“Ha! Maxton, glad I’ve found you alone,” cried Ned, seating himself on an empty box before the fire, over which the former was engaged in culinary operations. “I have been thinking over a plan for turning the course of the stream, and so getting at a portion of its bed.”
“Now that’s odd,” observed Maxton, “I have been thinking of the very same thing all morning.”
“Indeed! wits jump, they say. I fancied that I had the honour of first hitting on the plan.”
“First hitting on it!” rejoined Maxton, smiling. “My dear fellow, it has not only been hit upon, but hit off, many months ago, with considerable success in some parts of the diggings. The only thing that prevents it being generally practised is, that men require to work in companies, for the preliminary labour is severe, and miners seem to prefer working singly, or in twos and threes, as long as there is good ‘pay-dirt’ on the banks.”
“Well, then, the difficulty does not affect us, because we are already a pretty strong company, although our vaquero has left us, and I have seen a place this morning which, I think, will do admirably to begin upon; it is a deep pool, a few miles up the stream, under—”
“I know it,” interrupted Maxton, putting a large slice of pork into the frying-pan, which hissed delightfully in the ears of hungry men. “I know the place well, but there is a much better spot not a quarter of a mile higher up, where a Chinaman, named Ah-wow, lives; it will be more suitable, you’ll find, when I shew it you.”
“We’ll go and have a look at it after dinner,” observed Ned; “meanwhile, here are our comrades, let us hear what they have to say about the proposal.”
As he spoke, Collins, Jones, Larry, and the captain advanced in single file, and with disconsolate looks, that told of hard toil and little reward.
“Well, what have you got, comrades?”
“Nothin’,” answered Bill Jones, drawing forth his comforter. Bill’s comforter was black and short, and had a bowl, and was at all times redolent of tobacco.