My new room, with the exception of its red-calico window, was exactly like the old one. Although it was very small, a man and his wife (the latter was the housekeeper of the establishment) slept there also. With the aid of those everlasting blue blankets I curtained off our part, so as to obtain some small degree of privacy. I had one large pocket-handkerchief (it was meant for a young sheet) on my bed, which was filled with good, sweet, fresh hay, and plenty of the azure coverings, so short and narrow that, when once we had lain down, it behooved us to remain perfectly still until morning, as the least movement disarranged the bed-furniture and insured us a shivering night.
On the other side of the partition, against which our bedstead was built, stood the cooking-stove, in which they burnt nothing but pitch-pine wood. As the room was not lined, and the boards very loosely put together, the soot sifted through in large quantities and covered us from head to foot, and though I bathed so often that my hands were dreadfully chapped, and bled profusely from having them so much in the water, yet, in spite of my efforts, I looked like a chimney-sweep masquerading in women's clothes.
As it was very cold at this time, the damp ground upon which we were living gave me a severe cough, and I suffered so much from chillness that at last I betook myself to Rob Roy shawls and india-rubbers, and for the rest of the time walked about, a mere bundle of gum elastic and Scotch plaid. My first move in the morning was to go out and sit upon an old traveling wagon which stood in front of my room, in order, like an old beggar-woman, to gather a little warmth from the sun.
Mrs. —— said, "The Bostonians were horror-stricken because the poor Irish, who had never known any other mode of living, had no floors in their cabins, and were getting up all sorts of Howard benevolent societies to supply unfortunate Pat with what is to him an unwished-for luxury." She thought that they would be much better employed in organizing associations for ameliorating the condition of those wretched women in California who were so mad as to leave their comfortable homes in the mines to go a-pleasuring in the valleys.
My poor husband suffered even more than I did, for though he had a nominal share in my luxurious bed with its accompanying pocket-handkerchief, yet, as Mrs. —— took it into her head to pay me a visit, he was obliged to resign it to her and betake himself to the barroom, and as every bunk and all the blankets were engaged, he was compelled to lie on the bar-floor (thank Heaven, there was a civilized floor there, of real boards), with his boots for a pillow.
But I am sure you must be tired of this long letter, for I am, and I reserve the rest of my adventures in the American Valley until another time.
