The Sierra citizen., 1854-09-16

|
got anything more than experiecne; that's
something, however, we astertained how
far east the gold range extended.
The gold diggers nowadays think thai
we were fools to spehd our time prospect
ing, enduring prisation and hunger, while
other people dug the gold. Short-sighted
green-horns l have No patience with
them. Now and then one comes along
and the first word is chow long have you
been in the county?" "Since Forty-nine,
I reply meekly. "Well want to know
Reckon you've made pretty considera
BILE pile, hain't You? Be ye-ou from down
tu Bangor ?" This from some old itiarried
fogie, who has got twelve months leave
of absence, and keeps everlastingly whiD.
ing about going home. Poor nah he
made great mistake wheh he left angling
for mackerel! We have ''some on EN-
down here, who are going home as soon
as they can raise a hundred dollars =
Heaven help them! These are the men
who hang upon California, eating out her
substance; still she sustains them, and still
they curse the udders Whence they draw
their life, just as the changeling brat for
sakes his adopted mother after she is ema;
ciated, and he can nd fiiote fatteri Un her
breast:
Sometimes 1 wonder What would have
becohe Of these hombres, had they been
here in '49, but recollect an instance.
When l was coming up in ls49, somewhere
about Dobbins Ranch, met two or three
fellows streaking it below, faster than ever
the Lot Family went across the Plain
| made some inquiry about the up river
country, but they told me it was no use
going up the Yuba; it was all dug out,
and that l had better 60 back to the
American river. Just think of the Yuba
river being dug out in the fall of Forty
nine! But to my story about the gold
range.
Whoever goes five miles east of the
Buttes, on the South fork, to look for
gold, will go on bootless errand. He
may get the cUlor-that is one speck in
three pans full; enough perhaps to cause
him to fool away his time, but he will fe-
turn rather poorer than he went. We
had all to learn in our first expeditions;
had we known that the ranges ran nearly
north and south VIE could have kept upon
them, but this had to be learned by toiling
over the hills, day after day, and arriving
at conclusions by hard experience.
l once went on an expedition beyond
the Buttes, going up the ridge above Ka-
naka Flat. 1t was hard road to travel
with our heavy packs, and before night
we were glad to camp on the ridge, and
melt snow to make our tea. In the morn
ing we descended to the little valley back
Of the Buttes and attempted to sink hole
by the side of snow-bank some twenty
or thirty feet high, but we could not raise
the color, and pretty soon returned. You
are not to suppose that we were discours
aged, we only went back to take new
start, after the snow was gone.
1t now seems to me the extreme of mad-
moss to leave claims paying three or four
ounces day, loading themselves with
blankets and provisions, and toiling over
the mountains in search of-they hardly
knew what, the hot sun beating down
upon them, and their eyes well nigh put
out by the reflection from the snow; but
you too have been guilty of the same folly,
as we'll as myself, so am not solitary
example.
question whether you could get up an
old fashioned prospecting party now, un-
less indeed it be party of the old settlers,
and should you ever undertake to do so
again, never allow greenhorn or a mar
ried man to go; the first, thinks the hills
so distressingly steep, wishes he were in
diggings "where he could make grub"
threatening all the while to return to the
river and hire out; the other wants some
money to send home to his wife, he has
come out with the intention of making a
small fortune, and he sees the sun 90 down
with regret every day in which he has
been unsuccessful, and he rolls up in his
blankets whimpering at his hard luck, and
cursing the evil hour in which he parted
with Susy and the little 'uns, more particu-
larly if the little 'uns are not numerous.-
In the mean time we old bachelors rolled
up in our blankets and made ourselves
comfortable, watching the light. Of the