THE CALIFORNIA BIRTHDAY BOOK
Prose and Poetical Selections from
the Writings of Living California Authors
with a Brief Biographical Sketch of each
Edited and Arranged, with an Introduction, by
GEORGE WHARTON JAMES
Arroyo Guild Press
Los Angeles, California
1909
To the dearest and best
Literary Partner
man ever had:
MY WIFE
whose critical discernment and fine judgment
have materially aided in making the
selections for this book.
CALIFORNIA--GOD'S COUNTRY.
California--land of the brightest dreams of our childhood; of the
passionate longings of our youth; of the most splendid triumphs of our
manhood. California--land of golden thoughts, of golden hills, of
golden mines, and of golden deeds.
INTRODUCTORY
This book, as its title-page states, is made up of selections from the
writings of California authors. Most of the selections refer to
California--her scenic glories, mountains, valleys, skies, canyons,
Yosemites, islands, foothills, plains, deserts, shoreline; her
climatic charms, her flora and fauna, her varied population, her
marvellous progress, her wonderful achievements, her diverse
industries. Told by different authors, in both prose and poetry, the
book is a unique presentation both of California and California
writers. The Appendix gives further information (often asked for in
vain) about the authors themselves and their work. It is the hope of
the compiler that the taste given in these selections may lead many
Californians to take a greater interest in the writings of their
fellow citizens, and no interest pleases an author more than the
purchase, commendation, and distribution of his book.
If this unpretentious book gives satisfaction to the lovers of
California, both in and out of the State, the compiler will reap his
highest reward. If any suitable author has been left out the omission
was inadvertent, and will gladly be remedied in future editions.
GEORGE WHARTON JAMES.
1098 North Raymond Avenue
Pasadena, California.
October, 1909.
THE CALIFORNIA BIRTHDAY BOOK
CALIFORNIA.
Hearken, how many years
I sat alone, I sat alone and heard
Only the silence stirred
By wind and leaf, by clash of grassy spears,
And singing bird that called to singing bird.
Heard but the savage tongue
Of my brown savage children, that among
The hills and valleys chased the buck and doe,
And round the wigwam fires
Chanted wild songs of their wild savage sires,
And danced their wild, weird dances to and fro,
And wrought their beaded robes of buffalo.
Day following upon day,
Saw but the panther crouched upon the limb,
Smooth serpents, swift and slim,
Slip through the reeds and grasses, and the bear
Crush through his tangled lair
Of chaparral, upon the startled prey!
Listen, how I have seen
Flash of strange fires in gorge and black ravine;
Heard the sharp clang of steel, that came to drain
The mountain's golden vein
And laughed and sang, and sang and laughed again,
Because that "Now," I said, "I shall be known!
I shall not sit alone,
But shall reach my hands into my sister lands!
And they? Will they not turn
Old, wondering dim eyes to me and yearn--
Aye, they will yearn, in sooth,
To my glad beauty, and my glad, fresh youth."
INA D. COOLBRITH,
in _Songs from the Golden Gate._
LET US MAKE EACH DAY OUR BIRTHDAY.
WRITTEN ESPECIALLY FOR THE CALIFORNIA BIRTHDAY BOOK.
Let us make each day our birthday,
As with each new dawn we rise,
To the glory and the gladness
Of God's calm, o'erbending skies;
To the soul-uplifting anthems
Of Creation's swelling strains,
Chanted by the towering mountains,
Surging sea, and sweeping plains.
Let us make each day our birthday--
Every morning life is new,
With the splendors of the sunrise,
And the baptism of the dew;
With the glisten of the woodlands,
And the radiance of the flowers,
And the birds' exultant matins,
In the young day's wakening hours.
Let us make each day our birthday,
To a newer, holier life,
Rousing to some high endeavor,
Arming for a nobler strife,
Toiling upward, looking Godward,
Lest our poor lives be as discords,
In Heaven's symphony of love.
S.A.R.,
_College Notre Dame, San Jose, Cal._
JANUARY 1.
A NEW YEAR'S WISH.
May each day bring thee something
Fair to hold in memory--
Some true light to shine
Upon thee in the after days.
May each night bring thee peace,
As when the dove broods o'er
The young she loves; may day
And night the circle of
A rich experience weave
About thy life, and make
It rich with knowledge, but radiant
With Love, whose blossoms shall be
Tender deeds.
HELEN VAN ANDERSON GORDON.
JANUARY 2.
THE MIRAGE ON THE CALIFORNIA DESERT.
To the south the eye rests upon a vast lake, which can be seen ten or
twelve miles distant from the slopes of the mountains, and when I
first saw it, its beauty was entrancing. Away to the south, on its
borders, were hills of purple, each reflected as clearly as though
photographed, and still beyond rose the caps and summits of other
peaks and mountains rising from this inland sea, whose waters were
of turquoise; yet, as we moved down the slope, the lake was always
stealing on before. It was of the things dreams are made of, that has
driven men mad and to despair, its bed a level floor of alkali and
clay, covered with a dry, impalpable dust that the slightest wind
tossed and whirled in air.
CHARLES FREDERICK HOLDER,
in _Life in the Open._
JANUARY 3.
When the green waves come dashing,
With thunderous lashing,
Against the bold cliffs that defend the scarred earth,
He wheels through the roaring,
Where foam-flakes are pouring,
And flaps his broad wings in a transport of mirth.
JOSIAH KEEP,
in _The Song of the Sea-Bird_, in _Shells and Sea-Life._
JANUARY 4.
A long jagged peninsula, where barren heights and cactus-clad mesas
glow in the biting rays of an unobscured sun, where water holes are
accorded locations on the maps, and where, under the fluttering shade
of fluted palm boughs, life becomes a siesta dream. A land great in
its past and lean in its present. A land where the rattlesnake and
the sidewinder, the tarantula and the scorpion multiply, and where
sickness is unknown and fivescore years no uncommon span of life. A
land of strange contradictions! A peninsula which to the Spanish
_conquistadores_ was an island glistening in the azure web of
romance; a land for which the padres gave their lives in fanatic
devotion to the Cross; a land rich in history, when the timbers of the
_Mayflower_ were yet trees in the forest. Lower California, once
sought and guarded for her ores and her jewels, now a veritable terra
incognita, slumbering, unnoticed, at the feet of her courted child,
the great State of California. Lower California, her romance nigh
forgotten, her possibilities overlooked by enterprise and by the
statesmen of the two republics.
ARTHUR W. NORTH,
in _The Mother of California._
JANUARY 5.
Above me rise the snowy peaks
Where golden sunbeams gleam and quiver,
And far below, toward Golden Gate,
O'er golden sand flows Yuba River.
Through crystal air the mountain mist
Floats far beyond yon distant eagle,
And swift o'er crag and hill and vale
Steps morning, purple-robed and regal.
CLARENCE URMY,
in _A Vintage of Verse._
JANUARY 6.
With the assistance of Indians and swinging a good axe himself, the
worthy padre cut down a number of trees, and, having carried the logs
to the Gulf Coast, he there constructed from them a small vessel which
was solemnly christened _El Triumfo de la Cruz_.
Let Ugarte be remembered not only as a man of fine physique, the
first ship-builder in the Californias, but as an ardent Christian,
a wise old diplomat and a fearless explorer. He stands forth bold,
shrewd and aggressive, one of the most heroic figures in early
California history. * * *
At the same time that Ugarte was exploring the Gulf of California,
Captain George Shevlock of England was cruising about California
waters engaged in a little privateering enterprise. On his return
to England, Shevlock set forth on the charts that California was
an island. This assertion was not surprising, for at this time a
controversy was raging between certain of the Episcopal authorities
on the Spanish Main as to which bishopric _las Islas Californias_
belonged! Guadalajara was finally awarded the "island."
ARTHUR W. NORTH,
in _The Mother of California._
JANUARY 7.
CALIFORNIA.
A sleeping beauty, hammock-swung,
Beside the sunset sea,
And dowered with riches, wheat, and oil,
Vineyard and orange tree;
Her hand, her heart to that fair prince
Whose genius shall unfold
With rarest art her treasured tales
Of life and love and gold.
CLARENCE URMY,
in _A Vintage of Verse._
JANUARY 8.
BACK TO CALIFORNIA.
To the Californian born, California is the only place to live. Why do
men so love their native soil? It is perhaps a phase of the human love
for the mother. For we are compact of the soil. Out of the crumbling
granite eroded from the ribs of California's Sierras by California's
mountain streams--out of the earth washed into California's great
valleys by her mighty rivers--out of this the sons of California are
made, brain, and muscle, and bone. Why then should they not love their
mother, even as the mountaineers of Montenegro, of Switzerland, of
Savoy, love their mountain birthplace? Why should not exiled
Californians yearn to return? And we sons of California always do
return; we are always brought back by the potent charm of our native
land--back to the soil which gave us birth--and at the last back to
Earth, the great mother, from whom we sprung, and on whose bosom we
repose our tired bodies when our work is done.
JEROME A. HART,
in _Argonaut Letters._
JANUARY 9.
GIVE ME CALIFORNY.
Blizzard back in York state
Sings its frosty tune,
Here the sun a-shinin',
Air as warm as June.
Snow in Pennsylvany,
Zero times down East,
Here the flowers bloomin',
A feller's eyes to feast.
* * * * *
Its every one his own way,
The place he'd like to be,
But give me Californy--
It's good enough for me.
JOHN S. MCGROARTY,
in _Just California._
JANUARY 10.
If Mother Nature is indeed as we see her here, broad-browed and
broad-bosomed, strong and calm--calm because strong--swaying her
vain brats by unruffled love, not by fear; by wise giving, not by
privation; by caresses and gentle precepts, not by cuffs and scoldings
and hysterics--why, then she shall better justify our memories and the
name we have given her. It is well that our New England mothers had
a different climate in their hearts from that which beat at their
windows. I know one Yankee boy who never could quite understand that
his mother had gone _home_ till he came to know the skies of
California.
CHARLES F. LUMMIS,
in _The Right Hand of the Continent, Out West,
June_, 1902.
JANUARY 11.
California, the orchid in the garden of the states, the warm
motherland of genius, the land of enchantment, the land of romance,
the land of magic; California, the beautiful courtezan land, whose
ravishing form the enamored gods had strewed with scarlet roses and
white lilies, and buried deep in her bosom rich treasure; California
began the twentieth century with another tale, fantastic, incredible.
* * *
Until the oil was discovered the land had been worth from one to four
dollars an acre, but now offers were made for it from five hundred to
as many thousands.
MRS. FREMONT OLDER,
in _The Giants._
JANUARY 12.
A CALIFORNIAN TO HIS OLD HOME.
I oft feel sad and lone and cold
Here in the Golden West,
When I recall the times of old,
And fond hearts laid to rest;
The gladsome village crowd at e'en,
The stars a-peeping down,
And all the meadows robed in green
Around Claremorris Town.
* * * * *
This is, in truth, a lovely sphere,
A heaven-favored clime,
Here Nature smiles the whole long year,
'Tis summer all the time,
With spreading palms and pine trees tall
And grape-vines drooping down--
But gladly would I give them all
For you, Claremorris Town.
LAURENCE BRANNICK.
JANUARY 13.
The establishment of the Mission of Santa Catarina marks the close of
what may well be termed the third period of Lower California history.
It is a period remarkable for progress rather than for individual
actors. The great Junipero Serra passes quickly across the stage,
figuring as a man of physical endurance and a diplomat--not as an
explorer or a founder of many missions. His most historic act on the
Peninsula was performed when he drew a line of division between the
territory of the Dominicans and the Franciscans. He is a link between
the two Californias.
ARTHUR W. NORTH,
in _The Mother of California._
JANUARY 14.
TO THE U.S. CRUISER CALIFORNIA.
Godspeed our namesake cruiser,
Godspeed till the echoes cease
'Fore all may the nation choose her
To speak her will for peace.
That she in the hour of battle
Her western fangs may show.
That from her broadsides' rattle
A listening world may know--
She's more than a fighting vessel,
More than mere moving steel,
More than a hull to wrestle
With the currents at her keel;
That she bodies a living-spirit.
The spirit of a state,
A people's strength and merit,
Their hope, their love, their fate.
HAROLD S. SYMMES.
JANUARY 15.
CALIFORNIA AND ITALY.
More and more it becomes apparent to me that the Climate of California
spoils one for any other in the world. If Californians ever doubt that
their winter weather is the finest in the world, let them try that of
sunny Italy. If they have ever grumbled at their gentle rains, brought
on the wings of mild winds from the south, let them try the raw rain,
hail, snow, and sleet storms of sunny Italy. And then forever after
let them hold their peace.
JEROME A. HART,
in _Argonaut Letters._
JANUARY 16.
I see thee in this Hellas of the West,
Thy youngest, fairest child, upon whose crest
Thy white snows gleam, and at whose dimpled feet
The blue sea breaks, while on her heaving breast
The flowers droop and languish for her smile,
Thy grace is mirrored in her youthful form,
She lifts her forehead to the battling storm,
As proud, as fair as thou.
* * * * *
Like thee, she opens wide her snowy arms,
And folds the Nations on her mother-breast.
The brawny Sons of Earth have made their home
Where her wide Ocean casts its ceaseless foam,
Where lifts her white Sierras' orient peak
The wild exultant love of all that makes
The nobler life; the energy that shakes the Earth
And gives new eons birth.
S.A.S.H. of College of Notre Dame, San Jose,
in _Hellas._
JANUARY 17.
THE RETURN TO CALIFORNIA.
Across the desert waste we sped;
The cactus gloomed on either hand,
Wild, weird, grotesque each frowning head
Uprearing from the sand.
Through dull, gray dawn and blazing noon,
Like furnace fire the quivering air,
Till darkness fell, and the young moon
Smiled forth serene and fair.
A single star adown the sky
Shone like a jewel, clear and bright;
We heard the far coyote's cry
Pierce through the silent night.
Then morning--bathed in purple sheen;
Beyond--the grand, eternal hills;
With sunny, emerald vales between,
Crossed by a thousand rills.
Sweet groves, green pastures; buzz of bee
And scent of flower; a dash of foam
On rugged cliffs; the blessed sea,
And then--the lights of home!
MARY E. MANNIX.
JANUARY 18.
Around the Southern Californian home of the loving twain the roses are
in perpetual bloom. The vines are laden with clustered grapes, the
peach and the apricot trees bend under their loads of luscious fruit,
the milch cows yield their creamy milk, the honey-bees laying in their
stores of sweet spoil, the balmy air breathes fragrance, the drowsy
hum of life is the music of peace.
EDMUND MITCHELL,
in _Only a Nigger._
JANUARY 19.
CALIFORNIA SONG.
DEDICATED TO GEORGE WHARTON JAMES.
Proud are we to own us thine,
Land of Song and Land of Story,
All thy glory
Round our heart-hopes we entwine,
In our souls thy fame enshrine,
California!
Dear to us thy mystic name,
Leal-land; Love-land; Land of Might,
We would write
On the walls of Years thy fame,
With thy love a world inflame,
California!
Dear to us thy maiden grace,
Dear thy queenly Motherhood,
Fain we would
Keep the sun-smiles on thy face,
Worthy live of thy strong Race,
California!
Land of Beauty! Blossom-land!
Land of Heroes, Saints and Sages,
Let the Ages
Witness all thou canst command
From each loyal heart and hand,
California!
S.A.S.H.
JANUARY 20.
I always appreciate things as I go along, for no knowing whether
you'll ever go the same way twice in this world.
ALBERTA LAWRENCE,
in _The Travels of Phoebe Ann._
JANUARY 21.
MOUNT TAMALPAIS.
Home of the elements--where battling bands
Of clouds and winds the rocks defy--
Mute yet great, old Tamalpais stands
Outlined against the rosy sky.
His darkened form uprising there commands
The country round, and every eye
From lesser hills he strangely seems to draw
With lifted glance that speaks of wonder and of awe.
It is the awe that makes us reverence show
To men of might who proudly tower
Above their fellow-men; the glance that we bestow
On one whose native force and power
Have lifted him above the race below--
The pigmy mortals of an hour--
We almost bend the knee and bow the head
To the mighty force that marks his kingly tread.
MRS. PHILIP VERRILL MICHELS,
in _Readings from the California Poets._
JANUARY 22.
Broadly speaking, California is the only _elective_ State. Its
people are not here because their mothers happened to be here at the
time; not as refugees; not as ne'er-do-wells, drifting to do no
better; not even, in bulk, as joining the scrimmage for more money.
They have come by deliberate choice, and a larger proportion of them,
and more single-heartedly, for home's sake than in any other as large
migration on record.
CHARLES F. LUMMIS,
in _The Right Hand of the Continent, Out West,
August_, 1902.
JANUARY 23.
Is there any kind of climate,
Any scene for painter's eye,
The Almighty hath not crowded
'Neath our California sky?
Is there any fruit or flower,
Any gem or jewel old,
Any wonder of creation
This Garden doth not hold--
From the tiny midget blossom
To the grand Sequoia high,
With its roots in God's own country
And its top in God's own sky?
FRED EMERSON BROOKS,
in _Old Abe and Other Poems._
JANUARY 24.
A MENDOCINO MEMORY.
I climbed the canyon to a river-head,
And looking backward saw a splendor spread.
Miles beyond miles, of every kingly hue
And trembling tint the looms of Arras knew--
A flowery pomp as of the dying day,
A splendor where a god might take his way.
* * * * *
It was the brink of night and everywhere
Tall redwoods spread their filmy tops in air;
Huge trunks, like shadows upon shadow cast,
Pillared the under twilight, vague and vast.
* * * * *
Lightly I broke green branches for a bed,
And gathered ferns, a pillow for my head.
And what to this were kingly chambers worth--
Sleeping, an ant, upon the sheltering earth.
EDWIN MARKHAM,
in _Lincoln and Other Poems._
JANUARY 25.
CALIFORNIA.
Queen of the Coast, she stands here emerald-crowned,
Waiting her ships that sail in from the sea,
Fairer than all the western world to me,
Is this young Goddess whom the years have found
Ocean and land, with riches rare and sweet.
Loyally bring their treasures to her feet;
In her brave arms she holds with proud content
The varied plenty of a continent;
In her fair face, and in her dreaming eyes,
Shines the bright promise of her destinies;
Winds kiss her cheek, and fret the restless tides,
She in their truth with faith divine confides,
Watching the course of empire's brilliant fate,
She looks serenely through the Golden Gate.
ANNA MORRISON REED.
JANUARY 26.
Here was our first (and still largest) national romance, the first
wild-flower of mystery, the first fierce passion of an uncommonly
hard-fisted youth. To this day it persists the only glamour between
the covers of our geography. For more than fifty years its only name
has been a witchcraft, and its spell is stronger now than ever, as
shall be coolly demonstrated. This has meant something in the
psychology of so unfanciful a race. The flowering of imagination is no
trivial incident, whether in one farm boy's life or in a people's. It
may be outgrown, and so much as forgotten; but it shall never again be
as if it had never been. Without just that flower we should not have
just this fruit.
CHARLES F. LUMMIS,
in _Out West, June_, 1892.
JANUARY 27.
As time goes on its endless course, environment is sure to crystallize
the American nation. Its varying elements will become unified and the
weeding out process will probably leave the finest human product ever
known. The color, the perfume, the size and form that are placed in
the plants will have their analogies in the composite, the American of
the future.
And now what will hasten this development most of all? The proper
rearing of children. Don't feed children on maudlin sentimentalism or
dogmatic religion; give them nature. Let their souls drink in all that
is pure and sweet. Rear them, if possible, amid pleasant surroundings.
If they come into the world with souls groping in darkness, let them
see and feel the light. Don't terrify them in early life with the fear
of an after world. There never was a child that was made more noble
and good by the fear of a hell. Let nature teach them the lessons of
good and proper living. Those children will grow to be the best of men
and women. Put the best in them in contact with the best outside. They
will absorb it as a plant does sunshine and the dew.
LUTHER BURBANK.
JANUARY 28.
Let us embark freely upon the ocean of truth; listen to every word of
God-like genius as to a whisper of the Holy Ghost, with the conviction
that beauty, truth and love are always divine, and that the real Bible,
whose inspiration can never be questioned, comprises all noble and true
words spoken and written by man in all ages.
WILLIAM DAY SIMONDS,
in _Freedom and Fraternity._
JANUARY 29.
Westward the Star of Empire! Come West, young men! Westward ho! to all
of you who want an opportunity to do something and to be something.
Here is the place in the great Southwest, in the great Northwest, in
all the great West, where you can find an opportunity ready to your
hand. We are only 3,000,000 now. There is room here for 30,000,000.
Where each one of us is now finding an opportunity to do something and
be something there is plenty of room for ten more of you to come and
join us.
G.W. BURTON,
in _Burton's Book on California._
JANUARY 30.
IN CALIFORNIA'S MOUNTAINS.
'Mid the far, fair hills, beneath the pines
With their carpet of needles, soft and brown.
Dwells the precious scent of rare old wines.
Where the sun's distilling rays pour down:
Away from the city, mile on mile,
Far up in the hills where life's worth while.
There the rivulet in gladness leaps
Down a fronded valley, sweet and cool,
Or pausing a little moment sleeps
In a mossy, rock-bound, limpid pool:
Away from the city, mile on mile,
Far up in the hills where life's worth while.
The wild bird carols its sweetest lay,
And the world seems golden with love's good cheer;
There is never a care to cloud the day,
And Heaven, itself, seems, oh, so near!
Away from the city, mile on mile.
Far up in the hills where life's worth while.
WILLIS GEORGE EMERSON.
JANUARY 31.
OUT HERE IN CALIFORNIA.
Out here in California, when Winter's on the scene
And the earth is like a maiden clad in shimmering robes of green;
When the mountains 'way off yonder lift their snowy peaks to God,
While here the dainty flowers raise their faces from the sod;
When the sunbeams kiss the waters till they laugh beneath the rays,
And nature seems a-joining in a matchless hymn of praise;
When there's just enough of frostiness a sense of life to give,
Right here in California it's a comfort just to live.
Out here in California in the January days
The soul of nature seems to sing a jubilee of praise,
And the songbirds whistle clearer, and the blossoms are more fair,
And someway joy and blessing seem about us in the air.
It's cold perhaps off yonder, but we never feel it here,
For the seasons run together through a Summer-haunted year,
And Dame Nature in her bounty leaves us nothing to forgive
Right here in California, where it's comfort just to live.
Out here in California where the orange turns to gold
And Nature has forgotten all the art of growing old,
There's not a day throughout the year when flowers do not grow;
There's not a single hour the streams do not unfettered flow;
There's not a briefest moment when the songsters do not sing,
And life's a sort of constant race 'twixt Summer and the Spring.
Why, just to know the joy of it one might his best years give--
Out here in California, where it's comfort just to live.
A.J. WATERHOUSE.
FEBRUARY 1.
Night-time in California. Elsewhere men only guess
At the glory of the evenings that are perfect--nothing less;
But here the nights, returning, are the wond'rous gifts of God--
As if the days were maidens fair with golden slippers shod.
There is no cloud to hide the sky; the universe is ours,
And the starlight likes to look and laugh in Cupid-haunted bowers.
Oh the restful, peaceful evenings! In them my soul delights,
For God loved California when He gave to her her nights.
ALFRED JAMES WATERHOUSE,
in _Some Homely Little Songs._
FEBRUARY 2.
There it lay, a constellation of lights, a golden radiance dimmed by
the distance. San Francisco the Impossible. The City of Miracles! Of
it and its people many stories have been told, and many shall be; but
a thousand tales shall not exhaust its treasury of romance. Earthquake
and fire shall not change it, terror and suffering shall not break its
glad, mad spirit. Time alone can tame the town, restrain its wanton
manners, refine its terrible beauty, rob it of its nameless charm,
subdue it to the commonplace. May time be merciful--may it delay its
fatal duty till we have learned that to love, to forgive, to enjoy, is
but to understand!
GELETT BURGESS,
in _The Heart Line._
FEBRUARY 3.
INCONSTANCY.
The bold West Wind loved a crimson Rose.
West winds do.
This dainty secret he never had told.
He thought she knew.
But there were poppies to be caressed--
When he returned from his fickle quest,
He found _his_ Rose on another's breast.
Alas! Untrue!
IDA MANSFIELD-WILSON.
FEBRUARY 4.
THE FIRST FLAG RAISING IN CALIFORNIA.
In February, 1829 the ship Brookline of Boston arrived at San Diego.
The mate, James P. Arthur, was left at Point Loma, with a small party
to cure hides, while the vessel went up the coast. To attract passing
ships Arthur and one of his men, Greene, concluded to make and raise a
flag. This was done by using Greene's cotton shirt for the white and
Arthur's woolen shirts for the red and blue. With patient effort they
cut the stars and stripes with their knives, and sewed them together
with sail needles. A small tree lashed to their hut made a flag-pole.
A day or two later a schooner came in sight, and up went the flag.
This was on Point Loma, on the same spot, possibly, hallowed by the
graves of the seventy-five men who lost their lives in the Bennington
explosion, July 21, 1905.
MAJOR W.J. HANDY.
FEBRUARY 5.
Live for to-day--nor pause to fear
Of what To-morrow's sun may bring!
To-day has hours of hope and cheer.
To-day your songs of joy should ring.
The Yesterdays are dead and gone
Adown the long, uneven way;
But Hope is smiling with the dawn--
Live for To-day!
* * * * *
Live for To-day! He wins the crown
Whose work stands but the crucial test!
Who scales the heights through sneer and frown
And gives unto the world his best.
Bend to your task! The steep slopes climb,
And Love's true light will lead the way
To perfect peace in God's own time--
Live for To-day!
E.A. BRININSTOOL
FEBRUARY 6.
It is a peculiar feature of our sailing that within a few hours we may
change our climate. Cool, windy, moist, in the lower bays; and hot,
calm, and quiet in the rivers, creeks, and sloughs. As you go to Napa,
for instance, the wind gradually lightens as the bay is left, the air
is balmier, and finally the yacht is left becalmed. We can, moreover,
in two hours run from salt into fresh water. In spring the water is
fresh down into Suisun Bay; and at Antioch, fresh water is the rule.
The yachts frequently sail up there so that the barnacles will be
killed by the fresh water.
CHARLES G. YALE,
in _The Californian._
FEBRUARY 7.
Across San Pablo's heaving breast
I see the home-lights gleam,
As the sable garments of the night
Drop down on vale and stream.
* * * * *
Hard by, yon vessel from the seas
Her cargo homeward brings,
And soon, like sea-bird on her nest,
Will sleep with folded wings.
The fisher's boat swings in the bay,
From yonder point below,
While ours is drifting with the tide,
And rocking to and fro.
LUCIUS HARWOOD FOOTE,
in _A Red-Letter Day._
FEBRUARY 8.
A few years ago this valley of San Gabriel was a long open stretch of
wavy slopes and low rolling hills; in winter robed in velvety green
and spangled with myriads of flowers all strange to Eastern eyes; in
summer brown with sun-dried grass, or silvery gray where the light
rippled over the wild oats. Here and there stood groves of huge
live-oaks, beneath whose broad, time-bowed heads thousands of cattle
stamped away the noons of summer. Around the old mission, whose bells
have rung o'er the valley for a century, a few houses were grouped;
but beyond this there was scarcely a sign of man's work except the
far-off speck of a herdsman looming in the mirage, or the white walls
of the old Spanish ranch-house glimmering afar through the hazy
sunshine in which the silent land lay always sleeping.
T.S. VAN DYKE,
in _Southern California._
FEBRUARY 9.
The surroundings of Monterey could not well be more beautiful if they
had been gotten up to order. Hills, gently rising, the chain broken
here and there by a more abrupt peak, environ the city, crowned with
dark pines and the famous cypress of Monterey (_Cypressus macrocarpa_.)
Before us the bay lies calm and blue, and away across, can be seen
the town of Santa Cruz, an indistinct white gleam on the mountain side.
JOSEPHINE CLIFFORD McCRACKIN,
in _Another Juanita._
LOS ALTOS.
The lark sends up a carol blithe,
Bloom-billows scent the breeze,
Green-robed the rolling foot-hills rise
And poppies paint the leas.
HANNA OTIS BRUN.
FEBRUARY 10.
SANTA BARBARA.
A golden bay 'neath soft blue skies,
Where on a hillside creamy rise
The mission towers, whose patron saint
Is Barbara--with legend quaint.
HELEN ELLIOTT BANDINI,
in __History of California._
Dare to be free. Free to do the thing you crave to do and that craves
the doing. Free to live in that higher realm where none is fit to
criticise save one's self. Free to scorn ridicule, to face contempt,
to brave remorse. Free to give life to the one human soul that can
demand and grant such a boon--one's own self.
MIRIAM MICHELSON,
in _Anthony Overman._
FEBRUARY 11.
In Carmel pines the summer wind
Sings like a distant sea.
O harps of green, your murmurs find
An echoing chord in me!
On Carmel shore the breakers moan
Like pines that breast the gale.
O whence, ye winds and billows, flown
To cry your wordless tale?
GEORGE STERLING,
in _A Wine of Wizardry and Other Poems._
OAKLAND--BERKELEY--ALAMEDA.
O close-clasped towns across the bay,
Whose lights like gleaming jewels stray,
A ruby, golden, splendid way,
When day from earth has flown.
I watch you lighting night by night,
O twisted strands of jewels bright,
The altar-fires of home, alight--
I who am all alone.
GRACE HIBBARD,
in _Forget-me-nots from California._
FEBRUARY 12.
On the Berkeley Hills for miles away
I went a-roaming one winter's day,
And what do you think I saw, my dear?
A place where the sky came down to the hill,
And a big white cloud on the fresh green grass,
And bright red berries my basket to fill,
And mustard that grew in a golden mass--
All on a winter's day, my dear!
CHARLES KEELER,
in _Elfin Songs of Sunland._
FEBRUARY 13.
THE SUNSET GUN AT ANGEL ISLAND
A touch of night on the hill-tops gray;
A dusky hush on the quivering Bay;
A calm moon mounting the silent East--
White slave the day-god has released;
Small, scattered clouds
That seemed to wait
Like sheets of fire
O'er the Golden Gate.
And under Bonita, growing dim.
With a seeming pause on the ocean's rim,
Like a weary lab'rer, smiles the sun
To the booming crash of the sunset gun.
LOWELL OTUS REESE.
FEBRUARY 14.
MY VALENTINE.
My valentine needs not this day
Of Cupid's undisputed sway
To have my loving heart disclose
The love for her that brightly glows;
For it is hers alway, alway.
Whate'er the fickle world may say,
There's nought within its fair array
That for a moment could depose
My valentine.
Where'er the paths of life may stray,
'Mid valleys dark or gardens gay,
With holly wild or blushing rose,
Through summer's gleam or winter's snows,
Thou art, dear love, for aye and aye.
My valentine.
CLIFFORD HOWARD.
FEBRUARY 15.
JOAQUIN MILLER'S HOME ON THE HIGHTS.
* * * * *
Rugged! Rugged as Parnassus!
Rude, as all roads I have trod--
Yet are steeps and stone-strewn passes
Smooth o'erhead, and nearest God.
Here black thunders of my canyon
Shake its walls in Titan wars!
Here white sea-born clouds companion
With such peaks as know the stars.
* * * * *
Steep below me lies the valley,
Deep below me lies the town,
Where great sea-ships ride and rally,
And the world walks up and down.
O, the sea of lights far streaming
When the thousand flags are furled--
When the gleaming bay lies dreaming
As it duplicates the world.
* * * * *
JOAQUIN MILLER.
FEBRUARY 16.
I have watched the ships sailing and steaming in through the Golden
Gate, and they seemed like doves of peace bringing messages of
good-will from all the world. In the still night, when the scream of
the engine's whistle would reach my ears, I would reflect upon the
fact that though dwelling in a city whose boundaries were almost at
the verge of our nation's great territory, yet we were linked to it by
bands of steel, and Plymouth Rock did not seem so far from Shag Rock,
nor Bedloe's Island from Alcatraz.
LORENZO SOSSO,
in _Wisdom of the Wise._
FEBRUARY 17.
We believe that when future generations shall come to write our
history they will find that in this city of San Francisco we have been
true to our ideals; that we have struggled along as men who struggle,
not always unfalteringly, but at least always with a good heart; that
we have tried to do our duty by our town and by our country and by the
people who look to us for light, and that history will be able to say
of San Francisco that she has been true to her trust as the "Warder of
two continents"; that she has been the jewel set in the place where
the ends of the ring had met; that she is the mistress of the great
sea which spreads before us, and of the people who hunger for light,
for truth, and for civilization; that she stands for truth, a flaming
signal set upon the sentinel hills, calling all the nations to the
blessings of the freedom which we enjoy.
FATHER P.C. YORKE,
in _The Warder of Two Continents._
FEBRUARY 18.
FROM THE MOUNTAIN TOPS, LOOKING TOWARDS SAN FRANCISCO BAY.
From the mountain tops we see the valleys stretching out for leagues
below. The eye travels over the tilled fields and the blossoming
orchards, through the tall trees and along the verdant meadows that
are watered by the mountain streams. Beyond the valley rolls the
ocean, whereon we see the armored vessels, and the pleasure yachts,
and the merchant ships, laden with the grain of our golden shores,
sailing under every flag that floats the sea.
LAURENCE BRANNICK.
FEBRUARY 19.
THE POET'S SONG.
I gather flowers on moss-paved woodland ways
I roam with poets dead in tranced amaze;
Soon must my wild-wood sheaf be cast away,
But in my heart the poet's song shall stay.
CHARLES KEELER,
in _A Season's Sowing._
FEBRUARY 20.
Morning of fleet-arrive was splandid. By early hour of day all S.F.
persons has clustered therselves on tip of hills and suppression of
excitement was enjoyed. Considerable watching occurred. Barking of
dogs was strangled by collars, infant babies which desired to weep was
spanked for prevention of. Silences. Depressed banners was held in
American hands to get ready wave it.
Many persons in Sabbath clothings was there, including 1,000 Japanese
spies which were very nice behaviour. I was nationally proud of them.
Of suddenly, Oh!!!
Through the Goldy Gate, what see? Maglificent sight of marine
insurance! Floating war-boats of dozens approaching directly straight
by line and shooting salutes at people. On come them Imperial Navy of
Hon. Roosevelt and Hon. Hobson; what heart could quit beating at it?
Such white paint--like bath tub enamel, only more respectful in
appearance. * * *
From collected 1/2 million of persons on hills of S.F. one mad yell of
star-spangly joy. Fire-crack salute, siren whistle, honk-horn,
megaphone, extra edition, tenor solo--all connected together to give
impressions of loyal panderonium.
WALLACE IRWIN,
in _Letters of a Japanese Schoolboy._
FEBRUARY 21.
CALIFORNIA TO THE FLEET.
Behold, upon thy yellow sands,
I wait with laurels in my hands.
The Golden Gate swings wide and there
I stand with poppies in my hair.
Come in, O ships! These happy seas
Caressed the golden argosies
Of forty-nine. They felt the keel
Of dark Ayala's pinnace steal
Across the mellow gulf and pass
Unchallenged, under Alcatraz.
Not War we love, but Peace, and these
Are but the White Dove's argosies--
The symbols of a mighty will
No tyrant hand may use for ill.
DANIEL S. RICHARDSON,
in _Trail Dust._
FEBRUARY 22.
The splendors of a Sierra sunset cannot be accurately delineated by
pencil or brush. The combined pigments of a Hill and a Moran and a
Bierstadt cannot adequately reproduce so gorgeous a canvas. The
lingering sun floods all the west with flame; it touches with scarlet
tint the serrated outlines of the distant summits and hangs with
golden fringe each silvery cloud. Then the colors soften and turn into
amber and lilac and maroon. These soon assimilate and dissolve and
leave an ashes of rose haze on all far-away objects, when receding
twilight spreads its veil and shuts from view all but the mountain
outlines, the giant taxodiums and the fantastic fissures of the
canyons beneath.
BEN C. TRUMAN,
in _Occidental Sketches._
FEBRUARY 23.
GOLDEN GATE PARK IN MIDWINTER.
The dewdrops hang on the bending grass,
A dragon-fly cuts a sunbeam through.
The moaning cypress trees lift somber arms
Up to skies of cloudless blue.
A humming-bird sips from a golden cup,
In the hedge a hidden bird sings,
And a butterfly among the flowers
Tells me that the soul has wings.
GRACE HIBBARD,
in _Wild Roses of California._
FEBRUARY 24.
Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will
flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their
own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will
drop off like autumn leaves.
JOHN MUIR.
It was indeed a glorious morning. The bay, a molten blaze of many
blended hues, bore upon its serene surface the flags of all nations,
above which brooded the white doves of peace. Crafts of every
conceivable description swung in the flame-lit fathoms that laved the
feet of the stately hills, then stepping out, one by one, from their
gossamer night robes to receive the first kiss of dawn.
Grim Alcatraz, girdled with bristling armaments, scintillating in the
sun, suggested the presence of some monster leviathan, emerging from
the deep, still undivested of gems, from his submarine home.
EUGENIA KELLOGG,
in _The Awakening of Poccalito._
FEBRUARY 25.
THE SIERRA NEVADAS
They watch and guard the sleeping dells
Where ice born torrents flow--
A myriad granite sentinels,
Helmed and cuirassed with snow.
* * * * *
Yon glacial torrent's deep, hoarse lute
Its upward music flings--
The great, eternal crags stand mute,
And listen while it sings
O mighty range! Thy wounds and scars,
Thy weird, bewildering forms,
Attest thine everlasting wars--
Thy heritage of storms
And still what peace! Serenity
On crag and deep abyss,
O, may such calmness fall on me
When Azrael stoops to kiss.
GEORGE N. LOWE.
FEBRUARY 26.
Tamalpais is a wooded mountain with ample slopes, and from it on the
north stretch away ridges of forest land, the out posts of the great
Northern woods of _Sequoia sempervirens_, This mountain and the
mountainous country to the south bring the forest closer to San
Francisco than to any other American city. Within the last few years
men have killed deer on the slopes of Tamalpais and looked down to see
the cable cars crawling up the hills of San Francisco to the south. In
the suburbs coyotes still stole in and robbed hen roosts by night.
WILL IRWIN,
in _The City That Was._
FEBRUARY 27.
DAWN ON MOUNT TAMALPAIS.
A cloudless heaven is bending o'er us,
The dawn is lighting the linn and lea;
Island and headland and bay before us,
And, dim in the distance, the heaving sea.
The Farallon light is faintly flashing,
The birds are wheeling in fitful flocks,
The coast-line brightens, the waves are dashing
And tossing their spray on the Lobos rocks.
The Heralds of Morn in the east are glowing
And boldly lifting the veil of night;
Whitney and Shasta are bravely showing
Their crowns of snow in the morning light.
The town is stirring with faint commotion,
In all its highways it throbs and thrills;
We greet you! Queen of the Western Ocean,
As you wake to life on your hundred hills.
The forts salute, and the flags are streaming
From ships at anchor in cove and strait;
O'er the mountain tops, in splendor beaming,
The sun looks down on the Golden Gate.
LUCIUS HARWOOD FOOTE.
FEBRUARY 28.
ENOUGH.
When my calm majestic mountains are piled white and high
Against the perfect rose-tints of a living sunrise sky,
I can resign the dearest wish without a single sigh,
And let the whole world's restlessness pass all unheeded by.
MARY RUSSELL MILLS.
FEBRUARY 29.
MARSHALL SAUNDERS ON SAN FRANCISCO.
How we all love a city that we have once contemplated making our home!
Such a city to me is San Francisco, and but for unavoidable duties
elsewhere, I would be there today. I loved that bright, beautiful
city, and even the mention of its name sends my blood bounding more
quickly through my veins. That might have been _my_ city, and I
therefore rejoice in its prosperity. I am distressed when calamity
overtakes it--I never lose faith in its ultimate success. The heart of
the city is sound. It has always been sound, even in the early days
when a ring of corrupt adventurers would have salted the city of the
blessed herb with an unsavory reputation, but for the care of staunch
and courageous protectors at the heart of it.
San Francisco is not the back door of the continent. San Francisco is
the front door. Every ship sailing out of its magnificent bay to the
Orient, proclaims this fact. San Francisco will one day lead the
continent. A city that cares for its poor and helpless, its children
and dumb animals, that encourages art and learning, and never wearies
in its prosecution of evil-doers--that city will eventually emerge
triumphant from every cloud of evil report. Long live the dear city by
the Golden Gate!
MARSHALL SAUNDERS, _July_, 1909.
"Senor Barrow, I congratulate you," Morale said, in his native tongue.
"A woman who cannot be won away by passion or by chance, is a woman of
gold."
GERTRUDE B. MILLARD,
in _On the Ciudad Road, The Newsletter, Jan._, 1899.
AT THE PRESIDIO OF SAN FRANCISCO.
The rose and honey-suckle here entwine
In lovely comradeship their am'rous arms;
Here grasses spread their undecaying charms.
And every wall is eloquent with vine;
Far-reaching avenues make beckoning sign,
And as we stroll along their tree-lined way,
The songster trills his rapture-breathing lay
From where he finds inviolable shrine.
And yet, within this beauty-haunted place
War keeps his dreadful engines at command.
With scarce a smile upon his frowning face,
And ever ready, unrelaxing hand ...
We start to see, when dreaming in these bowers,
A tiger sleeping on a bed of flowers.
EDWARD ROBESON TAYLOR,
in _Moods and Other Verse._
MARCH 1.
THE CITY'S VOICE.
A mighty undertone of mingled sound;
The cadent tumult rising from a throng
Of urban workers, blending in a song
Of greater life that makes the pulses bound.
The whirr of turning wheels, the hammers' ring
The noise of traffic and the tread of men,
The viol's sigh, the scratching of a pen--
All to a vibrant Whole their echoes fling.
Hark to the City's voice; it tells a tale
Of triumphs and defeats, of joy and woe,
The lover's tryst, the challenge of a foe,
A dying gasp, a new-born infant's wail.
The pulse-beats of a million hearts combined,
Reverberating in a rhythmic thrill--
A vital message that is never still--
A sweeping, cosmic chorus, unconfined.
LOUIS J. STELLMANN,
in _San Francisco Town Talk, December_ 6, 1902.
MARCH 2.
From his windows on Russian Hill one saw always something strange and
suggestive creeping through the mists of the bay. It would be a South
Sea Island brig, bringing in copra, to take out cottons and idols; a
Chinese junk after sharks' livers; an old whaler, which seemed to drip
oil, home from a year of cruising in the Arctic. Even the tramp
windjammers were deep-chested craft, capable of rounding the Horn or
of circumnavigating the globe; and they came in streaked and
picturesque from their long voyaging.
WILL IRWIN,
in _The City That Was._
MARCH 3.
WILD HONEY.
The swarms that escape from their careless owners have a weary,
perplexing time of it in seeking suitable homes. Most of them make
their way to the foot-hills of the mountains, or to the trees that
line the banks of the rivers, where some hollow log or trunk may be
found. A friend of mine, while out hunting on the San Joaquin, came
upon an old coon trap, hidden among some tall grass, near the edge of
the river, upon which he sat down to rest. Shortly afterward his
attention was attracted to a crowd of angry bees that were flying
excitedly about his head, when he discovered that he was sitting upon
their hive, which was found to contain more than 200 pounds of honey.
JOHN MUIR,
in _The Mountains of California._
MARCH 4.
PHOSPHORESCENT SEA WAVES, BALBOA BEACH, CAL.
Responsive to my oar and hand,
Touching to glory sea and sand.
A glint, a sparkle, a flash, a flame,
An ecstasy above all name.
What art thou, strange, mysterious flame?
Art thou some flash of central fire,
So pure and strong thou wilt not expire
Tho' plunged in ocean's seething main?
Mayest thou not be that sacred flame,
Creative, moulding, purging fire.
Aspiring, abandoning all desire
Shaping perfection from Life's pain?
MARY RUSSELL MILLS,
in _Fellowship Magazine._
MARCH 5.
THE JOY OF THE HILLS.
I ride on the mountain tops, I ride;
I have found my life and am satisfied.
* * * * *
I ride on the hills, I forgive, I forget
Life's hoard of regret--
All the terror and pain
Of the chafing chain.
Grind on, O cities, grind;
I leave you a blur behind.
I am lifted elate--the skies expand;
Here the world's heaped gold is a pile of sand.
Let them weary and work in their narrow walls;
I ride with the voices of waterfalls!
I swing on as one in a dream; I swing
Down the airy hollows, I shout, I sing!
The world is gone like an empty word;
My body's a bough in the wind, my heart a bird.
EDWIN MARKHAM,
in _The Man with a Hoe, and Other Poems._
MARCH 6.
We move about these streets of San Francisco in cars propelled by
electric energy created away yonder on the Tuolumne River in the
foothills of the Sierras; we sit at home and read by a light furnished
from the same distant source. How splendid it all is--the swiftly
flowing cascades of the Sierra Nevadas are being harnessed like
beautiful white horses, tireless and ageless, to draw the chariots
of industry around this Bay.
CHARLES REYNOLDS BROWN.
MARCH 7.
BACK, BACK TO NATURE.
Weary! I am weary of the madness of the town,
Deathly weary of all women, and all wine.
Back, back to Nature! I will go and lay me down,
Bleeding lay me down before her shrine.
For the mother-breast the hungry babe must call,
Loudly to the shore cries the surf upon the sea;
Hear, Nature wide and deep! after man's mad festival
How bitterly my soul cries out for thee!
HERMAN SCHEFFAUER,
in _Of Both Worlds._
MARCH 8.
Across the valley was another mountain, dark and grand, with flecks of
black growing _chemisai_ in clefts and crevices, and sunny slopes
and green fields lying at its base. And oh, the charm of these
mountains. In the valley there might be fog and the chill of the
north, but on the mountains lay the warmth and the dreaminess of the
south.
JOSEPHINE CLIFFORD McCRACKIN,
in _Overland Tales._