On our way back we met the mail agent, who had letters for me. He declines taking gold-dust to San Francisco, on account of the danger. Remarked that he traveled feeling that he might be shot at any moment, and that the assassin might be concealed behind the next bush. Twelve murders have been committed within a week in and near Sonora. There is so much alarm that a volunteer company has been organized, till a regiment of dragoons can be ordered here. This state of things is no doubt owing, in part, to the heavy tax imposed upon foreigners, which deprives many of them of employment. In consequence, they become desperate, often being destitute of the means with which to purchase their daily supplies. They are accordingly driven to steal and to murder. The river being yet too high to allow us to commence our work upon Hart’s Bar, we postponed our meeting for a week, and returned to the mountains, hoping to find another vein of gold; but our efforts were not rewarded. On the 9th instant we came down to Hart’s Bar to attend a company meeting; but the river being still too high for profitable labor, we returned again to the mountains, where, and at Woods’s Creek, we have worked till this time, not averaging 50 cents a day. To-day we have come down to Hart’s Bar, to make all necessary arrangements--lay in our provisions, purchase mining tools, pitch our tents, erect brush arbors--before we begin the work. I have selected a spot for my arbor-home, a little above the bar, on a gentle rise, and at a short distance from the encampment of my companions, which consists of a picturesque group of tents and arbors on the bar below. Just behind me the mountain ascends abrupt and steep. I am making my arbor beneath a large pine, the only tree upon the bar. It is called the “medicine-tree,” because its pitch is used as a balsam for all burns and bruises. This tree forms one of the supporters of my arbor. Driving into the ground three posts, and putting poles across these, supported also by branches of the pine, I have covered the frame thus formed with brush and boughs, throwing them on the top, and interweaving them into the sides. This forms for me a cool, shaded room, about ten feet square, where I may find a shelter from the intense heat of the sun, which is to-day 113° in the shade. Between a pin driven into the tree and a post at the back of the arbor I have swung my hammock, in which, dressing myself and creeping into the bag, as I have already described, I shall spread my blankets over me. I can fancy this will be a sort of magnetic telegraph office, whence, as soon as I am asleep, I shall be transported home with lightning speed, and spend many a sweet hour with my distant family. On a post in the middle of the arbor, which supports also the poles and boughs overhead, I have left the short prongs, upon which I hang my clothes, bags, &c., excepting the small bag containing my letters and Daguerreotypes, which hangs upon the post at the head of my