I give the story in the words of Habakkuk Gaby—half trapper and half gold-digger, as we have seen him to be—as it is worth preserving, as a curious evidence of the rapid rise of San Francisco in the course of less than a dozen years from a state of almost perfect anarchy to such a height of civilisation and luxury as already to be regarded by many as all but the second city in the United States.
“Well, Master Trevor,” began Habakkuk one evening, as we were seated together, comfortably discussing our wine and cigars, “I’m no way partikler, but there is a place I’ve no wish to go to, though I guess that it ain’t hotter nor worse than Californy was when I first got to it. Ay, long before I got there, I guessed what was to follow; for a full day’s journey along the whole road was like a broker’s shop—only the goods were all smashed and had nobody to look after them. First, there were pianoes, fiddles, guitars, and other gimcracks. Then, chests of drawers, bedsteads, and boxes. Next, women’s fine clothes, bless them! and then bedding, pillows, and blankets. The useless first; then, step by step, one little comfort after ’tother. Then, sadder still, tents and cooking apparatus, skeletons of horses and oxen, broken-down waggons. Now and then, a grave; but, saddest of all, casks of biscuit and crackers, of flour and preserved meats, and whitened human bones!
“On, on! No time to bury the dead! Water, water! None to be had—not enough to cover the finger’s tip to cool the parched tongue! Whole families sank by the roadside and died of thirst. Perhaps one survived. It may be the father, whose thirst for gold had broken up a quiet home,—and all for greed had brought a fond wife and mother to perish on these arid plains—every vestige of vegetation dried up by the scorching sun—after seeing her little ones, one by one, droop and die away. Terrible such a fate! Welcome death! But death, in mockery, spares the thirsting wretch till madness supervenes, and suicide or murder ends what greed for gold began.
“No, Master Skipwith; ’tis only young and hale men, with no tie on earth to bind them, that should seek the diggings. Broken of heart, careless of the world, I’ve seen others who have left behind all they loved and were worth living for on the track to the gold-fields, labouring like machines, never smiling, seldom speaking, scarcely knowing why they thus toiled and laboured; now, all they had once loved on earth had gone. We could tell the nature of the country by the sorts of articles left on the road. Still worse, if anything, were the scenes which took place at the diggings. Rheumatism and fever brought many to the grave. The poor wretches lay in their tents or lean-tos, with no one to attend them—no one to speak to them—till death put an end to their sufferings, or sometimes madness seized them, and they would rush out attacking all they met, till they sank exhausted, or till they were knocked over by some of their companions, as if they had been wild beasts. Not content with having sickness for their foe, the diggers quarrelled among themselves. One party had diverted a stream from the claim of another. The latter demanded compensation, which was refused, on which they attacked the aggressors, killed several, and wounded many others. I guess gold-hunting, in those days, was not the pleasantest of occupations,” remarked Habakkuk, in conclusion.
“The Ingins, too, was troublesome in these parts, I’ve heard say,” observed Stalker.
“I guess they was,” answered Mr Gaby. “Can’t say, however, but what our people—that is, the whites—often brought it on themselves by shooting a red man without provocation; making them work against their will, beating them when they wouldn’t, and carrying off their squaws. Flesh and blood, whether it’s red or black, or white, don’t like that sort of treatment.
“One morning, two men were found speared in one of the out-huts of the camp, and everything in it carried off. Though we didn’t know much of the men, who they were or where they’d come from, they were whites, and that made the diggers very exasperated with the murderers. An expedition was at once organised to follow and punish the Red-men. We had no lack of leaders. Two or three men who had spent all their lives on the prairies or in the backwoods, and were well accustomed to cope with Indians, and knew all their tricks and cunning ways, offered their services. One fine old fellow was chosen—a Scotchman, called Donald McDonald. I guess that in his country there are a good many of the same name, but I don’t think many like him. He had lived all his life in these ports; and what made him come to Californy I don’t know, except the love of adventure, for he had plenty of money. He stood six feet four in his stockings, with a head of hair of a bright carrot-red, which hung down all over his shoulders—a beard and moustache to match. His brow, full of wrinkles, alone showed his age; for his eyes were bright and piercing, and his step as elastic as that of a young man. So as you seem pretty quiet with regard to the Ingins in these parts, I’ll just tell you how they manage things in the south, where, somehow or other, the whites are pretty nearly always at war with them. We assembled at the hut of the murdered men, that we might take our departure from it. There were numbers of footprints about the hut, but there had been no struggle near it. The men had been surprised by the crafty Ingins while they were asleep, run through with spears, and afterwards stabbed. Everything in the hut had been carried off by the murderers, who took no pains to conceal their numbers, or the direction in which they had gone. There was a considerable number of them, and their track led towards the most mountainous and intricate path of the country, with numerous streams intervening. ‘The varmints think by coming this way to baffle us; but we’ll soon let them know that a keen pair of eyes is following which has been accustomed for forty years or more to ferret them out, in spite of all their dodges,’ remarked Donald. It was well for those who had to accompany the old man to have a fast pair of legs.
“We kept on at a rapid rate the greater part of the day, the footmarks becoming more and more indistinct, from the nature of the ground, till we arrived at a mountain stream. As the traces were now totally lost, loud murmurs rose among our party.
“‘The savages have done us—depend on that,’ cried several of them.
“‘I ken they must be very clever savages, then,’ observed Donald, not a little offended at the imputation thrown on his sagacity.