"He goes to the well,
And he stands on the brink,
And stops for a spell
Jest to listen and think:
Let's see - well, that forty-foot grave wasn't his, sir,
that day, anyhow."

- Bret Harte.



Everywhere in the foothills of the Sierras there are still evidences of
gold mining. High cliffs face the rivers, all that is left of hills torn
down at the point of the powerful hydraulic nozzles, with great heaps of
cobbles at their base which Mother Nature, even in seventy years has
been unable to change or cover.

At the mouth of nearly every ravine there are countless little mounds
which marked the end, or dump of the sluice-box in the placer mining.
When the mound got the proper height the sluice was simply lengthened,
like putting another joint onto a caterpillar - and there you were! The
sluice-boxes have long since been moved away or rotted to mould but the
little mounds remain, to be mansions for hustling colonies of small
black ants.

The country, in various localities, is pitted with prospect holes, and
the hills are pierced with drift tunnels and abandoned mines. Some of
the prospect holes are mere grassy cups, others are very deep and partly
filled with water.