Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year, 1863, by A. ROMAN & Co., Proprietors, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Northern District of Californin PREFACE. I UNDERTAKE to write the resources of a state, which, though young in years, small in population, and remote from the chief centres of civilization, is yet known to the furthest corners of the earth, and, during the last twelve years, has had an influence upon the course of human life, and the prosperity and trade of nations, more powerful than that exerted during the same period by kingdoms whose subjects are numbered by millions, whose history dates back through thousands of years, and whose present stock of wealth began to accumulate before our continent was discovered, or our language was formed. I write of a land of wonders. I write of California, which has astonished the world by the great migration that suddenly built up the first large Caucasian community on the shores of the North Pacific; by her vast yield of gold, amounting within thirteen years to $700,000,000, which has sensibly affected the markets of labor and money in all the leading nations of Christendom; by the rapid development and great extent of her commerce; by the greatness of her chief port, which at one time had more large ships at her anchorage than were ever seen together in the harbor of either Liverpool, New York, or London; by the swift settlement of her remote districts; by the prompt organization of her government; |