"For gold, of course. I'm an old gold miner, but I'm down on my luck now. Here, take some of this salt, and hold it out in your hat. Horses will do almost anything for a bit of salt, and I guess you won't have any trouble catching him."
While he was speaking the old miner had put his bundle down on the ground, and opened it. The boys saw he had a regular outfit such as a man might use to camp out with along the road in the summer. There were some tin and sheet iron dishes and utensils, some food, and the head of a pickaxe.
"I can't get out of the habit of traveling just as I used to do when I was prospecting," said the man. "I don't have to ask any odds of anybody then, but it's not so easy packing this stuff on my back. I ought to have a mule or a pony, but I can't afford to. There, take this salt," and he gave Will some from a sack. "I guess that will fetch the horse."
Will put it in his hat, jumped the fence, and approached the animal, which ceased cropping the grass, and looked up as the boy entered the field. Probably old Pete was debating in his equine mind, if he had one, whether it was better to see what it was that Will had in his hat, or whether he would kick up his heels, and enjoy a little more freedom.
Meanwhile Jed, who had remained with the old miner, looked curiously at the bundle, which Mr. Harrison was tying up again.
"What's the pickaxe for?" inquired the boy.
"That's my old pick that I used when I was a miner."
"What are you carrying it with you for?"
"Because that's a lucky pickaxe. Many a hundred dollars' worth of gold has that pick dug for me. I broke the handle, and from then on I had bad luck. But I kept the pick, and some day I may put a new handle on it, and start to mining again."
"Where did you dig gold?" asked Jed, while a curious longing came into his heart to get away from the tiresome farm work and embark upon the free and fascinating life of a prospector. He knew little of such life, or, perhaps, he would not have desired to undertake it, for it is full of hardships and dangers, compared to which farming is easy and simple.