ue of New England. The cut-purse and pickpocket in
California find their occupation useless, and become
chevaliers of industry, in a better sense than the term has
ever before admitted of. It will appear natural," says our
author, "that California should be the most democratic country
in the world. The practical equality of all the members of
the community, whatever might be the wealth, intelligence,
or profession of each, was never before so thoroughly
demonstrated. Dress was no gauge of respectability and no
honest occupation, however menial in its character, affected
a man's standing. Lawyers, physicians, and ex-professors,
dug cellars, drove ox-teams, sawed wood, and carried baggage,
while men who had been army privates, sailors, cooks, or day
laborers, were at the head of profitable establishments, and
not unfrequently assisted in some of the minor details of
government. A man who would consider his fellow beneath
him, on account of his appearance or occupation, would have
had some difficulty in living peaceably in California. The
security of the country is owing in no small degree to this
plain, practical development of what the French reverence as
an abstraction, under the name of _Fraternite_. To sum up
all in three words, _Labor is respectable_. May it never
be otherwise while a grain of gold is left to glitter in
Californian soil!"

Our author returned by way of Mazatlan and the city of Mexico, meeting
with a pleasant variety of adventures, robbery included, on his
route. In taking leave of his volumes, we cannot forbear venturing
a suggestion to the author, that he may find a field of travel, less
known, and quite as interesting at the present time, in the vast
Territory of New Mexico--the valley of the Del Norte, with its old
Castilian and Aztec monuments and associations; the Great Salt Lake,
and the unexplored regions of the great valley of the Colorado,
between the mountain ranges of the Sierra Madre and the Sierra Nevada.
We know of no one better fitted for such an enterprise, or for whom,
judging from the spirit of his California narrative, it would present
more attractions.

[Footnote 2: Eldorado: Adventures in the Path of Empire. By Bayard
Taylor. New York. Putnam. 1850. Two volumes.]

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MEYERBEER AND WEBER.--The Berlin papers are reviving the rumor that
Meyerbeer