On the 25th ulto yours of the 11 Jany was received in which you instruct me that, owing to the unexpected decrease of production of the Estate and the consequent diminution of the working capital of the Company, the Trustees cannot for the present entertain the project of the Canal, though they hope eventually to carry it out. As, if it is to be eventually carried out, it is desirable that some regard should be had to this probability in nearly all improvements of a minor character to be made on the Estate, I trust that the Trustees will not object to my making in the course of the summer a preliminary survey of the whole route, sufficiently thorough to fully determine the question of its practicability and for a rough estimate of its cost.

Enclosed you have report of yesterday’s melting.

Princeton has done a little better than in the previous run.

Pine Tree considerably better.

Josephine worse, we shall discontinue the present Josephine workings.

Mt Ophir from the Winze shaft as explained in my last a little better.

Green Gulch much worse, the stopeings to the north of the [193]shaft having been exhausted and the miners necessarily mixing the good rock with prongs of slate where it pinched out. This is what I have advised you must be expected to soon occur. Stopeing continues to the South of the shaft on very good rock. I hope it will last several weeks.

The exploration by a new shaft to the southward of Green Gulch spoken of in my last continues to promise well. It is not unlikely, however, to prove a small deposit, like this we are now working through, adjoining the main shaft.

Four tons of rock from an exploration upon a vein in Section IX, Township V, included in the return of Mt Ophir mill, yielded at the rate of $23.27/100 per ton. The vein where now worked (twenty feet from surface) is but six inches thick but as the rock will about pay expenses at this rate I propose to continue the exploration in hopes that it will be found to widen below.

You express anxiety with regard to the Mariposa mine and intimate that Mr Park has not much confidence in it, resting his hope of the Estate in the Princeton. I am happy to say that up to this date the estimate which I originally expressed of the Mariposa is more than sustained by the results of our explorations and trials. We have lately found better rock than ever before.

I have satisfied myself by extensive enquiry that the Company pays more for its mining labor than is paid anywhere else in the state, and the high rates paid by the Company, which have now been maintained for several years without change, obliges others in this region of the state, to pay higher wages than they otherwise would, though none pay quite as high as the Company. The only ground on which higher wages than are paid elsewhere can be demanded here is that the expenses of living are higher.

Our present accommodations for the men are the meanest possible, being in some cases less comfortable than the wigwams of the Diggers, but the board at our houses is excellent, better than can be obtained at most “first class” hotels. The charge for board has been $1. a day. Mr Park undertook to compel all the men to live at the boarding houses, but I understand his requirement in this respect has never been strictly enforced, and when I arrived a large majority of the Princeton miners were living in hovels & booths of their own construction and provided and cooked their own food. They allege that they can board themselves satisfactorily at less than half the Company’s charges.

I some time since instructed the Superintendents & Captains to let the men know that a general reduction of wages was expected soon to be made.

It being very doubtful whether Mt Ophir and the northern mines could be profitably worked until the new openings were completed, and the yield of Princeton at the melting of the 13th Feb having been the [194]lowest obtained since the mine was opened and having secured contracts for all the important explorations (tunnels and shafts) and got the Company a little in debt to the Contractors, so as to have a penalty which we could enforce upon them if they should not meet their engagements, I thought we could at this time better afford any interruption of work which would necessarily result from undertaking to reduce wages than under any other circumstances likely to arise.

Accordingly on the 27 ult I gave written instructions as follows.

“Superintendents & others authorized to engage men on behalf of the Company are expected and required to do so at the lowest practicable rates, and the following are the highest rates which will be allowed after the 1st of March for the class of service indicated:

“For miners, per day $3.15

“For men working underground, as strikers or otherwise, who are not miners or mechanics $2.40

“An addition of ten cents per day may be made to these rates for married men living with their families; for men who board at the Company’s boarding houses and for men employed at points where the Company has not provided boarding houses for them. The charge for board at the Company’s boarding houses is reduced to eighty-five cents per day.

“The boarding houses of the Company are intended to furnish good board to the single men employed by the Company where there is no certainty that they would otherwise be able to obtain good board at a moderate price. It is not intended that any profit shall hereafter be made upon them. If they do not pay expenses at the price now fixed, the price will be again advanced or they will be given up. If but a small number of the single men make use of them they will not pay expenses at this price. If all make use of them it is possible that the price may hereafter be still further reduced. It is therefore desired that all single men, working near the Boarding Houses, should make use of them. Experience has shown that men who have the trouble of providing for themselves are not as steady workmen and do not on an average accomplish as much as those at the Boarding Houses. Hence a difference of ten cents per day is allowed to be made in wages in favor of those who make use of the accommodations provided by the Company.

“It is left for the present to the discretion of those now authorized to engage men to reduce the wages of others than those named above, it being, however, expected that a reduction will be made, according to circumstances, equivalent at least to the reduction in the rate of board.”

Work is suspended in all the mines today, the contractors with some few exceptions quitting with the rest, alleging that they do so under compulsion of the others. My present opinion is that about half our men will leave—many have already called to settle accounts who will of course [195]be promptly paid—and that when they are gone the mischief makers who are now trying to bring about a general combination to compel us to return to the old rates will be over-ruled by the men who have families to support and who are nearly all on contract work and I presume well disposed. I have no apprehensions of violence, though as the men are drinking a good deal, some accident may lead to it. We shall get off all the gold tonight (herewith). We have but a small amount of powder which is well distributed and secured.

If you should not have heard by telegraph, you may presume that we are going on regularly at the reduced rates but with a reduced force. I shall expect to make a further reduction in the autumn.