.
The ground was for a while the floor; yet I paid in advance the monthly
rent of two ounces of gold, and never had occasion to regret the
outlay. The heavy winter rains at length compelled my landlord to lay a
floor of rough boards, which cost him seven hundred dollars for a
thousand feet.

Before the establishment of the state government, there was a judiciary
created by an autocratical edict of General Riley; and a pamphlet,
extracted and translated from the Mexican Constitutional laws of 1836,
constituted the _Corpus Juris Civilis_ of the Territory of California.
The remainder of the law was made up of the judge's ideas of equity,
and of the law he had read before leaving home. Inartificial and rude
as was this system, still it was wonderfully efficient; and it was well
for the people of California that it was so, for an unparalleled
immigration had brought with it an unparalleled amount of litigation.

With the daily occurring causes of litigation, crowds assembled at the
school-house on the Plaza, where from morning to night sat a judge
dispensing off-hand justice. In front of him sat three or four clerks
conducting the business. The crowds of lawyers, litigants, and
witnesses that surrounded the court were not idle spectators, but
represented the ordinary accumulation of business for the day, which
was to be disposed of before the adjournment of the court. Speedy
justice was more desirable than exact justice, where labor was valued
at a gold ounce a day; and none were more desirous of speed than the
lawyers, whose prospects of compensation depended much upon the
promptitude with which judgment was rendered.

The moving spirit of the whole scene, Judge A----, watched from behind
the desk all that was said or done, seldom withdrawing his attention
unless to administer an oath for the consideration of one dollar, or to
sign an order for the consideration of two dollars. Sometimes he would
change his position; but, whether warming his uncovered feet at the
fire-place, or drawing on his boots, or replenishing his stock of
tobacco, there was the same unalterable attention on his part. As soon
as he comprehended a case, his authoritative voice was heard, closing
the discussion, and dictating to a clerk the exact number of dollars
and cents for which he should enter up a judgment. And then another,
and another case was called up, and submitted to this summary process,
until about nine o'clock at night, when the day's