ital Service. Dr. Williamson and Dr. Kinyoun both declared
plague to be present in the city. The business interests represented in
the Merchants' Association appealed to Kinyoun to suppress his reports
to Washington. In return he invited them to read the law which compelled
him to make reports. They then tackled Dr. Williamson, who replied that
he'd tell the truth as he found it, and if it was distasteful to them,
they needn't listen. They went to Mayor Phelan demanding Williamson's
head on a salver. Mayor Phelan stuck by his man. Governor Gage they
found more amenable. He issued a proclamation declaring that there was
no plague. Governor Gage is not a physician or a man of scientific
attainment. There is nothing in his record or career to show that he
could distinguish between a plague bacillus and a potato-bug.
Nevertheless he spent considerable of the State's money wiring positive
and unauthorized statements to Washington. His State Board of Health
refused to stand by him and he cut off their appropriation; whereupon
they resigned, and he secured another and more servile board, remolded
nearer to the heart's desire. Meantime the newspapers were strenuously
denying all the real facts of the epidemic, their policy culminating in
the complete suppression of plague news. Before this, however, they so
inflamed public opinion against Dr. Kinyoun and Dr. Williamson that
these two gentlemen became pariahs. Here are a few of the amenities of
journalism in the golden West, culled from the display heads of the
papers:

"Kinyoun, Enemy of the City."

"Has Kinyoun Gone Mad?"

"Desperate, Kinyoun Commits Another Outrage on San Francisco."

"Board of Health for Graft and Plunder."

"Our Bubonic Board."

One gentle patriot in the State Senate suggested in a thoughtful and
logical speech that Dr. Kinyoun should be hanged. This practical spirit
so appealed to the Chinese organizations (it was Chinatown that suffered
chiefly from the quarantine rigors) that those bodies put a price of
$10,000 on Kinyoun's head--not his political head, understand, but the
head which was very firmly set on a pair of broad shoulders. Some of the
officer's friends went to the Chinese Consul-General and explained
unofficially that they would hold him responsible for any accident to
Dr. Kinyoun. That personage, supposing that they were suggesting the
slow accounting of diplomacy, smiled blandly and said:

"Gentlemen, I sympathize