t was called, remained.

By the newcomers men were cursed for spreading abroad tales of beach
mining of the year before, but this was unjust, for conditions were not
the same. The waters bringing the gold to the beach could not, in one
season, replenish and leave the sands as rich as they had been after
long years, perhaps ages of action, and blame could not rightly be
attached to any one. Almost without exception, the men who did the
cursing were the men who had never been hard workers, and did not intend
to be, and so, after becoming satisfied that the nuggets were not there
to be simply picked up and pocketed, they turned, looked backward, and
went home. It was well for the new camp that they did.

There was also much trouble over real estate. Land was very high in
price. Some Swedes, who, the year before, had paid seven hundred dollars
for a town lot three hundred by fifty feet in size, now sold one-half of
it for ten thousand dollars. It is small wonder, then, where "possession
is nine points of the law" that men who rightfully claimed ground were
ready to fight to keep it, and those who were wrongfully in possession
many times stood guard with firearms.

In pitching our tents upon the sandy beach, especially after gaining
permission of the old captain who told us we would be in the street if
ever a street should be opened through on the Sandspit, but that was not
likely, and he had given us his full and free consent to our camping
temporarily there next his lots, we expected to have no trouble. Here we
miscalculated. Though the captain was kind and reasonable, he had a
partner who was just the reverse, and this person gave us infinite
trouble.

Scarcely had our first load of baggage been put upon the ground when he
began to tramp fussily about at all times of day and night. After our
stakes were driven he would come quietly in the night and pull them up,
so we would find our canvas flapping in the morning breeze when we
waked. Or, after we had retired for the night, he would come with some
other, stand within hearing distance, and threaten us if we did not move
away.

One morning, upon rising, we found that he had moved a long carpenter's
bench directly upon the spot next madam's tent, which I was trying to
reserve for my own tent as soon as I succeeded in getting my things from
the steamer. This disappointed me much, but I said nothing; and when my
tent finally came I pitched it on the other side, with my do