CHAPTER V. 



COLONEL FREMONT'S FIFTH EXPEDITION, AND POLITICAL 



HONORS. 



THUS did this intrepid explorer labor to obtain 

 a secure and practicable path which might conduct 

 him to Sacramento. He may be said to have then 

 thrown open, with his own hands, the golden gates 

 of that new El Dorado, which have since glittered 

 from afar upon the delighted vision of so many 

 myriads of ardent and enthusiastic adventurers. 

 His journey lay upon the straight line of the thirty- 

 eighth and thirty-ninth degrees. It is the same 

 route which prudence and wise policy indicate as 

 the one best adapted for the completion of the Ame- 

 rican Central Pacific Railway, when that great na- 

 tional work, so necessary to the future development 

 of the resources and capacities of the Confederacy, 

 shall be accomplished. 



On his arrival in California, Colonel Fremont 

 expected to settle and reside there permanently. In 

 1847, he had purchased a large tract of land, con- 

 taining seventy square miles, termed the Mariposas 



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