Francis Bret Harte was an American author and poet, who worked in a number of different professional capacities including miner, teacher, messenger and journalist before turning to full time writing in 1871. He became famed for his short fiction featuring gold diggers. "On the Frontier" is a collection of seven short stories and novellas, all set in the 1850s 60s, in or not far from San Francisco and the gold fields. The volume of witty, sometimes heart-rending tales will be pleasant for fans of short fiction. Ambrose Bierce called Harte's humor "incomparable," and the highlights of Harte's oeuvre helped establish the foundations of western American fiction. Enjoy the reading.