The Lake Fault Oil Gold 



at full speed to the place where we had left our friend. 

 On rounding a bend of the stream we were relieved, 

 but somewhat mystified, to see the troglodyte on 

 the top of a bank of sand waving his arms franti- 

 cally and shouting something to us, which we were 

 unable to hear properly owing to the roar of the 

 torrent. However, he appeared to be quite safe 

 and sound, at all events in body, so we put up our 

 pistols and slackened our pace. 



He had rushed back to the place where we 

 had left him at work, and we followed more slowly. 

 Presently, as we got nearer, he showed his head 

 above the bank, and shouting one word, "Gold!" 

 again disappeared. 



Thinking this was a stupid hoax, we determined to 

 return to camp, and then thinking it would be as well to 

 give him a ducking by way of revenge, we went to the 

 sandpit. There we found him sitting on the bank, 

 working away vigorously with one of the pans. Not 

 being expert at the work he had splashed himself from 

 head to foot with water, and only paused for a moment 

 to point to the other bowl which lay near. Our expert 

 panner made a dive for this, and after holding it to the 

 light of the setting sun, said calmly, " Gold it is right 

 enough." In the bottom of the pan, clinging to the still 

 wet surface, was a faint yellow smear, the " colour " of 

 the prospector. 



There was now little daylight remaining, but the 

 expert at once set to work upon another lot of sand and 

 once more got the colour, but this time so distinctly 

 that there could be no shadow of doubt about the dis- 

 covery. We could do no more that day, as the light 



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