“Yes you will, Jacob, from an old friend and comrade. It may tide you over a difficulty, who knows? Luck does not always last, as the saying goes.”
Still Buckley shook his head.
“Well, then,” continued Jack, “you can’t help yourself, for I’ve left the bag under your own pillow in the tent!”
Buckley’s reply was checked by a shout from Captain Samson. They had reached the parting point—a clump of trees on an eminence that overlooked a long stretch of undulating park-like region. Here they dismounted to shake hands and say farewell. Little was said at the time, but moistened eyes and the long grasp of hard muscular hands told something of feelings to which the lips could give no utterance.
The party could see that knoll for miles after leaving it, and whenever Polly reined up and looked back, she saw the sturdy forms of Baldwin Burr and Jacob Buckley waving a kerchief or a hat, standing side by side and gazing after them. At last they appeared like mere specks on the landscape, and the knoll itself finally faded from their view.
At San Francisco they found their vessel, the Rainbow, a large full-rigged ship, ready for sea. Embarking with their boxes of gold-dust they bade farewell to the golden shore, where so many young and vigorous men have landed in hopeful enthusiasm, to meet, too often, with disappointment, if not with death.
Our friends, being among the fortunate few, left it with joy.
The Rainbow shook out her sails to a favouring breeze, and, sweeping out upon the great Pacific, was soon bowling along the western coast of South America, in the direction of Cape Horn.