But the secret was too good to keep, and in a few days the whole country raised the same sordid cry of "gold, gold, gold," which had brought the Spaniards to the coast. In less than a year eighty thousand people came to California looking for gold. From an independent republic, California became a state and with its admission into the Union the search for El Dorado passed from Spanish into American hands. Both the padres and Cavaliers in California as elsewhere in the Americas enslaved the Indians in a system of peonage which thinned out their ranks, and led to many hostile outbreaks before they were finally subdued. The gold seekers had to do some of the fighting, but they did not rob and pillage the country, nor were they allowed to be unnecessarily cruel. One of our great writers has said of the Indian:
"The red man of America has something peculiarly sensitive in his nature. He shrinks instinctively from the rude touch of a foreign hand. Like some of the dumb creatures he pines and dies in captivity. If today we see them with their energies broken we simply learn from that what a terrible thing is slavery. In their faltering steps and meek and melancholy aspect we read the sad characteristics of a conquered race."
His faith in the traditions of his forefathers, the belief that the Golden Hearted would come again to bring him all that his heart desired finally enslaved and ruined him.
If we pity the Indian we must also feel sorry for the miserable ending of all the Spanish leaders who searched for El Dorado. Columbus spent the last years of his life in prison; Balboa, who discovered the Pacific Ocean, was treacherously executed and lies in an unknown grave near Panama; Pizarro was assassinated and buried in Peru; Magellan was killed by the natives in the Philippine Islands; Cortez was accused of strangling his wife to death, and finally deprived of all honors and wealth; Guzman died in poverty and distress while Coronado was said to be insane after his return to Mexico. For the crime and violence done by Spain in these expeditions she has not only lost all the revenues, but no longer owns a foot of land in any part of the new world.
Let us be thankful that the wisdom and liberty of our own government has saved us from making such terrible mistakes, and doing such grievous wrongs in our attempts to find El Dorado. The brave men and women who crossed the plains long before we had a railroad were willing to work for the riches they wanted. They did not come with the idea of robbing anybody, and when they found the gold they were generous and kind to less fortunate neighbors and friends.
"In this land of sunshine and flowers," they said, "we find gold in the crops of the chickens we have for our Sunday dinners, and our children build doll-houses with the odd-shaped nuggets given to them by the big-hearted miners."
It is hard to imagine the stirring times that followed. Everybody had the gold fever, and in crossing the plains they heard the name El Dorado as soon as they came near where Coronado had been. Some of them made up a song about it, which was for many years very popular among the men in the mining camps. This is one verse of it:
We'll rock the cradle around Pike's Peak
In search of the gold dust that we seek,
The Indians ask us why we're here