uce and trim, and
beautifully made, setting off his spare and active figure, which, though
he was sixty-two years of age, seemed always to be ready for a game of
leap-frog.

We were three days out of the Golden Gate, and the hills of the coast
ridge were faint and small, and the spires of the lower Nevada could
only be caught when the hot haze lifted; and every body lay about in our
ship where it seemed to afford the least smell and heat, and nobody
for a moment dreamed--for we really all were dreaming--of any body with
energy enough to be disturbed about any thing, when Major Hockin burst
in upon us all (who were trying not to be red-hot in the feeble shade
of poop awnings), leading by the hand an ancient woman, scarcely dressed
with decency, and howling in a tone very sad to hear.

"This lady has been robbed!" cried the Major; "robbed, not fifteen feet
below us. Robbed, ladies and gentlemen, of the most cherished treasures
of her life, the portrait of her only son, the savings of a life of
honest toil, her poor dead husband's tobacco-box, and a fine cut of
Colorado cheese."

"Ten pounds and a quarter, gospel true!" cried the poor woman, wringing
her hands, and searching for any kind face among us.

"Go to the captain," muttered one sleepy gentleman. "Go to the devil,"
said another sleepy man: "what have we to do with it?"

"I will neither go to the captain," replied the Major, very distinctly,
"nor yet to the devil, as a fellow who is not a man has dared to suggest
to me--"

"All tied in my own pocket-handkerchief!" the poor old woman began to
scream; "the one with the three-cornered spots upon 'un. Only two have
I ever owned in all my life, and this was the very best of 'em. Oh dear!
oh dear! that ever I should come to this exposing of my things!"

"Madam, you shall have justice done, as sure as my name is Hockin.
Gentlemen and ladies, if you are not all asleep, how would you like to
be treated so? Because the weather is a trifle warm, there you lie like
a parcel of Mexicans. If any body picked your pockets, would you have
life enough to roll over?"

"I don't think I should," said a fat young Briton, with a very
good-natured face; "but for a poor woman I can stand upright. Major
Hockin, here is a guinea for her. Perhaps more of us will give a
trifle."

"Well done!" cried the Major; "but not so much as that. Let us first
ascertain all the rights of the case. Perhaps half a crown apiece would
reach it."