them. Don't leave a foot's space unsearched.'

The troopers spent several hours in the quarries, moving every stone that
might hide the entrance to a small cave, and leaving no room for a
suspicion that Shine could be lying in concealment there. For a Dick,
who, in consideration of the seriousness of recent events with which he
had been directly concerned, enjoying a week's holiday, superintended the
hunt from the banks; but he wearied of the work at length, and crossed
the paddocks to join the men busy in the new shaft. Harry Hardy,
McKnight, Peterson, and Doon were sinking to cut the dyke discovered by
the Mount of Gold Quartz-mining Company. The mine had been christened the
Native Youth; Dick, as the holder of a third interest, felt himself to be
a person of some consequence about the claim, and discussed its prospects
with the elder miners like a person of vast experience and considerable
expert knowledge, using technical phrases liberally, and not forgetting
to drop a word of advice here and there. It might have been thought
presumptuous in the small boy, but was nothing of the kind in the
prospector and discoverer of the lode.

The big shareholder did not disdain even to assist in the work, and it
was a proud and happy youth, clay-smirched and wearing 'bo-yangs' below
his knees like a full-blown working miner, who marched through the bush
with the other owners of the Native Youth at crib-time. Being their own
bosses the men of the new mine went home to dinner, and dined at their
leisure like the aristocrats they expected to be.

Prouder still was Dick when he discovered brown haired, dark-eyed little
Kitty Grey loitering amongst the trees, regarding him with evident
admiration and awe. He felt at that moment that he needed only a black
pipe to make his triumph complete, and had a momentary resentment against