“True, it must be higher up the valley. Come along.”
On we plodded, hour after hour, halting often, and examining with care many a secluded spot that seemed to answer more or less the description of the spot for which we searched, but all in vain. Sunset found us as far from our object as ever, and as hungry as hawks. Darkness of course put an end to the search, and, with a feeling of disappointment and weariness that I had not experienced since arriving in that region, I set to work to fell and cut up a tree for fire wood, while Lumley shovelled a hole in the snow at the foot of a pine, and otherwise prepared our encampment.
But youth is remarkably elastic in spirit! No sooner was the fire crackling, the kettle singing, and the delicious odour of roasted ptarmigan tickling our nostrils, than disappointment gave way to hope and weariness to jollity.
“Come, we shall have at it again to-morrow,” said Lumley.
“So we shall,” said I—“mind that kettle. You have an unfortunate capacity for kicking things over.”
“One of the disadvantages of long legs, Max. They’re always in the way. Get out the biscuit now. My ptarmigan is ready. At least, if it isn’t, I can’t wait.”
“Neither can I, Jack. I sometimes wish that it were natural to us to eat things raw. It would be so very convenient and save sh–—a—lot—of—time.”
Hunger and a wrenched-off drumstick checked further utterance!
That night we lay in our snow camp, gazing up at the stars, with our feet to the fire, talking of gold and diamonds with all the eagerness of veritable misers—though it is but justice to myself to add that Eve’s blue eyes outshone, in my imagination, all the diamonds that ever decked the brow of Wealth or Beauty! When at last we slept, our dreams partook of the same glittering ideas—coupled, of course, with much of the monstrous absurdity to which dreams are liable. I had just discovered a gem which was so large that I experienced the utmost difficulty in thrusting it into my coat-pocket, and was busy shovelling small diamonds of the purest water into a wheelbarrow, when a tremendous whack on my nose awoke me.
Starting up with an indignant gasp I found that it was a lump of snow, which had been detached by the heat of our fire from a branch overhead.