GLANCES INTO CALIFORNIA.
SAILORS ON SHORE AS SOLDIERS.—THE BEAR FLAG.—CAPT. FREMONT AND HIS
ARMED BAND.—DEPARTURE OF ADMIRAL SEYMOUR.—SAN FRANCISCO.—ASPECTS OF
THE TOWN.—HABITS OF THE PEOPLE.—THE GOLD-DIGGER.—SPIRIT OF
SPECULATION.—GAMBLING.—EFFECTS OF THE GOLD MINES.—PAST AND PRESENT
CONDITION OF THE COUNTRY.
The peak where burns the blush of morn,
The glen in which a torrent rolled,
The crater where the Deil was born,
Are hemmed and stratified with gold;
And e’en the quartz, which bind the shore,
Sweat out at times the precious ore.
THURSDAY, JULY 16. The Cyane warped out of her berth this morning, and
we warped into it. Our ships are now moored in line, command the
anchorage, and present a very warlike appearance.
This afternoon a large ship was discovered rounding Point Pinos. She
entered the harbor under a cloud of canvas, and proved to be the
Collingwood, bearing the broad pennant of Admiral Seymour. She came to
anchor outside the Congress and Savannah. Our band greeted her with “God
save the Queen,” which she returned with “Hail, Columbia.” She is an 80
gun ship, and looks majestic on the wave. The Admiral was greatly
surprised to find Monterey in possession of the Americans.
[Illustration: SAN FRANCISCO IN 1846]
Commodore Sloat, having received information at Mazatlan, through the
public press, that our advanced posts on the Rio Grande had been
attacked by a Mexican force, sailed immediately for this port. On his
arrival the town was taken without any conflict, the flag run up and
saluted with twenty-one guns from each ship of the squadron. A
proclamation was then issued by the commodore, informing the inhabitants
of the bases of his proceedings, and invoking quietude as the condition
of security and repose; while our own men, who had been stationed on
shore, were strictly enjoined not to molest the citizens in their lawful
occupations.
FRIDAY, JULY 17. The bay of Monterey circles up broad and deep into the
coast. It is far from being land-locked, and yet the southern bend is
sufficiently sheltered to afford a safe and quiet anchorage. The town is
built within a circling range of forest-feathered hills, and on a plain
that descends in easy slopes to the strand of the bay. A more inviting
picturesque location for a city never entered a poet’s dream. The
buildings are reared of adobes, covered with a white layer of lime; they
are seldom over one story and a half, and are ornamented with porticoes
running the entire front. The streets are broad but irregular, and the
hills around connect themselves with the gleaming walls of cottages
which as yet exist only in your imagination.
The U. S. sloop-of-war Portsmouth, J. B. Montgomery commander, is at San
Francisco; the Warren, J. B. Hull, commander, is at Mazatlan. Our flag
is now flying over Monterey, San Francisco, Sonoma, and Sutter’s Fort.
No formidable attempt has been made by the Californians to recapture any
of these positions. The great body of the inhabitants seem but little
inclined to take up arms. They have no great affection for Mexico, or
reverence for the military chieftains whom she has sent to govern them.
Our marine guard, commanded by Lieut. Zelin, and fifty sailors under the
command of Lieut. Tilghman, left our ship to-day for duty on shore. It
is amusing to see Jack with a carbine in his hand; he don’t know what to
do with it, whether to carry it in one hand or both, at his side or on
his shoulder. When posted as a sentinel, he always forgets the
countersign of course, and if a man looks pretty honest, allows him to
pass; but if he comes in some mysterious shape, he may expect to be
shot. One on an outpost last night, hearing a rumpling sound among the
dry leaves, and catching glimpses, by the pale moonlight, of a form
gliding behind this bush and that, instead of hailing, “Who comes
there?” cried out, “A bloody Indian!” and let off his carbine. The
guard, hearing the report, rushed immediately to the spot, where they
found a bullock, which had narrowly escaped our sentinel’s bullet. Jack,
when shown his horned antagonist and rebuked for his precipitancy,
gruffly replied, that it was impossible to make out, in the night and
among the bushes, what sort of a craft was coming at him, and he thought
it best to get the first fire.
SATURDAY, JULY 18. The whole of California is in a state of tumult, and
was so before our squadron made a demonstration on Monterey. The
jealousy of the government had been roused by the arrival of a fresh
body of emigrants, who had located themselves on the Sacramento, and by
the movements of Capt. Fremont, whose scientific projects a disturbed
imagination had converted into revolutionary purposes. The emigrants
were ordered out of the country, with Capt. Fremont and his exploring
party; and measures adopted to enforce the mandate. But the indomitable
captain and the emigrants were not thus to be ousted or overawed. They
had the Anglo-Saxon blood in them, and decided that a man has a right to
live where he pleases on this green earth of God’s.
They ran up a flag sufficiently significant of their intentions,—a white
field, red border, with a grizzly bear eyeing a single star, which threw
its light on the motto, “The Republic of California.” To this flag and
its fortunes they pledged themselves in mutual confidence, and though a
band of only two hundred, pushed their measures so vigorously that Gen.
Castro, with a force of three times their numbers, retreated before
their resolute positions. They are now within the department of
Monterey, and their arrival is looked for hourly. Such in brief is the
history of the Bear flag, and of that courageous organization which set
the ball of Anglo-Saxon supremacy rolling in California.
SUNDAY, JULY 19. We had divine service at the usual hour. The object of
the sermon was a plain illustration of the text, “The way of
transgressors is hard.” The every-day life of the sailor is a living
commentary on the truth of this significant proverb. The hardships of
his lot have generally been entailed upon him by a career of folly. The
recitals of his errors, which are often poured into my ears, are full of
painful interest. I greatly fear the novelties of the shore, and the
excitements which reach us every day from all quarters, will dissipate
that religious concern which has prevailed of late among our crew.
MONDAY, JULY 20. Captain Fremont and his armed band, with Lieut.
Gillespie of the marine corps, arrived last evening from their pursuit
of Gen. Castro. They are two hundred strong, all well mounted, and have
some three hundred extra horses in their train. They defiled, two
abreast, through the principal street of the town. The ground seemed to
tremble under their heavy tramp. The citizens glanced at them through
their grated windows. Their rifles, revolving pistols, and long knives,
glittered over the dusky buckskin which enveloped their sinewy limbs,
while their untrimmed locks, flowing out from under their foraging caps,
and their black beards, with white teeth glittering through, gave them a
wild savage aspect. They encamped in the skirts of the woods which
overhang the town. The blaze of their watch-fires, as night came on,
threw its quivering light into the forest glades, and far out at sea.
Their sentinels were posted at every exposed point; they sleep in their
blankets under the trees, with their arms at their side, ready for the
signal shot or stir of the crackling leaf.
For let a footstep, scarce as loud
As falls the winter’s flake,
Approach their tents, they wake,
And spring like lightning from the cloud.
TUESDAY, JULY 21. The Levant has been ordered to be ready for sea with
all dispatch. She is to take Commodore Sloat to Panama, where he crosses
the Isthmus for the United States. His measures here involve some
responsibility, as no authentic intelligence of a declaration of war has
reached us. But his motives have been high and patriotic, and his action
opportune in the event of national hostilities. The command will now
devolve on Commodore Stockton; what he will do with the California
question, remains to be seen. Among the persons whose influence is felt
in these affairs, stands T. O. Larkin, Esq., U. S. Consul for many years
in this province, and of whose services I shall have occasion to speak
hereafter.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 22. Captain Fremont’s band of riflemen visited our ship
to-day, and lunched with us. Many of them are trappers from the interior
wilds, who have never seen a man-of-war before. They looked at our
frowning battery with a wonder for which their trap dialect had no
expression. The Indians connected with the body, wanted to know how such
an immense mass could be put on the _trail_. We pointed to our sails,
clewed to the yards; they shook their heads in incredulity. They seemed
to think there must be some invisible monster in the hold, whose
terrific energies caused the ship to go. Our band played some of their
most spirit-stirring airs, but they had as little effect on these
children of the wild as the song of the grasshopper. The article which
seemed to interest them most, was the rifle of Commodore Stockton; they
handled it with that yearning fondness which a mother feels clasping her
first-born.
THURSDAY, JULY 23. The Collingwood sailed to-day for the Sandwich
Islands. Many of her officers had clothes on shore in the hands of
washerwomen; they were hurried off, some half ironed, some half dry, and
some in the suds. Such are the accidents which await the linen of one
connected with a national ship. He may think himself fortunate if he
recovers his clothes at all; they are often left as contingent
remainders in a man’s will.
The Collingwood has offered us no molestation: Admiral Seymour is an
officer of great amenity of deportment,—has been several times on board
the Congress: he was much impressed with the force of our battery, and
says our ship is the most powerful frigate afloat in the world. The
Admiral and most of his officers are connected with the English
nobility, but assume no airs, and are boon companions wherever met. It
has been often stated by American writers that the Admiral intended to
raise the English flag in California, and would have done it had we not
stolen the march on him. I believe nothing of the kind; the allegation
is a mere assumption, unwarranted by a solitary fact. He had no such
instructions from the British ministry: what the English _might_ have
done, had they been apprized of our designs, is another thing; what they
_did_ do, was to watch our movements. When we had harpooned the whale,
they left us to make the most of its blubber and bones.
FRIDAY, JULY 24. Capt. Du Pont left us to-day to take command of the
Cyane—a fine ship, well officered and manned. We part with him with much
regret; he has been with us in gale and calm, amidst the ice of the Cape
and on the burning Line, and cheerfully shared, in his own person, every
hardship and peril. His professional knowledge and efficiency, with his
social qualities and unblemished character, have won our unmeasured
confidence and esteem.
Mr. Livingston, our first lieutenant, succeeds to the command, under an
appointment from Commodore Stockton, and combines, with the duties of
this post, those of executive officer. His station is one of some
difficulty, but he is the better qualified for it by his previous
services and thorough knowledge of the crew. Capt. Mervin takes command
of the Savannah—a post to which he is entitled by his experience and
rank. The officers attached to this frigate are an ornament to the
service; there are not wanting individuals among them whose religious
example has been felt deep and wide.
Here the publication of my journal must rest; and be resumed in another
volume, under the title of “Three Years in California.” But without
trenching on the incidents sketched in that volume, I may glance at a
few local circumstances which recent events have thrown into remarkable
prominency. The geographical features of the country will be described
in their proper place; I turn from these to a point which looms up, in
the fancy at least, like a headland on which a rosy twilight has poured
its golden charm.
The bay of San Francisco resembles a broad inland lake, communicating by
a narrow channel with the ocean. This channel, as the tradition of the
aborigines runs, was opened by an earthquake which a few centuries since
convulsed the continent. The town is built on the south bend of the bay,
near its communication with the sea. Its site is a succession of barren
sand-hills, tumbled up into every variety of shape. No levelling
process, on a scale of any magnitude, has been attempted. The buildings
roll up and over these sand ridges like a shoal of porpoises over the
swell of a wave, only the fish has much the most order in the disposal
of his head and tail. More incongruous combinations in architecture
never danced in the dreams of men. Brick warehouses, wooden shanties,
sheet-iron huts, and shaking tents, are blended in admirable confusion.
But these grotesque habitations have as much uniformity and sobriety as
the habits of those who occupy them. Hazards are made in commercial
transactions and projects of speculation, that would throw Wall-street
into spasms. I have seen merchants purchase cargoes without having even
glanced into the invoice. The conditions of the sale were a hundred per
cent. profits to the owner, and costs. In one cargo, when tumbled out,
were found twenty thousand dollars in the single article of red cotton
handkerchiefs! “I’ll get rid of those among the wild Indians,” said the
purchaser, with a shrug of his shoulders. “I’ve a water-lot which I will
sell,” cries another. “Which way does it stretch?” inquire half a a
dozen. “Right under that craft there,” is the reply. “And what do you
ask for it?” “Fifteen thousand dollars.” “I’ll take it.” “Then down with
your dust.” So the water-lot, which mortal eyes never yet beheld,
changes its owners without changing its fish. “I have two shares in a
gold mine,” cries another. “Where are they?” inquire the crowd. “Under
the south branch of the Yuba river, which we have almost turned,” is the
reply. “And what will you take?” “Fifteen thousand dollars.” “I’ll give
ten.” “Take them, stranger.” So the two shares of a _possibility_ of
gold under a branch of the Yuba, where the water still rolls rapid and
deep, are sold for ten thousand dollars paid down! Is there any thing in
the Arabian Nights that surpasses this?
But glance at that large wooden building, which looks as if the winds
had shingled it, and the powers of the air pinned its clapboards in a
storm. Enter, and you find a great hall filled with tables, and a motley
group gathered around each. Some are laying down hundreds and others
thousands on the turn of a card. Each has a bag of grain-gold in his
hand, which he must double or lose, and is only anxious to reach the
table where he can make the experiment. You would advise him at least to
purchase a suit of clothes, or repair his old ones, before he loses his
all; but what cares he for his outward garb, when piles of the yellow
dust swell and glitter in his excited imagination? Down goes his bag of
gold—and is lost! But does he look around for a rope or pistol that he
may end his ruin? No: the river bank, where he gathered that bag, has
more; so he cheers his momentary despondency with a strong glass of
brandy, and is off again for the mines. He found the gold by good
fortune, and has lost it by bad, and now considers himself about even
with the world. Such is the moral effect of gold hunting on a man whose
principles are not as fixed and immoveable as the rock. It begins in a
lottery and ends in a lottery, where the blanks outnumber the prizes ten
to one.
But you are hungry—want a breakfast—turn into a restaurant—call for ham,
eggs, and coffee—then your bill—six dollars! Your high boots, which have
never seen a brush since you first put them on, have given out: you find
a pair that can replace them-they are a tolerable fit, and now what is
the price—fifty dollars! Your beard has not felt a razor since you went
to the mines—it must come off, and your frizzled hair be clipped. You
find a barber: his dull shears hang in the knots of your hair like a
sheep-shearer’s in a fleece matted with burrs—his razor he straps on the
leg of his boot, and then hauls away—starting at every pull some new
fountain of tears. You vow you will let the beard go—but then one side
is partly off, and you try the agony again to get the other side
something like it; and now what is the charge for this torture—four
dollars! Night is approaching, and you must have a place where you can
sleep: to inquire for a bed would be as idle as to hunt a pearl in the
jungle of a Greenland bear. You look around for the lee of some shanty
or tent, and tumble down for the night; but a thousand fleas dispute the
premises with you—the contest is hopeless—you tumble out as you tumbled
in, and spend the remainder of the night in finding a place not occupied
by these aborigines of the soil.
But you are not perhaps a gold-digger, as I had supposed; you are a
supercargo, and have a valuable freight, which you wish to land. You
have warped your vessel in till her keel rakes, and yet you are several
hundred yards off. Some lighter must be found that can skim these
shallows; your own boats will not do: after waiting two or three weeks,
you get the use of a scow, called a lighter, for which you pay one
hundred and fifty dollars a day.
To-morrow you are going to commence unloading, and wake betimes; but
find that during the night every soul of your crew has escaped, and put
out for the mines. You rush about on shore to find hands, and collect
eight or ten loafers, who will assist you for fifteen dollars a day
each. Your cargo must be landed, and you close the bargain, though your
fresh hands are already half-seas over. The scow is shoved from shore,
brought alongside, loaded with goods, which are tumbled in as an
Irishman dumps a load of dirt, and then you up oars and poles and push
for the landing; but the tide has ebbed too soon: you are only halfway,
and there your scow sticks fast in the midst of a great mud bottom, from
which the last ripple of water has retreated. You cannot get forward,
and you are now too late to get back: night is setting in and the
rain-clouds are gathering fast; down comes a deluge, drenching your
goods, and filling your open scow. The returning tide will now be of no
use, the scow won’t float, except under water, and that is a sort of
floating which don’t suit you; skin for skin—though in this case not
dry—what will a man not give for his own life? So out you jump, and by
crawling and creeping, make your way through the mire to the landing,
and bring up against a bin, where another sort of wallower gives you a
grunt of welcome.
Your loafers must be paid off in the morning, and the scow recovered, or
its loss will cost you half the profits of your voyage. But the storm
last night has driven another brig into yours; and there they both are,
like a bear and bull that have gored and crushed each other. But “misery
loves company,” and you have it. The storm which swamped your scow and
stove your brig last night, has been busy on shore. Piles of goods
heaped up in every street, are in a condition which requires wreckers as
well as watchmen. But no one here is going to trouble himself about your
misfortunes, nor much about his own. The reverses of to-day are to be
more than repaired by the successes of to-morrow. These are only the
broken pickaxes and spades by which the great mine is to be reached.
What is the loss of a few thousands to one who is so soon to possess
millions? Only a coon back in his hole, while the buffalo remains within
rifle-shot,—only a periwinkle lost, while the whale is beneath the
harpoon,—only a farthing candle consumed, while the dowered bride,
blushing in beauty and bliss, is kneeling at the nuptial altar. But let
that pass.
But you are not alone in your destitution and dirt. There are hundreds
around you who were quite as daintily reared, and who are doing out here
what they dodged at home. Do you see that youth in red flannel shirt and
coarse brogans, rolling a wheelbarrow? He was once a clerk in a
counting-house in New York, and came here to shovel up gold as you scoop
up sand. He has been to the mines, gathered no gold, and returned, but
now makes his ten dollars a day by rolling that wheelbarrow; it costs
him six, however, to live, and the other four he loses at monté.
See you that young man with a long whip in his hand, cracking it over an
ox-team? He was one of the most learned geologists, for his age, in the
United States, and came out here to apply his science to the discovery
of gold deposites; but some how his diving-rods always dipped wrong—and
now he has taken a rod about which there is no mistake, so at least
think his cattle. He would accumulate a fortune did he not lose it as
fast as made in some phrensied speculation. But look yonder—do you see
that young gentlemen with a string of fish, which he offers for sale. He
was the best Greek and Latin scholar of his class in Yale College; and
subsequently one of the most promising members of our bar. But he
exchanged his Blackstone for a pick; and instead of picking fees out of
his clients’ pockets, he came here to pick gold out of the mines; but
the deuce was in it, for whenever his pick struck close upon a deposite,
it was no longer there! so he exchanged his pick for a hook and line,
and now angles for pike, pickerel, and perch, and can describe each fish
by some apt line from Catullus. He would do well at his new piscatory
profession, but for the gilded hook of the gambler. He laughs at the
trout for darting at a fictitious fly, and then chases a bait himself
equally fanciful and false.
But look again—do you see that pulperia, with its gathered groups of
soldiers and sailors, poets and politicians, merchants and mendicants,
doctors and draymen, clerks and cobblers, trappers and tinkers. That
little man who stands behind the bar and deals to each his dram of fire,
was once a preacher, and deemed almost a prophet, as he depicted the
pangs of that worm which dieth not; but now he has exchanged that _worm_
for another, but preserved his consistency, for this worm, too,
distilleth delirium and death. And that thick-set man who stands in the
midst of the crowd, with ruby countenance and revelling eye, whose
repartee sets the whole pulperia in a roar, and who is now watching the
liquor in his glass to see if it stirreth itself aright, once lectured
in the West on the temptations of those who tarry late at the wine; but
now his teetotalism covers all liquors as goodly gifts graciously
bestowed. But one brief year, and some dame Quickly may describe his
pale exit as that of his delirious prototype,—“I saw him fumble with the
sheets, and play with flowers, and smile upon his fingers’ ends.”
And yet with all these drawbacks—with all these gambling-tables,
grog-shops, shanties, shavers, and fleas, San Francisco is swelling into
a town of the highest commercial importance. She commands the trade of
the great valleys through which the Sacramento and San Joaquin, with
their numerous tributaries, roll. She gathers to her bosom the products
and manufactures of the United States, of England, China, the shores and
islands of the Pacific. But let us glance at California as she was a few
years since, as she is now, and as she is fast becoming.
Three years ago the white population of California could not have
exceeded ten thousand souls. She has now a population of two hundred
thousand, and a resistless tide of emigration rolling in through the
heart of Mexico, over the Isthmus of Panama, around Cape Horn, and over
the steeps of the Rocky Mountains. Then the great staple of the country
was confined to wild cattle; now it is found in exhaustless mines of
quicksilver and gold. Then the shipping which frequented her waters was
confined to a few drogers, that waddled along her coast in quest of
hides and tallow; now the richest argosies of the commercial world are
bound to her ports.
Three years ago the dwellings of her citizens were reared under the
hands of Indians, from sun-baked adobes of mud and straw; now a thousand
hammers are ringing on rafter and roof over walls of iron and brick.
Then the plough which furrowed her fields was the crotch of a tree,
which a stone or root might shiver; now the shares of the New-England
farmer glitter in her soil. Then the wheels of her carts were cut from
the butts of trees, with a hole in the centre for the rude axle; now the
iron-bound wheel of the finished mechanic rolls over her hills and
valleys. Then only the canoe of the Indian disturbed the sleeping
surface of her waters; now a fleet of steamers traverse her ample rivers
and bays. Then not a schoolhouse, public teacher, magazine, or
newspaper, could be found in the whole territory; now they are met with
in most of the larger towns. Then the tastes and passions of an idle
throng ran on the guitar and the fandango; now the calculations of the
busy multitudes turn to the cultured field and productive mine. Then
California was a dependency of Mexico, and subject to revolutions with
the success of every daring military chieftain; now she is an
independent state, with an enlightened constitution, which guaranties
equal rights and privileges to all. Then she was in arms against our
flag; now she unrolls it on the breeze, with the star of her own being
and pride glowing in the constellation which blazes on its folds.
Three years ago and San Francisco contained only three hundred souls;
now she has a population of twenty-seven thousand. Then a building lot
within her limits cost fifteen dollars; now the same lot cannot be
purchased at a less sum than fifteen thousand. Then her commerce was
confined to a few Indian blankets, and Mexican reboses and beads; now
from two to three hundred merchantmen are unloading their costly cargoes
on her quay. Then the famished whaler could hardly find a temporary
relief in her markets; now she has phrensied the world with her wealth.
Then Benicia was a pasture covered with lowing herds; now she is a
commercial mart, threatening to rival her sister nearer the sea. Then
Stockton and Sacramento City were covered with wild oats, where the elk
and deer gambolled at will; now they are laced with streets, and walled
with warehouses, through which the great tide of commerce rolls off into
a hundred mountain glens. Then the banks of the Sacramento and San
Joaquin were cheered only by the curling smoke of the Indian’s hut; now
they throw on the eye at every bend the cheerful aspect of some new
hamlet or town. Then the silence of the Sierra Nevada was broken only by
the voice of its streams; now every cavern and cliff is echoing under
the blows of the sturdy miner. The wild horse, startled in his glen,
leaves on the hill the clatter of his hoofs, while the huge bear, roused
from his patrimonial jungle, grimly retires to some new mountain
fastness.
But I must drop this contrast of the past with the present, and glance
at a few facts which affect the future. The gold deposites, which have
hitherto been discovered, are confined mainly to the banks and beds of
perpetual streams, or the bottoms of ravines through which roll the
waters of the transient freshet. These deposites are the natural results
of the laws of gravitation; the treasures which they contain must have
been washed from the slopes of the surrounding hills. The elevations,
like spend-thrifts, seem to have parted entirely with their golden
inheritance, except what may linger still in the quartz. And these
gold-containing quartz will be found to have their confined localities.
They will crown the insular peaks of a mountain ridge, or fret the verge
of some extinguished volcano. They have never been found in a continuous
range, except in the dreams of enchantment. You might as well look for a
wall of diamonds, or a solid bank of pearls. Nature has played off many
a prodigal caprice in California, but a mountain of gold is not one of
them.
The alluvial gold will at no distant day be measurably exhausted, and
the miners be driven into the mountains. Here the work can be
successfully prosecuted only by companies with heavy capitals. All the
uncertainties which are connected with mining operations will gather
around these enterprises. Wealth will reward the labors of the few,
whose success was mainly the result of good fortune; while
disappointment will attend the efforts of the many, equally skilful and
persevering. These wide inequalities, in the proceeds of the miner’s
labor, have exhibited themselves wherever a gold deposite has been
hunted or found in California. The past is the reliable prophecy of the
future.
Not one in ten of the thousands who have gone, or may go, to California
to hunt for gold, will return with a fortune. Still the great tide of
emigration will set there, till her valleys and mountain glens teem with
a hardy, enterprising population. As the gold deposites diminish, or
become more difficult of access, the quicksilver mines will call forth
their unflagging energies. This metal slumbers in her mountain spurs in
massive richness. The process is simple which converts it into that form
through which the mechanic arts subserve the thousand purposes of
science and social refinement, while the medical profession, through its
strange abuse, keep up a carnival in the court of Death. But for this
they who mine the ore are not responsible; they will find their reward
in the wealth which will follow their labors. It will be in their power
to silence the hammers in those mines which have hitherto monopolized
the markets of the world.
But the enterprise and wealth of California are not confined to her
mines. Her ample forests of oak, red-wood, and pine, only wait the
requisite machinery to convert them into elegant residences and
strong-ribbed ships. Her exhaustless quarries of granite and marble will
yet pillar the domes of metropolitan splendor and pride. The hammer and
drill will be relinquished by multitudes for the plough and sickle. Her
arable land, stretching through her spacious valleys and along the broad
banks of her rivers, will wave with the golden harvest. The rain-cloud
may not visit her in the summer months, but the mountain stream will be
induced to throw its showers over her thirsting plains.
Such was California a few years since—such is she now—and such will she
become, even before they who now rush to her shores find their footsteps
within the shadows of the pale realm.
[Illustration]
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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
1. Silently corrected obvious typographical errors and variations in
spelling.
2. Retained archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings as printed.
3. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.