of the cottage-builders. In some few cases these
cabins were still occupied; and when this was so, you
could depend upon it that the occupant was the very
pioneer who had built the cabin; and you could de-
pend on another thing, too--that he was there be-
cause he had once had his opportunity to go home to
the States rich, and had not done it; had rather lost
his wealth, and had then in his humiliation resolved
to sever all communication with his home relatives
and friends, and be to them thenceforth as one dead.
Round about California in that day were scattered a
host of these living dead men--pride-smitten poor
fellows, grizzled and old at forty, whose secret
thoughts were made all of regrets and longings--re-
grets for their wasted lives, and longings to be out of
the struggle and done with it all.

It was a lonesome land! Not a sound in all those
peaceful expanses of grass and woods but the drowsy
hum of insects; no glimpse of man or beast; nothing
to keep up your spirits and make you glad to be
alive. And so, at last, in the early part of the after-
noon, when I caught sight of a human creature, I
felt a most grateful uplift. This person was a man
about forty-five years old, and he was standing at
the gate of one of those cozy little rose-clad cottages
of the sort already referred to. However, this one
hadn't a deserted look; it had the look of being lived
in and petted and cared for and looked after; and so
had its front yard, which was a garden of flowers,
abundant, gay, and flourishing. I was invited in, of
course, and required to make myself at home--it was
the custom of the country.

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