m.

The Mistress of the Kennels had more than justified the doctor's
prophecies. Less than a month of life in the mountains had given
her back her old energy and strength. The third week there had
given her also the acquaintance, soon to ripen into friendship, of
a certain squatter's wife, who was spending a few weeks in the
hills with her husband and three children. Before the acquaintance
was a week old the Mistress of the Kennels had been pressingly
invited to make her home with the squatter and his wife at their
station, for a time at all events, in order that she might
supervise the education of the three youngsters, and, also, give
the squatter's wife the benefit of some of her experience in the
rearing of dogs. The Master could have found a minor opening on the
same station, but decided that he could not afford to take up a
life which offered no particular prospect of advancement, and was
confirmed in his decision by an offer that was made to him at this
time to join, in a working capacity, a small prospecting party
which was setting out for a tract of back-block country said to be
extremely rich in gold, copper, and silver. And so, for a time, the
Master and the Mistress had parted company.

Now, while there are many prospectors in Australia who, during a
lifetime of adventurous toil, have never made much more than a
labourer's wage, there are others who have made and lost many
fortunes, to whose credit may be placed a score or more of rich
discoveries, and much wealth enjoyed by other people. The leader of
the Master's party was of this latter class, and less than three
weeks after the outsetting of this particular expedition, the party
had pegged out a considerable number of rich claims. Some of these
claims had been of a kind which admitted of good deal of highly
profitable alluvial working but the majority called for the use of
machinery and the outlay of capital. Accordingly, the party
gathered to themselves such surface gold as was obtainable--the
Master's share came to L260--and then, laden with samples of ore,
returned townward, with a view to selling their claims to mining
capitalists, before starting out upon a second and more protracted
journey. The fascination of the prospector's calling had gripped
the Master strongly, and he gladly agreed to remain a member of the
party. But, in the meantime, having reached the city, he had
determined to pay a visit to Mr. Sandbrook's house, first, that he
migh