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 seemed to concentrate upon Lame Gulch; and much of the sense of aloofness and security which was the chief element in Amberley's content came from the illusion which he carefully guarded, that that wall of giants really was impenetrable. He liked, too, to feel himself at a great altitude above the lower world where he had so long and vainly toiled.

"Nine thousand feet above sea-level!" he would assure himself in self-congratulatory mood. "When I come to quit, I sha'n't hev fur to go!" which confidence in the direction his spirit was destined to take, may fairly be accepted as indication of a good conscience.

Amberley had not married, and although he felt the omission to be matter for regret, he had never, as far as his recollection served him, found his wish to do so particularized in favor of any one woman.

"No, I ain't never married," he reluctantly admitted, when Enoch Baker, his next-door neighbor at Lame Gulch, pressed the point.

Enoch lived with his wife just round on the other side of Bear Mountain, only three miles away, and although his now elderly consort was reputed to be unamiable,—not to say cantankerous,—yet her existence, and the existence in the world outside, of many children