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Show 382 PERSONAL ADVENTURES sooner concluded this arrangement, than I got my mule_ saddled, and my box and carpet-bag packed In the regular Isthmus fashion. The n1ule I obtained, like most of his fellows, was little better than a mere skeleton; but still it was the best I could procure, and I was fain to content n1yself with it. Some of n1y friends endeavoured to· persuade me that it was better to proceed on foot; but I knew the muddy and stony nature of the road, and thought it infinitely more comfortable to ride a slow animal than subject myself to the sufferings that I Inust experience from these inconveniences. The negro brought to my hotel a long frame of bamboo, with a sort of basket at the end, into which he crammed my luggage. This frame had two straps fastened to the upper part of it, through one of which he slipped his arm, whilst he passed the other over his left shoulder, and attached it under the latter to the frame which was now on his back. This contrivance not only effectually secures the load in its place, hut protects the shoulders of the bearer from the continual friction they would otherwise undergo. A large party had preceded me; but I felt no anxiety to overtake it, as there was little or no danger of my encountering violence on the route. I was anned with a good revolving pistol, in the IN CALIFORNIA. 383 event of anything of the sort presenting itself; so that, all things considered, I was just as ,veil pleased to be left to my o'vn society. As I rode up the principal street, I perceived a commotion at the entrance to one of the hotels, and, on stopping to inquire the cause of it, I \Vas informed that Mr. Burke, one of the passengers by the Panama steamer, had been robbed of a considerable amount in gold-dust. The trunk that contained it had been missing for several days, but had just been found, rifled of its contents, on one of the roads in the vicinity of the town. The gentleman to whom it belonged seerned to take the matter much more coolly than the persons by 'vhom he 'vas surrounded. I could not help adn1iring his philosophy, and told him that I supposed it was in some degree o'ving to his having adopted the usual precaution of dividing his money, and car rying a portion of it about his person. He re plied that he had fortunately done so, or he would have been left without the means of continuing his journey; and, as to the loss he had incurred, there ,vas no use in fretting about evils that could not be remedied. Considering the distance he had come, and the perils he had encountered in search of the little store of wealth he ·was bringing hon1e with him, I must say that he displayed 1nore than ordinary equa- |