“I think we’d better risk it, lad, and swim back, or they’ll all be coming over here to see what’s the matter,” said the shivering Fraser presently. “Besides, we’ll get a cramp if we stay here any longer.” Casimiro was immensely relieved when his odd guests left their perch and struck out vigorously for the opposite bank. He followed them with strong strokes. The two were thankful to see only men about when they reached shoal water. They didn’t wait to investigate further but made a dash for their clothes, into which they scrambled and then began running violently up and down in the early sunshine in order to restore warmth to their chilled blood. Casimiro shook his head in still greater mystification. The exercise and a hearty meal quite neutralized the bad effects of the morning episode, and before the sun was two hours high, Brent, Fraser, and a party of natives sought the spot which nature had made her richest treasure-house. Five or ten minutes’ walk through the trees brought them to a bare, barren spot, scarcely more than four hundred yards in extent, apparently a mere waste of sand which had been much thrown and tossed about. “The gold lies there,” said Casimiro, indicating the center of the white field where the surface had been much disturbed. Brent was surprised and disappointed. He saw nothing but worthless heaps of sand in a spot whose only interest was the mighty works of nature which surrounded and shut it in. Fraser’s trained eye sparkled with anticipation. “I see it all,” exclaimed the Scotchman looking rapidly about him at the general topography of the situation. “This used to be the bed of the river. There were falls over that straight line of rock there at the boundary of the sand, and all this is the gathered accumulation of ages in a great hollow or cup just before the water poured over the barrier. Does the river flow through the gap in the mountain we saw yesterday?” he asked turning to the Patagonian. “Yes. We believe in the early days of our fathers it flowed here,” answered the chief. “Exactly,” went on the Scotchman. “That convulsion, whenever it took place, changed the whole course of the river and left this basin full of gold, brought down bit by bit for centuries from the hills behind us and many miles away. But what an ideal placer mine! Nothing to do but to sift the gold from the sand!” And they went toward the primitive workings.