lying plateau in Nevada. The man who kept the station eating-house
was a Scot, and learning that I was the same, he grew very
friendly, and gave me some advice on the country I was now
entering. "You see," said he, "I tell you this, because I come
from your country." Hail, brither Scots!

His most important hint was on the moneys of this part of the
world. There is something in the simplicity of a decimal coinage
which is revolting to the human mind; thus the French, in small
affairs, reckon strictly by halfpence; and you have to solve, by a
spasm of mental arithmetic, such posers as thirty-two, forty-five,
or even a hundred halfpence. In the Pacific States they have made
a bolder push for complexity, and settle their affairs by a coin
that no longer that no longer exists - the BIT, or old Mexican
real. The supposed value of the bit is twelve and a half cents,
eight to the dollar. When it comes to two bits, the quarter-dollar
stands for the required amount. But how about an odd bit? The
nearest coin to it is a dime, which is, short by a fifth. That,
then, is called a SHORT bit. If you have one, you lay it
triumphantly down, and save two and a half cents. But if you have
not, and lay down a quarter, the bar-keeper or shopman calmly
tenders you a dime by way of change; and thus you have paid what is
called a LONG BIT, and lost two and a half cents, or even, by
comparison with a short bit, five cents. In country places all
over the Pacific coast, nothing lower than a bit is ever asked or
taken, which vastly increases the cost of life; as even for a glass
of beer you must pay fivepence or sevenpence-halfpenny, as the case
may be. You would say that this system of mutual robbery was as
broad as it was long; but I have discovered a plan to make it
broader, with which I here endow the public. It is brief and