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{ii}

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1855, by
H I N T O N   R.   H E L P ER.,
In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, for the
District of Maryland.

Sherwood & Co., Printers,
BALTIMORE.{iii}

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PREFACE.

Previous to my departure for California, near and dear friends extractedfrom me a promise to communicate by letter, upon every convenientoccasion, such intelligence as would give them a distinct idea of thetruthfulness or falsehood of the many glowing descriptions and reputedvast wealth of California. In accordance with this promise, I collected,from the best and most reliable sources, all that I deemed worthy ofrecord touching the past of the modern El Dorado, relying upon my ownpowers of observation to depicture its present condition and its futureprospects.

This correspondence was never intended for the public eye, for thesimple reason that the matter therein is set forth in a very plainmanner, with more regard to truth than elegance of diction. Indeed, howcould it be otherwise? I have only described those things which cameimmediately under my own observation, and, beside this, I make nopretensions to extensive scholastic attainments, nor do I claim to be anadept in the art of book-making.{vi}

A weary and rather unprofitable sojourn of three years in various partsof California, afforded me ample time and opportunity to become toothoroughly conversant with its rottenness and its corruption, itssqualor and its misery, its crime and its shame, its gold and its dross.Simply and truthfully I gave the history of my experience to friends athome, who, after my return, suggested that profit might be derived fromgiving these letters to the world in narrative form, and urged me sostrenuously, that I at length acceded to their wishes, but not withoutmuch reluctance, being doubtful as to the reception of a book from oneso incapable as myself of producing any thing more than a plain“unvarnished tale.”

In order to present a more complete picture of California, I have addedtwo chapters, that describing the route through Nicaragua, and thegeneral resume at the close of my volume. All that I solicit for this,my first offering, is a liberal and candid examination; not of a part,but of the whole—not a cursory, but a considerate reading.

H. R. H.

Salisbury, North

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