30th, 1879, part print, part manuscript, and the latter much
obliterated by the rains. It was by this identical piece of

paper that the mine had been held last year. For thirteen
months it had endured the weather and the change of seasons

on a cairn behind the shoulder of the canyon; and it was now
my business, spreading it before me on the table, and sitting

on a valise, to copy its terms, with some necessary changes,
twice over on the two sheets of note-paper. One was then to

be placed on the same cairn - a "mound of rocks" the notice
put it; and the other to be lodged for registration.

Rufe watched me, silently smoking, till I came to the place
for the locator's name at the end of the first copy; and when

I proposed that he should sign, I thought I saw a scare in
his eye. "I don't think that'll be necessary," he said

slowly; "just you write it down." Perhaps this mighty
hunter, who was the most active member of the local school

board, could not write. There would be nothing strange in
that. The constable of Calistoga is, and has been for years,

a bed-ridden man, and, if I remember rightly, blind. He had
more need of the emoluments than another, it was explained;

and it was easy for him to "depytize," with a strong accent
on the last. So friendly and so free are popular

institutions.
When I had done my scrivening, Hanson strolled out, and

addressed Breedlove, "Will you step up here a bit?" and after
they had disappeared a little while into the chaparral and

madrona thicket, they came back again, minus a notice, and
the deed was done. The claim was jumped; a tract of

mountain-side, fifteen hundred feet long by six hundred wide,
with all the earth's precious bowels, had passed from Ronalds

to Hanson, and, in the passage, changed its name from the
"Mammoth" to the "Calistoga." I had tried to get Rufe to

call it after his wife, after himself, and after Garfield,
the Republican Presidential candidate of the hour - since

then elected, and, alas! dead - but all was in vain. The
claim had once been called the Calistoga before, and he

seemed to feel safety in returning to that.
And so the history of that mine became once more plunged in

darkness, lit only by some monster pyrotechnical displays of
gossip. And perhaps the most curious feature of the whole

matter is this: that we should have dwelt in this quiet
corner of the mountains, with not a dozen neighbours, and yet

struggled all the while, like desperate swimmers, in this sea
of falsities and contradictions. Wherever a man is, there

will be a lie.
TOILS AND PLEASURES

I MUST try to convey some notion of our life, of how the days
passed and what pleasure we took in them, of what there was

to do and how we set about doing it, in our mountain
hermitage. The house, after we had repaired the worst of the

damages, and filled in some of the doors and windows with
white cotton cloth, became a healthy and a pleasant dwelling-

place, always airy and dry, and haunted by the outdoor
perfumes of the glen. Within, it had the look of habitation,

the human look. You had only to go into the third room,
which we did not use, and see its stones, its sifting earth,

its tumbled litter; and then return to our lodging, with the
beds made, the plates on the rack, the pail of bright water

behind the door, the stove crackling in a corner, and perhaps
the table roughly laid against a meal, - and man's order, the

little clean spots that he creates to dwell in, were at once
contrasted with the rich passivity of nature. And yet our

house was everywhere so wrecked and shattered, the air came
and went so freely, the sun found so many portholes, the

golden outdoor glow shone in so many open chinks, that we
enjoyed, at the same time, some of the comforts of a roof and

much of the gaiety and brightness of al fresco life. A
single shower of rain, to be sure, and we should have been

drowned out like mice. But ours was a Californian summer,
and an earthquake was a far likelier accident than a shower

of rain.
Trustful in this fine weather, we kept the house for kitchen

and bedroom, and used the platform as our summer parlour.
The sense of privacy, as I have said already, was complete.

We could look over the clump on miles of forest and rough
hilltop; our eyes commanded some of Napa Valley, where the

train ran, and the little country townships sat so close
together along the line of the rail. But here there was no

man to intrude. None but the Hansons were our visitors.
Even they came but at long intervals, or twice daily, at a

stated hour, with milk. So our days, as they were never
interrupted, drew out to the greater length; hour melted

insensibly into hour; the household duties, though they were
many, and some of them laborious, dwindled into mere islets

of business in a sea of sunny day-time; and it appears to me,
looking back, as though the far greater part of our life at

Silverado had been passed, propped upon an elbow, or seated
on a plank, listening to the silence that there is among the

hills.
My work, it is true, was over early in the morning. I rose

before any one else, lit the stove, put on the water to boil,
and strolled forth upon the platform to wait till it was

ready. Silverado would then be still in shadow, the sun
shining on the mountain higher up. A clean smell of trees, a

smell of the earth at morning, hung in the air. Regularly,
every day, there was a single bird, not singing, but

awkwardly chirruping among the green madronas, and the sound
was cheerful, natural, and stirring. It did not hold the

attention, nor interrupt the thread of meditation, like a
blackbird or a nightingale; it was mere woodland prattle, of

which the mind was conscious like a perfume. The freshness
of these morning seasons remained with me far on into the

day.
As soon as the kettle boiled, I made porridge and coffee; and

that, beyond the literal drawing of water, and the
preparation of kindling, which it would be hyperbolical to

call the hewing of wood, ended my domestic duties for the
day. Thenceforth my wife laboured single-handed in the

palace, and I lay or wandered on the platform at my own sweet
will. The little corner near the forge, where we found a

refuge under the madronas from the unsparing early sun, is
indeed connected in my mind with some nightmare encounters

over Euclid, and the Latin Grammar. These were known as
Sam's lessons. He was supposed to be the victim and the

sufferer; but here there must have been some misconception,
for whereas I generally retired to bed after one of these

engagements, he was no sooner set free than he dashed up to
the Chinaman's house, where he had installed a printing

press, that great element of civilization, and the sound of
his labours would be faintlyaudible about the canyon half

the day.
To walk at all was a laborious business; the foot sank and

slid, the boots were cut to pieces, among sharp, uneven,
rolling stones. When we crossed the platform in any

direction, it was usual to lay a course, following as much as
possible the line of waggon rails. Thus, if water were to be

drawn, the water-carrier left the house along some tilting
planks that we had laid down, and not laid down very well.