As the heavy, long-continued grinding of the
glaciers brought out the features of the Sierra, so the intense
experiences of the gold period have brought out the features of these
old miners, forming a richness and variety of character little known as
yet. The sketches of Bret Harte, Hayes, and Miller have not exhausted
this field by any means. It is interesting to note the extremes possible
in one and the same character: harshness and gentleness, manliness and
childishness, apathy and fierce endeavor. Men who, twenty years ago,
would not cease their shoveling to save their lives, now play in the
streets with children. Their long, Micawber-like waiting after the
exhaustion of the placers has brought on an exaggerated form of dotage.
I heard a group of brawny pioneers in the street eagerly discussing the
quantity of tail required for a boy's kite; and one graybeard undertook
the sport of flying it, volunteering the information that he was a boy,
"always was a boy, and d--n a man who was not a boy inside, however
ancient outside!" Mines, morals, politics, the immortality of the soul,
etc., were discussed beneath shade-trees and in saloons, the time for
each being governed apparently by the temperature.
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