A TALE OF THREE LIONS
Page: 9

got up and watched its growth, till it opened like a flower upon the
eastern sky, and the sunbeams began to spring up in splendour from
mountain-top to mountain-top. I watched it, and as I did so it flashed
upon me, with a complete conviction which I had not felt before, that
I had had enough of gold-mining to last me the rest of my natural
life, and I then and there made up my mind to clear out of Pilgrims'
Rest and go and shoot buffalo towards Delagoa Bay. Then I turned, took
the pick and shovel, and although it was a Sunday morning, woke up
Harry and set to work to see if there were any more nuggets about. As
I expected, there were none. What we had got had lain together in a
little pocket filled with soil that felt quite different from the
stiff stuff round and outside the pocket. There was not another trace
of gold. Of course it is possible that there were more pocketfuls
somewhere about, but all I have to say is I made up my mind that,
whoever found them, I should not; and, as a matter of fact, I have
since heard that this claim has been the ruin of two or three people,
as it very nearly was the ruin of me.

"'Harry,' I said presently, 'I am going away this week towards Delagoa
to shoot buffalo. Shall I take you with me, or send you down to
Durban?'

"'Oh, take me with you, father!' begged Harry, 'I want to kill a
buffalo!'

"'And supposing that the buffalo kills you instead?' I asked.

"'Oh, never mind,' he said, gaily, 'there are lots more where I came
from.'

"I rebuked him for his flippancy, but in the end I consented to take
him.



CHAPTER II

WHAT WAS FOUND IN THE POOL

"Something over a fortnight had passed since the night when I lost
half-a-sovereign and found twelve hundred and fifty pounds in looking
for it, and instead of that horrid hole, for which, after all,
Eldorado was hardly a misnomer, a very different scene stretched away
before us clad in the silver robe of the moonlight. We were camped--
Harry and I, two Kaffirs, a Scotch cart, and six oxen--on the swelling
side of a great wave of bushclad land. Just where we had made our
camp, however, the bush was very sparse, and only grew about in