y often make sacrifices to them, and celebrate
anniversaries of the dead with dancing and feasting. The Chinese feast
their dead at regular intervals, and carry them thousands of miles
across the ocean from foreign countries to rest in their own land at
last. The Manitous (ruling spirits) of earth, air, and water, with the
Indians, are, in some respects, like the Shin of the Chinese,--spirits
that inhabit all nature; but the Shin are inferior deities, not having
much power, being employed rather as detectives,--as the kitchen god, or
hearth spirit, who at the end of the year reports the conduct of the
family to Shang-te, the God of Heaven. Both races are firm believers in
the power and efficacy of charms: the Chinaman, in his green-jade
bracelet, is demon-proof; the Indian warrior, in a white wolf-skin,
rides to certain victory. Both are excessively superstitious,
considering that the ruling spirits are sometimes friendly, sometimes
hostile; and feel it necessary, in all the commonest acts of their
lives, to be constantly on the watch to guard against malign
influences,--attributing great power for harm to the spirits of the
dead. An Indian, like a Chinaman, will frequently abandon his lodge,
thinking some dead relative whom he has offended has discovered him
there. He is afraid to speak the name of any one who is dead, and often
changes his own name, that the dead person, not hearing the old name
spoken, may not so readily find him. Indians and Chinese are alike in
the habit of changing their names, having one for youth, another for
manhood, and a third for old age; taking new names many times in the
course of their lives,--as after any great event or performance.

They resemble each other in their infatuation for gambling,--a Chinaman,
after all his possessions have been staked and lost, sometimes selling
himself for a term of years, to keep up the game; or an Indian gambling
away a hand, an arm, a leg, and so on, and at last the head, until the
whole body is lost at the play, and then he goes into perpetual slavery.
The Indians will sometimes gamble away their children, though they are
usually very fond of them,--the typical "bad Indian" with them being one
who is cowardly, or who neglects his children.

XV.

Chun Fa's Funeral.--Alameda.--Gophers and Lizards.--Poison
Oak.--Sturdy Trees.--Baby Lizards.--Old Alameda.--Emperor
Norton.--California Generosity.--The Dead Newsboy.--Anniversary of