CALIFORNIA.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VI, Issue 450, 24 November 1849, Page 3

CALI FORNIA .

[From the Sydney Morning Herald, Oct 3.] By the Deborah, which arrived late last night, we have news from California to the 20th July. Gold still continued to be found in abundance. Immense numbers of people were pouring into the country from all parts of the world. Thirteen thousand persons have arrived from America alone. The state of society is described as most awful. There is no lavr. The people have declined to acknowledge the authority of the United States' officers. Murders, robberies, and other crimes, are of daily occurrence. The only paper we were able to obtain from the vessel contains no extractable matter, but we shall no doubt be able to give further information to-morrow, as several persons who went away from here early in the year have returned to Sydney. (From the S. M. Herald, Oct. 4.) We have two numbers of the rflta California, and several numbers oi the Polynesian. It is singular that in neither of the numbers of the Alta California is there any reference to the gold-digging, or to the murders, robberies, and outrages which we know from private letters, and the evidence of persons who were there, were so rife in June and July last. The apprehended collision between the government elected by the people of San Francisco, and the officers of the United States, had been avoided. The elected representatives had resigned, and a day had been fixed for the election of various officers, who were to hold office until November, 1850, when it is supposed the "territory of California" will become a portion of the United States, in the manner pointed out by the American constitution. Various reports were circulated yesterday, but we do not intend to publish anything that is not duly authenticated. The following graphic sketch of life at the mines is given by a correspondent of the Polynesian :—: — Gold — Mines down in the Mouth — Backing Out — Home Sickness — Sober Second Thoughts — Big Lumps — Southern Diggings —Indian Troubles — Oregonian Logic — Indian Trade — The Tailor makes the man — Tricks of Trade*— Price Current — How to • get Rich — the Liquor Trade — Effects in the Mountains — Liquor in High Life — Who's to blame ? — A Teetotaller — Welcome Immigrants — A Retired Functionary. San Francisco, June 27, 1849. Dear Pol. — About the gold — I promised to speak of that — the primum mobile — the grand attraction — the focus of all enterprise — the life, and glory, and cur.-c of California. How much do they get ? Why, sooth to say, the mountain streams are now up, and have put a damper on the miners. Your sleek-haired, silk-vested, soft-skinned, tightbooted New Yorkers are poor water-dogs, and are sadly tantalised to know that the lucre they covet lies a fathom or two deep, beneath the cold, eddying torrent, that rolls down from the melting snows. Many people are bitterly disappointed. Instead of floating into the gold region on a cloud, without effort, and filling a sack before breakfast of pure virgin metal, their blistered hands, lame legs, and breaking backs, their lost horses, hard j beds and rough fare, convince them that something more is to be done to get gold than cry "open sesame." One gentleman — a stout, muscular one, too — came down the other day with his face set, like a rusty wea-ther-cock, homewards. To fry his own salt pork, sleep on a cold rock in the wild mountains, and dream of his sweet wife and smiling bairns in the land of oysters, fresh cod, and feather beds, was too overwhelming. All the gold of the Sierra would not tempt him to stay. Starvation on a potato, at home, were preferable to the most prosperous gold-dig-ing. Poor fellow ! the illusion was over — the poetry of the thing had curdled to sour prose — he was home-sick ! and thousands of adventurers, before summer is over, will heartily sympathise with him. Many who have been at the mines within the last two months have hardly paid expenses ; some have returned poorer than they went. Every steamer henceforth will depart with some of these repentant wanderers. But some are more successful, and pound lumps, and larger, are occasionally turned up. One man, this summer, bought a hole that another had dug, and dug out, as he supposed, and after bailing out the water, extracted thirteen pounds in the first twenty-four hours; this fact is well attested — enough to keep the fever raging in the face of all obstacles. A gentleman from the islands brought down lately a beautiful specimen of pure gold, weighing eighteen ounces troy. The largest piece I havt seen was one of pure metal

eighty-one ounces in weight, found at the Stanislaus, and sold by Mr. Webbet, hi April, for 3,000 dollars, or nearly 37 dollais per ounce. It was sent to the States two months since. Another specimen from ihe Stanislaus, of gold mingled with quartz — a splendid illustrative specimen — some four in. in diameter, and weighing 6£lbs. troy, fell into the hands of Lieut. Woodworth, and has been sent home. Other pieces, larger than those, have been reported, but I have not seen them. The extent of the explorations has not been very materially enlarged the present seascn. Some parties have been working on the Tuallomy, Merced, and other tributaries of the San Joaquin, south of the Stanislaus ; but so far as I can learn, hitherto with indifferent success, owing to the height of the streams. The Indians have proved troublesome in that vicinity, and it is reported tbat many foreigners have been killed, among them Mr. Garner, of Monterey, with a party of half a dozen natives of the country, The Indian troubles at the north, near the American Fork, you are already aware of. Some fiery spirits from Oregon, fresh from the Indian war of last year, firmly believe that an Indian is an Indian the world over, and that they are commissioned, jure divino, to exterminate " every red-skin their rifle balls can reach under the whole heavens. To this indiscriminating hatred must be attributed, in the main, the hostile attitude of the aborigines. Last season the Indians were inoffensive — even friendly. Men passed with impunity, almost or entirely unharmed, through the wildest mountain fastnesses. I have myself spent days among them, wholly in their power, without the slightest apprehension of danger. » * * * * It is a matter of joy that of the thousands of new comers, a large portion are the staunch descendants of the old Puritans — hard-fisted, clear-headed, large-hearted yeomen — holding industry to be a cardinal virtue, order, as " Heaven's first law," and education the primum mobile — aiming at a spare penny, indeed, " for a rainy day," or a charity, but not forgetting, in the rush for gain, to build the court room and the meeting house. Come over here, my dear Pol., and shake hands with half the old friends you ever knew "down 1 east." Every other ship will bring you a " towney" or a schoolmate. A dozen of my fellow "chips" of the law are about me already. Were " wife and bairns" here, also, I should almost forget that I am not in New England. Speaking of old acquaintances, H. Ms. ex-Attorney General you would find, not framing " Organic Laws," but retired from legal practice, unheeded, and almost unheard of, in the golden fastnesses of the Sierra — whether in a golden palace, it might be impertinent to enquire. Adieu, my good fellow, for a week. Panorama.