pes and motions of his beloved birds. He took out of
the cote the very best of the lot, and gave it to one of our young
ladies to let fly outside, so that we could see it circle round and
round, and then make for its home again.

By this time it was toward evening, and we could descry in the dim
distance the return of Dr. Humphreys and his family, as their carriages
wound along the plain back again to Brentwood.

Night brought us a silver moon, which added new beauty to all our great
surroundings of plain and mountain, and we could look back over a day
filled to overflowing with interest and pleasantness, the half of which
is not told; but we must at least mention the grape-shot which was
picked up on the railroad track, and which set us thinking of how it
got there. Was it fired from a Spanish cannon in early days, or by
settlers in some Indian difficulty, or marauding trouble, or when?

We must also tell of the happy Chinese laundryman whom we interviewed
under the light of the moon, the very picture of placid, contented
comfort, as he smoked a huge pipe with stem two feet long. Poor soul,
all in his loneliness, coming out from his little hole for a breath of
fresh air and a touch of that great nature which is ever so good to us
all if we will but let it. Our Chinaman told us that his pipestem was
especially valuable, that it had the excellent quality of making the
smoke cool, and that such stems, being made of the tea shrub, were very
rare. One of our number next morning wished to purchase the said
pipestem from "John," but he refused all offers, saying he would not
give it for fifty dollars.

XIII

San Francisco.--Bustling Traffic.--Railroad Employees.--The
Flagman.--The Palace Hotel.--The Seal Rocks.--Sutro Residence and
Baths.--The Presidio.--Sentinels.--Golden Gate Park.--The Memorial
Cross.--San Francisco and Edinburgh Compared.--The Cable Cars.--
Chinatown.--The Opium Den.--The Goldsmiths' Shops.--Across the
Bay to Tiburon.--The Bohemian Club.

In San Francisco we had a couple of full days and fragments of two
others, all too short to fully take in the wonders of that romantic
city, so bizarre, so strange, and in its way so attractive.

After coming across the Bay from Oakland, we found ourselves in the
midst of the noise and bustle of the railroad yards, fronting on a
street crowded with teams and wagons from morning until night; and in
the night, the ever-resounding snorts of the iron horse we