66 THE CARIBOO TRAIL

day pronounced this a gas well burning above
some subterranean coal seam.

At length the Overlanders were ascending
the banks of the M‘Leod, whose torrential
current warned them of rising ground. Three
times in one day windfall and swamp forced
the party to ford the stream for passage on the
opposite side. The oxen swam and the ox-
carts floated and the packs came up the bank
dripping. For eleven days in August every
soul of the company, including Mrs Shubert’s
babies, travelled wet to the skin. At night
great log fires were kindled and the Over-
landers sat round trying to dry themselves
out. Then the trail lifted to the foothills.
And on the evening of the 15th of August
there pierced through the clouds the snowy,
shining, serrated peaks of the Rockies.

A cheer broke from the ragged band. Just
beyond the shining mountains lay—Fortune.
What cared these argonauts, who had tramped
across the width of the continent, that the
lofty mountains raised a sheer wall between
them and their treasure? Cheer on cheer
rang from the encampment. Men with clothes
in tatters pitched caps in air, proud that they
had proved themselves kings of their own fate.
It is, perhaps, well that we have to climb our