aversville, forty miles farther up the mountain heights, whose crests
were now white with snow, and the road in many places running within six
inches of the ragged chasms, thousands of feet in depth.

Our stage was drawn by four horses, and, at one time, the snow accumulated
around the foot of one of the leaders until it formed a huge ball, and
with this impediment he was partially precipitated over the edge of a
precipice. This noble animal exhibited more presence of mind than would
have characterized many human beings under similar circumstances, and,
with great judgment, gradually extricated the foot from its snowy burden,
and resumed his journey, but not before the face of every passenger was
blanched with terror.

After a few days at Weaversville, we returned to Sacramento, feeling that
we had enjoyed a pleasant and profitable trip.

CHAPTER XXX.

"A man he seems of cheerful yesterdays,
And confident to-morrows."

We made a trip to San Francisco at a time when life seemed a continued
carnival season, for there winter is the most delightful portion of the
year. We rented apartments in a delightful New England family, named
Collins. This, at that time, was the most comfortable way of living, for
in no part of the United States did restaurants furnish such good and
liberal fare at such reasonable rates. The characteristic cheerfulness of
California became intensified in San Francisco, where every face looked
radiant and happy as if all who entered the Golden Gate found a City of
the Sun.

We had so often asked the reason of this, and were as often told that "it
was all owing to the climate." We finally concluded that the climate
carried an unusual weight of responsibility; indeed, according to Joaquin
Miller, among "the first families of the Sierras," every unusual
phenomenon of nature, whether it came in the form of a fascinating widow,
a spooney man, a premature birth, or a fish with gold in its stomach, was
all owing to "this glorious climate of Californy."

Although San Francisco is pervaded by the business activity of a great
commercial metropolis, it is not possessed of the spirit of excessive
drudgery in the hot pursuit of the "almighty dollar" which prevails in
many other places. Every Saturday afternoon there is a lull in the labor
routine, business being entirely suspended, and the fashionable
promenades, Montgomery and Kearney Streets, are thronged with pleasure
seekers; husbands and