198 EVENING SCENES AMONG THE MINERS. [1859. lot had sold for five hundred dollars. When I asked a miner if there was any church, he replied: 'No; but we are going to build one before next Sunday.' Erecting a temple of worship in a week was in thorough ac cordance with the prevailing spirit. Thousands of miners were busy at the sluices, which now numbered several hundred. All reported gold-bearing rock abundant; but as yet there were no mills for crushing the quartz within a thousand miles. The 'pay dirt' was brought from the hill sides to the sluices in coffee sacks, borne upon the shoulders or drawn on rough sleds along smooth freshly-peeled pine trunks-a rudimental inclined-plane railway. Several miners were each taking out two hundred dollars per day; but not more than one in four was obtaining five dollars, By the established regulations the size of a claim was fifty feet by one hundred; and some were selling at from ten to forty thousand dollars. Generally only a few hundred dollars of the purchase money was paid down; if the claim did not yield the balance it was never liquidated. Climbing a hill side, I obtained a vivid evening view of the Alpine city. Beyond it a fire was raging upon an isolated peak. The flame swept evenly higher and higher, till at the summit, striking a single dead tree, it ran fiercely up the trunk into a perfect cone of fire, against a background of mountain and cloud. At my feet the valley was lighted with scores of camp-fires, casting the shadows of tall pines and firs in every direction, and throwing a lurid glare upon the swarthy faces of the miners. Some were cooking in the open air, some taking their evening meal upon tables of pine bark, and others sitting upon logs or reclining upon the ground smoking and talking. From one camp issued the lively notes of a violin; and from another, 'Home, sweet home' floating forth upon the evening air in a low, plaintive voice, told that the heart of the singer was with dear ones far away. On Sunday morning, a walk through the diggings revealed nearly all the miners disguised in clean clothing. Some were reading and writing letters, some ministering to the sick, and some enacting the part of Every-man-his-own-washer-woman-rubbing 1859.] THE GREGORY DIGGINGS ON SUNDAY. 199 valiantly away at the tub. Several hundred men, in the open air, were attending public religious worship-perhaps the first ever held in the Rocky Mountains. They were roughly clad, displaying weapons at their belts; and represented every section of the Union and almost every nation of the earth. They sat upon logs and stumps, a most attentive congregation, while the clergyman upon a rude log platform, preached from the text: 'Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy.' It was an impressive spectacle-that motley gathering of gold-seekers among the mountains, a thousand miles from home and civilization, to hear the 'good tidings' forever old and yet forever new. During the two weeks I spent in the mines the unhealthy diet and miasma arising from the freshly-broken earth, produced much fever. Many a poor fellow weak and listless, on straw bunk in squalid cabin, waited the approach of that grim specter with whom the ancients found prayers and sacrifices alike unavailing. Many with folded arms and rigid faces were consigned by stran gers to hill-side graves, with no child's voice to prattle its simple sorrow, no woman's tear to bedew their memory. We slept upon the ground under fir boughs. The sweetest of all rest is on the bosom of mother earth, watched by sentinel stars, lulled by the sad-hearted pine and falling water. I found in one camp a party of Kansas acquaintances living upon ham and eggs. The latter were a rare luxury, costing two dollars and fifty cents per dozen. My friends had packed several barrels in Leavenworth, pouring liquid lard around the eggs, which forming a mold enabled them to sustain with admirable composure their wagon-journey of seven hundred miles. Flour sold at twenty dollars per hundred, and milk at fifty cents a quart. Flapjacks were the substitute for bread. I think enough were made during the season to pave the road from Leavenworth to the mines. At every camp one saw perspiring men bending anxiously over the griddle, or turning the cake by tossing it skillfully in the air. To a looker-on, such masculine feats were decidedly amusing. Four years later, in rebel prisons, I found practical cookery far less entertaining. Many professional men were hard at work in the diggings. One often heard sunburnt miners while resting upon their 200 INTELLECTUAL, ARGUMENTATIVE MINERS. [1859, spades, discussing Shakspeare, the classics, religion, and political economy. FLAPJACKS. The stream beds abounded in mica, which old miners call 'fools' gold.' A shrewd German washed out and secreted an immense quantity, suppos ing he had discovered a new Golconda. Upon learning that it was not the precious metal he started back in disgust to the Pennsylvania coal mines. When the melancholy John Phenix occupied the tripod of the San Diego Herald, he ad vertised for a lad to bring water, black his boots aud keep the sanctum in orderone by whom obtaining a knowledge of the business would be deemed a sufficient compensation. The caution which he added-'No young woman in disguise need apply-was needful in a mining country. I encoun tered in the diggings several women dressed in masculine apparel, and each telling some romantic story of her past life. One averred that she had twice crossed the plains to California with droves of cattle. Some were adventurers; all were of the wretched class against which society shuts its iron doors, bidding them hasten an-cared-for to destruction. The Utes killed a number of the miners. William M. Slaughter a Denver pioneer, was out prospecting with two friends, when these savages, after dining with them in apparent friendliness, attacked the party, killing and scalping two. Slaughter * Or 'Utahs an Indian word signifying 'Dwellers among the Mountain Tops.' Those living near the Great Salt Lake were called 'Pah' (or water,) 'Utes,'-corrupted into 'Pi-Utes.' The Utahs were once a powerful nation, though embracing some wretched bands of Diggers who subsisted upon roots, worms and grasshoppers and were perhaps the lowest of the human race. 1859.] PREDICTIONS OF GOLD AND AGRICULTURE. 201 though repeatedly shot at, sprang into the bushes, concealed himself two days, and finally escaped. After spending six weeks in the new gold region, my published impression of the mines was thus summed up: 'I have absolute confidence in the permanency extent and richness of these dig gings. I believe that the mountain ranges, from Salt Lake to Mexico, abound in gold and the secondary metals, and that their yield will be the richest ever known in the world. Yet those who are doing moderately well at home should remember that not more than one man in ten meets with success in any mining country, and that the prairies of Kansas Nebraska and Missouri offer much stronger inducements to settlers than the gold regions.' I also hazarded the prediction that with proper cultivation the valleys of the Platte and its tributaries within fifty miles of Denver, would produce enough small grains and vegetables to support a population of two hundred thousand. This was scoffed at; and the arid sands did look unpromising. But now the settlers of Colorado have tested the agriculture of their new State, and yearly they raise enough farm produce for their own consumption. Returning down the mountains I found opportunity to contrast the two classes common to all gold regions. The new-comers going into the mines were sanguine and cheery, climbing with elastic step, and beguiling the way with song and laughter. But the stampeders turning homeward, convinced that gold digging was hard and unremunerative, left their packs and shovels behind, and trudged mechanically with downcast woe-begone faces. Reaching Denver again, I found the 'jumped cabin' lonely, and the novelties of the city exhausted. So early in July I started eastward. The stage line had been transferred from the Republican to the northern route. For four hundred miles from Denver it followed down the valley of that long tributary of the Missouri, which the Indians call the Nebraska, and French traders named the Platte-both appellations signifying shallow. They are specially fitting; for though the broad stream appears sufficient to float the navies of the world, it averages less than a foot in depth and abounds in treacherous quicksands. Many discouraged miners were attempting to descend in boats, but sooner or later all were skiff-wrecked. One Boston physician lost his boat and entire outfit, and when I saw him had just escaped from the river 202 A SHREWD CALIFORNIA EMIGRANT. [1859. minus every article of personal property except a single shirt which he 'happened to have about him at the time.' GOING INTO THE MINES. The Platte mosquitoes covered our mules with blood, and lacerated me through the thick sleeves of two woolen shirts. untiring coach rolled day and night, halting only for meals and changes of teams. Our We passed the Cache a la Poudre (Burial of the Powder) creek, named from an old French trap per, California emigrant, whose cattle died sundry casks of brandy by the road-side; piled the earth in the form of a grave; erected a head-board and inscribed upon it the name, age, nativity and virtues of a fabulous traveler, representing that he died of cholera. The ruse succeeded admirably; after reaching San Francisco he sold the spirits at a large profit to a person who returned and exhumed them. At the South Platte Crossing where our road struck the old emigrant trail from the Missouri to Salt Lake, we found several lodges of Sioux Indians, who termed our mail coach the 'paperwagon,' the little log post-office the 'paper house,' and our driver the 'king of the mules.' Among thousands of returning emigrants we passed one jovial party with a huge charcoal sketch of an elephant upon their wagon cover, labeled: What we saw at Pike's Peak.' |