CONTENTS
[ PREFACE. ]
[ CHAPTER I. ] A PEEP AT MY FATHER
[ CHAPTER II. ] ANOTHER PEEP AT MY FATHER
[ CHAPTER III. ] A FIRST STEP ON LIFE'S LADDER
[ CHAPTER IV. ] HOW I ENTERED COLLEGE, AND HOW I LEFT IT
[ CHAPTER V. ] A PEEP AT “HIGH AND LOW COMPANY”
[ CHAPTER VI. ] VIEWS OF LIFE
[ CHAPTER VII. ] A BOLD STROKE FOR AN OPENING IN THE WORLD
[ CHAPTER VIII. ] A QUIET CHOP AT 'KILLEEN'S'
[ CHAPTER IX. ] SIR DUDLEY BROUGHTON
[ CHAPTER X. ] THE VOYAGE OUT
[ CHAPTER XI. ] MEANS AND MEDITATIONS
[ CHAPTER XII. ] A GLIMPSE OF ANOTHER OPENING IN LIFE
[ CHAPTER XIII. ] QUEBEC
[ CHAPTER XIV. ] FELL IN AND OUT WITH THE WIDOW DAVIS
[ CHAPTER XV. ] AN EMIGRANTS FIRST STEP ON SHORE
[ CHAPTER XVI. ] A NIGHT IN THE LOWER TOWN
[ CHAPTER XVII. ] MY LUCUBRATIONS ON THE ST. LAWRENCE
[ CHAPTER XVIII. ] THE ORDINARY OF ALL NATIONS
[ CHAPTER XIX. ] ON BOARD THE 'CHRISTOBAL'
[ CHAPTER XX. ] THE LOG-HUT AT BRAZOS
[ CHAPTER XXI. ] A NIGHT IN THE FOREST OF TEXAS
[ CHAPTER XXII. ] THE LAZARETTO OF BEXAR
[ CHAPTER XXIII. ] THE PLACER
[ CHAPTER XXIV. ] THE FATE OF A GAMBUSINO
[ CHAPTER XXV. ] LA SEÑHORA
[ CHAPTER XXVI. ] THE DISCOVERY
[ CHAPTER XXVII. ] GUAJUAQUALLA
[ CHAPTER XXVIII. ] THE VOYAGE OF THE 'ACADIE'
[ CHAPTER XXIX. ] THE CARCEL MORENA AT MALAGA
[ CHAPTER XXX. ] CONSOLATIONS OF DIPLOMACY
[ CHAPTER XXXI. ] A NEW WALK IN PROGRESSIVE LIFE
[ CHAPTER XXXII. ] MOI ET MON PRINCE
[ CHAPTER XXXIII. ] A SOIRÉE IN THE GREAT WORLD
[ CHAPTER XXXIV. ] CONCLUSION
PREFACE.
An eminent apothecary of my acquaintance once told me that at each increase to his family, he added ten per cent to the price of his drugs, and as his quiver was full of daughters, Blackdraught, when I knew him, was a more costly cordial than Curaçoa.
To apply this to my own case, I may mention that I had a daughter born to me about the time this story dates from, and not having at my command the same resource as my friend the chemist, I adopted the alternative of writing another story, to be published contemporaneously with that now appearing,—“The Daltons;” and not to incur the reproach so natural in criticism—of over-writing myself—I took care that the work should come out without a name.
I am not sure that I made any attempt to disguise my style; I was conscious of scores of blemishes—I decline to call them mannerisms—that would betray me: but I believe I trusted most of all to the fact that I was making my monthly appearance to the world in another story, and with another publisher, and I had my hope that my small duplicity would thus escape undetected.
I was aware that there was a certain amount of peril in running an opposition coach on the line I had made in some degree my own; not to say that it might be questionable policy to glut the public with a kind of writing more remarkable for peculiarity than perfection.
I remember that excellent Irishman Bianconi, not the less Irish that he was born at Lucca,—which was simply a “bull,”—once telling me that to popularize a road on which few people were then travelling, and on which his daily two-horse car was accustomed to go its journey, with two or at most three passengers, the idea occurred to him that he would start an opposition conveyance, of course in perfect secrecy, and with every outward show of its being a genuine rival. He effected his object with such success that his own agents were completely taken in, and never wearied of reporting, for his gratification, all the shortcomings and disasters of the rival company.