to take my baggage to the rail for a certain sum. He
brought it to the station, delivered to me what I supposed was all,
and I had it duly "checked," as described. I then tendered him his
payment; he asked half as much again, saying the amount agreed to was
not enough. I objected. He replied, "I kept back one thing till you
paid me; it is in the waggon outside, and I shall not give it up." I
appealed to the rail officials; they answered curtly that it was no
business of theirs, and that I had better go to the police. This was
impossible, for the train was just leaving. I had my son with me,
and I thought I could take it from his waggon by force, but there
were many of his class by, and I did not fancy a free fight. "Pay the
money," said some one, "take his number and report him to the
superintendent of police," and I thought this the better way and did
so. I did report the case fully, and offered to return to Denver to
prove it by my son's evidence, but the said superintendent was not
even courteous enough to reply. The express-men are licensed by the
police, and accountable to them, but many told me, e'er I wrote, I
should get no redress, for unless prepared to spend money in the case
I should not get a hearing. The law on every point is most lax in the
States, for bribery and corruption are acknowledged on every side to
be the rule, and cases promising no profit are passed over. Still I
must add the above was an exceptional case, I having always found the
express-men act up to their bargains. I think, therefore, a bargain
made with them will be completed.

But all this does not advance the journey from New Orleans to San
Francisco. If you look them up on the map you will see how far they
are apart--some 2500 miles as the crow flies, and by rail, say, 3000
miles. You traverse the states of Louisiana, Texas, a little of New
Mexico, Arizona, and California. A state in America is, speaking
generally and leaving out the smallest, as large as England, some
much larger, twice as big. Thus it was no small journey; it took me
five days' and nights' incessant travel by rail. But what must the
distances in America have been before the days of railroads. Here in
England, between the old waggon era and the rail time, we had an
interregnum of coaches, which for speed were the best in the world.
Thus from one end of the kingdom to the other was then only an affair
of three or four days. It was different in the United States. As far