Chapter I: Front Matter

J. D. BORTHWICK. M. & N. HANHART, LITH.

OUR CAMP ON WEAVER CREEK.]

THREE YEARS

IN
CALIFORNIA

BY

J. D. BORTHWICK

WITH EIGHT ILLUSTRATIONS BY THE AUTHOR

WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS
EDINBURGH AND LONDON
MDCCCLVII

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

PAGE

California fever in the States--The start--New York to Panama--Shipboard--Chagres--Crossing the Isthmus--The river--Cruces--Gorgona, 1-25

CHAPTER II.

Panama in July 1851--Its architecture--Shops--Churches--Dirt--Diseases and diversions--Embark for San Francisco--Fever--Hard fare--Arrival, 26-42

CHAPTER III.

San Francisco--Appearance of the houses--Growth of the city--The Plaza--Ships in the streets--Living--Boot-blacks--Restaurants--Hotels, 43-64

CHAPTER IV.

Scarcity of labouring men--High wages--Want of social restraint--Intense rivalry in all pursuits--Disappointed hopes--Drunkenness--American style of drinking--The bars--Free luncheons--The bar-keeper--Variety of national houses--The Chinese--Chinese stores and washermen--Theatres and gambling-rooms--Masquerades--“No weapons admitted”--Magnificent shops--Grading the streets--Steam Paddy--Raising houses--Cabs--Post-office--Fire--Fire companies--Mission Dolores--San José--Native Californians, 65-93

CHAPTER V.

Start for the Mines--The Sacramento River--American river-steamboats in California--Natural facilities for inland navigation, and promptness of the Americans in taking advantage of them--Sacramento City--Appearance of the houses--Street nomenclature--Staging--Four-and-twenty four-horse coaches start together--The plains--The scenery--The weather--The mountains--Mountain roads and American drivers--First sight of gold-digging--Arrival at Hangtown, 94-111

CHAPTER VI.

Hangtown--First impression of “the Diggins”--Idea of a mining town--Gambling-houses--The street--The stores--Jew slop-shops--The Jews: their peculiarities--Hangtown on a Sunday--Bowie-knives and revolvers--Gold-deposits--Method of washing--Long-toms--Rockers--Prospecting--Middletown--Our ménage, 112-127

CHAPTER VII.

Digger Indians--Their love of dress--Their dogs--Their food--Their ingenuity--Indian female beauty, or otherwise--“Hunting” the Indians, and teaching them manners--’Coon Hollow--Coyote Diggings--Coyotes--Weaver Creek--The weather and the climate--Chinamen--A celestial “muss,” 128-145

CHAPTER VIII.

The Missourians--Pike county: their appearance--Humanising effects of California--Difference between the outward-bound Californians and the same men on their return home--The accomplishments of the Missourians--A phrenologer--A jury of miners--A civil suit--We buy a claim--A “brush-house”--Rats: how to circumvent them--Rat-shooting, 146-160

CHAPTER IX.

Hangtown--Digging in the houses--A golden vision--Slaves in California--Negroes--Caloma--First discovery of gold--Greenwood Valley--“The Illustrated News”--Middle fork of the American River--A “bar”--“Spanish bar”--Nomenclature of the mines--A table-d’hôte, 161-174

CHAPTER X.

The Grizzly-Bear House--Its cuisine--An Illinois warrior and the Mexican campaign--A bear-hunter--Bear stories--Grizzlies--Soft pillows--“Ranches”--Wild oats--Grasshoppers, and grasshopper paste--Arrival at Nevada City--Situation and general appearance of the city--Supper at the Hôtel de Paris--A three-decker--Richard III. and Bombastes Furioso, 175-187

CHAPTER XI.

Pine-trees--Sugar-pines--Woodpeckers and acorns--Quartz veins--Coyote Diggings--Speculative mining--Hiring out--Average yield of the mines--Loafers--An old sailor on a spree--Start for the Yuba--Vegetables--An old friend--“Packing”--Mexican packers and pack-mules, 188-198

CHAPTER XII.

Start for Foster’s Bar--A hard road to travel--Portrait-painting--Flattering likenesses--Foster’s Bar--Sleeping under difficulties--Camping out--Camp of a flaming company--Dangers of sketching--Taken for a highwayman, and raised to the rank of colonel--A long journey for nothing--A soiree musicale in the forest, 199-212

CHAPTER XIII.

Start for Downieville--Scenery and habitations on the way--Downieville--The houses--Saloons--Restaurants--Theatres--Concerts--“The Forks”--“Cape Horn,” 213-221

CHAPTER XIV.

Lynch law--Necessity for such an institution in California--The protection afforded by it--Its efficiency for the prevention and punishment of crime--Summary executions--Manner of execution--Maladministration of law in San Francisco--The Vigilance Committee--The revolution of May 1856--Statistics of murders, 222-234

CHAPTER XV.

Rapid growth of California--Amount of labour performed--Luxury and hardship--A ragged man--The Flying Dutchman--Foppery in rags--A study--The Tower of Babel--Frenchmen--A “Keskydee”--“Dutchmen”--Climbing a mountain--An extensive view, 235-249

CHAPTER XVI.

Travelling down the river--Mining operations--The Florida House--A hurdy-gurdy player--“Dead-broke”--Wandering habits of the miners--Coin--Express companies--Slate-Range--A camp--A “pine-log crossing,” 250-261

CHAPTER XVII.

Mississippi Bar--A Chinese camp--Chinese miners: their mechanical contrivances--The Chinese in California--The rainy season--A flood in the river--Nevada City--Snow-storm--Starved out--“Thrown-up” dirt, 262-272

CHAPTER XVIII.

Start for San Francisco--A journey--Flood--Marysville--The plains under water--“Drowned-out” squatters--Sacramento--Sailing in the streets--Dead rats--San Francisco--Changes since the year before--Fine weather--The climate, 273-283

CHAPTER XIX.

The northern and the southern mines--Spring--The mines inexhaustible--Produce of gold--Jacksonville--A pet bear--Moquelumne Hill--The population--The houses--Indians: their ultimate fate--A bull-and-bear fight--Trapping bears, 284-300

CHAPTER XX.

Want of water--Canals--Engineering difficulties--Volcano Diggings--Boiling dirt--Northern and southern mines--Difference in scenery, gold, and inhabitants--Visit to a cave--Whist and chess--Mexican horse-thieves--Crossing the Moquelumne--Chilian miners--An Indian cavalcade, 301-312

CHAPTER XXI.

San Andres--A ragged camp--Mexicans--Gambling-rooms--Music--A church--Throwing the lasso--Lynch law--An execution--Angel’s Camp--Chinese--A ball--The “Lancers”--The Highland Fling, 313-322

CHAPTER XXII.

Carson’s Hill--Rich quartz mine--Mexican mode of working it--The quartz vein of California--Gold-deposits--The Stanislaus River--Ferries and bridges--Sonora--The houses and inhabitants--Hotels and restaurants--A knowing Chinaman--The police--Gentlemen’s fashions, 323-333

CHAPTER XXIII.

A bull-fight--Riding the bull--Killing with the sword--A magician--Necromancy in the mines--Table Mountain--Shaw’s Flats, 334-343

CHAPTER XXIV.

Fire in Sonora--Rapid progress of the fire, and total destruction of the town--The burned-out inhabitants--Deaths by fire--Rebuilding of the town, 344-352

CHAPTER XXV.

The Fourth of July--The procession--The celebration--The oration--A bull-fight--A lady bull-fighter--Natural bridges, 353-362

CHAPTER XXVI.

French miners--Their ménage--Their capacity as miners--Frenchmen as colonists--Social equality in the mines--The reason of it--And the result, 363-374

CHAPTER XXVII.

The Stockton stage--The plains--San Francisco--Its progress--Improvement in style of living--Female influence--Extravagance--First settlement of California--Effective population--Americans as colonists--English in California--Modern discoveries of gold--Their consequences, 375-384

ILLUSTRATIONS.

CAMP,--_Frontispiece_. PAGE

MONTE, 118

FARO, 192

A FLUME ON THE YUBA, 208

CHINESE CAMP, 265

BULL-FIGHT, 296

A BALL IN THE MINES, 320

SHAW’S FLATS, 343

THREE YEARS IN CALIFORNIA.