Being a Series of Twenty-three Letters from DAME SHIRLEY (mrs. louise amelia knapp smith clappe) (continued 2)

About daylight, somewhat refreshed, we again mounted our mules, confidently believing that an hour's ride would bring us to the Berry Creek House, as we supposed, of course, that we had camped in its immediate vicinity. We tried more than a dozen paths, which, as they led nowhere, we would retrace to the principal trail. At last F. determined to keep upon one, as it must, he thought, in time, lead us out of the mountains, even if we landed on the other side of California. Well, we rode on, and on, and on, up hill and down hill, down hill and up, through fir-groves and oak-clumps, and along the edge of dark ravines, until I thought that I should go mad, for all this time the sun was pouring down its hottest rays most pitilessly, and I had an excruciating pain in my head and in all my limbs.

About two o'clock we struck the main trail, and, meeting a man,—the first human being that we had seen since we left Bidwell's,—were told that we were seven miles from the Berry Creek House, and that we had been down to the North Fork of the American River, more than thirty miles out of our way! This joyful news gave us fresh strength, and we rode on as fast as our worn-out mules could go.

Although we had eaten nothing since noon the day before, I bore up bravely until we arrived within two miles of the rancho, when courage and strength both gave way, and I implored F. to let me lie down under a tree and rest for a few hours. He very wisely refused, knowing that if I dismounted it would be impossible to get me onto my mule again, and we should be obliged to spend another night under the stars, which, in this enchanting climate, would have been delightful, had we possessed any food; but, knowing that I needed refreshment even more than I did rest, he was compelled to insist upon my proceeding.

My poor husband! He must have had a trying time with me, for I sobbed and cried like the veriest child, and repeatedly declared that I should never live to get to the rancho. F. said afterwards that he began to think I intended to keep my word, for I certainly looked like a dying person.

O Mary! it makes me shudder when I think of the mad joy with which I saw that rancho! Remember that, with the exception of three or four hours the night before, we had been in the saddle for nearly twenty-four hours without refreshment. When we stopped, F. carried me into the house and laid me onto a bunk, though I have no remembrance of it, and he said that when he offered me some food, I turned from it with disgust, exclaiming, "Oh, take it away! give me some cold water and let me sleep, and be sure you don't wake me for the next three weeks." And I did sleep, with a forty slumber-power; and when F. came to me late in the evening with some tea and toast, I awoke, oh! so refreshed, and perfectly well, for, after all the great fuss which I had made, there was nothing the matter with me but a little fatigue.

Every one that we met congratulated us upon not having encountered any Indians, for the paths which we followed were Indian trails, and it is said they would have killed us for our mules and clothes. A few weeks ago a Frenchman and his wife were murdered by them. I had thought of the circumstances when we camped, but was too sick to care what happened. They generally take women captive, however; and who knows how narrowly I escaped becoming an Indian chieftainess, and feeding for the rest of my life upon roasted grasshoppers, acorns, and flower-seeds? By the way, the last-mentioned article of food strikes me as rather poetical than otherwise.

After a good night's rest we are perfectly well, and as happy as the day itself,—which was one of Heaven's own choosing,—and rode to the "Wild Yankee's," where we breakfasted, and had, among other dainties, fresh butter and cream.

Soon after we alighted, a herd of Indians, consisting of about a dozen men and squaws, with an unknown quantity of papooses,—the last naked as the day they were born,—crowded into the room to stare at us. It was the most amusing thing in the world to see them finger my gloves, whip, and hat, in their intense curiosity. One of them had caught the following line of a song, "O, carry me back to old Martinez," with which he continued to stun our ears all the time we remained, repeating it over and over with as much pride and joy as a mocking-bird exhibits when he has learned a new sound.

On this occasion I was more than ever struck with what I have often remarked before,—the extreme beauty of the limbs of the Indian women of California. Though for haggardness of expression and ugliness of feature they might have been taken for a band of Macbethian witches, a bronze statue of Cleopatra herself never folded more beautifully rounded arms above its dusky bosom, or poised upon its pedestal a slenderer ankle or a more statuesque foot, than those which gleamed from beneath the dirty blankets of these wretched creatures. There was one exception, however, to the general hideousness of their faces. A girl of sixteen, perhaps, with those large, magnificently lustrous, yet at the same time soft, eyes, so common in novels, so rare in real life, had shyly glided like a dark, beautiful spirit into the corner of the room. A fringe of silken jet swept heavily upward from her dusky cheek, athwart which the richest color came and went like flashes of lightning. Her flexible lips curved slightly away from teeth like strips of cocoanut meat, with a mocking grace infinitely bewitching. She wore a cotton chemise,—disgustingly dirty, I must confess,—girt about her slender waist with a crimson handkerchief, while over her night-black hair, carelessly knotted beneath the rounded chin, was a purple scarf of knotted silk. Her whole appearance was picturesque in the extreme. She sat upon the ground with her pretty brown fingers languidly interlaced above her knee, "round as a period," (as a certain American poet has so funnily said of a similar limb in his Diana,) and smiled up into my face as if we were the dearest friends.

I was perfectly enraptured with this wildwood Cleopatra, and bored F. almost beyond endurance with exclamations about her starry eyes, her chiseled limbs, and her beautiful nut-brown cheeks.

I happened to take out of my pocket a paper of pins, when all the women begged for some of them. This lovely child still remained silent in the posture of exquisite grace which she had so unconsciously assumed, but, nevertheless, she looked as pleased as any of them when I gave her, also, a row of the much-coveted treasures. But I found I had got myself into business, for all the men wanted pins too, and I distributed the entire contents of the papers which I happened to have in my pocket, before they were satisfied, much to the amusement of F., who only laughs at what he is pleased to call my absurd interest in these poor creatures; but you know, M., I always did "take" to Indians, though it must be said that those who bear that name here have little resemblance to the glorious forest heroes that live in the Leatherstocking tales, and in spite of my desire to find in them something poetical and interesting, a stern regard for truth compels me to acknowledge that the dusky beauty above described is the only even moderately pretty squaw that I have ever seen.

At noon we stopped at the Buckeye Rancho for about an hour, and then pushed merrily on for the Pleasant Valley Rancho, which we expected to reach about sundown. Will you, can you, believe that we got lost again? Should you travel over this road, you would not be at all surprised at the repetition of this misfortune. Two miles this side of Pleasant Valley, which is very large, there is a wide, bare plain of red stones which one is compelled to cross in order to reach it, and I should not think that even in the daytime any one but an Indian could keep the trail in this place. It was here that, just at dark, we probably missed the path, and entered, about the center of the valley, at the opposite side of an extensive grove from that on which the rancho is situated. When I first began to suspect that we might possibly have to camp out another night, I Caudleized at a great rate, but when it became a fixed fact that such was our fate, I was instantly as mute and patient as the Widow Prettyman when she succeeded to the throne of the venerated woman referred to above. Indeed, feeling perfectly well, and not being much fatigued, I should rather have enjoyed it, had not F., poor fellow, been so grieved at the idea of my going supperless to a moss-stuffed couch. It was a long time before I could coax him to give up searching for the rancho, and, in truth, I should think that we rode round that part of the valley in which we found ourselves, for more than two hours, trying to find it.

About eleven o'clock we went back into the woods and camped for the night. Our bed was quite comfortable, and my saddle made an excellent pillow. Being so much higher in the mountains, we were a little chilly, and I was disturbed two or three times by a distant noise, which I have since been told was the growling of grizzly bears, that abounded in that vicinity. On the whole, we passed a comfortable night, and rose at sunrise feeling perfectly refreshed and well. In less than an hour we were eating breakfast at the Pleasant Valley Rancho, which we easily discovered by daylight.

Here they informed us that "we had escaped a great marcy," as old Jim used to say in relating his successful run from a wolf, inasmuch as the grizzlies had not devoured us during the night! But, seriously, dear M., my heart thrills with gratitude to the Father for his tender care of us during that journey, which, view it as lightly as we may, was certainly attended with some danger.

Notwithstanding we had endured so much fatigue, I felt as well as ever I did, and after breakfast insisted upon pursuing our journey, although F. anxiously advised me to defer it until next day. But imagine the horror, the crème de la crème of borosity, of remaining for twelve mortal hours of wakefulness in a filthy, uncomfortable, flea-haunted shanty, without books or papers, when Rich Bar—easily attainable before night, through the loveliest scenery, shining in the yellow splendor of an autumnal morn—lay before us! I had no idea of any such absurd self-immolation. So we again started on our strange, eventful journey.

I wish I could give you some faint idea of the majestic solitudes through which we passed,—where the pine-trees rise so grandly in their awful height, that they seem to look into heaven itself. Hardly a living thing disturbed this solemnly beautiful wilderness. Now and then a tiny lizard glanced in and out among the mossy roots of the old trees, or a golden butterfly flitted languidly from blossom to blossom. Sometimes a saucy little squirrel would gleam along the somber trunk of some ancient oak, or a bevy of quail, with their pretty tufted heads and short, quick tread, would trip athwart our path. Two or three times, in the radiant distance, we descried a stately deer, which, framed in by embowering leaves, and motionless as a tableau, gazed at us for a moment with its large, limpid eyes, and then bounded away with the speed of light into the evergreen depths of those glorious old woods.

Sometimes we were compelled to cross broad plains, acres in extent, called chaparrals, covered with low shrubs, which, leafless and barkless, stand like vegetable skeletons along the dreary waste. You cannot imagine what a weird effect these eldrich bushes had upon my mind. Of a ghastly whiteness, they at first reminded me of a plantation of antlers, and I amused myself by fancying them a herd of crouching deer; but they grew so wan and ghastly, that I began to look forward to the creeping across a chaparral (it is no easy task for the mules to wind through them) with almost a feeling of dread.

But what a lovely sight greeted our enchanted eyes as we stopped for a few moments on the summit of the hill leading into Rich Bar! Deep in the shadowy nooks of the far-down valleys, like wasted jewels dropped from the radiant sky above, lay half a dozen blue-bosomed lagoons, glittering and gleaming and sparkling in the sunlight as though each tiny wavelet were formed of rifted diamonds. It was worth the whole wearisome journey—danger from Indians, grizzly bears, sleeping under the stars, and all—to behold this beautiful vision. While I stood breathless with admiration, a singular sound, and an exclamation of "A rattlesnake!" from F., startled me into common sense again. I gave one look at the reptile, horribly beautiful, like a chain of living opals, as it corkscrewed itself into that peculiar spiral which it is compelled to assume in order to make an attack, and then, fear overcoming curiosity, although I had never seen one of them before, I galloped out of its vicinity as fast as my little mule could carry me.

The hill leading into Rich Bar is five miles long, and as steep as you can imagine. Fancy yourself riding for this distance along the edge of a frightful precipice, where, should your mule make a misstep, you would be dashed hundreds of feet into the awful ravine below. Every one we met tried to discourage us, and said that it would be impossible for me to ride down it. They would take F. aside, much to my amusement, and tell him that he was assuming a great responsibility in allowing me to undertake such a journey. I, however, insisted upon going on. About halfway down we came to a level spot, a few feet in extent, covered with sharp slate-stones. Here the girth of my saddle, which we afterwards found to be fastened only by four tacks, gave way, and I fell over the right side, striking on my left elbow. Strange to say, I was not in the least hurt, and again my heart wept tearful thanks to God, for, had the accident happened at any other part of the hill, I must have been dashed, a piece of shapeless nothingness, into the dim valleys beneath.

F. soon mended the saddle-girth. I mounted my darling little mule, and rode triumphantly into Rich Bar at five o'clock in the evening. The Rich Barians are astonished at my courage in daring to ride down the hill. Many of the miners have told me that they dismounted several times while descending it. I, of course, feel very vain of my exploit, and glorify myself accordingly, being particularly careful, all the time, not to inform my admirers that my courage was the result of the know-nothing, fear-nothing principle; for I was certainly ignorant, until I had passed them, of the dangers of the passage. Another thing that prevented my dismounting was the apparently utter impossibility, on such a steep and narrow path, of mounting again. Then, I had much more confidence in my mule's power of picking the way and keeping his footing, than in my own. It is the prettiest sight in the world to see these cunning creatures stepping so daintily and cautiously among the rocks. Their pretty little feet, which absolutely do not look larger than a silver dollar, seem made on purpose for the task. They are often perfect little vixens with their masters, but an old mountaineer, who has ridden them for twenty years, told me that he never knew one to be skittish with a woman. The intelligent darlings seem to know what a bundle of helplessness they are carrying, and scorn to take advantage of it.

We are boarding, at present, at the "Empire," a huge shingle palace in the center of Rich Bar, which I will describe in my next letter. Pardon, dear M., the excessive egotism of this letter; but you have often flattered me by saying that my epistles were only interesting when profusely illuminated by that manuscriptal decoration represented by a great I. A most intense love of the ornament myself makes it easy for me to believe you, and doubt not that my future communications will be as profusely stained with it as even you could desire.

Letter the Second

[The Pioneer, March, 1854]

RICH BAR—ITS HOTELS and PIONEER FAMILIES

SYNOPSIS

The Empire Hotel, the hotel of Rich Bar. The author safely ensconced therein. California might be called the "Hotel State," from the plenitude of its taverns, etc. The Empire the only two-story building in Rich Bar, and the only one there having glass windows. Built by gamblers for immoral purposes. The speculation a failure, its occupants being treated with contempt or pity. Building sold for a few hundred dollars. The new landlord of the Empire. The landlady, an example of the terrible wear and tear to the complexion in crossing the plains. A resolute woman. Left behind her two children and an eight-months-old baby. Cooking for six people, her two-weeks-old baby kicking and screaming in champagne-basket cradle. "The sublime martyrdom of maternity". Left alone immediately after infant's birth. Husband dangerously ill, and cannot help. A kindly miner. Three other women at the Bar. The "Indiana girl". "Girl" a misnomer. "A gigantic piece of humanity". "Dainty" habits and herculean feats. A log-cabin family. Pretty and interesting children. "The Miners' Home". Its petite landlady tends bar. "Splendid material for social parties this winter."

Letter the Second

Rich Bar—Its Hotels and Pioneer Families

Rich Bar, East Branch of the North Fork of Feather River,

September 15, 1851.

I believe that I closed my last letter by informing you that I was safely ensconced—after all the hair-breadth escapes of my wearisome, though at the same time delightful, journey—under the magnificent roof of the "Empire," which, by the way, is the hotel of the place, not but that nearly ever other shanty on the Bar claims the same grandiloquent title. Indeed, for that matter, California herself might be called the Hotel State, so completely is she inundated with taverns, boarding-houses, etc. The Empire is the only two-story building in town, and absolutely has a live "upstairs." Here you will find two or three glass windows, an unknown luxury in all the other dwellings. It is built of planks of the roughest possible description. The roof, of course, is covered with canvas, which also forms the entire front of the house, on which is painted, in immense capitals, the following imposing letters: "THE EMPIRE!" I will describe, as exactly as possible, this grand establishment. You first enter a large apartment, level with the street, part of which is fitted up as a barroom, with that eternal crimson calico which flushes the whole social life of the Golden State with its everlasting red, in the center of a fluted mass of which gleams a really elegant mirror, set off by a background of decanters, cigar-vases, and jars of brandied fruit; the whole forming a tout ensemble of dazzling splendor. A table covered with a green cloth,—upon which lies a pack of monte-cards, a back-gammon-board, and a sickening pile of "yallow-kivered" literature,—with several uncomfortable-looking benches, complete the furniture of this most important portion of such a place as "The Empire." The remainder of the room does duty as a shop, where velveteen and leather, flannel shirts and calico ditto,—the latter starched to an appalling state of stiffness,—lie cheek by jowl with hams, preserved meats, oysters, and other groceries, in hopeless confusion. From the barroom you ascend by four steps into the parlor, the floor of which is covered by a straw carpet. This room contains quite a decent looking-glass, a sofa fourteen feet long and a foot and a half wide, painfully suggestive of an aching back,—of course covered with red calico (the sofa, not the back),—a round table with a green cloth, six cane-bottom chars, red-calico curtains, a cooking-stove, a rocking-chair, and a woman and a baby, (of whom more anon,) the latter wearing a scarlet frock, to match the sofa and curtains. A flight of four steps leads from the parlor to the upper story, where, on each side of a narrow entry, are four eight-feet-by-ten bedrooms, the floors of which are covered by straw matting. Here your eyes are again refreshed with a glittering vision of red-calico curtains gracefully festooned above wooden windows picturesquely lattice-like. These tiny chambers are furnished with little tables covered with oilcloth, and bedsteads so heavy that nothing short of a giant's strength could move them. Indeed, I am convinced that they were built, piece by piece, on the spot where they now stand. The entire building is lined with purple calico, alternating with a delicate blue, and the effect is really quite pretty. The floors are so very uneven that you are always ascending a hill or descending into a valley. The doors consist of a slight frame covered with dark-blue drilling, and are hung on hinges of leather. As to the kitchen and dining-room, I leave to your vivid imagination to picture their primitiveness, merely observing that nothing was ever more awkward and unworkmanlike than the whole tenement. It is just such a piece of carpentering as a child two years old, gifted with the strength of a man, would produce, if it wanted to play at making grown-up houses. And yet this impertinent apology for a house cost its original owners more than eight thousand dollars. This will not be quite so surprising when I inform you that, at the time it was built, everything had to be packed from Marysville at a cost of forty cents a pound. Compare this with the price of freight on the railroads at home, and you will easily make an estimate of the immense outlay of money necessary to collect the materials for such an undertaking at Rich Bar. It was built by a company of gamblers as a residence for two of those unfortunates who make a trade—a thing of barter—of the holiest passion, when sanctified by love, that ever thrills the wayward heart of poor humanity. To the lasting honor of miners be it written, the speculation proved a decided failure. Yes! these thousand men, many of whom had been for years absent from the softening amenities of female society, and the sweet restraining influences of pure womanhood,—these husbands of fair young wives kneeling daily at the altars of their holy homes to pray for their far-off ones,—these sons of gray-haired mothers, majestic in their sanctified old age,—these brothers of virginal sisters, white and saintlike as the lilies of their own gardens,—looked only with contempt or pity on these, oh! so earnestly to be compassionated creatures. These unhappy members of a class, to one of which the tenderest words that Jesus ever spake were uttered, left in a few weeks, absolutely driven away by public opinion. The disappointed gamblers sold the house to its present proprietor for a few hundred dollars.

Mr. B., the landlord of the Empire, was a Western farmer who with his wife crossed the plains about two years ago. Immediately on his arrival he settled at a mining station, where he remained until last spring, when he removed to Rich Bar. Mrs. B. is a gentle and amiable looking woman, about twenty-five years of age. She is an example of the terrible wear and tear to the complexion in crossing the plains, hers having become, through exposure at that time, of a dark and permanent yellow, anything but becoming. I will give you a key to her character, which will exhibit it better than weeks of description. She took a nursing babe, eight months old, from her bosom, and left it with two other children, almost infants, to cross the plains in search of gold! When I arrived she was cooking supper for some half a dozen people, while her really pretty boy, who lay kicking furiously in his champagne-basket cradle, and screaming with a six-months-old-baby power, had, that day, completed just two weeks of his earthly pilgrimage. The inconvenience which she suffered during what George Sand calls "the sublime martyrdom of maternity" would appal the wife of the humblest pauper of a New England village. Another woman, also from the West, was with her at the time of her infant's birth, but scarcely had the "latest-found" given the first characteristic shriek of its debut upon the stage of life, when this person herself was taken seriously ill, and was obliged to return to her own cabin, leaving the poor exhausted mother entirely alone! Her husband lay seriously sick himself at the time, and of course could offer her no assistance. A miner, who lived in the house, and hoarded himself, carried her some bread and tea in the morning and evening, and that was all the care she had. Two days after its birth, she made a desperate effort, and, by easy stages of ten minutes at a time, contrived to get poor baby washed and dressed, after a fashion. He is an astonishingly large and strong child, holds his head up like a six-monther, and has but one failing,—a too evident and officious desire to inform everybody, far and near, at all hours of the night and day, that his lungs are in a perfectly sound and healthy condition,—a piece of intelligence which, though very gratifying, is rather inconvenient if one happens to be particularly sleepy.

Besides Mrs. B., there are three other women on the Bar. One is called "the Indiana girl," from the name of her pa's hotel, though it must be confessed that the sweet name of girl seems sadly incongruous when applied to such a gigantic piece of humanity. I have a great desire to see her, which will probably not be gratified, as she leaves in a few days for the valley. But, at any rate, I can say that I have heard her. The far-off roll of her mighty voice, booming through two closed doors and a long entry, added greatly to the severe attack of nervous headache under which I was suffering when she called. This gentle creature wears the thickest kind of miner's boots, and has the dainty habit of wiping the dishes on her apron! Last spring she walked to this place, and packed fifty pounds of flour on her back down that awful hill, the snow being five feet deep at the time.

Mr. and Mrs. B., who have three pretty children, reside in a log cabin at the entrance of the village. One of the little girls was in the barroom to-day, and her sweet and birdlike voice brought tearfully, and yet joyfully, to my memory "Tearsoul," "Leilie," and "Lile Katie."

Mrs. B., who is as small as "the Indiana girl" is large (indeed, I have been confidently informed that she weighs but sixty-eight pounds), keeps, with her husband, the "Miners' Home." (Mem.—The lady tends bar.) Voilà, my dear, the female population of my new home. Splendid material for social parties this winter, are they not?

Letter the Third

[The Pioneer, April, 1854]

LIFE and FORTUNE at the BAR-DIGGINGS

SYNOPSIS

Flashy shops and showy houses of San Francisco. Rich Bar charmingly fresh and original. A diminutive valley. Río de las Plumas, or Feather River. Rich Bar, the Barra Rica of the Spaniards. An acknowledgment of "a most humiliating consciousness of geological deficiencies". Palatial splendor of the Empire Hotel. Round tents, square tents, plank hovels, log cabins, etc. "Local habitations" formed of pine boughs, and covered with old calico shirts. The "office" of Dr. C. excites the risibilities of the author. One of the "finders" of Rich Bar. Had not spoken to a woman for two years. Honors the occasion by an "investment" in champagne. The author assists in drinking to the honor of her arrival at the Bar. Nothing done in California without the sanctifying influence of the "spirit". History of the discovery of gold at Rich Bar. Thirty-three pounds of gold in eight hours. Fifteen hundred dollars from a panful of "dirt". Five hundred miners arrive at Rich Bar in about a week. Smith Bar, Indian Bar, Missouri Bar, and other bars. Miners extremely fortunate. Absolute wealth in a few weeks. Drunken gamblers in less than a year. Suffering for necessaries of life. A mild winter. A stormy spring. Impassable trails. No pack-mule trains arrive. Miners pack flour on their backs for over forty miles. Flour at over three dollars a pound. Subsistence on feed-barley. A voracious miner. An abundance stored.

Letter the Third

Life and Fortune at the Bar-diggings

Rich Bar, East Branch of the North Fork of Feather River,

September 20, 1851.

I intend, to-day, dear M., to be as disagreeably statistical and as praiseworthily matter-of-factish as the most dogged utilitarian could desire. I shall give you a full, true, and particular account of the discovery, rise, and progress of this place, with a religious adherence to dates which will rather astonish your unmathematical mind. But let me first describe the spot as it looked to my wondering and unaccustomed eyes. Remember, I had never seen a mining district before, and had just left San Francisco, amid whose flashy-looking shops and showy houses the most of my time had been spent since my arrival in the Golden State. Of course, to me, the coup d'oeil of Rich Bar was charmingly fresh and original. Imagine a tiny valley about eight hundred yards in length, and perhaps thirty in width, (it was measured for my especial information,) apparently hemmed in by lofty hills, almost perpendicular, draperied to their very summits with beautiful fir-trees, the blue-bosomed Plumas (or Feather River, I suppose I must call it) undulating along their base,—and you have as good an idea as I can give you of the local of Barra Rica, as the Spaniards so prettily term it.

In almost any of the numerous books written upon California, no doubt you will be able to find a most scientific description of the origin of these bars. I must acknowledge with shame that my ideas on the subject are distressingly vague. I could never appreciate the poetry or the humor of making one's wrists ache by knocking to pieces gloomy-looking stones, or in dirtying one's fingers by analyzing soils, in a vain attempt to fathom the osteology or anatomy of our beloved earth, though my heart is thrillingly alive to the faintest shade of color and the infinite variety of styles in which she delights to robe her ever-changeful and ever-beautiful surface. In my unscientific mind, the formations are without form, and void; and you might as well talk Chinese to me, as to embroider your conversation with the terms "hornblende," "mica," "limestone," "slate," "granite," and "quartz" in a hopeless attempt to enlighten me as to their merits. The dutiful diligence with which I attended course after course of lectures on geology, by America's greatest illustrator of that subject, arose rather from my affectionate reverence for our beloved Dr. H., and the fascinating charm which his glorious mind throws round every subject which it condescends to illuminate, than to any interest in the dry science itself. It is therefore with a most humiliating consciousness of my geological deficiencies that I offer you the only explanation which I have been able to obtain from those most learned in such matters here. I gather from their remarks, that these bars are formed by deposits of earth rolling down from the mountains, crowding the river aside and occupying a portion of its deserted bed. If my definition is unsatisfactory, I can but refer you to some of the aforesaid works upon California.

Through the middle of Rich Bar runs the street, thickly planted with about forty tenements, among which figure round tents, square tents, plank hovels, log cabins, etc., the residences varying in elegance and convenience from the palatial splendor of "The Empire" down to a "local habitation" formed of pine boughs and covered with old calico shirts.

To-day I visited the "office," the only one on the river. I had heard so much about it from others, as well as from F., that I really did expect something extra. When I entered this imposing place the shock to my optic nerves was so great that I sank helplessly upon one of the benches, which ran, divan-like, the whole length (ten feet!) of the building, and laughed till I cried. There was, of course, no floor. A rude nondescript, in one corner, on which was ranged the medical library, consisting of half a dozen volumes, did duty as a table. The shelves, which looked like sticks snatched hastily from the woodpile, and nailed up without the least alteration, contained quite a respectable array of medicines. The white-canvas window stared everybody in the face, with the interesting information painted on it, in perfect grenadiers of capitals, that this was Dr. ——'s office.

At my loud laugh (which, it must be confessed, was noisy enough to give the whole street assurance of the presence of a woman) F. looked shocked, and his partner looked prussic acid. To him (the partner, I mean; he hadn't been out of the mines for years) the "office" was a thing sacred, and set apart for an almost admiring worship. It was a beautiful architectural ideal embodied in pine shingles and cotton cloth. Here he literally "lived, and moved, and had his being," his bed and his board. With an admiration of the fine arts truly praiseworthy, he had fondly decorated the walls thereof with sundry pictures from Godey's, Graham's, and Sartain's magazines, among which, fashion-plates with imaginary monsters sporting miraculous waists, impossible wrists, and fabulous feet, largely predominated.

During my call at the office I was introduced to one of the finders of Rich Bar,—a young Georgian,—who afterwards gave me a full description of all the facts connected with its discovery. This unfortunate had not spoken to a woman for two years, and, in the elation of his heart at the joyful event, he rushed out and invested capital in some excellent champagne, which I, on Willie's principle of "doing in Turkey as the Turkeys do," assisted the company in drinking, to the honor of my own arrival. I mention this as an instance that nothing can be done in California without the sanctifying influence of the spirit, and it generally appears in a much more "questionable shape" than that of sparkling wine. Mr. H. informed me that on the 20th of July, 1850, it was rumored at Nelson's Creek—a mining station situated at the Middle Fork of the Feather River, about eighty miles from Marysville—that one of those vague "Somebodies," a near relation of the "They-Says," had discovered mines of a remarkable richness in a northeasterly direction, and about forty miles from the first-mentioned place. Anxious and immediate search was made for "Somebody," but, as our Western brethren say, he "wasn't thar'." But his absence could not deter the miners when once the golden rumor had been set afloat. A large company packed up their goods and chattels, generally consisting of a pair of blankets, a frying-pan, some flour, salt pork, brandy, pickax and shovel, and started for the new Dorado. They "traveled, and traveled, and traveled," as we used to say in the fairy-stories, for nearly a week, in every possible direction, when, one evening, weary and discouraged, about one hundred of the party found themselves at the top of that famous hill which figures so largely in my letters, whence the river can be distinctly seen. Half of the number concluded to descend the mountain that night, the remainder stopping on the summit until the next morning. On arriving at Rich Bar, part of the adventurers camped there, but many went a few miles farther down the river. The next morning, two men turned over a large stone, beneath which they found quite a sizable piece of gold. They washed a small panful of the dirt, and obtained from it two hundred and fifty-six dollars. Encouraged by this success, they commenced staking off the legal amount of ground allowed to each person for mining purposes, and, the remainder of the party having descended the hill, before night the entire bar was "claimed." In a fortnight from that time, the two men who found the first bit of gold had each taken out six thousand dollars. Two others took out thirty-three pounds of gold in eight hours, which is the best day's work that has been done on this branch of the river. The largest amount ever taken from one panful of dirt was fifteen hundred dollars. In a little more than a week after its discovery, five hundred men had settled upon the Bar for the summer. Such is the wonderful alacrity with which a mining town is built. Soon after was discovered, on the same side of the river, about half a mile apart, and at nearly the same distance from this place, the two bars, Smith and Indian, both very rich, also another, lying across the river, just opposite Indian, called Missouri Bar. There are several more, all within a few miles of here, called Frenchman's, Taylor's, Brown's, The Junction, Wyandott, and Muggin's; but they are, at present, of little importance as mining stations.

Those who worked in these mines during the fall of 1850 were extremely fortunate, but, alas! the monte fiend ruined hundreds. Shall I tell you the fate of two of the most successful of these gold-hunters? From poor men, they found themselves, at the end of a few weeks, absolutely rich. Elated with their good fortune, seized with a mania for monte, in less than a year these unfortunates, so lately respectable and intelligent, became a pair of drunken gamblers. One of them, at this present writing, works for five dollars a day, and boards himself out of that; the other actually suffers for the necessaries of life,—a too common result of scenes in the mines.

There were but few that dared to remain in the mountains during the winter, for fear of being buried in the snow, of which, at that time, they had a most vague idea. I have been told that in these sheltered valleys it seldom falls to the depth of more than a foot, and disappears almost invariably within a day or two. Perhaps there were three hundred that concluded to stay, of which number two thirds stopped on Smith's Bar, as the labor of mining there is much easier than it is here. Contrary to the general expectation, the weather was delightful until about the middle of March. It then commenced storming, and continued to snow and rain incessantly for nearly three weeks. Supposing that the rainy season had passed, hundreds had arrived on the river during the previous month. The snow, which fell several feet in depth on the mountains, rendered the trail impassable, and entirely stopped the pack trains. Provisions soon became scarce, and the sufferings of these unhappy men were indeed extreme. Some adventurous spirits, with true Yankee hardihood, forced their way through the snow to the Frenchman's rancho, and packed flour on their backs for more than forty miles! The first meal that arrived sold for three dollars a pound. Many subsisted for days on nothing but barley, which is kept here to feed the pack-mules on. One unhappy individual, who could not obtain even a little barley for love or money, and had eaten nothing for three days, forced his way out to the Spanish Rancho, fourteen miles distant, and in less than an hour after his arrival had devoured twenty-seven biscuit and a corresponding: quantity of other eatables, and, of course, drinkables to match. Don't let this account alarm you. There is no danger of another famine here. They tell me that there is hardly a building in the place that has not food enough in it to last its occupants for the next two years; besides, there are two or three well-filled groceries in town.

Letter the Fourth

[The Pioneer, May, 1854]

ACCIDENTS—SURGERY—DEATH—FESTIVITY

SYNOPSIS

Frightful accidents to which the gold-seeker is constantly liable. Futile attempts of physician to save crushed leg of young miner. Universal outcry against amputation. Dr. C., however, uses the knife. Professional reputation at stake. Success attends the operation. Death of another young miner, who fell into mining-shaft. His funeral. Picturesque appearance of the miners thereat. Of what the miner's costume consists. Horror of the author aroused in contemplation of the lonely mountain-top graveyard. Jostling of life and death. Celebration of the anniversary of Chilian independence. Participation of a certain class of Yankees therein. The procession. A Falstaffian leader. The feast. A twenty-gallon keg of brandy on the table, gracefully encircled by quart dippers. The Chileños reel with a better grace, the Americans more naturally.

Letter the Fourth

Accidents—Surgery—Death—Festivity

Rich Bar, East Branch of the North Fork of Feather River,

September 22, 1851.

There has been quite an excitement here for the last week, on account of a successful amputation having been performed upon the person of a young man by the name of W. As I happen to know all the circumstances of the case, I will relate them to you as illustrative of the frightful accidents to which the gold-seekers are constantly liable, and I can assure you that similar ones happen very often. W. was one of the first who settled on this river, and suffered extremely from the scarcity of provisions during the last winter. By steady industry in his laborious vocation, he had accumulated about four thousand dollars. He was thinking seriously of returning to Massachusetts with what he had already gained, when, in the early part of last May, a stone, unexpectedly rolling from the top of Smith's Hill, on the side of which he was mining, crushed his leg in the most shocking manner. Naturally enough, the poor fellow shrank with horror from the idea of an amputation here in the mountains. It seemed absolutely worse than death. His physician, appreciating his feelings on the subject, made every effort to save his shattered limb, but, truly, the Fates seemed against him. An attack of typhoid fever reduced him to a state of great weakness, which was still further increased by erysipelas—a common complaint in the mountains—in its most virulent form. The latter disease, settling in the fractured leg, rendered a cure utterly hopeless. His sufferings have been of the most intense description. Through all the blossoming spring, and a summer as golden as its own golden self, of our beautiful California he has languished away existence in a miserable cabin, his only nurses men, some of them, it is true, kind and good, others neglectful and careless. A few weeks since, F. was called in to see him. He decided immediately that nothing but an amputation would save him. A universal outcry against it was raised by nearly all the other physicians on the Bar.

They agreed, en masse, that he could live but a few weeks unless the leg—now a mere lump of disease—was taken off. At the same time, they declared that he would certainly expire under the knife, and that it was cruel to subject him to any further suffering. You can perhaps imagine F.'s anxiety. It was a great responsibility for a young physician to take. Should the patient die during the operation, F.'s professional reputation would, of course, die with him; but he felt it his duty to waive all selfish considerations, and give W. that one chance, feeble as it seemed, for his life. Thank God, the result was most triumphant. For several days existence hung upon a mere thread. He was not allowed to speak or move, and was fed from a teaspoon, his only diet being milk, which we obtained from the Spanish Rancho, sending twice a week for it. I should have mentioned that F. decidedly refused to risk an operation in the small and miserable tent in which W. had languished away nearly half a year, and he was removed to the Empire the day previous to the amputation. It is almost needless to tell you that the little fortune, to accumulate which he suffered so much, is now nearly exhausted. Poor fellow! the philosophy and cheerful resignation with which he has endured his terrible martyrdom is beautiful to behold. My heart aches as I look upon his young face and think of "his gentle dark-eyed mother weeping lonely at the North" for her far-away and suffering son.

As I sat by the bedside of our poor invalid, yielding myself up to a world of dreamy visionings suggested by the musical sweep of the pine branch which I waved above his head, and the rosy sunset flushing the western casement with its soft glory, he suddenly opened his languid eyes and whispered, "The Chileño procession is returning. Do you not hear it?" I did not tell him—

had already informed me that a far other band than that of the noisy South Americans was solemnly marching by. It was the funeral train of a young man who was instantly killed, the evening before, by falling into one of those deep pits, sunk for mining purposes, which are scattered over the Bar in almost every direction. I rose quietly and looked from the window. About a dozen persons were carrying an unpainted coffin, without pall or bier (the place of the latter being supplied by ropes), up the steep hill which rises behind the Empire, on the top of which is situated the burial-ground of Rich Bar. The bearers were all neatly and cleanly dressed in their miner's costume, which, consisting of a flannel shirt (almost always of a dark-blue color), pantaloons with the boots drawn up over them, and a low-crowned broad-brimmed black felt hat (though the fashion of the latter is not invariable), is not, simple as it seems, so unpicturesque as you might perhaps imagine. A strange horror of that lonely mountain graveyard came over me as I watched the little company wending wearily up to the solitary spot. The "sweet habitude of being"—not that I fear death, but that I love life as, for instance, Charles Lamb loved it—makes me particularly affect a cheerful burial-place. I know that it is dreadfully unsentimental, but I should like to make my last home in the heart of a crowded city, or, better still, in one of those social homes of the dead, which the Turks, with a philosophy so beautiful and so poetical, make their most cheerful resort. Singularly enough, Christians seem to delight in rendering death particularly hideous, and graveyards decidedly disagreeable. I, on the contrary, would "plant the latter with laurels, and sprinkle it with lilies." I would wreathe "sleep's pale brother" so thickly with roses that even those rabid moralists who think that it makes us better to paint him as a dreadful fiend, instead of a loving friend, could see nothing but their blushing radiance. I would alter the whole paraphernalia of the coffin, the shroud, and the bier, particularly the first, which, as Dickens says, "looks like a high-shouldered ghost with its hands in its breeches-pockets." Why should we endeavor to make our entrance into a glorious immortality so unutterably ghastly? Let us glide into the "fair shadowland" through a "gate of flowers," if we may no longer, as in the majestic olden time, aspire heavenward on the wings of perfumed flame.

How oddly do life and death jostle each other in this strange world of ours! How nearly allied are smiles and tears! My eyes were yet moist from the egotistical pitié de moi-même in which I had been indulging at the thought of sleeping forever amid these lonely hills, which in a few years must return to their primeval solitude, perchance never again to be awakened by the voice of humanity, when the Chileño procession, every member of it most intensely drunk, really did appear. I never saw anything more diverting than the whole affair. Of course, selon les règles, I ought to have been shocked and horrified, to have shed salt tears, and have uttered melancholy jeremiads over their miserable degradation; but the world is so full of platitudes, my dear, that I think you will easily forgive me for not boring you with a temperance lecture, and will good-naturedly let me have my laugh, and not think me very wicked, after all.

You must know that to-day is the anniversary of the independence of Chile. The procession got up in honor of it consisted, perhaps, of twenty men, nearly a third of whom were of that class of Yankees who are particularly noisy and particularly conspicuous in all celebrations where it is each man's most onerous duty to get what is technically called "tight." The man who headed the procession was a complete comic poem in his own individual self. He was a person of Falstaffian proportions and coloring, and if a brandy-barrel ever does "come alive," and, donning a red shirt and buckskin trousers, betake itself to pedestrianism, it will look more like my hero than anything else that I can at present think of. With that affectionateness so peculiar to people when they arrive at the sentimental stage of intoxication, although it was with the greatest difficulty that he could sustain his own corporosity, he was tenderly trying to direct the zigzag footsteps of his companion, a little withered-up, weird-looking Chileño. Alas for the wickedness of human nature! The latter, whose drunkenness had taken a Byronic and misanthropical turn, rejected with the basest ingratitude these delicate attentions. Do not think that my incarnated brandy-cask was the only one of the party who did unto others as he would they should do unto him, for the entire band were officiously tendering to one another the same good-Samaritan-like assistance. I was not astonished at the Virginia-fence-like style of their marching when I heard a description of the feast of which they had partaken a few hours before. A friend of mine, who stepped into the tent where they were dining, said that the board—really, board—was arranged with a bottle of claret at each plate, and, after the cloth (metaphorically speaking, I mean, for table-linen is a mere myth in the mines) was removed, a twenty-gallon keg of brandy was placed in the center, with quart dippers gracefully encircling it, that each one might help himself as he pleased. Can you wonder, after that, that every man vied with his neighbor in illustrating Hogarth's line of beauty? It was impossible to tell which nation was the more gloriously drunk; but this I will say, even at the risk of being thought partial to my own beloved countrymen, That, though the Chileños reeled with a better grace, the Americans did it more naturally!

Letter the Fifth

[The Pioneer, June, 1854]

DEATH of a MOTHER—LIFE of PIONEER WOMEN

SYNOPSIS

Death of one of the four pioneer women of Rich Bar. The funeral from the log-cabin residence. Sickly ten-months-old baby moans piteously for its mother. A handsome girl of sick years, unconscious of her bereavement, shocks the author by her actions. A monte-table cover as a funeral pall. Painful feelings when nails are driven into coffin. The extempore prayer. Every observance possible surrounded the funeral. Visit to a canvas house of three "apartments". Barroom, dining-room, kitchen with bed-closet. A sixty-eight-pound woman. "A magnificent woman, a wife of the right sort". "Earnt her 'old man' nine hundred dollars in nine weeks, by washing". The "manglers" and the "mangled". Fortitude of refined California women pioneers. The orphaned girl a "cold-blooded little wretch". Remorse of the author. "Baby decanters". The gayety and fearlessness of the orphaned girl.

Letter the Fifth

Death of a Mother—Life of Pioneer Women

Rich Bar, East Branch of the North Fork of Feather River,

September 22, 1851.

It seems indeed awful, dear M., to be compelled to announce to you the death of one of the four women forming the female population of this Bar. I have just returned from the funeral of poor Mrs. B., who died of peritonitis (a common disease in this place), after an illness of four days only. Our hostess herself heard of her sickness but two days since. On her return from a visit which she had paid to the invalid, she told me that although Mrs. B.'s family did not seem alarmed about her, in her opinion she would survive but a few hours. Last night we were startled by the frightful news of her decease. I confess that, without being very egotistical, the death of one, out of a community of four women, might well alarm the remainder.

Her funeral took place at ten this morning. The family reside in a log cabin at the head of the Bar, and although it has no window, all the light admitted entering through an aperture where there will be a door when it becomes cold enough for such a luxury, yet I am told, and can easily believe, that it is one of the most comfortable residences in the place. I observed it particularly, for it was the first log cabin that I had ever seen. Everything in the room, though of the humblest description, was exceedingly clean and neat.

On a board, supported by two butter-tubs, was extended the body of the dead woman, covered with a sheet. By its side stood the coffin, of unstained pine, lined with white cambric. You, who have alternately laughed and scolded at my provoking and inconvenient deficiency in the power of observing, will perhaps wonder at the minuteness of my descriptions; but I know how deeply you are interested in everything relating to California, and therefore I take pains to describe things exactly as I see them, hoping that thus you will obtain an idea of life in the mines as it is.

The bereaved husband held in his arms a sickly babe ten months old, which was moaning piteously for its mother. The other child, a handsome, bold-looking little girl six years of age, was running gayly around the room, perfectly unconscious of her great bereavement. A sickening horror came over me, to see her, every few moments, run up to her dead mother and peep laughingly under the handkerchief that covered her moveless face. Poor little thing! It was evident that her baby-toilet had been made by men. She had on a new calico dress, which, having no tucks in it, trailed to the floor, and gave her a most singular and dwarf-womanly appearance.

About twenty men, with the three women of the place, had assembled at the funeral. An extempore prayer was made, filled with all the peculiarities usual to that style of petition. Ah, how different from the soothing verses of the glorious burial service of the church!

As the procession started for the hillside graveyard, a dark cloth cover, borrowed from a neighboring monte-table, was flung over the coffin. Do not think that I mention any of these circumstances in a spirit of mockery. Far from it. Every observance usual on such occasions, that was procurable, surrounded this funeral. All the gold on Rich Bar could do no more; and should I die to-morrow, I should be marshaled to my mountain-grave beneath the same monte-table-cover pall which shrouded the coffin of poor Mrs. B.

I almost forgot to tell you how painfully the feelings of the assembly were shocked by the sound of the nails (there being no screws at any of the shops) driven with a hammer into the coffin while closing it. It seemed as if it must disturb the pale sleeper within.

To-day I called at the residence of Mrs. R. It is a canvas house containing a suite of three "apartments," as Dick Swiveller would say, which, considering that they were all on the ground-floor, are kept surprisingly neat. There is a barroom blushing all over with red calico, a dining-room, kitchen, and a small bed-closet. The little sixty-eight-pounder woman is queen of the establishment. By the way, a man who walked home with us was enthusiastic in her praise. "Magnificent woman, that, sir," he said, addressing my husband; "a wife of the right sort, she is. Why," he added, absolutely rising into eloquence as he spoke, "she earnt her old man" (said individual twenty-one years of age, perhaps) "nine hundred dollars in nine weeks, clear of all expenses, by washing! Such women ain't common, I tell you. If they were, a man might marry, and make money by the operation." I looked at this person with somewhat the same kind of inverted admiration wherewith Leigh Hunt was wont to gaze upon that friend of his "who used to elevate the commonplace to a pitch of the sublime," and he looked at me as if to say, that, though by no means gloriously arrayed, I was a mere cumberer of the ground, inasmuch as I toiled not, neither did I wash. Alas! I hung my diminished head, particularly when I remembered the eight dollars a dozen which I had been in the habit of paying for the washing of linen-cambric pocket-handkerchiefs while in San Francisco. But a lucky thought came into my mind. As all men cannot be Napoleon Bonapartes, so all women cannot be manglers. The majority of the sex must be satisfied with simply being mangled. Reassured by this idea, I determined to meekly and humbly pay the amount per dozen required to enable this really worthy and agreeable little woman "to lay up her hundred dollars a week, clear of expenses." But is it not wonderful what femininity is capable of? To look at the tiny hands of Mrs. R., you would not think it possible that they could wring out anything larger than a doll's nightcap; but, as is often said, nothing is strange in California. I have known of sacrifices requiring, it would seem, superhuman efforts, made by women in this country, who, at home, were nurtured in the extreme of elegance and delicacy.

Mr. B. called on us to-day with little Mary. I tried to make her, at least, look sad as I talked about her mother; but although she had seen the grave closed over her coffin (for a friend of her father's had carried her in his arms to the burial), she seemed laughingly indifferent to her loss. Being myself an orphan, my heart contracted painfully at her careless gayety when speaking of her dead parent, and I said to our hostess, "What a cold-blooded little wretch it is!" But immediately my conscience struck me with remorse. Poor orphaned one! Poor bereaved darling! Why should I so cruelly wish to darken her young life with that knowledge which a few years' experience will so painfully teach her? "All my mother came into my eyes" as I bent down and kissed the white lids which shrouded her beautiful dark orbs, and, taking her fat little hand in mine, I led her to my room, where, in the penitence of my heart, I gave her everything that she desired. The little chatterer was enchanted, not having had any new playthings for a long while. It was beautiful to hear her pretty exclamations of ecstasy at the sight of some tiny scent-bottles, about an inch in length, which she called baby decanters.

Mr. B. intends, in a day or two, to take his children to their grandmother, who resides somewhere near Marysville, I believe. This is an awful place for children, and nervous mothers would "die daily" if they could see little Mary running fearlessly to the very edge of, and looking down into, these holes (many of them sixty feet in depth), which have been excavated in the hope of finding gold, and of course left open.

Letter the Sixth

[The Pioneer, July, 1854]

USE of PROFANITY—UNCERTAINTY of MINING

SYNOPSIS

Prevalence of profanity in California. Excuses for its use. A mere slip of the tongue, etc. Grotesqueness of some blasphemous expressions. Sleep-killing mining machinery. What a flume is. Project to flume the river for many miles. The California mining system a gambling or lottery transaction. Miner who works his own claim the more successful. Dr. C. a loser in his mining ventures. Another sleep-killer. Bowling-alleys. Bizarre cant phrases and slang used by the miners "Honest Indian?" "Talk enough when horses fight". "Talk enough between gentlemen". "I've got the dead-wood on him". "I'm going nary cent" (on person mistrusted). All carry the freshness of originality to the author's ear.

Letter the Sixth

Use of Profanity—Uncertainty of Mining

Rich Bar, East Branch of the North Fork of Feather River,

September 30, 1851.

I think that I have never spoken to you of the mournful extent to which profanity prevails in California. You know that at home it is considered vulgar for a gentleman to swear; but I am told that here it is absolutely the fashion, and that people who never uttered an oath in their lives while in the "States," now clothe themselves with curses as with a garment. Some try to excuse themselves by saying that it is a careless habit, into which they have glided imperceptibly from having been compelled to associate so long with the vulgar and the profane; that it is a mere slip of the tongue, which means absolutely nothing; etc. I am willing to believe this, and to think as charitably as possible of many persons here, who have unconsciously adopted a custom which I know they abhor. Whether there is more profanity in the mines than elsewhere, I know not; but, during the short time that I have been at Rich Bar, I have heard more of it than in all my life before. Of course the most vulgar blackguard will abstain from swearing in the presence of a lady, but in this rag-and-cardboard house one is compelled to hear the most sacred of names constantly profaned by the drinkers and gamblers, who haunt the barroom at all hours. And this is a custom which the gentlemanly and quiet proprietor, much as he evidently dislikes it, cannot possibly prevent. Some of these expressions, were they not so fearfully blasphemous, would be grotesquely sublime. For instance, not five minutes ago I heard two men quarreling in the street, and one said to the other, "Only let me get hold of your beggarly carcass once, and I will use you up so small that God Almighty himself cannot see your ghost!"

To live thus, in constant danger of being hushed to one's rosy rest by a ghastly lullaby of oaths, is revolting in the extreme. For that reason, and because it is infinitely more comfortable during the winter season than a plank house, F. has concluded to build a log cabin, where, at least, I shall not be obliged to hear the solemn names of the Father and the dear Master so mockingly profaned.

But it is not the swearing alone which disturbs my slumber. There is a dreadful flume, the machinery of which keeps up the most dismal moaning and shrieking all the livelong night, painfully suggestive of a suffering child. But, O dear! you don't know what that is, do you? Now, if I were scientific, I should give you such a vivid description of it that you would see a pen-and-ink flume staring at you from this very letter. But, alas! my own ideas on the subject are in a state of melancholy vagueness. I will do the best possible, however, in the way of explanation. A flume, then, is an immense trough which takes up a portion of the river, and with the aid of a dam compels it to run in another channel, leaving the vacated bed of the stream ready for mining purposes.

There is a gigantic project now on the tapis, of fluming the entire river for many miles, commencing a little above Rich Bar. Sometimes these fluming companies are eminently successful; at others, their operations are a dead failure.

But, in truth, the whole mining system in California is one great gambling or, better perhaps, lottery transaction. It is impossible to tell whether a claim will prove valuable or not. F. has invariably sunk money in every one that he has bought. Of course a man who works a claim himself is more likely, even should it turn out poor, to get his money back, as they say, than one who, like F., hires it done.

A few weeks since, F. paid a thousand dollars for a claim which has proved utterly worthless. He might better have thrown his money into the river than to have bought it, and yet some of the most experienced miners on the Bar thought that it would pay.

But I began to tell you about the different noises which disturb my peace of mind by day and my repose of body by night, and have gone, instead, into a financial disquisition upon mining prospects. Pray forgive me, even though I confess that I intend, some day, when I feel statistically inclined, to bore you with some profound remarks upon the claiming, drifting, sluicing, ditching, fluming, and coyoting politics of the "diggins."

But to return to my sleep-murderers. The rolling on the bowling-alley never leaves off for ten consecutive minutes at any time during the entire twenty-four hours. It is a favorite amusement at the mines, and the only difference that Sunday makes is, that then it never leaves off for one minute.

Besides the flume and the bowling-alley, there is an inconsiderate dog which will bark from starry eve till dewy morn. I fancy that he has a wager on the subject, as all the other puppies seem bitten by the betting mania.

Apropos of dogs, I found dear old Dake, the noble Newfoundland which H. gave us, look as intensely black and as grandly aristocratical as ever. He is the only high-bred dog on the river. There is another animal, by the plebeian name of John (what a name for a dog!), really a handsome creature, which looks as if he might have a faint sprinkling of good blood in his veins. Indeed, I have thought it possible that his great-grandfather was a bulldog. But he always barks at me, which I consider as proof positive that he is nothing but a low-born mongrel. To be sure, his master says, to excuse him, that he never saw a woman before; but a dog of any chivalry would have recognized the gentler sex, even if it was the first time that he had been blessed with the sight.

In the first part of my letter I alluded to the swearing propensities of the Rich Barians. Those, of course, would shock you; but, though you hate slang, I know that you could not help smiling at some of their bizarre cant phrases.

For instance, if you tell a Rich Barian anything which he doubts, instead of simply asking you if it is true, he will invariably cock his head interrogatively, and almost pathetically address you with the solemn adjuration, "Honest Indian?" Whether this phrase is a slur or a compliment to the aborigines of this country, I do not know.

Again, they will agree to a proposal with the appropriate words, "Talk enough when horses fight!" which sentence they will sometimes slightly vary to "Talk enough between gentlemen."

If they wish to borrow anything of you, they will mildly inquire if you have it "about your clothes." As an illustration: a man asked F., the other day, if he had a spare pickax about his clothes. And F. himself gravely inquired of me this evening, at the dinner-table, if I had a pickle about my clothes.

If they ask a man an embarrassing question, or in any way have placed him in an equivocal position, they will triumphantly declare that they have "got the dead-wood on him." And they are everlastingly "going nary cent" on those of whose credit they are doubtful. There are many others, which may be common enough everywhere, but as I never happened to hear them before, they have for me all the freshness of originality. You know that it has always been one of my pet rages to trace cant phrases to their origin; but most of those in vogue here would, I verily believe, puzzle Horne Tooke himself.

Letter the Seventh

[The Pioneer, August, 1854]

The NEW LOG-CABIN HOME at INDIAN BAR

SYNOPSIS

Change of residence to Indian Bar. Whether to go to the new camp on muleback over the hill, or on foot by crossing the river. The water-passage decided upon. An escort of Indian Barians. Magnificence of scenery on the way. Gold-miners at work. Their implements. "The color". The Stars and Stripes on a lofty treetop. A camp of tents and cabins. Some of calico shirts and pine boughs. Indian Bar described. Mountains shut out the sun. The "Humbolt" (spelled without the d on the sign) the only hotel in the camp. A barroom with a dancing-floor. A cook who plays the violin. A popular place. Clinking glasses and swaggering drinkers. "No place for a lady". The log-cabin residence. Its primitive and makeshift furnishings-The library. No churches, society, etc. "No vegetables but potatoes and onions, no milk, no eggs, no nothing."

Letter the Seventh

The New Log-cabin Home at Indian Bar

From our Log Cabin, Indian Bar,

October 7, 1851.

You will perchance be surprised, dear M., to receive a letter from me dated Indian instead of Rich Bar, but, as many of F.'s most intimate friends reside at this settlement, he concluded to build his log cabin here.

Solemn council was held upon the ways and means of getting "Dame Shirley" to her new home. The general opinion was, that she had better mount her fat mule and ride over the hill, as all agreed that it was very doubtful whether she would be able to cross the logs and jump the rocks which would bar her way by the water-passage. But that obstinate little personage, who has always been haunted with a passionate desire to do everything which people said she could not do, made up her willful mind immediately to go by the river. Behold, then, the "Dame" on her winding way, escorted by a deputation of Indian Barians, which had come up for that important purpose.

It is impossible, my sister, for any power of language, over which I have command, to convey to you an idea of the wild grandeur and the awful magnificence of the scenery in this vicinity. This fork of the Feather River comes down very much as the water does at Lodore, now gliding along with a liquid measure like a river in a dream, and anon bursting into a thousand glittering foam-beads over the huge rocks, which rise dark, solemn, and weird-like in its midst. The crossings are formed of logs, often moss-grown. Only think how charmingly picturesque to eyes wearied with the costly masonry or carpentry of the bridges at home! At every step gold-diggers, or their operations, greet your vision, sometimes in the form of a dam, sometimes in that of a river turned slightly from its channel to aid the indefatigable gold-hunters in their mining projects. Now, on the side of a hill, you will see a long-tom, a huge machine invented to facilitate the separation of the ore from its native element; or a man busily engaged in working a rocker, a much smaller and simpler machine used for the same object; or, more primitive still, some solitary prospector with a pan of dirt in his hands, which he is carefully washing at the water's edge to see if he can "get the color," as it is technically phrased, which means, literally, the smallest particle of gold.

As we approached Indian Bar the path led several times fearfully near deep holes, from which the laborers were gathering their yellow harvest, and Dame Shirley's small head swam dizzily as she crept shudderingly by.

The first thing which attracted my attention as my new home came in view, was the blended blue, red, and white of the American banner undulating like a many-colored snake amid the lofty verdure of the cedars which garland the brown brow of the hill behind our cabin. This flag was suspended on the Fourth of July last by a patriotic sailor, who climbed to the top of the tree to which he attached it, cutting away the branches as he descended, until it stood among its stately brethren a beautiful moss-wreathed liberty-pole, flinging to the face of heaven the glad colors of the Free.

When I attempt, dear M., to describe one of these spots to you, I regret more than ever the ill health of my childhood, which prevented my attaining any degree of excellence in sketching from nature. Had it not been for that interruption to my artistic education, I might, with a few touches of the pencil or the brush, give you the place and its surroundings. But, alas! my feeble pen will convey to you a very faint idea of its savage beauty.

This Bar is so small that it seems impossible that the tents and cabins scattered over it can amount to a dozen. There are, however, twenty in all, including those formed of calico shirts and pine boughs. With the exception of the paths leading to the different tenements, the entire level is covered with mining-holes, on the edges of which lie the immense piles of dirt and stones which have been removed from the excavations. There is a deep pit in front of our cabin, and another at the side of it, though they are not worked, as, when "prospected," they did not "yield the color."

Not a spot of verdure is to be seen on this place, but the glorious hills rising on every side, vested in foliage of living green, make ample amends for the sterility of the tiny level upon which we camp. The surrounding scenery is infinitely more charming than that of Rich Bar. The river, in hue of a vivid emerald, as if it reflected the hue of the fir-trees above, bordered with a band of dark red, caused by the streams flowing into it from the different sluices, ditches, long-toms, etc., which meander from the hill just back of the Bar, wanders musically along. Across the river, and in front of us, rises nearly perpendicularly a group of mountains, the summits of which are broken into many beautifully cut conical and pyramidal peaks. At the foot and left of these eminences, and a little below our Bar, lies Missouri Bar, which is reached from this spot by a log bridge. Around the latter the river curves in the shape of a crescent, and, singularly enough, the mountain rising behind this bend in the stream outlines itself against the lustrous heaven in a shape as exact and perfect as the moon herself in her first quarter. Within one horn of this crescent the water is a mass of foam-sparkles, and it plays upon the rocks which line its bed an everlasting dirge suggestive of the "grand forever" of the ocean.

At present the sun does not condescend to shine upon Indian Bar at all, and the old settlers tell me that he will not smile upon us for the next three months, but he nestles lovingly in patches of golden glory all along the brows of the different hills around us, and now and then stoops to kiss the topmost wave on the opposite shore of the Río de las Plumas.

The first artificial elegance which attracts your vision is a large rag shanty, roofed, however, with a rude kind of shingles, over the entrance of which is painted, in red capitals, ("to what base uses do we come at last,") the name of the great Humboldt spelt without the d. This is the only hotel in this vicinity, and as there is a really excellent bowling-alley attached to it, and the barroom has a floor upon which the miners can dance, and, above all, a cook who can play the violin, it is very popular. But the clinking of glasses, and the swaggering air of some of the drinkers, remind us that it is no place for a lady, so we will pass through the dining-room, and, emerging at the kitchen, in a step or two reach our log cabin. Enter, my dear; you are perfectly welcome. Besides, we could not keep you out if we would, as there is not even a latch on the canvas door, though we really intend, in a day or two, to have a hook put onto it.

The room into which we have just entered is about twenty feet square. It is lined over the top with white cotton cloth, the breadths of which, being sewed together only in spots, stretch gracefully apart in many places, giving one a bird's-eye view of the shingles above. The sides are hung with a gaudy chintz, which I consider a perfect marvel of calico-printing. The artist seems to have exhausted himself on roses. From the largest cabbage down to the tiniest Burgundy, he has arranged them in every possible variety of wreath, garland, bouquet, and single flower. They are of all stages of growth, from earliest budhood up to the ravishing beauty of the "last rose of summer." Nor has he confined himself to the colors usually worn by this lovely plant, but, with the daring of a great genius soaring above nature, worshiping the ideal rather than the real, he has painted them brown, purple, green, black, and blue. It would need a floral catalogue to give you the names of all the varieties which bloom upon the calico, but, judging by the shapes, which really are much like the originals, I can swear to moss-roses, Burgundies, York and Lancaster, tea-roses, and multifloras.

A curtain of the above-described chintz (I shall hem it at the first opportunity) divides off a portion of the room, behind which stands a bedstead that in ponderosity leaves the Empire couches far behind. But before I attempt the furniture let me finish describing the cabin itself.

The fireplace is built of stones and mud, the chimney finished off with alternate layers of rough sticks and this same rude mortar. Contrary to the usual custom, it is built inside, as it was thought that arrangement would make the room more comfortable, and you may imagine the queer appearance of this unfinished pile of stones, mud, and sticks. The mantelpiece (remember that on this portion of a great building some artists, by their exquisite workmanship, have become world-renowned) is formed of a beam of wood covered with strips of tin procured from cans, upon which still remain, in black hieroglyphics, the names of the different eatables which they formerly contained. Two smooth stones (how delightfully primitive!) do duty as fire-dogs. I suppose that it would be no more than civil to call a hole two feet square, in one side of the room, a window, although it is as yet guiltless of glass. F. tried to coax the proprietor of the Empire to let him have a window from that pine-and-canvas palace, but he, of course, declined, as to part with it would really inconvenience himself. So F. has sent to Marysville for some glass, though it is the general opinion that the snow will render the trail impassible for mules before we can get it. In this case we shall tack up a piece of cotton cloth, and should it chance at any time to be very cold, hang a blanket before the opening. At present the weather is so mild that it is pleasanter as it is, though we have a fire in the mornings and evenings, more, however, for luxury than because we really need it. For my part, I almost hope that we shall not be able to get any glass, for you will perhaps remember that it was a pet habit of mine, in my own room, to sit by a great fire, in the depth of winter, with my window open.

One of our friends had nailed up an immense quantity of unhemmed cotton cloth—very coarse—in front of this opening, and as he evidently prided himself upon the elegant style in which he had arranged the drapery, it went to my heart to take it down and suspend in its place some pretty blue linen curtains which I had brought from the valley. My toilet-table is formed of a trunk elevated upon two claret-cases, and by draping it with some more of the blue linen neatly fringed, it really will look quite handsome, and when I have placed upon it my rosewood workbox, a large cushion of crimson brocade, some Chinese ornaments of exquisitely carved ivory, and two or three Bohemian-glass cologne-stands, it would not disgrace a lady's chamber at home.

The looking-glass is one of those which come in paper cases for dolls' houses. How different from the full-length psyches so almost indispensable to a dressing-room in the States!

The wash-stand is another trunk, covered with a towel, upon which you will see, for bowl, a large vegetable-dish, for ewer, a common-sized dining-pitcher. Near this, upon a small cask, is placed a pail, which is daily filled with water from the river. I brought with me from Marysville a handsome carpet, a hair mattress, pillows, a profusion of bed-linen, quilts, blankets, towels, etc., so that, in spite of the oddity of most of my furniture, I am, in reality, as thoroughly comfortable here as I could be in the most elegant palace.

We have four chairs, which were brought from the Empire. I seriously proposed having three-legged stools. With my usual desire for symmetry, I thought that they would be more in keeping; but as I was told that it would be a great deal of trouble to get them made, I was fain to put up with mere chairs. So you see that even in the land of gold itself one cannot have everything that she desires. An ingenious individual in the neighborhood, blessed with a large bump for mechanics, and good nature, made me a sort of wide bench, which, covered with a neat plaid, looks quite sofa-like. A little pine table, with oilcloth tacked over the top of it, stands in one corner of the room, upon which are arranged the chess and cribbage boards. There is a larger one for dining purposes, and as unpainted pine has always a most dreary look, F. went everywhere in search of oilcloth for it, but there was none at any of the bars. At last, "Ned," the Humboldt Paganini, remembered two old monte-table covers which had been thrown aside as useless. I received them thankfully, and, with my planning and Ned's mechanical genius, we patched up quite a respectable covering. To be sure, the ragged condition of the primitive material compelled us to have at one end an extra border, but that only agreeably relieved the monotony. I must mention that the floor is so uneven that no article of furniture gifted with four legs pretends to stand upon but three at once, so that the chairs, tables, etc., remind you constantly of a dog with a sore foot.

At each end of the mantelpiece is arranged a candlestick, not, much to my regret, a block of wood with a hole in the center of it, but a real britanniaware candlestick. The space between is gayly ornamented with F.'s meerschaum, several styles of clay pipes, cigars, cigarritos, and every procurable variety of tobacco, for, you know, the aforesaid individual is a perfect devotee of the Indian weed. If I should give you a month of Sundays, you would never guess what we use in lieu of a bookcase, so I will put you out of your misery by informing you instantly that it is nothing more nor less than a candle-box which contains the library, consisting of a Bible and prayer-book, Shakespeare, Spenser, Coleridge, Shelley, Keats, Lowell's Fable for Critics, Walton's Complete Angler, and some Spanish books,—spiritual instead of material lights, you see.

There, my dainty Lady Molly, I have given you, I fear, a wearisomely minute description of my new home. How would you like to winter in such an abode? in a place where there are no newspapers, no churches, lectures, concerts, or theaters; no fresh books; no shopping, calling, nor gossiping little tea-drinkings; no parties, no balls, no picnics, no tableaus, no charades, no latest fashions, no daily mail (we have an express once a month), no promenades, no rides or drives; no vegetables but potatoes and onions, no milk, no eggs, no nothing? Now, I expect to be very happy here. This strange, odd life fascinates me. As for churches, "the groves were God's first temples," "and for the strength of the hills, the Swiss mountains bless him"; and as to books, I read Shakespeare, David, Spenser, Paul, Coleridge, Burns, and Shelley, which are never old. In good sooth, I fancy that nature intended me for an Arab or some other nomadic barbarian, and by mistake my soul got packed up in a Christianized set of bones and muscles. How I shall ever be able to content myself to live in a decent, proper, well-behaved house, where toilet-tables are toilet-tables, and not an ingenious combination of trunk and claret-cases, where lanterns are not broken bottles, bookcases not candle-boxes, and trunks not wash-stands, but every article of furniture, instead of being a makeshift, is its own useful and elegantly finished self, I am sure I do not know. However, when too much appalled at the humdrummish prospect, I console myself with the beautiful promises, that "sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof," and "as thy days, so shall thy strength be," and trust that when it is again my lot to live amid the refinements and luxuries of civilization, I shall endure them with becoming philosophy and fortitude.

Letter the Eighth

[The Pioneer, September, 1854]

LIFE and CHARACTERS at INDIAN BAR

SYNOPSIS

Ned, the mulatto cook and the Paganini of the Humboldt Hotel. A naval character. His ecstasy upon hearing of the coming of the author to the Bar. Suggestion of a strait-jacket for him. "The only petticoated astonishment on this Bar". First dinner at the log cabin. Ned's pretentious setting of the pine dining-table. The Bar ransacked for viands. The bill of fare. Ned an accomplished violinist. "Chock," his white accompanist. The author serenaded. An unappreciated "artistic" gift. A guide of the Frémont expedition camps at Indian Bar. A linguist, and former chief of the Crow Indians. Cold-blooded recitals of Indian fights. Indians near the Bar expected to make a murderous attack upon the miners. The guide's council with them. Flowery reply of the Indians. A studious Quaker. His merciless frankness and regard for truth. "The Squire," and how he was elected justice of the peace. Miners prefer to rule themselves.

Letter the Eighth

Life and Characters at Indian Bar

From our Log Cabin, Indian Bar,

October 20, 1851.

Having seen me, dear M., safely enthroned in my beautiful log palace with its outer walls all tapestried with moss, perhaps you would like a description of the coronation-dinner!

You must know that "Ned," the Paganini of the Humboldt, (who, by the way, is almost an historic, or, better perhaps, naval, character, inasmuch as he was cook on board of the Somers when her captain performed his little tragedy, to the horror of an entire nation,) had been in such a state of ecstasy ever since he had heard of the promised advent of Mrs. ——, that his proprietors, as Ned grandly calls them, had serious fears of being compelled to strait-jacket him.

"You see, sir," said Ned, "when the queen" (with Ned, as with the rest of the world, "a substitute shines brightly as a queen until a queen be by,"—and I am the only petticoated astonishment on this Bar) "arrives, she will appreciate my culinary efforts. It is really discouraging, sir, after I have exhausted my skill in preparing a dish, to see the gentlemen devour it with as much unconcern as though it had been cooked by a mere bungler in our art"!

When we entered our new home, we found the cloth—it was a piece left of that which lined the room overhead—already laid. As it was unhemmed and somewhat tattered at the ends, an imaginative mind might fancy it fringed on purpose, though, like the poor little Marchioness with her orange-peel and water, one would have to make believe very hard. Unfortunately, it was not wide enough for the table, and a dashing border of white pine banded each side of it. Ned had invested an unknown quantity of gold-dust in a yard of diaper,—awfully coarse,—which, divided into four pieces, and fringed to match the tablecloth, he had placed napkin-wise in the tumblers. He had evidently ransacked the whole bar to get viands wherewith to decorate the various dishes, which were as follows.

First Course

OYSTER SOUP

Second Course

FRIED SALMON CAUGHT FROM THE RIVER

Third Course

ROAST BEEF & BOILED HAM

Fourth Course

FRIED OYSTERS

Vegetables

POTATOES & ONIONS

Pastry

MINCE PIE, & PUDDING MADE WITHOUT EGGS OR MILK

Dessert

MADEIRA NUTS & RAISINS

Wines

CLARET & CHAMPAGNE

Coffee

I found that Ned had not overrated his powers. The dinner, when one considers the materials of which it was composed, was really excellent. The soup was truly a great work of art; the fried oysters dreamily delicious; and as to the coffee, Ned must have got the receipt for making it from the very angel who gave the beverage to Mahomet to restore that individual's decayed moisture.

Ned himself waited, dressed in a brand-new flannel shirt and calico ditto, his hair—he is a light mulatto—frizzled to the most intense degree of corkscrewity, and a benign and self-satisfied smile irradiating his face, such as should illumine the features of a great artist when he knows that he has achieved something, the memory of which the world will not willingly let die. In truth, he needed but white kid gloves to have been worthy of standing behind the chair of Count d'Orsay himself. So grand was his air, so ceremonious his every motion, that we forgot we were living in the heart of the Sierra Nevada; forgot that our home was a log cabin of mere primitive rudeness; forgot that we were sitting at a rough pine table covered with a ragged piece of four-cent cotton cloth, eating soup with iron spoons!

I wish, my funny little Molly, that you could have been here clairvoyantly. It was one of those scenes, just touched with that fine and almost imperceptible perfume of the ludicrous, in which you especially delight. There are a thousand minute shreds of the absurd which my duller sense overlooks, but which never can hope to escape your mirth-loving vision.

Ned really plays beautifully on the violin. There is a white man, by the name of "Chock," who generally accompanies him. Of course, true daughter of Eve that you are, you will wish to know "right off" what Chock's other name is. Young woman, I am ashamed of you! Who ever asks for the other name of Alexander, of Hannibal, of Homer? Suffice it that he is Chock by himself,—Chock, and assistant violinist to Paganini Vattal Ned.

Ned and one of his musical cronies—a white man—gave me a serenade the other evening. As it was quite cold, F. made them come inside the cabin. It was the richest thing possible, to see the patronizing and yet serene manner with which Ned directed his companion what marches, preludes, etc., to play for the amusement of that profound culinary and musical critic, Dame Shirley.

It must be confessed that Ned's love of the beautiful is not quite so correct as his taste in cooking and violin-playing. This morning a gentle knock at my door was followed by that polite person, bearing in triumph a small waiter, purloined from the Humboldt, on which stood in state, festooned with tumblers, a gaudy pitcher, which would have thrown Tearsoul and Lelie into ecstasies of delight. It was almost as wonderful a specimen of art as my chintz hanging. The groundwork is pure white, upon which, in bas-relief, are executed two diabolical-looking bandits, appallingly bewhiskered and mustached, dressed in red coats, yellow pantaloons, green boots, orange-colored caps with brown feathers in them, and sky-blue bows and arrows. Each of the fascinating vagabonds is attended by a bird-of-paradise-colored dog, with a crimson tail waggingly depicted. They are embowered beneath a morning-glory vine, evidently a species of the Convolvulus unknown in America, as each one of its pink leaves, springing from purple stems, is three times the size of the bandit's head.

Ned could not have admired it more if it had been a jar of richest porcelain or a rare Etruscan vase, and when I gently suggested that it was a pity to rob the barroom of so elegant an ornament, he answered, "Miners can't appreciate a handsome pitcher, any more than they can good cooking, and Mrs. —— will please to keep it."

Alas! I would infinitely have preferred the humblest brown jug, for that really has a certain beauty of its own, and, besides, it would have been in keeping with my cabin. However, that good creature looked upon the miraculous vegetable, the fabulous quadrupeds, and the impossible bipeds, with so much pride that I had not the heart to tell him that the pitcher was a fright, but, graciously accepting it, I hid it out of sight as quickly as possible, on the trunk wash-stand behind the curtain.

We breakfast at nine and dine at six, with a dish of soup at noon for luncheon. Do not think we fare as sumptuously every day as we did at the coronation-dinner. By no means; and it is said that there will probably be many weeks, during the season, when we shall have neither onions, potatoes, nor fresh meat. It is feared that the former will not keep through the whole winter, and the rancheros cannot at all times drive in cattle for butchering, on account of the expected snow.

Ned is not the only distinguished person residing on this Bar. There is a man camping here who was one of Colonel Frémont's guides during his travels through California. He is fifty years of age perhaps, and speaks several languages to perfection. As he has been a wanderer for many years, and for a long time was the principal chief of the Crow Indians, his adventures are extremely interesting. He chills the blood of the green young miners, who, unacquainted with the arts of war and subjugation, congregate around him by the cold-blooded manner in which he relates the Indian fights that he has been engaged in.