ROUGH WEATHER ON THE ROCKIES 421 



of fifty to one hundred dollars for personal expenditure or 

 saving. 



Silver having proved a broken reed, numberless men 

 are seeking high and low for the more precious and 

 reliable metal ; and as half the streams of the Rocky 

 Mountains can be made to give out, through the medium 

 of rock or sand, infinitesimal signs of gold-bearing, 

 they are continually following up a will-o'-the-wisp that 

 seldom leaves them without a crumb of comfort or hope. 

 But besides these ex-miners and temporary adventurers, 

 there is a whole regular army of wanderers, men whose 

 entire life has been spent, or will be spent, in wandering 

 round, seeking gold as they have hitherto sought silver, 

 and occasionally even stooping ostensibly to seek work. 

 That there is a charm about a prospector's life, as there 

 is about that of a hunter or trapper, with which it often 

 combines, is easy to understand. 



The charm has to be acquired, but once acquired it 

 takes such hold upon the individual that he seldom settles 

 down to more restricted life, but is ever restless and eager 

 to be off to the mountains, to his solitary camp-fire, his 

 lonely delving, and the free air of heaven, in a region where 

 God's creation is most grandly set forth in rock and wood- 

 land. This hermit is, as a rule, no holy man. He goes 

 not there to meditate, save on the chances of striking ore, 

 nor to renounce, save whisky, which he cannot for the 

 present get. So you may see many strange men in these 

 strange places. 



It had been snowing that night, had rained all that 

 morning, and was raining pitilessly still, when, 'twixt 

 4 and 5 P.M., it occurred to the cook of our party that 

 the monotony of cowering over the fire might be varied 

 by preparation for the evening meal, to be eaten stand- 

 ing, salt and sugar melting to hand, and the coffee 

 chilled and diluted a few seconds after attaining the cup. 

 Accordingly, he sallied forth from the clump of fir trees 

 that by courtesy were supposed to shelter us by the creek 

 bed, and set to work manfully with a blunt axe upon a 

 dead tree. Now, the sound of a stubborn axe upon well- 

 dried timber is as pronounced and far-reaching as the 



