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the current, and after traversing the whole length of the sluice, are thrown out at the lower end. The operation, as in the hydraulic or hose process, with which the sluice is always combined, is a continuous one, and requires comparatively little labor or attention, except to keep the sluice from clogging. In some localities, where the depth of the auriferous gravel and overlying clay and soil is not great,

FREMONT'S RANCHE.

water may be used to as great advantage in the sluice as under pressure. It has this advantage, that the auriferous earth may be washed as high up as the source of supply. The process is a close imitation of the operations of nature in concentrating gold in the deposits along the streams."

Quartz mining is the reduction to powder of the vein stone, which contains the gold, which is extracted from the powder by means of water, quicksilver, etc. There are so many practical difficulties in the way that it is very rarely attended with success, as the expenses eat up the profits, the gold not usually averaging more than one cent in a pound of rock. The quartz works at Allison's Ranche, in Grass Valley, and those at Fremont's Ranche, in Bear Valley, are worked to great profit. Col. Fremont's mines produce gold to

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the value of several hundred thousand dollars per annum, though at an immense outlay for mills, waterworks, etc. His great mine, it is supposed, contains 10 millions of dollars worth of gold above the water level of the Merced, from near which it rises up a pyramid of gold-bearing quartz, inclosed in a mountain of slate.

Marysville, the chief town of northern California, is located at the junction of the Yuba and Feather Rivers, just above their union with the Sacramento, about 40 miles north of Sacramento City. It is a well built town, principally of brick, and at the head of navigation in the direction of the northern mines. The country around it is of great fertility, and the town itself rapidly growing. Population about 16,000.

In the vicinity of Marysville, and easterly, toward the slopes of the Sierra Nevada, are the important mining towns of Nevada, Grass Valley, Auburn, Placerville, Diamond, Mera Springs. North of it, near the north line of the state, are the little thriving towns of Shasta City and Yreka, the former deriving its name from Mount Shasta, in its vicinity, at the head of Sacramento valley, the highest mountain in California, a vast cone of snow rising to the hight of 15,000 feet into the blue above.

Stockton disputes with Marysville the reputation of being the third city in importance in the state: and is the depot for the southern mines. It is situated on a bayou of San Joaquin, at the head of regular steamboat navigation, and is 48 miles south of Sacramento City, and by water 125 miles east of San Francisco. The channel is navigable for steamboats and vessels of

400 tuns, affording at all seasons ready communication with the Pacific, and the town has an extensive carrying trade. Here is the State Insane Asylum, a cabinet of natural history, and an Artesian well of 1,000 feet in depth. Stockton has some fine fruit gardens, and the foliage of these, together with an abundance of wide spreading oaks, gives the place a grateful aspect. Population about 16,000.

Sonora, the most important mining town in the southern mines, lies 130 miles east of San Francisco, and about 60 east of Stockton, and contains some 4,000 inhabitants. North-westerly from it are the mining towns of Mokelumne Hill, Columbia, and Murpheys. At the former is a noted mining canal of 40 miles in length. Within 15 miles of the latter, 86 from Stockton, and 213 from San Francisco, is the famous "Mammoth Tree Grove." A late visitor gives this description:

The "Big Tree Grove" occupies a space of about fifty acres, other evergreen trees being interspersed among them. The ground is "claimed" by the owners of the hotel, to whom it will prove a pretty fortune. It occupies a level plateau in the Sierra Mountains, and is elevated 4,500 feet above tide water. The mammoth trees are of a species unknown except in California.

The bark is very porous, so that it is used for pincushions. It is on some of the trees nearly two feet thick! The foliage is of a deep green, like that of the arbor vitæ, and the seeds are contained in a small cone. The wood is of a red color, like the cedar, and somewhat like the redwood of California. Still the tree differs from all these essentially. It is estimated by calculations based on the rings or layers which indicate the annual growth, that the largest of these trees are more than three thousand years old! A correspondent of the London Times made one, of the wood and bark of which he had a specimen, six thousand four hundred and eight years old. They are no doubt "the oldest inhabitants" of the state. A path has been made through the grove, leading by the most notable specimens, and each has been named, and has a label of wood or tin attached, on which is inscribed its name and size. In several cases, beautiful white marble tablets, with raised letters, have been let into the bark. There are, in all, ninety four of these monster trees, with multitudes of others from a foot high and upward.

Near the house is the stump of a tree that was felled in 1853 by the vandals. The stump is seven feet high, and measures in diameter, at the top, thirty feet. I paced it, and counted thirty paces across it. A canvas house has been erected over and around it, and a floor laid on the same level adjoining, and here dances are often had upon the stump, whose top has been smoothed for the purpose. Four quadrilles have been performed at once upon it, and the Alleghanians once gave a concert to about fifty persons here, performers and audience all occupying the stump. A portion of the trunk lies on the ground, divested of bark, and steps, twenty-six in number, have been erected, as nearly perpendicular as possible, by which visitors ascend its side as it lies upon the ground. The vandals had a hard job when they cut down this giant. It was accomplished by boring a series of holes with a large auger to the center and completely round it, the holes being of course fifteen feet deep each. Five men worked steadily for 25 days; and then so plumb was the tree that it would not fall. After trying various means to topple it over, at length they cut a large tree near it so that it should fall against it, but still it stood. A second attempt with another tree was successful, and it was forced over, and fell with a crash which made everything tremble, and which reverberated far and near through the mountains and forests. The solid trunk snapped in several places like a pipe-stem. The top of the stump is as large as the space lengthwise between the walls of two parlors, with folding doors, of fifteen feet each. Imagine the side walls spread apart to double their width, and then the stump would fill all the space! But at the roots, seven feet lower, it is much larger.

"Hercules" is the largest perfect standing tree, and it has been computed to contain seven hundred and twenty-five thousand feet of lumber, or enough to load a large clipper ship. It leans remarkably toward one side, so that the top is from

forty to fifty feet out of the perpendicular. It should have been named "The Leaning Tower." It is thirty-three feet between two roots that enter the ground near opposite sides of the trunk.

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Mammoth Tree Grove, in the Valley of the Calaveras.

The trees are evergreens and ninety-four of them are yet standing, many of which rise to more than 300 feet in hight. One, which has blown down, measured 110 feet in circumference, and was 450 high Another, which had fallen and is hollow, is ridden through on horseback for 75 feet. Some of them are estimated to be more than 3,000 years old. The bark is nearly two feet thick, and being porous is used for pincushions.

"The Husband and Wife" seem very affectionate, leaning toward each other so that their tops touch. They are two hundred and fifty feet high, and sixty each in circumference. "The Family Group" consists of two very large trees, the father and mother, with a family of grown-up children, twenty-four in number, around them, all large enough to be of age and to speak for themselves! The father blew down many years ago, having become feeble from old age. The trunk is hollow as it lies upon the ground, and would accommodate half a regiment with quarters.

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The circumference is one hundred and ten feet, or upward of thirty-three diameter! Its hight was four hundred and fifty feet, as great as that of the dome of St. Peter's at Rome! Near what was the base of the trunk, and within the cavity, there is now a never-failing pond of water, fed by a spring. Nearly half the trunk is embedded in the ground. The mother still stands amid her children and little grandchildren. She 327 feet high, 91 feet in circumference—a stately old dame! "The Horseback Ride" is an old hollow tree fallen and broken in two. I rode through the trunk a distance of 75 feet on horseback, with a good sized horse, as did my wife also. "Uncle Tom's Cabin " is hollow for some distance above the base, and 25 persons can seat themselves in the space.

"The Mother of the Forest" is 90 feet round, and 328 feet high. To the hight of 116 feet the bark has been taken off by some speculators, who carried it in sections to Paris, for exhibition. The staging on which they worked is still standing around the trunk. But so immense was the size indicated, that the Parisians would not believe it was all from one tree, and charged the exhibitor with Yankee trickery, and branded the whole thing a humbug, and as the result he lost considerable money in his speculation. The tree is now dead.

In one place we saw a small part of the trunk of what was an enormous tree, which had fallen probably centuries ago, and become imbedded in the earth, and so long ago did this happen, that three very large trees had grown up over its butt so as to inclose it with their roots completely. It was ludicrous to see as we did in one place, near one of the largest trees, a little one, about two feet high, growing from the seed of the large one, and evidently starting with high hopes and youthful ambition in the race of life. What a job, thought I, has that little fellow before him to work himself up 300 or 400 feet to reach the altitude of his father and uncles and aunts. But we bid him God speed, and I doubt not, if he perseveres, he will one day stand as proudly erect as his ancestors, and three thousand years hence he will be an object of as great curiosity and reverence to those who shall come after us as "Hercules" is now to us! What will be the condition and population of California and of the United States then?

But, seriously, I think I never was inspired with greater awe by an object on which I looked, than I felt when I walked about among these noble and ancient "sons of the forest," or rather patriarchs of the wood. To think that I stood beside and looked up toward the towering heads of trees that were standing, or at least had begun their growth, when Solomon's Temple was commenced; that were more than a thousand years old when the Savior of men trod the soil of Palestine; were ancients at the period of the Crusades! One sees in Europe old castles, and looks with reverence upon them as he thinks of their hoary antiquity, but these trees were between one thousand and two thousand years old when the foundations of the oldest building now standing in Europe were laid. I can think of but one thing more awe inspiring, and that is the group of Egyptian pyramids. One must actually look upon these objects, however, to realize the impression they make. He must study their proportions, calculate their altitude, compare them with other large trees or lofty objects, and he must do this repeatedly before he can take in the idea. It is a universal remark of visitors that the conception of the reality grows upon them every time they examine them, and that, at first sight, as in the case of Niagara Falls, there is a feeling of disappointment.

Seeds have been sent to Europe, and scattered over our Union, and trees are growing from them in some parts of the United States, but it is doubtful whether in any other soil or climate than that of California, they will ever make such a growth as is seen here.

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One thing is remarkable about these trees, viz: that although of such an immense age, many of them, yet where they have been unmolested by man and unscathed by fire, they still seem sound to the core and vigorous, the foliage is bright and constantly growing, and one can not see why they may not live one thousand or two thousand years more. We enter a dell," says Dr. Bushnell, "quietly lapped spot where they stand is beautiful. in the mountains, where the majestic vegetable minarets are crowded, as in some city of pilgrimage, there to look up, for the first time, in silent awe of the mere life principle." There is another grove as remarkable in Mariposa county, and smaller collections of the same species elsewhere, but they are not common all over the state.

Dr. Bushnell's theory of the enormous growths of California, is that the secret lies in these things-"First, a soil too deep and rich for any growth to measure it; second, a natural under-supply of water or artificial irrigation; next, the settings of fruit are limited. And then, as no time is lost in cloudings and rain, and the sun drives on his work unimpeded, month by month, the growth is pushed to its utmost limit. But these [enormous occasional specimens] are freaks or extravagances of nature-only such as can be equaled nowhere else. The big trees depend, in part, on these same contingencies, and partly on the remarkable longevity of their species. A tree that is watered without rain, having a

deep vegetable mold in which to stand, and not so much as one hour's umbrella of cloud to fence off the sun for the whole warm season, and a capacity to live withal for two thousand years or more, may as well grow three hundred and fifty or four hundred feet high and twenty-five feet in diameter, and show the very center point or pith still sound at the age of thirteen hundred [or three thousand] years, as to make any smaller figure.

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Coultersville and Mariposa are mining towns, south-easterly from Stockton. Near Mariposa is Fremont's Vein, and 45 miles east of Coultersville is the celebrated Valley of the Yo-hamite," which is pronounced by travelers one of the greatest of curiosities. It is a vast gorge in the Sierra, through which flows the Merced, a beautiful crystal stream, which rises high up in the mountains.

"Picture to yourself a perpendicular wall of bare granite nearly or quite a mile high! Yet there are some dozen or score of peaks in all, ranging from 3,000 to 5,000 feet above the valley, and a biscuit tossed from any of them would strike very near its base, and its fragments go bounding and falling still further. No single wonder of Nature on earth can claim a superiority over the Yo-hamite. Just dream yourself for one hour in a chasm nearly ten ailes long, with egress for birds and water out at either extremity, and none elsewhere save at these points, up the face of precipices from 3,000 to 4,000 feet high, he chasm scarcely more than a mile wide at any point, and tapering to a mere gorge or canon at either end, with walls of mainly naked and perpendicular white granite, from 3,000 to 5,000 feet high, so that looking up to the sky from it is like looking out of an unfathomable profound—and you will have some conception of the Yo-hamite.

The highest known cataract on the globe is in this valley, the Yo-hamite Fall, which tumbles over a perpendicular ledge, 1,800 feet at one plunge, then taking a second plunge of 400, ends by a third leap of 600, making in all 2,800 feet, or over half a mile in descent. The stream being small looks, in the distance, more like a white ribbon than a cascade. The Merced enters the valley by more imposing cataracts of nearly 1,000 feet fall. How many other wonders exist in this strange locality remains for farther exploration to unfold. "The valley varies from a quarter to a mile in width, the bottom level and covered with a luxuriant growth of vegetation, grass interspersed with beautiful flowers, and the finest of pines and evergreen shrubs, and the pure, clear, sparkling Merced River winding its ways, at its own sweet will,' through the midst. With its two points of egress guarded, no human being, once placed here within its rocky mountain walls, could ever hope to escape."

Beside the mountain ranges, with their summits clad with everlasting snow, and the beautiful scenery rendered more attractive by the wonderful purity of the atmosphere, California possesses many natural curiosities, among which are "The Geysers," or hot sulphur springs, of Napa county, and the "natural bridges," of Calaveras.

"The Geysers are from one to nine feet in diameter, and constantly in a boiling state, ejecting water to hights of 10 to 15 feet. Hundreds of fissures in the side of the mountain emit strong currents of heated gas, with a noise resembling that of vapor escaping from ocean steamers. We condense the following from Silliman's Journal, of Nov., 1851, by Professor Forest Shepard: 'From a high peak we saw on the W. the Pacific, on the S. Mount Diablo and San Francisco Bay, on the E. the Sierra Nevada, and on the N. opened at our feet an immense chasm, from which, at the distance of four or five miles, we distinctly saw dense columns of steam rising. Descending, we discovered within half a mile square from 100 to 200 openings, whence issued dense columns of vapor, to the hight of from 150 to 200 feet, accompanied by a roar which could be heard for a mile or more. Many acted spasmodically, throwing up jets of hot, scalding water to the hight of 20 or 30 feet. Beneath your footsteps you hear the lashing and foaming gyrations; and on cutting through the surface, are disclosed streams of angry, boiling water.'

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