[3] See Farnham's Adventures. Wilkes's and Fremont's Narratives, and Emory's Report.--In 1846, Eugenio Macnamara, a Catholic priest and Missionary, obtained a grant of a large tract of land between the San Joaquin and the Sierra Nevada, the Cosumnes and the Tulares in the vicinity of San Gabriel, from Pio Pico, governor of the Californias, for the purpose of establishing upon it a large colony of Irish Catholics; but the grant was not ratified by the Central Government, and the project was not carried into effect. There is no evidence that Father Macnamara was aware of the existence of gold in the valley of the San Joaquin. [4] Official Despatch of Colonel Mason, Commander of the 10th Military Department, August 17, 1848.--Letters of Thomas C. Larkin, U.S. Consul at Monterey, to the Secretary of State, June 1, and June 28, 1848. [5] Feather River is the first considerable branch of the Sacramento below the _Prairie Buttes_. It has a course of about forty miles, and empties into the main river about fifteen miles above New Helvetia. Though the Sacramento is navigable for vessels only to that place, boats can pass up one hundred miles further. CHAPTER VII. ADVENTURES OF SOME OF THE MINERS, AND INCIDENTS CONNECTED WITH MINING. The adventures of the eager gold-seekers in the region of their hopes, among the washings and the diggings of the _placers_, cannot but be interesting. The toil to which the men have to submit if they would obtain any thing like a satisfaction to their desires, is of a very irksome character. In the summer season, the heat is intense, and the principal part of the labor of washing and digging must be performed exposed to the full blaze of the sun. In the "dry diggings," the miners suffer greatly from the want of water. Most of the provisions having to be transported from the towns on the Sacramento and San Joaquin, soon grow unwholesome from exposure to the sultry air of the day and the damp air of the night. This diet, conjointly with the exposure of the miners, tends to produce intermittent fever and dysentery. The miners generally reside in huts of a rude construction, or in canvas tents, which afford but poor protection from the changes of the weather.