“Round-hoofed, small-eared, broad-headed, clear-eyed, short-teethed, clean-legged, wide-chested, and good-proportioned,” he enumerated. “I’m primed for a horse-sale, if I ever need to go to one; but I’m all at sea about a mule.” Mundon had seemed to be singularly averse to offering to make the purchase, Ben reflected, although he had been given ample opportunity to do so, and he was so well qualified to select exactly the animal needed. He had appeared anxious to get Ben out of the way. Could it be possible that he meant to make the attempt to get the rope over the top of the chimney during his absence? How would he manage it? It seemed a colossal, impossible task. The car clanged its bell along Kearny Street, whizzed across Market and swung into Third Street, on its way to the Potrero. A wild idea occurred to Ben. “If there’s a mule in the inclosure that points his ears at me, I’ll buy him,” he decided. Association with his father had implanted superstition in the boy’s character. Ben had seen it sway his father many times, as indeed it exerted an influence more or less potent upon all miners. A recollection of the sum he had resolved to expend reminded Ben that the occult must be confined within the limits of fifteen dollars. “I don’t know the first thing about it, anyway, and I might as well be guided by chance as anything else,” he reflected. He was a trifle ashamed of this decision, and half hoped that the mules themselves would render its execution impossible, by all laying back or all pointing their ears in unison. When he entered the gate of the vacant lot where the sale was to be held, a rough-haired, forlorn-looking specimen of a mule raised two weather-beaten ears and disconsolately surveyed him. “That settles it,” said Ben to himself. “After all it’s something to have the matter decided for one.” The man in charge was anxious to show Ben the superior animals within the inclosure; but he manifested so little interest in them that their owner began to have doubts as to his being a _bona fide_ purchaser. “Like as not the rest will all go above my price,” thought Ben; “but I think I can get ‘Despair’--” for so he had designated the mule he had settled upon--“for fifteen.” It was a long wait, and Ben was anxious to return to the Works; but the owner seemed to be in no hurry to begin, and, evidently, was waiting for a larger audience. When a dozen or more men had arrived, the sale was opened. It was confusing, the way in which the auctioneer rattled on, discovering invisible buyers in corners and on the outskirts of the crowd. Ben wondered how he should be able to keep his head when his time should come; and he realized that this thought made his heart beat rapidly. He witnessed some close buying that was bewildering to the inexperienced, and he saw one man badly kicked by the glossiest, plumpest mule in the lot.