230 MULE-HUNTING EXPEDITION. 
inlet or a lagoon; the rocks underlying the shingle 
have all the appearance, when denuded by the 
washing, of sea-wear. I try with a powerful 
lens to detect gold amidst the material they are 
washing, but not a trace is discoverable, and yet 
it pays an immense profit to the gold-washers. 
Hunt’s Hill is a timbered mountain, about 
3,500 feet in altitude. Washing its base is the 
Greenhorn river, on the banks of which some 
very rich gold-washings are carried on, as well 
as at’ Bear Creek, on the opposite slope of the 
ridge. Clothing the hill, towering high above 
the shanties of the miners, the sugar and nut- 
pines wave lazily; the immense cones of the 
latter, plentifully besprmnkling the ground, af- 
ford a feast to the Indians and lesser rodent 
mammals. 
March 29th.—Return to Marysville. Visited 
another hydraulic washing at Timbuctoo, on the 
Yuba river, much the same as that seen at Ne- 
vada. Marysville is about the third best city in 
California, situated on the bank of the Feather 
river, which is rapidly filling up, from the im- 
mense quantity of material brought down from 
the hydraulic washings. A single peach-orchard 
I visited was 200 acres, all fenced, and the 
trees in beautiful health; from it, I am told, 
