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Show 152 NATIONAL WAGON ROAD GUIDE. The first effort then, should be to obtain employment with experienced miners; there is a great advantaO'e in • b locating where steady employment can be secured; to do this, lose no time in arriving at that section of the mining region that you hear has a full supply of "'ater for mining purposes. Don't trust to all you hear, but make diligent inquiry, and then of all the information you gain, act upon that which to you seems the most reliable, and you can hardly go wrong. Having reached the mines, offer your services to miners 'v ho already understand their business, ·and go to work even at low wages, say fifty dollars a mo~th and board, until you gain experience in the use of tools toms, sluices, etc. Information thUs gained, with you1~ experience, is worth every thing to you as a miner and . ' Is more cheaply obtained, than it .can possibly be in any other way. Among the newly arrived, are often those who with . ' minds ever restless and changing, are not satisfied with the slow and certai? results of a steady ~pplication of labor, but are ever trying new diggings, new plans and' ne_w appliances, with the hope that their good luck may br~ng. them a fortune at a strike. Acting upon this principle-or rather lack of principle-large numbers spend their time and money, chasing phantoms. No story, too incredulous for them to believe while distance, and cost of migration tither seems only ~o lend additional enchantment. Thus they start, upon a worse than a wild goose chase, "for new and better diggins"; • • APPENDIX. · 153 but in four cases out of five, only to chase the visions of their imaginings, for weeks or months, to their utter disappointment and perhaps entire expenditure of means. '· I AM qOING TO GOLD LAKE. I HAVE BEEN TO GOLD LAKE. From careful observation for years, we ·are certain that the greater portion of those who have thus run 'vild at every " new discovery of rich diggins," now find themselves with less gold in their purses, than those who have diligently applied their time and labor to steady mining operations, even though at moderately paying rates ; better make sure of steady paying wages, than trust to fickle chance, for a speedy fortune. 6 |