Page:Mexico, Aztec, Spanish and Republican, Vol 2.djvu/467

Rh avoirdupois; and afterwards, by the fine process, produced eighty cents to the pound additional; making one dollar and twenty cents per pound as the average. Other assays exhibit results from ores in various sections of California, ranging from twenty-five cents to five dollars per pound, and that, too, in specimens where no gold is visible to the naked eye. Rocks examined even within two miles of San Francisco, have yielded gold to the amount of ten cents per pound. The result at the Mariposa mine has been at the rate of two thousand five hundred dollars for every ton!

These facts, stated upon grave authority, may be regarded as positive information applicable to the whole extent of the gold producing quartz. If we apply the results of the working of a British mining company,—The San Juan del Rey,—in Brazil, to these assays and conclusions, we may estimate the consequences upon the destiny of California and of the world. The work of this British company has increased annually for twenty years, and its last report dates on the 1st of March, 1850. In this it is stated that 69,000 tons of ore were crushed and the gold extracted therefrom;—applying this to the average yield of the mines in California, the result would be over one hundred and seventy millions of dollars!

Various speculations have been made as to the gross numerical summary of all these discoveries and labors in a broiling sun, in icy streams and under all kinds of privations; yet no definite accuracy can be attained. During the earlier enterprises, California was a country without law or restraint, for, all men, bent upon the single selfish task of greedily gathering gold, resolved society completely into its original elements. Out of the municipalities and villages there were no associations except in small bodies for mutual labor and protection. Severe and certain punishment secured the latter; but it may be reasonably supposed that the collection of statistics was not a duty willingly undertaken by such absorbed individuals. Accordingly, we are not enabled to present more than proximate calculations of the wealth given and promised by California to the human race.

Mr. King supposes, in his report, that during the first season there were not more than 5,000 employed in collecting gold, and that their average gain was one thousand dollars each, or an aggregate of five millions. But, in the season of 1849, the number of explorers increased by the vast influx from every quarter of the