Talk about Elam's being half wild! Tom and I were in that fix also. We saw Elam examine the broken bush, the one that was held in place by two limbs that were tied about it, and his face grew as white as a sheet. He worked his way into the bushes, making his way all too slowly to suit us who were following close at his heels, and finally stopped under the hanging rock, where there was a clear space about two feet in diameter. The bushes grew as thick here as they did anywhere else, but they had been cut with a knife to give the digger a chance to work. Not one of us said a word, because we were too highly excited. Elam reached his hand behind him, and I, knowing what he wanted, placed a spade within it; but you might as well have set a child to scraping it out with a teaspoon. His hand trembled so that it was scarcely any use to him.
"Here, Elam, give me that spade," I cried. "You will never get it up in the world. Now, stand back beside Tom, out of the way."
I did not think Elam would agree to this, but he did, and in two minutes I had the leaves and brush all out of the way, faster than it was put in, I'll bet. But what was this I struck against before I had gone down three inches? It was not as hard as a rock, because, when I placed my shovel against it and tried to pry it up, the instrument slipped from it and showed me the color of the pure gold.
"Elam, Elam, there's something here!" I shouted, so nearly beside myself that I did not know what I was saying. "Stand out of the way and let me handle it myself. When I get it out where the horses are, you can examine it till your head is as white as Uncle Ezra's."
I have since learned that the nugget weighed 130 pounds, but it did not seem half that weight as I pulled it out of the hole and started through the bushes with it. I paid no attention to the others, who followed along after me, lost in wonder. I carried it out to where the bushes ended, and then laid it down, hunted up a rock, and sat down and examined it.
"Elam, there's your nugget!" I said.
"By gum, I believe it is!" said Elam.
One would have thought by the way Elam went about it that he did not know whether it was or not. For fifteen minutes we sat there and watched him as he passed his hands carefully over it, brushing away a little particle of dirt here and pecking with his knife there to see if it was really gold, until he was satisfied; then he put up his knife and thrust out his hand to Tom.
"Tender-foot, I never would have found this if it hadn't been for you," said he, with something like a tremor in his voice. "Shake!"
"Thank you," said Tom, taking particular pains to keep his hands out of the way. "I'll take your word for it."