Chapter XIII

AN OLD SHE-GOAT--OUR MINERALOGIST--GOLD DIGGERS--MURDERER’S
BAR--THE THEORIST PUZZLED--MINING LAWS--JUMPING CLAIMS--THE MINER’S
LIFE--“LET HER SLIDE”--HOSTILE INDIANS--WE ARE
DISGUSTED--FIRE-PROOF HOUSES.

_July, 1851._

We reached the Salmon Fall diggings about noon, and, without halting, crossed a wooden bridge that had been built here on the north fork of the American River; we paid five dollars toll to its enterprising owner, and ascended the opposite hill. The road here became so uneven that we got out of the waggon in preference to being pitched out, and we were kept very busy in locking the wheels when it went down hill, and pushing behind when it went up. We passed no houses now, but trails led off on either side, whilst occasionally we encountered solitary miners “prospecting” near the road. “Prospecting” is the term applied to a pursuit of knowledge under difficulties, that is, searching for gold where no trace of it is apparent on the surface.[12] There are plenty of “prospectors” in the mines, but the profession scarcely pays, for the “prospector” is the jackall who must search for many days, and, when he has found, the lion, in the shape of the old miner, steps in and reaps the benefit. So that there is something to be learnt in the diggings, for undoubtedly one of the first principles in life is to look on while others work, and then step in and cry “halves.”

We stopped at dusk at a house a little off the trail, and, having had supper, we spread our blankets on the ground, and being tired were soon asleep; but we soon awoke again, for, separated from us by a canvas screen, was a young goat, whose dismal bleatings made “night hideous:” vain were the imprecations that were showered on the goat’s head; daylight discovered him still crying, and us awake and unrefreshed.

As we prepared to start, in rather a sullen humour, what was our astonishment when our host accosted us smilingly thus: “I had an addition to my family last evening, gentlemen, and as fine a boy as ever you saw!” So he must be, thought we, to have a voice like a goat; and, as we went on our way, we recalled the compliments with which, during the night, we had greeted the new-born babe, under the innocent impression that it was a kid; and conjectured to ourselves the feelings of the mother when she heard herself alluded to as an old she-goat!

As the waggon followed the trail, we walked through the forest at the side; the botanist of our party had now ample employment, and tortured a new flower at each step; whilst our mineralogist pocketed specimens with such fervour that their accumulated weight began at last to tell severely on his frame, upon which he discharged his gleanings surreptitiously, to our great amusement, for we insisted that he had dropped them by accident, and made him pocket them again. If the people of this world had but to carry their hobbies up a dusty mountain, under a hot sun, in the shape of a bag of quartz, how soon they’d cast them off!

At noon, having reached the ridge of the mountain, we had an extended view of the gold country as it stretched away for miles beyond us in a succession of steep red hills; through these the American Fork rushed impetuously, and huge masses of red-woods clothed the highest mountains; while, in the distance, the white peaks of the Sierra Nevada were perceptible; those famous mountains of which the reputed wealth is still as much the Dorado of the Californian diggers, as were the placer fields before me once the dream of the Mexicans of the sixteenth century. “Prospectors” visit these cheerless snows never to return; but, like the discontented squirrel of the fable, who would ascend the sun-lit hills that looked so much like gold, reach them, utter a moral and die.

A turn of the road presented a scene of mining life, as perfect in its details as it was novel in its features. Immediately beneath us the swift river glided tranquilly, though foaming still from the great battle which, a few yards higher up, it had fought with a mass of black obstructing rocks. On the banks was a village of canvas that the winter rains had bleached to perfection, and round it the miners were at work at every point. Many were waist-deep in the water, toiling in bands to construct a race and dam to turn the river’s course; others were entrenched in holes, like grave-diggers, working down to the “bed rock.” Some were on the brink of the stream washing out “prospects” from tin pans or wooden “batteas;” and others worked in company with the long-tom, by means of water-sluices artfully conveyed from the river. Many were coyote-ing in subterranean holes, from which from time to time their heads popped out, like those of squirrels, to take a look at the world; and a few with drills, dissatisfied with nature’s work, were preparing to remove large rocks with gunpowder. All was life, merriment, vigour, and determination, as this part of the earth was being turned inside out to see what it was made of.

The air was so still and clear that the voices rose to us with startling distinctness, and when a head appeared from a distant pit, and its owner vociferated, “How are you, Frank?” I thought at first he meant me, and was on the point of replying, “Well and hearty, thank him. How was he?”

Small patches of garden surrounded the village, which bore so palpably the stamp of cheerfulness and happy industry, that I was disappointed on learning that its name was “Murderer’s Bar;” though the appellation was justly conferred in memory of a brutal murder that had been committed amongst its earliest settlers.

Had all the diggings been named in accordance with the circumstances that ushered them individually into public notice, there would be more Murderer’s Bars than the traveller would well know what to do with, unless they were numerically arranged like the John Smiths in the muster-roll of a marching regiment.

The name is unpleasantly candid; there are plenty of “diggings” that can record their tales of blood much more forcibly than Murderer’s Bar, but under such peaceful titles as “Diamond Springs,” or “Happy Valley,” they bring no shudder to the traveller. So that we learn another thing at the diggings, which is, that it is ridiculous to be a Publican and make a clean breast of it to every stranger, when such great immunity is gained under the garb of the Pharisee.

One would ask how it is that Murderer’s Bar, despite its name, is a peaceable village, where each man’s wealth, in the shape of ten feet square of soil, is virtuously respected by his neighbour; it is not because there is enough for all, for every paying claim has long ago been appropriated, and the next comer must go further on. There is a justice of the peace (up to his arms in the river just at present), and there is a constable (who has been “prospecting” a bag of earth from the hill, and been rewarded with a gold flake of the value of three cents); these two, one would suppose, could scarcely control two or three hundred men, with rude passions and quick tempers, each of whom, as you observe, carries his revolver even while at work. But these armed, rough-looking fellows themselves elected their judge and constable, and stand, ever ready, as “specials,” to support them.

If a man wanted a pickaxe or a shovel, and thought to help himself to one of those that lie about at all times at Murderer’s Bar, he would find it inconvenient if discovered; for, as there is no extenuating clause of hunger or misery in the diggings, theft is held to be a great crime; in all probability the offender would be whipped at the tree; and this brings us again to the perplexing subject of Lynch law as relating to the miners.

I venture to say that it will puzzle the theorist to determine how far the roving population of the mining regions in California have been justified in taking measures to eject the bad and worthless from among them; for all rules and precedents fall before the strong argument of self-preservation. When Christian and his shipmates landed at Pitcairn’s Island and made laws for the regulation of their small colony (happily little needed) they acted as much upon the principle of Lynch law as did the miners; for these latter were equally without the reach of the laws under which they had been born. Where, after all, was the great difference in the first trial by jury and the Lynch execution among a colony of men living far from civilisation? Was the peace of a community of honest men to be disturbed by crime and bloodshed, unpunished, when, from circumstances, the law of their country was unable to protect them? These and similar questions would form the basis of the argument in defence of Lynch law in the mountains.

On the other hand, the opponent would point to the fearful instances on record of men being hurried to eternity without preparation--victims to the overwrought feelings of an excited mob. The defence of self-constituted law is untenable, yet there are instances in which small communities have seemed to me justified in enforcing, by the only means at their command, the order so necessary in such a state of society as that of the mountain gorges of California.

But when we see this law “subverting law” in a city like San Francisco, then we are forced sweepingly to condemn, once and for all, all that bears the name of Lynch, and we feel loth to admit that in any case the end can ever justify the means. Still it is a question, taken from first to last, that one may split straws on, when we see how peacefully Murderer’s Bar progresses, not under the _execution_, but under the _fear_ of Lynch law. In most mining villages public indignation has been confined to ordering men to “leave the camp” in twenty-four hours, or otherwise take the consequences; and after being thus warned, the nefarious digger invariably “slopes.”

The mining population have been allowed to constitute their own laws relative to the appointment of “claims,” and it is astonishing how well this system works. Had the Legislature, in ignorance of the miner’s wants, interfered and decided that a man should have so much, and no more, of the soil to work on, all would have been anarchy and confusion.

Whereas now, every “digging” has its fixed rules and by-laws, and all disputes are submitted to a jury of the resident miners; excepting in those instances where twenty men or so are met by twenty men, and in these cases there is first a grand demonstration with fire-arms, and eventually an appeal to the district court. The by-laws of each district are recorded in the Recorder’s Office of the county, and these laws are stringent although self-constituted; ill-defined at first, and varying as they did, they were conflicting and troublesome, but though they have been jumbled as it were in a bag, they have come out like Mr. Crockett, “right side up.”

I have had my claim in the digging more than once, of ten feet square; if a man “jumped” it, and encroached on my boundaries, and I did’nt knock him on the head with a pickaxe, being a Christian, I appealed to the “crowd,” and my claim being carefully measured from my stake and found to be correct, the “jumper” would be ordered to confine himself to his own territory, which of course he would do with many oaths.

It is customary to leave your mining tools in your claim, to indicate to all new comers that it is occupied, and as this rule is recognised it saves a great deal of unnecessary explanation; but it has often struck me that if in the quiet and virtuous hamlet of Little Pedlington, a market-gardener were to leave his spade outside as a sign of occupancy, he would not detect that implement in the morning, spite of the vigilance of the one policeman, who guards that blissful retreat.

We descended the cliff by a short cut; the mineralogist took a shorter, for a ledge of earth gave way beneath his weight, and enabled him to reach the base about three minutes before us.

Gongs sounded at this moment, and the red clayey population flocked in to dine, looking disproportionately dirty in contrast with their white houses: I did not see a woman in the “camp.” But these things are being better ordered now, and I can foresee the day when the traveller from Murderer’s Bar shall speak of anxious mothers rushing from the white tents with soap-sud arms to rescue embryo miners from the gutter; and when flaxen-headed urchins shall gaze suspiciously at the approach of such as I, and running back to their parents, will exclaim, “Oh! daddy, here’s a Britisher!”

The gold is found here in coarse flakes, and the bank washings, from all accounts, average five or six dollars a day per man.

The days had passed when diggings were abandoned, so soon as they ceased to reward a day’s toil with less than an ounce or two of gold, and “chunks” and “big strikes”[13] were now exceptions to the rule; but the days had passed, also, when to obtain these prizes men laboured painfully under the influence of fever, produced by bad food and poisonous spirits, to die at last, perhaps, disgorging every hard-earned flake of gold to some attendant quack.

Much happier the miner, when, as at Murderer’s Bar, his toil is regularly rewarded with a smaller gain, for his health is no longer impaired by feverish excitement and drink, and the necessaries of life are placed within his reach, at prices that enable him to save his gold scales as well as his constitution, for the “rainy day,” that in one form or the other comes to all at last.

Leaving the village and passing some hills, the sides of which were overgrown with the white azalia, we reached another part of the river, where was a ferry-boat, and here we found our waggon. On the opposite side of the river the ascent was very steep, and would have been impracticable for waggons, had not the owner of the ferry excavated a portion of the mountain, and otherwise constructed a road.

For this outlay of capital the ferryman was reaping a rich harvest; having thus opened the only practicable trail at this time to the more northern mines, he had secured to himself the toll of every waggon passing to or from those regions, and these tolls amounted in one year to sixty thousand dollars (12,000_l._). The original capital was, I understood, the result of successful digging; and I mention this circumstance as it proves two things, first, that fortunes in the mines are not dependent on the discovery of little nests of gold, as some suppose, but on the judicious application in a new country of the small capital which a little steady work with the pickaxe will ensure to any industrious and healthy man; and, secondly, that a large portion of the gold amassed in mining regions is expended upon the permanent improvement of the country; so that the export of the “dust” is no criterion of the yield.

Bridges, ferries, roads, watercourses, dams, hotels, and stage coaches, have nearly all been started by means of the capital obtained from the soil over which they run, or on which they are constructed. No one knows what a waggon will undergo, until he has mastered Californian trails and gulches. The worst places are the steep descents that skirt the base of a mountain, where the road has an inclination of about thirty degrees towards the precipice beneath.

In such places you may fasten a rope to the axle of the waggon, and passing the other end round a tree or rock as a check, you may let her “slide,” which she will do without any further trouble on your part.

We were now approaching a spot where a few days previously the Indians had made some successful descents upon mining parties, cutting off some of their number. The Indians of this region promise to be a great annoyance, for they are mounted and brave, and are gradually becoming possessed of rifles.

There is an Indian commission in the country, and portions of territory, called “Indian Reserves,” have been marked out as in other states, and presented to the Indians from their good father, the President. These “Reservations” the Indians accept and occupy, but the lurking idea still remains, that the rest of the country is theirs also, and in the mean time they “lift hair,”[14] from time to time, to keep their hands in.

When Indians, labouring under the ridiculous notion that anything can belong to them that the white man wants, become troublesome, it is customary to drive them back; but the Indians of this region when so driven, will find their revenge in carrying on an exterminating warfare against the overland emigration--at least so it appears to me.

Still, the policy of conciliation pursued by the “Commissioners” is the only one that lies open, and if they can persuade these savages “that half a loaf is better than no bread,” they will have carried out their diplomatic mission to its full extent. But it is easier to lull Indian suspicions than to eradicate them; and unfortunately for all parties, these aborigines cherish morbid ideas relative to the “graves of their fathers,” from which, under the influence of diplomacy, they have been induced to retire: and certainly in those cases, where their progenitors have been buried in auriferous soil, their remains are not more religiously respected than would they have been had their fate consigned them to some of our intramural burying grounds. For although, in a civilised country, one’s great grandmother’s skull may be thrown up with impunity, when her lease of the grave is out, these Indians cling to the absurd superstition that the great “Manitou” looks wrathfully on those who wilfully disturb the dead!

We ascended hill after hill, and by noon, being hot, tired, and dusty, the scenery had no longer charms for our eyes; we passed gigantic red-woods only to sneer at them; we pooh-pooh’d cascades that fell from masses of black basaltic rock; the honeysuckles that lent their sweetness to the air around us, were pronounced disgusting; and even the botanist reproached the yellow poppies with being “stinking,” as if _he_ couldn’t have borne with them.

But when we pulled up at “Smith’s ranche” and bathed and dined, we dismissed these unhealthy feelings, and took the honeysuckles to our bosoms again. We now began to experience the change of air consequent on our increased elevation, and the ascent was so rapid here, that thirty miles ahead of us the snow was reported to be lying fifteen feet in depth.

Where we now were, the main trail was little worn, but at a certain point we struck off to the right through the forest, and following the “blazed trees” we suddenly emerged on a clear and rocky ledge on the side of the mountain. Here was the quartz vein we had come to see, and its thirteen American owners lived upon the spot in a couple of log huts.

We were received with great hospitality, although this was of less substantial kind than it would have been, had not our entertainers been “out of everything” but flour, water, and tea. We had fortunately brought some provisions with us, otherwise we might have indulged in the luxury of a mountain appetite longer than was conducive to comfort. During two days we inspected the quartz mine, and having to the best of our ability satisfied ourselves of its wealth, we retraced our road to Sacramento, taking care to avoid the residence of the “old she goat,” but calling on Crockett, whom we again found with his “skin cracking” at some imaginary insult to his wife.

When we reached San Francisco we found that preparations were going on, on all sides, for erecting brick and stone buildings in lieu of combustible shanties.

The style of architecture in vogue was less remarkable for cunning design than for its sturdy fireproof qualities; and although the square houses, with their thick walls and double doors, and shutters of strong iron, and bomb-proof cellars underground, added little towards the embellishment of the city, it was no time to think of elegant façades or imposing friezes when the first object was the security of life and property. Each building, then, was intended to assume the character of a fortress to resist the common enemy of the place; and from that day to this, this end has been fortunately carried out, and the heart of the city is impervious to fire.