In one unending stream great tented wagons, carts, carriages, horsemen or even walkers moved along, all going in the same direction, to the golden land of the West.
Many were the dangers these adventurous travelers had to brave. There were dangers from hostile Indians, and from wild animals, from lack of food and water, and above all from sickness. Cholera broke out in these slow-moving trains, and many a man who had set out gaily found a grave by the wayside, and never reached the land of his golden hopes.
The road too was strewn with broken down wagons, and the bones of oxen and horses, and many had to finish their weary journey on foot.
But in spite of all mischances hundreds and thousands reached the gold fields, and all over the Sacramento Valley, or wherever gold was found, little towns sprang up.
These were towns of wooden shanties and canvas tents. And whenever the gold gave out, or news came of some richer mine, the diggers would forsake the little town, and rush off somewhere else. And no sign of life would be left in the once busy valley save the weather-worn huts and the upturned earth. Some men made fortunes almost in a day, many returned home well off. But by far the greater number returned poorer than they came, and with their health shattered by the hardships of the life. Many more never returned at all, but found a nameless grave among the lonely valleys.
Others made fortunes again and again, and lost them as quickly as they made them. For though at first the men who went to the gold fields were for the most part young, and strong, and honest, the greed of gain soon brought all the riff-raff of the towns. Many men joined the throng who had no intention of working, and who but came to lure the gold away from those who had found it.
So gambling saloons, and drinking saloons, sprang up everywhere, and many a man left them poorer if not wiser. Murders became frequent, but men thought little about them. Every man went armed, and if he could not protect himself it was his own fault.
Theft was looked upon as a far worse sin. For everybody lived in frail wooden juts or open tents. They had no means of locking up their gold, and thought nothing of leaving it lying about quite unprotected. But when criminals and lowdown ruffians began to come things were changed; until at last many were afraid to have it known that they possessed gold lest they should be murdered for it.
Among the many who did not make fortunes out of the finding of gold were Marshall and Sutter. Neither of them was lucky as a miner and both of them died in poverty.
__________