THE EAKLY DAYS OF CALIFORNIA. 159 



more on her corn, and wool, and tides, her wine, her grapes, oranges, and other fruits, 

 and on innumerable industries. Reader, you have eaten bread made from California wheat 

 it fetches a high price in Liverpool on account of its fine quality ; you may have been clothed 

 in California wool, and your boots made of her leather; more than likely you have drunk 

 California wine, of which large quantities are shipped to Hamburgh, where they are watered 

 and doctored for the rest of Europe, and exported under French and German names; your 

 head may have been shampooed with California borax ; and your watch-chain was probably, 

 and some of your coin assuredly, made from the gold of the Golden State. 



This is not a book on "The Land," but two or three stories of Californian life in 

 the early days may, however, be forgiven. The first is of a man who had just landed 

 from a ship, and who offered a somewhat seedy-looking customer, lounging on the wharf, 

 a dollar to carry his portmanteau. He got the reply, " I'll give you an ounce of 

 gold to see you carry it yourself." The new arrival thought he had come to a splendid 

 country, and shouldered his burden like a man, when the other, a successful gold-finder, 

 not merely gave him his ounce little less than 4 sterling but treated him to a 

 bottle of champagne, which cost another ounce. The writer can well believe the story, for 

 he paid two and a half dollars nearly half a guinea for an Illustrated London News, 

 and two dollars for a copy of Punch, in the Cariboo mines, in 1863 ; while a friend 

 now retired on a competency in England started a little weekly newspaper, the size of a 

 sheet of foolscap, selling it for one dollar (is. 2d.) per copy. He was fortunately not merely 

 a competent writer, but a practical printer. He composed his articles on paper first, and 

 then in type ; worked the press, delivered them to his subscribers, collected advertisements and 

 payments, and no doubt would have made his own paper if rags had not been too 

 costly ! 



A sailor purchased, about the year 1849, in an auction-room, while out on a "spree," 

 the lots of land on which the Plaza, one of the most important business squares of San 

 Francisco, now stands. He went off again, and after several years cruising about the world, 

 returned to find himself a millionaire. The City Hall stands on that property; it is 

 surrounded by offices, shops, and hotels, and very prettily planted with shrubs, grass-plots, 

 and flowers. 



There was a period when females were so scarce in California that the miners and farm- 

 hands, ay, and farmers and proprietors too a large number of these were old sailors would 

 travel any distance merely to see one.* At this present time any decent English housemaid 

 receives twenty dollars (4) per month, and is " found," while a superior servant, a first-class 

 cook, or competent housekeeper, gets anything from thirty dollars upwards. 



Theatres at San Francisco were once rude buildings of boards and canvas, and the 

 stalls were benches. A story is told that at a performance at such a house quite a 

 commotion was caused by the piercing squall of a healthy baby brought in by a mother 

 who, perhaps, had not had any amusement for a year or two, and most assuredly had no 

 servant with whom to leave it at home which was heard above the music. " Here, you 



* At the Cariboo mines, British Columbia, in 1863, there were 7,000 men on the various creeka, There were 

 not over a dozen women there ! 



