_California._--In the _Voyage round the World_, by Captain George
Shelvocke, begun Feb. 1719, he says of California (_Harris's
Collection_, vol. i. p. 233.):--
"The soil about Puerto, Seguro, and very likely in most of the
valleys, is a rich black mould, which, as you turn it fresh up
to the sun, appears as if intermingled with gold dust; some of
which we endeavoured to purify and wash from the dirt; but
though we were a little prejudiced against the thoughts that it
could be possible that this metal should be so promiscuously and
universally mingled with common earth, yet we endeavoured to
cleanse and wash the earth from some of it; and the more we did
the more it appeared like gold. In order to be further satisfied
I brought away some of it, which we lost in our confusion in
China."
How an accident prevented the discovery, more than a century back, of
the golden harvest now gathering in California!