that precious metal, but one powerful throb of a
loving heart could not be procured by all the yellow gold that ever did
or ever will enrich the human family.

But we are verging towards digression. Let us return to the simple idea
with which we intended to begin this chapter--the wonder-working power
of gold. In no country in the wide world, we venture to affirm, has
this power been exemplified so strikingly as in California. The
knowledge of the discovery of gold was so suddenly and widely
disseminated over the earth, that human beings flowed into the
formerly-uninhabited wilderness like a mighty torrent, while thousands
of ships flooded the markets with the necessaries of life. Then gold
was found to be so abundant, and, _at first_, so easily procured, that
the fever was kept up at white-heat for several years. The result of
this was, as we have remarked elsewhere, that changes, worthy of
Aladdin's lamp or Harlequin's wand, were wrought in the course of a few
weeks, sometimes in a few days.

The city of Sacramento was one of the most remarkable of the many
strange and sudden growths in the country. The river on which it stands
is a beautiful stream, from two to three hundred yards wide, and
navigable by large craft to a few miles above the city. The banks, when
our friends were there, were fringed with rich foliage, and the wild
trees of the forest itself stood growing in the streets. The city was
laid out in the form of a square, with streets crossing each other at
right angles; a forest of masts along the _embarcadero_ attested the
growing importance and wealth of the place; and nearly ten thousand
inhabitants swarmed in its streets. Many of those streets were composed
of canvas tents, or erections scarcely more durable. Yet here, little
more than a year before, there were only _four thousand_ in the place!

Those who chanced to be in possession of the land here were making
fortunes. Lots, twenty feet by seventy, in the best situations, brought
upwards of 3500 dollars. Rents, too, were enormous. One hotel paid
30,000 dollars (6000 pounds) per annum; another, 35,000 dollars. Small
stores fetched ten and twelve thousand dollars a year; while board at
the best hotels was five dollars a day. Truly, if gold was plentiful,
it was needed; for the common necessaries of life, though plentiful,
were bought and sold at fabulous prices. The circulation of gold was
enormous, and the growth of the city did not