Writers have often commented upon the strange
stroke of fortune that gave to Americans the
honor of discovering gold in California. Historically
the Spanish have been one of the world's great mining
peoples, while for Americans, prior to 1848, searching
for mineral wealth was an unusual occupation. Then,
too, in 1848 Cabrillo's voyage up the Pacific Coast was
three hundred and six years distant, and the Spanish
communities at San Diego and Monterey were seventy-
nine years old, whereas distinctively American settle-
ments had existed for only a few years.

Yet there is no mystery about the failure of the His-
pano-Californians to uncover the hidden treasure. The
gold was secreted in the interior of the province: pre-
cisely the region that the Spanish race had not colonized.
Had the mineral deposits been located near the sea, they
would doubtless have been uncovered much earlier, per-
haps by the first civilized settlers. Indeed, the Spanish
had discovered gold in southern California prior to
1848, and small amounts of the precious metal had
formed a part of the return cargoes of some of the "Bos-
ton ships" that came to trade on the California coast, but

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