A Millionaire of Rough-and-Ready

Ready," regarded it with the contemptuous indifference usually shown by those adventurers towards all bucolic pursuits. There was certainly no active objection to the occupation of two hillsi

eased valoo we give it-don't it? Oh, yes, certainly!" was their ironical commentary. Mulrady might have been pardoned for adopting this popular opinion; but by an equally incongruous sentiment, peculiar, however, to the man, he called upon Don Ramon, and actually offered to purchase the land, or "go shares" with him in the agricultural profits. It was alleged that the Don was so struck with this concession th

?" asked Mulrady, simply. "Ah, there are Spaniards and Moors," responded Don Ramon, sententiously. "Gold has been dug, and by caballeros; but no good ever came of it. There were Alvarados in Sonora, look you, who had mines of SILVER, and worked th

rady, with youthful feminine

founded yonder town, one was shot, another died of a fever-poisoned, you understand, by the soil-and the last got himself crazy of aguardiente. Even the scientifico,[1] who came here years ago and spied into the t

ore pretentious house on the opposite hill. A whitewashed fence replaced the rudely-split rails, which had kept out the wilderness. By degrees, the first evidences of cultivation-the gashes of red soil, the piles of brush and undergrowth, the bared boulders, and heaps of stone-melted away, and were lost under a carpet of lighter green, which made an oasis in the tawny desert of wild oats on the hillside. Water was the only free boon denied this Garden of Eden; what was necessary for irrigation had to be brought from a mining ditch at great expense, and was of insufficient quantity. In this emergency Mulrady thought of sinking an artesian well on the sunny slope beside his house; not, however, without serious consultation and much objection from h

ught of givin' your daughter to a common miner, or that I'm goin' to allow her to marry out of our own set?" "Our own set!" echoed Mulrady feebly, blinking at her in astonishment, and then glancing hurriedly across at his freckle-faced son and the two Chinamen at work in the cabbages. "Oh, you know what I mean," said Mrs. Mulrady sharply; "the set that we move in. The Alvarados and their friends! Doesn't the old Don come here every day, and ain't his son the right age for Mamie? And ain't they the real first families here-all the same as if they were noblemen? No, leave Mamie to me, and keep to your shaft; there never was a man yet had the least sabe about these things, or knew what was due to his family." Like most of his larger minded, but feebler equipped sex, Mulrady was too glad to accept the truth of the latter proposition, which left the meannesses of life to feminine manipulation, and went off to his shaft on the hillside. But during that afternoon he was perplexed and troubled. He was too loyal a husband not to be pleased with this proof of an unexpected and superior fores

red but unmistakably common presence. Mrs. Mulrady spoke openly of her "loss"; declared that the old families were dying out; and impressed the wives of a few new arrivals at Red Dog with the belief that her own family was contemporary with the Alvarados, and that her husband's health was far from perfect. She extended a motherly sympathy to the orphaned Don Caesar. Reserved, like his father, in

t astute lady, "and it's better for the looks

of her good man's voice, and the unusual circumstance of his return to the house before work was done, caused her, however, to drop her dusting cloth, and run to the kitchen door to meet him. She saw him running through the rows of cabbages, his face shining with perspiration and excitement, a light in his eyes which she had not seen for years.

sh that had also been recalled from the past with her housewife

struck it; and

without excitement, and looked at him

the boys have been looking fer. There's a fortin'

a mi

irs. He could hear her wonderingly and distinctly. "Y

f undisguised expos

said Mrs. Mulrad

on seemed to have taken off the keen edge of his enjoyment. He at once abd

old any one y

xpectin' of anything." He began, with an attempt at fresh enjoym

advised you taking the land,"

nk"-he began, hesitatingly. "I reckon, perhaps, I

have been yours-that's the law. And you bought the land without any restrictions. Besides,

is honest, pale-

ou know I hadn't

me." Her voice here took the strident form of action. "Knock off work at the shaft, and send your man away

choed Mulr

thout heeding him, "and Mamie wants a change and some proper. clothes. Le

very had vanished before he could fairly dazzle her with it; or, rather, she was not dazzled with it at all. It had become like business, and the expression "breaking it" to Mamie jarred upon him. He would have preferred to tell

to lose," she said, impa

ood fortune so confidently, he would not have spoken what was in his mind at the time; but he said

she said,

he vein sorter looked ez if it had been worked at. Follering the line outside to the base of the h

rs. Mulrady, c

sconnectedly, "it kinder looked as if som

dy knows the hill wasn't worth that for prospectin'; and it was abandoned when we came here. It's your property and you've paid

ature had prompted him to give it a fair consideration. She was probably right. What he might have thought had she t

bout the pick to yourself. There's no use of putting queer ideas i

her gazed somewhat anxiously and wistfully into his daughter's face. He had looked forward to those few moments to enjoy the freshness and naivete of Mamie's youthful delight and enthusiasm as a relief to his wife's practica

heiress? How do we like layin' over

E

t Sacramento; in reading the admiration of the clerks; in glancing down a little criticisingly at the broad cowhide brogues that strode at her s

hed with her charming preoccupation, and

little squeeze to his elbow to soften the separation. "I always had an idea SOMETHING would happen. I

to go without seeing

said Mamie, simply. "I reckon that's why ma m

dress," said Mulrady, watching her attentively; "and

rich all the time, and his father and grandfather

d followed her words, gave way to one of pain, and then of a

ponded Mamie, promptly. "There's bette

tune had just befallen them. But Mamie's teeth shone again between her parted lips. "La, pa! it ain't t

" queried her fa

boots! Everybody can see these are made for the

Mulrady, with a half-pl

gues, that seemed to have already gathered enough of the soil to indicate his right to that title. Mamie, who had recovered her spirits, but had not lost her preoccupation, wandered off by herself in the meadow, or ascended the hillside, as

d Mulrady had climbed to the box beside

t smart skeer, a m

ho

pt with that idiotic stare. I then let him have my opinion of him, in mighty strong English, and drove off, leavin' him there. The next morning, when I came by on the up-trip, darn my skin! if he wasn't thar, but lyin' all of a heap on the boulder. Jim drops down and picks him up. Doctor Duchesne, ez was along, allowst it was

lrady's unimaginative mind, he was almost on the point of disclosing his good fortune to t

in a rash passenger. "Did you ever ge

to get even." He paused again, and then added, carelessly, "They say he never kem to enuff to let on who he was or whar he kem from; and he was eventooally taken to a 'Sylum for Doddering Idjits and Gin'ral and Permiskus Imbeciles at Sacramento. I've he

t Douglas, who visited California before the gold excit