and very thin scales--which he omits to mention is the most valuable form in which gold is found, and is precisely where a good smelter would extract the largest quantity, the gold being reduced to that state by its own abrasion--he is satisfied that not one-half the deposit was saved. In evidence of the inexhaustibility of the placers he mentions the important fact that of even the earliest and richest locations heretofore worked, very few are yet abandoned. Many of them are, indeed, yielding, under improved modes of operating, and with moderated expenses, as much profit as when first discovered. Take the returning emigrants as met with, whether pleased or disgusted with the country, and they will admit that there is gold ground enough now known, but rejected, to employ every man in the mining region for years to come at a rate of product of two dollars per day, under the present system of mining. All this immense area, however, they will insist is utterly worthless, because it will never be worked. Against this, we are told, that "two years ago men turned their backs upon placers that were yielding ten dollars per day-they thought they could not afford to work them, because it required more than half of this to pay the cost of living. Now, no prudent miner would desert a spot that yields three dollars per day he can live comfortably for one." Two years hence, the cost of living will be reduced to at least fifty cents per day. The present aggregate product of sixty millions, Mr. Werth thinks will be sustained, if it shall not be increased. This portion of the subject concludes with an allusion to Indian depredations and outrages. Thousands of miners were hemmed within narrow and unproductive limits during the whole of last winter, because of the peril of explorations beyond populous settlements. Means of repressing these savages are imperiously demanded. To the objection that the miners were the aggressors, an unanswerable argument is confronted, in the question, Why Congress should "tax its time and ingenuity to digest a scheme for appro priating these very lands-for regulating their occupancy, and their thorough search and occupation by our people, without adopting the essential preliminary means to securing to them quiet possession?" No doubt Congress intend to protect the miners, and perhaps think they have made efficient provision for that purpose in the appropriation of twenty-five thousand dollars voted at the last ses-ion. But this liberality is itself the best evidence of what Mr. Werth has asserted of the information of the government regarding the wants of California. There were seven hundred miles of border to be guarded against the Indians, and the sum appropriated would be absorbed in the transportation within California of eighty tons of subsistence for troops, and provisions and clothing for Indian tribes, for the first hundred miles. The fourth chapter is on vein mining. Of the extent of the auriferous quartz formation of California, no estimate is given, but the assurance is offered that any disquiet about the monopoly of the whole area, by actual operations, will be for many years quite premature. The only question is as to the encouragement offered to the application of capital and labor. In treating of this, all the tales of wonder that have gone abroad of late, based upon "dazzling specimens," and supported by "incontestible evidence," "actual analysis," and "carefully-ascertained results," are thrown entirely out of calculation, and the worse than idle estimates heretofore offered to distant capitalists of the general average result of permanent and extensive operations, are wholly discarded. Veins, similar to those worked in the Southern States, he estimates, would involve an expense at present, in California, in working, of $16 to $24 a ton. In the present state of things, he thinks capitalists cannot be induced to enter into the business in any vein yielding less than four cents per pound, equal to twenty times the product of the most profitable veins in the Southern States. As soon as the expense of labor and subsistence are reduced 50 per cent, auriferous quartz veins yielding 1 per cent a pound, or $20 a ton, will compensate labor and capital employed in them. The question is, therefore, merely one of time, and California is destined to furnish the most extensive and productive vein as well as surface mining in the world. Chapter V. treats of the argentiferous and other ores. The attention of explorers has been so entirely absorbed in the search for gold, that other valuable ores--silver, copper, lead, iron, and even cinnabar--have been almost totally neglected. Clear proof is offered of the existence of these ores, and some of them in very rich mines. Some specimens of ore brought from the region of the Four Creeks were analyzed by Moffat & Co., with the following result: The disposal of the mineral lands forms the subject of the sixth chapter. The proposition is started that no system, repugnant to the people of California, can be enforced, though Congress may enact it; and although this may not be clear in the atmosphere of Washington, no one of its members would hesitate to acknowledge its infallibility, after mingling with the elements that would surround him in California. "The safety of the people is the supreme law," comprehends the simple and efficient criminal code of the people, and "The protection of local interests as the miners understand them," would be the irresistible substitute for any unfavorable "digest" of Federal legislation. The system needed in regard to the mineral lands, is one that shall encourage, and so far as it can, constrain the permanent settlement of the immigrants. That is declared to be the great point, overshadowing all others. Until this is done, the wealth of California, both mineral and agricultural, can never be fully developed. All the schemes yet entertained by Congress are disapproved of, and declared impracticable, as are all that would impose any system of taxation by license, or by excise on production, or any plan whatever, "involving periodical collections of revenue." We must refer the reader for the details of Mr. Werth's scheme regarding the disposal of these lands to the pamphlet itself. The author gives us no assurance that should it be adopted by Congress it can be carried into effect, although as fair a system, perhaps, as any which that body might be able to devise. It is apparently to his final suggestion only that Mr. Werth attaches any real consideration; namely, the cession of the mineral lands, under judicious conditions, to the State. We are not at all disposed to deny that this is the true policy for our government and the State of California both. Among these conditions are suggested a prohibition forever against the levying of any tax by the State on the product of the mines, or the profits of the miners, as such--that she shall assume her own river and harbor improvements-and that she should appropriate a portion of the proceeds of the sale or lease of the mineral lands toward the construction of a railroad from the waters of the Bay of San Francisco to the west ern line of the State, to meet any road extending from the Valley of the Mississippi to that line. The power of taxing the products of the mines, he thinks, will be exercised in a few years, if not relinquished in this way, in answer to the demand of the controlling population of her other districts. A source of future difficulty, if not judiciously guarded, is pointed out in the collision between the two interests of surface and vein mining. No clashing has yet occurred of serious importance, but when surface miners have exhausted the richer deposits on the flats, they will find profitable work on the slopes up to the very ledges of the quartz veins, and when the hights come to be generally occupied by the vein miners, fresh parties will trace out and occupy locations on the same veins in the flats. It will be indispensable to the vein miners, also, to occupy the stream beds for dams, and the flats for settlements. It is apparent, therefore, as our author states, that it would be as difficult a task to our legislators, Federal or State, to disentangle the two departments by arbitrary lines, as to regulate railroad travel by assigning one rate of speed for the locomotive and another for the tender. Both must be placed under one regulation, and if laid off in sections, they must be marked out by parallel lines, and all within the same limits, whether deposits or veins, or wood or water, must be subject solely and exclusively to the occupant. The question is difficult, but must be solved; for until some efficient system is provided, California is doomed to remain in the condition she has thus far occupied. That effected, and the greater portion of all who come within her borders, instead of carrying away her treasures to enrich other countries and places, will settle down as permanent citizens, and devote themselves to unlock the vast resources, and develop the mighty prosperity which are waiting to be realized. We come now, in the seventh chapter, to the agricultural lands of California. The matter embodied in this chapter equals in interest that of the foregoing divisions. The amount of arable land is such that no inquiry, based on fear of want, need be raised during the present century. As to quality, the greater part of the soil along the valleys of the rivers is richer than anything known in any sections of corresponding extent, and perhaps in any lands whatever in other parts of the United States. The instances detailed, and well attested of the remarkable productiveness of that region, we cannot find room to repeat. Mr. Werth estimates that the general average product of fifty millions of acres of the surface of California, under ordinary American cultivation, may be assumed at very moderately at three hundred bushels of potatoes, fifty bushels (in suitable locations) of corn, forty bushels of wheat, fifty bushels of barley, and sixty bushels of oats, to the acre. The latter grain is indigenous to the soil, and furnishes a superabundant provision of food, in autumn and early winter, to the millions of cattle and horses, and the countless herds of elk and deer and antelopes that roam over an almost undisturbed domain. says: Of animal precocity and fruitfulness in California, Mr. Werth Heifers, as a common rule, bring forth at two years old, and sheep multiply their kind twice in each year, very frequently thrice in fifteen months, and bringing, much oftener than in our old States, two at a birth. Our own race is not above this powerful influence; for we have the published authority of the Rev. Walter Colton for the fact that "it is no uncommon sight to find from fourteen to eighteen children at the same table, with their mother at their head;" and he gives instances of twenty-two! and "twenty-eight, with others, probably, yet to come!" of none other than a land of health and plenty, could these things be true. This outdoes the tales of even Irish fecundity; and if it is so, California ought not long to want the citizens, of whose non-existence our author so much complains, as a very small stock should afford an abundant population in a comparatively brief period. But it might be fair to ask why have not the Spaniards and Indians generally propagated in that region at something like this rate, or if they have, what has become of them all? How is it, that the Yankee invaders found only a sparse population of only about 12,000, of all races, complexions, kinds, and degrees? But Mr. Werth insists that his picture is not exaggerated, and he appeals to the testimony of thousands, who will confirm every word he has uttered. He declares there is no other place with such a climate, a soil so generousnature so bountiful--institutions so free, so reliable, so imperishable; and has no apprehensions that her valleys will remain long unpopulated and untilled, when the truth is fairly placed before the world. The last chapter, the ninth, is on the Commerce of California, which is treated in a brief space, as having better means of introduction to the public attention than the other matters considered. But while the subject is before us, we deem it necessary to the completeness of the picture to give some view of its growth and prospects, from such data as have come within our notice. Prior to the possession of California by the United States, and the start of San Francisco as a commercial city, the Republic of Chili-the only one of the nations of Spanish descent on the continent that has preserved anything like a proper appreciation of order and systematic industry-engrossed nearly the whole trade of the western coast of the American continent. Her capital, Valparaiso, was the great entrepôt of this Commerce, the supplies of the manufactures of Europe, and the luxuries of Asia, being thence distributed to the Pacific coast and islands. This commercial importance had been secured by a wise policy, encouraging foreign merchants to settle or establish branches of their business there, a system of bonding and warehousing foreign goods to facilitate the completion of assorted cargoes, and other measures, which have overcome some natural disabilities, that of a somewhat exposed harbor being among them. The imports and exports of Chili during the years 1849, 1850, and 1851, were as follows: The following statement shows with what countries this Commerce was carried on, and the importance of the trade with each country, in 1849: Imports. Countries. California.. Peru.. Bolivia.. Mexico. Central America. New Grenada..... Ecuador... Polynesian Isles.. Atlantic ports.... The Commerce with European countries was as follows:- $1,442,310 $1,870,282 $3,702,571 $4,760,011 $4,431,075 $4,295,359 Holland Spain.. Sardinia. Portugal.. Denmark Prussia... Sweden and Norway.. Total.... The latter sum constitutes above three-fourths of the whole export. Of the exports of agricultural products, the amount shipped to California in several years was, in 1848 $250,193; 1849 $1,835,400; 1850 82,448,868. Showing who feeds California and draws away her wealth, while she is neglecting her own luxurious valleys to wash over the glittering sands of the flats. In all the markets of this Chilian tade, California has equal access, and has far greater resources, when developed, to found a Commerce upon. What she has already done, in comparison with Chili, will be seen in the statements following. The point in this connection to which we wish to call especial attention, is the trade with China. In this important and highly interesting branch of her traffic, California has made remarkable strides, and is destined to achieve in it no insignificant part of all her future commercial greatness, however magnificent may be that result. The import of last year from China is stated at about eight hundred thousand dollars, having reached an extent nearly four times as large as that of Chili with the same empire. California is fast becoming the factor of the Pacific South American nations in this Chinese trade, an office which Chili has heretofore held exclusively to herself. The amount of dutiable goods imported into San Francisco from China, and re-exported, without paying duty, during the several quarters of the year commencing October 1, 1850, and ending September 30, 1851, was as follows: For the quarter from 1st October to 31st December, 1850.... $2,992 2,950 19,579 31,000 Total for the year. $56,521 |