The discovery of gold in California, in 1848, with its other mineral
resources, including the Alamada quicksilver mine at San José, which is
an article of first necessity in working gold or silver ore; and the
great silver mines of Nevada, in 1860, the Comstock lode, in which, in
ten years, from five to eight hundred millions of gold and silver were
taken out, a larger amount than was ever taken from one locality before,
the Alamada quicksilver mine being the second most productive of any in
the world, the one in Spain being the largest, said to be owned by the
Rothschilds. Its effect upon the general prosperity and development of
our country has been immense, almost incalculable. Before these
discoveries the amount of gold in the United States was estimated at
about seventy millions, now it is conceded to be seven hundred millions.
The Northern Pacific coast was then almost unpopulated. California a
territory three times as large as New York and Oregon and the State of
Washington, all now being cultivated and containing large and populous
cities, and railroads connecting them with the East. Why that country
should have remained uninhabited for untold ages, where universal
stillness must have prevailed as far as human activity is concerned, is
one of the unfathomable mysteries of nature. It is only one hundred and
twenty-five years since the Bay of San Francisco was first discovered,
one of the grandest harbors in the world, being land-locked, extending
thirty miles, where all the vessels of the world could anchor in safety.
The early pioneers of those two years immediately after the gold was
discovered (of which I am writing) are passing away. As Ossian says,
"People are like the waves of the ocean, like the leafs of woody marvin
that pass away in the rustling blast, and other leaves lift up their
green heads." There is probably not five per cent of the population of
California to-day, of those days, scenes and events of which I have
tried to portray. Another generation have taken their places who can
know but little of those times except by tradition. I, being one of the
pioneers, felt it a duty, or an inspiration seemed to come over me as an
obligation I owed to myself and compatriots of those times, to do what I
could to perpetuate the memory of them to some extent in the history of
our country as far as I had the ability to do it.