 6 A mining camp in the Rocky Mountains. Considering its great height, being three thousand feet above the Alpine snowline, Leadville has a wonderful climate. In the first week in October it was quite hot in the sun, though occasionally in passing corners one was reminded that there are snow drifts on the encircling belt of hills. In summer it is sometimes even sultry, though the nights are always cool. The town, though it looks dingy and worn out, is not more than five years old. It is partly built on California Gulch, a famous mining camp of twenty years ago. In 1859 California Gulch was first suspected, and one year the yield of gold was over six hundred thousand pounds sterling. But it gradually fell away, till in 1866 the diggings did not pay the cost of working, and were abandoned. It was pretty bleak in California Gulch in winter time, and the gold diggers, finding at hand a thick, consistent kind of mud, used to cork their cabins with it. After the gold diggers had gone, a pair of sharp eyes looking upon this mud recognized it as carbonate, worth eighty pounds a tonne. The tide of miners which had ebbed with the failure of the gold, set in again with a great rush when this fresh find was made. The discovery of silver was followed by the certain prospect of rich yields of lead. The miners in their spare time decided to found a town. A meeting was called at which twenty men put in an appearance, and out of their number they selected a mare. A lawyer who happened to be around was named Recorder, and Leadville was formally added to the list of cities within the United States. Today the city has a population varying from eighteen thousand to twenty-two thousand, more in winter and fewer in summer, when the miners go forth to prospect. In addition to mare and Recorder, there is now a city council, three daily papers which give surprisingly little for Tuppence-Hapney, three banks, two theatres, seven schools, and as far as I was able to observe, one church. In respect of this last institution I was left very much to personal observation. Some of the citizens from whom I made inquiry doubted the existence of a church. Others guessed there was one round about. The schools are amongst the handsomest and most substantial buildings in the place. They are all free, though Leadville has not yet reached the length of compulsory attendance. Leadville is in no sense a picturesque city, though its situation is unique, empowered as it is amid the loftiest heights of the rocky mountains. Being so near, the mountains have little of grandeur. The rockies want distance to make them beautiful. Seeing near at hand they are bare brown rocks, seared and fished, with a few stunted fir trees growing here and there in sheltered places. Just now the summits are sprinkled with snow, and close at hand are hills whose tops are covered with perpetual snow. But nowhere in the rocky mountains is there visible the deep, white snow that may be seen in Switzerland at altitudes two or three thousand feet less. Leadville has that striking feature of untidiness common to most American towns, some not having the excuse of recent birth. The streets are never sweat nor the sidewalks cleaned, whilst the main thoroughfares are only a trifle better than the streets of Chicago. Outside of Harrison Avenue the houses are mostly wood, some the true log house. They stand apart like toy houses. It is marvellous how some of the giants who work in the mines and lounge about the streets can insert themselves. Being once in, it would appear an easy matter to thrust their feet through the flooring, get a good grip of the back kitchen door and the front parlour fireplace, and walk off with the structure as Samson carried off the gates of Gaza. One of the houses, twelve feet long by ten square, had pasted over the front door a placard which obscured a fifth of the surface, announcing that it was a private boarding-house. The daily habit of working in confined spaces in the mine would probably enable a couple of men to adapt themselves to the conveniences of the establishment, but it would be hard work. On the bleak hillside leading up to chrysalite mine, several of these wooden boxes are scattered about among the burned stumps of trees and the debris of preserved meat cans. It is not an easy matter to see the mines. There is a good deal of jealousy and suspicion abroad, and as there are varying reports of the prosperity of mines, it is deemed advisable to keep strangers out, lest per adventure a spy might be entertained and unawares. A private introduction secured for us a hearty welcome at the chrysalite mine, and the fullest opportunity of inspecting it. But a silver mine does not lend itself to usages of description. It is chiefly dark and frequently wet. The roadways are narrow and heavily timbered, with the object of supporting the roof. Descending by the cage in pitch darkness we are on reaching the bottom, presented with a candle each, where we are to explore the recesses of the mine. But the darkness is so thick that a candle or even five candles are of little account in picking your way along an alley where there is sometimes a plank to walk on, and sometimes a stream of water to wade through. The roadways through this mine form an aggregate of seven or eight miles in length. There is no trolley as in English coal mines, but the men know shortcuts, which lead them to their work without undue loss of time. Holding the candles against the rock the metal can be seen to sparkle. But where the miners have dug out the ore, and it is being conveyed in carts to the smelters, it is difficult to believe that the yellow or brown earth contains silver or lead. The men work singly or in couples, grubbing away at the dark hard walls by the light of a single candle. The carpenters tread closely on the heels of the miners, shoring up the openings as fast as they are made. Chambers out of which ore has been dug rise up one over the other in some places reaching eight stories. Each is shored up by stout pillars roughly sawn from trees. Sometimes the supports break asunder like a match with the weight of the super-incumbent rock, when new ones are promptly inserted and catastrophe averted. This is only in cases where the mine is being worked. In an abandoned mine when the supports give way, the mine falls in. Close by the chrysalite, an old working has thus tumbled in just under the road along which wagons travel from the chrysalite mine to the smelting works. The road is now closed and a wooden cross warns chance passes by of danger. The miners are, take them all together, the finest men I ever saw. Six feet is a fair average of height, and some run to six feet four inches. They are good looking to boot, many of them handsome. To look at them one would suppose that mining was the healthiest occupation open to man. They have a frank bearing and manner of speech that astonishes the stranger. Every one is called by his Christian name not accepting the members of the firm. Good morning Ned, said our guide to one of the miners. Morning Frank, responded the miner, looking up for a moment to greet his employer, and then going on with his work. There was nothing rude or even brusque in this. It simply meant that in a mining camp one man is as good as another, as long as he is able to put in a good day's work. It is the merest accident that makes one man employer and another a wage-taker. If Ned had been around before Frank, he would probably have bought up the lease of the chrysalite, and the position of the two men would have been reversed. As it is, they live together in perfect friendliness, taking a shot at one another upon provocation it is true, but in the meanwhile working in hearty good fellowship. There are times when the Leadville miner is not seen to such advantage as when he stands, pick, or drill in hand, putting all his soul into the effort to dig out ore. Leadville has a continental reputation for being a wicked place, and it is understood that the orgies of the miner are too awful to be contemplated. I had the opportunity of going to see the miner at his worst, and found it run largely to dullness. The first place visited is known as the Carbonate Beer Hall. This is in Stade Street, admitted to be the bad street of Leadville. It turns out of Harrison Avenue, the Bond Street, Palmal, and Regent Street of the city. On entering the beer hall, the visitor is faced by a placard in treating him to patronise the bar. An admission fee of one shilling to the body of the hall, and two shillings to the boxes, is nominally fixed, but not strictly enforced. It is from the profits on the sale of liquor that the establishment is maintained. And when it is mentioned that a bottle of beer is charged at the rate of four and tuppence, and a thimbleful of bad whisky a shilling, it will be understood that this source of revenue does not fail. Inside were gathered about forty men, taking their pleasure with infinite sadness. One or two had abandoned the struggle against the weariness of it, and laying their heads on the table, soundly slept. The hall was furnished with beer-stained tables and dirty chairs. A gallery ran round the upper part, empty, save so far as the soles of a pair of boots, seen over the front of one of the boxes, indicated the presence of a gentleman. On the stage were two men in tights, for lawnly dancing to funereal music, provided by an orchestra consisting of a violin and a piano. When the dance had dropped to a conclusion, the dancers ducked their heads and retired, immediately coming forward again, bowing as if they had been recalled by an enthusiastic audience, and recommencing in obedience to an imaginary encore. As a matter of fact there had not been a sound or gesture of applause. The profound sorrow that brooded over the audience was too heavy to be thus uplifted. The only busy people in the place were the wife of the pianist, who sat by him industriously sowing, and the women who sold drink. These latter are called beer-juggers, and fill a large place in the evening life of the minor. They work on commission, receiving five pence for every jug of beer sold at a dollar. They have tickets, which the bartender punches upon each transaction, and at the close of the evening a cash settlement is made. It is obviously to their interest to make the minors drink, and to that end they indulge in blandishments, which relieve by a single touch of vice the level dullness of the night's entertainment. One of the beer-juggers, taking note of the pair of souls displayed from the box, went upstairs and confirmed the suspicion that there was more in them than met the eye by rousing up a gigantesque minor and inducing him to purchase a bottle of beer. The zoo, a somewhat similar establishment of higher pretensions, placards its portico with the injunction, for wine, women, and fun walks straight ahead. Admission here is to shillings, and is more strictly enforced. Perceiving opportunities for business, a beer-jugger showed us into a private box. We ordered a bottle of beer, which she brought with three glasses, and, uninvited, poured a glass out for herself and drank it, whilst lamenting the slackness of the times. One substantial reason why the fun here and elsewhere so grievously flagged was that payday was approaching. The miners are paid only once a month, and at this epoch, a dollar for a bottle of beer, those served with a lure from a repulsive creature in women's dress, was a little dear. At the end of a month a minor finds himself in possession of from twenty-five to thirty pounds, and as a corollary has what he calls a blowout. These are the Halcyon days of the beer-jugger. There are not in frequent occasions when a minor is cleared out in a single night, and starts on the morning after payday, with only a single dollar out of the hundred he had earned. The performance at the zoo was varied. There was a domestic drama in which a nigger-servant and a baby played the principal roles. Then appeared a nigger who danced and sang, and who, till a rollicking Irishman with a shillayly followed, seemed the most soul-depressing creature that ever started to stage. The boxes at the zoo were fairly filled, a moiety of the occupants being harlots, painted, noisy, and in all ways loveless. These women have their claim upon the consideration of the citizens, since they contribute largely to the relief of the rates. They are required to pay a pound a month for their license, and for the in-gathering of this revenue there is a municipally appointed collector. Should the five dollars in any case be lacking, the corporation suddenly and sternly awake to the sin of the thing, and the woman is cast into prison. If the five dollars be forthcoming, all is well. It should be said that the corporation of Leadville are as inflexible with wrong-doers within their own ranks as with those outside. A short time ago an alderman, having a difference of opinion with a local editor, settled the controversy by knocking him down and kicking him. The corporation, taking note of this irregularity, have forbidden the alderman to take part in their proceedings for one calendar month. Over the stage-box at the zoo is printed an injunction to step in and see Pap Wyman on your way home. We did so, and found Pap beaming over much business. He is one of the oldest residents in Leadville and started the first regular gambling house. He is now getting up in years and has developed some eccentricities. At the little counter where he dispenses drinks is a box in which is placed a Bible, so that a gentleman in the interval of playing yooka, or whilst refreshing himself with a cocktail, may read a verse or two. Over the clock-face is written, Please Don't Swear, and under strong provocation Pap has been known to enforce this request with a round oath. Though these little matters may seem to indicate what Leadville would call old-fashioned notions, Pap is well abreast of the times. He has fitted up machinery by which the saloon is illuminated by the electric light, and in other ways keeps his eyes open to the attractions of his place. Perhaps tables were all going, and so were the four at the Texas House. Two of the tables are for Pharaoh, one for Draw Poker, and the fourth for a game called Studhouse Poker, an improvement in speculative range on the older game which has recently made great headway in Leadville. The Pharaoh tables were most patronized. The banker sits in the middle, under the fierce light of two huge gas-burners. On his right, in a high armchair, sits a man who, in the interests of the proprietor, keeps his eye on the game, and sees that all bets lost to the bank have paid. In the contrary case, it is reckoned that the players may be trusted to see justice done. I visited several gambling dens, and found prevailing everywhere the same quiet, bordering upon dull, melancholy. The proprietors of the gambling dens, like the lessees of the drinking and dancing saloons, were pining for payday. I made the acquaintance of one gambler, who, as far as personal appearance and history went, comes nearer to the realization of Mr. John O'Churst than seemed possible. Born of a well-known Massachusetts family, he had been a gambler, miner, billiard-marker, and some other things not so reputable. Having won and lost several fortunes at cards, he had arrived at the conclusion that the chances are greatly in favour of the bank. He had, accordingly, very early after Pat Wyman began to flourish at the corner shop, set up in business for himself, and has so greatly prospered that he is now building a new saloon, paved, as he mentioned, with pardonable pride, with minton's tiles directly imported. A tall, handsome, dark-eyed, light-hearted man, I suspect he would not hesitate either to shoot or cheat an acquaintance, if direct advantage were to be obtained. But if physiognomy is not wholly deceitful, he looks like a man who would stand by a friend, and be kind to women and children. In these respects, and with the advantage of gentle birth and early education, he is a fair type of the drinking, gambling, shooting, and hard-working men of Leadville. CHAPTER VII THE CITY OF THE SAINTS The traveller entering Salt Lake City by the Denver and Rio Grande Railway has a very charming introduction. The beauty of this wonderful line has faded amid the sandy plains that lie between the green river and grassy trail. Then, in the early morning, the train glides into Utah Valley, with its comfortable little homesteads, tree-embarred and surrounded by grass plots, which excite the marvel and envy of dwellers in the Middle States, who all agree that it is more like Connecticut or Massachusetts than anything they are immediately acquainted with. Children throng about the train with baskets of apples, pears, and grapes, which they offer for sale on the principle of a Dutch auction, the price coming down very low indeed as the train begins to move away. We pass through this valley, with its blue lake on one side, and on the other, a range of hills, deepening from gray to purple, with streaks of blood-red shrubs growing in the fissures, making the hills look as if they had been cut open, and the wound left bleeding. Next comes a little pass in the hills, and the train is running along the Salt Lake Valley, to the left the lake, a streak of blue on the horizon, and to the right, shining in the early morning sun, the city of the saints. It is enough to make good Americans envious of a people whom they on other grounds strongly dislike to find them located in this pleasant, fruitful valley. A nearer acquaintance with the city is not calculated to lessen this feeling. Land was cheap when Brigham Young, a later Moses, led the tribes out of the wilderness. With all his special gifts of prophecy, the successor of Joseph Smith could not foresee what the new city would grow to. But he wisely determined that it should have a fair start, and began by laying out the streets at a width of 128 feet. By these, ever extending till the city now covers an area of nine square miles, were built business places and residences to suit the needs of the growing population. The houses round the outskirts are very prettily built, most frequently of one story, with verandas and gardens. The city is laid out in squares of ten acres, each subdivided into lots of one and a quarter acre. There are abundant trees growing boldly in the middle of the broad sidewalks, and mountain streams gaily raced down by the roadway. These are not trickling streams, but veritable brooks crossed by gangways. Throughout the territory land sells at six and sixpence an acre. Within the city boundaries it must be pretty dear, for Zion is not only beautiful to look upon, but profitable to peddle in, and the saints are, above all things, shrewd men of business. We had the good fortune to arrive at Salt Lake City on Conference Day. These conferences are held twice a year, and are attended by delegates from all the outlying tributaries of the Mormon metropolis. Here was a rare opportunity of seeing not only the city people, but the provincials, otherwise to be obtained only by extended travel. The broad streets were full of them, men, women and children, standing about, staring into the shop windows, or gossiping with old friends and new acquaintances. Bringing no prejudices to the consideration of this interesting settlement, I can honestly say that I never saw in a crowd of ten thousand people so many dull-looking, unintelligent men and women. The latter were atrociously dressed, but it is questionable whether any master of the art could have greatly improved their appearance. It was suggested to the profane mind that women so unattractive, having failed to secure monopoly over husband, had, with the patient resignation of their sex, finally contented themselves with a share. The peculiarity of personal appearance was marked by a little incident of street travel. Standing in Tribune Avenue, a stream of people suddenly issued from a large building, and made their way through the throng already gathered on the sidewalks. It was borne in upon me that it would be necessary to modify the note already taken, that after long and careful survey of a Mormon crowd, whether in the streets or the tabernacle, there was not only not a pretty face among the women, but not one of the women. One otherwise than actually plain. Of this new tributary to the crowd, out of every twenty women there were at least half a dozen pretty faces. They were better dressed, and altogether different in manner, laughing and chatting, and looking generally as if they were glad to be alive. Speaking of this to a resident in the Avenue, he solved the mystery. This was a Gentile crowd coming out of a Gentile theatre, where they had been enjoying a morning performance. Outsiders, like myself, hastily assume that the Mormon city is a city of Mormons. This is a mistake. Out of an estimated population of 27,000, one-fifths are Gentiles, and their number is increasing at least Paris-Pursuit with that of the saints. The Gentiles cannot turn the Mormons out of the valley, which they have made a blooming paradise, but neither can they themselves be kept out, though their incursion and increase are looked upon with jealousy and dislike by the Mormon leaders. It was not altogether unconnected with this matter that Brigham Young had the revelation unfavorable to mining as an occupation. To encourage mining would be to open the door to an influx of Gentiles, a thing by all means to be avoided. But the Gentiles, not being hampered by belief in the divine origin of this revelation, and there being much awe in the neighbourhood, have proceeded to work it and find Salt Lake City convenient headquarters. The only thing that can be done in the circumstances is to stand as far apart as possible, and contiguity of neighbourhood has not lessened the ill-will that has always existed between Mormons and law-abiding Americans. The Tabernacle stands in the centre of the city, broad streets radiating from it to the four points of the compass. It is a curious structure, the like of which was never seen on sea or land. A circumstance explained by the fact that its architectural points were also a divine revelation to Brigham Young. It has a dome-like roof covered with grey wooden tiles. The roof, which is oval in shape, 250 feet long and 150 feet wide, hangs low on 46 stone piers, the interspaces being filled up with doors and windows. The whole affair is strikingly like a prodigious tortoise that has lost its way and is thinking which turn it shall take. This is the summer meeting-house of the Mormons, and has neither means of lighting nor of giving heat. Close at hand is the Winter Church, more ordinary looking as being the work of a human architect. On the other side of the Tabernacle, making with it and the church three sides of an irregular square, the temple is slowly rising. This is a more pretentious building than either of the others. Over two millions of dollars have already been spent upon it, and it is still far from complete, though President Taylor expects it will be finished in the course of two years. Gentiles are permitted to enter the Tabernacle and attend the services, in the hope that some seed falling by the wayside may bear precious fruit. The temple will be kept sacred from all pollution. Only members of the church will pass its portals, and here will be carried on those special administrations, directed in the Book of Doctrine and Covenants, written by the inspired pen of Joseph Smith. The interior of the Tabernacle is plainly furnished with benches. A broad gallery runs round it, and at one end is a raised platform, flanked on either side by galleries chiefly occupied by the choir. Here also is the organ, which in size is equaled only by two others throughout the States, one in Boston and the other in Plymouth Church. It was, an apostle told me, built on the premises to avoid catastrophe in the way of finding it impossible otherwise to get it within the walls. The roof is hung with garlands of evergreens. These did not form part of the original revelation. It was a happy thought, inspired by the occurrence of a Sunday school festival. The decoration so greatly improved the appearance of the vast bear hall that the garlands have been left there, though they are old and withered now. Long before two o'clock the hour named for the afternoon conference, a stream of human population converged upon the Tabernacle, entering by its many doors and speedily flooding the place. When President Taylor took his seat there was not a bench anywhere vacant. A considerable majority of the congregation were women, plain-looking, hard-working, care-worn creatures, evidently glad of the little excitement brought into their dull lives by this festival. Next to the women, perhaps running them pretty close in the matter of numbers, were the children. There was no mistaking their presence. Long before the organ sounded or the choir rose to sing, the babies began, squall answering to squall throughout the vast edifice. Occasionally one choked with howling, and after being vainly beaten on the back and shaken up, was carried out. But two or three were nothing in such a multitude, balling and squealing, and the crowing went on without distinguishable decrease in volume. The proceedings were opened by prayer offered by a rugged-looking elder, who stood by the rostrum with horny hands rigidly uplifted. President Taylor occupied a seat in the back row of benches in the gallery, immediately behind the rostrum. Beside him sat his two councillors, in the row immediately before him with the twelve apostles. Before these were ranged a body of the bishops. Not all, for there is a bishop for every ward, and Salt Lake City alone has twenty-one wards. Prayer over, the organ sounded forth, proving to be as beautiful in tone as it was big in size. The choir sang excellently, and then Wilfred Woodruff appeared at the desk, declaring that he could not let the occasion pass without saying a few words. The words turned out to be many, but their purport lay in narrow compass. We, he said in effect, dwelling in this city of the New Jerusalem, are the chosen people, the sons of God. We go our way living temporarily, chastely and righteously. The world hates us with a bitter hatred, missing no opportunity of striking a blow at us. But what matter? It has ever been thus. The hatred of the world has always pursued the children of God, and it will be so till the end, when our glory and our triumph will come. This, Mr. Woodruff said over and over again in varying phrase, not one of which was successful in eliciting from the audience a movement or sign of sympathy. It would be difficult to imagine anything more commonplace, bold and ineffective than this address, harping on the one string which subsequent speakers touched, to bring out precisely the same tune. Elequence certainly is not one of the gifts, by exercise of which the Mormon leaders hold the people in sway. There were many other addresses delivered at the so-called conference at which all the talk was done by the hierarchy. None rose above the level of Mr. Woodruff's address, and it would not have been easy to fall below it. I particularise this speech because Mr. Woodruff is a notable man. As President of the Twelve Apostles, he is the natural successor of Mr. Taylor in the presidency, and in his hands will rest the principal guidance of the destinies of the people. Nominally the election of a new President rests with the people, in whose hands lie all appointments to office. But when a new President is elected, only one name is submitted, that of the President of the Twelve Apostles. The people may vote no if they please to assume an attitude of open revolt to their spiritual pastors and masters. As a matter of fact they never do, and when President Taylor dies, President Woodruff will reign in his stead, carrying forward in regular course the decline in personal ability, which has marked new presidents since it became necessary to elect a successor to Brigham Young. Mr. Taylor is a man of great shrewdness and sagacity, who would have stood higher in the public estimation if he had not had the misfortune to succeed a consummate statesman like Brigham Young. Born in Westmilland of German family, he came out to the States forty years ago, and was one of those who marched under the leadership of Brigham Young across the Great Plains into the valley of the Salt Lake. He has travelled widely, taking something more than his share of missionary work, laboring in England, France, and all over the United States. Travel has increased his knowledge, widened his sympathies, and made him what is known as a man of the world. That Mr. Woodruff lacks some of the qualities essential to the making of a statesman would appear from the fact that he is now bent upon reviving, and carrying into daily usage, certain super-added principles of the Mormon religion, of which Brigham Young judiciously fought shy, and is, in this respect, imitated by President Taylor. When Joseph Smith was growing old, with digestion weakened and spirits lowered, he had a revelation of the pernicious effects of hot drinks, tobacco, and malt liquor. This, it will be perceived, is a sweeping prohibition, for hot drinks include tea, coffee, and chocolate, beverages with which total abstainers compensate themselves. To enforce obedience to these precepts, would be to imperil the newly founded kingdom. Brigham Young always spoke respectfully of the words of wisdom, as this particular revelation is called, but did not have them written on the posts of his door, or embroidered on the hem of his garment. Neither does President Taylor wise in his generation. But Mr. Woodruff rigidly carries into practice all the instructions to be found in this revelation, which would be no particular matter, only he is insistent that others should do the same, under pain of being denounced as failing in their duty to God. In his address on Conference Day he dragged in this topic, and gave a sly hit at one of the sons of the late Prophet, who, he said, failed in one respect. Whether it is his whiskey cocktail, his cigar, or his hot cup of tea, that Mr. Young find too precious for sacrifice, was not particularised. When Mr. Woodruff had made an end of speaking, Mr. Q. Cannon came forward. This gentleman formally represented the territory in the Congress at Washington, but was not returned at the last election. He is an energetic, ambitious man, understood to be not quite sound on the principle that the President of the Apostles is the natural successor of the President of the Church. Mr. Cannon's duty on this occasion was limited to reading out the list of missionaries, called to go forth and spread among the Gentiles the Gospel of Joseph Smith. This part of the proceedings was summed up in the Gentile local paper the following day by the statement that 81 Mormon tramps are to be let loose next week on the United States and Europe. But a great fact is not to be ignored by a flippant adversary, and it struck me that this brief announcement formed the most striking part of the proceedings. The men who were thus nominated to go forth to the end of the earth and labour among hostile populations were of various ages and occupying diverse positions. They were old and young, married and single, but all sharing in common the necessity of earning their living. If the command laid upon them had also involved the appropriation of a more or less snug salary with expenses paid, it might in some cases have assumed a different aspect. But when men in the Mormon camp are suddenly called upon to leave father and mother, wife and children, business and home, they not only go forth without any provision in the way of monthly or yearly pay, but they pay their own passage money to the scene of their labours and their live as they can. Of course they may decline to go, and there are no means of active compulsion, but probably a man who had been ordered to pack off at a week's notice and who pleaded business or family ties would have a bad time of it among the faithful. President Taylor told me excuses are very rarely offered, and only in extremist cases. The most common response to the command is an assurance that the newly nominated missionary will be ready to start within a week or sooner if it be desired. Most churches have missionaries, but I do not know any church that exclusively has missionaries on these terms. And one that can command a constant supply will always be a power in the world. When Mr. Cannon had fired off his list, the congregation were asked whether they approved it, and whether they would sustain those going forth by faith and prayer. Those who were in the affirmative were asked to hold up their right hand, at which invitation about a third of those present in the church would be asked to hold up at which invitation about a third of those present held up their hand. When the question was put in a contrary sense there were no supporters, so the missionaries were unanimously, if not enthusiastically, nominated. A similarly listless ceremony was gone through when, in accordance with custom at these half-yearly conferences, the whole of the officers from the President downwards had their names submitted for confirmation in office. This is purely a matter of form, designed with the object of tickling the popular palette with the notion that though the President, Apostles and Bishops sit in high places, they do so only at the royal pleasure of the populace. But it is plain to see that this formula contains the seeds of a possible revolution. Nothing has hitherto happened to lead the people seriously to exercise their rights. A name or names have been submitted to them, and having no alternative they have languidly approved. But crises in the history of a nation silently grow, and one may have birth which will see the tabernacle filled with a crowd terribly in earnest. Just before the proceedings commenced, the President, advancing to the desk, firmly proclaimed that silence must be kept. If, he declared with all the weight of apostolic authority, any of the babies cannot be kept quiet, they must be carried out. Hereupon there arose a wail of defiance from the assembled infants in arms, before which the President assumed his seat. It was all very well to say the babies must be carried out, but where to begin? To make a wholesale raid upon them would have had as much appreciable effect as attempting to empty the serpentine with a bucket. Accordingly, in spite of the high authority invoked, the babies, with the exception of the few prematurely choked, remained and wailed, their united voices frequently drowning that of the President of the Apostles, and throughout the whole of his address and of others that followed prevented people beyond the middle of the hall hearing a single consecutive sentence. CHAPTER VIII. The Mormon President at Home Mr. John Taylor, President of the Mormon Church and State, lives in a fine house within a few minutes walk of the Tabernacle. Brigham Young first selected this spot as a residence, living in earlier years in the Lion House immediately opposite. This house is so called because it has a plaster cast of a lion over the porch. It is a very inadequate lion in point of size, but it is big enough to give the house a name, just as the cast of a beehive on the next door serves to name it. Both these houses are occupied by the family of the late prophet. A much larger and showier house over the way in which President Taylor lives is popularly known as the Amelia Palace, the current impression being that it was specially built for Brigham Young's favourite wife. This is, however, a story resolutely denied by high authorities, it being plainly contrary to the spirit of Mormonism that one wife should be exalted above the rest. The Amelia Theory is quietly ignored, and the house that has come to be recognized as the official residence of the President is, or should be, known as Garder House. It is a building of somewhat florid style, but is roomy and convenient. The drawing-room where the President courteously received me is a large double-room facing the road. It had not about it the knick-knacks and careful colouring of an English drawing-room, but it looked very comfortable with a large cold fire burning in an open grate. There were one or two oil paintings on the wall. Foust talking to Marguerite was the somewhat striking subject of one which held the principal place. The President is about seventy years of age, but his tall, powerful figure shows little sign of advancing years. His hair, snow-white, sets off a strong, kindly, and still ruddy face. Like all the officers of the Church, the President has earned his living by the sweat of his brow. Since he was elected to the Presidency, he has, of course, given up his farm, a fixed salary being attached to his office. The tendency to pay officers of the Church appears to increase as the revenues grow fatter. The bishops, formally voluntary workers, now, I understand, receive a small pecuniary acknowledgment of their labours. The revenues of the Church and State are drawn upon very simple principles. The system of tithes has answered all financial purposes in Utah. It is a kind of income tax, at the unvarying rate of two shillings in the pound. Practically, it comes to much more than that, since a tithe is taken not on the net income, but on the gross produce. This seems a little heavy, and a remark dropped by one of the apostles at the conference hinted that tithes were not coming in so readily as they should. Mr. Taylor, however, assures me there is no difficulty in the matter. The tax is not compulsory. No process would issue if it were not forthcoming. But I suspect that, as in the case of the missionary who might turn a deaf ear to the call to foreign parts, things would be made uncommonly hot for the defaulter. The president furnished me with some interesting statistics of the present strength of the Mormon settlement. It consists of one president, eleven apostles, fifty-eight patriarchs, three thousand eight hundred and eighty-five seventies, three thousand one hundred and fifty-three high priests, eleven thousand seven hundred and ninety-four elders, one thousand four hundred and ninety-eight bishops, and four thousand four hundred and nine deacons. As there are only twenty-three thousand one hundred and ninety families, it will be seen that there is about one and a fifth of this agglomeration of dignities to each family. The total number of members is one hundred and twenty-seven thousand two hundred and ninety-four. There are, I was not surprised to hear, not less than thirty-seven thousand seven hundred and fifty-four children under eight years of age, of whom two thousand three hundred and thirty-five have been born within the last six months. During the same period there have been three hundred and thirty-nine marriages. Two thousand three hundred and fifty new members have been admitted within six months, whilst eight hundred and fifty have passed away, showing a decided increase in the strength of the church. Of these absentees eighty-five have been excommunicated, generally as I hear from another and Gentile source, after they have voluntarily withdrawn from membership. On the subject of marriages the President spoke strongly and without reserve. He never used the word polygamy, except with the rider, as the world calls it. Mr. Woodruff, in his address to the conference, also declining to use the obnoxious word, described the practice as the patriarchal order of marriage. The President insisted that it was the order of celestial marriage. He anxiously explained that whilst the world made marriages for time, the Mormons married for eternity. You, Mary, he said, for better or for worse till death do you part. Our marriages made on earth continue in heaven, and man and wife shall live together hereafter as they are joined now. It did not seem to occur to him that this was not a prospect that would recommend itself in all households, but I did not open that view of the question. It is the practice of polygamy which makes Mormonism especially obnoxious in the eyes of the world, and it is on this that the Government of the United States has joined issue with the settlers. An act has been passed declaring that all who lived or have lived in marital relation with more than one person shall forfeit electoral rights. The act was so worded as to strike at both sexes, the intention being to disfranchise Mormons and to get the whole machinery of office in the territory in the hands of the small minority of the Gentiles. After this Mormonism might be harried out of Utah, as it was 37 years ago hounded out of Illinois. For the better carrying out of the purpose, commissioners appointed under the act were sent down to Utah, and prescribed an oath to be administered to all Mormons before they are allowed to vote, requiring them to swear that they were not polygamists. This had the effect of keeping away thousands from the poll, but that had no serious bearing upon the result, since at the last election all the Mormon candidates were carried at the head of the poll by the vote of the one-wived saints. It is to a continuation of this condition of affairs that President Taylor looks to enable him to baffle the efforts of the United States Legislature. If the worst comes to the worst, he said, we shall be able to carry on. Our population is yearly increasing, and we can always keep a sufficient number qualified by the United States law, should it be established as law, to carry everything. But we don't mean to let matters slide as far as that without a good fight. At the present time there are several cases pending in the courts, by which it has been determined to test the legality of the action of the United States. There Edmunds Act, the President said, is expost factor, and I do not know any civilised country where laws are deliberately so made. The United States say that everyone who has entered into marital relations with more than one person shall be disfranchised. Very well. That is a good or a bad law, but in any case it can touch only cases which arise after it has become law. Here there are tens of thousands of men who entered into the state of celestial marriage years before this act was passed. You can't go back on them and find them guilty of doing what was not declared illegal at the time of the act. The commissioners have gone even further. They have imposed an oath as a preliminary to a man or woman voting. But it is against the Constitution of the United States to impose a test oath in respect of the exercise of the franchise. Thus you have the commissioners performing an illegal act under an unconstitutional law. That's a double plea we shall submit, if necessary, to the Supreme Court of the United States. The President spoke with great bitterness of the allegation that the people of the United States were chiefly influenced in this crusade by love of morality. Morality, he urged at some length, was best conserved by the peculiar institution of Mormonism. But look how this test oath works in the cause of morality, he said. There is in this city a gentleman of prominent position and blameless life, who at one time, though now a widower, lived in a state of celestial marriage. His son was appointed registrar of the district, and when this act was passed, he informed his father that he could not conscientiously enter his name on the register. The very same day, a married man living in open adultery applied for registration, and no objection was taken. He, you see, was not living in marital relation with more than one woman. The United States, whilst striking at our marriages, carefully leaves scaseless the man who keeps a mistress. About the same time a notorious woman at the head of her banio applied to be registered, and this moral law placing no bar in the way, it was done. So much for the morality side of the question. The President talks with quiet assurance of the future of Mormonism. The church is increasing in numbers and the state in wealth. There is this cloud which rises over the United States, and is even now bigger than a man's hand. But, the President says, we have always had trouble with the world, and things are not nearly so bad now as they were when the blood of Joseph Smith's cried freshly from the ground, and we, driven out by Christians, went forth beyond the bounds of civilization to found a home and a nation. When I used to go out as a missionary, and tramping through some remote, unfriendly country, did not know where I should get a crust of bread for my supper, or a covered corner in which to lay my head, I used to pray to God, and I always had enough to eat. That is what we do now in this time of trial. The world is against us, but we trust in God. And keep our powder dry, I said, thinking of the skill with which the weak points in the armour of the United States legislature had been picked out for attack. Yes, that is God's will. The President answered, in the grave, quiet tones he had spoken throughout. We shall do our best, and never give up the fight as long as a man remains among us. But it will all be his direction, and with the consciousness that we are pleasing him. I have throughout given the President's views in his own words, but no description could convey a just idea of the quiet assurance and tone of simple confidence with which they were spoken. This Westmill and Yeoman evidently has faith of a kind that removes mountains, and it is in measure shared by all his people. The final struggle with Mormonism upon which the United States are bent is likely to prove a tough one. CHAPTER IX BY THE GOLDEN GATE Grapes at five pence a pound are an early and satisfactory indication that we have left the bare Brown Sierras behind us, and have reached of valley land flowing with milk and honey. Honey is mentioned here only because it belongs to the quotation. I suppose it is made somewhere in the States, but I have not met with it on any table, nor anywhere seen a beehive. But milk is abundant, and of a quality unknown in London. At the roadside station where grapes at five pence a pound were dispensed by a benevolent negro wearing a snowy white apron, milk stood in jugs on a table, in company with most excellent custard and apple tarts, large, flat and round. The milk having been standing half an hour, there was an inch of thick cream at the top, and what followed did not seem to have suffered from this concentration. Five pence a glass was the price of the milk, but that had evidently less reference to its intrinsic value than to the habitude in this neighbourhood of regarding ten cents as the lowest denomination of coin in which it is possible to deal. Everything cost ten cents, the grapes by the pound, the custard and apple pie by the slice, and the milk by the glass. In England, five pence for a glass of milk taken in a country place might be regarded as dear, but in a lordly California it was really a condescension on the part of the benevolent negro and his family to take so small a coin. Two days later in San Francisco one and eight pence was demanded and promptly paid for two glasses of thin milk and two half rolls of plain bread. In truth the United States is the dearest country in the world to travel in. I have made a careful computation and find that a dollar, nominally valued at four shillings, will buy of the necessaries and luxuries of life exactly as much as a shilling will in England. Money is easily made here, wages are high, profits are large, and the country is full of men grown suddenly rich. A dollar here or there is a matter not worth the expenditure of time for its consideration. It is a broad significant fact that a five cent piece, valued Toppins Hapney, is practically the lowest coin current in the States, and that it will sometimes buy for you what a penny would bring in a more effete country. There are, of course, cents, but except to buy stamps and in New York an evening paper you might as well be without them. Where the currency practically begins in everyday life is with the quarter, value one shilling. With these liberally dispensed on the slightest provocation, one can get along comfortably through the little needs and services of the day. Last night, strolling about the town, I stopped to hear a street-hawker, who with leather, lungs, and considerable humour was disposing of his wares. He was selling a parcel of plated jewellery and a pack of cards, the price being half a dollar. During the time I stood by he found at least twenty customers. No hawker in his senses would get up in the streets of London or any other large English town and attempt to sell things which he valued at two shillings. Sixpence would be a pretty high figure for such an audience as he would gather, and a penny a still more popular sum. Yet here in this Californian crowd two shillings were handed up almost as rapidly as he could pocket them. This is all very well for the Californians, but for slow-witted Englishmen a too rapid succession of experiences is apt to stun. An English gentleman in the city took his wife for a walk in the Chinese quarter. In a neat little cafe the lady drank a cup of tea, for which one dollar was demanded. After this the gentleman thought he would have his hair cut. On returning to his hotel he sent for the barber, who cut his hair, shaved, shampooed him, and charged him two dollars and a half. It is true that in this case the gentleman was what the late Mr. G.P.R. James was wont to call a belted earl, but making due allowance for that fact, ten and sixpence for cutting and shaving seems dear. San Francisco has sewn its wild oats of forty-nine, and is now one of the most staid cities in the States. The newspapers are quite tame, as compared with the smaller sheets published east. For days and even weeks there has been no shooting, nor even any holding up. On the day of my arrival I had what promised to be an opportunity of being present at a shooting-match, a domestic institution which had hitherto eluded personal observation. Like Mr. Charles Russell, who in his journeying over the States has been just outside of four railway accidents, I have been just too soon or too late for shootings. Whether retail in drinking saloons or wholesale in railway cars boarded in the dead of the night, here was a chance not to be missed. The two men, standing in the crowded streets, glared into each other's eyes like wild beasts. They cursed and swore and threatened, and then, just where the pistol should have come in, one doubled his fist, and in common place English-fashioned knocked the other down. That was scarcely worth travelling six thousand miles to sea, and must have spoken sadly to some veterans of the deterioration of the famous old mining camp. The star of mining empire has moved north and east. Montana and Colorado now take the place that California once held in the mining world. There are still rich minds in the State, though their names are not known in the English market. When we get a find, a Californian said to me with engaging frankness, I guess we keep it and work it ourselves. The good-looking bogus mind does just as well for export. On one of the spurs of the Sierra Nevada above Sacramento, gold mining of curious fashion is visibly in progress. The rocks are not worth approaching in regular mining fashion. There is gold in them, but it must be got cheaply to pay, so the miners can void the mountain streams, condense their force into hoses, and bringing these to bear on the mountain sides, literally wash away the rock. You can see it as you pass on the railway, grey or rich red according to the formation of the stone, but everywhere with a curiously pained, surprised air, as of an old gentleman who has had his weak suddenly and unaccountably snatched off, disclosing bare places. Of course, the aspect of the country is ruined wherever it has been played upon by this titanic hose. Worse still from a practical point of view, the debris washing down is filling up the Sacramento River and making the people of Sacramento exceeding wild. What business have you up there? They angrily ask the miners. What are you doing down there? The miners carelessly reply. The question of right has been referred to a court of law and a very knotty question it will prove for the judges. The old miners of 49 who wore flannel shirts, boots innocent of blacking and pistols always loaded, have departed from San Francisco as completely as the Dutch have died out from New York, but their successors are as ready, as capable and as enterprising. There are some giants of finance and engineering who dwell in palaces at San Francisco, all self-made men, and in the first generation honestly proud of this distinction. The coming generation, born into their inheritance, are steadily and determinately striding into other grooves, wherein their sons and daughters will carelessly slide, kid-gloved, with dresses from Paris, coats and boots from England, and with some secrets scorn for the rough-handed, hard-headed men who founded their fortunes, and for the stout dames their grandmothers who took in washing. If there were an American Mr Smiles, he would find in San Francisco stirring material for fresh volumes illustrative of self-help. The history of the making of the Central Pacific Railroad has yet to be told. It would be difficult to find a story fuller of pluck and skill, of successful battling with apparently insuperable obstacles human and divine. The career of Mr Crocker supplies a narrative which is the story of half a dozen of the richest men in California. He began life, and to his great honor is not cherry of the reminiscence, as a laborer in a mine, marrying in his own station of life. When opportunity came, he seized it by the hair with both hands, and, beginning to prosper in small ways, went on to greater deeds, till to-day he is a tenfold millionaire, ranking high even in the scale of California. Working in conjunction with four or five men of his own standing, they control all the public works and possibilities of making money in the state. They build railways, found steamship lines, work mines, own banks, and monopolize financial transactions in which they add to their millions, whilst the public is more or less well satisfied with its bargain. If they chose to fight each other there would be a struggle worthy of the gods and the public would benefit. They know better than that. They join their forces and pool their earnings. The English reader of American newspapers will constantly find references to some man or some combination obtaining a control of a railway system, a bank, or some commercial undertaking or public concern. The millionaires of San Francisco, working amicably in the task of milking of the common cow, have obtained the control of everything within reach in the state. People grumble, but what can they do? The combination is perfectly legal, though it has some awkward resemblance to a knockout at an auction. It is open for an outsider to bid and the highest bidder buys, but it would be hard to compete with a millionaire. It is hopeless to cope with half a dozen making common cause and opening a common purse. They are not only rich, but they retain the sagacity and the boldness that made them rich, and their purse apart they would be tough customers to deal with. Their latest feat in a local way dealt with the street tramways that are the wonder and the pride of San Francisco. Watching their time, they swept down on the market street route. They bought it up with a check for one million eight hundred thousand dollars. Now they have floated on a trustful public, bonds for three million, showing on this single transaction a profit of one million two hundred thousand dollars. The system of street tramways in vogue here seems to me to solve the question of motive power for this kind of traction. Recent experiments with a view to introduce the cable cars in the Highgate Road have made Halliday's system, partially at least, known in London. San Francisco is its birthplace, and here it is working with the greatest ease and the fullest measure of public benefit. The suburbs of San Francisco stretch themselves over steep hills, which it would seem were inaccessible by ordinary modes of locomotion, but land grew increasingly dear in the neighbourhood of the city. These hills once clambered are salubrious and afford splendid views. They were accordingly built upon, and men and horses laboriously crawled up the heights. Necessity here proved the mother of invention, and as there was in existence no convenient way of getting up these terrible stairs, the cable street tram had its birth. There is something eerie at first sight of these heavily laden cars running up a grade of one in five at the rate of seven miles an hour, and without any visible means of propulsion. There is neither smoke of engine nor clatter of horse-hoof on the highway. At a central spot the steam engine hauls on the endless cable. The cable itself is buried underneath the track along which the trams pass, and only careful inspection can guess at any means of communication between it and the car. As far as the public, who pay their tuppence hape me for a ride, are concerned, there is nothing but a comfortably seated car moving smoothly along iron rails, faster than a handsome cab, which can be pulled up to a dead stop in half the space of time required by an ordinary tram, and which will go uphill or downdale with equal facility. The original cost of the machinery is considerable, but it is also the last, there being no charges for horse renewals and very few for road maintenance. I was told that the cable cars here earn a ten percent dividend and judiciously pay eight, whilst with the advance of civilisation and the effacement of the rough pioneers by the new generation who ape the manners of London society, many of the former characteristics of San Francisco have disappeared, the city retains a notable one in the matter of earthquakes. Having peacefully gone to bed at midnight, we were awakened an hour later by an unmistakable shaking of the gigantic structure known as the Palace Hotel. The building rocked in a painfully distinct manner as if the God Thor, walking past to take his early bath in the Pacific, had placed his hand on the corners of the roof and playfully shaken the house. There are various estimates of the duration of the shock. To my mind, the impression conveyed was that it lasted whilst you could count ten and that it ceased as suddenly and as absolutely as it had commenced. There was a distinct movement outward of the building, a fierce rattling of the windows, a rushing noise in the air, then the house settled back, the rattling ceased, the stillness of the night resumed its sway, and everything was as if the earthquake had not been. One other strange matter was the unhesitating certainty with which strangers wholly unfamiliar with the phenomenon knew what it was. You may take your first terrapin without knowledge or suspicion that you have entered upon a new and distinct phase of gastronomy, but there's no mistaking your first earthquake. It being one of the few matters in which knowledge comes without experience. Society in San Francisco, as far as I was privileged to mix in it, is of a hearty, hospitable order. The older, simpler habits of the pioneers leavening the affectations of the younger branches of the family, who, after the discovery of the bonanza or other big boom, went off to visit London and the city they call Parres. I noted the disappearance of those titles which formally indicated the yearning of the Republican mind for social distinction. In all San Francisco I did not meet a single judge and only one colonel. This was a bullet-headed young man, with a moustache inadequate for military training, who was noteworthy in other ways as a type of the new social birth now in steady progress in San Francisco. The colonel is a well-meaning, smart young fellow, with a keen eye to business. Ludicrous only in the thirst for some means of presenting himself to the public other than as plain mister, who goes down to an office, sits on a stool, and looks after railways, mines, and common workaday things of that kind. It would be hard to give up this occupation since it brings in dollars by the thousand and sometimes by the half million. But out of office hours it would be nice to wear tight trousers and a coat of military-cut, and to strut about as nearly as possible in the style of the officers up on the reservation. So one morning, by some mysterious birth process, Colonel Blank was introduced to San Francisco, which receives him with good-natured laughter and kindest forbearance of the little foieble. As wealth grows, this type flourishes, and thus an aristocracy grows up, out of the rank, luxury made possible by the labour and inspiration of the men who came here any time during the last thirty-five years, with all their worldly goods in their wallet. As yet no great harm is done. San Francisco is still too practical and too busy money-making to be seriously influenced by the Colonel type. It is too busy even to drive with great regularity through the park, out to the beach, or round through the military reservation, which is a pity for there are few cities, whether in the old world or the new, that have a fairer possession. The reservation is an enclosed track of ground open to the public, and much frequented, since the roads are in excellent condition and skillfully graded. When we drove through, a gang of military prisoners were at work, surrounded by a cordon of watchful sentries, musket on shoulder. The officer's quarters are very prettily situated, forming rows of rustic cottages, with bright flower gardens and trimly-kept lawns of freshest green. These oases of green lawn are very striking. At this season of the year, trees and vegetation alike are at their utmost gasp for existence. It is months since rain fell, and what were green fields in the spring are now bare patches of brown earth, with here and there hapless tufts of haze showing themselves. It is hard to believe, looking down a far-reaching stretch of brown scorched earth, that in the spring this is a bank bright with lupin and other wild flowers. But such is the case, and so will it be again when the rain comes. In the officer's quarters, and by all the magnificent houses on Nobbs Hill and in Van Ness Avenue, the lawns are kept ever green by a pretty and useful device, which though not unknown is not common in England. This is a movable fountain, consisting of an upright iron pipe, fed by an India rubber hose. At the top there is a horizontal arrangement of small pipes, perforated after the manner of a rose in a water can. These revolve with the force of the water projected through them, and diffuse a fine soft shower of rain. When one section of the lawn is sufficiently watered, the fountain is moved to another. It can be lifted with one hand, so the rain is always falling and the grass ever blooming. The park was originally a waste of sandhills. Outside it the sandhills reassert their supremacy, and lead down to the sea by rich masses of yellows and brown. It is a favourite expedition both for strangers and citizens to drive out to cliff-home and watch the seals playing on the rocks. They are always there, floundering up or slipping off with a plunge into the cool depths, and incessantly grunting. There is one obituary of vast proportions, in whom popular fancy traces resemblance to General Butler. As we sat and watched, a fisherman's boat slowly paddled past the cluster of brown rocks, and with excited cries the seals slid off into the sea. It was pretty to see old Ben Butler slightly turning his stupendous carcass, so as to bring his weather-eye to bear upon the cause of the disturbance. When he saw what it was, he gave a little grunt, settled himself in a more comfortable position, and lazily watched the flutter among the younger members of the community. Beyond the grunt, Ben offered no remark audible on shore. But when he resettled himself, others, preparing to move, resumed their places, and some of those excitedly swimming round the edge of the rocks, returned reassured. It was evident that on the rock in the far west, as in Massachusetts in the far east, there was a general impression that Ben Butler might be safely trusted to look after himself. All day whilst the sun shines the seals play here. To the north stands Tamil Pius, with wreaths and white mist at its feet, and its head clothed in purple and golden brown, reaching far up in the blue sky. By here stands the Golden Gate, and beyond it the Pacific, breaking in white surf on the shore to the southward, and to the westward, nothing between us and Asia but a wilderness of blue water. End of Chapter 9 Chapter 10 The Labour Question The question of labour, always a pressing one in the United States, is just now accentuated in California and the bordering states, which have been accustomed to look for service to the Chinese. For twenty-five years the Chinese have flooded California, and have been principal and indispensable factors in its rapid prosperity. Without the Chinese, California would be ten years behind the stage it has now reached. These smug-faced, pigtailed immigrants have built the railways, made the roads, laboured in the mines, nursed the babies, and washed the clothes for California. It is in the character of Washerman that the Chinaman is most familiar to cursory information in England, but there is nothing he cannot do. His faculty and facility for labour are immeasurable, and whatever he does he accomplishes with the thoroughness that comes of patient industry. It is not difficult to understand how the presence of such a class should be distasteful to the Western working man. Even if the competition were on even terms, it would be hard to fight against this dexterous, industrious class. But the Chinaman has an enormous advantage over the ordinary labourer, whether of English, Irish, German, or American birth. The Western man must have his three stout meals a day, with corresponding proportion of drink. The Chinaman can live on food, the cost of which is almost literally infinitesimal. A bowl of rice, a square inch or two of dried fish, with, on the birthday of Confucius or some other gala day, a sausage, fearfully and wonderfully made, suffice to meet his needs in the way of solid food, whilst a bowl of the water in which the rice has been boiled, or a panicking of tea, taken without sugar or milk, comes up to his notion of what is necessary in the way of liquor. The ultimate basis of the rate of wages is the expenditure at which a man can support life. With a Chinaman, this is a sliding scale, reducible almost to the vanishing point. If the Western workman can live upon a dollar a day, the Chinaman will manage on fifty cents. If, in hard times, the Western workman drops down to three shillings, the Chinaman grows fat on eighteen pence, and as he can flourish on six pence a day, it is evident the Western workman has no chance in the competition. This is a condition of affairs which has for twenty years agitated California. It always came up at election times, and the Western working man, the small shopkeepers who live by him and whatever class could be influenced by him and them, sank all political questions in this social one, marching together under a banner on which was written, The Chinaman Must Go. There came a time when some shrewd politicians, seeing their opportunity, presented themselves as leaders of this noisy crusade, and a bill was triumphant they carried through Congress, closing the Golden Gate against the Chinaman. In a republic whose watch word is liberty and equality, a law was passed declaring that for ten years no Chinaman should enter the United States. This was little more than a year ago, and already the shoe is beginning to pinch. The import of Chinaman was not so overwhelming as would appear upon the face of it. There were always two streams flowing, one inward and the other outward. The Chinaman had no abiding city in California. It was a kind of El Dorado, where wages at the rate of thirty dollars a month were to be picked up with incredible margin for savings. When these accumulated to the extent of from three hundred to five hundred dollars, the wanderer's heart, untrammeled, fondly turned to home, and the Chinaman went back. This is a process still going on, but with an important variation of conditions. The drain of homeward bound Chinaman continues, and there are none coming in. The Californians are big men and can do great things, but they cannot successfully war against the principles of political economy. Having stopped the supply, the natural growth of demand increases, and the consequence is that the Chinese remaining in California are becoming masters of the situation. There was always employment and despair whilst the labor market was constantly supplied by fresh drafts from Hong Kong. Still, if a Chinaman was not found suitable, or if he demanded too high wages, there were others to be had. Now there are not, and the situation is every month growing more strained. The fortunate Chinaman who found themselves in California at the time the prohibition of immigration was decreed are fully alive to the personal advantages secured for them. They are raising their demand for wages, and are forming amongst themselves an association akin to the English trade unions, through which by the agency of strikes they can absolutely control the labor market. It is clear that employers of labor of all grades, from those who engage one or two domestic servants to the firms who have thousands of men on their wage list, will be heavily taxed. But there is something even worse behind, and that is the absolute impossibility of getting labor at any price. The Central Pacific Railway, to mention one illustration which has come under my personal observation, are extending their system northward to Oregon. When this was projected, they naturally looked to the Chinese for the services already performed in the matter of their main line. In the meantime this notable piece of legislation is accomplished and the prospect before the company is dismally blank. We want labor, one of the directors said to me in despairing tones, and it's not here. Thirty dollars a month and bored is the ordinary rate of wages paid for railway work. That was pretty well, seeing that a man might save nearly every penny. But in vain is it now cried aloud in the marketplace, and since the works must be completed, no one can say to what lengths the organised demand of the shrewd Chinese may not go. Here is a copy, in all except the large type and the notes of admiration, of a supplicatory appeal spread broadcast through Denver at the time I was there. I took it off a bundle tied to a street lamp post. Wanted. Five hundred laborers for the Denver and Southern Pacific Railroad at Leadville. Wages. Two dollars twenty-five cents a day. Bored five dollars a week. Nice new camp. Good places to sleep and good board. The contractors are one of the oldest and best firms in the country, and their camps are first class in every particular. Pay cash, no discount on time checks. Free transportation to the work. Be at the Union Depot baggage room with your blankets at seven this evening. It has come to this already, that nine shillings a day is offered to railway navies, with liberal arrangements for boarding them at the rate of about two shillings and tenpence a day. But the bait drew only a few score men, and is hanging out again in Denver and other approaches to Leadville. Whilst the exclusion bill was being forced through Congress, its supporters urged that if only the Chinese were dispossessed, then the honest, downtrodden, Western workmen would lift up his head. Justice would be done, and all would be well. But the European workmen has never in the past been numerically equal to the needs of the robust and lusty West, and he will not be so in any visible future. It is the Chinese who have made California, as the insignificant insect builds up the coral reef. And it is as if the future growth and advance of the structure had been sagaciously promoted by stamping out the insects. You've heard of the man who cut off his nose to spite his face, asked the despairing director of the Central Pacific. Well, I guess he lives in California. Labor was dear enough throughout the states before prices in the West received this extraordinary impetus. The English employer would be aghast at the wages paid for all kinds of labor, skilled or otherwise. To mention the class which will appeal to the widest range of sympathies, what does the English matron think of paying 14 shillings a week for a so-called housemaid, and 16 shillings for a self-styled cook admittedly plain? £40 a year is by no means extravagant for a good cook, and is not infrequently paid in London. But there are cooks and cooks, and the average kind who here draw this sum in ordinary households in New York and Boston, is generally the Irish woman who in English towns would go as sole servant in small households at wages averaging from £12 to £16 a year. Of the general character of domestic servants, better known as helps in this country, some idea will be gathered from mention of the fact, possibly by no means uncommon, that a lady friend in San Francisco told me she had had 18 servants in a month. One other straw which shows the way the wind blow is indicated in the advertisements of servants out of situations. The servant question is sore enough with us, but at least a cook or housemaid advertising for a place will condescend to call upon the employer. Here, when Mary Ann advertises for a place, she invariably closes her announcement with the curtain junction, call at Blank Street between such and such hours. There, seated in her room, at the hour most convenient to herself, Mary Ann will look at her proposed mistress, and sometimes, if in the humour, will engage herself. I have been much struck in travelling about to find electroplated knives provided for cutting or, to be more exact, for tearing meat at meals. The reason, when discovered, is very simple. Steel knives want constant and laborious cleaning on the board or with a machine, and the help declines to clean them, just as she imperatively refuses to polish boots. Electroplated knives are a little disappointing with a beef steak or a chop, but they are easily cleaned, and so we have them. The question of Sunday out, discussed on pretty equal terms in England, is settled on simple principles by the American help. He or she goes out when he or she pleases, and sometimes does not come back. The other night, a stranger called upon one of the magnets of Menlo Park with a letter of introduction. Dinner was just over, but the hospitable Californian insisted upon having a meal served for the newcomer. Presently a hitch arose. The butler, who had been around a few minutes before, had disappeared, and nothing was heard of him till the next day, when he sent for his clothes. He was a man of orderly habit, accustomed and willing to attend at one dinner per evening, but when it came to two, the second suddenly sprung upon him. He felt he could not sanction by his presence, so gross an outrage upon principle. So he put on his hat, drew on his gloves, and went his way. Looking down the column of a daily paper where female help is wanted, I find two waitresses wanted for a country hotel, one at £60, and the other at £72 a year. Two Protestant chambermaids for a first-class private family, wages offered £60 a year. A French or Scandinavian cook, £84, a general servant, £72. German cooks are worth £72, French nurses £60, whilst a firm advertises boldly for a hundred general servants, offering wages from £60 to £72 a year. These figures speak more eloquently than a chapter of explanation. They show that the domestic servant here has the whip hand, and the Chinese Exclusion Act has added another song to the whip. One class of employers upon whom the labour famine tells with fatal results is the proprietor, large or small, of vineyards and fruit farms. These last are a marvel to the Englishman, accustomed to the orchards of Herefordshire, Devonshire or the gardens of Kent. Just before reaching Oakland on the way to San Francisco, the train passes a fruit farm which seems miles in length, and is certainly many acres. Though the scale is gigantic, everything is as trim as an English orchard. The trees are all planted in far-reaching avenues, and the grass is kept closely cropped. This farm grows peaches by the million, and there comes a time when the fruit must be gathered or spoiled. It is the same in the vineyards, and between the two there springs up in the autumn an urgent cry for labour, which has hitherto been pretty fairly met by the Chinese. Now this source of supply is cut off, and the proprietors are in despair. Many of them, taking a look ahead, are already disposing of their property. They know that the tendency of things is to grow worse rather than better, and they are clearing out whilst there is yet a market for what has hitherto been amongst the best-paying property in the state. Some autumn, perhaps next year, there will be a great crop of fruit and no one to gather it, which will mean ruin for the proprietors. It would be a fatal mistake for the British workmen to suppose that these high wages mean the full measure of competence that appears on the face of them. As far as domestic servants are concerned, they are discounted only by the enhanced price of clothing. But for the ordinary working man who has to keep himself and his family, the difference between his lot and that of his English brother, who earns fewer shillings a week, is not great. Everything is dearer, house rent, clothing, and most of the necessaries of life. It is said that food is cheaper than in England, and it is difficult to imagine how meat and flour can cost as much to the American working man when America is one of the great sources of supply for Great Britain. Doubtless in some of the central and western states, meat is bought cheaper for the household than in rural districts in England. But taking New York as the largest centre of population, and comparing it with London, Liverpool, Manchester, and other hives of working man life, it is not so. I had the opportunity of making inquiries of the managers of two large households, one in Brooklyn and the other in New Jersey, and found the prices of butch's meat almost identical with those paid in a London household. In New Jersey, mutton was a little cheaper, but by way of compensation vegetables were considerably dearer. For example, a cauliflower which would cost six pence in London was not to be purchased in Brooklyn under a shilling. The reason for this in this particular neighbourhood was the same that prevails all over the States. Labour is dear, and as it costs nearly twice as much to grow a cauliflower in the neighbourhood of New Jersey as it does in the market gardens round London, cauliflower's are doubled in price. Here we get into the vicious circle through which domestic life moves in the United States. Labour is dear, because the labourer, when he takes his money to market, finds that a shilling will not buy more than eight pence, or in some transactions six pence, will in free trade England. The articles that Labour produces are dear, because the labourer must have the difference made up to him in cash. It is like taking money out of one pocket and putting it in the other, reversing the unprofitable process and pursuing it indefinitely. The only class who make a clear gain are the manufacturers, and they grumble because they have to pay the higher wages created by the artificial restraint of protection. The great school of free trade in the United States is the Custom House at New York. If it were possible for the whole population of the States to pass through the institution in a single year, and to remain in the frame of mind in which they leave it, protection would be hustled out of the country within twelve months. When a man comes to pay thirty-three percent duty on a supply of clothing or boots that he has brought from England, he begins to doubt the soundness of protection. Things are made badly and priced exorbitantly in America because the manufacturer has the consumer in a corner. He must either buy his goods, go without, or import them from Europe, paying the heavy fine imposed at the Custom House. It is a bitter reflection on American manufacturers, and a striking commentary on the working of a system of arbitrary restriction of competition, that whenever an American gets the chance, he adopts the last course. A fellow passenger on the Britannic brought with him for a relative, a well-known senator, and stout champion of protection, six pairs of boots, for which he had paid the fancy price of two pounds ten chilings a pair. To this was added a customs impost of one third, and yet the senator found it worthwhile to buy his boots in London, and comfortably and stoutly shod will in the coming presidential campaign angrily denounce three traders, and eloquently plead for the protection of American manufacturers. Another passenger had made a pilgrimage to Coventry, ordered a bicycle, paid freight and customs duty, and found the bargain better than anything he could do in the United States. The keeper of a gambling-house at Leadville, the same who boasted of his tiles imported from Minterns, told me he had a pair of riding breeches made in England. These lasted him five years. Giving out fourteen months ago, he bought another pair of American manufacture which were already worn out, and he was wondering how he could get a fresh supply from England. Advocates of protection admit all this, but see in it only a fresh argument against free trade. If we abolish protection, they say, our manufacturers must shut up, they cannot compete with England. Our manufacturers would all go bankrupt, and we should be driven to rely entirely upon agriculture. There are some Americans who take another view, and believe that if free trade were adopted the cost of living would decrease, the demand for wages would have a corresponding fall, and the American manufacturer no longer pampered and having cheap labour at his command would go in for making the best and cheapest article and would succeed. But this class is in the minority, and the era of free trade in the United States is still a far off. End of chapter 10