There was then, and for years later, a large percentage of the California miners not at work. Some would be traveling through the mountains with pick, shovel and pan, together with as much provisions as they were able to carry—“prospecting,” as it was called, or searching for a “rich lead.” Sometimes their labors would be happily and richly rewarded, but more often were they sadly disappointed. Many at that time were lying under friendly trees, or in their tents, having been stricken down by the prevalent diseases, at that time raging in the country, many dying almost daily. A very large number had been brought up without labor, and some were too indolent to labor; or perhaps, had been clerks or students, and to make enough for their present needs was as much as many were able to accomplish. Others would gamble at the Monte table, or at poker.
Owing to the influx of immigration into the territory in such large numbers, it was deemed best by many of the people to form a state constitution, and then ask admission to the Union. Accordingly, a convention was called at Monterey, which framed a constitution, and a little later it was submitted to the people, who almost unanimously adopted it, and immediately forwarded it to Washington.
The first gold dust seen by me in California was at Lassen’s Ranch, near where we entered the Sacramento valley. At that point there were traders selling provisions, mining implements, clothing and other needed articles to the unfortunate immigrants who had entered the valley by the way of “Greenhorn’s Cutoff,” and to miners that were traveling up the valley to Redding’s mines; these men taking in exchange gold dust which they wished with small scales provided for that purpose.
Gold dust at sixteen dollars per ounce was the principal medium of exchange in California. Some of the dust was nearly clean, and some had considerable quantities of black sand mixed with it. This at first seemed to be a very inconvenient manner of making change and paying for goods, but it possessed its good qualities.
The newcomer with his exalted ideas, on seeing the small quantity which he would receive for one, two, three or even five dollars, and so very fine was the dust, that it looked to him almost insignificant. Some of it was so very fine that it almost required a microscope to be able to discover its separate particles. A person must be able to earn something to make a living here.
Flour retails at 40 cents per pound; pork from 50 to 75 cents; potatoes at $1.50 per pound; sugar 50 cents; eggs $5.00 per dozen; a pick or shovel $8 to $10 each; rockers to wash gold with in the mines, from $40 to $50 each; a quicksilver gold rocker $300; lumber in the mines sold for $2.00 per foot, or at the rate of $2000 per thousand feet, and at Sacramento City it sold at six hundred dollars per thousand.
Other necessaries sold at equally as high prices in proportion. Such seemingly exorbitant prices seemed at first to the newly arrived immigrant as if he was being robbed. It seemed far different to those that have been here a few weeks. In buying provisions or other necessaries they do not appear to think any more about paying the California prices than they would the customary prices when at their homes.
This at present is a fast country, and money must be made fast or the miners could not make a comfortable livelihood, having to pay such prices. It is said that in case a person is taken sick here and employs a physician, that the M. D. will size his “pile,” whether large or small. Probably this was not strictly true in all cases, but in many cases they collected very exorbitant fees. It was also a prevailing opinion among the miners that many of the physicians now in the country do not understand the prevailing diseases of the country; and that many of them are the cause of more sickness and death than they are the means of saving lives. How far this is true I will not undertake to determine; but from what I saw at this time and later, there were apparently a few good, skilled physicians in the country, and very many whose success seemed to be quite poor and unfortunate for some cause.
It seemed to require but two things only to kill the strongest man in California, however slight the disease might at first be. First, to apply for a doctor; and second, to lose his courage and believe he would soon die, and that he would never see his home and friends again. With this combination I never knew the first man to recover under similar circumstances, in the early days of California.
The population of the country at this time was a heterogeneous mass from almost all parts of the civilized world. New England is well represented. The majority of the Yankees came by the way of Cape Horn; some across the Isthmus of Panama, and a few across the country.