pitiable condition, Californians injudiciously sent them a large supply of beef and flour—a sort of food to which they were unaccustomed, and of which they ate so greedily as to induce a virulent disease, of which fifty-two died, practically exterminating the tribe. This was Rocky Mountain men’s justice that was thus dealt out in the California mines, and of the same piece as that of the Cayuse war, or that of the general Indian war of 1855-56. It was rough and terrible, and the Indians were the victims; but the old California system was the real cause. The attempt was made to work the mines upon a system of inequality—of proprietors and peons. The Oregonians, accustomed to a system of equality, finding themselves exposed to outlawry, and not protected from the poor savagery of the Indians, struck as they could. It is to be remembered, too, that the secret murder of thirty-two men, without any attempt at meting out justice, was an enormity that no community should brook. But that it was not mere personal vengeance, but the purpose to establish the system of free labor, and to root out the contract system, or rather the peon system, was shown by the following: At length Case decided to go up into the mines when affairs were at last settled, and the men were working without trouble or danger; he had fallen in with a certain Major Whiting, an American by birth, who had, however, been living in Mexico, and had even served in the Mexican army against the United States. This Mexican officer was now bringing up from that region a long mule train of provisions and a company of peons whom he had taken from prison at a cost to himself on the average of but $2 each, and had contracted with them to work for him at eighteen cents a day. Case reached the mines before him. When Whiting arrived he called upon Case first of all to ask what was the intention of the Oregon miners about allowing his debtors to work upon the bars. Case replied, “I speak only for myself; but I am opposed to it.” Whiting then asked him to call a meeting to determine the opinion of the miners. Case complied. Mr. Finley of Oregon City happened to be chosen chairman of this meeting, and a young man named——, secretary. The call had been made most literally by Case’s getting up upon a high rock and shouting so as to be heard all over the canyon, and then those that came first raised such a cry that it could be heard for a distance of two miles up and down, and a pistol was also fired. At such a summons, of course, the miners came to the camp in great numbers, and upon the object of the meeting being announced, resolutions were passed unanimously to allow no working of the mines except by those who were American citizens and intended to remain in the United States; thus forbidding those who were not citizens or who came simply to work and then return to foreign homes. In the face of this decision, Whiting, of course, was obliged to