Page:California Inter Pocula.djvu/376



delver but  that  my  turn  may  come  next,  and  my  life be illuminated  by  the  roseate  tints  of  gold,  warm mellow metal,  transcendent  gold. Take for  example the tunneling  operations  which  in  1854-5  dissected every hill. Without capital,  without  means  even  to buy  bread,  four  or  six  or  ten  men  form  themselves into a  company  and  coolly  begin  a  work  requiring years of  labor  and  thousands  of  dollars  to  complete. Buoyed by  faith  in  theories  of  world-building  you hear them  talking  of  ages  past  as  other  men  talk  of yesterday,  reasoning  of  the  time  when  channels  of rivers  wound  round  the  lofty  hills,  when  through  a silent  world  tenantless  streams  rolled  into  a  saltless sea.

Thus strong  in  faith, hope  feeds  and  clothes  the  phil- osophic miner for  months  and  years. He lives  and  la- bors, he scarcely  knows  how. Time passes  ;  the  end approaches; the  last  blow  is  struck;  the  point  is  reached which marks  success  or  failure. Round him  who washes the  first  prospect-pan  on  reaching  the  end  of  the shaft or  tunnel,  a  group  gathers  breathless  with  anxiety. One with  furrowed  brow,  and  silver-sprinkled  hair,  and features fixed  and  immobile  from  care  and  toil,  thinks of her  who  with  him  has  started  down  the  limitless decline, whose  days  will  soon  be  past  brightening with gold,  and  whose  fate  for  life  with  that  of  others dear to  him,  the  next  five  minutes  may  decide. An- other, a young  sire,  forgotten  of  his  children,  scours into a  fiery  glow  the  hairy  skin  above  the  heart,  calls back his  flitting  fancy  from  the  heaven  of  the  old home, and  peers  into  that  pan  of  dirt  as  into  an  oracle. Yet another,  little  more  than  boy  in  years,  though  old enough in  experience,  delicately  featured  and  bearing signs of  good  breeding,  the  small  hands  hardened,  and fingers cramped  by  crowbar  and  pickhandle,  yet  not so stiff  but  they  can  renew  by  every  steamer  the  story of unchanged  love  to  her  whose  image  fills  his  heart, ah ! What means  the  product  of  that  pan  of  dirt  to