her to his reg:enerate heart. Gaudet tentaminc virtus!
The men were relatively superior to the women. As a rule, the better class of men came to California, and a more ordinary class of women. The trip to this country was tedious, disgusting to a sensitive, delicate woman ; there was no society here, no household con venience. It was a very hard place for a wouiaii. The finer specimens of womanhood could find husbands at home ; there was no necessity for them to undergo the horrors of a sea voyage to California, and its so- ciety afterward. Nevertheless, nmltitudes of noble and true women did come ; but it must be admitted that woman here in early times was not the intelligent, refined, and sensible being that is found in older and more settled communities. In California oood hus- bands regularly once a week rolled up their sleeves, and helped wife or daughter at the wash-tub.
To live in purity, woman must have the sympathy of those around her; thousands in California have fallen simply from the fact that men had no faith in them. Othello played before a Californian audience in those days would have appealed to sentiments strange to the hearts of many of the hearers.
Now and then ships from France and elsewhere would enter the port, with compaiiies of respectable girls on board, who would be immediately caught up by gamblers and saloon-keepers, to assist at the table or dispense drinks, at two hundred and fift}^ dollars a month; but alas, within a week or two, despite the vigilance of the proprietor, they would be mated !
Thus we see that there were true women and there were false women among those the gold-seekers left behind. California widows they were called, and they were to be found in every rural town, every hotel, boarding-house, and watering place. Faithful, modest Avives and mothers some of them were, patiently waiting the end of this sudden and strange family dis- ruption. Round them were mouths to feed and no re- mittance came ; yet never doubting, the heart-en-
