SEAM OF GOLD, EXTRACTED FROM LARGE LODE LINE

Once you reach the hills, you’re one of few miners looking for treasure. Things are looking up.

Even though you spent the last of your money on a pickaxe and a crude map, you swell with confidence — at least it’s not shoulder-to-shoulder with prospectors, you reason.

A camp is springing up about 40 yards up the hill, laborers laying some type of scaffolding around the entrance to a large cave.

Axe on your shoulder, you climb past the camp, across a ridge line, and past a small spring.  You identify a small cavern and start picking away.

Your optimism is quickly validated.  After less than an hour of picking, you see a dull glint coming from a rock cleavage.  You discover a lode line in the cavern.

“El Dorado!” you whisper, and your pulse quickens.

A seam of gold as long as your leg, and almost as thick, is just below the surface. You quietly pick out the gold, place it all in a burlap sack, and head back into town.

The goldsmith gives you the good news — your find is worth nearly $2,300, which translates to more than a hundred thousand dollars today.

Your first day, and you’re already rich!

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