Read it through once

Our journey up the Sacramento River was interesting, chiefly because of the queer people who came on board at every landing. President and monarch and pauper, churchman and infidel, saint and sinner, jolly, sullen, talkative, silent,—all sorts and conditions of men,—were there, and they all had amusing things to say or do. It was this motley company, and the strange tales they told, that gave the voyage its chief charm.