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THE ANNOYANCES OF MY JUDICIAL LIFE.

After the narrative of my Personal Reminiscences was completed, I concluded to dictate an account of some strange annoyances to which I had been subjected in the course of my judicial life.  The account will have an interest to those of my friends for whom the Reminiscences were printed, and it is intended for their perusal alone.

ROSY VIEWS OF JUDICIAL LIFE GRADUALLY VANISHING.—­UNSETTLED LAND TITLES OF THE STATE.—­ASSERTED OWNERSHIP BY THE STATE OF GOLD AND SILVER FOUND IN THE SOIL.—­PRESENT OF A TORPEDO.

When I went on the bench, I not only entertained elevated notions of the dignity and importance of the judicial office, but looked forward confidently to the respect and honor of the community from a faithful discharge of its duties.  I soon discovered, however, that there would be but little appreciation for conscientious labor on the bench, except from a small number of the legal profession, until after the lapse of years.  For the heavy hours of toil which the judges endured, for the long examination which they gave to voluminous records, for their nights of sleeplessness passed in anxious thought to ascertain what was true and right amidst a mass of conflicting evidence and doubtful principles, the public at large appeared to have little thought and less consideration.  The cry of disappointment over frustrated schemes of cupidity and fraud was sufficient for the time to drown all other expressions of judgment upon the action of the court.

The unsettled condition of the land titles of the State gave occasion to a great deal of litigation and was for a long time the cause of much bad feeling towards the judges who essayed to administer impartial justice.  When California was acquired, the population was small and widely scattered.  To encourage colonization, grants of land in large quantities, varying from one to eleven leagues, had been made to settlers by the Mexican government.  Only small tracts were subjected to cultivation.  The greater part of the land was used for grazing cattle, which were kept in immense herds.  The grants were sometimes of tracts with defined boundaries, and sometimes of places by name, but more frequently of specified quantities within boundaries embracing a greater amount.  By the Mexican law, it was incumbent upon the magistrates of the vicinage to put the grantees in possession of the land granted to them; and for that purpose to measure off and segregate the quantity designated.  Owing to the sparseness of the population there was little danger of dispute as to boundaries, and this segregation in the majority of cases had been neglected before our acquisition of the country.  From the size of the grants and the want of definite boundaries, arose nearly all the difficulties and complaints of the early settlers.  Upon the discovery of gold,