Francisco.  He is regarded as among the ablest and best of the State Judges.  Mr. Reardon has been a District Judge for some years in the Fourteenth District, greatly respected by the profession for his ability and learning.  Isaac S. Belcher, who came to Marysville at a later period—­in 1855, I believe—­was noted for his quiet manners and studious habits.  He has since been District Judge, and has worthily filled a seat on the bench of the Supreme Court of the State, where he was greatly respected by his associates and members of the bar.  Edward C. Marshall, the brilliant orator, who at one time represented the State in Congress, had his office in Marysville in 1855 and ’56.  He occasionally appeared in court, though he was generally occupied in politics, and in his case, as in nearly all others, the practice of the law and the occupation of politics did not always move harmoniously together.

Charles E. Filkins, afterwards County Judge; Charles Lindley, afterwards also County Judge and one of the Code Commissioners; Henry P. Haun, the first County Judge, and afterwards appointed to the United States Senate by Governor Weller; N.E.  Whitesides, afterwards a member of the Legislature from Yuba, and Speaker of the House; F.L.  Hatch, now County Judge of Colusa; George Howe, afterwards Treasurer of the County; and Wm. S. Belcher, who afterwards rendered good service to the public as a School Commissioner, also practiced at the Marysville bar with success.

Charles E. DeLong, afterwards a member of the State Senate, and our Minister to Japan, and Henry K. Mitchell, afterwards a nominee of the Democrats for the U.S.  Senate in Nevada, were just getting a good position at the bar when I left, and gave evidence of the ability which they afterwards exhibited.  Others might be named who held fine positions in the profession.

These mentioned show a bar of great respectability, and I may add that its members were, with few exceptions, gentlemen of general information and courteous manners.  The litigation which chiefly occupied them and gave the largest remuneration related to mines and mining claims.  The enforcement of mortgages and collection of debts was generally—­by me, at least—­entrusted to clerks, unless a contest was made upon them.

There was one case which I recall with pleasure, because of the result obtained in face of unconcealed bribery on the other side.  The subject of the suit was the right to a “placer” mine in Yuba River, at Park’s Bar.  Its value may be estimated from the fact that within two or three weeks after the decision of the case, the owners took from the mine over ninety thousand dollars in gold dust.  The suit was brought before a justice of the peace, and was for an alleged forcible entry and detainer, a form of action generally adopted at the time for the recovery of mining claims, because the title to the lands in which the mines were found was in the United States.  It was prosecuted as a purely