the country, and its geological peculiarities, hardly confirm this opinion, although it is by no means improbable. Gold has been found, or there are indications of its existence, at different points along the western base of the Sierra Nevada, for nearly seven hundred miles; and it has been discovered east of the mountains, on the Great Salt Lake, and at various other places in the great interior basin of California. If we may place any reliance upon the inferences fairly deducible from these facts, it may be safely presumed, that the rugged buttresses of the Sierra Nevada contain a vaster deposit of mineral wealth than has yet been found in any other locality in the known world, — in extent and productiveness far excelling the Andes of Peru, the Carpathian range of Hungary, or the Ural mountains of Russia.[1]
In addition to the gold mines, other important discoveries have been made in Upper California. A rich vein of quicksilver has been opened at New Almadin, near Santa Clara, which, with imperfect machinery, — the heat by which the metal is made to exude from the rock being applied by a very rude process, — yields over thirty per cent. This mine, — one of the principal advantages to be derived from which will be, that the working of the silver mines scattered through the territory must now become profitable, — is superior to those of Almadin in old Spain, and second only to those of Idria, near Trieste, the richest in the world.[2] It is more than probable, also, that other veins will be opened, as the soil for miles around is highly impregnated with mercury.
Lead mines have likewise been discovered in the neighborhood of Sonoma, and vast beds of iron ore near the American fork, yielding from eighty-five to ninety per cent. Copper, platina, tin, sulphur, zinc, and cobalt, everywhere abound; coal exists in large quantities in the Cascade Range of Oregon, of which the Sierra Nevada is a continuation; and in the vicinity of all this mineral wealth, there are immense quarries of marble and granite, for building purposes.
Colonel Mason expresses the opinion, in his official dispatch, that "there is more gold in the country drained by the Sacramento and San Joaquim rivers, than will pay the cost of the [late] war with Mexico a hundred times over."[3] Should this even prove to be an exaggeration, there can be little reason to doubt, when we take into consideration all
- ↑ The peaks of the Sierre Nevada are from ten to fifteen thousand feet above the level of the ocean; the Carpathian mountains seven thousand five hundred feet; and the Ural mountains between four and five thousand feet.
- ↑ The mines of Almadin yield only ten per cent; and those at Idria range as high as eighty per cent, although ores containing only one per cent are worked Specimens of cinnabar from California have been examined at the Philadelphia mint: the red ore yielded over thirty-three per cent, and the yellow ore over fifteen.
- ↑ Letter to the Secretary of War, dated August 17, 1848.
