For a time I wrote literary screeds for the Golden Era.

C.H.Webb had established a very excellent literary weekly called the Californian, but high merit was no guaranty of success; it languished, and he sold out to three printers, and Bret Harte became editor at $20 a week, and I was employed to contribute an article a week at $12.

But the journal still languished, and the printers sold out to Captain Ogden, a rich man and a pleasant gentleman who chose to amuse himself with such an expensive luxury without much caring about the cost of it.

When he grew tired of the novelty, he re-sold to the printers, the paper presently died a peaceful death, and I was out of work again.

I would not mention these things but for the fact that they so aptly illustrate the ups and downs that characterize life on the Pacific coast.