But Pierre Robideau--for such is the name of the young hunter--is not mad, and not yet ready to rush to the last terrible alternative. It is not hope that induces him to hold on--it is only the dread horror of death. His arm is stretched almost to dislocation of its joints--the sinews drawn tight as a bow-string, and still his fingers clutch firmly to the branch, lapped like iron round it. His cheeks are colourless; his jaws have dropped till the lips are agape, displaying his white teeth; his eyes protrude as if about to start forth from their sockets. And yet out of these wild eyes one more glance is given to the glade-- one more sweep among the trunks standing around it. What was seen in that last glaring look? Was it the form of a fair girl dimly outlined under the shadow of the trees? or was it only that same form conjured up by a fancy flickering on the edge of eternity? No matter now. It is too late. Even if Lena were there she would not be in time to save him. Nature, tortured to the last throe, can hold out no longer. She relaxes the grasp of Pierre Robideau's hand, and the next moment he is seen hanging under the branch, with the tightened noose around his neck, and his tongue protruding between his lips, livid with the dark mantling of death! STORY ONE, CHAPTER FIVE. TWO OLD CHUMS. "Bound for Kaliforny, air ye?" "Yes; that's the country for me." "If what you say's true, it oughter be the country for more'n you. Air ye sure 'beout it?" "Seems believing. Look at this." The man who gave utterance to the old saw pulled from his pocket a small packet done up in fawn skin, and untying the string, exhibited some glistening nodules of a yellowish colour. "True; seein' air believin', they do say, an' feelin' air second nater. Let's lay my claw on't." The packet was passed into his hands. "Hang me eft don't look like gold! an' it feel like it, too; an', durn me, ef't don't taste like it." This after he had put one of the nodules in his mouth, and rolled it over his tongue, as if testing it. "It _is_ gold," was the positive rejoinder. "An' ye tell me, Dick Tarleton, they find these sort o' nuts in Kaliforny lyin' right on the surface o' the groun'?" "Almost the same. They dig them out of the bed of a river, and then wash the mud off them. The thing's been just found out by a man named Captain Sutter while they were clearing out a mill-race. The fellow I got these from's come direct from there with his bullet-pouch chock full of them, besides several pounds weight of dust in a canvas bag. He was in New Orleans to get it changed into dollars; an' he did it, too, five thousand in all, picked up, he says, in a spell of three months' washing. He's going right back."