The climate of Los Angeles is much better than that of San Francisco, but it is not all that it is cracked up to be. The winters are much damper than in Texas, and though the summers are fine there are very bad dust storms at times, and it gets very hot indeed. But the residents resent complaint of their weather, as they think it is the finest on earth, and you can hardly blame them, for the climate is what brings most of the money to the town. And certainly it produced some of the finest and healthiest-looking men and women it has ever been my luck to see. This question of climate has a curious effect on the labour market. So many young fellows of large brain but weak bodies have flocked to the town that an office man cannot approach the wages paid to a labourer or a mechanic; good office men could be got for from $40 to $50 per month at the time when labourers could get $1.75 per day, carpenters $3.50 for eight hours’ work, and masons $6.50 per day. I had a negro raker working under me who was getting the same salary as myself, and we had a cement sidewalk finisher who was drawing more pay per week than the superintendent. The yard foreman and I soon fell out, for the inspector was condemning the material he sent up, and, as I could not say anything, it was sent back to the yard. The yard foreman, to get even, would report more stuff sent up than I had received, and finally things got to such a pass that when we got the first of the streets finished I left. The day after I resigned I was riding up town on my bicycle when I met the manager of our big rival company. He stopped me and asked if it was true that I had left the Barber people. When I told him so he asked me if I would work for him. I refused, saying that I was sick of Los Angeles and the trouble with the street department, and had the offer of a position in Boston. He told me that if I worked for them I would have no further trouble with the street department, and he would give me the same salary as I had been getting, besides a bonus on any exceptionally good work. So the next day found me at work for the rival concern, and it was like coming into a harbour from a storm at sea. This concern had been making friends with the powers that ruled while Arthur had been making enemies, and the inspectors helped instead of hindering the work. If any of us were called away for a time the inspector would take hold of the gang and look after things till one returned. I was surprised, till I found out that they were one and all on the company’s pay-roll, besides what the city paid them for looking after the city’s interests. Thus the public was robbed; but this form of robbery is so common that the public seems to expect it, and can hardly realise such a thing as an honest contractor or honest public officials.