ascent, there was a sheer precipice of about two hun-
dred feet, at the foot of which, in eternal shade, lay
heaps of snow. The mountains in this direction were
more rugged and barren, and beyond them appeared
the white peaks of the Sierra Nevada. The atmosphere
was intensely clear ; it was as if there were no atmos-
phere at all, and the view of the most remote objects
was so vivid and distinct that any one not used to
such a clime would have been slow to believe that
their distance was so great as it actually was. Monte
Diablo, a peculiarly shaped mountain within a few
miles of San Francisco, and upwards of three hundred
miles from where I stood, was plainly discernible,
and with as much distinctness as on a clear day in
England a mountain is seen at a distance of fifty or
sixty miles.
The beauty of the view, which consisted chiefly in
its vastness, was greatly enhanced by being seen from
such a lofty pinnacle. It gave one the idea of being
suspended in the air, and cut off from all communi-
cation with the world below. The perfect solitude of
DISRUPTION OF THE ROCKS. 249
the place was quite oppressive, and was rendered still
more awful by the occasional loud report of some
piece of rock, which, becoming detached from the
mass, went bounding down to seek a more humble
resting-place. The gradual disruption seemed to be
incessant, for no sooner had one fragment got out of
hearing down below, than another started after it.
There was a keen wind blowing, and it was so miser-
ably cold, that when I had been up here for about an
hour, I became quite benumbed and chilled. It was
rather ticklish work coming down from my exalted
position, and more perilous a good deal than it had
been to climb up to it; but I managed it without
accident, and reached the cabin of my quartz-grinding
friend before dark.
Here I found there had arrived in the mean time
three men from a ranch which they had taken up
in a small valley, about thirty miles farther up in the
mountains. There were no other white men in that
direction, and this cabin was the nearest habitation to
them. They had come in with six or seven mule-
loads of hay for the use of the unfortunate animals
who were kept in a state of constant revolution in the
" rasters."
CHAPTER XVI.
TRAVELLING DOWN THE RIVER MINING OPERATIONS THE FLORIDA
HOUSE A HURDY-GURDY PLAYER "DEAD-BROKE" WANDER-
ING HABITS OF THE MINERS COIN EXPRESS COMPANIES
SLATE-RANGE A CAMP A " PINE-LOG CROSSING."
I RETURNED to Downieville the next day, and as the
weather was now getting rather cold and disagree-
able, and I did not wish to be caught quite so far
up in the mountains by the rainy season, I began to
make my way down the river again to more acces-
sible diggings.
On leaving, I took a trail which kept along the
bank of the river for some miles, before striking up
to the mountain-ridge. Immediately below the town
the mountain was very steep and smooth, and round
this wound the trail, at the height of three or four
hundred feet above the river. It was a mere beaten
path so narrow that two men could not walk
abreast, while there was hardly a bush or a tree
to interrupt one's progress in rolling down from the
trail to the river.
When trains of pack-mules met at this place, they
had the greatest difficulty in passing. The " down
SCENES ON THE RIVER. 251
train," being of course unloaded, had to give way
to the other. The mules understood their own
rights perfectly well. Those loaded with cargo
kept sturdily to the trail, while the empty mules
scrambled up the bank, where they stood still till
the others had passed. It not unfrequently hap-
pened, however, that a loaded mule got crowded off
the trail, and rolled down the hill. This was always
the last journey the poor mule ever performed. The
cargo was recovered more or less damaged, but the
remnants of deceased mules on the rocks down below
remained as a warning to all future travellers. It
was only a few days before that a man was riding
along here, when, from some cause, his mule stumbled
and fell off the trail. The mule, of course, went as a
small contribution to the collection of skeletons of
mules which had gone before him ; and his rider would
have shared the same fate, had he not fortunately been
arrested in his progress by a bush, the only object in
his course which could possibly have saved him.
The trail, after passing this spot, kept more among
the rocks on the river -side ; and though it was
rough travelling, the difficulties of the way were
beguiled by the numbers of miners' camps through
which one passed, and in observing the different
varieties of mining operations being carried on. For
miles the river was borne along in a succession of
flumes, in which were set innumerable water-wheels,
for working all sorts of pumps, and other contriv-
ances for economising labour. The bed of the river
252 GOODYEAR'S HILL.
was alive with miners ; and here and there, in the
steep banks, were rows of twenty or thirty tunnels,
out of which came constant streams of men, wheel-
ing the dirt down to the river-side, to be washed in
their long-toms.
At Goody ear's Bar, which is a place of some size,
the trail leaves the river, and ascends a mountain
which is said to be the worst in that part of the
country, and for my part I was quite willing to
believe it was. I met several men coming down,
who were all anxious to know if they were near the
bottom. I was equally desirous to know if I was
near the top, for the forest of pines was so thick,,
that, looking up, one could only get a glimpse be-
tween the trees of the zigzag trail far above.
About half-way up the mountain, at a break in the
ascent, I found a very new log-cabin by the side of a
little stream of water. It bore a sign about as large
as itself, on which was painted the "Florida House ;"
and as it was getting dark, and the next house was
five miles farther on, I thought I would take up my
quarters here for the night. The house was kept by
an Italian, or an " Eyetalian," as he is called across
the Atlantic. He had a Yankee wife, with a lot of
children, and the style of accommodation was as
good as one usually found in such places.
I was the only guest that night ; and as we sat by
the fire, smoking our pipes after supper, my host,
who was a cheerful sort of fellow, became very com-
municative. He gave me an interesting account of
. THE ITALIAN FIDDLE. 253
his California experiences, and also of his farming
operations in the States, where he had spent the
last few years of his life. Then, going backwards in
his career, he told me that he had lived for some
years in England and Scotland, and spoke of many
places there as if he knew them well. I was rather
curious to know in what capacity such an exceed-
ingly dingy-looking individual had visited all the
cities of the kingdom, but he seemed to wish to avoid
cross examination on the subject, so I did not press him.
He became intimately connected in my mind, however,
with sundry plaster-of-Paris busts of Napoleon, the
Duke of Wellington, Sir Walter Scott, and other
distinguished characters. I could fancy I saw the
whole collection of statuary on the top of his head,
and felt very much inclined to shout out " Images !"
to see what effect it would have upon him.
In the course of the evening he asked me if I
would like to hear some music, saying that he played
a little on the Italian fiddle. -I said I would be
delighted, particularly as I did not know the instru-
ment. The only national fiddle I had ever heard of
was the Caledonian, and I trusted this instrument of
his was a different sort of thing ; but I was very much
amused when it turned out to be nothing more or
less than a genuine orthodox hurdy-gurdy. It put
me more in mind of home than anything I had heard
for a long time. At the first note, of course, the
statuary vanished, and was replaced by a vision of
an unfortunate monkey in a red coat, while my
254 A HURDY-GURDY PLAYER.
friend's extensive travels in the United Kingdom
became very satisfactorily accounted for, and I
thought it by no means unlikely that this was not
the first time I had heard the sweet strains of his
Italian fiddle. He played several of the standard old
tunes ; but hurdy-gurdy music is of such a character
that a little of it goes a great way ; and I was not
sorry when a couple of strings snapped to the great
disgust, however, of my friend, for he had no more
with which to replace them.
Hurdy-gurdy player or not, he was a very enter-
taining agreeable fellow. I only hope all the frater-
nity are like him (perhaps they are, if one only knew
them), and attain ultimately to such a respectable
position in life, dignifying their instruments with the
name of Italian fiddles, and reserving them for the
entertainment of their particular friends.
I was on my way to Slate Range, a place some
distance down the river, but the next day I only
went as far as Oak Valley, travelling the last few
miles with a young fellow from one of the Southern
States, whom I overtook on the way. He had been
mining, he told me, at Downieville, and was now
going to join some friends of his at a place some
thirty miles off.
At supper he did not make his appearance, which
I did not observe, as there were a number of men at
table, till the landlord asked me if that young fellow
who arrived with me was not going to have any
supper, and suggested that perhaps he was " strap-
DEAD-BROKE. 255
ped," " dead-broke " Anglice, without a cent in his
pocket. I had not inferred anything of the sort from
his conversation, but on going out and asking him
why he did not come to supper, he reluctantly ad-
mitted that the state of his finances would not admit
of it. I told him, in the language of Mr Toots, that
it was of no consequence, and made him come in,
when he was most unceremoniously lectured by the
rest of the party, and by the landlord particularly,
on the absurdity of his intention of going supperless
to bed merely because he happened to be " dead-
broke," getting at the same time some useful hints
how to act under such circumstances in future from
several of the men present, who related how, when
they had found themselves in such a predicament,
they had, on frankly stating the fact, been made
welcome to everything.
To be " dead-broke " was really, as far as a man's
immediate comfort was concerned, a matter of less
importance in the mines than in almost any other
place. There was no such thing as being out of em-
ployment, where every man employed himself, and
could always be sure of ample remuneration for his
day's work. But notwithstanding the want of excuse
for being " strapped," it was very common to find
men in that condition. There were everywhere
numbers of lazy idle men, who were always without a
dollar ; and others reduced themselves to that state
by spending their time and money on claims which,
after all, yielded them no return, or else gradually
256 COIN AND GOLD-DUST.
exhausted their funds in travelling about the country,
and prospecting, never satisfied with fair average
diggings, but always having the idea that better were
to be found elsewhere. Few miners located them-
selves permanently in any place, and there was a
large proportion of the population continually on the
move. In almost every place I visited in the mines,
I met men whom I had seen in other diggings.
Some men I came across frequently, who seemed to
do nothing but wander about the country, satisfied
with asking the miners in the different diggings how
they were "making out," but without ever taking
the trouble to prospect for themselves.
Coin was very scarce, what there was being
nearly all absorbed by the gamblers, who required it
for convenience in carrying on their business. Ordi-
nary payments were made in gold dust, every store
being provided with a pair of gold scales, in which
the miner weighed out sufficient dust from his buck-
skin purse to pay for his purchases.
In general trading, gold dust was taken at sixteen
dollars the ounce ; but in the towns and villages, at
the agencies of the various San Francisco bankers
and Express Companies, it was bought at a higher
price, according to the quality of the dust, and as it
was more or less in demand for remittance to New
York.
The " Express " business of the United States is
one which has not been many years established, and
which was originally limited to the transmission of
"EXPRESS" COMPANIES. 257
small parcels of value. On the discovery of gold in
California, the Express houses of New York imme-
diately established agencies in San Francisco, and at
once became largely engaged in transmitting gold
dust to the mint in Philadelphia, and to various parts
of the United States, on account of the owners in
California. As a natural result of doing such a busi-
ness, they very soon began to sell their own drafts on
New York, and to purchase and remit gold dust on
their own account.
They had agencies also in every little town in the
mines, where they enjoyed the utmost confidence of
the community, receiving deposits from miners and
others, and selling drafts on the Atlantic States. In
fact, besides carrying on the original Express busi-
ness of forwarding goods and parcels, and keeping up
an independent post-office of their own, they became
also, to all intents and purposes, bankers, and did as
large an exchange business as any legitimate banking
firm in the country.
The want of coin was equally felt in San Francisco,
and coins of all countries were taken into circulation
to make up the deficiency. As yet a mint had not
been granted to California, but there was a Govern-
ment Assay Office, which issued a large octagonal
gold piece of the value of fifty dollars a roughly
executed coin, about twice the bulk of a crown-piece ;
while the greater part of the five, ten, and twenty dollar
pieces were not from the United States Mint, but were
coined and issued by private firms in San Francisco.
R
258 GOLD ESCORTS.
Silver was still more scarce, and many pieces were
consequently current at much more than their value.
A quarter of a dollar was the lowest appreciable sum
represented by coin, and any piece approaching it in
size was equally current at the same rate. A franc
passed for a quarter of a dollar, while a five-franc
piece only passed for a dollar, which is about its
actual worth. As a natural consequence of francs
being thus taken at 25 per cent more than their
real value, large quantities of them were imported
and put into circulation. In 1854, however, the
bankers refused to receive them, and they gradually
disappeared.
There was wonderfully little precaution taken in
conveying the gold down from the mountains, and
yet, although nothing deserving the name of an escort
ever accompanied it, I never knew an instance of an
attack upon it being attempted. On several occa-
sions I saw the Express messenger taking down a
quantity of gold from Downieville. He and another
man, both well mounted, were driving a mule loaded
with leathern sacks, containing probably two or three
hundred pounds' weight of gold. They were well
armed, of course ; but a couple of robbers, had they
felt so inclined, might easily have knocked them both
over with their rifles in the solitude of the forest,
without much fear of detection. Bad as California
was, it appeared a proof that it was not altogether
such a country as was generally supposed, when
large quantities of gold were thus regularly brought
SLATE RANGE. 259
over the lonely mountain-trails, with even less pro-
tection than would have been thought necessary in
many parts of the Old World.
From Oak Valley I went down to Slate Kaiige
with an American who was anxious I should visit
his camp there. After climbing down the mountain-
side, we at last reached the river, which here was
confined between huge masses of slate rock, turning
in its course, and disappearing behind bold rocky
points so abruptly, that seldom could more of the
length than the breadth of the river be seen at a
time.
An hour's scrambling over the sharp-edged slate
rocks on the side of the river brought us to his camp,
or at least the place where he and his partners camped
out, which was on the bare rocks, in a corner so over-
shadowed by the steep mountain that the sun never
shone upon it. It was certainly the least luxurious
habitation, and in the most wild and rugged locality,
I had yet seen in the mines. On a rough board
which rested on two stones were a number of tin
plates, pannikins, and such articles of table furniture,
while a few flat stones alongside answered the pur-
pose of chairs. Scattered about, as was usual in all
miners' camps, were quantities of empty tins of pre-
served meats, sardines, and oysters, empty bottles of
all shapes and sizes, innumerable ham-bones, old
clothes, and other rubbish. Round the blackened
spot which was evidently the kitchen were pots and
frying-pans, sacks of flour and beans, and other
260 CAMPING OUT.
provisions, together with a variety of cans and bottles,
of which no one could tell the contents without
inspection ; for in the mines everything is perverted
from its original purpose, butter being perhaps
stowed away in a tin labelled " fresh lobsters/' tea in
a powder canister, and salt in a sardine-box.
There was nothing in the shape of a tent or
shanty of any sort ; it was not required as a shelter
from the heat of the sun, as the place was in the per-
petual shade of the mountain, and at night each man
rolled himself up in his blankets, and made a bed
of the smoothest and softest piece of rock he could
find.
This part of the river was very rich, the gold being
found in the soft slate rock between the layers and
in the crevices.
My friend and his partners were working in a
" wing dam " in front of their camp, and the river,
being pushed back off one half of its bed, rushed
past in a roaring torrent, white with foam. A large
water-wheel was set in it, which worked several pumps,
and a couple of feet above it lay a pine-tree, which
had been felled there so as to serve as a bridge. The
river was above thirty feet wide, and the tree, not
more than a foot and a half in diameter, was in its
original condition, perfectly round and smooth, and was,
moreover, kept constantly wet with the spray from
the wheel, which was so close that one could almost
touch it in passing. If one had happened to slip and
fall into the water, he would have had about as much
A PINE -LOG CROSSING. 261
chance of coining out alive as if he had fallen before
the paddles of a steamer ; and any gentleman with
shaky legs and unsteady nerves, had he been com-
pelled to pass such a bridge, would most probably
have got astride of it, and so worked his passage
across. In the mines, however, these "pine-log
crossings " were such a very common style of bridge,
that every one was used to them, and walked them
like a rope-dancer : in fact, there was a degree of
pleasant excitement in passing a very slippery and
difficult one such as this.
CHAPTER XVII.
MISSISSIPPI BAR A CHINESE CAMP CHINESE MINERS : THEIR ME-
CHANICAL CONTRIVANCES THE CHINESE IN CALIFORNIA THE
RAINY SEASON A FLOOD IN THE RIVER NEVADA CITY SNOW-
STORM STARVED OUT "THROWN-UP" DIRT.
WHILE at this camp, I went down the river two or
three miles to see a place called Mississippi Bar, where
a company of Chinamen were at work. After an
hour's climbing along the rocky banks, and having
crossed and recrossed the river some half-dozen times
on pine logs, I at last got down among the Celestials.
There were about a hundred and fifty of them
here, living in a perfect village of small tents, all
clustered together on the rocks. They had a claim
in the bed of the river, which they were working by
means of a wing dam. A " wing dam," I may here
mention, is one which first runs half-way across the
river, then down the river, and back again to the
same side, thus damming off a portion of its bed
without the necessity of the more expensive operation
of lifting up the whole river bodily in a " flume."
The Chinamen's dam was two or three hundred
CHINESE MINERS. 263
yards in length, and was built of large pine-trees
laid one on the top of the other. They must have
had great difficulty in handling such immense logs
in such a place ; but they are exceedingly ingenious
in applying mechanical power, particularly in con-
centrating the force of a large number of men upon
one point.
There were Chinamen of the better class among
them, who no doubt directed the work, and paid the
common men very poor wages poor at least for Cali-
fornia. A Chinaman could be hired for two, or at
most three dollars a-day by any one who thought
their labour worth so much ; but those at work here
were most likely paid at a still lower rate, for it was
well known that whole shiploads of Chinamen came
to the country under a species of bondage to some
of their wealthy countrymen in San Francisco, who,
immediately on their arrival, shipped them off to the
mines under charge of an agent, keeping them com-
pletely under control by some mysterious celestial
influence, quite independent of the laws of the country.
They sent up to the mines for their use supplies of
Chinese provisions and clothing, and thus all the
gold taken out by them remained in Chinese hands,
and benefited the rest of the community but little
by passing through the ordinary channels of trade.
In fact, the Chinese formed a distinct class, which
enriched itself at the expense of the country, ab-
stracting a large portion of its latent wealth without
contributing, in a degree commensurate with their
264 ISOLATION OF THE CHINESE.
numbers, to the prosperity of the community of
which they formed a part.
The individuals of any community must exist by
supplying the wants of others ; and when a man
neither does this, nor has any wants of his own but
those which he provides for himself, he is of no use to
his neighbours ; but when, in addition to this, he also
diminishes the productiveness of the country, he is a
positive disadvantage in proportion to the amount
of public wealth which he engrosses, and becomes a
public nuisance.
What is true of an individual is true also of a class ;
and the Chinese, though they were no doubt, as far
as China was concerned, both productive and con-
sumptive, were considered by a very large party in
California to be merely destructive as far as that
country was interested.
They were, of course, not altogether so, for such a
numerous body as they were could not possibly be so
isolated as to be entirely independent of others ; but
any advantage which the country derived from their
presence was too dearly paid for by the quantity of
gold which they took from it ; and the propriety of
expelling all the Chinese from the State was long
discussed, both by the press and in the Legislature ;
but the principles of the American constitution pre-
vailed ; the country was open to all the world, and
the Chinese enjoyed equal rights with the most
favoured nation. In some parts of the mines, how-
ever, the miners had their own ideas on the subject,
CHINESE PUMPS. 265
and would not allow the Chinamen to come among
them ; but generally they were not interfered with,
for they contented themselves with working such
poor diggings as it was not thought worth while to
take from them.
This claim on the Yuba was the greatest under-
taking I ever saw attempted by them.
They expended a vast deal of unnecessary labour
in their method of working, and their individual
labour, in effect, was as nothing compared with that
of other miners. A company of fifteen or twenty
white men would have wing-dammed this claim, and
worked it out in two or three months, while here
were about a hundred and fifty Chinamen humbug-
ging round it all the season, and still had not worked
one half the ground.
Their mechanical contrivances were not in the
usual rough straightforward style of the mines ;
they were curious, and very elaborately got up, but
extremely wasteful of labour, and, moreover, very
ineffective.
The pumps which they had at work here were an
instance of this. They were on the principle of a
chain-pump, the chain being formed of pieces of wood
about six inches long, hingeing on each other, with
cross-pieces in the middle for buckets, having about
six square inches of surface. The hinges fitted ex-
actly to the spokes of a small wheel, which was
turned by a Chinaman at each side of it working a
miniature treadmill of four spokes on the same axle.