Jimville was having the time of its life the Silver
Dollar had those same coins let into the bar top for a border, but
the proprietor pried them out when the glory departed. There are three
hundred inhabitants in Jimville and four bars, though you are not to
argue anything from that.

Hear now how Jimville came by its name. Jim Calkins discovered the
Bully Boy, Jim Baker located the Theresa. When Jim Jenkins opened an
eating-house in his tent he chalked up on the flap, "Best meals in
Jimville, $1.00," and the name stuck.

There was more human interest in the origin of Squaw Gulch, though it
tickled no humor. It was Dimmick's squaw from Aurora way. If Dimmick had
been anything except New Englander he would have called her a mahala,
but that would not have bettered his behavior. Dimmick made a strike,
went East, and the squaw who had been to him as his wife took to drink.
That was the bald way of stating it in the Aurora country. The milk of
human kindness, like some wine, must not be uncorked too much in speech
lest it lose savor. This is what they did. The woman would have returned
to her own people, being far gone with child, but the drink worked her
bane. By the river of this ravine her pains overtook her. There Jim
Calkins, prospecting, found her dying with a three days' babe nozzling
at her breast. Jim heartened her for the end, buried her, and walked
back to Poso, eighteen miles, the child poking in the folds of his
denim shirt with small mewing noises, and won support for it from the
rough-handed folks of that place. Then he came back to Squaw Gulch, so
named from that day, and discovered the Bully Boy. Jim humbly regarded
this piece of luck as interposed for his reward, and I for one believed
him. If it had been in mediaeval times you would have had a legend or
a ballad. Bret Harte would have given you a tale. You see in me a mere
recorder, for I know what is best for you; you shall blow out this
bubble from your own breath.

You could never get into any proper relation to Jimville unless you
could slough off and swallow your acquired prejudices as a lizard does
his skin. Once wanting some womanly attentions, the stage-driver assured
me I might have them at the Nine-Mile House from the lady barkeeper.
The phrase tickled all my after-dinner-coffee sense of humor into an
anticipation of Poker Flat. The stage-driver proved himself really
right, though you are not to suppose from this that Jimville had no
conventi