A Tramp Through the Bret Harte Country Part 3

Without unnecessary delay, therefore, we resumed the march.

It is practically up-hill--"on the collar"--all the way to Colfax, as is plainly evidenced by the heavy railroad grade. About a mile short of the town, we made a digression to an Italian vineyard of note. There, at a long table under a vine-covered trellis that connected the stone cellar with the dwelling-house, we were served with wine by a young woman having the true Madonna features of Sunny Italy, her mother, a comely matron, in the meantime preparing the evening meal, while on the hard ground enc.u.mbered with no superfluous clothing, disported the younger members of the family. And as I sat and smoked the pipe of peace, I reflected upon how much better they do these things in Italy--for to all intents and Purposes, I was in Italy.

Colfax--before the advent of the C. P. R. R. called "Illinois Town"--is an odd blending of past and present; the solid structures of the mining days contrasting strangely with the flimsy wooden buildings that seem to mark a railroad town. We were amazed at the amount of traffic that occurs in the night. Three big overland trains pa.s.sed through in either direction, the interim being filled in with the switching of cars, accompanied apparently with a most unnecessary ringing of bells and piercing shrieks from whistles. Since our hotel was not more than a hundred and fifty feet from the main line, with no intervening buildings to temper the noises, sleep of any consequence was an utter impossibility.

Few Californians are aware, probably, that a considerable amount of tobacco is raised in the foothills of the Sierras. At Colfax, I smoked a very fair cigar made from tobacco grown in the vicinity, and manufactured in the town.

I think we were both glad to leave Colfax. Apart from a nerve-racking night, the mere proximity of the railroad with its accompanying a.s.sociations served constantly to bring to mind all that I had fled to the mountains to escape. Yet I cannot bring myself to agree with those who profess to brand a railroad "a blot on the landscape." The enormous engines which pull the overland trains up the heavy grades of the Sierra Nevada impress one by their size, strength and suggestion of reserve power, as not being out of harmony with the forces of Nature they are constructed to contend with and overcome.

This thought occurred to us as we watched a pa.s.senger train slowly winding its way around the famous Cape Horn, some four miles from Colfax. Although several miles in an air line intervened, one seemed to feel the vibrations in the air caused by the panting monster, while great jets of steam shot up above the pine trees. I confess to a sense of elation at the spectacle. Nature in some of her moods seems so malignant, that I felt proud of this magnificent exhibition of man's victory over the obstacles she so well knows how to interpose.

The road between Colfax and Gra.s.s Valley--the next stopping place on our itinerary--lay through so lovely a country that we pa.s.sed through it as in a dream. Descending into the valley we were joined by several small boys, attracted, I suppose, by our--to them--unusual costume and equipment, who plied us with questions. They asked if "we carried a message for the mayor," and were visibly disappointed when we regretted we had overlooked that formality. For several minutes they kept us busy trying to give truthful answers to most unexpected questions. They had never heard of Tuolumne and wanted to know if it was in California.

Their world, in fact, was bounded by Colfax on the south and Nevada City on the north.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Western Hotel, Gra.s.s Valley. Plate22]

Gra.s.s Valley received its name from the meadow in which the town, for the most part, is situated. The ground is so moist that, notwithstanding the heat, the gra.s.s was a vivid green. Apple trees growing in the gra.s.s, as in the orchards of England and in the Atlantic States, and perfectly healthy, conveyed that suggestion of the Old World which lends a peculiar charm to these towns. And Gra.s.s Valley really is a town, having seven thousand inhabitants; and is, withal, clean, picturesque and altogether delightful. One understood why "Tuolumne" sounded meaningless to those small boys. Thus early in life they were under influences which will probably keep them in after years--as they kept their fathers--permanent citizens of the town of Gra.s.s Valley.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Gra.s.s Valley. Plate21]

Gra.s.s Valley was one of the richest of the old mining camps. There was literally gold everywhere, even in the very roots of the gra.s.s. The mining is now all underground and drifts from the North Star and Ophir mines underlie a part of the town.

After a methodical search, we discovered an excellent restaurant and made a note of it as a recurrent possibility. A judicious choice of a suitable place in which to eat and eke, to pa.s.s the night, is to the tramp a matter of vital interest. Robert Louis Stevenson, in those entertaining narratives "An Inland Voyage" and "Travels with a Donkey,"

lays heartfelt stress on these particulars; when things were not to his liking, roundly denouncing them, but if agreeably surprised, lifting up his voice in song and praise.

Though tempted to pa.s.s the night in Gra.s.s Valley, impelled by curiosity, we pushed on four miles farther, to Nevada City. It is useless to attempt to convey in words the fascination of Nevada City. My friend, who is familiar with the country, said it reminded him of Italy. Houses rise one above the other on the hillside; while down below, the winding streets with their quaint old-time stores and balconied windows, are equally attractive. The horrors of the previous night at Colfax made the quiet peacefulness of Nevada City the more refreshing. At the National Hotel I enjoyed the soundest sleep since leaving home.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Nevada City. Plate23]

In the morning there was a delicious breeze from the mountains, which rendered strolling about the town a pleasure. According to custom, we went our several ways, each drawn by what appealed to him the most at the moment. When ready to depart, finding no trace of my companion at the hotel, I left word that I had returned to Gra.s.s Valley; where an hour or two later, he rejoined me.

More fortunate than I, my friend by chance encountered Mr. Morrison M.

Green, on the street in front of his home upon the hill which looks down upon the town. This gentleman, who is in his eighty-third year, related an almost incredible incident in connection with the fire in 1857, which wiped out the town, with the exception of one house. Three prominent citizens who chanced to have met in a saloon when the fire broke out, having the utmost confidence in the safety of a certain building, on account of its ma.s.sive walls and iron door, made a vow to lock themselves in it, and actually did so. They might perhaps have withstood the ordeal, had not the roof been broken in by the fall of the walls of the adjoining building. The iron door having been warped with the heat, it was impossible to open it; when last seen, they were standing with their arms around one another in the center of the store.

At Gra.s.s Valley, my friend--greatly to my regret and I think also to his own--received word which rendered his return to San Francisco imperative. After a farewell dinner at the restaurant before mentioned, I accompanied him to the railway station, and in the words of Christian in "The Pilgrim's Progress," "I saw him no more in my dream." I confess to a feeling of depression after his departure, for however enjoyable the experiences of the road, they are rendered doubly so by the sympathetic companionship of a man endowed not only with a keen sense of humor but also with an unusual perception of human nature.

After registering at the Holbrooke--a substantial survival of the old times--I called by appointment on Mr. Ben Taylor, a much respected citizen of Gra.s.s Valley and probably the oldest inhabitant of Nevada County, having reached the patriarchal age of eighty-six.

Mr. Taylor has a charming home with extensive grounds overlooking the town and surrounding country. In his garden is a spruce he planted himself forty-five years ago, and apple trees of the same age. The spruce now has the appearance of a forest tree and shades the whole front of the house. His present home was built in 1864 and from all appearances should last the century out. He said the lumber was carefully selected, the boards being heavier than usual, and all the important timbers, instead of being nailed, were morticed and dove-tailed. This thoroughness of workmanship accounts for the excellent condition of the wooden buildings in these towns, many of which were constructed over fifty years ago.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Ben Taylor. Plate06]

Mr. Taylor came to Gra.s.s Valley September 22, 1849, and has lived there almost continuously ever since. He crossed the plains one of twenty-five men, the last of his companions dying in 1905. The little band suffered many hardships, having to be constantly on watch for Indians, though he said they were more fearful of the Mormons. They came over the old emigrant trail across the Sierra Nevada. When they reached Gra.s.s Valley, their Captain, a man named Broughton, exclaimed: "Boys! here's the gold; this is good enough for us!" And there they stayed, the twenty-five of them!

Mr. Taylor had frequently met Mark Twain, but never to his knowledge, Bret Harte. In common with other men who had known the Great American Humorist, Mr. Taylor smiled at the bare mention of his name. Twain's breezy, hail-fellow-well-met manner, combined with his dry humor, insured him a welcome at all the camps; he was a man who would "pa.s.s the time of day" and take a friendly drink with any man upon the road.

Twain, he told me, and a man with whom he was traveling on one occasion, lost their mules. They tracked them to a creek and concluding the mules had crossed it, Twain said to his companion: "What's the use of both of us getting wet? I'll carry you!" The other complying, Twain reached in safety the deepest part of the creek and, purposely or not, dropped him.

A man, to play such pranks as this, must be sure of his standing in a primitive community.

Mr. Taylor is known to everyone in Nevada County as "Ben." His genial manner and kindly nature are apparent at a glance. But while Ben Taylor was on friendly terms with Mark Twain, he was never so intimate with him as with Bayard Taylor, whom, it seems, he much resembled. This accidental likeness, combined with the similarity of names, caused many more or less amusing but embarra.s.sing complications, since they were frequently taken for each other and received each other's correspondence.

I asked Ben Taylor--he rightly dislikes "Mister," perhaps the ugliest and most inappropriate word in the English language--if the shootings and hangings which figure so prominently in the stories of the romancers were not exaggerations. He said he certainly was of that opinion. I said: "As a matter of fact, did you ever see a man either shot or hung for a crime?" "I never did," he replied with emphasis. "But I once came across the bodies of several men who had been strung up for horse-stealing; that, however, was not in Gra.s.s Valley."

Ben Taylor was present when Lola Montez horsewhipped Henry Shibley, editor of the Gra.s.s Valley National, for what she considered derogatory reflections on herself, published in his paper. It can readily be understood that Gra.s.s Valley was at that time a place of importance, when Lola Montez considered it worth while to stay there several years and sing and dance for the miners.

In parting, Ben Taylor told me pathetically that his wife had died a few years before and he had never recovered from the blow; "I am merely marking time until the end comes," he added. Since his married daughter and family live with him, he is a.s.sured in his latter days of loving care and attention.

Chapter VI

E. W. Maslin and His Recollections of Pioneer Days In Gra.s.s Valley.

Origin of Our Mining Laws

To Mr. E. W. Maslin, of Alameda, of whom Ben Taylor said: "He is like a brother to me," I am indebted for information of much interest, bearing on the olden days and Gra.s.s Valley in particular. Mr. Maslin came around the "Horn" to California, in the ship Herman, on May 7, 1853. He arrived in Gra.s.s Valley and went to work as a miner the following morning. He now holds, and has for years, the responsible position in the United States Custom House, San Francisco, of Deputy Naval Officer of the Port.

The clearing papers of every vessel that leaves San Francis...o...b..ar his signature. Although in his eightieth year, his memory is as clear and his sense of humor as vivid as when, a youth of nineteen, he left for good, Maryland, his native state. Few men in the San Francis...o...b..y region are more widely known than he. His ready wit, cheery laugh and fund of information--for he is extremely well-read--always insure for him an attentive and appreciative audience.

Speaking of Ben Taylor, he told me a characteristic incident, which being also typical of the men of '49, I give, with his consent, as related. When the White Pine excitement in 1869 started a rush of prospectors to Nevada, Mr. Maslin caught the fever with the rest. In common with all who dug for gold, he had his ups and downs, the fat years and the lean ones; at the time, his fortunes being at a lew ebb, he joined the stampede. Several years previous to his departure, without informing his wife, he had borrowed of Ben Taylor, three hundred dollars, secured by mortgage on his house in Gra.s.s Valley. At White Pine he met with considerable success, and in a short time sent his wife five hundred dollars, telling her for the first time of the mortgage on their home and requesting her to go to Ben Taylor at once and pay him in full.

It so happened that Taylor had called on Mrs. Maslin for news of her husband, as she was reading this letter. She immediately tendered him the check with the request that he would inform her to what the interest amounted. "Why, Molly," said Ben Taylor, "you surely ought to know me well enough to know I would never take any interest on that money!" When it is remembered that the legal rate of interest at that time was ten per cent, and that double that amount was not infrequently paid--Mr.

Maslin, in fact, expecting to pay Taylor something like five hundred dollars--the att.i.tude of the latter will be the better appreciated.

This seems a fitting place to pay a humble personal tribute of respect to the memory of the men of "the fall of '49 and the spring of '50." Not since the Crusades, when the best blood of Europe was spilt in defense of the Holy Sepulchre, has the world seen a finer body of men than the Argonauts of California. True, the quest of the "Golden Fleece" was the prime motive, but sheer love of adventure for adventure's sake played a most important part. Later on, the turbulent element arrived. It was due to the rect.i.tude, inherent sense of justice and courage of the pioneers that they were held in check and, by force of arms when necessary, made to understand the white man's code of honor.

So much in song and story has been said of the scramble for gold in the early days after the discovery, and so little attention given to the artistic and aesthetic sense of the pioneers, that the general impression made by the famous old mining towns of California, when seen for the first time, may be worth recording. In the ma.s.sive stone hotels and stores of that period, as well as in the careful construction of dwelling houses, they exhibited a true perception of "the eternal fitness of things." The buildings of the fifties, in their extreme simplicity, are far more imposing than the nondescript, pretentious structures of today, and will, beyond doubt, in usefulness outlast them.

As a result of ignoring the checker-board plan, and permitting the streets to follow the natural contour of the hills and ravines, these mountain towns seem to have become blended and to be in harmony with the wonderful setting Nature has provided. All buildings, residential or otherwise, are protected from the summer heat by umbrageous trees.

Lawns of richest green delight the eye, and vines and flowers surround cottages perched on steep hillsides, or half-hidden in deep ravines.

The first glimpse from a distant eminence of any of the old mining towns conveys the suggestion of peaceful homes buried in greenery, basking contentedly in the brilliant sunshine, surrounded by the whispering pines, with the snow-clad peaks of the Sierra Nevada for a background.

You also receive the impression of cleanliness. If there were any old cans, sc.r.a.ps of paper and miscellaneous rubbish lying about in any town through which I pa.s.sed, I did not notice them. One is struck, too, by the absence of the "vacant lot"--that unsightly blot of such frequent occurrence in all towns in the process of building, especially when forced by "booms" beyond their normal growth. Fortunately the very word "boom," in its significance as applied to inflated real estate values, has no meaning in these towns, with the result that they are compact.

One may search in vain for the "house to let" sign. When no more houses were needed, no more houses were built. This compactness of form, cleanliness, and the elimination to a great extent of the rectangular block, contribute in no small measure to that indefinable suggestion of the Old World--a charm that haunts the memory and finally becomes permanent acquisition.

However clever the stories of the romancers--of whom Bret Harte preeminently stands first--after all, their characters were intrinsically but creatures of the imagination; the pioneers were the real thing! Yet such is the nature of this topsy-turvy world, the copies will remain, whilst the originals will fade away and be forgotten!

The writer will always hold it a privilege that he had the pleasure of meeting in the flesh a remnant of the men who laid the foundation of the inst.i.tutions by means of which this great Commonwealth has grown and prospered; big, broad-minded, strong men who, whatever their failings--for they were very human--were generous to a fault, ever ready to listen to the cry of distress or help a fallen brother to his feet, scornful of pettiness, ignorant of sn.o.bbery, fair and square in their dealings with their fellows. Alas, that it should have come to "Hail and Farewell" to such a type of manhood!

At my request, Mr. Maslin, at one time a practicing attorney, dictated the following succinct account of the origin of the mining laws of California. The discovery at Gold Hill, now within the corporate limits of Gra.s.s Valley, of a gold-bearing quartz ledge, subsequently the property of Englishmen who formed an organization known as "The Gold Hill Quartz Mining Company," led to the founding of the mining laws of California. On December 30, 1850, the miners pa.s.sed regulations which had with them the force of laws, defining the location and ownership of mines. It was provided that claims should be forty feet by thirty feet; a recorder was to be elected by the miners and all difficulties arising out of trespa.s.s on claims were to be tried before the recorder and two miners, an appeal to be taken to the justice of the peace.

When quartz lodes began to be discovered and worked, it was found that the location of claims by square feet did not protect the miner or afford sufficient territory upon which to expend his labor. Accordingly a miners' meeting was held in Nevada City on December 20, 1852, and a body of laws prescribed, governing all quartz mines within the county of Nevada. The following were the salient features: "Each proprietor of a quartz claim shall be ent.i.tled to one hundred feet on a quartz ledge or vein; the discoverer shall be allowed one hundred feet additional. Each claim shall include all the dips, angles, and variations of the same."

The remaining articles related to the working, holding and recording of claims. This law was incorporated in the raining legislation of the State of Nevada and has formed the basis of the mining laws of each territory of the United States. Thus we have a proof not only of the intelligence of the early miner, but also of his capacity for self-government. It must be remembered that the miners came from all over the United States, but princ.i.p.ally from the West and the South.

Probably none had seen a quartz ledge before coming to California, yet the necessity for extending a claim as far as the ledge dipped was soon perceived, as also the taking into consideration a change in the direction or course of the lode. Commenting on these laws and the causes leading to their adoption, Mr. Muslin became emphatic. He said:

"No body of rough, uncouth, pistolled ruffians, such as Bret Harte depicts the miners, would have formed such a group of benevolent, far-reaching and comprehensive laws. The early miner represented the best type of American character. He was brave, undeterred by obstacles, enduring with patient fort.i.tude the perils and privations of the long journey of half a year by land, or a tempestuous voyage by sea; undaunted alike by the terrors of Cape Horn or the insidious diseases of the Isthmus of Panama. He met the, to him, hitherto unknown problem of the extraction of gold and solved it with the wisdom and vigor which distinguish the American. Observe that the provision against throwing dirt on another man's claim antic.i.p.ated by many years the famous hydraulic decision of Judge Sawyer. It is another way of stating the maxim of law and equity: 'so use your own property, as not to injure that of another.'"

Mr. Maslin agrees with Ben Taylor that the hangings and shootings of the period following the discovery of gold have been grossly exaggerated.

On this point he said: "I will venture to a.s.sert that in certain of the Mississippi Valley States, in their early settlement, more men were killed in one year than in ten of the early mining years in California."

Of lynching, he said: "There were few lynchings in California, and those mostly in the southern tier of counties, of persons convicted of cattle-stealing." In connection with lynching he related a serio-comic incident that occurred in Gra.s.s Valley in the early days.

Several fires had taken place in the town and the inhabitants were in consequence much excited. A watchman on his rounds espied a light in a vacant log cabin, and entering, caught a man in the act of striking a match. He arrested him and the populace were for taking summary vengeance. A man known as "Blue Coat Osborne" cried out, "Let's hang him! Nevada City once hanged a man and Gra.s.s Valley never did!" This was an effective appeal, for the rivalry that has lasted ever since already existed. Fortunately, wiser counsels prevailed; the man was subsequently tried and acquitted, it appearing that he was a traveling prospector who had merely entered the cabin in order to light his pipe! In this connection, I may state that Mr. Maslin confirmed the story of the three friends in Nevada City, who attempted to withstand "the ordeal by fire."