58 HISTORY OF CALIFORNIA. 



canos. When he had recovered himself a little, he 

 told me that, however great my surprise might be at 

 his unexpected reappearance, it would be much greater 

 when I heard the intelligence he had come to bring 

 me. 'Intelligence,' he added, 'which, if properly 

 profited by, would put both of us in possession of un- 

 heard-of wealth — millions and millions of dollars, in 

 fact.' I frankly own, when I heard this, that I thought 

 something had touched Marshall's brain, when sud- 

 denly all my misgivings were put an end to by his 

 flinging on the table a handful of scales of pure virgin 

 gold. I was fairly thunderstruck, and asked him to 

 explain what all this meant, when he went on to say, 

 that, according to my instructions, he had thrown the 

 mill-wheel out of gear, to let the whole body of the water 

 in the dam find a passage through the tail-race, which 

 was previously too narrow to allow the w T ater to run 

 off in sufficient quantity, whereby the wheel was pre- 

 vented from efficiently performing its work. By this 

 alteration the narrow channel was considerably en- 

 larged, and a mass of sand and gravel carried off by 

 the force of the torrent. Early in the morning after 

 this took place, he (Mr. Marshall) was walking along 

 the left bank of the stream, when he perceived some- 

 thing which he at first took for a piece of opal — a 

 clear transparent stone, very common here — glittering 

 on one of the spots laid bare by the sudden crumbling 

 away of the bank. He paid no attention to this ; but 

 while he was giving directions to the workmen, having 

 observed several similar glittering fragments, his 

 curiosity was so far excited, that he stooped down and 

 picked one of them up. 'Do you know,' said Mr. 

 Marshall to me, ' I positively debated within myself 

 two or three times whether I should take the trouble 



