tended by
force and arms to take that historic post.

PART III

THE MINES

CHAPTER XIV

SUTTER'S FORT

Sutter's Fort was situated at the edge of the live-oak park. We found it
to resemble a real fort, with high walls, bastions, and a single gate at
each end through which one entered to a large enclosed square, perhaps a
hundred and fifty yards long by fifty wide. The walls were not pierced
for guns; and the defence seemed to depend entirely on the jutting
bastions. The walls were double, and about twenty-five feet apart. Thus
by roofing over this space, and dividing it with partitions, Sutter had
made up his barracks, blacksmith shop, bakery, and the like. Later in
our investigations we even ran across a woollen factory, a distillery, a
billiard room, and a bowling alley! At the southern end of this long
space stood a two-story house. Directly opposite the two-story house and
at the other end of the enclosure was an adobe corral.

The place was crowded with people. A hundred or so miners rushed here
and there on apparently very important business, or loafed contentedly
against the posts or the sun-warmth of adobe walls. In this latter
occupation they were aided and abetted by a number of the native
Californians. Perhaps a hundred Indians were leading horses, carrying
burdens or engaged in some other heavy toil. They were the first we had
seen, and we examined them with considerable curiosity. A good many of
them were nearly naked; but some had on portions of battered civilized
apparel. Very few could make up a full suit of clothes; but contented
themselves with either a coat, or a shirt, or a pair of pantaloons, or
even with only a hat, as the case might be. They were very swarthy,
squat, villainous-looking savages, with big heads, low foreheads, coarse
hair, and beady little eyes.

We stopped for some time near the sentry box at the entrance,
accustoming ourselves to the whirl and movement. Then we set out to find
McClellan. He was almost immediately pointed out to us, a short, square,
businesslike man, with a hard gray face, dealing competently with the
pressure. A score of men surrounded him, each eager for his attention.
While we hovered, awaiting our chance, two men walked in through the
gate. They were accorded the compliment of almost a complete silence on
the part of those who caught sight of them.

The first was a Californian about thirty-five or forty years of age, a
man of a lofty, st