And for similar explorations
in the same class of depositions we have the experiences of our own times,
and which explain by comparison all the previous operations alluded to.
Thus in the year 1849, after the cession of the northern portion of Mexico
to the United States of North America, the rich mineral district of
California was at once invaded by hardy and intelligent bands of mining
adventurers from all parts of the world, who, with little other means at
their disposal but pick, shovel, and pan, soon fell on the productive bars
of rivers and rich ravines where the gold was trapped, derived from its
original birthplaces, where it had been sparsely disseminated, to be
dispersed by the subsequent disintegrations and denudations of the
mountains themselves, and deposited in a disengaged form for the first
comer; and so perfect were sometimes these concentrations, in certain
localities where water once streamed, that, divested of its earthy matrix,
the cleansed pure metal was found deposited, detained by its superior
specific gravity, on the bare rock, and only hidden from vision by a
slight covering of vegetable mould. In this manner, as an example of such
concentration, a "pot" or "find" (in mining parlance) to the value of
L10,000 was collected in a space of 15 square yards, or within the limits
of a particular "mining claim," at the foot of Mokulumne Hill, in a
southern county of California, soon after the territorial transfer from
Mexico.
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