Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 — Letter 20

_September_ 4, 1852. If I could coax some good-natured fairy or some mischievous Puck to borrow for me the pen of Grace Greenwood, Fanny Forester, or Nathaniel P.

Willis, I might be able to weave my stupid nothings into one of those airy fabrics the value of which depends entirely upon the skillful work, or rather penmanship, which distinguishes it.

I have even fancied that if I could steal a feather from the living opal swinging like a jeweled pendulum from the heart of the great tiger-lily which nods its turbaned head so stately within the mosquito-net cage standing upon the little table, my poor lines would gather a certain beauty from the rainbow-tinted quill with which I might trace them.

But as there is nobody magician enough to go out and shoot a fairy or a brownie and bind it by sign and spell to do my bidding, and as I have strong doubts whether my coarse fingers would be able to manage the delicate pen of a humming-bird even if I could have the heart to rob my only remaining pet of its brilliant feathers, I am fain to be content with one of "Gillott's Best,"--no, of "C. R.

Sheton's Extra Fine," although I am certain that the sentences following its hard stroke will be as stiff as itself.

If they were only as bright, one might put up with the want of grace, but to be stiff and stupid both, is _too_ provoking, is it not, dear M.?

However, what must be, must be; and as I have nothing to write about, and do not possess the skill to make that nothing graceful, and as you will fret yourself into a scold if you do not receive the usual amount of inked pages at the usual time, why, of course I am bound to act (my first appearance on _any_ stage, I flatter myself in _that_ character) the very original part of the _bore_, and you must prepare to be bored with what philosophy you may.

But, without further preface, I will begin with one of the nothings.

A

few days after the death of the unfortunate Spaniard, related in my last letter, a large log, felled by some wickedly careless woodman, rolled down from one of the hills, and so completely extinguished the little ramada in which our poor friend lay at the time of his death that you would never have imagined from the heap of broken branches that remain that it had once been a local habitation with such a pretty name.

Providentially, at the time of the accident, none of those who had been in the habit of staying there were within.

If Senor Pizarro had survived the amputation of his leg, it would only have been to suffer a still more terrible death,--an accident which would have deepened, if possible, the gloom which we have suffered during the melancholy summer.

There has been another murder committed within a few miles of this place, which has given us something to gossip about, for the committee of vigilance had the good nature, purely for our amusement I conclude, to apprehend a lucky individual (I call him _lucky_ advisedly, for he had all his expenses paid at the Humboldt, was remunerated for his lost time, enjoyed a holiday from hard work, had a sort of guard of honor composed of the most respectable men on the river, and was of more consequence for four days than ever he had been in the whole of his insignificant little life before) whom somebody fancied bore a faint resemblance to the description of the murderer.

This interesting lion--I was so fortunate as to catch a glimpse of him one morning, and am convinced that he would "roar you as gently as any sucking dove"--was fully cleared from the suspected crime; and if, before his acquittal, one might have fancied from the descriptions of his countenance that none but that of Mephistopheles in the celebrated picture of the Game of Life could equal its terrific malignity, after-accounts drew it a very Saint John's for sweet serenity of expression.

What was then called sullenness now took the name of resignation, and stupidity was quiet contempt.

Indeed, I began to fear that they would give him a public triumph, and invite me to make the flag with which to grace it.

I confess that I would almost have voted him a procession myself, in gratitude for the amusement which he had given us.

However, the committee were content with making him a handsome apology and present, and paying his expenses at the Humboldt.

O public opinion in the mines, thou art in truth a _cruel_ thing, but, thank God, most _fickle_!

The other day we were invited by a Spanish friend to breakfast at a garden situated half a mile from The Junction, and owned by another Spaniard.

It was a lovely morning in the latter part of August, and as we started about six o'clock, the walk was a most delightful one.

The river, filled with flumes, dams, etc. , and crowded with busy miners, was as much altered from its old appearance as if an earthquake had frightened it from its propriety.

I suppose that you are quite worn out with descriptions of walks, and I will spare you this once.

I will not tell you how sometimes we were stepping lightly over immense rocks which a few months since lay fathoms deep beneath the foaming Plumas; nor how sometimes we were walking high above the bed of the river, from flume to flume, across a board connecting the two; nor how now we were scrambling over the roots of the upturned trees, and now jumping tiny rivulets; nor shall I say a single word about the dizziness we felt as we crept by the deep excavations lying along the road, nor of the beautiful walk at the side of the wing-dam (it differs from a common dam, in dividing the river lengthways instead of across), the glittering water rising bluely almost to a level with the path.

I do not think that I will ever tell you about the impromptu bath which one of the party took by tumbling accidentally into the river as he was walking gallantly behind us, which said bath made him decidedly disagree in our enthusiastic opinion of the loveliness of the promenade.

No; I shall not say a single word upon any of these subjects, but leave them all to your vivid imagination.

Corkscrews could not draw a solitary sentence from me, now that I have made up my mind to silence.

But I _will_ tell you about the driftings in the side of the hill, which we visited on our way,--not so much from a precious desire of enlightening your pitiable ignorance upon such subjects, you poor, little, untraveled Yankee woman!

but to prove to you that, having fathomed the depths of shafts, and threaded the mazes of coyote-holes, I intend to astonish the weak nerves of stay-at-homes, if I ever return to New England, by talking learnedly upon such subjects, as one having authority.

These particular "claims" consist of three galleries lying about eighty feet beneath the summit of the hill, and have already been drifted from one hundred and fifty to two hundred feet into its side.

They are about five feet in height, slightly arched, the sides and roof, formed of rugged rocks, dripping with moisture, as if sweating beneath the great weight above.

Lights are placed at regular distances along these galleries to assist the miners in their work, and boards laid on the wet ground to make a convenient path for the wheelbarrows which convey the dirt and sand to the river for the purpose of washing it.

Wooden beams are placed here and there to lessen the danger of caving in, but I must confess that in spite of this precaution I was at first haunted with a horrible feeling of insecurity.

As I became reassured I repeated loudly those glorious lines of Mrs. Hemans commencing with-- For the strength of the hills we bless thee, O God, our fathers' God!

And a strange echo the gray rocks sent back, as if the mine-demons, those ugly gnomes which German legends tell us work forever in the bowels of the earth, were shouting my words in mockery from the dim depths beyond.

These claims have paid remarkably well, and if they hold out as they have commenced, the owners will gather a small fortune from their summer's work.

There is nothing which impresses me more strangely than the fluming operations.

The idea of a mighty river being taken up in a wooden trough, turned from the old channel along which it has foamed for centuries perhaps, its bed excavated many feet in depth, and itself restored to its old home in the fall,--these things strike me as almost a blasphemy against nature, And then the idea of men succeeding in such a work here in the mountains, with machinery and tools of the poorest description, to say nothing of the unskilled workmen,--doctors, lawyers, ministers, scholars, gentlemen, farmers, etc. When we arrived at the little oak-opening described in a former letter, we were, of course, in duty bound to take a draft from the spring, which its admirers declare is the best water in all California.

When it came to my turn, I complacently touched the rusty tin cup, though I never _did_ care much for water, in the abstract, _as_ water.

Though I think it very useful to make coffee, tea, chocolate, and other good drinks, I could never detect any other flavor in it than that of _cold_, and have often wondered whether there was any truth in the remark of a character in some play, that, ever since the world was drowned in it, it had tasted of sinners!

When we arrived at what may be called, in reference to the Bar, the country-seat of Don Juan, we were ushered into the parlor, two sides of which opened upon the garden and the grand old mountains which rise behind it, while the other two sides and the roof were woven with fresh willow boughs, crisply green, and looking as if the dew had scarcely yet dried from the polished leaves.

After opening some cans of peaches, and cutting up some watermelons gathered from the garden, our friends went in to, or rather _out_ to, the kitchen fire (two or three stones are generally the extent of this useful apartment in the mines) to assist in preparing the breakfast--and _such_ a breakfast!

If "Tadger could do it when it chose," so can we miners.

We had--but what did we _not_ have?

There were oysters which, I am sure, could not have been nicer had they just slid from their shells on the shore at Amboy; salmon, in color like the red, red gold; venison with a fragrant spicy gusto, as if it had been fed on cedar-buds; beef cooked in the Spanish fashion,--that is, strung onto a skewer and roasted on the coals,--than which I never tasted better; preserved chicken; and almost every possible vegetable bringing up the rear.

Then, for drinkables, we had tea, coffee, and chocolate;

champagne, claret, and porter, with stronger spirits _for_ the stronger spirits.

We lacked but one thing.

That was ice; which we forgot to bring from the Bar.

As, only four miles from our cabin, the snow never melts, that is a luxury we are never without, and, indeed, so excessively warm has been the season, that without it, and the milk which has been brought us daily from a rancho five miles from here, we should have suffered.

I must say that even though we had no ice, our mountain picnic, with its attendant dandies in their blue and red flannel shirts, was the most charming affair of the kind that I ever attended.

On our return we called to see Yank's cub, which is fast rising into young grizzly-bearhood.

It is about the size of a calf, very good-natured, and quite tame.

Its acquirements, as yet, are few, being limited to climbing a pole.

Its education has not been conducted with that care and attention which so intelligent a beast merits, but it is soon, I hear, to be removed to the valley and placed under teachers capable of developing its wonderful talents to the utmost.

We also stopped at a shanty to get a large gray squirrel which had been promised to me some days before; but I certainly am the most unfortunate wretch in the world with pets.

This spiteful thing, on purpose to annoy me I do believe, went and got itself drowned the very night before I was to take it home.

It is always so.

I never had two humming-birds, With plumage like a sunset sky, But one was sure to fly away, And the other one was sure to die.

I never nursed a flying-squirrel, To glad me with its soft black eye, But it always ran into somebody's tent, Got mistaken for a rat and killed!

There, M. ; there is poetry for you.

"Oh, the second verse doesn't rhyme."

--"Doesn't?"

--"And it ain't original, is it?"

Well, _I_ never heard that rhyme was necessary to make a poet, any more than colors to make a painter.

And what if Moore _did_ say the same thing twenty years ago?

I am sure any writer would consider himself lucky to have an idea which has been anticipated but _once_.

I am tired of being a "mute inglorious Milton," and, like that grand old master of English song, would gladly write something which the world would not willingly let die; and having made that first step, as witness the above verses, who knows what will follow?

Last night one of our neighbors had a dinner-party.

He came in to borrow a teaspoon.

"Had you not better take them all?"

I said.

"Oh, no," was the answer; "that would be too much luxury.

My guests are not used to it, and they would think that I was getting aristocratic, and putting on airs.

One is enough; they can pass it round from one to the other."

A blacksmith--not the learned one--has just entered, inquiring for the Doctor, who is not in, and he is obliged to wait.

Shall I write down the conversation with which he is at this moment entertaining me?

"Who writ this 'ere?"

is his first remark, taking up one of my most precious books, and leaving the marks of his irreverent fingers upon the clean pages.

"Shakespeare," I answer, as politely as possible.

"Did Spokeshave write it?

He was an almighty smart fellow, that Spokeshave, I've hear'n tell," replies my visitor.

"I must write hum and tell our folks that this 'ere is the first carpet I've seen sin' I came to Californy, four year come next month," is his next remark.

For the last half-hour he has been entertaining me with a wearisome account of the murder of his brother by an Irishman in Boston, and the chief feeling which he exhibits is a fear that the jury should only bring in a verdict of manslaughter.

But I hear F.' s step, and his entrance relieves me from the bore.

I am too tired to write more.

Alas, dear M. this letter is indeed a stupid one--a poor return for your pregnant epistles.

It is too late to better it.

The express goes at eight in the morning.

The midnight moon is looking wonderingly in at the cabin window, and the river has a sleepy murmur that impels me irresistibly bedward.

LETTER _the_ TWENTY-FIRST [_The_ PIONEER, _October_, 1855] DISCOMFORTS _of_ TRIP _to_ POLITICAL CONVENTION SYNOPSIS

Visit to the American Valley.

Journey thither.

Scenes by the way.

Political convention.

Delegates from Indian Bar.

Arrival at Greenwood's Rancho, headquarters of Democrats.

Overcrowded.

Party proceed to the American Rancho, headquarters of Whigs.

Also overcrowded.

Tiresome ride of ladies on horseback.

Proceed to house of friend of lady in party.

An inhospitable reception, but the author entertains herself.

Men of party return to American Rancho.

Inroad upon the eatables.

Landlord aghast, but pacified by generous orders for drinkables.

California houses not proof against eavesdroppers.

Misunderstandings and explanations overheard by the author.

Illness of hostess.

Uncomfortable and miserable night, and worse quarters.

Handsome riding-habit, etc. , of the hostess.

Table-service, carpeting, chests of tea, casks of sugar, bags of coffee, etc. , "the good people possessed everything but a house".

"The most beautiful spot I ever saw in California".

Owner building house of huge hewn logs.

The author returns to the American Rancho.

Its primitive furniture, etc. Political visitors.

The convention.

Horse-racing and gambling.

The author goes to Greenwood's Rancho.

More primitive furniture and lack of accommodations.

Misplaced benevolence of Bostonians.

Should transfer their activities to California.