Personal Reminiscences of Early Days in California with Other Sketches | Page 4

the score of comfort.
The next morning I started out early with three dollars in my pocket. I
hunted, up a restaurant and ordered the cheapest breakfast I could get.
It cost me two dollars. A solitary dollar was, therefore, all the money in
the world I had left, but I was in no respect despondent over my
financial condition. It was a beautiful day, much like an Indian Summer
day in the East, but finer. There was something exhilarating and
exciting in the atmosphere which made everybody cheerful and
buoyant. As I walked along the streets, I met a great many persons I
had known in New York, and they all seemed to be in the highest
spirits. Every one in greeting me, said "It is a glorious country," or
"Isn't it a glorious country?" or "Did you ever see a more glorious
country?" or something to that effect. In every case the word "glorious"
was sure to come out. There was something infectious in the use of the
word, or rather in the feeling, which made its use natural. I had not
been out many hours that morning before I caught the infection; and
though I had but a single dollar in my pocket and no business whatever,
and did not know where I was to get the next meal, I found myself
saying to everybody I met, "It is a glorious country." The city presented
an appearance which, to me, who had witnessed some curious scenes in
the course of my travels, was singularly strange and wild. The Bay then
washed what is now the east side of Montgomery street, between
Jackson and Sacramento streets; and the sides of the hills sloping back

from the water were covered with buildings of various kinds, some just
begun, a few completed,--all, however, of the rudest sort, the greater
number being merely canvas sheds. The locality then called Happy
Valley, where Mission and Howard streets now are, between Market
and Folsom streets, was occupied in a similar way. The streets were
filled with people, it seemed to me, from every nation under Heaven,
all wearing their peculiar costumes. The majority of them were from
the States; and each State had furnished specimens of every type within
its borders. Every country of Europe had its representatives; and
wanderers without a country were there in great numbers. There were
also Chilians, Sonorians, Kanakas from the Sandwich Islands, and
Chinese from Canton and Hong Kong. All seemed, in hurrying to and
fro, to be busily occupied and in a state of pleasurable excitement.
Everything needed for their wants; food, clothing, and lodging-quarters,
and everything required for transportation and mining, were in urgent
demand and obtained extravagant prices. Yet no one seemed to
complain of the charges made. There was an apparent disdain of all
attempts to cheapen articles and reduce prices. News from the East was
eagerly sought from all new comers. Newspapers from New York were
sold at a dollar apiece. I had a bundle of them, and seeing the price paid
for such papers, I gave them to a fellow-passenger, telling him he might
have half he could get for them. There were sixty-four numbers, if I
recollect aright, and the third day after our arrival, to my astonishment
he handed me thirty-two dollars, stating that he had sold them all at a
dollar apiece. Nearly everything else brought a similarly extravagant
price. And this reminds me of an experience of my own with some
chamois skins. Before I left New York, I purchased a lot of stationery
and the usual accompaniments of a writing-table, as I intended to
practise my profession in California. The stationer, learning from some
remark made by my brother Cyrus, who was with me at the time, that I
intended to go to California, said that I ought to buy some chamois
skins in which to wrap the stationery, as they would be needed there to
make bags for carrying gold-dust. Upon this suggestion, I bought a
dozen skins for ten dollars. On unpacking my trunk, in Marysville,
these chamois skins were of course exposed, and a gentleman calling at
the tent, which I then occupied, asked me what I would take for them. I
answered by inquiring what he would give for them. He replied at once,

an ounce apiece. My astonishment nearly choked me, for an ounce was
taken for sixteen dollars; at the mint, it often yielded eighteen or
nineteen dollars in coin. I, of course, let the skins go, and blessed the
hunter who brought the chamois down. The purchaser made bags of the
skins, and the profit to him from their sale amounted to two ounces on
each skin. From this transaction, the story arose that I had sold
porte-monnaies in Marysville before