Such was the pair who ruled in the old Silverado Hotel, among the windy trees, on the mountain shoulder overlooking the whole length of Napa Valley, as the man aloft looks down on the ship’s deck.  There they kept house, with sundry horses and fowls, and a family of sons, Daniel Webster, and I think George Washington, among the number.  Nor did they want visitors.  An old gentleman, of singular stolidity, and called Breedlove—­I think he had crossed the plains in the same caravan with Rufe—­housed with them for awhile during our stay; and they had besides a permanent lodger, in the form of Mrs. Hanson’s brother, Irvine Lovelands.  I spell Irvine by guess; for I could get no information on the subject, just as I could never find out, in spite of many inquiries, whether or not Rufe was a contraction for Rufus.  They were all cheerfully at sea about their names in that generation.  And this is surely the more notable where the names are all so strange, and even the family names appear to have been coined.  At one time, at least, the ancestors of all these Alvins and Alvas, Loveinas, Lovelands, and Breedloves, must have taken serious council and found a certain poetry in these denominations; that must have been, then, their form of literature.  But still times change; and their next descendants, the George Washingtons and Daniel Websters, will at least be clear upon the point.  And anyway, and however his name should be spelt, this Irvine Lovelands was the most unmitigated Caliban I ever knew.

Our very first morning at Silverado, when we were full of business, patching up doors and windows, making beds and seats, and getting our rough lodging into shape, Irvine and his sister made their appearance together, she for neighbourliness and general curiosity; he, because he was working for me, to my sorrow, cutting firewood at I forget how much a day.  The way that he set about cutting wood was characteristic.  We were at that moment patching up and unpacking in the kitchen.  Down he sat on one side, and down sat his sister on the other.  Both were chewing pine-tree gum, and he, to my annoyance, accompanied that simple pleasure with profuse expectoration.  She rattled away, talking up hill and down dale, laughing, tossing her head, showing her brilliant teeth.  He looked on in silence, now spitting heavily on the floor, now putting his head back and uttering a loud, discordant, joyless laugh.  He had a tangle of shock hair, the colour of wool; his mouth was a grin; although as strong as a horse, he looked neither heavy nor yet adroit, only leggy, coltish, and in the road.  But it was plain he was in high spirits, thoroughly enjoying his visit; and he laughed frankly whenever we failed to accomplish what we were about.  This was scarcely helpful:  it was even, to amateur carpenters, embarrassing; but it lasted until we knocked off work and began to get dinner.  Then Mrs. Hanson remembered she should have been gone an hour ago; and the pair retired, and the lady’s laughter died away among the nutmegs down the path.  That was Irvine’s first day’s work in my employment—­the devil take him!