Ocean to Ocean on Horseback Part 33

Stopped next for the night at Halleck, a small village--over 5,000 feet elevation--thirteen miles from Camp Halleck, where United States troops are occasionally stationed. Leaving Halleck after a night's rest and a hearty breakfast of ham and eggs, I rode twenty-four miles to Elko, six hundred and nineteen miles from San Francisco. This important town stands at an elevation of 5,063 feet above sea-level and is on the Humboldt River. The State University is situated here. Silver smelting works and manufactures of farming implements were the princ.i.p.al industries. One daily and two weekly papers were well supported. There were also three large freight depots for the accommodation of the railway business. I noticed several Indians about the town. The hot mineral springs of Elko are considered of great value for bathing.

Population at the time of my visit, about 1,700, but the town is destined to develop into an important city. The money paid for freights consigned to this place, averaged $1,000,000 a year.

Leaving Elko, I pushed on for thirty miles. The pastures and meadows, with isolated cottages, were soon pa.s.sed and I reached Palisade in the evening, a village of 250 inhabitants. Remained here for the night. For the last two hundred miles the road had been a gradual descent and the change of temperature was very perceptible. Palisade is a growing little place with a population of about 400 souls. It is located about half-way down a canyon, whose rocky, perpendicular walls give it a singular but picturesque appearance.

My mustang carried me forty-one miles next day, to Argentina, where I rested. This village is located in the midst of alkali flats and seemed to me an unattractive place for a residence. Continuing my journey along the foot of Reese River Mountain, I soon found myself at Battle Mountain, at the junction of Reese River and Humboldt valleys. The town of Battle Mountain has several stores, a public hall, a good school house and an excellent hotel; with increasing trade. The mountain from which the town derives its name is about three miles south of the latter and is said to have been the scene of a conflict between a party of emigrants and a band of Indians.

Golconda was reached on the evening of the following day--four hundred and seventy-eight miles from San Francisco. Here are gold and silver mines, but the place was small and calls for no further remark.

Remounted at sunrise the following morning and rode to Winnemucca, the county-seat of Humboldt County. The town has a fine brick Court House, together with several stores, a hotel, shops and a school house.

Reached Humboldt the following day, where I was reminded that I was still in the land of civilization. Stopped at the Humboldt House, a most comfortable hostelry, its surroundings recalling my home in the East.

Humboldt is the business centre of several mining districts and has a bright prospect before it.

Lovelocks, the next point reached, is also on the Central Pacific Railroad. It is a grazing region, and large herds of cattle are fattened upon the rich native gra.s.ses. Leaving Lovelocks, I found myself again on a barren desert, covered in places with salt and alkali deposits.

Another station in the midst of this desert is Hot Springs. Pushing forward I reached Desert, three hundred and thirty-five miles from San Francisco. The village is rightly named, for it is, in truth, a dreary place. I was much relieved on reaching Wadsworth, a town of about 700 inhabitants, and only three hundred and twenty-eight miles from the end of my journey. Some large stores here do a flourishing business. There are also several good hotels, in one of which I was soon comfortably housed. For several days I had seen nothing but dreary, monotonous plains, and now, almost another world opened to my view--a world of beauty and sublimity. It was with reluctance I left Wadsworth and crossed the Truckee River. The trees, green meadows, comfortable farmhouses, and well-tilled fields, were pleasant to look upon, and with the prospect of soon reaching my final destination, I rode on, and crossed the boundary into California.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A ROCKY MOUNTAIN RIVER.]

Truckee, although within the State of California, is in the Sierra Nevada, one hundred and twenty-one miles from Sacramento. The village is handsomely built, the surroundings picturesque and finely timbered, and there is a line of stages running to the beautiful Lakes Tahoe and Donner.

CHAPTER XXIX.

ALONG THE SACRAMENTO.

From Truckee I rode along the line of the Central Pacific Railroad, stopping for the night at villages intermediate between Truckee and Sacramento, the princ.i.p.al of which were Summit, Colfax and Auburn.

Summit is the highest point of the pa.s.s through which the railroad crosses the Sierra Nevada, its height above sea-level being 7,042 feet.

The population was only a little over one hundred. Colfax, fifty-four miles from Sacramento, had a population of nearly six hundred, mostly employed in the gold mines in the vicinity. Auburn, thirty-six miles from Sacramento, is also a gold-mining village. Its population was given me as over 1,200. Two weekly papers are published here, and three hotels offer good accommodations to tourists and others. Sacramento was reached November twenty-first, and here I found myself within a hundred miles of my destination.

California has the Pacific Ocean for its western boundary. Along the seaboard lies the Coast Range of mountains, while for an eastern boundary of the State stretch the Sierras. Between these two chains lies many a hill, yet, in the main, the whole interior of the State is a great depression, called the Valley of California. The northern portion is called again the Sacramento Valley; the southern, the Valley of San Joaquin, both named for the streams that water them.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A LAKE IN THE SIERRA NEVADAS.]

The inhabitants are a motley set; English, Celts, Spaniards, Mexicans, Indians, and above all the man from the eastern part of the United States, leaving his impress on all, Americanizing all.

Sutter's Fort, as already explained, was founded in 1839, very near the junction of the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys, by a Swiss named John A. Sutter. It stood on a small hill, skirted by a creek which falls into the American River near its junction with the Sacramento, and overlooked a vast extent of ditch-enclosed fields, and park stock ranges, broken by groves and belts of timber. The settlement consisted of the Fort and an old adobe house, called the hospital. A garden of eight or ten acres, filled with vegetables and tropical fruits, surrounded the Fort, cattle covered the plains and boats were tied to the wharves.

Sutter's confirmed grant contained eleven leagues.

The Fort, so called, was a parallelogram. Its walls were of adobe, its dimensions five hundred by one hundred and fifty feet. It had loop-holes, bastions at the angles, and twelve cannon.

Inside of the walls were granaries, warehouses, storehouses, shops, and in the centre of it all the house of the commander, the potentate, Sutter. His house was rough, "Bare rafters and unpanelled walls." Many of the rooms were roughly furnished, crude benches and deal tables. Fine China bowls did duty for both cups and plates, and silver spoons were the only luxury which marked the service of the meals.

For his private apartments Sutter obtained from the Russians a clumsy set of California laurel furniture.

In front of his house, yet within the stockade, was a tiny square containing one bra.s.s gun, by which, day and night, paced a sentry, stopping only at the belfry post to chime the hours.

The Fort was a business centre. In it was located a blacksmith, a carpenter, and a general variety and liquor store. Prices were booming.

Four dollars were charged for shoeing a horse. Wheat sold for one dollar per bushel, peas for a dollar and a half per bushel.

A sort of gravel road led to the spot, over which horses galloped, and heavy wagons rolled.

Sutter owned twelve thousand cattle, two thousand horses and mules, from one thousand to fifteen hundred sheep, and two thousand hogs.

This unique Fort was "the capital of the vast interior valley, pregnant with approaching importance."

In 1846, Sutter staked out the town of Sutterville, three miles below the Fort on the Sacramento, and built the first house there. His example was shortly followed by a man named Zims, who erected the first real brick structure in the State.

The Fort and town kept up regular communication with San Francis...o...b.. means of a twenty-ton sloop owned by Sutter, and manned by a few savages in his employ.

There was a ferry at the Fort, which consisted of a single canoe handled by an Indian.

The strangest of populations gathered about the settlement. Emigrants were there, many Mormons among them. Native Californians were there, wearing sombreros, sashes, and jingling spurs. Half-subdued Indians abounded, wrapped in their blankets, and decked with beads and feathers.

While here and there appeared a shrewd Yankee, come across mountains of snow and rocks to seek his fortune.

The climate of Sacramento is charming, the average temperature in winter being 45; that in summer 69. The thermometer does not vary ten degrees between night and day. The sea breezes are constant, leaving rarely an uncooled night. Rainfall is a tenth less than on the Atlantic Coast.

Early autumn finds this region dry and arid; its small streams dried up, the green fields sere, the weeds snapping like gla.s.s.

The winter rain begins in November, after six months of clear weather, and under its grateful ministry the region "buds and blossoms like the rose."

John A. Sutter, potentate of the region, in 1847, needed lumber, and therefore needed a saw-mill. His neighbors wanted lumber, too, and there would be a good market for it in San Francisco. Therefore a saw-mill would be profitable; but no trees suitable for this purpose could be found short of the foot-hills. Consequently the foot-hills were selected as the spot upon which he would build.

He engaged a motley company of all nationalities to erect his mill, appointing James Wilson Marshall, a native of New Jersey, as superintendent of the venture.

In August they started for their new field of enterprise, taking their belongings in Mexican ox-carts, and driving a flock of sheep before them for food.

By New Year's day, 1848, the mill frame was up.

On the afternoon of January twenty-fourth, Superintendent Marshall was inspecting the tail-race of the mill. There had been a heavy flood, which had previously retreated, and to his surprise Marshall found the ground thickly strewn with a peculiar yellow dust. He stooped down and gathered some of it, remarking quietly, "Boys, I believe I have found a gold mine!" Then he began some simple tests upon the metal. Gold must be heavy. He weighed it. That was all right. Gold must be malleable. He bit and pounded it, and it stood the test. Then he applied _aqua fortis_ to it, and it responded as it should. And so the truth was known at last.

It was gold, and the ground was full of it.

Marshall saddled his horse, and dashed over to consult with Sutter, and together they agreed to keep the matter quiet, and if possible to buy up the surrounding land. But how to buy it. That was the question! They leased it from its semi-barbaric owners, paying for it in hats and trinkets, but that t.i.tle seemed insecure. The Mexican government could no longer give grants. The United States government was appealed to in vain. The answer came that California was held as a conquered province, and no t.i.tle deed could be executed.

And meantime the precious secret leaked out. Sutter was impelled to write the wonderful news to friends at a distance. All the men at the saw-mill knew of the discovery. One of them, named Bennett, while in a store near Monte del Diablo, pulled out of his pocket a bag of gold dust, exclaiming, "I have something here which will make this the greatest country in the world." The same man took a specimen of the precious metal and showed it at San Francisco. A few days later an intoxicated Swede offered, at a store, to pay for his drink in gold dust. Then a Mormon must tell his fellow-saints of the discovery. So the secret was out, and the precious mystery became public.

Both Sutter and Marshall were backwoodsmen, unsophisticated, child-like, trustful, slow. They hesitated, they faltered, they delayed mining, and they were lost! Before they fully comprehended the matter, the great world had rushed in, and taken possession of the treasure.

In the last issue of _The Californian_ appears this only too true statement: "The whole country from San Francisco to Los Angeles, and from the sea-sh.o.r.e to the base of the Sierra Nevada, resounds to the sordid cry of gold! GOLD!! GOLD!!! while the field is left half planted, the house half built, and everything neglected but the manufacture of shovels and pick-axes, and the means of transportation to the spot where one man obtained one hundred and twenty-eight dollars' worth of the real stuff in one day's washing, and the average for all concerned is twenty dollars per diem."

In the rush Marshall and Sutter were crushed.

Marshall had little or no money to invest. He was particularly unfortunate in locating his small claims. Worst of all, the miners, knowing him to be the great discoverer, followed him _en ma.s.se_, believing that he knew the secrets of the hills and rivers. The crowds so overwhelmed him, that he had no chance to mine. They even threatened to hang him if he did not lead them to the finest diggings. In a few years after, he died, miserable, broken-hearted, poverty-stricken.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A CASCADE BY THE ROADSIDE.]

Sutter fared but little better. True, he sold a half-interest in his saw-mill for six thousand dollars, and he gained something from the mining of his Indians, but Sutter's Fort was, for the time being, ruined. Let him tell the story in his own words. He says: