Nashville, September, 1881.
Introduction.
The first issue of the "California Sketches" was very popular, deservedly so. The distinguished Author has prepared a Second Series. In this fact the reading public will rejoice.
In these hooks we have the romance and prestige of fiction; the thrill of incident and adventure; the wonderful phases of society in a new country, and under the pressure of strong and peculiar excitements; human character loose from the restraints of an old civilization—a settled order of things; individuality unwarped by imitation—free, varied, independent. The materials are rich, and they are embodied in a glowing narrative. The writer himself lived amid the scenes and the people he describes, and, as a citizen, a preacher, and an editor, was an important factor among the forces destined to mold the elements which were to be formulated in the politics of the State and the enterprises of the Church. A close observer, gifted with a keen discrimination and retentive memory, a decided relish for the ludicrous and the sportive, and always ready to give a religions turn to thought and conversation, he is admirably adapted to portray and recite what he saw, heard, and felt.
These Sketches furnish good reading for anybody. For the young they are charming, full of entertainment, and not wanting in moral instruction. They will gratify the taste of those who love to read, and, what is more important, beget the appetite for books among the dull and indifferent. He who can stimulate children and young men and women to read renders a signal service to society at large. Mental growth depends much upon reading, and the fertilization of the original soil by the habit wisely directed connects vitally with the outcome and harvest of the future.
Dr. Fitzgerald is doing good service in the work already done, and I trust the patronage of the people will encourage him to give us another and another of the same sort. At my house we all read the "California Sketches"—old and young—and long for more.
G. F. Pierce.
Contents.
Dick The Diggers The California Mad-House San Quentin "Corralled" The
Reblooming The Emperor Norton Camilla Cain Lone Mountain Newton The
California Politician Old Man Lowry Suicide In California Father Fisher
Jack White The Rabbi My Mining Speculation Mike Reese Uncle Nolan
Buffalo Jones Tod Robinson Ah Lee The Climate of California After The
Storm Bishop Kavanaugh In California Sanders A Day Winter-Blossomed A
Virginian In California At The End
Dick.