All the camps were very much alike. A straggling row of log
cabins or huts of motley construction; a few stores so-called,
sometimes of logs, or, if a saw-mill was at hand, of rude sawn
boards; a number of saloons, each of which customarily also
supported a dance-hall; a series of cabins or huts where dwelt
individual men, each doing his own cooking and washing; and
outside these huts the uptorn earth--such were the camps which
dotted the trails of the stampedes across inhospitable deserts
and mountain ranges. Church and school were unknown. Law there
was none, for of organized society there was none. The women who
lived there were unworthy of the name of woman. The men strode
about in the loose dress of the camp, sometimes without
waistcoat, sometimes coatless, shod with heavy boots, always
armed.
If we look for causes contributory to the history of the
mining-camp, we shall find one which ordinarily is
overlooked--the invention of Colt's revolving pistol. At the time
of the Civil War, though this weapon was not old, yet it had
attained very general use throughout the frontier.
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