Brown pointed to a piece of bacon. The traveller having



OLD TIMES IN VIRGINIA CITY. 67

no knife, asked for one. Brown pulled out an immense
bowie, then thrust it forward with the remark that he
had "already killed five men with that knife," and
the startled visitor fled in haste.
Brown on one occasion in Virginia City took offence
at some remark made by a poor half-witted fellow.
Without a word he seized his prey and slashed him to
pieces with the terrible bowie. Then he lay down on the
billiard table and went to sleep while the remains of the
victim were being gathered up from the floor. This
incident and several others quite as bad are well au-
thenticated in the history of the rampant ruffianism
and crime of the period. Sam Brown's long list of
murders caine to a sudden end when a plucky rancher
whom he had threatened to kill on sight filled him full
of buckshot.
A few " gentlemanly cutthroats " of rather more
prepossessing appearance were occasionally found — ^men
like Cherokee Bob, of Oregon and Idaho, the undoubted
original of Bret Harte's Jack Hamlin. One of these,
" El Dorado Johnny," desiring to shoot a man, bought
a new suit of clothes, got shaved, had his hair curled
and his boots polished, saying that he might be " used
up " and desired to " look nice if he was Idlled," which
was exactly what occurred.
