r the men
and six for me.' The piece of gold I must describe. Its value is between four and live dollars. It looks like a piece of spruce gum just out of tLe mouth of a school-girl, except the color. It is rather Hat, full of indenta- tions, just as the teeth make in a piece of nice gum. There are one or two rough points on the edge, which, Wjth a little stretch of the imagination, gives tlie appearance of a man's head with a helmet on; then, turn it an- other way, and, as Mrs Wiemer said, 'it looks like some kind of varmint or other.' It can easily be identified by any one who has ever seen it before. Other accounts of secondary importance are given by Barstow, Sherman, Mason, Bidwell, the AnwU of San Francisco, the Brpresentative Men of the Pacific, Tuthill, Hittell, Dunbar, Woods, and a multitude of newspaper writers.
Going back to Bigler's diary I find it of interest to follow him for a few days after the discovery.
The men hastened the work at the mill, so as to keep by their promise with Sutter, and be sooner able to dig for gold ; and though some spoke of throwing up their employment, yet the fear that the mines were not rich deterred them. On Sundays, however, they went into the tail-race, and scratching about with their butcher knives frequently obtained from three to eight dollars. The first gold discovery be- yond the limits of the Coloma saw-mill was on Sun- day, the 6th of February. Early that morning Bigler said he would cross the stream and try the bare rocks facing the saw-mill; Barger said he would go with him, and the two started, taking only their knives. Up to this time none of the mill hands knew the simple process of washing, nor had they ever seen rockers ; the way they gathered the gold was to pick it up grain by grain as it lay on the rocks, or with their knives dig it out from the crevices and holes. On this Sunday Bigler secured ten dollars. For de- termining the value of gold-dust, he made a light pair of wooden scales ; and by balancing twelve and a half cents in silver with gold-dust, he formed a ratio of one bit to two dollars, twenty-five cents to four dollars, and so on. Bigler seems to have been the only one who was seriously affected by the news of the gold discovery. Not content to wait till the next Sunday, he on Saturday afternoon threw down his pick, for he with Brown and others were digging at the race, and
