They reached the cabin at last, and then a question which Grant was about to ask was answered. The old man lived alone.

The furniture was of the simplest: a bed, a couple of chairs, a table, and a few dishes.

“Is there no one to take care of you?” asked Grant.

“No, I need no one,” was the quick reply. “I have remedies that will soon quiet the pain.”

“I should think you would feel lonely.”

“I prefer solitude¹ to the society of mean, selfish, and designing men,” answered the old man bitterly.

“All men are not mean or selfish.”

“No doubt you are right, but those whom I trusted most have proved so.”

“How long have you lived here?”

212“Six years.”

“Are you—poor? If so, perhaps I can help you.”

“No, no; poverty is the smallest of my troubles. Look there!” and the old man drew from his pocket a handful of gold pieces. “I have enough to see me through the few years I have yet to live.”

“But you have no occupation—no way to fill up your time?”

“I have a few books and my own thoughts. I will tell you what little is to be told. I came here six years ago, and for a time devoted² myself to gold-digging. I was fortunate, and secured all I needed for my modest wants. Then I stopped, for I had no object in accumulating more. But you tell me about yourself. You are young to be in California.”

“Yes, I came to seek my fortune. I was a poor boy, and my mother is unhappily situated³. I came to see if I could not improve her lot and my own.”

“What are you doing?”

“I am digging for gold.”

“Where?”

213“At Howe’s Gulch⁴.”

“Have you succeeded?”

“So poorly that I am thinking of giving it up and going elsewhere. In Sacramento I worked in a restaurant, and made a good deal more money than I have made at the mines. I am twenty dollars poorer than when I came here.”

“Are you alone?”

“No, I have a friend with me—a young man whose acquaintance I made in crossing the plains.”

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