Since the recent robberies, the local express companies and bankers had refused to receive it, except the owners were known and identified.

There had been but one box of coin, which had already been speedily divided up among the band.

Drafts, bills, bonds, and valuable papers had been usually intrusted to one "Charley," who acted as a flying messenger to a corrupt broker in Sacramento, who played the role of the band's "fence." It had been the duty of Chivers to control this delicate business, even as it had been his peculiar function to open all the letters and documents.

This he had always lightened by characteristic levity and sarcastic comments on the private revelations of the contents.

The rough, ill-spelt letter of the miner to his wife, inclosing a draft, or the more sentimental effusion of an emigrant swain to his sweetheart, with the gift of a "specimen," had always received due attention at the hands of this elegant humorist.