{"product_id":"2940013296497","title":"Handbook To The New Gold-Fields","description":"INTRODUCTION.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHANDBOOK TO THE NEW EL-DORADO.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe problem of colonisation in the north-western portion of British\u003cbr\u003eAmerica is fast working itself out.  The same destiny which pushed\u003cbr\u003eforward Anglo-Saxon energy and intelligence into the rich plains of\u003cbr\u003eMexico, and which has peopled Australia, is now turning the current of\u003cbr\u003eemigration to another of the \"waste-places of the earth.\"  The discovery\u003cbr\u003eof extensive goldfields in the extreme west of the territories now\u003cbr\u003eoccupied by the Hudson's Bay Company, is a great fact.  It no longer\u003cbr\u003ecomes to us as the report of interested adventurers, or the exaggeration\u003cbr\u003eof a few sanguine diggers, but with well-authenticated results--large\u003cbr\u003equantities of gold received at San Francisco, and a consequent rush of\u003cbr\u003eall nations from the gold regions of California, as well as from the\u003cbr\u003eUnited States and Canada.  The _thirst for Gold_ is, as it always has\u003cbr\u003ebeen, the most attractive, the strongest, the most unappeasable of\u003cbr\u003eappetites--the impulse that builds up, or pulls down empires, and floods\u003cbr\u003ethe wilderness with a sudden population.  In those wild regions of the\u003cbr\u003eFar West men are pouring in one vast, gold-searching tide of thousands\u003cbr\u003eand tens of thousands, into the comparatively unknown territory beyond\u003cbr\u003ethe Rocky Mountains, for which our Legislature has just manufactured a\u003cbr\u003egovernment.  How strange is the comparison instituted by the _Times_\u003cbr\u003ebetween the rush to Fraser River and the mediaeval crusades, which\u003cbr\u003ecarried so large a portion of the population of Europe to die on the\u003cbr\u003eburning plains of Palestine!  At Clermont Ferrand, Peter the Hermit has\u003cbr\u003econcluded his discourse; cries are heard in every quarter, \"It is the\u003cbr\u003ewill of God!  It is the will of God!\"; Every one assumes the cross, and\u003cbr\u003ethe crowd disperses to prepare for conquering under the walls of the\u003cbr\u003eearthly, a sure passage to the heavenly, Jerusalem.  What elevation of\u003cbr\u003emotive, what faith, what enthusiasm!  Compare with this the picture\u003cbr\u003epresented by San Francisco Harbour.  A steamer calculated to carry 600\u003cbr\u003epersons, is laden with 1600.  There is hardly standing room on the deck.\u003cbr\u003eIt is almost impossible to clear a passage from one part of the vessel\u003cbr\u003eto the other.  The passengers are not knights and barons, but tradesmen,\u003cbr\u003e\"jobbers,\" tenants, and workmen of all the known varieties.  Their\u003cbr\u003eobject in of the earth, earthy--wealth in its rawest and rudest form--\u003cbr\u003egold, the one thing for which they bear to live, or dare to die.\u003cbr\u003eAlthough in the comparison the crusades may have the superiority in many\u003cbr\u003epoints, yet so little have ideal, romantic, and sentimental\u003cbr\u003econsiderations to do with the current of human affairs, that while the\u003cbr\u003ecrusades remain a monument of abortive and objectless folly, fatal to\u003cbr\u003ethose who embarked in them, and leaving as their chief result a tinge of\u003cbr\u003eAsiatic ferocity on European barbarism, the exodus of San Francisco,\u003cbr\u003enotwithstanding the material end it has in view, is sure to work out the\u003cbr\u003eprogress of happiness and civilisation, and add another to the many\u003cbr\u003econquests over nature, which the present age has witnessed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn a year more than ordinarily productive of remarkable events, one of\u003cbr\u003ethe most noteworthy, and that which is likely to leave a lasting\u003cbr\u003eimpression on the world, is this discovery of gold on the coasts of the\u003cbr\u003ePacific.  The importance of the new region as a centre for new\u003cbr\u003eramifications of English relations with the rest of the world cannot\u003cbr\u003ewell be exaggerated either in a political or a commercial point of view.\u003cbr\u003eIt will be the first really important point we shall have ever\u003cbr\u003ecommanded on that side of the Pacific Ocean, and it cannot but be of\u003cbr\u003einestimable value in developing our relations with America, China,\u003cbr\u003eJapan, and Eastern Russia.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47176562049264,"sku":"2940013296497","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013296497_p0.jpg?v=1763579341","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013296497","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}