XV. 



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FTER I had started to hunt a place to stay all night 

 I was joined by John Galdie, or " Scottie," as we 

 all called him, who proposed that we should go 

 together. As I knew him to be a quiet, honest fellow I agreed 

 to it. He was nearly as poor as I was, so there was no danger 

 of his taking me to a five-dollar-a-day hotel. We were an 

 uncouth looking pair, and made some sport for the street 

 gamins; used as they were to queer characters. What was 

 known as the " Frazer River bubble," by which thousands 

 had been induced to go up the coast to dig for gold, had 

 lately bursted, and hundreds were coming back ragged and 

 poor. Thinking we were just from the luckless diggings, 

 much interest was taken in us by the boys. They called 

 us " Frazer," asked us how we found the folks and where we 

 proposed investing our money. Paying no attention to such 

 nonsense we trudged over the amphibious streets next the 

 water front; streets lying over what was late the bay. Near 

 the edge of the rising ground on which the solid part of the 

 city is built we came in sight of a sign bearing the words, 

 " Pacific Lodgings, Twenty-five cents." Now the amount of 

 my coin possessions was two ten-cent pieces ; but these, on 

 account of a financial reckoning peculiar to California, 



(210) 



