Page:Mexico, Aztec, Spanish and Republican, Vol 2.djvu/445

Rh which were so necessary for our mercantile progress as well as political and maritime convenience.

As soon as the country was quieted by the arrangement which Colonel Frémont made with the Californian leaders at Couenga, the people who had been engaged in the brief local war returned to their peaceful avocations. Our forces were stationed in small detachments, from Sutter's fort to San Diego, while our national vessels were anchored in the different harbors throughout the whole coast. In the maritime towns the supreme authorities collected a revenue from imports under the Contribution tariff. Order was promptly restored every where; but the only recognized control was that of the military government, which had devolved upon Colonel Mason at the departure of General Kearney.

Meanwhile the emigration from the United States, which, amounted to about five hundred individuals during the summer and fall of 1845, had been considerably augmented by recruits and adventurers during the continuance of the war. These men, as soon as hostilities ceased, naturally turned their attention to the two most important subjects that engage an American's attention, wherever fortune may cast his lot. Their future prospects of wealth, and the character of their government, demanded immediate care; yet while they relied upon Congress for the security of their political rights, they found, in spite of California's renown for agricultural riches, that they could only establish themselves successfully on the Pacific, or return with fortunes from its shores, by a steady and thrifty devotion to labor.

Such was the condition of California in the spring of 1848, when the accidental discovery of gold which might be rapidly and easily gathered in apparently inexhaustible quantities, changed not only the condition of the inhabitants, but affected the whole commerce of the world. "The towns were forthwith deserted by their male population, and a complete cessation of the whole industrial pursuits of the country was the consequence. Commerce, agriculture, mechanical pursuits, professions,—all were abandoned for the purpose of gathering the glittering treasures which lay buried in the ravines, gorges and rivers of the Sierra Nevada. The productive industry of the country was annihilated in a day. In some instances the moral perceptions were blunted, and men left their families unprovided, and soldiers deserted their posts."

But the greediness of the adventurers soon taught them that