At 2 o'clock yesterday morning, a corporal and five men belonging to the Provost GuardⒺexplanatory note started up from headquarters to relieve the sentries in front of the mintⒺexplanatory note. They were as drunk as lords when they started, and the further they went the drunkerⒶemendation they got. TheyⒶemendation brought up at the “Blue Wing” saloonⒺexplanatory note in the course of their wanderings, and took a drink or so and set out to complete their mission. They went in the wrong direction. The Corporal marched in front down Montgomery street, and kept a sharp lookout for the mint building, and finally thought he had found it. He examined the “Bank Exchange” with a critical eye for a while, and then placed a guard over it and started for home. He did not go far, however, before it occurred to his foggy mind that something was wrong—he was alone, and he ought to have the relieved guard with him. So he went back, took another look, and decided that the Bank Exchange was not the mint, and ordered his men to take up the line of march again. The party stopped at the “Old Corner” a few moments; the corporal put the men through the manual of arms on the pavement—and it was a remarkably loose performance—and then took them in and treated them.

By this time a squad of late idlers had got interested in the expedition, and were bent on seeing it out. The valiant corporal marched up to Wells, Fargo & Co's buildingⒺexplanatory note and left a guard over it, and reeled down streetⒶtextual note again. And again he could not account for his being alone. He went back and formed his troop into line of [begin page 373] battle, and demanded of them what had become of “that other d—d guard.” One man touched his hat and ventured to suggest, in language carefully framed to give as little offense as possible, that they were taking care of some other place instead of the mint.

“Silence!” thundered the corporal, and gave the man to understand that he must not arrogate to himself more wisdom than his officer. Then he drifted around at large for an hour or so, putting his army through a drunken drill at intervals, when his perplexity became too burdensome for him, and successively placing under military guard the Lick HouseⒺexplanatory note, the Occidental MarketⒶemendation Ⓔexplanatory note, and St. Mary's CathedralⒺexplanatory note and other buildings which resembled the mint about as much as the mint resembles a top sail schooner. Toward daylight the weary troop marched down Washington street, and turned into KearnyⒶemendation, and the corporal set them to watch the City Hall. He then went in and ordered the lights in Chief Burke's office to be put out, and was informed that the regulations required them to be kept burning in the police department. The corporal was glad to find he was at the police station; he said his guard at the mint had deserted their post, and he had placed the relief guard in possession of it some twenty times since two o'clock, but he couldn't go to headquarters without the retiring squad, and so he had been obliged every time to start out cruising after them afresh. He said of course they had got drunk and got into the station house. He did not want them if that was the case, but promised to come “in the morning” and get them out. So he gave the order “Double file—left wheel—march!” or something to that effect, and shortly disappeared down the street in the fog. He continued to “cruise” after the lost men and the lost mint all day, maybe, for at nine o'clock the guard in front of that building had not yet been relieved.