rust may be gathered from the fact that the property left in
their charge has not only been secured and protected, but increased a
hundredfold in value; and that the young lady, who yesterday attained
her majority, is not only one of the richest landed heiresses on the
Pacific Slope, but one of the most accomplished and thoroughly educated
of her sex. It is now no secret that this favored child of Chrysopolis
is the Dona Maria Concepcion de Arguello de la Yerba Buena, so called
from her ancestral property on the island, now owned by the Federal
government. But it is an affecting and poetic tribute to the parent of
her adoption that she has preferred to pass under the old, quaintly
typical name of the city, and has been known to her friends simply as
'Miss Yerba Buena.' It is a no less pleasant and suggestive
circumstance that our 'youngest senator,' the Honorable Paul Hathaway,
formerly private secretary to Mayor Hammersley, is one of the original
unofficial trustees; while the chivalry of the older days is
perpetuated in the person of Colonel Harry Pendleton, the remaining
trustee."

As soon as he had finished, Paul took a pencil and crossed out the last
sentence; but instead of laying the proof aside, or returning it to the
waiting secretary, he remained with it in his hand, his silent, set
face turned towards the window. Whether the merely human secretary was
tired of waiting, or the devoted partisan saw something on his young
chief's face that disturbed him, he turned to Paul with that
exaggerated respect which his functions as secretary had grafted upon
his affection for his old associate, and said:--

"I hope nothing's wrong, sir. Not another of those scurrilous attacks
on you for putting that bill through to relieve Colonel Pendleton? Yet
it was a risky thing for you, sir."

Paul started, recovered himself as if from some remote abstraction,
and, with a smile, said: "No,--nothing. Quite the reverse. Write to
Mr. Slate, thank him, and say that it will do very well--with the
exception of the lines I have marked out. Then bring me the letter,
and I will add this inclosure. Did you call on Colonel Pendleton?"

"Yes, sir. He was at Santa Clara, and had not yet returned,--at least,
that's what that dandy nigger of his told me. The airs and graces that
that creature puts on since the colonel's affairs have been
straightened out is a little too much for a white man to stand. Why,
sir! d--d if he didn't w