HUBERT HOWE BANCROFT, in _Literary Industries._ DECEMBER 5. LAW IN THE EARLY MINING-CAMPS. Here, in a new land, under new conditions, subjected to tremendous pressure and strain, but successfully resisting them, were associated bodies of freemen bound together for a time by common interests, ruled by equal laws, and owning allegiance to no higher authority than their own sense of right and wrong. They held meetings, chose officers, decided disputes, meted out a stern and swift punishment to offenders, and managed their local affairs with entire success; and the growth of their committees was proceeding at such a rapid rate, that days and weeks were often sufficient for vital changes, which, in more staid communities, would have required months or even years. CHARLES HOWARD SHINN, in _Mining Camps._ DECEMBER 6. New towns were laid out in the valleys to supply the camps, and those already established grew with astonishing rapidity. Stockton, for instance, increased in three months from a solitary ranch-house to a canvas city of one thousand inhabitants. Sacramento also became a canvas city, whose dust-clouds whirled, and men, mules, and oxen toiled; where boxes, barrels, bales innumerable, were piled in the open air, no shelter being needed for months. For the City Hotel, Sacramento, thirty thousand dollars per year was paid as rent, although it was only a small frame building. The Parker House, San Francisco, cost thirty thousand dollars to build, and rented for fifteen thousand dollars per month. CHARLES HOWARD SHINN, in _Mining Camps._ DECEMBER 7. The prospector is the advance agent of progress, civilization and prosperity. * * * It is for the sight of a yellow streak in his pan that he has been tempted to endure the fatigue, cold, and hunger of the mountains, and the heat, thirst and horror of the desert. The prospector is a man of small pretensions, of peaceful disposition, indomitable will, boundless perseverance, remarkable endurance, undoubted courage, irrepressible hopefulness, and unlimited hospitality He is the friend of every man till he has evidence that the man is his enemy, and he is the most respected man in the mining regions of the West. ARTHUR J. BURDICK, in _The Mystic Mid-Region._ DECEMBER 8. To a little camp of 1848 a lad of sixteen came one day, footsore, weary, hungry, and penniless. There were thirty robust and cheerful miners at work in the ravine; and the lad sat on the bank, watching them awhile in silence, his face telling the sad story of his fortunes. At last one stalwart miner spoke to his fellows, saying: "Boys, I'll work an hour for that chap if you will." At the end of the hour a hundred dollars' worth of gold dust was laid in the youth's handkerchief. The miners made out a list of tools and necessaries.