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400 Discovery of gold in California. [i848 and the Liberty Party was absorbed by the new Free-Soil Party, as it was called. When the election was over it appeared that the split in the Democratic party in New York had decided the issue. The thirty-six electoral votes of New York were given to Taylor ; and the majority of Taylor over Cass in the electoral college numbered exactly thirty-six. The vigour of the Free-Soil movement in the North and the triumph of the Whigs were sufficient to have brought the question of freedom or slavery in the new Territories to a crisis. But the discovery of gold in California, rumours of which began to reach the East in the fall of 1848, greatly hastened and complicated the issue. Some years before this time, a Swiss emigrant named J. A. Sutter obtained from the Mexican Governor of California a great tract of land in the Sacramento Valley, and on it, at the junction of the American and Sacramento rivers, had built what was called Sutter's Fort. Over his land roamed thousands of cattle, sheep, and horses. In his employment were hundreds of labourers; and about his fort many American citizens had settled. As Sutter used a great deal of lumber, he employed a man named James Marshall to build a saw-mill at a place called Coloma, some fifty miles away. The saws were to be moved by a water-wheel ; but, when the wheel was finished and the water turned on, the ditch which was to carry off* the water proved to be too small. In order to enlarge it, water was rushed through , and a bed of mud and gravel was consequently formed at the end of the ditch. As Marshall stood looking at this bed of mud one day in January, 1848, he saw some glittering particles. These he picked out, examined, and beat between two stones, and, finding them malleable, at once guessed that they were gold. Gathering a few more, he set off for Sutter's Fort, reached the place at dead of night, and roused Sutter, who easily proved that the flakes found by Marshall were gold. To keep the secret was impossible. Sutter and Marshall acted so strangely that a work- man watched them and found some gold. Then the news spread fast ; and a rush for the gold-fields began. The whole social condition of California was instantly changed. Labourers left their fields, tradesmen their shops. Seamen deserted their ships in every harbour; soldiers defiantly left their barracks. Neither threats nor punishment could hold men to their legal engagements. In May one hundred and fifty people left San Francisco. Day after day the bay was covered with launches loaded with the goods of people hurrying up the Sacramento. On May 29 the Californian newspaper suspended its issue because editor, type-setter, and printer's devil had hurried to the mines. On June 14 the Star stopped for a like reason; and California no longer possessed a newspaper. By July immigrants were crowding in from Monterey, Santa Cruz, Los Angelos, and Oregon. In October Commodore Jones reported from Monterey to the Secretary of the Navy: "Nothing can exceed the deplorable condition of things in California, growing out of the maddening effects of the gold mania. For the present and for