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(34 IN A CALIFORNIA

hard to hold on to the bar, of looking up to the Prince for help in a helpless way ; the house seemed to rock and reel, and then one side of the room is lifted up so high I cannot keep my feet cannot see distinctly, cannot hear at all, and then all seemed to recede ; and all the senses refused to struggle longer against the black and the blank sea that came over me, and all things around me.

The Prince, I think, put out his strong arms and took me up, but I do not know. All this is painful to recall. I never asked anything about it when I got up again, because I tried to forget it. That is impossible. I see that bar, bar-keeper, and grizzly- bear so distinctly this moment, that if I were a painter I could put every face, every tumbler, every thing there, on canvas as truthfully as they could be taken by a photograph.

I remember the room they took me to up-stairs. They spoke kindly, but I do not think I could answer. Every now and then, through it all and in all things, I could see the one-eyed negro. I lay looking at the double-barrelled shot-gun against the wall by the bed, and the bowie-knife that lay beside a brace of pistols on the table ; some decanters on a stand, and a long white pole, perhaps a sort of pick- handle, in the corner, are all that I remember. And yet all this fixed on the mind in an instant ; for soon my remaining senses went away, and returned no more for many, many weeks.

There was a little Chinaman, tawny, moon-eyed,