"Oh, mamma!" cried Rob; and "Oh, papa!" cried Nelly. "We've found a mine; we've got lots of ore; now we can get all the money we want. You see if this isn't almost exactly like the stuff in the man's wagon!" and Nelly emptied her apron on the ground, and Rob emptied his jacket; he had taken it off and carried it by the sleeves so as to make a big sack of it. Mr. and Mrs. March could hardly keep from laughing at the sight: there were the two piles of little bits of stone, and the children with red and dirty faces and the perspiration rolling down their cheeks, getting down on their knees to pick out the choicest specimens. Nelly was fumbling deep down in her pocket; presently she drew out her handkerchief all knotted in a wisp, and out of the last knot she took the little bit of ore which they had borrowed from the wagon for a sample. This she laid in her father's hand: "There, papa," she said, "that's the man's: we borrowed it to carry along to tell by."
"They don't look so much like it as they did," she added, turning sorrowfully back to the poor little pile of stones. Rob was gazing at them too, with a crest-fallen face.
"Why, they don't shine a bit now," he said; "up there they shone like every thing."
Mr. March picked up a bit of the stone and looked closely at it.
"Ah, Rob," he said, "the reason it doesn't shine now, is because the sun has gone under a cloud. There are little points of mica in these stones, and mica shines in the sun; but there isn't any silver here, dear. Did you really think you had made all our fortunes?"
Rob did not speak. He had hard work to keep from crying. He stood still, slowly kicking the pile of stones with one foot. His father pitied him very much.
"Never mind, Rob," he said; "you're not the first fellow that has thought he had found a mine, and been mistaken."
Rob stooped down and picked up two big handfuls of the stones and threw them as far as he could throw them.
"Old cheats!" he said.
"Yes, real old cheats!" said Nelly; and she began to scatter the stones with her foot. "And they were awful heavy. Oh, mamma, I'm so hungry!"