. A sentiment
accompanied the blow, but it was incomplete when Peters dropped the
pick-axe and went down on his knees on the wet ground to gather up the
fragments he had broken off the boulder. Then, with a yell, he leaped to
his feet.

"We've struck it, boys; we've struck it!" he shouted. "It's gold!"

Rain, fatigue, the horses, hunger, bad temper, and disappointment alike
vanished from the minds of the three as they heard the words. They
crowded over to where Peters, laughing in his delight, was hugging the
broken fragments of rock to his breast and capering round the boulder.
Palmer Billy, silent as yet, bent down and examined the spot where
Peters had struck. The fresh-broken face, already moistened by the rain,
showed small heads and points of orange-coloured metal.

"Darned new-chum fool!" he muttered, as he stood up. "Here, you
moonstruck jackeroo, stop that damned corroboree!" he shouted to the
capering Peters. "If you want to know, it's native copper. I've seen
tons of it. On the Cloncurry you can get it by the square mile."

"It's gold," Peters yelled in answer--"gold, you old wind-bag! There's a
fortune in that boulder. Come on, boys. Out with the tools, and let us
dolly a lump and test it."

It might be only native copper, but for the moment neither Tony nor
Murray doubted the opinion of Peters. There was a scurry and a confused
bungle as each tried to get what was wanted, while Palmer Billy stood
by, trying to light his pipe, and muttering uncomplimentary sentences
against all of them.

Peters had with him a rough-and-ready apparatus for testing any mineral
encountered. A blowpipe, a bit of candle, a small bottle of powdered
borax, another of mercury, and a bent platinum wire, packed away in an
empty jam-tin, formed his assayer's kit--a paraphernalia which induced
as much mirth and scoffing contempt from Palmer Billy as it would have
done from a skilled and cultured scientist, who, without hair-balances,
acids, retorts, and a dozen other appliances, would have scorned the
idea of an analysis or anything approaching it. But in the annals of
mining discovery, how often has the resources of a great mine been made
known and available to human enterprise by the crude, simple apparatus
of a travelling prospector, and how many hopeless and worthless
"properties" have swallowed the contributions of a gullable public
through the ornamental reports of the skilled and cultured proprietor of
an elaborate laborat