31

BOOK I

1860-1861

32 33

CHAPTER I

TO CALIFORNIA VIA PANAMA

Panama--Acapulco--San Francisco .

New York.

Sunday Evening, October 21, 1860.

I SHALL sail at noon tomorrow, and drop a line before starting. I went to Chickering's* at Springfield, Vermont, Saturday night, October 13, after I left home and stayed until Monday noon. Monday night I spent in Boston, and went to Greenland Tuesday afternoon. I left there again for Boston early Wednesday morning. Wednesday night I went to Northampton, and Thursday, October 18, I came on here with Professor Whitney and his family, stopping a few hours at New Haven where I met old friends and had a short but pleasant visit. At Springfield I met the publisher of the valuable work on the trees of America, in five volumes, worth seventy dollars.* He wants to learn more about the trees of California and offers to send me a copy of his work--quite a gift certainly. I also met Gray, the botanist, at Cambridge, and got much valuable information. He also gave me a useful book.

J. W. Chickering taught at Ovid Academy with Brewer, 1857-58. F. Andrew Michaux and Thomas Nuttall, The North American Sylva (Philadelphia, 1857).

Whitney has been back to Boston and I have had to get the baggage on board ship including our apparatus, some $2,500 to $3,000 worth, belonging to him and to the Survey.

I took dinner with Mr. Brush* today and tea at Hunter's this evening. We sail on the North Star , the steamer Vanderbilt made his famous pleasure trip with. It has a full load of passengers. I have met quite a number of scientific men this 34 4 evening who will see us off in the morning. I have had many letters to write and it is now past two o'clock.

George Jarvis Brush, a classmate of Brewer at Yale (Ph. B. 1852); was Professor of Metallurgy at Yale, 1855-71; Professor of Mineralogy, 1864-98; emeritus, 1898 until his death in 1912.

My baggage from Washington has not arrived. If it is not here in the morning, I shall have it shipped by Freeman's Express. It will be as cheap as to take it with me, but not so convenient.

At Sea.

October 26.

WE sailed Monday noon, punctually as we expected. There was the usual crowd, and partings, and tears, and blessings--I was glad I had parted with my friends at home, not here in this crowd. It was a dark, nasty day, but it did not rain much. We passed out of the harbor, ran down the Jersey coast and before night we had left the land out of sight. We have since then kept due south. The weather has been growing steadily warmer. Today we crossed the Tropic of Cancer and we are now in the tropics in earnest. Our ship is a good one, but terribly crowded. I think there must be 1,000 or 1,200 on board--certainly the former number of passengers.

Caribbean Sea, off the south coast of Cuba.

Saturday, October 27.

CUBA has been in sight nearly all day, and it is now, at 5 P.M., vanishing from view beneath the sea. We now take our way across the Caribbean Sea and the next land we see will be the Isthmus. We have had a most lovely day with a fine breeze from the east, the trade wind, yet it has been intensely hot, like the hottest August day. We ran east of Cuba, about three miles from the shore. San Domingo (or Haiti) was in the dim distance, but Cuba was most beautiful. The east end of the island is very rough, high mountains rise from the interior, nearly as high as the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

35

WILLIAM H. BREWER 1859

36 5

CUBA is a most picturesque island. I regret that I could not see more of it. We are now nearly across the Caribbean Sea; will reach the Isthmus in the morning, when I must send this. This is a poor place to write because of the intense heat and the crowds on deck, which is now piled with trunks that have been brought out in the night to be weighed. Around is the clear deep blue Caribbean Sea. My baggage did not arrive at New York, so it will be sent by an express company.

Ship Golden Age .

Pacific Ocean, near Acapulco.

November 6.

WE arrived at Aspinwall on Tuesday noon, a week ago today, and crossed to Panama the same day. The weather, although intensely hot, was cooler than usual. I wish I could adequately describe the gorgeousness of the vegetation of the Isthmus--it even exceeded the pictures imagination had painted--cocoanut trees, palms, bananas, plantains, oranges, lemons, limes, and other tropical fruits. Tall palms, mahogany, and such woods, vines hanging like ropes from the branches, parasitic plants growing over everything, made a scene I wish you all might see. We were detained more than half the night before we got on the ship at Panama, then found we could not sail all the next day, Wednesday; so I went ashore again and visited the town, for the ship lay a mile or two off, anchored. Panama is the most picturesque place I ever saw. It was once a place of much importance, walled about like the cities of the old world in the Middle Ages, but its glory has departed. Its walls are in ruins, and also many of its fine old churches are entirely in ruins, and over all is a most vigorous growth of tropical vegetation. Trees and shrubs flourish wherever they can get a foothold. This exuberance of vegetation is the feature that strikes me, reared 37 6 in a colder clime. You have no idea of the dampness, especially at this, the rainy, season of the year. An old resident told me that clothing must be aired every day--even books on the shelves wiped every day, or they mold and rot.

The town seems quaint enough. Its tile roofs--no chimneys, for fires are only needed to cook by--its open houses--all make it a queer old place. There are a few Americans connected with the railroad. The better class are Spanish. The masses are black but speak Spanish. They are scantily clothed, the children entirely naked. All along the railroad we passed villages where the houses were only mere roofs upon poles or posts, no sides, the roofs steep and covered with palm leaves, the women with skirt only and the men with only pants, naked from the waist up, the children naked as cupids. The blacks have become the dominant race, and it occurred to me that perhaps in some of our warmer states we were following in the same way.

Wednesday at midnight we were off. We have had hot weather and a smooth sea ever since. Tonight we stop at Acapulco for coal, but it will be after dark and I do not know whether we can go ashore. We have a much more comfortable time on the Golden Age than we had on the other side. In eight days more we will be in San Francisco.

A word more about the Panama railroad. It is well built, its bridges of iron--indeed, iron is used wherever possible, for the wood rots in a year or so. The length is forty-eight and one-half miles, the fare twenty-five dollars, and freight accordingly; so you can well believe that it pays well. Most of the hands are blacks, but all the conductors are Americans. It does an immense business and is a great enterprise, but it cost four thousand lives to build it amid the swamps and miasma of that climate. It follows up the Chagres River about twenty-five miles, then crosses the ridges to the Pacific. The Bay of Panama is fine and large.

38 7

San Francisco, California.

Thursday Evening, November 15.

TUESDAY, November 6, the day of the great election, was a quiet day on shipboard, and at about half-past eight or nine in the evening we ran into the harbor of Acapulco, in Mexico, where the ships coal. Much to the regret of us all we ran in by night and thus missed the beauties of that beautiful harbor. It is so completely locked in by hills that when in, one cannot see the ocean at all; it is completely secure from the storms of the ocean outside. In fact, it is the best harbor between Cape Horn and San Francisco.

The ship anchored in the bay, for there are no wharves; the coal and washing is taken on from lighters. Notwithstanding that it was night, a number of us went ashore. It is a picturesque place of about four thousand inhabitants, hemmed in by hills, and hot as Brazil. All the fruits of the tropics grow there, and I bought a basket of oranges, limes, plantains, and bananas; the last two fruits are very similar. The houses are all of the most open description--lattice doors and often lattice sides. The public square or plaza was filled with natives, some with fruits, shells, and liquors to sell to the passengers, others gambling with each other. I spent an hour looking at them gamble. They are nearly all Indians, but there is some negro and some Spanish blood, and Spanish is the language. Some of the girls were quite pretty.

The men who put the coal on the ship were in strong contrast with those we saw at Panama, in just so much as the Indian form is finer than the negro. The coal was in bags, on an old hulk moored in the bay, and was brought on board by these natives, and the effect of the light of the bright torches on these half-naked men in the gloomy night was picturesque beyond description. The coal is brought from the Atlantic states and costs the company from eighteen to twenty-five, and even at times thirty, dollars per ton in these Pacific ports. We coaled, took on cattle, etc., for provisions, and before 39 8 morning had passed outside and were again on our way on the broad Pacific.

Wednesday, November 7, we kept nearly all day in sight of land, the high Cordilleras often in sight; in fact, they were always in sight when we could see the land at all, and some of the views of them were grand. I had never heard that the views of the mountains of Mexico and Central America were so fine from the ship, so I was entirely unprepared for them.

Thursday they were even finer, and Colima, the volcano, was in sight all day, although it was ninety miles inland and we not less than twenty miles off the coast. We saw it plainly when we were 150 to 180 miles distant, its massive cone-like peak rising against the clear blue sky. Sometimes it stood out clear, at other times clouds curled about its summit. The weather continued magnificent, indeed it has remained so ever since.

Friday, November 9, we crossed the mouth of the Gulf of California and had more wind and a rougher sea, although still comparatively smooth. The next two days we skirted along the coast of Lower California; its barren shores, parched and burned, looked desolate beyond description. On Sunday afternoon two passengers died, one a Mexican who got on at Acapulco, the other a child. Both were sick when they came on shipboard, and both died quite suddenly. They were buried that night, both at the same time. A hard rain squall happened just at that moment, making the scene doubly sad and impressive.

Monday and Tuesday we were along the coast of California proper; the shore often, but not always, in sight, and the weather much cooler. Thick coats were comfortable, and I could no longer sleep on deck. All along in the tropics I slept on the deck, wrapped in my blanket, with the sky overhead--it was not only delicious but glorious, considering the contrast between that and my stateroom, where four persons were crowded into a place scarce six feet square.

Wednesday morning (yesterday) we sailed into the Golden 40 9 Gate, as the entrance to the harbor is called.* It is a narrow strait between steep rocks, with a crooked channel. Inside, the broad bay spreads out, a calm placid lake, so large that all the ships of the world might ride there at anchor with room to spare, and yet so placid that it seemed like a mere pond. It is by far the most beautiful harbor I have ever seen, not even excepting New York.

This name was given by Fre´mont before the discovery of gold. In his Geographical Memoir upon Upper California, in Illustration of His Map of Oregon and California , 1848, he says: "Called Chrysopylae (Golden gate) on the map, on the same principle that the harbor of Byzantium (Constantinople afterwards) was called Chrysoceras (Golden horn). The form of the harbor and its advantages for commerce (and that before it became an entrepot of eastern commerce), suggested the name to the Greek founders of Byzantium. The form of the entrance into the bay of San Francisco, and its advantages for commerce (Asiatic inclusive), suggest the name which is given to this entrance" (p. 32).

As we had instruments to carry we did not hurry on shore, so it was nearly noon before we were fairly at our hotel, and our journey of nearly 6,000 miles brought to an end. It is over 2,000 from New York to Panama, and about 3,300 from Panama to San Francisco. And on the whole of this journey we had fine weather, indeed lovely weather; twenty days out of the twenty-three were as fine as our finest Indian summer.

This place I will not speak of now--it has astounded me. First, after our long trip by sea and by land we are still in the United States; second, a city only about ten years old, it seems at least half a century. Large streets, magnificent buildings of brick, and many even of granite, built in the most substantial manner, give a look of much greater age than the city has.

The weather is perfectly heavenly. They say this is a fair specimen of winter here, yet the weather is very like the very finest of our Indian summer, only not so smoky--warm, balmy, not hot, clear, bracing--in fact I have not words to describe the weather of these two days I have been here. In the yards are many flowers we see only in house cultivation: various kinds of geraniums growing of immense size, dew plant growing like a weed, acacia, fuchsia, etc., growing in the open air in the gardens.

Our arrival was anticipated by the Pony Express. All the papers had announced that the members of the Geological Survey were on their way, and yesterday and today all the city papers have noticed our arrival. Whitney and I get most of the puffs, some of which are quite complimentary.* I have been 41 10 introduced to many prominent citizens, tendered the use of libraries, etc. The Coast Survey offers many facilities, free passage on its vessels along the coast, etc. This afternoon Judge Field and the Governor of the State leave Sacramento to come down here to see us; we shall see them tomorrow.

An editorial in the Daily Alta California speaks of Brewer as "a gentleman of splendid scientific attainments."

We found the news of Lincoln's election when we landed, an unprecedented quick trip of news. I have been out to see fire-works, processions, etc., in the early part of the evening, so now it is late. Good night.

42

CHAPTER II

LOS ANGELES AND ENVIRONS

By Steamer to San Pedro--Los Angeles--Benito Wilson's--Santa Monica Mountains--Personnel--San Gabriel .

Los Angeles, California.

Sunday, December 2, 1860.

PROFESSOR WHITNEY returned from Sacramento Wednesday, November 21, with the "sinews of war," and with orders to get off immediately. The next two days were spent in the greatest activity, buying blankets, getting tents made, getting harness, saddles, some groceries, tea and coffee, etc., and Saturday, November 24, we were on board a steamer for San Pedro, 380 miles southwest of San Francisco. Four of us started. Professor Whitney went to Mariposa with Colonel Fre´mont, intending to come down by the next steamer, about three weeks later. As first assistant, the company was placed in my charge, a heavy responsibility I would like to have had placed on someone else. We were to come down here, buy mules, provision and equip fully, and go into camp and await Professor Whitney.

Well, we sailed on Saturday, a most lovely morning, and took our course down the coast to the southeast. There are two small rocky islands just at the Golden Gate and they were completely covered with sea lions, a kind of large seal, apparently nearly as large as a walrus. They barked at us as we passed and many tumbled into the sea, but hundreds were basking in the sun or moving about with awkward motions.

The next morning we arrived at San Luis Obispo. The port is but a single house, and the village is about four miles distant. As we lay there all day, I went ashore with a friend, a doctor from the United States Army, and spent several hours, saw the 43 12 country and collected some plants, all strange to me. The steamer was anchored a mile from the shore, and the freight, some seventy or eighty tons, had to be landed in yawls or rowboats. There is no dock, so it is landed on a rock.

The land was very dry, the rains had hardly begun, so the vegetation looked very scanty and the land desolate. Scrub oaks, crabbed sycamores, and scrubby undershrubs composed the scanty vegetation. We wandered along the beach and picked up a few shells, some of great beauty. The sea has worn the rocks in fantastic shapes; there are several natural arches, one of great size.

On our return to the ship, we found the passengers playing cards, singing songs, drinking whiskey, etc.--a Californian sabbath. The Boundary Commission,* to run the line between California and countries east, were aboard, a hard set, who were making much noise and drinking much whiskey. They are now encamped near here. One of their men died this morning, killed most probably with bad whiskey. He was out yesterday, walked to camp last evening, and died this morning.

The records of this commission are obscure. It appears to have had some connection with work done by Lieut. Joseph C. Ives on the Colorado River in 1861, but the group mentioned here by Brewer was probably not under Ives's command. Contemporary newspapers mention a party of fourteen men, with transport, including three camels, engaged in the eastern boundary survey, traveling from Los Angeles, via Mohave Desert, to Owens Valley.

Well, we started that evening. The next morning, after stopping a few hours at Santa Barbara, we arrived at San Pedro, the port of Los Angeles, about twenty-five miles from here. We got in about sundown, rode six miles up the river on a small steamer, then disembarked for this place by stage. It was a most lovely night, but there were more than three times as many passengers as there was stage room, so two of us came up and left two other men with the baggage. They came up the next day. We have been here since, looking at mules, harness, bacon, stores, etc. We hope to be in camp in two days more. I have been to church once today, we had a congregation of about thirty or forty, I should think.

In Camp at Los Angeles.

December 7.

WELL, we are in camp. It is a cold rainy night, but I can hardly realize the fact that you at home are blowing your 44 13 fingers in the cold, and possibly sleighing, while I am sitting here in a tent, without fire, and sleeping on the ground in blankets, in this month. We are camped on a hill near the town, perhaps a mile distant, a pretty place.

Los Angeles is a city of some 3,500 or 4,000 inhabitants, nearly a century old, a regular old Spanish-Mexican town, built by the old padres , Catholic Spanish missionaries, before the American independence. The houses are but one story, mostly built of adobe or sun-burnt brick, with very thick walls and flat roofs. They are so low because of earthquakes, and the style is Mexican. The inhabitants are a mixture of old Spanish, Indian, American, and German Jews; the last two have come in lately.* The language of the natives is Spanish, and I have commenced learning it. The only thing they appear to excel in is riding, and certainly I have never seen such riders.

Harris Newark, in Sixty Years in Southern California, 1853-1913 (2d ed., revised, 1926), gives a picture of Los Angeles life at this period.

Here is a great plain, or rather a gentle slope, from the Pacific to the mountains. We are on this plain about twenty miles from the sea and fifteen from the mountains, a most lovely locality; all that is wanted naturally to make it a paradise is water , more water . Apples, pears, plums, figs, olives, lemons, oranges, and "the finest grapes in the world," so the books say, pears of two and a half pounds each, and such things in proportion. The weather is soft and balmy--no winter, but a perpetual spring and summer. Such is Los Angeles, a place where "every prospect pleases and only man is vile."

As we stand on a hill over the town, which lies at our feet, one of the loveliest views I ever saw is spread out. Over the level plain to the southwest lies the Pacific, blue in the distance; to the north are the mountains of the Sierra Santa Monica; to the south, beneath us, lies the picturesque town with its flat roofs, the fertile plain and vineyards stretching away to a great distance; to the east, in the distance, are some mountains without name, their sides abrupt and broken, while still above them stand the snow covered peaks of San Bernardino. The 45 14 effect of the pepper, fig, olive, and palm trees in the foreground, with the snow in the distance, is very unusual.

This is a most peculiar climate, a mingling of the temperate with the tropical. The date palm and another palm grow here, but do not fruit, while the olive, fig, orange, and lemon flourish well. The grapes are famous, and the wine of Los Angeles begins to be known even in Europe.

We got in camp on Tuesday, December 4. We had been invited to a ranch and vineyard about nine miles east, and went with a friend on Tuesday evening. It lies near San Gabriel Mission, on a most beautiful spot, I think even finer than this. Mr. Wilson,* our host, uneducated, but a man of great force of character, is now worth a hundred or more thousand dollars and lives like a prince, only with less luxury. His wife is finely educated and refined, and his home to the visitor a little paradise. We were received with the greatest cordiality and were entertained with the greatest hospitality. A touch of the country and times was indicated by our rig--I was dressed in colored woolen shirt, with heavy navy revolver (loaded) and huge eight-inch bowie knife at my belt; my friend the same; and the clergyman who took us out in his carriage carried along his rifle, he said for game, yet owned that it was "best to have arms after dark."

Benjamin Davis Wilson, familiarly known as "Benito" (1811-78), a native of Tennessee, came to Los Angeles in 1841 after a career as trapper and trader in New Mexico. In 1852 he purchased the Lake Vineyard property and made his home there. In 1864 he built a burro path to the top of the mountain which bears his name.

Here let me digress. This southern California is still unsettled. We all continually wear arms--each wears both bowie knife and pistol (navy revolver), while we have always for game or otherwise, a Sharp's rifle, Sharp's carbine, and two double-barrel shotguns. Fifty to sixty murders per year have been common here in Los Angeles, and some think it odd that there has been no violent death during the two weeks that we have been here. Yet with our care there is no considerable danger, for as I write this there are at least six heavy loaded revolvers in the tent, besides bowie knives and other arms, so we anticipate no danger. I have been practicing with my revolver and am becoming expert.

46 15

Well, to return to my story, and to Mr. Wilson's. We found a fine family, with two lovely young ladies. The next day, Wednesday, December 5, we went up into the mountain, followed up a canyon (gorges are called can˜ons or canyons), and then separated. I climbed a hill 2,500 or more feet, very steep and rocky, gathered some plants, and had one of the most magnificent views of my life--the plain, and the ocean beyond. The girls went with us into the canyon, but did not climb higher. After our climb and a lunch, a ride of eight miles over the fields (for no fences obstruct the land) brought us back; then dinner and return here. We had a delightful time--I ought to say "we" were the field assistant Mr. Ashburner and I. We will try to visit them again when Professor Whitney comes.

It is cold, wet, and cheerless, so good night! Rain patters on the tent and dribbles within.

Sunday Evening, December 9.

YESTERDAY was rainy and cheerless enough in our tents--cold, damp, wet--but it cleared up by noon, and today is most lovely, yet cool, thirty-nine degrees in our tent this morning.

I like camp life thus far. I had expected to take cold and all that, but not so. I have slept well and have eaten well, and am well, only have more responsibility than I wish. By tomorrow night I shall have paid out over nine hundred dollars in the last two weeks--but Professor Whitney will be here Tuesday.

Camp No. 2, Sierra Santa Monica.

Monday Evening, December 17.

MONDAY, December 10, I sent a wagon and two men to San Pedro, on the coast, for instruments, and that night Professor Whitney arrived. He stayed in town; we kept in camp. The next day (Tuesday) it rained very heavily all day. It began before daylight and drowned us out at dawn. Soon the water was ankle deep in the tent. Oh, the comforts of camp in these 47 16 tropical rains, when it doesn't rain but pours! Ditches were dug, but were insufficient, stakes were freshly driven to keep the tents from blowing down in the wind, then blankets, instruments, books, maps, etc., were transported to the driest tent--lucky that we had but four in camp! We breakfasted on raw bacon and dry bread. An unoccupied hut was found, where we built a fire and spent a part of the day, and two spent the night there. I stuck to the tent, along with the cook.

At ten at night the men arrived with the wagon, but I sent them into town to sleep. They brought me some papers and two letters from San Francisco, the first and only ones I have yet received. I sat up in bed--that is, in my blankets--and read them. But how the rain came! It poured, it battered through the canvas until I was wet; yet I slept well that night, although between the letters and the novel situation, my dreams carried me back to other scenes with other friends around me.

On Wednesday and Thursday, December 12 and 13, we explored the region round about and completed our equipment. We have nine fine mules, saddles, harness, spurs, and all. The morning of the fourteenth we raised our camp and came here to explore this range--a small range north of Los Angeles.

We had some most amusing incidents on this trip. A four-mule team drew our wagon, in which two rode; the remaining five were mounted on similar brave animals, some of them scarcely half broken, just half wild from the ranches, with these queer Mexican saddles, still queerer Mexican bridles, and most queer of all Mexican spurs. By a grand streak of good luck, no one was thrown. But there was kicking and jumping, and mules persisting in going the wrong way, and whipping and spurring, then fresh kicking and some swearing. We were in camp by dark. A gentleman from Los Angeles had come out with us, but his horses ran away that night and he is after them still.

Saturday morning four of us started, muleback, for the 48 17 center of the Sierra. The gentlest mule carried the Professor, with a barometer to measure heights; I went to botanize; another to guide; another (Spaniard) to hunt. With no little trepidation, which I was ashamed to show, I mounted my mule. He is one of the most spirited in the crowd--our driver says the best in the lot--and quite wild. I expected a scene when I took my botanical box (tin) on him, but managed him better than I anticipated or even hoped for; but, cunning brute, he knows I am both awkward and green, and takes advantage accordingly.

Well, we rode up the canyon a few miles, rugged (but not high) mountains on either side, with here and there a crabbed tree and a stunted, shrubby vegetation. We at last tied our mules, ascended a ridge, took some observations (but did not reach the highest peak), found some fossils, or rather, found where to get them, then returned.

Tuesday Evening, December 18.

ON our return in the trip mentioned, we came near having an accident. It was necessary to jump our mules over a log. The first two mules required much urging, but when mine came he not only jumped the log but sailed over a steep bank, the steepness and depth of which were concealed by bushes. Visions of his rolling over me popped into my head as I caught a glimpse of where I was and of the distance below me, but thanks to his wisdom and strength we got out, I don't know how even yet. No horse could have saved himself as that mule did. He was hurt some, and I have not ridden him since, nor will I for a week to come, except just to move our camp.

Sunday, December 16, it rained all day and a part of the night. Monday, it was clear, and after getting nine o'clock observations for longitude, I started again with Ashburner to the peaks. Professor Whitney remained to get more observations for latitude, and to watch the station barometer. We carried the other along to measure the heights. This time we went on foot--went up the canyon a few miles, then climbed again 49

JOSIAH DWIGHT WHITNEY WILLIAM H. BREWER (1864) CHESTER AVERILL WILLIAM ASHBURNER

50 18 the peak visited on Saturday. Ashburner almost gave out on the steep ascent, but he rested while watching the barometer. Another peak a few hundred feet higher was near. We climbed to that, but only to see one still higher an hour's climb farther on. I was for going to it. Ashburner objected, so we set up the barometer and watched its height for an hour. A most grand and magnificent view was beneath us, unlike anything I have seen before. We got a load of fossils, and, tired enough, returned after dark.

This morning we sent four men, with wagon and one tent, to find another camping place near the end of the ridge at the sea, while Professor Whitney and I remained here, with our cook. After the morning observations, a cloudy sky coming up, we followed. He walks much better than Ashburner, so we did much more, but a fog came on and so enveloped the peaks that nothing was to be seen. However, we found some new fossils, traced up the granite core of the mountains, the backbone as it were, then returned this evening. We leave here tomorrow.

And now, of our company--I believe I have not yet told you of them.

First, Professor Whitney, a capital fellow--I think the best man in the United States for this gigantic work. I like him better each day.

Second, the botanist, etc., of the Survey, your humble servant will not describe.

Third, Mr. Ashburner,* of Stockbridge, Mass., a good fellow, graduate of the School of Mines, in France, about my age, or younger. He is field assistant.

William Ashburner (1831-87) became a prominent citizen of California. After leaving the Geological Survey he entered the practice of mining engineering in San Francisco and was for a time Honorary Professor of Mining Engineering in the University of California. In 1880 he was appointed a Regent of the University. He was also a trustee of the Leland Stanford, Junior, University. During his later years he was active in banking. His wife, Emilia Field, whom he had married in Stockbridge in 1856, was a niece of Justice Stephen J. Field of California, who had been most influential in causing the State Geological Survey to be established. Mrs. Ashburner is now (1930) living in San Francisco.

Fourth, Averill,* a young man, a graduate of Union College; then spent a year and a half on a voyage around the world, visited South America, East India, China, etc., and is now here seeking his fortune. He is a capital fellow. He keeps accounts and assists in general at whatever he can do.

Chester Averill, also from Stockbridge.

Fifth, Guirado, a Spanish-Mexican-Californian, about twenty, a brother-in-law of the Governor,* a regular Spaniard, 51 19 a good fellow, just the one to ride a wild mule and to shoot our game, yet by far the least valuable of our crew.

John G. Downey married, in 1852, Maria Jesu´s Guirado, daughter of Don Rafael Guirado, who had come from Sonora to Los Angeles in 1853.

Sixth, Mike, a jolly young Irishman, our cook, just getting broken into the harness, and I think with practice will do well.

Seventh, last, but by no means least, Pete,* our jolly mule driver--a capital fellow in his line--young, game, posted as to mules, can tell a story, sing a song, shoot rabbits (and dress, cook, and eat them)--a most valuable man. Has been over the plains, was with Colonel Lander on his wagon-road expedition, etc. I pride myself on choosing him out of the host of applicants.

His full name was John Peter Gabriel.

Oh, how still it is! No sound but the hooting of owls, or the sound of other night birds. No house near, and but few signs of civilization. Good night!

Camp 3.

Sunday Evening, December 23.

ANOTHER rainy Sunday, or at least it rained all the morning, but has cleared up tonight, most lovely. We came to this camp on Thursday. It is to the west of our last, on the seacoast, or rather, within a mile and a half of it. We hear the surf continually; it is the last sound at night, breaking the stillness of the night, but not the solitude, for it seems more solitary than ever. This effect is increased by the doleful hooting of numerous owls all night long, and the occasional bark of the coyote, or California wolf, a small, sneaking but not dangerous animal.

Friday two of us went several miles along the seashore to observe the outcropping of rocks there. On Saturday we took mules, rode up the canyon about eight miles, rising a thousand feet in that distance, then leaving our animals and climbing to a peak about eight hundred feet higher. It was the hardest climbing I have done yet. It was very steep, many precipices obstructed us, and when there were no rocks there was an almost impenetrable thicket, or chaparral, as it is here called. We carried up a barometer, which increased the labor, and got back at dark, tired enough.

52 20

Today we have loafed around tent, cleaned pistols, etc., but it bids fair for a good day tomorrow.

Los Angeles.

December 26.

WE came in here the twenty-fourth and stopped over night at ahotel. It commenced raining and has rained until this afternoon. It has now stopped and we shall probably go on in a day or two, certainly as soon as the weather and streams will allow.

As I had lost my mule (he is since found), I walked in from Camp 3, about twenty miles, over the plain--a most lovely rolling plain, only wanting water to make it of the greatest fertility. Now, during the rainy season it is most green and lovely, thousands (probably thirty thousand to fifty thousand) of horses and cattle are grazing there. One of our mules is among them still, or else stolen. One of our men has been hunting him a week. We hope to get him, however.

Rain interfered with Christmas festivities, but it was still quite lively. I stepped in a fandango a little while in the evening and looked on to see the dancing, which did not come up to my expectations. In the next room they were playing monte for large piles of silver--the stakes not large, but the silver accumulated.

The rain has been the severest for eleven years. Probably as much as six or seven inches fell in about forty hours. You can imagine the effect. It is very hard on these adobe houses. Several have fallen, one row of stores, among the rest, involving a loss of many thousand dollars. It has been the rainiest season since '49--lucky we were not in camp during this siege, it is decidedly better at the hotel. As a sample of how damp the air is, when I am writing, fine as my writing is, the first line of the page is not yet dry when the last is written.

Camp No. 6, mouth of San Gabriel Canyon.

January 3, 1861.

I SENT my last letter from Los Angeles a week ago and have 53 21 been too busy to write any since. The rain ceased, and we sent an advance camp out on Friday, December 28. Professor Whitney and I followed on Saturday. We camped on the ranch of Mr. Wilson, and only left there this morning. His ranch is in a beautiful plain, hemmed in on all sides by hills or mountains, except for one narrow opening to the sea, like a bay filled up. The hills on the west, toward Los Angeles, are not high. This valley plain is perhaps fifty or sixty thousand acres; his ranch is four leagues, about fourteen thousand acres. He also owns very extensive vineyards, the "Lake Vineyards," which have as fine a reputation as any in the state.

When this part of the state belonged to Mexico, it was settled by the old Spanish missionaries, or padres as they are here called, who converted the Indians and formed great missions, wealthy and powerful. One was near Mr. Wilson's, the Mission of San Gabriel. Thousands of natives were the voluntary slaves of these priests, vineyards of great extent were planted, and at the time of the confiscation of their property by the Mexican Government they had twenty thousand horses, eighty thousand cattle, etc. All now is in ruins.*

Mission San Gabriel Arcangel was founded in 1771 by the Franciscan missionaries, Fray Angel Somera and Fray Benito Cambo´n. Secularization took place from 1832 to 1840.

Sunday morning I rode over to the Mission, about three miles from camp, with Guirado, who went to Mass. The old church and a few houses still stand--the church bells are by far the sweetest I have heard in California--six are left in the old tower, two are gone. Extensive ruins of adobe buildings, now the abode of myriads of ground squirrels, told how large the town once had been. Long lines of tuna , or prickly-pear hedges, now all ruined, told of ancient enclosures and vineyards, but now a waste. Immense labor had once wrought this lovely valley into a veritable paradise, but now it is desolate again. A few tall date palm trees are there, but the fruit does not ripen. We went into a garden owned by the priests, still enclosed. It was still kept up, the finest orange trees were laden with golden fruit, so that the trees were propped up to keep them from breaking under the load. They were most beautiful 54 22 --the graceful form of the tree, the intense dark green of the foliage contrasting with the rich golden fruit, produced a beautiful effect. We bought some oranges, also lemons and limes. Olives abound--many of the trees are large--and English walnuts grow as fine as in Europe. Water was brought for irrigating from a neighboring stream in a long ditch from the San Gabriel River, over twenty miles distant from the remotest part. Such was San Gabriel Mission--now it is a ruin and cut up into ranches.

To the east of us lay a very precipitous chain of mountains.* I had before been in a canyon in them and had climbed a few hundred feet. We now determined to ascend. We four, chief men of the Survey, drew cuts to see who should stay in camp to observe the station barometer, as one must stay, and all were anxious to go. The lot fell on me, but Averill most generously yielded his right, and I went in his place. No one had been on the highest peak, but a native agreed to pilot us to the second highest point.

The San Gabriel Range, which includes Mount Lowe (5,650 feet), Mount Wilson (5,700 feet), San Gabriel Peak (6,152 feet); and farther east, Mount San Antonio (10,080 feet), and others. The climb appears to have been upon one of the lesser peaks near Mount Lowe or Mount Wilson.

We arose on Monday and breakfasted before dawn, then waited over an hour for our guide. We rode to the base, and into a canyon about five or six miles from camp, tied our mules, and after a barometrical observation, commenced to climb. It was the steepest and hardest climb I have ever had by far. We carried up barometer, compass, and botanical box. The chaparral became almost impenetrable. It was terribly hard to climb. As we crossed from one peak to another on a very narrow ridge, the third hour, Ashburner gave out. I took his load and we left him behind. In four and a half hours' climbing we found it impossible to make the highest peak, so we planted our tripod and put up compass and barometer. We had risen 4,200 feet above camp and 5,000 feet above the sea. Another peak rose 1,500 feet, at least, above us yet. The view was magnificent. I will attempt no lengthy description. All the lower hills to the west sank into the plain that was spread out beneath us to the very sea, and we could see a great distance, probably 55 23 fifty or sixty miles, out to sea. Los Angeles, with its vineyards and all, was a mere speck on the landscape.

A little snow lay around us, and the summits above were very white. We built a fire, melted snow in my botanical box for drinking, ate our lunch, took the bearings of the most important points, and descended. All the region to the north and east was very mountainous, yet it was hard to realize that I was nearly as high as Mount Washington, and higher than the celebrated Rigi. We carried down my box full of snow for the ladies at the ranch. It was a great curiosity--the younger ones had never seen it before. One man went off in ecstasies on tasting it; he had not had snow in his hand since leaving Europe fifteen years ago.

It was long after dark when we got back. A hearty supper so much refreshed me that I spent the evening, New Year's Eve, at Mr. Wilson's, and spent it very pleasantly. He has a large family; there are several ladies there.

Tuesday (New Year's), we sent the wagon to town (Los Angeles), nine miles distant, for supplies. Professor Whitney and I, along with Mr. Wilson, rode a few miles to visit some old quarries and see some other things of interest. It was a lovely day. We dined at five at Mr. Wilson's--a most sumptuous dinner. A small party was there and we spent a pleasant and lively evening, notwithstanding that our "rig," just from camp, was hardly fashionable. The evening was lovely, as was the last. The midnight bells at the old Mission the night before, tolling out the old year and in the new, were sweet, but no sweeter than the nine o'clock bells of that New Year's night.

Yesterday, January 2, we sent our men to another camp, while Professor Whitney and I stopped for observations on latitude and longitude. It so happens that I can observe time on the chronometers much closer than the assistant who was brought along for that purpose, so I stay in camp some days to do it. The day was lovely--thermometer 67° F.--spring weather. Think of such weather for the holidays! Today we 56 24 raised our camp, and rode on here, about twelve miles; the other camp will be here tomorrow.

Saturday, January 5.

YESTERDAY Professor Whitney and I went a few miles up the San Gabriel Canyon. Silver and gold are worked. A silver mine is being opened, and the stockholders desired to go up with us. Some came along and we went up to their mine, about six or seven miles. It is a wild canyon, granite rocks from two to four thousand feet high on each side, very steep but nowhere perpendicular. Many side ravines come in, and many small streams swell the San Gabriel to a river. We had to cross it twelve times each way, twenty-four in all, very easy to those who had horses, but not quite so easy with our short-legged mules as the water often came up to their sides. The mine has been commenced by running a tunnel into the mountain, but we found it caved in by the recent heavy rains, and as we could not get in we returned.

On our way we met four more of the stockholders--they urged us to go back, as they had the "materials" for a jolly night coming. We, however, kept on our way. Soon we met some men with pack-mules. One carried blankets; another a basket of champagne and other wine; another, a Spaniard, a guitar. So I imagine that they are having a jolly time in their cabin this rainy morning.

The path was up a mere mule path, over rocks, logs, among bowlders, where you would think no horse or mule could get. All provisions, etc., must be packed, that is, carried on the backs of mules. It was a wild scene all the way. Yet one I had never heard of before, nor is the canyon laid down on any map, although it is forty miles long.

This want of maps, as well as incorrect maps, is a very serious evil which we feel much. We have to make observations all the way. Professor Whitney does work splendidly. Two sets of observations at the last camp, where he used the sextant and I 57 25 the chronometer, agreed to within the one-tenth of a second , while our last barometrical observations, for altitude, two sets, agreed to within an inch and a half, although the camps were eight or nine miles apart. We have very fine barometers, reading to the thousandth of an inch, and we carry them with care, hence the precision. When we measure any height we use two barometers, one at the camp, the other carried with us.

Sunday, January 6.

IT rained most of the day yesterday, all last night, and thus far today without any prospect of a cessation. Yesterday I fixed plants, wrote up descriptions, mended shirts, drawers, etc., made oilcloth cases for compasses, etc. My cheap woolen shirts don't prove well made--have had to sew on buttons and work all the buttonholes over again; the work is now securely done even if it is not ornamental.

Monday, January 7.

IT has now rained about seventy hours without cessation--for forty hours of that time, over twenty consecutive, it has rained like the hardest thundershower at home. No signs of clearing up yet--fire out by the rains, provisions getting rather scarce--one meal per day now. But our tent is dry--we have it well pitched, and in a dry place.

I have been studying Spanish, writing up letters, notes, etc. I have written thirteen letters, or about eighty pages, during this rain, to be mailed when we can get to town, but it will be a number of days, for the streams will be impassable. Lucky we did not stay up in the canyon Friday night as they wanted us to, we could not have got down yet. I never saw such rains before, and it has not rained so much before of a winter since 1848, so the people say.

Tuesday, January 8.

RAIN has stopped--the San Gabriel River is impassable, so we can neither get to town for supplies, nor visit up the canyon, 58 26 nor move camp toward Temescal. The stream is high and swift. An empty stage was carried off night before last, and a man was drowned about a mile from our camp yesterday while attempting to swim the river. We shall get letters when we can get to Los Angeles again. It is a fine evening.

Wednesday Evening, January 9.

WE have had lovely day. Three of us climbed a ridge about two thousand feet above our camp to measure height and get the bearings of the various points around. We got a most magnificent view. The rain here had been snow on the peaks behind; they lay in their silent grandeur, so white and massive, while on the opposite side were the lovely plains of San Gabriel, El Monte, and Los Angeles. But I am too tired to write. Possibly a team can get to town tomorrow to mail this as the river has fallen some.

59 60 61

CHAPTER III

MORE OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

Chino Ranch--Santa Ana Mountains--Temescal .

Camp No. 6, San Gabriel Canyon.

Sunday Evening, January 13, 1861.

SINCE the heavy rain ceased we have had fine warm weather--lovely days, some slightly cool (55°), and one night some frost. The peaks just above us are covered with snow, and at times cold raw winds come down from them. Such is the case tonight. The wind howls most pitilessly, shakes the tent, whistles under its edge, and flaps its sides in a decidedly lively manner.

We have the most lovely sunsets I have ever seen. I have watched sunsets from my own native hills, the finer sunsets from Ovid over Seneca Lake, from shipboard on the Atlantic and on the Pacific, finer than either on the Caribbean Sea; I have watched the sun set behind the Rhine Valley, over the plains of Bavaria; I have climbed the matchless Alps and Tyrol, and have even see it setting over the the Mediterranean, that land and sea of sunsets--but have never seen these surpassed. Professor Whitney, who has been three times to Europe and has traveled from Norway to Italy and from England to Moscow, says he has never seen them equaled. In the Alps of Switzerland, just at sunset and sunrise, a peculiar rosy pink light illuminates the snowy peaks and glaciers--the alpenglu¨hen of the Swiss mountaineers. That peculiar and lovely tinge is even more marked here than I ever saw it there.

During the recent rains, much snow fell on the mountains above us, and the contrast of their cold tops, not ten miles distant (they seem but one mile), with our green plain, is most lovely.

62 30

Our wagon brought out a "pile" of newspapers--a real lot--two dollars worth, for New York papers cost twenty-five cents each, and San Francisco papers ten cents. Two dollars bought near a dozen. How we have perused them--the exciting political times, etc.

We heard possibly of our lost mule--may, and may not yet get him, probably the latter--but bought a horse to take his place. Professor Whitney takes him, so I get his well-trained mule, a little white fellow, for all the world like an ass, I should judge about ten hands high.

Four men were drowned near here in the recent rains, and much damage done. In town vast damage was done-- adobe houses hurt--the adobe cathedral which has stood over half a century is nearly ruined, some of its walls fallen.*

This building, dedicated to Nuestra Sen˜ora la Reina de Los Angeles , was erected in 1822, succeeding an earlier structure located nearby. It was remodeled and rebuilt in 1861 and again restored in 1912.

When we came from San Francisco near two months ago, the United States and California Boundary Commission (to run the east line of California), came down with us--a decidedly hard set. They camped near Los Angeles before we did, and have loafed there ever since--on pay of course. Their mules and camels came three weeks ago to take them across the desert, but they started not. Well, they were just ready as the rains came. They were camped near the river, which rose, swept away their tents, saddles, equipage, all--one camel was killed.* Most of them were green hands, many of them the personal appointees of President Buchanan. They started at last yesterday.

Camels were introduced into the southwest in 1857 by the United States War Department (Jefferson Davis, Secretary of War) under supervision of Lieut. Edward F. Beale. The camels used by the Boundary Commission were doubtless loaned by the War Department. The camel experiment was abandoned by the Government shortly afterward and the animals were sold at auction or turned loose in the desert. (See Uncle Sam's Camels , by Lewis Burt Lesley, Harvard University Press, 1929.)

Tuesday Evening, January 15.

IT is a cold evening--some frost last night. It is only seven o'clock, but the rest are in bed--gone to bed to keep warm. I will write until my fingers get cold, then go too.

Yesterday we started on the advance camp, all but Professor Whitney, myself, and the cook. They took one tent and a load of effects. The Professor and I rode a few miles to visit a curious hill of volcanic rock that rises like an island about six or seven hundred feet in this plain, the smooth plain like a sea about it.

63 31

This morning, after taking longitude observations, Professor Whitney stayed in camp to calculate them and at the same time take observations on the barometer to compare with those being taken at the next camp, while Mike (the cook) and I rode a few miles to climb a peculiar looking sharp peak that rises like a spire on the edge of the regular mountain chain. It is a little over 2,000 feet high above the camp, quite steep, and to our surprise we found it a great mass of lava, very perfect and very marked. It had a few large granite veins in it. We climbed to the top, but the good weather was deserting us. We had that same magnificent view I have described before, but it began to rain some and we hurried down and hastened our mules back to camp. But little rain fell. It has again cleared off cold, and the wind blows again tonight very hard. Our driver returned, and we shall move on in the morning--weather permitting.

Camp No. 8, Santa Ana River.

Thursday, January 17.

WELL, so much farther on our "winding way." All are in bed but me. I will write half an hour--it is only eight o'clock--ten hours in bed is more than I can stand.

It was blowing hard when I went to bed Tuesday night. The wind increased. We got up about eleven and packed the instruments. While getting ready for the worst, a hard gale took the fly of the tent and tore a rent fifteen feet long. We ran out and unfastened it, and over it went. A few minutes later the tent followed. We held on, drew it over our goods, piled carpetbags, saddles, etc., on the edges to keep it down so the wind could not get under it, crawled under again, rolled in our blankets, and whiled away the night as best we could. It was exceedingly laughable, but by no means comfortable. The wind howled and shrieked above us, the heavy tent flapped and whacked and slapped, shaking dust into our faces all the time, and last, but by no means least, multitudes of flies which had been in our tent were now caged close to us, buzzing and humming and 64 32 crawling as we warmed them into life. The night was cool, but we slept some. Morning came, but the wind still howled fiercely, and, sweeping down from the snowy mountains, was raw and cold enough. However, we packed up and left and rode across the plain about twenty-two miles to the next camp at Chino Ranch. The wind was so fierce at times as to almost blow us off from our mules.

Chino is much colder than where we left, with mountains on both sides. We could see dense clouds of dust on the desert twenty-five miles east of us. A regular sand-storm was raging there. We stopped at Chino all night. Ice froze over half an inch thick, but I slept warm and well. It is a most beautiful ranch, much of it level, with mountains for the background on either side, and with two streams running through it. It is some twenty or thirty thousand acres and supports many cattle. We left there this morning for Temescal. But my fingers are too cold to write legibly any longer. I must turn in.

Sunday, January 20.

WE left Chino Ranch Thursday morning, but had not got over two or three miles when, in crossing a stream, we were brought to a dead stop by the breaking of the tongue of our wagon. A stream which runs across the plain had worn a channel about eight or ten feet deep--in one place wagons get down and up, but it is very steep. Our wagon went into the slough ker-chug , and off went the tongue, the wheels up to the axles in the mud. We unloaded, got out the wagon, and sent back to a ranch about two miles, where we got a piece of board and some rawhide. With two or three hours' work, all was repaired and we were ready to proceed. I had carried a barometer on my mule for about forty miles, but had handed it to the man in the wagon just a mile or two back. We took it out, found to our dismay some mercury in the case, but on taking it apart found the tube still whole. Professor Whitney and I spent the time in mending that--the kid-leather packing had given way. We 65 33 sent Guirado to a ranch two miles off; the lady gave us a kid glove, and in time all was in order again, but we could only get on about seven miles that day.

We are in a most interesting place for a geological camp. High bluffs rise above us, while across the river rise the Santa Ana Mountains. Friday the Professor and I geologized along the foothills, and yesterday three of us climbed the highest point near, about three thousand feet. The climb was not so steep as some we have made before, but the chaparral was so exceedingly dense that it seemed as if no progress could be made. We carried up compass, tripod, and barometer. I never before appreciated the difficulty of carrying a barometer in such places. I carried it first on my mule as far as we could go, then on my back. On our return Pete and I ruined our pants in the bushes--they hung in ribbons. Averill had severe rents in his, and Pete's shirt was literally torn from him--there was scarcely anything left. But we got back all safe just at sunset.

The river here is quite a stream--several rods wide and up to the sides of our mules as we ford it. I have not seen a bridge in southern California, nor is there timber enough here to make them. Talk about a railroad! Timber for bridges and ties would cost at least a hundred dollars per thousand here, and much more farther east. The Overland passes here--that miracle of undertakings--over plains and deserts, over mountains, through gorges, into rivers, yet always inside of schedule time.

Today is a lovely day, but the nights are cold enough. It freezes thick every night here, temperature 27° or 28° in the tent--decidedly cool--and it makes my rheumatism complain some, yet I feel otherwise in most excellent health.

Camp No. 12, San Gabriel.

Sunday, February 3.

I HAVE not written for some time--the nights have been too cold for me to write without bringing on my rheumatism, and my days have been entirely occupied, much of the time with 66 34 fatiguing travel or field work. Today is lovely again. I am writing this sitting under a tree, minus coat, vest, and hat, thermometer at 80° in shade, and sky as clear as August. We are back in good weather again, and I will take up my journal where I left it.

Monday morning, January 21, it looked like rain. We measured the cliffs above camp (about four hundred feet high). Then it cleared up, and I went on with advance camp to find a good place to camp at Temescal, where we expected to spend several days. We took our way southeast, over a sort of plain which sloped each side from the mountains. Most of it was very green, but alkali covered a part, and to the northeast many hills of granite rose like islands in it. The flying clouds shading this great plain in places, the snowy mountains on the horizon, the grassy carpet beneath, the fine hard road we were on, all conspired to make it a lovely view and pleasant ride. We got in camp before night near the Temescal Overland station, at the foot of the Temescal hills, a splendid place to camp, wood and water plenty, and protected from the winds.

Tuesday, January 22, I stayed in camp all day and observed barometer, to compare with observations at Santa Ana River. Pete went back and brought up the rest of the party. Wednesday, January 23, while the Professor went to the tin mines, Averill and I went across to the hills on the opposite side of the valley to observe rocks. The Temescal hills are a range some two thousand feet high, lying east of the Santa Ana Mountains, and are celebrated now as being the locality of fabulous mines and quantities of tin. People are "crazy" about tin ore, every man has from one to fifty claims, while poor devils with ragged clothes and short pipes talk as they smoke of being the wealthy owners of one hundred or two hundred tin claims, each in time to rival Cornwall or Banca. It was to see these mines and the formation around that we came here.

The Santa Ana Mountains rise between us and the coast. It was desirable that we should ascend them, so Thursday, 67 35 January 24, Averill, Pete, and I started on our mules to ride a few miles and examine the base and find some practical way to get up them. Hot springs issue from the base, where a bathhouse has been erected. Here Averill and Pete stayed, not wishing to climb, while I went alone to a height of 2,500 or 3,000 feet above the sea, found a practical way of ascent, and made some interesting geological observations. The stillness was profound, the solitude almost oppressive. I found no grizzlies, of which I had heard so much, but on my way back, trying to explore a canyon, got into chaparral so thick that I tore my pants off almost. They were completely ruined--my last pair, but I bought a pair of Averill to get back to Los Angeles with.

Camp at San Gabriel Canyon.

February 3.

FRIDAY, January 25, we rode to the principal tin mine, four miles distant--found it a splendid humbug. These hills are desolate beyond description, rough and dry, no trees, scarcely a bush, very little water and that quite strongly alkaline and nauseous. Many black streaks are found in the rocks; some of which contain some tin. Many claims are made and entered. One man has invested $14,500, and has commenced mining operations, that is, has sunk a shaft in the granite to look for richer ore. All thus far is mere speculation, and will end in that, I think. We carried a barometer and measured the height of the hill at the mine--found it about a thousand feet above the sea.

We were back soon after noon, when Professor Whitney, Pete, Guirado, and I took our small tent and went about seven miles to Camp 10, at the base of the mountains across the valley from the ridge of tin, and camped in the mouth of a wild canyon, Can˜on Agua Fria , or "Cold Water Canyon." A fine stream of pure cold water here issues from the mountain. We were in bed early for an early rise. The Professor and I were to climb the mountain the next day, so all was got in readiness.

68 36

Saturday, January 26, we were up and breakfasted at dawn, and as soon as it was light enough we started. Professor Whitney carried barometer, hammer and bag, and canteen of water; I, a compass and tripod, level, spyglass, provisions, and another canteen. We had heard such big stories of animals that, by the advice of all, each carried a heavy revolver loaded with slugs, and a heavy bowie, for emergencies. We carried some bread, a little meat, and some panoli . This last is made by the Indians here, and is pulverized roasted corn--when mixed with some water and with some sugar is very refreshing as a drink, sustaining one as hardly anything else will, as we found that day. These, with a few other small items made up our burdens.

We struck up the canyon a short distance. The granite sides were generally inaccessible, but at last we took up a slope exceedingly steep, some thirty-three degrees (the roof of an ordinary house is but twenty-three degrees). Vigorous climbing in due time brought us on a ridge, where the rising sun greeted us, first gilding the snowy peaks in the distance, and then flooding the valley below us in light and casting dark shadows in the canyons of the Temescal Range opposite. Several very steep slopes were surmounted until we gained a ridge at 2,200 or 2,500 feet, which runs laterally from the central chain. Here we found a few pine and fir trees. The chaparral became more dense, but by following the ridge we found in places a trail worn by deer and other animals. Tracks of deer, wildcats, and coyotes (small wolves), with their other traces, were numerous. Here we reached the highest point I had climbed to three days before, and we made it in a little over two hours.

The sun came out hotter, thawing the frozen ground, making it slippery in places, and increasing our thirst--our canteens were often used. After another hour's climbing I lost the plug to my canteen, so we stopped and mixed the water left in it with panoli , and after dispatching it and resting, felt decidedly refreshed and in fine climbing trim.

Now commenced the real hard work of our ascent. We had 69 37 risen much over half the height to be gained, but in places we had to climb over cragged granite rocks, and then walk over a steep slippery slope of decomposing feldspar. The stones which were loosened by our feet went bounding away into the canyons sometimes hundreds of feet beneath. But the real difficulty was the chaparral, which in places seemed absolutely impenetrable--a tangled mass of stiff, interlaced, thorny shrubs. Sometimes we broke them down (our hatchet had been lost), sometimes tore through, sometimes crawled on our hands and knees a long distance. At one time nearly an hour was consumed in making probably sixty or eighty rods. I had rigged up an old pair of pants for the occasion, but they were "nowhere"--they were torn to shreds. My drawers "followed suit" and left my legs to the mercy of the thorns. I had to go ahead, as the Professor carried the barometer. His shirt fared as badly as my pants, but my shirt stood it with only a few tears.

At last, after over six hours of the most vigorous climbing, we reached the summit.* We had found snow for the last two hours of our climb, and a cold, piercing, raw wind fairly shrieked over the summit. We went about thirty feet below to hang the barometer in the bushes. After half an hour's observations, eating our lunch, and drinking the rest of our panoli we put up the barometer, and planted our compass on the summit to get the bearings of the conspicuous objects around. It was so cold that I could scarcely write the bearings as read off.

To this mountain they gave the name Mount Downey, in honor of the then governor of the state (Whitney Survey, Geology , I, 177). The name has not persisted, however.

But the view more than repaid us for all we had endured. It was one of the grandest I ever saw. Not less than ten or twelve thousand square miles were spread out in the field of vision; or, if we take the territory embraced within the extreme points--land and sea--more than twice that amount. We were on the highest point of the Santa Ana Range. To the west and south lay the sea, 150 miles of the coast in full view, from Point Duma to the islands off Lower California, Los Coronados. Table Mountain in Lower California was in full view on the horizon. The whole plain along the sea lay to the northwest: 70 38 the plain of Los Angeles and beyond, some eighty or ninety miles to the Sierra Santa Monica, with the Santa Clara Mountains much farther still, the tops covered with snow, 125 or 150 miles distant (much more by road). We could see out on the Pacific a hundred miles from the coast, with the islands of Santa Barbara, San Miguel, etc., visible.

To the north lay the chain we were on, gradually growing lower, and at last sinking into the plain; beyond that the snow-covered Sierra Madre, the highest peaks nine thousand or more feet. A desert at the base, although eighteen or twenty miles across, seemed but a brown level field. In the northeast the great mass of San Bernardino with its many ridges shut out the farther view; it was probably fifty miles distant. A sort of plain stretches from its base to us, like the sea, with numerous rocky hills rising from it, like islands, some twenty or thirty miles in extent, but far beneath us. The scene in this direction, as well as to the southeast, was desolate in the extreme--dry, almost desert, broken into rough, rugged, rocky ridges, or dry valleys--no forests, no water or rivers to amount to anything--a country nature had not favored.

Time was short, we must hurry. We had to pass the same chaparral. Trying an easier way in one direction for a short distance, we found trails, but the traces of grizzlies grew so very numerous, that we took to the ridge again.

The sun set while we had a thousand feet still to descend. We saw it gild the snowy peaks on the horizon. Tired as we were, we were not too tired to admire the beauties of that sunset. It was just dark as we got back. Pete had shot some quail and rabbits, and had them served in their best style, and how that meal tasted! We cut a sorry figure as we came back--clothes torn, parts out, boots ruined, scratched, bleeding, bruised, dirty, and tired, I was nearer used up than I had been before; the Professor stood it better. But a hearty supper, early to bed, and late up in the morning, worked wonders. More quail for breakfast, then a most luxurious bath at the warm 71 39 sulphur springs, and, save bruises and scratches, I was myself again. Our barometrical observations made the height of the peak 4,900 feet above camp and 5,675 above the sea. The next morning after breakfast we raised our tent, loaded up soon, and being short of provisions, went back to the other camp, about six miles distant.

On the way we stopped at the Temescal hot sulphur springs and bathed. The warm sulphur-water issues from the rock in large quantities at a temperature of 93°, very soft water, and slightly mineral. A rude bathhouse has been erected over it, and a bath in that warm water was refreshing in the highest degree. An Indian village, the old village of Temescal, lies at the spring, although the Overland station five miles distant is now the place called Temescal. The Indians speak Spanish and Indian. They are a miserable, thieving set. I saw a half-breed squaw, the prettiest I have seen in California thus far. We spent the rest of the day resting in camp, quietly enough, and had fine roasted wild ducks for dinner.

Los Angeles.

February 10.

Monday, January 28, I rode with Averill to the north end of the Temescal Range, a series of granite ridges, covered with bowlders, some of immense size. One was seen forty feet high and many twenty-five or thirty feet.

Tuesday, January 29, the advance camp started to return to Los Angeles, on our old route. Professor Whitney and I rode with the proprietor of several tin leads to see them, several miles in the mountains, up steep and narrow trails, where we at home would think no horse or mule could climb, much less carry a rider. I rode my mule, the Professor our new horse, which had shown many signs of tricks and had thrown him two or three times. When about seven or eight miles from camp his horse threw him and got away. Our companion lassoed him once, but he got away again. He lost his saddle, which was 72 40 stolen by the Indians, and we never recovered it. I tied my mule to some sagebushes while we climbed a hill, and when I returned it had pulled up the bushes and left. We footed it back. We found my mule at camp, but it was two days before we got the horse.

During the next two days I climbed over those barren hills with Professor Whitney looking at tin leads and studying the interesting geology of the place. I found some exquisitely beautiful flowers of very small size, several species being less than an inch in height, as small as any alpine vegetation.

The loss of our horse detained us a day longer than we expected, but we were off Saturday morning, February 2, for San Gabriel Canyon, about thirty-eight miles distant, where the rest were encamped. We were detained, however, by a "slough," and failed to make it. Although we had started very early, night found us five or six miles short. So we pitched camp, and early the next morning, Sunday, were up, raised our tent, and got into camp before the rest had got their breakfast.

Monday, February 4, the Professor and I rode a few miles, and climbed a ridge about 2,500 feet high, where there were extensive outcroppings of rock. We saw four fine deer, but of course had no guns to shoot them with.

Tuesday, February 5, we came on to Los Angeles and camped again on the site of our first camp. We passed over the lovely plains of San Gabriel, El Monte, and Los Angeles, with their thousands of cattle, horses, and sheep feeding; tens of thousands were seen, in pleasing contrast with the barren hills of Temescal. We saw on our return quantities of wild ducks and geese in the ponds along the road. The plains and hills were green, men were putting their vineyards in order, and fruit trees were coming in bloom here, fruit plenty in the streets, but very dear--apples four to fifteen cents each, oranges five to ten cents.

Thursday, February 7, Professor Whitney left for San 73

SANTA BARBARA MISSION From a drawing by Edward Vischer

THE CELEBRATED GRAPEVINE AT MONTECITO From a drawing by Edward Vischer

74 41

Francisco, leaving the party in my charge, a responsibility I by no means desire, but I will make the best of it. That night three of our men came in very drunk, for the first time, a bad beginning of my rule. I had been in town in the evening, and on returning put things in order, as it looked like rain. At two o'clock they came in, and disarranged some of the things. Soon after it began to rain hard, and rained until near daylight, the wind cold and increasing. Just before daylight the wind changed, and a fierce squall carried over both tents in the rain. Such a pickle ! Instruments and blankets and books were hurried in the wagon, clothes lost in the intense darkness. I worked barefooted, in shirt tail and drawers-- ugh !--how cold it was! It completely sobered the men, I assure you. It was fortunately near daylight, and the wind and rain lulled and finally ceased. When day dawned we found our clothes (wet, to be sure), put up our tents, dried ourselves by the fire, and, after a hearty breakfast, laughed at our mishaps. No serious damage was done.

The next two days were spent in making preparations to leave for the north.

75 76

CHAPTER IV

STARTING NORTHWARD

The San Fernando Valley--San Buenaventura--Carpinteria .

Camp No. 13, Sycamore Canyon,

San Fernando Valley.

Sunday, February 17, 1861.

OUR course before leaving Los Angeles the last time had been from San Pedro on the coast to the Temescal Range about eighty miles east. Either a plain or a valley runs this whole distance, with high, steep, rugged, barren mountains on one or both sides, nowhere covered with timber or of any value for agricultural purposes. These mountains so far as yet examined are mostly of porous granite, or other porous rock which absorbs most of the water that falls on them. The streams that run off in places follow narrow canyons or gorges down their sides, and as soon as they strike the plain or valley spread out wide and generally sink. These "washes" or dry beds are often two or three miles wide, covered with bowlders and sand, supporting only a vegetation of stunted shrubs, from five to ten feet high.

It is surprising how large a stream will soon sink. The Santa Ana River, 150 or 200 yards wide and nearly up to the bellies of the mules, sinks in a few miles after leaving the mountains, leaving only dry drifting sand in its bed. In this way a man may travel a great distance and see no water, yet cross the beds of streams every little while, beds sometimes a mile wide, over which the streams in high water shift their courses, sometimes following one channel, sometimes another. Already, only the middle of February, we have to follow up the canyons into the base of the mountains to find water for camp. We are now 77 44 about a mile or a mile and a half up a stream; here is water but below only sand.

This is one of the proposed routes for a Pacific railroad, yet from San Pedro to Temescal, eighty miles, to even fence the road, would take all the available timber from a strip ten miles wide , five miles each side of the road, unless a brush fence was made. Of course there are places where there is some timber, but I have asked each of our men if they thought a strip ten miles wide would do it, and they think not, and the thing grows worse as we go farther, for here we can get timber from the north but it costs enormously to get it inland. Fence posts of redwood, split four by six inches and about seven feet long, cost there fifty cents each; what must they cost a hundred miles farther on!

The Temescal region is so barren as to be practically useless, and will ever support only a very sparse population, and this whole country will only be used for stock raising on large ranches. In a few places, of limited extent compared with the whole, will be lovely fertile spots where there is water, but the agricultural capabilities of the region are small.*

Brewer overlooked the possibilities of irrigation and of the importation of water by long aqueducts, developments which have completely transformed this region.

Even here the San Fernando Valley looks fertile, yet you could take a patch in the middle of a hundred or a hundred and fifty thousand acres, where it does not touch the hills, where there would be no water for over half of the year. Hence the land is owned in large ranches, and those only in the more favored places. On these ranches, as there are no fences, the cattle are half wild, and require many horses to keep them and tend them. A ranch with a thousand head of cattle will have a hundred horses. The natives here are lazy enough, but are slowly giving way before the Americans, with whom they do not assimilate.

There is a knotty political question here which causes no fuss now; but make southern California a slave state and people it with southerners, and it may become complicated. Our treaty on obtaining this region guaranteed to the Mexican 78 45 citizens all the privileges of American citizens on entering this republic. Mexico recognized Indians, negroes, etc., as citizens under certain circumstances, so there are actually negroes citizens of the United States.

Now to my journal. On Monday, February 11, we left Los Angeles and came on about twelve miles and camped in the Cahuenga Pass, where the Overland road passes through the Sierra Santa Monica, there a range of hills about 1,600 feet high. It is not much of a pass. We stopped there until Wednesday morning, then entered the San Fernando Valley. We went along the north side of the Sierra Santa Monica, at its base, and camped here, some twenty-five miles from Los Angeles. We intended to leave here Friday morning, but on starting, had not gone three rods when a wheel of the wagon broke down. We had to unload, camp again and send the wagon to Los Angeles for repairs. Here we are yet, but the wagon got back late last night and we will move on in the morning. We have reduced our load, and having two extra mules, we "pack" them; that is, place loads on their backs--blankets, bags of barley, carpetbags, etc.

Camp 15, near Triunfo Ranch.

Sunday, February 24.

ON Monday, February 18, we crossed the valley to the north side, a stretch of about ten miles across a plain, a part of it almost desert for want of water, the rest covered with grass. It all belongs to the San Fernando Mission, under old Spanish grants. On the north side of the valley there is a great chain of hills--mountains, I should say.* The rocks are all broken up, and rise in ridges, some of them two thousand feet or more above the plain, the broken edges of the strata forming lines of rock or high precipices in places, visible for many miles. We camped in a quiet canyon at the base.

The Santa Susana Mountains.

Tuesday, February 19, we sent the wagon again to Los Angeles to take in Ashburner, get letters, etc. Ashburner has 79 46 given out, and the Professor called him from the field to work in the laboratory. He cannot stand camp life. He got the scurvy a year and a half ago while on geological excursions in Newfoundland, and it broke out again in camp, and we feared it would use him up. I advised Professor Whitney to send him to the city some weeks ago. I think there is no danger now, as he was much better before he left, but he has not at all been able to stem the hard work of the field.

This increases my labors some, as he has made all the mathematical calculations; some of them I must make now. I have practiced Guirado in making observations with the barometer, and shall teach Averill soon to compute them; this will lessen the work for me again.

Wednesday, February 20, I started back in the hills alone, got into a wild rocky canyon and followed up it for three or four hours--I don't know how many miles. The stream made its way through the red sandstone rock, which often rose in high precipices--a lovely walk. At last I climbed a high ridge, some two thousand feet above camp. Here a stratum of rock comes out filled with large shells in fine preservation. It rises in a ridge, ending in a precipice to the north. In places these fossil shells had been weathered out in immense numbers. The ridge was strewn with them, as thick as any seabeach I have ever seen, and in as good preservation--oyster shells by the cartload, clam shells, in fact many species. They have not lost their character as shells yet, that is, they have not turned to stone. The shell of lime was as when fresh, and the scar where the muscle was attached was as plain as if it had stood the weather but a few years. Some were worn by the waves. Oyster shells had grown together in that old ocean as now, and the pebbles of the beach were bored into by shells as I see them here on the coast now.

I cannot describe my feelings as I stood on that ridge, that shore of an ancient ocean. How lonely and desolate! Who shall tell how many centuries, how many decades of centuries, have 80 47 elapsed since these rocks resounded to the roar of breakers, and these animals sported in their foam? I picked up a bone, cemented in the rock with the shells. A feeling of awe came over me. Around me rose rugged mountains; no human being was within miles of me to break the silence. And then I felt overwhelmed with the magnitude of the work ahead of me. I was at work alone in the field work of this great state, a territory larger than all New England and New York, complicated in its geology.

But the real soon roused me from reveries--I must get back. I was alone, far from camp--grizzlies might come out as the moon came up, for the weather was warm. I made my way back into the canyon, and at dark arrived at camp, tired enough. Peter brought back from Los Angeles a pile of letters, and after supper how I devoured them!

Friday, February 22, I started to examine a peak a few miles to the north. Averill and Mike (our cook) went with me. I carried a barometer. Averill shot an eagle with his revolver. It measured fifty inches from tip to tip. He was a savage fellow, and as he was not killed entirely, he fought most vigorously. We had a difficult climb. My companions both showed signs of giving out and finally stopped at the foot of the last slope we had to rise. I went on alone, but they finally followed and succeeded. The peak was 2,700 feet above camp, or some 3,800 feet above the sea. We had a glorious view from this point and collected some more fossils on our way back. We celebrated Washington's birthday, in the evening, with a glass of toddy.

Saturday, February 23, we raised camp and started on our course. We had an accident or two in crossing the plain, but came on. On getting into the hills, in coming down a very steep one, that wheel began to crack again. We went on cautiously a mile or so and found a good place to camp, a small running stream and some trees for wood. Here we are now, about three miles from Triunfo Ranch.* Good grass around. 81 48 Our animals are now gaining. We have had to feed barley up to this time, but I hope that the grass will soon be big enough. It is good here. We had in Sycamore Canyon a week ago thermometer from 70° to 80° (once 86°) for several days. It is every day nearly up to 60°. Think of that for February! What must June, July, and August be! Whew!

This spot was visited January 13, 1770, by Portola´'s party on the return from the expedition to San Francisco Bay, and was named on that occasion El Triunfo del Dulci´simo Nombre de Jesu´s (Fray Francisco Palo´u, Historical Memoirs of New California . ed. Herbert Eugene Bolton [1926]. II, 254-255). It is interesting to follow the course of the Portola´ expedition of 1769-70 over much of this same ground through the medium of Doctor Bolton's translation of Palo´u's Noticias .

Tuesday, February 26.

YESTERDAY I visited the country southeast of camp and had a hard climb over rocky and precipitous hills. We rode to the foot, about four miles, and there left our mules. We came upon four fine, large deer, almost within pistol shot--graceful and beautiful animals. This makes eleven deer I have seen this month.

We intended to move on this morning, but before day it began to rain hard, and rained at intervals all the morning. It cleared up at noon, however, and we will move in the morning. Peter has repaired the weak wagon wheel with that universal plaster for ailing implements, rawhide, and says it will now go. We will try it. I had no idea of the many uses to which rawhides are put here. I was in a house on a ranch, where a rawhide was spread before the beds as a carpet or mat. Bridle-reins and ropes or lassos ( riatas ) are made, fences are tied--everything is done with rawhide.

It is a clear, cold evening, all the men are smoking around the fire except me; my fingers are cold and I must go out too. I wish I could be in "The States" this and next week--exciting times! Next week must tell what the South will do on Lincoln's inauguration. We get the political news pretty well; we have got New York papers nearly every steamer and will get them again on reaching San Luis Obispo, if not before. I hope to be at Santa Barbara in ten days.

Camp 18, Carpinteria.

March 5.

A WEEK has passed since I wrote anything to anybody. Wednesday, 82 49 February 27, we raised camp and went about eighteen miles, first passing the lovely Triunfo Ranch, a large grassy valley surrounded by high hills. Then we crossed a high rocky ridge and descended a hill about five or six hundred feet. It was terribly steep, but Peter managed the wagon with a skill to be praised--all down safely. We then struck west a few miles, in a valley, and by a stream near Cayeguas Ranch. Here we stopped over one day and gathered some fine fossils. A hill was as full of large clam shells, barnacles, conch shells, oyster shells, etc., as any modern beach--much more so than the beach of the Pacific here now.

Friday, March 1, we came on to San Buenaventura, on the seacoast. Soon after leaving Cayeguas we entered the plain, which there lies along the sea, and crossed it to the sea about twenty miles. It is a fine grassy plain, with here and there a gentle green knoll, with a few dry creeks or alkaline ponds, and one fine stream, the Santa Clara River, running through it. We stopped for an hour on its bank and rested our mules, lunched and refreshed ourselves in a grove of cottonwoods which came nearer to a forest than anything I have yet seen here. We forded the river and came on. At San Buenaventura the hills come up to the sea, the plain ceases, but a fine stream comes down from a pretty valley, green, grassy, and rich.

Here is the old Mission San Buenaventura, once rich, now poor.* A little dirty village of a few inhabitants, mostly Indian, but with some Spanish-Mexican and American. The houses are of adobe , the roofs of red tiles, and all dirty enough. A fine old church stands, the extensive garden now in ruins, but with a few palm trees and many figs and olives--the old padres ' garden. Ruined buildings, two or three old fountains with lions and horses sculptured on them, now dry and ruined, told of former luxury. An old threshing floor stood, a circular wall of stones laid up in mortar, about forty or fifty feet in diameter, the wall about four or five feet high, where they used to put in wheat and drive in wild horses to thresh it.

This mission named in honor of the Doctor Sera´fico San Buenaventura (Giovanni Fidanga, 1221-74), was founded by Junipero Serra in 1782. The name of the locality has been shortened to Ventura. 83 50

Saturday we roamed over the hills, went down to the beach, took a bath in the surf--decidedly refreshing, but cold. The roar of the breakers hushed us to sleep at night and was the first sound heard in the morning.

Sunday we strolled down to the beach in the morning and made the discovery of multitudes of cockles (small clams) in the sand. Soon we were all digging with our fingers; we got so many in a few minutes that they are not eaten yet. After a feast on raw clams, we went into town to Mass.

The church was precisely like the others seen here, only in better condition. A description of it will do almost as well for Los Angeles or San Gabriel. The walls are very thick, built of adobes ; the ceiling is of timber and boards laid across, painted; the walls are painted rudely in pilasters, festoons, etc.; the floor is of large square bricks. The room was a parallelogram in shape, three times as long as broad, probably 120 or 130 feet long, ceiling high, with two entrances, one at the end, one at the middle of one side. Over the end and main door is a small wooden gallery for the singers; opposite the door is the altar decked with tinsel and silver, a few old images standing in various places about the altar and about side shrines--once brilliant with paint, tinsel, and gilding, now faded, dingy, and dilapidated. A few pictures hang on the walls, some really quite good, but dingy, their gilded frames worm-eaten and tarnished. All speaks of decline, decay.

At the altar was an Italian priest, saying Mass. Kneeling, sitting, or standing on the floor, was the congregation of about fifty women and half as many men, reverent, devout, and attentive. The effect was very picturesque. The women, sitting or kneeling, had shawls over their heads, hanging down behind and held or pinned beneath the chin, as is the custom here--some black, but most of very gay colors. A few children were among them; here a babe in arms--black hair, blacker sparkling eyes, and dark skin--peeping over some mother's shoulder; there a little girl, just learning to cross herself and read her prayers, 84 51 beside her mother or larger sister. Most of them were Indians, but there were a few Spanish or other whites. Some of the half-breeds were really pretty. Some of the men wore moccasins, leggins, and Indian costume, others the Spanish or common. The women wore frocks, some with many flounces, while a few hoops and flat hats told of inroads of modern fashion in this place. The women were better looking as a set than those at the Indian villages or missions before visited. Several Indians visited our camp, quite intelligent looking fellows. All the Indians here are much blacker than those in the East, and with flatter noses and less intelligent faces.

After Mass we went back to camp, a mile from town, but Guirado stayed with some friends during the afternoon and came back telling of spirited horse races--six horses changed owners by betting--billiards, dancing, and a fight--common accompaniments of a Spanish Sunday. What things we purchased there we paid a most exorbitant price for, except cigarritos , the only cheap thing found in the place.

Yesterday, Monday, March 4, we came on here, about eighteen miles. The road followed the seacoast; high bluffs or cliffs rose from the shore all the way. Sometimes we rode on the sand close to the water, sometimes over sand-hills, half knee-deep, sometimes over a little flat beck with deep, steep gulches, and, worse than all the rest, over big bowlders for a mile or two--bowlders piled thick together as only the sea can pile them. This was too much for our invalid wagon wheel; it showed signs of giving in. We stopped in this fine valley--good grass and wood, but poor water.

Tuesday Evening, March 5.

LAST night as we were sitting around our cheerful camp fire, the sound of a cannon came booming on the still night air, above the roar of the surf. How it startled us, for it told of the arrival of the steamer at Santa Barbara, eight miles distant, 85 52 probably with the Professor, or if not with him, with letters and funds .

This last was an important item. He left four weeks ago, leaving with me but three hundred dollars. Several bills which had been left unpaid and our unexpected break-downs reduced this. I sent for more by Ashburner when he went up two weeks ago, for when the wagon returned from Los Angeles I was horrified to find that our treasurer had paid out all but about twelve or fifteen dollars.

This afternoon Guirado returned, brought letters, but no Professor, and what was worse, no funds . I counted up and found $3.25 in the treasury and $3.00 in private hands--total, $6.25. Five men in camp, two weeks before another steamer, flour all gone, jerked beef ditto, onions ditto, potatoes ditto--long ago--have forgotten how some of them looked--bacon, small chunk, and even beans only a meager, lonely few left in the last corner of the sack. We have lived poorly the last two weeks, looking forward for better fare on reaching Santa Barbara; decidedly a poor prospect ahead! I shall stay here one day more, then go to Santa Barbara and try to make a raise of fifty or a hundred dollars by an order on Professor Whitney to sell to someone, by borrowing, or otherwise. Can't tell exactly how, but I will make it go in some way or another.

Rode along the beach a few miles today through the fog, visited some rocks of interest, frightened a large seal off from some rocks, saw thousands of gulls, geese, cranes, and other sea birds. After dinner at four o'clock, took a fine bath in the surf.

86 87 88

CHAPTER V

SANTA BARBARA

A Decadent Town--The Old Mission--A Remarkable Grapevine--Rough Trails--Inspecting a Coal Mine--Holy Week .

In Camp at Santa Barbara.

Sunday, March 10, 1861.

WE came on here Thursday, March 7, arriving in the afternoon. The steamer was to leave that night for San Francisco, the only public communication with the outer world. I tried to make a raise and get some money from express agents, merchants, etc.--no go--so wrote on to Professor Whitney that we would wait here until either funds or he arrived. Friday we visited the Mission, examined the foothills, etc. More of the Mission anon.

Saturday, with Averil, I visited a hot spring about five miles from here. First a good road, past some pretty ranches, then up a wild ravine by such a path as you would all put down as entirely impassable to horses, but it was mere fun for our mules. They climbed the stones and logs, now between these bowlders and now over this rock, as if it were their home. We found several copious springs, making together a fine brook, issuing from the rocks at the base of a very steep rocky mountain. This is just near the base of a rugged peak, at perhaps five hundred feet above the sea. The water was sulphury and had temperatures varying from 115° to 118° F. In the States, or near a large city, it would be a fortune to some enterprising man. There is more timber here, as at Carpinteria, than we have seen south, along the streams and in the valleys.

Santa Barbara lies on the seashore, and until lately it was isolated from the rest of the world by high mountains. No 89 56 wagon road or stage route ran into it from without, only mere trails or paths for horses over the mountains. For a few years they had had a mail once in two weeks by steamer from San Francisco--two mails per month was the only news of the world outside. But the Overland has been working the road--or the county has--and will run this way after the first of April. Here is a village of about 1,200 inhabitants. A wealthy Mission formerly existed here, but like all the rest, is now poor after the robbery by the Mexican Government. I have not seen before in America, except at Panama, such extensive ruins.

The Mission was founded about the time of the American Revolution--the locality was beautiful, water good and abundant. A fine church and ecclesiastical buildings were built and a town sprang up around. The slope beneath was all irrigated and under high cultivation--vineyards, gardens, fields, fountains, once embellished that lovely slope. Now all is changed. The church is in good preservation, with the monastery alongside--all else is ruined.*

The Presidio of Santa Barbara was founded in 1782, but the founding of the Mission was delayed until 1786. The first buildings were destroyed by earthquake; the main building standing in 1861 dated from 1820. Missionary activities declined until they ceased in 1856, but the building continued to be used by a missionary college.

It was with a feeling of much sadness that I rode through the old town. Here were whole streets of buildings, built of adobes , their roofs gone, their walls tumbling, squirrels burrowing in them--all now desolate, ruined, deserted. Grass grows in the old streets and cattle feed in the gardens. Extensive yards ( corrals ) built with stone walls, high and solid, stand without cattle. The old threshing floor is ruined, the weeds growing over its old pavement. The palm trees are dead, and the olive and fig trees are dilapidated and broken.

We went into the church--a fine old building, about 150 feet long (inside), 30 wide, and 40 high, with two towers, and a monastery, sacristy, etc., 250 feet long at one side, with long corridors and stone pillars and small windows and tile roofs. The interior of the church was striking and picturesque. Its walls were painted by the Indians who built it. The cornice and ornaments on the ceiling were picturesque indeed--the colors bright and the designs a sort of cross between arabesques, 90 57 Greek cornice, and Indian designs, yet the effect was pretty. The light streamed in through the small windows in the thick walls, lighting up the room. The floor was of cement. The sides and ceiling were plastered with the usual accompaniment of old pictures, shrines, images, altar, etc. The pictures were dingy with age, the tinsel and gilt of the images dull and tarnished by time and neglect. Some of the pictures were of considerable merit; such were two, one of the Crucifixion and another of the Conception.

On either side of the door, beneath the choir, were two old Mexican paintings: one of martyrs calm and resigned in fire; the other, the damned in hell. The latter showed a lurid furnace of fire, the victims, held in by iron bars, tormented by devils of every kind. In front was the drunkard with empty glass in his hand, a devil with the head of a hog pouring liquid fire upon him from a bottle. The gambler, ready to clutch the money and the cards, was held back by a demon no less ugly. An old bald-headed man stood with a fighting-cock in his hand, but tormented now. A woman had a serpent twined about her and feeding upon her breast, another was stung by scorpions.

Although the picture attracted the attention and imagination, it had none of the merits of Rubens' "Descent of the Damned." The victims had not that expression of remorse and anguish which he could paint so well, nor the demons that fiendish diabolical expression he conceived and expressed.

The same was true of another picture of Judgment Day, the separation of the just from the unjust--an elaborate work of the imagination, but not good as a work of art. Much better was a picture of the Virgin with broken scales of justice in her hand, an angel on each side pointing and directing the penitents at her feet to her look and mercy.

There were old tombs beneath the church, and a churchyard by the side. A few monks still occupy the place and preserve the church and monastery from utter ruin. They were kind to us. I got much information from the old padre , nearly seventy 91 58 years old, a fine old benevolent-looking man, who had known the Mission in the days of its prosperity and who could tell of wildernesses reclaimed and works of art erected, of savages converted and taught the arts of civilized life, and of heathen embracing the gospel. One of the monks, an Irishman, with the strongest Celtic features, showed us through the building, took us up into the towers, where we had a good view of the Mission and its ruins, the scene of its former greatness and present desolation.*

"The old Spanish Franciscan mentioned in the narrative of Brewer was the Very Rev. Fr. Jose´ Mari´a Gonza´lez Ru´bio, O.F.M., who died here November 2, 1875. The young Irish Franciscan was the Rev. Fr. Joseph Jeremiah O'Keefe. He was a native of San Francisco, Calif. He departed from this life at St. Joseph's Hospital, San Francisco, on August 13th, 1915" (letter to the editor from Rev. Fr. Zephyrin, O.F.M.; see also Fr. Zephyrin Engelhardt, O.F.M., Santa Barbara Mission [San Francisco, 1923]).

Up the canyon two or three miles a strong cement dam had been built, whence the water was brought down to the Mission in an aqueduct made of stone and cement, still in good repair. Near the Mission it flows into two large tanks or cisterns, reservoirs I ought to call them, built of masonry and cement, substantial and fine. These fed a mill where grain was ground, and ran in pipes to supply the fountains in front of the church and in the gardens, and thence to irrigate the cultivated slope beneath. But all now is in ruin--the fountains dry, the pipes broken, weeds growing in the cisterns and basins. The bears, from whose mouths the water flowed, are broken, and weeds and squirrels are again striving to obtain mastery as in years long before.

I find it hard to realize that I am in America--in the United States , the young and vigorous republic as we call her--when I see these ruins. They carry me back again to the Old World with its decline and decay, with its histories of war and blood and strife and desolation, with its conflict of religions and races.

Tuesday, March 12.

STILL foggy and wet. This weather is abominable--now for nearly two weeks we have had foggy, damp weather, tramping through wet bushes, riding in damp, foggy air, burning wet wood to dry ourselves, no sun to dry our damp blankets. I find that it makes some of my joints squeak with rheumatic 92 59 twinges. Went out this morning, found it so wet that we had to return to camp. I have been writing labels and packing specimens, and now will write letters, hoping that it will dry off some after dinner.

Yesterday, with two citizens of the place, a lawyer and a surveyor, who were going to survey a ranch, I rode about six miles west along the coast. We rode over grassy hills, with some timber, where many cattle and sheep were grazing. We struck the coast about six miles from here, where asphaltum, a kind of coal-tar, comes out of the rocks and hardens in the sun. It is used for making roofs, by mixing with sand, boiling, and spreading on hot. It occurs in immense quantities and will eventually be the source of some considerable wealth. We found some fossils, stayed there several hours, and then rode back along the beach, it being low tide. It was an interesting ride to us. The strata which come out to the sea have been twisted and torn by volcanic forces, and then worn into fantastic shapes by the waves.

Sunday Evening, March 17.

WE have had a clear hot day, after a two weeks' fog, and have improved the opportunity to dry our blankets and clothes, botanical papers, etc.

Yesterday three of us rode again to the hot springs five miles east, and took a refreshing bath in the hot waters. On the way we passed the most remarkable grapevine I have ever seen. Although not quite so large at the main stalk as a wild one at Ovid, and none of the branches so long, yet it was much more remarkable, as it was pruned and under good cultivation. It was at Montecito, about four miles east, in the garden of Jose´ Dominguez. It was planted by his mother about thirty years ago. It stands in the center of a sort of garden, and its branches occupy the whole of it. It is trained up in a single stalk, like a tree, about six feet, then branches off into about twenty branches from six to twenty inches in circumference, running in every direction. The main stalk is from thirty-one 93 60 to thirty-five inches in circumference in its various parts--the branches extend over a horizontal framework about seventy feet in diameter each way. In summer the foliage is very dense over the whole of this surface, some 3,600 to 4,000 square feet, or about one-tenth of an acre. The vine was well pruned, and the yield of grapes is as extraordinary as its size, being from three to four tons per year--good years the latter quantity is estimated. One year 6,300 bunches were counted and that was hardly more than a third-- sixteen thousand bunches was considered a low estimate for that year. Single bunches have weighed as high as seven pounds , as can be attested by many witnesses! I question if the world can produce its equal, especially if we consider its youth. None of the old vines of the Old World are as great, so far as I can remember. The woman who planted it was old at that time--she is now about a hundred years old. She sat watching it like a child, with a stick to keep the fowls away. It is not yet in leaf for this year. A little sancha (artificial stream) runs near it, from which it is irrigated by hand. It is about three miles from the sea, high, steep mountains rise to the north of it to shelter it from the north winds. Men have visited it from all parts of the world, all pronounce it the king of vines.*

This vine appears to have been older than Brewer supposed. It is said to have grown from a slip cut from a vineyard at San Antonio Mission, Monterey County, and planted before 1800, perhaps about 1796. The planter of this vine was Don˜a Marcellina Feliz de Dominguez, wife of an old soldier, Jose´ Mari´a Dominguez, who came up to Alta California with one of the earliest expeditions from Sonora, before 1780. He died in 1845 at the age of nearly 100 years. Don˜a Dominguez died in 1865 at the age of 102, or, according to some, 105 years. The couple had fourteen children, and at the time of her death there were three hundred descendants. (San Francisco, Daily Evening Bulletin , May 26, 1865.)

In Camp at Santa Barbara.

Monday, March 25.

THE foggy weather that had lasted for over two weeks ceased, the sky cleared up on Sunday night, and on Monday morning, March 18, I started to climb and measure the ridge lying north of us. Averill was somewhat under the weather, so I took Peter and Guirado with me. We rode to the hot springs, about five miles, left our mules in charge of Guirado, while Peter and I made the ascent. To the first peak, about 1,500 or 2,000 feet above the hot spring, was very steep, rocky, and hot. The sultry sun poured down floods of heat on the hot, dry rocks. The sun falling on the thermometer for scarcely a single minute 94 61 ran it up to 120° F., and as it was graduated no higher I could not measure the temperature; it must have been 140°, or more, in the direct rays of the sun.

Reaching the first peak, we struck back over a transverse ridge, down and up, through dense chaparral, in which we toiled for seven hours. This is vastly more fatiguing than merely climbing steep slopes; it tries every muscle in the body. We reached the summit of the ridge at an altitude of 3,800 feet above the sea--over 3,700 above camp. Our lunch was useless, for in our intense thirst we could eat nothing except a little juicy meat. Our only canteen of water gave out long before we reached the top, although we had husbanded it by taking merely sips at a time.

I never before suffered with thirst as I did that day. What must it be on the deserts! I have heard tales of suffering here, on the deserts of California, Utah, Arizona, etc., as touching as those of Africa or Arabia. Peter found relief by chewing a quarter of a dollar for several hours, the means they use on the plains, but I could find no relief that way.

About sundown we reached the hot spring. A small pool of bad water was there. How I wanted cool water; hot sulphur water (118°) for a thirsty man is hardly the thing, yet we found it good. We ate our lunch, sat by the spring for half an hour, drinking small quantities often, then bathed in the hot waters and were more refreshed than one could have believed. But night closed in on us then. Guirado had brought the mules up into the canyon. The moon was bright as we struck down the wild dangerous trail. The wild dark canyon, rugged rocks, the dark shadows under the bushes and behind the rocks, the wild scene on every side, conspired with the hour to produce a most picturesque effect. Refreshed, we were lighthearted. Peter rode ahead, I followed on my sturdy mule with the barometer, Guirado bringing up the rear. Occasionally a snatch of song would awaken the echoes above the clattering of the hoofs of the mules over the rocks.

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As we approached the most dangerous place, where the path went down a steep slope, over and among large bowlders, as high as the horses on each side, and piled in the path, we were stiller. Suddenly a crash--Peter's mule caught his foot between two rocks and fell, Peter pitching headlong over his head on the rocks. How he escaped unhurt, I cannot imagine, yet he was but slightly bruised. The poor mule fared not so well. His forefoot was held between two rocks as in a vise. He had fallen over below, and was hanging much of his weight on that foot. We could budge neither the rocks nor his foot. We thought his leg broken, and saw no way of releasing him. He was a valuable mule, worth $150 or more. We tugged, toiled, pried with levers, dug, all to no purpose. He made a tremendous effort, but only made matters worse, twisting his leg nearly around. After lying so for some time, while we worked frantically, he made another effort, tore off his shoe, and got out--strange to say, uninjured . A horse would have been ruined. We washed his foot and leg in the brook, led him a mile or so, and soon he scarcely limped. Peter then mounted him and rode him home to camp.

It is in such places that the superior sagacity of mules over horses is seen. Much as is said and written about the sagacity of horses--poets sing of it and romance writers harp on it--it is far inferior to the much abused mule. This fellow, as he lay so helpless, instead of struggling frantically, would get all ready and then coolly exert his greatest strength to get his foot loose, but not when we were working with it. Although he groaned pitifully and gnawed the ground and rocks in his intense pain, he did not bite us, but would put his head against us and look up most wistfully.

And while on the subject, a word more about our mules. I have an old white mule, I think the oldest in the lot, but can't tell her age. She is only thirteen hands high, but is very stout. It would take two whole letters to give the instances of her sagacity. How sure-footed she is on a mountain trail--she 96

SAN LUIS OBISPO From a drawing by Ogilby, after Vischer

MISSION OF SAN JUAN BAUTISTA From a drawing by Edward Vischer

97 63 never treads on a loose stone or on a smooth one, never treads in a hole where her feet may get caught, never puts her foot in a mud-hole until she tries if it is miry or not. I carry a barometer on her; she is just the mule for my use, gentle, surefooted, true, sagacious, but awful homely. Some of our mules are fine ones; it is considered a valuable lot.

We got back at nine o'clock in the evening, and found that the steamer had arrived, and with it Professor Whitney. He stayed until Saturday morning early, then left again. We expected that he would remain with the party, but I think he was decidedly pleased with our work, and concluded to leave the party in my command in the Coast Range, while he looked up the coal regions of Mount Diablo and the gold regions farther north. We were very busy the four days he was here, packed up eleven boxes of fossils we had collected, and did much work, explored some, he going over the ground we had before visited.

On Wednesday, March 20, we walked along the beach to the asphaltum beds, and over the hills, a long walk of eighteen or twenty miles. Some interesting things turned up during the day. We found a whale stranded on the beach. I had no idea how huge they look when fresh. He was forty-five feet long, and about thirteen to fifteen through from back to belly. Such a pile of flesh I never saw in one mass, it was equal to at least half a dozen large elephants. We also found a crab that was just shedding its shell. We secured it in its soft, velvety, new shell, and the old one alongside. Not the least--a half-naked Indian fishing on the shore had caught two of the remarkable vivaparoa fishes, which instead of laying eggs bring forth their young alive, a thing nowhere known except on the coast of California. We saw the mother fish with a number of little ones.

Monday Night, March 25.

THIS is so notorious a place for horse stealing and robbery that we have kept guard since we have been here. We divide the 98 64 night into three watches, the first until twelve, the second until three, the next until morning. I have the midnight watch, and it is so clear and light by the bright moon that I will add a word. These clear nights it is rather pleasant than otherwise. The clear sky above, the twinkling stars--to watch them rise over the mountains in the northeast and sink out of sight in the west, to watch the moon rise from the waves as it does in its wane--all this is pleasant. And the roar of the surf, coming up like that of some mighty waterfall, is continual music. But not so the foggy nights. For near two weeks the air was very foggy and wet--unpleasant wet days followed by wetter nights. Then the watches were anything but pleasant--sky black, nothing visible at any distance, beard and clothes dripping with wet, the camp fire light scarcely penetrating the gloom for a few feet, the roar of the ocean coming up dull and sullen on the thick air. Watching such nights is by no means poetical, and it awoke musings and memories of a very different fireside but a short year ago.

Sunday Evening, March 31 (Easter).

WELL, I have another week's experience to detail--rich enough in events to make two letters, but I cannot write all. A trip in the mountains of three days; Holy Week among the Catholics; men getting drunk, fighting, and in jail, etc. I have spent half of today getting one of my men out of jail where he got put yesterday for fighting. But to take things in order.

A coal mine is reputed to exist a short distance from here in the mountains; a company has been formed, some hundreds of dollars expended, and many look ahead to speedy wealth. It was desirable that we visit it. "Rich indications," "Not more than fifteen miles distant," "Possibly farther by the trail," "Good trail over the mountains for a horse," "Railroad practicable," etc., were a few of the statements of anxious stockholders. We decided to visit it. Rains and bad weather prevented for some time--the good weather we had the week that 99 65 Professor Whitney was with us left the day that he did--but it looked better, so Tuesday, March 26, Averill and I started. We had an experienced mountaineer guide, the original discoverer and, as consequence, owner of several "shares." He rode a good horse for such a tramp; I rode my trusty mule; Averill took "Old Sleepy," quite a noted mule in our flock, one supposed to be peculiarly adapted to such a trip. We were up at dawn and off with the sun--saddlebags on the saddle, our blanket, three days' provisions, coffeepot, etc., strapped behind, knives, pistols, and hammers swung to our belts--all equipped in good style.

We rode directly east about six miles, past some fine ranches and across two or three small streams that issued from the mountains, with some timber--almost a forest in places in the wetter soil--then struck up a canyon into the heart of the ridge. Such a trail as we found that day! The worst I had traveled before was a turnpike compared with that. Now following along a narrow ledge, now in the brook over bowlders, now dismounting and jumping our mules over logs, or urging them to mount rocks I would have believed inaccessible--yet this was "pretty good yet," our guide told us. Arrived near the head of the canyon, high, steep slopes hemmed us in. I saw no means of getting farther, but the "trail" ran up that slope. I saw the rocks rising near or quite a thousand feet above us, at an angle of forty-five to sixty degrees in many places, and up this the trail wound. I dismounted, but our guide said, "Oh no, ride up, man, it's not bad!" Averill drew the girth tighter on Old Sleepy and started. I preferred leading my mule. Up a few hundred feet, going up over a steep rock, down went Old Sleepy. For a moment I expected to see him and Averill roll into the canyon two or three hundred feet beneath, but he caught against a bush. We helped him, but after that Averill took it afoot. The trail ran up by zigzags, at an actual angle of thirty degrees average, and in places over forty degrees! We measured one slope of several hundred feet where the trail 100 66 was at an angle of thirty-seven degrees, the slope itself much steeper. You will appreciate this better when you remember that the roof of a house with "quarter pitch," the usual slant, has an angle of but about twenty-four degrees.

We crossed the summit at an elevation of 3,500 to 3,700 feet, but clouds had enveloped us for the last thousand feet--damp, drizzly, and thick, decidedly unpleasant--and shut out the fine view we had when we returned. The north slope of the ridge was less steep. It was covered with a very dense chaparral, about twelve feet high, so dense that no animal could get through it in many places, but a good trail had been cut through. We descended about two thousand feet into a deep canyon, then struck into another, finally crossed the Santa Inez River and struck up another canyon in this wild labyrinth of mountains. We found deer and wolf tracks in abundance, and a few grizzly tracks. We rested an hour and lunched on a little grassy spot, then pushed on. Near night we came up to a deserted cabin, an old Indian "ranch" called Nahalawaya ( Nah-hah-lah-way-yah ). As it looked like rain and no other shelter could be expected, we concluded to stop until the next morning. We soon had a fire in its old fireplace, a good lunch, and a sound sleep that night under its hospitable shelter; our animals found some poor grass.

We were up early in the morning, and pushed for the "mines." We were getting used to a "hard road to travel," but this beat our yesterday's experience. We passed up a canyon, in which we surmounted obstacles I would have thought entirely impassable. It was perfectly astonishing how the mules would go. We would get off, tie up the reins, lead them up to a rock; they would eye it well, and coolly, with a spring or two, mount rocks nearly perpendicular, six to ten feet high, if they could only get a foothold. I wondered how we were to get back, but on returning they would slide down coolly and safely.

We followed this canyon a few miles, then crossed another ridge near or quite four thousand feet high, possibly more. 101 67 From this summit we had a grand view of the desolate, forbidding wilderness of mountains that surrounded us. We then sank into another canyon, 1,500 or 2,000 feet, followed it up, and at last arrived at the mines near noon--thirteen or fourteen hours in the saddle to overcome a distance of about twenty-four or twenty-five miles from camp, half of that time on not over six miles of trail.

We found the mines positively nothing. A few seams of coal from one-eighth to three-quarters of an inch thick, and those short, standing in perpendicular strata of rock, were the "indications." A sort of "pocket" had furnished about a peck of coal or less, on which the company had been formed, a shaft commenced, four hundred dollars expended, and great prospective wealth built up--to such a feverish state is the whole community worked up here about mines. I did not tell the stockholders how very slim the indications were, on my return, but slicked it over by merely telling them that they would not find the coal in profitable quantities, that the difficulty of access, position of the strata, and necessary thinness of the beds would prevent the mines being profitable.

We found tools, drill, picks, shovels, hammers, crowbar, tent, provisions, etc., which had been left by the men when the work was deserted some months ago. We saw bear and wolf tracks along the stream--one bear must have been truly huge--and deer tracks without number. We once came on a flock of ten beautiful deer. Averill tried to get a shot with his pistol but could not succeed. We returned to the cabin again that night, as we found no grass for our hungry mules beyond that point; and lucky we were, for it rained nearly all of that night--decidedly damp to be out.

The next day (Thursday) we returned. We got a fine view from the ridge--the plain and ocean on the south, the mountains on the north. We were up to the height of snow on other peaks, but we found none. This trail was cut two or three years ago to carry the mail on horseback to Fort Tejon, but never 102 68 used, and rains and neglect had reduced it to its present condition. The trip was a tiresome one, but most interesting. Could it all be put on one ascent and descent, I doubt not that it would make a twenty thousand or twenty-five thousand foot climb up, and the same back.

Only six things were lacking to make it a very "thrilling tale." First, to have had it rain hard, and we, with no shelter, to lie out in it--it rained enough but we had the shelter--and to have had said rains so swell the water in the canyons that we could not get out, but have to subsist on mule meat, roots, and "yarbs." Second, to have met and vanquished several grizzlies, and to have returned triumphant with their skins, and lots of wounds and bites, as trophies--we saw only their tracks. Third, to have had a mule and its rider go tumbling down some precipice, both to be food for the buzzards and a warning to the venturesome--but Old Sleepy only slipped. Fourth, to have killed sundry deer with our pistols and returned fat and portly on eating so much venison--we only saw the deer, and got back hungry. Fifth, to have had our mules get away, and we have to foot it home, packing our saddles, blankets, and specimens on our own backs--alas, they were well picketed. And sixth, to have lost our teapot on the first slope and be obliged to drink cold water--we lost only the lid. Owing to these failures I have no thrilling tale to write. Good night!

April 4.

I PROMISED to tell something about the festivities of Holy Week in Santa Barbara. The whole week was a week of festival, but I was in town only the last three days. Friday I was in camp most of the day, but there was the ceremony of "lying in the sepulcher," "washing of feet," etc. The town seemed like a true sabbath day. Among the true Catholics, men are not allowed to ride on horseback--formerly policemen prevented any from so riding on Good Friday--and but few horsemen are seen now.

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I went into town in the afternoon. In the church the altar was trimmed off with a profusion of flowers around the sepulcher, tapers were burning, the windows were partially darkened, and a few of the devout were praying to their favorite saints. We rode to the Mission church--its windows were darkened by thick curtains and the many candles at the altar did not light up the obscurity. Many Indians were about. Within, a number of Indian women were kneeling before a shrine; one would lead off with the prayers and all join in the responses. Their pensive voices, the darkened vast interior, the pictures and images obscurely seen in the dim light, the tapers of the altar, the echoes of their voices, the only sounds heard breaking the stillness, produced an effect I can easily conceive most touching to the imagination of the worshipers. Some of the Indian girls and half-breeds were quite pretty, but the majority were decidedly ugly.

Saturday I attended Mass in the morning. The curtains were removed from the altar, and more ceremonies were gone through with than I can detail, but they differed very materially from the ceremonies at Munich on a similar occasion. The music was the best I have heard in California. It began with an instrumental gallopade (I think from Norma ), decidedly lively and un devotional in its effect and associations. But other parts were more appropriate. As the priests chanted the long list of saints in order, the response, "Ora pro nobis," by the audience (I can hardly say congregation) and choir was very pretty indeed. At the unveiling of the altar, two lovely little girls dressed as angels, with large white swan wings upon their shoulders, one on each side of the altar, looked most lovely. They stood there as watching angels during the ceremonies.

Not the least interesting to me were the costumes. Standing, kneeling, sitting over the floor were the people of many races. Here is a genuine American; in that aisle kneels a genuine Irishman, his wife by his side; near him some Germans; in the 104 70 short pew by the wall I recognize some acquaintances, French Catholics, also an Italian. But the majority of the congregation are Spanish Californians. Black eyes twinkle beneath the shawls drawn over the heads of the females, and glossy hair peeps out also, and the responses show sets of pearly teeth that would make an American belle die with envy should she see them. A few bonnets and "flats" tell of American or foreign women mingled with the crowd. Here is a group of Indians, the women nearly conforming to the Spanish dress, only their calico dresses are of even brighter colors--all are dressed in holiday clothes. Here is a man with Parisian rig; there one with the regular Mexican costume, buttons down the sides of his pants; beside him is an Indian with fancy moccasins and gay leggins; behind me, in the vestibule, looking on with curiosity, are two Chinamen. No place but California can produce such groups.

In the afternoon there were horse races, etc., but I did not attend them. Thereby hangs a tale, but of that more anon.

Saturday evening I was in town again. A gay, jolly crowd were in the streets, the buccaros on their horses, and such horsemen as only Mexico or similar countries can show! Such feats of horsemanship one cannot see in a circus--trying to throw each other from their horses, or throw their horses--it looked as if somebody must be killed, but of course nobody was seriously hurt in their rough sport. I will tell another time of the horsemanship here. Now for less poetry.

Saturday afternoon I was busy at camp, but the men were in town. Peter returned--said one was "jolly," and the two others getting decidedly "mellow." Soon they returned, minus Mike, one of them decidedly "over the bay"; Mike had got in the jail. He had not been drunk before with us, but perfectly sober and steady. He is a zealous Catholic, and today celebrated too hard--got pugnacious like all drunken Irishmen, pitched into everybody, whipped and rolled ignominiously in the dust the fat Dutch justice of the peace who came to arrest 105 71 him, much to the amusement of the crowd, but was finally overpowered, bound, and taken off to jail. Now this excited one of the other men. He was cool at first, but seeing Mike tied, he took out his knife, cut him loose, and was about to take him to camp when the sheriff came and carried Mike to jail. The others then came to camp.

I was decidedly annoyed by this turn of affairs, and while ruminating on this new episode in my company, I was waited on by the sheriff and a deputy who came to arrest the other man on charge of "assault and battery, aiding in escape, prevention of arrest, etc." I kept him out of the lock-up after much palaver by going his bonds for appearance. I tried to get Michael, but did not get him out on bail until the next morning (Sunday). Finally, on Monday, with the aid of an ingenious American lawyer, I got them off with the payment of costs, about twenty or twenty-five dollars. A decidedly unpleasant affair all around, but a severe lesson for both of them.

During our stay in Santa Barbara we bought milk at a house on the edge of town. Sunday afternoon the woman and baby, little girl, and daughter (young woman), came into camp and paid us a visit of several hours. They sat down in the tent and chatted away very lively--Spanish, of course. The mother was middle-aged, very dark, as dark as a dark mulatto, but with Spanish features, with a shade, perhaps a quarter, Indian--hair black as jet, eyes even blacker, teeth like pearl. She had a lively babe of eight months, which she fed in the "natural way," decidedly unreservedly. The senorita was quite pretty, hardly as dark as her mother, with clear, olive skin, hair like a raven (not crow ), and the finest sparkling eyes, and pearly teeth. She chatted, smoked cigarritos , and apparently enjoyed the visit as much as we did. Some of these Spanish girls are pretty, especially the hair, eyes, and teeth.

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CHAPTER VI

THE COAST ROAD

California Caravans--Gaviota Pass--Santa Inez Mission--Foxen's Ranch--A Wagon Wreck--San Luis Obispo--The Santa Lucia Mountains--On "The State of the Union ."

Camp No. 22, near Santa Inez.

April 7, 1861.

WE are camped about four miles north of Santa Inez Mission at the ranch Alamo Pintado. It is a quiet, hot Sunday afternoon, 98° in the tent, so I go out and write in the shade of a tree, where it is cooler, only 90°; yet last night was a cold chilly night, almost cold enough for frost.

Tuesday, April 2, early in the morning, we started north. Santa Barbara County until now has been nearly isolated from the country around by rugged mountains. During the last few months thirty or forty thousand dollars have been expended by the county on getting a good wagon road through from San Luis Obispo on the north to Los Angeles on the south. The southern part of the road is not yet finished but the north end is, and a fine road connects it with San Luis Obispo. This road we are following--sometimes it is a mere obscure trail across the grassy plain, scarcely visible yet for want of travel, at others well engineered, built over and along high hills and through deep canyons at great expense and labor. Fine bridges of wood span the streams and gulches, the first bridges we have seen in the southern country. Our mules are shy of these, to them, strange structures.

We came on about twenty-five miles and camped on the sea-shore, where a fine stream emerges from a canyon, on the ranch of Dos Pueblos.* During the day's ride, the high, rugged 108 74 mountains ran nearly parallel with the coast, from one to six miles distant from the sea. The space between was made of gentle slopes, and very green grassy hills, on which were a profusion of wild flowers with brilliant colors. Immense herds and flocks of cattle, horses, and sheep were feeding. We passed one herd of over 2,000 head, kept in a close body by a large body of buccaros (herdsmen on horseback), while the owners were separating out cattle for some drover to take north. This fertile, lovely strip is well watered by frequent streams that come down from the mountain at intervals of every two or three miles, and is all occupied, either by rancheros under old Spanish grants or by the recent, wandering, worthless American "squatters." I found a fine mastodon (or mammoth) tooth during the day's ride.

The Dos Pueblos grant was made to Dr. Nicholas A. Den in 1842. The site is now called Naples. The name Dos Pueblos dates back to the landing of Cabrillo, 1542.

We camped in a lovely spot, where the sea was unusually rough, just at a point. The surf was heavy, and its thunder lulled us to sleep.

We spent the next day there looking up the adjacent hills. The road for the first three days from Santa Barbara was more traveled than any we had seen before. The first Overland through Santa Barbara, on Monday evening, April 1, was celebrated with the firing of cannon, etc. Many emigrants were passing over the road. One long train was bound for Texas, sick of California. One meets many such uneasy families who have lived in Ohio or Michigan, then Kansas or Iowa, then California or Oregon, and now for Texas or somewhere else. Several small companies of five to ten passed us on horseback, natives (Spanish Californian), traveling for pleasure or business, on horseback with one or two pack-mules along with baggage. The women wear black hats with feathers, much like a Kossuth hat, ordinary (not long "riding") dresses, often of gay colors. They ride with the feet on the right side of the horse, sitting nearly squarely crosswise, both feet hanging down as if they were sitting on a bench. Often a strap ornamented with silver and tassels, or a mere red sash, is tied over the lap, holding 109 75 them firmly to the saddle. No horse can throw them; they would go sweeping past us at a California gallop. We came on two or three parties at their noon lunch. They will ride sixty or seventy miles in a day and not complain.

Thursday, April 4, we came on about twenty miles, through the Gaviota Pass, crossed it, and camped in a most lovely valley on its north side, at the Nojoqui Ranch. After leaving the previous camp the mountains began to approach the sea; the green hills were scarcely half a mile wide, the barren, rugged, sandstone hills rising immediately back of these slaty green hills. This sandstone ridge is a continuous one, and has but one break, the Gaviota Pass, for a hundred miles or more. At the Gaviota a rent or fissure divides the ridge, but a few feet wide at the narrowest part and several hundred feet high. The road passes this "gate" and then winds up a wild rocky canyon, the wildest pass I have yet seen here. The mountains rise very rugged about 2,000 feet on each side. The narrowest part is not the highest; the road continues to ascend for about six miles where we cross the summit. A horrible trail ran through this formerly, but now the road is good.

As I could not agree with Dr. Antisell, of the Pacific Railroad Survey,* in his notions of the geology of the pass, we camped, and the next day Averill and I rode through it, and climbed two high hills. We had fine views of the ocean over the pass, and the labyrinth of hills to the north of the Santa Inez River. We got some fossils and I killed a rattlesnake that we came upon--he was inclined to get away at first, but fought bravely when attacked. He was not very long--two and a half feet--but was very thick--half as large as a large man's wrist--and had eight rattles.

The remarks of Thomas Antisell, M.D., geologist of Lieutenant Parke's expedition of the Pacific Railroad Survey, 1854-55, are found in Reports , Vol. VII, Pt.II.

Saturday, April 6 (yesterday), I visited the hills two or three miles north of camp in the morning, alone, for Averill was under the weather. In the afternoon we raised camp and came about ten or twelve miles to our present camp, near Santa Inez Mission.

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Camp No. 24, Nipomo Ranch.

Wednesday, April 10.

WE camped on Saturday, April 6, about four miles from the Mission at a little ranch owned by an American--the Ranch Alamo Pintado. It was a lovely spot. Large oaks scattered here and there, the green grass beneath, and the great profusion of flowers, made it look like a fine park. There are two species of oaks here.* One is an evergreen, with great spreading branches, gnarled and knotted trunks, worthless for timber because it is never straight and it has so many branches, but beautiful, as a tree, with its dark green foliage. The other is a deciduous tree. Like the first it branches low down, so it, too, is useless for timber. It is a most beautiful tree, however, the large limbs branching in great curves--not Gothic arches like the elm, but great round curves, great Roman arches of thirty to fifty feet span, coming down again near the ground. Sometimes such a limb will be thirty feet high twenty or thirty feet from the tree, and again near the end almost touch the ground. A tree close by camp, under which I wrote on Sunday, had a head of over a hundred feet in diameter, and the trunk was about fifteen feet in circumference in the smallest place below the branches. A trailing lichen hangs from every branch, delicate as lace, of a greenish gray color, swaying with every breeze--the effect is beautiful.

The first is the coast live oak ( Quercus agrifolia ); the second is the valley oak ( Quercus lobata ).

On Sunday morning Guirado and I rode to the Mission.* Here was quite a town in former times, but, like the rest of the missions, it is in ruins now. A large, old church stands, but there were scarcely more than a dozen persons--two or three Californians, and a few groups of Indians--kneeling in the vast church. It looked desolate and lonely. The church was highly painted, pictures hung on the walls, but all was dilapidated. The bells were of sweet tone--we could hear them at our camp.

La Misio´n Santa Ine´z (or Ine´s , i.e., Agnes) was founded in 1804.

Alongside of the church is a college, which once had a hundred or more students.* It now has but eleven, three of whom are Guirado's brothers. The place is in complete ruins. Not 111 77 over half a dozen houses are inhabited, the rest going to ruin. Some are roofless, and the adobe walls are crumbling with every rain; some, mere banks of dirt or clay, the abode of great numbers of ground squirrels that burrow in the ruins. The old corral is torn down in places, the old threshing floor broken in--all in decay. Long lines of water courses, sanchas or small aqueducts, some of them miles in length, laid in stone and cement, to supply the town and irrigate the fields, are now dry and broken. The vineyards are all gone, now dry pastures, and the olive and pear trees are dead. No town is growing up in its stead. A fine cement reservoir and a mill alongside are in ruins. It is the same story that I have written before of other missions.

Founded in 1844 (Bancroft, History of California , IV, 425-426).

Here, in this county, is a great field for missionary labor--not a single Protestant church or congregation in the county, not even a mission station, the prestige of the Roman church failing, the padres ' power lost, a race growing up more wicked, desperate, immoral than any that has gone before. The religious destitution and moral state of the county (Santa Barbara) is not easy to describe. It is the most Spanish, or Mexican, in its character and inhabitants of all counties in the United States.

Monday, we went on to Camp No. 23, at Foxen's Ranch, about twelve miles. Foxen is an old Englishman who came to America a mere boy--came as a sailor to the western coast, was hunter and trapper, then married a Spanish wife and settled on a ranch. He has been in California over forty years. He was decidedly an original character.* We camped near his house, for there is only water at the ranches, at intervals of six to ten miles on an average.

Benjamin Foxen came to California as a sailor on the British ship Courier in 1826, settled in Santa Barbara, was naturalized (baptized William Domingo), and married into a Spanish family. He died in 1874. Bancroft says: "He was a rough and violent man, often in trouble with other rough men and with the authorities, being sentenced to four years in prison in '48 for killing Augustin Davila--yet accredited with good qualities, such as bravery and honesty" ( ibid ., III, 746).

The hills we passed among during the day's ride were covered with pasture, or grass, with a great profusion of flowers. Sometimes we went along a valley with fine scattered trees. But the road was worse and our erring wagon wheel once more began to show signs of weakness and Pete mended it again with 112 78 thongs of rawhide. I examined the region around and found many fossils, among them a portion of a fossil whale, dug up at the ranch, the bones very stony.

Tuesday, April 9, we came on here, to Nipomo Ranch, about twenty-two miles. Our road first wound through some valleys, then struck into the valley of Santa Maria River. This river is now entirely dry, not a drop of water, its valley a perfectly level plain, with the exception of an occasional terrace or old riverbank, about six or eight miles wide. We struck down and across this valley about ten or twelve miles, a most tedious ride. We were dry, but no water was met with for the twenty-two miles traveled except a sink-hole with stagnant, alkaline, dirty, stinking water. Our lunch of dry bread and drier cheese, which we ate as we rode along, was hardly "sumptuous."

The ride was very tedious as we wound our slow way over the plains, here a drifting sand, there a partial pasture. Nothing relieved the eye; the senses tired with the level scene. The profusion of flowers, beautiful elsewhere, now tired us with their abundance and their sameness; wind filled the air with gray dust, sometimes shutting out the sight of the hills like drifting snow. Lovely green hills lay on each side at the distance of a few miles. Many cattle and horses were feeding on the hills or on the plain. Water every four to six miles in the side canyons was sufficient for them. They seemed mere specks on the plain--a herd of a thousand like a few flies on the floor. This valley runs to the sea, and in that direction a mirage kept ahead of us in the hot air--a very good appearance of water, but not nearly so perfect as I saw on the plains in Bavaria.

How we hailed the first tree of shade we came to, a fine sycamore on the dry riverbank, with fine shade--the first we had seen for fourteen miles. We stopped a few minutes, then pushed on, crossed the dry bed of sand half a mile or more wide, and struck up a side canyon about two miles, to water, at this ranch. To be sure, the water is alkaline and stinks from the droppings of the many animals, but made into tea it is drinkable, 113 79 and we can stand it if those who live here can. They, however, have a "spring," so called--a hole dug in the bank half a mile or more from here, where the water is cleaner. Bad water has affected the bowels of most of the party except me--I escape any material bad effects.

Today, Averill and I have been over the hills near here, exploring the geology and botany, quite a ride and walk. We came once on a large coyote, or wolf, and got a pistol shot at him but did not hit him. He was a big fellow, and two more were seen near camp by the other men. A snake five or more feet long, but harmless, was killed near our tent just at dark.

I forgot to mention that I killed a rattlesnake at Camp 22. He was within a rod or two of the tent, a small one, of another species from the first. There are several species of rattlesnakes found in this state, but all are dangerous. This fellow had fangs sharp as needles. We examined them. When not irritated they are covered with skin, like the claw of a cat, but are erected when required for use. This fellow, like the last, did not show fight until after he was attacked.

Camp No. 26, near San Luis Obispo.

Sunday Morning, April 14.

We were at Nipomo Ranch when I last wrote. Thursday, April 11, we came on. After leaving Santa Barbara County the roads were again horrible--no road in fact, but a mere trail, like a cow path, hardly marked by the track of wheels, and often very obscure. We crossed gulches down almost straight on one side, then "ker-chug" in the bottom, then up as steep on the other.

Our wagon is like the Overland stages, square covered body, hung on straps or "thorough-braces," as they are called. It is too light for our purpose, although it stood the road, but that weak wheel groaned and complained at times, notwithstanding its rawhide supports.

We wound among hills, and at last at the Arroyo Grande, 114 80 had a bad hill to descend. We had come a longer road because the "hill was easier" this way. Well, we got to the "easy" hill. It was about five or six hundred feet high, the sides at an angle of about thirty degrees, down which the road ran in "crooks"--now one side up, now the other. No work had been expended on it, so it was always very sidling, and very steep at the same time. We chained both hind wheels, and for a time all went well. We had descended about one-third of the way, sliding, slipping, dragging, when, quick as a flash, over went the whole concern. Pete and Mike escaped from under the pile by a miracle of agility that would astonish a circus performer. Such a pile! The wagon caught when completely upside down, the wheels high in the air. The mules were tangled in the harness, one on his back, his mate standing over and astride him. One of the wild leaders got loose, and was lassoed by Guirado a mile distant.

We got up the mule, then attended to the wagon. I never before unloaded a load from the bottom--carpetbags, instruments, tools, provisions, tent-ropes, botanical papers, etc. Two or three large boxes had been filled with rocks and fossils, each specimen carefully wrapped in paper and packed, now in one promiscuous pile. Frying pans, pails, basins, soap, etc., completed the picture. Michael had, at last camp, providently boiled a huge dish of applesauce for our supper that night. It, too, played its part in the confusion, and sundry very suggestive looking spots as a consequence adorned our carpetbags and furniture generally. (Themes for more papers on "The Distribution of Species" than even the famous antiquarian stone of Mr. Pickwick.)

We unloaded, turned the wagon up again, found the top a total wreck with no insurance, but no other serious damage, loaded up a half, and camped at the foot of the hill on a pretty, grassy bottom by the finest stream of water we had seen for some time. After dark we sat by our cheerful fire and talked over the adventures of the day and laughed at our mishaps, 115 81 troublesome though they were. I had the curiosity to go back to the hill the next day, when we packed down on our backs a part of the baggage, the wagon top, etc., and measured the angle. In one place for some distance the road descended at an angle of twenty-nine degrees ! Yet this is the "better" road to San Luis Obispo.

Friday, April 12, I sent the wagon on here with a part of the load, about twelve miles. Mike and I remained. The wagon returned and we came on yesterday afternoon.

The camp was in a pretty spot, on Mr. Branch's ranch. He is an American and has a ranch of eighty thousand acres , well stocked with many thousand choice cattle and horses, comparatively well watered, and fertile.* I explored the region around and called on him at his house. He lives quite stylishly for this county--that is, about half as well as a man would at home who owned a hundred-acre farm paid for.

Francis Zida Branch came to California in 1831 with the Woldskill party of trappers from New Mexico. He settled in Santa Barbara, married Manuela Carlou in 1835, and obtained the grant of the Santa Manuela Rancho in 1839. There he spent the rest of his life. He died in 1874 at the age of seventy-two ( ibid, II 727 ).

The advance camp carried the tent, so Mike and I had to take the open air. Rolled in our blankets on the green sod, the stars above in the clearest sky, we slept better than if beds of down supported us and a canopy of silk covered us. I love to watch the stars in the open air as I go to sleep, and see them greet me if I awaken in the night. But the nights are cold here under this clear sky. The thermometer sinks generally forty or fifty degrees lower than it was by day--90° in the shade in the afternoon, and 38° or 40° at night. As a consequence, dew falls, very heavy, almost like rain, which is the most serious drawback in sleeping out. We put an India rubber or oilcloth over us, and the water flows from this like rain, yet it is not so bad as you would think.

We are camped about two miles from San Luis Obispo, and will remain here two or three weeks. We must meet Professor Whitney about 250 or 300 miles north, near Monterey, about the middle of June. He is north now, where severe rains have deluged the country.

My health is excellent. The chaparral was so bad for pants 116 82 that I bought three buckskins. Peter "smoked" them as the Indians do, and from them I have made a splendid pair of pants, which defy chaparral, are healthy for rattlesnakes and tarantulas, and please me much every way, except that they are not particularly ornamental--in fact, I would hardly attend a party East in them. The hot sun has given the color of well-smoked ham to my hands and face; my hair nearly came out, so I have it cut short, the longest scarcely half an inch long. How I would like to happen in on you. See if you would recognize the captain of our geological party.

Camp at San Luis Obispo.

April 23.

SAN LUIS OBISPO town lies in a beautiful, green, grassy valley, about nine miles from the sea. A ridge of the Coast Range lies to the north, a continuous ridge, about three thousand feet high, with a single pass through it near town. The pass is about 1,500 or 1,800 feet high. This valley is more like a plain, from four to six miles wide and fifteen or twenty long, running northwest to the ocean. A range of hills lies to the south, separating it from the sea in that direction.

Through this plain rise many sharp peaks or "buttes"--rocky, conical, very steep hills, from a few feet to two thousand feet, mostly of volcanic origin, directly or indirectly. These buttes are a peculiar feature, their sharp, rugged outlines standing so clear against the sky, their sides sloping from thirty to fifty degrees, often with an average slope of forty to forty-five degrees! One near camp is beautifully rounded, about eight or nine hundred feet high, and perfectly green--scarcely a rock mars its beauty, yet the rock comes to the surface in many places. A string of these buttes, more than twenty in number, some almost as sharp as a steeple, extend in a line northwest to the sea, about twenty miles distant, one standing in the sea, the Morro Rock, rising like a pyramid from the waters.*

These buttes are concisely described in a bulletin of the United States Geological Survey ("The Shasta Route and Coast Line," Guidebook of the Western United States , No. 614, Pt. D, p. 115) as follows: "The most prominent topographic feature in the vicinity of San Luis Obispo (Spanish for St. Louis the bishop) is the row of conical hills that begins with Islay Hill, on the right (east), a little over 2 miles southeast of San Luis Obispo, and extending to Cerro Romualdo, about 4 miles northwest of the town. There are eight of these hills (Spanish cerros ), the four larger northwest and the four smaller southeast of the city. These hills, of which The Bishop (1502 feet) is the highest, are composed of igneous rock and are the cones of small volcanoes which broke through the Franciscan sedimentary rocks. The easter part of Islay Hill consists of a surface flow of basaltic lava." 117 83

We arrived on Saturday, April 13, in the afternoon. Sunday I remained in camp until the afternoon, when I went into town, about two miles. The old church is much like the other missions, except that the ceiling is made of short but wide split boards, and these are alternately painted in different bright colors, probably an Indian fancy, but by no means pleasing to the taste of Americans. The town looks more South American or Spanish than even the others we have seen. It is a small, miserable place.

Monday, April 15, we climbed a butte east of town, 1,200 to 1,500 feet high. A most lovely view we had from the top. The mountains to the north were covered with clouds at their summits, but their green sides, the great green plain to the south and west at our feet, the curious old town, the rugged buttes rising from this plain, the winding streams in it, all aided in making a lovely picture. A range of hills along the coast terminated the valley, but we were higher than they and could see the ocean beyond, covered with a fog near its surface, white, and tossed by the wind into huge billows.

That night fog again settled over the plain, as indeed it did every night during the week, but the fog cleared up sometime during the forenoon. The nights, however, were cold, wet, and disagreeable.

Tuesday we rode to the sea, and examined the coast hills. Wednesday we examined some of the buttes on the plain. Thursday we rode on to the summit of the pass, nine or ten miles, and visited the adjacent hills. Friday we visited a ranch ten miles distant, but as we expect to go there again I will defer description. We got somewhat wet by a rain that day, and rode the ten miles in wet clothes. Saturday was another wet day, but in the afternoon we examined and climbed a very rocky butte about four miles northwest of camp. A fog came on and shut out the view just as we reached the top. Sunday was a better day, but I spent it quietly in camp until the afternoon, when I rode into town and mailed letters; then rode to a 118 84 ranch near camp to see about an orphan child, at the request of a lady in San Francisco.

We had been waiting for better weather for climbing and measuring the Santa Lucia Mountains. As Monday, April 22, was a fine day, I got an early start, taking Guirado with me, and leaving Averill to observe barometer at camp--of course, carrying another barometer along with me. We rode about five miles to the base, left our mules, and climbed to the summit in four hours. For the first two thousand feet the way was up a very steep but perfectly grassy slope, covered with wild oats about a foot or foot and a half high, green as the greenest meadow. Then we struck a low chaparral. We gained the summit of the first ridge, but as usual a higher one rose farther toward the center of the chain, so we descended about five hundred feet, got on a transverse ridge, and in due time reached the highest peak. It was 2,605 feet above camp, or about 2,900 feet above the sea. The day was lovely, cool, and the air clear--not so clear as it often is here, but it would be called very clear at home. Objects twenty or twenty-five miles distant seemed as plain as they would through four or five miles of our air at home. For example, the breakers on the shore were perfectly distinct twenty miles distant !

The view was very fine, finer than we shall have again soon. To the south we could see plain beyond plain, and hill beyond hill, although beyond the Cuyama Plain, thirty-five miles distant, things were indistinct through the dust from that plain. To the southwest and west lay all the lovely plain of San Luis Obispo, the buttes rising through it--over twenty were visible--brown pyramids on the emerald plain. Beyond were the coast hills, while beyond all was the blue Pacific, stretching away to the horizon. To the northwest was our chain of mountains; north, the valley of Santa Margarita and Salinas Valley, bordered with myriad hills, stretching away for sixty or seventy miles. We sat and contemplated the scene for over an hour before leaving.

119

GENERAL VIEW OF CARMEL MISSION From a drawing by Edward Vischer

CARMEL MISSION BEFORE ITS RESTORATION From a photograph by C. E. Watkins

120 85

Each mountain ascent has something peculiarly its own to distinguish it from the others. The feature of that day's trip was the unpoetic one of rolling rocks down the slope . Nature seemed to have made it for that--a smooth, grassy slope, with few obstructions on it, and plenty of rocks at the right place near the top. We could start them, they would go about six hundred to nine hundred feet at an angle of forty-five or fifty degrees, then roll down a slope of twenty-five to thirty degrees, going a mile from their starting place and falling probably nearly two thousand feet. Their velocity was incredible. As they would roll, large, angular fragments bounding in immense leaps through the air, they would whistle like cannon balls. We could hear them whistle half a mile ! Their leaps would surpass belief. After rolling many, I went down to the foot of the first slope to see them come by--Guirado starting them. Some came within thirty feet of me; their whistling exceeded my belief. They would leap through the air on meeting slight obstructions--pieces flying off would fly a hundred feet in the air, whistling like bullets. One stone of over a hundred pounds leaped close to me. I measured the leap; it was sixty feet ! Another, much larger, perhaps four hundred pounds, came thundering down, struck a flat stone bedded flat in the soil, which it crushed into a thousand pieces, then bounded one hundred feet , and then took its straight course down the slope.

Sunday, April 28.

I WILL answer some inquiries made in letters from home.

First--as to whether we have "camp bedsteads?" No, by no means-- State officers can't afford such luxuries, only Uncle Sam's men can indulge in them. Each man has two pairs of heavy blankets, and an India-rubber sheet or oilcloth. The latter is spread on the ground, to keep us from the wet, and we sleep on that, rolled in our blankets. The colder the night the more we use above and the less below. When we sleep out in the 121 86 open air we generally put an oilcloth or old coat over us to keep our blankets as dry as possible, for the dews are like rain these clear nights. One soon gets used to the ground, but it is often hard, and oftener rough with stones or cattle-tracks. This last is the most serious inconvenience. Often a great hummock or hollow is found just under one, and one must adapt himself to the ground. For pillows we use coats, saddlebags, or something of the kind--one learns to sleep on a hard pillow, only it makes the ears sore and bruised.

Second--tent. We first used two; the larger is discarded now. We use a Sibley tent, of government model, built after the style of an Indian "lodge," round, with one pole only, in the middle; and after our experience of blowing down in the rain we strengthened this with three guy ropes or stays. These latter are also handy to hang shirts on to dry, towels, etc. The canvas closes into a ring at the top, about two feet in diameter, which is suspended to the top of the pole by short ropes. This leaves a hole in the top for ventilation on hot days. It is closed by a hood or fly.

Third--the barometers. These are mountain barometers. The glass tube is enclosed in a tube of brass; the cistern is so arranged as to be closed with a screw, the air expelled, and the mercury made to fill the whole tube and cistern. This is then inverted, put in a wooden case, and this again in a leather case. This last is round, about three inches in diameter and three feet long, and is carried by a strap over the shoulder. They are admirably packed, but it requires much care to carry an instrument with so long a glass tube filled with mercury. We have, however, not broken one yet, except one of the thermometers attached, which burst with the heat. It was graduated to only 120°, which is entirely insufficient for open-air use in this climate, where reliable men have told me that they have seen it 167° F. in the sun. We have lost two thermometers by leaving them where the sun would come on them; in a few minutes they would burst at 120° to 125° F.

122 87

Another week's labors have closed, and we have finished all that we have time to do here. Professor Whitney has gone to Washoe. He will be back in San Francisco about June 15, and soon after rejoin us. We will be up to Monterey by that time.

I brought matters up to Monday night. Tuesday we intended to go about twelve miles for fossils, but our mules got away and too much of the day was spent in getting them to go then.

Wednesday, April 24, we went. The fossils occur on a ranch of Mr. Wilson, an Englishman. Our road lay down the valley of Osos, toward the sea, west of San Luis Obispo. Mr. Wilson has several ranches together, about 80,000 to 100,000 acres, keeps 20,000 head of cattle, 1,000 or 1,500 horses, etc., living in patriarchal style, monarch of all he surveys. His "farm" is about thirteen or fourteen miles long and nearly as wide. He seemed like a close-fisted old fellow, but treated us well. The fossils lay on a high hill. We could not get within two and a half miles of them with our wagon, so we camped by a brook. We packed the specimens down on mules.

In rough, broken hills, at about 1,800 feet elevation are these immense beds of fossil oysters. The shells are as numerous as in a modern oyster bed, all grown together, and of gigantic size, a foot to fifteen inches long, half as wide, and the thickest shell, sometimes five inches thick . (See also Pacific Railroad Reports , Vol. VII, Pt. 11, p. 45, for a description of similar ones.) They would weigh from ten to thirty pounds each. We packed down several mule loads of these and other fossil shells.

As we stayed over night, we camped. We declined an invitation to stop with Mr. Wilson a mile distant, as a child died the day we arrived and was to be buried the next. We sat by our bright camp fire until the bright moon rose, then went to bed on the green grass, in our blankets. The wind blew up fresh from the sea a few miles distant. We could hear the breakers, although they were five or six miles off. It is glorious to watch 123 88 the stars and moon before going to sleep, but unpoetical to turn in the night and bring yourself in contact with a portion of the blanket soaked with dew, and ugh , how cold! But I have always slept gloriously in the open air, whenever I have tried it.

We returned Thursday evening. Friday we packed up our specimens, and Saturday (yesterday) took them to the landing for shipment. We had sixteen boxes, enough for quite a cabinet.

Last night a mail arrived bringing the first and scanty news of the attack on Fort Sumter. The eastern troubles have worried me much of late, although I have not written. We get papers often, a package nearly every steamer. I fear the prestige of the American name is passed away, not soon to return. We are doing and reaping as monarchists have often told us we would do--put designing, immoral, wicked, and reckless men in office until they robbed us of our glory, corrupted the masses, and broke us in pieces for their gain. But four and five short years ago I often argued this could never be--at the very time that we were pampering the knaves that could do it. I hope and trust that we may yet be united, but the American Union can never exist in the hearts of the entire people again as we have fondly dreamed that it did. I have long been prepared for anything that southern politicians would try, demoralized as they have become, but I expected a much more conservative force there than has shown itself.

This state is eminently for Union. The people almost unanimously feel that all that California is she owes to her nationality. I don't know a single Secession paper here. Of course, there are many desperadoes who would do anything, hoping to gain personally in any row that might arise, but the masses feel that their only safety is in the Union. Without protection, without mails, what would California be? A "Republic of the Pacific" is the sheerest nonsense. A republic of only about 900,000 inhabitants, less than a million, spread over a territory much larger than the original thirteen states, scattered, hostile Indians and worse Mormons on their borders--what 124 89 would either sustain or protect such a country? And the people feel it.

But bad men are in power here as well as elsewhere in the United States. I have heard good citizens say that there was but one honest officer in this county. Court adjourned one day last week because both judge and district attorney were too drunk to carry it on. It is a common thing to see the highest officials of this county drunk on the streets here in town, but this is a notoriously hard place. I assure you, we never go to sleep without having our revolvers handy.

But the masses of the state are farther north. The whole south is sparsely populated, and will so remain so long as it is mostly divided into ranches so large that they are never spoken of by the acre , but always by the square league . A has four leagues, B ten leagues, C twenty leagues, etc.

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CHAPTER VII

SALINAS VALLEY AND MONTEREY

"Chores"--Paso Del Robles--San Antonio River--Animal Life--Soledad--Guadalupe Ranch--Monterey--Pescadero Ranch--Mission of Carmelo--A Trip in the Monterey Hills--Finch's Ranch .

Camp No. 28, Nacimiento River.

Saturday Afternoon, May 4, 1861.

IT is a lovely afternoon, intensely hot in the sun, but a wind cools the air. A belt of trees skirts the river. I have retreated to a shady nook by the water, alike out of the sun and wind; a fine, clear, swift stream passes within a few rods of camp, a belt of timber a fourth of a mile wide skirts it--huge cottonwoods and sycamores, with an undergrowth of willows and other shrubs. We have been here three days.

I returned from a long walk at noon and concluded to devote the afternoon to writing and "chores." First, dinner; next, put on clean clothes and wash my dirty ones. A few buttons sewn on, and rents repaired; then the garments lay in the water to soak while I wrote a letter of three sheets to headquarters, during which time a flock of sheep trod my shirts into the mud. Then the wash, that I so much abominate. But clothes must be cleansed, and there is no woman to do it. Were I to describe the abominable operation it would take a whole letter. I can't do it--just some items only. First, I get a place on the bank and begin. A huge gust scatters sand over the wet clothes, which are in a pile on the bank. Stockings are washed--I congratulate myself on how well I have done it. An undershirt is begun--goes on swimmingly. Suddenly the sand close to the water where I squat gives way. I go in, half boot deep, and in the strife to get out, tread on the clean stockings and shove 127 92 them three inches into the mud and sand. A stick is got and laid close to the water. On that I kneel, as do the Mexican and Indian washerwomen. This goes better, and the work goes bravely on. Next, the slippery soap glides out of my hands and into the deep water--here a long delay in poking it out with a long stick, during which performance it goes every way except toward shore. At last the final garment is washed. With a long breath I rise to leave, when I find the lowest of the clean pile is all dirty from the log I laid them on--the cleanest place I could find. But soon all difficulties are surmounted, and the clothes are now fluttering in the wind, suspended from one of the guy ropes of our tent. The picture is underdrawn rather than exaggerated--just try it by taking your clothes to the creek to wash the next time.

Monday morning, April 29, we left San Luis and took our way on--we had been there two weeks. We crossed the San Luis Pass of the Santa Lucia Mountains, a pass about 1,500 or 1,800 feet high, and entered the Santa Margarita Valley. North of the Santa Lucia chain, which trends off to the northwest and ends at Monterey, lies the valley of Salinas, a valley running northwest, widening toward its mouth, and at least a hundred and fifty miles long. This valley branches above. One branch, the west, is the Santa Margarita, into which we descended from the San Luis Pass. We followed down this valley to near its junction with the Salinas River and camped at the Atascadero Ranch, about twenty-two miles from San Luis Obispo and six from the Mission of Santa Margarita.*

This was not a mission, but was the chapel of Santa Margarita, an asistencia of the Mission of San Luis Obispo.

On passing the Santa Lucia the entire aspect of the country changed. It was as if we had passed into another land and another clime. The Salinas Valley thus far is much less verdant than we anticipated. There are more trees but less grass. Imagine a plain ten to twenty miles wide, cut up by valleys into innumerable hills from two to four hundred feet high, their summits of nearly the same level, their sides rounded into gentle slopes. The soil is already dry and parched, the grass 128 93 already as dry as hay, except along streams, the hills brown as a stubble field. But scattered over these hills and in these valleys are trees every few rods--great oaks, often of immense size, ten, twelve, eighteen, and more feet in circumference, but not high; their wide-spreading branches making heads often over a hundred feet in diameter--of the deepest green foliage--while from every branch hangs a trailing lichen, often several feet long and delicate as lace. In passing over this country, every hill and valley presents a new view of these trees--here a park, there a vista with the blue mountains ahead. I could never tire of watching some of these beautiful places of natural scenery. A few pines were seen for several miles, with a very open, airy habit, entirely unlike any pine I have ever seen before, even lighter and airier than the Italian pines common in southern France by the Mediterranean. They cast but little shade.

The Mission of Santa Margarita was in ruins. It is the seat of a fine ranch which was sold a few days ago for $45,000. The owner, Don Joaquin de Estrada, lives now at Atascadero Ranch, where we camped. This last ranch is all he now has left of all his estates. Five years ago he had sixteen leagues of land (each league over 4,400 acres, or over 70,000 acres of land), 12,000 head of cattle, 4,000 horses, etc. Dissipation is scattering it at the rate of thousands of dollars for a single spree. Thus the ranches are fast passing out of the hands of the native population.

Camp No. 29, Jolon Ranch, on San Antonio River.

May 8.

I DID not write last Sunday as there was an American ranch near our camp and we borrowed some magazines, rare luxuries for camp, and I read them all day. The American who has this ranch, keeps fifteen or sixteen thousand sheep. He is a very gentlemanly Virginian and was very kind to us. He says that the loss of sheep by wolves, bears, and rattlesnakes is quite an 129 94 item. We are in a bear region. Three men have been killed within a year near our last camp by grizzlies.

Monday we came on here, about twenty-five miles. The day was intensely hot, and as we rode over the dry roads the sun was scorching. We crossed a ridge by a horrible road and came into the valley of the San Antonio, a small branch of the Salinas, and followed up it to this point, where we are camped on its bank. We passed but one ranch and house in the twenty-five miles. In one place, two bears had followed the road some distance the night before--their tracks were very plain in the dust.

We are now over sixty miles from San Luis Obispo. Here is a postoffice, the only one between the latter place and San Juan, a distance of about two hundred miles. We found the "office" at the ranch; not one person could speak a word of English, so we searched out our letters from a handful that lay on the mantel, the whole stock on hand.

The last two days we have been exploring the hills. Yesterday, with Averill, I climbed some hills. Today he had to go to a store a few miles distant for flour, so I took a long tramp of eighteen to twenty miles alone. We got an early breakfast, and I started in the cool of the morning, with a bag of lunch, compass, canteen of water, and knife, pistol, and hammer in belt. As one is so liable to find bears and lions here, it is not well to be without arms. I pushed back over the hills and through canyons about ten miles from camp to the chain of rugged mountains west of us. I was indeed alone in the solitudes. The way led up a canyon about four miles, with high steep hills on each side, then a ridge to be crossed, from which I had a fine view, then down again and among gentle hills about three miles farther to the base of the mountains. Here a stream was crossed by pulling off boots and wading, and then up a canyon into the mountains. This last I followed as far as I considered safe, for it was just the place for grizzlies, and I kept a sharp lookout.

130 95

Here I climbed a ridge to get a view behind. The slope was very steep, the soil hot, no wind, and the sun like a furnace. I got the view and information I desired. A very rugged landscape of mountains behind, steep, rocky, black with chaparral, 3,500 to 4,000 feet high. In front was the series of ridges I had crossed; beyond, the Salinas Valley, with blue mountains on the distant eastern horizon. Some very peculiar rocky pinnacles of brown rock rose like spires near me, several hundred feet high--naked rocks.

I started to return, and had reached the stream, when a crash in the brush near by startled me, and in a moment two fine fat deer, small but very beautiful, sprang out. I shot at one with my pistol, but only wounded him--so he got away. I have had the sight recently repaired, and I find to my disgust it is all wrong; had it been correct I certainly would have killed him, for it was a very fair shot, not over twenty-five or thirty yards. I shot twice more, but the deer were too far off, and my balls went still wider from the mark. I lunched in the cool shade of a fine oak.

The cattle here over the hills are very wild; they will run if they see a man on foot at the distance of forty or fifty rods off. Sometimes an old bull will boldly make an attack, so it is unsafe to go through a herd alone and on foot. The rancheros consider it desirable that their cattle be thus wild--they are less liable to be stolen or to be caught by wild animals. I passed near a herd. They first ran, but an old bull took for the offensive-defensive, and made for me. I did not dare trust to my pistol, so took "leg bail" and made for a tree, reached it, and then stood my ground, resolved to shoot him when he got near; but a club at last brought him to a stop, and finally he fled. On my way back I met Averill about two miles from camp, coming up the canyon to meet me with a mule.

While speaking of animals--the grizzly bear is much more dreaded than I had any idea of. A wounded grizzly is much more to be feared than even a lion; a tiger is not more 131 96 ferocious. They will kill and eat sheep, oxen, and horses, are as swift as a horse, of immense strength, quick though clumsy, and very tenacious of life. A man stands a slight chance if he wounds a bear, but not mortally, and a shot must be well directed to kill. The universal advice by everybody is to let them alone if we see them, unless we are well prepared for battle and have experienced hunters along. They will generally let men alone, unless attacked, so I have no serious fears of them.

Less common than bear are the California lions, a sort of panther, about the color of a lion, and size of a small tiger, but with longer body. They are very savage, and I have heard of a number of cases of their killing men. But don't be alarmed on my account--I don't court adventures with any such strangers. Deer are quite common. Formerly there were many antelope, but they are very rapidly disappearing. We have seen none yet. Rabbits and hares abound; a dozen to fifty we often see in a single day, and during winter ate many of them.

There are many birds of great beauty. One finds the representatives of various lands and climes. Not only the crow, but also the raven is found, precisely like the European bird; there are turkey-buzzards, also a large vulture something like the condor--an immense bird.* Owls are very plenty, and the cries of several kinds are often heard the same night. Hawks, of various sizes and kinds and very tame, live on the numerous squirrels and gophers. I see a great variety of birds with beautiful plumage, from humming birds up.

The California condor ( Gymnogyps californianus ) is now almost, if not quite, extinct.

But it is in reptile and insect life that this country stands pree¨minent. There are snakes of many species and some of large size, generally harmless, but a few venomous. Several species of large lizards are very abundant. Salamanders and chameleons are dodging around every log and basking on every stone. Hundreds or thousands may be seen in a day, from three inches to a foot long. Some strange species are covered with horns like the horned frogs.

132 97

But insects are the most numerous. They swarm everywhere. House flies were as abundant in our tent in winter as at home in summer. Ticks and bugs get on us whenever we go in the woods. Just where we are now camped there are myriads of bugs in the ground, not poisonous, but annoying by their running over one. Last night I could scarcely sleep, and shook perhaps a hundred or two hundred out of my blankets this morning.

I shall sleep outdoors tonight--in fact all the rest are asleep but me, and only one is in the tent. We are under some cotton-wood trees which so swarm with ladybugs that Mike yesterday counted how many he brushed off of him in an hour. They amounted to 250--but he sat still under the tree. Scorpions occur farther south and are much dreaded. The equally dreaded tarantula abounds here. It is an enormous spider, larger than a large bumblebee, and has teeth as large as a rattlesnake's. I killed one by our tent at Camp 27, and saved his teeth as a curiosity. Their holes in the ground are most ingenious.

Camp 31, Guadalupe Ranch.

May 12.

WE left San Antonio Thursday morning, May 9, and followed up the valley a few miles, then crossed a high steep ridge over one thousand feet high, which separates the San Antonio from the Salinas, and then descended and struck down the great Salinas plain. Dry as had been the region for the last sixty or seventy miles, it was nothing to this plain.

The Salinas Valley for a hundred or more miles from the sea, up to the San Antonio hills, is a great plain ten to thirty miles wide. Great stretches are almost perfectly level, or have a very slight slope from the mountains to the river which winds through it. The ground was dry and parched and the very scanty grass was entirely dry. One saw no signs of vegetation at the first glance--that is, no green thing on the plain--so a 133 98 belt of timber by the stream, from twenty to a hundred rods wide, stood out as a band of the liveliest green in this waste. The mouth of this valley opens into Monterey Bay, like a funnel, and the northwest wind from the Pacific draws up through this heated flue with terrible force. Wherever we have found a valley opening to the northwest, we have found these winds, fierce in the afternoon. For over fifty miles we must face it on this plain. Sometimes it would nearly sweep us from our mules--it seemed as if nothing could stand its force. The air was filled with dry dust and sand, so that we could not see the hills at the sides, the fine sand stinging our faces like shot, the air as dry as if it had come from a furnace, but not so very hot--it is wonderfully parching. The poor feed and this parching wind reduced our mules in a few days as much as two weeks' hard work would. Our lips cracked and bled, our eyes were bloodshot, and skins smarting.

We stopped for lunch at a point where the mules could descend to the river. A high terrace, or bluff, skirts the present river--that is, the plain lies from 75 to 150 feet above the present river. The mules picked some scanty herbage at the base of the bluff; we took our lunch in the hot sun and piercing wind, then drove on. We pulled off from the road a mile or so at night, and stopped beneath a bluff near the river. We had slept in the open air the previous night and did so again. It turns very cold during the clear nights, yet so dry was it that no dew fell those two nights, cold as it was! The mules found some picking where you would think that a sheep or a goat would starve.

Friday we pushed on all day, facing the wind. We met a train of seven wagons, with tents and beds--a party of twenty-five or thirty persons from San Jose going to the hot springs, some on horseback. Two-thirds were ladies. A curious way for a "fashionable trip to the springs," you say, but the style here. They will camp there, and have a grand time, I will warrant. We kept the left bank of the river, through the Mission 134 99 Soledad. Before reaching it we crossed the sandy bed of a dry creek, where the sand drifted like snow and piled up behind and among the bushes like snow banks.

The Mission Soledad is a sorry looking place, all ruins--a single house, or at most two, are inhabited. We saw the sign up, "Soledad Store," and went in, got some crackers at twenty-five cents a pound, and went on. Quite extensive ruins surround the place, empty buildings, roofless walls of adobe , and piles of clay, once adobe walls. It looked very desolate. I do not know where they got their water in former times, but it is dry enough now. We came on seventeen miles farther. Here we find tolerable feed and a spring of poor water, so here is a ranch.

Sorry as has been this picture, it is not overdrawn, yet all this land is occupied as "ranches" under Spanish grants. Cattle are watered at the river and feed on the plains, and scanty as is the feed, thousands are kept on this space, which must be at least four to six thousand square miles, counting way back to the Santa Lucia Mountains. The ranches do not cover all this, but cover the water , which is the same thing. We could see a house by the river every fifteen to eighteen miles, and saw frequent herds of cattle. The season is unusually dry, and the plain seems much poorer than it really is. In the spring, two months ago, it was all green, and must have been of exceeding beauty. With water this would be finer than the Rhine Valley itself; as it is, it is half desert. As to the actual capability of the plain, with water, the Pacific Railroad Reports state that "At Mr. Hill's farm near the town of Salinas, sixteen miles east of Monterey, sixty bushels of wheat have been raised off the acre, and occasionally eighty-five bushels. Barley, one hundred bushels, running up to one hundred and forty-nine bushels, and vegetables in proportion" (VII, Pt. II, 39).

We passed through a flock of sheep, the largest I have ever seen, even in this country of big flocks. It was attended by shepherds, and must have contained not less than 6,000 sheep, judging from the flocks of 2,000 and 1,500 we have seen often 135 100 before. Some of our party thought there must have been 8,000. Sheep are generally kept in flocks of not over 1,800 head.

High mountains rise on the opposite side, in the northeast, and still nearer us on the left. These latter were very rugged--from 3,000 to 4,500 feet high, black, or very dark green, with chaparral--yet not abounding in streams as one would imagine, although now only early in May. The Nacimiento and San Antonio rivers are the only tributaries of the Santa Margarita and Salinas valleys on the west side, this side of Atascadero Ranch--that is, only these two streams for a distance of 120 miles. And, from leaving the San Antonio, sixty-one miles back, we have not crossed a single brook or seen a single spring until reaching this ranch, where there is a spring.

Yesterday I climbed the ridge southwest of camp. I ascended about 3,000 or 3,500 feet, a hard climb, and had a good view of over a hundred miles of the Salinas Valley from the Bay of Monterey to above where we last struck it, or over the extreme limits of about 130 to 150 miles, with the successive ridges beyond. Four thousand to seven thousand square miles must have been spread out before me. I have never been in a land before with so many extensive views--the wide valley, brown and dry, the green belt of timber winding through it, like a green ribbon, the mountains beyond, dried and gray at the base, and deep green with chaparral on their sides and summits, with ridge after ridge stretching away beyond in the blue distance. Then to the north, a landscape I had not seen before, with the whole Bay of Monterey in the northwest. To the west and south of me was the very rugged and forbidding chain of mountains that extends from Monterey along the coast to San Luis Obispo and there trends more easterly--the Sierra Santa Lucia.

I have found much of intense geological interest during the last two weeks. I had intended to spend at least two weeks more in this valley had we found water or feed as we expected. Not finding it, and having four weeks on our hands before the 136

IN CAMP NEAR MONTEREY, MAY 1861 From a photograph taken on leather (see page 104). The cracks appear to be due to shrinkage of the coating material rather than to the leather backing

137 101 rendezvous with Professor Whitney at San Juan, I decided to push on to Monterey, which I had not intended to visit. We are now within eight or ten leagues of there--will be there in a few days. I feel now that we are indeed working north and I long to be in San Francisco again. It is now over five months since I have attended church (Protestant) and have only had that privilege three times since I left New York.

Sunday Evening.

TODAY has been a windier day on the plain than any other day we were on it. I am glad enough we are sheltered here in camp. Clouds of gray dust, rising to the height of five or six thousand feet have shut out the view in the north all the afternoon, and even the hills opposite could not be seen at times, and all day they have been obscurely seen through this veil. If it is thus in May, what must it be here in July or August, as no rain will fall for at least four months yet! It was interesting yesterday, while on the peaks above, to watch the great current of air up the valley, increasing with the day until at last the valley seemed filled with gray smoke.

While speaking of the plain, I forgot to mention the mirage that we had. The sun on the hot waste produced precisely the effect of water in the distance; we would see a clear lake ahead, in which would be reflected the objects on the plain. This was most marked on the dry sands near Soledad--we could see the trees at the Mission mirrored in the clear surface--but it kept retreating as we advanced. The illusion was perfect. At times the atmospheric aberration would only cause objects to be distorted--wagons and cattle would appear much higher than they really were, as if seen through poor glass.

Monterey.

May 17.

WE arrived here on Wednesday. On Monday, May 13, we left Guadalupe Ranch and came about fourteen or fifteen miles and 138 102 camped in a valley that turns off from the Salinas on the road to Monterey. We had hardly camped, and were eating dinner, when the stage came along. I went to the driver to get him to carry a letter to the next post office. He had to stop there to water his horses. A familiar face appeared in the stage, not at first recognized, but a mutual recognition soon took place--it was a good friend I had known on shipboard, a friend of Averill's, a lawyer from New York, a Mr. Tompkins,* one of the finest gentlemen and most entertaining that I have met for a long while. We were much together on shipboard. He had traded eastern property for a ranch near Monterey, on the coast, and had just been to it and was returning to San Francisco. He was the first acquaintance met since Los Angeles, or I should say, since we left San Francisco. The meeting was mutually pleasant. He tendered us the hospitality of his ranch, although he could not be with us there, but gave us a letter to his majordomo (head ranchero ) to give us all attention, feed, board, horses to ride, etc. We shall go there next week. He had so improved that we did not at first know him--he was in ill health last fall, but hearty enough now. We, tanned by the sun, bronzed by exposure, without coats or vests, in buckskin pants, bowie and Colt at our belts--he said at first sight we fulfilled his beau ideal of buccaneers stopping the stage. We stopped there over Tuesday and the driver gave us a Monday's paper from San Francisco, with the latest news. That was the fourteenth, and we had news up to May 3, by Pony Express, that is, only eleven days from New York to camp .

Edward Tompkins, graduate of Union College, married Sarah Haight, lived in Oakland, was a state senator, worked for the founding of the University of California, and was a valuable supporter of the Survey.

We have been quite lucky thus far for news, and it has been a great item in these times. I cannot write how heavily the national troubles bear upon my mind, they are in my mind by night and by day. God grant that we may yet save the United States, but I fear for the worst. Newspapers from home are always acceptable, but we get the great news by earlier means. On arriving here, by a "judicious" distribution of patronage 139 103 to two leading stores, we got lots of papers for reading, a dozen or more.

This sheet finishes my letter paper of thin kind--the last scrap is here--and I must use such as I can get hereafter until I get to "Frisco." Trusting that the mails will not be "seized" by pirates, it must go by next steamer. The last steamer went out fully armed, for it was currently believed that a party was going abroad as passengers to take her for the Southern Confederacy. The Union sentiment here is overwhelming.

Monterey.

Sunday, May 19.

IT is a lovely evening--the moon shines brightly, the old pines and thick oaks by our camp cast dark shadows, and the quiet bay sparkles in the moonlight.

I have been to church today--attended Protestant service for the first time since last November, nearly six months ago. There is a Methodist mission station here. I heard there was to be service at 11 A.M. in the courthouse, so was on hand. The rest of the party went to Mass. I found two or three fellows loafing on the porch, and as the door was locked, a man started to find somebody who had the key. Meanwhile, a dozen collected on the porch. After much delay the key was found, and, half an hour after time, services opened. How unlike a Roman missionary-- he would have had all ready and shown himself "diligent in business" as well as "fervent in spirit." The congregation at last numbered some twenty or twenty-five persons, not counting the few children. The clergyman was a very doleful looking man, with very dull style and manner, who spoke as if he did it because he thought it his duty to preach and not because he had any special object in convincing or moving his audience. His nose was very pug, his person very lean, his collar very high and stiff, and his whole appearance denoted a man entirely lacking energy, surely not the man for a California missionary. Yet how good it seemed to meet again with 140 104 a few for divine service--it was indeed a pleasure. We have now been over a country twice as large as Massachusetts, and this is the second Protestant congregation we have seen, and both of these feeble and small. But there are Catholic churches in every considerable town.

As I came out of church and met Averill in the street, we were accosted by a man who wanted us to ride a few miles and look at a supposed silver "lead" he had discovered. We declined, but were soon beset by others, with ore and "indications" from another mine. I must take the specimens, which I did, and returned to camp and "blowpiped" them to get rid of them--found a little silver.

Monterey has about 1,600 inhabitants and is more Mexican than I expected. It is the old capital of California. There are two Catholic churches, and Spanish is still the prevailing language. Like all other places yet seen, more than half of the "places of business" are liquor shops, billard saloons, etc.--all the stores sell cigars, cigarritos , and liquor. Stores are open on Sunday as well as other days, and that is the day for saloons and barrooms to reap a rich harvest. Billiard tables go from morning till midnight--cards and monte are no secrets. Thus it has been in all the towns. Liquor and gambling are the curse of this state. Lots of drunken Indians are in the outskirts of the town tonight.

Pescadero Ranch.

Monday, May 27.

AFTER examining things about Monterey for three days, we came here to Mr. Tompkins's ranch, where the feed is good. It is a ranch of four or five thousand acres, on the coast about five miles from Monterey. We pitched our tent in the yard, but a larger log house is our headquarters. Last Monday, while in Monterey, a dull day with showers, we got an "artist" to bring his camera out to camp and take a few pictures of camp on leather. He took four--not good in an artistic sense, 141 105 but good as showing our camp. We divided our pictures by cutting cards for the choice, and I got the best picture.

Pescadero Ranch was formerly owned by an eccentric, misanthropic, curious man, who lived in solitude and tried to educate two boys, keeping aloof from the world and the rest of mankind. He built a large and very secure log house, for fear of robbers, just on the shore of the Pacific, by a lovely little bay. Behind rise hills covered with tall dark pines, and near the house is a field of about a hundred or more acres, fenced in, where we have fine feed for our mules. His books are still here--a strange collection on science, art, astrology, romance, infidelity, religion, mysteries, etc. Old harness, spades, implements, harpoons, etc., are stored in large numbers. I know not why he had them. He had invented a new harpoon which no one would use.*

The present Pebble Beach golf course is on the site of Pescadero Ranch. "The log house was built by a Mr. Gore, who was a brilliant scholar, kept aloof, was very proud, but was not considered eccentric by old Montereyans." (Information from Mr. Frank Doud, of Monterey.) Mr. J. Beaumont, secretary of Del Monte Properties Company, provides additional information derived from the title records. John C. Gore, the original claimant against the United States for confirmation of title, based his claim on a conveyance made in 1853, which gave him succession to the interest of Fabian Barreto, who had received the grant in 1840. Gore, on August 1, 1860, conveyed the property to Edward Tompkins, who sold it in 1862. It was acquired by the Pacific Improvement Company in 1880.

By the way, Monterey Bay is a great place for whaling. Two companies are at work, and already over half a dozen whales have been taken here. On Wednesday we saw them towing one in, and on Thursday morning went down to see them cut him up. He was a huge fellow, fifty feet long. Last year they caught one ninety-three feet long which made over a hundred barrels of oil. After stripping off the blubber, the carcasses are towed out into the bay, and generally drift up on the southeast side. The number of whale bones on the sandy beach is astonishing--the beach is white with them. Hundreds of carcasses have there decayed, fattening clouds of buzzards and vultures. The whales are covered with thick black skin. The tail is horizontal. They have no fins, but a pair of huge "paddles," one on each side--oars, as it were--like great flat arms covered with skin, three or four feet wide and twelve or fifteen feet long. The ball-and-socket joint which attaches the paddle to the body is wonderful--the ball is as large as the end of a half-barrel. Barnacles grow on the skin in great numbers; I will try to collect some if they do not stink too badly.

To return to Pescadero. We came on Thursday. I had 142 106 letters to several persons. Wednesday evening I had called on a prominent Monterey citizen, and spent an evening in female society, and heard a piano for the first time in many months. On Friday we rode a few miles to Judge Haight's. He is a wealthy San Francisco gentleman and has a fine ranch here, where he spends a part of the year with the whole or a part of his family. We presented our letters, but did not find him at home.*

Fletcher Mathews Haight, a graduate of Hamilton College, practiced law at Rochester, N.Y., later at St. Louis, came to San Francisco in 1854, where he practiced law with his son, Henry, who had preceded him to California. In 1861 F. M. Haight was appointed United States District Judge. He died February 23, 1866, at the age of sixty-six. His son, Henry Huntley Haight, was governor of California, 1867-71.

We visited the old Mission of Carmelo,* in the Carmelo Valley, near his ranch. It is now a complete ruin, entirely desolate, not a house is now inhabited. The principal buildings were built around a square, enclosing a court. We rode over a broken adobe wall into this court. Hundreds (literally) of squirrels scampered around to their holes in the old walls. We rode through an archway into and through several rooms, then rode into the church. The main entrance was quite fine, the stone doorway finely cut. The doors, of cedar, lay nearby on the ground.

La Misio´n San Carlos Borromeo was established in 1770 at Monterey, but was moved to the present site in 1771. No portion of the present structure was erected until 1793. The Mission was secularized in 1833 and the buildings rapidly fell in ruins. A partial restoration of the buildings was made in 1887.

The church is of stone, about 150 feet long on the inside, has two towers, and was built with more architectural taste than any we have seen before. About half of the roof had fallen in, the rest was good. The paintings and inscriptions on the walls were mostly obliterated. Cattle had free access to all parts; the broken font, finely carved in stone, lay in a corner; broken columns were strewn around where the altar was; and a very large owl flew frightened from its nest over the high altar. I dismounted, tied my mule to a broken pillar, climbed over the rubbish to the altar, and passed into the sacristy. There were the remains of an old shrine and niches for images. A dead pig lay beneath the finely carved font for holy water. I went into the next room, which had very thick walls--four and a half feet thick--and a single small window, barred with stout iron bars. Heavy stone steps led from here, through a passage in the thick wall, to the pulpit. As I started to ascend, a very large owl flew out of a nook. Thousands of birds, 143 107 apparently, lived in nooks of the old deserted walls of the ruins, and the number of ground squirrels burrowing in the old mounds made by the crumbling adobe walls and the deserted adobe houses was incredible--we must have seen thousands in the aggregate. This seems a big story, but hundreds were in sight at once. The old garden was now a barley field, but there were many fine pear trees left, now full of young fruit. Roses bloomed luxuriantly in the deserted places, and geraniums flourished as rank weeds . So have passed away former wealth and power even in this new country.

Our road to the Mission was a mere trail through the thick chaparral, crossing some deep ravines. We came on the tracks of numerous grizzlies--or, rather, numerous tracks. There are three grizzlies living in the brush near here, particularly bold and savage. One has nearly killed several people. They came here to eat a whale stranded on the beach. As we had two good Sharp's rifles, besides other guns, we concluded to watch for them that night. An Indian, an old bear hunter, entered into the project, but on examination of the ground, it was found that there was no good place--no trees to get into and watch from--for no one is so mad as to engage in a bear fight unless he has all the odds on his side. So we had to give it up.

Judge Haight came over and invited Averill and me to dinner yesterday. We rode to Point Cypress in the morning--a granite, rocky point, covered with a kind of cedar called "cypress," more like the cedar of Lebanon than any other tree I have seen.* Some of the trees were beautiful--and often three or four feet in diameter. I measured one that was eighteen feet eight inches in circumference as high as I could reach. Another, twenty-three feet at two feet from the ground.

The famous Monterey cypress ( Cypressus macrocarpa ) is found in an exceedingly restricted area--the Monterey peninsula and the neighboring Point Lobos.

Returning to camp, we took other mules and rode to Mr. Haight's, about five miles. We rode through the old Mission again--and paused a short time among the ruins. We were on hand at two o'clock, the appointed time.

Judge Haight is a fine old man, a man of much intellect, 144 108 lives in a comfortable house, has with him two daughters, most lovely young women, of perhaps eighteen and twenty-two years--pretty, agreeable, cultivated, and sensible. I don't know when I have spent an afternoon so pleasantly. The dinner was good, not brilliant--champagne was partaken of moderately. His library was well stocked with choice works. It was indeed a luxury to meet with ladies--the first time we had sat at a table with them since New Year's at Mr. Wilson's. We were decidedly pleased, and we think they were, for they are much isolated here. They had a fine piano, and one of the girls played well. We climbed a hill just above the valley, and had a pretty view of the Carmelo Valley, the sea beyond, and the mountains in the south. He has a fine ranch, keeps about twelve hundred sheep, much better animals than one generally sees here. We were so urged to stay to tea that we did, and rode home by twilight. One dared not wait later for fear of grizzlies. Where our trail ran through dense chaparral we came on fresh tracks made but a few minutes before--after a man had passed an hour before--but we were spared a sight of any animals.

El Pescadero.

Tuesday Evening, June 4.

WE were ready early Tuesday morning, May 28, for a start. Up at daylight--Averill, Peter, and a buccaro for a guide--saddlebags packed, and two pack-mules: Sleepy with blankets and some meat, coffeepots, and bread; Stupid with more blankets, frying pan, and more provisions. We followed a trail about three miles, then struck the road up the Carmelo Valley. We stopped at a house half an hour to wait for Charley, the buccaro , to overtake us. He had been to town for bread for the trip. Mrs. McDougal, where we stopped, insisted on our drinking a pan of milk, which we did, then struck up the valley.

We followed the road about twenty miles. Five ranches were passed; some barley fields along the river, and wild oats in abundance on the hills, supporting many cattle. We lunched at 145 109 a stream, saddled, and were again off. Here we left the road, and for fifteen miles followed trails, now winding along a steep hillside--steep as a Gothic roof, the stones from the path bounding into a canyon hundreds of feet below--now through a wide stretch of wild oats, now through a deep canyon. We passed two more ranches, where cattle are raised among the hills, and at last struck through a rocky canyon, in which flowed a fine stream, with some glorious old trees. Before dark we arrived at a small ranch owned by a man named Finch, with whom Charley was acquainted. We camped near, and slept well, for we had been ten and a half hours in the saddle in thirteen hours. We frightened up four fine deer just as we went into camp.

Peter and Averill had each bought a "Sharp" for hunting, so on Wednesday they tried for deer. I climbed the mountain for "geology." First I passed through a wild canyon, then over hills covered with oats, with here and there trees--oaks and pines. Some of these oaks were noble ones indeed. How I wish one stood in our yard at home. One species, called encina , with dark green foliage, was not extra fine, but another, el roble , was very fine.* I measured one of the latter, with wide spreading and cragged branches, that was twenty-six and a half feet in circumference. Another had a diameter of over six feet, and the branches spread over seventy-five feet each way . I lay beneath its shade a little while before going on. Two half-grown deer sprang up close to me, but got out of pistol shot before I, in my flurry, had the pistol ready. Up, still up, I toiled, got above the grass and oats and trees into the chaparral that covers the high peaks. I struck for the highest peak, but backed out before quite reaching it, for the traces of grizzlies and lions became entirely too thick for anything like safety. Both are very numerous here. Finch killed three a few days before we arrived.

The first, encina , is the coast live oak( Quercus agrifolia ); the second, el roble , is the valley oak ( Quercus lobata ).

But what a magnificent view I had! A range of hills two thousand to three thousand feet high extends from Monterey 146 110 to Soledad. It is a part of the mountains, yet there is a system of valleys behind, up which we had passed. The Carmelo River follows this a part of the way. I was higher than these hills. Over them, to the northwest, lay the Bay of Monterey, calm, blue, and beautiful. Beyond were blue mountains, dim in the haze; to the east was the great Salinas plain, with the mountains beyond, dim in the blue distance. In the immediate foreground was the range of hills alluded to, the Palo Scrito, in some places covered with oats, now yellow and nearly ripe, in others black with chaparral. Behind lay a wilderness of mountains, rugged, covered with chaparral, forbidding, and desolate. They are nearly inaccessible, and a large region in there has never been explored by white men.

I returned by the same way I had come up. There is a most beautiful tree I had not seen before, with foliage something like but even richer than the magnolia--it is a kind of manzanita. It would be splendid in cultivation in a mild climate.*

The madron˜a ( Arbutus menziesii ).

Averill and Peter returned without any venison, but Averill brought in an enormous rattlesnake, by far the biggest we have yet seen. He was huge, and, Averill says, decidedly savage when wounded. He was four and a half feet long, as thick as one's arm, and had twelve rattles. His head was over an inch and three-quarters broad, with mouth corresponding. I cut out one of his fangs as a specimen.

We spent an hour in Mr. Finch's house that evening. Two brothers, Americans, have a ranch, and are raising horses. Mrs. Finch seemed a meek, sad woman, with more culture and sensibility than her husband, and evidently pining for other lands and other scenes here in this lonely place, away from the world, almost away from the "rest of mankind." The house was of sticks plastered with mud, the floor, the earth. Two pretty little girls were playing upon a grizzly skin before the fire. It is a lonely life they lead there.*

The two brothers were Charles W. and James Finch. The latter married Ellen O'Neil, daughter of Major John M. O'Neil who came to California in 1847 with Stevenson's Regiment.

Thursday we took a young man for guide and pushed on, over hills, through canyons, winding, climbing, toiling; our 147 111 road, cattle trails; our landmarks, mountains. I saw many pretty flowers, some new to me. We struck a fine stream of water that flows toward the Salinas plain at Soledad, fourteen miles distant, but it sinks long before that in the arroyo seco , or dry canyon. It was a swift clear stream, and good water on that trip was one of our luxuries. It has been long since I have tasted good water. Here we found a little ranch, Hitchcock's. The owner was talkative, asked for papers, showed us some fine quicksilver ore, but was too shy to tell us where he found it. He only said it was back in the mountains--"A hell of a place to get to"--which I can easily imagine, if it is six miles farther in than we were, as he said it was.

Here we struck up the canyon into the heart of the mountains a few miles, now over a table for a mile, now down a steep bank and crossing the stream, up on the other side, steep as a house roof. But our mules were trusty; Old Sleepy, with his pack, proved himself equal to the occasion, and my old white mule won fresh laurels. Up this canyon the strata are bent, twisted, contorted, and broken. I never before saw finer examples of bent strata. They were less grand than the noted ones on Lake Lucerne, but more beautiful.

We saw some deer and got a shot--one was wounded, but we did not get him. All had rifles but me; my botanical box and hammer were enough for me. Soon more deer were seen. Peter and the guide started after them. We missed the trail, and in attempting to cross the stream and climb the bank came near having an accident. The bank had a slope of forty-five degrees; the path wound up it at twenty-nine degrees--I measured it. Averill's mule trod on loose stones and went down. A mule never slips, but here the path slipped. Averill got off and saved himself, but the mule went down slowly and got away. An hour and a half were spent in finding and getting her. At last all were ready again, and we took our way up the canyon as far as mules could get--and that is saying a good deal--and struck a very narrow, wild canyon leading to a little lake 148 112 (laguna ). It was a lovely spot, but a poor place to camp, so we turned back a mile, and camped on the banks of the main stream.

I wish I could describe the spot. A deep rocky canyon, with rugged, almost perpendicular sides, but green, grassy bottom, opens into the main canyon, where there is a swift stream of water of crystal clearness, grass and oats abundant for our mules, fine trees scattered around for effect and all around rise high, rugged, rocky mountains. We are now beyond all traces of human homes, but in the abodes of grizzlies and deer. A fire is built, supper (as well as dinner) got, and then we go out to hunt. In ten minutes Averill is back with a deer, and an hour later the others come in with another. I know not how many deer we saw on that trip. I took a swim in the cool stream--it was refreshing enough after riding on dusty trails and through hot canyons.

I wish you could look on such a camp at night. Scattered around are pack-saddles, saddles, bread--and oh, such bread as we had after sixty miles' travel on a mule's back in a bag! It needed sifting to get pieces large enough for mouthfuls. The mules are picketed near and around us. They will give the alarm if grizzlies become too familiar. Scattered on the grass around, we lie rolled in our blankets. A rifle peeps out from beneath the blankets here and there--loaded too, for, although grizzlies never molest persons asleep, it is best to have the weapons handy. The bright camp fire throws a ruddy glare on the green foliage, which shows black shadows and grim recesses back, and stately trunks and gnarled limbs shine out brighter here and there. But brighter than all, and more beautiful to me, are the stars in the deep, clear, blue sky. One is just trembling over the brow of that rugged mountain, it seems almost to touch it--others are slowly moving behind the trees, or the hills, in their majestic march to the west. The only sound to break the silence of this solitude is the murmur of the streams by us. And thus we sleep--such glorious sleep--sound 149 113 and refreshing; no bad air, no close smell of feathers, no musty, ill-aired beds from which one rises in the morning with gummy eyes and heavy brain and mouth tasting as if half filled with Glauber's salts and clay.

The shadows were dark in the canyon as we rose, and some choice cuts of venison roasted on the coals were partaken of with a relish that many a hothouse millionaire might well envy. Ah, it was good! We lingered around some; I botanized an hour--and then we took our way back, following nearly our same trail. In one place the trail led along the very brink of a precipice 250 to 300 feet high; one could look down, unobstructed, almost perpendicularly (tourists would say quite so), to the rocks and water so far below. It was as steep as the north bank of Taughannock Falls, by the house, and two-thirds as high, the path scarcely a foot wide. But the mules did not hesitate--they know their own powers--and with loose rein we let them take their way, slowly, surely, now looking steadily at the path, but often swinging their heads over and looking at the abyss below. Where the path ascended a steep slope I got off, not for greater safety so much as to ease my mule, which is most too light for me. But most of them rode here, nor spoke of danger.

We got back to Finch's that night. We found some fossil bones on our way--the backbone of a large fish, not so large as a whale, yet very large. Thousands of acres of these lower hills are covered with wild oats, as thick as a poor oat field at home. These are the "live oats" or "animated oats," sometimes cultivated at home, and were introduced here from Spain by the old padres .

We got back safely on Saturday, June 1, after a pleasant trip, no mishaps, and much of botanical and geological interest, but well tired from the hard riding.

150 151

BOOK II

1861

152 153

CHAPTER I

AN INTERLUDE

San Juan--A Call to San Francisco--Union Sentiment--Personnel Problems--Hot Weather--Doctor Cooper--San Juan Mission--Monterey Again--Sea Life .

San Francisco.

Sunday, June 23, 1861.

I SENT my last a few days ago from San Juan, to go by the steamer of yesterday.* You are surprised, no doubt, to see my letter dated at San Francisco. But, although I sent Averill up on Monday last, yet Tuesday I received a letter from the Professor asking me to come up here immediately to confer with him on some important business relating to present and future plans of operations. The next morning found me on the stage, and Wednesday night found me here. But I will continue my journal in the order of time. I closed my last letter Sunday or Monday.

This letter was lost. Professor Brewer's notebooks, however, show that camp was at Pescadero and Monterey June 1 to 12, at Natividad (near Salinas) June 12 and 13, and from June 14 at San Juan.

On Monday, June 17, I explored alone some high sandstone hills southwest of San Juan--hills covered with wild oats, with here and there bold outcroppings of coarse red sandstone, often worn into fantastic and grotesque forms by the weather. Ledges would be perforated with numerous holes and caverns from the smallest size up to those capable of holding a hundred men. Thousands of swallows had built their nests in them, as they build in barns at home. I sat down in one of these caves, the largest I saw, opening out to the valley and commanding a lovely view. A steep ravine lay below me, brilliant and fragrant with flowers, around which swarms of humming birds were flitting, like large bees. Various species of humming birds are common, but I have nowhere seen so many as at that place. 154 118 They often came in the cave, hovering in the air near me; several times they would stand in the air so close to me that I could touch them with my hand easily, then they would dart away again.

The aspect of the scenery around San Juan is peculiar--a level valley, enclosed in large fields, hills rising beyond; all covered with oats, now ripe. The hills have a dry, soft, straw-colored look, which, in the twilight, or by moonlight, is peculiarly rich.

On Tuesday I rode a few miles to visit an asphaltum spring, or rather, several. The principal ones are on a ranch of a Mr. Sargent. He has his ranch enclosed with good fence in two fields, one of two thousand acres; the other, through which we rode, of seven thousand acres. It is hill land, and most of it is covered with a heavy growth of wild oats, in places as heavy as a good field of oats at home--a grand field of feed, that!

The mail arrives at San Juan near ten o'clock in the night, but I walked into town and waited for it that night, and with it came a letter from Professor Whitney calling me to San Francisco for consultation. I returned to camp, hastily made my preparations, left my orders, and returned to town, for the stage started at six in the morning, too early to get in from camp. Six o'clock the next morning found me in the stage for San Francisco, where I arrived at seven in the evening. The region passed through, especially about fifty miles of the Santa Clara Valley, is the garden of California--a most lovely valley, settled by Americans, with fertile fields and heavy crops, beautiful gardens and thriving villages.

There were the usual accompaniments of a stage ride--various passengers, bristling landlords running out at the stations, dust, dirt, politics, and local news. Professor Whitney had invited me to stay at his house, where I went after taking a bath and buying and putting on clean clothes--a "biled shirt" was a luxury not enjoyed for a long time before.

Thursday, Friday, and Saturday I spent in running around, 155 119 talking over plans, seeing men on business, working up geological notes, posting the Professor up on progress, etc. Every minute was occupied. How busy, bustling, hurrying, high-wrought, and excited this city seems, in contrast with the quiet life of camp!

There is much improvement going on here, even more building than usual. Business is brisk, but rates of exchange with the East are enormous--more than twice as high as they were before the War, or even three times. When I sent money home in the fall, it cost three per cent, now six to ten per cent; and so it will remain until the fear of privateers ceases.

It has been most lovely weather, but the afternoons are windy, and the air often filled with dust. No hot weather--this city is always cool--never hot, never cold.

Professor Whitney has a house several hundred feet above the city, on a hill, with a most lovely view of the city, the bay, and the hills beyond. These lovely moonlight nights the scene is surpassingly beautiful. The city below, basking in the soft light, the myriad gas lights, the bay glittering in the moonbeams, the ships, the opposite shores in the dim light, all form a picture that must be seen to be appreciated. This is indeed a lovely climate--children and women look as fresh and rosy as in England.

I meet many friends and acquaintances here; all say, "How fat you have grown," "How camp has improved you," "How stout and healthy you look," and similar assurances. Every friend I have met speaks of it.

There is a very strong Union sentiment prevailing here, although the governor is Secession, and there are thousands of desperadoes who would rejoice to do anything for a general row, out of which they could pocket spoils; yet the state is overwhelmingly Union . Flags stream from nearly every church steeple in the city--the streets, stores, and private houses are gay with them--but all are the Stars and Stripes--a Palmetto would not live an hour in the breeze.

156 120

On Saturday night at ten o'clock a flag was raised on T. Starr King's church. He is very strong for the Union, and this was for a surprise for him on his return from up country. A crowd was in the streets as he returned from the steamer. He mounted the steps, made a most brilliant impromptu speech, and then ran up the flag with his own hand to a staff fifty feet above the building. It was a beautiful flag, and as it floated out on the breeze that wafted in from the Pacific, in the clear moonlight, the hurrahs rent the air--it was a beautiful and patriotic scene.

Sunday I went to hear him preach. He is a most brilliant orator, his language strong and beautiful. He is almost worshiped here, and is exerting a greater intellectual influence in the state than any other two men.

Today I have been ordering a new wagon made, buying supplies, writing, etc., and must go soon to a meeting of the Academy of Natural Sciences which meets tonight (Monday). Professor Whitney has a grand scheme for erecting a great building for the state collections here; we are ventilating the matter here now. Today I saw my cousin, Henry Du Bois. He is working at his trade in this city.

Friday Evening, June 28.

I HAD expected to leave San Francisco on Tuesday morning, but Tuesday I had to meet some men to talk over matters relating to our cabinet building, so was delayed until Wednesday. We left at eight o'clock, on the top of the stage, which seat we kept all the way through, having a fine chance to see the country.

San Jose and Santa Clara are large and thriving towns, but the whole country looks dry now. The fields are all dry and yellow, the herbage on the waste lands eaten down to the very roots, the fields of grain ripe for the harvest. Many reaping machines were at work and prosperity and abundance appeared to smile on the lovely region. But how dry it looked ! Hundreds 157

THE PLANILLA

THE HACIENDA NEW ALMADEN QUICKSILVER MINE From photographs by C. E. Watkins reproduced by heliotype in Volume II of the Whitney Survey Geology

158 121 of windmills pump water from the wells for the cattle and for irrigating the lands, but the streams are dry, and sand and clouds of dust fill the dry air. While seated on the stage we often could not see the leaders at all for the dust. Yet there will be no more rainfall for the next three or four months to revive the soil or green the landscape. The driver said the dust often became very fine, and eight inches deep, before the close of the dry season, filling the air with dust clouds.

Much as can be said about this lovely climate, yet give me our home climate, variable as it is. This is healthy, very healthy, lovely, but it is monotonous--four more months, long months of dry air and clear sky. The budding freshness of spring, with its resurrection of life; the summer with its flowers, its showers, its rich green; autumn with its fruits, its fall of leaves, its gorgeous forests; winter, with its dead outer world, but its life at the fireside--all are unknown here. A slowly dawning spring, tardily coming, is followed by a slower, dry, arid summer. This is the climate for a lazy man, that for labor, this for dolce far niente , that for action .

We got back a little after ten in the evening, and before eleven were in camp again. It seemed like home. The soft, luxurious bed of the city had given me quite a severe cold, which my better sleep on my blankets is improving. Ah! camp is the place to sleep--sweet sleep--refreshing sleep. There is no canopy like the tent, or the canopy of Heaven, no bed so sweet as the bosom of Mother Earth.

I have not had everything to my mind in camp. Men who came into it with enthusiasm, now that the novelty has worn off, abate their zeal. I had a long talk on the matter with Professor Whitney and I was thinking of either discharging Mike, or making him "toe the mark" closer. I determined to try the latter first. He has been surly under reproof and slack in his work for some time. His work was very light and his wages high (forty-five dollars per month). But yesterday I was saved all the trouble by his coming to me and asking to quit. I 159 122 discharged him without further words and he went to San Francisco this morning. He has lost a good place, but I am glad to be rid of him. He, however, thought much of me, shook me cordially by the hand on parting, and said, "Mr. Brewer, I have always got along well with you . I have never worked under a man I liked better. You are a gentleman "--very emphatic. He then took his leave without saying a word or bidding good-bye to either Averill or Guirado, with whom he had not got along so smoothly. Ere this he is in "Frisco," as the metropolis is called.

We have changed plans. We keep in the field as late in the fall as we can, then disband and do our office work in the winter. This seems advisable. We have at least three men on the Survey who do not well sustain themselves. Two of these were employed because of influential political friends in this state, whom it was desirable to appease. It is not a pleasant matter to dismiss them, but by "disbanding" for the winter, stopping field work, we can throw them out. I feel sorry for the individuals, but believe it to be for the interests of the Survey. From the confidence with which I am consulted on these important matters, I feel that I am sustaining my place even better than I dared hope for, yet it is by no means impossible that policy may remove me too--but I hope not.

San Juan.

July 2.

MY last letter was sent three days ago, but I fear for its safety; while the secession troubles last in Missouri the Overland may be troubled. I shall send the next by Wells & Fargo's Express. Way mails in this state are so uncertain that all important letters are carried by a private express in government envelopes. The company sends three-cent letters for ten cents, and to the states, ten-cent letters for twenty cents. Here in this state it is used very largely, the Wells & Fargo mail being often larger than the government mail. We avail ourselves of it, even on so short a distance as from here to San 160 123 Francisco, if the letter has any special importance or needs to go with certainty of dispatch. I have had letters two weeks in getting where they ought to go in two days with a daily mail. I very strongly suspect that some of the letters between here and home that were so long delayed were delayed on this side. One letter was from the first to the eighteenth of June coming from San Francisco to this place, one day's ride.

War news becomes more and more exciting; the "Pony" brings all the general news far in advance of the mails. I do not dare to think where it will all end; but I trust that in this, as in other matters, an All-ruling Providence will bring all things to work together for good in the end. The Stripes and Stars wave from the peak of our tent, the ornament of the camp.

Yesterday I climbed a high steep peak about eight miles distant, a hot, toilsome day's trip. We rode up a valley about three miles, then struck up a narrow, deep side canyon about one or two miles farther, beside a small stream. A cattle trail led up the stream, often steep and slanting, but our trusty mules managed it. Arriving at the end of this trail, we unsaddled and tied our mules beneath some trees, and mounted the ridge. It was very steep, of a rotten granite that was decomposed into a sand that slid beneath the feet and reflected the intense heat of the sun with fearful effect. It seemed as if it would broil us, and the perspiration flowed in streams. Often not a breath of wind stirred the parched, scorching air. A wet hankerchief was worn in the crown of the hat, as we do now all the time when in the sun, to save from a possible sunstroke.

A ridge was gained, which ran transverse to the main ridge we wished to reach. Three miles more along this ridge, sometimes down, sometimes up, now over sand, then over rocks and bushes, sometimes in a scorching heat, at others fanned by a breeze--at last we planted our compass on the highest crest of the Gabilan, a very sharp, steep, bold peak, some 2,500 to 3,000 feet high, probably nearer the latter. We had a most 161 124 magnificent and extensive view of the dry landscape--the Salinas plain, Monterey and the Santa Lucia, the sea, the hills north of Santa Cruz, San Juan and its valley, the valley of Santa Clara beyond, an immense stretch of landscape beside.

Our canteens were exhausted and our lunch dispatched before we had arrived at the top, but the descent was easier, although the last slope before reaching our mules was intensely hot. A fine, clear, cold stream flowed in the canyon--and how sweet it tasted!--but it sinks before entering the valley of San Juan. A ride back to camp, a sumptuous dinner prepared by Peter, then a lounge under the large oak that stands by our camp, in the delicious breeze, then the comet in the west at night, made us forget the toils of the day.

There is a very curious meteorological fact connected with these hills. It is cooler in the large valleys, and hotter on the hills. A delicious cool breeze draws up the larger valleys from the sea, sometimes far too violent for comfort, but always cooling. It often does not reach the hills, so that rising a thousand feet ofen brings us into a hotter instead of cooler air. The hot weather is now upon us, much hotter than in the immediate vicinity of the sea. One does not so notice it if still or in the shade. Today it is by no means oppressive in the shade for there is a delicious breeze. It has not been above 90° F. under the tree where I write this during the day, but out in the sun or in exercise it is hot, very hot.

This morning at ten, when the thermometer was 80°, I laid it out in the sun and in fifty minutes it ran up fifty degrees, or to 130°. There the graduation stopped, so I could not measure the actual heat; it was probably about 140°, although it sometimes rises to 165° or 170° F. in some of the valleys of this state! Surely the state is rightly named from calor , heat, and fornax, furnace--a heated furnace , literally*

The origin of the name "California" has been the subject of much discussion. In 1862, Rev. Edward Everett Hale called attention to the fact that the name appeared intact in an old Spanish romance, Las Sergas de Esplandia´n , and was almost certainly familiar to Cortez and his contemporaries who first placed it on Pacific shores. That in some way the name came from this source is now the prevailing opinion. Prior to this explanation, however, there were many ingenious speculations, most of them taking the form of compounds from Latin and Greek roots; some seeking an Indian origin. The subject is discussed in Charles E. Chapman, A History of California: The Spanish Period (1921), chap. vi; in Ruth Putnam, California: The Name , "University of California Publications in History," Vol. IV, No. 4 (December 19, 1917); and in the California Historical Society Quarterly , 1922), 46-56; Vol. VI, No. 2 (1927), 167-168.

I have not been so active today; it is too hot to enjoy work. Iron articles get so hot that they cannot be held in the hand; water for drinking is at blood heat; the fat of our meats runs 162 125 away in spontaneous gravy, and bread dries as if in a kiln. You can have no idea of the dryness of the air. When I wash my handkerchief I don't "hang it out" to dry, I merely hold it in my hand, stretched out, and in two or three minutes it is dry enough to put in my pocket.

July 4.

THE "Glorious Fourth" is at hand, but I am quiet in camp, and alone. All have gone into town to celebrate. Yesterday, while hammering a very hard rock, to get out a fossil, a splinter of the stone struck me in the eye and hurt it some. It is by no means serious, but somewhat painful, and I, therefore, will keep quiet in camp today to prevent any inflammation or bad turn. With a handkerchief bound over it, it feels quite comfortable, and I apprehend nothing serious. I have one eye left for writing.

Yesterday I rode five or six miles to visit a range of hills north of the town, across the San Benito River. They were gentle, grass-covered hills, or rather oat -covered hills, enclosed in enormous fields and rich in pasturage. The oats were in places as heavy and thick as in a cultivated field, but generally not so heavy. They are ripe and dry now. There was some stock in, but the land here is not nearly so heavily stocked as it is farther south. There were trails up the sides, which in places were quite steep, but we rode to the summit, eight hundred or a thousand feet above the plains, an isolated ridge between the plains of San Juan and the stream on the north. That stream, tributary to the Pajaro, is in a wide valley, but the stream is a small one. The San Benito, which at times is a wide and rapid river, is now a small stream, scarcely ankle deep, filtering over its sandy bed, except where it passes through rocky hills, where it is quite a river. The view from our elevation was quite extensive and beautiful. We were back at camp before night.

Peter acts the part of cook now until we can get another suitable person. Would that he could be induced to keep the 163 126 office. He is as neat and skilful as if he had served an apprenticeship in a French restaurant. We had a sumptuous dinner, but with few courses. With his revolver he had shot a large hare, which was served up in splendid style.

On our arrival in the state last fall we met a Doctor Cooper, who was very anxious to get the place as zoo¨logist to our Survey or as an assistant in that department.* He was a young man, scarcely my age, but had been over most of the United States, had crossed the plains several times, had seen much of California, and all of Washington and Oregon. He had written a large book (with Doctor Sulkley) on the Natural Productions of Washington Territory , was well posted in his department, was a man of more than ordinary intellect and zeal in science, but I fear not a very companionable fellow in camp. He was employed during the winter as surgeon at Fort Mohave, on the desert on the southeastern border, and Professor Whitney employed him to collect plants and make observations for us there. He was just returning to San Francisco by stage, when he stopped over night here, and we most unexpectedly met him last night. I think Professor Whitney will employ him, at least for a time. I have got many items for him, and he has collected some four or five hundred species of plants from the deserts for me.

James Graham Cooper (1830-1902) was the son of William Cooper (ornithologist, friend of Audubon, Nuttall, Torrey, and Lucien Bonaparte, and one of the founders of the Lyceum of Natural History of New York). He was graduated in 1851 from the college of Physicians and Surgeons, New York; in 1853 he contracted with Governor Isaac I. Stevens, of Washington Territory, as physician of the northwestern division of the Pacific Railroad Survey. In addition to his medical duties he made botanical and zoo¨logical collections and meteorological observations. He continued to engage in similar work up to the time of his connection with the California Survey. The results of his work under Whitney are preserved in a publication of the Survey issued in 1870, Ornithology , Vol. I, "Land Birds," edited by F. S. Baird from Dr. Cooper's manuscript and notes. In his own North American Land Birds , Professor Baird remarks: "By far the most valuable contribution to the biography of American birds that has appeared since the time of Audubon, is that written by Dr. J. G. Cooper in the Geological Survey of California." Dr. Cooper was commissioned by Governor Lowe, in 1864, Assistant Surgeon, 2d Cavalry, California Volunteers. In 1866 he married Rosa M. Wells, of Oakland. He lived in Ventura County from 1871 until 1875, when he took up his residence in Hayward, where he lived for the remainder of his life. The Cooper Ornithological Club, named in his honor, was organized in 1893. (References: "Dr. James G. Cooper. A Sketch," by W. O. Emerson, in Bulletin of the Cooper Ornithological Club , Vol. I, No. 1, Santa Clara, January-February, 1899; "In Memoriam," by W. O. Emerson, and "The Ornithological Writings of Dr. J. G. Cooper," by Joseph Grinnell, both in The Condor , Vol. IV, No. 5, Santa Clara, September-October, 1902.)

This place is very dull for the day; everybody has gone to Watsonville, fourteen miles distant, where there is a celebration. Peter burnished his harness, harnessed the mules, and with flags on their heads, has gone to town in patriotic style. But it is hot here; the daily breeze has not yet sprung up, the flag droops lazily from our tent, and the thermometer is 85° to 90° in the tent. About noon the breeze will begin and it will be cooler.

Sunday, July 7.

YESTERDAY I rode eight or ten miles, visiting some tar springs and oil works, where oil for burning is made from asphaltum.

164 127

We received a letter a day or two ago from Professor Whitney that he would be down either Saturday or Monday, for certain , so I suppose he will surely be here tomorrow, after our long suspense in waiting for him. He writes, and other letters and the papers confirm it, that several shocks of earthquakes took place last week in San Francisco, and reports come in from other parts of the state. I think that I have before told you that nearly or quite the whole of this state is subject to earthquakes. There will never be a high steeple built in the state, and in San Francisco the loftiest houses are but three stories high, the majority only two. There are two hotels four stories, but all old residenters will not stop at them for fear of having them shaken down over their heads. The shocks last week (six principal shocks) were quite severe, much more so than usual, and caused much alarm. Our office is in the Montgomery Block, a high three-story stone building, full of offices, but a building many are afraid of. Professor Whitney says he thinks that all of the occupants ran out into the street except him, and says that the building rocked and swayed finely. The city was in terror, the streets filled in an instant, everyone excited. No business was urgent enough to keep a man at it; men rushed into the streets from barber shops with their faces lathered and towels about their necks; men even rushed naked from baths, but were stopped before reaching the city in that primitive costume. We have perceived no shocks, but they were reported in the vicinity two weeks ago.

I went to Mass this morning in the Mission Church.* It is a fine old church, with thick adobe walls, some two hundred feet long and forty feet wide, quite plain inside, and whitewashed. The light is admitted through a few small windows in the thick walls near the ceiling, windows so small that they seem mere portholes on the outside, but entirely sufficient in this intensely light climate, where the desire is to exclude heat as much as to admit light--so the air was cool within, and the eyes relieved of the fierce glare that during the day reigns without.

La Misio´n San Juan Bautista was founded 1797. 165 128

The usual number of old and dingy paintings hung on the walls, the priest performed the usual ceremonies, while violins, wind instruments, and voices in the choir at times filled the venerable interior with soft music. I never wonder that the Catholic church has such power over the feelings of the masses, especially when I compare its ceremonies with such as I saw in a Protestant church here. A congregation of perhaps 150 or 200 knelt, sat, or stood on its brick floor--a mixed and motley throng, but devout--Mexican (Spanish descent), Indian, mixed breeds, Irish, French, German. There was a preponderance of Indians. Some of the Spanish sen˜oritas with their gaily-colored shawls on their heads, were pretty, indeed. It is only in a Roman church that one sees such a picturesque mingling of races, so typical of Christian brotherhood.

With scarcely enough Protestants here to support one church well, there are three churches, wasting on petty jealousies the energies that should be exerted in advancing true religion and rolling back the tide of vice swelling in the land.

Tuesday, July 9.

LAST night Professor Whitney arrived, bringing with him a topographer,* so today our company is quite lively again. I have returned from a trip on the Gabilan hills--quite a ride. Tomorrow the Professor and I will go to Monterey to be gone three or four days.

Charles Frederick Hoffmann was born at Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany, 1838, and was educated in engineering before coming to America. In 1857 he was topographer for Lander's Fort Kearney, South Pass, and Honey Lake wagon-road survey. He came to California in 1858. Next to Whitney himself, he had the longest connection with the California State Geological Survey, remaining through all vieissitudes until its discontinuance in 1874. During a hiatus in the Survey, 1871-72, he served as Professor of Topographical Engineering at Harvard. In 1870 he married Lucy Mayotta Browne, daughter of J. Ross Browne. For many years he was associated with his brother-in-law, Ross E. Browne, in the practice of mining engineering, for a time at Virginia City, Nevada, later at San Francisco. He also managed mines in Mexico, and at Forest Hill Divide, California, and investigated mines in Siberia and in Argentina. During the latter part of his life he lived in Oakland, where he died in 1913. The importance of his work on the California Survey and its influence upon the development of topography in the United States have been mentioned in the introduction to this volume.

San Juan.

July 14.

IT is a quiet Sunday, and, although the wind blows, it is too hot to write in the tent, so I write in the shade of a fine oak by our camp. My last was sent the first of last week, by express.

Well, Professor Whitney arrived on Monday night. Tuesday was spent in arranging some small matters, and Wednesday, 166 129 July 10, we started for Monterey--Professor Whitney, Averill, and I. We were up at dawn, had our breakfast, and by half past five were in our saddles. I took one of the team mules to ride, being stronger than my little one. The early morn was clear, but soon the fog rolled in from the sea, enveloping the hills.

It was thirty-nine miles to Monterey, but a mountain trail shortened the distance some five miles, so we took that, although neither of us had ever traveled it. First up a canyon, then across the ridge about a thousand feet high, by a steep winding trail, then down on the other side. Our trail was often obscure, mingling with cattle paths, and the dense fog obscured all landmarks, but in about seven miles we emerged on the Salinas plain, where we took the stage road and crossed the plain. There was some wind, and it was cool, but the fog did not entirely obscure the hills. We stopped at Salinas, and fed both ourselves and our mules, then rode on. On striking the valley that leads up to Monterey for about sixteen miles we had hotter air, but not much dust. We arrived before night, and found the town (city, I should say--a city of six hundred or eight hundred population!) in much excitement over a recent discovery of silver mines in the vicinity, but which I don't think will ever prove of any value.

The next morning we went on to Pescadero Ranch, found no one at home, so climbed in by the window, opened the back door, and "took possession." This was the place where we had encamped so long, you recollect. I had found the geology too much for me, and I wanted Professor Whitney to see it; hence our visit to Monterey, for it was a matter of some importance to settle. Mr. Tompkins, the owner of the ranch, had tendered us its hospitalities, but his buccaro , Charley, was gone--all the dishes dirty on the table, and no provisions to be found, no candles, no wood cut. We spent the day looking up the objects we had come to see. Averill went into town, four miles, and got supplies, we washed up the dishes, got our dinner and supper, 167 130 and made ourselves comfortable. Professor Whitney was as much interested as I had been, both in the geology and in the abundant life in the sea.

I wish I could describe the coast there, the rocks jutting into the sea, teeming with life to an extent you, who have only seen other coasts, cannot appreciate. Shellfish of innumerable forms, from the great and brilliant abalone to the smallest limpet--every rock matted with them, stuck into crevices, clinging to stones--millions of them. Crustaceans (crabs, etc.) of strange forms and brilliant colors, scampered into every nook at our approach. Zoo¨phytes of brilliant hue, whole rocks covered closely with sea anemones so closely that the rock could not be seen--each with its hundred arms extended to catch the passing prey. Some forms of these "sea flowers," as they are called because of their shape, were as large as a dinner plate, or from six to twelve inches in diameter! Every pool of water left in the rugged rocks by the receding tide was the most populous aquarium to be imagined. More species could be collected in one mile of that coast than in a hundred miles of the Atlantic coast.

Birds scream in the air--gulls, pelicans, birds large and birds small, in flocks like clouds. Seals and sea lions bask on the rocky islands close to the shore; their voices can be heard night and day. Buzzards strive for offal on the beach, crows and ravens "caw" from the trees, while hawks, eagles, owls, vultures, etc., abound. These last are enormous birds, like a condor, and nearly as large. We have seen some that would probably weigh fifty or sixty pounds, and I have frequently picked up their quills over two feet long--one thirty inches--and I have seen them thirty-two inches long. They are called condors by the Americans. A whale was stranded on the beach, and tracks of grizzlies were thick about it.

The air was cool, and at times fog rolled in from the Pacific, as it often does there. We found beds and blankets, and after breakfast the next day rode to Point Lobos, then over some 168 131 high hills back of Carmelo Mission, but the fog obscured the fine views I wanted Professor Whitney to see.

We descended into the valley, and called at Judge Haight's, where we had visited before. Professor Whitney soon returned to Pescadero, but the young ladies pressed us so cordially to stay to tea that Averill and I did, and had a most pleasant visit. It is a very intelligent and pleasant family indeed. Our tea, and a walk we took with the ladies, detained us so that we had to ride home after dark. This would be a light matter at home, but not so here, where for three or four miles the trail led through a woods or dense chaparral as high as our heads or higher, where grizzlies sometimes dispute the right of way, and across a dark gulch with almost perpendicular sides, where none of you would trust yourselves to ride by broad daylight.

Saturday morning we had intended to start back, but were detained on our way, in Monterey, until noon, so we only reached Salinas, twenty miles from Pescadero.

An excitement in the dull monotony of the little town was occasioned by the arrival of an English brig, of only 180 tons, six months out from London. She had not seen land during all that time. She was in a terrible condition, and had put in in distress. Provisions and water very scant and bad all the way, now exhausted, men sick of the scurvy, captain dead of the same disease, second mate and boatswain lost in a storm, sailors decidedly used up--their story was a pitiful one.

As I said, we stopped last night at Salinas. This morning we were up early, and were off, crossing the plain, then over the mountain trail again, and by ten o'clock were at camp, where we found all well. We had our blankets washed during our absence. We are resting quietly this lovely afternoon after our long ride.

169 170 171 172

CHAPTER II

NEW IDRIA

The Road to New Idria--Examining the Mines--Hot and Dry--Back to San Juan .

New Idria Quicksilver Mines.

Sunday, July 21, 1861.

MONDAY, July 15, was spent in making preparations for leaving San Juan. All baggage that could be dispensed with was left in town; we were cut down to the shortest allowance. Tuesday we were up at early dawn, had our breakfast before five, and were soon loaded up. We passed east across the level San Benito Valley, which for eight or ten miles was as level as a floor, then struck up a side valley. We lunched at a ranch, Tres Pinos, fifteen miles, and then struck up the Canyon Joaquin Soto ( Arroyo los Muertos of the map). The country became drier and the air hotter. Hills rose on each side, often high and steep, and in places the valley widened, showing that much more water once existed there. High terraces indicated the shores of an ancient lake. These terraces were most beautiful and made a remarkable contrast with the rugged rocky hills behind.

We at last entered a narrow canyon, and before night stopped at a spring where a Mr. Booker has a ranch. Desolate and dry as this region is, over some of the hills grass and oats grow, which although scanty are very nutritious, and a few cattle and sheep may be grazed. In this barren, hot, scorching, inhospitable, comfortless place was the ranch, and the proprietor regaled us with an account of its advantages. "The finest ranch anywheres near!" "Good water!" "The fattest of cattle!"

Around this place rise high hills, entirely of stratified gravel, 173 136 in some places nearly as hard as rock, which has been washed down from the mountains and has formed a deposit of incredible thickness. It is cut into steep bluffs, in many places six hundred or more feet high, very steep; and the hills, of the same material, rise 1,800 feet high. It must have a thickness of at least two thousand feet, or nearly half a mile! Yet it is quite modern. Surely this region could not always have been so dry. Not the least remarkable fact is that a part of this has been turned up on edge by earthquakes or similar agencies in such a late geological period.

We spent the forenoon of Wednesday, July 17, examining this deposit and measuring the height of one of the hills, and in the afternoon came on twelve or fourteen miles to a well, the only water for thirty-five miles of our road. Our road lay up a canyon, rising, and our camp was near the summit, about two thousand feet above the sea, yet the day had been intensely hot. Over these hills there is scanty pasturage; a man has three thousand sheep which feed there and water is drawn by hand for them during the dry summer. The mountains here are depressed, a "gap" as it were, so the road does not rise above 2,000 or 2,500 feet. We slept in the open air, as usual. How clear the sky was! Never in Switzerland even have I seen so clear a sky of nights. The thermometer fell to 40° F. (only eight degrees above freezing) at night, yet there was no dew, so dry is the air at this season.

Early dawn found us astir, and after a scanty breakfast we were early on the way. We crossed the ridge and then descended into the valley of Little Panoche Creek. Beyond the ridge we found many pretty oak trees scattered over the gentle hills into which the chain is divided, and scattered pines were seen on the mountains at some distance, but on sinking a few hundred feet into the valley an entirely different landscape was entered. A plain extends for many miles up into the mountains, the bed of an old lake, its bottom level as a sheet of water. Lines of terraces around the margin tell unequivocally and 174 137 plainly of old shores and different levels of water. This is on the map between the two branches of the Panoche River, now dry beds of sand. We crossed this plain, some ten miles or more--naked, dry, desolate. No tree cheered the landscape, no living thing, save insects, told of life. Toward the southeastern end of the valley we came to a clump of cottonwoods along the dry river bed, whose lively green looked refreshing; then we turned up a very wild, rocky, narrow canyon, the Vallecito, about six or seven miles, to a place where we found water and a house--Griswold's. The heat of the sun in this canyon was fearful.

At Griswold's the stream emerges to the surface, poor, salt, alkaline water, and here he has his ranch. We camped under some cottonwoods, bought a bag of barley for our mules, and resolved to stay the rest of the day. The place was dirty enough--dry, dusty sand, which hot gusts of wind at times blew into our eyes and mouths--there was neither cleanliness nor comfort in taking our meals and the water was very nauseous. Griswold, a hard looking customer, expatiated on the qualities of his "ranch"--squatter claim of course, for who would buy such a place? His cattle were "the fattest in the state" (and, strange enough, they were in good order); " such good water," etc. "To be sure," he said, "it does physic people when they drink much of it, but a little whiskey kills the alkali." Sitting by his "spring," a dirty mudhole, and pointing exultingly to some frogs, he exclaimed triumphantly, "Look at them toads--they can't live in poor water!" It was interesting to me to know that a frog could live in such a solution. The thermometer stood at 92° F. in the coolest place I could find, in the shade and wind. He said it was the coolest day for over a month, too cool for him after the last two months' heat!

The thermometer, placed in the sun, soon rose to 150° F. on this "cool" day, and that with the wind. You can well imagine what the hot days must have been. That night it sank to 46° F., a daily range of over one hundred degrees!--a range as 175 138 great as from zero of winter to the hottest in the shade of our summer. With this daily change in temperature, no wonder that the plants of this state are so peculiar!

We found some very interesting geological facts there, so we waited over. We were up at dawn and came on ten or twelve miles to a stream, where we stopped and took breakfast. This brook looked refreshing, the first for fifty miles, and our morning ride was refreshing. Once we came on a drove of ten antelope, the first we have seen. They were very plentiful a few years ago in this state, in large flocks. They are very graceful, pretty animals, like small deer, but little taller than sheep. After breakfast, Professor Whitney and I came on ahead, leaving the rest to follow. We struck up a very wild, picturesque canyon into the heart of the mountains, rising very fast, and in six or seven miles, before noon, came to the furnace and the director's house, below the mines. We introduced ourselves, and found a place to camp, and two hours later the rest of the party arrived.

The New Idria quicksilver mines lie in the heart of the chain of mountains which runs southeast from Monte Diablo. There are three principal mines--New Idria, Aurora, and San Carlos--all in the center of the chain, with some six or seven miles between their extreme limits. The furnace and the superintendent's quarters are in a valley some six miles from some of the mines, and three or four miles from the others, at a height of 2,500 to 2,700 feet above the sea. The highest mine lies 2,500 feet higher still. Mr. Maxwell, the superintendent, is very obliging and shows us every attention. Friday afternoon we examined the furnaces and the works for preparing and reducing ore. These are on a large scale and are very complete and scientific in their arrangement. Averill and I dined with Mr. Maxwell that afternoon, and champagne was introduced in our honor.

Yesterday, Saturday, July 20, we started under the guidance of Mr. Maxwell for the San Carlos Mine. The road ran up 176 139 a canyon and over ridges--steep, yet a good road. Three yoke of oxen were toiling up with an empty wagon to bring down ore. We passed a cluster of tents and cabins of the miners at "Centerville" on the way. A single frame house perched on a lofty crag at a dizzy height was seen from below, and being the only house we asked what it was. "Oh, a billiard saloon and drinking house," was the answer. "A man recently built it and I believe he has other refreshments for the miners, a load of squaws went up a day or two ago." We passed this cluster of cabins and continued our way, and in due time reached the San Carlos Mine.

The mine is almost on the summit of a mountain about five thousand feet high. The ore is diffused in streaks through the rocks and is wrought extensively. Diggings, galleries, shafts, and cuts run in every direction, wherever the richest ore may be found. The rock is a very remarkable one, a sort of altered slate, acted on by heat and hot water, and the brilliant red ore is diffused through it. We spent five or six hours there, visiting every working. We planted our barometer on the summit. I had carried it up, and we got our observations for altitude, to be calculated after our return. The miners are mostly Chileans, a hard set, and their quarters are in shanties covered with bushes, in huts, and even in deserted workings. We went into one to get a drink of water; it was a deserted gallery, and a squaw was in attendance, the wife pro tem of two or three miners.

The view from the summit is extensive and peculiar. It is to the north and east that the view is most remarkable--the Panoche plain, with the mountains beyond--chain after chain of mountains, most barren and desolate. No words can describe one chain, at the foot of which we had passed on our way--gray and dry rocks or soil, furrowed by ancient streams into innumerable canyons, now perfectly dry, without a tree, scarcely a shrub or other vegetation-- none , absolutely, could be seen. It was a scene of unmixed desolation, more terrible for 177 140 a stranger to be lost in than even the snows and glaciers of the Alps.

Beyond this lay the San Joaquin, or Tulare, Valley, wide and dreary. It is fifteen to twenty-five miles wide, without trees, save a green belt along the river--all the rest dry and brown. Dust rose from it, shutting out the mountains beyond, but in places we could see the snows of the Sierra Nevada glittering in the sun through the veil of dust that hung between us. They looked grand and sublime in the faint outlines we could see and appeared ten or twelve thousand feet high. Although we were so high, five thousand feet, yet the temperature was about 80° F.

New Idria Mine.

Wednesday, July 24.

SUNDAY, July 21, seemed hot enough but it was only the beginning. We remained three days longer, the thermometer each day rising from ninety-five to one hundred degrees in the coolest place we could find. God only knows how high in the hottest places!

Monday we visited the largest mine, the New Idria Mine proper. We were on hand early and three of us went in, accompanied by the superintendent and mining captain. We spent the day under ground. For six hours we threaded drifts, galleries, tunnels, climbed over rocks, crawled through holes, down shafts, up inclines, mile after mile, like moles, sometimes near the surface, at others a thousand feet from daylight.

The distribution of ore through the rock is very capricious, and where a thread of it can be found it is followed up, so the workings run in every conceivable direction, and being mostly mined by Chilean and Mexican miners, the work is more irregular by far than the burrows of animals. Sometimes we climbed down by a rope, hand over hand, bracing the feet against the wall of rock, sometimes on escaladors , sticks merely notched. But the trip was interesting, and as they wanted our professional advice, we saw all, the two men devoting the day to us.

178 141

Iron pyrites occurs in the rock, which decomposes on exposure to the air, causing heat, and the temperature of some of the galleries was near 100° F. Most of the mine, however, was deliciously cool. Although so deep in places, there is no water, save a very little in the very lowest drift, and the rock has been so broken by volcanic forces and cracked in every direction and the galleries are so extensive that the air is perfectly pure and so dry that the miners use rawhide buckets.

The effect was often picturesque indeed--the brilliant red ore contrasting with the dull color of the rock, the miners, naked above the waist, their lithe forms and swarthy skins shown by the light of our candles, the broken walls, the occasional sound of a blast, like heavy, dull, underground thunder. We emerged at 4 P.M. into the hot, dry, scorching outer world and took our dinner at five o'clock--the air heated to near 100° in our cool camp, where there was a brisk breeze.

Tuesday we rode to the Aurora Mine, which is not good for much, then visited the top of a ridge 4,500 feet high. Here there was a very extensive vein of chromate of iron, the black heavy ore occurring in immense quantities. This was supposed to be silver ore of the richest kind! A company was formed, many tons got out, a furnace built, thousands of dollars expended, and then it was found that there was not a particle of silver in it. But this led to the discovery of the quicksilver mines.

But oh, how hot it was, even at that height! The sand burned our feet through our boots, and a stiff breeze, dry and hot as if from a furnace, played over the ridge. We saw much of geological interest and got back to camp before night.

Last night I returned on foot to a cragged ridge, 1,500 or 2,000 feet above camp, for specimens. It was a toilsome walk, but I was repaid. The sun set while I was there, coloring with orange light the barren mountains north and east and even showing plainly the snowy Sierra in the distance. The view was glorious but desolate as a desert. A few clouds curled over the 179 142 distant snowy peaks, crimson in the rays of the setting sun. But the shades drew on, the valleys grew darker, and I took my way back. It was cooler, but still hot. I stopped often with my load of specimens. How still it was!--no sound of a bird in the evening twilight, no chirrup of insect, but silence, deathly stillness reigned.

Wednesday we spent in making another visit to the New Idria Mine, and getting ready to be off. It was even hotter than before. We took double sets of astronomical observations that day, for latitude and longitude. In such cases I have to "mark time" with the chronometers, while Professor Whitney observes with the sextant. He says that I mark time more accurately than many old astronomers who have practiced all their lives--making long sets agree to the tenth of a second.

Before leaving, a few words as a summing up. The mines have been profitable to the stockholders, and are still. They own several miles in extent, have a store, sell goods to the miners at great prices and profits. There are 250 or 300 persons employed in the various departments. The miners work by the job--the average wage is about three dollars a day, but often less than two, but in rich luck sometimes as high as twenty or twenty-five dollars a day. Such streaks of luck are profitable to the company as well as to the miners, and can only take place on finding unexpectedly very rich ore. The yield of quicksilver now is about nine hundred flasks of seventy-five pounds each per month, or about 67,500 pounds, and it sells at thirty-five to forty cents a pound. It is sent to San Juan, thence to Alviso on the Bay of San Francisco, and there shipped.

The work at the furnaces is much more unhealthy and commands the higher wages. Sulphurous acids, arsenic, vapors of mercury, etc., make a horrible atmosphere, which tells fearfully on the health of the workmen, but the wages always command men and there is no want of hands. The ore is roasted in furnaces and the vapors are condensed in great brick chambers, 180 143 or "condensers." These have to be cleaned every year by workmen going into them, and many have their health ruined forever by the three or four days' labor, and all are injured; but the wages, twenty dollars a day, always bring victims. There are but few Americans, only the superintendent and one or two other officials; the rest are Mexicans, Chileans, Irish (a few), and Cornish miners.

I can hardly conceive a place with fewer of the comforts of life than these mines have--a community by itself, 75 miles from the nearest town (San Juan) and 135 from the county seat, separated from the rest of the world by desert mountains, a fearfully hot climate where the temperature for months together ranges from 90° to 110° F., where all the necessities of life have to be brought from a great distance in wagons in the hot sun. As might be expected, little besides the bare necessities of life is seen, and if any luxuries come in, it is only at an extravagant price.

Such is New Idria and by such toils and sufferings do capitalists increase their wealth!

San Juan.

July 29.

THURSDAY, July 25, we were up at three o'clock. We loaded up by the bright moon, and at four o'clock, just as the first streaks of morning light began to be seen in the east, we were on our way. The twilight in this latitude is shorter than it is farther north, and it soon became light. As we emerged from the canyon into a wider valley six miles below, the sun came upon us, now in all its force. We stopped at Griswold's, fifteen miles, for breakfast, and to feed. Our mules had had no hay or grass, merely dry grain (barley), and but little of that, since we got into this region. Our breakfast was eaten with the thermometer at 95°, although but 8° in the morning; but our appetites were good after seventeen hours' fast.

We were now on our way again, along the foot of the most 181 144 barren chain of mountains, or rather between two such, in the Vallecito Canyon. Then we struck across the plain of Panoche. I wish I might describe that ride that you might realize it, but words are tame. The temperature was as high as any traveler has noted it (so far as I know) on the deserts of Africa or Arabia. Hour after hour we plodded along--no tree or bush. A thermometer held in the shade of our own bodies (the only shade to be found) rose to 105°--it was undoubtedly at times 110°, while in the direct rays of the sun it must have fluctuated from 140° to 150° or 160°. I think, from other observations, it must have risen to the last figure!

Imagine our feelings when we found that after our first drink a hole had been knocked in the canteen and our water was all gone. But the plain was crossed, and at its edge we stopped for a few minutes under the shade of a large oak. Here it was cooler--the mercury sank to 100°. It was the first tree we had seen for twelve miles of the road--I mean near the road--and we were still ten miles from any water. Here the road takes over the hills, dry and barren, but with scattered trees, oaks. None of the trees there (although some of the oaks are large) have foliage enough to make a complete shade--the leaves are too small, scarcely an inch long, and too few to shut out the sun. So, too, the pines, although their leaves are very long, cast only a very scanty shade. Many shrubs have the leaves with their edges turned to the sun, like the trees of the deserts of Australia--a most curious feature!

As we climbed the hill, panting and thirsty, we met a wagon with some watermelons ! A man visiting the mines had bought, at San Jose, 110 miles distant, some fine melons. Needless to say, we bought two, although the price was the modest sum of two dollars each . We stopped under a tree near by and ate them. They were large and fine ones, and I never knew before how deliciously refreshing a watermelon could be. He will sell the rest at two and three dollars each at the mines; a large muskmelon he valued at four dollars. These facts are 182 145 significant as showing how rare such luxuries must be there to command such prices. I surely felt satisfied with my expenditure of a dollar for a third of one of them.

One of our mules, Old Sleepy, had been tied behind the wagon, his rider riding in the wagon. He had pulled back some, got a little choked, the dust and intense heat affected him like the blind staggers, and when discovered, grew suddenly very bad. Professor Whitney and I rode on ahead. It took several hours for the rest of the party to get him on to camp--the sheep wells before alluded to--the only water within many miles. Here we camped after our terribly hot day's ride. Old Sleepy grew worse, a bottle of brandy poured down his throat partially revived him, but he was very ill.

Friday was another hot day. It was impossible to move Sleepy, so after breakfast the rest of the party went on, leaving Hoffmann, Guirado, and me with him, the rest taking all the baggage to the next camp, fifteen miles distant, at Booker's.

Leaving Guirado with the mule, Hoffmann and I started to visit some hills in the vicinity. We toiled up--temperature 98° to 102° all the time--crossed a ridge, then a deep canyon, then on to another ridge, where we found a worse canyon between us and the peak we desired to scale. But, oh, how hot it was! At times there was a wind more scorching than the still air.

One observation will explain. You all know that evaporation produces cold. If we take two thermometers and keep the bulb of one wet it will sink below the other, the drier the air the more the difference between the wet and dry bulb. In our eastern climate a difference of ten degrees F. is considered very high. I think it is very rarely as much as that in our driest times. I had a thermometer along, and when it had stood at 99° or 100° (the latter heat was observed at the time of the experiment), by merely wetting it with saliva from my tongue, it sank in a few seconds to 64°--or, it sank thirty-five degrees F. I dare say, an ordinary "wet bulb," where the bulb is covered with cotton and wet with water, would have sunk much lower. Such is 183 146 that climate! The deserts of Africa are not hotter nor drier than this region at this season, the difference being that here there is rain in the winter. You cannot conceive the thirst that this dry air rapidly creates.

We were very dry, but it was desirable that we scale the peak, so we pushed on. I began to regret that we had attempted to make the peak, when we suddenly and unexpectedly came upon a little spring; the only one, we afterwards learned, within several miles, and this will be dry soon. We stopped there half an hour, and then, refreshed, started on and soon planted our barometer and compass on the peak. It commanded a magnificent view as regards extent, but a desolate one. It was about 2,000 feet above camp, and 3,500 or 4,000 feet above the sea, yet the thermometer stood 98° and 99°, at times 100°, on the summit, and in the breeze!

We were back to camp at three or four o'clock, took our dinner of bread, out of which all moisture had dried, and fat bacon, which we roasted by holding slices on a stick over the fire, and washed the whole down with water neither very pure nor cool--not a luxurious meal, but our appetites proved a good sauce.

We sent Guirado on to the camp where the rest were. We stayed. We had only one saddle blanket, which was insufficient, and the gravel on the rocky ground made a poorer bed than usual. But how clear the sky was at that height! The myriad stars shone with more than the splendor of a winter's night, and at midnight the moon came up and lit up the scene. We were out of food, but the man who herded the sheep most hospitably offered us his fare, which we thankfully partook of--fried beans, dry bread, and poor coffee without sugar, but it was sufficient.

Before eight o'clock, Saturday, July 27, Peter came back, with provisions to last him three days, to stay with the mule. Hoffmann and I pushed on for San Juan, forty-one miles distant. The first thirty miles was a hot ride, but before ten at 184 147 night we were at San Juan, having stopped twice, and got something to eat at a Mexican ranch house.

Here we are in San Juan, and are preparing to leave in the morning for Santa Cruz. Professor Whitney left for San Francisco immediately on his arrival here. I did not see him after leaving him at the sheep wells, but he will join us at New Almaden, near San Jose, in about two weeks.

The delightful temperature here at San Juan, of 75° to 85°, is now too cold. I left my coat with Peter and shivered all day yesterday (Sunday) as I lay in camp resting after our hard trip.

185 186

CHAPTER III

NEW ALMADEN

Pacheco Peak--Santa Cruz--Mountain Charlie's--Governor Downey--New Almaden Mine--A Visit to San Jose--Social Life at New Almaden--Climbing Mount Bache--Enriquita and Guadalupe Mines .

Santa Cruz.

August 4, 1861.

WE had intended to leave for Santa Cruz on Tuesday, July 30, so on Monday made our preparations, but that afternoon Professor Whitney telegraphed to me to wait until Thursday for letters and orders. This gave us three days on our hands. I resolved to visit Pacheco Peak, about twenty-eight miles northeast of San Juan, so Hoffmann and I started on our mules. Averill in the meanwhile went to Monterey for a horse he had bought.

I will describe our trip. First a ride of eighteen miles across the dead-level plain, tedious and monotonous. The Gabilan Range on the south, the Monte Diablo Range on the north, to which Pacheco, Santa Ana, and other peaks belong. To one who has never tried riding on a level plain, no description is adequate to cause a full realization of its tediousness.

The distance seems near, very near, to begin with. Pacheco Peak rises in such full view from our camp, its rocks and ravines every one so distinct that any of you would estimate its distance, without California experience, as five or six miles at most, instead of the near thirty we must ride to reach it--twenty, at least, in a straight line. The road is crooked, several miles are lost by its windings; the air is hot as we plod across it; league after league is passed without the aspect of the scene changing; the Pacheco seems no more near, nor the 187 150 Gabilan no more distant, than it did an hour before. But at last a belt of scattered oaks is entered. Then we strike up a canyon, on the Pacheco Pass, through which the Overland made the crossing of this chain. Eight miles up this canyon, by a good road, brought us to Hollenbeck's tavern, in the heart of the chain at the foot of Pacheco Peak and at some elevation above the plain.

We had ridden the twenty-four miles from camp, but were not too tired to climb the peak, and as time was valuable and as it was still only two o'clock, our mules were put out, our dinner was got, and we started. There is a good and easy trail most of the way up, three or four miles, made by cattle and sheep. The wind had been high during the middle of the day and still shrieked through the canyons; it had annoyed us much on coming up the pass by the dust it raised.

Up, up, we toiled. The peak rises like a very sharp cone, forty to forty-six degrees' slope on each side, about six hundred feet above the mass of mountains around--a sharp, steep, conical peak, towering far above everything near. It has generally been put down as a volcano (extinct) and the rock on top as lava, hence it was important to visit it. All wrong, however. The rock was the same as the rest of the chain, metamorphic, only a little more altered by heat. The ascent of the last cone was steep and laborious, but it was accomplished, and we stood on the highest rock of the summit--about 2,600 or 2,700 feet above the sea, and 2,500 feet above the plain on either side.

Strange, that the strong current of wind that sweeps through all the valleys scarcely reaches us here, only a gentle breeze plays over the summit. Below, to the south lies the great San Juan plain, its division into two parts, one running to Gilroy, the other to San Juan. It is four or five hundred square miles in extent, but it seems not one-fourth of that. A cloud of dust rises from it, raised by the high wind like a gauze veil two to three thousand feet high, but the Gabilan Mountains, the Salinas plain more obscure through the gaps, and the Santa Cruz Mountains to the west, are all visible.

188 151

The chain we are on is about thirteen or fifteen miles through the base, rising in an innumerable number of ridges to the height of about two thousand feet, furrowed into countless canyons, the whole elevated mass running northwest and southeast. To the east is the great Tulare, or San Joaquin, Valley, but a dense cloud of dust rises from it and forms an opaque white veil that shuts out the view of the Sierra Nevada beyond. We have a view of eighty or a hundred miles of the chain we are on, with the higher peaks to the east of us, some of which rise about three thousand feet, but are without names.

When you go off in rhapsodies over the grandeur of Mount Tom or Mount Holyoke, around which cluster so many poetical associations, think that the former is less than 900 and the latter but 1,200 feet high, with all their poetry! Here, peak after peak raises its grand head against the sky, and the addition of either of the Massachusetts heroes to the height of any one of them would scarcely be noticed; yet these peaks are not only unknown to fame, but are even without names. I was about to say, "Born to blush unseen, and waste their grandeur on the desert air."

The mountains are covered with oats, now dry, giving them a soft straw color. We lingered on the peak until the sun was nearly set, the shadows long and dark on the plain, the canyons dark and gloomy, the sunny slopes bathed in the softest golden light. We returned to our tavern, ate supper, talked in the barroom on Secession at home, then retired--Hoffmann to fight fleas all night, I to congratulate myself that they do not bite me but only crawl over me in active troops. I wished for my blankets that I might go out and sleep.

Wednesday we returned to camp--a terribly windy day--and found Peter back. He had run out of money and left Sleepy thirty miles back. Michael, also, was back; he had left us, you recollect, some weeks ago, but came back so penitent that I concluded to try him once more.

August 1, Hoffmann and I again climbed Gabilan Peak, about seven miles from camp, for the sake of measuring it and getting 189 152 fresh bearing from its summit. It was 2,932 feet above camp and I suppose about 3,100 feet above the sea--quite a peak. I dispatched Guirado, meanwhile, after Sleepy, and to our surprise he got him into camp the next forenoon, having traveled all night in the cool. The mule was much better, but we had to leave him at San Juan.

Friday, August 2, we intended starting early. We were up and had our breakfast at five o'clock, but Averill did not arrive. We packed up and waited all the day, or at least until 1 P.M., then started on without him. We came on about eighteen miles, first over the hills, then across the most lovely Pajaro Valley, a little bottom five or six miles wide and eight or ten long--a perfect level--an old lake filled in as is shown by its position and by the terraces around its sides. On the river is Watsonville, a neat, thriving, bustling, American-looking little town. The country around is in the very highest cultivation, divided into farms, covered with the heaviest of grain, or a still heavier crop of weeds. Several threshing machines were seen at work in the fields, and the hum of industry in the little town sounded American-like.

I ought to mention a little item. The squirrels were very thick around our San Juan camp--they came out of their holes to eat the barley near our mules. Guirado killed seven at one shot with the shotgun, and Peter, one morning, shot twenty-one in four shots. The morning we left, while we were waiting for Averill, as I sat making some calculations, I kept my revolver by my side to shoot at the squirrels when they came out. I killed five in thirteen shots, so you see I am getting to be quite expert with the "instrument."

We camped about three miles from Watsonville and came on here to Santa Cruz yesterday, Saturday. Santa Cruz is a pretty little place. We camped at a farmhouse about a mile from town, near the seashore. The church bells on Sunday morning reminded me of home, and as I had been in a Protestant church but twice since last November, I resolved to go. 190

SHERMAN DAY GOV. JOHN G. DOWNEY REV. LAURENTINE HAMILTON REV. THOMAS STARR KING

191 153 We went down to the beach for a bath and preparatory wash, and I took the barometer along for observations at the same time. Climbing down the rocks at the beach I slipped and fell about ten feet, and in trying to save the barometer I received a terrible bruise on my left knee. The barometer, however, was saved, but a thermometer was smashed, my pants and drawers were torn and ruined, and my knee was quite seriously damaged. I stayed in camp quietly that day, and then the next went to work again.

Monday, August 5, I visited some limestone quarries and lime kilns near town. Lime is burned for the San Francisco market. All the arrangements are very fine and complete, and about five thousand barrels per month are burned. The proprietor, Mr. Jordan, was very kind and showed me around. These people own a large ranch, raise their own cattle, keep their own teams, cut their own wood, etc. They have schooners for shipping the lime, and the wagons they use in drawing it to the wharf are enormous. These wagons draw from 90 to 150 barrels to a load, each barrel weighing 200 to 250 pounds--surely quite a load.

The mountains back of Santa Cruz are partially covered with magnificent forests of redwood, pine, and fir--tall, straight, beautiful.* Many of the redwoods are from ten to twelve feet in diameter; one is nineteen or twenty feet in diameter. You cannot appreciate how tall and straight these Californian evergreen trees are. Mr. Jordan cut a fir for a "liberty pole" that was 14 inches in diameter at the butt, and 2 1/2 inches where it broke off at the top, perfectly straight, and 171 feet long . In falling it broke in the middle and was spliced. I saw some magnificent sticks cut from these fir trees. The redwood is by far the most valuable timber of California. It grows only on the mountains near the coast. It is between a pine and a cedar--the wood is as coarse grained as pine, but of the color and durability of red cedar. The trees grow of enormous size, very large and tall, with a habit something 192 154 like our hemlock, only the trees swell out more at the base. The "giant trees" of the Sierra Nevada are of the same genus, and much like it in all respects, only larger.* The wood splits well and all the cabins in the mountains are built of it--fencing, timber, everything. Northward they grow still larger. Chester (Averill) tells of seeing in Humboldt County a house and barn--roof, timber, boards--all--and several acres fenced--with one tree . Such is the redwood.

The redwood ( Sequoia sempervirens ) is found as far south as the Santa Lucia Mountains, in Monterey County, and extends north barely beyond the Oregon boundary. In its natural state it is found nowhere else. The pine referred to here is the yellow pine ( Pinus ponderosa ); the fir is not a true fir, but the Douglas fir ( Pseudotsuga taxifolia ). The big tree ( Sequoia gigantea ) is found in its natural state only in the Sierra Nevada.

Tuesday, we went to see some noted rocks called "The Ruins," six or seven miles back in the mountains. We found them a humbug--nothing near what we expected--some were small outcrops of sandstone, which had weathered in curious forms, some were in tubes like chimneys two or three feet high. These had been regarded as artificial works--"chimneys of furnaces"--and at one time a company was actually formed to dig for treasures that might be buried there. So inflamed is the public mind here on hidden treasures !

The town stands on a terrace about sixty feet above the sea, a table that runs back a mile, where another terrace rises--an old sea beach about 180 feet higher, which may be traced for miles. Wednesday we spent in examining these terraces and measuring their heights. The town is prettily situated on a clear stream, the San Lorenzo River. The place looks quite American--neat homes, trees in the yards, gardens, flowers, and American farms around. Even the old adobe mission church is nearly torn down and a neat wooden church stands by its side, the old adobe walls and ruins telling of another race of builders. There are some Spanish people and Indians left yet, but the town is American.

Thursday, August 8, we left for the New Almaden Mines, striking north through the mountains, where a fine road runs to San Jose and Santa Clara. It is the most picturesque road we have yet traveled. We struck back into the mountains directly behind the town, wound up valleys, through and across canyons, over ridges, and along steep hillsides. Sometimes the 193 155 way lay along a bare hillside, giving a fine view, but oftener in dark forests, where enormous trees shot up on every side; sometimes singly, their giant trunks like huge columns supporting the thick canopy of foliage above; at others groups of trunks started from a great rooted base, half a dozen or more trees together, their spreading tops forming only one head of immense size. Laurels, or bay trees, with their fragrant foliage, firs, pines, oaks, mingled in that picturesque scene, which continually changed with every turn of our ever winding road.

We at last struck a ridge and followed it some miles, and at 2 P.M. camped on the summit at "Mountain Charlie's," about two thousand feet above the sea. Evergreen oaks grew around, a lovely place to camp, and a little pond overgrown with sedge and rushes lay beside the house. After dinner we went on a hill near camp, a few hundred feet above it, for bearings and observations. The view was both extensive and lovely, one of the prettiest I have yet seen. Around us was the sea of mountains, every billow a mountain; deep dark canyons thread them, the form and topography very complicated, the geological structure very broken. Redwood forests darken the canyons on the west toward the sea, chaparral covers the ridges on the east. Some of the peaks about us are very high--Mount Bache* rises in grandeur nearly four thousand feet, Mount Choual and others over three thousand feet. To the south lie the whole Bay of Monterey and a vast expanse of ocean.

This name, given in honor of Alexander Dallas Bache, Superintendent of the United States Coast Survey from 1843 to 1867, is no longer in use; the mountain is now called Loma Prieta.

The beautiful curved line of the bay seems like an immense semicircle, thirty-five miles across, but every part of the arc distinct. Monterey is obscured by fog, but the mountains rise above it in the clear air. Fog forms at the head of the bay and rolls up the great Salinas Valley as far as we can see, but we are far above it and looking on the top of it--it seems like a great arm of the sea, or a mighty river, stretching away to the distant horizon. The mountains beyond Monterey also rise above it, in the clear air. Each ridge is distinct--the range of 194 156 Point Pinos, the Palo Scrito hills, while in the blue dim distance rise the high peaks of the center of the chain, ninety or a hundred miles distant from us. Southeast, over the lower ridges, rises the Gabilan, thirty-five or forty miles distant; nearer, the high ridges of our own chain.

The "chain" is here a series of ridges and we are near the middle. Through a break we can see the lovely Santa Clara Valley in the north, and the towns of Santa Clara and San Jose, eighteen or twenty miles distant, are in full view--the separate houses can be distinguished with our glasses.

Some plants were collected, barometrical observations made, supper eaten, and in the twilight we sang songs beneath the branches of the trees until we turned in and watched the stars twinkling throught the leaves in the clear, blue mountain air.

Friday found us astir early, and we came on. The valleys and canyons and the distant bay were all covered with dense fog, but we were above it, looking down on its top. As the sun came up this fog seemed a sea of the purest white, the mountains rising through it as islands and the tall trees often rising above its surface. It was now tossed into huge billows by the morning breeze, and as the sun rose higher it curled up. The scenes gradually shifted as the curtain rolled away, and the mountain landscape was itself again.

We came on, first down a gradual slope for about nine or ten miles, then down a canyon that breaks through the outer ridge, until we emerged into the Santa Clara Valley. We passed over the tableland at the base or among the foothills, about twelve miles, and camped near the mines of New Almaden.

New Almaden Mines

August 17.

ON the way to the New Almaden Mines we met Governor Downey* and his wife and sister in a carriage with driver. Guirado was ahead, and as I came up he introduced me. I was decidedly in a "rig" for introduction to such society--buckskin 195 157 pants, leggins, dirty gray shirt, without coat, vest, cravat, or suspenders, begrimed with the dust of our very dusty road--yet it was all the same. We stopped and talked a short time, then passed on.

Governor John G. Downey, born in Ireland, 1827, came to America in 1842 and to California in 1849. He was elected Lieutenant-Governor in 1859 and succeeded Governor Milton S. Latham when the latter resigned to become United States Senator in January, 1860. Downey was succeeded by Leland Stanford in January, 1862. His first wife, daughter of Don Rafael Guirado, was killed in a railroad accident in 1883. His sister, Eleanor, married Walter H. Harvey in 1858 (d. 1861) and Edward Martin in 1869; she died in San Francisco in 1928 at the age of 102 years. Another sister, Annie, married Peter Donahue in 1869; she died in 1896.

He is a wealthy man, Irish, has a ranch worth $300,000, has risen from the ranks, has a Spanish wife, is a zealous Catholic--so has the elements of political popularity here. President Lincoln has made a requisition on this state for mounted volunteers to protect the Overland mail route, and the Governor has offered Guirado a first lieutenant's commission, decidedly a fine opening, so he left the party yesterday morning.

Well, we arrived. A most lovely little town has sprung up by the furnace--neat houses on a long street, with a row of fine young shade trees, green yards, pleasant gardens, etc. The superintendent, Mr. Young,* is absent. He lives in most magnificent style, like a prince, has a wife half Spanish-Californian, half Scotch, who has a lot of single sisters, the Misses Walkinshaw, lovely girls, of whom more anon.

John Young, a native of Scotland, came to California in 1844 or 1845. He was a trader and master of vessels on the coast for a time. He died at San Francisco in 1864. He married a daughter of Robert Walkinshaw, a Scot who had been a resident of Mexico before coming to California in 1847. He managed the New Almaden mines prior to his return to Scotland in 1858.

Mr. and Mrs. Whitney were at the house of Mr. Day, the mining engineer, and head man in Mr. Young's absence. We were introduced to the ladies in the same unpresentable costume, which excited much mirth. It was the first time I had seen Mrs. Whitney since taking the field. She scarcely knew me in my bronzed, burnt skin, robust looks, and un-Parisian costume, and she failed entirely to recognize Averill, so has he changed by exposure and the growth of a tremendous beard. We were soon camped below the town, by a stream, in a pretty spot. Another rig donned (colored shirts, of course, but clean), and I returned to talk about affairs with Professor Whitney. He had to go to a party, so I went up late in the evening to talk with him after his return.

Saturday, August 10, we visited the principal mine of New Almaden, with Mr. Day to guide and conduct us. It is probably the richest quicksilver mine in the world, and is worth one 196 158 or two million dollars. The pure red cinnabar (sulphuret of mercury) is taken out by the thousands of tons, and the less rich by the hundreds of thousands of tons. The mine is perfectly managed and conducted. The main drift is as large as a railroad tunnel, with a fine heavy railroad track running in. Six hundred feet in and three hundred feet below the surface of the hill is a large engine room, with a fine steam engine at work pumping water and raising ore from beneath. The workings extend 250 feet lower down. We went down. The extent of the mine is enormous--miles (not in a straight line) have been worked underground in the many short workings, and immense quantities of metal have been raised. We were underground nearly half a day, then came out and had a sumptuous dinner at a French restaurant near, then climbed the hill over the mine.

A ridge runs parallel with the main chain of mountains, about 1,700 feet high, in which are three mines, of which this is the principal one. The view from "Mine Hill" is perfectly magnificent--over the region east and north, with the bold, high peaks back of it.

Mrs. Whitney went to San Francisco that day. Professor Whitney returned on Sunday, August 11, when I rode down twelve miles to San Jose with him.

San Jose (always pronounced as if one word, San-ho-zay´ ) is a pretty town in the Santa Clara Valley, on a level plain. Orchards, gardens, pretty houses, fruit, fertile fields are the features--a bustling, thriving town, of probably six or seven thousand inhabitants. The roads at this season are dusty beyond description and the town looks accordingly.

I bade good-bye to Professor Whitney and then went to church--Mr. Hamilton's church (of Ovid).* He was absent, but Mrs. Hamilton (formerly Miss Mead, you remember, of Gorham and Ovid) was there, and on my going up to her after service she was as much surprised as if I had really dropped from the clouds, as she asked me if I had--although no clouds 197 159 had been seen here for months. I went to the parsonage, a neat house next the church, where they are living very neatly and comfortably indeed. She has become thoroughly Californian, is delighted with the country, climate, people, etc. A pretty little boy with light hair and fine gray eyes was running around, the pride of his mother's heart. Mr. Hamilton had been absent six weeks in Oregon, but was daily expected back. I need not say that we had a pleasant chat until it was time for me to return.

Laurentine Hamilton, born at Seneca, N.Y., 1827, was educated at Hamilton College and at Auburn Theological Seminary, N.Y. He married Miss Isabella Mead, of Gorham, Me., and Ovid, N.Y. In 1855 he came to California as a missionary and went to the mining town of Columbia, where he built the Presbyterian Church that still stands. Later he became pastor of a church in San Jose until called in 1865 to the First Presbyterian Church in Oakland. He was an advanced liberal and was charged with heresy. Resigning, he established the Independent Presbyterian Church, which later was the Independent Church. On Easter Sunday, April 9, 1882, he dropped dead in his pulpit. His sermons and addresses were published in a volume entitled A Reasonable Christianity . Mount Hamilton, now famous as the site of Lick Observatory, bears his name. The little boy mentioned by Brewer was Edward H. Hamilton, a well-known journalist now (1930) living in San Francisco.

We were down with the wagon. I ran around town but very little, for the climbing up and down so many hundred feet of ladders the previous day in the mine had told fearfully on my lame knee, and I began to be anxious. I bought some medicine for it, and we returned to camp at nightfall. Monday I was so lame that I resolved to stay in camp quietly and recruit my knee before it grew worse, as I had some mountain climbing to do during the week.

In the evening I rode up to Mr. Day's.* He has two daughters now home. A young lady was visiting, and half a dozen came in, and a lively time we had of it. We were invited to a horseback ride the next afternoon with some of the ladies. Mr. Day is a son of President Day of Yale College, is a fine man with a very fine family, has been here twelve years, and many a chat we have had about New Haven and old Yale. The room I occupied in college was his old room at home.

Sherman Day was graduated from Yale, A.B., 1826, and received also the degree of A.M. His father, Jeremiah Day (1773-1867), was president of Yale from 1817 to 1846. Sherman Day was born in New Haven, Connecticut, 1806; he died in Berkeley, California, 1884. After his graduation from Yale he lived in New York and Philadelphia for a time as a merchant. For several years he was in Ohio and Indiana as an engineer. In 1843 he published Historical Collections of the State of Pennsylvania . He came to California in 1849 and engaged in civil and mining engineering at San Jose, New Almaden, Folsom, and Oakland. In 1855 he made for the state a survey of wagon-road routes across the Sierra; he served in the State Senate, 1855-56; was United States Surveyor General for California, 1868-71; was one of the original trustees of the University of California, and for a time was Professor of Mine Construction and Surveying. He married Elizabeth Ann King, of Westfield, Mass., in 1832. The two daughters at New Almaden in 1861 were Harriet (Mrs. Charles Theodore Hart Palmer) and Jane Olivia (later Mrs. Henry Austin Palmer). The Miss Clark, of Folsom, was either Mary or Annie Clark; a sister, Harriet, had recently married Roger Sherman Day, son of Sherman Day. (Information from members of the Day family.)

Tuesday, August 13, I went to the mines and collected specimens. The mines are about two miles from the furnaces, on the hill. We collected two or three boxes of specimens, then returned. The furnaces are complete, and about three thousand flasks (seventy-five pounds each) of quicksilver are made each month. More might be made if desired, but that is enough for the market. An old furnace has been taken down, and the soil beneath for twenty-five feet down (no one knows how much deeper) is so saturated with the metallic quicksilver in the minutest state of division, that they are now digging it up and 198 160 sluicing the dirt, and much quicksilver is obtained in that way. Thousands of pounds have already been taken out, and they are still at work.

No wonder that there has been such legal knavery to get this mine, when we consider its value. Every rich mine is claimed by some ranch owner. These old Spanish grants were in the valleys; and, when a mine is discovered, an attempt is made to float the claim to the hills. Two separate ranches, miles apart and miles from the mine, have claimed it, and immense sums expended to get possession. The company has probably spent nearly a million dollars in defending its claim--over half a million has been spent in lawyers' fees alone, I hear.* The same at New Idria--it was claimed by a ranch, the nearest edge of which is fifteen miles off !

The contest for title to the mines is summarized in Bancroft's History of California , VI, 551.

And this is only a sample of the way such things go here. Were I with you I could relate schemes of deeply laid fraud, villainy, rascality, perjury, and wickedness in land titles that would entirely stagger your belief, yet strictly true. The uncertainty of land titles and the Spanish-grant system are doing more than all other causes combined to retard the healthy growth of this state.

But to our horseback ride. Mrs. Young's Scotch father, Robert Walkinshaw, having died, the children now live here. There are several girls left, all beautiful. Professor Whitney thinks one the most lovely lady he has seen in the state. I hardly go to that length. They ride every afternoon and invited us to ride with them. Three of them, with Miss Day, a Miss Clark of Folsom, a young Englishman, Averill, and I, made up the party. It was the pleasantest time I have had in the state. We started at five o'clock and rode five or six miles east to the top of a hill that commands a lovely view of the Santa Clara Valley and the opposite mountain chain.

I wish you could see those Mexican ladies ride; you would say you never saw riding before. Our American girls along could not shine at all. There seems to be a peculiar talent in 199 161 the Spanish race for horsemanship; all ride gracefully, but I never saw ladies in the East who could approach the poorest of the Spanish ladies whom I have yet seen ride. I cannot well convey an adequate conception of the way they went galloping over the fields--squirrel holes, ditches, and logs are no cause of stopping--jumping a fence or a gulch if one was in the way. The roads are too dusty to ride in, so we rode over the hills and through fields, sometimes on a trail, sometimes not. We took tea at Mrs. Day's, then were invited to Mr. Young's, where we spent a pleasant evening. My lame knee was better, but still bad enough as an excuse for not dancing.

Wednesday I went to the Enriquita Mine, about six miles distant. It is a poor mine, but yields some quicksilver. It is twelve miles or more distant by the road, but not half that distance by the trail we took across the hills. My knee was much better, but I refrained from using it much.

It was desirable to ascend the mountains about five miles back, in a direct line, from the mines. Professor Whitney was anxious to have them examined. They form a long ridge, covered with chaparral, rugged, forbidding, but not so steep as some we have seen. The highest point, Mount Bache, is the highest point of this chain, and as it was a Coast Survey signal station its height had been carefully ascertained. Because of its known height, we wanted to test our aneroid barometer.

A good trail had once been cut to the top, and the view was so grand that several ladies wished to make the ascent with us; Mr. Day and several other gentlemen also wanted to go. A man was sent the day before to reconnoiter part way. He declared it to be impossible for ladies, so they were left behind. Five were to go, and five o'clock named as the hour of starting. I suggested a later hour, as previous experience had taught me the uncertainty of getting the outside party out so early, although we could start at any time; but five was the hour set.

Thursday, August 15, we were up before four, ate our breakfast by the light of the stars, and at five were on hand at the 200 162 rendezvous, punctual, as we always are. Our aneroid had not arrived the previous evening by express, as was expected, but we found the expressman--he had it--returned to camp, unpacked it, got our other barometer, got back--the rest not ready. Two long hours were consumed before we got the party off, eight persons instead of five--Averill, Hoffmann, and I, of our party, Mr. Day, Wilson (a young Englishman who had never climbed a mountain), a Doctor Cobb, a Mr. Reed, and our guide. Mrs. Day insisted on putting up our lunch, so we could not well carry along any other. We were to ride to the foot of the chaparral, about 1,500 feet above camp, leave our horses by a spring--then, two hours' climb to the summit, 2,000 feet above. A single gallon canteen was to be amply sufficient for the ascent--since there was such a fine spring on the summit! To be sure, none of the party had ever been there, but we had the minutest directions.

Well, we reached the water, unsaddled, found good water but very scanty; it took an hour to get enough for our horses and mules. I hung up my barometer for observations, when we found the aneroid smashed--a total wreck. I had not examined it in the morning; Averill had carried it, and it must have been broken in the express on the way from San Francisco.

It was ten o'clock when we started from there, the time we were to have been at the summit, at the very latest. Our visitors "pitched in" vigorously on the start. I remonstrated, told them they never could stand it. It was hot, the hill steep. Mr. Day had once or twice said he "knew more about mountain traveling than any of us." Five hundred feet were gained, some began to lag, the perspiration streamed, our green climbers pitched into the water, scarce as it was, rested, pushed on, some fell behind, and before we had ascended a thousand feet the intense heat, dense chaparral, and hard climbing told so fearfully that two gave out, drank up part of the water, rested, then went back. Averill went back with them, foreseeing a hard time, and fearing he would give out. The rest of us pushed on 201 163 exultingly--hotter, more chaparral, greenies hotter, so they drank up the water.

At last the summit of Mount Choual, 3,400 feet, is reached. All are terribly thirsty, it is most intensely hot, all pant, all are dry. Here we lunch, for it is noon, in the heat, in the sun, of 136°, and no shade, no air, no water--and our lunch such as was fitting for a picnic. The butter had melted and streamed over everything--of course, we stood the best chance, being used to all kinds of fare.

Here two more gave out, as the hardest of the work was still ahead. Mr. Day's "knowledge of mountain climbing" was hardly sufficient; he lay panting under the bushes and I feared for his safety. Four of us pushed on, intensely thirsty, but water lay ahead at the summit. We descended a few hundred feet through bad chaparral, then over a knob four or five hundred feet high, then descended again as much more. Here we got into a terrible chaparral. We toiled, tugged, worked, and lucky were those without instruments. We got so tired that, finding a shady spot under the dense brush, we lay down and rested or slept half an hour--quite refreshing. Strange, all dreamed of water . Our guide was hardy--he stood it well. Poor Wilson vowed that a "pleasure trip" would never get him on a mountain again. Our last ascent was a toilsome one, but soon after three o'clock we stood on the summit, 3,800 feet high, as nearly used up a set of men as you ever saw.

Water would have readily brought five dollars a quart, and sherry cobblers would have been above price--but there was no spring, no water. We must return; some feared they never could get back. I have not suffered so before with thirst--it was terrific. It was half past three when we got the instruments set; no one admired the landscape. One who gave out behind, pushed on and gained the summit; but, finding no water, all started back except Hoffmann and I, who stayed until after four o'clock taking our observations. Hoffmann's eyes looked as sunken, his visage as haggard, as if he had been 202 164 on hard fare for two weeks. I suspect I looked worse, for I had carried the barometer, level, etc. He carried the compass, tripod, and sketch book--but the fine view was left unsketched--only the topographical bearings and barometrical observations were taken. As before remarked, the rest started back, and straggled to the spring, one by one, haggard, used up, faint--some staggering, so faint--disgusted in general with mountain climbing.

Hoffmann and I took it back more slowly, often lying down to rest, and it was after sunset when we got back to the spring. Averill came up a few hundred feet and met us with a canteen of water. We soon drained the gallon between us, and were quite fresh when we reached the others. We soon saddled up, rode back by the bright light of the moon, and at half past nine were in camp. Supper, drink--two bottles of wine--and we sat and sang until eleven o'clock in the clear light of the moon, for it was Averill's last night with us. I sent him to Monterey today to join Doctor Cooper, our naturalist.

Thus ended our trip. Had we the management of it all the suffering would have been avoided; as it was, it was a day of intense suffering. Today I am in camp, writing, packing specimens, etc.

New Almaden.

August 17.

IT is a lovely Sunday--above 90° in the tent where I write, but less outside in the cool breeze, beneath the trees--there the air is delicious. Our camp seems small and quiet, but although my party is small, it is effective.

Yesterday (Saturday) we were up in good season, and Hoffmann and I rode to visit the other quicksilver mines of this vicinity. There are three mines within a region of six miles, all in the same ridge, which is about 1,700 feet high, lying parallel with the high chain of mountains behind, and separated from the Santa Clara Valley by a still lower chain of foothills.

203 165

We rode to the Enriquita Mine,* about six miles from camp, by a trail over the hills. It is the poorest of the three, and lies about midway between the other two, the three being in a direct line. We introduced ourselves to the superintendent and engineer, Mr. Janin, who showed us every attention, going into the mine with us. It is much like New Almaden in character, but vastly poorer. Its owners are one set of disputants for the title of New Almaden also, so of course there is much feeling between the two mines. Four sets of claimants are lawing for New Almaden, and two more wait behind, to claim of these claimants should the latter be successful--a pretty "kettle of fish," to be sure.

This mine was opened in 1859. J. M. Hutchings, in Scenes of Wonder and Curiosity in California (1860), pp. 168-172, quotes an account of the dedication, which describes the naming of the mine for the little daughter of the manager, Mr. Laurencel, Henrietta (Spanish, Henriquita or Enriquita ).

The mine of Enriquita has been going about two years, has its great works, deep cuts, long tunnels, furnaces, steam engine to work machinery, etc. Mr. Janin is a very young man, New Orleans birth, but has spent several years in Europe at mining schools, mostly at Freiburg in Saxony.* He knew many of my friends, and we had a capital time.

Louis Janin (1836-1914) was a native of New Orleans, where his father was a prominent member of the bar. After completing his sophomore year at Yale, in 1856, he went to Europe and studied mining engineering at Freiberg, Saxony, for three years. He also studied at the E´cole des Mines, at Paris, before returning to America in 1861. His engagement as superintendent of the Enriquita Mine was a brief one. He was succeeded there by his younger brother, Henry, whose career up to this time closely paralleled his own. Louis Janin went to the Comstock mines in Nevada, where he advanced rapidly as a metallurgist, becoming superintendent of the Gould and Curry Company in 1864. After a period as manager of mines in Mexico he was employed for a year by the Japanese Government and then entered upon a long and distinguished practice as consulting engineer and mining expert with offices in San Francisco. During the last twenty years of his life he resided at Gaviota, California. (Biographical notice by R. W. Raymond in Transactions of the American Institute of Mining Engineers for 1914, XLIX, 831.) It was through Louis Janin that Herbert Hoover received his start in the profession of mining engineering.

The third mine, the Guadalupe, is two or three miles farther to the northwest. As he had never been in that, Mr. Janin offered to go with us, which he did, and introduced us to Doctor Mayhew. The mine is more rich, extensive, and profitable than the Enriquita, but vastly poorer than the New Almaden. It is mostly in a valley between the "mine ridge" and the main chain, and its workings extend down about 450 feet below the bottom of the valley. As it is so much lower it is much more wet and dirty than the other mines here. There are also workings in the hill, all of which we visited, spending some hours in climbing ladders, crawling through passages, threading tunnels, examining the character of the rock and ore everywhere.

We came out dirty, but were taken to Doctor Mayhew's house, introduced to a lovely little wife, with two fine babies four months old. Doctor Mayhew is a rough Baltimore man, probably forty or forty-five, his wife a lovely girl of perhaps sixteen or seventeen. His story was brief but comprehensive: 204 166 "Well, I wandered many years, concluded a year ago last spring that I ought to marry and settle, went home from Salt Lake, married, returned, and in nine months and two days was astonished with a pair of daughters. And here I have, in about a year and a half, traveled, stopped, married, settled, and have a smart and growing family--California is a prosperous state!"

His wife laughed heartily at her mistake, for seeing three men in red woolen shirts, belts, Spanish hats, saddles, spurs, etc., she had exclaimed, "There come some fine looking Mexicans !"

I loaded my saddlebags with specimens, returned to Enriquita, spent an hour or so more with Janin, then returned here at evening. We are having lovely moonlight nights now--cool, clear, bright. I am soory that I must so soon leave this place and the acquaintances I have made. We spent the evening at Mr. Day's. It was pay day yesterday, and last night the town rang with the sound of violins, guitars, dancing, fandangos , singing, and mirth.

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CHAPTER IV

APPROACHING THE BAY

Santa Clara Valley--A Camp-Fire Scene--San Jose--Mount Hamilton--Mountain View--A Democratic Barbecue--Mission San Jose--A Rattlesnake--A Skunk--Financial Disturbances--Amador Valley--San Ramon Valley--Oakland--Sacramento and the State Fair .

Camp 48, San Jose.

Saturday, August 24, 1861.

MONDAY I made my preparations to leave, packed and sent off specimens, etc. In the evening I called again on our lady acquaintances. The Misses Walkinshaw were even more lovely and agreeable than usual. We had a pleasant time.

We visited a famous soda spring near the mines--a copious spring highly charged with carbonic acid and other mineral matter. A house is built over it. It is as highly charged and as sparkling as the Saratoga Springs. It is delicious, and the gas is so abundant that it fills the spring that is walled in.

Tuesday, August 20, we left camp early, crossed some low hills by a byroad, then down the valley of Llagas Creek, a pretty, picturesque valley, and in about fifteen miles emerged into the Santa Clara Valley and camped at the "21 Mile House," twenty-one miles below San Jose.

The Santa Clara Valley (San Jose Valley of the map) is the most fertile and lovely of California. At the point where we came into it, it is about six miles wide, its bottom level, a fine belt of scattered oaks four or five miles wide covering the middle. It is here all covered with Spanish grants, so is not cultivated, but near San Jose, where it is divided into farms, it is 208 170 in high cultivation; farmhouses have sprung up and rich fields of grain and growing orchards everywhere abound. But near our camp it lies in a state of nature, and only supports a few cattle. One ranch there covers twenty-two thousand acres of the best land in the valley--all valuable. This Spanish grant land-title system is one of the great drawbacks of this country. One man will make an immense fortune from that ranch, but the public suffers.

We camped under some beautiful oaks, near a house, where we got hay and water. Two days were spent examining the hills to the east of the valley, from the summits of which (near two thousand feet above the valley) are to be had most magnificent views. One sharp peak rose near camp, on the west, conspicuous from every direction. It was very sharp, and rose very steeply (over thirty degrees on each side), more than eleven hundred feet above the valley. The view from its top was superb. It has been burned over this summer, and its black cone is a grand object, whether seen by day or by the clear moonlight of these lovely nights.

Peter had been sent to San Juan to see about Old Sleepy, the mule that had been left there. He found him still unfit for traveling, so he sold him for twenty dollars, which was five less than he has cost us since he gave out. He cost us a hundred last December.

We camped under the trees and did not pitch our tent. A camp scene may repay writing. Thursday evening Mike resolved on a "treat," so he bought a keg of lager beer and some cigars and brought them into camp. After supper I went to the house to read the news and when I returned a fine fire was lighted, the beer tapped, the moon was bright, and all were happy.

I only wish you might have beheld the scene. Five large oaks, their branches festooned with lichens, are our canopy. The bright fire lights up their trunks and foliage and the group around. The moonlight lies soft on the plain and lights up the 209 171 black mass of the peak, Ojo de Agua de la Coche, that rises back of the camp, its black outlines sharp against the blue sky.

But it is the group near the fire that demands our attention. The baggage and equipage are piled against a tree--saddles, axes, instruments, provisions--back stands the wagon in the shadow, the harness hanging on the pole. A Sharp (rifle) is leaning against a tree, while from the trunk of another are suspended barometers, thermometers, etc. Some piles of blankets lie on the sod, ready for their occupants at bed time. The bread chest stands modestly in the distance. The light is reflected from the bright tin canisters of tea, coffee, etc., and the grim kettles and gridiron stand against them. The water pails and washbasins are near too, and a few towels hanging on a limb flutter in the gentle breeze. The table stands under the largest tree, a few notebooks and maps on it.

But these are only the background of the picture. Nearer the fire are the group. Beside that tree, on a box of specimens, a beer keg is poised, a pitcher and four glasses standing on the ground near it until distributed; soon this takes place. That man on a camp stool, his California hat on one side, his legs crossed with ease, his plaid overshirt brilliant in the firelight, but not entirely concealing the luxurious "biled shirt" which he has on today, puffing a cigar with the dignity of a senator, is Peter. Between him and the beer keg sits Michael, the host of the evening. His red shirt is doubly brilliant by the bright firelight, his face beams with more than his usual good humor, it even seems to me that his light hair curls tighter--he evidently enjoys it, and he puffs his cigar with gravity worthy of the occasion.

Beyond the fire, on the manta (saddle-cover), with the grace of a Turk on the divan in his harem, reclines Hoffmann, our topographer. His well used red pipe lies beside him--a cigar has taken its place--and maps, bearings, and topography are forgotten as the smoke curls up lazily, only interrupted by taking another glass from time to time. His black shirt looks 210 172 somber, in keeping with night. That great mass lying between him and the fire is not an outcropping of metamorphic rock, as it might at first be taken for, but his mountain shoes, from the soles of which those stupendous nails loom up and glitter grandly in the firelight.

That demure, modest looking individual on the ground, leaning against a tree (but close to the beer keg) is the humble botanist. His face is indistinctly seen, as it is modestly hid behind a huge stone pipe, a native "California Meerschaum" from which occasionally curls up a blue column of smoke as from the crater of a half-sleeping volcano. His last pair of pants are a little torn, and a flag of truce is displayed in the rear--emblem of peace, even if not of plenty.

Song follows story, and laughs follow both, until the oaks echo again with their ring. The keg is finished, the cigars are smoked, the embers have ceased blazing, the moon is higher and its shadows shorter, the lights are out at the house near, and the owls are hooting among the trees as we turn in to our blankets and sleep closes and covers the scene.

Friday, August 23, we came here, twenty-one miles down the valley, and camped just on the edge of the town. The day was warm, and the roads very dusty-- a` la California .

San Jose.

Wednesday, August 29.

WE arrived here Friday night. Saturday morning we found we had lost a roll of maps. Here was a loss truly. The maps had cost us months of labor, were partly compiled from the Land Office surveys, ranch surveys, coast surveys, and our own labor--the compilations and results of immense labor--and we had no copies. One was, moreover, of the field we were to work up for the remainder of the year. Five hundred dollars would have been a trifling loss compared with the loss of these few sheets of paper. They were in a roll in a tin case and had dropped out of our wagon. I wrote some notices, offering ten 211 173 dollars reward for their recovery, and sent Hoffmann back. He rode back to our last camp, twenty-one miles--no tidings. Then, recollecting that he was not sure of seeing them since leaving New Almaden, he took the back trail and, by a streak of good luck, found them about twenty-five miles from our camp in a place where we had lost our trail and they had rolled out on the rough ground five days before .

Sunday I went to hear Mr. Hamilton preach. It seemed like old times to hear him again. He has changed much, and has improved. He stands very high in this state as a preacher. Hearing him carried me back to the old times and other scenes and other hearers. He is pleasantly settled here. Both he and Mrs. Hamilton have grown old fast since they left the East six years ago. I took tea in town on Sunday evening at a Doctor Cobb's.

Professor Whitney is on his way to Washoe, or is there now. I got a letter from him from Placerville a few days ago. I shall be glad when he gets back, which will be in three weeks now.

Camp 49, Mountain View.

Sunday, September 1.

NEARLY east of San Jose, some distance in the mountains, is a high peak* we wished to reach, being the highest in that part of the Diablo Range. As near as we could judge from our maps, we supposed it nine miles distant in a straight line. It proved over fifteen. Mr. Hamilton went with us. A ride of six miles across the plain brought us to the foot of the ridge. All this is enclosed, in farms, and under good cultivation. Farmhouses, orchards, etc., give it an American look. We then struck the ridge, and on rising, had a capital chance to see this part of the Santa Clara Valley. It is perhaps twelve or fourteen miles wide at San Jose, an almost perfect plain, very fertile, a perfect garden, and much of it in higher cultivation than any other part of California.

This is the earliest account known of an ascent of Mount Hamilton. Professor Whitney vetoed a proposal to name the mountain for him (Brewster, Life and Letters of Josiah Dwight Whitney [1909], p. 238). It was thereupon named for the San Jose clergyman, and is cited as Mount Hamilton in the Whitney Survey, Geology , I, 43, 50, etc. 212 174

This first ridge was about 1,000 or 1,500 feet high. Then we crossed a wide valley, then up another ridge. We had attained an altitude of nearly three thousand feet, when we came upon another deep and steep canyon cutting us off from the peak. Here we left our mules and proceeded on foot about three miles and reached the peak after 4 P.M. The view was very extensive and the day very clear. It was about 4,000 feet high--we made it 4,200 feet--but that is doubtless too high.* We could see various portions of the Coast Range, from far above San Francisco to below Monterey, probably 140 to 150 miles between the points, and the Diablo Range for about a hundred miles.

The altitude of Mount Hamilton is given by the U.S. Geological Survey as 4,209 feet.

It was five o'clock before we left and after sundown before we got on our mules, with at least fifteen miles to ride. Night closed on us among a labyrinth of hills and canyons twelve miles from camp and at least six from any road. We gave our mules the bridle and let them find the way back, which they did with a sagacity beyond belief, over steep hills, along ridges, through canyons, to the road at the foot of the hills at the edge of the plain. It was near midnight when we reached camp. It is at such times that I realize how healthy we are in camp. While others must bundle up and put on extra clothes for fear of catching cold, we never have colds. Not anticipating any such delay we were without either coats or vests. We were wet with the perspiration of a six mile walk and climb, the last three miles very vigorous, then a ride of that distance in the cool night air, much of the way against a chilly wind--yet no cold or symptoms of any. Averill writes me, "Since I have taken to living in a house, full of rats and fleas, haunted by tom cats (or the devil), I have taken an abominable cold." He never had a cold in camp.

Tuesday, August 27, we went to examine a hill east of the head of the bay and north of San Jose.* It was both farther (14 or 15 miles) and higher (2,500 to 2,800 feet) than we expected, so it took us all day. The valley looked like a map, 213 175 and the head of the bay, with its swamps intersected and cut up with winding streams and bayous crossing and winding in every direction, made by far the prettiest arabesque picture of the kind I have ever seen. It was wonderful.

Monument Peak (2,647 feet).

Wednesday afternoon we took dinner with Mr. Hamilton, then rode to some sulphur springs and rocks that produce alum, about eight or nine miles east of town, returned and took tea with him. We had a pleasant time.

Thursday I spent in trying to sell mules, could not, so gave up, and dined out. Friday I had resolved to put up my mules at auction on Saturday, so had the day for leisure. In the morning, with a young lady who was visiting at Mr. Hamilton's, I went out of town a mile and visited the residence of a wealthy citizen, Mr. Belden.* He and his wife had come here early (1841), poor, had got rich, visited Europe, bought many works of art, etc. He lives here very comfortably on his money, has a fine house, pretty grounds, etc. We spent two or more hours most pleasantly in looking over pictures, photographs, etc., which he had brought from Europe. He was absent, but his wife appears a very fine and pleasant woman.

Josiah Belden was a member of the first party to cross the plains to California for the purpose of settlement, known as the Bartleson-Bidwell party of 1841. The story of this party is well known through John Bidwell's articles in the Century Magazine (November and December, 1890), and his Echoes of the Past , first printed at Chico, lately reprinted by the Lakeside Press (Chicago, 1928). Belden settled in San Jose about 1848 and was its first mayor (1850). He married Sarah M. Jones, a pioneer of '46.

Saturday I sold the mules, got as much as I expected--$71 for two mules we gave $130 for--then came on here, seventeen miles northwest of San Jose. This is on a farm of Mr. Putnam,* a brother-in-law of Professor Whitney. He is in business in San Francisco, but has a farm here, where his family spend the summer. He comes down every Saturday night and returns on Monday morning. It is in the foothills, at the base of the high mountains, a lovely, quiet, secluded, beautiful spot.

Samuel Osgood Putnam, one time of Milwaukee, married Elizabeth Whitney. He came to California in 1850 and was connected with the California Steam Navigation Company.

One event of the week must not be forgotten--a grand barbecue of the Breckenridge Democrats (Secession), in a grove about a mile from camp. The Breckenridge party is quite large in this state and is much feared. Some of its men are open and avowed Secessionists, but the majority call themselves Union men, Peace men, most bitterly opposed to the Administration and opposed to any war policy--in fact, are for letting all 214 176 secede who wish to. They are making great exertions just now, and hope to carry the state at the election next Wednesday. If they do I fear this state will be plunged into the same condition that Missouri is in. There are many more Secessionists in this state than you in the East believe, and many of them are desperadoes ready for anything in the shape of a row.

But to my story. From quite early in the morning a stream of carriages and horses poured into the grove--men, women, children. After dinner Hoffmann and I rode out. Such a political meeting I never before saw. It seemed a cross between a camp meeting and a German May picnic. There were as many women and children as men, some listening to fierce political speeches, but more loitering in the shade of the large sycamores. All were well dressed, as if for a festival, and all good natured.

Dinner was announced. A long ditch or trench had been dug, a fire built in it, and spitted over it on iron rods laid across were immense quantities of mutton, beef, and pork, finely roasted. These were served up at long tables, with bread, peaches, etc., and if poor Lincoln's army is assaulted as vigorously as was that pile of eatables it stands a narrow chance, and if Secessionists fight as valiantly as they eat, then the Union is indeed in danger.

It was a scene for a Hogarth or a Cruikshank. Here a youth with a huge bone in one hand and a chunk of bread to match in the other--there a rustic beauty, her cheeks distended with juicy meat--another maiden with countenance equally indicative of bread--children with faces, from their eyes down, daubed with pie, happy and greasy--men with fingers distended and hands elevated, greasy, and afraid to touch anything because of it--old ladies in agony for fear the gravy would get on their best frocks--matrons attending to the wants of a numerous band of rising and growing, but youthful, Democrats--young men helping their sweethearts--family groups, friendly groups, crowded spots, solitary eaters.

215 177

Then, the scene of desolation over the tables half an hour later, as women begin to wipe their fingers, children ask if there are any more peaches, young men and large boys begin to parade, each with a long nine cigar stuck in one cheek, men begin to talk of crops, mules, horses, hard times, or politics, children to play, and women to look up acquaintances and inquire why on earth they had stayed away so long and not been to see them, or talk of family cares and domestic duties.

Then the speeches commenced again. Men and women were seated, and the eloquent speakers told of the horrible designs of the other parties, of their infamous doctrines, of their wonderful inconsistencies, of the scoundrels who were the leaders; and they pathetically told of the cruel persecutions and slanderings their own party had received, of its patriotic leaders and pure principles, of its innocence and the immaculate purity of its office seekers.

I sat and listened for a while, and as I gazed on the scene around I felt sad that so pure a party should not have all the offices, and the scoundrels of the other parties could not all be instantly hung.

Two or three women near me, who were feeding their infants in the natural way, impressed me deeply with the productiveness of the state, and its capacity for feeding the rising population.

There was much good humor, no fighting, some faint cheering for the Union, some equally faint for Jeff Davis and his cause.

We left and went to camp, through a dust the like of which you never saw. The wind was high, and the dust of a thronged road in this dry climate, where not a drop of rain has fallen for three or four months, can never be appreciated until it is seen and felt. The fiercest snowstorm is not more blinding.

That evening I heard Conness, the candidate of the Douglas Democrats for governor. I then learned that it was the other party that were plotting the downfall of the state and general 216 178 ruin of mankind, which terrible catastrophe could be averted only by voting the ticket of this patriotic and moral party.

Tuesday, September 3.

YESTERDAY was a most lovely day. We started early on foot to climb a high mountain that rises behind the camp, over three thousand feet.* It was hard to get at. We were over eleven hours at it, and had no water. We had a canteen along to fill at a spring on the way, but we found it dry. We took it up moderately, however, and did not suffer much from thirst. We found tracks and traces of grizzlies, more abundant than we have seen them before--we were in paths where their fresh tracks covered the ground, but we did not meet any.

Black Mountain (2,787 feet).

Today has been a very fine day, very clear. We took a ride of five or six miles over the hills west of camp, pretty rolling hills, covered with wild oats, and stocked with much better cattle than one sees in the southern country. We see everywhere here the evidence of American enterprise in the farming and stock. There is a thousand dollar Durham bull on this ranch.

This whole valley abounds in the best of fruit: peaches, apples, pears, melons, etc. Peaches are very abundant and cheap. I saw a steam threshing machine at work in a field last week--it worked well, and easily threshes 1,500 bushels of barley in a day. A thousand bushels a day they call light work.

Formerly there was a lack of water here for stock and for irrigating. The large streams that run into the valley either sink or dwindle away to mere pools. So hundreds of artesian wells have been bored. Sometimes water is struck within a hundred feet, but many wells are three or four hundred feet deep. Many of these overflow, often with a large stream, but with the majority the water only rises to near the surface without overflowing. It is then pumped up by windmills, and hundreds of these may be seen in motion every afternoon when there is a strong breeze up the valley. Many of these are very 217 179 ornamental, costing from three hundred to six hundred dollars, and impart a very peculiar feature to the landscape.

Camp 50, near Mission San Jose.

Sunday, September 8.

IT is a lovely, warm, quiet day. I have been to Mass at the Mission, have done my Sunday's allowance of "plain sewing," and will now drop a few more lines.

Wednesday, September 4, we left our last camp and crossed the plain via Alviso and Milpitas to the east side of the bay, and camped about a mile from the old Mission of San Jose.* It was election day, and much excitement existed at the several polls passed. This place is Secession.

La Misio´n del Gloriosi´simo Patriarcha Sen˜or San Jose´, founded 1797.

There was more excitement in this state than there has been since the days of the Vigilance Committee. But the state has gone overwhelmingly Republican. There was much fear on the subject, from the fact that the Secessionists were united while the Union men were divided into Republicans and Douglas Democrats. But California is still for the Union, one and undivided.

Thursday we examined the hills north of camp and Friday visited some noted hot springs near. These have quite a reputation for the cure of sundry diseases, and the houses, grounds, etc., are better fitted up for comfort and luxury than any of the mineral springs we have before seen here. The water is somewhat sulphury, contains various salts in solution and has a warm temperature. There are five principal springs, with temperatures varying from 87° F. to 95 1/2° F. The baths are really luxurious.

Yesterday we started for a high mountain some twenty miles southeast, in the center of the range. We followed up a canyon several miles, and when we left it we struck up the wrong ridge and came out on another peak twelve miles distant from the one we started for. It answered our purpose, 218 180 however. We got the topography of a region on which maps were blank. We attained a height of over three thousand feet, but the distant view was obscured by smoky air.

An incident of the day may be noted, as it came very near costing the Survey a valuable mule, if not an assistant also. We stopped on the summit, took our bearings and observations, unsaddled, and fed our mules some barley we had brought, then sat in the cool shade of a fine oak and took our lunch. Then a smoke while waiting for an hour, hoping the air would clear and enable us to obtain distant bearings. It was useless, so we saddled up. Just as I finished, I felt something squirming under my feet vigorously, looked and found I was on a snake, holding him fast under my well nailed boots while he was writhing to get free. I stepped off from him and saw that it was a large rattlesnake! He ran between the forefeet of the mule, over one hoof, then through between the hind feet. I took the tripod of our compass and caught him, held him fast and cut his head off with my bowie. He was between two and a half and three feet long and had nine rattles. Had he shown as much fight as the others we have seen, both I and the mule would have got our share. But my buckskin pants and my boots would have been pretty good armor, for buckskin absorbs the poison from the tooth so much that but little enters the wound, it is said.

He had three fangs, two on one side, side by side. They were as sharp as needles. I took them out as trophies. A cool breeze blowing over the summit probably accounts for his stupidity. He struck the tripod vigorously, however, when I overhauled him. He had come out from under the tree, from a hole less than two feet from where we were sitting. Here was a danger seen , how many unseen we pass only our Protecting Providence knows.*

In later years Professor Brewer frequently told this rattlesnake story to illustrate a peculiarity of human fear. A portion of the story omitted in the Journal is supplied by his son, Arthur Brewer. After cutting off the rattles and head and wrapping them in a piece of paper, he put them in his pocket and proceeded down the mountain. He had traveled but a short distance when he decided to go back and measure the rattler. As he started to straighten out the snake, in order to measure it with his tape, the body coiled and struck him on the wrist with the stump where the head had been. Although he knew there was absolutely no danger, as the head, fangs, and poison sac were in his pocket, he was so unnerved by the incident that it was some time before he could remount his mule and resume his journey. Professor Brewer was accustomed to point out by this incident how one's fear could not always be controlled by one's reason.

Later.

ALL are in bed. I cannot sleep as much as the rest do, so go to bed later, and have a quiet hour when all is still. We all sleep outside now. Here, near the bay, the nights are much cooler, 219 181 the sky is clear, with sometimes a fog in the morning, and a heavy dew falls every night. Often our blankets are quite wet. We are in a cooler region than we have been in most of the time for the last two months.

This is a little old mission town--a large dilapidated church, old adobe houses with tile roofs, a few dilapidated walls and gardens, and new American buildings springing up around and among them. The very houses show the decay and decline of one race and the coming in of a superior one.

The old church is large, gaudily painted on the inside, but dilapidated; the congregation a mixture of Indian, Spanish, mixed breeds, Irish, with a few German, French, and American. There are a few stores here--it is a little village, one that will never be a large one. As we work north the decay of the native and Spanish element becomes more and more marked.

A camp incident this morning: We had just finished breakfast when we saw walking leisurely along the road the largest kind of a gentleman skunk. Peter started with revolver, but fired at such a respectful distance that he missed four shots, all he had loaded, and his skunkship started up the hill. Pete got the shotgun and Mike and Hoffmann joined pursuit. Hoffmann shot five revolver balls at him--all missed. I got my revolver from under my pillow--four barrels were loaded--but I ran so hard that my shots met with like success. Then an Irishman and dog joined in the pursuit, and something might have been smelt for some distance.

I was mending my stocking at the breaking out of the meˆle´e . I returned and finished the work while the battle raged over the hill. I had just loaded up my revolver when the party returned, the skunk still ahead, coming into the field near our tent. I again rushed to the battle, drove him from the field into the road to get him away from camp, then finished his career with two balls through him. We covered him with earth. A fragrance pervaded the valley, decidedly rank, but the hot sun and fine breeze entirely dissipated it in a few hours. Thus 220 182 ended the tragedy. It made ten times the excitement of yesterday's rattlesnake adventure.

We all sleep with loaded revolvers here, and Mike and Pete sleep with the mules in the corral, with a double-barrel shotgun extra, for horse thieves are thick and bold. A fine horse was stolen from this very spot last week, valued at two hundred dollars. We have been fortunate with our mules thus far, considering their value. But then we have been vigilant, and loiterers who come into camp can easily ascertain that each man has a navy revolver handy and is expert in its use. This may seem to many a superfluous caution, but I am convinced that it is judicious, considering our occupation and mode of life. It insures the "respect" of the class of gentry most likely to covet our property.

Sacramento.

Wednesday, September 18.

MORE than ten days have elapsed since I have written anything--days of too much anxiety and labor to allow any time for letters or journal. But I will continue my story in order. Monday morning, September 9, we left camp at Mission San Jose and moved up to Haywards, fifteen miles, along the east side of the bay, near San Leandro. The road led through a lovely region. A slope from four to eight miles wide lies between the hills and the bay, of beautiful land and of extraordinary fertility. It is all under cultivation, and enormous crops are raised on it. The fields are fenced, the houses American, and all tells of American enterprise. On arriving at Haywards I found a dispatch calling me to San Francisco immediately. I got in camp, left my party, and at night arrived at the city, twenty-three miles distant. I spent Tuesday, September 10, there with Professor Whitney trying to devise "ways and means" of continuing the work, and then returned to camp. I will give the main features of our trouble.

221 183

There was an appropriation of $20,000 before we came. We expected to use but $10,000 or $15,000 this year, so got an additional appropriation of $15,000 to carry on our work this and the first part of next year. We drew immediately in advance $10,000, and afterwards got $5,000. There was, on our arrival, over half a million of specie in the state treasury. We apprehended no difficulty in getting the money as we needed it after the opening of the new year's accounts. But at last session a transfer of over a quarter of a million was made from one fund to another, which has thrown trouble into all the machinery of state finances, depleted the treasury, and crippled us. We went without our salaries, but were promised $5,000 certainly the first of this month. The time has arrived but the money can't be got. We have seen the Governor, the Treasurer, and others, but our only answer and consolation is: that there is no money in the treasury; that they can't pay us until the first of December, and then but $5,000; that we are no worse off than the rest of the state officers; that the Governor and all the officers have received no salaries for months; that we get none of our last $15,000 appropriation until next March; and that we must retrench and cut down our party and wait.

I have held long consultations with Professor Whitney and the present plan is to curtail expenses, dismiss one or two assistants, do without our salaries until next March, except what is absolutely necessary for the direst necessities, keep in the field say six weeks yet, then withdraw from the field and dismiss all but the three assistants in the first departments, and run on borrowed money, if we can borrow . We borrowed $2,500 for present use.

To continue my story. Tuesday, September 10, I returned to camp. Wednesday I visited some of the hills in the neighborhood, and among the rest, a "coal mine" where much money had been expended and not a particle of coal found, and where 222 184 a very little geological knowledge would have saved the money. Then a "copper mine" just as bad and more expensive. I went down a shaft a hundred feet, hanging on a rope, then into a drift in rock where it is impossible for a mine to occur--money thrown away. I told the man to stop digging, and I think he will--after sinking a few more hundreds.

That night Professor Whitney joined us in camp. He had just returned from Washoe. I wish I could recount his tales of that country--it seems a fable--a desert region, inhospitable, but with mines of fabulous richness--$700,000 taken from one vein in a short time--the largest steam stamping mills in the world erected, where the freight amounted to sixteen cents per pound ($320 per ton)--for a short distance of the road boilers sent by express at thirty cents per pound--tales of money being both lost and won by the hundreds of thousands, of a large town springing up in that desert in two years, etc.

We were camped on a lovely spot by a stream, under a stupendous sycamore, on a rich bottom. The land was recently sold for one hundred dollars per acre, as it had produced over ninety bushels of wheat per acre. But pretty as it was, a heavy fog rolled in from the sea by night and dripped from the trees like rain, wetting our blankets as we slept under them--reminding me of rain once more.

The next day we moved on to Amador Valley, northeast, at the south side of Mount Diablo, then climbed a high hill after we got in camp, where we had a fine view of the region. The San Ramon Valley, west of Mount Diablo, lay at our feet, the richest and most lovely I have yet seen in the state. It is all held in farms, where wheat is grown, and crops of over sixty bushels per acre are expected--they sometimes rise to over ninety--such crops does this state produce! The premium crop of wheat last year was nineteen acres, accurately measured, which averaged ninety-five bushels per acre over the whole, or over 1,800 bushels on nineteen acres! well authenticated--and 223 185 so very dry that each 100 bushels would be at least 105 to 108 in the eastern states.

I have many things to write about the agriculture of this state, but every letter I don't do it, for I have so much else that I want to tell. Were I with you it would take me a month to "talk out."

We camped at the farm of a Major Russell, who had been with the Mormons. He sat in camp during the lovely evening and told us much of Mormon life. The universal testimony about the Mormons is the same; those that know the most of them give them the worst name.

The sky was very clear, the stars and moon bright, as we went to bed under some lovely live oaks by a little brook. The brook had "broken out" after the earthquake in June last--it is good water, and Russell says is worth $5,000 to his farm. The ground had cracked quite extensively near our camp, and a number of good springs had broken out in the valley at that time.*

An earthquake, July 4, 1861, "cracked open the earth, started a new spring, threw the water out of an old one, and cast down men standing up in the field" ( Daily Alta California , August 8, 1864).

Game was once very abundant--bear in the hills, and deer, antelope, and elk like cattle, in herds. Russell said he had known a party of thirty or forty to lasso twenty-eight elk on one Sunday. All are now exterminated, but we find their horns by the hundreds.

Friday, September 13, we went up the San Ramon Valley about twelve miles, and left our party to camp, while we pushed up the valley, then climbed the hill, 2,500 or 2,800 feet high, where we had an extensive and comprehensive view. Mount Diablo was the grandest object in the landscape. I will not attempt a description of the view, but cannot pass over some geological facts.

The strata here are all filled with shells and are of enormous thickness. They are turned up at high angles and much broken. The whole country is of mountains 2,000 to 3,500 feet in elevation, made by the broken edges of the strata. We saw 224 186 sections of these strata over a mile in thickness, yet full of shells through their whole thickness. I think the Tertiary rocks of this region are two or three miles thick! Who shall estimate the countless ages that must have elapsed while they were being deposited in that ancient ocean? While these myriads of animals were called into existence, generations lived and died, and at last the species themselves became extinct. Each day reveals new marvels in our labors, teaches us new truths in the world's history.

We had camped in a "wind gap" and the air drew through fiercely. We expected it to die down with the night, but it did not. We "retired," scattered here and there on the ground, some under the trees, but I out in the clear open air, for should fogs come on it is drier, as the sequel proved.

How the wind howled round my head and played with my hair and shrieked through the trees, as I lay and watched the stars before I went to sleep! The wind continued through the night, and with it came a dense fog from the sea, which wet our blankets, searched out every crevice, probed every rheumatic corner of our bones, and dripped like rain from the trees. The morning was dark, but we got out, got breakfast, packed up, and started on our way before the fog cleared and the sun came out. The stream by that camp, like the last, opened and sprang up at the last earthquake.

We traveled all day and reached Oakland that night, opposite San Francisco. We camped and the Professor and I went into town. Sunday I returned to camp to see if all was right and to make preparation for leaving for a week. The ferry-boats were crowded by the thousands who were going over to see a parade at the camps near Oakland that day.

Oakland is a pretty little place, springing up with residences of San Francisco merchants. It is like Brooklyn from New York, only it is farther, the bay being some seven or eight miles wide there. Pretty oaks are scattered over the sandy flat. 225 187 I returned to the city that night. The next day, Monday, September 16, I transacted various business affairs and then came up here along with Professor Whitney.

Sacramento.

September 20.

WE left the city by steamer for Sacramento, 120 miles, at 4 P.M. and did not get into the river until after dark. The sail up the bay is very fine. The islands and the shores of hills are bare and brown now--I mean bare of trees--only dried grass. The effect of the setting sun, illuminating this with its mellow light, was most beautiful indeed. Mount Diablo stood up, a grand object, in the landscape.

The Rev. T. Starr King, the celebrated orator and clergyman, was on board with us. I got an introduction and had a pleasant time with him. He is as agreeable in conversation as he is eloquent in the rostrum. Night closed in on us before we entered the Sacramento River, and when I got up in the morning we were lying quietly at the wharf of that new city, the capital of the state, the "Albany" of California.

The State Fair is being held here. The noise and bustle distracts me. I feel nervous and excited and long for the camp again, with its clear air, calm still nights, simple life, and its loneliness, rather than this bustle and crowd. I took cold when in San Francisco ten days ago, and again now--had I my blankets here I would be tempted to sleep out on the fairground.

The Fair is like other fairs--hundreds of big cattle, horses, etc. (the horses the finest)--many more Durhams than I expected to see, few Devons (in fact, none at all), some few sheep, fewer hogs, some mules and jacks. The grounds are fine, over twenty acres enclosed with a high brick wall with ten entrances, a fine track, etc. The stalls for cattle are finely arranged around the outside, and a promenade is to be built 226 188 on the flat roofs of the stalls. There is a large stand for two thousand spectators, and a fine track. The races were received with California gusto, where horsemanship is such an accomplishment.

Indoors the Fair was more peculiar--no flowers at all, but fine fruits. These latter were more remarkable for size than any other characteristic. It is too late for the best plums and peaches. I will give you some items of pears and apples. Numbers of apples which I measured were over 15 inches in circumference--one 16 1/2 inches! Three pears on one plate, I measured, both around them lengthwise and around the largest part crosswise, and their measurements in circumference were 17 inches by 14, 16 1/2 by 14 7/8, and 18 7/8 by 14 3/4 inches, respectively, the three weighing 6 1/2 pounds! Numbers of pears were seen measuring over fifteen inches around, and proportionately larger if measured around from stem to blossom end. In two instances of three pears on one stem, each cluster weighed together over five pounds. There were grapes of four-, five-, six-, and even seven-pound clusters! Yet, I must say candidly that I think the quality of all the fruit, except pears, to be inferior to the same kinds in the eastern states. Pears grow peculiarly well here.

The park is about a mile outside of the city, the pavilion for indoor show is in the city and was built earlier. The park was only fitted up this summer. The pavilion is an enormous brick building, has cost already over $30,000, and it will take $10,000 more to complete it according to the plan. It is lit by gas, and the greatest crowds are there in the evening, when the beauty and fashion of the city are on hand.

It is unnecessary for me to speak of two laborious and "borous" days I spent on a committee to make arrangements for sending things from the Pacific Coast to the great World's Fair at London next year. Governor Nye, of Nevada Territory, was our chairman, but most of the work devolved on a 227

HOLLENBECK'S ROCK, PACHECO PASS From a sketch by Charles F. Hoffmann

THE BEER KEG From a sketch by Charles F. Hoffmann

228 189 small sub-committee of seven, of which I was one. Governor Nye had as "delegates" to the Fair from his territory (Nevada) three great ingots of silver from the Washoe Mines, each of over sixty pounds avoirdupois weight--nice pocket pieces.

A noticeable feature of the Fair was the gambling. Besides the usual sideshows of live snakes, big cows, fat hogs, fat women, etc., there were hundreds of fan, monte , and other gaming tables, each with their piles of silver and gold, often to the value of hundreds and even thousands of dollars, in full blast, with the crowds around. Music, females singing or dealing cards to draw the custom, liquor, noise, swearing, etc., were the accompaniments. Yet the whole Fair was orderly. I never saw a Fair in the East where the crowds were more orderly or so well dressed as at this.

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CHAPTER V

THE MOUNT DIABLO RANGE

Camp at Clayton's--Measuring the Height--Raphael Pumpelly--War-Time Shudders--Geology of Mount Diablo Region--Corral Hollow--Rumors of Coal--Return to Mount Diablo.

San Francisco.

Sunday Evening, September 29, 1861.

FOR over a week I have been entirely too busy to write to anyone. I arrived back here from Sacramento, Friday, September 20, and the next two days were spent here, active and busy. Monday I rejoined my party with Professor Whitney. They were camped at the foot of Mount Diablo, on the north side. We found a noted German traveler, a Mr. Jagor,* from Berlin, who has been on a tour of four or five years to Asia, the East Indies, the Philippines, etc. He spent several days with us. He was a quiet, inoffensive, and unassuming man. He has taken elaborate notes and sketches of the countries visited and has over 1,700 drawings.

Friedrich Jagor (1816-1900).

Mount Diablo is a bold peak nearly four thousand feet high, which rises quite abruptly on the north side, and is one of the most extensively seen objects of the state. Because of its central position and the great distance that it is visible from every direction, a point on the top is the starting point of all the surveys of the state. The Coast Survey determined its position--latitude and longitude--and the land surveys started from the same point, a base line and meridian being run through it.

Tuesday, September 24, we ascended it. It was the easiest mountain to climb we have yet had. A pretty good trail runs to the top, so we could ride our mules most of the way. We 231 192 carried to the top a new barometer, one made for the government topographical engineers, and an aneroid barometer of the finest construction, to test the accuracy of the other instrument. We found it far less accurate than the mercurial barometer, and it required just as much care to carry it.

The view from the summit was remarkably fine, but the day was not clear and the distant views were shut out. There were no clouds, but a haze or smoke in the air shut out everything over fifty miles distant. But the bay, the valleys of San Joaquin and Sacramento, and the mountains around were fine indeed.

As an instance of how dry this climate is, I found a four-bladed knife on the top that must have been lost by some previous party weeks, or possibly months, ago--there was not a speck of rust on the new and polished blades!

Wednesday Professor Whitney and I climbed on foot a side spur, very steep and rugged, some 3,200 or 3,500 feet high, a much harder day's work than the last, and a much hotter one.

Thursday Averill and I visited the hills to the north and ran a line of barometrical observations across a number of hills and valleys in order to get an accurate section across from the mountain through the coal mines that are just now attracting much attention here. It was a laborious day's work, making many miles of hot walking and climbing.

Coal on the Pacific Coast is a great desideratum, where anthracite coal for ocean steamers has sometimes sold for fifty dollars per ton, and often for over thirty dollars, and is now, I think (not sure), over twenty dollars. Bituminous coal is cheaper, of course, but brings ten to twelve dollars per ton, if good. The true "coal measures" do not exist, in any probability, west of the Rocky Mountains. But in various places a kind of soft coal known as "brown coal" and "Tertiary coal" is found, especially up in Russian America. It is now being discovered in this state, the most valuable deposits thus far 232 193 found being near Mount Diablo. I will reserve a description of the mines until I pay them another visit.

Friday we visited the hills east of the mountain. One of the localities visited was a so-called "borax spring," for which we were told the owner had refused $17,000. We examined it, found it only a salt spring, and a poor one at that, not worth 17,000 cents at most.

The region north and northwest of Mount Diablo is a beautiful one--pretty valleys scattered over with oaks, many of enormous size, with wide branches often drooping like the elm. The rugged mountain rises against the clear sky, and when illumined by the setting sun is an object of peculiar beauty. Our camp was in a very pretty place, with great trees around, and the mountain in full view.

Friday evening we had a little incident. We were camped near a Mr. Clayton's house. His dog treed a large coon close by camp, up a very large and wide-branching oak. Mike and Pete built a fire under it, we all got around but no coon could be seen. Pete climbed the tree, no easy feat as the trunk was four or five feet in diameter. Up in the branches--still no coon--built another fire--it lit up the foliage, and the scenery around--caught a glimpse of him--Pete followed him out to the end of a lofty limb sixty or eighty feet from the ground and shot him with his revolver. It was exciting, as he got higher and higher, shooting and missing, in the dark, until he had but one more load left, then following him out to near the end, and that ball brought him. He was a huge fellow, much like our eastern coon, but rather larger, and of a different species.

While in the city I had caught cold and I had slept badly, but the clear sky and ground soon brought sound and refreshing sleep. This is no affectation, but plain truth. I have now caught cold five times , each time very hoarse and with more or less sore throat, each time that I have slept indoors for the last ten months, and these are the only colds I have had, and 233 194 each vanished as soon as I took to the open air again! I have slept in the open air, under the open sky, for the last three months--sometimes with fog like rain--I have slept in the rain itself, slept in wet blankets for night after night, and not taken cold, yet go into a house, sleep in a bed, and I am sure to take cold! And my case is not peculiar. It is the general experience here--need we stronger proof that colds are owing to a close and artificial mode of life? It has long been known that those who sleep in small or close and warm rooms are more subject to colds than those who sleep in large and well-ventilated rooms.

Camp 58, near Martinez.

October 1.

I RETURNED here last night and have spent the day among the hills and the evening in closing up the last month's accounts. For six weeks I have kept the accounts of the party, but as Averill has returned to camp he will keep them hereafter. It is quite a job--I have written six large "cap" pages, added the long columns, and balanced all.

It was necessary to have barometers. We bought one new one, and hearing that we could get tubes, the Professor and I went to San Francisco Saturday to fill some for the old cases. Sunday we went to work--the tubes were so poor that only after trying and breaking three did we at last fill one, taking us nearly all day; but it broke of itself before Monday morning. So much for Sunday work!

Monday I got stores, etc., and returned here. I met Blake,* an old classmate, in San Francisco. He has accepted a place to go to Japan, to aid those people in developing their mines there.

William Phipps Blake, graduated from Yale Scientific School, 1852; geologist and mineralogist for the Pacific Railroad Survey, 1853; a candidate for the position as State Geologist ultimately given to Whitney; Professor of Mineralogy and Geology, College of California, 1864; later at the University of Arizona.

We go again to Mount Diablo tomorrow. I am glad to get in camp--but the season flies--as I lie in my blankets at night and see the Pleiades rising so high in the clear sky I am reminded that winter is at hand--and what a terrible winter for 234 195 our country--I tremble to think of it. I have been anxious and low spirited much of late over our unhappy troubles--the end looks dark. I would rather see the nation reduced to poverty and a million men perish than see the Union broken--but what will be the end? God only knows, and in Him we must put our trust.

Clayton, at the foot of Mount Diablo.

October 4.

THIS is my first chance to write in camp during the day time for a long while. We made Mount Diablo higher than it is marked on the maps, so wished to make another and more careful measurement. We sent Averill to the top with barometer this morning, to observe today, while I stay here in camp and observe another barometer. I have been making calculations all day and will now write--with the necessary interruption of having to note observations every fifteen minutes.

We have a pretty camp, on the north side of the mountain, about five miles from the summit in direct line. Fine oaks shade our camp, and the grand mass of the mountain looms up in front of us. When lit by the evening sun it is a magnificent object.

The Californians tell us that once in olden time they had a battle with the Indians here; it was going hard with the Spaniards, when the Devil came out of the mountain, helped the Spaniards, and the Indians were vanquished.* I cannot vouch for the truth of their story, but the story gave the name to the mountain, and the rocks certainly do look as if the devil had been about at some time. There is a breaking up and roasting of strata on a grand scale.

See also Bret Harte's "The Legend of Monte del Diablo," one of his Spanish and American Legends .

We are having lovely weather here now--days and nights clear, not a cloud to be seen for week in and week out, days warm (70° to 80° in shade, but the sun is scorching) yet with a delicious breeze every day from the bay. The nights are cool (it has been down below 40° the last two nights) but 235 196 without dew--glorious nights to sleep under the clear sky, only a little cool.

As I have read home letters telling of "dry weather," "very dry spell," "no rain for six weeks," I often compare that with this climate. There was a heavy rain here last April, but none since. I have seen no heavy rain since early last January . We had slight showers later, but not a drop since a slight shower at Monterey late in May (possibly the first week of June). Think and try to conceive, if possible, how dry it must be--everything, except trees, parched and sere, watercourses but dry beds of sand, roads two to eight inches deep of the finest dust, soil everywhere cracked to the depth of two to six feet, the cracks often wide enough for the foot to slip in when walking, and indeed, the whole surface fissured with cracks one to three inches wide. "Dust thou art and to dust shalt thou return" extends to the soil here as well as to its inhabitants.

A young man of whom I have long heard much has just returned from Arizona. His name is Pumpelly,* originally from Owego, New York, then in the Scientific School at Yale after I left, then at Freiburg and other European schools. A year ago he went to Arizona as engineer in one of the mines of that country. You have seen enough in the papers of that region--a region of vast mineral wealth, but the most inhospitable part of America--desert, hot, parched--producing only thorns and cacti--with here and there a fertile valley--cut off from the world--inhabited by the Apaches, the most treacherous and bloodthirsty of American Indians--with Mexicans, more treacherous but less honorable than the Indians. Twice in the history of that country, before its purchase by the United States, the Apaches expelled and exterminated the Mexican race from the territory, and now they have expelled the Americans--the first place on the continent where our race has had to resign territory once occupied. But the treachery of the United States officers, the withdrawal of troops, the inciting of the Indians to murder by the Southern Confederacy, has 236 197 inaugurated scenes of horror in that country for which the early history even of the eastern states shows no parallel for cruelty and atrocity.

Raphael Pumpelly (1837-1923) made extensive geological explorations and was in charge of important surveys and mining enterprises in many parts of the world. In Across America and Asia (1870) he describes his Arizona experiences and his work in Japan, referred to by Brewer. On page 67 he says: "In preparing for this journey I became indebted to many kind friends, especially to Professor J. D. Whitney, of the State Geological Survey, and to his Assistants, Messrs. Brewer and Ashburner, as well as to Messrs. Louis and Henry Janin, of the Enriquita mines." Further references are found in My Reminiscences , by Raphael Pumpelly, 1918.

Every superintendent of mines in the country has been killed, men, women, and children murdered, their dead bodies always mutilated, many tortured, others burned, and no means of redress for the present. Pumpelly, with some others, escaped, as if by miracle, traveling six hundred miles across deserts with only panoli (roasted corn or wheat, pounded) to eat, and is now safely here. A terrible responsibility rests on the heads of those who inaugurated this war on our country. It makes me lose my patience to hear them excused or even palliated.

I must fear trouble in this state. I know that the state as a state is loyal--it has shown it at the last election, it has shown it at the recruiting offices. But we have a large desperado population, most of whom belong to the Secessionists--men ready for anything, who care nothing for the cause of either North or South in the abstract, but who would inaugurate war for the sake of its spoils. Then there are others of southern birth and southern sympathies to lead them. A large Mexican population, but semi-civilized at best, and who, as a class, hate the Americans with an inveterate hatred, is being incited by the Secessionists, especially in the southern part of the state. Already, over a large region life is very insecure, unarmed men stand no chance, robberies are daily committed by armed bodies calling themselves Secessionists. This does not extend here. It is mostly in San Diego, San Bernardino, and Los Angeles counties--an immense region, sparsely peopled, and containing much desert. It is the worst in San Bernardino, and while I hope for the best, there is just cause of apprehension for a terrible state of affairs yet in this state.

We came here from Martinez day before yesterday. A fair (County of Contra Costa) was in progress at the village of Pacheco, and we stopped for a few hours. It was the poorest fair I have ever seen--some poor fruit, half a dozen poor 237 198 cattle, and some good horses made up the exhibition, for which a dollar admittance was charged. The town was overrun with gamblers-- faro and monte tables and similar establishments abounded everywhere, with all their attendant scenes of drunkenness, swearing, and vice.

We then came on here, and yesterday Averill and I took a tramp of twelve or fifteen miles over the coal mine region--a long and hot walk, over steep hills and through hot canyons.

Pumpelly goes up with Ashburner, working without salary for the rest of the season, when he will probably be employed as an assistant.

Clayton (formerly Deadfall).

Sunday, October 6.

STILL here, and a lovely day it is, but warm. I am writing this in a lovely "bower." By our camp runs a watercourse, the bed of a considerable stream in winter and spring, but all dry now. The bed is three or four rods wide, sunk a few feet, covered with gravel, and shaded overhead with large oaks and here and there willows and grapevines. A pretty place here is shadowed and festooned by vines, under which I am writing, a gentle breeze plays through, very pleasant, but it blows my papers--the thermometer in this cool place is 80° F., but in the sun, laid on the dried grass, it is 120°. Pete is making a couple of pies for dinner, the rest are lounging about in the shade, birds flit and sing overhead, and quail trip around near me.

We have had delightful nights lately--I wish you might be with us once. As I sleep less than the rest, and the evenings are getting longer--they go to bed at eight or eight-thirty--I sit in the tent and read until cold, then go out and sit by the fire, warm myself, gaze into its embers and reflect on distant scenes and distant friends, take a quiet smoke (for I smoke in camp), then retire. The brilliant shooting stars, so common in August, have almost ceased--but here the sky is clearer, like our clearest winter's night, and the stars twinkle as 238 199 brightly. The oaks are grouped around with their drooping branches, and the stars twinkle through them--while in the southern sky loom up the bold and grand outlines of the majestic old mountain.

The strata about Mount Diablo are of most enormous thickness, in all probability not less than one and a half or two miles! I think even more than the latter number. With the elevation of the mountain these were broken up--the central mountain mass roasted and baked, yet perfectly stratified often, but on all sides the strata only broken--the broken edges stuck up, forming ridges 1,500 to 2,000 feet high, the strata dipping at a high angle, often entirely perpendicular. Scattered through these are many fossils, and in this great mass is a bed of coal over four feet thick. The bed, like the strata in which it is found, is inclined about forty-five degrees. Several mines are opened, and companies have formed with capital to the amount of some three or four millions of dollars. They are now getting perhaps a hundred tons per day and making preparations for more extensive work.

We took a piece of wood only partially decayed from a stratum of clay under the coal. The stick was some six feet long. We got out one piece fifteen or sixteen inches long and four or five in diameter, quite perfect, with the knots in it--it seemed like a piece of wood that might have lain a few years in wet mud, partially rotted, the rest sound, yet this lay in a stratum that must have had nearly or quite a mile of rock deposited over it after it was placed there, then thrown up at the raising of the mountain! The mind vainly tries to grasp the ages that stick must have been thus buried, now to be dug out by moderns. It was about a hundred feet from the present surface.

I rode over the hills, leaving the party, to a hill several miles northeast, nearer the bay. Here I found some pretty fossils, mostly shells; but the most interesting was fossil wood, trees silicified as hard as flint, but with the whole structure preserved 239 200 in its minutest details. The grain was pretty. I cannot compare it with anything but curled maple, yet finer than that.

I collected as much as I could carry, then rode back to camp, arriving after sundown. As I rode up the valley the old mountain never looked so gorgeous before, tinged in purple with the setting sun.

We expect a "Pony" today, and are anxious for the news.

Corral Hollow.

Sunday, October 13.

IF you look on the map, southeast of Mount Diablo, you will find a valley, "Corral Hollow," watered by a curved river, enclosed in the mountains. If you are posted in newspapers you have heard of the "rich coal mines" in said Corral Hollow. Well, here we are! As distance lends enchantment to the view, just believe it a lovely spot; but as we are here, we find it a most Godforsaken, cheerless, inhospitable, comfortless region.

I will not anticipate, however, but keep on the even tenor of my story. Monday, October 7, we sent Averill to Martinez to take barometrical observations, to determine the height of our camp at Clayton, the basis of all our observations about Mount Diablo. Professor Whitney remained to take observations at camp. I took my mule, to visit the hills eight or ten miles to the north and northeast of camp. A very lonely ride, first through the Kirker Pass, then among rounded hills, almost bare of grass or herbage, in places entirely so--no trees to cheer the eye, no water in the many canyons and ravines. I found much of geological interest, quantities of fossil wood--of the hardest flint, yet the finest grain of the wood preserved in the minutest details--fossil shells of more than ordinary beauty, immense beds of sandstone, and thick strata, over a hundred feet thick, of volcanic pumice stone and lava. I had no lunch along, and found no water for self or mule, except some alkaline springs which neither mule nor I could drink. The day was hot, and it was long, too, being without either water or 240 201 lunch. I got so many specimens that I packed them on my saddle and led my mule, walking eight or ten miles back to camp, where I arrived just at sundown. Didn't my supper taste good, and a drink taste better!

A few clouds were in the sky during the day, light fleecy clouds, and the barometer fell rapidly and all prophesied rain, for it is now getting time for it. Night came on and the clouds vanished. No rain, but instead, a windstorm. Whew! how it blew! The wind just shrieked--clouds of dust--dried leaves--pieces of grass--etc. It was hard work to keep one's blankets on, and the wind blew through the blankets, cold and rheumatic. The ground is so dry that a wind raises much dust, and in the tent it is much worse, for the tent flaps in the wind and raises an "infamous" air. Professor Whitney slept in the tent and came out in the morning looking decidedly grimy. He reported a miserable night inside.

Tuesday we left that camp, Averill remaining to observe barometer. We went on ten or twelve miles, crossing a pass on the east side of the mountain, and camped in a deep canyon, where we found good water, a stream that came to the surface for two or three miles. The wind was very high during the day, and the air so filled with dust that at times nothing distant could be seen. The old mountain was at times obscured, at others stood out faintly in the thick gray air. We slept among a few trees that grew near the water in the canyon, but the wind howled throughout the night, blankets seemed but a partial protection, and every rheumatic joint would almost creak as one turned and turned again to keep his blankets over him.

Wednesday the wagon returned for Averill and to bring the rest of our things. Professor Whitney returned with it, much to my regret, for we were now on our way to a hard region, its geology complicated and its "accommodations" horrible, but he thought it best.

Hoffmann and I visited a high ridge southeast of Mount Diablo, a ridge over 2,600 feet high. The wind was high, but 241 202 it died down about noon, and in two hours more we had a fine view of the surrounding country for many miles--not clear, however--but we got the bearings we desired from the summit. To the south of Mount Diablo the range is depressed in the middle and there is a great valley basin, of probably two hundred square miles or more--a great plain, once probably an inland lake. It is the Livermore Valley. Livermore Pass is on the east side. The valley is not marked on the maps. It is a great basin, branching off into several valleys--Calaveras Valley, Amador Valley, San Ramon, etc.--but the streams do not follow them at present, so great have been the changes in modern geological times. This great valley was spread out beneath us. We had seen it before from various points, and had been in its western edge from Haywards, but this was the best view.

Thursday, October 10, we came on to Camp 60, in the entrance of Livermore Pass. First, down the canyon about eight miles to a Mr. Marsh's ranch. He has a fine stone house, by far the finest in this whole region. As this was the last water, we stopped two hours, lunched, and I visited a "quicksilver lead" of his, which proved to be no quicksilver at all, but a red clay. He gave us some fine grapes.

We had expected to get across through the hills, but found it impossible--we must take the plain. It is about thirty-six miles to the coal mines, water to be found in only one place on the way, sixteen miles on.

We strike out on the plain--oh! what a tedious plain--league after league stretches away--it seems as boundless as the sea--we go slow, for it is sultry--but we pull up into the hills at the place directed and find a little tavern at a spring, with a few stunted willows around, the first trees we have seen for over a dozen miles.

The San Joaquin (pronounced San Waugh-keen´ ) plain lies between the Mount Diablo Range and the Sierra Nevada--a great plain here, as much as forty to fifty miles broad, desolate, without trees save along the river, without water during 242 203 nine or ten months of the year, and practically a desert. The soil is fertile enough, but destitute of water, save the marshes near the river and near the Tulare Lake. The marshy region is unhealthy and infested with mosquitoes in incredible numbers and of unparalleled ferocity. The dry plain on each side abounds in tarantulas by the thousands. These are spiders, living in holes, and of a size that must be seen to be appreciated. I shall try and catch some to send home, but I have seen them where two would cover this page, as they stand, their bodies as large as a half-grown mouse, their hairy legs of proportionate size, their fangs as large as those of a moderate sized rattlesnake. Pleasant companions! We never think of pulling on our boots in the morning without first shaking them, for fear of tarantulas--but luckily they seldom travel by night. They bite vigorously when provoked, and their bite is generally considered fatal, although I have heard of but one well-authenticated case of death resulting since I have been here; but the bite generally proves a painful and serious affair.

The Diablo Range is skirted on the east side (I think its whole length, certainly for 150 or more miles) by ranges of barren hills, sinking into the plain, and sometimes rising to the height of 1,500 feet, mostly rounded, nearly destitute of water. Barren, very barren, few trees--often one will have a prospect of a dozen or even twice that number of square miles without a tree or shrub large enough to be seen, the ground either entirely bare or with a very scanty vegetation of stunted grass and low weeds.

A few cattle feed among these hills or on the adjacent plain, knowing where the water is to be found in the ravines, or going to the river. Hundreds of trails here lead to the river. Cattle go down in the forenoon, linger near the water until near night, then start in droves, single file, for the hills. They will thus go six or eight miles for water each day, going to the hills to feed and to keep away from the mosquitoes. The streams that form in these hills in the spring all sink when they 243 204 enter the plain, and as summer advances they dry up farther and farther until they all disappear. Such is an immense region, such it must ever remain, supporting a scanty population.

Our camp (No. 60) was at Zimmermann's Mountain House at the entrance of Livermore Pass. The hills near had been extensively prospected for coal, but nothing of importance found. We spent Friday there, and Hoffmann and I visited a peak about eight miles distant, 1,700 feet high, while Averill went to the river to observe barometer at the same time.

Saturday morning we started for our present camp. We were told that it was seventeen miles. First out on the plain, hot, sultry, tedious, four weary leagues were made, when we struck up the canyon of Corral Hollow. Here we followed up the dry bed of the creek; sand and gravel deep, often dusty, the air close, no wind, hot and sultry. It was but 85° in the shade, but it seemed much hotter. We were heavily loaded, for we had, besides our regular baggage, barely for our mules, for nothing can be got here for them to eat. Our seventeen miles proved over twenty, which took us seven hours to accomplish, with no water on the way save that in our canteens, which was a little salt and alkaline and got warm, say 80°, and was insipid and nauseous enough.

We arrived at the mines, and an hour was spent looking for water before we came to camp. Water to drink had to be carried by hand from a canyon a mile distant. Our mules could drink the water that ran from the mine, a little stream where the teamsters watered their horses. It was half a mile from camp, and it was awful , contained alkali and sulphur, and the poor animals refused it until driven by keen thirst. There was a deep well at a house, but it was insufficient in quantity to supply the people and too alkaline to drink. The woman told us: "It is good water, we can cook some things with it and make coffee, but it spiles tea ."

Under these disadvantages we camped and got our dinner 244 205 at sunset after the day's fast. We concluded to move camp this morning down the valley again to a spring. So after breakfast we packed up and moved down the canyon three miles. Here is a spring, tolerably good water, but not enough. We will stay here, for this will do for cooking and drinking, although we must take our mules three miles to the mine to drink.

A few trees grow in the bottom of this canyon. We are camped under some oaks, a good enough place if we only had water. We have spent a quiet afternoon, a quiet Sunday, but with more fasting than prayer, I am afraid. Our mules drank the muddy spring so dry that we could get no dinner until night, and then the tea was gritty with the mud. But we are used to going without dinners as well as to other discomforts.

Alas, how little we appreciate the blessings we enjoy amid the comforts of a home, where we have food when we are hungry, water when we are thirsty, shelter in the storm, and beds when we are weary; where we can sit and talk with those dearest to the heart when the day's work is done, can be cheered by friends when we feel sad or lonely, comforted by them when we feel troubled, advised when we are perplexed. Ah, my dear friends, you little appreciate or know what you enjoy--they are so much matters of everyday life that they cause no thought.

All are asleep but me--my "claim is located," the stones picked out of my bed, my blankets spread on the rough gravel and invite to sleep. The sky is unusually murky, the wind howls down the canyon,it feels like an unpleasant night. A year ago yesterday I left home.

Corral Hollow.

Tuesday, October 15.

I FIND what I wrote about the San Joaquin plain may be misunderstood. There is water in the river that runs through it, but from the river to the hills on each side, especially the west side, a distance of four to fifteen miles, there is no water--fifty or sixty miles might be passed on the plain between the 245 206 river and the hills without crossing a stream of water, for those figured on the map are all dry now.

Corral Hollow runs up west into the mountains, then suddenly turns southeast, the canyon much narrowing at the same time. The coal mines are near the curve, about nine miles up. The sandstone that forms the hills is broken and thrown up, and there a few seams of poor coal are found. There is but one mine of any account or that has as yet sold any coal, and that not over three hundred or four hundred tons at most. I question if any mine here will ever prove profitable. But there are several companies, and many thousands have been expended, as well as much money spent in prospecting. One company spent $11,000 I hear, and got no coal worth speaking of--not a ton of workable coal. I have spent most of today in the mines.

Yesterday Averill, Hoffmann, and I visited a hill to the southwest, over three thousand feet high and over two thousand feet above camp. We rode up the canyon, then mounted a ridge and crossed several knobs, but the air was so filled with dust that we could see but a few miles, scarcely ten in any direction. The first hills crossed were over the sandstone, but the soil is clay, dry and cracked.

A fine rattlesnake sounded his alarm and then retreated into one of the cracks in the soil. I punched him with the tripod of our compass, the only stick we could get, until he ceased rattling, but we could not get him.

We soon struck other hills, where the sandstones had been twisted and baked by volcanic heat for miles, and here the scene changed--some trees scattered here and there, canyons more narrow, and hills more sharp.

We took a circuitous route up, which we thought we could shorten several miles on the return by descending into the Corral Hollow canyon above its curve and following it down. We descended into it, a narrow gorge more than a thousand feet deep, down a very steep slope, our mules sliding and getting down as best they could--it was too steep to ride them--a 246 207 slope of thirty degrees or more--then struck down the stream. We got into a fix.

The gorge got narrow, huge rocks had fallen in and choked it up in places, but we got our mules down nearly to the road, when the route became absolutely impassable. We spent two hours in getting them about a mile through the rocks, and then had to get them out by making them climb a slope having a average incline of forty-seven degrees, and in places over fifty degrees, for five or six hundred feet. Think of that! But they did it, and we got out safely.

We were without lunch yesterday and got no dinner until dark, and far from a sumptuous one then. Our coffee has given out, the last "fresh" meat, in an advanced state of blueness and beginning to have a questionable odor as well as color, was eaten for breakfast, but bacon yet remains. We get no good pork in this state. Our sugar gave out this morning, but as bacon and beans are very nutritious, there is no danger of starving.

In the beds of sandstone a mile or so north of our camp we found today the finest fossil leaves I have ever seen. The rock was filled with leaves of several species of trees, most minutely preserved, as fine as the finest paintings, black in the light colored sandstone, with many hundred feet of sandstone resting on them. They were in a deep canyon. Much fossil wood abounds. We found one tree, or rather stump, erect, its stony roots still in the bed containing the leaves, once soft mud, the stump sticking up into the sandstone strata above--all now flint, but with the finest markings of the grain of the wood.

All this shows that true coal cannot exist here, only "Tertiary" coal, which must be, of necessity, an inferior kind; while the way the rocks are broken and tossed about must make following the beds very precarious and uncertain. Most of the coal stands nearly perpendicular, all at an angle over forty-five degrees. To follow such seams far one must go very deep, and the beds are cut off by the breaks or faults in the strata.

247 208

Friday Night, October 18.

EVERY night now is windy, the days warm (about 80°--84° F.), hazy, or dusty--I cannot say smoky --but the air is thicker than in our thickest Indian summer. It interferes with the work of our topographer very seriously.

We will leave tomorrow. I sent Averill on today for barometrical observations to connect with this camp. I have been hard at work every day, and provisions getting lower. Peter shot some quail and rabbits, and we have had two or three "potpies" that vanished before our attacks like dew on a summer's morning. But small game is scarce (except tarantulas) and this morning we bought half a deer of a hunter.

This hunter, by the way, is an old companion of "Grizzly" Adams.* His cabin is near our camp. We are camping by Adams' spring, the ruins of his cabin are within a hundred yards of me. This man came here and lived with Adams before he left, and has hunted ever since, but he complains that civilization has interfered seriously with his sport. "We had good times before the settlers came," he says, and he bears terrible scars, the trophies of contact with grizzlies. He told me this morning that he had killed seven or eight hundred deer here since he came, but they are getting scarce now. He was so badly used by a bear last spring that he has hunted none all summer and is just beginning again now. His venison was very acceptable, for our "table" has not exhibited a great variety of late--tea without sugar or milk, bread, pork, and beans. We have tea for only two days more, and water too bad to drink alone.

The Adventures of James Capen Adams, Mountaineer and Grizzly Bear Hunter, of California (1860), by Theodore H. Hittell, is one of the classics of California literature, Adams captured and tamed wild animals, specializing in grizzlies, several of which--Ben Franklin, Lady Washington, and Samson--were especially famous. They were exhibited in San Francisco, 1856-59. In 1860 he took his animals to New York and exhibited them under contract with Barnum. Adams came to Corral Hollow in 1855, where he made a bargain to hunt with a man named Wright. The experiences in Corral Hollow are told in The Adventures , chap. xiv.

For the last few days we have been hard at work here, exploring the hills, and will be off in the morning. I shall be glad when we can get stores again, hear the news, and get a drink of good water. I assure you the last is no little item. But such things are incidental to our work and are most cheerfully borne.

Much of the region around here is practically a desert, not 248 209 called so, but really so. The bed of this stream tells of a large stream at times, but often years pass without any water flowing down it to the plain, much less to the river beyond.

The region is thrown up into hills from one thousand to three thousand feet high. These on the north are all rounded and furrowed with canyons, but almost destitute of springs, and at the present time are dry beyond anything you can picture to your mind. Sometimes the soil is cracked, in other places dry sand, and in others a dry clay-loam, as dry as ashes, into which the mules sink to the fetlock at every step. There is scanty herbage here and there, but large patches are as bare as a dried summer fallow. I have been on hills today where there were such soils, with here and there scattered bushes--artemisia, sage, etc.--living, yet the leaves so dry that they crumble with the slightest touch.* They are reduced to dust in the hand in an instant if you rub them, yet they are alive, and with the first rain these same leaves will show that they are alive. They are not shed every year, only dry up. I picked some low green herbs--small, to be sure, but perfectly green--in one place, on a soil as dry as if it had been dried in an oven, a soil that had been exposed to this scorching sun for many months without either rain or dew. There is no dew here now, the nights are as dry as your dry days, and things will dry as fast.

Sagebrush ( Artemisia californica ) and sage ( Salvia mellifera ) are both found here (Jepson).

I wished to preserve some tarantulas--I will send you one when I can--so a day or so ago I caught a couple. This incited the boys--yesterday they caught some and made them fight. I tried it this evening. One of the boys went out and caught four near camp, huge fellows, and placed two near each other and irritated them. Soon they closed in--such a biting--they clasp each other firmly, then bite until one or the other dies. You can see the poison exude from their jaws. Pleasant fellows to find in one's boot or coat sleeve! They live in holes in the ground, and, on the whole, are not dangerous.

There is a large blue wasp with orange wings, a wasp two 249 210 or three times as large as the largest hornet of the East, that is the natural enemy of the tarantula. I have never seen a field battle, but we caught one yesterday and made him fight a tarantula in a box. In this instance the tarantula was victorious. In the field the wasp is--he lies down on his back, and as the tarantula pounces on him, he stings him and suddenly glides out, and soon kills his bigger foe.

The wind is roaring down the canyon, a stiff breeze, and not comfortable for sleeping.

San Ramon Valley.

Monday Evening, October 21.

AFTER I finished writing on Friday evening and went to bed, the wind howled all night--a tremendous wind. I had to pile boots, saddlebags, etc., on my blankets while I rolled myself up in them to keep them, and then the wind blew through them. It was by no means a comfortable night, and I often thought of a bed at home. The moon shone bright, the sky was clear, the wind in its fury. When we got up in the morning--with eyes and faces full of dust, hair and beards full of sticks, pieces of grass, and leaves, blankets in the same fix--could you have seen us you would have thought us a rough set, to say the least. We packed up, and I sent the wagon on, clouds of dust following it down the canyon.

A pass leads over the hill into the Livermore Valley, and could we get over it it would be but six miles to Livermore's. As it is, it is over thirty, and we must take the long road. Buggies can get over the pass, and light empty wagons. A hundred dollars would fix the hill. There is but one hill, about 1,760 feet high, or 890 feet above the valley. It rises this 890 feet in about three-quarters of a mile--somewhat steep, surely, but all the rest is a good road.

Hoffmann and I stayed in camp until noon, observing barometer. I took the time to visit a prospecting shaft near, where they are looking for coal. The shaft is a miserable hole, scarcely larger than a well, very insecurely timbered, and 150 250 211 feet deep. To hang on a poor rope, much worn, stranded in several places, and thus be let down that distance into such a hole was decidedly suggestive of accidents, but I concluded that if they could trust it for themselves, I could. I stood on the bucket and they often stopped to give me a chance to examine the strata as I went down. The worst was in coming up, for the bucket would catch against the timbers and would have to be lowered a little and tried again. Their work is folly--they never will get a profitable mine there. One seam of coal two feet thick was passed, standing nearly perpendicular, and I think that it is all they will find. The ground is so broken up by the forces that have upheaved and twisted the strata, that even if they find more, mining there must ever be risky.

Another uncomfortable night at Zimmermann's. The wind swept through the pass, not a tree or shrub to break its force, everything dusty. The wind died down in the night, and in the morning heavy clouds hung overhead and enveloped the mountains. All prophesied rain. We were in a sorry plight to meet it there, out of provisions and no wood--we used dried "buffalo chips" for fuel, but as there are no buffalo here that means cow chips, or in camp parlance "counterfeits." Money was reduced to less than twenty-five dollars, so I ordered a start, although it was Sunday. The whole camp was decidedly in favor of it. It is the first Sunday that we have traveled all day, although twice we have traveled a few hours, and the previous Sunday had moved our camp three miles.

First our way lay through Livermore Pass, about eight miles, among rounded hills over a thousand feet high, then we emerged into the Livermore Valley. We crossed the plain about fifteen or sixteen miles, a tedious ride. At Amador we stopped, fed our mules, and got our dinner. Here are two taverns, a grocery, and about two houses besides. A horse race was coming off in the afternoon, and a mixed crowd of fifty or a hundred Americans, Mexicans, and Indians had assembled--decidedly a hard looking crowd--drinking, swearing, betting, 251 212 and gambling. After dinner we came on here, where we camped some five weeks ago--at Major Russell's.

Today Hoffmann and I have been up about eight or ten miles on the ridges at the foot of Mount Diablo. We passed over the edges of perpendicular strata, standing perfectly on edge, for two or three miles, showing that these strata have that enormous thickness. They contain shells in abundance at intervals through the whole of that immense thickness--oyster, clam, and other shells. We were on a ridge over two thousand feet high, with these shells on the top and in the rock. Last week we were on a ridge 2,200 feet high, where wagon loads of immense oyster shells might be picked up. Today I found also the joint of a whale's backbone! These are some of the marvels of Californian geology.

252

CHAPTER VI

NAPA VALLEY AND THE GEYSERS

Overland Telegraph--Benicia--Judge Hastings--Suscol--Napa--Yount's--St. Helena--McDonald's--Pluton River--Pioneer Mine--The Geysers--Rain--San Francisco and Winter Quarters.

Camp 62, near Benicia.

Saturday Evening, October 26, 1861.

ON Tuesday last we came on from San Ramon, intending to come a few miles and stop over one day, but finding no place to camp we came on to Martinez.

On Wednesday night Professor Whitney came and brought with him a tremendous package of letters for us all. Peter got the sad news of the death of his mother, who lived in Illinois (or Iowa). He had not seen her for two or three years, but often spoke of her in terms of the tenderest affection. He is much depressed by it.

I had expected that Professor Whitney would remain with us, but Pumpelly has accepted a place on the Japan affair, so the Professor has to go up with Ashburner. He spent but one day with us.

That day, Thursday, October 24, was a most memorable one for California. The last piece of wire was put up on the Overland Telegraph, and dispatches were received from the East, Salt Lake, etc. You cannot appreciate the importance of this, but great as it is, it made but little excitement here. A dispatch leaving New York at noon may now be received in San Francisco at a quarter before nine of that morning, or over three hours ahead of time!

This line is built by two companies acting in concert and meeting at Great Salt Lake City--the Overland Telegraph Co., 253 214 owned in San Francisco, on this side, and the Pacific Telegraph Co., owned in the western states mostly. The latter has put up 1,600 miles in four months! News may now come by telegraph from Cape Race, seventy-two degrees of longitude east, 3,500 miles distant in a direct line, or 4,500 miles by the telegraphic route--surely a most gigantic circuit--the difference in time being nearly five hours. The tariff to New York City is now a dollar per word, and for the first two days the office has been crowded with dispatches.

Friday morning we crossed the ferry to Benicia and camped four miles north of the town. As an item of California prices, we paid nine dollars to be ferried over from Martinez on the regular (steam) ferry, and had our whole party been there it would have been ten dollars. Hoffmann and Professor Whitney were absent. The former we had sent to San Francisco. He returned that evening (last night) and brought papers with news from New York up to the previous evening.

This morning a cold heavy fog hung over everything, and many shrugged rheumatic shoulders. Tonight I shall take to the tent and sleep there after this.

Camp 63, at Suscol, five miles from Napa.

November 1.

SATURDAY night, October 26, was foggy, but it cleared up in the morning and the day was most wonderfully clear. It was the loveliest day for a long time. Two gentlemen called at camp --Judge Hastings and a Mr. Whitman. Judge Hastings invited us to dinner on Sunday. After dressing, Averill and I went into town and attended the Episcopal church, the first service of that denomination I have attended for a long time. The church was small but neat, the attendance good, and very "respectable." At the close, we were met at the door by Mr. Whitman, one of the vestrymen, who invited us to his house near to take a whiskey cocktail . As it was too early to go to 254 215 Judge Hastings we went in, he being an old friend of Averill's. We sat an hour, walked into his garden, the most noticeable feature of which was an abundance of most delicious almonds, now just ripe. The cocktail story may seem a large one, but it is literally true--you have no idea how prevalent drinking is in this state--one scarcely ever goes into a house without being invited to drink. If you go to dinner you are asked to drink before, but a refusal to drink is always courteously received--at least, I have always found it so, as I quite seldom accept the invitation except wine.

At three we went to Judge Hastings' and were most cordially received. The Judge is quite a noted man here, has made much money, is a man of influence, was once one of the supreme judges of the state.* He has a pretty wife and several children; some of the latter very pretty, others not.

Serranus Clinton Hastings (1814-93) was a native of Jefferson County, N. Y. He lived for a time in Indiana, then in Iowa, where he became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court after serving a term in Congress. He came to California in 1849 and settled at Benicia. He was immediately appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of California (1849-51). In 1851 he was elected Attorney-General and served two years. Turning to business and the practice of law, he made a large fortune from lands and was reputed to be worth nearly a million dollars in 1862. He founded the Hastings College of Law in 1878. His wife, Azalea Brodt, of Iowa, died in 1876. They had four sons and four daughters ( History of the Bench and Bar of California , ed. Oscar T. Shuck [Los Angeles, 1901]).

Don't ask me to describe dinners, that is out of my line. The dinner was quite ordinary--two or three courses. The waiters were three Digger Indians, of the homeliest kind, two young squaws, and a boy--far from neat, yet tolerably handy. After dinner Mrs. Hastings bragged of her Indians, told me all their merits and demerits, admired them as servants, but not as cooks--she has a Chinaman cook. So are the races mixed up here. Judge Hastings is a convert to the Roman church; his wife is a leading Presbyterian here. He, like all proselytes, is very zealous, is probably the most influential man in that church here. He had traveled abroad, and gave us a most interesting description of his presentation to the Pope.

Benicia is noted for its schools. There is a college, and there are two large female schools. One of the latter is Roman Catholic, in charge of nuns (sisters, rather) of the order of Ste. Catherine. They have recently made great enlargements, put up a new building at an expense of thirty or thirty-five thousand dollars, and have made proportionate improvements. Judge Hastings asked if we would like to visit it, so we did, were introduced to the "Mother" (Mother Mary) at the head, 255 216 and went through many of the rooms. About thirty-five sisters have charge, dressed in the most untasteful white garbs of their order. They are very kind and the pupils are greatly attached to them. There were about a hundred girls (besides the day scholars), who, of course, are kept very secluded. It being Sunday there were no studies, but we met them all coming out of the chapel and saw most of them there or in some large recreation rooms. A peculiar feature was an examination hall, apart from the other buildings, in the grounds. It is a building with roof, lattice sides, and floor, built in a hollow, with the ground rising on each side forming a natural amphitheater. It was an excellent arrangement, but of course only suited to a Californian climate.

Our visit there so prolonged our stay that we rode back after dark in the chilly night air. The night was glorious, but cool. The day had been of the most lovely kind, the sky intensely blue, and the mountains across the bay, twenty miles distant, seemed scarcely three miles away.

Monday, October 28, was another magnificent day, clear as the previous one, harbinger of the fall rains they say. Myriads of wild geese flew over our camp, as they have for several days, their numbers incredible. At this season of the year they come from the north to winter in this state. They congregate on the plains, and at times hundreds of acres will be literally covered with them. I believe I wrote last winter of the immense numbers we saw near Los Angeles.

We raised our camp and moved up the Napa Valley to Suscol Ferry, five miles from Napa. The roads were dusty almost beyond endurance. There is much travel, and every team moved in such a cloud that it was impossible to see it at any distance--you only saw its cloud of dust.

We camped by a pretty brook, near the Suscol House. On our way we passed the pretty little village of Vallejo (pronounced here in the Spanish style Val-lay´-ho ), where the United States has a navy yard. We passed through a fertile 256

RAPID TRANSPORTATION AND COMMUNICATION IN THE EARLY SIXTIES From a drawing by Edward Vischer

257 217 region, fine farmhouses at frequent intervals, farms fenced, young orchards growing, everything with an American look.

After camping, Peter shot a fine wild goose near camp. A flock came down in a stubble field, and he stole up and killed one.

Camp 64, Sebastopol.

Sunday, November 3.

TUESDAY, October 29, was a cloudy morn, but soon partially cleared up. Hoffmann and I started for a sharp rocky peak some six or seven miles east, and, as the fields were fenced, we took it afoot--a long walk. We reached it, a sharp rocky knob 1,332 feet high, from which we got bearings of all the surrounding country. A cold wind swept over the summit, but although the sky was cloudy, the air was clear, and the prospect extensive. The arms of the bay, with the winding bayous (called here "sloughs") in the swamps around them, were very beautiful, the effect heightened by the rugged mountains on the north and northwest.

As the wind was so high and raw, we crept behind some bushes on the lee of the hill and hung up the barometer behind them and waited there half an hour for observations, taking a quiet smoke and enjoying the lovely prospect beneath. The wind shrieked over our heads. The pipes smoked out, observations taken, barometer put up, as we emerged from the bushes we saw a dense mass of clouds sweeping down from the north with rain. The whole aspect of the sky in that quarter had changed while we were in the bushes. We struck for the camp "double quick" pace, but had not made over one or two miles when the clouds came sweeping over us. Our way here lay along the crests of a series of ridges for about three or four miles--the ridges in places quite sharp, in other places branching off in spurs--easy enough to see in the clear air, but blind enough in the dense gloom of the thick fog that shrouded us.

With this cloud and fog came a fine rain, sweeping with the 258 218 wind. But a few minutes were necessary to wet us to the skin, cold and uncomfortable, but the smell of the rain, the damp air, the smell of wet ground, was delightfully refreshing. It carried me back to days of summer showers, to green grass, fresh air, and no dust--this feature was positively delightful, in spite of the discomfort of the wet.

We pushed on our blind way, facing the stiff wind, and as we neared the end of the ridge where we were to descend into the valley the rain ceased. In a few hundred feet we got below the clouds, and the lovely Napa Valley, with its neat village, pretty farms, green trees, and pretty sites, lay below us, lit by patches of sunshine here and there. A spot of sun lay directly on the village of Napa, six or seven miles distant, producing a delightfully beautiful effect.

We found it had rained but little at camp, not enough to lay the dust. The rest of the afternoon was quite fair, but not clear, and dense masses of clouds hung over the ridges we had left. We changed our clothes for dry ones. Mike soon had the goose roasting, and at half-past four it was served up in good style and partaken of with an appetite any epicure would envy. The skeleton was dismembered, the bones polished, and every vestige that was eatable soon disposed of.

The evenings are getting longer. The weather drove us all to the tent to sleep, and after all the preparations for rain were made, the long evening was whiled away with reading and euchre, varied by a game of "seven-up." But we had no more rain.

Wednesday there was no rain, but a dense fog hung over everything. Averill went to Napa for letters. I lounged down to the tavern to read the news. While there, a rough but intelligent-looking man entered into conversation and invited me to his house a few rods distant for a "glass of good cider." I went, got the cider, the best I have tasted in the state, and went into his house. I found him an intelligent man, quite a botanist, and even found that he had some rare and expensive 259 219 illustrated botanical works, such as Silva Americana , worth sixty to eighty dollars--the last place in the world I would have looked for such works. He does not own the ranch, is merely a hired man, having charge! There is an orchard of ten or twelve thousand trees and a vineyard--he makes wine and cider and sells fruit.

It cleared up, and Averill and I took a tramp of ten or twelve miles over the hills--visited a knob over 1,700 feet high and got a magnificent view. The day was most delightful and clear after eleven o'clock.

Thursday, October 31, another foggy morning. Mr. Beardsley came to camp and invited us to his house for more cider. We went, spent an hour, when it cleared up, and we started for a peak seven or eight miles northeast. We got on the wrong ridge, got up about two thousand feet, saw much of geological interest, and got back long after dark.

The hills of the ridge to the east are of strata derived mostly from volcanic products--lava, pumice stone, volcanic ashes--which appear to have been thrown up in water and deposited in strata many hundred feet thick. After being thus deposited, the strata have been upturned, much twisted and broken, and again baked by volcanic agencies--a most complicated affair. These rocks are of all colors, red as brick, gray, black, brown.

Friday, November 1, I sent Averill and Hoffmann to a point we failed to reach the day before, while I visited some points nearer camp, collected and packed specimens, observed barometer. The day was very clear, after a cloudy morning, and they had an all-day's ride of it, getting back after dark. They reached the point, 2,200 feet high, and got good bearings and had a most extensive view, reaching to San Francisco and Stockton on the southwest and southeast and far into the mountains in the opposite direction.

The swamps bordering all the rivers, bays, or lakes, are covered with a tall rush, ten or twelve feet high, called "tule" ( tu´-lee ), which dries up where it joins arable land. On the 260 220 plain below camp, fire was in the tules and in the stubble grounds at several places every night, and in the night air the sight was most grand--great sheets of flame, extending over acres, now a broad lurid sheet, then a line of fire sweeping across stubble fields. The glare of the fire, reflected from the pillar of smoke which rose from each spot--a pillar of fire it seemed--was magnificent. Every evening we would go out and sit on a fence on the ridge and watch this beautiful sight, some nights finer than others.

Saturday morning we started, first to Napa, five miles, then on to this place, nine or ten farther. We had gone but a short distance when we came on a large flock of geese, several hundred feeding in a stubble field close by the road. They are very sagacious, always keeping several on watch while feeding, and never allowing a man to approach on foot. But they are not so afraid of horses and wagons going along the road. We stopped and loaded our double-barrel shotgun. Peter walked behind a mule to within eighty yards, then shot. The geese rose, but three fell; two we got, the other fell in the tule where we could not get him.

The various tricks that hunters resort to, to kill these geese, are ingenious, and the sagacity of the geese is as marked. The hunters lie in the bushes and shoot the geese as they fly over, but the geese learn in a few days to fly high over these bushes. Sometimes they train a horse, but the geese soon learn to avoid a horseman. On the San Joaquin plain, where there are multitudes of cattle, which can approach the geese, an ox is trained so that a man can walk behind into the very flock and bang away with both barrels and kill several, but the geese soon learn which ox is the suspicious one. The geese bring a good price in market. (N.B.--Mike is now roasting a goose outside the tent--I smell the savor thereof--I wish you could dine with us.)

To go on--Napa is a pretty, American town, on a stream large enough for a small steamer to ply to San Francisco, and 261 221 is a place of much trade. We stopped a few minutes. I got letters, one from Professor Whitney, one from home--which I read after mounting, as I rode along.

We came on nine miles farther up the valley. Pretty farms, neat farmhouses, fine young orchards, lined the way. The bottom is three to five miles wide most of the way, very fertile land, and the fields have scattered over them many most grand oaks, which would be an ornament to any park with their broad spreading branches, drooping at the ends like those of an elm--majestic trees.

But the feature of that nine miles was the dust, dust ! DUST! The road has been much used, hauling grain, and from fence to fence the dust is from two to six inches deep, fine as the liveliest plaster of Paris, impalpable clay, into which the mules sink to the fetlock, raising a cloud out of which you often cannot see. Each team we met was enveloped in a cloud, so that often you could not see whether it was a one-, two-, four-, or eight-horse team we were meeting; the people, male and female, were covered with dust--fences, trees, ground, everything covered. Need I say that on our arrival to camp a wash was one of the first performances?

San Francisco.

November 17.

SAFELY back here again in the city. The last two weeks have been such laborious ones--one week in the rain--that I have done no letter writing. I will now bring up my journal as I have time.

This was left off at Camp 64, at Sebastopol, the "Yount's" of your maps.* And so it should now be called, in justice to the settler, Yount, who settled there twenty-eight years ago.* His story seems a romance. He was a western man who wandered across the Rocky Mountains, lived with the Indians, hunted, and trapped. While plying the trade of trapper he entered San Francisco Bay, pushed up its northern arm, entered Napa 262 222 Valley, and found this lovely spot, inhabited by savage Indians and a few semi-savage Mexicans.

The name Sebastopol was retained until about 1867, when it gave way to Yountville. There is a Sebastopol in Sonoma County, with which this place should not be confused. George Yount was one of the outstanding American pioneers in California in the period preceding the gold discovery. He was born in Burke County, North Carolina, 1794, whence the family moved to Missouri. He enlisted in the War of 1812 and then, and subsequently, engaged in Indian fighting. After several years of farm life in Missouri, during which he married and had children, he set out for the west and engaged in trapping. He was with the Patties on the Gila in 1826, and came to California with Wolfskill in 1831. After hunting sea otter near Santa Barbara, he came to San Francisco Bay and settled for a time at Sonoma, where he became acquainted with M. G. Vallejo. He obtained a grant of land in Napa Valley, the Caymus Rancho, which was confirmed in 1836. To obtain land it was necessary to be baptized a Roman Catholic, and it was thus that he obtained the middle name Concepcio´n. He died at the Caymus Rancho in 1865 and was buried at Yountville with Masonic honors ("The Chronicles of George C. Yount," ed. Charles L. Camp in the California Historical Society Quarterly , Vol. II, No. 1 [April, 1923]).

In his youth, in a western state, a fortune teller had predicted to him his future home, settled in a lovely valley, etc. Here seemed to be the place--a fertile valley, enclosed by high mountain ridges, a rich bottom with grand trees, a stream rich in fish. He did not stay, however, but the prediction of the sibyl so often came up to him that he returned a year or so later and got a grant of the Mexican Government of two leagues of land in the valley. He built him a cabin--at once fort, fortress, and home.

By his force of character and kindness he overcame the Indians and made them such warm friends that to this day many live on his ranch. With his rifle he compelled the submission of the treacherous Mexicans. His exploits and adventures smack of the marvelous, but he held his place, fully determined that Fate had destined that spot to be his home. He raised cattle, had a village of Indians on his ranch, and lived that patriarchal life for fifteen years before the discovery of gold here and the immigration. His Mexican grant was confirmed by the United States Government after much delay and difficulty, and now he is surrounded by thriving and valuable farms, fine orchards, above and below him. We camped on his land, but missed seeing him. Here are the "heads" for a "romance" or "tale" for some future author.

One evening while at this camp I attempted to go up to Yount's and call on the old man as he had sent us an invitation. It was but a mile or so from camp. We had had a hard climb that day and the others declined going, so I started alone. I passed the Indian village on the ranch. It was after dark. The homes were mere sheds covered with bushes or rushes, the front side entirely open to the air. These seemed their "sitting rooms." A bright fire lit up the hut. Standing, lying, squatting around the fires were the Indians--some with bright red blankets around them--squaws doing various work, dressed in skirt 263 223 and chemise, the latter quite scanty in the neck, and in many of the middle-aged women showing enormous and flabby breasts--children playing about. The whole, lit up by their bright fires, made a most picturesque and peculiar picture. The Indians of this state, except some of the tribes in the extreme north, are perhaps the ugliest looking in North America--they are certainly much inferior to the other tribes I have seen. I missed the way, for the night was very dark, and I could not find Yount's house, so I returned to camp. I thus missed seeing him, as I had no other opportunity.

November 4 we climbed a high rock ridge east of the valley--a rough craggy mountain 2,147 feet high, its sides furrowed by canyons, and very picturesque as seen from the valley. Although not very high it was quite a rugged climb and the view from the top decidedly fine. We had no lunch along, but a roasted goose about sunset answered for dinner and supper both, and some prophesied for breakfast too. But the prediction proved untrue--we ate it all, polished the bones, and left not even a "wreck" of its trimmings, and morning found us hungry again, of course. By the way, we came near losing our geese. The night after our arrival, just after dark, a stranger approached camp. We did not see him, but his presence was unmistakable. Mike, notoriously careless, had tied the geese in a bush, quite too near the ground. We "heard something drop," rushed out, cautious, for we had a very formidable thief to contend with, but by our infernal yells, shouts, pounding on a board, etc., he left the geese and sneaked away through the bushes. We then tied them so high that no marauding skunk could get them, but he hung around during the night, loading the air with the odor of his presence.

November 5 Hoffmann and I climbed a ridge west of camp, about five or six miles distant. A steep sharp ridge rises from the valley, very steep, its top a very sharp point, 2,400 feet high, with no rocks in sight and but few trees. Its steep sides and sharp top show a smooth surface of dark green chaparral 264 224 --beautiful to the lover of scenery, but forbidding to our experienced eyes. We have seen too much of that treacherous surface, which looks so inviting in the distance but is so difficult and laborious to penetrate.

A ride of about four miles up and across the valley, then back through the fields, and then we strike up a ridge. A few hundred feet are gained, when suddenly a board fence bars further progress. But we are ready for the difficulty, as it is one we often meet. I have some nails in my saddlebags, my geological hammer is the right tool--I soon knock off the top boards, jump our mules over, replace the boards with fresh nails, and ride on. We soon get into a cattle trail that carries us up until it gets too steep to ride farther. We tie and make the rest on foot, find the chaparral not tall, and less difficult than was anticipated.

The view from the top is finer than any we have had since crossing the bay, more extensive and more grand. San Pablo Bay gleams in the distance; the lovely Napa Valley lies beneath us, with its pretty farms, its majestic trees, its vineyards and orchards and farmhouses. Its villages, of which three or four were in sight, the most picturesque of which is St. Helena, are nestled among the trees at the head of the valley. Bold rocky ridges stand across the valley, a bold broken country around us. To the northwest lies the distant valley of the Russian River, one of the finest in the state, many thinking it even finer than the Napa and the Santa Clara valleys. But the feature is Mount St. Helena, rising to the north of us, over four thousand feet--steep, bold, and rocky--an object of sublimity as well as beauty.

We stayed for nearly two hours on the peak. We were tired and hungry. I thought we had no lunch. Hoffmann had told Mike, however, to put up something. We searched my saddlebags, and lo! six quails, finely broiled (cold), with bread, salt, etc! How we feasted! and the scene looked even more beautiful after it. As the peak was without a name we called it Mount 265 225 Henry, as it was something like Mount Bache across the bay, and we thought it well to honor the distinguished man of science.*

Joseph Henry (1797-1878) of Princeton and of the Smithsonian Institution. The name was never adopted and the mountain is now known as St. John Mountain (2,370 feet).

Our return was without especial interest. Found a goose roasted for dinner, the last of the season for us--last but not least. It went the way of its predecessors.

Professor Whitney came to camp the evening of the fifth. It had been our intention to visit the new quicksilver region of Napa County and the Geysers, but we had already exceeded the time set for withdrawing from the field. The rain had kept off unusually long, and it was feared that when it would once begin there would be no stop. The Professor was more than half inclined to turn back as it began to look like rain, but I was anxious to get up into that country, even if it were only for a week, and I carried my point.

The next day we started on, following up the valley eighteen miles. The bottom grew narrower, the hills on each side more rugged, and trees more abundant. The pretty little village of St. Helena, with its fifty or more houses, many of them neat and white, nestled among grand old oaks, was very picturesque. We got meat and vegetables and pushed on eight miles farther and stopped at Fowler's Ranch, Carne Humana ("Human Flesh Ranch") but we could not find out the origin of the name--near some quite noted hot springs. These last are curious--a number break out around the base of a low but sharp conical hill that rises in the valley. The springs vary in temperature from 157° to 170° F. The waters smell quite strongly of sulphur and have some considerable reputation in the cure of diseases. There is a fine public house with bathhouses, etc.*

Calistoga.

The weather continued to look like rain, but November 7 we pushed on. The trees grew more numerous, not only oaks, but fir or spruce, pines, the majestic redwood here and there with trunks towering perhaps two hundred feet high, and a lovely madron˜a tree growing finer than we had seen it before. This is a beautiful tree, has leaves like the magnolia, rich dark 266 226 green, sheds its outer bark every year, and is very peculiar as well as beautiful.

Here let me state that your maps will give but little satisfaction for the region I am to describe. All north of the Napa Valley is guess work--much totally wrong--only a few of the main features are correct. There is a Mount St. Helena (not St. Helens), but no Mount Putas (Whore Mountain). The latter is probably the one now called Mount Cobb, as there is a high Mount Cobb near where the map puts Mount Putas. But all the region through to Clear Lake and on to the Humboldt is a very rough country, of which there are as yet no maps anywhere near correct. We, of course, are getting as many details and bearings as we can, and will eventually, I hope, get a tolerably good map. But do not wonder if my letters and the maps disagree during the remainder of this trip.*

The maps referred to were probably editions of Colton's Map of California , published from 1855 to 1860. Much of the detail of the Colton maps agrees with that on Goddard's map, published by Britton & Rey, San Francisco, 1857. The Whitney Survey added something to the topographical knowledge of this region, but even today there are no reliable maps of the portion of California north of Sonoma and Napa counties.

We passed up to the head of the Napa Valley, then over a low divide toward the northwest and descended into Knight's Valley, a lovely valley watered by a tributary of the Russian River. The divide between these valleys on the south side of Mount St. Helena is very low, not over five or six hundred feet high. We passed down Knight's Valley a few miles, then across by an obscure road, over low hills to McDonald's, on a creek of his name, a tributary of Knight's Creek. Here we camped--Camp 66.

McDonald is a quiet, fine man, and what is rare in such regions, a pious man. He settled here twelve or fifteen years ago, then the remotest settler in this region between San Francisco and the settlements in Oregon. His wife, then but twenty years old, is still pretty, an intelligent and amiable woman. It must have requiredcourage to settle here at that time, surrounded by Indians, so far away from civilization.

As this was the "headwaters" of wagon navigation we made our preparations to go on with mules. To the north of this lies a region now creating much excitement from the discovery of many quicksilver "leads." This we wished to hastily visit.

267 227

We had a cold night, and November 8 the temperature was 37° F. in the morning--but the sky was intensely clear. We started, Professor Whitney, Averill, and I, each with a mule, and Old Jim carrying our blankets and some provisions packed on his saddle. The Professor and I carried saddlebags on our mules, while tin cups, pistols, knives, and hammers swung from our belts. We agreed to ride the two mules by turns, but it proved in the end that it was little riding that any of us did. Mr. McDonald went with us on foot as guide the first day. First we went up the valley of the little stream two or three miles, then struck up the ridge and crossed Pine Mountain, some 3,000 or 3,200 feet high, commanding a glorious prospect from its summit. The ascent was steep, the trail very obscure, and we would never have found it alone, even with all our mountain experience.

The summit of the ridge has some scattered pines, but on descending its northern slope we passed through a forest--firs, pines of several species, oaks, madron˜as, etc., and with these the strange "nutmeg tree"--a curious tree something like a pine, more like a hemlock, but bearing fruit in size, shape, and taste very like a nutmeg.*

Torreya californica .

We descended a few hundred feet into a canyon, where a cabin had been built beside a fine brook. It was now deserted, but here we camped, unloaded, and picketed our mules to feed, then descended into another wild canyon to a claim that was being worked.

On our return we found two other men had followed us, with pack-horses, having "interests" in some of the leads. A fire was built in the cabin, a dirty coffeepot found, which we cleaned up, coffee made, bacon roasted, and we had a comfortable supper, after which we sat by the bright fire and listened to the tales of pioneer life and adventure in these wilds. The rest slept in the cabin, but the Professor and I spread our blankets out under a majestic fir tree. The night was clear, the stars very bright, twinkling through the floiage; the sighing 268 228 of the wind through the pines carried me back to recollections of other years and far distant scenes. The night was cold, but we were tired and slept well. To be sure, we were not over ten miles in a direct line from camp, probably not that, but distance in such places is not to be reckoned by miles but by the hours required to accomplish them.

November 9, by early dawn, we were astir and before the sun had gilded the mountain tops had breakfasted and packed up. We had but four miles to make that day, in direct line, but such miles! On our way we visited several leads, some quite rich. But such a trail--across steep ridges, zigzag, up and down, through deep gulches, over ridges--one of which was three thousand feet high and two thousand feet above other parts of our trail--through chaparral. In one place we were two hours making one mile in a direct line. We struck a trail, however, and descended into the valley of the Pluton River near its head--a canyon rather than valley--where the furnace of the Pioneer Mine is situated.

Here are the furnace, smith shop, and the homes of the workmen, among the trees, in a most picturesque spot, and, although in a canyon, still over two thousand feet above the sea. No wagon road leads here--everything must be packed on mules, even the fire brick for the furnace, tools, even an anvil; a wagon had been taken apart and packed in over a trail that crosses ridges over three thousand feet high.

We were most cordially and hospitably greeted and welcomed by Mr. Wattles, the foreman of the mines. We spent the rest of the afternoon in examining the furnaces and in visiting the "Little Geysers," some remarkable hot springs near. The furnace was new and but two charges had yet been burnt in it. Great hopes are entertained of its eventual success. The ore of the Pioneer Mine is remarkable for its being native quicksilver, or the metallic quicksilver mixed with the rock. In places the rock is completely saturated with the fluid metal. It appears 269 229 in minute drops through the whole mass--shake a lump and a silver shower of the glittering metal falls from it. It sparkles in every crevice, and sparkles like gems on the ragged surfaces of the freshly broken rock. Sometimes a "pocket" will be broken into of quartz crystal, pure white quartz filled entirely or in part with the metal. Break into such a pocket and the mercury pours out, often to the amount of several ounces, and even pounds--over six pounds of the pure metal has been saved from a single such pocket.

The mines are on a hill at an altitude of near three thousand feet, or eight or nine hundred feet above the furnaces. The ores are packed down on the backs of mules. How profitable the mines will prove remains to be seen by experience. The principal mines of this region are within an extent of about six or seven miles, and on the line of the leads many are prospecting, digging tunnels, etc., the majority of which must bring only disappointment and loss. Yet some will, in all probability, make money. More mines of the same metal have been found a few miles distant, which we did not visit.

We commenced the season's work a year ago, intending to work up the Coast Range to the Geysers, then to go into winter quarters. Here we were, within less than four miles (six or seven by the trail) of the spot, late in the season. Although it was Sunday and looked like rain, this four miles must be made and the season's work finished. The next day we might not do it, if the rains set in, as they bid fair to; so, Sunday, November 10, we started on our way. Mr. Wattles and another man from the mines accompanied us.

First we went up a very steep slope through a forest, then through chaparral to the summit of the ridge. We rode along the crest several miles, commanding one of the most sublime views for wild scenery since leaving the southern country. We rose to the altitude of about 3,500 feet. Around on all sides was a wild and rough country. We were higher than the country 270 230 south, but on the north mountains rose higher than we were. The air was very clear, although the day was cloudy, the sun appearing only at times.

To the west of us rose Sulphur Mountain, a sharp conical peak 3,500 to 3,700 feet high, sharp, regular, and covered with dark green chaparral, like a great green mat. At times clouds curled over its summit, at others they rolled away and the sharp cone stood out against the cloudy sky. To the southwest lay the beautiful valley of the Russian River, some villages scattered in it, mere specks in the distance; beyond it were the rough ridges between it and the sea, against which heavy masses of cold fog rolled in from the Pacific.

To the south we could see the broken country lying between the Napa and the Russian River valleys, the Santa Rosa Valley, the black peak of Tamalpais by Tomales Bay, and the Bay of San Francisco. To the southeast was Napa Valley with rugged ridges east of it; and at the head of the valley stood the grand St. Helena, towering over a thousand feet above us, its rugged sides scarred by the elements, sometimes clear and distinct, at others with heavy manes of clouds drifting across its rocky brow for two thousand feet down its sides.

To the north was the deep, almost inaccessible canyon of Pluton (Pluto's) River, more than a thousand feet beneath us, and towering beyond it stood Mount Cobb, which, though not a thousand feet higher than our position, was enveloped in masses of cloud at times, although occasionally its tall pines stood out marvelously clear. Then we could see the valley of Clear Lake and the rugged mountains around it.

The scene was not merely beautiful, it was truly sublime. But we returned from the ridge, down the steep sides of Pluto's Canyon, and soon lost all this extensive view. The hill was so steep that we walked, leading our mules. On descending the slope, we saw the pillar of steam rising, several miles distant, and when more than a mile, we could see the Geyser Canyon very distinctly and hear the roaring, rushing, hissing steam. 271 231 We were soon on the spot. The principal springs or geysers are in a little side canyon that opens into Pluton Canyon.

Here let me say, by way of introduction, that the geysers are not geysers at all, in the sense in which that word is used in Iceland--they are merely hot springs. Their appearance has been greatly exaggerated, hence many visitors come away disappointed. They were first seen by white men some nine or ten years ago, and such very extraordinary descriptions were given, that it was supposed that the whole world would flock to see the curiosity. All the facts were magnified, and fancy supplied the entire features of some of their wonders. But a company pree¨mpted a claim of 160 acres, embracing the principal springs and the surrounding grounds, built quite a fine hotel on a most picturesque spot, and at an enormous expense made a wagon road to them, leading over mountains over three thousand feet high. But the road was such a hard one, the charges at the hotel so extortionate, and the stories of the wonderful geysers so much magnified, that in this land of "sights" they fell into bad repute and the whole affair proved a great pecuniary loss. The hotel is kept up during the summer, but the wagon road is no longer practicable for wagons and is merely used as a trail for riding on horseback or on mules.

The springs cover an extent of a number of acres, but the principal ones are in a very narrow canyon with very steep sides. They break out on the bottom and along the sides up to the height of 150 or 200 feet, and on a little flat nearby. There are hundreds of springs--of boiling water--boiling, hissing, roaring. The whole ground is scorched and seared, strewn with slag and cinders, or with sulphur and various salts that have either come up in the steam or have been crystallized from the waters.

Passing over the flat we saw several of these--many in fact--here a boiling spring, there a hole in the ground from which steam issues, sometimes as quietly as from the spout of a teakettle simmering over the fire, but at others rushing out as if it 272 232 came from the escape pipe of some huge engine. The ground is so hot as to be painful to the feet through thick boots, and so abounds in sulphuric acid and acid salts as to quickly destroy thin leather--it even chars and blackens the fragments of wood that get into it.

Near some of the springs a treacherous crust covers a soft, sticky, viscous, scaldi