caulk ; horse-powers to oil 
 and otherwise put in order, and the thousand and one 
 other duties which go to make up the day of a busy 
 stockman. Then came the fall shearing with its fort 
 night of pandemonium and confusion, followed by the 
 half-yearly dipping; and then an unexpected group of 
 visitors which had to be taken back into the hills for a 
 week s quail shoot. In short, October found the spot 
 still unvisited, and the site of the mine as much a mys 
 tery as ever. Then came the autumn rains. 
 
 In fact it was not until the spring of the following 
 year that we found the opportunity so long and ardently 
 looked for, Waring in the meantime paying another 
 
 116
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 visit to the home of my cousin. That was the year 1884. 
 If you are an old timer you should easily recall how very 
 wet and late was that spring of 1884. I remember I ar 
 rived the first week in June in response to an urgent re 
 quest from Waring to join him, and for three weeks 
 was rain-bound at Shepherd s Rest. Not that the fact 
 annoyed me. Up to that time those were the happiest 
 three weeks of my life. For Naomi was there and the 
 intervals between showers were passed in spirited rides 
 over the plains, and in visits to the Table Mountain, 
 where we studied the flowers together, and watched the 
 piles of white cloud and the great spaces of limpid blue 
 between, chase in waves of sunshine and shadow across 
 the broad, open valley at our feet, taking in on their way 
 the dark clump of gums of the ranch, and the towering 
 windmill, finally to loose themselves over the rounding 
 tops of the more distant hills. And when the rain fell 
 we hung in sweet tete-a-tete over the piano at the dusky 
 end of the low-ceilinged room, where a fire smouldered 
 on the hearth, more to cheer by its presence than to 
 rob the air of any sharpness, paying heed to neither 
 time nor tide. It was the last of June, and the mullion 
 by which Roger had his easel and sat at his work, wholly 
 oblivious of our presence, was wide open in welcome to 
 the season. It was all settled in those few weeks. Mrs. 
 Waring was most kind and motherly; Roger, himself 
 in the heaven of his new-found love, most considerate. 
 If ever the course of love was made to run smooth it 
 was ours. 
 
 When at last the weather cleared for the summer and 
 the last of the ewes and lambs had departed for the 
 mountains, Waring made his final arrangements for the 
 oft-postponed visit to the scenes of the past summer s 
 
 117
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 adventure. On this occasion, unlike the other, we 
 started from the ranch, the three of us, with pack and 
 saddle-animals; and instead of the wagon-roads we took 
 the trails which everywhere seemed to cut through the 
 hills, and all of which were equally familiar to the in 
 stinctive intelligence of Sutcliff. As before, the first 
 night out we camped on the Fork, the next day enter 
 ing the Basin. On the Lip we paused for a view of the 
 Butte, the cynosure, of course, of all eyes. From top to 
 base it was cloaked in snow. 
 
 " It is quite evident that we can not make the riffle 
 there," said Sutcliff quietly, guiding his horse to the 
 trail and beginning the easy descent into the gently-de 
 clining, saucer-shaped depression. " We must go by 
 way of the Gap. You say there is a trail entering from 
 there, do you not, Waring ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 And instead of stopping to encamp upon the verge of 
 the Cherry-Creek Meadows we passed on beyond some 
 distance to where a small side-hill or "hanging" meadow 
 offered the sought-for horse-feed, and there unpacked, 
 in the near vicinity of the Gap. 
 
 " It must have been in here that Silas killed the buck 
 last summer which Ballard, you remember, roused from 
 his feeding," said Waring, pausing for a moment in the 
 work of unpacking to look about him. 
 
 I laughed quietly at the recollection. 
 
 " Yes," returned Sutcliff with a show of severity. 
 "And not content with killing the only buck we met 
 upon the trip added insult to injury by returning to 
 civilization with three cartridges to his name." 
 
 " He only had four to begin with I remember." 
 
 Sutcliff shook his head affirmatively. 
 
 ITS
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 "And you? " I asked, curious for a reply. 
 
 " Love noise and bluster too much to have fared as 
 well." 
 
 We pitched our tent, and about sunset went up into 
 the Gap for a view of the far mountains. Strewn with 
 the needles and the pollen of the pines, much snow still 
 lay piled in the shadow of the fir-copses and in the brush- 
 entanglements, from which little rills of water crossed 
 our path at every few steps, softening the ground to 
 that unpleasant consistency that we sought the higher 
 and more sterile slopes to pass over. 
 
 " We ll never get through here to-morrow with the 
 horses," said Sutcliff, pausing in the climb to survey the 
 conditions. " We ll have to skirt the ridge still higher 
 up where the stony nature of the soil will prevent our 
 miring." 
 
 "We ll do better than that," returned Waring; "we ll 
 simply leave the horses behind and go it afoot." 
 
 From the Gap the view beyond was the one I so well 
 remembered seeing from the Butte s top, only here it 
 was more on a level with the eye; against a matchless 
 sky of turquoise the serrated ridges of the Minarets, 
 very white and very pure in the snow-robes of winter, 
 and 
 
 " Bathed in the glories of the glowing west." 
 
 Below, the feathered ridges leading to and down be 
 tween the two forks of the Chiquita stood out dark and 
 clear in the translucent blue of mountain shadow ; their 
 beauty a little higher up and nearer at hand heightened 
 by the deeper tones of a picturesque group of dishevelled 
 firs on a jutting crag. The air everywhere was rever 
 berant with the rush of waters, the only sound it seemed 
 to break in upon the silence. Not a breath was there 
 
 119
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 to pulse into the soul-stirring music of the mountains 
 their great aeolian harps, the pines; not the chirp of a 
 bird, the first fore-runner of its kind, nor the buzz of 
 an insect. The quiet of death itself hung about. But 
 as we stood the sharp yelp of a coyote came to us with 
 a startling clearness from some aspens just below, to be 
 repeated at intervals and at growing distances until lost 
 to the sense. 
 
 Returned to camp we felt ourselves rather fortunate 
 in coming upon a pitchy log, fortunate I say where all 
 the fallen timber reeked with wet, by the aid of which 
 we started a rousing fire. For while there was some 
 thing of the promise of spring in the air to buoy the soul, 
 there was also the nip of frost which made the material 
 man seek the shelter and warmth of an overcoat and 
 the cheer of a fire. Besides there was no moon. The 
 night grew dark, thin films of vapor hiding the stars ; 
 and dancing shadows, which in the overwhelming silence 
 of the place grew uncanny as the night wore on and our 
 story progressed, filled the timber just beyond the circle 
 of light, forming a blurry blackness momentarily pene 
 trated by an occasional flicker of our fire to the point 
 even of at times outlining in lurid colors the forms of 
 our horses on the mountain side above us. 
 
 And seated by that fire Waring gave us for the first 
 time the story of the lost mine in its relation to the life 
 of its latest discoverer. 
 
 1 20
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 BEGINS THE TALE OF THE LOST MINE. 
 
 " I NEVER heard of a like case in all my days," Sut- 
 cliff remarked, with the relieved sigh of one who returns 
 to earth after a flight in fancy to unwonted heights. 
 
 Clad in his corduroys, and pipe in mouth, he crouched 
 at one end of the burning logs to escape the smoke, 
 which as it rose clung close in indecision for a moment, 
 to be swept the next in a dissipating cloud into the en 
 gulfing blur of the woods below by the air-current from 
 the Gap. 
 
 " Ah, yes ;" said Waring, " such love is indeed rare. It 
 was one of heaven s marriages. You have heard of 
 such?" 
 
 Sutcliff nodded. 
 
 " But then he was always of, I will not say a melan 
 choly, but of a spiritual frame of mind," continued War 
 ing, "and inclined to idealize every relationship of life. 
 That may, perhaps, account for some of its vehemence." 
 
 He paused as if expecting a reply. But none came. 
 
 " No matter," he resumed once more. " The fact re 
 mains that his life was wrapped up in hers, so that when 
 death came to claim its own, only the shell of him, so 
 to speak, was left behind." 
 
 121
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 I made a motion as if to interrupt him; but he con 
 tinued quietly, his eyes in abstraction upon the fire, not 
 noting my gesture. 
 
 " Not that he was wanting in faith, men of his turn 
 of mind seldom are. To put the matter simply, the ties 
 of earth were the stronger for the moment. To use a 
 term of the sea, he dragged his anchor. Like a derelict 
 he roamed the country with burro and pack aimlessly, 
 indifferently, hopelessly. It was five or six years ago 
 that he appeared in this neighborhood for the first time, 
 and quite by accident fell in with old Gray at the Flats. 
 Now, old Gray, though he cohabits with a squaw, is a 
 man it seems of superior education. He is well-read, 
 and what is more to the point has done "much thinking 
 along independent lines. The philosophies are his partic 
 ular hobby. At any rate the quaint character of the deaf 
 old mountaineer pleased the fancy of your uncle, and at 
 Gray s urgent solicitations the homestead on the moun 
 tain-side was made the centre of his peregrinations here. 
 
 " For reasons at once obvious its position on one of 
 the most frequented trails of the Sierra for one the 
 little clearing is more or less an Indian rendezvous. 
 And from there it is but an hour s ride to the Fork and 
 its rancherias. Curious, he fell in with the Indians 
 there, and shortly became more or less a nomad himself. 
 For in his then state of mind the true relationship of 
 things had lost some of its proportions. Where in the 
 past he had given thought to only the more important, 
 now the trivial excited his interest quite as much. 
 Among other things he fell to studying his aboriginal 
 friends, their manner of thought, their aims, their 
 language, and their lore. 
 
 "And here for the first time he came upon the story 
 
 122
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono, 
 
 of the lost mine. The romance of it all, wound up as 
 it was in the gossamer of a thousand details, had pos 
 session of him from the first. In his trailings through 
 the mountains his eyes grew to live only for the pros 
 pect that in the end was to lead him to its discovery. 
 Upon the back stoop of the little hut in the grey of the 
 mountain twilight, and as the moon topped the ridge 
 above, all the philosophic discussions in the end reverted 
 to the one subject always uppermost in his mind. Even 
 his hours of sleep were not free from thoughts of it, 
 for it was in his dreams that all the vain hopes and 
 yearnings of the day found realization, and he exulted 
 in the possession of the mine s untold wealth. The 
 search became a pitiful, while altogether harmless, mania 
 with him. He became the inseparable friend of the old 
 chief, the herder once in my father s employ, and as time 
 passed on won upon the friendship and esteem of others 
 of the tribe, man, woman and child. 
 
 But all to no purpose. All were bound to secrecy; 
 at least so it seemed to him, for no one could be found 
 to divulge a word that would afford him a clue to the 
 location of this fabled mine. Then accident gave him 
 the key. Seated one morning it was the day after his 
 annual return late one spring, gun in hand upon a big, 
 rounded rock overlooking the brush thickets under the 
 Figure 7 upon the one side, and the tumbled course of the 
 Black Laurel upon the other, a dark, insignificant 
 speck in that vast expanse of sky and mountain mapped 
 out in the heat and haze of a mid-summer day, he 
 was recalled to himself by the sudden report of a rifle 
 close at hand, followed by others in quick succession, 
 and by half-stifled cries for help. Springing from the 
 rock he hastened in the direction indicated, and came 
 
 123
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 just in time to put a bullet into the heart of a great 
 cinnamon engaged in deadly combat with a man. That 
 man was the old chief. This incident turned the tide in 
 his favor. It bore down the last vestige of racial re 
 straint between them. Carrington felt he had the red 
 man at his mercy, and that he might command anything 
 he possessed. 
 
 "And white-man-like he chose the secret of the lost 
 mine. Great as was the call put upon him there was no 
 hesitation on the part of the Indian. The mystery of 
 the location was to be given him. And to this end one 
 morning while the stars were paling in the east, and an 
 ebbing moon cradled in a few fleecy clouds hung low 
 in the flushing sky, they quietly stole forth from the 
 rancheria on the Fork, followed by the bayings of the 
 startled dogs of the tribe. On the way, in the light of 
 the early morning, they stopped at Gray s, where Car 
 rington told in triumph of their mission. Harmless 
 enough, but unhappily for all concerned the old man s 
 son, Joe the half-breed, a fellow with an unreasoning 
 hatred of everything white, coupled to an avarice that 
 knew no bounds, overheard. You know the man." 
 
 We nodded, not wishing to interrupt with a word the 
 thread of a narrative so graphically told. 
 
 " This man resolved if possible to frustrate their plans. 
 But how? To harm a hair of Carrington s head was 
 Imt to invite trouble upon himself at the hands of the 
 whites, and was of course a thing to be avoided. Be 
 sides, Carrington was his father s one intimate friend, 
 and read his Joe s, very soul whenever they met; 
 which fact bore heavily upon the superstitious streak in 
 him. The plan the. least resultant of danger to himself 
 was to kill the old chief traitor he called him to nerve 
 
 124
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 himself to the deed, before the purpose of their visit was 
 accomplished; for he knew of the indifference of the 
 whites usually to the shedding of blood where that blood 
 was that of a so-called inferior people. So when they 
 started again he followed in secret upon their trail with 
 murder in his heart. And well up on the mountain, 
 while Carrington had gone somewhat ahead, he stole 
 upon the full-blood, buried his knife in his back, and 
 hurled him over the rocks. 
 
 " From the trail above Carrington saw all that trans 
 pired ; and Joe the half-breed saw he saw and fled into 
 the woods. Carrington followed him the many miles back 
 to the ranch, sought him out like a nemesis, and in sub 
 stance said to him : " You have nothing to fear at my 
 hands ; your secret is safe. Murderer that you are, you 
 have a worthy father. And that father is my friend. But 
 for that fact the law should have you." And so the 
 secret of the deed rested IJfetween them ; Carrington im 
 mune because of the dread sway he held over the man 
 of crossed blood; the Indian secure in the promise of 
 immunity given. 
 
 " In his writings Carrington gives two reasons for his 
 course. The first is that he wished to protect from sor 
 row the few remaining years of his aged friend, which 
 was laudable enough. The other is of a much more 
 complex nature, and was characteristic of the man. It 
 had not yet been proven to him that two wrongs made 
 a right. If murder was wrong, he argued, then murder 
 in atonement was murder still, even if done in the guise 
 of law, and in the name of justice. And then after all, 
 what was the material life? Did we not, perhaps, sweet 
 as it is, give it undue importance? Did not God, the 
 Center from which springs all light and all the good 
 
 125
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 of the Universe, require it at the hands of all? Millions 
 answered each year in obedience to His call. Not but 
 that murder was wrong; but with him the wrong lay 
 more in the violation of that abstract law that marks the 
 boundary of what we call the right, and the perversion 
 of that right. He was a man of peculiar mental turn, 
 you see. With him the murdered had not been sinned 
 against half so much as had the murderer sinned 
 against himself, strange as this may sound. For he 
 believed that the purposes of life, expressed here in the 
 material existence, are beyond permanent human inter 
 vention ; that they lie strictly within the control of some 
 higher power, and continue on in an after-life irrespec 
 tive of what occurred on earth. But to the murderer, 
 as to all wrongdoers, comes a day of reckoning as in 
 evitable as death itself, bringing with/ it the fires of re 
 morse to waste, and possibly even to destroy, the soul 
 for whose home-coming we are told the Most High is 
 continually on the watch. 
 
 " The discovery of the body by yourself, Sutcliff , re 
 lieved him of the necessity of exposing his knowledge 
 of the affair. And that he stood high in the estimation 
 of the Indians on the Fork is evident in the fact that 
 throughout not a shadow of suspicion rested upon him. 
 He was the last man known to have been with him; 
 and certain covert tales, emanating, of course, from the 
 wily half-breed, sought at one time to unduly color 
 that fact and so raise a sense of distrust against him. 
 But they were in vain. 
 
 "A few days later Carrington returned to the moun 
 tain alone. For while the secret in its focus had died 
 with the old chief, enough had been disclosed to very 
 materially circumscribe the field of search. The vast 
 
 126
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 drift of snow at the upper end of the ravine had been 
 pointed out to him as being directly in the path; and 
 once on the summit it was well nigh impossible to go 
 wrong where but one passable depression led down 
 the declivity to the east. At the foot, he had been told, 
 they would find a beautiful flat with the horse-feed belly- 
 high upon it, overtopped with trees of wonderful growth ; 
 and a lake, set like a gem in the brow of the hoary 
 mountain. Once the ice of his natural reserve all 
 melted the poor fellow had grown garrulous on the 
 short trail. 
 
 " But once in the alcove it became apparent at once 
 that there ended all certainty. The finding of the mine 
 itself was again as much a matter of uncertainty and 
 chance as it had ever been in its checkered history. He 
 returned at once over the mountain for a burro loaded 
 with provisions and tools. These he cached in the ravine, 
 again toiling to the enchanted flat with pick and shovel, 
 and axe. to hew for himself a trail over the rocks ana 
 through the brush on the almost perpendicular walls to 
 the right, in the direction of the Gap, so that he might 
 have easier egress from the place. It was a blind trail 
 at best, and a pile of fallen limbs thrown across two 
 boulders upon it most effectually balked any tendency 
 of the burro to roam. Then began a thorough and sys 
 tematic search for the hidden treasure. But vain was 
 his work. For weeks it continued, morning, noon, and 
 afternoon. The tranquil summer passed away and the 
 golden autumn came, to find him still at his task. Then 
 came the first rains ; and later the snows of winter, forc 
 ing him very much against his will to seek the more 
 clement weather of the plains. 
 
 " With the early spring he came again, T think it was 
 127
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 the year I met him in the Flats. But in the meantime 
 a peculiar change had begun to come over him. The 
 groundwork of his nature had come to slowly reassert it 
 self. The simple life he was leading away from the 
 grossness of the crowd, and amid the entrancing beauty 
 which encompassed him on every hand, the vivid high 
 lights, the cool shadow-tones, the magnitude of moun 
 tain, valley, and air-line ; and most potent of all, the 
 soul-reaching silence, were all working their secret 
 charm, and revivifying the spiritual side of his nature 
 far beyond its old-time limits. The long days of intro 
 spective thought, into a train of which he had been 
 thrown by the death of his wife, and which of late had 
 been much intensified by the solitude of the position 
 he had chosen, were slowly revolutionizing the man. 
 Not that he took a lesser interest in the things of this 
 world than in the days of old; the truth was he took 
 more. But his horizons were enlarging. He began to 
 see things from a higher and broader plane. He gen 
 eralized more. Unconsciously he approached the foun 
 tain-head of wisdom. He still took an active interest in 
 his search, but the ardor of old was beginning to pale. 
 " In the pauses that now came between he built him 
 self the little cabin and the broad fire-place. From his 
 home in the north he brought with him books and per 
 iodicals ; and music ; and I have no doubt that many a 
 night-prowler and particularly the lion whose pelt we 
 found upon the floor, and which had resented his appear 
 ance upon the mountain from the first, has paused in 
 the uncertain light of the forest to listen to the unwonted 
 sound of his flute." 
 
 128
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 HE OPENS TELEPATHIC COMMUNICATION WITH THE 
 WORLD. 
 
 "AND where," continued Waring, " in the other sum 
 mer he had courted the strictest solitude, occasionally 
 now the call of his kind grew upon him to a strength 
 not to be denied, when he paid willing, and what oft be 
 came protracted, visits to the Gray clearing. 
 
 That this world is one full of surprises you no doubt 
 have discovered long before this. We come upon them 
 in the most unlikely places. Here we have one in the 
 old shake-maker whose cabin stands beyond the Lip. 
 If we judge from appearances, I admit, the assertion 
 carries with it an air of doubt, but I have the word of 
 your uncle that this white-haired old man has a knowl 
 edge of things that would put to shame the learning of 
 many a college professor. His favorite study and theme 
 of discourse is the human mind and its workings, a sub 
 ject that received a new direction now at the hands of 
 the two friends ; for it seems that Carrington, too, was 
 well fitted by early education, but more particularly by 
 nature for the proper understanding and manipulating 
 of this little-understood subject. 
 
 " Both had given thought to the matter in the years 
 129
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 before their meeting; and the discussions now brought 
 with them a revival and a certain hitherto unattainable 
 familiarity, owing to the want of maturity due to ex 
 perience and age, that but very few enjoy or can even 
 be brought to realize as possible. They held theories 
 which they sought to organize into a science as it were. 
 That they succeeded in their work much beyond the ordi 
 nary is plain enough, for some very remarkable results 
 followed upon their experiments. 
 
 " They first convinced themselves what they had 
 argued all along, that thought is a dynamic force cap 
 able of being projected from mind to mind without the 
 intermediary of speech. Speech it was claimed is but the 
 mode of the clumsy. This in a measure is no doubt true. 
 As we age in experience we find the eye in many cases 
 to serve as well, or more subtly still, a touch. Carrington 
 cites instance after instance and I have met cases my 
 self, where he had read question in the eyes of his wife, 
 and he had answered them quite as intelligently through 
 the use of the same channel ; at least so he had judged 
 from their changed expression. And many times, too, 
 later in life, when the souls of the two had become more 
 transfused, on a comparison of notes after days of ab 
 sence, he was rather surprised to find that there had 
 been an unconscious communion of thought, though miles 
 lay betwen them at the time. The idea is simply to be 
 able to recognize an impression or suggestion from with 
 out as a message from afar; or, in other words, to be 
 able to winnow the grain from the chaff. The universe 
 is full of them, many breathed unconsciously, there 
 fore, negatively; a few projected with precision, force 
 and purpose, to be accepted by the wise at their true 
 value. Nature seems to repeat her processes in all the 
 
 130
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 rising steps of her seeming progress, showing, it appears 
 to me, the existence of one universal law. We cast a 
 stone into a pool and rippling waves circle to the banks. 
 We speak, and start similar circles in the atmosphere 
 about us, to be received here and there by an organ made 
 for the purpose, the ear. The human will gives rise to 
 a thought, and we start a delicate but far-reaching pro 
 pulsive force in just this same way, which beats through 
 the finer atoms of the ether, to be received by the 
 nature sensitive enough to respond. Touch a string on 
 a harp and it is not the wood of the place that replies 
 but the sister-harp in the corner, attuned in unison. I 
 ask you to recall if you can my argument of a year 
 ago on the comparative nature of all life. Try to thor 
 oughly assimilate this idea. It will surprise you to find 
 how much of a step it is to the fuller conception of the 
 ideas of the omnipresent, the illimitable, and the eter 
 nal : expressions much used but little understood. 
 
 " The work of the two at first in this field of thought- 
 transference was, of course, unsatisfactory. But having 
 met with partial success, they wrought on diligently 
 and understandingly, until, just think! an avenue of 
 communication had been opened up that no earthly 
 distance could fetter. 
 
 :< This success here opened up to Carrington a hither 
 to undreamed-of field of possibilities. With the key 
 now in his possession he doubted not for a moment but 
 that intercourse with the beyond was possible. The 
 key? The same that makes for success in all the other 
 walks of life, Concentration. The air is full of yellow 
 sunbeams, comparatively powerless as distributed by 
 nature ; yet focus them and you can set the world afire. 
 So with the mind. Focus your thought and you can
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 accomplish wonders, even such as these. The mind 
 and the will, that is all there is to it. 
 
 " Carrington sought to establish this line with all the 
 ardor of an enthusiastic nature. For many weeks in 
 vain. But from the grace which sustained him through 
 out he felt that he was not alone in the work: that on 
 the other side of that inscrutable veil we call death a 
 higher intelligence than his own was working for the 
 same end. And one afternoon the air was strangely 
 still, and himself so concentered that for the moment 
 he was totally oblivious of the beauty on every hand, 
 he received a communication; a single impression, 
 the one word " Thomas," yet given with all the sweet 
 cadence he remembered so well in the days before death 
 parted them. So realistic was it all that involuntarily he 
 looked about him, while his heart ceased its beating for 
 the moment. But he saw nothing, and the movement 
 recalled him to earth. He sought further, despairingly; 
 but no more messages came that day. The next he 
 tried again; but, too expectant, he tried in vain. The 
 next again ; and humbled by the disappointment of the 
 previous day, there came to him that same message 
 " Thomas," but more vividly than before, and dissipat 
 ing his last shadow of doubt. He was already growing 
 more responsive. For weeks this continued, through 
 less and less of disappointment; he at each success com 
 ing more and more to understand just what condition 
 of mind was essential to that success. Having mastered 
 so to say the elements, the single impressions in the 
 course of time gave way to simple phrases, and later 
 to more complex sentences. One of the first one 
 she had often used in their earth-life, gave him a par 
 ticular pleasure, the simple words of endearment, 
 " Thomas, my husband." 
 
 132
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 "And then came the regret that he could not see. But 
 no sooner had the thought found life in his brain than 
 with a swiftness and unerringness that was a revelation 
 to him it stood answered. " Mind is king. Patience 
 poor mortal." And true enough, before long there came 
 a glimmer of light to him, a dawn such as the physic 
 ally blind whose vision is about to be restored might be 
 supposed to experience, and through the dissipating 
 mists, his heart the while increasing its beating, he more 
 than once felt sure that he had had a passing glimpse 
 of the airy outlines of the form of his beloved wife. 
 Here again opened up an era of alternate failure and 
 success; for here, too, a special preparation covering 
 many weeks had to be gone through. For to see clearly 
 required a special control. 
 
 " One day it was the first of his full awakening into 
 the soul-life, she burst upon him without warning in 
 the full splendor of her angelic loveliness ; her queenly 
 form clad in clinging garments that only half-hid and 
 half disclosed its grace of outline ; her brown tresses 
 piled with a graceful care above the smooth brow ; her 
 red lips smiling, her blue eyes sparkling their welcome. 
 The old Rose indeed, but a thousand times more beauti 
 ful; with a grace accentuated in unnumbered elusive 
 ways which it puzzled him for the moment to locate 
 until it dawned upon him that it was not the old beauty 
 as he remembered it that he looked upon, but a soul- 
 vision with the cloy and awkwardness of earth gone. 
 As the mists due to imperfect control of self cleared 
 away, he noted that she had come to him with out 
 stretched hands over green fields, shaded afar with bor 
 dering copses and blue hills, a spot very like their fav 
 orite haunt in the first years of their married life. She 
 
 133
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 glided rather than walked toward him, and as she 
 touched him he awoke to find himself upon the moun 
 tain alone with the tops of the pines droning in the 
 afternoon breeze. He was faint, and a cold perspira 
 tion was upon him. For a moment he believed the 
 beautiful vision to have been a dream; but with the re 
 turn of his equanimity came conviction, and the con 
 clusion which had had part possession of him for some 
 time definitely fixed that the true life begins only at 
 death s door. For life on earth after all is but a span, 
 while an eternity awaits us beyond. 
 
 "Thus was opened an intercourse which grew broader 
 as time wore on. Nor did it cease, though it was inter 
 rupted, by the change of environment that came with his 
 return home that winter. In the privacy of his own 
 chamber he could always summon the beloved presence. 
 But it was in the quiet and charm of the mountains that 
 results were ever the best, and with the earliest signs 
 of spring he was there again. 
 
 " By this time the line of communication had been 
 brought to that perfection that converse was held as 
 fluently as though they sat side by side in the flesh. 
 Under these circumstances, after the first novelty of his 
 position had worn off, many questions arose to his 
 mind; to be answered by replies that impinged with a 
 simple directness in contrast with the uncertain ones 
 we usually receive here. Why, you ask? I believe, be 
 cause of our self-sufficiency, we are not prayerful 
 enough. But as few of these have direct bearing upon 
 the story I am relating we will pass them over, unless 
 you feel that some of them might be of interest to you. 
 
 " I do not know whether the same feeling strikes 
 either of you, but to me there is a beauty in this com- 
 
 134
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 panionship of the two that somehow strangely appeals 
 to me. I have read in tales where the hero or heroine 
 have been haunted or pursued by phantoms, but never one 
 where a spirit sought to correct and sustain the way 
 wardness and the inherent weakness of man through 
 words of cheer and the highest wisdom. And the beauty 
 of it all lies in the fact that it is all true, that they are 
 conditions possible to you and me every day of our life 
 here if we possess but a prayerful heart and the required 
 amount and quality of faith. 
 
 " Day after day, in the earlier periods of this com 
 munion, they wandered about the forest in silent con 
 verse, or sat by the open doorway where the button- 
 wood in the springtime spread its array of magnificent 
 blossoms, and in the fall its red seed attracted the dark- 
 plumaged woodcock. An aimless and useless life, you 
 think; but let us pause to remember that this is due 
 to the particular nature we have to deal with; and that 
 the possibilities under the somewhat ideal conditions 
 which I am trying to paint for you are by no means 
 confined to the case in hand. Supposing we were given 
 a man of superior energy, what good might not be ac 
 complished. And then we might be premature in our 
 verdict even here. Who knows? The seed has only 
 been sown, and results are only to be judged at harvest 
 time. 
 
 " This earth-life, it would seem, is never without its 
 hour of repining, nor do I believe the soul-life to be 
 wholly so either. Yet it is well for us and the general 
 good that this is so, that there is ever something to 
 keep us on the verge of expectancy, and in the moil of 
 the sequent states of discontent. The trouble lay in 
 the extremes of emotion to which he was subject be- 
 
 135
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 tween the hours of soulful elation on the one side, and, 
 on the other, the utter desolation of his position on 
 his return to earth. For such violent revulsions the 
 body is in no wise prepared, and their effect upon our 
 friend became somewhat slowly, but too surely appar 
 ent. They affected his health in a general undermin 
 ing; their ravages being greater or less just as in pro 
 portion his interest was stamped with less of earth and 
 more of heaven. His clairvoyant periods became more 
 and more protracted, periods of half-stupefaction and 
 complete absence of mind to those immersed in the 
 material who occasionally came upon him on the trail." 
 
 136
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE HYPNOTIC INTROMISSION. 
 
 WARING paused for a moment, his eyes upon the fire. 
 His thoughts had outstripped the thread of his narrative 
 and were wandering far afield, and without hindrance. 
 With an effort he drew himself together, looked up at 
 us with an odd smile, and resumed. 
 
 "At times came reaction when the ties of earth re 
 turned and for a time held him in a grip that reminded 
 him of the strength of old. At such moments came 
 thoughts of children, home and friends. And one day 
 the lost mine. 
 
 " When next they met this thought was uppermost. 
 
 " Without a word, and somewhat gravely, Rose beck 
 oned him to take her hand. He arose obediently, and 
 at her touch felt a thrill, keen yet pleasurable, possess 
 his whole being, and his inner vision clarify preternatur- 
 ally. 
 
 " Through the trembling mist he saw slowly appear a 
 stretch of mountain forest where below the sombre tones 
 of the pines, the foliage of the deciduous growth 
 had dyed itself in all the brilliant color of fall. 
 It was apparently late in the season October, 
 he judged, for the haze of Indian summer hung 
 
 137
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 about the woods and the openings beyond. As he 
 gazed, spellbound, the lone figure of a man appeared, 
 a dark speck in that sylvan grandeur, gun in hand. 
 His approach was made carefully, warily in fact, as if 
 he feared an ambush at every step. Suddenly he stood 
 erect as a lithe body glided noiselessly through the part 
 ing brush upon his right. It was the form of a moun 
 tain lion. With the swiftness of thought he now turned, 
 raised his rifle and fired. At that same moment Car- 
 rington recognized in the hunter whom? Strangely 
 enough, himself. Imagine if you can what this discov 
 ery brought him in the way of a sensation. Instinctively 
 he sought much the same as in this life we seek to 
 grasp two or more ideas at one and the same time, 
 and while very much alive to the episode enacting be 
 fore him, to take in something of the further beyond. 
 But he found that mind was still mind, and incapable 
 of accepting more than one impression at a time, and 
 that if he would lose nothing of the little drama un 
 folding before him and yet wished to behold some of 
 the scenes in the background, he must take them in their 
 connected sequence. It took him but an instant to re 
 alize this; the next his attention was again upon the 
 animal, which had bounded to cover down a defile to 
 the right where the dogwood and alder formed an al 
 most impenetrable shelter. Very carefully he followed, 
 guided by the blood-trail, until he came to where an 
 other gulch came down from the right to meet the first, 
 the two forming an acute angle of some sharpness. It 
 was a wilderness of brush and boulders which an oc 
 casional pine overtopped, a natural cover which only the 
 most intrepid dared penetrate in the face of the danger 
 known to lurk there. For a moment he even wondered 
 
 138
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono, 
 
 at his own hardihood and fell to analyzing his emotions. 
 It surprised him rather to find that fear was not a part 
 of them. 
 
 " At this point the brute had made a sudden turn up 
 ward toward a wall of rock which apparently barred all 
 progress in that direction. It seemed sorely stricken, 
 and had rested many times to nurse its wound, as the 
 condition of the trail freely attested ; so sorely indeed 
 that it seemed often to have moved only as the sound 
 of crackling brush came to it and told of the threatening 
 nearness of the hunter following. This fact made the 
 task a doubly perilous one, and he, Carrington, who 
 was now following not with eyes only, but with all his 
 senses on a keen alert, and with all the emotions of a 
 principal, wondered at the remarkable cowardice of the 
 animal. Common report gave it the reputation of being 
 more than ordinarily dangerous when wounded, and yet, 
 very strangely, here under the most favoring of circum 
 stances, not the faintest attempt at a stand was being 
 made. 
 
 " Foot by foot he scanned the brush ; foot by foot he 
 climbed upward toward the base of the wall, where, he 
 now felt convinced, he would find the lair of this queen 
 of the mountains. And sure enough before long he had 
 a glimpse of the tawny form in the dusk of an alcove 
 formed by an overhanging rock, her bloody flanks pal 
 pitating tumultuously, and covered with the coarse 
 granite particles, the dry leaves and twigs of the trail. 
 
 "As he drew near she made the one stand of the en 
 tire chase. Sweeping the ground in majestic curves 
 with her tail she came forward, defiance in her attitude, 
 to give him with a bloodcurdling cry a terrifying dis 
 play of her teeth. But this display of courage was mo- 
 
 139
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 mentary only, for she almost immediately withdrew 
 and then deeper than before, into the natural recess, 
 and trembling with a fear that was unaccountable. 
 Slowly and unerringly this time, he again raised the 
 rifle, and fired the shot that brought the trembling form 
 to the ground. 
 
 " Then the riddle was explained. For by his side 
 stood Rose, whom the clear instincts of the animal 
 or possibly some sense of which we know not, had 
 undoubtedly recognized as something out of the or 
 dinary. Natural history abounds with just such cases. 
 
 " He flayed the brute, her s was a most magnificent 
 pelt, and this done rested himself for a moment on a 
 rock before returning. Below him narrowed the gulch 
 he was in; beyond arose, he thought, the Jackass. It 
 was all evidently a part of the mountain upon which 
 he was housed. He sought more fully to locate himself, 
 but in vain. Above him arose the loose wall of rock, 
 a wall that had evidently at some early period of the 
 earth s history been projected intact, and only creviced 
 by the convulsion, from somewhere far up the mountain. 
 A little stream oozed from above to water a few late 
 flowers blooming there. He looked again to more closely 
 study the formation. It was of quartz, and his heart 
 almost stopped its beating, it seemed literally alive 
 with pure gold. He moved feverishly forward : he raised 
 his hand and broke . 
 
 " Ah, another dream ! With a tremor that shook his 
 entire frame he reluctantly shook himself free of the 
 influence that bound him. Like one aroused from a deep 
 sleep he looked about him. The early morning sun shone 
 brightly in upon him, touching with its gold the blue 
 of giant lupins whose fingerlike foliage shadowed the 
 
 140
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 bare logs of the hut in the vicinity of the doorstep. 
 Through the trees beyond arose the mountains of the 
 Jackass almost, it seemed to him, as he had seen them 
 but a moment before, and in the further distance the 
 Minarets, very still and clear in the crisp of the June 
 morning. 
 
 The vision left an indelible impression, and gave new 
 vigor to the search which was again resumed. The 
 mine was undoubtedly a reality; he had seen it. And 
 it was as undubitably ordained that he was to find it. 
 The question was simply, was it to be effected through 
 chance or a concentration of effort on his part? To a 
 man like him of prearranged action always there was 
 but one reply, and that was, through system of course. 
 
 " He sought early and late again, and once more to 
 no purpose. Then one day came a thought. With arms 
 folded upon his breast, and dejected of spirit, he was re 
 clining against a rock on the trail, that winds from the 
 Gap to the Chiquita. It was the end of June and all 
 nature stood in the luscious ripeness of midsummer. 
 Suddenly the wonderful truth dawned upon him. He 
 remembered that in that one glimmer into the future 
 which had been vouchsafed him the black-oaks upon the 
 mountain s slope ; the wild cherry of the thickets ; all the 
 alders and buttonwoods on the creek-banks ; nay the very 
 sumac in the canyon below, where the lioness had come to 
 her death, had stood arrayed in the vari-colored glories of 
 autumn. With mind awakened to the new wisdom he 
 slowly returned to his cabin. In that one moment he had 
 become a fatalist. Chance and I may add that then al 
 ready the significance of the term was undergoing a 
 change for him, was after all to be the arbiter of his 
 fortune. 
 
 141
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " His policy was now one of waiting. Through the 
 long summer days he read much; pondered; performed 
 upon his- flute; studied the forest, the mountain and the 
 .stream. He made friends with the birds, the squirrels, 
 the chipmunks ; and with such success that all entered 
 fearlessly as he sat at his meals, to be fed by his hands, 
 or to nibble daintily at the proffered food upon the table. 
 Once he caught sight of a half-grown grizzly surveying 
 with uplifted muzzle the human habitation from the up 
 per end of the forest opening; a moment later resum 
 ing his leisurely way as Carrington hallooed at him. At 
 times again he would drop to the Chiquita with fly and 
 rod to beat the stream for trout; generally to return, 
 tired and worn, but with a generous string, in the dusk 
 of the evening. He was at peace with all the world. 
 
 " Nay. There was one exception. The lion whose 
 haunt he had disturbed with his presence would give him 
 no peace. Each summer it migrated, each fall to re 
 turn. It was plainly to be war to the end. And the poor 
 burro stood in mortal dread, and came each evening to 
 the cabin to tremble under its eaves. It made the heart 
 stand still to hear its cry almost human in its cadence, 
 in the distant depths of the forest when night had fal 
 len, and to note its gradual approach. How well he re 
 membered mistaking it one night for a human being 
 astray in the woods, and had answered from the brink 
 of the precipice beyond the lake, where the moonlight 
 fell over the silent, depthless canyon of the Chiquita. 
 At times it became so malevolent that he had been 
 forced to build a fire in self-protection. It was away 
 now the summer, but would be sure to return with the 
 first turning leaf. 
 
 "And again came a thought. Was this animal in any 
 
 142
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 way to be instrumental in the locating 1 of the lost mine? 
 Was it in some inexplicable way the same which he had 
 followed in his vision? It seemed indeed unlikely, and 
 yet strange things happen. At any rate the brute held 
 a new interest for him from that hour forth." 
 
 143
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE AFTER-UFE. 
 
 "AND from here, with your permission," continued 
 Waring, " I will quote you from the writings direct. 
 We are down to the more personal part of our story, 
 and my so doing will avoid much useless repetition. I 
 have selected, you will find, only such parts as are rel 
 evant, and which hold an interest because of that rel 
 evancy, if for no other reason. 
 
 "At this point I find an entry which purports to 
 throw some light upon the conditions prevailing in the 
 after-life. It may sound wild and chimerical to you, 
 but I found it interesting reading enough, and so will 
 you, I am sure. Shall I read it?" 
 
 We silently acquiesced, and Waring read : 
 
 Throughout this period Rose is my almost constant 
 companion and never a day passes but I find that I 
 have absorbed something of wisdom from the com 
 panionship. Many and varied are the themes that come 
 up for discussion between us ! children, home, friends ; 
 our own happy past; more often, however, the future, 
 now no longer the uncertain for me. The future. 
 
 144
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Wonderful word ! Language holds nothing more preg 
 nant with meaning. 
 
 As to where we meet I am somewhat in doubt. Does 
 Rose come to earth, or do I flee to spirit-land? My 
 position is most unique. Our environs at times are 
 such an intermingling of the one and the other that I 
 do not often know whether I am in the celestial sphere 
 or still within the earth s attraction. Possibly we vacil 
 late between. 
 
 For instance, I find trees and flowers, beautiful 
 flowers, great gardens of them; and trees, tall and 
 idyllic, such as we come upon occasionally on the can 
 vasses of some imaginative master of the brush. And 
 lawns, broad, sweeping ones, without hedge or break, 
 that fade away into the blue of distance, or that of 
 some shimmering sea dotted with sails of idling craft. 
 These are all of earth, and yet so unlike. For there is 
 here a greater perfection; everything is more ideal; 
 there is less of the stiffness, of the imperfection, the 
 dwarfing and distortion of earth, where there is always 
 some obstacle to an unrestricted growth. Birds of 
 sweet song and gay plumage, delighting at once both 
 the eye and the ear, hover above among the boughs; 
 while beneath deer sport and rabbits gambol, and all 
 the nobler animals that have, because of some kindly 
 trait in their natures, endeared themselves to mankind, are 
 much in evidence. Children I find at play at every point, 
 and the sound of their laughter and merrymaking fills 
 the air. 
 
 And such homes, such magnificent temples of learn 
 ing, such wonderful cities as I have seen ! In the by 
 gone years I have had visions of such, little dreaming 
 then that the true poet is ever a prophet, and that there 
 
 145
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 is not a single picture of his imagining that is an ad 
 vance upon existing conditions but will some day find 
 its realization in the life beyond death. Cities with broad, 
 and seemingly interminable boulevards, and open 
 squares where matchless marbles dot the sward, and 
 fountains play in a sparkle to confuse the mind; cities 
 of marble and alabaster, dreamlike in the massiveness of 
 their edifices, and scintillating as in the light of day in 
 the soft self-effulgence of the place ; cities gay with life 
 and color, and music, the life of the crowd, composed 
 of men who are men not in form only but in character 
 as well, and of women who are all heart and womanliness 
 and not mere puppets of paint and powder and hollow 
 sham, finding a common love in an intercourse with 
 less and less of friction in it. It is all beyond rendering 
 in words. 
 
 There are no marts of trade, only beautiful homes 
 where souls dwell in a certain content; not the cold, 
 stary, repellant mansions of our large cities that speak 
 of greed, pomp and selfishness in every stone, but 
 buildings cheery and inviting in appearance, the re 
 flex in short of the character that prompted their up 
 building. Note that I am describing but a small section 
 of the land, the section wherein Rose and her com 
 panions have their abode, and that every conceivable 
 condition necessary to the happiness comparative al 
 ways as you will plainly see, of any and every indi- 
 vidiual can, and eventually will, be found by the indi 
 vidual affected : that is to say, oceans are there for roam- 
 ers of the sea ; great mountain-chains to meet the loves 
 of the Tyrolese, the Himalayans, the Andeans ; sandy 
 deserts, brown, bare, and vague in their interpretation of 
 their mission to man, for the Nubian and the Saharan ; 
 
 146
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 winding water-ways, rock-bluffed, for the Patagonian 
 and the Aleut ; and so on through the long category, each 
 according to his desires. 
 
 All of which seemed strange to me, brought up in the 
 orthodox faith, and for some time I sought in vain for 
 the reason. But as usual in these matters of doubt, 
 Rose came to my rescue with the explanation that all 
 visible life was the result of mental effort, and that the 
 consciousness of it in man was wholly a matter of sen 
 sation. Rob man of the function of a single of the or 
 gans of the objective senses and you curtail his con 
 sciousness of life just so much. Rob him of all and 
 he is dead to the outer world, or what we call the un 
 conscious state. But an inner consciousness lives per- 
 renial, the consciousness of the soul. 
 
 This consciousness, whether outer or inner, is an ef 
 fect due to causes eternal in their nature. When a tree 
 grows up, matures, dies ; when a flower springs from the 
 sod, blooms, seeds, and fades away, an effect rises and 
 disappears within the limits of the objective sense, but 
 the cause remains, to extend into an after-world, there 
 to work upon material ever growing finer, yet which, 
 strange to say, acts upon our equally refining organs in 
 impressions that rise in the old familiar forms we know. 
 
 This, however, does not mean that a tree is forever a 
 tree, except in name perhaps, or the true and tried house 
 dog forever a dog. Nature in the law of evolution has 
 provided for the contrary. The graceful elm, the sil 
 ver birch of to-day are not the stalky fern or palm of the 
 carboniferous period. Nor is the tree nameless to me, 
 which I see arise upon the other side, near like the 
 birch or the elm I speak of. They are things of a grace 
 and beauty beyond words. What the ultimate may be 
 lies hidden in the far, far future. 
 
 147
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Nor does it mean, again, that the environs there are 
 composed entirely of types of life that have their origin 
 or parallels on earth, for the after-world teems with a 
 life characteristically its own. For me to attempt to de 
 scribe it would, of course, prove useless. For as I have 
 said the consciousness of life lies in impressions, these 
 impressions, again being the result of sensations borne to 
 the brain through the function of one or more of the 
 media for the purpose, the organs of sense. Now, if this 
 life lies as in this case it does, beyond the capacity of 
 the organic sense, and the inner sense has not yet found 
 development to the point of clairvoyance in which case 
 you would be able to see with the soul s organ, it of 
 necessity lies for the time beyond your comprehension. 
 
 And then the spiritual light which so noticeably ir 
 radiates the countenances of all Rose ; my darling 
 mother ; the coterie of friends, to each member of which 
 strange coincidence, or is it coincidence? I remem 
 ber now having felt myself particularly attached during 
 their sojourn here. I commented upon it this very morn 
 ing. Rose smiled as she assured me of their happiness 
 a happiness beyond words a happiness, she said in 
 finitely beyond anything possible on earth, where there 
 are restrictions at no time to be completely shaken off. 
 There they were free. 
 
 But happy as they were, she continued, their beatitude 
 was still comparative only, a very beginning, as it were. 
 I echoed her words in surprise. But Rose only repeated 
 her assurances. Nothing was perfect but God. Strange 
 as it may sound, there was a very eternity of planes 
 above, each in their order as superior to the one next 
 below as their s was superior to ours. Through all these 
 gradations were we compelled to pass in the gradual un- 
 
 148
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 folding of the human character, which made up the sum 
 of the work of redemption. For God lay within. 
 
 I have said every gradation : it would have been more 
 correct to have said, every gradation above the one to 
 which you will find yourself translated upon your release 
 from the body. " For man," she said, " is like the thistle 
 down of the fields, that ripened and released by the sun 
 and winds, floats here and there, some near the meadow- 
 surface, some high in air. Only where they are the 
 sports of the elements, the soul is more under the im 
 mediate surveillance and tutelage of Law." 
 
 Then we do not all reach the same goal ? " I asked. 
 
 " By no means." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Men are not all alike, not even born alike, and 
 neither are their souls. Some are of better mold than 
 others ; so with their souls. Some are blessed with 
 parents with common-sense, who start them well upon 
 their pilgrimage while still on earth. Others, to the 
 third and fourth generation, have the sins of their 
 fathers visited upon them. These are doomed to a 
 period of mortal turpitude an agony worse than any any 
 orthodox hell was ever conceived to hold. For God 
 punishes even more refinedly than man would. It is 
 hell in truth, the only hell. Imagine a worse punish 
 ment than to be left with only your viler thoughts, 
 and the memories of actions now or soon to be re 
 gretted, and breathing the atmosphere common to a 
 myriad of others, not one of whom is better thart your 
 self." 
 
 " That breathes of injustice to me," I said. 
 
 " It is on its face only, my friend. Man is, to a cer 
 tain measure, or in a certain way at least, a free agent. 
 
 149
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 If, in a life spent at the cost of the best there is in him, 
 his conscience speaks and he heeds it not, it is but a 
 just retribution that overtakes him. Suffering is the 
 price of all retrogression." 
 
 " But is it always retrogression ? " I asked. 
 
 " Invariably where suffering follows. It may not have 
 been a step of yours, but somewhere in the long chain 
 of past generations a falling away from the right and 
 that is God, has taken place, the moral law broken." 
 
 A moment s silence came between us. 
 
 " I noted," I said then, " that in your first reply there 
 was something of a qualifying character." 
 
 " Yes. For, what may seem strange, there is another 
 section which does not suffer, immersed as it is in this 
 same hell, so resourceful of poignancy to others. It is 
 made up of the souls of those who have not yet attained 
 to wisdom or felt of higher things. So far has this sec 
 tion developed and no further: in it the spiritual is still 
 latent. It breathes but its normal atmosphere. You find 
 its exemplification on earth, where one finds light and 
 happiness and another darkness and discontent." 
 
 " Have you anything in the way of a remedy to 
 offer ? " I asked, sadness at my heart. 
 
 " Only a return to the right, to God," came the un 
 hesitating reply. 
 
 "And as this depends upon the individual, and an un 
 qualified concert of action in man is at no time possible, 
 the return of the race as a race, can never be more than 
 partial. In other words, a condition wholly purged of 
 sin is not possible to earth as long as man is the creature 
 he is." 
 
 " The race as a whole does not need redemption. It 
 is the individual. And as regards the partial return you
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 speak of, the success of every such effort lies as much 
 with you as with every other being on earth." 
 
 " How do you mean ? of what does it consist," I 
 asked. 
 
 "Of the simple performance of your duty to God and 
 man." 
 
 " But the injustice still remains. Perhaps it is because 
 I do not understand. Why should one be made to suffer 
 and the other not ? Why do we not all start alike ? " 
 
 " We do." 
 
 " But you have just led me to infer to the contrary." 
 
 " You are right ; you do not understand. As contem 
 poraries it may be said we do not start alike. Take 
 yourself and a savage from the wilds of Africa for in 
 stance. You are both men ; yet beyond this you are no 
 more alike than are a bit of charcoal and a diamond the 
 same. You are men in different stages of development, 
 physically, mentally, morally, spiritually, and every other 
 way. They are both carbon; the one crude, the other 
 refined. 
 
 " But for all this difference there was a time some 
 where in the far past when mankind, as so many units, 
 started from one common point, though ages apart ; hence 
 in one sense it may be said that all started alike. But 
 let me explain more fully, for I see that you are sorely 
 puzzled. 
 
 " To begin with, the conditions essential to the appear 
 ance of man upon earth were not the work of a moment 
 as we are asked to believe. Many long ages were con 
 sumed in the attainment of that point, where from some 
 thing lower man mounted to that stage of perfection 
 where God in reviewing his work pronounced it good 
 and crowned it with immortality. And having reached
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 it, it was the work of other ages to bring about the dis 
 appearance of that period of mystery. 
 
 " Between its dawn and close man appeared upon earth, 
 not in the single pair of the Eden story, but in many 
 pairs, and in various parts of the earth, the conditions 
 becoming universal, and not in a day, but many centu 
 ries, possibly even ages, apart, for the mills of the 
 gods grind slowly, and lastly with all the physical pe 
 culiarities which to-day distinguish the various races. 
 
 " For man is not an after-thought, not the mere whim 
 of an hour, but the product for which all the earthly 
 forces never blind, have been working through the 
 long cycles of the past. Nor was he the comparatively 
 finished product of to-day. Far from it. The very low 
 est strata of society at the present time, probably, marks 
 the flood of that era of half-spontaneity. 
 
 "At this point then, you see, we all started alike. 
 There was no royal road then, nor is there before God 
 any now. Justice pure and simple was then and is now 
 being meted out to all alike. But the first product, 
 borne unconsciously upon the tide of natural progress, 
 was ages ahead in the general development before the 
 last of that natural growth appeared. Nature s pro 
 cesses, marked by human standards, as I have said, 
 work slowly, and it is very probable that the last to ap 
 pear was but little if any in advance in point of devel 
 opment to the first man to tread the earth. However 
 this might be, there was a difference, be it large or 
 small; and to this start the start of the first-born, > 
 is due the greater difference we find in men to-day. 
 
 " I might add that should man ever, through some 
 totally inconceivable and wholly improbable catastrophe, 
 disappear from the face of the earth and not a seed of 
 
 152
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 him remain, your globe would forever remain man-free. 
 For the conditions that made his evolution possible no 
 longer exist, and can under no circumstances be re 
 peated or revived. Leaving all minor conditions out of 
 the question, the earth as an earth and a unit would 
 prevent it. For the earth of to-day is by no means the 
 earth of cycles past. It has lost much while yet in 
 appreciable to human sense and calculation, in volume, 
 and in axial and orbital velocity; adding belt upon belt 
 to itself in the process of matter of an ever-increasing 
 fineness, and lengthening your day and year. Life would 
 of course follow any readjustment of forces, but it would 
 be a life of a higher type than any now existent with you, 
 and would border more upon our own. But then all 
 this is pure theory and can never be realized in fact, for 
 die unforeseen never happens to God. He, of course, has 
 complete control." 
 
 153
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE EXTENDED SENSE. 
 
 (AGAIN Waring came to a pause, for a few moments 
 fumbling among the leaves of the book he held as if 
 in search of a page of special interest. Having found 
 it, and without looking up, he continued the reading.) 
 
 " You have memories of earth ? " I remarked tenta 
 tively this morning. 
 
 " We have, such as you have of your childhood ; pic 
 tures losing themselves in the mists of time. Why not? 
 But," reading my thought, " there is for us no more 
 reason for desiring to remember the earth-life than there 
 is for you to remember your boyhood days. Many are 
 glad enough to forget them. The man or woman who 
 makes life a success in the broader sense of the word is 
 usually not one to regret the past, though he may 
 look upon it with fondness. So with us. He alone who 
 would recall, if possible, a course pursued does that. The 
 eyes of the successful are always to the front, feeling 
 that life s solution lies there, that the future, in other 
 words, is the vital part of existence." 
 
 " Then you do not know ? " 
 
 " Yes, and yet again, no," Rose answered. "Hav- 
 
 154
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 ing passed Death s portal we are at least assured of an 
 after-life. But the great why of it all still lies en 
 shrouded in mystery." 
 
 "For evermore, do you think?" 
 
 " No, but, as upon earth, to be gradually penetrated 
 as human understanding and individual character devel 
 ops. That secret is an absolute point in the Master 
 Mind, only to be solved ages hence for you and me, when 
 we have attained to that perfection which will permit us 
 to stand in His presence with impunity." 
 
 " With impunity ? " I echoed, surprised at her words. 
 " Have all our lessons then been in vain ? Is God not 
 the source of all that is kindly and good ? " 
 
 " He is. God is love. Whatever betides remember 
 that. Should question arise, never doubt Him, but, for 
 the answer, probe deeper within yourself. It is his 
 thoughtful care that provides for every relationship of 
 life ; carbon for the plant ; oxygen for man ; and yet 
 a subtler fluid for our own existence. For we breathe. 
 Yet reverse the order of Law, give oxygen to the plant 
 and ether to the man and you turn what is good under 
 one set the natural, of conditions into the rankest of 
 evils. So with His environments. They are of an order 
 so high and rare that no spirit can breathe them until 
 fitted therefor by a probation covering ages." 
 
 " Then are those environments material ? " 
 
 " In the broader sense of the future, yes. For it is 
 matter, spirit matter, which is after all but a qualify 
 ing term. It is the essence of matter; matter in its 
 sublimest forms, the quintessence of all that here appeals 
 to you as color, music, perfume, contact, taste." 
 
 " What are we to understand by this ? " I asked. 
 
 She laughed, the sweetest of music to me. 
 155
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " I fear little or nothing where so few really under 
 stand the properties of spirit matter even in its closest 
 relationship to matter as you of earth understand it. We 
 only know that the flight of matter is toward the spiri 
 tual, the unseen; that the earth, and at a certain stage 
 of their formation all the stars of the Universe, owing 
 to central forces within, is constantly throwing off fine 
 particles of matter, which immediately above its face 
 constitutes the atmosphere of man, and at various heights 
 above the planes and atmospheres of many higher orders 
 of beings; that in short matter has the power of assum 
 ing as many varied forms without as it has within the 
 limits of the physical senses, the simplest and rarest of 
 which is the highest. And as intuitively we know that 
 He is the Unit from whence all departs and to whom 
 all returns, you should, with very little effort, be able to 
 grasp my meaning." 
 
 " It is wonderful," I acquiesced in admiration. 
 
 " You will wonder even more once you have crossed 
 into this borderland of ours. And your first subject of 
 wonder will be, I know, the striking similarity in many 
 ways of the life we lead to the one on earth. We breathe ; 
 we clothe; we walk, where distances are short; we 
 laugh ; we sing ; we do many things very many in fact, 
 that you do." 
 
 " So I have perceived from time to time. But are our 
 senses, being objective, dropped at death?" 
 
 " Not so. The organs are, but their functions are at 
 once taken up by another set much more comprehensive 
 in every way, and which are carried in embryo as it were 
 through the physical life. There is no stoppage at any 
 moment. In fact the senses with which we are here en 
 dowed are but extensions of those you enjoy, made to 
 cover a new and broader field." 
 
 156
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 I was silent, doubtful. 
 
 "Would you have evidence of what I say of its 
 truth ? " she asked with a smile, noting my emotion. 
 
 I gave a silent assent. Rose held out her hand to me. 
 I took it with a sentiment of awe. 
 
 At the contact I felt that keen thrill surge through me 
 once more which I so well remembered experiencing on 
 the occasion of my first intromission some time previous. 
 For a few brief moments nothing of an unusual nature 
 transpired, and I was beginning to wonder what the out 
 come would be when a gentle but decided increase of 
 pressure of the hand on the part of Rose seemed to bring 
 about the desired condition. For a few seconds my 
 mind stood in a state of bewilderment. Then clearness 
 came. 
 
 " Now note," she half-commanded, yet kindly, just as 
 a mother would craving her child s attention. 
 
 I looked. 
 
 " I see nothing unusual," I said. 
 
 " Good. Your sense then is what you would call nor 
 mal?" 
 
 " In every way. But that is no proof." 
 
 Again came that delighted laugh. 
 
 " No. But now." 
 
 There came another slight pressure in the contact of 
 hands. With her other she pointed below us. 
 
 Then I started. For the ground beneath seemed slowly 
 to fade away; not entirely, but leaving it of a transpar 
 ency and apparent fragility which made me shrink in 
 voluntarily within myself. In that moment my sense had 
 assumed a strange accession of power. 
 
 " Do not fear," I was assured ; " you stand on firm 
 ground. You can prove it by stamping your foot." 
 
 157
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 I did so, still with trepidation. 
 
 Assured by the act more than her words I gave my at 
 tention now completely over to the enjoyment of the thus 
 suddenly acquired faculty. The loose, fibrous earth, I 
 noticed, offered little or no impediment to its exercise, 
 but I saw at once that solids were not all alike ; that, in 
 other words, while all were transparent, they were all 
 more or less so according, I opined, to their density and 
 specific gravity: showing that the sense there follows 
 the same general law which here restricts the physical 
 one. 
 
 For a moment I misinterpreted the demonstration. 
 
 " No, they have not changed," I was told as surprise 
 arose to my mind once more. " The change is wholly 
 within yourself." 
 
 By a slight direction of the will on the part of Rose 
 my attention was once more rivetted to the ground. 
 
 I now saw that it, beneath my feet, was honeycombed 
 with the passages of many underground streams, which 
 then, greatly shrunken, still scurried from a thousand 
 and one directions to mingle in one central current, 
 which in the freshet season must assume large propor 
 tions indeed, if one may judge from the size of the chan 
 nel it has worn for itself. Originally, I decided as the 
 result of a more general survey, immense boulders had 
 filled in this granite concave, worn smooth by glacial 
 attrition, half a mountainside having first blocked the 
 narrowing outlet of the defile. Upon this smaller rocks 
 had been deposited, filling in the interstices ; an accretio n 
 of yet smaller forming a third layer and a kind of soil, 
 upon which in the course of time shrubs and trees had 
 grown to heaven, the entire process probably consum 
 ing thousands of years in the formation. 
 
 158
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 I followed with a curious and interested eye the long, 
 snakelike roots of the pines and oaks which supported 
 in a network of snarls and intertwinings the mat of the 
 forest floor and all its beauty ; and admired, while I mar 
 velled at the intelligence shown, the adroit manner in 
 which every vantage point had been seized upon for the 
 purpose of building for the greatest resisting strength. 
 It is God s way, in the carrying out of his inscrutable 
 purpose, to thus build, and then destroy, in a rebuilding. 
 As I looked I saw a boulder, depressed by the weight 
 put upon it, splinter with a crash, and a readjustment 
 of the upper crust take place, a by no means reassuring 
 experience. I remember now having heard just such 
 muffled detonations before and wondering at the cause. 
 
 Sudden fear rose to my mind, and thoughts of the 
 danger that threatened my cabin and myself. I shud 
 dered once more, and sought, with ludicrous result, I 
 know, to tread buoyantly. 
 
 " Do not despair," I was assured ; " you at least are 
 safe." 
 
 A new enigma. 
 
 " I do not understand. Why I ? " I asked, preparing 
 for another revelation. 
 
 For a moment Rose hesitated. 
 
 " Do not ask me now : that will be explained later. 
 The time of disclosure is not quite ripe." 
 
 She released my hand, and slowly my surroundings 
 assumed their natural conditions, or rather, to be more 
 exact, my unaided sense reasserted itself. 
 
 " Now tell me," Rose asked, "was there throughout 
 aught unnatural in the experience you underwent ? " 
 
 " In no sense that I could ascertain. Apart from an 
 
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 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 attendant feeling of surprise all was as natural as could 
 be." 
 
 " That is to say then that the impressions received 
 reached the sensorium through exactly the same chan 
 nels, as far at least as you are able to say, through which 
 pass the impressions of your everyday life? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "And since you recognized it as such even that feeling 
 of surprise can not have been out of the ordinary. Now 
 let me add that this is but one of many, or at least one 
 of several, directions in which you will find this one 
 sense enlarged." 
 
 I remained silent, unable to follow her meaning. 
 
 " Telescopically and microscopically for instance," she 
 continued. 
 
 " I do not understand you." 
 
 " How dull you are," she laughed lightly. " I mean 
 that the soul s, or the spirit-eye is so organized that by 
 a slight volitional effort it can be made to, in a greatly 
 enlarged scope while still within certain elastic bounds, 
 penetrate interstellar space; or by another adjustment 
 delve into that other world, equally incomprehensible, 
 the microscopic. There lies a world undreamed of by 
 the many. In his pride and ignorance man has asserted 
 since the days of Adam that the visible to the naked eye 
 marked the boundary of the material life, where the 
 truth is, proven in this later day, that we have failed so 
 far to find the point where the visible ends, just as we 
 have on the other hand failed to mark the limit of the 
 created heavens. Everywhere life teems. The micro 
 scopic world is in fact as limitless as the other." 
 
 It was a new direction. I was lost in wonder and re 
 mained silent. 
 
 160
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 * In fact the Universe is one grand whole," she con 
 tinued, "and what makes it appear made up of parts is 
 only the finite nature of our senses." 
 
 " Then there is a limit to the spiritual sense ? I thought 
 the line of demarcation I noted a moment ago was due 
 to the fact that I was not wholly freed from earth and its 
 ties." 
 
 That fact certainly had its bearings. But as you say 
 there is a certain limit. As an instance I cite the fact 
 that to us the plane of matter, spirit-matter remember 
 to you upon which we have our existence or being is al 
 most as opaque as is your plane to your sense." 
 
 "And yet I can not see it? " 
 
 " If the will was all that was necessary you would. But 
 an organ is essential to the conveying of an impression 
 whatever its nature, and that organ is wisely restricted 
 in its powers. Our plane lies simply just without the 
 boundary of the physical organ. That is what I am try 
 ing to make plain. And now mark you what I say. Just 
 as the invention of the telescope and the microscope has 
 made plain its shortcomings in at least two directions, 
 so some day, when human effort is directed spiritward, an 
 instrument will be devised which will prove to you of 
 earth the truth of what T say in this, a third direction. 
 
 " But the microscope has to do with material life," I 
 corrected. 
 
 " Oh, the perversity of man. There is no other. It 
 was spirit-matter, or the spiritual, so long as it had no ex 
 istence for man, that is, you might say, until the ap 
 pearance of the microscope. Then it became material. 
 When that prospective instrument I speak of becomes 
 a fact it will demonstrate to you our sphere to be as 
 much a natural and material a one. Material and I 
 
 161
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 cannot impress this upon you too often, is but a com 
 parative term. It includes all substances in some way 
 palpable to the senses, and without regard to their 
 density or any other property but those of a certain 
 opacity or power of resistance. When I say senses, I 
 speak advisedly, for I would include my own. And 
 they being the more far-reaching, I think that they 
 should mark the truth or untruth of what I say." 
 
 This was said with a smile and a triumphant arching 
 of the brows. 
 
 " But as it is," she continued a moment later, " neither 
 are more than temporary. With new fields come new 
 sensations, to understand which will require organs 
 more sensitive and more expansive than those either 
 you or I possess at the present moment. Wonderful 
 as they are they may be compared as mere makeshifts 
 with the organs of the future." 
 
 " That should mean another death, or a series of 
 deaths." 
 
 " No. In the uses for which they were intended the 
 physical organs show themselves capable of adjustment 
 to any demand put upon them; which is great when we 
 figure from the dull beginning of infancy, to experienced 
 old age. So with ours. They are even more elastic, as I 
 have just shown you in one direction, and some time ago 
 in another. Our future has nothing to do with expansion 
 of body, or, beyond a certain degree, of soul, but solely 
 with growth of intellect and the unfoldment of moral 
 character. In that development, it is true, there is a 
 slight throwing off continually of the coarser parts of 
 us, an unconscious process, the analogy of which you 
 find on earth in the unconscious expansion of the boy 
 into the man, but it is a change involving no change 
 
 162
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 of organism. No; there is but one death, the death 
 of earth. We simply pass, as we are successively fit 
 ted, consciously from one grade to another with char 
 acter as our password." 
 
 " You are at perfect liberty then ? " I asked. 
 
 " We are. The choice of all that goes to make up 
 our existence certainly lies with us." 
 
 " Then why do you not pass on?" I asked, surprised. 
 
 " For many reasons. Can you remember the joy we 
 felt when we were children together and life was 
 young, roaming the fields flooded with the varying 
 beauty of the spring, the summer and the fall? That 
 experience we repeat here on another and nobler scale. 
 I am in the midst of that enjoyment now. I am like 
 a traveller in a new country where much is novel and 
 interesting. Then my loves hold me here; and a sense 
 of duty I have." 
 
 " Loves ? duty ? Duty to whom ? " 
 
 "My kind." 
 
 "Ah, I understand. I see you engaged often in mis 
 sionary work." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " But I find you always at work among your own 
 countrymen and women. How is that? On earth we 
 go among the heathen." 
 
 She laughed lightly. 
 
 " That is where you of earth err. Charity should al 
 ways begin at home. It is a work assigned us, you 
 know," she continued more seriously, " from higher 
 planes in the work of the general redemption." 
 
 " I begin to understand. And your allusion to your 
 loves ? " 
 
 " Means that love with us is the attracting and co- 
 163
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 alescing force as it is with you. I remain here because 
 the attractions bid me. I love the flowers here, the 
 trees, the brooks, the people." 
 
 " But where the choice to higher things the solution 
 of the mysteries which here enshroud us, are yours, 
 I marvel that you loiter on the way." 
 
 " Man upon earth loiters three score years. Why 
 should we haste. We have an eternity before us. It 
 is not even asked of us. Besides there are other 
 reasons. I have already made plain that sudden and 
 inadvisable transmissions from a lower to a higher level 
 are not possible. Then I repeat love rules. You must 
 first learn to love, to long for something in some higher 
 section before you can feel the desire to pass on. Until 
 that desire comes we are powerless. That is why pro 
 gress with us is as much a matter of time as with you. 
 But do not think us unprogressive, for that would be far 
 from the truth. Little by little we feel the attraction 
 to higher things seizing upon our natures and calling us 
 to the front, away from the gods of our younger 
 days. You know that the loves of our youth are not 
 those of our maturer years." 
 
 " Except my love for you, my Rose." 
 
 "And that is because our loves have kept apace." 
 
 ********* 
 And so time passes. 
 
 164
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE CHASE OF THE MOUNTAIN LION. 
 
 DREAMS. Mere vaporings? Or have they relation to 
 our past or future? Have they relation to our life at all, 
 or are they of a world entirely apart? That, however, 
 can not be. The Universe is one. And, while phantas- 
 mic, dreams are still effects, and as effects live only 
 through causes. To concede the existence then of causes 
 extraneous to those upon which our universe is based 
 is to concede the existence of a power in rivalry to our 
 God s, a contingency we can not conceive to be, hence 
 eschew the idea in toto. 
 
 What relationship then with our life? That some . 
 the more beautiful and ideal, may have connection with 
 our future may well be imagined. But how about those 
 bordering on the phantasmagoric those where the ele 
 mental life life without the controlling factors of 
 reason and conscience, has its being and finds the time 
 to carry out its diabolical scheming. They can only 
 have to do with the past, the world s past, since the 
 earth to-day brings forth no life in the least resembling 
 that in them depicted. Has the spirit indeed the faculty 
 of recalling all the vast, interminable past? even to 
 
 165
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 that point where the first thought of creation finds birth 
 in the Master Brain? 
 
 Is there in truth a past? is there a future? or is 
 there but a now? I begin to doubt. In the round of 
 the eternal we must concede the existence still of that 
 primary law that presides over the birth of worlds ; for 
 to do otherwise would be to admit the beginning of an 
 end, and the enthronement of the finite. And that the 
 law which on the other hand oversees the extinction of 
 worlds also prevails we too must admit, as our astronomy 
 abounds in instances where suns have disappeared from 
 our ken wrapped in a mystery that can only be ex 
 plained in the surmise that they have returned to the 
 elemental form. No, no. The laws of the Most High 
 are eternal. There is naught but a present. Beyond the 
 gates of Death the mystery of life, we will find, lies re 
 vealed from the beginning, lies mapped out to the end, 
 and what we know as change lies really in the indi 
 vidual in his contact with those laws, and to that un 
 accounted property we call growth. 
 
 Usually there is a chain of intelligent action running 
 like a golden thread through every dream that is normal, 
 whatever may be said of the sanity or reverse of its 
 setting. And mine was normal, that is to say it was 
 not brought about or influenced so far as I am able to 
 say by any indisposition of body. I had been out all 
 morning upon the mountain in a search for deer, and 
 fatigued in body but perfectly clear and bright of mind, 
 was napping the late afternoon away seated in the door 
 way, my head pillowed against the rude frame. The 
 dream that came to me I can not describe : nor does it 
 matter. I will not even say that this time it bore any in 
 telligent relevancy, such as, for instance, where the 
 
 166
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 spiritual thread, broken in the awakening, is taken up 
 by the material life in a strange continuance. And yet 
 again it must have, for it was this very thing that took 
 place. I only remember and happily it is all we re 
 quire, that, as it progressed, in the turmoil of an action 
 I can not interpret, there came to me a faint and distant 
 cry, a cry not as a thing apart, but as a part of the filmy 
 tissue of my dream, a cry that repeated itself with such 
 swelling insistence that gradually it drew apart and be 
 came a thing distinct, and so full of a vindictiveness, 
 and a horror to ice the blood, that I awoke. 
 
 Life, taken in all its ramifications, is certainly a curious 
 thing. In that first moment of awakening I thought I 
 had dozed but a moment. Then I realized that I must 
 have soundly slept for more than two hours. The sun 
 had set, and even across the canyon the reflected flush 
 of sunset had cooled into the gray of the coming night. 
 It was in fact twilight, and the shadows of evening were 
 fast filling the depths of the woods. Not a sound dis 
 turbed the quiet; the tall pines stood spectral-like in the 
 uncertain blend of light and dusk. Yet it seemed to me 
 that the crags had not yet ended the re-echoing of that 
 last thrilling cry of my dream. The very silence was 
 palpitant with its burden. The cold shiver of an unname- 
 able fear seized upon me. 
 
 My ass had drawn near, and now, with a harshness 
 that grated upon my high strung nerves, filled the forest 
 with a prolonged bray. To me it seemed an answer, 
 and to be vibrant with a terror which for the moment 
 I could not understand. Then again came the cry of 
 my dreaming, shrill, blood-curdling, filling the canyon 
 with its horror. In a moment I had recognized it, and 
 I laughed quietly to myself. It was the lion returned. 
 
 167
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 It was still some distance away, down the canyon 
 below the shelving rock. I took up my rifle and went 
 to the brink to reconnoiter. For half an hour its weird 
 cries were repeated at intervals of a few minutes, and 
 ever at gradually approaching distances. Then they 
 worked away to the left, where as gradually they were 
 lost in the distance there. With a sigh of relief I re 
 turned slowly to the cabin in the blur of the woods. 
 
 I built a little fire by the corner nearest the doorway 
 to cheer me, for I was not completely over that first 
 spasm of fear. Then for an hour I hung over it in a 
 profound reverie, adding a stick every now and then in 
 an absent-minded way as the fire burned down and the 
 encroaching darkness suggested to me the need. Then 
 I rose, stretched myself with a lazy feeling of pleasure, 
 and was about to enter my cabin for the night, when 
 startlingly near this time, and from the upper end of the 
 glade, the cry was repeated. 
 
 The unexpected sound made my hair stand on end. 
 For a moment I stood rooted to the ground, unable to 
 move hand or foot. Then I hastily replenished the fire 
 once more, seized a burning brand and started another 
 on the corner diagonally back of the first. When these 
 flared up, and the sparks fled in show r ers among the 
 branches overhead, they filled the flat with an unbroken 
 circle of lurid light wherein the trunks of the pines cast 
 dancing shadows and the granite boulders stood impres 
 sive in their massiveness. For a time the glare was dis 
 concerting, and the shrieks of the animal ceased. But it 
 was for a short time only. Gaining courage with the 
 passing of time and my seeming impotence, it again ap 
 proached, and its shadowy form was ever and anon to be 
 seen circling in the murk of the further forest. 
 
 168
 
 The Lost Aline of the Mono. 
 
 Never has it shown such venom. It appeared as if its 
 one purpose was to arouse in me a feeling of rancor in the 
 hope that at some time of its greatest fury I would be 
 led into an indiscretion. But reason held unruffled sway 
 in my brain throughout, and every indiscreet display of 
 the slinking body only ended in its becoming the mark 
 of my rifle. And in my mind, too, I was resolving all 
 the while on the morrow to put an end for all time to 
 the animal s threatened depredations. 
 
 My marksmanship also had its deterrent effect. I 
 noted with satisfaction that after each shot the circles 
 described were always enlarging ones, and that all its 
 movements were of a more guarded nature ; and when 
 one shot better than the rest brought a sharp growl, part 
 of pain, but more of surprise and sullenness at the un 
 looked-for nature of the attack, I saw it no more. Fif 
 teen minutes later its cry came to me once more from 
 far up the gulch, where it was repeated a number of 
 times, when all was still. I now labored to bring in some 
 of the larger wood so that my fires should not die down 
 while I slept. Then for another brief period I hung 
 about, half-dreading the beast s return. But all remained 
 quiet and I entered the cabin, carefully fastened the door, 
 and sought my night s repose. 
 
 ********* 
 Early this morning it is the mellow autumn, rifle in 
 hand I took up the chase. I had no difficulty in finding 
 the trail of the brute. Its last fading cries had come 
 to me from afar up the wooded gulch between the two 
 domes to the north and west. It is a bit of my immediate 
 surroundings which has never had my attention until to 
 day as its general appearance had proclaimed it as im- 
 
 169
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 passable. Nor is this impression much belied by actual 
 fact, for boulder and shrub hem easy progress on every 
 side. But it evidently was the natural channel of ingress 
 into the nook of the brute for a wellworn trail worms 
 itself through the brush from over the saddle and the 
 country beyond. 
 
 This I followed very carefully, on all fours most of 
 the time, and always on the alert for a sudden appear 
 ance of the animal. Arrived on the other side I dropped 
 relieved to the open, wooded bench some distance below. 
 It was upon a part of the mountain altogether new to 
 me. A chain of dry meadows fringed with hazel swung 
 down from the left and intercepted my path. Across this 
 chain I passed. Here I lost the trail, the open nature of 
 the country making it unnecessary for the animal to con 
 tinue upon a fixed path. I paused for a moment in in 
 decision to look about me. The forest was grand, sombre, 
 silent in the early morning light, the dark pine trunks 
 rising straight to heaven, the green immobile canopy 
 overhead. But below, the underbrush the few gnarled, 
 beechen-stemmed aspens on the meadow, the hazel, the 
 vast oaks here and there interspersed, were gay with 
 color. A jay broke the silence which reigned like the 
 spirit of prayer about, and a squirrel nibbled audibly at 
 a cone far up among the branches of a pine. Then like 
 a flash an idea came to me. It was in the nature of re 
 velation. I looked about me with a peculiar searching. 
 Had the hour come? Yea, surely; for the scene was 
 growing strangely familiar. It seemed to me as 
 if I had been over all that ground before. Half-instinct- 
 ively I turned to my right. Yes; it was by yon group 
 of sugarpines . As if in corroboration a lithe, tawny 
 body moved among the underbrush, then sprang crouch- 
 
 170
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 ingly upon the trunk of a fallen pine, which lay its length 
 a short distance before me. Without the least hesitation 
 I raised my rifle and fired, giving no thought whatever 
 to the possible consequence. My aim was good; with a 
 snarl the animal half-turned and with a bound disap 
 peared. With every sense now preternaturally awake I 
 followed . Yes; there was the defile down which it had 
 disappeared in my dream, with its covert of dogwood 
 and alder in autumn garb. With a sudden and unflinch 
 ing faith in the result I sprang in excited pursuit. 
 
 As I fully expected, some distance down came in that 
 side ravine to form the acute angle which I remembered, 
 and up which the lioness had turned if my dream was 
 to come true. A moment, then a turn, and there stood 
 the overhanging wall of rock with its shadowy alcove, 
 tenanted a moment later by the treacherous beast; the 
 wilderness of brush and boulder, the overtopping pines ; 
 to my left beyond, the Jackass, just as I remembered 
 seeing it. 
 
 In my bewilderment my heart almost ceased its beat 
 ing, and I might have been pardoned if at that moment 
 I had forgotten all else in my eagerness to reach that 
 spot, the focal point of all my thoughts and labors for 
 the past four or five years. But the truth which is often 
 stranger than fiction, is that all thought of the mine 
 for the moment was strangely absent from my mind. 
 The ardor with which my object has been pursued has 
 paled much of late. A change has come over me in many 
 ways, but chiefly in mind and spirit. Much thought 
 have I given to the discourses I have had with Rose, 
 to the wonderful conditions obtaining in the afterworld ; 
 and the thought now uppermost, together with a dazed 
 feeling of wonder, was the unerring manner in which 
 
 171
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 the scenes of my intromission of months back were 
 being realized. I have never heard its parallel. For one 
 moment only was I brought sharply to myself, and to a 
 sense of the danger I was incurring. That was when the 
 animal made its stand, and turned upon me with that 
 formidable display of its ivories, giving vent to a blood- 
 curling cry that echoed and re-echoed along the moun 
 tain-side. With a little more care given my aim I 
 again raised my rifle and fired, this time the shot that 
 brought the noble feline to the ground. Without a sound 
 it dropped, quivered for a moment and then was still. 
 
 Then I relapsed into my previous state of mental tor 
 por ... I flayed the lioness with the feelings of a man 
 doing a duty perfunctorily, the task of another which 
 somehow had been imposed upon me. It was not until 
 I was resting from my labor upon a rock near by that a 
 semblance of clearness came to me. Then, half-mechan- 
 ically, and in an effort to locate myself, I ran my 
 thoughts, link by link, over the odd chain of events as 
 I remembered them in that clairvoyant hour months ago, 
 to the moment of my flaying the animal and my later 
 reclining on the rock. It was a necessary step to the 
 complete restoration of myself to my wonted compo 
 sure. What had followed ? Ah, yes ; I remembered. 
 I turned, still half-bewildered, rose, and stepped to the 
 cliff, my last shadow of doubt and mystification dissi 
 pating. 
 
 172
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THE DISCOVERY OF THE MINE. 
 
 ALL has come true. There stood the long-lost mine, 
 a wall of dessicated quartz, half hid in a tangle of shrub 
 bery. I have not been played false in a single par 
 ticular. To me it seems rich beyond reckoning. Its 
 full extent I can but conjecture owing to a maze of 
 tumbled boulders, and the rank growth of brushwood 
 which covers the steep slopes which here shelve sharply 
 from both sides to the gully which drains the place, and 
 in which a trickle of water keeps the grasses green, and 
 nourishes a few late flowers. As die swirl of secret 
 excitement following upon my discovery subsided, and 
 I gradually came once more to control myself, I grew 
 observant. I noticed then what had struck me months 
 before that it was a loose wall which somehow in some 
 far geologic age has become transfixed in the narrow 
 gateway of the gulch, and that it formed what toys we 
 are in the hands of the higher powers, the coping so to 
 speak, of the nook, over the rim of which is had that 
 entrancing view of the distant mountains. 
 
 173
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 I actually laughed aloud at this irony of fate. For 
 four long years had I searched so faithfully, so with 
 out complaint; for four long years had I lived within 
 a bow s shot of my goal. Are our paths indeed ordained ? 
 
 And now that I have found it what is it to me ? I feel 
 no jubilation of spirit such as I had pictured to myself 
 many times in the days when the fever of search was 
 strong upon me, nay, not even the most ordinary satis 
 faction. Is it that the half-conscious growth which is the 
 result of my subconscious communions has raised me to 
 a plane above the reach of that common love which is the 
 root of all evil ? I have even come to wonder by what a 
 fatality I have come to spend so many years upon a pro 
 ject of so fleeting a nature. 
 
 Such were my thoughts as slowly and somewhat de 
 jectedly, with pelt slung across my shoulder, and rifle 
 in hand, I returned in the high glory of noon to the se 
 clusion of my cabin. 
 
 With to-day has come a change of mood, and with the 
 change another train of thought. It is one of those peri 
 odic changes or reactions of which I have made mention 
 earlier in these pages. For the nonce the visionary has 
 disappeared in the man of the world. I am giving the 
 matter saner thought, more leisurely consideration, am 
 weighing all the pros and cons of the situation. To-day 
 I can not but see the powerful advantage the possession 
 of all this vast wealth, now within my grasp, will give me. 
 After all wealth in itself is no serious objection, in 
 
 174
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 itself holds no harm. It is only when the loves of man 
 appear in connection that the propensity for good or 
 evil comes to the surface. It all depends upon the in 
 dividual and the use to which it is put. But there shall 
 be no doubt in the world as concerns me; and in the 
 event of my speedy demise and I feel it within me 
 that I am not here for long-, and the passing- of my 
 fortune to my children, I will still vouch for its use in 
 a good purpose. Some grand project for the general 
 uplift of humanity its exact nature I leave for future 
 decision, shall be the result of its expenditure. 
 
 But I am growing old and unfit for this world. My 
 health is being generally undermined; I know a 
 knowledge that has been mine now for some time, 
 that I have become subject to a weak heart and may 
 at any moment be called away to that other world. 
 What if it should be before I can share the knowledge of 
 my discovery with my children, and through them 
 with the world? I am assured to the contrary by Rose 
 and her companions, but a nervous fear possesses me 
 nevertheless. The task of the moment is plainly evident 
 to ensure to the future as far as is possible the location 
 of this fabled mine. It seems woefully insufficient in 
 view of the sequestered nature of my abode and the 
 tenuous chance of some stranger falling upon it, but 
 it is the best at my command. 
 
 In the cool of my cabin, where the stray sunbeams 
 through the chinks of the roof form a twilight of se- 
 
 175
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 ductive beauty, and the tranquility is invaded at times 
 by the buzzing of a yellow- jacket, or the softer flutter 
 ing of a butterfly in its passage in through the door and 
 out through the chimney, I am drawing up an elaborate 
 map of the vicinity. I am taking no chances. Every 
 point of any prominence at all, all the little streams 
 and half-blind trails, find a place upon it. At the 
 same time I am writing up data in confirmation. When 
 these are completed I will roll them together, tie them 
 with a ribbon which somewhere I found among my pos 
 sessions, and place them beyond the reach of any damp 
 or marauding vermin in a metal tube I have secured. 
 Should the worst come I still have faith in the powers 
 and love of my Rose. 
 
 Home again. A month has passed since the date of 
 my last entry. A week or ten days after the date of 
 that entry came the first storms of winter and I re 
 turned to the plains. On the way out I stopped over 
 night at the clearing to share with my old shake-mak 
 ing friend the knowledge of the good fortune which 
 has overtaken me, first pledging him to absolute secrecy. 
 Arrived here I have confided the documents recently 
 completed to the safe-keeping of Ida, particularly im 
 pressing upon her their value and importance. 
 
 The spring once more is here, and as the time for 
 my periodic return to the mountain draws near it is 
 with the growing feeling that it is to be for the last 
 time; a feeling that finds its origin more in the nature 
 
 176
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 of a premonition than in any knowledge I have of a 
 more stable character. The long winter nights I have 
 passed in relating to Ida all the wonderful story of my 
 life in the nook; a story which she, being younger in 
 experience, and therefore more skeptical, has accepted 
 with some mental reservations. But the tale has grown 
 upon her; a greater faith has come; and when I shared 
 with her to-day also this emotion presaging our last 
 good-bye, there came to her too, as in a flash, this dread 
 which ere the year is out is to culminate in certainty. 
 With the warm tears of love in her eyes, and her young 
 heart torn with an anguish that a father alone can 
 fathom, she beseeches me to remain with her. Useless 
 pleading: with the appearance of the first snowflower 
 upon that eastern slope I must, I will be there. 
 
 Once more the mountains, the eternal mountains ! 
 How I love them ! Nature is just awakening, at times 
 seems uncertain of the hour, relapses for days at a time 
 back to winter sleep, then to awake with a greater cer 
 titude and life. The days are gray and chill; but fuel 
 is plentiful; the chimney broad; the fire cheery, and life 
 again full of interest. Great fields of snow still encloak 
 the mountain above; but about me the grasses are up, 
 the brush is throwing out fresh shoots, and my burro 
 finds good pasture. 
 
 I feel somehow that the threads of my life are focus- 
 fng themselves for an important event. Have they to do 
 
 177
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 with those preparations I see being made upon the other 
 side of that veil, the passing of which we call death, and 
 which rather mystify me? 
 
 178
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 IN WHICH THE HERMIT S END IS ANNOUNCED. 
 
 FOR there beneath the trees that rise about the abode 
 of Rose and its fronting parterres of flowers has ap 
 peared a mysterious and unoccupied couch, pillowed, 
 and soft with downy coverings. Just when it first ap 
 peared I have no recollection, but probably some little 
 time before I became impressed by the strange insist 
 ence of its presence. It is a shaded spot, and a breeze 
 warms and yet cools it pleasantly. Birds sing above, 
 and there is the soft splash of fountains. Cordials rest 
 upon a table close by, and fruits and viands, such as 
 have, since my earliest schooldays, always been associ 
 ated in my mind; with thoughts of the revelries of the 
 gods of the ancients. Occasionally in my clairvoyant 
 flights I come upon Rose seated by it with a smile of ex 
 pectancy upon her face ; sometimes with a few friends 
 in attendance but more often alone. For there privacy 
 is sought, and held sacred, just as here. 
 
 179
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 This morning the mystery was made light. 
 
 I found Rose as usual seated by the couch with that 
 far-away look in her eyes that I have seen there so 
 much of late, two young sprites sporting a short distance 
 away. 
 
 " You are expecting a friend ? " I asked. 
 
 " I am expecting a spirit from earth," she answered 
 me simply. 
 
 I can not understand the unseen connections of this 
 life, what something it was that prompted me to the 
 next question. 
 
 " Might it be possible that we are acquainted? But 
 of course, since your friends were always my friends." 
 
 Rose smiled. 
 
 "You do." 
 
 She regarded me with the tenderest love and pity in 
 her eyes. 
 
 I paled, for suddenly it flashed upon me that it was 
 myself for whom she was waiting. 
 
 " With all you have seen and all you have heard of 
 the conditions prevailing in our world do you still fear 
 death ? " she asked, noting the perturbation upon my 
 countenance. 
 
 I hesitated a moment before replying, a moment 
 given up to a searching self-scrutiny. Its result I con 
 fess proved far from flattering. 
 
 " Can man ever wholly shake it off ? " I answered her. 
 " I fear," I continued in great humility, " that I am at 
 best but human and have in me still that feeling of un 
 certainty which everywhere seems to attend thoughts 
 of death." 
 
 " Because of convictions half formed, because of the 
 want of the true faith." 
 
 180
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " Yet I feel," I continued with a sublimer air, " that 
 I can be brave when my hour comes." 
 
 " Nobly spoken. My friend, your hour has come." 
 
 " I do not understand," I fenced vaguely. 
 
 " I mean that your days on earth are numbered. We 
 have the knowledge from the higher powers." 
 
 Doubtful I remained silent. 
 
 " Powers," she continued with a gentle insistence, 
 "whose penetration of the future is deeper, and whose 
 wisdom, because of a broader experience, is profounder 
 than our own." 
 
 It seemed incredible, and further doubt rose in my 
 mind. 
 
 "When, then, do I die?" 
 
 " I can not say." 
 
 I breathed relieved in spite of myself. 
 
 " You will die suddenly." 
 
 "And know of it days, weeks, possibly months ahead ?" 
 I asked amazed. 
 
 " Without this fore-knowledge it would be sudden, 
 sudden because unexpected." 
 
 " But how can anything unlooked-for be foretold ? 
 an accident ? " 
 
 " There are no accidents. Everything is the result of 
 law, and therefore, in a manner foreordained." 
 
 I shook my head, still in doubt. 
 
 " Listen," said Rose. " Note this ant here upon your 
 table in its everyday pursuit of food. Does it know, do 
 you think, of the death which impends as you raise your 
 hand to crush it? No. To its fellows, however, grant 
 ing for a moment that they have the intelligence to ap 
 preciate the fact, its death would appear sudden. It 
 was unnatural, out of the ordinary. Yet you, being of 
 
 181
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 a higher type of intelligence, and with a greater hold 
 on life because of that intelligence, know of it minutes, 
 hours, if you will, beforehand." 
 
 I shrugged my shoulders in silent perplexity. 
 
 " That is what you call fate." 
 
 " And foreordination ? Are we then thus the play of 
 the higher powers ? " 
 
 " God in his infinite wisdom has ordained that they be 
 beneficent ones." 
 
 "And yet they crush ? " 
 
 " Nay, you mistake ; not the higher. The desire to 
 inflict pain or suffering is altogether foreign to them. 
 They would elevate. The impulse to crush bespeaks 
 the lower orders, the purely animal." 
 
 "If that then is fate, what is providence?" 
 
 " Fate and providence," she smiled, "are a mere in 
 terchange of words with their meaning dependent upon 
 the individual affected. An act is both fateful and pro 
 vidential always at one and the same time. In other 
 words, there is a silver lining to every cloud. To il 
 lustrate we will again take up this colony from which 
 we just now drew our analogy. Here, you see, is a 
 member tussling with a seed far too large for it to 
 handle with comfort. And here comes another not so 
 fortunate foraging for something it might bear away to 
 the general store. We rob the first to place our booty 
 in the path of the other. Now note the bearing of the 
 act upon the individual. It was an act of providence 
 to one, a disaster to the other." 
 
 " It was robbery." 
 
 " It was, from man s point of view. And as such it 
 might even have been regarded among them had one of 
 their own kind, or some agency within the scope of their 
 comprehension, seized upon the prize." 
 
 182
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " But, you argue, where a power of which they know 
 naught, and in a manner the operation of which they 
 do not understand, intervenes, it is either Fate or Pro 
 vidence. 
 
 " Just so." 
 
 " Does it matter ? " 
 
 " Not in the least, for God controls the situation and 
 works His will in either case; and however doubtful 
 we may be at times, always for the general good. God 
 is above all things impersonal, and in this impersonality 
 lies His power to see clearly and justly. He loves you ." 
 
 " But He loves my enemy as well." 
 
 " Yes. And the fact that he may be a saint and you 
 a sinner makes no difference. He loves all things ; 
 not for the perfection to which they have been brought, 
 but for what lies in them, the power of being moulded 
 into something higher and better, in other words, their 
 perfectibility." 
 
 " I can imagine," I said in a sort of rapture, "an artist 
 whose ardor is such that he finds an almost equal pleas 
 ure in the contemplation of his pigments, and the power 
 for beauty latent within them, as in the finished work it 
 self." 
 
 " Man s perception, on the other hand," she continued 
 after a moment s pause, " is never wholly free of bias, 
 however, he may pride himself to the contrary. The ego 
 ivill manifest itself consciously or unconsciously, and 
 however much repressed. Man is too inherently self- 
 conscious to ever rid himself enough of the thought of 
 self to get a true perspective on life. Therein, lies the 
 root of all earthly evil. When the first of the human 
 race, in those far days before history began, voiced the 
 realization that it, the race, was the highest pinnacle to 
 
 183
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 which, in point of perfection, the materially organized 
 on earth had been brought, man was the creature ab 
 solutely of the natural senses. Of the higher the spiri 
 tual life, he had no inkling. For him such a life 
 had no existence. So far had his powers of perception 
 reached and no further. It required a further develop 
 ment before it could hope to enter into a comprehensible 
 communion with God. For, understand, every phase 
 of development, whether general or individual, carries 
 with it its limitations, its own sphere of consciousness 
 and peculiar range of thought; and the suggestion that 
 came to him that he was the centre the object of all 
 the lavish care we find displayed on every hand, the 
 one for whom all this splendor of earth and sky was cre 
 ated, but marked the arc of flight to which man s fancy 
 at the time was capable of soaring. Viewed from the 
 changed and changing view-point of to-day that thought 
 appears the soul of selfishness, and the effect of its cen 
 turies-long repeating is still deep-seated in man. It has 
 taken a thousand wars to loosen its hold upon him. Still, 
 it was God s way, a way the tortuousness of which we 
 do not understand. 
 
 " But to-day nobler and broader aspirations control us. 
 You of earth are gradually coming to shed the callous 
 ness that results from continued self-centered thought, 
 coming more and more, in the spirit of altruism, to 
 think, more and more to act for your fellowman. And 
 with this broadening of the view of your relationship 
 with the greater life of the Universe is slowly dawning, 
 in the nature of a conclusion, the truth that, while the 
 education, the growth, and the elevation of the soul may 
 be, nay, no doubt is, the object of this earth-life, it is 
 after all but a fragment and a very small fragment, of 
 the grand, the whole truth. 
 
 184
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " For the key that is to open to him the secret of ex 
 istence in its entirety man must leave earth and self to 
 soar among the stars. There will he find it and not here. 
 The constant viewing and reviewing of a drop of water 
 or a grain of sand can never furnish him with an ad 
 equate idea of the overpowering magnitude and beauty 
 of mountain or sea. Man is that drop of ocean, earth 
 is that grain of sand, in the measureless scheme of the 
 Universe. The will must teach the soul to fly. Man, in 
 spirit must hie to the cloudless ether of some height of 
 fancy far from the blinding influences of his petty strifes, 
 and there, in the serenity of the primal life, give free 
 scope to every heaven-born faculty within him, if he would 
 obtain some idea bordering on the truth. For while the 
 way to Him lies within, God still lives without, and you 
 must learn to seek for him afar as well as near at hand. 
 Not necessarily in some star, unless it be the pivotal one 
 about which the inconceivably great mechanism of 
 the Universe may be conceived to revolve. The mighty 
 darks of space may prove quite as potent. And when you 
 have found Him, as never question you will if you but 
 seek aright, the riddle of the ages will stand revealed to 
 you. For you will have found the sensorium of the 
 world; the one absolute point in all the Universe; the 
 generating point of all energy ; the abiding place of truth 
 and love ; the heaven, in short, of all your desires." 
 
 "And yet with all your wisdom," I resumed a few mo 
 ments later, "you can not say just when I am to die?" 
 
 " I can not," was Rose s simple answer. 
 
 "Why not? Can you tell me that ?" 
 
 " I can. Life in the body, you know, is sustained by a 
 nervous energy often taken for the life itself, which in 
 the perfect subject reaches into every atom of his being. 
 
 185
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Where it does not, ailment is the consequence, and if not 
 quickly overcome and the machinery set to rights death 
 in its first approaches has been heralded. It may be years 
 to the culmination, nevertheless that moment where the 
 nervous force is on the wane marks the turning point of 
 the tide and the approach of the inevitable. 
 
 " The problem then simply resolves itself into this. 
 How long can a piece of mechanism such as the human 
 frame, a portion of it now comprising faulty parts, bear 
 up before those faulty parts transmit their difficulties to 
 every other part and the whole come to a standstill. It 
 is a nice calculation, you must concede, one too com 
 plex for human comprehension as at present developed, 
 involving fields of experience not known to you or us 
 except as possible of existence. But it so happens that 
 this very point is a subject for elucidation in a sphere a 
 few points removed from ours and it is from there comes 
 all our certain knowledge in the matter. As the time 
 approaches, of course, and the indications of the final dis 
 solution come more within the range of its special knowl 
 edge, each of the intervening grades, in the order of their 
 perfection, will know of it, just as you in your broader 
 experience may know of an impending event long before 
 an inexperienced child may. When the light enters my 
 own sphere, I too shall know, hours, possibly even days, 
 before you in the ordinary run of things could know." 
 
 "And when that time arrives you will apprise me ? " 
 
 " I will." 
 
 186
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 ROSE TAKES A HAND IN THE WORLD S AFFAIRS. 
 
 FAITHFUL to the promise she made me a few days 
 ago Rose this morning approached me on the subject 
 then under discussion, saying: 
 
 " Your time has come." 
 
 " I know it," I answered briefly, and with something of 
 the air of a martyr. " My heart has protested in the 
 exercise of its functions for some days past." 
 
 "It may cease in its duty at any moment, my dear, 
 and we have preparations to make." 
 
 I echoed her words. 
 
 " Preparations ? For what, Rose ? Tell me quickly, 
 sweetheart, for a panic of fear is overmastering me." 
 
 As strangely enough was the fact. For in a moment, 
 and altogether without warning, I was seized with an 
 uncontrollable trembling akin to the palsy, attended by a 
 perspiration that broke from every pore of my body in 
 cold exudations. 
 
 " Nay, why should it ? " She laid a finger gently 
 upon me. " Compose yourself to think, my friend. 
 Death is not a thing to be shunned, but on the contrary 
 a thing to be courted. It is not a thing of horror, but a 
 
 187
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 thing of beauty, the birth into a new life, the eternal 
 life, which in its further reaches and higher states holds 
 for you and me and all mankind an era wherein we are 
 blessed with creative energy, the peer of God himself. 
 The earth-life is but the embryonic period of the soul and 
 nothing more." 
 
 She was sublime ; and I ? how petty we are at times. 
 
 " But, am I to lie here and rot? " I asked with a dis 
 content that was half-forced, " the prey of marauding 
 animals ? " 
 
 She looked at me in silence for a moment, pain, sur 
 prise, and a great pity in the depths of her eyes as she 
 came to know my irresolution. 
 
 " I said that we must prepare," she returned then even 
 more gently if that were possible than before. " I have 
 read your thoughts for weeks past a noble fight be 
 tween the earthly and the divine in you. I beg to assure 
 you you will not." 
 
 " But how ? I am alone. I have every faith in you, 
 dear heart ; but how ? " 
 
 Rose smiled, a smile so sweet and compassionate, 
 and withal so reassuring, that gradually I came to lose 
 my fear and grew composed. 
 
 " Listen," she began. " On the edge of the hills, 
 where the last brown ridge slopes into the level im 
 mensity of the plain, with his mother and only sister, 
 lives a young man who is well-favored in many ways. 
 His aims, while only general at present, are above the 
 ordinary. A good executive, he is still a youth more 
 purely intellectual, with desires standing for betterment 
 in all things." 
 
 " His name ? " I asked, curious at the strange turn the 
 conversation was taking. 
 
 "Roger Waring." 
 
 188
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Somewhere I had heard the name. 
 
 " Waring," I repeated. " The name is familiar ; I 
 have come upon it before. But where ? " 
 
 " In the Flats. Do you not remember, my dear, one 
 morning some years back a young man assisting you in 
 the readjustment of your pack?" 
 
 " I do, I remember the incident well. But why this 
 portentious interest in him ? " 
 
 "He loves Ida." 
 
 " I had not even heard that they had met," I said in 
 surprise. 
 
 They have, only casually, it is true, but none the 
 less definitely. They met in the City where, you know, 
 she is completing her studies. There was only a glance 
 of eyes meeting, a mingling of the personalities passing, 
 but his heart kindled and love sprang aflame, and to that 
 love he lives true to this moment." 
 
 "And Ida ? What does our daughter say ? " 
 
 " Poor girl," Rose smiled ; " she suspects nothing. But 
 in her secret thoughts I am joyed to find his image rises 
 with a fateful persistency." 
 
 " Have they met since ? This is news to me and in 
 terests most keenly." 
 
 " They have not. They are strangers to each other 
 and do not know how to bring about another meeting. 
 Blind to the possible he indeed lives in the hope that 
 Providence will interfere, with the result that they meet 
 again. It is a frail thing to build on ; and but for the 
 proverbial fact that the young heart bounds high in 
 hope always, he must have given up in despair long 
 ago." 
 
 "And you propose to bring about this meeting?" I 
 asked after a moment s pause. 
 
 189
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " I do." 
 
 "But how?" 
 
 " Listen once more. This young man has a friend 
 in the City of whom he thinks particularly much. They 
 were classmates once." 
 
 A brief pause ensued. 
 
 " This friend of our friend is Paul Carrington." 
 
 " Paul Carrington?" I asked in utter surprise; " my 
 nephew ? my brother s boy ? " 
 
 " Yes. And Paul in his rather cold way reciprocates 
 the thought so showered upon him." 
 
 " Go on, go on ; I am still mortal, and impatient." 
 
 " In his heart of hearts Roger is seeking to perpetuate 
 this brotherly regard in a love-match between Paul and 
 his only sister, Naomi." 
 
 "Ah, I perceive." 
 
 " He has invited Paul to the ranch with much per 
 sistence. But Paul is a much-occupied man, and to the 
 present time has been unable to accede to his wishes." 
 
 There was another pause, of bated interest to me. 
 
 " Roger loves these mountains as few mortals do. It 
 is the one shrine before which he bows his knee to pour 
 forth all the ardor of his young soul in an adoration 
 of the Most High. And when extending his friendly 
 invitations to Paul an excursion into them was always 
 a conspicuous feature in the entertainment he held in 
 prospect. And, of even more vital importance to our 
 end s, the Basin has always been the goal of goals to 
 him. It is the site of his earliest peregrinations here, 
 hence its subtle attraction for him apart from its natural 
 charm. So that, once his wish with regard to Paul s 
 visit to the ranch is realized, I feel that they will hie 
 
 190
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 them thither as surely as turns the needle to the pole." 
 
 " The question then remains only how to bring them 
 to this little, secret nook in the mountain," I said, anti 
 cipating the thread of her story. 
 
 " Yes ; and having read your thoughts in this matter 
 for some time past I have laid out a plan of action." 
 
 " How good of you. And your plan?" 
 
 " Has at least the merit of simplicity. I have but, 
 through the utilization of that universal language, 
 suggestion, to impress upon Paul the expediency of ac 
 cepting at this time Waring s invitation, and all is done." 
 
 " So easily ? " I laughed. " I am afraid you will have 
 to explain to me more fully." 
 
 " Circumstances, it so happens, are most favorable to 
 my plan. With Paul once upon the ranch I fear noth 
 ing. Naomi is beautiful, good as beautiful, and with 
 just enough of intellect to make her charming. She is 
 just the woman Paul most admires. So with this re 
 taining force in play at the ranch Roger will experience 
 no trouble in persuading him to the trip into the moun 
 tains, if, indeed, he finds persuasion necessary at all; 
 which I very much doubt as Paul has had visions of rest 
 in green fields and shady woods for some time. He 
 has been very diligent in his work of late, too diligent 
 in fact. And then Waring has a most admirable coad 
 jutor in the person of his friend Sutcliff. Once in the 
 Basin I have but to suggest the climb of the moun 
 tain." 
 
 " Which I fear will be no easy task," I interrupted. 
 
 " Fear nothing. Another suggestion and it is done. 
 To ensure our success, however, we will have to appeal 
 strongly upon the sensational. Anything short may 
 pass unnoticed. The unusual, you know, holds piquancy 
 
 191
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 and charm for the human mind always. Now, upon 
 the mountain-top facing the Basin stands a monster pine, 
 now dead for many years. It is part of my plan that 
 on the morning of their arrival in the Basin you fire this 
 tree." 
 
 " I follow you readily. My mind is unusually clear 
 this morning." 
 
 " I will apprise you of their coming. They will 
 noon on the flats of the Deerhorn, the Ferrals are even 
 now projecting the pitching of their camp there." 
 
 " The Ferrals ? " I repeated in surprise. " What can 
 they possibly have to do with us ? " 
 
 Rose smiled. 
 
 " You will begin to see shortly that intelligence rules 
 this world, that nothing is really the outcome of 
 chance. We follow Law in every action of our lives, 
 be it what we call voluntary or otherwise. They will 
 prove the retaining force at the meadows, from whence 
 only is had that imposing view of the Butte. Otherwise 
 Waring s friend in his eagerness will pass on through 
 to the Cherry-Creek Meadows." 
 
 " I see." 
 
 "At the Meadows there will be a short strife of 
 opinion. When our signal first rises to heaven, every 
 member will give expression to an interpretation of its 
 purpose; but it will remain for Waring the most sus 
 ceptible to my influence, to carry the day." 
 
 "And man prides himself on being a free agent," I 
 ejaculated, breathless at this new version of life. 
 
 " Man is one with God, the head. He directs in all 
 things." 
 
 " But," said I, aghast, " do you not realize that in 
 thus depriving man of the belief that he is a free agent, 
 
 192
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 responsible for his every action to God and man, you 
 are depriving him of that responsibility ? " 
 
 "I do ; and more. It is a responsibility that lies 
 lightly. And can I help what is? But after all it is 
 immaterial. The man or woman doing right follows 
 an inborn principle, or at least a very pronounced be 
 lief, and an expression of belief, if wrong, will in 
 no wise influence either. God has guarded every 
 byway, you see. On the other hand unsupported 
 theory, even if it prove right, never made a true 
 Christian. Before good can come God must stand 
 within. A man may join the church, but unless the vital 
 point, the fundamental principle of his character has 
 evolved from the purely physical and intellectual 
 which are but a step from the animal, to that higher 
 plane, the spiritual, which is the true human plane, he 
 is as far from the Absolute as he was while he stood 
 without. That change must come ; it is natural, and 
 there will be no mistaking it when it does, that inner 
 realization that there breathes a world beyond. So you 
 see any opinion I may entertain or you, upon the sub 
 ject has really no vital bearing. 
 
 " But, for the sake of the discussion, I believe that 
 upon this subject man is in general mistaken. What 
 does he really know of the nature of evil? its constitu 
 tion, or the purpose of its existence? I hold that God 
 never errs, can not in the very nature of things, be 
 ing the All-in-all. Even abortions, dropping for the 
 moment to the material, or what pass as such, wherever 
 found, must have their purpose. Evil is not a chance 
 or irresponsible product, but exists as much for a fixed 
 end, and that end the higher exaltation of good, as the 
 very principle of good itself. 
 
 193
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 " But unlike the principle of good, which is fixed 
 and absolute in God, that of evil is not. As we near the 
 good we are conscious of an approach, we can feel the 
 distance lessening, the chasm between filling in as it 
 were; but when we look back, even from our highest 
 point of rectitude, we find that evil has kept apace, 
 that we are still immersed in an atmosphere of it, an at 
 mosphere we now begin to realize we can never hope to 
 fully escape from. It extends, comparative always, re 
 member, beyond the earth state ; it prevails amongst us 
 in the border-land; it pervades the sections higher up. 
 It is, in short, a necessary concomitant quality to the 
 scheme of our moral growth. 
 
 " Then so many content themselves with applying the 
 lotion to the scrofula, forgetting that the seat of disease 
 lies far down in the impurities of the blood. Sin is an 
 effect whose cause lies not in nature without but in 
 man s nature within ; is an emanation of self in other 
 words, we each inhaling and what is far worse. ex 
 haling an atmosphere of it peculiar to ourselves. For 
 evil is a moral obliquity due to a dwarfed and undevel 
 oped soul. 
 
 "And. you know, it is the root of disease that the 
 surgeon worthy the name seeks at all times to remove. 
 What is the root in this case ? It is plainly evident : sel 
 fishness, hatred, suspicion, falsehood, dishonesty, envy, 
 everything demeaning and worthy our profoundest 
 contempt ; an array of negatives it should pain a think 
 ing man to survey; a host of parasites that enslave the 
 soul and vitiate its life. 
 
 " Now, let us for a moment imagine them supplanted 
 by their opposites, the qualities upon which the soul may 
 feed, and grow and wax to that perfection which is akin 
 
 194
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 to God. Those opposites are, benevolence, love, faith, 
 truth, honesty, loyalty, charity, certainly a shining host. 
 And mark the result. Sin vanishes as darkness does 
 before the dawn. 
 
 " The road of escape is plain enough. It is up to man, 
 through the medium of his duty to God and man, to get 
 out upon it. In so far are we at least free agents. That 
 path lies not in a change of physical environment, nor in 
 a social readjustment, but in a moral regeneration. We 
 must cultivate in ourselves and our children these all- 
 powerful positives. No permanent banishment of evil 
 can result in any other way. Legal or social prohibition 
 only serve to dam the tide that later floods the land in 
 a moral reaction. Not but that regulation may be ne 
 cessary: the mistake is in considering it all-sufficient. 
 
 195
 
 CHAPTER XXL 
 
 THE LAST DAY. 
 
 MY last day. I note that I write the words with my 
 usual tranquility of mind. There is no transfiguration; 
 only an elation a little more acute than any I have ever 
 felt. Is it that I do not realize what the expression 
 means to me? that I must write the words again and 
 again before I can hope to realize it? The thought of it 
 all seems so unreal, so like some fantastic dream, that 
 I can never seem to quite grasp it. And then again it is 
 all so ingrained in the web of my being, is so real, that it 
 seems to have been part of my life since time first began. 
 
 My last day. The feeling is not one of resignation 
 with which I view the future. It is not resignation we 
 feel at the close of one bright day, and with the certainty 
 before us that the morrow will bring another even more 
 fair. It is hope. The culprit about to meet his doom 
 may feel resignation as his hour draws near; it is all he 
 is capable of, moral paralytic that he is. I question even 
 whether the simple faith of the martyrs brought to them 
 more that resignation in that last hour at the stake or 
 within the sanded oval of the arena. Faith, if only blind 
 
 196
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 faith and not a wisdom that is half intuitive, must fail 
 it seems to me at the last moment. Knowledge alone 
 can have the power to bring more. 
 
 My last day. I know we all have one, some early in 
 life, computing in our puny, artificial way from com 
 parative standards, some late. But was there ever man 
 situated as I am ? with the fact of his end known to him, 
 and the hour of that end approaching, approaching, 
 approaching? slowly, it is true, but with an inevitable- 
 ness under no circumstances to be evaded? To most 
 to most, I say? to all that last day comes unheralded, 
 comes when least expected. It may be to-day, it may 
 be one or a score of years hence. We never know. And 
 well it is that we do not. 
 
 And yet God s wisdom in this has been questioned, 
 as his wisdom is being questioned at every turn of our 
 lives. How much easier, they say, would it be to do our 
 duty with the certainty of a reward in an after-life. Why 
 this darkness? why this blindness? True. But how 
 for the soul? What do we know of the future? what 
 it may hold for the need of the strength to repress, the 
 strength to control, the strength to persevere? 
 
 And with all our philosophy it is but a half-truth 
 after all. For God does not hide. " Seek and ye shall 
 find," it is said. To the pure and spiritually clean 
 the only cleanliness that is next to godliness, there 
 comes a condition possible to them alone. It is the 
 divine light breaking through the clear crystal, to illumine 
 and beautify with its iridescence. It brings with it a 
 broader relationship with the powers that be. They see 
 further, they see deeper; they hear the whispers of 
 things dead before; they feel a presence of whose ex 
 istence they once stood in doubt; they taste of joys of 
 
 197
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 which, before they reached this plane of development, 
 they knew not of. 
 
 Ah, the beauty of this life, ah, the error of our ways ! 
 With the waters of life on every hand we yet perish 
 of thirst. Awake, oh man ! Awake to what is possible 
 to you on earth ! 
 
 Last night was sublime. I walked in an atmosphere 
 that was half divine. There was a storm; the rain 
 poured, the lightning flashed above as never before. 
 And when the storm was over and above the tumbled 
 clouds marshalled over the dark Minarets the moon 
 shone across the void beyond the shelving rock upon 
 which I stood, my soul rose in a very uplift of thanks 
 giving to God for the blessedness of life. There was a 
 calm the calm of a mysterious life it was to me, 
 about the woods, silent in the light, silent in the darks 
 of passing clouds, such as I have never felt before. The 
 secret of the Future is about to be bared to me. I 
 seemed strangely full of life. I drowsed not. Not be 
 cause of a dread of what the future may hold: that is 
 a settled question. I was surcharged with the element 
 of life. The pulses of earth are dying within, baring 
 the field to the higher and finer instincts that come from 
 above. It was long after the middle of the night before 
 I slept. 
 
 And this morning! What mortal dares attempt to 
 describe it? It broke bright and clear, and without a 
 cloud. As the dawn advanced, however, little wisps of 
 
 198
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 fog appeared in the canyons for a time, half-enshroud 
 ing the dusky pinegrown bases of the mountains. And 
 then came the glorious sun, to play upon the fresh, 
 fragrant forests in a million scintillating points, and in 
 all the colors of the spectrum. It was like a page from 
 fairy-land. 
 
 With the sun appeared my feathered friends to fill 
 the warm air about my door with their melody. What 
 songs are theirs ! Joy and hope, hope and joy, always 
 and forever. Man alone mourns. And my four-footed 
 visitants, dainty and span, afraid of the rumple and dis 
 order in the damp of the earlier morn. Lightly balanced 
 on the rim of my sugar-bowl, attended by a stranger as 
 yet shy and a little fearful, little Chip views me askance 
 as he nibbles at the sweet of its contents questioning the 
 why of my unusual quiet. Good-bye, little one. Your 
 companionship has helped while away many an hour that 
 might otherwise have proved most dreary to me. To 
 morrow we part. Will it be for ever? Nay, nay; but 
 for a time. Never fear. Somewhere, somehow, some 
 time, and in some shape, in the vast seeming void of the 
 Universe, we shall meet again. The orbits of our lives 
 have simply run side by side so far, have crossed, and 
 are about to part. Somewhere and sometime in the 
 future, just as the planets repeat theirs, yet never wholly 
 the same, will ours recross. Shall we know each other 
 then? Yes, surely. Does God know? Then shall we 
 also, for we are one with him. 
 
 Outside all is charm this morning. Overtopping the 
 cupping shakes of the cabin the buttonwood spreads its 
 
 199
 
 The Lost Mine of the Motw. 
 
 long boughs in a shower of white bloom against the dusk 
 of the forest wall. From the creek comes the fragrance 
 of the bed of wood-violets that reposes there in such shy 
 modesty, and which has more than once added strength 
 to the conviction I entertain of the exalted purposes of 
 this life. In the sunlit, needle-strewn open near the lake 
 a scattering of lilies nod in the wind. To all I went visit 
 ing, to each bade a tender farewell, my heart thankful, 
 my soul appreciating a purpose in their existence in the 
 greater fullness their life on earth has brought my own. 
 
 Yesterday already I removed the brush from the trail 
 for I had a moment of doubt seize me, not of the out- 
 come of the prophecy, but as to the hour of its consum 
 mation. My dumb companion was loth to leave, and in 
 the end I had to drive him before me over the zig-zag of 
 sunlit trail well into the Basin, where, I feel he will 
 fall in with some packtrain on its way to or from 
 the summits. My heart was deeply stirred, I confess, 
 and my eyes moistened as I bade my faithful friend of 
 years adieu ; he following me with his eyes in a stupid, 
 slow-comprehending way, and voicing his remonstrance 
 of my desertion of him till I dropped to this side of the 
 mountain, and eye and ear knew him no more. 
 
 I feel myself growing weaker. My heart fails in its 
 full duty at times, almost coming to a complete stop 
 now and then, at others beating with a tumultuousness 
 that I know is not provocative of either peace of mind 
 or welfare of body. Otherwise the functions of both are 
 
 200
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 normal. I read for an hour this morning-; following it 
 with the inscribing of a note to the party for whose com 
 ing I am now waiting, writing with an indifference at 
 first until it came to me what wonder theirs would be 
 when they came to read, and smiling at the thought that 
 they might even come to think me light of head. Then I 
 played upon my flute, with more than my usual power it 
 must be, for, beautiful as the morning is, with every in 
 ducement to song in light and air, the birds seemed to 
 cease in theirs in order to listen to mine. I am resting 
 quietly now, reserving all my energies for the climb to 
 the mountain s top and the great pine upon its brow. I 
 greatly fear that at the last moment my strength will for 
 sake me, and that I may sink exhausted by the way. But 
 Rose says nay, and lays a hand upon me, when, lo! a 
 new life surges through me and urges me onward. 
 
 Last night in the calm succeeding the tumult of the 
 early evening I sought and found communication with 
 the clearing. It is strange that at times I am taken with 
 that groundless fear that all our calculations may yet go 
 awry ; but so used is human nature to consider chance as 
 a factor in a scheme that knows only Law. Such a mo 
 ment was it that prompted me then, such a moment wa^ 
 it that prompted me earlier in the day. My faith is not 
 yet fully established, or say rather the weak points of 
 my early training have not been fully strengthened and 
 restored. From my friend I have at no time witheld 
 anything of importance, and my plea now was, that 
 should the ends for which both Rose and myself have 
 worked so faithfully miscarry, and not before, that he 
 use every endeavor in his power to deliver to Ida, my 
 
 20 1
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 daughter, the mine of the Mono, an appeal, I was as 
 sured, that was not to be made in vain. 
 
 I have now but to await the hour. I have done all, 
 fulfilled Rose s every wish. My grave cool, moist, rest 
 ful, even inviting, stands ready to receive me. And I 
 have fired the tree. The climb to the point on the brow 
 where it stands alone, the hoary, unassuming hero of a 
 thousand storms, I made with little effort enough, 
 much less than I had thought for, sustained as I was 
 by Rose s presence. But now, returned, and left to my 
 own unaided and enfeebled resources, reaction has come ; 
 my strength is quickly forsaking me, leaving me very 
 weak indeed. Yet what matters it, heart, where a few 
 more hours will end this earthly life. 
 
 Imagine my thoughts, imagine the emotions that 
 surged through me as I stood beneath the gnarled mon 
 arch and watched the dense, resinous smoke roll above 
 me in a large white cloud against the blue of the sky ; the 
 woodland scape a thousand feet below reposing dark in 
 the calm of the June morning. It was my last day on 
 earth ; it was to be my last view of that wondrous scene, 
 tranquil with that great tranquility that has ever held me 
 in its thrall and named me willing kin in that greater 
 kinship that includes all nature. There was but one curl 
 of smoke visible above the points of the pines in that ex 
 panse of forest and mountain, blue, small, insignificant, 
 and speaking of human effort in its weakness to accom 
 plish. There could be no mistaking it, it was on the 
 verge of the open that marks the meadows of the Deer- 
 horn. With the glass I had taken with me to descry if 
 
 202
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 possible one last vestige of human life before departing 
 from earth and its ties forever, I made out the forms of 
 my friends, dark mites upon the green. For friends 
 they are, though strangers to me, not excepting Paul, 
 though the same blood courses through both our veins. 
 I even thought I could note a certain excitement show 
 up among them, like that occasioned in the colony by 
 an untoward footfall upon an ant-heap, created no doubt 
 by the appearance of my mysterious signal. If so, it 
 was shortlived, for shortly they disappeared beneath the 
 trees, and I saw but the moving forms of their grazing 
 animals. As a human entity I have seen the last of my 
 kind. For to-morrow I am more than human. 
 
 And so here I am face to face with the inevitable. Yet 
 am I tranquil, more so than I ever pictured to myself 
 was possible. It is night, and I write in the quiet of my 
 cabin. The moon shines in at the door, and down the 
 chimney, flecking the ash-covered west wall with the 
 patches of its light; and the flickering of the burning 
 logs upon the hearth brings into fantastic play every 
 lurking shadow of the place. A cricket chirps shrilly 
 and insistently beneath the bunk, and outside I hear the 
 occasional lament of a bird disturbed in its nest. What 
 a life is this ! What an absorbing, eluding mystery ! 
 What a blending of the real with the unreal ! With 
 our feeble ray of understanding we seek to pierce the 
 unknown : we strike upon a glimmer of the Truth, only 
 to have it engulfed the next moment in the shades of 
 an ever-enlarging mystery. 
 
 I must have dozed. It is long past midnight, for the 
 play of the moonbeams has shifted to the opposite wall 
 
 203
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 of the chimney, and through the cracks of the window, 
 falls in bars of silver upon the table, where my candle 
 burns mistily. My cricket friend has ceased his song; 
 the bird without settled to a peaceful slumber. Not a 
 sound is there to disturb the hallowed quiet. Yes, hark, 
 there is one other. Like the faint breath of the wind 
 it comes to my ear, the rustle as of silken garments, 
 and through the earth-gloom appears Rose, her face 
 radiant with the light of a wish fulfilled, her hair an 
 aureole, her blue eyes lakes of a depth that is wonder 
 ful. Friends of every age, male and female, attend her, 
 and stand vaguely about, pleasure nay, a welcome, 
 simple and direct, upon every countenance. The 
 scene grows clearer, blends into the well-known one of 
 Rose s abode with its idyllic groves and beautiful flowers, 
 its silver-throated birds, its play of crystal fountains, 
 its happy children their laughter for the moment stilled, 
 its waiting couch. Rose beckons me, but a strange 
 moment of hesitation seizes me. She bids me laughingly 
 desist in my writing, and still I hesitate. She 
 approaches with a smile, and with arms extended. Those 
 arms, a sudden weakness is upon me I must lay me 
 down for a moment ; Rose ! Almighty God ! I co . 
 
 Waring closed the book and for many moments not a 
 word was spoken between us, so affected were we. 
 
 " His life was one long prayer," was his gentle com 
 ment then. " We can easily imagine the rest, the single 
 step to the cot the half-unconscious drawing of the 
 coverlet, the half-return to consciousness, the spirit s 
 embrace, the final dissolution, when the extended arms 
 
 204
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 fell powerless upon his bosom, there to lay till we found 
 him. A modern miracle." 
 
 Sutcliff thrust a twig into the coals in silence, a mo 
 ment later lighting his pipe with the flaming end. 
 
 "A modern miracle indeed." 
 
 205
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 SURPRISE. 
 
 How long I slept I do not know, but I remember 
 awakening with a start and the sense strong upon me 
 that something stupendous had, or was about to happen. 
 I sat up in my blankets with every faculty keenly alive. 
 
 Outside our fire had not been allowed to die down. 
 Before retiring for the night we had heaped great 
 quantities of fuel upon the coals, and this was now 
 burning brightly and cheerily. By its flickering light as, 
 subdued, it penetrated the white canvas slopes of our 
 tent, I saw SutclifFs bed had been vacated, and that 
 Waring was slumbering easily in his. I heard footsteps 
 without that I recognized as SutclifFs. I heard also the 
 uneasy trampling of our horses, and the steady roar of 
 many waters. 
 
 Suddenly I started to my feet. For the mountain had 
 trembled as if shaken by a mighty hand, and a distant 
 roar was swelling and fading away over all other sounds. 
 I rushed from the tent. 
 
 I found Sutcliff by the fire standing expectant. Above 
 us the trampling of the horses grew chaotic. I heard 
 
 206
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 also from yet further up the slope a boulder set free by 
 the unusual vibration come clattering down the moun 
 tain, loosening a miniature avalanche of stones in its 
 descent, and continuing its career down an adjacent 
 ravine. 
 
 A change at once decided and agreeable had taken 
 place in the weather. It was one of those sudden changes 
 for which there is no apparent cause. It had grown 
 noticeably milder since the hour of our retiring, a warm 
 air breathing over the mountain that was very pleasant 
 to our sense of comfort. The clouds above were break 
 ing asunder, and a moon in its last quarter stood high 
 in the east. 
 
 "An earthquake ? " I questioned of my companion. 
 
 But Sutcliff only shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " I do not know," he returned after a while ; " It is 
 an experience entirely new to me." 
 
 For an hour we hung over the fire, kicking in the butts 
 and heaping fresh logs upon it as bit by bit it died down 
 and needed replenishing. Twice there came a renewal 
 of the trembling, but it was in a much more subdued 
 form, and accompanied by no sound. 
 
 Then, assured by the silence, we re-entered the tent 
 and crawled beneath our blankets to try for an hour 
 more of fitful sleep. I do not know what success waited 
 upon Sutcliff. I only know that the first streak of that 
 early dawn had appeared in the east before I succeeded 
 
 in snatching a period of needed repose. 
 ********* 
 
 That next morning, so both Waring and Sutcliff af 
 firmed, was one of the most perfect they had met with in 
 all their extensive experience in the mountains. The 
 clouds had entirely disappeared, disclosing an expanse of 
 
 207
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 blue above the sharp, dark points of the pines, smiling, 
 and of a translucency and depth that were inspiring. In 
 the crystal clear atmosphere every detail of the landscape 
 stood out with cameo-like distinctness ; the fringe of 
 ice-corroded granite above the steep, brush-bound de 
 clivity to the south, irradiating with the light of the ris 
 ing sun; the dark bowl of the Basin back of, and below 
 us, resting in the shadow of the mountain ; and nearer at 
 hand all the many and varied objects of our more im 
 mediate surroundings. 
 
 A white frost lay upon the meadow, where upon its 
 verge our horses stood shivering in the gray of the morn 
 ing. Nevertheless there was a warmth in the air that 
 made the blood course quick in hope, and made plain to 
 man and beast that the dilatory summer had at last ar 
 rived and was securing a foothold in the land. Perhaps 
 the change of mood was mine, but it seemed to me that 
 over night the waters had changed the burden of their 
 song; that instead of suggestions of discomfort, which 
 had been theirs the day before, they had now inter 
 twined in their music certain repetent notes, a subtle 
 dominant as it were that brought visions of breaking 
 buds on the oaks and laurel about us ; of the fuller 
 fragrance of bush and flower, and the lush of the green 
 meadows of the middle-reaches ; and lastly, in the heat 
 mists of the farthest distance, of yellow fields bending 
 before the wind, and fruits hanging in purpling clusters 
 in the long converging lines of the valley vineyards. And 
 yet, again, I feel that the change was not wholly mine. 
 In a way that was equine it is true, but none the less 
 conclusive, our animals, too, seemed to have caught the 
 infection. For as the sun broke through in long 
 bars of light, and the air grew more and more 
 
 208
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 springlike, there came an ever-increasing disturb 
 ance from among them ; a challenging neigh for instance, 
 followed by an acrimonious uplifting of hoofs in play 
 or reprisal ; a condition of things in fact to which Sut- 
 cliff found it necessary to call a halt by putting in an 
 appearance among them, disentangling where he could 
 the wet, wirelike ropes, and giving a pat of cheer here 
 and a word of gentle admonition there. 
 
 And when after breakfast we took up our rifles and 
 passed over the saddle to drop into the open of the slide 
 beyond, where the skunk cabbage stood luxuriously 
 green, and the laurel bloomed in patches of rose and 
 white, what a pleasure it was to bask in the warmth and 
 radiance which there beat upon the slope. It is well for 
 us, a nation of " dollar-dazzled success-worshippers," as 
 a recent writer very aptly put it, that the "call of the 
 wild" is so deeply rooted within us. God indeed works 
 his ends in many mysterious ways. But for this "call," 
 and a periodical return to first principles, we would in 
 the course of time, Heaven knows, become but so much 
 machinery, sentiment-proof automatons, and nothing 
 more. To me it was worth a fortune that morning to be 
 able to enjoy myself as I did ; and that not only, but to 
 see the others and more particularly the hearty manner 
 of Sutcliff, enjoy the varied beauty of mountain and 
 canyon ; the lavish wealth of color ; the hush of the im 
 mense silence ; the this last tacitly and half-unconscious- 
 ly, recognition of the spirit of God permeating un 
 seen and yet so very palpably every object about us. 
 
 Arrived below we were unable to locate the exact spot 
 where the trail to the deserted cabin of our one-time her 
 mit friend branched from the main one to the Chiquita. 
 But having reached as we thought the level of the glade, 
 
 209
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 which was a little below the general wall of rock which 
 here supported the summit, we plunged boldly north 
 ward into the entanglements of brush and talus, taking 
 the general direction only for a guide. We had gone no 
 considerable distance when Sutcliff s eagle eye found 
 signs of where the brush had been cut and thrown aside 
 upon our left. Working toward it we in a few minutes 
 found ourselves upon a dim, sinuous path, marked at its 
 acute turnings by little mounds of stones. 
 
 Upon this we trudged hopefully on for an hour, hop 
 ing at every turn to be brought face to face with our 
 goal, and incidentally with our fortunes. We came upon 
 the spot on the trail where the brush barrier had been 
 placed that was to prevent, in the years that were, the 
 straying of the hermit s little beast of burden, and which 
 he had on that day so considerately removed to 
 allow of the animal s egress and later wandering through 
 the Gap into the Basin; its hoof-prints no doubt being 
 those Len Ferrall had come upon in his jaunt on the morn 
 ing we first saw the flaming signal from the mountain- 
 top. 
 
 Then a sudden turn brought into view the granite 
 domes which we so well remembered encompassed the 
 nook in the mountain. Only a single ridge lay be 
 tween, and upon its apex Waring, who was in the lead, 
 came to a sudden halt. An exclamation of extreme sur 
 prise broke from him. Pausing for a moment before we 
 too reached the spot where he alone stood, we turned 
 upon him with questioning eyes. He had half turned 
 toward us, his features white, and with trembling hand 
 was directing over the ridge. 
 
 " My God, see !" 
 
 We scrambled in wild excitement to the top to blanch 
 and tremble in our turn. 
 
 210
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 For, mark you, there was no enchanting nook; no 
 cabin or lake; no strip of forest-land; none, in short, of 
 the many beauteous details which the visit of the year 
 before had so indelibly impressed upon our minds, and 
 which we had expected to see with the same feeling of 
 certainty with which we had expected the dawn to follow 
 the night. All had disappeared. Instead there was gashed 
 a long, ochrous wound in the mountain-side reaching 
 from the over-lapping snowdrifts above to far down, 
 where the mass had slid in a mighty avalanche in the di 
 rection of the Chiquita below. 
 
 The sight was at once terrific and wonderful. Such 
 a chaotic intermingling of boulder and tree and general 
 debris I have never seen. Where the little cabin with 
 all its beauty of overtopping tree had stood this wound 
 had scarred its broadest, and had scored to the very 
 bone of the mountain, a granite, overlaid with a clay, 
 yellow, and of a puttylike consistency. But for the 
 harsh, immovable domes, whose very roots had been 
 bared, we should never have recognized this scene of 
 ruin as the site of our visit of the year before. 
 
 The mystery of the disturbance of the night 
 now stood revealed to us. Loosened by the frost action 
 of many decades back, by secret, subterranean streams, 
 and by the law of gravitation, the slope with all it held 
 had in a moment been hurled into oblivion. The suc 
 ceeding tremors which we had felt had without doubt 
 been caused by the parting and dropping away of minor 
 detachments due to the nature of the first slide. No 
 question for a single moment arose in our minds. It 
 was too conclusive. For upon the pines, lying crossed 
 and re-crossed in inextricable confusion, the needles 
 were as fresh and green as those upon the standing trees. 
 
 211
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 Nay, as we stood upon the brink, silent, bewildered, I 
 noted that the water, where it had become isolated in 
 little pools, still stood yellowed and only partially clear; 
 and that the spring torrent in its middle occasionally 
 backed as some fresh impediment blocked its way; to a 
 moment later, as the momentary dam broke asunder, 
 race with an increased vehemence upon its changed 
 course. 
 
 It would be undertaking a matter of no little difficulty 
 were I to attempt to describe our feelings as, for the 
 moment bereft of speech, we stood there. I can not 
 remember that disappointment to the degree of keenness 
 at least to make it unduly felt, was a factor at any time, 
 at least as regarded myself ; for throughout an element 
 of uncertainty had prevailed which had prevented an 
 at best vacillating faith from crystallizing into something 
 more positive, accustomed as I was in my vocation to 
 the handling of facts and figures. As for Waring, his 
 earlier reading of my uncle s papers should have and 
 in a measure did, I believe, prepared him for what was 
 to come. I believe of our trio Sutcliff perhaps took the 
 matter most seriously to heart. His faith since seeing 
 that little heap of ore by the cabin-door was unshaken; 
 and by nature of a sanguine temperament, as we have 
 come to know, I fear that he let his imagination run 
 away with him. But as I have said, the impression of 
 the moment was overwhelming, and in that one over 
 mastering one every minor emotion was engulfed. 
 ********* 
 
 As I have said in the beginning of my little tale, all 
 this occurred years ago. Since then many changes have 
 taken place. Both Waring and myself, for one thing, 
 have married and have about us a growing group of 
 
 212
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 boys and girls. He is still at the ranch, where we visit 
 him periodically, always an occasion the family looks 
 forward to with pleasure and delight. After supper 
 at such times we usually group upon the broad veranda, 
 where in the moonlight it is but a very natural step for 
 us to revert to those wonderful days. To see the aston 
 ished eyes of our boys, and to read the interest in their 
 voices, as they gather in the singular incidents that go 
 to make up the story, greatly amuse both Waring and 
 myself. I ask about our friends; Ballard, the oddity, 
 Stayton, the Ferralls, the herder, Faggerty, the half- 
 breed, and lastly, Sutcliff. 
 
 And here a strange thing shows up. Sutcliff alone of 
 all that party has faith in the story of the lost mine to 
 day. For as time passes and the glamor of that golden 
 summer and its strange adventure wear away in the 
 humdrum of our everyday life, both Waring and myself 
 experience grave doubts as to whether it may not after 
 all have been the vagaries of a brain diseased, and with 
 out foundation in fact. Not so with Sutcliff, poor fellow. 
 Faith has become ingrained in the man. As the years 
 elapse he grows more and more decided in his views. 
 He is not the one to doubt the evidence of his senses at 
 any time, and had he not seen the little dump with his 
 own eyes and handled a part with his own hands ? That 
 a painstaking search in the vicinity of the site where the 
 mine was alleged to have been discovered failed to pro 
 duce anything in support, in no wise shook him in his 
 beliefs. In his opinion that fact rather added weight to 
 the tale since it accorded with what the hermit had sev 
 eral times dwelled upon, namely the impression that it 
 was but a fragment from above, bearing upon the bed 
 rock but not coalescent with it. Then another search 
 
 213
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 was made of all that ground lying toward the summit, 
 that too without result. Then we thought we had him. 
 But, no; the virus of the gold fever had become too 
 deepseated. He maintained that the face of nature 
 changed continually, and in this, of course, he was right. 
 He claimed that it must have been deposited from auove 
 in ages prehistoric, when the mountain stood much 
 nearer heaven. The elements had worn down the moun 
 tain top till not a vestige of the original deposit had re 
 mained. This was a new point of view, and gave rise to 
 yet another. He began to argue that if such was the case 
 placer veins should be a consequence. He took up the 
 idea with avidity. It has had possession of him ever 
 since. He is a most worthy successor to my uncle, I 
 must say. Every summer he camps upon the Chiquita 
 to prospect. He has come to know every foot of that 
 mountain. Down under the shadow of its brows, on the 
 edge of the woods where a stretch of meadow sweeps to 
 an open ford of the Chiquita, he has erected a little shake 
 cabin where any time from June to October he may be 
 found. If you meditate interviewing him on this matter 
 of the mine there are several trails by which he can be 
 reached. All are very interesting. You may for instance 
 pass up Hooker s Cove, a rather difficult feat over a 
 rough trail, and having reached its mouth, swing up 
 the Chiquita to his abode. Another is the well-known 
 one back of Heron Valley and the old Scarlett Mill. 
 When you have reached the ruined hut among the tam 
 arack of the Summit Meadows turn to your right down 
 between the forks, a comparatively easy though some 
 what long trail. The first route has this advantage : you 
 may anticipate your man an hour or two, as he is an ar 
 dent angler and puts in a goodly portion of his time on 
 
 214
 
 The Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 the stream between French Bar and his cabin with rod 
 and line. The second has this : you can put in a day very 
 pleasantly at the lake back of the dam fishing for black 
 bass ; an agreeable interruption, let me say, to the 
 tedium of travel over hill-roads at no time such as to 
 cater to our sense of comfort. Then, again, on the high 
 est point on that trail, where to the east you have mapped 
 below you the long, green chain so frequently mentioned 
 as the Summit Meadows, there is a dark stretch of fir 
 woods upon the right which the sun only checkers in in 
 frequent spots. Swing off the trail here and a short dis 
 tance up the ridge you come to another point of interest, 
 another artificial lake ; the site where once was sought 
 the diversion of a portion of the waters of the Chiquita, 
 to have them mingle with, and swell the volume of the 
 Fork. 
 
 But by far the most interesting is the route we took 
 upon our last visit. One here meets with all the points 
 of interest, the deserted mill on the Fork, Gray s the 
 Deerhorn Meadows, the Butte, and the imposing heights 
 of Spirit Mountain, and lastly the Gap of the Shuteye 
 and the trail to the Chiquita. By this route you will 
 arrive at the cabin late in the afternoon, a most op 
 portune hour you will discover, as the chances are 
 greatly in your favor, that you will find a pan of crisp 
 trout, or a quarter of venison, nicely browning over the 
 fire, awaiting you, together with an ovenful of white, 
 wholesome bread, a pot of refreshing tea, a hospitable 
 host, and over the campfire later an entertaining recital 
 of the story of the Lost Mine of the Mono. 
 
 215
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT LOS ANGELES 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below 
 
 HAY 
 
 19*3 
 
 195Q 
 
 FEB 1 8 1960 
 NOV 2 1 1960 
 
 of CALIFORMEi
 
 PS 
 321 
 
 K668 1