human
I was born among these fells; and I have helped to pack various kinds of mining truck over much rougher mountains.
gpt
Have you ever gone up as steep a place as this with a load?
human
If I remember rightly, the top of the Hause drops about three hundred feet, and we'll probably spend half an hour in reaching the valley. There was one western divide that it took us several days to cross, dragging a tent, camp gear and provisions in relays. Its foot was wrapped in tangled brush that tore most of our clothes to rags, and the last pitch was two thousand feet of rock where the snow lay waist-deep in the hollows.
gpt
Two thousand feet! That dwarfs our little drop to the Hause. What were you doing so far up in the ranges?
human
Looking for a copper mine.
gpt
And you found one?
human
No; not that time. As a rule, the mineral trail leads poor men to greater poverty, and sometimes to a grave; but once you have set your feet on it you follow it again. The thing becomes an obsession; you feel forced to go.
gpt
Even if you bring nothing back?
human
One always brings back something--frost-bite, bruises, a bag of specimens that assayers and mineral development men smile at. They're the palpable results, but in most cases you pick up an intangible something else.
gpt
And that is?
human
A thing beyond definition. A germ that lies in wait in the lonely places and breeds fantasies when it gets into your blood. Anyway, you can never quite get rid of it.
gpt
It conduces to unrest?
human
Yes. One feels that there's a rich claim waiting beyond the thick timber through which one can hardly scramble, across the icy rivers, or over the snow-line.
gpt
But you found one.
human
At last I found it easily. After ranging the wildest solitudes, we struck it in a sheltered valley near the warm west coast. Curious, isn't it?
gpt
But didn't that banish the unrest and leave you satisfied?
human
As I explained, it can't be banished. There's always a richer claim somewhere that you haven't found. Our prospectors dream of it as the Mother Lode, and some spend half their lives in search of it; it was called El Dorado three hundred years ago. After all, the idea's a deeper thing than a miner's fantasy: in one shape or another it's inherent in optimistic human nature. Are you sure the microbe hasn't bitten you and Mopsy?