Monday, Oct. 2. I went among the gold-diggers; found half a dozen at the bottom of the ravine, tearing up the bogs, and up to their knees in mud. Beneath these bogs lay a bed of clay, sprinkled in spots with gold. These deposits, and the earth mixed with them, were shovelled into bowls, taken to a pool near by, and washed out. The bowl, in working, is held in both hands, whirled violently back and forth through half a circle, and pitched this way and that sufficiently to throw off the earth and water, while the gold settles to the bottom. The process is extremely laborious, and taxes the entire muscles of the frame. In its effect it is more like swinging a scythe than any work I ever attempted.
Not having much relish for the bogs and mud, I procured a light crowbar and went to splitting the slate-rocks which project into the ravine. I found between the layers, which were not perfectly closed, particles of gold, resembling in shape the small and delicate scales of a fish. These were easily scraped from the slate by a hunter’s knife, and readily separated in the wash-bowl from all foreign substances. The layers in which they were found generally inclined from a vertical or horizontal position, and formed an acute angle with the bank of the ravine, in the direction of the current. In the reverse of this position, and where the inclination was with the current, they rarely contained any gold. The inference would seem to be, that these deposits are made by the currents when swelled by the winter rains, and poured in a rushing tide down these channels. It is only the most rapid stream that can carry this treasure, and even that must soon resign it to some eddy, or the rock that paves its footsteps.
There are about seventy persons at work in this ravine, and all within a few yards of each other. They average about one ounce per diem each. They who get less are discontented, and they who get more are not satisfied. Every day brings in some fresh report of richer discoveries in some quarter not far remote, and the diggers are consequently kept in a state of feverish excitement. One woman, a Sonoranian, who was washing here, finding at the bottom of her bowl only the amount of half a dollar or so, hurled it back again into the water, and straightening herself up to her full height, strode off with the indignant air of one who feels himself insulted. Poor woman! how little thou knowest of those patient females, who in our large cities make a shirt or vest for ten cents! Were an ounce of diamonds to fall into one of our hands every day, we should hold out the other just as eager and impatient as if its fellow were empty. Such is human nature; and a miserable thing it is, too, especially when touched with the gold fever.
Tuesday, Oct. 3. We parted to-day with the society of Mr. Stewart and Mr. Simmons: they were on a tour of observation; were bound to Sutter’s Fort, and availed themselves of the company of Gov. Mason and Capt. Sherman, who were going in the same direction; may they have an agreeable journey, and each find a lump of gold as big as Vulcan’s anvil. We ordered up our own horses, packed our mules, and started for a ravine some seven miles distant. Our path lay over the spur of a mountain, so rugged and steep that we were obliged to dismount. The soaring masses were piled around us in the wildest sublimity, presenting those thunder-scarred fronts which the volcano in its terrific energy throws into the eye of the sun. You had a dim persuasion that some fearful charm, some unseen treasure lurked in the sunless recesses of these stupendous piles; and so it seemed, for out walked a grizzly bear from a mountain gorge, and fixed his burning eyes steadfastly on us. Not being certain of our rifles, as we had not used them for several days, we deemed prudence the better part of valor, and gave the old monarch of the woods a pretty wide berth.
We examined several spots on our route for gold, but found none, either on the table-rock, or in the channels of the mountain streams. If it ever existed there, it had been swept below, or remained in the veins of the rock beyond the reach of pickaxe and spade. On the plain we fell in with the camp of Mr. Murphy, who invited us into his tent, and set before us refreshments that would have graced a scene less wild than this. His tent is pitched in the midst of a small tribe of wild Indians who gather gold for him, and receive in return provisions and blankets. He knocks down two bullocks a day to furnish them with meat. Though never before within the wake of civilization, they respect his person and property. This, however, is to be ascribed in part to the fact that he has married the daughter of the chief—a young woman of many personal attractions, and full of that warm wild love which makes her the Haide of the woods. She is the queen of the tribe, and walks among them with the air of one on whom authority sets as a native grace,—a charm which all feel, and of which she seems the least conscious.
The men and boys were busy with their bows and arrows. A difficulty had arisen between this tribe and one not far remote, and they were expecting an attack. Though the less powerful tribe of the two, they seemed not the least dismayed. The old men looked stern and grave, but the boys were full of glee as if mustering for a deer-hunt. The mothers with Spartan coolness were engaged in pointing arrows with flint stones, so shaped that they easily penetrate and break off in the effort to extract them, and always leave an ugly wound. They project these arrows from their bows with incredible force, often burying them to the feather in the luckless elk; the deer gives his last life-bound and falls, while the unsuspecting foe drops unwarned from his saddle. I saw no signs of intoxication among these Indians, and was told by Mr. Murphy that he allowed no liquors in the camp. He said a trader brought there a few days since a barrel of rum, and that he gave him exactly five minutes in which to decide whether he would quit the grounds, or have the head of the barrel knocked in. He of course took his fire-curse to some other place.
Wednesday, Oct. 4. Our camping-ground is in a broad ravine through which a rivulet wanders, and which is dotted with the frequent tents of gold-diggers. The sounds of the crowbar and pick, as they shake or shiver the rock, are echoed from a thousand cliffs; while the hum of human voices rolls off on the breeze to mingle with the barking of wolves, who regard with no friendly eyes this intrusion into their solitude. They resemble their great progenitrix, trembling in stone, as the Vandals broke into Rome. But little care the gold-diggers about the wolves, it is enough for them to know that this ravine contains gold; and it must be dug out, though an earthquake may slumber beneath. If you want to find men prepared to storm the burning threshold of the infernal prison, go among gold-diggers.
The provisions with which we left San José are gone, and we have been obliged to supply ourselves here. We pay at the rate of four hundred dollars a barrel for flour; four dollars a pound for poor brown sugar, and four dollars a pound for indifferent coffee. And as for meat, there is none to be got except jerked-beef, which is the flesh of the bullock cut into strings and hung up in the sun to dry, and which has about as much juice in it as a strip of bark dangling in the wind from a dead tree. Still, when moistened and toasted, it will do something towards sustaining life; so also will the sole of your shoe. And yet I have seen men set and grind it as if it were nutritious and sweetly flavored. Oh ye who lose your temper because your sirloin has rolled once too much on the spit, come to the mines of California and eat jerked-beef!
Thursday, Oct. 5. The rivulet, which waters the ravine, collects here and there into deep pools. Over one of these a low limb had thrown itself, upon which I ventured out with an apparatus for scooping up the sand at the bottom. But just as I had lowered my dipper the limb broke, and down I went to the chin in water. It was some minutes before I could extricate myself, and when I did there was not a dry thread on my body. The chill of the stream reduced the gold fever in me very considerably. I had brought no outward garments but those in which I stood; I wrung out the water and hung them up in the sun to dry, and wound myself, like an Indian, in my blanket. But I was not more savage in my aspect than in my feelings. This, however, soon passed off, and I could laugh with others at the gold plunge. But nothing is a novelty here for more than a minute; were a man to cast his skin or lose his head, no one would stop to inquire if he had recovered either, unless they suspected foul play, and then they would arraign and execute the culprit before one of our lawyers could pen an indictment.
Friday, Oct. 6. The most efficient gold-washer here is the cradle, which resembles in shape that appendage of the nursery, from which it takes its name. It is nine or ten feet long, open at one end and closed at the other. At the end which is closed, a sheet-iron pan, four inches deep, and sixteen over, and perforated in the bottom with holes, is let in even with the sides of the cradle. The earth is thrown into the pan, water turned on it, and the cradle, which is on an inclined plane, set in motion. The earth and water pass through the pan, and then down the cradle, while the gold, owing to its specific gravity, is caught by cleets fastened across the bottom. Very little escapes; it generally lodges before it reaches the last cleet. It requires four or five men to supply the earth and water to work such a machine to advantage. The quantity of gold washed out must depend on the relative proportion of gold in the earth. The one worked in this ravine yields a hundred dollars a day; but this is considered a slender result. Most of the diggers use the bowl or pan; its lightness never embarrasses their roving habits; and it can be put in motion wherever they may find a stream or spring. It can be purchased now in the mines for five or six dollars; a few months since it cost an ounce—sixteen dollars for a wooden bowl! But I have seen twenty-four dollars paid for a box of seidlitz-powders, and forty dollars for as many drops of laudanum.