s not down with touches of his old
jungle fever, would be ten times worse. All the same, though, I have no
doubt that the old mine is rich."

"But Arthur, my dear," protested Mrs Pendarve, "think of how much money
has been--"

"Thrown down mines, my dear?" said the Colonel, smiling. "Yes I do, and
I don't think our peaceful retired life is going to be disturbed by
anything a mining adventurer may say."

"But it would be interesting, father," said Gwyn.

"Very, my boy," said his father, smiling. "It would give you and Joe
Jollivet--"

"Old Joe Jolly-wet," said Gwyn to himself.

"A fine opportunity for trying to break your necks--"

"Oh, my dear!" cried Mrs Pendarve.

"Getting drowned in some unfathomable hole full of water."

"Arthur!" protested Mrs Pendarve.

"Losing yourself in some of the mazy recesses of the ancient workings."

"Really, my dear!" began Mrs Pendarve; but the Colonel went on--

"Or getting crushed to death by some fall of the mine roofing that has
been tottering ready to fall perhaps for hundreds of years."

"Pray don't talk like that, my dear," said Mrs Pendarve, piteously.

"He doesn't mean it, mother," said Gwyn, laughing. "Father's only
saying it to frighten me. But really, father, do you think the mine is
so very old?"

"I have no doubt of it, my boy. It is certainly as old as the Roman
occupation, and I should not be surprised if it proved to be as early as
the time when the Phoenicians traded here for tin."

"But I thought it was only stream tin that they got. I read it
somewhere."

"No doubt, my boy, they searched the surface for tin; but suppose you
had been a sturdy fellow from Tyre or Sidon, instead of a tiresome,
idle, mischievous young nuisance of an English boy--"

"Not quite so bad as that, am I, mother?" said Gwyn, laughing.

"That you are not, my dear," said Mrs Pendarve, "though I must own that
you do worry me a great deal sometimes by being so daring with your
boating, climbing and swimming."

"Oh, but I do take care--I do, really," said Gwyn, reaching out to lay
his hand upon his mother's arm.

"Yes, just as much as any other thoughtless, reckless young dog would,"
grumbled the Colonel. "I'm always expecting to have one of the
fishermen or miners come here with a head or an arm or a leg, and say he
picked it up somewhere, and does it belong to my son?"

"Really, Arthur, you are too bad," began Mrs Pendarve.

"He's only teasing you, ma, dear," cri