One could live here in a way which seemed perfectly luxurious after cruising about the mountains among the small out-of-the-way camps; for, besides having a choice of good hotels, one could enjoy most of the comforts and conveniences of ordinary life; even ice-creams and sherry-cobblers were to be had, for snow was packed in on mules thirty or forty miles from the Sierra Nevada, and no one took even a cocktail without its being iced. But what struck me most as a sign of civilization, was seeing a drunken man, who was kicking up a row in the street, deliberately collared and walked off to the lock-up by a policeman. I never saw such a thing before in the mines, where the spectacle of drunken men rolling about the streets unmolested had become so familiar to me that I was almost inclined to think it an infringement of the individual liberty of the subject--or of the citizen, I should say--not to allow this hog of a fellow to sober himself in the gutter, or to drink himself into a state of quiescence if he felt so inclined. This policeman represented the whole police force in his own proper person, and truly he had no sinecure. He was not exactly like one of our own blue-bottles; he was not such a stoical observer of passing events, nor so shut out from all social intercourse with his fellow-men. There was nothing to distinguish him from other citizens, except perhaps the unusual size of his revolver and bowie-knife; and his official dignity did not prevent him from mixing with the crowd and taking part in whatever amusement was going on.