The Golden Butterfly

you think

a half a length, turned in his s

the chief, who was

ould not camp where we are. The sun will be down in two hours; the way is long, the wind is cold, or will be soon. This pilgrim has tightened his belt to

, grown over with grass, than by any evidences of engineering skill. "Roads lead to places; places ha

fers, with a monosyllabic man, may I be condemned to another two months of buffalo steak without Worcester sauce, such as I

, for want of imaginatio

migod, and every book is true. He is a man, inasmuch as he has the firm step of manhood, he has passed through his calf-love, he knows what claret means, and his heart is set upon the things for which boys care nothing. He is a youth, because he can still play a game of football and rejoice a

m, a little spare about the shoulders; but a youth of a ruddy and a cheerful countenance. To say that the lines of his face were never set to gravity would be too much, because I defy any man to laugh when he is sleeping, eating, or drinking. At all other times this young man was ready to laugh without stoppi

sed; eyes which sometimes sparkled in response to some genial thought, or bubbled over at some joke of his companion, but which, as a rule, were like gimlets for sternness, so that strangers, especially stranger servants-the nigger of Jamaica, the guileless Hindoo of his Indian station, and other members of the inferior human brotherhood-trembled exceedingly when t

chet-face, lurked the most amiable of dispositions. At any rate, Ladds was never known to thrash a native servant, or to swear more than is becoming and needful at a syce, while his hatchet-face had been more t

e, smeared with oil, and naked, to effect his escape by crawling through a hedge of prickly pear. Also, because they were in a foreign land, and wished to be in harmony with its institutions, they wore immense steel spurs, inlaid with silver filigree, and furnished with "lobs" attached to them, which jangled and danced to make melody, just as if they formed part of an illustration to a Christmas book. Boots of course, they wore, and the artistic instinct which, a year before, had converted the younger man into a thing of beauty and a joy for the whole Park in the afternoon, now impelled him to assume a cummerbund of scarlet silk, with white-tasselled fringes, the like of which, perhaps, had never before been seen on the back of a Californian mus

o, his spurs being heavier, the pattern of his check-shirt being larger, his saddle bigger; only for the silk cummerbund he wore a leather strap, the last symbol of the honourable condition of dependence. He rode in advance of the greasers, whom he held in contempt, and some thirty yards behi

h the brush-wood called the chaparelle, in which grew the manzanita and the scrub-oak, with an occasional cedar pine, not in the least like the cedars of Lebanon and Clapham Common. Hanging about in the jungle or stretching its arms along the side of the dry water course which ran at the traveller's feet beside the road was the wild vine lo

iness, shut in by mountains which rose over and behind them like friendly giants guarding a troop of sleeping maidens. Pelion was piled on Ossa a

clear from the snowy sides of the higher slopes; yet among them lingered the flowers of April u

and ditches formed by the miners ran up and down the face of the country like the wrinkles in the cheek of a baby monkey; old pits, not deep enough to kill, but warranted to maim and disable, lurked like man-traps in the open; the old wooden aqueducts, run up by the miners in the year '52, were still standing where they were abandoned by the "pioneers;" here and there lay about old washing-p

ard, that anybody could see his primary object was speed. After him, with heavy stride, seeming to be in no kind of hurry, and yet covering the ground at a much greater rate than the man, there came a bear-a real old grisly. A bear who was "shadowing" the man and meant cl

s ready. The younger threw the reins of h

ood still

he bear hunted him. No longer did he warily follow up the game; the game boldly followed him. No joyous sound of horns cheered on the hunter: no shout, such as those which inspirit the fox and put fresh vigour into the hare-not even the short eager bark of the hounds, at the sound of which Reynard begins to think how many of his hundred turns are

ide to side, while his great silent paws rapid

the young fellow, "

ve Grisly two minutes more.

rly of the Danube, prisoner, taken red-handed in revolt, and therefore moriturus, performed with vigour, sympathy, and spirit the r?le of Act?on, ending, as we all know, in a splendid chase by bloodhounds; after which the poor Teuton, maddened by his long flight an

o minutes," sai

ny apparent effort, but just to show that he saw the dodge, and meant that it should not succeed, put on a spurt, and the distance between them lessened every moment. Fifty yards; forty yards. Ma

stood beside the younger man, giving the reins of both horses to one

ing him do

m down, y

track ran. Man saw nothing but the ground over which he flew; bear saw nothing but man before him. The doubling man?uvre was, however, the one thing needed to bring Grisly within easy reach. Faster flew the man, but it

ve it!" gro

ides, like a fat German over a trois-temps waltz, suddenly lifted his face, and roared. Then the man shrieked: then the bear stopped, and raised himself for a moment, pawi

shoulder. This time Grisly roars no more. He r

tretched hands; and when he came to a heap of shingle and sand-one of those left over from the old surface-mines-he fell headlong on the pile with a cry, and could not rise. The two wh

d Tommy, pulling out

s skin. John, we will have the beast skinned.

ying on his face

, "might as well sit up, you know, if you can't

and tried to take a compre

g pull. Then he got up, and somewhat ostentatious

e been of a rough tweed, or they might have been black cloth, because grease, many drenchings, the buffeting of years, and the holes into which they were worn, had long deprived them of their original colour and brilliancy. Above the trousers he wore a tattered flannel shirt, the right arm of which, nearly torn to pieces, revealed a tattooed limb, which was strong although thin; the bu

in fact, was a law unto himself. He had no coat; the rifle of Californian civilisation was missing; there was no sign of knife or revolver; and the only encumbrance, if that was any, to the li

ith both eyes. This was the effect o

ich, as stated above, looked ostentatious, but was really only nervous agitation. Then he rose, an

nce, ten years later, saw Balafré dead at his feet, he did kick the lifeless body, with a wretched joke. The king was a cur. My American was not. He stood over Bruin with a look in hi

in this doggoned country I've had one or t

he bear, and the English servant was g

than before-perhaps with more emphasis on the word "gentlemen" than was alto

Ladds, a man of few words, pointed to the young man, wh

ath took off his shaky thorn-beset f

he meant his right hand-"we shall be brothers. All that's mine shall be yours. I do not ask you, sir, to reciprocate. All that's mine, sir, when I get anything, shall be yours. At present,

aughed and shoo

st shot," he explaine

f the running. Glad you're not clawed-unpleasant to be c

Patrick's Camp. It was here that Patrick kept his store. In those old days-they're gone now-if a man wanted to buy a blanket, that article, sir, was put into one scale, and weighed down with gold-dust in th

left of

ew town, called Empire City, ought to be an hour or so up the track. I was trying to find my way there when I met with old Grisly. Perhaps if I

did the ch

orty nights, or near about. And you

Perhaps, for the present