"Keep her gaun, Mac; keep her gaun," this personage would splutter when his more portly comrade showed signs of flagging, which well he might, considering that he clutched in his arms a weight of nearly forty pounds.
"Wha's stoppin'? ye inseegneeficant broken-winded donkey engine!" retorted his aggravated compatriot, rolling along manfully.
But the race was nearly over. Half a mile further on the land dipped ever so slightly, and in the gentle hollow formed about a dozen men rushed madly about, pacing off prospectors' claims, and driving rude pegs at the boundary corners.
The sight had an exhilarating effect on Mac and Stewart, and with wild shouts they quickly drew up the little distance they had lost, and would have passed my white-shirted pacemaker and myself were we not compelled for very shame to keep our lead if we died for it.
"By Jove!" panted he of the strange garments, "these beggars behind can run."
And Mac at his heels chivalrously grunted between his breaths, "I've never had a harder tussle tae keep up ma deegnity—no never."
A few minutes more, and we reached the field of operations. The men there were too busy marking off their properties to give us much attention. I noticed swiftly that our first visitor of the few words had his claim neatly pegged, and was sitting in the middle of it, complacently smoking. He must have received special information of the find or he could not have got away so much before the others. Our second passing acquaintance—he of the emotionless countenance who had steered our quartet unknowingly—had got in a hundred yards ahead of us, and he was now coolly cutting pegs with which to mark his chosen area.
"It's a deep alluvial leader, mate," he said to me. Then he added obligingly, "I guess I knows the lie of the kintry, an' if ye hitch on at the end o' my boundaries, ye'll likely sink on it, plumb."
The advice of an experienced miner should always be accepted; and while Mac and Stewart were felling several small trees for use as marking-posts, I proceeded to line off the direction of our claim as suggested by the angle of my adviser's corner channels. I performed this work with much care, knowing how slim are one's chances of holding any gold-bearing area at a rush unless the holder's title is beyond dispute according to official regulations.
The straggling body of men was now beginning to appear on the crest of the undulation which marked the only visible natural boundary of the valley; in less than three minutes the madly-striving crowd would be upon us, and we should be assuredly swamped by its numbers so that no pegs could be driven. Then I noticed the man who had doffed his fashionable coat to oblige Stewart, standing dejectedly near by; his sleeves were rolled up, displaying splendidly-formed muscles, and he held his shovel loosely in his hand as if uncertain what to do with it.