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Show 242 PERSONAL ADVENTURES . reason to rejoice at the success which attended our efforts. But at this time my health began to be affected by the extreme dampness, of the O'round for the spot was low and marshy; and ~ ' it therefore became necessary to remove, the more particularly as the proprietor of the lot politely informed us that he was offered seventy-five dollars a month for it, which he did not intend to refuse. As such a rental, in such a locality, did not suit us, we took the hint, and looked out for another lot. It was fortunate for us that we shifted our quarters; for, although in the summer season the whole of the ground in the neighbourhood of our establishment was eagerly bought up, or let at enormous prices, the locality in winter became uninhabitable, on account_ of the heavy floods which poured into it from the upper lands, converti· ng I· t ·I n t o a mere n1orass, and spoiling the goods of the unlucky traders who happened to be resident there. We re1noved to a plot of ground directly opposite the '' Shades " hotel, which we ob· tained at a n1onthly rental of fifty dollars: a IN CALIFORNIA. 243 sum sufficiently high, as this was an inferior business locality, although we continued to carry on our affairs prosperously. I suffered greatly, nevertheless, from the wretched peculiarities of the climate of San Francisco. From noontide till midnight there is a perfect gale of wind continually blowing during the whole of the su1n1ner season, and that of the bleakest kind; and in the \Vinter, though it is mild, so great an abundance of rain falls, as to render pedestrian exercise, for the commonest purposes, a regular toil, RO in undated are the lower portions of the town, which may be said then to stand in a huge basin of mud. We dared not expose the side of our tent to the wind, as it would have presented too large a surface; wherefore, being perfectly aware of the inconvenience \Ve should have to encouqter in such a case, and of the danger there would be of the entire structure being blown prostrate, the uprights 'vere firmly sunk into the ground, so as to oppose the smallest possible angle to the action of the -rude gusts that swept the hill. We like,vise strengthened M2 |