the convicts from the British penal colonies, should
not be permitted to mar the fair prospects of the
state, which sentiment led to popular tribunals, des-
cribed in another volume.
Hundreds of Micawbers were always waiting for something, anything, to come along — waiting about the post-office, custom-house, and other federal and municipal free-soup houses ; standing in auction rooms, and strollino; down Lono; Wharf
The country was filled with would-be great men — men who measured the greatness of their own worth by the fancied littleness of their neighbor. Every bosom beat high with aspirations.
I have said that in the absence of old-time associa- tions, some were disposed to be lonely at times, to the damag^e of their morals. While this was true, it was likewise true that, although in a strange land, isolated, without friends or female companions, exposed to temptations, reverses and hardships, the 'forty-niner found much in the form of a substitute for ennui. There was an indescribable stimulant in the business atmosphere, in mingling with men, not unlike that so often glorified in the physical, which chased away lone- liness, generated excitement, stripped time of its mo- notony, and glued the heart of the adventurer forever to the soil
A German editor of San Francisco is responsible for the following, which he tells for a true story : One day a German was leisurely riding along Sansome street, near Sacramento, when he heard a pistol shot behind him, heard the whizzing of a ball, and felt it strike his hat. Turning about he saw a man with a revolver in his hand, and taking off his hat he found a bullet hole in it. "Did you shoot at me ?" he asked. "Yes," replied the other, "that is my horse; it was stolen from me a short time ago." "You must be mistaken," said the German, "I have owned this horse for three years." "Well," exclaimed the other, " now that I come to look at it, I believe I am mis-
