ruck him; He could impress
both his old partner and the upstarts at the window; he would put in the
name of the latest "swell" hotel in San Francisco, said to be a fairy
dream of opulence. He added "The Oriental," and without folding the
paper shoved it in the window.

"Don't you want an envelope?" asked the clerk.

"Put a stamp on the corner of it," responded Uncle Billy, laying down a
coin, "and she'll go through." The clerk smiled, but affixed the stamp,
and Uncle Billy turned away.

But it was a short-lived triumph. The disappointment at finding Uncle
Jim's address conveyed no idea of his habitation seemed to remove him
farther away, and lose his identity in the great city. Besides, he must
now make good his own address, and seek rooms at the Oriental. He went
thither. The furniture and decorations, even in these early days of
hotel-building in San Francisco, were extravagant and over-strained,
and Uncle Billy felt lost and lonely in his strange surroundings. But
he took a handsome suite of rooms, paid for them in advance on the spot,
and then, half frightened, walked out of them to ramble vaguely through
the city in the feverish hope of meeting his old partner. At night his
inquietude increased; he could not face the long row of tables in the
pillared dining-room, filled with smartly dressed men and women;
he evaded his bedroom, with its brocaded satin chairs and its gilt
bedstead, and fled to his modest lodgings at the Good Cheer House, and
appeased his hunger at its cheap restaurant, in the company of retired
miners and freshly arrived Eastern emigrants. Two or three days passed
thus in this quaint double existence. Three or four times a day he would
enter the gorgeous Oriental with affected ease and carelessness, demand
his key from the hotel-clerk, ask for the letter that did not come, go
to his room, gaze vaguely from his window on the passing crowd below for
the partner he could not find, and then return to the Good Cheer House
for rest and sustenance. On the fourth day he received a short note
from Uncle Jim; it was couched in his usual sanguine but brief and
businesslike style. He was very sorry, but important and profitable
business took him out of town, but he trusted to return soon and welcome
his old partner. He was also, for the first time, jocose, and hoped
that Uncle Billy would not "see all the sights" before he, Uncle Jim,
returned. Disappointing as this procrastination was to Uncle Billy, a
gle