He reduced all the material of his text-books to notes.
Tearing out the leaves of these note-books, he pasted them upon the walls of his room; then, in his shirt-sleeves, a cheap cigar in his teeth, his hands in his pockets, he walked around and around the room, scowling fiercely at his notes, memorising, devouring, digesting.

At intervals, he drank great cupfuls of unsweetened, black coffee.

When the bar examinations were held, he was admitted at the very head of all the applicants, and was complimented by the judge.

Immediately afterwards, he collapsed with nervous prostration; his stomach "got out of whack," and he all but died in a Sacramento boarding-house, obstinately refusing to have anything to do with doctors, whom he vituperated as a rabble of quacks, dosing himself with a patent medicine and stuffing himself almost to bursting with liver pills and dried prunes.
He had taken a trip to Europe after this sickness to put himself completely to rights.

He intended to be gone a year, but returned at the end of six weeks, fulminating abuse of European cooking.