THE LAND OF THE GOLDEN FLEECE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 7294, 14 July 1885, Page 3

THE LAND OF THE GOLDEN FLEECE.

Br George Augustus Sala,

I. —ACROSS THE PACIFIC.

Five yoars ago, in tho early spring-time,

sojourning for a while at San Francisco, a

friend drove mo in his spider-waggon one enchanting, sunny morning through the leafy

glades of the Golden Gate Park, and so to an liotel on the seashore over against tho famous

Seal Rock. I mind tho trip well for more than one reason. Lunching at the hotel' I found my dear old friend Edward Askew Sofchorn, who— as Lord Dundreary — had booh playing to crowded houses at San Francisco during the Week, but who had been. for a long time iii deplorably bud health; Ho looked that spring morning at the Cliff - house lis Oue uiimistitkiibfy liiiifktid toi\ death: All who nin might read " Tlianatos" imprinted witli ghastly distinctness on his forehead. He was so pitiably weak and ill that ho .was compelled to forego partaking of a little entertainment wliich we had planned for that afternoom and to lie down on a couch until it was time for him to return to Eldorado and play Tom-fool— and how inimitably did'he play it—for the five or six thousandeth time as the eccentric whom he had taught millions of Americans, and even Englishmen, to regard ns the lifelike type of a member of the British aristocracy. I was only to gaze upon his handsome face and listen to his kindly voico onco more on this side the gravo. A few months after our meeting on the shore hard by the Golden Gate I just had time to shake his hand, and interchange half-a-dozeu words with him in a private box at the Princess' Theatro, Loudon. A very few days afterwards I heard that poor Sothorn was dead.

But there is another reason why that trip to the Cliff-house and the Seal Rocks continues to dwell in my memory. 'Twas when the waggon turned a sharp angle of the road, shortly before we arrived at our destination, that mine eyes first caught sight of the Pacific. Yes j the Pacific Ocean, a, broad band of ultramarine, gleaming at the end of a Vista of graceful foliage. I have heard of travellers who have expressed themselves as disappointed with the Atlantic, and who have even failed to be impressed by the first sight of the Falls of Niagara; and it is related of John Kemble, tho tragedian, that, visiting Ohilmouhix Very late In life, he made iio secret of his opinion that Mont Blanc was a much overrated mountain. I own, myself, that I have gazed without emotion on the Guadalquiver, and that I never thought much of" the Mallsanai'es. But the first rapid glimpso of the Pacific filled me with almost unmingled delight. It was Wol'th while^weil worth While—to have Coliio so many thousands of miles to behold that sea; to have been jolted hi the train day after day from Chicago tb Omaha, from Omaha to Ogden,from Ogdeii to Sacramento City; to have traversed Wearyfoot Common, otherwise the Rocky Mountains; to have run the gauntlet of the snowsheds and Webber's Canon and the Devil's Slide, to have threaded the gorges of the Sierra Nevadas; and, entering at last on the joyous descent of the. Pacific Slope, to have passed through what .appeared to you as an earthly Eden after all tbo snowy deserts which- you have painfully, plodded over. And at last you had reached thelong-yeained-for Pacific. I said that my delight in reaching a boijrpe so anxiously awaited was almost unmmglefl: But there was just one little drop of bitter in niy clip of joy. I stood ' for a long-time alone in the verandah of the hotel, satiating my vision with the now unimpeded view of the blue ocean.. ■' Over agaiust me, within' pistol shot, was the group of rocks up which the brown-furred, black-eyed, good-natured-looking seals were clambering, or lying basking in the sun by the score and by the hundred. Anon they would descend and dive into the_ briny breakers, bent, I suppose, on a brief fishing excursion. Now and again there would be a tumultuary splashing in the water, and an ominous popping-up from the surface of one bullet-head after another—bullet-heads displaying teeth likewise as though seal had fallen out with seal, and there w-as a,fight in progress on sonde disputed question of piscatorial property. All this v/hile the creatures; which were clambering oivskylarking on the crags, or scattering the foam from their fur coats, ceased not to bark furiously..'. The residents of the western extremity of the Marine parade, at Brighton, ■used bitterly to complain of the nocturnal uprbar raised by the sea-lions at the Aquarium. I wonder what; those delicately-nerved people would have thought cf, the incessant bow-bowing of the furry denizens of the Seal Rods s? Surely the narrow waterway between tho crags and the' cliffs ought to be called " Barking Creek '{" .But I looked far ahead—far, far away beyond the waste of blue. I looked to the horizon.. Over there was China; over. thore was Japan; over there was Australia. For how riiauy years' had I been longing to look at life in the Southern Hemisphere ? In the Bay of San Francisco there was a plenitude of stout ships, which, in less than a month, would bear me to Hong Kong, to Yokohama, or to Sydney. And why not return to England by the way of India ? It. was not to be this time. I had been globetrotting for many years, but the pardonable ambition to be a circumnavigator was not yot to be gratified. Besides, I had left responsibilities behind me.--.. I had given hostages to Fortune in the United States. I had come straight to 'Frisco, leaving Utah unvisited. I was morally bound "on my return eastward, to turn aside at Ogden, branch off at Salt! Lake City and have a peep at what was going on down among the Mormons. There was, besides, a matter of two portmanteaux and a bonnet-box left in the baggage room of the Grand Pacific Hotel at Chicago, and the remembrance of these impedimenta lay heavy on my soul. And my mind was further troubled, by the remembrance that there was a box full of books waiting for me at New York. Tmust goback by the way which I had come—the Union and Central Pacific, the Chicago and North-Western, and Erie railways, and so, by a Cunard steamship, to England; Five years area large slice out of the life of of.au elderly wanderer; yet time and the hour wore out, somehow, the roughest of the days and months between Christmas" '79 and Christ- , mas '84. Once more I left London at the beginning .'of the " festive season," Once' more I went to sea ma storm,traversed the snowy and ice-bound Eastern States to find strawberries, green .peas, oranges, -and japonicas growing in the open in California. Once more a friend has driven mfc down from the Palace Hotel through the Golden Gate Park to the Cliff-house and the Pacific beach; and onco more I watched the gambadoes and listened to the barking of the merry brown. seals on the group of rocks. But it has not been wistfully, nor with the sickness of heart of hope deferred, that I have gazed this time upon the huge azure and expause and scanned the horizon. My baggage is at the wharf, and my barque is in the bay, : This is Saturday, and on Monday the steamer m which I have taken passage—the good ship Australia, Captain Ghest commanding —starts for Honolulu, and Sydney, New South Wales.

But I must now write in the past tense. Many moons, of observation, adventure, and experience have passed, and I have been slowly, sedulously, and laboriously endeavouring to learn something of a country vast, and new, and strange to me. But ere I enter on the narrative of what I have seen, and heard, aricK thought in the Land of the Golden Fleece—in the Australasian Colonies—some brief space may be allowed to me wherein to tell how I came hither, and what manner of things and people, and what vicissitudes of climate, and the ways of the mighty deep I met with on the way. Especially may I dwell, perhaps, on the last night of my stay in the beloved city of Sau Francisco. Ay, beloved! You know what the Romans say of the Fountain of Trevi. The stranger, they aver, who has once drunk of the Trevi waters is bound to return again and again to the Eternal City; and, indeed, even as I am penning these lines, in a kind of bird-eve opening on to a verandah looking out on the beautiful Fitzroy River at sultry Roekhampton, in Queensland—we are not far from the tropin, {ihd one of the leading local journals is called the Capricornian—l am thinking of what a very .nice thing it will be if I am spared to bid farewell to Australasia at the height of her summer next Christmas, and travelling homewards by a P, and O: touching at Brindisi or an Orient touching at Naples, to find myself in the early spring-time at Rome, and within touch of the Fountain of Trevi. There arc no fountains in 'Frisco that I am aware of, but you always preface your breakfast—such a breakfast^ —at the,Palaco Hotel,' Market street, hy quaffing a .tumbler of. iced water and devourin" a couple of oranges, to put you in proper trimlor the fried oysters, the torn cod, the tender loin steaks, the scrambled eggs, the stuffed tomatoes, the fishballs, the buckwheat cakes, and the strawberries and cream whicli are to follow, Pio Nono once told Kaiser AVilheim that all Christians belonged, somehow or another to the Pope. The Imperial Hohenzollern was unable to recognise the cogency of the assertion; still, I am fatalist enough to think that when a traveller has once drunk his glass of iced water and sucked his oranges in the breakfast-room of the Palace Hotel, he is unconsciously subjected to an obligation to cross the Rockies and .the Sierra Novadas again and again ; to " do the block "in Kearney street, and be fascinated by the beauty of tho ladies engaged in afternoon shopping in that fashionable thoroughfare; to be amazed at the architectural magnificence of tho Californian millionaires' redwood palaces on " Nob hill;" and whilo admiring the celerity, efficiency, and cheapness of the cable-tram street cars, to do his best to avoid being run over by those swift and silent but somewhat perilous arks. 'To be plain, San Francisco is one of the pleasantest cities in the whole world; and you experience the liveliest sense of gratification in "belonging" for tho time to Mr Sharon, tho manager of the Palace, and to Mr George H. Smith, the courteous, indefatigable, and übiquitous chief clerk of that colossal establishment.

_ There had been fearful snows in the Eastern States. AVinter had put on its ghastliest guise iv .Cincinnati, and this streets of Chicago had been so many avenues of avalanches. Snow on the summits of the Rockies and snowdrifts in the canons and gullies, and the English mail bound for Australia, via New York and San Francisco, was two days late. Captain Ghest was staying at the Palace, and at least six times a day did we, who hud taken our passages to Sydney, interrogate the countenance of that intrepid commander as though it had beon a barometer. We were ashamed to ask him orally

too often as to the precise timo that ho thought tho royal mail steamer Australia would really , start on hey voyage to Sydney, for master mariners have much to put up with, bolh on sea mid land, from passengers ; and I have known captains who had quick- tempers, and who could give- upon Occasions- short answers. How Stinging'-ivas' the rebuke adihinistored by the late Commodore Judkins, of the Cuuard service, to the lady .passenger who; when the ship was oft'- the Banks of Newfoundland; asked-him if it it wertj always foggy there. "Do you think 1 livo hero, niumV"quoth stern Commodore Judkins. From CapGhest, who was quite a. model of nautical politeness, we did not expect curt replies of the snub-, directorder; but in courtesy we spared him the hiiliotlOh of • porpotiinl nuorios amounting to, " When do you really think tho Australia will sail,captain?'' But 24hours after 24 lioUSspassed by, and the Australia made no sign of sailing. A rumour ran that the captain had boen seen to tthttkalils head in a very dcspondingmaiincr about lilnclleon-timo, ilnd stl'iu^lltttny was it bruited about that the mail tritiil had dome to griof somewhere near Cheyenne. Then soveral siiow-slieds in tlie Sierras had) it was vehentoudntly asserted, beeii hurried dOttn; aiid then tiie. cbiiflflent, statement got abroad that the moil was b'biiclessl^ sild\Ved-"up;.gP.ijiiles west of Ogden. But towards dinner-time it was rioised far nnd wide—in the world of the Palace Hotel—that Captain Ghest had been seen to smile in a -waggish manner, nud to interchange jokes with Mr George H. Smith in the clerk's office. Then hopo revived, and valises which in gloomy uncertainty had been half unpacked were joyfully refilled and strapped, and corded. On Sunday we learned that the overdue mail train from England was coming along bravely, and that tho Australia would positively sail on the ensuing Monday at 2 p.m.

I shall not readily forget my last night in San Francisco. I had' " rested " there some nine days, if it could bo called resting to have dined out five time times, lunched out seven times, and attended a wedding, two evening receptions and suppers, and three 5 o'clock teas. But this Sunday night was to be the last one ere I embarked, and I had a double engagement to fulfil. I had an appointment with an officer of police at 9 p.m. to explore the penetralia of China Town, and at 11 I was to attend a "small-and-early" at the Palaco Hotel itself, Under ordinary circumstances 1 might not have felt any violent inclination to revisit China 'lWn. John Chinaman's picturesqtieneSs is apt to become after a tinld monotonous, and then to satiate, and at length to revolt. 'J?a'kc hlm.it his best, and with the most favourable surroundings, the Celectial somehow leaves rtii unpleasant taste iii your mouth; The Roman epigrammatist who did'nt like JJabidus, and the Oxford undergraduate who didn't like Dr Fell, might, be unanimous in the expression of their dislike for tho Heathen Chinee j yet as incapable of giving a definite reason for their aversion. It was the Chinese New Year) and wlieli We pluhged into the congeries of narrow streets, where the Yellow Men Most do congregate we found this strango excerpt frdnl the Flowery Land) this assemblage Bf tea-trays, chow-elitiw dabinets, chdpsticks, pigtails, and slides witli paper soles so dddly washed tip Oil the Pacific coast, generally and - jubilant!)- enfetct Li Hung Chung wits having a "high old time" of it, Quang Choo Loo ivas entertaining all his wife's relations, and Go Bang Wum was giving a banquet in honour of his ancestors under _.the Ming dynasty.. The eaves and bulks of the stores were thickly hung with paper lanterns of divers colours; and on every side was audible the fizzing and bursting of crackers. The police force usually on duty in the Chinese quarter had been-largely augmented in view of the festivities of the New Year (February 15), not. through any apprehension of the Celestials falling out among themselves—for, as a rule, "they.are peaceable folk enough—but in order to guard agaiust the contigency of the white "hoodlums" 6'i- roughs coming down in force from the American quarter of the city and "going for" the Mongols. To stone, buffet, spit upon, and kick John Chinaman, to haul him hither and thither bythe pigtail, .and roll him in'the gutter, so as to sihirch and spoil 'his nice, clean, Now Year's clothes, aro recreations dear to the hoodlum heart. Fortunately, on this occasion the hoodlums did not muster,very strongly jn China Town; while, on the other hand, there was quite a large gathering of re-spectably-dressed ladies and gentlemen mingled with the crowd of Orientals, and tranquilly amusing themtelves by watching the bizarre panorama which was being: unrolled. '■ All the leading merchants - and storekeepers' were keeping open - house or open - shop in honour of, ..the New Year, and in every store which we entered the proprietor welcomed us with gravely punctilious politeness, pressing upon us cakes, oranges, sweetmeats, together with cigars, champagne, and some -lukewarm alcoholic preparation served in dainty little porcelain cups, and of which beverage the flavour closely resembled' that of very bad whisky—the well-known "silent spirit" or '" cocked hat-' blend, wliich had been stirred up with a tallow caudle and clarified with an ancient egg. -But .we' should not. look, tke gift horse in the mouth. It did hot matter much whore that. villainously nasty alcoholic stimulant came from.

I scarcely think, cither, that the champagne was in any way affiliated to the vintages of Epernay, or that the cigars had had their birth in the island ef Cuba, or oven in' Bremen or Hamburg. Those weeds were more probably "domestics," manufactured in Caifornia by the hands of Chinese artisans. . Still. the wine fizzed and ■ sparkled, and was. potable, and the cigars were smokable, and all was offered with graceful hospitality and in good faith. If ■ all the Celestials in China Town resembled the merchants and manufacturers, there would '~be no need to recall the unreasoning ill nature of the epigrams, on Zabidus and Doctor Fell. Unfortunately, the mass of the inhabitants of .the Chinese quarter are the nastiest of nasty'creatures. AYe went) to the largest of the two large theatres. The house was crammed almost to suffocation by a hilarious aiid strongly malodorous audience. So densely, indeed, was the playhouse packed, nnd so very powei-rul was the perfume emitted by the audience, that the obliging manager insisted that we should witness the performance from the stage itself, where stools, cigarettes, and tea were'brought' for our accommodation and re-' freshment. It needed but to strew the stage with rushes to imagine that the Elizabethan age of the drama had come again on the shores of the Pacific. AVhat the play itself' was about; of course.l could not tell, nor did it matter one cent what' was its scope or purport. Possibly it was a portion of the selfsame drama of' which I had been a spectator when I was last in.--.'Frisco, in March 1880, and which had been going on without a solution of continuity ever since. It was much, more interesting to enter the dressing-rooms and watch the actors bedizening themselves and "making up" their - faces. In the property-room, too, I saw a large' number of appallingly hideous masks; while in the wardrobe I was shown shelves piled with dresses really extraordinary in. the splendour of their fabric and ornamentation. •' The Chinese theatres of San Francisco, at which performances take place twice a day, Sundays not excepted, are, they tell me, always full. Surely Hi Quang, or How Long, or Yew Bit must be very prosperous managers indeed. From the theatre we went to -a. very grand entertainment indeed, the cookery being exclusively Chinese, and the use of chopsticks in preference to knives and forks de rigueur. Wo' did not partake of the banquet, which was laid . out in an infinity of little round saucers. What they' contained—pickled eels' feet a la day.be, or salmi oE frogs' giblets, birds-nest soup, dried ducks, beche-de-mer, snips, or snails, or puppy dogs' tails—l know not. The banqueting table was very prettily decorated with artificial flowers cut out of "coloured paper ; and, as a preliminary to the feast, there was a vocal and instrumental concert, given by a body of Chinese maidens, ranging, to all appearance between 14 and 17 years of age, and .w-ere clad in loose casaqums and white trousers of rich materials sumptuously brocaded. None of the damsels were "Golden Lilies" or small-footed. Their complexions were ivory-hued, their eyes almondshaped and sable as sloes, their hair, very black and lustrous, and very well dressed, a profusion of jewellery, and their eyebrows and I lips were manifestly painted. They would really have been pretty but for the sickly, defected, down-trodden, almost imbecile simper playing about their ruddied lips—the simper of the slave continually deprecating the always' imminent bamboo. They were indeed professional glee maidens, the apprentices,'and while their apprenticeship lasts the mere slaves and chattels of their master—a fat, tall Chinaman, with a face like an over-ripe vegetable marrow. The singing was the usual Chinese whine, rising now and again to a screech—an ululation no doubt delightful to Oriental oars, but to tho Occidental tympanum distressingly dissonant. AA re left this scone of revelry to pay a visit to a joss-house, Tho temple was situated up three pairs of stairs, kopt scrupulously clean, and carefully oil-elothod, but the stairs were rather inconveniently crowded by pilgrims to the Joss, and among this closely-packed throng there seemed to be fully as many Americans as there were Chinamen. The josshouse itself was an octagonal apartment, with a high altar covered with painted mats, and behind it a kind of reredos of wood, elaborately curved, gilt in some places, and in others daubed with garish hues. On the altar itself was a heterogenous assemblage of lacquer trays, porcelain vases full of cutpaper flowers, bronze and ivory ornaments, tablo napkins tied up with parti-coloured ribbons, pastry, confectionery, dried fish, nuts, oranges, and little saucers full of what appeared to bo. respectively saffron and indigo. These last, together with a number of gaudy littlo paper purses, which looked suspiciously like Christmas crackers, were, I apprehend offerings to the Joss. . That which struck me as passing strange in this temple was' that there was not the slightest devotional expression on the countenances of the crowd bf Chinamen who passed before the altar. They gazed "on" the display with the usual listless simper, and refrained not from cracking languid jokes to each other in their own inscrutible lingo. Perhaps it is not in accordance with Chinese etiquette to be religious in a joss-house when Fanquis a-ro present. Perhaps the really devout Chinaman reserves his genuflections and his prostrations for a time when he can hu alone with his Joss. A mysterious race. John Chinaman always reminds me of a cat from Montaigne's point of view. You may laugh ut Grimalkin, but don't bu too.sure that ho is not laughing ab you. John Chinaman, I fancy, knows a' great deal more about you than you do about liim. AVhen we left the joss-house we began to sink lower and lower in the social scale, and contrived at last to get very low indeed. Although it was New Year's Night, aud a high holiday, the ■ Chinese pawnbrokers wore doing a roaring trade. Why should Mine Uncle have been immersed

in business at this festive season? Simwly for the reason that most of the Chinamen' who were not at the play or the joss-house," or who were not smoking opium or dead-drunken with that drug, were gambling, and that, as a Chinaman when ho is gambling wi(l stake not only his money'to the last cent., but the,worth of his wearing apparel andl his,, minutest personal belongings, it .naturally follows that the pawnbroker is a very convenient accessory to the gambling-table. Is our , Uncle wholly1 unknown in the luxurious haunts of Monte Carlo? ..When.. Madaiuo la PriiicesHc KatorichassofE' has been losing heavily by bucking 7.01-0, has she not been known over and over again, cilvlehi tripot, to slip from her fair arms her dazzling diamond bracelets, to push from her rosy ear-lobes their gloaming pendants, and by the hands of a watchful ser- 1

Vitpv solid tho glittering gew-gaws to the pawnbrokers. The World, aftor all, is not so big a village as we sohidUnius tako it to be, Humanity in far distant lands does not vary half so much as we think, or pretend to think, tbat it varies from our own types; and between this villaih'Olls pawn-shop in the Chinese slum at 'Frisco Unci tlio elegant establishment of Mine Uncle ttt Bloiuico or of Mine Uncle in London, or Mn, T'auto iv Paris, who shall say th.it there wiis ifofc a close bond of uitii'.ft ? it>- j, tbijre is realty fflucli brotherhood among mankind,' rilthfujfh; -, perhaps,- there is a much larger amount of frtUcni'iy iii tice than in virtue. As for the Celestial" spout lit San Francisco, the objects pledged were certainly more remarkable for their miscellaneous character than for their intrinsic value. A few rusty revolvers—possibly " snabbled " or.stolen from their original " Melliean " owners, for the Chinaman, as a rule, is not a shooting animalshoes with pnpor soles, broad-brimmed hats, umbrellas, bundles of wearing apparel, fans, fryingpans, handbells, saddles and bridles, lanterns, clocks, a bamboo chair, and musical box. And the pledging continued merrily late into the night season, for " fan-tan " was at its height, and gambling ceased not in its fastness and its filly, . From the i«iwiislitip of nn " opium joint "—a kind of soporific taVetn, tin Opittm-smokers' " pub," where for a paltry feo tho slave to narcotic enjoyment is privileged to consume a Certain quantity of the drug and to occupy a bunk or ii ; portion of 11 bunk' until he has slept ofl: the effects of his debauch, Ifc was an illicit" joint" of course, quite Contrary to tho law) but we saw many more illegal spectacles that night of f loW'cry festivity; and grosser was the violation of the law, state or municipal, the greater was the alacrity Of the to admit the officer of police. It was as tiloilgJt thoy were saying, " Take us as we really are; see U3 .at our very worst; and then judge candidly for yourselves whether you white-skinned lawmakers are morally very much better than '■ wo ■'yellow-skinned law-breakers are." In some of the vilest of the dens which we visited on that night of feasting and revelry—cellars beneath collars, tier below tier: of infamy and squalor too dreadful, too shameful, and too sickening to describe—our coming was evidently expected. The officer of police was dreaded, and perlmps'hated, : stiil he Was a -personage to be conciliated and propitiated. J Thus every, door of an exceptionally illegal haunt was instantaneously opened in response to the.slightest tap from our conductor's knuckles,; aud in ■sonic of tlie sub-subterf.trie-i.iiSj in which-the' passages were unusually dark, noistmie, and tortuous,:• dud . the constantly recurrilig - stairs usually, rickett'y and rcftte'ri,' the kerosene lamp placed at intervals on the' filthy floor would be snpplement&l "by cleft sticks, holding an-inch or two of: candle, lighting which the experienced tlguaeil would pilot us through fresh caves, fresh dens of hideous stenches and hideous doings. The ftices that I saw that night—faces more abominable in their distortion and depravation', from the normal aspect of humanity, faces wliich, in their demoniacal grotesqucness arid theii-'pallid horror made . pale and sickly the wildest efforts of the graphic imagination of Jaques Callot and • Breliglfal .'d'Ehfer,- and the Spaniard Francisco Goya—those faces haunt me now as I am -writing in the sunshine and among the -vivid .greenery of a beautiful.land. And they were the faces not only of men, but of women. The ghost of that last New Year's night in China Town, Sau Francisco, I contrived, however, to lay in the Red Sea ; for, bidding farewell to our cautious and courteous cicerone, the officer of police, who would take neither fee nor reward for his pains, I had to hasten back to the Palaco Hotel and array myself in the war-paint of civilisation—that is to say, evening dress, for, as I have previously said, I v/as to be a guest in ono of tlie suites of rooms of the hotel, at a "small and cariy," organised oii a scale-commensurate-with the San Franciscan ideas of smallness and earliness ; so that when I went, very late indeed, to bed my dreams wore, fortunately, not of the Mongolism, but of the Caucasian race—they were dreams of bearded beaux and beauteous ladies in radiant toilettes,"- of the glittering of diamonds, and curling fumes of Cabanas " regalias imperiales" at 75 cents apiece—dreams of champagne which really came from Bpernay, and cost four dollars a bottle, with perhaps some transient visions of a peculiar Californian punch, which, I am informed, contains 12 ingredients, consisting, its concoctbrs proudly boast, not one singlo drop of water. ...

On the morrow one had, much against the grain, to bid farewell to 'Frisco. Jordan, we all believe,, is "a hard road to travel. So is it hard'to "got to 'EL-Dorado; but it is much .harder, morally, to. get away again, simply because the city is so beautiful, the people so hospitable and so kind, and life in general so thoroughly enjoyable. There is, perhaps, a little too liberal employment of the revolver in the adjustment of political and journalistic difficulties, but it was not my luck to quarrel with anybody during my brief and happy stay among the Argonauts, and no descendant of Admiral Jason offered to put the contents of a six-shooter into me. At 2 p.m. on Monday the Pacific Steam Navigation Company's ship Australia steamed^ away from the wharf down the harbour to the Golden Gate, and I was busy unpacking my belongings in the handsomely-furnished and roomy deck cabin, dubbed the "bridal chamber," which1 the agent of the company' had politely placed at my disposal. If the bridal chamber had a drawback, it lay, perhaps, in the circumstance that the bridal bed wasabout three sizes too large for an inmate who was temporarily a bachelor. Thus, during the exceedingly rough weather which was my frequent fate to endure on our passage, I was fain to avoid being "flung out of my too spacious nuptial couch, by packing, jarnbing, and blocking myself up therein witli bags and bundles,which, as we neared the tropics,' proved somewhat embarrassing accessories to those bed-clothes with which, in the tropics themselves,' you would willingly, in tho intolerably sultry nights, have dispensed with altogether. I am bound .to admit that the Golden City did not behave very well to us after her citizens had. bidden us so cordial a farewell at the company's wharf. ■"; Indeed, she sent after us a most abominable sea fog' which first blurred and then wholly eclipsed the' glories of a magnificent sunset; and when this detestable brumous mist cleared away-just before the gorgeous but all too brief afterglow was succeeded by blackest nightnight that descends, as it were, as swiftly and vertically as the curtain at the playhouse veiling the many-coloured splendours of one of Mr AVilliam Beverley's transformation scenes—we had_ the mortification to see the Australia passed, and passed quickly, too, by an audacious steamer called the Alameda, which had left Sau Francisco at least an hour after our departure. I had had the advantage of an offer of a passage on board the Alamudu, which was bound to the Sandwich Islands; and had I had eight or 10 hours' leisure in the capital oi' the realm of King Kalakaua, I might perhaps have transacted some profitable business there; but I was pledged to the Australia and Captain Ghest, and you are hound, I think, under all circumstances, to stick to your, ship and your skipper. So, with magnanimous indifference, we suffered the saucy Alameda to pass us, consoling ourselves with the reflection that she was ouly bound for Honolulu and other roadsteads ° •-.!?! Hawaiiau Sl' ou P> on busmess connected with the sngar trade mainly intent;'whereas our great ocean steamer was on her course right through Polynesia with the Royal British and United States mails, to say nothing of an assorted cargo, a locomotive engine, several tons of St. Jacobs Oil and Dr Quack's Somebody's Parcelsian pills, a couple of Californian lions, '} v -^~. 1S ll(! 1 an Pastor, several missionaries en route for li 3 i, the New Hebrides, the Samoan Islands, and ISew Guinea, and an American lady doctor bent on practising the healing art in Melbourne._ A fig, then, for the Alameda and her saccharine concernments.