have
heard of rolling in gold being spoken of as a pleasant process, but I
certainly do not recommend anybody who values comfort to try sitting
on it--I should run a very good chance of being 'handspiked' before the
night was over.

"'If you want to know what it was, Mr. Tom,' I went on, with my politest
air, although in agony from the nugget underneath--for I hold it is
always best to be polite to a man who is so ready with a handspike--'my
boy and I have had a slight difference of opinion, and I was enforcing
my view of the matter upon him; that's all.'

"'Yes, Mr. Tom,' put in Harry, beginning to weep, for Harry was a smart
boy, and saw the difficulty we were in, 'that was it--I halloed because
father beat me.'

"'Well, now, did yer, my dear boy--did yer? Well, all I can say is that
a played-out old claim is a wonderful queer sort of place to come to for
to argify at ten o'clock of night, and what's more, my sweet youth, if
ever I should 'ave the argifying of yer'--and he leered unpleasantly at
Harry--'yer won't 'oller in quite such a jolly sort 'o way. And now I'll
be saying good-night, for I don't like disturbing of a family party.
No, I ain't that sort of man, I ain't. Good-night to yer, 'unter
Quatermain--good-night to yer, my argified young one;' and Mr. Tom
turned away disappointed, and prowled off elsewhere, like a human
jackal, to see what he could thieve or kill.

"'Thank goodness!' I said, as I slipped off the lump of gold. 'Now,
then, do you get up, Harry, and see if that consummate villain has
gone.' Harry did so, and reported that he had vanished towards Pilgrim's
Rest, and then we set to work, and very carefully, but trembling with
excitement, with our hands hollowed out all the space of ground into
which I had struck the pick. Yes, as I hoped, there was a regular nest
of nuggets, twelve in all, running from the size of a hazel-nut to that
of a hen's egg, though of course the first one was much larger than
that. How they all came there nobody can say; it was one of those
extraordinary freaks, with stories of which, at any rate, all people
acquainted with alluvial gold-mining will be familiar. It turned out
afterwards that the American who sold me the claim had in the same way
made his pile--a much larger one than ours, by the way--out of a single
pocket, and then worked for six months without seeing colour, after
which he gave it up.

"At any rate, there the nuggets were, to the value, as it turne