FOR THE CHILDREN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18577, 8 December 1923, Page 4 (Supplement)

FOR THE CHILDREN.

YOUNG PIONEERS.

BY EDITH HOWES.

All Bights Reserved.

CHAPTER XII.

The three" hurried up the bank of the stream. " This is the place," said Jo when she saw the big rock; and they all waded in. " The nugget was wedged in here," she said, stooping. They looked eagerly down, peered into every crevice, lifted, the loose stones Tying about*; not a gleam of yellow was to be seen. , „ " Help me to turn this rock over, said Mr.' Forsythe. Together they tugged at the rock under which the nugget had been wedged. At first it .resisted all their efforts, but when they pulled away the boulders that were jamming it on either side it began to loosen. "Stand clear!" ordered Mr. Forsythe, and he gave it a great heave that sent it rolling over on its back, immediately water and loosened earth, swirled into the cavity beneath it, hiding everything; but for an instant something yellow had shown itself. All three had seen it. " It's there." Jack shouted " Wait a minute. Let things settle. The water will clear itself." Mr. ForBvthe held them back, and they gazed breathlessly while the water grew transparent again and a thin* film of mud settled over the yellow floor of the cavity. Then Mr. -Forsvthe said suddenly: turn your backs. Don't look again till I tell von." ~, , ,• , , * Obediently they turned their backs, and he stooped "and gently scooped the mud out with his hand, then waited till the water was clear again. "Now look! he a They looked. The hole was floored with golden nuggets. None of them was quite so large as that one Jo had found, but there they were in hundreds, gleaming solid gold. "There lies a fortune said Mr. Forsythe, and his face was pale wi*'' excittr.cnt. They gathered handfuls of the gleaming heavy metal and carried them m tne bank, depositing them in Mr. Forsythe s boots, which he had taken off for wading. "Hooray!" and "Hooray!" and "Hooray! shouted" the»children, wild with joy. "If onlv,mother knew!" cried Jo. *If onlv ' we'could send her some of this at once!^ "Everything shall be made up to her. ! Said Mr. Forsvthe. " I have been thinking—" He "said no more, but his very quietness told the children how much this discovery meant.

The pocket of gold went deeply down. The boots were filled, and were far too heavy to carry. Now leaves were spread on the bank and the gold was heaped on them. All the nuggets, big and little, were water-smoothed. "Some reef in the high mountains must have been broken and brought down by the torrent in flood," said Mr. Forsythe. " The smashed-up rock would be carried down-stream, but the gold sank into this pocket on the way.'' At last the hole was emptied. Only a hollow basin of stone was left. "Perhaps there is gold under all the other rocks," said Jo. " There may be. Wc shall certainly look." returned her father. " But in the meantime we are neglecting our patient. He must be starving." But when they returned to the tent, with ;i.s much of the gold as they could j carry, the invalid seemed none the worse for the long waiting, and when they told him their wonderful news and showed him their find, the excitement and joy, seemed to do him good. " What a day!" he sighed happilv. " First help comes, and 'now this! What a day! And those kids of yours have done it all." " Why, yes, it's all the children's doing, when you come to think of it. I have ' been here for months, and have turned j many a rock over in the stream, but never 1 a speck of gold have I found, yet Jo (joes out to. get a drink and finds a fortune." Oh, father, I only found the first, nugget," ' ' ' ' ' \ " And that led to the fortune. Jim. of course you get your share. Why, old . man, if you hadn't kept me here till the youngsters came we should probably have lpft lliis "lace WitK>"f f.»d : r, Mm* .>—l^ But let's have a meal. We can't live ou gold, however precious it is. ' " I'm far too excited to eat," Jo jsserted. But when the meal was at last cooked she found that she was as ravenous as everyone else. They sat a little while, planning joyfully, then returned to their heap of gold. They cut a bag into squares of canvas, tied the gold in the squaresjwith flax, and so found themselves, able to carry it down to the tent. There it was hidden under a heap of rubble in a corner. ' " Say nothing about it when you go down for help," Mr. Forsythe warned the children. " We must tell nobody about it until 'we get it safely home and in the bank. There are a few wild characters roaming about the country who would think nothing of robbing us or evfen worse. If they knew we had found gold they would come up like flies to a honeypot." The children did not go down for help the next day. Instead, they ransacked j the stream with their father, turning over rocks, fossicking among the smaller stones, peering into every corner and cranny. Not another nugget, not even a speck of gold did they find. It seemed that all brought down had been washed into th#

one deep hole. How long it had lain there it was impossible to say. Perhaps for centuries. ■. On the following morning the children made their preparations and set off on the retsrn journey to Donald Scott s homestead. Down the ravine they went, down through the mountain 1 country, up past the printed rock and the garden of Alpine flowers, over the ridge and down into the winding'valley with its little lake set like a blue jewel in its midst, into the bush of the foothills, remembering to keep out of cattle-tracks, aria down on to the wide plain with its streams and swamps and flax and toi-toi. They travelled fast, for most of the journey was downhill. Besides, they were not watching for a notornis now; they had almost forgotten the notornis. They had found their father and they had found a fortune; naturally these two great discoveries filled their minds and coloured all their talk. " Mother shall go back to England now. She often cries for England," said Jo. " Then I suppose we'll all go back to England," said Jack. .'*l don't think I want to go. The bush, and all our adventures! Jo, do you want to leave them ? "No, no!" cried Jo quickly. Then, more slowly ; " We'll have to, Jack, we'll have to. Mother will never be happy till she goes." (To be continued.)