My Experiences in Algeria.

“ENRIQUE SAW ME KISS THE SEÑORITA JUST AS HE WAS DISMOUNTING.”

About this time another misfortune befell me. Roberto came over and found me holding a very earnest conversation with his betrothed. Knowing nothing of previous happenings, this fiery-tempered young man became violently enraged, and, without asking any explanation, immediately attacked me with a heavy riding-whip. We had a smart struggle, but I succeeded in wresting it from him and knocking him down with a blow from my fist. Springingto his feet with a snarl, he made off as fast as his legs would carry him, leaving his horse tied to the gate. The señorita promptly swooned, and the last glimpse Roberto got of us showed me carrying the young lady in my arms into the house. I have a faint recollection of seeing him shake his fist at me and grind his gleaming white teeth.

Well, now I was “up against it” properly, with two heart-broken girls on my hands and two lovers vowing to have my life. I discussed the matter at length with Don Eduardo, explaining to him that, while I liked the young ladies very much indeed and valued their friendship greatly, I was not in love with them and had done nothing to warrant anyone in thinking I was, the “kiss incident” notwithstanding. It seemed very hard lines that I should go in peril of my life and get into general hot water through trying, by means of a harmless joke, to bring a bashful or undecided lover “up to the scratch.”

Needless to say, I was very much worried by the turn things were taking, and for several days I got very little sleep. One night, while tossing wakefully upon my bed, I seemed to feel some danger in the air, so much so that I got up and lit the lamp to get rid of the feeling of depression which seemed to overwhelm me. Lying down again, I fell into a light slumber. Presently I was awakened by something touching me upon the shoulder. Opening my eyes, I saw right above me, with his head and one shoulder through the window, the same old Indian who had previously visited me. He was trying to slip a noose over my head by means of a long stick, but the instant I opened my eyes he disappeared. A moment later the noose slipped over the bed-post, dragging the entire end out bodily and jerking it against the wall. There followed a snort and a grunt outside, and the sound of a horse dashing off.

Next morning revealed a broken saddle to which the rope had been tied, it evidently being the intention to jerk me through the window—which stood eleven feet from the ground—thus breaking my neck most effectually.

In spite of this little interlude, the night’s adventures were not yet over by any means, and I had scarcely got over this first shock when a bundle was flung through the window, landing upon the mattress by my side. Shoving it hurriedly off on to the floor, I found it contained a hissing and squirming mass of snakes, and soon the room was filled with a score or so of the vipers usually known in the medical world as “corals”—the only really deadly reptiles in that part of the country, their bite being often known to kill in thirty minutes.

As I slept some distance from anyone else I did not care to arouse the household in the middle of the night, so I spent the remaining hours perched upon a bookcase, out of reach of harm. It is needless to say that before the slaying of the reptiles was over next morning the commotion upon the “finca” was at fever-heat and no work was done at all, the labourers being dispatched in different directions in a vain effort to find either of the two revengeful youths.

At night, when no trace had been found of either of them, Señor Eduardo, greatly perturbed, dispatched a note to the nearest Alcalde for police protection. This, however, could not arrive until the second day, and in the meanwhile I also took a trip over to the two plantations in an effort to locate the belligerents and explain matters.

That night nothing out of the ordinary happened, but I took pains to fasten my room securely, and obtained a good night’s rest. Next day I again endeavoured to locate Messrs. Roberto and Enrique, but without success. The following evening I happened to be strolling up and down the long front veranda with the Señorita Hortensia, who had now become somewhat reconciled to the new state of affairs. We had stopped to look at the reflection of the moon upon a lake a mile or so down the valley, when, without the slightest warning, a figure rose silently from the shadow of a bush and hurled an immense knife directly at the young lady. The father and son, who were sitting upon the steps, saw the movement, and leapt to their feet with yells of alarm. As in the other cases, however, Providence seemed to be with us, and the dagger merely pierced the señorita’s dress, though it missed her body only by a couple of inches.

Seeing that no harm had occurred, we three men sprang forward and captured the would-be assassin just as he was in the act of flinging another of his murderous missiles at the fainting girl. It proved to be Enrique, and he put up a nasty fight before he was finally landed by the heels. At this stage Hortensia, having recovered from the shock, took the lead in the affair and immediately appropriated the prisoner to herself. When we finally got through explaining things to him, he came round completely and apologized most generously for all that he had done. That night there was much rejoicing at Las Flores, and the announcement was made that Enrique and Hortensia were to be married very shortly.

Everyone seemed to have temporarily forgotten about the Señorita Leonia and her troubles, but Enrique suddenly remembered them and volunteered to go immediately andfetch Roberto. An hour later the two young men returned together, and another reconciliation took place. Don Eduardo, all smiles now, settled things for the lovers, and the billing and cooing was quite affecting. Next night a grand “biallie,” or dance, was held at the “finca,” and the whole countryside was invited. Soon after the banns were posted for a double wedding, at which, several weeks later, the girls’ brother and myself acted as “best men.” There is now a little Enrique and a little Roberto, to say nothing of a young Pablo, named in my honour, and of whom I am the proud godfather. Master Pablo little knows, however, what a time his worthy godparent had of it when he foolishly tried to adjust the love affairs of the aforesaid Master Pablo’s parents.

“SHOVING IT HURRIEDLY OFF ON TO THE FLOOR, I FOUND IT CONTAINED A HISSING AND SQUIRMING MASS OF SNAKES.”

By the Baroness de Boerio.

The Baroness’s husband, an officer in the French army, was ordered to Algeria, and took his wife and children with him. There, located at a tiny post far from civilization, in the midst of fierce and unruly tribes, the authoress met with some very strange adventures, which she here sets forth in a chatty and amusing fashion.

Weclimbed into the regimental brake very gladly, had a good breakfast at Boghar, and then, at four o’clock in the afternoon, started for the first caravanserai, Ain Ousera, on the way to Laghouat, where we ought to have arrived at about half-past seven. However, half-past nine came, and still no caravanserai was in sight. The night was of an inky blackness, and we began to suspect that we had lost our way. My husband accordingly stopped the carriage and questioned the driver, who acknowledged that he had only been that way once before, and was not very sure of his route. In this country, where there are no roads, one always follows the direction of the telegraph posts.

“Where are they?” asked my husband.

The Spahi hung his head abashed.

“I have not seen one since it grew dark,” he confessed.

ARAB WOMEN WASHING IN A STREAM.From a Photograph.

There was no use being angry and abusing him, so my husband set to work to gain some idea of our position. Happily we met an Arab, who gave us the indication required, and we set out again at a good pace. Whether the Arab gave us the wrong direction, or whether the driver deviated, I cannot say; but we were spinning along, making up for lost time, when suddenly the horses were flung back on their haunches and a voice yelled, “Back! Back!Malheureux!” The Spahi fortunately obeyed the command, and my husband jumped out quickly to see what new adventure had befallen us. This one, however, came very near being our last, for we had been stopped by the guardian on the very brink of a quarry! Another few yards and we should have leaptinto space and fallen down a precipice some thirty feet deep. My husband was afraid to trust the soldier driver any more, so he arranged with the quarry guardian to guide us, and we ultimately arrived at Ain Ousera towards 2 a.m., tired out and as hungry as wolves. We woke up the landlord and asked for beds and food. There was nothing to be had, he said, but bread, potatoes, and eggs, but we told him that would do if some strong, hot coffee accompanied it. An hour later we were all snoring.

“THE HORSES WERE FLUNG BACK ON THEIR HAUNCHES AND A VOICE YELLED, ‘BACK! BACK!’”

The rest of our journey was less adventurous. At a caravanserai called Gelt Es Stel we were to send back the regimental brake and continue our road in a carriage sent by the Bach-Agha of Laghouat. We waited in vain for the promised vehicle, however, and when, on the second day, the mail and passenger coach came in, we decided it was better to continue our journey by that. Thecoupé—a small compartment for three in the front of the coach—was all that was available, so in we got—my husband, myself, three children, and four dogs! I shall never forget that journey. My legs were too long forthe space, and the cramp at last grew unbearable, while the roof was so near my head that I had to sit perfectly still, with a swanlike curve of the neck which, though perhaps very graceful, was also excruciatingly uncomfortable. No one was more devoutly thankful than myself when at last we finally reached our destination.

Laghouat, or, properly speaking, El-Aghouath, the “Pearl of the South,” as the Arabs call it, is built on and around two rocks rising out of the burning plain and cutting the oasis in two, thus giving it the form of a green horse-shoe. A small canalized stream passes between the two rocks, watering first the north and then the south oasis.

THE TOWN OF LAGHOUAT, ON THE EDGE OF THE DESERT.From a Photograph.

From the top of these rocks the view, to the lover of Sahara beauty, is magnificent. Away to the south stretches the desert, sterile and naked, save for the tufts of vegetation here and there, yet the lights and shades of colour are so variable and rich that it is a pure joy to gaze over its infinity. On the north the undulating flatness is relieved by a low line of rocky barren hills, round the top of which is a curious dark line, which one could swear was a high-water mark. On a hot summer day these hills rise black as coal out of the flame of golden sand around them; then, as evening draws nigh, some become pale rose-colour, others deepest pansy purple, or bright ochre yellow, and all so vivid, so luminous, that the artist despairs of transferring their colours to his canvas.

Nearly all the houses at Laghouat are built of mud bricks, mixed with straw and baked in the sun. As a child I used to be very much perplexed by the Israelites’ complaint during their Egyptian captivity, “How can we make bricks, for we have no more straw?” No one could explain the matter to me satisfactorily, but now I understood. In these parts, when the earth is not sand, it is clay. This clay is well wetted and patted, in the way dear to the childish heart, and then mixed and rolled in very short straw. Afterwards it is put in a square wooden frame, well patted once more, turned out in rows, and left to bake in the sun for a fortnight. The bricks are then stacked up ready for use.

Personally, I liked these houses immensely; it was so easy to put nails in the walls solidly. As a rule, things I nail up fall down suddenly, without any warning, on some revered head—never on mine, because I take care not to place myself underneath the work of my own hands. In the Laghouat houses, however, you can plant a good long nail boldly. It enters as though into butter, you hang up your picture, or whatever it is, and then go outside and hang a pot of flowers or a water-pot on the point which has come through—and there you are, perfectly balanced on both sides! But these mud houses have one rather serious drawback. When it rains—fortunately this only occurs at very rare intervals—the buildings, unless strongly white washed, have a tendency to fall down and melt away into shapeless mud-heaps. This is all in the day’s work to the Arab, and does not upset him overmuch, unless a child—or what is to him worse, a sheep or horse—is buried in the ruins.He just camps out under a camel hair tent in the highest part of his garden, or, if he hasn’t a tent, under a carpet—everyone has a carpet. Then, when it ceases raining, he serenely rebuilds. “Tu cha Allah!” he says—“It is the will of God.”

The rain-storms, though infrequent, are really terrifying when they do come. I have seen waves several feet high turning the corner of my house, and that half an hour after a downpour began. The river of sand, Oued M’zi, which becomes Oued Djdid farther on, fills with water in the twinkling of an eye, and is soon a deep, roaring torrent two miles broad; it is perfectly incredible the rapidity with which the floods rise.

A LAGHOUT MUD-HOUSE—DURING THE RAIN-STORMS THESE BUILDINGS HAVE AN AWKWARD HABIT OF MELTING AWAY!From a Photograph.

This Oued M’zi is supposed by the Roman historian Juba to be the real source of the Nile. It is an uncanny river, disappearing underground at various points for several days’ march. It finally disappears altogether at Cholt Melghir, but the Roman historian points out that after twenty days’ march it reappears as the source of the Nile.

Some seven years before I arrived at Laghouat, I was informed, the M’zi rose to such a height that it bore all before it on the north side of the oasis. Men, women, children, tents, and herds were carried away for many kilometres, and the deaths by drowning numbered several hundred.

I remember once passing a night of anguish when my husband was away in the south. I had changed my house during his absence and taken a smaller one, with a huge garden, in the north oasis, some hundred yards from the river. The autumn rains began, and soon my garden and outer court were under water. The river came thundering down, and the mud house seemed to quiver. Towards ten at night the sound of the swift-rushing flood grew so terrific that my heart almost stood still, and I remembered the catastrophe of seven years back. “Why, oh, why did I leave our solid stone house to inhabit this dangerous hole?” I asked myself.

I tramped across the court, knee-deep in water, to my Arab servant’s room.

“Mohammed,” I cried, “come with me to see if the pathway to town is in a good enough state to take the children to the hotel. The water frightens me; we shall be drowned like rats in a trap.”

We tried to open the garden door giving on the wall-lined pathway along which the irrigation stream ran, and which was the only road to the town for the houses or gardens of the northern oasis. The door opened outward, and fortunately for us the pressure of water against it was so heavy that our united strength could not move it half an inch.

Mohammed accordingly climbed on the wall and looked down. The water was nearly six feet deep! He descended hastily, observing calmly, with a critical look at the wall, “It’s a very old wall. It must be the will of Allah that it does not fall.”

There was obviously nothing to be done, so I retired indoors and changed my clothes, for I was soaking wet. The waters thundered and swirled all about us, and I was thankful indeed when daylight came and the flood gradually began to subside.

The women of Laghouat never go out by day, and at night are closely veiled as they journey under escort from one relation’s house to another; even the lower classes and the dancing women faithfully observe this custom. Only on two feasts, which last three and seven days—the “Aid el Srir” and “Aid el Kebir,” the “little” and “great” Feast of the Sheep, which correspond with the Jewish Passover and killing of the Paschal lamb—do the latter ladies don their finest clothes and strut about barefaced.

Their costumes are indeed splendid—silks and brocades of the very best quality and the most lovely hues, with gold, silver, and gem-studdedembroideries. The veils hanging from their bejewelled head-dresses are of cloth of silver and gold, their bosoms are covered with precious stones, and the noise of the numerous bracelets they wear on arms and legs can be heard some way off.

A SCENE IN THE SAHARA.From a Photograph.

The dancing women of the province of Algiers and Oran are nearly all of the tribes of the Ouled Najls. The women of these tribes have chosen dancing as their profession, and when quite young they go forth to earn their dowry by “tripping on the light fantastic toe.” When they have earned it they generally return home, marry, and make as good wives and mothers as the rest of womenkind.

A GROUP OF DANCING GIRLS OF THE OULED NAJL.From a Photograph.

There are now about thirty-eight tribes of Ouled Najls, stretching from Biskara to the Djebel-Amour, all pastoral, wandering wherever the blessed rain of heaven falls and grasses grow, without taking any notice of distance or frontiers. The supreme happiness of a Najl is to find a quiet corner where the grass is green and abundant, and there to snooze under the sun’s rays, watching his sheep and camels fatten,and fattening himself as well, for he lives chiefly on their milk. Later he exchanges his flocks for corn, dates, and everything necessary for his existence. Truly these people are still in the age of Abraham.

THE BACH-AGHA OF THE LARBAAS, AN IMPORTANT ARAB CHIEF.From a Photograph.

A fortnight after I arrived at Laghouat the Bach-Agha of the Larbaas (a tribe of warriors who have always been faithful to France) gave a “diffa” in our honour. Warned by my experience of painful memory at Teniet-el-Haad, I did not try to partake of all the twenty-five dishes which were served in weary succession. After the repast was over we paid a visit to the chief’s two wives. The favourite, a young woman of twenty-four, was most beautifully dressed in eau-de Nil brocade. The costume was that of the Algiers women, full trousers closing in tightly round the small, silk-socked, golden-slippered feet. Then came a three-quarter skirt of the same material and a much-embroidered tight-fitting bodice. The front of this latter garment was so covered with jewels that the stuff was hardly visible. The head-dress was composed of silk handkerchiefs and chains of gold and precious stones. She had two children, a boy of eight and a girl ten years old. She told me she was very happy, that she had been married to the Bach-Agha since she was twelve years old, and that he had only beaten her once, when she had broken one of her pieces of jewellery in a temper. She showed us the very piece, with much laughter—a big, finely-worked gold filigree disc.

“You did not laugh so loudly when you felt thematraqueon your shoulders,” said a grim voice behind her.

Without another word she pulled one of her handkerchiefs over her face and stood motionless. It was now our turn to laugh, which we did heartily, for we had seen the Bach-Agha come in, and had understood his sign for us not to betray him.

After teasing her a little the good old man—he was sixty—told her to unveil, but not to boast too much of her one beating, or he should have to make it two.

We much admired the beautiful carpets and embroidered cushions on the marble floor, and the handsome silver and brass jugs, cups, and plates which adorned the Arab brackets, but we thought the four-poster bed, with white muslin curtains, which stood in the far corner, rather out of place.

The young wife’s apartments consisted of two big rooms, about fourteen yards long by four wide, both leading out into a big square court with pink marblepillars, where palms and various other exotic plants flourished. In the centre was a fountain where goldfish glinted.

Then we went to see the other wife, old, like her husband. Her room was big, her bed comfortable, her clothing good, but everything was of the simplest. Her only jewel was a tiny gold brooch fastening a drapery drawn round the head under the chin. She seemed too weary to talk.

“Life is over for me,” she said. “My children are dead; my husband has not spoken to me for years. I, too, shall soon be gone.” And she clacked her tongue in her cheek in a dismally resigned fashion. I felt heavy-hearted as I went out.

“How sad!” I said to Ben Aouda, one of the Bach-Agha’s three grown-up sons. “I thought she was your mother.”

“My mother and my brothers’ mother has been dead a long time,” he replied. “That one”—and I distinguished a shade of contempt in his voice—“only gave my father daughters—feeble creatures who died young.”

If an Arab woman wishes to retain any power she may ever have had over her husband, she must first be a mother, and, secondly, the mother of male children, strong and lusty. There are, of course, exceptions; I knew of one at Laghouat later. The two longed for a family. They made pilgrimages to all sorts of outlandish places. In accordance with Arab superstitions, the husband tore the still-throbbing heart out of countless jackals’ palpitating bodies and devoured it warm, while his wife wore all sorts of horrible fetishes round her neck and drank the blood of hyenas. It was all of no avail, but despite the advice and worrying of his family he refused to divorce her or to take another wife, as the law allowed him. But he was a very rare exception to the general rule.

Besides the Bach-Agha’s, I used to visit at the rival house, where lived descendants of other rulers of Laghouat. Here I was often amused by the harmless little intrigues I came across. The master of the house possessed three very pretty and very young wives, ruled and guarded by his mother—one of the jolliest, gayest old ladies I have ever met. She was always draped in a spotless fine woollenmelhafa, bordered with green.

It was extraordinary, seeing the secluded life they led, how familiar these young wives were with Laghouat society.

Peeping through their closely-latticed window, looking on to the road, they would say: “Ah! there goes Lieutenant This, or Captain That,” and then they would tell me stories concerning these officers that I had no idea of, and enjoy my surprise.

“We may be shut up, but we know everything that goes on and have plenty of fun,” they would say. One day when I arrived, however, I found their harmony disturbed. Zohra, an Algiers Moor, kept apart, silent and sullen, darting looks of hatred at Aicha, who was happily nursing her lately-born son.

Hennia, the youngest, following my gaze, whispered: “She is mad with jealousy because Aicha has a son, and our lord is pleased with Aicha and angry with Zohra, who has been four years married and has given him no offspring.”

“And you?” I inquired.

She shrugged her slender shoulders. “It is only six months since he brought me to his house, and the last wife is never the least until many moons have waned.”

Worried by Zohra’s look I returned shortly, but she sullenly refused to speak to me. Then, suddenly, one day as I was leaving, she ran after me and drew me aside. “I hate her! I hate her!” she panted. “She has stolen his love from me. Help me, O Roumia, help me, or I shall die.”

“What can I do for you?” I inquired, rather upset by her burning gaze and passionate whisper.

“Bring me the little white powder,” she breathed, “the dear little powder, to sweeten her coffee and make her sleep, sleep, sleep!”

She seized my wrists and held me fast, her eyes blazing like those of a madwoman.

“To do evil that good may come” is not usually one of my principles, but on this occasion I thought it excusable. So I promised her the powder, and, what is more, I took her not one, but two! One, for her rival, was composed of chalk and sugar, and the other, for herself, of Epsom salts.

“For these powders to have any effect you must take another at the same time,” I told her, impressively. “If Aicha has really stolen your share of your lord’s love from you she will surely die; but if you have accused her wrongly, then you yourself will be the one to suffer. You will not die, but you will suffer.” She eagerly agreed—and she certainly suffered, too; but her jealousy was effectually cured, and my next visit found the trio reunited and full of their usual light-hearted tittle-tattle. When I told the story to the husband he laughed as Arabs seldom laugh.

By Ralph Stock, R. L. C. Morrison, and A. E. MacGrotty.

“For ways that are dark and tricks that are vain,” says Bret Harte’s famous poem, “the heathen Chinee is peculiar.” The subjoined examples of clever rascality, however, show that the Celestial has by no means a monopoly of the gentle art of living at other people’s expense.

Itwas on the first anniversary of the great earthquake that I found myself in San Francisco. The city was a forest of scaffolding and steam-cranes; huge blocks of stone and concrete hung suspended above the streets on their way to clothe the towering “quake-proof” steel frameworks that rose from thedébrisof former buildings like gigantic skeletons. Hills of bricks, mortar, and plaster confronted the pedestrian at every turn, and the dust from these and the streets generally made the city a blinding, choking wilderness.

The demand for labour in rebuilding had drawn to San Francisco the very dregs of humanity throughout the Americas, and strikes, street riots, and robberies with violence were of daily occurrence. The authority of the police was a sinecure; fat, good-natured giants in white, uniforms and helmets, with truncheons swinging from their wrists, leant against hoardings at street corners and smoked cigarettes, or earnestly requested a striker who became more than usually vociferous to “Cut it out” or “Go way back and sit down.”

It appears that in “’Frisco” the cheapest way of living is by drinking, for by buying five cents’ worth of inferior beer one is entitled to eat at a “free lunch counter” adjacent to the bar and have a cut from the joint and cheese and biscuitsad lib. To a world-wanderer like myself, whose income was, to say the least, precarious, this was a great institution; and it was at one of these counters that I met a would-be guide, philosopher, and friend in the form of a gaunt youth who, after a brief exchange of civilities, professed the desire to show me a little of ‘Frisco under-life—at my expense. He promised me Chinese opium and gambling dens and orgies in subterranean dancing-halls, with attendant excitements undreamed of by my prosaic mind.

Such an appeal to the adventure-loving spirit that lies hidden in most of us was irresistible. I closed with the offer, and after investing in a cheap revolver, that was quite as likely to hurt the man behind it as the one in front, we set out for the less frequented parts of the city. Down by the docks the streets were dark and deserted, and my guide improved the occasion by relating the various “sand-baggings” and assaults that had distinguished the quarter during the past week.

The only lighted shop we passed was a small tobacco booth, where I stopped to buy cigarettes. This could hardly have taken me more than two minutes, yet when I stepped out into the street I found my unfortunate guide lying face downwards on the pavement, with a thin stream of red creeping from his forehead towards the gutter. For a brief moment I thought he had fainted; then I saw his clothes had been rifled, and, glancing up the street, discerned the dim outline of three dark figures trotting silently and apparently without haste into the gloom.

A wave of anger took possession of me; thecowardly assailants evidently thought they would get off scot-free after an easy and profitable night’s work. I longed to give them at least a scare for their money.

Leaving my companion, still insensible, to the care of the tobacconist, I dashed up the street in pursuit. My footfalls echoed along the deserted thoroughfare like rifle-shots, so I hastily discarded my boots and continued the chase in socks.

Rather to my surprise I soon came in sight of the three figures in front, who had now dropped into a leisurely walk. This confidence in their security for some reason angered me the more, and in the deep shadows of a wall I crept nearer and drew the revolver from my pocket.

I had never shot a man in my life, and for the first time I experienced the dread of doing this in cold blood. Then I remembered my companion’s gaunt figure prone on the pavement, and the fact that but for a packet of cigarettes I should have certainly shared the same fate. I fired—low down.

The men scattered like startled rabbits; two darted down by-streets on opposite sides of the road, while the third took an abrupt seat on the pavement and examined his leg, evidently more concerned about his wound than the chances of escape.

As I rushed down the turning to the left I sighted my second quarry scrambling over a mound of bricks; he turned and saw me at the same instant, and then began a chase and obstacle race combined under conditions that are probably unique. Over mounds of sand, lime, and broken brick; through mazes of scaffolding, barrels, planks, and wheelbarrows, pools of muddy water, and quagmires of soft mortar we went. My bootless feet were soon battered and bruised, but the fever of the chase was in my veins, and as long as my quarry was in sight I felt incapable of abandoning the pursuit.

The fugitive was now hardly thirty feet ahead, and I dashed after him round a corner of scaffolding, confident that I had run him to earth; and I did, but not in the way expected. He had crouched low just round the corner, and, unable to stop myself, I fell headlong over his body. It was an old trick, and I scrambled to my feet anathematizing myself for a fool, but my man had vanished. With slightly cooler blood and a bruised head I had just decided to leave matters where they stood, when I heard a gentle rasping, and looked up to find him clinging to a scaffold-pole above my head. I could see his white face looking down at me.

“What are you going to do about it?” he demanded, breathlessly.

“Come down and you’ll see,” said I, sternly.

When at last we stood facing each other, however, I found myself at a loss. He was a mere boy, with a wizened, old-young face and cunning eyes that took me in from hatless head to socked feet with a callous insolence that rather appealed to me. WhatwasI going to do about it? The police of San Francisco were either asleep or smoking cigarettes in more salubrious quarters of the city; and it was next to impossible to give him in charge, so I took the law into my own hands.

“Hand over what you took,” said I, “and you shall go.”

“The others went through him,” he replied, sullenly; “I don’t know how much they got.”

“Shall we call it twenty-five dollars as a minimum?” I suggested.

His face expressed neither approval nor dissent, but he drew from a ragged pocket a large gold watch.

“Guess that’ll cover it,” he said, coolly, and on examination I found that it did, by fully another twenty-five dollars.

When, after considerable difficulty, I found my way back to the tobacconist, my companion had recovered consciousness and, with a bandaged head, sat up to hear my report.

“How much did you lose?” was my first question.

“Nothing,” he said; “I haven’t a cent in the world.”

“Then here’s something to be going on with,” said I, and handed him the watch.

After the foregoing, it is with some reluctance that I relate what happened two days later, but the experience is so typical of San Franciscan under-life that I can hardly allow it to pass unrecorded. My own part in the affair was entirely reprehensible, and I need say no more, for everyone knows that, while confession may be good for the soul, it is rarely compatible with personal dignity.

I wished to go to a certain theatre, and asked the way of the first pedestrian I met. He smilingly informed me that I was going in precisely the opposite direction, and that, as he happened to be passing the doors himself, he would show me the way. During the next five minutes I learnt that my guide was also a stranger to San Francisco, and that he had come from Canada. As I had lived there myself for four years this supplied a connecting link in our reminiscences, and we entered the first bar to improve the occasion. He certainly knew the Canadian prairie like a book, and his anecdotes of ranch and bush life were so interesting that the theatre was soon forgotten and we settled down for a chat.

“UNABLE TO STOP MYSELF, I FELL HEADLONG OVER HIS BODY.”

It appeared that he had tired of the rough life of the plains, and after a course of study had become a telegraph operator in Denver.

While there he had been approached by a gang of wire-tappers2with a view to his becoming a confederate, but he had refused. A few weekslater he heard of their capture, and went to see the trial and conviction of the entire gang.

2Those who intercept telegraph messages by establishing secret connections on branch wires, thus gaining news of races in advance of the general public.

Now, however, they were again at large, for he had recognised their leader that very day in the streets of San Francisco, and without a doubt he was engaged in his old nefarious business.

My companion’s idea was to make a round of the city pool-rooms, where they received news of the races by wire, and, if he encountered the “wire-tapper,” force him by threats of exposure to divulge what horses he was going to back. “There might be some brisk fun,” he said. “Would you care to come and see it?”

This appealed to me rather more than the theatre, and we accordingly started a careful tour of every pool-room in the city. They were dark, dusty places, swarming with a heterogeneous collection of humanity that ceaselessly shuffled and elbowed round boards bearing notices of the odds and winners, while a sleek gentleman in faultless attire stood on a rostrum at the end of the room and acted as “bookie.”

The fruitlessness of my companion’s search was growing a trifle monotonous, when, on entering the fourth of these rooms, he seized my arm and nodded in the direction of a tall, stout man who had emerged from the crowd and stood counting over a large roll of bills. At last he seemed satisfied, slipped an elastic band round the roll, and strode out into the street.

“Come on,” whispered my companion, excitedly; “that’s my man.”

Not far from the door he tapped the stranger on the shoulder. The tall man faced about with surprising swiftness.

“What do you want?” he snapped.

“I know all about you,” said my companion, evenly.

The collapse was sudden; the tall man’s jaw dropped perceptibly.

“Come farther away and I’ll listen to you,” he said, with a furtive glance at the pool-room doors.

Round a quiet corner my companion stated his business, and the wire-tapper brought out his roll of bills and fingered them feverishly.

“This is blackmail,” he whined; “but how much do you want?”

“It’s not blackmail, and I want none of your money,” protested my companion, indignantly. “All you have to do is to takemymoney and place it on the right horse. Here are ten dollars for a start. I shall watch you go in and come out of the pool-room from this corner.”

The wire-tapper had hardly left us when a little boy of thirteen or fourteen ran up to him with a note; then he disappeared through the swinging doors.

Presently the wire-tapper came out and, without a word, counted thirty dollar bills into the other’s hand.

“The price was only two to one,” he explained, apologetically.

“Never mind,” said my companion; “better luck next time. Just place this thirty dollars for me, and that will do—for the present.”

The process was repeated, and this time ninety dollars changed hands; but the wire-tapper was evidently nervous and anxious to be gone, and when my companion tentatively suggested a third attempt he refused point-blank, on the ground that if he won any more that day it would arouse suspicion. This objection, however, was overruled by the other offering to place the money himself.

“And we’ll make the amount worth while; shall we?” he added, turning to me. “Do you feel inclined to join me in a hundred-dollar bet?”

Fifty dollars meant a good deal to me then, but the two or three hundred it would bring in meant a great deal more, so I took the plunge. After another note had changed hands between the wire-tapper and the boy, he told us to back Rough Diamond for the next race, and threw in fifty dollars as his own stake; then we took up our position on the opposite pavement and waited expectantly.

To my surprise my companion soon appeared and exultantly informed us that he had succeeded in placing our stake on Rough Diamond to win at three to one.

“To win?” roared the wire-tapper.

“Yes, to win,” retorted the other, feebly.

The wire-tapper literally danced on the pavement.

“You fool!” he spluttered; “I told you to back the horse for aplacethis time—it has come in third.” He turned to me. “Didn’t I say for a place?” he snapped, vehemently.

But I took no further interest in the proceedings. In Western parlance, I had been “done brown.” The men were confederates, and all that was left for me to do was to swallow my medicine without grimacing. So I smiled blandly, congratulated them on their acting, and left them to marvel at man’s credulity.

It all sounds very foolish and easy, set down in black and white, but the San Franciscan “confidence man,” by long and unhampered practice, has reduced his methods to a fine art; and although it is hardly likely that any respectable, level-headed reader ofThe Wide Worldwould fall a victim to his wiles, such a thing has been known to occur to others, and if the foregoing personal experience helps to put these on their guard, the purpose of its recounting will be served.

In November of the year 1885, when I had reached the mature age of seventeen, I found myself in Glasgow, my native city, in the service of an uncle of mine named Mr. James Thomson, who was a merchant tailor and Colonial outfitter in Hope Street.

One afternoon towards the end of the month my uncle gave me instructions to call at the offices of a well-known firm in the neighbourhood of Jamaica Street.

I was to collect an account, whose total represented a substantial sum, and give a receipt for the money. There would, I was told, be no difficulty about drawing what was due, as the firm in question had duly intimated to my uncle that if he would present the account on a certain date payment would be made then and there.

It was close upon three o’clock when I put in an appearance at the counting-house of the firm, taking up my position in a somewhat extended queue of clerks and others who had arrived on the same errand as myself.

The queue was arranged in single file along a passage of considerable length on the second storey, to reach which a flight of something like a score of steps had to be ascended.

Right away at the far end of this passage was what had all the appearance of a railway station booking office, where, behind a square aperture of limited dimensions, stood the sharp-witted cashier.

I took my turn with the rest, and in due course found myself in front of the pigeon-hole, where I presented my uncle’s account.

“All right; receipt it,” exclaimed the cashier, as he returned it.

I did so, receiving the amount of the account in Bank of Scotland pound notes, a couple of score of them, or more, which I quickly folded into a kind of roll and thrust deep into my trousers pocket, keeping my hand over them for safety’s sake.

Pleased with the thought that I had got the money, I briskly threaded my way among the nondescript crowd in the passage, and even more briskly negotiated the stairs.

I had scarcely walked the length of the side thoroughfare which led into Jamaica Street, however, when I heard hurrying footsteps behind me, and, looking round, was surprised to see a very stylishly-dressed man, whose appearance was enhanced by his faultlessly-groomed hair and moustache. As soon as I looked in his direction he held up his hand and beckoned me to stop.

Wondering what he could want with me I obeyed without further ado, waiting for him to come up with me.

“Excuse me, sir,” he said, with much politeness, at the same time slightly raising his hat, “but I believe this is your handkerchief.” As he spoke he swept round his hand, which he had held behind his back, and displayed to view a blue silk specimen in the handkerchief line. It was mine; there was no doubt about that, and as I advanced my hand he extended it towards me.

“I saw you drop it as you came down the stairs of Messrs. ——’s office” (mentioning the name of the firm), he explained.

I thanked him and was about to resume my way when he asked if I could direct him to Hope Street.

As everyone who knows anything about Glasgow is aware, it does not take long to reach Hope Street from Jamaica Street, and I was beginning to explain this to him when he cut me short with the remark that before we went any farther I must have a drink with him. As I was a teetotaller, however, I promptly declined his proffered hospitality, and once more resumed my walk.

The next moment he laid a daintily-gloved hand on my shoulder, and, with an engaging smile, said, with the utmost good humour, “But surely a glass of lemonade or ginger-beer cannot do you any harm?”

There was a strange magnetism about the man which carried me away, and I meekly surrendered myself to his will.

“Let us turn up this street,” he said, suddenly. “I know a nice little quiet place where we can have a drink in comfort.”

I followed him. Strange as it may seem, I was for the time being incapable of resistance. Perhaps my new-found friend was a hypnotist, or something of the kind; if he did not actually possess occult powers, he certainly had the gift in a very marked degree of ingratiating himself with strangers.

As we walked along side by side he kept up a lively and interesting conversation, touching lightly upon a variety of subjects. He evidently possessed a well-stored mind, for his fund of knowledge and anecdote seemed almost inexhaustible.

I became so interested in what he was telling me—wonderful adventures he said he had had in South America, and a graphic description of how diamonds are found—that I did not noticewhere I was being led. All I know is that we traversed street after street, until at length the man whom I had offered to guide to Hope Street had taken me to a part of the city in which I never remember having previously been.

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