“No, ’tis not, for if you were sailing a ship out at sea and the wind blew real hard, you’d lie too.”
Bill’s levity fell upon unappreciative soil. I was too much in earnest, and resumed:
“I’m bound to go out there, Bill, if I don’t pick more than a hatful of gold in a day. There’s nothing like trying, you know. But what’s the use of going after gold, you say? Well, now, isn’t that what we are all after, and nearly crazy to get? And, isn’t it easier to go to a country where you can scrape it up from the ground or pick it out from among the grass by the bucketful, than it is to toil and sweat and worry through a long life here?”
I cannot now remember whether Bill was just a little cynical, or simply echoed the opinions of some of the wiseacres of that day when he parried my query with,
“There’s plenty of money in the country now, and more is unnecessary. What are you going to do with it all?”
“That’s a singular idea,” I answered. “Do you suppose it’s possible to have too much money in the country? Such old, puritanical notions about money are ridiculous. You and I haven’t too much and we could use a few millions to good advantage, if we had them. And if it should prove true that lots of gold can be found in California, you’ll live to see this country step to the front among nations in wealth, prosperity and enterprise.”
In my ardor I had risen to unwonted heights of eloquence.
Bill thought that there was enough enterprise in the country, already.
I assured him that when we began to send gold back from California in ton lots, the various enterprises would boom to an extent never before witnessed in the world.
Bill had, however, taken the negative side of the issue and fired another broadside at me: