VISIT TO THE SONORANIAN CAMP.—FESTIVITIES AND GAMBLING.—THE DOCTOR AND
TEAMSTER.—AN ALCALDE TURNED COOK.—THE MINER’S TATTOO.—THE LITTLE
DUTCHMAN.—NEW DEPOSITS DISCOVERED.—A WOMAN KEEPING A MONTÉ TABLE.—UP
TO THE KNEE AND NINE-PENCE.—THE VOLCANOES AND GOLD.—ARRIVAL OF A
BARREL OF RUM.
FRIDAY, OCT. 20. I threw myself into my saddle at an early hour this
morning, and started for a cañada, about ten miles distant. The
foot-trail which I followed, lay over several sharp ridges to the quick
waves of the Stanislaus, and then up a steep mountain spur. I was
obliged to dismount, draw myself up by the bushes, and trust to the
fidelity of my horse to follow. At last we gained the summit, but it was
only to gaze down a wild precipitous descent, where the cliffs hung in
toppling terror. A vein of white quartz runs along the ridge, like a
line of unmelted snow, with here and there spangles of gold glittering
in the sun. I had no implement with me but my hunting-knife, and vainly
broke the point of that. I tried one of my pistols; the bullet knocked
out the gold-drop, but jewel and lead went over the steep verge
together. I let myself down by the bushes, blessing every lythe limb and
steadfast root, while my horse, more sagacious, fetched a circuit, and
reached the plain before me.
Ascending another ridge, the ravine, which had induced this adventure,
lay in jagged wildness beneath. It was in uproarious life; an elk had
been shot; and the miners were feasting on its fat ribs. The repast was
hardly over, when the monté table, with its piles of gold, glimmered in
the shade. It was the great camp of the Sonoranians, and hundreds were
crowding around to reach the bank, and deposit their treasures on the
turn of a card. They seemed to play for the excitement, and often
doubled their stakes whether they won or lost. They apparently connect
no moral obliquity with the game; one of them, who sleeps near my
camping-tree, will kneel by the half hour on the sharp rock in his Ave
Marias, while the keen night-wind cuts his scarce clad frame, then rise
and stake his last dollar at monté. At the break of day he is on his
knees again, and his prayer trembles up with the first trill of the
waking birds. It was in this ravine that a few weeks since the largest
lump of gold found in California was discovered. It weighs twenty-three
pounds, is nearly pure, and cubic in its form. Its discovery shook the
whole mines; the shout of the _eureka_ swelled on the wind like the
cheer of seamen when the pharos breaks through a stormy night. I waved
my adieu to the miners, and fetching a bold circuit to the east, reached
at night-fall my camping-tree.
SATURDAY, OCT. 21. Extravagant charges here are often made as offsets. A
doctor of my acquaintance, wishing to remove to another cañada a few
miles off, tost his machine into an empty wagon, bound in that
direction, and on arriving, asked the teamster what he was to pay; the
reply was a hundred dollars! which was planked down without a word. Soon
after this the teamster had a grip of the cholic, from which he sought
relief in two or three of the doctor’s pills. The relieved patient now
asked what _he_ was to pay; the doctor, after a few moment’s
abstraction, in which he seemed to be rummaging his memory more than his
medicines, replied, “The charge is exactly one hundred dollars!” “Ah,”
said the wagoner, “I knew that cradle would yet rock thunder at me.” But
he paid the fee, and squared the account.
I have been out for several hours this morning scouring a conical hill
crowned with quartz. I took with me the sailor, who knocked his cup of
gold out of sight by an accidental glance of his pick. We searched the
hill from top to bottom, shivered the quartz on its summit, and rummaged
among the fragments of the same, which the storms of ages had swept to
its base, but we found no gold. Following one of the slopes which
terminated in a glen, overhung with willows, and where a current had
flowed, we struck into a confined basin, where we found, among the
pebbles, a deposit of gold, and gathered, in the course of the day,
about two ounces; with beautiful trophies we returned to camp.
MONDAY, OCT. 23. It was now near noon, and my day to cook the dinner; so
I hastened back to our camping-tree, and piling up the half-extinguished
brands, soon raised a fire. Then taking a tin pan, which served
alternately as a gold-washer and a bread-tray, I turned into it a few
pounds of flour, a small solution of saleratus, and a few quarts of
water, and then went to work in it with my hands, mixing it up and
adding flour till I got it to the right consistency; then shaping it
into a loaf, raked open the embers, and rolled it in, covering it with
the live coals. While this baking was going on, I placed in a stew-pan,
after pounding it pretty well between two stones, a string of
jerked-beef, with a small quantity of water, and lodged it on the fire.
Then taking some coffee, which had been burnt the evening before, I tied
it in the end of a napkin, and hammering it to pieces between two
stones, turned it into a coffee-pot filled with water, and placed that,
too, on the fire. In half an hour or so my bread was baked, my jerk-beef
stewed, and my coffee boiled. I settled the latter by turning on it a
pint of cold water. The bread was well done; a little burnt on one side,
and somewhat puffed up, like the expectations of the gold-digger in the
morning, or the vanity of a stump-orator just after a cheer. My
companions returned, and seating ourselves on the ground, each with a
tin cup of coffee, a junk of bread, and a piece of the stewed jerky, our
dinner was soon dispatched, and with a relish which the epicure never
yet felt or fancied. The water here is slightly impregnated with iron
and sulphur; the one acting as a tonic, the other as an aperient. And
then this fine mountain air, some eight hundred feet above the level of
the sea, all conduce to health and buoyancy of spirits. Among the
hundred gold-diggers around, not one hypochondriac throws on rock or
rill the shadow of a long countenance. Even they who hardly get out gold
enough to pay their way, laugh at their bad luck, and hope for better
success to-morrow. They have yet plenty of tickets in the lottery, and
some of them may turn out prizes. At any rate, they are not going to
despond while these glens contain an undisturbed bar, or these hills
lift their cones of white rock in the sun.
TUESDAY, OCT. 24. The ravine in which we are camped runs nearly north
and south, and is walled by lofty ranges of precipitous rock. It is near
ten o’clock of the day before the rays of the sun strike its depths; but
when they do reach you, it is with a power that drives you at once into
the shade. It is twilight in the glen, while the cliffs above still
blaze in the radiance of the descending orb. As darkness comes on, the
camp-fires of the diggers, kindled along the ravine, throw their light
into every recess, where forms are seen, gathered in groups, or glancing
about, while every now and then some merry tale or apt joke explodes in
a roar of laughter. At eight o’clock every tin pan and brass kettle is
put in requisition, and the thumpers beat a tattoo, which is concluded
with the simultaneous discharge of several muskets. The jargon is enough
to frighten the wolf out of his cavern; and yet no harmony that ever
rolled from theatrical orchestra or cathedral choir, can charm you half
as much. It is the music of the heart reeling itself off through tin
pans in melodious numbers. But the musicians are now all sound asleep;
their camp-fires wane, and there is only heard the dirge of the pines,
murmuring in the night-wind. Thousands who lie on beds of down, under
canopies of silk, might envy the sleepers on these rocks their quiet
repose. The stars gaze on no groups where slumber shakes from its wings
such a refreshing dew.
WEDNESDAY, OCT. 25. A little Dutchman came to me this morning, and
informed me, in whispers, that he and his companion had, unbeknown to
the rest, stolen off to a glen about three miles distant, where they had
found a rich deposit, and then invited me to come and share it with
them. He took my pan, which had served as a bread-tray, and we wound
over the hills to his glen. Here we found his red-haired companion,
knee-deep in mud, which he was shovelling out to reach the bed of clay
beneath. On this bed lay the gold in grains about the size of
wheat-kernels. Every now and then the water, which was as cold as ice,
would gather in the hole, and required to be bailed out or drained off.
The chill of the water was enough for me; I had tried that once before,
and felt no disposition to repeat the experiment. The mud I could stand,
for I was already dirty as a pig just rolling out of his _siesta_. So I
told my young friends to go to work, and I would poke about the edges.
They urged me to jump in; and truly the temptation was strong, and
required some share of prudence to resist it, but I contented myself
with working where I could keep my feet dry. But they several times
called for my pan, and filled it with earth, scraped from the clay bed,
which I washed out, and then found at the bottom fifteen or twenty
dollars in gold. They obtained, as the result of their joint labors
through the day, about a thousand dollars. Night was advancing, and I
returned over the hills to our camping-tree.
THURSDAY, OCT. 26. Where is the little Dutchman and the red-haired
Paddy? ran in excited inquiry through the ravine this morning, for they
had now been missed from the camp twenty-four hours, and no doubt
existed on the minds of many that they had found a rich deposit
somewhere, and were secretly working it out. I knew well where they
were, but no one thought of questioning me on the subject, for I was
looked upon as a sort of amateur gold-hunter, very much given to
splitting rocks and digging in unproductive places; and, indeed, this
was not far from the truth, for my main object was information, and a
specimen of wild mountain life.
But to return to the little Dutchman. All knew him to be a shrewd
gold-hunter, and determined to find him before he should exhaust his
discovery. No child lost in the woods ever awakened half the concern:
some started in this direction, others in that, till all the cardinal
points in the heaven, and all the glens between, had men travelling
towards them. The most curious feature in this business is, that out of
a regiment of gold-hunters, where the utmost apparent confusion
prevails, the absence of two men should be noticed. But the motions of
every man are watched. Even when he gathers up his traps, takes formal
leave, and is professedly bound home, he is tracked for leagues. No
disguise can avail him; the most successful war-stratagem would fail
here.
FRIDAY, OCT. 27. I have just returned from another ravine, five miles
distant, where there are eighty or a hundred gold-diggers. They are
mostly Sonoranians, and, like all their countrymen, passionately devoted
to gambling. They were playing at monté; the keeper of the bank was a
woman, and herself a Sonoranian. There was no coin on the table; the
bank consisted of a pile of gold, weighing, perhaps, a hundred pounds;
and each of the players laid down his ounce or pound, as his means or
courage permitted. The woman, on the whole, appeared to be the winner,
though one man, in the course of half an hour, took ten pounds from her
yellow pile. But such a loss was felt only for the moment, and only had
the effect to stimulate others to lose what little they had left. A
Sonoranian digs out gold simply and solely that he may have the
wherewithal for gambling. This is the rallying thought which wakes with
him in the morning, which accompanies him through the day, and which
floats through his dreams at night. For this he labors, and cheerfully
denies himself every comfort. All this is the result of habit. A
Mussulman looks upon gambling as a species of larceny,—as a crime which
deserves the bastinado. I saw a Turkish cadi at Smyrna sentence a man to
thirty-nine lashes for having, as he termed it, _swindled_ another out
of fifty dollars at faro. Give me a Turk where there is a rogue to be
caught or a crime punished. The flashings of the sword of justice follow
the crime as light the shark in a phosphoric sea.
SATURDAY, OCT. 28. A portion of the party that went in quest of the
little Dutchman have found him, and helped him to dig out his new
deposit—a sort of assistance for which he can feel no very profound
obligation. It was much like that rendered by Prince Hal in the division
of the spoils secured by the knight of sack at Gad’s hill. A successful
gold-hunter is like the leader of hounds in the chase—the whole pack
comes sweeping after, and are sure to be in at the death. No doubling
hill, or covert, or stream throws them upon a false scent. I advise all
fox-hunters to come here and train their hounds, and throw away their
horns. Even his Grace of Wellington, who is still so hotly keen in the
chase, that the snows of eighty winters fall from his locks unperceived,
might catch some valuable hints in the gold mines of California.
MONDAY, OCT. 30. I encountered to-day, in a ravine some three miles
distant, among the gold-washers, a woman from San José. She was at work
with a large wooden bowl, by the side of a stream. I asked her how long
she had been there, and how much gold she averaged a day. She replied,
“Three weeks and an ounce.” Her reply reminded me of an anecdote of the
late Judge B——, who met a girl returning from market, and asked her,
“How deep did you find the stream? what did you get for your butter?”
“Up to the knee and nine-pence,” was the reply. Ah! said the judge to
himself; she is the girl for me—no words lost there: turned back,
proposed, was accepted, and married the next week; and a more happy
couple the conjugal bonds never united: the nuptial lamp never waned;
its ray was steady and clear to the last. Ye, who paddle off and on for
seven years, and are at last perhaps capsized, take a lesson of the
judge. That “up to the knee and nine-pence” is worth all the rose
letters and melancholy rhymes ever penned. But I am wandering; I did
intend to write this journal without an episode, but they will keep
forcing themselves in, like the curiosity of the crowd in a family jar,
or remembrances of wrong upon a guilty conscience. I know the interest
of a journal depends much on the continuity of its thread; but it is the
easiest thing in the world to be continuously stupid, and _that_ is my
apology for these episodical breaks. If the reader don’t like this
reason, then let him look up a better; while I plunge into that
o’ershadowed glen, and see if it contains any gold.
TUESDAY, OCT. 31. I have collected, since my arrival in the mines,
several singular and beautiful specimens of the gold. One of the pieces
resembles a pendulous ear-drop, and must have assumed that shape when
the metal was in a state of fusion. That all the gold here has once been
in that state is sufficiently evident from the forms in which it is
found. I have a specimen, weighing several ounces, in which the
characteristics of the slate rock are as palpable as if they had been
engraved. I have another specimen, in which a clear crystal of quartz is
set, with a finish of execution which no jeweller can rival. I have
another specimen still, where the gold gleams up, in the shape of
buck-shot, from a basis of sandstone; and another still, where it has
taken the form of a paper-folder, and may be used to cut the leaves of a
book, which have escaped the knife of the binder. A most interesting
cabinet of curiosities might be gathered from the variety of
combinations and forms which the gold in these mines has assumed. Nature
never indulged in fancies more elegant and whimsical. If these are the
works of the volcano, then jewellers, instead of looking to the
laboratories of Paris, or Amsterdam, for models, should come and seat
themselves by the side of these craters. Here are laboratories, which no
human power has constructed, and models, which no human skill can rival.
WEDNESDAY, NOV. 1. There are several persons among the gold-diggers here
who rarely use any implement but their wooden bowls. Into these they
scrape the dirt left by others, which they stir and whirl till the gold
gradually works its way to the bottom. The earth, as these heavier
particles descend, is thrown off by the hands, and the gold remains.
This process is what they call dry washing: it is resorted to where
there is no water in the vicinity, and will answer pretty well where the
gold is found in coarse grains; but the finer particles, of course,
escape. The Sonoranians obviate this difficulty to some extent by
calling their lungs into requisition. They rub the earth into their
bowls, through their hands, detaching and throwing away all the pebbles,
and then blow off the sand and dust, leaving the gold at the bottom. But
on some of the streams, particularly the Yuba, the gold is too fine even
for this process. It is amusing to see a group of Sonoranians, seated
around a deposit, blowing the earth out of their bowls. But for the dust
they raise, you would think they were cooling hasty-pudding. Their
cheeks swell out, like the chops of a squirrel, carrying half the
beech-nuts on a tree to his hole. A more provident fellow he than his
two-legged superior! He lays in his stores against the inclemency of
winter; while the Sonoranian squanders his at the gambling-table. There
is more practical wisdom in an ant-hill than is often found in a city.
But I am digressing again—a propensity which I shall never get over.
THURSDAY, NOV. 2. Quite a sensation was produced among the gold-diggers
this morning by the arrival of a wagon from Stockton, freighted with
provisions and a barrel of liquor. The former had been getting scarce,
and the latter had long since entirely given out. The prices of the
first importation were—flour, two dollars a pound; sugar and coffee,
four dollars; and the liquor, which was nothing more nor less than New
England rum, was twenty dollars the quart. But few had bottles: every
species of retainer was resorted to; some took their quart cups, some
their coffee-pots, and others their sauce-pans; while one fellow, who
had neither, offered ten dollars to let him suck with a straw from the
bung. All were soon in every variety of excitement, from prattling
exhilaration, to roaring inebriety. Some shouted, some danced, and some
wrestled: a son of Erin poured out his soul on the beauties of the
Emerald isle; a German sung the songs of his father-land; a Yankee
apostrophized the mines, which swelled in the hills around; an
Englishman challenged all the bears in the mountain glens to mortal
combat; and a Spaniard, posted aloft on a beetling crag, addressed the
universe. The multitudinous voices which rang from every chasm and cove
of the ravine, rivalled the roar that went up around the tower of Babel.
But night has come; the camp-fires burn dim; and the revellers are at
rest, save here and there one who strides about in his delirium,
commanding silence among the wolves who bark from the hills. What
exciting, elevating, and expanding powers there are in a barrel of New
England rum! It makes one to-day monarch of peopled realms, and their
riches; but leaves him to-morrow in rags, and with only ground enough in
which to sink his pauper grave.
“Thou sparkling bowl! thou sparkling bowl!
Though lips of bards thy brim may press,
And eyes of beauty o’er thee roll,
And song and dance thy power confess—
I will not touch thee; for there clings
A scorpion to thy side that stings.”
PIERPONT.