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"But he isn't." A jealous instinct roused a spirit of prophecy in the woman. "He's -how do I know what he is?" she added with a hard laugh, "but he's got the place that 'll come to the cap'n some day. I've heard 'em say so many a time."

"We don't want it," said Blossom softly. "We've money enough, you and I, for us all. Let him keep it, and he may live forever, poor old man!" The world was wide, no one need be crowded out of it to make room for her.

In all this time while Captain Elyot's happy honeymoon was passing, no one called upon his young bride-with the exception of the chaplain's wife, and Mrs. Bryce who left her name at the door one afternoon when she was sure that Blossom was out. As for Claudia, horses could hardly have dragged her to the house, and the other ladies at the post took their cue from head-quarters and staid away without exception. If Mrs. Stubbs fancied that the words of the clergyman pronounced over her from his book and the bearing of a new name would bring about a change in Blossom's social position, she was fated to disappointment. But nothing had come about as she expected, and she was too bewildered by the turn affairs had taken and in her new position, to be for a while in any way affected by outside events. It was only when she had settled at last into her place in the new household and the hours began to hang heavy upon the hands unused to ease, that she became aware of this fresh neglect. "They're set against us," the poor soul said; but her strength for resistance was waning and she was strangely humbled in her own opinion. The idea haunted her half-crazed brain that it would be different if she were only out of the way. There was no lack of respect in Captain Elyot's manner, nor had Blossom's love been turned away from her mother by her marriage, but it would be better for them both, she had come to believe, if she were not here. Alone, Blossom might win her way, even here, where she was so lightly esteemed, but she, Mrs. Stubbs herself, who would have done anything for the child, was only a bar and a hindrance.

She planned all manner of schemes to rid them of her, wild impracticable schemes which she had no courage to attempt. Would this old man never die? The summer was here already, the grass green about them, the great arched sky vividly blue overhead. The river, dark and full, slid on

its way over its sandy bed. The verbenas and larkspurs in Blossom's little garden nodded scarlet and blue and pink in the sunshine. And many a heart-ache awoke with the flowers as one after another of the officers at the post were ordered away into active service. Captain Elyot's turn might come any day, and then where would her hopes be? What if after all her scheming she should gain nothing for Blossom but a broken heart at last!

CHAPTER XX.

WHEN THE SUN SHINES ON THE MIST.

It was early summer and the door of the store stood wide open. In one corner screened from the sight of passers outside, a party of men in undress uniform were gathered about a card-table; two or three idlers looked over their shoulders, among whom was Cogger, the wagoner, who had just come in with an emigrant train on its way south.

The whole place had changed its appearance since Mrs. Stubbs retired to private life. There was a lack of that scrupulous neatness which displayed itself under her rule, and a greater striving after startling effects. Gaudy calicoes and gay-bordered handkerchiefs swung from perch to perch. Showy horse-equipments were displayed ostentatiously, while the array of bottles upon the shelves would have done credit to a barroom. Nor were the necessities of human life forgotten. They did not, however, push themselves disagreeably to the front, but like the virtues-were to be had upon demand.

Cogger had bestowed upon all this display a comprehensive stare which might or might not express admiration.

Blinkins, the new sutler, observed it with a self-satisfied smile. "You knew him?" "I did. Me an' him was as good as pardners the last time I crossed the plains."

"Good fellow enough, they say, but slowcoach," the young man apostrophized, flippantly, setting his regulation cap a little more on one side.

"He warn't spry," Cogger replied slowly; "but ye'd find him thar when ye looked for him, most likely."

"Oh yes, good fellow I don't doubt," the sutler assented glibly. "Make yourself at home Mr.-Mr. Coggle. Look about you, may be we can suit you with something in our line. Here's a fine pair of buckskins now." And he eyed Cogger's worn nether garments as he spoke. But the wagoner shook his head.

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"I'll take a little baccy; I never did think much o' clothes 'cept as a kiver, not bein' much t' look at myself, but I'll bear it in mind all the same." And he returned to the players.

"What ever came of the wimmin-folks arter Stubbs was put under and this pooty boy took his place?" he asked in a whisper loud enough to reach the ears of the lastnamed individual.

"What women-folks?" some quired absently.

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"Stubbs's wife an' the little un." "Where've you been, man, not to hear the news? Why, Elyot married the girl. Confounded good luck, too, whatever they may say. She'll have no end of money, and

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"Ye don't say?" And Cogger thrust himself into the group. "I reckoned it might come round,-kind o' Providence in it."

"I don't know about that," returned the speaker; "but there's money enough in it. Elyot cut us all out, but there was no chance for a man; the old woman kept her pretty daughter under lock and key and only brought her out at the end of a chain."

"Ye don't say?" Cogger was not yet over his astonishment at this happy termination of affairs. "An' they're here now?"

"They were an hour ago; I hardly think they can have strayed very far away since then."

"An' the old woman?"

"Oh, she's with 'em; a kind of providential balance."

"Ye don't say?" Cogger added for the third time. And after a moment of silence, he addressed the sutler again : "Young man, I don't keer ef I do take a look at them buckskins."

The young man addressed hastened to bring forward the desired garments, with a running comment on their excellence as he spread them out.

Cogger held them at arm's length while he screwed up one eye and tried the effect of distance. Then, bringing them nearer, he tested their quality by a brisk rubbing between his fists to the evident anxiety of the store-keeper. At last giving the whole a shake which would have annihilated anything of a less firm texture, he pronounced them all right. "I suppose you kin give a man the rest o' the fixin's?"

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"Certainly, certainly; anything you wish, Mr. Coggle; just choose for yourself. I venture to say there is not such a stock this side of Independence. Perhaps you'd like

to step in here and try them on," and he threw open the door into what had been Blossom's parlor.

"What has come over Cogger?" exclaimed one of the players a little later when the wagon-master, arrayed in his new purchase and a somewhat shop-worn flannel blouse of enormous size, stood before a very small mirror complacently surveying as much of his figure as could be reflected therein at one time.

"Going to a funeral," suggested one, at sight of the lean figure arrayed in this loose garment which hung about his form as a flag drapes its staff on a breezeless day.

"Just look at that," said the sutler, with a wink toward the players. "Did you ever see such a fit?" and dexterously seizing a handful of the coat between the shoulders behind (thus drawing it into temporary shape in front) he bade Cogger look in the glass. Then wheeling him about with a sudden grip in front he urged him to look over his shoulder and see for himself. "Was there ever a snugger fit in the back ?”

And Cogger was satisfied even to incipient vanity, especially when to these were added a new pair of boots, a gay-colored handkerchief and a bottle of pomade.

"I say, Cogger," broke in one of the cardplayers, "what's going to be done now?"

"I don't mind telling ye that I'm thinkin' o' gettin' married," the wagon-master replied, proceeding with grave deliberation to finish his toilet. "Thar's a young gal down on the Santa Fé trail I spoke to as I came along in the fall. She'll be lookin' out for me most likely, an' I might as well be ready. Ye never kin tell what'll happen. Her name is Susannah," he added carelessly. "Hm; an' so Elyot married the little gal!"

"What blessed luck some fellows have!" burst out one of the group. "Stubbs must have left a pretty fortune, and as if that wasn't enough, some rich old fellow in the states, just ready to drop off, 'll leave him another pile. They say he'll throw up his commission before long."

"I happen to know something of that second story." The speaker was a newcomer fresh from the states. He glanced about carefully as he went on dealing out the cards in his hands, then he proceeded cautiously: "It may be all true enough about this Stubbs's fortune, but Elyot ll never get his uncle's money. The old man is swearing mad over his nephew's marrying the sutler's daughter."

"Hush!" whispered some one at his elbow. "There's the old woman now."

It was true. Mrs. Stubbs had come in unobserved and stood scarcely a dozen yards from the speaker. There was a rustle of the stiff black garments as she passed out and away. She had not seen their faces, but every word had reached her ears. In one moment her castle in the air fell to ruins. Her dream of glory for the child faded like a mist touched by the sun. The old man was angry! Even Captain Elyot's fine friends had turned away from the child; and she would never be a grand lady after all. The glare of the sinking sun dazed her eyes, the sudden shine of the river-as she turned a corner hardly knowing whither she went and struck out beyond the stockade-brought a deathly faintness. She could have fallen, but some instinct of will held her up till she had passed beyond the reach of curious eyes and an angle of the rough wall screened her from sight. Here she sank down and let the strange numbness that had seized her lock her into forgetfulness. It must have been hours before she came to herself, before she rose up with a confused sensation of bearing a weight under which she staggered, and moved toward her new home. As she approached slowly and with difficulty, some one hanging about the corner of the house came to meet her, screened by the gathering darkness, for night was at hand.

"I hope I see ye well, ma'am," said Cogger, removing his hat and advancing with an awkward, hesitating step.

"Eh?" There was no recognition in the eyes which looked beyond him.

"Pears to me you aint over civil to old friends."

The wagon-master was piqued into selfconfidence.

"I aint no friends," the woman responded in a hollow voice, each word coming laboriously from her lips. "Nobody's friends t' Nobody's friends t' ye, only t' git what they kin."

"That's an awful hard sayin'; if I was you I wouldn't hold to it," replied the wagonmaster confidentially. "Why, I've come t' show ye 'taint so! Here am I, who aint | much t' look at, t' be sure, but I've been thinking about ye an' the little gal all the way along the trail. I had somethin'He fumbled in the pockets of his coat and brought out a little chain cut deftly and delicately from the bones of some animal

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which had fallen on the plains. "I thought p'r'aps the little gal ud like it, seein' her father an' me was as good as pardners."

"What is it? What do you want?" questioned the woman vacantly, letting the chain which had cost Cogger many an hour's labor slip through her fingers.

"It's for the little gal, for Miss Blossom. They say she's married. If you'd give it to her. "Taint much, but ye might wish her joy with it an' tell her there wa'n't a link of it that didn't have her bright eyes shinin' through 'em, when I was workin' at it."

The woman seemed but half to comprehend this long message, but she raised the little bauble and examined it absently. Then she dropped it into his hand again.

"Why, man, she's got 'em o' gold!"

She brushed by him and entered the house. She passed on to the room which Blossom had insisted upon making fine for her and threw herself heavily upon the bed. On the wall before her was a picture-the only remaining one of Stubbs's gallery-which she had pinned there with her own hands, fancying that the face, though high-colored and rudely drawn, bore a resemblance to BlosAs she lay here, her mind gradually clearing and her thoughts returning to their old channel,-the deep-cut channel from which there was now no escape, the eyes with a touch of sadness in them seemed to gaze upon her continually. Turn whichever way she would they pursued her like a reproach.

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(To be continued.)

A CALIFORNIA MINING CAMP.

I OFTEN think, as I stoop to pick a cluster of white-petaled flowers, that seem the very expression of the freshness and briefness of the morning, how, in some shadowy "labór" a thousand feet below, a gang of Mexicans, finishing their night-shift, may be passing the "barrilito" from one grimy mouth to another.

If one possessed an ear-trumpet like Dame Eleanor Spearing's, by laying it on almost any spot of these steeply mounting hills and winding trails, one might hear the ringing of hammer and drill against the rock, the rumbling of cars through cavernous drifts, the dull thunder of blasts, even the voices of men burrowing in the heart of the mountain. One can walk, in the passages only of this underground world, for twenty-seven miles without treading the same path twice. Only those familiar with its blind ways from childhood may venture below in safety without a guide, for besides the danger of being lost, is that of wandering into some disused " labór," where the rotten timbers threaten a "cave." Within the last year, I am told, a part of "Mine Hill" has settled three inches, and everywhere above the "old workings" great cracks and holes show how the shell is constantly sinking. If this burrowing process goes on with the same vigor as during the last thirty years, the mountain will some day be nothing but a hollow crust,-a huge nut-shell, emptied of its kernel. Acres of its surface now cover nothing but emptiness, —caverns, hundreds of feet in length and breadth, connected by winding passages hewn out of the rock, and propped by a net-work of timbers.

"Nuevo Almadén," the mine was called, under the leisurely Mexican régime; then the quicksilver ore was carried in leather sacks on the miners' heads, up ladders made of notched logs, and "packed" down the mountain to the furnaces, on the backs of mules. There is an old "labór" called "La Cruz," where candles were kept burning before a shrine to the Virgin, hollowed out of the rocky wall. It was furnished with a crucifix and an image of the Queen of Heaven with a crown on her head and the Holy Child in her arms. Here the miners knelt in prayer before going to their day's or night's work. No one ever passed it without making the sign of the cross.

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mule-trains, the Mexican ladders, the shrine and crucifix disappeared when the Baron family lost their claim and "Nuevo" became New Almaden. That prompt and urgent monosyllable was the key-note to the change of dynasty. What the mine may have lost in picturesqueness, it has gained, however, in general interest, from the curious mixture of races gathered here, all living under a common rule, with the same work and the same general influences, yet as distinctly national as if each occupied its own corner of the earth.

It gives me a strange feeling to see the miners go down into the underworld. The men's heads show above the top of the "skip," the bell strikes, the engineer moves a lever, the great wheels of the engine slowly swing round and the heads disappear down the black hole. I can see a hand waved and the glimmer of a candle for a little way. The spark grows fainter and a warm, damp wind blows up the shaft.

Above-ground, the colony is in three stories: the Hacienda* at the foot of the mountain, the Cornish camp half-way up, and the Mexican camp on top; a long winding road leads from one to another, like a staircase. From its breezy landings, looking back, one can follow the Santa Clara valley, opening out to the sea, and the long quiet lines of the Coast Range opposite, while the nearer mountains fold in around with strong lights and shadows. The mountains are not bare, but clothed chiefly with scrub-oak and live-oak, not large, yet sufficient to soften the rugged outlines. The "works" are hidden by spurs and clefts, so as to be quite inconspicuous. The shafthouses and miners' cottages on the sides of the hills are of no more consequence than rabbit-holes.

The charms of the Hacienda are of the obvious kind: a long, shady street, following the bright ripples of a stream (which the tourist generally speaks of as the "Arroyo de los Alamitos "), at one end the manager's house, with its double piazzas

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and easy hospitable breadth of front, a lonely background of mountains at the other, and the vine-covered cottages between. These agreeable objects can be as well appreciated in a drive along the main street as in a year's residence there, it is very pretty; but as the "show" village of the mine, ever conscious of the manager's presence, the Hacienda wears an air of propriety and best behavior, fatal to its pict

uresqueness.

There is no undue propriety about the mining camps on the "Hill." Their domestic life has the most unrestrained frankness of expression, and their charms are certainly not obtrusive. The Mexicans have the gift of harmoniousness; they seem always to fit their surroundings, and their dingy little camp has made itself at home on the barren hills, over which it is scattered; but the charm of the Cornish camp lies partly in the vivid incongruity between its small, clamorous activities, and the repose of the vast, silent nature around it.

As you climb the last hill before reaching the Cornish camp, a live-oak tree, warped by the wind, leans out in relief against the sky at a sharp bend of the road. It bears upon its trunk certain excrescences in the shape of oblong boxes, inscribed (in various experimental styles of chirography) with

the names of dwellers remote from the highroad. Many trees in the camp, standing at the meeting of ways, bear these excrescences. To a New England mind they would at once suggest the daily paper; but the Cornish miners sustain life on something more substantial than "bread and the newspaper." The meat-wagon, on its morning rounds, leaves Tyrrell his leg-o'-mutton, Tregoning his soup-bone, and Trengove his two-bits' worth of steak, in the boxes bearing these names respectively. Harold, in Tennyson's drama, boasts that, in his earldom,

"A man may hang gold bracelets on a bush, And leave them for a year, and coming back, Find them again,"

and such is the honesty of the Cornish camp, that trees bearing soup-bones, steaks, and legs-of-mutton, are never plucked of their fruit, save by the rightful owners.

The camp seems always to be either washing or moving, or both. Monday and Mayday arrive here quite regardless of the almanac or the customs of society. The Cornish miner can hardly be said to

fold his tent like the Arab, And silently steal away.

When the wind sits in the shoulder of his sail, the entire camp is aware of the fact. There is an auction of his household gear, at which his neighbors are cheerfully emulous that some private good should result from the loss to the community. He departs with his wife and quiverful of chil

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CORNISHMAN "TRAMMING' AT BUSH TUNNEL.

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VOL. XV.-33.

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