and other refuse of the miners' camps; but every now and then I would
catch a glimpse of the hillside high overhead: and always those
lights were flashing there, though in varying numbers. Now, having a
clear view, I found to my dismay that they had shrunk to one. It was
like a story in the _Arabian Nights_. I swore, though, that I would
not be cheated of this last chance. The flashing object, whatever it
was, lay some two hundred yards above me on the slope; and I
approached cautiously, with my eyes fixed on it, much like a child
hunting grasshoppers in a hay-field. I was less than ten paces from
it when the light suddenly vanished, and five paces more knocked the
bottom out of the mystery. The object was a battered and empty
meat-can.

"I had passed a hundred such, at least, on my way. The camps had
lain pretty close to the track, and the rains descending upon their
refuse heaps had washed the labels off these cans, that now, as sun
and moon rose and passed over the mountain side, flashed moving
signals down to Eucalyptus in the valley--signals of failure and
desolation. And these had been the Bishop's pillar of fire in the
wilderness!"

'Was it weary, then,
In the wilderness?' . . .

"I turned and went down the track.

"At the Necropolis gate I found Captain Bill standing, with a heavy
and puzzled face, beside my horse.

"'I was stepping up to Cornice House; but found your nag here, and