CHAPTER XIII.
FURTHER ABNORMITIES.
E come gli stornei ne portan I'ali
Nel freddo tempo a shiera larga e piena;
Cosi quel fiato gli spirit! mali
Di qua, di la, di giu, di su gli mena :
Nulla speranza gli conforta mai ;
Non die di posa, ma di minor penor.
-Deir Inferno.
In Lucian's Dialogues of the Dead, Charon com- pels all to strip before entering his boat ; the rich man of his wealth, the vain man of his foppery, the king of his pride and kingship, the athlete of his flesh, the partrician of his noble birth and his honors, the phil- osopher of his dis[)utatiousness, his rhetorical flourishes, liis antitheses and parallelisms, and all his wordy trumpery. None may go to the regions of the dead even with a rag of clothes on.
Now there are many in California who would like to take with them there all they have, who are trem- blingly fearful of dying and leaving the wealth they love so much ; who cannot bear the thought of parting with it even after death ; and so they leave it to be dis- sipated by lawyers and executors, instead of devoting it themselves to some useful and noble purpose. Many large estates have, in this way been scattered, which doubtless wrung the souls of their former owners as they looked up, watchful and wistful, at the hapless flow of their dear ducats. After all, there is a not wholly unjust law of compensation applicable to savage and civilized, poor and rich, the past and the present ; e^en the most tormented in life may find relief in the
