Some men don't want to go after gold, but they are
the very men to go."^^
Thus the threatened migration was stayed; a few companies departed/^ and were asked in all kindness never to return. "If they have a golden god in their hearts," said Brigham, "they had better stay were they are." But the majority of the settlers were well content to abide in the valley, building up towns, planting farms, and tending stock in their land of promise.
- Oiithe 7th of December, 1848, Brigham writes in his journal- 'Some
few have caught the gold fever; I counselled such, and all the saints, to re- main in the valleys of the mountains, make improvements, build comfort- able houses, and raise grain against the days of famine and pestilence with which the earth would be visited. '
^*The gold fever first broke out in June 1848, news of the discovery be- ing brought by a party of battalion men that arrived from California in that month. In March 1849, about a dozen families departed or were preparing to depart for the mines. In March 1851, about 520 of the saints were gath- ered at Payson, Utah county, most of them for the purpose of moving to California. Utah Early Records, MS., 31, 69, 122.
