ELDORADO 135 



by gravity while the miners stood upon either side and 

 shoveled ui the auriferous earth. Finally the hydraulic 

 process was adopted, the most rapid and efficacious of 

 all. 



The first quartz lead discovered and worked was by 

 Alvinza Hayward, on Rancheri creek in Amador coun- 

 ty, near where I was placer mining at the time. I be- 

 lieve that after the lapse of 50 years it is still valuable. 



The day after my arrival in Placerville, I left for 

 Live Oak bar, on the South Fork, three miles due 

 north, hoping to make a strike to replenish my nearly 

 exhausted finances. Meeting with a small mining par- 

 ty whom 1 had known 'back in the States," I was 

 welcomed as one of their number. 

 . We remained there a couple of weeks, realizing only 

 fair compensation for our labor, and then went 12 

 miles down the river to Coloma. This is where gold 

 was first discovered on January 19, 1848, by James W. 

 Marshall, who had contracted to build a sawmill for 

 Gen. John A. Sutter. He had turned the waters of the 

 river into the race in order to widen and deepen it, and 

 when the water was turned ofif he noticed several yel- 

 low particles in the sand, and picked up a number of 

 them, one weighing several pennyweights. The news 

 of the discovery did not reach San Francisco until Feb- 

 ruary, 1848. Then followed such an excitement as 

 the world had never before seen. Its thrill went to 

 the remotest corners of the earth, and caused among all 

 classes the most intense excitement. The eyes and 

 thoughts of all men turned to California as the land 

 of promise, and suddenly all ways seemed to lead to 

 her golden shores. 



Here, within 100 yards of the old millrace, we built a 



