your coffin," "here's hoping these few Hnes will find you enjoying the same blessing."
The apt and chameleon-like bar-keeper, who could adapt himself to the color and moods of every customer, though not a proprietor, was a person of no mean consequence. Studying his business as a profession he rose in it, ennobling himself while he ennobled his occupation, as he acquired skill. With practice his clumsy fingers became pliable, and bottles and glasses flew from shelf, hand, and counter in orderly confusion.
Decanters tipped their several ingredients into the forming compound with magic nicety, and cascades of brilliant liquids poured from glass to glass held at arm's length with the precision of a rock-bound cataract. Nor was the profession restricted in its advancement to mere mechanical skill. Ingenuity was displayed in concocting new nectar, and soon a long list of delicious beverages became as household words. There was the champagne cocktail, the mint julep, brandy smash, hot whisky punch, sulky sangaree, tom and jerry, and a host of others, but the usual mode of taking drink was, as most other things were taken in California—straig^ht.
Sundays, evenings, and at all times saloons were the general rendezvous for the entire population. There loafers congregated and business men met: there all flocked to learn the news, to talk over the prospects of the times, to beguile tedious hours, and once there smoking, drinking, gambling, stag-dances, blasphemous yells, and shooting followed. Brilliantly lighted at night, with a roaring fire in cold weather, and chair and benches on which to sit and smoke, and tables at which to drink and play, in those days of loneliness and discomfort they were the most attractive places in the town. Nor was it considered improper or disreputable for a respectable man to be seen there as I have before remarked, even although, as was oftentimes the case, the scene was graced by
