CHAPTER XVIII.

THE GOLD FINDS OF HISTORY.

Gold in the days of Abraham-Solomon's expeditions to Ophir-Edomites as Argonauts-Cortez in Mexico and Pizarro in Peru-Early attempts by the English to find gold in America-North Carolina an "Eldorado"-The Georgian "intrusion"-The days of the Forty-niners-John Marshall and his end—Australian and Klondike nuggets compared-The Frazer River craze—The "Kaffer circus"-South African mines capitalized at $1,500,000,000-Four hundred years of gold digging-The gold kings of the world.

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ENTURIES upon centuries have come and gone since the stories of fabulous gold finds first fired the hearts and imaginations of men. Our records probably do not go back far enough to include the earliest of these.

That there were such epochs of gold discovery in ancient history it is impossible to doubt, though transportation was so difficult in those days that rushes of gold seekers to the diggings must have been limited. It is hardly to be supposed that the vast quantities of gold which were in existence in Judea, at Babylon, in India, in Persia, and in Egypt were gradually accumulated by the working of lean sands; the bulk must have been the yield of discoveries of rich deposits. Gold figures as an article of exchange and merchandise as far back as the time of Abraham, and when Solomon came to the throne he fairly plastered the temple with gold.

Nor could it have been rare in other parts of Asia. At Babylon, where, in the time of Belshazzar, they had

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OPHIR THE FIRST ELDORADO.

gods of gold, and gold vessels for every guest of the king to drink out of; or in Persia, where the king had beds of gold and goblets of gold; or in Hindostan, where the king sat on a throne of gold, and Nadir Shah took fifty millions of treasure from the single city of Delhi. It was safe to infer that before these great masses of gold were gathered together there must have been startling discoveries of gold deposits somewhere, causing rushes of gold seekers to the new camps, just like the present rush to Klondike; and, considering the undeveloped condition of the mining industry at that time, it may also be inferred that the gold found was always alluvial. Where it was found we have no means of knowing. There are no records of gold discoveries in the ancient books.

Ophir is the first "El Dorado" of which we have any record, and this includes little but the bare fact that it was a gold-producing country. There are no data by which it may be even approximately located.

That Solomon received the tip about the riches of Ophir before the diggings were worked out is well attested by biblical records. He was in the habit of receiving gold from other sources. The King of Tyre sent him 120 talents, the equivalent of about $250,000; and his friend, the Queen of Sheba, gave him about $200,000 at the time he was fixing up the temple at Jerusalem. He was not satisfied with this, and sent frequent expeditions to Ophir. The ships were sent out from ports on the Red Sea, and it is easy to imagine that desire to accompany them was fully as strong among the Edomites in those early days as is the present-day anxiety

on the part of thousands of people to be off for the Klondike and its hidden treasures. Solomon obtained about $500,000 from the Ophir mines.

The first rush of gold seekers to a land of promise, of which we have authentic historical record, took place from Spain to the countries discovered by Columbus, On the islands he visited and those portions of the con.. tinent on which he landed there are and were then no gold mines. But the natives he met wore ornaments of gold obtained mostly from South America, and Cortez found a good deal of it, though neither he nor his people undertook to mine. When Montezuma surrendered the treasure in gold which fell to the share of the conquerors it amounted to 162,000 pieces of eight, equivalent, according to Mr. Prescott, to $6,300,000, a small sum if contrasted with the yield of modern mining camps, but more, perhaps, than the contents of the coffers of any European monarch of that day, and quite enough to disturb values throughout the world.

It was less than the sum secured a few years later by Pizarro in Peru. At Cuzco he divided among his men 580,200 pieces of eight, and the ineffectual ransom of Adahualpa cost the unfortunate Inca a sum exceeding $15,000,000 of our money. The Spanish army in Peru. received and sent home four times as much as the followers of Cortez sent from Mexico. It is diverting to observe how the ill-gotten gains operated precisely as the discovery of a bonanza does in a mining camp. The chronicler says: "Every article rose in value. A quire of paper sold for ten pieces of eight, a bottle of wine

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EARLY EXPECTATIONS.

for sixty, a sword for forty or fifty, a cloak for a hundred, a pair of shoes for thirty or forty, and a horse for twentyfive hundred." A piece of eight was equivalent to an ounce of gold.

It will be noted that none of the gold obtained by Pizarro and Cortez and their followers was obtained directly from the mines. Numerous expeditions were undertaken during the first century of the New World's history for the avowed object of finding the precious metal, and yet remarkable as it may seem, gold was not discovered within the boundaries of the present United States, nor ever anywhere north of the Rio Grande, until 300 years after Columbus had finished his earthly labors. The lust for gold drove hundreds of adventurers across the Atlantic to brave the dangers of the unknown wilds in their attempts to find the land of gold, the Eldorado of which the Indians had told, and of which the most romantic tales were being circulated in Europe. The adventurers were of all the seafaring nations of the civilized world. The Spaniards, through the massacring of the nations and the plundering of their temples, proved successful, while the English, on the other hand, were unsuccessful throughout.

Sir Walter Raleigh's expeditions were dismal failures. He suffered with his life for his ill-fortune. The Eldorado, which had been sought in South America, had not been found. The attention of adventurers was now turned to the opposite direction, and the imaginary land of gold was now placed in the north of America. This idea became so strong that, in 1576, Martin Frobisher

set out from England for the Northwest, seeking a passage to India north of Hudson's Strait. He came to an island which he named Meta Incognita, and on his return took with him a stone which the English refiners declared to contain gold. London was greatly excited. But when a second expedition returned and brought with it a lot of valueless dirt, the disappointment set the populace wild with rage. But the public was ready to be imposed upon again. As early as 1605 Captain John Smith heard from the Indians reports of rich gold mines in Virginia. The same statements were repeated by other explorers after him, and soon adventurers flocked to the new settlements on the Virginia coast. The second lot of emigrants to Jamestown consisted chiefly of vagabond gentlemen and goldsmiths, who, in spite of the remonstrances of Smith, believed they had discovered grains of gold in the glittering earth. There was now nothing done but digging for gold, washing gold, refining gold. Newport, the commander, believed himself immeasurably rich as he embarked for England with a freight of worthless earth.

Gradually the hope of ever finding Eldorado vanished, and for 200 years the golden phantom did not appear. Not till this century were the gold treasures of North America taken from the bosom of the earth. They were found primarily, as the result of accident, not of mad, thoughtless quest.

It was in the second year of this century, when the report spread as rapidly as was possible in those early days, through the Eastern States, that gold, real gold,