f his hand at
a guess, bowed formally to each of us in turn, picked up his bag and
departed, rigidly erect, the fine red dust crawling and eddying at his
feet.

Then we held a council of war, all of us. Don Gaspar announced his
intention of returning to his rancho in the south.

"I have found the gold, and I have made fren's, and I have now enough,"
said he.

Bagsby, too, said he thought he would just ride down as far as Sutter's
Fort, there to lay in a supply of powder and ball for a trip in the
mountains.

"I kind of want to git up another b'ar fight," said he. "If I thought
there was a ghost of a show to git them robbers for you boys, I'd stay
and help you scout for them; but there ain't a show in the world.
They've had a good three days' start."

After shaking hands with us again and again, and obtaining promises that
we should all surely meet in San Francisco or Monterey, they mounted and
took their departure in order to get well clear of the settlement before
nightfall.

When they had gone Yank opened his eyes from the apparent sleep into
which he had fallen.

"You fellows don't hang around here with me, I can tell you that," he
stated. "I'm fixed all right. I want you to make arrangements with these
people yere to keep me; tuck my gold under my piller, stack old Betsey
up yere in the corner by me, and go about your business. You come out
yere to dig gold, not to take keer of cripples."

"All right, Yank, we'll fix it somehow," I agreed. "Now if you're all
right, Johnny and I will just go and straighten out our camp things a
little."

We were now, it will be remembered, without horses. Don Gaspar had
unpacked our few belongings before departing. Johnny and I found a good
camping place, then carried the stuff over on our backs. We cooked
ourselves some food, lit pipes, and sat down to talk the situation over.

We got nowhere. As a matter of fact, we were both in the dead-water of
reaction from hard, long-continued labour, and we could not bring
ourselves to face with any enthusiasm the resuming of gold washing.
Revulsion shook us at the mere thought of getting down in a hot, glaring
ravine and moving heavy earth and rocks. Yet we had not made a fortune,
nor much of a beginning at one, and neither of us was what is known as a
quitter. We realized perfectly that we would go on gold mining.

"What we need is a recess," Johnny ended, "and I move we take it. Just
let's camp here, and loaf for a few days o