I
launched
out
as
a lecturer, now,
with
great
boldness. I had
the
field
all
to
myself,
for
public lectures
were
almost
an
unknown
commodity
in
the
Pacific
market.
They
are
not
so
rare, now, I suppose. I
took
an
old
personal
friend
along
to
play
agent
for
me,
and
for
two
or
three
weeks
we
roamed
through
Nevada
and
California
and
had a
very
cheerful time
of
it.
Two
days
before
I lectured
in
Virginia
City,
two
stagecoaches
were
robbed
within
two
miles
of
the
town.
The
daring
act
was
committed
just
at
dawn,
by
six
masked men,
who
sprang
up
alongside
the
coaches,
presented
revolvers
at
the
heads
of
the
drivers
and
passengers,
and
commanded
a
general
dismount. Everybody climbed down,
and
the
robbers
took
their
watches
and
every
cent
they
had.
Then
they
took
gunpowder
and
blew
up
the
express
specie
boxes
and
got
their
contents.
The
leader
of
the
robbers
was
a small, quick-spoken man,
and
the
fame
of
his
vigorous
manner
and
his
intrepidity
was
in
everybody's
mouth
when
we
arrived.
The
night
after
instructing
Virginia, I walked
over
the
desolate "divide"
and
down
to
Gold
Hill,
and
lectured there.
The
lecture done, I stopped
to
talk
with
a friend,
and
did
not
start
back
till
eleven.
The
"divide"
was
high, unoccupied ground,
between
the
towns,
the
scene
of
twenty
midnight
murders
and
a
hundred
robberies.
As
we
climbed
up
and
stepped
out
on
this
eminence,
the
Gold
Hill
lights
dropped
out
of
sight
at
our
backs,
and
the
night
closed
down
gloomy
and
dismal. A sharp wind swept
the
place, too,
and
chilled
our
perspiring
bodies
through. "I
tell
you
I don't
like
this
place
at
night," said Mike
the
agent. "Well, don't
speak
so
loud," I said. "You needn't remind anybody
that
we
are
here."
Just
then
a
dim
figure
approached
me
from
the
direction
of
Virginia—a man, evidently.
He
came straight
at
me,
and
I
stepped
aside
to
let
him
pass;
he
stepped
in
the
way
and
confronted
me
again.
Then
I
saw
that
he
had a mask
on
and
was
holding
something
in
my face—I
heard
a click-click
and
recognized
a revolver
in
dim
outline. I
pushed
the
barrel
aside
with
my
hand
and
said: "Don't!"
He
ejaculated
sharply: "Your watch!
Your
money!" I said: "You
can
have
them
with
pleasure—but
take
the
pistol
away
from
my face, please.
It
makes
me
shiver." "No remarks!
Hand
out
your
money!" "Certainly—I—" "Put
up
your
hands! Don't
you
go
for
a weapon!
Put
'em up! Higher!" I
held
them
above
my head. A pause. Then: "Are
you
going
to
hand
out
your
money
or
not?" I
dropped
my
hands
to
my
pockets
and
said: Certainly! I—" "Put
up
your
hands!
Do
you
want
your
head
blown
off? Higher!" I
put
them
above
my
head
again.
Another
pause.
Are
you
going
to
hand
out
your
money
or
not? Ah-ah—again?
Put
up
your
hands!
By
George,
you
want
the
head
shot
off
you
awful
bad!" "Well, friend, I'm trying my
best
to
please
you.
You
tell
me
to
give
up
my money,
and
when
I reach
for
it
you
tell
me
to
put
up
my hands.
If
you
would
only—. Oh, now—don't!
All
six
of
you
at
me!
That
other
man
will
get
away
while.—Now
please
take
some
of
those
revolvers
out
of
my face—do,
if
you
please!
Every
time
one
of
them
clicks, my
liver
comes
up
into
my throat!
If
you
have
a mother—any
of
you—or
if
any
of
you
have
ever
had a mother—or a—grandmother—or a—" "Cheese it!
Will
you
give
up
your
money,
or
have
we
got to—. There—there—none
of
that!
Put
up
your
hands!" "Gentlemen—I
know
you
are
gentlemen
by
your—" "Silence!
If
you
want
to
be
facetious,
young
man,
there
are
times
and
places
more
fitting.
This
is
a
serious
business." "You
prick
the
marrow
of
my opinion.
The
funerals I
have
attended
in
my time
were
comedies
compared
to
it.
Now
I think—" "Curse
your
palaver!
Your
money!—your money!—your money! Hold!—put
up
your
hands!" "Gentlemen,
listen
to
reason.
You
see
how
I
am
situated—now don't
put
those
pistols
so
close—I
smell
the
powder. "You
see
how
I
am
situated.
If
I had
four
hands—so
that
I
could
hold
up
two
and—" "Throttle him!
Gag
him! Kill him!" "Gentlemen, don't! Nobody's
watching
the
other
fellow.
Why
don't
some
of
you—. Ouch!
Take
it
away, please! "Gentlemen,
you
see
that
I've got
to
hold
up
my hands;
and
so
I can't
take
out
my money—but
if
you'll
be
so
kind
as
to
take
it
out
for
me, I
will
do
as
much
for
you
some—" "Search
him
Beauregard—and stop
his
jaw
with
a bullet, quick,
if
he
wags
it
again.
Help
Beauregard, Stonewall."
Then
three
of
them,
with
the
small,
spry
leader,
adjourned
to
Mike
and
fell
to
searching
him. I
was
so
excited
that
my lawless fancy tortured
me
to
ask
my
two
men
all
manner
of
facetious
questions
about
their
rebel brother-generals
of
the
South, but,
considering
the
order
they
had received,
it
was
but
common
prudence
to
keep
still.
When
everything had been taken
from
me,—watch, money,
and
a
multitude
of
trifles
of
small value,—I supposed I
was
free,
and
forthwith
put
my cold
hands
into
my empty
pockets
and
began
an
inoffensive
jig
to
warm
my feet
and
stir
up
some
latent
courage—but instantly
all
pistols
were
at
my head,
and
the
order came again:
They
stood Mike
up
alongside
of
me,
with
strict
orders
to
keep
his
hands
above
his
head, too,
and
then
the
chief
highwayman said: "Beauregard,
hide
behind
that
boulder; Phil Sheridan,
you
hide
behind
that
other
one; Stonewall Jackson,
put
yourself
behind
that
sage-bush there.
Keep
your
pistols
bearing
on
these
fellows,
and
if
they
take
down
their
hands
within
ten
minutes,
or
move
a single peg,
let
them
have
it!"
Then
three
disappeared
in
the
gloom
toward
the
several
ambushes,
and
the
other
three
disappeared
down
the
road
toward
Virginia.
It
was
depressingly still,
and
miserably cold.
Now
this
whole
thing
was
a
practical
joke,
and
the
robbers
were
personal
friends
of
ours
in
disguise,
and
twenty
more
lay
hidden
within
ten
feet
of
us
during
the
whole
operation, listening. Mike
knew
all
this,
and
was
in
the
joke,
but
I suspected
nothing
of
it.
To
me
it
was
most
uncomfortably genuine.
When
we
had stood
there
in
the
middle
of
the
road
five
minutes,
like
a
couple
of
idiots,
with
our
hands
aloft, freezing
to
death
by
inches, Mike's
interest
in
the
joke
began
to
wane.
He
said: "The time's up, now, aint it?" "No,
you
keep
still.
Do
you
want
to
take
any
chances
with
these
bloody
savages?" Presently Mike said: "Now
the
time's up, anyway. I'm freezing." "Well freeze.
Better
freeze
than
carry
your
brains
home
in
a basket. Maybe
the
time
is
up,
but
how
do
we
know?—got
no
watch
to
tell
by. I
mean
to
give
them
good
measure. I
calculate
to
stand
here
fifteen
minutes
or
die. Don't
you
move." So,
without
knowing it, I
was
making
one
joker
very
sick
of
his
contract.
When
we
took
our
arms
down
at
last,
they
were
aching
with
cold
and
fatigue,
and
when
we
went sneaking off,
the
dread
I
was
in
that
the
time
might
not
yet
be
up
and
that
we
would
feel
bullets
in
a moment,
was
not
sufficient
to
draw
all
my
attention
from
the
misery
that
racked my
stiffened
body.
The
joke
of
these
highwayman
friends
of
ours
was
mainly a
joke
upon
themselves;
for
they
had
waited
for
me
on
the
cold hill-top
two
full
hours
before
I came,
and
there
was
very
little
fun
in
that;
they
were
so
chilled
that
it
took
them
a
couple
of
weeks
to
get
warm
again. Moreover, I
never
had a
thought
that
they
would
kill
me
to
get
money
which
it
was
so
perfectly
easy
to
get
without
any
such
folly,
and
so
they
did
not
really frighten
me
bad
enough
to
make
their
enjoyment
worth
the
trouble
they
had taken. I
was
only
afraid
that
their
weapons
would
go
off
accidentally.
Their
very
numbers
inspired
me
with
confidence
that
no
blood
would
be
intentionally spilled.
They
were
not
smart;
they
ought
to
have
sent
only
one
highwayman,
with
a double-barrelled
shot
gun,
if
they
desired
to
see
the
author
of
this
volume
climb a tree. However, I
suppose
that
in
the
long
run
I got
the
largest
share
of
the
joke
at
last;
and
in
a
shape
not
foreseen
by
the
highwaymen;
for
the
chilly exposure
on
the
"divide"
while
I
was
in
a
perspiration
gave
me
a cold
which
developed
itself
into
a troublesome
disease
and
kept my
hands
idle
some
three
months, besides
costing
me
quite
a
sum
in
doctor's bills.
Since
then
I
play
no
practical
jokes
on
people
and
generally
lose
my temper
when
one
is
played
upon
me.
When
I
returned
to
San Francisco I projected a pleasure
journey
to
Japan
and
thence
westward
around
the
world;
but
a
desire
to
see
home
again
changed
my mind,
and
I
took
a berth
in
the
steamship,
bade
good-bye
to
the
friendliest
land
and
livest, heartiest
community
on
our
continent,
and
came
by
the
way
of
the
Isthmus
to
New
York—a trip
that
was
not
much
of
a pic-nic excursion,
for
the
cholera
broke
out
among
us
on
the
passage
and
we
buried
two
or
three
bodies
at
sea
every
day. I found
home
a
dreary
place
after
my
long
absence;
for
half
the
children I had known
were
now
wearing
whiskers
or
waterfalls,
and
few
of
the
grown
people
I had been acquainted
with
remained
at
their
hearthstones
prosperous
and
happy—some
of
them
had
wandered
to
other
scenes,
some
were
in
jail,
and
the
rest
had been hanged.
These
changes
touched
me
deeply,
and
I went
away
and
joined
the
famous
Quaker
City
European
Excursion
and
carried my
tears
to
foreign
lands. Thus,
after
seven
years
of
vicissitudes, ended a "pleasure trip"
to
the
silver
mines
of
Nevada
which
had
originally
been
intended
to
occupy
only
three
months. However, I usually
miss
my
calculations
further
than
that. MORAL.
If
the
reader
thinks
he
is
done, now,
and
that
this
book
has
no
moral
to
it,
he
is
in
error.
The
moral
of
it
is
this:
If
you
are
of
any
account, stay
at
home
and
make
your
way
by
faithful
diligence;
but
if
you
are
"no account,"
go
away
from
home,
and
then
you
will
have
to
work,
whether
you
want
to
or
not.
Thus
you
become
a
blessing
to
your
friends
by
ceasing
to
be
a
nuisance
to
them—if
the
people
you
go
among
suffer
by
the
operation.