of a strange and wonderful substance. He took the incident as a
good omen and went again to the hilltop. Under the maguey had sprung
up slender stalks of white, bearing delicate gold flowers, and as these
flowers waved in the wind a fine golden dust, as fine as powdered ashes,
blew away toward the north. Padre Juan was mystified, but believed that
great fortune attended upon him and his poor people. So he went again
and again to the hilltop in hope that the Virgin would appear to him.

"One morning, as the sun rose gloriously, he looked across the windy
hill toward the waving grass and golden flowers under the maguey, and
he saw the Virgin beckoning to him. Again he fell upon his knees; but
she lifted him and gave him of the golden flowers, and bade him leave
his home and people to follow where these blowing golden ashes led.
There he would find gold--pure gold--wonderful fortune to bring back to
his poor people to build a church for them, and a city.

"Padre Juan took the flowers and left his home, promising to return,
and he traveled northward over the hot and dusty desert, through the
mountain passes, to a new country where fierce and warlike Indians
menaced his life. He was gentle and good, and of a persuasive speech.
Moreover, he was young and handsome of person. The Indians were Apaches,
and among them he became a missionary, while always he was searching for
the flowers of gold. He heard of gold lying in pebbles upon the mountain
slopes, but he never found any. A few of the Apaches he converted; the
most of them, however, were prone to be hostile to him and his religion.
But Padre Juan prayed and worked on.

"There came a time when the old Apache chief, imagining the padre had
designs upon his influence with the tribe, sought to put him to death
by fire. The chief's daughter, a beautiful, dark-eyed maiden, secretly
loved Juan and believed in his mission, and she interceded for his
life and saved him. Juan fell in love with her. One day she came to
him wearing golden flowers in her dark hair, and as the wind blew the
flowers a golden dust blew upon it. Juan asked her where to find such
flowers, and she told him that upon a certain day she would take him
to the mountain to look for them. And upon the day she led up to the
mountain-top from which they could see beautiful valleys and great trees
and cool waters. There at the top of a wonderful slope that looked down
upon the world, she showed Juan the flowers. And