Esmeralda, Aug. 7, 1862.
My Dear Bro:
Barstow wrote that if I wanted the place I could have it. I wrote him [ to let that ]I guessed I would take it, and asked him [ lo how ]long before I must come up there. I have not heard from him since.
Now I shall leave at midnight [to-night], alone and on foot for a walk of 60 or 70 miles through a totally uninhabited country, and it is barely possible that mail [facilities ]may prove infernally “slow” during the few weeks I expect to spend out there. But do you write Barstow that I have left here for a week or so, and in case he should want me he must write me here, or let me know through you. You see I want to know something about that country out [yonnder].1
The Contractors say they will strike the Fresno next week. After fooling with those assayers a week, they concluded not to buy ‸“M. Flower”‸ at $50, [ w although ]they would have given five times the sum for it four months ago. So I have made out a deed for one-half of all Johnny’s ground and acknowledged and left it in Judge F. K. Bechtel’s hands, and if Judge Turner wants it he must write to Bechtel and pay him his Notary fee of $1.50.2 I would have paid that fee myself, but I want money now as I leave town to-night. However, if you think it isn’t right, you can pay the fee to Judge Turner yourself.
[Hang to ]your money now. I may want some when I get back.
Col. Youngs sends his regards, & says he will have our census completed & send up to you to-morrow, & we ought to have a larger representation—although the law said census must be taken in May—but he couldn’t help it, d—n’em they wouldn’t run the line.3
Yes, I will scrape up some specimens—have got a lot—but they’re a d—d nuisance about a cabin. I picked up some splendid agates & such things, but I expect they are all lost by this time.
No—I shan’t pay Upton—just yet.
See that you keep out of debt—to anybody[.] [ Bunker Bully for ]Bunker. Write him that I would write him myself, but I am to take a walk [to-night ]& haven’t time. Tell him to bring his family out with him.4 He can rely upon what I say—and I say the land has lost its ancient desolate appearance; the rose and the oleander have taken the place of the departed sage-brush; a rich black loam, garnished with moss, and flowers, and the greenest of grass, smiles to Heaven from the vanished sand-plains; the “endless snows” have all disappeared, and in their stead—or to repay us for their loss, the mountains rear their billowy heads aloft, crowned with a fadeless and eternal verdure; birds, and fountains, and trees—tropical trees—everywhere!—and the poet dreampt of Nevada when he wrote:
“—and Sharon waves, in solemn praise,
Her silent groves of palm.”5
and to-day the royal Raven stands on [ t a ]fragrant carcass and listens in a dreamy stupor to the songs of the thrush and the nightingale and the canary—and shudders when the gaudy-plumaged birds of the distant South sweep by him to the orange groves of Carson. Tell him he wouldn’t recognise the d—d country. He [ f ] should bring his family by all means.
I intended to write home, but I haven’t done it.
Yr. Bro.
Sam.
P. S. Put the enclosed slips in my scrap book.6
Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary
Source text(s):Previous publication:
L1, 233–235; MTB, 1:204, brief excerpt; MTL, 1:83–84, with ommissions.
Provenance:see McKinney Family Papers, pp. 459–61.
Emendations and textual notes:
to let that • [‘that’ over ‘to let’]
lo how • [‘h’ over ‘lo’]
to-night • to-|night
facilities • facilieties [‘t’ over ‘e’]
yonnder • [possibly ‘younder’]
w although • [‘a’ over ‘w’]
Hang to • [sic]
Bunker Bully for • Bu‸lly‸ nker for [‘lly f’ over ‘nker’]
to-|night • to-night
t a • [‘a’ over possible ‘t’]
f should • [‘s’ over ‘f’]
