The recital of Custer's deeds nerved Alfonso to renewed efforts to win Christine's hand. He declined with thanks to join the captain's excursion party, and early next day rode south into the upper basin of the Park, which contains over 400 springs and geysers; many of the springs in their peculiar shapes, translucent waters, and variety and richness of color, are of exquisite beauty. Alfonso visited emerald and sapphire springs, where it is said nymphs, elfs, and fairies came to bathe, and don their dainty dress of flowers and jewelled dew drops.
Many bronzed tourists had assembled, and their faces showed amazement as they watched giant geysers in action. Suddenly the solid earth is tremulous with rumbling vibrations, like those that herald earthquakes. Frightful gurgling sounds are audible in the geyser's throat. Sputtering steam is visible above the cone, the water below boils like a cauldron, and scalding hot, the eruption becomes terribly violent, belching forth clouds of smoke-like steam, and hurling rocks into the air as though a mortar of some feudal stronghold had been discharged. The stupendous column of hot water is veiled in spray as it mounts towards heaven. Boiling water is flowing in brooks to the Firehole River, which is soon swollen to a foaming torrent washing away the bridges below. The valley is filled with dense vapors, and the air is laden with sulphurous fumes, while the hoarse rumblings and subterranean tremors chill the heart. Beneath your feet are positive evidences of eternal fires, and all about you the might of God. Alfonso was glad to leave this region of the supernatural.
He hastened across the Snake River, which winds through Idaho, and pushed on towards the Teton Range, one of many that form the Rocky Mts. In sight are snow-touched sentinel peaks kissed by earliest and latest sun. The Rocky Mts. or Great Continental Divide is a continuation of the famous Andes of South America, and jointly they form the longest and most uniform chain of mountains on the globe. Amid the gorges of this system of mountains, over 3000 miles in length, America's largest rivers have their birth, and find their outlet into the Atlantic, Arctic, and Pacific Oceans.
These mountains are vast vaults that will hold in trust for centuries to come untold supplies of precious metal for the American nations. This general fact did not concern Alfonso. He was ambitious to unlock for his own use only a single box of the huge vault. He was familiar with the wonderful story of Mackay, Fair, Flood, and O'Brien, Kings of the Comstock Lode, and owners of the Big Bonanza, who paid their 600 miners five dollars per day in gold, for eight hours' labor a third of a mile below the earth's surface. The Comstock Lode yielded over $5,000,000 per month, or a total output of silver and gold of over $250,000,000.
For six long weary months Alfonso and his companion searched for gold down the Green River and along the river bottom of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado, till they reached the Needles on the A. & P. Railway. Thence they rode west to Kern River. This stream they followed on horseback into the Sierra Nevada Mountains, all the time searching for precious metals, especially gold. The mountains were crossed over to Owen's Lake, and a river traced north. Alfonso was prospecting in new fields, but his search thus far was fruitless. His companion sickened and died, but Alfonso bravely climbed among the mountains hoping to cross the crest and reach the cabins of friendly government officials on duty in the park of the big trees in Mariposa County.
It was late in the fall, grasses and leaves had browned, Alfonso's horse had grown thin, and being too weak and lame to go forward, finally died. His provisions had given out; his own strength and courage had failed; he needed water for his parched tongue and lips, but none was at hand; fever quickened his pulse. Sitting alone in the shadow of a giant boulder that afforded partial protection from the gathering storm, his mind reverted to his home at Harrisville where abundance could be had, to his family that thought him dead, and to Christine across the sea, whom he had vowed to win with gold. All seemed lost. Alfonso's head reeled, he fell back upon the ground, and the early snows seemed to form for him a shroud.
Good fortune guided this way a party of Yosemite Indians, who were returning from an extended hunt for deer and elk. They had also slain a few bears and a couple of mountain lions. The dead horse first arrested their attention, and then the exhausted miner was found asleep covered with snow. The Indians wrapped the sick man at once in a grizzly bear skin, fastened him to a pony, and carried him to their camp near the big trees. It was morning before Alfonso was conscious of his surroundings. Standing by him was a shy Indian maiden with a dish of hot soup. His bed, he discovered was in a burned-out cavity of one of the big trees. Near by were several tepees, the tops of which emitted smoke. Straight, black-haired Indians in bright blankets moved slowly from tent to tent.
Alfonso scarcely conscious had strange dreams. Sometimes he thought he was in the Hodoo Region, or Goblin Land, the abode of evil spirits, where he saw every kind of fantastic beast, bird, and reptile, and no end of spectral shapes in the winding passages of a weird labyrinth on a far-off island. Then his dreams were of rare beauty. Green foliage was changed to pure white, the trees became laden with sparkling crystals, roadways and streams were laid in shining silver, and geyser-craters enlarged in strange forms resembled huge white thrones in gorgeous judgment halls. Such fleeting beauty suggested to Alfonso's feverish brain the supernatural, the abode perhaps of spirit beings. For days the medicine man and Mariposa, daughter of the Indian chief, watched and cared for Alfonso, whose life hovered over the grave.
Mariposa, Spanish for butterfly, was a fit name for the pretty Indian maiden. She paid great deference not only to her tall father, Red Cloud, but to the pale faces whenever in their presence. For four years Mariposa, unusually bright, attended the Indian school at Carlisle, Pa.; when she returned to her wild home in the forest she was able to speak and read the language of the pale face, and beside she loved history and poetry.
One day, Alfonso's health having slowly improved, Mariposa put in his hands a small pine cone, the size of a hen's egg, and said, "Three years go by from the budding to the ripening of the seed of the sequoias, or big trees."