The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 Part 16

There was another dear old lady to whom I took the largest kind of a liking, she was so exquisitely neat. Although she too had no floor, her babe always had on a clean white dress, and face to match. She was about four feet high, and had a perfect pa.s.sion for wearing those frightful frontpieces of false hair with which the young women of L.

were once in the habit of covering their abundant tresses. She used to send me little pots of fresh b.u.t.ter,--the first that I had tasted since I left the States,--beautifully stamped, and looking like ingots of virgin gold. I, of course, made a dead-set at the frontpiece, though I do believe that to this distorted taste, and its accompanying horror of a cap, she owed the preservation of her own beautiful hair. To please me she laid it aside, but I am convinced that it was restored to its proud eminence as soon as I left the valley, for she evidently had a "sneaking kindness" for it that nothing could destroy. I have sometimes thought that she wore it from religious principle, thinking it her duty to look as old as possible, for she appeared fifteen years younger when she took it off. She told me that in crossing the plains she used to stop on Sat.u.r.days, and taking everything out of the wagons, wash them in strong lye, to which precaution she attributed the perfect health which they all enjoyed (the _family_, not the wagons) during the whole journey.

There is one thing for which the immigrants deserve high praise, and that is, for having adopted the bloomer dress (frightful as it is on all other occasions) in crossing the plains. For such an excursion it is just the thing.

I ought to say a word about the dances which we used to have in the barroom, a place so low that a _very_ tall man could not have stood upright in it. One side was fitted up as a store, and another side with bunks for lodgers. These bunks were elegantly draperied with red calico, through which we caught dim glimpses of blue blankets. If they could only have had sheets, they would have fairly been enveloped in the American colors. By the way, I wonder if there is anything _national_ in this eternal pa.s.sion for blue blankets and red calico. On ball-nights the bar was closed, and everything was very quiet and respectable. To be sure, there was some danger of being swept away in a flood of tobacco-juice, but luckily the floor was uneven, and it lay around in puddles, which with care one could avoid, merely running the minor risk of falling prostrate upon the wet boards in the midst of a galopade.

Of course the company was made up princ.i.p.ally of the immigrants. Such dancing, such dressing, and such conversation, surely was never heard or seen before. The gentlemen generally were compelled to have a regular fight with their fair partners before they could drag them onto the floor. I am happy to say that almost always the stronger vessel won the day, or rather night, except in the case of certain timid youths, who, after one or two attacks, gave up the battle in despair.

I thought that I had had some experience in bad grammar since I came to California, but these good people were the first that I had ever heard use right royal _we_ instead of _us_. Do not imagine that all, or even the larger part, of the company were of this description. There were many intelligent and well-bred women, whose acquaintance I made with extreme pleasure.

After reading the description of the inconveniences and discomforts which we suffered in the American Valley,--and I can a.s.sure you that I have not at all exaggerated them,--you may imagine my joy when two of our friends arrived from Indian Bar for the purpose of accompanying us home. We took two days for our return, and thus I was not at all fatigued. The weather was beautiful, our friends amusing, and F. well and happy. We stopped at night at a rancho where they had a tame frog.

You cannot think how comic it looked hopping about the bar, quite as much at home as a tame squirrel would have been. I had a bed made up for me at this place, on one end of a long dining-table. It was very comfortable, with the trifling drawback that I had to rise earlier than I wished, in order that what had been a bed at night might become a table by day.

We stopped at the top of the hill and set fire to some fir-trees. Oh, how splendidly they looked, with the flames leaping and curling amid the dark green foliage like a golden snake fiercely beautiful. The shriek which the fire gave as it sprang upon its verdant prey made me think of the hiss of some furious reptile about to wrap in its burning folds its helpless victim.

With what perfect delight did I re-enter my beloved log cabin. One of our good neighbors had swept and put it in order before my arrival, and everything was as clean and neat as possible. How grateful to my feet felt the thick warm carpet; how perfect appeared the floor, which I had once reviled (I begged its pardon on the spot) because it was not exactly even; how cozy the old faded-calico couch; how thoroughly comfortable the four chairs (two of them had been thoroughly rebottomed with brown sail-cloth, tastefully put on, with a border of carpet-tacks); how truly elegant the closet-case toilet-table, with the doll's looking-gla.s.s hanging above, which showed my face (the first time that I had seen it since I left home) some six shades darker than usual; how convenient the trunk, which did duty as a wash-stand, with its vegetable-dish instead of a bowl (at the rancho I had a pint tin pan when it was not in use in the kitchen); but, above and beyond all, how superbly luxurious the magnificent bedstead, with its splendid hair mattress, its clean, wide linen sheets, its nice square pillows, and its large, generous blankets and quilts. And then the cozy little supper, arrayed on a table-cloth, and the long, delightful evening afterwards, by a fragrant fire of beech and pine, when we talked over our past sufferings. Oh, it was delicious as a dream, and almost made amends for the three dreadful weeks of pleasuring in the American Valley.

LETTER _the_ TWENTY-THIRD

[_The_ PIONEER, _December_, 1855]

MINING FAILURES--DEPARTURE _from_ INDIAN BAR

SYNOPSIS

Dread of spending another winter at Indian Bar. Failure of nearly all the fluming companies. Official report of one company. Incidental failure of business people. The author's preparations to depart.

Prediction of early rains. High prices cause of dealers' failure to lay in supply of provisions. Probable fatal results to families unable to leave Bar. Rain and snow. The Squire a poor weather prophet. Pack-mule trains with provisions fail to arrive. Amus.e.m.e.nt found in petty litigation. Legal ac.u.men of the Squire. He wins golden opinions. The judgment all the prevailing party gets. What the constable got in effort to collect judgment. Why Dr. C.'s fee was not paid. A prescription of "calumny and other pizen doctor's stuff". A wonderful gold specimen in the form of a basket. "Weighs about two dollars and a half". How little it takes to make people comfortable. A log-cabin meal and its table-service. The author departs on horseback from Indian Bar.

Her regrets upon leaving the mountains. "Feeble, half-dying invalid not recognizable in your now perfectly healthy sister."

Letter _the_ Twenty-third

MINING FAILURES--DEPARTURE _from_ INDIAN BAR

_From our Log Cabin_, INDIAN BAR,

_November_ 21, 1852.

I suppose, Molly dear,--at least, I flatter myself,--that you have been wondering and fretting a good deal for the last few weeks at not hearing from Dame Shirley. The truth is, that I have been wondering and fretting _myself_ almost into a fever at the dreadful prospect of being compelled to spend the winter here, which, on every account, is undesirable.

To our unbounded surprise, we found, on our return from the American Valley, that nearly all the fluming companies had failed. Contrary to every expectation, on arriving at the bed-rock no gold made its appearance. But a short history of the rise, progress, and final fate of one of these a.s.sociations, given me in writing by its own secretary, conveys a pretty correct idea of the result of the majority of the remainder.

"The thirteen men, of which the American Fluming Company consisted, commenced getting out timber in February. On the 5th of July they began to lay the flume. A thousand dollars were paid for lumber which they were compelled to buy. They built a dam six feet high and three hundred feet in length, upon which thirty men labored nine days and a half. The cost of said dam was estimated at two thousand dollars. This company left off working on the twenty-fourth day of September, having taken out, in _all_, gold-dust to the amount of forty-one dollars and seventy cents!

Their lumber and tools, sold at auction, brought about two hundred dollars."

A very small amount of arithmetical knowledge will enable one to figure up what the American Fluming Company made by _their_ summer's work.

This result was by no means a singular one. Nearly every person on the river received the same stepmother's treatment from Dame Nature in this her mountain workshop.

Of course the whole world (_our_ world) was, to use a phrase much in vogue here, "dead broke." The shopkeepers, restaurants, and gambling-houses, with an amiable confidingness peculiar to such people, had trusted the miners to that degree that they themselves were in the same moneyless condition. Such a batch of woeful faces was never seen before, not the least elongated of which was F.'s, to whom nearly all the companies owed large sums.

Of course with the failure of the golden harvest Oth.e.l.lo's occupation was gone. The ma.s.s of the unfortunates laid down the shovel and the hoe, and left the river in crowds. It is said that there are not twenty men remaining on Indian Bar, although two months ago you could count them up by hundreds.

We were to have departed on the 5th of November, and my toilet-table and wash-hand-stand, duly packed for that occasion, their occupation _also_ gone, have remained ever since in the humble position of mere trunks. To be sure, the expressman called for us at the appointed time, but, unfortunately, F. had not returned from the American Valley, where he had gone to visit a sick friend, and Mr. Jones was not willing to wait even one day, so much did he fear being caught in a snowstorm with his mules. It was the general opinion, from unmistakable signs, that the rainy season would set in a month earlier than common, and with unusual severity. Our friends urged me to start on with Mr. Jones and some other acquaintances, and leave F. to follow on foot, as he could easily overtake us in a few hours. This I decidedly refused to do, preferring to run the fearful risk of being compelled to spend the winter in the mountains, which, as there is not enough flour to last six weeks, and we personally have not laid in a pound of provisions, is not so indifferent a matter as it may at first appear to you. The traders have delayed getting in their winter stock, on account of the high price of flour, and G.o.d only knows how fatal may be the result of this selfish delay to the unhappy mountaineers, many of whom, having families here, are unable to escape into the valley.

It is the twenty-first day of November, and for the last three weeks it has rained and snowed alternately, with now and then a fair day sandwiched between, for the express purpose, as it has seemed, of aggravating our misery, for, after twelve hours of such sunshine as only our own California can show, we were sure to be gratified by an exceedingly well got up tableau of the deluge, _without_ that ark of safety, a mule team, which, sister-Anna-like, we were ever straining our eyes to see descending the hill. "There! I hear a mule-bell," would be the cry at least a dozen times a day, when away we would all troop to the door, to behold nothing but great brown raindrops rushing merrily downward, as if in mockery of our sufferings. Five times did the Squire, who has lived for some two or three years in the mountains, and is quite weather-wise, solemnly affirm that the rain was over for the present, and five times did the storm-torrent of the next morning give our prophet the lie. In the mean while we have been expecting, each day, the advent of a mule train. Now the rumor goes that Clark's mules have arrived at Pleasant Valley, and now that Bob Lewis's train has reached the Wild Yankee's, or that Jones, with any quant.i.ty of animals and provisions, has been seen on the brow of the hill, and will probably get in by evening. Thus constantly is alternating light and gloom in a way that nearly drives me mad.

The few men that have remained on the Bar have amused themselves by prosecuting one another right and left. The Squire, bless his honest, lazy, Leigh Huntish face, comes out strong on these occasions. He has p.r.o.nounced decisions which, for legal ac.u.men, brilliancy, and acuteness, would make Daniel Webster, could he hear them, tear his hair to that extent--from sheer envy--that he would be compelled to have a wig ever after. But, jesting apart, the Squire's course has been so fair, candid, and sensible, that he has won golden opinions from all; and were it not for his insufferable laziness and good nature, he would have made a most excellent justice of the peace. The prosecuting party generally "gets judgment," which is about all he _does_ get, though sometimes the constable is more fortunate, as happened to-day to our friend W., who, having been detained on the Bar by the rain, got himself sworn into the above office for the fun of the thing. He performs his duties with great delight, and is always accompanied by a guard of honor, consisting of the majority of the men remaining in the place. He entered the cabin about one hour ago, when the following spicy conversation took place between him and F., who happened to be the prosecutor in this day's proceedings.

"Well, old fellow, did you see Big Bill?" eagerly inquired F.

"Yes," is the short and sullen reply.

"And what did you _get_?" continued his questioner.

"I got THIS!" savagely shouts the amateur constable, at the same time pointing with a grin of rage to a huge swelling on his upper lip, gleaming with all the colors of the rainbow.

"What did you do then?" was the next meek inquiry.

"Oh, I came away," says our brave young officer of justice. And indeed it would have been madness to have resisted this delightful Big Bill, who stands six feet four inches in his stockings, with a corresponding amount of bone and muscle, and is a star of the first magnitude in boxing circles. F. saved the creature's life last winter, having watched with him three nights in succession. He refuses to pay his bill "'cos he gin him _calumny_ and other pizen doctor's stuff." Of course poor W. got dreadfully laughed at, though I looked as solemn as possible while I stayed him with cups of coffee, comforted him with beefsteaks and onions, and coaxed the wounded upper lip with an infinite succession of little bits of brown paper drowned in brandy.

I wish that you could see _me_ about these times. I am generally found seated on a cigar-box in the chimney-corner, my chin in my hand, rocking backwards and forwards (weaving, you used to call it) in a despairing way, and now and then casting a picturesquely hopeless glance about our dilapidated cabin. Such a looking place as it is! Not having been repaired, the rain, pouring down the outside of the chimney, which is inside of the house, has liquefied the mud, which now lies in spots all over the splendid tin mantelpiece, and festoons itself in graceful arabesques along the sides thereof. The lining overhead is dreadfully stained, the rose-garlanded hangings are faded and torn, the sofa-covering displays picturesque glimpses of hay, and the poor, old, worn-out carpet is not enough to make india-rubbers desirable.

Sometimes I lounge forlornly to the window and try to take a bird's-eye view of outdoors. First, now a large pile of gravel prevents my seeing anything else, but by dint of standing on tiptoe I catch sight of a hundred other large piles of gravel, Pelion-upon-Ossa-like heaps of gigantic stones, excavations of fearful deepness, innumerable tents, calico hovels, shingle palaces, ramadas (pretty arbor-like places, composed of green boughs, and baptized with that sweet name), half a dozen blue and red shirted miners, and one hatless hombre, in garments of the airiest description, reclining gracefully at the entrance of the Humboldt in that transcendental state of intoxication when a man is compelled to hold on to the earth for fear of falling off. The whole Bar is thickly peppered with empty bottles, oyster-cans, sardine-boxes, and brandied-fruit jars, the harsher outlines of which are softened off by the thinnest possible coating of radiant snow. The river, freed from its wooden-flume prison, rolls gracefully by. The green and purple beauty of these majestic old mountains looks lovelier than ever, through its pearl-like network of foaming streamlets, while, like an immense concave of pure sapphire without spot or speck, the wonderful and never-enough-to-be-talked-about sky of California drops down upon the whole its fathomless splendor. The day happens to be the inner fold of one of the atmospheric sandwiches alluded to above. Had it been otherwise, I doubt whether I should have had spirit enough to write to you.

I have just been called from my letter to look at a wonderfully curious gold specimen. I will try to describe it to you; and to convince you that I do not exaggerate its rare beauty, I must inform you that two friends of ours have each offered a hundred dollars for it, and a blacksmith in the place--a man utterly unimaginative, who would not throw away a red cent on a _mere_ fancy--has tried to purchase it for fifty dollars. I wish most earnestly that you could see it. It is of unmixed gold, weighing about two dollars and a half. Your first idea on looking at it is of an exquisite little basket. There is the graceful cover with its rounded nub at the top, the three finely carved sides (it is triformed), the little stand upon which it sets, and the tiny clasp which fastens it. In detail it is still more beautiful. On one side you see a perfect W, each finely shaded bar of which is fashioned with the nicest exactness. The second surface presents to view a Grecian profile, whose delicately cut features remind you of the serene beauty of an antique gem. It is surprising how much expression this face contains, which is enriched by an oval setting of delicate beading. A plain triangular s.p.a.ce of burnished gold, surrounded with bead-work similar to that which outlines the profile, seems left on purpose for a name. The owner, who is a Frenchman, decidedly refuses to sell this gem, and you will probably never have an opportunity to see that the same Being who has commanded the violet to be beautiful can fashion the gold, crucibled into metallic purity within the earth's dark heart, into shapes as lovely and curious.

To my extreme vexation, Ned, that jewel of cooks and fiddlers, departed at the first approach of rain, since when I have been obliged to take up the former delightful employment myself. Really, everybody ought to go to the mines, just to see how little it takes to make people comfortable in the world. My ordinary utensils consist of,--item, one iron dipper, which holds exactly three pints; item, one bra.s.s kettle of the same size; and item, the gridiron, made out of an old shovel, which I described in a former letter. With these three a.s.sistants I perform absolute wonders in the culinary way. Unfortunately, I am generally compelled to get three breakfasts, for sometimes the front-stick _will_ break, and then down comes the bra.s.s kettle of potatoes and the dipper of coffee, extinguishing the fire, spilling the breakfast, wetting the carpet, scalding the dog, waking up F. from an eleven-o'clock-in-the-day dream, and compelling poor me to get up a second edition of my morning's work on safer and more scientific principles.

At dinner-time some good-natured friend carves the beef at a stove outside, on condition that he may have a plate and knife and fork at our table. So when that meal is ready I spread on the said table, which at other times does duty as a china-closet, a quarter of a sheet, which, with its three companion quarters, was sanctified and set apart, when I first arrived here, for that sacred purpose. As our guests generally amount to six or eight, we dispense the three teaspoons at the rate of one to every two or three persons. All sorts of outlandish dishes serve as teacups. Among others, wine-gla.s.ses and tumblers--there are always plenty of these in the mines--figure largely. Last night, our company being larger than usual, one of our friends was compelled to take his tea out of a soup-plate. The same individual, not being able to find a seat, went outside and brought in an empty gin-cask, upon which he sat, sipping iron tablespoonfuls of his tea, in great apparent glory and contentment.

F. has just entered, with the joyful news that the expressman has arrived. He says that it will be impossible for mule trains to get in for some time to come, even if the storm is really over, which he does not believe. In many places on the mountains the snow is already five feet in depth, although he thinks that, so many people are constantly leaving for the valley, the path will be kept open, so that I can make the journey with comparative ease on his horse, which he has kindly offered to lend me, volunteering to accompany F., and some others who will make their exodus at the same time, on foot. Of course I shall be obliged to leave my trunks, merely taking a change of linen in a carpet bag. We shall leave to-morrow, whether it rain or snow, for it would be madness to linger any longer.

My heart is heavy at the thought of departing forever from this place.

I _like_ this wild and barbarous life. I leave it with regret. The solemn fir-trees, whose "slender tops _are_ close against the sky"

here, the watching hills, and the calmly beautiful river, seem to gaze sorrowfully at me as I stand in the moonlighted midnight to bid them farewell. Beloved, unconventional wood-life; divine Nature, into whose benign eyes I never looked, whose many voices, gay and glad, I never heard, in the artificial heart of the busy world,--I quit your serene teachings for a restless and troubled future. Yes, Molly, smile if you will at my folly, but I go from the mountains with a deep heart-sorrow.

I took kindly to this existence, which to you seems so sordid and mean.

Here, at least, I have been contented. The "thistle-seed," as you call me, sent abroad its roots right lovingly into this barren soil, and gained an unwonted strength in what seemed to you such unfavorable surroundings. You would hardly recognize the feeble and half-dying invalid, who drooped languidly out of sight as night shut down between your straining gaze and the good ship Manilla as she wafted her far away from her Atlantic home, in the person of your _now_ perfectly healthy sister.