Gold

by White, Stewart Edward

  As the sun declined, the wind fell. Fortunately the current in the river was hardly perceptible. We slipped along on glassy waters. Thousands upon thousands of blackbirds dipped across us uttering their calls. Against a saffron sky were long lines of waterfowl, their necks outstretched. A busy multitudinous noise of marsh birds rose and fell all about us. The sun was a huge red ball touching the distant hills.

  At last the wind failed us entirely, but the sailor got out a pair of sweeps, and we took turns rowing. Within a half hour we caught the silhouette of three trees against the sky, and shortly landed on a little island of solid ground. Here we made camp for the night.

  All next day, and the days after, being luckily favoured by steady fair winds, we glided up the river. I could not but wonder at the certainty with which our sailor picked the right passage from the numerous false channels that offered themselves. The water was beautifully clear and sweet; quite different from the muddy currents of to-day. Shortly the solid ground had drawn nearer; so that often we passed long stretches of earth standing above the tule-grown water. Along these strips grew sycamore and cottonwood trees of great size, and hanging vines of the wild grape. The trees were as yet bare of leaves, but everything else was green and beautiful. We could see the tracks of many deer along the flats, but caught no sight of the animals themselves. At one place, however, we did frighten a small band of half a dozen elk. They crashed away recklessly through the brush, making noise and splashing enough for a hundred. Yank threw one of his little pea bullets after them; and certainly hit, for we found drops of blood. The sailor shook his head disparagingly over the size of the rifle balls, to Yank’s vast disgust. I never saw him come nearer to losing his temper. As a matter of fact I think the sailor’s contention had something in it; the long accurate weapon with its tiny missile was probably all right when its user had a chance to plant the bullet exactly in a fatal spot, but not for such quick snap shooting as this. At any rate our visions of cheap fresh meat vanished on the hoof.

  The last day out we came into a wide bottomland country with oaks. The distant blue hills had grown, and had become slate-gray. At noon we discerned ahead of us a low bluff, and a fork in the river; and among the oak trees the gleam of tents, and before them a tracery of masts where the boats and small ships lay moored to the trees. This was the embarcadero of Sutter’s Fort beyond; or the new city of Sacramento, whichever you pleased. Here our boat journey ended.

  We disembarked into a welter of confusion. Dust, men, mules, oxen, bales, boxes, barrels, and more dust. Everything was in the open air. Tents were pitched in the open, under the great oaks, anywhere and everywhere. Next, the river, and for perhaps a hundred yards from the banks, the canvas structures were arranged in rows along what were evidently intended to be streets; but beyond that every one simply “squatted” where he pleased. We tramped about until we found a clear space, and there dumped down our effects. They were simple enough; and our housekeeping consisted in spreading our blankets and canvas, and unpacking our frying pan and pots. The entire list of our provisions consisted of pork, flour, salt, tea, coffee, sugar, tobacco, and some spirits.

  After supper we went out in a body to see what we could find out concerning our way to the mines. We did not even possess a definite idea as to where we wanted to go!

  In this quest we ran across our first definite discouragement. The place was full of men and they were all willing to talk. Fully three quarters were, like ourselves, headed toward the mines; and were consequently full of theoretical advice. The less they actually knew the more insistent they were that theirs was the only one sure route or locality or method. Of the remainder probably half were the permanent population of the place, and busily occupied in making what money they could. They were storekeepers, gamblers, wagon owners, saloonkeepers, transportation men. Of course we could quickly have had from most of these men very definite and practical advice as to where to go and how to get there; but the advice would most likely have been strongly tempered with self-interest. The rest of those we encountered were on their way back from the mines. And from them we got our first dash of cold water in the face.

  According to them the whole gold-fable was vastly exaggerated. To be sure there was gold, no one could deny that, but it occurred very rarely, and in terrible places to get at. One had to put in ten dollars’ worth of work, to get out one dollars’ worth of dust. And provisions were so high that the cost of living ate up all the profits. Besides, we were much too late. All the good claims had been taken up and worked out by the earliest comers. There was much sickness in the mines, and men were dying like flies. A man was a fool ever to leave home but a double-dyed fool not to return there as soon as possible. Thus the army of the discouraged. There were so many of them, and they talked so convincingly, that I, for one, felt my golden dream dissipating; and a glance at Johnny’s face showed that he was much in the same frame of mind. We were very young; and we had so long been keyed up so high that a reaction was almost inevitable. Yank showed no sign; but chewed his tobacco imperturbably.

  We continued our inquiries, however, and had soon acquired a mass of varied information. The nearest mines were about sixty miles away; we could get our freight transported that far by the native Californian cargadores at fifty dollars the hundredweight. Or we could walk and carry our own goods. Or we might buy a horse or so to pack in our belongings. If we wanted to talk to the cargadores we must visit their camp over toward the south; if we wanted to buy horses we could do nothing better than to talk to McClellan, at Sutter’s Fort. Fifty dollars a hundred seemed pretty steep for freighting; we would not be able to carry all we owned on our backs; we decided to try to buy the horses.

  Accordingly next morning, after a delicious sleep under the open sky, we set out to cover the three or four miles to Sutter’s Fort.

  This was my first sight of the California country landscape, and I saw it at the most beautiful time of year. The low-rolling hills were bright green, against which blended the darker green of the parklike oaks. Over the slopes were washes of colour where the wild flowers grew, like bright scarves laid out in the sun. They were of deep orange, or an equally deep blue, or, perhaps, of mingled white and purple. Each variety, and there were many of them, seemed to grow by itself so that the colours were massed. Johnny muttered something about “the trailing glory–banners of the hills”; but whether that was a quotation or just Johnny I do not know.

  The air was very warm and grateful, and the sky extraordinarily blue. Broad-pinioned birds wheeled slowly, very high; and all about us, on the tips of swaying bushes and in the tops of trees, thousands of golden larks were singing. They were in appearance like our meadow-larks back east, but their note was quite different; more joyous and lilting, but with the same liquid quality. We flushed many sparrows of different sorts; and we saw the plumed quail, the gallant, trim, little, well-groomed gentlemen, running rapidly ahead of us. And over it all showered the clear warmth of the sun, like some subtle golden ether that dissolved and disengaged from the sleeping hills multitudinous hummings of insects, songs of birds, odours of earth, perfumes of flowers.

  In spite of ourselves our spirits rose. We forgot our anxious figurings on ways and means, our too concentrated hopes of success, our feverish, intent, single-minded desire for gold. Three abreast we marched forward through the waving, shimmering wild oats, humming once more the strains of the silly little song to which the gold seekers had elected to stride:

  “I soon shall be in mining camps,

  And then I’ll look around,

  And when I see the gold-dust there,

  I’ll pick it off the ground.

  “I’ll scrape the mountains clean, old girl,

  I’ll drain the rivers dry;

  I’m off for California.

  Susannah, don’t you cry!”

  Even old Yank joined in the chorus, and he had about as much voice as a rusty windmill, and about the same idea of tune as a hog has of war.

  “Oh, Susan
nah! don’t you cry for me!

  I’m off to California with my washbowl on my knee!”

  We topped a rise and advanced on Sutter’s Fort as though we intended by force and arms to take that historic post.

  *

  PART III

  THE MINES

  *

  CHAPTER XIV

  SUTTER’S FORT

  Sutter’s Fort was situated at the edge of the live-oak park. We found it to resemble a real fort, with high walls, bastions, and a single gate at each end through which one entered to a large enclosed square, perhaps a hundred and fifty yards long by fifty wide. The walls were not pierced for guns; and the defence seemed to depend entirely on the jutting bastions. The walls were double, and about twenty-five feet apart. Thus by roofing over this space, and dividing it with partitions, Sutter had made up his barracks, blacksmith shop, bakery, and the like. Later in our investigations we even ran across a woollen factory, a distillery, a billiard room, and a bowling alley! At the southern end of this long space stood a two-story house. Directly opposite the two-story house and at the other end of the enclosure was an adobe corral.

  The place was crowded with people. A hundred or so miners rushed here and there on apparently very important business, or loafed contentedly against the posts or the sun-warmth of adobe walls. In this latter occupation they were aided and abetted by a number of the native Californians. Perhaps a hundred Indians were leading horses, carrying burdens or engaged in some other heavy toil. They were the first we had seen, and we examined them with considerable curiosity. A good many of them were nearly naked; but some had on portions of battered civilized apparel. Very few could make up a full suit of clothes; but contented themselves with either a coat, or a shirt, or a pair of pantaloons, or even with only a hat, as the case might be. They were very swarthy, squat, villainous-looking savages, with big heads, low foreheads, coarse hair, and beady little eyes.

  We stopped for some time near the sentry box at the entrance, accustoming ourselves to the whirl and movement. Then we set out to find McClellan. He was almost immediately pointed out to us, a short, square, businesslike man, with a hard gray face, dealing competently with the pressure. A score of men surrounded him, each eager for his attention. While we hovered, awaiting our chance, two men walked in through the gate. They were accorded the compliment of almost a complete silence on the part of those who caught sight of them.

  The first was a Californian about thirty-five or forty years of age, a man of a lofty, stern bearing, swarthy skin, glossy side whiskers, and bright supercilious eyes. He wore a light blue short jacket trimmed with scarlet and with silver buttons, a striped silk sash, breeches of crimson velvet met below by long embroidered deerskin boots. A black kerchief was bound crosswise on his head entirely concealing the hair; and a flat-crowned, wide, gray hat heavily ornamented with silver completed this gorgeous costume. He moved with the assured air of the aristocrat. The splendour of his apparel, the beauty of his face and figure, and the grace of his movements attracted the first glance from all eyes. Then immediately he was passed over in favour of his companion.

  The latter was a shorter, heavier man, of more mature years. In fact his side whiskers were beginning to turn gray. His costume was plain, but exquisitely neat, and a strange blend of the civil and the military. The jacket for example, had been cut in the trim military fashion, but was worn open to exhibit the snowy cascade of the linen beneath. But nobody paid much attention to the man’s dress. The dignity and assured calm of his face and eye at once impressed one with conviction of unusual quality.

  Johnny stared for a moment, his brows knit. Then with an exclamation, he sprang forward.

  “Captain Sutter!” he cried.

  Sutter turned slowly, to look Johnny squarely in the face, his attitude one of cold but courteous inquiry. Johnny was approaching, hat in hand. I confess he astonished me. We had known him intimately for some months, and always as the harum-scarum, impulsive, hail fellow, bubbling, irresponsible. Now a new Johnny stepped forward, quiet, high-bred, courteous, self-contained. Before he had spoken a word, Captain Sutter’s aloof expression had relaxed.

  “I beg your pardon for addressing you so abruptly,” Johnny was saying. “The surprise of the moment must excuse me. Ten years ago, sir, I had the pleasure of meeting you at the time you visited my father in Virginia.”

  “My dear boy!” cried Sutter. “You are, of course the son of Colonel Fairfax. But ten years ago–you were a very young man!”

  “A small boy, rather,” laughed Johnny.

  They chatted for a few moments, exchanging news, I suppose, though they had drawn beyond our ear-shot. In a few moments we were summoned, and presented; first to Captain Sutter, then to Don Gaspar Martinez. The latter talked English well. Yank and I, both somewhat silent and embarrassed before all this splendour of manner, trailed the triumphal progress like two small boys. We were glad to trail, however. Captain Sutter took us about, showing us in turn all the many industries of the place.

  “The old peaceful life is gone,” said he. “The fort has become a trading post for miners. It is difficult now to get labour for my crops, and I have nearly abandoned cultivation. My Indians I have sent out to mine for me.”

  He showed us a row of long troughs outside the walls to which his Indian workmen had come twice a day for their rations of wheat porridge. “They scooped it out with their hands,” he told us, “like animals.” Also he pointed out the council circle beneath the trees where he used to meet the Indians. He had great influence with the surrounding tribes; and had always managed to live peacefully with them.

  “But that is passing,” said he. “The American miners, quite naturally, treat them as men; and they are really children. It makes misunderstanding, and bloodshed, and reprisals. The era of good feeling is about over. They still trust me, however, and will work for me.”

  Don Gaspar here excused himself on the ground of business, promising to rejoin us later.

  “That trouble will come upon us next,” said Captain Sutter, nodding after the Spaniard’s retreating form. “It is already beginning. The Californians hold vast quantities of land with which they do almost nothing. A numerous and energetic race is coming; and it will require room. There is conflict there. And their titles are mixed; very mixed. It will behoove a man to hold a very clear title when the time comes.”

  “Your own titles are doubtless clear and strong,” suggested Johnny.

  “None better. My grant here came directly from the Mexican government itself.” The Captain paused to chuckle, “I suspect that the reason it was given me so freely was political–there existed at that time a desire to break up the power of the Missions; and the establishment of rival colonies on a large scale would help to do that. The government evidently thought me competent to undertake the opening of this new country.”

  “Your grant is a large one?” surmised Johnny.

  “Sixty miles by about twelve,” said Captain Sutter.

  We had by now finished our inspection, and stood by the southern gate.

  “I am sorry,” said Captain Sutter, “that I am not in a position to offer you hospitality. My own residence is at a farm on the Feather River. This fort, as no doubt you are aware, I have sold to the traders. In the changed conditions it is no longer necessary to me.”

  “Do you not regret the changed conditions?” asked Johnny after a moment. “I can imagine the interest in building a new community–all these industries, the training of the Indians to work, the growing of crops, the raising of cattle.”

  “One may regret changed conditions; but one cannot prevent their changing,” said Captain Sutter in his even, placid manner. “The old condition was a very pleasant dream; this is a reality.”

  We walked back through the enclosure. Our companion was greeted on all sides with the greatest respect and affection. To all he responded with benign but unapproachable dignity. From the vociferating group he called the trader, McClellan, to whom he introduced us, al
l three, with urbane formality.

  “These young men,” he told McClellan, who listened to him intently, his brows knit, “are more than acquaintances, they are very especial old friends of mine. I wish to bespeak your good offices for what they may require. They are on their way to the mines. And now, gentlemen, I repeat, I am delighted to have had this opportunity; I wish you the best of luck; and I sincerely hope you may be able to visit me at Feather River, where you are always sure of a hearty welcome. Treat them well, McClellan.”

  “You know, Cap’n, friends of your’n are friends of mine,” said McClellan briefly.

  At the end of half an hour we found ourselves in possession of two pack-horses and saddles, and a load of provisions.

  “Look out for hoss thieves,” advised McClellan. “These yere Greasers will follow you for days waitin’ for a chance to git your stock. Don’t picket with rawhide rope or the coyotes are likely to knaw yore animiles loose. Better buy a couple of ha’r ropes from the nearest Mex. Take care of yoreselves. Good-bye.” He was immediately immersed in his flood of business.

  We were in no hurry to return, so we put in an hour or so talking with the idlers. From them we heard much praise for Sutter. He had sent out such and such expeditions to rescue snow-bound immigrants in the mountains; he had received hospitably the travel-worn transcontinentals; he had given freely to the indigent; and so on without end. I am very glad that even at second hand I had the chance to know this great-hearted old soldier of Charles X while in the glory of his possessions and the esteem of men. Acre by acre his lands were filched from him; and he died in Washington vainly petitioning Congress for restitution.