Presently, at the top, a low village comes in sight; yelping curs start from wayside cabins; coarse, dull-featured women gape at half-opened doors or sit idly on rude steps; and the men we chance to meet wear that cadaverous pallor inseparable from the mere idea of a miner.  We do not regret that the pert dogs have imparted speed to our horses’ heels;—­a swift, exhilarating gallop brings us in sight of a large, comfortable house, perched like a bird-box in the hills; then others are discerned; and in a few more bounds, we are at the gate.  Here, where all visitors to the Minnesota Mines are received and entertained, we prove avant-couriers of the slowly advancing wagon-load,—­“the largest party of ladies ever met there,” they tell us, as we forewarn our hosts of the band so boldly invading their copper-bound country.

Very soon we are rambling over the hills,—­those of Nature’s rearing, and others formed by the accumulation of refuse brought up from the mine.  We discover and secure some fine specimens of the metal; sundry of the knowing ones, after mysterious interviews with rascally-looking miners, appear with curious bits of pure silver ore mingled with crystals of quartz and tinted with tiny specks of copper.  These, being the most valuable curiosities of the region, are usually secreted by the miners for the purpose of private speculation.

We feel a reverence for this ground, so teeming with metallic wealth,—­and yet a certain timorousness, as we remember that we walk on a crust, that beneath us are great caves and subterranean galleries.

This outer shell, this surface-knowledge of what lies below, does not content me.  I have also a brave friend who shares my feeling.  We agree, that, despite the interest of this crust, to know of the fruit beneath and not taste it is worse than aggravating; we grow reckless in our thirst for the forbidden knowledge.

We have entertained a little plot in our headstrong minds all the way, which we have hardly dared to name before.  It is surely not feminine to look longingly on those ladders made for the descent of hardy miners only; visitors beneath the surface are rare; only gentlemen interested in seeing for themselves the richness of these vaunted mines have essayed the tour; even many of these failing to penetrate farther than the first level, and bravely owning their faint-heartedness.  In spite of this, we feel our way cautiously.  A descent is to be made this night, when the Captain of the Mine goes his nightly round of inspection; a gentleman, the head and front of our expedition, whom we shall call the “Colonel,” proposes to accompany him.

Why may we not form an harmonious quartette?  We have nerve; has it not been tested throughout the somewhat arduous journey of the preceding weeks?  We have presence of mind; we are passable gymnastes.

In fact, viewing Mon Amie and me from our own point of view, than ourselves never did there exist two mortals more manifestly fashioned straight from the hand of Nature, and educated by previous physical culture and mental discipline for the performance of a feat at once perilous and daring, one unknown to the members of “our set,” and which might have been thought impracticable by all who had known us only in the gas-light glare of Society, and the circumspection of crinoline’s confining circle.