A Tale Of Three Lions Read Free

he
could thieve or kill.
    “‘Thank goodness!’ I said, as I slipped off the lump of gold. ‘Now, then,
do you get up, Harry, and see if that consummate villain has gone.’ Harry did
so, and reported that he had vanished towards Pilgrim’s Rest, and then we set
to work, and very carefully, but trembling with excitement, with our hands
hollowed out all the space of ground into which I had struck the pick. Yes,
as I hoped, there was a regular nest of nuggets, twelve in all, running from
the size of a hazel-nut to that of a hen’s egg, though of course the first
one was much larger than that. How they all came there nobody can say; it was
one of those extraordinary freaks, with stories of which, at any rate, all
people acquainted with alluvial gold-mining will be familiar. It turned out
afterwards that the American who sold me the claim had in the same way made
his pile—a much larger one than ours, by the way—out of a
single pocket, and then worked for six months without seeing colour, after
which he gave it up.
    “At any rate, there the nuggets were, to the value, as it turned out
afterwards, of about twelve hundred and fifty pounds, so that after all I
took out of that hole four hundred and fifty pounds more than I put into it.
We got them all out and wrapped them up in a handkerchief, and then, fearing
to carry home so much treasure, especially as we knew that Mr. Handspike Tom
was on the prowl, made up our minds to pass the night where we were—a
necessity which, disagreeable as it was, was wonderfully sweetened by the
presence of that handkerchief full of virgin gold—the interest of my
lost half- sovereign.
    “Slowly the night wore away, for with the fear of Handspike Tom before my
eyes I did not dare to go to sleep, and at last the dawn came. I 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.
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CHAPTER 2
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