Of these, twenty
thousand crossed the continent by way of the South Pass; and nearly all
of them started from the Missouri River between Independence and St.
Joseph, in the month of May. They formed an army; in daytime their
trains filled up the roads for miles, and at night their camp-fires
glittered in every direction about the places blessed with grass and
water. The excitement continued from 1850 to 1853; emigrants continued
to come by land and sea, from Europe and America, and in the last named
year from China also. In 1854 the migration fell off, and since that
time until the completion of the Union Pacific Railroad California
received the chief accessions to her white population by the Panama
steamers.
The whole world felt a beneficent influence from the great gold yield of
the Sacramento Basin. Labor rose in value, and industry was stimulated
from St. Louis to Constantinople. The news, however, was not welcome to
all classes. Many of the capitalists feared that gold would soon be so
abundant as to be worthless, and European statesmen feared the power to
be gained by the arrogant and turbulent democracy of the New World.
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