290 . RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA. 
southwestern part of the county. The diggings are mostly in 
the basins of Clear Creek, Cottonwood Creek, Rock Creek, 
and Salt Creek, all of which enter into the Sacramento. There 
are four quartz-mills in the county, one at French Gulch, one 
at Middle Creek, one at Muletown, and one at Old Diggings. 
The county has twenty-seven mining ditches, with a joint length 
of one hundred and forty-one miles, an average of five miles 
each. The chief mining towns are Shasta, Horsetown, French 
Gulch, Muletown, Briggsville, Whiskey, and Middletown. 
§ 220. Plumas and Sierra—South of the eastern part of 
Shasta county lies Plumas, which is about seventy miles square. 
About one-third of the county, in the southwestern part of it, 
comprising that portion drained by the head-waters of Feather 
River, is anriferous. It lies high above the level of the sea, 
and the work of mining is interrupted during a considerable 
portion of the winter, by cold, snow, and ice. Hydraulic and 
tunnel claims in deep hills, furnish a large portion of the gold 
yield of the county. There are five quartz-mills, one at Eliza- 
bethtown, one at Eureka Lake, and three at Jamison Creek. 
The principal mining towns are Quincy, Jamison City, Indian 
Bar, Nelson’s Point, and Poorman’s Creek. 
South of Plumas is Sierra county, which is fifty miles long 
from east to west and twenty miles wide from north to south. 
The North Fork of the Yuba River runs through its cen- 
tre, and the Middle Fork is its southern boundary. Though 
small, it is one of the richest mining counties of the state, and 
in proportion to the extent of its mining ground, is much 
richer than any other county. All its territory is four thou- 
sand feet above the sea-level, at the lowest. Most of the min- 
ing is done in hydraulic and tunnel] claims in deep hills. Near 
the centre of the county is a mountain called the Downieville 
Butte, or the Yuba Butte, eight thousand eight hundred and 
forty-six feet high, on the sides of which are found some rich 
guartz leads. In 1859 there were eleven quartz-mills in Sierra 
county, of which seven are at the Butte, two at Downieville, 
one at the Mountain House, and one at Sierra City. The 
