30G EAST PRUSSIA TO THE GOLDEN GATE 



was so overstocked with oranges this summer that the 

 very best of them could almost be had for the asking. 

 What nonsense to send a vessel like the "Expedition" 

 out here with a cargo of fruit which this country pro- 

 duces in over-abundance. It took Mueller fifty-eight days 

 from Tahiti here, while our American coasters generally 

 make the trip in thirty days, but the regular packets — 

 and they are all fine sailing vessels, schooners after clip- 

 per model— will make the run in twenty days, which 

 means about one-third the time that it took Mueller. 

 Poor fellow, he will give old Laubmeyer a few practical 

 hints on modern navigation that will open his eyes or 

 paralyze him for life. 



The Prussian flag is flying in port just now, which I 

 had not seen since I left Hamburg. It belongs to the 

 brig "Titania," Capt. Voss, from Stettin. 



I would very much like to keep you posted on some 

 public matters but I have not time to give you the news 

 of the day. This, I know, should not be neglected, as it 

 is only by constant truthful details that you could better 

 learn to understand American conditions and modes of 

 living; for affairs run so very differently in the Old 

 World. It is true, there are two German newspapers 

 published in San Francisco, but to send them to you 

 would certainly not accomplish the object I have in view, 

 as both are miserable sheets, published as organs of 

 political cliques and edited by men who have not even 

 a fair knowledge of the language in which they write, 

 and who would do better to take some lessons in the 

 grammar of their own mother tongue before they at- 

 tempt to write for the public. If you understood Eng- 

 lish I should send you the "steamer edition" of one of 

 our better American papers now and then. This edition 

 is published regularly on the day before the mail steam- 

 ers leave and gives in a concise form all the news of the 

 previous two weeks for its readers in the Atlantic states 

 and in Europe. 



I suppose I shall have to send you one of the French 

 papers from here. "Le Messager" is published in such 



