free of water and dirt, and Mike announced
that he could commence digging in the morning if he had a few "shores"
and boards to prop up the places where excavations had been going on.
These we readily granted, and began to take an interest in our claim
that we had not felt before.

"Mike," I said, at supper time, addressing our new acquaintance, "we
will give you one quarter of the gold which you find, and board you into
the bargain, but we will not pay you wages."

Mike thought of the proposition for a moment, and announced his
intention of accepting it without restriction, and at daylight the next
morning he was at work many feet below the surface of the earth, picking
away the dirt, and examining it carefully, as though he expected to find
a nugget in every gravel stone that he met with. Once or twice in the
course of the day, we walked over to the spot and lent a helping hand,
for the purpose of freeing the place of water, and when night arrived,
we had no need to ask questions in regard to the luck of Mike. His face
proclaimed that he had found nothing; but I think that he was more
disappointed on our account than on his own.

"No luck to-day, Mike?" said I.

"Divil a ha'penny of goold have I found sir; but there's no telling what
may come on yet. I don't despair."

Neither did we; although we had but few hopes of ever getting our money
back. The next morning Mike was promptly at his post, and we did not
hear from him until about two o'clock; I was dozing on a lounge, Fred
was asleep on the counter, and Mr. Critchet was mending
stockings,--about the first work that he attempted to do,--when Mike
rushed frantically into the store, threw himself upon his knees, and
began talking, laughing, and crying at the same moment.

"Glory to God and all the saints!" he exclaimed, after he had recovered
his breath, and then he began to laugh frantically, swaying his body
back and forth, as though it was an impossibility to keep still.

"It's my opinion," said Fred, without rising from his recumbent
position, "that you are a little out of your head, or else you have been
drinking."

"Divil a bit of whiskey have I touched for two days; but I'll have a
drop now for the purpose of drinking long lives to your honors. It's me
head that is affected, and well it may be. O, it's little did I think
that I should come to this. Glory to God--it's plazed the old woman and
the childers will be."

He made a dive at the whiskey cask