The passenger is but fairly reseated in the first stage, when an offer of two dollars tumbles him out again, and an offer of one dollar sends him back. But the opposition is not to be beaten in this way.

"Well, old fellow," he finally puts in, "sorry to make you so much trouble, but get back here and I will carry you for nothing, pay for your dinner, and give you all the whiskey you can drink on the way!"

I will cite one instance showing the behavior of these knights of the whip, under trying circumstances. Upon the box of the coach leaving Forest City for Nevada the 23d of July, 1855, were seated two men, members of the Jehu brotherhood, one of whom was driving. Passing under the limb of a tree which seemed in some way to have settled and dropped down since the last trip, the top of the stage was torn entirely off, and the driver thrown to the ground. Of the eleven passengers one was thrown upon the root and three jumped to the ground. The crash of the breaking vehicle frightened the horses, which started off at full speed, dragging the driver some distance before they freed themselves from his grasp. The horses were now dashing along the road at a furious rate, wholly without control, and the inmates of the stage apparently helpless. At this juncture the man who occupied the seat next the driver, deliberately got down upon the pole, walked to the end of it, gathered up the reins, returned safely to his seat, and finally succeeded in stopping the horses without further damage or loss of life.

It was when the long routes were established across the plains, however, that staging assumed its most gigantic proportions; one by the way of Salt Lake and the other through New Mexico and Arizonatwo thousand miles in twenty days and nights, stopping only to change horses and for meals. The road across the Sierra Nevada was fearfully picturesque, and going down the mountain sides was anything but quieting to unsteady nerves. Lighting a cigar

MULE PACK TRAINS.

331

and putting on the break and lashing his snorting horses to a keen run, the skillful Jehu, with a diabolical leer, would send his coach dashing round precipice and craggy wall on a thread of chiseled-out road, swaying and sliding to within a few inches of death, and dodging the overhanging rocks and trees, diving in and out of ruts and whirling round on the verge of chasms where but for the timely cry of "Sit up to windward," horses, coach, and company would be hurled into the abyss below. More than once the thing has happened, when upon a drunken driver, a slippery road, a fallen tree or boulder unexpectedly encountered in rounding some sharp turn, was laid the blame.

At first, between the several towns and camps there were no wagon roads, but only mule trails; so that among the hills and in the mountains, provisions and other supplies had to be carried to the miners strapped to aparejos upon the backs of mules. Thus "packing" became a large business, and was one of the features of the times. Mules for the purpose were driven up from Sonora and Sinaloa, and Mexicans were chiefly employed as vaqueros or muleteers. Making up their cargoes in loads of from two to four hundred pounds according to the roads and the ability of the respective animals, each load was evenly balanced and firmly lashed on. At sunrise or thereabouts all was ready for the start, when an old horse with a cow-bell at his neck and a boy on his back led off, and the tinkling of this bell the mules would follow day and night. Three or five Mexicans on saddle-mules would follow a train of twenty or fifty mules re-adjusting loads, assisting the fallen, and urging on the whole with loud cries of "upa! mula, arriba arriba!"

The Mexicans are the best vaqueros in the world. They are as familiar with the habits and idiosyncrasies of the horse and mule as is the Arab of those of the camel, and they sit upon the saddle as if part

of the animal. A loaded train will travel about

twenty-five miles a day. The favorite campingground is a grassy spot near a stream of clear water; there at night the Mexicans dismount and unpack. Bringing up one mule after another, a blind is thrown over the animal's eyes to make it stand quietly, then with one man on each side the hide ropes are rapidly untied, and the cargoes, consisting of sacks of flour, sugar, barley, and bacon, boxes of tobacco, dried fruit, and miscellaneous groceries, and kegs of liquors, each kept separately, are ranged in a row with the aparejo or pack-saddle in a parallel row, each saddle directly opposite its load, with the girth and saddle-cloth belonging to it folded and laid upon the top. the top. The mule's back is then examined, and if galled, remedies are applied to the spot, and the tired animal is turned loose to graze. In the morning the mules are driven up and packed in like manner, and on they go.

On the whole the cunning little animal bears a good character. Though sometimes stubborn, it is as one possessed of the devil or overtaken by a fault rather than willfully wicked, for in his ordinary mood he is very patient and faithful. Though in some respects his sensibilities may be somewhat blunted, he nevertheless has a keen moral sense. He guards the load entrusted him with intelligence and faithfulness, being careful not to knock it against the trunks of trees, stooping low to let it pass under an overhanging limb, planting his feet firmly in dangerous places, eyeing the rocks that jut out over the trail round the mountain side, lest in an evil moment his pack striking one, he be thrown from the narrow path, and hurled trembling into the abyss below. The moment the pack is loose or anything drops from it he stops, and no matter how hungry or weary he may be he is allowed little time to eat until his work is finished.

Even in those days dreams were dreamed and prophecies prophesied of the time when San Francisco

DREAMS AND PROPHECIES.

333

should be but five days' journey from New York, and the summer houses of the Gothamites should bask on the Pacific slope; of the time when the shadows of gigantic trees should fall on mansions glittering like temples; and in the vistas of long colonnades, fringed and rainbowed by countless fountains, should stand statues worthy of Phydias, and should walk a people worthy to have been his models. These new Greeks were the Californians of the twentieth or thirtieth centuries. Every woman is then to be pure as Diana, wise as the unborn goddess, and fair as she whose beauty awed the judges of Athens. The men are to be thewed like Hercules, shaped like Apollo, and wise as Plato.

CHAPTER XIV.

BUSINESS.

The world is full of hopeful analogies, and handsome, dubious eggs, called possibilities.

-George Eliot.

BUSINESS lines and methods were not definitely determined. You might buy butter in a hardware store and drygoods at a liquor shop.

When Purser Forbes, of the steamer California, set out to purchase stores, he ransacked the place, picking up here and there what he could find, paying usually a dollar a pound for provisions; whereupon, becoming somewhat disheartened, he dropped into a restaurant, where, for a mutton chop, with poor bread, and still poorer coffee, and no butter, he was made to pay $350. Thereupon he thought it must be a great country, and so went on with his purchases.

Business was conducted on high-pressure principles. On Long Wharf there was a candy shop, the owner of which, after six months' business failed for $100,000. So quickly after a fire was building begun, that a water bucket would have to be used before the new timbers were laid.

Since the days of the Medici, who ranked high among the class of Lombard money-changers, the insignia of the three golden balls, derived from their armorial bearings, hang over the entrance to the pawnbroker's shop.

Frenchmen were the first to raise the occupation of boot-blacking into an art. The cleaning, and dampening, and plastering, and polishing were not done by