Nellie cried a good deal and it saddened her
parent's heart, when stealing softly into her room, he saw the traces
of tears on her cheeks. Who can tell the sorrows of childhood when
such a cruel affliction comes upon it? But it is a blessed truth that
time is the healer of all wounds, and after awhile the little one
ceased to ask about her mother. When the whole truth was told her, she
had become old enough to bear the blow.

Maurice Dawson's first purpose was to remain only for a week or two
with the friends of himself and child. He had set out for the Pacific
coast, and, although it was still a thousand miles distant, he felt it
his duty to press on, but he suffered himself to be dissuaded, when it
was explained that the prospect of obtaining gold was as good at New
Constantinople, whereas, if he continued his journey, he would have to
make his home among strangers, who were not likely to feel the
interest in him and his child that was felt by those who were the
means of saving their lives. Furthermore, since he had lost his team,
he was without the means of pressing on. None of the emigrant trains
turned so far out of their course as to come to Dead Man's Gulch, and
nothing was plainer than that the citizens of that place would not
give the least help in an enterprise that was to deprive them of
Nellie. It is impossible to say what would have followed, had he
persisted in his first decision, for while the men might have
consented to let him go, they would have rebelled had he attempted to
take the child from them.

And so it came about, we repeat, that Maurice Dawson decided to make
his home indefinitely in the town that had been christened New
Constantinople. With the help of his neighbors, Landlord Ortigies
divided his rear room into two apartments, one of which was turned
over to the parent and his child. Nearly every miner brought some
article, such as a fragment of mirror, a picture or trinket and
presented it to the little one, whose room naturally became the finest
in New Constantinople.

Dawson himself joined the miners at their work, all showing an
eagerness to lend him a helping hand, and there was reason to hope
that in time there would be a fair reward for their labor. He was not
only an educated man, but was strong and enterprising, considerate of
the feelings of others, and now that his life partner was gone, he had
but the little daughter to live for. Gladly he toiled for her, for no
child was eve