I am strongly disposed to think this immense hollow must have been the rocky shore of an inlet or a lagoon; the rocks underlying the shingle have all the appearance, when denuded by the washing, of sea-wear. I try with a powerful lens to detect gold amidst the material they are washing, but not a trace is discoverable, and yet it pays an immense profit to the gold-washers. Hunt’s Hill is a timbered mountain, about 3,500 feet in altitude. Washing its base is the Greenhorn river, on the banks of which some very rich gold-washings are carried on, as well as at Bear Creek, on the opposite slope of the ridge. Clothing the hill, towering high above the shanties of the miners, the sugar and nut-pines wave lazily; the immense cones of the latter, plentifully besprinkling the ground, afford a feast to the Indians and lesser rodent mammals. _March 29th._—Return to Marysville. Visited another hydraulic washing at Timbuctoo, on the Yuba river, much the same as that seen at Nevada. Marysville is about the third best city in California, situated on the bank of the Feather river, which is rapidly filling up, from the immense quantity of material brought down from the hydraulic washings. A single peach-orchard I visited was 200 acres, all fenced, and the trees in beautiful health; from it, I am told, 80,000 dollars were returned in a single year by the sale of the peaches. • • • • • I commence my journal again on _April 24th._—I am in the ‘Victor’ steamboat, a small crank flat-bottomed affair, pushed against the current by a huge stern-wheel—an ugly appendage, but very effective in navigating swift shallow streams. I am bound for Red Bluffs, 275 miles above Sacramento. Pass the exits of the Yuba and Feather rivers, and change the yellow muddy water for the pure sparkling stream fresh from the mountain. _April 25th._—Starting again—the ‘Victor’ having been fastened up all night, tethered to a tree, as one would tie up his horse—the scenery, as we wend along the sinuous course of the stream, rapidly changes its character. The banks get steep, and sharp hills take the place of the flat lands behind us. Wild grape-vines hang in clustering tangles of green luxuriance from the branches of the ilex, oak, and arbutus, forming a continuous arcade over the water. The Bluffs are reached. A straggling town, built on a high bank beetling over the Sacramento river, peeps out, from amidst some tall trees. Men, women, children, and dogs are crowding down, marching like ants from a hill towards a recent discovery of eatables. The banks are red, the soil is red, and the houses are built of red brick—Red Bluffs, a proper and appropriate name. Land, and put up at —— House, not remarkable for anything but dirt and discomfort.