Doherty agreed with every word; but as they resumed their journey, and Moseley fell a few paces behind, he reminded Denis of the nuggets which Bullocky had forced upon them at the inn. "I said we'd keep them for luck," replied Denis; "but, of course, I could only speak for myself; you must do what you like with yours." "I do what you do," said the boy. "And you both do well!" added Moseley, catching them up. "I'm all in favour of a fetish; that's what I never had on Bendigo. But nuggets--decoy nuggets--set a nugget to catch a nugget, eh? That's a fetish and a half! I suppose they're only little bits of things? Do you mind letting me see them?" When he did see them, he changed his tune. "Good heavens! But these must be over a pound between them, if not getting on for three figures in the other kind of pounds; do you mean to say you had these given you? I say, I'm not sure that my affection for a fetish would hold out against one of these." "Well, mine will," said Denis, smiling with set teeth. "I don't turn presents into money, Moseley, till the devil drives!" "But who on earth made you such presents as these?" "Oh, a rough diamond with a beard to his middle, and a voice like a bull, who did his best to stand on his head in a bucket of champagne." "By Jove! I believe it must have been old Bullocky himself." "It was. Do you know him?" "Know him? No one was ever yet on Bendigo without knowing old Bullocky; he's cock of the walk in Ironbark Gully, finds gold every time, by a sort of second sight, as some of these chaps find water. Why, the first time I ever saw him he was sitting picking nuggets out of a lump of earth like plums from a pudding!" And Moseley beguiled a mile or more with tales of the great gorilla; he had, indeed, a very passable gift of anecdote, and an easy, idle, fanciful wit which made up in rarer qualities what it lacked in brilliance and virility. He had not a foul or an unkind word in his vocabulary; and Denis had been too long at sea to undervalue either merit. Moseley was not only a gentleman, but a man of refinement and no little charm, whose companionship might well be prized by such another at that wild end of the earth. And yet Denis forgot to listen as one entertaining tale led light-heartedly to another, for it was only the humours of the life that Moseley seemed to have absorbed. "But I might as well save my breath," said Moseley, with more truth than he supposed. "It's bound to be the same on Ballarat, only more of it; the one thing I can promise you is plenty of compensation if the fetish doesn't do his duty." Denis smiled without replying. "I suppose you don't know what sort of soil it is at Ballarat?" he asked at length. "At Ballarat?" cried Moseley, greatly amused. "Why, my dear fellow, I couldn't tell you what sort it was at Bendigo!" "But you were digging there five months." "Digging, exactly; not studying the soil." "They seemed to you to find it anywhere, did they?"