summaryrefslogtreecommitdiff
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      Roughing It, Complete
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    <h2>
      ROUGHING IT, COMPLETE, By Mark Twain
    </h2>
<pre xml:space="preserve">

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Roughing It, by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

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with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net


Title: Roughing It

Author: Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

Release Date: August 18, 2006 [EBook #3177]
Last Updated: October 18, 2012

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROUGHING IT ***




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</pre>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="boxnote">
      <i> <a
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      <img alt="cover.jpg (90K)" src="images/cover.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
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      <br /><br /><br /><br />
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      <img alt="spine.jpg (54K)" src="images/spine.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </p>
    <h1>
      ROUGHING IT
    </h1>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      By Mark Twain
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="frontispiece1.jpg (168K)" src="images/frontispiece1.jpg"
      width="100%" /><br />
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    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br /> <a name="linkfrontispiece2" id="linkfrontispiece2"></a>
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="frontispiece2.jpg (184K)" src="images/frontispiece2.jpg"
      width="100%" /><br />
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    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
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    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="titlepage.jpg (95K)" src="images/titlepage.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="dedication.jpg (18K)" src="images/dedication.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      PREFATORY.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      This book is merely a personal narrative, and not a pretentious history or
      a philosophical dissertation. It is a record of several years of
      variegated vagabondizing, and its object is rather to help the resting
      reader while away an idle hour than afflict him with metaphysics, or goad
      him with science. Still, there is information in the volume; information
      concerning an interesting episode in the history of the Far West, about
      which no books have been written by persons who were on the ground in
      person, and saw the happenings of the time with their own eyes. I allude
      to the rise, growth and culmination of the silver-mining fever in Nevada&mdash;a
      curious episode, in some respects; the only one, of its peculiar kind,
      that has occurred in the land; and the only one, indeed, that is likely to
      occur in it.
    </p>
    <p>
      Yes, take it all around, there is quite a good deal of information in the
      book. I regret this very much; but really it could not be helped:
      information appears to stew out of me naturally, like the precious ottar
      of roses out of the otter. Sometimes it has seemed to me that I would give
      worlds if I could retain my facts; but it cannot be. The more I calk up
      the sources, and the tighter I get, the more I leak wisdom. Therefore, I
      can only claim indulgence at the hands of the reader, not justification.
    </p>
    <p>
      THE AUTHOR.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CONTENTS.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br /> <a href="#linkch01">CHAPTER I.</a> My Brother appointed Secretary of
      Nevada&mdash;I Envy His Prospective Adventures&mdash;Am Appointed Private
      Secretary Under Him&mdash;My Contentment Complete&mdash;Packed in One Hour&mdash;Dreams
      and Visions&mdash;On the Missouri River&mdash;A Bully Boat<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch02">CHAPTER II.</a> Arrive at St. Joseph&mdash;Only
      Twenty-five Pounds Baggage Allowed&mdash;Farewell to Kid Gloves and Dress
      Coats&mdash;Armed to the Teeth&mdash;The "Allen"&mdash;A Cheerful Weapon&mdash;Persuaded
      to Buy a Mule&mdash;Schedule of Luxuries&mdash;We Leave the "States"&mdash;"Our
      Coach"&mdash;Mails for the Indians&mdash;Between a Wink and an Earthquake&mdash;A
      Modern Sphynx and How She Entertained Us&mdash;A Sociable Heifer<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch03">CHAPTER III.</a> "The Thoroughbrace is Broke"&mdash;Mails
      Delivered Properly&mdash;Sleeping Under Difficulties&mdash;A Jackass
      Rabbit Meditating, and on Business&mdash;A Modern Gulliver&mdash;Sage-brush&mdash;Overcoats
      as an Article of Diet&mdash;Sad Fate of a Camel&mdash;Warning to
      Experimenters<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch04">CHAPTER IV.</a> Making Our Bed&mdash;Assaults
      by the Unabridged&mdash;At a Station&mdash;Our Driver a Great and Shining
      Dignitary&mdash;Strange Place for a Frontyard&mdash;Accommodations&mdash;Double
      Portraits&mdash;An Heirloom&mdash;Our Worthy Landlord&mdash;"Fixings and
      Things"&mdash;An Exile&mdash;Slumgullion&mdash;A Well Furnished Table&mdash;The
      Landlord Astonished&mdash;Table Etiquette&mdash;Wild Mexican Mules&mdash;Stage-coaching
      and Railroading<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch05">CHAPTER V.</a> New
      Acquaintances&mdash;The Cayote&mdash;A Dog's Experiences&mdash;A Disgusted
      Dog&mdash;The Relatives of the Cayote&mdash;Meals Taken Away from Home<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch06">CHAPTER VI.</a> The Division Superintendent&mdash;The
      Conductor&mdash;The Driver&mdash;One Hundred and Fifty Miles' Drive
      Without Sleep&mdash;Teaching a Subordinate&mdash;Our Old Friend Jack and a
      Pilgrim&mdash;Ben Holliday Compared to Moses<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch07">CHAPTER
      VII.</a> Overland City&mdash;Crossing the Platte&mdash;Bemis's Buffalo
      Hunt&mdash;Assault by a Buffalo&mdash;Bemis's Horse Goes Crazy&mdash;An
      Impromptu Circus&mdash;A New Departure&mdash;Bemis Finds Refuge in a Tree&mdash;Escapes
      Finally by a Wonderful Method<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch08">CHAPTER VIII.</a>
      The Pony Express&mdash;Fifty Miles Without Stopping&mdash;"Here he Comes"&mdash;Alkali
      Water&mdash;Riding an Avalanche&mdash;Indian Massacre<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch09">CHAPTER IX.</a> Among the Indians&mdash;An Unfair
      Advantage&mdash;Laying on our Arms&mdash;A Midnight Murder&mdash;Wrath of
      Outlaws&mdash;A Dangerous, yet Valuable Citizen<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch10">CHAPTER X.</a> History of Slade&mdash;A Proposed
      Fist-fight&mdash;Encounter with Jules&mdash;Paradise of Outlaws&mdash;Slade
      as Superintendent&mdash;As Executioner&mdash;A Doomed Whisky Seller&mdash;A
      Prisoner&mdash;A Wife's Bravery&mdash;An Ancient Enemy Captured&mdash;Enjoying
      a Luxury&mdash;Hob-nobbing with Slade&mdash;Too Polite&mdash;A Happy
      Escape<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch11">CHAPTER XI</a>. Slade in Montana&mdash;"On
      a Spree"&mdash;In Court&mdash;Attack on a Judge&mdash;Arrest by the
      Vigilantes&mdash;Turn out of the Miners&mdash;Execution of Slade&mdash;Lamentations
      of His Wife&mdash;Was Slade a Coward?<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch12">CHAPTER
      XII.</a> A Mormon Emigrant Train&mdash;The Heart of the Rocky Mountains&mdash;Pure
      Saleratus&mdash;A Natural Ice-House&mdash;An Entire Inhabitant&mdash;In
      Sight of "Eternal Snow"&mdash;The South Pass&mdash;The Parting Streams&mdash;An
      Unreliable Letter Carrier&mdash;Meeting of Old Friends&mdash;A Spoiled
      Watermelon&mdash;Down the Mountain- -A Scene of Desolation&mdash;Lost in
      the Dark&mdash;Unnecessary Advice&mdash;U.S. Troops and Indians&mdash;Sublime
      Spectacle&mdash;Another Delusion Dispelled&mdash;Among the Angels<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch13">CHAPTER XIII.</a> Mormons and Gentiles&mdash;Exhilarating
      Drink, and its Effect on Bemis&mdash;Salt Lake City&mdash;A Great Contrast&mdash;A
      Mormon Vagrant&mdash;Talk with a Saint&mdash;A Visit to the "King"&mdash;A
      Happy Simile<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch14">CHAPTER XIV.</a> Mormon
      Contractors&mdash;How Mr. Street Astonished Them&mdash;The Case Before
      Brigham Young, and How he Disposed of it&mdash;Polygamy Viewed from a New
      Position<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch15">CHAPTER XV.</a> A Gentile Den&mdash;Polygamy
      Discussed&mdash;Favorite Wife and D. 4&mdash;Hennery for Retired Wives&mdash;Children
      Need Marking&mdash;Cost of a Gift to No. 6&mdash;A Penny- whistle Gift and
      its Effects&mdash;Fathering the Foundlings&mdash;It Resembled Him&mdash;The
      Family Bedstead<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch16">CHAPTER XVI.</a> The Mormon
      Bible&mdash;Proofs of its Divinity&mdash;Plagiarism of its Authors&mdash;Story
      of Nephi&mdash;Wonderful Battle&mdash;Kilkenny Cats Outdone<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch17">CHAPTER XVII.</a> Three Sides to all Questions&mdash;Everything
      "A Quarter"&mdash;Shriveled Up&mdash;Emigrants and White Shirts at a
      Discount&mdash;"Forty-Niners"&mdash;Above Par&mdash;Real Happiness<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch18">CHAPTER XVIII.</a> Alkali Desert&mdash;Romance of
      Crossing Dispelled&mdash;Alkali Dust&mdash;Effect on the Mules&mdash;Universal
      Thanksgiving<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch19">CHAPTER XIX.</a> The Digger
      Indians Compared with the Bushmen of Africa&mdash;Food, Life and
      Characteristics&mdash;Cowardly Attack on a Stage Coach&mdash;A Brave
      Driver&mdash;The Noble Red Man<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch20">CHAPTER XX.</a>
      The Great American Desert&mdash;Forty Miles on Bones&mdash;Lakes Without
      Outlets&mdash;Greely's Remarkable Ride&mdash;Hank Monk, the Renowned
      Driver&mdash;Fatal Effects of "Corking" a Story&mdash;Bald-Headed Anecdote<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch21">CHAPTER XXI.</a> Alkali Dust&mdash;Desolation and
      Contemplation&mdash;Carson City&mdash;Our Journey Ended&mdash;We are
      Introduced to Several Citizens&mdash;A Strange Rebuke&mdash;A Washoe
      Zephyr at Play&mdash;Its Office Hours&mdash;Governor's Palace&mdash;Government
      Offices&mdash;Our French Landlady Bridget O'Flannigan&mdash;Shadow Secrets&mdash;Cause
      for a Disturbance at Once&mdash;The Irish Brigade&mdash;Mrs. O'Flannigan's
      Boarders&mdash;The Surveying Expedition&mdash;Escape of the Tarantulas<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch22">CHAPTER XXII.</a> The Son of a Nabob&mdash;Start for
      Lake Tahoe&mdash;Splendor of the Views&mdash;Trip on the Lake&mdash;Camping
      Out&mdash;Reinvigorating Climate&mdash;Clearing a Tract of Land&mdash;Securing
      a Title&mdash;Outhouse and Fences<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch23">CHAPTER
      XXIII.</a> A Happy Life&mdash;Lake Tahoe and its Moods&mdash;Transparency
      of the Waters&mdash;A Catastrophe&mdash;Fire! Fire!&mdash;A Magnificent
      Spectacle&mdash;Homeless Again&mdash;We take to the Lake&mdash;A Storm&mdash;Return
      to Carson<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch24">CHAPTER XXIV.</a> Resolve to Buy a
      Horse&mdash;Horsemanship in Carson&mdash;A Temptation&mdash;Advice Given
      Me Freely&mdash;I Buy the Mexican Plug&mdash;My First Ride&mdash;A Good
      Bucker&mdash;I Loan the Plug&mdash;Experience of Borrowers&mdash;Attempts
      to Sell&mdash;Expense of the Experiment&mdash;A Stranger Taken In<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch25">CHAPTER XXV.</a> The Mormons in Nevada&mdash;How to
      Persuade a Loan from Them&mdash;Early History of the Territory&mdash;Silver
      Mines Discovered&mdash;The New Territorial Government&mdash;A Foreign One
      and a Poor One&mdash;Its Funny Struggles for Existence&mdash;No Credit, no
      Cash&mdash;Old Abe Currey Sustains it and its Officers&mdash;Instructions
      and Vouchers&mdash;An Indian's Endorsement&mdash;Toll-Gates<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch26">CHAPTER XXVI.</a> The Silver Fever&mdash;State of the
      Market&mdash;Silver Bricks&mdash;Tales Told&mdash;Off for the Humboldt
      Mines<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch27">CHAPTER XXVII.</a> Our manner of going&mdash;Incidents
      of the Trip&mdash;A Warm but Too Familiar a Bedfellow&mdash;Mr. Ballou
      Objects&mdash;Sunshine amid Clouds&mdash;Safely Arrived<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch28">CHAPTER XXVIII.</a> Arrive at the Mountains&mdash;Building
      Our Cabin&mdash;My First Prospecting Tour&mdash;My First Gold Mine&mdash;Pockets
      Filled With Treasures&mdash;Filtering the News to My Companions&mdash;The
      Bubble Pricked&mdash;All Not Gold That Glitters<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch29">CHAPTER XXIX.</a> Out Prospecting&mdash;A Silver Mine At
      Last&mdash;Making a Fortune With Sledge and Drill&mdash;A Hard Road to
      Travel&mdash;We Own in Claims&mdash;A Rocky Country<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch30">CHAPTER XXX.</a> Disinterested Friends&mdash;How "Feet"
      Were Sold&mdash;We Quit Tunnelling&mdash;A Trip to Esmeralda&mdash;My
      Companions&mdash;An Indian Prophesy&mdash;A Flood&mdash;Our Quarters
      During It<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch31">CHAPTER XXXI.</a> The Guests at
      "Honey Lake Smith's"&mdash;"Bully Old Arkansas"&mdash;"Our Landlord"-
      -Determined to Fight&mdash;The Landlord's Wife&mdash;The Bully Conquered
      by Her&mdash;Another Start&mdash;Crossing the Carson&mdash;A Narrow Escape&mdash;Following
      Our Own Track&mdash;A New Guide&mdash;Lost in the Snow<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch32">CHAPTER XXXII.</a> Desperate Situation&mdash;Attempts to
      Make a Fire&mdash;Our Horses leave us&mdash;We Find Matches&mdash;One,
      Two, Three and the Last&mdash;No Fire&mdash;Death Seems Inevitable&mdash;We
      Mourn Over Our Evil Lives&mdash;Discarded Vices&mdash;We Forgive Each
      Other&mdash;An Affectionate Farewell&mdash;The Sleep of Oblivion<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch33">CHAPTER XXXIII.</a> Return of Consciousness&mdash;Ridiculous
      Developments&mdash;A Station House&mdash;Bitter Feelings&mdash;Fruits of
      Repentance&mdash;Resurrected Vices<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch34">CHAPTER
      XXXIV.</a> About Carson&mdash;General Buncombe&mdash;Hyde vs. Morgan&mdash;How
      Hyde Lost His Ranch- -The Great Landslide Case&mdash;The Trial&mdash;General
      Buncombe in Court&mdash;A Wonderful Decision&mdash;A Serious Afterthought<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch35">CHAPTER XXXV.</a> A New Travelling Companion&mdash;All
      Full and No Accommodations&mdash;How Captain Nye found Room&mdash;and
      Caused Our Leaving to be Lamented&mdash;The Uses of Tunnelling&mdash;A
      Notable Example&mdash;We Go into the "Claim" Business and Fail&mdash;At
      the Bottom<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch36">CHAPTER XXXVI.</a> A Quartz Mill&mdash;Amalgamation&mdash;"Screening
      Tailings"&mdash;First Quartz Mill in Nevada&mdash;Fire Assay&mdash;A Smart
      Assayer&mdash;I stake for an advance<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch37">CHAPTER
      XXXVII.</a> The Whiteman Cement Mine&mdash;Story of its Discovery&mdash;A
      Secret Expedition&mdash;A Nocturnal Adventure&mdash;A Distressing Position&mdash;A
      Failure and a Week's Holiday<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch38">CHAPTER
      XXXVIII.</a> Mono Lake&mdash;Shampooing Made Easy&mdash;Thoughtless Act of
      Our Dog and the Results&mdash;Lye Water&mdash;Curiosities of the Lake&mdash;Free
      Hotel&mdash;Some Funny Incidents a Little Overdrawn<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch39">CHAPTER XXXIX.</a> Visit to the Islands in Lake Mono&mdash;Ashes
      and Desolation&mdash;Life Amid Death Our Boat Adrift&mdash;A Jump For Life&mdash;A
      Storm On the Lake&mdash;A Mass of Soap Suds&mdash;Geological Curiosities&mdash;A
      Week On the Sierras&mdash;A Narrow Escape From a Funny Explosion&mdash;"Stove
      Heap Gone"<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch40">CHAPTER XL.</a> The "Wide West"
      Mine&mdash;It is "Interviewed" by Higbie&mdash;A Blind Lead&mdash;Worth a
      Million&mdash;We are Rich At Last&mdash;Plans for the Future<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch41">CHAPTER XLI.</a> A Rheumatic Patient&mdash;Day Dreams&mdash;An
      Unfortunate Stumble&mdash;I Leave Suddenly&mdash;Another Patient&mdash;Higbie
      in the Cabin&mdash;Our Balloon Bursted&mdash;Worth Nothing&mdash;Regrets
      and Explanations&mdash;Our Third Partner<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch42">CHAPTER
      XLII.</a> What to do Next?&mdash;Obstacles I Had Met With&mdash;"Jack of
      All Trades"&mdash;Mining Again&mdash;Target Shooting&mdash;I Turn City
      Editor&mdash;I Succeed Finely<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch43">CHAPTER XLIII.</a>
      My Friend Boggs&mdash;The School Report&mdash;Boggs Pays Me An Old Debt&mdash;Virginia
      City<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch44">CHAPTER XLIV.</a> Flush Times&mdash;Plenty
      of Stock&mdash;Editorial Puffing&mdash;Stocks Given Me&mdash;Salting Mines&mdash;A
      Tragedian In a New Role<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch45">CHAPTER XLV.</a>
      Flush Times Continue&mdash;Sanitary Commission Fund&mdash;Wild Enthusiasm
      of the People&mdash;Would not wait to Contribute&mdash;The Sanitary Flour
      Sack&mdash;It is Carried to Gold Hill and Dayton&mdash;Final Reception in
      Virginia&mdash;Results of the Sale&mdash;A Grand Total<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch46">CHAPTER XLVI.</a> The Nabobs of Those Days&mdash;John
      Smith as a Traveler&mdash;Sudden Wealth&mdash;A Sixty-Thousand-Dollar
      Horse&mdash;A Smart Telegraph Operator&mdash;A Nabob in New York City&mdash;Charters
      an Omnibus&mdash;"Walk in, It's All Free"&mdash;"You Can't Pay a Cent"&mdash;"Hold
      On, Driver, I Weaken"&mdash;Sociability of New Yorkers<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch47">CHAPTER XLVII.</a> Buck Fanshaw's Death&mdash;The Cause
      Thereof&mdash;Preparations for His Burial&mdash;Scotty Briggs the
      Committee Man&mdash;He Visits the Minister&mdash;Scotty Can't Play His
      Hand&mdash;The Minister Gets Mixed&mdash;Both Begin to See&mdash;"All Down
      Again But Nine"&mdash;Buck Fanshaw as a Citizen&mdash;How To "Shook Your
      Mother"&mdash;The Funeral&mdash;Scotty Briggs as a Sunday School Teacher<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch48">CHAPTER XLVIII.</a> The First Twenty-Six Graves in
      Nevada&mdash;The Prominent Men of the County&mdash;The Man Who Had Killed
      His Dozen&mdash;Trial by Jury&mdash;Specimen Jurors&mdash;A Private Grave
      Yard&mdash;The Desperadoes&mdash;Who They Killed&mdash;Waking up the Weary
      Passenger&mdash;Satisfaction Without Fighting<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch49">CHAPTER
      XLIX.</a> Fatal Shooting Affray&mdash;Robbery and Desperate Affray&mdash;A
      Specimen City Official&mdash;A Marked Man&mdash;A Street Fight&mdash;Punishment
      of Crime<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch50">CHAPTER L.</a> Captain Ned Blakely&mdash;Bill
      Nookes Receives Desired Information&mdash;Killing of Blakely's Mate&mdash;A
      Walking Battery&mdash;Blakely Secures Nookes&mdash;Hang First and Be Tried
      Afterwards&mdash;Captain Blakely as a Chaplain&mdash;The First Chapter of
      Genesis Read at a Hanging&mdash;Nookes Hung&mdash;Blakely's Regrets<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch51">CHAPTER LI.</a> The Weekly Occidental&mdash;A Ready
      Editor&mdash;A Novel&mdash;A Concentration of Talent&mdash;The Heroes and
      the Heroines&mdash;The Dissolute Author Engaged&mdash;Extraordinary Havoc
      With the Novel&mdash;A Highly Romantic Chapter&mdash;The Lovers Separated&mdash;Jonah
      Out-done&mdash;A Lost Poem&mdash;The Aged Pilot Man&mdash;Storm On the
      Erie Canal&mdash;Dollinger the Pilot Man&mdash;Terrific Gale&mdash;Danger
      Increases&mdash;A Crisis Arrived&mdash;Saved as if by a Miracle<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch52">CHAPTER LII.</a> Freights to California&mdash;Silver
      Bricks&mdash;Under Ground Mines&mdash;Timber Supports&mdash;A Visit to the
      Mines&mdash;The Caved Mines&mdash;Total of Shipments in 1863<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch53">CHAPTER LIII.</a> Jim Blaine and his Grandfather's Ram&mdash;Filkin's
      Mistake&mdash;Old Miss Wagner and her Glass Eye&mdash;Jacobs, the Coffin
      Dealer&mdash;Waiting for a Customer&mdash;His Bargain With Old Robbins&mdash;Robbins
      Sues for Damage and Collects&mdash;A New Use for Missionaries&mdash;The
      Effect&mdash;His Uncle Lem and the Use Providence Made of Him&mdash;Sad
      Fate of Wheeler&mdash;Devotion of His Wife&mdash;A Model Monument&mdash;What
      About the Ram?<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch54">CHAPTER LIV.</a> Chinese in
      Virginia City&mdash;Washing Bills&mdash;Habit of Imitation&mdash;Chinese
      Immigration&mdash;A Visit to Chinatown&mdash;Messrs. Ah Sing, Hong Wo, See
      Yup, &amp;c<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch55">CHAPTER LV.</a> Tired of
      Virginia City&mdash;An Old Schoolmate&mdash;A Two Years' Loan&mdash;Acting
      as an Editor&mdash;Almost Receive an Offer&mdash;An Accident&mdash;Three
      Drunken Anecdotes&mdash;Last Look at Mt. Davidson&mdash;A Beautiful
      Incident<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch56">CHAPTER LVI.</a> Off for San
      Francisco&mdash;Western and Eastern Landscapes&mdash;The Hottest place on
      Earth&mdash;Summer and Winter<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch57">CHAPTER LVII.</a>
      California&mdash;Novelty of Seeing a Woman&mdash;"Well if it ain't a
      Child!"&mdash;One Hundred and Fifty Dollars for a Kiss&mdash;Waiting for a
      turn<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch58">CHAPTER LVIII.</a> Life in San
      Francisco&mdash;Worthless Stocks&mdash;My First Earthquake&mdash;Reportorial
      Instincts&mdash;Effects of the Shocks&mdash;Incidents and Curiosities&mdash;Sabbath
      Breakers&mdash;The Lodger and the Chambermaid&mdash;A Sensible Fashion to
      Follow&mdash;Effects of the Earthquake on the Ministers<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch59">CHAPTER LIX.</a> Poor Again&mdash;Slinking as a Business&mdash;A
      Model Collector&mdash;Misery loves Company&mdash;Comparing Notes for
      Comfort&mdash;A Streak of Luck&mdash;Finding a Dime&mdash;Wealthy by
      Comparison&mdash;Two Sumptuous Dinners<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch60">CHAPTER
      LX.</a> An Old Friend&mdash;An Educated Miner&mdash;Pocket Mining&mdash;Freaks
      of Fortune<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch61">CHAPTER LXI.</a> Dick Baker and
      his Cat&mdash;Tom Quartz's Peculiarities&mdash;On an Excursion&mdash;Appearance
      On His Return&mdash;A Prejudiced Cat&mdash;Empty Pockets and a Roving Life<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch62">CHAPTER LXII.</a> Bound for the Sandwich Islands&mdash;The
      Three Captains&mdash;The Old Admiral&mdash;His Daily Habits&mdash;His Well
      Fought Fields&mdash;An Unexpected Opponent&mdash;The Admiral Overpowered&mdash;The
      Victor Declared a Hero<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch63">CHAPTER LXIII.</a>
      Arrival at the Islands&mdash;Honolulu&mdash;What I Saw There&mdash;Dress
      and Habits of the Inhabitants&mdash;The Animal Kingdom&mdash;Fruits and
      Delightful Effects<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch64">CHAPTER LXIV.</a> An
      Excursion&mdash;Captain Phillips and his Turn-Out&mdash;A Horseback Ride&mdash;A
      Vicious Animal&mdash;Nature and Art&mdash;Interesting Ruins&mdash;All
      Praise to the Missionaries<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch65">CHAPTER LXV.</a>
      Interesting Mementoes and Relics&mdash;An Old Legend of a Frightful Leap&mdash;An
      Appreciative Horse&mdash;Horse Jockeys and Their Brothers&mdash;A New
      Trick&mdash;A Hay Merchant&mdash;Good Country for Horse Lovers<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch66">CHAPTER LXVI.</a> A Saturday Afternoon&mdash;Sandwich
      Island Girls on a Frolic&mdash;The Poi Merchant&mdash;Grand Gala Day&mdash;A
      Native Dance&mdash;Church Membership&mdash;Cats and Officials&mdash;An
      Overwhelming Discovery<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch67">CHAPTER LXVII.</a>
      The Legislature of the Island&mdash;What Its President Has Seen&mdash;Praying
      for an Enemy&mdash;Women's Rights&mdash;Romantic Fashions&mdash;Worship of
      the Shark&mdash;Desire for Dress&mdash;Full Dress&mdash;Not Paris Style&mdash;Playing
      Empire&mdash;Officials and Foreign Ambassadors&mdash;Overwhelming
      Magnificence<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch68">CHAPTER LXVIII.</a> A Royal
      Funeral&mdash;Order of Procession&mdash;Pomp and Ceremony&mdash;A Striking
      Contrast&mdash;A Sick Monarch&mdash;Human Sacrifices at His Death&mdash;Burial
      Orgies<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch69">CHAPTER LXIX.</a> "Once more upon the
      Waters."&mdash;A Noisy Passenger&mdash;Several Silent Ones&mdash;A
      Moonlight Scene&mdash;Fruits and Plantations<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch70">CHAPTER
      LXX.</a> A Droll Character&mdash;Mrs. Beazely and Her Son&mdash;Meditations
      on Turnips&mdash;A Letter from Horace Greeley&mdash;An Indignant Rejoinder&mdash;The
      Letter Translated but too Late<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch71">CHAPTER LXXI.</a>
      Kealakekua Bay&mdash;Death of Captain Cook&mdash;His Monument&mdash;Its
      Construction&mdash;On Board the Schooner<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch72">CHAPTER
      LXXII.</a> Young Kanakas in New England&mdash;A Temple Built by Ghosts&mdash;Female
      Bathers&mdash;I Stood Guard&mdash;Women and Whiskey&mdash;A Fight for
      Religion&mdash;Arrival of Missionaries<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch73">CHAPTER
      LXXIII.</a> Native Canoes&mdash;Surf Bathing&mdash;A Sanctuary&mdash;How
      Built&mdash;The Queen's Rock&mdash;Curiosities&mdash;Petrified Lava<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch74">CHAPTER LXXIV.</a> Visit to the Volcano&mdash;The
      Crater&mdash;Pillar of Fire&mdash;Magnificent Spectacle&mdash;A Lake of
      Fire<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch75">CHAPTER LXXV.</a> The North Lake&mdash;Fountains
      of Fire&mdash;Streams of Burning Lava&mdash;Tidal Waves<br /><br /> <a
      href="#linkch76">CHAPTER LXXVI.</a> A Reminiscence&mdash;Another Horse
      Story&mdash;My Ride with the Retired Milk Horse- -A Picnicing Excursion&mdash;Dead
      Volcano of Holeakala&mdash;Comparison with Vesuvius&mdash;An Inside View<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch77">CHAPTER LXXVII.</a> A Curious Character&mdash;A Series
      of Stories&mdash;Sad Fate of a Liar&mdash;Evidence of Insanity<br /><br />
      <a href="#linkch78">CHAPTER LXXVIII.</a> Return to San Francisco&mdash;Ship
      Amusements&mdash;Preparing for Lecturing&mdash;Valuable Assistance Secured&mdash;My
      First Attempt&mdash;The Audience Carried&mdash;"All's Well that Ends
      Well."<br /><br /> <a href="#linkch79">CHAPTER LXXIX.</a> Highwaymen&mdash;A
      Predicament&mdash;A Huge Joke&mdash;Farewell to California&mdash;At Home
      Again&mdash;Great Changes. Moral.<br /><br /> <a href="#linkAPPENDIX">APPENDIX.
      A.</a>&mdash;Brief Sketch of Mormon History B.&mdash;The Mountain Meadows
      Massacre C.&mdash;Concerning a Frightful Assassination that was never
      Consummated<br /><br /> <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br /> 1. <a href="#linkfrontispiece2">THE MINERS' DREAM</a><br /><br /> 2.
      <a href="#link020">ENVIOUS CONTEMPLATIONS</a><br /><br /> 3. <a
      href="#link021">INNOCENT DREAMS</a><br /><br /> 4. <a href="#link023a">LIGHT
      TRAVELING ORDER</a><br /><br /> 5. <a href="#link023b">THE "ALLEN"</a><br /><br />
      6. <a href="#link024">INDUCEMENTS TO PURCHASE</a><br /><br /> 7. <a
      href="#link025">THE FACETIOUS DRIVER</a><br /><br /> 8. <a href="#link026">PLEASING
      NEWS</a><br /><br /> 9. <a href="#link027">THE SPHYNX</a><br /><br /> 10. <a
      href="#link032">MEDITATION</a><br /><br /> 11. <a href="#link033a">ON
      BUSINESS</a><br /><br /> 12. <a href="#link033b">AUTHOR AS GULLIVER</a><br /><br />
      13. <a href="#link035">A TOUCH STATEMENT</a><br /><br /> 14. <a
      href="#link038">THIRD TRIP OF THE UNABRIDGED</a><br /><br /> 15. <a
      href="#link041">A POWERFUL GLASS</a><br /><br /> 16. <a href="#link042a">AN
      HEIRLOOM</a><br /><br /> 17. <a href="#link042b">OUR LANDLORD</a><br /><br />
      18. <a href="#link043">DIGNIFIED EXILE</a><br /><br /> 19. <a href="#link044">DRINKING
      SLUMGULLION</a><br /><br /> 20. <a href="#link045">A JOKE WITHOUT CREAM</a><br /><br />
      21. <a href="#link047">PULLMAN CAR DINING-SALOON</a><br /><br /> 22. <a
      href="#link049">OUR MORNING RIDE</a><br /><br /> 23. <a href="#link050">PRAIRIE
      DOGS</a><br /><br /> 24. <a href="#link051">A CAYOTE</a><br /><br /> 25. <a
      href="#link052">SHOWING RESPECT TO RELATIVES</a><br /><br /> 26. <a
      href="#link055">THE CONDUCTOR</a><br /><br /> 27. <a href="#link057">TEACHING
      A SUBORDINATE</a><br /><br /> 28. <a href="#link058">JACK AND THE ELDERLY
      PILGRIM</a><br /><br /> 29. <a href="#link061">CROSSING THE PLATTE</a><br /><br />
      30. <a href="#link062">I BEGAN TO PRAY</a><br /><br /> 31. <a href="#link063">A
      NEW DEPARTURE</a><br /><br /> 32. <a href="#link065">SUSPENDED OPERATIONS</a><br /><br />
      33. <a href="#link068">A WONDERFUL LIE</a><br /><br /> 34. <a href="#link069">TALL
      PIECE</a><br /><br /> 35. <a href="#link071">HERE HE COMES</a><br /><br /> 36.
      <a href="#link072">CHANGING HORSES</a><br /><br /> 37. <a href="#link073">RIDING
      THE AVALANCHE</a><br /><br /> 38. <a href="#link076">INDIAN COUNTRY</a><br /><br />
      39. <a href="#link081">A PROPOSED FIST FIGHT</a><br /><br /> 40. <a
      href="#link082">FROM BEHIND THE DOOR</a><br /><br /> 41. <a href="#link084">SLADE
      AS AN EXECUTIONER</a><br /><br /> 42. <a href="#link085">AN UNPLEASANT VIEW</a><br /><br />
      43. <a href="#link088">UNAPPRECIATED POLITENESS</a><br /><br /> 44. <a
      href="#link092">SLADE IN COURT</a><br /><br /> 45. <a href="#link095">A
      WIFE'S LAMENTATIONS</a><br /><br /> 46. <a href="#link099">THE CONCENTRATED
      INHABITANT</a><br /><br /> 47. <a href="#link100">THE SOUTH PASS</a><br /><br />
      48. <a href="#link101">THE PARTED STREAMS</a><br /><br /> 49. <a
      href="#link102">IT SPOILED THE MELON</a><br /><br /> 50. <a href="#link103">THE
      CAYOTE AND THE RAVEN</a><br /><br /> 51. <a href="#link104">"DON'T COME HERE
      ...</a><br /><br /> 52. <a href="#link105">"THINK I'M A FOOL ...</a><br /><br />
      53. <a href="#link106">THE "DESTROYING ANGEL...</a><br /><br /> 54. <a
      href="#link109">EFFECTS OF "VALLEY TAN"</a><br /><br /> 55. <a
      href="#link110a">ONE CREST</a><br /><br /> 56. <a href="#link110b">THE OTHER</a><br /><br />
      57. <a href="#link111">THE VAGRANT</a><br /><br /> 58. <a href="#link112">PORTRAIT
      OF EBER KIMBALL</a><br /><br /> 59. <a href="#link113">PORTRAIT OR BRIGHAM
      YOUNG</a><br /><br /> 60. <a href="#link116">THE CONTRACTORS BEFORE THE KING</a><br /><br />
      61. <a href="#link117">I WAS TOUCHED</a><br /><br /> 62. <a href="#link118">THE
      ENDOWMENT</a><br /><br /> 63. <a href="#link120">FAVORITE WIFE AND D.4</a><br /><br />
      64. <a href="#link121">NEEDED MARKING</a><br /><br /> 65. <a href="#link124">A
      REMARKABLE RESEMBLANCE</a><br /><br /> 66. <a href="#link126">THE FAMILY
      BEDSTEAD</a><br /><br /> 67. <a href="#link131">THE MIRACULOUS COMPASS</a><br /><br />
      68. <a href="#link137">THREE SIDES TO A QUESTION</a><br /><br /> 69. <a
      href="#link138">RESULT OF HFGH FREIGHTS</a><br /><br /> 70. <a
      href="#link139">A SHRIVELED QUARTER</a><br /><br /> 71. <a href="#link140">AN
      OBJECT OF PITY</a><br /><br /> 72. <a href="#link141">TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br />
      73. <a href="#link145">TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br /> 74. <a href="#link147">GOSHOTT
      INDIANS HANGING AROUND</a><br /><br /> 75. <a href="#link148">THE DRIVE FOR
      LIFE</a><br /><br /> 76. <a href="#link151">GREELEY'S RIDE</a><br /><br /> 77.
      <a href="#link154">BOTTLING AN ANECDOTE</a><br /><br /> 78. <a
      href="#link156">TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br /> 79. <a href="#link158">CONTEMPLATION</a><br /><br />
      80. <a href="#link159">THE WASHOE ZEPHYR</a><br /><br /> 81. <a
      href="#link161">THE GOVERNOR'S HOUSE</a><br /><br /> 82. <a href="#link162">DARK
      DISCLOSURES</a><br /><br /> 83. <a href="#link163">THE IRISH BRIGADE</a><br /><br />
      84. <a href="#link164">RECREATION</a><br /><br /> 85. <a href="#link165">THE
      TARANTULA</a><br /><br /> 86. <a href="#link166">LIGHT THROWN ON THE SUBJECT</a><br /><br />
      87. <a href="#link169">I STEERED</a><br /><br /> 88. <a href="#link170">THE
      INVALID</a><br /><br /> 89. <a href="#link171">THE RESTORED</a><br /><br />
      90. <a href="#link172">OUR HOUSE</a><br /><br /> 91. <a href="#link174">AT
      BUSINESS</a><br /><br /> 92. <a href="#link176">FIGHT AT LAKE TAHOE</a><br /><br />
      93. <a href="#link179">"THINK HIM AN AMERICAN HORSE"</a><br /><br /> 94. <a
      href="#link180">UNEXPECTED ELEVATION</a><br /><br /> 95. <a href="#link181">UNIVERSALLY
      UNSETTLED</a><br /><br /> 96. <a href="#link182">RIDING THE PLUG</a><br /><br />
      97. <a href="#link183">WANTED EXERCISE</a><br /><br /> 98. <a href="#link186">BORROWING
      MADE EASY</a><br /><br /> 99. <a href="#link188">FREE RIDES</a><br /><br />
      100. <a href="#link190">SATISFACTORY VOUCHERS</a><br /><br /> 101. <a
      href="#link191">NEEDS PRAYING FOR</a><br /><br /> 102. <a href="#link192">MAP
      OF TOLL ROADS</a><br /><br /> 103. <a href="#link194">UNLOADING SILVER
      BRICKS</a><br /><br /> 104. <a href="#link196">VIEW IN HUMBOLDT MOUNTAINS</a><br /><br />
      105. <a href="#link199">GOING TO HUMBOLDT</a><br /><br /> 106. <a
      href="#link201">BALLOU'S BEDFELLOW</a><br /><br /> 107. <a href="#link202">PLEASURES
      OF CAMPING OUT</a><br /><br /> 108. <a href="#link205">THE SECRET SEARCH</a><br /><br />
      109. <a href="#link207">"CAST YOUR EYE ON THAT ...</a><br /><br /> 110. <a
      href="#link210">"WE'VE GOT IT"</a><br /><br /> 111. <a href="#link212">INCIPIENT
      MILLIONAIRES</a><br /><br /> 112. <a href="#link214">ROCKS-TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br />
      113. <a href="#link216">"DO YOU SEE IT?"</a><br /><br /> 114. <a
      href="#link218">FAREWELL SWEET RIVER</a><br /><br /> 115. <a href="#link219">THE
      RESCUE</a><br /><br /> 116. <a href="#link222">"MR. ARKANSAS ...</a><br /><br />
      117. <a href="#link225">AN ARMED ALLY</a><br /><br /> 118. <a href="#link227">CROSSING
      THE FLOOD</a><br /><br /> 119. <a href="#link229">ADVANCE IN A CIRCLE</a><br /><br />
      120, <a href="#link230">THE SONGSTER</a><br /><br /> 121. <a href="#link231">THE
      FOXES HAVE HOLES-TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br /> 122. <a href="#link233">A FLAT
      FAILURE</a><br /><br /> 123. <a href="#link234">THE LAST MATCH</a><br /><br />
      124. <a href="#link236">DISCARDED VICES</a><br /><br /> 125. <a
      href="#link237">FLAMES-TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br /> 127. <a href="#link240">IT
      WAS THUS WE MET</a><br /><br /> 128. <a href="#link242">TAKING POSSESSION</a><br /><br />
      129. <a href="#link244">A GREAT EFFORT</a><br /><br /> 130. <a
      href="#link246">REARRANGING AND SHIFTING</a><br /><br /> 131. <a
      href="#link249">WE LEFT LAMENTED</a><br /><br /> 132. <a href="#link250">PICTURE
      OF TOWNSEND'S TUNNEL</a><br /><br /> 133. <a href="#link253">QUARTZ MILL</a><br /><br />
      134. <a href="#link254">ANOTHER PROCESS OF AMALGAMATION</a>&nbsp;<br /><br />
      135. <a href="#link256">FIRST QUARTZ MILL IN NEVADA</a><br /><br /> 136. <a
      href="#link257">A SLICE OF RICH ORE</a><br /><br /> 137. <a href="#link260">THE
      SAVED BROTHER</a><br /><br /> 138. <a href="#link268">ON A SECRET EXPEDITION</a><br /><br />
      139. <a href="#link265">LAKE MONO</a><br /><br /> 140. <a href="#link266a">RATHER
      SOAPY</a><br /><br /> 141. <a href="#link266b">A BARK UNDER FULL SAIL</a><br /><br />
      142. <a href="#link268">A MODEL BOARDING HOUSE</a><br /><br /> 143. <a
      href="#link271">LIFE AMID DEATH</a><br /><br /> 144. <a href="#link273">A
      JUMP FOR LIFE</a><br /><br /> 145. <a href="#link275">"STOVE HEAP GONE"</a><br /><br />
      146. <a href="#link279">INTERVIEWING THE "WIDE WEST"</a><br /><br /> 147. <a
      href="#link280">WORTH A MILLION</a><br /><br /> 148. <a href="#link282">MILLIONAIRES
      LAYING PLANS</a><br /><br /> 149. <a href="#link287">DANGEROUSLY SICK</a><br /><br />
      150. <a href="#link288">WORTH NOTHING</a><br /><br /> 151. <a href="#link294">THE
      COMPROMISE</a><br /><br /> 152. <a href="#link293">ONE OF MY FAILURES</a><br /><br />
      153. <a href="#link294">TARGET SHOOTING</a><br /><br /> 154. <a
      href="#link295">AS CITY EDITOR</a><br /><br /> 155. <a href="#link296">THE
      ENTIRE MARKET</a><br /><br /> 156. <a href="#link297">A FRIEND INDEED</a><br /><br />
      157. <a href="#link298">UNION-TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br /> 158. <a
      href="#link301">AN EDUCATIONAL REPORT</a><br /><br /> 159. <a href="#link302">NO
      PARTICULAR HURRY</a><br /><br /> 160. <a href="#link304">VIEW OF VIRGINIA
      CITY AND MT. DAVIDSON</a><br /><br /> 161. <a href="#link307">A NEW MINE</a><br /><br />
      162. <a href="#link309">TRY A FEW</a><br /><br /> 163. <a href="#link310">PORTRAIT
      OF MR. STEWART</a><br /><br /> 164. <a href="#link311">SELLING A MINE</a><br /><br />
      165. <a href="#link315">COULDN'T WAIT</a><br /><br /> 166. <a href="#link317">THE
      GREAT "FLOUR SACS" PROCESSION</a><br /><br /> 167. <a href="#link319">TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br />
      168. <a href="#link321">A NABOB</a><br /><br /> 169. <a href="#link323">MAGNIFICENCE
      AND MISERY</a><br /><br /> 170. <a href="#link326">A FRIENDLY DRIVER</a><br /><br />
      171. <a href="#link327">ASTONISHES THE NATIVES</a><br /><br /> 172. <a
      href="#link328">COL. JACK WEAKENS</a><br /><br /> 173. <a href="#link331">SCOTTY
      BRIGGS AND THE MINISTER</a><br /><br /> 174. <a href="#link335">REGULATING
      MATTERS</a><br /><br /> 175. <a href="#link337">DIDN'T SHOOK HIS MOTHER</a><br /><br />
      176. <a href="#link338">SCOTTY AS S. S. TEACHER</a><br /><br /> 177. <a
      href="#link340">THE MAN WHO HAD KILLED HIS DOZEN</a><br /><br /> 178. <a
      href="#link342">THE UNPREJUDICED JURY</a><br /><br /> 179. <a href="#link344">A
      DESPERADO GIVING REFERENCE</a><br /><br /> 180. <a href="#link346">SATISFYING
      A FOE</a><br /><br /> 181. <a href="#link351">TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br /> 182.
      <a href="#link353">GIVING INFORMATION</a><br /><br /> 183. <a href="#link355">A
      WALKING BATTERY</a><br /><br /> 184. <a href="#link358">OVERHAULING HIS
      MANIFEST</a><br /><br /> 185. <a href="#link359">SHIP-TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br />
      186. <a href="#link361">THE HEROES AND HEROINES OF THE STORY</a><br /><br />
      187. <a href="#link362">DISSOLUTE AUTHOR</a><br /><br /> 188. <a
      href="#link365">THERE SAT THE LAWYER</a><br /><br /> 189. <a href="#link367">JONAH
      OUTDONE</a><br /><br /> 190. <a href="#link370">DOLLINGER</a><br /><br /> 191.
      <a href="#link371">LOW BRIDGE</a><br /><br /> 192. <a href="#link372">SHORTENING
      SAIL</a><br /><br /> 193. <a href="#link374">LIGHTENING SHIP</a><br /><br />
      194. <a href="#link375">THE MARVELLOUS RESCUE</a><br /><br /> 195. <a
      href="#link377">SILVER BRICKS</a><br /><br /> 196. <a href="#link379">TIMBER
      SUPPORTS</a><br /><br /> 197. <a href="#link380">FROM GALLERY TO GALLERY</a><br /><br />
      198. <a href="#link384">JIM BLAINE</a><br /><br /> 199. <a href="#link385">HURRAH
      FOR NIXON</a><br /><br /> 200. <a href="#link386">MISS WAGNER</a><br /><br />
      201. <a href="#link387">WAITING FOR A CUSTOMER</a><br /><br /> 202. <a
      href="#link388">WAS TO BE THERE</a><br /><br /> 209. <a href="#link389">THE
      MONUMENT</a><br /><br /> 205. <a href="#link390">WHERE IS THE RAM-TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br />
      205. <a href="#link392">CHINESE WASH BILL</a><br /><br /> 206. <a
      href="#link393">IMITATION</a><br /><br /> 207. <a href="#link396">CHINESE
      LOTTERY</a><br /><br /> 208. <a href="#link397">CHINESE MERCHANT AT HOME</a><br /><br />
      209. <a href="#link399">AN OLD FRIEND</a><br /><br /> 210. <a href="#link403">FAREWELL
      AND ACCIDENT</a><br /><br /> 211. <a href="#link404">"GIMME A CIGAR"</a><br /><br />
      212. <a href="#link406">THE HERALD OF GLAD NEWS</a><br /><br /> 213. <a
      href="#link407">FLAG-TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br /> 214. <a href="#link409">A
      NEW ENGLAND SCENE</a><br /><br /> 215. <a href="#link410">A VARIABLE CLIMATE</a><br /><br />
      216. <a href="#link413">SACRAMENTO AND THREE NODES AWAY</a><br /><br /> 217.
      <a href="#link416">"FETCH HER OUT ...</a><br /><br /> 218. <a href="#link417">"WELL
      IF IT AINT A CHILD ...</a><br /><br /> 219. <a href="#link418">A GENUINE
      LIVE WOMAN</a><br /><br /> 220. <a href="#link420">THE GRACE OF A KANGAROO</a><br /><br />
      221. <a href="#link421">DREAMS DISSIPATED</a><br /><br /> 222. <a
      href="#link422">THE "ONE HORSE SHAY" OUTDONE</a><br /><br /> 223. <a
      href="#link423a">HARD ON THE INNOCENTS</a><br /><br /> 224. <a
      href="#link423b">DRY BONES SHAKEN</a><br /><br /> 225. <a href="#link424">"OH!
      WHAT, SHALL I DO!...</a><br /><br /> 226. <a href="#link425">"GET OUT YOUR
      TOWEL MY DEAR"</a><br /><br /> 227. <a href="#link426">"WE WILL OMIT THE
      BENEDICTION...</a><br /><br /> 228. <a href="#link429">SLINKING</a><br /><br />
      229. <a href="#link431">A PRIZE</a><br /><br /> 230. <a href="#link432">A
      LOOK IN AT THE WINDOW</a><br /><br /> 231. <a href="#link433">"DO IT
      STRANGER"</a><br /><br /> 232. <a href="#link436">THE OLD COLLEGIATE</a><br /><br />
      233. <a href="#link437">STRIKING A POCKET</a><br /><br /> 234. <a
      href="#link440">TOM QUARTZ</a><br /><br /> 235. <a href="#link441">AN
      ADVANTAGE TAKEN</a><br /><br /> 236. <a href="#link442">AFTER AN EXCURSION</a><br /><br />
      237. <a href="#link445">THE THREE CAPTAINS</a><br /><br /> 238. <a
      href="#link448">THE OLD ADMIRAL</a><br /><br /> 239. <a href="#link449">THE
      DESERTED FIELD</a><br /><br /> 240. <a href="#link453">WILLIAMS</a><br /><br />
      241. <a href="#link455">SCENE ON THE SANDWICH ISLANDS</a><br /><br /> 242.
      <a href="#link456">FASHIONABLE ATTIRE</a><br /><br /> 243. <a href="#link457">A
      BITE</a><br /><br /> 244. <a href="#link458">RECONNOITERING</a><br /><br />
      246. <a href="#link461">LOOKING FOR MISCHIEF</a><br /><br /> 247. <a
      href="#link462">A FAMILY LIKENESS</a><br /><br /> 248. <a href="#link467">SIT
      DOWN To LISTEN</a><br /><br /> 249. <a href="#link469">"MY BROTHER, WE
      TWINS"</a><br /><br /> 250. <a href="#link470">EXTRAORDINARY CAPERS</a><br /><br />
      251. <a href="#link471">A LOAD OF HAY</a><br /><br /> 252. <a href="#link472">MARCHING
      THROUGH GEORGIA</a><br /><br /> 253. <a href="#link474">SANDWICH ISLAND
      GIRLS</a><br /><br /> 254. <a href="#link475">ORIGINAL HAM SANDWICH</a><br /><br />
      255. <a href="#link478">"I KISSED HIM FOR HIS MOTHER"</a><br /><br /> 256.
      <a href="#link479">AN OUTSIDER</a><br /><br /> 257. <a href="#link482">AN
      ENEMY'S PRAYER</a><br /><br /> 258. <a href="#link484">VISITING THE
      MISSIONARIES</a><br /><br /> 259. <a href="#link485">FULL CHURCH DRESS</a><br /><br />
      260. <a href="#link486">PLAYING EMPIRE</a><br /><br /> 261. <a
      href="#link488">ROYALTY AND ITS SATELLITES</a><br /><br /> 262. <a
      href="#link489">A HIGH PRIVATE</a><br /><br /> 263. <a href="#link492">A
      MODERN FUNERAL</a><br /><br /> 264. <a href="#link497">FORMER FUNERAL ORGIES</a><br /><br />
      265. <a href="#link499">A PASSENGER</a><br /><br /> 266. <a href="#link501">MOONLIGHT
      ON THE WATER</a><br /><br /> 267. <a href="#link502">GOING INTO THE
      MOUNTAINS</a><br /><br /> 268. <a href="#link503">EVENING</a><br /><br /> 289.
      <a href="#link505">THE DEMENTED</a><br /><br /> 270. <a href="#link507">DISCUSSING
      TURNIPS</a><br /><br /> 271. <a href="#link509">GREELEY'S LETTER</a><br /><br />
      272. <a href="#link514">KEALAKEKUA BAY AND COOK'S MONUMENT</a><br /><br />
      273. <a href="#link518">THE GHOSTLY BUILDERS</a><br /><br /> 274. <a
      href="#link519">ON GUARD</a><br /><br /> 275. <a href="#link521">BREAKING
      THE TABU</a><br /><br /> 276. <a href="#link525">SURF BATHING</a><br /><br />
      277. <a href="#link526">SURF BATHING A FAILURE</a><br /><br /> 278. <a
      href="#link527">CITY OF REFUGE</a><br /><br /> 279. <a href="#link529">THE
      QUEEN'S ROCK</a><br /><br /> 280. <a href="#link531">TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br />
      281. <a href="#link533">THE PILLAR OF FIRE</a><br /><br /> 282. <a
      href="#link535">THE CRATER</a><br /><br /> 283. <a href="#link539">BROKE
      THROUGH</a><br /><br /> 284. <a href="#link540">FIRE FOUNTAINS</a><br /><br />
      285. <a href="#link542">LAVA STREAM</a><br /><br /> 286. <a href="#link543">A
      TIDAL WAVE</a><br /><br /> 287. <a href="#link545">TRIP ON THE MILKY WAY</a><br /><br />
      288. <a href="#link547">A VIEW IN THE TAO VALLEY</a><br /><br /> 289. <a
      href="#link549">MAGNIFICENT SPORT</a><br /><br /> 290. <a href="#link553">ELEVEN
      MILES TO SEE</a><br /><br /> 291. <a href="#link554">CHASED BY A STORM</a><br /><br />
      292. <a href="#link555">LEAVING WORK</a><br /><br /> 293. <a href="#link557">TAIL-PIECE</a><br /><br />
      294. <a href="#link559">OUR AMUSEMENTS</a><br /><br /> 295. <a
      href="#link561">SEVERE CASE OF STAGE FRIGHT</a><br /><br /> 296. <a
      href="#link562">MY THREE PARQUETTE ALLIES</a><br /><br /> 297. <a
      href="#link562">SAWYER IN THE CIRCLE</a><br /><br /> 298. <a href="#link567">A
      PREDICAMENT</a><br /><br /> 299. <a href="#link569">THE BEST OF THE JOKE</a><br /><br />
      300. <a href="#link570">THE END</a><br /><br /> <br /><br /><br /><br /> <br /><br />
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch01" id="linkch01"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER I.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      My brother had just been appointed Secretary of Nevada Territory&mdash;an
      office of such majesty that it concentrated in itself the duties and
      dignities of Treasurer, Comptroller, Secretary of State, and Acting
      Governor in the Governor's absence. A salary of eighteen hundred dollars a
      year and the title of "Mr. Secretary," gave to the great position an air
      of wild and imposing grandeur. I was young and ignorant, and I envied my
      brother. I coveted his distinction and his financial splendor, but
      particularly and especially the long, strange journey he was going to
      make, and the curious new world he was going to explore. He was going to
      travel! I never had been away from home, and that word "travel" had a
      seductive charm for me. Pretty soon he would be hundreds and hundreds of
      miles away on the great plains and deserts, and among the mountains of the
      Far West, and would see buffaloes and Indians, and prairie dogs, and
      antelopes, and have all kinds of adventures, and may be get hanged or
      scalped, and have ever such a fine time, and write home and tell us all
      about it, and be a hero. And he would see the gold mines and the silver
      mines, and maybe go about of an afternoon when his work was done, and pick
      up two or three pailfuls of shining slugs, and nuggets of gold and silver
      on the hillside. And by and by he would become very rich, and return home
      by sea, and be able to talk as calmly about San Francisco and the ocean,
      and "the isthmus" as if it was nothing of any consequence to have seen
      those marvels face to face.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link020" id="link020"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="020.jpg (69K)" src="images/020.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      What I suffered in contemplating his happiness, pen cannot describe. And
      so, when he offered me, in cold blood, the sublime position of private
      secretary under him, it appeared to me that the heavens and the earth
      passed away, and the firmament was rolled together as a scroll! I had
      nothing more to desire. My contentment was complete.
    </p>
    <p>
      At the end of an hour or two I was ready for the journey. Not much packing
      up was necessary, because we were going in the overland stage from the
      Missouri frontier to Nevada, and passengers were only allowed a small
      quantity of baggage apiece. There was no Pacific railroad in those fine
      times of ten or twelve years ago&mdash;not a single rail of it. I only
      proposed to stay in Nevada three months&mdash;I had no thought of staying
      longer than that. I meant to see all I could that was new and strange, and
      then hurry home to business. I little thought that I would not see the end
      of that three-month pleasure excursion for six or seven uncommonly long
      years!
    </p>
    <p>
      I dreamed all night about Indians, deserts, and silver bars, and in due
      time, next day, we took shipping at the St. Louis wharf on board a
      steamboat bound up the Missouri River.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link021" id="link021"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="021.jpg (82K)" src="images/021.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We were six days going from St. Louis to "St. Jo."&mdash;a trip that was
      so dull, and sleepy, and eventless that it has left no more impression on
      my memory than if its duration had been six minutes instead of that many
      days. No record is left in my mind, now, concerning it, but a confused
      jumble of savage-looking snags, which we deliberately walked over with one
      wheel or the other; and of reefs which we butted and butted, and then
      retired from and climbed over in some softer place; and of sand-bars which
      we roosted on occasionally, and rested, and then got out our crutches and
      sparred over.
    </p>
    <p>
      In fact, the boat might almost as well have gone to St. Jo. by land, for
      she was walking most of the time, anyhow&mdash;climbing over reefs and
      clambering over snags patiently and laboriously all day long. The captain
      said she was a "bully" boat, and all she wanted was more "shear" and a
      bigger wheel. I thought she wanted a pair of stilts, but I had the deep
      sagacity not to say so.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch02" id="linkch02"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER II.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The first thing we did on that glad evening that landed us at St. Joseph
      was to hunt up the stage-office, and pay a hundred and fifty dollars
      apiece for tickets per overland coach to Carson City, Nevada.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link023a" id="link023a"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="023a.jpg (31K)" src="images/023a.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The next morning, bright and early, we took a hasty breakfast, and hurried
      to the starting-place. Then an inconvenience presented itself which we had
      not properly appreciated before, namely, that one cannot make a heavy
      traveling trunk stand for twenty-five pounds of baggage&mdash;because it
      weighs a good deal more. But that was all we could take&mdash;twenty-five
      pounds each. So we had to snatch our trunks open, and make a selection in
      a good deal of a hurry. We put our lawful twenty-five pounds apiece all in
      one valise, and shipped the trunks back to St. Louis again. It was a sad
      parting, for now we had no swallow-tail coats and white kid gloves to wear
      at Pawnee receptions in the Rocky Mountains, and no stove-pipe hats nor
      patent-leather boots, nor anything else necessary to make life calm and
      peaceful. We were reduced to a war-footing. Each of us put on a rough,
      heavy suit of clothing, woolen army shirt and "stogy" boots included; and
      into the valise we crowded a few white shirts, some under-clothing and
      such things. My brother, the Secretary, took along about four pounds of
      United States statutes and six pounds of Unabridged Dictionary; for we did
      not know&mdash;poor innocents&mdash;that such things could be bought in
      San Francisco on one day and received in Carson City the next. I was armed
      to the teeth with a pitiful little Smith &amp; Wesson's seven-shooter,
      which carried a ball like a homoeopathic pill, and it took the whole seven
      to make a dose for an adult. But I thought it was grand. It appeared to me
      to be a dangerous weapon. It only had one fault&mdash;you could not hit
      anything with it. One of our "conductors" practiced awhile on a cow with
      it, and as long as she stood still and behaved herself she was safe; but
      as soon as she went to moving about, and he got to shooting at other
      things, she came to grief. The Secretary had a small-sized Colt's revolver
      strapped around him for protection against the Indians, and to guard
      against accidents he carried it uncapped. Mr. George Bemis was dismally
      formidable. George Bemis was our fellow-traveler.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link023b" id="link023b"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="023b.jpg (11K)" src="images/023b.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We had never seen him before. He wore in his belt an old original "Allen"
      revolver, such as irreverent people called a "pepper-box." Simply drawing
      the trigger back, cocked and fired the pistol. As the trigger came back,
      the hammer would begin to rise and the barrel to turn over, and presently
      down would drop the hammer, and away would speed the ball. To aim along
      the turning barrel and hit the thing aimed at was a feat which was
      probably never done with an "Allen" in the world. But George's was a
      reliable weapon, nevertheless, because, as one of the stage-drivers
      afterward said, "If she didn't get what she went after, she would fetch
      something else." And so she did. She went after a deuce of spades nailed
      against a tree, once, and fetched a mule standing about thirty yards to
      the left of it. Bemis did not want the mule; but the owner came out with a
      double-barreled shotgun and persuaded him to buy it, anyhow. It was a
      cheerful weapon&mdash;the "Allen." Sometimes all its six barrels would go
      off at once, and then there was no safe place in all the region round
      about, but behind it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link024" id="link024"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="024.jpg (96K)" src="images/024.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We took two or three blankets for protection against frosty weather in the
      mountains. In the matter of luxuries we were modest&mdash;we took none
      along but some pipes and five pounds of smoking tobacco. We had two large
      canteens to carry water in, between stations on the Plains, and we also
      took with us a little shot-bag of silver coin for daily expenses in the
      way of breakfasts and dinners.
    </p>
    <p>
      By eight o'clock everything was ready, and we were on the other side of
      the river. We jumped into the stage, the driver cracked his whip, and we
      bowled away and left "the States" behind us. It was a superb summer
      morning, and all the landscape was brilliant with sunshine. There was a
      freshness and breeziness, too, and an exhilarating sense of emancipation
      from all sorts of cares and responsibilities, that almost made us feel
      that the years we had spent in the close, hot city, toiling and slaving,
      had been wasted and thrown away. We were spinning along through Kansas,
      and in the course of an hour and a half we were fairly abroad on the great
      Plains. Just here the land was rolling&mdash;a grand sweep of regular
      elevations and depressions as far as the eye could reach&mdash;like the
      stately heave and swell of the ocean's bosom after a storm. And everywhere
      were cornfields, accenting with squares of deeper green, this limitless
      expanse of grassy land. But presently this sea upon dry ground was to lose
      its "rolling" character and stretch away for seven hundred miles as level
      as a floor!
    </p>
    <p>
      Our coach was a great swinging and swaying stage, of the most sumptuous
      description&mdash;an imposing cradle on wheels. It was drawn by six
      handsome horses, and by the side of the driver sat the "conductor," the
      legitimate captain of the craft; for it was his business to take charge
      and care of the mails, baggage, express matter, and passengers. We three
      were the only passengers, this trip. We sat on the back seat, inside.
      About all the rest of the coach was full of mail bags&mdash;for we had
      three days' delayed mails with us. Almost touching our knees, a
      perpendicular wall of mail matter rose up to the roof. There was a great
      pile of it strapped on top of the stage, and both the fore and hind boots
      were full. We had twenty-seven hundred pounds of it aboard, the driver
      said&mdash;"a little for Brigham, and Carson, and 'Frisco, but the heft of
      it for the Injuns, which is powerful troublesome 'thout they get plenty of
      truck to read."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link026" id="link026"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="026.jpg (65K)" src="images/026.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But as he just then got up a fearful convulsion of his countenance which
      was suggestive of a wink being swallowed by an earthquake, we guessed that
      his remark was intended to be facetious, and to mean that we would unload
      the most of our mail matter somewhere on the Plains and leave it to the
      Indians, or whosoever wanted it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link025" id="link025"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="025.jpg (32K)" src="images/025.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We changed horses every ten miles, all day long, and fairly flew over the
      hard, level road. We jumped out and stretched our legs every time the
      coach stopped, and so the night found us still vivacious and unfatigued.
    </p>
    <p>
      After supper a woman got in, who lived about fifty miles further on, and
      we three had to take turns at sitting outside with the driver and
      conductor. Apparently she was not a talkative woman. She would sit there
      in the gathering twilight and fasten her steadfast eyes on a mosquito
      rooting into her arm, and slowly she would raise her other hand till she
      had got his range, and then she would launch a slap at him that would have
      jolted a cow; and after that she would sit and contemplate the corpse with
      tranquil satisfaction&mdash;for she never missed her mosquito; she was a
      dead shot at short range. She never removed a carcase, but left them there
      for bait. I sat by this grim Sphynx and watched her kill thirty or forty
      mosquitoes&mdash;watched her, and waited for her to say something, but she
      never did. So I finally opened the conversation myself. I said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "The mosquitoes are pretty bad, about here, madam."
    </p>
    <p>
      "You bet!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "What did I understand you to say, madam?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "You BET!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link027" id="link027"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="027.jpg (31K)" src="images/027.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Then she cheered up, and faced around and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Danged if I didn't begin to think you fellers was deef and dumb. I did,
      b'gosh. Here I've sot, and sot, and sot, a-bust'n muskeeters and wonderin'
      what was ailin' ye. Fust I thot you was deef and dumb, then I thot you was
      sick or crazy, or suthin', and then by and by I begin to reckon you was a
      passel of sickly fools that couldn't think of nothing to say. Wher'd ye
      come from?"
    </p>
    <p>
      The Sphynx was a Sphynx no more! The fountains of her great deep were
      broken up, and she rained the nine parts of speech forty days and forty
      nights, metaphorically speaking, and buried us under a desolating deluge
      of trivial gossip that left not a crag or pinnacle of rejoinder projecting
      above the tossing waste of dislocated grammar and decomposed
      pronunciation!
    </p>
    <p>
      How we suffered, suffered, suffered! She went on, hour after hour, till I
      was sorry I ever opened the mosquito question and gave her a start. She
      never did stop again until she got to her journey's end toward daylight;
      and then she stirred us up as she was leaving the stage (for we were
      nodding, by that time), and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Now you git out at Cottonwood, you fellers, and lay over a couple o'
      days, and I'll be along some time to-night, and if I can do ye any good by
      edgin' in a word now and then, I'm right thar. Folks'll tell you't I've
      always ben kind o' offish and partic'lar for a gal that's raised in the
      woods, and I am, with the rag-tag and bob-tail, and a gal has to be, if
      she wants to be anything, but when people comes along which is my equals,
      I reckon I'm a pretty sociable heifer after all."
    </p>
    <p>
      We resolved not to "lay by at Cottonwood."
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch03" id="linkch03"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER III.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      About an hour and a half before daylight we were bowling along smoothly
      over the road&mdash;so smoothly that our cradle only rocked in a gentle,
      lulling way, that was gradually soothing us to sleep, and dulling our
      consciousness&mdash;when something gave away under us! We were dimly aware
      of it, but indifferent to it. The coach stopped. We heard the driver and
      conductor talking together outside, and rummaging for a lantern, and
      swearing because they could not find it&mdash;but we had no interest in
      whatever had happened, and it only added to our comfort to think of those
      people out there at work in the murky night, and we snug in our nest with
      the curtains drawn. But presently, by the sounds, there seemed to be an
      examination going on, and then the driver's voice said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "By George, the thoroughbrace is broke!"
    </p>
    <p>
      This startled me broad awake&mdash;as an undefined sense of calamity is
      always apt to do. I said to myself: "Now, a thoroughbrace is probably part
      of a horse; and doubtless a vital part, too, from the dismay in the
      driver's voice. Leg, maybe&mdash;and yet how could he break his leg
      waltzing along such a road as this? No, it can't be his leg. That is
      impossible, unless he was reaching for the driver. Now, what can be the
      thoroughbrace of a horse, I wonder? Well, whatever comes, I shall not air
      my ignorance in this crowd, anyway."
    </p>
    <p>
      Just then the conductor's face appeared at a lifted curtain, and his
      lantern glared in on us and our wall of mail matter. He said: "Gents,
      you'll have to turn out a spell. Thoroughbrace is broke."
    </p>
    <p>
      We climbed out into a chill drizzle, and felt ever so homeless and dreary.
      When I found that the thing they called a "thoroughbrace" was the massive
      combination of belts and springs which the coach rocks itself in, I said
      to the driver:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I never saw a thoroughbrace used up like that, before, that I can
      remember. How did it happen?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why, it happened by trying to make one coach carry three days' mail&mdash;that's
      how it happened," said he. "And right here is the very direction which is
      wrote on all the newspaper-bags which was to be put out for the Injuns for
      to keep 'em quiet. It's most uncommon lucky, becuz it's so nation dark I
      should 'a' gone by unbeknowns if that air thoroughbrace hadn't broke."
    </p>
    <p>
      I knew that he was in labor with another of those winks of his, though I
      could not see his face, because he was bent down at work; and wishing him
      a safe delivery, I turned to and helped the rest get out the mail-sacks.
      It made a great pyramid by the roadside when it was all out. When they had
      mended the thoroughbrace we filled the two boots again, but put no mail on
      top, and only half as much inside as there was before. The conductor bent
      all the seat-backs down, and then filled the coach just half full of
      mail-bags from end to end. We objected loudly to this, for it left us no
      seats. But the conductor was wiser than we, and said a bed was better than
      seats, and moreover, this plan would protect his thoroughbraces. We never
      wanted any seats after that. The lazy bed was infinitely preferable. I had
      many an exciting day, subsequently, lying on it reading the statutes and
      the dictionary, and wondering how the characters would turn out.
    </p>
    <p>
      The conductor said he would send back a guard from the next station to
      take charge of the abandoned mail-bags, and we drove on.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was now just dawn; and as we stretched our cramped legs full length on
      the mail sacks, and gazed out through the windows across the wide wastes
      of greensward clad in cool, powdery mist, to where there was an expectant
      look in the eastern horizon, our perfect enjoyment took the form of a
      tranquil and contented ecstasy. The stage whirled along at a spanking
      gait, the breeze flapping curtains and suspended coats in a most
      exhilarating way; the cradle swayed and swung luxuriously, the pattering
      of the horses' hoofs, the cracking of the driver's whip, and his "Hi-yi!
      g'lang!" were music; the spinning ground and the waltzing trees appeared
      to give us a mute hurrah as we went by, and then slack up and look after
      us with interest, or envy, or something; and as we lay and smoked the pipe
      of peace and compared all this luxury with the years of tiresome city life
      that had gone before it, we felt that there was only one complete and
      satisfying happiness in the world, and we had found it.
    </p>
    <p>
      After breakfast, at some station whose name I have forgotten, we three
      climbed up on the seat behind the driver, and let the conductor have our
      bed for a nap. And by and by, when the sun made me drowsy, I lay down on
      my face on top of the coach, grasping the slender iron railing, and slept
      for an hour or more. That will give one an appreciable idea of those
      matchless roads. Instinct will make a sleeping man grip a fast hold of the
      railing when the stage jolts, but when it only swings and sways, no grip
      is necessary. Overland drivers and conductors used to sit in their places
      and sleep thirty or forty minutes at a time, on good roads, while spinning
      along at the rate of eight or ten miles an hour. I saw them do it, often.
      There was no danger about it; a sleeping man will seize the irons in time
      when the coach jolts. These men were hard worked, and it was not possible
      for them to stay awake all the time.
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by we passed through Marysville, and over the Big Blue and Little
      Sandy; thence about a mile, and entered Nebraska. About a mile further on,
      we came to the Big Sandy&mdash;one hundred and eighty miles from St.
      Joseph.
    </p>
    <p>
      As the sun was going down, we saw the first specimen of an animal known
      familiarly over two thousand miles of mountain and desert&mdash;from
      Kansas clear to the Pacific Ocean&mdash;as the "jackass rabbit." He is
      well named. He is just like any other rabbit, except that he is from one
      third to twice as large, has longer legs in proportion to his size, and
      has the most preposterous ears that ever were mounted on any creature but
      a jackass.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link032" id="link032"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="032.jpg (27K)" src="images/032.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      When he is sitting quiet, thinking about his sins, or is absent-minded or
      unapprehensive of danger, his majestic ears project above him
      conspicuously; but the breaking of a twig will scare him nearly to death,
      and then he tilts his ears back gently and starts for home. All you can
      see, then, for the next minute, is his long gray form stretched out
      straight and "streaking it" through the low sage-brush, head erect, eyes
      right, and ears just canted a little to the rear, but showing you where
      the animal is, all the time, the same as if he carried a jib. Now and then
      he makes a marvelous spring with his long legs, high over the stunted
      sage-brush, and scores a leap that would make a horse envious. Presently
      he comes down to a long, graceful "lope," and shortly he mysteriously
      disappears. He has crouched behind a sage-bush, and will sit there and
      listen and tremble until you get within six feet of him, when he will get
      under way again. But one must shoot at this creature once, if he wishes to
      see him throw his heart into his heels, and do the best he knows how. He
      is frightened clear through, now, and he lays his long ears down on his
      back, straightens himself out like a yard-stick every spring he makes, and
      scatters miles behind him with an easy indifference that is enchanting.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link033a" id="link033a"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="033a.jpg (35K)" src="images/033a.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Our party made this specimen "hump himself," as the conductor said. The
      secretary started him with a shot from the Colt; I commenced spitting at
      him with my weapon; and all in the same instant the old "Allen's" whole
      broadside let go with a rattling crash, and it is not putting it too
      strong to say that the rabbit was frantic! He dropped his ears, set up his
      tail, and left for San Francisco at a speed which can only be described as
      a flash and a vanish! Long after he was out of sight we could hear him
      whiz.
    </p>
    <p>
      I do not remember where we first came across "sage-brush," but as I have
      been speaking of it I may as well describe it.
    </p>
    <p>
      This is easily done, for if the reader can imagine a gnarled and venerable
      live oak-tree reduced to a little shrub two feet-high, with its rough
      bark, its foliage, its twisted boughs, all complete, he can picture the
      "sage-brush" exactly. Often, on lazy afternoons in the mountains, I have
      lain on the ground with my face under a sage-bush, and entertained myself
      with fancying that the gnats among its foliage were liliputian birds, and
      that the ants marching and countermarching about its base were liliputian
      flocks and herds, and myself some vast loafer from Brobdignag waiting to
      catch a little citizen and eat him.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link033b" id="link033b"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="033b.jpg (30K)" src="images/033b.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It is an imposing monarch of the forest in exquisite miniature, is the
      "sage-brush." Its foliage is a grayish green, and gives that tint to
      desert and mountain. It smells like our domestic sage, and "sage-tea" made
      from it taste like the sage-tea which all boys are so well acquainted
      with. The sage-brush is a singularly hardy plant, and grows right in the
      midst of deep sand, and among barren rocks, where nothing else in the
      vegetable world would try to grow, except "bunch-grass."&mdash;["Bunch-grass"
      grows on the bleak mountain-sides of Nevada and neighboring territories,
      and offers excellent feed for stock, even in the dead of winter, wherever
      the snow is blown aside and exposes it; notwithstanding its unpromising
      home, bunch-grass is a better and more nutritious diet for cattle and
      horses than almost any other hay or grass that is known&mdash;so stock-men
      say.]&mdash;The sage-bushes grow from three to six or seven feet apart,
      all over the mountains and deserts of the Far West, clear to the borders
      of California. There is not a tree of any kind in the deserts, for
      hundreds of miles&mdash;there is no vegetation at all in a regular desert,
      except the sage-brush and its cousin the "greasewood," which is so much
      like the sage-brush that the difference amounts to little. Camp-fires and
      hot suppers in the deserts would be impossible but for the friendly
      sage-brush. Its trunk is as large as a boy's wrist (and from that up to a
      man's arm), and its crooked branches are half as large as its trunk&mdash;all
      good, sound, hard wood, very like oak.
    </p>
    <p>
      When a party camps, the first thing to be done is to cut sage-brush; and
      in a few minutes there is an opulent pile of it ready for use. A hole a
      foot wide, two feet deep, and two feet long, is dug, and sage-brush
      chopped up and burned in it till it is full to the brim with glowing
      coals. Then the cooking begins, and there is no smoke, and consequently no
      swearing. Such a fire will keep all night, with very little replenishing;
      and it makes a very sociable camp-fire, and one around which the most
      impossible reminiscences sound plausible, instructive, and profoundly
      entertaining.
    </p>
    <p>
      Sage-brush is very fair fuel, but as a vegetable it is a distinguished
      failure. Nothing can abide the taste of it but the jackass and his
      illegitimate child the mule. But their testimony to its nutritiousness is
      worth nothing, for they will eat pine knots, or anthracite coal, or brass
      filings, or lead pipe, or old bottles, or anything that comes handy, and
      then go off looking as grateful as if they had had oysters for dinner.
      Mules and donkeys and camels have appetites that anything will relieve
      temporarily, but nothing satisfy.
    </p>
    <p>
      In Syria, once, at the head-waters of the Jordan, a camel took charge of
      my overcoat while the tents were being pitched, and examined it with a
      critical eye, all over, with as much interest as if he had an idea of
      getting one made like it; and then, after he was done figuring on it as an
      article of apparel, he began to contemplate it as an article of diet. He
      put his foot on it, and lifted one of the sleeves out with his teeth, and
      chewed and chewed at it, gradually taking it in, and all the while opening
      and closing his eyes in a kind of religious ecstasy, as if he had never
      tasted anything as good as an overcoat before, in his life. Then he
      smacked his lips once or twice, and reached after the other sleeve. Next
      he tried the velvet collar, and smiled a smile of such contentment that it
      was plain to see that he regarded that as the daintiest thing about an
      overcoat. The tails went next, along with some percussion caps and cough
      candy, and some fig-paste from Constantinople.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link035" id="link035"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="035.jpg (95K)" src="images/035.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And then my newspaper correspondence dropped out, and he took a chance in
      that&mdash;manuscript letters written for the home papers. But he was
      treading on dangerous ground, now. He began to come across solid wisdom in
      those documents that was rather weighty on his stomach; and occasionally
      he would take a joke that would shake him up till it loosened his teeth;
      it was getting to be perilous times with him, but he held his grip with
      good courage and hopefully, till at last he began to stumble on statements
      that not even a camel could swallow with impunity. He began to gag and
      gasp, and his eyes to stand out, and his forelegs to spread, and in about
      a quarter of a minute he fell over as stiff as a carpenter's work-bench,
      and died a death of indescribable agony. I went and pulled the manuscript
      out of his mouth, and found that the sensitive creature had choked to
      death on one of the mildest and gentlest statements of fact that I ever
      laid before a trusting public.
    </p>
    <p>
      I was about to say, when diverted from my subject, that occasionally one
      finds sage-bushes five or six feet high, and with a spread of branch and
      foliage in proportion, but two or two and a half feet is the usual height.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch04" id="linkch04"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER IV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      As the sun went down and the evening chill came on, we made preparation
      for bed. We stirred up the hard leather letter-sacks, and the knotty
      canvas bags of printed matter (knotty and uneven because of projecting
      ends and corners of magazines, boxes and books). We stirred them up and
      redisposed them in such a way as to make our bed as level as possible. And
      we did improve it, too, though after all our work it had an upheaved and
      billowy look about it, like a little piece of a stormy sea. Next we hunted
      up our boots from odd nooks among the mail-bags where they had settled,
      and put them on. Then we got down our coats, vests, pantaloons and heavy
      woolen shirts, from the arm-loops where they had been swinging all day,
      and clothed ourselves in them&mdash;for, there being no ladies either at
      the stations or in the coach, and the weather being hot, we had looked to
      our comfort by stripping to our underclothing, at nine o'clock in the
      morning. All things being now ready, we stowed the uneasy Dictionary where
      it would lie as quiet as possible, and placed the water-canteens and
      pistols where we could find them in the dark. Then we smoked a final pipe,
      and swapped a final yarn; after which, we put the pipes, tobacco and bag
      of coin in snug holes and caves among the mail-bags, and then fastened
      down the coach curtains all around, and made the place as "dark as the
      inside of a cow," as the conductor phrased it in his picturesque way. It
      was certainly as dark as any place could be&mdash;nothing was even dimly
      visible in it. And finally, we rolled ourselves up like silk- worms, each
      person in his own blanket, and sank peacefully to sleep.
    </p>
    <p>
      Whenever the stage stopped to change horses, we would wake up, and try to
      recollect where we were&mdash;and succeed&mdash;and in a minute or two the
      stage would be off again, and we likewise. We began to get into country,
      now, threaded here and there with little streams. These had high, steep
      banks on each side, and every time we flew down one bank and scrambled up
      the other, our party inside got mixed somewhat. First we would all be down
      in a pile at the forward end of the stage, nearly in a sitting posture,
      and in a second we would shoot to the other end, and stand on our heads.
      And we would sprawl and kick, too, and ward off ends and corners of mail-
      bags that came lumbering over us and about us; and as the dust rose from
      the tumult, we would all sneeze in chorus, and the majority of us would
      grumble, and probably say some hasty thing, like: "Take your elbow out of
      my ribs!&mdash;can't you quit crowding?"
    </p>
    <p>
      Every time we avalanched from one end of the stage to the other, the
      Unabridged Dictionary would come too; and every time it came it damaged
      somebody. One trip it "barked" the Secretary's elbow; the next trip it
      hurt me in the stomach, and the third it tilted Bemis's nose up till he
      could look down his nostrils&mdash;he said. The pistols and coin soon
      settled to the bottom, but the pipes, pipe-stems, tobacco and canteens
      clattered and floundered after the Dictionary every time it made an
      assault on us, and aided and abetted the book by spilling tobacco in our
      eyes, and water down our backs.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link038" id="link038"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="038.jpg (54K)" src="images/038.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Still, all things considered, it was a very comfortable night. It wore
      gradually away, and when at last a cold gray light was visible through the
      puckers and chinks in the curtains, we yawned and stretched with
      satisfaction, shed our cocoons, and felt that we had slept as much as was
      necessary. By and by, as the sun rose up and warmed the world, we pulled
      off our clothes and got ready for breakfast. We were just pleasantly in
      time, for five minutes afterward the driver sent the weird music of his
      bugle winding over the grassy solitudes, and presently we detected a low
      hut or two in the distance. Then the rattling of the coach, the clatter of
      our six horses' hoofs, and the driver's crisp commands, awoke to a louder
      and stronger emphasis, and we went sweeping down on the station at our
      smartest speed. It was fascinating&mdash;that old overland stagecoaching.
    </p>
    <p>
      We jumped out in undress uniform. The driver tossed his gathered reins out
      on the ground, gaped and stretched complacently, drew off his heavy
      buckskin gloves with great deliberation and insufferable dignity&mdash;taking
      not the slightest notice of a dozen solicitous inquires after his health,
      and humbly facetious and flattering accostings, and obsequious tenders of
      service, from five or six hairy and half-civilized station-keepers and
      hostlers who were nimbly unhitching our steeds and bringing the fresh team
      out of the stables&mdash;for in the eyes of the stage-driver of that day,
      station-keepers and hostlers were a sort of good enough low creatures,
      useful in their place, and helping to make up a world, but not the kind of
      beings which a person of distinction could afford to concern himself with;
      while, on the contrary, in the eyes of the station-keeper and the hostler,
      the stage-driver was a hero&mdash;a great and shining dignitary, the
      world's favorite son, the envy of the people, the observed of the nations.
      When they spoke to him they received his insolent silence meekly, and as
      being the natural and proper conduct of so great a man; when he opened his
      lips they all hung on his words with admiration (he never honored a
      particular individual with a remark, but addressed it with a broad
      generality to the horses, the stables, the surrounding country and the
      human underlings); when he discharged a facetious insulting personality at
      a hostler, that hostler was happy for the day; when he uttered his one
      jest&mdash;old as the hills, coarse, profane, witless, and inflicted on
      the same audience, in the same language, every time his coach drove up
      there&mdash;the varlets roared, and slapped their thighs, and swore it was
      the best thing they'd ever heard in all their lives. And how they would
      fly around when he wanted a basin of water, a gourd of the same, or a
      light for his pipe!&mdash;but they would instantly insult a passenger if
      he so far forgot himself as to crave a favor at their hands. They could do
      that sort of insolence as well as the driver they copied it from&mdash;for,
      let it be borne in mind, the overland driver had but little less contempt
      for his passengers than he had for his hostlers.
    </p>
    <p>
      The hostlers and station-keepers treated the really powerful conductor of
      the coach merely with the best of what was their idea of civility, but the
      driver was the only being they bowed down to and worshipped. How
      admiringly they would gaze up at him in his high seat as he gloved himself
      with lingering deliberation, while some happy hostler held the bunch of
      reins aloft, and waited patiently for him to take it! And how they would
      bombard him with glorifying ejaculations as he cracked his long whip and
      went careering away.
    </p>
    <p>
      The station buildings were long, low huts, made of sundried, mud-colored
      bricks, laid up without mortar (adobes, the Spaniards call these bricks,
      and Americans shorten it to 'dobies). The roofs, which had no slant to
      them worth speaking of, were thatched and then sodded or covered with a
      thick layer of earth, and from this sprung a pretty rank growth of weeds
      and grass. It was the first time we had ever seen a man's front yard on
      top of his house. The building consisted of barns, stable-room for twelve
      or fifteen horses, and a hut for an eating-room for passengers. This
      latter had bunks in it for the station-keeper and a hostler or two. You
      could rest your elbow on its eaves, and you had to bend in order to get in
      at the door. In place of a window there was a square hole about large
      enough for a man to crawl through, but this had no glass in it. There was
      no flooring, but the ground was packed hard. There was no stove, but the
      fire-place served all needful purposes. There were no shelves, no
      cupboards, no closets. In a corner stood an open sack of flour, and
      nestling against its base were a couple of black and venerable tin
      coffee-pots, a tin teapot, a little bag of salt, and a side of bacon.
    </p>
    <p>
      By the door of the station-keeper's den, outside, was a tin wash-basin, on
      the ground. Near it was a pail of water and a piece of yellow bar soap,
      and from the eaves hung a hoary blue woolen shirt, significantly&mdash;but
      this latter was the station-keeper's private towel, and only two persons
      in all the party might venture to use it&mdash;the stage-driver and the
      conductor. The latter would not, from a sense of decency; the former would
      not, because did not choose to encourage the advances of a station-
      keeper. We had towels&mdash;in the valise; they might as well have been in
      Sodom and Gomorrah. We (and the conductor) used our handkerchiefs, and the
      driver his pantaloons and sleeves. By the door, inside, was fastened a
      small old-fashioned looking-glass frame, with two little fragments of the
      original mirror lodged down in one corner of it. This arrangement afforded
      a pleasant double-barreled portrait of you when you looked into it, with
      one half of your head set up a couple of inches above the other half. From
      the glass frame hung the half of a comb by a string&mdash;but if I had to
      describe that patriarch or die, I believe I would order some sample
      coffins.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link041" id="link041"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="041.jpg (47K)" src="images/041.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="link042a" id="link042a"></a>
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="042a.jpg (11K)" src="images/042a.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It had come down from Esau and Samson, and had been accumulating hair ever
      since&mdash;along with certain impurities. In one corner of the room stood
      three or four rifles and muskets, together with horns and pouches of
      ammunition. The station-men wore pantaloons of coarse, country-woven
      stuff, and into the seat and the inside of the legs were sewed ample
      additions of buckskin, to do duty in place of leggings, when the man rode
      horseback&mdash;so the pants were half dull blue and half yellow, and
      unspeakably picturesque. The pants were stuffed into the tops of high
      boots, the heels whereof were armed with great Spanish spurs, whose little
      iron clogs and chains jingled with every step. The man wore a huge beard
      and mustachios, an old slouch hat, a blue woolen shirt, no suspenders, no
      vest, no coat&mdash;in a leathern sheath in his belt, a great long "navy"
      revolver (slung on right side, hammer to the front), and projecting from
      his boot a horn-handled bowie-knife.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link042b" id="link042b"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="042b.jpg (42K)" src="images/042b.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The furniture of the hut was neither gorgeous nor much in the way. The
      rocking-chairs and sofas were not present, and never had been, but they
      were represented by two three-legged stools, a pine-board bench four feet
      long, and two empty candle-boxes. The table was a greasy board on stilts,
      and the table- cloth and napkins had not come&mdash;and they were not
      looking for them, either. A battered tin platter, a knife and fork, and a
      tin pint cup, were at each man's place, and the driver had a queens-ware
      saucer that had seen better days. Of course this duke sat at the head of
      the table. There was one isolated piece of table furniture that bore about
      it a touching air of grandeur in misfortune. This was the caster. It was
      German silver, and crippled and rusty, but it was so preposterously out of
      place there that it was suggestive of a tattered exiled king among
      barbarians, and the majesty of its native position compelled respect even
      in its degradation.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was only one cruet left, and that was a stopperless, fly-specked,
      broken-necked thing, with two inches of vinegar in it, and a dozen
      preserved flies with their heels up and looking sorry they had invested
      there.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link043" id="link043"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="043.jpg (23K)" src="images/043.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The station-keeper upended a disk of last week's bread, of the shape and
      size of an old-time cheese, and carved some slabs from it which were as
      good as Nicholson pavement, and tenderer.
    </p>
    <p>
      He sliced off a piece of bacon for each man, but only the experienced old
      hands made out to eat it, for it was condemned army bacon which the United
      States would not feed to its soldiers in the forts, and the stage company
      had bought it cheap for the sustenance of their passengers and employees.
      We may have found this condemned army bacon further out on the plains than
      the section I am locating it in, but we found it&mdash;there is no
      gainsaying that.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then he poured for us a beverage which he called "Slum gullion," and it is
      hard to think he was not inspired when he named it. It really pretended to
      be tea, but there was too much dish-rag, and sand, and old bacon-rind in
      it to deceive the intelligent traveler.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link044" id="link044"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="044.jpg (64K)" src="images/044.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      He had no sugar and no milk&mdash;not even a spoon to stir the ingredients
      with.
    </p>
    <p>
      We could not eat the bread or the meat, nor drink the "slumgullion." And
      when I looked at that melancholy vinegar-cruet, I thought of the anecdote
      (a very, very old one, even at that day) of the traveler who sat down to a
      table which had nothing on it but a mackerel and a pot of mustard. He
      asked the landlord if this was all. The landlord said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "All! Why, thunder and lightning, I should think there was mackerel enough
      there for six."
    </p>
    <p>
      "But I don't like mackerel."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh&mdash;then help yourself to the mustard."
    </p>
    <p>
      In other days I had considered it a good, a very good, anecdote, but there
      was a dismal plausibility about it, here, that took all the humor out of
      it.
    </p>
    <p>
      Our breakfast was before us, but our teeth were idle.
    </p>
    <p>
      I tasted and smelt, and said I would take coffee, I believed. The
      station-boss stopped dead still, and glared at me speechless. At last,
      when he came to, he turned away and said, as one who communes with himself
      upon a matter too vast to grasp:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Coffee! Well, if that don't go clean ahead of me, I'm d&mdash;-d!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link045" id="link045"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="045.jpg (40K)" src="images/045.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We could not eat, and there was no conversation among the hostlers and
      herdsmen&mdash;we all sat at the same board. At least there was no
      conversation further than a single hurried request, now and then, from one
      employee to another. It was always in the same form, and always gruffly
      friendly. Its western freshness and novelty startled me, at first, and
      interested me; but it presently grew monotonous, and lost its charm. It
      was:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Pass the bread, you son of a skunk!" No, I forget&mdash;skunk was not the
      word; it seems to me it was still stronger than that; I know it was, in
      fact, but it is gone from my memory, apparently. However, it is no matter&mdash;probably
      it was too strong for print, anyway. It is the landmark in my memory which
      tells me where I first encountered the vigorous new vernacular of the
      occidental plains and mountains.
    </p>
    <p>
      We gave up the breakfast, and paid our dollar apiece and went back to our
      mail-bag bed in the coach, and found comfort in our pipes. Right here we
      suffered the first diminution of our princely state. We left our six fine
      horses and took six mules in their place. But they were wild Mexican
      fellows, and a man had to stand at the head of each of them and hold him
      fast while the driver gloved and got himself ready. And when at last he
      grasped the reins and gave the word, the men sprung suddenly away from the
      mules' heads and the coach shot from the station as if it had issued from
      a cannon. How the frantic animals did scamper! It was a fierce and furious
      gallop&mdash;and the gait never altered for a moment till we reeled off
      ten or twelve miles and swept up to the next collection of little
      station-huts and stables.
    </p>
    <p>
      So we flew along all day. At 2 P.M. the belt of timber that fringes the
      North Platte and marks its windings through the vast level floor of the
      Plains came in sight. At 4 P.M. we crossed a branch of the river, and at 5
      P.M. we crossed the Platte itself, and landed at Fort Kearney, fifty-six
      hours out from St. Joe&mdash;THREE HUNDRED MILES!
    </p>
    <p>
      Now that was stage-coaching on the great overland, ten or twelve years
      ago, when perhaps not more than ten men in America, all told, expected to
      live to see a railroad follow that route to the Pacific. But the railroad
      is there, now, and it pictures a thousand odd comparisons and contrasts in
      my mind to read the following sketch, in the New York Times, of a recent
      trip over almost the very ground I have been describing. I can scarcely
      comprehend the new state of things:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "ACROSS THE CONTINENT.
      </p>
      <p>
        "At 4.20 P.M., Sunday, we rolled out of the station at Omaha, and
        started westward on our long jaunt. A couple of hours out, dinner was
        announced&mdash;an "event" to those of us who had yet to experience what
        it is to eat in one of Pullman's hotels on wheels; so, stepping into the
        car next forward of our sleeping palace, we found ourselves in the
        dining-car. It was a revelation to us, that first dinner on Sunday. And
        though we continued to dine for four days, and had as many breakfasts
        and suppers, our whole party never ceased to admire the perfection of
        the arrangements, and the marvelous results achieved. Upon tables
        covered with snowy linen, and garnished with services of solid silver,
        Ethiop waiters, flitting about in spotless white, placed as by magic a
        repast at which Delmonico himself could have had no occasion to blush;
        and, indeed, in some respects it would be hard for that distinguished
        chef to match our menu; for, in addition to all that ordinarily makes up
        a first-chop dinner, had we not our antelope steak (the gormand who has
        not experienced this&mdash;bah! what does he know of the feast of fat
        things?) our delicious mountain-brook trout, and choice fruits and
        berries, and (sauce piquant and unpurchasable!) our sweet-scented,
        appetite-compelling air of the prairies?
      </p>
      <p>
        <a name="link047" id="link047"></a> <br /><br />
      </p>
      <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
        <img alt="047.jpg (88K)" src="images/047.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
      </div>
      <p>
        <br /><br />
      </p>
      <p>
        "You may depend upon it, we all did justice to the good things, and as
        we washed them down with bumpers of sparkling Krug, whilst we sped along
        at the rate of thirty miles an hour, agreed it was the fastest living we
        had ever experienced. (We beat that, however, two days afterward when we
        made twenty-seven miles in twenty-seven minutes, while our Champagne
        glasses filled to the brim spilled not a drop!) After dinner we repaired
        to our drawing-room car, and, as it was Sabbath eve, intoned some of the
        grand old hymns&mdash;"Praise God from whom," etc.; "Shining Shore,"
        "Coronation," etc.&mdash;the voices of the men singers and of the women
        singers blending sweetly in the evening air, while our train, with its
        great, glaring Polyphemus eye, lighting up long vistas of prairie,
        rushed into the night and the Wild. Then to bed in luxurious couches,
        where we slept the sleep of the just and only awoke the next morning
        (Monday) at eight o'clock, to find ourselves at the crossing of the
        North Platte, three hundred miles from Omaha&mdash;fifteen hours and
        forty minutes out."
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch05" id="linkch05"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER V.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Another night of alternate tranquillity and turmoil. But morning came, by
      and by. It was another glad awakening to fresh breezes, vast expanses of
      level greensward, bright sunlight, an impressive solitude utterly without
      visible human beings or human habitations, and an atmosphere of such
      amazing magnifying properties that trees that seemed close at hand were
      more than three mile away. We resumed undress uniform, climbed a-top of
      the flying coach, dangled our legs over the side, shouted occasionally at
      our frantic mules, merely to see them lay their ears back and scamper
      faster, tied our hats on to keep our hair from blowing away, and leveled
      an outlook over the world-wide carpet about us for things new and strange
      to gaze at. Even at this day it thrills me through and through to think of
      the life, the gladness and the wild sense of freedom that used to make the
      blood dance in my veins on those fine overland mornings!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link049" id="link049"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="049.jpg (43K)" src="images/049.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <a name="link050" id="link050"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="050.jpg (51K)" src="images/050.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Along about an hour after breakfast we saw the first prairie-dog villages,
      the first antelope, and the first wolf. If I remember rightly, this latter
      was the regular cayote (pronounced ky-o-te) of the farther deserts. And if
      it was, he was not a pretty creature or respectable either, for I got well
      acquainted with his race afterward, and can speak with confidence. The
      cayote is a long, slim, sick and sorry-looking skeleton, with a gray
      wolf-skin stretched over it, a tolerably bushy tail that forever sags down
      with a despairing expression of forsakenness and misery, a furtive and
      evil eye, and a long, sharp face, with slightly lifted lip and exposed
      teeth. He has a general slinking expression all over. The cayote is a
      living, breathing allegory of Want. He is always hungry.
    </p>
    <p>
      He is always poor, out of luck and friendless. The meanest creatures
      despise him, and even the fleas would desert him for a velocipede. He is
      so spiritless and cowardly that even while his exposed teeth are
      pretending a threat, the rest of his face is apologizing for it. And he is
      so homely!&mdash;so scrawny, and ribby, and coarse-haired, and pitiful.
      When he sees you he lifts his lip and lets a flash of his teeth out, and
      then turns a little out of the course he was pursuing, depresses his head
      a bit, and strikes a long, soft-footed trot through the sage-brush,
      glancing over his shoulder at you, from time to time, till he is about out
      of easy pistol range, and then he stops and takes a deliberate survey of
      you; he will trot fifty yards and stop again&mdash;another fifty and stop
      again; and finally the gray of his gliding body blends with the gray of
      the sage-brush, and he disappears. All this is when you make no
      demonstration against him; but if you do, he develops a livelier interest
      in his journey, and instantly electrifies his heels and puts such a deal
      of real estate between himself and your weapon, that by the time you have
      raised the hammer you see that you need a minie rifle, and by the time you
      have got him in line you need a rifled cannon, and by the time you have
      "drawn a bead" on him you see well enough that nothing but an unusually
      long-winded streak of lightning could reach him where he is now. But if
      you start a swift-footed dog after him, you will enjoy it ever so much&mdash;especially
      if it is a dog that has a good opinion of himself, and has been brought up
      to think he knows something about speed.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link051" id="link051"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="051.jpg (42K)" src="images/051.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The cayote will go swinging gently off on that deceitful trot of his, and
      every little while he will smile a fraudful smile over his shoulder that
      will fill that dog entirely full of encouragement and worldly ambition,
      and make him lay his head still lower to the ground, and stretch his neck
      further to the front, and pant more fiercely, and stick his tail out
      straighter behind, and move his furious legs with a yet wilder frenzy, and
      leave a broader and broader, and higher and denser cloud of desert sand
      smoking behind, and marking his long wake across the level plain! And all
      this time the dog is only a short twenty feet behind the cayote, and to
      save the soul of him he cannot understand why it is that he cannot get
      perceptibly closer; and he begins to get aggravated, and it makes him
      madder and madder to see how gently the cayote glides along and never
      pants or sweats or ceases to smile; and he grows still more and more
      incensed to see how shamefully he has been taken in by an entire stranger,
      and what an ignoble swindle that long, calm, soft-footed trot is; and next
      he notices that he is getting fagged, and that the cayote actually has to
      slacken speed a little to keep from running away from him&mdash;and then
      that town-dog is mad in earnest, and he begins to strain and weep and
      swear, and paw the sand higher than ever, and reach for the cayote with
      concentrated and desperate energy. This "spurt" finds him six feet behind
      the gliding enemy, and two miles from his friends. And then, in the
      instant that a wild new hope is lighting up his face, the cayote turns and
      smiles blandly upon him once more, and with a something about it which
      seems to say: "Well, I shall have to tear myself away from you, bub&mdash;business
      is business, and it will not do for me to be fooling along this way all
      day"&mdash;and forthwith there is a rushing sound, and the sudden
      splitting of a long crack through the atmosphere, and behold that dog is
      solitary and alone in the midst of a vast solitude!
    </p>
    <p>
      It makes his head swim. He stops, and looks all around; climbs the nearest
      sand-mound, and gazes into the distance; shakes his head reflectively, and
      then, without a word, he turns and jogs along back to his train, and takes
      up a humble position under the hindmost wagon, and feels unspeakably mean,
      and looks ashamed, and hangs his tail at half- mast for a week. And for as
      much as a year after that, whenever there is a great hue and cry after a
      cayote, that dog will merely glance in that direction without emotion, and
      apparently observe to himself, "I believe I do not wish any of the pie."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link052" id="link052"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="052.jpg (145K)" src="images/052.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The cayote lives chiefly in the most desolate and forbidding desert, along
      with the lizard, the jackass-rabbit and the raven, and gets an uncertain
      and precarious living, and earns it. He seems to subsist almost wholly on
      the carcases of oxen, mules and horses that have dropped out of emigrant
      trains and died, and upon windfalls of carrion, and occasional legacies of
      offal bequeathed to him by white men who have been opulent enough to have
      something better to butcher than condemned army bacon.
    </p>
    <p>
      He will eat anything in the world that his first cousins, the desert-
      frequenting tribes of Indians will, and they will eat anything they can
      bite. It is a curious fact that these latter are the only creatures known
      to history who will eat nitro-glycerine and ask for more if they survive.
    </p>
    <p>
      The cayote of the deserts beyond the Rocky Mountains has a peculiarly hard
      time of it, owing to the fact that his relations, the Indians, are just as
      apt to be the first to detect a seductive scent on the desert breeze, and
      follow the fragrance to the late ox it emanated from, as he is himself;
      and when this occurs he has to content himself with sitting off at a
      little distance watching those people strip off and dig out everything
      edible, and walk off with it. Then he and the waiting ravens explore the
      skeleton and polish the bones. It is considered that the cayote, and the
      obscene bird, and the Indian of the desert, testify their blood kinship
      with each other in that they live together in the waste places of the
      earth on terms of perfect confidence and friendship, while hating all
      other creature and yearning to assist at their funerals. He does not mind
      going a hundred miles to breakfast, and a hundred and fifty to dinner,
      because he is sure to have three or four days between meals, and he can
      just as well be traveling and looking at the scenery as lying around doing
      nothing and adding to the burdens of his parents.
    </p>
    <p>
      We soon learned to recognize the sharp, vicious bark of the cayote as it
      came across the murky plain at night to disturb our dreams among the
      mail-sacks; and remembering his forlorn aspect and his hard fortune, made
      shift to wish him the blessed novelty of a long day's good luck and a
      limitless larder the morrow.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch06" id="linkch06"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER VI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Our new conductor (just shipped) had been without sleep for twenty hours.
      Such a thing was very frequent. From St. Joseph, Missouri, to Sacramento,
      California, by stage-coach, was nearly nineteen hundred miles, and the
      trip was often made in fifteen days (the cars do it in four and a half,
      now), but the time specified in the mail contracts, and required by the
      schedule, was eighteen or nineteen days, if I remember rightly. This was
      to make fair allowance for winter storms and snows, and other unavoidable
      causes of detention. The stage company had everything under strict
      discipline and good system. Over each two hundred and fifty miles of road
      they placed an agent or superintendent, and invested him with great
      authority. His beat or jurisdiction of two hundred and fifty miles was
      called a "division." He purchased horses, mules harness, and food for men
      and beasts, and distributed these things among his stage stations, from
      time to time, according to his judgment of what each station needed. He
      erected station buildings and dug wells. He attended to the paying of the
      station-keepers, hostlers, drivers and blacksmiths, and discharged them
      whenever he chose. He was a very, very great man in his "division"&mdash;a
      kind of Grand Mogul, a Sultan of the Indies, in whose presence common men
      were modest of speech and manner, and in the glare of whose greatness even
      the dazzling stage-driver dwindled to a penny dip. There were about eight
      of these kings, all told, on the overland route.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link055" id="link055"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="055.jpg (39K)" src="images/055.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Next in rank and importance to the division-agent came the "conductor."
      His beat was the same length as the agent's&mdash;two hundred and fifty
      miles. He sat with the driver, and (when necessary) rode that fearful
      distance, night and day, without other rest or sleep than what he could
      get perched thus on top of the flying vehicle. Think of it! He had
      absolute charge of the mails, express matter, passengers and stage, coach,
      until he delivered them to the next conductor, and got his receipt for
      them.
    </p>
    <p>
      Consequently he had to be a man of intelligence, decision and considerable
      executive ability. He was usually a quiet, pleasant man, who attended
      closely to his duties, and was a good deal of a gentleman. It was not
      absolutely necessary that the division-agent should be a gentleman, and
      occasionally he wasn't. But he was always a general in administrative
      ability, and a bull-dog in courage and determination&mdash;otherwise the
      chieftainship over the lawless underlings of the overland service would
      never in any instance have been to him anything but an equivalent for a
      month of insolence and distress and a bullet and a coffin at the end of
      it. There were about sixteen or eighteen conductors on the overland, for
      there was a daily stage each way, and a conductor on every stage.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next in real and official rank and importance, after the conductor, came
      my delight, the driver&mdash;next in real but not in apparent importance&mdash;for
      we have seen that in the eyes of the common herd the driver was to the
      conductor as an admiral is to the captain of the flag-ship. The driver's
      beat was pretty long, and his sleeping-time at the stations pretty short,
      sometimes; and so, but for the grandeur of his position his would have
      been a sorry life, as well as a hard and a wearing one. We took a new
      driver every day or every night (for they drove backward and forward over
      the same piece of road all the time), and therefore we never got as well
      acquainted with them as we did with the conductors; and besides, they
      would have been above being familiar with such rubbish as passengers,
      anyhow, as a general thing. Still, we were always eager to get a sight of
      each and every new driver as soon as the watch changed, for each and every
      day we were either anxious to get rid of an unpleasant one, or loath to
      part with a driver we had learned to like and had come to be sociable and
      friendly with. And so the first question we asked the conductor whenever
      we got to where we were to exchange drivers, was always, "Which is him?"
      The grammar was faulty, maybe, but we could not know, then, that it would
      go into a book some day. As long as everything went smoothly, the overland
      driver was well enough situated, but if a fellow driver got sick suddenly
      it made trouble, for the coach must go on, and so the potentate who was
      about to climb down and take a luxurious rest after his long night's siege
      in the midst of wind and rain and darkness, had to stay where he was and
      do the sick man's work. Once, in the Rocky Mountains, when I found a
      driver sound asleep on the box, and the mules going at the usual
      break-neck pace, the conductor said never mind him, there was no danger,
      and he was doing double duty&mdash;had driven seventy-five miles on one
      coach, and was now going back over it on this without rest or sleep. A
      hundred and fifty miles of holding back of six vindictive mules and
      keeping them from climbing the trees! It sounds incredible, but I remember
      the statement well enough.
    </p>
    <p>
      The station-keepers, hostlers, etc., were low, rough characters, as
      already described; and from western Nebraska to Nevada a considerable
      sprinkling of them might be fairly set down as outlaws&mdash;fugitives
      from justice, criminals whose best security was a section of country which
      was without law and without even the pretence of it. When the "division-
      agent" issued an order to one of these parties he did it with the full
      understanding that he might have to enforce it with a navy six-shooter,
      and so he always went "fixed" to make things go along smoothly.
    </p>
    <p>
      Now and then a division-agent was really obliged to shoot a hostler
      through the head to teach him some simple matter that he could have taught
      him with a club if his circumstances and surroundings had been different.
      But they were snappy, able men, those division-agents, and when they tried
      to teach a subordinate anything, that subordinate generally "got it
      through his head."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link057" id="link057"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="057.jpg (53K)" src="images/057.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      A great portion of this vast machinery&mdash;these hundreds of men and
      coaches, and thousands of mules and horses&mdash;was in the hands of Mr.
      Ben Holliday. All the western half of the business was in his hands. This
      reminds me of an incident of Palestine travel which is pertinent here, so
      I will transfer it just in the language in which I find it set down in my
      Holy Land note-book:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        No doubt everybody has heard of Ben Holliday&mdash;a man of prodigious
        energy, who used to send mails and passengers flying across the
        continent in his overland stage-coaches like a very whirlwind&mdash;two
        thousand long miles in fifteen days and a half, by the watch! But this
        fragment of history is not about Ben Holliday, but about a young New
        York boy by the name of Jack, who traveled with our small party of
        pilgrims in the Holy Land (and who had traveled to California in Mr.
        Holliday's overland coaches three years before, and had by no means
        forgotten it or lost his gushing admiration of Mr. H.) Aged nineteen.
        Jack was a good boy&mdash;a good-hearted and always well-meaning boy,
        who had been reared in the city of New York, and although he was bright
        and knew a great many useful things, his Scriptural education had been a
        good deal neglected&mdash;to such a degree, indeed, that all Holy Land
        history was fresh and new to him, and all Bible names mysteries that had
        never disturbed his virgin ear.
      </p>
      <p>
        Also in our party was an elderly pilgrim who was the reverse of Jack, in
        that he was learned in the Scriptures and an enthusiast concerning them.
        He was our encyclopedia, and we were never tired of listening to his
        speeches, nor he of making them. He never passed a celebrated locality,
        from Bashan to Bethlehem, without illuminating it with an oration. One
        day, when camped near the ruins of Jericho, he burst forth with
        something like this:
      </p>
      <p>
        "Jack, do you see that range of mountains over yonder that bounds the
        Jordan valley? The mountains of Moab, Jack! Think of it, my boy&mdash;the
        actual mountains of Moab&mdash;renowned in Scripture history! We are
        actually standing face to face with those illustrious crags and peaks&mdash;and
        for all we know" [dropping his voice impressively], "our eyes may be
        resting at this very moment upon the spot WHERE LIES THE MYSTERIOUS
        GRAVE OF MOSES! Think of it, Jack!"
      </p>
      <p>
        "Moses who?" (falling inflection).
      </p>
      <p>
        <a name="link058" id="link058"></a> <br /><br />
      </p>
      <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
        <img alt="058.jpg (62K)" src="images/058.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
      </div>
      <p>
        <br /><br />
      </p>
      <p>
        "Moses who! Jack, you ought to be ashamed of yourself&mdash;you ought to
        be ashamed of such criminal ignorance. Why, Moses, the great guide,
        soldier, poet, lawgiver of ancient Israel! Jack, from this spot where we
        stand, to Egypt, stretches a fearful desert three hundred miles in
        extent&mdash;and across that desert that wonderful man brought the
        children of Israel!&mdash;guiding them with unfailing sagacity for forty
        years over the sandy desolation and among the obstructing rocks and
        hills, and landed them at last, safe and sound, within sight of this
        very spot; and where we now stand they entered the Promised Land with
        anthems of rejoicing! It was a wonderful, wonderful thing to do, Jack!
        Think of it!"
      </p>
      <p>
        "Forty years? Only three hundred miles? Humph! Ben Holliday would have
        fetched them through in thirty-six hours!"
      </p>
      <p>
        The boy meant no harm. He did not know that he had said anything that
        was wrong or irreverent. And so no one scolded him or felt offended with
        him&mdash;and nobody could but some ungenerous spirit incapable of
        excusing the heedless blunders of a boy.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      At noon on the fifth day out, we arrived at the "Crossing of the South
      Platte," alias "Julesburg," alias "Overland City," four hundred and
      seventy miles from St. Joseph&mdash;the strangest, quaintest, funniest
      frontier town that our untraveled eyes had ever stared at and been
      astonished with.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch07" id="linkch07"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER VII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It did seem strange enough to see a town again after what appeared to us
      such a long acquaintance with deep, still, almost lifeless and houseless
      solitude! We tumbled out into the busy street feeling like meteoric people
      crumbled off the corner of some other world, and wakened up suddenly in
      this. For an hour we took as much interest in Overland City as if we had
      never seen a town before. The reason we had an hour to spare was because
      we had to change our stage (for a less sumptuous affair, called a
      "mud-wagon") and transfer our freight of mails.
    </p>
    <p>
      Presently we got under way again. We came to the shallow, yellow, muddy
      South Platte, with its low banks and its scattering flat sand-bars and
      pigmy islands&mdash;a melancholy stream straggling through the centre of
      the enormous flat plain, and only saved from being impossible to find with
      the naked eye by its sentinel rank of scattering trees standing on either
      bank. The Platte was "up," they said&mdash;which made me wish I could see
      it when it was down, if it could look any sicker and sorrier. They said it
      was a dangerous stream to cross, now, because its quicksands were liable
      to swallow up horses, coach and passengers if an attempt was made to ford
      it. But the mails had to go, and we made the attempt. Once or twice in
      midstream the wheels sunk into the yielding sands so threateningly that we
      half believed we had dreaded and avoided the sea all our lives to be
      shipwrecked in a "mud-wagon" in the middle of a desert at last. But we
      dragged through and sped away toward the setting sun.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link061" id="link061"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="061.jpg (69K)" src="images/061.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      Next morning, just before dawn, when about five hundred and fifty miles
      from St. Joseph, our mud-wagon broke down. We were to be delayed five or
      six hours, and therefore we took horses, by invitation, and joined a party
      who were just starting on a buffalo hunt. It was noble sport galloping
      over the plain in the dewy freshness of the morning, but our part of the
      hunt ended in disaster and disgrace, for a wounded buffalo bull chased the
      passenger Bemis nearly two miles, and then he forsook his horse and took
      to a lone tree. He was very sullen about the matter for some twenty-four
      hours, but at last he began to soften little by little, and finally he
      said:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link062" id="link062"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="062.jpg (81K)" src="images/062.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, it was not funny, and there was no sense in those gawks making
      themselves so facetious over it. I tell you I was angry in earnest for
      awhile. I should have shot that long gangly lubber they called Hank, if I
      could have done it without crippling six or seven other people&mdash;but
      of course I couldn't, the old 'Allen's' so confounded comprehensive. I
      wish those loafers had been up in the tree; they wouldn't have wanted to
      laugh so. If I had had a horse worth a cent&mdash;but no, the minute he
      saw that buffalo bull wheel on him and give a bellow, he raised straight
      up in the air and stood on his heels. The saddle began to slip, and I took
      him round the neck and laid close to him, and began to pray. Then he came
      down and stood up on the other end awhile, and the bull actually stopped
      pawing sand and bellowing to contemplate the inhuman spectacle.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Then the bull made a pass at him and uttered a bellow that sounded
      perfectly frightful, it was so close to me, and that seemed to literally
      prostrate my horse's reason, and make a raving distracted maniac of him,
      and I wish I may die if he didn't stand on his head for a quarter of a
      minute and shed tears. He was absolutely out of his mind&mdash;he was, as
      sure as truth itself, and he really didn't know what he was doing. Then
      the bull came charging at us, and my horse dropped down on all fours and
      took a fresh start&mdash;and then for the next ten minutes he would
      actually throw one hand-spring after another so fast that the bull began
      to get unsettled, too, and didn't know where to start in&mdash;and so he
      stood there sneezing, and shovelling dust over his back, and bellowing
      every now and then, and thinking he had got a fifteen-hundred dollar
      circus horse for breakfast, certain. Well, I was first out on his neck&mdash;the
      horse's, not the bull's&mdash;and then underneath, and next on his rump,
      and sometimes head up, and sometimes heels&mdash;but I tell you it seemed
      solemn and awful to be ripping and tearing and carrying on so in the
      presence of death, as you might say. Pretty soon the bull made a snatch
      for us and brought away some of my horse's tail (I suppose, but do not
      know, being pretty busy at the time), but something made him hungry for
      solitude and suggested to him to get up and hunt for it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link063" id="link063"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="063.jpg (63K)" src="images/063.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "And then you ought to have seen that spider legged old skeleton go! and
      you ought to have seen the bull cut out after him, too&mdash;head down,
      tongue out, tail up, bellowing like everything, and actually mowing down
      the weeds, and tearing up the earth, and boosting up the sand like a
      whirlwind! By George, it was a hot race! I and the saddle were back on the
      rump, and I had the bridle in my teeth and holding on to the pommel with
      both hands. First we left the dogs behind; then we passed a jackass
      rabbit; then we overtook a cayote, and were gaining on an antelope when
      the rotten girth let go and threw me about thirty yards off to the left,
      and as the saddle went down over the horse's rump he gave it a lift with
      his heels that sent it more than four hundred yards up in the air, I wish
      I may die in a minute if he didn't. I fell at the foot of the only
      solitary tree there was in nine counties adjacent (as any creature could
      see with the naked eye), and the next second I had hold of the bark with
      four sets of nails and my teeth, and the next second after that I was
      astraddle of the main limb and blaspheming my luck in a way that made my
      breath smell of brimstone. I had the bull, now, if he did not think of one
      thing. But that one thing I dreaded. I dreaded it very seriously. There
      was a possibility that the bull might not think of it, but there were
      greater chances that he would. I made up my mind what I would do in case
      he did. It was a little over forty feet to the ground from where I sat. I
      cautiously unwound the lariat from the pommel of my saddle&mdash;&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Your saddle? Did you take your saddle up in the tree with you?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Take it up in the tree with me? Why, how you talk. Of course I didn't. No
      man could do that. It fell in the tree when it came down."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh&mdash;exactly."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Certainly. I unwound the lariat, and fastened one end of it to the limb.
      It was the very best green raw-hide, and capable of sustaining tons. I
      made a slip-noose in the other end, and then hung it down to see the
      length. It reached down twenty-two feet&mdash;half way to the ground. I
      then loaded every barrel of the Allen with a double charge. I felt
      satisfied. I said to myself, if he never thinks of that one thing that I
      dread, all right&mdash;but if he does, all right anyhow&mdash;I am fixed
      for him. But don't you know that the very thing a man dreads is the thing
      that always happens? Indeed it is so. I watched the bull, now, with
      anxiety&mdash;anxiety which no one can conceive of who has not been in
      such a situation and felt that at any moment death might come. Presently a
      thought came into the bull's eye. I knew it! said I&mdash;if my nerve
      fails now, I am lost. Sure enough, it was just as I had dreaded, he
      started in to climb the tree&mdash;&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "What, the bull?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Of course&mdash;who else?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "But a bull can't climb a tree."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link065" id="link065"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="065.jpg (75K)" src="images/065.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "He can't, can't he? Since you know so much about it, did you ever see a
      bull try?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "No! I never dreamt of such a thing."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, then, what is the use of your talking that way, then? Because you
      never saw a thing done, is that any reason why it can't be done?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, all right&mdash;go on. What did you do?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "The bull started up, and got along well for about ten feet, then slipped
      and slid back. I breathed easier. He tried it again&mdash;got up a little
      higher&mdash;slipped again. But he came at it once more, and this time he
      was careful. He got gradually higher and higher, and my spirits went down
      more and more. Up he came&mdash;an inch at a time&mdash;with his eyes hot,
      and his tongue hanging out. Higher and higher&mdash;hitched his foot over
      the stump of a limb, and looked up, as much as to say, 'You are my meat,
      friend.' Up again&mdash;higher and higher, and getting more excited the
      closer he got. He was within ten feet of me! I took a long breath,&mdash;and
      then said I, 'It is now or never.' I had the coil of the lariat all ready;
      I paid it out slowly, till it hung right over his head; all of a sudden I
      let go of the slack, and the slipnoose fell fairly round his neck! Quicker
      than lightning I out with the Allen and let him have it in the face. It
      was an awful roar, and must have scared the bull out of his senses. When
      the smoke cleared away, there he was, dangling in the air, twenty foot
      from the ground, and going out of one convulsion into another faster than
      you could count! I didn't stop to count, anyhow&mdash;I shinned down the
      tree and shot for home."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Bemis, is all that true, just as you have stated it?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I wish I may rot in my tracks and die the death of a dog if it isn't."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, we can't refuse to believe it, and we don't. But if there were some
      proofs&mdash;&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Proofs! Did I bring back my lariat?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "No."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Did I bring back my horse?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "No."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Did you ever see the bull again?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "No."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, then, what more do you want? I never saw anybody as particular as
      you are about a little thing like that."
    </p>
    <p>
      I made up my mind that if this man was not a liar he only missed it by the
      skin of his teeth. This episode reminds me of an incident of my brief
      sojourn in Siam, years afterward. The European citizens of a town in the
      neighborhood of Bangkok had a prodigy among them by the name of Eckert, an
      Englishman&mdash;a person famous for the number, ingenuity and imposing
      magnitude of his lies. They were always repeating his most celebrated
      falsehoods, and always trying to "draw him out" before strangers; but they
      seldom succeeded. Twice he was invited to the house where I was visiting,
      but nothing could seduce him into a specimen lie. One day a planter named
      Bascom, an influential man, and a proud and sometimes irascible one,
      invited me to ride over with him and call on Eckert. As we jogged along,
      said he:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Now, do you know where the fault lies? It lies in putting Eckert on his
      guard. The minute the boys go to pumping at Eckert he knows perfectly well
      what they are after, and of course he shuts up his shell. Anybody might
      know he would. But when we get there, we must play him finer than that.
      Let him shape the conversation to suit himself&mdash;let him drop it or
      change it whenever he wants to. Let him see that nobody is trying to draw
      him out. Just let him have his own way. He will soon forget himself and
      begin to grind out lies like a mill. Don't get impatient&mdash;just keep
      quiet, and let me play him. I will make him lie. It does seem to me that
      the boys must be blind to overlook such an obvious and simple trick as
      that."
    </p>
    <p>
      Eckert received us heartily&mdash;a pleasant-spoken, gentle-mannered
      creature. We sat in the veranda an hour, sipping English ale, and talking
      about the king, and the sacred white elephant, the Sleeping Idol, and all
      manner of things; and I noticed that my comrade never led the conversation
      himself or shaped it, but simply followed Eckert's lead, and betrayed no
      solicitude and no anxiety about anything. The effect was shortly
      perceptible. Eckert began to grow communicative; he grew more and more at
      his ease, and more and more talkative and sociable. Another hour passed in
      the same way, and then all of a sudden Eckert said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, by the way! I came near forgetting. I have got a thing here to
      astonish you. Such a thing as neither you nor any other man ever heard of&mdash;I've
      got a cat that will eat cocoanut! Common green cocoanut&mdash;and not only
      eat the meat, but drink the milk. It is so&mdash;I'll swear to it."
    </p>
    <p>
      A quick glance from Bascom&mdash;a glance that I understood&mdash;then:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why, bless my soul, I never heard of such a thing. Man, it is
      impossible."
    </p>
    <p>
      "I knew you would say it. I'll fetch the cat."
    </p>
    <p>
      He went in the house. Bascom said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "There&mdash;what did I tell you? Now, that is the way to handle Eckert.
      You see, I have petted him along patiently, and put his suspicions to
      sleep. I am glad we came. You tell the boys about it when you go back. Cat
      eat a cocoanut&mdash;oh, my! Now, that is just his way, exactly&mdash;he
      will tell the absurdest lie, and trust to luck to get out of it again.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Cat eat a cocoanut&mdash;the innocent fool!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link068" id="link068"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="068.jpg (84K)" src="images/068.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Eckert approached with his cat, sure enough.
    </p>
    <p>
      Bascom smiled. Said he:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'll hold the cat&mdash;you bring a cocoanut."
    </p>
    <p>
      Eckert split one open, and chopped up some pieces. Bascom smuggled a wink
      to me, and proffered a slice of the fruit to puss. She snatched it,
      swallowed it ravenously, and asked for more!
    </p>
    <p>
      We rode our two miles in silence, and wide apart. At least I was silent,
      though Bascom cuffed his horse and cursed him a good deal, notwithstanding
      the horse was behaving well enough. When I branched off homeward, Bascom
      said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Keep the horse till morning. And&mdash;you need not speak of this&mdash;foolishness
      to the boys."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link069" id="link069"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="069.jpg (50K)" src="images/069.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch08" id="linkch08"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER VIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In a little while all interest was taken up in stretching our necks and
      watching for the "pony-rider"&mdash;the fleet messenger who sped across
      the continent from St. Joe to Sacramento, carrying letters nineteen
      hundred miles in eight days! Think of that for perishable horse and human
      flesh and blood to do! The pony-rider was usually a little bit of a man,
      brimful of spirit and endurance. No matter what time of the day or night
      his watch came on, and no matter whether it was winter or summer, raining,
      snowing, hailing, or sleeting, or whether his "beat" was a level straight
      road or a crazy trail over mountain crags and precipices, or whether it
      led through peaceful regions or regions that swarmed with hostile Indians,
      he must be always ready to leap into the saddle and be off like the wind!
      There was no idling-time for a pony-rider on duty. He rode fifty miles
      without stopping, by daylight, moonlight, starlight, or through the
      blackness of darkness&mdash;just as it happened. He rode a splendid horse
      that was born for a racer and fed and lodged like a gentleman; kept him at
      his utmost speed for ten miles, and then, as he came crashing up to the
      station where stood two men holding fast a fresh, impatient steed, the
      transfer of rider and mail-bag was made in the twinkling of an eye, and
      away flew the eager pair and were out of sight before the spectator could
      get hardly the ghost of a look. Both rider and horse went "flying light."
      The rider's dress was thin, and fitted close; he wore a "round-about," and
      a skull-cap, and tucked his pantaloons into his boot-tops like a
      race-rider. He carried no arms&mdash;he carried nothing that was not
      absolutely necessary, for even the postage on his literary freight was
      worth five dollars a letter.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link071" id="link071"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="071.jpg (120K)" src="images/071.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      He got but little frivolous correspondence to carry&mdash;his bag had
      business letters in it, mostly. His horse was stripped of all unnecessary
      weight, too. He wore a little wafer of a racing-saddle, and no visible
      blanket. He wore light shoes, or none at all. The little flat mail-pockets
      strapped under the rider's thighs would each hold about the bulk of a
      child's primer. They held many and many an important business chapter and
      newspaper letter, but these were written on paper as airy and thin as
      gold-leaf, nearly, and thus bulk and weight were economized. The stage-
      coach traveled about a hundred to a hundred and twenty-five miles a day
      (twenty-four hours), the pony-rider about two hundred and fifty. There
      were about eighty pony-riders in the saddle all the time, night and day,
      stretching in a long, scattering procession from Missouri to California,
      forty flying eastward, and forty toward the west, and among them making
      four hundred gallant horses earn a stirring livelihood and see a deal of
      scenery every single day in the year.
    </p>
    <p>
      We had had a consuming desire, from the beginning, to see a pony-rider,
      but somehow or other all that passed us and all that met us managed to
      streak by in the night, and so we heard only a whiz and a hail, and the
      swift phantom of the desert was gone before we could get our heads out of
      the windows. But now we were expecting one along every moment, and would
      see him in broad daylight. Presently the driver exclaims:
    </p>
    <p>
      "HERE HE COMES!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Every neck is stretched further, and every eye strained wider. Away across
      the endless dead level of the prairie a black speck appears against the
      sky, and it is plain that it moves. Well, I should think so!
    </p>
    <p>
      In a second or two it becomes a horse and rider, rising and falling,
      rising and falling&mdash;sweeping toward us nearer and nearer&mdash;growing
      more and more distinct, more and more sharply defined&mdash;nearer and
      still nearer, and the flutter of the hoofs comes faintly to the ear&mdash;another
      instant a whoop and a hurrah from our upper deck, a wave of the rider's
      hand, but no reply, and man and horse burst past our excited faces, and go
      winging away like a belated fragment of a storm!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link072" id="link072"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="072.jpg (33K)" src="images/072.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      So sudden is it all, and so like a flash of unreal fancy, that but for the
      flake of white foam left quivering and perishing on a mail-sack after the
      vision had flashed by and disappeared, we might have doubted whether we
      had seen any actual horse and man at all, maybe.
    </p>
    <p>
      We rattled through Scott's Bluffs Pass, by and by. It was along here
      somewhere that we first came across genuine and unmistakable alkali water
      in the road, and we cordially hailed it as a first-class curiosity, and a
      thing to be mentioned with eclat in letters to the ignorant at home. This
      water gave the road a soapy appearance, and in many places the ground
      looked as if it had been whitewashed. I think the strange alkali water
      excited us as much as any wonder we had come upon yet, and I know we felt
      very complacent and conceited, and better satisfied with life after we had
      added it to our list of things which we had seen and some other people had
      not. In a small way we were the same sort of simpletons as those who climb
      unnecessarily the perilous peaks of Mont Blanc and the Matterhorn, and
      derive no pleasure from it except the reflection that it isn't a common
      experience. But once in a while one of those parties trips and comes
      darting down the long mountain-crags in a sitting posture, making the
      crusted snow smoke behind him, flitting from bench to bench, and from
      terrace to terrace, jarring the earth where he strikes, and still glancing
      and flitting on again, sticking an iceberg into himself every now and
      then, and tearing his clothes, snatching at things to save himself, taking
      hold of trees and fetching them along with him, roots and all, starting
      little rocks now and then, then big boulders, then acres of ice and snow
      and patches of forest, gathering and still gathering as he goes, adding
      and still adding to his massed and sweeping grandeur as he nears a three
      thousand-foot precipice, till at last he waves his hat magnificently and
      rides into eternity on the back of a raging and tossing avalanche!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link073" id="link073"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="073.jpg (48K)" src="images/073.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      This is all very fine, but let us not be carried away by excitement, but
      ask calmly, how does this person feel about it in his cooler moments next
      day, with six or seven thousand feet of snow and stuff on top of him?
    </p>
    <p>
      We crossed the sand hills near the scene of the Indian mail robbery and
      massacre of 1856, wherein the driver and conductor perished, and also all
      the passengers but one, it was supposed; but this must have been a
      mistake, for at different times afterward on the Pacific coast I was
      personally acquainted with a hundred and thirty-three or four people who
      were wounded during that massacre, and barely escaped with their lives.
      There was no doubt of the truth of it&mdash;I had it from their own lips.
      One of these parties told me that he kept coming across arrow-heads in his
      system for nearly seven years after the massacre; and another of them told
      me that he was struck so literally full of arrows that after the Indians
      were gone and he could raise up and examine himself, he could not restrain
      his tears, for his clothes were completely ruined.
    </p>
    <p>
      The most trustworthy tradition avers, however, that only one man, a person
      named Babbitt, survived the massacre, and he was desperately wounded. He
      dragged himself on his hands and knee (for one leg was broken) to a
      station several miles away. He did it during portions of two nights, lying
      concealed one day and part of another, and for more than forty hours
      suffering unimaginable anguish from hunger, thirst and bodily pain. The
      Indians robbed the coach of everything it contained, including quite an
      amount of treasure.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch09" id="linkch09"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER IX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We passed Fort Laramie in the night, and on the seventh morning out we
      found ourselves in the Black Hills, with Laramie Peak at our elbow
      (apparently) looming vast and solitary&mdash;a deep, dark, rich indigo
      blue in hue, so portentously did the old colossus frown under his beetling
      brows of storm-cloud. He was thirty or forty miles away, in reality, but
      he only seemed removed a little beyond the low ridge at our right. We
      breakfasted at Horse-Shoe Station, six hundred and seventy-six miles out
      from St. Joseph. We had now reached a hostile Indian country, and during
      the afternoon we passed Laparelle Station, and enjoyed great discomfort
      all the time we were in the neighborhood, being aware that many of the
      trees we dashed by at arm's length concealed a lurking Indian or two.
      During the preceding night an ambushed savage had sent a bullet through
      the pony-rider's jacket, but he had ridden on, just the same, because
      pony-riders were not allowed to stop and inquire into such things except
      when killed. As long as they had life enough left in them they had to
      stick to the horse and ride, even if the Indians had been waiting for them
      a week, and were entirely out of patience. About two hours and a half
      before we arrived at Laparelle Station, the keeper in charge of it had
      fired four times at an Indian, but he said with an injured air that the
      Indian had "skipped around so's to spile everything&mdash;and ammunition's
      blamed skurse, too." The most natural inference conveyed by his manner of
      speaking was, that in "skipping around," the Indian had taken an unfair
      advantage.
    </p>
    <p>
      The coach we were in had a neat hole through its front&mdash;a
      reminiscence of its last trip through this region. The bullet that made it
      wounded the driver slightly, but he did not mind it much. He said the
      place to keep a man "huffy" was down on the Southern Overland, among the
      Apaches, before the company moved the stage line up on the northern route.
      He said the Apaches used to annoy him all the time down there, and that he
      came as near as anything to starving to death in the midst of abundance,
      because they kept him so leaky with bullet holes that he "couldn't hold
      his vittles." This person's statement were not generally believed.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link076" id="link076"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="076.jpg (53K)" src="images/076.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We shut the blinds down very tightly that first night in the hostile
      Indian country, and lay on our arms. We slept on them some, but most of
      the time we only lay on them. We did not talk much, but kept quiet and
      listened. It was an inky-black night, and occasionally rainy. We were
      among woods and rocks, hills and gorges&mdash;so shut in, in fact, that
      when we peeped through a chink in a curtain, we could discern nothing. The
      driver and conductor on top were still, too, or only spoke at long
      intervals, in low tones, as is the way of men in the midst of invisible
      dangers. We listened to rain-drops pattering on the roof; and the grinding
      of the wheels through the muddy gravel; and the low wailing of the wind;
      and all the time we had that absurd sense upon us, inseparable from travel
      at night in a close-curtained vehicle, the sense of remaining perfectly
      still in one place, notwithstanding the jolting and swaying of the
      vehicle, the trampling of the horses, and the grinding of the wheels. We
      listened a long time, with intent faculties and bated breath; every time
      one of us would relax, and draw a long sigh of relief and start to say
      something, a comrade would be sure to utter a sudden "Hark!" and instantly
      the experimenter was rigid and listening again. So the tiresome minutes
      and decades of minutes dragged away, until at last our tense forms filmed
      over with a dulled consciousness, and we slept, if one might call such a
      condition by so strong a name&mdash;for it was a sleep set with a
      hair-trigger. It was a sleep seething and teeming with a weird and
      distressful confusion of shreds and fag-ends of dreams&mdash;a sleep that
      was a chaos. Presently, dreams and sleep and the sullen hush of the night
      were startled by a ringing report, and cloven by such a long, wild,
      agonizing shriek! Then we heard&mdash;ten steps from the stage&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      "Help! help! help!" [It was our driver's voice.]
    </p>
    <p>
      "Kill him! Kill him like a dog!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'm being murdered! Will no man lend me a pistol?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Look out! head him off! head him off!"
    </p>
    <p>
      [Two pistol shots; a confusion of voices and the trampling of many feet,
      as if a crowd were closing and surging together around some object;
      several heavy, dull blows, as with a club; a voice that said appealingly,
      "Don't, gentlemen, please don't&mdash;I'm a dead man!" Then a fainter
      groan, and another blow, and away sped the stage into the darkness, and
      left the grisly mystery behind us.]
    </p>
    <p>
      What a startle it was! Eight seconds would amply cover the time it
      occupied&mdash;maybe even five would do it. We only had time to plunge at
      a curtain and unbuckle and unbutton part of it in an awkward and hindering
      flurry, when our whip cracked sharply overhead, and we went rumbling and
      thundering away, down a mountain "grade."
    </p>
    <p>
      We fed on that mystery the rest of the night&mdash;what was left of it,
      for it was waning fast. It had to remain a present mystery, for all we
      could get from the conductor in answer to our hails was something that
      sounded, through the clatter of the wheels, like "Tell you in the
      morning!"
    </p>
    <p>
      So we lit our pipes and opened the corner of a curtain for a chimney, and
      lay there in the dark, listening to each other's story of how he first
      felt and how many thousand Indians he first thought had hurled themselves
      upon us, and what his remembrance of the subsequent sounds was, and the
      order of their occurrence. And we theorized, too, but there was never a
      theory that would account for our driver's voice being out there, nor yet
      account for his Indian murderers talking such good English, if they were
      Indians.
    </p>
    <p>
      So we chatted and smoked the rest of the night comfortably away, our
      boding anxiety being somehow marvelously dissipated by the real presence
      of something to be anxious about.
    </p>
    <p>
      We never did get much satisfaction about that dark occurrence. All that we
      could make out of the odds and ends of the information we gathered in the
      morning, was that the disturbance occurred at a station; that we changed
      drivers there, and that the driver that got off there had been talking
      roughly about some of the outlaws that infested the region ("for there
      wasn't a man around there but had a price on his head and didn't dare show
      himself in the settlements," the conductor said); he had talked roughly
      about these characters, and ought to have "drove up there with his pistol
      cocked and ready on the seat alongside of him, and begun business himself,
      because any softy would know they would be laying for him."
    </p>
    <p>
      That was all we could gather, and we could see that neither the conductor
      nor the new driver were much concerned about the matter. They plainly had
      little respect for a man who would deliver offensive opinions of people
      and then be so simple as to come into their presence unprepared to "back
      his judgment," as they pleasantly phrased the killing of any fellow-being
      who did not like said opinions. And likewise they plainly had a contempt
      for the man's poor discretion in venturing to rouse the wrath of such
      utterly reckless wild beasts as those outlaws&mdash;and the conductor
      added:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I tell you it's as much as Slade himself want to do!"
    </p>
    <p>
      This remark created an entire revolution in my curiosity. I cared nothing
      now about the Indians, and even lost interest in the murdered driver.
      There was such magic in that name, SLADE! Day or night, now, I stood
      always ready to drop any subject in hand, to listen to something new about
      Slade and his ghastly exploits. Even before we got to Overland City, we
      had begun to hear about Slade and his "division" (for he was a
      "division-agent") on the Overland; and from the hour we had left Overland
      City we had heard drivers and conductors talk about only three things&mdash;"Californy,"
      the Nevada silver mines, and this desperado Slade. And a deal the most of
      the talk was about Slade. We had gradually come to have a realizing sense
      of the fact that Slade was a man whose heart and hands and soul were
      steeped in the blood of offenders against his dignity; a man who awfully
      avenged all injuries, affront, insults or slights, of whatever kind&mdash;on
      the spot if he could, years afterward if lack of earlier opportunity
      compelled it; a man whose hate tortured him day and night till vengeance
      appeased it&mdash;and not an ordinary vengeance either, but his enemy's
      absolute death&mdash;nothing less; a man whose face would light up with a
      terrible joy when he surprised a foe and had him at a disadvantage. A high
      and efficient servant of the Overland, an outlaw among outlaws and yet
      their relentless scourge, Slade was at once the most bloody, the most
      dangerous and the most valuable citizen that inhabited the savage
      fastnesses of the mountains.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch10" id="linkch10"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER X.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Really and truly, two thirds of the talk of drivers and conductors had
      been about this man Slade, ever since the day before we reached Julesburg.
      In order that the eastern reader may have a clear conception of what a
      Rocky Mountain desperado is, in his highest state of development, I will
      reduce all this mass of overland gossip to one straightforward narrative,
      and present it in the following shape:
    </p>
    <p>
      Slade was born in Illinois, of good parentage. At about twenty-six years
      of age he killed a man in a quarrel and fled the country. At St. Joseph,
      Missouri, he joined one of the early California-bound emigrant trains, and
      was given the post of train-master. One day on the plains he had an angry
      dispute with one of his wagon-drivers, and both drew their revolvers. But
      the driver was the quicker artist, and had his weapon cocked first. So
      Slade said it was a pity to waste life on so small a matter, and proposed
      that the pistols be thrown on the ground and the quarrel settled by a
      fist-fight. The unsuspecting driver agreed, and threw down his pistol&mdash;whereupon
      Slade laughed at his simplicity, and shot him dead!
    </p>
    <p>
      He made his escape, and lived a wild life for awhile, dividing his time
      between fighting Indians and avoiding an Illinois sheriff, who had been
      sent to arrest him for his first murder. It is said that in one Indian
      battle he killed three savages with his own hand, and afterward cut their
      ears off and sent them, with his compliments, to the chief of the tribe.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link081" id="link081"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="081.jpg (55K)" src="images/081.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Slade soon gained a name for fearless resolution, and this was sufficient
      merit to procure for him the important post of overland division-agent at
      Julesburg, in place of Mr. Jules, removed. For some time previously, the
      company's horses had been frequently stolen, and the coaches delayed, by
      gangs of outlaws, who were wont to laugh at the idea of any man's having
      the temerity to resent such outrages. Slade resented them promptly.
    </p>
    <p>
      The outlaws soon found that the new agent was a man who did not fear
      anything that breathed the breath of life. He made short work of all
      offenders. The result was that delays ceased, the company's property was
      let alone, and no matter what happened or who suffered, Slade's coaches
      went through, every time! True, in order to bring about this wholesome
      change, Slade had to kill several men&mdash;some say three, others say
      four, and others six&mdash;but the world was the richer for their loss.
      The first prominent difficulty he had was with the ex-agent Jules, who
      bore the reputation of being a reckless and desperate man himself. Jules
      hated Slade for supplanting him, and a good fair occasion for a fight was
      all he was waiting for. By and by Slade dared to employ a man whom Jules
      had once discharged. Next, Slade seized a team of stage-horses which he
      accused Jules of having driven off and hidden somewhere for his own use.
      War was declared, and for a day or two the two men walked warily about the
      streets, seeking each other, Jules armed with a double-barreled shot gun,
      and Slade with his history-creating revolver. Finally, as Slade stepped
      into a store Jules poured the contents of his gun into him from behind the
      door. Slade was plucky, and Jules got several bad pistol wounds in return.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link082" id="link082"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="082.jpg (157K)" src="images/082.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Then both men fell, and were carried to their respective lodgings, both
      swearing that better aim should do deadlier work next time. Both were
      bedridden a long time, but Jules got to his feet first, and gathering his
      possessions together, packed them on a couple of mules, and fled to the
      Rocky Mountains to gather strength in safety against the day of reckoning.
      For many months he was not seen or heard of, and was gradually dropped out
      of the remembrance of all save Slade himself. But Slade was not the man to
      forget him. On the contrary, common report said that Slade kept a reward
      standing for his capture, dead or alive!
    </p>
    <p>
      After awhile, seeing that Slade's energetic administration had restored
      peace and order to one of the worst divisions of the road, the overland
      stage company transferred him to the Rocky Ridge division in the Rocky
      Mountains, to see if he could perform a like miracle there. It was the
      very paradise of outlaws and desperadoes. There was absolutely no
      semblance of law there. Violence was the rule. Force was the only
      recognized authority. The commonest misunderstandings were settled on the
      spot with the revolver or the knife. Murders were done in open day, and
      with sparkling frequency, and nobody thought of inquiring into them. It
      was considered that the parties who did the killing had their private
      reasons for it; for other people to meddle would have been looked upon as
      indelicate. After a murder, all that Rocky Mountain etiquette required of
      a spectator was, that he should help the gentleman bury his game&mdash;otherwise
      his churlishness would surely be remembered against him the first time he
      killed a man himself and needed a neighborly turn in interring him.
    </p>
    <p>
      Slade took up his residence sweetly and peacefully in the midst of this
      hive of horse-thieves and assassins, and the very first time one of them
      aired his insolent swaggerings in his presence he shot him dead! He began
      a raid on the outlaws, and in a singularly short space of time he had
      completely stopped their depredations on the stage stock, recovered a
      large number of stolen horses, killed several of the worst desperadoes of
      the district, and gained such a dread ascendancy over the rest that they
      respected him, admired him, feared him, obeyed him! He wrought the same
      marvelous change in the ways of the community that had marked his
      administration at Overland City. He captured two men who had stolen
      overland stock, and with his own hands he hanged them. He was supreme
      judge in his district, and he was jury and executioner likewise&mdash;and
      not only in the case of offences against his employers, but against
      passing emigrants as well. On one occasion some emigrants had their stock
      lost or stolen, and told Slade, who chanced to visit their camp. With a
      single companion he rode to a ranch, the owners of which he suspected, and
      opening the door, commenced firing, killing three, and wounding the
      fourth.
    </p>
    <p>
      From a bloodthirstily interesting little Montana book.&mdash;["The
      Vigilantes of Montana," by Prof. Thos. J. Dimsdale.]&mdash;I take this
      paragraph:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "While on the road, Slade held absolute sway. He would ride down to a
        station, get into a quarrel, turn the house out of windows, and maltreat
        the occupants most cruelly. The unfortunates had no means of redress,
        and were compelled to recuperate as best they could."
      </p>
      <p>
        <a name="link084" id="link084"></a> <br /><br />
      </p>
      <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
        <img alt="084.jpg (67K)" src="images/084.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
      </div>
      <p>
        <br /><br />
      </p>
      <p>
        On one of these occasions, it is said he killed the father of the fine
        little half-breed boy Jemmy, whom he adopted, and who lived with his
        widow after his execution. Stories of Slade's hanging men, and of
        innumerable assaults, shootings, stabbings and beatings, in which he was
        a principal actor, form part of the legends of the stage line. As for
        minor quarrels and shootings, it is absolutely certain that a minute
        history of Slade's life would be one long record of such practices.
      </p>
      <p>
        "The Vigilantes of Montana" by Prof. Thomas J. Dimsdale
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      Slade was a matchless marksman with a navy revolver. The legends say that
      one morning at Rocky Ridge, when he was feeling comfortable, he saw a man
      approaching who had offended him some days before&mdash;observe the fine
      memory he had for matters like that&mdash;and, "Gentlemen," said Slade,
      drawing, "it is a good twenty-yard shot&mdash;I'll clip the third button
      on his coat!" Which he did. The bystanders all admired it. And they all
      attended the funeral, too.
    </p>
    <p>
      On one occasion a man who kept a little whisky-shelf at the station did
      something which angered Slade&mdash;and went and made his will. A day or
      two afterward Slade came in and called for some brandy. The man reached
      under the counter (ostensibly to get a bottle&mdash;possibly to get
      something else), but Slade smiled upon him that peculiarly bland and
      satisfied smile of his which the neighbors had long ago learned to
      recognize as a death-warrant in disguise, and told him to "none of that!&mdash;pass
      out the high-priced article." So the poor bar-keeper had to turn his back
      and get the high-priced brandy from the shelf; and when he faced around
      again he was looking into the muzzle of Slade's pistol. "And the next
      instant," added my informant, impressively, "he was one of the deadest men
      that ever lived."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link085" id="link085"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="085.jpg (94K)" src="images/085.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The stage-drivers and conductors told us that sometimes Slade would leave
      a hated enemy wholly unmolested, unnoticed and unmentioned, for weeks
      together&mdash;had done it once or twice at any rate. And some said they
      believed he did it in order to lull the victims into unwatchfulness, so
      that he could get the advantage of them, and others said they believed he
      saved up an enemy that way, just as a schoolboy saves up a cake, and made
      the pleasure go as far as it would by gloating over the anticipation. One
      of these cases was that of a Frenchman who had offended Slade. To the
      surprise of everybody Slade did not kill him on the spot, but let him
      alone for a considerable time. Finally, however, he went to the
      Frenchman's house very late one night, knocked, and when his enemy opened
      the door, shot him dead&mdash;pushed the corpse inside the door with his
      foot, set the house on fire and burned up the dead man, his widow and
      three children! I heard this story from several different people, and they
      evidently believed what they were saying. It may be true, and it may not.
      "Give a dog a bad name," etc.
    </p>
    <p>
      Slade was captured, once, by a party of men who intended to lynch him.
      They disarmed him, and shut him up in a strong log-house, and placed a
      guard over him. He prevailed on his captors to send for his wife, so that
      he might have a last interview with her. She was a brave, loving, spirited
      woman. She jumped on a horse and rode for life and death. When she arrived
      they let her in without searching her, and before the door could be closed
      she whipped out a couple of revolvers, and she and her lord marched forth
      defying the party. And then, under a brisk fire, they mounted double and
      galloped away unharmed!
    </p>
    <p>
      In the fulness of time Slade's myrmidons captured his ancient enemy Jules,
      whom they found in a well-chosen hiding-place in the remote fastnesses of
      the mountains, gaining a precarious livelihood with his rifle. They
      brought him to Rocky Ridge, bound hand and foot, and deposited him in the
      middle of the cattle-yard with his back against a post. It is said that
      the pleasure that lit Slade's face when he heard of it was something
      fearful to contemplate. He examined his enemy to see that he was securely
      tied, and then went to bed, content to wait till morning before enjoying
      the luxury of killing him. Jules spent the night in the cattle-yard, and
      it is a region where warm nights are never known. In the morning Slade
      practised on him with his revolver, nipping the flesh here and there, and
      occasionally clipping off a finger, while Jules begged him to kill him
      outright and put him out of his misery. Finally Slade reloaded, and
      walking up close to his victim, made some characteristic remarks and then
      dispatched him. The body lay there half a day, nobody venturing to touch
      it without orders, and then Slade detailed a party and assisted at the
      burial himself. But he first cut off the dead man's ears and put them in
      his vest pocket, where he carried them for some time with great
      satisfaction. That is the story as I have frequently heard it told and
      seen it in print in California newspapers. It is doubtless correct in all
      essential particulars.
    </p>
    <p>
      In due time we rattled up to a stage-station, and sat down to breakfast
      with a half-savage, half-civilized company of armed and bearded
      mountaineers, ranchmen and station employees. The most gentlemanly-
      appearing, quiet and affable officer we had yet found along the road in
      the Overland Company's service was the person who sat at the head of the
      table, at my elbow. Never youth stared and shivered as I did when I heard
      them call him SLADE!
    </p>
    <p>
      Here was romance, and I sitting face to face with it!&mdash;looking upon
      it&mdash;touching it&mdash;hobnobbing with it, as it were! Here, right by
      my side, was the actual ogre who, in fights and brawls and various ways,
      had taken the lives of twenty-six human beings, or all men lied about him!
      I suppose I was the proudest stripling that ever traveled to see strange
      lands and wonderful people.
    </p>
    <p>
      He was so friendly and so gentle-spoken that I warmed to him in spite of
      his awful history. It was hardly possible to realize that this pleasant
      person was the pitiless scourge of the outlaws, the raw-head-and-bloody-
      bones the nursing mothers of the mountains terrified their children with.
      And to this day I can remember nothing remarkable about Slade except that
      his face was rather broad across the cheek bones, and that the cheek bones
      were low and the lips peculiarly thin and straight. But that was enough to
      leave something of an effect upon me, for since then I seldom see a face
      possessing those characteristics without fancying that the owner of it is
      a dangerous man.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link088" id="link088"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="088.jpg (57K)" src="images/088.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The coffee ran out. At least it was reduced to one tin-cupful, and Slade
      was about to take it when he saw that my cup was empty.
    </p>
    <p>
      He politely offered to fill it, but although I wanted it, I politely
      declined. I was afraid he had not killed anybody that morning, and might
      be needing diversion. But still with firm politeness he insisted on
      filling my cup, and said I had traveled all night and better deserved it
      than he&mdash;and while he talked he placidly poured the fluid, to the
      last drop. I thanked him and drank it, but it gave me no comfort, for I
      could not feel sure that he would not be sorry, presently, that he had
      given it away, and proceed to kill me to distract his thoughts from the
      loss. But nothing of the kind occurred. We left him with only twenty-six
      dead people to account for, and I felt a tranquil satisfaction in the
      thought that in so judiciously taking care of No. 1 at that
      breakfast-table I had pleasantly escaped being No. 27. Slade came out to
      the coach and saw us off, first ordering certain rearrangements of the
      mail-bags for our comfort, and then we took leave of him, satisfied that
      we should hear of him again, some day, and wondering in what connection.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link089" id="link089"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="089.jpg (31K)" src="images/089.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /><br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch11" id="linkch11"></a>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And sure enough, two or three years afterward, we did hear him again. News
      came to the Pacific coast that the Vigilance Committee in Montana (whither
      Slade had removed from Rocky Ridge) had hanged him. I find an account of
      the affair in the thrilling little book I quoted a paragraph from in the
      last chapter&mdash;"The Vigilantes of Montana; being a Reliable Account of
      the Capture, Trial and Execution of Henry Plummer's Notorious Road Agent
      Band: By Prof. Thos. J. Dimsdale, Virginia City, M.T." Mr. Dimsdale's
      chapter is well worth reading, as a specimen of how the people of the
      frontier deal with criminals when the courts of law prove inefficient. Mr.
      Dimsdale makes two remarks about Slade, both of which are accurately
      descriptive, and one of which is exceedingly picturesque: "Those who saw
      him in his natural state only, would pronounce him to be a kind husband, a
      most hospitable host and a courteous gentleman; on the contrary, those who
      met him when maddened with liquor and surrounded by a gang of armed
      roughs, would pronounce him a fiend incarnate." And this: "From Fort
      Kearney, west, he was feared a great deal more than the almighty." For
      compactness, simplicity and vigor of expression, I will "back" that
      sentence against anything in literature. Mr. Dimsdale's narrative is as
      follows. In all places where italics occur, they are mine:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        After the execution of the five men on the 14th of January, the
        Vigilantes considered that their work was nearly ended. They had freed
        the country of highwaymen and murderers to a great extent, and they
        determined that in the absence of the regular civil authority they would
        establish a People's Court where all offenders should be tried by judge
        and jury. This was the nearest approach to social order that the
        circumstances permitted, and, though strict legal authority was wanting,
        yet the people were firmly determined to maintain its efficiency, and to
        enforce its decrees. It may here be mentioned that the overt act which
        was the last round on the fatal ladder leading to the scaffold on which
        Slade perished, was the tearing in pieces and stamping upon a writ of
        this court, followed by his arrest of the Judge Alex. Davis, by
        authority of a presented Derringer, and with his own hands.
      </p>
      <p>
        J. A. Slade was himself, we have been informed, a Vigilante; he openly
        boasted of it, and said he knew all that they knew. He was never
        accused, or even suspected, of either murder or robbery, committed in
        this Territory (the latter crime was never laid to his charge, in any
        place); but that he had killed several men in other localities was
        notorious, and his bad reputation in this respect was a most powerful
        argument in determining his fate, when he was finally arrested for the
        offence above mentioned. On returning from Milk River he became more and
        more addicted to drinking, until at last it was a common feat for him
        and his friends to "take the town." He and a couple of his dependents
        might often be seen on one horse, galloping through the streets,
        shouting and yelling, firing revolvers, etc. On many occasions he would
        ride his horse into stores, break up bars, toss the scales out of doors
        and use most insulting language to parties present. Just previous to the
        day of his arrest, he had given a fearful beating to one of his
        followers; but such was his influence over them that the man wept
        bitterly at the gallows, and begged for his life with all his power. It
        had become quite common, when Slade was on a spree, for the shop-keepers
        and citizens to close the stores and put out all the lights; being
        fearful of some outrage at his hands. For his wanton destruction of
        goods and furniture, he was always ready to pay, when sober, if he had
        money; but there were not a few who regarded payment as small
        satisfaction for the outrage, and these men were his personal enemies.
      </p>
      <p>
        From time to time Slade received warnings from men that he well knew
        would not deceive him, of the certain end of his conduct. There was not
        a moment, for weeks previous to his arrest, in which the public did not
        expect to hear of some bloody outrage. The dread of his very name, and
        the presence of the armed band of hangers-on who followed him alone
        prevented a resistance which must certainly have ended in the instant
        murder or mutilation of the opposing party.
      </p>
      <p>
        Slade was frequently arrested by order of the court whose organization
        we have described, and had treated it with respect by paying one or two
        fines and promising to pay the rest when he had money; but in the
        transaction that occurred at this crisis, he forgot even this caution,
        and goaded by passion and the hatred of restraint, he sprang into the
        embrace of death.
      </p>
      <p>
        Slade had been drunk and "cutting up" all night. He and his companions
        had made the town a perfect hell. In the morning, J. M. Fox, the
        sheriff, met him, arrested him, took him into court and commenced
        reading a warrant that he had for his arrest, by way of arraignment. He
        became uncontrollably furious, and seizing the writ, he tore it up,
        threw it on the ground and stamped upon it.
      </p>
      <p>
        <a name="link092" id="link092"></a> <br /><br />
      </p>
      <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
        <img alt="092.jpg (121K)" src="images/092.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
      </div>
      <p>
        <br /><br />
      </p>
      <p>
        The clicking of the locks of his companions' revolvers was instantly
        heard, and a crisis was expected. The sheriff did not attempt his
        retention; but being at least as prudent as he was valiant, he
        succumbed, leaving Slade the master of the situation and the conqueror
        and ruler of the courts, law and law-makers. This was a declaration of
        war, and was so accepted. The Vigilance Committee now felt that the
        question of social order and the preponderance of the law-abiding
        citizens had then and there to be decided. They knew the character of
        Slade, and they were well aware that they must submit to his rule
        without murmur, or else that he must be dealt with in such fashion as
        would prevent his being able to wreak his vengeance on the committee,
        who could never have hoped to live in the Territory secure from outrage
        or death, and who could never leave it without encountering his friend,
        whom his victory would have emboldened and stimulated to a pitch that
        would have rendered them reckless of consequences. The day previous he
        had ridden into Dorris's store, and on being requested to leave, he drew
        his revolver and threatened to kill the gentleman who spoke to him.
        Another saloon he had led his horse into, and buying a bottle of wine,
        he tried to make the animal drink it. This was not considered an
        uncommon performance, as he had often entered saloons and commenced
        firing at the lamps, causing a wild stampede.
      </p>
      <p>
        A leading member of the committee met Slade, and informed him in the
        quiet, earnest manner of one who feels the importance of what he is
        saying: "Slade, get your horse at once, and go home, or there will be&mdash;&mdash;to
        pay." Slade started and took a long look, with his dark and piercing
        eyes, at the gentleman. "What do you mean?" said he. "You have no right
        to ask me what I mean," was the quiet reply, "get your horse at once,
        and remember what I tell you." After a short pause he promised to do so,
        and actually got into the saddle; but, being still intoxicated, he began
        calling aloud to one after another of his friends, and at last seemed to
        have forgotten the warning he had received and became again uproarious,
        shouting the name of a well-known courtezan in company with those of two
        men whom he considered heads of the committee, as a sort of challenge;
        perhaps, however, as a simple act of bravado. It seems probable that the
        intimation of personal danger he had received had not been forgotten
        entirely; though fatally for him, he took a foolish way of showing his
        remembrance of it. He sought out Alexander Davis, the Judge of the
        Court, and drawing a cocked Derringer, he presented it at his head, and
        told him that he should hold him as a hostage for his own safety. As the
        judge stood perfectly quiet, and offered no resistance to his captor, no
        further outrage followed on this score. Previous to this, on account of
        the critical state of affairs, the committee had met, and at last
        resolved to arrest him. His execution had not been agreed upon, and, at
        that time, would have been negatived, most assuredly. A messenger rode
        down to Nevada to inform the leading men of what was on hand, as it was
        desirable to show that there was a feeling of unanimity on the subject,
        all along the gulch.
      </p>
      <p>
        The miners turned out almost en masse, leaving their work and forming in
        solid column about six hundred strong, armed to the teeth, they marched
        up to Virginia. The leader of the body well knew the temper of his men
        on the subject. He spurred on ahead of them, and hastily calling a
        meeting of the executive, he told them plainly that the miners meant
        "business," and that, if they came up, they would not stand in the
        street to be shot down by Slade's friends; but that they would take him
        and hang him. The meeting was small, as the Virginia men were loath to
        act at all. This momentous announcement of the feeling of the Lower Town
        was made to a cluster of men, who were deliberation behind a wagon, at
        the rear of a store on Main street.
      </p>
      <p>
        The committee were most unwilling to proceed to extremities. All the
        duty they had ever performed seemed as nothing to the task before them;
        but they had to decide, and that quickly. It was finally agreed that if
        the whole body of the miners were of the opinion that he should be
        hanged, that the committee left it in their hands to deal with him. Off,
        at hot speed, rode the leader of the Nevada men to join his command.
      </p>
      <p>
        Slade had found out what was intended, and the news sobered him
        instantly. He went into P. S. Pfouts' store, where Davis was, and
        apologized for his conduct, saying that he would take it all back.
      </p>
      <p>
        The head of the column now wheeled into Wallace street and marched up at
        quick time. Halting in front of the store, the executive officer of the
        committee stepped forward and arrested Slade, who was at once informed
        of his doom, and inquiry was made as to whether he had any business to
        settle. Several parties spoke to him on the subject; but to all such
        inquiries he turned a deaf ear, being entirely absorbed in the
        terrifying reflections on his own awful position. He never ceased his
        entreaties for life, and to see his dear wife. The unfortunate lady
        referred to, between whom and Slade there existed a warm affection, was
        at this time living at their ranch on the Madison. She was possessed of
        considerable personal attractions; tall, well-formed, of graceful
        carriage, pleasing manners, and was, withal, an accomplished horsewoman.
      </p>
      <p>
        A messenger from Slade rode at full speed to inform her of her husband's
        arrest. In an instant she was in the saddle, and with all the energy
        that love and despair could lend to an ardent temperament and a strong
        physique, she urged her fleet charger over the twelve miles of rough and
        rocky ground that intervened between her and the object of her
        passionate devotion.
      </p>
      <p>
        Meanwhile a party of volunteers had made the necessary preparations for
        the execution, in the valley traversed by the branch. Beneath the site
        of Pfouts and Russell's stone building there was a corral, the
        gate-posts of which were strong and high. Across the top was laid a
        beam, to which the rope was fastened, and a dry-goods box served for the
        platform. To this place Slade was marched, surrounded by a guard,
        composing the best armed and most numerous force that has ever appeared
        in Montana Territory.
      </p>
      <p>
        The doomed man had so exhausted himself by tears, prayers and
        lamentations, that he had scarcely strength left to stand under the
        fatal beam. He repeatedly exclaimed, "My God! my God! must I die? Oh, my
        dear wife!"
      </p>
      <p>
        On the return of the fatigue party, they encountered some friends of
        Slade, staunch and reliable citizens and members of the committee, but
        who were personally attached to the condemned. On hearing of his
        sentence, one of them, a stout-hearted man, pulled out his handkerchief
        and walked away, weeping like a child. Slade still begged to see his
        wife, most piteously, and it seemed hard to deny his request; but the
        bloody consequences that were sure to follow the inevitable attempt at a
        rescue, that her presence and entreaties would have certainly incited,
        forbade the granting of his request. Several gentlemen were sent for to
        see him, in his last moments, one of whom (Judge Davis) made a short
        address to the people; but in such low tones as to be inaudible, save to
        a few in his immediate vicinity. One of his friends, after exhausting
        his powers of entreaty, threw off his coat and declared that the
        prisoner could not be hanged until he himself was killed. A hundred guns
        were instantly leveled at him; whereupon he turned and fled; but, being
        brought back, he was compelled to resume his coat, and to give a promise
        of future peaceable demeanor.
      </p>
      <p>
        Scarcely a leading man in Virginia could be found, though numbers of the
        citizens joined the ranks of the guard when the arrest was made. All
        lamented the stern necessity which dictated the execution.
      </p>
      <p>
        Everything being ready, the command was given, "Men, do your duty," and
        the box being instantly slipped from beneath his feet, he died almost
        instantaneously.
      </p>
      <p>
        The body was cut down and carried to the Virginia Hotel, where, in a
        darkened room, it was scarcely laid out, when the unfortunate and
        bereaved companion of the deceased arrived, at headlong speed, to find
        that all was over, and that she was a widow. Her grief and
        heart-piercing cries were terrible evidences of the depth of her
        attachment for her lost husband, and a considerable period elapsed
        before she could regain the command of her excited feelings.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link095" id="link095"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="095.jpg (48K)" src="images/095.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      There is something about the desperado-nature that is wholly unaccountable&mdash;at
      least it looks unaccountable. It is this. The true desperado is gifted
      with splendid courage, and yet he will take the most infamous advantage of
      his enemy; armed and free, he will stand up before a host and fight until
      he is shot all to pieces, and yet when he is under the gallows and
      helpless he will cry and plead like a child. Words are cheap, and it is
      easy to call Slade a coward (all executed men who do not "die game" are
      promptly called cowards by unreflecting people), and when we read of Slade
      that he "had so exhausted himself by tears, prayers and lamentations, that
      he had scarcely strength left to stand under the fatal beam," the
      disgraceful word suggests itself in a moment&mdash;yet in frequently
      defying and inviting the vengeance of banded Rocky Mountain cut-throats by
      shooting down their comrades and leaders, and never offering to hide or
      fly, Slade showed that he was a man of peerless bravery. No coward would
      dare that. Many a notorious coward, many a chicken-livered poltroon,
      coarse, brutal, degraded, has made his dying speech without a quaver in
      his voice and been swung into eternity with what looked liked the calmest
      fortitude, and so we are justified in believing, from the low intellect of
      such a creature, that it was not moral courage that enabled him to do it.
      Then, if moral courage is not the requisite quality, what could it have
      been that this stout-hearted Slade lacked?&mdash;this bloody, desperate,
      kindly-mannered, urbane gentleman, who never hesitated to warn his most
      ruffianly enemies that he would kill them whenever or wherever he came
      across them next! I think it is a conundrum worth investigating.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch12" id="linkch12"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Just beyond the breakfast-station we overtook a Mormon emigrant train of
      thirty-three wagons; and tramping wearily along and driving their herd of
      loose cows, were dozens of coarse-clad and sad-looking men, women and
      children, who had walked as they were walking now, day after day for eight
      lingering weeks, and in that time had compassed the distance our stage had
      come in eight days and three hours&mdash;seven hundred and ninety- eight
      miles! They were dusty and uncombed, hatless, bonnetless and ragged, and
      they did look so tired!
    </p>
    <p>
      After breakfast, we bathed in Horse Creek, a (previously) limpid,
      sparkling stream&mdash;an appreciated luxury, for it was very seldom that
      our furious coach halted long enough for an indulgence of that kind. We
      changed horses ten or twelve times in every twenty-four hours&mdash;changed
      mules, rather&mdash;six mules&mdash;and did it nearly every time in four
      minutes. It was lively work. As our coach rattled up to each station six
      harnessed mules stepped gayly from the stable; and in the twinkling of an
      eye, almost, the old team was out, and the new one in and we off and away
      again.
    </p>
    <p>
      During the afternoon we passed Sweetwater Creek, Independence Rock,
      Devil's Gate and the Devil's Gap. The latter were wild specimens of rugged
      scenery, and full of interest&mdash;we were in the heart of the Rocky
      Mountains, now. And we also passed by "Alkali" or "Soda Lake," and we woke
      up to the fact that our journey had stretched a long way across the world
      when the driver said that the Mormons often came there from Great Salt
      Lake City to haul away saleratus. He said that a few days gone by they had
      shoveled up enough pure saleratus from the ground (it was a dry lake) to
      load two wagons, and that when they got these two wagons-loads of a drug
      that cost them nothing, to Salt Lake, they could sell it for twenty-five
      cents a pound.
    </p>
    <p>
      In the night we sailed by a most notable curiosity, and one we had been
      hearing a good deal about for a day or two, and were suffering to see.
      This was what might be called a natural ice-house. It was August, now, and
      sweltering weather in the daytime, yet at one of the stations the men
      could scape the soil on the hill-side under the lee of a range of
      boulders, and at a depth of six inches cut out pure blocks of ice&mdash;hard,
      compactly frozen, and clear as crystal!
    </p>
    <p>
      Toward dawn we got under way again, and presently as we sat with raised
      curtains enjoying our early-morning smoke and contemplating the first
      splendor of the rising sun as it swept down the long array of mountain
      peaks, flushing and gilding crag after crag and summit after summit, as if
      the invisible Creator reviewed his gray veterans and they saluted with a
      smile, we hove in sight of South Pass City. The hotel-keeper, the
      postmaster, the blacksmith, the mayor, the constable, the city marshal and
      the principal citizen and property holder, all came out and greeted us
      cheerily, and we gave him good day. He gave us a little Indian news, and a
      little Rocky Mountain news, and we gave him some Plains information in
      return. He then retired to his lonely grandeur and we climbed on up among
      the bristling peaks and the ragged clouds. South Pass City consisted of
      four log cabins, one if which was unfinished, and the gentleman with all
      those offices and titles was the chiefest of the ten citizens of the
      place. Think of hotel-keeper, postmaster, blacksmith, mayor, constable,
      city marshal and principal citizen all condensed into one person and
      crammed into one skin. Bemis said he was "a perfect Allen's revolver of
      dignities." And he said that if he were to die as postmaster, or as
      blacksmith, or as postmaster and blacksmith both, the people might stand
      it; but if he were to die all over, it would be a frightful loss to the
      community.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link099" id="link099"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="099.jpg (57K)" src="images/099.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Two miles beyond South Pass City we saw for the first time that mysterious
      marvel which all Western untraveled boys have heard of and fully believe
      in, but are sure to be astounded at when they see it with their own eyes,
      nevertheless&mdash;banks of snow in dead summer time. We were now far up
      toward the sky, and knew all the time that we must presently encounter
      lofty summits clad in the "eternal snow" which was so common place a
      matter of mention in books, and yet when I did see it glittering in the
      sun on stately domes in the distance and knew the month was August and
      that my coat was hanging up because it was too warm to wear it, I was full
      as much amazed as if I never had heard of snow in August before. Truly,
      "seeing is believing"&mdash;and many a man lives a long life through,
      thinking he believes certain universally received and well established
      things, and yet never suspects that if he were confronted by those things
      once, he would discover that he did not really believe them before, but
      only thought he believed them.
    </p>
    <p>
      In a little while quite a number of peaks swung into view with long claws
      of glittering snow clasping them; and with here and there, in the shade,
      down the mountain side, a little solitary patch of snow looking no larger
      than a lady's pocket-handkerchief but being in reality as large as a
      "public square."
    </p>
    <p>
      And now, at last, we were fairly in the renowned SOUTH PASS, and whirling
      gayly along high above the common world. We were perched upon the extreme
      summit of the great range of the Rocky Mountains, toward which we had been
      climbing, patiently climbing, ceaselessly climbing, for days and nights
      together&mdash;and about us was gathered a convention of Nature's kings
      that stood ten, twelve, and even thirteen thousand feet high&mdash;grand
      old fellows who would have to stoop to see Mount Washington, in the
      twilight. We were in such an airy elevation above the creeping populations
      of the earth, that now and then when the obstructing crags stood out of
      the way it seemed that we could look around and abroad and contemplate the
      whole great globe, with its dissolving views of mountains, seas and
      continents stretching away through the mystery of the summer haze.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link100" id="link100"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="100.jpg (164K)" src="images/100.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      As a general thing the Pass was more suggestive of a valley than a
      suspension bridge in the clouds&mdash;but it strongly suggested the latter
      at one spot. At that place the upper third of one or two majestic purple
      domes projected above our level on either hand and gave us a sense of a
      hidden great deep of mountains and plains and valleys down about their
      bases which we fancied we might see if we could step to the edge and look
      over. These Sultans of the fastnesses were turbaned with tumbled volumes
      of cloud, which shredded away from time to time and drifted off fringed
      and torn, trailing their continents of shadow after them; and catching
      presently on an intercepting peak, wrapped it about and brooded there&mdash;then
      shredded away again and left the purple peak, as they had left the purple
      domes, downy and white with new-laid snow. In passing, these monstrous
      rags of cloud hung low and swept along right over the spectator's head,
      swinging their tatters so nearly in his face that his impulse was to
      shrink when they came closet. In the one place I speak of, one could look
      below him upon a world of diminishing crags and canyons leading down,
      down, and away to a vague plain with a thread in it which was a road, and
      bunches of feathers in it which were trees,&mdash;a pretty picture
      sleeping in the sunlight&mdash;but with a darkness stealing over it and
      glooming its features deeper and deeper under the frown of a coming storm;
      and then, while no film or shadow marred the noon brightness of his high
      perch, he could watch the tempest break forth down there and see the
      lightnings leap from crag to crag and the sheeted rain drive along the
      canyon-sides, and hear the thunders peal and crash and roar. We had this
      spectacle; a familiar one to many, but to us a novelty.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link101" id="link101"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="101.jpg (164K)" src="images/101.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We bowled along cheerily, and presently, at the very summit (though it had
      been all summit to us, and all equally level, for half an hour or more),
      we came to a spring which spent its water through two outlets and sent it
      in opposite directions. The conductor said that one of those streams which
      we were looking at, was just starting on a journey westward to the Gulf of
      California and the Pacific Ocean, through hundreds and even thousands of
      miles of desert solitudes. He said that the other was just leaving its
      home among the snow-peaks on a similar journey eastward&mdash;and we knew
      that long after we should have forgotten the simple rivulet it would still
      be plodding its patient way down the mountain sides, and canyon-beds, and
      between the banks of the Yellowstone; and by and by would join the broad
      Missouri and flow through unknown plains and deserts and unvisited
      wildernesses; and add a long and troubled pilgrimage among snags and
      wrecks and sandbars; and enter the Mississippi, touch the wharves of St.
      Louis and still drift on, traversing shoals and rocky channels, then
      endless chains of bottomless and ample bends, walled with unbroken
      forests, then mysterious byways and secret passages among woody islands,
      then the chained bends again, bordered with wide levels of shining
      sugar-cane in place of the sombre forests; then by New Orleans and still
      other chains of bends&mdash;and finally, after two long months of daily
      and nightly harassment, excitement, enjoyment, adventure, and awful peril
      of parched throats, pumps and evaporation, pass the Gulf and enter into
      its rest upon the bosom of the tropic sea, never to look upon its
      snow-peaks again or regret them.
    </p>
    <p>
      I freighted a leaf with a mental message for the friends at home, and
      dropped it in the stream. But I put no stamp on it and it was held for
      postage somewhere.
    </p>
    <p>
      On the summit we overtook an emigrant train of many wagons, many tired men
      and women, and many a disgusted sheep and cow.
    </p>
    <p>
      In the wofully dusty horseman in charge of the expedition I recognized
      John &mdash;&mdash;. Of all persons in the world to meet on top of the
      Rocky Mountains thousands of miles from home, he was the last one I should
      have looked for. We were school-boys together and warm friends for years.
      But a boyish prank of mine had disruptured this friendship and it had
      never been renewed. The act of which I speak was this. I had been
      accustomed to visit occasionally an editor whose room was in the third
      story of a building and overlooked the street. One day this editor gave me
      a watermelon which I made preparations to devour on the spot, but chancing
      to look out of the window, I saw John standing directly under it and an
      irresistible desire came upon me to drop the melon on his head, which I
      immediately did. I was the loser, for it spoiled the melon, and John never
      forgave me and we dropped all intercourse and parted, but now met again
      under these circumstances.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link102" id="link102"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="102.jpg (41K)" src="images/102.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We recognized each other simultaneously, and hands were grasped as warmly
      as if no coldness had ever existed between us, and no allusion was made to
      any. All animosities were buried and the simple fact of meeting a familiar
      face in that isolated spot so far from home, was sufficient to make us
      forget all things but pleasant ones, and we parted again with sincere
      "good-bye" and "God bless you" from both.
    </p>
    <p>
      We had been climbing up the long shoulders of the Rocky Mountains for many
      tedious hours&mdash;we started down them, now. And we went spinning away
      at a round rate too.
    </p>
    <p>
      We left the snowy Wind River Mountains and Uinta Mountains behind, and
      sped away, always through splendid scenery but occasionally through long
      ranks of white skeletons of mules and oxen&mdash;monuments of the huge
      emigration of other days&mdash;and here and there were up-ended boards or
      small piles of stones which the driver said marked the resting-place of
      more precious remains.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was the loneliest land for a grave! A land given over to the cayote and
      the raven&mdash;which is but another name for desolation and utter
      solitude. On damp, murky nights, these scattered skeletons gave forth a
      soft, hideous glow, like very faint spots of moonlight starring the vague
      desert. It was because of the phosphorus in the bones. But no scientific
      explanation could keep a body from shivering when he drifted by one of
      those ghostly lights and knew that a skull held it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link103" id="link103"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="103.jpg (35K)" src="images/103.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At midnight it began to rain, and I never saw anything like it&mdash;indeed,
      I did not even see this, for it was too dark. We fastened down the
      curtains and even caulked them with clothing, but the rain streamed in in
      twenty places, nothwithstanding. There was no escape. If one moved his
      feet out of a stream, he brought his body under one; and if he moved his
      body he caught one somewhere else. If he struggled out of the drenched
      blankets and sat up, he was bound to get one down the back of his neck.
      Meantime the stage was wandering about a plain with gaping gullies in it,
      for the driver could not see an inch before his face nor keep the road,
      and the storm pelted so pitilessly that there was no keeping the horses
      still. With the first abatement the conductor turned out with lanterns to
      look for the road, and the first dash he made was into a chasm about
      fourteen feet deep, his lantern following like a meteor. As soon as he
      touched bottom he sang out frantically:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link104" id="link104"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="104.jpg (30K)" src="images/104.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Don't come here!"
    </p>
    <p>
      To which the driver, who was looking over the precipice where he had
      disappeared, replied, with an injured air: "Think I'm a dam fool?"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link105" id="link105"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="105.jpg (30K)" src="images/105.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The conductor was more than an hour finding the road&mdash;a matter which
      showed us how far we had wandered and what chances we had been taking. He
      traced our wheel-tracks to the imminent verge of danger, in two places. I
      have always been glad that we were not killed that night. I do not know
      any particular reason, but I have always been glad. In the morning, the
      tenth day out, we crossed Green River, a fine, large, limpid stream&mdash;stuck
      in it with the water just up to the top of our mail- bed, and waited till
      extra teams were put on to haul us up the steep bank. But it was nice cool
      water, and besides it could not find any fresh place on us to wet.
    </p>
    <p>
      At the Green River station we had breakfast&mdash;hot biscuits, fresh
      antelope steaks, and coffee&mdash;the only decent meal we tasted between
      the United States and Great Salt Lake City, and the only one we were ever
      really thankful for.
    </p>
    <p>
      Think of the monotonous execrableness of the thirty that went before it,
      to leave this one simple breakfast looming up in my memory like a shot-
      tower after all these years have gone by!
    </p>
    <p>
      At five P.M. we reached Fort Bridger, one hundred and seventeen miles from
      the South Pass, and one thousand and twenty-five miles from St. Joseph.
      Fifty-two miles further on, near the head of Echo Canyon, we met sixty
      United States soldiers from Camp Floyd. The day before, they had fired
      upon three hundred or four hundred Indians, whom they supposed gathered
      together for no good purpose. In the fight that had ensued, four Indians
      were captured, and the main body chased four miles, but nobody killed.
      This looked like business. We had a notion to get out and join the sixty
      soldiers, but upon reflecting that there were four hundred of the Indians,
      we concluded to go on and join the Indians.
    </p>
    <p>
      Echo Canyon is twenty miles long. It was like a long, smooth, narrow
      street, with a gradual descending grade, and shut in by enormous
      perpendicular walls of coarse conglomerate, four hundred feet high in many
      places, and turreted like mediaeval castles. This was the most faultless
      piece of road in the mountains, and the driver said he would "let his team
      out." He did, and if the Pacific express trains whiz through there now any
      faster than we did then in the stage-coach, I envy the passengers the
      exhilaration of it. We fairly seemed to pick up our wheels and fly&mdash;and
      the mail matter was lifted up free from everything and held in solution! I
      am not given to exaggeration, and when I say a thing I mean it.
    </p>
    <p>
      However, time presses. At four in the afternoon we arrived on the summit
      of Big Mountain, fifteen miles from Salt Lake City, when all the world was
      glorified with the setting sun, and the most stupendous panorama of
      mountain peaks yet encountered burst on our sight. We looked out upon this
      sublime spectacle from under the arch of a brilliant rainbow! Even the
      overland stage-driver stopped his horses and gazed!
    </p>
    <p>
      Half an hour or an hour later, we changed horses, and took supper with a
      Mormon "Destroying Angel."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Destroying Angels," as I understand it, are Latter-Day Saints who are set
      apart by the Church to conduct permanent disappearances of obnoxious
      citizens. I had heard a deal about these Mormon Destroying Angels and the
      dark and bloody deeds they had done, and when I entered this one's house I
      had my shudder all ready. But alas for all our romances, he was nothing
      but a loud, profane, offensive, old blackguard! He was murderous enough,
      possibly, to fill the bill of a Destroyer, but would you have any kind of
      an Angel devoid of dignity? Could you abide an Angel in an unclean shirt
      and no suspenders? Could you respect an Angel with a horse-laugh and a
      swagger like a buccaneer?
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link106" id="link106"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="106.jpg (47K)" src="images/106.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      There were other blackguards present&mdash;comrades of this one. And there
      was one person that looked like a gentleman&mdash;Heber C. Kimball's son,
      tall and well made, and thirty years old, perhaps. A lot of slatternly
      women flitted hither and thither in a hurry, with coffee-pots, plates of
      bread, and other appurtenances to supper, and these were said to be the
      wives of the Angel&mdash;or some of them, at least. And of course they
      were; for if they had been hired "help" they would not have let an angel
      from above storm and swear at them as he did, let alone one from the place
      this one hailed from.
    </p>
    <p>
      This was our first experience of the western "peculiar institution," and
      it was not very prepossessing. We did not tarry long to observe it, but
      hurried on to the home of the Latter-Day Saints, the stronghold of the
      prophets, the capital of the only absolute monarch in America&mdash;Great
      Salt Lake City. As the night closed in we took sanctuary in the Salt Lake
      House and unpacked our baggage.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch13" id="linkch13"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We had a fine supper, of the freshest meats and fowls and vegetables&mdash;a
      great variety and as great abundance. We walked about the streets some,
      afterward, and glanced in at shops and stores; and there was fascination
      in surreptitiously staring at every creature we took to be a Mormon. This
      was fairy-land to us, to all intents and purposes&mdash;a land of
      enchantment, and goblins, and awful mystery. We felt a curiosity to ask
      every child how many mothers it had, and if it could tell them apart; and
      we experienced a thrill every time a dwelling-house door opened and shut
      as we passed, disclosing a glimpse of human heads and backs and shoulders&mdash;for
      we so longed to have a good satisfying look at a Mormon family in all its
      comprehensive ampleness, disposed in the customary concentric rings of its
      home circle.
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by the Acting Governor of the Territory introduced us to other
      "Gentiles," and we spent a sociable hour with them. "Gentiles" are people
      who are not Mormons. Our fellow-passenger, Bemis, took care of himself,
      during this part of the evening, and did not make an overpowering success
      of it, either, for he came into our room in the hotel about eleven
      o'clock, full of cheerfulness, and talking loosely, disjointedly and
      indiscriminately, and every now and then tugging out a ragged word by the
      roots that had more hiccups than syllables in it. This, together with his
      hanging his coat on the floor on one side of a chair, and his vest on the
      floor on the other side, and piling his pants on the floor just in front
      of the same chair, and then comtemplating the general result with
      superstitious awe, and finally pronouncing it "too many for him" and going
      to bed with his boots on, led us to fear that something he had eaten had
      not agreed with him.
    </p>
    <p>
      But we knew afterward that it was something he had been drinking. It was
      the exclusively Mormon refresher, "valley tan."
    </p>
    <p>
      Valley tan (or, at least, one form of valley tan) is a kind of whisky, or
      first cousin to it; is of Mormon invention and manufactured only in Utah.
      Tradition says it is made of (imported) fire and brimstone. If I remember
      rightly no public drinking saloons were allowed in the kingdom by Brigham
      Young, and no private drinking permitted among the faithful, except they
      confined themselves to "valley tan."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link109" id="link109"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="109.jpg (55K)" src="images/109.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Next day we strolled about everywhere through the broad, straight, level
      streets, and enjoyed the pleasant strangeness of a city of fifteen
      thousand inhabitants with no loafers perceptible in it; and no visible
      drunkards or noisy people; a limpid stream rippling and dancing through
      every street in place of a filthy gutter; block after block of trim
      dwellings, built of "frame" and sunburned brick&mdash;a great thriving
      orchard and garden behind every one of them, apparently&mdash;branches
      from the street stream winding and sparkling among the garden beds and
      fruit trees&mdash;and a grand general air of neatness, repair, thrift and
      comfort, around and about and over the whole. And everywhere were
      workshops, factories, and all manner of industries; and intent faces and
      busy hands were to be seen wherever one looked; and in one's ears was the
      ceaseless clink of hammers, the buzz of trade and the contented hum of
      drums and fly-wheels.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link110a" id="link110a"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="110a.jpg (25K)" src="images/110a.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The armorial crest of my own State consisted of two dissolute bears
      holding up the head of a dead and gone cask between them and making the
      pertinent remark, "UNITED, WE STAND&mdash;(hic!)&mdash;DIVIDED, WE FALL."
      It was always too figurative for the author of this book. But the Mormon
      crest was easy. And it was simple, unostentatious, and fitted like a
      glove. It was a representation of a GOLDEN BEEHIVE, with the bees all at
      work!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link110b" id="link110b"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="110b.jpg (23K)" src="images/110b.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The city lies in the edge of a level plain as broad as the State of
      Connecticut, and crouches close down to the ground under a curving wall of
      mighty mountains whose heads are hidden in the clouds, and whose shoulders
      bear relics of the snows of winter all the summer long.
    </p>
    <p>
      Seen from one of these dizzy heights, twelve or fifteen miles off, Great
      Salt Lake City is toned down and diminished till it is suggestive of a
      child's toy-village reposing under the majestic protection of the Chinese
      wall.
    </p>
    <p>
      On some of those mountains, to the southwest, it had been raining every
      day for two weeks, but not a drop had fallen in the city. And on hot days
      in late spring and early autumn the citizens could quit fanning and
      growling and go out and cool off by looking at the luxury of a glorious
      snow-storm going on in the mountains. They could enjoy it at a distance,
      at those seasons, every day, though no snow would fall in their streets,
      or anywhere near them.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link111" id="link111"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="111.jpg (83K)" src="images/111.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Salt Lake City was healthy&mdash;an extremely healthy city. They declared
      there was only one physician in the place and he was arrested every week
      regularly and held to answer under the vagrant act for having "no visible
      means of support." They always give you a good substantial article of
      truth in Salt Lake, and good measure and good weight, too. [Very often, if
      you wished to weigh one of their airiest little commonplace statements you
      would want the hay scales.]
    </p>
    <p>
      We desired to visit the famous inland sea, the American "Dead Sea," the
      great Salt Lake&mdash;seventeen miles, horseback, from the city&mdash;for
      we had dreamed about it, and thought about it, and talked about it, and
      yearned to see it, all the first part of our trip; but now when it was
      only arm's length away it had suddenly lost nearly every bit of its
      interest. And so we put it off, in a sort of general way, till next day&mdash;and
      that was the last we ever thought of it. We dined with some hospitable
      Gentiles; and visited the foundation of the prodigious temple; and talked
      long with that shrewd Connecticut Yankee, Heber C. Kimball (since
      deceased), a saint of high degree and a mighty man of commerce.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link112" id="link112"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="112.jpg (21K)" src="images/112.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We saw the "Tithing-House," and the "Lion House," and I do not know or
      remember how many more church and government buildings of various kinds
      and curious names. We flitted hither and thither and enjoyed every hour,
      and picked up a great deal of useful information and entertaining
      nonsense, and went to bed at night satisfied.
    </p>
    <p>
      The second day, we made the acquaintance of Mr. Street (since deceased)
      and put on white shirts and went and paid a state visit to the king. He
      seemed a quiet, kindly, easy-mannered, dignified, self-possessed old
      gentleman of fifty-five or sixty, and had a gentle craft in his eye that
      probably belonged there. He was very simply dressed and was just taking
      off a straw hat as we entered. He talked about Utah, and the Indians, and
      Nevada, and general American matters and questions, with our secretary and
      certain government officials who came with us. But he never paid any
      attention to me, notwithstanding I made several attempts to "draw him out"
      on federal politics and his high handed attitude toward Congress. I
      thought some of the things I said were rather fine. But he merely looked
      around at me, at distant intervals, something as I have seen a benignant
      old cat look around to see which kitten was meddling with her tail.
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by I subsided into an indignant silence, and so sat until the end,
      hot and flushed, and execrating him in my heart for an ignorant savage.
      But he was calm. His conversation with those gentlemen flowed on as
      sweetly and peacefully and musically as any summer brook. When the
      audience was ended and we were retiring from the presence, he put his hand
      on my head, beamed down on me in an admiring way and said to my brother:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Ah&mdash;your child, I presume? Boy, or girl?"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link113" id="link113"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="113.jpg (49K)" src="images/113.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch14" id="linkch14"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XIV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Mr. Street was very busy with his telegraphic matters&mdash;and
      considering that he had eight or nine hundred miles of rugged, snowy,
      uninhabited mountains, and waterless, treeless, melancholy deserts to
      traverse with his wire, it was natural and needful that he should be as
      busy as possible. He could not go comfortably along and cut his poles by
      the road-side, either, but they had to be hauled by ox teams across those
      exhausting deserts&mdash;and it was two days' journey from water to water,
      in one or two of them. Mr. Street's contract was a vast work, every way
      one looked at it; and yet to comprehend what the vague words "eight
      hundred miles of rugged mountains and dismal deserts" mean, one must go
      over the ground in person&mdash;pen and ink descriptions cannot convey the
      dreary reality to the reader. And after all, Mr. S.'s mightiest difficulty
      turned out to be one which he had never taken into the account at all.
      Unto Mormons he had sub-let the hardest and heaviest half of his great
      undertaking, and all of a sudden they concluded that they were going to
      make little or nothing, and so they tranquilly threw their poles overboard
      in mountain or desert, just as it happened when they took the notion, and
      drove home and went about their customary business! They were under
      written contract to Mr. Street, but they did not care anything for that.
      They said they would "admire" to see a "Gentile" force a Mormon to fulfil
      a losing contract in Utah! And they made themselves very merry over the
      matter. Street said&mdash;for it was he that told us these things:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I was in dismay. I was under heavy bonds to complete my contract in a
      given time, and this disaster looked very much like ruin. It was an
      astounding thing; it was such a wholly unlooked-for difficulty, that I was
      entirely nonplussed. I am a business man&mdash;have always been a business
      man&mdash;do not know anything but business&mdash;and so you can imagine
      how like being struck by lightning it was to find myself in a country
      where written contracts were worthless!&mdash;that main security, that
      sheet- anchor, that absolute necessity, of business. My confidence left
      me. There was no use in making new contracts&mdash;that was plain. I
      talked with first one prominent citizen and then another. They all
      sympathized with me, first rate, but they did not know how to help me. But
      at last a Gentile said, 'Go to Brigham Young!&mdash;these small fry cannot
      do you any good.' I did not think much of the idea, for if the law could
      not help me, what could an individual do who had not even anything to do
      with either making the laws or executing them? He might be a very good
      patriarch of a church and preacher in its tabernacle, but something
      sterner than religion and moral suasion was needed to handle a hundred
      refractory, half-civilized sub-contractors. But what was a man to do? I
      thought if Mr. Young could not do anything else, he might probably be able
      to give me some advice and a valuable hint or two, and so I went straight
      to him and laid the whole case before him. He said very little, but he
      showed strong interest all the way through. He examined all the papers in
      detail, and whenever there seemed anything like a hitch, either in the
      papers or my statement, he would go back and take up the thread and follow
      it patiently out to an intelligent and satisfactory result. Then he made a
      list of the contractors' names. Finally he said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "'Mr. Street, this is all perfectly plain. These contracts are strictly
      and legally drawn, and are duly signed and certified. These men manifestly
      entered into them with their eyes open. I see no fault or flaw anywhere.'
    </p>
    <p>
      "Then Mr. Young turned to a man waiting at the other end of the room and
      said: 'Take this list of names to So-and-so, and tell him to have these
      men here at such-and-such an hour.'
    </p>
    <p>
      "They were there, to the minute. So was I. Mr. Young asked them a number
      of questions, and their answers made my statement good. Then he said to
      them:
    </p>
    <p>
      "'You signed these contracts and assumed these obligations of your own
      free will and accord?'
    </p>
    <p>
      "'Yes.'
    </p>
    <p>
      "'Then carry them out to the letter, if it makes paupers of you! Go!'
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link116" id="link116"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="116.jpg (101K)" src="images/116.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "And they did go, too! They are strung across the deserts now, working
      like bees. And I never hear a word out of them.
    </p>
    <p>
      "There is a batch of governors, and judges, and other officials here,
      shipped from Washington, and they maintain the semblance of a republican
      form of government&mdash;but the petrified truth is that Utah is an
      absolute monarchy and Brigham Young is king!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Mr. Street was a fine man, and I believe his story. I knew him well during
      several years afterward in San Francisco.
    </p>
    <p>
      Our stay in Salt Lake City amounted to only two days, and therefore we had
      no time to make the customary inquisition into the workings of polygamy
      and get up the usual statistics and deductions preparatory to calling the
      attention of the nation at large once more to the matter.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link117" id="link117"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="117.jpg (104K)" src="images/117.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I had the will to do it. With the gushing self-sufficiency of youth I was
      feverish to plunge in headlong and achieve a great reform here&mdash;until
      I saw the Mormon women. Then I was touched. My heart was wiser than my
      head. It warmed toward these poor, ungainly and pathetically "homely"
      creatures, and as I turned to hide the generous moisture in my eyes, I
      said, "No&mdash;the man that marries one of them has done an act of
      Christian charity which entitles him to the kindly applause of mankind,
      not their harsh censure&mdash;and the man that marries sixty of them has
      done a deed of open-handed generosity so sublime that the nations should
      stand uncovered in his presence and worship in silence."
    </p>
    <p>
      [For a brief sketch of Mormon history, and the noted Mountain Meadow
      massacre, see Appendices A and B. ]
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link118" id="link118"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="118.jpg (82K)" src="images/118.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch15" id="linkch15"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It is a luscious country for thrilling evening stories about
      assassinations of intractable Gentiles. I cannot easily conceive of
      anything more cosy than the night in Salt Lake which we spent in a Gentile
      den, smoking pipes and listening to tales of how Burton galloped in among
      the pleading and defenceless "Morisites" and shot them down, men and
      women, like so many dogs. And how Bill Hickman, a Destroying Angel, shot
      Drown and Arnold dead for bringing suit against him for a debt. And how
      Porter Rockwell did this and that dreadful thing. And how heedless people
      often come to Utah and make remarks about Brigham, or polygamy, or some
      other sacred matter, and the very next morning at daylight such parties
      are sure to be found lying up some back alley, contentedly waiting for the
      hearse.
    </p>
    <p>
      And the next most interesting thing is to sit and listen to these Gentiles
      talk about polygamy; and how some portly old frog of an elder, or a
      bishop, marries a girl&mdash;likes her, marries her sister&mdash;likes
      her, marries another sister&mdash;likes her, takes another&mdash;likes
      her, marries her mother&mdash;likes her, marries her father, grandfather,
      great grandfather, and then comes back hungry and asks for more. And how
      the pert young thing of eleven will chance to be the favorite wife and her
      own venerable grandmother have to rank away down toward D 4 in their
      mutual husband's esteem, and have to sleep in the kitchen, as like as not.
      And how this dreadful sort of thing, this hiving together in one foul nest
      of mother and daughters, and the making a young daughter superior to her
      own mother in rank and authority, are things which Mormon women submit to
      because their religion teaches them that the more wives a man has on
      earth, and the more children he rears, the higher the place they will all
      have in the world to come&mdash;and the warmer, maybe, though they do not
      seem to say anything about that.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link120" id="link120"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="120.jpg (96K)" src="images/120.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      According to these Gentile friends of ours, Brigham Young's harem contains
      twenty or thirty wives. They said that some of them had grown old and gone
      out of active service, but were comfortably housed and cared for in the
      henery&mdash;or the Lion House, as it is strangely named. Along with each
      wife were her children&mdash;fifty altogether. The house was perfectly
      quiet and orderly, when the children were still. They all took their meals
      in one room, and a happy and home-like sight it was pronounced to be. None
      of our party got an opportunity to take dinner with Mr. Young, but a
      Gentile by the name of Johnson professed to have enjoyed a sociable
      breakfast in the Lion House. He gave a preposterous account of the
      "calling of the roll," and other preliminaries, and the carnage that
      ensued when the buckwheat cakes came in. But he embellished rather too
      much. He said that Mr. Young told him several smart sayings of certain of
      his "two-year-olds," observing with some pride that for many years he had
      been the heaviest contributor in that line to one of the Eastern
      magazines; and then he wanted to show Mr. Johnson one of the pets that had
      said the last good thing, but he could not find the child.
    </p>
    <p>
      He searched the faces of the children in detail, but could not decide
      which one it was. Finally he gave it up with a sigh and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link121" id="link121"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="121.jpg (86K)" src="images/121.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "I thought I would know the little cub again but I don't." Mr. Johnson
      said further, that Mr. Young observed that life was a sad, sad thing&mdash;"because
      the joy of every new marriage a man contracted was so apt to be blighted
      by the inopportune funeral of a less recent bride." And Mr. Johnson said
      that while he and Mr. Young were pleasantly conversing in private, one of
      the Mrs. Youngs came in and demanded a breast-pin, remarking that she had
      found out that he had been giving a breast-pin to No. 6, and she, for one,
      did not propose to let this partiality go on without making a satisfactory
      amount of trouble about it. Mr. Young reminded her that there was a
      stranger present. Mrs. Young said that if the state of things inside the
      house was not agreeable to the stranger, he could find room outside. Mr.
      Young promised the breast-pin, and she went away. But in a minute or two
      another Mrs. Young came in and demanded a breast-pin. Mr. Young began a
      remonstrance, but Mrs. Young cut him short. She said No. 6 had got one,
      and No. 11 was promised one, and it was "no use for him to try to impose
      on her&mdash;she hoped she knew her rights." He gave his promise, and she
      went. And presently three Mrs. Youngs entered in a body and opened on
      their husband a tempest of tears, abuse, and entreaty. They had heard all
      about No. 6, No. 11, and No. 14. Three more breast-pins were promised.
      They were hardly gone when nine more Mrs. Youngs filed into the presence,
      and a new tempest burst forth and raged round about the prophet and his
      guest. Nine breast-pins were promised, and the weird sisters filed out
      again. And in came eleven more, weeping and wailing and gnashing their
      teeth. Eleven promised breast-pins purchased peace once more.
    </p>
    <p>
      "That is a specimen," said Mr. Young. "You see how it is. You see what a
      life I lead. A man can't be wise all the time. In a heedless moment I gave
      my darling No. 6&mdash;excuse my calling her thus, as her other name has
      escaped me for the moment&mdash;a breast-pin. It was only worth
      twenty-five dollars&mdash;that is, apparently that was its whole cost&mdash;but
      its ultimate cost was inevitably bound to be a good deal more. You
      yourself have seen it climb up to six hundred and fifty dollars&mdash;and
      alas, even that is not the end! For I have wives all over this Territory
      of Utah. I have dozens of wives whose numbers, even, I do not know without
      looking in the family Bible. They are scattered far and wide among the
      mountains and valleys of my realm. And mark you, every solitary one of
      them will hear of this wretched breast pin, and every last one of them
      will have one or die. No. 6's breast pin will cost me twenty-five hundred
      dollars before I see the end of it. And these creatures will compare these
      pins together, and if one is a shade finer than the rest, they will all be
      thrown on my hands, and I will have to order a new lot to keep peace in
      the family. Sir, you probably did not know it, but all the time you were
      present with my children your every movement was watched by vigilant
      servitors of mine. If you had offered to give a child a dime, or a stick
      of candy, or any trifle of the kind, you would have been snatched out of
      the house instantly, provided it could be done before your gift left your
      hand. Otherwise it would be absolutely necessary for you to make an
      exactly similar gift to all my children&mdash;and knowing by experience
      the importance of the thing, I would have stood by and seen to it myself
      that you did it, and did it thoroughly. Once a gentleman gave one of my
      children a tin whistle&mdash;a veritable invention of Satan, sir, and one
      which I have an unspeakable horror of, and so would you if you had eighty
      or ninety children in your house. But the deed was done&mdash;the man
      escaped. I knew what the result was going to be, and I thirsted for
      vengeance. I ordered out a flock of Destroying Angels, and they hunted the
      man far into the fastnesses of the Nevada mountains. But they never caught
      him. I am not cruel, sir&mdash;I am not vindictive except when sorely
      outraged&mdash;but if I had caught him, sir, so help me Joseph Smith, I
      would have locked him into the nursery till the brats whistled him to
      death. By the slaughtered body of St. Parley Pratt (whom God assail!)
      there was never anything on this earth like it! I knew who gave the
      whistle to the child, but I could, not make those jealous mothers believe
      me. They believed I did it, and the result was just what any man of
      reflection could have foreseen: I had to order a hundred and ten whistles&mdash;I
      think we had a hundred and ten children in the house then, but some of
      them are off at college now&mdash;I had to order a hundred and ten of
      those shrieking things, and I wish I may never speak another word if we
      didn't have to talk on our fingers entirely, from that time forth until
      the children got tired of the whistles. And if ever another man gives a
      whistle to a child of mine and I get my hands on him, I will hang him
      higher than Haman! That is the word with the bark on it! Shade of Nephi!
      You don't know anything about married life. I am rich, and everybody knows
      it. I am benevolent, and everybody takes advantage of it. I have a strong
      fatherly instinct and all the foundlings are foisted on me.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Every time a woman wants to do well by her darling, she puzzles her brain
      to cipher out some scheme for getting it into my hands. Why, sir, a woman
      came here once with a child of a curious lifeless sort of complexion (and
      so had the woman), and swore that the child was mine and she my wife&mdash;that
      I had married her at such-and-such a time in such-and- such a place, but
      she had forgotten her number, and of course I could not remember her name.
      Well, sir, she called my attention to the fact that the child looked like
      me, and really it did seem to resemble me&mdash;a common thing in the
      Territory&mdash;and, to cut the story short, I put it in my nursery, and
      she left.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link124" id="link124"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="124.jpg (68K)" src="images/124.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And by the ghost of Orson Hyde, when they came to wash the paint off that
      child it was an Injun! Bless my soul, you don't know anything about
      married life. It is a perfect dog's life, sir&mdash;a perfect dog's life.
      You can't economize. It isn't possible. I have tried keeping one set of
      bridal attire for all occasions. But it is of no use. First you'll marry a
      combination of calico and consumption that's as thin as a rail, and next
      you'll get a creature that's nothing more than the dropsy in disguise, and
      then you've got to eke out that bridal dress with an old balloon. That is
      the way it goes. And think of the wash-bill&mdash;(excuse these tears)&mdash;nine
      hundred and eighty-four pieces a week! No, sir, there is no such a thing
      as economy in a family like mine. Why, just the one item of cradles&mdash;think
      of it! And vermifuge! Soothing syrup! Teething rings! And 'papa's watches'
      for the babies to play with! And things to scratch the furniture with! And
      lucifer matches for them to eat, and pieces of glass to cut themselves
      with! The item of glass alone would support your family, I venture to say,
      sir. Let me scrimp and squeeze all I can, I still can't get ahead as fast
      as I feel I ought to, with my opportunities. Bless you, sir, at a time
      when I had seventy-two wives in this house, I groaned under the pressure
      of keeping thousands of dollars tied up in seventy-two bedsteads when the
      money ought to have been out at interest; and I just sold out the whole
      stock, sir, at a sacrifice, and built a bedstead seven feet long and
      ninety-six feet wide.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link126" id="link126"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="126.jpg (99K)" src="images/126.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But it was a failure, sir. I could not sleep. It appeared to me that the
      whole seventy-two women snored at once. The roar was deafening. And then
      the danger of it! That was what I was looking at. They would all draw in
      their breath at once, and you could actually see the walls of the house
      suck in&mdash;and then they would all exhale their breath at once, and you
      could see the walls swell out, and strain, and hear the rafters crack, and
      the shingles grind together. My friend, take an old man's advice, and
      don't encumber yourself with a large family&mdash;mind, I tell you, don't
      do it. In a small family, and in a small family only, you will find that
      comfort and that peace of mind which are the best at last of the blessings
      this world is able to afford us, and for the lack of which no accumulation
      of wealth, and no acquisition of fame, power, and greatness can ever
      compensate us. Take my word for it, ten or eleven wives is all you need&mdash;never
      go over it."
    </p>
    <p>
      Some instinct or other made me set this Johnson down as being unreliable.
      And yet he was a very entertaining person, and I doubt if some of the
      information he gave us could have been acquired from any other source. He
      was a pleasant contrast to those reticent Mormons.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch16" id="linkch16"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XVI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      All men have heard of the Mormon Bible, but few except the "elect" have
      seen it, or, at least, taken the trouble to read it. I brought away a copy
      from Salt Lake. The book is a curiosity to me, it is such a pretentious
      affair, and yet so "slow," so sleepy; such an insipid mess of inspiration.
      It is chloroform in print. If Joseph Smith composed this book, the act was
      a miracle&mdash;keeping awake while he did it was, at any rate. If he,
      according to tradition, merely translated it from certain ancient and
      mysteriously-engraved plates of copper, which he declares he found under a
      stone, in an out-of-the-way locality, the work of translating was equally
      a miracle, for the same reason.
    </p>
    <p>
      The book seems to be merely a prosy detail of imaginary history, with the
      Old Testament for a model; followed by a tedious plagiarism of the New
      Testament. The author labored to give his words and phrases the quaint,
      old-fashioned sound and structure of our King James's translation of the
      Scriptures; and the result is a mongrel&mdash;half modern glibness, and
      half ancient simplicity and gravity. The latter is awkward and
      constrained; the former natural, but grotesque by the contrast. Whenever
      he found his speech growing too modern&mdash;which was about every
      sentence or two&mdash;he ladled in a few such Scriptural phrases as
      "exceeding sore," "and it came to pass," etc., and made things
      satisfactory again. "And it came to pass" was his pet. If he had left that
      out, his Bible would have been only a pamphlet.
    </p>
    <p>
      The title-page reads as follows:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        THE BOOK OF MORMON: AN ACCOUNT WRITTEN BY THE HAND OF MORMON, UPON
        PLATES TAKEN FROM THE PLATES OF NEPHI.
      </p>
      <p>
        Wherefore it is an abridgment of the record of the people of Nephi, and
        also of the Lamanites; written to the Lamanites, who are a remnant of
        the House of Israel; and also to Jew and Gentile; written by way of
        commandment, and also by the spirit of prophecy and of revelation.
        Written and sealed up, and hid up unto the Lord, that they might not be
        destroyed; to come forth by the gift and power of God unto the
        interpretation thereof; sealed by the hand of Moroni, and hid up unto
        the Lord, to come forth in due time by the way of Gentile; the
        interpretation thereof by the gift of God. An abridgment taken from the
        Book of Ether also; which is a record of the people of Jared; who were
        scattered at the time the Lord confounded the language of the people
        when they were building a tower to get to Heaven.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      "Hid up" is good. And so is "wherefore"&mdash;though why "wherefore"? Any
      other word would have answered as well&mdash;though&mdash;in truth it
      would not have sounded so Scriptural.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next comes:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        THE TESTIMONY OF THREE WITNESSES. Be it known unto all nations,
        kindreds, tongues, and people unto whom this work shall come, that we,
        through the grace of God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, have
        seen the plates which contain this record, which is a record of the
        people of Nephi, and also of the Lamanites, their brethren, and also of
        the people of Jared, who came from the tower of which hath been spoken;
        and we also know that they have been translated by the gift and power of
        God, for His voice hath declared it unto us; wherefore we know of a
        surety that the work is true. And we also testify that we have seen the
        engravings which are upon the plates; and they have been shown unto us
        by the power of God, and not of man. And we declare with words of
        soberness, that an angel of God came down from heaven, and he brought
        and laid before our eyes, that we beheld and saw the plates, and the
        engravings thereon; and we know that it is by the grace of God the
        Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, that we beheld and bear record that
        these things are true; and it is marvellous in our eyes; nevertheless
        the voice of the Lord commanded us that we should bear record of it;
        wherefore, to be obedient unto the commandments of God, we bear
        testimony of these things. And we know that if we are faithful in
        Christ, we shall rid our garments of the blood of all men, and be found
        spotless before the judgment-seat of Christ, and shall dwell with Him
        eternally in the heavens. And the honor be to the Father, and to the
        Son, and to the Holy Ghost, which is one God. Amen. OLIVER COWDERY,
        DAVID WHITMER, MARTIN HARRIS.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      Some people have to have a world of evidence before they can come anywhere
      in the neighborhood of believing anything; but for me, when a man tells me
      that he has "seen the engravings which are upon the plates," and not only
      that, but an angel was there at the time, and saw him see them, and
      probably took his receipt for it, I am very far on the road to conviction,
      no matter whether I ever heard of that man before or not, and even if I do
      not know the name of the angel, or his nationality either.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next is this:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        AND ALSO THE TESTIMONY OF EIGHT WITNESSES. Be it known unto all nations,
        kindreds, tongues, and people unto whom this work shall come, that
        Joseph Smith, Jr., the translator of this work, has shown unto us the
        plates of which hath been spoken, which have the appearance of gold; and
        as many of the leaves as the said Smith has translated, we did handle
        with our hands; and we also saw the engravings thereon, all of which has
        the appearance of ancient work, and of curious workmanship. And this we
        bear record with words of soberness, that the said Smith has shown unto
        us, for we have seen and hefted, and know of a surety that the said
        Smith has got the plates of which we have spoken. And we give our names
        unto the world, to witness unto the world that which we have seen; and
        we lie not, God bearing witness of it. CHRISTIAN WHITMER, JACOB WHITMER,
        PETER WHITMER, JR., JOHN WHITMER, HIRAM PAGE, JOSEPH SMITH, SR., HYRUM
        SMITH, SAMUEL H. SMITH.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      And when I am far on the road to conviction, and eight men, be they
      grammatical or otherwise, come forward and tell me that they have seen the
      plates too; and not only seen those plates but "hefted" them, I am
      convinced. I could not feel more satisfied and at rest if the entire
      Whitmer family had testified.
    </p>
    <p>
      The Mormon Bible consists of fifteen "books"&mdash;being the books of
      Jacob, Enos, Jarom, Omni, Mosiah, Zeniff, Alma, Helaman, Ether, Moroni,
      two "books" of Mormon, and three of Nephi.
    </p>
    <p>
      In the first book of Nephi is a plagiarism of the Old Testament, which
      gives an account of the exodus from Jerusalem of the "children of Lehi";
      and it goes on to tell of their wanderings in the wilderness, during eight
      years, and their supernatural protection by one of their number, a party
      by the name of Nephi. They finally reached the land of "Bountiful," and
      camped by the sea. After they had remained there "for the space of many
      days"&mdash;which is more Scriptural than definite&mdash;Nephi was
      commanded from on high to build a ship wherein to "carry the people across
      the waters." He travestied Noah's ark&mdash;but he obeyed orders in the
      matter of the plan. He finished the ship in a single day, while his
      brethren stood by and made fun of it&mdash;and of him, too&mdash;"saying,
      our brother is a fool, for he thinketh that he can build a ship." They did
      not wait for the timbers to dry, but the whole tribe or nation sailed the
      next day. Then a bit of genuine nature cropped out, and is revealed by
      outspoken Nephi with Scriptural frankness&mdash;they all got on a spree!
      They, "and also their wives, began to make themselves merry, insomuch that
      they began to dance, and to sing, and to speak with much rudeness; yea,
      they were lifted up unto exceeding rudeness."
    </p>
    <p>
      Nephi tried to stop these scandalous proceedings; but they tied him neck
      and heels, and went on with their lark. But observe how Nephi the prophet
      circumvented them by the aid of the invisible powers:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        And it came to pass that after they had bound me, insomuch that I could
        not move, the compass, which had been prepared of the Lord, did cease to
        work; wherefore, they knew not whither they should steer the ship,
        insomuch that there arose a great storm, yea, a great and terrible
        tempest, and we were driven back upon the waters for the space of three
        days; and they began to be frightened exceedingly, lest they should be
        drowned in the sea; nevertheless they did not loose me. And on the
        fourth day, which we had been driven back, the tempest began to be
        exceeding sore. And it came to pass that we were about to be swallowed
        up in the depths of the sea.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      Then they untied him.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link131" id="link131"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="131.jpg (77K)" src="images/131.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        And it came to pass after they had loosed me, behold, I took the
        compass, and it did work whither I desired it. And it came to pass that
        I prayed unto the Lord; and after I had prayed, the winds did cease, and
        the storm did cease, and there was a great calm.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      Equipped with their compass, these ancients appear to have had the
      advantage of Noah.
    </p>
    <p>
      Their voyage was toward a "promised land"&mdash;the only name they give
      it. They reached it in safety.
    </p>
    <p>
      Polygamy is a recent feature in the Mormon religion, and was added by
      Brigham Young after Joseph Smith's death. Before that, it was regarded as
      an "abomination." This verse from the Mormon Bible occurs in Chapter II.
      of the book of Jacob:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        For behold, thus saith the Lord, this people begin to wax in iniquity;
        they understand not the Scriptures; for they seek to excuse themselves
        in committing whoredoms, because of the things which were written
        concerning David, and Solomon his son. Behold, David and Solomon truly
        had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before me,
        saith the Lord; wherefore, thus saith the Lord, I have led this people
        forth out of the land of Jerusalem, by the power of mine arm, that I
        might raise up unto me a righteous branch from the fruit of the loins of
        Joseph. Wherefore, I the Lord God, will no suffer that this people shall
        do like unto them of old.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      However, the project failed&mdash;or at least the modern Mormon end of it&mdash;for
      Brigham "suffers" it. This verse is from the same chapter:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        Behold, the Lamanites your brethren, whom ye hate, because of their
        filthiness and the cursings which hath come upon their skins, are more
        righteous than you; for they have not forgotten the commandment of the
        Lord, which was given unto our fathers, that they should have, save it
        were one wife; and concubines they should have none.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      The following verse (from Chapter IX. of the Book of Nephi) appears to
      contain information not familiar to everybody:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        And now it came to pass that when Jesus had ascended into heaven, the
        multitude did disperse, and every man did take his wife and his
        children, and did return to his own home.
      </p>
      <p>
        And it came to pass that on the morrow, when the multitude was gathered
        together, behold, Nephi and his brother whom he had raised from the
        dead, whose name was Timothy, and also his son, whose name was Jonas,
        and also Mathoni, and Mathonihah, his brother, and Kumen, and Kumenenhi,
        and Jeremiah, and Shemnon, and Jonas, and Zedekiah, and Isaiah; now
        these were the names of the disciples whom Jesus had chosen.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      In order that the reader may observe how much more grandeur and
      picturesqueness (as seen by these Mormon twelve) accompanied on of the
      tenderest episodes in the life of our Saviour than other eyes seem to have
      been aware of, I quote the following from the same "book"&mdash;Nephi:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        And it came to pass that Jesus spake unto them, and bade them arise. And
        they arose from the earth, and He said unto them, Blessed are ye because
        of your faith. And now behold, My joy is full. And when He had said
        these words, He wept, and the multitude bear record of it, and He took
        their little children, one by one, and blessed them, and prayed unto the
        Father for them. And when He had done this He wept again, and He spake
        unto the multitude, and saith unto them, Behold your little ones. And as
        they looked to behold, they cast their eyes toward heaven, and they saw
        the heavens open, and they saw angels descending out of heaven as it
        were, in the midst of fire; and they came down and encircled those
        little ones about, and they were encircled about with fire; and the
        angels did minister unto them, and the multitude did see and hear and
        bear record; and they know that their record is true, for they all of
        them did see and hear, every man for himself; and they were in number
        about two thousand and five hundred souls; and they did consist of men,
        women, and children.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      And what else would they be likely to consist of?
    </p>
    <p>
      The Book of Ether is an incomprehensible medley of if "history," much of
      it relating to battles and sieges among peoples whom the reader has
      possibly never heard of; and who inhabited a country which is not set down
      in the geography. These was a King with the remarkable name of
      Coriantumr,^^ and he warred with Shared, and Lib, and Shiz, and others, in
      the "plains of Heshlon"; and the "valley of Gilgal"; and the "wilderness
      of Akish"; and the "land of Moran"; and the "plains of Agosh"; and
      "Ogath," and "Ramah," and the "land of Corihor," and the "hill Comnor," by
      "the waters of Ripliancum," etc., etc., etc. "And it came to pass," after
      a deal of fighting, that Coriantumr, upon making calculation of his
      losses, found that "there had been slain two millions of mighty men, and
      also their wives and their children"&mdash;say 5,000,000 or 6,000,000 in
      all&mdash;"and he began to sorrow in his heart." Unquestionably it was
      time. So he wrote to Shiz, asking a cessation of hostilities, and offering
      to give up his kingdom to save his people. Shiz declined, except upon
      condition that Coriantumr would come and let him cut his head off first&mdash;a
      thing which Coriantumr would not do. Then there was more fighting for a
      season; then four years were devoted to gathering the forces for a final
      struggle&mdash;after which ensued a battle, which, I take it, is the most
      remarkable set forth in history,&mdash;except, perhaps, that of the
      Kilkenny cats, which it resembles in some respects. This is the account of
      the gathering and the battle:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        7. And it came to pass that they did gather together all the people,
        upon all the face of the land, who had not been slain, save it was
        Ether. And it came to pass that Ether did behold all the doings of the
        people; and he beheld that the people who were for Coriantumr, were
        gathered together to the army of Coriantumr; and the people who were for
        Shiz, were gathered together to the army of Shiz; wherefore they were
        for the space of four years gathering together the people, that they
        might get all who were upon the face of the land, and that they might
        receive all the strength which it was possible that they could receive.
        And it came to pass that when they were all gathered together, every one
        to the army which he would, with their wives and their children; both
        men, women, and children being armed with weapons of war, having
        shields, and breast-plates, and head-plates, and being clothed after the
        manner of war, they did march forth one against another, to battle; and
        they fought all that day, and conquered not. And it came to pass that
        when it was night they were weary, and retired to their camps; and after
        they had retired to their camps, they took up a howling and a
        lamentation for the loss of the slain of their people; and so great were
        their cries, their howlings and lamentations, that it did rend the air
        exceedingly. And it came to pass that on the morrow they did go again to
        battle, and great and terrible was that day; nevertheless they conquered
        not, and when the night came again, they did rend the air with their
        cries, and their howlings, and their mournings, for the loss of the
        slain of their people.
      </p>
      <p>
        8. And it came to pass that Coriantumr wrote again an epistle unto Shiz,
        desiring that he would not come again to battle, but that he would take
        the kingdom, and spare the lives of the people. But behold, the Spirit
        of the Lord had ceased striving with them, and Satan had full power over
        the hearts of the people, for they were given up unto the hardness of
        their hearts, and the blindness of their minds that they might be
        destroyed; wherefore they went again to battle. And it came to pass that
        they fought all that day, and when the night came they slept upon their
        swords; and on the morrow they fought even until the night came; and
        when the night came they were drunken with anger, even as a man who is
        drunken with wine; and they slept again upon their swords; and on the
        morrow they fought again; and when the night came they had all fallen by
        the sword save it were fifty and two of the people of Coriantumr, and
        sixty and nine of the people of Shiz. And it came to pass that they
        slept upon their swords that night, and on the morrow they fought again,
        and they contended in their mights with their swords, and with their
        shields, all that day; and when the night came there were thirty and two
        of the people of Shiz, and twenty and seven of the people of Coriantumr.
      </p>
      <p>
        9. And it came to pass that they ate and slept, and prepared for death
        on the morrow. And they were large and mighty men, as to the strength of
        men. And it came to pass that they fought for the space of three hours,
        and they fainted with the loss of blood. And it came to pass that when
        the men of Coriantumr had received sufficient strength, that they could
        walk, they were about to flee for their lives, but behold, Shiz arose,
        and also his men, and he swore in his wrath that he would slay
        Coriantumr, or he would perish by the sword: wherefore he did pursue
        them, and on the morrow he did overtake them; and they fought again with
        the sword. And it came to pass that when they had all fallen by the
        sword, save it were Coriantumr and Shiz, behold Shiz had fainted with
        loss of blood. And it came to pass that when Coriantumr had leaned upon
        his sword, that he rested a little, he smote off the head of Shiz. And
        it came to pass that after he had smote off the head of Shiz, that Shiz
        raised upon his hands and fell; and after that he had struggled for
        breath, he died. And it came to pass that Coriantumr fell to the earth,
        and became as if he had no life. And the Lord spake unto Ether, and said
        unto him, go forth. And he went forth, and beheld that the words of the
        Lord had all been fulfilled; and he finished his record; and the
        hundredth part I have not written.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      It seems a pity he did not finish, for after all his dreary former
      chapters of commonplace, he stopped just as he was in danger of becoming
      interesting.
    </p>
    <p>
      The Mormon Bible is rather stupid and tiresome to read, but there is
      nothing vicious in its teachings. Its code of morals is unobjectionable-
      -it is "smouched" [Milton] from the New Testament and no credit given.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch17" id="linkch17"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XVII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At the end of our two days' sojourn, we left Great Salt Lake City hearty
      and well fed and happy&mdash;physically superb but not so very much wiser,
      as regards the "Mormon question," than we were when we arrived, perhaps.
      We had a deal more "information" than we had before, of course, but we did
      not know what portion of it was reliable and what was not&mdash;for it all
      came from acquaintances of a day&mdash;strangers, strictly speaking. We
      were told, for instance, that the dreadful "Mountain Meadows Massacre" was
      the work of the Indians entirely, and that the Gentiles had meanly tried
      to fasten it upon the Mormons; we were told, likewise, that the Indians
      were to blame, partly, and partly the Mormons; and we were told, likewise,
      and just as positively, that the Mormons were almost if not wholly and
      completely responsible for that most treacherous and pitiless butchery. We
      got the story in all these different shapes, but it was not till several
      years afterward that Mrs. Waite's book, "The Mormon Prophet," came out
      with Judge Cradlebaugh's trial of the accused parties in it and revealed
      the truth that the latter version was the correct one and that the Mormons
      were the assassins. All our "information" had three sides to it, and so I
      gave up the idea that I could settle the "Mormon question" in two days.
      Still I have seen newspaper correspondents do it in one.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link137" id="link137"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="137.jpg (62K)" src="images/137.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I left Great Salt Lake a good deal confused as to what state of things
      existed there&mdash;and sometimes even questioning in my own mind whether
      a state of things existed there at all or not. But presently I remembered
      with a lightening sense of relief that we had learned two or three trivial
      things there which we could be certain of; and so the two days were not
      wholly lost. For instance, we had learned that we were at last in a
      pioneer land, in absolute and tangible reality.
    </p>
    <p>
      The high prices charged for trifles were eloquent of high freights and
      bewildering distances of freightage. In the east, in those days, the
      smallest moneyed denomination was a penny and it represented the smallest
      purchasable quantity of any commodity. West of Cincinnati the smallest
      coin in use was the silver five-cent piece and no smaller quantity of an
      article could be bought than "five cents' worth." In Overland City the
      lowest coin appeared to be the ten-cent piece; but in Salt Lake there did
      not seem to be any money in circulation smaller than a quarter, or any
      smaller quantity purchasable of any commodity than twenty-five cents'
      worth. We had always been used to half dimes and "five cents' worth" as
      the minimum of financial negotiations; but in Salt Lake if one wanted a
      cigar, it was a quarter; if he wanted a chalk pipe, it was a quarter; if
      he wanted a peach, or a candle, or a newspaper, or a shave, or a little
      Gentile whiskey to rub on his corns to arrest indigestion and keep him
      from having the toothache, twenty-five cents was the price, every time.
      When we looked at the shot-bag of silver, now and then, we seemed to be
      wasting our substance in riotous living, but if we referred to the expense
      account we could see that we had not been doing anything of the kind.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link138" id="link138"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="138.jpg (21K)" src="images/138.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But people easily get reconciled to big money and big prices, and fond and
      vain of both&mdash;it is a descent to little coins and cheap prices that
      is hardest to bear and slowest to take hold upon one's toleration. After a
      month's acquaintance with the twenty-five cent minimum, the average human
      being is ready to blush every time he thinks of his despicable five-cent
      days. How sunburnt with blushes I used to get in gaudy Nevada, every time
      I thought of my first financial experience in Salt Lake. It was on this
      wise (which is a favorite expression of great authors, and a very neat
      one, too, but I never hear anybody say on this wise when they are
      talking). A young half-breed with a complexion like a yellow-jacket asked
      me if I would have my boots blacked. It was at the Salt Lake House the
      morning after we arrived. I said yes, and he blacked them. Then I handed
      him a silver five-cent piece, with the benevolent air of a person who is
      conferring wealth and blessedness upon poverty and suffering. The
      yellow-jacket took it with what I judged to be suppressed emotion, and
      laid it reverently down in the middle of his broad hand. Then he began to
      contemplate it, much as a philosopher contemplates a gnat's ear in the
      ample field of his microscope. Several mountaineers, teamsters, stage-
      drivers, etc., drew near and dropped into the tableau and fell to
      surveying the money with that attractive indifference to formality which
      is noticeable in the hardy pioneer. Presently the yellow-jacket handed the
      half dime back to me and told me I ought to keep my money in my
      pocket-book instead of in my soul, and then I wouldn't get it cramped and
      shriveled up so!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link139" id="link139"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="139.jpg (61K)" src="images/139.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      What a roar of vulgar laughter there was! I destroyed the mongrel reptile
      on the spot, but I smiled and smiled all the time I was detaching his
      scalp, for the remark he made was good for an "Injun."
    </p>
    <p>
      Yes, we had learned in Salt Lake to be charged great prices without
      letting the inward shudder appear on the surface&mdash;for even already we
      had overheard and noted the tenor of conversations among drivers,
      conductors, and hostlers, and finally among citizens of Salt Lake, until
      we were well aware that these superior beings despised "emigrants." We
      permitted no tell-tale shudders and winces in our countenances, for we
      wanted to seem pioneers, or Mormons, half-breeds, teamsters,
      stage-drivers, Mountain Meadow assassins&mdash;anything in the world that
      the plains and Utah respected and admired&mdash;but we were wretchedly
      ashamed of being "emigrants," and sorry enough that we had white shirts
      and could not swear in the presence of ladies without looking the other
      way.
    </p>
    <p>
      And many a time in Nevada, afterwards, we had occasion to remember with
      humiliation that we were "emigrants," and consequently a low and inferior
      sort of creatures. Perhaps the reader has visited Utah, Nevada, or
      California, even in these latter days, and while communing with himself
      upon the sorrowful banishment of these countries from what he considers
      "the world," has had his wings clipped by finding that he is the one to be
      pitied, and that there are entire populations around him ready and willing
      to do it for him&mdash;yea, who are complacently doing it for him already,
      wherever he steps his foot.
    </p>
    <p>
      Poor thing, they are making fun of his hat; and the cut of his New York
      coat; and his conscientiousness about his grammar; and his feeble
      profanity; and his consumingly ludicrous ignorance of ores, shafts,
      tunnels, and other things which he never saw before, and never felt enough
      interest in to read about. And all the time that he is thinking what a sad
      fate it is to be exiled to that far country, that lonely land, the
      citizens around him are looking down on him with a blighting compassion
      because he is an "emigrant" instead of that proudest and blessedest
      creature that exists on all the earth, a "FORTY-NINER."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link140" id="link140"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="140.jpg (30K)" src="images/140.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The accustomed coach life began again, now, and by midnight it almost
      seemed as if we never had been out of our snuggery among the mail sacks at
      all. We had made one alteration, however. We had provided enough bread,
      boiled ham and hard boiled eggs to last double the six hundred miles of
      staging we had still to do.
    </p>
    <p>
      And it was comfort in those succeeding days to sit up and contemplate the
      majestic panorama of mountains and valleys spread out below us and eat ham
      and hard boiled eggs while our spiritual natures revelled alternately in
      rainbows, thunderstorms, and peerless sunsets. Nothing helps scenery like
      ham and eggs. Ham and eggs, and after these a pipe&mdash;an old, rank,
      delicious pipe&mdash;ham and eggs and scenery, a "down grade," a flying
      coach, a fragrant pipe and a contented heart&mdash;these make happiness.
      It is what all the ages have struggled for.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link141" id="link141"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="141.jpg (29K)" src="images/141.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch18" id="linkch18"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XVIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At eight in the morning we reached the remnant and ruin of what had been
      the important military station of "Camp Floyd," some forty-five or fifty
      miles from Salt Lake City. At four P.M. we had doubled our distance and
      were ninety or a hundred miles from Salt Lake. And now we entered upon one
      of that species of deserts whose concentrated hideousness shames the
      diffused and diluted horrors of Sahara&mdash;an "alkali" desert. For
      sixty- eight miles there was but one break in it. I do not remember that
      this was really a break; indeed it seems to me that it was nothing but a
      watering depot in the midst of the stretch of sixty-eight miles. If my
      memory serves me, there was no well or spring at this place, but the water
      was hauled there by mule and ox teams from the further side of the desert.
      There was a stage station there. It was forty-five miles from the
      beginning of the desert, and twenty-three from the end of it.
    </p>
    <p>
      We plowed and dragged and groped along, the whole live-long night, and at
      the end of this uncomfortable twelve hours we finished the forty-five-
      mile part of the desert and got to the stage station where the imported
      water was. The sun was just rising. It was easy enough to cross a desert
      in the night while we were asleep; and it was pleasant to reflect, in the
      morning, that we in actual person had encountered an absolute desert and
      could always speak knowingly of deserts in presence of the ignorant
      thenceforward. And it was pleasant also to reflect that this was not an
      obscure, back country desert, but a very celebrated one, the metropolis
      itself, as you may say. All this was very well and very comfortable and
      satisfactory&mdash;but now we were to cross a desert in daylight. This was
      fine&mdash;novel&mdash;romantic&mdash;dramatically adventurous&mdash;this,
      indeed, was worth living for, worth traveling for! We would write home all
      about it.
    </p>
    <p>
      This enthusiasm, this stern thirst for adventure, wilted under the sultry
      August sun and did not last above one hour. One poor little hour&mdash;and
      then we were ashamed that we had "gushed" so. The poetry was all in the
      anticipation&mdash;there is none in the reality. Imagine a vast, waveless
      ocean stricken dead and turned to ashes; imagine this solemn waste tufted
      with ash-dusted sage-bushes; imagine the lifeless silence and solitude
      that belong to such a place; imagine a coach, creeping like a bug through
      the midst of this shoreless level, and sending up tumbled volumes of dust
      as if it were a bug that went by steam; imagine this aching monotony of
      toiling and plowing kept up hour after hour, and the shore still as far
      away as ever, apparently; imagine team, driver, coach and passengers so
      deeply coated with ashes that they are all one colorless color; imagine
      ash-drifts roosting above moustaches and eyebrows like snow accumulations
      on boughs and bushes. This is the reality of it.
    </p>
    <p>
      The sun beats down with dead, blistering, relentless malignity; the
      perspiration is welling from every pore in man and beast, but scarcely a
      sign of it finds its way to the surface&mdash;it is absorbed before it
      gets there; there is not the faintest breath of air stirring; there is not
      a merciful shred of cloud in all the brilliant firmament; there is not a
      living creature visible in any direction whither one searches the blank
      level that stretches its monotonous miles on every hand; there is not a
      sound&mdash;not a sigh&mdash;not a whisper&mdash;not a buzz, or a whir of
      wings, or distant pipe of bird&mdash;not even a sob from the lost souls
      that doubtless people that dead air. And so the occasional sneezing of the
      resting mules, and the champing of the bits, grate harshly on the grim
      stillness, not dissipating the spell but accenting it and making one feel
      more lonesome and forsaken than before.
    </p>
    <p>
      The mules, under violent swearing, coaxing and whip-cracking, would make
      at stated intervals a "spurt," and drag the coach a hundred or may be two
      hundred yards, stirring up a billowy cloud of dust that rolled back,
      enveloping the vehicle to the wheel-tops or higher, and making it seem
      afloat in a fog. Then a rest followed, with the usual sneezing and bit-
      champing. Then another "spurt" of a hundred yards and another rest at the
      end of it. All day long we kept this up, without water for the mules and
      without ever changing the team. At least we kept it up ten hours, which, I
      take it, is a day, and a pretty honest one, in an alkali desert. It was
      from four in the morning till two in the afternoon. And it was so hot! and
      so close! and our water canteens went dry in the middle of the day and we
      got so thirsty! It was so stupid and tiresome and dull! and the tedious
      hours did lag and drag and limp along with such a cruel deliberation! It
      was so trying to give one's watch a good long undisturbed spell and then
      take it out and find that it had been fooling away the time and not trying
      to get ahead any! The alkali dust cut through our lips, it persecuted our
      eyes, it ate through the delicate membranes and made our noses bleed and
      kept them bleeding&mdash;and truly and seriously the romance all faded far
      away and disappeared, and left the desert trip nothing but a harsh reality&mdash;a
      thirsty, sweltering, longing, hateful reality!
    </p>
    <p>
      Two miles and a quarter an hour for ten hours&mdash;that was what we
      accomplished. It was hard to bring the comprehension away down to such a
      snail-pace as that, when we had been used to making eight and ten miles an
      hour. When we reached the station on the farther verge of the desert, we
      were glad, for the first time, that the dictionary was along, because we
      never could have found language to tell how glad we were, in any sort of
      dictionary but an unabridged one with pictures in it. But there could not
      have been found in a whole library of dictionaries language sufficient to
      tell how tired those mules were after their twenty-three mile pull. To try
      to give the reader an idea of how thirsty they were, would be to "gild
      refined gold or paint the lily."
    </p>
    <p>
      Somehow, now that it is there, the quotation does not seem to fit&mdash;but
      no matter, let it stay, anyhow. I think it is a graceful and attractive
      thing, and therefore have tried time and time again to work it in where it
      would fit, but could not succeed. These efforts have kept my mind
      distracted and ill at ease, and made my narrative seem broken and
      disjointed, in places. Under these circumstances it seems to me best to
      leave it in, as above, since this will afford at least a temporary respite
      from the wear and tear of trying to "lead up" to this really apt and
      beautiful quotation.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link145" id="link145"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="145.jpg (32K)" src="images/145.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch19" id="linkch19"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XIX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      On the morning of the sixteenth day out from St. Joseph we arrived at the
      entrance of Rocky Canyon, two hundred and fifty miles from Salt Lake. It
      was along in this wild country somewhere, and far from any habitation of
      white men, except the stage stations, that we came across the wretchedest
      type of mankind I have ever seen, up to this writing. I refer to the
      Goshoot Indians. From what we could see and all we could learn, they are
      very considerably inferior to even the despised Digger Indians of
      California; inferior to all races of savages on our continent; inferior to
      even the Terra del Fuegans; inferior to the Hottentots, and actually
      inferior in some respects to the Kytches of Africa. Indeed, I have been
      obliged to look the bulky volumes of Wood's "Uncivilized Races of Men"
      clear through in order to find a savage tribe degraded enough to take rank
      with the Goshoots. I find but one people fairly open to that shameful
      verdict. It is the Bosjesmans (Bushmen) of South Africa. Such of the
      Goshoots as we saw, along the road and hanging about the stations, were
      small, lean, "scrawny" creatures; in complexion a dull black like the
      ordinary American negro; their faces and hands bearing dirt which they had
      been hoarding and accumulating for months, years, and even generations,
      according to the age of the proprietor; a silent, sneaking, treacherous
      looking race; taking note of everything, covertly, like all the other
      "Noble Red Men" that we (do not) read about, and betraying no sign in
      their countenances; indolent, everlastingly patient and tireless, like all
      other Indians; prideless beggars&mdash;for if the beggar instinct were
      left out of an Indian he would not "go," any more than a clock without a
      pendulum; hungry, always hungry, and yet never refusing anything that a
      hog would eat, though often eating what a hog would decline; hunters, but
      having no higher ambition than to kill and eat jack-ass rabbits, crickets
      and grasshoppers, and embezzle carrion from the buzzards and cayotes;
      savages who, when asked if they have the common Indian belief in a Great
      Spirit show a something which almost amounts to emotion, thinking whiskey
      is referred to; a thin, scattering race of almost naked black children,
      these Goshoots are, who produce nothing at all, and have no villages, and
      no gatherings together into strictly defined tribal communities&mdash;a
      people whose only shelter is a rag cast on a bush to keep off a portion of
      the snow, and yet who inhabit one of the most rocky, wintry, repulsive
      wastes that our country or any other can exhibit.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link147" id="link147"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="147.jpg (86K)" src="images/147.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The Bushmen and our Goshoots are manifestly descended from the self-same
      gorilla, or kangaroo, or Norway rat, which-ever animal&mdash;Adam the
      Darwinians trace them to.
    </p>
    <p>
      One would as soon expect the rabbits to fight as the Goshoots, and yet
      they used to live off the offal and refuse of the stations a few months
      and then come some dark night when no mischief was expected, and burn down
      the buildings and kill the men from ambush as they rushed out. And once,
      in the night, they attacked the stage-coach when a District Judge, of
      Nevada Territory, was the only passenger, and with their first volley of
      arrows (and a bullet or two) they riddled the stage curtains, wounded a
      horse or two and mortally wounded the driver. The latter was full of
      pluck, and so was his passenger. At the driver's call Judge Mott swung
      himself out, clambered to the box and seized the reins of the team, and
      away they plunged, through the racing mob of skeletons and under a
      hurtling storm of missiles. The stricken driver had sunk down on the boot
      as soon as he was wounded, but had held on to the reins and said he would
      manage to keep hold of them until relieved.
    </p>
    <p>
      And after they were taken from his relaxing grasp, he lay with his head
      between Judge Mott's feet, and tranquilly gave directions about the road;
      he said he believed he could live till the miscreants were outrun and left
      behind, and that if he managed that, the main difficulty would be at an
      end, and then if the Judge drove so and so (giving directions about bad
      places in the road, and general course) he would reach the next station
      without trouble. The Judge distanced the enemy and at last rattled up to
      the station and knew that the night's perils were done; but there was no
      comrade-in-arms for him to rejoice with, for the soldierly driver was
      dead.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link148" id="link148"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="148.jpg (43K)" src="images/148.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Let us forget that we have been saying harsh things about the Overland
      drivers, now. The disgust which the Goshoots gave me, a disciple of Cooper
      and a worshipper of the Red Man&mdash;even of the scholarly savages in the
      "Last of the Mohicans" who are fittingly associated with backwoodsmen who
      divide each sentence into two equal parts: one part critically
      grammatical, refined and choice of language, and the other part just such
      an attempt to talk like a hunter or a mountaineer, as a Broadway clerk
      might make after eating an edition of Emerson Bennett's works and studying
      frontier life at the Bowery Theatre a couple of weeks&mdash;I say that the
      nausea which the Goshoots gave me, an Indian worshipper, set me to
      examining authorities, to see if perchance I had been over-estimating the
      Red Man while viewing him through the mellow moonshine of romance. The
      revelations that came were disenchanting. It was curious to see how
      quickly the paint and tinsel fell away from him and left him treacherous,
      filthy and repulsive&mdash;and how quickly the evidences accumulated that
      wherever one finds an Indian tribe he has only found Goshoots more or less
      modified by circumstances and surroundings&mdash;but Goshoots, after all.
      They deserve pity, poor creatures; and they can have mine&mdash;at this
      distance. Nearer by, they never get anybody's.
    </p>
    <p>
      There is an impression abroad that the Baltimore and Washington Railroad
      Company and many of its employees are Goshoots; but it is an error. There
      is only a plausible resemblance, which, while it is apt enough to mislead
      the ignorant, cannot deceive parties who have contemplated both tribes.
      But seriously, it was not only poor wit, but very wrong to start the
      report referred to above; for however innocent the motive may have been,
      the necessary effect was to injure the reputation of a class who have a
      hard enough time of it in the pitiless deserts of the Rocky Mountains,
      Heaven knows! If we cannot find it in our hearts to give those poor naked
      creatures our Christian sympathy and compassion, in God's name let us at
      least not throw mud at them.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch20" id="linkch20"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      On the seventeenth day we passed the highest mountain peaks we had yet
      seen, and although the day was very warm the night that followed upon its
      heels was wintry cold and blankets were next to useless.
    </p>
    <p>
      On the eighteenth day we encountered the eastward-bound telegraph-
      constructors at Reese River station and sent a message to his Excellency
      Gov. Nye at Carson City (distant one hundred and fifty-six miles).
    </p>
    <p>
      On the nineteenth day we crossed the Great American Desert&mdash;forty
      memorable miles of bottomless sand, into which the coach wheels sunk from
      six inches to a foot. We worked our passage most of the way across. That
      is to say, we got out and walked. It was a dreary pull and a long and
      thirsty one, for we had no water. From one extremity of this desert to the
      other, the road was white with the bones of oxen and horses. It would
      hardly be an exaggeration to say that we could have walked the forty miles
      and set our feet on a bone at every step! The desert was one prodigious
      graveyard. And the log-chains, wagon tyres, and rotting wrecks of vehicles
      were almost as thick as the bones. I think we saw log-chains enough
      rusting there in the desert, to reach across any State in the Union. Do
      not these relics suggest something of an idea of the fearful suffering and
      privation the early emigrants to California endured?
    </p>
    <p>
      At the border of the Desert lies Carson Lake, or The "Sink" of the Carson,
      a shallow, melancholy sheet of water some eighty or a hundred miles in
      circumference. Carson River empties into it and is lost&mdash;sinks
      mysteriously into the earth and never appears in the light of the sun
      again&mdash;for the lake has no outlet whatever.
    </p>
    <p>
      There are several rivers in Nevada, and they all have this mysterious
      fate. They end in various lakes or "sinks," and that is the last of them.
      Carson Lake, Humboldt Lake, Walker Lake, Mono Lake, are all great sheets
      of water without any visible outlet. Water is always flowing into them;
      none is ever seen to flow out of them, and yet they remain always level
      full, neither receding nor overflowing. What they do with their surplus is
      only known to the Creator.
    </p>
    <p>
      On the western verge of the Desert we halted a moment at Ragtown. It
      consisted of one log house and is not set down on the map.
    </p>
    <p>
      This reminds me of a circumstance. Just after we left Julesburg, on the
      Platte, I was sitting with the driver, and he said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I can tell you a most laughable thing indeed, if you would like to listen
      to it. Horace Greeley went over this road once. When he was leaving Carson
      City he told the driver, Hank Monk, that he had an engagement to lecture
      at Placerville and was very anxious to go through quick. Hank Monk cracked
      his whip and started off at an awful pace. The coach bounced up and down
      in such a terrific way that it jolted the buttons all off of Horace's
      coat, and finally shot his head clean through the roof of the stage, and
      then he yelled at Hank Monk and begged him to go easier&mdash;said he
      warn't in as much of a hurry as he was awhile ago. But Hank Monk said,
      'Keep your seat, Horace, and I'll get you there on time'&mdash;and you bet
      you he did, too, what was left of him!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link151" id="link151"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="151.jpg (54K)" src="images/151.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      A day or two after that we picked up a Denver man at the cross roads, and
      he told us a good deal about the country and the Gregory Diggings. He
      seemed a very entertaining person and a man well posted in the affairs of
      Colorado. By and by he remarked:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I can tell you a most laughable thing indeed, if you would like to listen
      to it. Horace Greeley went over this road once. When he was leaving Carson
      City he told the driver, Hank Monk, that he had an engagement to lecture
      at Placerville and was very anxious to go through quick. Hank Monk cracked
      his whip and started off at an awful pace. The coach bounced up and down
      in such a terrific way that it jolted the buttons all off of Horace's
      coat, and finally shot his head clean through the roof of the stage, and
      then he yelled at Hank Monk and begged him to go easier&mdash;said he
      warn't in as much of a hurry as he was awhile ago. But Hank Monk said,
      'Keep your seat, Horace, and I'll get you there on time!'&mdash;and you
      bet you he did, too, what was left of him!"
    </p>
    <p>
      At Fort Bridger, some days after this, we took on board a cavalry
      sergeant, a very proper and soldierly person indeed. From no other man
      during the whole journey, did we gather such a store of concise and well-
      arranged military information. It was surprising to find in the desolate
      wilds of our country a man so thoroughly acquainted with everything useful
      to know in his line of life, and yet of such inferior rank and
      unpretentious bearing. For as much as three hours we listened to him with
      unabated interest. Finally he got upon the subject of trans- continental
      travel, and presently said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I can tell you a very laughable thing indeed, if you would like to listen
      to it. Horace Greeley went over this road once. When he was leaving Carson
      City he told the driver, Hank Monk, that he had an engagement to lecture
      at Placerville and was very anxious to go through quick. Hank Monk cracked
      his whip and started off at an awful pace. The coach bounced up and down
      in such a terrific way that it jolted the buttons all off of Horace's
      coat, and finally shot his head clean through the roof of the stage, and
      then he yelled at Hank Monk and begged him to go easier&mdash;said he
      warn't in as much of a hurry as he was awhile ago. But Hank Monk said,
      'Keep your seat, Horace, and I'll get you there on time!'&mdash;and you
      bet you he did, too, what was left of him!"
    </p>
    <p>
      When we were eight hours out from Salt Lake City a Mormon preacher got in
      with us at a way station&mdash;a gentle, soft-spoken, kindly man, and one
      whom any stranger would warm to at first sight. I can never forget the
      pathos that was in his voice as he told, in simple language, the story of
      his people's wanderings and unpitied sufferings. No pulpit eloquence was
      ever so moving and so beautiful as this outcast's picture of the first
      Mormon pilgrimage across the plains, struggling sorrowfully onward to the
      land of its banishment and marking its desolate way with graves and
      watering it with tears. His words so wrought upon us that it was a relief
      to us all when the conversation drifted into a more cheerful channel and
      the natural features of the curious country we were in came under
      treatment. One matter after another was pleasantly discussed, and at
      length the stranger said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I can tell you a most laughable thing indeed, if you would like to listen
      to it. Horace Greeley went over this road once. When he was leaving Carson
      City he told the driver, Hank Monk, that he had an engagement to lecture
      in Placerville, and was very anxious to go through quick. Hank Monk
      cracked his whip and started off at an awful pace. The coach bounced up
      and down in such a terrific way that it jolted the buttons all off of
      Horace's coat, and finally shot his head clean through the roof of the
      stage, and then he yelled at Hank Monk and begged him to go easier&mdash;said
      he warn't in as much of a hurry as he was awhile ago. But Hank Monk said,
      'Keep your seat, Horace, and I'll get you there on time!'&mdash;and you
      bet you bet you he did, too, what was left of him!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Ten miles out of Ragtown we found a poor wanderer who had lain down to
      die. He had walked as long as he could, but his limbs had failed him at
      last. Hunger and fatigue had conquered him. It would have been inhuman to
      leave him there. We paid his fare to Carson and lifted him into the coach.
      It was some little time before he showed any very decided signs of life;
      but by dint of chafing him and pouring brandy between his lips we finally
      brought him to a languid consciousness. Then we fed him a little, and by
      and by he seemed to comprehend the situation and a grateful light softened
      his eye. We made his mail-sack bed as comfortable as possible, and
      constructed a pillow for him with our coats. He seemed very thankful. Then
      he looked up in our faces, and said in a feeble voice that had a tremble
      of honest emotion in it:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen, I know not who you are, but you have saved my life; and
      although I can never be able to repay you for it, I feel that I can at
      least make one hour of your long journey lighter. I take it you are
      strangers to this great thorough fare, but I am entirely familiar with it.
      In this connection I can tell you a most laughable thing indeed, if you
      would like to listen to it. Horace Greeley&mdash;&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link154" id="link154"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="154.jpg (51K)" src="images/154.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I said, impressively:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Suffering stranger, proceed at your peril. You see in me the melancholy
      wreck of a once stalwart and magnificent manhood. What has brought me to
      this? That thing which you are about to tell. Gradually but surely, that
      tiresome old anecdote has sapped my strength, undermined my constitution,
      withered my life. Pity my helplessness. Spare me only just this once, and
      tell me about young George Washington and his little hatchet for a
      change."
    </p>
    <p>
      We were saved. But not so the invalid. In trying to retain the anecdote in
      his system he strained himself and died in our arms.
    </p>
    <p>
      I am aware, now, that I ought not to have asked of the sturdiest citizen
      of all that region, what I asked of that mere shadow of a man; for, after
      seven years' residence on the Pacific coast, I know that no passenger or
      driver on the Overland ever corked that anecdote in, when a stranger was
      by, and survived. Within a period of six years I crossed and recrossed the
      Sierras between Nevada and California thirteen times by stage and listened
      to that deathless incident four hundred and eighty-one or eighty-two
      times. I have the list somewhere. Drivers always told it, conductors told
      it, landlords told it, chance passengers told it, the very Chinamen and
      vagrant Indians recounted it. I have had the same driver tell it to me two
      or three times in the same afternoon. It has come to me in all the
      multitude of tongues that Babel bequeathed to earth, and flavored with
      whiskey, brandy, beer, cologne, sozodont, tobacco, garlic, onions,
      grasshoppers&mdash;everything that has a fragrance to it through all the
      long list of things that are gorged or guzzled by the sons of men. I never
      have smelt any anecdote as often as I have smelt that one; never have
      smelt any anecdote that smelt so variegated as that one. And you never
      could learn to know it by its smell, because every time you thought you
      had learned the smell of it, it would turn up with a different smell.
      Bayard Taylor has written about this hoary anecdote, Richardson has
      published it; so have Jones, Smith, Johnson, Ross Browne, and every other
      correspondence-inditing being that ever set his foot upon the great
      overland road anywhere between Julesburg and San Francisco; and I have
      heard that it is in the Talmud. I have seen it in print in nine different
      foreign languages; I have been told that it is employed in the inquisition
      in Rome; and I now learn with regret that it is going to be set to music.
      I do not think that such things are right.
    </p>
    <p>
      Stage-coaching on the Overland is no more, and stage drivers are a race
      defunct. I wonder if they bequeathed that bald-headed anecdote to their
      successors, the railroad brakemen and conductors, and if these latter
      still persecute the helpless passenger with it until he concludes, as did
      many a tourist of other days, that the real grandeurs of the Pacific coast
      are not Yo Semite and the Big Trees, but Hank Monk and his adventure with
      Horace Greeley.
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        [And what makes that worn anecdote the more aggravating, is, that the
        adventure it celebrates never occurred. If it were a good anecdote, that
        seeming demerit would be its chiefest virtue, for creative power belongs
        to greatness; but what ought to be done to a man who would wantonly
        contrive so flat a one as this? If I were to suggest what ought to be
        done to him, I should be called extravagant&mdash;but what does the
        sixteenth chapter of Daniel say? Aha!]
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link156" id="link156"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="156.jpg (17K)" src="images/156.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch21" id="linkch21"></a>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We were approaching the end of our long journey. It was the morning of the
      twentieth day. At noon we would reach Carson City, the capital of Nevada
      Territory. We were not glad, but sorry. It had been a fine pleasure trip;
      we had fed fat on wonders every day; we were now well accustomed to stage
      life, and very fond of it; so the idea of coming to a stand-still and
      settling down to a humdrum existence in a village was not agreeable, but
      on the contrary depressing.
    </p>
    <p>
      Visibly our new home was a desert, walled in by barren, snow-clad
      mountains. There was not a tree in sight. There was no vegetation but the
      endless sage-brush and greasewood. All nature was gray with it. We were
      plowing through great deeps of powdery alkali dust that rose in thick
      clouds and floated across the plain like smoke from a burning house.
    </p>
    <p>
      We were coated with it like millers; so were the coach, the mules, the
      mail-bags, the driver&mdash;we and the sage-brush and the other scenery
      were all one monotonous color. Long trains of freight wagons in the
      distance envelope in ascending masses of dust suggested pictures of
      prairies on fire. These teams and their masters were the only life we saw.
      Otherwise we moved in the midst of solitude, silence and desolation. Every
      twenty steps we passed the skeleton of some dead beast of burthen, with
      its dust-coated skin stretched tightly over its empty ribs. Frequently a
      solemn raven sat upon the skull or the hips and contemplated the passing
      coach with meditative serenity.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link158" id="link158"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="158.jpg (17K)" src="images/158.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by Carson City was pointed out to us. It nestled in the edge of a
      great plain and was a sufficient number of miles away to look like an
      assemblage of mere white spots in the shadow of a grim range of mountains
      overlooking it, whose summits seemed lifted clear out of companionship and
      consciousness of earthly things.
    </p>
    <p>
      We arrived, disembarked, and the stage went on. It was a "wooden" town;
      its population two thousand souls. The main street consisted of four or
      five blocks of little white frame stores which were too high to sit down
      on, but not too high for various other purposes; in fact, hardly high
      enough. They were packed close together, side by side, as if room were
      scarce in that mighty plain.
    </p>
    <p>
      The sidewalk was of boards that were more or less loose and inclined to
      rattle when walked upon. In the middle of the town, opposite the stores,
      was the "plaza" which is native to all towns beyond the Rocky Mountains&mdash;a
      large, unfenced, level vacancy, with a liberty pole in it, and very useful
      as a place for public auctions, horse trades, and mass meetings, and
      likewise for teamsters to camp in. Two other sides of the plaza were faced
      by stores, offices and stables.
    </p>
    <p>
      The rest of Carson City was pretty scattering.
    </p>
    <p>
      We were introduced to several citizens, at the stage-office and on the way
      up to the Governor's from the hotel&mdash;among others, to a Mr. Harris,
      who was on horseback; he began to say something, but interrupted himself
      with the remark:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'll have to get you to excuse me a minute; yonder is the witness that
      swore I helped to rob the California coach&mdash;a piece of impertinent
      intermeddling, sir, for I am not even acquainted with the man."
    </p>
    <p>
      Then he rode over and began to rebuke the stranger with a six-shooter, and
      the stranger began to explain with another. When the pistols were emptied,
      the stranger resumed his work (mending a whip-lash), and Mr. Harris rode
      by with a polite nod, homeward bound, with a bullet through one of his
      lungs, and several in his hips; and from them issued little rivulets of
      blood that coursed down the horse's sides and made the animal look quite
      picturesque. I never saw Harris shoot a man after that but it recalled to
      mind that first day in Carson.
    </p>
    <p>
      This was all we saw that day, for it was two o'clock, now, and according
      to custom the daily "Washoe Zephyr" set in; a soaring dust-drift about the
      size of the United States set up edgewise came with it, and the capital of
      Nevada Territory disappeared from view.
    </p>
    <p>
      Still, there were sights to be seen which were not wholly uninteresting to
      new comers; for the vast dust cloud was thickly freckled with things
      strange to the upper air&mdash;things living and dead, that flitted hither
      and thither, going and coming, appearing and disappearing among the
      rolling billows of dust&mdash;hats, chickens and parasols sailing in the
      remote heavens; blankets, tin signs, sage-brush and shingles a shade
      lower; door-mats and buffalo robes lower still; shovels and coal scuttles
      on the next grade; glass doors, cats and little children on the next;
      disrupted lumber yards, light buggies and wheelbarrows on the next; and
      down only thirty or forty feet above ground was a scurrying storm of
      emigrating roofs and vacant lots.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link159" id="link159"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="159.jpg (92K)" src="images/159.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It was something to see that much. I could have seen more, if I could have
      kept the dust out of my eyes.
    </p>
    <p>
      But seriously a Washoe wind is by no means a trifling matter. It blows
      flimsy houses down, lifts shingle roofs occasionally, rolls up tin ones
      like sheet music, now and then blows a stage coach over and spills the
      passengers; and tradition says the reason there are so many bald people
      there, is, that the wind blows the hair off their heads while they are
      looking skyward after their hats. Carson streets seldom look inactive on
      Summer afternoons, because there are so many citizens skipping around
      their escaping hats, like chambermaids trying to head off a spider.
    </p>
    <p>
      The "Washoe Zephyr" (Washoe is a pet nickname for Nevada) is a peculiar
      Scriptural wind, in that no man knoweth "whence it cometh." That is to
      say, where it originates. It comes right over the mountains from the West,
      but when one crosses the ridge he does not find any of it on the other
      side! It probably is manufactured on the mountain-top for the occasion,
      and starts from there. It is a pretty regular wind, in the summer time.
      Its office hours are from two in the afternoon till two the next morning;
      and anybody venturing abroad during those twelve hours needs to allow for
      the wind or he will bring up a mile or two to leeward of the point he is
      aiming at. And yet the first complaint a Washoe visitor to San Francisco
      makes, is that the sea winds blow so, there! There is a good deal of human
      nature in that.
    </p>
    <p>
      We found the state palace of the Governor of Nevada Territory to consist
      of a white frame one-story house with two small rooms in it and a
      stanchion supported shed in front&mdash;for grandeur&mdash;it compelled
      the respect of the citizen and inspired the Indians with awe. The newly
      arrived Chief and Associate Justices of the Territory, and other machinery
      of the government, were domiciled with less splendor. They were boarding
      around privately, and had their offices in their bedrooms.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link161" id="link161"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="161.jpg (63K)" src="images/161.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The Secretary and I took quarters in the "ranch" of a worthy French lady
      by the name of Bridget O'Flannigan, a camp follower of his Excellency the
      Governor. She had known him in his prosperity as commander-in-chief of the
      Metropolitan Police of New York, and she would not desert him in his
      adversity as Governor of Nevada.
    </p>
    <p>
      Our room was on the lower floor, facing the plaza, and when we had got our
      bed, a small table, two chairs, the government fire-proof safe, and the
      Unabridged Dictionary into it, there was still room enough left for a
      visitor&mdash;may be two, but not without straining the walls. But the
      walls could stand it&mdash;at least the partitions could, for they
      consisted simply of one thickness of white "cotton domestic" stretched
      from corner to corner of the room. This was the rule in Carson&mdash;any
      other kind of partition was the rare exception. And if you stood in a dark
      room and your neighbors in the next had lights, the shadows on your canvas
      told queer secrets sometimes! Very often these partitions were made of old
      flour sacks basted together; and then the difference between the common
      herd and the aristocracy was, that the common herd had unornamented sacks,
      while the walls of the aristocrat were overpowering with rudimental fresco&mdash;i.e.,
      red and blue mill brands on the flour sacks.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link162" id="link162"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="162.jpg (42K)" src="images/162.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Occasionally, also, the better classes embellished their canvas by pasting
      pictures from Harper's Weekly on them. In many cases, too, the wealthy and
      the cultured rose to spittoons and other evidences of a sumptuous and
      luxurious taste. [Washoe people take a joke so hard that I must explain
      that the above description was only the rule; there were many honorable
      exceptions in Carson&mdash;plastered ceilings and houses that had
      considerable furniture in them.&mdash;M. T.]
    </p>
    <p>
      We had a carpet and a genuine queen's-ware washbowl. Consequently we were
      hated without reserve by the other tenants of the O'Flannigan "ranch."
      When we added a painted oilcloth window curtain, we simply took our lives
      into our own hands. To prevent bloodshed I removed up stairs and took up
      quarters with the untitled plebeians in one of the fourteen white pine
      cot-bedsteads that stood in two long ranks in the one sole room of which
      the second story consisted.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a jolly company, the fourteen. They were principally voluntary
      camp-followers of the Governor, who had joined his retinue by their own
      election at New York and San Francisco and came along, feeling that in the
      scuffle for little territorial crumbs and offices they could not make
      their condition more precarious than it was, and might reasonably expect
      to make it better. They were popularly known as the "Irish Brigade,"
      though there were only four or five Irishmen among all the Governor's
      retainers.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link163" id="link163"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="163.jpg (95K)" src="images/163.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      His good-natured Excellency was much annoyed at the gossip his henchmen
      created&mdash;especially when there arose a rumor that they were paid
      assassins of his, brought along to quietly reduce the democratic vote when
      desirable!
    </p>
    <p>
      Mrs. O'Flannigan was boarding and lodging them at ten dollars a week
      apiece, and they were cheerfully giving their notes for it. They were
      perfectly satisfied, but Bridget presently found that notes that could not
      be discounted were but a feeble constitution for a Carson boarding- house.
      So she began to harry the Governor to find employment for the "Brigade."
      Her importunities and theirs together drove him to a gentle desperation at
      last, and he finally summoned the Brigade to the presence. Then, said he:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen, I have planned a lucrative and useful service for you&mdash;a
      service which will provide you with recreation amid noble landscapes, and
      afford you never ceasing opportunities for enriching your minds by
      observation and study. I want you to survey a railroad from Carson City
      westward to a certain point! When the legislature meets I will have the
      necessary bill passed and the remuneration arranged."
    </p>
    <p>
      "What, a railroad over the Sierra Nevada Mountains?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, then, survey it eastward to a certain point!"
    </p>
    <p>
      He converted them into surveyors, chain-bearers and so on, and turned them
      loose in the desert. It was "recreation" with a vengeance! Recreation on
      foot, lugging chains through sand and sage-brush, under a sultry sun and
      among cattle bones, cayotes and tarantulas.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link164" id="link164"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="164.jpg (15K)" src="images/164.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Romantic adventure" could go no further. They surveyed very slowly, very
      deliberately, very carefully. They returned every night during the first
      week, dusty, footsore, tired, and hungry, but very jolly. They brought in
      great store of prodigious hairy spiders&mdash;tarantulas&mdash;and
      imprisoned them in covered tumblers up stairs in the "ranch." After the
      first week, they had to camp on the field, for they were getting well
      eastward. They made a good many inquiries as to the location of that
      indefinite "certain point," but got no information. At last, to a
      peculiarly urgent inquiry of "How far eastward?" Governor Nye telegraphed
      back:
    </p>
    <p>
      "To the Atlantic Ocean, blast you!&mdash;and then bridge it and go on!"
    </p>
    <p>
      This brought back the dusty toilers, who sent in a report and ceased from
      their labors. The Governor was always comfortable about it; he said Mrs.
      O'Flannigan would hold him for the Brigade's board anyhow, and he intended
      to get what entertainment he could out of the boys; he said, with his
      old-time pleasant twinkle, that he meant to survey them into Utah and then
      telegraph Brigham to hang them for trespass!
    </p>
    <p>
      The surveyors brought back more tarantulas with them, and so we had quite
      a menagerie arranged along the shelves of the room. Some of these spiders
      could straddle over a common saucer with their hairy, muscular legs, and
      when their feelings were hurt, or their dignity offended, they were the
      wickedest-looking desperadoes the animal world can furnish. If their glass
      prison-houses were touched ever so lightly they were up and spoiling for a
      fight in a minute. Starchy?&mdash;proud? Indeed, they would take up a
      straw and pick their teeth like a member of Congress. There was as usual a
      furious "zephyr" blowing the first night of the brigade's return, and
      about midnight the roof of an adjoining stable blew off, and a corner of
      it came crashing through the side of our ranch. There was a simultaneous
      awakening, and a tumultuous muster of the brigade in the dark, and a
      general tumbling and sprawling over each other in the narrow aisle between
      the bedrows. In the midst of the turmoil, Bob H&mdash;&mdash;sprung up out
      of a sound sleep, and knocked down a shelf with his head. Instantly he
      shouted:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Turn out, boys&mdash;the tarantulas is loose!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link165" id="link165"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="165.jpg (15K)" src="images/165.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      No warning ever sounded so dreadful. Nobody tried, any longer, to leave
      the room, lest he might step on a tarantula. Every man groped for a trunk
      or a bed, and jumped on it. Then followed the strangest silence&mdash;a
      silence of grisly suspense it was, too&mdash;waiting, expectancy, fear. It
      was as dark as pitch, and one had to imagine the spectacle of those
      fourteen scant-clad men roosting gingerly on trunks and beds, for not a
      thing could be seen. Then came occasional little interruptions of the
      silence, and one could recognize a man and tell his locality by his voice,
      or locate any other sound a sufferer made by his gropings or changes of
      position. The occasional voices were not given to much speaking&mdash;you
      simply heard a gentle ejaculation of "Ow!" followed by a solid thump, and
      you knew the gentleman had felt a hairy blanket or something touch his
      bare skin and had skipped from a bed to the floor. Another silence.
      Presently you would hear a gasping voice say:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Su&mdash;su&mdash;something's crawling up the back of my neck!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Every now and then you could hear a little subdued scramble and a
      sorrowful "O Lord!" and then you knew that somebody was getting away from
      something he took for a tarantula, and not losing any time about it,
      either. Directly a voice in the corner rang out wild and clear:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I've got him! I've got him!" [Pause, and probable change of
      circumstances.] "No, he's got me! Oh, ain't they never going to fetch a
      lantern!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link166" id="link166"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="166.jpg (89K)" src="images/166.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The lantern came at that moment, in the hands of Mrs. O'Flannigan, whose
      anxiety to know the amount of damage done by the assaulting roof had not
      prevented her waiting a judicious interval, after getting out of bed and
      lighting up, to see if the wind was done, now, up stairs, or had a larger
      contract.
    </p>
    <p>
      The landscape presented when the lantern flashed into the room was
      picturesque, and might have been funny to some people, but was not to us.
      Although we were perched so strangely upon boxes, trunks and beds, and so
      strangely attired, too, we were too earnestly distressed and too genuinely
      miserable to see any fun about it, and there was not the semblance of a
      smile anywhere visible. I know I am not capable of suffering more than I
      did during those few minutes of suspense in the dark, surrounded by those
      creeping, bloody-minded tarantulas. I had skipped from bed to bed and from
      box to box in a cold agony, and every time I touched anything that was
      furzy I fancied I felt the fangs. I had rather go to war than live that
      episode over again. Nobody was hurt. The man who thought a tarantula had
      "got him" was mistaken&mdash;only a crack in a box had caught his finger.
      Not one of those escaped tarantulas was ever seen again. There were ten or
      twelve of them. We took candles and hunted the place high and low for
      them, but with no success. Did we go back to bed then? We did nothing of
      the kind. Money could not have persuaded us to do it. We sat up the rest
      of the night playing cribbage and keeping a sharp lookout for the enemy.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch22" id="linkch22"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It was the end of August, and the skies were cloudless and the weather
      superb. In two or three weeks I had grown wonderfully fascinated with the
      curious new country and concluded to put off my return to "the States"
      awhile. I had grown well accustomed to wearing a damaged slouch hat, blue
      woolen shirt, and pants crammed into boot-tops, and gloried in the absence
      of coat, vest and braces. I felt rowdyish and "bully," (as the historian
      Josephus phrases it, in his fine chapter upon the destruction of the
      Temple). It seemed to me that nothing could be so fine and so romantic. I
      had become an officer of the government, but that was for mere sublimity.
      The office was an unique sinecure. I had nothing to do and no salary. I
      was private Secretary to his majesty the Secretary and there was not yet
      writing enough for two of us. So Johnny K&mdash;&mdash;and I devoted our
      time to amusement. He was the young son of an Ohio nabob and was out there
      for recreation. He got it. We had heard a world of talk about the
      marvellous beauty of Lake Tahoe, and finally curiosity drove us thither to
      see it. Three or four members of the Brigade had been there and located
      some timber lands on its shores and stored up a quantity of provisions in
      their camp. We strapped a couple of blankets on our shoulders and took an
      axe apiece and started&mdash;for we intended to take up a wood ranch or so
      ourselves and become wealthy. We were on foot. The reader will find it
      advantageous to go horseback. We were told that the distance was eleven
      miles. We tramped a long time on level ground, and then toiled laboriously
      up a mountain about a thousand miles high and looked over. No lake there.
      We descended on the other side, crossed the valley and toiled up another
      mountain three or four thousand miles high, apparently, and looked over
      again. No lake yet. We sat down tired and perspiring, and hired a couple
      of Chinamen to curse those people who had beguiled us. Thus refreshed, we
      presently resumed the march with renewed vigor and determination. We
      plodded on, two or three hours longer, and at last the Lake burst upon us&mdash;a
      noble sheet of blue water lifted six thousand three hundred feet above the
      level of the sea, and walled in by a rim of snow-clad mountain peaks that
      towered aloft full three thousand feet higher still! It was a vast oval,
      and one would have to use up eighty or a hundred good miles in traveling
      around it. As it lay there with the shadows of the mountains brilliantly
      photographed upon its still surface I thought it must surely be the
      fairest picture the whole earth affords.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link169" id="link169"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="169.jpg (80K)" src="images/169.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We found the small skiff belonging to the Brigade boys, and without loss
      of time set out across a deep bend of the lake toward the landmarks that
      signified the locality of the camp. I got Johnny to row&mdash;not because
      I mind exertion myself, but because it makes me sick to ride backwards
      when I am at work. But I steered. A three-mile pull brought us to the camp
      just as the night fell, and we stepped ashore very tired and wolfishly
      hungry. In a "cache" among the rocks we found the provisions and the
      cooking utensils, and then, all fatigued as I was, I sat down on a boulder
      and superintended while Johnny gathered wood and cooked supper. Many a man
      who had gone through what I had, would have wanted to rest.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a delicious supper&mdash;hot bread, fried bacon, and black coffee.
      It was a delicious solitude we were in, too. Three miles away was a saw-
      mill and some workmen, but there were not fifteen other human beings
      throughout the wide circumference of the lake. As the darkness closed down
      and the stars came out and spangled the great mirror with jewels, we
      smoked meditatively in the solemn hush and forgot our troubles and our
      pains. In due time we spread our blankets in the warm sand between two
      large boulders and soon feel asleep, careless of the procession of ants
      that passed in through rents in our clothing and explored our persons.
      Nothing could disturb the sleep that fettered us, for it had been fairly
      earned, and if our consciences had any sins on them they had to adjourn
      court for that night, any way. The wind rose just as we were losing
      consciousness, and we were lulled to sleep by the beating of the surf upon
      the shore.
    </p>
    <p>
      It is always very cold on that lake shore in the night, but we had plenty
      of blankets and were warm enough. We never moved a muscle all night, but
      waked at early dawn in the original positions, and got up at once,
      thoroughly refreshed, free from soreness, and brim full of friskiness.
      There is no end of wholesome medicine in such an experience. That morning
      we could have whipped ten such people as we were the day before&mdash;sick
      ones at any rate. But the world is slow, and people will go to "water
      cures" and "movement cures" and to foreign lands for health. Three months
      of camp life on Lake Tahoe would restore an Egyptian mummy to his pristine
      vigor, and give him an appetite like an alligator. I do not mean the
      oldest and driest mummies, of course, but the fresher ones. The air up
      there in the clouds is very pure and fine, bracing and delicious. And why
      shouldn't it be?&mdash;it is the same the angels breathe. I think that
      hardly any amount of fatigue can be gathered together that a man cannot
      sleep off in one night on the sand by its side. Not under a roof, but
      under the sky; it seldom or never rains there in the summer time. I know a
      man who went there to die. But he made a failure of it. He was a skeleton
      when he came, and could barely stand. He had no appetite, and did nothing
      but read tracts and reflect on the future. Three months later he was
      sleeping out of doors regularly, eating all he could hold, three times a
      day, and chasing game over mountains three thousand feet high for
      recreation. And he was a skeleton no longer, but weighed part of a ton.
      This is no fancy sketch, but the truth. His disease was consumption. I
      confidently commend his experience to other skeletons.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /> <a name="link170" id="link170"></a>
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="170.jpg (19K)" src="images/170.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <a
      name="link171" id="link171"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="171.jpg (34K)" src="images/171.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I superintended again, and as soon as we had eaten breakfast we got in the
      boat and skirted along the lake shore about three miles and disembarked.
      We liked the appearance of the place, and so we claimed some three hundred
      acres of it and stuck our "notices" on a tree. It was yellow pine timber
      land&mdash;a dense forest of trees a hundred feet high and from one to
      five feet through at the butt. It was necessary to fence our property or
      we could not hold it. That is to say, it was necessary to cut down trees
      here and there and make them fall in such a way as to form a sort of
      enclosure (with pretty wide gaps in it). We cut down three trees apiece,
      and found it such heart-breaking work that we decided to "rest our case"
      on those; if they held the property, well and good; if they didn't, let
      the property spill out through the gaps and go; it was no use to work
      ourselves to death merely to save a few acres of land. Next day we came
      back to build a house&mdash;for a house was also necessary, in order to
      hold the property.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link172" id="link172"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="172.jpg (142K)" src="images/172.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We decided to build a substantial log- house and excite the envy of the
      Brigade boys; but by the time we had cut and trimmed the first log it
      seemed unnecessary to be so elaborate, and so we concluded to build it of
      saplings. However, two saplings, duly cut and trimmed, compelled
      recognition of the fact that a still modester architecture would satisfy
      the law, and so we concluded to build a "brush" house. We devoted the next
      day to this work, but we did so much "sitting around" and discussing, that
      by the middle of the afternoon we had achieved only a half-way sort of
      affair which one of us had to watch while the other cut brush, lest if
      both turned our backs we might not be able to find it again, it had such a
      strong family resemblance to the surrounding vegetation. But we were
      satisfied with it.
    </p>
    <p>
      We were land owners now, duly seized and possessed, and within the
      protection of the law. Therefore we decided to take up our residence on
      our own domain and enjoy that large sense of independence which only such
      an experience can bring. Late the next afternoon, after a good long rest,
      we sailed away from the Brigade camp with all the provisions and cooking
      utensils we could carry off&mdash;borrow is the more accurate word&mdash;and
      just as the night was falling we beached the boat at our own landing.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch23" id="linkch23"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      If there is any life that is happier than the life we led on our timber
      ranch for the next two or three weeks, it must be a sort of life which I
      have not read of in books or experienced in person. We did not see a human
      being but ourselves during the time, or hear any sounds but those that
      were made by the wind and the waves, the sighing of the pines, and now and
      then the far-off thunder of an avalanche. The forest about us was dense
      and cool, the sky above us was cloudless and brilliant with sunshine, the
      broad lake before us was glassy and clear, or rippled and breezy, or black
      and storm-tossed, according to Nature's mood; and its circling border of
      mountain domes, clothed with forests, scarred with land-slides, cloven by
      canons and valleys, and helmeted with glittering snow, fitly framed and
      finished the noble picture. The view was always fascinating, bewitching,
      entrancing. The eye was never tired of gazing, night or day, in calm or
      storm; it suffered but one grief, and that was that it could not look
      always, but must close sometimes in sleep.
    </p>
    <p>
      We slept in the sand close to the water's edge, between two protecting
      boulders, which took care of the stormy night-winds for us. We never took
      any paregoric to make us sleep. At the first break of dawn we were always
      up and running foot-races to tone down excess of physical vigor and
      exuberance of spirits. That is, Johnny was&mdash;but I held his hat. While
      smoking the pipe of peace after breakfast we watched the sentinel peaks
      put on the glory of the sun, and followed the conquering light as it swept
      down among the shadows, and set the captive crags and forests free. We
      watched the tinted pictures grow and brighten upon the water till every
      little detail of forest, precipice and pinnacle was wrought in and
      finished, and the miracle of the enchanter complete. Then to "business."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link174" id="link174"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="174.jpg (84K)" src="images/174.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      That is, drifting around in the boat. We were on the north shore. There,
      the rocks on the bottom are sometimes gray, sometimes white. This gives
      the marvelous transparency of the water a fuller advantage than it has
      elsewhere on the lake. We usually pushed out a hundred yards or so from
      shore, and then lay down on the thwarts, in the sun, and let the boat
      drift by the hour whither it would. We seldom talked. It interrupted the
      Sabbath stillness, and marred the dreams the luxurious rest and indolence
      brought. The shore all along was indented with deep, curved bays and
      coves, bordered by narrow sand-beaches; and where the sand ended, the
      steep mountain-sides rose right up aloft into space&mdash;rose up like a
      vast wall a little out of the perpendicular, and thickly wooded with tall
      pines.
    </p>
    <p>
      So singularly clear was the water, that where it was only twenty or thirty
      feet deep the bottom was so perfectly distinct that the boat seemed
      floating in the air! Yes, where it was even eighty feet deep. Every little
      pebble was distinct, every speckled trout, every hand's- breadth of sand.
      Often, as we lay on our faces, a granite boulder, as large as a village
      church, would start out of the bottom apparently, and seem climbing up
      rapidly to the surface, till presently it threatened to touch our faces,
      and we could not resist the impulse to seize an oar and avert the danger.
      But the boat would float on, and the boulder descend again, and then we
      could see that when we had been exactly above it, it must still have been
      twenty or thirty feet below the surface. Down through the transparency of
      these great depths, the water was not merely transparent, but dazzlingly,
      brilliantly so. All objects seen through it had a bright, strong
      vividness, not only of outline, but of every minute detail, which they
      would not have had when seen simply through the same depth of atmosphere.
      So empty and airy did all spaces seem below us, and so strong was the
      sense of floating high aloft in mid-nothingness, that we called these
      boat-excursions "balloon-voyages."
    </p>
    <p>
      We fished a good deal, but we did not average one fish a week. We could
      see trout by the thousand winging about in the emptiness under us, or
      sleeping in shoals on the bottom, but they would not bite&mdash;they could
      see the line too plainly, perhaps. We frequently selected the trout we
      wanted, and rested the bait patiently and persistently on the end of his
      nose at a depth of eighty feet, but he would only shake it off with an
      annoyed manner, and shift his position.
    </p>
    <p>
      We bathed occasionally, but the water was rather chilly, for all it looked
      so sunny. Sometimes we rowed out to the "blue water," a mile or two from
      shore. It was as dead blue as indigo there, because of the immense depth.
      By official measurement the lake in its centre is one thousand five
      hundred and twenty-five feet deep!
    </p>
    <p>
      Sometimes, on lazy afternoons, we lolled on the sand in camp, and smoked
      pipes and read some old well-worn novels. At night, by the camp-fire, we
      played euchre and seven-up to strengthen the mind&mdash;and played them
      with cards so greasy and defaced that only a whole summer's acquaintance
      with them could enable the student to tell the ace of clubs from the jack
      of diamonds.
    </p>
    <p>
      We never slept in our "house." It never recurred to us, for one thing; and
      besides, it was built to hold the ground, and that was enough. We did not
      wish to strain it.
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by our provisions began to run short, and we went back to the old
      camp and laid in a new supply. We were gone all day, and reached home
      again about night-fall, pretty tired and hungry. While Johnny was carrying
      the main bulk of the provisions up to our "house" for future use, I took
      the loaf of bread, some slices of bacon, and the coffee-pot, ashore, set
      them down by a tree, lit a fire, and went back to the boat to get the
      frying-pan. While I was at this, I heard a shout from Johnny, and looking
      up I saw that my fire was galloping all over the premises! Johnny was on
      the other side of it. He had to run through the flames to get to the lake
      shore, and then we stood helpless and watched the devastation.
    </p>
    <p>
      The ground was deeply carpeted with dry pine-needles, and the fire touched
      them off as if they were gunpowder. It was wonderful to see with what
      fierce speed the tall sheet of flame traveled! My coffee-pot was gone, and
      everything with it. In a minute and a half the fire seized upon a dense
      growth of dry manzanita chapparal six or eight feet high, and then the
      roaring and popping and crackling was something terrific. We were driven
      to the boat by the intense heat, and there we remained, spell-bound.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link176" id="link176"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="176.jpg (161K)" src="images/176.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Within half an hour all before us was a tossing, blinding tempest of
      flame! It went surging up adjacent ridges&mdash;surmounted them and
      disappeared in the canons beyond&mdash;burst into view upon higher and
      farther ridges, presently&mdash;shed a grander illumination abroad, and
      dove again&mdash;flamed out again, directly, higher and still higher up
      the mountain-side- -threw out skirmishing parties of fire here and there,
      and sent them trailing their crimson spirals away among remote ramparts
      and ribs and gorges, till as far as the eye could reach the lofty
      mountain-fronts were webbed as it were with a tangled network of red lava
      streams. Away across the water the crags and domes were lit with a ruddy
      glare, and the firmament above was a reflected hell!
    </p>
    <p>
      Every feature of the spectacle was repeated in the glowing mirror of the
      lake! Both pictures were sublime, both were beautiful; but that in the
      lake had a bewildering richness about it that enchanted the eye and held
      it with the stronger fascination.
    </p>
    <p>
      We sat absorbed and motionless through four long hours. We never thought
      of supper, and never felt fatigue. But at eleven o'clock the conflagration
      had traveled beyond our range of vision, and then darkness stole down upon
      the landscape again.
    </p>
    <p>
      Hunger asserted itself now, but there was nothing to eat. The provisions
      were all cooked, no doubt, but we did not go to see. We were homeless
      wanderers again, without any property. Our fence was gone, our house
      burned down; no insurance. Our pine forest was well scorched, the dead
      trees all burned up, and our broad acres of manzanita swept away. Our
      blankets were on our usual sand-bed, however, and so we lay down and went
      to sleep. The next morning we started back to the old camp, but while out
      a long way from shore, so great a storm came up that we dared not try to
      land. So I baled out the seas we shipped, and Johnny pulled heavily
      through the billows till we had reached a point three or four miles beyond
      the camp. The storm was increasing, and it became evident that it was
      better to take the hazard of beaching the boat than go down in a hundred
      fathoms of water; so we ran in, with tall white-caps following, and I sat
      down in the stern-sheets and pointed her head-on to the shore. The instant
      the bow struck, a wave came over the stern that washed crew and cargo
      ashore, and saved a deal of trouble. We shivered in the lee of a boulder
      all the rest of the day, and froze all the night through. In the morning
      the tempest had gone down, and we paddled down to the camp without any
      unnecessary delay. We were so starved that we ate up the rest of the
      Brigade's provisions, and then set out to Carson to tell them about it and
      ask their forgiveness. It was accorded, upon payment of damages.
    </p>
    <p>
      We made many trips to the lake after that, and had many a hair-breadth
      escape and blood-curdling adventure which will never be recorded in any
      history.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch24" id="linkch24"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXIV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I resolved to have a horse to ride. I had never seen such wild, free,
      magnificent horsemanship outside of a circus as these picturesquely-clad
      Mexicans, Californians and Mexicanized Americans displayed in Carson
      streets every day. How they rode! Leaning just gently forward out of the
      perpendicular, easy and nonchalant, with broad slouch-hat brim blown
      square up in front, and long riata swinging above the head, they swept
      through the town like the wind! The next minute they were only a sailing
      puff of dust on the far desert. If they trotted, they sat up gallantly and
      gracefully, and seemed part of the horse; did not go jiggering up and down
      after the silly Miss-Nancy fashion of the riding-schools. I had quickly
      learned to tell a horse from a cow, and was full of anxiety to learn more.
      I was resolved to buy a horse.
    </p>
    <p>
      While the thought was rankling in my mind, the auctioneer came skurrying
      through the plaza on a black beast that had as many humps and corners on
      him as a dromedary, and was necessarily uncomely; but he was "going,
      going, at twenty-two!&mdash;horse, saddle and bridle at twenty-two
      dollars, gentlemen!" and I could hardly resist.
    </p>
    <p>
      A man whom I did not know (he turned out to be the auctioneer's brother)
      noticed the wistful look in my eye, and observed that that was a very
      remarkable horse to be going at such a price; and added that the saddle
      alone was worth the money. It was a Spanish saddle, with ponderous
      'tapidaros', and furnished with the ungainly sole-leather covering with
      the unspellable name. I said I had half a notion to bid. Then this
      keen-eyed person appeared to me to be "taking my measure"; but I dismissed
      the suspicion when he spoke, for his manner was full of guileless candor
      and truthfulness. Said he:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I know that horse&mdash;know him well. You are a stranger, I take it, and
      so you might think he was an American horse, maybe, but I assure you he is
      not. He is nothing of the kind; but&mdash;excuse my speaking in a low
      voice, other people being near&mdash;he is, without the shadow of a doubt,
      a Genuine Mexican Plug!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link179" id="link179"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="179.jpg (96K)" src="images/179.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I did not know what a Genuine Mexican Plug was, but there was something
      about this man's way of saying it, that made me swear inwardly that I
      would own a Genuine Mexican Plug, or die.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Has he any other&mdash;er&mdash;advantages?" I inquired, suppressing what
      eagerness I could.
    </p>
    <p>
      He hooked his forefinger in the pocket of my army-shirt, led me to one
      side, and breathed in my ear impressively these words:
    </p>
    <p>
      "He can out-buck anything in America!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Going, going, going&mdash;at twent&mdash;ty&mdash;four dollars and a
      half, gen&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Twenty-seven!" I shouted, in a frenzy.
    </p>
    <p>
      "And sold!" said the auctioneer, and passed over the Genuine Mexican Plug
      to me.
    </p>
    <p>
      I could scarcely contain my exultation. I paid the money, and put the
      animal in a neighboring livery-stable to dine and rest himself.
    </p>
    <p>
      In the afternoon I brought the creature into the plaza, and certain
      citizens held him by the head, and others by the tail, while I mounted
      him. As soon as they let go, he placed all his feet in a bunch together,
      lowered his back, and then suddenly arched it upward, and shot me straight
      into the air a matter of three or four feet! I came as straight down
      again, lit in the saddle, went instantly up again, came down almost on the
      high pommel, shot up again, and came down on the horse's neck&mdash;all in
      the space of three or four seconds. Then he rose and stood almost straight
      up on his hind feet, and I, clasping his lean neck desperately, slid back
      into the saddle and held on. He came down, and immediately hoisted his
      heels into the air, delivering a vicious kick at the sky, and stood on his
      forefeet. And then down he came once more, and began the original exercise
      of shooting me straight up again. The third time I went up I heard a
      stranger say:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link180" id="link180"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="180.jpg (50K)" src="images/180.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, don't he buck, though!"
    </p>
    <p>
      While I was up, somebody struck the horse a sounding thwack with a
      leathern strap, and when I arrived again the Genuine Mexican Plug was not
      there. A California youth chased him up and caught him, and asked if he
      might have a ride. I granted him that luxury. He mounted the Genuine, got
      lifted into the air once, but sent his spurs home as he descended, and the
      horse darted away like a telegram. He soared over three fences like a
      bird, and disappeared down the road toward the Washoe Valley.
    </p>
    <p>
      I sat down on a stone, with a sigh, and by a natural impulse one of my
      hands sought my forehead, and the other the base of my stomach. I believe
      I never appreciated, till then, the poverty of the human machinery&mdash;for
      I still needed a hand or two to place elsewhere. Pen cannot describe how I
      was jolted up. Imagination cannot conceive how disjointed I was&mdash;how
      internally, externally and universally I was unsettled, mixed up and
      ruptured. There was a sympathetic crowd around me, though.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link181" id="link181"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="181.jpg (38K)" src="images/181.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      One elderly-looking comforter said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Stranger, you've been taken in. Everybody in this camp knows that horse.
      Any child, any Injun, could have told you that he'd buck; he is the very
      worst devil to buck on the continent of America. You hear me. I'm Curry.
      Old Curry. Old Abe Curry. And moreover, he is a simon-pure, out-and-out,
      genuine d&mdash;d Mexican plug, and an uncommon mean one at that, too.
      Why, you turnip, if you had laid low and kept dark, there's chances to buy
      an American horse for mighty little more than you paid for that bloody old
      foreign relic."
    </p>
    <p>
      I gave no sign; but I made up my mind that if the auctioneer's brother's
      funeral took place while I was in the Territory I would postpone all other
      recreations and attend it.
    </p>
    <p>
      After a gallop of sixteen miles the Californian youth and the Genuine
      Mexican Plug came tearing into town again, shedding foam-flakes like the
      spume-spray that drives before a typhoon, and, with one final skip over a
      wheelbarrow and a Chinaman, cast anchor in front of the "ranch."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link182" id="link182"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="182.jpg (45K)" src="images/182.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Such panting and blowing! Such spreading and contracting of the red equine
      nostrils, and glaring of the wild equine eye! But was the imperial beast
      subjugated? Indeed he was not.
    </p>
    <p>
      His lordship the Speaker of the House thought he was, and mounted him to
      go down to the Capitol; but the first dash the creature made was over a
      pile of telegraph poles half as high as a church; and his time to the
      Capitol&mdash;one mile and three quarters&mdash;remains unbeaten to this
      day. But then he took an advantage&mdash;he left out the mile, and only
      did the three quarters. That is to say, he made a straight cut across
      lots, preferring fences and ditches to a crooked road; and when the
      Speaker got to the Capitol he said he had been in the air so much he felt
      as if he had made the trip on a comet.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link183" id="link183"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="183.jpg (50K)" src="images/183.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In the evening the Speaker came home afoot for exercise, and got the
      Genuine towed back behind a quartz wagon. The next day I loaned the animal
      to the Clerk of the House to go down to the Dana silver mine, six miles,
      and he walked back for exercise, and got the horse towed. Everybody I
      loaned him to always walked back; they never could get enough exercise any
      other way.
    </p>
    <p>
      Still, I continued to loan him to anybody who was willing to borrow him,
      my idea being to get him crippled, and throw him on the borrower's hands,
      or killed, and make the borrower pay for him. But somehow nothing ever
      happened to him. He took chances that no other horse ever took and
      survived, but he always came out safe. It was his daily habit to try
      experiments that had always before been considered impossible, but he
      always got through. Sometimes he miscalculated a little, and did not get
      his rider through intact, but he always got through himself. Of course I
      had tried to sell him; but that was a stretch of simplicity which met with
      little sympathy. The auctioneer stormed up and down the streets on him for
      four days, dispersing the populace, interrupting business, and destroying
      children, and never got a bid&mdash;at least never any but the
      eighteen-dollar one he hired a notoriously substanceless bummer to make.
      The people only smiled pleasantly, and restrained their desire to buy, if
      they had any. Then the auctioneer brought in his bill, and I withdrew the
      horse from the market. We tried to trade him off at private vendue next,
      offering him at a sacrifice for second-hand tombstones, old iron,
      temperance tracts&mdash;any kind of property. But holders were stiff, and
      we retired from the market again. I never tried to ride the horse any
      more. Walking was good enough exercise for a man like me, that had nothing
      the matter with him except ruptures, internal injuries, and such things.
      Finally I tried to give him away. But it was a failure. Parties said
      earthquakes were handy enough on the Pacific coast&mdash;they did not wish
      to own one. As a last resort I offered him to the Governor for the use of
      the "Brigade." His face lit up eagerly at first, but toned down again, and
      he said the thing would be too palpable.
    </p>
    <p>
      Just then the livery stable man brought in his bill for six weeks' keeping&mdash;stall-room
      for the horse, fifteen dollars; hay for the horse, two hundred and fifty!
      The Genuine Mexican Plug had eaten a ton of the article, and the man said
      he would have eaten a hundred if he had let him.
    </p>
    <p>
      I will remark here, in all seriousness, that the regular price of hay
      during that year and a part of the next was really two hundred and fifty
      dollars a ton. During a part of the previous year it had sold at five
      hundred a ton, in gold, and during the winter before that there was such
      scarcity of the article that in several instances small quantities had
      brought eight hundred dollars a ton in coin! The consequence might be
      guessed without my telling it: peopled turned their stock loose to starve,
      and before the spring arrived Carson and Eagle valleys were almost
      literally carpeted with their carcases! Any old settler there will verify
      these statements.
    </p>
    <p>
      I managed to pay the livery bill, and that same day I gave the Genuine
      Mexican Plug to a passing Arkansas emigrant whom fortune delivered into my
      hand. If this ever meets his eye, he will doubtless remember the donation.
    </p>
    <p>
      Now whoever has had the luck to ride a real Mexican plug will recognize
      the animal depicted in this chapter, and hardly consider him exaggerated&mdash;but
      the uninitiated will feel justified in regarding his portrait as a fancy
      sketch, perhaps.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch25" id="linkch25"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Originally, Nevada was a part of Utah and was called Carson county; and a
      pretty large county it was, too. Certain of its valleys produced no end of
      hay, and this attracted small colonies of Mormon stock-raisers and farmers
      to them. A few orthodox Americans straggled in from California, but no
      love was lost between the two classes of colonists. There was little or no
      friendly intercourse; each party staid to itself. The Mormons were largely
      in the majority, and had the additional advantage of being peculiarly
      under the protection of the Mormon government of the Territory. Therefore
      they could afford to be distant, and even peremptory toward their
      neighbors. One of the traditions of Carson Valley illustrates the
      condition of things that prevailed at the time I speak of. The hired girl
      of one of the American families was Irish, and a Catholic; yet it was
      noted with surprise that she was the only person outside of the Mormon
      ring who could get favors from the Mormons. She asked kindnesses of them
      often, and always got them. It was a mystery to everybody. But one day as
      she was passing out at the door, a large bowie knife dropped from under
      her apron, and when her mistress asked for an explanation she observed
      that she was going out to "borry a wash-tub from the Mormons!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link186" id="link186"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="186.jpg (88K)" src="images/186.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In 1858 silver lodes were discovered in "Carson County," and then the
      aspect of things changed. Californians began to flock in, and the American
      element was soon in the majority. Allegiance to Brigham Young and Utah was
      renounced, and a temporary territorial government for "Washoe" was
      instituted by the citizens. Governor Roop was the first and only chief
      magistrate of it. In due course of time Congress passed a bill to organize
      "Nevada Territory," and President Lincoln sent out Governor Nye to
      supplant Roop.
    </p>
    <p>
      At this time the population of the Territory was about twelve or fifteen
      thousand, and rapidly increasing. Silver mines were being vigorously
      developed and silver mills erected. Business of all kinds was active and
      prosperous and growing more so day by day.
    </p>
    <p>
      The people were glad to have a legitimately constituted government, but
      did not particularly enjoy having strangers from distant States put in
      authority over them&mdash;a sentiment that was natural enough. They
      thought the officials should have been chosen from among themselves from
      among prominent citizens who had earned a right to such promotion, and who
      would be in sympathy with the populace and likewise thoroughly acquainted
      with the needs of the Territory. They were right in viewing the matter
      thus, without doubt. The new officers were "emigrants," and that was no
      title to anybody's affection or admiration either.
    </p>
    <p>
      The new government was received with considerable coolness. It was not
      only a foreign intruder, but a poor one. It was not even worth plucking&mdash;except
      by the smallest of small fry office-seekers and such. Everybody knew that
      Congress had appropriated only twenty thousand dollars a year in
      greenbacks for its support&mdash;about money enough to run a quartz mill a
      month. And everybody knew, also, that the first year's money was still in
      Washington, and that the getting hold of it would be a tedious and
      difficult process. Carson City was too wary and too wise to open up a
      credit account with the imported bantling with anything like indecent
      haste.
    </p>
    <p>
      There is something solemnly funny about the struggles of a new-born
      Territorial government to get a start in this world. Ours had a trying
      time of it. The Organic Act and the "instructions" from the State
      Department commanded that a legislature should be elected at such-and-
      such a time, and its sittings inaugurated at such-and-such a date. It was
      easy to get legislators, even at three dollars a day, although board was
      four dollars and fifty cents, for distinction has its charm in Nevada as
      well as elsewhere, and there were plenty of patriotic souls out of
      employment; but to get a legislative hall for them to meet in was another
      matter altogether. Carson blandly declined to give a room rent-free, or
      let one to the government on credit.
    </p>
    <p>
      But when Curry heard of the difficulty, he came forward, solitary and
      alone, and shouldered the Ship of State over the bar and got her afloat
      again. I refer to "Curry&mdash;Old Curry&mdash;Old Abe Curry." But for him
      the legislature would have been obliged to sit in the desert. He offered
      his large stone building just outside the capital limits, rent-free, and
      it was gladly accepted. Then he built a horse-railroad from town to the
      capitol, and carried the legislators gratis.
    </p>
    <p>
      He also furnished pine benches and chairs for the legislature, and covered
      the floors with clean saw-dust by way of carpet and spittoon combined. But
      for Curry the government would have died in its tender infancy. A canvas
      partition to separate the Senate from the House of Representatives was put
      up by the Secretary, at a cost of three dollars and forty cents, but the
      United States declined to pay for it. Upon being reminded that the
      "instructions" permitted the payment of a liberal rent for a legislative
      hall, and that that money was saved to the country by Mr. Curry's
      generosity, the United States said that did not alter the matter, and the
      three dollars and forty cents would be subtracted from the Secretary's
      eighteen hundred dollar salary&mdash;and it was!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link188" id="link188"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="188.jpg (30K)" src="images/188.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The matter of printing was from the beginning an interesting feature of
      the new government's difficulties. The Secretary was sworn to obey his
      volume of written "instructions," and these commanded him to do two
      certain things without fail, viz.:
    </p>
    <p>
      1. Get the House and Senate journals printed; and, 2. For this work, pay
      one dollar and fifty cents per "thousand" for composition, and one dollar
      and fifty cents per "token" for press-work, in greenbacks.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was easy to swear to do these two things, but it was entirely
      impossible to do more than one of them. When greenbacks had gone down to
      forty cents on the dollar, the prices regularly charged everybody by
      printing establishments were one dollar and fifty cents per "thousand" and
      one dollar and fifty cents per "token," in gold. The "instructions"
      commanded that the Secretary regard a paper dollar issued by the
      government as equal to any other dollar issued by the government. Hence
      the printing of the journals was discontinued. Then the United States
      sternly rebuked the Secretary for disregarding the "instructions," and
      warned him to correct his ways. Wherefore he got some printing done,
      forwarded the bill to Washington with full exhibits of the high prices of
      things in the Territory, and called attention to a printed market report
      wherein it would be observed that even hay was two hundred and fifty
      dollars a ton. The United States responded by subtracting the printing-
      bill from the Secretary's suffering salary&mdash;and moreover remarked
      with dense gravity that he would find nothing in his "instructions"
      requiring him to purchase hay!
    </p>
    <p>
      Nothing in this world is palled in such impenetrable obscurity as a U.S.
      Treasury Comptroller's understanding. The very fires of the hereafter
      could get up nothing more than a fitful glimmer in it. In the days I speak
      of he never could be made to comprehend why it was that twenty thousand
      dollars would not go as far in Nevada, where all commodities ranged at an
      enormous figure, as it would in the other Territories, where exceeding
      cheapness was the rule. He was an officer who looked out for the little
      expenses all the time. The Secretary of the Territory kept his office in
      his bedroom, as I before remarked; and he charged the United States no
      rent, although his "instructions" provided for that item and he could have
      justly taken advantage of it (a thing which I would have done with more
      than lightning promptness if I had been Secretary myself). But the United
      States never applauded this devotion. Indeed, I think my country was
      ashamed to have so improvident a person in its employ.
    </p>
    <p>
      Those "instructions" (we used to read a chapter from them every morning,
      as intellectual gymnastics, and a couple of chapters in Sunday school
      every Sabbath, for they treated of all subjects under the sun and had much
      valuable religious matter in them along with the other statistics) those
      "instructions" commanded that pen-knives, envelopes, pens and
      writing-paper be furnished the members of the legislature. So the
      Secretary made the purchase and the distribution. The knives cost three
      dollars apiece. There was one too many, and the Secretary gave it to the
      Clerk of the House of Representatives. The United States said the Clerk of
      the House was not a "member" of the legislature, and took that three
      dollars out of the Secretary's salary, as usual.
    </p>
    <p>
      White men charged three or four dollars a "load" for sawing up stove-
      wood. The Secretary was sagacious enough to know that the United States
      would never pay any such price as that; so he got an Indian to saw up a
      load of office wood at one dollar and a half. He made out the usual
      voucher, but signed no name to it&mdash;simply appended a note explaining
      that an Indian had done the work, and had done it in a very capable and
      satisfactory way, but could not sign the voucher owing to lack of ability
      in the necessary direction. The Secretary had to pay that dollar and a
      half. He thought the United States would admire both his economy and his
      honesty in getting the work done at half price and not putting a pretended
      Indian's signature to the voucher, but the United States did not see it in
      that light.
    </p>
    <p>
      The United States was too much accustomed to employing dollar-and-a-half
      thieves in all manner of official capacities to regard his explanation of
      the voucher as having any foundation in fact.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link190" id="link190"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="190.jpg (22K)" src="images/190.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But the next time the Indian sawed wood for us I taught him to make a
      cross at the bottom of the voucher&mdash;it looked like a cross that had
      been drunk a year&mdash;and then I "witnessed" it and it went through all
      right. The United States never said a word. I was sorry I had not made the
      voucher for a thousand loads of wood instead of one.
    </p>
    <p>
      The government of my country snubs honest simplicity but fondles artistic
      villainy, and I think I might have developed into a very capable
      pickpocket if I had remained in the public service a year or two.
    </p>
    <p>
      That was a fine collection of sovereigns, that first Nevada legislature.
      They levied taxes to the amount of thirty or forty thousand dollars and
      ordered expenditures to the extent of about a million. Yet they had their
      little periodical explosions of economy like all other bodies of the kind.
      A member proposed to save three dollars a day to the nation by dispensing
      with the Chaplain. And yet that short-sighted man needed the Chaplain more
      than any other member, perhaps, for he generally sat with his feet on his
      desk, eating raw turnips, during the morning prayer.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link191" id="link191"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="191.jpg (99K)" src="images/191.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The legislature sat sixty days, and passed private tollroad franchises all
      the time. When they adjourned it was estimated that every citizen owned
      about three franchises, and it was believed that unless Congress gave the
      Territory another degree of longitude there would not be room enough to
      accommodate the toll-roads. The ends of them were hanging over the
      boundary line everywhere like a fringe.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link192" id="link192"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="192.jpg (29K)" src="images/192.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The fact is, the freighting business had grown to such important
      proportions that there was nearly as much excitement over suddenly
      acquired toll-road fortunes as over the wonderful silver mines.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch26" id="linkch26"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXVI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by I was smitten with the silver fever. "Prospecting parties" were
      leaving for the mountains every day, and discovering and taking possession
      of rich silver-bearing lodes and ledges of quartz. Plainly this was the
      road to fortune. The great "Gould and Curry" mine was held at three or
      four hundred dollars a foot when we arrived; but in two months it had
      sprung up to eight hundred. The "Ophir" had been worth only a mere trifle,
      a year gone by, and now it was selling at nearly four thousand dollars a
      foot! Not a mine could be named that had not experienced an astonishing
      advance in value within a short time. Everybody was talking about these
      marvels. Go where you would, you heard nothing else, from morning till far
      into the night. Tom So-and-So had sold out of the "Amanda Smith" for
      $40,000&mdash;hadn't a cent when he "took up" the ledge six months ago.
      John Jones had sold half his interest in the "Bald Eagle and Mary Ann" for
      $65,000, gold coin, and gone to the States for his family. The widow
      Brewster had "struck it rich" in the "Golden Fleece" and sold ten feet for
      $18,000&mdash;hadn't money enough to buy a crape bonnet when Sing-Sing
      Tommy killed her husband at Baldy Johnson's wake last spring. The "Last
      Chance" had found a "clay casing" and knew they were "right on the ledge"&mdash;consequence,
      "feet" that went begging yesterday were worth a brick house apiece to-day,
      and seedy owners who could not get trusted for a drink at any bar in the
      country yesterday were roaring drunk on champagne to-day and had hosts of
      warm personal friends in a town where they had forgotten how to bow or
      shake hands from long-continued want of practice. Johnny Morgan, a common
      loafer, had gone to sleep in the gutter and waked up worth a hundred
      thousand dollars, in consequence of the decision in the "Lady Franklin and
      Rough and Ready" lawsuit. And so on&mdash;day in and day out the talk
      pelted our ears and the excitement waxed hotter and hotter around us.
    </p>
    <p>
      I would have been more or less than human if I had not gone mad like the
      rest. Cart-loads of solid silver bricks, as large as pigs of lead, were
      arriving from the mills every day, and such sights as that gave substance
      to the wild talk about me. I succumbed and grew as frenzied as the
      craziest.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link194" id="link194"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="194.jpg (65K)" src="images/194.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Every few days news would come of the discovery of a bran-new mining
      region; immediately the papers would teem with accounts of its richness,
      and away the surplus population would scamper to take possession. By the
      time I was fairly inoculated with the disease, "Esmeralda" had just had a
      run and "Humboldt" was beginning to shriek for attention. "Humboldt!
      Humboldt!" was the new cry, and straightway Humboldt, the newest of the
      new, the richest of the rich, the most marvellous of the marvellous
      discoveries in silver-land was occupying two columns of the public prints
      to "Esmeralda's" one. I was just on the point of starting to Esmeralda,
      but turned with the tide and got ready for Humboldt. That the reader may
      see what moved me, and what would as surely have moved him had he been
      there, I insert here one of the newspaper letters of the day. It and
      several other letters from the same calm hand were the main means of
      converting me. I shall not garble the extract, but put it in just as it
      appeared in the Daily Territorial Enterprise:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        But what about our mines? I shall be candid with you. I shall express an
        honest opinion, based upon a thorough examination. Humboldt county is
        the richest mineral region upon God's footstool. Each mountain range is
        gorged with the precious ores. Humboldt is the true Golconda.
      </p>
      <p>
        The other day an assay of mere croppings yielded exceeding four thousand
        dollars to the ton. A week or two ago an assay of just such surface
        developments made returns of seven thousand dollars to the ton. Our
        mountains are full of rambling prospectors. Each day and almost every
        hour reveals new and more startling evidences of the profuse and
        intensified wealth of our favored county. The metal is not silver alone.
        There are distinct ledges of auriferous ore. A late discovery plainly
        evinces cinnabar. The coarser metals are in gross abundance. Lately
        evidences of bituminous coal have been detected. My theory has ever been
        that coal is a ligneous formation. I told Col. Whitman, in times past,
        that the neighborhood of Dayton (Nevada) betrayed no present or previous
        manifestations of a ligneous foundation, and that hence I had no
        confidence in his lauded coal mines. I repeated the same doctrine to the
        exultant coal discoverers of Humboldt. I talked with my friend Captain
        Burch on the subject. My pyrhanism vanished upon his statement that in
        the very region referred to he had seen petrified trees of the length of
        two hundred feet. Then is the fact established that huge forests once
        cast their grim shadows over this remote section. I am firm in the coal
        faith. Have no fears of the mineral resources of Humboldt county. They
        are immense&mdash;incalculable.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      Let me state one or two things which will help the reader to better
      comprehend certain items in the above. At this time, our near neighbor,
      Gold Hill, was the most successful silver mining locality in Nevada. It
      was from there that more than half the daily shipments of silver bricks
      came. "Very rich" (and scarce) Gold Hill ore yielded from $100 to $400 to
      the ton; but the usual yield was only $20 to $40 per ton&mdash;that is to
      say, each hundred pounds of ore yielded from one dollar to two dollars.
      But the reader will perceive by the above extract, that in Humboldt from
      one fourth to nearly half the mass was silver! That is to say, every one
      hundred pounds of the ore had from two hundred dollars up to about three
      hundred and fifty in it. Some days later this same correspondent wrote:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        I have spoken of the vast and almost fabulous wealth of this region&mdash;it
        is incredible. The intestines of our mountains are gorged with precious
        ore to plethora. I have said that nature has so shaped our mountains as
        to furnish most excellent facilities for the working of our mines. I
        have also told you that the country about here is pregnant with the
        finest mill sites in the world. But what is the mining history of
        Humboldt? The Sheba mine is in the hands of energetic San Francisco
        capitalists. It would seem that the ore is combined with metals that
        render it difficult of reduction with our imperfect mountain machinery.
        The proprietors have combined the capital and labor hinted at in my
        exordium. They are toiling and probing. Their tunnel has reached the
        length of one hundred feet. From primal assays alone, coupled with the
        development of the mine and public confidence in the continuance of
        effort, the stock had reared itself to eight hundred dollars market
        value. I do not know that one ton of the ore has been converted into
        current metal. I do know that there are many lodes in this section that
        surpass the Sheba in primal assay value. Listen a moment to the
        calculations of the Sheba operators. They purpose transporting the ore
        concentrated to Europe. The conveyance from Star City (its locality) to
        Virginia City will cost seventy dollars per ton; from Virginia to San
        Francisco, forty dollars per ton; from thence to Liverpool, its
        destination, ten dollars per ton. Their idea is that its conglomerate
        metals will reimburse them their cost of original extraction, the price
        of transportation, and the expense of reduction, and that then a ton of
        the raw ore will net them twelve hundred dollars. The estimate may be
        extravagant. Cut it in twain, and the product is enormous, far
        transcending any previous developments of our racy Territory.
      </p>
      <p>
        A very common calculation is that many of our mines will yield five
        hundred dollars to the ton. Such fecundity throws the Gould &amp; Curry,
        the Ophir and the Mexican, of your neighborhood, in the darkest shadow.
        I have given you the estimate of the value of a single developed mine.
        Its richness is indexed by its market valuation. The people of Humboldt
        county are feet crazy. As I write, our towns are near deserted. They
        look as languid as a consumptive girl. What has become of our sinewy and
        athletic fellow-citizens? They are coursing through ravines and over
        mountain tops. Their tracks are visible in every direction. Occasionally
        a horseman will dash among us. His steed betrays hard usage. He alights
        before his adobe dwelling, hastily exchanges courtesies with his
        townsmen, hurries to an assay office and from thence to the District
        Recorder's. In the morning, having renewed his provisional supplies, he
        is off again on his wild and unbeaten route. Why, the fellow numbers
        already his feet by the thousands. He is the horse-leech. He has the
        craving stomach of the shark or anaconda. He would conquer metallic
        worlds.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link196" id="link196"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="196.jpg (187K)" src="images/196.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      This was enough. The instant we had finished reading the above article,
      four of us decided to go to Humboldt. We commenced getting ready at once.
      And we also commenced upbraiding ourselves for not deciding sooner&mdash;for
      we were in terror lest all the rich mines would be found and secured
      before we got there, and we might have to put up with ledges that would
      not yield more than two or three hundred dollars a ton, maybe. An hour
      before, I would have felt opulent if I had owned ten feet in a Gold Hill
      mine whose ore produced twenty-five dollars to the ton; now I was already
      annoyed at the prospect of having to put up with mines the poorest of
      which would be a marvel in Gold Hill.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch27" id="linkch27"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXVII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Hurry, was the word! We wasted no time. Our party consisted of four
      persons&mdash;a blacksmith sixty years of age, two young lawyers, and
      myself. We bought a wagon and two miserable old horses. We put eighteen
      hundred pounds of provisions and mining tools in the wagon and drove out
      of Carson on a chilly December afternoon. The horses were so weak and old
      that we soon found that it would be better if one or two of us got out and
      walked. It was an improvement. Next, we found that it would be better if a
      third man got out. That was an improvement also. It was at this time that
      I volunteered to drive, although I had never driven a harnessed horse
      before and many a man in such a position would have felt fairly excused
      from such a responsibility. But in a little while it was found that it
      would be a fine thing if the drive got out and walked also. It was at this
      time that I resigned the position of driver, and never resumed it again.
      Within the hour, we found that it would not only be better, but was
      absolutely necessary, that we four, taking turns, two at a time, should
      put our hands against the end of the wagon and push it through the sand,
      leaving the feeble horses little to do but keep out of the way and hold up
      the tongue. Perhaps it is well for one to know his fate at first, and get
      reconciled to it. We had learned ours in one afternoon. It was plain that
      we had to walk through the sand and shove that wagon and those horses two
      hundred miles. So we accepted the situation, and from that time forth we
      never rode. More than that, we stood regular and nearly constant watches
      pushing up behind.
    </p>
    <p>
      We made seven miles, and camped in the desert. Young Clagett (now member
      of Congress from Montana) unharnessed and fed and watered the horses;
      Oliphant and I cut sagebrush, built the fire and brought water to cook
      with; and old Mr. Ballou the blacksmith did the cooking. This division of
      labor, and this appointment, was adhered to throughout the journey. We had
      no tent, and so we slept under our blankets in the open plain. We were so
      tired that we slept soundly.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link199" id="link199"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="199.jpg (54K)" src="images/199.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We were fifteen days making the trip&mdash;two hundred miles; thirteen,
      rather, for we lay by a couple of days, in one place, to let the horses
      rest.
    </p>
    <p>
      We could really have accomplished the journey in ten days if we had towed
      the horses behind the wagon, but we did not think of that until it was too
      late, and so went on shoving the horses and the wagon too when we might
      have saved half the labor. Parties who met us, occasionally, advised us to
      put the horses in the wagon, but Mr. Ballou, through whose iron-clad
      earnestness no sarcasm could pierce, said that that would not do, because
      the provisions were exposed and would suffer, the horses being "bituminous
      from long deprivation." The reader will excuse me from translating. What
      Mr. Ballou customarily meant, when he used a long word, was a secret
      between himself and his Maker. He was one of the best and kindest hearted
      men that ever graced a humble sphere of life. He was gentleness and
      simplicity itself&mdash;and unselfishness, too. Although he was more than
      twice as old as the eldest of us, he never gave himself any airs,
      privileges, or exemptions on that account. He did a young man's share of
      the work; and did his share of conversing and entertaining from the
      general stand-point of any age&mdash;not from the arrogant, overawing
      summit-height of sixty years. His one striking peculiarity was his
      Partingtonian fashion of loving and using big words for their own sakes,
      and independent of any bearing they might have upon the thought he was
      purposing to convey. He always let his ponderous syllables fall with an
      easy unconsciousness that left them wholly without offensiveness. In truth
      his air was so natural and so simple that one was always catching himself
      accepting his stately sentences as meaning something, when they really
      meant nothing in the world. If a word was long and grand and resonant,
      that was sufficient to win the old man's love, and he would drop that word
      into the most out-of-the-way place in a sentence or a subject, and be as
      pleased with it as if it were perfectly luminous with meaning.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link201" id="link201"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="201.jpg (62K)" src="images/201.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We four always spread our common stock of blankets together on the frozen
      ground, and slept side by side; and finding that our foolish, long-legged
      hound pup had a deal of animal heat in him, Oliphant got to admitting him
      to the bed, between himself and Mr. Ballou, hugging the dog's warm back to
      his breast and finding great comfort in it. But in the night the pup would
      get stretchy and brace his feet against the old man's back and shove,
      grunting complacently the while; and now and then, being warm and snug,
      grateful and happy, he would paw the old man's back simply in excess of
      comfort; and at yet other times he would dream of the chase and in his
      sleep tug at the old man's back hair and bark in his ear. The old
      gentleman complained mildly about these familiarities, at last, and when
      he got through with his statement he said that such a dog as that was not
      a proper animal to admit to bed with tired men, because he was "so
      meretricious in his movements and so organic in his emotions." We turned
      the dog out.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a hard, wearing, toilsome journey, but it had its bright side; for
      after each day was done and our wolfish hunger appeased with a hot supper
      of fried bacon, bread, molasses and black coffee, the pipe-smoking, song-
      singing and yarn-spinning around the evening camp-fire in the still
      solitudes of the desert was a happy, care-free sort of recreation that
      seemed the very summit and culmination of earthly luxury.
    </p>
    <p>
      It is a kind of life that has a potent charm for all men, whether city or
      country-bred. We are descended from desert-lounging Arabs, and countless
      ages of growth toward perfect civilization have failed to root out of us
      the nomadic instinct. We all confess to a gratified thrill at the thought
      of "camping out."
    </p>
    <p>
      Once we made twenty-five miles in a day, and once we made forty miles
      (through the Great American Desert), and ten miles beyond&mdash;fifty in
      all&mdash;in twenty-three hours, without halting to eat, drink or rest. To
      stretch out and go to sleep, even on stony and frozen ground, after
      pushing a wagon and two horses fifty miles, is a delight so supreme that
      for the moment it almost seems cheap at the price.
    </p>
    <p>
      We camped two days in the neighborhood of the "Sink of the Humboldt." We
      tried to use the strong alkaline water of the Sink, but it would not
      answer. It was like drinking lye, and not weak lye, either. It left a
      taste in the mouth, bitter and every way execrable, and a burning in the
      stomach that was very uncomfortable. We put molasses in it, but that
      helped it very little; we added a pickle, yet the alkali was the prominent
      taste and so it was unfit for drinking.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link202" id="link202"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="205.jpg (58K)" src="images/205.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The coffee we made of this water was the meanest compound man has yet
      invented. It was really viler to the taste than the unameliorated water
      itself. Mr. Ballou, being the architect and builder of the beverage felt
      constrained to endorse and uphold it, and so drank half a cup, by little
      sips, making shift to praise it faintly the while, but finally threw out
      the remainder, and said frankly it was "too technical for him."
    </p>
    <p>
      But presently we found a spring of fresh water, convenient, and then, with
      nothing to mar our enjoyment, and no stragglers to interrupt it, we
      entered into our rest.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch28" id="linkch28"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXVIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      After leaving the Sink, we traveled along the Humboldt river a little way.
      People accustomed to the monster mile-wide Mississippi, grow accustomed to
      associating the term "river" with a high degree of watery grandeur.
      Consequently, such people feel rather disappointed when they stand on the
      shores of the Humboldt or the Carson and find that a "river" in Nevada is
      a sickly rivulet which is just the counterpart of the Erie canal in all
      respects save that the canal is twice as long and four times as deep. One
      of the pleasantest and most invigorating exercises one can contrive is to
      run and jump across the Humboldt river till he is overheated, and then
      drink it dry.
    </p>
    <p>
      On the fifteenth day we completed our march of two hundred miles and
      entered Unionville, Humboldt county, in the midst of a driving snow-
      storm. Unionville consisted of eleven cabins and a liberty-pole. Six of
      the cabins were strung along one side of a deep canyon, and the other five
      faced them. The rest of the landscape was made up of bleak mountain walls
      that rose so high into the sky from both sides of the canyon that the
      village was left, as it were, far down in the bottom of a crevice. It was
      always daylight on the mountain tops a long time before the darkness
      lifted and revealed Unionville.
    </p>
    <p>
      We built a small, rude cabin in the side of the crevice and roofed it with
      canvas, leaving a corner open to serve as a chimney, through which the
      cattle used to tumble occasionally, at night, and mash our furniture and
      interrupt our sleep. It was very cold weather and fuel was scarce. Indians
      brought brush and bushes several miles on their backs; and when we could
      catch a laden Indian it was well&mdash;and when we could not (which was
      the rule, not the exception), we shivered and bore it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link205" id="link205"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="205.jpg (58K)" src="images/205.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I confess, without shame, that I expected to find masses of silver lying
      all about the ground. I expected to see it glittering in the sun on the
      mountain summits. I said nothing about this, for some instinct told me
      that I might possibly have an exaggerated idea about it, and so if I
      betrayed my thought I might bring derision upon myself. Yet I was as
      perfectly satisfied in my own mind as I could be of anything, that I was
      going to gather up, in a day or two, or at furthest a week or two, silver
      enough to make me satisfactorily wealthy&mdash;and so my fancy was already
      busy with plans for spending this money. The first opportunity that
      offered, I sauntered carelessly away from the cabin, keeping an eye on the
      other boys, and stopping and contemplating the sky when they seemed to be
      observing me; but as soon as the coast was manifestly clear, I fled away
      as guiltily as a thief might have done and never halted till I was far
      beyond sight and call. Then I began my search with a feverish excitement
      that was brimful of expectation&mdash;almost of certainty. I crawled about
      the ground, seizing and examining bits of stone, blowing the dust from
      them or rubbing them on my clothes, and then peering at them with anxious
      hope. Presently I found a bright fragment and my heart bounded! I hid
      behind a boulder and polished it and scrutinized it with a nervous
      eagerness and a delight that was more pronounced than absolute certainty
      itself could have afforded. The more I examined the fragment the more I
      was convinced that I had found the door to fortune. I marked the spot and
      carried away my specimen. Up and down the rugged mountain side I searched,
      with always increasing interest and always augmenting gratitude that I had
      come to Humboldt and come in time. Of all the experiences of my life, this
      secret search among the hidden treasures of silver-land was the nearest to
      unmarred ecstasy. It was a delirious revel.
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by, in the bed of a shallow rivulet, I found a deposit of shining
      yellow scales, and my breath almost forsook me! A gold mine, and in my
      simplicity I had been content with vulgar silver! I was so excited that I
      half believed my overwrought imagination was deceiving me. Then a fear
      came upon me that people might be observing me and would guess my secret.
      Moved by this thought, I made a circuit of the place, and ascended a knoll
      to reconnoiter. Solitude. No creature was near. Then I returned to my
      mine, fortifying myself against possible disappointment, but my fears were
      groundless&mdash;the shining scales were still there. I set about scooping
      them out, and for an hour I toiled down the windings of the stream and
      robbed its bed. But at last the descending sun warned me to give up the
      quest, and I turned homeward laden with wealth. As I walked along I could
      not help smiling at the thought of my being so excited over my fragment of
      silver when a nobler metal was almost under my nose. In this little time
      the former had so fallen in my estimation that once or twice I was on the
      point of throwing it away.
    </p>
    <p>
      The boys were as hungry as usual, but I could eat nothing. Neither could I
      talk. I was full of dreams and far away. Their conversation interrupted
      the flow of my fancy somewhat, and annoyed me a little, too. I despised
      the sordid and commonplace things they talked about. But as they
      proceeded, it began to amuse me. It grew to be rare fun to hear them
      planning their poor little economies and sighing over possible privations
      and distresses when a gold mine, all our own, lay within sight of the
      cabin and I could point it out at any moment. Smothered hilarity began to
      oppress me, presently. It was hard to resist the impulse to burst out with
      exultation and reveal everything; but I did resist. I said within myself
      that I would filter the great news through my lips calmly and be serene as
      a summer morning while I watched its effect in their faces. I said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Where have you all been?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Prospecting."
    </p>
    <p>
      "What did you find?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Nothing."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Nothing? What do you think of the country?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Can't tell, yet," said Mr. Ballou, who was an old gold miner, and had
      likewise had considerable experience among the silver mines.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, haven't you formed any sort of opinion?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes, a sort of a one. It's fair enough here, may be, but overrated. Seven
      thousand dollar ledges are scarce, though.
    </p>
    <p>
      "That Sheba may be rich enough, but we don't own it; and besides, the rock
      is so full of base metals that all the science in the world can't work it.
      We'll not starve, here, but we'll not get rich, I'm afraid."
    </p>
    <p>
      "So you think the prospect is pretty poor?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "No name for it!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, we'd better go back, hadn't we?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, not yet&mdash;of course not. We'll try it a riffle, first."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Suppose, now&mdash;this is merely a supposition, you know&mdash;suppose
      you could find a ledge that would yield, say, a hundred and fifty dollars
      a ton&mdash;would that satisfy you?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Try us once!" from the whole party.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Or suppose&mdash;merely a supposition, of course&mdash;suppose you were
      to find a ledge that would yield two thousand dollars a ton&mdash;would
      that satisfy you?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Here&mdash;what do you mean? What are you coming at? Is there some
      mystery behind all this?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Never mind. I am not saying anything. You know perfectly well there are
      no rich mines here&mdash;of course you do. Because you have been around
      and examined for yourselves. Anybody would know that, that had been
      around. But just for the sake of argument, suppose&mdash;in a kind of
      general way&mdash;suppose some person were to tell you that
      two-thousand-dollar ledges were simply contemptible&mdash;contemptible,
      understand&mdash;and that right yonder in sight of this very cabin there
      were piles of pure gold and pure silver&mdash;oceans of it&mdash;enough to
      make you all rich in twenty-four hours! Come!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I should say he was as crazy as a loon!" said old Ballou, but wild with
      excitement, nevertheless.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen," said I, "I don't say anything&mdash;I haven't been around,
      you know, and of course don't know anything&mdash;but all I ask of you is
      to cast your eye on that, for instance, and tell me what you think of it!"
      and I tossed my treasure before them.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link207" id="link207"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="207.jpg (92K)" src="images/207.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      There was an eager scramble for it, and a closing of heads together over
      it under the candle-light. Then old Ballou said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Think of it? I think it is nothing but a lot of granite rubbish and nasty
      glittering mica that isn't worth ten cents an acre!"
    </p>
    <p>
      So vanished my dream. So melted my wealth away. So toppled my airy castle
      to the earth and left me stricken and forlorn.
    </p>
    <p>
      Moralizing, I observed, then, that "all that glitters is not gold."
    </p>
    <p>
      Mr. Ballou said I could go further than that, and lay it up among my
      treasures of knowledge, that nothing that glitters is gold. So I learned
      then, once for all, that gold in its native state is but dull,
      unornamental stuff, and that only low-born metals excite the admiration of
      the ignorant with an ostentatious glitter. However, like the rest of the
      world, I still go on underrating men of gold and glorifying men of mica.
      Commonplace human nature cannot rise above that.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch29" id="linkch29"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXIX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      True knowledge of the nature of silver mining came fast enough. We went
      out "prospecting" with Mr. Ballou. We climbed the mountain sides, and
      clambered among sage-brush, rocks and snow till we were ready to drop with
      exhaustion, but found no silver&mdash;nor yet any gold. Day after day we
      did this. Now and then we came upon holes burrowed a few feet into the
      declivities and apparently abandoned; and now and then we found one or two
      listless men still burrowing. But there was no appearance of silver. These
      holes were the beginnings of tunnels, and the purpose was to drive them
      hundreds of feet into the mountain, and some day tap the hidden ledge
      where the silver was. Some day! It seemed far enough away, and very
      hopeless and dreary. Day after day we toiled, and climbed and searched,
      and we younger partners grew sicker and still sicker of the promiseless
      toil. At last we halted under a beetling rampart of rock which projected
      from the earth high upon the mountain. Mr. Ballou broke off some fragments
      with a hammer, and examined them long and attentively with a small
      eye-glass; threw them away and broke off more; said this rock was quartz,
      and quartz was the sort of rock that contained silver. Contained it! I had
      thought that at least it would be caked on the outside of it like a kind
      of veneering. He still broke off pieces and critically examined them, now
      and then wetting the piece with his tongue and applying the glass. At last
      he exclaimed:
    </p>
    <p>
      "We've got it!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link210" id="link210"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="210.jpg (74K)" src="images/210.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We were full of anxiety in a moment. The rock was clean and white, where
      it was broken, and across it ran a ragged thread of blue. He said that
      that little thread had silver in it, mixed with base metal, such as lead
      and antimony, and other rubbish, and that there was a speck or two of gold
      visible. After a great deal of effort we managed to discern some little
      fine yellow specks, and judged that a couple of tons of them massed
      together might make a gold dollar, possibly. We were not jubilant, but Mr.
      Ballou said there were worse ledges in the world than that. He saved what
      he called the "richest" piece of the rock, in order to determine its value
      by the process called the "fire-assay." Then we named the mine "Monarch of
      the Mountains" (modesty of nomenclature is not a prominent feature in the
      mines), and Mr. Ballou wrote out and stuck up the following "notice,"
      preserving a copy to be entered upon the books in the mining recorder's
      office in the town.
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "NOTICE."
      </p>
      <p>
        "We the undersigned claim three claims, of three hundred feet each (and
        one for discovery), on this silver-bearing quartz lead or lode,
        extending north and south from this notice, with all its dips, spurs,
        and angles, variations and sinuosities, together with fifty feet of
        ground on either side for working the same."
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      We put our names to it and tried to feel that our fortunes were made. But
      when we talked the matter all over with Mr. Ballou, we felt depressed and
      dubious. He said that this surface quartz was not all there was of our
      mine; but that the wall or ledge of rock called the "Monarch of the
      Mountains," extended down hundreds and hundreds of feet into the earth&mdash;he
      illustrated by saying it was like a curb-stone, and maintained a nearly
      uniform thickness-say twenty feet&mdash;away down into the bowels of the
      earth, and was perfectly distinct from the casing rock on each side of it;
      and that it kept to itself, and maintained its distinctive character
      always, no matter how deep it extended into the earth or how far it
      stretched itself through and across the hills and valleys. He said it
      might be a mile deep and ten miles long, for all we knew; and that
      wherever we bored into it above ground or below, we would find gold and
      silver in it, but no gold or silver in the meaner rock it was cased
      between. And he said that down in the great depths of the ledge was its
      richness, and the deeper it went the richer it grew. Therefore, instead of
      working here on the surface, we must either bore down into the rock with a
      shaft till we came to where it was rich&mdash;say a hundred feet or so&mdash;or
      else we must go down into the valley and bore a long tunnel into the
      mountain side and tap the ledge far under the earth. To do either was
      plainly the labor of months; for we could blast and bore only a few feet a
      day&mdash;some five or six. But this was not all. He said that after we
      got the ore out it must be hauled in wagons to a distant silver-mill,
      ground up, and the silver extracted by a tedious and costly process. Our
      fortune seemed a century away!
    </p>
    <p>
      But we went to work. We decided to sink a shaft. So, for a week we climbed
      the mountain, laden with picks, drills, gads, crowbars, shovels, cans of
      blasting powder and coils of fuse and strove with might and main. At first
      the rock was broken and loose and we dug it up with picks and threw it out
      with shovels, and the hole progressed very well. But the rock became more
      compact, presently, and gads and crowbars came into play. But shortly
      nothing could make an impression but blasting powder.
    </p>
    <p>
      That was the weariest work! One of us held the iron drill in its place and
      another would strike with an eight-pound sledge&mdash;it was like driving
      nails on a large scale. In the course of an hour or two the drill would
      reach a depth of two or three feet, making a hole a couple of inches in
      diameter. We would put in a charge of powder, insert half a yard of fuse,
      pour in sand and gravel and ram it down, then light the fuse and run. When
      the explosion came and the rocks and smoke shot into the air, we would go
      back and find about a bushel of that hard, rebellious quartz jolted out.
      Nothing more. One week of this satisfied me. I resigned. Clagget and
      Oliphant followed. Our shaft was only twelve feet deep. We decided that a
      tunnel was the thing we wanted.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link212" id="link212"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="212.jpg (89K)" src="images/212.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      So we went down the mountain side and worked a week; at the end of which
      time we had blasted a tunnel about deep enough to hide a hogshead in, and
      judged that about nine hundred feet more of it would reach the ledge. I
      resigned again, and the other boys only held out one day longer. We
      decided that a tunnel was not what we wanted. We wanted a ledge that was
      already "developed." There were none in the camp.
    </p>
    <p>
      We dropped the "Monarch" for the time being.
    </p>
    <p>
      Meantime the camp was filling up with people, and there was a constantly
      growing excitement about our Humboldt mines. We fell victims to the
      epidemic and strained every nerve to acquire more "feet." We prospected
      and took up new claims, put "notices" on them and gave them grandiloquent
      names. We traded some of our "feet" for "feet" in other people's claims.
      In a little while we owned largely in the "Gray Eagle," the "Columbiana,"
      the "Branch Mint," the "Maria Jane," the "Universe," the "Root-Hog-or-
      Die," the "Samson and Delilah," the "Treasure Trove," the "Golconda," the
      "Sultana," the "Boomerang," the "Great Republic," the "Grand Mogul," and
      fifty other "mines" that had never been molested by a shovel or scratched
      with a pick. We had not less than thirty thousand "feet" apiece in the
      "richest mines on earth" as the frenzied cant phrased it&mdash;and were in
      debt to the butcher. We were stark mad with excitement&mdash;drunk with
      happiness&mdash;smothered under mountains of prospective wealth&mdash;arrogantly
      compassionate toward the plodding millions who knew not our marvellous
      canyon&mdash;but our credit was not good at the grocer's.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was the strangest phase of life one can imagine. It was a beggars'
      revel. There was nothing doing in the district&mdash;no mining&mdash;no
      milling&mdash;no productive effort&mdash;no income&mdash;and not enough
      money in the entire camp to buy a corner lot in an eastern village,
      hardly; and yet a stranger would have supposed he was walking among
      bloated millionaires. Prospecting parties swarmed out of town with the
      first flush of dawn, and swarmed in again at nightfall laden with spoil&mdash;rocks.
      Nothing but rocks. Every man's pockets were full of them; the floor of his
      cabin was littered with them; they were disposed in labeled rows on his
      shelves.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link214" id="link214"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="214.jpg (51K)" src="images/214.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch30" id="linkch30"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I met men at every turn who owned from one thousand to thirty thousand
      "feet" in undeveloped silver mines, every single foot of which they
      believed would shortly be worth from fifty to a thousand dollars&mdash;and
      as often as any other way they were men who had not twenty-five dollars in
      the world. Every man you met had his new mine to boast of, and his
      "specimens" ready; and if the opportunity offered, he would infallibly
      back you into a corner and offer as a favor to you, not to him, to part
      with just a few feet in the "Golden Age," or the "Sarah Jane," or some
      other unknown stack of croppings, for money enough to get a "square meal"
      with, as the phrase went. And you were never to reveal that he had made
      you the offer at such a ruinous price, for it was only out of friendship
      for you that he was willing to make the sacrifice. Then he would fish a
      piece of rock out of his pocket, and after looking mysteriously around as
      if he feared he might be waylaid and robbed if caught with such wealth in
      his possession, he would dab the rock against his tongue, clap an eyeglass
      to it, and exclaim:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Look at that! Right there in that red dirt! See it? See the specks of
      gold? And the streak of silver? That's from the Uncle Abe. There's a
      hundred thousand tons like that in sight! Right in sight, mind you! And
      when we get down on it and the ledge comes in solid, it will be the
      richest thing in the world! Look at the assay! I don't want you to believe
      me&mdash;look at the assay!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link216" id="link216"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="216.jpg (63K)" src="images/216.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Then he would get out a greasy sheet of paper which showed that the
      portion of rock assayed had given evidence of containing silver and gold
      in the proportion of so many hundreds or thousands of dollars to the ton.
    </p>
    <p>
      I little knew, then, that the custom was to hunt out the richest piece of
      rock and get it assayed! Very often, that piece, the size of a filbert,
      was the only fragment in a ton that had a particle of metal in it&mdash;and
      yet the assay made it pretend to represent the average value of the ton of
      rubbish it came from!
    </p>
    <p>
      On such a system of assaying as that, the Humboldt world had gone crazy.
      On the authority of such assays its newspaper correspondents were frothing
      about rock worth four and seven thousand dollars a ton!
    </p>
    <p>
      And does the reader remember, a few pages back, the calculations, of a
      quoted correspondent, whereby the ore is to be mined and shipped all the
      way to England, the metals extracted, and the gold and silver contents
      received back by the miners as clear profit, the copper, antimony and
      other things in the ore being sufficient to pay all the expenses incurred?
      Everybody's head was full of such "calculations" as those&mdash;such
      raving insanity, rather. Few people took work into their calculations&mdash;or
      outlay of money either; except the work and expenditures of other people.
    </p>
    <p>
      We never touched our tunnel or our shaft again. Why? Because we judged
      that we had learned the real secret of success in silver mining&mdash;which
      was, not to mine the silver ourselves by the sweat of our brows and the
      labor of our hands, but to sell the ledges to the dull slaves of toil and
      let them do the mining!
    </p>
    <p>
      Before leaving Carson, the Secretary and I had purchased "feet" from
      various Esmeralda stragglers. We had expected immediate returns of
      bullion, but were only afflicted with regular and constant "assessments"
      instead&mdash;demands for money wherewith to develop the said mines. These
      assessments had grown so oppressive that it seemed necessary to look into
      the matter personally. Therefore I projected a pilgrimage to Carson and
      thence to Esmeralda. I bought a horse and started, in company with Mr.
      Ballou and a gentleman named Ollendorff, a Prussian&mdash;not the party
      who has inflicted so much suffering on the world with his wretched foreign
      grammars, with their interminable repetitions of questions which never
      have occurred and are never likely to occur in any conversation among
      human beings. We rode through a snow-storm for two or three days, and
      arrived at "Honey Lake Smith's," a sort of isolated inn on the Carson
      river. It was a two-story log house situated on a small knoll in the midst
      of the vast basin or desert through which the sickly Carson winds its
      melancholy way. Close to the house were the Overland stage stables, built
      of sun-dried bricks. There was not another building within several leagues
      of the place. Towards sunset about twenty hay-wagons arrived and camped
      around the house and all the teamsters came in to supper&mdash;a very,
      very rough set. There were one or two Overland stage drivers there, also,
      and half a dozen vagabonds and stragglers; consequently the house was well
      crowded.
    </p>
    <p>
      We walked out, after supper, and visited a small Indian camp in the
      vicinity. The Indians were in a great hurry about something, and were
      packing up and getting away as fast as they could. In their broken English
      they said, "By'm-by, heap water!" and by the help of signs made us
      understand that in their opinion a flood was coming. The weather was
      perfectly clear, and this was not the rainy season. There was about a foot
      of water in the insignificant river&mdash;or maybe two feet; the stream
      was not wider than a back alley in a village, and its banks were scarcely
      higher than a man's head.
    </p>
    <p>
      So, where was the flood to come from? We canvassed the subject awhile and
      then concluded it was a ruse, and that the Indians had some better reason
      for leaving in a hurry than fears of a flood in such an exceedingly dry
      time.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link218" id="link218"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="218.jpg (37K)" src="images/218.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At seven in the evening we went to bed in the second story&mdash;with our
      clothes on, as usual, and all three in the same bed, for every available
      space on the floors, chairs, etc., was in request, and even then there was
      barely room for the housing of the inn's guests. An hour later we were
      awakened by a great turmoil, and springing out of bed we picked our way
      nimbly among the ranks of snoring teamsters on the floor and got to the
      front windows of the long room. A glance revealed a strange spectacle,
      under the moonlight. The crooked Carson was full to the brim, and its
      waters were raging and foaming in the wildest way&mdash;sweeping around
      the sharp bends at a furious speed, and bearing on their surface a chaos
      of logs, brush and all sorts of rubbish. A depression, where its bed had
      once been, in other times, was already filling, and in one or two places
      the water was beginning to wash over the main bank. Men were flying hither
      and thither, bringing cattle and wagons close up to the house, for the
      spot of high ground on which it stood extended only some thirty feet in
      front and about a hundred in the rear. Close to the old river bed just
      spoken of, stood a little log stable, and in this our horses were lodged.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link219" id="link219"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="219.jpg (173K)" src="images/219.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      While we looked, the waters increased so fast in this place that in a few
      minutes a torrent was roaring by the little stable and its margin
      encroaching steadily on the logs. We suddenly realized that this flood was
      not a mere holiday spectacle, but meant damage&mdash;and not only to the
      small log stable but to the Overland buildings close to the main river,
      for the waves had now come ashore and were creeping about the foundations
      and invading the great hay-corral adjoining. We ran down and joined the
      crowd of excited men and frightened animals. We waded knee-deep into the
      log stable, unfastened the horses and waded out almost waist-deep, so fast
      the waters increased. Then the crowd rushed in a body to the hay- corral
      and began to tumble down the huge stacks of baled hay and roll the bales
      up on the high ground by the house. Meantime it was discovered that Owens,
      an overland driver, was missing, and a man ran to the large stable, and
      wading in, boot-top deep, discovered him asleep in his bed, awoke him, and
      waded out again. But Owens was drowsy and resumed his nap; but only for a
      minute or two, for presently he turned in his bed, his hand dropped over
      the side and came in contact with the cold water! It was up level with the
      mattress! He waded out, breast-deep, almost, and the next moment the
      sun-burned bricks melted down like sugar and the big building crumbled to
      a ruin and was washed away in a twinkling.
    </p>
    <p>
      At eleven o'clock only the roof of the little log stable was out of water,
      and our inn was on an island in mid-ocean. As far as the eye could reach,
      in the moonlight, there was no desert visible, but only a level waste of
      shining water. The Indians were true prophets, but how did they get their
      information? I am not able to answer the question. We remained cooped up
      eight days and nights with that curious crew. Swearing, drinking and card
      playing were the order of the day, and occasionally a fight was thrown in
      for variety. Dirt and vermin&mdash;but let us forget those features; their
      profusion is simply inconceivable&mdash;it is better that they remain so.
    </p>
    <p>
      There were two men&mdash;&mdash;however, this chapter is long enough.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /> <br /> <br /><br /><br /><br /> <a name="linkch31" id="linkch31"></a>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      There were two men in the company who caused me particular discomfort. One
      was a little Swede, about twenty-five years old, who knew only one song,
      and he was forever singing it. By day we were all crowded into one small,
      stifling bar-room, and so there was no escaping this person's music.
      Through all the profanity, whisky-guzzling, "old sledge" and quarreling,
      his monotonous song meandered with never a variation in its tiresome
      sameness, and it seemed to me, at last, that I would be content to die, in
      order to be rid of the torture. The other man was a stalwart ruffian
      called "Arkansas," who carried two revolvers in his belt and a bowie knife
      projecting from his boot, and who was always drunk and always suffering
      for a fight. But he was so feared, that nobody would accommodate him. He
      would try all manner of little wary ruses to entrap somebody into an
      offensive remark, and his face would light up now and then when he fancied
      he was fairly on the scent of a fight, but invariably his victim would
      elude his toils and then he would show a disappointment that was almost
      pathetic. The landlord, Johnson, was a meek, well-meaning fellow, and
      Arkansas fastened on him early, as a promising subject, and gave him no
      rest day or night, for awhile. On the fourth morning, Arkansas got drunk
      and sat himself down to wait for an opportunity. Presently Johnson came
      in, just comfortably sociable with whisky, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I reckon the Pennsylvania 'lection&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      Arkansas raised his finger impressively and Johnson stopped. Arkansas rose
      unsteadily and confronted him. Said he:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Wha-what do you know a&mdash;about Pennsylvania? Answer me that. Wha&mdash;what
      do you know 'bout Pennsylvania?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I was only goin' to say&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "You was only goin' to say. You was! You was only goin' to say&mdash;what
      was you goin' to say? That's it! That's what I want to know. I want to
      know wha&mdash;what you ('ic) what you know about Pennsylvania, since
      you're makin' yourself so d&mdash;-d free. Answer me that!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Mr. Arkansas, if you'd only let me&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link222" id="link222"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="222.jpg (55K)" src="images/222.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Who's a henderin' you? Don't you insinuate nothing agin me!&mdash;don't
      you do it. Don't you come in here bullyin' around, and cussin' and goin'
      on like a lunatic&mdash;don't you do it. 'Coz I won't stand it. If fight's
      what you want, out with it! I'm your man! Out with it!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Said Johnson, backing into a corner, Arkansas following, menacingly:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why, I never said nothing, Mr. Arkansas. You don't give a man no chance.
      I was only goin' to say that Pennsylvania was goin' to have an election
      next week&mdash;that was all&mdash;that was everything I was goin' to say&mdash;I
      wish I may never stir if it wasn't."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well then why d'n't you say it? What did you come swellin' around that
      way for, and tryin' to raise trouble?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why I didn't come swellin' around, Mr. Arkansas&mdash;I just&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'm a liar am I! Ger-reat Caesar's ghost&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, please, Mr. Arkansas, I never meant such a thing as that, I wish I
      may die if I did. All the boys will tell you that I've always spoke well
      of you, and respected you more'n any man in the house. Ask Smith. Ain't it
      so, Smith? Didn't I say, no longer ago than last night, that for a man
      that was a gentleman all the time and every way you took him, give me
      Arkansas? I'll leave it to any gentleman here if them warn't the very
      words I used. Come, now, Mr. Arkansas, le's take a drink&mdash;le's shake
      hands and take a drink. Come up&mdash;everybody! It's my treat. Come up,
      Bill, Tom, Bob, Scotty&mdash;come up. I want you all to take a drink with
      me and Arkansas&mdash;old Arkansas, I call him&mdash;bully old Arkansas.
      Gimme your hand agin. Look at him, boys&mdash;just take a look at him.
      Thar stands the whitest man in America!&mdash;and the man that denies it
      has got to fight me, that's all. Gimme that old flipper agin!"
    </p>
    <p>
      They embraced, with drunken affection on the landlord's part and
      unresponsive toleration on the part of Arkansas, who, bribed by a drink,
      was disappointed of his prey once more. But the foolish landlord was so
      happy to have escaped butchery, that he went on talking when he ought to
      have marched himself out of danger. The consequence was that Arkansas
      shortly began to glower upon him dangerously, and presently said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Lan'lord, will you p-please make that remark over agin if you please?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I was a-sayin' to Scotty that my father was up'ards of eighty year old
      when he died."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Was that all that you said?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes, that was all."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Didn't say nothing but that?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "No&mdash;nothing."
    </p>
    <p>
      Then an uncomfortable silence.
    </p>
    <p>
      Arkansas played with his glass a moment, lolling on his elbows on the
      counter. Then he meditatively scratched his left shin with his right boot,
      while the awkward silence continued. But presently he loafed away toward
      the stove, looking dissatisfied; roughly shouldered two or three men out
      of a comfortable position; occupied it himself, gave a sleeping dog a kick
      that sent him howling under a bench, then spread his long legs and his
      blanket-coat tails apart and proceeded to warm his back. In a little while
      he fell to grumbling to himself, and soon he slouched back to the bar and
      said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Lan'lord, what's your idea for rakin' up old personalities and blowin'
      about your father? Ain't this company agreeable to you? Ain't it? If this
      company ain't agreeable to you, p'r'aps we'd better leave. Is that your
      idea? Is that what you're coming at?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why bless your soul, Arkansas, I warn't thinking of such a thing. My
      father and my mother&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Lan'lord, don't crowd a man! Don't do it. If nothing'll do you but a
      disturbance, out with it like a man ('ic)&mdash;but don't rake up old
      bygones and fling'em in the teeth of a passel of people that wants to be
      peaceable if they could git a chance. What's the matter with you this
      mornin', anyway? I never see a man carry on so."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Arkansas, I reely didn't mean no harm, and I won't go on with it if it's
      onpleasant to you. I reckon my licker's got into my head, and what with
      the flood, and havin' so many to feed and look out for&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "So that's what's a-ranklin' in your heart, is it? You want us to leave do
      you? There's too many on us. You want us to pack up and swim. Is that it?
      Come!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Please be reasonable, Arkansas. Now you know that I ain't the man to&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Are you a threatenin' me? Are you? By George, the man don't live that can
      skeer me! Don't you try to come that game, my chicken&mdash;'cuz I can
      stand a good deal, but I won't stand that. Come out from behind that bar
      till I clean you! You want to drive us out, do you, you sneakin'
      underhanded hound! Come out from behind that bar! I'll learn you to bully
      and badger and browbeat a gentleman that's forever trying to befriend you
      and keep you out of trouble!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Please, Arkansas, please don't shoot! If there's got to be bloodshed&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Do you hear that, gentlemen? Do you hear him talk about bloodshed? So
      it's blood you want, is it, you ravin' desperado! You'd made up your mind
      to murder somebody this mornin'&mdash;I knowed it perfectly well. I'm the
      man, am I? It's me you're goin' to murder, is it? But you can't do it
      'thout I get one chance first, you thievin' black-hearted, white- livered
      son of a nigger! Draw your weepon!"
    </p>
    <p>
      With that, Arkansas began to shoot, and the landlord to clamber over
      benches, men and every sort of obstacle in a frantic desire to escape. In
      the midst of the wild hubbub the landlord crashed through a glass door,
      and as Arkansas charged after him the landlord's wife suddenly appeared in
      the doorway and confronted the desperado with a pair of scissors! Her fury
      was magnificent. With head erect and flashing eye she stood a moment and
      then advanced, with her weapon raised. The astonished ruffian hesitated,
      and then fell back a step. She followed. She backed him step by step into
      the middle of the bar-room, and then, while the wondering crowd closed up
      and gazed, she gave him such another tongue-lashing as never a cowed and
      shamefaced braggart got before, perhaps! As she finished and retired
      victorious, a roar of applause shook the house, and every man ordered
      "drinks for the crowd" in one and the same breath.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link225" id="link225"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="225.jpg (102K)" src="images/225.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The lesson was entirely sufficient. The reign of terror was over, and the
      Arkansas domination broken for good. During the rest of the season of
      island captivity, there was one man who sat apart in a state of permanent
      humiliation, never mixing in any quarrel or uttering a boast, and never
      resenting the insults the once cringing crew now constantly leveled at
      him, and that man was "Arkansas."
    </p>
    <p>
      By the fifth or sixth morning the waters had subsided from the land, but
      the stream in the old river bed was still high and swift and there was no
      possibility of crossing it. On the eighth it was still too high for an
      entirely safe passage, but life in the inn had become next to
      insupportable by reason of the dirt, drunkenness, fighting, etc., and so
      we made an effort to get away. In the midst of a heavy snow-storm we
      embarked in a canoe, taking our saddles aboard and towing our horses after
      us by their halters. The Prussian, Ollendorff, was in the bow, with a
      paddle, Ballou paddled in the middle, and I sat in the stern holding the
      halters. When the horses lost their footing and began to swim, Ollendorff
      got frightened, for there was great danger that the horses would make our
      aim uncertain, and it was plain that if we failed to land at a certain
      spot the current would throw us off and almost surely cast us into the
      main Carson, which was a boiling torrent, now. Such a catastrophe would be
      death, in all probability, for we would be swept to sea in the "Sink" or
      overturned and drowned. We warned Ollendorff to keep his wits about him
      and handle himself carefully, but it was useless; the moment the bow
      touched the bank, he made a spring and the canoe whirled upside down in
      ten-foot water.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link227" id="link227"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="227.jpg (95K)" src="images/227.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Ollendorff seized some brush and dragged himself ashore, but Ballou and I
      had to swim for it, encumbered with our overcoats. But we held on to the
      canoe, and although we were washed down nearly to the Carson, we managed
      to push the boat ashore and make a safe landing. We were cold and water-
      soaked, but safe. The horses made a landing, too, but our saddles were
      gone, of course. We tied the animals in the sage-brush and there they had
      to stay for twenty-four hours. We baled out the canoe and ferried over
      some food and blankets for them, but we slept one more night in the inn
      before making another venture on our journey.
    </p>
    <p>
      The next morning it was still snowing furiously when we got away with our
      new stock of saddles and accoutrements. We mounted and started. The snow
      lay so deep on the ground that there was no sign of a road perceptible,
      and the snow-fall was so thick that we could not see more than a hundred
      yards ahead, else we could have guided our course by the mountain ranges.
      The case looked dubious, but Ollendorff said his instinct was as sensitive
      as any compass, and that he could "strike a bee-line" for Carson city and
      never diverge from it. He said that if he were to straggle a single point
      out of the true line his instinct would assail him like an outraged
      conscience. Consequently we dropped into his wake happy and content. For
      half an hour we poked along warily enough, but at the end of that time we
      came upon a fresh trail, and Ollendorff shouted proudly:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I knew I was as dead certain as a compass, boys! Here we are, right in
      somebody's tracks that will hunt the way for us without any trouble. Let's
      hurry up and join company with the party."
    </p>
    <p>
      So we put the horses into as much of a trot as the deep snow would allow,
      and before long it was evident that we were gaining on our predecessors,
      for the tracks grew more distinct. We hurried along, and at the end of an
      hour the tracks looked still newer and fresher&mdash;but what surprised us
      was, that the number of travelers in advance of us seemed to steadily
      increase. We wondered how so large a party came to be traveling at such a
      time and in such a solitude. Somebody suggested that it must be a company
      of soldiers from the fort, and so we accepted that solution and jogged
      along a little faster still, for they could not be far off now. But the
      tracks still multiplied, and we began to think the platoon of soldiers was
      miraculously expanding into a regiment&mdash;Ballou said they had already
      increased to five hundred! Presently he stopped his horse and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Boys, these are our own tracks, and we've actually been circussing round
      and round in a circle for more than two hours, out here in this blind
      desert! By George this is perfectly hydraulic!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link229" id="link229"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="229.jpg (83K)" src="images/229.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Then the old man waxed wroth and abusive. He called Ollendorff all manner
      of hard names&mdash;said he never saw such a lurid fool as he was, and
      ended with the peculiarly venomous opinion that he "did not know as much
      as a logarythm!"
    </p>
    <p>
      We certainly had been following our own tracks. Ollendorff and his "mental
      compass" were in disgrace from that moment.
    </p>
    <p>
      After all our hard travel, here we were on the bank of the stream again,
      with the inn beyond dimly outlined through the driving snow-fall. While we
      were considering what to do, the young Swede landed from the canoe and
      took his pedestrian way Carson-wards, singing his same tiresome song about
      his "sister and his brother" and "the child in the grave with its mother,"
      and in a short minute faded and disappeared in the white oblivion. He was
      never heard of again. He no doubt got bewildered and lost, and Fatigue
      delivered him over to Sleep and Sleep betrayed him to Death. Possibly he
      followed our treacherous tracks till he became exhausted and dropped.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link230" id="link230"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="230.jpg (20K)" src="images/230.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Presently the Overland stage forded the now fast receding stream and
      started toward Carson on its first trip since the flood came. We hesitated
      no longer, now, but took up our march in its wake, and trotted merrily
      along, for we had good confidence in the driver's bump of locality. But
      our horses were no match for the fresh stage team. We were soon left out
      of sight; but it was no matter, for we had the deep ruts the wheels made
      for a guide. By this time it was three in the afternoon, and consequently
      it was not very long before night came&mdash;and not with a lingering
      twilight, but with a sudden shutting down like a cellar door, as is its
      habit in that country. The snowfall was still as thick as ever, and of
      course we could not see fifteen steps before us; but all about us the
      white glare of the snow-bed enabled us to discern the smooth sugar-loaf
      mounds made by the covered sage-bushes, and just in front of us the two
      faint grooves which we knew were the steadily filling and slowly
      disappearing wheel-tracks.
    </p>
    <p>
      Now those sage-bushes were all about the same height&mdash;three or four
      feet; they stood just about seven feet apart, all over the vast desert;
      each of them was a mere snow-mound, now; in any direction that you
      proceeded (the same as in a well laid out orchard) you would find yourself
      moving down a distinctly defined avenue, with a row of these snow-mounds
      an either side of it&mdash;an avenue the customary width of a road, nice
      and level in its breadth, and rising at the sides in the most natural way,
      by reason of the mounds. But we had not thought of this. Then imagine the
      chilly thrill that shot through us when it finally occurred to us, far in
      the night, that since the last faint trace of the wheel-tracks had long
      ago been buried from sight, we might now be wandering down a mere
      sage-brush avenue, miles away from the road and diverging further and
      further away from it all the time. Having a cake of ice slipped down one's
      back is placid comfort compared to it. There was a sudden leap and stir of
      blood that had been asleep for an hour, and as sudden a rousing of all the
      drowsing activities in our minds and bodies. We were alive and awake at
      once&mdash;and shaking and quaking with consternation, too. There was an
      instant halting and dismounting, a bending low and an anxious scanning of
      the road-bed. Useless, of course; for if a faint depression could not be
      discerned from an altitude of four or five feet above it, it certainly
      could not with one's nose nearly against it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link231" id="link231"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="231.jpg (33K)" src="images/231.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch32" id="linkch32"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We seemed to be in a road, but that was no proof. We tested this by
      walking off in various directions&mdash;the regular snow-mounds and the
      regular avenues between them convinced each man that he had found the true
      road, and that the others had found only false ones. Plainly the situation
      was desperate. We were cold and stiff and the horses were tired. We
      decided to build a sage-brush fire and camp out till morning. This was
      wise, because if we were wandering from the right road and the snow-storm
      continued another day our case would be the next thing to hopeless if we
      kept on.
    </p>
    <p>
      All agreed that a camp fire was what would come nearest to saving us, now,
      and so we set about building it. We could find no matches, and so we tried
      to make shift with the pistols. Not a man in the party had ever tried to
      do such a thing before, but not a man in the party doubted that it could
      be done, and without any trouble&mdash;because every man in the party had
      read about it in books many a time and had naturally come to believe it,
      with trusting simplicity, just as he had long ago accepted and believed
      that other common book-fraud about Indians and lost hunters making a fire
      by rubbing two dry sticks together.
    </p>
    <p>
      We huddled together on our knees in the deep snow, and the horses put
      their noses together and bowed their patient heads over us; and while the
      feathery flakes eddied down and turned us into a group of white statuary,
      we proceeded with the momentous experiment. We broke twigs from a sage
      bush and piled them on a little cleared place in the shelter of our
      bodies. In the course of ten or fifteen minutes all was ready, and then,
      while conversation ceased and our pulses beat low with anxious suspense,
      Ollendorff applied his revolver, pulled the trigger and blew the pile
      clear out of the county! It was the flattest failure that ever was.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link233" id="link233"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="233.jpg (89K)" src="images/233.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      This was distressing, but it paled before a greater horror&mdash;the
      horses were gone! I had been appointed to hold the bridles, but in my
      absorbing anxiety over the pistol experiment I had unconsciously dropped
      them and the released animals had walked off in the storm. It was useless
      to try to follow them, for their footfalls could make no sound, and one
      could pass within two yards of the creatures and never see them. We gave
      them up without an effort at recovering them, and cursed the lying books
      that said horses would stay by their masters for protection and
      companionship in a distressful time like ours.
    </p>
    <p>
      We were miserable enough, before; we felt still more forlorn, now.
      Patiently, but with blighted hope, we broke more sticks and piled them,
      and once more the Prussian shot them into annihilation. Plainly, to light
      a fire with a pistol was an art requiring practice and experience, and the
      middle of a desert at midnight in a snow-storm was not a good place or
      time for the acquiring of the accomplishment. We gave it up and tried the
      other. Each man took a couple of sticks and fell to chafing them together.
      At the end of half an hour we were thoroughly chilled, and so were the
      sticks. We bitterly execrated the Indians, the hunters and the books that
      had betrayed us with the silly device, and wondered dismally what was next
      to be done. At this critical moment Mr. Ballou fished out four matches
      from the rubbish of an overlooked pocket. To have found four gold bars
      would have seemed poor and cheap good luck compared to this.
    </p>
    <p>
      One cannot think how good a match looks under such circumstances&mdash;or
      how lovable and precious, and sacredly beautiful to the eye. This time we
      gathered sticks with high hopes; and when Mr. Ballou prepared to light the
      first match, there was an amount of interest centred upon him that pages
      of writing could not describe. The match burned hopefully a moment, and
      then went out. It could not have carried more regret with it if it had
      been a human life. The next match simply flashed and died. The wind puffed
      the third one out just as it was on the imminent verge of success. We
      gathered together closer than ever, and developed a solicitude that was
      rapt and painful, as Mr. Ballou scratched our last hope on his leg. It
      lit, burned blue and sickly, and then budded into a robust flame. Shading
      it with his hands, the old gentleman bent gradually down and every heart
      went with him&mdash;everybody, too, for that matter&mdash;and blood and
      breath stood still. The flame touched the sticks at last, took gradual
      hold upon them&mdash;hesitated&mdash;took a stronger hold&mdash;hesitated
      again&mdash;held its breath five heart-breaking seconds, then gave a sort
      of human gasp and went out.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link234" id="link234"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="234.jpg (42K)" src="images/234.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Nobody said a word for several minutes. It was a solemn sort of silence;
      even the wind put on a stealthy, sinister quiet, and made no more noise
      than the falling flakes of snow. Finally a sad-voiced conversation began,
      and it was soon apparent that in each of our hearts lay the conviction
      that this was our last night with the living. I had so hoped that I was
      the only one who felt so. When the others calmly acknowledged their
      conviction, it sounded like the summons itself. Ollendorff said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Brothers, let us die together. And let us go without one hard feeling
      towards each other. Let us forget and forgive bygones. I know that you
      have felt hard towards me for turning over the canoe, and for knowing too
      much and leading you round and round in the snow&mdash;but I meant well;
      forgive me. I acknowledge freely that I have had hard feelings against Mr.
      Ballou for abusing me and calling me a logarythm, which is a thing I do
      not know what, but no doubt a thing considered disgraceful and unbecoming
      in America, and it has scarcely been out of my mind and has hurt me a
      great deal&mdash;but let it go; I forgive Mr. Ballou with all my heart,
      and&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      Poor Ollendorff broke down and the tears came. He was not alone, for I was
      crying too, and so was Mr. Ballou. Ollendorff got his voice again and
      forgave me for things I had done and said. Then he got out his bottle of
      whisky and said that whether he lived or died he would never touch another
      drop. He said he had given up all hope of life, and although ill-prepared,
      was ready to submit humbly to his fate; that he wished he could be spared
      a little longer, not for any selfish reason, but to make a thorough reform
      in his character, and by devoting himself to helping the poor, nursing the
      sick, and pleading with the people to guard themselves against the evils
      of intemperance, make his life a beneficent example to the young, and lay
      it down at last with the precious reflection that it had not been lived in
      vain. He ended by saying that his reform should begin at this moment, even
      here in the presence of death, since no longer time was to be vouchsafed
      wherein to prosecute it to men's help and benefit&mdash;and with that he
      threw away the bottle of whisky.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link236" id="link236"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="236.jpg (21K)" src="images/236.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Mr. Ballou made remarks of similar purport, and began the reform he could
      not live to continue, by throwing away the ancient pack of cards that had
      solaced our captivity during the flood and made it bearable.
    </p>
    <p>
      He said he never gambled, but still was satisfied that the meddling with
      cards in any way was immoral and injurious, and no man could be wholly
      pure and blemishless without eschewing them. "And therefore," continued
      he, "in doing this act I already feel more in sympathy with that spiritual
      saturnalia necessary to entire and obsolete reform." These rolling
      syllables touched him as no intelligible eloquence could have done, and
      the old man sobbed with a mournfulness not unmingled with satisfaction.
    </p>
    <p>
      My own remarks were of the same tenor as those of my comrades, and I know
      that the feelings that prompted them were heartfelt and sincere. We were
      all sincere, and all deeply moved and earnest, for we were in the presence
      of death and without hope. I threw away my pipe, and in doing it felt that
      at last I was free of a hated vice and one that had ridden me like a
      tyrant all my days. While I yet talked, the thought of the good I might
      have done in the world and the still greater good I might now do, with
      these new incentives and higher and better aims to guide me if I could
      only be spared a few years longer, overcame me and the tears came again.
      We put our arms about each other's necks and awaited the warning
      drowsiness that precedes death by freezing.
    </p>
    <p>
      It came stealing over us presently, and then we bade each other a last
      farewell. A delicious dreaminess wrought its web about my yielding senses,
      while the snow-flakes wove a winding sheet about my conquered body.
      Oblivion came. The battle of life was done.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link237" id="link237"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="237.jpg (34K)" src="images/237.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch33" id="linkch33"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I do not know how long I was in a state of forgetfulness, but it seemed an
      age. A vague consciousness grew upon me by degrees, and then came a
      gathering anguish of pain in my limbs and through all my body. I
      shuddered. The thought flitted through my brain, "this is death&mdash;this
      is the hereafter."
    </p>
    <p>
      Then came a white upheaval at my side, and a voice said, with bitterness:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Will some gentleman be so good as to kick me behind?"
    </p>
    <p>
      It was Ballou&mdash;at least it was a towzled snow image in a sitting
      posture, with Ballou's voice.
    </p>
    <p>
      I rose up, and there in the gray dawn, not fifteen steps from us, were the
      frame buildings of a stage station, and under a shed stood our still
      saddled and bridled horses!
    </p>
    <p>
      An arched snow-drift broke up, now, and Ollendorff emerged from it, and
      the three of us sat and stared at the houses without speaking a word. We
      really had nothing to say. We were like the profane man who could not "do
      the subject justice," the whole situation was so painfully ridiculous and
      humiliating that words were tame and we did not know where to commence
      anyhow.
    </p>
    <p>
      The joy in our hearts at our deliverance was poisoned; well-nigh
      dissipated, indeed. We presently began to grow pettish by degrees, and
      sullen; and then, angry at each other, angry at ourselves, angry at
      everything in general, we moodily dusted the snow from our clothing and in
      unsociable single file plowed our way to the horses, unsaddled them, and
      sought shelter in the station.
    </p>
    <p>
      I have scarcely exaggerated a detail of this curious and absurd adventure.
      It occurred almost exactly as I have stated it. We actually went into camp
      in a snow-drift in a desert, at midnight in a storm, forlorn and hopeless,
      within fifteen steps of a comfortable inn.
    </p>
    <p>
      For two hours we sat apart in the station and ruminated in disgust. The
      mystery was gone, now, and it was plain enough why the horses had deserted
      us. Without a doubt they were under that shed a quarter of a minute after
      they had left us, and they must have overheard and enjoyed all our
      confessions and lamentations.
    </p>
    <p>
      After breakfast we felt better, and the zest of life soon came back. The
      world looked bright again, and existence was as dear to us as ever.
      Presently an uneasiness came over me&mdash;grew upon me&mdash;assailed me
      without ceasing. Alas, my regeneration was not complete&mdash;I wanted to
      smoke! I resisted with all my strength, but the flesh was weak. I wandered
      away alone and wrestled with myself an hour. I recalled my promises of
      reform and preached to myself persuasively, upbraidingly, exhaustively.
      But it was all vain, I shortly found myself sneaking among the snow-drifts
      hunting for my pipe. I discovered it after a considerable search, and
      crept away to hide myself and enjoy it. I remained behind the barn a good
      while, asking myself how I would feel if my braver, stronger, truer
      comrades should catch me in my degradation. At last I lit the pipe, and no
      human being can feel meaner and baser than I did then. I was ashamed of
      being in my own pitiful company. Still dreading discovery, I felt that
      perhaps the further side of the barn would be somewhat safer, and so I
      turned the corner. As I turned the one corner, smoking, Ollendorff turned
      the other with his bottle to his lips, and between us sat unconscious
      Ballou deep in a game of "solitaire" with the old greasy cards!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link240" id="link240"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="240.jpg (102K)" src="images/240.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Absurdity could go no farther. We shook hands and agreed to say no more
      about "reform" and "examples to the rising generation."
    </p>
    <p>
      The station we were at was at the verge of the Twenty-six-Mile Desert. If
      we had approached it half an hour earlier the night before, we must have
      heard men shouting there and firing pistols; for they were expecting some
      sheep drovers and their flocks and knew that they would infallibly get
      lost and wander out of reach of help unless guided by sounds.
    </p>
    <p>
      While we remained at the station, three of the drovers arrived, nearly
      exhausted with their wanderings, but two others of their party were never
      heard of afterward.
    </p>
    <p>
      We reached Carson in due time, and took a rest. This rest, together with
      preparations for the journey to Esmeralda, kept us there a week, and the
      delay gave us the opportunity to be present at the trial of the great
      land-slide case of Hyde vs. Morgan&mdash;an episode which is famous in
      Nevada to this day. After a word or two of necessary explanation, I will
      set down the history of this singular affair just as it transpired.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch34" id="linkch34"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXIV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The mountains are very high and steep about Carson, Eagle and Washoe
      Valleys&mdash;very high and very steep, and so when the snow gets to
      melting off fast in the Spring and the warm surface-earth begins to
      moisten and soften, the disastrous land-slides commence. The reader cannot
      know what a land-slide is, unless he has lived in that country and seen
      the whole side of a mountain taken off some fine morning and deposited
      down in the valley, leaving a vast, treeless, unsightly scar upon the
      mountain's front to keep the circumstance fresh in his memory all the
      years that he may go on living within seventy miles of that place.
    </p>
    <p>
      General Buncombe was shipped out to Nevada in the invoice of Territorial
      officers, to be United States Attorney. He considered himself a lawyer of
      parts, and he very much wanted an opportunity to manifest it&mdash;partly
      for the pure gratification of it and partly because his salary was
      Territorially meagre (which is a strong expression). Now the older
      citizens of a new territory look down upon the rest of the world with a
      calm, benevolent compassion, as long as it keeps out of the way&mdash;when
      it gets in the way they snub it. Sometimes this latter takes the shape of
      a practical joke.
    </p>
    <p>
      One morning Dick Hyde rode furiously up to General Buncombe's door in
      Carson city and rushed into his presence without stopping to tie his
      horse. He seemed much excited. He told the General that he wanted him to
      conduct a suit for him and would pay him five hundred dollars if he
      achieved a victory. And then, with violent gestures and a world of
      profanity, he poured out his grief. He said it was pretty well known that
      for some years he had been farming (or ranching as the more customary term
      is) in Washoe District, and making a successful thing of it, and
      furthermore it was known that his ranch was situated just in the edge of
      the valley, and that Tom Morgan owned a ranch immediately above it on the
      mountain side.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link242" id="link242"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="242.jpg (114K)" src="images/242.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And now the trouble was, that one of those hated and dreaded land-slides
      had come and slid Morgan's ranch, fences, cabins, cattle, barns and
      everything down on top of his ranch and exactly covered up every single
      vestige of his property, to a depth of about thirty-eight feet. Morgan was
      in possession and refused to vacate the premises&mdash;said he was
      occupying his own cabin and not interfering with anybody else's&mdash;and
      said the cabin was standing on the same dirt and same ranch it had always
      stood on, and he would like to see anybody make him vacate.
    </p>
    <p>
      "And when I reminded him," said Hyde, weeping, "that it was on top of my
      ranch and that he was trespassing, he had the infernal meanness to ask me
      why didn't I stay on my ranch and hold possession when I see him a-coming!
      Why didn't I stay on it, the blathering lunatic&mdash;by George, when I
      heard that racket and looked up that hill it was just like the whole world
      was a-ripping and a-tearing down that mountain side&mdash;splinters, and
      cord-wood, thunder and lightning, hail and snow, odds and ends of hay
      stacks, and awful clouds of dust!&mdash;trees going end over end in the
      air, rocks as big as a house jumping 'bout a thousand feet high and
      busting into ten million pieces, cattle turned inside out and a-coming
      head on with their tails hanging out between their teeth!&mdash;and in the
      midst of all that wrack and destruction sot that cussed Morgan on his
      gate-post, a-wondering why I didn't stay and hold possession! Laws bless
      me, I just took one glimpse, General, and lit out'n the county in three
      jumps exactly.
    </p>
    <p>
      "But what grinds me is that that Morgan hangs on there and won't move
      off'n that ranch&mdash;says it's his'n and he's going to keep it&mdash;likes
      it better'n he did when it was higher up the hill. Mad! Well, I've been so
      mad for two days I couldn't find my way to town&mdash;been wandering
      around in the brush in a starving condition&mdash;got anything here to
      drink, General? But I'm here now, and I'm a-going to law. You hear me!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Never in all the world, perhaps, were a man's feelings so outraged as were
      the General's. He said he had never heard of such high-handed conduct in
      all his life as this Morgan's. And he said there was no use in going to
      law&mdash;Morgan had no shadow of right to remain where he was&mdash;nobody
      in the wide world would uphold him in it, and no lawyer would take his
      case and no judge listen to it. Hyde said that right there was where he
      was mistaken&mdash;everybody in town sustained Morgan; Hal Brayton, a very
      smart lawyer, had taken his case; the courts being in vacation, it was to
      be tried before a referee, and ex-Governor Roop had already been appointed
      to that office and would open his court in a large public hall near the
      hotel at two that afternoon.
    </p>
    <p>
      The General was amazed. He said he had suspected before that the people of
      that Territory were fools, and now he knew it. But he said rest easy, rest
      easy and collect the witnesses, for the victory was just as certain as if
      the conflict were already over. Hyde wiped away his tears and left.
    </p>
    <p>
      At two in the afternoon referee Roop's Court opened and Roop appeared
      throned among his sheriffs, the witnesses, and spectators, and wearing
      upon his face a solemnity so awe-inspiring that some of his fellow-
      conspirators had misgivings that maybe he had not comprehended, after all,
      that this was merely a joke. An unearthly stillness prevailed, for at the
      slightest noise the judge uttered sternly the command:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Order in the Court!"
    </p>
    <p>
      And the sheriffs promptly echoed it. Presently the General elbowed his way
      through the crowd of spectators, with his arms full of law-books, and on
      his ears fell an order from the judge which was the first respectful
      recognition of his high official dignity that had ever saluted them, and
      it trickled pleasantly through his whole system:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Way for the United States Attorney!"
    </p>
    <p>
      The witnesses were called&mdash;legislators, high government officers,
      ranchmen, miners, Indians, Chinamen, negroes. Three fourths of them were
      called by the defendant Morgan, but no matter, their testimony invariably
      went in favor of the plaintiff Hyde. Each new witness only added new
      testimony to the absurdity of a man's claiming to own another man's
      property because his farm had slid down on top of it. Then the Morgan
      lawyers made their speeches, and seemed to make singularly weak ones&mdash;they
      did really nothing to help the Morgan cause. And now the General, with
      exultation in his face, got up and made an impassioned effort; he pounded
      the table, he banged the law-books, he shouted, and roared, and howled, he
      quoted from everything and everybody, poetry, sarcasm, statistics,
      history, pathos, bathos, blasphemy, and wound up with a grand war-whoop
      for free speech, freedom of the press, free schools, the Glorious Bird of
      America and the principles of eternal justice! [Applause.]
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link244" id="link244"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="244.jpg (96K)" src="images/244.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      When the General sat down, he did it with the conviction that if there was
      anything in good strong testimony, a great speech and believing and
      admiring countenances all around, Mr. Morgan's case was killed. Ex-
      Governor Roop leant his head upon his hand for some minutes, thinking, and
      the still audience waited for his decision. Then he got up and stood
      erect, with bended head, and thought again. Then he walked the floor with
      long, deliberate strides, his chin in his hand, and still the audience
      waited. At last he returned to his throne, seated himself, and began
      impressively:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen, I feel the great responsibility that rests upon me this day.
      This is no ordinary case. On the contrary it is plain that it is the most
      solemn and awful that ever man was called upon to decide. Gentlemen, I
      have listened attentively to the evidence, and have perceived that the
      weight of it, the overwhelming weight of it, is in favor of the plaintiff
      Hyde. I have listened also to the remarks of counsel, with high interest&mdash;and
      especially will I commend the masterly and irrefutable logic of the
      distinguished gentleman who represents the plaintiff. But gentlemen, let
      us beware how we allow mere human testimony, human ingenuity in argument
      and human ideas of equity, to influence us at a moment so solemn as this.
      Gentlemen, it ill becomes us, worms as we are, to meddle with the decrees
      of Heaven. It is plain to me that Heaven, in its inscrutable wisdom, has
      seen fit to move this defendant's ranch for a purpose. We are but
      creatures, and we must submit. If Heaven has chosen to favor the defendant
      Morgan in this marked and wonderful manner; and if Heaven, dissatisfied
      with the position of the Morgan ranch upon the mountain side, has chosen
      to remove it to a position more eligible and more advantageous for its
      owner, it ill becomes us, insects as we are, to question the legality of
      the act or inquire into the reasons that prompted it. No&mdash;Heaven
      created the ranches and it is Heaven's prerogative to rearrange them, to
      experiment with them around at its pleasure. It is for us to submit,
      without repining.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link246" id="link246"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="246.jpg (92K)" src="images/246.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "I warn you that this thing which has happened is a thing with which the
      sacrilegious hands and brains and tongues of men must not meddle.
      Gentlemen, it is the verdict of this court that the plaintiff, Richard
      Hyde, has been deprived of his ranch by the visitation of God! And from
      this decision there is no appeal."
    </p>
    <p>
      Buncombe seized his cargo of law-books and plunged out of the court-room
      frantic with indignation. He pronounced Roop to be a miraculous fool, an
      inspired idiot. In all good faith he returned at night and remonstrated
      with Roop upon his extravagant decision, and implored him to walk the
      floor and think for half an hour, and see if he could not figure out some
      sort of modification of the verdict. Roop yielded at last and got up to
      walk. He walked two hours and a half, and at last his face lit up happily
      and he told Buncombe it had occurred to him that the ranch underneath the
      new Morgan ranch still belonged to Hyde, that his title to the ground was
      just as good as it had ever been, and therefore he was of opinion that
      Hyde had a right to dig it out from under there and&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      The General never waited to hear the end of it. He was always an impatient
      and irascible man, that way. At the end of two months the fact that he had
      been played upon with a joke had managed to bore itself, like another
      Hoosac Tunnel, through the solid adamant of his understanding.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch35" id="linkch35"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      When we finally left for Esmeralda, horseback, we had an addition to the
      company in the person of Capt. John Nye, the Governor's brother. He had a
      good memory, and a tongue hung in the middle. This is a combination which
      gives immortality to conversation. Capt. John never suffered the talk to
      flag or falter once during the hundred and twenty miles of the journey. In
      addition to his conversational powers, he had one or two other endowments
      of a marked character. One was a singular "handiness" about doing anything
      and everything, from laying out a railroad or organizing a political
      party, down to sewing on buttons, shoeing a horse, or setting a broken
      leg, or a hen. Another was a spirit of accommodation that prompted him to
      take the needs, difficulties and perplexities of anybody and everybody
      upon his own shoulders at any and all times, and dispose of them with
      admirable facility and alacrity&mdash;hence he always managed to find
      vacant beds in crowded inns, and plenty to eat in the emptiest larders.
      And finally, wherever he met a man, woman or child, in camp, inn or
      desert, he either knew such parties personally or had been acquainted with
      a relative of the same. Such another traveling comrade was never seen
      before. I cannot forbear giving a specimen of the way in which he overcame
      difficulties. On the second day out, we arrived, very tired and hungry, at
      a poor little inn in the desert, and were told that the house was full, no
      provisions on hand, and neither hay nor barley to spare for the horses&mdash;must
      move on. The rest of us wanted to hurry on while it was yet light, but
      Capt. John insisted on stopping awhile. We dismounted and entered. There
      was no welcome for us on any face. Capt. John began his blandishments, and
      within twenty minutes he had accomplished the following things, viz.:
      found old acquaintances in three teamsters; discovered that he used to go
      to school with the landlord's mother; recognized his wife as a lady whose
      life he had saved once in California, by stopping her runaway horse;
      mended a child's broken toy and won the favor of its mother, a guest of
      the inn; helped the hostler bleed a horse, and prescribed for another
      horse that had the "heaves"; treated the entire party three times at the
      landlord's bar; produced a later paper than anybody had seen for a week
      and sat himself down to read the news to a deeply interested audience. The
      result, summed up, was as follows: The hostler found plenty of feed for
      our horses; we had a trout supper, an exceedingly sociable time after it,
      good beds to sleep in, and a surprising breakfast in the morning&mdash;and
      when we left, we left lamented by all! Capt. John had some bad traits, but
      he had some uncommonly valuable ones to offset them with.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link249" id="link249"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="249.jpg (53K)" src="images/249.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Esmeralda was in many respects another Humboldt, but in a little more
      forward state. The claims we had been paying assessments on were entirely
      worthless, and we threw them away. The principal one cropped out of the
      top of a knoll that was fourteen feet high, and the inspired Board of
      Directors were running a tunnel under that knoll to strike the ledge. The
      tunnel would have to be seventy feet long, and would then strike the ledge
      at the same dept that a shaft twelve feet deep would have reached! The
      Board were living on the "assessments." [N.B.&mdash;This hint comes too
      late for the enlightenment of New York silver miners; they have already
      learned all about this neat trick by experience.] The Board had no desire
      to strike the ledge, knowing that it was as barren of silver as a
      curbstone. This reminiscence calls to mind Jim Townsend's tunnel. He had
      paid assessments on a mine called the "Daley" till he was well-nigh
      penniless. Finally an assessment was levied to run a tunnel two hundred
      and fifty feet on the Daley, and Townsend went up on the hill to look into
      matters.
    </p>
    <p>
      He found the Daley cropping out of the apex of an exceedingly sharp-
      pointed peak, and a couple of men up there "facing" the proposed tunnel.
      Townsend made a calculation. Then he said to the men:
    </p>
    <p>
      "So you have taken a contract to run a tunnel into this hill two hundred
      and fifty feet to strike this ledge?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes, sir."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, do you know that you have got one of the most expensive and arduous
      undertakings before you that was ever conceived by man?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why no&mdash;how is that?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Because this hill is only twenty-five feet through from side to side; and
      so you have got to build two hundred and twenty-five feet of your tunnel
      on trestle-work!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link250" id="link250"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="250.jpg (61K)" src="images/250.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The ways of silver mining Boards are exceedingly dark and sinuous.
    </p>
    <p>
      We took up various claims, and commenced shafts and tunnels on them, but
      never finished any of them. We had to do a certain amount of work on each
      to "hold" it, else other parties could seize our property after the
      expiration of ten days. We were always hunting up new claims and doing a
      little work on them and then waiting for a buyer&mdash;who never came. We
      never found any ore that would yield more than fifty dollars a ton; and as
      the mills charged fifty dollars a ton for working ore and extracting the
      silver, our pocket-money melted steadily away and none returned to take
      its place. We lived in a little cabin and cooked for ourselves; and
      altogether it was a hard life, though a hopeful one&mdash;for we never
      ceased to expect fortune and a customer to burst upon us some day.
    </p>
    <p>
      At last, when flour reached a dollar a pound, and money could not be
      borrowed on the best security at less than eight per cent a month (I being
      without the security, too), I abandoned mining and went to milling. That
      is to say, I went to work as a common laborer in a quartz mill, at ten
      dollars a week and board.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch36" id="linkch36"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXVI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I had already learned how hard and long and dismal a task it is to burrow
      down into the bowels of the earth and get out the coveted ore; and now I
      learned that the burrowing was only half the work; and that to get the
      silver out of the ore was the dreary and laborious other half of it. We
      had to turn out at six in the morning and keep at it till dark. This mill
      was a six-stamp affair, driven by steam. Six tall, upright rods of iron,
      as large as a man's ankle, and heavily shod with a mass of iron and steel
      at their lower ends, were framed together like a gate, and these rose and
      fell, one after the other, in a ponderous dance, in an iron box called a
      "battery." Each of these rods or stamps weighed six hundred pounds. One of
      us stood by the battery all day long, breaking up masses of silver-bearing
      rock with a sledge and shoveling it into the battery. The ceaseless dance
      of the stamps pulverized the rock to powder, and a stream of water that
      trickled into the battery turned it to a creamy paste. The minutest
      particles were driven through a fine wire screen which fitted close around
      the battery, and were washed into great tubs warmed by super-heated steam&mdash;amalgamating
      pans, they are called. The mass of pulp in the pans was kept constantly
      stirred up by revolving "mullers." A quantity of quicksilver was kept
      always in the battery, and this seized some of the liberated gold and
      silver particles and held on to them; quicksilver was shaken in a fine
      shower into the pans, also, about every half hour, through a buckskin
      sack. Quantities of coarse salt and sulphate of copper were added, from
      time to time to assist the amalgamation by destroying base metals which
      coated the gold and silver and would not let it unite with the
      quicksilver.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link253" id="link253"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="253.jpg (73K)" src="images/253.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      All these tiresome things we had to attend to constantly. Streams of dirty
      water flowed always from the pans and were carried off in broad wooden
      troughs to the ravine. One would not suppose that atoms of gold and silver
      would float on top of six inches of water, but they did; and in order to
      catch them, coarse blankets were laid in the troughs, and little
      obstructing "riffles" charged with quicksilver were placed here and there
      across the troughs also. These riffles had to be cleaned and the blankets
      washed out every evening, to get their precious accumulations&mdash;and
      after all this eternity of trouble one third of the silver and gold in a
      ton of rock would find its way to the end of the troughs in the ravine at
      last and have to be worked over again some day. There is nothing so
      aggravating as silver milling. There never was any idle time in that mill.
      There was always something to do. It is a pity that Adam could not have
      gone straight out of Eden into a quartz mill, in order to understand the
      full force of his doom to "earn his bread by the sweat of his brow." Every
      now and then, during the day, we had to scoop some pulp out of the pans,
      and tediously "wash" it in a horn spoon&mdash;wash it little by little
      over the edge till at last nothing was left but some little dull globules
      of quicksilver in the bottom. If they were soft and yielding, the pan
      needed some salt or some sulphate of copper or some other chemical rubbish
      to assist digestion; if they were crisp to the touch and would retain a
      dint, they were freighted with all the silver and gold they could seize
      and hold, and consequently the pan needed a fresh charge of quicksilver.
      When there was nothing else to do, one could always "screen tailings."
      That is to say, he could shovel up the dried sand that had washed down to
      the ravine through the troughs and dash it against an upright wire screen
      to free it from pebbles and prepare it for working over.
    </p>
    <p>
      The process of amalgamation differed in the various mills, and this
      included changes in style of pans and other machinery, and a great
      diversity of opinion existed as to the best in use, but none of the
      methods employed, involved the principle of milling ore without "screening
      the tailings." Of all recreations in the world, screening tailings on a
      hot day, with a long-handled shovel, is the most undesirable.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link254" id="link254"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="254.jpg (78K)" src="images/254.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At the end of the week the machinery was stopped and we "cleaned up." That
      is to say, we got the pulp out of the pans and batteries, and washed the
      mud patiently away till nothing was left but the long accumulating mass of
      quicksilver, with its imprisoned treasures. This we made into heavy,
      compact snow-balls, and piled them up in a bright, luxurious heap for
      inspection. Making these snow-balls cost me a fine gold ring&mdash;that
      and ignorance together; for the quicksilver invaded the ring with the same
      facility with which water saturates a sponge&mdash;separated its particles
      and the ring crumbled to pieces.
    </p>
    <p>
      We put our pile of quicksilver balls into an iron retort that had a pipe
      leading from it to a pail of water, and then applied a roasting heat. The
      quicksilver turned to vapor, escaped through the pipe into the pail, and
      the water turned it into good wholesome quicksilver again. Quicksilver is
      very costly, and they never waste it. On opening the retort, there was our
      week's work&mdash;a lump of pure white, frosty looking silver, twice as
      large as a man's head. Perhaps a fifth of the mass was gold, but the color
      of it did not show&mdash;would not have shown if two thirds of it had been
      gold. We melted it up and made a solid brick of it by pouring it into an
      iron brick-mould.
    </p>
    <p>
      By such a tedious and laborious process were silver bricks obtained. This
      mill was but one of many others in operation at the time. The first one in
      Nevada was built at Egan Canyon and was a small insignificant affair and
      compared most unfavorably with some of the immense establishments
      afterwards located at Virginia City and elsewhere.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link256" id="link256"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="256.jpg (96K)" src="images/256.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      From our bricks a little corner was chipped off for the "fire-assay"&mdash;a
      method used to determine the proportions of gold, silver and base metals
      in the mass. This is an interesting process. The chip is hammered out as
      thin as paper and weighed on scales so fine and sensitive that if you
      weigh a two-inch scrap of paper on them and then write your name on the
      paper with a course, soft pencil and weigh it again, the scales will take
      marked notice of the addition.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then a little lead (also weighed) is rolled up with the flake of silver
      and the two are melted at a great heat in a small vessel called a cupel,
      made by compressing bone ashes into a cup-shape in a steel mold. The base
      metals oxydize and are absorbed with the lead into the pores of the cupel.
      A button or globule of perfectly pure gold and silver is left behind, and
      by weighing it and noting the loss, the assayer knows the proportion of
      base metal the brick contains. He has to separate the gold from the silver
      now. The button is hammered out flat and thin, put in the furnace and kept
      some time at a red heat; after cooling it off it is rolled up like a quill
      and heated in a glass vessel containing nitric acid; the acid dissolves
      the silver and leaves the gold pure and ready to be weighed on its own
      merits. Then salt water is poured into the vessel containing the dissolved
      silver and the silver returns to palpable form again and sinks to the
      bottom. Nothing now remains but to weigh it; then the proportions of the
      several metals contained in the brick are known, and the assayer stamps
      the value of the brick upon its surface.
    </p>
    <p>
      The sagacious reader will know now, without being told, that the
      speculative miner, in getting a "fire-assay" made of a piece of rock from
      his mine (to help him sell the same), was not in the habit of picking out
      the least valuable fragment of rock on his dump-pile, but quite the
      contrary. I have seen men hunt over a pile of nearly worthless quartz for
      an hour, and at last find a little piece as large as a filbert, which was
      rich in gold and silver&mdash;and this was reserved for a fire-assay! Of
      course the fire-assay would demonstrate that a ton of such rock would
      yield hundreds of dollars&mdash;and on such assays many an utterly
      worthless mine was sold.
    </p>
    <p>
      Assaying was a good business, and so some men engaged in it, occasionally,
      who were not strictly scientific and capable. One assayer got such rich
      results out of all specimens brought to him that in time he acquired
      almost a monopoly of the business. But like all men who achieve success,
      he became an object of envy and suspicion. The other assayers entered into
      a conspiracy against him, and let some prominent citizens into the secret
      in order to show that they meant fairly. Then they broke a little fragment
      off a carpenter's grindstone and got a stranger to take it to the popular
      scientist and get it assayed. In the course of an hour the result came&mdash;whereby
      it appeared that a ton of that rock would yield $1,184.40 in silver and
      $366.36 in gold!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link257" id="link257"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="257.jpg (34K)" src="images/257.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Due publication of the whole matter was made in the paper, and the popular
      assayer left town "between two days."
    </p>
    <p>
      I will remark, in passing, that I only remained in the milling business
      one week. I told my employer I could not stay longer without an advance in
      my wages; that I liked quartz milling, indeed was infatuated with it; that
      I had never before grown so tenderly attached to an occupation in so short
      a time; that nothing, it seemed to me, gave such scope to intellectual
      activity as feeding a battery and screening tailings, and nothing so
      stimulated the moral attributes as retorting bullion and washing blankets&mdash;still,
      I felt constrained to ask an increase of salary. He said he was paying me
      ten dollars a week, and thought it a good round sum. How much did I want?
    </p>
    <p>
      I said about four hundred thousand dollars a month, and board, was about
      all I could reasonably ask, considering the hard times.
    </p>
    <p>
      I was ordered off the premises! And yet, when I look back to those days
      and call to mind the exceeding hardness of the labor I performed in that
      mill, I only regret that I did not ask him seven hundred thousand.
    </p>
    <p>
      Shortly after this I began to grow crazy, along with the rest of the
      population, about the mysterious and wonderful "cement mine," and to make
      preparations to take advantage of any opportunity that might offer to go
      and help hunt for it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch37" id="linkch37"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXVII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It was somewhere in the neighborhood of Mono Lake that the marvellous
      Whiteman cement mine was supposed to lie. Every now and then it would be
      reported that Mr. W. had passed stealthily through Esmeralda at dead of
      night, in disguise, and then we would have a wild excitement&mdash;because
      he must be steering for his secret mine, and now was the time to follow
      him. In less than three hours after daylight all the horses and mules and
      donkeys in the vicinity would be bought, hired or stolen, and half the
      community would be off for the mountains, following in the wake of
      Whiteman. But W. would drift about through the mountain gorges for days
      together, in a purposeless sort of way, until the provisions of the miners
      ran out, and they would have to go back home. I have known it reported at
      eleven at night, in a large mining camp, that Whiteman had just passed
      through, and in two hours the streets, so quiet before, would be swarming
      with men and animals. Every individual would be trying to be very secret,
      but yet venturing to whisper to just one neighbor that W. had passed
      through. And long before daylight&mdash;this in the dead of Winter&mdash;the
      stampede would be complete, the camp deserted, and the whole population
      gone chasing after W.
    </p>
    <p>
      The tradition was that in the early immigration, more than twenty years
      ago, three young Germans, brothers, who had survived an Indian massacre on
      the Plains, wandered on foot through the deserts, avoiding all trails and
      roads, and simply holding a westerly direction and hoping to find
      California before they starved, or died of fatigue. And in a gorge in the
      mountains they sat down to rest one day, when one of them noticed a
      curious vein of cement running along the ground, shot full of lumps of
      dull yellow metal. They saw that it was gold, and that here was a fortune
      to be acquired in a single day. The vein was about as wide as a curbstone,
      and fully two thirds of it was pure gold. Every pound of the wonderful
      cement was worth well-nigh $200.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link260" id="link260"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="260.jpg (59K)" src="images/260.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Each of the brothers loaded himself with about twenty-five pounds of it,
      and then they covered up all traces of the vein, made a rude drawing of
      the locality and the principal landmarks in the vicinity, and started
      westward again. But troubles thickened about them. In their wanderings one
      brother fell and broke his leg, and the others were obliged to go on and
      leave him to die in the wilderness. Another, worn out and starving, gave
      up by and by, and laid down to die, but after two or three weeks of
      incredible hardships, the third reached the settlements of California
      exhausted, sick, and his mind deranged by his sufferings. He had thrown
      away all his cement but a few fragments, but these were sufficient to set
      everybody wild with excitement. However, he had had enough of the cement
      country, and nothing could induce him to lead a party thither. He was
      entirely content to work on a farm for wages. But he gave Whiteman his
      map, and described the cement region as well as he could and thus
      transferred the curse to that gentleman&mdash;for when I had my one
      accidental glimpse of Mr. W. in Esmeralda he had been hunting for the lost
      mine, in hunger and thirst, poverty and sickness, for twelve or thirteen
      years. Some people believed he had found it, but most people believed he
      had not. I saw a piece of cement as large as my fist which was said to
      have been given to Whiteman by the young German, and it was of a seductive
      nature. Lumps of virgin gold were as thick in it as raisins in a slice of
      fruit cake. The privilege of working such a mine one week would be
      sufficient for a man of reasonable desires.
    </p>
    <p>
      A new partner of ours, a Mr. Higbie, knew Whiteman well by sight, and a
      friend of ours, a Mr. Van Dorn, was well acquainted with him, and not only
      that, but had Whiteman's promise that he should have a private hint in
      time to enable him to join the next cement expedition. Van Dorn had
      promised to extend the hint to us. One evening Higbie came in greatly
      excited, and said he felt certain he had recognized Whiteman, up town,
      disguised and in a pretended state of intoxication. In a little while Van
      Dorn arrived and confirmed the news; and so we gathered in our cabin and
      with heads close together arranged our plans in impressive whispers.
    </p>
    <p>
      We were to leave town quietly, after midnight, in two or three small
      parties, so as not to attract attention, and meet at dawn on the "divide"
      overlooking Mono Lake, eight or nine miles distant. We were to make no
      noise after starting, and not speak above a whisper under any
      circumstances. It was believed that for once Whiteman's presence was
      unknown in the town and his expedition unsuspected. Our conclave broke up
      at nine o'clock, and we set about our preparation diligently and with
      profound secrecy. At eleven o'clock we saddled our horses, hitched them
      with their long riatas (or lassos), and then brought out a side of bacon,
      a sack of beans, a small sack of coffee, some sugar, a hundred pounds of
      flour in sacks, some tin cups and a coffee pot, frying pan and some few
      other necessary articles. All these things were "packed" on the back of a
      led horse&mdash;and whoever has not been taught, by a Spanish adept, to
      pack an animal, let him never hope to do the thing by natural smartness.
      That is impossible. Higbie had had some experience, but was not perfect.
      He put on the pack saddle (a thing like a saw-buck), piled the property on
      it and then wound a rope all over and about it and under it, "every which
      way," taking a hitch in it every now and then, and occasionally surging
      back on it till the horse's sides sunk in and he gasped for breath&mdash;but
      every time the lashings grew tight in one place they loosened in another.
      We never did get the load tight all over, but we got it so that it would
      do, after a fashion, and then we started, in single file, close order, and
      without a word. It was a dark night. We kept the middle of the road, and
      proceeded in a slow walk past the rows of cabins, and whenever a miner
      came to his door I trembled for fear the light would shine on us an excite
      curiosity. But nothing happened. We began the long winding ascent of the
      canyon, toward the "divide," and presently the cabins began to grow
      infrequent, and the intervals between them wider and wider, and then I
      began to breathe tolerably freely and feel less like a thief and a
      murderer. I was in the rear, leading the pack horse. As the ascent grew
      steeper he grew proportionately less satisfied with his cargo, and began
      to pull back on his riata occasionally and delay progress. My comrades
      were passing out of sight in the gloom. I was getting anxious. I coaxed
      and bullied the pack horse till I presently got him into a trot, and then
      the tin cups and pans strung about his person frightened him and he ran.
      His riata was wound around the pummel of my saddle, and so, as he went by
      he dragged me from my horse and the two animals traveled briskly on
      without me. But I was not alone&mdash;the loosened cargo tumbled overboard
      from the pack horse and fell close to me. It was abreast of almost the
      last cabin.
    </p>
    <p>
      A miner came out and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Hello!"
    </p>
    <p>
      I was thirty steps from him, and knew he could not see me, it was so very
      dark in the shadow of the mountain. So I lay still. Another head appeared
      in the light of the cabin door, and presently the two men walked toward
      me. They stopped within ten steps of me, and one said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Sh! Listen."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link263" id="link263"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="263.jpg (75K)" src="images/263.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I could not have been in a more distressed state if I had been escaping
      justice with a price on my head. Then the miners appeared to sit down on a
      boulder, though I could not see them distinctly enough to be very sure
      what they did. One said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I heard a noise, as plain as I ever heard anything. It seemed to be about
      there&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      A stone whizzed by my head. I flattened myself out in the dust like a
      postage stamp, and thought to myself if he mended his aim ever so little
      he would probably hear another noise. In my heart, now, I execrated secret
      expeditions. I promised myself that this should be my last, though the
      Sierras were ribbed with cement veins. Then one of the men said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'll tell you what! Welch knew what he was talking about when he said he
      saw Whiteman to-day. I heard horses&mdash;that was the noise. I am going
      down to Welch's, right away."
    </p>
    <p>
      They left and I was glad. I did not care whither they went, so they went.
      I was willing they should visit Welch, and the sooner the better.
    </p>
    <p>
      As soon as they closed their cabin door my comrades emerged from the
      gloom; they had caught the horses and were waiting for a clear coast
      again. We remounted the cargo on the pack horse and got under way, and as
      day broke we reached the "divide" and joined Van Dorn. Then we journeyed
      down into the valley of the Lake, and feeling secure, we halted to cook
      breakfast, for we were tired and sleepy and hungry. Three hours later the
      rest of the population filed over the "divide" in a long procession, and
      drifted off out of sight around the borders of the Lake!
    </p>
    <p>
      Whether or not my accident had produced this result we never knew, but at
      least one thing was certain&mdash;the secret was out and Whiteman would
      not enter upon a search for the cement mine this time. We were filled with
      chagrin.
    </p>
    <p>
      We held a council and decided to make the best of our misfortune and enjoy
      a week's holiday on the borders of the curious Lake. Mono, it is sometimes
      called, and sometimes the "Dead Sea of California." It is one of the
      strangest freaks of Nature to be found in any land, but it is hardly ever
      mentioned in print and very seldom visited, because it lies away off the
      usual routes of travel and besides is so difficult to get at that only men
      content to endure the roughest life will consent to take upon themselves
      the discomforts of such a trip. On the morning of our second day, we
      traveled around to a remote and particularly wild spot on the borders of
      the Lake, where a stream of fresh, ice-cold water entered it from the
      mountain side, and then we went regularly into camp. We hired a large boat
      and two shot-guns from a lonely ranchman who lived some ten miles further
      on, and made ready for comfort and recreation. We soon got thoroughly
      acquainted with the Lake and all its peculiarities.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch38" id="linkch38"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXVIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Mono Lake lies in a lifeless, treeless, hideous desert, eight thousand
      feet above the level of the sea, and is guarded by mountains two thousand
      feet higher, whose summits are always clothed in clouds. This solemn,
      silent, sail-less sea&mdash;this lonely tenant of the loneliest spot on
      earth&mdash;is little graced with the picturesque. It is an unpretending
      expanse of grayish water, about a hundred miles in circumference, with two
      islands in its centre, mere upheavals of rent and scorched and blistered
      lava, snowed over with gray banks and drifts of pumice-stone and ashes,
      the winding sheet of the dead volcano, whose vast crater the lake has
      seized upon and occupied.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link265" id="link265"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="265.jpg (138K)" src="images/265.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The lake is two hundred feet deep, and its sluggish waters are so strong
      with alkali that if you only dip the most hopelessly soiled garment into
      them once or twice, and wring it out, it will be found as clean as if it
      had been through the ablest of washerwomen's hands. While we camped there
      our laundry work was easy. We tied the week's washing astern of our boat,
      and sailed a quarter of a mile, and the job was complete, all to the
      wringing out. If we threw the water on our heads and gave them a rub or
      so, the white lather would pile up three inches high. This water is not
      good for bruised places and abrasions of the skin. We had a valuable dog.
      He had raw places on him. He had more raw places on him than sound ones.
      He was the rawest dog I almost ever saw. He jumped overboard one day to
      get away from the flies. But it was bad judgment. In his condition, it
      would have been just as comfortable to jump into the fire.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link266a" id="link266a"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="266a.jpg (44K)" src="images/266a.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The alkali water nipped him in all the raw places simultaneously, and he
      struck out for the shore with considerable interest. He yelped and barked
      and howled as he went&mdash;and by the time he got to the shore there was
      no bark to him&mdash;for he had barked the bark all out of his inside, and
      the alkali water had cleaned the bark all off his outside, and he probably
      wished he had never embarked in any such enterprise. He ran round and
      round in a circle, and pawed the earth and clawed the air, and threw
      double somersaults, sometimes backward and sometimes forward, in the most
      extraordinary manner. He was not a demonstrative dog, as a general thing,
      but rather of a grave and serious turn of mind, and I never saw him take
      so much interest in anything before. He finally struck out over the
      mountains, at a gait which we estimated at about two hundred and fifty
      miles an hour, and he is going yet. This was about nine years ago. We look
      for what is left of him along here every day.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link266b" id="link266b"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="266b.jpg (51K)" src="images/266b.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      A white man cannot drink the water of Mono Lake, for it is nearly pure
      lye. It is said that the Indians in the vicinity drink it sometimes,
      though. It is not improbable, for they are among the purest liars I ever
      saw. [There will be no additional charge for this joke, except to parties
      requiring an explanation of it. This joke has received high commendation
      from some of the ablest minds of the age.]
    </p>
    <p>
      There are no fish in Mono Lake&mdash;no frogs, no snakes, no polliwigs&mdash;nothing,
      in fact, that goes to make life desirable. Millions of wild ducks and
      sea-gulls swim about the surface, but no living thing exists under the
      surface, except a white feathery sort of worm, one half an inch long,
      which looks like a bit of white thread frayed out at the sides. If you dip
      up a gallon of water, you will get about fifteen thousand of these. They
      give to the water a sort of grayish-white appearance. Then there is a fly,
      which looks something like our house fly. These settle on the beach to eat
      the worms that wash ashore&mdash;and any time, you can see there a belt of
      flies an inch deep and six feet wide, and this belt extends clear around
      the lake&mdash;a belt of flies one hundred miles long. If you throw a
      stone among them, they swarm up so thick that they look dense, like a
      cloud. You can hold them under water as long as you please&mdash;they do
      not mind it&mdash;they are only proud of it. When you let them go, they
      pop up to the surface as dry as a patent office report, and walk off as
      unconcernedly as if they had been educated especially with a view to
      affording instructive entertainment to man in that particular way.
      Providence leaves nothing to go by chance. All things have their uses and
      their part and proper place in Nature's economy: the ducks eat the flies&mdash;the
      flies eat the worms&mdash;the Indians eat all three&mdash;the wild cats
      eat the Indians&mdash;the white folks eat the wild cats&mdash;and thus all
      things are lovely.
    </p>
    <p>
      Mono Lake is a hundred miles in a straight line from the ocean&mdash;and
      between it and the ocean are one or two ranges of mountains&mdash;yet
      thousands of sea-gulls go there every season to lay their eggs and rear
      their young. One would as soon expect to find sea-gulls in Kansas. And in
      this connection let us observe another instance of Nature's wisdom. The
      islands in the lake being merely huge masses of lava, coated over with
      ashes and pumice-stone, and utterly innocent of vegetation or anything
      that would burn; and sea-gull's eggs being entirely useless to anybody
      unless they be cooked, Nature has provided an unfailing spring of boiling
      water on the largest island, and you can put your eggs in there, and in
      four minutes you can boil them as hard as any statement I have made during
      the past fifteen years. Within ten feet of the boiling spring is a spring
      of pure cold water, sweet and wholesome.
    </p>
    <p>
      So, in that island you get your board and washing free of charge&mdash;and
      if nature had gone further and furnished a nice American hotel clerk who
      was crusty and disobliging, and didn't know anything about the time
      tables, or the railroad routes&mdash;or&mdash;anything&mdash;and was proud
      of it&mdash;I would not wish for a more desirable boarding-house.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link268" id="link268"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="268.jpg (51K)" src="images/268.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Half a dozen little mountain brooks flow into Mono Lake, but not a stream
      of any kind flows out of it. It neither rises nor falls, apparently, and
      what it does with its surplus water is a dark and bloody mystery.
    </p>
    <p>
      There are only two seasons in the region round about Mono Lake&mdash;and
      these are, the breaking up of one Winter and the beginning of the next.
      More than once (in Esmeralda) I have seen a perfectly blistering morning
      open up with the thermometer at ninety degrees at eight o'clock, and seen
      the snow fall fourteen inches deep and that same identical thermometer go
      down to forty-four degrees under shelter, before nine o'clock at night.
      Under favorable circumstances it snows at least once in every single month
      in the year, in the little town of Mono. So uncertain is the climate in
      Summer that a lady who goes out visiting cannot hope to be prepared for
      all emergencies unless she takes her fan under one arm and her snow shoes
      under the other. When they have a Fourth of July procession it generally
      snows on them, and they do say that as a general thing when a man calls
      for a brandy toddy there, the bar keeper chops it off with a hatchet and
      wraps it up in a paper, like maple sugar. And it is further reported that
      the old soakers haven't any teeth&mdash;wore them out eating gin cocktails
      and brandy punches. I do not endorse that statement&mdash;I simply give it
      for what it is worth&mdash;and it is worth&mdash;well, I should say,
      millions, to any man who can believe it without straining himself. But I
      do endorse the snow on the Fourth of July&mdash;because I know that to be
      true.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch39" id="linkch39"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XXXIX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      About seven o'clock one blistering hot morning&mdash;for it was now dead
      summer time&mdash;Higbie and I took the boat and started on a voyage of
      discovery to the two islands. We had often longed to do this, but had been
      deterred by the fear of storms; for they were frequent, and severe enough
      to capsize an ordinary row-boat like ours without great difficulty&mdash;and
      once capsized, death would ensue in spite of the bravest swimming, for
      that venomous water would eat a man's eyes out like fire, and burn him out
      inside, too, if he shipped a sea. It was called twelve miles, straight out
      to the islands&mdash;a long pull and a warm one&mdash;but the morning was
      so quiet and sunny, and the lake so smooth and glassy and dead, that we
      could not resist the temptation. So we filled two large tin canteens with
      water (since we were not acquainted with the locality of the spring said
      to exist on the large island), and started. Higbie's brawny muscles gave
      the boat good speed, but by the time we reached our destination we judged
      that we had pulled nearer fifteen miles than twelve.
    </p>
    <p>
      We landed on the big island and went ashore. We tried the water in the
      canteens, now, and found that the sun had spoiled it; it was so brackish
      that we could not drink it; so we poured it out and began a search for the
      spring&mdash;for thirst augments fast as soon as it is apparent that one
      has no means at hand of quenching it. The island was a long, moderately
      high hill of ashes&mdash;nothing but gray ashes and pumice-stone, in which
      we sunk to our knees at every step&mdash;and all around the top was a
      forbidding wall of scorched and blasted rocks. When we reached the top and
      got within the wall, we found simply a shallow, far-reaching basin,
      carpeted with ashes, and here and there a patch of fine sand. In places,
      picturesque jets of steam shot up out of crevices, giving evidence that
      although this ancient crater had gone out of active business, there was
      still some fire left in its furnaces. Close to one of these jets of steam
      stood the only tree on the island&mdash;a small pine of most graceful
      shape and most faultless symmetry; its color was a brilliant green, for
      the steam drifted unceasingly through its branches and kept them always
      moist. It contrasted strangely enough, did this vigorous and beautiful
      outcast, with its dead and dismal surroundings. It was like a cheerful
      spirit in a mourning household.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link271" id="link271"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="271.jpg (56K)" src="images/271.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We hunted for the spring everywhere, traversing the full length of the
      island (two or three miles), and crossing it twice&mdash;climbing
      ash-hills patiently, and then sliding down the other side in a sitting
      posture, plowing up smothering volumes of gray dust. But we found nothing
      but solitude, ashes and a heart-breaking silence. Finally we noticed that
      the wind had risen, and we forgot our thirst in a solicitude of greater
      importance; for, the lake being quiet, we had not taken pains about
      securing the boat. We hurried back to a point overlooking our landing
      place, and then&mdash;but mere words cannot describe our dismay&mdash;the
      boat was gone! The chances were that there was not another boat on the
      entire lake. The situation was not comfortable&mdash;in truth, to speak
      plainly, it was frightful. We were prisoners on a desolate island, in
      aggravating proximity to friends who were for the present helpless to aid
      us; and what was still more uncomfortable was the reflection that we had
      neither food nor water. But presently we sighted the boat. It was drifting
      along, leisurely, about fifty yards from shore, tossing in a foamy sea. It
      drifted, and continued to drift, but at the same safe distance from land,
      and we walked along abreast it and waited for fortune to favor us. At the
      end of an hour it approached a jutting cape, and Higbie ran ahead and
      posted himself on the utmost verge and prepared for the assault. If we
      failed there, there was no hope for us. It was driving gradually shoreward
      all the time, now; but whether it was driving fast enough to make the
      connection or not was the momentous question. When it got within thirty
      steps of Higbie I was so excited that I fancied I could hear my own heart
      beat. When, a little later, it dragged slowly along and seemed about to go
      by, only one little yard out of reach, it seemed as if my heart stood
      still; and when it was exactly abreast him and began to widen away, and he
      still standing like a watching statue, I knew my heart did stop. But when
      he gave a great spring, the next instant, and lit fairly in the stern, I
      discharged a war-whoop that woke the solitudes!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link273" id="link273"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="273.jpg (62K)" src="images/273.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But it dulled my enthusiasm, presently, when he told me he had not been
      caring whether the boat came within jumping distance or not, so that it
      passed within eight or ten yards of him, for he had made up his mind to
      shut his eyes and mouth and swim that trifling distance. Imbecile that I
      was, I had not thought of that. It was only a long swim that could be
      fatal.
    </p>
    <p>
      The sea was running high and the storm increasing. It was growing late,
      too&mdash;three or four in the afternoon. Whether to venture toward the
      mainland or not, was a question of some moment. But we were so distressed
      by thirst that we decide to try it, and so Higbie fell to work and I took
      the steering-oar. When we had pulled a mile, laboriously, we were
      evidently in serious peril, for the storm had greatly augmented; the
      billows ran very high and were capped with foaming crests, the heavens
      were hung with black, and the wind blew with great fury. We would have
      gone back, now, but we did not dare to turn the boat around, because as
      soon as she got in the trough of the sea she would upset, of course. Our
      only hope lay in keeping her head-on to the seas. It was hard work to do
      this, she plunged so, and so beat and belabored the billows with her
      rising and falling bows. Now and then one of Higbie's oars would trip on
      the top of a wave, and the other one would snatch the boat half around in
      spite of my cumbersome steering apparatus. We were drenched by the sprays
      constantly, and the boat occasionally shipped water. By and by, powerful
      as my comrade was, his great exertions began to tell on him, and he was
      anxious that I should change places with him till he could rest a little.
      But I told him this was impossible; for if the steering oar were dropped a
      moment while we changed, the boat would slue around into the trough of the
      sea, capsize, and in less than five minutes we would have a hundred
      gallons of soap- suds in us and be eaten up so quickly that we could not
      even be present at our own inquest.
    </p>
    <p>
      But things cannot last always. Just as the darkness shut down we came
      booming into port, head on. Higbie dropped his oars to hurrah&mdash;I
      dropped mine to help&mdash;the sea gave the boat a twist, and over she
      went!
    </p>
    <p>
      The agony that alkali water inflicts on bruises, chafes and blistered
      hands, is unspeakable, and nothing but greasing all over will modify it&mdash;but
      we ate, drank and slept well, that night, notwithstanding.
    </p>
    <p>
      In speaking of the peculiarities of Mono Lake, I ought to have mentioned
      that at intervals all around its shores stand picturesque turret-looking
      masses and clusters of a whitish, coarse-grained rock that resembles
      inferior mortar dried hard; and if one breaks off fragments of this rock
      he will find perfectly shaped and thoroughly petrified gulls' eggs deeply
      imbedded in the mass. How did they get there? I simply state the fact&mdash;for
      it is a fact&mdash;and leave the geological reader to crack the nut at his
      leisure and solve the problem after his own fashion.
    </p>
    <p>
      At the end of a week we adjourned to the Sierras on a fishing excursion,
      and spent several days in camp under snowy Castle Peak, and fished
      successfully for trout in a bright, miniature lake whose surface was
      between ten and eleven thousand feet above the level of the sea; cooling
      ourselves during the hot August noons by sitting on snow banks ten feet
      deep, under whose sheltering edges fine grass and dainty flowers
      flourished luxuriously; and at night entertaining ourselves by almost
      freezing to death. Then we returned to Mono Lake, and finding that the
      cement excitement was over for the present, packed up and went back to
      Esmeralda. Mr. Ballou reconnoitred awhile, and not liking the prospect,
      set out alone for Humboldt.
    </p>
    <p>
      About this time occurred a little incident which has always had a sort of
      interest to me, from the fact that it came so near "instigating" my
      funeral. At a time when an Indian attack had been expected, the citizens
      hid their gunpowder where it would be safe and yet convenient to hand when
      wanted. A neighbor of ours hid six cans of rifle powder in the bake-oven
      of an old discarded cooking stove which stood on the open ground near a
      frame out-house or shed, and from and after that day never thought of it
      again. We hired a half-tamed Indian to do some washing for us, and he took
      up quarters under the shed with his tub. The ancient stove reposed within
      six feet of him, and before his face. Finally it occurred to him that hot
      water would be better than cold, and he went out and fired up under that
      forgotten powder magazine and set on a kettle of water. Then he returned
      to his tub.
    </p>
    <p>
      I entered the shed presently and threw down some more clothes, and was
      about to speak to him when the stove blew up with a prodigious crash, and
      disappeared, leaving not a splinter behind. Fragments of it fell in the
      streets full two hundred yards away. Nearly a third of the shed roof over
      our heads was destroyed, and one of the stove lids, after cutting a small
      stanchion half in two in front of the Indian, whizzed between us and drove
      partly through the weather-boarding beyond. I was as white as a sheet and
      as weak as a kitten and speechless. But the Indian betrayed no
      trepidation, no distress, not even discomfort. He simply stopped washing,
      leaned forward and surveyed the clean, blank ground a moment, and then
      remarked:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link275" id="link275"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="275.jpg (68K)" src="images/275.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Mph! Dam stove heap gone!"&mdash;and resumed his scrubbing as placidly as
      if it were an entirely customary thing for a stove to do. I will explain,
      that "heap" is "Injun-English" for "very much." The reader will perceive
      the exhaustive expressiveness of it in the present instance.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link276" id="link276"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="276.jpg (30K)" src="images/276.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch40" id="linkch40"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XL.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I now come to a curious episode&mdash;the most curious, I think, that had
      yet accented my slothful, valueless, heedless career. Out of a hillside
      toward the upper end of the town, projected a wall of reddish looking
      quartz-croppings, the exposed comb of a silver-bearing ledge that extended
      deep down into the earth, of course. It was owned by a company entitled
      the "Wide West." There was a shaft sixty or seventy feet deep on the under
      side of the croppings, and everybody was acquainted with the rock that
      came from it&mdash;and tolerably rich rock it was, too, but nothing
      extraordinary. I will remark here, that although to the inexperienced
      stranger all the quartz of a particular "district" looks about alike, an
      old resident of the camp can take a glance at a mixed pile of rock,
      separate the fragments and tell you which mine each came from, as easily
      as a confectioner can separate and classify the various kinds and
      qualities of candy in a mixed heap of the article.
    </p>
    <p>
      All at once the town was thrown into a state of extraordinary excitement.
      In mining parlance the Wide West had "struck it rich!" Everybody went to
      see the new developments, and for some days there was such a crowd of
      people about the Wide West shaft that a stranger would have supposed there
      was a mass meeting in session there. No other topic was discussed but the
      rich strike, and nobody thought or dreamed about anything else. Every man
      brought away a specimen, ground it up in a hand mortar, washed it out in
      his horn spoon, and glared speechless upon the marvelous result. It was
      not hard rock, but black, decomposed stuff which could be crumbled in the
      hand like a baked potato, and when spread out on a paper exhibited a thick
      sprinkling of gold and particles of "native" silver. Higbie brought a
      handful to the cabin, and when he had washed it out his amazement was
      beyond description. Wide West stock soared skywards. It was said that
      repeated offers had been made for it at a thousand dollars a foot, and
      promptly refused. We have all had the "blues"&mdash;the mere sky- blues&mdash;but
      mine were indigo, now&mdash;because I did not own in the Wide West. The
      world seemed hollow to me, and existence a grief. I lost my appetite, and
      ceased to take an interest in anything. Still I had to stay, and listen to
      other people's rejoicings, because I had no money to get out of the camp
      with.
    </p>
    <p>
      The Wide West company put a stop to the carrying away of "specimens," and
      well they might, for every handful of the ore was worth a sun of some
      consequence. To show the exceeding value of the ore, I will remark that a
      sixteen-hundred-pounds parcel of it was sold, just as it lay, at the mouth
      of the shaft, at one dollar a pound; and the man who bought it "packed" it
      on mules a hundred and fifty or two hundred miles, over the mountains, to
      San Francisco, satisfied that it would yield at a rate that would richly
      compensate him for his trouble. The Wide West people also commanded their
      foreman to refuse any but their own operatives permission to enter the
      mine at any time or for any purpose. I kept up my "blue" meditations and
      Higbie kept up a deal of thinking, too, but of a different sort. He
      puzzled over the "rock," examined it with a glass, inspected it in
      different lights and from different points of view, and after each
      experiment delivered himself, in soliloquy, of one and the same unvarying
      opinion in the same unvarying formula:
    </p>
    <p>
      "It is not Wide West rock!"
    </p>
    <p>
      He said once or twice that he meant to have a look into the Wide West
      shaft if he got shot for it. I was wretched, and did not care whether he
      got a look into it or not. He failed that day, and tried again at night;
      failed again; got up at dawn and tried, and failed again. Then he lay in
      ambush in the sage brush hour after hour, waiting for the two or three
      hands to adjourn to the shade of a boulder for dinner; made a start once,
      but was premature&mdash;one of the men came back for something; tried it
      again, but when almost at the mouth of the shaft, another of the men rose
      up from behind the boulder as if to reconnoitre, and he dropped on the
      ground and lay quiet; presently he crawled on his hands and knees to the
      mouth of the shaft, gave a quick glance around, then seized the rope and
      slid down the shaft.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link279" id="link279"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="279.jpg (47K)" src="images/279.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      He disappeared in the gloom of a "side drift" just as a head appeared in
      the mouth of the shaft and somebody shouted "Hello!"&mdash;which he did
      not answer. He was not disturbed any more. An hour later he entered the
      cabin, hot, red, and ready to burst with smothered excitement, and
      exclaimed in a stage whisper:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I knew it! We are rich! IT'S A BLIND LEAD!"
    </p>
    <p>
      I thought the very earth reeled under me. Doubt&mdash;conviction&mdash;doubt
      again&mdash;exultation&mdash;hope, amazement, belief, unbelief&mdash;every
      emotion imaginable swept in wild procession through my heart and brain,
      and I could not speak a word. After a moment or two of this mental fury, I
      shook myself to rights, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Say it again!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "It's blind lead!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Cal, let's&mdash;let's burn the house&mdash;or kill somebody! Let's get
      out where there's room to hurrah! But what is the use? It is a hundred
      times too good to be true."
    </p>
    <p>
      "It's a blind lead, for a million!&mdash;hanging wall&mdash;foot wall&mdash;clay
      casings&mdash;everything complete!" He swung his hat and gave three
      cheers, and I cast doubt to the winds and chimed in with a will. For I was
      worth a million dollars, and did not care "whether school kept or not!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link280" id="link280"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="280.jpg (50K)" src="images/280.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But perhaps I ought to explain. A "blind lead" is a lead or ledge that
      does not "crop out" above the surface. A miner does not know where to look
      for such leads, but they are often stumbled upon by accident in the course
      of driving a tunnel or sinking a shaft. Higbie knew the Wide West rock
      perfectly well, and the more he had examined the new developments the more
      he was satisfied that the ore could not have come from the Wide West vein.
      And so had it occurred to him alone, of all the camp, that there was a
      blind lead down in the shaft, and that even the Wide West people
      themselves did not suspect it. He was right. When he went down the shaft,
      he found that the blind lead held its independent way through the Wide
      West vein, cutting it diagonally, and that it was enclosed in its own
      well-defined casing-rocks and clay. Hence it was public property. Both
      leads being perfectly well defined, it was easy for any miner to see which
      one belonged to the Wide West and which did not.
    </p>
    <p>
      We thought it well to have a strong friend, and therefore we brought the
      foreman of the Wide West to our cabin that night and revealed the great
      surprise to him. Higbie said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "We are going to take possession of this blind lead, record it and
      establish ownership, and then forbid the Wide West company to take out any
      more of the rock. You cannot help your company in this matter&mdash;nobody
      can help them. I will go into the shaft with you and prove to your entire
      satisfaction that it is a blind lead. Now we propose to take you in with
      us, and claim the blind lead in our three names. What do you say?"
    </p>
    <p>
      What could a man say who had an opportunity to simply stretch forth his
      hand and take possession of a fortune without risk of any kind and without
      wronging any one or attaching the least taint of dishonor to his name? He
      could only say, "Agreed."
    </p>
    <p>
      The notice was put up that night, and duly spread upon the recorder's
      books before ten o'clock. We claimed two hundred feet each&mdash;six
      hundred feet in all&mdash;the smallest and compactest organization in the
      district, and the easiest to manage.
    </p>
    <p>
      No one can be so thoughtless as to suppose that we slept, that night.
      Higbie and I went to bed at midnight, but it was only to lie broad awake
      and think, dream, scheme. The floorless, tumble-down cabin was a palace,
      the ragged gray blankets silk, the furniture rosewood and mahogany. Each
      new splendor that burst out of my visions of the future whirled me bodily
      over in bed or jerked me to a sitting posture just as if an electric
      battery had been applied to me. We shot fragments of conversation back and
      forth at each other. Once Higbie said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "When are you going home&mdash;to the States?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "To-morrow!"&mdash;with an evolution or two, ending with a sitting
      position. "Well&mdash;no&mdash;but next month, at furthest."
    </p>
    <p>
      "We'll go in the same steamer."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Agreed."
    </p>
    <p>
      A pause.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Steamer of the 10th?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes. No, the 1st."
    </p>
    <p>
      "All right."
    </p>
    <p>
      Another pause.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Where are you going to live?" said Higbie.
    </p>
    <p>
      "San Francisco."
    </p>
    <p>
      "That's me!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Pause.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Too high&mdash;too much climbing"&mdash;from Higbie.
    </p>
    <p>
      "What is?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I was thinking of Russian Hill&mdash;building a house up there."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Too much climbing? Shan't you keep a carriage?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Of course. I forgot that."
    </p>
    <p>
      Pause.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link282" id="link282"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="282.jpg (70K)" src="images/282.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Cal., what kind of a house are you going to build?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I was thinking about that. Three-story and an attic."
    </p>
    <p>
      "But what kind?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, I don't hardly know. Brick, I suppose."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Brick&mdash;bosh."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why? What is your idea?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Brown stone front&mdash;French plate glass&mdash;billiard-room off the
      dining- room&mdash;statuary and paintings&mdash;shrubbery and two-acre
      grass plat&mdash;greenhouse&mdash;iron dog on the front stoop&mdash;gray
      horses&mdash;landau, and a coachman with a bug on his hat!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "By George!"
    </p>
    <p>
      A long pause.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Cal., when are you going to Europe?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well&mdash;I hadn't thought of that. When are you?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "In the Spring."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Going to be gone all summer?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "All summer! I shall remain there three years."
    </p>
    <p>
      "No&mdash;but are you in earnest?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Indeed I am."
    </p>
    <p>
      "I will go along too."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why of course you will."
    </p>
    <p>
      "What part of Europe shall you go to?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "All parts. France, England, Germany&mdash;Spain, Italy, Switzerland,
      Syria, Greece, Palestine, Arabia, Persia, Egypt&mdash;all over&mdash;everywhere."
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'm agreed."
    </p>
    <p>
      "All right."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Won't it be a swell trip!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "We'll spend forty or fifty thousand dollars trying to make it one,
      anyway."
    </p>
    <p>
      Another long pause.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Higbie, we owe the butcher six dollars, and he has been threatening to
      stop our&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Hang the butcher!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Amen."
    </p>
    <p>
      And so it went on. By three o'clock we found it was no use, and so we got
      up and played cribbage and smoked pipes till sunrise. It was my week to
      cook. I always hated cooking&mdash;now, I abhorred it.
    </p>
    <p>
      The news was all over town. The former excitement was great&mdash;this one
      was greater still. I walked the streets serene and happy. Higbie said the
      foreman had been offered two hundred thousand dollars for his third of the
      mine. I said I would like to see myself selling for any such price. My
      ideas were lofty. My figure was a million. Still, I honestly believe that
      if I had been offered it, it would have had no other effect than to make
      me hold off for more.
    </p>
    <p>
      I found abundant enjoyment in being rich. A man offered me a three-
      hundred-dollar horse, and wanted to take my simple, unendorsed note for
      it. That brought the most realizing sense I had yet had that I was
      actually rich, beyond shadow of doubt. It was followed by numerous other
      evidences of a similar nature&mdash;among which I may mention the fact of
      the butcher leaving us a double supply of meat and saying nothing about
      money.
    </p>
    <p>
      By the laws of the district, the "locators" or claimants of a ledge were
      obliged to do a fair and reasonable amount of work on their new property
      within ten days after the date of the location, or the property was
      forfeited, and anybody could go and seize it that chose. So we determined
      to go to work the next day. About the middle of the afternoon, as I was
      coming out of the post office, I met a Mr. Gardiner, who told me that
      Capt. John Nye was lying dangerously ill at his place (the "Nine-Mile
      Ranch"), and that he and his wife were not able to give him nearly as much
      care and attention as his case demanded. I said if he would wait for me a
      moment, I would go down and help in the sick room. I ran to the cabin to
      tell Higbie. He was not there, but I left a note on the table for him, and
      a few minutes later I left town in Gardiner's wagon.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /><br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch41" id="linkch41"></a>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Captain Nye was very ill indeed, with spasmodic rheumatism. But the old
      gentleman was himself&mdash;which is to say, he was kind-hearted and
      agreeable when comfortable, but a singularly violent wild-cat when things
      did not go well. He would be smiling along pleasantly enough, when a
      sudden spasm of his disease would take him and he would go out of his
      smile into a perfect fury. He would groan and wail and howl with the
      anguish, and fill up the odd chinks with the most elaborate profanity that
      strong convictions and a fine fancy could contrive. With fair opportunity
      he could swear very well and handle his adjectives with considerable
      judgment; but when the spasm was on him it was painful to listen to him,
      he was so awkward. However, I had seen him nurse a sick man himself and
      put up patiently with the inconveniences of the situation, and
      consequently I was willing that he should have full license now that his
      own turn had come. He could not disturb me, with all his raving and
      ranting, for my mind had work on hand, and it labored on diligently, night
      and day, whether my hands were idle or employed. I was altering and
      amending the plans for my house, and thinking over the propriety of having
      the billard-room in the attic, instead of on the same floor with the
      dining-room; also, I was trying to decide between green and blue for the
      upholstery of the drawing-room, for, although my preference was blue I
      feared it was a color that would be too easily damaged by dust and
      sunlight; likewise while I was content to put the coachman in a modest
      livery, I was uncertain about a footman&mdash;I needed one, and was even
      resolved to have one, but wished he could properly appear and perform his
      functions out of livery, for I somewhat dreaded so much show; and yet,
      inasmuch as my late grandfather had had a coachman and such things, but no
      liveries, I felt rather drawn to beat him;&mdash;or beat his ghost, at any
      rate; I was also systematizing the European trip, and managed to get it
      all laid out, as to route and length of time to be devoted to it&mdash;everything,
      with one exception&mdash;namely, whether to cross the desert from Cairo to
      Jerusalem per camel, or go by sea to Beirut, and thence down through the
      country per caravan. Meantime I was writing to the friends at home every
      day, instructing them concerning all my plans and intentions, and
      directing them to look up a handsome homestead for my mother and agree
      upon a price for it against my coming, and also directing them to sell my
      share of the Tennessee land and tender the proceeds to the widows' and
      orphans' fund of the typographical union of which I had long been a member
      in good standing. [This Tennessee land had been in the possession of the
      family many years, and promised to confer high fortune upon us some day;
      it still promises it, but in a less violent way.]
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link287" id="link287"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="287.jpg (69K)" src="images/287.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      When I had been nursing the Captain nine days he was somewhat better, but
      very feeble. During the afternoon we lifted him into a chair and gave him
      an alcoholic vapor bath, and then set about putting him on the bed again.
      We had to be exceedingly careful, for the least jar produced pain.
      Gardiner had his shoulders and I his legs; in an unfortunate moment I
      stumbled and the patient fell heavily on the bed in an agony of torture. I
      never heard a man swear so in my life. He raved like a maniac, and tried
      to snatch a revolver from the table&mdash;but I got it. He ordered me out
      of the house, and swore a world of oaths that he would kill me wherever he
      caught me when he got on his feet again. It was simply a passing fury, and
      meant nothing. I knew he would forget it in an hour, and maybe be sorry
      for it, too; but it angered me a little, at the moment. So much so,
      indeed, that I determined to go back to Esmeralda. I thought he was able
      to get along alone, now, since he was on the war path. I took supper, and
      as soon as the moon rose, began my nine-mile journey, on foot.
    </p>
    <p>
      Even millionaires needed no horses, in those days, for a mere nine-mile
      jaunt without baggage.
    </p>
    <p>
      As I "raised the hill" overlooking the town, it lacked fifteen minutes of
      twelve. I glanced at the hill over beyond the canyon, and in the bright
      moonlight saw what appeared to be about half the population of the village
      massed on and around the Wide West croppings. My heart gave an exulting
      bound, and I said to myself, "They have made a new strike to- night&mdash;and
      struck it richer than ever, no doubt." I started over there, but gave it
      up. I said the "strick" would keep, and I had climbed hill enough for one
      night. I went on down through the town, and as I was passing a little
      German bakery, a woman ran out and begged me to come in and help her. She
      said her husband had a fit. I went in, and judged she was right&mdash;he
      appeared to have a hundred of them, compressed into one. Two Germans were
      there, trying to hold him, and not making much of a success of it. I ran
      up the street half a block or so and routed out a sleeping doctor, brought
      him down half dressed, and we four wrestled with the maniac, and doctored,
      drenched and bled him, for more than an hour, and the poor German woman
      did the crying. He grew quiet, now, and the doctor and I withdrew and left
      him to his friends.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a little after one o'clock. As I entered the cabin door, tired but
      jolly, the dingy light of a tallow candle revealed Higbie, sitting by the
      pine table gazing stupidly at my note, which he held in his fingers, and
      looking pale, old, and haggard. I halted, and looked at him. He looked at
      me, stolidly. I said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Higbie, what&mdash;what is it?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "We're ruined&mdash;we didn't do the work&mdash;THE BLIND LEAD'S
      RELOCATED!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link288" id="link288"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="288.jpg (57K)" src="images/288.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It was enough. I sat down sick, grieved&mdash;broken-hearted, indeed. A
      minute before, I was rich and brimful of vanity; I was a pauper now, and
      very meek. We sat still an hour, busy with thought, busy with vain and
      useless self-upbraidings, busy with "Why didn't I do this, and why didn't
      I do that," but neither spoke a word. Then we dropped into mutual
      explanations, and the mystery was cleared away. It came out that Higbie
      had depended on me, as I had on him, and as both of us had on the foreman.
      The folly of it! It was the first time that ever staid and steadfast
      Higbie had left an important matter to chance or failed to be true to his
      full share of a responsibility.
    </p>
    <p>
      But he had never seen my note till this moment, and this moment was the
      first time he had been in the cabin since the day he had seen me last. He,
      also, had left a note for me, on that same fatal afternoon&mdash;had
      ridden up on horseback, and looked through the window, and being in a
      hurry and not seeing me, had tossed the note into the cabin through a
      broken pane. Here it was, on the floor, where it had remained undisturbed
      for nine days:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Don't fail to do the work before the ten days expire. W. has passed
      through and given me notice. I am to join him at Mono Lake, and we shall
      go on from there to-night. He says he will find it this time, sure. CAL."
    </p>
    <p>
      "W." meant Whiteman, of course. That thrice accursed "cement!"
    </p>
    <p>
      That was the way of it. An old miner, like Higbie, could no more withstand
      the fascination of a mysterious mining excitement like this "cement"
      foolishness, than he could refrain from eating when he was famishing.
      Higbie had been dreaming about the marvelous cement for months; and now,
      against his better judgment, he had gone off and "taken the chances" on my
      keeping secure a mine worth a million undiscovered cement veins. They had
      not been followed this time. His riding out of town in broad daylight was
      such a common-place thing to do that it had not attracted any attention.
      He said they prosecuted their search in the fastnesses of the mountains
      during nine days, without success; they could not find the cement. Then a
      ghastly fear came over him that something might have happened to prevent
      the doing of the necessary work to hold the blind lead (though indeed he
      thought such a thing hardly possible), and forthwith he started home with
      all speed. He would have reached Esmeralda in time, but his horse broke
      down and he had to walk a great part of the distance. And so it happened
      that as he came into Esmeralda by one road, I entered it by another. His
      was the superior energy, however, for he went straight to the Wide West,
      instead of turning aside as I had done&mdash;and he arrived there about
      five or ten minutes too late! The "notice" was already up, the
      "relocation" of our mine completed beyond recall, and the crowd rapidly
      dispersing. He learned some facts before he left the ground. The foreman
      had not been seen about the streets since the night we had located the
      mine&mdash;a telegram had called him to California on a matter of life and
      death, it was said. At any rate he had done no work and the watchful eyes
      of the community were taking note of the fact. At midnight of this woful
      tenth day, the ledge would be "relocatable," and by eleven o'clock the
      hill was black with men prepared to do the relocating. That was the crowd
      I had seen when I fancied a new "strike" had been made&mdash;idiot that I
      was.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link290" id="link290"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="290.jpg (141K)" src="images/290.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      [We three had the same right to relocate the lead that other people had,
      provided we were quick enough.] As midnight was announced, fourteen men,
      duly armed and ready to back their proceedings, put up their "notice" and
      proclaimed their ownership of the blind lead, under the new name of the
      "Johnson." But A. D. Allen our partner (the foreman) put in a sudden
      appearance about that time, with a cocked revolver in his hand, and said
      his name must be added to the list, or he would "thin out the Johnson
      company some." He was a manly, splendid, determined fellow, and known to
      be as good as his word, and therefore a compromise was effected. They put
      in his name for a hundred feet, reserving to themselves the customary two
      hundred feet each. Such was the history of the night's events, as Higbie
      gathered from a friend on the way home.
    </p>
    <p>
      Higbie and I cleared out on a new mining excitement the next morning, glad
      to get away from the scene of our sufferings, and after a month or two of
      hardship and disappointment, returned to Esmeralda once more. Then we
      learned that the Wide West and the Johnson companies had consolidated;
      that the stock, thus united, comprised five thousand feet, or shares; that
      the foreman, apprehending tiresome litigation, and considering such a huge
      concern unwieldy, had sold his hundred feet for ninety thousand dollars in
      gold and gone home to the States to enjoy it. If the stock was worth such
      a gallant figure, with five thousand shares in the corporation, it makes
      me dizzy to think what it would have been worth with only our original six
      hundred in it. It was the difference between six hundred men owning a
      house and five thousand owning it. We would have been millionaires if we
      had only worked with pick and spade one little day on our property and so
      secured our ownership!
    </p>
    <p>
      It reads like a wild fancy sketch, but the evidence of many witnesses, and
      likewise that of the official records of Esmeralda District, is easily
      obtainable in proof that it is a true history. I can always have it to say
      that I was absolutely and unquestionably worth a million dollars, once,
      for ten days.
    </p>
    <p>
      A year ago my esteemed and in every way estimable old millionaire partner,
      Higbie, wrote me from an obscure little mining camp in California that
      after nine or ten years of buffetings and hard striving, he was at last in
      a position where he could command twenty-five hundred dollars, and said he
      meant to go into the fruit business in a modest way. How such a thought
      would have insulted him the night we lay in our cabin planning European
      trips and brown stone houses on Russian Hill!
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch42" id="linkch42"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      What to do next?
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a momentous question. I had gone out into the world to shift for
      myself, at the age of thirteen (for my father had endorsed for friends;
      and although he left us a sumptuous legacy of pride in his fine Virginian
      stock and its national distinction, I presently found that I could not
      live on that alone without occasional bread to wash it down with). I had
      gained a livelihood in various vocations, but had not dazzled anybody with
      my successes; still the list was before me, and the amplest liberty in the
      matter of choosing, provided I wanted to work&mdash;which I did not, after
      being so wealthy. I had once been a grocery clerk, for one day, but had
      consumed so much sugar in that time that I was relieved from further duty
      by the proprietor; said he wanted me outside, so that he could have my
      custom. I had studied law an entire week, and then given it up because it
      was so prosy and tiresome. I had engaged briefly in the study of
      blacksmithing, but wasted so much time trying to fix the bellows so that
      it would blow itself, that the master turned me adrift in disgrace, and
      told me I would come to no good. I had been a bookseller's clerk for
      awhile, but the customers bothered me so much I could not read with any
      comfort, and so the proprietor gave me a furlough and forgot to put a
      limit to it. I had clerked in a drug store part of a summer, but my
      prescriptions were unlucky, and we appeared to sell more stomach pumps
      than soda water. So I had to go.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link293" id="link293"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="293.jpg (43K)" src="images/293.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I had made of myself a tolerable printer, under the impression that I
      would be another Franklin some day, but somehow had missed the connection
      thus far. There was no berth open in the Esmeralda Union, and besides I
      had always been such a slow compositor that I looked with envy upon the
      achievements of apprentices of two years' standing; and when I took a
      "take," foremen were in the habit of suggesting that it would be wanted
      "some time during the year."
    </p>
    <p>
      I was a good average St. Louis and New Orleans pilot and by no means
      ashamed of my abilities in that line; wages were two hundred and fifty
      dollars a month and no board to pay, and I did long to stand behind a
      wheel again and never roam any more&mdash;but I had been making such an
      ass of myself lately in grandiloquent letters home about my blind lead and
      my European excursion that I did what many and many a poor disappointed
      miner had done before; said "It is all over with me now, and I will never
      go back home to be pitied&mdash;and snubbed." I had been a private
      secretary, a silver miner and a silver mill operative, and amounted to
      less than nothing in each, and now&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      What to do next?
    </p>
    <p>
      I yielded to Higbie's appeals and consented to try the mining once more.
      We climbed far up on the mountain side and went to work on a little
      rubbishy claim of ours that had a shaft on it eight feet deep. Higbie
      descended into it and worked bravely with his pick till he had loosened up
      a deal of rock and dirt and then I went down with a long-handled shovel
      (the most awkward invention yet contrived by man) to throw it out. You
      must brace the shovel forward with the side of your knee till it is full,
      and then, with a skilful toss, throw it backward over your left shoulder.
      I made the toss, and landed the mess just on the edge of the shaft and it
      all came back on my head and down the back of my neck. I never said a
      word, but climbed out and walked home. I inwardly resolved that I would
      starve before I would make a target of myself and shoot rubbish at it with
      a long-handled shovel.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link294" id="link294"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="294.jpg (50K)" src="images/294.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I sat down, in the cabin, and gave myself up to solid misery&mdash;so to
      speak. Now in pleasanter days I had amused myself with writing letters to
      the chief paper of the Territory, the Virginia Daily Territorial
      Enterprise, and had always been surprised when they appeared in print. My
      good opinion of the editors had steadily declined; for it seemed to me
      that they might have found something better to fill up with than my
      literature. I had found a letter in the post office as I came home from
      the hill side, and finally I opened it. Eureka! [I never did know what
      Eureka meant, but it seems to be as proper a word to heave in as any when
      no other that sounds pretty offers.] It was a deliberate offer to me of
      Twenty-Five Dollars a week to come up to Virginia and be city editor of
      the Enterprise.
    </p>
    <p>
      I would have challenged the publisher in the "blind lead" days&mdash;I
      wanted to fall down and worship him, now. Twenty-Five Dollars a week&mdash;it
      looked like bloated luxury&mdash;a fortune a sinful and lavish waste of
      money. But my transports cooled when I thought of my inexperience and
      consequent unfitness for the position&mdash;and straightway, on top of
      this, my long array of failures rose up before me. Yet if I refused this
      place I must presently become dependent upon somebody for my bread, a
      thing necessarily distasteful to a man who had never experienced such a
      humiliation since he was thirteen years old. Not much to be proud of,
      since it is so common&mdash;but then it was all I had to be proud of. So I
      was scared into being a city editor. I would have declined, otherwise.
      Necessity is the mother of "taking chances." I do not doubt that if, at
      that time, I had been offered a salary to translate the Talmud from the
      original Hebrew, I would have accepted&mdash;albeit with diffidence and
      some misgivings&mdash;and thrown as much variety into it as I could for
      the money.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link295" id="link295"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="295.jpg (34K)" src="images/295.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I went up to Virginia and entered upon my new vocation. I was a rusty
      looking city editor, I am free to confess&mdash;coatless, slouch hat, blue
      woolen shirt, pantaloons stuffed into boot-tops, whiskered half down to
      the waist, and the universal navy revolver slung to my belt. But I secured
      a more Christian costume and discarded the revolver.
    </p>
    <p>
      I had never had occasion to kill anybody, nor ever felt a desire to do so,
      but had worn the thing in deference to popular sentiment, and in order
      that I might not, by its absence, be offensively conspicuous, and a
      subject of remark. But the other editors, and all the printers, carried
      revolvers. I asked the chief editor and proprietor (Mr. Goodman, I will
      call him, since it describes him as well as any name could do) for some
      instructions with regard to my duties, and he told me to go all over town
      and ask all sorts of people all sorts of questions, make notes of the
      information gained, and write them out for publication. And he added:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Never say 'We learn' so-and-so, or 'It is reported,' or 'It is rumored,'
      or 'We understand' so-and-so, but go to headquarters and get the absolute
      facts, and then speak out and say 'It is so-and-so.' Otherwise, people
      will not put confidence in your news. Unassailable certainly is the thing
      that gives a newspaper the firmest and most valuable reputation."
    </p>
    <p>
      It was the whole thing in a nut-shell; and to this day when I find a
      reporter commencing his article with "We understand," I gather a suspicion
      that he has not taken as much pains to inform himself as he ought to have
      done. I moralize well, but I did not always practise well when I was a
      city editor; I let fancy get the upper hand of fact too often when there
      was a dearth of news. I can never forget my first day's experience as a
      reporter. I wandered about town questioning everybody, boring everybody,
      and finding out that nobody knew anything. At the end of five hours my
      notebook was still barren. I spoke to Mr. Goodman. He said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Dan used to make a good thing out of the hay wagons in a dry time when
      there were no fires or inquests. Are there no hay wagons in from the
      Truckee? If there are, you might speak of the renewed activity and all
      that sort of thing, in the hay business, you know.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link296" id="link296"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="296.jpg (34K)" src="images/296.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "It isn't sensational or exciting, but it fills up and looks business
      like."
    </p>
    <p>
      I canvassed the city again and found one wretched old hay truck dragging
      in from the country. But I made affluent use of it. I multiplied it by
      sixteen, brought it into town from sixteen different directions, made
      sixteen separate items out of it, and got up such another sweat about hay
      as Virginia City had never seen in the world before.
    </p>
    <p>
      This was encouraging. Two nonpareil columns had to be filled, and I was
      getting along. Presently, when things began to look dismal again, a
      desperado killed a man in a saloon and joy returned once more. I never was
      so glad over any mere trifle before in my life. I said to the murderer:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Sir, you are a stranger to me, but you have done me a kindness this day
      which I can never forget. If whole years of gratitude can be to you any
      slight compensation, they shall be yours. I was in trouble and you have
      relieved me nobly and at a time when all seemed dark and drear. Count me
      your friend from this time forth, for I am not a man to forget a favor."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link297" id="link297"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="297.jpg (44K)" src="images/297.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      If I did not really say that to him I at least felt a sort of itching
      desire to do it. I wrote up the murder with a hungry attention to details,
      and when it was finished experienced but one regret&mdash;namely, that
      they had not hanged my benefactor on the spot, so that I could work him up
      too.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next I discovered some emigrant wagons going into camp on the plaza and
      found that they had lately come through the hostile Indian country and had
      fared rather roughly. I made the best of the item that the circumstances
      permitted, and felt that if I were not confined within rigid limits by the
      presence of the reporters of the other papers I could add particulars that
      would make the article much more interesting. However, I found one wagon
      that was going on to California, and made some judicious inquiries of the
      proprietor. When I learned, through his short and surly answers to my
      cross-questioning, that he was certainly going on and would not be in the
      city next day to make trouble, I got ahead of the other papers, for I took
      down his list of names and added his party to the killed and wounded.
      Having more scope here, I put this wagon through an Indian fight that to
      this day has no parallel in history.
    </p>
    <p>
      My two columns were filled. When I read them over in the morning I felt
      that I had found my legitimate occupation at last. I reasoned within
      myself that news, and stirring news, too, was what a paper needed, and I
      felt that I was peculiarly endowed with the ability to furnish it. Mr.
      Goodman said that I was as good a reporter as Dan. I desired no higher
      commendation. With encouragement like that, I felt that I could take my
      pen and murder all the immigrants on the plains if need be and the
      interests of the paper demanded it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link298" id="link298"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="298.jpg (22K)" src="images/298.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch43" id="linkch43"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      However, as I grew better acquainted with the business and learned the run
      of the sources of information I ceased to require the aid of fancy to any
      large extent, and became able to fill my columns without diverging
      noticeably from the domain of fact.
    </p>
    <p>
      I struck up friendships with the reporters of the other journals, and we
      swapped "regulars" with each other and thus economized work. "Regulars"
      are permanent sources of news, like courts, bullion returns, "clean-ups"
      at the quartz mills, and inquests. Inasmuch as everybody went armed, we
      had an inquest about every day, and so this department was naturally set
      down among the "regulars." We had lively papers in those days. My great
      competitor among the reporters was Boggs of the Union. He was an excellent
      reporter. Once in three or four months he would get a little intoxicated,
      but as a general thing he was a wary and cautious drinker although always
      ready to tamper a little with the enemy. He had the advantage of me in one
      thing; he could get the monthly public school report and I could not,
      because the principal hated the Enterprise. One snowy night when the
      report was due, I started out sadly wondering how I was going to get it.
      Presently, a few steps up the almost deserted street I stumbled on Boggs
      and asked him where he was going.
    </p>
    <p>
      "After the school report."
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'll go along with you."
    </p>
    <p>
      "No, sir. I'll excuse you."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Just as you say."
    </p>
    <p>
      A saloon-keeper's boy passed by with a steaming pitcher of hot punch, and
      Boggs snuffed the fragrance gratefully. He gazed fondly after the boy and
      saw him start up the Enterprise stairs. I said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I wish you could help me get that school business, but since you can't, I
      must run up to the Union office and see if I can get them to let me have a
      proof of it after they have set it up, though I don't begin to suppose
      they will. Good night."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Hold on a minute. I don't mind getting the report and sitting around with
      the boys a little, while you copy it, if you're willing to drop down to
      the principal's with me."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Now you talk like a rational being. Come along."
    </p>
    <p>
      We plowed a couple of blocks through the snow, got the report and returned
      to our office. It was a short document and soon copied. Meantime Boggs
      helped himself to the punch. I gave the manuscript back to him and we
      started out to get an inquest, for we heard pistol shots near by. We got
      the particulars with little loss of time, for it was only an inferior sort
      of bar-room murder, and of little interest to the public, and then we
      separated. Away at three o'clock in the morning, when we had gone to press
      and were having a relaxing concert as usual&mdash;for some of the printers
      were good singers and others good performers on the guitar and on that
      atrocity the accordion&mdash;the proprietor of the Union strode in and
      desired to know if anybody had heard anything of Boggs or the school
      report. We stated the case, and all turned out to help hunt for the
      delinquent. We found him standing on a table in a saloon, with an old tin
      lantern in one hand and the school report in the other, haranguing a gang
      of intoxicated Cornish miners on the iniquity of squandering the public
      moneys on education "when hundreds and hundreds of honest hard-working men
      are literally starving for whiskey." [Riotous applause.] He had been
      assisting in a regal spree with those parties for hours. We dragged him
      away and put him to bed.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link301" id="link301"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="301.jpg (93K)" src="images/301.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Of course there was no school report in the Union, and Boggs held me
      accountable, though I was innocent of any intention or desire to compass
      its absence from that paper and was as sorry as any one that the
      misfortune had occurred.
    </p>
    <p>
      But we were perfectly friendly. The day that the school report was next
      due, the proprietor of the "Genessee" mine furnished us a buggy and asked
      us to go down and write something about the property&mdash;a very common
      request and one always gladly acceded to when people furnished buggies,
      for we were as fond of pleasure excursions as other people. In due time we
      arrived at the "mine"&mdash;nothing but a hole in the ground ninety feet
      deep, and no way of getting down into it but by holding on to a rope and
      being lowered with a windlass. The workmen had just gone off somewhere to
      dinner. I was not strong enough to lower Boggs's bulk; so I took an
      unlighted candle in my teeth, made a loop for my foot in the end of the
      rope, implored Boggs not to go to sleep or let the windlass get the start
      of him, and then swung out over the shaft. I reached the bottom muddy and
      bruised about the elbows, but safe. I lit the candle, made an examination
      of the rock, selected some specimens and shouted to Boggs to hoist away.
      No answer. Presently a head appeared in the circle of daylight away aloft,
      and a voice came down:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Are you all set?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "All set&mdash;hoist away."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Are you comfortable?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Perfectly."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Could you wait a little?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh certainly&mdash;no particular hurry."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well&mdash;good by."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why? Where are you going?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "After the school report!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link302" id="link302"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="302.jpg (71K)" src="images/302.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And he did. I staid down there an hour, and surprised the workmen when
      they hauled up and found a man on the rope instead of a bucket of rock. I
      walked home, too&mdash;five miles&mdash;up hill. We had no school report
      next morning; but the Union had.
    </p>
    <p>
      Six months after my entry into journalism the grand "flush times" of
      Silverland began, and they continued with unabated splendor for three
      years. All difficulty about filling up the "local department" ceased, and
      the only trouble now was how to make the lengthened columns hold the world
      of incidents and happenings that came to our literary net every day.
      Virginia had grown to be the "livest" town, for its age and population,
      that America had ever produced. The sidewalks swarmed with people&mdash;to
      such an extent, indeed, that it was generally no easy matter to stem the
      human tide. The streets themselves were just as crowded with quartz
      wagons, freight teams and other vehicles. The procession was endless. So
      great was the pack, that buggies frequently had to wait half an hour for
      an opportunity to cross the principal street. Joy sat on every
      countenance, and there was a glad, almost fierce, intensity in every eye,
      that told of the money-getting schemes that were seething in every brain
      and the high hope that held sway in every heart. Money was as plenty as
      dust; every individual considered himself wealthy, and a melancholy
      countenance was nowhere to be seen. There were military companies, fire
      companies, brass bands, banks, hotels, theatres, "hurdy- gurdy houses,"
      wide-open gambling palaces, political pow-wows, civic processions, street
      fights, murders, inquests, riots, a whiskey mill every fifteen steps, a
      Board of Aldermen, a Mayor, a City Surveyor, a City Engineer, a Chief of
      the Fire Department, with First, Second and Third Assistants, a Chief of
      Police, City Marshal and a large police force, two Boards of Mining
      Brokers, a dozen breweries and half a dozen jails and station-houses in
      full operation, and some talk of building a church. The "flush times" were
      in magnificent flower! Large fire-proof brick buildings were going up in
      the principal streets, and the wooden suburbs were spreading out in all
      directions. Town lots soared up to prices that were amazing.
    </p>
    <p>
      The great "Comstock lode" stretched its opulent length straight through
      the town from north to south, and every mine on it was in diligent process
      of development. One of these mines alone employed six hundred and
      seventy-five men, and in the matter of elections the adage was, "as the
      'Gould and Curry' goes, so goes the city." Laboring men's wages were four
      and six dollars a day, and they worked in three "shifts" or gangs, and the
      blasting and picking and shoveling went on without ceasing, night and day.
    </p>
    <p>
      The "city" of Virginia roosted royally midway up the steep side of Mount
      Davidson, seven thousand two hundred feet above the level of the sea, and
      in the clear Nevada atmosphere was visible from a distance of fifty miles!
      It claimed a population of fifteen thousand to eighteen thousand, and all
      day long half of this little army swarmed the streets like bees and the
      other half swarmed among the drifts and tunnels of the "Comstock,"
      hundreds of feet down in the earth directly under those same streets.
      Often we felt our chairs jar, and heard the faint boom of a blast down in
      the bowels of the earth under the office.
    </p>
    <p>
      The mountain side was so steep that the entire town had a slant to it like
      a roof. Each street was a terrace, and from each to the next street below
      the descent was forty or fifty feet. The fronts of the houses were level
      with the street they faced, but their rear first floors were propped on
      lofty stilts; a man could stand at a rear first floor window of a C street
      house and look down the chimneys of the row of houses below him facing D
      street. It was a laborious climb, in that thin atmosphere, to ascend from
      D to A street, and you were panting and out of breath when you got there;
      but you could turn around and go down again like a house a-fire&mdash;so
      to speak. The atmosphere was so rarified, on account of the great
      altitude, that one's blood lay near the surface always, and the scratch of
      a pin was a disaster worth worrying about, for the chances were that a
      grievous erysipelas would ensue. But to offset this, the thin atmosphere
      seemed to carry healing to gunshot wounds, and therefore, to simply shoot
      your adversary through both lungs was a thing not likely to afford you any
      permanent satisfaction, for he would be nearly certain to be around
      looking for you within the month, and not with an opera glass, either.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link304" id="link304"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="304.jpg (102K)" src="images/304.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      From Virginia's airy situation one could look over a vast, far-reaching
      panorama of mountain ranges and deserts; and whether the day was bright or
      overcast, whether the sun was rising or setting, or flaming in the zenith,
      or whether night and the moon held sway, the spectacle was always
      impressive and beautiful. Over your head Mount Davidson lifted its gray
      dome, and before and below you a rugged canyon clove the battlemented
      hills, making a sombre gateway through which a soft-tinted desert was
      glimpsed, with the silver thread of a river winding through it, bordered
      with trees which many miles of distance diminished to a delicate fringe;
      and still further away the snowy mountains rose up and stretched their
      long barrier to the filmy horizon&mdash;far enough beyond a lake that
      burned in the desert like a fallen sun, though that, itself, lay fifty
      miles removed. Look from your window where you would, there was
      fascination in the picture. At rare intervals&mdash;but very rare&mdash;there
      were clouds in our skies, and then the setting sun would gild and flush
      and glorify this mighty expanse of scenery with a bewildering pomp of
      color that held the eye like a spell and moved the spirit like music.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch44" id="linkch44"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLIV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      My salary was increased to forty dollars a week. But I seldom drew it. I
      had plenty of other resources, and what were two broad twenty-dollar gold
      pieces to a man who had his pockets full of such and a cumbersome
      abundance of bright half dollars besides? [Paper money has never come into
      use on the Pacific coast.] Reporting was lucrative, and every man in the
      town was lavish with his money and his "feet." The city and all the great
      mountain side were riddled with mining shafts. There were more mines than
      miners. True, not ten of these mines were yielding rock worth hauling to a
      mill, but everybody said, "Wait till the shaft gets down where the ledge
      comes in solid, and then you will see!" So nobody was discouraged. These
      were nearly all "wild cat" mines, and wholly worthless, but nobody
      believed it then. The "Ophir," the "Gould &amp; Curry," the "Mexican," and
      other great mines on the Comstock lead in Virginia and Gold Hill were
      turning out huge piles of rich rock every day, and every man believed that
      his little wild cat claim was as good as any on the "main lead" and would
      infallibly be worth a thousand dollars a foot when he "got down where it
      came in solid." Poor fellow, he was blessedly blind to the fact that he
      never would see that day. So the thousand wild cat shafts burrowed deeper
      and deeper into the earth day by day, and all men were beside themselves
      with hope and happiness. How they labored, prophesied, exulted! Surely
      nothing like it was ever seen before since the world began. Every one of
      these wild cat mines&mdash;not mines, but holes in the ground over
      imaginary mines&mdash;was incorporated and had handsomely engraved "stock"
      and the stock was salable, too. It was bought and sold with a feverish
      avidity in the boards every day. You could go up on the mountain side,
      scratch around and find a ledge (there was no lack of them), put up a
      "notice" with a grandiloquent name in it, start a shaft, get your stock
      printed, and with nothing whatever to prove that your mine was worth a
      straw, you could put your stock on the market and sell out for hundreds
      and even thousands of dollars. To make money, and make it fast, was as
      easy as it was to eat your dinner.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link307" id="link307"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="307.jpg (54K)" src="images/307.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Every man owned "feet" in fifty different wild cat mines and considered
      his fortune made. Think of a city with not one solitary poor man in it!
      One would suppose that when month after month went by and still not a wild
      cat mine (by wild cat I mean, in general terms, any claim not located on
      the mother vein, i.e., the "Comstock") yielded a ton of rock worth
      crushing, the people would begin to wonder if they were not putting too
      much faith in their prospective riches; but there was not a thought of
      such a thing. They burrowed away, bought and sold, and were happy.
    </p>
    <p>
      New claims were taken up daily, and it was the friendly custom to run
      straight to the newspaper offices, give the reporter forty or fifty
      "feet," and get them to go and examine the mine and publish a notice of
      it. They did not care a fig what you said about the property so you said
      something. Consequently we generally said a word or two to the effect that
      the "indications" were good, or that the ledge was "six feet wide," or
      that the rock "resembled the Comstock" (and so it did&mdash;but as a
      general thing the resemblance was not startling enough to knock you down).
      If the rock was moderately promising, we followed the custom of the
      country, used strong adjectives and frothed at the mouth as if a very
      marvel in silver discoveries had transpired. If the mine was a "developed"
      one, and had no pay ore to show (and of course it hadn't), we praised the
      tunnel; said it was one of the most infatuating tunnels in the land;
      driveled and driveled about the tunnel till we ran entirely out of
      ecstasies&mdash;but never said a word about the rock. We would squander
      half a column of adulation on a shaft, or a new wire rope, or a dressed
      pine windlass, or a fascinating force pump, and close with a burst of
      admiration of the "gentlemanly and efficient Superintendent" of the mine&mdash;but
      never utter a whisper about the rock. And those people were always
      pleased, always satisfied. Occasionally we patched up and varnished our
      reputation for discrimination and stern, undeviating accuracy, by giving
      some old abandoned claim a blast that ought to have made its dry bones
      rattle&mdash;and then somebody would seize it and sell it on the fleeting
      notoriety thus conferred upon it.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was nothing in the shape of a mining claim that was not salable. We
      received presents of "feet" every day. If we needed a hundred dollars or
      so, we sold some; if not, we hoarded it away, satisfied that it would
      ultimately be worth a thousand dollars a foot. I had a trunk about half
      full of "stock." When a claim made a stir in the market and went up to a
      high figure, I searched through my pile to see if I had any of its stock&mdash;and
      generally found it.
    </p>
    <p>
      The prices rose and fell constantly; but still a fall disturbed us little,
      because a thousand dollars a foot was our figure, and so we were content
      to let it fluctuate as much as it pleased till it reached it. My pile of
      stock was not all given to me by people who wished their claims "noticed."
      At least half of it was given me by persons who had no thought of such a
      thing, and looked for nothing more than a simple verbal "thank you;" and
      you were not even obliged by law to furnish that. If you are coming up the
      street with a couple of baskets of apples in your hands, and you meet a
      friend, you naturally invite him to take a few. That describes the
      condition of things in Virginia in the "flush times." Every man had his
      pockets full of stock, and it was the actual custom of the country to part
      with small quantities of it to friends without the asking.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link309" id="link309"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="309.jpg (41K)" src="images/309.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Very often it was a good idea to close the transaction instantly, when a
      man offered a stock present to a friend, for the offer was only good and
      binding at that moment, and if the price went to a high figure shortly
      afterward the procrastination was a thing to be regretted. Mr. Stewart
      (Senator, now, from Nevada) one day told me he would give me twenty feet
      of "Justis" stock if I would walk over to his office. It was worth five or
      ten dollars a foot. I asked him to make the offer good for next day, as I
      was just going to dinner. He said he would not be in town; so I risked it
      and took my dinner instead of the stock. Within the week the price went up
      to seventy dollars and afterward to a hundred and fifty, but nothing could
      make that man yield. I suppose he sold that stock of mine and placed the
      guilty proceeds in his own pocket. [My revenge will be found in the
      accompanying portrait.] I met three friends one afternoon, who said they
      had been buying "Overman" stock at auction at eight dollars a foot. One
      said if I would come up to his office he would give me fifteen feet;
      another said he would add fifteen; the third said he would do the same.
      But I was going after an inquest and could not stop. A few weeks afterward
      they sold all their "Overman" at six hundred dollars a foot and generously
      came around to tell me about it&mdash;and also to urge me to accept of the
      next forty-five feet of it that people tried to force on me.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link310" id="link310"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="310.jpg (27K)" src="images/310.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      These are actual facts, and I could make the list a long one and still
      confine myself strictly to the truth. Many a time friends gave us as much
      as twenty-five feet of stock that was selling at twenty-five dollars a
      foot, and they thought no more of it than they would of offering a guest a
      cigar. These were "flush times" indeed! I thought they were going to last
      always, but somehow I never was much of a prophet.
    </p>
    <p>
      To show what a wild spirit possessed the mining brain of the community, I
      will remark that "claims" were actually "located" in excavations for
      cellars, where the pick had exposed what seemed to be quartz veins&mdash;and
      not cellars in the suburbs, either, but in the very heart of the city; and
      forthwith stock would be issued and thrown on the market. It was small
      matter who the cellar belonged to&mdash;the "ledge" belonged to the
      finder, and unless the United States government interfered (inasmuch as
      the government holds the primary right to mines of the noble metals in
      Nevada&mdash;or at least did then), it was considered to be his privilege
      to work it. Imagine a stranger staking out a mining claim among the costly
      shrubbery in your front yard and calmly proceeding to lay waste the ground
      with pick and shovel and blasting powder! It has been often done in
      California. In the middle of one of the principal business streets of
      Virginia, a man "located" a mining claim and began a shaft on it. He gave
      me a hundred feet of the stock and I sold it for a fine suit of clothes
      because I was afraid somebody would fall down the shaft and sue for
      damages. I owned in another claim that was located in the middle of
      another street; and to show how absurd people can be, that "East India"
      stock (as it was called) sold briskly although there was an ancient tunnel
      running directly under the claim and any man could go into it and see that
      it did not cut a quartz ledge or anything that remotely resembled one.
    </p>
    <p>
      One plan of acquiring sudden wealth was to "salt" a wild cat claim and
      sell out while the excitement was up. The process was simple.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link311" id="link311"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="311.jpg (69K)" src="images/311.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The schemer located a worthless ledge, sunk a shaft on it, bought a wagon
      load of rich "Comstock" ore, dumped a portion of it into the shaft and
      piled the rest by its side, above ground. Then he showed the property to a
      simpleton and sold it to him at a high figure. Of course the wagon load of
      rich ore was all that the victim ever got out of his purchase. A most
      remarkable case of "salting" was that of the "North Ophir." It was claimed
      that this vein was a "remote extension" of the original "Ophir," a
      valuable mine on the "Comstock." For a few days everybody was talking
      about the rich developments in the North Ophir. It was said that it
      yielded perfectly pure silver in small, solid lumps. I went to the place
      with the owners, and found a shaft six or eight feet deep, in the bottom
      of which was a badly shattered vein of dull, yellowish, unpromising rock.
      One would as soon expect to find silver in a grindstone. We got out a pan
      of the rubbish and washed it in a puddle, and sure enough, among the
      sediment we found half a dozen black, bullet- looking pellets of
      unimpeachable "native" silver. Nobody had ever heard of such a thing
      before; science could not account for such a queer novelty. The stock rose
      to sixty-five dollars a foot, and at this figure the world-renowned
      tragedian, McKean Buchanan, bought a commanding interest and prepared to
      quit the stage once more&mdash;he was always doing that. And then it
      transpired that the mine had been "salted"&mdash;and not in any hackneyed
      way, either, but in a singularly bold, barefaced and peculiarly original
      and outrageous fashion. On one of the lumps of "native" silver was
      discovered the minted legend, "TED STATES OF," and then it was plainly
      apparent that the mine had been "salted" with melted half-dollars! The
      lumps thus obtained had been blackened till they resembled native silver,
      and were then mixed with the shattered rock in the bottom of the shaft. It
      is literally true. Of course the price of the stock at once fell to
      nothing, and the tragedian was ruined. But for this calamity we might have
      lost McKean Buchanan from the stage.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch45" id="linkch45"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The "flush times" held bravely on. Something over two years before, Mr.
      Goodman and another journeyman printer, had borrowed forty dollars and set
      out from San Francisco to try their fortunes in the new city of Virginia.
      They found the Territorial Enterprise, a poverty-stricken weekly journal,
      gasping for breath and likely to die. They bought it, type, fixtures,
      good-will and all, for a thousand dollars, on long time. The editorial
      sanctum, news-room, press-room, publication office, bed- chamber, parlor,
      and kitchen were all compressed into one apartment and it was a small one,
      too. The editors and printers slept on the floor, a Chinaman did their
      cooking, and the "imposing-stone" was the general dinner table. But now
      things were changed. The paper was a great daily, printed by steam; there
      were five editors and twenty-three compositors; the subscription price was
      sixteen dollars a year; the advertising rates were exorbitant, and the
      columns crowded. The paper was clearing from six to ten thousand dollars a
      month, and the "Enterprise Building" was finished and ready for occupation&mdash;a
      stately fireproof brick. Every day from five all the way up to eleven
      columns of "live" advertisements were left out or crowded into spasmodic
      and irregular "supplements."
    </p>
    <p>
      The "Gould &amp; Curry" company were erecting a monster hundred-stamp mill
      at a cost that ultimately fell little short of a million dollars. Gould
      &amp; Curry stock paid heavy dividends&mdash;a rare thing, and an
      experience confined to the dozen or fifteen claims located on the "main
      lead," the "Comstock." The Superintendent of the Gould &amp; Curry lived,
      rent free, in a fine house built and furnished by the company. He drove a
      fine pair of horses which were a present from the company, and his salary
      was twelve thousand dollars a year. The superintendent of another of the
      great mines traveled in grand state, had a salary of twenty-eight thousand
      dollars a year, and in a law suit in after days claimed that he was to
      have had one per cent. on the gross yield of the bullion likewise.
    </p>
    <p>
      Money was wonderfully plenty. The trouble was, not how to get it,&mdash;but
      how to spend it, how to lavish it, get rid of it, squander it. And so it
      was a happy thing that just at this juncture the news came over the wires
      that a great United States Sanitary Commission had been formed and money
      was wanted for the relief of the wounded sailors and soldiers of the Union
      languishing in the Eastern hospitals. Right on the heels of it came word
      that San Francisco had responded superbly before the telegram was half a
      day old. Virginia rose as one man! A Sanitary Committee was hurriedly
      organized, and its chairman mounted a vacant cart in C street and tried to
      make the clamorous multitude understand that the rest of the committee
      were flying hither and thither and working with all their might and main,
      and that if the town would only wait an hour, an office would be ready,
      books opened, and the Commission prepared to receive contributions. His
      voice was drowned and his information lost in a ceaseless roar of cheers,
      and demands that the money be received now&mdash;they swore they would not
      wait. The chairman pleaded and argued, but, deaf to all entreaty, men
      plowed their way through the throng and rained checks of gold coin into
      the cart and skurried away for more. Hands clutching money, were thrust
      aloft out of the jam by men who hoped this eloquent appeal would cleave a
      road their strugglings could not open. The very Chinamen and Indians
      caught the excitement and dashed their half dollars into the cart without
      knowing or caring what it was all about. Women plunged into the crowd,
      trimly attired, fought their way to the cart with their coin, and emerged
      again, by and by, with their apparel in a state of hopeless dilapidation.
      It was the wildest mob Virginia had ever seen and the most determined and
      ungovernable; and when at last it abated its fury and dispersed, it had
      not a penny in its pocket.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link315" id="link315"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="315.jpg (125K)" src="images/315.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      To use its own phraseology, it came there "flush" and went away "busted."
    </p>
    <p>
      After that, the Commission got itself into systematic working order, and
      for weeks the contributions flowed into its treasury in a generous stream.
      Individuals and all sorts of organizations levied upon themselves a
      regular weekly tax for the sanitary fund, graduated according to their
      means, and there was not another grand universal outburst till the famous
      "Sanitary Flour Sack" came our way. Its history is peculiar and
      interesting. A former schoolmate of mine, by the name of Reuel Gridley,
      was living at the little city of Austin, in the Reese river country, at
      this time, and was the Democratic candidate for mayor. He and the
      Republican candidate made an agreement that the defeated man should be
      publicly presented with a fifty-pound sack of flour by the successful one,
      and should carry it home on his shoulder. Gridley was defeated. The new
      mayor gave him the sack of flour, and he shouldered it and carried it a
      mile or two, from Lower Austin to his home in Upper Austin, attended by a
      band of music and the whole population. Arrived there, he said he did not
      need the flour, and asked what the people thought he had better do with
      it. A voice said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Sell it to the highest bidder, for the benefit of the Sanitary fund."
    </p>
    <p>
      The suggestion was greeted with a round of applause, and Gridley mounted a
      dry-goods box and assumed the role of auctioneer. The bids went higher and
      higher, as the sympathies of the pioneers awoke and expanded, till at last
      the sack was knocked down to a mill man at two hundred and fifty dollars,
      and his check taken. He was asked where he would have the flour delivered,
      and he said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Nowhere&mdash;sell it again."
    </p>
    <p>
      Now the cheers went up royally, and the multitude were fairly in the
      spirit of the thing. So Gridley stood there and shouted and perspired till
      the sun went down; and when the crowd dispersed he had sold the sack to
      three hundred different people, and had taken in eight thousand dollars in
      gold. And still the flour sack was in his possession.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link317" id="link317"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="317.jpg (157K)" src="images/317.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The news came to Virginia, and a telegram went back:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Fetch along your flour sack!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Thirty-six hours afterward Gridley arrived, and an afternoon mass meeting
      was held in the Opera House, and the auction began. But the sack had come
      sooner than it was expected; the people were not thoroughly aroused, and
      the sale dragged. At nightfall only five thousand dollars had been
      secured, and there was a crestfallen feeling in the community. However,
      there was no disposition to let the matter rest here and acknowledge
      vanquishment at the hands of the village of Austin. Till late in the night
      the principal citizens were at work arranging the morrow's campaign, and
      when they went to bed they had no fears for the result. At eleven the next
      morning a procession of open carriages, attended by clamorous bands of
      music and adorned with a moving display of flags, filed along C street and
      was soon in danger of blockade by a huzzaing multitude of citizens. In the
      first carriage sat Gridley, with the flour sack in prominent view, the
      latter splendid with bright paint and gilt lettering; also in the same
      carriage sat the mayor and the recorder. The other carriages contained the
      Common Council, the editors and reporters, and other people of imposing
      consequence. The crowd pressed to the corner of C and Taylor streets,
      expecting the sale to begin there, but they were disappointed, and also
      unspeakably surprised; for the cavalcade moved on as if Virginia had
      ceased to be of importance, and took its way over the "divide," toward the
      small town of Gold Hill. Telegrams had gone ahead to Gold Hill, Silver
      City and Dayton, and those communities were at fever heat and rife for the
      conflict. It was a very hot day, and wonderfully dusty. At the end of a
      short half hour we descended into Gold Hill with drums beating and colors
      flying, and enveloped in imposing clouds of dust. The whole population&mdash;men,
      women and children, Chinamen and Indians, were massed in the main street,
      all the flags in town were at the mast head, and the blare of the bands
      was drowned in cheers. Gridley stood up and asked who would make the first
      bid for the National Sanitary Flour Sack. Gen. W. said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "The Yellow Jacket silver mining company offers a thousand dollars, coin!"
    </p>
    <p>
      A tempest of applause followed. A telegram carried the news to Virginia,
      and fifteen minutes afterward that city's population was massed in the
      streets devouring the tidings&mdash;for it was part of the programme that
      the bulletin boards should do a good work that day. Every few minutes a
      new dispatch was bulletined from Gold Hill, and still the excitement grew.
      Telegrams began to return to us from Virginia beseeching Gridley to bring
      back the flour sack; but such was not the plan of the campaign. At the end
      of an hour Gold Hill's small population had paid a figure for the flour
      sack that awoke all the enthusiasm of Virginia when the grand total was
      displayed upon the bulletin boards. Then the Gridley cavalcade moved on, a
      giant refreshed with new lager beer and plenty of it&mdash;for the people
      brought it to the carriages without waiting to measure it&mdash;and within
      three hours more the expedition had carried Silver City and Dayton by
      storm and was on its way back covered with glory. Every move had been
      telegraphed and bulletined, and as the procession entered Virginia and
      filed down C street at half past eight in the evening the town was abroad
      in the thoroughfares, torches were glaring, flags flying, bands playing,
      cheer on cheer cleaving the air, and the city ready to surrender at
      discretion. The auction began, every bid was greeted with bursts of
      applause, and at the end of two hours and a half a population of fifteen
      thousand souls had paid in coin for a fifty-pound sack of flour a sum
      equal to forty thousand dollars in greenbacks! It was at a rate in the
      neighborhood of three dollars for each man, woman and child of the
      population. The grand total would have been twice as large, but the
      streets were very narrow, and hundreds who wanted to bid could not get
      within a block of the stand, and could not make themselves heard. These
      grew tired of waiting and many of them went home long before the auction
      was over. This was the greatest day Virginia ever saw, perhaps.
    </p>
    <p>
      Gridley sold the sack in Carson city and several California towns; also in
      San Francisco. Then he took it east and sold it in one or two Atlantic
      cities, I think. I am not sure of that, but I know that he finally carried
      it to St. Louis, where a monster Sanitary Fair was being held, and after
      selling it there for a large sum and helping on the enthusiasm by
      displaying the portly silver bricks which Nevada's donation had produced,
      he had the flour baked up into small cakes and retailed them at high
      prices.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was estimated that when the flour sack's mission was ended it had been
      sold for a grand total of a hundred and fifty thousand dollars in
      greenbacks! This is probably the only instance on record where common
      family flour brought three thousand dollars a pound in the public market.
    </p>
    <p>
      It is due to Mr. Gridley's memory to mention that the expenses of his
      sanitary flour sack expedition of fifteen thousand miles, going and
      returning, were paid in large part if not entirely, out of his own pocket.
      The time he gave to it was not less than three months. Mr. Gridley was a
      soldier in the Mexican war and a pioneer Californian. He died at Stockton,
      California, in December, 1870, greatly regretted.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link319" id="link319"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="319.jpg (51K)" src="images/319.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch46" id="linkch46"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLVI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      There were nabobs in those days&mdash;in the "flush times," I mean. Every
      rich strike in the mines created one or two. I call to mind several of
      these. They were careless, easy-going fellows, as a general thing, and the
      community at large was as much benefited by their riches as they were
      themselves&mdash;possibly more, in some cases.
    </p>
    <p>
      Two cousins, teamsters, did some hauling for a man and had to take a small
      segregated portion of a silver mine in lieu of $300 cash. They gave an
      outsider a third to open the mine, and they went on teaming. But not long.
      Ten months afterward the mine was out of debt and paying each owner $8,000
      to $10,000 a month&mdash;say $100,000 a year.
    </p>
    <p>
      One of the earliest nabobs that Nevada was delivered of wore $6,000 worth
      of diamonds in his bosom, and swore he was unhappy because he could not
      spend his money as fast as he made it.
    </p>
    <p>
      Another Nevada nabob boasted an income that often reached $16,000 a month;
      and he used to love to tell how he had worked in the very mine that
      yielded it, for five dollars a day, when he first came to the country.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link321" id="link321"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="321.jpg (31K)" src="images/321.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The silver and sage-brush State has knowledge of another of these pets of
      fortune&mdash;lifted from actual poverty to affluence almost in a single
      night&mdash;who was able to offer $100,000 for a position of high official
      distinction, shortly afterward, and did offer it&mdash;but failed to get
      it, his politics not being as sound as his bank account.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then there was John Smith. He was a good, honest, kind-hearted soul, born
      and reared in the lower ranks of life, and miraculously ignorant. He drove
      a team, and owned a small ranch&mdash;a ranch that paid him a comfortable
      living, for although it yielded but little hay, what little it did yield
      was worth from $250 to $300 in gold per ton in the market. Presently Smith
      traded a few acres of the ranch for a small undeveloped silver mine in
      Gold Hill. He opened the mine and built a little unpretending ten-stamp
      mill. Eighteen months afterward he retired from the hay business, for his
      mining income had reached a most comfortable figure. Some people said it
      was $30,000 a month, and others said it was $60,000. Smith was very rich
      at any rate.
    </p>
    <p>
      And then he went to Europe and traveled. And when he came back he was
      never tired of telling about the fine hogs he had seen in England, and the
      gorgeous sheep he had seen in Spain, and the fine cattle he had noticed in
      the vicinity of Rome. He was full of wonders of the old world, and advised
      everybody to travel. He said a man never imagined what surprising things
      there were in the world till he had traveled.
    </p>
    <p>
      One day, on board ship, the passengers made up a pool of $500, which was
      to be the property of the man who should come nearest to guessing the run
      of the vessel for the next twenty-four hours. Next day, toward noon, the
      figures were all in the purser's hands in sealed envelopes. Smith was
      serene and happy, for he had been bribing the engineer. But another party
      won the prize! Smith said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Here, that won't do! He guessed two miles wider of the mark than I did."
    </p>
    <p>
      The purser said, "Mr. Smith, you missed it further than any man on board.
      We traveled two hundred and eight miles yesterday."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, sir," said Smith, "that's just where I've got you, for I guessed
      two hundred and nine. If you'll look at my figgers again you'll find a 2
      and two 0's, which stands for 200, don't it?&mdash;and after 'em you'll
      find a 9 (2009), which stands for two hundred and nine. I reckon I'll take
      that money, if you please."
    </p>
    <p>
      The Gould &amp; Curry claim comprised twelve hundred feet, and it all
      belonged originally to the two men whose names it bears. Mr. Curry owned
      two thirds of it&mdash;and he said that he sold it out for twenty-five
      hundred dollars in cash, and an old plug horse that ate up his market
      value in hay and barley in seventeen days by the watch. And he said that
      Gould sold out for a pair of second-hand government blankets and a bottle
      of whisky that killed nine men in three hours, and that an unoffending
      stranger that smelt the cork was disabled for life. Four years afterward
      the mine thus disposed of was worth in the San Francisco market seven
      millions six hundred thousand dollars in gold coin.
    </p>
    <p>
      In the early days a poverty-stricken Mexican who lived in a canyon
      directly back of Virginia City, had a stream of water as large as a man's
      wrist trickling from the hill-side on his premises. The Ophir Company
      segregated a hundred feet of their mine and traded it to him for the
      stream of water. The hundred feet proved to be the richest part of the
      entire mine; four years after the swap, its market value (including its
      mill) was $1,500,000.
    </p>
    <p>
      An individual who owned twenty feet in the Ophir mine before its great
      riches were revealed to men, traded it for a horse, and a very sorry
      looking brute he was, too. A year or so afterward, when Ophir stock went
      up to $3,000 a foot, this man, who had not a cent, used to say he was the
      most startling example of magnificence and misery the world had ever seen&mdash;because
      he was able to ride a sixty-thousand-dollar horse&mdash;yet could not
      scrape up cash enough to buy a saddle, and was obliged to borrow one or
      ride bareback. He said if fortune were to give him another
      sixty-thousand-dollar horse it would ruin him.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link323" id="link323"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="323.jpg (46K)" src="images/323.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      A youth of nineteen, who was a telegraph operator in Virginia on a salary
      of a hundred dollars a month, and who, when he could not make out German
      names in the list of San Francisco steamer arrivals, used to ingeniously
      select and supply substitutes for them out of an old Berlin city
      directory, made himself rich by watching the mining telegrams that passed
      through his hands and buying and selling stocks accordingly, through a
      friend in San Francisco. Once when a private dispatch was sent from
      Virginia announcing a rich strike in a prominent mine and advising that
      the matter be kept secret till a large amount of the stock could be
      secured, he bought forty "feet" of the stock at twenty dollars a foot, and
      afterward sold half of it at eight hundred dollars a foot and the rest at
      double that figure. Within three months he was worth $150,000, and had
      resigned his telegraphic position.
    </p>
    <p>
      Another telegraph operator who had been discharged by the company for
      divulging the secrets of the office, agreed with a moneyed man in San
      Francisco to furnish him the result of a great Virginia mining lawsuit
      within an hour after its private reception by the parties to it in San
      Francisco. For this he was to have a large percentage of the profits on
      purchases and sales made on it by his fellow-conspirator. So he went,
      disguised as a teamster, to a little wayside telegraph office in the
      mountains, got acquainted with the operator, and sat in the office day
      after day, smoking his pipe, complaining that his team was fagged out and
      unable to travel&mdash;and meantime listening to the dispatches as they
      passed clicking through the machine from Virginia. Finally the private
      dispatch announcing the result of the lawsuit sped over the wires, and as
      soon as he heard it he telegraphed his friend in San Francisco:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Am tired waiting. Shall sell the team and go home."
    </p>
    <p>
      It was the signal agreed upon. The word "waiting" left out, would have
      signified that the suit had gone the other way.
    </p>
    <p>
      The mock teamster's friend picked up a deal of the mining stock, at low
      figures, before the news became public, and a fortune was the result.
    </p>
    <p>
      For a long time after one of the great Virginia mines had been
      incorporated, about fifty feet of the original location were still in the
      hands of a man who had never signed the incorporation papers. The stock
      became very valuable, and every effort was made to find this man, but he
      had disappeared. Once it was heard that he was in New York, and one or two
      speculators went east but failed to find him. Once the news came that he
      was in the Bermudas, and straightway a speculator or two hurried east and
      sailed for Bermuda&mdash;but he was not there. Finally he was heard of in
      Mexico, and a friend of his, a bar-keeper on a salary, scraped together a
      little money and sought him out, bought his "feet" for a hundred dollars,
      returned and sold the property for $75,000.
    </p>
    <p>
      But why go on? The traditions of Silverland are filled with instances like
      these, and I would never get through enumerating them were I to attempt do
      it. I only desired to give, the reader an idea of a peculiarity of the
      "flush times" which I could not present so strikingly in any other way,
      and which some mention of was necessary to a realizing comprehension of
      the time and the country.
    </p>
    <p>
      I was personally acquainted with the majority of the nabobs I have
      referred to, and so, for old acquaintance sake, I have shifted their
      occupations and experiences around in such a way as to keep the Pacific
      public from recognizing these once notorious men. No longer notorious, for
      the majority of them have drifted back into poverty and obscurity again.
    </p>
    <p>
      In Nevada there used to be current the story of an adventure of two of her
      nabobs, which may or may not have occurred. I give it for what it is
      worth:
    </p>
    <p>
      Col. Jim had seen somewhat of the world, and knew more or less of its
      ways; but Col. Jack was from the back settlements of the States, had led a
      life of arduous toil, and had never seen a city. These two, blessed with
      sudden wealth, projected a visit to New York,&mdash;Col. Jack to see the
      sights, and Col. Jim to guard his unsophistication from misfortune. They
      reached San Francisco in the night, and sailed in the morning. Arrived in
      New York, Col. Jack said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I've heard tell of carriages all my life, and now I mean to have a ride
      in one; I don't care what it costs. Come along."
    </p>
    <p>
      They stepped out on the sidewalk, and Col. Jim called a stylish barouche.
      But Col. Jack said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "No, sir! None of your cheap-John turn-outs for me. I'm here to have a
      good time, and money ain't any object. I mean to have the nobbiest rig
      that's going. Now here comes the very trick. Stop that yaller one with the
      pictures on it&mdash;don't you fret&mdash;I'll stand all the expenses
      myself."
    </p>
    <p>
      So Col. Jim stopped an empty omnibus, and they got in. Said Col. Jack:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Ain't it gay, though? Oh, no, I reckon not! Cushions, and windows, and
      pictures, till you can't rest. What would the boys say if they could see
      us cutting a swell like this in New York? By George, I wish they could see
      us."
    </p>
    <p>
      Then he put his head out of the window, and shouted to the driver:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Say, Johnny, this suits me!&mdash;suits yours truly, you bet, you! I want
      this shebang all day. I'm on it, old man! Let 'em out! Make 'em go! We'll
      make it all right with you, sonny!"
    </p>
    <p>
      The driver passed his hand through the strap-hole, and tapped for his fare&mdash;it
      was before the gongs came into common use. Col. Jack took the hand, and
      shook it cordially. He said:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link326" id="link326"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="326.jpg (51K)" src="images/326.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "You twig me, old pard! All right between gents. Smell of that, and see
      how you like it!"
    </p>
    <p>
      And he put a twenty-dollar gold piece in the driver's hand. After a moment
      the driver said he could not make change.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Bother the change! Ride it out. Put it in your pocket."
    </p>
    <p>
      Then to Col. Jim, with a sounding slap on his thigh:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Ain't it style, though? Hanged if I don't hire this thing every day for a
      week."
    </p>
    <p>
      The omnibus stopped, and a young lady got in. Col. Jack stared a moment,
      then nudged Col. Jim with his elbow:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Don't say a word," he whispered. "Let her ride, if she wants to.
      Gracious, there's room enough."
    </p>
    <p>
      The young lady got out her porte-monnaie, and handed her fare to Col.
      Jack.
    </p>
    <p>
      "What's this for?" said he.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Give it to the driver, please."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Take back your money, madam. We can't allow it. You're welcome to ride
      here as long as you please, but this shebang's chartered, and we can't let
      you pay a cent."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link327" id="link327"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="327.jpg (34K)" src="images/327.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The girl shrunk into a corner, bewildered. An old lady with a basket
      climbed in, and proffered her fare.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Excuse me," said Col. Jack. "You're perfectly welcome here, madam, but we
      can't allow you to pay. Set right down there, mum, and don't you be the
      least uneasy. Make yourself just as free as if you was in your own
      turn-out."
    </p>
    <p>
      Within two minutes, three gentlemen, two fat women, and a couple of
      children, entered.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Come right along, friends," said Col. Jack; "don't mind us. This is a
      free blow-out." Then he whispered to Col. Jim,
    </p>
    <p>
      "New York ain't no sociable place, I don't reckon&mdash;it ain't no name
      for it!"
    </p>
    <p>
      He resisted every effort to pass fares to the driver, and made everybody
      cordially welcome. The situation dawned on the people, and they pocketed
      their money, and delivered themselves up to covert enjoyment of the
      episode. Half a dozen more passengers entered.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, there's plenty of room," said Col. Jack. "Walk right in, and make
      yourselves at home. A blow-out ain't worth anything as a blow-out, unless
      a body has company." Then in a whisper to Col. Jim: "But ain't these New
      Yorkers friendly? And ain't they cool about it, too? Icebergs ain't
      anywhere. I reckon they'd tackle a hearse, if it was going their way."
    </p>
    <p>
      More passengers got in; more yet, and still more. Both seats were filled,
      and a file of men were standing up, holding on to the cleats overhead.
      Parties with baskets and bundles were climbing up on the roof.
      Half-suppressed laughter rippled up from all sides.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, for clean, cool, out-and-out cheek, if this don't bang anything
      that ever I saw, I'm an Injun!" whispered Col. Jack.
    </p>
    <p>
      A Chinaman crowded his way in.
    </p>
    <p>
      "I weaken!" said Col. Jack. "Hold on, driver! Keep your seats, ladies, and
      gents. Just make yourselves free&mdash;everything's paid for. Driver,
      rustle these folks around as long as they're a mind to go&mdash;friends of
      ours, you know. Take them everywheres&mdash;and if you want more money,
      come to the St. Nicholas, and we'll make it all right. Pleasant journey to
      you, ladies and gents&mdash;go it just as long as you please&mdash;it
      shan't cost you a cent!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link328" id="link328"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="328.jpg (93K)" src="images/328.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The two comrades got out, and Col. Jack said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Jimmy, it's the sociablest place I ever saw. The Chinaman waltzed in as
      comfortable as anybody. If we'd staid awhile, I reckon we'd had some
      niggers. B' George, we'll have to barricade our doors to-night, or some of
      these ducks will be trying to sleep with us."
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch47" id="linkch47"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLVII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Somebody has said that in order to know a community, one must observe the
      style of its funerals and know what manner of men they bury with most
      ceremony. I cannot say which class we buried with most eclat in our "flush
      times," the distinguished public benefactor or the distinguished rough&mdash;possibly
      the two chief grades or grand divisions of society honored their
      illustrious dead about equally; and hence, no doubt the philosopher I have
      quoted from would have needed to see two representative funerals in
      Virginia before forming his estimate of the people.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was a grand time over Buck Fanshaw when he died. He was a
      representative citizen. He had "killed his man"&mdash;not in his own
      quarrel, it is true, but in defence of a stranger unfairly beset by
      numbers. He had kept a sumptuous saloon. He had been the proprietor of a
      dashing helpmeet whom he could have discarded without the formality of a
      divorce. He had held a high position in the fire department and been a
      very Warwick in politics. When he died there was great lamentation
      throughout the town, but especially in the vast bottom-stratum of society.
    </p>
    <p>
      On the inquest it was shown that Buck Fanshaw, in the delirium of a
      wasting typhoid fever, had taken arsenic, shot himself through the body,
      cut his throat, and jumped out of a four-story window and broken his neck&mdash;and
      after due deliberation, the jury, sad and tearful, but with intelligence
      unblinded by its sorrow, brought in a verdict of death "by the visitation
      of God." What could the world do without juries?
    </p>
    <p>
      Prodigious preparations were made for the funeral. All the vehicles in
      town were hired, all the saloons put in mourning, all the municipal and
      fire-company flags hung at half-mast, and all the firemen ordered to
      muster in uniform and bring their machines duly draped in black. Now&mdash;let
      us remark in parenthesis&mdash;as all the peoples of the earth had
      representative adventurers in the Silverland, and as each adventurer had
      brought the slang of his nation or his locality with him, the combination
      made the slang of Nevada the richest and the most infinitely varied and
      copious that had ever existed anywhere in the world, perhaps, except in
      the mines of California in the "early days." Slang was the language of
      Nevada. It was hard to preach a sermon without it, and be understood. Such
      phrases as "You bet!" "Oh, no, I reckon not!" "No Irish need apply," and a
      hundred others, became so common as to fall from the lips of a speaker
      unconsciously&mdash;and very often when they did not touch the subject
      under discussion and consequently failed to mean anything.
    </p>
    <p>
      After Buck Fanshaw's inquest, a meeting of the short-haired brotherhood
      was held, for nothing can be done on the Pacific coast without a public
      meeting and an expression of sentiment. Regretful resolutions were passed
      and various committees appointed; among others, a committee of one was
      deputed to call on the minister, a fragile, gentle, spiritual new
      fledgling from an Eastern theological seminary, and as yet unacquainted
      with the ways of the mines. The committeeman, "Scotty" Briggs, made his
      visit; and in after days it was worth something to hear the minister tell
      about it. Scotty was a stalwart rough, whose customary suit, when on
      weighty official business, like committee work, was a fire helmet, flaming
      red flannel shirt, patent leather belt with spanner and revolver attached,
      coat hung over arm, and pants stuffed into boot tops. He formed something
      of a contrast to the pale theological student. It is fair to say of
      Scotty, however, in passing, that he had a warm heart, and a strong love
      for his friends, and never entered into a quarrel when he could reasonably
      keep out of it. Indeed, it was commonly said that whenever one of Scotty's
      fights was investigated, it always turned out that it had originally been
      no affair of his, but that out of native good-heartedness he had dropped
      in of his own accord to help the man who was getting the worst of it. He
      and Buck Fanshaw were bosom friends, for years, and had often taken
      adventurous "pot-luck" together. On one occasion, they had thrown off
      their coats and taken the weaker side in a fight among strangers, and
      after gaining a hard-earned victory, turned and found that the men they
      were helping had deserted early, and not only that, but had stolen their
      coats and made off with them! But to return to Scotty's visit to the
      minister. He was on a sorrowful mission, now, and his face was the picture
      of woe. Being admitted to the presence he sat down before the clergyman,
      placed his fire-hat on an unfinished manuscript sermon under the
      minister's nose, took from it a red silk handkerchief, wiped his brow and
      heaved a sigh of dismal impressiveness, explanatory of his business.
    </p>
    <p>
      He choked, and even shed tears; but with an effort he mastered his voice
      and said in lugubrious tones:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Are you the duck that runs the gospel-mill next door?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Am I the&mdash;pardon me, I believe I do not understand?"
    </p>
    <p>
      With another sigh and a half-sob, Scotty rejoined:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why you see we are in a bit of trouble, and the boys thought maybe you
      would give us a lift, if we'd tackle you&mdash;that is, if I've got the
      rights of it and you are the head clerk of the doxology-works next door."
    </p>
    <p>
      "I am the shepherd in charge of the flock whose fold is next door."
    </p>
    <p>
      "The which?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "The spiritual adviser of the little company of believers whose sanctuary
      adjoins these premises."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link331" id="link331"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="331.jpg (76K)" src="images/331.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Scotty scratched his head, reflected a moment, and then said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "You ruther hold over me, pard. I reckon I can't call that hand. Ante and
      pass the buck."
    </p>
    <p>
      "How? I beg pardon. What did I understand you to say?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, you've ruther got the bulge on me. Or maybe we've both got the
      bulge, somehow. You don't smoke me and I don't smoke you. You see, one of
      the boys has passed in his checks and we want to give him a good send-
      off, and so the thing I'm on now is to roust out somebody to jerk a little
      chin-music for us and waltz him through handsome."
    </p>
    <p>
      "My friend, I seem to grow more and more bewildered. Your observations are
      wholly incomprehensible to me. Cannot you simplify them in some way? At
      first I thought perhaps I understood you, but I grope now. Would it not
      expedite matters if you restricted yourself to categorical statements of
      fact unencumbered with obstructing accumulations of metaphor and
      allegory?"
    </p>
    <p>
      Another pause, and more reflection. Then, said Scotty:
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'll have to pass, I judge."
    </p>
    <p>
      "How?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "You've raised me out, pard."
    </p>
    <p>
      "I still fail to catch your meaning."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why, that last lead of yourn is too many for me&mdash;that's the idea. I
      can't neither-trump nor follow suit."
    </p>
    <p>
      The clergyman sank back in his chair perplexed. Scotty leaned his head on
      his hand and gave himself up to thought.
    </p>
    <p>
      Presently his face came up, sorrowful but confident.
    </p>
    <p>
      "I've got it now, so's you can savvy," he said. "What we want is a
      gospel-sharp. See?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "A what?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gospel-sharp. Parson."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh! Why did you not say so before? I am a clergyman&mdash;a parson."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Now you talk! You see my blind and straddle it like a man. Put it there!"&mdash;extending
      a brawny paw, which closed over the minister's small hand and gave it a
      shake indicative of fraternal sympathy and fervent gratification.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Now we're all right, pard. Let's start fresh. Don't you mind my snuffling
      a little&mdash;becuz we're in a power of trouble. You see, one of the boys
      has gone up the flume&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gone where?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Up the flume&mdash;throwed up the sponge, you understand."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Thrown up the sponge?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes&mdash;kicked the bucket&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Ah&mdash;has departed to that mysterious country from whose bourne no
      traveler returns."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Return! I reckon not. Why pard, he's dead!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes, I understand."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, you do? Well I thought maybe you might be getting tangled some more.
      Yes, you see he's dead again&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Again? Why, has he ever been dead before?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Dead before? No! Do you reckon a man has got as many lives as a cat? But
      you bet you he's awful dead now, poor old boy, and I wish I'd never seen
      this day. I don't want no better friend than Buck Fanshaw. I knowed him by
      the back; and when I know a man and like him, I freeze to him&mdash;you
      hear me. Take him all round, pard, there never was a bullier man in the
      mines. No man ever knowed Buck Fanshaw to go back on a friend. But it's
      all up, you know, it's all up. It ain't no use. They've scooped him."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Scooped him?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes&mdash;death has. Well, well, well, we've got to give him up. Yes
      indeed. It's a kind of a hard world, after all, ain't it? But pard, he was
      a rustler! You ought to seen him get started once. He was a bully boy with
      a glass eye! Just spit in his face and give him room according to his
      strength, and it was just beautiful to see him peel and go in. He was the
      worst son of a thief that ever drawed breath. Pard, he was on it! He was
      on it bigger than an Injun!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "On it? On what?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "On the shoot. On the shoulder. On the fight, you understand. He didn't
      give a continental for any body. Beg your pardon, friend, for coming so
      near saying a cuss-word&mdash;but you see I'm on an awful strain, in this
      palaver, on account of having to cramp down and draw everything so mild.
      But we've got to give him up. There ain't any getting around that, I don't
      reckon. Now if we can get you to help plant him&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Preach the funeral discourse? Assist at the obsequies?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Obs'quies is good. Yes. That's it&mdash;that's our little game. We are
      going to get the thing up regardless, you know. He was always nifty
      himself, and so you bet you his funeral ain't going to be no slouch&mdash;solid
      silver door-plate on his coffin, six plumes on the hearse, and a nigger on
      the box in a biled shirt and a plug hat&mdash;how's that for high? And
      we'll take care of you, pard. We'll fix you all right. There'll be a
      kerridge for you; and whatever you want, you just 'scape out and we'll
      'tend to it. We've got a shebang fixed up for you to stand behind, in No.
      1's house, and don't you be afraid. Just go in and toot your horn, if you
      don't sell a clam. Put Buck through as bully as you can, pard, for anybody
      that knowed him will tell you that he was one of the whitest men that was
      ever in the mines. You can't draw it too strong. He never could stand it
      to see things going wrong. He's done more to make this town quiet and
      peaceable than any man in it. I've seen him lick four Greasers in eleven
      minutes, myself. If a thing wanted regulating, he warn't a man to go
      browsing around after somebody to do it, but he would prance in and
      regulate it himself. He warn't a Catholic. Scasely. He was down on 'em.
      His word was, 'No Irish need apply!' But it didn't make no difference
      about that when it came down to what a man's rights was&mdash;and so, when
      some roughs jumped the Catholic bone-yard and started in to stake out
      town-lots in it he went for 'em! And he cleaned 'em, too! I was there,
      pard, and I seen it myself."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link335" id="link335"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="335.jpg (105K)" src="images/335.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "That was very well indeed&mdash;at least the impulse was&mdash;whether
      the act was strictly defensible or not. Had deceased any religious
      convictions? That is to say, did he feel a dependence upon, or acknowledge
      allegiance to a higher power?"
    </p>
    <p>
      More reflection.
    </p>
    <p>
      "I reckon you've stumped me again, pard. Could you say it over once more,
      and say it slow?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, to simplify it somewhat, was he, or rather had he ever been
      connected with any organization sequestered from secular concerns and
      devoted to self-sacrifice in the interests of morality?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "All down but nine&mdash;set 'em up on the other alley, pard."
    </p>
    <p>
      "What did I understand you to say?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why, you're most too many for me, you know. When you get in with your
      left I hunt grass every time. Every time you draw, you fill; but I don't
      seem to have any luck. Lets have a new deal."
    </p>
    <p>
      "How? Begin again?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "That's it."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Very well. Was he a good man, and&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "There&mdash;I see that; don't put up another chip till I look at my hand.
      A good man, says you? Pard, it ain't no name for it. He was the best man
      that ever&mdash;pard, you would have doted on that man. He could lam any
      galoot of his inches in America. It was him that put down the riot last
      election before it got a start; and everybody said he was the only man
      that could have done it. He waltzed in with a spanner in one hand and a
      trumpet in the other, and sent fourteen men home on a shutter in less than
      three minutes. He had that riot all broke up and prevented nice before
      anybody ever got a chance to strike a blow. He was always for peace, and
      he would have peace&mdash;he could not stand disturbances. Pard, he was a
      great loss to this town. It would please the boys if you could chip in
      something like that and do him justice. Here once when the Micks got to
      throwing stones through the Methodis' Sunday school windows, Buck Fanshaw,
      all of his own notion, shut up his saloon and took a couple of
      six-shooters and mounted guard over the Sunday school. Says he, 'No Irish
      need apply!' And they didn't. He was the bulliest man in the mountains,
      pard! He could run faster, jump higher, hit harder, and hold more
      tangle-foot whisky without spilling it than any man in seventeen counties.
      Put that in, pard&mdash;it'll please the boys more than anything you could
      say. And you can say, pard, that he never shook his mother."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link337" id="link337"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="337.jpg (60K)" src="images/337.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Never shook his mother?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "That's it&mdash;any of the boys will tell you so."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, but why should he shake her?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "That's what I say&mdash;but some people does."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Not people of any repute?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, some that averages pretty so-so."
    </p>
    <p>
      "In my opinion the man that would offer personal violence to his own
      mother, ought to&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Cheese it, pard; you've banked your ball clean outside the string. What I
      was a drivin' at, was, that he never throwed off on his mother&mdash;don't
      you see? No indeedy. He give her a house to live in, and town lots, and
      plenty of money; and he looked after her and took care of her all the
      time; and when she was down with the small-pox I'm d&mdash;-d if he didn't
      set up nights and nuss her himself! Beg your pardon for saying it, but it
      hopped out too quick for yours truly.
    </p>
    <p>
      "You've treated me like a gentleman, pard, and I ain't the man to hurt
      your feelings intentional. I think you're white. I think you're a square
      man, pard. I like you, and I'll lick any man that don't. I'll lick him
      till he can't tell himself from a last year's corpse! Put it there!"
      [Another fraternal hand-shake&mdash;and exit.]
    </p>
    <p>
      The obsequies were all that "the boys" could desire. Such a marvel of
      funeral pomp had never been seen in Virginia. The plumed hearse, the
      dirge-breathing brass bands, the closed marts of business, the flags
      drooping at half mast, the long, plodding procession of uniformed secret
      societies, military battalions and fire companies, draped engines,
      carriages of officials, and citizens in vehicles and on foot, attracted
      multitudes of spectators to the sidewalks, roofs and windows; and for
      years afterward, the degree of grandeur attained by any civic display in
      Virginia was determined by comparison with Buck Fanshaw's funeral.
    </p>
    <p>
      Scotty Briggs, as a pall-bearer and a mourner, occupied a prominent place
      at the funeral, and when the sermon was finished and the last sentence of
      the prayer for the dead man's soul ascended, he responded, in a low voice,
      but with feelings:
    </p>
    <p>
      "AMEN. No Irish need apply."
    </p>
    <p>
      As the bulk of the response was without apparent relevancy, it was
      probably nothing more than a humble tribute to the memory of the friend
      that was gone; for, as Scotty had once said, it was "his word."
    </p>
    <p>
      Scotty Briggs, in after days, achieved the distinction of becoming the
      only convert to religion that was ever gathered from the Virginia roughs;
      and it transpired that the man who had it in him to espouse the quarrel of
      the weak out of inborn nobility of spirit was no mean timber whereof to
      construct a Christian. The making him one did not warp his generosity or
      diminish his courage; on the contrary it gave intelligent direction to the
      one and a broader field to the other.
    </p>
    <p>
      If his Sunday-school class progressed faster than the other classes, was
      it matter for wonder? I think not. He talked to his pioneer small-fry in a
      language they understood! It was my large privilege, a month before he
      died, to hear him tell the beautiful story of Joseph and his brethren to
      his class "without looking at the book." I leave it to the reader to fancy
      what it was like, as it fell, riddled with slang, from the lips of that
      grave, earnest teacher, and was listened to by his little learners with a
      consuming interest that showed that they were as unconscious as he was
      that any violence was being done to the sacred proprieties!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link338" id="link338"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="338.jpg (52K)" src="images/338.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch48" id="linkch48"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLVIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The first twenty-six graves in the Virginia cemetery were occupied by
      murdered men. So everybody said, so everybody believed, and so they will
      always say and believe. The reason why there was so much slaughtering
      done, was, that in a new mining district the rough element predominates,
      and a person is not respected until he has "killed his man." That was the
      very expression used.
    </p>
    <p>
      If an unknown individual arrived, they did not inquire if he was capable,
      honest, industrious, but&mdash;had he killed his man? If he had not, he
      gravitated to his natural and proper position, that of a man of small
      consequence; if he had, the cordiality of his reception was graduated
      according to the number of his dead. It was tedious work struggling up to
      a position of influence with bloodless hands; but when a man came with the
      blood of half a dozen men on his soul, his worth was recognized at once
      and his acquaintance sought.
    </p>
    <p>
      In Nevada, for a time, the lawyer, the editor, the banker, the chief
      desperado, the chief gambler, and the saloon keeper, occupied the same
      level in society, and it was the highest. The cheapest and easiest way to
      become an influential man and be looked up to by the community at large,
      was to stand behind a bar, wear a cluster-diamond pin, and sell whisky. I
      am not sure but that the saloon-keeper held a shade higher rank than any
      other member of society. His opinion had weight. It was his privilege to
      say how the elections should go. No great movement could succeed without
      the countenance and direction of the saloon- keepers. It was a high favor
      when the chief saloon-keeper consented to serve in the legislature or the
      board of aldermen.
    </p>
    <p>
      Youthful ambition hardly aspired so much to the honors of the law, or the
      army and navy as to the dignity of proprietorship in a saloon.
    </p>
    <p>
      To be a saloon-keeper and kill a man was to be illustrious. Hence the
      reader will not be surprised to learn that more than one man was killed in
      Nevada under hardly the pretext of provocation, so impatient was the
      slayer to achieve reputation and throw off the galling sense of being held
      in indifferent repute by his associates. I knew two youths who tried to
      "kill their men" for no other reason&mdash;and got killed themselves for
      their pains. "There goes the man that killed Bill Adams" was higher praise
      and a sweeter sound in the ears of this sort of people than any other
      speech that admiring lips could utter.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link340" id="link340"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="340.jpg (115K)" src="images/340.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The men who murdered Virginia's original twenty-six cemetery-occupants
      were never punished. Why? Because Alfred the Great, when he invented trial
      by jury and knew that he had admirably framed it to secure justice in his
      age of the world, was not aware that in the nineteenth century the
      condition of things would be so entirely changed that unless he rose from
      the grave and altered the jury plan to meet the emergency, it would prove
      the most ingenious and infallible agency for defeating justice that human
      wisdom could contrive. For how could he imagine that we simpletons would
      go on using his jury plan after circumstances had stripped it of its
      usefulness, any more than he could imagine that we would go on using his
      candle-clock after we had invented chronometers? In his day news could not
      travel fast, and hence he could easily find a jury of honest, intelligent
      men who had not heard of the case they were called to try&mdash;but in our
      day of telegraphs and newspapers his plan compels us to swear in juries
      composed of fools and rascals, because the system rigidly excludes honest
      men and men of brains.
    </p>
    <p>
      I remember one of those sorrowful farces, in Virginia, which we call a
      jury trial. A noted desperado killed Mr. B., a good citizen, in the most
      wanton and cold-blooded way. Of course the papers were full of it, and all
      men capable of reading, read about it. And of course all men not deaf and
      dumb and idiotic, talked about it. A jury-list was made out, and Mr. B.
      L., a prominent banker and a valued citizen, was questioned precisely as
      he would have been questioned in any court in America:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Have you heard of this homicide?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Have you held conversations upon the subject?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Have you formed or expressed opinions about it?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Have you read the newspaper accounts of it?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Yes."
    </p>
    <p>
      "We do not want you."
    </p>
    <p>
      A minister, intelligent, esteemed, and greatly respected; a merchant of
      high character and known probity; a mining superintendent of intelligence
      and unblemished reputation; a quartz mill owner of excellent standing,
      were all questioned in the same way, and all set aside. Each said the
      public talk and the newspaper reports had not so biased his mind but that
      sworn testimony would overthrow his previously formed opinions and enable
      him to render a verdict without prejudice and in accordance with the
      facts. But of course such men could not be trusted with the case.
      Ignoramuses alone could mete out unsullied justice.
    </p>
    <p>
      When the peremptory challenges were all exhausted, a jury of twelve men
      was impaneled&mdash;a jury who swore they had neither heard, read, talked
      about nor expressed an opinion concerning a murder which the very cattle
      in the corrals, the Indians in the sage-brush and the stones in the
      streets were cognizant of! It was a jury composed of two desperadoes, two
      low beer-house politicians, three bar-keepers, two ranchmen who could not
      read, and three dull, stupid, human donkeys! It actually came out
      afterward, that one of these latter thought that incest and arson were the
      same thing.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link342" id="link342"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="342.jpg (52K)" src="images/342.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The verdict rendered by this jury was, Not Guilty. What else could one
      expect?
    </p>
    <p>
      The jury system puts a ban upon intelligence and honesty, and a premium
      upon ignorance, stupidity and perjury. It is a shame that we must continue
      to use a worthless system because it was good a thousand years ago. In
      this age, when a gentleman of high social standing, intelligence and
      probity, swears that testimony given under solemn oath will outweigh, with
      him, street talk and newspaper reports based upon mere hearsay, he is
      worth a hundred jurymen who will swear to their own ignorance and
      stupidity, and justice would be far safer in his hands than in theirs. Why
      could not the jury law be so altered as to give men of brains and honesty
      and equal chance with fools and miscreants? Is it right to show the
      present favoritism to one class of men and inflict a disability on
      another, in a land whose boast is that all its citizens are free and
      equal? I am a candidate for the legislature. I desire to tamper with the
      jury law. I wish to so alter it as to put a premium on intelligence and
      character, and close the jury box against idiots, blacklegs, and people
      who do not read newspapers. But no doubt I shall be defeated&mdash;every
      effort I make to save the country "misses fire."
    </p>
    <p>
      My idea, when I began this chapter, was to say something about
      desperadoism in the "flush times" of Nevada. To attempt a portrayal of
      that era and that land, and leave out the blood and carnage, would be like
      portraying Mormondom and leaving out polygamy. The desperado stalked the
      streets with a swagger graded according to the number of his homicides,
      and a nod of recognition from him was sufficient to make a humble admirer
      happy for the rest of the day. The deference that was paid to a desperado
      of wide reputation, and who "kept his private graveyard," as the phrase
      went, was marked, and cheerfully accorded. When he moved along the
      sidewalk in his excessively long-tailed frock- coat, shiny stump-toed
      boots, and with dainty little slouch hat tipped over left eye, the
      small-fry roughs made room for his majesty; when he entered the
      restaurant, the waiters deserted bankers and merchants to overwhelm him
      with obsequious service; when he shouldered his way to a bar, the
      shouldered parties wheeled indignantly, recognized him, and&mdash;apologized.
    </p>
    <p>
      They got a look in return that froze their marrow, and by that time a
      curled and breast-pinned bar keeper was beaming over the counter, proud of
      the established acquaintanceship that permitted such a familiar form of
      speech as:
    </p>
    <p>
      "How're ye, Billy, old fel? Glad to see you. What'll you take&mdash;the
      old thing?"
    </p>
    <p>
      The "old thing" meant his customary drink, of course.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link344" id="link344"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="344.jpg (47K)" src="images/344.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The best known names in the Territory of Nevada were those belonging to
      these long-tailed heroes of the revolver. Orators, Governors, capitalists
      and leaders of the legislature enjoyed a degree of fame, but it seemed
      local and meagre when contrasted with the fame of such men as Sam Brown,
      Jack Williams, Billy Mulligan, Farmer Pease, Sugarfoot Mike, Pock Marked
      Jake, El Dorado Johnny, Jack McNabb, Joe McGee, Jack Harris, Six-fingered
      Pete, etc., etc. There was a long list of them. They were brave, reckless
      men, and traveled with their lives in their hands. To give them their due,
      they did their killing principally among themselves, and seldom molested
      peaceable citizens, for they considered it small credit to add to their
      trophies so cheap a bauble as the death of a man who was "not on the
      shoot," as they phrased it. They killed each other on slight provocation,
      and hoped and expected to be killed themselves&mdash;for they held it
      almost shame to die otherwise than "with their boots on," as they
      expressed it.
    </p>
    <p>
      I remember an instance of a desperado's contempt for such small game as a
      private citizen's life. I was taking a late supper in a restaurant one
      night, with two reporters and a little printer named&mdash;Brown, for
      instance&mdash;any name will do. Presently a stranger with a long-tailed
      coat on came in, and not noticing Brown's hat, which was lying in a chair,
      sat down on it. Little Brown sprang up and became abusive in a moment. The
      stranger smiled, smoothed out the hat, and offered it to Brown with
      profuse apologies couched in caustic sarcasm, and begged Brown not to
      destroy him. Brown threw off his coat and challenged the man to fight&mdash;abused
      him, threatened him, impeached his courage, and urged and even implored
      him to fight; and in the meantime the smiling stranger placed himself
      under our protection in mock distress. But presently he assumed a serious
      tone, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Very well, gentlemen, if we must fight, we must, I suppose. But don't
      rush into danger and then say I gave you no warning. I am more than a
      match for all of you when I get started. I will give you proofs, and then
      if my friend here still insists, I will try to accommodate him."
    </p>
    <p>
      The table we were sitting at was about five feet long, and unusually
      cumbersome and heavy. He asked us to put our hands on the dishes and hold
      them in their places a moment&mdash;one of them was a large oval dish with
      a portly roast on it. Then he sat down, tilted up one end of the table,
      set two of the legs on his knees, took the end of the table between his
      teeth, took his hands away, and pulled down with his teeth till the table
      came up to a level position, dishes and all! He said he could lift a keg
      of nails with his teeth. He picked up a common glass tumbler and bit a
      semi-circle out of it. Then he opened his bosom and showed us a net-work
      of knife and bullet scars; showed us more on his arms and face, and said
      he believed he had bullets enough in his body to make a pig of lead. He
      was armed to the teeth. He closed with the remark that he was Mr.&mdash;&mdash;of
      Cariboo&mdash;a celebrated name whereat we shook in our shoes. I would
      publish the name, but for the suspicion that he might come and carve me.
      He finally inquired if Brown still thirsted for blood. Brown turned the
      thing over in his mind a moment, and then&mdash;asked him to supper.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link346" id="link346"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="346.jpg (73K)" src="images/346.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      With the permission of the reader, I will group together, in the next
      chapter, some samples of life in our small mountain village in the old
      days of desperadoism. I was there at the time. The reader will observe
      peculiarities in our official society; and he will observe also, an
      instance of how, in new countries, murders breed murders.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch49" id="linkch49"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER XLIX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      An extract or two from the newspapers of the day will furnish a photograph
      that can need no embellishment:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        FATAL SHOOTING AFFRAY.&mdash;An affray occurred, last evening, in a
        billiard saloon on C street, between Deputy Marshal Jack Williams and
        Wm. Brown, which resulted in the immediate death of the latter. There
        had been some difficulty between the parties for several months.
      </p>
      <p>
        An inquest was immediately held, and the following testimony adduced:
      </p>
      <p>
        Officer GEO. BIRDSALL, sworn, says:&mdash;I was told Wm. Brown was drunk
        and was looking for Jack Williams; so soon as I heard that I started for
        the parties to prevent a collision; went into the billiard saloon; saw
        Billy Brown running around, saying if anybody had anything against him
        to show cause; he was talking in a boisterous manner, and officer Perry
        took him to the other end of the room to talk to him; Brown came back to
        me; remarked to me that he thought he was as good as anybody, and knew
        how to take care of himself; he passed by me and went to the bar; don't
        know whether he drank or not; Williams was at the end of the
        billiard-table, next to the stairway; Brown, after going to the bar,
        came back and said he was as good as any man in the world; he had then
        walked out to the end of the first billiard-table from the bar; I moved
        closer to them, supposing there would be a fight; as Brown drew his
        pistol I caught hold of it; he had fired one shot at Williams; don't
        know the effect of it; caught hold of him with one hand, and took hold
        of the pistol and turned it up; think he fired once after I caught hold
        of the pistol; I wrenched the pistol from him; walked to the end of the
        billiard-table and told a party that I had Brown's pistol, and to stop
        shooting; I think four shots were fired in all; after walking out, Mr.
        Foster remarked that Brown was shot dead.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      Oh, there was no excitement about it&mdash;he merely "remarked" the small
      circumstance!
    </p>
    <p>
      Four months later the following item appeared in the same paper (the
      Enterprise). In this item the name of one of the city officers above
      referred to (Deputy Marshal Jack Williams) occurs again:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        ROBBERY AND DESPERATE AFFRAY.&mdash;On Tuesday night, a German named
        Charles Hurtzal, engineer in a mill at Silver City, came to this place,
        and visited the hurdy-gurdy house on B street. The music, dancing and
        Teutonic maidens awakened memories of Faderland until our German friend
        was carried away with rapture. He evidently had money, and was spending
        if freely. Late in the evening Jack Williams and Andy Blessington
        invited him down stairs to take a cup of coffee. Williams proposed a
        game of cards and went up stairs to procure a deck, but not finding any
        returned. On the stairway he met the German, and drawing his pistol
        knocked him down and rifled his pockets of some seventy dollars. Hurtzal
        dared give no alarm, as he was told, with a pistol at his head, if he
        made any noise or exposed them, they would blow his brains out. So
        effectually was he frightened that he made no complaint, until his
        friends forced him. Yesterday a warrant was issued, but the culprits had
        disappeared.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      This efficient city officer, Jack Williams, had the common reputation of
      being a burglar, a highwayman and a desperado. It was said that he had
      several times drawn his revolver and levied money contributions on
      citizens at dead of night in the public streets of Virginia.
    </p>
    <p>
      Five months after the above item appeared, Williams was assassinated while
      sitting at a card table one night; a gun was thrust through the crack of
      the door and Williams dropped from his chair riddled with balls. It was
      said, at the time, that Williams had been for some time aware that a party
      of his own sort (desperadoes) had sworn away his life; and it was
      generally believed among the people that Williams's friends and enemies
      would make the assassination memorable&mdash;and useful, too&mdash;by a
      wholesale destruction of each other.
    </p>
    <p>
      It did not so happen, but still, times were not dull during the next
      twenty-four hours, for within that time a woman was killed by a pistol
      shot, a man was brained with a slung shot, and a man named Reeder was also
      disposed of permanently. Some matters in the Enterprise account of the
      killing of Reeder are worth nothing&mdash;especially the accommodating
      complaisance of a Virginia justice of the peace. The italics in the
      following narrative are mine:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        MORE CUTTING AND SHOOTING.&mdash;The devil seems to have again broken
        loose in our town. Pistols and guns explode and knives gleam in our
        streets as in early times. When there has been a long season of quiet,
        people are slow to wet their hands in blood; but once blood is spilled,
        cutting and shooting come easy. Night before last Jack Williams was
        assassinated, and yesterday forenoon we had more bloody work, growing
        out of the killing of Williams, and on the same street in which he met
        his death. It appears that Tom Reeder, a friend of Williams, and George
        Gumbert were talking, at the meat market of the latter, about the
        killing of Williams the previous night, when Reeder said it was a most
        cowardly act to shoot a man in such a way, giving him "no show." Gumbert
        said that Williams had "as good a show as he gave Billy Brown," meaning
        the man killed by Williams last March. Reeder said it was a d&mdash;-d
        lie, that Williams had no show at all. At this, Gumbert drew a knife and
        stabbed Reeder, cutting him in two places in the back. One stroke of the
        knife cut into the sleeve of Reeder's coat and passed downward in a
        slanting direction through his clothing, and entered his body at the
        small of the back; another blow struck more squarely, and made a much
        more dangerous wound. Gumbert gave himself up to the officers of
        justice, and was shortly after discharged by Justice Atwill, on his own
        recognizance, to appear for trial at six o'clock in the evening. In the
        meantime Reeder had been taken into the office of Dr. Owens, where his
        wounds were properly dressed. One of his wounds was considered quite
        dangerous, and it was thought by many that it would prove fatal. But
        being considerably under the influence of liquor, Reeder did not feel
        his wounds as he otherwise would, and he got up and went into the
        street. He went to the meat market and renewed his quarrel with Gumbert,
        threatening his life. Friends tried to interfere to put a stop to the
        quarrel and get the parties away from each other. In the Fashion Saloon
        Reeder made threats against the life of Gumbert, saying he would kill
        him, and it is said that he requested the officers not to arrest
        Gumbert, as he intended to kill him. After these threats Gumbert went
        off and procured a double- barreled shot gun, loaded with buck-shot or
        revolver balls, and went after Reeder. Two or three persons were
        assisting him along the street, trying to get him home, and had him just
        in front of the store of Klopstock &amp; Harris, when Gumbert came
        across toward him from the opposite side of the street with his gun. He
        came up within about ten or fifteen feet of Reeder, and called out to
        those with him to "look out! get out of the way!" and they had only time
        to heed the warning, when he fired. Reeder was at the time attempting to
        screen himself behind a large cask, which stood against the awning post
        of Klopstock &amp; Harris's store, but some of the balls took effect in
        the lower part of his breast, and he reeled around forward and fell in
        front of the cask. Gumbert then raised his gun and fired the second
        barrel, which missed Reeder and entered the ground. At the time that
        this occurred, there were a great many persons on the street in the
        vicinity, and a number of them called out to Gumbert, when they saw him
        raise his gun, to "hold on," and "don't shoot!" The cutting took place
        about ten o'clock and the shooting about twelve. After the shooting the
        street was instantly crowded with the inhabitants of that part of the
        town, some appearing much excited and laughing&mdash;declaring that it
        looked like the "good old times of '60." Marshal Perry and officer
        Birdsall were near when the shooting occurred, and Gumbert was
        immediately arrested and his gun taken from him, when he was marched off
        to jail. Many persons who were attracted to the spot where this bloody
        work had just taken place, looked bewildered and seemed to be asking
        themselves what was to happen next, appearing in doubt as to whether the
        killing mania had reached its climax, or whether we were to turn in and
        have a grand killing spell, shooting whoever might have given us
        offence. It was whispered around that it was not all over yet&mdash;five
        or six more were to be killed before night. Reeder was taken to the
        Virginia City Hotel, and doctors called in to examine his wounds. They
        found that two or three balls had entered his right side; one of them
        appeared to have passed through the substance of the lungs, while
        another passed into the liver. Two balls were also found to have struck
        one of his legs. As some of the balls struck the cask, the wounds in
        Reeder's leg were probably from these, glancing downwards, though they
        might have been caused by the second shot fired. After being shot,
        Reeder said when he got on his feet&mdash;smiling as he spoke&mdash;"It
        will take better shooting than that to kill me." The doctors consider it
        almost impossible for him to recover, but as he has an excellent
        constitution he may survive, notwithstanding the number and dangerous
        character of the wounds he has received. The town appears to be
        perfectly quiet at present, as though the late stormy times had cleared
        our moral atmosphere; but who can tell in what quarter clouds are
        lowering or plots ripening?
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      Reeder&mdash;or at least what was left of him&mdash;survived his wounds
      two days! Nothing was ever done with Gumbert.
    </p>
    <p>
      Trial by jury is the palladium of our liberties. I do not know what a
      palladium is, having never seen a palladium, but it is a good thing no
      doubt at any rate. Not less than a hundred men have been murdered in
      Nevada&mdash;perhaps I would be within bounds if I said three hundred&mdash;and
      as far as I can learn, only two persons have suffered the death penalty
      there. However, four or five who had no money and no political influence
      have been punished by imprisonment&mdash;one languished in prison as much
      as eight months, I think. However, I do not desire to be extravagant&mdash;it
      may have been less.
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        However, one prophecy was verified, at any rate. It was asserted by the
        desperadoes that one of their brethren (Joe McGee, a special policeman)
        was known to be the conspirator chosen by lot to assassinate Williams;
        and they also asserted that doom had been pronounced against McGee, and
        that he would be assassinated in exactly the same manner that had been
        adopted for the destruction of Williams&mdash;a prophecy which came true
        a year later. After twelve months of distress (for McGee saw a fancied
        assassin in every man that approached him), he made the last of many
        efforts to get out of the country unwatched. He went to Carson and sat
        down in a saloon to wait for the stage&mdash;it would leave at four in
        the morning. But as the night waned and the crowd thinned, he grew
        uneasy, and told the bar-keeper that assassins were on his track. The
        bar-keeper told him to stay in the middle of the room, then, and not go
        near the door, or the window by the stove. But a fatal fascination
        seduced him to the neighborhood of the stove every now and then, and
        repeatedly the bar- keeper brought him back to the middle of the room
        and warned him to remain there. But he could not. At three in the
        morning he again returned to the stove and sat down by a stranger.
        Before the bar-keeper could get to him with another warning whisper,
        some one outside fired through the window and riddled McGee's breast
        with slugs, killing him almost instantly. By the same discharge the
        stranger at McGee's side also received attentions which proved fatal in
        the course of two or three days.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link351" id="link351"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="351.jpg (9K)" src="images/351.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch50" id="linkch50"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER L.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      These murder and jury statistics remind me of a certain very extraordinary
      trial and execution of twenty years ago; it is a scrap of history familiar
      to all old Californians, and worthy to be known by other peoples of the
      earth that love simple, straightforward justice unencumbered with
      nonsense. I would apologize for this digression but for the fact that the
      information I am about to offer is apology enough in itself. And since I
      digress constantly anyhow, perhaps it is as well to eschew apologies
      altogether and thus prevent their growing irksome.
    </p>
    <p>
      Capt. Ned Blakely&mdash;that name will answer as well as any other
      fictitious one (for he was still with the living at last accounts, and may
      not desire to be famous)&mdash;sailed ships out of the harbor of San
      Francisco for many years. He was a stalwart, warm-hearted, eagle-eyed
      veteran, who had been a sailor nearly fifty years&mdash;a sailor from
      early boyhood. He was a rough, honest creature, full of pluck, and just as
      full of hard-headed simplicity, too. He hated trifling conventionalities&mdash;"business"
      was the word, with him. He had all a sailor's vindictiveness against the
      quips and quirks of the law, and steadfastly believed that the first and
      last aim and object of the law and lawyers was to defeat justice.
    </p>
    <p>
      He sailed for the Chincha Islands in command of a guano ship. He had a
      fine crew, but his negro mate was his pet&mdash;on him he had for years
      lavished his admiration and esteem. It was Capt. Ned's first voyage to the
      Chinchas, but his fame had gone before him&mdash;the fame of being a man
      who would fight at the dropping of a handkerchief, when imposed upon, and
      would stand no nonsense. It was a fame well earned. Arrived in the
      islands, he found that the staple of conversation was the exploits of one
      Bill Noakes, a bully, the mate of a trading ship. This man had created a
      small reign of terror there. At nine o'clock at night, Capt. Ned, all
      alone, was pacing his deck in the starlight. A form ascended the side, and
      approached him. Capt. Ned said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Who goes there?"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link353" id="link353"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="353.jpg (77K)" src="images/353.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'm Bill Noakes, the best man in the islands."
    </p>
    <p>
      "What do you want aboard this ship?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I've heard of Capt. Ned Blakely, and one of us is a better man than
      'tother&mdash;I'll know which, before I go ashore."
    </p>
    <p>
      "You've come to the right shop&mdash;I'm your man. I'll learn you to come
      aboard this ship without an invite."
    </p>
    <p>
      He seized Noakes, backed him against the mainmast, pounded his face to a
      pulp, and then threw him overboard.
    </p>
    <p>
      Noakes was not convinced. He returned the next night, got the pulp
      renewed, and went overboard head first, as before.
    </p>
    <p>
      He was satisfied.
    </p>
    <p>
      A week after this, while Noakes was carousing with a sailor crowd on
      shore, at noonday, Capt. Ned's colored mate came along, and Noakes tried
      to pick a quarrel with him. The negro evaded the trap, and tried to get
      away. Noakes followed him up; the negro began to run; Noakes fired on him
      with a revolver and killed him. Half a dozen sea-captains witnessed the
      whole affair. Noakes retreated to the small after-cabin of his ship, with
      two other bullies, and gave out that death would be the portion of any man
      that intruded there. There was no attempt made to follow the villains;
      there was no disposition to do it, and indeed very little thought of such
      an enterprise. There were no courts and no officers; there was no
      government; the islands belonged to Peru, and Peru was far away; she had
      no official representative on the ground; and neither had any other
      nation.
    </p>
    <p>
      However, Capt. Ned was not perplexing his head about such things. They
      concerned him not. He was boiling with rage and furious for justice. At
      nine o'clock at night he loaded a double-barreled gun with slugs, fished
      out a pair of handcuffs, got a ship's lantern, summoned his quartermaster,
      and went ashore. He said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Do you see that ship there at the dock?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Ay-ay, sir."
    </p>
    <p>
      "It's the Venus."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Ay-ay, sir."
    </p>
    <p>
      "You&mdash;you know me."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Ay-ay, sir."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Very well, then. Take the lantern. Carry it just under your chin. I'll
      walk behind you and rest this gun-barrel on your shoulder, p'inting
      forward&mdash;so. Keep your lantern well up so's I can see things ahead of
      you good. I'm going to march in on Noakes&mdash;and take him&mdash;and jug
      the other chaps. If you flinch&mdash;well, you know me."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Ay-ay, sir."
    </p>
    <p>
      In this order they filed aboard softly, arrived at Noakes's den, the
      quartermaster pushed the door open, and the lantern revealed the three
      desperadoes sitting on the floor. Capt. Ned said:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link355" id="link355"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="355.jpg (93K)" src="images/355.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'm Ned Blakely. I've got you under fire. Don't you move without orders&mdash;any
      of you. You two kneel down in the corner; faces to the wall&mdash;now.
      Bill Noakes, put these handcuffs on; now come up close. Quartermaster,
      fasten 'em. All right. Don't stir, sir. Quartermaster, put the key in the
      outside of the door. Now, men, I'm going to lock you two in; and if you
      try to burst through this door&mdash;well, you've heard of me. Bill
      Noakes, fall in ahead, and march. All set. Quartermaster, lock the door."
    </p>
    <p>
      Noakes spent the night on board Blakely's ship, a prisoner under strict
      guard. Early in the morning Capt. Ned called in all the sea-captains in
      the harbor and invited them, with nautical ceremony, to be present on
      board his ship at nine o'clock to witness the hanging of Noakes at the
      yard-arm!
    </p>
    <p>
      "What! The man has not been tried."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Of course he hasn't. But didn't he kill the nigger?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Certainly he did; but you are not thinking of hanging him without a
      trial?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Trial! What do I want to try him for, if he killed the nigger?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, Capt. Ned, this will never do. Think how it will sound."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Sound be hanged! Didn't he kill the nigger?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Certainly, certainly, Capt. Ned,&mdash;nobody denies that,&mdash;but&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Then I'm going to hang him, that's all. Everybody I've talked to talks
      just the same way you do. Everybody says he killed the nigger, everybody
      knows he killed the nigger, and yet every lubber of you wants him tried
      for it. I don't understand such bloody foolishness as that. Tried! Mind
      you, I don't object to trying him, if it's got to be done to give
      satisfaction; and I'll be there, and chip in and help, too; but put it off
      till afternoon&mdash;put it off till afternoon, for I'll have my hands
      middling full till after the burying&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Why, what do you mean? Are you going to hang him any how&mdash;and try
      him afterward?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Didn't I say I was going to hang him? I never saw such people as you.
      What's the difference? You ask a favor, and then you ain't satisfied when
      you get it. Before or after's all one&mdash;you know how the trial will
      go. He killed the nigger. Say&mdash;I must be going. If your mate would
      like to come to the hanging, fetch him along. I like him."
    </p>
    <p>
      There was a stir in the camp. The captains came in a body and pleaded with
      Capt. Ned not to do this rash thing. They promised that they would create
      a court composed of captains of the best character; they would empanel a
      jury; they would conduct everything in a way becoming the serious nature
      of the business in hand, and give the case an impartial hearing and the
      accused a fair trial. And they said it would be murder, and punishable by
      the American courts if he persisted and hung the accused on his ship. They
      pleaded hard. Capt. Ned said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen, I'm not stubborn and I'm not unreasonable. I'm always willing
      to do just as near right as I can. How long will it take?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Probably only a little while."
    </p>
    <p>
      "And can I take him up the shore and hang him as soon as you are done?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "If he is proven guilty he shall be hanged without unnecessary delay."
    </p>
    <p>
      "If he's proven guilty. Great Neptune, ain't he guilty? This beats my
      time. Why you all know he's guilty."
    </p>
    <p>
      But at last they satisfied him that they were projecting nothing
      underhanded. Then he said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, all right. You go on and try him and I'll go down and overhaul his
      conscience and prepare him to go&mdash;like enough he needs it, and I
      don't want to send him off without a show for hereafter."
    </p>
    <p>
      This was another obstacle. They finally convinced him that it was
      necessary to have the accused in court. Then they said they would send a
      guard to bring him.
    </p>
    <p>
      "No, sir, I prefer to fetch him myself&mdash;he don't get out of my hands.
      Besides, I've got to go to the ship to get a rope, anyway."
    </p>
    <p>
      The court assembled with due ceremony, empaneled a jury, and presently
      Capt. Ned entered, leading the prisoner with one hand and carrying a Bible
      and a rope in the other. He seated himself by the side of his captive and
      told the court to "up anchor and make sail." Then he turned a searching
      eye on the jury, and detected Noakes's friends, the two bullies.
    </p>
    <p>
      He strode over and said to them confidentially:
    </p>
    <p>
      "You're here to interfere, you see. Now you vote right, do you hear?&mdash;or
      else there'll be a double-barreled inquest here when this trial's off, and
      your remainders will go home in a couple of baskets."
    </p>
    <p>
      The caution was not without fruit. The jury was a unit&mdash;the verdict.
      "Guilty."
    </p>
    <p>
      Capt. Ned sprung to his feet and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Come along&mdash;you're my meat now, my lad, anyway. Gentlemen you've
      done yourselves proud. I invite you all to come and see that I do it all
      straight. Follow me to the canyon, a mile above here."
    </p>
    <p>
      The court informed him that a sheriff had been appointed to do the
      hanging, and&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      Capt. Ned's patience was at an end. His wrath was boundless. The subject
      of a sheriff was judiciously dropped.
    </p>
    <p>
      When the crowd arrived at the canyon, Capt. Ned climbed a tree and
      arranged the halter, then came down and noosed his man. He opened his
      Bible, and laid aside his hat. Selecting a chapter at random, he read it
      through, in a deep bass voice and with sincere solemnity. Then he said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Lad, you are about to go aloft and give an account of yourself; and the
      lighter a man's manifest is, as far as sin's concerned, the better for
      him. Make a clean breast, man, and carry a log with you that'll bear
      inspection. You killed the nigger?"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link358" id="link358"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="358.jpg (61K)" src="images/358.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      No reply. A long pause.
    </p>
    <p>
      The captain read another chapter, pausing, from time to time, to impress
      the effect. Then he talked an earnest, persuasive sermon to him, and ended
      by repeating the question:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Did you kill the nigger?"
    </p>
    <p>
      No reply&mdash;other than a malignant scowl. The captain now read the
      first and second chapters of Genesis, with deep feeling&mdash;paused a
      moment, closed the book reverently, and said with a perceptible savor of
      satisfaction:
    </p>
    <p>
      "There. Four chapters. There's few that would have took the pains with you
      that I have."
    </p>
    <p>
      Then he swung up the condemned, and made the rope fast; stood by and timed
      him half an hour with his watch, and then delivered the body to the court.
      A little after, as he stood contemplating the motionless figure, a doubt
      came into his face; evidently he felt a twinge of conscience&mdash;a
      misgiving&mdash;and he said with a sigh:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, p'raps I ought to burnt him, maybe. But I was trying to do for the
      best."
    </p>
    <p>
      When the history of this affair reached California (it was in the "early
      days") it made a deal of talk, but did not diminish the captain's
      popularity in any degree. It increased it, indeed. California had a
      population then that "inflicted" justice after a fashion that was
      simplicity and primitiveness itself, and could therefore admire
      appreciatively when the same fashion was followed elsewhere.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link359" id="link359"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="359.jpg (38K)" src="images/359.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch51" id="linkch51"></a>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Vice flourished luxuriantly during the hey-day of our "flush times." The
      saloons were overburdened with custom; so were the police courts, the
      gambling dens, the brothels and the jails&mdash;unfailing signs of high
      prosperity in a mining region&mdash;in any region for that matter. Is it
      not so? A crowded police court docket is the surest of all signs that
      trade is brisk and money plenty. Still, there is one other sign; it comes
      last, but when it does come it establishes beyond cavil that the "flush
      times" are at the flood. This is the birth of the "literary" paper. The
      Weekly Occidental, "devoted to literature," made its appearance in
      Virginia. All the literary people were engaged to write for it. Mr. F. was
      to edit it. He was a felicitous skirmisher with a pen, and a man who could
      say happy things in a crisp, neat way. Once, while editor of the Union, he
      had disposed of a labored, incoherent, two-column attack made upon him by
      a contemporary, with a single line, which, at first glance, seemed to
      contain a solemn and tremendous compliment&mdash;viz.: "THE LOGIC OF OUR
      ADVERSARY RESEMBLES THE PEACE OF GOD,"&mdash;and left it to the reader's
      memory and after-thought to invest the remark with another and "more
      different" meaning by supplying for himself and at his own leisure the
      rest of the Scripture&mdash;"in that it passeth understanding." He once
      said of a little, half-starved, wayside community that had no subsistence
      except what they could get by preying upon chance passengers who stopped
      over with them a day when traveling by the overland stage, that in their
      Church service they had altered the Lord's Prayer to read: "Give us this
      day our daily stranger!"
    </p>
    <p>
      We expected great things of the Occidental. Of course it could not get
      along without an original novel, and so we made arrangements to hurl into
      the work the full strength of the company. Mrs. F. was an able romancist
      of the ineffable school&mdash;I know no other name to apply to a school
      whose heroes are all dainty and all perfect. She wrote the opening
      chapter, and introduced a lovely blonde simpleton who talked nothing but
      pearls and poetry and who was virtuous to the verge of eccentricity. She
      also introduced a young French Duke of aggravated refinement, in love with
      the blonde. Mr. F. followed next week, with a brilliant lawyer who set
      about getting the Duke's estates into trouble, and a sparkling young lady
      of high society who fell to fascinating the Duke and impairing the
      appetite of the blonde. Mr. D., a dark and bloody editor of one of the
      dailies, followed Mr. F., the third week, introducing a mysterious
      Roscicrucian who transmuted metals, held consultations with the devil in a
      cave at dead of night, and cast the horoscope of the several heroes and
      heroines in such a way as to provide plenty of trouble for their future
      careers and breed a solemn and awful public interest in the novel. He also
      introduced a cloaked and masked melodramatic miscreant, put him on a
      salary and set him on the midnight track of the Duke with a poisoned
      dagger. He also created an Irish coachman with a rich brogue and placed
      him in the service of the society-young-lady with an ulterior mission to
      carry billet-doux to the Duke.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link361" id="link361"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="361.jpg (79K)" src="images/361.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      About this time there arrived in Virginia a dissolute stranger with a
      literary turn of mind&mdash;rather seedy he was, but very quiet and
      unassuming; almost diffident, indeed. He was so gentle, and his manners
      were so pleasing and kindly, whether he was sober or intoxicated, that he
      made friends of all who came in contact with him. He applied for literary
      work, offered conclusive evidence that he wielded an easy and practiced
      pen, and so Mr. F. engaged him at once to help write the novel. His
      chapter was to follow Mr. D.'s, and mine was to come next. Now what does
      this fellow do but go off and get drunk and then proceed to his quarters
      and set to work with his imagination in a state of chaos, and that chaos
      in a condition of extravagant activity. The result may be guessed. He
      scanned the chapters of his predecessors, found plenty of heroes and
      heroines already created, and was satisfied with them; he decided to
      introduce no more; with all the confidence that whisky inspires and all
      the easy complacency it gives to its servant, he then launched himself
      lovingly into his work: he married the coachman to the society-young-lady
      for the sake of the scandal; married the Duke to the blonde's stepmother,
      for the sake of the sensation; stopped the desperado's salary; created a
      misunderstanding between the devil and the Roscicrucian; threw the Duke's
      property into the wicked lawyer's hands; made the lawyer's upbraiding
      conscience drive him to drink, thence to delirium tremens, thence to
      suicide; broke the coachman's neck; let his widow succumb to contumely,
      neglect, poverty and consumption; caused the blonde to drown herself,
      leaving her clothes on the bank with the customary note pinned to them
      forgiving the Duke and hoping he would be happy; revealed to the Duke, by
      means of the usual strawberry mark on left arm, that he had married his
      own long-lost mother and destroyed his long-lost sister; instituted the
      proper and necessary suicide of the Duke and the Duchess in order to
      compass poetical justice; opened the earth and let the Roscicrucian
      through, accompanied with the accustomed smoke and thunder and smell of
      brimstone, and finished with the promise that in the next chapter, after
      holding a general inquest, he would take up the surviving character of the
      novel and tell what became of the devil!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link362" id="link362"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="362.jpg (39K)" src="images/362.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It read with singular smoothness, and with a "dead" earnestness that was
      funny enough to suffocate a body. But there was war when it came in. The
      other novelists were furious. The mild stranger, not yet more than half
      sober, stood there, under a scathing fire of vituperation, meek and
      bewildered, looking from one to another of his assailants, and wondering
      what he could have done to invoke such a storm. When a lull came at last,
      he said his say gently and appealingly&mdash;said he did not rightly
      remember what he had written, but was sure he had tried to do the best he
      could, and knew his object had been to make the novel not only pleasant
      and plausible but instructive and&mdash;&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      The bombardment began again. The novelists assailed his ill-chosen
      adjectives and demolished them with a storm of denunciation and ridicule.
      And so the siege went on. Every time the stranger tried to appease the
      enemy he only made matters worse. Finally he offered to rewrite the
      chapter. This arrested hostilities. The indignation gradually quieted
      down, peace reigned again and the sufferer retired in safety and got him
      to his own citadel.
    </p>
    <p>
      But on the way thither the evil angel tempted him and he got drunk again.
      And again his imagination went mad. He led the heroes and heroines a
      wilder dance than ever; and yet all through it ran that same convincing
      air of honesty and earnestness that had marked his first work. He got the
      characters into the most extraordinary situations, put them through the
      most surprising performances, and made them talk the strangest talk! But
      the chapter cannot be described. It was symmetrically crazy; it was
      artistically absurd; and it had explanatory footnotes that were fully as
      curious as the text. I remember one of the "situations," and will offer it
      as an example of the whole. He altered the character of the brilliant
      lawyer, and made him a great-hearted, splendid fellow; gave him fame and
      riches, and set his age at thirty-three years. Then he made the blonde
      discover, through the help of the Roscicrucian and the melodramatic
      miscreant, that while the Duke loved her money ardently and wanted it, he
      secretly felt a sort of leaning toward the society-young-lady. Stung to
      the quick, she tore her affections from him and bestowed them with tenfold
      power upon the lawyer, who responded with consuming zeal. But the parents
      would none of it. What they wanted in the family was a Duke; and a Duke
      they were determined to have; though they confessed that next to the Duke
      the lawyer had their preference. Necessarily the blonde now went into a
      decline. The parents were alarmed. They pleaded with her to marry the
      Duke, but she steadfastly refused, and pined on. Then they laid a plan.
      They told her to wait a year and a day, and if at the end of that time she
      still felt that she could not marry the Duke, she might marry the lawyer
      with their full consent. The result was as they had foreseen: gladness
      came again, and the flush of returning health. Then the parents took the
      next step in their scheme. They had the family physician recommend a long
      sea voyage and much land travel for the thorough restoration of the
      blonde's strength; and they invited the Duke to be of the party. They
      judged that the Duke's constant presence and the lawyer's protracted
      absence would do the rest&mdash;for they did not invite the lawyer.
    </p>
    <p>
      So they set sail in a steamer for America&mdash;and the third day out,
      when their sea-sickness called truce and permitted them to take their
      first meal at the public table, behold there sat the lawyer! The Duke and
      party made the best of an awkward situation; the voyage progressed, and
      the vessel neared America.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link365" id="link365"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="365.jpg (74K)" src="images/365.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But, by and by, two hundred miles off New Bedford, the ship took fire; she
      burned to the water's edge; of all her crew and passengers, only thirty
      were saved. They floated about the sea half an afternoon and all night
      long. Among them were our friends. The lawyer, by superhuman exertions,
      had saved the blonde and her parents, swimming back and forth two hundred
      yards and bringing one each time&mdash;(the girl first). The Duke had
      saved himself. In the morning two whale ships arrived on the scene and
      sent their boats. The weather was stormy and the embarkation was attended
      with much confusion and excitement. The lawyer did his duty like a man;
      helped his exhausted and insensible blonde, her parents and some others
      into a boat (the Duke helped himself in); then a child fell overboard at
      the other end of the raft and the lawyer rushed thither and helped half a
      dozen people fish it out, under the stimulus of its mother's screams. Then
      he ran back&mdash;a few seconds too late&mdash;the blonde's boat was under
      way. So he had to take the other boat, and go to the other ship. The storm
      increased and drove the vessels out of sight of each other&mdash;drove
      them whither it would.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link366" id="link366"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="366.jpg (83K)" src="images/366.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      When it calmed, at the end of three days, the blonde's ship was seven
      hundred miles north of Boston and the other about seven hundred south of
      that port. The blonde's captain was bound on a whaling cruise in the North
      Atlantic and could not go back such a distance or make a port without
      orders; such being nautical law. The lawyer's captain was to cruise in the
      North Pacific, and he could not go back or make a port without orders. All
      the lawyer's money and baggage were in the blonde's boat and went to the
      blonde's ship&mdash;so his captain made him work his passage as a common
      sailor. When both ships had been cruising nearly a year, the one was off
      the coast of Greenland and the other in Behring's Strait. The blonde had
      long ago been well-nigh persuaded that her lawyer had been washed
      overboard and lost just before the whale ships reached the raft, and now,
      under the pleadings of her parents and the Duke she was at last beginning
      to nerve herself for the doom of the covenant, and prepare for the hated
      marriage.
    </p>
    <p>
      But she would not yield a day before the date set. The weeks dragged on,
      the time narrowed, orders were given to deck the ship for the wedding&mdash;a
      wedding at sea among icebergs and walruses. Five days more and all would
      be over. So the blonde reflected, with a sigh and a tear. Oh where was her
      true love&mdash;and why, why did he not come and save her? At that moment
      he was lifting his harpoon to strike a whale in Behring's Strait, five
      thousand miles away, by the way of the Arctic Ocean, or twenty thousand by
      the way of the Horn&mdash;that was the reason. He struck, but not with
      perfect aim&mdash;his foot slipped and he fell in the whale's mouth and
      went down his throat. He was insensible five days. Then he came to himself
      and heard voices; daylight was streaming through a hole cut in the whale's
      roof. He climbed out and astonished the sailors who were hoisting blubber
      up a ship's side. He recognized the vessel, flew aboard, surprised the
      wedding party at the altar and exclaimed:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Stop the proceedings&mdash;I'm here! Come to my arms, my own!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link367" id="link367"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="367.jpg (88K)" src="images/367.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      There were foot-notes to this extravagant piece of literature wherein the
      author endeavored to show that the whole thing was within the
      possibilities; he said he got the incident of the whale traveling from
      Behring's Strait to the coast of Greenland, five thousand miles in five
      days, through the Arctic Ocean, from Charles Reade's "Love Me Little Love
      Me Long," and considered that that established the fact that the thing
      could be done; and he instanced Jonah's adventure as proof that a man
      could live in a whale's belly, and added that if a preacher could stand it
      three days a lawyer could surely stand it five!
    </p>
    <p>
      There was a fiercer storm than ever in the editorial sanctum now, and the
      stranger was peremptorily discharged, and his manuscript flung at his
      head. But he had already delayed things so much that there was not time
      for some one else to rewrite the chapter, and so the paper came out
      without any novel in it. It was but a feeble, struggling, stupid journal,
      and the absence of the novel probably shook public confidence; at any
      rate, before the first side of the next issue went to press, the Weekly
      Occidental died as peacefully as an infant.
    </p>
    <p>
      An effort was made to resurrect it, with the proposed advantage of a
      telling new title, and Mr. F. said that The Phenix would be just the name
      for it, because it would give the idea of a resurrection from its dead
      ashes in a new and undreamed of condition of splendor; but some low-
      priced smarty on one of the dailies suggested that we call it the Lazarus;
      and inasmuch as the people were not profound in Scriptural matters but
      thought the resurrected Lazarus and the dilapidated mendicant that begged
      in the rich man's gateway were one and the same person, the name became
      the laughing stock of the town, and killed the paper for good and all.
    </p>
    <p>
      I was sorry enough, for I was very proud of being connected with a
      literary paper&mdash;prouder than I have ever been of anything since,
      perhaps. I had written some rhymes for it&mdash;poetry I considered it&mdash;and
      it was a great grief to me that the production was on the "first side" of
      the issue that was not completed, and hence did not see the light. But
      time brings its revenges&mdash;I can put it in here; it will answer in
      place of a tear dropped to the memory of the lost Occidental. The idea
      (not the chief idea, but the vehicle that bears it) was probably suggested
      by the old song called "The Raging Canal," but I cannot remember now. I do
      remember, though, that at that time I thought my doggerel was one of the
      ablest poems of the age:
    </p>
    <h3>
      THE AGED PILOT MAN.
    </h3>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        On the Erie Canal, it was,<br /> All on a summer's day,<br /> I sailed
        forth with my parents<br /> Far away to Albany.
      </p>
      <p>
        From out the clouds at noon that day<br /> There came a dreadful storm,<br />
        That piled the billows high about,<br /> And filled us with alarm.
      </p>
      <p>
        A man came rushing from a house,<br /> Saying, "Snub up your boat I pray,<br />
        [The customary canal technicality for 'tie up.']<br /> Snub up your boat,
        snub up, alas,<br /> Snub up while yet you may."
      </p>
      <p>
        Our captain cast one glance astern,<br /> Then forward glanced he,<br />
        And said, "My wife and little ones<br /> I never more shall see."
      </p>
      <p>
        Said Dollinger the pilot man,<br /> In noble words, but few,--<br /> "Fear
        not, but lean on Dollinger,<br /> And he will fetch you through."
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link370" id="link370"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="370.jpg (53K)" src="images/370.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        The boat drove on, the frightened mules<br /> Tore through the rain and
        wind,<br /> And bravely still, in danger's post,<br /> The whip-boy strode
        behind.
      </p>
      <p>
        "Come 'board, come 'board," the captain cried,<br /> "Nor tempt so wild a
        storm;"<br /> But still the raging mules advanced,<br /> And still the boy
        strode on.
      </p>
      <p>
        Then said the captain to us all,<br /> "Alas, 'tis plain to me,<br /> The
        greater danger is not there,<br /> But here upon the sea.
      </p>
      <p>
        "So let us strive, while life remains,<br /> To save all souls on board,<br />
        And then if die at last we must,<br /> Let . &nbsp;. &nbsp;. &nbsp;.
        &nbsp;I cannot speak the word!"
      </p>
      <p>
        Said Dollinger the pilot man,<br /> Tow'ring above the crew,<br /> "Fear
        not, but trust in Dollinger,<br /> And he will fetch you through."
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link371" id="link371"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="371.jpg (102K)" src="images/371.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "Low bridge! &nbsp;low bridge!" all heads went down,<br /> The laboring
        bark sped on;<br /> A mill we passed, we passed church,<br /> Hamlets, and
        fields of corn;<br /> And all the world came out to see,<br /> And chased
        along the shore<br /> Crying, "Alas, alas, the sheeted rain,<br /> The
        wind, the tempest's roar!<br /> Alas, the gallant ship and crew,<br /> Can
        nothing help them more?"
      </p>
      <p>
        And from our deck sad eyes looked out<br /> Across the stormy scene:<br />
        The tossing wake of billows aft,<br /> The bending forests green,<br />
        The chickens sheltered under carts<br /> In lee of barn the cows,<br />
        The skurrying swine with straw in mouth,<br /> The wild spray from our
        bows!
      </p>
      <p>
        "She balances!<br /> She wavers!<br /> Now let her go about!<br /> If she
        misses stays and broaches to,<br /> We're all"--then with a shout,<br />
        "Huray! &nbsp;huray!<br /> Avast! &nbsp;belay!<br /> Take in more sail!<br />
        Lord, what a gale!<br /> Ho, boy, haul taut on the hind mule's tail!"<br />
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link372" id="link372"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="372.jpg (105K)" src="images/372.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "Ho! &nbsp;lighten ship! &nbsp;ho! &nbsp;man the pump!<br /> Ho, hostler,
        heave the lead!"
      </p>
      <p>
        "A quarter-three!--'tis shoaling fast!<br /> Three feet large!--t-h-r-e-e
        feet!--<br /> Three feet scant!" I cried in fright<br /> "Oh, is there no
        retreat?"
      </p>
      <p>
        Said Dollinger, the pilot man,<br /> As on the vessel flew,<br /> "Fear
        not, but trust in Dollinger,<br /> And he will fetch you through."
      </p>
      <p>
        A panic struck the bravest hearts,<br /> The boldest cheek turned pale;<br />
        For plain to all, this shoaling said<br /> A leak had burst the ditch's
        bed!<br /> And, straight as bolt from crossbow sped,<br /> Our ship swept
        on, with shoaling lead,<br /> Before the fearful gale!
      </p>
      <p>
        "Sever the tow-line! &nbsp;Cripple the mules!"<br /> Too late! &nbsp;There
        comes a shock!<br /> Another length, and the fated craft<br /> Would have
        swum in the saving lock!
      </p>
      <p>
        Then gathered together the shipwrecked crew<br /> And took one last
        embrace,<br /> While sorrowful tears from despairing eyes<br /> Ran down
        each hopeless face;<br /> And some did think of their little ones<br />
        Whom they never more might see,<br /> And others of waiting wives at
        home,<br /> And mothers that grieved would be.
      </p>
      <p>
        But of all the children of misery there<br /> On that poor sinking frame,<br />
        But one spake words of hope and faith,<br /> And I worshipped as they
        came:<br /> Said Dollinger the pilot man,--<br /> (O brave heart, strong
        and true!)--<br /> "Fear not, but trust in Dollinger,<br /> For he will
        fetch you through."
      </p>
      <p>
        Lo! &nbsp;scarce the words have passed his lips<br /> The dauntless
        prophet say'th,<br /> When every soul about him seeth<br /> A wonder crown
        his faith!
      </p>
      <p>
        "And count ye all, both great and small,<br /> As numbered with the dead:<br />
        For mariner for forty year,<br /> On Erie, boy and man,<br /> I never yet
        saw such a storm,<br /> Or one't with it began!"
      </p>
      <p>
        So overboard a keg of nails<br /> And anvils three we threw,<br />
        Likewise four bales of gunny-sacks,<br /> Two hundred pounds of glue,<br />
        Two sacks of corn, four ditto wheat,<br /> A box of books, a cow,<br /> A
        violin, Lord Byron's works,<br /> A rip-saw and a sow.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link374" id="link374"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="374.jpg (67K)" src="images/374.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        A curve! &nbsp;a curve! &nbsp;the dangers grow!<br />
        "Labbord!--stabbord!--s-t-e-a-d-y!--so!--<br /> Hard-a-port,
        Dol!--hellum-a-lee!<br /> Haw the head mule!--the aft one gee!<br />
        Luff!--bring her to the wind!"
      </p>
      <p>
        For straight a farmer brought a plank,--<br /> (Mysteriously inspired)--<br />
        And laying it unto the ship,<br /> In silent awe retired.
      </p>
      <p>
        Then every sufferer stood amazed<br /> That pilot man before;<br /> A
        moment stood. &nbsp;Then wondering turned,<br /> And speechless walked
        ashore.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <a name="link375" id="link375"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="375.jpg (82K)" src="images/375.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch52" id="linkch52"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Since I desire, in this chapter, to say an instructive word or two about
      the silver mines, the reader may take this fair warning and skip, if he
      chooses. The year 1863 was perhaps the very top blossom and culmination of
      the "flush times." Virginia swarmed with men and vehicles to that degree
      that the place looked like a very hive&mdash;that is when one's vision
      could pierce through the thick fog of alkali dust that was generally
      blowing in summer. I will say, concerning this dust, that if you drove ten
      miles through it, you and your horses would be coated with it a sixteenth
      of an inch thick and present an outside appearance that was a uniform pale
      yellow color, and your buggy would have three inches of dust in it, thrown
      there by the wheels. The delicate scales used by the assayers were
      inclosed in glass cases intended to be air-tight, and yet some of this
      dust was so impalpable and so invisibly fine that it would get in,
      somehow, and impair the accuracy of those scales.
    </p>
    <p>
      Speculation ran riot, and yet there was a world of substantial business
      going on, too. All freights were brought over the mountains from
      California (150 miles) by pack-train partly, and partly in huge wagons
      drawn by such long mule teams that each team amounted to a procession, and
      it did seem, sometimes, that the grand combined procession of animals
      stretched unbroken from Virginia to California. Its long route was
      traceable clear across the deserts of the Territory by the writhing
      serpent of dust it lifted up. By these wagons, freights over that hundred
      and fifty miles were $200 a ton for small lots (same price for all express
      matter brought by stage), and $100 a ton for full loads. One Virginia firm
      received one hundred tons of freight a month, and paid $10,000 a month
      freightage. In the winter the freights were much higher. All the bullion
      was shipped in bars by stage to San Francisco (a bar was usually about
      twice the size of a pig of lead and contained from $1,500 to $3,000
      according to the amount of gold mixed with the silver), and the freight on
      it (when the shipment was large) was one and a quarter per cent. of its
      intrinsic value.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link377" id="link377"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="377.jpg (16K)" src="images/377.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      So, the freight on these bars probably averaged something more than $25
      each. Small shippers paid two per cent. There were three stages a day,
      each way, and I have seen the out-going stages carry away a third of a ton
      of bullion each, and more than once I saw them divide a two-ton lot and
      take it off. However, these were extraordinary events. [Mr. Valentine,
      Wells Fargo's agent, has handled all the bullion shipped through the
      Virginia office for many a month. To his memory&mdash;which is excellent&mdash;we
      are indebted for the following exhibit of the company's business in the
      Virginia office since the first of January, 1862: From January 1st to
      April 1st, about $270,000 worth of bullion passed through that office,
      during the next quarter, $570,000; next quarter, $800,000; next quarter,
      $956,000; next quarter, $1,275,000; and for the quarter ending on the 30th
      of last June, about $1,600,000. Thus in a year and a half, the Virginia
      office only shipped $5,330,000 in bullion. During the year 1862 they
      shipped $2,615,000, so we perceive the average shipments have more than
      doubled in the last six months. This gives us room to promise for the
      Virginia office $500,000 a month for the year 1863 (though perhaps,
      judging by the steady increase in the business, we are under estimating,
      somewhat). This gives us $6,000,000 for the year. Gold Hill and Silver
      City together can beat us&mdash;we will give them $10,000,000. To Dayton,
      Empire City, Ophir and Carson City, we will allow an aggregate of
      $8,000,000, which is not over the mark, perhaps, and may possibly be a
      little under it. To Esmeralda we give $4,000,000. To Reese River and
      Humboldt $2,000,000, which is liberal now, but may not be before the year
      is out. So we prognosticate that the yield of bullion this year will be
      about $30,000,000. Placing the number of mills in the Territory at one
      hundred, this gives to each the labor of producing $300,000 in bullion
      during the twelve months. Allowing them to run three hundred days in the
      year (which none of them more than do), this makes their work average
      $1,000 a day. Say the mills average twenty tons of rock a day and this
      rock worth $50 as a general thing, and you have the actual work of our one
      hundred mills figured down "to a spot"&mdash;$1,000 a day each, and
      $30,000,000 a year in the aggregate.&mdash;Enterprise. [A considerable
      over estimate&mdash;M. T.]]
    </p>
    <p>
      Two tons of silver bullion would be in the neighborhood of forty bars, and
      the freight on it over $1,000. Each coach always carried a deal of
      ordinary express matter beside, and also from fifteen to twenty passengers
      at from $25 to $30 a head. With six stages going all the time, Wells,
      Fargo and Co.'s Virginia City business was important and lucrative.
    </p>
    <p>
      All along under the centre of Virginia and Gold Hill, for a couple of
      miles, ran the great Comstock silver lode&mdash;a vein of ore from fifty
      to eighty feet thick between its solid walls of rock&mdash;a vein as wide
      as some of New York's streets. I will remind the reader that in
      Pennsylvania a coal vein only eight feet wide is considered ample.
    </p>
    <p>
      Virginia was a busy city of streets and houses above ground. Under it was
      another busy city, down in the bowels of the earth, where a great
      population of men thronged in and out among an intricate maze of tunnels
      and drifts, flitting hither and thither under a winking sparkle of lights,
      and over their heads towered a vast web of interlocking timbers that held
      the walls of the gutted Comstock apart. These timbers were as large as a
      man's body, and the framework stretched upward so far that no eye could
      pierce to its top through the closing gloom. It was like peering up
      through the clean-picked ribs and bones of some colossal skeleton. Imagine
      such a framework two miles long, sixty feet wide, and higher than any
      church spire in America. Imagine this stately lattice- work stretching
      down Broadway, from the St. Nicholas to Wall street, and a Fourth of July
      procession, reduced to pigmies, parading on top of it and flaunting their
      flags, high above the pinnacle of Trinity steeple. One can imagine that,
      but he cannot well imagine what that forest of timbers cost, from the time
      they were felled in the pineries beyond Washoe Lake, hauled up and around
      Mount Davidson at atrocious rates of freightage, then squared, let down
      into the deep maw of the mine and built up there. Twenty ample fortunes
      would not timber one of the greatest of those silver mines. The Spanish
      proverb says it requires a gold mine to "run" a silver one, and it is
      true. A beggar with a silver mine is a pitiable pauper indeed if he cannot
      sell.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link379" id="link379"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="379.jpg (47K)" src="images/379.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I spoke of the underground Virginia as a city. The Gould and Curry is only
      one single mine under there, among a great many others; yet the Gould and
      Curry's streets of dismal drifts and tunnels were five miles in extent,
      altogether, and its population five hundred miners. Taken as a whole, the
      underground city had some thirty miles of streets and a population of five
      or six thousand. In this present day some of those populations are at work
      from twelve to sixteen hundred feet under Virginia and Gold Hill, and the
      signal-bells that tell them what the superintendent above ground desires
      them to do are struck by telegraph as we strike a fire alarm. Sometimes
      men fall down a shaft, there, a thousand feet deep. In such cases, the
      usual plan is to hold an inquest.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link380" id="link380"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="380.jpg (161K)" src="images/380.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      If you wish to visit one of those mines, you may walk through a tunnel
      about half a mile long if you prefer it, or you may take the quicker plan
      of shooting like a dart down a shaft, on a small platform. It is like
      tumbling down through an empty steeple, feet first. When you reach the
      bottom, you take a candle and tramp through drifts and tunnels where
      throngs of men are digging and blasting; you watch them send up tubs full
      of great lumps of stone&mdash;silver ore; you select choice specimens from
      the mass, as souvenirs; you admire the world of skeleton timbering; you
      reflect frequently that you are buried under a mountain, a thousand feet
      below daylight; being in the bottom of the mine you climb from "gallery"
      to "gallery," up endless ladders that stand straight up and down; when
      your legs fail you at last, you lie down in a small box-car in a cramped
      "incline" like a half-up-ended sewer and are dragged up to daylight
      feeling as if you are crawling through a coffin that has no end to it.
      Arrived at the top, you find a busy crowd of men receiving the ascending
      cars and tubs and dumping the ore from an elevation into long rows of bins
      capable of holding half a dozen tons each; under the bins are rows of
      wagons loading from chutes and trap-doors in the bins, and down the long
      street is a procession of these wagons wending toward the silver mills
      with their rich freight. It is all "done," now, and there you are. You
      need never go down again, for you have seen it all. If you have forgotten
      the process of reducing the ore in the mill and making the silver bars,
      you can go back and find it again in my Esmeralda chapters if so disposed.
    </p>
    <p>
      Of course these mines cave in, in places, occasionally, and then it is
      worth one's while to take the risk of descending into them and observing
      the crushing power exerted by the pressing weight of a settling mountain.
      I published such an experience in the Enterprise, once, and from it I will
      take an extract:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        AN HOUR IN THE CAVED MINES.&mdash;We journeyed down into the Ophir mine,
        yesterday, to see the earthquake. We could not go down the deep incline,
        because it still has a propensity to cave in places. Therefore we
        traveled through the long tunnel which enters the hill above the Ophir
        office, and then by means of a series of long ladders, climbed away down
        from the first to the fourth gallery. Traversing a drift, we came to the
        Spanish line, passed five sets of timbers still uninjured, and found the
        earthquake. Here was as complete a chaos as ever was seen&mdash;vast
        masses of earth and splintered and broken timbers piled confusedly
        together, with scarcely an aperture left large enough for a cat to creep
        through. Rubbish was still falling at intervals from above, and one
        timber which had braced others earlier in the day, was now crushed down
        out of its former position, showing that the caving and settling of the
        tremendous mass was still going on. We were in that portion of the Ophir
        known as the "north mines." Returning to the surface, we entered a
        tunnel leading into the Central, for the purpose of getting into the
        main Ophir. Descending a long incline in this tunnel, we traversed a
        drift or so, and then went down a deep shaft from whence we proceeded
        into the fifth gallery of the Ophir. From a side-drift we crawled
        through a small hole and got into the midst of the earthquake again&mdash;earth
        and broken timbers mingled together without regard to grace or symmetry.
        A large portion of the second, third and fourth galleries had caved in
        and gone to destruction&mdash;the two latter at seven o'clock on the
        previous evening.
      </p>
      <p>
        At the turn-table, near the northern extremity of the fifth gallery, two
        big piles of rubbish had forced their way through from the fifth
        gallery, and from the looks of the timbers, more was about to come.
        These beams are solid&mdash;eighteen inches square; first, a great beam
        is laid on the floor, then upright ones, five feet high, stand on it,
        supporting another horizontal beam, and so on, square above square, like
        the framework of a window. The superincumbent weight was sufficient to
        mash the ends of those great upright beams fairly into the solid wood of
        the horizontal ones three inches, compressing and bending the upright
        beam till it curved like a bow. Before the Spanish caved in, some of
        their twelve-inch horizontal timbers were compressed in this way until
        they were only five inches thick! Imagine the power it must take to
        squeeze a solid log together in that way. Here, also, was a range of
        timbers, for a distance of twenty feet, tilted six inches out of the
        perpendicular by the weight resting upon them from the caved galleries
        above. You could hear things cracking and giving way, and it was not
        pleasant to know that the world overhead was slowly and silently sinking
        down upon you. The men down in the mine do not mind it, however.
      </p>
      <p>
        Returning along the fifth gallery, we struck the safe part of the Ophir
        incline, and went down it to the sixth; but we found ten inches of water
        there, and had to come back. In repairing the damage done to the
        incline, the pump had to be stopped for two hours, and in the meantime
        the water gained about a foot. However, the pump was at work again, and
        the flood-water was decreasing. We climbed up to the fifth gallery again
        and sought a deep shaft, whereby we might descend to another part of the
        sixth, out of reach of the water, but suffered disappointment, as the
        men had gone to dinner, and there was no one to man the windlass. So,
        having seen the earthquake, we climbed out at the Union incline and
        tunnel, and adjourned, all dripping with candle grease and perspiration,
        to lunch at the Ophir office.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      During the great flush year of 1863, Nevada [claims to have] produced
      $25,000,000 in bullion&mdash;almost, if not quite, a round million to each
      thousand inhabitants, which is very well, considering that she was without
      agriculture and manufactures. Silver mining was her sole productive
      industry.
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        [Since the above was in type, I learn from an official source that the
        above figure is too high, and that the yield for 1863 did not exceed
        $20,000,000.] However, the day for large figures is approaching; the
        Sutro Tunnel is to plow through the Comstock lode from end to end, at a
        depth of two thousand feet, and then mining will be easy and
        comparatively inexpensive; and the momentous matters of drainage, and
        hoisting and hauling of ore will cease to be burdensome. This vast work
        will absorb many years, and millions of dollars, in its completion; but
        it will early yield money, for that desirable epoch will begin as soon
        as it strikes the first end of the vein. The tunnel will be some eight
        miles long, and will develop astonishing riches. Cars will carry the ore
        through the tunnel and dump it in the mills and thus do away with the
        present costly system of double handling and transportation by mule
        teams. The water from the tunnel will furnish the motive power for the
        mills. Mr. Sutro, the originator of this prodigious enterprise, is one
        of the few men in the world who is gifted with the pluck and
        perseverance necessary to follow up and hound such an undertaking to its
        completion. He has converted several obstinate Congresses to a deserved
        friendliness toward his important work, and has gone up and down and to
        and fro in Europe until he has enlisted a great moneyed interest in it
        there.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch53" id="linkch53"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Every now and then, in these days, the boys used to tell me I ought to get
      one Jim Blaine to tell me the stirring story of his grandfather's old ram&mdash;but
      they always added that I must not mention the matter unless Jim was drunk
      at the time&mdash;just comfortably and sociably drunk. They kept this up
      until my curiosity was on the rack to hear the story. I got to haunting
      Blaine; but it was of no use, the boys always found fault with his
      condition; he was often moderately but never satisfactorily drunk. I never
      watched a man's condition with such absorbing interest, such anxious
      solicitude; I never so pined to see a man uncompromisingly drunk before.
      At last, one evening I hurried to his cabin, for I learned that this time
      his situation was such that even the most fastidious could find no fault
      with it&mdash;he was tranquilly, serenely, symmetrically drunk&mdash;not a
      hiccup to mar his voice, not a cloud upon his brain thick enough to
      obscure his memory. As I entered, he was sitting upon an empty powder-
      keg, with a clay pipe in one hand and the other raised to command silence.
      His face was round, red, and very serious; his throat was bare and his
      hair tumbled; in general appearance and costume he was a stalwart miner of
      the period. On the pine table stood a candle, and its dim light revealed
      "the boys" sitting here and there on bunks, candle-boxes, powder-kegs,
      etc. They said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Sh&mdash;! Don't speak&mdash;he's going to commence."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link384" id="link384"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="384.jpg (53K)" src="images/384.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h3>
      THE STORY OF THE OLD RAM.
    </h3>
    <p>
      I found a seat at once, and Blaine said:
    </p>
    <p>
      'I don't reckon them times will ever come again. There never was a more
      bullier old ram than what he was. Grandfather fetched him from Illinois&mdash;got
      him of a man by the name of Yates&mdash;Bill Yates&mdash;maybe you might
      have heard of him; his father was a deacon&mdash;Baptist&mdash;and he was
      a rustler, too; a man had to get up ruther early to get the start of old
      Thankful Yates; it was him that put the Greens up to jining teams with my
      grandfather when he moved west.
    </p>
    <p>
      'Seth Green was prob'ly the pick of the flock; he married a Wilkerson&mdash;Sarah
      Wilkerson&mdash;good cretur, she was&mdash;one of the likeliest heifers
      that was ever raised in old Stoddard, everybody said that knowed her. She
      could heft a bar'l of flour as easy as I can flirt a flapjack. And spin?
      Don't mention it! Independent? Humph! When Sile Hawkins come a browsing
      around her, she let him know that for all his tin he couldn't trot in
      harness alongside of her. You see, Sile Hawkins was&mdash;no, it warn't
      Sile Hawkins, after all&mdash;it was a galoot by the name of Filkins&mdash;I
      disremember his first name; but he was a stump&mdash;come into pra'r
      meeting drunk, one night, hooraying for Nixon, becuz he thought it was a
      primary; and old deacon Ferguson up and scooted him through the window and
      he lit on old Miss Jefferson's head, poor old filly.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link385" id="link385"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="385.jpg (52K)" src="images/385.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      She was a good soul&mdash;had a glass eye and used to lend it to old Miss
      Wagner, that hadn't any, to receive company in; it warn't big enough, and
      when Miss Wagner warn't noticing, it would get twisted around in the
      socket, and look up, maybe, or out to one side, and every which way, while
      t' other one was looking as straight ahead as a spy-glass.
    </p>
    <p>
      'Grown people didn't mind it, but it most always made the children cry, it
      was so sort of scary. She tried packing it in raw cotton, but it wouldn't
      work, somehow&mdash;the cotton would get loose and stick out and look so
      kind of awful that the children couldn't stand it no way.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link386" id="link386"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="386.jpg (26K)" src="images/386.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      She was always dropping it out, and turning up her old dead-light on the
      company empty, and making them oncomfortable, becuz she never could tell
      when it hopped out, being blind on that side, you see. So somebody would
      have to hunch her and say, "Your game eye has fetched loose. Miss Wagner
      dear"&mdash;and then all of them would have to sit and wait till she
      jammed it in again&mdash;wrong side before, as a general thing, and green
      as a bird's egg, being a bashful cretur and easy sot back before company.
      But being wrong side before warn't much difference, anyway; becuz her own
      eye was sky- blue and the glass one was yaller on the front side, so
      whichever way she turned it it didn't match nohow.
    </p>
    <p>
      'Old Miss Wagner was considerable on the borrow, she was. When she had a
      quilting, or Dorcas S'iety at her house she gen'ally borrowed Miss
      Higgins's wooden leg to stump around on; it was considerable shorter than
      her other pin, but much she minded that. She said she couldn't abide
      crutches when she had company, becuz they were so slow; said when she had
      company and things had to be done, she wanted to get up and hump herself.
      She was as bald as a jug, and so she used to borrow Miss Jacops's wig&mdash;Miss
      Jacops was the coffin-peddler's wife&mdash;a ratty old buzzard, he was,
      that used to go roosting around where people was sick, waiting for 'em;
      and there that old rip would sit all day, in the shade, on a coffin that
      he judged would fit the can'idate; and if it was a slow customer and kind
      of uncertain, he'd fetch his rations and a blanket along and sleep in the
      coffin nights. He was anchored out that way, in frosty weather, for about
      three weeks, once, before old Robbins's place, waiting for him; and after
      that, for as much as two years, Jacops was not on speaking terms with the
      old man, on account of his disapp'inting him. He got one of his feet
      froze, and lost money, too, becuz old Robbins took a favorable turn and
      got well.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link387" id="link387"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="387.jpg (61K)" src="images/387.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The next time Robbins got sick, Jacops tried to make up with him, and
      varnished up the same old coffin and fetched it along; but old Robbins was
      too many for him; he had him in, and 'peared to be powerful weak; he
      bought the coffin for ten dollars and Jacops was to pay it back and
      twenty-five more besides if Robbins didn't like the coffin after he'd
      tried it. And then Robbins died, and at the funeral he bursted off the lid
      and riz up in his shroud and told the parson to let up on the
      performances, becuz he could not stand such a coffin as that. You see he
      had been in a trance once before, when he was young, and he took the
      chances on another, cal'lating that if he made the trip it was money in
      his pocket, and if he missed fire he couldn't lose a cent. And by George
      he sued Jacops for the rhino and got jedgment; and he set up the coffin in
      his back parlor and said he 'lowed to take his time, now. It was always an
      aggravation to Jacops, the way that miserable old thing acted. He moved
      back to Indiany pretty soon&mdash;went to Wellsville&mdash;Wellsville was
      the place the Hogadorns was from. Mighty fine family. Old Maryland stock.
      Old Squire Hogadorn could carry around more mixed licker, and cuss better
      than most any man I ever see. His second wife was the widder Billings&mdash;she
      that was Becky Martin; her dam was deacon Dunlap's first wife. Her oldest
      child, Maria, married a missionary and died in grace&mdash;et up by the
      savages. They et him, too, poor feller&mdash;biled him. It warn't the
      custom, so they say, but they explained to friends of his'n that went down
      there to bring away his things, that they'd tried missionaries every other
      way and never could get any good out of 'em&mdash;and so it annoyed all
      his relations to find out that that man's life was fooled away just out of
      a dern'd experiment, so to speak. But mind you, there ain't anything ever
      reely lost; everything that people can't understand and don't see the
      reason of does good if you only hold on and give it a fair shake;
      Prov'dence don't fire no blank ca'tridges, boys. That there missionary's
      substance, unbeknowns to himself, actu'ly converted every last one of them
      heathens that took a chance at the barbacue. Nothing ever fetched them but
      that. Don't tell me it was an accident that he was biled. There ain't no
      such a thing as an accident.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link388" id="link388"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="388.jpg (43K)" src="images/388.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      'When my uncle Lem was leaning up agin a scaffolding once, sick, or drunk,
      or suthin, an Irishman with a hod full of bricks fell on him out of the
      third story and broke the old man's back in two places. People said it was
      an accident. Much accident there was about that. He didn't know what he
      was there for, but he was there for a good object. If he hadn't been there
      the Irishman would have been killed. Nobody can ever make me believe
      anything different from that. Uncle Lem's dog was there. Why didn't the
      Irishman fall on the dog? Becuz the dog would a seen him a coming and
      stood from under. That's the reason the dog warn't appinted. A dog can't
      be depended on to carry out a special providence. Mark my words it was a
      put-up thing. Accidents don't happen, boys. Uncle Lem's dog&mdash;I wish
      you could a seen that dog. He was a reglar shepherd&mdash;or ruther he was
      part bull and part shepherd&mdash;splendid animal; belonged to parson
      Hagar before Uncle Lem got him. Parson Hagar belonged to the Western
      Reserve Hagars; prime family; his mother was a Watson; one of his sisters
      married a Wheeler; they settled in Morgan county, and he got nipped by the
      machinery in a carpet factory and went through in less than a quarter of a
      minute; his widder bought the piece of carpet that had his remains wove
      in, and people come a hundred mile to 'tend the funeral. There was
      fourteen yards in the piece.
    </p>
    <p>
      'She wouldn't let them roll him up, but planted him just so&mdash;full
      length. The church was middling small where they preached the funeral, and
      they had to let one end of the coffin stick out of the window. They didn't
      bury him&mdash;they planted one end, and let him stand up, same as a
      monument. And they nailed a sign on it and put&mdash;put on&mdash;put on
      it&mdash;"sacred to&mdash;the m-e-m-o-r-y&mdash;of fourteen y-a-r-d-s&mdash;of
      three-ply&mdash;car&mdash;-pet&mdash;containing all that was&mdash;m-o-r-t-a-l&mdash;of&mdash;of&mdash;W-i-l-l-i-a-m&mdash;W-h-e&mdash;"'
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link389" id="link389"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="389.jpg (111K)" src="images/389.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Jim Blaine had been growing gradually drowsy and drowsier&mdash;his head
      nodded, once, twice, three times&mdash;dropped peacefully upon his breast,
      and he fell tranquilly asleep. The tears were running down the boys'
      cheeks&mdash;they were suffocating with suppressed laughter&mdash;and had
      been from the start, though I had never noticed it. I perceived that I was
      "sold." I learned then that Jim Blaine's peculiarity was that whenever he
      reached a certain stage of intoxication, no human power could keep him
      from setting out, with impressive unction, to tell about a wonderful
      adventure which he had once had with his grandfather's old ram&mdash;and
      the mention of the ram in the first sentence was as far as any man had
      ever heard him get, concerning it. He always maundered off, interminably,
      from one thing to another, till his whisky got the best of him and he fell
      asleep. What the thing was that happened to him and his grandfather's old
      ram is a dark mystery to this day, for nobody has ever yet found out.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link390" id="link390"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="390.jpg (64K)" src="images/390.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch54" id="linkch54"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LIV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Of course there was a large Chinese population in Virginia&mdash;it is the
      case with every town and city on the Pacific coast. They are a harmless
      race when white men either let them alone or treat them no worse than
      dogs; in fact they are almost entirely harmless anyhow, for they seldom
      think of resenting the vilest insults or the cruelest injuries. They are
      quiet, peaceable, tractable, free from drunkenness, and they are as
      industrious as the day is long. A disorderly Chinaman is rare, and a lazy
      one does not exist. So long as a Chinaman has strength to use his hands he
      needs no support from anybody; white men often complain of want of work,
      but a Chinaman offers no such complaint; he always manages to find
      something to do. He is a great convenience to everybody&mdash;even to the
      worst class of white men, for he bears the most of their sins, suffering
      fines for their petty thefts, imprisonment for their robberies, and death
      for their murders. Any white man can swear a Chinaman's life away in the
      courts, but no Chinaman can testify against a white man. Ours is the "land
      of the free"&mdash;nobody denies that&mdash;nobody challenges it. [Maybe
      it is because we won't let other people testify.] As I write, news comes
      that in broad daylight in San Francisco, some boys have stoned an
      inoffensive Chinaman to death, and that although a large crowd witnessed
      the shameful deed, no one interfered.
    </p>
    <p>
      There are seventy thousand (and possibly one hundred thousand) Chinamen on
      the Pacific coast. There were about a thousand in Virginia. They were
      penned into a "Chinese quarter"&mdash;a thing which they do not
      particularly object to, as they are fond of herding together. Their
      buildings were of wood; usually only one story high, and set thickly
      together along streets scarcely wide enough for a wagon to pass through.
      Their quarter was a little removed from the rest of the town. The chief
      employment of Chinamen in towns is to wash clothing. They always send a
      bill, like this below, pinned to the clothes. It is mere ceremony, for it
      does not enlighten the customer much.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link392" id="link392"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="392.jpg (12K)" src="images/392.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Their price for washing was $2.50 per dozen&mdash;rather cheaper than
      white people could afford to wash for at that time. A very common sign on
      the Chinese houses was: "See Yup, Washer and Ironer"; "Hong Wo, Washer";
      "Sam Sing &amp; Ah Hop, Washing." The house servants, cooks, etc., in
      California and Nevada, were chiefly Chinamen. There were few white
      servants and no Chinawomen so employed. Chinamen make good house servants,
      being quick, obedient, patient, quick to learn and tirelessly industrious.
      They do not need to be taught a thing twice, as a general thing. They are
      imitative. If a Chinaman were to see his master break up a centre table,
      in a passion, and kindle a fire with it, that Chinaman would be likely to
      resort to the furniture for fuel forever afterward.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link393" id="link393"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="393.jpg (42K)" src="images/393.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      All Chinamen can read, write and cipher with easy facility&mdash;pity but
      all our petted voters could. In California they rent little patches of
      ground and do a deal of gardening. They will raise surprising crops of
      vegetables on a sand pile. They waste nothing. What is rubbish to a
      Christian, a Chinaman carefully preserves and makes useful in one way or
      another. He gathers up all the old oyster and sardine cans that white
      people throw away, and procures marketable tin and solder from them by
      melting. He gathers up old bones and turns them into manure. In California
      he gets a living out of old mining claims that white men have abandoned as
      exhausted and worthless&mdash;and then the officers come down on him once
      a month with an exorbitant swindle to which the legislature has given the
      broad, general name of "foreign" mining tax, but it is usually inflicted
      on no foreigners but Chinamen. This swindle has in some cases been
      repeated once or twice on the same victim in the course of the same month&mdash;but
      the public treasury was no additionally enriched by it, probably.
    </p>
    <p>
      Chinamen hold their dead in great reverence&mdash;they worship their
      departed ancestors, in fact. Hence, in China, a man's front yard, back
      yard, or any other part of his premises, is made his family burying
      ground, in order that he may visit the graves at any and all times.
      Therefore that huge empire is one mighty cemetery; it is ridged and
      wringled from its centre to its circumference with graves&mdash;and
      inasmuch as every foot of ground must be made to do its utmost, in China,
      lest the swarming population suffer for food, the very graves are
      cultivated and yield a harvest, custom holding this to be no dishonor to
      the dead. Since the departed are held in such worshipful reverence, a
      Chinaman cannot bear that any indignity be offered the places where they
      sleep. Mr. Burlingame said that herein lay China's bitter opposition to
      railroads; a road could not be built anywhere in the empire without
      disturbing the graves of their ancestors or friends.
    </p>
    <p>
      A Chinaman hardly believes he could enjoy the hereafter except his body
      lay in his beloved China; also, he desires to receive, himself, after
      death, that worship with which he has honored his dead that preceded him.
      Therefore, if he visits a foreign country, he makes arrangements to have
      his bones returned to China in case he dies; if he hires to go to a
      foreign country on a labor contract, there is always a stipulation that
      his body shall be taken back to China if he dies; if the government sells
      a gang of Coolies to a foreigner for the usual five-year term, it is
      specified in the contract that their bodies shall be restored to China in
      case of death. On the Pacific coast the Chinamen all belong to one or
      another of several great companies or organizations, and these companies
      keep track of their members, register their names, and ship their bodies
      home when they die. The See Yup Company is held to be the largest of
      these. The Ning Yeong Company is next, and numbers eighteen thousand
      members on the coast. Its headquarters are at San Francisco, where it has
      a costly temple, several great officers (one of whom keeps regal state in
      seclusion and cannot be approached by common humanity), and a numerous
      priesthood. In it I was shown a register of its members, with the dead and
      the date of their shipment to China duly marked. Every ship that sails
      from San Francisco carries away a heavy freight of Chinese corpses&mdash;or
      did, at least, until the legislature, with an ingenious refinement of
      Christian cruelty, forbade the shipments, as a neat underhanded way of
      deterring Chinese immigration. The bill was offered, whether it passed or
      not. It is my impression that it passed. There was another bill&mdash;it
      became a law&mdash;compelling every incoming Chinaman to be vaccinated on
      the wharf and pay a duly appointed quack (no decent doctor would defile
      himself with such legalized robbery) ten dollars for it. As few importers
      of Chinese would want to go to an expense like that, the law-makers
      thought this would be another heavy blow to Chinese immigration.
    </p>
    <p>
      What the Chinese quarter of Virginia was like&mdash;or, indeed, what the
      Chinese quarter of any Pacific coast town was and is like&mdash;may be
      gathered from this item which I printed in the Enterprise while reporting
      for that paper:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        CHINATOWN.&mdash;Accompanied by a fellow reporter, we made a trip
        through our Chinese quarter the other night. The Chinese have built
        their portion of the city to suit themselves; and as they keep neither
        carriages nor wagons, their streets are not wide enough, as a general
        thing, to admit of the passage of vehicles. At ten o'clock at night the
        Chinaman may be seen in all his glory. In every little cooped-up, dingy
        cavern of a hut, faint with the odor of burning Josh-lights and with
        nothing to see the gloom by save the sickly, guttering tallow candle,
        were two or three yellow, long-tailed vagabonds, coiled up on a sort of
        short truckle-bed, smoking opium, motionless and with their lustreless
        eyes turned inward from excess of satisfaction&mdash;or rather the
        recent smoker looks thus, immediately after having passed the pipe to
        his neighbor&mdash;for opium-smoking is a comfortless operation, and
        requires constant attention. A lamp sits on the bed, the length of the
        long pipe-stem from the smoker's mouth; he puts a pellet of opium on the
        end of a wire, sets it on fire, and plasters it into the pipe much as a
        Christian would fill a hole with putty; then he applies the bowl to the
        lamp and proceeds to smoke&mdash;and the stewing and frying of the drug
        and the gurgling of the juices in the stem would well-nigh turn the
        stomach of a statue. John likes it, though; it soothes him, he takes
        about two dozen whiffs, and then rolls over to dream, Heaven only knows
        what, for we could not imagine by looking at the soggy creature.
        Possibly in his visions he travels far away from the gross world and his
        regular washing, and feast on succulent rats and birds'-nests in
        Paradise.
      </p>
      <p>
        Mr. Ah Sing keeps a general grocery and provision store at No. 13 Wang
        street. He lavished his hospitality upon our party in the friendliest
        way. He had various kinds of colored and colorless wines and brandies,
        with unpronouncable names, imported from China in little crockery jugs,
        and which he offered to us in dainty little miniature wash-basins of
        porcelain. He offered us a mess of birds'-nests; also, small, neat
        sausages, of which we could have swallowed several yards if we had
        chosen to try, but we suspected that each link contained the corpse of a
        mouse, and therefore refrained. Mr. Sing had in his store a thousand
        articles of merchandise, curious to behold, impossible to imagine the
        uses of, and beyond our ability to describe.
      </p>
      <p>
        His ducks, however, and his eggs, we could understand; the former were
        split open and flattened out like codfish, and came from China in that
        shape, and the latter were plastered over with some kind of paste which
        kept them fresh and palatable through the long voyage.
      </p>
      <p>
        We found Mr. Hong Wo, No. 37 Chow-chow street, making up a lottery
        scheme&mdash;in fact we found a dozen others occupied in the same way in
        various parts of the quarter, for about every third Chinaman runs a
        lottery, and the balance of the tribe "buck" at it. "Tom," who speaks
        faultless English, and used to be chief and only cook to the Territorial
        Enterprise, when the establishment kept bachelor's hall two years ago,
        said that "Sometime Chinaman buy ticket one dollar hap, ketch um two
        tree hundred, sometime no ketch um anything; lottery like one man fight
        um seventy&mdash;may-be he whip, may-be he get whip heself, welly good."
      </p>
      <p>
        <a name="link396" id="link396"></a> <br /><br />
      </p>
      <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
        <img alt="396.jpg (69K)" src="images/396.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
      </div>
      <p>
        <br /><br />
      </p>
      <p>
        However, the percentage being sixty-nine against him, the chances are,
        as a general thing, that "he get whip heself." We could not see that
        these lotteries differed in any respect from our own, save that the
        figures being Chinese, no ignorant white man might ever hope to succeed
        in telling "t'other from which;" the manner of drawing is similar to
        ours.
      </p>
      <p>
        Mr. See Yup keeps a fancy store on Live Fox street. He sold us fans of
        white feathers, gorgeously ornamented; perfumery that smelled like
        Limburger cheese, Chinese pens, and watch-charms made of a stone
        unscratchable with steel instruments, yet polished and tinted like the
        inner coat of a sea-shell. As tokens of his esteem, See Yup presented
        the party with gaudy plumes made of gold tinsel and trimmed with
        peacocks' feathers.
      </p>
      <p>
        We ate chow-chow with chop-sticks in the celestial restaurants; our
        comrade chided the moon-eyed damsels in front of the houses for their
        want of feminine reserve; we received protecting Josh-lights from our
        hosts and "dickered" for a pagan God or two. Finally, we were impressed
        with the genius of a Chinese book-keeper; he figured up his accounts on
        a machine like a gridiron with buttons strung on its bars; the different
        rows represented units, tens, hundreds and thousands. He fingered them
        with incredible rapidity&mdash;in fact, he pushed them from place to
        place as fast as a musical professor's fingers travel over the keys of a
        piano.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      They are a kindly disposed, well-meaning race, and are respected and well
      treated by the upper classes, all over the Pacific coast. No Californian
      gentleman or lady ever abuses or oppresses a Chinaman, under any
      circumstances, an explanation that seems to be much needed in the East.
      Only the scum of the population do it&mdash;they and their children; they,
      and, naturally and consistently, the policemen and politicians, likewise,
      for these are the dust-licking pimps and slaves of the scum, there as well
      as elsewhere in America.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link397" id="link397"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
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    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch55" id="linkch55"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I began to get tired of staying in one place so long.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was no longer satisfying variety in going down to Carson to report
      the proceedings of the legislature once a year, and horse-races and
      pumpkin-shows once in three months; (they had got to raising pumpkins and
      potatoes in Washoe Valley, and of course one of the first achievements of
      the legislature was to institute a ten-thousand-dollar Agricultural Fair
      to show off forty dollars' worth of those pumpkins in&mdash;however, the
      territorial legislature was usually spoken of as the "asylum"). I wanted
      to see San Francisco. I wanted to go somewhere. I wanted&mdash;I did not
      know what I wanted. I had the "spring fever" and wanted a change,
      principally, no doubt. Besides, a convention had framed a State
      Constitution; nine men out of every ten wanted an office; I believed that
      these gentlemen would "treat" the moneyless and the irresponsible among
      the population into adopting the constitution and thus well-nigh killing
      the country (it could not well carry such a load as a State government,
      since it had nothing to tax that could stand a tax, for undeveloped mines
      could not, and there were not fifty developed ones in the land, there was
      but little realty to tax, and it did seem as if nobody was ever going to
      think of the simple salvation of inflicting a money penalty on murder). I
      believed that a State government would destroy the "flush times," and I
      wanted to get away. I believed that the mining stocks I had on hand would
      soon be worth $100,000, and thought if they reached that before the
      Constitution was adopted, I would sell out and make myself secure from the
      crash the change of government was going to bring. I considered $100,000
      sufficient to go home with decently, though it was but a small amount
      compared to what I had been expecting to return with. I felt rather
      down-hearted about it, but I tried to comfort myself with the reflection
      that with such a sum I could not fall into want. About this time a
      schoolmate of mine whom I had not seen since boyhood, came tramping in on
      foot from Reese River, a very allegory of Poverty. The son of wealthy
      parents, here he was, in a strange land, hungry, bootless, mantled in an
      ancient horse-blanket, roofed with a brimless hat, and so generally and so
      extravagantly dilapidated that he could have "taken the shine out of the
      Prodigal Son himself," as he pleasantly remarked.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link399" id="link399"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      He wanted to borrow forty-six dollars&mdash;twenty-six to take him to San
      Francisco, and twenty for something else; to buy some soap with, maybe,
      for he needed it. I found I had but little more than the amount wanted, in
      my pocket; so I stepped in and borrowed forty-six dollars of a banker (on
      twenty days' time, without the formality of a note), and gave it him,
      rather than walk half a block to the office, where I had some specie laid
      up. If anybody had told me that it would take me two years to pay back
      that forty-six dollars to the banker (for I did not expect it of the
      Prodigal, and was not disappointed), I would have felt injured. And so
      would the banker.
    </p>
    <p>
      I wanted a change. I wanted variety of some kind. It came. Mr. Goodman
      went away for a week and left me the post of chief editor. It destroyed
      me. The first day, I wrote my "leader" in the forenoon. The second day, I
      had no subject and put it off till the afternoon. The third day I put it
      off till evening, and then copied an elaborate editorial out of the
      "American Cyclopedia," that steadfast friend of the editor, all over this
      land. The fourth day I "fooled around" till midnight, and then fell back
      on the Cyclopedia again. The fifth day I cudgeled my brain till midnight,
      and then kept the press waiting while I penned some bitter personalities
      on six different people. The sixth day I labored in anguish till far into
      the night and brought forth&mdash;nothing. The paper went to press without
      an editorial. The seventh day I resigned. On the eighth, Mr. Goodman
      returned and found six duels on his hands&mdash;my personalities had borne
      fruit.
    </p>
    <p>
      Nobody, except he has tried it, knows what it is to be an editor. It is
      easy to scribble local rubbish, with the facts all before you; it is easy
      to clip selections from other papers; it is easy to string out a
      correspondence from any locality; but it is unspeakable hardship to write
      editorials. Subjects are the trouble&mdash;the dreary lack of them, I
      mean. Every day, it is drag, drag, drag&mdash;think, and worry and suffer&mdash;all
      the world is a dull blank, and yet the editorial columns must be filled.
      Only give the editor a subject, and his work is done&mdash;it is no
      trouble to write it up; but fancy how you would feel if you had to pump
      your brains dry every day in the week, fifty-two weeks in the year. It
      makes one low spirited simply to think of it. The matter that each editor
      of a daily paper in America writes in the course of a year would fill from
      four to eight bulky volumes like this book! Fancy what a library an
      editor's work would make, after twenty or thirty years' service. Yet
      people often marvel that Dickens, Scott, Bulwer, Dumas, etc., have been
      able to produce so many books. If these authors had wrought as
      voluminously as newspaper editors do, the result would be something to
      marvel at, indeed. How editors can continue this tremendous labor, this
      exhausting consumption of brain fibre (for their work is creative, and not
      a mere mechanical laying-up of facts, like reporting), day after day and
      year after year, is incomprehensible. Preachers take two months' holiday
      in midsummer, for they find that to produce two sermons a week is wearing,
      in the long run. In truth it must be so, and is so; and therefore, how an
      editor can take from ten to twenty texts and build upon them from ten to
      twenty painstaking editorials a week and keep it up all the year round, is
      farther beyond comprehension than ever. Ever since I survived my week as
      editor, I have found at least one pleasure in any newspaper that comes to
      my hand; it is in admiring the long columns of editorial, and wondering to
      myself how in the mischief he did it!
    </p>
    <p>
      Mr. Goodman's return relieved me of employment, unless I chose to become a
      reporter again. I could not do that; I could not serve in the ranks after
      being General of the army. So I thought I would depart and go abroad into
      the world somewhere. Just at this juncture, Dan, my associate in the
      reportorial department, told me, casually, that two citizens had been
      trying to persuade him to go with them to New York and aid in selling a
      rich silver mine which they had discovered and secured in a new mining
      district in our neighborhood. He said they offered to pay his expenses and
      give him one third of the proceeds of the sale. He had refused to go. It
      was the very opportunity I wanted. I abused him for keeping so quiet about
      it, and not mentioning it sooner. He said it had not occurred to him that
      I would like to go, and so he had recommended them to apply to Marshall,
      the reporter of the other paper. I asked Dan if it was a good, honest
      mine, and no swindle. He said the men had shown him nine tons of the rock,
      which they had got out to take to New York, and he could cheerfully say
      that he had seen but little rock in Nevada that was richer; and moreover,
      he said that they had secured a tract of valuable timber and a mill-site,
      near the mine. My first idea was to kill Dan. But I changed my mind,
      notwithstanding I was so angry, for I thought maybe the chance was not yet
      lost. Dan said it was by no means lost; that the men were absent at the
      mine again, and would not be in Virginia to leave for the East for some
      ten days; that they had requested him to do the talking to Marshall, and
      he had promised that he would either secure Marshall or somebody else for
      them by the time they got back; he would now say nothing to anybody till
      they returned, and then fulfil his promise by furnishing me to them.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was splendid. I went to bed all on fire with excitement; for nobody had
      yet gone East to sell a Nevada silver mine, and the field was white for
      the sickle. I felt that such a mine as the one described by Dan would
      bring a princely sum in New York, and sell without delay or difficulty. I
      could not sleep, my fancy so rioted through its castles in the air. It was
      the "blind lead" come again.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next day I got away, on the coach, with the usual eclat attending
      departures of old citizens,&mdash;for if you have only half a dozen
      friends out there they will make noise for a hundred rather than let you
      seem to go away neglected and unregretted&mdash;and Dan promised to keep
      strict watch for the men that had the mine to sell.
    </p>
    <p>
      The trip was signalized but by one little incident, and that occurred just
      as we were about to start. A very seedy looking vagabond passenger got out
      of the stage a moment to wait till the usual ballast of silver bricks was
      thrown in. He was standing on the pavement, when an awkward express
      employee, carrying a brick weighing a hundred pounds, stumbled and let it
      fall on the bummer's foot. He instantly dropped on the ground and began to
      howl in the most heart-breaking way. A sympathizing crowd gathered around
      and were going to pull his boot off; but he screamed louder than ever and
      they desisted; then he fell to gasping, and between the gasps ejaculated
      "Brandy! for Heaven's sake, brandy!" They poured half a pint down him, and
      it wonderfully restored and comforted him. Then he begged the people to
      assist him to the stage, which was done. The express people urged him to
      have a doctor at their expense, but he declined, and said that if he only
      had a little brandy to take along with him, to soothe his paroxyms of pain
      when they came on, he would be grateful and content. He was quickly
      supplied with two bottles, and we drove off. He was so smiling and happy
      after that, that I could not refrain from asking him how he could possibly
      be so comfortable with a crushed foot.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link403" id="link403"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="403.jpg (72K)" src="images/403.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well," said he, "I hadn't had a drink for twelve hours, and hadn't a cent
      to my name. I was most perishing&mdash;and so, when that duffer dropped
      that hundred-pounder on my foot, I see my chance. Got a cork leg, you
      know!" and he pulled up his pantaloons and proved it.
    </p>
    <p>
      He was as drunk as a lord all day long, and full of chucklings over his
      timely ingenuity.
    </p>
    <p>
      One drunken man necessarily reminds one of another. I once heard a
      gentleman tell about an incident which he witnessed in a Californian bar-
      room. He entitled it "Ye Modest Man Taketh a Drink." It was nothing but a
      bit of acting, but it seemed to me a perfect rendering, and worthy of
      Toodles himself. The modest man, tolerably far gone with beer and other
      matters, enters a saloon (twenty-five cents is the price for anything and
      everything, and specie the only money used) and lays down a half dollar;
      calls for whiskey and drinks it; the bar-keeper makes change and lays the
      quarter in a wet place on the counter; the modest man fumbles at it with
      nerveless fingers, but it slips and the water holds it; he contemplates
      it, and tries again; same result; observes that people are interested in
      what he is at, blushes; fumbles at the quarter again&mdash;blushes&mdash;puts
      his forefinger carefully, slowly down, to make sure of his aim&mdash;pushes
      the coin toward the bar-keeper, and says with a sigh:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link404" id="link404"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gimme a cigar!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Naturally, another gentleman present told about another drunken man. He
      said he reeled toward home late at night; made a mistake and entered the
      wrong gate; thought he saw a dog on the stoop; and it was&mdash;an iron
      one.
    </p>
    <p>
      He stopped and considered; wondered if it was a dangerous dog; ventured to
      say "Be (hic) begone!" No effect. Then he approached warily, and adopted
      conciliation; pursed up his lips and tried to whistle, but failed; still
      approached, saying, "Poor dog!&mdash;doggy, doggy, doggy!&mdash;poor
      doggy-dog!" Got up on the stoop, still petting with fond names; till
      master of the advantages; then exclaimed, "Leave, you thief!"&mdash;planted
      a vindictive kick in his ribs, and went head-over-heels overboard, of
      course. A pause; a sigh or two of pain, and then a remark in a reflective
      voice:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Awful solid dog. What could he ben eating? ('ic!) Rocks, p'raps. Such
      animals is dangerous.&mdash;' At's what I say&mdash;they're dangerous. If
      a man&mdash;('ic!)&mdash;if a man wants to feed a dog on rocks, let him
      feed him on rocks; 'at's all right; but let him keep him at home&mdash;not
      have him layin' round promiscuous, where ('ic!) where people's liable to
      stumble over him when they ain't noticin'!"
    </p>
    <p>
      It was not without regret that I took a last look at the tiny flag (it was
      thirty-five feet long and ten feet wide) fluttering like a lady's
      handkerchief from the topmost peak of Mount Davidson, two thousand feet
      above Virginia's roofs, and felt that doubtless I was bidding a permanent
      farewell to a city which had afforded me the most vigorous enjoyment of
      life I had ever experienced. And this reminds me of an incident which the
      dullest memory Virginia could boast at the time it happened must vividly
      recall, at times, till its possessor dies. Late one summer afternoon we
      had a rain shower.
    </p>
    <p>
      That was astonishing enough, in itself, to set the whole town buzzing, for
      it only rains (during a week or two weeks) in the winter in Nevada, and
      even then not enough at a time to make it worth while for any merchant to
      keep umbrellas for sale. But the rain was not the chief wonder. It only
      lasted five or ten minutes; while the people were still talking about it
      all the heavens gathered to themselves a dense blackness as of midnight.
      All the vast eastern front of Mount Davidson, over- looking the city, put
      on such a funereal gloom that only the nearness and solidity of the
      mountain made its outlines even faintly distinguishable from the dead
      blackness of the heavens they rested against. This unaccustomed sight
      turned all eyes toward the mountain; and as they looked, a little tongue
      of rich golden flame was seen waving and quivering in the heart of the
      midnight, away up on the extreme summit! In a few minutes the streets were
      packed with people, gazing with hardly an uttered word, at the one
      brilliant mote in the brooding world of darkness. It flicked like a
      candle-flame, and looked no larger; but with such a background it was
      wonderfully bright, small as it was. It was the flag!&mdash;though no one
      suspected it at first, it seemed so like a supernatural visitor of some
      kind&mdash;a mysterious messenger of good tidings, some were fain to
      believe. It was the nation's emblem transfigured by the departing rays of
      a sun that was entirely palled from view; and on no other object did the
      glory fall, in all the broad panorama of mountain ranges and deserts. Not
      even upon the staff of the flag&mdash;for that, a needle in the distance
      at any time, was now untouched by the light and undistinguishable in the
      gloom. For a whole hour the weird visitor winked and burned in its lofty
      solitude, and still the thousands of uplifted eyes watched it with
      fascinated interest. How the people were wrought up! The superstition grew
      apace that this was a mystic courier come with great news from the war&mdash;the
      poetry of the idea excusing and commending it&mdash;and on it spread, from
      heart to heart, from lip to lip and from street to street, till there was
      a general impulse to have out the military and welcome the bright waif
      with a salvo of artillery!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link406" id="link406"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And all that time one sorely tried man, the telegraph operator sworn to
      official secrecy, had to lock his lips and chain his tongue with a silence
      that was like to rend them; for he, and he only, of all the speculating
      multitude, knew the great things this sinking sun had seen that day in the
      east&mdash;Vicksburg fallen, and the Union arms victorious at Gettysburg!
    </p>
    <p>
      But for the journalistic monopoly that forbade the slightest revealment of
      eastern news till a day after its publication in the California papers,
      the glorified flag on Mount Davidson would have been saluted and
      re-saluted, that memorable evening, as long as there was a charge of
      powder to thunder with; the city would have been illuminated, and every
      man that had any respect for himself would have got drunk,&mdash;as was
      the custom of the country on all occasions of public moment. Even at this
      distant day I cannot think of this needlessly marred supreme opportunity
      without regret. What a time we might have had!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link407" id="link407"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch56" id="linkch56"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LVI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We rumbled over the plains and valleys, climbed the Sierras to the clouds,
      and looked down upon summer-clad California. And I will remark here, in
      passing, that all scenery in California requires distance to give it its
      highest charm. The mountains are imposing in their sublimity and their
      majesty of form and altitude, from any point of view&mdash;but one must
      have distance to soften their ruggedness and enrich their tintings; a
      Californian forest is best at a little distance, for there is a sad
      poverty of variety in species, the trees being chiefly of one monotonous
      family&mdash;redwood, pine, spruce, fir&mdash;and so, at a near view there
      is a wearisome sameness of attitude in their rigid arms, stretched down
      ward and outward in one continued and reiterated appeal to all men to "Sh!&mdash;don't
      say a word!&mdash;you might disturb somebody!" Close at hand, too, there
      is a reliefless and relentless smell of pitch and turpentine; there is a
      ceaseless melancholy in their sighing and complaining foliage; one walks
      over a soundless carpet of beaten yellow bark and dead spines of the
      foliage till he feels like a wandering spirit bereft of a footfall; he
      tires of the endless tufts of needles and yearns for substantial, shapely
      leaves; he looks for moss and grass to loll upon, and finds none, for
      where there is no bark there is naked clay and dirt, enemies to pensive
      musing and clean apparel. Often a grassy plain in California, is what it
      should be, but often, too, it is best contemplated at a distance, because
      although its grass blades are tall, they stand up vindictively straight
      and self-sufficient, and are unsociably wide apart, with uncomely spots of
      barren sand between.
    </p>
    <p>
      One of the queerest things I know of, is to hear tourists from "the
      States" go into ecstasies over the loveliness of "ever-blooming
      California." And they always do go into that sort of ecstasies. But
      perhaps they would modify them if they knew how old Californians, with the
      memory full upon them of the dust-covered and questionable summer greens
      of Californian "verdure," stand astonished, and filled with worshipping
      admiration, in the presence of the lavish richness, the brilliant green,
      the infinite freshness, the spend-thrift variety of form and species and
      foliage that make an Eastern landscape a vision of Paradise itself. The
      idea of a man falling into raptures over grave and sombre California, when
      that man has seen New England's meadow-expanses and her maples, oaks and
      cathedral-windowed elms decked in summer attire, or the opaline splendors
      of autumn descending upon her forests, comes very near being funny&mdash;would
      be, in fact, but that it is so pathetic. No land with an unvarying climate
      can be very beautiful. The tropics are not, for all the sentiment that is
      wasted on them. They seem beautiful at first, but sameness impairs the
      charm by and by. Change is the handmaiden Nature requires to do her
      miracles with. The land that has four well-defined seasons, cannot lack
      beauty, or pall with monotony. Each season brings a world of enjoyment and
      interest in the watching of its unfolding, its gradual, harmonious
      development, its culminating graces&mdash;and just as one begins to tire
      of it, it passes away and a radical change comes, with new witcheries and
      new glories in its train. And I think that to one in sympathy with nature,
      each season, in its turn, seems the loveliest.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link409" id="link409"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      San Francisco, a truly fascinating city to live in, is stately and
      handsome at a fair distance, but close at hand one notes that the
      architecture is mostly old-fashioned, many streets are made up of
      decaying, smoke-grimed, wooden houses, and the barren sand-hills toward
      the outskirts obtrude themselves too prominently. Even the kindly climate
      is sometimes pleasanter when read about than personally experienced, for a
      lovely, cloudless sky wears out its welcome by and by, and then when the
      longed for rain does come it stays. Even the playful earthquake is better
      contemplated at a dis&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      However there are varying opinions about that.
    </p>
    <p>
      The climate of San Francisco is mild and singularly equable. The
      thermometer stands at about seventy degrees the year round. It hardly
      changes at all. You sleep under one or two light blankets Summer and
      Winter, and never use a mosquito bar. Nobody ever wears Summer clothing.
      You wear black broadcloth&mdash;if you have it&mdash;in August and
      January, just the same. It is no colder, and no warmer, in the one month
      than the other. You do not use overcoats and you do not use fans. It is as
      pleasant a climate as could well be contrived, take it all around, and is
      doubtless the most unvarying in the whole world. The wind blows there a
      good deal in the summer months, but then you can go over to Oakland, if
      you choose&mdash;three or four miles away&mdash;it does not blow there. It
      has only snowed twice in San Francisco in nineteen years, and then it only
      remained on the ground long enough to astonish the children, and set them
      to wondering what the feathery stuff was.
    </p>
    <p>
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    </p>
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      During eight months of the year, straight along, the skies are bright and
      cloudless, and never a drop of rain falls. But when the other four months
      come along, you will need to go and steal an umbrella. Because you will
      require it. Not just one day, but one hundred and twenty days in hardly
      varying succession. When you want to go visiting, or attend church, or the
      theatre, you never look up at the clouds to see whether it is likely to
      rain or not&mdash;you look at the almanac. If it is Winter, it will rain&mdash;and
      if it is Summer, it won't rain, and you cannot help it. You never need a
      lightning-rod, because it never thunders and it never lightens. And after
      you have listened for six or eight weeks, every night, to the dismal
      monotony of those quiet rains, you will wish in your heart the thunder
      would leap and crash and roar along those drowsy skies once, and make
      everything alive&mdash;you will wish the prisoned lightnings would cleave
      the dull firmament asunder and light it with a blinding glare for one
      little instant. You would give anything to hear the old familiar thunder
      again and see the lightning strike somebody. And along in the Summer, when
      you have suffered about four months of lustrous, pitiless sunshine, you
      are ready to go down on your knees and plead for rain&mdash;hail&mdash;snow&mdash;thunder
      and lightning&mdash;anything to break the monotony&mdash;you will take an
      earthquake, if you cannot do any better. And the chances are that you'll
      get it, too.
    </p>
    <p>
      San Francisco is built on sand hills, but they are prolific sand hills.
      They yield a generous vegetation. All the rare flowers which people in
      "the States" rear with such patient care in parlor flower-pots and green-
      houses, flourish luxuriantly in the open air there all the year round.
      Calla lilies, all sorts of geraniums, passion flowers, moss roses&mdash;I
      do not know the names of a tenth part of them. I only know that while New
      Yorkers are burdened with banks and drifts of snow, Californians are
      burdened with banks and drifts of flowers, if they only keep their hands
      off and let them grow. And I have heard that they have also that rarest
      and most curious of all the flowers, the beautiful Espiritu Santo, as the
      Spaniards call it&mdash;or flower of the Holy Spirit&mdash;though I
      thought it grew only in Central America&mdash;down on the Isthmus. In its
      cup is the daintiest little facsimile of a dove, as pure as snow. The
      Spaniards have a superstitious reverence for it. The blossom has been
      conveyed to the States, submerged in ether; and the bulb has been taken
      thither also, but every attempt to make it bloom after it arrived, has
      failed.
    </p>
    <p>
      I have elsewhere spoken of the endless Winter of Mono, California, and but
      this moment of the eternal Spring of San Francisco. Now if we travel a
      hundred miles in a straight line, we come to the eternal Summer of
      Sacramento. One never sees Summer-clothing or mosquitoes in San Francisco&mdash;but
      they can be found in Sacramento. Not always and unvaryingly, but about one
      hundred and forty-three months out of twelve years, perhaps. Flowers bloom
      there, always, the reader can easily believe&mdash;people suffer and
      sweat, and swear, morning, noon and night, and wear out their stanchest
      energies fanning themselves. It gets hot there, but if you go down to Fort
      Yuma you will find it hotter. Fort Yuma is probably the hottest place on
      earth. The thermometer stays at one hundred and twenty in the shade there
      all the time&mdash;except when it varies and goes higher. It is a U.S.
      military post, and its occupants get so used to the terrific heat that
      they suffer without it. There is a tradition (attributed to John Phenix
      [It has been purloined by fifty different scribblers who were too poor to
      invent a fancy but not ashamed to steal one.&mdash;M. T.]) that a very,
      very wicked soldier died there, once, and of course, went straight to the
      hottest corner of perdition,&mdash;and the next day he telegraphed back
      for his blankets. There is no doubt about the truth of this statement&mdash;there
      can be no doubt about it. I have seen the place where that soldier used to
      board. In Sacramento it is fiery Summer always, and you can gather roses,
      and eat strawberries and ice-cream, and wear white linen clothes, and pant
      and perspire, at eight or nine o'clock in the morning, and then take the
      cars, and at noon put on your furs and your skates, and go skimming over
      frozen Donner Lake, seven thousand feet above the valley, among snow banks
      fifteen feet deep, and in the shadow of grand mountain peaks that lift
      their frosty crags ten thousand feet above the level of the sea.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link413" id="link413"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="413.jpg (94K)" src="images/413.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      There is a transition for you! Where will you find another like it in the
      Western hemisphere? And some of us have swept around snow-walled curves of
      the Pacific Railroad in that vicinity, six thousand feet above the sea,
      and looked down as the birds do, upon the deathless Summer of the
      Sacramento Valley, with its fruitful fields, its feathery foliage, its
      silver streams, all slumbering in the mellow haze of its enchanted
      atmosphere, and all infinitely softened and spiritualized by distance&mdash;a
      dreamy, exquisite glimpse of fairyland, made all the more charming and
      striking that it was caught through a forbidden gateway of ice and snow,
      and savage crags and precipices.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch57" id="linkch57"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LVII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It was in this Sacramento Valley, just referred to, that a deal of the
      most lucrative of the early gold mining was done, and you may still see,
      in places, its grassy slopes and levels torn and guttered and disfigured
      by the avaricious spoilers of fifteen and twenty years ago. You may see
      such disfigurements far and wide over California&mdash;and in some such
      places, where only meadows and forests are visible&mdash;not a living
      creature, not a house, no stick or stone or remnant of a ruin, and not a
      sound, not even a whisper to disturb the Sabbath stillness&mdash;you will
      find it hard to believe that there stood at one time a
      fiercely-flourishing little city, of two thousand or three thousand souls,
      with its newspaper, fire company, brass band, volunteer militia, bank,
      hotels, noisy Fourth of July processions and speeches, gambling hells
      crammed with tobacco smoke, profanity, and rough-bearded men of all
      nations and colors, with tables heaped with gold dust sufficient for the
      revenues of a German principality&mdash;streets crowded and rife with
      business&mdash;town lots worth four hundred dollars a front foot&mdash;labor,
      laughter, music, dancing, swearing, fighting, shooting, stabbing&mdash;a
      bloody inquest and a man for breakfast every morning&mdash;everything that
      delights and adorns existence&mdash;all the appointments and appurtenances
      of a thriving and prosperous and promising young city,&mdash;and now
      nothing is left of it all but a lifeless, homeless solitude. The men are
      gone, the houses have vanished, even the name of the place is forgotten.
      In no other land, in modern times, have towns so absolutely died and
      disappeared, as in the old mining regions of California.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a driving, vigorous, restless population in those days. It was a
      curious population. It was the only population of the kind that the world
      has ever seen gathered together, and it is not likely that the world will
      ever see its like again. For observe, it was an assemblage of two hundred
      thousand young men&mdash;not simpering, dainty, kid-gloved weaklings, but
      stalwart, muscular, dauntless young braves, brimful of push and energy,
      and royally endowed with every attribute that goes to make up a peerless
      and magnificent manhood&mdash;the very pick and choice of the world's
      glorious ones. No women, no children, no gray and stooping veterans,&mdash;none
      but erect, bright-eyed, quick-moving, strong-handed young giants&mdash;the
      strangest population, the finest population, the most gallant host that
      ever trooped down the startled solitudes of an unpeopled land. And where
      are they now? Scattered to the ends of the earth&mdash;or prematurely aged
      and decrepit&mdash;or shot or stabbed in street affrays&mdash;or dead of
      disappointed hopes and broken hearts&mdash;all gone, or nearly all&mdash;victims
      devoted upon the altar of the golden calf&mdash;the noblest holocaust that
      ever wafted its sacrificial incense heavenward. It is pitiful to think
      upon.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a splendid population&mdash;for all the slow, sleepy,
      sluggish-brained sloths staid at home&mdash;you never find that sort of
      people among pioneers&mdash;you cannot build pioneers out of that sort of
      material. It was that population that gave to California a name for
      getting up astounding enterprises and rushing them through with a
      magnificent dash and daring and a recklessness of cost or consequences,
      which she bears unto this day&mdash;and when she projects a new surprise,
      the grave world smiles as usual, and says "Well, that is California all
      over."
    </p>
    <p>
      But they were rough in those times! They fairly reveled in gold, whisky,
      fights, and fandangoes, and were unspeakably happy. The honest miner raked
      from a hundred to a thousand dollars out of his claim a day, and what with
      the gambling dens and the other entertainments, he hadn't a cent the next
      morning, if he had any sort of luck. They cooked their own bacon and
      beans, sewed on their own buttons, washed their own shirts&mdash;blue
      woollen ones; and if a man wanted a fight on his hands without any
      annoying delay, all he had to do was to appear in public in a white shirt
      or a stove-pipe hat, and he would be accommodated. For those people hated
      aristocrats. They had a particular and malignant animosity toward what
      they called a "biled shirt."
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a wild, free, disorderly, grotesque society! Men&mdash;only
      swarming hosts of stalwart men&mdash;nothing juvenile, nothing feminine,
      visible anywhere!
    </p>
    <p>
      In those days miners would flock in crowds to catch a glimpse of that rare
      and blessed spectacle, a woman! Old inhabitants tell how, in a certain
      camp, the news went abroad early in the morning that a woman was come!
      They had seen a calico dress hanging out of a wagon down at the
      camping-ground&mdash;sign of emigrants from over the great plains.
      Everybody went down there, and a shout went up when an actual, bona fide
      dress was discovered fluttering in the wind! The male emigrant was
      visible. The miners said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Fetch her out!"
    </p>
    <p>
      He said: "It is my wife, gentlemen&mdash;she is sick&mdash;we have been
      robbed of money, provisions, everything, by the Indians&mdash;we want to
      rest."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Fetch her out! We've got to see her!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "But, gentlemen, the poor thing, she&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "FETCH HER OUT!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link416" id="link416"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="416.jpg (87K)" src="images/416.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      He "fetched her out," and they swung their hats and sent up three rousing
      cheers and a tiger; and they crowded around and gazed at her, and touched
      her dress, and listened to her voice with the look of men who listened to
      a memory rather than a present reality&mdash;and then they collected
      twenty- five hundred dollars in gold and gave it to the man, and swung
      their hats again and gave three more cheers, and went home satisfied.
    </p>
    <p>
      Once I dined in San Francisco with the family of a pioneer, and talked
      with his daughter, a young lady whose first experience in San Francisco
      was an adventure, though she herself did not remember it, as she was only
      two or three years old at the time. Her father said that, after landing
      from the ship, they were walking up the street, a servant leading the
      party with the little girl in her arms. And presently a huge miner,
      bearded, belted, spurred, and bristling with deadly weapons&mdash;just
      down from a long campaign in the mountains, evidently-barred the way,
      stopped the servant, and stood gazing, with a face all alive with
      gratification and astonishment. Then he said, reverently:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link417" id="link417"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="417.jpg (58K)" src="images/417.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, if it ain't a child!" And then he snatched a little leather sack
      out of his pocket and said to the servant:
    </p>
    <p>
      "There's a hundred and fifty dollars in dust, there, and I'll give it to
      you to let me kiss the child!"
    </p>
    <p>
      That anecdote is true.
    </p>
    <p>
      But see how things change. Sitting at that dinner-table, listening to that
      anecdote, if I had offered double the money for the privilege of kissing
      the same child, I would have been refused. Seventeen added years have far
      more than doubled the price.
    </p>
    <p>
      And while upon this subject I will remark that once in Star City, in the
      Humboldt Mountains, I took my place in a sort of long, post-office single
      file of miners, to patiently await my chance to peep through a crack in
      the cabin and get a sight of the splendid new sensation&mdash;a genuine,
      live Woman! And at the end of half of an hour my turn came, and I put my
      eye to the crack, and there she was, with one arm akimbo, and tossing
      flap- jacks in a frying-pan with the other.
    </p>
    <p>
      And she was one hundred and sixty-five [Being in calmer mood, now, I
      voluntarily knock off a hundred from that.&mdash;M.T.] years old, and
      hadn't a tooth in her head.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link418" id="link418"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="418.jpg (28K)" src="images/418.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch58" id="linkch58"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LVIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      For a few months I enjoyed what to me was an entirely new phase of
      existence&mdash;a butterfly idleness; nothing to do, nobody to be
      responsible to, and untroubled with financial uneasiness. I fell in love
      with the most cordial and sociable city in the Union. After the sage-brush
      and alkali deserts of Washoe, San Francisco was Paradise to me. I lived at
      the best hotel, exhibited my clothes in the most conspicuous places,
      infested the opera, and learned to seem enraptured with music which
      oftener afflicted my ignorant ear than enchanted it, if I had had the
      vulgar honesty to confess it. However, I suppose I was not greatly worse
      than the most of my countrymen in that. I had longed to be a butterfly,
      and I was one at last. I attended private parties in sumptuous evening
      dress, simpered and aired my graces like a born beau, and polkad and
      schottisched with a step peculiar to myself&mdash;and the kangaroo. In a
      word, I kept the due state of a man worth a hundred thousand dollars
      (prospectively,) and likely to reach absolute affluence when that silver-
      mine sale should be ultimately achieved in the East. I spent money with a
      free hand, and meantime watched the stock sales with an interested eye and
      looked to see what might happen in Nevada.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link420" id="link420"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="420.jpg (49K)" src="images/420.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Something very important happened. The property holders of Nevada voted
      against the State Constitution; but the folks who had nothing to lose were
      in the majority, and carried the measure over their heads. But after all
      it did not immediately look like a disaster, though unquestionably it was
      one I hesitated, calculated the chances, and then concluded not to sell.
      Stocks went on rising; speculation went mad; bankers, merchants, lawyers,
      doctors, mechanics, laborers, even the very washerwomen and servant girls,
      were putting up their earnings on silver stocks, and every sun that rose
      in the morning went down on paupers enriched and rich men beggared. What a
      gambling carnival it was! Gould and Curry soared to six thousand three
      hundred dollars a foot! And then&mdash;all of a sudden, out went the
      bottom and everything and everybody went to ruin and destruction! The
      wreck was complete.
    </p>
    <p>
      The bubble scarcely left a microscopic moisture behind it. I was an early
      beggar and a thorough one. My hoarded stocks were not worth the paper they
      were printed on. I threw them all away. I, the cheerful idiot that had
      been squandering money like water, and thought myself beyond the reach of
      misfortune, had not now as much as fifty dollars when I gathered together
      my various debts and paid them. I removed from the hotel to a very private
      boarding house. I took a reporter's berth and went to work. I was not
      entirely broken in spirit, for I was building confidently on the sale of
      the silver mine in the east. But I could not hear from Dan. My letters
      miscarried or were not answered.
    </p>
    <p>
      One day I did not feel vigorous and remained away from the office. The
      next day I went down toward noon as usual, and found a note on my desk
      which had been there twenty-four hours. It was signed "Marshall"&mdash;the
      Virginia reporter&mdash;and contained a request that I should call at the
      hotel and see him and a friend or two that night, as they would sail for
      the east in the morning. A postscript added that their errand was a big
      mining speculation! I was hardly ever so sick in my life. I abused myself
      for leaving Virginia and entrusting to another man a matter I ought to
      have attended to myself; I abused myself for remaining away from the
      office on the one day of all the year that I should have been there. And
      thus berating myself I trotted a mile to the steamer wharf and arrived
      just in time to be too late. The ship was in the stream and under way.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link421" id="link421"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="421.jpg (20K)" src="images/421.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I comforted myself with the thought that may be the speculation would
      amount to nothing&mdash;poor comfort at best&mdash;and then went back to
      my slavery, resolved to put up with my thirty-five dollars a week and
      forget all about it.
    </p>
    <p>
      A month afterward I enjoyed my first earthquake. It was one which was long
      called the "great" earthquake, and is doubtless so distinguished till this
      day. It was just after noon, on a bright October day. I was coming down
      Third street. The only objects in motion anywhere in sight in that thickly
      built and populous quarter, were a man in a buggy behind me, and a street
      car wending slowly up the cross street. Otherwise, all was solitude and a
      Sabbath stillness. As I turned the corner, around a frame house, there was
      a great rattle and jar, and it occurred to me that here was an item!&mdash;no
      doubt a fight in that house. Before I could turn and seek the door, there
      came a really terrific shock; the ground seemed to roll under me in waves,
      interrupted by a violent joggling up and down, and there was a heavy
      grinding noise as of brick houses rubbing together. I fell up against the
      frame house and hurt my elbow. I knew what it was, now, and from mere
      reportorial instinct, nothing else, took out my watch and noted the time
      of day; at that moment a third and still severer shock came, and as I
      reeled about on the pavement trying to keep my footing, I saw a sight! The
      entire front of a tall four-story brick building in Third street sprung
      outward like a door and fell sprawling across the street, raising a dust
      like a great volume of smoke! And here came the buggy&mdash;overboard went
      the man, and in less time than I can tell it the vehicle was distributed
      in small fragments along three hundred yards of street.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link422" id="link422"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="422.jpg (87K)" src="images/422.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      One could have fancied that somebody had fired a charge of chair-rounds
      and rags down the thoroughfare. The street car had stopped, the horses
      were rearing and plunging, the passengers were pouring out at both ends,
      and one fat man had crashed half way through a glass window on one side of
      the car, got wedged fast and was squirming and screaming like an impaled
      madman. Every door, of every house, as far as the eye could reach, was
      vomiting a stream of human beings; and almost before one could execute a
      wink and begin another, there was a massed multitude of people stretching
      in endless procession down every street my position commanded. Never was
      solemn solitude turned into teeming life quicker.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link423a" id="link423a"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="423a.jpg (38K)" src="images/423a.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Of the wonders wrought by "the great earthquake," these were all that came
      under my eye; but the tricks it did, elsewhere, and far and wide over the
      town, made toothsome gossip for nine days.
    </p>
    <p>
      The destruction of property was trifling&mdash;the injury to it was wide-
      spread and somewhat serious.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link423b" id="link423b"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="423b.jpg (37K)" src="images/423b.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The "curiosities" of the earthquake were simply endless. Gentlemen and
      ladies who were sick, or were taking a siesta, or had dissipated till a
      late hour and were making up lost sleep, thronged into the public streets
      in all sorts of queer apparel, and some without any at all. One woman who
      had been washing a naked child, ran down the street holding it by the
      ankles as if it were a dressed turkey. Prominent citizens who were
      supposed to keep the Sabbath strictly, rushed out of saloons in their
      shirt-sleeves, with billiard cues in their hands. Dozens of men with necks
      swathed in napkins, rushed from barber-shops, lathered to the eyes or with
      one cheek clean shaved and the other still bearing a hairy stubble. Horses
      broke from stables, and a frightened dog rushed up a short attic ladder
      and out on to a roof, and when his scare was over had not the nerve to go
      down again the same way he had gone up.
    </p>
    <p>
      A prominent editor flew down stairs, in the principal hotel, with nothing
      on but one brief undergarment&mdash;met a chambermaid, and exclaimed:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, what shall I do! Where shall I go!"
    </p>
    <p>
      She responded with naive serenity:
    </p>
    <p>
      "If you have no choice, you might try a clothing-store!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link424" id="link424"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="424.jpg (63K)" src="images/424.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      A certain foreign consul's lady was the acknowledged leader of fashion,
      and every time she appeared in anything new or extraordinary, the ladies
      in the vicinity made a raid on their husbands' purses and arrayed
      themselves similarly. One man who had suffered considerably and growled
      accordingly, was standing at the window when the shocks came, and the next
      instant the consul's wife, just out of the bath, fled by with no other
      apology for clothing than&mdash;a bath-towel! The sufferer rose superior
      to the terrors of the earthquake, and said to his wife:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Now that is something like! Get out your towel my dear!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link425" id="link425"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="425 (40K)" src="images/425.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The plastering that fell from ceilings in San Francisco that day, would
      have covered several acres of ground. For some days afterward, groups of
      eyeing and pointing men stood about many a building, looking at long zig-
      zag cracks that extended from the eaves to the ground. Four feet of the
      tops of three chimneys on one house were broken square off and turned
      around in such a way as to completely stop the draft.
    </p>
    <p>
      A crack a hundred feet long gaped open six inches wide in the middle of
      one street and then shut together again with such force, as to ridge up
      the meeting earth like a slender grave. A lady sitting in her rocking and
      quaking parlor, saw the wall part at the ceiling, open and shut twice,
      like a mouth, and then-drop the end of a brick on the floor like a tooth.
      She was a woman easily disgusted with foolishness, and she arose and went
      out of there. One lady who was coming down stairs was astonished to see a
      bronze Hercules lean forward on its pedestal as if to strike her with its
      club. They both reached the bottom of the flight at the same time,&mdash;the
      woman insensible from the fright. Her child, born some little time
      afterward, was club-footed. However&mdash;on second thought,&mdash;if the
      reader sees any coincidence in this, he must do it at his own risk.
    </p>
    <p>
      The first shock brought down two or three huge organ-pipes in one of the
      churches. The minister, with uplifted hands, was just closing the
      services. He glanced up, hesitated, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "However, we will omit the benediction!"&mdash;and the next instant there
      was a vacancy in the atmosphere where he had stood.
    </p>
    <p>
      After the first shock, an Oakland minister said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Keep your seats! There is no better place to die than this"&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      And added, after the third:
    </p>
    <p>
      "But outside is good enough!" He then skipped out at the back door.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link426" id="link426"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="426.jpg (40K)" src="images/426.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Such another destruction of mantel ornaments and toilet bottles as the
      earthquake created, San Francisco never saw before. There was hardly a
      girl or a matron in the city but suffered losses of this kind. Suspended
      pictures were thrown down, but oftener still, by a curious freak of the
      earthquake's humor, they were whirled completely around with their faces
      to the wall! There was great difference of opinion, at first, as to the
      course or direction the earthquake traveled, but water that splashed out
      of various tanks and buckets settled that. Thousands of people were made
      so sea-sick by the rolling and pitching of floors and streets that they
      were weak and bed-ridden for hours, and some few for even days afterward.&mdash;Hardly
      an individual escaped nausea entirely.
    </p>
    <p>
      The queer earthquake&mdash;episodes that formed the staple of San
      Francisco gossip for the next week would fill a much larger book than
      this, and so I will diverge from the subject.
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by, in the due course of things, I picked up a copy of the
      Enterprise one day, and fell under this cruel blow:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        NEVADA MINES IN NEW YORK.&mdash;G. M. Marshall, Sheba Hurs and Amos H.
        Rose, who left San Francisco last July for New York City, with ores from
        mines in Pine Wood District, Humboldt County, and on the Reese River
        range, have disposed of a mine containing six thousand feet and called
        the Pine Mountains Consolidated, for the sum of $3,000,000. The stamps
        on the deed, which is now on its way to Humboldt County, from New York,
        for record, amounted to $3,000, which is said to be the largest amount
        of stamps ever placed on one document. A working capital of $1,000,000
        has been paid into the treasury, and machinery has already been
        purchased for a large quartz mill, which will be put up as soon as
        possible. The stock in this company is all full paid and entirely
        unassessable. The ores of the mines in this district somewhat resemble
        those of the Sheba mine in Humboldt. Sheba Hurst, the discoverer of the
        mines, with his friends corralled all the best leads and all the land
        and timber they desired before making public their whereabouts. Ores
        from there, assayed in this city, showed them to be exceedingly rich in
        silver and gold&mdash;silver predominating. There is an abundance of
        wood and water in the District. We are glad to know that New York
        capital has been enlisted in the development of the mines of this
        region. Having seen the ores and assays, we are satisfied that the mines
        of the District are very valuable&mdash;anything but wild-cat.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      Once more native imbecility had carried the day, and I had lost a million!
      It was the "blind lead" over again.
    </p>
    <p>
      Let us not dwell on this miserable matter. If I were inventing these
      things, I could be wonderfully humorous over them; but they are too true
      to be talked of with hearty levity, even at this distant day. [True, and
      yet not exactly as given in the above figures, possibly. I saw Marshall,
      months afterward, and although he had plenty of money he did not claim to
      have captured an entire million. In fact I gathered that he had not then
      received $50,000. Beyond that figure his fortune appeared to consist of
      uncertain vast expectations rather than prodigious certainties. However,
      when the above item appeared in print I put full faith in it, and
      incontinently wilted and went to seed under it.] Suffice it that I so lost
      heart, and so yielded myself up to repinings and sighings and foolish
      regrets, that I neglected my duties and became about worthless, as a
      reporter for a brisk newspaper. And at last one of the proprietors took me
      aside, with a charity I still remember with considerable respect, and gave
      me an opportunity to resign my berth and so save myself the disgrace of a
      dismissal.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch59" id="linkch59"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LIX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      For a time I wrote literary screeds for the Golden Era. C. H. Webb had
      established a very excellent literary weekly called the Californian, but
      high merit was no guaranty of success; it languished, and he sold out to
      three printers, and Bret Harte became editor at $20 a week, and I was
      employed to contribute an article a week at $12. But the journal still
      languished, and the printers sold out to Captain Ogden, a rich man and a
      pleasant gentleman who chose to amuse himself with such an expensive
      luxury without much caring about the cost of it. When he grew tired of the
      novelty, he re-sold to the printers, the paper presently died a peaceful
      death, and I was out of work again. I would not mention these things but
      for the fact that they so aptly illustrate the ups and downs that
      characterize life on the Pacific coast. A man could hardly stumble into
      such a variety of queer vicissitudes in any other country.
    </p>
    <p>
      For two months my sole occupation was avoiding acquaintances; for during
      that time I did not earn a penny, or buy an article of any kind, or pay my
      board. I became a very adept at "slinking." I slunk from back street to
      back street, I slunk away from approaching faces that looked familiar, I
      slunk to my meals, ate them humbly and with a mute apology for every
      mouthful I robbed my generous landlady of, and at midnight, after
      wanderings that were but slinkings away from cheerfulness and light, I
      slunk to my bed. I felt meaner, and lowlier and more despicable than the
      worms. During all this time I had but one piece of money&mdash;a silver
      ten cent piece&mdash;and I held to it and would not spend it on any
      account, lest the consciousness coming strong upon me that I was entirely
      penniless, might suggest suicide. I had pawned every thing but the clothes
      I had on; so I clung to my dime desperately, till it was smooth with
      handling.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link429" id="link429"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="429.jpg (36K)" src="images/429.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      However, I am forgetting. I did have one other occupation beside that of
      "slinking." It was the entertaining of a collector (and being entertained
      by him,) who had in his hands the Virginia banker's bill for forty-six
      dollars which I had loaned my schoolmate, the "Prodigal." This man used to
      call regularly once a week and dun me, and sometimes oftener. He did it
      from sheer force of habit, for he knew he could get nothing. He would get
      out his bill, calculate the interest for me, at five per cent a month, and
      show me clearly that there was no attempt at fraud in it and no mistakes;
      and then plead, and argue and dun with all his might for any sum&mdash;any
      little trifle&mdash;even a dollar&mdash;even half a dollar, on account.
      Then his duty was accomplished and his conscience free. He immediately
      dropped the subject there always; got out a couple of cigars and divided,
      put his feet in the window, and then we would have a long, luxurious talk
      about everything and everybody, and he would furnish me a world of curious
      dunning adventures out of the ample store in his memory. By and by he
      would clap his hat on his head, shake hands and say briskly:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, business is business&mdash;can't stay with you always!"&mdash;and
      was off in a second.
    </p>
    <p>
      The idea of pining for a dun! And yet I used to long for him to come, and
      would get as uneasy as any mother if the day went by without his visit,
      when I was expecting him. But he never collected that bill, at last nor
      any part of it. I lived to pay it to the banker myself.
    </p>
    <p>
      Misery loves company. Now and then at night, in out-of-the way, dimly
      lighted places, I found myself happening on another child of misfortune.
      He looked so seedy and forlorn, so homeless and friendless and forsaken,
      that I yearned toward him as a brother. I wanted to claim kinship with him
      and go about and enjoy our wretchedness together. The drawing toward each
      other must have been mutual; at any rate we got to falling together
      oftener, though still seemingly by accident; and although we did not speak
      or evince any recognition, I think the dull anxiety passed out of both of
      us when we saw each other, and then for several hours we would idle along
      contentedly, wide apart, and glancing furtively in at home lights and
      fireside gatherings, out of the night shadows, and very much enjoying our
      dumb companionship.
    </p>
    <p>
      Finally we spoke, and were inseparable after that. For our woes were
      identical, almost. He had been a reporter too, and lost his berth, and
      this was his experience, as nearly as I can recollect it. After losing his
      berth he had gone down, down, down, with never a halt: from a boarding
      house on Russian Hill to a boarding house in Kearney street; from thence
      to Dupont; from thence to a low sailor den; and from thence to lodgings in
      goods boxes and empty hogsheads near the wharves. Then; for a while, he
      had gained a meagre living by sewing up bursted sacks of grain on the
      piers; when that failed he had found food here and there as chance threw
      it in his way. He had ceased to show his face in daylight, now, for a
      reporter knows everybody, rich and poor, high and low, and cannot well
      avoid familiar faces in the broad light of day.
    </p>
    <p>
      This mendicant Blucher&mdash;I call him that for convenience&mdash;was a
      splendid creature. He was full of hope, pluck and philosophy; he was well
      read and a man of cultivated taste; he had a bright wit and was a master
      of satire; his kindliness and his generous spirit made him royal in my
      eyes and changed his curb-stone seat to a throne and his damaged hat to a
      crown.
    </p>
    <p>
      He had an adventure, once, which sticks fast in my memory as the most
      pleasantly grotesque that ever touched my sympathies. He had been without
      a penny for two months. He had shirked about obscure streets, among
      friendly dim lights, till the thing had become second nature to him. But
      at last he was driven abroad in daylight. The cause was sufficient; he had
      not tasted food for forty-eight hours, and he could not endure the misery
      of his hunger in idle hiding. He came along a back street, glowering at
      the loaves in bake-shop windows, and feeling that he could trade his life
      away for a morsel to eat. The sight of the bread doubled his hunger; but
      it was good to look at it, any how, and imagine what one might do if one
      only had it.
    </p>
    <p>
      Presently, in the middle of the street he saw a shining spot&mdash;looked
      again&mdash;did not, and could not, believe his eyes&mdash;turned away, to
      try them, then looked again. It was a verity&mdash;no vain,
      hunger-inspired delusion&mdash;it was a silver dime!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link431" id="link431"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="431.jpg (31K)" src="images/431.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      He snatched it&mdash;gloated over it; doubted it&mdash;bit it&mdash;found
      it genuine&mdash;choked his heart down, and smothered a halleluiah. Then
      he looked around&mdash;saw that nobody was looking at him&mdash;threw the
      dime down where it was before&mdash;walked away a few steps, and
      approached again, pretending he did not know it was there, so that he
      could re-enjoy the luxury of finding it. He walked around it, viewing it
      from different points; then sauntered about with his hands in his pockets,
      looking up at the signs and now and then glancing at it and feeling the
      old thrill again. Finally he took it up, and went away, fondling it in his
      pocket. He idled through unfrequented streets, stopping in doorways and
      corners to take it out and look at it. By and by he went home to his
      lodgings&mdash;an empty queens-ware hogshead,&mdash;and employed himself
      till night trying to make up his mind what to buy with it. But it was hard
      to do. To get the most for it was the idea. He knew that at the Miner's
      Restaurant he could get a plate of beans and a piece of bread for ten
      cents; or a fish- ball and some few trifles, but they gave "no bread with
      one fish-ball" there. At French Pete's he could get a veal cutlet, plain,
      and some radishes and bread, for ten cents; or a cup of coffee&mdash;a
      pint at least&mdash;and a slice of bread; but the slice was not thick
      enough by the eighth of an inch, and sometimes they were still more
      criminal than that in the cutting of it. At seven o'clock his hunger was
      wolfish; and still his mind was not made up. He turned out and went up
      Merchant street, still ciphering; and chewing a bit of stick, as is the
      way of starving men.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link432" id="link432"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="432.jpg (38K)" src="images/432.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      He passed before the lights of Martin's restaurant, the most aristocratic
      in the city, and stopped. It was a place where he had often dined, in
      better days, and Martin knew him well. Standing aside, just out of the
      range of the light, he worshiped the quails and steaks in the show window,
      and imagined that may be the fairy times were not gone yet and some prince
      in disguise would come along presently and tell him to go in there and
      take whatever he wanted. He chewed his stick with a hungry interest as he
      warmed to his subject. Just at this juncture he was conscious of some one
      at his side, sure enough; and then a finger touched his arm. He looked up,
      over his shoulder, and saw an apparition&mdash;a very allegory of Hunger!
      It was a man six feet high, gaunt, unshaven, hung with rags; with a
      haggard face and sunken cheeks, and eyes that pleaded piteously. This
      phantom said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Come with me&mdash;please."
    </p>
    <p>
      He locked his arm in Blucher's and walked up the street to where the
      passengers were few and the light not strong, and then facing about, put
      out his hands in a beseeching way, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Friend&mdash;stranger&mdash;look at me! Life is easy to you&mdash;you go
      about, placid and content, as I did once, in my day&mdash;you have been in
      there, and eaten your sumptuous supper, and picked your teeth, and hummed
      your tune, and thought your pleasant thoughts, and said to yourself it is
      a good world&mdash;but you've never suffered! You don't know what trouble
      is&mdash;you don't know what misery is&mdash;nor hunger! Look at me!
      Stranger have pity on a poor friendless, homeless dog! As God is my judge,
      I have not tasted food for eight and forty hours!&mdash;look in my eyes
      and see if I lie! Give me the least trifle in the world to keep me from
      starving&mdash;anything&mdash;twenty-five cents! Do it, stranger&mdash;do
      it, please. It will be nothing to you, but life to me. Do it, and I will
      go down on my knees and lick the dust before you! I will kiss your
      footprints&mdash;I will worship the very ground you walk on! Only
      twenty-five cents! I am famishing&mdash;perishing&mdash;starving by
      inches! For God's sake don't desert me!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link433" id="link433"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="433.jpg (71K)" src="images/433.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Blucher was bewildered&mdash;and touched, too&mdash;stirred to the depths.
      He reflected. Thought again. Then an idea struck him, and he said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Come with me."
    </p>
    <p>
      He took the outcast's arm, walked him down to Martin's restaurant, seated
      him at a marble table, placed the bill of fare before him, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Order what you want, friend. Charge it to me, Mr. Martin."
    </p>
    <p>
      "All right, Mr. Blucher," said Martin.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then Blucher stepped back and leaned against the counter and watched the
      man stow away cargo after cargo of buckwheat cakes at seventy-five cents a
      plate; cup after cup of coffee, and porter house steaks worth two dollars
      apiece; and when six dollars and a half's worth of destruction had been
      accomplished, and the stranger's hunger appeased, Blucher went down to
      French Pete's, bought a veal cutlet plain, a slice of bread, and three
      radishes, with his dime, and set to and feasted like a king!
    </p>
    <p>
      Take the episode all around, it was as odd as any that can be culled from
      the myriad curiosities of Californian life, perhaps.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch60" id="linkch60"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by, an old friend of mine, a miner, came down from one of the
      decayed mining camps of Tuolumne, California, and I went back with him. We
      lived in a small cabin on a verdant hillside, and there were not five
      other cabins in view over the wide expanse of hill and forest. Yet a
      flourishing city of two or three thousand population had occupied this
      grassy dead solitude during the flush times of twelve or fifteen years
      before, and where our cabin stood had once been the heart of the teeming
      hive, the centre of the city. When the mines gave out the town fell into
      decay, and in a few years wholly disappeared&mdash;streets, dwellings,
      shops, everything&mdash;and left no sign. The grassy slopes were as green
      and smooth and desolate of life as if they had never been disturbed. The
      mere handful of miners still remaining, had seen the town spring up
      spread, grow and flourish in its pride; and they had seen it sicken and
      die, and pass away like a dream. With it their hopes had died, and their
      zest of life. They had long ago resigned themselves to their exile, and
      ceased to correspond with their distant friends or turn longing eyes
      toward their early homes. They had accepted banishment, forgotten the
      world and been forgotten of the world. They were far from telegraphs and
      railroads, and they stood, as it were, in a living grave, dead to the
      events that stirred the globe's great populations, dead to the common
      interests of men, isolated and outcast from brotherhood with their kind.
      It was the most singular, and almost the most touching and melancholy
      exile that fancy can imagine.&mdash;One of my associates in this locality,
      for two or three months, was a man who had had a university education; but
      now for eighteen years he had decayed there by inches, a bearded, rough-
      clad, clay-stained miner, and at times, among his sighings and
      soliloquizings, he unconsciously interjected vaguely remembered Latin and
      Greek sentences&mdash;dead and musty tongues, meet vehicles for the
      thoughts of one whose dreams were all of the past, whose life was a
      failure; a tired man, burdened with the present, and indifferent to the
      future; a man without ties, hopes, interests, waiting for rest and the
      end.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link436" id="link436"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="436.jpg (34K)" src="images/436.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In that one little corner of California is found a species of mining which
      is seldom or never mentioned in print. It is called "pocket mining" and I
      am not aware that any of it is done outside of that little corner. The
      gold is not evenly distributed through the surface dirt, as in ordinary
      placer mines, but is collected in little spots, and they are very wide
      apart and exceedingly hard to find, but when you do find one you reap a
      rich and sudden harvest. There are not now more than twenty pocket miners
      in that entire little region. I think I know every one of them personally.
      I have known one of them to hunt patiently about the hill-sides every day
      for eight months without finding gold enough to make a snuff-box&mdash;his
      grocery bill running up relentlessly all the time&mdash;and then find a
      pocket and take out of it two thousand dollars in two dips of his shovel.
      I have known him to take out three thousand dollars in two hours, and go
      and pay up every cent of his indebtedness, then enter on a dazzling spree
      that finished the last of his treasure before the night was gone. And the
      next day he bought his groceries on credit as usual, and shouldered his
      pan and shovel and went off to the hills hunting pockets again happy and
      content. This is the most fascinating of all the different kinds of
      mining, and furnishes a very handsome percentage of victims to the lunatic
      asylum.
    </p>
    <p>
      Pocket hunting is an ingenious process. You take a spadeful of earth from
      the hill-side and put it in a large tin pan and dissolve and wash it
      gradually away till nothing is left but a teaspoonful of fine sediment.
      Whatever gold was in that earth has remained, because, being the heaviest,
      it has sought the bottom. Among the sediment you will find half a dozen
      yellow particles no larger than pin-heads. You are delighted. You move off
      to one side and wash another pan. If you find gold again, you move to one
      side further, and wash a third pan. If you find no gold this time, you are
      delighted again, because you know you are on the right scent.
    </p>
    <p>
      You lay an imaginary plan, shaped like a fan, with its handle up the hill&mdash;for
      just where the end of the handle is, you argue that the rich deposit lies
      hidden, whose vagrant grains of gold have escaped and been washed down the
      hill, spreading farther and farther apart as they wandered. And so you
      proceed up the hill, washing the earth and narrowing your lines every time
      the absence of gold in the pan shows that you are outside the spread of
      the fan; and at last, twenty yards up the hill your lines have converged
      to a point&mdash;a single foot from that point you cannot find any gold.
      Your breath comes short and quick, you are feverish with excitement; the
      dinner-bell may ring its clapper off, you pay no attention; friends may
      die, weddings transpire, houses burn down, they are nothing to you; you
      sweat and dig and delve with a frantic interest&mdash;and all at once you
      strike it! Up comes a spadeful of earth and quartz that is all lovely with
      soiled lumps and leaves and sprays of gold. Sometimes that one spadeful is
      all&mdash;$500. Sometimes the nest contains $10,000, and it takes you
      three or four days to get it all out. The pocket-miners tell of one nest
      that yielded $60,000 and two men exhausted it in two weeks, and then sold
      the ground for $10,000 to a party who never got $300 out of it afterward.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link437" id="link437"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="437.jpg (37K)" src="images/437.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The hogs are good pocket hunters. All the summer they root around the
      bushes, and turn up a thousand little piles of dirt, and then the miners
      long for the rains; for the rains beat upon these little piles and wash
      them down and expose the gold, possibly right over a pocket. Two pockets
      were found in this way by the same man in one day. One had $5,000 in it
      and the other $8,000. That man could appreciate it, for he hadn't had a
      cent for about a year.
    </p>
    <p>
      In Tuolumne lived two miners who used to go to the neighboring village in
      the afternoon and return every night with household supplies. Part of the
      distance they traversed a trail, and nearly always sat down to rest on a
      great boulder that lay beside the path. In the course of thirteen years
      they had worn that boulder tolerably smooth, sitting on it. By and by two
      vagrant Mexicans came along and occupied the seat. They began to amuse
      themselves by chipping off flakes from the boulder with a sledge- hammer.
      They examined one of these flakes and found it rich with gold. That
      boulder paid them $800 afterward. But the aggravating circumstance was
      that these "Greasers" knew that there must be more gold where that boulder
      came from, and so they went panning up the hill and found what was
      probably the richest pocket that region has yet produced. It took three
      months to exhaust it, and it yielded $120,000. The two American miners who
      used to sit on the boulder are poor yet, and they take turn about in
      getting up early in the morning to curse those Mexicans&mdash;and when it
      comes down to pure ornamental cursing, the native American is gifted above
      the sons of men.
    </p>
    <p>
      I have dwelt at some length upon this matter of pocket mining because it
      is a subject that is seldom referred to in print, and therefore I judged
      that it would have for the reader that interest which naturally attaches
      to novelty.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /> <br /> <br /><br /><br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch61"
      id="linkch61"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      One of my comrades there&mdash;another of those victims of eighteen years
      of unrequited toil and blighted hopes&mdash;was one of the gentlest
      spirits that ever bore its patient cross in a weary exile: grave and
      simple Dick Baker, pocket-miner of Dead-House Gulch.&mdash;He was
      forty-six, gray as a rat, earnest, thoughtful, slenderly educated,
      slouchily dressed and clay- soiled, but his heart was finer metal than any
      gold his shovel ever brought to light&mdash;than any, indeed, that ever
      was mined or minted.
    </p>
    <p>
      Whenever he was out of luck and a little down-hearted, he would fall to
      mourning over the loss of a wonderful cat he used to own (for where women
      and children are not, men of kindly impulses take up with pets, for they
      must love something). And he always spoke of the strange sagacity of that
      cat with the air of a man who believed in his secret heart that there was
      something human about it&mdash;may be even supernatural.
    </p>
    <p>
      I heard him talking about this animal once. He said:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link440" id="link440"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="440.jpg (18K)" src="images/440.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen, I used to have a cat here, by the name of Tom Quartz, which
      you'd a took an interest in I reckon&mdash;most any body would. I had him
      here eight year&mdash;and he was the remarkablest cat I ever see. He was a
      large gray one of the Tom specie, an' he had more hard, natchral sense
      than any man in this camp&mdash;'n' a power of dignity&mdash;he wouldn't
      let the Gov'ner of Californy be familiar with him. He never ketched a rat
      in his life&mdash;'peared to be above it. He never cared for nothing but
      mining. He knowed more about mining, that cat did, than any man I ever,
      ever see. You couldn't tell him noth'n 'bout placer diggin's&mdash;'n' as
      for pocket mining, why he was just born for it.
    </p>
    <p>
      "He would dig out after me an' Jim when we went over the hills
      prospect'n', and he would trot along behind us for as much as five mile,
      if we went so fur. An' he had the best judgment about mining ground&mdash;why
      you never see anything like it. When we went to work, he'd scatter a
      glance around, 'n' if he didn't think much of the indications, he would
      give a look as much as to say, 'Well, I'll have to get you to excuse me,'
      'n' without another word he'd hyste his nose into the air 'n' shove for
      home. But if the ground suited him, he would lay low 'n' keep dark till
      the first pan was washed, 'n' then he would sidle up 'n' take a look, an'
      if there was about six or seven grains of gold he was satisfied&mdash;he
      didn't want no better prospect 'n' that&mdash;'n' then he would lay down
      on our coats and snore like a steamboat till we'd struck the pocket, an'
      then get up 'n' superintend. He was nearly lightnin' on superintending.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, bye an' bye, up comes this yer quartz excitement. Every body was
      into it&mdash;every body was pick'n' 'n' blast'n' instead of shovelin'
      dirt on the hill side&mdash;every body was put'n' down a shaft instead of
      scrapin' the surface. Noth'n' would do Jim, but we must tackle the ledges,
      too, 'n' so we did. We commenced put'n' down a shaft, 'n' Tom Quartz he
      begin to wonder what in the Dickens it was all about. He hadn't ever seen
      any mining like that before, 'n' he was all upset, as you may say&mdash;he
      couldn't come to a right understanding of it no way&mdash;it was too many
      for him. He was down on it, too, you bet you&mdash;he was down on it
      powerful&mdash;'n' always appeared to consider it the cussedest
      foolishness out. But that cat, you know, was always agin new fangled
      arrangements&mdash;somehow he never could abide'em. You know how it is
      with old habits. But by an' by Tom Quartz begin to git sort of reconciled
      a little, though he never could altogether understand that eternal sinkin'
      of a shaft an' never pannin' out any thing. At last he got to comin' down
      in the shaft, hisself, to try to cipher it out. An' when he'd git the
      blues, 'n' feel kind o'scruffy, 'n' aggravated 'n' disgusted&mdash;knowin'
      as he did, that the bills was runnin' up all the time an' we warn't makin'
      a cent&mdash;he would curl up on a gunny sack in the corner an' go to
      sleep. Well, one day when the shaft was down about eight foot, the rock
      got so hard that we had to put in a blast&mdash;the first blast'n' we'd
      ever done since Tom Quartz was born. An' then we lit the fuse 'n' clumb
      out 'n' got off 'bout fifty yards&mdash;'n' forgot 'n' left Tom Quartz
      sound asleep on the gunny sack.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link441" id="link441"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="441.jpg (89K)" src="images/441.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "In 'bout a minute we seen a puff of smoke bust up out of the hole, 'n'
      then everything let go with an awful crash, 'n' about four million ton of
      rocks 'n' dirt 'n' smoke 'n; splinters shot up 'bout a mile an' a half
      into the air, an' by George, right in the dead centre of it was old Tom
      Quartz a goin' end over end, an' a snortin' an' a sneez'n', an' a clawin'
      an' a reachin' for things like all possessed. But it warn't no use, you
      know, it warn't no use. An' that was the last we see of him for about two
      minutes 'n' a half, an' then all of a sudden it begin to rain rocks and
      rubbage, an' directly he come down ker-whop about ten foot off f'm where
      we stood Well, I reckon he was p'raps the orneriest lookin' beast you ever
      see. One ear was sot back on his neck, 'n' his tail was stove up, 'n' his
      eye-winkers was swinged off, 'n' he was all blacked up with powder an'
      smoke, an' all sloppy with mud 'n' slush f'm one end to the other.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well sir, it warn't no use to try to apologize&mdash;we couldn't say a
      word. He took a sort of a disgusted look at hisself, 'n' then he looked at
      us&mdash;an' it was just exactly the same as if he had said&mdash;'Gents,
      may be you think it's smart to take advantage of a cat that 'ain't had no
      experience of quartz minin', but I think different'&mdash;an' then he
      turned on his heel 'n' marched off home without ever saying another word.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link442" id="link442"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="442.jpg (16K)" src="images/442.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "That was jest his style. An' may be you won't believe it, but after that
      you never see a cat so prejudiced agin quartz mining as what he was. An'
      by an' bye when he did get to goin' down in the shaft agin, you'd 'a been
      astonished at his sagacity. The minute we'd tetch off a blast 'n' the
      fuse'd begin to sizzle, he'd give a look as much as to say: 'Well, I'll
      have to git you to excuse me,' an' it was surpris'n' the way he'd shin out
      of that hole 'n' go f'r a tree. Sagacity? It ain't no name for it. 'Twas
      inspiration!"
    </p>
    <p>
      I said, "Well, Mr. Baker, his prejudice against quartz-mining was
      remarkable, considering how he came by it. Couldn't you ever cure him of
      it?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Cure him! No! When Tom Quartz was sot once, he was always sot&mdash;and
      you might a blowed him up as much as three million times 'n' you'd never a
      broken him of his cussed prejudice agin quartz mining."
    </p>
    <p>
      The affection and the pride that lit up Baker's face when he delivered
      this tribute to the firmness of his humble friend of other days, will
      always be a vivid memory with me.
    </p>
    <p>
      At the end of two months we had never "struck" a pocket. We had panned up
      and down the hillsides till they looked plowed like a field; we could have
      put in a crop of grain, then, but there would have been no way to get it
      to market. We got many good "prospects," but when the gold gave out in the
      pan and we dug down, hoping and longing, we found only emptiness&mdash;the
      pocket that should have been there was as barren as our own.&mdash;At last
      we shouldered our pans and shovels and struck out over the hills to try
      new localities. We prospected around Angel's Camp, in Calaveras county,
      during three weeks, but had no success. Then we wandered on foot among the
      mountains, sleeping under the trees at night, for the weather was mild,
      but still we remained as centless as the last rose of summer. That is a
      poor joke, but it is in pathetic harmony with the circumstances, since we
      were so poor ourselves. In accordance with the custom of the country, our
      door had always stood open and our board welcome to tramping miners&mdash;they
      drifted along nearly every day, dumped their paust shovels by the
      threshold and took "pot luck" with us&mdash;and now on our own tramp we
      never found cold hospitality.
    </p>
    <p>
      Our wanderings were wide and in many directions; and now I could give the
      reader a vivid description of the Big Trees and the marvels of the Yo
      Semite&mdash;but what has this reader done to me that I should persecute
      him? I will deliver him into the hands of less conscientious tourists and
      take his blessing. Let me be charitable, though I fail in all virtues
      else.
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        Note: Some of the phrases in the above are mining technicalities,
        purely, and may be a little obscure to the general reader. In "placer
        diggings" the gold is scattered all through the surface dirt; in
        "pocket" diggings it is concentrated in one little spot; in "quartz" the
        gold is in a solid, continuous vein of rock, enclosed between distinct
        walls of some other kind of stone&mdash;and this is the most laborious
        and expensive of all the different kinds of mining. "Prospecting" is
        hunting for a "placer"; "indications" are signs of its presence;
        "panning out" refers to the washing process by which the grains of gold
        are separated from the dirt; a "prospect" is what one finds in the first
        panful of dirt&mdash;and its value determines whether it is a good or a
        bad prospect, and whether it is worth while to tarry there or seek
        further.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch62" id="linkch62"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      After a three months' absence, I found myself in San Francisco again,
      without a cent. When my credit was about exhausted, (for I had become too
      mean and lazy, now, to work on a morning paper, and there were no
      vacancies on the evening journals,) I was created San Francisco
      correspondent of the Enterprise, and at the end of five months I was out
      of debt, but my interest in my work was gone; for my correspondence being
      a daily one, without rest or respite, I got unspeakably tired of it. I
      wanted another change. The vagabond instinct was strong upon me. Fortune
      favored and I got a new berth and a delightful one. It was to go down to
      the Sandwich Islands and write some letters for the Sacramento Union, an
      excellent journal and liberal with employees.
    </p>
    <p>
      We sailed in the propeller Ajax, in the middle of winter. The almanac
      called it winter, distinctly enough, but the weather was a compromise
      between spring and summer. Six days out of port, it became summer
      altogether. We had some thirty passengers; among them a cheerful soul by
      the name of Williams, and three sea-worn old whaleship captains going down
      to join their vessels. These latter played euchre in the smoking room day
      and night, drank astonishing quantities of raw whisky without being in the
      least affected by it, and were the happiest people I think I ever saw. And
      then there was "the old Admiral&mdash;" a retired whaleman. He was a
      roaring, terrific combination of wind and lightning and thunder, and
      earnest, whole-souled profanity. But nevertheless he was tender- hearted
      as a girl. He was a raving, deafening, devastating typhoon, laying waste
      the cowering seas but with an unvexed refuge in the centre where all
      comers were safe and at rest. Nobody could know the "Admiral" without
      liking him; and in a sudden and dire emergency I think no friend of his
      would know which to choose&mdash;to be cursed by him or prayed for by a
      less efficient person.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link445" id="link445"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="445.jpg (65K)" src="images/445.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      His Title of "Admiral" was more strictly "official" than any ever worn by
      a naval officer before or since, perhaps&mdash;for it was the voluntary
      offering of a whole nation, and came direct from the people themselves
      without any intermediate red tape&mdash;the people of the Sandwich
      Islands. It was a title that came to him freighted with affection, and
      honor, and appreciation of his unpretending merit. And in testimony of the
      genuineness of the title it was publicly ordained that an exclusive flag
      should be devised for him and used solely to welcome his coming and wave
      him God-speed in his going. From that time forth, whenever his ship was
      signaled in the offing, or he catted his anchor and stood out to sea, that
      ensign streamed from the royal halliards on the parliament house and the
      nation lifted their hats to it with spontaneous accord.
    </p>
    <p>
      Yet he had never fired a gun or fought a battle in his life. When I knew
      him on board the Ajax, he was seventy-two years old and had plowed the
      salt water sixty-one of them. For sixteen years he had gone in and out of
      the harbor of Honolulu in command of a whaleship, and for sixteen more had
      been captain of a San Francisco and Sandwich Island passenger packet and
      had never had an accident or lost a vessel. The simple natives knew him
      for a friend who never failed them, and regarded him as children regard a
      father. It was a dangerous thing to oppress them when the roaring Admiral
      was around.
    </p>
    <p>
      Two years before I knew the Admiral, he had retired from the sea on a
      competence, and had sworn a colossal nine-jointed oath that he would
      "never go within smelling distance of the salt water again as long as he
      lived." And he had conscientiously kept it. That is to say, he considered
      he had kept it, and it would have been more than dangerous to suggest to
      him, even in the gentlest way, that making eleven long sea voyages, as a
      passenger, during the two years that had transpired since he "retired,"
      was only keeping the general spirit of it and not the strict letter.
    </p>
    <p>
      The Admiral knew only one narrow line of conduct to pursue in any and all
      cases where there was a fight, and that was to shoulder his way straight
      in without an inquiry as to the rights or the merits of it, and take the
      part of the weaker side.&mdash;And this was the reason why he was always
      sure to be present at the trial of any universally execrated criminal to
      oppress and intimidate the jury with a vindictive pantomime of what he
      would do to them if he ever caught them out of the box. And this was why
      harried cats and outlawed dogs that knew him confidently took sanctuary
      under his chair in time of trouble. In the beginning he was the most
      frantic and bloodthirsty Union man that drew breath in the shadow of the
      Flag; but the instant the Southerners began to go down before the sweep of
      the Northern armies, he ran up the Confederate colors and from that time
      till the end was a rampant and inexorable secessionist.
    </p>
    <p>
      He hated intemperance with a more uncompromising animosity than any
      individual I have ever met, of either sex; and he was never tired of
      storming against it and beseeching friends and strangers alike to be wary
      and drink with moderation. And yet if any creature had been guileless
      enough to intimate that his absorbing nine gallons of "straight" whiskey
      during our voyage was any fraction short of rigid or inflexible
      abstemiousness, in that self-same moment the old man would have spun him
      to the uttermost parts of the earth in the whirlwind of his wrath. Mind, I
      am not saying his whisky ever affected his head or his legs, for it did
      not, in even the slightest degree. He was a capacious container, but he
      did not hold enough for that. He took a level tumblerful of whisky every
      morning before he put his clothes on&mdash;"to sweeten his bilgewater," he
      said.&mdash;He took another after he got the most of his clothes on, "to
      settle his mind and give him his bearings." He then shaved, and put on a
      clean shirt; after which he recited the Lord's Prayer in a fervent,
      thundering bass that shook the ship to her kelson and suspended all
      conversation in the main cabin. Then, at this stage, being invariably "by
      the head," or "by the stern," or "listed to port or starboard," he took
      one more to "put him on an even keel so that he would mind his hellum and
      not miss stays and go about, every time he came up in the wind."&mdash;And
      now, his state-room door swung open and the sun of his benignant face
      beamed redly out upon men and women and children, and he roared his
      "Shipmets a'hoy!" in a way that was calculated to wake the dead and
      precipitate the final resurrection; and forth he strode, a picture to look
      at and a presence to enforce attention. Stalwart and portly; not a gray
      hair; broadbrimmed slouch hat; semi-sailor toggery of blue navy flannel&mdash;roomy
      and ample; a stately expanse of shirt-front and a liberal amount of black
      silk neck-cloth tied with a sailor knot; large chain and imposing seals
      impending from his fob; awe-inspiring feet, and "a hand like the hand of
      Providence," as his whaling brethren expressed it; wrist-bands and sleeves
      pushed back half way to the elbow, out of respect for the warm weather,
      and exposing hairy arms, gaudy with red and blue anchors, ships, and
      goddesses of liberty tattooed in India ink. But these details were only
      secondary matters&mdash;his face was the lodestone that chained the eye.
      It was a sultry disk, glowing determinedly out through a weather beaten
      mask of mahogany, and studded with warts, seamed with scars, "blazed" all
      over with unfailing fresh slips of the razor; and with cheery eyes, under
      shaggy brows, contemplating the world from over the back of a gnarled crag
      of a nose that loomed vast and lonely out of the undulating immensity that
      spread away from its foundations. At his heels frisked the darling of his
      bachelor estate, his terrier "Fan," a creature no larger than a squirrel.
      The main part of his daily life was occupied in looking after "Fan," in a
      motherly way, and doctoring her for a hundred ailments which existed only
      in his imagination.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link448" id="link448"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="448.jpg (48K)" src="images/448.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The Admiral seldom read newspapers; and when he did he never believed
      anything they said. He read nothing, and believed in nothing, but "The Old
      Guard," a secession periodical published in New York. He carried a dozen
      copies of it with him, always, and referred to them for all required
      information. If it was not there, he supplied it himself, out of a
      bountiful fancy, inventing history, names, dates, and every thing else
      necessary to make his point good in an argument. Consequently he was a
      formidable antagonist in a dispute. Whenever he swung clear of the record
      and began to create history, the enemy was helpless and had to surrender.
      Indeed, the enemy could not keep from betraying some little spark of
      indignation at his manufactured history&mdash;and when it came to
      indignation, that was the Admiral's very "best hold." He was always ready
      for a political argument, and if nobody started one he would do it
      himself. With his third retort his temper would begin to rise, and within
      five minutes he would be blowing a gale, and within fifteen his
      smoking-room audience would be utterly stormed away and the old man left
      solitary and alone, banging the table with his fist, kicking the chairs,
      and roaring a hurricane of profanity. It got so, after a while, that
      whenever the Admiral approached, with politics in his eye, the passengers
      would drop out with quiet accord, afraid to meet him; and he would camp on
      a deserted field.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link449" id="link449"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="449.jpg (34K)" src="images/449.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But he found his match at last, and before a full company. At one time or
      another, everybody had entered the lists against him and been routed,
      except the quiet passenger Williams. He had never been able to get an
      expression of opinion out of him on politics. But now, just as the Admiral
      drew near the door and the company were about to slip out, Williams said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Admiral, are you certain about that circumstance concerning the clergymen
      you mentioned the other day?"&mdash;referring to a piece of the Admiral's
      manufactured history.
    </p>
    <p>
      Every one was amazed at the man's rashness. The idea of deliberately
      inviting annihilation was a thing incomprehensible. The retreat came to a
      halt; then everybody sat down again wondering, to await the upshot of it.
      The Admiral himself was as surprised as any one. He paused in the door,
      with his red handkerchief half raised to his sweating face, and
      contemplated the daring reptile in the corner.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Certain of it? Am I certain of it? Do you think I've been lying about it?
      What do you take me for? Anybody that don't know that circumstance, don't
      know anything; a child ought to know it. Read up your history! Read it up&mdash;&mdash;-,
      and don't come asking a man if he's certain about a bit of ABC stuff that
      the very southern niggers know all about."
    </p>
    <p>
      Here the Admiral's fires began to wax hot, the atmosphere thickened, the
      coming earthquake rumbled, he began to thunder and lighten. Within three
      minutes his volcano was in full irruption and he was discharging flames
      and ashes of indignation, belching black volumes of foul history aloft,
      and vomiting red-hot torrents of profanity from his crater. Meantime
      Williams sat silent, and apparently deeply and earnestly interested in
      what the old man was saying. By and by, when the lull came, he said in the
      most deferential way, and with the gratified air of a man who has had a
      mystery cleared up which had been puzzling him uncomfortably:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Now I understand it. I always thought I knew that piece of history well
      enough, but was still afraid to trust it, because there was not that
      convincing particularity about it that one likes to have in history; but
      when you mentioned every name, the other day, and every date, and every
      little circumstance, in their just order and sequence, I said to myself,
      this sounds something like&mdash;this is history&mdash;this is putting it
      in a shape that gives a man confidence; and I said to myself afterward, I
      will just ask the Admiral if he is perfectly certain about the details,
      and if he is I will come out and thank him for clearing this matter up for
      me. And that is what I want to do now&mdash;for until you set that matter
      right it was nothing but just a confusion in my mind, without head or tail
      to it."
    </p>
    <p>
      Nobody ever saw the Admiral look so mollified before, and so pleased.
      Nobody had ever received his bogus history as gospel before; its
      genuineness had always been called in question either by words or looks;
      but here was a man that not only swallowed it all down, but was grateful
      for the dose. He was taken a back; he hardly knew what to say; even his
      profanity failed him. Now, Williams continued, modestly and earnestly:
    </p>
    <p>
      "But Admiral, in saying that this was the first stone thrown, and that
      this precipitated the war, you have overlooked a circumstance which you
      are perfectly familiar with, but which has escaped your memory. Now I
      grant you that what you have stated is correct in every detail&mdash;to
      wit: that on the 16th of October, 1860, two Massachusetts clergymen, named
      Waite and Granger, went in disguise to the house of John Moody, in
      Rockport, at dead of night, and dragged forth two southern women and their
      two little children, and after tarring and feathering them conveyed them
      to Boston and burned them alive in the State House square; and I also
      grant your proposition that this deed is what led to the secession of
      South Carolina on the 20th of December following. Very well." [Here the
      company were pleasantly surprised to hear Williams proceed to come back at
      the Admiral with his own invincible weapon&mdash;clean, pure, manufactured
      history, without a word of truth in it.] "Very well, I say. But Admiral,
      why overlook the Willis and Morgan case in South Carolina? You are too
      well informed a man not to know all about that circumstance. Your
      arguments and your conversations have shown you to be intimately
      conversant with every detail of this national quarrel. You develop matters
      of history every day that show plainly that you are no smatterer in it,
      content to nibble about the surface, but a man who has searched the depths
      and possessed yourself of everything that has a bearing upon the great
      question. Therefore, let me just recall to your mind that Willis and
      Morgan case&mdash;though I see by your face that the whole thing is
      already passing through your memory at this moment. On the 12th of August,
      1860, two months before the Waite and Granger affair, two South Carolina
      clergymen, named John H. Morgan and Winthrop L. Willis, one a Methodist
      and the other an Old School Baptist, disguised themselves, and went at
      midnight to the house of a planter named Thompson&mdash;Archibald F.
      Thompson, Vice President under Thomas Jefferson,&mdash;and took thence, at
      midnight, his widowed aunt, (a Northern woman,) and her adopted child, an
      orphan&mdash;named Mortimer Highie, afflicted with epilepsy and suffering
      at the time from white swelling on one of his legs, and compelled to walk
      on crutches in consequence; and the two ministers, in spite of the
      pleadings of the victims, dragged them to the bush, tarred and feathered
      them, and afterward burned them at the stake in the city of Charleston.
      You remember perfectly well what a stir it made; you remember perfectly
      well that even the Charleston Courier stigmatized the act as being
      unpleasant, of questionable propriety, and scarcely justifiable, and
      likewise that it would not be matter of surprise if retaliation ensued.
      And you remember also, that this thing was the cause of the Massachusetts
      outrage. Who, indeed, were the two Massachusetts ministers? and who were
      the two Southern women they burned? I do not need to remind you, Admiral,
      with your intimate knowledge of history, that Waite was the nephew of the
      woman burned in Charleston; that Granger was her cousin in the second
      degree, and that the woman they burned in Boston was the wife of John H.
      Morgan, and the still loved but divorced wife of Winthrop L. Willis. Now,
      Admiral, it is only fair that you should acknowledge that the first
      provocation came from the Southern preachers and that the Northern ones
      were justified in retaliating. In your arguments you never yet have shown
      the least disposition to withhold a just verdict or be in anywise unfair,
      when authoritative history condemned your position, and therefore I have
      no hesitation in asking you to take the original blame from the
      Massachusetts ministers, in this matter, and transfer it to the South
      Carolina clergymen where it justly belongs."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link453" id="link453"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="453.jpg (44K)" src="images/453.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The Admiral was conquered. This sweet spoken creature who swallowed his
      fraudulent history as if it were the bread of life; basked in his furious
      blasphemy as if it were generous sunshine; found only calm, even-handed
      justice in his rampart partisanship; and flooded him with invented history
      so sugarcoated with flattery and deference that there was no rejecting it,
      was "too many" for him. He stammered some awkward, profane sentences about
      the&mdash;&mdash;-Willis and Morgan business having escaped his memory,
      but that he "remembered it now," and then, under pretence of giving Fan
      some medicine for an imaginary cough, drew out of the battle and went
      away, a vanquished man. Then cheers and laughter went up, and Williams,
      the ship's benefactor was a hero. The news went about the vessel,
      champagne was ordered, and enthusiastic reception instituted in the
      smoking room, and everybody flocked thither to shake hands with the
      conqueror. The wheelman said afterward, that the Admiral stood up behind
      the pilot house and "ripped and cursed all to himself" till he loosened
      the smokestack guys and becalmed the mainsail.
    </p>
    <p>
      The Admiral's power was broken. After that, if he began argument, somebody
      would bring Williams, and the old man would grow weak and begin to quiet
      down at once. And as soon as he was done, Williams in his dulcet,
      insinuating way, would invent some history (referring for proof, to the
      old man's own excellent memory and to copies of "The Old Guard" known not
      to be in his possession) that would turn the tables completely and leave
      the Admiral all abroad and helpless. By and by he came to so dread
      Williams and his gilded tongue that he would stop talking when he saw him
      approach, and finally ceased to mention politics altogether, and from that
      time forward there was entire peace and serenity in the ship.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch63" id="linkch63"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      On a certain bright morning the Islands hove in sight, lying low on the
      lonely sea, and everybody climbed to the upper deck to look. After two
      thousand miles of watery solitude the vision was a welcome one. As we
      approached, the imposing promontory of Diamond Head rose up out of the
      ocean its rugged front softened by the hazy distance, and presently the
      details of the land began to make themselves manifest: first the line of
      beach; then the plumed coacoanut trees of the tropics; then cabins of the
      natives; then the white town of Honolulu, said to contain between twelve
      and fifteen thousand inhabitants spread over a dead level; with streets
      from twenty to thirty feet wide, solid and level as a floor, most of them
      straight as a line and few as crooked as a corkscrew.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link455" id="link455"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="455.jpg (98K)" src="images/455.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The further I traveled through the town the better I liked it. Every step
      revealed a new contrast&mdash;disclosed something I was unaccustomed to.
      In place of the grand mud-colored brown fronts of San Francisco, I saw
      dwellings built of straw, adobies, and cream-colored pebble-and-shell-
      conglomerated coral, cut into oblong blocks and laid in cement; also a
      great number of neat white cottages, with green window-shutters; in place
      of front yards like billiard-tables with iron fences around them, I saw
      these homes surrounded by ample yards, thickly clad with green grass, and
      shaded by tall trees, through whose dense foliage the sun could scarcely
      penetrate; in place of the customary geranium, calla lily, etc.,
      languishing in dust and general debility, I saw luxurious banks and
      thickets of flowers, fresh as a meadow after a rain, and glowing with the
      richest dyes; in place of the dingy horrors of San Francisco's pleasure
      grove, the "Willows," I saw huge-bodied, wide-spreading forest trees, with
      strange names and stranger appearance&mdash;trees that cast a shadow like
      a thunder-cloud, and were able to stand alone without being tied to green
      poles; in place of gold fish, wiggling around in glass globes, assuming
      countless shades and degrees of distortion through the magnifying and
      diminishing qualities of their transparent prison houses, I saw cats&mdash;Tom-cats,
      Mary Ann cats, long-tailed cats, bob-tailed cats, blind cats, one-eyed
      cats, wall-eyed cats, cross-eyed cats, gray cats, black cats, white cats,
      yellow cats, striped cats, spotted cats, tame cats, wild cats, singed
      cats, individual cats, groups of cats, platoons of cats, companies of
      cats, regiments of cats, armies of cats, multitudes of cats, millions of
      cats, and all of them sleek, fat, lazy and sound asleep. I looked on a
      multitude of people, some white, in white coats, vests, pantaloons, even
      white cloth shoes, made snowy with chalk duly laid on every morning; but
      the majority of the people were almost as dark as negroes&mdash;women with
      comely features, fine black eyes, rounded forms, inclining to the
      voluptuous, clad in a single bright red or white garment that fell free
      and unconfined from shoulder to heel, long black hair falling loose, gypsy
      hats, encircled with wreaths of natural flowers of a brilliant carmine
      tint; plenty of dark men in various costumes, and some with nothing on but
      a battered stove-pipe hat tilted on the nose, and a very scant
      breech-clout;&mdash;certain smoke-dried children were clothed in nothing
      but sunshine&mdash;a very neat fitting and picturesque apparel indeed.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link456" id="link456"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="456.jpg (25K)" src="images/456.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In place of roughs and rowdies staring and blackguarding on the corners, I
      saw long-haired, saddle-colored Sandwich Island maidens sitting on the
      ground in the shade of corner houses, gazing indolently at whatever or
      whoever happened along; instead of wretched cobble-stone pavements, I
      walked on a firm foundation of coral, built up from the bottom of the sea
      by the absurd but persevering insect of that name, with a light layer of
      lava and cinders overlying the coral, belched up out of fathomless
      perdition long ago through the seared and blackened crater that stands
      dead and harmless in the distance now; instead of cramped and crowded
      street-cars, I met dusky native women sweeping by, free as the wind, on
      fleet horses and astride, with gaudy riding-sashes, streaming like banners
      behind them; instead of the combined stenches of Chinadom and Brannan
      street slaughter-houses, I breathed the balmy fragrance of jessamine,
      oleander, and the Pride of India; in place of the hurry and bustle and
      noisy confusion of San Francisco, I moved in the midst of a Summer calm as
      tranquil as dawn in the Garden of Eden; in place of the Golden City's
      skirting sand hills and the placid bay, I saw on the one side a frame-work
      of tall, precipitous mountains close at hand, clad in refreshing green,
      and cleft by deep, cool, chasm-like valleys&mdash;and in front the grand
      sweep of the ocean; a brilliant, transparent green near the shore, bound
      and bordered by a long white line of foamy spray dashing against the reef,
      and further out the dead blue water of the deep sea, flecked with "white
      caps," and in the far horizon a single, lonely sail&mdash;a mere
      accent-mark to emphasize a slumberous calm and a solitude that were
      without sound or limit. When the sun sunk down&mdash;the one intruder from
      other realms and persistent in suggestions of them&mdash;it was tranced
      luxury to sit in the perfumed air and forget that there was any world but
      these enchanted islands.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link457" id="link457"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="457.jpg (43K)" src="images/457.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It was such ecstacy to dream, and dream&mdash;till you got a bite. A
      scorpion bite. Then the first duty was to get up out of the grass and kill
      the scorpion; and the next to bathe the bitten place with alcohol or
      brandy; and the next to resolve to keep out of the grass in future. Then
      came an adjournment to the bed-chamber and the pastime of writing up the
      day's journal with one hand and the destruction of mosquitoes with the
      other&mdash;a whole community of them at a slap. Then, observing an enemy
      approaching,&mdash;a hairy tarantula on stilts&mdash;why not set the
      spittoon on him? It is done, and the projecting ends of his paws give a
      luminous idea of the magnitude of his reach. Then to bed and become a
      promenade for a centipede with forty-two legs on a side and every foot hot
      enough to burn a hole through a raw-hide. More soaking with alcohol, and a
      resolution to examine the bed before entering it, in future. Then wait,
      and suffer, till all the mosquitoes in the neighborhood have crawled in
      under the bar, then slip out quickly, shut them in and sleep peacefully on
      the floor till morning. Meantime it is comforting to curse the tropics in
      occasional wakeful intervals.
    </p>
    <p>
      We had an abundance of fruit in Honolulu, of course. Oranges, pine-
      apples, bananas, strawberries, lemons, limes, mangoes, guavas, melons, and
      a rare and curious luxury called the chirimoya, which is deliciousness
      itself. Then there is the tamarind. I thought tamarinds were made to eat,
      but that was probably not the idea. I ate several, and it seemed to me
      that they were rather sour that year. They pursed up my lips, till they
      resembled the stem-end of a tomato, and I had to take my sustenance
      through a quill for twenty-four hours.
    </p>
    <p>
      They sharpened my teeth till I could have shaved with them, and gave them
      a "wire edge" that I was afraid would stay; but a citizen said "no, it
      will come off when the enamel does"&mdash;which was comforting, at any
      rate. I found, afterward, that only strangers eat tamarinds&mdash;but they
      only eat them once.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link458" id="link458"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="458.jpg (145K)" src="images/458.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch64" id="linkch64"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXIV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In my diary of our third day in Honolulu, I find this:
    </p>
    <p>
      I am probably the most sensitive man in Hawaii to-night&mdash;especially
      about sitting down in the presence of my betters. I have ridden fifteen or
      twenty miles on horse-back since 5 P.M. and to tell the honest truth, I
      have a delicacy about sitting down at all.
    </p>
    <p>
      An excursion to Diamond Head and the King's Coacoanut Grove was planned
      to-day&mdash;time, 4:30 P.M.&mdash;the party to consist of half a dozen
      gentlemen and three ladies. They all started at the appointed hour except
      myself. I was at the Government prison, (with Captain Fish and another
      whaleship- skipper, Captain Phillips,) and got so interested in its
      examination that I did not notice how quickly the time was passing.
      Somebody remarked that it was twenty minutes past five o'clock, and that
      woke me up. It was a fortunate circumstance that Captain Phillips was
      along with his "turn out," as he calls a top-buggy that Captain Cook
      brought here in 1778, and a horse that was here when Captain Cook came.
      Captain Phillips takes a just pride in his driving and in the speed of his
      horse, and to his passion for displaying them I owe it that we were only
      sixteen minutes coming from the prison to the American Hotel&mdash;a
      distance which has been estimated to be over half a mile. But it took some
      fearful driving. The Captain's whip came down fast, and the blows started
      so much dust out of the horse's hide that during the last half of the
      journey we rode through an impenetrable fog, and ran by a pocket compass
      in the hands of Captain Fish, a whaler of twenty-six years experience, who
      sat there through the perilous voyage as self-possessed as if he had been
      on the euchre-deck of his own ship, and calmly said, "Port your helm&mdash;port,"
      from time to time, and "Hold her a little free&mdash;steady&mdash;so&mdash;so,"
      and "Luff&mdash;hard down to starboard!" and never once lost his presence
      of mind or betrayed the least anxiety by voice or manner. When we came to
      anchor at last, and Captain Phillips looked at his watch and said,
      "Sixteen minutes&mdash;I told you it was in her! that's over three miles
      an hour!" I could see he felt entitled to a compliment, and so I said I
      had never seen lightning go like that horse. And I never had.
    </p>
    <p>
      The landlord of the American said the party had been gone nearly an hour,
      but that he could give me my choice of several horses that could overtake
      them. I said, never mind&mdash;I preferred a safe horse to a fast one&mdash;I
      would like to have an excessively gentle horse&mdash;a horse with no
      spirit whatever&mdash;a lame one, if he had such a thing. Inside of five
      minutes I was mounted, and perfectly satisfied with my outfit. I had no
      time to label him "This is a horse," and so if the public took him for a
      sheep I cannot help it. I was satisfied, and that was the main thing. I
      could see that he had as many fine points as any man's horse, and so I
      hung my hat on one of them, behind the saddle, and swabbed the
      perspiration from my face and started. I named him after this island,
      "Oahu" (pronounced O-waw-hee). The first gate he came to he started in; I
      had neither whip nor spur, and so I simply argued the case with him. He
      resisted argument, but ultimately yielded to insult and abuse. He backed
      out of that gate and steered for another one on the other side of the
      street. I triumphed by my former process. Within the next six hundred
      yards he crossed the street fourteen times and attempted thirteen gates,
      and in the meantime the tropical sun was beating down and threatening to
      cave the top of my head in, and I was literally dripping with
      perspiration. He abandoned the gate business after that and went along
      peaceably enough, but absorbed in meditation. I noticed this latter
      circumstance, and it soon began to fill me with apprehension. I said to my
      self, this creature is planning some new outrage, some fresh deviltry or
      other&mdash;no horse ever thought over a subject so profoundly as this one
      is doing just for nothing. The more this thing preyed upon my mind the
      more uneasy I became, until the suspense became almost unbearable and I
      dismounted to see if there was anything wild in his eye&mdash;for I had
      heard that the eye of this noblest of our domestic animals is very
      expressive.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link461" id="link461"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="461.jpg (86K)" src="images/461.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I cannot describe what a load of anxiety was lifted from my mind when I
      found that he was only asleep. I woke him up and started him into a faster
      walk, and then the villainy of his nature came out again. He tried to
      climb over a stone wall, five or six feet high. I saw that I must apply
      force to this horse, and that I might as well begin first as last. I
      plucked a stout switch from a tamarind tree, and the moment he saw it, he
      surrendered. He broke into a convulsive sort of a canter, which had three
      short steps in it and one long one, and reminded me alternately of the
      clattering shake of the great earthquake, and the sweeping plunging of the
      Ajax in a storm.
    </p>
    <p>
      And now there can be no fitter occasion than the present to pronounce a
      left-handed blessing upon the man who invented the American saddle. There
      is no seat to speak of about it&mdash;one might as well sit in a shovel-
      -and the stirrups are nothing but an ornamental nuisance. If I were to
      write down here all the abuse I expended on those stirrups, it would make
      a large book, even without pictures. Sometimes I got one foot so far
      through, that the stirrup partook of the nature of an anklet; sometimes
      both feet were through, and I was handcuffed by the legs; and sometimes my
      feet got clear out and left the stirrups wildly dangling about my shins.
      Even when I was in proper position and carefully balanced upon the balls
      of my feet, there was no comfort in it, on account of my nervous dread
      that they were going to slip one way or the other in a moment. But the
      subject is too exasperating to write about.
    </p>
    <p>
      A mile and a half from town, I came to a grove of tall cocoanut trees,
      with clean, branchless stems reaching straight up sixty or seventy feet
      and topped with a spray of green foliage sheltering clusters of cocoa-
      nuts&mdash;not more picturesque than a forest of collossal ragged
      parasols, with bunches of magnified grapes under them, would be.
    </p>
    <p>
      I once heard a gouty northern invalid say that a cocoanut tree might be
      poetical, possibly it was; but it looked like a feather-duster struck by
      lightning. I think that describes it better than a picture&mdash;and yet,
      without any question, there is something fascinating about a cocoa-nut
      tree&mdash;and graceful, too.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link462" id="link462"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="462.jpg (29K)" src="images/462.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      About a dozen cottages, some frame and the others of native grass, nestled
      sleepily in the shade here and there. The grass cabins are of a grayish
      color, are shaped much like our own cottages, only with higher and steeper
      roofs usually, and are made of some kind of weed strongly bound together
      in bundles. The roofs are very thick, and so are the walls; the latter
      have square holes in them for windows. At a little distance these cabins
      have a furry appearance, as if they might be made of bear skins. They are
      very cool and pleasant inside. The King's flag was flying from the roof of
      one of the cottages, and His Majesty was probably within. He owns the
      whole concern thereabouts, and passes his time there frequently, on sultry
      days "laying off." The spot is called "The King's Grove."
    </p>
    <p>
      Near by is an interesting ruin&mdash;the meagre remains of an ancient
      heathen temple&mdash;a place where human sacrifices were offered up in
      those old bygone days when the simple child of nature, yielding
      momentarily to sin when sorely tempted, acknowledged his error when calm
      reflection had shown it him, and came forward with noble frankness and
      offered up his grandmother as an atoning sacrifice&mdash;in those old days
      when the luckless sinner could keep on cleansing his conscience and
      achieving periodical happiness as long as his relations held out; long,
      long before the missionaries braved a thousand privations to come and make
      them permanently miserable by telling them how beautiful and how blissful
      a place heaven is, and how nearly impossible it is to get there; and
      showed the poor native how dreary a place perdition is and what
      unnecessarily liberal facilities there are for going to it; showed him
      how, in his ignorance he had gone and fooled away all his kinfolks to no
      purpose; showed him what rapture it is to work all day long for fifty
      cents to buy food for next day with, as compared with fishing for pastime
      and lolling in the shade through eternal Summer, and eating of the bounty
      that nobody labored to provide but Nature. How sad it is to think of the
      multitudes who have gone to their graves in this beautiful island and
      never knew there was a hell!
    </p>
    <p>
      This ancient temple was built of rough blocks of lava, and was simply a
      roofless inclosure a hundred and thirty feet long and seventy wide&mdash;nothing
      but naked walls, very thick, but not much higher than a man's head. They
      will last for ages no doubt, if left unmolested. Its three altars and
      other sacred appurtenances have crumbled and passed away years ago. It is
      said that in the old times thousands of human beings were slaughtered
      here, in the presence of naked and howling savages. If these mute stones
      could speak, what tales they could tell, what pictures they could
      describe, of fettered victims writhing under the knife; of massed forms
      straining forward out of the gloom, with ferocious faces lit up by the
      sacrificial fires; of the background of ghostly trees; of the dark pyramid
      of Diamond Head standing sentinel over the uncanny scene, and the peaceful
      moon looking down upon it through rifts in the cloud-rack!
    </p>
    <p>
      When Kamehameha (pronounced Ka-may-ha-may-ah) the Great&mdash;who was a
      sort of a Napoleon in military genius and uniform success&mdash;invaded
      this island of Oahu three quarters of a century ago, and exterminated the
      army sent to oppose him, and took full and final possession of the
      country, he searched out the dead body of the King of Oahu, and those of
      the principal chiefs, and impaled their heads on the walls of this temple.
    </p>
    <p>
      Those were savage times when this old slaughter-house was in its prime.
      The King and the chiefs ruled the common herd with a rod of iron; made
      them gather all the provisions the masters needed; build all the houses
      and temples; stand all the expenses, of whatever kind; take kicks and
      cuffs for thanks; drag out lives well flavored with misery, and then
      suffer death for trifling offences or yield up their lives on the
      sacrificial altars to purchase favors from the gods for their hard rulers.
      The missionaries have clothed them, educated them, broken up the tyrannous
      authority of their chiefs, and given them freedom and the right to enjoy
      whatever their hands and brains produce with equal laws for all, and
      punishment for all alike who transgress them. The contrast is so strong&mdash;the
      benefit conferred upon this people by the missionaries is so prominent, so
      palpable and so unquestionable, that the frankest compliment I can pay
      them, and the best, is simply to point to the condition of the Sandwich
      Islanders of Captain Cook's time, and their condition to-day.
    </p>
    <p>
      Their work speaks for itself.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch65" id="linkch65"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by, after a rugged climb, we halted on the summit of a hill which
      commanded a far-reaching view. The moon rose and flooded mountain and
      valley and ocean with a mellow radiance, and out of the shadows of the
      foliage the distant lights of Honolulu glinted like an encampment of
      fireflies. The air was heavy with the fragrance of flowers. The halt was
      brief.&mdash;Gayly laughing and talking, the party galloped on, and I
      clung to the pommel and cantered after. Presently we came to a place where
      no grass grew&mdash;a wide expanse of deep sand. They said it was an old
      battle ground. All around everywhere, not three feet apart, the bleached
      bones of men gleamed white in the moonlight. We picked up a lot of them
      for mementoes. I got quite a number of arm bones and leg bones&mdash;of
      great chiefs, may be, who had fought savagely in that fearful battle in
      the old days, when blood flowed like wine where we now stood&mdash;and
      wore the choicest of them out on Oahu afterward, trying to make him go.
      All sorts of bones could be found except skulls; but a citizen said,
      irreverently, that there had been an unusual number of "skull-hunters"
      there lately&mdash;a species of sportsmen I had never heard of before.
    </p>
    <p>
      Nothing whatever is known about this place&mdash;its story is a secret
      that will never be revealed. The oldest natives make no pretense of being
      possessed of its history. They say these bones were here when they were
      children. They were here when their grandfathers were children&mdash;but
      how they came here, they can only conjecture. Many people believe this
      spot to be an ancient battle-ground, and it is usual to call it so; and
      they believe that these skeletons have lain for ages just where their
      proprietors fell in the great fight. Other people believe that Kamehameha
      I. fought his first battle here. On this point, I have heard a story,
      which may have been taken from one of the numerous books which have been
      written concerning these islands&mdash;I do not know where the narrator
      got it. He said that when Kamehameha (who was at first merely a
      subordinate chief on the island of Hawaii), landed here, he brought a
      large army with him, and encamped at Waikiki. The Oahuans marched against
      him, and so confident were they of success that they readily acceded to a
      demand of their priests that they should draw a line where these bones now
      lie, and take an oath that, if forced to retreat at all, they would never
      retreat beyond this boundary. The priests told them that death and
      everlasting punishment would overtake any who violated the oath, and the
      march was resumed. Kamehameha drove them back step by step; the priests
      fought in the front rank and exhorted them both by voice and inspiriting
      example to remember their oath&mdash;to die, if need be, but never cross
      the fatal line. The struggle was manfully maintained, but at last the
      chief priest fell, pierced to the heart with a spear, and the unlucky omen
      fell like a blight upon the brave souls at his back; with a triumphant
      shout the invaders pressed forward&mdash;the line was crossed&mdash;the
      offended gods deserted the despairing army, and, accepting the doom their
      perjury had brought upon them, they broke and fled over the plain where
      Honolulu stands now&mdash;up the beautiful Nuuanu Valley&mdash;paused a
      moment, hemmed in by precipitous mountains on either hand and the
      frightful precipice of the Pari in front, and then were driven over&mdash;a
      sheer plunge of six hundred feet!
    </p>
    <p>
      The story is pretty enough, but Mr. Jarves' excellent history says the
      Oahuans were intrenched in Nuuanu Valley; that Kamehameha ousted them,
      routed them, pursued them up the valley and drove them over the precipice.
      He makes no mention of our bone-yard at all in his book.
    </p>
    <p>
      Impressed by the profound silence and repose that rested over the
      beautiful landscape, and being, as usual, in the rear, I gave voice to my
      thoughts. I said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "What a picture is here slumbering in the solemn glory of the moon! How
      strong the rugged outlines of the dead volcano stand out against the clear
      sky! What a snowy fringe marks the bursting of the surf over the long,
      curved reef! How calmly the dim city sleeps yonder in the plain! How soft
      the shadows lie upon the stately mountains that border the dream-haunted
      Mauoa Valley! What a grand pyramid of billowy clouds towers above the
      storied Pari! How the grim warriors of the past seem flocking in ghostly
      squadrons to their ancient battlefield again&mdash;how the wails of the
      dying well up from the&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      At this point the horse called Oahu sat down in the sand. Sat down to
      listen, I suppose. Never mind what he heard, I stopped apostrophising and
      convinced him that I was not a man to allow contempt of Court on the part
      of a horse. I broke the back-bone of a Chief over his rump and set out to
      join the cavalcade again.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link467" id="link467"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="467.jpg (33K)" src="images/467.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Very considerably fagged out we arrived in town at 9 o'clock at night,
      myself in the lead&mdash;for when my horse finally came to understand that
      he was homeward bound and hadn't far to go, he turned his attention
      strictly to business.
    </p>
    <p>
      This is a good time to drop in a paragraph of information. There is no
      regular livery stable in Honolulu, or, indeed, in any part of the Kingdom
      of Hawaii; therefore unless you are acquainted with wealthy residents (who
      all have good horses), you must hire animals of the wretchedest
      description from the Kanakas. (i.e. natives.) Any horse you hire, even
      though it be from a white man, is not often of much account, because it
      will be brought in for you from some ranch, and has necessarily been
      leading a hard life. If the Kanakas who have been caring for him
      (inveterate riders they are) have not ridden him half to death every day
      themselves, you can depend upon it they have been doing the same thing by
      proxy, by clandestinely hiring him out. At least, so I am informed. The
      result is, that no horse has a chance to eat, drink, rest, recuperate, or
      look well or feel well, and so strangers go about the Islands mounted as I
      was to-day.
    </p>
    <p>
      In hiring a horse from a Kanaka, you must have all your eyes about you,
      because you can rest satisfied that you are dealing with a shrewd
      unprincipled rascal. You may leave your door open and your trunk unlocked
      as long as you please, and he will not meddle with your property; he has
      no important vices and no inclination to commit robbery on a large scale;
      but if he can get ahead of you in the horse business, he will take a
      genuine delight in doing it. This traits is characteristic of horse
      jockeys, the world over, is it not? He will overcharge you if he can; he
      will hire you a fine-looking horse at night (anybody's&mdash;may be the
      King's, if the royal steed be in convenient view), and bring you the mate
      to my Oahu in the morning, and contend that it is the same animal. If you
      make trouble, he will get out by saying it was not himself who made the
      bargain with you, but his brother, "who went out in the country this
      morning." They have always got a "brother" to shift the responsibility
      upon. A victim said to one of these fellows one day:
    </p>
    <p>
      "But I know I hired the horse of you, because I noticed that scar on your
      cheek."
    </p>
    <p>
      The reply was not bad: "Oh, yes&mdash;yes&mdash;my brother all same&mdash;we
      twins!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link469" id="link469"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="469.jpg (81K)" src="images/469.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      A friend of mine, J. Smith, hired a horse yesterday, the Kanaka warranting
      him to be in excellent condition.
    </p>
    <p>
      Smith had a saddle and blanket of his own, and he ordered the Kanaka to
      put these on the horse. The Kanaka protested that he was perfectly willing
      to trust the gentleman with the saddle that was already on the animal, but
      Smith refused to use it. The change was made; then Smith noticed that the
      Kanaka had only changed the saddles, and had left the original blanket on
      the horse; he said he forgot to change the blankets, and so, to cut the
      bother short, Smith mounted and rode away. The horse went lame a mile from
      town, and afterward got to cutting up some extraordinary capers. Smith got
      down and took off the saddle, but the blanket stuck fast to the horse&mdash;glued
      to a procession of raw places. The Kanaka's mysterious conduct stood
      explained.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link470" id="link470"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="470.jpg (33K)" src="images/470.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Another friend of mine bought a pretty good horse from a native, a day or
      two ago, after a tolerably thorough examination of the animal. He
      discovered today that the horse was as blind as a bat, in one eye. He
      meant to have examined that eye, and came home with a general notion that
      he had done it; but he remembers now that every time he made the attempt
      his attention was called to something else by his victimizer.
    </p>
    <p>
      One more instance, and then I will pass to something else. I am informed
      that when a certain Mr. L., a visiting stranger, was here, he bought a
      pair of very respectable-looking match horses from a native. They were in
      a little stable with a partition through the middle of it&mdash;one horse
      in each apartment. Mr. L. examined one of them critically through a window
      (the Kanaka's "brother" having gone to the country with the key), and then
      went around the house and examined the other through a window on the other
      side. He said it was the neatest match he had ever seen, and paid for the
      horses on the spot. Whereupon the Kanaka departed to join his brother in
      the country. The fellow had shamefully swindled L. There was only one
      "match" horse, and he had examined his starboard side through one window
      and his port side through another! I decline to believe this story, but I
      give it because it is worth something as a fanciful illustration of a
      fixed fact&mdash;namely, that the Kanaka horse- jockey is fertile in
      invention and elastic in conscience.
    </p>
    <p>
      You can buy a pretty good horse for forty or fifty dollars, and a good
      enough horse for all practical purposes for two dollars and a half. I
      estimate "Oahu" to be worth somewhere in the neighborhood of thirty-five
      cents. A good deal better animal than he is was sold here day before
      yesterday for a dollar and seventy-five cents, and sold again to-day for
      two dollars and twenty-five cents; Williams bought a handsome and lively
      little pony yesterday for ten dollars; and about the best common horse on
      the island (and he is a really good one) sold yesterday, with Mexican
      saddle and bridle, for seventy dollars&mdash;a horse which is well and
      widely known, and greatly respected for his speed, good disposition and
      everlasting bottom.
    </p>
    <p>
      You give your horse a little grain once a day; it comes from San
      Francisco, and is worth about two cents a pound; and you give him as much
      hay as he wants; it is cut and brought to the market by natives, and is
      not very good it is baled into long, round bundles, about the size of a
      large man; one of them is stuck by the middle on each end of a six foot
      pole, and the Kanaka shoulders the pole and walks about the streets
      between the upright bales in search of customers. These hay bales, thus
      carried, have a general resemblance to a colossal capital 'H.'
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link471" id="link471"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="471.jpg (59K)" src="images/471.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The hay-bundles cost twenty-five cents apiece, and one will last a horse
      about a day. You can get a horse for a song, a week's hay for another
      song, and you can turn your animal loose among the luxuriant grass in your
      neighbor's broad front yard without a song at all&mdash;you do it at
      midnight, and stable the beast again before morning. You have been at no
      expense thus far, but when you come to buy a saddle and bridle they will
      cost you from twenty to thirty-five dollars. You can hire a horse, saddle
      and bridle at from seven to ten dollars a week, and the owner will take
      care of them at his own expense.
    </p>
    <p>
      It is time to close this day's record&mdash;bed time. As I prepare for
      sleep, a rich voice rises out of the still night, and, far as this ocean
      rock is toward the ends of the earth, I recognize a familiar home air. But
      the words seem somewhat out of joint:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Waikiki lantoni oe Kaa hooly hooly wawhoo."
    </p>
    <p>
      Translated, that means "When we were marching through Georgia."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link472" id="link472"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="472.jpg (28K)" src="images/472.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch66" id="linkch66"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXVI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Passing through the market place we saw that feature of Honolulu under its
      most favorable auspices&mdash;that is, in the full glory of Saturday
      afternoon, which is a festive day with the natives. The native girls by
      twos and threes and parties of a dozen, and sometimes in whole platoons
      and companies, went cantering up and down the neighboring streets astride
      of fleet but homely horses, and with their gaudy riding habits streaming
      like banners behind them. Such a troop of free and easy riders, in their
      natural home, the saddle, makes a gay and graceful spectacle. The riding
      habit I speak of is simply a long, broad scarf, like a tavern table cloth
      brilliantly colored, wrapped around the loins once, then apparently passed
      between the limbs and each end thrown backward over the same, and floating
      and flapping behind on both sides beyond the horse's tail like a couple of
      fancy flags; then, slipping the stirrup-irons between her toes, the girl
      throws her chest forward, sits up like a Major General and goes sweeping
      by like the wind.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link474" id="link474"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="474.jpg (88K)" src="images/474.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The girls put on all the finery they can on Saturday afternoon&mdash;fine
      black silk robes; flowing red ones that nearly put your eyes out; others
      as white as snow; still others that discount the rainbow; and they wear
      their hair in nets, and trim their jaunty hats with fresh flowers, and
      encircle their dusky throats with home-made necklaces of the brilliant
      vermillion-tinted blossom of the ohia; and they fill the markets and the
      adjacent street with their bright presences, and smell like a rag factory
      on fire with their offensive cocoanut oil.
    </p>
    <p>
      Occasionally you see a heathen from the sunny isles away down in the South
      Seas, with his face and neck tatooed till he looks like the customary
      mendicant from Washoe who has been blown up in a mine. Some are tattooed a
      dead blue color down to the upper lip&mdash;masked, as it were&mdash;leaving
      the natural light yellow skin of Micronesia unstained from thence down;
      some with broad marks drawn down from hair to neck, on both sides of the
      face, and a strip of the original yellow skin, two inches wide, down the
      center&mdash;a gridiron with a spoke broken out; and some with the entire
      face discolored with the popular mortification tint, relieved only by one
      or two thin, wavy threads of natural yellow running across the face from
      ear to ear, and eyes twinkling out of this darkness, from under shadowing
      hat-brims, like stars in the dark of the moon.
    </p>
    <p>
      Moving among the stirring crowds, you come to the poi merchants, squatting
      in the shade on their hams, in true native fashion, and surrounded by
      purchasers. (The Sandwich Islanders always squat on their hams, and who
      knows but they may be the old original "ham sandwiches?" The thought is
      pregnant with interest.) The poi looks like common flour paste, and is
      kept in large bowls formed of a species of gourd, and capable of holding
      from one to three or four gallons. Poi is the chief article of food among
      the natives, and is prepared from the taro plant.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link475" id="link475"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="475.jpg (33K)" src="images/475.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The taro root looks like a thick, or, if you please, a corpulent sweet
      potato, in shape, but is of a light purple color when boiled. When boiled
      it answers as a passable substitute for bread. The buck Kanakas bake it
      under ground, then mash it up well with a heavy lava pestle, mix water
      with it until it becomes a paste, set it aside and let if ferment, and
      then it is poi&mdash;and an unseductive mixture it is, almost tasteless
      before it ferments and too sour for a luxury afterward. But nothing is
      more nutritious. When solely used, however, it produces acrid humors, a
      fact which sufficiently accounts for the humorous character of the
      Kanakas. I think there must be as much of a knack in handling poi as there
      is in eating with chopsticks. The forefinger is thrust into the mess and
      stirred quickly round several times and drawn as quickly out, thickly
      coated, just as it it were poulticed; the head is thrown back, the finger
      inserted in the mouth and the delicacy stripped off and swallowed&mdash;the
      eye closing gently, meanwhile, in a languid sort of ecstasy. Many a
      different finger goes into the same bowl and many a different kind of dirt
      and shade and quality of flavor is added to the virtues of its contents.
    </p>
    <p>
      Around a small shanty was collected a crowd of natives buying the awa
      root. It is said that but for the use of this root the destruction of the
      people in former times by certain imported diseases would have been far
      greater than it was, and by others it is said that this is merely a fancy.
      All agree that poi will rejuvenate a man who is used up and his vitality
      almost annihilated by hard drinking, and that in some kinds of diseases it
      will restore health after all medicines have failed; but all are not
      willing to allow to the awa the virtues claimed for it. The natives
      manufacture an intoxicating drink from it which is fearful in its effects
      when persistently indulged in. It covers the body with dry, white scales,
      inflames the eyes, and causes premature decripitude. Although the man
      before whose establishment we stopped has to pay a Government license of
      eight hundred dollars a year for the exclusive right to sell awa root, it
      is said that he makes a small fortune every twelve-month; while saloon
      keepers, who pay a thousand dollars a year for the privilege of retailing
      whiskey, etc., only make a bare living.
    </p>
    <p>
      We found the fish market crowded; for the native is very fond of fish, and
      eats the article raw and alive! Let us change the subject.
    </p>
    <p>
      In old times here Saturday was a grand gala day indeed. All the native
      population of the town forsook their labors, and those of the surrounding
      country journeyed to the city. Then the white folks had to stay indoors,
      for every street was so packed with charging cavaliers and cavalieresses
      that it was next to impossible to thread one's way through the cavalcades
      without getting crippled.
    </p>
    <p>
      At night they feasted and the girls danced the lascivious hula hula&mdash;a
      dance that is said to exhibit the very perfection of educated notion of
      limb and arm, hand, head and body, and the exactest uniformity of movement
      and accuracy of "time." It was performed by a circle of girls with no
      raiment on them to speak of, who went through an infinite variety of
      motions and figures without prompting, and yet so true was their "time,"
      and in such perfect concert did they move that when they were placed in a
      straight line, hands, arms, bodies, limbs and heads waved, swayed,
      gesticulated, bowed, stooped, whirled, squirmed, twisted and undulated as
      if they were part and parcel of a single individual; and it was difficult
      to believe they were not moved in a body by some exquisite piece of
      mechanism.
    </p>
    <p>
      Of late years, however, Saturday has lost most of its quondam gala
      features. This weekly stampede of the natives interfered too much with
      labor and the interests of the white folks, and by sticking in a law here,
      and preaching a sermon there, and by various other means, they gradually
      broke it up. The demoralizing hula hula was forbidden to be performed,
      save at night, with closed doors, in presence of few spectators, and only
      by permission duly procured from the authorities and the payment of ten
      dollars for the same. There are few girls now-a-days able to dance this
      ancient national dance in the highest perfection of the art.
    </p>
    <p>
      The missionaries have christianized and educated all the natives. They all
      belong to the Church, and there is not one of them, above the age of eight
      years, but can read and write with facility in the native tongue. It is
      the most universally educated race of people outside of China. They have
      any quantity of books, printed in the Kanaka language, and all the natives
      are fond of reading. They are inveterate church-goers&mdash;nothing can
      keep them away. All this ameliorating cultivation has at last built up in
      the native women a profound respect for chastity&mdash;in other people.
      Perhaps that is enough to say on that head. The national sin will die out
      when the race does, but perhaps not earlier.&mdash;But doubtless this
      purifying is not far off, when we reflect that contact with civilization
      and the whites has reduced the native population from four hundred
      thousand (Captain Cook's estimate,) to fifty-five thousand in something
      over eighty years!
    </p>
    <p>
      Society is a queer medley in this notable missionary, whaling and
      governmental centre. If you get into conversation with a stranger and
      experience that natural desire to know what sort of ground you are
      treading on by finding out what manner of man your stranger is, strike out
      boldly and address him as "Captain." Watch him narrowly, and if you see by
      his countenance that you are on the wrong tack, ask him where he preaches.
      It is a safe bet that he is either a missionary or captain of a whaler. I
      am now personally acquainted with seventy-two captains and ninety-six
      missionaries. The captains and ministers form one-half of the population;
      the third fourth is composed of common Kanakas and mercantile foreigners
      and their families, and the final fourth is made up of high officers of
      the Hawaiian Government. And there are just about cats enough for three
      apiece all around.
    </p>
    <p>
      A solemn stranger met me in the suburbs the other day, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Good morning, your reverence. Preach in the stone church yonder, no
      doubt?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "No, I don't. I'm not a preacher."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Really, I beg your pardon, Captain. I trust you had a good season. How
      much oil"&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oil? What do you take me for? I'm not a whaler."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, I beg a thousand pardons, your Excellency.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Major General in the household troops, no doubt? Minister of the
      Interior, likely? Secretary of war? First Gentleman of the Bed-chamber?
      Commissioner of the Royal"&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      "Stuff! I'm no official. I'm not connected in any way with the
      Government."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Bless my life! Then, who the mischief are you? what the mischief are you?
      and how the mischief did you get here, and where in thunder did you come
      from?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "I'm only a private personage&mdash;an unassuming stranger&mdash;lately
      arrived from America."
    </p>
    <p>
      "No? Not a missionary! Not a whaler! not a member of his Majesty's
      Government! not even Secretary of the Navy! Ah, Heaven! it is too blissful
      to be true; alas, I do but dream. And yet that noble, honest countenance&mdash;those
      oblique, ingenuous eyes&mdash;that massive head, incapable of&mdash;of&mdash;anything;
      your hand; give me your hand, bright waif. Excuse these tears. For sixteen
      weary years I have yearned for a moment like this, and"&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link478" id="link478"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="478.jpg (67K)" src="images/478.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Here his feelings were too much for him, and he swooned away. I pitied
      this poor creature from the bottom of my heart. I was deeply moved. I shed
      a few tears on him and kissed him for his mother. I then took what small
      change he had and "shoved".
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link479" id="link479"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="479.jpg (31K)" src="images/479.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch67" id="linkch67"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXVII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I still quote from my journal:
    </p>
    <p>
      I found the national Legislature to consist of half a dozen white men and
      some thirty or forty natives. It was a dark assemblage. The nobles and
      Ministers (about a dozen of them altogether) occupied the extreme left of
      the hall, with David Kalakaua (the King's Chamberlain) and Prince William
      at the head. The President of the Assembly, His Royal Highness M.
      Kekuanaoa, [Kekuanaoa is not of the blood royal. He derives his princely
      rank from his wife, who was a daughter of Kamehameha the Great. Under
      other monarchies the male line takes precedence of the female in tracing
      genealogies, but here the opposite is the case&mdash;the female line takes
      precedence. Their reason for this is exceedingly sensible, and I recommend
      it to the aristocracy of Europe: They say it is easy to know who a man's
      mother was, but, etc., etc.] and the Vice President (the latter a white
      man,) sat in the pulpit, if I may so term it. The President is the King's
      father. He is an erect, strongly built, massive featured, white-haired,
      tawny old gentleman of eighty years of age or thereabouts. He was simply
      but well dressed, in a blue cloth coat and white vest, and white
      pantaloons, without spot, dust or blemish upon them. He bears himself with
      a calm, stately dignity, and is a man of noble presence. He was a young
      man and a distinguished warrior under that terrific fighter, Kamehameha
      I., more than half a century ago. A knowledge of his career suggested some
      such thought as this: "This man, naked as the day he was born, and
      war-club and spear in hand, has charged at the head of a horde of savages
      against other hordes of savages more than a generation and a half ago, and
      reveled in slaughter and carnage; has worshipped wooden images on his
      devout knees; has seen hundreds of his race offered up in heathen temples
      as sacrifices to wooden idols, at a time when no missionary's foot had
      ever pressed this soil, and he had never heard of the white man's God; has
      believed his enemy could secretly pray him to death; has seen the day, in
      his childhood, when it was a crime punishable by death for a man to eat
      with his wife, or for a plebeian to let his shadow fall upon the King&mdash;and
      now look at him; an educated Christian; neatly and handsomely dressed; a
      high-minded, elegant gentleman; a traveler, in some degree, and one who
      has been the honored guest of royalty in Europe; a man practiced in
      holding the reins of an enlightened government, and well versed in the
      politics of his country and in general, practical information. Look at
      him, sitting there presiding over the deliberations of a legislative body,
      among whom are white men&mdash;a grave, dignified, statesmanlike
      personage, and as seemingly natural and fitted to the place as if he had
      been born in it and had never been out of it in his life time. How the
      experiences of this old man's eventful life shame the cheap inventions of
      romance!"
    </p>
    <p>
      The christianizing of the natives has hardly even weakened some of their
      barbarian superstitions, much less destroyed them. I have just referred to
      one of these. It is still a popular belief that if your enemy can get hold
      of any article belonging to you he can get down on his knees over it and
      pray you to death. Therefore many a native gives up and dies merely
      because he imagines that some enemy is putting him through a course of
      damaging prayer. This praying an individual to death seems absurd enough
      at a first glance, but then when we call to mind some of the pulpit
      efforts of certain of our own ministers the thing looks plausible.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link482" id="link482"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="482.jpg (33K)" src="images/482.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In former times, among the Islanders, not only a plurality of wives was
      customary, but a plurality of husbands likewise. Some native women of
      noble rank had as many as six husbands. A woman thus supplied did not
      reside with all her husbands at once, but lived several months with each
      in turn. An understood sign hung at her door during these months. When the
      sign was taken down, it meant "NEXT."
    </p>
    <p>
      In those days woman was rigidly taught to "know her place." Her place was
      to do all the work, take all the cuffs, provide all the food, and content
      herself with what was left after her lord had finished his dinner. She was
      not only forbidden, by ancient law, and under penalty of death, to eat
      with her husband or enter a canoe, but was debarred, under the same
      penalty, from eating bananas, pine-apples, oranges and other choice fruits
      at any time or in any place. She had to confine herself pretty strictly to
      "poi" and hard work. These poor ignorant heathen seem to have had a sort
      of groping idea of what came of woman eating fruit in the garden of Eden,
      and they did not choose to take any more chances. But the missionaries
      broke up this satisfactory arrangement of things. They liberated woman and
      made her the equal of man.
    </p>
    <p>
      The natives had a romantic fashion of burying some of their children alive
      when the family became larger than necessary. The missionaries interfered
      in this matter too, and stopped it.
    </p>
    <p>
      To this day the natives are able to lie down and die whenever they want
      to, whether there is anything the matter with them or not. If a Kanaka
      takes a notion to die, that is the end of him; nobody can persuade him to
      hold on; all the doctors in the world could not save him.
    </p>
    <p>
      A luxury which they enjoy more than anything else, is a large funeral. If
      a person wants to get rid of a troublesome native, it is only necessary to
      promise him a fine funeral and name the hour and he will be on hand to the
      minute&mdash;at least his remains will.
    </p>
    <p>
      All the natives are Christians, now, but many of them still desert to the
      Great Shark God for temporary succor in time of trouble. An irruption of
      the great volcano of Kilauea, or an earthquake, always brings a deal of
      latent loyalty to the Great Shark God to the surface. It is common report
      that the King, educated, cultivated and refined Christian gentleman as he
      undoubtedly is, still turns to the idols of his fathers for help when
      disaster threatens. A planter caught a shark, and one of his christianized
      natives testified his emancipation from the thrall of ancient superstition
      by assisting to dissect the shark after a fashion forbidden by his
      abandoned creed. But remorse shortly began to torture him. He grew moody
      and sought solitude; brooded over his sin, refused food, and finally said
      he must die and ought to die, for he had sinned against the Great Shark
      God and could never know peace any more. He was proof against persuasion
      and ridicule, and in the course of a day or two took to his bed and died,
      although he showed no symptom of disease. His young daughter followed his
      lead and suffered a like fate within the week. Superstition is ingrained
      in the native blood and bone and it is only natural that it should crop
      out in time of distress. Wherever one goes in the Islands, he will find
      small piles of stones by the wayside, covered with leafy offerings, placed
      there by the natives to appease evil spirits or honor local deities
      belonging to the mythology of former days.
    </p>
    <p>
      In the rural districts of any of the Islands, the traveler hourly comes
      upon parties of dusky maidens bathing in the streams or in the sea without
      any clothing on and exhibiting no very intemperate zeal in the matter of
      hiding their nakedness. When the missionaries first took up their
      residence in Honolulu, the native women would pay their families frequent
      friendly visits, day by day, not even clothed with a blush. It was found a
      hard matter to convince them that this was rather indelicate. Finally the
      missionaries provided them with long, loose calico robes, and that ended
      the difficulty&mdash;for the women would troop through the town, stark
      naked, with their robes folded under their arms, march to the missionary
      houses and then proceed to dress!&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link484" id="link484"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="484.jpg (63K)" src="images/484.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The natives soon manifested a strong proclivity for clothing, but it was
      shortly apparent that they only wanted it for grandeur. The missionaries
      imported a quantity of hats, bonnets, and other male and female wearing
      apparel, instituted a general distribution, and begged the people not to
      come to church naked, next Sunday, as usual. And they did not; but the
      national spirit of unselfishness led them to divide up with neighbors who
      were not at the distribution, and next Sabbath the poor preachers could
      hardly keep countenance before their vast congregations. In the midst of
      the reading of a hymn a brown, stately dame would sweep up the aisle with
      a world of airs, with nothing in the world on but a "stovepipe" hat and a
      pair of cheap gloves; another dame would follow, tricked out in a man's
      shirt, and nothing else; another one would enter with a flourish, with
      simply the sleeves of a bright calico dress tied around her waist and the
      rest of the garment dragging behind like a peacock's tail off duty; a
      stately "buck" Kanaka would stalk in with a woman's bonnet on, wrong side
      before&mdash;only this, and nothing more; after him would stride his
      fellow, with the legs of a pair of pantaloons tied around his neck, the
      rest of his person untrammeled; in his rear would come another gentleman
      simply gotten up in a fiery neck-tie and a striped vest.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link485" id="link485"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="485.jpg (90K)" src="images/485.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The poor creatures were beaming with complacency and wholly unconscious of
      any absurdity in their appearance. They gazed at each other with happy
      admiration, and it was plain to see that the young girls were taking note
      of what each other had on, as naturally as if they had always lived in a
      land of Bibles and knew what churches were made for; here was the evidence
      of a dawning civilization. The spectacle which the congregation presented
      was so extraordinary and withal so moving, that the missionaries found it
      difficult to keep to the text and go on with the services; and by and by
      when the simple children of the sun began a general swapping of garments
      in open meeting and produced some irresistibly grotesque effects in the
      course of re-dressing, there was nothing for it but to cut the thing short
      with the benediction and dismiss the fantastic assemblage.
    </p>
    <p>
      In our country, children play "keep house;" and in the same high-sounding
      but miniature way the grown folk here, with the poor little material of
      slender territory and meagre population, play "empire." There is his royal
      Majesty the King, with a New York detective's income of thirty or
      thirty-five thousand dollars a year from the "royal civil list" and the
      "royal domain." He lives in a two-story frame "palace."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link486" id="link486"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="486.jpg (35K)" src="images/486.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And there is the "royal family"&mdash;the customary hive of royal
      brothers, sisters, cousins and other noble drones and vagrants usual to
      monarchy,&mdash;all with a spoon in the national pap-dish, and all bearing
      such titles as his or her Royal Highness the Prince or Princess So-and-so.
      Few of them can carry their royal splendors far enough to ride in
      carriages, however; they sport the economical Kanaka horse or "hoof it"
      with the plebeians.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then there is his Excellency the "royal Chamberlain"&mdash;a sinecure, for
      his majesty dresses himself with his own hands, except when he is
      ruralizing at Waikiki and then he requires no dressing.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next we have his Excellency the Commander-in-chief of the Household
      Troops, whose forces consist of about the number of soldiers usually
      placed under a corporal in other lands.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next comes the royal Steward and the Grand Equerry in Waiting&mdash;high
      dignitaries with modest salaries and little to do.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then we have his Excellency the First Gentleman of the Bed-chamber&mdash;an
      office as easy as it is magnificent.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next we come to his Excellency the Prime Minister, a renegade American
      from New Hampshire, all jaw, vanity, bombast and ignorance, a lawyer of
      "shyster" calibre, a fraud by nature, a humble worshipper of the sceptre
      above him, a reptile never tired of sneering at the land of his birth or
      glorifying the ten-acre kingdom that has adopted him&mdash;salary, $4,000
      a year, vast consequence, and no perquisites.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then we have his Excellency the Imperial Minister of Finance, who handles
      a million dollars of public money a year, sends in his annual "budget"
      with great ceremony, talks prodigiously of "finance," suggests imposing
      schemes for paying off the "national debt" (of $150,000,) and does it all
      for $4,000 a year and unimaginable glory.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next we have his Excellency the Minister of War, who holds sway over the
      royal armies&mdash;they consist of two hundred and thirty uniformed
      Kanakas, mostly Brigadier Generals, and if the country ever gets into
      trouble with a foreign power we shall probably hear from them. I knew an
      American whose copper-plate visiting card bore this impressive legend:
      "Lieutenant-Colonel in the Royal Infantry." To say that he was proud of
      this distinction is stating it but tamely. The Minister of War has also in
      his charge some venerable swivels on Punch-Bowl Hill wherewith royal
      salutes are fired when foreign vessels of war enter the port.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next comes his Excellency the Minister of the Navy&mdash;a nabob who rules
      the "royal fleet," (a steam-tug and a sixty-ton schooner.)
    </p>
    <p>
      And next comes his Grace the Lord Bishop of Honolulu, the chief dignitary
      of the "Established Church"&mdash;for when the American Presbyterian
      missionaries had completed the reduction of the nation to a compact
      condition of Christianity, native royalty stepped in and erected the grand
      dignity of an "Established (Episcopal) Church" over it, and imported a
      cheap ready-made Bishop from England to take charge. The chagrin of the
      missionaries has never been comprehensively expressed, to this day,
      profanity not being admissible.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next comes his Excellency the Minister of Public Instruction.
    </p>
    <p>
      Next, their Excellencies the Governors of Oahu, Hawaii, etc., and after
      them a string of High Sheriffs and other small fry too numerous for
      computation.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then there are their Excellencies the Envoy Extraordinary and Minister
      Plenipotentiary of his Imperial Majesty the Emperor of the French; her
      British Majesty's Minister; the Minister Resident, of the United States;
      and some six or eight representatives of other foreign nations, all with
      sounding titles, imposing dignity and prodigious but economical state.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link488" id="link488"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="488.jpg (94K)" src="images/488.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Imagine all this grandeur in a play-house "kingdom" whose population falls
      absolutely short of sixty thousand souls!
    </p>
    <p>
      The people are so accustomed to nine-jointed titles and colossal magnates
      that a foreign prince makes very little more stir in Honolulu than a
      Western Congressman does in New York.
    </p>
    <p>
      And let it be borne in mind that there is a strictly defined "court
      costume" of so "stunning" a nature that it would make the clown in a
      circus look tame and commonplace by comparison; and each Hawaiian official
      dignitary has a gorgeous vari-colored, gold-laced uniform peculiar to his
      office&mdash;no two of them are alike, and it is hard to tell which one is
      the "loudest." The King had a "drawing-room" at stated intervals, like
      other monarchs, and when these varied uniforms congregate there&mdash;weak-eyed
      people have to contemplate the spectacle through smoked glass. Is there
      not a gratifying contrast between this latter-day exhibition and the one
      the ancestors of some of these magnates afforded the missionaries the
      Sunday after the old-time distribution of clothing? Behold what religion
      and civilization have wrought!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link489" id="link489"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="489.jpg (40K)" src="images/489.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch68" id="linkch68"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXVIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      While I was in Honolulu I witnessed the ceremonious funeral of the King's
      sister, her Royal Highness the Princess Victoria. According to the royal
      custom, the remains had lain in state at the palace thirty days, watched
      day and night by a guard of honor. And during all that time a great
      multitude of natives from the several islands had kept the palace grounds
      well crowded and had made the place a pandemonium every night with their
      howlings and wailings, beating of tom-toms and dancing of the (at other
      times) forbidden "hula-hula" by half-clad maidens to the music of songs of
      questionable decency chanted in honor of the deceased. The printed
      programme of the funeral procession interested me at the time; and after
      what I have just said of Hawaiian grandiloquence in the matter of "playing
      empire," I am persuaded that a perusal of it may interest the reader:
    </p>
    <p>
      After reading the long list of dignitaries, etc., and remembering the
      sparseness of the population, one is almost inclined to wonder where the
      material for that portion of the procession devoted to "Hawaiian
      Population Generally" is going to be procured:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link490" id="link490"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="490.jpg (34K)" src="images/490.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="491.jpg (105K)" src="images/491.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Undertaker. Royal School. Kawaiahao School. Roman Catholic School. Maemae
      School. Honolulu Fire Department. Mechanics' Benefit Union. Attending
      Physicians. Knonohikis (Superintendents) of the Crown Lands, Konohikis of
      the Private Lands of His Majesty Konohikis of the Private Lands of Her
      late Royal Highness. Governor of Oahu and Staff. Hulumanu (Military
      Company). Household Troops. The Prince of Hawaii's Own (Military Company).
      The King's household servants. Servants of Her late Royal Highness.
      Protestant Clergy. The Clergy of the Roman Catholic Church. His Lordship
      Louis Maigret, The Right Rev. Bishop of Arathea, Vicar- Apostolic of the
      Hawaiian Islands. The Clergy of the Hawaiian Reformed Catholic Church. His
      Lordship the Right Rev. Bishop of Honolulu. Her Majesty Queen Emma's
      Carriage. His Majesty's Staff. Carriage of Her late Royal Highness.
      Carriage of Her Majesty the Queen Dowager. The King's Chancellor. Cabinet
      Ministers. His Excellency the Minister Resident of the United States. H.
      B. M's Commissioner. H. B. M's Acting Commissioner. Judges of Supreme
      Court. Privy Councillors. Members of Legislative Assembly. Consular Corps.
      Circuit Judges. Clerks of Government Departments. Members of the Bar.
      Collector General, Custom-house Officers and Officers of the Customs.
      Marshal and Sheriffs of the different Islands. King's Yeomanry. Foreign
      Residents. Ahahui Kaahumanu. Hawaiian Population Generally. Hawaiian
      Cavalry. Police Force.
    </p>
    <p>
      I resume my journal at the point where the procession arrived at the royal
      mausoleum:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        As the procession filed through the gate, the military deployed
        handsomely to the right and left and formed an avenue through which the
        long column of mourners passed to the tomb. The coffin was borne through
        the door of the mausoleum, followed by the King and his chiefs, the
        great officers of the kingdom, foreign Consuls, Embassadors and
        distinguished guests (Burlingame and General Van Valkenburgh). Several
        of the kahilis were then fastened to a frame- work in front of the tomb,
        there to remain until they decay and fall to pieces, or, forestalling
        this, until another scion of royalty dies. At this point of the
        proceedings the multitude set up such a heart-broken wailing as I hope
        never to hear again.
      </p>
      <p>
        <a name="link492" id="link492"></a> <br /><br />
      </p>
      <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
        <img alt="492.jpg (90K)" src="images/492.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
      </div>
      <p>
        <br /><br />
      </p>
      <p>
        The soldiers fired three volleys of musketry&mdash;the wailing being
        previously silenced to permit of the guns being heard. His Highness
        Prince William, in a showy military uniform (the "true prince," this&mdash;scion
        of the house over-thrown by the present dynasty&mdash;he was formerly
        betrothed to the Princess but was not allowed to marry her), stood guard
        and paced back and forth within the door. The privileged few who
        followed the coffin into the mausoleum remained sometime, but the King
        soon came out and stood in the door and near one side of it. A stranger
        could have guessed his rank (although he was so simply and
        unpretentiously dressed) by the profound deference paid him by all
        persons in his vicinity; by seeing his high officers receive his quiet
        orders and suggestions with bowed and uncovered heads; and by observing
        how careful those persons who came out of the mausoleum were to avoid
        "crowding" him (although there was room enough in the doorway for a
        wagon to pass, for that matter); how respectfully they edged out
        sideways, scraping their backs against the wall and always presenting a
        front view of their persons to his Majesty, and never putting their hats
        on until they were well out of the royal presence.
      </p>
      <p>
        He was dressed entirely in black&mdash;dress-coat and silk hat&mdash;and
        looked rather democratic in the midst of the showy uniforms about him.
        On his breast he wore a large gold star, which was half hidden by the
        lapel of his coat. He remained at the door a half hour, and occasionally
        gave an order to the men who were erecting the kahilis [Ranks of
        long-handled mops made of gaudy feathers&mdash;sacred to royalty. They
        are stuck in the ground around the tomb and left there.] before the
        tomb. He had the good taste to make one of them substitute black crape
        for the ordinary hempen rope he was about to tie one of them to the
        frame-work with. Finally he entered his carriage and drove away, and the
        populace shortly began to drop into his wake. While he was in view there
        was but one man who attracted more attention than himself, and that was
        Harris (the Yankee Prime Minister). This feeble personage had crape
        enough around his hat to express the grief of an entire nation, and as
        usual he neglected no opportunity of making himself conspicuous and
        exciting the admiration of the simple Kanakas. Oh! noble ambition of
        this modern Richelieu!
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      It is interesting to contrast the funeral ceremonies of the Princess
      Victoria with those of her noted ancestor Kamehameha the Conqueror, who
      died fifty years ago&mdash;in 1819, the year before the first missionaries
      came.
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "On the 8th of May, 1819, at the age of sixty-six, he died, as he had
        lived, in the faith of his country. It was his misfortune not to have
        come in contact with men who could have rightly influenced his religious
        aspirations. Judged by his advantages and compared with the most eminent
        of his countrymen he may be justly styled not only great, but good. To
        this day his memory warms the heart and elevates the national feelings
        of Hawaiians. They are proud of their old warrior King; they love his
        name; his deeds form their historical age; and an enthusiasm everywhere
        prevails, shared even by foreigners who knew his worth, that constitutes
        the firmest pillar of the throne of his dynasty.
      </p>
      <p>
        "In lieu of human victims (the custom of that age), a sacrifice of three
        hundred dogs attended his obsequies&mdash;no mean holocaust when their
        national value and the estimation in which they were held are
        considered. The bones of Kamehameha, after being kept for a while, were
        so carefully concealed that all knowledge of their final resting place
        is now lost. There was a proverb current among the common people that
        the bones of a cruel King could not be hid; they made fish-hooks and
        arrows of them, upon which, in using them, they vented their abhorrence
        of his memory in bitter execrations."
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      The account of the circumstances of his death, as written by the native
      historians, is full of minute detail, but there is scarcely a line of it
      which does not mention or illustrate some by-gone custom of the country.
      In this respect it is the most comprehensive document I have yet met with.
      I will quote it entire:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "When Kamehameha was dangerously sick, and the priests were unable to
        cure him, they said: 'Be of good courage and build a house for the god'
        (his own private god or idol), that thou mayest recover.' The chiefs
        corroborated this advice of the priests, and a place of worship was
        prepared for Kukailimoku, and consecrated in the evening. They proposed
        also to the King, with a view to prolong his life, that human victims
        should be sacrificed to his deity; upon which the greater part of the
        people absconded through fear of death, and concealed themselves in
        hiding places till the tabu [Tabu (pronounced tah-boo,) means
        prohibition (we have borrowed it,) or sacred. The tabu was sometimes
        permanent, sometimes temporary; and the person or thing placed under
        tabu was for the time being sacred to the purpose for which it was set
        apart. In the above case the victims selected under the tabu would be
        sacred to the sacrifice] in which destruction impended, was past. It is
        doubtful whether Kamehameha approved of the plan of the chiefs and
        priests to sacrifice men, as he was known to say, 'The men are sacred
        for the King;' meaning that they were for the service of his successor.
        This information was derived from Liholiho, his son.
      </p>
      <p>
        "After this, his sickness increased to such a degree that he had not
        strength to turn himself in his bed. When another season, consecrated
        for worship at the new temple (heiau) arrived, he said to his son,
        Liholiho, 'Go thou and make supplication to thy god; I am not able to
        go, and will offer my prayers at home.' When his devotions to his
        feathered god, Kukailimoku, were concluded, a certain religiously
        disposed individual, who had a bird god, suggested to the King that
        through its influence his sickness might be removed. The name of this
        god was Pua; its body was made of a bird, now eaten by the Hawaiians,
        and called in their language alae. Kamehameha was willing that a trial
        should be made, and two houses were constructed to facilitate the
        experiment; but while dwelling in them he became so very weak as not to
        receive food. After lying there three days, his wives, children and
        chiefs, perceiving that he was very low, returned him to his own house.
        In the evening he was carried to the eating house, where he took a
        little food in his mouth which he did not swallow; also a cup of water.
        The chiefs requested him to give them his counsel; but he made no reply,
        and was carried back to the dwelling house; but when near midnight&mdash;ten
        o'clock, perhaps&mdash;he was carried again to the place to eat; but, as
        before, he merely tasted of what was presented to him. Then Kaikioewa
        addressed him thus: 'Here we all are, your younger brethren, your son
        Liholiho and your foreigner; impart to us your dying charge, that
        Liholiho and Kaahumanu may hear.' Then Kamehameha inquired, 'What do you
        say?' Kaikioewa repeated, 'Your counsels for us.'
      </p>
      <p>
        "He then said, 'Move on in my good way and&mdash;.' He could proceed no
        further. The foreigner, Mr. Young, embraced and kissed him. Hoapili also
        embraced him, whispering something in his ear, after which he was taken
        back to the house. About twelve he was carried once more to the house
        for eating, into which his head entered, while his body was in the
        dwelling house immediately adjoining. It should be remarked that this
        frequent carrying of a sick chief from one house to another resulted
        from the tabu system, then in force. There were at that time six houses
        (huts) connected with an establishment&mdash;one was for worship, one
        for the men to eat in, an eating house for the women, a house to sleep
        in, a house in which to manufacture kapa (native cloth) and one where,
        at certain intervals, the women might dwell in seclusion.
      </p>
      <p>
        "The sick was once more taken to his house, when he expired; this was at
        two o'clock, a circumstance from which Leleiohoku derived his name. As
        he breathed his last, Kalaimoku came to the eating house to order those
        in it to go out. There were two aged persons thus directed to depart;
        one went, the other remained on account of love to the King, by whom he
        had formerly been kindly sustained. The children also were sent away.
        Then Kalaimoku came to the house, and the chiefs had a consultation. One
        of them spoke thus: 'This is my thought&mdash;we will eat him raw. [This
        sounds suspicious, in view of the fact that all Sandwich Island
        historians, white and black, protest that cannibalism never existed in
        the islands. However, since they only proposed to "eat him raw" we
        "won't count that". But it would certainly have been cannibalism if they
        had cooked him.&mdash;M. T.] Kaahumanu (one of the dead King's widows)
        replied, 'Perhaps his body is not at our disposal; that is more properly
        with his successor. Our part in him&mdash;his breath&mdash;has departed;
        his remains will be disposed of by Liholiho.'
      </p>
      <p>
        "After this conversation the body was taken into the consecrated house
        for the performance of the proper rites by the priest and the new King.
        The name of this ceremony is uko; and when the sacred hog was baked the
        priest offered it to the dead body, and it became a god, the King at the
        same time repeating the customary prayers.
      </p>
      <p>
        "Then the priest, addressing himself to the King and chiefs, said: 'I
        will now make known to you the rules to be observed respecting persons
        to be sacrificed on the burial of this body. If you obtain one man
        before the corpse is removed, one will be sufficient; but after it
        leaves this house four will be required. If delayed until we carry the
        corpse to the grave there must be ten; but after it is deposited in the
        grave there must be fifteen. To-morrow morning there will be a tabu,
        and, if the sacrifice be delayed until that time, forty men must die.'
      </p>
      <p>
        "Then the high priest, Hewahewa, inquired of the chiefs, 'Where shall be
        the residence of King Liholiho?' They replied, 'Where, indeed? You, of
        all men, ought to know.' Then the priest observed, 'There are two
        suitable places; one is Kau, the other is Kohala.' The chiefs preferred
        the latter, as it was more thickly inhabited. The priest added, 'These
        are proper places for the King's residence; but he must not remain in
        Kona, for it is polluted.' This was agreed to. It was now break of day.
        As he was being carried to the place of burial the people perceived that
        their King was dead, and they wailed. When the corpse was removed from
        the house to the tomb, a distance of one chain, the procession was met
        by a certain man who was ardently attached to the deceased. He leaped
        upon the chiefs who were carrying the King's body; he desired to die
        with him on account of his love. The chiefs drove him away. He persisted
        in making numerous attempts, which were unavailing. Kalaimoka also had
        it in his heart to die with him, but was prevented by Hookio.
      </p>
      <p>
        "The morning following Kamehameha's death, Liholiho and his train
        departed for Kohala, according to the suggestions of the priest, to
        avoid the defilement occasioned by the dead. At this time if a chief
        died the land was polluted, and the heirs sought a residence in another
        part of the country until the corpse was dissected and the bones tied in
        a bundle, which being done, the season of defilement terminated. If the
        deceased were not a chief, the house only was defiled which became pure
        again on the burial of the body. Such were the laws on this subject.
      </p>
      <p>
        "On the morning on which Liholiho sailed in his canoe for Kohala, the
        chiefs and people mourned after their manner on occasion of a chief's
        death, conducting themselves like madmen and like beasts. Their conduct
        was such as to forbid description; The priests, also, put into action
        the sorcery apparatus, that the person who had prayed the King to death
        might die; for it was not believed that Kamehameha's departure was the
        effect either of sickness or old age. When the sorcerers set up by their
        fire-places sticks with a strip of kapa flying at the top, the chief
        Keeaumoku, Kaahumaun's brother, came in a state of intoxication and
        broke the flag-staff of the sorcerers, from which it was inferred that
        Kaahumanu and her friends had been instrumental in the King's death. On
        this account they were subjected to abuse."
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      You have the contrast, now, and a strange one it is. This great Queen,
      Kaahumanu, who was "subjected to abuse" during the frightful orgies that
      followed the King's death, in accordance with ancient custom, afterward
      became a devout Christian and a steadfast and powerful friend of the
      missionaries.
    </p>
    <p>
      Dogs were, and still are, reared and fattened for food, by the natives&mdash;hence
      the reference to their value in one of the above paragraphs.
    </p>
    <p>
      Forty years ago it was the custom in the Islands to suspend all law for a
      certain number of days after the death of a royal personage; and then a
      saturnalia ensued which one may picture to himself after a fashion, but
      not in the full horror of the reality. The people shaved their heads,
      knocked out a tooth or two, plucked out an eye sometimes, cut, bruised,
      mutilated or burned their flesh, got drunk, burned each other's huts,
      maimed or murdered one another according to the caprice of the moment, and
      both sexes gave themselves up to brutal and unbridled licentiousness.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link497" id="link497"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And after it all, came a torpor from which the nation slowly emerged
      bewildered and dazed, as if from a hideous half-remembered nightmare. They
      were not the salt of the earth, those "gentle children of the sun."
    </p>
    <p>
      The natives still keep up an old custom of theirs which cannot be
      comforting to an invalid. When they think a sick friend is going to die, a
      couple of dozen neighbors surround his hut and keep up a deafening wailing
      night and day till he either dies or gets well. No doubt this arrangement
      has helped many a subject to a shroud before his appointed time.
    </p>
    <p>
      They surround a hut and wail in the same heart-broken way when its
      occupant returns from a journey. This is their dismal idea of a welcome. A
      very little of it would go a great way with most of us.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch69" id="linkch69"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXIX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Bound for Hawaii (a hundred and fifty miles distant,) to visit the great
      volcano and behold the other notable things which distinguish that island
      above the remainder of the group, we sailed from Honolulu on a certain
      Saturday afternoon, in the good schooner Boomerang.
    </p>
    <p>
      The Boomerang was about as long as two street cars, and about as wide as
      one. She was so small (though she was larger than the majority of the
      inter-island coasters) that when I stood on her deck I felt but little
      smaller than the Colossus of Rhodes must have felt when he had a man-of-
      war under him. I could reach the water when she lay over under a strong
      breeze. When the Captain and my comrade (a Mr. Billings), myself and four
      other persons were all assembled on the little after portion of the deck
      which is sacred to the cabin passengers, it was full&mdash;there was not
      room for any more quality folks. Another section of the deck, twice as
      large as ours, was full of natives of both sexes, with their customary
      dogs, mats, blankets, pipes, calabashes of poi, fleas, and other luxuries
      and baggage of minor importance. As soon as we set sail the natives all
      lay down on the deck as thick as negroes in a slave-pen, and smoked,
      conversed, and spit on each other, and were truly sociable.
    </p>
    <p>
      The little low-ceiled cabin below was rather larger than a hearse, and as
      dark as a vault. It had two coffins on each side&mdash;I mean two bunks. A
      small table, capable of accommodating three persons at dinner, stood
      against the forward bulkhead, and over it hung the dingiest whale oil
      lantern that ever peopled the obscurity of a dungeon with ghostly shapes.
      The floor room unoccupied was not extensive. One might swing a cat in it,
      perhaps, but not a long cat. The hold forward of the bulkhead had but
      little freight in it, and from morning till night a portly old rooster,
      with a voice like Baalam's ass, and the same disposition to use it,
      strutted up and down in that part of the vessel and crowed. He usually
      took dinner at six o'clock, and then, after an hour devoted to meditation,
      he mounted a barrel and crowed a good part of the night. He got hoarser
      all the time, but he scorned to allow any personal consideration to
      interfere with his duty, and kept up his labors in defiance of threatened
      diphtheria.
    </p>
    <p>
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Sleeping was out of the question when he was on watch. He was a source of
      genuine aggravation and annoyance. It was worse than useless to shout at
      him or apply offensive epithets to him&mdash;he only took these things for
      applause, and strained himself to make more noise. Occasionally, during
      the day, I threw potatoes at him through an aperture in the bulkhead, but
      he only dodged and went on crowing.
    </p>
    <p>
      The first night, as I lay in my coffin, idly watching the dim lamp
      swinging to the rolling of the ship, and snuffing the nauseous odors of
      bilge water, I felt something gallop over me. I turned out promptly.
      However, I turned in again when I found it was only a rat. Presently
      something galloped over me once more. I knew it was not a rat this time,
      and I thought it might be a centipede, because the Captain had killed one
      on deck in the afternoon. I turned out. The first glance at the pillow
      showed me repulsive sentinel perched upon each end of it&mdash;cockroaches
      as large as peach leaves&mdash;fellows with long, quivering antennae and
      fiery, malignant eyes. They were grating their teeth like tobacco worms,
      and appeared to be dissatisfied about something. I had often heard that
      these reptiles were in the habit of eating off sleeping sailors' toe nails
      down to the quick, and I would not get in the bunk any more. I lay down on
      the floor. But a rat came and bothered me, and shortly afterward a
      procession of cockroaches arrived and camped in my hair. In a few moments
      the rooster was crowing with uncommon spirit and a party of fleas were
      throwing double somersaults about my person in the wildest disorder, and
      taking a bite every time they struck. I was beginning to feel really
      annoyed. I got up and put my clothes on and went on deck.
    </p>
    <p>
      The above is not overdrawn; it is a truthful sketch of inter-island
      schooner life. There is no such thing as keeping a vessel in elegant
      condition, when she carries molasses and Kanakas.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was compensation for my sufferings to come unexpectedly upon so
      beautiful a scene as met my eye&mdash;to step suddenly out of the
      sepulchral gloom of the cabin and stand under the strong light of the moon&mdash;in
      the centre, as it were, of a glittering sea of liquid silver&mdash;to see
      the broad sails straining in the gale, the ship heeled over on her side,
      the angry foam hissing past her lee bulwarks, and sparkling sheets of
      spray dashing high over her bows and raining upon her decks; to brace
      myself and hang fast to the first object that presented itself, with hat
      jammed down and coat tails whipping in the breeze, and feel that
      exhilaration that thrills in one's hair and quivers down his back bone
      when he knows that every inch of canvas is drawing and the vessel cleaving
      through the waves at her utmost speed. There was no darkness, no dimness,
      no obscurity there. All was brightness, every object was vividly defined.
      Every prostrate Kanaka; every coil of rope; every calabash of poi; every
      puppy; every seam in the flooring; every bolthead; every object; however
      minute, showed sharp and distinct in its every outline; and the shadow of
      the broad mainsail lay black as a pall upon the deck, leaving Billings's
      white upturned face glorified and his body in a total eclipse.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link501" id="link501"></a> <br /><br />
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Monday morning we were close to the island of Hawaii. Two of its high
      mountains were in view&mdash;Mauna Loa and Hualaiai. The latter is an
      imposing peak, but being only ten thousand feet high is seldom mentioned
      or heard of. Mauna Loa is said to be sixteen thousand feet high. The rays
      of glittering snow and ice, that clasped its summit like a claw, looked
      refreshing when viewed from the blistering climate we were in. One could
      stand on that mountain (wrapped up in blankets and furs to keep warm), and
      while he nibbled a snowball or an icicle to quench his thirst he could
      look down the long sweep of its sides and see spots where plants are
      growing that grow only where the bitter cold of Winter prevails; lower
      down he could see sections devoted to production that thrive in the
      temperate zone alone; and at the bottom of the mountain he could see the
      home of the tufted cocoa-palms and other species of vegetation that grow
      only in the sultry atmosphere of eternal Summer. He could see all the
      climes of the world at a single glance of the eye, and that glance would
      only pass over a distance of four or five miles as the bird flies!
    </p>
    <p>
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by we took boat and went ashore at Kailua, designing to ride
      horseback through the pleasant orange and coffee region of Kona, and
      rejoin the vessel at a point some leagues distant. This journey is well
      worth taking. The trail passes along on high ground&mdash;say a thousand
      feet above sea level&mdash;and usually about a mile distant from the
      ocean, which is always in sight, save that occasionally you find yourself
      buried in the forest in the midst of a rank tropical vegetation and a
      dense growth of trees, whose great bows overarch the road and shut out sun
      and sea and everything, and leave you in a dim, shady tunnel, haunted with
      invisible singing birds and fragrant with the odor of flowers. It was
      pleasant to ride occasionally in the warm sun, and feast the eye upon the
      ever- changing panorama of the forest (beyond and below us), with its many
      tints, its softened lights and shadows, its billowy undulations sweeping
      gently down from the mountain to the sea. It was pleasant also, at
      intervals, to leave the sultry sun and pass into the cool, green depths of
      this forest and indulge in sentimental reflections under the inspiration
      of its brooding twilight and its whispering foliage. We rode through one
      orange grove that had ten thousand tree in it! They were all laden with
      fruit.
    </p>
    <p>
      At one farmhouse we got some large peaches of excellent flavor. This
      fruit, as a general thing, does not do well in the Sandwich Islands. It
      takes a sort of almond shape, and is small and bitter. It needs frost,
      they say, and perhaps it does; if this be so, it will have a good
      opportunity to go on needing it, as it will not be likely to get it. The
      trees from which the fine fruit I have spoken of, came, had been planted
      and replanted sixteen times, and to this treatment the proprietor of the
      orchard attributed his-success.
    </p>
    <p>
      We passed several sugar plantations&mdash;new ones and not very extensive.
      The crops were, in most cases, third rattoons. [NOTE.&mdash;The first crop
      is called "plant cane;" subsequent crops which spring from the original
      roots, without replanting, are called "rattoons."] Almost everywhere on
      the island of Hawaii sugar-cane matures in twelve months, both rattoons
      and plant, and although it ought to be taken off as soon as it tassels, no
      doubt, it is not absolutely necessary to do it until about four months
      afterward. In Kona, the average yield of an acre of ground is two tons of
      sugar, they say. This is only a moderate yield for these islands, but
      would be astounding for Louisiana and most other sugar growing countries.
      The plantations in Kona being on pretty high ground&mdash;up among the
      light and frequent rains&mdash;no irrigation whatever is required.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link503" id="link503"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch70" id="linkch70"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We stopped some time at one of the plantations, to rest ourselves and
      refresh the horses. We had a chatty conversation with several gentlemen
      present; but there was one person, a middle aged man, with an absent look
      in his face, who simply glanced up, gave us good-day and lapsed again into
      the meditations which our coming had interrupted. The planters whispered
      us not to mind him&mdash;crazy. They said he was in the Islands for his
      health; was a preacher; his home, Michigan. They said that if he woke up
      presently and fell to talking about a correspondence which he had some
      time held with Mr. Greeley about a trifle of some kind, we must humor him
      and listen with interest; and we must humor his fancy that this
      correspondence was the talk of the world.
    </p>
    <p>
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It was easy to see that he was a gentle creature and that his madness had
      nothing vicious in it. He looked pale, and a little worn, as if with
      perplexing thought and anxiety of mind. He sat a long time, looking at the
      floor, and at intervals muttering to himself and nodding his head
      acquiescingly or shaking it in mild protest. He was lost in his thought,
      or in his memories. We continued our talk with the planters, branching
      from subject to subject. But at last the word "circumstance," casually
      dropped, in the course of conversation, attracted his attention and
      brought an eager look into his countenance. He faced about in his chair
      and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Circumstance? What circumstance? Ah, I know&mdash;I know too well. So you
      have heard of it too." [With a sigh.] "Well, no matter&mdash;all the world
      has heard of it. All the world. The whole world. It is a large world, too,
      for a thing to travel so far in&mdash;now isn't it? Yes, yes&mdash;the
      Greeley correspondence with Erickson has created the saddest and bitterest
      controversy on both sides of the ocean&mdash;and still they keep it up! It
      makes us famous, but at what a sorrowful sacrifice! I was so sorry when I
      heard that it had caused that bloody and distressful war over there in
      Italy. It was little comfort to me, after so much bloodshed, to know that
      the victors sided with me, and the vanquished with Greeley.&mdash;It is
      little comfort to know that Horace Greeley is responsible for the battle
      of Sadowa, and not me.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Queen Victoria wrote me that she felt just as I did about it&mdash;she
      said that as much as she was opposed to Greeley and the spirit he showed
      in the correspondence with me, she would not have had Sadowa happen for
      hundreds of dollars. I can show you her letter, if you would like to see
      it. But gentlemen, much as you may think you know about that unhappy
      correspondence, you cannot know the straight of it till you hear it from
      my lips. It has always been garbled in the journals, and even in history.
      Yes, even in history&mdash;think of it! Let me&mdash;please let me, give
      you the matter, exactly as it occurred. I truly will not abuse your
      confidence."
    </p>
    <p>
      Then he leaned forward, all interest, all earnestness, and told his story&mdash;and
      told it appealingly, too, and yet in the simplest and most unpretentious
      way; indeed, in such a way as to suggest to one, all the time, that this
      was a faithful, honorable witness, giving evidence in the sacred interest
      of justice, and under oath. He said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Mrs. Beazeley&mdash;Mrs. Jackson Beazeley, widow, of the village of
      Campbellton, Kansas,&mdash;wrote me about a matter which was near her
      heart&mdash;a matter which many might think trivial, but to her it was a
      thing of deep concern. I was living in Michigan, then&mdash;serving in the
      ministry. She was, and is, an estimable woman&mdash;a woman to whom
      poverty and hardship have proven incentives to industry, in place of
      discouragements. Her only treasure was her son William, a youth just
      verging upon manhood; religious, amiable, and sincerely attached to
      agriculture. He was the widow's comfort and her pride. And so, moved by
      her love for him, she wrote me about a matter, as I have said before,
      which lay near her heart&mdash;because it lay near her boy's. She desired
      me to confer with Mr. Greeley about turnips. Turnips were the dream of her
      child's young ambition. While other youths were frittering away in
      frivolous amusements the precious years of budding vigor which God had
      given them for useful preparation, this boy was patiently enriching his
      mind with information concerning turnips. The sentiment which he felt
      toward the turnip was akin to adoration. He could not think of the turnip
      without emotion; he could not speak of it calmly; he could not contemplate
      it without exaltation. He could not eat it without shedding tears. All the
      poetry in his sensitive nature was in sympathy with the gracious
      vegetable. With the earliest pipe of dawn he sought his patch, and when
      the curtaining night drove him from it he shut himself up with his books
      and garnered statistics till sleep overcame him. On rainy days he sat and
      talked hours together with his mother about turnips. When company came, he
      made it his loving duty to put aside everything else and converse with
      them all the day long of his great joy in the turnip.
    </p>
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    </p>
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    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "And yet, was this joy rounded and complete? Was there no secret alloy of
      unhappiness in it? Alas, there was. There was a canker gnawing at his
      heart; the noblest inspiration of his soul eluded his endeavor&mdash;viz:
      he could not make of the turnip a climbing vine. Months went by; the bloom
      forsook his cheek, the fire faded out of his eye; sighings and abstraction
      usurped the place of smiles and cheerful converse. But a watchful eye
      noted these things and in time a motherly sympathy unsealed the secret.
      Hence the letter to me. She pleaded for attention&mdash;she said her boy
      was dying by inches.
    </p>
    <p>
      "I was a stranger to Mr. Greeley, but what of that? The matter was urgent.
      I wrote and begged him to solve the difficult problem if possible and save
      the student's life. My interest grew, until it partook of the anxiety of
      the mother. I waited in much suspense.&mdash;At last the answer came.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link509" id="link509"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "I found that I could not read it readily, the handwriting being
      unfamiliar and my emotions somewhat wrought up. It seemed to refer in part
      to the boy's case, but chiefly to other and irrelevant matters&mdash;such
      as paving-stones, electricity, oysters, and something which I took to be
      'absolution' or 'agrarianism,' I could not be certain which; still, these
      appeared to be simply casual mentions, nothing more; friendly in spirit,
      without doubt, but lacking the connection or coherence necessary to make
      them useful.&mdash;I judged that my understanding was affected by my
      feelings, and so laid the letter away till morning.
    </p>
    <p>
      "In the morning I read it again, but with difficulty and uncertainty
      still, for I had lost some little rest and my mental vision seemed
      clouded. The note was more connected, now, but did not meet the emergency
      it was expected to meet. It was too discursive. It appeared to read as
      follows, though I was not certain of some of the words:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "Polygamy dissembles majesty; extracts redeem polarity; causes hitherto
        exist. Ovations pursue wisdom, or warts inherit and condemn. Boston,
        botany, cakes, folony undertakes, but who shall allay? We fear not.
        Yrxwly, HEVACE EVEELOJ.'
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      "But there did not seem to be a word about turnips. There seemed to be no
      suggestion as to how they might be made to grow like vines. There was not
      even a reference to the Beazeleys. I slept upon the matter; I ate no
      supper, neither any breakfast next morning. So I resumed my work with a
      brain refreshed, and was very hopeful. Now the letter took a different
      aspect-all save the signature, which latter I judged to be only a harmless
      affectation of Hebrew. The epistle was necessarily from Mr. Greeley, for
      it bore the printed heading of The Tribune, and I had written to no one
      else there. The letter, I say, had taken a different aspect, but still its
      language was eccentric and avoided the issue. It now appeared to say:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "Bolivia extemporizes mackerel; borax esteems polygamy; sausages wither
        in the east. Creation perdu, is done; for woes inherent one can damn.
        Buttons, buttons, corks, geology underrates but we shall allay. My
        beer's out. Yrxwly, HEVACE EVEELOJ.'
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      "I was evidently overworked. My comprehension was impaired. Therefore I
      gave two days to recreation, and then returned to my task greatly
      refreshed. The letter now took this form:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "Poultices do sometimes choke swine; tulips reduce posterity; causes
        leather to resist. Our notions empower wisdom, her let's afford while we
        can. Butter but any cakes, fill any undertaker, we'll wean him from his
        filly. We feel hot. Yrxwly, HEVACE EVEELOJ.'
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      "I was still not satisfied. These generalities did not meet the question.
      They were crisp, and vigorous, and delivered with a confidence that almost
      compelled conviction; but at such a time as this, with a human life at
      stake, they seemed inappropriate, worldly, and in bad taste. At any other
      time I would have been not only glad, but proud, to receive from a man
      like Mr. Greeley a letter of this kind, and would have studied it
      earnestly and tried to improve myself all I could; but now, with that poor
      boy in his far home languishing for relief, I had no heart for learning.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Three days passed by, and I read the note again. Again its tenor had
      changed. It now appeared to say:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "Potations do sometimes wake wines; turnips restrain passion; causes
        necessary to state. Infest the poor widow; her lord's effects will be
        void. But dirt, bathing, etc., etc., followed unfairly, will worm him
        from his folly&mdash;so swear not. Yrxwly, HEVACE EVEELOJ.'
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      "This was more like it. But I was unable to proceed. I was too much worn.
      The word 'turnips' brought temporary joy and encouragement, but my
      strength was so much impaired, and the delay might be so perilous for the
      boy, that I relinquished the idea of pursuing the translation further, and
      resolved to do what I ought to have done at first. I sat down and wrote
      Mr. Greeley as follows:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        "DEAR SIR: I fear I do not entirely comprehend your kind note. It cannot
        be possible, Sir, that 'turnips restrain passion'&mdash;at least the
        study or contemplation of turnips cannot&mdash;for it is this very
        employment that has scorched our poor friend's mind and sapped his
        bodily strength.&mdash;But if they do restrain it, will you bear with us
        a little further and explain how they should be prepared? I observe that
        you say 'causes necessary to state,' but you have omitted to state them.
      </p>
      <p>
        "Under a misapprehension, you seem to attribute to me interested motives
        in this matter&mdash;to call it by no harsher term. But I assure you,
        dear sir, that if I seem to be 'infesting the widow,' it is all seeming,
        and void of reality. It is from no seeking of mine that I am in this
        position. She asked me, herself, to write you. I never have infested her&mdash;indeed
        I scarcely know her. I do not infest anybody. I try to go along, in my
        humble way, doing as near right as I can, never harming anybody, and
        never throwing out insinuations. As for 'her lord and his effects,' they
        are of no interest to me. I trust I have effects enough of my own&mdash;shall
        endeavor to get along with them, at any rate, and not go mousing around
        to get hold of somebody's that are 'void.' But do you not see?&mdash;this
        woman is a widow&mdash;she has no 'lord.' He is dead&mdash;or pretended
        to be, when they buried him. Therefore, no amount of 'dirt, bathing,'
        etc., etc., howsoever 'unfairly followed' will be likely to 'worm him
        from his folly'&mdash;if being dead and a ghost is 'folly.' Your closing
        remark is as unkind as it was uncalled for; and if report says true you
        might have applied it to yourself, sir, with more point and less
        impropriety. Very Truly Yours, SIMON ERICKSON.
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      "In the course of a few days, Mr. Greely did what would have saved a world
      of trouble, and much mental and bodily suffering and misunderstanding, if
      he had done it sooner. To wit, he sent an intelligible rescript or
      translation of his original note, made in a plain hand by his clerk. Then
      the mystery cleared, and I saw that his heart had been right, all the
      time. I will recite the note in its clarified form:
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p>
        [Translation.] 'Potatoes do sometimes make vines; turnips remain
        passive: cause unnecessary to state. Inform the poor widow her lad's
        efforts will be vain. But diet, bathing, etc. etc., followed uniformly,
        will wean him from his folly&mdash;so fear not. Yours, HORACE GREELEY.'
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      "But alas, it was too late, gentlemen&mdash;too late. The criminal delay
      had done its work&mdash;young Beazely was no more. His spirit had taken
      its flight to a land where all anxieties shall be charmed away, all
      desires gratified, all ambitions realized. Poor lad, they laid him to his
      rest with a turnip in each hand."
    </p>
    <p>
      So ended Erickson, and lapsed again into nodding, mumbling, and
      abstraction. The company broke up, and left him so.... But they did not
      say what drove him crazy. In the momentary confusion, I forgot to ask.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /> <br /> <br /><br /><br /><br /> <a name="linkch71" id="linkch71"></a>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At four o'clock in the afternoon we were winding down a mountain of dreary
      and desolate lava to the sea, and closing our pleasant land journey. This
      lava is the accumulation of ages; one torrent of fire after another has
      rolled down here in old times, and built up the island structure higher
      and higher. Underneath, it is honey-combed with caves; it would be of no
      use to dig wells in such a place; they would not hold water&mdash;you
      would not find any for them to hold, for that matter. Consequently, the
      planters depend upon cisterns.
    </p>
    <p>
      The last lava flow occurred here so long ago that there are none now
      living who witnessed it. In one place it enclosed and burned down a grove
      of cocoa-nut trees, and the holes in the lava where the trunks stood are
      still visible; their sides retain the impression of the bark; the trees
      fell upon the burning river, and becoming partly submerged, left in it the
      perfect counterpart of every knot and branch and leaf, and even nut, for
      curiosity seekers of a long distant day to gaze upon and wonder at.
    </p>
    <p>
      There were doubtless plenty of Kanaka sentinels on guard hereabouts at
      that time, but they did not leave casts of their figures in the lava as
      the Roman sentinels at Herculaneum and Pompeii did. It is a pity it is so,
      because such things are so interesting; but so it is. They probably went
      away. They went away early, perhaps. However, they had their merits; the
      Romans exhibited the higher pluck, but the Kanakas showed the sounder
      judgment.
    </p>
    <p>
      Shortly we came in sight of that spot whose history is so familiar to
      every school-boy in the wide world&mdash;Kealakekua Bay&mdash;the place
      where Captain Cook, the great circumnavigator, was killed by the natives,
      nearly a hundred years ago. The setting sun was flaming upon it, a Summer
      shower was falling, and it was spanned by two magnificent rainbows. Two
      men who were in advance of us rode through one of these and for a moment
      their garments shone with a more than regal splendor. Why did not Captain
      Cook have taste enough to call his great discovery the Rainbow Islands?
      These charming spectacles are present to you at every turn; they are
      common in all the islands; they are visible every day, and frequently at
      night also&mdash;not the silvery bow we see once in an age in the States,
      by moonlight, but barred with all bright and beautiful colors, like the
      children of the sun and rain. I saw one of them a few nights ago. What the
      sailors call "raindogs"&mdash;little patches of rainbow&mdash;are often
      seen drifting about the heavens in these latitudes, like stained cathedral
      windows.
    </p>
    <p>
      Kealakekua Bay is a little curve like the last kink of a snail-shell,
      winding deep into the land, seemingly not more than a mile wide from shore
      to shore. It is bounded on one side&mdash;where the murder was done&mdash;by
      a little flat plain, on which stands a cocoanut grove and some ruined
      houses; a steep wall of lava, a thousand feet high at the upper end and
      three or four hundred at the lower, comes down from the mountain and
      bounds the inner extremity of it. From this wall the place takes its name,
      Kealakekua, which in the native tongue signifies "The Pathway of the
      Gods." They say, (and still believe, in spite of their liberal education
      in Christianity), that the great god Lono, who used to live upon the
      hillside, always traveled that causeway when urgent business connected
      with heavenly affairs called him down to the seashore in a hurry.
    </p>
    <p>
      As the red sun looked across the placid ocean through the tall, clean
      stems of the cocoanut trees, like a blooming whiskey bloat through the
      bars of a city prison, I went and stood in the edge of the water on the
      flat rock pressed by Captain Cook's feet when the blow was dealt which
      took away his life, and tried to picture in my mind the doomed man
      struggling in the midst of the multitude of exasperated savages&mdash;the
      men in the ship crowding to the vessel's side and gazing in anxious dismay
      toward the shore&mdash;the&mdash;but I discovered that I could not do it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link514" id="link514"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="514.jpg (93K)" src="images/514.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      It was growing dark, the rain began to fall, we could see that the distant
      Boomerang was helplessly becalmed at sea, and so I adjourned to the
      cheerless little box of a warehouse and sat down to smoke and think, and
      wish the ship would make the land&mdash;for we had not eaten much for ten
      hours and were viciously hungry.
    </p>
    <p>
      Plain unvarnished history takes the romance out of Captain Cook's
      assassination, and renders a deliberate verdict of justifiable homicide.
      Wherever he went among the islands, he was cordially received and welcomed
      by the inhabitants, and his ships lavishly supplied with all manner of
      food. He returned these kindnesses with insult and ill- treatment.
      Perceiving that the people took him for the long vanished and lamented god
      Lono, he encouraged them in the delusion for the sake of the limitless
      power it gave him; but during the famous disturbance at this spot, and
      while he and his comrades were surrounded by fifteen thousand maddened
      savages, he received a hurt and betrayed his earthly origin with a groan.
      It was his death-warrant. Instantly a shout went up: "He groans!&mdash;he
      is not a god!" So they closed in upon him and dispatched him.
    </p>
    <p>
      His flesh was stripped from the bones and burned (except nine pounds of it
      which were sent on board the ships). The heart was hung up in a native
      hut, where it was found and eaten by three children, who mistook it for
      the heart of a dog. One of these children grew to be a very old man, and
      died in Honolulu a few years ago. Some of Cook's bones were recovered and
      consigned to the deep by the officers of the ships.
    </p>
    <p>
      Small blame should attach to the natives for the killing of Cook. They
      treated him well. In return, he abused them. He and his men inflicted
      bodily injury upon many of them at different times, and killed at least
      three of them before they offered any proportionate retaliation.
    </p>
    <p>
      Near the shore we found "Cook's Monument"&mdash;only a cocoanut stump,
      four feet high and about a foot in diameter at the butt. It had lava
      boulders piled around its base to hold it up and keep it in its place, and
      it was entirely sheathed over, from top to bottom, with rough, discolored
      sheets of copper, such as ships' bottoms are coppered with. Each sheet had
      a rude inscription scratched upon it&mdash;with a nail, apparently&mdash;and
      in every case the execution was wretched. Most of these merely recorded
      the visits of British naval commanders to the spot, but one of them bore
      this legend:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Near this spot fell CAPTAIN JAMES COOK, The Distinguished
      Circumnavigator, Who Discovered these Islands A. D. 1778."
    </p>
    <p>
      After Cook's murder, his second in command, on board the ship, opened fire
      upon the swarms of natives on the beach, and one of his cannon balls cut
      this cocoanut tree short off and left this monumental stump standing. It
      looked sad and lonely enough to us, out there in the rainy twilight. But
      there is no other monument to Captain Cook. True, up on the mountain side
      we had passed by a large inclosure like an ample hog-pen, built of lava
      blocks, which marks the spot where Cook's flesh was stripped from his
      bones and burned; but this is not properly a monument since it was erected
      by the natives themselves, and less to do honor to the circumnavigator
      than for the sake of convenience in roasting him. A thing like a
      guide-board was elevated above this pen on a tall pole, and formerly there
      was an inscription upon it describing the memorable occurrence that had
      there taken place; but the sun and the wind have long ago so defaced it as
      to render it illegible.
    </p>
    <p>
      Toward midnight a fine breeze sprang up and the schooner soon worked
      herself into the bay and cast anchor. The boat came ashore for us, and in
      a little while the clouds and the rain were all gone. The moon was beaming
      tranquilly down on land and sea, and we two were stretched upon the deck
      sleeping the refreshing sleep and dreaming the happy dreams that are only
      vouchsafed to the weary and the innocent.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch72" id="linkch72"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In the breezy morning we went ashore and visited the ruined temple of the
      last god Lono. The high chief cook of this temple&mdash;the priest who
      presided over it and roasted the human sacrifices&mdash;was uncle to
      Obookia, and at one time that youth was an apprentice-priest under him.
      Obookia was a young native of fine mind, who, together with three other
      native boys, was taken to New England by the captain of a whaleship during
      the reign of Kamehameha I, and they were the means of attracting the
      attention of the religious world to their country. This resulted in the
      sending of missionaries there. And this Obookia was the very same
      sensitive savage who sat down on the church steps and wept because his
      people did not have the Bible. That incident has been very elaborately
      painted in many a charming Sunday School book&mdash;aye, and told so
      plaintively and so tenderly that I have cried over it in Sunday School
      myself, on general principles, although at a time when I did not know much
      and could not understand why the people of the Sandwich Islands needed to
      worry so much about it as long as they did not know there was a Bible at
      all.
    </p>
    <p>
      Obookia was converted and educated, and was to have returned to his native
      land with the first missionaries, had he lived. The other native youths
      made the voyage, and two of them did good service, but the third, William
      Kanui, fell from grace afterward, for a time, and when the gold excitement
      broke out in California he journeyed thither and went to mining, although
      he was fifty years old. He succeeded pretty well, but the failure of Page,
      Bacon &amp; Co. relieved him of six thousand dollars, and then, to all
      intents and purposes, he was a bankrupt in his old age and he resumed
      service in the pulpit again. He died in Honolulu in 1864.
    </p>
    <p>
      Quite a broad tract of land near the temple, extending from the sea to the
      mountain top, was sacred to the god Lono in olden times&mdash;so sacred
      that if a common native set his sacrilegious foot upon it it was judicious
      for him to make his will, because his time had come. He might go around it
      by water, but he could not cross it. It was well sprinkled with pagan
      temples and stocked with awkward, homely idols carved out of logs of wood.
      There was a temple devoted to prayers for rain&mdash;and with fine
      sagacity it was placed at a point so well up on the mountain side that if
      you prayed there twenty-four times a day for rain you would be likely to
      get it every time. You would seldom get to your Amen before you would have
      to hoist your umbrella.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link518" id="link518"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="518.jpg (54K)" src="images/518.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      And there was a large temple near at hand which was built in a single
      night, in the midst of storm and thunder and rain, by the ghastly hands of
      dead men! Tradition says that by the weird glare of the lightning a
      noiseless multitude of phantoms were seen at their strange labor far up
      the mountain side at dead of night&mdash;flitting hither and thither and
      bearing great lava-blocks clasped in their nerveless fingers&mdash;appearing
      and disappearing as the pallid lustre fell upon their forms and faded away
      again. Even to this day, it is said, the natives hold this dread structure
      in awe and reverence, and will not pass by it in the night.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link519" id="link519"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="519.jpg (43K)" src="images/519.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At noon I observed a bevy of nude native young ladies bathing in the sea,
      and went and sat down on their clothes to keep them from being stolen. I
      begged them to come out, for the sea was rising and I was satisfied that
      they were running some risk. But they were not afraid, and presently went
      on with their sport. They were finished swimmers and divers, and enjoyed
      themselves to the last degree.
    </p>
    <p>
      They swam races, splashed and ducked and tumbled each other about, and
      filled the air with their laughter. It is said that the first thing an
      Islander learns is how to swim; learning to walk being a matter of smaller
      consequence, comes afterward. One hears tales of native men and women
      swimming ashore from vessels many miles at sea&mdash;more miles, indeed,
      than I dare vouch for or even mention. And they tell of a native diver who
      went down in thirty or forty-foot waters and brought up an anvil! I think
      he swallowed the anvil afterward, if my memory serves me. However I will
      not urge this point.
    </p>
    <p>
      I have spoken, several times, of the god Lono&mdash;I may as well furnish
      two or three sentences concerning him.
    </p>
    <p>
      The idol the natives worshipped for him was a slender, unornamented staff
      twelve feet long. Tradition says he was a favorite god on the Island of
      Hawaii&mdash;a great king who had been deified for meritorious services&mdash;just
      our own fashion of rewarding heroes, with the difference that we would
      have made him a Postmaster instead of a god, no doubt. In an angry moment
      he slew his wife, a goddess named Kaikilani Aiii. Remorse of conscience
      drove him mad, and tradition presents us the singular spectacle of a god
      traveling "on the shoulder;" for in his gnawing grief he wandered about
      from place to place boxing and wrestling with all whom he met. Of course
      this pastime soon lost its novelty, inasmuch as it must necessarily have
      been the case that when so powerful a deity sent a frail human opponent
      "to grass" he never came back any more. Therefore, he instituted games
      called makahiki, and ordered that they should be held in his honor, and
      then sailed for foreign lands on a three-cornered raft, stating that he
      would return some day&mdash;and that was the last of Lono. He was never
      seen any more; his raft got swamped, perhaps. But the people always
      expected his return, and thus they were easily led to accept Captain Cook
      as the restored god.
    </p>
    <p>
      Some of the old natives believed Cook was Lono to the day of their death;
      but many did not, for they could not understand how he could die if he was
      a god.
    </p>
    <p>
      Only a mile or so from Kealakekua Bay is a spot of historic interest&mdash;the
      place where the last battle was fought for idolatry. Of course we visited
      it, and came away as wise as most people do who go and gaze upon such
      mementoes of the past when in an unreflective mood.
    </p>
    <p>
      While the first missionaries were on their way around the Horn, the
      idolatrous customs which had obtained in the island, as far back as
      tradition reached were suddenly broken up. Old Kamehameha I., was dead,
      and his son, Liholiho, the new King was a free liver, a roystering,
      dissolute fellow, and hated the restraints of the ancient tabu. His
      assistant in the Government, Kaahumanu, the Queen dowager, was proud and
      high-spirited, and hated the tabu because it restricted the privileges of
      her sex and degraded all women very nearly to the level of brutes. So the
      case stood. Liholiho had half a mind to put his foot down, Kaahumahu had a
      whole mind to badger him into doing it, and whiskey did the rest. It was
      probably the rest. It was probably the first time whiskey ever prominently
      figured as an aid to civilization. Liholiho came up to Kailua as drunk as
      a piper, and attended a great feast; the determined Queen spurred his
      drunken courage up to a reckless pitch, and then, while all the multitude
      stared in blank dismay, he moved deliberately forward and sat down with
      the women!
    </p>
    <p>
      They saw him eat from the same vessel with them, and were appalled!
      Terrible moments drifted slowly by, and still the King ate, still he
      lived, still the lightnings of the insulted gods were withheld! Then
      conviction came like a revelation&mdash;the superstitions of a hundred
      generations passed from before the people like a cloud, and a shout went
      up, "the tabu is broken! the tabu is broken!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link521" id="link521"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="521.jpg (100K)" src="images/521.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Thus did King Liholiho and his dreadful whiskey preach the first sermon
      and prepare the way for the new gospel that was speeding southward over
      the waves of the Atlantic.
    </p>
    <p>
      The tabu broken and destruction failing to follow the awful sacrilege, the
      people, with that childlike precipitancy which has always characterized
      them, jumped to the conclusion that their gods were a weak and wretched
      swindle, just as they formerly jumped to the conclusion that Captain Cook
      was no god, merely because he groaned, and promptly killed him without
      stopping to inquire whether a god might not groan as well as a man if it
      suited his convenience to do it; and satisfied that the idols were
      powerless to protect themselves they went to work at once and pulled them
      down&mdash;hacked them to pieces&mdash;applied the torch&mdash;annihilated
      them!
    </p>
    <p>
      The pagan priests were furious. And well they might be; they had held the
      fattest offices in the land, and now they were beggared; they had been
      great&mdash;they had stood above the chiefs&mdash;and now they were
      vagabonds. They raised a revolt; they scared a number of people into
      joining their standard, and Bekuokalani, an ambitious offshoot of royalty,
      was easily persuaded to become their leader.
    </p>
    <p>
      In the first skirmish the idolaters triumphed over the royal army sent
      against them, and full of confidence they resolved to march upon Kailua.
      The King sent an envoy to try and conciliate them, and came very near
      being an envoy short by the operation; the savages not only refused to
      listen to him, but wanted to kill him. So the King sent his men forth
      under Major General Kalaimoku and the two host met a Kuamoo. The battle
      was long and fierce&mdash;men and women fighting side by side, as was the
      custom&mdash;and when the day was done the rebels were flying in every
      direction in hopeless panic, and idolatry and the tabu were dead in the
      land!
    </p>
    <p>
      The royalists marched gayly home to Kailua glorifying the new
      dispensation. "There is no power in the gods," said they; "they are a
      vanity and a lie. The army with idols was weak; the army without idols was
      strong and victorious!"
    </p>
    <p>
      The nation was without a religion.
    </p>
    <p>
      The missionary ship arrived in safety shortly afterward, timed by
      providential exactness to meet the emergency, and the Gospel was planted
      as in a virgin soil.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link523" id="link523"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="523.jpg (57K)" src="images/523.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch73" id="linkch73"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At noon, we hired a Kanaka to take us down to the ancient ruins at
      Honaunan in his canoe&mdash;price two dollars&mdash;reasonable enough, for
      a sea voyage of eight miles, counting both ways.
    </p>
    <p>
      The native canoe is an irresponsible looking contrivance. I cannot think
      of anything to liken it to but a boy's sled runner hollowed out, and that
      does not quite convey the correct idea. It is about fifteen feet long,
      high and pointed at both ends, is a foot and a half or two feet deep, and
      so narrow that if you wedged a fat man into it you might not get him out
      again. It sits on top of the water like a duck, but it has an outrigger
      and does not upset easily, if you keep still. This outrigger is formed of
      two long bent sticks like plow handles, which project from one side, and
      to their outer ends is bound a curved beam composed of an extremely light
      wood, which skims along the surface of the water and thus saves you from
      an upset on that side, while the outrigger's weight is not so easily
      lifted as to make an upset on the other side a thing to be greatly feared.
      Still, until one gets used to sitting perched upon this knifeblade, he is
      apt to reason within himself that it would be more comfortable if there
      were just an outrigger or so on the other side also. I had the bow seat,
      and Billings sat amidships and faced the Kanaka, who occupied the stern of
      the craft and did the paddling. With the first stroke the trim shell of a
      thing shot out from the shore like an arrow. There was not much to see.
      While we were on the shallow water of the reef, it was pastime to look
      down into the limpid depths at the large bunches of branching coral&mdash;the
      unique shrubbery of the sea. We lost that, though, when we got out into
      the dead blue water of the deep. But we had the picture of the surf, then,
      dashing angrily against the crag- bound shore and sending a foaming spray
      high into the air.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was interest in this beetling border, too, for it was honey-combed
      with quaint caves and arches and tunnels, and had a rude semblance of the
      dilapidated architecture of ruined keeps and castles rising out of the
      restless sea. When this novelty ceased to be a novelty, we turned our eyes
      shoreward and gazed at the long mountain with its rich green forests
      stretching up into the curtaining clouds, and at the specks of houses in
      the rearward distance and the diminished schooner riding sleepily at
      anchor. And when these grew tiresome we dashed boldly into the midst of a
      school of huge, beastly porpoises engaged at their eternal game of arching
      over a wave and disappearing, and then doing it over again and keeping it
      up&mdash;always circling over, in that way, like so many well- submerged
      wheels. But the porpoises wheeled themselves away, and then we were thrown
      upon our own resources. It did not take many minutes to discover that the
      sun was blazing like a bonfire, and that the weather was of a melting
      temperature. It had a drowsing effect, too.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link525" id="link525"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="525.jpg (87K)" src="images/525.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In one place we came upon a large company of naked natives, of both sexes
      and all ages, amusing themselves with the national pastime of
      surf-bathing. Each heathen would paddle three or four hundred yards out to
      sea, (taking a short board with him), then face the shore and wait for a
      particularly prodigious billow to come along; at the right moment he would
      fling his board upon its foamy crest and himself upon the board, and here
      he would come whizzing by like a bombshell! It did not seem that a
      lightning express train could shoot along at a more hair-lifting speed. I
      tried surf-bathing once, subsequently, but made a failure of it. I got the
      board placed right, and at the right moment, too; but missed the
      connection myself.&mdash;The board struck the shore in three quarters of a
      second, without any cargo, and I struck the bottom about the same time,
      with a couple of barrels of water in me. None but natives ever master the
      art of surf-bathing thoroughly.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link526" id="link526"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="526.jpg (33K)" src="images/526.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      At the end of an hour, we had made the four miles, and landed on a level
      point of land, upon which was a wide extent of old ruins, with many a tall
      cocoanut tree growing among them. Here was the ancient City of Refuge&mdash;a
      vast inclosure, whose stone walls were twenty feet thick at the base, and
      fifteen feet high; an oblong square, a thousand and forty feet one way and
      a fraction under seven hundred the other. Within this inclosure, in early
      times, has been three rude temples; each two hundred and ten feet long by
      one hundred wide, and thirteen high.
    </p>
    <p>
      In those days, if a man killed another anywhere on the island the
      relatives were privileged to take the murderer's life; and then a chase
      for life and liberty began&mdash;the outlawed criminal flying through
      pathless forests and over mountain and plain, with his hopes fixed upon
      the protecting walls of the City of Refuge, and the avenger of blood
      following hotly after him!
    </p>
    <p>
      Sometimes the race was kept up to the very gates of the temple, and the
      panting pair sped through long files of excited natives, who watched the
      contest with flashing eye and dilated nostril, encouraging the hunted
      refugee with sharp, inspiriting ejaculations, and sending up a ringing
      shout of exultation when the saving gates closed upon him and the cheated
      pursuer sank exhausted at the threshold. But sometimes the flying criminal
      fell under the hand of the avenger at the very door, when one more brave
      stride, one more brief second of time would have brought his feet upon the
      sacred ground and barred him against all harm. Where did these isolated
      pagans get this idea of a City of Refuge&mdash;this ancient Oriental
      custom?
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link527" id="link527"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="527.jpg (73K)" src="images/527.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      This old sanctuary was sacred to all&mdash;even to rebels in arms and
      invading armies. Once within its walls, and confession made to the priest
      and absolution obtained, the wretch with a price upon his head could go
      forth without fear and without danger&mdash;he was tabu, and to harm him
      was death. The routed rebels in the lost battle for idolatry fled to this
      place to claim sanctuary, and many were thus saved.
    </p>
    <p>
      Close to the corner of the great inclosure is a round structure of stone,
      some six or eight feet high, with a level top about ten or twelve in
      diameter. This was the place of execution. A high palisade of cocoanut
      piles shut out the cruel scenes from the vulgar multitude. Here criminals
      were killed, the flesh stripped from the bones and burned, and the bones
      secreted in holes in the body of the structure. If the man had been guilty
      of a high crime, the entire corpse was burned.
    </p>
    <p>
      The walls of the temple are a study. The same food for speculation that is
      offered the visitor to the Pyramids of Egypt he will find here&mdash;the
      mystery of how they were constructed by a people unacquainted with science
      and mechanics. The natives have no invention of their own for hoisting
      heavy weights, they had no beasts of burden, and they have never even
      shown any knowledge of the properties of the lever. Yet some of the lava
      blocks quarried out, brought over rough, broken ground, and built into
      this wall, six or seven feet from the ground, are of prodigious size and
      would weigh tons. How did they transport and how raise them?
    </p>
    <p>
      Both the inner and outer surfaces of the walls present a smooth front and
      are very creditable specimens of masonry. The blocks are of all manner of
      shapes and sizes, but yet are fitted together with the neatest exactness.
      The gradual narrowing of the wall from the base upward is accurately
      preserved.
    </p>
    <p>
      No cement was used, but the edifice is firm and compact and is capable of
      resisting storm and decay for centuries. Who built this temple, and how
      was it built, and when, are mysteries that may never be unraveled. Outside
      of these ancient walls lies a sort of coffin-shaped stone eleven feet four
      inches long and three feet square at the small end (it would weigh a few
      thousand pounds), which the high chief who held sway over this district
      many centuries ago brought thither on his shoulder one day to use as a
      lounge! This circumstance is established by the most reliable traditions.
      He used to lie down on it, in his indolent way, and keep an eye on his
      subjects at work for him and see that there was no "soldiering" done. And
      no doubt there was not any done to speak of, because he was a man of that
      sort of build that incites to attention to business on the part of an
      employee.
    </p>
    <p>
      He was fourteen or fifteen feet high. When he stretched himself at full
      length on his lounge, his legs hung down over the end, and when he snored
      he woke the dead. These facts are all attested by irrefragable tradition.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link529" id="link529"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="529.jpg (86K)" src="images/529.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      On the other side of the temple is a monstrous seven-ton rock, eleven feet
      long, seven feet wide and three feet thick. It is raised a foot or a foot
      and a half above the ground, and rests upon half a dozen little stony
      pedestals. The same old fourteen-footer brought it down from the mountain,
      merely for fun (he had his own notions about fun), and propped it up as we
      find it now and as others may find it a century hence, for it would take a
      score of horses to budge it from its position. They say that fifty or
      sixty years ago the proud Queen Kaahumanu used to fly to this rock for
      safety, whenever she had been making trouble with her fierce husband, and
      hide under it until his wrath was appeased. But these Kanakas will lie,
      and this statement is one of their ablest efforts&mdash;for Kaahumanu was
      six feet high&mdash;she was bulky&mdash;she was built like an ox&mdash;and
      she could no more have squeezed herself under that rock than she could
      have passed between the cylinders of a sugar mill. What could she gain by
      it, even if she succeeded? To be chased and abused by a savage husband
      could not be otherwise than humiliating to her high spirit, yet it could
      never make her feel so flat as an hour's repose under that rock would.
    </p>
    <p>
      We walked a mile over a raised macadamized road of uniform width; a road
      paved with flat stones and exhibiting in its every detail a considerable
      degree of engineering skill. Some say that that wise old pagan, Kamehameha
      I planned and built it, but others say it was built so long before his
      time that the knowledge of who constructed it has passed out of the
      traditions. In either case, however, as the handiwork of an untaught and
      degraded race it is a thing of pleasing interest. The stones are worn and
      smooth, and pushed apart in places, so that the road has the exact
      appearance of those ancient paved highways leading out of Rome which one
      sees in pictures.
    </p>
    <p>
      The object of our tramp was to visit a great natural curiosity at the base
      of the foothills&mdash;a congealed cascade of lava. Some old forgotten
      volcanic eruption sent its broad river of fire down the mountain side
      here, and it poured down in a great torrent from an overhanging bluff some
      fifty feet high to the ground below. The flaming torrent cooled in the
      winds from the sea, and remains there to-day, all seamed, and frothed and
      rippled a petrified Niagara. It is very picturesque, and withal so natural
      that one might almost imagine it still flowed. A smaller stream trickled
      over the cliff and built up an isolated pyramid about thirty feet high,
      which has the semblance of a mass of large gnarled and knotted vines and
      roots and stems intricately twisted and woven together.
    </p>
    <p>
      We passed in behind the cascade and the pyramid, and found the bluff
      pierced by several cavernous tunnels, whose crooked courses we followed a
      long distance.
    </p>
    <p>
      Two of these winding tunnels stand as proof of Nature's mining abilities.
      Their floors are level, they are seven feet wide, and their roofs are
      gently arched. Their height is not uniform, however. We passed through one
      a hundred feet long, which leads through a spur of the hill and opens out
      well up in the sheer wall of a precipice whose foot rests in the waves of
      the sea. It is a commodious tunnel, except that there are occasional
      places in it where one must stoop to pass under. The roof is lava, of
      course, and is thickly studded with little lava-pointed icicles an inch
      long, which hardened as they dripped. They project as closely together as
      the iron teeth of a corn-sheller, and if one will stand up straight and
      walk any distance there, he can get his hair combed free of charge.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link531" id="link531"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="531.jpg (55K)" src="images/531.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch74" id="linkch74"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXIV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We got back to the schooner in good time, and then sailed down to Kau,
      where we disembarked and took final leave of the vessel. Next day we
      bought horses and bent our way over the summer-clad mountain-terraces,
      toward the great volcano of Kilauea (Ke-low-way-ah). We made nearly a two
      days' journey of it, but that was on account of laziness. Toward sunset on
      the second day, we reached an elevation of some four thousand feet above
      sea level, and as we picked our careful way through billowy wastes of lava
      long generations ago stricken dead and cold in the climax of its tossing
      fury, we began to come upon signs of the near presence of the volcano&mdash;signs
      in the nature of ragged fissures that discharged jets of sulphurous vapor
      into the air, hot from the molten ocean down in the bowels of the
      mountain.
    </p>
    <p>
      Shortly the crater came into view. I have seen Vesuvius since, but it was
      a mere toy, a child's volcano, a soup-kettle, compared to this. Mount
      Vesuvius is a shapely cone thirty-six hundred feet high; its crater an
      inverted cone only three hundred feet deep, and not more than a thousand
      feet in diameter, if as much as that; its fires meagre, modest, and
      docile.&mdash;But here was a vast, perpendicular, walled cellar, nine
      hundred feet deep in some places, thirteen hundred in others, level-
      floored, and ten miles in circumference! Here was a yawning pit upon whose
      floor the armies of Russia could camp, and have room to spare.
    </p>
    <p>
      Perched upon the edge of the crater, at the opposite end from where we
      stood, was a small look-out house&mdash;say three miles away. It assisted
      us, by comparison, to comprehend and appreciate the great depth of the
      basin&mdash;it looked like a tiny martin-box clinging at the eaves of a
      cathedral. After some little time spent in resting and looking and
      ciphering, we hurried on to the hotel.
    </p>
    <p>
      By the path it is half a mile from the Volcano House to the lookout-
      house. After a hearty supper we waited until it was thoroughly dark and
      then started to the crater. The first glance in that direction revealed a
      scene of wild beauty. There was a heavy fog over the crater and it was
      splendidly illuminated by the glare from the fires below. The illumination
      was two miles wide and a mile high, perhaps; and if you ever, on a dark
      night and at a distance beheld the light from thirty or forty blocks of
      distant buildings all on fire at once, reflected strongly against
      over-hanging clouds, you can form a fair idea of what this looked like.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link533" id="link533"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="533.jpg (37K)" src="images/533.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      A colossal column of cloud towered to a great height in the air
      immediately above the crater, and the outer swell of every one of its vast
      folds was dyed with a rich crimson luster, which was subdued to a pale
      rose tint in the depressions between. It glowed like a muffled torch and
      stretched upward to a dizzy height toward the zenith. I thought it just
      possible that its like had not been seen since the children of Israel
      wandered on their long march through the desert so many centuries ago over
      a path illuminated by the mysterious "pillar of fire." And I was sure that
      I now had a vivid conception of what the majestic "pillar of fire" was
      like, which almost amounted to a revelation.
    </p>
    <p>
      Arrived at the little thatched lookout house, we rested our elbows on the
      railing in front and looked abroad over the wide crater and down over the
      sheer precipice at the seething fires beneath us. The view was a startling
      improvement on my daylight experience. I turned to see the effect on the
      balance of the company and found the reddest-faced set of men I almost
      ever saw. In the strong light every countenance glowed like red-hot iron,
      every shoulder was suffused with crimson and shaded rearward into dingy,
      shapeless obscurity! The place below looked like the infernal regions and
      these men like half-cooled devils just come up on a furlough.
    </p>
    <p>
      I turned my eyes upon the volcano again. The "cellar" was tolerably well
      lighted up. For a mile and a half in front of us and half a mile on either
      side, the floor of the abyss was magnificently illuminated; beyond these
      limits the mists hung down their gauzy curtains and cast a deceptive gloom
      over all that made the twinkling fires in the remote corners of the crater
      seem countless leagues removed&mdash;made them seem like the camp-fires of
      a great army far away. Here was room for the imagination to work! You
      could imagine those lights the width of a continent away&mdash;and that
      hidden under the intervening darkness were hills, and winding rivers, and
      weary wastes of plain and desert&mdash;and even then the tremendous vista
      stretched on, and on, and on!&mdash;to the fires and far beyond! You could
      not compass it&mdash;it was the idea of eternity made tangible&mdash;and
      the longest end of it made visible to the naked eye!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link535" id="link535"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="535.jpg (125K)" src="images/535.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The greater part of the vast floor of the desert under us was as black as
      ink, and apparently smooth and level; but over a mile square of it was
      ringed and streaked and striped with a thousand branching streams of
      liquid and gorgeously brilliant fire! It looked like a colossal railroad
      map of the State of Massachusetts done in chain lightning on a midnight
      sky. Imagine it&mdash;imagine a coal-black sky shivered into a tangled
      net- work of angry fire!
    </p>
    <p>
      Here and there were gleaming holes a hundred feet in diameter, broken in
      the dark crust, and in them the melted lava&mdash;the color a dazzling
      white just tinged with yellow&mdash;was boiling and surging furiously; and
      from these holes branched numberless bright torrents in many directions,
      like the spokes of a wheel, and kept a tolerably straight course for a
      while and then swept round in huge rainbow curves, or made a long
      succession of sharp worm-fence angles, which looked precisely like the
      fiercest jagged lightning. These streams met other streams, and they
      mingled with and crossed and recrossed each other in every conceivable
      direction, like skate tracks on a popular skating ground. Sometimes
      streams twenty or thirty feet wide flowed from the holes to some distance
      without dividing&mdash;and through the opera-glasses we could see that
      they ran down small, steep hills and were genuine cataracts of fire, white
      at their source, but soon cooling and turning to the richest red, grained
      with alternate lines of black and gold. Every now and then masses of the
      dark crust broke away and floated slowly down these streams like rafts
      down a river. Occasionally the molten lava flowing under the
      superincumbent crust broke through&mdash;split a dazzling streak, from
      five hundred to a thousand feet long, like a sudden flash of lightning,
      and then acre after acre of the cold lava parted into fragments, turned up
      edgewise like cakes of ice when a great river breaks up, plunged downward
      and were swallowed in the crimson cauldron. Then the wide expanse of the
      "thaw" maintained a ruddy glow for a while, but shortly cooled and became
      black and level again. During a "thaw," every dismembered cake was marked
      by a glittering white border which was superbly shaded inward by aurora
      borealis rays, which were a flaming yellow where they joined the white
      border, and from thence toward their points tapered into glowing crimson,
      then into a rich, pale carmine, and finally into a faint blush that held
      its own a moment and then dimmed and turned black. Some of the streams
      preferred to mingle together in a tangle of fantastic circles, and then
      they looked something like the confusion of ropes one sees on a ship's
      deck when she has just taken in sail and dropped anchor&mdash;provided one
      can imagine those ropes on fire.
    </p>
    <p>
      Through the glasses, the little fountains scattered about looked very
      beautiful. They boiled, and coughed, and spluttered, and discharged sprays
      of stringy red fire&mdash;of about the consistency of mush, for instance&mdash;from
      ten to fifteen feet into the air, along with a shower of brilliant white
      sparks&mdash;a quaint and unnatural mingling of gouts of blood and
      snow-flakes!
    </p>
    <p>
      We had circles and serpents and streaks of lightning all twined and
      wreathed and tied together, without a break throughout an area more than a
      mile square (that amount of ground was covered, though it was not strictly
      "square"), and it was with a feeling of placid exultation that we
      reflected that many years had elapsed since any visitor had seen such a
      splendid display&mdash;since any visitor had seen anything more than the
      now snubbed and insignificant "North" and "South" lakes in action. We had
      been reading old files of Hawaiian newspapers and the "Record Book" at the
      Volcano House, and were posted.
    </p>
    <p>
      I could see the North Lake lying out on the black floor away off in the
      outer edge of our panorama, and knitted to it by a web-work of lava
      streams. In its individual capacity it looked very little more respectable
      than a schoolhouse on fire. True, it was about nine hundred feet long and
      two or three hundred wide, but then, under the present circumstances, it
      necessarily appeared rather insignificant, and besides it was so distant
      from us.
    </p>
    <p>
      I forgot to say that the noise made by the bubbling lava is not great,
      heard as we heard it from our lofty perch. It makes three distinct sounds&mdash;a
      rushing, a hissing, and a coughing or puffing sound; and if you stand on
      the brink and close your eyes it is no trick at all to imagine that you
      are sweeping down a river on a large low-pressure steamer, and that you
      hear the hissing of the steam about her boilers, the puffing from her
      escape-pipes and the churning rush of the water abaft her wheels. The
      smell of sulphur is strong, but not unpleasant to a sinner.
    </p>
    <p>
      We left the lookout house at ten o'clock in a half cooked condition,
      because of the heat from Pele's furnaces, and wrapping up in blankets, for
      the night was cold, we returned to our Hotel.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch75" id="linkch75"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXV.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The next night was appointed for a visit to the bottom of the crater, for
      we desired to traverse its floor and see the "North Lake" (of fire) which
      lay two miles away, toward the further wall. After dark half a dozen of us
      set out, with lanterns and native guides, and climbed down a crazy,
      thousand-foot pathway in a crevice fractured in the crater wall, and
      reached the bottom in safety.
    </p>
    <p>
      The irruption of the previous evening had spent its force and the floor
      looked black and cold; but when we ran out upon it we found it hot yet, to
      the feet, and it was likewise riven with crevices which revealed the
      underlying fires gleaming vindictively. A neighboring cauldron was
      threatening to overflow, and this added to the dubiousness of the
      situation. So the native guides refused to continue the venture, and then
      every body deserted except a stranger named Marlette. He said he had been
      in the crater a dozen times in daylight and believed he could find his way
      through it at night. He thought that a run of three hundred yards would
      carry us over the hottest part of the floor and leave us our shoe-soles.
      His pluck gave me back-bone. We took one lantern and instructed the guides
      to hang the other to the roof of the look-out house to serve as a beacon
      for us in case we got lost, and then the party started back up the
      precipice and Marlette and I made our run. We skipped over the hot floor
      and over the red crevices with brisk dispatch and reached the cold lava
      safe but with pretty warm feet. Then we took things leisurely and
      comfortably, jumping tolerably wide and probably bottomless chasms, and
      threading our way through picturesque lava upheavals with considerable
      confidence. When we got fairly away from the cauldrons of boiling fire, we
      seemed to be in a gloomy desert, and a suffocatingly dark one, surrounded
      by dim walls that seemed to tower to the sky. The only cheerful objects
      were the glinting stars high overhead.
    </p>
    <p>
      By and by Marlette shouted "Stop!" I never stopped quicker in my life. I
      asked what the matter was. He said we were out of the path. He said we
      must not try to go on till we found it again, for we were surrounded with
      beds of rotten lava through which we could easily break and plunge down a
      thousand feet. I thought eight hundred would answer for me, and was about
      to say so when Marlette partly proved his statement by accidentally
      crushing through and disappearing to his arm-pits.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link539" id="link539"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="539.jpg (43K)" src="images/539.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      He got out and we hunted for the path with the lantern. He said there was
      only one path and that it was but vaguely defined. We could not find it.
      The lava surface was all alike in the lantern light. But he was an
      ingenious man. He said it was not the lantern that had informed him that
      we were out of the path, but his feet. He had noticed a crisp grinding of
      fine lava-needles under his feet, and some instinct reminded him that in
      the path these were all worn away. So he put the lantern behind him, and
      began to search with his boots instead of his eyes. It was good sagacity.
      The first time his foot touched a surface that did not grind under it he
      announced that the trail was found again; and after that we kept up a
      sharp listening for the rasping sound and it always warned us in time.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a long tramp, but an exciting one. We reached the North Lake
      between ten and eleven o'clock, and sat down on a huge overhanging lava-
      shelf, tired but satisfied. The spectacle presented was worth coming
      double the distance to see. Under us, and stretching away before us, was a
      heaving sea of molten fire of seemingly limitless extent. The glare from
      it was so blinding that it was some time before we could bear to look upon
      it steadily.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was like gazing at the sun at noon-day, except that the glare was not
      quite so white. At unequal distances all around the shores of the lake
      were nearly white-hot chimneys or hollow drums of lava, four or five feet
      high, and up through them were bursting gorgeous sprays of lava-gouts and
      gem spangles, some white, some red and some golden&mdash;a ceaseless
      bombardment, and one that fascinated the eye with its unapproachable
      splendor. The mere distant jets, sparkling up through an intervening
      gossamer veil of vapor, seemed miles away; and the further the curving
      ranks of fiery fountains receded, the more fairy-like and beautiful they
      appeared.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link540" id="link540"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="540.jpg (78K)" src="images/540.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Now and then the surging bosom of the lake under our noses would calm down
      ominously and seem to be gathering strength for an enterprise; and then
      all of a sudden a red dome of lava of the bulk of an ordinary dwelling
      would heave itself aloft like an escaping balloon, then burst asunder, and
      out of its heart would flit a pale-green film of vapor, and float upward
      and vanish in the darkness&mdash;a released soul soaring homeward from
      captivity with the damned, no doubt. The crashing plunge of the ruined
      dome into the lake again would send a world of seething billows lashing
      against the shores and shaking the foundations of our perch. By and by, a
      loosened mass of the hanging shelf we sat on tumbled into the lake,
      jarring the surroundings like an earthquake and delivering a suggestion
      that may have been intended for a hint, and may not. We did not wait to
      see.
    </p>
    <p>
      We got lost again on our way back, and were more than an hour hunting for
      the path. We were where we could see the beacon lantern at the look-out
      house at the time, but thought it was a star and paid no attention to it.
      We reached the hotel at two o'clock in the morning pretty well fagged out.
    </p>
    <p>
      Kilauea never overflows its vast crater, but bursts a passage for its lava
      through the mountain side when relief is necessary, and then the
      destruction is fearful. About 1840 it rent its overburdened stomach and
      sent a broad river of fire careering down to the sea, which swept away
      forests, huts, plantations and every thing else that lay in its path. The
      stream was five miles broad, in places, and two hundred feet deep, and the
      distance it traveled was forty miles. It tore up and bore away
      acre-patches of land on its bosom like rafts&mdash;rocks, trees and all
      intact. At night the red glare was visible a hundred miles at sea; and at
      a distance of forty miles fine print could be read at midnight. The
      atmosphere was poisoned with sulphurous vapors and choked with falling
      ashes, pumice stones and cinders; countless columns of smoke rose up and
      blended together in a tumbled canopy that hid the heavens and glowed with
      a ruddy flush reflected from the fires below; here and there jets of lava
      sprung hundreds of feet into the air and burst into rocket-sprays that
      returned to earth in a crimson rain; and all the while the laboring
      mountain shook with Nature's great palsy and voiced its distress in
      moanings and the muffled booming of subterranean thunders.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link542" id="link542"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="542.jpg (103K)" src="images/542.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Fishes were killed for twenty miles along the shore, where the lava
      entered the sea. The earthquakes caused some loss of human life, and a
      prodigious tidal wave swept inland, carrying every thing before it and
      drowning a number of natives. The devastation consummated along the route
      traversed by the river of lava was complete and incalculable. Only a
      Pompeii and a Herculaneum were needed at the foot of Kilauea to make the
      story of the irruption immortal.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link543" id="link543"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="543.jpg (113K)" src="images/543.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch76" id="linkch76"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXVI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We rode horseback all around the island of Hawaii (the crooked road making
      the distance two hundred miles), and enjoyed the journey very much. We
      were more than a week making the trip, because our Kanaka horses would not
      go by a house or a hut without stopping&mdash;whip and spur could not
      alter their minds about it, and so we finally found that it economized
      time to let them have their way. Upon inquiry the mystery was explained:
      the natives are such thorough-going gossips that they never pass a house
      without stopping to swap news, and consequently their horses learn to
      regard that sort of thing as an essential part of the whole duty of man,
      and his salvation not to be compassed without it. However, at a former
      crisis of my life I had once taken an aristocratic young lady out driving,
      behind a horse that had just retired from a long and honorable career as
      the moving impulse of a milk wagon, and so this present experience awoke a
      reminiscent sadness in me in place of the exasperation more natural to the
      occasion. I remembered how helpless I was that day, and how humiliated;
      how ashamed I was of having intimated to the girl that I had always owned
      the horse and was accustomed to grandeur; how hard I tried to appear easy,
      and even vivacious, under suffering that was consuming my vitals; how
      placidly and maliciously the girl smiled, and kept on smiling, while my
      hot blushes baked themselves into a permanent blood-pudding in my face;
      how the horse ambled from one side of the street to the other and waited
      complacently before every third house two minutes and a quarter while I
      belabored his back and reviled him in my heart; how I tried to keep him
      from turning corners and failed; how I moved heaven and earth to get him
      out of town, and did not succeed; how he traversed the entire settlement
      and delivered imaginary milk at a hundred and sixty-two different
      domiciles, and how he finally brought up at a dairy depot and refused to
      budge further, thus rounding and completing the revealment of what the
      plebeian service of his life had been; how, in eloquent silence, I walked
      the girl home, and how, when I took leave of her, her parting remark
      scorched my soul and appeared to blister me all over: she said that my
      horse was a fine, capable animal, and I must have taken great comfort in
      him in my time&mdash;but that if I would take along some milk-tickets next
      time, and appear to deliver them at the various halting places, it might
      expedite his movements a little. There was a coolness between us after
      that.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link545" id="link545"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="545.jpg (90K)" src="images/545.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      In one place in the island of Hawaii, we saw a laced and ruffled cataract
      of limpid water leaping from a sheer precipice fifteen hundred feet high;
      but that sort of scenery finds its stanchest ally in the arithmetic rather
      than in spectacular effect. If one desires to be so stirred by a poem of
      Nature wrought in the happily commingled graces of picturesque rocks,
      glimpsed distances, foliage, color, shifting lights and shadows, and
      failing water, that the tears almost come into his eyes so potent is the
      charm exerted, he need not go away from America to enjoy such an
      experience. The Rainbow Fall, in Watkins Glen (N.Y.), on the Erie railway,
      is an example. It would recede into pitiable insignificance if the callous
      tourist drew on arithmetic on it; but left to compete for the honors
      simply on scenic grace and beauty&mdash;the grand, the august and the
      sublime being barred the contest&mdash;it could challenge the old world
      and the new to produce its peer.
    </p>
    <p>
      In one locality, on our journey, we saw some horses that had been born and
      reared on top of the mountains, above the range of running water, and
      consequently they had never drank that fluid in their lives, but had been
      always accustomed to quenching their thirst by eating dew-laden or
      shower-wetted leaves. And now it was destructively funny to see them sniff
      suspiciously at a pail of water, and then put in their noses and try to
      take a bite out of the fluid, as if it were a solid. Finding it liquid,
      they would snatch away their heads and fall to trembling, snorting and
      showing other evidences of fright. When they became convinced at last that
      the water was friendly and harmless, they thrust in their noses up to
      their eyes, brought out a mouthful of water, and proceeded to chew it
      complacently. We saw a man coax, kick and spur one of them five or ten
      minutes before he could make it cross a running stream. It spread its
      nostrils, distended its eyes and trembled all over, just as horses
      customarily do in the presence of a serpent&mdash;and for aught I know it
      thought the crawling stream was a serpent.
    </p>
    <p>
      In due course of time our journey came to an end at Kawaehae (usually
      pronounced To-a-hi&mdash;and before we find fault with this elaborate
      orthographical method of arriving at such an unostentatious result, let us
      lop off the ugh from our word "though"). I made this horseback trip on a
      mule. I paid ten dollars for him at Kau (Kah-oo), added four to get him
      shod, rode him two hundred miles, and then sold him for fifteen dollars. I
      mark the circumstance with a white stone (in the absence of chalk&mdash;for
      I never saw a white stone that a body could mark anything with, though out
      of respect for the ancients I have tried it often enough); for up to that
      day and date it was the first strictly commercial transaction I had ever
      entered into, and come out winner. We returned to Honolulu, and from
      thence sailed to the island of Maui, and spent several weeks there very
      pleasantly. I still remember, with a sense of indolent luxury, a picnicing
      excursion up a romantic gorge there, called the Iao Valley. The trail lay
      along the edge of a brawling stream in the bottom of the gorge&mdash;a
      shady route, for it was well roofed with the verdant domes of forest
      trees. Through openings in the foliage we glimpsed picturesque scenery
      that revealed ceaseless changes and new charms with every step of our
      progress. Perpendicular walls from one to three thousand feet high guarded
      the way, and were sumptuously plumed with varied foliage, in places, and
      in places swathed in waving ferns. Passing shreds of cloud trailed their
      shadows across these shining fronts, mottling them with blots; billowy
      masses of white vapor hid the turreted summits, and far above the vapor
      swelled a background of gleaming green crags and cones that came and went,
      through the veiling mists, like islands drifting in a fog; sometimes the
      cloudy curtain descended till half the canon wall was hidden, then
      shredded gradually away till only airy glimpses of the ferny front
      appeared through it&mdash;then swept aloft and left it glorified in the
      sun again. Now and then, as our position changed, rocky bastions swung out
      from the wall, a mimic ruin of castellated ramparts and crumbling towers
      clothed with mosses and hung with garlands of swaying vines, and as we
      moved on they swung back again and hid themselves once more in the
      foliage. Presently a verdure-clad needle of stone, a thousand feet high,
      stepped out from behind a corner, and mounted guard over the mysteries of
      the valley. It seemed to me that if Captain Cook needed a monument, here
      was one ready made&mdash;therefore, why not put up his sign here, and sell
      out the venerable cocoanut stump?
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link547" id="link547"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="547.jpg (192K)" src="images/547.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      But the chief pride of Maui is her dead volcano of Haleakala&mdash;which
      means, translated, "the house of the sun." We climbed a thousand feet up
      the side of this isolated colossus one afternoon; then camped, and next
      day climbed the remaining nine thousand feet, and anchored on the summit,
      where we built a fire and froze and roasted by turns, all night. With the
      first pallor of dawn we got up and saw things that were new to us. Mounted
      on a commanding pinnacle, we watched Nature work her silent wonders. The
      sea was spread abroad on every hand, its tumbled surface seeming only
      wrinkled and dimpled in the distance. A broad valley below appeared like
      an ample checker-board, its velvety green sugar plantations alternating
      with dun squares of barrenness and groves of trees diminished to mossy
      tufts. Beyond the valley were mountains picturesquely grouped together;
      but bear in mind, we fancied that we were looking up at these things&mdash;not
      down. We seemed to sit in the bottom of a symmetrical bowl ten thousand
      feet deep, with the valley and the skirting sea lifted away into the sky
      above us! It was curious; and not only curious, but aggravating; for it
      was having our trouble all for nothing, to climb ten thousand feet toward
      heaven and then have to look up at our scenery. However, we had to be
      content with it and make the best of it; for, all we could do we could not
      coax our landscape down out of the clouds. Formerly, when I had read an
      article in which Poe treated of this singular fraud perpetrated upon the
      eye by isolated great altitudes, I had looked upon the matter as an
      invention of his own fancy.
    </p>
    <p>
      I have spoken of the outside view&mdash;but we had an inside one, too.
      That was the yawning dead crater, into which we now and then tumbled
      rocks, half as large as a barrel, from our perch, and saw them go
      careering down the almost perpendicular sides, bounding three hundred feet
      at a jump; kicking up cast-clouds wherever they struck; diminishing to our
      view as they sped farther into distance; growing invisible, finally, and
      only betraying their course by faint little puffs of dust; and coming to a
      halt at last in the bottom of the abyss, two thousand five hundred feet
      down from where they started! It was magnificent sport. We wore ourselves
      out at it.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link549" id="link549"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="549.jpg (138K)" src="images/549.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The crater of Vesuvius, as I have before remarked, is a modest pit about a
      thousand feet deep and three thousand in circumference; that of Kilauea is
      somewhat deeper, and ten miles in circumference. But what are either of
      them compared to the vacant stomach of Haleakala? I will not offer any
      figures of my own, but give official ones&mdash;those of Commander Wilkes,
      U.S.N., who surveyed it and testifies that it is twenty-seven miles in
      circumference! If it had a level bottom it would make a fine site for a
      city like London. It must have afforded a spectacle worth contemplating in
      the old days when its furnaces gave full rein to their anger.
    </p>
    <p>
      Presently vagrant white clouds came drifting along, high over the sea and
      the valley; then they came in couples and groups; then in imposing
      squadrons; gradually joining their forces, they banked themselves solidly
      together, a thousand feet under us, and totally shut out land and ocean&mdash;not
      a vestige of anything was left in view but just a little of the rim of the
      crater, circling away from the pinnacle whereon we sat (for a ghostly
      procession of wanderers from the filmy hosts without had drifted through a
      chasm in the crater wall and filed round and round, and gathered and sunk
      and blended together till the abyss was stored to the brim with a fleecy
      fog). Thus banked, motion ceased, and silence reigned. Clear to the
      horizon, league on league, the snowy floor stretched without a break&mdash;not
      level, but in rounded folds, with shallow creases between, and with here
      and there stately piles of vapory architecture lifting themselves aloft
      out of the common plain&mdash;some near at hand, some in the middle
      distances, and others relieving the monotony of the remote solitudes.
      There was little conversation, for the impressive scene overawed speech. I
      felt like the Last Man, neglected of the judgment, and left pinnacled in
      mid-heaven, a forgotten relic of a vanished world.
    </p>
    <p>
      While the hush yet brooded, the messengers of the coming resurrection
      appeared in the East. A growing warmth suffused the horizon, and soon the
      sun emerged and looked out over the cloud-waste, flinging bars of ruddy
      light across it, staining its folds and billow-caps with blushes, purpling
      the shaded troughs between, and glorifying the massy vapor- palaces and
      cathedrals with a wasteful splendor of all blendings and combinations of
      rich coloring.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was the sublimest spectacle I ever witnessed, and I think the memory of
      it will remain with me always.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch77" id="linkch77"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXVII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I stumbled upon one curious character in the Island of Mani. He became a
      sore annoyance to me in the course of time. My first glimpse of him was in
      a sort of public room in the town of Lahaina. He occupied a chair at the
      opposite side of the apartment, and sat eyeing our party with interest for
      some minutes, and listening as critically to what we were saying as if he
      fancied we were talking to him and expecting him to reply. I thought it
      very sociable in a stranger. Presently, in the course of conversation, I
      made a statement bearing upon the subject under discussion&mdash;and I
      made it with due modesty, for there was nothing extraordinary about it,
      and it was only put forth in illustration of a point at issue. I had
      barely finished when this person spoke out with rapid utterance and
      feverish anxiety:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, that was certainly remarkable, after a fashion, but you ought to have
      seen my chimney&mdash;you ought to have seen my chimney, sir! Smoke! I
      wish I may hang if&mdash;Mr. Jones, you remember that chimney&mdash;you
      must remember that chimney! No, no&mdash;I recollect, now, you warn't
      living on this side of the island then. But I am telling you nothing but
      the truth, and I wish I may never draw another breath if that chimney
      didn't smoke so that the smoke actually got caked in it and I had to dig
      it out with a pickaxe! You may smile, gentlemen, but the High Sheriff's
      got a hunk of it which I dug out before his eyes, and so it's perfectly
      easy for you to go and examine for yourselves."
    </p>
    <p>
      The interruption broke up the conversation, which had already begun to
      lag, and we presently hired some natives and an out-rigger canoe or two,
      and went out to overlook a grand surf-bathing contest.
    </p>
    <p>
      Two weeks after this, while talking in a company, I looked up and detected
      this same man boring through and through me with his intense eye, and
      noted again his twitching muscles and his feverish anxiety to speak. The
      moment I paused, he said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Beg your pardon, sir, beg your pardon, but it can only be considered
      remarkable when brought into strong outline by isolation. Sir, contrasted
      with a circumstance which occurred in my own experience, it instantly
      becomes commonplace. No, not that&mdash;for I will not speak so
      discourteously of any experience in the career of a stranger and a
      gentleman&mdash;but I am obliged to say that you could not, and you would
      not ever again refer to this tree as a large one, if you could behold, as
      I have, the great Yakmatack tree, in the island of Ounaska, sea of
      Kamtchatka&mdash;a tree, sir, not one inch less than four hundred and
      fifteen feet in solid diameter!&mdash;and I wish I may die in a minute if
      it isn't so! Oh, you needn't look so questioning, gentlemen; here's old
      Cap Saltmarsh can say whether I know what I'm talking about or not. I
      showed him the tree."
    </p>
    <p>
      Captain Saltmarsh&mdash;"Come, now, cat your anchor, lad&mdash;you're
      heaving too taut. You promised to show me that stunner, and I walked more
      than eleven mile with you through the cussedest jungle I ever see, a
      hunting for it; but the tree you showed me finally warn't as big around as
      a beer cask, and you know that your own self, Markiss."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link553" id="link553"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      "Hear the man talk! Of course the tree was reduced that way, but didn't I
      explain it? Answer me, didn't I? Didn't I say I wished you could have seen
      it when I first saw it? When you got up on your ear and called me names,
      and said I had brought you eleven miles to look at a sapling, didn't I
      explain to you that all the whale-ships in the North Seas had been wooding
      off of it for more than twenty-seven years? And did you s'pose the tree
      could last for-ever, con-found it? I don't see why you want to keep back
      things that way, and try to injure a person that's never done you any
      harm."
    </p>
    <p>
      Somehow this man's presence made me uncomfortable, and I was glad when a
      native arrived at that moment to say that Muckawow, the most companionable
      and luxurious among the rude war-chiefs of the Islands, desired us to come
      over and help him enjoy a missionary whom he had found trespassing on his
      grounds.
    </p>
    <p>
      I think it was about ten days afterward that, as I finished a statement I
      was making for the instruction of a group of friends and acquaintances,
      and which made no pretence of being extraordinary, a familiar voice chimed
      instantly in on the heels of my last word, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "But, my dear sir, there was nothing remarkable about that horse, or the
      circumstance either&mdash;nothing in the world! I mean no sort of offence
      when I say it, sir, but you really do not know anything whatever about
      speed. Bless your heart, if you could only have seen my mare Margaretta;
      there was a beast!&mdash;there was lightning for you! Trot! Trot is no
      name for it&mdash;she flew! How she could whirl a buggy along! I started
      her out once, sir&mdash;Colonel Bilgewater, you recollect that animal
      perfectly well&mdash;I started her out about thirty or thirty-five yards
      ahead of the awfullest storm I ever saw in my life, and it chased us
      upwards of eighteen miles! It did, by the everlasting hills! And I'm
      telling you nothing but the unvarnished truth when I say that not one
      single drop of rain fell on me&mdash;not a single drop, sir! And I swear
      to it! But my dog was a-swimming behind the wagon all the way!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link554" id="link554"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="554.jpg (76K)" src="images/554.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      For a week or two I stayed mostly within doors, for I seemed to meet this
      person everywhere, and he had become utterly hateful to me. But one
      evening I dropped in on Captain Perkins and his friends, and we had a
      sociable time. About ten o'clock I chanced to be talking about a merchant
      friend of mine, and without really intending it, the remark slipped out
      that he was a little mean and parsimonious about paying his workmen.
      Instantly, through the steam of a hot whiskey punch on the opposite side
      of the room, a remembered voice shot&mdash;and for a moment I trembled on
      the imminent verge of profanity:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Oh, my dear sir, really you expose yourself when you parade that as a
      surprising circumstance. Bless your heart and hide, you are ignorant of
      the very A B C of meanness! ignorant as the unborn babe! ignorant as
      unborn twins! You don't know anything about it! It is pitiable to see you,
      sir, a well-spoken and prepossessing stranger, making such an enormous
      pow-wow here about a subject concerning which your ignorance is perfectly
      humiliating! Look me in the eye, if you please; look me in the eye. John
      James Godfrey was the son of poor but honest parents in the State of
      Mississippi&mdash;boyhood friend of mine&mdash;bosom comrade in later
      years. Heaven rest his noble spirit, he is gone from us now. John James
      Godfrey was hired by the Hayblossom Mining Company in California to do
      some blasting for them&mdash;the "Incorporated Company of Mean Men," the
      boys used to call it.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, one day he drilled a hole about four feet deep and put in an awful
      blast of powder, and was standing over it ramming it down with an iron
      crowbar about nine foot long, when the cussed thing struck a spark and
      fired the powder, and scat! away John Godfrey whizzed like a skyrocket,
      him and his crowbar! Well, sir, he kept on going up in the air higher and
      higher, till he didn't look any bigger than a boy&mdash;and he kept going
      on up higher and higher, till he didn't look any bigger than a doll&mdash;and
      he kept on going up higher and higher, till he didn't look any bigger than
      a little small bee&mdash;and then he went out of sight! Presently he came
      in sight again, looking like a little small bee&mdash;and he came along
      down further and further, till he looked as big as a doll again&mdash;and
      down further and further, till he was as big as a boy again&mdash;and
      further and further, till he was a full-sized man once more; and then him
      and his crowbar came a wh-izzing down and lit right exactly in the same
      old tracks and went to r-ramming down, and r-ramming down, and r-ramming
      down again, just the same as if nothing had happened! Now do you know,
      that poor cuss warn't gone only sixteen minutes, and yet that Incorporated
      Company of Mean Men DOCKED HIM FOR THE LOST TIME!"
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link555" id="link555"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="555.jpg (42K)" src="images/555.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I said I had the headache, and so excused myself and went home. And on my
      diary I entered "another night spoiled" by this offensive loafer. And a
      fervent curse was set down with it to keep the item company. And the very
      next day I packed up, out of all patience, and left the Island.
    </p>
    <p>
      Almost from the very beginning, I regarded that man as a liar.
    </p>
    <p>
      The line of points represents an interval of years. At the end of which
      time the opinion hazarded in that last sentence came to be gratifyingly
      and remarkably endorsed, and by wholly disinterested persons. The man
      Markiss was found one morning hanging to a beam of his own bedroom (the
      doors and windows securely fastened on the inside), dead; and on his
      breast was pinned a paper in his own handwriting begging his friends to
      suspect no innocent person of having any thing to do with his death, for
      that it was the work of his own hands entirely. Yet the jury brought in
      the astounding verdict that deceased came to his death "by the hands of
      some person or persons unknown!" They explained that the perfectly
      undeviating consistency of Markiss's character for thirty years towered
      aloft as colossal and indestructible testimony, that whatever statement he
      chose to make was entitled to instant and unquestioning acceptance as a
      lie. And they furthermore stated their belief that he was not dead, and
      instanced the strong circumstantial evidence of his own word that he was
      dead&mdash;and beseeched the coroner to delay the funeral as long as
      possible, which was done. And so in the tropical climate of Lahaina the
      coffin stood open for seven days, and then even the loyal jury gave him
      up. But they sat on him again, and changed their verdict to "suicide
      induced by mental aberration"&mdash;because, said they, with penetration,
      "he said he was dead, and he was dead; and would he have told the truth if
      he had been in his right mind? No, sir."
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link557" id="link557"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="557.jpg (26K)" src="images/557.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkch78" id="linkch78"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXIII.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      After half a year's luxurious vagrancy in the islands, I took shipping in
      a sailing vessel, and regretfully returned to San Francisco&mdash;a voyage
      in every way delightful, but without an incident: unless lying two long
      weeks in a dead calm, eighteen hundred miles from the nearest land, may
      rank as an incident. Schools of whales grew so tame that day after day
      they played about the ship among the porpoises and the sharks without the
      least apparent fear of us, and we pelted them with empty bottles for lack
      of better sport. Twenty-four hours afterward these bottles would be still
      lying on the glassy water under our noses, showing that the ship had not
      moved out of her place in all that time. The calm was absolutely
      breathless, and the surface of the sea absolutely without a wrinkle. For a
      whole day and part of a night we lay so close to another ship that had
      drifted to our vicinity, that we carried on conversations with her
      passengers, introduced each other by name, and became pretty intimately
      acquainted with people we had never heard of before, and have never heard
      of since. This was the only vessel we saw during the whole lonely voyage.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link559" id="link559"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
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    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      We had fifteen passengers, and to show how hard pressed they were at last
      for occupation and amusement, I will mention that the gentlemen gave a
      good part of their time every day, during the calm, to trying to sit on an
      empty champagne bottle (lying on its side), and thread a needle without
      touching their heels to the deck, or falling over; and the ladies sat in
      the shade of the mainsail, and watched the enterprise with absorbing
      interest. We were at sea five Sundays; and yet, but for the almanac, we
      never would have known but that all the other days were Sundays too.
    </p>
    <p>
      I was home again, in San Francisco, without means and without employment.
      I tortured my brain for a saving scheme of some kind, and at last a public
      lecture occurred to me! I sat down and wrote one, in a fever of hopeful
      anticipation. I showed it to several friends, but they all shook their
      heads. They said nobody would come to hear me, and I would make a
      humiliating failure of it.
    </p>
    <p>
      They said that as I had never spoken in public, I would break down in the
      delivery, anyhow. I was disconsolate now. But at last an editor slapped me
      on the back and told me to "go ahead." He said, "Take the largest house in
      town, and charge a dollar a ticket." The audacity of the proposition was
      charming; it seemed fraught with practical worldly wisdom, however. The
      proprietor of the several theatres endorsed the advice, and said I might
      have his handsome new opera-house at half price&mdash;fifty dollars. In
      sheer desperation I took it&mdash;on credit, for sufficient reasons. In
      three days I did a hundred and fifty dollars' worth of printing and
      advertising, and was the most distressed and frightened creature on the
      Pacific coast. I could not sleep&mdash;who could, under such
      circumstances? For other people there was facetiousness in the last line
      of my posters, but to me it was plaintive with a pang when I wrote it:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Doors open at 7 1/2. The trouble will begin at 8."
    </p>
    <p>
      That line has done good service since. Showmen have borrowed it
      frequently. I have even seen it appended to a newspaper advertisement
      reminding school pupils in vacation what time next term would begin. As
      those three days of suspense dragged by, I grew more and more unhappy. I
      had sold two hundred tickets among my personal friends, but I feared they
      might not come. My lecture, which had seemed "humorous" to me, at first,
      grew steadily more and more dreary, till not a vestige of fun seemed left,
      and I grieved that I could not bring a coffin on the stage and turn the
      thing into a funeral. I was so panic-stricken, at last, that I went to
      three old friends, giants in stature, cordial by nature, and
      stormy-voiced, and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "This thing is going to be a failure; the jokes in it are so dim that
      nobody will ever see them; I would like to have you sit in the parquette,
      and help me through."
    </p>
    <p>
      They said they would. Then I went to the wife of a popular citizen, and
      said that if she was willing to do me a very great kindness, I would be
      glad if she and her husband would sit prominently in the left-hand stage-
      box, where the whole house could see them. I explained that I should need
      help, and would turn toward her and smile, as a signal, when I had been
      delivered of an obscure joke&mdash;"and then," I added, "don't wait to
      investigate, but respond!"
    </p>
    <p>
      She promised. Down the street I met a man I never had seen before. He had
      been drinking, and was beaming with smiles and good nature. He said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "My name's Sawyer. You don't know me, but that don't matter. I haven't got
      a cent, but if you knew how bad I wanted to laugh, you'd give me a ticket.
      Come, now, what do you say?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Is your laugh hung on a hair-trigger?&mdash;that is, is it critical, or
      can you get it off easy?"
    </p>
    <p>
      My drawling infirmity of speech so affected him that he laughed a specimen
      or two that struck me as being about the article I wanted, and I gave him
      a ticket, and appointed him to sit in the second circle, in the centre,
      and be responsible for that division of the house. I gave him minute
      instructions about how to detect indistinct jokes, and then went away, and
      left him chuckling placidly over the novelty of the idea.
    </p>
    <p>
      I ate nothing on the last of the three eventful days&mdash;I only
      suffered. I had advertised that on this third day the box-office would be
      opened for the sale of reserved seats. I crept down to the theater at four
      in the afternoon to see if any sales had been made. The ticket seller was
      gone, the box-office was locked up. I had to swallow suddenly, or my heart
      would have got out. "No sales," I said to myself; "I might have known it."
      I thought of suicide, pretended illness, flight. I thought of these things
      in earnest, for I was very miserable and scared. But of course I had to
      drive them away, and prepare to meet my fate. I could not wait for
      half-past seven&mdash;I wanted to face the horror, and end it&mdash;the
      feeling of many a man doomed to hang, no doubt. I went down back streets
      at six o'clock, and entered the theatre by the back door. I stumbled my
      way in the dark among the ranks of canvas scenery, and stood on the stage.
      The house was gloomy and silent, and its emptiness depressing. I went into
      the dark among the scenes again, and for an hour and a half gave myself up
      to the horrors, wholly unconscious of everything else. Then I heard a
      murmur; it rose higher and higher, and ended in a crash, mingled with
      cheers. It made my hair raise, it was so close to me, and so loud.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was a pause, and then another; presently came a third, and before I
      well knew what I was about, I was in the middle of the stage, staring at a
      sea of faces, bewildered by the fierce glare of the lights, and quaking in
      every limb with a terror that seemed like to take my life away. The house
      was full, aisles and all!
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link561" id="link561"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="561.jpg (45K)" src="images/561.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      The tumult in my heart and brain and legs continued a full minute before I
      could gain any command over myself. Then I recognized the charity and the
      friendliness in the faces before me, and little by little my fright melted
      away, and I began to talk Within three or four minutes I was comfortable,
      and even content. My three chief allies, with three auxiliaries, were on
      hand, in the parquette, all sitting together, all armed with bludgeons,
      and all ready to make an onslaught upon the feeblest joke that might show
      its head. And whenever a joke did fall, their bludgeons came down and
      their faces seemed to split from ear to ear.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link562" id="link562"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="562.jpg (153K)" src="images/562.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      Sawyer, whose hearty countenance was seen looming redly in the centre of
      the second circle, took it up, and the house was carried handsomely.
      Inferior jokes never fared so royally before. Presently I delivered a bit
      of serious matter with impressive unction (it was my pet), and the
      audience listened with an absorbed hush that gratified me more than any
      applause; and as I dropped the last word of the clause, I happened to turn
      and catch Mrs.&mdash;'s intent and waiting eye; my conversation with her
      flashed upon me, and in spite of all I could do I smiled. She took it for
      the signal, and promptly delivered a mellow laugh that touched off the
      whole audience; and the explosion that followed was the triumph of the
      evening. I thought that that honest man Sawyer would choke himself; and as
      for the bludgeons, they performed like pile-drivers. But my poor little
      morsel of pathos was ruined. It was taken in good faith as an intentional
      joke, and the prize one of the entertainment, and I wisely let it go at
      that.
    </p>
    <p>
      All the papers were kind in the morning; my appetite returned; I had a
      abundance of money. All's well that ends well.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <a name="linkch79" id="linkch79"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      CHAPTER LXXIX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      I launched out as a lecturer, now, with great boldness. I had the field
      all to myself, for public lectures were almost an unknown commodity in the
      Pacific market. They are not so rare, now, I suppose. I took an old
      personal friend along to play agent for me, and for two or three weeks we
      roamed through Nevada and California and had a very cheerful time of it.
      Two days before I lectured in Virginia City, two stagecoaches were robbed
      within two miles of the town. The daring act was committed just at dawn,
      by six masked men, who sprang up alongside the coaches, presented
      revolvers at the heads of the drivers and passengers, and commanded a
      general dismount. Everybody climbed down, and the robbers took their
      watches and every cent they had. Then they took gunpowder and blew up the
      express specie boxes and got their contents. The leader of the robbers was
      a small, quick-spoken man, and the fame of his vigorous manner and his
      intrepidity was in everybody's mouth when we arrived.
    </p>
    <p>
      The night after instructing Virginia, I walked over the desolate "divide"
      and down to Gold Hill, and lectured there. The lecture done, I stopped to
      talk with a friend, and did not start back till eleven. The "divide" was
      high, unoccupied ground, between the towns, the scene of twenty midnight
      murders and a hundred robberies. As we climbed up and stepped out on this
      eminence, the Gold Hill lights dropped out of sight at our backs, and the
      night closed down gloomy and dismal. A sharp wind swept the place, too,
      and chilled our perspiring bodies through.
    </p>
    <p>
      "I tell you I don't like this place at night," said Mike the agent.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, don't speak so loud," I said. "You needn't remind anybody that we
      are here."
    </p>
    <p>
      Just then a dim figure approached me from the direction of Virginia&mdash;a
      man, evidently. He came straight at me, and I stepped aside to let him
      pass; he stepped in the way and confronted me again. Then I saw that he
      had a mask on and was holding something in my face&mdash;I heard a
      click-click and recognized a revolver in dim outline. I pushed the barrel
      aside with my hand and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Don't!"
    </p>
    <p>
      He ejaculated sharply:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Your watch! Your money!"
    </p>
    <p>
      I said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "You can have them with pleasure&mdash;but take the pistol away from my
      face, please. It makes me shiver."
    </p>
    <p>
      "No remarks! Hand out your money!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Certainly&mdash;I&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Put up your hands! Don't you go for a weapon! Put 'em up! Higher!"
    </p>
    <p>
      I held them above my head.
    </p>
    <p>
      A pause. Then:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Are you going to hand out your money or not?"
    </p>
    <p>
      I dropped my hands to my pockets and said:
    </p>
    <p>
      Certainly! I&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Put up your hands! Do you want your head blown off? Higher!"
    </p>
    <p>
      I put them above my head again.
    </p>
    <p>
      Another pause.
    </p>
    <p>
      Are you going to hand out your money or not? Ah-ah&mdash;again? Put up
      your hands! By George, you want the head shot off you awful bad!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well, friend, I'm trying my best to please you. You tell me to give up my
      money, and when I reach for it you tell me to put up my hands. If you
      would only&mdash;. Oh, now&mdash;don't! All six of you at me! That other
      man will get away while.&mdash;Now please take some of those revolvers out
      of my face&mdash;do, if you please! Every time one of them clicks, my
      liver comes up into my throat! If you have a mother&mdash;any of you&mdash;or
      if any of you have ever had a mother&mdash;or a&mdash;grandmother&mdash;or
      a&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Cheese it! Will you give up your money, or have we got to&mdash;. There&mdash;there&mdash;none
      of that! Put up your hands!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen&mdash;I know you are gentlemen by your&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Silence! If you want to be facetious, young man, there are times and
      places more fitting. This is a serious business."
    </p>
    <p>
      "You prick the marrow of my opinion. The funerals I have attended in my
      time were comedies compared to it. Now I think&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Curse your palaver! Your money!&mdash;your money!&mdash;your money! Hold!&mdash;put
      up your hands!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen, listen to reason. You see how I am situated&mdash;now don't
      put those pistols so close&mdash;I smell the powder.
    </p>
    <p>
      "You see how I am situated. If I had four hands&mdash;so that I could hold
      up two and&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Throttle him! Gag him! Kill him!"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen, don't! Nobody's watching the other fellow. Why don't some of
      you&mdash;. Ouch! Take it away, please!
    </p>
    <p>
      "Gentlemen, you see that I've got to hold up my hands; and so I can't take
      out my money&mdash;but if you'll be so kind as to take it out for me, I
      will do as much for you some&mdash;"
    </p>
    <p>
      "Search him Beauregard&mdash;and stop his jaw with a bullet, quick, if he
      wags it again. Help Beauregard, Stonewall."
    </p>
    <p>
      Then three of them, with the small, spry leader, adjourned to Mike and
      fell to searching him. I was so excited that my lawless fancy tortured me
      to ask my two men all manner of facetious questions about their rebel
      brother-generals of the South, but, considering the order they had
      received, it was but common prudence to keep still. When everything had
      been taken from me,&mdash;watch, money, and a multitude of trifles of
      small value,&mdash;I supposed I was free, and forthwith put my cold hands
      into my empty pockets and began an inoffensive jig to warm my feet and
      stir up some latent courage&mdash;but instantly all pistols were at my
      head, and the order came again:
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link567" id="link567"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="567.jpg (72K)" src="images/567.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      They stood Mike up alongside of me, with strict orders to keep his hands
      above his head, too, and then the chief highwayman said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Beauregard, hide behind that boulder; Phil Sheridan, you hide behind that
      other one; Stonewall Jackson, put yourself behind that sage-bush there.
      Keep your pistols bearing on these fellows, and if they take down their
      hands within ten minutes, or move a single peg, let them have it!"
    </p>
    <p>
      Then three disappeared in the gloom toward the several ambushes, and the
      other three disappeared down the road toward Virginia.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was depressingly still, and miserably cold. Now this whole thing was a
      practical joke, and the robbers were personal friends of ours in disguise,
      and twenty more lay hidden within ten feet of us during the whole
      operation, listening. Mike knew all this, and was in the joke, but I
      suspected nothing of it. To me it was most uncomfortably genuine. When we
      had stood there in the middle of the road five minutes, like a couple of
      idiots, with our hands aloft, freezing to death by inches, Mike's interest
      in the joke began to wane. He said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "The time's up, now, aint it?"
    </p>
    <p>
      "No, you keep still. Do you want to take any chances with these bloody
      savages?"
    </p>
    <p>
      Presently Mike said:
    </p>
    <p>
      "Now the time's up, anyway. I'm freezing."
    </p>
    <p>
      "Well freeze. Better freeze than carry your brains home in a basket. Maybe
      the time is up, but how do we know?&mdash;got no watch to tell by. I mean
      to give them good measure. I calculate to stand here fifteen minutes or
      die. Don't you move."
    </p>
    <p>
      So, without knowing it, I was making one joker very sick of his contract.
      When we took our arms down at last, they were aching with cold and
      fatigue, and when we went sneaking off, the dread I was in that the time
      might not yet be up and that we would feel bullets in a moment, was not
      sufficient to draw all my attention from the misery that racked my
      stiffened body.
    </p>
    <p>
      The joke of these highwayman friends of ours was mainly a joke upon
      themselves; for they had waited for me on the cold hill-top two full hours
      before I came, and there was very little fun in that; they were so chilled
      that it took them a couple of weeks to get warm again. Moreover, I never
      had a thought that they would kill me to get money which it was so
      perfectly easy to get without any such folly, and so they did not really
      frighten me bad enough to make their enjoyment worth the trouble they had
      taken. I was only afraid that their weapons would go off accidentally.
      Their very numbers inspired me with confidence that no blood would be
      intentionally spilled. They were not smart; they ought to have sent only
      one highwayman, with a double-barrelled shot gun, if they desired to see
      the author of this volume climb a tree.
    </p>
    <p>
      However, I suppose that in the long run I got the largest share of the
      joke at last; and in a shape not foreseen by the highwaymen; for the
      chilly exposure on the "divide" while I was in a perspiration gave me a
      cold which developed itself into a troublesome disease and kept my hands
      idle some three months, besides costing me quite a sum in doctor's bills.
      Since then I play no practical jokes on people and generally lose my
      temper when one is played upon me.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link569" id="link569"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="569.jpg (39K)" src="images/569.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <p>
      When I returned to San Francisco I projected a pleasure journey to Japan
      and thence westward around the world; but a desire to see home again
      changed my mind, and I took a berth in the steamship, bade good-bye to the
      friendliest land and livest, heartiest community on our continent, and
      came by the way of the Isthmus to New York&mdash;a trip that was not much
      of a pic-nic excursion, for the cholera broke out among us on the passage
      and we buried two or three bodies at sea every day. I found home a dreary
      place after my long absence; for half the children I had known were now
      wearing whiskers or waterfalls, and few of the grown people I had been
      acquainted with remained at their hearthstones prosperous and happy&mdash;some
      of them had wandered to other scenes, some were in jail, and the rest had
      been hanged. These changes touched me deeply, and I went away and joined
      the famous Quaker City European Excursion and carried my tears to foreign
      lands.
    </p>
    <p>
      Thus, after seven years of vicissitudes, ended a "pleasure trip" to the
      silver mines of Nevada which had originally been intended to occupy only
      three months. However, I usually miss my calculations further than that.
    </p>
    <p>
      MORAL.
    </p>
    <p>
      If the reader thinks he is done, now, and that this book has no moral to
      it, he is in error. The moral of it is this: If you are of any account,
      stay at home and make your way by faithful diligence; but if you are "no
      account," go away from home, and then you will have to work, whether you
      want to or not. Thus you become a blessing to your friends by ceasing to
      be a nuisance to them&mdash;if the people you go among suffer by the
      operation.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link570" id="link570"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <div class="fig" style="width:80%;">
      <img alt="570.jpg (75K)" src="images/570.jpg" width="100%" /><br />
    </div>
    <p>
      <br /><br /> <br /><br /> <a name="linkAPPENDIX" id="linkAPPENDIX"></a> <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      APPENDIX.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <p>
      APPENDIX. A.
    </p>
    <p>
      BRIEF SKETCH OF MORMON HISTORY.
    </p>
    <p>
      Mormonism is only about forty years old, but its career has been full of
      stir and adventure from the beginning, and is likely to remain so to the
      end. Its adherents have been hunted and hounded from one end of the
      country to the other, and the result is that for years they have hated all
      "Gentiles" indiscriminately and with all their might. Joseph Smith, the
      finder of the Book of Mormon and founder of the religion, was driven from
      State to State with his mysterious copperplates and the miraculous stones
      he read their inscriptions with. Finally he instituted his "church" in
      Ohio and Brigham Young joined it. The neighbors began to persecute, and
      apostasy commenced. Brigham held to the faith and worked hard. He arrested
      desertion. He did more&mdash;he added converts in the midst of the
      trouble. He rose in favor and importance with the brethren. He was made
      one of the Twelve Apostles of the Church. He shortly fought his way to a
      higher post and a more powerful&mdash;President of the Twelve. The
      neighbors rose up and drove the Mormons out of Ohio, and they settled in
      Missouri. Brigham went with them. The Missourians drove them out and they
      retreated to Nauvoo, Illinois. They prospered there, and built a temple
      which made some pretensions to architectural grace and achieved some
      celebrity in a section of country where a brick court-house with a tin
      dome and a cupola on it was contemplated with reverential awe. But the
      Mormons were badgered and harried again by their neighbors. All the
      proclamations Joseph Smith could issue denouncing polygamy and repudiating
      it as utterly anti-Mormon were of no avail; the people of the
      neighborhood, on both sides of the Mississippi, claimed that polygamy was
      practised by the Mormons, and not only polygamy but a little of everything
      that was bad. Brigham returned from a mission to England, where he had
      established a Mormon newspaper, and he brought back with him several
      hundred converts to his preaching. His influence among the brethren
      augmented with every move he made. Finally Nauvoo was invaded by the
      Missouri and Illinois Gentiles, and Joseph Smith killed. A Mormon named
      Rigdon assumed the Presidency of the Mormon church and government, in
      Smith's place, and even tried his hand at a prophecy or two. But a greater
      than he was at hand. Brigham seized the advantage of the hour and without
      other authority than superior brain and nerve and will, hurled Rigdon from
      his high place and occupied it himself. He did more. He launched an
      elaborate curse at Rigdon and his disciples; and he pronounced Rigdon's
      "prophecies" emanations from the devil, and ended by "handing the false
      prophet over to the buffetings of Satan for a thousand years"&mdash;probably
      the longest term ever inflicted in Illinois. The people recognized their
      master. They straightway elected Brigham Young President, by a prodigious
      majority, and have never faltered in their devotion to him from that day
      to this. Brigham had forecast&mdash;a quality which no other prominent
      Mormon has probably ever possessed. He recognized that it was better to
      move to the wilderness than be moved. By his command the people gathered
      together their meagre effects, turned their backs upon their homes, and
      their faces toward the wilderness, and on a bitter night in February filed
      in sorrowful procession across the frozen Mississippi, lighted on their
      way by the glare from their burning temple, whose sacred furniture their
      own hands had fired! They camped, several days afterward, on the western
      verge of Iowa, and poverty, want, hunger, cold, sickness, grief and
      persecution did their work, and many succumbed and died&mdash;martyrs,
      fair and true, whatever else they might have been. Two years the remnant
      remained there, while Brigham and a small party crossed the country and
      founded Great Salt Lake City, purposely choosing a land which was outside
      the ownership and jurisdiction of the hated American nation. Note that.
      This was in 1847. Brigham moved his people there and got them settled just
      in time to see disaster fall again. For the war closed and Mexico ceded
      Brigham's refuge to the enemy&mdash;the United States! In 1849 the Mormons
      organized a "free and independent" government and erected the "State of
      Deseret," with Brigham Young as its head. But the very next year Congress
      deliberately snubbed it and created the "Territory of Utah" out of the
      same accumulation of mountains, sage-brush, alkali and general desolation,&mdash;but
      made Brigham Governor of it. Then for years the enormous migration across
      the plains to California poured through the land of the Mormons and yet
      the church remained staunch and true to its lord and master. Neither
      hunger, thirst, poverty, grief, hatred, contempt, nor persecution could
      drive the Mormons from their faith or their allegiance; and even the
      thirst for gold, which gleaned the flower of the youth and strength of
      many nations was not able to entice them! That was the final test. An
      experiment that could survive that was an experiment with some substance
      to it somewhere.
    </p>
    <p>
      Great Salt Lake City throve finely, and so did Utah. One of the last
      things which Brigham Young had done before leaving Iowa, was to appear in
      the pulpit dressed to personate the worshipped and lamented prophet Smith,
      and confer the prophetic succession, with all its dignities, emoluments
      and authorities, upon "President Brigham Young!" The people accepted the
      pious fraud with the maddest enthusiasm, and Brigham's power was sealed
      and secured for all time. Within five years afterward he openly added
      polygamy to the tenets of the church by authority of a "revelation" which
      he pretended had been received nine years before by Joseph Smith, albeit
      Joseph is amply on record as denouncing polygamy to the day of his death.
    </p>
    <p>
      Now was Brigham become a second Andrew Johnson in the small beginning and
      steady progress of his official grandeur. He had served successively as a
      disciple in the ranks; home missionary; foreign missionary; editor and
      publisher; Apostle; President of the Board of Apostles; President of all
      Mormondom, civil and ecclesiastical; successor to the great Joseph by the
      will of heaven; "prophet," "seer," "revelator." There was but one dignity
      higher which he could aspire to, and he reached out modestly and took that&mdash;he
      proclaimed himself a God!
    </p>
    <p>
      He claims that he is to have a heaven of his own hereafter, and that he
      will be its God, and his wives and children its goddesses, princes and
      princesses. Into it all faithful Mormons will be admitted, with their
      families, and will take rank and consequence according to the number of
      their wives and children. If a disciple dies before he has had time to
      accumulate enough wives and children to enable him to be respectable in
      the next world any friend can marry a few wives and raise a few children
      for him after he is dead, and they are duly credited to his account and
      his heavenly status advanced accordingly.
    </p>
    <p>
      Let it be borne in mind that the majority of the Mormons have always been
      ignorant, simple, of an inferior order of intellect, unacquainted with the
      world and its ways; and let it be borne in mind that the wives of these
      Mormons are necessarily after the same pattern and their children likely
      to be fit representatives of such a conjunction; and then let it be
      remembered that for forty years these creatures have been driven, driven,
      driven, relentlessly! and mobbed, beaten, and shot down; cursed, despised,
      expatriated; banished to a remote desert, whither they journeyed gaunt
      with famine and disease, disturbing the ancient solitudes with their
      lamentations and marking the long way with graves of their dead&mdash;and
      all because they were simply trying to live and worship God in the way
      which they believed with all their hearts and souls to be the true one.
      Let all these things be borne in mind, and then it will not be hard to
      account for the deathless hatred which the Mormons bear our people and our
      government.
    </p>
    <p>
      That hatred has "fed fat its ancient grudge" ever since Mormon Utah
      developed into a self-supporting realm and the church waxed rich and
      strong. Brigham as Territorial Governor made it plain that Mormondom was
      for the Mormons. The United States tried to rectify all that by appointing
      territorial officers from New England and other anti-Mormon localities,
      but Brigham prepared to make their entrance into his dominions difficult.
      Three thousand United States troops had to go across the plains and put
      these gentlemen in office. And after they were in office they were as
      helpless as so many stone images. They made laws which nobody minded and
      which could not be executed. The federal judges opened court in a land
      filled with crime and violence and sat as holiday spectacles for insolent
      crowds to gape at&mdash;for there was nothing to try, nothing to do
      nothing on the dockets! And if a Gentile brought a suit, the Mormon jury
      would do just as it pleased about bringing in a verdict, and when the
      judgment of the court was rendered no Mormon cared for it and no officer
      could execute it. Our Presidents shipped one cargo of officials after
      another to Utah, but the result was always the same&mdash;they sat in a
      blight for awhile they fairly feasted on scowls and insults day by day,
      they saw every attempt to do their official duties find its reward in
      darker and darker looks, and in secret threats and warnings of a more and
      more dismal nature&mdash;and at last they either succumbed and became
      despised tools and toys of the Mormons, or got scared and discomforted
      beyond all endurance and left the Territory. If a brave officer kept on
      courageously till his pluck was proven, some pliant Buchanan or Pierce
      would remove him and appoint a stick in his place. In 1857 General Harney
      came very near being appointed Governor of Utah. And so it came very near
      being Harney governor and Cradlebaugh judge!&mdash;two men who never had
      any idea of fear further than the sort of murky comprehension of it which
      they were enabled to gather from the dictionary. Simply (if for nothing
      else) for the variety they would have made in a rather monotonous history
      of Federal servility and helplessness, it is a pity they were not fated to
      hold office together in Utah.
    </p>
    <p>
      Up to the date of our visit to Utah, such had been the Territorial record.
      The Territorial government established there had been a hopeless failure,
      and Brigham Young was the only real power in the land. He was an absolute
      monarch&mdash;a monarch who defied our President&mdash;a monarch who
      laughed at our armies when they camped about his capital&mdash;a monarch
      who received without emotion the news that the august Congress of the
      United States had enacted a solemn law against polygamy, and then went
      forth calmly and married twenty-five or thirty more wives.
    </p>
    <p>
      B. THE MOUNTAIN MEADOWS MASSACRE.
    </p>
    <p>
      The persecutions which the Mormons suffered so long&mdash;and which they
      consider they still suffer in not being allowed to govern themselves&mdash;they
      have endeavored and are still endeavoring to repay. The now almost
      forgotten "Mountain Meadows massacre" was their work. It was very famous
      in its day. The whole United States rang with its horrors. A few items
      will refresh the reader's memory. A great emigrant train from Missouri and
      Arkansas passed through Salt Lake City and a few disaffected Mormons
      joined it for the sake of the strong protection it afforded for their
      escape. In that matter lay sufficient cause for hot retaliation by the
      Mormon chiefs. Besides, these one hundred and forty-five or one hundred
      and fifty unsuspecting emigrants being in part from Arkansas, where a
      noted Mormon missionary had lately been killed, and in part from Missouri,
      a State remembered with execrations as a bitter persecutor of the saints
      when they were few and poor and friendless, here were substantial
      additional grounds for lack of love for these wayfarers. And finally, this
      train was rich, very rich in cattle, horses, mules and other property&mdash;and
      how could the Mormons consistently keep up their coveted resemblance to
      the Israelitish tribes and not seize the "spoil" of an enemy when the Lord
      had so manifestly "delivered it into their hand?"
    </p>
    <p>
      Wherefore, according to Mrs. C. V. Waite's entertaining book, "The Mormon
      Prophet," it transpired that&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      "A 'revelation' from Brigham Young, as Great Grand Archee or God, was
      dispatched to President J. C. Haight, Bishop Higbee and J. D. Lee (adopted
      son of Brigham), commanding them to raise all the forces they could muster
      and trust, follow those cursed Gentiles (so read the revelation), attack
      them disguised as Indians, and with the arrows of the Almighty make a
      clean sweep of them, and leave none to tell the tale; and if they needed
      any assistance they were commanded to hire the Indians as their allies,
      promising them a share of the booty. They were to be neither slothful nor
      negligent in their duty, and to be punctual in sending the teams back to
      him before winter set in, for this was the mandate of Almighty God."
    </p>
    <p>
      The command of the "revelation" was faithfully obeyed. A large party of
      Mormons, painted and tricked out as Indians, overtook the train of
      emigrant wagons some three hundred miles south of Salt Lake City, and made
      an attack. But the emigrants threw up earthworks, made fortresses of their
      wagons and defended themselves gallantly and successfully for five days!
      Your Missouri or Arkansas gentleman is not much afraid of the sort of
      scurvy apologies for "Indians" which the southern part of Utah affords. He
      would stand up and fight five hundred of them.
    </p>
    <p>
      At the end of the five days the Mormons tried military strategy. They
      retired to the upper end of the "Meadows," resumed civilized apparel,
      washed off their paint, and then, heavily armed, drove down in wagons to
      the beleaguered emigrants, bearing a flag of truce! When the emigrants saw
      white men coming they threw down their guns and welcomed them with cheer
      after cheer! And, all unconscious of the poetry of it, no doubt, they
      lifted a little child aloft, dressed in white, in answer to the flag of
      truce!
    </p>
    <p>
      The leaders of the timely white "deliverers" were President Haight and
      Bishop John D. Lee, of the Mormon Church. Mr. Cradlebaugh, who served a
      term as a Federal Judge in Utah and afterward was sent to Congress from
      Nevada, tells in a speech delivered in Congress how these leaders next
      proceeded:
    </p>
    <p>
      "They professed to be on good terms with the Indians, and represented them
      as being very mad. They also proposed to intercede and settle the matter
      with the Indians. After several hours parley they, having (apparently)
      visited the Indians, gave the ultimatum of the savages; which was, that
      the emigrants should march out of their camp, leaving everything behind
      them, even their guns. It was promised by the Mormon bishops that they
      would bring a force and guard the emigrants back to the settlements. The
      terms were agreed to, the emigrants being desirous of saving the lives of
      their families. The Mormons retired, and subsequently appeared with thirty
      or forty armed men. The emigrants were marched out, the women and children
      in front and the men behind, the Mormon guard being in the rear. When they
      had marched in this way about a mile, at a given signal the slaughter
      commenced. The men were almost all shot down at the first fire from the
      guard. Two only escaped, who fled to the desert, and were followed one
      hundred and fifty miles before they were overtaken and slaughtered. The
      women and children ran on, two or three hundred yards further, when they
      were overtaken and with the aid of the Indians they were slaughtered.
      Seventeen individuals only, of all the emigrant party, were spared, and
      they were little children, the eldest of them being only seven years old.
      Thus, on the 10th day of September, 1857, was consummated one of the most
      cruel, cowardly and bloody murders known in our history."
    </p>
    <p>
      The number of persons butchered by the Mormons on this occasion was one
      hundred and twenty.
    </p>
    <p>
      With unheard-of temerity Judge Cradlebaugh opened his court and proceeded
      to make Mormondom answer for the massacre. And what a spectacle it must
      have been to see this grim veteran, solitary and alone in his pride and
      his pluck, glowering down on his Mormon jury and Mormon auditory, deriding
      them by turns, and by turns "breathing threatenings and slaughter!"
    </p>
    <p>
      An editorial in the Territorial Enterprise of that day says of him and of
      the occasion:
    </p>
    <p>
      "He spoke and acted with the fearlessness and resolution of a Jackson; but
      the jury failed to indict, or even report on the charges, while threats of
      violence were heard in every quarter, and an attack on the U.S. troops
      intimated, if he persisted in his course.
    </p>
    <p>
      "Finding that nothing could be done with the juries, they were discharged
      with a scathing rebuke from the judge. And then, sitting as a committing
      magistrate, he commenced his task alone. He examined witnesses, made
      arrests in every quarter, and created a consternation in the camps of the
      saints greater than any they had ever witnessed before, since Mormondom
      was born. At last accounts terrified elders and bishops were decamping to
      save their necks; and developments of the most starling character were
      being made, implicating the highest Church dignitaries in the many murders
      and robberies committed upon the Gentiles during the past eight years."
    </p>
    <p>
      Had Harney been Governor, Cradlebaugh would have been supported in his
      work, and the absolute proofs adduced by him of Mormon guilt in this
      massacre and in a number of previous murders, would have conferred
      gratuitous coffins upon certain citizens, together with occasion to use
      them. But Cumming was the Federal Governor, and he, under a curious
      pretense of impartiality, sought to screen the Mormons from the demands of
      justice. On one occasion he even went so far as to publish his protest
      against the use of the U.S. troops in aid of Cradlebaugh's proceedings.
    </p>
    <p>
      Mrs. C. V. Waite closes her interesting detail of the great massacre with
      the following remark and accompanying summary of the testimony&mdash;and
      the summary is concise, accurate and reliable:
    </p>
    <p>
      "For the benefit of those who may still be disposed to doubt the guilt of
      Young and his Mormons in this transaction, the testimony is here collated
      and circumstances given which go not merely to implicate but to fasten
      conviction upon them by 'confirmations strong as proofs of Holy Writ:'
    </p>
    <p>
      "1. The evidence of Mormons themselves, engaged in the affair, as shown by
      the statements of Judge Cradlebaugh and Deputy U.S. Marshall Rodgers.
    </p>
    <p>
      "2. The failure of Brigham Young to embody any account of it in his Report
      as Superintendent of Indian Affairs. Also his failure to make any allusion
      to it whatever from the pulpit, until several years after the occurrence
    </p>
    <p>
      "3. The flight to the mountains of men high in authority in the Mormon
      Church and State, when this affair was brought to the ordeal of a judicial
      investigation.
    </p>
    <p>
      "4. The failure of the Deseret News, the Church organ, and the only paper
      then published in the Territory, to notice the massacre until several
      months afterward, and then only to deny that Mormons were engaged in it.
    </p>
    <p>
      "5. The testimony of the children saved from the massacre.
    </p>
    <p>
      "6. The children and the property of the emigrants found in possession of
      the Mormons, and that possession traced back to the very day after the
      massacre.
    </p>
    <p>
      "7. The statements of Indians in the neighborhood of the scene of the
      massacre: these statements are shown, not only by Cradlebaugh and Rodgers,
      but by a number of military officers, and by J. Forney, who was, in 1859,
      Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Territory. To all these were such
      statements freely and frequently made by the Indians.
    </p>
    <p>
      "8. The testimony of R. P. Campbell, Capt. 2d Dragoons, who was sent in
      the Spring of 1859 to Santa Clara, to protect travelers on the road to
      California and to inquire into Indian depredations."
    </p>
    <p>
      C. CONCERNING A FRIGHTFUL ASSASSINATION THAT WAS NEVER CONSUMMATED
    </p>
    <p>
      If ever there was a harmless man, it is Conrad Wiegand, of Gold Hill,
      Nevada. If ever there was a gentle spirit that thought itself unfired
      gunpowder and latent ruin, it is Conrad Wiegand. If ever there was an
      oyster that fancied itself a whale; or a jack-o'lantern, confined to a
      swamp, that fancied itself a planet with a billion-mile orbit; or a summer
      zephyr that deemed itself a hurricane, it is Conrad Wiegand. Therefore,
      what wonder is it that when he says a thing, he thinks the world listens;
      that when he does a thing the world stands still to look; and that when he
      suffers, there is a convulsion of nature? When I met Conrad, he was
      "Superintendent of the Gold Hill Assay Office"&mdash;and he was not only
      its Superintendent, but its entire force. And he was a street preacher,
      too, with a mongrel religion of his own invention, whereby he expected to
      regenerate the universe. This was years ago. Here latterly he has entered
      journalism; and his journalism is what it might be expected to be:
      colossal to ear, but pigmy to the eye. It is extravagant grandiloquence
      confined to a newspaper about the size of a double letter sheet. He
      doubtless edits, sets the type, and prints his paper, all alone; but he
      delights to speak of the concern as if it occupies a block and employs a
      thousand men.
    </p>
    <p>
      [Something less than two years ago, Conrad assailed several people
      mercilessly in his little "People's Tribune," and got himself into
      trouble. Straightway he airs the affair in the "Territorial Enterprise,"
      in a communication over his own signature, and I propose to reproduce it
      here, in all its native simplicity and more than human candor. Long as it
      is, it is well worth reading, for it is the richest specimen of
      journalistic literature the history of America can furnish, perhaps:]
    </p>
    <p>
      From the Territorial Enterprise, Jan. 20, 1870.
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <h4>
        SEEMING PLOT FOR ASSASSINATION MISCARRIED.
      </h4>
      <p>
        TO THE EDITOR OF THE ENTERPRISE: Months ago, when Mr. Sutro incidentally
        exposed mining management on the Comstock, and among others roused me to
        protest against its continuance, in great kindness you warned me that
        any attempt by publications, by public meetings and by legislative
        action, aimed at the correction of chronic mining evils in Storey
        County, must entail upon me (a) business ruin, (b) the burden of all its
        costs, (c) personal violence, and if my purpose were persisted in, then
        (d) assassination, and after all nothing would be effected.
      </p>
      <p>
        YOUR PROPHECY FULFILLING. In large part at least your prophecies have
        been fulfilled, for (a) assaying, which was well attended to in the Gold
        Hill Assay Office (of which I am superintendent), in consequence of my
        publications, has been taken elsewhere, so the President of one of the
        companies assures me. With no reason assigned, other work has been taken
        away. With but one or two important exceptions, our assay business now
        consists simply of the gleanings of the vicinity. (b) Though my own
        personal donations to the People's Tribune Association have already
        exceeded $1,500, outside of our own numbers we have received (in money)
        less than $300 as contributions and subscriptions for the journal. (c)
        On Thursday last, on the main street in Gold Hill, near noon, with
        neither warning nor cause assigned, by a powerful blow I was felled to
        the ground, and while down I was kicked by a man who it would seem had
        been led to believe that I had spoken derogatorily of him. By whom he
        was so induced to believe I am as yet unable to say. On Saturday last I
        was again assailed and beaten by a man who first informed me why he did
        so, and who persisted in making his assault even after the erroneous
        impression under which he also was at first laboring had been clearly
        and repeatedly pointed out. This same man, after failing through
        intimidation to elicit from me the names of our editorial contributors,
        against giving which he knew me to be pledged, beat himself weary upon
        me with a raw hide, I not resisting, and then pantingly threatened me
        with permanent disfiguring mayhem, if ever again I should introduce his
        name into print, and who but a few minutes before his attack upon me
        assured me that the only reason I was "permitted" to reach home alive on
        Wednesday evening last (at which time the PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE was issued)
        was, that he deems me only half-witted, and be it remembered the very
        next morning I was knocked down and kicked by a man who seemed to be
        prepared for flight. [He sees doom impending:]
      </p>
      <p>
        WHEN WILL THE CIRCLE JOIN? How long before the whole of your prophecy
        will be fulfilled I cannot say, but under the shadow of so much
        fulfillment in so short a time, and with such threats from a man who is
        one of the most prominent exponents of the San Francisco mining-ring
        staring me and this whole community defiantly in the face and pointing
        to a completion of your augury, do you blame me for feeling that this
        communication is the last I shall ever write for the Press, especially
        when a sense alike of personal self- respect, of duty to this
        money-oppressed and fear-ridden community, and of American fealty to the
        spirit of true Liberty all command me, and each more loudly than love of
        life itself, to declare the name of that prominent man to be JOHN B.
        WINTERS, President of the Yellow Jacket Company, a political aspirant
        and a military General? The name of his partially duped accomplice and
        abettor in this last marvelous assault, is no other than PHILIP LYNCH,
        Editor and Proprietor of the Gold Hill News.
      </p>
      <p>
        Despite the insult and wrong heaped upon me by John B. Winters, on
        Saturday afternoon, only a glimpse of which I shall be able to afford
        your readers, so much do I deplore clinching (by publicity) a serious
        mistake of any one, man or woman, committed under natural and not self-
        wrought passion, in view of his great apparent excitement at the time
        and in view of the almost perfect privacy of the assault, I am far from
        sure that I should not have given him space for repentance before
        exposing him, were it not that he himself has so far exposed the matter
        as to make it the common talk of the town that he has horsewhipped me.
        That fact having been made public, all the facts in connection need to
        be also, or silence on my part would seem more than singular, and with
        many would be proof either that I was conscious of some unworthy aim in
        publishing the article, or else that my "non-combatant" principles are
        but a convenient cloak alike of physical and moral cowardice. I
        therefore shall try to present a graphic but truthful picture of this
        whole affair, but shall forbear all comments, presuming that the editors
        of our own journal, if others do not, will speak freely and fittingly
        upon this subject in our next number, whether I shall then be dead or
        living, for my death will not stop, though it may suspend, the
        publication of the PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE. [The "non-combatant" sticks to
        principle, but takes along a friend or two of a conveniently different
        stripe:]
      </p>
      <p>
        THE TRAP SET. On Saturday morning John B. Winters sent verbal word to
        the Gold Hill Assay Office that he desired to see me at the Yellow
        Jacket office. Though such a request struck me as decidedly cool in view
        of his own recent discourtesies to me there alike as a publisher and as
        a stockholder in the Yellow Jacket mine, and though it seemed to me more
        like a summons than the courteous request by one gentleman to another
        for a favor, hoping that some conference with Sharon looking to the
        betterment of mining matters in Nevada might arise from it, I felt
        strongly inclined to overlook what possibly was simply an oversight in
        courtesy. But as then it had only been two days since I had been bruised
        and beaten under a hasty and false apprehension of facts, my caution was
        somewhat aroused. Moreover I remembered sensitively his contemptuousness
        of manner to me at my last interview in his office. I therefore felt it
        needful, if I went at all, to go accompanied by a friend whom he would
        not dare to treat with incivility, and whose presence with me might
        secure exemption from insult. Accordingly I asked a neighbor to
        accompany me.
      </p>
      <p>
        THE TRAP ALMOST DETECTED. Although I was not then aware of this fact, it
        would seem that previous to my request this same neighbor had heard Dr.
        Zabriskie state publicly in a saloon, that Mr. Winters had told him he
        had decided either to kill or to horsewhip me, but had not finally
        decided on which. My neighbor, therefore, felt unwilling to go down with
        me until he had first called on Mr. Winters alone. He therefore paid him
        a visit. From that interview he assured me that he gathered the
        impression that he did not believe I would have any difficulty with Mr.
        Winters, and that he (Winters) would call on me at four o'clock in my
        own office.
      </p>
      <p>
        MY OWN PRECAUTIONS. As Sheriff Cummings was in Gold Hill that afternoon,
        and as I desired to converse with him about the previous assault, I
        invited him to my office, and he came. Although a half hour had passed
        beyond four o'clock, Mr. Winters had not called, and we both of us began
        preparing to go home. Just then, Philip Lynch, Publisher of the Gold
        Hill News, came in and said, blandly and cheerily, as if bringing good
        news:
      </p>
      <p>
        "Hello, John B. Winters wants to see you."
      </p>
      <p>
        I replied, "Indeed! Why he sent me word that he would call on me here
        this afternoon at four o'clock!"
      </p>
      <p>
        "O, well, it don't do to be too ceremonious just now, he's in my office,
        and that will do as well&mdash;come on in, Winters wants to consult with
        you alone. He's got something to say to you."
      </p>
      <p>
        Though slightly uneasy at this change of programme, yet believing that
        in an editor's house I ought to be safe, and anyhow that I would be
        within hail of the street, I hurriedly, and but partially whispered my
        dim apprehensions to Mr. Cummings, and asked him if he would not keep
        near enough to hear my voice in case I should call. He consented to do
        so while waiting for some other parties, and to come in if he heard my
        voice or thought I had need of protection.
      </p>
      <p>
        On reaching the editorial part of the News office, which viewed from the
        street is dark, I did not see Mr. Winters, and again my misgivings
        arose. Had I paused long enough to consider the case, I should have
        invited Sheriff Cummings in, but as Lynch went down stairs, he said:
        "This way, Wiegand&mdash;it's best to be private," or some such remark.
      </p>
      <p>
        [I do not desire to strain the reader's fancy, hurtfully, and yet it
        would be a favor to me if he would try to fancy this lamb in battle, or
        the duelling ground or at the head of a vigilance committee&mdash;M. T.:]
      </p>
      <p>
        I followed, and without Mr. Cummings, and without arms, which I never do
        or will carry, unless as a soldier in war, or unless I should yet come
        to feel I must fight a duel, or to join and aid in the ranks of a
        necessary Vigilance Committee. But by following I made a fatal mistake.
        Following was entering a trap, and whatever animal suffers itself to be
        caught should expect the common fate of a caged rat, as I fear events to
        come will prove.
      </p>
      <p>
        Traps commonly are not set for benevolence. [His body-guard is shut out:]
      </p>
      <p>
        THE TRAP INSIDE. I followed Lynch down stairs. At their foot a door to
        the left opened into a small room. From that room another door opened
        into yet another room, and once entered I found myself inveigled into
        what many will ever henceforth regard as a private subterranean Gold
        Hill den, admirably adapted in proper hands to the purposes of murder,
        raw or disguised, for from it, with both or even one door closed, when
        too late, I saw that I could not be heard by Sheriff Cummings, and from
        it, BY VIOLENCE AND BY FORCE, I was prevented from making a peaceable
        exit, when I thought I saw the studious object of this "consultation"
        was no other than to compass my killing, in the presence of Philip Lynch
        as a witness, as soon as by insult a proverbially excitable man should
        be exasperated to the point of assailing Mr. Winters, so that Mr. Lynch,
        by his conscience and by his well known tenderness of heart toward the
        rich and potent would be compelled to testify that he saw Gen. John B.
        Winters kill Conrad Wiegand in "self-defence." But I am going too fast.
      </p>
      <p>
        OUR HOST. Mr. Lynch was present during the most of the time (say a
        little short of an hour), but three times he left the room. His
        testimony, therefore, would be available only as to the bulk of what
        transpired. On entering this carpeted den I was invited to a seat near
        one corner of the room. Mr. Lynch took a seat near the window. J. B.
        Winters sat (at first) near the door, and began his remarks essentially
        as follows:
      </p>
      <p>
        "I have come here to exact of you a retraction, in black and white, of
        those damnably false charges which you have preferred against me in
        that-&mdash;infamous lying sheet of yours, and you must declare yourself
        their author, that you published them knowing them to be false, and that
        your motives were malicious."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Hold, Mr. Winters. Your language is insulting and your demand an
        enormity. I trust I was not invited here either to be insulted or
        coerced. I supposed myself here by invitation of Mr. Lynch, at your
        request."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Nor did I come here to insult you. I have already told you that I am
        here for a very different purpose."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Yet your language has been offensive, and even now shows strong
        excitement. If insult is repeated I shall either leave the room or call
        in Sheriff Cummings, whom I just left standing and waiting for me
        outside the door."
      </p>
      <p>
        "No, you won't, sir. You may just as well understand it at once as not.
        Here you are my man, and I'll tell you why! Months ago you put your
        property out of your hands, boasting that you did so to escape losing it
        on prosecution for libel."
      </p>
      <p>
        "It is true that I did convert all my immovable property into personal
        property, such as I could trust safely to others, and chiefly to escape
        ruin through possible libel suits."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Very good, sir. Having placed yourself beyond the pale of the law, may
        God help your soul if you DON'T make precisely such a retraction as I
        have demanded. I've got you now, and by&mdash;before you can get out of
        this room you've got to both write and sign precisely the retraction I
        have demanded, and before you go, anyhow&mdash;you&mdash;-low-lived&mdash;lying&mdash;-,
        I'll teach you what personal responsibility is outside of the law; and,
        by&mdash;, Sheriff Cummings and all the friends you've got in the world
        besides, can't save you, you&mdash;-, etc.! No, sir. I'm alone now, and
        I'm prepared to be shot down just here and now rather than be villified
        by you as I have been, and suffer you to escape me after publishing
        those charges, not only here where I am known and universally respected,
        but where I am not personally known and may be injured."
      </p>
      <p>
        I confess this speech, with its terrible and but too plainly implied
        threat of killing me if I did not sign the paper he demanded, terrified
        me, especially as I saw he was working himself up to the highest
        possible pitch of passion, and instinct told me that any reply other
        than one of seeming concession to his demands would only be fuel to a
        raging fire, so I replied:
      </p>
      <p>
        "Well, if I've got to sign&mdash;," and then I paused some time.
        Resuming, I said, "But, Mr. Winters, you are greatly excited. Besides, I
        see you are laboring under a total misapprehension. It is your duty not
        to inflame but to calm yourself. I am prepared to show you, if you will
        only point out the article that you allude to, that you regard as
        'charges' what no calm and logical mind has any right to regard as such.
        Show me the charges, and I will try, at all events; and if it becomes
        plain that no charges have been preferred, then plainly there can be
        nothing to retract, and no one could rightly urge you to demand a
        retraction. You should beware of making so serious a mistake, for
        however honest a man may be, every one is liable to misapprehend.
        Besides you assume that I am the author of some certain article which
        you have not pointed out. It is hasty to do so."
      </p>
      <p>
        He then pointed to some numbered paragraphs in a TRIBUNE article, headed
        "What's the Matter with Yellow Jacket?" saying "That's what I refer to."
      </p>
      <p>
        To gain time for general reflection and resolution, I took up the paper
        and looked it over for awhile, he remaining silent, and as I hoped,
        cooling. I then resumed saying, "As I supposed. I do not admit having
        written that article, nor have you any right to assume so important a
        point, and then base important action upon your assumption. You might
        deeply regret it afterwards. In my published Address to the People, I
        notified the world that no information as to the authorship of any
        article would be given without the consent of the writer. I therefore
        cannot honorably tell you who wrote that article, nor can you exact it."
      </p>
      <p>
        "If you are not the author, then I do demand to know who is?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "I must decline to say."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Then, by&mdash;, I brand you as its author, and shall treat you
        accordingly."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Passing that point, the most important misapprehension which I notice
        is, that you regard them as 'charges' at all, when their context, both
        at their beginning and end, show they are not. These words introduce
        them: 'Such an investigation [just before indicated], we think MIGHT
        result in showing some of the following points.' Then follow eleven
        specifications, and the succeeding paragraph shows that the suggested
        investigation 'might EXONERATE those who are generally believed guilty.'
        You see, therefore, the context proves they are not preferred as
        charges, and this you seem to have overlooked."
      </p>
      <p>
        While making those comments, Mr. Winters frequently interrupted me in
        such a way as to convince me that he was resolved not to consider
        candidly the thoughts contained in my words. He insisted upon it that
        they were charges, and "By&mdash;," he would make me take them back as
        charges, and he referred the question to Philip Lynch, to whom I then
        appealed as a literary man, as a logician, and as an editor, calling his
        attention especially to the introductory paragraph just before quoted.
        He replied, "if they are not charges, they certainly are insinuations,"
        whereupon Mr. Winters renewed his demands for retraction precisely such
        as he had before named, except that he would allow me to state who did
        write the article if I did not myself, and this time shaking his fist in
        my face with more cursings and epithets.
      </p>
      <p>
        When he threatened me with his clenched fist, instinctively I tried to
        rise from my chair, but Winters then forcibly thrust me down, as he did
        every other time (at least seven or eight), when under similar imminent
        danger of bruising by his fist (or for aught I could know worse than
        that after the first stunning blow), which he could easily and safely to
        himself have dealt me so long as he kept me down and stood over me.
      </p>
      <p>
        This fact it was, which more than anything else, convinced me that by
        plan and plot I was purposely made powerless in Mr. Winters' hands, and
        that he did not mean to allow me that advantage of being afoot, which he
        possessed. Moreover, I then became convinced, that Philip Lynch (and for
        what reason I wondered) would do absolutely nothing to protect me in his
        own house. I realized then the situation thoroughly. I had found it
        equally vain to protest or argue, and I would make no unmanly appeal for
        pity, still less apologize. Yet my life had been by the plainest
        possible implication threatened. I was a weak man. I was unarmed. I was
        helplessly down, and Winters was afoot and probably armed. Lynch was the
        only "witness." The statements demanded, if given and not explained,
        would utterly sink me in my own self-respect, in my family's eyes, and
        in the eyes of the community. On the other hand, should I give the
        author's name how could I ever expect that confidence of the People
        which I should no longer deserve, and how much dearer to me and to my
        family was my life than the life of the real author to his friends. Yet
        life seemed dear and each minute that remained seemed precious if not
        solemn. I sincerely trust that neither you nor any of your readers, and
        especially none with families, may ever be placed in such seeming direct
        proximity to death while obliged to decide the one question I was
        compelled to, viz.: What should I do&mdash;I, a man of family, and not
        as Mr. Winters is, "alone." [The reader is requested not to skip the
        following.&mdash;M. T.:]
      </p>
      <p>
        STRATEGY AND MESMERISM. To gain time for further reflection, and hoping
        that by a seeming acquiescence I might regain my personal liberty, at
        least till I could give an alarm, or take advantage of some momentary
        inadvertence of Winters, and then without a cowardly flight escape, I
        resolved to write a certain kind of retraction, but previously had
        inwardly decided:
      </p>
      <p>
        First.&mdash;That I would studiously avoid every action which might be
        construed into the drawing of a weapon, even by a self-infuriated man,
        no matter what amount of insult might be heaped upon me, for it seemed
        to me that this great excess of compound profanity, foulness and epithet
        must be more than a mere indulgence, and therefore must have some
        object. "Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird."
        Therefore, as before without thought, I thereafter by intent kept my
        hands away from my pockets, and generally in sight and spread upon my
        knees.
      </p>
      <p>
        Second.&mdash;I resolved to make no motion with my arms or hands which
        could possibly be construed into aggression.
      </p>
      <p>
        Third.&mdash;I resolved completely to govern my outward manner and
        suppress indignation. To do this, I must govern my spirit. To do that,
        by force of imagination I was obliged like actors on the boards to
        resolve myself into an unnatural mental state and see all things through
        the eyes of an assumed character.
      </p>
      <p>
        Fourth.&mdash;I resolved to try on Winters, silently, and unconsciously
        to himself a mesmeric power which I possess over certain kinds of
        people, and which at times I have found to work even in the dark over
        the lower animals.
      </p>
      <p>
        Does any one smile at these last counts? God save you from ever being
        obliged to beat in a game of chess, whose stake is your life, you having
        but four poor pawns and pieces and your adversary with his full force
        unshorn. But if you are, provided you have any strength with breadth of
        will, do not despair. Though mesmeric power may not save you, it may
        help you; try it at all events. In this instance I was conscious of
        power coming into me, and by a law of nature, I know Winters was
        correspondingly weakened. If I could have gained more time I am sure he
        would not even have struck me.
      </p>
      <p>
        It takes time both to form such resolutions and to recite them. That
        time, however, I gained while thinking of my retraction, which I first
        wrote in pencil, altering it from time to time till I got it to suit me,
        my aim being to make it look like a concession to demands, while in fact
        it should tersely speak the truth into Mr. Winters' mind. When it was
        finished, I copied it in ink, and if correctly copied from my first
        draft it should read as follows. In copying I do not think I made any
        material change.
      </p>
      <p>
        COPY. To Philip Lynch, Editor of the Gold Hill News: I learn that Gen.
        John B. Winters believes the following (pasted on) clipping from the
        PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE of January to contain distinct charges of mine against
        him personally, and that as such he desires me to retract them
        unqualifiedly.
      </p>
      <p>
        In compliance with his request, permit me to say that, although Mr.
        Winters and I see this matter differently, in view of his strong
        feelings in the premises, I hereby declare that I do not know those
        "charges" (if such they are) to be true, and I hope that a critical
        examination would altogether disprove them. CONRAD WIEGAND. Gold Hill,
        January 15, 1870.
      </p>
      <p>
        I then read what I had written and handed it to Mr. Lynch, whereupon Mr.
        Winters said:
      </p>
      <p>
        "That's not satisfactory, and it won't do;" and then addressing himself
        to Mr. Lynch, he further said: "How does it strike you?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "Well, I confess I don't see that it retracts anything."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Nor do I," said Winters; "in fact, I regard it as adding insult to
        injury. Mr. Wiegand you've got to do better than that. You are not the
        man who can pull wool over my eyes."
      </p>
      <p>
        "That, sir, is the only retraction I can write."
      </p>
      <p>
        "No it isn't, sir, and if you so much as say so again you do it at your
        peril, for I'll thrash you to within an inch of your life, and, by&mdash;,
        sir, I don't pledge myself to spare you even that inch either. I want
        you to understand I have asked you for a very different paper, and that
        paper you've got to sign."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Mr. Winters, I assure you that I do not wish to irritate you, but, at
        the same time, it is utterly impossible for me to write any other paper
        than that which I have written. If you are resolved to compel me to sign
        something, Philip Lynch's hand must write at your dictation, and if,
        when written, I can sign it I will do so, but such a document as you say
        you must have from me, I never can sign. I mean what I say."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Well, sir, what's to be done must be done quickly, for I've been here
        long enough already. I'll put the thing in another shape (and then
        pointing to the paper); don't you know those charges to be false?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "I do not."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Do you know them to be true?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "Of my own personal knowledge I do not."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Why then did you print them?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "Because rightly considered in their connection they are not charges,
        but pertinent and useful suggestions in answer to the queries of a
        correspondent who stated facts which are inexplicable."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Don't you know that I know they are false?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "If you do, the proper course is simply to deny them and court an
        investigation."
      </p>
      <p>
        "And do YOU claim the right to make ME come out and deny anything you
        may choose to write and print?"
      </p>
      <p>
        To that question I think I made no reply, and he then further said:
      </p>
      <p>
        "Come, now, we've talked about the matter long enough. I want your final
        answer&mdash;did you write that article or not?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "I cannot in honor tell you who wrote it."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Did you not see it before it was printed?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "Most certainly, sir."
      </p>
      <p>
        "And did you deem it a fit thing to publish?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "Most assuredly, sir, or I would never have consented to its appearance.
        Of its authorship I can say nothing whatever, but for its publication I
        assume full, sole and personal responsibility."
      </p>
      <p>
        "And do you then retract it or not?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "Mr. Winters, if my refusal to sign such a paper as you have demanded
        must entail upon me all that your language in this room fairly implies,
        then I ask a few minutes for prayer."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Prayer!&mdash;-you, this is not your hour for prayer&mdash;your time to
        pray was when you were writing those&mdash;lying charges. Will you sign
        or not?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "You already have my answer."
      </p>
      <p>
        "What! do you still refuse?"
      </p>
      <p>
        "I do, sir."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Take that, then," and to my amazement and inexpressible relief he drew
        only a rawhide instead of what I expected&mdash;a bludgeon or pistol.
        With it, as he spoke, he struck at my left ear downwards, as if to tear
        it off, and afterwards on the side of the head. As he moved away to get
        a better chance for a more effective shot, for the first time I gained a
        chance under peril to rise, and I did so pitying him from the very
        bottom of my soul, to think that one so naturally capable of true
        dignity, power and nobility could, by the temptations of this State, and
        by unfortunate associations and aspirations, be so deeply debased as to
        find in such brutality anything which he could call satisfaction&mdash;but
        the great hope for us all is in progress and growth, and John B.
        Winters, I trust, will yet be able to comprehend my feelings.
      </p>
      <p>
        He continued to beat me with all his great force, until absolutely
        weary, exhausted and panting for breath. I still adhered to my purpose
        of non- aggressive defence, and made no other use of my arms than to
        defend my head and face from further disfigurement. The mere pain
        arising from the blows he inflicted upon my person was of course
        transient, and my clothing to some extent deadened its severity, as it
        now hides all remaining traces.
      </p>
      <p>
        When I supposed he was through, taking the butt end of his weapon and
        shaking it in my face, he warned me, if I correctly understood him, of
        more yet to come, and furthermore said, if ever I again dared introduce
        his name to print, in either my own or any other public journal, he
        would cut off my left ear (and I do not think he was jesting) and send
        me home to my family a visibly mutilated man, to be a standing warning
        to all low-lived puppies who seek to blackmail gentlemen and to injure
        their good names. And when he did so operate, he informed me that his
        implement would not be a whip but a knife.
      </p>
      <p>
        When he had said this, unaccompanied by Mr. Lynch, as I remember it, he
        left the room, for I sat down by Mr. Lynch, exclaiming: "The man is mad&mdash;he
        is utterly mad&mdash;this step is his ruin&mdash;it is a mistake&mdash;it
        would be ungenerous in me, despite of all the ill usage I have here
        received, to expose him, at least until he has had an opportunity to
        reflect upon the matter. I shall be in no haste."
      </p>
      <p>
        "Winters is very mad just now," replied Mr. Lynch, "but when he is
        himself he is one of the finest men I ever met. In fact, he told me the
        reason he did not meet you upstairs was to spare you the humiliation of
        a beating in the sight of others."
      </p>
      <p>
        I submit that that unguarded remark of Philip Lynch convicts him of
        having been privy in advance to Mr. Winters' intentions whatever they
        may have been, or at least to his meaning to make an assault upon me,
        but I leave to others to determine how much censure an editor deserves
        for inveigling a weak, non-combatant man, also a publisher, to a pen of
        his own to be horsewhipped, if no worse, for the simple printing of what
        is verbally in the mouth of nine out of ten men, and women too, upon the
        street.
      </p>
      <p>
        While writing this account two theories have occurred to me as possibly
        true respecting this most remarkable assault: First&mdash;The aim may
        have been simply to extort from me such admissions as in the hands of
        money and influence would have sent me to the Penitentiary for libel.
        This, however, seems unlikely, because any statements elicited by fear
        or force could not be evidence in law or could be so explained as to
        have no force. The statements wanted so badly must have been desired for
        some other purpose. Second&mdash;The other theory has so dark and
        wilfully murderous a look that I shrink from writing it, yet as in all
        probability my death at the earliest practicable moment has already been
        decreed, I feel I should do all I can before my hour arrives, at least
        to show others how to break up that aristocratic rule and combination
        which has robbed all Nevada of true freedom, if not of manhood itself.
        Although I do not prefer this hypothesis as a "charge," I feel that as
        an American citizen I still have a right both to think and to speak my
        thoughts even in the land of Sharon and Winters, and as much so
        respecting the theory of a brutal assault (especially when I have been
        its subject) as respecting any other apparent enormity. I give the
        matter simply as a suggestion which may explain to the proper
        authorities and to the people whom they should represent, a well
        ascertained but notwithstanding a darkly mysterious fact. The scheme of
        the assault may have been:
      </p>
      <p>
        First&mdash;To terrify me by making me conscious of my own helplessness
        after making actual though not legal threats against my life.
      </p>
      <p>
        Second&mdash;To imply that I could save my life only by writing or
        signing certain specific statements which if not subsequently explained
        would eternally have branded me as infamous and would have consigned my
        family to shame and want, and to the dreadful compassion and patronage
        of the rich.
      </p>
      <p>
        Third&mdash;To blow my brains out the moment I had signed, thereby
        preventing me from making any subsequent explanation such as could
        remove the infamy.
      </p>
      <p>
        Fourth&mdash;Philip Lynch to be compelled to testify that I was killed
        by John B. Winters in self-defence, for the conviction of Winters would
        bring him in as an accomplice. If that was the programme in John B.
        Winters' mind nothing saved my life but my persistent refusal to sign,
        when that refusal seemed clearly to me to be the choice of death.
      </p>
      <p>
        The remarkable assertion made to me by Mr. Winters, that pity only
        spared my life on Wednesday evening last, almost compels me to believe
        that at first he could not have intended me to leave that room alive;
        and why I was allowed to, unless through mesmeric or some other
        invisible influence, I cannot divine. The more I reflect upon this
        matter, the more probable as true does this horrible interpretation
        become.
      </p>
      <p>
        The narration of these things I might have spared both to Mr. Winters
        and to the public had he himself observed silence, but as he has both
        verbally spoken and suffered a thoroughly garbled statement of facts to
        appear in the Gold Hill News I feel it due to myself no less than to
        this community, and to the entire independent press of America and Great
        Britain, to give a true account of what even the Gold Hill News has
        pronounced a disgraceful affair, and which it deeply regrets because of
        some alleged telegraphic mistake in the account of it. [Who received the
        erroneous telegrams?]
      </p>
      <p>
        Though he may not deem it prudent to take my life just now, the
        publication of this article I feel sure must compel Gen. Winters (with
        his peculiar views about his right to exemption from criticism by me) to
        resolve on my violent death, though it may take years to compass it.
        Notwithstanding I bear him no ill will; and if W. C. Ralston and William
        Sharon, and other members of the San Francisco mining and milling Ring
        feel that he above all other men in this State and California is the
        most fitting man to supervise and control Yellow Jacket matters, until I
        am able to vote more than half their stock I presume he will be retained
        to grace his present post.
      </p>
      <p>
        Meantime, I cordially invite all who know of any sort of important
        villainy which only can be cured by exposure (and who would expose it if
        they felt sure they would not be betrayed under bullying threats), to
        communicate with the PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE; for until I am murdered, so long
        as I can raise the means to publish, I propose to continue my efforts at
        least to revive the liberties of the State, to curb oppression, and to
        benefit man's world and God's earth. <br /><br />CONRAD WIEGAND.
      </p>
      <p>
        <br /><br />
      </p>
      <blockquote>
        <p>
          [It does seem a pity that the Sheriff was shut out, since the good
          sense of a general of militia and of a prominent editor failed to
          teach them that the merited castigation of this weak, half-witted
          child was a thing that ought to have been done in the street, where
          the poor thing could have a chance to run. When a journalist maligns a
          citizen, or attacks his good name on hearsay evidence, he deserves to
          be thrashed for it, even if he is a "non-combatant" weakling; but a
          generous adversary would at least allow such a lamb the use of his
          legs at such a time.&mdash;M. T.]
        </p>
      </blockquote>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <br /> <br />
    </p>
<pre xml:space="preserve">





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