174 HISTORY OF CALIFORNIA. 



seem, conclusive evidence respecting the quantity of 

 gold remaining undiscovered in the quartz veins. It 

 is not probable that the gold in the dry diggings, and 

 that in the rivers — the former in lumps, the latter in 

 dust — was created by different processes. That which 

 is found in the rivers has undoubtedly been cut or 

 worn from the veins in the rock, with which their 

 currents have come in contact. All of them appear 

 to be equally rich. This is shown by the fact that a 

 laboring man may collect nearly as much in one river 

 as he can in another. They intersect and cut through 

 the gold region, running from east to west at irregu- 

 lar distances of fifteen to twenty, and perhaps some 

 of them thirty, miles apart. 



" Hence it appears that the gold veins are equally 

 rich in all parts of that most remarkable section of 

 country. Were it wanting, there are further proofs 

 of this in the ravines and dry diggings, which uni- 

 formly confirm what nature so plainly shows in the 

 rivers." 



It is an interesting inquiry — what was the amount 

 of the golden treasure collected during the years 1848 

 and '49 ? The satisfaction of this inquiry will enable 

 us to form some faint conception of the value of the 

 gold region, and the dependence which may be placed 

 upon its yield for a commercial return. Premising 

 that the gold was first discovered in May, 1848, and 

 that intelligence of it was not received in the United 

 States till late in the following autumn, Mr. King, in 

 his report, proceeds in making an estimate of the 

 quantity accumulated till the close of 1849 : 



a No immigration into the mines could, therefore, 

 have taken place from the old States in that year. 

 The number of miners was, consequently, limited to 



