themselves to become assured of the identity of their victims.  A worthy citizen in going home through Merchant Street between eight and nine o’clock in the evening was approached from behind by a person who, pressing his arm over his shoulder thrust a knife into his breast.  Luckily the knife encountered in its passage a thick pocket memorandum book which it cut through, and but for which, he would have lost his life.  The intended assassin undoubtedly mistook him for another person whom he somewhat resembled.  A few days after a gentleman passing by the Oriental Hotel heard the report of a pistol, and was sensible of the passage of a ball through his hat in most uncomfortable proximity to his head.  A person immediately stepped up to him saying, “Excuse me, I thought it was another man.”

The ally of the people in times of difficulty and danger, the Press, seemed subservient from choice to this vile domination, or overawed and controlled by it.  Experience had proved that its conductors could be true, bold, effective only at the peril of their lives.  More than one had suffered in his person the penalty of his allegiance to truth and duty; until at length intimidated and desponding, they had ceased to struggle with the spirit of evil ....

One man upon whom public attention was now turned, and whom the people of the City and State began to regard as their champion and deliverer, was James King of William, and he was no common man.  He was born in Georgetown, D. C., in January, 1822, and was therefore thirty-four years old at the time of his death.  Having received a common school education, he was placed at an early age in the banking house of Corcoran & Riggs at Washington City where he remained many years.  His health at length failing from steady application to business and conscientious devotion to his employer’s interests, he was induced to seek its restoration in the invigorating climate of California.  He arrived in the country just previous to the discovery of gold.  The marvelous growth of City and State soon required facilities for the transaction of business, and he became a resident of San Francisco, and established the first banking house in that City.  For several years he was eminently successful in business; and his strict honesty and integrity secured for him the abiding confidence and respect of the business community.  But the sudden and extreme depression in business in 1855 closed his doors as well as those of many other bankers and merchants.  By the surrender to his creditors of all he possessed, even his homestead, which, to the value of five thousand dollars, the laws of California allowed him to retain, and which might well be coveted by him as a home for his wife and six children; every claim against him was promptly met and discharged.  Retaining amidst all his reverses, the respect of all who knew him, he engaged as a clerk in the banking house of Adams & Co. where most of his old customers followed him,