The Growth of Our City

As the days wore on, it seemed certain that we might fulfill the prediction Mr. Middleton had made when he said this Fountain. City of ours was destined to grow into a prosperous settlement. Well-meaning men joined us who had come into the country to make homes, rather than to seek for gold, adding to our numbers day by day until for a full mile on the western side of the stream, houses such as Mr. Middleton had built stretched far away into the green of the outlying forest. So rapid was the growth of our city during that first summer, that I prophesied that it would within another year outstrip Lawrence.

So, even now, I believe it might have grown and prospered, but for that great curse, the thirst for gold, which seized upon our people at intervals, when miners coming out disappointed or going into the hills full of hope, told of this lucky find or of that man who, after only two months of labor, had become fabulously rich.

Despite the fact that we were situated as pleasantly as any people could desire, and although the lands were yielding so bountifully that it really seemed as if one need only to thrust in the seed and then lie at ease until the crop was ripe for harvest, yet our people, or some of them at least, yearned to try their "luck" in the diggings. We might on one day gain four or five new settlers, to lose on the next day seven or eight who had gone suddenly mad in their desire to try mining.