Over the prairies, toward the sandy
Humboldt, long emigrant trains are crawling toward the golden canyons
of the Sierras. The restless blood of the Mexican War pours across
the Gila deserts and the sandy wastes of the Colorado.
The Creole boy learns that he, too, can work with pick, pan,
cradle, rocker, at the long tom, sluice, and in the tunnel drift.
The world is mad for gold. New York and New Orleans pour shiploads
of adventurers in by Panama and Nicaragua. Sailing vessels from
Europe, fleets around the Horn, vessels from Chile, Mexico, Sandwich
Islands, and Australia crowd each other at the Golden Gates.
In San Francisco six months show ten thousand madmen. Tent, hut,
shanty, shed, even pretentious houses appear. Uncoined nuggets,
glittering gold dust in grains and powder, prove the harvest is
real.
The Indians and lazy Californians are crowded out of the diggings.
The superior minds among the priests and rancheros can only explain
the long ignorance of the gold deposits by the absolute brutishness of
the hill tribes. Their knowledge of metals was absolutely nothing.
Beyond flint-headed spears, their bows and arrows, and a few mats,
baskets, and skin robes, they had no arts or useful handicraft.
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