October. The lilacs and
laburnums, lit with the glory-fires of autumn, hung burning and flashing
in the upper air, a fairy bridge provided by kind Nature for the
wingless wild things that have their homes in the tree-tops and would
visit together; the larch and the pomegranate flung their purple and
yellow flames in brilliant broad splashes along the slanting sweep of
the woodland; the sensuous fragrance of innumerable deciduous flowers
rose upon the swooning atmosphere; far in the empty sky a solitary
oesophagus slept upon motionless wing; everywhere brooded stillness,
serenity, and the peace of God.

October is the time--1900; Hope Canyon is the place, a silver-mining
camp away down in the Esmeralda region. It is a secluded spot, high and
remote; recent as to discovery; thought by its occupants to be rich in
metal--a year or two's prospecting will decide that matter one way or
the other. For inhabitants, the camp has about two hundred miners, one
white woman and child, several Chinese washermen, five squaws, and a
dozen vagrant buck Indians in rabbit-skin robes, battered plug hats, and
tin-can necklaces. There are no mills as yet; there is no church, no
newspaper. The camp has existed but two years; it has made no big
strike; the world is ignorant of its name and place.

On both sides of the canyon the mountains rise wall-like, three thousand
feet, and the long spiral of straggling huts down in its narrow bottom
gets a kiss from the sun only once a day, when he sails over at noon.
The village is a couple of miles long; the cabins stand well apart from
each other. The tavern is the only "frame" house--the only house, one
might say. It occupies a central position, and is the evening resort of
the population. They drink there, and play seven-up and dominoes; also
billiards, for there is a table, crossed all over with torn places
repaired with court-plaster; there are some cues, but no leathers; some
chipped balls which clatter when they run, and do not slow up gradually,
but stop suddenly and sit down; there is part of a cube of chalk,
with a projecting jag of flint in it; and the man who can score six on a
single break can set up the drinks at the bar's expense.

Flint Buckner's cabin was the last one of the village, going south;
his silver-claim was at the other end of the village, northward, and a
little beyond the last hut in that direction. He was a sour creature,
unsociable, and had no companionships. People who