Besides, a convention had framed a State Constitution; nine men out of every ten wanted an office; I believed that these gentlemen would "treat" the moneyless and the irresponsible among the population into adopting the constitution and thus well-nigh killing the country (it could not well carry such a load as a State government, since it had nothing to tax that could stand a tax, for undeveloped mines could not, and there were not fifty developed ones in the land, there was but little realty to tax, and it did seem as if nobody was ever going to think of the simple salvation of inflicting a money penalty on murder).
I believed that a State government would destroy the "flush times," and I wanted to get away.

I believed that the mining stocks I had on hand would soon be worth $100,000, and thought if they reached that before the Constitution was adopted, I would sell out and make myself secure from the crash the change of government was going to bring.

I considered $100,000 sufficient to go home with decently, though it was but a small amount compared to what I had been expecting to return with.

I felt rather down-hearted about it, but I tried to comfort myself with the reflection that with such a sum I could not fall into want.

About this time a schoolmate of mine whom I had not seen since boyhood, came tramping in on foot from Reese River, a very allegory of Poverty.
The son of wealthy parents, here he was, in a strange land, hungry, bootless, mantled in an ancient horse-blanket, roofed with a brimless hat, and so generally and so extravagantly dilapidated that he could have "taken the shine out of the Prodigal Son himself," as he pleasantly remarked.
He wanted to borrow forty-six dollars--twenty-six to take him to San Francisco, and twenty for something else; to buy some soap with, maybe, for he needed it.