As he talked he kept turning the nugget over and over, examining it on every side, and presently, in a little crevice or fold, he espied a tiny white streak. Taking out his pocket-knife he extracted a little of this white material and thoughtfully spread it upon the palm of his hand. It made a mark like white paint.
We two stood patiently waiting for him to offer some explanation of this mysterious “find,” when, with startling suddenness, he cast his knife upon the ground, slapped his leg, and burst into a great laugh; a laugh half of amusement and half of annoyance.
“Ho, ho, ho!” he went, stamping about and clutching his back hair as if he had been stung by a hornet. “Oh my, oh my, oh my! What a blundering dunderhead I must have been never to have guessed it before! Here, give me a hand with this pole, one of you,” picking up, as he spoke, the butt end of a dead pine-tree which formed part of our heap of fire-wood.
“What are you going to do with it?” asked Percy, as he shouldered the little end.
“Show you that vein, I hope,” replied Jack. “Come on!”
Down we went to the stream, and there we reared the pole on end and leaned it against one piece of the prostrate cap, when Jack at once shinned up it and stepped upon the top of the rock. In half a minute he looked down, at us and said, in a rather excited tone of voice “Come up!”
Up went Percy, with me close behind him, and soon we were standing at our leader’s side.
“Look here!” said he.
About half the surface of the rock, originally its under side, was covered with a layer of reddish, clay-like material some two inches thick, across the middle of which ran a white streak about a span in width. Going down upon his knees, Jack pointed out to us little flakes and lumps of gold, showing in several places along the white streak.
“There is our gold-vein,” said he. “It has been lying under our noses, or, rather, above our heads, all this time. The gold we got out of the pot-holes with the help of the clay balls came out of the clay balls themselves. With our own stupid hands we put the gold into the pot-holes, and then ‘discovered’ it. Did ever such a thing happen before? And to think that I never suspected it! No wonder we couldn’t find the vein up in the mountain, when, just as likely as not, this rock rode on a glacier down from Alaska or Hudson’s Bay, or anywhere else you like, ages ago, when half this continent was covered with ice.”