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[p.2] but the water being to high to work there at present I made us a claim of two hundred feet of ground on a canion [canyon] or large creek that is said to be rich and left it in care of a young man that I was acquainted with here. We shall go there first when we leave here and if we find nothing there then we will move along further and still keep moving on untill [until] we find some place where it has not been all tore to peices [pieces] like it is in this vicinity[.] We have been working over old digings [diggings] all winter and I want to find some new place where I can have the first chance at it as I want to make one thousand dollars more between this and the first of Nov [November] for that is the time that I have fixed upon to start for home if I am spared untill [until] then. I never expect to make a verry [very] big pile in Calafornia [California] for I see that it is only one in five hundred that makes them big strikes that you see published in the papers. Dear Emeline be patient as you can for you may expect me home by the first of January if I live and have my health[.] I long once more to see and enjoy the society of my family. I have received Georges leter [letter]of the 14th of Jan. Tell him that I will comply with his request when I get in good digings [diggings] where I think a man hired as he spoke of can make something more than expences [expenses] so that there will be something left for him. Tell one armed Robbinson that his son John was here last Sunday at our cabbin [cabin]. He works four miles from here. He said that he made one hundred and fifty dollars the week before [.] that makes about $350 that he has in all [.] he was well. Alonzo Burroughs left here to take the first of May boat for home [.] The ballance [balance] of the boys have gone North. I heard from Osro [?] three weeks ago [.] he had then made about one hundred dollars Since he left here in February [.] A roling [rolling] stone gathers no moss. Vegitation [vegetation] bears a much diferent [different] aspect from what it did when we