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2 volumes. xii, 251; [2], 247 + 45 ad pp. Illustrated with 8 tinted lithograph plates, including frontispieces (view of San Francisco in 1848 and 1849). 7¾x5, original blind-stamped green cloth, spines lettered in gilt. Vol. I is the First Edition, Vol. II the Second Edition.

One of the most influential and widely read books on the California Gold Rush. A successful author and correspondent with the New York Tribune, Bayard Taylor went to California specifically to record the Gold Rush. The Zamorano Eighty notes that "This work by an eminent writer and artist is probably the outstanding book on the early gold rush in California. The author's description of the Constitutional Convention at Monterey is the best we have, as are also the views he gives us of the earliest mining camps. The colored plates are beautifully tinted works of art depicting San Francisco, Monterey, Sacramento, and the mining camps. Bayard Taylor saw everything and recorded everything he saw." Cowan p.630; Graff 4074; Howes T43; Kurutz 618a; Sabin 94440; Streeter 2654; Wheat Gold Rush 204; Zamorano Eighty 73.