Digging for Gold: Adventures in California

It happened that while this was going on, another of the thieving fraternity, who did not know of the storm that was gathering and about to burst over the heads of such as he, took advantage of the excitement to enter a tent, and abstract therefrom a bag of gold worth several hundred pounds. It chanced that the owner of it happened to be ailing slightly that day, and, instead of following his companions, had lain still in his tent, rolled up in blankets. He was awakened by the thief, sprang up and collared him, and, observing what he was about, dragged him before the tribunal which was still sitting in deliberation on the affairs of the community. The man was instantly condemned to be shot, and this was done at once—several of the exasperated judges assisting the firing party to carry the sentence into execution.

“Now men,” cried a tall raw-boned Yankee from the Western States, mounting on a stump after the body had been removed, and speaking with tremendous vehemence, “I guess things have come to such a deadlock here that it’s time for honest men to carry things with a high hand, so I opine we had better set about it and make a few laws,—an’ if you have no objections, I’ll lay down a lot o’ them slick off—bran’ new laws, warranted to work well, and stand wear and tear, and ready greased for action.”

“Hear! hear!” cried several voices in the crowd that surrounded this western Solon, while others laughed at his impudence. All, however, were eager to see the prevailing state of things put right, and glad to back any one who appeared able and willing to act with vigour.

“Wall then, here goes,” cried the Yankee. “Let it be decreed that whatever critter shall be nabbed in the act of makin’ tracks with what isn’t his’n, shall have his ears cut off, if it’s a mild case, and be hanged or shot if it’s a bad un.”

A hearty and stern assent was at once given to this law, and the law-giver went on to lay down others. He said that of course murder would be punished also with death, and for several other offences men should be flogged or branded on the cheeks with red-hot irons. Having in little more than ten minutes laid down these points, he enacted that thenceforth each man should be entitled to a claim of ten feet square, which, being multiplied by the number of his mess, would give the limits of the allotments in particular locations; but that, he said, would not prevent any man from moving from one site and fixing on another.

To this proposition, however, some of the miners demurred, and the law-giver found that, although in criminal law he had been allowed to have it all his own way, in civil matters he must listen to the opinion of others. However, after much wrangling this law was agreed to; and it was also arranged, among other things, that as long as any one left his tools in his claim, his rights were to be respected.

This meeting had the most beneficial influence on the miners. Rough and ready, as well as harsh, though their proceedings were, they accomplished the end in view most effectually, for after several terrible examples had been made, which proved to evil-doers that men were thoroughly in earnest, stealing, quarrelling about boundaries, and murdering were seldom heard of in that district—insomuch that men could leave bags of gold in their tents unwatched for days together, and their tools quite open in their claims without the slightest fear of their being touched!

The reader must not suppose here that we are either upholding or defending the proceedings of the celebrated Judge Lynch. We are merely recording facts, which prove how efficacious his severe code was in bringing order out of confusion in Bigbear Gully at that time.

It is not necessary that we should follow the varied fortunes of our hero and his friends, day by day, while they were engaged in digging for gold. Suffice it to say that sometimes they were fortunate, sometimes the reverse, but that on the whole, they were successful beyond the average of diggers, and became sanguine of making their fortunes in a short time.

Nevertheless Frank Allfrey did not like the life. Whatever else might arouse his ambition, he was evidently not one of those whose soul was set upon the acquisition of wealth. Although successful as a digger, and with more gold in his possession than he knew what to do with, he detested the dirty, laborious work of digging and dabbling in mud from morning till night. He began to see that, as far as the nature of his daily toil was concerned, he worked harder, and was worse off than the poorest navvy who did the dirtiest work in old England! He sighed for more congenial employment, meditated much over the subject, and finally resolved to give up gold-digging.

Before, however, he could carry this resolve into effect, he was smitten with a dire disease, and in a few days lay on the damp floor of his poor hut, as weak and helpless as a little child.

Chapter Eight.

Frank and Joe take to Wandering; See some Wonderful Things, and have a Narrow Escape

Before our hero became convalescent, his comrade Douglas was “laid down” with dysentery. In these circumstances, the digging went on slowly, for much of the time of Meyer and Graddy was necessarily occupied in nursing—and truly kind and devoted, though rough, nurses they proved to be in that hour of need.

Gradually, but surely, Douglas sank. There was no doctor to prescribe for him, no medicine to be had for love or money. In that wretched hut he lay beside his sick friend, and conversed, as strength permitted, in faint low tones, on the folly of having thrown his life away for “mere gold,” and on the importance of the things that concern the soul. As he drew near his end, the name of the Saviour was often on his lips, and often did he reproach himself for having neglected the “great salvation,” until it was almost too late. Sometimes he spoke of home—in Scotland,—and gave many messages to Frank, which he begged him to deliver to his mother, if he should ever get well and live to return home.

There was something in that “if” which went with a thrill to Frank’s heart, as he lay there, and realised vividly that his comrade was actually dying, and that he too might die.

One evening Joe entered the hut with more alacrity than he had done for many a day. He had a large nugget, just dug up, in his hand, and had hastened to his companions to cheer them, if possible, with a sight of it. Douglas was just passing away. He heard his comrade’s hearty remarks, and looked upon the mass of precious metal.

“Joe,” he whispered faintly, “Wisdom is more to be desired than gold; ‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.’”

He never spoke again, and died within an hour after that.

At last Frank began to mend, and soon found himself strong enough to travel, he therefore made arrangements to leave Bigbear Gully with his inseparable friend Joe. Meyer, being a very strong man, and in robust health, determined to remain and work out their claim, which still yielded abundance of gold.

“Meyer,” said Frank, the evening before his departure, “I’m very sorry that we are obliged to leave you.”

“Ya, das ist mos’ miserable,” said the poor German, looking disconsolate.

“But you see,” continued Frank, “that my remaining, in my present state of health, is out of the question. Now, Joe and I have been talking over our affairs. We intend to purchase three mules and set off under the guidance of a half-caste Californian, to visit different parts of this country. We will continue our journey as long as our gold lasts, and then return to San Francisco and take passage for England,—for we have both come to the unalterable determination that we won’t try to make our fortunes by gold-digging. We have sufficient dust to give us a long trip and pay our passage to England, without making use of that big nugget found by Joe, which is worth at least 200 pounds; so we have determined to leave it in possession of Jeffson, to be used by you if luck should ever take a wrong turn—as it will sometimes do—and you should chance to get into difficulties. Of course if you continue prosperous, we will reclaim our share of it on our return hither.”

“Ah, you is too goot,” cried the warm-hearted German, seizing Frank’s hand and wringing it, “bot I vill nevair use de nuggut—nevair! You sall find him here sartainly ven you do com bak.”

“Well, I hope so, for your own sake,” said Frank, “because that will show you have been successful. But if you get into low water, and do not use it, believe me I shall feel very much aggrieved.”

Next day about noon, our hero and Joe, with Junk, their vaquero, mounted their mules and rode away.

“A new style o’ cruisin’ this,” said Joe Graddy, one fine day, as they pulled up under the shade of a large tree, at a spot where the scenery was so magnificent that Frank resolved to rest and sketch it.

“New, indeed, and splendid too,” he exclaimed enthusiastically, leaping off his mule. “You can go shoot squirrels or bears if you like, Joe, but here I remain for the next three or four hours.”

As Frank had been in the habit of treating his friend thus almost every day since starting on their tour, he was quite prepared for it; smiled knowingly, ordered the vaquero to tether the mules and accompany him into the forest, and then, taking his bearings with a small pocket-compass, and critically inspecting the sun, and a huge pinchbeck watch which was the faithful companion of his wanderings, he shouldered his gun and went off, leaving the enthusiastic painter to revel in the glories of the landscape.

And truly magnificent the scenery was. They had wandered by that time far from the diggings, and were involved in all the grandeur of the primeval wilderness. Stupendous mountains, capped with snow, surrounded the beautiful valley through which they were travelling, and herbage of the richest description clothed the ground, while some of the trees were so large that many of the giant oaks of old England would have appeared small beside them. Some of the precipices of the valley were fully three thousand feet high, without a break from top to bottom, and the mountain-ranges in the background must have been at least as high again. Large tracts of the low grounds were covered with wild oats and rich grasses; affording excellent pasturage to the deer, which could be seen roving about in herds. Lakes of various sizes were alive with waterfowl, whose shrill and plaintive cries filled the air with wild melody. A noble river coursed throughout the entire length of the valley, and its banks were clothed with oaks, cypresses, and chestnuts, while, up on the mountain sides, firs of truly gigantic size reared their straight stems above the surrounding trees with an air of towering magnificence, which gave them indisputable right to be considered the aristocracy of those grand solitudes.

Of these firs Frank observed one so magnificent that, although anxious to begin work without delay, he could not resist the desire to examine it closely. Laying down his book and pencil he ran towards it, and stood for some time in silent amazement, feeling that he was indeed in the presence of the Queen of the Forest. It was a pine which towered to a height of certainly not less than three hundred and sixty feet, and, after careful measurement, was found to be ninety-three feet in circumference. In regarding this tree as the Queen, Frank was doubly correct, for the natives styled it the “Mother of the Forest.” The bark of it, to the height of a hundred and sixteen feet, was, in after years, carried to England, and built up in its original form in the Crystal Palace of Sydenham. It was unfortunately destroyed in the great fire which a few years ago consumed a large part of that magnificent building.

But this was not the only wonderful sight that was seen that day. After Frank had finished his drawing, and added it to a portfolio which was already well filled, he fired a shot to recall his nautical comrade and the vaquero. They soon rejoined him, and, continuing their journey, came to a waterfall which, in some respects, excelled that of the far-famed Niagara itself.

It had sounded like murmuring thunder in their ears the greater part of that day, and as they approached it the voice of its roar became so deafening that they were prepared for something unusually grand, but not for the stupendous sight and sound that burst upon them when, on turning round the base of a towering precipice, they came suddenly in full view of one of the most wonderful of the Creator’s works in that land.

A succession of wall-like mountains rose in two tiers before them into the clouds. Some of the lower clouds floated far below the highest peaks. From the summit of the highest range, a river, equal to the Thames at Richmond, dropt sheer down a precipice of more than two thousand feet. Here it met the summit of the lower mountain-range, on which it burst with a deep-toned sullen roar, comparable only to eternal thunder. A white cloud of spray received the falling river in its soft embrace, and sent it forth again, turbulent and foam-bespeckled, towards its second leap,—another thousand feet,—into the plain below. The entire height of this fall was above three thousand feet!

Our hero was of course anxious to make a careful drawing of it, but having already exhausted the greater part of the day, he was fain to content himself with a sketch, after making which they pushed rapidly forward, and encamped for the night, still within sight and sound of the mighty fall.

“D’you know, Joe,” said Frank, leaning back against a tree stem, as he gazed meditatively into into the fire after supper was concluded, “it has often struck me that men are very foolish for not taking full possession of the splendid world in which they have been placed.”

Frank paused a few moments, but the observation not being sufficiently definite for Joe, who was deep in the enjoyment of his first pipe, no reply was made beyond an interjectional “h’m.”

“Just look around you,” pursued Frank, waving his hand towards the landscape, “at this magnificent country; what timber, what soil, what an amount of game, what lakes, what rivers, what facilities for farming, manufacturing, fishing,—everything, in fact, that is calculated to gladden the heart of man.”

“Includin’ gold,” suggested Joe.

“Including gold,” assented Frank; and there it all lies—has lain since creation—hundreds of thousands of acres of splendid land unoccupied.

“Ha! there’s a screw loose somewhere,” said Joe, taking the pipe from his lips and looking at it earnestly, as if the remark were addressed to it, “somethin’ out o’ j’int—a plank started, so to speak—cer’nly.”

“No doubt of it,” said Frank; “and the broad acres which we now look upon, as well as those over which we have lately travelled, are as nothing compared with the other waste but fertile lands in America, on which hundreds of thousands of the human race might live happily. Yet, strange to say, men seem to prefer congregating together in little worlds of brick, stone, and mortar, living tier upon tier above each other’s heads, breathing noxious gases instead of the scent of flowers, treading upon mud, stone, and dust, instead of green grass, and dwelling under a sky of smoke instead of bright blue ether—and this, too, in the face of the Bible command to ‘go forth and replenish the earth.’”

“Yes, there’s great room,” said Joe, “for the settin’ up of a gin’ral enlightenment an’ universal emigration society, but I raither think it wouldn’t pay.”

“I know it wouldn’t, but why not?” demanded Frank.

“Ah, why not?” repeated Joe.

As neither of them appeared to be able to answer the question, they both remained for some time in a profound reverie, Frank gazing as he was wont to do into the fire, and Joe staring through smoke of his own creation at the vaquero, who reclined on the opposite side of the fire enjoying the tobacco to the full by letting it puff slowly out at his nose as well as his mouth.

“Joe,” said Frank.

“Ay, ay, sir,” answered Joe with nautical promptitude.

“I have been thinking a good deal about our affairs of late, and have come to the conclusion that the sooner we go home the better.”

“My notions pre-cisely.”

“Moreover,” continued Frank, “I think that we have come far enough in this direction, and that it would be a good plan to return to Bigbear Gully by a different route from that by which we came here, and thus have an opportunity of seeing some of the other parts of the diggings. What say you to that?”

“I’m agreeable,” answered Joe.

“Well then, shall we decide to commence our return journey to-morrow?”

“By all means. Down wi’ the helm, ’bout ship an’ lay our course on another tack by daylight,” said Joe, shaking the ashes out of his pipe with the slow unwilling air of a man who knows that he has had enough but is loath to give up; “I always like to set sail by daylight. It makes one feel up to the mark so to speak, as if one had lost none of the day, and I suppose,” he added with a sigh which resolved itself into a yawn, “that if we means to start so bright an’ early the sooner we tumble in the better.”

“True,” said Frank, whose mouth irresistibly followed the example of Joe’s, “I think it will be as well to turn in.”

There was a quiet, easy-going lowness in the speech and motions of the two friends, which showed that they were just in a state of readiness to fall into the arms of the drowsy god. They rolled themselves in their blankets, placed their rifles by their sides, their heads on their saddles, and their feet to the fire.

Joe Graddy’s breathing proclaimed that he had succumbed at once, but Frank lay for a considerable time winking owlishly at the stars, which returned him the compliment with interest by twinkling at him through the branches of the overhanging trees.

Early next morning they arose, remounted their mules and turned back, diverging, according to arrangement, from their former track, and making for a particular part of the diggings where Frank had been given to understand there were many subjects of interest for his pencil. We would fain linger by the way to describe much of what they saw, but the limits of our space require that we should hasten onward, and transport the reader at once to a place named the Great Cañon, which, being a very singular locality, and peculiarly rich in gold, merits description.

It was a gloomy gap or gorge—a sort of gigantic split in the earth—lying between two parallel ranges of hills at a depth of several hundred feet, shaped like a wedge, and so narrow below that there was barely standing room. The gold all lay at the bottom, the slopes being too steep to afford it a resting-place.

The first diggers who went there were said to have gathered vast quantities of gold; and when Frank and Joe arrived there was quite enough to repay hard work liberally. The miners did not work in companies there. Indeed, the form of the chasm did not admit of operations on a large scale being carried on at any one place. Most of the men worked singly with the pan, and used large bowie-knives with which they picked gold from the crevices of the rocks in the bed of the stream, or scratched the gravelly soil from the roots of the overhanging trees, which were usually rich in deposits. The gorge, about four miles in extent, presented one continuous string of men in single file, all eagerly picking up gold, and admitting that in this work they were unusually successful.

But these poor fellows paid a heavy price for the precious metal in the loss of health, the air being very bad, as no refreshing breezes could reach them at the bottom of the gloomy defile.

The gold at that place was found both in very large and very small grains, and was mixed with quantities of fine black sand, which the miners blew off from it somewhat carelessly—most of them being “green hands,” and anxious to get at the gold as quickly as possible. This carelessness on their part was somewhat cleverly taken advantage of by a keen old fellow who chanced to enter the hut of a miner when Frank and Joe were there. He had a bag on his back and a humorous twinkle in his eye.

“Well, old foxey, what do you want?” asked the owner of the hut, who happened to be blowing off the sand from a heap of his gold at the time.

“Sure it’s only a little sand I want,” said the man, in a brogue which betrayed his origin.

“Sand, Paddy, what for?”

“For emery, sure,” said the man, with a very rueful look; “troth it’s myself as is gittin’ too owld entirely for the diggin’s. I was a broth of a boy wance, but what wid dysentery and rheumatiz there’s little or nothin’ o’ me left, so I’m obleeged to contint myself wid gatherin’ the black sand, and sellin’ it as a substitute for emery.”

“Well, that is a queer dodge,” said the miner, with a laugh.

“True for ye, it is quare, but it’s what I’m redooced to, so av you’ll be so kind as plaze to blow the sand on to this here tray, it’ll be doin’ a poor man a good turn, an’ costin’ ye nothin’.”

He held up a tin tray as he spoke, and the miner cheerfully blew the sand off his gold-dust on to it.

Thanking him with all the fervour peculiar to his race, the Irishman emptied the sand into his bag, and heaving a heavy sigh, left the hut to request a similar favour of other miners.

“You may depend on it,” said Frank, as the old man went out, “that fellow is humbugging you. It is gold, not sand, that he wants.”

“That’s a fact,” said Joe Graddy, with an emphatic nod and wink.

“Nonsense,” said the miner, “I don’t believe we lose more than a few specks in blowing off the sand—certainly nothing worth speaking of.”

The man was wrong in this, however, for it was afterwards discovered that the sly old fellow carried his black sand to his hut, and there, every night, by the agency of quicksilver, he extracted from the sand double the average of gold obtained by the hardest working miner in the Cañon!

At each end of this place there was a hut made of calico stretched on a frame of wood, in which were sold brandy and other strong liquors of the most abominable kind, at a charge of about two shillings for a small glass! Cards were also to be found there by those who wished to gamble away their hard-earned gains or double them. Places of iniquity these, which abounded everywhere throughout the diggings, and were the nightly resort of hundreds of diggers, and the scene of their wildest orgies on the Sabbath-day.

Leaving the Great Cañon, our travellers—we might almost term them inspectors—came to a creek one raw, wet morning, where a large number of miners where at work. Here they resolved to spend the day, and test the nature of the ground. Accordingly, the vaquero was directed to look after the mules while Frank and Joe went to work with pick, shovel, and pan.

They took the “dirt” from a steep incline considerably above the winter level of the stream, in a stratum of hard bluish clay, almost as hard as rock, with a slight surface-covering of earth. It yielded prodigiously. At night they found that they had washed out gold to the value of forty pounds sterling! The particles of gold were all large, many being the size of a grain of corn, with occasional nuggets intermixed, besides quartz amalgamations.

“If this had been my first experience o’ them there diggin’s,” said Joe Graddy, as he smoked his pipe that night in the chief gambling and drinking store of the place, “I would have said our fortin wos made, all but. Hows’ever, I don’t forget that the last pair o’ boots I got cost me four pound, an’ the last glass o’ brandy two shillin’s—not to speak o’ death cuttin’ an’ carvin’ all round, an’ the rainy season a-comin’ on, so it’s my advice that we ’bout ship for home as soon as may be.”

“I agree with you, Joe,” said Frank, “and I really don’t think I would exchange the pleasure I have derived from journeying through this land, and sketching the scenery, for all the gold it contains. Nevertheless I would not like to be tempted with the offer of such an exchange!—Now, I’ll turn in.”

Next morning the rain continued to pour incessantly, and Frank Allfrey had given the order to get ready for a start, when a loud shouting near the hut in which they had slept induced them to run out. A band of men were hurrying toward the tavern with great haste and much gesticulation, dragging a man in the midst of them, who struggled and protested violently.

Frank saw at a glance that the prisoner was his former companion Bradling, and that one of the men who held him was the stranger who had been so badly wounded by him at the camp-fire, as formerly related.