On the first of July, he took the boat from Monterey to San José. There he was the guest of Don Tiburcio Castro for a few days, and attended a bull fight, a race at which the men bet the very clothes off their backs, a religious festival, and three balls; then took the stage which passed Redwoods on its way to San Francisco. It was a ride of thirty miles under a blistering sun, through dust twelve inches deep which the heavy hoofs of the horses and the wheels of the lumbering coach tossed ten feet in the air, half smothering the inside passengers, and coating those on top within and without. Thorpe had secured the seat by the driver, thinking to forget the physical discomforts in the scenery. But the tame prettiness of the valley was obliterated by the shifting wall of dust about the stage; and Thorpe closed his eyes, and resigned himself to misery. Even the driver would not talk, beyond observing that it was "the goldarndest hottest day he'd ever knowed, and that was saying a darned sight, _you_ bet!" It was late in the afternoon when the stage pulled up at the "hotel" of a little village. "That there's Redwoods," said the driver, pointing with his whip toward a mass of trees on rising ground. "Evenin'. I wish I wuz you." The hotel seemed principally saloon; but the proprietor, who was chewing vigorously, told Thorpe he guessed he could accommodate him, and led him to a small room whose very walls were crackling with the heat. Thorpe distinctly saw the fleas jumping on the bare boards, and shuddered. "Can I have a bath?" he asked. "A what?" "A bath." "Oh!--we don't pronounce it that way in these parts. And bath-tubs is a luxury you'll have to go to 'Frisco for, I guess." "Hav'n't you any sort of a tub you could bring me? I have a call to pay, and I must clean up." "Perhaps the ole woman'd let you have one of her wash-tubs. I'll ask her." "Do. And I should like supper as soon after as possible."