"Si, señor, I have heard so," replied the doctor, who had studied a little Spanish, and was, like all the rest of us, fond of letting it off on every occasion.
"And do you know who I am?"
"Si, señor."
"Don't you say see senior to me," returned his amphibiousantagonist, with drunken deliberation, and shaking his fist portentously at every syllable; "I know what see senior means as well as you do—it means darn your eyes."
While this was passing, a fierce dispute arose among the crowd on the other side, when one of the combatants seizing a small crowbar, dealt his enemy such a blow on the seat of honour as fairly knocked him into the creek, then jumping in after him, they instantly grappled with deadliest animosity, each striving to force the other's head under water, until they were with difficulty separated by the more sober among the spectators. This did not end the disturbance, however; knives were drawn, and matters began to assume a decidedly bloody aspect, when a miner named Graham, a man of unusual energy, seized an empty musket and threatened incontinently to shoot the first man who should renew the contest. This was an argument that all could understand; the ferment gradually abated, and something like the peace and quiet of a New England Sabbath was at length restored.
By far the greater part of the miners regarded these scenes with abhorrence; and to prevent their recurrence as far as possible, and wipe off from Ford's Bar the reputation of being the worst place on the river, they appointed a meeting to be held the next day for enacting certain laws, and choosing officers to see that they were executed.
About fifty miners assembled at the time appointed, and after a long discussion, arising from the folly of some who thought everything must be done in the same formal and cumbrous manner in which parliamentary proceedings are conducted, in more civilized communities, a few simple laws were agreed upon, Graham chosen Alcalde, and a bulky Missourian sheriff of Ford's Bar and the adjacent diggings.
The very next day an opportunity occurred of testing the new regime. The Tinker was again the hero of the play. Having swum the river, at this place comparatively smooth, he entered the store entirely naked; and after calling upon usto view his fine proportions, and touching briefly but with infinite power of expression upon his only sister, then residing in the elegant neighbourhood of the Five Points, he slung four bottles of brandy round his neck, and again committed himself to the rapid current. He would undoubtedly have reached the other side with little difficulty, even though encumbered with his precious freight; but having imprudently ventured to make a display of his amphibious powers, he was drawn into an eddy, and compelled to abandon his brandy to save the only thing he held more dear—his life.
Our hero, or rather our Leander, having thus, like hook-nosed Cæsar landing on the shores of Britain, reached the farther bank and escaped the dangers of the deep, was compelled to do battle with a yet more cruel foe. Thickset, bull-headed, exasperated by the loss of that liquor in which he was a partner, the burly giant rushed upon The Tinker, who received him nothing loath, and then ensued a combat such as was often witnessed in the classic games of Rome, but is seldom seen in these degenerate days. The contest was fierce and obstinate—long time in even scale the battle hung, but when the dust cleared away from the field of view, our reporter, intently watching the progress of the fray through his levelled glass, announced that The Tinker was victorious.
Sitting astride on the body of his prostrate foe, like Mr. Dhu on poor Fitz Jamie, or Warburton on his astonished crocodile, a junk bottle—fit instrument for such a deed—already gleamed high in air, and the next moment, as next moments always are, would have been too late, if Thickset had not suddenly drawn a knife from his right boot, and by sundry cuts and thrusts diverted the deadly blow.
Now drawing a knife upon any one was one of the offences included in our criminal statutes; but the sage legislators of Ford's Bar no more thought of including a bottle in their list of prohibited weapons than king Kehama, though possessed of superhuman wisdom, thought of charming his son'slife against a stake. The Tinker therefore escaped, while his antagonist having been brought into court by the sheriff, and tried before Justice Graham, assisted by a jury of three members, was fined twelve dollars and ordered to leave the bar within twenty-four hours under penalty of a sound flogging. Accordingly, early the next morning he was seen ascending the mountain, and was shot several months after in a quarrel somewhere below Mormon Island.
This instance of prompt severity exerted a very salutary influence; though little disputes were constantly arising, the services of the judge were not again called into exercise, at least in criminal cases, through the whole summer, and Ford's Bar became tolerably quiet.
Men, to be sure, still continued to get drunk. There was no attempt that I ever heard of to introduce the Maine Law into the mines, and the only restraint imposed upon their excesses was an empty purse and failing credit, or a feeble resolution of our Nantucketer to sell no more liquor to a man who was already too tipsy to stand without leaning against the counter.
The high moral Scotchman before mentioned and one or two others were seldom seen when they were not, to say the least, somewhat elevated. They had long before reached that stage when a man can hardly be said to be himself except when animated by liquor. Deprive them of that, they were dull lifeless machines, like a run-down clock, and needed every few hours to be wound up afresh. Pour into them a little brandy and the effect was electrical—the hidden springs and wheels began to move, and soon the whole complex apparatus was in active operation. Then, what flashes of wit and humour! what eloquent harangues! what high-toned moral sentiments! Alas! what hypocrisy, what inconsistency is like that of strong drink! how high in profession, how less than nothing in practice!
Then, no matter what subject might be started, our friendPop or Poppycoc was ready at a moment's warning to mount a box or barrel, and declaim for the hour together in any style that should be required, pathetic, didactic, historical, or argumentative. The last, however, especially suited his humour. In his mouth the expression, That's all poppycoc, from which he obtained his name, and which he had borrowed from some scenes in The Mysteries of Paris, possessed an almost magic significance. It was a mortal stab, a downright crushing blow that could neither be parried nor evaded. No matter how wisely his opponent argued, nor how good the cause, the inevitable "That's all poppycoc," broke through all his defences, and compelled him to an ignominious retreat. It was the bar of iron forty feet long on the shoulders of the dwarf, and equally confounded all degrees.
The same week on which these events occurred, our society received a most agreeable accession in the person of a little German doctor with whom we had become partially acquainted at Mormon Island.
Dr. Tabisch was a short squat figure, with a low wrinkly forehead, unusually wide, especially at the eyebrows, small piercing gray eyes, and a very large, long, and pointed nose, wearing its spectacles, for they plainly had nothing to do with the eyes, way down at its lower extremity. His mouth was also large, something between Washington's and Henry Clay's, or the blind man's that stands near the Old Brick, with long thick lips, that yet met when they were at rest, which to be sure was not very often, in a firm straight line. He wore in all weathers a long brown surtout secured under his chin with a single button; and being prevented by age and infirmity from mining, he went stumping about the country, visiting his neighbours, indulging his natural taste for botany, and making regularly, as often as once a month, what he called wonderful discoveries about the gold.
His voice was his most remarkable peculiarity, and would have made the fortune of half a dozen singing masters orventriloquists. It began way down in his chest, and came rolling and rumbling, then shrieking, up his throat like an echo behind mountains or a locomotive coming from under a covered bridge. He uttered his first words in a smothered German guttural, and gradually raised his voice to a sharp falsetto; and if the sentence were longer than common, he went through the same process the second time. He had a habit, while speaking, of shaking his head in a very impressive manner, and bending his face towards the ground, while his sharp grey eye—it seemed at such times as if he had only one—glared terribly from under its ambush eyebrows, and his forefinger, as if to give greater certainty to his aim, vibrated slowly from the end of his own nose to that of his fascinated victim.
Such flexibility of voice could not exist without equal mobility of feature. His mouth worked incessantly, whether he were talking or not; sometimes he champed the ends of his iron-grey moustache, at others gnawed his nether lip, or protruded both as if he were about to whistle Old Hundred, or were trying to drink cider out of an imaginary bung-hole without the aid of a straw.
Add to this his strong German accent, the odd way in which he prolonged many of his vowels, those especially belonging to his bass notes, and the simple child-like vivacity he displayed on every occasion, and we had one of the funniest, most agreeable little old gentlemen I ever met with.
He had been a great traveller—had seen much of the world—and his stories were none the less interesting for being delivered in such outlandish phrase. According to his own account he had been in the allied army in 1813, and consequently entertained the most profound aversion towards Napoleon whom he allowed to possess no other merit than that of a great legislator.
"Napoleon," said he, in his most characteristic manner, "wasmean—disagreeable—nothandsome: he made the monksof St. Bernard furnish piecebread—piececheese—glasswine—to sixty-seven thousand men, andthen!only paid them forty thousand francs."
In this sentence the words in italics were thrown up with a sort of jerking emphasis, in the highest falsetto; while the rest, especially the forty thousand francs, was ground slowly out in most scornful gutturals.
Like most of his countrymen, he was jealous, and extremely irritable—had no relish of a jest—and was furthermore opinionative and dogmatical to the last degree; so that to continue long on good terms with him required no little caution and subserviency.
He remained but a short time at Ford's Bar, for, finding the air of the place unfavourable to his rheumatic affections, he was obliged to return to Mormon Island, leaving his son, who had hitherto accompanied him, still mining on the Middle Fork. "Well, doctor, and how much have you made?" cried Col. Oldbuck one day soon after his return.
"Five hundred dollar," returned the sturdy Knickerbocker, in his gruffest tones, and not deigning to turn his eyes on his inquisitor, who, stepping out the next moment, the doctor exclaimed, "Impudent fellaar! I did tell him lie—ask how much I made!—I would tell any man lie."
Sunday, the 9th of June, I attended church for the first and last time in California. The services were held in the open air, under the shadow of a huge pine, a short way up the creek. The congregation were seated on a pine-log, and the preacher, a strapping hirsute individual, who went by the name of Old Grizzly, stood at one end, and thus poured his eloquence into our left ear.
It was impossible not to feel the influences of the occasion. The listening mountains, older than the pyramids—the laughing brook, their twin-sister, yet so suggestive of eternal youth—the clouds that swept over the valley, and the breeze thathad haunted there since creation—all disposed the soul to the most devout and lofty contemplations.
The next day we were invited to attend a funeral. Poor Van Scheick, a miner who had been suffering several weeks under two dreadful diseases, scurvy and dysentery, in more dreadful combination, had at length given up the unequal contest. He was buried high up on the hillside, that his grave might never be desecrated by the unrelenting hands of toiling avarice. No useless coffin enclosed his breast; and there, in more than regal solitude, with none to elbow him for room or grudge him his scanty six feet of earth, he laid him down to his last sleep.
There is something very affecting in this utter isolation from one's kind even in death. On our frequent visits to Georgetown we had often noticed, in a secluded spot a little way from the road, two graves side by side, with rude head-boards containing the names and residence of the deceased. I was more affected by this simple emblem of mortality than by the costliest monuments of populous graveyards. There death has become, as it were, common; it is the rule, and not the exception—it ceases to be a distinction, and no longer affects the imagination. But, in a new country, death comes to us with something of the freshness of novelty. We are not yet familiar with its aspect. We thought, perhaps, that we had left it behind—had escaped beyond its jurisdiction. Indeed, it always seemed to me strange and unaccountable that men should die in California—they came there for so short a time, and for so different a purpose; unless it should be thought they had gone twenty thousand miles simply for that!
Early in June we at length obtained possession of one fourth of a submarine armour. We paid for it three hundred and twenty-five dollars, or nearly one half our little capital; but such was my own confidence in the success of our schemes that I parted with the money that had cost us so much labour without the least reluctance. St. John was less sanguine, andI saw him turning it over in his palm with an expression of profound solicitude, as if debating the question whether a fish in hand were not worth two in the water. However, he soon decided, and clutching the purse in his fist walked rapidly down the Bar. When he returned, the purse was empty and the share was ours. The remaining shares were held by men at Big Bar, eight miles farther up the river; but, for the first scene of their operations, they had selected a spot about three miles from Ford's, and reported to be one of the richest on the Middle Fork.
The distance from our camp, trifling as it may seem, was rendered truly formidable by the nature of the path which wound along the edge of the river, sometimes dipping beneath the surface and at others rising high on the shelvy face of the mountain, or over rocks where a single false step would precipitate the unwary traveller a hundred feet down into the boiling current. At one place, called Jacob's Ladder, a flight of gigantic steps brought the giddy climber to a narrow projection resembling a pulpit, though in height a very steeple, over whose tottering verge, if he had nerve enough to make the trial, he could see the sunken rocks and whirling eddies directly at its base.
One dark and stormy night, soon after our friend Dr. B. arrived on the Bar, he was called by a stranger to go two miles up the river to visit a man supposed to be dying. Fortunately, he had never been over the path before, or his presence of mind would certainly have failed him; but, on returning the same way the next morning, he could hardly credit his senses on seeing by daylight the dangers through which he had passed, in the pitchy darkness of night and rain, with no other assistance than the pressure of the hand or hurried warning of his guide.
As these difficulties in effect greatly increased the distance, and would render it impossible for the one who assisted in working the armour to return oftener than once a week, andas he would in consequence be exposed to many hardships and privations from which our more civilized life was comparatively exempt, it became a question of considerable importance on which of us the lot should fall. The difficulty was removed, however, by St. John's magnanimously offering himself for this enterprise, which not only far exceeded our apprehensions, but proved to be the most stirring episode in the whole course of our adventures.
In giving an account of his experience, I shall still continue to make use of the third person, partly for convenience, and partly from a foolish fondness I have always had for that individual.
What have we here? a man or a fish? dead or alive? A fish;—he smells like a fish; a very ancient and fishlike smell; a kind of, not of the newest, Poor John. A strange fish!
What have we here? a man or a fish? dead or alive? A fish;—he smells like a fish; a very ancient and fishlike smell; a kind of, not of the newest, Poor John. A strange fish!
One glowing summer's day, in the pleasant month of June, two travellers might have been seen slowly winding along the narrow path that led from Ford's Bar, on the Middle Fork of the American River, to Big Bar, eight miles above. It needed but a glance at the arms and equipment of the first, to see that he was a knight of distinguished rank, who was now, doubtless, wandering over the world in search of adventures. The light cap that he wore on the back of his head, showed crisp-curling black hair, sparkling eyes, united with a rather thoughtful and grave expression, as of one equally skilled in counsel and in fight. His helmet, which he carried slung over his left shoulder, was of very unusual dimensions, and apparently made of burnished copper, that fairly dazzled the eyes of the beholder as it glinted back the rays of the morning sun.
If any one, however, had taken the trouble to peep into this resplendent headpiece, he would have seen enough to satisfy him that this exalted personage was now bent on some peaceful mission, and had not the most remote fears of any encounter. Potatoes and onions, with a great piece of ancient Dutch cheese, a goodly lump of salt pork, and a great variety of smaller articles, all of the like harmless and soft-hearted temper, reposed quietly in its warm belly, as the lion, in earlydays, dandled the kid. The squire, who, according to the custom of the time, walked a few paces in the rear, carried, with no little difficulty, the remainder of his master's armour. It consisted of a puzzling pair of large brass tubes, somewhat in shape resembling an opera-glass; but the experienced observer had no difficulty in determining at once their dangerous and destructive nature. They were the invention of a very profound philosopher, who proposed to destroy his enemies without the effusion of blood, by cunningly sucking the breath out of their body. The squire carried this cumbrous implement of destruction astride on his shoulders, and in his right hand grasped a weapon more suited to his degree, and of the same description as was erewhile employed by that distinguished jester, the Saxon Wamba, in his renowned combat with Isaac the Jew.
A stout pair of blankets, strapped firmly to his back, completed the squire's equipment, and showed that he was ready at any time, if need were, to bivouac in the open air.
The sun had sunk behind the western hills—the broad shadow had slid across the river and crept noiselessly up the steep face of the mountain on their right; but still our travellers toiled on, now dipping their dusty, burning feet in the cooling flood, now balancing cautiously along the narrow path, where a single false step would have been destruction, and where one resolute man could have held the pass against a thousand foes. The stars were already appearing in the darkened sky, when they at last halted beneath a sombre pine that had thrust its roots deep in among the rocks.
The place seemed well chosen to guard against attack; on one side was the river shutting off all approach in that direction; behind them was a rugged mountain which no one in his senses would think of descending; and on either hand the narrow path rendered all access almost equally difficult. The knight disencumbered himself of his helmet, and laid it, with due regard to its precious contents, carefully in a hollow besidehim; the squire did the same with his breath-compelling weapon, and after a frugal supper of bread and cheese they stretched themselves on the smoothest part of the rock, and were soon fast asleep.
All this might have been seen, dear reader, and that too without any greater stress of imagination than is usually demanded on similar occasions; though strict veracity, that veracity that forms so pleasing and fundamental a part of the character of bully Bottom, may require a little explanation.
In good sooth then, our knight was no knight at all, but simple Ethan Allen, not of revolutionary memory, but one of his numerous descendants, degenerated from that rantipole, thundering, Ticonderoga hero into a soft-tongued, smooth-faced varlet, who hated the British by hereditary right, and still swore by the Continental Congress. I had the honour of being his humble companion, and the deadly mischief on my aching shoulders was neither more nor less than the ponderous air-pumps that were to furnish a substitute for gills in our proposed aquatic incursions.
Having given this brief word of caution, we will continue our narrative in the more sober style befitting a grave and discreet chronicler. We had expected to find the rest of our companions awaiting us at the appointed place of meeting; but they did not make their appearance till the next morning, when we at once set about making the necessary preparations for putting the machine in operation.
From one to two hundred pounds of shot were required to overcome the buoyancy of the armour; and as this could not be obtained nearer than Coloma, Allen started alone on this errand, leaving to the rest of us the work of constructing a raft. Incredible as it may seem, the preliminary operations necessary to this simple undertaking occupied us a whole week; the only trees fit for the purpose grew high up on the mountain, and when we had at last succeeded in felling them, the still more arduous task remained of getting them safelydown to the river's brink. The easiest and most natural method was to set them in motion by crowbars and long levers, when their own momentum would without any further trouble on our part carry them crashing down the steep; but besides the danger of losing them altogether by their plunging into the river, their ungovernable rage and impetuosity would, in case of their striking any sufficient obstacle, dash them into a hundred pieces. We were accordingly compelled to proceed with the utmost caution, and let them down gradually by a rope passed once or twice round a tree, in the same way that whalemen check the fierce flight oftheirvictim in his frenzied efforts to escape.
This being at length accomplished, we proceeded to throw them into the river, when one after another, as fast as they reached the water, sunk like a stone beneath the surface, and settling cosily side by side at the bottom, left us staring at each other with a ludicrous mixture of amazement and indignation. Greater amaze could hardly have seized the followers of the pious Eneas when their ships threatened with hostile flames plunged goddesses of the sea beneath the waves. There was no time to be lost, however, in useless lamentation; and finding by this decisive experiment that live timber knew too much to swim, we immediately commenced a search for some drier and more stupid material. Some distance above our claim we found lodged among the jagged rocks where it had been left by some previous freshet, a mighty pine bleached as dry and white as the thigh bone of some antediluvian monster. Its spongy elastic fibre long set at defiance our united efforts, but having at last cut it into logs of a convenient length, we rolled them into the water, and guided them down the river by long ropes, the rapidity of the current rendering the task as difficult as the steepness of the hill had done before, and often threatening to wrest the log entirely from our control.
It was usual for the miners to rest several hours during theheat of the day; but though our work was far more laborious, our impatience to finish this undertaking hardly permitted us to relax our efforts for a moment. Several days while we were thus occupied, the mercury stood at 105° in the shade and the reader can but faintly imagine what we endured standing on burning rocks, exposed to the fierce reflection from the water, and at the same time obliged to exert our energies to the utmost in overcoming the stupid obstinacy of large sticks of timber, of all labour the most humiliating and discouraging.
From six till seven we toiled without intermission, stopping only an hour at noon for dinner, and sleeping in the open air, on the softest rocks, with no other canopy than the branches of a spreading oak, through whose scanty foliage I could see the stars winking and blinking in my face.
We found little time for conversation during the day, and it might be supposed that we should have had little inclination for it at night; but weary as I was, I could not resist the garrulity of one of my companions, whose amusing narrative, continued night after night, might well sustain a comparison with the more classic stories of Scheherezade.
Passing over the earlier parts of his history in which, as with other distinguished characters, his birth, whooping cough, and measles occupied the principal portion, we come to the time when the young Weaver, for such he was entitled, first displayed his ardent love of heroic adventure by running away from home, and embarking in a long and hazardous voyage in pursuit of mackerel.
This was the turning point in his life; and from this apparently unimportant step the skilful historian will easy trace all his subsequent career—all those striking ideosyncracies that, whether they betrayed the greatness or the weakness of his character, equally distinguished him from the mass of ordinary men around him.
The fishy odour of that first voyage still lingered about hisperson, as grateful to his senses as to others the bank of violets where they had played in childhood. He loved to talk of barrels and of quintals, of schools of mackerel and of cod; till in his flowing figures the little fishing smack assumed the state and importance of some mighty whaler, and his puny prey was invested with all the terrors of Leviathan.
No such mackerel were ever seen in these degenerate days, and no such storms as he then encountered. When, in process of years, the greater love of ease, and lessening spirit of adventure induced him, yet unwillingly, to give up what had hitherto been his favourite pastime, he manifested his icthyological propensities and the strength of early associations, by declining his affections upon an oyster. In the society of those amiable and suggestive testacea he passed many grateful hours, sailing the while in fancy o'er his much-loved Banks of Newfoundland, or watching the dying flounderings of some gigantic cod that had erewhile yielded to his victorious hook.
His observations on life and manners in the metropolis of New England, had about them the same smack of fishy sagacity, plainly declaring from what source his philosophy had been derived.
"Boston," said he, with a melancholy shake of the head at the tender recollection of some earlier passages in his varied experience, "Boston, I will allow, is a mighty dangerous place for a man to be out o' nights: yet, somehow'r other, I never felt very ticklish about it, though they know't I was in the habit of carrying about considerable sums o' money. Many and many's the time 'at I've been through some o' the very worst places in the city, with as much as a gallon or two of iseters, and sometimes the money for 'em, too; but nobody ever offered to touch me—I s'pose acause they'd a kind o' stinking notion 'at I'd be likely to prove an ugly customer.
"The gentleman as I was a working with used ollus to send me to carry the iseters; ''cause,' says he, 'Weaver's a man as can be depended on, and what he says he'll do, he'lldo.' I remember one day, when we was all-fired busy—seems to me folks in Boston never ate so many iseters before—a gentleman was going to have a large party, and he sent for me to come and help. Boss, 'cause we was so busy, you know, was agoing to send somebody else; but the gentleman, he says, says he, 'I don't want nobody but Weaver.' So I went, and I was out in the kitchen a opening iseters for dear life, when the gentleman he came out, and asked me, why I didn't go in and see the folks. So, bimeby, I went in—I had on my best close, and looked about as smart as any on 'em—and his wife and daughters—he had four, and they was none o' yer milk-an'-water things either—they said, 'how d'ye do, Mr. Weaver? We are very glad to see you.' So I told 'em I was very glad to see them; and then I sat down and talked awhile, and bimeby somebody said sumthin' about iseters—so I began, and told 'em all I knew about it, and all about my going a-mackereling, and they was so interested, you never see.
"And then, sich a supper as they had! It was just the beatimost thing I ever did see; for they was real tip-top folks, and no mistake—and, as for the iseters, you may be sure, I looked out for them myself.
"So, after the party was over, and the folks was going home, the gentleman steps up to me, before 'em all, as perlite as could be, and says, says he, 'we're very much obliged to you, Mr Weaver; I really don't know how we should ha' got along without you:' and then he offered to pay me for the iseters; but I wan't agoing to do no sich thing. 'Not a cent,' says I, 'not a cent;' for I thought 'twould be real shabby to go to his party, and then make him pay for the iseters. So he put the money back into his pocket, and everybody laughed and looked so tickled, 'at I knowed I'd done just about the right thing. And then he said, he hoped he should have the pleasure—I misremember the exact words, but that's near enough—of seeing me again at his house, some time'r other,and so I mean he shall; for, as soon as ever I git ten thousand dollars, I'm going straight back to Boston, and I mean to call on him the very first thing.
"And, then, I'm going to the old shop where I used to work; and, first, I shall call for a dozen raw—and then I shall call for a dozen fried—and then for an out-and-out stew; and then! I'll walk up to the counter, and pay 'm in gold dust! won't that make 'em stare?"
When the cunning Weaver had woven so much of his fantastic web, he invariably turned over and went to sleep—very wisely, as I thought; for, surely, no wit of man could blow a more airy and buoyant bubble than that on which, balloon-like, he now set sail for the land of dreams.
The morning brought with it less seductive realities. For breakfast we had, at first, coffee without sugar—the sugar and pepper having become too intimately blended during their rough journey to answer their legitimate purpose—ship biscuit, with a bit of pork or bacon, and, now and then, a dish of stewed beans. After living this way a week, we obtained a keg of butter and a small quantity of flour; and, one evening, "Now," says Weaver, "I'm going to have some nice biscuit for supper, so hold on, boys, I'll have 'em ready in a twinkling."
Weaver was a short, thick-set fellow, and wore a pair of oilcloth pantaloons, strikingly suggestive of his former avocations. Owing to their natural gummy and adhesive nature, their original colour had been overlaid and aggravated, something like a painter's palette, by numerous successive layers of every variety of hue, among which, however, dirt-colour was decidedly predominant. This process of accretion had been carried on with most perseverance and success on that part of his nether garments that would naturally stand in greatest need of such patching, and which, from constant manipulation, now exhibited a truly Parthian polish, almost dazzling to behold.
Having emptied a due proportion of flour and water into one of the large, shallow tin-pans used in mining, Weaver gave his hands, fresh from their day's work, a desperate slide over the part aforesaid, and, without more ado, plunged them half up to the elbows into the paste. A liberal supply of saleratus was added, and, in half an hour, he placed upon the smooth stone that served us for a table, two small loaves of a greenish-yellow complexion and about the consistency of a middling-boiled egg.
"There!" said he, triumphantly, as he drew a long knife from his boot, and, breathing upon it, gave it a preparatory wipe over his breeches, "that's what I call despatch. Now for some butter!"
The butter was brought in a plate, already bearing the indisputable marks of pork and beans; though a bowl would have been the more fitting receptacle, the heat of the sun having converted the contents of the keg into a state of perfect fluidity.
"Never mind," said Weaver, "I'll fix it to-morrow;" and with the word, five knives clashed together on the bottom of the plate, and returned as if they had been dipt in oil.
Weaver was as good as his word; he had said that he would fix the butter, and he did. Sometime the next day, the butter, which had partially cooled during the night, having again melted, he set the keg in the edge of the water; and, not long after, we witnessed the novel and pleasing spectacle of what seemed a river of oil or honey. The water had risen, as it did regularly once in twenty-four hours, and the whole of our butter issuing out of the keg, had floated tranquilly down the stream.
The next morning, when Weaver was preparing to renew his culinary operations, I, by some manœuvre, called his attention to a man just performing his matin ablutions on the opposite side of the river, and cautiously suggested that it might be as well to follow his example. He received thehint, as if the idea had just dawned upon him for the first time; and, having bathed his hands and face, declared that, really, he didn't know before how much better a man felt after being washed; and he thought it would be a good plan to do it every morning, or at least as often as every Sunday.
I am sorry that I am unable to state whether this knight of the knife and the shell ever attained the summit of his modest ambition; but I am rather impressed with the belief that he never succeeded in throwing off his old habits, and may still be found at his former quarters in Devonshire street, busily and not ignobly employed in studying his favourite science of conchology.
On fastening our logs together by wooden bolts and ropes of bark, we found the raft thus constructed altogether inadequate to sustain the necessary weight consisting of four men, the armour weighing about one hundred pounds, and nearly double that quantity of shot; but by means of ropes attached to the outer corners, and made fast to the rocks, we made it sufficiently buoyant to answer for the first experiment; and our eager impatience would not admit of any longer delay.
As none of our company felt willing to play the part of diver, we hired for that purpose a man who had already been down in one of "the masheens" at home, and now gladly embraced the opportunity of making somewhat higher wages than he had been in the habit of receiving. It was not a little curious and amusing to watch the operations of his toilet while preparing for the descent,—seldom is the proudest belle while being drest for a ball waited upon by more zealous and obsequious attendants; he seemed indeed like some turtle fed alderman now disabled by gout or other infirmity, and dependent upon the services of others.
Our nabob divested of all but shirt and pantaloons, seated himself on a stone, while two of his ready servitors pulled on his boots and breeches all in one—a suit of genteel black very wide at the hips and having a copper ring round the waist.We next arrayed his highmightiness in a close jacket of the same fashion, with a second ring at the bottom, and at the top a monstrous copper basin somewhat larger than a water bucket, "within which his head seemed to have shrunk away like a dried filbert in its shell." He looked out through two glass eyes having that lidless stare peculiar to the sculpen, and there was a still larger window opposite his mouth, opening by a screw in order to give him air while dressing.
The jacket and trowsers were screwed firmly together by means of the two copper rings—the bags of shot and sand tied over his shoulders and round his waist—the viser closed, and the air-pumps at the same moment put in motion. A long hose of india rubber connected the pumps with the top of his helmet, and as the unwieldly figure rose to its feet, and waddled forward to the edge of the raft, while the inrushing air puffed out his flabby skin to its full extent, he looked like an infant elephant on its hind legs, or some of the monstrous idols of heathendom, among which, however, he would certainly have carried off the palm for ugliness. He was not like most other amphibious animals, awkward and clumsy on land, but all alert in the water; his awkwardness never deserted him, and the ridiculous splash, it could hardly be called a plunge, with which he settled into what seemed a more congenial element, reminded me of nothing so much as Ma'am Bridges sitting unexpectedly down in her own wash-tub.
After he had been gone some ten minutes, and no signal twitch had been given at the cord provided for that purpose, we began to look at each other with a mysterious sort of dread, and debate the expediency of pulling him up. My own position at the pumps prevented me from taking any more active part, but I did my best to induce my companions to haul him in without any further delay, and they at length yielded to my expostulations. But, to our infinite consternation, we now found all our strength unable to move him fromthe bottom; and crying out, all at once, to a party of miners on the opposite bank, two of them came in a canoe to our assistance, and by pulling directly over the spot where the diver lay, succeeded in bringing him to the surface.
We drew him hastily to the shore, and opening the visor saw, within the depths of the helmet, a countenance paler than that of Ivanhoe when he fainted in the very presence of the Queen of Love and Beauty, at the gentle and famous passage of arms at Ashby de la Zouche. Long after his armour had been removed, he still lay apparently lifeless,—and it was an hour before he could give us any account of his misfortune. He then told us that walking along the bottom he had suddenly stepped into a hole behind a rock, and was having the best time he ever had in his life, when all at once he fell asleep.
He was not in the least disturbed by the imminent danger he had escaped so narrowly, and declared his readiness to make a second trial, if a place could be found free from rocks, and where the water was sufficiently clear for us to see him from the surface.
As no such place was to be found in that vicinity, all our previous labour went for nothing; we abandoned our raft, and moved several miles further up the river to a spot not far below Big Bar, and said in the high flown language of the miners to contain a cart load of gold.
The sand bags proving quite unfit for the purpose, Allen again set off in search of an additional supply of shot; and the rest of us set to work with redoubled energy, to construct a second and larger raft, with such improvements as our hard-won experience suggested.
In the meantime I went down the river to Ford's Bar to purchase a stock of provisions, and a number of articles required in our delicate operations. Having bought a hundred weight of flour—a small quantity of pork, sugar andcoffee—and a large coil of rope at Dutch Tom's, I hired him and a mule to carry them to our camp.
As it was utterly impossible for a mule to make his way on the shore, we determined to ascend the mountain and keep along the summit as far as was convenient, and then get down the best way we could. The hill in question resembled nothing so much as a monstrous hyena, up whose tail we now slowly climbed, till we reached its spinous bristly back bone, where the travelling was comparatively smooth. Having at length arrived as near as I could judge, at the proper point, we began to descend; but had gone only a few rods when the mule came to a full halt, and Dutch Tom declared that it was altogether out of the question for man or beast to go any further; he had been over all the worst places within fifty miles, but this was a little too much even for him.
I coaxed, I threatened, I expostulated in vain. I offered to give him ten dollars more than the price we had promised, if he remained faithful to his agreement, and assured him, on the other hand, he would never receive a dollar if he deserted me in such a situation—but he swore that if the flour were turned into gold it would be no temptation, and urged me not to make the venture. I told him, however, that I could be as obstinate as any Dutchman of them all; and finding me as good as my word, he unloaded his mule and set out on his return with that unpleasant coolness and deliberation for which his countrymen are so remarkable, and which I found it mere affectation to attempt to equal.
In fact I was not cool at all, and could have thrashed the perfidious Nederlander with hearty good will, but as he was now beyond my reach, I vented my rage with far greater ease and safety against the inoffensive sack of flour, pleasing myself all the while with the thought that I was demolishing a broad-skirted Dutchman at every kick. When I was tired of this exercise, I sat down again to rest and think what I had best do next.
It was now nearly sundown—the valley below lay in deep shadow which was slowly creeping with a broken irregular front, and with the stealthy tread of an Indian army up the mountain. Tired and exhausted as I was by our long march under a burning sun I had yet no time to rest; and no sooner had the sound of hoofs died away in the distance than I sprang to my feet and commenced my descent.
Having first marked the place as carefully as I could, I made a bundle of some of the more indispensable articles, weighing in all some eighty pounds, and lashed it firmly to my back in order to leave my hands at perfect liberty. The face of the mountain consisted, like that at Ford's Bar, of broken slate that continually, as it was started by the feet, slid away in little streams awaking a strange curiosity to see how far they would go. A scattered growth of shrubs and vines covered the ground, but the first were too brittle to be of much service, and the thorns that guarded the latter only tore my clothes and scratched my hands and face without in the least retarding my downward course. Crouching down on my feet I sometimes slid straightforward a distance of several rods—at others, I was obliged to advance more slowly in a diagonal direction, when I could not help wishing that my legs, like those of the animal called the brocke, were of unequal length, that they might correspond better to the sloping surface.
After proceeding thus painfully about an hour I came almost before I was aware upon a perpendicular precipice from one to two hundred feet in height, which seemed effectually to bar all further progress in that direction. I could now hear however the roar of the river with great distinctness, and the sound inspiring me with fresh energy, I resolved to make the attempt. I accordingly took my pack from my shoulders, and having thrown it into what seemed a clump of bushes at the foot of the precipice, prepared myself to follow, though with somewhat greater deliberation.
In my cooler moments I should have shrunk at once from so perilous an undertaking; but I was now possessed with a sort of stupid, unreasoning courage that prevented me from seeing the full extent of the danger, and probably actually diminished it in the same proportion.
The first part of the way was by no means difficult; I discovered on closer inspection a narrow shelf descending steeply along the face of the precipice, affording barely room for my feet, so that in order to preserve my balance I was obliged to advance in a sidling direction with my face to the rock, and my fingers constantly thrust into the narrow seams that mapped its surface. The shelf terminated abruptly about fifty feet from the summit, and for a moment I saw no way of continuing my descent. Creeping slowly back the path I had just travelled, I came in a few steps to a sort of fissure in the rock about two feet in width and penetrating deeper than my eye could follow. By bracing my feet against the opposite sides of this hollow, I thought I would descend in the same manner in which a sweep works his way up and down a chimney.
It was a peculiarity of the state of mind I was then in that the moment any plan presented itself I hastened to put it in execution. In a few minutes I found myself far below the point at which I had started, the numerous hollows and projections in the sides of my chimney affording an excellent foothold; but now a new difficulty presented itself. The chasm had insensibly widened, till now, with my feet planted firmly against one side, and my hands braced against the other, I found it no easy matter to maintain my position. To ascend seemed an effort wholly beyond my strength, yet another step downward might plunge me headlong on to the rocks below. The little light that found its way into the mouth of the chasm did not enable me to see the bottom, but I naturally concluded that the depth was considerable.
Cautiously sliding my hands a little lower, and thenstretching out one foot as far as possible, I found to my utter consternation, that the wall retired so rapidly at this point that it was entirely beyond my reach. My limbs which had been before as rigid as iron, now seemed weaker than a child's, but it was only for a moment. The next my hope revived, and I resolved, desperate as it seemed, to make an attempt to return. But just then a stone detached by my foot fell into the chasm. I listened to hear it strike with the same sort of curiosity as if I had been in perfect safety; but to my great surprise no sound followed. Could it be that the hollow was so deep, or had it,—and I trembled at the thought,—fallen so short a distance as to make no noise? It would be easy to determine the fact by another trial, but on making the effort I could not find a single stone that was loose. I succeeded however, by a violent effort, in getting my hand into my pocket; and taking out my knife dropped it carefully in the middle of the chasm and the same moment heard it strike just at my feet. A single step placed me on the level ground at the bottom, which had been all the while scarcely an inch beyond my reach. I groped about till I had found my knife; and following the slender ray of light that streamed from a short distance, soon felt the cool breath of the river on my burning brow.
Our camp, it fortunately happened, was not far off, where my sudden arrival astonished my companions almost as much as if I had fallen from the moon. I was too much exhausted, however, to satisfy their curiosity, and lost no time in stretching myself out on my bed of rocks with a far keener sense of rest and enjoyment than the bridal chamber of the St. Nicholas could ever bestow.
I dreamed all night of rolling down hill in a barrel stuck full of nails; and in the morning, when I came to feel my bruises and look at my torn and bleeding hands, I almost believed my dream to be real; hardly a spot in my body butwas as black and blue as if I had been hunted by a legion of fairies through every forest in Christendom.
In less than a week our raft was completed; it was much larger than the other, with an opening at one end, over which we erected a stout triangle or tripod to assist in raising and lowering the diver. For more than a month we continued to struggle against a series of delays and vexatious such as must necessarily attend an undertaking of so great magnitude in a new country; but after all, the thing itself was the chief obstacle,—all others were finally surmounted, but we were apparently as far as ever from attaining our object. The diver was almost entirely helpless in his moving prison; he was unable to remain under water more than a few hours a day, and came out dripping with perspiration and trembling as if he had the ague.
More than once he was overtaken by the same fit or faintness that had so alarmed us before, and we were thus kept in a state of constant apprehension. He found it nearly impossible to use a pick or shovel under water, but contrived by means of a small scoop to fill an iron pot we lowered down to him; and though it contained little gold, this trifling achievement raised considerably the spirits of the more sanguine of our party.
I had for some time, however, ceased to feel any lively faith in our success, and, on consulting with my brothers, we all agreed that there was little hope of doing anything that season, and determined to sell our share without further delay. An opportunity soon offering, I disposed of our quarter of the armour for four hundred and ninety-five dollars, to be paid two days after at Coloma; and thus ended six weeks of the severest labour I ever encountered.
While St. John was occupied as narrated in the preceding chapter, we remained at Ford's Bar, and prayed that the river might speedily fall.
The same day on which we bought the armour I went with Dr. Browne to a spot not far from Jacob's Ladder, to put up a notice of our intention to construct a wing-dam at that place as soon as the water permitted. This simple bit of paper, with our names and signatures attached, was posted in a conspicuous position on a tree hard by, and secured to us possession of the territory therein described as effectually as all the sealed and witnessed and recorded formalities of more artificial society.
The spot we had selected had been found unusually rich the year before, and it was but natural to conclude that a great deal of the precious deposit still remained, which could be reached, however, only by a wing-dam. This is nothing but a thick mound or dike of stones and earth, projecting half way across the river, and then running down the stream fifty or perhaps several hundred feet. When possible, it is built just above a fall or rapid, which lowers the water in the partially enclosed space sufficiently to enable the miner with long-handled shovels to dig out the earth without much difficulty; but when no such rapids are to be found, the only advantage of a wing-dam consists in the stillness of the water, the current being generally so violent that it would be quite impossible, without some such expedient, to raise a shovelful of earth above the surface.
The miner then, standing in the water up to his middle, scoops up the gravel from the bottom, and either flings it on to the bank or empties it into a bucket held by one of his companions. Much of the gold is unavoidably lost by this imperfect process, but the labour is so slight compared with the ordinary method of damming, and requires so much less expenditure of time and money, that the miner can well afford to overlook its peculiar disadvantages.
With a wing-dam in prospect, and one fourth of a submarine armour in actual possession, we thought we might safely bid defiance to fortune. The water, however, was yet too high, and in the mean time we worked, though very interruptedly, here and there along the banks, sometimes making half an ounce apiece, and at others spending the whole day in prospecting without earning a dollar. The 12th of June was uncomfortably cool, and a slight shower fell in the morning, the first rain we had known for more than six weeks. The next day the river had contracted so much with the cold that we made a beginning in our claim at the lower end of the bar, but the water again rising, drove us out at thirty buckets.
In the afternoon we walked down to the store to see a wonderful instrument that had just been brought into the valley. On entering the store, we found a large crowd assembled, and in the midst a heavy-looking Dutchman, who held in his hands a strip of whalebone apparently taken from an umbrella, and split in two about half its length.
The Dutchman was talking very earnestly, and the crowd, as if afraid of his potent wand, kept at a respectful distance while he expounded to them the extraordinary properties lodged in this innocent-looking bit of umbrella, and the way in which it could be used to most advantage. Just as I forced my way into the circle, the operator, astrologer, magician, or what not, grasped the two ends of the split firmly in his hands, giving the whole nearly the form of the letter Y, when a pan of gold being placed under the point, it wasat once depressed from a horizontal to a vertical position, as if drawn by some mysterious and irresistible attraction.
Having with some difficulty persuaded the owner to trust his magic in my profane hands, I found that the weight of the rod caused it to twist with considerable violence; but if this were to be regarded as any indication of the presence of gold, the whole floor of the tent must be underlaid with that precious metal.
Our Dutchman, however, still maintained that in his hands it manifested this dipping propensity only over the pan of gold, and explained its perversity when in my keeping by the same theory as that advanced by the believers in animal magnetism, that some constitutions are more susceptible or impressible than others. While he was defending his opinion, with a good deal of volubility and ill-temper, a buckskin purse was brought in half full of black sand, and laid upon the ground for a second experiment. On being held over it the point sunk as rapidly as before, whereupon the unbelievers set up a laugh, and even the faithful looked somewhat disconcerted; but the wary conjuror, nothing daunted on learning the contents of the purse, ingeniously contended that this was a stronger proof of his position—that there must be, of course, a few grains of gold still sticking in the corners, and that they had affected the delicate nerves of his divining-rod.
He even had the assurance to offer his services in discovering rich deposits, demanding only ten per cent. for his own share; but, the miners being generally unable to appreciate the value of his invention, he joined himself to a party possessed of superior discernment, who, trusting to the guidance of the witch-whalebone, (I never knew whether its having been part of an umbrella had anything to do with its remarkable properties,) dug one hole after another on the banks of Otter Creek, and would undoubtedly have at length discovered the treasure, had not the same envious, and malignant spritesthat guard the spoils of Captain Kidd hurried it away, just as they were on the point of success.
As we were now in constant expectation of receiving an answer to the letter I had written in February, in regard to the submarine armour, we walked to Georgetown as often as we could muster courage to ascend the hill; and, though we were often disappointed in the object of our visit, we never failed to be rewarded for our labour. After living so long in that narrow valley, the high rolling country above seemed almost like a new creation. Our thoughts expanded with the horizon, and we breathed purer and easier, as if we had just escaped from prison, or the dismal depths of a mine. We stopped repeatedly to satiate our eyes, long unused to such telescopic vision, on the circling prospect, and to inhale the larger air that came sifting through those giant pines. Every thing about us was on a grander and more magnificent scale, and Ford's Bar seemed a baby-house, a world in miniature, where the sky, the trees, the winds, were all alike stunted and Lilliputian.
In fact, we were becoming heartily tired of Ford's Bar, and of the Middle Fork, and not without reason; for neither was exactly the place that one would choose for a summer residence. By the first of July, the heat had become almost intolerable; pent up in such close quarters, it was reverberated from mountain to mountain, till their dark, slaty sides became charged like immense reservoirs, from which it was poured down upon our heads. By shortening the sun's reign, however, several hours, morning and evening, the hills sensibly diminished the evil; and a fresh breeze that flowed through the valley all the middle of the day, still farther reduced the temperature. But when, as was sometimes the case, the surrounding atmosphere was warmer than our bodies, the breeze seemed rather like the breath of an oven, and the coolest place was that least exposed to its influence.
The mercury often stood at a hundred, and rose severaltimes to one hundred and ten; when the only way of obtaining relief was to sit down, up to our chins in the water of the Creek, like so many pond-lillies just raising their heads above the surface.
To make any exertion in such weather, was not to be thought of for a moment. We had read all the books in the circulating library—Dr. Tabisch had returned to Mormon Island—Dr. Browne had also gone thither on a visit—the river fell slower than it was ever known to do before—and, in short, everything conspired to make the state of ennui to which we were now reduced more and more intolerable.
Under these circumstances, it is not very wonderful that we tired of our way of life—of sleeping on the ground—of cooking our own food—of wearing dirty clothes—of talking of our unvaried theme; or that we should long for some rational amusement—for white sheets and table-cloths—for cream in our coffee, and ice on our butter—for carpets and easy-chairs—for books and music, and the sight of a pretty face, whether of child or woman—and for a New England Sabbath.
It was not till the middle of July that the shrinking of the river brought a temporary interruption to this indolent existence, by enabling us at length to take undivided possession of our claim. The earth paid from fifteen to fifty cents to the bucket; but there was so little of it, that we were compelled to put a prudent restraint upon our energies, and work only half the time, lest we should be left entirely without occupation.
About this time, the miners who camped on Otter Creek were horribly scared by the nocturnal visits of a large grizzly bear, who came prowling round their tents, and carried off sundry legs of bacon that were hanging on trees before their doors. As our tents would prove a slight protection, in case he should desire to extend his acquaintance, it was determined,if possible, to rout the enemy out of the neighbourhood.
Accordingly, one fine morning, long before the sun had gilded the topmost edge of our western boundary, a party of ten or twelve bold hunters started off in pursuit, firmly resolved not to return without a trophy; and, though I had never been hunting in my life, I could not withstand the temptation to accompany them.
I slung a heavy rifle over my shoulder, and the whole party, after advancing several miles up the Creek, began slowly to ascend the mountain, following without difficulty the rude trail of the slouching monster; till being at length, as we supposed, somewhere in his vicinity, we halted to arrange our plan of operations. The place where we stood was directly under a low, steep bank, and had evidently been occupied as a lair by the animal, as it was easy to see the hollow he had scooped out for his bed, and the coarse dark hair sticking in little tufts, where he had rubbed himself against the rocks.
"Now, boys!" said our leader, who had taken that office upon himself, by virtue of his greater skill and experience, "the plaguey varmint is somewhere here about, I reckon; so we may as well be all ready for him; for when he does come, he'll likely be pooty sudden and uproarious. But don't go to being skeered, but jist wait till you ken see the white of his eyes, and then blaze away."
"Never mind, cap'n, about our being afraid, but just tell us how we're agoing to find him; we might scuttle about among these everlasting bushes for a month without—"
"Oh, don't you be alarmed," interrupted a third, "we'll find him soon enough, I'll warrant;" and the words were hardly out of his mouth, before they were followed by a something between a snort and a roar, that seemed to come from over our heads, and almost in our very ears.
Raising our eyes all at once to the bank above, we sawthe bushes parted by the pointed head, leg-of-mutton-paws, and monstrous front of a full-grown grizzly, apparently in the very act of springing upon us. His coming had, indeed, been sudden and uproarious in the last degree; no one thought of waiting till he could see the white of his eyes, but away we went, over rocks and bushes, like a bevy of partridges, in every direction; and, so successfully did we execute this manœuvre, that no two of us were left together, and we came into the camp, one after the other, all the rest of the day, with the unanimous conviction, that if we had frightened the bear half so much as he had frightened us, he would never pay us a second visit.
This incident produced a good deal of mirth at our expense, and was the occasion of several entertaining stories. An old backwoodsman who had lived many years in Oregon was listened to with the greatest attention.
He was hunting one day in the mountains with a single companion, when coming to a little clump of rocks and bushes, they each took a different path intending to meet at the other end. On reaching the spot, however, he saw nothing of his companion; but hearing just then the report of a rifle, he walked round the other side to see what was going on. He had not gone far when he came upon a large grizzly bear sitting upright on the snow like a dog, but not a man was in sight. Wondering what all this could mean he took deliberate aim and fired, when the brute sprang growling towards him, but suddenly stopped and then walked slowly off in another direction.
Anxious to learn what had befallen his friend the hunter left the bear, and continued his search; and the next moment coming to the place where the bear had been sitting, he found his companion pressed down into the snow, and almost suffocated by his close confinement. It seems he had fired at the bear, who had rushed upon him before he could reload, and throwing him down without inflicting any serious injury, hadthen expressed his contempt in the most emphatic manner by seating himself directly upon his prostrate foe.
Another anecdote still better illustrated the almost human cunning of this dangerous brute. A party who were out in pursuit of cattle encountered a bear of unusual size; and being desirous of taking him alive, attacked him with their lassoes. The sagacious animal no sooner found his progress impeded by the lasso which had been thrown over his hind leg, than sitting upright on his haunches he seized the line in his forepaws and proceeded to draw towards him the luckless horse and rider, just as a fisherman would pull in a cod or halibut.
The whole thing was so sudden and unexpected that no one had time to interfere,—in an instant he laid open the horse's belly by a single blow, and the rider only avoided the same fate by falling off backwards and thus making his escape. This bear was afterwards killed, and found to weigh when dressed upwards of a thousand pounds.
On the 22d of July, having walked over to Georgetown, I received the long-expected letter announcing that a diving dress had been shipped from New York according to my directions; and St. John coming the same day from Big Bar with an unfavourable report of the aspect of affairs at that place, we determined to sell our share as speedily as possible.
In the evening a party of poor fellows just arrived in the mines were sitting round their camp-fire before the store. Leaning against the door-post, I looked at them awhile with half-shut eyes, and presently I began to laugh. In fact, I couldn't help it. I couldn't hear what they were talking about, but I knew just as well as if I had. I even knew their very thoughts. Poor simpletons! what a bitter experience was before them! what a sad seesaw of fear and faith! hope slow drowning, like a nine-and-a-half-days' puppy, opening its eyes just in time to die.
Then my eyelids drooped still farther, and my inward sightgrew stronger. I saw the waiting ones at home—the young wife—the widowed mother—the helpless orphan—waiting—watching—weeping—oh how wearily!—the death-list, and the long despair.
When I opened my eyes again, the party in which I had insensibly become so interested, were just stooping to enter their tent; I flung off the chills and damps that were creeping over me, and walked swiftly up the creek.
A few days after I walked to Coloma to receive the price of our armour. Passing through Georgetown without stopping, I arrived at Coloma about noon; and after resting a few hours, as my man had not yet arrived, I thought I could do no better than to take a walk down the river to the bar that Number Four and I had prospected a year before.
I found the selfsame hole that we had dug with so much fruitless labour, and moralized over it in the most edifying and affecting manner. It was, in good sooth, fitted to excite "a most humorous sadness," and I could have wept it full of tears to think of all the brilliant hopes that had faded and gone out since we first struck our spades into the gravel. A number of miners were at work hard by, and from them I learned that the place paid only four or five cents to the bucket, and had hence received the significant title of Poverty Bar.
"Only four or five cents!" I repeated; "surely you must be mistaken. A friend of mine, a very scientific man, assured me that the formation was unusually promising."
"Formation be d——d," replied the other; "I've been at work here these three weeks, and the most I've made any day yet is four dollars and a half; but perhaps," he added, with a leer, "I don't go to work in a scientific fashion."
Turning my back on Poverty Bar, with a feeling of secret satisfaction that our conclusions had been so fully verified, I took a short cut across the hills, and presently came to a bend in the river where a large party of Dutchmen had commencedthe most extensive damming operations I had yet witnessed. The river at this point made almost a complete circle, so that by digging through a hill a quarter of a mile in width they drained a mile and a half of the channel. The tunnel was about ten feet square, dug through a ledge of rotten granite. The work went on day and night, and a wooden railroad with small hand-cars was employed to remove the rubbish. When completed the tunnel was found too small to conduct the river, and the lateness of the season obliged the company to postpone further operations till the next summer.
I took supper at a boarding-house kept by the most enterprising merchant in all that section. The extent of his business operations may be inferred from a single fact. At a time when flour was worth a dollar a pound, he was said to have from one to two hundred thousand pounds in store, and other staples in nearly equal proportions. His warehouse at Coloma was a long low building, stuffed with goods of every description, from which he supplied the trading posts he had established at Ford's Bar, and other places on the Middle Fork.
The company assembled at table was of a very mixed character, and the conversation, which had by some strange accident strayed from mining to politics, was more free and easy than is usual on such occasions. I was not a little amused by one of the company, a Col. Somebody, from Ohio, who asserted, in the same tone as if he were stating a truism, that Andrew Jackson was the greatest man that ever lived except St. Paul. I leave it to more theological politicians, or more political theologians than I, to settle this knotty question.
The next morning, having received my money, I set out on my return, but after walking about two miles remembered an important errand I had neglected, and was obliged to retrace my steps to Coloma. This was but a foretaste of what was to follow. A new road had recently been constructed by the merchants of Georgetown and Coloma, winding in a verypicturesque manner along the face of the mountain, and reminding me, to compare great things with small, of Napoleon's road over the Simplon. Having reached the summit, and turned my back upon the vast panorama that had presented itself in so many different aspects as the road dragged its length like a wounded snake in irregular curves from point to point, I walked on more rapidly, without paying much attention to my path, till an uneasy instinctive impression that I had lost my way brought me to a sudden pause.
The old and new roads came together seven miles from Coloma; but though, as I supposed, I had walked much further than that distance, there was yet nothing about me that I remembered to have seen before. I found myself in a narrow winding footpath that ran along the elevated ridge or backbone of the mountain, and in the midst of a dark pine forest. The solitude was most profound. It seemed an immense manufactory of silence, enough to supply the whole world, where nothing was ever heard but the melancholy cry of the mourning-dove, the only safety-valve of a stillness pent up till it was like to burst. This bird is the most skilful of all ventriloquists; for, though he may be perched directly over your head, his voice seems always to proceed from a great distance, which gives it a startling unearthly sound impossible to be described.
After walking irresolutely back and forth a few minutes, I determined to proceed, trusting soon to meet some one who could give me the necessary information. The narrow footpath presently led me to the brow of the hill, when, instantly recognising the wide road that skirted its base as the one I had travelled the preceding day, I descended with a bound, inwardly congratulating myself on the sagacity and good fortune that had prevented me from turning back as I had at first intended. Meeting a wagon soon after, I asked the driver with the utmost confidence how far it was to Georgetown, to which he replied with a grin that, if I meant Greenwood Valley,it was not more than five or six miles, but Georgetown was in a very different direction.