t the truth is, very often, they came of the gentlest
blood and life. The border man, born and bred in storms, never gets
discouraged: it is the man of culture, refinement, and sensitive nature
who falls from the front in the hard-fought battles of the West.

This man's brow was broad and full; had his beard and hair been combed
and cared for, his head had looked a very picture. But after all, there
was one weak point in his face. He had a small, hesitating nose.

As a rule, in any great struggle involving any degree of strategy and
strength, the small nose must go to the wall. It may have pluck, spirit,
refinement, sensitiveness, and, in fact, to the casual observer, every
quality requisite to success; but somehow invariably at the very crisis
it gives way.

Small noses are a failure. This is the verdict of history. Give me a
man, or woman either, with a big nose--not a nose of flesh, not a loose
flabby nose like a camel's lips, nor a thin, starved nose that the eyes
have crowded out and forced into prominence, but a full, strong,
substantial nose, that is willing and able to take the lead; one that
asserts itself boldly between the eyes, and reaches up towards the
brows, and has room enough to sit down there and be at home.

Give me a man, or woman either, with a nose like that, and I will have a
nose that will accomplish something. I grant you that such a nose may be
a knave; but it is never a coward nor a fool--never!

In the strong stream of miners' life as it was, no man could stand
still. He either went up or down. The strong and not always the best
went up. The weak--which often embraced the gentlest and sweetest
natures--were borne down and stranded here and there all along the
river.

I have noticed that those who stop, stand, and look longest at the
tempting display of viands in cook-shop windows, are those that have not
a penny to purchase with. Perhaps there was something of this nature in
Old Baboon that impelled him to look again and again over his
shoulder--as he clutched tighter to the tow-string--at the
cinnamon-headed bottle-washer behind the bar.

A stranger stood before this man. He turned his eyes from the
bar-keeper and lifted them helplessly to his.

"Charlie is dead."

"Charlie who? Who is 'Charlie'?"

"Charlie Godfrey, The Gopher, and here is his dog;" and as he spoke, the
dog, as if knowing his master's name and feeling his loss, crouched
close to the old man's legs.

A new commo