Francisco was still the city of gold and silver. The bonanza kings had
not left it, but were trying to accommodate themselves to the palaces
they were rearing with their loose millions. Society yet retained its
cosmopolitan tone, careless, brilliant, and unconventional. There were
figures in it that had made it famous--men who began life with a pick
and shovel and ended it in an orgy of luxury; women, whose habits of
early poverty fell off them like a garment, and who, carried away by
their power, displayed the barbaric caprices of Roman empresses.
The sudden possession of vast wealth had intoxicated this people,
lifting them from the level of the commonplace into a saturnalia of
extravagance. Poverty, the only restraint many of them had ever felt,
was gone. Money had made them lawless, whimsical, bizarre. It had
developed all-conquering personalities, potent individualities. They
were still playing with it, wondering at it, throwing it about.
GERALDINE BONNER,
in _Tomorrow's Tangle._
JUNE 24.
Menlo Park, originally a large Spanish grant, had long since been cut
up into country places for what may be termed the "Old Families of San
Francisco!" The eight or ten families that owned this haughty precinct
were as exclusive, as conservative, as any group of ancient families
in Europe. Many of them had been established here for twenty years,
none for less than fifteen. This fact set the seal of gentle blood
upon them for all time in the annals of California.
GERTRUDE ATHERTON,
in _The Californians._
JUNE 25.
John Bidwell, prince of California pioneers, was my chief in a
memorable camping trip in the northern Sierras. What a magnificent
camper was Bidwell! What a world of experience, what a wealth of
reminiscence! What a knowledge; what unbounded hospitality! Not while
life lasts can I forget the gentle yet commanding greatness of this
man, whose friendships and benefactions were as broad as his spreading
acres of Rancho Chico.
ROCKWELL D. HUNT,
in _Camping Out in California, Overland Monthly,
September_, 1907.
JUNE 26.
The average stage-driver merits one's liveliest gratitude. He is the
essence of good nature and thoughtfulness. His stories, tinctured by
his own quaint personality, ward off the drowsy wings of sleep and
materially shorten the long hours of the night. * * * To the
households scattered along his route he is the never-failing bearer of
letters, and newspapers, and all sorts of commodities, from a sack of
flour to a spool of cotton. His interest in their individual needs is
universal, and the memory he displays is simply phenomenal. He has
traveled up and down among them for many years, and calls each one by
his or her given name, and in return is treated by them as one of the
family. He is sympathetic and friendly without impertinence, and in
spite of your aching head and disjointed bones, you feel an
undercurrent of regret that civilization will soon do away with these
fresh and original characters.
NINETTA EAMES,
in _Overland Monthly, January_, 1888.
JUNE 27.
When the June sunshine gladdened the Sacramento Valley, three little
bare-footed girls walked here and there among the homes and tents of
Sutter's Fort. They were scantily clothed, and one carried a thin
blanket. At night they said their prayers, lay down in whatever tent
they happened to be, and, folding the blanket about them, fell asleep
in each other's arms. When they were hungry they asked food of
whomsoever they met. If anyone inquired who they were, they answered
as their mother had taught them: "We are the children of Mr. and Mrs.
George Donner." But they added something which they had learned since.
It was: "And our parents are dead."
C.F. McGLASHAN,
in _History of the Donner Party._
JUNE 28.
This cart was gaily decorated with a canopy which was in fact an
exquisitely embroidered silken bedspread. The background was of
grass-green silk, embroidered over the entire field with brightest red
and yellow, pink and white roses, with intertwining leaves and stems,
making the old _carreta_ appear to be a real rose-bower blooming
along the King's Highway. From the edges hung a rich, deep, silken
knotted fringe. Beneath the heavy fringe again hung lace curtains.
MRS. A.S.C. FORBES,
in _Mission Tales in the Days of the Dons._
A half-naked beggar will find a dirty ribbon out of an ash-barrel to
ornament himself, if he happens to be a she. * * * We women are such
striking guys without our first little aids to the ugly.
MIRIAM MICHELSON,
in _Anthony Overman._
JUNE 29.
During this unsettled period (1849), the "judge of first instance," or
alcalde, sat each day in the little school-room on the plaza of San
Francisco, trying cases, and rendering that speedy justice that was
then more desirable than exact justice, since men's time, in those
early days of 1849, was worth from sixteen dollars to one hundred
dollars per day. The judge listened to brief arguments, announced his
decision, took his fees, and called up another case; hardly once in a
hundred trials was there any thought of an appeal to the Governor at
Monterey.
CHARLES HOWARD SHINN,
in _Mining-Camps._
JUNE 30.
Like the senators Cineas found at Rome, they were an assembly of
kings, above law, who dealt out justice fresh and evenly balanced as
from the hand of the eternal. In all the uprisings in California there
has never been manifested any particular penchant on the part of the
people for catching and hanging criminals. They do not like it.
Naturally the law detests vigilance because vigilance is a standing
reproach to law. Let the law look to it and do its duty.
HUBERT HOWE BANCROFT,
in _Popular Tribunals._
AMONG THE MARIPOSA BIG TREES.
Older than man or beast or bird,
Ancient when God first spake and Adam heard--
We gaze with souls profoundly stirred
And plead for one revealing word.
But the great trees all are silent.
BENJAMIN FAY MILLS.
JULY 1.
VINTAGE IN THE GOLDEN LAND.
O fruit of changeless, ever-changing beauty!
Heavy with summer and the gift of love--
Caressingly I gather and lay you down;
Ensilvered as with dew, the innocent bloom
Of quiet days, yet thrilling with the warmth
Of life--tumultuous blood o' the earth!
The vital sap, the honey-laden juice
Dripping with ripeness, yields to murmuring bee
A pleasant burden; and the meadow-lark
With slow, voluptuous beak the nectar drinks
From the pierced purple.
* * * * *
How good it is, to sense the vineyard life!
To touch the fresh-veined leaves, the straggling stems,
The heavy boughs that bend along the ground;
And like a gay Bacchante, pluck the fruit
And taste the imperial flavors, beauty-wild
And singing child-songs with the bee and bird,
Deep in the vineyard's heart, 'neath the open sky--
Wide, wide, and blue, filled with sun-flooded space
And the silent song of the ripening of days!--
Eternal symbol of the bearing earth--
Harvest and vintage.
RUBY ARCHER.
JULY 2.
Whatever you believe when you are alone at night with the little imp
of conscience seated on the bedpost and whispering to you what to do,
whatever you believe to be best for yourself and best for your city at
that time, you do that thing and you won't be far wrong.
ANDREW FURUSETH.
JULY 3.
Above an elevation of four thousand feet timber is quite abundant.
Along the river-bottoms and low grounds the sycamore is found as
clean-limbed, tall and stately as elsewhere. The cottonwood, too, is
common, though generally dwarfed, scraggy and full of dead limbs. A
willow still more scraggy, and having many limbs destroyed with
mistletoe, is often found in the same places. The elder rises above
the dignity of a shrub, or under-shrub, but can hardly be found a
respectable tree. Two varieties of oak are common, and the alder forms
here a fine tree along the higher water-courses.
T.S. VAN DYKE,
in _Southern California._
JULY 4.
A WESTERN FOURTH.
Here, where Peralta's cattle used to stray;
Here, where the Spaniards in their early day
Rode, jingling, booted, spurred, nor ever guessed
Our race would own the land by them possessed;
Here, where Castilian bull-fights left their stain
Of blood upon the soil of this New Spain;
Here, where old live-oaks, spared till we condemn.
Still wait within this city named for them--
We celebrate, with bombshell and with rhyme
Our noisiest Day of Days of yearly time!
O bare Antonio's hills that rim our sky--
Antonio's hills, that used to know July
As but a time of sleep beneath the sun--
Such days of languorous dreaming are all done!
MARY BAMFORD,
in _Fourth of July Celebration, Oakland_, 1902.
JULY 5.
THE LIVE-OAKS.
In massy green, upon the crest
Of many a slanting hill,
By gentle wind and sun caressed,
The live-oaks carry still
A ponderous head, a sinewy breast,
A look of tameless will.
They plant their roots full firmly deep,
As for the avalanche;
And warily and strongly creep
Their slow trunks to the branch;
A subtle, devious way they keep,
Thrice cautious to be stanch.
A mighty hospitality
At last the builders yield,
For man and horse and bird and bee
A hospice and a shield,
Whose monolithic mystery
A curious power concealed.
RUBY ARCHER,
in _Los Angeles Times._
JULY 6.
FATE AND I.
"Thine the fault, not mine," I cried.
Brooding bitterly,
And Fate looked grim and once again
Closed in and grappled me.
"Mine, not thine, the fault," I said,
Discerning verity,
And Fate arose and clasped my hand
And made a man of me.
HAROLD S. SYMMES,
in _The American Magazine, April_, 1909.
JULY 7.
THE BROTHERHOOD OF TREES.
Dear brotherhood of trees! With you we find
Robust and hearty friendship, free from all
The laws of petty gods men travail for.
No wrangle here o'er things of small avail--
No knavery, nor charity betrayed--
But comrade beings--'Stalwart, steadfast, good.
You help the world in the noblest way of all--
By living nobly--showing in your lives
The utmost beauty, the full power and love
That through your wisdom and your long desire
Thrill in your vibrant veins from heart of earth.
Open your arms, O Trees, for us who come
With woodland longings in our pilgrim souls!
RUBY ARCHER.
JULY 8.
The scene was a ravine that had been cloven into the flank of a mighty
mountain as if by the stroke of a giant's axe. For about half a mile
this gash ran sharp and narrow; but at the upper end, the resting
place of the travelers, it widened into a spacious amphitheatre,
dotted with palm trees that rose with clean cylindrical boles sixty to
eighty feet before spreading their crowns of drooping leafage against
the azure of a cloudless sky--a wonderful touch of Egypt and the East
to surroundings typical of the American Far West.
EDMUND MITCHELL,
in _In Desert Keeping._
The noblest life--the life of labor;
The noblest love--the love of neighbor.
LORENZO SOSSO,
in _Wisdom for the Wise._
JULY 9.
THE LIVE OAKS AT MENLO PARK.
The road wound for some half mile through a stretch of uncultivated
land, dotted with the forms of huge live-oaks. The grass beneath them
was burnt gray and was brittle and slippery. The massive trees, some
round and compact and so densely leaved that they were impervious to
rain as an umbrella, others throwing out long, gnarled arms as if
spellbound in some giant throe of pain, cast vast slanting shadows
upon the parched ground. Some seemed, like trees in Dore's drawings,
to be endowed with a grotesque, weird humanness of aspect, as though
an imprisoned dryad or gnome were struggling to escape, causing the
mighty trunk to bow and writhe, and sending tremors of life along each
convulsed limb. A mellow hoariness marked them all, due to their own
richly subdued coloring and the long garlands of silvery moss that
hung from their boughs like an old, rich growth of hair.
GERALDINE BONNER,
in _Tomorrow's Tangle._
JULY 10.
MADRONA.
No other of our trees, to those who know it in its regions of finest
development, makes so strong an appeal to man's imagination--to his
love of color, of joyful bearing, of sense of magic, of surprise and
change. He walks the woods in June or July and rustles the mass of
gold-brown leaves fresh fallen under foot, or rides for unending weeks
across the Mendocino ranges--and always with a sense of fresh interest
and stimulation at the varying presence of this tree.
W.L. JEPSON,
in _Trees of California._
JULY 11.
THE WOODS OF THE WEST.
Oh, woods of the west, leafy woods that I love.
Where through the long days I have heard
The prayer of the wind in the branches above,
And the tremulous song of the bird.
Where the clust'ring blooms of the dog-wood hang o'er--
White stars in the dusk of the pine,
And down the dim aisles of the old forest pour
The sunbeams that melt into wine!
* * * * *
Oh, woods of the west, I am sighing today
For the sea-songs your voices repeat,
For the evergreen glades, for the glades far away
From the stifling air of the street,
And I long, ah, I long to be with you again
And to dream in that region of rest.
Forever apart from this warring of men--
Oh, wonderful woods of the west!
HERBERT BASHFORD,
in _At the Shrine of Song._
JULY 12.
The Mohave yucca is a remarkable plant, which resembles in its nature
both the cactus and the palm. It is found nowhere save in the Mohave
Desert. It attains a height of thirty or forty feet, and the trunk,
often two or three feet in diameter, supports half a dozen irregular
branches, each tipped with a cluster of spine-like leaves. The
flowers, which are of a dingy white color, come out in March and last
until May, giving off a disagreeable odor. The fruit, however, which
is two or three inches long, is pulpy and agreeable, resembling a date
in flavor.
ARTHUR J. BURDICK,
in _The Mystic Mid-Region._
JULY 13 AND 14.
Throughout the coast region, except in the extreme north, this Live
Oak is the most common and characteristic tree of the Coast Range
valleys which it beautifies with low broad heads whose rounded
outlines are repeated in the soft curves of the foothills. Disposed in
open groves along the bases of low hills, fringing the rich lands
along creeks or scattered by hundreds or thousands over the fertile
valley floors, the eyes of the early Spanish explorers dwelt on the
thick foliage of the swelling crowns and read the fertility of the
land in these evergreen oaks which they called Encina. The chain of
Franciscan Missions corresponded closely to the general range of the
Live Oak although uniformly well within the margin of its geographical
limits both eastward and northward. The vast assemblage of oaks in the
Santa Clara Valley met the eyes of Portola, discoverer of San
Francisco Bay, in 1769, and a few years later, Crespi, in the
narrative of the expedition of 1772, called the valley the "Plain of
Oaks of the Port of San Francisco." Then came Vancouver, Englishman
and discoverer. Although he was the first to express a just estimate
of the Bay of San Francisco, which he declared to be as fine as any
port in the world, nevertheless it is his felicitous and appreciative
description of the groves of oaks, the fertile soil (of which they
were a sign), and the equable climate that one reads between his lines
of 1792 the prophecy of California's later empire.
W.L. JEPSON,
in _Silva of California._
JULY 15.
Huge live-oaks, silvered with a boar of lichen, stretched their boughs
in fantastic frenzies. Gray fringes of moss hung from them, and
tangled screens of clematis and wild grape caught the sunlight in
their flickering meshes or lay over mounds of foliage like a torn
green veil. * * *
For nearly two miles the carriage drive wound upward through this
sylvan solitude. As it approached the house a background of emerald
lawns shone through the interlacing branches, and brilliant bits of
flower beds were set like pieces of mosaic between gray trunks.
GERALDINE BONNER,
in _The Pioneer._
JULY 16.
The Yellow Pine is the most abundant and widely distributed tree of
the forests of California and is particularly characteristic of the
Sierra Nevada, where it attains its finest development. The largest
trees most commonly grow along the ridges and it is the ridges which
the trails ordinarily follow. Here the traveler may journey day after
day, over needle-carpeted or grassy ground, mostly free of underbrush,
amidst great clean shafts 40 to 150 feet high, of really massive
proportions but giving a sense of lightness by reason of their color,
symmetry, and great height. No two trunks in detail of bark are
modeled exactly alike, for each has its own particular finish; so it
is that the eye never wearies of the fascination of the Yellow Pine
but travels contentedly from trunk to trunk and wanders satisfyingly
up and down their splendid columns--the finest of any pine.
W.L. JEPSON,
in _Silva of California._
JULY 17.
MENDOCINO.
A vast cathedral by the western sea,
Whose spires God set in majesty on high,
Peak after peak of forests to the sky,
Blended in one vast roof of greenery.
The nave, a river broadening to the sea:
The aisles, deep canyons of eternal build;
The transepts, valleys with God's splendor filled;
The shrines, white waterfalls in leaf-laced drapery;
The choir stands westward by the sounding shore;
The cliffs like beetling pipes set high in air;
Roll from the beach the thunders crashing there;
The high wind-voices chord the breakers' roar;
And wondrous harmonies of praise and prayer
Swell to the forest altars evermore.
LILLIAN H. SHUEY,
in _Among the Redwoods._
JULY 18.
They were passing an orange-grove, and they entered a road bordered
with scarlet geraniums that wound for a mile through eucalyptus trees,
past artificial lakes where mauve water-lilies floated in the sun, and
boats languorously invited occupants. Finally they came upon a smooth
sward like that of an English park, embellished with huge date-palms,
luxuriant magnolias, and regal banana-trees. Then they passed a brook
tumbling in artificial cascades between banks thick with mossy ferns,
and bright with blossoms. The children led their companion beneath fig
and bay trees through an Italian garden; all of this splendid luxury
of verdure had sprung from the desert as the result of a fortune
patiently spent in irrigation.
MRS. FREMONT OLDER,
in _The Giants._
JULY 19.
Some men have an eye for trees and an inborn sympathy with these
rooted giants, as if the same sap ran in their own veins. To them
trees have a personality quite as animals have, and, to be sure, there
are "characters" among trees. I knew a solitary yellow pine which
towered in the landscape, the last of its race. Its vast columnal
trunk seemed to loom and expand as one approached. Always there was
distant music in the boughs above, a noble strain descending from the
clouds. Its song was more majestic than that of any other tree, and
fell upon the listening ear with the far-off cadence of the surf, but
sweeter and more lyrical, as if it might proceed from some celestial
harp. Though there was not a breeze stirring below, this vast tree
hummed its mighty song. Apparently its branches had penetrated to
another world than this, some sphere of increasing melody.
C.H. KIRKHAM,
in _In the Open._
JULY 20.
You will think the gentlemen were fine dandies in those Mexican days,
when I tell you that they often wore crimson velvet knee trousers
trimmed with gold lace, embroidered white shirts, bright green cloth
or velvet jackets with rows and rows of silver buttons and red sashes
with long streaming ends. Their wide-brimmed _sombreros_ (hats)
were trimmed with silver or gold braid and tassels. * * * Each
gentleman wore a large Spanish cloak of rich velvet or embroidered
cloth, and if it rained, he threw over his fine clothes a
_serape_, or square woolen blanket, with a slit cut in the middle
for the head.
ELLA M. SEXTON,
in _Stories of California._
JULY 21.
ON THE PLANTING OF THE TREES AT THE PACIFIC THEOLOGICAL
SEMINARY, OAKLAND.
And what shall be the children's tree,
To grow while we are sleeping?
The maple sweet; the manzanete;
The gentle willow weeping;
The larch; the yew; the oak so true,
Kind mother strong and tender;
Or, white and green, in gloss and sheen,
Queen Magnolia's splendor?
One wan, hot noon. His path was strewn,
Whose love did all love quicken,
With leaves of palm while song and psalm
Held all the world to listen.
For His dear sake, the palm we'll take--
Each frond shall be a prayer
That He will guide, whate'er betide,
Until we meet Him there.
CHARLES J. WOODBURY.
JULY 22.
The landscape, glazed with heat, seemed to faint under the unwinking
glare of the sun. From the parched grass-land and the thickets of
chaparral, pungent scents arose--the ardent odors that the woods of
foot-hill California exhale in the hot, breathless quiescence of
summer afternoons. * * *
The air came over it in glassy waves, carrying its dry, aromatic
perfume to one's nostrils. On its burnt expanse a few huge live-oaks
rose dark and dome-like, their shadows, black and irregular, staining
the ground beneath them.
GERALDINE BONNER,
in _The Pioneer._
JULY 23.
With great discomfort and considerable difficulty they threaded this
miniature forest, starting all sorts of wild things as they went on.
Cotton-tail rabbits fled before them. Gophers stuck their heads out of
the ground, and viewed them with jewel-like eyes, then noiselessly
retreated to their underground preserves. Large gray ground squirrels
sat up on their haunches, with bushy tails curled gracefully around
them and wee forepaws dropped downward as if in mimic courtesy, but
scampered off at their approach. Flocks of birds arose from their
feeding grounds, and lizards rustled through the dead leaves.
FLORA HAINES LOUGHEAD,
in _The Abandoned Claim._
JULY 24.
THE SENTINEL TREE.
(CYPRESS POINT, CALIFORNIA.)
A giant sentinel, alone it stands
On rocky headland where the breakers roar,
Parted from piny woods and pebbled shore.
Holding out branches as imploring hands.
Poor lonely tree, where never bird doth make
Its nest, or sing at morn and eve to thee,
Nor in whose shadow wild rose calleth bee
To come on gauzy wing for love's sweet sake.
Nature cares for thee, gives thee sunshine gold,
Handfuls of pearls cast from the crested waves,
For thee pink-throated shells soft murmurs hold,
And seaweed vested chorists chant in caves.
Whence came thee, lone one of an alien band.
To guard an outpost of this sunset land?
GRACE HIBBARD,
in _Forget-me-nots from California._
JULY 25.
IN THE MEXICAN JUNGLE.
The jungle, however, rang with life. Brilliant birds flew, screaming
at their approach--noisy parrots and macaws; the _gaucamaya_, one
flush of red and gold; a king vulture, raven black save for his
scarlet crest. From the safe height of a saber, monkeys showered
vituperations upon them. Once an _iguana_, great chameleon
lizard, rose under foot and dashed for the nearest water; again a
python wound its slow length across the path. Vegetation was equally
gorgeous, always strange. He saw plants that stung more bitterly than
insects; insects barely distinguishable from plants. Here a tree bore
flowers instead of leaves; there flowers grew as large as trees. * * *
Birds, beasts, flowers--all were strange, all were wonderful.
HERMAN WHITAKER,
in _The Planter._
JULY 26.
Sitting in the white-paved pergola at Montecito. with overhead a leafy
shelter of pink-flowered passifloras, looking out over the little
lake, its surface dotted with water-lilies, its banks fringed with
drooping shrubs and vines, the hum of the bee and the bird in the
air--I looked down over a wonderful collection of nearly 200 rare
palms and listened to the music that floated up from their waving
branches like that of a thousand silken-stringed eolian harp; and
there came into my mind visions of a people that shall be strong with
the strength of great hills, calm with the calm of a fair sea, united
as are at last the palm and the pine, mighty with the presence of God.
BELLE SUMNER ANGIER,
in _The Garden Book of California._
JULY 27.
THE GIANT SEQUOIAS.