Bret Harte's witty, sometimes heart-rending tales of frontier California, earned him acclaim during the 1860s as the new prophet of American letters. His books, The Luck of Roaring Camp, The Outcasts of Poker Flat and M'liss, helped establish the foundations of western American fiction. An excerpt from the book reads: There was something in the speaker's tone which seemed to touch a common chord in their natures, and this was voiced by Barker with sudden and almost pathetic earnestness. I tell you what, boys, we ought to swear here tonight to always stand by each other.