THE GOLD-BEARING QUARTZ.—THEIR LOCALITY.—RICHNESS AND
EXTENT.—SPECIMENS AND DOUBTFUL CONCLUSIONS.—THE SUITABLE MACHINERY
TO BE USED IN THE MOUNTAINS.—THE COURT OF ADMIRALTY AT MONTEREY.—ITS
ORGANIZATION AND JURISDICTION.—THE CASES DETERMINED.—SALE OF THE
PRIZES.—CONVENTION AND CONSTITUTION OF CALIFORNIA.—DIFFICULTIES AND
COMPROMISES.—SPIRIT OF THE INSTRUMENT.
The surface gold in California will in a few years be measurably
exhausted; the occasional discovery of new deposits cannot long postpone
such a result; nor will it be delayed for any great number of years, by
any more scientific and thorough method of securing the treasure.
California will prove no exception in these respects to other sections
of the globe where surface gold has been found. The great question is,
will her mountains be exhausted with her streams and valleys? Will her
rock gold give out with her alluvial deposits? The gold-bearing quartz
is the sheet-anchor at which the whole argosy rides; if this parts, your
golden craft goes to fragments.
When an old Sonoranian told me in the mines that the quartz _sweated_
out the gold, all the young savans around laughed at the old man’s
stupidity; and I must say the _perspiration_ part of the business rather
staggered my credulity, which has some compass, where there are no laws
to guide one. But the old digger was nearer the truth than many who have
more felicitous terms in which to express their theories. Though the
gold may not ooze from the quartz as water drips from a rock, yet it is
_there_, and often beads from the surface like a tear that has lost its
way among the dimples of a lady’s cheek. In other instances it shows
itself only in fine veins; and in others still, is wholly concealed from
the naked eye, and even eludes the optical instrument; but when reduced
to powder with the quartz, flies to the embrace of quicksilver, and
takes a virgin shape, massive and rich. The specimens of quartz which
have been subjected to experiment, have yielded from one to three
dollars the pound. These specimens were gathered at different points, in
the foot range of the Sierra Nevada, and are deemed only a fair average
of the yield that may be derived from the quartz.
The gold rocks of Georgia and Virginia yield, on an average, less than
half a cent to the pound, and yet the profits are sufficient to justify
deep mining. What then must be the profits of working a rock which lies
near the surface, and which yields over a dollar to the pound! The
result staggers credulity; and we seek a refuge from the weakness of
faith in the more reasonable persuasion, that the specimens tested are
richer than the average of the veins and quarries which remain. And yet
the poorest specimen, which the casual blow of the sledge has knocked
from the sunlit peak, has seemingly more gold in its shadow, than the
rock unhouseled from its mine in Virginia beneath forty fathoms of
darkness. The only real defence for our incredulity lies in the
presumption, that the gold-bearing quartz, like the surface deposits,
has its confined localities. And yet Mr. Wright, our member of Congress
from California, who has traversed the slopes of the Sierra, collected
more specimens, and made more experiments than any other individual, is
sanguine in the opinion that the gold-bearing quartz occupies a broad
continuous vein through the entire extent of the foot range: and in this
opinion the Hon. T. Butler King, in his lucid report, coincides. Still
such a wide departure in nature from all her known laws, or capricious
impulses, in the distribution of gold, leaps beyond my belief. In no
other part of her wide domain has she deposited in the quartz rock a
proportion of gold more than sufficient barely to compensate the hardy
miner: and it is difficult to believe, that with all her affection for
California, she has been so prodigal of her gifts. It surpasses the
rainbow-inwoven coat bestowed by the partial love of the patriarch on
his favorite child.
When a simple swain saw a necromancer break a cocoanut shell and let fly
half a dozen canary birds, he remarked, there was no doubt the young
birds were hatched in the cocoanut; but what puzzled him was, to know
how the old bird could get in to lay the eggs. But a deeper puzzle with
me is, that each and every cocoanut on this California tree, should have
a nest of canaries in it. And yet, with all these dogged doubts and
dismal dissuasives, were I going to invest in California speculations,
my inklings would turn strongly to quartz and stampers.
But I would send out no machinery which should have a piece in it
weighing over seventy or eighty pounds: no other can be taken through
the gorges, and over the acclivities to the lofty steeps where the
quartz exists. The machinery which can be readily taken to the mines in
Virginia, would cost a fortune in its transportation to the proper
localities in California. The heaviest capitalist would find himself
swamped before he got to work. Every piece must be taken over elevations
where a man can hardly draw himself up, and where his life is often
suspended on the strength of the fibres which twine the bush to the
fissures of the rock. It should be so light as to render its removal to
any new and more productive locality practicable, without involving a
ruinous expense. A machine wielding the force of one man, and stamping
on the spot, will be more productive than a forty-horse power working at
a distance. All the transportation must be done by hand, for no animal
can subsist among the steeps where the quartz prevail. Watch the eagle
as he soars to his high cliff with a writhing snake in his beak, and
then seize your light machinery and pursue his track. But, chained to a
heavy engine, you would make about as much progress as that mountain
bird with his talons driven into the back of a mastodon or whale.
COURT OF ADMIRALTY.
There were seven prize cases introduced into the court of admiralty at
Monterey, on which condemnation and sale of the property libelled
ensued. They were all clearly cases of legal capture, and came under the
well-established rule of international law, that the hostile character
attaches to the commerce of the neutral domiciled in the enemy’s
country. This rule is enforced by every consideration of sound policy
and national justice. If the flag of the neutral can protect the
property over which it waves, the entire commerce of the belligerent
might assume this neutral garb, and be as safe in time of war as peace.
To prevent such an abuse, the comity of nations has conceded the general
principle, that all commerce flowing to or emanating from a mercantile
house, established in the enemy’s country, shall be deemed hostile, and
be held liable to seizure.
A much more difficult question arose connected with the competency of
the court. Its organization arose out of the exigences of war; the
alternative lay between a recognition of its jurisdiction, and the
extreme right of the belligerent to burn and sink his captures.
Congress, in a declaration of war, virtually invests the executive with
authority to prosecute it, and secure the ends for which it has been
waged. He is necessarily entrusted with extraordinary discretion and
corresponding powers; when, in the due prosecution of these measures, he
finds himself borne beyond their statutory provisions, and surrounded by
exigences, lying at the time perhaps beyond the purview of legislative
enactment, he must either forego the objects which animated the acts of
the national legislature, or temporarily assume the responsibility which
the crisis demands. He must authorize the maintenance of civil
government in territories acquired by our arms, and judicial proceedings
in cases of capture on the high seas, which cannot be brought within the
jurisdiction of our established courts.
Nor is there any thing in such judicial proceedings which trenches upon
the laws of nations; these laws never assume the right to define the
powers vested in the executive of a realm. They claim no authority to
bring into court the constitutional prerogatives of a prince or of the
president of a republic; these are questions which appertain to the
forms of government where the acts originate, where the power is
exercised, and which must be disposed of as the wisdom of the nation may
deem proper. It is enough that national law allows the captor at his
peril to burn or sink his prize. Any executive measure to prevent such a
precipitate result, and to subject the legality of the capture to the
forms of a judicial investigation, is in accordance with every dictate
of moral justice, and that strong sense of right which binds every
civilized nation in a period of war as well as peace. Nor can the
captor, from a want of jurisdiction in the court that determines his
case, lose his prize. All the claimant can do is to require him to
appear before a court of competent authority, where the case must be
examined and decided _de novo_ on its merits. This great principle in
maritime jurisprudence has been recognized and confirmed in the decision
of the High Court of Admiralty in England. Half a century has rolled
over that decision, but its authoritative force remains firm and
unshaken as the base of the sea-girt isle.
It devolved on the court at Monterey not only to determine the prize
cases submitted, but to assume an onerous responsibility in the disposal
of the property libelled and condemned. The cargo of one of these prizes
consisted of a large amount of cotton, paper, and iron, destined to a
Mexican market, and for which there was no adequate demand in
California. The highest cash bid that could be procured at a sale duly
notified, was $34,000. To this bid the property must be knocked down, or
surrendered to a credit bid of $60,000, involving conditions for the
benefit of the purchaser wholly inadmissible in law. In this perplexity
I bid the ship and cargo in; placed a faithful, competent agent and crew
on board, and sent the whole to Mazatlan, which had become a port of
entry. The result was, that after discharging all claims existing
against the property, I paid over to the Secretary of the Navy, as the
net proceeds of the sales, the sum of $68,000, and stand credited with
that amount on the books of the department. But this is rather a matter
of personal service than a topic of public interest; it is, however,
connected with official duty, and exhibits one of the many forms in
which private responsibility may be tasked in saving from sacrifice
property confided to its care. A failure in such cases often brings
ruin; and even success may be obliged to seek its meagre remuneration
through the slow forms of legislative relief.
CONSTITUTION OF CALIFORNIA.
The desires of the people of California for a civil government, suited
to their new condition, at length found utterance at the ballot-box. The
best informed and most sedate of her citizens were elected in their
several districts, and commissioned to proceed to Monterey, for the
purpose of drafting in concert the provisions of a constitution. Never
were interests, habits, and associations more diverse than those
represented in this body. Unanimity could be reached only through the
largest concessions. It was the conquerors and the conquered, the
conservatives and the progressives; they who owned the lands, and they
who worked the mines, assembling to frame organic laws which should
equally secure and bind the interests of all. No cloud ever cast its
shadow on equal incongruities grouped in cliffs and chasms, pinnacles
and precipices, without having it broken into a thousand fragments. But
the honest and patriotic purpose which animated the convention, raised
that body above all national prejudice and local interests, and poured
its spirit in blending power over its measures. They had been
commissioned to plan and perfect a constitution for California, and they
were true to their trust. Day after day they labored at that eventful
instrument; no passion, no prejudice disturbed their counsels: where
opinions clashed, they were softened; where interests jarred, they were
harmonized; where local feeling sought assertion, it was surrendered.
Till at last, through this spirit of deference, compromise, and public
concern, the instrument was finished. And now let us glance at its
prominent features.
This constitution is thoroughly democratic; no prescriptive privileges,
or invidious distinctions are recognized; the interests of the great
mass fill every provision. Political and social equality are its bases,
while the rights of private judgment and individual conscience flow
untrammelled through its spirit. It is the embodiment of the American
mind, throwing its convictions, impulses, and aspirations into a
tangible, permanent shape. It is the creed of the thousands who wield
the plough, the plane, the hammer, the trowel, and spade. It is the
palladium of freedom, rolled in from the seaboard, and down from the
mountains, and which has caught its echoes from every river, steep, and
valley. It is the fraternal oath of a great people, uttered in the
presence of God and the hearing of nations. Millions will turn their
eyes to the fulfilment of its promises, when time and disaster have
engulfed the monuments of their own splendor and strength.
The 13th of October, 1849, will never fade from the annals of
California. It was not the sun, circling up into a broad and brilliant
heaven, that gave this morn its brightness: it was not the thunder of
the Pacific on the sea-beaten strand, that gave the day its impressive
force: it was not the long heavy roll of the artillery that most
signalized the hour; nor the harmony of the winds rolling their anthems
from the steep forests that stirred most strongly the human heart. It
was the silent signatures of the members of the convention to the
constitution, which had been confided to their wisdom and patriotic
fidelity. It was this last crowning act in an eventful moral enterprise,
having its source in the exigences of a great community. I wonder not
the old pioneer of the Sacramento pronounced it the greatest day of his
life; I wonder not that the veteran “Hero of Contreras” forgot the
laurels gathered on that field of fame, in the higher and nobler honors
showered upon him in this day’s achievements. It was his steady purpose
and fearless responsibility that threw into organized forms and
practical results, the plans and purposes of the people of California.
He will find his reward in the happiness and prosperity of a great
state, over which the flag of the Union shall never cease to wave. The
tide of Anglo-Saxon blood stops not here; it is to circulate on other
shores, continents, and isles; its progress is blent with the steady
triumphs of commerce, art, civilization, and religion. It will yet flow
the globe round, and beat in every nation’s pulse; morn will not blush,
or twilight fade where its swelling wave is not; its guiding-star is
above the disasters in which the purposes of man are sphered.
I regret my limits will not permit me to follow the Pacific squadron,
under the command of Com. Shubrick, to the Mexican coast. The capture
and occupation of Mazatlan has hardly stirred a whisper in the trump of
fame, which has poured out such strains on the other side of the
continent. And yet this achievement of the commodore had in it a spirit
of wisdom, resolution, and firmness that might emblazon a much loftier
page than mine. When the history of the Mexican war shall be written,
and the services of those who shared in its hardships and perils be duly
recognized, Com. Shubrick, with the gallant officers and brave men
attached to his command, will receive a lasting meed of merited renown.
It is now silently written in that international compact which
terminated the apprehensions of one republic and sealed the triumphs of
another. It was the waving of the stars and stripes on the strand of the
Pacific which left a forlorn hope without a refuge, and coerced the
terms of an honorable peace; and long may that peace remain unbroken by
the monster of discord and war.