On arriving at his tent, which was pitched in a very damp, unwholesome ravine, we found the doctor was not at home; but keeping on from one gulch to another we at last spied his hat just dodging behind a bank of earth in which he was at work. He seemed far more surprised than pleased at our sudden advent, and after a few moments' conversation, suddenly jerking out his watch, exclaimed, "Well, it's nearly twelve, and I must be going home to dinner; good morning, gentlemen," and away he hurried, leaving us divided between laughter and indignation; but inwardly resolving that it must be a very bad conscience indeed that could put a watch a whole hour out of the way. After his unceremonious departure we continued to prospect the ravines in the neighbourhood, but found none worth coming so far to seek. There was very little water running in any of them, and the two or three miners we saw at work were obliged to use the same scanty supply till it became too muddy to answer the purpose.
We spent the next three or four days in putting up our new tent and arranging the furniture within; for, as we expected to remain here several months, we did everything in the most substantial manner. The tent itself was nearly square, being twelve feet wide and fifteen feet long. Near the two sides, which were about three feet in height, we set several thick posts with stout crotches at the top, and laid in these heavy logs to which we secured the ropes that served to stretch the roof. As the tent was made of cotton drilling which we had already found insufficient to keep out the rain, we bought cloth enough to make a second roof, called a fly, which we stretched over the first, leaving a space of several inches between. The ridgepole, which was formed of the spouts belonging to the Burke rocker, and projected at each end beyond the roof, was supported by the tall stumps of two oaks we had cut off for the purpose, and was also strengthened in the middle by a pole passing through the centre of our little table. The whole was surrounded on every side but one by a thick array of branches, like a chevaux-de-frize, that broke the force of the wind, and imparted an appearance of great snugness and security.
The stove thrust its pipe out of one of the gables, just at the left of the door, and smoked away right lustily, day and night, as if conscious that a good deal depended upon its vigilance and fidelity. Altogether our new abode was of a very picturesque character, and I doubt not that many a humdrum citizen, yawning fearfully in his luxurious apartments, would consider it a very desirable residence—for a single day.
The interior was fitted up in a style of corresponding simplicity and elegance. A dry-goods' box that stood on end between the door and stove, and did duty as a sideboard, seemed to give an air of dignity and refinement to the apartment. It may not be in very good taste to parade the price of one's furniture; but as I know that many, at the present day especially, are apt to be curious in such matters, I will simply mention that our sideboard, though of pine, could not have been bought for less than fifty dollars.
Half a dozen tin plates and dippers—we could have had gold if we had pleased, but that was too common—two or three pans and pewter mugs—a large tin pail for making soup—a frying pan and coffee-pot, together with a squad of battered boxes that had once contained sardines or preserved meats, composed the list of our culinary utensils.
We had been sometime seeking to add a stewpan to our possessions, and meeting one day a party who were about leaving the mines, we inquired if they had such an article to dispose of. In reply they introduced us to a coffee-pot as tall as a two-year-old infant, and lifting the lid, Number Four peered curiously down into the capacious interior, as into the crater of an extinct volcano. It was a perfect geological curiosity. Beef, pork, beans, rice, potatoes, and onions, lying in distinct strata, or mingled into a dense conglomerate, rose half way to the top, while a faint and steamy odour from all these various ingredients drove us back as from the witches' cauldron.
At the foot of one of our beds and in the centre of the tent, stood the table—a few boards laid on the top of a flour barrel; the corner behind the door was used as a store room for our provisions, while all the remaining space was occupied by our beds. These were framed of sticks and grapevines, and covered, instead of a mattrass, with grass and moss; we carpeted the floor with the same material, and then, having exhausted our ingenuity, had nothing left to do but run in and out, and admire our own handiwork.
Many trifling improvements were subsequently added during the tiresome monotony of stormy weather. Tertium fitted the sideboard with shelves and a swinging door, and paved the space around the stove with smooth stones. He contrived a fastening for the door so artfully that he could not open it himself in less than half an hour, and even carried his ingenuity so far as to make a pair of bellows that blew equally well on all sides at once. I succeeded in manufacturing a pair of tongs out of an iron hoop, and then undertook to build an oven, but desisted after labouring at it several weeks, by which time it bid fair to rival the biggest of the Egyptian pyramids.
Thanksgiving came as usual, and found us still in the bustle of house-building, but as we had been invited to dine out, we did not intermit our labours till noon, when we dressed ourselves in our cleanest shirts, and walked over to our entertainers.
The party to which we would now introduce the reader had been some time our nearest neighbours, and since the departure of all our other acquaintance, we had contracted a sudden intimacy which afterwards ripened, with one of them at least, into a lasting friendship.