[15] Laborers left the fields, tradesmen the shops, and seamen deserted their ships as soon as they entered port. One California newspaper suspended its issue because editor, typesetters, and printer's devil had gone to the gold fields. In June the Star stopped for a like reason, and California was without a newspaper. Some men made $5000, $10,000, and $15,000 in a few days. California life in the early times is described in Kirk Munroe's _Golden Days of '49_, and in Bret Harte's _Luck of Roaring Camp_ and _Tales of the Argonauts_. [16] Those who crossed the plains suffered terribly, and for many years the wrecks of their wagons, the bones of their oxen and horses, and the graves of many of the men were to be seen along the route. This route was from Independence in Missouri, up the Platte River, over the South Pass, past Great Salt Lake, and so to "the diggings." [17] Some miners obtained gold by digging the earth, putting it into a tin pan, pouring on water, and then shaking the pan so as to throw out the muddy water and leave the particles of gold. Others used a box mounted on rockers and called a "cradle" or "rocker." [18] Read the speeches of Calhoun and Webster in _Johnston's American Orations_, Vol. II. Webster's speech gave great offense in the North. Read McMaster's _Daniel Webster_, pp. 314-324, and Whittier's poem _Ichabod_. The debate and its attendant scenes are well described in Rhodes's _History of the U. S._, Vol. I, pp. 104-189. [19] The fugitive slave law gave great offense to the North. It provided that a runaway slave might be seized wherever found, and brought before a United States judge or commissioner. The negro could not give testimony to prove he was not a fugitive but had been kidnapped, if such were the case. All citizens were "commanded," when summoned, to aid in the capture of a fugitive, and, if necessary, in his delivery to his owner. Fine and imprisonment were provided for any one who harbored a fugitive or aided in his escape. The law was put in execution at once, and "slave catchers," "man hunters," as they were called, "invaded the North." This so excited the people that many slaves when seized were rescued. Such rescues occurred during 1851 at New York, Boston, Syracuse, and at Ottawa in Illinois. Read Wilson's _Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America_, Chap. 26. In the midst of this excitement Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe published her story of _Uncle Tom's Cabin_. Mrs. Stowe's purpose was "to show the institution of slavery truly just as it existed." The book is rather a picture of what slavery might have been than of what slavery really was; but it was so powerfully written that everybody read it, and thousands of people in the North who hitherto cared little about the slavery issue were converted to abolitionism. [Illustration: THE UNITED STATES IN 1850.] CHAPTER XXVI THE STRUGGLE FOR FREE SOIL