 357  At first Sutter and his men agreed to keep the discovery secret, but soon the news began to spread. The Californians would not believe it for some time. But one day a man came down from Sutter's Fort to San Francisco [^senfran'siskou] with a bottle of gold dust, and shouted, "Gold, gold!” At Once people from all over the territory (2) set out for the mining areas. Workers left their jobs, farmers left their crops standing in the fields, soldiers deserted from the army, and sailors deserted from their ships. They all left their families behind. Many of these first-comers grew rich (3). They found the places where it was easiest to dig out the gold. Many dug from ten to fifty dollar's worth in a day. At the end of the year 1848 and the beginning of 1849 news began to reach people farther east that gold had been discovered m California At first they laughed at such a stoiy. But the stoiy was repeated again and again, and finally men began to listen. Within a few months the news spread all over the East. Men sold their houses to get money enough to go to California. Mexicans, British, French, Germans and from Asia and all over the world, joined in the rush. Most of them set out in the year 1849, and were therefore called Forty-Niners. The would-be miners (4) were chiefly young men. Most of them dressed in red flannel shirts, trousers, wide hats, with guns and knives in their belts. They wore not ordinaty shoes, but high boots. They let their hair and beards grow long. When they reached California, the men immediately hurried to the mines. These were along rivers or on the sides of mountains. The men dug up the gravel from the river banks, put it in a pan, and washed the earth away with water. In the bottom of the pan would remain wet sand and usually some gold dust. When the sand was dry, they blew it away (5): the gold, being heavier, remained. They found it hard to dig all day in the hot sun, often standing waist-deep in the ice-cold water of the mountain rivers. (to be continued) (1) Mexican War - война между США и Мексикой, окончившаяся в 1848 г. отторжением от Мексики территории штатов Калифорния, Техас и Нью-Мексико. (2) from all over the territory - со всех концов территории. Дальше в тексте вы встретите all over the East - по всему востоку Америки и from all over the world - со всех концоф света. (3) first-comers значит people who came first, т.е. первые поселенцы. То grow rich - разбогатеть. Глагол to grow часто значит становиться, хотя его основное значение - расти. 357 |
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