ms come true.
But neither was content. Each wanted the other's companionship and yet
each feared that pride would keep his poor partner from accepting his
advances. They grew morose, and finally both blew up their holdings to
conceal their riches and headed back along the Divide to meet, face to
face, the partner they had deserted.

Prospectors are philosophers, without hurry or worry. They meet each
situation as it arises calmly, and let to-morrow take care of its own.
When food and dynamite give out, they make a pilgrimage to the foothill
towns and with alluring tales of leads, lodes and veins of hidden
treasure soon to be revealed--just as soon as they have time to do a
little more development work--they secure another grub stake and are on
their way to high country again. They always find willing listeners,
for the heart of many a less daring, conservative business man is in
the hills. The listeners are easily inveigled into staking these old
beggars, hypnotized and hypnotizing with dreams, and do it again and
again, gambling on the next strike being a lucky one. The man who
furnishes a grub stake shares half and half with the prospector he
equips.

No matter how little they have, prospectors will share with anyone who
comes their way. Their hospitality is genuine, though perforce
limited. They invite you first, and learn who you are and what your
business may be later.

One day I was picking my way down the bogs and marshes of Forest Canyon.
All at once it narrowed, boxing up between high walls. To go on I had
either to climb the walls or back-track for some distance. I elected
to climb. After the struggle up the face of the rock I sat down to
rest.

"No one within miles," I panted as I sat down.

"Don't look like there's ever been anyone here," I added as I recalled
the way I had come.

"What ya take me fur?"

Ten feet away, standing motionless beside an old stump, stood a
cadaverous fellow whose rags suggested the moss that hung from the
trees.

"Hungry?" he shot at me before I recovered from my surprise. "Camp's
right hyar."

He led the way with all the poise of a gentleman.

But his camp! Beside an old tunnel that plunged beneath the side wall
of the canyon was a lean-to. Upon green boughs were spread a single
pair of ragged blankets. His campfire still smoldered. Upon its coals
were his only culinary utensils, an old tin bucket, in which simmered
his left-over coffee, and a gold