loo Life and Sport on the Pacific Slope 



Many persons supposed that my brother and I 

 were amongst the Vigilantes. We were not. We 

 knew absolutely nothing of what was going on, so 

 to speak, under our noses, till the next morning. 

 What knowledge came to us after the event we 

 discreetly kept to ourselves. One young fellow, 

 I remember, a druggist, imprudently hinted that 

 he could tell a strange story if he pleased, and it 

 seems that towards midnight he had been wakened 

 out of his sleep by the Vigilantes passing his drug- 

 store on their way to the calaboose which adjoined 

 it. It was said that the young man looked out 

 into the night and saw a dozen masked men, that 

 he heard the dialogue that ensued between the 

 leader of the Vigilantes and the constable on guard, 

 that he followed the party to the bridge (a most 

 unwise proceeding), and witnessed the lynching. 

 For a brief season this youth was the hero of the 

 hour; then a quiet, middle-aged citizen, a man 

 with a square brow and chin, and a pair of keen 

 blue eyes, was seen to enter the drug-store, and — 

 mirahile dictu ! — after this the mind and memory 

 of Peeping Tom became a blank. He had seen — 

 nothing; he had heard — nothing; he knew — 

 nothing. But observant persons remarked that 

 this young gentleman's face, normally as ruddy as 

 David's, had turned of a sudden a dirty grey-green ; 

 so we may infer that the quiet, middle-aged citizen 

 did not call upon his fellow-townsman to pass the 

 time of day, or to buy drugs. 



According to the gentlemen who write with ease 

 upon any subject within or without their ken, the 

 West is now tame. My own experience is this: 



