8 CHAPTER I.

THE FIELD. Which gives me A more content in course of true delight Than to be thirsty after tottering honour, Or tie my pleasure up in silken bags, To please the fool and death.

Pericles.

THIS volume closes the narrative portion of my historical series; there yet remains to be completed the biographical section.

It is now over thirty years since I entered upon the task to-day accomplished. During this period my efforts have been continuous. Sickness and death have made felt their presence; financial storms have swept over the land, leaving ghastly scars; calamities more or less severe have at various times called at my door; yet have I never been wholly overwhelmed, or reached a point where was forced upon me a cessation of library labors, even for a single day. Nor has my work been irksome; never have I lost interest or enthusiasm; never have I regretted the consecration of my life to this cause, or felt that my abilities might have been better employed in some one of the great enterprises attending the material development of this western world, or in accumulating property, which was never a difficult thing for me to do. It has been from first to last a labor of love, its importance ever standing before me paramount to that of any other undertaking in which I could engage, while of this world's goods I have felt that I had 9 2 always my share, and have been ready to thank God for the means necessary to carry forward my work to its full completion. And while keenly alive to my lack of ability to perform the task as it ought to be done, I have all the time been conscious that it were a thousand times better it should be done as I could do it than not at all.

What was this task? It was first of all to save to the world a mass of valuable human experiences, which otherwise, in the hurry and scramble attending the securing of wealth, power, or place in this new field of enterprise, would have dropped out of existence. These experiences were all the more valuable from the fact that they were new; the conditions attending their origin and evolution never had before existed in the history of mankind, and never could occur again. There was here on this coast the ringing-up of universal intelligence for a final display of what man can do at his best, with all the powers of the past united, and surrounded by conditions such as had never before fallen to the lot of man to enjoy.

Secondly, having secured to the race a vast amount of valuable knowledge which otherwise would have passed into oblivion, my next task was to extract from this mass what would most interest people in history and biography, to properly classify and arrange the same, and then to write it out as a historical series, in the form of clear and condensed narrative, and so place within the reach of all this gathered knowledge, which otherwise were as much beyond the reach of the outside world as if it never had been saved. Meanwhile the work of collecting continued, while I erected a refuge of safety for the final preservation of the library, in the form of a fire-proof brick building on Valencia street, in the city of San Francisco. Finally, it was deemed necessary to add a biographical section to the history proper, in order that the builders of the 10 3 commonwealths on this coast might have as full and fair treatment as the work of their hands was receiving.

Not that the plan in all its completeness arose in my mind as a whole in the first instance. Had it so presented itself, and with no alternative, I never should have had the courage to undertake it. It was because I was led on by my fate, following blindly in paths where there was no returning, that I finally became so lost in my labors that my only way out was to finish them. Wherefore, although I am not conscious of superstition in my nature, I cannot but feel that in this great work I was but the humble instrument of some power mightier than I, call it providence, fate, environment, or what you will. All the originatings of essential ideas and acts connected with the work grew out of the necessities of the case, and were not in the main inventions of mine, as this volume will show. That I should leave my home and friends at the east and come to this coast an unsophisticated boy, having in hand and mind the great purpose of securing to a series of commonwealths, destined to be second in intelligence and importance to none the sun has ever shone upon, more full and complete early historical data than any government or people on earth enjoy to-day, is not for a moment to be regarded as the facts of the case. It was the vital expression of a compelling energy.

Nor is it out of place, this referring of our physical unfoldings to the undeterminable for explanation, for it is only since the world has been so plainly told that it sees somewhat of the action and effect of environment. The individual entity, if it be an intelligent, thinking entity, does not now imagine itself either its own product or the exclusive product of any other individual entity. The unthinking thing acts and is acted on by universal regulation, passively, unknowingly. Even the natural selections of progress are made in accordance therewith, and seldom artificially or arbitrarily. Underlying all phenomena is the absolute, the elemental source of vital knowledge 11 4 and thus all the grand issues of life are referred back to a matter of carbon and ammonia.

And now, while presenting here a history of my history, and explanation of my life, its efforts and accomplishments, it is necessary first of all that there should be established in the mind of the reader a good and sufficient reason for the same. For in the absence of such a reason, to whose existence the simple appearing of the book is ex hypothesi a declaration, then is the author guilty of placing himself before the world in the unenviable light of one who appears to think more highly of himself and his labors than the world thinks, or than the expressions and opinions of the world would justify him in thinking.

In any of the departments of human activity, he alone can reasonably ask to be heard who has some new application of ideas; something to say which has never been said before; or, if said before, then something which can be better said this second or twentieth time. Within the last clause of this proposition my efforts do not come. All ancient facts are well recorded; all old ideas are already clothed in more beautiful forms than are at my command. It therefore remains to be shown that my historical labors, of which this volume is an exposition, come properly within the first of the categories. And this I am confident will appear, namely, that I do not only deal in new facts, but in little else; in facts brought out in this latter-day dispensation as a revelation of development as marvellous in its origin and as magical in its results as any appearing upon the breaking up of the great dark age preceding the world's uncovering and enlightenment. Every glance westward was met by a new ray of intelligence; every drawn breath of western air brought inspiration; every step taken was over an untried field; every experiment, every thought, every aspiration and act were original and individual; and the faithful recorder of the events attendant thereunto, who must be at once 12 5 poet and prophet of the new dispensation, had no need of legendary lore, of grandfather's tales, or of paths previously trodden.

And not only should be here established a proper reason for the appearance of this volume, as the results of a life of earnest endeavor, but all its predecesors should be reëstablished in the good opinions of the learned and intelligent world, of all who have so fully and freely bestowed their praise in times past; for the two propositions must stand or fall together. If my historical efforts have been superfluous or unnecessary; if it were as well they had never been undertaken, or little loss if blotted out of existence, then, not only have they no right to exist, to cumber the earth and occupy valuable room upon the shelves of libraries, but this volume must be set down as the product of mistaken zeal commensurate with the ideas of the author in regard to the merit, originality, and value claimed for the series. In a word, if the work is nothing, the explanation is worse than nothing; but if the work is worthy of its reputation, as something individual, important, and incapable of repetition or reproduction, then is this history and description of it not only not inopportune or superfluous, but it is a work which should be done, a work imperatively demanded of the author as the right of those whose kindness and sympathy have sustained him in his long and arduous undertakings.

The proposition stands thus: As the author's life has been mainly devoted to this labor, and not his alone but that of many others, and as the work has been extensive and altogether different from any which has hitherto been accomplished in any other part of the globe, it was thought that it might prove of interest if he should present a report, setting forth what he has accomplished and how he accomplished it. Coming to this coast a boy, he has seen it transformed from a wilderness into a garden of latter-day civilization, vast areas between the mountains and the sea 13 6 which were at first pronounced valueless unfolding into homes of refinement and progress. It would therefore seem, that as upon the territory covered by his work there is now being planted a civilization destined in time to be superior to any now existing; and as to coming millions, if not to those now here, everything connected with the efforts of the builders of the commonwealths on these shores will be of vital interest—it seems not out of place to devote the last volume of his historical series, proper, to an account of his labors in this field.

It was rather a slow process, as affairs are at present progressing, that of belting the earth by Asiatic and European civilization. Three thousand years, or we might say four thousand, were occupied in making the circuit now effected daily by the conscious lightning; three or four thousand years in finding a pathway now the thoroughfare of the nations. Half the distance—that is, from the hypothetical cradle of this civilization eastward to the Pacific and westward to the Atlantic—was achieved at a comparatively early period. The other half dragged its slow course along, a light age and a dark age intervening, the work beginning in earnest only after the inventions of gunpowder, printing, and the mariner's compass, the last permitting presumptuous man to traverse the several seas of darkness. Even after Mediterranean navigators had passed the Pillars of Hercules, and ventured beyond the sight of land, several hundred years elapsed before the other earth's end was permanently attained by way of the east and the west on the Pacific shores of America.

As the earth was thus disclosing its form and its secrets, men began to talk and write about it, saying much that was true and much that was false. First among the records are the holy books of Asia; holy, because their authors dwelt little on the things of this world concerning which they knew little, while 14 7 they had much to say of other worlds of which they knew nothing. Then came Homer, Herodotus, and others, who wrote of the classic region on the central sea and its inhabited skies; and who, because they told more of truth, were pronounced profane. For fifteen hundred years the Ptolemy geographies and the standard cosmographies kept the world informed of its progress, filling the blank places of the universe from a fertile imagination. Following the works of the wise men of Egypt, India, and China were a multitude of histories and geographies by the scholars of Greece, and Rome, and western Europe.

The finding of the cape of Good Hope route to India, and the discovery and occupation of the western hemisphere, gave a mighty impulse to histories of the world, and their several parts became rapidly complete. All the grand episodes were written upon and rewritten by men of genius, patient and profound, and admiring thousands read the stories, bequeathing them to their children. By the middle of the nineteenth century there was scarcely a nation or a civilized state on the globe whose history had not been vividly protrayed, some of them many times. That part of the north temperate zone, the illuminated belt of human intelligence, where its new western end looks across the Pacific to the ancient east, the last spot occupied by European civilization, and the final halting-place of westward-marching empire, was obviously the least favored in this respect; while the tropical plateaux adjoining, in their unpublished annals, offered far more of interest to history than many other parts of which far more had been written. A hundred years before John Smith saw the spot on which was planted Jamestown, or the English pilgrims placed foot on the rock of Plymouth, thousands from Spain had crossed the high sea, achieved mighty conquests, seizing large portions of the two Americas and placing under tribute their peoples. They had built towns, worked mines, established plantations, 15 8 and solved many of the problems attending European colonization in the New World. Yet, while the United States of North America could spread before English readers its history by a dozen respectable authors, the states of Central America and Mexico could produce comparatively few of their annals in English, and little worthy their history even in the Spanish language. Canada was better provided in this respect, as were also several of the governments of South America. Alaska belonged to Russia, and its history must come through Russian channels. British Columbia still looked toward England, but the beginning, aside from the earliest coast voyages, was from Canada. Washington, Oregon, and the inland territory adjacent were an acknowledged part of the United States, whose acquisition from Mexico, in 1847, of the territory lying between the parallels 32° and 42° left the ownership of the coast essentially as it is to-day. Enticingly stood these Pacific states before the enlightened world, yet neglected; for it is safe to say that there was no part of the globe equal in historic interest and importance to this western half of North America, including the whole of Mexico and Central America, which at the time had not its historical material in better shape, and its history well written by one or more competent persons. Before him who was able to achieve it, here, of all purposes and places, lay The Field.

Midst the unfoldings of my fate, I found myself in the year of 1856 in the newly Americanized and gold-burnished country of California, in the city of San Francisco, which stands on a narrow peninsula, about midway between either extreme of the mighty stretch of western earth's end seaboard, beside a bay unequalled by any along the whole seven thousand miles of shore line, and unsurpassed as a harbor by any in the world. Out of this circumstance, as from omnipotent accident, sprang the Literary Industries of which this volume is a record.

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California was then a-weary. Young, strong, with untouched, undreamed of resources a thousand-fold more dazzling than any yet uncovered, with a million matchless years before her during which to turn and overturn the world's great centres of civilization, penetrate the mysteries of time, and bring to pass the unknowable, she was a-weary, spiritless as a sick girl after a brief and harmless dissipation, and suffering from that tædium vitæ which comes from excess.

Reaction after the flush times had fairly set in. Agriculture had not yet assumed great importance; still more insignificant were manufactures. Placer mining returns had fallen from an ounce of gold to half an ounce, then to a quarter of an ounce a day to the digger; quartz mining was as ruinous as gambling. Most of the merchants had already failed once, some of them several times. As a rule they had begun business on nothing, had conducted it recklessly, with large profits expecting still larger, until, from overtrading, from repeated fires and failures, they were awaking as from a commercial delirium to find themselves bankrupt, and their credit and original opportunities alike gone. A maladie du pays seized upon some, who there upon departed; others set about reforming their ideas and habits, and so began the battle of life anew.

There was little thought of mental culture at this time, of refinement and literature, or even of great wealth and luxury. The first dream was over of ships laden with gold-dust and of palaces at convenient intervals in various parts of the world, and humbler aspirations claimed attention. Yet beneath the ruffled surface were the still, deep waters, which contained as much of science and philosophy as the more boisterous waves, commonly all that we regard of ocean.

Slowly as were unlocked to man the wealth and mysteries of this Pacific seaboard, so will be the intellectual possibilities of this cradle of the new civilization. As a country once deemed unproductive can 17 10 now from its surplus feed other countries, so from our intellectual products shall we some day feed the nations. In the material wealth and beauty with which nature has endowed this land we may find the promise of the wealth and beauty of mind. The metal-veined mountains are symbolic of the human force that will shortly dwell beneath their shadows. And what should be the quality of the strength so symbolized? Out of terrace parks rise these mountains, lifting their granite fronts proudly into the ambient air, their glittering crests sporting and quarrelling with the clouds. Their ruggedness, now toned by distance into soft coral hues, time will smooth to nearer inspection, but even ages cannot improve the halo thrown over slopes covering untold millions of mineral wealth by the blending of white snow-fields with red-flushed foothills. In further significance of æsthetics here to be unfolded we might point to the valleys carpeted with variegated flowers, golden purple and white, and whose hilly borders are shaggy with gnarled trees and undergrowth; to higher peaks, with their dense black forests, from which shoot pinnacles of pine, like spires of the green temple of God; to oak-shaded park lands, and islands and shores with bright-leaved groves, and long blue headlands of hills sheltering quiet bays; to dreamy, soft, voluptuous valleys, and plains glowing in summer as from hidden fire, their primitive aspect already modified by man; to the lonely grandeur of craggy cliffs bathed in blue air, and deep gorges in the foothills seamed with fissures and veiled in purple mists; to winds rolling in from the ocean leaden fog-banks, and beating into clouds of white smoke the powdered flakes of snowclad summits, and sending them in whirlwinds to the milder temperatures below; to lakes and watercourses lighted by the morning sun into luminous haze; to summers radiant in sunshine, to winters smiling in tears; to misty moonlights and clarified noondays; to the vapor-charged elliptic arch that 18 11 bathes the landscape with reflected light; to the pugent ocean air and the balsamic odor of cañons; to these, and ten thousand other beauties of plain and sierra, sky and sea, which still encompass secrets of as mighty import to the race as any hitherto brought to the understanding of man.

Civilization as the stronger element supplants savagism, drives it from the more favored spots of earth, and enters in to occupy. The aspects of nature have no less influence on the distribution or migrations of civilized peoples than upon indigenous unfoldings. It is a fact no less unaccountable than pleasing to contemplate, that these western shores of North America should have been so long reserved, that a land so well adapted to cosmopolitan occupation, which has a counterpart for all that can be found in other lands, which has so little that is objectionable to any, which presents so many of the beauties of other climes and so few of their asperities—that so favorable a spot, the last of temperate earth, should have been held unoccupied so long, and then that it should have been settled in such a way, the only possible way it would seem for the full and immediate accomplishment of its high destiny—I say, though pleasing to contemplate, it is passing strange. Here the chronic emigrant must rest; there is for him no farther west. From its Asiatic cradle westward round the antipodes, to the very threshold of its source, civilization has ever been steady and constant on the march, leaving in its track the expended energies of dead nations unconsciously dropped into dream-land. A worn-out world is reanimated as it slowly wanders toward the setting sun. Constantinople shrivels, and San Francisco springs into being. Shall the dead activites of primordial peoples ever revive, or their exhausted soil be ever re-created and worked by new nations? If not, when our latest and last west is dead, in what direction lies the hope of the world?

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CHAPTER II.

THE ATMOSPHERE. The true, great want is of an atmosphere of sympathy in intellectual aims. An artist can afford to be poor, but not to be companionless. It is not well that he should feel pressing on him, in addition to his own doubt whether he can achieve a certain work, the weight of the public doubt whether it be worth achieving. No man can live entirely on his own ideal.

Higginson.

OFTEN during the progress of my literary labors questions have arisen as to the influence of California climate and society on the present and future development of letters. Charles Nordhoff said to me one day at his villa on the Hudson, “The strangest part of it is how you ever came to embark in such a labor. The atmosphere of California is so foreign to literary pursuits, the minds of the people so much more intent on gold-getting and society pleasures than on intellectual culture and the investigation of historical or abstract subjects, that your isolation must have been severe. I could not help feeling this keenly myself,” continued my entertainer, “while on your coast. With a host of friends ready to do everything in their power to serve me, I was in reality without companionship, without that broad and generous sympathy which characterizes men of letters everywhere; so that it amazes me to find a product like yours germinating and developing in such a soil and such a climate.”

While it was true, I replied, that no great attempts were made in the field of letters in California, and while comparatively few of the people were specially interested in literature or literary men, yet I had never experienced the feeling of which he spoke.

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My mother used to say that she never felt lonely in her life; and yet she was most companionable, and enjoyed society as much as any one I ever knew. But her heart was so single and pure, her mind so clear, intelligent, and free, that to commune with her heart, and allow her mind to feed on its own intelligence, filled to the full the measure of her soul's requirements. A healthy cultivated mind never can be lonely; all the universe is its companion. Yet it may be alone, and may feel that aloneness, that natural craving for companionship, of which it is not good for man long to remain deprived. Though for different reasons, I can say with her that I never have experienced loneliness in my labors. If ever alone it was in an atmosphere of dead forms and conventionalisms crushing to my nature, and where something was expected of me other than I had to give. Thus have I been lonely for my work, but not in it. Once engaged, all else was forgotten; as the sublime Jean Paul Richter expresses it, “Ein Gelehrter hat keine lange Weile.” Nor can I truly say that I have ever felt any lack of appreciation on the part of the people of California. As a matter of fact, my mind has had little time to dwell on such things. What chiefly has concerned me these twenty or thirty years has been not what people were thinking of me and of my efforts, but how I could best and most thoroughly perform my task. I have never stopped to consider whether my labors were appreciated by my neighbors, or whether they knew aught of them, or concerned themselves therewith. I have never felt isolation or self-abnegation. To be free, free in mind and body, free of business, of society, free from interruptions and weariness, these have been my chief concern.

True, I could not overlook the fact that in the midst of many warm friends, and surrounded by a host of hearty well-wishers, my motives were not fully understood nor my work appreciated. Had it 21 14 been otherwise I should not entertain a very high opinion of either. If that which engaged me, body and soul, was not above the average aspiration, or even execution, there was nothing flattering in the thought, and I had better not dwell upon it. I was an individual worker, and my task was individual; and I solaced myself with the reflection that the ablest and most intelligent men manifested most interest in the work. I had never expected very wide recognition or appreciation, and I always had more than I deemed my due. Surely I could find no fault with the people of the Pacific coast for attending to their business, each according to his interest or taste, while I followed what best pleased me. Further than this, I did not regard my fate as resting wholly in their hands; for unless I could gain the approval of leading men of letters throughout the world, of those wholly disinterested and most competent to judge, my efforts in my own eyes would prove a failure. Thus, from the outset, I learned to look on myself and the work, not as products of California, or of America, but of the world; therefore isolation signified only retirement, for which I felt most thankful.

Perhaps men of letters are too critical; sensitive as a rule they always have been, though less so than men in some other professions. Hawthorne complained of a lack of sympathy during twelve years of his young manhood, in which he failed to make the slightest impression on the public mind, so that he found “no incitement to literary effort in a reasonable prospect of reputation or profit; nothing but the pleasure itself of composition—an enjoyment not at all amiss in its way, and perhaps essential to the merit of the work in hand, but which, in the long run, will hardly keep the chill out of the writer's heart or the numbness out of his fingers.” It is scarcely to be expected that the unappreciative masses should be deeply interested in such work. And as regards the more intelligent, each as a rule 22 15 has something specially commanding his attention, which being of paramount interest to himself, he naturally expects it to command the attention of others. He who makes the finest beer or brandy, or builds the largest house, or fills the grandest church, or sports the largest stud of horses, holds himself as much an object of consideration as he who engages in important literary work. The attention of the great heedless public will invariably be caught by that which most easily and instantly interests them, by that which most easily and instantly can be measured by big round dollars, or by pleasures which they appreciate and covet.

I can truthfully say that from the very first I have been more than satisfied with the recognition my fellow-citizens of California have given my attempts at authorship. If, by reason of preoccupation or other cause, their minds have not absorbed historical and literary subjects as mine has done, it is perhaps fortunate for them. Indeed, of what is called the culture of letters there was none during my working days in California. The few attemts made to achieve literature met a fate but little superior to that of a third-rate poet in Rome in the time of Juvenal.

Peoples rapidly change; but what shall we say when so esteemed a writer as Grace Greenwood adds to the social a physical cause why literature in California should not prosper? “I really cannot see,” she writes, “how this coast can ever make a great record in scientific discoveries and attainments, and the loftier walks of literature—can ever raise great students, authors, and artists of its own. Leaving out of consideration the fast and furious rate of business enterprise, and the maelstrom-like force of the spirit of speculation, of gambling, on a mighty, magnificent sweep, I cannot see how, in a country so enticingly picturesque, where three hundred days out of every year invite you forth into the open air with bright beguilements and soft blandishments, any 23 16 considerable number of sensible, healthy men and women can ever be brought to buckle down to study of the hardest, most persistent sort; to ‘poring over miserable books'; to brooding over theories and incubating inventions. California is not wanting in admirable educational enterprises, originated and engineered by able men and fine scholars; and there is any amount of a certain sort of brain stimulus in the atmosphere. She will always produce brilliant men and women of society, wits, and ready speakers; but I do not think she will ever be the rival of bleak little Massachusetts or stony old Connecticut in thorough culture, in the production of classical scholars, great jurists, theologians, historians, and reformers. The conditions of life are too easy. East winds, snows, and rocks are the grim allies of serious thought and plodding research, of tough brain and strong wills.”

On the other hand, the author of Greater Britain, after speaking of the weirdly peaked or flattened hills, the new skies, and birds, and plants, and the warm crisp air, unlike any in the world but those of South Australia, thinks “it will be strange if the Pacific coast does not produce a new school of Saxon poets,” affirming that “painters it has already given to the world.” “For myself,” exclaims Bayard Taylor, “in breathing an air sweeter than that which first caught the honeyed words of Plato, in looking upon lovelier vales than those of Tempe and Eurotas, in wandering through a land whose sentinel peak of Shasta far overtops the Olympian throne of Jupiter, I could not but feel that nature must be false to her promise, or man is not the splendid creature he once was, if the art, the literature, and philosophy of ancient Greece are not one day rivalled on this last of inhabited shores!” Mr John S. Hittell thinks that “California has made a beginning in the establishment of a local literature, but that her writers were nearly all born elsewhere, though they were impelled to it by our intellectual atmosphere;” by which latter phrase I 24 17 understand the writer to mean an atmosphere that excites to intellectual activity rather than a social atmosphere breathing the breath of letters.

“What effect the physical climate of California may have on literary instincts and literary efforts,” says Walter M. Fisher, “I am afraid it would be premature, from our present data, exactly to say or predict. Its general Laodicean equability, summer and winter through, may tend to a monotony of tension unfavorable to that class of poetic mind developed in and fed by the fierce extremes of storm or utter calm, of fervent summers, or frosts like those of Niffelheim. It is generally held, however, that the mildness of the Athenian climate had much to do with the 'sweet reasonableness' of her culture, and it is usual to find a more rugged and less artistic spirit inhabit the muses of the Norse zone; while the lilies and languors of the tropics are doubtfully productive of anything above the grade of pure ‘sensuous caterwauling.’ Following this very fanciful line of thought the Golden State should rejuvenate the glories of the City of the Violet Crown and become the alma mater of the universe. As to the effects of the social climate of California on literary aspiration and effort, little that is favorable can be said for the present, little that is unfavorable should be feared from the future. California père is a parvenu, making money, fighting his way into society, having no time or taste for studying anything save the news of the day and perhaps an occasional work of broad humor. It is for his heir, California fils, to be a gentleman of leisure and wear ‘literary frills.’ For the present, a taste in that direction is simply not understood, though it is tolerated, as the worship of any strange god is. The orthodox god of the hour is Plutus: sanctus, sanctus sanctus, dominus deus sabaoth: exaltat cornu populi sui: selah! All this, however, is but for a moment. Let us put our fancy apocalyptically, after the fashion of Dr Cumming: ‘And the first beast was like a lion, 25 18 and the second beast was like a calf, and the third beast had a face as a man, and the fourth beast was like a flying eagle!’ California past, present, and to come. The lion-hearts of reckless ‘49 are cold. The golden calf bestrides the land, belittling man. Tomorrow they will make it a beast of burden, not a god. And when the lion's heart is joined to riches, and riches to pure manhood, and manhood to a high and far-reaching culture in letters, and science, and art, then no symbol of eagle eye or eagle wing will be unapt to the sunward progress of the state.”

Returning east from the Pacific coast in 1882, Oscar Wilde reported: “California is an Italy without its art. There are subjects for the artists; but it is universally true, the only scenery which inspires utterance is that which man feels himself the master of. The mountains of California are so gigantic that they are not favorable to art or poetry. The scenery for definite utterance is that which man is lord of. There are good poets in England, but none in Switzerland. There the mountains are too high. Art cannot add to nature.”

So might we go on with what twenty or fifty others have imagined regarding the effect of social and physical surroundings on literature and art in California or elsewhere, and be little the wiser for it all. With the first coming to Oregon of divinely appointed New England propagandists, books began to be written which should tell to the east what the unrevealed west contained. And this writing continued and will continue as long as there are men and women who fancy that knowledge as it first comes to them first comes to the world.

We may fully recognize the mighty power of environment without being able to analyze it. As Goldoni observes, “Il mondo è un bel libro, ma poco serve a chi non lo sa leggere;” and as Hegel says, “nature should not be rated too high nor too low. The mild Ionic sky certainly contributed much to the 26 19 charm of the Homeric poems, yet this alone can produce no Homer.” While literature is an increment of social intelligence and the resultant of social progress, it is certainly influenced through the mind of man by climate and scenery, by accident and locality, which act both positively and negatively, partly in harmony, partly in antagonism. Some atmospheres seem to absorb the subtile substance of the brain; others feed the mental powers and stimulate them to their utmost capabilities.

The idyllic picture of his life at Scillus, as presented by Xenophon, not wholly in the bustling world nor yet beyond it, is most charming. Sophocles retired from busy Athens to lovely Colonus. Horace in gay luxurious Rome renounced wealth and social distinction, preferring few friendships and those of the purest and best—Mæcenas, Virgil, Varius—preferring pleasures more refined, and which might be bought only by temperance in all things, and contentment, that content which abhors the lust of gain and the gnawing disquietudes of social envy.

Mæcenas loved the noisy streets of Rome, but Horace doted on his little Sabine farm, the gift of his devoted friend. It was there in free and undisturbed thought he found that leisure so necessary to his soul's health. Yet sometimes he felt the need of the capital's bustle and the stimulus of society, and then again he longed for the stillness of the country, so that his ambling mule was kept in exercise carrying him forth and back. The gentle satirist puts words of ridicule into the mouth of his servant Davus, ridicule of the author himself, and his rhapsodies of town and country. “At Rome you for the country sigh; When in the country, to the sky You, flighty as the thistle's down, Are always crying up the town.”

Dugald Stewart clung to his quiet home; Scott 27 20 found repose among his antiquated folios; but Jeffreys disdained literary retirement, and sought comfort in much company. Pope loved his lawn at Twickenham, and Wordsworth the solitude of Grasmere. Heine, cramped in his narrow Paris quarters, sighed for trees. Dr Arnold hated Rugby, but, said he, “it is very inspiring to write with such a view before one's eyes as that from our drawing-room at Allen Bank, where the trees of the shrubbery gradually run up into the trees of the cliff, and the mountain-side, with its infinite variety of rocky peaks and points, upon which the cattle expatiate, rises over the tops of the trees.” Galileo and Cowper thought the country especially conducive to intellectual culture; Mr Buckle preferred the city, while Tycho Brahe, and the brothers Humboldt, with shrewder wisdom, established themselves in suburban quarters near a city, where they might command the advantages and escape the inconveniences of both.

Exquisite, odd, timidly bold, and sweetly misanthropic Charles Lamb could not endure the glare of nature, and so must needs hide himself between the brick walls of busy London, where he lived alone with his sister, shrinking alike from enemy and friend. “To him,” says a biographer, “the tide of human life that flowed through Fleet street and Ludgate Hill was worth all the Wyes and Yarrows in the universe; there were to his thinking no green lanes to compare with Fetter Lane or St Bride's; no garden like Covent Garden; and the singing of all the feathered tribes of the air grated harsh discord in his ear, attuned as it was only to the drone or the squall of the London ballad-singer, the grinding of the hand-organ, and the nondescript London cries, set to their cart-wheel accompaniment.” And Dr Johnson, too, loved dingy, dirty Fleet street and smoky Pall Mall above any freshness or beauty nature could afford in the country. “Sir,” he says, after his usual sententious fashion, “when you have seen one green 28 21 field you have seen all green fields. Sir, I like to look upon men. Let us walk down Cheapside.”

How different had been the culture of Goethe, less diversified, perhaps, but deeper, if instead of the busy old Frankfort city his life had been spent in the rural districts. What would Dickens have been, confined for life to the mountains of Switzerland? or Ruskin, shut between the dingy walls of London? No St John would find heaven in the New York of to-day; nor need Dante, in the California Inferno of 'forty-nine, have gone beneath the surface to find hell. A desultory genius is apt to be led away by city life and bustle; a bashful genius is too likely, in the country, to bury himself from necessary society and knowledge of the world; a healthy genius finds the greatest benefit in spending a portion of the time in both city and country. Blindness seems often an aid rather than a drawback to imaginative writing. Democritus is said to have even made himself blind in order the better to learn; and it was only when the light of the world was shut from the eyes of Milton that the heavenly light broke forth in the Paradise Lost.

Thus we find that different conditions best suit different temperaments. Some enjoy scenery, others care little for it; some prefer the country, others the city. To many, while ardently loving nature, and having no predilection for coal smoke and the rattle of vehicles, being wholly absorbed during active occupation, time and place are nothing. Scenery, other than the scenery within, has little to do with true work. If not called to consciousness by some external agent, the absorbed worker hardly knows or cares whether he occupies a tent in the wilderness or a parlor in the city. Nothing can exceed the satisfaction, if indeed congenial and comfortable, of a room in a country cottage, where the student may spread his books upon the floor, shut out superfluous light, and when weary, step at once into the warm glowing sunshine to stretch his 29 22 limbs and smoke a cigar. On the whole, the country offers superior advantages, but more on account of freedom from interruption than any other cause.

Change, almost always beneficial, to many is essential. Often many a one with an exquisite sense of relief escapes from the din and clatter of the city, and the harassing anxieties of business, to the soft sensuous quiet of the country, with its hazy light, aromatic air, and sweet songs of birds. Thus freed for a time from killing care, and reposing in delicious reverie in some sequestered nook, thought is liberated, sweeps the universe, and looks its maker in the face. Sky, hill, and plain are all instinct with eloquence. And best of all, the shelter there; no one to molest. All day, and all night, and the morrow, secure. No buzzing of business about one's ears; no curious callers nor stupid philosophers to entertain. Safe with the world walled out, and heaven opening above and around. Then ere long the bliss becomes tame; the voluptuous breath of nature palls, her beauties become monotonous, the rested energies ache for want of exercise, and with Socrates the inconstant one exclaims, “Trees and fields tell me nothing; men are my teachers!”

Yet, after all, the city only absorbs men, it does not create them. Intellect at its inception, like forest-trees, must have soil, sunshine, and air; afterward it may be worked into divers mechanisms, comfortable homes, and tough ships. The city consumes mind as it consumes beef and potatoes, and must be constantly replenished from the country, otherwise life there exhausts itself. Its atmosphere, physically and morally deleterious from smoke and dust and oft-repeated breathings, from the perspirations of lust and the miasmatic vapors arising from sink-holes of vice, exercises a baneful influence on the young poetic soul, as do the stimulating excesses of business and polished life. The passions of humanity concentrated in masses, like ill cured hay in the stack, 30 23 putrefy and send forth, in place of the sweet odor of new-mown grass, a humid, musty smell, precursor of innumerable fetid products. In the country the affections harmonize more with nature, engender purer thoughts, and develop lovelier forms than in the callous-shouldered unsympathetic crowds of a city.

A life in closets and cloisters leads to one-sided fixedness of ideas. Yet, though retirement often produces eccentricity, it likewise promotes originality. But for his dislike for general society Shelley would have been a commonplace thinker. To thoughtful, sensitive natures, retirement is absolutely essential. Every man must follow his own bent in this respect. Method is good in all things, but it is perhaps better to be without method than to be the slave of it. Distance from the object dwelt upon often lends clearness to thought. Distinctly audible are the solemn strokes of the town clock beyond the limits of the village, though near at hand they may be drowned by the hum of the moving multitude.

There are minor conditions peculiar to individual writers which stimulate or retard intellectual labor. There is the lazy man of genius, like Hazlitt, who never writes till driven to it by hunger; unless, indeed, bursting with some subject, he throws it off on paper to find relief. Hensius says: “I no sooner come into the library but I bolt the door to me, excluding lust, ambition, avarice, and all such vices whose nurse is idleness, the mother of ignorance and melancholy. In the very lap of eternity, amongst so many divine souls, I take my seat with so lofty a spirit and sweet content, that I pity all our great ones and rich men that know not this happiness.” Rooms are frequently mentioned. If favorable surroundings are so necessary, what shall we say of the great works engendered under unfavorable conditions? But for the imprisonment of Cervantes, who can tell if ever the world would have known the inimitable Don Quixote and his servant Sancho? Bunyan's grand allegory 31 24 was likewise a prison plant, with the Bible and Fox's Martyrs as the author's library of reference. The studios of artists are usually remarkable for nothing but their plain or slovenly appearance, dusty walls, with cobwebbed corners, and floor and furniture smeared with paint. Leslie and Turner both painted in very plain rooms. Gustave Doré's studio was furnished with nothing but easels, a plain table, and two cheap chairs. Goethe's study was exceedingly plain. Scott could compose very well in the sitting-room, surrounded by his family, but of all the elegant apartments at Abbotsford he preferred a small, plain, quiet room in which to write. In the main, while it makes little difference to the head whether the feet rest on an Axminster carpet or on rough boards, everything else being equal, a plain room is preferable to one elegantly furnished. Plain, hard, practical furniture seems best to harmonize with plain, hard, practical thought. Writing is not the soft, languid reverie that luxurious fittings and furnishings suggest; it is the hardest and most wearing of occupations, and it seems a mockery, when the temples throb and the bones ache, for the eye to meet at every turn only invitations to idleness and ease. It strikes a discord and jars the sensibilities when the lifted eyes meet objects more beautiful and graceful than the flow of thought or the product of the overworked brain. A plain table, a cane-bottomed chair, and good writing materials are the best. So much for immediate surroundings.

To the critics previously quoted I would say that it is folly sweepingly to assert of this or that strip of temperate zone that it is physically conducive to the growth of letters or otherwise. Variety of food, of scenery, of entertainment is the essential need of the mind. As for the stone fences and east winds of Mrs Lippincott, I never knew them to be specially stimulating to brain work; no better, at all events, than 32 25 the sand and fog of San Francisco, or the north winds and alternate reigns of fire and water in the valley of California. If to become a scholar it requires no discipline or self-denial greater than to withstand the allurements of her bewitching climate, California shall not lack scholars. When most ravished by the charms of nature many students find it most difficult to tear themselves from work. Invigorating air and bright sunshine, purple hills, misty mountains, and sparkling waters may be enticing, but they are also inspiring.

Where were bleak Massachusetts and stony Connecticut when Athens, and Rome, and Alexandria flourished? If barrenness and stones are more conducive to literature, the Skye Islands may claim to be the best place for notable men of letters. I can hardly believe that unless culture is beaten into us by scowling nature we must forever remain savages. Oxygen is oxygen, whether it vitalizes mind on the Atlantic or on the Pacific seaboard; and to the student of steady nerves, absorbed in his labors, it matters little whether his window overlooks a park or a precipice. If I remember rightly the country about Stratford-on-Avon is not particularly rugged, neither is London remarkable for picturesque scenery. And surely there can be little in the climate of California antagonistic to intellectual attainments. In San Francisco there is no incompatibility, that I can discover, between philosophic insight and sandhills. On the other hand, throughout the length and breadth of these Pacific States there are thousands of elements stimulating to mental activity. If the mountains of California are too gigantic for Mr Wilde's present art, may not man's capabilities some day rise to meet the emergency? May not intellect and art become gigantic?

Agassiz insists that the climate of Europe is more favorable to literary labors than that of America. This I do not believe; but, if admitted, California is 33 26 better than Massachusetts, for the climate of California is European rather than eastern. It is a thinking air, this of California, if such a thing exists outside of the imagination of sentimentalists; an air that generates and stimulates ideas; a dry elastic air, strong, subtile, and serene. It has often been noticed in going back and forth across the continent; and may be safely asserted that one can do more and better work in California than in the east. At the same time another might prefer the eastern extremes of heat and cold. The temperature of the Pacific slope is slightly raised, the thermal lines bending northward as they cross the Rocky mountains. Extreme cold we never have, except on alpine altitudes. On the seaboard the atmosphere throughout the entire year is uniform, cool, and bracing. There is little difference between summer and winter, between night and day; one can here work all the time. Indeed, so stimulating and changeless is this ocean air that men are constantly lured to longer efforts than they can endure, and a sudden breaking up of health or a softened brain is in many instances the end of excessive and prolonged labor. In the east men are driven from their work by the heat of summer, and the cold of winter compels some to rest; here, while nature rests, that is during the dry season, man can labor as well as at any other time, but when driven on by ambition or competition he is almost sure to lay upon his body and mind more than they can long endure.

I do not think there is anything in the climate that absorbs strength unduly, or that breaks up the constitution earlier than elsewhere; the system wears out and falls to pieces. If this happens earlier in life than it ought, the cause is to be found in continuous and restless application, and not in the climate. Anteauriferous Californians uniformly attained a ripe age; in many cases four, five, and six score years being reached after bringing into the world from fifteen to twenty-five children. In the interior, during the 34 27 rains of winter, the climate is similar to that of the coast—fresh and bracing; in summer the air is hot and dry during the day, but cool and refreshing at night. A moist hot climate is enervating; if the air under a vertical sun is dry the effect of the heat is much less unfavorable. In the warm valleys of the Coast range students can work without discomfort from morning till night throughout the entire summer, while in the east, the temperature being the same, or even lower, they would be completely prostrated. Yet, from the whirling rapidity of our progress, the friction of the machinery wears heavily upon the system. There is little danger for the present of rusting out, with such an exhilarating climate to feed energy, and such cunning ingenuity to direct it. Extremes, the bane of humanity, are here as nicely balanced as in the classic centres of the Old World. Excessive heat and cold, humidity and dryness, redundancy and sterility, are so far uncommon as not to interfere with progress.

With reference to the oft-repeated objections against the pursuit of wealth because of its influence on letters, much may be said. From necessary labor, and from the honorable and praiseworthy enterprise incident to life and independence, to an avaricious pursuit of wealth for the sake of wealth, the progress is so imperceptible and the change so unconscious that few are able to realize it. And if they were, it would make no difference. All nature covets power. Beasts, and men, and gods, all place others under them so far as they are able; and those so subordinated, whether by fair words, fraud, or violence, will forever after bow their adoration. Money is an embodiment of power; therefore all men covet money. Most men desire it with an inordinate craving wholly beyond its true and relative value. This craving fills their being to the exclusion of higher, nobler, and what would be to them, if admitted, happier sentiments. This is the 35 28 rule the world over; the passion is no stronger in California than in many other places. But it has here its peculiarities. Society under its present régime was begun on a gold-gathering basis. In the history of the world there never was founded so important a commonwealth on a skeleton so exclusively metallic. Most of the colonial attempts of Asia and Europe have been made partly with the object of religion, empire, agriculture, commerce. It is true that these avowed objects were often little more than pretences, money lying at the root of all; yet even the pretence was better in some respects than the bald, hard-visaged fact. But during the earlier epoch in California's history three hundred thousand men and women came hither from various parts of the world with no other object, entertained or expressed, than to obtain gold and carry it away with them. Traditionary and conventional restraints they left at home. They would get money now, and attend to other things at another time. Nor has the yellow ghost of this monetary ideal ever wholly abandoned the San Francisco sandhills; some have secured the substance, but all round the Californian amphitheatre, since 1849, penniless misers have been hugging, not gold, but the empty expectation of it.

Some degree of wealth in a community is essential to the culture of letters. Where all must work constantly for bread the hope of literature is small. On the other hand excess of wealth may be an evil. The sudden and enormous accumulation of wealth exercises a most baneful influence. Brave indeed must be the struggles that overcome the allurements of luxury, the subtle, sensuous influence of wealth, entering as it does the domains alike of intellect and the affections, commanding nature, expanding art, and filling enlarged capacities for enjoyment. Yet he who would attain the highest must shake from him these entrancing fetters, if ever fortune lays them on him, and stand forth absolutely a free man. Poor as was 36 29 Jean Paul Richter, he deemed his burden of poverty less hard for genius to bear than the comparative wealth of Goethe.

Drop in upon a man given body and soul to business, a man who has already a thousand times more than ever he will rightly use; visit him in his hours of business; he calls his time precious, and knits his brow at you if the interruption lasts. His time is precious? Yes. How much is it worth? Fifty dollars, five hundred dollars an hour. How much are fifty or five hundred dollars worth? Go to, blind maggots! Will you not presently have millions of years of leisure? Oh wise rich man, oh noble mind and aspiration, to measure moments by money!

The remedy lies in the disease. Excess of avarice that sinks society so low, nauseates. Thus the right-minded man will argue: If Plutus is always to remain a pig in intellect and culture, is always to be a worshipful pig, the only adorable of his fellow-pigs, to his marble-stepped gilded sty with him and his money. I'll none of him. God and this bright universe beaming with intelligence and love; mind that lifts me up, and makes me a reasoning creature, and tells me what I am, withholding not the sweet perfume thrown round me by the flowers of unfolding knowledge; immortal soul, breathing upon mind the divine breath; and its mortal casement, the body, limited to a few short days of this blessed sunlight, of drinking in soft, sweet air and nature's many melodies—these will not let me sink. The commercial or mechanical plodder again will say: What are these pitiful thousands, or tens or hundreds of thousands, which by a lifetime of faithful toil and economy I have succeeded in getting together, when men infinitely my inferior in ability, intellect, and culture, by a lucky stroke of fortune make their millions in a month? Surely money is no longer the measure of intelligent industry; it is becoming a common and less creditable thing: I'll worship it no longer. Even envy is baffled, 37 30 overreached. These many and mammoth fortunes made by stock-gambling and railway manipulations so overshadow and belittle legitimate efforts that accumulators are constrained to pause and consider what is the right and destiny of all this, and to begin comparisons between material wealth beyond a competency and that wealth of mind which alone elevates and ennobles man.

Midas of the ass's ears is dead, choked on gold given him by offended deities; but Midas of the serpent, Midas of the slimy way, still lives, and is among us, sapping our industries, monopolizing our products, glutting himself with the hard-earned gold of our working men and women. Let him take warning; let him go bathe in Pactolus and cleanse himself withal.

The time will surely come in California when some will surfeit of wealth and hold the money struggle in contempt. They will tire of the harpies of avarice who snatch from them the mind-food for which they pine, even as the fabled harpies snatched from the luxury-loving monarch Prester John the food for which his body hungered. This western spurt of enterprise is a century-step backward in certain kinds of culture.

San Francisco has absorbed well-nigh all that is left of the Inferno. Take the country at large, and since the youthful fire that first flashed in our cities and cañons California in some respects has degenerated. Avarice is a good flint on which to strike the metal of our minds, but it yields no steady flame. The hope of sudden gain excites the passions, whets the brain, and rouses the energies; but when the effort is over, whether successful or otherwise, the mind sinks into comparative listlessness. It must have some healthier pabulum than cupidity, or it starves. The quality of our Californian mind to-day may be seen displayed in our churches and in the newspaper press. The most intellectual and refined of our pulpit orators are not always the most popular. Clerical 38 31 jolly-good-fellowship covers barrels of pulpit stupidity, and is no less effectual in the formation and guidance of large flocks than it is agreeable to the shepherd. Hard study, broad views of life and the times, thorough investigation of the mighty enginery that is now driving mankind so rapidly forward materially and intellectually, deep and impartial inquiry into the origin and tendency of things, do not characterize clergymen as a class. There are, however, some noble exceptions in California as well as elsewhere; but there must be many more if Christians would retain their hold on the minds of men, and stay the many thinking persons who are dropping off from their accustomed places in the sanctuary.

One other influence adverse to the higher intellectual life I will mention, and that is promiscuous reading—not necessarily so-called light reading, for there are works of fiction in the highest degree beneficial, more so than many a true narrative; but reading in which there is neither healthful amusement nor valuable instruction. There is too much reading of books, far too much reading of newspapers and magazines, for the highest good of exact knowledge, too much pedagogic cramming and windy sermonizing, too little practical thought, too little study of nature, too little cultivation of germ-intelligence, of those inherent natural qualities which feed civilization.

There is a vast difference between what is called deep thinking and right thinking. Thought may dive deep into Stygian lakes, into opaque pools of superstition, so that the deeper it goes the farther will be the remove from intellectual clearness or moral worth. What to the heathen are the profound reveries of the Christian? what to the Christian the myths and doctrines of the heathen? A mind may be talented, learned, devoted, and yet unable to find the pearls of the sea of Cortés in the brackish waters of the Utahs. One may be blind, yet honest; purblind, yet 39 32 profound. It is a mistaken idea that clear convictions spring from deep thinking. Decided opinions are oftener the result of ignorance than of right thinking. Particularly is this true in regard to the super-natural and unknowable. Here clear thinking tends to unsettle pronounced opinion, while study, research, profound learning and deep thinking only sink the inquirer into lower depths of conviction, which may be false or true, not as investigation is profound, but as it is rightly directed. Impartiality is essential to right thinking; but how can the mind be impartial upon a question predetermined? Right thinking comes only where love of truth rises above love of self, of country, of tradition. Convictions, so called, arising from the exercise of will power are not convictions, but merely expressions of will power. Of such are the rank weeds of prejudice overspreading the fertile fields of literature, politics, and religion. Deep thinking is subtile and cunning; right thinking simple and ingenuous. The surface thoughts of clear, practical, uncultivated common-sense often lie nearer the truth than the subtilties of the schools. Intellect and education may create profound thinkers, but not always right thinkers. Absolute freedom from prejudice and absolute indifference as to the ultimates attained by freedom of thought are impossible, but the nearer an inquiring mind approaches this condition the more ready it is to receive unadulterated truth; and truth alone, irrespective of hopes and fears, is the only object of healthy thought. In study, to every height, there is a beyond; round every height a border of opaque blue, and to clear thinking direction is more than distance.

Pure unadulterated truth is not palatable to the popular mind. In politics we would rather believe the opposition all corruption, and our own party all purity, than to believe the truth. In religion we would rather believe ours the only road to heaven, and all those who differ from us doomed to a sure 40 33 eternal perdition. In society we enjoy sweet scandal far more than honest fairness; and if we could drive our unfortunate brothers and sisters, all of them about whose skirts are the odors of vice—if we could drive the vicious, with hateful ways, and all those who differ from us as to the best mode of exterminating vice, down to the depths of despair, it would suit our temper better than manfully to recognize the good there is in Lucifer, and lift up those that have fallen through no special fault of their own.

Newspapers have become a necessity to our civilization, and though they are bad masters they are good and indispensable servants. As a messenger of intelligence; as a stimulant to industry and knowledge—though not as knowledge; as an instrument for the enlargement of intellectual vision, enabling it to belt the earth and take in at one view all interests and civilizations; as promoting toleration in opinions, breaking down prejudice, and keeping alive the interests of individuals and nations in each other; as a terror to evil-doers, a lash held over political hounds—too often the only one they fear, without which our present liberal system of government could not stand; and as the exponent of current thought and culture, the newspaper is indispensable. The newspaper is no evil, but there is such a thing as reading it too much. When deeply absorbed in work the true student will not look at a journal for weeks, preferring rather to let his mind pursue its course day after day without being disturbed by passing events. “Among modern books avoid magazine and review literature,” is Ruskin's advice; yet magazines and reviews are much more instructive reading as a rule than newspapers. In moderation they are beneficial to the student, being the media which bring the world as guests to his closet and keep from him the evil of solitude.

We may safely say that in the hands of honest and independent men, an untrammelled press is the very 41 34 bulwark of society; in the hands even of men unsainted, who are not immaculate in their morals nor above reproach, of men no more honest than the times admit, who talk much of the virtue and of the purity of their sheet, but nevertheless love lucre—in the hands even of these the public press is a power indispensable to liberty and social safety.

Most writers and speakers are unfair in controversy. Newspapers are specially so. As a rule, in political affairs they do not expect to be believed by any but their own party. In matters of public interest or utility, what is printed must first be strained through the colander of self-interest before it can be allowed to go forth. This self-interest is a beam in the editor's eye which hides the largest fact likely to interfere with it.

The editor of a popular monthly will tell you that the reading of periodicals does not interfere with thorough systematic study. He will say that there never were more books bought and read than now; that transient literature excites a taste for study, and that science and progress are fostered and stimulated by newspapers. All of this may be true, and yet the assertion hold good that he who spends much time in skimming the frothy political decoctions of the ephemeral press never can reach the profounder depths of science and philosophy. Nine tenths of what is printed in newspapers consists of speculations on what may or may not happen. By waiting we can know the result, if it be worth knowing, without wasting time in following it through all the incipient stages.

But this is not the worst of it. Editorial comments on people, parties, and passing events are seldom sincere. There is too often some ulterior influence at work, some object in view other than that of simply and honestly benefiting their readers, ministering to their intellectual necessities, and giving them the highest possible standard of right, irrespective of 42 35 prejudice, popularity, or gain. Too often is public opinion palpably and absurdly in error; and too often the editor combats or pampers public opinion, not in accordance with what he believes to be right, but according to the direction in which his interest lies. Frequently a policy is marked out, and, right or wrong, it must be maintained. The journal must be consistent with itself at all hazards, truth and justice to the contrary notwithstanding. The modern Bohemian will write up or down either side of any party creed or principle with equal willingness and facility. It would be deemed presumption for an employé of the press to attempt to change the traditions of the journal that employs him. Says Noah Porter, “the modern newspaper, so far as it is insincere, is immoral and demoralizing.” If a newspaper fails fully and unequivocally to correct an error as soon as known; if carried away by partisan temper or tactics it states a fact unfairly, tells part of the truth and keeps back part; if it indulges in the vilification of an unpopular though not guilty person; if for the sake of money, or pride, or hatred, it advocates a cause knowing it to be contrary to public weal; if honest convictions are subordinated to popularity or the interests of the journal; if it resorts to devices and sensational reports in order to call attention to its columns and thereby increase its importance and circulation, then is it insincere, and consequently immoral. Few approach even a fairly commendable standard; but then books are often as bad. What shall we say of a history of christianity written by a bigoted churchman, or a history of America by a strong partisan, or an attempt to establish a scientific theory or hypothesis when facts are collected on one side only? These are not history and science, but only pleas for one side of the question. As from the days of Patristic discussion to the present time theologians have deemed it necessary to keep back all the truths of God not consistent with their dogmas, so writers for 43 36 money will send forth nothing to the confusion of their deity.

Lies, humbug, hypocrisy: these are what the people want and will buy; and such being the case, they are what our honorable journalists are bound to furnish. Nor should I be disposed to censure them severely if they would honestly own to their charlatanism, and not make foul the air by their professions of honesty and integrity, for the chief fault is with the people who demand such villainous literature. With an old English divine the journalists may say, “It is hard to maintain truth, but still harder to be maintained by it;” or as La Fontaine more tersely puts it, “Tout faiseur de journaux doit tribut au Malin;” all editors of newspapers pay tribute to the devil.

Waves of opinion roll over the community, and reason is powerless to check them. Not until they have spent themselves, one after another, do men take the trouble to consider their good or evil effects. The cunning journalist lets his boat ride these waves, well knowing the impolicy of any attempt to buffet them.

That the editor's life is hard no one for a moment doubts. “Consider his leading articles,” says Carlyle, “what they treat of, how passably they are done. Straw that has been threshed a hundred times without wheat; ephemeral sound of a sound; such portent of the hour as all men have seen a hundred times turn out inane; how a man, with merely human faculty, buckles himself nightly with new vigor and interest to this threshed straw, nightly gets up new thunder about it; and so goes on threshing and thundering for a considerable series of years; this is a fact remaining still to be accounted for in human physiology. The vitality of man is great.” Of all kinds of literary labor, writing for newspapers is the best paid, pecuniarily, partly because that class of literature is bought and read by the people at large, 44 37 and partly in consequence of the impersonality of the writer, whose productions bring him little pleasure or gratified vanity.

Taken as a whole, and as it is, the effect of the newspaper press on the mental temperament of the United States is to excite rather than instruct. The morbid appetite with which men and their families devour scandal and the squabbles of politicians is not favorable to wholesome literature. There may be entertainment in criminal trials, in columns of editorial vituperation, in details and discussions on insignificant and local events, but there is little instruction. Some of the ill effects arising from an inordinate reading of newspapers are to lower the intellectual tone, to influence the reader to shirk the responsibility of independent thought, to receive information in the shape of garbled and one-sided statements, to attach undue importance to novel and sensational events, to magnify and distort the present at the expense of the past, to dwarf abstract conception, and to occupy time which might be better employed.

“The greatest evil of newspapers, in their effect on intellectual life,” says Hamerton, “is the enormous importance they are obliged to attach to mere novelty. From the intellectual point of view, it is of no consequence whether a thought occurred twenty-two centuries ago to Aristotle or yesterday evening to Mr Charles Darwin; and it is one of the distinctive marks of the truly intellectual to be able to take a hearty interest in all truth, independently of the date of its discovery. The emphasis given by newspapers to novelty exhibits things in wrong relations, as the lantern shows you what is nearest at the cost of making the general landscape appear darker by the contrast.” Auguste Comte not only religiously abstained from newspapers, but from holding conversation with men of ordinary intellect.

Newspapers are not intended to educate so much 45 38 as to enlighten; giving only the current gossip of the day throughout the world, they do not pretend to carry their readers through a course of study. The events recorded by the ephemeral press are most of them forgotten as soon as read; they leave nothing to enrich the mind. I do not say that it is better not to read at all than to read periodical literature. Magazines and newspapers are undoubtedly doing as much in their way to break down the black walls of ignorance and stupidity, and to advance science and exact knowledge, as books, and perhaps more. The world is kept alive, is kept charged with electrical progressive energy, by newspapers, telegraphs, and railroads, but these are neither history, nor science, nor any other part of serious study.

There is as much original thinking in California, in proportion to the population, I venture to assert, as anywhere else on the globe; yet even here what worlds of empty words for atoms of inspiration! What we want is a thinking-school for teachers, for learners, for writers, for readers, and for all who cultivate or express opinion. More than in most places, public opinion here rules the press instead of being ruled by it. There is here more life and activity in the newspaper press than in most older communities. Since the gold-discovery there have been published on this coast more newspapers in proportion to the population than the world has ever before seen.

Half a century ago, when one weekly journal was considered sufficient for that kind of intellectual requirement, the members of a household having books at its command were more thoroughly trained in literature and general knowledge than now. He who reads only newspapers never can be generally intelligent, not to say learned. The culture of the early Greeks has in some respects never been equalled. What must have been the mental condition of a people whose masses could delight in Æschylus? American masses think Shakespeare's tragedies dry and severe; 46 39 with their superlative beauties and their simple plots, they are too difficult for their untrained minds to follow. Yet Æschylus, which an Athenian of ordinary intelligence enjoyed at the first hearing, is as much more difficult of appreciation than Shakespeare as Shakespeare is more difficult than a dime novel. In what lay the mental superiority of the Athenians in this direction, unless it was that, being less trammelled with the multiplicity of exciting interests and events, such as an undue study of the newspaper fosters, their minds were occupied with purer learning? The Athenian had few books and few models, but these were of great excellence.

The newspaper is blamed because its readers like disgraceful scandals, highly wrought accounts of defalcations, suicides, conjugal infidelity, and murders; and because to them the records of virtue are tame and vice alone is spicy. This is folly. Everybody knows that a newspaper is published to make money, and the proprietor is no more to be censured for adopting the profitable course than the prostitute, the politician, the clergyman, or the man of merchandise. Here, as everywhere, when evil stalks abroad the people are ready to blame any but themselves, who are alone to blame. Women will be as virtuous as men permit them to be, and not more so. Theatres will produce such spectacles as the public wish most, and will pay most, to see. Books or newspapers will be moral or immoral, honest or dishonest, as the people are moral and honest. To see in any community a vulgar mendacious sheet with a large circulation is sure evidence that a large part of the people are low and lying. The fastness of our fast life is increased tenfold by the newspapers. They keep the minds of men and women in a constant ferment, and create a morbid appetite, which, as it is indulged, settles into a fixed habit, so that to sit down to study, to the steady perusal of history, or science, or any book which will really improve the mind, is not to be 47 40 thought of when three or four unread newspapers and magazines lie upon the table filled with the doings of the day, political battles, local quarrels, and scandal, with flaunting essays for the mother, flashy poems for the sentimental daughter, and unhealthy tales for the aspiring youth.

The beneficial influence of intelligent homes should be extended in order to eradicate the evils of omnivorous reading. Home and contentment are in themselves elements of intellectual strength. The home of the provident man is more than a well built and furnished house; it is to wife and children a daily oblation significant of his being and doing. The house, and all its belongings, rooms, furniture, pictures, and books, bear upon them his own stamp, breathe upon him their sympathy, tender him a mute farewell when he goes, and welcome him when he returns.

In reviewing the effect of California social atmosphere on intellectual culture we should glance at the body social, its origin and its destiny, the character of the first comers, the cause of their coming, the apprenticeship to which they were subjected on their arrival, and finally the triumph of the good and the confusion of the evil. It was no pilgrim band, these gold-seeking emigrants, fleeing from persecution; it was not a conquest for dominion or territory; nor was it a missionary enterprise, nor a theoretical republic. It was a stampede of the nations, a hurried gathering in a magnificent wilderness for purposes of immediate gain by mining for gold, and was unprecedented in the annals of the race. Knowing all this as we now do; knowing the metal these men were made of, the calibre of their minds, the fiery furnace of experience through which they passed; knowing what they are, what they have done, what they are doing, is it not idle to ask if men like these, or the sons of such men, can achieve literature? They can do anything. They halt not at any obstacle 48 41 surmountable by man. They pause discomfited only upon the threshold of the unknowable and the impossible. The literary atmosphere of which we speak is not here to-day; but hither the winds from the remotest corners of the earth are wafting it; all knowledge and all human activities are placed under contribution, and out of this alembic of universal knowledge will in due time be distilled the fine gold of Letters.

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CHAPTER III.

SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. On fait presque toujours les grandes choses sans savoir comment on les fait, et on est tout surpris qu'on les a faites. Demandez à César comment il se rendit le maître du monde; peut-ître ne vous repondra-t-il pas aisément.

Fontenelle.

SERMONIZE as we may on fields and atmospheres, internal agencies and environment, at the end of life we know little more of the influences that moulded us than at the beginning. Without rudder or compass our bark is sent forth on the stormy sea, and although we fancy we know our present haven, the trackless path by which we came hither we cannot retrace. The record of a life written—what is it? Between the lines are characters invisible which might tell us something could we translate them. They might tell us something of those ancient riddles, origin and destiny, free-will and necessity, discussed under various names by learned men through the centuries, and all without having penetrated one hair's breadth into the mystery, all without having gained any knowledge of the subject not possessed by men primeval. In this mighty and universal straining to fathom the unknowable, Plato, the philosophic Greek, seems to succeed no better than Moncacht Apé, the philosophic savage.

This much progress, however, has been made; there are men now living who admit that they know nothing about such matters; that after a lifetime of study and meditation the eyes of the brightest intellect can see beyond the sky no farther than those of 50 43 the most unlearned dolt. And they are the strongest who acknowledge their weakness in this regard; they are the wisest who confess their ignorance. Even the ancients understood this, though by the mouth of Terentius they put the proposition a little differently: “Faciunt næ intelligendo, ut nihil intelligant;” by too much knowledge men bring it about that they know nothing. Confining our investigations to the walks of literature, surely one would think genius might tell something of itself, something of its inceptions and inspirations. But what says genius? “They ask me,” complains Goethe of the perplexed critics who sought in vain the moral design of his play, “what idea I wished to incorporate with my Faust. Can I know it? Or, if I know, can I put it into words?” A similar retort was made by Sheridan Knowles to a question by Douglas Jerrold, who asked the explanation of a certain unintelligible incident in the plot of The Hunchback. “My dear boy,” said Knowles, “upon my word I can't tell you. Plots write themselves.”

Why we are what we are, and not some other person or thing; why we do as we do, turning hither instead of thither, are problems which will be solved only with the great and universal exposition. And yet there is little that seems strange to us in our movements. Things appear wonderful as they are unfamiliar; in the unknown and unfathomed we think we see God; but is anything known or fathomed? Who shall measure mind, we say, or paint the soul, or rend the veil that separates eternity and time? Yet do we but think of it, everything relating to mankind and the universe is strange, the spring that moves the mind of man not more than the mechanism on which it presses. “How wonderful is death!” says Shelley; but surely not more wonderful than life or intellect which brings us consciousness. We see the youth's bleached body carried to the grave, and wonder at the absence of that life so lately animating it, and question what it is, whence it came, and whither it 51 44 has flown. We call to mind whatever there may have been in that youth's nature of promise or of singular excellence; but the common actions of the youth, the while he lived, we deem accountable, and pass them by because of our familiarity with like acts in others. We see nations rise and die, worlds form and crumble, and wonder at the universe unfolding, but the minutiæ of evolution, the proximate little things that day by day go to make up the great ones, we think we understand, and wonder at them not at all. It was regarded an easy matter a century ago to define a mineral, plant, or animal, but he is a bold man indeed who attempts to-day to tell what these things are. Then, as now, only that was strange which people acknowledged they did not understand; and as there was little which they would voluntarily throw into that category, each referring unknowable phenomena to his own peculiar superstition for solution, there was comparatively little in the universe wonderful to them.

Therefore, not wishing to be classed among the ignorant and doltish of by-gone ages, but rather among this wise generation, in answer to that part of Mr Nordhoff's wonderings why I left business and embarked in literature, I say I cannot tell. Ask the mother why she so lovingly nurses her little one, watching with tender solicitude its growth to youth and manhood, only to send it forth weaned, perhaps indifferent or ungrateful, to accomplish its destiny. Literature is my love, a love sprung from my brain, no less my child than the offspring of my body. In its conception and birth is present the parental instinct, in its cultivation and development the parental care, in its results the parental anxiety. There are those, says Hammerton, “who are urged toward the intellectual life by irresistible instincts, as water-fowl are urged to an aquatic life....If a man has got high mental culture during his passage through life, it is of little consequence where he acquired it, or how. The school of the intellectual man is the place 52 45 where he happens to be, and his teachers are the people, books, animals, plants, stones, and earth round about him.”

There are millions of causes, then, why we are what we are, and when we can enumerate but a few score of them we rightly say we do not know. In my own case, that I was born in central Ohio rather than in Oahu is one cause; that my ancestors were of that stern puritan stock that delighted in self-denial and effective well-doing, sparing none, and least of all themselves, in their rigid proselyting zeal, is another cause; the hills and vales around my home, the woods and meadows through which I roamed, my daily tasks—no pretence alone of work—that were the beginning of a life-long practice of mental and muscular gymnastics, were causes; every opening of the eye, every wave of nature's inspiration, was a cause. And thus it ever is. Every ray of sunshine thrown upon our path, every shower that waters our efforts, every storm that toughens our sinews, swells the influence that makes us what we are. The lights and shades of a single day color one's whole existence. There is no drop of dew, no breath of air, no shore, no sea, no heavenly star, but writes its influence on our destiny. In the morning of life the infant sleeps into strength, and while he sleeps are planted the seeds of his fate; for weal or woe are planted the fig-tree and the thorn-tree, fair flowers and noisome weeds. Then are born cravings for qualities and forms of existence, high aspirations and debasing appetites; the poetic, the sacred, the sublime, and love, and longings, are there in their incipiency; hate, and all the influences for evil mingling with the rest. Wrapped in the mysterious enfoldings of fate are these innumerable springs of thought and action, for the most part dormant till wakened by the sunshine and storm wherein they bask and battle to the end.

And later in the life of the man, of the nation, or 53 46 the evolution of a principle, how frequently insignificant is the only appearing cause of mighty change. Mohammed, a tradesman's clerk, was constrained to marry his mistress and turn prophet, and therefrom arose a power which wellnigh overwhelmed christendom. Luther's sleep was troubled with impish dreams, and his waking hours with the presence of papal indulgences, from which results of indigestion, brain oppression, or extrinsic pressure of progress, the church was shorn of a good share of its authority. Frog soup was one day in 1790 prescribed as a suitable diet for a lady of Bologna, Signora Galvani; and but for this homely incident the existence of what we call galvanism might not have been discovered to this day. Joseph Smith's revelation put into his hands the metal-plated book of Mormon, though unfortunately for his followers it was some three centuries late in appearing.

Lucian's first occupation was making gods, a business quite extensively indulged in by all men of all ages—making deities and demolishing them; carving them in wood, or out of airy nothings, and then setting them a-fighting. Lucian used to cut Mercuries out of marble in his uncle's workshop. Thence he descended to humbler undertakings, learned to write, and finally handled the gods somewhat roughly. Thus with him the one occupation followed closely on the other. Thomas Hood's father was a bookseller, and his uncle an engraver. Disgusted first with a mercantile and afterward with a mechanical occupation, Hood took to verse-making, and finally abandoned himself wholly to literature. And there is at least one instance where a young scribbler, Planché, resolved to be a bookseller so that he might have the opportunity of publishing his own works; in accordance with which determination he apprenticed himself, though shortly afterward, not finding in the connection the benefits imagined, he took to playacting and writing. An author of genius sometimes 54 47 rises into notice by striking accidentally the key-note of popular fancy or prejudice which sounds his fame. Until Sam Weller, a character which genius alone could construct, was brought before the world, the Pickwick Papers, then and for five months previous issued by Chapman and Hall as a serial, was a failure. John Stuart Mill claims to have been not above the average boy or girl in natural mind powers, but credits his talents to his father's superior management of his youth; indeed, until so told by his father he was not aware that he knew more than other boys, or was more thoughtful, intelligent, or learned, and accepted the information as a fact rather than a compliment. And so we might study life's mosaic forever, here and there finding—though more frequently not—what appears the immediate agency that wrought in us the love of letters, or any other love. In my own case I may further surmise with Sir Thomas Browne that I was born in the planetary hour of Saturn, and was ever after held a victim to his leaden sway, by which pernicious influence the stream of my life was perverted from plain honest gold-getting into the quicksands of literature.

My father was born in Massachusetts; his father's great-great-grandfather, John Bancroft, came from London in the ship James in 1632. My father's great-great-grandparents were Nathaniel and Ruth Bancroft, whose son Samuel was born July 8, 1711, and died July 6, 1788. Sarah White was Samuel's wife; and their son Samuel, my father's grandfather, was born at West Springfield, Massachusetts, April 22, 1737. His father, Azariah Bancroft, the eldest of nine children, was born in Granville, Massachusetts, April 13, 1768; and on the 25th of January, 1799, my father was born in Granville, the fourth in a family of eleven. His great-grandparents removed to Granville, Massachusetts, in 1738, when Samuel Bancroft was a year old—the first settlers coming to 55 48 Granville the year he was born. In the book entitled A Golden Wedding my father says: “My recollections of my grandfather are vivid and pleasant. He was a tall, thin, voluble old gentleman, fond of company, jokes, and anecdotes. He served in the French and Indian war, and afterward in the Revolutionary war with the rank of lieutenant. He was paid off in continental money, receiving it in sheets, which he never cut apart. He was very fond of relating incidents of the war, and was never happier than when surrounded by old comrades and neighbors, talking over different campaigns, with a mug of cider warming before the fire.” ‘Slim-legs' he was called by the soldiers. He married Elizabeth Spelman, and died January 2, 1820.

From my grandfather, Azariah Bancroft, who married Tabitha, daughter of Gerard Pratt, and from the wife of the latter, sometime called Dorcas Ashley, my father derived his name Azariah Ashley. This Gerard Pratt was quite a character, and displayed enough peculiarities, which were not affected, to entitle his name to be placed on the roll of great men or men of genius. For example, constantly in season and out of season he wore his hat, a broad-brimmed quakerish-looking affair, although he was no quaker. It was the last article of apparel to be removed at night, when he placed it on the bedpost, the first to be put on in the morning when he arose, and it was removed during the day only when he asked the blessing at table, which was done standing, and during that time he held it in his hand, replacing it before beginning to eat. Half a mile from the old town of Granville, Massachusetts, lived these great-grand-parents of mine, on two acres of good garden land, with a small orchard in which were six famous seek-no-farther apple-trees, reserved from the old family farm, afterward owned by their son-in-law, James Barlow. They were aged and infirm when my father, then a small boy, came every year to help his 56 49 grandfather dig and store his potatoes, and gather and sell his apples, the fine seek-no-farthers readily bringing a cent apiece by the dozen. His grandmother met her death from an accident at ninety-five. A mile and a half from this Pratt farm lived my grandfather Bancroft, a man of good judgment, active in light open-air work, though not of sound health, for he was afflicted with asthma. My grandmother was a woman of great endurance, tall and slender, with a facility for accomplishing work which was a marvel to her neighbors. “She did not possess great physical force,” says my father in his journal, “but managed to accomplish no inconsiderable work in rearing a large family, and providing both for their temporal and spiritual wants—clothing them according to the custom of the time with the wool and flax of her own spinning. The raw material entered the house from the farm, and never left it except as warm durable garments upon the backs of its inmates. The fabric was quite good, as good at least as that of our neighbors, though I ought to admit that it would not compare with the Mission woollen goods of San Francisco; still, I think a peep into my mother's factory as it was in the year 1800 would be found interesting to her descendants of the present day. This was before the day of our country carding machines. My mother had nine operatives at this time, of different ages, and not a drone among us all. All were busy with the little picking machines, the handcards, the spinning-wheel, and the loom. It can be well imagined that my mother was much occupied in her daily duties, yet she found time to teach her little ones the way to heaven, and to pray with them that they might enter therein. And such teaching! such prayers! What of the result? We verily believe those children all gave their hearts to the Savior, either early in childhood or in youth. She had eleven children; two died in infancy. The remaining nine all reared families, and a large 57 50 proportion of them are pious. May a gracious God have mercy upon the rising generation, and in answer to the prayers of a long line of pious ancestry save their children. My mother died in Granville, Ohio, January 29, 1842, in her seventy-first year.”

It seemed to me that boys in Ohio were early put to work, but they used to begin earlier in Massachusetts. A boy, or rather baby of five, could ride horse to plow, a line for guiding the animal being then used less than at present. He could gather surface stones into little heaps, drop corn, and pull flax. During the next year or two, in his linen frock, he performed all kinds of general light work; among the rest he would walk beside the ox team while plowing. The farm on which my father worked at this tender age was quite rough and stony, and before the plowing oxen was sometimes hitched a gentle horse without a bridle, guided, like the oxen, with the whip. My father had not yet reached the end of his sixth year when, toward the close of a long hot summer day, during which he had trudged manfully, whip in hand, beside these cattle, he became exceedingly tired, and the silent tears began to fall. Noticing this the father asked, “What is the matter, my child?” “Nothing, sir,” was the reply, “only I think this is a pretty big team for so small a boy to drive all day.” “I think so too, my son, and we will stop now,” said my grandfather. After his seventh birthday my father was withdrawn from school during summer, his services on the farm being too valuable to be spared. In 1809 my grandfather Bancroft removed his family to Pennsylvania, where Yankees were then eyed suspiciously by the Dutch, and in 1814 he emigrated to Ohio.

My mother was a native of Vermont. Sibyl Phelps was her mother's maiden name, and the Phelps family at an early day removed from the vicinity of St Albans to Ohio. My mother's parents were both originally from Massachusetts, Sibyl 58 51 Phelps leaving Springfield about the time Curtis Howe, my mother's father, left Granville, the two meeting first at Swanton, Vermont, in 1797, their marriage taking place the following year. Curtis Howe was one in whom were united singular mildness of disposition and singular firmness of character, and withal as lovable a nature as ever man had. He lived to the age of ninety-eight, a venerable patriarch, proud of his numerous descendants, who with one accord regarded him as the best man that ever lived. Like a shepherd amidst his flock, with his white hair, and mild beaming eye, and quiet loving smile; with sweet counsel ever falling from his lips, Sabbath days and other days, his simple presence blessed them. In the consciousness of duty well performed, with a firm reliance on his God, a faith deep-rooted in his bible, which though the mountains were upturned could not be shaken, a trust that the sweet Christ on whom he leaned would guide his steps and smooth his path daily and hourly so long as life should last, and give him final rest, the good man brought down heaven and made the world to him a paradise. And when earthly trials thickened, he lifted his soul and soared amidst the stars, and made the saints and angels his companions.

Ah! talk not to me of living then and now. We plume ourselves, poor fools, and say that more of life is given us in the short space we run it through than was vouchsafed our ancestors a century or two ago in thrice the time. Puffed up by our mechanical contrivances which we call science, our parcelling-out of earth and ores which we call wealth, our libertinism which we call liberty; casting ourselves adrift from our faith, calling in question the wisdom and goodness of our maker, throwing off all law but the law of lust, all affection save avarice and epicurism, we plunge headlong into some pandemonium or cast ourselves under some soul-crushing juggernaut of progress, and 59 52 call it life, and boast one year of such hurry-skurry existence to be worth ten, ay, a hundred, of the old-time sort.

Lacrymæ Christi! What, then, is life? To swine, a wallowing in the mire; to the money-getter, a wrangling on the mart; to the brainless belle, a beau, dancing, and dissipation; to the modern young man, billiards, cigars, and champagne cocktails—and if he stops at these he does well. To the woman of fashion life is a war on wrinkles; to the epicure, it is frogs and turtles; to the roué, women and fast horses; to the politician, chicanery, cheatings, and overreachings; to the man of science, evolution, universal law, and a dark uncertain future. Away with aged father and tottering mother! hence with them, coffin them, wall them in, send their souls quick to heaven and let their names be canonized, so that they depart and give their ambitious children room. So swiftly do the actions of modern fast lives follow their swift thoughts that the recording angel must be indeed a good stenographer to take down all their doings. “Think of the crowning hours of men's lives,” exclaims Thomas Starr King, “if you would learn how much living can be crowded into a minute; of Copernicus, when he first saw the sun stop in its career, and the earth, like a moth, begin to flutter round it; of Newton, when the law of gravity was first breaking into the inclosure of his philosophy, and at the same glance he saw his own name written forever on the starry sky; of Le Verrier, when from Berlin word came back that a new planet had been evoked by the sorcery of his mathematics, to spin a wider thread of reflected light than had ever before been traced; of Washington, when the English general's sword was surrendered to him at Yorktown; of Columbus, when on his deck ‘before the upright man there arose a light,’ when San Salvador lifted its candle to his sight and shot its rays across on Castile; and for the jeers of a continent, the mutiny of his men, he was repaid as he saw that the round idea that 60 53 haunted him was demonstrated. To pictures like these we must turn to understand the untranslatable bliss of which a moment is capable, to learn what fast living really is.”

To few, however, is given the happiness of thus hanging the results of a noble life on a point of time, but to all is given the privelege of making somewhat of life. Our life is but one among millions of lives, our world one among millions of worlds, our solar system one among millions of solar systems. “La plupart des hommes,” says La Bruyère, “emploient la première partie de leur vie à rendre l'autre misérable.” Nevertheless it is safe to say that every man receives from the world more than he gives. These so-called fast livers do not live at all, do not know what life is. They act as though they imagined it to be a gladiatorial show, in which each was called to be an actor, a thief, and fierce butcher of time, when in reality they are but spectators, the creator providing the entertainment, which is not a gladiatorial show, but a pastoral feast, where nature herself presides and distributes the gifts. Let it be inscribed on the tombstone of him whose fastness of life lies in money, wine and women:—Here lies one to whom God had given intellect and opportunity, who lived—nay rotted—in an age which yielded to inquiry the grandest returns, doubly rewarding the efforts of mind by blessing him who gave and him who received; but who in all his threescore years lived not an hour, being absorbed all that time in hurried preparations to live, and who died laboring under the strange delusion that he had lived half a century or more. There is about all this bustle and business the stifling vapor of merchandise, town lots, and stocks, which, as one says truthfully, “deoxygenates the air of its fair humanities and ethereal spiritualities, and the more one breathes of it the less one lives.” What recompense to mummied man for overheated brain, withered affections, and scoffing distempers? Can 61 54 wealth atone, or even knowledge? Vain simpleton! get money if you will, and with it buy desolation, heart-weariness; with fame buy shipwrecked faith and blasting winds, which, sweeping over the gardens of the soul once joyous in their fresh bloom, leave behind a withered desert. Wealth, fame, and knowledge, and these alone, bring neither faith, hope, nor sweet charity.

Life is but the glass upon the quicksilver which mirrors thought. As has been fitly said, one may see in the filthy stagnant pool the effulgent clouds rolling in an abyss of blue, or one may see—only a filthy pool. We may fix our eyes forever on the figures of our ledger, our minds on sordid dust, and hug to our selfish souls a consuming fire; or we may lift our eyes and look God in the face, take him by the hand, walk with him, and talk with him of his wonderful works, and begin our eternity of heaven by making a heaven of our hearts and filling them with the inspirations of beauty and contentment. Such was the life of my grandfather; and, say I, give me out of this old man's ninety-eight years one poor day, the poorest of them all, and I will show you more of life than the modern Dives can find by diligent search in ninety-eight such years as his!

From a family sketch written by Curtis Howe in 1857 I quote as follows: “My grandfather, John Howe, was born in London in the year 1650, and remained there through his juvenile years. Nothing is known of his parents, and very little of him, only that some time after he became a man he came to this country with a brother whose name is not known. He purchased a farm in New Haven, Connecticut, acquired a handsome property, and married at the age of sixty a girl of nineteen. My father, Ephraim Howe, was their youngest, born in April, 1730, his father being at that time eighty years old. December 2, 1756, my father married Damaris 62 55 Seaward, he being twenty-seven and she seventeen. According to the family record I was born May 10, 1772; I remained very small and grew but little until I arrived at my teens, and reaching my full size, I suppose, only when nearly twenty-one.”

Things changed as time went on; the world bustled forward and left my grandfather behind. His children to the third and fourth generations became scattered from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and as he advanced in years there was a growing desire in him to see them all and leave with them his blessing ere he died. Many of them he did see, making long journeys in his wagon rather than trust himself to a railway. Queer caution this, it always seemed to me. The good patriarch could trust his God implicitly in most matters; indeed he was confident of his ability to protect him everywhere except on steam-cars and steam-boats. He could go to him in trouble, he could leave his cares with him, knowing that whatever was meted out to him was right and best; but he was a little doubtful about the newfangled, rattling, screeching, bellowing method of travelling, and he preferred the old and sure way, horses and wagons, such as had brought him and his household safely from St Albans to Granville and such as he had ever since employed. The spirit of steam had not yet fallen on him. Nevertheless, so great was the desire to see his children in California, that he finally summoned courage or faith sufficient to brave both railway and steam-ship, making the fatiguing, and for him dangerous passage by the Isthmus at the advanced age of ninety-four.

From family records I have ascertained that a grandmother of my father and a grandmother of my mother were born in the same town the same year; both died the same year at the advanced age of ninety-six. My grandfathers Bancroft and Howe were both born in Granville, Massachusetts; the former died in Ohio, the latter in Kansas.

63 56

Both of my parents were born in the year 1799. I was born in Granville, Ohio, on the fifth day of May, 1832, just two centuries after the arrival of my ancestor John in America. The town of Granville was settled by a colony from New England, and took its name from Granville, Massachusetts, whence many of its settlers came. It was in 1805 that a company was formed in Granville, Massachusetts, to emigrate to the far west, and two of the number went to search the wilderness for a suitable location. They selected a heavily timbered township in Ohio, in the county of Licking, so called from the deer-licks found there. They secured from the proprietors, Stanbury and Rathburn, this tract, and it afterward took the name of Granville, as before mentioned, from their old home. The year following the colony was organized, not as a joint-stock company, but as a congregational church. At starting a sermon was preached from the text: “If thy presence go not with me, carry us not up hence.” Then, after baking much bread, a portion of which was dried to rusk and coarsely ground at the flouring mill, the cattle were hitched to the wagons, and driving their cows before them they moved off in the direction of the star of empire. It was quite a different thing, this New England colony, from an ordinary western settlement. Though eminently practical, it partook rather of the subjective and rational element than of the objective and material. Though unlike their forefathers fleeing from persecution—only for more and better land than they could find at home would they go—they nevertheless, with their households, transplanted their opinions and their traditions, without abating one jot or tittle of either. With their ox teams and horse teams, with all their belongings in covered wagons, these colonists came, bearing in their bosoms their love of God, their courageous faith, their stern morality, their delight in sacrifice; talking of these things by the way, camping by the road side at night, resting on the Sabbath when 64 57 all the religious ordinances of the day were strictly observed, consuming in the journey as many days as it now occupies half-hours, and all with thanksgiving, prayer, and praise.

Quite a contrast, this sort of swarming, to that which characterized the exodus to California less than half a century later, wherein greed usurped the place of godliness, and lust the place of love. The nation had progressed, it was said, since Ohio was the frontier—crablike in some respects, surely; nevertheless there was more of ‘life’ in it, that is to say ebullition, fermentation, called life, as brainless boys and men doomed to perdition call their fopperies, harlotings, and drunken revelries life. There had been a grand broadening since then; Yankeedom now stretched, if not from pole to pole, at least from ocean to ocean, and scarcely had the guns ceased braying that added to our domain the whole of Alta California when the chink of gold was heard upon our western seaboard, and thither flocked adventurers of every caste, good and bad, learned and unlearned, mercantile, mechanical, and nondescript. The sons of the puritans, in common with all the world, rose and hastily departed on their pilgrimage to this new shrine of Plutus. Eagerly they skirted the continent, doubled Cape Horn, crossed the Isthmus, or traversed the plains, in order to reach the other side. The old covered wagon was again brought out, the oxen and the horses; wives and little ones were left behind, and so, alas! too often were conscience, and honesty, and humanity. Not as their forefathers had journeyed did these latter-day men of progress migrate. Sacrifice, there was enough of it, but of quite a different kind. Comfort, society with its wholesome restraints, and Sabbath were sacrificed; the bible, the teachings of their youth, and the Christ himself, were sacrificed. Oaths and blasphemy instead of praise and thanksgiving were heard; drunken revelry and gambling took 65 58 the place of psalms and sermons. Playing-cards were the gold-seeker's testament, rum the spirit of his contemplations, and lucre his one and final love. The rifle and the bowie-knife cleared his path of beasts and native men and women, and the unfortunate ‘greasers,’ by which opprobrious epithet the Anglo-Saxon there greeted his brethren of the Latin race, fared but little better. Here was a new departure in colonizing; nor yet a colonizing—only a huddling of humanity, drunk from excess of avarice.

It was late in the week that the New England emigrants to Ohio reached their destination and camped on a picturesque bench, the rolling forested hills on one side, and on the other a strip of timbered bottom, through which flowed a clear quiet stream. Arranging their wagons in the way best suited for convenience and defence, they felled a few of the large maple and other trees and began to prepare material for building. Then came the warm Sabbath morning, when no sound of the axe was heard, and even nature softened her shrill music and breathed low as arose to heaven the voice of prayer, and praise, and thanksgiving, nevermore to be new or strange among these consecrated hills. A sermon was read on that first Granville Sabbath, and never from that day to this has the peaceful little spot been without its Sabbath and its sermon. Houses were quickly erected, and a church, Timothy Harris being the first pastor. Schools quickly followed; and all thus far being from one place, and of one faith, and one morality, no time was lost in sage discussions, so that Granville grew in solid comforts and intelligence, outstripping the neighboring communities, and ere long sending forth hundreds of young men and women to educate others.

The Phelps family was among the earliest to leave Vermont for the Ohio Granville, thus established by the Massachusetts men. Then came the Bancrofts from Pennsylvania and the Howe family from 66 59 Vermont. Among the first acts of the colonists was to mark out a village and divide the surrounding lands into hundred-acre farms. Now it so happened that the farms of Azariah Bancroft and Curtis Howe adjoined. Both of these settlers were blessed with numerous children; my father was one of eleven, four boys and five girls reaching maturity. It was not the custom in that slow age for parents to shirk their responsibility. Luxury, pleasure, ease, had not yet unsurped the place of children in the mother's breast; and as for strength to bear them, it was deemed disgraceful in a woman to be weak who could not show just cause for her infirmity. As I have said before, work was the order of the day—work, by which means alone men can be men, or women women; by which means alone there can be culture, development, or a human species fit to live on this earth. Men and women, and boys and girls, all worked in those days, worked physically, mentally, and morally, and so strengthened hand, and head, and heart. Thus working in the kitchen field and barn-yard, making hay and milking cows, reaping, threshing, spinning, weaving, Ashley Bancroft and Lucy Howe grew up, the one a lusty, sinewy, dark-eyed youth, the other a bright merry maiden, with golden hair, and the sweetest smile a girl ever had, and the softest, purest eyes that ever let sunlight into a soul. Those eyes played the mischief with the youth. Sly glances were given and returned; at spelling-school, singing-school, chestnutting, and sleighing, whenever they encountered one another the heart of either beat the faster. And in the full course of time they were married, and had a hundred-acre farm of their own; had cattle, and barn, and farm implements, and in time a substantial two-story stone house, with a bright tin roof; and soon there were six children in it, of whom I was the fourth; and had all these comforts paid for—for these thrify workers hated debt as they hated the devil—all paid for save the children, for which debt the 67 60 parents ceased not to make acknowledgments to almighty God morning and evening to the end.

Writing in his journal at the age of eighty-three, just after the death of my mother, in 1882, my father tells the story thus: “Well, a long time ago a little stammering boy”—my father had a slight impediment in his speech—“turned up from the rocks and hills of Massachusetts, who might eventually want a wife; and Infinite Benevolence took the case into His own hands, and being able to see the end from the beginning, by way of compensation, perhaps, for the grievous affliction entailed upon him, He was graciously inclined to bestow upon him one of the very best young women in His keeping, and in accordance with His plan he caused the damsels of His mighty realm to pass before Him, and strange to relate, near the Green Mountains of Vermont one was found with whom He was perfectly acquainted, and whom He knew would be the right person to fill the place. Now the parties were far removed from each other, and still farther removed from the scene of their future destination. And as the time drew nigh when these young persons were to be brought together, discipline and counsel were preparing them; for good parents had been given by the great Moving Power, who could clearly see that they would rear a family of children that they would not be ashamed of. And now, in accordance with the great plan, I was sent out to Ohio a few years in advance of my mate; and four years later there was a movement in a family in Vermont, who bade farewell to friends and started for the west. The second day after their arrival I was walking from father's toward town, when I met two persons, one of whom was my sister Matilda and the other Miss Lucy D. Howe. My sister lightly introduced us, and we all passed on, but not until I had seen a great deal; my eyes were fixed upon this new object; and I could not tell why, nothing escaped me, not even her dress, which I should think was of 68 61 scarlet alpaca, and well fitted. I do not know exactly how it was, whether the dress became the person, or the person the dress, but taking them together I thought them the finest affair I had ever seen.”

They were then in their sixteenth year, and seven years were yet to elapse before their marriage. My father was what people in those days called a good boy, that is he was scarcely a boy at all—sober, sedate, pious, having in him little fun or frolic, though possessing somewhat of a temper, but for which his father would have pronounced him the best boy that ever lived. The immaculate youth had not yet won his bride, who was as clear-headed and single-hearted as he, and joyous as a sunbeam withal. What could he do, extremely sensitive and bashful as he was; how could he bring his faulty tongue to speak the momentous words? There was a way in old-time wooings not practised so much of late. Listen. “Poor Ashley!” continues my father, “he was indeed smitten, though he could not make a move. But he had one resource. He knew the way to a throne of grace, and his prayer for months was that God would give him a companion that should prove a rich and lasting blessing to him. And how wonderfully that prayer has been answered. Miss Howe when she started out from her home that morning did not know she was going forth to meet him who had been appointed to be her companion during a pilgrimage of sixty years.” They joined the same church at the same time, after which, like her father before her, my mother taught school, sometimes at Granville and sometimes at Irville. It was on one of these occasions, when she was absent, that my father summoned courage to write her a proposal, which after much delay resulted in the bright consummation of his hopes. But before marriage my mother assisted her father from her own earnings in building his farm-house, and by further teaching and making bonnets of straw she accumulated enough for her wedding outfit. A few months after their marriage 69 62 they removed to Newark, Ohio, where my father had taken a contract to build a large brick residence for William Stanbury. This work occupied him two years, and when completed was the finest residence in Licking county. In part payment he took the Granville farm, the childhood home of his sons and daughters. He also built locks for the Ohio canal, under contract. “During the year 1840,” writes my father, “while travelling south on business, I encountered a fine rich farming country in Missouri, and in the following year removed my family thither, in company with some of my Granville neighbors; but after a sojourn of about three years we were driven back by the unwholesomeness of the climate. In 1850 I joined a company from Licking county bound for California. We went out by steamer to Chagres, and from Panamá by sailing vessel. Accidents and delays so retarded our progress that our voyage occupied over six months. I returned to Ohio in 1852. In 1861 I received an appointment from Government as Indian Agent for the Yakima nation, at Fort Simcoe, where I remained for nearly four years. I returned to San Francisco in November, 1864, and since then have lived quietly and happily among my children and my children's children.”

My parents were married in Granville, Ohio, on the 21st of February, 1822, the Reverend Ahab Jenks officiating; the 21st of February, 1872, at my house in San Francisco, they celebrated their golden wedding, probably the most joyous event of their long and happy lives. Two of my father's brothers have likewise celebrated their golden weddings, one before this and one afterward. While I am now writing, my father of eighty-five is talking with my children, Paul, Griffing, Philip, and Lucy, aged six, four, two, and one, respectively, telling them of things happening when he was a boy, which, were it possible for them to remember and tell at the age of eighty-five to their grandchildren, would be indeed a 70 63 collating of the family book of life almost in century-pages. Living is not always better than dying; but to my boys I would say, if they desire to live long in this world they must work and be temperate in all things.

Thus it happened that I was born into an atmosphere of pungent and invigorating puritanism, such as falls to the lot of few in these days of material progress and transcendental speculation. This atmosphere, however, was not without its fogs. Planted in this western New England oasis, side by side with the piety and principles of the old Plymouth colony, and indeed one with them, were all the antis and isms that ever confounded Satan—Calvinism, Lutheranism, Knoxism, and Hussism, pure and adulterated; abolitionism, whilom accounted a disgrace, later the nation's proudest honor; anti-rum, anti-tobacco, anti tea and coffee, anti sugar and cotton if the enslaved black man grew them, and anti fiddles and cushions and carpets in the churches, anti-sensualism of every kind, and even comforts if they bordered on luxury. Thus the fanatically good, in their vehement attempts at reform, may perchance move some atom of the progressional world which of inherent necessity, if left alone, would move without their aid or in spite of them. Multitudinous meetings and reforms, high-pressure and low-pressure, were going on, whether wise or unwise, whether there was anything to meet for or to reform, or not. As my mother used to say, “to be good and to do good should constitute the aim and end of every life.” Children particularly should be reformed, and that right early; and so Saturday night was ‘kept,’ preparatory to the Sabbath, on which day three ‘meetings' were always held, besides a Sunday-school and a prayer-meeting, the intervals being filled with Saturday-cooked repasts, catechism, and Sunday readings.

Preparations were made for the Sabbath as for a 71 64 solemn ovation. The garden was put in order, and the sheep and kine were driven to their quiet quarters. The house was scrubbed, and in the winter fuel prepared the day before. All picture-books and scraps of secular reading which might catch the eye and offend the imagination were thrust into a closet, and on the table in their stead were placed the bible, Memoirs of Payson, and Baxter's Saints' Rest. The morning of the holy day crept silently in; even nature seemed subdued. The birds sang softer; the inmates of the farm-yard put on their best behavior; only the brazen-faced sun dared show itself in its accustomed character. Prayers and breakfast over, cleanly frocked, through still streets and past closed doors each member of the household walked with downcast eyes to church. Listen and heed. Speak no evil of the godly man, nor criticise his words.

Not only is religion, or the necessity of worship, as much a part of us as body, mind, or soul, but ingrafted superstition of some sort so fastens itself on our nature that the philosphy of the most skeptical cannot wholly eradicate it.

Often have I heard latter-day progressive fathers say: “For myself, I care not for dogmas and creeds, but something of the kind is necessary for women and children; society else would fall in pieces.” Without subscribing to such a sentiment, I may say that I thank God for the safe survival of strict religious training; and I thank him most of all for emancipation from it. It may be good to be born in a hotbed of reverential sectarianism; it is surely better, at some later time, to escape it.

Excess of any kind is sure, sooner or later, to defeat its own ends. Take, for instance, the meetings inflicted on the society into which destiny had projected me. There were pulpit meetings, conference meetings, missionary meetings, temperance meetings, mothers' meetings, young men's meetings, Sunday-school meetings, inquiry meetings, moral-reform 72 65 meetings, ministers' meetings, sunrise and sunset meetings, anti-slavery meetings—these for the ordinary ministrations, with extra impromptu meetings on special occasions, and all intermingled with frequent and fervid revivals. The consequence was that the young men of Granville were noted in all that region for their wickedness. Home influence and the quiet but effectual teachings of example were overshadowed by the public and more active poundings of piety into the young. The tender plant was so watered, and digged about, and fertilized, that natural and healthy growth was impeded. A distaste for theological discourse was early formed, arising, not from a distaste for religion, nor from special inherent badness, but from the endless unwholesome restraints thrown upon youthful unfoldings, which led in many instances to the saddest results. “Born in sin!” was the cry that first fell on infant ears, and “brought forth in iniquity!” the refrain. This beautiful world that thou seest is given thee, not to enjoy with thankful adoration, but as a snare of Satan. Do penance, therefore, for sins which thou wilt be sure to commit if thou livest. Let thy mind dwell little upon the things thou canst see and understand, and much upon what is beyond the sky, of which thou canst know nothing. By prayer and propitiation peradventure thou mayest induce omnipotence to avert from thine innocent head some of its premeditated wrath; or, if there must be a display of the creator's power let it fall on our neighbors and not on us. So the heaven that my kind heavenly father throws round my earthly habitation is turned into furnace-fires to melt the metal of self-abnegation into coins with which to buy the heaven hereafter.

What then shall be the coming religion? The prophet has not yet arisen to proclaim it. Whatever else its quality, sure I am it will not be a religion of creeds, dogmas, or traditions. We have had enough of the teachings of twilight civilization, of being told by the ignorant and supersititious of by-gone centuries 73 66 what we must believe, by those whose occupation and interest it is to instil ignorance and befog the intellects of men. Whatever else it may contain, the new religion will be founded on reality and common-sense. It will, first of all, discard such parts of every religion as are unable to bear the test of reason, and accept such parts of every religion as are plain, palpable truths. It will look within and without; it will search for knowledge to the uttermost, not ignoring intentions and spiritual aspirations, but vain speculation it will leave to the winds.

It is not to be wondered at that, after such an excess of piety and exalted contemplation, to the young elastic mind an interview with the devil was most refreshing; and as these boys were taught that in tobacco, small-beer, and the painted cards that players used, he lurked, there the pious urchins sought him. Clubs were formed—rough little knots, for polished wickedness had as yet no charm for them—and meetings held for the purpose of acquiring proficiency in these accomplishments. Often after leaving our ‘inquiry’ meeting—that is to say, a place where young folks met ostensibly for the purpose of inquiring what they should do to be saved—have I gone home and to bed; then later, up and dressed, in company with my comrades I would resort to a cellar, garret, or barn, with tallow candle, cent cigars, and a pack of well-worn greasy playing-cards, and there hold sweet communion with infernal powers; in consequence of which enthusiasm one barn was burned and several others narrowly escaped burning. Strange to say, later in life, as soon as I learned how playing-cards were made, and that no satanic influences were employed in their construction or use, they ceased to have any fascination for me.

The spirit of mischief broke out in various ways, such as unhinging gates and hiding them in the grass, rousing the inmates of a house at the dead of night on some frivolous pretext; sometimes choice fruits 74 67 would be missing, and a farmer would find his horses unaccountably used up some morning, or his wagon in the neighboring town. Hither with their noble ethics these New England emigrants had brought their fierce bigotry, which yielded fruit, the one as well as the other.

But on the whole, excess of what we call goodness is better than excess of wickedness. A French writer complains, “Tous les vices médiocres sont presque généralement approuvés; on ne les condamne que dans leur excés.” Now excess per se I hold to be the very essence of evil, the sum of all evils, the sole evil incident to humanity. “Virtus est medium vitiorum et utrinque reductum,” says Horace. Virtue is always found lying between two vices. Those very excellences, moral and intellectual, which cultivated in modernation tend to happiness, if cultivated to an extreme tend to misery. Plato had the idea, though it is somewhat confusedly expressed when he says, “Slavery and freedom, if immoderate, are each of them an evil; if moderate, they are altogether a good. Moderate is the slavery to a god; but immoderate to men. God is a law to the man of sense; but pleasure is a law to the fool.” Dr Young remarks, “When we dip too deep in pleasure we always stir up a sediment that renders it impure and noxious.” We can but notice in the history of high attainments reached by various ages and nations, culminating points, in leaping which progress defeats itself. Undue culture in one direction retards advancement in another. Intellectual excesses, of all others, tend to drive a man to extremes. The higher a brain worker is lifted out of or above himself, the lower he sinks in the reaction; for to ignore himself, his human and material nature, is impossible. A strain upon those exquisitely delicate organs essential to the higher chords of genius produces discordant results. The temptation for refined and intellectual men to 75 68 periodical coarseness and immorality is far greater than persons of less delicate organizations can imagine. Thus beyond a certain line the intellectual in man can be further developed only at the expense of the physical, or the physical only at the expense of the mental. The intensity of force arising from alcoholic stimulants results in subsequent exhaustion. Consulting Dr Fothergill on this subject, we are told that “where man is left too much to his mere muscular efforts, without the mind being engaged, we find disease engendered, and that, too, to a decided extent. The monotonous occupation entailed by the division of labor, and the mental lethargy entailed by a form of labor making no demand upon the intellectual powers, leave the persons engaged in such labor a prey to every form of excitement when the work hours are over. Drunkenness, political and theological agitation, bursts of excitement, and a sensational literature of the lowest order, are the price mankind pays for the development of industrial enterprise. Insanity dogs the neglect of the intellect even more than over-use of it, and the percentage of insanity among field laborers is much higher than among the professional classes.”

It is by the development of all our faculties simultaneously that perfect manhood is attained. For in this simultaneous development the true mean asserts itself and subordinates excess. The moment one faculty is taxed at the expense of another both cry out for redress; one by reason of the too heavy burden laid upon it, and the other under the sufferings of neglect. Excess pays no attention to these cries, but abandons its victim to passion; while temperance heeds and obeys. Hence excessive so-called goodness becomes in itself a great evil, and excessive so-called evil is sure in the end to react and to some extent right itself, or rot and fall in pieces. Abstract evil without some amalgam of good to give it form and consistence cannot hold together. It is like a lump of clay fashioned in the 76 69 image of man, but without life or motive principle; or like man fashioned after the image of his maker, without the soul of the creator's goodness. We are not invited into this world to be angels or demons, but simply men; let us strive never so hard to be one or the other, and we signally fail. Coupled with the superlative, “Pray without ceasing,” is the caution, “Be not righteous overmuch.” Avoid irreligion, atheism, soulless nescience; avoid likewise superstition, fanaticism, and pious brawlings. May not our ills be merely blessings in excess? And the higher and holier the good, the greater the curse of it when we swallow too much. I know of no such things as ‘vices médiocres.’ To sin against my body, be it ever so little, is to sin, for it is written, “Thou shalt do no murder;” to sin against my mind, my soul, is to sin against mind immortal, the soul of my soul. This it is to be born in sin, and nothing more; to be born unevenly balanced, so that throughout life we are constantly vibrating, ever verging toward one extreme or another.

In the broader view of man and his environment, in watching the powerful influences that govern him, and his almost futile efforts to govern himself or his surroundings, one cannot but be struck by the self-regulating principle in the machinery. We walk through life as on a tight-rope, and the more evenly we balance ourselves the better we can go forward. Too much leaning on one side involves a corresponding movement toward the other extreme in order to gain an equilibrium, and so we go on wriggling and tottering all our days. Hence, to avoid excesses of every kind I hold to be the truest wisdom. We have before us, in the history of mankind, thousands of examples if we would profit by them, thousands of illustrations of we will see them, wherein excess of what we call good and excess of what we call evil both alike tend to destruction. The effects of excessive piety are before us in forms of morbid asceticism, with 77 70 self-flagellations, and starvations, and half a nation turned beggarly monks, to be kept alive at the expense of the other half or left to die; in persecutions and slaughters, which for centuries made this fair earth an Aceldama, whence the smoke from reeking millions slain, ascending heavenward, called aloud for vengeance. “Crucify thy body and the lusts thereof,” cries the ascetic; until, alas! the knees smite together, and the imbecile mind, deprived of its sustenance, wanders with weird images in the clouds. “Give us meat and drink; let us be merry,” says the sensualist; and so the besotted intellect is brought down and bemired until the very brutes regard it contemptuously. Away with effeminate sentimentality on the one side and beastly indulgence on the other! Away with straining at gnats and swallowing camels! Use, but do not abuse, all that God has given thee—the fair earth, that wonderful machine, thy body, that thrice awful intelligence that enthrones thy body and makes thee companion of immortals. Given a world of beings in which mind and body are evenly balanced, and the millennium were come; no more need of priest or pill-taking; no more need of propagandist or hangman. Olympus sinks to earth, and men walk to and fro as gods.

It is the will of God, as christianity expresses it, or inexorable necessity, as the Greek poets would say, or the tendency of evolution, as science puts it, for goodness on this earth to grow; for men to become better, and for evil to disappear. Self-preservation demands moderation in all things, and it is ordained, whether we will it or not, that temperance, chastity, frugality, and all that is elevating and ennobling, shall ultimately prevail. Not that we are passive instruments in the hand of fate, without will or power to move. We may put forth our puny efforts, and as regards our individual selves, and those nearest us, we may accomplish much; and the more we struggle for the right, whether on utilitarian or inherent 78 71 morality principles, the more we cultivate in our hearts the elements of piety, morality, and honesty, the better and happier we are. This the experience of all mankind in all ages teaches, and this our own experience tells us every day. Whatever else I know or am doubtful of, one thing is plain and sure to me: to do my duty as best I may, each day and hour, as it comes before me; to do the right as best I know it, toward God, my neighbor, and myself; this done, and I may safely trust the rest. To know the right, and do it, that is life. Compromises with misery-breeding ignorance, blind and stupid bigotry, and coyings and harlotings with pestilential prudences, lackadaisical loiterings and tamperings with conscience, when right on before you is the plain Christ-trodden path—these things are death. He who knows the right and does it, never dies; he who tampers with the wrong, dies every day. But alas! conduct is one thing and rules of conduct quite another.

Nevertheless, I say it is better to be righteous overmuch than to be incorrigibly wicked. And so the puritans of Granville thought as they enlarged their meeting-houses, and erected huge seminaries of learning, and called upon the benighted from all parts to come in and be told the truth. Likewise they comforted the colored race.

The most brilliant exploit of my life was performed at the tender age of eleven, when I spent a whole night in driven a two-horse wagon load of runaway slaves on their way from Kentucky and slavery to Canada and freedom—an exploit which was regarded in those days by that community with little less approbation than that bestowed by a fond Apache mother upon the son who brandishes before her his first scalp. The ebony cargo consisted of three men and two women, who had been brought into town the night before by some teamster of kindred mind to my father's, and kept snugly stowed away from prying 79 72 eyes during the day. About nine o'clock at night the large lumber-box wagon filled with straw was brought out, and the black dissenters from the American constitution, who so lightly esteemed our glorious land of freedom, were packed under the straw, and some blankets and sacks thrown carelessly over them, so that outwardly there might be no significance of the dark and hidden meaning of the load. My careful mother bundled me in coats and scarfs, to keep me from freezing, and with a round of good-bys, given not without some apprehensions for my safety, and with minute instructions, repeated many times lest I should forget them, I climbed to my seat, took the reins, and drove slowly out of town. Once or twice I was hailed by some curious passer-by with, “What have you got there?” to which I made answer as in such case had been provided. Just what the answer was I have forgotten, but it partook somewhat of the flavor of my mission, which was more in the direction of the law of God than of the law of man. Without telling an unadulterated Ananias and Sapphira lie, I gave the inquirer no very reliable information; still, most of the people in that vicinity understood well enough what the load meant, and were in sympathy with the shippers. I was much nearer danger when I fell asleep and ran the wagon against a tree near a bank, over which my load narrowly escaped being turned. The fact is, this was the first time in my life I had ever attempted to keep my eyes open all night, and more than once, as my horses jogged along, I was brought to my senses by a jolt, and without any definite idea of the character of the road for some distance back. My freight behaved very well; once fairly out into the country, and into the night, the ‘darkies' straightened up, grinned, and appeared to enjoy the performance hugely. During the night they would frequently get out and walk, always taking care to keep carefully covered in passing through a town. About three o'clock in the morning 80 73 I entered a village and drove up to the house whither I had been directed, roused the inmates, and transferred to them my load. Then I drove back, sleepy but happy.

Once my father's barn was selected as the most available place for holding a grand abolition meeting, the first anniversary of the Ohio State Anti-Slavery society. Rotten eggs flew lively about the heads of the speakers, but they suffered no serious inconvenience from them until after the meeting was over and they had begun their homeward journey. Beyond the precincts of the village they were met by a mob, and although spurring their horses they did not escape until the foul flood had drenched them. Those were happy days, when there was something to suffer for; now that the slavery monster is dead, and the slayers have well-nigh spent their strength kicking the carcass, there is no help for reformers but to run off into woman's rights, free-love, and a new string of petty isms which should put them to the blush after their doughty deeds. There are yet many souls dissatisfied with God's management of things, who feel themselves ordained to re-create mankind upon a model of their own. Unfortunately the model varies, and instead of one creator we have ten thousand, who turn the world upside down with their whimsical vagaries.

I cannot say that my childhood was particularly happy; or if it was, its sorrows are deeper graven on my memory than its joys. The fault, if fate be fault, was not my parents', who were always most kind to me. Excessive sensitiveness has ever been my curse; since my earliest recollections I have suffered from this defect more than I can tell. My peace of mind has ever been in hands other than my own; at school rude boys cowed and tormented me, and later knaves and fools have held me in derision.

How painful to a sensitive mind is the attention 81 74 drawn by personal peculiarity; how powerful the influence of external trifles! Instance Byron, with his club-foot; and the pimpled Hazlitt, as his Tory critics called him, his morbid imagination haunted by the ever present picture of himself, the sinister effects of which governed well-nigh every action of his life. Then there was the dusopia of Plutarch's which consisted in the inability of saying no; and the shyness that subordinated judgment to fear, such as that manifested by Antipater when invited to the feast of Demetrius, or that of young Hercules, Alexander's son, who was browbeaten into accepting the invitation of Polysperchon, which, as the son of Alexander had feared, resulted in his death; worst of all is the bashfulness of dissimulation, and that counterfeit of shyness, egoism. I never had any difficulty in saying no, never lacked decision. No matter at what expense of unpopularity, or even odium, I stood always ready to maintain the right; and as for the diffidence of dissimulation, I was frank enough among my friends, though reserved with strangers. By nature I was melancholy without being morose, affectionate and proud, and keenly alive to home happiness and the blessings of every-day life. So far as I am able to analyze the failing, it arose from no sense of fear, inferiority, or vanity; it was simply a distaste or disinclination to feel obliged to meet and converse with strangers when I had nothing to see them for, and nothing to converse about; at the same time, when urged by duty or business, my mind once made up, I could go anywhere and encounter any person without knee-shaking. My trouble partook more of that nervousness which Lord Macauly ascribes to Mr Pitt, who always took laudanum and sal-volatile before speaking, than of that shyness complained of by Bulwer, who said he could resist an invitation to dinner so long as it came through a third person, in the form of a written or verbal message, but once assaulted by the entertainer in person and he 82 75 was lost. It is true, a simple invitation to a general assemblage oppressed my spirits, yet I would go and endure from a sense of duty. I was timid; others were bold. Conscious of merits and abilities, superior, in my own opinion at least, to those of the persons I most disliked to meet, I would not subject myself to the withering influences of their loud and burly talking. With the natural desire for approbation mingled a nervous horror of shame; with aspirations to excel the fears of failure; and I felt a strong repugnance to exposing myself at a disadvantage, or permitting such merit as I possessed to be undervalued or overmatched by the boisterous and contemptible. Yet I will contend that it was less pride than a morbid excess of modesty curdled into a curse.

The author of Caxtoniana says in his essay on shyness: “When a man has unmistakably done a something that is meritorious, he must know it; and he cannot in his heart undervalue that something, otherwise he would never have strained all his energy to do it. But till he has done it, it is not sure that he can do it; and if, relying upon what he fancies to be genius, he does not take as much pains as if he were dull, the probability is that he will not do it at all. Therefore merit not proved is modest; it covets approbation, but is not sure that it can win it. And while thus eager for its object, and secretly strengthening all its powers to achieve it by a wise distrust of unproved capacities and a fervent admiration for the highest models, merit is tremulously shy.” It is by no means proven that modesty is a mark of merit, or shyness a sign of genius. On the contrary we might as naturally ask of the bashful person what he has done that he is ashamed of. But without theory, without knowing or caring what was the cause, all through my younger days to meet people was distasteful to me; so I threw round myself a wall of solitude, within which admittance was gained by few. This state of things continued until some time after 83 76 I had arrived at the age of maturity, when it gradually left me; enough remaining, however, to remind me of the past.

It is one of the saddest processes of life, this of tanning the heart and turning the seat of the affections into a barb-proof ball; but there is no other way of warding off those untoward accidents and incidents which peril the sensitive angles of the many-sided bashful man, and of keeping back affliction that constantly pours in upon him. To absorb and digest all the infelicities that press round us is like going to sea in a worm-eaten boat; despite our best efforts the bitter waters will come in and overwhelm us. From the day of our birth till death gives us rest, ills hover over us and crowd round us, fancied ills most of them, or misfortunes which never happen, but to the timid more fearful than real ones. There are more of these than we are able to bear, and if we would not sink into the depths of despair we must fill our hearts with that which will turn the tide of unhappiness. Pitch will do it to some extent, though it may not be handled without defilement. Charity absorbs troubles rather than sheds them. Nevertheless, whatever the cost, some portion of the frowns of our fellows and the evils anticipated by the fearful and sensitive must be flung off. We suffer infinitely more in the anticipation than in the reality, and then not more than one in a hundred of our anticipated evils ever reaches us. Like Pyramus, who prematurely stabbed himself because he thought his Thisbe slain by a lion when she was safe, or Romeo, who might have had his Juliet here had he not been in such haste to meet her in heaven, we are driven to despair by the evil that never touches us. Throw off evil then; and above all, throw off the fear of possible or probable evil. When it comes, turn your craft to meet the storm as best you may, but do not die a thousand times before death comes.

And thus it was that later in life, as I wandered 84 77 among the scenes of my childhood, sadness stood everywhere prominent. I seemed to remember only the agony of my young life, and every step I took wrung from my very soul tears of sympathetic pity. The steed well fed and warmly housed at night will stand the keenest, coldest day unflinchingly; give to the boy a happy life, and the man will take care of himself. Let him who will, after arriving at maturity, defy opinion and the contempt of the world, but do not ask the child to do it. Nothing exceeds the misery suffered by the sensitive youth from the jeers of companions. Let the boy be a boy during his youth, and as far into manhood as possible. The boyish delight of Lamartine as he revelled among the mountain's sparkling streams, breathing the flower-scented breath of May, was to his ascetic fater-confessor, Père Varlet, almost a crime. I was reared in that saturnine school which teaches it to be a sin for the insulted boy to strike back; and often in my school-days, overwhelmed with a sense of ignominy and wrong, I have stolen off to weep away a wounded spirit. The fruit of such training never leaves the child or man; its sting penetrates the blood and bones, and poisons the whole future life. Yet for all that, and more, of puritan Granville I may say, it was well for this man that he was born there.

My boyhood was spent in working during the summer, and in winter attending school, where I progressed so far as to obtain a smattering of Latin and Greek, and some insight into the higher mathematics. No sooner had my father placed in a forward state of cultivation his hundred acres, and built him a large and comfortable stone house—which he did with his own hands, quarrying the blocks from a hill near by—and cleared the place from debt, than, seized by the spirit of unrest, he sold his pleasant home and moved his family to the ague swamps of New Madrid, Missouri, where rich land, next to nothing in price, 85 78 with little cultivation would yield enormous returns, worth next to nothing when harvested, through lack of any market.

After three years of ague and earthquake agitations in that uncertain-bottomed sand-blown land of opossums and puckering persimmons, fearing lest the very flesh would be shaken from our bones, we all packed ourselves back, and began once more where we left off, but minus the comfortable stone house and farm.

Call it discontent, ambition, enterprise, or what you will, I find this spirit of my father fastened somewhat upon his son; though with Caliph Ali, Mohammed's son-in-law, I may say, that “in the course of my long life, I have often observed that men are more like the times they live in than they are like their fathers.” It is characteristic of some people that they are never satisfied except when they are a little miserable. Like the albatross, which loves the tempest, sailing round and round this life's waste of ocean, if perchance he crosses the line of calm, he straightway turns back, suffocated by the silence, and with much contentment commits himself to new buffetings. Philosophically put by Herbert Ainslie, “Self-consciousness must involve intervals of unhappiness; not to be self-conscious is to be as bird or beast, living without knowing it, having no remembrance or anticipation of joy or sorrow. Self-consciousness, too, must involve the consciousness of an ideal or type; a sense of that which nature intended us to be, and how far we fall short of it. To finish my homily, if man be the highest result of nature's long effort to become self-conscious, to ‘know herself,’ not to be self-conscious, that is, to be always happy, is to be not one of nature's highest results. The ‘perfect man,’ then, must be one ‘acquainted with grief.’” Often in the simple desire for new companionship we tire of unadulterated good, and communion with some sorrow or the nursing of some heartache becomes a pleasing 86 79 pastime. There are persons who will not be satisfied, though in their garden were planted the kalpa-tarou, the tree of the imagination, in Indian mythology, whence may be gathered whatever is desired. To natures thus constituted a real tangible calamity, such as failure in business or the breaking of a leg, is a god-send. Pure unalloyed comfort is to them the most uncomfortable of positions. The rested bones ache for new hardships, and the quieted mind frets for new cares. So roam our souls through life, sailing eternally in air like feetless birds of paradise.

After all, this spirit, the spirit of unrest, of discontent, is the spirit of progress. Underlying all activities, it moves every enterprise; it is the mainspring of commerce, culture, and indeed of every agency that stimulates human improvement. Nay, more: that fire which may not be smothered, that will not let us rest, those deep and ardent longings that stir up discontent, that breed distempers, and make a bed of roses to us a couch of thorns—religion it may be, and ideal national morality, or sense of duty, or laudable desire in any form—is it any other influence than Omnipotence working in us his eternal purposes, driving us on, poor blind cogs that we are in the wheel of destiny, to the fulfilment of predetermined ends? It is a law of nature that water, the life-giver, the restorer, the purifier, shall find no rest upon this planet; it is a law of God that we, human drops in the stream of progress, shall move ever onward—in the bubblings, and vaulting, and pool-eddyings of youth, in the successive murmurings, and roarings, and deeper affairs of life, and in the more silent and sluggish flow of age—on, never resting, to the black limitless ocean of the Beyond.

Nor may our misery, our nervous petulance, our fretful discontent, our foolish fears, and all the catalogue of hateful visitations that grate and jar upon ourselves and others, and make us almost savage in our undying hunger, be altogether accounted to us for 87 80 ill. That divina particula auræ, the one little particle of divine breath that is within us, will not let us rest. As Pierre Nicol has it, “L'homme est si misérable, que l'inconstance avec laquelle il abandonne ses desseins est, en quelque sorte, sa plus grande vertu; parce qu'il témoigne par là qu'il y a encore en lui quelque reste de grandeur qui le porte à se dégoûter des choses qui ne méritent pas son amour et son estime.”

Lovely little Granville! dear, quiet home-nook; under the long grass of thy wall-encircled burial-ground rest the bones of these new puritan patriarchs, whose chaste lives, for their descendants, and for all who shall heed them, bridge the chasm between the old and the new, between simple faith and soul-sacrificing science, between the east and the west—the chasm into which so many have haplessly fallen. Many a strong man thou hast begotten and sent forth, not cast upon the world lukewarm, characterless, but as sons well trained and positive for good or evil.

Lovely in thy summer smiles and winter frowns; lovely, decked in dancing light and dew pearls, or in night's star-studded robe of sleep. Under the soft sky of summer we ploughed and planted, made hay, and harvested the grain. Winter was the time for study, while nature, wrapped in her cold covering, lay at rest. Fun and frolic then too were abroad on those soft silvery nights, when the moon played between the brilliant sky and glistening snow, and the crisp air carried far over the hills the sound of bells and merry laughter. Then winter warms into spring, that sun-spirit which chases away the snow, and swells the buds, and fills the air with the melody of birds, and scatters fragrance over the breathing earth; and spring melts into summer, and summer sighs her autumn exit—autumn, loved by many as the sweetest, saddest time of the year, when the husbandman, after laying up his 88 81 winter store, considers for a moment his past and future, when the squirrel heaps its nest with nuts, and the crow flies to the woods, and the cries of birds of passage in long angular processions are heard high in air, and the half-denuded forest is tinged with the hectic flush of dying foliage.

I well remember, on returning from my absence, with what envy and dislike I regarded as interlopers those who then occupied my childhood home; and child as I was, the earliest and most determined ambition of my life was to work and earn the money to buy back the old stone house. Ah God! how with swelling heart, and flushed cheek, and brain on fire, I have later tramped again that ground, the ground my boyhood trod; how I have skirted it about, and wandered through its woods, and nestled in its hedges, listening to the rustling leaves and still forest murmurings that seemed to tell me of the past; uncovering my head to the proud old elms that nodded to me as I passed, and gazing at the wild-flowers that looked up into my face and smiled as I trod them, even as time had trodden my young heart; whispering to the birds that stared strangely at me and would not talk to me—none save the bickering blackbird, and the distant turtle-dove to whose mournful tone my breast was tuned; watching in the little stream the minnows that I used to fancy waited for me to come and feed them before they went to bed; loitering under the golden-sweet appletree where I used to loll my study hours away; eying the ill-looking beasts that occupied the places of my pets, while at every step some familiar object would send a thousand sad memories tugging at my heartstrings, and call up scenes happening a few years back but acted seemingly ages ago, until I felt myself as old as Abraham. There was the orchard, celestial white and fragrant in its blossoms, whose every tree I could tell, and the fruit that grew on it; the meadow, through whose bristling stubble my naked feet had 89 82 picked their way when carrying water to the haymakers and fighting bumblebees; the cornfield, where I had ridden the horse to plough; the barnyard, where from the backs of untrained colts I had encountered so many falls; the hillock, down which I had been tumbled by my pet lamb, afterward sacrificed and eaten for its sins—eaten unadvisedly by youthful participants, lest the morsels should choke them. There was the garden I had been made to weed, the well at which I had so often drunk, the barn where I used to hunt eggs, turn somersets, and make such fearful leaps upon the hay; there were the sheds, and yards, and porches; every fence, and shrub, and stone, stood there, the nucleus of a thousand heart throbs.

From the grassy field where stands conspicuous the stone-quarry gash, how often have I driven the cows along the base of the wooded hill separating my father's farm from the village, to the distant pasture where the long blue-eyed grass was mixed with clover, and sprinkled with buttercups, and dotted with solitary elms on whose limbs the crows and blackbirds quarrelled for a place. And under the beech-trees beneath the hill where wound my path, as my bare feet trudged along, how boyish fancies played through my brain while I was all unconscious of the great world beyond my homely horizon. On the bended bough of that old oak, planted long before I was born, and which these many years has furnished the winter's store and storehouse to the thrifty woodpecker, while in its shadow lies the lazy cud-chewing cow, there sits the robin where sat his father, and his father's father, singing the self-same song his grandfather sang when he wooed his mate, singing the self-same song his sons and his sons' sons shall sing; and still remains unanswered the question of the boy: Who gives the bird his music lesson?

Dimly, subduedly sweet, were those days, clouded perhaps a little with boyish melancholy, and now 90 83 brought to my remembrance by the play of sunshine and shadow in and round familiar nooks, by the leafy woodbine under the garden wall, by the sparkling dewy grass-blades, and the odor of the breathing woods, by the crab-appletree hedge, covered with grape-vines, and bordered with blackberry bushes, and inclosing the several fields, each shedding its own peculiar fragrance; by the row of puritanical poplars lining the road in front of the house, by the willows drinking at the brook, the buckeyes on the hill, and the chestnut, hickory, butternut, and walnut trees, whose fruit I gathered every autumn, storing it in the garret, and cracking it on Sundays after sunset, as a reward for ‘keeping’ Saturday night. Even the loud croaking of frogs in the little swamp between the barn and meadow thrilled me more than did ever Strauss' band.

There is something delicious in the air, though the ground be wet and the sky murky; it is the air in which I first cried and laughed. There, upon the abruptly sloping brow of the hill yonder, is where I buried myself beneath a load of wood, overturned from a large two-horse sled into the snow. And in that strip of thicket to the right I used to hide from thunder-showers on my way from school. Behind that stone wall many a time have I crept up and frightened chanticleer in the midst of his crow, raising his wrath by breaking his tune, and thereby instigating him to thrice as loud and thrice as long a singing the moment my back was turned. The grove of sugar-maple trees, to me a vast and trackless forest infested with huge reptiles and ravenous beasts, when there I slept all night by the camp-fire boiling the unsubstantial sap to sweeter consistency, it is now all cleared away, and, instead, a pasture tempts the simple sheep. Away across the four-acre lot still stands the little old bridge wherefrom I fished for minnows in the brook it spans, with pork-baited pins for hooks.

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There is something painfully sweet in memories painful or sweet. How sorrows the heart over its lost friendships; how the breath of other days whispers of happiness never realized; how the sorrowful past plays its exquisite strains upon the heartstrings! Things long gone by, deemed little then and joyless, are magnified by the mists of time and distance into a mirage of pleasurable remembrances. How an old song sometimes stirs the whole reservoir of regrets, and makes the present well-nigh unbearable! Out of my most miserable past I draw the deepest pain-pleasures, beside which present joys are insipid. There is no sadder sound to the questioner's ear than the church bell which sometime called him to believing prayer. At once it brings to mind a thousand holy aspirations, and rings the death knell of an eternity of joy.

Like tiny tongues of pure flame darting upward amidst the mountain of sombre smoke, there are many bright memories even among the most melancholy reveries. The unhappiest life contains many happy hours, just as the most nauseating medicine is made up of divers sweet ingredients. Even there, golden run life's golden sands, for into the humble home ambition brings as yet no curse.

But alas! the glowing charm thrown over all by the half-heavenly conceptions of childhood shall never be revived. Every harvesting now brings but a new crop of withered pleasures, which with the damask freshness of youth are flung into the storehouse of desolation. Therefore hence! back to your hot-bed; this is a lost Eden to you!

Thus wrapped in dim vistas, forgetful of what I am, of time, and age, and ache, I light a cigar and throw myself upon the turf, and as through the curling smoke I review the old familiar landscape, the past and present of my life circle round and round and mount upward with visions of the future. With triple sense I see fashioned by the fantastic smoke ghosts of cities, seas, and continents, of railways, grain-fields, and gold-fields. 92 85 Through the perspective of impassioned youth I see my bark buoyant on burnished waters, while round the radiant shore satisfying pleasures beckon me, and warm friendships await me, and the near and dear companions of my childhood, the hills, the trees, and sky, with whose hebate soul my eager soul has often held communion, imparting here alone the secrets of my youthful phantasy, they whisper the assurance in my ear that every intense yearning shall be rocked to rest, and every high hope and noble aspiration realized. Then with the eye of mature manhood I look, and experience reveals a charnel-house of dead ambitions, of failures chasing fresh attempts, of lost opportunities and exploded honors, with all the din and clatter of present passionate strife; and along the crowded pathway to Plutus' shrine are weary, dusty pilgrims, bent with toil and laden with disappointment. Out upon this so swiftly changing earth there are the rich and the poor, the righteous and the wicked, the strong and healthy, the sick and suffering, advancing infancy and departing age, all hustling each other, and hurrying hither and thither, like blind beetles following their blind instinct, not knowing the sea or city, grain-field or gold-field, not knowing their whence or whither, not knowing themselves or the least of created or uncreated things. Once more I look, and behold, the flattering future is as ready as ever with her illusions, and men are as ready as ever to anchor to her false hopes!

Smoke here seems out of place. Its odor is strange and most unwelcome in this spot. It savors too strongly of the city and artificial life, of business, travel, and luxury, to harmonize with the fresh fragrance of the country. Let it not poison the air of my early and innocent breathings, laden as are such airs with the perfumes of paradise. Billowy sensations sweep over the breast as, standing thus alone amidst these memory surges, the thickly crowding imageries of the past rise and float upon the surface of the present. 93 86 How ticklishly fall the feet of manhood on paths its infancy trod! There is a new road through the beech woods yonder which I shun as possessing no interest; I have had enough of new roads. Then I ask myself, will the old elms never wither? will the stones never decay about these spots? Who would have all the farms bounded by this horizon as a gift? Yet people will be born here ten thousand years after I am dead, and people must live.

Lingering still; the uprooted affections hugging the soil of their early nourishment. Here, as nowhere on this earth, nature and I are one. These hills and fields, this verdant turf and yonder trees are part of me, their living and breathing part of my living and breathing, their soul one with my soul. For all which expression let Dante make my apology: “Poichè la carità del natio loco, mi estrinse, raunai le fronde sparte;” because the charity of my native place constrained me, gathered I the scattered leaves.

It is a maddening pleasure thus to conjure from the soil the buried imageries of boyhood. At every step arise scores of familiar scenes, ascending in sequent pictures that mingle with the clouds and float off a brilliant panorama of the past. The very curb-stones of the village streets stand as monuments, and every dust particle represents some weird image, some boyish conceit, which even now flits before me, racing round the corners and dancing over the house-tops.

The pretty village has scarcely changed within the quarter century. The broad, dusty streets, bordered by grass and foliage, half burying the white and brown houses that lie scattered on either side; the several churches, the two great seminaries, the schoolhouses, and the college on the hill, are all as when I left them last.

Here is the ill kept graveyard, the scene of all my youthful ghost stories, with its time-eaten tombstones toppling over sunken graves, and its mammoth thorntree, beneath whose shadow the tired hearse-bearers 94 87 set down their dingy cloth-covered burden on the way to the newly made grave, while the bell that strikes its slow notes on the suffocating air warns all flesh of coming dissolution.

Down below the bench yonder winds the wooded creek, where in my summer school-days we used to rehearse our exhibition pieces, and bathe. On the other sides of the village are Sugar-loaf and Alligator hills. I grow thirsty as I drink the several scenes.

How distances lessen! Before eyes accustomed to wider range than the village home and farm adjoining, the mists and mirage of youth disappear. I start to walk a block, and ere aware of it I am through the town and into the country. After all, the buildings and streets of my native town are not so grand as my youthful mind was impressible.

How the villagers come out of their houses to stare at me; and the old stone house, how rusty, and rugged, and mean it looks compared with the radiance my unhackneyed brain clothed it in, though the tin roof glitters as brightly now as then, and in its day sheltered a world of love.

Never is there a home like the home of our youth; never such sunshine as that which makes shadows for us to play in, never such air as that which swells our little breasts and gives our happy hearts free expression, never such water as the laughing dancing streamlet in which we wade through silvery bubblings over glittering pebbles, never such music as the robin's roundelay and the swallow's twittering that wake us in the morning, the tinkling of the cow bells, the rustling of the vines over the window, the chirrup of the cricket, and the striking of the old house clock that tells us our task is done. The home of our childhood once abandoned, is forever lost. It may have been a hut, standing on the rudest patch of ground the earth affords, yet so wrapped round the heart is it, so charged with youthful imagery is every stick and stone of it, that the gilded castle built in 95 88 after life, with all the rare and costly furnishings that art and ingenuity can afford, is but an empty barn beside it!

What restfulness, what heartfelt satisfaction, what exquisite joy, in returning to one's childhood home, with its dear inmates, father, mother, and all the ancient and time-honored belongings, still there, with all those familiar objects which so wrap themselves round our young affections, and live within us, yielding joy if not enjoying, and gladdening the light of day with their presence. These gone, and joy and beauty are entombed, and the returned wanderer walks as one waked from the dead. How soothing and how happy it would be could I but return, and after the long weary battle of life rest here the remainder of my days, grow young with age, become a child again, and, lapped by my first surroundings, lay life down in nature's arms where first I took it up. Then should my hot brain be cooled by the cool air of moonlights long gone by, and my sinking soul revived by the sunlights of memory and hope.

Thus glided magic, mysterious childhood. Pass me Hebe's cup, and let me be young again, that I may try this mystery once more.

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CHAPTER IV.

THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER. No man is born into the world whose work is not born with him; there is always work and tools to work withal, for those who will.

Lowell.

CROSSING a muddy street one rainy day on her way to school, my eldest sister, dark-eyed and tender of heart, encountered a sandy-haired but by no means ill-looking youth, who made way for her by stepping back from the plank which served pedestrians. The young man was a member of the Derby family of booksellers, afterward noted for their large establishments in various cities. Of course these two young persons, thus thrown together on this muddy crossing, fell in love; how else could it be? and indue time were married, vowing thenceforth to cross all muddy streets in company, and not from opposite directions. And in this rain, and mud, and marriage, I find another of the causes that led me to embark in literature. The marriage took place in 1845, when I was thirteen years of age, and the happy couple made their home in Geneva, New York, where Mr Derby was then doing business. Subsequently he removed his bookstore and family to Buffalo.

On our return from the land of milk and honey, as we at first soberly and afterward ironically called our southern prairie home, my father entered into copartnership with one Wright, a tanner and farmer. The tasks then imposed upon me were little calculated to give content or yield profit. Mingled with my school and Sunday duties, interspersed with occasional times 97 90 for shooting, fishing, swimming, skating, sleighing, and nut and berry gathering, was work, such as grinding bark, sawing wood, chopping, clearing, fencing, milling, teaming, ploughing, planting, harvesting, and the like, wherein I could take but little interest and make no progress, and which consequently I most heartily hated.

To my great delight, a year or two after the marriage of my sister, I was offered the choice of preparing for college or of entering the Buffalo bookstore. The doctrine was just then coming into vogue that in the choice of a profession or occupation youthful proclivities should be directed, but the youth should not be coerced. This, within the bounds of reason, is assuredly the correct idea.

Here was quite a modification of the strait-laced theories prominent in this community in morals and religion. Yet in spiritual affair, those pertaining to the remote and indefinite future, the strictest rules of conduct were still laid down, the slightest departure from which entailed social death. Heaven and hell remained fixed in their respective localities, weighed and measured, the streets of gold laid out, and the boundaries of the lakes of sulphuric fire defined. All were accurately mapped, the populations were given, and available accommodations estimated for future applicants. Moreover, there were the roads plainly distinguishable to the one and to the other, the one narrow, rugged, and grassgrown, the other broad, and dusty from much travel. This the parent knew; of it he was sure though sure of nothing else; though not sure of anything relating to this world, such as the earth, the trees, his senses, himself—for so his parent had told him, and his grandparent had told his parent, and so on back to the beginning, and therefore it must be so; and the heir to such a long and distinctly defined inheritance must be required to live up to his high privileges. The dim and indistinct future was thus by faith 98 91 brought near, materialized, measured, and fitted to the actions of every-day life. But the more proximate and practical future of the child, that alone of which from his own experience the parent could speak, that which might teach the child how best to live in this world, that was left chiefly to the rising generation. In other words, concerning things of which the child knows as much as the parent, the severest rules of conduct are laid down; concerning things of which the child knows nothing, and of which the parent, by the practical experiences of his life, should have learned something, profound attention must be paid to the opinions of the child—as if the vagaries of the youth were a surer guide to ultimate success than the maturer judgment of the parent.

In ancient times, as to some extent at present in the older countries, custom forbade children any will of their own, and almost any identity; till nearly of mature age they were kept in the background, hidden from the world as if not yet born into it. In Spain the son, with head uncovered, stands speechless in the father's presence until permission be given him to sit or speak, and the daughter is kept secluded in the nursery or confined to the women's special part of the house until a husband is brought her and she is told to marry. Of a wealthy Californian lady living in Los Angeles I was told that, in the good old time when Anglo-Americans were few in the land, at the age of thirteen, on entering the church one day in company with other members of the family, according to their custom, a gentleman was pointed out to her as the one destined to be her husband; and she was directed by her father, without further notice, to step up to the altar and be married, which she did accordingly, “thinking nothing of it,” as she affirms. In France and elsewhere it is somewhat similar, but not quite so bad. Now, and particularly in new and rapidly developing countries, custom in this regard is drifting toward the opposite 99 92 extreme. In the eastern states of America there is a perpetual loosening of parental authority; and in California, if the fathers and mothers escape entire overthrow they do well. The wilful maiden who would marry the unapproved object of her fancy steps aboard a railway train, is whisked away to distant parts, and soon a letter comes back asking pardon and a reconciliation, which are usually granted in time. Surely simple justice would seem to demand that those who had brought a daughter into being, nursed her through infancy, watched over her in childhood, tenderly feeding and clothing, educating and loving her, should have their wishes and their judgment respected in so important a step as marriage. None should marry without mutual love. The parent has no right to compel the daughter to marry against her will; neither has the daughter a right to marry against the will of her parents, except in cases most extreme. There should be love; but love may be directed. It is not necessary when falling in love to fall out with reason and common-sense. Love based on judgment is the only sound and lasting love. To marry for wealth is the most contemptible of all, but better it is that a woman should sell herself for so much money to a man of worth than fling herself away for the worthless love of a worthless fellow. It is no credit to a good woman to love a bad man. Marry for love as you live by your conscience, but let it be an enlightened love, neither ignoble, nor base, nor heathenish. Consult the eternal fitness of things; let the worthless mate, but let not the girl of cultivation, beauty, intelligence, and refinement throw herself away on a brainless, shiftless, or dissolute young man, because she happens to fancy the color of his eyes or curl of his mustache. And of this fitness who is the better judge, the experienced parent, solicitous for the welfare of the child, or the lovesick girl, fancy-ridden, and blinded by passion and intriguing arts? The days for blind 100 93 cupids have passed; the world has so far progressed that the son of Aphrodite may now, with safety to the race, open his eyes.

For the protection of worthy unsophisticated young men, so that they may not be seduced to their destruction by designing maidens or their mothers, a Babylonian marriage-market would not be out of place, such as Herodotus spoke of, where young women may be put up at auction and sold as wives to the highest bidder, and the premium brought by the beautiful be given as a dowry with the ill-favored, so that each may give her husband either beauty or wealth, for there should be equity and compensation in all such dealings.

In all this the fault lies chiefly with the parents, or with the state of society in which the family dwells. The young may be reared as well in California as elsewhere, the maidens may be as modest and the young men as respectful, but in a new community, where all is haste and freeness, it is more difficult for the heads of families so desiring it to make their children decorous and retiring than in older and more settled states. This, however, will right itself in time. There is no place in the world where the rising generation bids fair to obtain so high a development as in California; let us hope that simplicity, refinement, and respectful obedience may accompany it.

A wise parent will study the idiosyncrasies of the child, and before permitting a son to adopt a profession or embark in a pursuit he will analyze his character and consider the qualities of mind and body, setting apart temper, mood, and talent, one from the other, and then determine from the nature and quality of the material before him what sort of man, under given conditions, it will make, and how it can be best moulded and directed so as to achieve the highest success. And if the parent is correct in his judgment, and the child is not swayed by passion or prejudice, both will arrive at about the same conclusion as to what is best 101 94 to be done. Talk with the boy about his future occupation, and with the girl of the lover whom she would make her husband; then let the parent decide, and not the child. This is the office of the parent; to this end young men and maidens were given parents.

The two courses in life at this time offered me were each not without attractions, and for a time I hesitated, thinking that if I adopted one it would be well, and if I adopted the other it would be better. Nor should I feel much more competent to decide a similar case at present. To have the elements of success within is the main thing; it then does not import so much in what direction they are developed. “Non quis, sed quomodo;” it matters little what one does, it matters everything how one does it. Napoleon used to ask, “Qu'est-ce qu'il a fait?” not “Who is his father?” To be a good brick-maker is infinitely better than to be a bad book-maker. If the inherent elements of success are present they are pretty sure to find a channel. As Ruskin says of it, “Apricot out of currant, great man out of small, did never yet art or effort make; and in a general way, men have their excellence nearly fixed for them when they are born.”

Emerson is of the opinion that “each man has his own vocation. The talent is the call. There is one direction in which all space is open to him. He has faculties silently inviting him thither to endless exertion. He is like a ship in the river—he runs against obstructions on every side but one; on that side all obstruction is taken away, and he sweeps serenely ever God's depths into the infinite sea. This talent and this call depend on his own organization, or the mode in which the general soul incarnates itself in him.” And more beautifully than any of them Jean Paul Richter remarks, “Whoever is not forced by necessity, but feels within him, growing with his growth, an inclination and declination of his magnetic 102 95 needle, let him follow its pointing, trusting to it as to a compass in the desert.”

This marriage of my sister's changed the course not only of my own destiny but of that of every member of my family. It was the hinge on which the gate swung to open a new career to all of us. Puritan Granville was a good place to be reared in, but it was a better place to emigrate from. It was in the world but not of the world. Success there would be a hundred acres of land, a stone house, six children, an interest in a town store or a grist-mill, and a deaconship in the church.

But how should I decide the question before me? What had I upon which to base a decision? Nothing but my feelings, my passions, and propensities—unsafe guides enough when coupled with experience, but absolutely dangerous when left to shift for themselves. By such were guided the genius that made Saint Just and Robespierre, Alcibiades and Byron, Caligula and Nero; and the greater the talents the greater the perversion of youthful fire and intelligence if misdirected.

Mérimée, when about ten years of age, was deceived by his elders, whereupon he adopted for his maxim, “Remember to distrust,” and retiring within himself he incrusted his sensibilities with indifference and maintained a cold reserve forever after. Yet beneath this cynical crust burned love and sentiment, burned all the fiercer from confinement, and finally burst forth in his Lettres à une inconnue, whether a real or a mythical personage no one seemed to know. In his youth he had lacked wise counsel and kind considerate direction; that was all.

Study had always strong fascinations for me, and the thought of sometime becoming a great lawyer or statesman set heart and head rapturously a-twirl. I cannot remember the time when I could not read, recite the catechism, and ride and drive a horse. I am told that I was quick to learn when young, and 103 96 that at the age of three years I could read the New Testament without having to spell out many of the words. If that be true the talent must have ended with my childhood, for later on taking up study I found it almost impossible to learn, and still more difficult to remember, whatever talent I may have possessed in that direction having been driven out of me in the tread-mill of business.

One winter I was sent to the brick school-house, a rusty red monument of orthodox efforts, long since torn down. There presided over the boys at one time my mother's brother. The Howes engaged in school-teaching naturally, they and their children, boys and girls, without asking themselves why. The family have taught from the Atlantic to the Pacific, in New York, Ohio, Iowa, Nevada, Oregon, and California. They were good teachers, and they were good for nothing else. Take from them their peculiar knack of imparting knowledge and there were left only bones and nerves kept in motion by a purposeless brain. The one who taught in Granville had written a grammar, and all the boys were compelled to study it. It consisted chiefly of rules which could not be understood, and contained little of the kind of examples which remained fastened in the mind to be afterward of practical value. It is safe to say that children now learn twice as much with half the trouble. Then the study of grammar under a grammar-making uncle did me little good.

Those Howe grammar lessons were the curse of that winter. Often I wept over the useless and distasteful drudgery, but in vain. Tears were a small argument with my parents where they deemed duty to be concerned; and the brother made my mother believe that if I failed in one jot or tittle of his grammar there would be no hope for me afterward in any direction. Mathematics I enjoyed. Stretched on the hearth before a blazing fire, with book and slate, I worked out my problems during the long 104 97 evenings, and then took the Howe grammar lesson as I would castor-oil.

My studies were mixed with house and barn duties, such as paring apples, pounding rusk, feeding and milking the cows, and scores of like occupations. Long before daylight I would be called from my slumber to work and study, a summons I usually responded to with alacrity. Then my mother called me good, and my home life was happy. Soon after breakfast, with books, and tin pail well stored with luncheon, I was out into the snappish air and over the hill to school. But still the Howe grammar hung over all my joys like a grim shadow, darkening all delights. For, in that I did not love the grammar, the Howe did not love me, and he made the place exceedingly uncomfortable, until finally my mother became satisfied that I was injudiciously and unfairly treated, and to my great joy took me from the purgatory.

I was passionately fond of music, not so much of listening as performing. The intensest aspirations of my life seem to have taken this form; I longed to do rather than to enjoy. Purposeless pleasure was not pleasant to me. To-day I find neither satisfaction nor profit in reading or writing, or doing anything for my own personal enjoyment. There must be an aim, and a high, immediate, and direct one, if in my doing or being I am to find pleasure.

In the matter of music, there was within me something which sighed for expression, and to throw it off in song or through the melodies of an instrument was the simplest method of relief. This restless desire to unburden my breast was present in my earliest consciousness. It was always in some way stifled in my younger days. There were singing-schools which I could and did attend, but bleating in concert with a class of boys and girls was not what I wanted. By saving up dimes and half-dollars I succeeded in buying an old violin. I paid four dollars for it; and I remember with what trepidation I invested my entire 105 98 capital in the instrument. For several years I scraped persistently and learned to play badly a few vulgar tunes. I had no teacher and no encouragement; I was laughed at and frowned at, until finally I abandoned it. Fiddling in that saturnine society was almost as much a sin as card-playing; for if cards were for gamblers, fiddles were for dancers, and dancing was a devilish pastime. Christ never danced; and although David did, our minister used to apologize for him by saying that his was a slow, measured, kingly step, something of a Shaker dance—at all events nothing like the whirling embracements of these later times.

To return to the matter of choosing between study and business. Finding myself possessed of these and many other burning aspirations, without stopping to count the cost, childlike I struck at once for the prize. If self-devotion and hard study could win, it should be mine. So I chose the life of a student, and spent another year in preparing for college. There was an academy as well as a college in the place; indeed, as I have before remarked, my native town, in its way, was quite a seat of learning.

It was now the winter of 1847-8, and bravely I set about my self-imposed task, studying hard, and for a time making fair progress. I was still obliged to work morning and evening, and, with now and then a holiday, during the vacations. I was much alone in my studies, although I attended my teacher as zealously as if I had been under competitive influence. My nearest and indeed almost the only companion I had at this time was my cousin Edgar Hillyer, afterward United States judge for Nevada. In age he was a year my senior, but in ability and accomplishments many years. He was a good student, apt in debate, well read in classical literature, nimble on the violin, a rollicking, jolly companion, muscular, active, and courageous, and could hold his own with the best of them on the play-ground. When violin-playing 106 99 became fashionable in churches he sawed away at a base-viol behind the church choir, reading a novel under cover of his huge instrument during the sermon. He was given a little to sarcasm at times, which cut me somewhat; otherwise we were true and stanch friends. He it was who aided and influenced me more than any other in many things. In advance of me in studies, he entered college and I was left alone. Still I toiled on, notwithstanding occasional letters from Buffalo which tended to unsettle my plans. Before the time for entering college arrived I had lost somewhat of my interest in study: without the stimulus of sympathizing friends and competition, the unfed fire of my ambition died away.

Meanwhile Mr Derby, who was an enthusiast in his business, had made occasional visits to my father's house, and in listening to his conversation I became attracted toward Buffalo. There was, moreover, in me a growing desire for independence; not that I was dissatisfied with my home so much as with myself. I longed to be doing something that would show results; I wanted to be a man, to be a great man, to be a man at once. The road to learning was slow and hard; besides, my father was not rich, and although ready to deny himself anything for me, I could see that to continue my plan of study would be a heavy tax on him. Yet I loved it, and, as the sequel will show, left it here only to take it up at a future time. Now I wanted money, I felt the need of money, and I determined to have money. Not to hug and hoard, not to love and cherish as a thing admirable in itself, not as a master to bid me fetch and carry all my days, nor as a god to fall before and worship, sealing the heart from human sympathy, but as a servant to do my bidding, as an Aladdin lamp to buy me independence, leisure, culture.

Contented poverty, cheered by the sweets of meditation and the play of intellect in friendly converse, the priceless wealth of mind drawn freely and 107 100 without cost from books, which are the world's storehouse of knowledge, this has found its devotees in all ages. Most of the thoughts and words thus engendered have been idle: some little of such intercourse, however, has been productive of the greatest results.

But this would never satisfy me. Mine must be a fruitful life, as I have said. And at the portal of every ambition, even of intellectual ambition, if it be high or rich in results, at the door of every soul aspiration, of every taste and tendency, of every moral and social sentiment, stands money. Even the doors of love, and of heaven itself, are opened by money. To the mere money-grubber intellectual joys are denied. His money is useless to him when he gets it. Of his scholarly friend Iccius, who sold his library and went to Arabia Felix, the El Dorado of the day, Horace asked if it was true that he grudged the Arabs their wealth. Like many a scholar in California, this Roman Iccius was grievously disappointed.

How marvellous is money! each dollar thrown into the mill of successful business becoming the grandsire of many dollars. As society is organized, a moneyless man is scarcely a man at all, only a beast of burden, fortunate if he attain the position of hireling, even as in the time of Socrates, who said, “Nowadays he is wisest who makes most money.” In common with others, this moneyless man entered the world with a body and a soul, since which time he has made no addition to his entity; he has body and soul still, perhaps a mind, and these are his stock in trade on which he must subsist. To feed his senses something must be sold, and having nothing else he sells himself. He may sell his body to save his soul, or sell the soul to save the body, or sell intellect to keep the rest together. To all our great cities, from farm and hamlet, mind by want or ambition pinched is driven to market, offered for sale to the highest bidder, and sold and slaughtered like cattle in the shambles. Culture and refinement are for sale; and 108 101 too often, as Whipple complains, at ruinously low prices. “To a man of letters, especially, who may be holding off in hope of a rise in the article, nothing can be more irritating than the frequent spectacle of authors whose souls are literally ‘not above nine-pences'—who will squander honor, truth, perception of character, sympathy with all that is pure and high in ideal being, in short, a writer's whole stock in trade, on the cunning hucksters of ninepenny pamphlets, thus running the risk of damnation in both worlds for the paltriest consideration, when a little judgment might have given them the chance of a life, death, and burial in octavos.”

I do not know which is the more deplorable, to be without money or to be its slave. Money is the best of servants, but the worst of masters. As a servant it is the open sesame to all the world, the master-key to all energies, the passport to all hearts; as a master it is a very demon, warping the judgment, searing the conscience, and fossilizing the affections. Wrapped by cold Selene in an eternal slumber deep as that of Endymion, its victims are lost to the beauties of earth and the glories of heaven. Give me the independence, the command of myself, of my time, my talents, my opportunities, that wealth alone can give, but save me from the gluttony of greed, the fetters of avarice, the blind beastliness and intellectual degradation engendered by an inordinate heaping up of riches.

We are born under the domination of nature, serfs of the soil, and under this suzerainty we remain until the intellect rises up and to some extent emancipates us. Nevertheless, like crystals, the constitutents of our being are self-existent and perfect, however minute, and we assume volume and importance by accretion alone. To the penniless young man who would cultivate his talents and make something of himself I would say, at the outset or as soon as practicable, get money wherewith to buy time. This is the order of natural progress: first the 109 102 physical man, then the intellectual. Civilization does not bloom on an empty stomach. Get gold; not like the one-eyed Arimaspi, who could see nothing else, but accumulate something, however little; then shun debt, and, although your liberty necessitates your dining on a crust of bread, you are on the royal road to manhood. It matters less how much you have than that you have something. There is more difference between a thousand dollars and nothing than there is between a thousand and a hundred thousand. There is such a thing as too much money. The young student of unlimited wealth and liberty has more to contend with in holding to his purpose than the poorest scholar, for the temptation to spend and enjoy is so much the greater. Too much wealth is poverty: too much wealth leads to a loss of time, of heart, of head—the only true wealth.

Adopt a calling, if it be only for a time, and labor in it for your liberty; labor diligently, as if your life depended on it, as indeed it does. Serve that you may command. Get money, but get it only in order that you may ransom mind, for it is mind and not money that makes the man. As Bulwer says of it, “Keep to the calling that assures a something out of which you may extract independence until you are independent. Give to that calling all your heart, all your mind. If I were a hatter, or tailor, or butcher, or baker, I should resolve to consider my calling the best in the world, and devote to it the best of my powers. Independence once won, then be a Byron or Scott if you can.”

This competency, moreover, is within the reach of all able-bodied young men. It consists less in what one has than in what one need have; less in large resources than in moderate desires. It takes but little, after all, to satisfy our actual requirements; but once embarked upon the sea of artificial wants or fancied necessities and there is no haven. He who earns or has an income of a dollar a day and spends but half 110 103 of it is independent, and if satisfied, rich. He who spends all his earnings or income is poor, though he has a thousand dollars a day; doubly poor is he, in that he must needs waste his life to spend his money. He who spends all is the slave of his own fortune; he who lays by something every day is always his own master. And more; in making and saving there is a double profit: the addition of skill thus called forth to one's stock of experience, and the addition of money thus earned to one's stock of cash; this point reached, it makes a vast difference whether the time at one's command be spent in fruitful study, which costs nothing, or in squandering one's accumulations, which costs time and too often yields nervous prostration and mental debasement. This weaving during the day, only like Penelope to unravel at night, is one of the worst features attending the efforts of our young men.

“Qui perd pèche.” He who loses, sins. Whether a man be in the wrong or not, if unsuccessful he is blamed. But no man in this age is uniformly and permanently unsuccessful unless there be something wrong about him, some glaring imperfection of composition or character. The rule is that success attends merit; the unsuccessful is pretty sure to be faulty. No one has a right to be poor in California. Unaccompanied by ill health or other misfortune, poverty is a sin. It is true that wealth is not always a mark of merit. Jove made Plutus, the god of wealth, blind, so that he should not discern knaves from honest men. Nevertheless, no boy or man true to himself, who does his duty, laboring with his hands, or head, or both, as God ordains that men, and beasts, and birds alike shall labor, practising meanwhile reasonable economy, will for any length of time, except under extraordinary circumstances, remain dependent. Though born naked, providence furnishes the means wherewith to clothe ourselves. If we refuse to stretch forth our hands and make use of them, we rightly suffer for it. In all this I am speaking of 111 104 simple independence, rather than success and failure resulting from attempts to achieve great things, to which I shall have occasion to allude hereafter.

Thus unsettled in my mind by the allurements of active business and city life, my attention distracted from studies, discontented in the thought of plodding a poverty-stricken path to fame, and unwilling to burden my father for a term of years, I asked and obtained leave to enter the shop; selling books, for the nonce, offering stronger attractions than studying them.

Nor am I now disposed to cavil over the wisdom of my final decision. Commercial and industrial training offers advantages in the formation of mind, as well as scientific and literary training. School is but a mental gymnasium. Little is there learned except the learning how to learn; and the system that aims at this gymnastic exercise of mind, rather than cramming, is the best. He who studies most does not always learn most, nor is he who reads most always the best read. Understanding, and not cramming, is education. Learn how to form opinions of your own rather than fill your head with the opinions of others. What a farce it is, on commencement or examination day, to parade a crowd of boys or girls, after three or four years' skimming through schoolbooks, upon a stage before friends and spectators, and with music and flourish of trumpets to make a grand display of their acquirements, and end by giving them a certificate of learning which shall forever after set at rest the question of their education! When just ready to begin to learn, the diploma intimates that their studying days are over; those, consequently, who make the loudest noise on exhibition days are seldom heard from afterward. Even if in following a collegiate course the student learns fairly well how to study, if this acquisition is not combined with habits of industry and application it avails little.

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In regard to education, there is too much teaching from books and too little from nature. Books are useful to supplement the instructions of nature, not to forestall them. Early training should be such as to instil a taste for study, rather than a studying; such as teaches how to learn, rather than an attempt to acquire knowledge. This done, that is, the taste acquired and the knowledge how to get knowledge gained, every hour of life thereafter will be a garnering of knowledge. Hence if I might have another chance at life, with my present ideas I would pay the most careful attention to three things: I would bend all the powers within me to learn how to think, how to write, and how to speak, for I could then command myself and others. The highest teachings are those of truth; the highest morality that which springs from simple truth. To love the right for its own sake is the only sure ground on which to build a moral fabric. To hate knavery, licentiousness, and all iniquity because they are hateful, because they are low, vulgar, debasing, and misery-breeding—this is a healthful and hopeful moral ideal.

In business, plodding industry and steady application lie at the foundation of all success. Though in an economic sense credit is not capital, in a commercial sense it is. Brilliant talents and extraordinary shrewdness as often outwit the possessor as others. There is no field in commerce for a great display of genius. To buy, and sell, and get gain is the object; he who fancies himself a prophet able to solve business riddles of the future becomes a gambler, and oftener loses than wins. Speculation there may be, but it must be speculation backed by capital, and conducted on sound business principles rather than on flights of fancy or theoretical schemes.

Though few trades are without their tricks, the industrial life, on the whole, tends to accuracy and veracity. The man of business adopts honesty as a calling; it is at once the capital he employs in buying 113 106 and the guaranty he offers in selling. Wealth being the object sought, character is credit, and credit money. No merchant can long cheat his customers and live; no manufacturer can make and sell a spurious article for any length of time. Dishonesty in business not only does not pay, but, if continued, it is certain and absolute ruin. Trustworthiness usually attends application. Among the laboring classes, as a rule, skilful workmen are moral men. The habits necessarily growing out of continuous mental or physical application are such as promote moral growth. He who is deeply occupied in a worthy calling has little time for wickedness.

The political life, on the other hand, tends to artifice and circumvention as the bases of success in that direction. All is fair in war, and while honor must be maintained among thieves, opposite parties and the public may be fleeced with impunity. The conscience of a merchant is in his pocket, that of a politician is in his popularity; with the one interest is almost always identical with honor, but with the other success is oftener the result of chicanery or bribery than of honest merit. And yet it does not speak well for commerce when we see the leading manufacturers of the United States combining for purposes of wholesale bribery, and merchants generally allowing officials commissions on goods bought for the government.

At an early date in his public career Cicero discovered that the people of Rome had dull ears but sharp eyes. The unprecedented honors devised for him by the Sicilians were little talked of at Rome, whereupon he determined that thenceforth the eyes of the Romans should ever behold him. Daily he frequented the Forum; no one was denied admittance at his gate, and even sleep was never made an excuse for not granting an audience. In this Cicero was serving Cicero and not Rome. If they were seized, these worthy patriots, with honesty enough to 114 107 say with Voltaire, “Le peuple n'est rien,” immediately their occupation was gone. Theirs is not the simple ingenuous love that makes the land their fons et origo, the soil that fostered them their parent. Neither is it love of countrymen or loyalty to rulers. There is no passion in their patriotism.

Our country is not ruled by its best and wisest men, nor under its present régime will it ever be. The good and wise are few; the irrational and prejudiced are many, and as long as the majority rule, office can be obtained only by pandering to the lower passions. In this senseless display of party pride and prejudice, which men call patriotism, it is not liberty itself that is worshipped, but the tinsel and paraphernalia of liberty. As in the cunning days of sleek Iago, preferment goes by letter and affection, and not by fair gradations where each second stands heir to the first.

Opposing parties are a necessity in any free political system; not because one side is better or worse than the other, but as stimulants to advancement, checks on premature progress, and as a means of preventing that demoralization which always attends unlimited or irresponsible power. But the machinery of government must be worked on some other principles than those of lying and cheating before it can be very worshipful. The people, who are the government, must awake and act. The wildest delusion of our day is that good legislation can come from the representatives of an ignorant and immoral people, who at present are, to a great extent, our voters; or that arguing with the bad agents of a bad government will make them better. “Opinions are numbered, not weighed,” said Pliny, “there is nothing so unequal as equality.” The specious fallacy of universal suffrage was better understood by the Romans than by us, it seems. This state of things will cease only when politics cease to be a trade followed for gain, and when both the trade and the hucksters who follow it shall be disgraced in the eyes of all good men. Before our government can 115 108 settle upon an enduring foundation it must be reconstructed in form and in execution. Young as it is the elements of decay are plainly apparent; our popular liberty is being consumed by what it feeds on. But before the end there will be wars, political and commercial wars, for the people will not always submit to the tyranny of monopoly, iniquitous trusts, and other impositions of combined capital. More than once in the history of despotism have the feuds of Roman Orsini and Colonna, of Grecian Isagoraidæ and Alcmæonidæ, given birth to freedom. “A superior man indeed is Kea Pihyuh!” says Confucius; “when a good government prevails in his state, he is to be found in office. When a bad government prevails, he can roll his principles up and keep them in his breast.”

What in these latter days should be the prayer of the patriot having the true interests of America and of mankind at heart? From our friends, from those who would serve us, who would lay their invaluable lives on the altar of their country, from political demagogues, political libertinism, political peculation, from excess of voting and constant rotation in office, from legislators who spend in personal and party strife, to keep themselves in office, the people's time and money which should be spent in the study of the nation's welfare—from cant and corruption of every kind, good Lord deliver us! particularly from the humbug and hypocrisy of political journals; ay, from the journals themselves, as well as from the parties, and principles, and persons they advocate, deliver us, we beseech thee, lest we be tempted with ‘The Man without a Country’ to exclaim, “Damn the United States!” The politician is usually as lean as Cassius in patriotism, and as hungry for place. The professional man, if with his broader philosophy and deeper insight into certain secret phases of human nature he escape laxity in great things, and exaggeration in little things, does well.

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The law as a profession holds up its glittering prize to the youth burning for distinction. Its labors are arduous; its fortunes precarious. One in a hundred, perhaps, attains some degree of local eminence; not one in a thousand achieves a national reputation; ninety-five of every hundred secure in return for long and expensive preparation nothing further than a life of drudgery, fortunate, indeed, if they escape disreputable penury.

In the commercial spirit there are two oppugnant elements, boldness and conservatism, which underlie all advancement, and act as powerful stimulants in the strengthening and developing of mind. These properly united and nicely balanced produce the highest type of intellect, whether for action in the field of commerce, or of law, or of letters. In the absence of either quality, or if disproportionately joined, discomfiture is inevitable. The industrial spirit, perhaps more perfectly than the professional, engenders patience, sobriety, self-control, which tend to thrift and respectability; at the same time there can be no great things accomplished in business without risk or speculation. Now, the principles that lead to success are identical in all human activities, in letters, law, and philosophy, as well as in industry and commerce—originality of thought, a letting-fly of the imagination, a restless impatience over meaningless forms and empty traditions, and bold independence in action united with caution and a love of truth for truth's sake. Speculation and conservatism: the one the propelling power which sends forward the machine, the other the brake that saves it from destruction. One is as necessary as the other; and the two properly united, under ordinary circumstances, are as certain to achieve success as the absence of these conditions is certain to result in failure.

About the 1st of August, 1848, I left Granville for Buffalo, where I arrived on the 9th. I was now 117 110 sixteen years of age, and this may be regarded as my starting out in life. Then I left my father's house, and ever since have I been my own master, and made my own way in the world. There was no railway from my native town, and my journey was made in a canal boat as far as Cleveland, and thence by steam-boat over Lake Erie to Buffalo. The captain of the canal-boat was a brother of my uncle Hillyer, and permission was given me to ride horse on the towpath in lieu of paying fare. I gladly availed myself of the opportunity, and took my turn night and day during the whole journey. The day after my arrival in Buffalo I was permitted a view of the bookseller's shop. It would not be regarded as much of a store nowadays, but it was the largest establishment I had ever seen, and the, to me, huge piles of literature, the endless ranges of book-shelves, the hurrying clerks, the austere accountants, the lord paramount proprietor, all filled me with awe not unaccompanied by heart-sinkings. A day or so was spent in looking about the city, accompanying my sister to the market, and attending a great political convention which was then in full blast. On the Monday following my arrival I was put to work in the bindery over the counting-room, and initiated into the mysteries of the book business by folding and stitching reports of the aforesaid convention. There I was kept, living with my sister, and undergoing in the shop a vast amount of unpalatable though doubtless very necessary training, till the following October, when the bindery was sold. I was then left for a time in an uncertain, purgatorial, purposeless state, with nothing in particular to occupy me. After being given plainly to understand by my brother-in-law that my person was not at all necessary to his happiness, I was finally thrust into the counting-house at the foot of the ladder, as the best means of getting rid of me.

The fact is, I was more ambitious than amiable, and my brother-in-law was more arbitrary than agreeable. I was stubborn and headstrong, impatient 118 111 under correction, chafing over every rub against my country angularities; he distant, unsympathizing, and injudicious in his management of me. I felt that I was not understood, and saw no way of making myself known to him. Any attempt to advance or to rise above the position first assigned me was frowned down; not because he hated, or wished to injure, or persecute me, but because he thought boys should not be presumptuous, that they should be kept in the background—especially pale, thin, thoughtful, supersensitive brothers-in-law.

For some six months I held this anomalous position, till one day the chief book-keeper intimated to me that, in the opinion of the head of the house, nature had never designed me for a bookseller—a species of divinity in the eyes of these men born but not made—and that should I retire from active duty no one about the premises would be overwhelmed with sorrow. In plain English, I was discharged. The blood which mantled my face under a sense of what I deemed indignity and wrong was my only response; yet in my heart I was glad. I saw that this was no place for me, that my young life was being turned to wormwood, and that my bosom was becoming a hell of hatefulness.

I have never in my life, before that time or since, entertained a doubt of reasonable success in any reasonable undertaking. I now determined to start in business on my own account. Since I could not work for the Buffalo bookselling people, I would work for myself. I was entirely without money, having received nothing for my services—which indeed were worth nothing—yet I borrowed enough to take me back to Ohio, and Mr Derby, it appears, had sufficient confidence to trust me for a few cases of goods. Shipping my stock up the lake to Sandusky, and thence by rail to Mansfield, the terminus of the road, I hurried on to Granville for a horse and wagon, with which I proceeded back to Mansfield, loaded up, 119 112 and began distributing my goods among the country merchants of that vicinity. For about four months I travelled in this manner over different parts of my native state, selling, remitting, and ordering more goods, and succeeding in the main very well; that is to say, I paid my expenses, and all the obligations I had before contracted, and had enough left to buy a silver watch, and a suit of black broadcloth. Never was watch like that watch, fruit as it was of my first commercial earnings.

Winter approaching, I sold out my stock, paid my debts, and went home. Owing to my success, it seems, I had risen somewhat in the estimation of the Buffalo book magnates, and just as my mind was made up to enter school for the winter I was summoned back to Buffalo, with instructions to bring my youngest sister, Mary, afterward Mrs Trevett. We embarked at Sandusky, encountering the first night out a storm, and after beating about among the short jerky waves of the lake for two days, we reached Buffalo on the 8th of December, 1849. This time I was to enter the store as a recognized clerk, and was to receive a salary of one hundred dollars a year from the first of January, 1850.

I now began to look upon myself as quite a man. A hundred dollars was a great deal of money; I was over seventeen years of age, had travelled, had been in business, and was experienced. So I relaxed a little from puritanical ideas of propriety. I bought a high hat and a cane; smoked now and then surreptitiously a cigar; a gaudy tie adorned my neck, and a flashy ring encircled my finger. I do not think I ever held myself in higher estimation before or since; at no time of my life did I ever presume so much on my knowledge, or present personally so fine an appearance. On the street I fancied all eyes to be upon me; the girls particularly, I used to think, were all in love with me.

Honored and trusted, my moroseness evaporated at 120 113 intervals. Soon I found myself more in sympathy with my employer, and felt that he now began somewhat to understand me. And here I will pay my tribute of respect to the memory of George H. Derby. He was of unblemished reputation, thoroughly sound in morals, sincere in religion, honest in his business, kind in his family, warm and lovable in his friendships, patriotic as a citizen, and liberal, chivalrous, and high-spirited as a man and a gentleman. He was among the best friends I ever had—he, and his wife, my sister. He seemed to repose the utmost confidence in me, trusted me, a green boy in the midst of the whirlpool of the Californian carnival, with property which he could ill afford to lose, the risk being regarded as little less than madness on his part by business acquaintances. His death I felt more keenly than that of any other man who ever died. His goodness will remain fresh in my memory to my dying day. Yet, when thrown together as under our first relations—he the master, I the boy—our dispositions and natures were strangely out of tune. He held his own peculiar views regarding the training and treatment of relatives. He seemed to delight in squeezing and tormenting, in a business way, all who were in any wise allied to him by blood or marriage, and the nearer the relationship the greater the persecution. Of a didactic turn in all his relations, he was particularly severe with me; and it was only when a younger brother of his was with him, one nearer to him than I, and on whom his merciless words were showered, that I found relief. While but a child, and before I went to Buffalo, or had ever been away from home, I was sent into the backwoods of Ohio to obtain subscriptions for a work on the science of government. Of course I made a failure of it, enduring much head sickness and heart sickness thereby, and was laughed to scorn as a youth who would never succeed at anything. My father, totally inexperienced in the book business, but having a little money wherewith to make 121 114 the purchase, was induced to take a cargo of books down the Mississippi river, which proved to be another failure and a severe loss. In all this my brother-in-law seemed to care little so long as he sold his wares and secured the money. All were fish, friend or foe, that helped to swell the volume of his business.

With a sister ever kind to me, and an employer really desirous of advancing my best interests, the training I underwent at this period of my life was about as injudicious for an ambitious, sensitive youth as could well have been devised. Even after my return from Ohio I was at times headstrong, impatient of restraint, impudent, angry, and at open war with my brother-in-law; yet I was eager to learn, quick, and intelligent, and would gladly have worked, early and late, with faithful and willing diligence in any advancing direction. But it seemed that my employer still considered it best for me to be kept down; to be censured much and never praised; to have one after another placed above me whom I very naturally deemed no more capable than myself. The consequence was that during the greater part of my stay in Buffalo I was in a sullen state of mad exasperation. I was hateful, stubborn, and greatly to be blamed, but the discipline I received only intensified these faults, and tended in no wise to remove them. One word of kindness, and I would have followed this man to the death; yet while he crucified me he did not mean to be cruel, and portions of the time I was really happy in his society. I know he was full of generous feeling for me even while I tried him most; for when, after leaving for California, I sent him a letter, opening my heart as I had never done before, on receipt of it, as my sister told me, he threw himself upon the sofa and wept like a child.

The mould destined for me ill fitting my nature, which would not be melted for recasting, or even made to assume comeliness by attrition, I fell into my own ways, which were very bad ways; tramping the streets 122 115 at night with jovial companions, indulging in midnight suppers, and all-night dancings. Lo, how the puritan's son has fallen! Conscience pricked faithfully at first. I soon grew easier in mind; then reckless; and finally neglecting my bible, my prayers, and all those Sabbath restraints which hold us back from rushing headlong to destruction, I gave myself over to hardness of heart. Yet all this time I usually listened with enjoyment and profit to one sermon on Sunday; I also attended lectures given by Park Benjamin, G.P.R. James, Gough, and others; these and novel-reading comprised my intellectual food.

Into that bookseller's shop I went with all the untempted innocence of a child; out of it I came with the tarnish of so-called manly experience. There I plucked my first forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil; yet the sense of right remained, and that remorse which ever mixes bitter with the sweets of sin. The inherent morality doctrine, and a trusting to it, is flattering, but exceedingly risky. Men and women, young and old, inherently good or inherently bad, nine times in ten will stand or fall according to environment, according to influence, temptation, companionship.

Every now and then I would turn over a new leaf; bravely begin a diary, scoring the first page with high resolves, such as total abstinence form every species of wickedness, tea, coffee, wine, tobacco; determined to think, speak, and do no evil, to walk always as before the eye of Omniscience, clean in heart, pure in mind, and strong in body; in short, to be a perfect man—which sublime state of things, wrought up beyond human endurance, would last sometimes for three days or three weeks, and end in a collapse. Sometimes I would keep my diary up during the year; then again I would open a blank book, without fixed dates, and discharge my burning thoughts into it in the hope of relief. Many a paving-block have I laid in hell; that is to say, if good intentions are there used for 123 116 treading on. No sooner had I departed from Buffalo on my way to California than all desire left me to commit these foolish boyish excesses. There was then no one to hoodwink, no watchful eye to circumvent; it ceased to be amusing when I was my own master; so when thrown into the pandemonium at San Francisco I had not the slightest inclination to make a beast or a villain of myself.

But the time thus lost! How have I longed to live again the former three years and the three following. Six years of my young life as good as squandered, in some respects worse, for instead of laying the foundation for health, purity, intellect, I was crushing my God-given faculties, damming the source of high thoughts and ennobling affections, and sowing by Stygian streams the wild seeds of perdition. At the time when of all others the plant needs judicious care, when the hard soil needs softening, the ill-favored branches pruning, the destroyer steps in and places locusts on the leaves and worms about the roots.

How I have longed to go back and place myself with a riper experience under my own tuition, and see what would come of it! How I would gather in those golden opportunities which were so ruthlessly thrown away; how I would prize those hours, and days, and years so flippantly regarded; how I would cherish and cultivate that body and mind so wellnigh wrecked on the shoals of youthful folly! Why could we not have been born old, and from decrepitude with learning and widsom have grown young, and so have had the benefit of our wealth of experience in the enjoyment of our youth! It seems that if I had only known something of what life is and the importance of right living, I could have made almost anything of myself. So has thought many another; and so thinking, life appears such a precious delusion—the life which to know requires living, and which is lived only to know that it is lost!

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It was a few months before I left my home for the first time that gold had been discovered in California; but not until a year later did the news so overspread the country as to cause any excitement in the quiet town of Granville. Scarcely had I reached Buffalo the second time when letters informed me that my father was thinking of going to the new El Dorado. The ancient leaven of industry and enterprise still worked in him, and although far past the average age of those who joined the pilgrimage to the golden shrine, he could not resist the temptation. Though but little over fifty, he was called an old man in those days in California. By the lst of February it was settled that he would go, and in March, 1850, he set sail from New York. I had a boyish desire to accompany him, but did not think seriously of going at the time. I was more absorbed in flirtations, oyster suppers, and dancing parties than fascinated by the prospect of digging for gold.

Nevertheless the wheel of my destiny was turning. In January, 1851, Mr Derby received a letter from an uncle of mine, my mother's brother, then in Oregon, ordering quite a quantity of books. This demand, coming from a new and distant market, made quite an impression upon the mind of the ardent young bookseller. Visions filled his brain of mammoth warehouses rising in vast cities along the shores of the Pacific, of publication offices and manufacturing establishments, having hundreds of busy clerks and artisans, buying, making, and selling books, and he would walk the floor excitedly and talk of these things by the hour, until he was wellnigh ready to sell out a safe and profitable business, pack up, and go to California himself. These visions were prophetic; and through his instrumentality one such establishment as he had dreamed of was planted in the metropolis of this western seaboard, although he did not live to know of it.

My nearest companion at this time was a fellow-clerk, George L. Kenny, the son of an Irish gentleman. 125 118 He had come to seek his fortune in America, and found his way almost direct from the mother country to the Buffalo bookstore, where he had been engaged but a few months when I first arrived there. From that day for over a third of a century his life and mine have been closely linked. In physique he was tall, thin, and muscular, somewhat awkward in his movements, with an open countenance, as we used to call his large mouth, which in laughing he displayed to its widest extent. I have occasion to remember both the awkwardness and the strength of my ancient comrade; for one day in Buffalo, ‘skylarking,’ as we termed it, with his huge fist he placed my nasal organ out of line, where it ever after remained. In disposition and character he was generous almost to a fault; affectionate, warm-hearted, and mild, though passionate and stubborn when roused; jovial and inspiriting as a companion, stanch and reliable as a friend, and honest as a man. He it was who introduced me into the mysteries of bookselling, and other and more questionable mysteries, when first I went to Buffalo.

Mr Derby was a man of many ideas. Though practical and conservative in the main, the fertility of his brain and his enthusiasm often gave him little rest. Once seized with the thought of California in connection with his business, he could not dispossess his mind of it. There it fastened, causing him many a restless day and sleepless night. He talked of sending out one, then another, then he thought he would go himself; but much of what was said he knew to be impracticable, and all the while his ideas were dim and shadowy. Finally he talked more directly of me as the one to go—why I do not know, unless it was that I could best be spared, and also that I had friends there, who, if they succeeded, might supply me with money. Oregon was the point at this time talked of. I was ready to go, but had as yet not special enthusiasm for the adventure.

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Meanwhile Mr Derby had ventured three shipments of goods to the Pacific; one small lot sold at seventy-five per cent above the invoice, and although the other two were lost, one by fire and the other by failure of the consignee, the one success was sufficient to excite great hopes. This, together with a letter from my father received toward the latter part of December, 1851, determined me to go to California. I was anxious to have Mr Kenny accompany me. He would like much to go, he said, but had not the money. I urged him to speak to Mr Derby about it. He did so, when our now most gracious employer replied: “For a long time I have been desirous of your going to California; only I would not propose it.” He then entered heartily into our plans and opened the way for both of us.

I felt by no means eager for gold; it was rather boyish adventure that prompted me. California was pictured in my mind as a nondescript country on the other side of huge mountains, which once overstepped, with most that I cared for left behind, there was little hope of return. I was not so weaned but that I must see my mother before I departed, perhaps never to return; and although it involved an unpleasant and expensive journey over the snow in the dead of winter, I immediately performed it. Then bidding all a long farewell, and calling on the way upon Mr James C. Derby of Auburn, my comrade Kenny and I went down to New York, entered our names at the Irving house, and were ready to embark by the next steamer.

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CHAPTER V.

HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA! Never despair; but if you do, work in despair.

Burke.

A DETAILED description of an early voyage from New York to Chagres, across the Isthmus to Panamá, and thence to San Francisco, belongs rather to the time than to the individual. So large a portion of the Californian's life, during the first twenty years following the discovery of gold, was occupied in the passage by the various routes from one side of the continent to the other, that a picture of that epoch, with this prominent and characteristic scene left out, would be unfinished. During the first fifteen years of my residence on the western coast I made the passage between New York and San Francisco by way of Panamá no less than eleven times, thus spending on the water nearly one year, or what would be almost equivalent to every other Sunday during that time. Many made the voyage twice or thrice as often, and life on the steamer was but a part of California life. It was there the beginning was made; it was sometimes the ending. It was there the angular eccentricities were first filed off, and roughly filed, as many a soft-bearded fledgling thought. It was there the excrescences of egotism and the morbid superfluities fastened on the character by local training, or lack of training, first began the rub against the excrescences and superfluities of others, all of which tended to the ultimate polish and perfection of the mass.

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In my California Inter Pocula I have given a full account of the voyage out. I have there given it in detail, not because of anything particularly striking, but to show what the voyage in those days was; for, excepting shipwrecks, epidemics, or other special hardships, they were all very like. I shall not therefore repeat the description here, but merely say that on the 24th of February, 1852, in company with Mr Kenny, I embarked at New York on the steamer George Law, bound for Habana. On reaching this port the sixth day, passengers, mails, and freight were transferred, with those of the steamer from New Orleans, to the Georgia, which that night sailed for Chagres, touching at Jamaica. Arrived at Chagres we were sent to Aspinwall to disembark, so as to ride over some six or eight miles of the Panamá railway just then opened for that distance—that we might ride over the road and pay the fare. After the usual delay on the Isthmus we embarked on the steamer Panamá the 12th of March, touched at several ports on the Pacific, and reached San Francisco at twelve o'clock the first day of April.

When I arrived in California John Bigler was governor. The Capital had just been removed from Vallejo to Sacramento. In San Francisco the wars with squatters, Peter Smith titles, and water-lot frauds were attracting the chief attention. Portions of the streets were brilliantly lighted from the glare of gambling-saloons; elsewhere all was thick darkness. On Montgomery street, indeed, lamps were posted by the occupants, but there was no system of street lights, and in the dark places about the docks, in the back streets, and round the suburbs, many dark deeds were committed. Crime, driven into holes and hiding-places by the Vigilance Committee of 1851, was beginning to show its face again, but the authorities, wakened to a livelier sense of duty by the late arbitrary action of the citizens, were more on the alert than formerly, and criminals were caught and punished with some degree 129 122 of thoroughness. Agriculture was attracting more attention than at any time previous. Bull and bear fights at the Mission, and the childlike game of ABC on Long wharf, were in vogue. Gambling was somewhat on the decline—times were becoming too hard to risk a hundred dollars for an evening's amusement—but it was the day of grand raffles, grand auction sales, grand quartz-mining schemes, and Biscaccianti concerts. Fire and flood held their alternate sway over the destinies of town and country, aiding other causes to accomplish business disruptions and failures.

It was the day of complimenting sea-captains who approximated to their duty; of long annual sessions of the legislature, of fighting officials, and anti-Chinese meetings—though concerning this last named fermentation the question arises, When in California was it not? The most striking feature of the town at night to a stranger was the gambling-houses, the more aristocratic establishments being then situated on the plaza and Commercial street, and the lower dens principally on Long wharf. The better class supported a fine orchestra of five or six wind instruments, while in others a solitary cracked piano or violin squeaked the invitation to enter. The building was usually a mere shell, while the interior was gorgeously decorated and illumined with chandeliers presenting a mass of glittering glass pendants. Monte, faro, roulette, lansquenet, vingt-et-un, and rouge-et-noir, were the favorite games, though many others were played. During week-days these places were usually quiet, but at night and on Sundays the jingling of coin and the clinking of glasses were mingled with the music of the orchestra in hellish harmony. Above all voices was heard that of the dealer: “Make your game, gentlemen, make your game! All down? Make your game! All down? The game is made! no more; deuce, black wins.”

Then followed the raking-in process, and the payingout, after which came a new shuffe and a new deal; 130 123 and thus the performance was repeated and the excitement kept up throughout the quickly flying hours of the night. Round the tables sat beautiful females in rustling silks and flaming diamonds, their beauty and magnificent attire contrasting strangely with the grizzly features, slouched hats, and woollen shirts of their victims. The license for a single table was fifty dollars per quarter. In some saloons were eight or ten of these tables, in others but one; and there were hundreds of saloons, so that the revenue to the city was large. A bill prohibiting gambling was introduced in the legislature just before I arrived, but it was lost in the senate.

Two days and nights amid scenes like these in San Francisco were sufficient to drive away the little wit left by the strange experiences at Habana, on the Isthmus, and on board the steamers, and to properly prepare the boyish mind for the pandemonium of the miners. The two days were spent by me in wandering about the business parts of the town, wading muddy streets, and climbing sand-hills; the nights in going from one gaming-house to another, observing the crowds of people come and go, watching the artistic barkeepers in their white coats mixing fancy drinks and serving from gorgeously decorated and mirrored bars fiery potations of every kind, gazing in rapt bewilderment upon the fortune-turning table with its fatal fascinations, marking the piles of money increase and lessen, and the faces behind them broaden and lengthen, and listening to the music that mingled with the chinking of gold, the rattling of glasses, and the voices of rough, loud-laughing men. “There are indeed but very few,” says Addison, “who know how to be idle and innocent.” Two days and nights of this; then from Long wharf we boarded a steam-boat and went to Sacramento.

Having letters to Barton Reed and Grimm, commission merchants of Sacramento, to whom Mr 131 124 Derby had made one or two consignments of books on a venture, we immediately called on them and talked over the relative business chances in San Francisco and Sacramento. The plan of going to Oregon had been long since abandoned, and now Sacramento seemed to offer more attractions for the opening of a small shop than any other place. San Francisco was the larger field, but it seemed more than fully occupied, as has been the case in every city and town on the coast from the beginning. As a rule, one half the merchants with one half the stocks would have supplied all the requirements of trade. Overtrading has always been a source of loss or ruin to those engaged in mercantile pursuits. True, this has been and is more or less the case elsewhere. There are too many men anxious for gain without the labor of producing. All branches of business are overdone; the professions are crowded to overflowing, and for every vacant clerkship there are a hundred applicants. In new countries this is almost always the way; particularly has it been so in California, where gold mining was added to the usual allurements of speculative traffic. Here, where all started equal in the race for wealth, and all were eager to secure a permanent foothold, where many opened at once on a large scale, and competition ran high, and almost every one traded beyond his capital, the inducements to enter the whirlpool in any locality were tame enough. But in the breasts of the young and adventurous hope is strong.

Sacramento having been decided on as the more fitting field, the next thing was to write Mr Derby and inform him of our decision. This done we took the boat for Marysville, en route for Long bar, in search of my father. There I was initiated into the mysteries of mining and mining life. The placer diggings of this locality were then good, and so remained for several years, but the population changed every few months, the dissatisfied leaving and new adventurers coming in. Ten dollars a day was too little in the 132 125 eyes of those accustomed to make twenty, and so they sold or abandoned their claims and prospected for richer diggings. Wandering thus from placer to placer for years, they lost their opportunity, if not their lives, and usually ended their mining career where they began, without a dollar.

When my father came to the country, my eldest brother, Curtis, who had preceded him, was keeping a store and hotel at Long bar. He was doing well, was making money steadily and safely. At one time he had five thousand dollars surplus capital, with which he started for San Francisco, there to invest it in city lots. Had he done so, buying judiciously and holding, he might now be worth millions instead of nothing. Unfortunately, on his way he communicated the plan to John C. Fall, then one of the leading merchants of Marysville, and high in the esteem of my brother. By him he was induced to make a venture which involved his leaving Long bar, and ultimately ended in financial ruin. Rich bar, on Feather river, had lately been discovered, and was drawing multitudes of fortune-seekers from every quarter. It was not difficult for Mr Fall to persuade my brother with an abundance of means and an unlimited credit to buy a band of mules and freight them for that place. Once there he erected a building, and opened a hotel and store. For a time all went well. Up and down the river the diggings were rich, and gold dust was poured into his coffers by the quart. The establishment at Long bar seemed insignificant in comparison, and being attended with some care, he sold it and moved his family to Rich bar. My father remained at Long bar. He had been in the country now about two years, had accumulated quite a little sum, and contemplated soon returning home. But shortly before setting out an opportunity offered whereby he might increase his little fortune tenfold, and with-out a risk of failure—so it seemed to him and to others.

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Quartz mining was about this time attracting attention, and the prospect was very flattering. The ledge was discovered and staked off, its dimensions told, its rock assayed, the cost of crushing reckoned, and the number of years calculated before the mine would be exhausted. Surely this was no vain speculation, it was a simple arithmetical sum, the quantity, the quality, the cost of separation, and the net profits. Yet it was a sum which wrecked thousands. The gold was in the mine, and rock enough of an ascertained grade to last for years, but the cost of extracting was more than had been anticipated, and, what was worst of all, and almost always overlooked in these calculations, the methods of saving the gold after the rock was crushed were imperfect, so that even good rock failed to pay expenses.

Two miles from Long bar, near the Marysville road, was a place called Brown valley, and through this ran a quartz ledge, long known but regarded as valueless, because no one could extract the gold from the hard white rock which held it. When, however, quartz mining became the fashion, and every one who owned a share was sure of a fortune, this ledge was taken up and staked off into claims under the names of different companies. One of these companies was called the Plymouth, always a pleasing name to the ear of my father, and as it embosomed an abundance of gold, he was induced to invest—not venture—the greater part of the money he had made, before returning home.

Midway between Long bar and the mine ran a little stream, whose name, Dry creek, was significant of its character, it being, like many other streams in California, flush with water in the winter and dry as a parlor floor in the summer. This stream had been dammed, a race dug, and a quartz mill with eight or ten stamps constructed, all in working order; and at the time of my arrival it was just ready, as it had been at any time since its erection, to make every shareholder rich. 134 127 It was merely necessary to effect some little change in the method of extractig and saving the gold, and this was receiving attention.

I found my father, in connection with other members of the Plymouth association, busily engaged in working this mine. He occupied a little cloth house in the vicinity of the ledge, and being the owner of a good mule team, he employed himself in hauling rock from the mine to the mill, about one mile apart, and in gathering wood with which to burn the rock, so that it could be the more easily crushed. The first night I spent with him in the hotel at Long bar. Foremost among my recollections of the place are the fleas, which, together with the loud snorings and abominable smells proceeding from the great hairy unwashed strewed about on bunks, benches, tables, and floor, so disturbed my sleep that I arose and went out to select a soft place on the hill-side above the camp, where I rolled myself in a blanket and passed the night, my first in the open air of California.

The next day found me settled down to business. As eight or nine months must elapse before my letter from Sacramento could be received by Mr Derby, and goods reach me by way of Cape Horn, it was arranged that I should work with my father for the Plymouth company. In the morning we climbed the oak trees scattered about the valley, and with an axe lopped off the large brittle branches, adding them to the already huge pile of wood beside the mill. At noon we proceeded to the little cloth house, unharnessed and fed the animals, and then cooked and ate our dinner. Beefsteak, beans, bread, and potatoes, with coffee, canned fruits, pancakes, or anything of the kind we chose to add, constituted the fare of self-boarding miners in those days; but with all our culinary talents we could not offer Mr Kenny a meal sufficiently tempting to induce him to partake of it, and so he obtained his dinner from a 135 128 boarding-house near by, and left shortly afterward for Rich bar.

I cannot say that I enjoyed this kind of life, and could scarcely have endured it but for the thought that it was only temporary. At night the animals were turned loose to graze. Early in the morning, long before the sun had risen, I was up and over the hills after them. Stiff and sore from the previous day's work, wet with wading through the long damp grass, I was in no humor to enjoy those glorious mornings, ushered in by myriads of sweet songsters welcoming the warm sunlight which came tremblingly through the soft misty air. To the clouds of top-knotted quails which rose at my approach, the leaping hare, the startled deer, and the thick beds of fresh fragrant flowers which I trampled under my feet, I was alike indifferent. The music of the mules alone allured me, though the clapper of the bell which told me where they were beat discordantly on my strained ear. Back to my breakfast and then to work. How I loaded and lashed the poor dumb beasts in my distemper, and gritted my teeth with vexation over the unwelcome task! The sharp rock cut my hands, the heavy logs of wood strained my muscles; and my temper, never one of the sweetest, fumed and fretted like that of a newly chained cub. Were it in my power I would have pluralized those mules so as to smite the more. Some woods send forth fragrance under the tool of the carver. Such was not my nature. I never took kindly to misfortune; prosperity fits me like a glove. It is good to be afflicted; but I do not like to receive the good in that way. “Bonarum rerum consuetudo est pessima,” says Publius Syrus; but such has not been my experience. I will admit that adversity may be good for other people, but the continuance of prosperity, I verily believe, has never by any means been prejudicial to me, either in mind or morality. Byron thought Shelley, who 136 129 had borne up manfully under adversity, the most amiable of men, until he saw Lord Blessington, who had retained his gentle good nature through a long series of unvarying prosperity.

The night before leaving Buffalo I had danced until morning. It happened that about the only clothes saved from the thieves of the Isthmus were the ones used on that occasion. These I wore until work turned them into rags. In the pocket I one day found a pair of white kid gloves, relic of past revelries, and putting them on I gathered up the reins, mounted the load, and beating my mules into a round trot, rode up to the mill laughing bitterly at the absurdity of the thing. It was the irony of gentlemanly digging. Ten or twelve loads was a fair day's work; I hauled twenty or twenty-five. A dollar a load was the price allowed—but it was not money, it was wrath, that made me do it. My father, though mild in his treatment of me, expostulated. He feared I would kill the animals. I said nothing, but when out of his sight I only drove them the harder. Little cared I whether the mules or myself were killed. Sunday was a day of rest, but on Monday I felt sorer in body and mind than on any other day. I had brought plenty of books with me, but could not read, or if I did it was only to raise a flood of longings which seemed sometimes to overwhelm me. My soul was in harmony with nothing except the coyotes which all night howled discordantly behind the hills.

After two months of this kind of life the hot weather was upon us. The streams began to dry up; water was becoming scarce. We had heaped up the wood and the rock about the mill, and my tally showed a long score against the company for work. But the mill did not pay. There was always something wrong about it, some little obstacle that stood in the way of immediate brilliant success: the stamps were not heavy enough, or the metal was too soft, or they did not work smoothly; the rest of the 137 130 machinery was inadequate, and the rock was harder than had been anticipated. That it was hard enough, I who had handled it well knew. There was no money, but there were plenty of shares.

It is very difficult when once faith, even in a falsity, has taken possession of the mind, to eradicate it. Especially difficult is it when self-interest stands in the way and blinds the understanding. Skepticism is a plant of slow growth. The seeds are sown by inexorable fact, in an unwelcome soil, and the germ is smothered by ignorance and prejudice until time and experience force it to the light. I had not then reached the point later attained, when I could say with Dante, “Non men che saver, dubbiar m'aggrata;” though doubt seldom chains a gold-digger so much as knowledge of facts. I cannot tell why neither my father nor I should have seen by this time that the enterprise was a failure. But we did not see it. We had schooled ourselves in the belief that the rocky bank contained a mint of money which must some day enrich the possessor. But there was then nothing more to be done, and my father concluded to pay a parting visit to my brother at Rich bar and set out for home. For our work we took more shares, and still more in exchange for the team and the scattering effects, and abandoned it all forever. Several years afterward I learned that a new company had taken possession of the claim and was doing well. Not long after leaving the place I became convinced that the enterprise was a failure, and firmly resolved that thenceforth, whatever speculation I might at any time engage in, it should be not with my own labor. I might stake money, but if I worked with my hands I would have pay for such labor.

Behold us now! my old father and me, tramping over the plains beneath a broiling sun about the middle of June, each with a bundle and stick, mine containing my sole possessions. In the early morning, fresh from sleep, with gladness of heart at leaving 138 131 the beautiful valley of hateful occupation behind, we marched away over the hills at a round pace. But as the sun above our heads neared the point from which it poured its perpendicular and most effectual wrath, I became excessively fatigued. My feet blistered; my limbs ached; water was to be had only at intervals; the prayed-for breath of air came hot and suffocating, like a sirocco, mingled with incandescent dust beaten from the parched plain. Thinking over my short experience in the country and my present position, I exclaimed, “If this be California, I hope God will give me little of it.” As we trod slowly along, stepping lightly on the burning ground, I began to think the mules would have been better for our purpose than the shares, but I said nothing.

That day we walked thirty miles, crossed the river at Bidwell bar, intending to stop over night at a rancho some distance on in the mountains; but we had not ascended far before I persuaded my father to camp, for rest I must. He willingly complied, and selecting a sheltered place well covered with dry leaves we spread our blankets. In a moment I was asleep, and knew nothing further till morning, when I awoke almost as fresh as ever. We had food with us, but the night before I was too tired to eat. The first day was the worst. We were now in the cool fragrant air of the Sierra, travelling a well-beaten path intersected by numerous rivulets of melted snow. The third day we reached Rich bar in good condition. My father, after a visit of about a week, returned with the express train—of mules, not steamcars—to Marysville, where he took the boat for San Francisco, and thence the steamer homeward.

As I had still six months or thereabout to wait for my goods, I agreed to remain with my brother Curtis for such compensation as he should choose to give. My duties were to carry on the store and look after the business generally in his absence. Mr Kenny was likewise engaged by my brother in an 139 132 establishment carried on by him at Indian bar, a few miles down the river. There we remained until November, when we went to San Francisco.

Shortly before leaving Rich bar I had received intelligence of the death of Harlow Palmer, eldest son of George Palmer, a wealthy and highly respected citizen of Buffalo. Harlow Palmer had married my sister Emily. For fine womanly instincts and self-sacrificing devotion to duty and friendship she had no superior; and her husband was among the noblest of men. Away in the heart of the Sierra I received the heart-rending tidings as a message from another world. I said nothing to any one; but when the sun had buried itself in the granite waves beyond, and had left the sky and earth alone together, alone to whisper each other their old-time secrets, with my sad secret I wandered forth beside the transparent river, where the lusty diggers had honey-combed the pebbly bottom and opened graves for myriads of hopes, and there, down in the deep cañon, walled in by sky-propping mountains, I sped my longings upward, the only window of escape for my pent up sorrow. O earth! how dark and desolate thou art, with thy boisterous streams singing requiems for the dead. O starlit sky! dim not my vision that would pierce thy milky veil, nor speed back my blind intelligence from its unapproachable source. Behold the immobile sepulchral moon! Ghastly the sun's reflected light thrown from fantastic rocks which cast their phantom shadows round yawning craters reveals the hideousness of the gentle orb, gentle because dead, tenantless as a cemetery. Bats we are, all of us, teachers and pupils alike, beating our senseless brains against the murky cavern-walls that hem us in, screeching about that illimitable brightness beyond, of which we have been told so much and know so little, only to drop at length upon the damp floor, despairing.

But this was only the beginning of sorrow. Scarcely had I reached Sacramento when the death of George 140 133 H. Derby was announced. Surely, said I, there must be a mistake. It is Mr Palmer they mean; they have confused the husbands of the two sisters. I would not believe it; it could not be. Letters, however, soon confirmed the report. The two brothers-in-law, young, high-spirited, active, intelligent, promising men, the warmest of friends, living on the same side of the same street, not more than a mile apart, had both been swept away by the cholera the same month. I was stricken dumb, stupefied, and for a time, listless and purposeless, I wandered about the quagmires and charred remains of the city—for Sacramento had about that time been visited by both flood and fire—the miry and sombre surroundings according well with the despond-sloughs and ashen contemplations within. To the pure fanatic and the pure philosopher alike death has no sting. Deep meditations on man's destiny only show the folly of harassing concern about what is hidden from human ken or of loudly bewailing what is inevitable to all. But where neither fanaticism nor philosophy exists one suffers when friends die.

All my plans and purposes I saw at once were at an end. I knew very well that no one else, now that Mr Derby was dead, would do so foolish a thing as to continue shipments of goods to an inexperienced moneyless boy in California. Indeed, directly after receiving the first sad intelligence came a letter from the executor, requesting the speedy sale of the consignment about to arrive and the remittance of the money. Accompanying this order was an urgent but most unnecessary appeal to my sympathies in behalf of my sister, Mrs Derby. The estate, it affirmed, would net little else than the property in my hands, without which the widow and children must suffer.

Having no further business in the burned-out mud-hole of Sacramento, I went down to the bay and put up at the Rassette house. Kenny was with me. I was determined, whatever the cost, that Mrs Derby 141 134 should have the full amount of the invoice, with commissions added, as soon as the goods could be converted into money and the proceeds remitted to her. To sell in that market, at that time, a miscellaneous assortment of books and stationery in one lot, without a sacrifice, was impossible. I determined there should be no sacrifice, even if I had to peddle the stuff from door to door. I possessed only one hundred and fifty dollars, the result of my services at Rich bar, and began to look about for employment till the goods should arrive. At none of the several book and stationery shops in town was there any prospect. I was thin, young, awkward, bashful, had no address, and was slow of wit. Besides, merchants were shy of a clerk with shipments of goods behind him; for why should he desire a situation except to learn the secrets of his employer and then use them to his own advantage? I explained the poverty of my prospects and declared the purity of my intentions. All was in vain; nobody would have my services, even as a gift.

Mr Kenny was more fortunate. In his nature were blended the suaviter in modo and the fortiter in re. He was older than I, and possessed of an Irish tongue withal; he made friends wherever he went. An equal partnership was offered him by William B. Cooke, who had lately dissolved with Josiah J. Le Count, and was then establishing himself anew at the corner of Merchant and Montgomery streets. The terms were that Kenny should place upon Cooke's shelves the stock sent me; that the proceeds should be remitted east as fast as sales were made, or, if possible, payments should be even faster than this; in any event not less than five hundred dollars was to be paid on each steamer day. I must shift for myself; but this did not trouble me. I readily consented, stipulating only for immediate control of the stock if the firm did not remit as fast as promised. In no surer or quicker way could I realize the invoice price for the whole shipment, and this was now my chief ambition.

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Well, the goods arrived, and the firm of Cooke, Kenny, and Company was organized, the company being a young friend of Mr Cooke. I had free access to the premises, and watched matters closely for a while. Everything went on satisfactorily, and the whole amount was remitted to the executors of Mr Derby's estate according to agreement. Meanwhile I had applied myself more earnestly than ever to obtain work of some kind. I felt obliged to stay in San Francisco until my account with the estate was settled, unwilling to trust any one for that, and I greatly preferred remaining in the city altogether. Mines and the miners, and country trading of any kind, had become exceedingly distasteful to me. I felt, if an opportunity were offered, that I would prove competent and faithful in almost any capacity; for though diffident I had an abundance of self-conceit, or at least of self-reliance, and would do anything. Accustomed to work all my life, idleness was to me the greatest of afflictions. My bones ached for occupation and I envied the very hod-carriers.

Thus for six months, day after day, I tramped the streets of San Francisco seeking work, and failed to find it. Thousands have since in like manner applied to me, and remembering how the harsh refusals once cut my sensitive nature, I try to be kind to applicants of whatsoever degree, and if not always able to give work I can at least offer sympathy and advice. Finally, sick with disappointment, I determined to leave the city: not for the Sierra foothills; rather China, or Australia. The choice must be made quickly, for the last dollar from Rich bar was gone, and I would not live on others, or run in debt with nothing wherewith to pay. Often I wandered down about the shipping and scanned the vessels for different ports. I knew little of the various parts of the world, and had little choice where to go. My future turned upon a hair.

In the spring of 1853 the San Francisco papers 143 136 began to notice a new town on the California shore of the Pacific, some fifteen or twenty miles from the Oregon boundary line. Crescent City the place was called, from a long sweep taken by the shore inward between Trinidad bay and Point St George; indeed, there was then much more crescent than city, only a few tents and split-board houses stood trembling between the sullen roar of the ocean at the front door and the ofttimes whistling wind in the dense pine forest at the back door to mark the site of the prospective commercial metropolis of northern California. On both sides of the boundary line between Oregon and California were extensive mining districts, at various distances from the coast, access to which had hitherto been from Oregon only by way of Portland and Scottsburg, and from the Sacramento valley through Shasta. Most of the country hereabout might have been traversed in wagons but for one difficulty—there were no wagon roads; consequently most of the merchandise carried to this port by steamers and sailing vessels was conveyed into the interior on the backs of mules. There was plenty of good agricultural land round Crescent City, and forests of magnificent timber, but few thought of farming in those days, and lumber could be more easily obtained at other points along the coast. The mines and the trade with them offered the chief attractions for establishing a city. Nor was it to depend so much on the mines already discovered as on those which were sure to be found as soon as the country was fairly prospected. The color of gold, they said, had been seen on Smith river, only twelve miles distant; and farther up, at Althouse and Jacksonville, was gold itself, and men at work digging for it. As other parts boasted their Gold lakes and Gold bluffs, so here was an unsolved mystery wherein gold was the fitful goddess—a lone cabin that men talked of in whispers, where treasure-diggers long since departed had filled bags, and bottles, and tin cans with the glittering 144 137 dirt that made glad the hearts of those awaiting them in their eastern homes. Several parties went in search of this lone cabin at various times. It was confidently believed that some day it would be found, and when that day should come, a seaport town, with railways, wharves, and shipping, would be absolutely necessary to furnish the diggers in that vicinity with food and clothing, tents, strychnine whiskey, and playing-cards, and receive and export for the honest magnates the tons of heavy yellow stuff which they would shovel up.

Knowing of no better place, I determined to try my fortune at Crescent City; so, with fifty dollars borrowed, and a case of books and stationery bought on credit, I embarked on board the steamer Columbia about the middle of May. Two days and one night the voyage lasted—long enough, with the crowded state of the vessel and the poor comforts at my command, to leave me on landing completely prostrated with sea-sickness and fatigue. Taken ashore in a whale-boat, I crawled to a hotel and went to bed. My box was landed in a lighter, but for a day or two I made no attempt at business. Adjoining the hotel was the general merchandise store of Crowell and Fairfield, and there I made the acquaintance of Mr Crowell, which resulted in mutual confidence and esteem. Mr Fairfield was then absent at the bay. As our friendship increased, Mr Crowell occasionally requested me to attend the store during his absence, and also to enter in the day-book sales which he had made. At length, on learning my purpose, he made me an offer of fifty dollars a month to keep his books, with the privilege of placing my stock on his shelves and selling from it for my own account free of charge. I gladly accepted, and was soon enrolled as book-keeper and book-seller. On his return Mr Fairfield ratified the arrangement, and we were ever after the best of friends. As I slept in the store, indulged in little dissipation, and was not extravagant in dress, my 145 138 expenses were very light, while the profits on my goods, which I sold only for cash, were large. Meanwhile, as the business of the firm augmented and the duties became more responsible, my salary was from time to time increased, until at the expiration of eighteen months, with the use of a few thousand dollars which I had accumulated and allowed to remain at the disposal of the firm, I found myself the recipient of two hundred and fifty dollars monthly. Some six months later the firm failed. I bought a portion of the stock and tried merchandising on my own account for a short time, but being dissatisfied with my life there, I disposed of the business, built a one-story brick store, which I leased to some hardware merchants, and leaving my affairs in the hands of an agent I went down to San Francisco.

Though it was a trading rather than a mining town, life at Crescent City was in most respects similar to life in the mines. There was the same element in the community, the same lack of virtuous women, the same species of gaming-houses, drinking-saloons, and dens of prostitution. Florimel's girdle was worn by never a woman there. The Reverend Mr Lacy, afterward pastor of the first congregational society in San Francisco, essayed to build a church and reform the people, but his efforts were attended with poor success.

A ranchería of natives occupied the point that formed the northern horn of the Crescent, and with them the mild-mannered citizens of the town endeavored to live in peace. One night the ranchería took fire, an unusual thing which excited some commotion. The natives thought the white men wished to burn them out, and the white men began to fear the red men intended to overturn everything and massacre everybody, beginning with the destruction of their own houses. Morning, however, threw light upon the matter. It appears a drunken white man, the night before, had taken lodgings in a native hut, and 146 139 feeling cold, in the absence of the accustomed alcoholic fires he built a fire of wood to warm himself withal; but being drunk, he built it after the white man's fashion, at one end of the room against the bark boards of the house, and not where the sober savage would have placed it, in the centre of the room. The pioneer citizens of the Crescent were orderly, well meaning men, who prided themselves on emptying a five-gallon keg of the most fiery spirits San Francisco could send them, and on carrying it respectably, with eyes open, head up, and tongue capable of articulating, even though it did thicken and crisp a little sometimes toward morning after a night at poker. They could not therefore silently pass by the affront cast on their dusky neighbors by an unworthy member of their own color; and in the absence of a court of law they held a court of inquiry, followed by a court of retort, requiring the vile white man who could not drink without making himself drunk, first to pay the natives blankets, beads, and knives enough to fully satisfy them for loss and damage to their property, and then to leave the place. Well begun, noble topers of the Crescent, who would not see even the poor savages at their door wronged by one of their number!

The two and a half years I spent at Crescent City were worse than thrown away, although I did accumulate some six or eight thousand dollars. With an abundance of time on my hands, I read little but trashy novels, and though from my diffidence I did not mingle greatly with the people, I improved my mind no better than they. One bosom friend I had, Theodore S. Pomeroy, county clerk and editor of the Herald, probably the most intelligent man in the place, and much of my time outside of business I spent with him at cards or billiards. On Sundays there was horse-racing, or foot-racing, or cock-fighting on the beach; and often a band of rowdies, composed of the most respectable citizens, would start out at any time between 147 140 midnight and daybreak, and with horns, tin pans, and gongs, make the round of the place, pounding at every door, and compelling the occupant to arise, administer drink to all, and join the jovial company. Knives and pistols were almost universally carried and recklessly used. In a drunken brawl a man was shot dead one night in front of my store. I did not rush out with others to witness the scene, and so saved myself a month's time, and the heavy expenses of a journey to Yreka to attend the trial of the murderer. During my residence at this place I made several trips on business to San Francisco, and on the whole managed my affairs with prudence and economy. I well remember the first five hundred dollars I made. The sum was deposited with Page, Bacon, and company, so that whatever befell me I might have that amount to carry me back to my friends, for I never ceased longing to see them. Fortunately, Crowell and Fairfield being in need of money, I drew it out for their use just before the bank failed. I have never felt so rich before or since. Having great faith in the ultimate growth of Crescent City, I invested my earnings there, though after the lapse of several years I was glad to realize at thirty cents on the dollar.

My sisters had often urged me strongly to return to the east. Mrs Derby, particularly, was quite alone, and she wished me to come, and if possible settle permanently near her. I now felt quite independent, and consequently proud and happy, for my brick store at Crescent City, worth, as I counted it, eight thousand dollars, and rented for two hundred and fifty dollars a month, seemed at that time sufficient to make me comfortable without work. Hence I resolved to go home—the eastern side was always home then, whether one lived there or not—and my friend Pomeroy promised to accompany me. My object was to visit friends and make plans for the future; his was to marry a woman of Albany, with 148 141 whom he had opened correspondence and made a matrimonial engagement through the medium of a friend, a female friend of course, living in San Francisco. The firm of Cooke, Kenny, and company had failed, from lack of capital, and Mr Kenny, who in the mean time had married an estimable woman, was doing business for another house. Often have I thought how fortunate it was that I did not start in business at San Francisco or Sacramento at that time, since the inevitable result would have been failure. As I have said, almost every firm then doing business failed; and if men with capital and experience, with a large trade already established, could not succeed, how could I expect to do so? In November, 1855, with Mr Pomeroy as a companion, I sailed from San Francisco for New York, where we safely arrived, and shortly after separated for the homes of our respective friends.

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CHAPTER VI.

THE HOUSE OF H. H. BANCROFT AND COMPANY. Seest thou a man diligent in business, he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men.

Proverbs.

HOME again! None but a wanderer, and a youthful wanderer, can feel those words in their fullest import. Back from the first three years in California. Out of the depths and into paradise. Away from harassing cares, from the discordant contentions of money-getting, from the contaminations of filthy debaucheries, beyond the shot of pistol or reach of bowie-knife, safe home, there let me rest. Nor does the prestige of success lessen the pleasure of the returned Californian. Even our warmest friends are human. Those who would nurse us most kindly in sickness, who would spare no self-denial for our comfort, who, unworthy as we might be of their affection, would die for us if necessary, the hearts of even these in their thanksgiving are warmed with pride if to their welcome they may add “Well done!”

How the snappish frosty air tingles the blood, and lightens the feet, and braces the sinews. How white the soft snow resting silently on trees and lawn, and how the music of the bells rings in the heart the remembrance of old time merrymakings! Rosy-cheeked girls, muffled in woollens and furs, frolic their way to school, filling the clear cold air with their musical laughter, and blooming young ladies grace the sidewalk in such numbers as would turn a mining camp topsy-turvy for a month. Oysters! How the whilom bean-and-bacon eaters regale themselves! First a 150 143 raw, then a stew, then a fry, and then a raw again. To live in a house, eat with people, lounge in elegantly furnished parlors—it is very pleasant, but a little close. The Sundays, how quiet they are; no one abroad, no trafficking, no revelry! And then to go to church, and sit in the old family pew, and meet the gaze of faces familiar from boyhood. How much smaller things appear than of old. The ancients of the church are plainer in their apparel and simpler in their features than they used to be, and the minister is a little more prosy and peculiar. But the girls, ah! there's the rub. Immediately on my arrival I fell in love with half a dozen, and, bashful as I was, would have married one upon the spot, had not her father fancied a young man whose father's property was in New York, in preference to one who possessed something of his own at Crescent City. And how the men, and women, and children all eyed me; one saying, “You are not a bear,” and another, “I do not see but that you look very like other people.” The impression seemed to prevail at the east in those days that a Californian could not be otherwise than brown and bearded, and rough and red-shirted. I was still a pale, thin, timid boy, though I had passed through furnace fires enough to deeper bronze or blacken Mephistopheles.

I found my sister Mrs Derby, with her three daughters, cosily keeping house in Auburn, New York. My youngest sister, Mary, was with her. Soon Mrs Palmer, my second sister, came down from Buffalo to see her Californian brother. It was a happy meeting, though saddened by the recollection of irreparable disruptions. Between Auburn and Buffalo I passed the winter delightfully, and in the spring visited my friends in Granville. I tried my best to like it at the east, to make up my mind to abandon California and settle permanently in Buffalo or New York, to be a comfort to my sisters, and a solace to my parents; but the western coast, with all its rough hardships and impetuous faults so fascinating, had fastened itself 151 144 too strongly upon me to be shaken off. And so round many a poor pilgrim California has thrown her witcheries, drawing him back to her bright shores whenever he attempted to leave them, like the magnetic mountain of Arabian story, which drew the nails from any ship that approached it. If the nails from the vessels entering the Golden Gate were not so drawn by the metal-veined sierra the men were, for only too often they left the ships tenantless and unmanageable hulks. The east, as compared with the west, was very comfortable, very cultivated, soothing to the senses and refining to the intelligence; but society was so proper, so particular, and business ways seemed stale and flat.

Suddenly in April, 1856, I made up my mind no longer to remain there. I had visited enough and wasted time enough. I was impatient to be doing. So, without saying a word at first, I packed my trunk, and then told my sister of the resolve. I appreciated her kindness most fully. I regretted leaving her more than words could tell, but I felt that I must go; there was that in California which harmonized with my aspirations and drew forth energies which elsewhere would remain dormant. I must be up and doing.

On one side of the continent all was new, all was to be done; on the other side beginnings were pretty well over. To the satisfied and unambitious an eastern or European life of dolce far niente might be delicious; to me if I had millions it would be torment. The mill must needs grind, for so the maker ordained; if wheat be thrown into the hopper it sends forth fine flour, but if unfed it still grinds, until it grinds itelf away. I must be something of myself, and do something by myself; it is the Me, and not money, that cries for activity and development.

“One thing do for me,” said my sister, “and you may go.”

“I will; what is it?”

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“You remember the money sent from California in return for goods shipped by Mr Derby?”

“Yes.”

“The money is now so invested that I am fearful of losing it. Help me to get it, then take it and use it in any way you think best.”

“I will help you to get it,” said I, “most certainly, but I could not sleep knowing that your comfort depended on my success. I may be honest and capable, and yet fail. I may woo fortune but I cannot command her. The risk is altogether too great for you to take.”

“Nevertheless I will take it,” replied my noble sister, and in that decision she decided my destiny.

How a seemingly small thing, as we have before remarked, will sometimes turn the current, not only of a man's own future life, but that of his friends, his family, and multitudes who shall come after him. In this womanish resolve of my sister—womanish because prompted by the heart rather than by the head—the destinies of many hundreds of men and women were wrapped. By it my whole career in California was changed, and with mine that of my father's entire family. Herein is another cause, if we choose to call it so, of my embarking in literature. I hesitated yet further about taking the money, but finally concluded that I might keep it safely for her; if not, there was yet the Crescent City property to fall back upon.

After some little difficulty we succeeded in drawing the money, five thousand five hundred dollars, which sum was placed in my hands. I then asked her if she would accept a partnership in my proposed undertaking; but she answered no, she would prefer my note, made payable in five or six years, with interest at the rate of one per cent a month.

Now it was that I determined to execute the original plan formed by Mr Derby, in pursuance of which I first went to California; and that with the very money, I might say, employed by him, this being the 153 146 exact amount of his original shipments—only, I would lay the foundations broader than he had done, establish at once a credit, for without that my capital would not go far, and plant myself in San Francisco with aspirations high and determination fixed, as became one who would win or die in the first city of the Pacific seaboard.

There was a man in New York, Mr John C. Barnes, who had been a warm friend of Mr Derby. To him my sister gave a letter of introduction, with which, and drafts for fifty-five hundred dollars, she sent me forth to seek my fortune. Mr Barnes was partner in the large stationery house of Ames, Herrick, Barnes, and Rhoads, 75 John street. I found him very affable, stated to him my plans, deposited with him my drafts, and received the assurance that everything possible should be done to forward my wishes. First of all, I wanted to establish business relations with the leading publishers of the east. I wanted the lowest prices and the longest time—the lowest prices so that the advance I was necessarily obliged to add should not place my stock beyond the reach of consumers, and the longest time because four or six months were occupied in transportation.

California credit in New York at that time rated low, as elsewhere I have observed. Nearly every one I met had lost, some of them very heavily, either by flood, or fire, or failure. Some of their customers had proved dishonest, others unfortunate, and a curse seemed attached to the country from which at one time so much had been expected. I told them I was starting fresh, untrammelled, with everything in my favor, and I believed I could succeed; that they had met with dishonest men did not prove every man dishonest; and because they had lost it did not follow that they were always sure to lose. I might have added, if at that time I had known enough of the manner of eastern merchants in dealing with the California market, that for nine tenths of their losses 154 147 they had only themselves to blame, for after selling to legitimate dealers all the goods necessary for the full supply of the market, they would throw into auction on their own account in San Francisco such quantities of merchandise as would break prices and entail loss on themselves and ruin on their customers. All the blame attending California credit did not belong to Californians, although the disgrace might be laid only on them; but the shippers of New York and Boston knew a trick or two as well as the merchants of San Francisco.

At all events, before these angry croakers decided against me, or persisted in their fixed purpose never to sell a dollar's worth of goods to California without first receiving the dollar, I begged them to see Mr Barnes and ascertain what he thought of it. This they were ready to promise, if nothing more; and the consequence was that when I called the second time almost every one was ready to sell me all the goods I would buy. From that day my credit was established, becoming firmer with time, and ever afterward it was my first and constant care to keep it good. “A good credit, but used sparingly;” that was my motto. At this time I did not buy largely, only about ten thousand dollars' worth, preferring to wait till I became better acquainted with the market before ordering heavily. This was in June. My goods shipped, I returned to Auburn, there to spend the few months pending the passage of the vessel round Cape Horn rather than await its arrival in California. And very pleasantly passed this time with the blood warm and hope high.

October saw me again en route for San Francisco. I found Mr Kenny occupying his old store with a small stock of goods belonging to Mr Le Count. I told him to settle his business and come with me, and he did so. We engaged the room adjoining, being in the building of Naglee, the brandymaker, near the 155 148 corner of Montgomery and Merchant streets, where ten years before a yerba-buena bordered sand-bank was washed by the tide-waters of he bay. Our stock arriving shortly after in good order, we opened it and began business under the firm name of H. H. Bancroft and Company about the first of December, 1856. There was nothing peculiar in the shop, its contents, business, or proprietors, that I am aware of. During the closing months of the year, and the opening months of the year following, the inside was exposed to the weather while the building was taking on a new front; but in such a climate this was no hardship. At night we closed the opening with empty boxes, and I turned into a cot bed under the counter to sleep; in the morning I arose, removed the boxes, swept the premises, put the stock in order, breakfasted, and was then ready to post books, sell goods, or carry bundles, according to the requirements of the hour. We let two offices, one to Mr Woods, the broker, and one to Jonathan Hunt, insurance agent, and thus reduced our rent one third, the original sum being two hundred and fifty dollars a month. With the constant fear of failure before me, I worked and watched unceasingly. Mr Kenny was salesman, for he was much more familiar with the business than I; he possessed many friends and had already a good trade established. Affairs progressed smoothly; we worked hard and made money, first slowly, then faster. Times were exceedingly dull. Year after year the gold crop had diminished; or if not diminished, it required twice the labor and capital to produce former results. Stocks had accumulated, merchants had fallen in arrears, and business depression was far greater than at any time since the discovery of gold. In the vernacular of the day, trade had touched bottom. But hard times are the very best of times in which to plant and nourish a permanent business. Hard times lead to careful trading and thrift; flush times to recklessness and overdoing. On every side of us old firms were falling 156 149 to pieces, and old merchants were forced out of business. The term ‘old’ was then applied to firms of five or six years' standing. This made me all the more nervous about success. But we had every advantage; our stock was good and well bought, our credit excellent, our expenses light, and gradually the business grew.

Toward the end of the first year the idea struck me that I might use my credit further, without assuming much more responsibility, by obtaining consignments of goods in place of buying large quantities outright. But this would involve my going east to make the arrangements, and, as Mr Kenny would thus be left alone, I proposed to Mr Hunt, whose acquaintance had ripened into friendship, to join us, contribute a certain amount of capital, and take a third interest in the partnership. The proposition was accepted. Mr Hunt came into the firm, the name of which remained unchanged, and soon after, that is to say in the autumn of 1857, I sailed for New York. My plan was successful. I readily obtained goods on the terms asked to the amount of sixty or seventy thousand dollars, which added largely to our facilities.

Before returning to California, which was in the spring of 1858, I visited my parents, then living as happily as ever in Granville. My views of life had changed somewhat since I had left my boyhood home, and later they changed still more. I was well enough satisfied then with the choice I had made in foregoing the benefits of a college course, and my mind is much more clear upon the subject now than then.

Were a boy of mine to ask me to-day, “Shall I enter college?” I should inquire, “For what purpose? What do you intend to do or to be? Are you satisfied with your position and possessions, or shall you desire fame or wealth? If the former, then in what direction? Have you a taste for languages and literature; would you be a preacher, or professor, or president of a university; has statesmanship attractions for 157 150 you—the pure and unadulterated article I mean, not demagogism, or the ordinary path of the politician? If so, a classical education, as a tool of the trade, might be of use to you. But for almost anything else it would be a downright disadvantage, the time spent upon it being worse than thrown away. I know you would not be a clergymen; you love the natural and truthful too well. You would not be a lawyer, having no mental or moral abilities to sell for money; you could not reduce the equities wholly to a traffic, or study law that with it you may spend your life in defeating the ends of justice, or place yourself in a position where you are expected to advocate either side of any proposition for pay. You would not adopt a profession based upon butchering principles, or spend your life wrangling for money in the quarrels of other men. In regard to the calling of the medical man, while it is not ignoble, I do not imagine that you have any fancy that way.” “Well, then, a scientific course?” I should say that might do; but would it not be well for the young man first to think it over a little, and determine—not irrevocably, but as far as an intelligent youth with some degree of an understanding of himself can reasonably do—what calling or pursuit in life he would like to follow, and then study with that end in view? To be a blacksmith, the wise boy will scarely apprentice himself to a shoemaker. If his ambition is to be a great artist, he will not spend the best portions of his best days in music or oratory. If wealth is his object, a commercial or industrial career is the place for him; and if he would do his best, he will begin upon it early, and let colleges alone altogether. Often is the question asked, but seldom answered, “Where are your college men?” Few of them, indeed, put in an appearance among those who move the world or conduct the great affairs of life.

In all this that relates to a calling and a career, it is well to consider our point of view, whether our 158 151 chief purpose is to be or to do, to formulate or be formulated. It is one thing to make money, and quite another to be made by money.

While stopping in Buffalo once more I made the acquaintance of Miss Emily Ketchum, daughter of a highly respected and prominent citizen of the place, and of whom my sister Mrs Palmer was loud in praise. Her face was not what one would call beautiful, but it was very refined, very sweet. She was tall, with light hair and eyes, exquisitely formed, and very graceful. Her mind was far above the average female intellect, and well cultivated; she was exceedingly bright in conversation, and with a ready wit possessed keen common-sense. Her well trained voice in singing was one of the sweetest I ever heard. I was captivated and soon determined to marry her—if I could. My time was short; I must return to my affairs immediately. We had not met half a dozen times before I called one afternoon to say good-by. She was entirely unconscious of having aroused any special interest in me, and as a matter of course I could not then make a proposal.

What to do I did not know. I could not leave matters as they were and go back to California to be absent perhaps for years, and yet I could not speak my heart. I dared not even ask if I might write, lest I should frighten her. At last fortune came to my relief. The young woman had lately become deeply interested in religion, was a new convert, as she said, though her whole life had been one of the strictest religious training. Naturally she was keen for proselytes, and evidently took me for a heathen, one of the worst sort, a California heathen. Zealously she attacked me, therefore, her eyes sparkling, her cheeks glowing, her whole soul lit with inspiration in proclaiming the blessedness of her faith. I listened attentively; I could have listened had she been demonstrating a problem in Euclid, or talking of Queen Victoria's new 159 152 bonnet. After a three hours' session, during which by dropping here and there a penitent word the fire of her enthusiasm had been kept ablaze, I rose to take my leave.

“Absorbed in business as I am,” I said, “away from home and its hallowing influences, worship is neglected and piety grows cold. Had I you to remind me of my duty now and then I might do better.”

“Would that I could be of such assistance to you,” she replied.

“You can.”

“How?” she asked.

“Write me occasionally.”

“I will,” was the prompt response.

It was enough, more than I had expected, better than I could have hoped for: I had her promise to write—little cared I what she wrote about—and then, of course, I could write to her. My heart was light, the barrier of conventionalism was broken.

Nor did I forget her sermon. I remembered it on the railway journey to New York; I remembered it on the steamer deck, down in the tropics, as I gazed up into the starlit sky and thought of her and her sweet words. And I vowed to be a better man, one more worthy of her. I remembered it when on reaching San Francisco I put my brains in my pocket and joined the good people of Calvary church in their march heavenward. I remembered it at the Sabbath-school where I taught, at the prayer-meetings which I attended. All through the religious life which for the next ten years I so strictly led I never forgot her, for she was with me, with her holy living and that dear love and fond devotion of which in part she robbed God to bestow on me.

Indeed and in truth I was earnest in my profession both of love and of godliness; and my love was crowned with success, for during the next visit east I married Emily Ketchum. My godliness, ubi lapsus? For ten years I was of the strictest sect a devotee. I 160 153 paid tithes, attended to all the ordinances of religion, would not even look at a secular newspaper on the sabbath; I sank my reason in reasonless dogmas, and blindly abandoned myself to blind teachers. Of a verity mine was the fides carbonarii; I believed what the church believed, and the church believed what I believed. Now, what I believe God knoweth; what the church believes God knoweth. Belief is based on blindness: faith in things unseen and unknown is made a merit; reason is repudiated, but mine will work whether I will or no.

I will only glance over the leading events of the next twelve years, and hasten to the subject-matter of this book. Shortly after my return to San Francisco, to make room for the large additions to our stock, we rented two rooms fronting on Merchant street, in the rear of our store, cutting through the partition wall to give us access from the Montgomery-street store. Subsequently we occupied the whole building on Merchant street, forty by sixty feet, three stories. During the next year Mr Hunt withdrew from the partnership. Meanwhile, though little more than a boy myself, I gave special attention to my boys. I was determined that my establishment should be a model of order, morality, and discipline. At once studying them and teaching them, of some I made salesmen, of others book-keepers, giving to the brightest and most devoted leaderships.

In the spring of 1859 I again visited the east, and in the autumn of that year my marriage took place, which was in this wise: The sacred correspondence had long since been cut off. To the parents the device was altogether too transparent. On reaching Buffalo I immediately presented myself, and found the lady amiable and tractable. I told her I had come to marry her; in reply she declared herself willing, but feared her parents would object to her going so far from them. That night I left for Ohio, to give time 161 154 for consideration. In three weeks I returned and asked her if she was ready. For herself, yes, but she would not leave her father and mother without their full and free assent; so to the father and mother I went. They sighed and hesitated; I desired a ‘yes' or ‘no,’ and receiving neither that night I left for New York. This time I remained away six weeks, and on returning all was happiness. In due time the ceremony was performed and we sailed for California. The first two years we lived on Harrison street, between First and Second streets, and there my daughter Kate was born. Afterward we passed certain seasons at Oakland and Alameda.

In 1860 my father was appointed by President Lincoln Indian agent in Washington territory, and took up his residence at Fort Simcoe. My mother soon joined him, and also my youngest sister, Mary, who afterward married Mr T. B. Trevett. After the expiration of the term, four years, my parents settled in San Francisco, and Mrs Trevett in Portland, Oregon.

Having now an abundance of means at my command, I determined to establish a branch in the stationery business among the wholesale houses, as we had little of that trade. To this Mr Kenny took exceptions. I persisting, he withdrew; the stock was divided, and he joining his brother-in-law, Mr Alexander, they opened a shop opposite to me. Naturally enough we quarrelled; he brought suit against me, but, remembering our long friendship, before the case came up for trial I went to him and told him he should have all he demanded. Immediately we became friends again; and this was our first and last unpleasantness.

As I was now alone, I closed the stationery branch, and moved the stock to the Montgomery street store, where I could better control matters. Scarcely was this done when the political sky darkened; then roared rebellion; and for the next five years fortunes were thrust on Californian merchants from the rise in gold, 162 155 or rather from the depreciation of the currency in which they paid their debts—fortunes which otherwise could never have been accumulated but by generations of successful trade.

In January, 1862, my wife made a visit to her friends at home, and the following summer I took a hurried trip to London, Paris, New York, and Buffalo, bringing her back with me. This knocking about the world, with the time which it forced from business devoted to observation and thought under new conditions, was a great educator. It was then that ambition became fired, and ideas came rushing in on me faster than I could handle them. Notwithstanding I had read and studied somewhat, yet the old world, with its antique works and ways, seen by the eye of inexperience, was at once a romance and a revelation. In 1866-7 I spent a year in Europe with my wife, made the tour of Great Britain and the continent, came back to Buffalo, and there remained the following winter, visited Washington in the spring, and returned to San Francisco in the autumn of 1868.

Meanwhile the business had assumed such proportions that more room was absolutely necessary. Although it had two store-rooms on Commerical street, and suffered the inconvenience of having the stock divided; and although we had goods stored in warehouses, we were still very crowded. My friends had long desired that I should build, and had been looking for a suitable place for years without finding one. In the selection of a site two points were to be regarded, locality and depth of lot. Without the one our trade would suffer, and without the other, in order to obtain the amount of room necessary, so much frontage on the street would be taken up as to make the property too costly for the business to carry. In regard to the site, if we could not obtain exactly what we would like we must take what we could get.

Following Montgomery and Kearny streets out to 163 156 Market, we examined every piece of property and found nothing; then out Market to Third street, and beyond, where after some difficulty, and by paying a large price to five different owners, I succeeded in obtaining seven lots together, three on Market street and four on Stevenson street, making in all a little more than seventy-five by one hundred and seventy feet. This was regarded as far beyond business limits at the time, but it was the best I could do, and in six or seven years a more desirable location could not be found in the city.

It was one of the turning-points of my life, this move to Market street. Had I been of a temperament to hasten less rapidly; had I remained content to plod along after the old method, out of debt and danger, with no thought of anything further than accumulation and investment, for self and family, for this world and the next world, a comfortable place in both being the whole of it—the map of my destiny, as well as that of many others, would present quite a different appearance. But like all else that God ordains, it is better as it is. The truth is, my frequent absence from business had weaned me from it—this, and the constantly recurring question which kept forcing itself on my mind, “Is he not worse than a fool who labors for more when he has enough; worse than a swine who stuffs himself when he is already full?” If I could turn my back upon it all, it would add to my days, if that were any benefit. Had I known what was before me I would probably have retired from business at the time, but in my employ were as fine a company of young men, grown up under my own eye and teachings, as ever I saw in any mercantile establishment, and I had not the heart to break in pieces the commercial structure which with their assistance I had reared, and turn them adrift upon the world.

In Europe, for the first time in my life, I had 164 157 encountered a class of people who deemed it a disgrace to engage in trade. Many I had seen who were too proud or too lazy to work, but never before had come to my notice those who would not if they could make money, though it involved no manual labor. Here the idea seemed first to strike me, and I asked myself, Is there then in this world something better than money that these men should scorn to soil their fingers with it? Now I never yet was ashamed of my occupation, and I hope never to be; otherwise I should endeavor speedily to lay it aside. Nor do I conceive any more disgrace attached to laboring with the hands than with the head. I feel no more sense of shame when carrying a bundle or nailing up a box of goods than when signing a check, or writing history, or riding in the park. A banker is necessarily neither better nor worse per se than a boot-black, though, if obliged to chose, I would adopt the former calling, because it is more important, and productive of greater results. The consuming of my soul on the altar of avarice I objected to, not work. I have worked twice, ten times, as hard writing books as ever I did selling books. But for the occasional breaking away from business, long enough for my thoughts to form for themselves new channels, I should have been a slave to it till this day, for no one was more interested and absorbed in money-making while engaged in it than I.

In accordance with my purposes, then, historical and professional, in 1869 I began building. Already I had in contemplation a costly dwelling, parts of which had been constructed in England and at the east, and shipped hither from time to time, till a great mass of material had accumulated which must be put together. I resolved, somewhat recklessly, to make one affair of it all, and build a store and dwelling-house at the same time, and have done with it. Times were then good, business was steady, and with the experience of thirteen years behind me I thought I could calculate closely enough in money matters not 165 158 to be troubled. Consequently my plans were drawn, I ordered my material, gave out contracts for the several parts, and soon a hundred men or more were at work.

And now began a series of the severest trials of my life, trials which I gladly would have escaped in death, thanking the merciless monster had he finished the work which was half done. In December, 1869, my wife died. Other men's wives had died before, and left them, I suppose, as crushed as I was; but mine had never died, and I knew not what it was to disjoin and bury that part of myself. That which comes to every one, in coming to me for the first time brought surprise. If my sorrow had been the only sorrow of the kind inflicted on the race I might publish it with loud lamentations for the entertainment of mankind; but all know of death, and its effects, though none know what it is. It is not a very pleasant sensation, that of being entirely alone in the universe, that of being on not very good terms with the invisible, and caring little or nothing for the visible. Oh the wearisome sun! I cried, will it never cease shining? Will the evening never cease its visitation, or the river its flow? Must the green grass always grow, and must birds always sing? True, I had my little daughter; God bless her! but when night after night she sobbed herself to sleep upon my breast, it only made me angry that I could not help her. Behold the quintessence of folly! to mourn for that which is inevitable to all, to be incensed at inexorable fate, to remain for years sullen over the mysterious ways of the unknowable. I tried prayer for relief both before and after her death; if ever one of God's creatures prayed earnestly and honestly, with clean uplifted hands, in faith nothing doubting, that one was myself. But all was of no avail. Then I began to think, and to ask myself if ever a prayer of mine had been answered; or if to any one who ever lived was given, to a certainty, not as seen alone through the eyes of faith, the 166 159 thing he asked because he asked it. And I complained; the light of my soul put out—wherefore? Not in punishment, as some would say, else God is not just, because many more wicked than I are not so afflicted. I would not treat my worst enemy, let alone my child, as God deals with me, whom he professes to love more than I love my child. But the ways of God are past finding out, saith the preacher. Then why preach to me as though you had found them out? Sent hither without our will, thrust hence against our will—be still, my heart, you know not what you say! Wait.

It is beautiful, this world, and life is lovely. Death presents no pleasing prospect. Mortal or immortal, the soul dissolved or hied to realms of bliss; that mighty miracle, the intellect, which here moves mountains, laughs at the sea, and subjects all things earthly—this subtile intelligence that knows it is, evaporated, returned to gas, to cosmic force, to Nirvana, or hovering mute and inane in space; to close the eyes to this fair world, to the bright sun, the gorgeous landscape, and the sparkling waters; to close the mouth to its draughts of life-inspiring air; and the boxed body to consign to its slimy walled dungeon, there to fatten worms, seems scarcely a fitting end for so much care, so much straining at higher planes of existence. Better befitting death, judging from all we can see of it, is a Dives' life, wherein pleasure is the only profit, than a threescore and ten years of self-denial, struggling for attainments only to be dissipated in the end. O horrible nightmare of a possible future non-existence! Better never to have been than to have been and not to be; else to what purpose this life of dispensations? Some say they desire death, but few such I believe. Death is ever at the bidding of those who seek him. Such are either half-crazed with morbid grief, or drunk with pride and egotism, or smitten with coward fear. No healthy mind is anxious to cast itself into the boundless, mysterious, 167 160 unknown beyond. Fanatics, Christians, Mohammedans, savages, may dethrone sense, set up and hug to blindness a fancied paradise or happy hunting-ground in the belief that to die is to gain, yet none are more chary of risking their precious lives upon it than these.

Life and death are most stupendous mysteries, death not more than life, being simply not being. One thing alone might ever make me covet death, and that would be an eager anxiety to know what it is, and what is beyond it. But millions know this, or are beyond the knowing of it; and when in an average good humor, though I be as thirsty for truth as Odin, who gave one eye to drink of the waters of Mimir's well wherein all knowledge lay concealed, I am willing to wait the few short swiftly whirling years left to me.

It is a fearful thing thus to go forth into the blackness, but still harder to endure to let wife or little one grope thither alone. Give me, O God, no food for my hungry love, else snatch it not from me ere I have scarcely tasted it! For her who so lately clung to me as to an anchor of safety, who so often opened upon me the eyes of her inward mute pride and consolation, to be as by rude hands hurried hence seemed not heavenly to me. Not until the fire lighted by disease had spent itself, not until the hectic flush had faded, and the fever heat had fled, leaving the heart still and the limbs cold, did love forsake the glazing eye, or those fleshless fingers cease to press the clasped hand.

She is gone, and who cares? Neither deities nor men. The world laughs, and swears, and cheats as hitherto. The undertaker's long face of mercenary solemnity haunts you; the hustling crowd, careless of your cankering grief, madden you. There go the word-wise whippers-in of Charon, the doctors, with their luxurious equipages drawn by sleek horses, the gift of hell-feeding Hermes; scarce enough they make themselves their work being done—so ran my bitter thoughts.

168 161

It is difficult even for a philosopher to separate sorrow and gloom from death. When at the demise of Socrates, Plato wished to cheer and comfort Apollodorus, the disciple of the great deceased, so great indeed that neither death nor time could rob him of his greatness, he offered him a cup of wine; whereupon Apollodorus replied indignantly, “I would rather have pledged Socrates in his hemlock than you in this wine.” “Animus æquus optimum est ærumnæ condimentum,” says Plautus, which is all very well as a maxim. There is no doubt that a well balanced mind is the best remedy against afflictions, but great grief often throws mind out of balance, so that, the remedy being absent, the application fails.

It often strikes me strangely to hear dead men's discourses on death, to read what matchless Shakespeare says of it, and proud, imperious Byron, and subtilesensed Shelley, and Aristotle, Plato, and the rest. Pity 'tis we cannot now speak the word that tells us what death is, we who have yet to die.

The burden of my loss was laid upon me gradually; it was not felt in its fullest force at first; it was only as the years passed by that I could fully realize it. Occupation is the antidote to grief; give me work or I die; work which shall be to me a nepenthe to obliterate all sorrows. And work enough I had, but it was of the exasperting and not of the soothing kind. If I could have shut myself up, away from the world, and absorbed my mind in pursuit of whatever was most congenial to it, that would have been medicine indeed. Cicero found far more consolation in the diversion of thought incident to the writing of his philosophical treatises, than in the philosophy they contained. But this was denied me. It was building and business, grown doubly hateful now that she for whom I chiefly labored had gone. I stayed the workmen on the house, and let it stand, a ghastly spectacle to the neighborhood for over a year; then I finished it, thinking it well enough to save the material. The 169 162 carpenters still hammered away on the store building, and completed it in April, 1870.

The business was now one of the most extensive of the kind in the world. It was divided into nine departments, each in charge of an experienced and responsible head, with the requisite number of assistants, and each in itself as large as an ordinary business in our line of trade. But this was not enough. Thus far it was purely a mercantile and publishing house. To make it perfect, complete, and symmetrical, manufacturing must be added. This I had long been ambitious of doing, but was prevented by lack of room. Now this obstacle was removed, and I determined to try the experiment. The mercantile stock was brought up and properly arranged in the different departments on the first and second floors and basement, on one side of the new building. These rooms were each thirty-five by one hundred and seventy feet. On the third and fourth floors respectively were placed a printing-office and bookbindery, each covering the entire ground of the building, seventy-five by one hundred and seventy feet. To accomplish this more easily and economically several small establishments were purchased and moved with their business into the new premises, such as a printing, an engraving, a lithographing, and a stationery establishment. A steam-engine was placed in the basement to drive the machinery above, and an artesian well was dug to supply the premises with water. A department of music and pianos was also added. My library of Pacific coast books was alphabetically arranged on the fifth floor, which was of the same dimensions as the rooms below. Then I changed the name of the business, the initial letters only, my responsibility, however, remaining the same. The idea was not eminently practicable, I will admit, that I should expect to remain at the head of a large and intricate business, involving many interests and accompanied by endless detail, and see continue its successful course, and at 170 163 the same time withdraw my thoughts and attention from it so as to do justice to any literary or historical undertaking. “How dared you undertake crossing the Sierra?” the pioneer railroad men were asked.

“Because we were not railroad men,” was the reply.

Thus, I felt, was ended the first episode of my life. I had begun with nothing, building up by my own individual efforts, in sixteen years, a mammoth business of which I might justly feel proud. I had schooled from the rudiments, and carried them through all the ramifications and complications of that business, a score and more of active and intelligent young men, each competent to take the lead in his department, and of them I was proud. Arrived at that estate where money-making had ceased to be the chief pleasure, I might now retire into idleness, or begin life anew. The short spurt of self-consciousness vouchsafed our vitality ought not all to be spent in getting ready to live.

But this was not yet to be. I must first pay the penalty of overdoing, a penalty which in my business career I have oftener paid than the penalty arising from lack of energy. That I had built simultaneously a fine store and an expensive dwelling was no mark of folly, for my finances were such that I could afford it. That I had reorganized the business, spread it out upon a new basis, doubled its capacity, and doubled its expenses, was no mark of folly, for every department, both of the mercantile and manufacturing parts, had grown into existence. There was nothing about the establishment theoretical, fanciful, or speculative in character. All was eminently practical, the result of natural growth. The business extended from British Columbia to Mexico, and over to the Hawaiian islands, Japan, and China, and was in a flourishing condition; and reports from the heads of the several departments showed its status every month. That it 171 164 should successfully carry us through the most trying time which was to follow, amply proves that its condition was not unsound, nor its establishment on such a basis impracticable.

Woes, however, were at hand. First appeared one following the opening of the Pacific railway. This grand event, so ardently desired, and so earnestly advocated on both sides of the continent since the occupation of the country by Anglo-Americans, was celebrated with guns, and banners, and music, as if the millennium had come; and every one thought it had. There were many afterward who said they knew and affirmed it at the time that this road at first would bring nothing but financial disaster and ruin to California, but before such disaster and ruin came I for one heard nothing of its approach. On the contrary, though prices of real estate were already inflated, and the city had been laid out in homestead lots for a distance of ten miles round, and sold at rates in keeping with a population of three millions, the universal impression was that prices would go higher and that every one on completion of the railway would be rich. But every one did not become rich. Every one wanted to sell, and could not, and there was a general collapse. For five years the best and most central property remained stationary, with scarcely a movement in all that time, while outside property fell in some cases to one tenth its former estimated value.

Business was likewise revolutionized. Immediately the railway was in running order the attention of buyers throughout the country, large and small, was turned toward the east. “We can now purchase in New York as well as in San Francisco,” they said, “and save one profit.” Consequently prices in San Francisco fell far below remunerative rates, and the question with our jobbers was, not whether they could make as much money as formerly, but whether they could do business at all. Some classes of business were obliged to succumb, and many merchants failed. 172 165 Large stocks, accumulated at low rates during the war when currency was at a discount of from twenty-five to fifty per cent, were thrown upon the market, and prices of many articles ruled far below the cost of reproduction. Thus, with heavy expenses and no profits, affairs began to look ominous. At such times a large, broadly extended business is much more unwieldy than a small one. Certain expenses are necessary; it is impossible to reduce them in proportion to the shrinkage of prices and the stagnation of trade.

More was yet to come. As all Californians well know, the prosperity of a season depends on the rainfall. Sometimes the effects of one dry winter may be bridged over by a prosperous year before and after. But when two or three dry seasons come together the result is most disastrous, and a year or two of favorable rains are usually required before the state entirely recuperates. As if to try the endurance of our merchants to the utmost, three dry winters and five long years of hard times followed the opening of the railway. That so many lived through them is the wonder. That my business especially did not fail, with such an accumulation of untoward circumstances, proved conclusively that it was sound and well managed. Building has ruined many a man; I had built. Branching out has ruined many a man; I had branched. The fall in real estate, the revolution in profits incident to the opening of the railway, and the dry seasons, each of these has severally ruined many men. All these came upon me at one time, and yet the house lived through it.

It may easily be seen that to draw one's mind from business at such a time and fix it on literary pursuits was no easy matter. Cares, like flies, buzz perpetually in one's ears; lock the door, and they creep in through invisible apertures. Yet I attempted it, though at first with indifferent success. The work on the fifth floor, hereinafter to be described, was 173 166 not always regarded with favor by those of the other floors. It drew money from the business, which remaining might be the means of saving it from destruction. It allured the attention of one whose presence might be the salvation of the establishment. After all it was but a hobby, and would result in neither profit nor honor. Of course I could do as I liked with my own, but was it not folly to jeopardize the life of the business to gain a few years of time for profitless work? Would it not be better to wait till times were better, till money could be spared, and danger was passed?

Although the years of financial uncertainty that followed the completion of the railway were thus withering to my work, gloomy and depressing, yet I persisted. Day after day, and year after year, I lavished time and money in the vain attempt to accomplish I knew not what. It was something I desired to do, and I was determined to find out what it was, and then to do it if I could. Although my mind was in anything but a condition suitable for the task, I felt in no mood to wait. Every day, or month, or year delayed was so much taken from my life. My age—thirty-seven or thereabout—was somewhat advanced for undertaking a literary work of any magnitude, and no time must be lost. Such was my infatuation that I would not have hesitated, any moment these dozen years, had the question arisen to abandon the business or my plan. I did not consider it right to bring disaster on others, but I never believed that such a result would follow my course. True, it is one thing to originate a business and quite another to maintain it; yet I felt that the heads of departments were competent to manage affairs, reporting to me every month. The business was paying well, and I would restrict my expenditures in every other way except to forego or delay a work which had become dearer to me than life. So I toiled on with greater or less success, oftentimes with a heavy heart and a 174 167 heated brain, tired out, discouraged, not knowing if ever I should be permitted to complete anything I had undertaken, in which event all would be lost. I toiled as if divinely commissioned, though dealing less and less in divinity. I was constrained to the effort, if any one can tell what that is.

It was between the hours of work that I experienced the greatest depression; once at my table and fairly launched upon my writing, I was absorbed by it, and forgot for the time the risks I was taking.

This season of trial was not without its benefits. It forced upon me a species of self-abnegation which I might never otherwise have attained. Had pleasure been pleasurable to me; had I been able to enjoy high living and extravagant expenditures with my affairs in so uncertain a state, or had my finances been such as to enable me without stint to enjoy gentlemanly leisure, or literary or other idling, it is doubtful whether I could have mustered courage and persistence to carry forward my undertaking, or rather to undertake it. One knows not what can be done or suffered until necessity makes the demand. It was a trial of temper which well-nigh proved fatal. My life during these years a series of excesses, the very worst state into which a man can fall—excess of work, followed by its natural reaction, and ending in ill health and despondency. Work is the amethystine antidote to every excess, except excess of work.

In time, however, the clouds cleared; the wheels of business revolved with smoothness and regularity; my work assumed shape, part of it was finished and praised; letters of encouragement came pouring in like healthful breezes to the heated brow; I acquired a name, and all men smiled upon me. Then I built Babylonian towers, and climbing heavenward peered into paradise.

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CHAPTER VII.

FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. Still am I besy bokes assemblynge; For to have plenty, it is a pleasaunt thynge.

Brandt.

THUS far, all through life, had my intellectual being craved ever more substantial nutriment. While in business I was Mammon's devotee; yet money did not satisfy me. Religion tended rather to excite longings than to allay them. Religionists would say I did not have enough of it, if indeed I had any at all—in other words I was not doctrinally dead drunk. Yet I fasted and prayed, prayed as if to enlist all the forces of heaven to make a man of me, and fancied I had faith, fancied I saw miracles wrought in my behalf and mountains removed; though later, when my eyes were opened and my prejudice melted by the light of reason, even as the sun dispels the fog, I saw the mountains standing just where they were. Yet for a time I revelled in the delights of fanaticism. The feeling that in God's presence and before the very eyes of interested omnipotence I was conscientiously accomplishing my duties, this gave a consolation that the drudgery of Sunday-school efforts, or even the overwhelming shame of breaking down in prayer-meeting, could not wholly eradicate. Nevertheless, saintship sat not gracefully upon me. I knew myself to be not what I professed to be, better or different from other sinners, any more than were those who sat in the pews around me; so I struggled, beating the air and longing for a more realistic existence.

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I could not understand it then, but I see it clearly now. It was the enlargement and ennoblement of the immaterial Me that I longed for. My intellect seemed caged in brass, and my soul smothered in the cheating mannerisms of society. Often I asked myself, Is this then all of life? to heap up merchandise for those who come after me to scatter, and to listen on Sundays to the stupid reiteration of dead formulas? Insatiable grew my craving; and I said, I will die now in order that I may live a little before I die. I will die to the past, to money getting, to station rooting; I will take a straight look upward and beyond, and see if I can realize religion; I will unlock the cage of my thoughts and let them roam whithersoever they will; better, I will bare my soul to its maker, and throw myself, as he made me, humbly and trustingly on him. Away with the continual quaking fear of God's wrath, like that of the savage who hears his demon howl in the tempest; away with the fashionable superstitions of society, that sap manliness and lay burdens upon us that would shame an African slave to bear! Spanning the circle of knowledge, which sweeps round from the beginning of knowledge to the present time, henceforth I will consider with Socrates, “how I shall present my soul whole and undefiled before the judge in that day. Renouncing the honors at which the world aims, I desire only to know the truth, to live as well as I can, and when the time comes, to die.”

Ah! this gradual unloading of hope, as slowly along the riper years of our experience we awake from the purple colorings of youth to a sense of what and where we are. Mothers should be careful regarding the stories they tell their children, lest their minds remain always infantile. Cicero would not, while he lived, have his mistaken belief in the immortality of the soul uprooted, if it were a mistaken belief. But Cicero me no Ciceros. I would know the truth. Though death is a hideous thing, I would not have mine sugar-coated with a lie. Intellectual cultivation implies thinking, 177 170 and thinking tends to weaken faith. There is no help for it. At the border land of faith reason must pause. To know, you must question; once question and you are lost. The will can accomplish its purpose only by resolutely shutting the eyes and plunging itself into the blackness of reasonless belief; just as in any kind of human development one part can reach its fullest attainment only at the expense of another part, and the moment you attempt to strike the happy mean you topple over to the other side. If nothing else, nihilism is quickly reached; just as Spinoza, in abandoning judaism without accepting christianity, became, as some said, the blank leaf between the old testament and the new.

Mind progresses in surges. An age of skepticism succeeds an age of faith. History separates civilization into periods, now organic and affirmative, now critical and negative; at one time creeds and convictions are established and developed, at another time they grow old and die or are abolished. Greek and Roman polytheism, and christianity, each marked an organic period; Greek philosophy, the reformation, and modern science, each marked an epoch of skepticism.

There is no higher morality than disinterestedness. There is no virtue like intellectual liberty. There is no vice so scourging as prejudice. To be the slave of sect or party, or to barter truth for pride of opinion, is to sell one's soul to the father of lies. I would rather be the dog of Diogenes than high-priest of the proudest superstition. It is pitiful to see the waves of intellectual bias on which mankind ride into eternity, to realize how little is true of all that is written in books and newspapers, of all that is spoken by politicians, preachers, men of business, and women of society.

When Francis Bacon wrote, “I had rather believe all the fables in the legends, and the talmud, and the alcoran, than that this universal frame is without mind,” he did not display that great wisdom for which 178 171 he is accredited. Of course, Bacon was privileged to believe what he chose, but what he believed does not affect the fact—what anybody believes does not affect any fact. This universal frame may not be without mind; let us hope that it is not; if the universal frame has not mind, where does man's intellect come from? Bacon was a great philosopher, but a bad man and a mean man—too innately mean and bad ever to have written the matchless plays of Shakespeare, in my opinion. Plato was also a great philosopher, likewise Aristotle and the rest. But the ancients and their wisdom, as concerning things spiritual, were as devoid of common sense as what is too often preached upon the subject to-day.

A thinking man who deals in facts is skeptical before he knows it. To be at all fitted for writing history, or indeed for writing anything, a man must have at his command a wide range of facts which he stands ready to regard fairly and to handle truthfully. Unless he is ready to be led wherever truth will take him he should leave investigating alone. If he holds to shadows and prizes them more than realities, if he prefers beliefs to truth, it were better he kept to his farm or his merchandise, and let teaching and preaching alone, for we have enough already of hypocrisy and cant.

And so it was that, as time and my work went on, and faith in traditions, in what others had said and believed, became weakened; seeing in all that had been written so much diversity of opinion, so much palpable error and flat contradiction, I found within me stronger and ever increasing the desire of independent and exact thinking. Still, as the rosy expectations of youth are scorched by the light of experience it is little comfort to know that one is growing wiser; it is little comfort to the eye of faith to have the dimness of vision removed, only to see its dearest hopes melt into illimitable ether.

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While in Europe and elsewhere every moment of my spare time was occupied in historical reading and in the study of languages; yet it seemed like pouring water into a sieve. The appetite was ravenous, increased by what it fed on. Books! books! I revelled in books. After buying and selling, after ministering to others all my life, I would now enjoy them; I would bathe my mind in them till saturated with the better part of their contents. And still to this day I cry with Horace, Let me have books! Not as the languid pleasure of Montaigne, but as the substantial world of Wordsworth.

I read and crammed my head with basketfuls of facts and figures, only to crowd them out and overflow it with others. Hundreds of authors I skimmed in rapid succession until I knew or felt I knew nothing. Then I threw aside reading for a time and let my thoughts loose, only to return again to my beloved books.

Had my mind been able to retain what it received, there would have been greater hope of filling it. The activities and anxieties of trade had left me unprepared all at once to digest this great and sudden feast. As I have before said, only a trained mind possesses the power of pure abstraction. Even reading without reflection is a weakening process. It seemed to me I had no memory for isolated or individual facts, that as yet there was no concretion in my attainments, not enough of knowledge within me to coalesce, centralize or hold together. For many months all seemed chaotic, and whatever was thrown into my mental reservoir appeared to evaporate, or become nebulous, and mingle obscurely with the rest. While in Buffalo, after my return from Europe, I wrote somewhat; but the winter was spent under a cloud, and it was not until after a trip to New York and Washington, and indeed a longer one to San Francisco, wherein I was forced to pause and reflect, that the sky became bright and my mental machinery began to work with precision. The transition thus accomplished was like the ending 180 173 of one life and the entering upon another, so different and distinct are the two worlds, the world of business and the world of letters.

In an old diary begun the 5th of May, 1859, I find written: “To-day I am twenty-seven years of age. In my younger days I used to think it praiseworthy to keep a diary. I do a great deal of thinking at times; some of it may amount to something, much of it does not. I often feel that if I could indulge, to the fullest and freest extent, in the simple act of discharging my thoughts on paper, it would afford my mind some relief.”

To begin at the beginning. In 1859 William H. Knight, then in my service as editor and compiler of statistical works relative to the Pacific coast, was engaged in preparing the Hand-Book Almanac for the year 1860. From time to time he asked of me certain books required for the work. It occurred to me that we should probably have frequent occasion to refer to books on California, Oregon, Washington, and Utah, and that it might be more convenient to have them all together. I always had a taste, more pleasant than profitable, for publishing books, for conceiving a work and having it wrought out under my direction. To this taste may be attributed the origin of half the books published in California during the first twenty years of its existence as a state, if we except law reports, legislative proceedings, directories, and compilations of that character. Yet I have seldom published anything but law-books that did not result in a loss of money. Books for general reading, miscellaneous books in trade vernacular, even if intrinsically good, found few purchasers in California. The field was not large enough; there were not enough book buyers in it to absorb an edition of any work, except a law-book, or a book intended as a working tool for a class. Lawyers like solid leverage, and in the absence of books they are powerless; they cannot afford to be 181 174 without them; they buy them as mill-men buy stones to grind out toll withal. Physicians do not require so many books, but some have fine libraries. Two or three medical books treating of climate and diseases peculiar to California have been published in this country with tolerable success; but the medical man is by no means so dependent on books as the man of law—that is to say, after he has once finished his studies and is established in practice. His is a profession dependent more on intuition and natural insight into character and causations, and above all, on a thorough understanding of the case, and the closest watchfulness in conducting it through intricate and ever-changing complications. Poetry has often been essayed in California, for the most part doggerel; yet should Byron come here and publish for the first time his Childe Harold, it would not find buyers enough to pay the printer. Even Tuthill's History of California, vigorously offered by subscription, did not return the cost of plates, paper, presswork, and binding. He who dances must pay the fiddler. Either the author or the publisher must make up his mind to remunerate the printer; the people will not till there are more of them, and with different tastes.

By having all the material on California together, so that I could see what had been done, I was enabled to form a clearer idea of what might be done in the way of book-publishing on this coast. Accordingly I requested Mr Knight to clear the shelves around his desk, and to them I transferred every book I could find in my stock having reference to this country. I succeeded in getting together some fifty or seventy-five volumes. This was the origin of my library, sometimes called the Pacific Library, but latterly the Bancroft Library. I looked at the volumes thus brought together, and remarked to Mr Knight, “That is doing very well; I did not imagine there were so many.

I thought no more of the matter till some time 182 175 afterward, happening in at the bookstore of Epes Ellery, on Washington street, called antiquarian because he dealt in second-hand books, though of recent dates, my eyes lighted on some old pamphlets, printed at different times in California, and it occurred to me to add them to the Pacific coast books over Mr Knight's desk. This I did, and then examined more thoroughly the stocks of Ellery, Carrie and Damon, and the Noisy Carrier, and purchased one copy each of all the books, pamphlets, magazines, and pictures touching the subject. Afterward I found myself looking over the contents of other shops about town, and stopping at the stands on the sidewalk, and buying any scrap of a kindred nature which I did not have. Frequently I would encounter old books in auction stores, and pamphlets in lawyers' offices, which I immediately bought and added to my collection. The next time I visited the east, without taking any special trouble to seek them, I secured from the second-hand stores and book-stalls of New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, whatever fell under my observation.

Bibliomaniac I was not. This, with every other species of lunacy, I disliked. I know nothing morally wrong for one possessing the money, and having an appetite for old china, furniture, or other relics, to hunt it down and buy it; but it is a taste having no practical purpose in view, and therefore never would satisfy me. So in books; to become a collector, one should have some object consistent with usefulness. Duplicates, fine bindings, and rare editions, seemed to me of less importance than the subject-matter of the work. To collect books in an objectless, desultory manner is not profitable to either mind or purse. Book collecting without a purpose may be to some a fascinating pastime, but give it an object and you endow it with dignity and nobility. Not half the books printed are ever read; not half the books sold are bought to be read. Least of all in the rabid bibliomaniac need we look for the well read man. 183 176 It is true that thus far, and for years afterward, I had no well defined purpose, further than the original and insignificant one, in gathering these books; but with the growth of the collection came the purpose. Accident first drew me into it, and I continued the pastime with vague intent. “Very generally,” says Herbert Spencer, “when a man begins to accumulate books he ceases to make much use of them;” or, as Disraeli puts it: “A passion for collecting books is not always a passion for literature.”

And the rationale of it? Ask a boy why he fills his pockets with marbles of different varieties, willingly giving two of a kind of which he has three for one of a kind of which he has none, and his answer will be, “To see how many kinds I can get.” Collectors of old china, of coins, of ancient relics, and of natural objects, many of them have no higher aim than the boy with his marbles, though some of the articles may be of greater utility. At the residence of a gentleman in London I once saw a collection of old china which he affirmed had cost him twenty thousand pounds, and his boast was, simply, that his was the best and largest in existence. I remember with what satisfaction he showed me an old cup and saucer, worth intrinsically perhaps half a crown, for which a certain nobleman was pining to give him fifty guineas. “But he cannot have it, sir! he cannot have it!” cried the old virtuoso, rubbing his hands in great glee. After all, what are any of us but boys?

I had a kind of purpose at the beginning, though that was speedily overshadowed by the magnitude the matter had assumed as the volumes increased. I recognized that nothing I could ever accomplish in the way of publishing would warrant such an outlay as I was then making. It was not long before any idea I may have entertained in the way of pecuniary return was abandoned; there was no money in making the collection, or in any literary work connected with it. Yet certain books I knew to be intrinsically 184 177 valuable; old, rare, and valuable books would increase rather than diminish in value, and as I came upon them from time to time I thought it best to secure all there were relating to this coast. After all the cost in money was not much; it was the time that counted; and the time, might it not be as profitable so spent as in sipping sugared water on the Paris boulevard, or other of the insipid sweets of fashionable society? It was understood from the first that nothing in my collection was for sale; sometime, I thought, the whole might be sold to a library or public institution; but I would wait, at least, until the collection was complete.

The library of Richard Heber, the great English bibliomaniac, who died in 1833, consisting of about 140,000 volumes, cost him, when rare books were not half so expensive as now, over $900,000, or say seven dollars a volume, equivalent at least to fifteen dollars a volume at the present time. Two hundred and sixteen days were occupied in the sale, by auction, of this famous collection after the owner's death. And there are many instances where collections of books have brought fair prices. The directors of the British Museum gave Lord Elgin £35,000 for fragments of the Athenian Parthenon, collected by him in 1802, worth to Great Britain not a tenth part of what the Bancroft collection is worth to California. And yet I well knew if my library were then sold it would not bring its cost, however it might increase in value as the years went by.

I had now, perhaps, a thousand volumes, and began to be pretty well satisfied with my efforts. When, however, in 1862 I visited London and Paris, and rummaged the enormous stocks of second-hand books in the hundreds of stores of that class, my eyes began to open. I had much more yet to do. And so it was, when the collection had reached one thousand volumes I fancied I had them all; when it had grown to five thousand, I saw it was but begun. As my time was 185 178 short I could then do little beyond glancing at the most important stocks and fill a dozen cases or so; but I determined as soon as I could command the leisure to make a thorough search all over Europe and complete my collection, if such a thing were possible, which I now for the first time began seriously to doubt.

This opportunity offered itself in 1866, when others felt competent to take charge of the business. On the 17th of August I landed with my wife at Queenstown, spent a week in Dublin, passed from the Giant's causeway to Belfast and Edinburgh, and after the tour of the lakes proceeded to London. In Ireland and Scotland I found little or nothing; indeed I visited those countries for pleasure rather than for books. In London, however, the book mart of the world—as in fact it is the mart of most other things bought and sold—I might feed my desires to the full.

During all this time my mind had dwelt more and more upon the subject, and the vague ideas of materials for history which originally floated through my brain began to assume more definite proportions, though I had no thought, as yet, of ever attempting to write such a history myself. But I was obliged to think more or less on the subject in order to determine the limits of my collection. So far I had searched little for Mexican literature. Books on Lower California and northern Mexico I had bought, but Mexican history and archæology proper had been passed over. Now the question arose, Where shall I draw the dividing line? The history of California dates back to the days of Cortés; or more properly, it begins with the expeditions directed northward by Nuño de Guzman, in 1530, and the gradual occupation, during two and a quarter centuries, of Nueva Galicia, Nueva Vizcaya, and the Californias. The deeds of Guzman, his companions, and his successors, the disastrous attempts of the great Hernan Cortés to explore the Pacific seaboard, and the spiritual conquests of the new lands by the society of Jesus, I found recorded 186 179 in surviving fragments of secular and ecclesiastical archives, in the numerous original papers of the Jesuit missionaries, and in the standard works of such writers as Mota Padilla, Ribas, Alegre, Frejes, Arricivita, and Beaumont, or, of Baja California especially, in Venegas, Clavigero, Baegert, and one or two important anonymous authorities. The Jesuits were good chroniclers; their records, though diffuse, are very complete; and from them, by careful work, may be formed a satisfactory picture of the period they represent.

Hence, to gather all the material requisite for a complete narrative of events bearing on California, it would be necessary to include a large part of the early history of Mexico, since the two were so blended as to make it impossible to separate them. This I ascertained in examining books for California material alone. It was my custom when collecting to glance through any book which I thought might contain information on the territory marked out. I made it no part of my duty at this time to inquire into the nature or quality of the production; it might be the soundest science or the sickliest of sentimental fiction. I did not stop to consider, I did not care, whether the book was of any value or not; it was easier and cheaper to buy it than to spend time in examining its value. Besides, in making such a collection it is impossible to determine at a glance what is of value and what is not. The most worthless trash may prove some fact wherein the best book is deficient, and this makes the trash valuable. The thoughtful may learn from the stupid much respecting the existence of which the possessor himself was ignorant. In no other way could I have made the collection so speedily perfect; so perfect, indeed, that I have often been astonished, in writing on a subject or an epoch, to find how few important books were lacking. An investigator should have before him all that has been said upon his subject; he will then make such use of it as his judgment 187 180 dictates. Nearly every work in existence, or which was referred to by the various authorities, I found on my shelves. And this was the result of my method of collecting, which was to buy everything I could obtain, with the view of winnowing the information at my leisure.

Months of precious time I might easily have wasted to save a few dollars; and even then there would have been no saving. I would not sell to-day out of the collection the most worthless volume for twice its cost in money. Every production of every brain is worth something, if only to illustrate its own worthlessness. Every thought is worth to me in money the cost of transfixing it. Surely I might give the cost for what the greatest fool in christendom should take the trouble to print on a subject under consideration. As La Fontaine says: “Il n'est rien d'inutile aux personnes de sens.” Indeed no little honor should attach to such distinguished stupidity.

A book is the cheapest thing in the world. A common laborer, with the product of a half day's work, may become possessor of the choicest fruits of Shakespeare's matchless genius. Long years of preparation are followed by long years of patient study and a painful bringing-forth, and the results, summed, are sold in the shops for a few shillings. And in that multiplication of copies by the types, which secures this cheapness, there is no diminution of individual value. Intrinsically and practically the writings of Plato, which I can buy for five dollars, are worth as much to me, will improve my mind as much, as if mine was the only copy in existence. Ay, they are worth infinitely more; for if Plato had but one reader on this planet, it were as well for that reader he had none.

Gradually and almost imperceptibly had the area of my efforts enlarged. From Oregon it was but a step to British Columbia and Alaska; and as I was obliged for California to go to Mexico and Spain, it finally became settled to my mind to make the 188 181 western half of North America my field, including in it the whole of Mexico and Central America. And thereupon I searched the histories of Europe for information concerning their New World relations; and the archives of Spain, Italy, France, and Great Britain were in due time examined.

In London I spent about three months, and went faithfully through every catalogue and every stock of books likely to contain anything on the Pacific coast. Of these there were several score, new and old. It was idle to enter a shop and ask the keeper if he had any works on California, Mexico, or the Hawaiian islands: the answer was invariably No. And though I might pick up half a dozen books under his very eyes, the answer would still be, if you asked him, No. California is a long way from London, much farther than London is from California. None but a very intelligent bookseller in London knows where to look for printed information concerning California. The only way is to examine catalogues and search through stocks, trusting to no one but yourself.

Believing that a bibliography of the Pacific States would not only greatly assist me in my search for books but would also be a proper thing to publish some day, I employed a man to search the principal libraries, such as the library of the British Museum and the library of the Royal Geographical Society, and make a transcript of the title of every book, manuscript, pamphlet, and magazine article, touching this territory, with brief notes or memoranda on the subject-matter. It was necessary that the person employed should be a good scholar, familiar with books, and have at his command several languages. The person employed was Joseph Walden, and the price paid him was two guineas a week. My agent, Mr J. Whitaker, proprietor of The Bookseller, engaged him for me and superintended the work, which was continued during the three months I remained in 189 182 London, and for about eight months thereafter. The titles and abstracts were entered upon paper cards about four inches square; or, if one work contained more matter than could be properly described within that space, the paper would be cut in strips of a uniform width, but of the requisite length, and folded to the uniform size. The cost of this catalogue was a little over a thousand dollars. In consulting material in these libraries, which contain much that exists nowhere else, this list is invaluable as a guide to the required information. It might be supposed that the printed catalogues of the respective libraries would give their titles in such a way as to designate the contents of the works listed, but this is not always the case. The plan adopted by me was to have any book or manuscript, and all periodicals and journals of societies, likely to contain desired information, carefully examined, the leaves turned over one by one, and notes made of needed material. By this means I could at once learn where the material was, what it was, and turn to the book and page.

From London I went to Paris, and searched the stalls, antiquarian warehouses, and catalogues, in the same careful manner. I found much material in no other way obtainable, but it was small in comparison with what I had secured in London. Dibdin speaks of a house in Paris, the Debures, bibliopolists, dealers in rare books, who would never print a catalogue. It was not altogether folly that prompted the policy, for obvious reasons. Leaving Paris the 3d of January, 1867, I went down into Spain full of sanguine anticipations. There I expected to find much relating to Mexico at the stalls for old books, but soon learned that everything of value found its way to London. It has been said that in London any article of any description will bring a price nearer its true value than anywhere else in the world. This I know to be true of books. I have in my library little old worthless-looking volumes that cost me two or three hundred 190 183 dollars each in London, which if offered at auction in San Francisco would sell for twenty-five or fifty cents, unless some intelligent persons who understood books happened to be present, in which case competition might raise the sum to five dollars. On the other hand, that which cost a half dollar in London might sell for five dollars in San Francisco.

There were not three men in California, I venture to say, who at that time knew anything either of the intrinsic or marketable value of old books. Booksellers knew the least. I certainly have had experience both as dealer and as collector, but I profess to know little about the value of ancient works, other than those which I have had occasion to buy. Let me pick up a volume of the Latin classics, for example, or of Dutch voyages, and ask the price. If the book were as large as I could lift, and the shopman told me half a crown, I should think it much material for the money, but I should not question the integrity of the shopman; if the book were small enough for the vest pocket, and the seller charged me twenty pounds for it, I should think it right, and that there must be real value about it in some way, otherwise the man would not ask so much. There may be six or eight dealers in New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, who know something of the value of ancient books; but aside from these, among the trade throughout America, I doubt if there are three. A collector, devoting himself to a specialty, may learn something by experience, by looking over his bills and paying them, regarding the value of books in the direction of his collecting, but that must be a small part of the whole range of the science of bibliography.

I thought the London shopkeepers were apathetic enough, but they are sprightly in comparison with the Spanish booksellers. To the average Spanish bookseller Paris and London are places bordering the mythical; if he really believes them to exist, they are mapped in his mind with the most vague 191 184 indistinctness. As to a knowledge of books and booksellers' shops in those places, there are but few pretensions.

Opening on the main plaza of Búrgos, which was filled with some of the most miserable specimens of muffled humanity I ever encountered—cutthroat, villainous-looking men and women in robes of sewed rags—were two small shops, in which not only books and newspapers were sold, but traps and trinkets of various kinds. There I found a few pamphlets which spoke of Mexico. Passing through a Californian-looking country we entered Madrid, the town of tobacco and bull-fights. If bookselling houses are significant of the intelligence of the people—and we in California, who boast the finest establishments of the kind in the world according to our population, claim that they are—then culture in Spain is at a low ebb.

The first three days in Madrid I spent in collecting and studying catalogues. Of these I found but few, and they were all similar, containing about the same class of works. Then I searched the stalls and stores, and gathered more than at one time I thought I should be able to, sufficient to fill two large boxes; but to accomplish this I was obliged to work diligently for two weeks.

To Saragossa, Barcelona, Marseilles, Nice, Genoa, Bologna, Florence, and Rome; then to Naples, back to Venice, and through Switzerland to Paris. After resting a while I went to Holland, then up the Rhine and through Germany to Vienna; then through Germany and Switzerland again, Paris and London, and finally back to New York and Buffalo. Everywhere I found something, and seized upon it, however insignificant, for I had long since ceased to resist the malady. Often have I taken a cab or a carriage to drive me from stall to stall all day, without obtaining more than perhaps three or four books or pamphlets, for which I paid a shilling or a franc each. Then again I would light upon a valuable manuscript which 192 185 relieved my pocket to the extent of three, five, or eight hundred dollars.

Now, I thought, my task is done. I have rifled America of its treasures; Europe have I ransacked; and after my success in Spain, Asia and Africa may as well be passed by. I have ten thousand volumes and over, fifty times more than ever I dreamed were in existence when the collecting began. My library is a fait accompli. Finis coronat opus. Here will I rest.

But softly! What is this inch-thick pamphlet that comes to me by mail from my agent in London? By the shade of Tom Dibdin it is a catalogue! Stripping off the cover I read the title-page: Catalogue de la Riche Bibliothèque de D. José María Andrade. Livres manuscrits et imprimés. Littérature Française et Espagnole. Histoire de L'Afrique, de L'Asie, et de L'Amérique. 7000 pièces et volumes ayant rapport au Mexique ou imprimés dans ce pays. Dont la vente se fera Lundi 18 Janvier 1869 et jours suivants, à Leipzig, dans la salle de ventes de MM. List & Francke, 15 rue de L'Université, par le ministère de M. Hermann Francke, commissaire priseur.

Seven thousand books direct from Mexico, and probably half of them works which should be added to my collection! What was to be done? Here were treasures beside which the gold, silver, and rich merchandise found by Ali Baba in the robbers' cave were dross. A new light broke in upon me. I had never considered that Mexico had been printing books for three and a quarter centuries—one hundred years longer than Massachusetts—and that the earlier works were seldom seen floating about book-stalls and auction-rooms. One would think, perhaps, that in Mexico there might be a rich harvest; that where the people were ignorant and indifferent to learning, books would be lightly esteemed, and a large collection easily made. And such at times and to some extent 193 186 has been the fact, but it is not so now. It is characteristic of the Mexican, to say nothing of the Yankee, that an article which may be deemed worthless until one tries to buy it, suddenly assumes great value. The common people, seeing the priests and collectors place so high an estimate on these embodiments of knowledge, invest them with a sort of supernatural importance, place them among their lares and penates, and refuse to part with them at any price. Besides, Mexico as well as other countries has been overrun by book collectors. In making this collection Señor Andrade had occupied forty years; and being upon the spot, with every facility, ample means at his command, a thorough knowledge of the literature of the country, and familiarity with the places in which books and manuscripts were most likely to be found, he surely should have been able to accomplish what no other man could.

And then again, rare books are every year becoming rarer. In England particularly this is the case. Important sales are not so frequent now as fifty years ago, when a gentleman's library, which at his death was sold at auction for the benefit of heirs, almost always offered opportunities for securing some rare books. Then, at the death of one, another would add to his collection, and at his death another, and so on. During the past half century many new public libraries have been formed both in Europe and America, until the number has become very large. These, as a rule, are deficient in rare books; but having with age and experience accumulated funds and the knowledge of using them, or having secured all desirable current literature, the managers of public libraries are more and more desirous of enriching their collections with the treasures of the past; and as institutions seldom or never die, when once a book finds lodgment on their shelves the auctioneer rarely sees it again. Scores of libraries in America have their agents, with lists of needed books in their hands, 194 187 ready to pay any price for any one of them. Since there is but a limited number of these books in existence, with a dozen bidders for every one, they are becoming scarcer and dearer every year.

There were no fixed prices for rare and ancient books in Mexico, and they were seldom or never to be obtained in the ordinary way of trade. Until recently, to make out a list of books and expect a bookseller of that country to procure them for you was absurd, and you would be doomed to disappointment. It was scarcely to be expected that he should be so much in advance of his bookselling brother of Spain, who would scarcely leave his seat to serve you with a book from his own shelves, still less to seek it elsewhere.

Book collecting in Mexico during the midst of my efforts was a trade tombé des nues, the two parties to the business being, usually, one a professional person, representing the guardianship of learning, but so carnal-minded as to require a little money to satisfy his cravings, and the other the recipient of the favors, who cancelled them with money. The latter, ascertaining the whereabouts of the desired volume, bargained with a politician, an ecclesiastic, or a go-between, and having agreed on the price, the place and hour were named—which must be either a retired spot or an hour in which the sun did not shine—whereupon the book was produced and the money paid; but there must be no further conversation regarding the matter. Should the monastic libraries occasionally be found deficient in volumes once in their possession, owing to the absence of catalogues and responsible librarians it is difficult to fasten upon the guardian the charge that such books and manuscripts had ever been in his possession.

José María Andrade combined in himself the publisher, journalist, littérateur, bibliopole, and bibliophile; and the tenacity with which he clung to his collection was remarkable. Nor was he induced to 195 188 part with it except for the consummation of a grand purpose. It was ever the earnest desire of the unfortunate Maximilian to advance the interests of the country in every way in his power; and prominent among his many praiseworthy designs was that of improving the mental condition of the people by the elevation of literature. Scarcely had he established himself in the government when he began the formation of an imperial library. This could be accomplished in no other way so fully or so easily as by enlisting the coöperation of Señor Andrade, while on the other hand the intelligent and zealous collector could in no other way reap a reward commensurate with his long and diligent researches. It was therefore arranged that, in consideration for a certain sum of money to be paid the owner of the books, this magnificent collection should form the basis of a Biblioteca Imperial de Mejico. By this admirable and only proper course the fullest collection of books on Mexico, together with valuable additions from the literature of other countries, would remain in the country and become the property of the government. But unfortunately for Mexico this was not to be. These books were to be scattered among the libraries of the world, and the rare opportunity was forever lost. Evil befell both emperor and bibliophile. The former met the fate of many another adventurer of less noble birth and less chivalrous and pure intention, and the latter failed to secure his money.

When it became certain that Maximilian was doomed to die at the hands of his captors, Señor Andrade determined to secure to himself the proceeds from the sale of his library as best he might. Nor was there any time to lose. Imperialism in Mexico was on the decline, and the friends of the emperor could scarcely hope to see their contracts ratified by his successor. Consequently, while all eyes were turned in the direction of Querétaro, immediately after the enactment of the bloody tragedy, and 196 189 before the return wave of popular fury and vandalism had reached the city of Mexico, Señor Andrade hastily packed his books into two hundred cases, placed them on the backs of mules, and hurried them to Vera Cruz, and thence across the water to Europe.

Better for Mexico had the bibliophile taken with him one of her chief cities than that mule-train load of literature, wherein for her were stores of mighty experiences, which, left to their own engendering, would in due time bring forth healing fruits. Never since the burning of the Aztec manuscripts by the bigot Zumárraga had there fallen on the country such a loss. How comparatively little of human experience has been written, and yet how much of that which has been written is lost! How many books have been scattered; how many libraries burned: how few of the writings of the ancients have we. Of the hundred plays said to have been written by Sophocles, only seven are preserved.

M. Deschamps says of Señor Andrade's collection: “The portion of this library relating to Mexico is incontestably unique, and constitutes a collection which neither the most enlightened care, the most patient investigation, nor the gold of the richest placers could reproduce. The incunabula of American typography, six Gothic volumes head the list, printed from 1543 to 1547, several of which have remained wholly unknown to bibliographers; then follows a collection of documents, printed and in manuscript, by the help of which the impartial writer may reëstablish on its true basis the history of the firm domination held by Spain over these immense territories, from the time of Cortés to the glorious epoch of the wars of Independence. The manuscripts are in part original and in part copies of valuable documents made with great care from the papers preserved in the archives of the empire at Mexico. It is well known that access to these archives is invariably refused to the public, and that it required the sovereign intervention of an 197 190 enlightened prince to render possible the long labors of transcription.”

Such is the history of the collection of which I now received a catalogue, with notice of sale beginning the 18th of January, 1869. Again I asked myself, What was to be done? Little penetration was necessary to see that this sale at Leipsic was most important; that such an opportunity to secure Mexican books never had occurred before and could never occur again. It was not among the possibilities that Señor Andrade's catalogue should ever be duplicated. The time was too short for me, after receiving the catalogue, to reach Leipsic in person previous to the sale. The great satisfaction was denied me to make out a list of requirements with my own catalogue and the catalogue of Andrade before me. Yet I was determined not to let the opportunity slip without securing something, no matter at what hazard or at what sacrifice.

Shutting my eyes to the consequences, therefore, I did the only thing possible under the circumstances to secure a portion of that collection: I telegraphed my agent in London five thousand dollars earnest money, with instructions to attend the sale and purchase at his discretion. I expected nothing less than large lots of duplicates, with many books which I did not care for; but in this I was agreeably disappointed. Though my agent, Mr Whitaker, was not very familiar with the contents of my library, he was a practical man, and thoroughly versed in the nature and value of books, and the result of his purchase was to increase my collection with some three thousand of the rarest and most valuable volumes extant.

There were in this purchase some works that gave me duplicates, and some books bought only for their rarity, such as specimens of the earliest printing in Mexico, and certain costly linguistic books. But on the whole I was more than pleased; I was delighted. A sum five times larger than the cost of the books 198 191 would not have taken them from me after they were once in my possession, from the simple fact that though I should live a hundred years I would not see the time when I could buy any considerable part of them at any price. And furthermore, no sooner had I begun authorship than experience taught me that the works thus collected and sold by Señor Andrade included foreign books of the highest importance. There were among them many books and manuscripts invaluable for a working library. It seemed after all as though Mr Whitaker had instinctively secured what was most wanted, allowing very few of the four thousand four hundred and eighty-four numbers of the catalogue to slip through his fingers that I would have purchased if present in person.

But this was not the last of the Andrade-Maximilian episode. Another lot, not so large as the Leipsic catalogue, but enough to constitute a very important sale, was disposed of by auction in London, by Puttick and Simpson, in June of the same year. The printed list was entitled: Bibliotheca Mejicana. A Catalogue of an extraordinary collection of books relating to Mexico and North and South America, from the first introduction of printing in the New World, A.D. 1544, to A.D. 1868. Collected during 20 years' official residence in Mexico. Mr Whitaker likewise attended this sale for me, and from his purchases I was enabled still further to fill gaps and perfect the collection.

Prior to these large purchases, namely in December, 1868, Mr Whitaker made some fine selections for me at a public sale in Paris. This same year was sold in New York the library of A. A. Smet, and the year previous had been sold that of Richard W. Roche. The library of George W. Pratt was sold in New York in March, 1868; that of Amos Dean, at private sale, in New York the same year; that of W. L. Mattison in New York in April, 1869; that of John A. Rice in New York in March, 1870; that of S. G. 199 192 Drake in Boston in May and June, 1876; that of John W. Dwinelle in San Francisco in July, 1877; that of George T. Strong in New York in November, 1878; that of Milton S. Latham in San Francisco in April, 1879; that of Gideon N. Searing in New York in May, 1880; that of H. R. Schoolcraft in New York in November, 1880; that of A. Oakey Hall in New York in January, 1881; that of J. L. Hasmar in Philadelphia in March, 1881; that of George Brinley in New York, different dates; that of W. B. Lawrence in New York in 1881-2; that of the Sunderland Library, first part, in London in 1881; that of W. C. Prescott in New York in December, 1881; and that of J. G. Keil in Leipsic in 1882;—from each of which I secured something. Besides those elsewhere enumerated there were to me memorable sales in Lisbon, New York, and London, in 1870; in London and New York in 1872; in Paris, Leipsic, and New York, in 1873, and in New York in 1877. The several sales in London of Henry G. Bohn, retiring from business, were important.

The government officials in Washington and the officers of the Smithsonian Institution have always been very kind and liberal to me, as have the Pacific coast representatives in congress. From members of the Canadian cabinet and parliament I have received valuable additions to my library. From the many shops of Nassau street, New York, and from several stores and auction sales in Boston, I have been receiving constant additions to my collection for a period of over a quarter of a century.

From the Librairie Tross of Paris in April, 1870, I obtained a long list of books, selected from a catalogue. So at various times I have received accessions from Maisonneuve et Cie, Paris, notably quite a shipment in September, 1878. From Trübner, Quaritch, Rowell, and others, in London, the stream was constant, though not large, for many years. Asher of Berlin managed to offer at various times valuable 200 193 catalogues, as did also John Russell Smith of London; F. A. Brockhaus of Leipsic; Murguía of Mexico, and Madrileña of Mexico; Muller of Amsterdam; Weigel of Leipsic; Robert Clarke & Co. of Cincinnati; Scheible of Stuttgart; Bouton of New York; Henry Miller of New York, and Olivier of Bruxelles. Henry Stevens of London sold in Boston, through Leonard, by auction in April, 1870, a collection of five thousand volumes of American history, which he catalogued under the title of Bibliotheca Historica, at which time he claimed to have fifteen thousand similar volumes stored at 4 Trafalgar square.

In April, 1876, was sold by auction in New York the collection of Mr E. G. Squier, relating in a great measure to Central America, where the collector, when quite young, was for a time United States minister. Being a man of letters, the author of several books, and many essays and articles on ethnology, history, and politics, and a member of home and foreign learned societies, Mr Squier was enabled by his position to gratify his tastes to their full extent, and he availed himself of the opportunities. His library was rich in manuscripts, in printed and manuscript maps, and in Central American newspapers, and political and historical pamphlets. There were some fine original drawings by Catherwood of ruins and monolith idols, and some desirable engravings and photographs. Books from the library of Alexander Von Humboldt were a feature, and there was a section on Scandinavian literature. In regard to his manuscripts, which he intended to translate and print, the publication of Palacio, Cartas, being the beginning, Mr Squier said: “A large part of these were obtained from the various Spanish archives and depositories by my friend Buckingham Smith, late secretary of the legation of the United States in Spain. Others were procured during my residence in Central America either in person or through the intervention of friends.” I gladly availed 201 194 myself of the opportunity to purchase at this sale whatever the collection contained and my library lacked. Of Mr Squier's library Mr Sabin testified: “In the department relative to Central America the collection is not surpassed by any other within our knowledge; many of these books being published in Central America, and having rarely left the land of their birth, are of great value, and are almost unknown outside the localities from which they were issued.”

The next most important opportunity was the sale, by auction, of the library of Caleb Cushing in Boston, in October, 1879. This sale was attended for me by Mr Lauriat, and the result was in every way satisfactory.

Quite a remarkable sale was that of the library of Ramirez, by auction, in London in July 1880, not so much in regard to numbers, for there were but 1290, as in variety and prices. The title of the catalogue reads as follows: Bibliotheca Mexicana. A catalogue of the Library of rare books and important manuscripts, relating to Mexico and other parts of Spanish America, formed by the late Señor Don José Fernando Ramirez, president of the late Emperor Maximilian's first ministry, comprising fine specimens of the presses of the early Mexican typographers Juan Cromberger, Juan Pablos, Antonio Espinosa, Pedro Ocharte, Pedro Balli, Antonio Ricardo, Melchior Ocharte; a large number of works, both printed and manuscript, on the Mexican Indian languages and dialects; the civil and ecclesiastical history of Mexico and its provinces; collections of laws and ordinances relating to the Indies. Valuable unpublished manuscripts relating to the Jesuit missions in Texas, California, China, Peru, Chili, Brasil, etc.; collections of documents; sermons preached in Mexico; etc., etc. Ramirez was a native of the city of Durango, where he had been educated and admitted to the bar, rising to eminence as state and federal judge. He was at one time head of the national museum of Mexico; also minister of foreign affairs, and again president of Maximilian's first ministry. Upon the 202 195 retirement of the French expedition from Mexico Señor Ramirez went to Europe and took up his residence at Bonn, where he died in 1871. The books comprising the sale formed the second collection made by this learned bibliographer, the first having been sold to become the foundation of a state library in the city of Durango. The rarest works of the first collection were reserved, however, to form the nucleus of the second, which was formed after he removed to the capital; his high public position, his reputation as scholar and bibliographer, and his widely extended influence affording him the best facilities. Many of his literary treasures were obtained from the convents after the suppression of the monastic orders. From the collection, as it stood at the death of Ramirez, his heirs permitted A. Chavero to select all works relating to Mexico. “We believe we do not exaggerate,” the sellers affirmed, “when we say that no similar collection of books can again be brought into the English market.” Writing me in 1869 regarding the Paris and London sales of that year, Mr Whitaker says: “If I may argue from analogy, I do not think that many more Mexican books will come to Europe for sale. I remember some twenty-five years ago a similar series of sales of Spanish books which came over here in consequence of the revolution, but for many years there have been none to speak of.” Thus we find the same idea expressed by an expert eleven years before the Ramirez sale. In one sense both opinions proved true; the collections were different in character, and neither of them could be even approximately duplicated. With regard to prices at the respective sales of 1869 Mr Whitaker remarks: “Some of the books sold rather low considering their rarity and value, but on the whole prices ruled exceedingly high.” Had Mr Whitaker attended the Ramirez sale he would have been simply astounded. If ever the prices of Mexican books sold prior to this memorable year of 1880 could in comparison be 203 196 called high, such sales have been wholly outside of my knowledge. I had before paid hundreds of dollars for a thin 12mo volume; but a bill wherein page after page the items run from $50 to $700 is apt to call into question the general sanity of mankind. And yet this was at public sale, in the chief book mart of the world, and it is to be supposed that the volumes were sold with fairness.

Notice of this sale, with catalogue, was forwarded to me by Mr Stevens, who attended it in my behalf. I made out my list and sent it on with general instructions, but without special limit; I did not suppose the whole lot would amount to over $10,000 or $12,000. The numbers I ordered brought nearer $30,000. Mr Stevens did not purchase them all, preferring to forego his commissions rather than subject me to such fearfully high prices. My chief consolation in drawing a check for the purchase was that if books were worth the prices brought at the Ramirez sale my library would foot up a million of dollars. And yet Mr Stevens writes: “On the whole you have secured your lots very reasonably. A few are dear; most of them are cheap. The seven or eight lots that you put in your third class, and which Mr Quaritch or Count Heredia bought over my bids, you may rest assured went dear enough.” There were scarcely any purchasers other than the three bidders above named, though Mr Stevens held orders likewise for the British Museum library. There was no calling off or hammering by the auctioneer. The bidders sat at a table on which was placed the book to be sold; each made his bids and the seller recorded the highest.

Referring once more to Mr Walden and his work, Mr Whitaker writes in April, 1869: “The delay in sending off all the Andrade books arose from the desire to have them catalogued. Mr Walden has been terribly slow over the work, but it was difficult to stop. He has now finished all that I bought first, and I told 204 197 him that he is altogether to suspend operations upon your account after Saturday, May 1st, to which date I have paid him. It appears to me that you will now have enough materials in the books you have bought and the sale catalogues, etc., to enable you to get all the information you require. Walden sees his way to seven years' more work.” And from Mr Walden Himself a month later: “It has afforded me great pleasure to hear at different times from Mr Whitaker that you are satisfied with the slips received, and the manner in which I have catalogued the books. In following out your instructions much time must evidently be taken up in searching for works on the various subjects, and the time and money thus spent will assuredly repay itself in having such a list of books on the various subjects required, and on that part of America; it will not have its equal in any catalogue yet made. I have not yet catalogued the whole of the manuscripts relating to your subjects in the British Museum.”

Thus it was that in 1869, ten years after beginning to collect, after the Maximilian sale, but before those of Ramirez, Squier, and many others, I found in my possession, including pamphlets, about sixteen thousand volumes; and with these, which even before its completion I placed on the fifth floor of the Market-street building, I concluded to begin work. As a collector, however, I continued lying in wait for opportunities. All the new books published relative to the subject were immediately added to the collection, with occasional single copies, or little lots of old books secured by my agents. Before leaving Europe I appointed agents in other principal cities besides London to purchase, as opportunity offered, whatever I lacked. There were many other notable additions to the library from sources not yet mentioned, of which I shall take occasion to speak during the progress of this history of my work.

205 198

CHAPTER VIII.

THE LIBRARY Could a man be secure That his days would endure As of old, for a thousand long years, What things might he know! What deeds might he do! And all without hurry or care.

Old Song.

IF as Plato says knowledge is goodness, and goodness God, then libraries occupy holy ground, and books breathe the atmosphere of heaven. Although this philosophy may be too transcendental for the present day, and although the agency of evil sometimes appears in the accumulation of knowledge as well as the agency of good, thus making scholars not always heirs of God, we have yet to learn of a collection of books having been made for purposes of evil, or the results of such efforts ever having been otherwise than beneficial to the race. Particularly is such the case where the main incentive has been the accumulation of facts for the mere love of such accumulation, and not from devotion to dogma, or for the purpose of pleading a cause—for something of the instinct of accumulation inherent in humanity may be found in the garnering of knowledge, no less than in the gathering of gold or the acquisition of broad acres.

My library, when first it came to be called a library, occupied one corner of the second story of the bookstore building on Merchant street, which connected with the front room on Montgomery street, as 206 199 before described. When placed on the fifth floor of the Market-street building, it occupied room equivalent to thirty-five by one hundred and seventy feet, being about fifty feet wide at the south end, and narrowing irregularly towards the north end. The ceiling was low, and the view broken by the enclosures under the skylights, and by sections of standing supports with which it was found necessary to supplement the half mile and more of shelving against the walls. Following the works of reference, the books were arranged alphabetically by authors, some seventy-five feet at the north end, both walls and floor room, being left for newspapers. On the east side were four rooms, two occupied as sleeping apartments by Mr Oak and Mr Nemos, and two used as working rooms by Mrs Victor and myself. There was one large draughtsman's working-counter, with drawers, and a rack for maps. The desks and writing tables stood principally at the south end of the main library room, that being the best locality for light and air. A large, high, revolving table occupied the centre of my room. Attached to it was a stationary stand into which it fitted, or rather of which it formed part. At this table I could stand, or by means of a high chair with revolving seat I could sit at it, and write on the stationary part. The circular or revolving portion of the table was some eight or nine feet in diameter. Besides this machine there were usually two or three common plain tables in the room. On the walls were maps, and drawings of various kinds, chiefly referring to early history; also certificates of degrees conferred, and of membership of learned societies.

In the main room, in addition to the long tables shown in the drawing, there were a dozen or so small movable tables, and also a high table and a high desk, the two accommodating four or five persons, should any wish to stand. All was well arranged, not only for literary but for mechanical work, for close at hand were compositors, printers, and binders. 207 200 No place could better have suited my purpose but for interruptions, for I was never entirely free from business.

Yet, all through the dozen years the library was there I trembled for its safety through fear of fire, as indeed did many others who appreciated its historical significance to this coast, well knowing that once lost no power on earth could reproduce it. Hence its place in this building was regarded as temporary from the first. We all thought constantly of it, and a hundred times I have talked over the matter of removal with Mr Oak and others. Now and then the danger would be more vividly brought home to us by the alarm of fire on the premises; and once in particular a fire broke out in the basement of the furniture store occupying the western side of the building, filling the library with dense smoke, and driving the inmates to the roof. It occurred about half-past five in the afternoon. The furniture store was nearly destroyed, and the bookstore suffered serious damage. It was a narrow escape for the library.

Thus, when in the autumn of 1881 Mr William B. Bancroft, my nephew, in charge of the manufacturing department, regarded the room as essential to his ever growing purposes, and as the money could be spared, I lent a willing ear.

First to be considered in choosing a new locality was whether the library should remain on the peninsula of San Francisco, or take its place at some point across the bay. Oakland was seriously considered, and San Rafael, not to mention Sonoma, where long before my enthusiastic friend General Vallejo had offered to furnish land and all the building requirements free. There were pleasant places in the direction of San Mateo and Menlo Park; but we finally concluded to remain in the city. Before ever it saw Market street I had dreamed of having the library near my house on California street; but that was not to be. I had deemed it advisable some time before 208 201 to sell my residence property in that locality, so that it was now necessary to select another spot. In making such selection I could not take as fully into the account as I would have liked the influence of a library upon its locality. For example, who shall say what might or might not be the effects upon the graduating members of a great institution of learning, or upon the assembled law-makers for the nation, or upon that class of wealthy and intelligent inhabitants of the commercial metropolis who delight in scientific or historic association for the good of their country? We cannot set up in our midst a theater, hotel, race-course, church, or drinking-saloon without the whole community being affected thereby. A library is not merely a depository of learning, but a society for the promotion of knowledge in whatsoever direction its contents tends. If it be a library of law, medicine, or theology, the corresponding profession is affected by it in a degree greater than we realize; if it be a library of history, then sooner or later its influence is felt in the direction of historical investigation and elucidation. The very fact of its existence presupposes somewhere a demand for its existence, and this not without cause or reason—the cause or reason being its use for the purposes for which it was created; that is to say, for the protection and promulgation of historical data. The effect of an abundance of rich historical data on a local historical society is much greater than the effect of the society on the collecting of data. With the data at hand, members will set themselves at work; while if it be absent they will not seek it.

After some search a place was found uniting several advantages, and which on the whole proved satisfactory. It was on Valencia street, the natural continuation of Market street, on the line of the city's growth, and reached by the cars from the ferry which passed the store. There, on the west side, near its junction with Mission street, I purchased a lot one hundred and 209 202 twenty by one hundred and twenty-six feet in size, and proceeded forthwith to erect a substantial two story and basement brick building, forty by sixty feet. In order that the building might be always detached it was placed in the centre of the lot, and to make it more secure from fire all the openings were covered with iron. A high fence was erected on two sides for protection against the wind, and the grounds were filled with trees, grass, and flowers, making the place a little Eden. On the glass over the entrance was placed the number, 1538, and on the door a plate lettered in plain script, THE BANCROFT LIBRARY.

The building proved most satisfactory. No attempt was made at elaboration, either without or within; plain neat good taste, with comfort and convenience, was alone aimed at. Every part of it was ordered with an eye single to the purpose; the rooms are spacious, there are plenty of large windows, and the building is well ventilated. From the front door the main room, lower floor, is entered, which, though almost without a break in its original construction, became at once so crowded as to render its proper representation in a drawing impossible. Ample space, as was supposed, had been allowed in planning the building, but such a collection of books is susceptible of being expanded or contracted to a wonderful extent. On the wall shelves of this apartment are placed for the most part sets and various collections aggregating 16,000 volumes. These sets are conveniently lettered and numbered, in a manner that renders each work readily accessible, as will be described in detail elsewhere. They consist of large collections of voyages and travels; of documents, periodicals, legislative and other public papers of the federal government and the several states and territories of the Pacific slope; of laws, briefs, and legal reports; series of scrap-books, almanacs, directories, bound collections of pamphlets, cumbersome folios, Mexican sermons, papeles varios, and other miscellaneous matter. Three 210 203 lofty double tiers of shelving, extending across the room from north to south, are loaded with 500 bulky files of Pacific States newspapers, amounting, if a year of weeklies and three months of dailies be accounted a volume, to over 5000 volumes. It is a somewhat unwieldy mass, but indispensable to the local historian. Also was built and placed here a huge case, with drawers for maps, geographically arranged; also cases containing the card index, and paper bags of notes, all of which are explained elsewhere.

To the room above, the main library and working-room, the entrance is by a staircase rising from the middle of the first floor. Here, seated at tables, are a dozen literary workmen, each busy with his special task. The walls are filled with shelving nine tiers high, containing four classes of books. Most of the space is occupied by works of the first class, the working library proper of printed books, alphabetically arranged, each volume bearing a number, and the numbers running consecutively from one to 12,000 under alphabetical arrangement, and afterward without arrangement, as additions are made indefinitely. The second class consists of rare books, of about 400 volumes, set apart by reason of their great value, not merely pecuniary, though the volumes will bring from $35 to $800 each in the book markets of the world, but literary value, representing standard authorities, bibliographic curiosities, specimens of early printing, and rare linguistics. The third class is composed entirely of manuscripts, in 1200 volumes of three sub-divisions, relating respectively to Mexico and Central America, to California, and to the Northwest Coast—the Oregon and interior territory, British Columbia, and Alaska. The fourth class is made up of 450 works of reference and bibliographies. When the collection was placed in the library building it numbered 35,000 volumes, since which time additions have steadily been made, until the number now approaches 50,000. At the east end of the upper room is situated 211 204 my private apartment, while at the other end are the rooms of Mrs Victor, Mr Nemos, and Mr Oak. All otherwise unoccupied wall space, above and below, is filled with portraits, plans, and other drawings, engravings, and unique specimens, all having reference to the territory covered by the collection.

Considerable inconvenience had been experienced during the first twelve years' use of the library, for want of proper numbering and cataloguing. Mr Oak had made a card catalogue which about the time of removal to Market street was copied in book form; but though the former was kept complete, the latter was soon out of date owing to the rapid increase of the books. For a time an alphabetical arrangement answered every purpose, but under this system books were so often out of place, and losses so frequent, that it was deemed best on removing to Valencia street to adopt a book-mark, a system of numbering, and make a new catalogue. The book-mark consisted of a lithographed line in plain script letters, The Bancroft Library, with the number. Preparatory to numbering, the several classes before mentioned were separated from the general collection, the whole weeded of duplicates, and every book and pamphlet put in place under the old alphabetical arrangement. The main working collection was then numbered from one to 12,000 consecutively. This prohibited further alphabetical arrangement, and thereafter all volumes that came in were added at the end without regard to any arrangement, and were covered by new numbers. In regard to the other several classes, letters were employed in the numbering to distinguish one from the other. The first catalogue was written on narrow-ruled paper, six by nine inches when folded, and then bound; the second was written on thick paper, fourteen by eighteen inches when folded, and ruled for the purpose with columns, and with subsidiary lines for numbers and description. This catalogue indicates 212 205 the shelf position of every book in the library; and the plan admits of additions almost limitless without breaking the alphabetic order. In copying it from the original cards Mr Benson was engaged for over a year. When completed it was strongly bound in thick boards and leather.

No one can know, not having had the experience, the endless labor and detail attending the keeping in order and under control of a large and rapidly growing collection of historical data. Take newspapers, for example. The newspaper is the first and often the only printed matter pertaining directly to the local affairs sometimes of a wide area. As such its historical importance is obvious. It is the only printed record of the history of the section it covers. No collection of early historic data can be deemed in any degree complete without liberal files of the daily and weekly journals. But when these files of periodicals reach the number of five hundred, as before mentioned, equivalent in bulk and information to five thousand volumes of books, with large daily additions, it becomes puzzling sometimes to know what to do with them, for these too must be indexed and put away in their proper place before the knowledge they contain can be reached or utilized. The course we pursued was first of all after collocation to enter them by their names, and arranged territorially, in a ten-quire demy record book, writing down the numbers actually in the library; chronologically, with blank spaces left for missing numbers, to be filled in as those numbers were obtained and put in their places. But before putting away in their proper places either the files or the incoming additional numbers, all were indexed, after the manner of indexing the books of the library, and desired information extracted thereform in the usual way.

In describing the contents of the library, aside from its arrangement in the building, one would classify it somewhat differently, territory and 213 206 chronology taking precedence of outward form and convenience, more as I have done in another place. Any allusion in this volume must be necessarily very brief; any approach to bibliographical analysis is here out of the question. We can merely glance at the several natural divisions of the subject, namely, aboriginal literature, sixteenth-century productions, works of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, nineteenth-century publications, maps, manuscripts, and, by way of a specialty, the material for California and Northwest Coast history.

Passing the books of the savages, as displayed by the scattered picture-writings of the wilder northern tribes, which indeed have no place even in the category first named, we come to the more enduring records of the southern plateaux.

First there are the picture records of the Aztec migrations, from Gemelli Carreri and the Boturini collection, and representations of the education of Aztec children, from the Codex Mendoza. Specimens of the next aboriginal class, superior to the Aztec picture writing, may be found in the sculptured hieroglyphics covering the tablets of Palenque, and the statues of Copan. Among the works of Lord Kingsborough and of Brasseur de Bourbourg are volumes of free discussion, which leave the student at the end of his investigations exactly where he stood at the beginning. Then there is the Maya alphabet of Bishop Landa, and the specimens preserved in the Dresden codex, which so raise intelligent curiosity as to make us wish that the Spanish bigots had been burned instead of the masses of priceless aboriginal manuscripts of which they built their bonfires. In the national museum of the university of Mexico were placed the remnants of the aboriginal archives of Tezcuco; and we may learn much from the writings of some of their former possessors, Ixtlilxochitl, Sigüenza, Boturini, Veytia, Ordaz, Leon y Gama, and Sanchez. Clavigero has also used this material with profit in writing his history. 214 207 The calendar stone of the Aztecs, a representation of which is given in the Native Races, may be examined with interest; also the paintings of the Aztec cycle, the Aztec year, and the Aztec month. Some remains of Central American aboriginal literature are preserved in the manuscript Troano, reproduced in lithography by the French government.

The sixteenth-century productions relating to America, taken as one class begin with the letters of Columbus written during the last decade of the fifteenth century. Of these there were printed two, and one by a friend of the admiral, and the papal bull of Alexander VI., in 1493, making four plaquettes printed prior to 1500. Then came more papal bulls and more letters, and narratives of voyages by many navigators; there were maps, and globes, and cosmographies, and numerous ‘mundus novus' books, conspicuous among their writers being Vespucci, Peter Martyr, the authors of Ptolemy's Geographia, and Enciso, who printed in 1519 his Suma de Geografía. After these were itinerarios and relaciones by Juan Diaz, Cortés, and others. The doughty deeds of Pedrarias Dávila were sung in 1525, and not long afterward the writings of the chronicler Oviedo began to appear in print. In 1532 appeared the De Insulis of Cortés and Martyr, and in 1534 the Chronica of Amandus, and some letters by Francisco Pizarro. Between 1540 and 1550 were divers plaquettes, besides the Relaciones of Cabeza de Vaca, the Comentarios of Pedro Hernandez, and the Apología of Sepúlveda.

The chief works touching the Pacific States territory which appeared during the last half of the sixteenth century were those of Las Casas, Gomara, Benzoni, Monardes, Fernando Colon, Palacio, Acosta, Perez, and Padilla. The many accounts of voyages and collections of voyages, such as Ramusio, Huttich, and Hakluyt, appearing during this period, and the hundreds of ordenanzas, nuevas leyes, and cédulas, 215 208 I cannot here enumerate. Nor is it necessary to mention here the oft described earliest books printed in America.

New chroniclers, historians, compilers of voyages, cosmographers, and geographers came forward during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Among these were Ens, Philoponus, the author of West-Indische Spieghel, Gottfried, D'Avity, Ogilby, Montanus, García, Herrera, Torquemada, Villagrá, Simon, De Bry, Purchas, Bernal Diaz, Pizarro y Orellana, De Laet, Gage, Solís, Cogolludo, Piedrahita, Vetancurt, and some English books on the Scots at Darien; there were likewise innumerable sermons, and the De Indiarum Ivre of Solórzano Pereira, the views of Grotius, the Teatro Eclesiástico of Gil Gonzalez Dávila, and other kindred works. The mission chronicles were a literary feature of the times, and toward the latter part of the epoch come the English, French, and Dutch voyages of circumnavigation.

The name of Humboldt stands prominent at the beginning of nineteenth-century Pacific States literature; and near him the Mexican historian Bustamante. Then follow Escudero, Prescott, Irving, Alaman, Carbajal Espinosa, Chevalier, Brantz Mayer, Domenech,—among voyagers and collections of voyages, Krusenstern, Langsdorff, Lisiansky, Kotzebue, Roquefeuil, Beechy, Petit-Thouars, Laplace, Duhaut-Cilly, Belcher, Simpson, and Wilkes, Burney, Pinkerton, Richarderie, La Harpe, and Annales des Voyages.

Collections of original documents are a feature of this century, conspicuous among which are those of Navarrete, Ternaux-Compans, Buckingham Smith, Ieazbalceta, Calvo, Pacheco and Cárdenas, and of somewhat kindred character the works of Sahagun, Veytia, Cavo, Tezozomoc, Scherzer, Brasseur de Bourbourg, Palacio, Landa, Duran, Mota Padilla, Mendieta,—and yet more relating to the aborigines, the works of Cabrera, Leon y Gama, Morton, 216 209 Bradford, Catlin, Boscana, Holmberg, Müller, Baldwin, Dupaix, Waldeck, Nebel, Catherwood, Charnay, Adelung, Du Ponceau, Veniamino, Ludewig, Pimentel, Orozco y Berra, Arenas, Amaro, Molina, ávila, and many others. The century presents a lengthy list of valuable books of travel, and physical and political descriptions, such as the works of Lewis and Clarke, James, Hunter, Cox, Stephens, Squier, Strangeways, Montgomery, Dunlop, Byam, Möllhausen, Robinson, Bryant, Bayard Taylor, De Mofras, and a thousand others, covering the entire range of territory from Alaska to Panamá. Periodical literature likewise assumes importance.

With regard to maps, the field resembles that of books in these respects, that it dates from the fifteenth century and is without end. It would seem that sometime such delineations should be finished; yet I suspect that my works, as full and complete as I can make them, will prove only the foundation of a hundred far more attractive volumes. In our examination of maps we may if we like go back to the chart of the brothers Zeno, drawn in 1390, following with Behaim's Globe in 1492, Juan de la Cosa's map in 1500, and those by Ruysch in 1508, Peter Martyr, 1511, that in the Ptolemy's Cosmography of 1513, those in the Munich Atlas and Schöner's globe, 1520, Colon's and Ribero's, drawn in 1527 and 1529 respectively, Orontius Fine in 1531, and Castillo, 1541, showing the peninsula of California, after which the number becomes numerous.

In my collection of manuscripts, taken as a whole, I suppose the Concilios Provinciales Mexicanos should be mentioned first. It is in four volumes, and is a record of the first three ecclesiastical councils held in Mexico; in comparison with which a number of more strictly religious works are hardly worth mentioning—for example, the Cathecismo echo por el Concilio IV. 217 210 Mexicano; the Explicacion de la doctrina hecha por el Concilio IV.; Çumarraga, Joannes de, Pastoral, in Latin; the Moralia S. Gregorii Papæ,, and the like.

Of more value are the Sermones, of the discursos panegíricos stamp, and other branches of the religio-historical type, while the worth of such works as Materiales para la Historia de Sonoma, the same of Texas, Nueva Galicia, Nueva Vizcaya, and other provinces thereabout, secured mostly from the Maximilian collection, is past computation. Among the hundreds of titles which present themselves having greater or less claims to importance are Memorias de Mexico; Rivera, Diario Curioso; Mexico, Archivo General; Beaumont, Crónica de la Provincia de S. Pedro y S. Pablo de Mechoacan: Cartas Americanas; Gomez, Diario de Mexico. Some of the Squier manuscripts are Grijalva, Relacion; Andagoya, Carta; Yzaguirre, Relacion; Alvarado, Cartas; Cerezeda, Carta, and Relacion; Viana, Gallego, and Cadena, Relacion; Criado de Castilla, Relacion; Dávila, Relacion; Documentos relativos á la Historia de la Audiencia de los Confines; Leon Pinelo, Relacion, and Velasco, Capítulos de Carta. From the Ramirez collection I obtained Reales Cédulas, Reales Ordenanzas, Leyes, etc.; Actas Provinciales; Albieuri, Historia de las Misiones; Autos formados a Pedimento de esta Noblessima ciudad; Figueroa, Vindicias; Papeles de Jesuitas; Disturbios de Frailes; Noticias de la Nueva California; Morfi, Apuntes sobre el Nuevo Mexico; Monteverde, Memoria sobre Sonora; Monumentos Historicos; Relacion de la Orden de San Francisco en la Nueva España; Memorias para la Historia de la Procincia de Sinaloa; Tamaron, Visita del obispado de Durango; Tumultos de Mexico, and many others.

In regard to the hundreds of manuscript volumes of copied archives, histories, and narratives upon which the histories of the northern half of the Pacific territory is based, it is useless here to attempt any mention; I can only refer the reader to the 218 211 bibliographical notices in my histories of that region, and to other places, where somewhat more space is devoted to the subject. It is impossible, however, to give in a few chapters any adequate idea of the vast army of authors, arranged in battalions, regiments, and companies, quartered in the library building on Valencia street. The best exposition of the contents of the books of the library may be found in my volume of Essays and Miscellany, where I devote four chapters to the literature of the territory covered by my writings, entitled, respectively, Literature of Central Amieica; Literature of Colonial Mexico; Literature of Mexico during the Present Century; and Early California Literature. These chapters, together with the bibliographical notes carried through all my historical works, and which I have endeavored to make systematic, thorough, and complete, constitute not only an exposé of the contents of the library, but a very fair history and analysis of Pacific States literature, the library containing as it does the entire literature of these lands. While thousands of authors must obviously remain unmentioned, yet in spirit and in essence the writings of the place and time are fairly presented, the object being to tell so far as possible all that has been done in the various fields of learning and letters.

In these chapters are presented not only results, but causes, whence emerged, under conditions favorable or unfavorable, natural or abnormal developments. The colonial literature of Central America and Mexico was some advance on the aboriginal, but not so great as many imagine; but when we reach the republican era of material and mental development, we find a marked change. The Pacific United States are bringing forth some strong men and strong books, though thus far authors of repute as a rule have come in from beyond the border-line, and are not sons of the soil.

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A collection of books, like everything else, has its history and individuality. Particularly is this the case in regard to collections limited to a special subject, time, or territory. Such collections are the result of birth and growth; they are not found in the market for sale, ready made; there must have been sometime the engendering idea, followed by a long natural development.

From the ordinary point of view there is nothing remarkable in gathering 50,000 volumes and providing a building for their reception. There are many libraries larger than this, some of them having been founded and carried forward by an individual, without government or other aid, who likewise erected a building for his books. Nevertheless, there are some remarkable features about this collection, some important points in connection therewith, which cannot be found elsewhere.

First, as an historical library it stands apart from any other, being the largest collection in the world of books, maps, and manuscripts relating to a special territory, time, or subject. There are larger masses of historical data lodged in certain archives or libraries, but they are more general, or perhaps universal, relating to all lands and peoples, and not to so limited an area of the earth. And when the further facts are considered, how recently this country was settled, and how thinly peopled it now is as compared with what it will be some day, the difference is still more apparent.

Secondly, it gives to each section of the area covered more full, complete, and accurate data concerning its early history than any state or nation in the civilized world, outside of this territory, has or ever can have. This is a stupendous fact, which will find its way into the minds of men in due time. I repeat it: so long as this collection is kept intact, and neither burned nor scattered, California, Oregon, and the rest of these Pacific commonwealths may find 220 213 here fuller material regarding their early history than Massachusetts, New York, or any other American state, than England, Germany, Italy, or any other European nation. The reason is obvious: they lost their opportunity; not one of them can raise the dead or gather from oblivion.

Third, it has been put to a more systematic and practical use than any other historical library in the world. I have never heard of any considerable collection being indexed according to the subject-matter contained in each volume, as has been the case here; or of such a mass of crude historic matter being ever before worked over, winnowed, and the parts worth preserving written out and printed for general use, as has been done in this instance.

Says an eminent writer: “Respecting Mr Bancroft's Pacific Library as a storehouse of historic data, pertaining to this broad and new western land, but one opinion has been expressed during the twenty years that the existence of such an institution has been known to the world. In all that has been said or written, at home or abroad, by friend or foe, by admirers, indifferent observers, conservative critics, or hypercritical fault-finders, there has been entire unanimity of praise of the library as a collection of historic data. Disinterested and impartial visitors, after a personal inspection, have invariably shown a degree of admiration far exceeding that of the warmest friends who knew the library only from description. The praise of those who might be supposed to be influenced to some extent by local pride has never equalled that of prominent scholars from the east and Europe.

“There is no American collection with which this can fairly be compared. There are other large and costly private libraries; but the scope, plan, and purpose of the Bancroft Library place it beyond the possibility of comparison. It is made up exclusively of printed and manuscript matter pertaining to the 221 214 Pacific States, from Alaska to Panamá. To say that it is superior to any other in its own field goes for little, because there are no others of any great magnitude; but when we can state truthfully that nowhere in the world is there a similar collection equal to it, the assertion means something. And not only does this collection thus excel all others as a whole, but a like excellence is apparent for each of its parts. In it may be found, for instance, a better library of Mexican works, of Central American works, of Pacific United States works, than elsewhere exists. And to go further, it may be said to contain a more perfect collection on Alaska, on New Mexico, on Texas, on Colorado, on Utah, on Costa Rica, and the other individual states or governments than can be found outside its walls. Not only this, but in several cases, notably that of California, this library is regarded as incomparably superior to any state collection existing, or that could at this date be formed in all the United States of Europe.

“There is no other state or country whose historic data have been so thoroughly collected at so early a period of its existence, especially none whose existence has been so varied and eventful, and its record so complicated and perishable. Mr Bancroft has attempted, and successfully as is believed, to do for his country a work which in the ordinary course of events would have been left for a succession of historical societies and specialists to do in a later generation, after the largest part of the material had been lost, and the accomplishment of the purpose would be absolutely impossible. Then, too, from such work the resulting stores of data, besides their comparative paucity, would be scattered, and not accessible as a whole to any single investigator. The advantage of having such historic treasures in one place rather than in many is almost as obvious as that of preventing the loss of valuable material.”

In this connection it is worthy of our serious 222 215 consideration what the coming great libraries of the world are going to do for those ancient and important works which constitute at once the foundation and gems of every great collection. However it may be some time hence, it is certain that at the present day no collection of books is worthy of the name of library without a fair share of these rare and valuable works. Particularly is this the case in our own country, where the value and importance of every library must depend, not on Elzevir editions, elaborate church missals, or other old-world curiosities, often as worthless as they are costly, but on works of material interest and value relating to the discovery, conquest, settlement, and development of America, in its many parts from south to north, and east to west, from the days of Columbus to the present time—books becoming every day rarer and more costly. A prominent New York bookseller thus prints in his catalogue, in regard to old and valuable books as an investment: “We have often, in the course of our experience as booksellers, heard more or less comment on our prices. ‘You have good books and rare books,’ our customers will say, ‘but your prices are high.’ And yet there is not a collector in the country who would not be glad to have books in his line at prices catalogued by us three or four years ago, could we supply them at the same prices now. So it may be safely affirmed that in rare books the tendency of prices is upward, the number of collectors increasing, and the difficulty in finding good books also increasing. We have always found it more difficult to obtain a really rare book in good condition than to sell it. To the genuine lover of books it may be said: First find the book you want, then buy it, and if you think you have been extravagant, repent at your leisure, and by the time you have truly repented the book will have increased sufficiently in value to give you full absolution.” The time will come, indeed, when men will cease their efforts to measure the value of knowledge 223 216 by money. Any person or any people have the right to ask, not, How much gold is a barrel of knowledge worth? but, Can we afford to be intelligent or learned, or must we by reason of our poverty forever remain in ignorance? Let all who love knowledge, and delight in the intelligence and progress of the race, gather while they may.

Thus in these various forms and attitudes the magnitude and importance of my work kept coming up and urging me on. This western coast, it seemed to me as I came to know and love it, is the best part of the United States, a nation occupying the best part of the two Americas, and rapidly becoming the most intellectual and powerful in the world. Its early history and all the data connected with it which can be gathered is of corresponding importance.

Nor is this view so extravagant as to some it may appear. Already New England is physically on the decline, while there is surely as much mental vigor west as east. Along the Atlantic seaboard are thousands of farms which will not sell for what the improvements cost, while the extremes of climate are killing and driving away. Work has scarcely yet begun on the Pacific seaboard, where are millions of unoccupied acres, ten of which with proper cultivation will support a family in comfort. The commonwealths of the New World are becoming more and more united under the beneficent influences of peace and progress; and the Monroe doctrine, at first negative rather than positive in its assertions, is pointing the way toward world-wide domination by American brotherhood. The greatest of republics, surrounded and sustained in all that is elevating and progressive by lesser free governments, enters upon its second century of national existence under circumstances more favorable than has ever before been vouchsafed to man. The integrity of the union has been tried and preserved; the atain of slavery has 224 217 been eradicated; and while there is yet enough of corruption and licentiousness, political and social, there is more than enough of good to counterbalance the evil. In moral health and intellectual freedom we are second to none, and so rapidly is our wealth increasing that England will soon be left behind in the race for riches. Give to the United States one half of the five centuries Rome gave herself in which to become established in that inherent strength which made her mistress of the world, and the great American republic cannot be otherwise if she would than the most powerful nation on earth. And when that time comes, California and the commonwealths around, and up and down this Pacific seaboard, will be a seat of culture and power to which all roads shall lead. So I give myself no concern as to the importance or ultimate appreciation of my work, however humble or imperfect may be the instrument of its accomplishment. And of the two sections, the historical narrative proper and the biographical section, the latter I should say has even more of the invaluable practical experiences of the builders of these commonwealths, which otherwise would have passed out of existence, than the former. The biographies and characterizations of the eminent personages who during the first fifty years of the existence of the Pacific commonwealths laid the foundations of empire, and built upon them with such marvellous rapidity, skill, and intelligence, and surrounded as they are in a framework of the material conditions out of which evolved their magnificent destiny, contain vast magazines of valuable knowledge almost altogether new and nowhere else existing.

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CHAPTER IX.

DESPERATE ATTEMPTS AT GREAT THINGS. Some have been seene to bite their pen, scratch their head, bend their browes, bite their lips, beat the boord, teare their paper, when they were faire for somewhat, and caught nothing therein.

Camden.

HEAPS and heaps of diamonds and—sawdust! Good gold and genuine silver, pearls and oyster-shells, copper and iron mixed with refuse and débris—such was the nature and condition of my collection in 1869, before any considerable labor had been bestowed upon it. Surrounded by these accumulations, I sat in an embarrassment of wealth. Chaff and wheat; wheat, straw, and dirt; where was the brain or the score of brains to do this winnowing?

What winnowing? I never promised myself or any one to do more than to gather; never promised even that, and probably, had I known in the beginning what was before me, I never should have undertaken it. Was it not enough to mine for the precious metal without having to attempt the more delicate and difficult task of melting down the mass and refining it, when I knew nothing of such chemistry? But I could at least arrange my accumulations in some kind of order, and even dignify them by the name of library.

During my last visit abroad Mr Knight had been clipping in a desultory manner from Pacific coast journals, and classifying the results under numerous headings in scrap-books and boxes; and I had also at that time an arrangement with the literary editor of 226 219 the New York Evening Post, whereby he clipped from European and American journals, and forwarded to San Francisco, monthly, such articles of value touching this territory as fell under his eye. By this means much pertinent matter was saved which I should never otherwise have seen. These clippings were all arranged, as nearly as possible, under such several divisions as suggested themselves.

While these persons were thus engaged, which was for little less than a year, there came to the establishment of H. H. Bancroft and Company a young man, a native of New England, Henry L. Oak by name, recommended by Mr S. F. Barstow for the position of office-editor of a religious journal called The Occident, which the firm was then publishing for a religious association.

Knight was then manager of the publishing department, and to him Mr Oak was introduced. I had not yet returned from the east, where I remained some time on my way back from Europe. After talking the matter over with the persons interested, Mr Oak was finally installed in the position. His predecessor remained a few weeks instructing him in his duties, and he had no difficulty in filling the position to the satisfaction of all concerned. These duties consisted at first in writing the news items and minor editorial notes, making selections from printed matter, reading proof, folding and mailing papers, keeping the accounts, corresponding with contributors and subscribers, and collecting bills. Gradually the whole burden of editing the journal fell on him. The persons interested failing to carry out their agreement, the firm declined the further publication of the journal, and the young editor was thrown out of employment. Thus the matter stood on my return from the east, and then my attention was first directed to Mr Oak.

Meanwhile I had engaged as assistant, and finally successor, to Mr Knight, an Englishman of erratic 227 220 mind and manner, who called himself Bosquetti. He was remarkably quick and clear-headed in some directions, and a good talker on almost any subject. Large additions had lately been made to the library; there were some wagon loads of old musty books, apparently unfit for anything, which had been thrust promiscuously as received into large bins in one corner of the second floor wareroom of the Merchant-street building, before mentioned.

Bosquetti was directed to arrange and catalogue these lots. He had some knowledge of books and even of cataloguing, but his mind was not remarkable for breadth or depth; the capability to produce finished results was wanting. He had been thus occupied about a month when I engaged Mr Oak to assist him. Oak knew little of books except such as he had studied at college, and professed to know nothing of cataloguing; but he possessed to an eminent degree that rarest of qualities, common-sense. Within a few weeks he had familiarized himself with the best systems, improving on them all in many respects, or at least he had taken from them such parts as best befitted his work and had applied them to it. Thick medium writing paper was cut to a uniform size, three and a half by five inches, and the full titles were written thereon; these were then abridged on smaller cards, two and a half by four inches, and finally copied alphabetically in a blank book made for that purpose. The United States government documents were examined, a list of volumes needed to fill sets was made out, and the contents of those at hand determined. A copy was likewise made of the catalogue of the San Diego archives, kindly furnished by Judge Hayes, which subsequently fell to me as part of the collection purchased from him. Shortly afterward Bosquetti decamped, leaving Oak alone in his work, which he pursued untiringly for over a year. Indeed, he may be said to have done the whole of the cataloguing 228 221 himself, for what his coadjutor had written was of little practical benefit.

The flight of Bosquetti was in this wise: First I sent him to Sacramento to make a list of such books on California as were in the state library. This he accomplished to my satisfaction. On his return, having heard of some valuable material at Santa Clara college, I sent him down to copy it. A month passed, during which time he wrote me regularly, reporting his doings, what the material consisted of, what the priests said to him, and how he was progressing in his labors. He drew his pay religiously, the money both for salary and expenses being promptly sent him. It did not occur to me that there was anything wrong. He had been with me now for several months and I had never had cause to distrust him, until one day the proprietor of the hotel at which he lodged wrote me, saying that he understood the gentleman to be in my service, and he thought it but right to inform me that since he came to his house he had been most of the time in a state of beastly intoxication and had not done a particle of work. When his bottle became low he would sober up enough to make a visit to the college, write me a letter, receive his pay, and buy more liquor.

In some way Bosquetti learned that I had been informed of his conduct, and not choosing to wait for my benediction, he wrote me a penitent letter and turned his face southward, seemingly desirous above all to widen the distance between us. I was satisfied to be rid of him at the cost of a few hundred dollars.

Oak was thus left in sole charge of the literary accumulations, of which he was duly installed librarian. When the card copying was nearly completed the books were alphabetically arranged, tied up in packages, and placed in one hundred and twenty-one large cases, in which shape, in May, 1870, they were transferred to the fifth floor of the new and yet unfinished building on Market street. After 229 222 superintending their removal the librarian daily climbed a series of ladders to one of the side rooms of the new library, where a floor had been laid and a table placed. There he continued copying into a book the contents of the small cards previously prepared, and thus made the first manuscript catalogue of the library, which was in daily use for a period of twelve years. He was assisted a portion of the time by a cousin of mine, son of my most esteemed friend and uncle, W. W. Bancroft, of Granville. Shelving was then constructed; the cases were opened, and the books placed alphabetically upon the shelves. During this time I made some passes at literature, writing for the most part at my residence. Shortly after we had fairly moved into the Market-street building, the full effects of the business depression before mentioned were upon us. The business outlook was not flattering, but nevertheless we pressed forward, well knowing that to falter was perdition.

During the autumn of 1870 Mr Oak continued his labors on the fifth floor, cataloguing new lots of books as they came in, arranging maps, briefs, and newspapers, copying and clipping bibliographical notes from catalogues, and taking care of the books and room. It was still my intention in due time to issue a bibliography of the Pacific coast, which should include all of my own collection and as many more titles as I could find. Before the end of the year there was quite a pile of my own manuscript on my table, and in the drawers, monographs, mostly, on subjects and incidents connected with the Pacific coast. All my thoughts were on history, and topics kindred thereto, Pacific States history, and the many quaint and curious things and remarkable and thrilling events connected therewith. I was passionately fond of writing; I would take up a subject here or an episode there and write it up for the pure pleasure it gave me, and every day I found myself 230 223 able with greater ease and facility to discharge my thoughts on paper. But even yet I had no well defined intentions of writing a book for publication. The responsibility was greater than I cared to assume. I had seen in my business so many futile attempts in that direction, so many failures, that I had no desire to add mine to the number.

While I was wavering upon this border land of doubt and hesitancy in regard to a yet more direct and deeper plunge into the dark and dangerous wilderness of erudition before me, Mr Oak concluded to visit his old home and pass the winter with his friends at the east.

I continued writing, though in a somewhat desultory manner; the idea of anything more systematic at this time was somewhat repugnant to me. As yet my feebly kindled enthusiasm refused to burn brightly. I longed to do something, I did not know what; I longed to do great things, I did not know how; I longed to say something, I had nothing to say. And yet I would write as if my life depended on it, and if ever a bright thought or happy expression fell from my pen my breast would swell with as much pleasure as if I saw it written in the heavens, though the next moment I consigned it to a dungeon there to remain perhaps forever. Much of what I last published was thus first written. The difficulty, so far as more systematic effort was concerned, was to flee the incubi of care, and of pecuniary responsibility that leech-like had fastened themselves upon me these twenty years, and now threatened destruction to any plans I might make. For weeks at a time I would studiously avoid the library, like a jilted lover hating the habitation of his mistress; and the more I kept away the more the place became distasteful to me. Then I would arouse myself, resolve and re-resolve, dissipate depressing doubts, shut my eyes to former slights, and turn to the dwelling of my love.

Long before I had a thought of writing anything 231 224 myself for publication, the plan of an encyclopædia of the Pacific States had been propsed to me by several gentlemen of California, who had felt the need of such a work. The idea presented itself thus: My collection, they said, was composed of every species of matter relating to the coast—physical geography, geology, botany, ethnology, history, biography, and so on through the whole range of knowledge. Was it not desirable to give to the world the fruits of such a field in the most compact shape, and was not an encyclopædia the natural, and indeed the only feasible form?

I did not at all fancy the task which they would thus lay upon me. It was not to my taste to manipulate knowledge merely. To write and publish a treatise on every subject embraced within the categories of general knowledge would be a task almost as impracticable as to reproduce and offer to the world the books of the library in print. Yet it was true that an encyclopædia of knowledge relating wholly to the territory covered by the collection, which should supplement rather than supersede eastern and European encyclopædias, would certainly be desirable. The volumes should be rather small, and the articles which treated purely of Pacific coast matters longer than those contained in other encyclopædias. Some subjects might occupy a whole volume—as, for example, bibliography, mines and mining, physical geography, ethnology—and might be published separately, if necessary, as well in the series. The matter was discussed, with rising or falling enthusiasm, for some time.

Mr Oak departed for the east in December, returned the 28th of April, and on the 1st of May, 1871, resumed his duties as librarian. Ten days were spent by him in attending to the preparation of two guide-books for tourists, the publication of which I had undertaken, and in dicussing the scheme of an encyclopædia, which I finally consented to superintend. 232 225 I then began to look about for contributors. It was desirable at once to draw out as much as possible of talent latent on this coast, and at the same time to secure the best writers for the work. Circulars were accordingly issued, not only to men eminent in literature and the professions, but to pioneers, and to all likely to possess information, stating the purpose and requesting coöperation. To several of the judges, lawyers, physicians, clergymen, and others in San Francisco of known literary tastes and talents, I made personal appeals, and received flattering assurances.

I appointed an agent in New York, Mr Henry P. Johnston, then on the editorial staff of the Sun newspaper, to call on Californians and others capable and willing to write, and engage their contributions. Mr Coleman promised to dictate to a stenographer an account of the San Francisco Vigilance Committee, and Mr Simonton agreed to contribute an article on journalism provided I would furnish the data. Mr Kemble, Professor Wood, Dr Scott, Mr Raymond, Mr Squier, and many others, placed themselves freely at my service.

Mr John S. Hittell took a lively interest in the scheme, carefully preparing a list of the principal subjects which according to his idea should be treated, and the space to be given to each. A prospectus was printed, and letters sent out inviting coöperation. Many promised to contribute, among them Isaac Bird, C. H. Eberle, W. W. Chipman, A. N. Fisher of Nevada, Matthew P. Deady of Oregon, M. Baechtel, Archbishop Alemany, John W. Dwinelle, Charles H. Sawyer, James De Fremery, John B. Harmon, J. G. Icazbalceta of Mexico, J. J. Warner, R. G. Greene of Washington, R. McCormick of Arizona, L. F. Grover of Oregon, E. S. Holden, J. B. Lamar, J. F. Lewis, T. M. Logan, O. C. Marsh of Yale College, L. B. Mizner, A. R. Safford of Arizona, A. F. White, Ogden Hoffman, Wm. Ingraham Kip, John B. Felton, Hall McAllister, Horatio Stebbins, Frank Soulé 233 226 John T. Doyle, Henry H. Haight, W. Loomis, Wm. M. Gwin, David D. Colton, James S. Bush, Maurice C. Blake, Fred W. Loring of Boston, Nathaniel Bennett, Henry Cox, James T. Gardner, John R. Jarboe, Elwood Evans, G. A. Shurtleff, John B. Frisbie, John McHenry, James Blake, H. H. Toland, John G. McCullough, Andrew L. Stone, Alphonse L. Pinart. M. de G. Vallejo, Morris M. Estee, James T. Boyd, Charles N. Fox, Albert Hart, and a hundred more.

Many other projected works have at various times commanded my attention, and to execute them would have given me great pleasure, but I was obliged to forego the achievement, a thousand years of life not having been allotted me. Among them were A History of Gold; Physical Features of the Pacific States; a volume on Interoceanic Communication; one on Pacific Railways; a series of volumes of condensed Voyages and Travels; a Geography in small 8vo; also a similar volume on Ethnology, and one on History, all of popular nature embodying certain ideas which I have never seen worked out. On this last mentioned project, and indeed on some of the others, considerable work was done. I have likewise intended to print fifty or one hundred of the most valuable of my manuscripts as material for Pacific States history. Whoever has lived, laboring under the terrible pressure of the cacoëthes scribendi, without promising himself to write a dozen books for every one accomplished!

For the first time in my life health now began to fail. The increasing demands of the vast mercantile and manufacturing struture which I had reared drew heavily upon my nervous system. I grew irritable, was at times despondent, and occasionally desperately indifferent. I determined on a change of scene. Accordingly the 10th of May I started for the purpose of recreation and recuperation on a visit to the east, stopping at Salt Lake City for the purpose 234 227 of enlisting the Mormons in my behalf. President Young and the leading elders entered heartily into my project, and a scheme was devised for obtaining information from every part of Utah. A schedule of the material required was to be forwarded through the channels of the government, with such instructions from the chief authorities as would command the immediate and careful attention of their subordinates throughout the territory. With the intention of calling on my return and then to carry out the plan I continued my journey. Then I fell into despondency. The state of my nerves, and the uncertainty of my financial future, had so dissipated ambition that much of the time I found myself in a mood fitter for making my exit from the world than for beginning a new life in it.

At this time the chances that any important results would ever emanate from the library through my intervention were very slight. Gradually I abandoned the idea of having anything to do with an encyclopædia. My energies were sapped. My grip on destiny seemed relaxing. I had helmed the ship of business until exhausted, and the storm continuing, I left it to others, little caring, so far as I was personally concerned, whether it weathered the gale or not. There was too much of a lengthening out of the agony; if I was to be hanged, let me be hanged and have done with it. Such was my humor during the summer of 1871, as I lounged about among my friends at the east, listless and purposeless.

From this lethargy I was awakened by the accidental remark of a lady, at whose house I was visiting with my daughter. She was an earnest, practical woman, cool and calculating; one whose friendship had been of long duration, and whose counsel now was as wise as it was beneficent. Conscious of superior intellect, vain of her wealth and her influence, her strong character had much in it to admire in its energy and decision, though often wraped by egotism and 235 228 jealousy. Clearly comprehending the situation, she saw that for me activity was life, passivity death, and her mind seemed to dwell on it. One day she said to me, “The next ten years will be the best of your life; what are you going to do with them?” A leading question, truly, and one I had often asked myself of late without ability to answer; yet her womanly way of putting these few simple words brought them home to me in a manner I had never before felt. I was standing by, waiting to see whether I might proceed with my literary undertaking or whether I should have to go to work for my bread.

Those were the days of unattempted achievements, of great things unaccomplished. Imaginary sproutings of imaginary seeds sown and to be sown were visible to the mind's eye on every side, embryo volumes and germs of great works, and there were at hand the soil and fertilizers to stimulate development, but as yet I could point to little that betokened success. There was a rich field of honors yet to be sown and reaped. Huge quantities of invaluable material lay strewn on every side, material absolutely valueless in its present shape. And thus was I held in sort of limbus patrum, half way between earth and heaven.

What was I to do? I did not know; but I would do something, and that at once. I would mark out a path and follow it, and if in the mean time I should be overwhelmed, let it be so; I would waste no more time waiting. Once more I rubbed my lamp and asked the genius what to do. In due time the answer came; the way was made clear, yet not all at once; still, from that time I was at less loss as to what next I should do, and how I should proceed to do it. From that day to this I have known less wavering, less hesitation. I would strike at once for the highest, brightest mark before me. I would make an effort, whatever the result, which should be ennobling, in which even failure should be infinitely better than listless inaction. Exactly what I would undertake I 236 229 could not now determine. History-writing I conceived to be among the highest of human occupations, and this should be my choice, were my ability equal to my ambition. There was enough with which to wrestle, under these new conditions, to strengthen nerve and sharpen skill.

Thus roused I went back to California. I entered the library. Oak, alone and rudderless on a sudorific sea, was faithfully at work cutting up duplicate copies of books and severalizing the parts upon the previous plan, thus adding to the numerous scraps hitherto collected and arranged. It was a sorrowful attempt at great things; nevertheless it was an attempt. To this day the fruits of many such plantings in connection with these Literary Industries remain unplucked. Yet, if never permitted by my destiny to accomplish great things, I could at least die attempting them.

237 230

CHAPTER X.

A LITERARY WORKSHOP. We were the first that ever burst Into that silent sea.

Coleridge.

IT was the 20th of August, 1871, that I returned from my eastern trip, being summoned to the support of a greatly imperiled business. My friends had become fearful for the safety of the firm, and had telegraphed me to return. Wicked reports of things undreamed of by ourselves had been so long and so persistently circulated by certain of our competitors, who feared and hated us, that the confidence of even those slow to beleive ill of us began to be shaken. No Achilles was near to smite to earth those sons of Thersites.

The fact of my changing the name of the firm, the reason for which I had some delicacy about loudly proclaiming, was perverted by our enemies into a fear as to the ultimate success of the business, and a determination on my part in case of failure not to be brought down with it. And this, notwithstanding they knew, or might have known, that I never shirked any part of the responsibility connected with the change of name, and that every dollar I had was pledged for the support of the business. To their great disappointment we did not succumb; we did not ask for an extension, or any favors from any one. Nevertheless my friends desired me to return, and I came.

But I was in a bad humor for business. I never thought it possible so to hate it, and all the belittlings 238 231 and soul-crushings connected with it. Even the faint glimpse of the Above and Beyond in my fancies had been sufficient to spoil me for future money grubbings. “Only those who know the supremacy of the intellectual life,” says George Eliot, “the life which has a seed of ennobling thought and purpose within it, can understand the grief of one who falls from that serene activity into the absorbing soul-wasting struggle with worldly annoyances.” Had I been alone, with only myself to suffer, and had not even my literary aspirations been dependent on the success of the shop, I would have turned my back on it forever to let it sink or swim, as it pleased or was able.

This, however, was not to be. My duty was too plain before me. The business must have my attention; it must have more money, and I must provide it. Into the breach I threw myself, and stood there as well as I was able, though at such a cost of feeling as no one ever knew, and as few could ever appreciate. Having done this, all that I could do, and in fact all that was necessary to save the business, I mentally consigned the whole establishment to oblivion, and directed my attention once more, and this time in desperate earnest, to my literary infatuation.

At the very threshold of my resolve, however, stared me in the face the old inquiry, What shall I do, and how shall I do it? One thing was plain, even to a mind as unskilled in the mysteries of book-making as mine. On my shelves were tons of unwinnowed material for histories unwritten and sciences undeveloped. In the present shape it was of little use to me or to the world. Facts were too scattered; indeed, mingled and hidden as they were in huge masses of débris, the more one had of them the worse one was off. All this was like mixing chlorine and hydrogen in the dark: so long as the mixture is kept from light the ingredients manifest no disposition to unite, but once let sunshine in and quickly they combine into muriatic acid. Thus, not until the rays of 239 232 experience illuminated my library did the union of my efforts and material fructify. A little truth in such a form as one could use, a quantity such as one could grasp, was better than uncontrollable heaps. Much knowledge out of order is little learning; confusion follows the accumulation in excess of ungeneralized data.

To find a way to the gold of this amalgam, to mark out a path through a wilderness of knowledge to the desired facts, was the first thing to be done. He who would write at the greatest advantage on any practical subject must have before him all that has been written by others, all knowledge extant on that subject. To have that knowledge upon his shelves, and yet be unable to place his hand upon it, is no better than to be without it. If I wished to write fully on the zoölogy, for example, of the Pacific slope, nine tenths of all the books in my library containing reference to the animals of the coast might as well be at the bottom of the ocean as in my possession unless I was prepared to spend fifteen years on this one subject. And even then it could not be thoroughly done. Fancy an author with thirty or fifty thousand volumes before him sitting down to read or look through ten thousand of them for every treatise or article he wrote! De Quincey gives a close reader from five to eight thousand volumes to master between the ages of twenty and eighty; hence a man beginning at thirty-seven with twenty thousand volumes soon increased to forty thousand, could scarcely hope in his lifetime even to look into them all.

This was the situation. And before authorship could begin a magic wand must be waved over the assembled products of ten thousand minds, which would severalize what each had said on all important topics, and reduce the otherwise rebellious mass to form and system. This, after the collection of the material, was the first step in the new chemistry of literary reduction. Here, as elsewhere in the application of science, 240 233 facts must be first collected, then classified, after which laws and general knowledge may be arrived at.

How was this to be accomplished? It is at the initial period of an undertaking that the chief difficulty arises. I had no guide, no precedent by which to formulate my operations. I might write after the ordinary method of authors, but in this field comparatively little could come of it. To my knowledge, authorship of the quality to which I aspired had never before been attempted by a private individual. A mass of material like mine had never before been collected, collocated, eviscerated, and re-created by one man, unassisted by any society or government. The great trouble was to get at and abstract the information. Toward the accomplishment of this my first efforts were crude, as may well be imagined. I attempted to read or cursorily examine such volumes as were likely to contain information on the subjects to be written, and to mark the passages to be extracted. A system of figures was adopted, one of which, pencilled on the margin of the page, denoted the subject-heading under which the extracted page or paragraph should appear. These passages were then copied. Of course it would have been easier to purchase two copies of every important book, and to have cut them up, as in fact was done in many instances; but nine tenths of the library could not be duplicated at any cost, and to destroy a book or even a newspaper of which I could not buy another copy was not for a moment to be thought of.

But what was one man, one reader, among so many thousand authors! After going over a dozen volumes or so in this manner, and estimating the time required for reading and marking all the books of the library, I found that by constant application, eight hours a day, it would take four hundred years to go through the books of the library in a superficial way. It must be borne in mind that these books had been collected on a special subject, and therefore it was necessary to examine every one of them. I concluded, 241 234 therefore, that other men must also be set to read, and more men to copy literatim all information likely to be required in the study of any subject. Thus these literary industries began gradually to assume broader proportions, and so they continued till December of this same year.

On trial, however, the plan proved a failure. The copied material relating to the same or kindred topics could indeed be brought together, but on beginning to write I found the extracts unsatisfying, and felt the necessity of the book itself. The copyist may have made a mistake; and to appraise the passage at its full value I must see the connection. Any experienced author could have told me this; but there was no experienced author at hand.

After some twenty-five reams of legal cap paper had thus been covered on one side, to consign the labors of these six or eight men for these several months to the waste heap was but the work of a moment. There was too much involved, the enterprise was projected on too large a scale, to admit of a wrong beginning; and prepared as I was to stake past, present, and future on this literary adventure, it appeared folly to continue a path shown to be wrong. La Fontaine's idea was not a bad one: “Le trop d'expédiens peut gâter une affaire: on perd du temps au choix, on tente; on veut tout faire. N'en ayons qu'un; mais qu'il soit bon.”

Meanwhile, after frequent and protracted discussions, I determined to have the whole library indexed as one would index a single book. This surely would bring before me all that every author had said on any subject about which I should choose to write. This, too, would give me the authors themselves, and embody most of the advantages of the former scheme without its faults. In pursuance of this plan Oak took up the voyage collections of Hakluyt and Navarrete, while less important works were distributed to 242 235 such of the former readers and copyists as were deemed competent. For example, one Gordon made an index of California legislative documents. Albert Goldschmidt's first work was to make an index, on a somewhat more general plan than that of Navarrete, of the Atlantic Monthly. and other magazines and reviews. He afterward catalogued a large lot of Mexican books. To Cresswell, since in the Nevada senate, Pointdexter, and others, was given less important work.

Among other parts of the outlined encyclopædia was a collection of voyages and travels to and throughout the Pacific States. As the more comprehensive programme was gradually set aside, my attention became more and more concentrated on these several parts. True, history was ever the prominent idea in my mind, but, audacious as was my ambition, I had not the presumption to rush headlong into it during the incipient stages of my work. At the beginning of my literary pilgrimage, I did little but flounder in a slough of despond. Until my feet touched more solid ground, I did not dare essay that which appeared to me no less difficult than grand.

A collection of voyages and travels such as I projected offered many attractions as an initial step in my literary undertakings. Incident and instruction were therein so combined as under a sparkling pen to awaken and retain the liveliest interest. Here was less risk of failure than in more ambitious attempts; I alone possessed the material, and surely I could serve it in a style not wholly devoid of attractions. If this were not within the scope of my accomplishment nothing was. So, during the first half of 1872, in conjunction with the indexing, under a devised system of condensation, several persons were employed in extracting Pacific coast voyages and travels. Mr Ora Oak, a younger brother of the librarian, was so employed for some time, displaying marked ability. Walter M. Fisher wrote out the travels of Bryant, 243 236 Bayard Taylor, Humboldt, and others. This work altogether lasted about a year, and resulted in—nothing.

Several women were also employed upon these voyages; one, a pretty widow whose name I have forgotten, brought her luncheon and made her tea at my fire. I know not why it is, but almost every attempt to employ female talent in connection with these Industries has proved a signal failure. Many poor and needy women, all educated, and some of them talented and highly cultivated, came to me begging employment. They had done great things hitherto, and were sure they could do this so simple work. Indexing, as they imagined, was nothing; and as for travels, had they not been up and down the world writing for this weekly or the other monthly? I know of no object on earth so pitiable as an incompetent, impecunious woman, bas bleu or brainless, obliged to earn her living and too proud to work with her hands; and there are always thousands of such in California. Sympathizing with their forlorn condition, I have often given them work when I knew they could not do it, giving the time of a valuable man to teach them, paying perhaps for a fortnight's annoyance, and then throwing the results of her efforts into the waste-basket.

I have to-day nothing to show for thousands of dollars paid out for the futile attempts of female writers. What it is they lack, justly attributable to their sex, I hardly know. That a woman has not the mental or physical force and endurance of a man does not seem a sufficient reason. True, in literary labors, strength is taxed to the utmost. I have tried many occupations, and there is no kind of work, I venture to say, so wearing as literary labor. The management of a large commerical establishment is play beside it. A mercantile and manufacturing book and stationery business, with two hundred men at work at fifty different things, is as intricate and full of detail 244 237 as any other occupation; and yet while deep in literary labors I have voluntarily assumed the sole management of the business which I had built, for several years at a time, finding relief and recreation in it. It was well systematized; there were good men at the head of every part of it; and for me to manage it was as easy and pleasurable as driving a well trained four-in-hand. An enduring attack by the mind on the tableful of mind spread out before it; a grappling of intellects and a struggle, if not for preponderance at least for identity, for life—this, while the brain saps the essences of the body until the head is hot, and the feet cold, and the limbs stiff, this is the work of men. It is not the play at work of women. If a woman has genius, that is another thing. But even then genius alone is of little avail to me. My work demands drudgery as well. If she have genius, let her stay at home, write from her effervescent brain, and sell the product to the highest bidder.

Hard work, the hardest of work, is not for frail and tender woman. It were a sin to place it on her. Give her a home, with bread and babies; love her, treat her kindly, give her all the rights she desires, even the defiling right of suffrage if she can enjoy it, and she will be your sweetest, loveliest, purest, and most devoted companion and slave. But life-long application, involving life-long self-denial, involving constant pressure on the brain, constant tension of the sinews, is not for women, but for male philosophers or—fools. So, long since, I forswore petticoats in my library; breeches are sometimes bad enough, but when unbefitting they are disposed of somewhat more easily.

Later in my work, and as an exception to the above, I am glad to testify to the ability and success of one female writer, if for no other reason than to deliver me from the charge of prejudice. I have found in Mrs Frances Fuller Victor, during her arduous labors for a period of ten years in my library, a lady of cultivated mind, of ability and singular 245 238 application; likewise her physical endurance was remarkable.

Long before this I had discovered the plan of the index then in progress to be impracticable. It was too exact; it was too exact; it was on too minute a scale. Besides absorbing an enormous amount of time and money in its making, when completed it would be so voluminous and extended as to be cumbersome, and too unwieldy for the purpose designed.

Others realized this more fully than myself, and from them came many suggestion in perfecting the present and more practical system. This is a modification and simplification of the former, a reduction to practice of what before was only theory. Three months were occupied in planning and testing this new system. When we became satisfied with the results, we began indexing and teaching the art to the men. As the work progressed and the plan inspired confidence, more indexers were employed. Hundreds were instructed, and the efficient ones retained. Mr William Nemos came in, and as he quickly mastered the system and displayed marked ability in various directions, the indexing and the indexers were place under his supervision.

The system as perfected and ever since in successful and daily operation, I will now describe:

Forty or fifty leading subjects were selected, such as Agriculture, Antiquities, Botany, Biography, Commerce, Drama, Education, Fisheries, Geology, History, Indians, Mining, etc., which would embrace all real knowledge, and cover the contents of the whole collection, except such parts as were irrelevant. For example, a writer's ideas of religion were considered of no value, as was anything he saw or did outside of our Pacific States territory; or his personal affairs, unless of so striking a character as to command general interest. These forty or fifty subjects formed the basis of the index, embracing the whole range of practical knowledge, history, biography, and science, while 246 239 excluding tons of trash, with which every author seems bound in a greater or less degree to dilute his writings.

Now as to the collection of minor subjects or subtopics under the general headings, so as to permit a ready use of the material with the least possible friction. The device is at once ingenious, simple, and effectual. The lists of subjects were so chosen that each might be made to embrace a variety of subdivisions. Thus under the head Agriculture are included stock raising, soils, fruits, and all other products of farm cultivation. Under Antiquities are included ruins, relics, hieroglyphics, and all implements and other works of native Americans prior to the coming of Europeans; also ancient history, traditions, migrations, manners and customs before the conquest, and speculations, native and European, concerning the origin of the Americans. The same system was observed with Architecture, Art, Bibliography, Biography, Ethnology, Jurisprudence, Languages, Manufactures, Medicine, Meteorology, Mythology, and all the other chief subject-headings, including states and localities. A list of abbreviations was then made, and the plan was ready for application.

The operation of indexing was as follows: A list of subjects, with their subdivisions and abbreviations, was placed before an assistant, who proceeded to read the book also given him, indexing its contents upon cards of heavy writing paper three by five inches in size. When he came to a fact bearing on any of the subjects in the list he wrote it on a card, each assistant following the same form, so as to produce uniform results. For example, the top line of all the cards was written in this manner:

Agric. Cal., Silk Culture, 1867.

Antiq. Chiapas, Palenque.

Biog. Cortés (H.)

Hist. Mexico. 1519.

Ind. Nev. Shoshones (Dwellings).

Ogn. Portland. 1870.

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The second line of each card gave the title of the book, with the volume and page where the information was to be found; and, finally, a few words were given denoting the character of the information. Here-with I give a specimen card complete:

Ind. Tehuan. Zapotec. 1847.

Macgregor, J. Progress of America. London, 1847.

Vol. I., pp. 848-9.

Location, Character, Dress, Manufactures.

Here we have a concise index to a particular fact or piece of information. It happens to relate to the aborigines, and so falls under the general heading Indians. It has reference especially to the natives of Tehuantepec. It is supposed to describe them as they were in the year 1847. It concerns the Zapotec tribe particularly. It has to do with their location, character, dress, and manufactures, and it is to be found on pages 848 and 849 of the first volume of a book entitled Progress of America, written by J. Macgregor, and published in London in 1847. Of course, when the cards are put away in their case all the cards on Indians are brought together. Of the Indian cards all those relating to Tehuantepec are brought together. Of the Tehuantepec natives all in the library that relate to the Zapotec tribe will be found together; and so on.

Thus the student is directed at once to all the sources of information concerning his subject, and the orderly treating of innumerable topics, otherwise impossible, is thus made practicable. If, for example, a person wishes to study or write upon the manners and customs of all the aborigines inhabiting the territory covered by the library, he takes all the cards of the index bearing the general heading Indians, and is by 248 241 them directed immediately to all the sources of information, which else would take him ten years at least to ferret. If information is desired of Tehuantepec, take the Tehuantepec cards; or if of the Zapotec tribe only, the Zapotec cards. So it is with any subject relating to mining, history, society, or any other category within the range of knowledge.

Thus book by book of the authorities collected was passed through the hands of skilled assistants, and with checks and counter-checks an immense and all-comprehending system of indexing was applied to each volume. Physical, moral, geographical, historical, from the fibre of an Eskimo's hair to the coup de maître of Cortés, nothing was too insignificant or too great to find its place there. With the index cards before him, the student or writer may turn at once to the volume and page desired; indeed, so simple and yet so effectual are the workings of the system that a man may seat himself at a bare table and say to a boy, Bring me all that is known about the conquest of Darien, the mines of Nevada, the missions of Lower California, the agriculture of Oregon, the lumber interests of Washington, the state of Sonora, the town of Querétaro, or any other information extant, or any description, regarding any described portion of the western half of North America, and straightway, as at the call of a magician, such knowledge is spread before him, with the volumes opened at the page. Aladdin's lamp could produce no such results. That commanded material wealth, but here is a sorcery that conjures up the wealth of mind and places it at the disposition of the seer.

Hundreds of years of profitless uninteresting labor may be saved by this simple device; and a prominent feature of it is that the index is equally valuable in connection with any other library where copies of my material may exist. The cost of this index was about thirty-five thousand dollars, but its value is not to be measured by money.

249 242

After the explanation given, one would think it easy to find men who could make this index. But it was not so. Never was there man or woman who looked at it but instantly knew or thought they knew, all about it; yet nineteen out of twenty who attempted it failed. The difficulty was this: to be of value, the work must all be done on a uniform plan. If one competent person could have done the whole, the index would be all the better. But one person could not do all; from five to twenty men were constantly employed upon it for years. Many of the books were indexed two or three times, owing to the incompetency of those who first undertook the task.

It was extremely difficult to make the indexers comprehend what to note and what not. Rules for general guidance could be laid down, yet in every instance something must be left to the discretion of the individual. All must work to a given plan, yet all must use judgment. In attempting this, one would adhere so rigidly to rule as to put down a subject-heading whenever a mere word was encountered, even though unaccompanied by any information. If, for example, the sentence occurred, “The machinery of government had not yet been set in motion along the Sierra foothills,” such an indexer would make a card under Machinery, to the infinite disgust of the investigator of mechanical affairs. At the same time, most important facts might be omitted, simply because they were not expressed in words which broadly pointed to a subject on the list. Then, too, there was much difference between men in aptness, some finding it necessary to plod through every line before grasping the pith of the matter, while others acquired such expertness that they could tell by merely glancing down a page whether it contained any useful information. But by constant accessions and eliminations a sufficient number of competent persons was found to carry the work forward to completion.

When a volume was finished the indexer would 250 243 hand it with his cards to Mr Oak or Mr Nemos, who glanced over the work, testing it here and there to see that it was properly done, and then gave out another book. Finally the cards were all classified under their distinguishing title, and placed in alphabetical order in upright cupboard-like cases made for the purpose. The cases are each about five feet in height, four feet in width, and less than six inches in thickness, with board partitions, and tin shelves slanting inward to hold the cards in place. The partitions are distant apart the length of the card, and the depth of the case is equivalent to the width of the card. In other words, the receptacles were made to fit the cards.

In special work of great magnitude, such as exhaustive history, it is necessary to invest the system of indexing with greater detail, more as it was first established, making innumerable special references, so that when done and arranged according to subject and date, all that has been said by every author on every point is brought together in the form of notes. I shall have occasion to refer to this subject again.

Such was the machinery which we found necessary to contrive in order to extract the desired material from the cumbersome mass before us. And by this or other similar means alone can the contents of any large library be utilized; and the larger the collection the more necessity for such an index. A universal index, applicable to any library, or to the books of the world collectively, might be made with incalculable advantage to civilization; but the task would be herculean, involving the reading of all the books and manuscripts in existence. Such an instrument in the hands of a student may be likened to the dart given by Abaris, the Hyperborean priest, to Pythagoras, which carried the possessor over rivers and mountains whithersoever he listed. This will probably never be done, although theoretically the plan is not so preposterous as might at first glance appear. No individual 251 244 possessed of reason would undertake it as a private scheme; necessarily it must be a national, or rather an international, work; and the number of persons of different climes and tongues to be employed would very likely prove fatal to it. Yet I believe the time will come when all the chief libraries of the world will have their index. Surely in no other way can scholars command the knowledge contained in books; and as books multiply, the necessity increases.

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CHAPTER XI.

SOME OF MY ASSISTANTS. Not chaos-like together crush'd and bruis'd, But, as the world, harmoniously confus'd, Where order in variety we see, And where, though all things differ, all agree.

Pope.

THOSE to whom I apply the term assistants by no means include all the army of workers who have at various times and in various ways lent me their services in my historical efforts. During the long term of my labors, it is safe to say that no less than six hundred different persons were at work for me at various times in my library. As the minimum, the number engaged in the library at any one time during a period of thirty years seldom fell below twelve; the highest being fifty, some thirty of whom were on regular details. The highest number was employed, however, only when there was extra work to do, such as special indexing, extracting, copying, or verifications. My assistants proper, as the term is used here, are those who aided me in my more responsible labors, and may be reduced to twenty in all, though more than a hundred made the effort unsuccessfully at one time or another.

All my life, whatever I have had in hand, whether in the field of business or of literature, I have always been fortunate enough to have good men about me, not only efficient aids, but those whom I could call my friends, and the enjoyment of whose regard was ever a source of gratification. Obviously this is a necessity whenever a person undertakes to accomplish 253 246 more in any direction than a single head and pair of hands can do in a lifetime. Though all have not ability and integrity, I have always found some in whose faithfulness I could trust as in my own; and while the responsibility must always rest upon me alone, some portion of that praise which has been so lavishly bestowed upon me and my enterprise rightly belongs to them.

Not only must the man who would assist in historical work aiming at the truth be honest, but honesty must be so inbred, so permeating the blood and bones of him, that deceit shall find no entrance. Not only must he be conscientious, but conscience must have full possession, and all his thoughts and actions be as under the all-seeing eye. For the opportunities, and to the careless and unprincipled the inducements, for slighting the work, for taking the easiest rather than the most thorough way of doing a thing, are so great, that if so disposed he may devote the requisite number of hours to his task and accomplish worse than nothing. If heedless and indifferent, and he be so disposed, he may save himself much drudgery, the performance of which never would be known or appreciated. Hence, I say, love of truth for truth's sake must be to every one of these men as the apple of his eye. It is true, every man is known to his fellows, and thoroughly known in the end. No one, however cunning, can deceive and escape detection always. He will be weighed and measured as time passes by at his exact value; but in researches like mine, he could, if he would, subject one to great annoyance, and spoil as much as or more than he accomplished, which, indeed, was not unfrequently done in my library.

First among my collaborators I may mention here Henry Lebbeus Oak. I have already told how he first came to the library, and at an early day became an important adjunct to it. I have often regarded it 254 247 as remarkable that so true and conscientious a friend, so faithful a librarian and laborer, should so early and opportunely have come to my aid. He was born at Garland, Maine, on the 13th of May, 1844. His Welsh, English, and Scotch ancestry was American on all four sides from a date preceding the revolution; his great-grandfather, the Rev. Ebenezer Hill, was a Harvard man of 1786, and his grandparents, unmindful of the star of empire, moved to Maine from Boscawen and Mason, New Hampshire, early in the present century.

Childhood and youth were passed uneventfully in his native village. School duties were mingled with a little work in garden, stable, wood-shed, or in the shop of his father, who was a harness-maker. His parents, however, were indulgent; there was but little work to be done, and I cannot learn that he was over anxious to do that little; thus most of his time was spent in idleness, mischief, and novel-reading, varied with out-door sports of the quieter class; for vice and dissipation he had slight inclination, and still less opportunity. He was educated at the common and high school, attending the latter, which was exceptionally good at Garland, in autumn and spring, from the age of ten years.

In 1861 he entered the freshman class of Bowdoin college, and was graduated at Dartmouth in the class of 1865. His college course corresponded in time with the great civil war which called away many of his classmates; and indeed, Oak often had the desire—a most foolish one, as it seemed to him later—to enlist, but was kept from doing so by the opposition of his parents, who were giving him a college education at a sacrifice they could ill afford. In the winter vacations he taught school in different towns of his native state; and after graduation was employed for a year as assistant in an academy at Morristown, New Jersey. The occupation was most distasteful, though our Yankee schoolmaster seems to have had 255 248 fair success as instructor and disciplinarian; and in the hope of one day shaking it off, he prepared for commerce by devoting some evenings to the study of book-keeping, and for law by borrowing a law-book and letting it lie on his table till the owner wanted it. California then came to his rescue, as she has rescued many another, saving some from hell, but vastly more from heaven. Through the aid of his college roommate, George R. Williams, an old Californian, then studying law at Petaluma, he obtained an engagement as clerk in the grain warehouse of McNear Brothers, and came to California by steamer in 1866. Illness, something new in Oak's experience, soon forced him to quit this employment, and reduced him, financially, to nothing; indeed, I have heard him attribute his escape from permanent lodgings at Lone mountain, or some less expensive resort for the dead, to the kindness of Mr and Mrs S.F. Barstow of San Francisco, the latter a sister of Williams, at whose house he was well cared for. And, here I say, may God's best blessing rest on those who, at the cost of time, money, and personal convenience, befriended sick and destitute wanderers in the early gold-getting days of California and later.

On his feet again, with the aid of John Swett, in the spring of 1867 Oak found a position as principal of the Haywards public school, where he remained for one term, rapidly regaining his health; and then for a term became assistant at the Napa collegiate institute, a methodist institution, where the term ‘assistant’ was somewhat comprehensive, since the principal was on the circuit and but rarely made his appearance. A peculiar phase of his experience here, to which I have heard him allude, was the rather embarrassing necessity of conducting school and family prayers, besides asking a blessing on rather doubtful food three times a day, as he had recklessly agreed at the first to do, rather than lose the job, if the principal should chance now and then to be absent. Five 256 249 months of this sort of thing became somewhat tedious, though, by developing episcopalian tendencies, he avoided having to keep up a reputation with the brethren at prayer-meetings, and even read his family service from a book, though the school prayer sometimes became prayed out and required remodelling. I find nothing of hypocrisy in all this; in a sense, though fast drifting into free thought, he was in earnest; it takes a long time for a boy to rid himself of the old beliefs that are breathed in with the New England air, and Oak saw no harm in addressing petitions to a supreme being, even if that being and his methods were not quite so clear to him as they seemed to others. And later, when his religious creed—that of entire ignorance respecting the affairs of another world, mingled with respect and somewhat of envy for those who know all about it—had become more settled, I doubt not he would have performed the strange task with much less embarrassment, even if Mohammed or Quetzalcoatl had been the object of local worship.

From Napa he came again to San Francisco; and in the spring of 1868, after a long period of idleness, when on the point of being forced by lack of funds to become again a teacher, he was employed as office editor of the Occident, a presbyterian organ; and a year later, when the publication of that paper passed from the control of our firm, he assumed the position of librarian and superintendent of that wide range of intricate detail essential to extracting material in the Bancroft library, a place he held continuously for a period of nearly twenty years.

I suppose nature has a place and purpose for everything she makes, though it certainly would seem that not everything made by nature finds its place and purpose. This man, however, certainly found his vocation, and fitted himself to it perfectly. In him were combined, in a remarkable degree, those rare and admirable qualities essential to the work. Ability, 257 250 application, endurance, clear-headedness, and sound judgment, united with patience and enthusiasm, enabled him to trample down many of the obstacles which constantly beset our path. He had a thorough knowledge of Spanish and French, with a useful smattering of other languages. Pleasant and affable to all around him, he sought no man's company. Methodical in his habits, having little to do with society, he fastened his mind upon the work, and there kept it day after day, and year after year. No one ever has known, or ever will know, the early history of California or the Spanish northwest as we knew it then—I say never will know it, because, if possessed of taste, time, talent, and all other necessary qualities, no one will have the same opportunity. History was in the mouths of men, and in the air as well as in old letters and musty manuscripts. Soon all this changed; and tongues that then talked of mission life, the Bear Flag war, and the gold-gathering struggle of the nations, were forever silenced; yet only hereafter will the value of a complete record made before it was too late be fully appreciated.

Oak is plain of speech. Without dogmatism he has an opinion, and usually a clear and correct one, on almost every current topic, particularly if it be connected with his work or the library. And in the expression of opinion he is not timid. It has been my custom from the beginning to discuss freely with him and others every question of importance arising in my work. I have always courted criticism from those about me as freely as I have been ready to bestow it on them. Often somewhat radical differences of opinion have arisen between Oak and myself; but during the many pleasant years we have labored together, the first disrespectful thought has yet to find utterance, the first unkind word has yet to be spoken.

It is a remarkable fact that this is the only live Yankee to find permanent occupation in my work. New Englanders in California, as a rule, make better 258 251 business men than literary men. They are here too eager for traffic, too anxious to trade jack-knives, too sharp after the dollars, to settle down to plodding brain-work which yields them no substantial return. Their minds are no better fitted for it than their inclinations. Their education has taken a different turn. Their ambition is of that caste that culture alone will not satisfy. They want money, houses, horses, wine, and tobacco. We of the fifth floor, and of Valencia Street, did not eschew all these. We were no anchorites, though trimming our midnight lamp and working in a garret. But when our stomachs were full, and divers other longings gratified, we remembered that we had heads.

In the mercantile and manufacturing parts of the business, on the other hand, the Anglo-American element was displayed to the greatest advantage. There boys were to be found brimful of energy and ambition, bound to carve for themselves a fortune or die; also men of ability and integrity, many of whom I reared and educated in the book-selling occupation myself.

Working in the library at one time I have had representatives from England, Ireland, and Scotland; from France, Germany, and Switzerland; from Russia, Poland, Spain, and Italy—with but one from any part of the United States. But let me say that this one, in regard to ability, intergrity, and life-devotion to me and my cause, was surpassed by none.

Never was there a more devoted, faithful worker in any field than my valued friend William Nemos, a nom de plume by which he preferred to be known among us. Retiring in all his tastes, and enthusiastic as a student, he loved to dip into lore of every description, with a predilection for the abstruse and for linguistics. He possessed, indeed, a knowledge more or less complete of all the principal languages of Europe, from those of Spain and Italy in the south, to 259 252 Russian and Swedish in the north, the latter his native tongue. Further than this, after he entered my library he improved rapidly in method, taste, and style. But let me briefly tell the story of his early life.

At the foot of Bore, where the snow-crowned summits of the lofty fjelds gleam in perpetual defiance of Helios, beside a roaring torrent that issued from the rugged mountains, he was born, in February 1848, his natal day being next after Washington's. Poor Finland! Will naught satisfy the tyrannous Muscovite till the last drop of Scandinavian blood be let upon the thirsty earth?

His father was a nobleman, not rich; his mother of a wealthy family of good stock. His ancestry and his country's glorious past, with stories of the mighty Kucko, and of the famous Oden, who gathered the braves unto his Walhalla, were duly impressed upon his youthful mind. German and piano lessons were first given him by his mother. A talent for languages was early developed under parental tuition, so that an uncle insisted he should go to St Petersburg, and there prepare himself for some position under the tzar.

Wrapped in contraband stuffs, he was passed tremblingly through the hands of the fierce Muscovites into the gentler ones of a lady for whom the goods were intended, and who unrolled him with affectionate care. After a year at private school he returned home to attend the church or grammar school; it was finally determined that the gymnasium, or classic high school, at Stockholm was the place for him; so to the Venice of the north he was forthwith sent, preparatory to entering the Upsala university, where at the time was a brother whom he visited occasionally to obtain initiation into the student life proposed for him also, but not to be realized.

After a pretty thorough course of mathematics and the classics at Stockholm, complicated family affairs 260 253 compelled him to break off his studies, go to London, and enter a commission and ship-broker office. The place was procured through the favoring influence of a family friend in London, who wisely deemed a thorough acquisition of the English language and business routine of the highest advantage to his young friend.

Pride and sensitiveness would not permit him to drag the time-honored family title into the dusty purlieus of a London trafficker's office, or to consent that it should otherwise be lightly treated. Rather let it be laid aside until such time as it might be worn again with befitting form.

He continued his studies, which now included a course of philosphy under an Upsala graduate. Well grounded in the critical system of Kant, with its subjective methods, this tutor could not but feel the inconsistency of theories which, centring everything in the ego, yet left this involved in hopeless confusion. On coming to England, therefore, Nemos was naturally drawn more strongly to her typical empiricism, as presented in the sense-perceptions of Locke, although even here the mist could not be cleared, for instance, from the hypothetic duality in the relation between ideas and qualities. Nemos profited by these inquiries in a comparative study of both the experimentarian and transcendental doctrines, and this under the guidance of a devotee whose enthusiasm tended to impress his teachings.

After a business training of eighteen months he was transferred to a position in a leading house trading with India. There he remained at a good salary for five years, acting as junior correspondent, after being for a time in charge of the shipping department, and sometimes aid to the cashier. Trips to the continent during summer vacation afforded a pleasing variation from business routine, and added to the instructive sights of London.

Ill health, apparently more imaginary than real, now 261 254 broke his connection with the British metropolis and sent him adrift upon the sea. Hard study, and a neglect of due attention to hours and exercise, had affected his spirits, and as a sister had died of consumption, the fear seized him of congenital tendencies. Correspondence with the family physician at home brought about the resolution to take a long voyage. In the spring of 1870 he left Liverpool by sailing vessel for Australia, and arrived at Melbourne, after a pleasant voyage, the third month out. There, with many of his fellow-passengers, he made haste to seek employment, and as thousands have done in that city as in San Francisco, sought in vain.

The allurement of gold stole upon his youthful fancy, with dreams of hidden treasures and speedy enrichment. A still feeble constitution pleaded, moreover, for bracing mountain air, and confinement within the narrow bounds of a ship, after a still longer enchainment to the desk, assisted by mere contrast to gild the unfettered life in camp and forest. Soon came disenchantment.

In the mines he fell among thieves. One of his partners was an ex-convict, who prompted the rest to recompense him for furnishing all the supplies of flour, bacon, whiskey, and tobacco for the company by concealing in their mouths the little gold they took out. This was, perhaps, as neat an arrangement as the villains ever concocted, and remarkably simple—they had a man to furnish all the provisions, while they took all the proceeds.

When his money was gone, Nemos concluded to dissolve the partnership and retire from business. Driving his partners out of camp, he packed up and returned to Melbourne, and thence proceeded to Sydney. There he revelled in the tranquil beauties of that southern Pacific garden—to him a paradise of verdure-clad promontories creeping softly into the still waters, as if to woo the orange groves of the tiny isles bathing at their feet; to the California of the 262 255 rushing, roaring times, a paradise of Satan-serpents sending its slimy brood across the ocean to set on fire the incipient hell already there prepared by the assembled gold-drunken hosts.

Hawaii next, and then San Francisco, landing at the latter in midsummer 1871; and thence to Oregon to accept an engagement as assistant civil engineer on the proposed railroad. This being finished, 1873 saw him again in San Francisco. Failing to obtain congenial employment, he determined to go to New York, satisfied that his linguistic attainments would be better appreciated there than in the far west. But in the mean time my efforts attracted his attention, and he readily obtained permanent employment in the library.

In this labor his rare abilities for the first time found fitting occupation. Little by little, throughout almost the entire period of my historical efforts, his talents unfolded, until in many respects he stood first, and became director of the library detail, including later the librarianship. He had a remarkable faculty for systematizing work, and drilling men into a common method, as before explained. Alive to the interests of the library as to his own, he was ever jealous of its reputation, and untiring in his efforts to see produced historical results only of the soundest and most reliable order. I would that the countries among whose archives he has spent the better part of his life laboring, might appreciate his services to them at their proper worth.

Thomas Savage was born in the city of Habana, of New England parents, the 27th of August, 1823. His ancestors were among the earliest settlers of Boston, many of whom acquired wealth and distinction in various professions.

When nine years of age the boy could speak Spanish better than English, and French more fluently than either. He read Don Quixote in Spanish 263 256 before he had been taught the alphabet. Masters were provided him, and he was also sent to school at Habana, where he read the Latin classics, became proficient in mathematics, and prepared himself for the legal profession.

His father, who was a man of fine business ability, making money easily and rapidly, but somewhat deficient in the art of keeping it, died when Thomas was quite young. Ill health obliged him at length to abandon study; besides, he had no taste for the law. Yet in the short time spent at his studies he learned enough to be able to rapidly transcribe for me, in a hand as neat as Thackeray's or Leigh Hunt's, upon the usual half-sheets of legal paper, a clear translation of almost any language I might choose to place before him. He was sickly from childhood; many times his life was despaired of, and ever since I have known him he has been a constant sufferer; yet all the while he has worked as industriously and as cheerfully as if enjoying the best health.

Several children were the result of marriage in 1850, but sickness and death kept his purse low. Within a period of ten years Mr Savage buried thirteen members of his family.

A few years in a mercantile house as book-keeper were followed by an engagement in the United States consulate, as clerk under Robert B. Campbell, then consul at Habana. For twenty-one and a half years thereafter Mr Savage was in continuous consulate service, portions of the time in charge of the office as deputy and as chief.

During his long tenure of office many important international questions arose, in which he took part, and many were the acts of disinterested charity performed by him, particularly to passing Californians in trouble. The years 1849-51 at this port were specially important, both to the United States and to California. Then it was that his thorough knowledge of the Spanish language, and his long experience 264 257 in consular business, rendered his services invaluable. In Mexican-war times General Santa Anna was there whiling away the tedious hours of exile by cock-fighting. Mr Savage was present at an interview between Mr Campbell and Santa Anna to obtain the latter's views as to the future policy of Mexico. Almonte, Rejon, Basadre, and others were present, but the wily Mexican, though by no means reserved, was extremely non-committal. The invasions of Cuba by Lopez in 1850-1, the last of which terminated so disastrously to the expedition, made Savage much work in the copious correspondence which followed. Many Californian gold-seekers, on their return, reached Habana broken in health and without means to proceed farther to their home and friends. These must be provided for; and all such relief came out of the pockets of their poorly paid countrymen there stationed. And to his enduring honor be it said, never did distressed stranger appeal to him in vain. While I, a green boy for the first time from home, in the spring of 1852, was gazing in rapt wonderment about the streets of Habana, and taking in my fill of the strange sights, Mr Savage was in the consulate office engaged in his duties, each oblivious, so far as the other was concerned, of the present and the pregnant future.

Prominent men, both from the United States and Mexico, were now his associates. He always strongly opposed the slave-trade. When the war for the union broke out he remained faithful to his government, though his chief was an active secessionist. One day a man called on Mr Savage and revealed a plot then hatching in San Francisco to capture the Pacific Mail company's steamer at Acapulco. At another time one informed him of a plan of revolution then being prepared in southern California, detailing to him how much of money each conspirator had subscribed in support of the scheme. These facts were made known by Savage to the government officials at 265 258 Washington, who telegraphed them to General McDowell. For twenty months during the hottest of the war, while blockade-running from Habana to Mobile and other southern ports was of almost daily occurrence, Mr Savage was in full charge of the consulate at Habana. Every movement adverse to the government he narrowly watched and reported, and the capture of many a valuable prize was due directly to his exertions. For which service, of empty thanks he received abundance, but no prize-money, as, indeed, he was not entitled to any. Neither did the government remunerate him for his extra service and expenses, though to that he was justly entitled.

To Mr Savage is due the credit of discovering the plot of capturing the San Francisco treasure steamer in 1864. It was to be effected through the prior capture of the Panamá Railway company's steamer Guatemala, with which, when taken, the conspirators were to lie in wait for the treasure steamer bound down, from San Francisco to Panamá. They embarked at Habana, where many schemes of this kind were concocted requiring the utmost care of the consul to frustrate, on board the British Royal Mail steamer for St Thomas, thence to go to Panamá and seize the Guatemala.

The 31st of December, 1867, Mr Savage retired from the consulate at Habana, poorer by the loss of twenty-one laborious years than when he entered it. After spending the greater part of 1868 in the United States, in November of that year he went to Panamá and edited the Spanish part of the Star and Herald. Likewise for a time while at Panamá he acted as consul for Guatemala. At Panamá, in 1870, he married his second wife, a most charming lady, young, beautiful, accomplished, and wealthy, and withal devotedly attached to her husband. Soon after their marriage a disastrous fire swept away a large portion of her property.

Mr Savage then went to San Salvador, where, 266 259 after teaching and writing for the newspapers for a time, he was appointed United States consul. Shortly afterward a revolution broke out. The city was barricaded and threatened with an attack. The United States minister, Torbert, and the consul lived on the same street, opposite each other. Day and night they kept their flags flying, and at times their houses were filled with refugees. Finally at Santa Ana the revolutionists won a battle; the government of President Dueñas fell to the ground, and in due time order was again restored.

The climate of Salvador did not agree with Mrs Savage. A sister of hers died there. So Mr Savage determined to try Guatemala. There he edited a paper, which did not pay expenses, and after a residence of eighteen months, he determined to try the coast northward. The 26th of March, 1873, he arrived at San Francisco, and four months afterward entered the library.

For many years Mr Savage was my main reliance on Spanish-American affairs. All my chief assistants were good Spanish scholars, but all in cases of doubt were glad to refer to him as an expert. With good scholarship, ripe experience, and a remarkable knowledge of general history, he brought to the library strong literary tastes, a clear head, and methodical habits. At my suggestion he prepared for The Bancroft Company a most valuable work, entitled the Spanish-American Manual. The work was written for the purpose of giving to the commercial world a vast amount of information lying hidden under the foreign language and peculiar customs of the people of Latin America.

Frances Fuller was born in the township of Rome, New York, May 23, 1826, and educated at the seminary in Wayne county, Ohio, whither her parents erelong removed. Her mother, who was married at sixteen, while the father was but eighteen, was a 267 260 passionate lover of the beautiful in nature and art. Given the parentage, what of the children? They had for their inheritance pride of race, susceptibility to beauty, intellectual strength, the rhythmic sense, and good physical traits. Out of these they should without doubt evolve that temperament which, on account of its excessive sensibility, we call the poetic, although it is not always accompanied by the poetic faculty or sense of numbers. In this case, however, of five girls two became known as writers of both verse and prose, and a third of prose only.

Frances was the eldest of the family, and was but thirteen years of age when her father settled in Wooster, Ohio. Her education after that was derived from a course in a young ladies' seminary, no great preparation for literary work. At the age of fourteen she contributed to the county papers; when a little older, to the Cleveland Herald, which paid for her poems, some of which were copied in English journals. Then the New York papers sought her contributions, and finally she went to New York for a year to become acquainted with literary people, and was very kindly treated—too kindly she tells me, because they persuaded her at an immature age to publish a volume of her own and her sister Metta's poems. But worse things were in store than this mistaken kindness. Just at the time when a plan was on foot to make the tour of Europe with some friends, the ill-health of her mother recalled her to Ohio and the end of all her dreams. What with nursing, household cares, and the lack of stimulating society, life began to look very real. A year or two later her father died, and there was still more real work to do, for now there must be an effort to increase the family income month by month. In this struggle Metta was most successful, having a great facility of invention, and being a rapid writer, and stories being much more in demand than poems brought more money. Frances possessed a wider 268 261 range of intellectual powers, of the less popular because more solid order. The sisters were twin souls, and very happy together, “making out,” as Charlotte Bronte says, the plan of a story or poem by their own bright fireside in winter, or under the delicious moonlight of a summer evening in Ohio. A position was offered them on a periodical in Detroit, and they removed to Michigan. This did not prove remunerative, and was abandoned. By and by came marriage, and the sisters were separated, Metta going to New York, where she led a busy life. Their husbands were brothers. Frances married Henry C. Victor, a naval engineer, who came to California under orders in 1863. Mrs Victor accompanied him, stopping a while at Acapulco, where the Narragansett to which Mr Victor was ordered, was lying. At San Francisco, she found the government paying in greenbacks. To make up the loss of income something must be done. So she wrote for the Bulletin city editorials and a series of society articles, under the nom de plume of “Florence Fane,” which were continued for nearly two years, and elicited much pleasant comment by their humorous hits, even the revered pioneers not being spared. About the time the war closed, Mr Victor resigned and went to Oregon, where, early in 1865, Mrs Victor followed him, and was quickly captivated by the novelty, romance, and grandeur of the wonderful north-west. Her letters in the Bulletin, articles in the Overland Monthly, and her books, All over Oregon and Washington and The River of the West, with other writings, show how cordially she entered into the exploration of a fresh field. In 1878 she accepted a hint from me, and came readily to my assistance, with greater enthusiasm than one less acquainted with her subject could be expected to feel. In ability, conscientiousness, and never-creasing interest and faithfulness Mrs Victor was surpassed by none.

Walter M. Fisher and T. Arundel Harcourt came 269 262 to the library in 1872, the former early in the year, and the latter in November. Albert Goldschmidt had been at work about a year when Harcourt came. Fisher was the son of an Irish elergyman; Harcourt claimed to be a scion of the English aristocracy; while Goldschmidt was of German extraction. Fisher, fresh from college, was brought in by a fellow-countryman, the Reverend Hemphill, and set to work taking out material for voyages. He applied himself closely, devoting his days to writing and his nights to the study of languages and literature. Throughout his college course he had paid special attention to literature, and now he determined to adopt it as a profession. Probably at that time there was no better school for him in the world in which to make rapid and practical advancement in his favorite literary paths than my library. For although the work therein was in one sense local, yet all literary work of any pretensions must be in some respects general, and the experience he obtained while with me was invaluable to him. And this he was ever ready to acknowledge. In a book entitle The Californias, published in London soon after his return to the old country, wherein men and things here were somewhat severly spoken of, all his references to the library and to the time spent there were of the most cordial and pleasing character.

Born in Ulster in 1849, he used to call himself a '49er. His father was of the Scotch presbyterian church, and the family were members of a Scotch and English colony “in the Atlantic Ocean to the west of Great Britain,” as the son said. Indeed, Fisher always insisted that he was an Englishman, holding apparently no great respect for the Irish. In his own religious belief, or rather in the absence of any, he was quite liberal, and it was on this account, as much as any other, that he originally left his father's house.

After the tutors and pedagogues came three years 270 263 with old Doctor Timothy Blaine of the Royal Academical institution of Belfast, whose lessons and lectures on the English language and its literature were then as novel in middle-class schools as they were masterly and attractive in themselves. Fisher was among his favorite pupils. After that he matriculated in the Queen's university, attending lectures connected with that institution at Belfast. The college library, however, did more for him than all the lectures, and there he was so sedulous a student that his professors often looked in vain for him on their benches.

University paths he saw, in due time, were not his. Old-time ways by rule and rote he could neither profess, preach, nor practise; so he went to London, and thence to Paris—books, books, books, being ever the substance of his dreams. The French war upsetting his plans, he returned to London. There, one day, he picked up a book in the British Museum on the subject of California, and before he laid it down the determination was on him. He packed his books, and in December 1871 steamed out of Liverpool with a ticket in his pocket-book marked San Francisco. Two days after his arrival he was at work in the library.

Toward the close of 1875 he returned to London, proposing between London and Paris to spend his days doing such work in literature as he found to do; doing it, as he says of it himself, “better every way, I believe, for the sun of California, for the fellowship and labors we had together there, and for the loves there born. Oh, the grand days we had, warm with hope and strong with endurance! If no man says it, I dare to say it, there have been lesser heroes than we, up on that fifth floor in a San Francisco bookshop, fighting against the smiles of the children of mammon and of Belial, fighting alone, modest and silent, each of us ‘travaillant pour son cœur, laissant à Dieu le reste.’”

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Goldschmidt was a pleasant, social man, of no very pronounced parts, in age about thirty-five, given to ease and quietness rather than to physical exertion or hard study. He made himself familiar with the books of the library, and was apt and useful in many ways. There was scarcely any language with which we had to do but that he would decipher it after a fashion. Old Dutch was his delight. Many of those sixteenth-century writers done into the purest and best English are meaningless enough, some of them in places absolutely unintelligible, any one of half a dozen constructions being equally applicable to the words; and yet Goldschmidt was never so happy as when seated before a table full of these works, in various languages, and written from widely different standpoints by authors oceans asunder, with plenty of time at his command, engaged in the work of reconciling their jargon.

Harcourt, as he called himself, said that he was born in London in 1851; that his father was a gentleman of old family and considerable property, which was slightly increased by marriage with a lady of high birth; and that when eight years old his mother died, and then for the first time he was sent to school. Possessed of quick perceptions, he might easily have outstripped his fellows in learning; indeed, at the end of his first half-year he carried home the prize for superior attainments in Latin. But in those days it was not the fashion for aristocratic boys to study. The hard workers were poor weaklings, easily thrashed; creatures to be despised, spat upon; beings expressly contrived by nature to be used, to be punched into writing the verses of their superiors in station, strength, and laziness. He to whom the mysteries of dactyl and spondee were plain as a pikestaff, whom the terror of Xenophon could not appal, stood at the head of the row, pale, weak, and ‘lickable’ to every other boy in the class. The winning of a prize at the 272 265 outset of his school career by the youth Harcourt was a mistake which he took care never again to repeat, so greatly was he chagrined as he pressed his way back to his place amidst mutterings of ‘crammer,’ ‘little grind,’ and like epithets significant of the contempt in which he was held by his fellows.

A voyage to India was followed by a term at a German university, and after that the young man drifted to California, and entered the library in 1873. He late engaged in newspaper work, and died in 1884 at San Francisco.

A strong man, and one of talent, was J. J. Peatfield, born in Nottinghamshire, England, August 26, 1833. His father, a conservative tory clergyman, educated him for the church. He took his degree at Cambridge in 1857, having graduated in the classical tripos. The church being distasteful to him as a profession, he obtained a tutorship, with occasional travel, the last position of the kind being in a Russian family in St Petersburg.

Peatfield was now twenty-nine years of age, and the life he was leading did not satisfy him. He determined to emigrate. The gold discoveries in British Columbia attracted his attention; and while he was thinking of going thither, a college friend presented the flattering prospects of gains to be derived from cultivating cacao on the Atlantic seaboard of Central America, and he finally concluded to make the latter venture. Taking passage on board the steamship Norwegian to Portland, Maine, he proceeded thence by rail to New York, and after a fortnight's stay there he went to Greytown, Nicaragua, in the schooner George S. Adams.

The cacao-planting enterprise was a failure. The cultivation of the tree had been tried there without success years before, both by Americans and Europeans. Nevertheless he remained in that vicinity for two years, locating himself on the Serapiqué river, 273 266 an affluent in Costa Rican territory of the San Juan. He tried cotton-raising, as the price was very high during the civil war in the United States, but the excessive rains destroyed the crop. He then tried, likewise, cacao and coffee. Rapid and luxuriant growth attended every experiment, but the flowers of the cacao-tree dropped off without fructifying; the cotton rotted in the bolls; the coffee berries did not ripen.

As there was nothing to stay for but the fever and ague, which he did not want, about the middle of 1865 Mr Peatfield crossed the sierra to San José, the capital of Costa Rica. He there accepted the situation of book-keeper in a mercantile establishment. In January 1868 he was appointed clerk and translator to the legation at Guatemala, and two years later, on the departure of Minister Corbett for England, Peatfield was appointed British vice-consul in Guatemala. Upon the death of Consul Wallis, of Costa Rica, in whose charge the legation had been left, Peatfield received from the foreign office, London, the appointment of acting consul-general of Central America. After that he held the consulship of Guatemala for a time. Then his health began to fail, and at the end of 1871 he resigned and left Guatemala for San Francisco, where he arrived in November.

A winter of teaching was followed by a hemorrhage from which he barely recovered. In August 1872 he obtained a lucrative position as book-keeper and cashier of a mine owned by an English company in White Pine, Nevada. His engagement concluded, he went to Pioche, where sickness soon reduced him to poverty. For ten weeks he lay in the hospital suffering intensely with inflammatory rheumatism, much of the time unable to move, and occasionally insensible. One day, on recovering consciousness, he was told by the physician that he could not live; nevertheless he slowly recovered. Then he taught 274 267 school a while; after which he returned to San Francisco, where he nearly died from pneumonia. Recovery was followed by another period of teaching and book-keeping, until February 1881, when he entered the library, and soon became one of my most valued assistants.

Alfred Bates, a native of Leeds, England, entered the library after two years' work on The Commerce and Industries of the Pacific Coast, under its editor, John S. Hittell. Mr Bates displayed the most ability of any one of Mr Hittell's dozen assistants, and was a valuable acquisition to my corps of workers. He was born the 4th of May, 1840, his father being a wool-stapler, who made a fortune during the railway excitement of 1845-6, and had the misfortune to lose it in the panic of 1847.

Alfred recollects of his childhood that he was overgrown, weak, and always hungry. At the age of fifteen years he earned his own livelihood by teaching, among other places in Marlborough college, at the time the dean of Westminster being head-master, and to whom he was private secretary in 1862. While preparing for Cambridge the following year, he accepted a lucrative situation in Sidney, New South Wales. Though his life there was by no means an unhappy one, he suffered from ill health, being given up for dead at one time by three doctors. Indeed, animation was totally suspended for a time; and when the spark of life revived, supposing at the first that he was really dead, he says the sensation was by no means disagreeable.

Invited by his brother to come to California and take charge of a school, he made the passage by the Penang, the first year after his arrival being occupied in teaching.

Alfred Kemp, a most worthy man and earnest worker, was born in October 1847, in England, his 275 268 father being a landed proprietor in Kent. Alfred was educated for the army at a military school near Woolwich; but his father losing most of his property, the young man was obliged to abandon his contemplated career. In 1869 he went to France to learn the language, but the war with Germany breaking out, he returned to England, narrowly escaping the siege. After a clerkship from 1871 to 1874 in a commission house, he engaged in business on his own account, but making a loss of it, he came to California with his wife and daughter, and in 1883 he joined my corps of laborers at the library.

Edward P. Newkirk, a native of New York state, after passing an academical course, spent one year at Fort Monroe artillery school, four years in a bank, then joined the army in 1861 and fought for the union until 1865, among ther service going through the peninsular campaign with McClellan, and through the campaigns of Sherman resulting in the capture of Atlanta and Savannah; was twice wounded, and reached the rank of captain. From November 1866 to November 1872 he served in Washington City, Fort Delaware, and other stations. At the date last mentioned he accompanied a detachment of his regiment to California, and after a stay of two weeks at the presidio of San Francisco, two of the batteries were ordered to Alaska.

Newkirk landed at Sitka in the midst of a blinding December snow-storm, after arough passage of two weeks by steam. After three years of monotonous frontier life, during which the arrival of the monthly mail or some small trading-vessel was the chief event, he retired from the service and returned to San Francisco. Not satisfied with what he had seen of Alaska, he joined an arctic expedition in pursuit of walrus, and found himself at midnight, on the 4th of July, 1876, standing on a cake of ice with the sun in full view. The vessel rounded Point Barrow, sailed 276 269 two days east, was driven back by fogs and ice, and while seeking more favorable grounds had her rudder crushed by an ice-cake, which compelled her captain to seek a sheltered cove for repairs. What appeared a snug harbor was chosen, but it proved the vessel's tomb. No sooner had the repairs been completed, than while the party were confident of an easy escape from these inhospitable regions, a large iceberg grounded directly in the mouth of the cove, shutting the vessel in. For two weeks or more a close watch was kept in the hope that a change of wind might unlock the prison-door; but it came not, and the party, abandoning their vessel, with hastily constructed sledges drew their provisions several miles to open water, where they were picked up by the boats of a returning whaler. On reaching San Francisco, Mr Newkirk worked for a year or so with Mr Hittell on Commerce and Industries, and then entered the library.

Thomas Matthew Copperthwaite, born in Dublin in 1848, began his education in London, and thence proceeded to Belgium in 1859, where he entered the college of La Sainte Trinité at Louvain, following in that institution the classical course, and at the same time gaining a practical knowledge of French and Spanish.

His father about this time losing his fortune, the son was obliged to discontinue his studies and earn his livelihood. He went next to Berlin and engaged with a furniture manufacturing company, remaining there till 1868, meanwhile learning German. Then he entered a commission house in Paris, and in 1869 came to California, where he obtained employment in a mill and mining company near Georgetown, and subsequently for a time was teller in the Colusa County bank.

In 1872 Mr Copperthwaite bought a tract of land, going in debt for part, and finally losing the whole of 277 270 it. In 1875 he became a naturalized citizen of the United States, being republican in politics. It was thought that El Paso would become a great railroad centre, and thither, after leaving the bank, Mr Coperthwaite went, but only in time to be attacked by malarial fever, which nearly took his life away. His physician recommended his return to California, where, his health being in due time restored, he went to work in the library.

Ivan Petroff, born near St Petersburg in 1842, was of great assistance to me in preparing Russian material for the history of Alaska, and of the Russian colony at Fort Ross, in California. For one so lately and so thoroughly a Russian, he had a remarkable command of English. He was likewise a good draughtsman, and made for me many surveys and plans, also visiting Alaska and Washington in search of historical matter.

His life before entering my service was briefly as follows: The son of a soldier, and losing his mother in infancy, at the age of five he was placed in the educational establishment of the first corps of cadets in St Petersburg to prepare for a military career. At the battle of Inkerman his father was killed, and as the boy displayed a wonderful faculty for the acquisition of languages, he was transferred to the department of oriental languages of the imperial academy of sciences for training as military interpreter. An impediment of speech, the result of serious and prolonged illness, put an end to the proposed career, but the young orphan was permitted to continue his studies in the oriental department, first serving as amanuensis to Professor Bohttink during his labors connected with the publication of a Sanskrit dictionary. Subsequently he was attached to another member of the academy, M. Brosset, engaged at that period in the study of Armenian antiquities and literature, during which time he became so proficient in the 278 271 language that he was chosen by M. Brosset to accompany him on a voyage of scientific exploration through the ancient kingdoms of Georgia and Armenia.

Returned from this expedition, which occupied two years, Petroff was sent with part of the material there obtained to St Hilaire at Paris, to assist him in a proposed work on American antiquities; but St Hilaire not being at that time ready to continue his labors, Petroff determined to see more of the wide world, and so in the midsummer 1861 set sail for New York.

So little attention had he hitherto given to the English language, that on landing he could scarcely make himself understood. After a temporary engagement on the Courier des Etats Unis, he joined the union army, and by hard study was soon so far master of the language as to be able to write it easily and correctly, often writing letters for the soldiers as a means of practice.

First private, then corporal, then he became sergeant and color-bearer, which rank he held when in 1864 the company to which he belonged, the Seventh New Hampshire, was sent to Florida. Petroff took part in all the battles fought by Butler's army, and was twice wounded. After the capture of Fort Fisher he was made lieutenant.

Satisfied that Alaska would one day become the property of the United States, when mustered out of service in July 1865 he returned to New York and made a five years' engagement with the Russian-American company to act as English and German correspondent in the company's office at Sitka. Delayed en route at San Francisco, he thought to improve the time by making a horseback tour through northern California, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon, in which he narrowly escaped death at the hands of a band of Shoshones, in encountering which his horse was killed and he wounded in the arm. When he reached Sitka he found his place in the office filled; 279 272 but he was given charge of a trading post at Cook inlet, which position he held until the transfer of the territory, when he went to Kodiak island and was appointed acting custom-house officer to take charge of the barkentine Constitution, which had been seized, and with that vessel he arrived in San Francisco in October 1870, and entered the library almost immediately afterward.

William J. Carr and John H. Gilmour were two young Englishmen of fine education and ability, introduced by Hall McAllister. The latter had spent most of his life in India, and was employed for several years in the library.

Charles Welch was born and educated in San Francisco, perhaps the only native Californian among all my workers. Though but a boy when he came to the library, he soon made himself a useful member of the corps, doing most faithfully and efficiently whatever was given him to do. For several years his duties were those of what might be termed an assistant librarian, a place that was by no means a sinecure, and that could hardly have been better filled than by Welch. He was subsequently transferred to our mercantile establishment, in which for many years he held a responsible position.

W. H. Benson was, in a sense, the successor of Welch in the work of keeping the library in order, attending to various and complicated details in the routine of extracting material, and the cataloguing of new matter that was constantly swelling the bulk of the collection. He was an Englishman of good education, whose experience had been marked by the usual routine of adventurous wanderings. Benson was an intelligent man, a hard worker, a fine penman, and altogether a faithful and useful assistant; but consumption had marked him for its victim, and he died in 1884. The duties of his position were subsequently performed by Newkirk and Kemp.

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Amos Bowman was a stenographer of scientific attainments, with some experience in government surveys and mining explorations, who first aided me in my northern tour of investigation, and later, for a brief period, in library work. Harry Larkin was an English adventurer of good abilities, many accomplishments, and an adventurous career, which was terminated by his murder in California.

There was a class of men who possessed decided talents in some directions, but whose lack of ability as applied to my work it took me some time to discover. There was Galan, formerly governor of Lower California, and Paton, an Irish captain who had seen service in India.

Galan was in some respects a singular character. He undertook to practise law in San Francisco, but was unable to sustain himself. He was a middle-aged man, medium height, dark-skinned, with a handsome face and a quick, clear, bright, intelligent eye. He conversed, not only fluently, but eloquently and learnedly, on almost any topic concerning Mexican or Central American affairs, at any epoch of their history, which might be started; but let him undertake practical and exact work, and his powers failed him.

Thus it will be seen that although my assistants were of marked and diversified abilities, I had not at my command at all times the best material for my purpose. On the whole, my tools were not of the latest and best pattern; and though this was no fault of theirs, it threw the whole burden and responsibility on me, where it remained from first to last, even my best and most efficient assistants being able to prove up the correctness of but a portion of the work, leaving me to do the rest as best I was able.

Of Enrique Cerruti, Murray, and some others, I say enough elsewhere. I might make mention of scores of others, each of whom had his history, more or less eventful, more or less strange. There was 281 274 Samuel L. Simpson, who came down from Oregon and edited the Pacific coast readers for the firm; a young man of rare ability, though lacking somewhat in steady application.

There were many of Spanish and Mexican origin, not half of whose names I ever knew. Month after month they plodded more or less diligently along, as part of the great combination, directed perhaps by Savage, Oak, or Nemos, and drawing their pay every Saturday.

Of these, Vicente P. Gomez was one. A native of Mexico, he came to California when a child, was sent back to be educated, and came again with General Micheltorena. His father was a merchant and a ranchero here, and held an office under government. The elder Gomez built the only sea-going vessel the Spaniards ever attempted on the California shore. Launches and lighters they had built, and the Russians had constructed small craft, but no Hispano-Californian before or since. It was only twenty and a half tons burden, and was called Peor es Nada, “nothing would be worse,” from which naming one would think the owner was not very proud of it. The younger Gomez had a wonderful memory, supplemented with broad inventive faculties, with fine conversational powers, and a fund of anecdote. He wrote a beautiful hand, and spoke the most graceful Spanish of any man in California. He was the Victor of Bret Harte's Story of a Mine.

Besides laboring long and faithfully at the surveyor's office extracting material from the archives, he accompanied Mr Savage to Santa Clara, Salinas, Monterey, and Santa Cruz, on the same mission. He copied from the archives at all these places, and knowing everybody, he was able to secure much outside information of early times. But further and far more important than all this was the manuscript volume of 430 pages of his own reminiscences. While extracting material for history, or in conversation, 282 275 wherever he happened to be, whenever recollections arose in his mind we had a man ready to take them down. It was singular how it worked. He could extract material well enough, but if left to write his own experiences he would never do it, but he could talk fluently of his past, so that another could easily write from his dictation. After the work of copying from the archives was finished he was put to work in the library, and definite topics given him to write from his own knowledge, and in this way he succeeded quite well, and the result was the manuscript volume before mentioned, a most magnificent contribution to the historical literature of this coast, and invaluable because it contains much knowledge nowhere else found, and which but for this method would have been forever lost.

Rosendo V. Corona was another good man. He was a native of Tepic, Mexico, and cousin of the Mexican minister at Madrid. Educated as a civil engineer at Guadalajara, he came hither to perfect his education and obtain employment. He assisted in extracting material at the archbishop's library, and accompanied Savage and Gomez to Santa Clara and the southern coast.

Emilio Piña, a native of Chihuahua, was the son of a distinguished jurist. He was employed in the library and at several of the missions copying and extracting material, before which time he was engaged as editor, shoolmaster, and in the public service in Mexico.

Labadie was a native of Mexico, of French parentage, and educated in France. While there the war broke out, and he entered the army against Germany, going in a private and coming out a sergeant. He was finely educated, being among other things a good painter and musician. In the mines of Mexico he took the fever, and came to California for health and improvement.

Manuel Fernandez Martinez was more French than 283 276 Spanish in appearance. Sorcini was an educated Mexican with an Italian father. Eldridge was a native Peruvian with an American father. He came to California in 1849, bringing a ship with him laden with merchandise, but which was lost, vessel and cargo. He was translator of the laws of California from English into Spanish for several years, and had a brother also employed in the library.

Martin Barientos, born in Chili, boasted his pure Araucanian blood, being of that race of aboriginals who were never conquered. He was a skilful penman, did some illuminated title-pages beautifully, and could turn his hand to almost anything, being a printer, writer, and singer. Indeed, he came to California from South America as one of a French operabouffe company, and often appeared upon the stage here.

Among my stenographers were some not merely mechanical men, but possessed of the spirit of research sufficiently to gather and write out for me much fresh and valuable information. Among these was Mr Leighton, from Boston, who labored for me most successfully for several years.

Thus I might go on enumerating and describing until half a dozen chapters were filled. Those named are few as compared with those not named; but I have mentioned enough to give some idea of the wonderful variety of nationality and talent employed upon this work, not the least wonderful part of which was the strange coincidents bringing together so heterogeneous an assembly; and yet, under the perfect system and organization which we finally succeeded in establishing, all laboring with regularity and harmony.

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CHAPTER XII.

MY FIRST BOOK. Two strong angels stand by the side of History as heraldic supporters: the angel of research on the left hand, that must read millions of dusty parchments, and of pages blotted with lies; the angel of meditation on the right hand, that must cleanse these lying records with fire, even as of old the draperies of asbestos were cleansed, and must quicken them into regenerated life.

De Quincey.

How many of the works of authors may be attributed purely to accident! Had not Shakespeare been a play-actor we should have had no Shakespeare's plays. Had not Bunyan been imprisoned and Milton blind we might look in vain for the Pilgrim's Progress and Paradise Lost. Robert Pearse Gillies says of Sir Walter Scott, “I have always been persuaded that had he not chanced, and in those days it was a rare chance, to get some German lessons from a competent professor, and had he not also chanced to have Lenora and The Wild Huntsman played before him as exercises, we should never have had The Lay of the Last Minstrel or The Lady of the Lake.” More than any other one effort, Thackeray's writing for Punch taught him wherein his strength lay. The great satirist at the beginning of his literary career was not successful, and it is a question whether he ever would have been but for a certain train of circumstances which crowded application upon his genius. Apelles, unable to delineate to his satisfaction the foam of Alexander's horse, dashed his brush against the canvas in angry despair, when lo! upon the picture, effected thus by accident, appeared what had baffled his cunningest skill. Turning-points in life are not always mere 285 278 accident. Often they are the result of teachings or inborn aspirations, and always they are fraught with some moral lesson of special significance.

Although my Native Races cannot be called a chance creation, its coming as my first work was purely accident. Following my general plan, which was a series of works on the western half of North America, I must of necessity treat of the aborigines at some time. But now, as ever, I was intent only on history, whose fascinations increased with my ever increasing appreciation of its importance. All our learning we derive from the past. To-day is the pupil of yesterday, this year of last year; drop by drop the activities of each successive hour are distilled from the experiences of the centuries.

And the moment was so opportune. Time enough had elapsed for these western shores to have a history, yet not enough, since civilization lighted here, to lose any considerable portion of it. Then, strange as it may seem, from the depths of despair I would sometimes rise to the firm conviction that with my facilities and determined purpose I could not only do this work, but that I could save to these Pacific States more of their early incidents than had been preserved to other nations; that I could place on record annals exceptionally complete and truthful; that I could write a history which as a piece of thorough work, if unaccompanied by any other excellence, would be given a place among the histories of the world.

Nor was the idea necessarily the offspring of egoism. I do not say that I regarded this country as the greatest whose history had ever been written, or myself as a very able historian. Far, very far from it. There were here no grand evolutions or revolutions of mankind, no mighty battles affecting the world's political balance, no ten centuries of darkness and non-progressional torpidity, no pageantry of kings, or diplomacy of statemen, or craft of priestly magnates with which to embellish my pages and stir to glowing 286 279 admiration the interest of my readers. The incidents of history here were in a measure tame, and for that reason all the more difficult of dramatic presentation. The wars of conquest were mostly with savages, or with nations palsied by superstition; and since the conquest no such spasms of progress have been made as to command the world's attention or admiration for any length of time. Not that fighting is the fittest subject for record, or that without social convulsions the nation has no history. The time has come when war should be deemed the deepest disgrace, a brutal way of settling differences, and the evolutions of arts, industries, and intellect the fairest flowers of progress. That which is constant is history, that which is elevating and ennobling, no less than debasing war and social disruptions. The philosophic or didactic writer of the present day is of opinion that to form correct conceptions of a people one should know something of the state of society and institutions that evolved them. The development of a nation's institutions, their structure and functions, are of no less importance than a narrative of a nation's fortunes in other respects, or the sayings and doings of its great men. Yet, if ever fancy whispered I could write well, I had but to read a page of Shakespeare, whose pencil was dipped in colors of no earthly extraction, and whose every finished sentence is a string of pearls, and the fountains of my ambition would dwindle to insignificance. What were my miserable efforts beside the conceptions of a Dante, the touch of a Doré, the brilliant imagery of a St John! How powerful are words to him who can handle them, and yet how insignificant in the hands of weaklings to describe these subtile shades of human qualities! What are the many thousand different words, made by the various combinations of the twenty-six letters of the alphabet, and of which many more might be made, since the possible combination of these words into others and into sentences is practically infinite—what are all these word-fitting 287 280 possibilities in the hands of a bungler, or of one who lacks the ideas to call them forth and array them? And yet, were the scope of human language a thousand times more varied, and there should arise one capable of wielding this enlarged vocabulary, the varied thought and feeling incident to humanity would still be but poorly expressed.

Not only the thoughts of a great poet but the language in which his thoughts are clothed display his genius. Undertake to express his idea in words of your own, and you will find its essence evaporated. Coleridge says you “might as well think of pushing a brick out of the wall with your forefinger as attempt to remove a word out of any of the finished passages of Shakespeare.” Become possessed with an idea, and you will then find language according to your ability to express it; it is poverty of ideas that makes men complain of the poverty of language. In the writings of Shakespeare imagination and experience, wisdom, wit, and charity, commingle and play upon and into each other until simple words glow like fire illuminated by supernatural significance.

And as thought becomes elevated, the simpler and plainer becomes expression. The seed of eloquence lies in the conception of the thought, and the simplicity with which it is expressed gives the sublime soul-stirring power. It is significant that the books which have held their highest place in literature for centuries have been written in the purest and simplest Saxon. The English language as used by Shakespeare and Milton shows amazing strength, flexibility, delicacy, and harmony.

Thus the billows of despondency passed over me, and at times it seemed as if my life and all my labors were empty air. Overwhelmed by the magnitude of my task, I sat for days and brooded, heart-sick and discouraged. What profiteth me this heavy labor? 288 281 My mind is vapid, my nerves unstrung; I have not the strength, physical or intellectual, for a work of such magnitude. I may succeed or I may fail. In either case some will approve, others will ridicule. And what is approval or ridicule to me? Even if success comes, what good will it do me? I do not profess to love my race or country better than another. I do this work to please neither God nor man, but only myself. It is based on a selfishness almost as broad as that of patriots and propagandists. I must toil on, denying myself companionship, which indeed was small hardship; I must deprive myself of every pleasure, even of the blessed air and sunshine, the sweetest gifts of nature, and which are freely bestowed upon the meanest of created things. These and nine tenths of the joys of association and recreation I must yield to musty books and dusty garret; I must hug this heaviness, and all because of an idea. All the powers of mind and body must be made captive to this one purpose; passion, prejudice, and pleasure, where they interfere. And yet must the worker often grope in vain for the power of mental concentration, while progress laughs mockingly. For such work, such self-denial, I cannot take my pay in praise. There must be some higher, some nobler aim. Ah! these failures, these heart-sicknesses. But write! write! write! The fiend is at my elbow and I must write. Maudlin stuff it may be, but I must write it down. Death alone can deliver me from these toils, can open a wide current for my stagnant thoughts and leaden sensibilities. And my prayer shall be, Let me die like Plato, at my table, pen in hand, and be buried among the scenes of my labors.

There have been men, and many of them, who felt that they must write, and yet who wrote with difficulty, and from no desire for fame, who wrote neither from a pretended anxiety to make men better nor under necessity. Why, then, did they write? Perhaps from the pressure of genius, perhaps from a lack of common sense. 289 282 No person knows less of the stuff he is made of than he who takes pen in hand and has nothing to say.

What profiteth it me? again I ask. Money? I shall die a poor man, and my children will have only their father's folly for an inheritance. Does God pay for such endeavor? I should have more heart did I but feel assured of some compensation hereafter, for this life seems pretty well lost to me. But even such assurance is denied me. Posthumous fame is but a phantom, the off-float from scarcely more solid contemporaneous opinion, the ghost of a man's deeds. In looking over my writings I sometimes doubt whom I serve most, Christ or Belial, or whether either will acknowledge me his servant. And yet the half is not told, for if it were, with the good Cid Hamete I might be applauded less for what I have written than for what I have omitted to write.

There is a quality of intellectual application that will never be satisfied with less than grand results. It is enough for some money-makers to gather and hoard, to feel themselves the possessors of wealth, their power increased by the power their dollars will measure; others such toad-life fails to satisfy; there must be with them a birth, a creation, as the fruit of their labor. And amidst such labors many cares are dissipated. As the Chinese say, “The dog in his kennel barks at his fleas, but the dog that is hunting does not feel them.” Labor pursued as pleasure is light, yet he who seeks only pleasure in his work will never find it. Pleasure is a good chance acquaintance, but a bad companion. It is the useful, the beneficial alone which gives true enjoyment, and in the attainment of this there is often much pain. Yet if life like the olive is a bitter fruit, when pressed it yields sweet oil, Jean Paul Richter would say.

It does not make much difference whether one receives impressions through the ears like Madame de Staël, or through the eyes like Ruskin, so long as one embraces opportunities and utilizes the results. To 290 283 read for my own pleasure or benefit was not sufficient for me; it was not consistent with the aims and industries of my past life, as I have elsewhere observed, which were never content unless there appeared something tangible as the result of each year's endeavor. Hence the melancholia which Albert Dürer pictures, and which otherwise would have devoured me, I never felt to that degree of intensity experienced by many students. Speaking of this brooding melancholy, which is so apt to be inseparable from the lives of severe workers, Mr Hamerton says: “I have known several men of action, almost entirely devoid of intellectual culture, who enjoyed an unbroken flow of animal energy, and were clearly free from the melancholy of Dürer, but I never intimately knew a really cultivated person who had not suffered from it more or less; and the greatest sufferers were the most conscientious thinkers and students.”

Then another train of thought would take possession of me, and I would argue to myself that after all, in the absence of a quality, material or acquired, there is always compensation, if not complete at least partial. Public speaking is an art which I have often coveted. To hold in rapt attention a thousand listeners whose presence and sympathy should feed fires radiating in dazzling conceits is a fascination often rising before the student of ardent longings, and most vividly of all before him in whom such talents are lamentably absent. Yet the rule is, to which I know exceptions, that the brilliant speaker is seldom the best scholar or the most profound thinker.

It is told of the vocalist Lablache that by facial expression he could represent a thunder-storm in a most remarkable manner. The gloom which over-shadowed the face, as clouds the sky, deepened into darkness, then lowered as an angry tempest. Lightning flashed from the winking eyes, twitching the muscles of the face and mouth, and thunder shook the head. Finally the storm died away, and the 291 284 returning sun illumined the features and wreathed the face in smiles. There is something irresistible in the tone and manner of an eloquent speaker; likewise in the flowing thoughts of a graceful writer. As in meeting a stranger, we are at first attracted by the dress and polish which conceal character rather than by qualities of the head and heart, of which we know nothing. But since science now so often strips from the kernel of things their soft and comely covering, history is no longer willing to sacrifice for meat life, or for the body raiment.

Following violent exercise, mental or physical, comes the reaction; sinking of spirit follows elevation of spirit. Night succeeds day in mental efforts, and dark indeed is the night of the intellectual life. The men whom we regard most happy and successful are not free from this blue-sickness; for, passing the extreme cases of morbid melancholy such as was displayed by Wordsworth, Byron, and Shelley, the curses attending the imaginative temperament are too plainly palpable even in such happy productions as Werther and Maud. The intensity and excitement which produce a poem, as a matter of course can be but transient; that which follows too often causes the poet to appear as much less than man, as in the authorship he appeared to be more than man.

Books are a mighty enginery. Yet before men became bookish there issued from them an influence subtile as air and strong as the tempest. To the survivors of the Athenian host annihilated at Syracuse it was ordained that any prisoner who could recite passages or scenes from the dramas of Euripides should be taken from the quarries and kindly treated in Sicilian houses. What weapon was here! One little dreamed of, even by him who held it.

Literary activity manifested itself in the days of the empire, when for two hundred years there had been a steady flow of wealth from all parts of the civilized world into the lap of Rome. Refined tastes 292 285 followed that love of enjoyment and display which is the first fruits of money, and with luxury came culture. In gorgeous palaces were crowded the treasures of Hellenic civilization; manuscripts and works of art, gathered by Greek collectors, found their way into the libraries of Asia and Europe. In Rome, two thousand years ago, when an author about to read his manuscript appeared before the audience, he sometimes arrayed himself in a gayly colored hood, ear bandages, and a comforter about his neck, hoping by thus decking his person to give the greater efficacy to his discourse. So runs fashion. In the days of chivalry learning was accounted almost a disgrace. Priests might know a little without loss of caste, but women and churls had other and more highly esteemed uses. All else were knights-errant, and if one of these could read he kept the knowledge of the accomplishment hidden from his fellows. To the soldier of the sixteenth century money-making was a low occupation, especially if it involved work. They might kill for gold but they must not dig for it. Now any one may make money, even at the cost of damaged honor, and all is well; yet few understand how a sane man can eschew fortune, pleasure, and indeed fame, for the satisfaction of gratifying his intellectual tastes. Mrs Tuthill says in an introduction to one of Ruskin's volumes: “The enthusiasm of a man of genius appears to the multitude like madness.”

Before my cooler judgment my self-imposed task presented itself in this form: Next after gathering, already partially accomplished, was the acquisition of power over the mass. From being slave of all this knowledge, I must become master. This was already partially accomplished by means of the index, as before explained, which placed at my command the instantaneous appearance of whatever my authors had said on any subject. To know anything perfectly, one must know many things perfectly. Then surely 293 286 with all the evidence extant on any historical point or incident before me I should be able with sufficient study and thought to determine the truth, and in plain language to write it down. My object seemed to be the pride and satisfaction it would afford me to improve somewhat the records of my race, save something of a nation's history, which but for me would drop into oblivion; to catch from the mouths of living witnesses, just ready to take their final departure, important facts explaining new incidents and strange experiences; to originate and perfect a system by which means alone this history could be gathered and written; to lay the corner-stone of this fair land's literature while the land was yet young and ambitious, and accomplish in one generation what by the slower stage-coach processes hitherto employed even by the latest and best historians would have occupied ten generations, or indeed from the very nature of things might never have been accomplished at all. Here-upon turns all progress, all human advancement. One of the main differences between civilization and savagism is that one preserves its experiences as they accumulate and the other does not. Savagism ceases to be savagism and becomes civilization the moment the savage begins a record of events.

Mine was a great work that could be performed by a small man. As Beaumarchais says: “Médiocre et rampant, et l'on arrive à tout.” Vigorous and persistent effort for twenty or thirty years, with sufficient self-abnegation, a liberal outlay of money, and an evenly balanced mind, not carried away by its enthusiasm, could accomplish more at this time than would be later possible under any circumstances. And although in my efforts like the eagle, which mistook the bald head of æschylus for a stone, I sometimes endeavored to crack the shell of my tortoise on the wrong subject; and although much of the time the work was apparently stationary, yet in reality like a glacier it was slowly furrowing for itself a path.

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“Good aims not always make good books,” says Mrs Browning. So with mind well tempered and ambition held in strict control, I determined to work and wait. Some men live in their endeavors. Unless they have before them intricate work they are not satisfied. The moment one difficult undertaking is accomplished they straightway pine for another. Great pleasure is felt in finishing a tedious and difficult piece of work, but long before one was done by me I had a dozen other tedious and difficult pieces planned. Early in my efforts the conquest of Mexico attracted my attention. This brilliant episode lay directly in my path or I never should have had the audacity to grapple with it after the graceful and philosophic pen of Prescott had traced its history. This story of the conquest possessed me with a thrilling interest which might almost carry inspiration; and before me lay not only the original authorities, with much new and unused collateral information, but complete histories of that epoch, in English, Spanish, French, Italian, and German—careful histories from able and eloquent pens. These might be the guide of the literary fledgling. Ah! there was the trouble. Had there been any need for such a work; had the work not been done better than I could hope to do it; had I not these bright examples all before me, seemingly in derision of my puny efforts, I should have been better able to abstract the facts and arrange them in readable order.

My first concern was the manner of fitting words together; the facts seemed for the moment of secondary consideration. To array in brilliant colors empty ideas was nearer model history-writing than the sharpest philosophy in homely garb. The consequence was, this mountain of my ambition after hard labor brought forth a few chapters of sententious nothings, which a second writing seemed only to confuse yet more, and which after many sighings and heart-sinkings I tore up, and cleared my table of 295 288 authorities on the grand conquest. The result brought to my mind the experience of Kant, who for the second edition of his Critique of Pure Reason rewrote some parts of it in order to give them greater perspicuity, though in reality the explanation was more enigmatical than what had been first written.

Now, I said, will I begin at the beginning, where I should have begun. The Pacific States territory, as by this time I had it marked, extended south to the Atrato river, so as to include the whole of the isthmus of Darien. I would notice the first appearance of the Spaniards along these shores. I would make my first volume the conquest of Darien, bringing the history down from the discovery by Columbus and the first touching of the North American continent at the Isthmus by Rodrigo de Bastidas in 1501, to about the year 1530, to be followed by a chapter on the expedition of Pizarro from Panamá to Peru.

So I entered upon a thorough study of the discovery of America, of society and civilization in Europe at and prior to the discovery; paying particular attention to Spanish character and institutions. At this time I was almost wholly occupied in handling the ideas of others; but it was not long before I began to have ideas of my own; just as Spinoza in writing a synopsis of the system of Descartes threw into the principles of Cartesian philosophy much original thought and speculation while scarcely conscious of it. I wrote a long dissertation for what I conceived a fit introduction to a history of the Pacific States. To follow this introduction, with some assistance I prepared a summary of voyages and discovery from the earliest times to about 1540.

Over these two summaries I labored long and faithfully, spending fully six months on them with all the assistance I could utilize. Oftentimes work arose where assistance was impracticable; I could perform it better alone: with a dozen good men at my elbow I have nevertheless written many volumes alone, 296 289 taking out all notes myself, because I could not profitably employ help. And further than this, I often carried on no less than four or five distinct works pari passu.

To my help in writing this introduction I called a man well informed in all mediæval knowledge. In all science and regarding all schools his opinions were modern, yet he could readily explain the theories of those who held opposite doctrines. Surely, I thought, in preparing such an essay as I desired such a person would be invaluable. So I instructed him to study the subject, particularly that part of it relating to literature, language, and learning, with the view of his gathering some pertinent facts for me. He read, and read, eagerly devouring all he could lay hands on. And he would have continued reading to this day had I been willing to pay him his salary regularly for it. He liked to read. And I said to myself, this is glorious! Surely, as the result of such enthusiasm I shall have a bushel of invaluable notes.

Meanwhile I labored hard myself, studying carefully over two hundred volumes bearing upon the subject, taking notes and committing my ideas to paper. The trouble was—as was always the trouble—to limit the sketch, yet make it symmetrical and complete. Occasionally I would urge my assistant to bring his investigations to some practical result, for after reading two months he had not half a dozen pages of written matter to show.

“Let me get it fairly into my head,” said he, “and I will soon commit it to paper.”

And so for another month he continued the stuffing process, until I became tired of it, and told him plainly to give me what he had gathered and leave the subject. A fortnight later he handed me about thirty pages of commonplace information, in which there was hardly a note that proved any addition to my own researches. And this was the result of his three months' hard work, for he did really apply himself 297 290 diligently to the task, and thought all the time that he was making progress until he came to the summing up, which disappointed him as much as myself. While engaged in the study his mind had absorbed a vast amount of information, which might some time prove valuable to him, but was of no use to me. And so it often happened, particularly at the first, and before I had applied a thorough system of drilling; months and years were vainly spent by able persons in the effort to extract material for me. With regard to the introduction, as was yet often the case, I had vague conceptions only of what I should require, for the reason that I could not tell what shape the subject would assume when wrought out. This was the case with many a chapter or volume. Its character I could not altogether control; nay, rather than control it I would let fact have free course, and record only as directed by the subject itself. One is scarcely fit to write upon a subject until one has written much upon it. That which is I would record; yet that which is may be differently understood by different persons. I endeavored always to avoid planting myself upon an opinion, and saying thus and so it is, and shall be, all incidental and collateral facts being warped accordingly; rather would I write the truth, let the result be what it might.

He who aims at honesty will never leave a subject on which he discourses without an effort at a judicial view, or without an attempt to separate himself from his subject and to marshal the arguments on the other side. He will contradict his own statement, and demur at his conclusions, until the matter is so thoroughly sifted in his own mind that a highly prejudiced view would be improbable. He who warps fact or fails to give in evidence against himself is not entitled to our respect. The writer of exact history must lay aside, so far as possible, his emotional nature. Knowing that his judgment is liable to prejudice, and that it is impossible to be always conscious of its presence, he 298 291 will constantly suspect himself and rigidly review his work. If there was one thing David Hume piqued himself on more than another, it was his freedom from bias; and yet the writings of no historian uncover more glaring prejudices than do his in certain places. A classicist of the Diderot and Voltaire school, he despised too heartily the writings of the monkish chroniclers to examine them. Macaulay sacrificed truthfulness to an epigrammatic style, the beauty and force of which lay in exaggeration. It has always been my custom to examine carefully authorities currently held of little or no value. Not that I ever derived, or expected to derive, much benefit from them, but it was a satisfaction to know everything that had been written on the subject I was treating. And as for bias, though not pretending to be free from it—who that lives is?—yet were I ever knowingly to reach the point where pride of opinion was preferred before truth, I should wish from that moment to lay down my pen. Should ever any obstacle or temptation interpose to warp the facts before me; should ever fear, favor, conventionality, tradition, or a desire for praise or popularity, or any other vile contravention, wittingly come between me and plain unadulterated truth, I should say, Palsied be the hand that writes a lie!

The introduction to my history was exclusively my own theme; in some subjects others might to some extent participate with me, but not in this. Hence, during the fourteen weeks my really talented and intelligent assistant was floundering in a sea of erudition, with little or nothing available in the end to show for it, I myself had taken out material from which I easily wrote three hundred pages, though after twice re-arranging and rewriting I reduced it one half, eliminated half of what was left, and printed the remainder.

To form a critical estimate of our own literary ability is impossible. “It is either very good or very bad, I don't know which,” sighed Hawthorne as he 299 292 placed in the hands of a friend the manuscript of his Scarlet Letter. It is often more difficult to form a just opinion of the character or ability of a long esteemed friend than of an ordinary acquaintance; it is more difficult to form a critical estimate of a contemporary than of a writer of the past. As Cervantes says: “Porque no ay padre ni madre á quien sus hijos le parezcan féos: y en los que lo son del entendimiento, corremos este engaño.” Did not Jean Paul Richter, with faith in himself, labor in the deepest poverty for ten long years before his genius was even recognized? Who are our great men of to-day? Blinded by the dust of battle, if we have them we cannot see them. Our children and grandchildren will tell; we do not know. The current of passing impressions, the record of contemporaneous opinion, differ widely from the after judgments of history. “Yet the judgment of history,” says one, “must be based on contemporaneous evidence.”

In all this the failure of certain of my assistants to prove profitable to my work was a source of small anxiety to me as compared with my own failures. It was what I could do with my own brain and fingers, and that alone, which gave me pleasure. “Not what I have, but what I do is my kingdom,” says Teufelsdrockh. If by securing help I might accomplish more, well; but the work itself must be mine alone, planned by me and executed by me.

And now was fully begun this new life of mine, the old life being dead; a sea of unborn experiences which I prayed might be worth the sailing over, else might I as well have ceased to be ere myself embarking. This change of life was as the birth of a new creature, a baptism in a new atmosphere. With the chrysalis of business was left the ambition of ordinary acquisition, so that the winged intellect might rise into the glorious sunshine of yet nobler acquisition. The wealth which might minister to sensual gratification was made to subserve the wealth of intellectual 300 293 gratification. Literature is its own recompense. “The reward of a good sentence is to have written it,” says Higginson. And again, “the literary man must love his art, as the painter must love painting, out of all proportion to its rewards; or rather, the delight of the work must be its own reward.” Ten thousand since Hippocrates have said that art is longer than life. Whatever I undertook to do seemed long, interminably long it seemed to me. In the grammar of mankind it requires nearly half a century of study to learn that the present tense of life is now. Nay, not only is the present tense now, but the present is the only tense; the past for us is gone; the future, who shall say that it is his?

Looking back over the past my life lies spread before me in a series of lives, a succession of deaths and new life, until I feel myself older than time, though young and hopeful in my latest, newest life. And each life has its individual growth. The thoughtful student of books is an endogenous plant, growing from the inside; the man of the world is the exogenous, or outside-grower. Each has its advantage; the inside-growers are cellular and fibrous, while the outside-growers are woody and pithy.

I had now become fully imbued with the idea that there was a work to do, and that this was my work. I entered upon it with relish, and as I progressed it satisfied me. The truth is, I found myself at this time nearer the point reached by Gibbon when he said, “I was now master of my style and subject, and while the measure of my daily performance was enlarged, I discovered less reason to cancel or correct.” By reason of the late soul-storms, through the clear dry atmosphere of my present surroundings, the distant mountain of toilsome ascent was brought near and made inviting.

Following a fit of despondency, a triumph was like the dancing of light on the icy foliage after a gloomy storm. In planning and executing, in loading my 301 294 mind and discharging it on paper, in finding outlet and expression to pent thought, in the healthful exercise of my mental faculties, I found relief such as I had never before experienced, relief from the corroding melancholy of stifled aspirations, and a pleasure more exquisite than any I had hitherto dreamed of. There is a pivot on which man's happiness and unhappiness not unevenly balance. How keen this enjoyment after an absence or break of any kind in my labors. Back to my work, my sweet work, surrounded by wife and children; away from hates and heart-burnings, from brutish snarlings, law courts, and rounds of dissipating society; back to the labor that fires the brain and thrills the heart. For weeks after a period of business and society desiccation, the literary worker can do little else than plant himself in his closet, day after day, until he again in some degree becomes filled with his subject.

Hermonitas thought he might achieve virtue, as if by scaling a mountain, and reach the top in twenty years. “But,” said he, “if once attained, one minute of enjoyment on the summit will fully recompense me for all the time and pains.”

Let the world wag. There might be wars, convulsions, earthquakes, epidemics; there might be business or social troubles, none of them should come nigh so long as I had my library and my labors in which to hide myself. My mind had hungered for food, and had found it.

“The consciousness of a literary mission,” says Stoddard, “is an agreeable one; for however delusive it may be, it raises its possessor for the time being above his fellows, and places him in his own estimation among the benefactors of his race.” With Pliny I can heartily say, “I find my joy and solace in literature. There is no gladness that this cannot increase, no sorrow that it cannot lessen.”

This, however, may be all very well for the sorrow, but it is bad for the literature. Yet Schubert says:

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“Grief sharpens the understanding and strengthens the soul, whereas joy seldom troubles itself about the former, and makes the latter either effeminate or frivolous.” Sorrow may drive a man to study, as hunger does to labor, but as labor can be better performed when the body is not overcome by hunger, so literature prospers best when the heart is free from grief.

Though ever steadfast in my purpose, I was often obliged to change plans. I kept on, however, at the history until I had completed the first volume, until I had written fully the conquest of Darien and the conquest of Peru—until I had rewritten the volume, the first writing not suiting me. This I did, taking out even most of the notes myself. But long before I had finished this volume I became satisfied that something must be done with the aborigines. Wherever I touched the continent with my Spaniards they were there, a dusky, disgusting subject. I did not fancy them. I would gladly have avoided them. I was no archæologist, ethnologist, or antiquary, and had no desire to become such. My tastes in the matter, however, did not dispose of the subject. The savages were there, and there was no help for me; I must write them up to get rid of them.

Nor was their proper place the general history, or any of the several parts thereof; nor was it the place to speak of them where first encountered. It would not do to break off a narrative of events in order to describe the manners and customs, or the language, or the mythology of a native nation. The reader should know something of both peoples thus introduced to each other before passing the introduction; he should know all about them.

Once settled that the natives must be described in a work set apart for them, the question arose, How should they be treated? Uppermost in the mind when the words ‘Indian’ and ‘Digger’ appeared were the ragged, half-starved, and half-drunken prowlers 303 296 round the outskirts of civilization, cooped in reservations or huddled in missions; and a book on them would treat of their thefts, massacres, and capture. Little else than raids, fightings, and exterminations we heard concerning them; these, coupled with opprobrious epithets which classed them as cattle rather than as human beings, tended in no wise to render the subject fascinating to me. Indeed I never could bring my pen to write the words ‘buck,’ ‘squaw,’ or ‘Digger,’ if I could help it. The first two are vulgarisms of the lowest order; the third belongs to no race or nation in particular, but was applied indiscriminately to the more debased natives of California and Nevada.

In fact the subject was not popularly regarded as very interesting, unless formed into a bundle of thrilling tales, and that was exactly what I would not do. Battles and adventures belonged to history proper; here was required all that we could learn of them before the coming of the Europeans: some history, all that they had, but mostly description. They should be described as they stood in all their native glory, and before the withering hand of civilization was laid upon them. They should be described as they were first seen by Europeans along the several paths of discovery, by the conquerors of Darien, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Guatemala, and Mexico, during the first half of the sixteenth century; by the missionaries to the north; by the American fur-hunters, the French Canadian trappers, the Hudson's Bay Company's servants, and the Russian voyagers and seal-catchers on the shores of Alaska; also by circumnavigators and travellers in various parts—thus the plan presented itself to my mind.

As a matter of course, much personal investigation in such a work was impossible. For the purpose of studying the character and customs of hundreds of nations and tribes I could not spend a lifetime with each; and to learn the six hundred and more dialects 304 297 which I found on these shores was impracticable, even had they all been spoken at the time of my investigations. I must take the word of those who had lived among these people, and had learned during the three centuries of their discovering whatever was known of them.

Spreading before me the subject with hardly any other guide than practical common-sense, I resolved the question into its several divisions. What is it we wish to know about these people? I asked myself. First, their appearance, the color of the skin, the texture of the hair, form, features, physique. Then there were the houses in which they lived, the food they ate, how they built their houses, and obtained and preserved their food, their implements and weapons; there were ornaments and dress to be considered, as well as many other questions, such as what constituted wealth with them; their government, laws, and religious institutions; the power and position of rulers, and the punishment of crimes; the arts and intellectual advancement; family relations, husband and wife, children, slaves; the position of woman, including courtship, marriage, polygamy, childbirth, and chastity; their amusements, dances, games, feasts, bathing, smoking, drinking, gambling, racing; their diseases, treatment of the sick, medicine-men; their mourning, burial, and many other like topics relative to life and society among these unlettered denizens of this blooming wilderness.

Manners and customs being the common term employed by ethnologists for such description, unable to find, after careful study and consideration of the question, a better one, I adopted it. The first division of my subject, then, was the manners and customs of these peoples. But here a difficulty arose. In points of intellectual growth and material progress, of relative savagism and civilization, there were such wide differences between the many nations of the vast Pacific seaboard that to bring them all together would 305 298 make an incongruous mass, and to fit them to one plan would be far-fetched and impracticable.

For example, there were the snake-eating Shoshones of Utah, and the cloth-makers and land-tillers of the Pueblo towns of New Mexico; there were the blubber-eating dwellers of the subterranean dens of Alaska, and the civilized city-builders of the Mexican table-land; the coarse brutal inhabitants of British Columbia, and the refined and intelligent Mayas and Quichés of Central America. What had these in common to be described more than Arab, Greek, and African?

Obviously there must be some division. The subject could not be handled in such a form. Whatever might be their relation as regards the great continental divisions of the human family, the terms race and species as applied to the several American nations I soon discovered to be meaningless. As convincing arguments might be advanced to prove them of one race as of twenty, of three as of forty. Some call the Eskimos one race, and all the rest in America from Hudson Bay to Tierra del Fuego one race. Some segregate the Aztecs; other distinguish the Californians as Malays, and the natives of Brazil as Africans. I soon perceived that ethnologists still remained mystified and at variance, and I resolved not to increase the confusion.

This I could do: I could group them geographically, and note physique, customs, institutions, beliefs, and, most important of all, languages; then he who would might classify them according to race and species. In all my work I was determined to keep upon firm ground, to avoid meaningless and even technical terms, to avoid theories, speculations, and superstitions of every kind, and to deal only in facts. This I relied on more than on any other one thing. My work could not be wholly worthless if I gathered only facts, and arranged them in some form which should bring them within reach of those who 306 299 had not access to my material, or who could not use it if they had; whereas theories might be overthrown as worthless. I had not studied long the many questions arising-from a careful survey of the material brought forth and arranged for my Native Races before I became aware that many things which were long since supposed to be settled were not settled, and much which I would be expected to decide never could be decided by any one. The more I thought of these things the stronger became an inherent repugnance to positiveness in cases where nothing was positive.

Often we hear it urged upon the young, “Get opinions, make up your mind upon the leading questions of the day, and once having formed an opinion, hold it fast.” All matters from Moses to Darwin, all disputed questions relative to this world and the next, are to be forever decided in the mind of a young man just setting out in life, and whether the conclusions thus jumped at be right or wrong they must be forever fixed and immovable. None but the ignorant egoist, or one with an ill-balanced mind, will attempt to arrive at fixed conclusions on any subject with only partial data before him.

Many complained because I did not settle insoluble questions for them, because I did not determine beyond peradventure the origin of the Americans,where they came from, who their fathers were, and who made them. But far more found this absence of vain and tiresome speculation commendable.

Finally, after much deliberation to enable me to grasp the subject which lay spread over such a vast territory, I concluded to divide manners and customs into two parts, making of the wild or savage tribes one division, and of the civilized nations another. The civilized nations all lay together in two main families, the Nahuas of central Mexico and the Mayas of Central America. The savage tribes, however, extended from the extreme north to the extreme southern limits 307 300 of our Pacific States territory, completely surrounding the civilized nations. The wild tribes, therefore, must be grouped; and I could reach no better plan than to adopt arbitrarily territorial divisions, never dividing, however, a nation, tribe, or family that seemed clearly one. There were the Pueblos of New Mexico, who could be placed among the savage or civilized nations according to convenience. I placed them among the wild tribes, though they were as far in advance of the Nootkas of Vancouver island as the Mayas were in advance of the Pueblos. Indeed, like most of these expressions, the terms savage and civilized are purely relative. Where is the absolute savage on the face of the earth to-day; where the man absolutely perfect in his civilization? What we call civilization is not a fixed state, but an irresistible and eternal moving onward.

The groupings I at last adopted for the Manners and Customs of the Wild Tribes were: Beginning at the extreme north, all those nations lying north of the fifty-fifth parallel I called, arbitrarily, Hyperboreans; to those whose lands were drained by the Columbia river and its tributaries I gave the name Columbians; the Californians included in their division the inhabitants of the great basin; then there were the New Mexicans, the Wild Tribes of Mexico, and the Wild Tribes of Central America. There was no special reason in beginning at the north rather than at the south. Indeed, in treating the subject of antiquities I began at the south, but this was partly because the chief monumental remains were in Central America and Mexico, and few of importance north of Mexico. And there were other topics to be examined, such as languages, myths, and architectural remains; and the civilized nations had their own written history to be given.

It was my purpose to lay before the world absolutely all that was known of these peoples at the time of the appearing among them of their European 308 301 exterminators. All real knowledge of them I would present, and their history, so far as they had a history. I had little to say of the aborigines or their deeds since the coming of the Europeans, of their wars against invaders and among themselves; of repartimientos, presidios, missions, reservations, and other institutions for their conquest, conversion, protection, or oppression. My reason for this was that all these things, so far as they possessed importance, belonged to the modern history of the country where they were to receive due attention. The wild tribes in the absence of written records had very little history, and that little was mingled with the crudest of supernatural conceptions.

Besides these several branches of the subject I could think of no others. These included all that related in any wise to their temporalities or their spiritualities; everything relating to mind, soul, body, and estate, language, and literature. The last mentioned subjects, namely, myths, languages, antiquities, and history, I thought best to treat separately, and for the following reasons: The myths of these peoples, their strange conceptions of their origin, their deities, and their future state, would present a much more perfect and striking picture placed together where they might the better be analyzed and compared. And so with languages and the other. These might or might not be taken up territorially; in this respect I would be governed by the subject-matter at the time I treated it. It resulted that as a rule they were so treated; that is, beginning at one end or the other of the territory and proceeding systematically to the other end. Myths and languages each begin at the north; antiquities proceed from the south; history is confined mostly to the table-lands of Mexico and Central America, and had no need of territorial treatment.

All this I hoped to condense, at the outset, into two volumes, the first of which would comprise the manners and customs of both savage and civilized tribes, the other divisions filling the second volume. 309 302 But I soon saw that, after the severest and most persistent compressing, the manners and customs of the wild tribes alone would fill a volume. In each of the six great territorial divisions of this branch of the subject there was much in common with all the rest. A custom or characteristic once mentioned was seldom again described, differences only being noticed; but in every nation there was much which, though generally similar to like characteristics in other tribes, so differed in minor if not in main particulars as to demand a separate description. Hence I was obliged either to take more space or let the varying customs go unnoticed, and the latter course I could not make up my mind to adopt.

So the first volume became two almost at the outset; for it was soon apparent that the portraiture of the civilized nations—a description of their several eras; their palaces, households, and government; their castes and classes, slaves, tenure of land, and taxation; their education, marriage, concubinage, childbirth, and baptism; their feasts and amusements; their food, dress, commerce, and war customs; their laws and law courts, their arts and manufactures; their calendar and picture-writing; their architecture, botanical gardens, medicines, funeral rites, and the like—would easily fill a volume.

Proceeding further in the work it was ascertained that myths and languages would together require a volume; that the subject of antiquities, with the necessary three or four hundred illustrations, would occupy a volume, and that the primitive history of the Nahuas and Mayas, with which Brasseur de Bourbourg filled four volumes, could not be properly written in less than one.

Thus we see the two volumes swollen to five, even then one of the principal difficulties in the work being to confine the ever swelling subjects within these rigidly prescribed limits. So great is the tendency, so much easier is it, when one has an interesting 310 303 subject, to write it out and revel in description, rather than to cramp it into a sometimes distorting compass, that whatever I take up is almost sure to overrun first calculations as to space.

Five volumes, then, comprised the Native Races of the Pacific States: the first being the Wild Tribes, their manners and customs; the second, the Civilized Nations of Mexico and Central America; the third, Myths and Languages of both savage and civilized nations; the fourth, Antiquities, including Architectural remains; and the fifth, Primitive History and Migrations. A copious index, filling one hundred and sixty-two pages, and referring alphabetically to each of the ten or twelve thousand subjects mentioned in the five volumes, completed the work.

Maps showing the locations of the aborigines according to their nation, family, and tribe, were introduced wherever necessary, the first volume containing six, one for each of the great territorial divisions.

Such was the plan; now as to the execution. As the scheme was entirely my own, as I had consulted with no one outside of the library about it, and with my assistants but little, I had only to work it out after my own fashion.

The questions of race and species settled, to my own satisfaction at least, in an Ethnological Introduction, which constitutes the first chapter of the first volume, I brought together for following chapters all the material touching the first main division, the Hyperboreans, and proceeded to abstract it. It was somewhat confusing to me at first to determine the subjects to be treated and the order in which I should name them; but sooner than I had anticipated there arose in my mind what I conceived to be natural sequence in all these things, and there was little difficulty or hesitation. Above all things I sought simplicity in style, substance, and arrangement, fully realizing that the more easily I could make myself understood, the better my readers would be pleased.

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One of the most difficult parts of the work was to locate the tribes and compile the maps. Accurately to define the boundaries of primitive nations, much of the time at war and migrating with the seasons, is impossible, from the fact that, although they aim to have limits of their lands well defined, these boundaries are constantly shifting. The best I could do was to take out all information relative to the location of every tribe, bring together what each author had said upon the different peoples, and print it in his own language, under the heading Tribal Boundaries, in small type at the end of every chapter.

Thus there were as many of these sections on tribal boundaries as there were divisions; and from these I had drawn a large ethnographical map of the whole Pacific States, from which were engraved the subdivisions inserted at the beginning of each section. In this way every available scrap of material in existence was used and differences as far as possible were reconciled.

When my first division was wholly written I submitted it in turn to each of my principal assistants, and invited their criticim, assuring them that I should be best pleased with him who could find most fault with it. A number of suggestions were made, some of which I acted on. In general the plan as first conceived was carried out; and to-day I do not see how it could be changed for the better. I then went on and explained to my assistants how I had reached the results, and giving to each a division I requested them in like manner to gather and arrange the material, and place it before me in the best form possible for my use. During the progress of this work I succeeded in utilizing the labors of my assistants to the full extent of my anticipations; indeed, it was necessary I should do so. Otherwise from a quarter to a half century would have been occupied in this one work. Without taking into account the indexing of thousands of volumes merely to point out where 312 305 material existed, or the collecting of the material, there was in each of these five volumes the work of fifteen men for eight months, or of one man for ten years. This estimate, I say, carefully made after the work was done, showed that there had been expended on the Native Races labor equivalent to the well directed efforts of one man, every day, Sundays excepted, from eight o'clock in the morning till six at night, for a period of fifty years. In this estimate I do not include the time lost in unsuccessful experiments, but only the actual time employed in taking out the material, writing the work, preparing the index for the five volumes, which alone was one years' labor, proofreading, and comparison with authorities. The last two requirements consumed an immense amount of time, the proof being read eight or nine times, and every reference compared with the original authority after the work was in type. This seemed to me necessary to insure accuracy, on account of the many foreign languages in which the authorities were written, and the multitude of native and strange words which crowded my pages. Both text and notes were rewritten, compared, and corrected without limit, until they were supposed to be perfect; and I venture to say that never a work of that character and magnitude went to press finally with fewer errors.

Fifty years! I had not so many to spare upon this work. Possibly I might die before the time had expired or the volumes were completed; and what should I do with the two or three hundred years' additional work planned?

When the oracle informed Mycerinus that he had but six years to live, he thought to outwit the gods by making the night as day. Lighting his lamps at nightfall he feasted until morning, thus striving to double his term. I must multiply my days in some way to do this work. I had attempted the trick of Mycerinus, but it would not succeed with me, for straightway the outraged deities ordained that for 313 306 every hour so stolen I must repay fourfold. The work of my assistants, besides saving me an immense amount of drudgery and manual labor, left my mind always fresh, and open to receive and retain the subject as a whole. I could institute comparisons and indulge in generalizations more freely, and I believe more effectually, than with my mind overwhelmed by a mass of detail. I do not know how far others have carried this system. Herbert Spencer, I believe, derived much help from assistants. German authors have the faculty of multiplying their years with the aid of others in a greater degree than any other people. Besides having scholars in various parts of the country at work for him, Bunsen employed five or six secretaries. Professors in the German universities are most prolific authors, and these almost to a man have the assistance of one or two students.

Thus says Hurst: “While the real author is responsible for every word that goes out under his own name, and can justly claim the parentage of the whole idea, plan, and scope of the work, he is spared much of the drudgery incident to all book-making which is not the immediate first fruit of imagination. Where history is to be ransacked, facts to be grouped, and matters of pure detail to be gleaned from various sources, often another could do better service than the author.” The young Germans who thus assist authors, highly prize the discipline by means of which they often become authors themselves. At Halle, during his half century of labor, Tholuck had several theological students at work for him, some of whom were members of his own family. And thence proceeded several famous authors, among whom were Kurtz and Held. So Jacobi and Piper started forth from Neander. And the system is growing in favor in the United States.

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CHAPTER XIII.

THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. Murciélagos literarios Que hacés á pluma y á pelo, Si queréis vivir con todos Miráos en este espejo.

Iriarte.

ALL the anxiety I had hitherto felt in regard to the Native Races was as author thereof; now I had to undergo the trials of publishing.

Business experience had taught me that the immediate recognition, even of a work of merit, depends almost as much on the manner of bringing it forth as upon authorship. So easily swayed are those who pass judgment on the works of authors; so greatly are they ruled by accidental or incidental causes who form for the public their opinion, that pure substantial merit is seldom fully and alone recognized.

I do not mean by this that the better class of critics are either incompetent or unfair, that they cannot distinguish a meritorious work from a worthless one, or that, having determined the value of a production in their own minds, they will not so write it down. Yet comparatively speaking there are few reviewers of this class. Many otherwise good journals, both in America and in Europe, publish miserable book notices.

To illustrate: Would the average newspaper publisher on the Pacific coast regard with the same eyes a book thrust suddenly and unheralded upon his attention as the production of a person whom he had never known except as a shopkeeper, one whom he 315 308 had never suspected of aspiring to literature, as if the same book were placed before him with explanation, and bearing upon it the approving stamp of those whose opinions must overrule even his own; would he handle it with the same hands, and would the print of it, and the paper, binding, and subject-matter, and style of it be to him the same?

How differently the most discriminating, for the moment at least, would regard a volume of verses if told beforehand that in the writer burned brightly the fires of genius, of if with ridicule he was pronounced an illiterate crack-brained rhymster. How much has the lewdness of Byron and the religious infidelity of Shelley to do with our appreciation of their poems? Lamartine called the author of Cosmos, before Humboldt had made his greatest reputation, “a clever man, but without much real merit.” “Motley,” writes Mérimée to his Incognita, “though an American is a man of talent.” Here was sound judgment, in due time, seen rising above prejudice. Sannazaro, the Italian poet, for an epigram of six lines on the beauty of Venice received six hundred ducats from the Venetian senate. Yet who reads Sannazaro now? The pride of these old men was flattered, and the sentiment went farther with them than merit. Yet there is no study productive of higher results, and such as are the most beneficial to the race than the life and labors of prominent men; for in it we find all that is best of both history and biography. Pericles boasted that at Athens sour looks were not thrown by his neighbors upon a man on account of his eccentricities.

Addison wished to know his author before reading his works; De Quincey, afterward. Yet many, in forming the acquaintance of an author, like best the natural way; that is, as one forms the acquaintance of the man: first an introduction, which shall tell who and what he is, time and place of birth, education and 316 309 occupation. Then let it be seen what he has done to demand attention; give of the labors of his brain some of the fruits; and if by this time they have not had enough of him, they will enter with relish into the details of his life, habits, temper, and peculiarities.

Hordes of literary adventurers are constantly coming and going, not one in a thousand of whom will be known a century hence; and among these are so-called scientists with their long-drawn speculations and unanswerable theories, to say nothing of doctors of various degrees and instructors in supernatural sleight-of-hand.

Philosophers are these fellows after the order of Diogenes the cynic. “One needs no education,” they say with their master, “or reading, or such nonsense, for this system; it is the real short cut to reputation. Be you the most ordinary person, cobbler, sausage-monger, carpenter, pawnbroker, nothing hinders your becoming the object of popular admiration, provided only that you've impudence enough, and brass enough, and a happy talent for bad language.” Almost every man endowed with talents which would win success in one field affects, or has some time in his life affected, a pursuit for which he has no talent. Bentley, Sainte-Beuve, and many another, fancied themselves great poets when criticism only was their forte. Praise Girardet's pictures and he brings you his verses; praise Canova's sculpture and he brings a picture. The good comic actor often cares little for comedy, but delights in tragedy; if Douglas Jerrold, the successful wit, could only write on natural philosophy he would be a made man. To his dying day Sainte-Beuve did not cease to lament his slighted muse; yet he would never have become a poet, even had he written as many lines as the Persian Ferdosi who in thirty years ground out one hundred and twenty thousand verses. After his third failure he abandoned the idea of further attempts at publishing poetry and confined himself to criticism. Goethe says: “Der Mensch mag sich wenden wohin 317 310 er will, er mag unternehmen was es auch sey, stets wird er auf jenen Weg wieder zurückkehren, den ihm die Natur einmal vorgezeichnet hat.” In his younger days Jean Paul Richter fancied that his genius was especially adapted to satire, when nothing was further from his nature.

In ranging the field of modern literature, one can but observe upon how slight a foundation some reputations have been built; not slight as regards alone the quantity of work done, but the quality. Fortunately for mankind such reputations never last. The public may be for the moment deceived, but time is a true measure of values. No book can live for fifty years unless it has merit; and no meritorious book in these present days can remain very long hidden.

There is a difference in books in this respect, however. Scientific data, for example, might be faithfully collected from a new field by an unknown author and brought to the light in a far-off corner of the literary world, there remaining unnoticed for some time before scholars should hear of it. This misfortune, assuming that my work was meritorious, I was anxious to avoid.

Experience had told me that a book written, printed, and published at this date on the Pacific coast, no matter how meritorious or by whom sent forth, that is to say if done by any one worth the castigating, would surely be condemned by some and praised coldly and critically by others. There are innumerable local prejudices abroad which prevent us from recognizing to the fullest extent the merits of our neighbor. Least of all would a work of mine be judged solely upon its merits. Trade engenders competition, and competition creates enemies. There were hundreds in California who damned me every day, and to please this class as well as themselves there were newspaper writers who would like nothing better than, by sneers and innuendoes, to consign the fruits of laborious years to oblivion.

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“This man is getting above his business,” some would say. “Because he can sell books he seems to infer a divine mission to write them. Now it may be as well first as last for him to understand that merchandising and authorship are two distinct things; that a commercial man who has dealt in books as he would deal in bricks, by count, weight, or dollars' worth, cannot suddenly assume to know all things and set himself up as a teacher of mankind. He must be put down. Such arrogance cannot be countenanced. If writing is thus made common our occupation is gone.”

All did not so feel; but there was more of such sentiment behind editorial spectacles than editors would admit even to themselves. I have seen through jealousy, or conscienceless meanness, the fruits of a good man's best days thrown to the dogs by some flippant remark of an unprincipled critic. Tuthill's History of California was a good book, the best by far which up to its time had been written on the subject. It was in the main truthful and reliable. The author was a conscientious worker; lying was foreign to his nature; he spent his last days on this work, and on his death-bed corrected the proofs as they passed from the press. And yet there were those among his brother editors in California who did not scruple, when the book was placed in their hands for review, to color their criticism from some insignificant flaws which they pretended to have discovered, and so consign a faithful, true history of this coast to perdition, because the author had taken a step or two above them.

To local fame, or a literary reputation restricted to California, I did not attach much value. Not that I was indifferent to the opinions of my neighbors, or that I distrusted Pacific-coast journalists as a class. I had among them many warm friends whose approbation I coveted. But at this juncture I did not desire the criticism either of enemies or friends, but of strangers; I was desirous above all that my book should be first 319 312 reviewed on its merits and by disinterested and unprejudiced men. Adverse criticism at home, where the facts were supposed to be better known, might injure me abroad, while if prejudiced in my favor, the critic might give an opinion which would be negatived by those of New England or of Europe. Besides, I could not but feel, if my work was worth anything, if it was a work worth doing and well done, that the higher the scholar, or the literary laborer, the higher to him would appear its value.

The reason is obvious. I dealt in facts, gathered from new fields and conveniently arranged. These were the raw material for students in the several branches of science, and for philosophers in their generalizations. My theories, if I indulged in any, would be worse than thrown away on them. This was their work; they would theorize, and generalize, and deduce for themselves. But they would not despise my facts; for were they as mighty as Moses they could not make bricks without straw. Hence it was by the verdict of the best men of the United States, of England, France, and Germany, the world's ripest scholars and deepest thinkers, that my contributions to knowledge must stand or fall, and not by the wishes of my friends or the desire of my enemies. This is why, I say, a home reputation alone never would have satisfied me, never would have paid me for my sacrifice of time, labor, and many of the amenities of life.

To reach these results, which were as clearly defined in my mind before as after their accomplishment, involved a journey to the eastern states. Yet before leaving this coast on such a mission there should be some recognition of my efforts here. It were not best for me to leave my state entirely unheralded. If those who knew me best, who lived beside me, who frequented my library and should know of my labors, if these had nothing to say, would it not appear 320 313 somewhat strange to those at a distance before whom I was now about to make pretensions?

Up to this time, about the beginning of 1874, I had spoken little of my work to any one, preferring to accomplish something first and then point to what I had done rather than talk about what I intended to do. I was fully aware that often the reputation which precedes performance is greater than that which comes after it, hence I would husband whatever good was to be said of me until it had something to rest on. During the previous year several notices had crept into the papers, mostly through visitors from the east, concerning the library and the work going on there. Members of the San Francisco press often came to me for information, but were asked to wait till I was ready to publish something on the subject. At present all I desired was to be let alone.

When the plan of the Native Races was fully settled, and the first volume, and parts of the second and third volumes were in type, I invited a number of men eminent in their several callings, and in whom I knew the public had confidence, to inspect my work and report. Among these were Brantz Mayer, author of several works on Mexico; Benjamin P. Avery, editor of the Overland Monthly, and shortly after minister to China; Daniel C. Gilman, president of the university of California; J. Ross Browne, probably the foremost writer on the coast; Frederick Whymper, author of a work on Alaska; and others.

The opinions formed from these investigations were forwarded to me in the form of letters, which I printed as a circular, adding to my list of letters from time to time until the circular reached sixteen pages of flattering testimonials.

Some of these men were exceedingly interested and astonished. There was Professor George Davidson, I remember, for many years at the head of the United States coast survey, president of the California academy of sciences, and in every respect 321 314 one of the first scientific men of the age. He happened to be absent from the city when I issued my first invitations, and on his return I sent Goldschmidt to him with a copy of the Native Races, as far as printed, for his examination.

Goldschmidt found the professor in his rear office, stated his errand, and laid the printed pages before him. Davidson looked at them, looked at the list of twelve hundred authorities quoted which stood at the beginning of volume I., turned over the leaves, dropped now and then an ejaculation, but said little. Presently his colored attendant came to the door and addressed him.

“A gentleman wishes to see you.” No response. The black man retired; but it was not long before he appeared again with a similar message.

“All right,” returned Davidson.

Some ten or fifteen minutes now elapsed, during which the professor was examining the pages and asking Goldschmidt questions. Again the black face appeared at the portal, this time wrinkled by portentous concern.

“There are four or five men in the outer office waiting to speak with you, sir.”

“Very well, let them wait!” exclaimed the professor. “Such work as this doesn't fall into my hands every day.”

Though I had not then met Professor Davidson, I admired him, and valued his opinion highly. If from disinterested intelligent men my efforts could not secure approval, I felt that I need go no farther.

Among the literary notes of the Overland Monthly for March 1874 appeared a brief account of the collecting and indexing, with intimation that the mass was to be sifted and the results given to the world in some shape. This notice of the library was copied by several of the daily newspapers.

Next appeared a long article in the same 322 315 magazine of June 1874, under the heading of “Some Rare Books about California.” The Overland was the first and indeed the only literary journal of any pretensions west of the Rocky mountains. The article was based on the library, and treated of the rare historical works it contained, but no allusion whatever was made to the Native Races, or any other work undertaken or in contemplation, except that it spoke of a bibliography of the coast which sometime might be made by somebody, also of writers in and on California, and again alluded to Mr Bancroft's “self-imposed life work of condensing his material into a series of standard works on Spanish North America, with its English and Russian additions in the north-west, a territory which he terms the Pacific States.”

The name I should give to the territory marked out had often troubled me. There were the original Spanish-American, English, and Russian possessions, for which it was absolutely necessary to have some one simple appellation, such as would be most applicable and most easily understood by the world at large. There were objections to the term Pacific States. It had been applied by me as publisher, and by some few others, to the United States territory on the Pacific, and if it had any signification it meant only those states and territories. I could not say the Pacific coast, for the territory embraced much more than the coast. It included half the North American continent, and the whole of Mexico and Central America. Why I selected this territory as the field for my historical investigations I have already explained. I proposed to do a large work, and I would cover a large territory: it was all new; its history was unwritten; it had a past and would have a future; and there was no one part of it claiming attention more than another, unless it was the central part, which must ever exercise a dominant influence over the rest. I did not like the term Pacific nations, or Pacific 323 316 territories. The several nationalities on these shores had often changed, were still changing, and might be all one confederacy, republic, empire, or kingdom some day for aught I knew. At all events, they were states now; there were the Central American states, the states of the Mexican and American republics, and the colonial possessions of Great Britain and lately of Russia, which were, and always would be in some form, states, using the term in a broad sense. Open to the charge of lack of unity was my whole scheme, in all its several bearings, physical, ethnographical, and historical; and yet, the territory being all now occupied by European nations, it was no more diverse in its origin, character, and interests than Europe, and men had written histories of Europe ere now. The Pacific States of North America, therefore, as the best and most fitting term for the designation of this territory, its past, present, and future, I finally settled upon, and I know of no more simple and comprehensive expression to apply to it now.

At last I was ready for the newspaper reporters, if not for the reviewers. They might publish what they pleased about the library, its contents, and how collected, but my work was not yet on exhibition. In they came, and made sweeping work of it, representatives of English, French, Spanish, German, and Italian journals, of the interior towns as well as of the cities. The Bulletin, Alta, Post, and Chronicle of San Francisco came out in long articles, vying with each other in the extent of their description and the loudness of their praise. From Sacramento the proprietor of the Record-Union sent one of its editors who by appointment with Mr Oak spent a whole day in a critical examination of the contents of the fifth floor, which resulted in a highly flattering article covering an entire page of that journal. From Oregon and from Mexico, from British Columbia and from Central America, the journals now came to be laden with elaborate description of my collection.

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There was nothing so terrible in all this. It was about as might have been expected. But there was plenty which was worse before me, now and for twenty years. I must presently go east, call upon fifty or a hundred of the leading literary men, scientists, and journalists, and explain personally to them the character of the work I was engaged in.

This I dreaded. To go with my book, like a canvasser for praise, from one stranger to another, tell them of myself, what I was doing, and ask their opinion—proud and sensitive, I felt it to be a most difficult, most unpleasant task, one repugnant to my nature, which coveted retirement above all things else. Writers are sensitive. It is well they are. The thoroughbred is thinner-skinned than the ass. A man who is not sensitive about his reputation never will make one. A writer of the first class represents not only his own genius, but the genius and highest culture of his time; little wonder is it, therefore, that the results of long labor, involving the best efforts of a new aspirant, are given to the bulls and bears of literature tremblingly.

Yet it must be done. I felt that I owed it to myself and to my work. Life and fortune were now fully embarked in this enterprise, and my enthusiasm for the work was mounting higher as the months and years went by. Now was the turning-point with me. My first work was ready for publication, and on its reception would depend in a measure my whole future.

Not that a failure of the Native Races to sell would have discouraged me. This was the least that troubled me. It was altogether a secondary matter whether copies of the book were sold or not. I merely wished to assure myself whether mine was a good work well performed, or a useless one poorly done. I would have the book issued by first-class publishers in New York and Europe, for it must bear upon it the stamp of a first-class publication, but the people might 325 318 buy it or not, as they pleased. That was not what concerned me.

Crabbe was not more timorous in asking the generous Burke to look at his verses than I in begging critics to glance at my productions. Not every one can understand the feeling. Not every one would hesitate to show a book of which one might be proud to men interested in such books. But there was the trouble with me. I did not feel sure that my work was sufficiently meritorious to awaken their interest, that I had done anything to be proud of, and I did not know whether or not they would be interested. It came up to me as a species of beggary in which to indulge was worse than starvation. I must appear before these literary lords as a western adventurer, or at best a presumptuous littérateur—coveting their praise—a rôle I despised above all others. I must appear as one asking favor for a product of his brain so inferior in quality that if left to itself it could not stand. But there was behind me work piled mountain high, and for the sake of the future I would undertake the mission.

If the object be to bring the book to the notice of these eastern literati, cannot that be done as well by letter, accompanied by a copy of the work? I asked myself. No. The book was not yet published, although I had printed one hundred copies with AUTHOR's COPY on the title-page for private distribution before the plates were sent east; and I could and did use the copies for such distribution. But this was not the vital point. Mine was a peculiar work, originated and executed in a peculiar way. I required the opinion of these men concerning it. No amount of writing would lay the matter before them as I could do myself. I must have direct and immediate assurance as to the quality of my work from the only class of men the critics feared, and then I should not fear the critics.

It was no part of my purpose at any time to 326 319 publish my first work in San Francisco, or to permit the imprint of our firm upon the title-page either as publisher or agent. The firm should have the exclusive sale of the book upon the Pacific coast, but it seemed to me in bad taste for the author's name and publishing house to appear upon the same title-page.

Another time I should not be particular about it; that is to say, if this proved a success. But now I must obtain for it all the weight of a first-class eastern publisher, and not impart to it the appearance of having been originated by a bookseller as a commercial speculation. In his Cyropædia, Xenophon places the department of public instruction in the grand square near the king's palace and government offices, whence merchandise and trade “with their noise and vulgarity” were banished. So with my bantling; I could not afford, even in appearance, and in this instance at least, to expose the product of my brain to doubts and risks.

Returned from my eastern pilgrimage, an account of which is given in the next chapter, and armed with letters from the high-priests of New England learning, I was ready to have my book reviewed in the Overland. This of all others was the proper journal to publish the first notice of my first work. It was, for a western magazine, ably edited and enthusiastically published, at a monthly loss of certain hundreds of dollars. The article should be by a first-class writer, and printed before reviews began to arrive from the east. Mr Fisher and Mr Harcourt, as we shall see, had assumed the joint editorship of the magazine after the departure of Mr Avery for China, and they were solicitous for the appearance of such an article in the holiday number, namely that of December 1874.

But the question was, Who should be the writer of the article? Obviously no one in the library, nor any one who had participated in the work. It must 327 320 be by some one thoroughly competent to judge of such work, and whose name would carry weight with it here and in distant parts. The editors suggested Mr Gilman. I was well enough satisfied. I had often met him since his assuming the presidency of the university of California; he had been a guest at my house, had frequently visited the library, spending considerable time there, and had always expressed much interest in my work. It was a favorite project of his in some way to transfer my library to the lands of the university, evidently with the idea that once there it would never be removed.

One day he came to me and stated that a building fund was about to be appropriated to the purpose of the university, that the plans of new buildings were drawn, and that if I would agree to move my library to Berkeley, without any other obligation expressed or implied, with full liberty at any time to remove it, he would have a building erected specially for the collection, and thereby lessen the danger to which it was then exposed of being destroyed by fire, for that would be a national calamity.

I declined. For, however free I might be to remove my collection, there would ever be resting over me an implied obligation which I was by no means willing to incur. I had no thought of donating my collection to any institution. Surely I was spending time and money enough for the good of my country to be permitted to keep my books.

I felt the risk of fire; felt it every day. But until I could erect a suitable structure myself, I, and the commonwealth, and posterity must take the chances of the devouring flames. I explained to the president, moreover, that the library was not merely a reference library, but a working library; that I had imposed upon myself certain tasks which would occupy the better part of my life, if not, indeed, the whole of it, and it was more convenient both for me and for my assistants where it was. Still, this objection was not 328 321 paramount. I would do much to avoid fire risk; but I must decline hampering my work in any way or placing myself under obligations to the state or to any corporation or person. Writing history of all things demands freedom; I was free, absolutely free. I sought neither emolument nor office from any quarter. While desiring the friendship and sympathy of all, I feared none, and for favor would never depart from what I deemed the right. I was free, and must remain so. The university president expressed himself satisfied.

Mr Gilman then lived in Oakland, and one day in November the young editors proposed to me that we should visit him. To this I readily assented, and that night we crossed the bay and called at his house. He received us cordially, entered into the plan with interest, and even enthusiasm, and at once promised to undertake the article. To facilitate matters, as the president's time was valuable, and in order that he might derive the most assistance from the experience of others, he requested that Nemos, Harcourt, Oak, and Goldschmidt should each severally write whatever occurred to him respecting the library, the book to be reviewed, and the author, and hand the material to Gilman, who would thus be obliged merely to use these statements so far as they went, instead of making lengthy original research. But it was distinctly understood that these notes should serve only as memoranda, and that the author of the article should verify every statement, make thorough personal investigation, and speak with dignity and decision concerning the work, commending or condemning, as his judgment might dictate.

Yet withal there was something in the university president's manner I did not understand. He was a very pleasant, very plausible man, and quite positive sometimes. He was a good man, an earnest, honest, and practical man, and he made a good college president, though in some respects he was somewhat too 329 322 diplomatic. In short, while he meant everything for the best, and would under no consideration do an ungentlemanly, not to say dishonorable act, he was not remarkable for plain, straighforward, and thorough sincerity. Such was his nature; he could not help it.

The hard lineaments of a grave face may hide much that is sweet and sympathetic; so the winning vivacity of a pleasing face may serve as the cover of empty diplomacy. In this instance, like Franklin's Governor Keith, he wished to please; he wished to contribute the article; and yet, as the sequel showed, he lacked the courage to do it.

The time was limited. The article must be ready soon in order to gain its insertion in the December number. The president assured the editors that they might rely upon him. The memoranda were sent promptly as agreed. He spent some time in the library looking over the books, index, and the notes, and questioning my assistants, all of which augured well. Perhaps I was mistaken in my impressions. He might have more stamina than I had given him credit for.

But no, alas! for when the article was handed in at the Overland office it proved to have been fearfully and wonderfully prepared. Fisher immediately rushed up with it to my room. “Here's a pretty go!” he exclaimed, almost out of breath from running up five flights of stairs. Sure enough; the flabby flesh of it was fair enough, but it lacked bones, or any substantial framework. Instead of saying ‘I have looked into this matter, I have examined this work thoroughly, and I find this good and that bad, or perhaps all good or all bad,’ either or any of which would have satisfied me so far as his good intention and ability were concerned, he wrote, ‘Mr Nemos says this, Mr Goldschmidt that, Mr Harcourt the other thing,’ hovering about the subject and avoiding the question himself.

I never was thoroughly satisfied whether he lacked 330 323 the disposition to write the article, or the stamina of mind to have an opinion and avow it. He was a very timid man, particularly as to the estimation in which college and literary men at the east would hold him. It must be remembered that no review of the Native Races had as yet appeared, and if Mr Gilman were to commit himself to an opinion which should prove not the opinion of his friends at the east, he never would forgive himself. Scholasticus swore he would never enter water until he could swim; Gilman would not venture a criticism until he was sure it would float. I then felt and feel now very grateful to Mr Gilman for his distinguished courtesy and kindness to me on many occasions both before and after this. But here was required something else than courtesy or kindness. The life-issue of my literary labors was at stake. I must know where I stood, and I asked the president of the university of California, as one high in learning and authority, to tell me, to tell the world. He was friendly to me, friendly to the work, had been useful, wanted to be useful now, but he lacked what I most wanted then, and what I was determined to have—positiveness.

Tearing the manuscript in pieces and throwing it into the waste-basket, I turned to my work. “What shall we do now?” asked Fisher.

“Ross Browne is the best man on the coast, if we could get him,” he said. “He is much better known at the east than Gilman.”

“I can get him,” said Harcourt. Within an hour he was across the bay and driving to the pagoda-looking villa situated in the foothills beyond Oakland. He was accustomed to tell the story by this time, and soon Mr Browne knew all about it. He promised his immediate and hearty attention. The consequence was one of the best articles ever written upon the subject, in the Overland of December. The library, the index and the first volume of the Native Races were all critically examined, explained, and opinions 331 324 pronounced. The article was copied in the News Letter, and in part by the newspaper press generally.

Gilman often said afterward that he would yet review that book somewhere, but he never did. In fact I told him not to trouble himself. In relation with my work his policy seemed somewhat Machiavelian; and I might say as Doctor Johnson remarked to Lord Chesterfield: “The notice which you have been pleased to take of my labors, had it been early, had been kind; but it has been delayed till I am indifferent and cannot enjoy it; till I am solitary and cannot impart it; till I am known and do not want it.” Those who are first to recognize the merit of his work, the author never forgets. It is at the outset that he most needs recognition; when it has become the fashion to praise he does not need or value it so highly.

Then I went alike to my friends and my enemies of the San Francisco daily press. I placed in their hands my book; told them I was now ready to have it reviewed; that no reviews had as yet appeared from any quarter, but that they would shortly appear in the quarterlies, the monthlies, and the dailies of Europe and America. Of their probable nature they might judge somewhat from letters which I had received and which I spread out before them.

As it was an important work, I begged them to examine it thoroughly and review wholly upon merit. This, eastern and European scholars would expect, as the work emanated from California, and they would certainly note what Californian journals said of it. All were gracious. None cared to run counter to the profuse expressions of praise already in my possession. The work demanded investigation, they said, and should have it. It was an enterprise of which they felt proud, and they heartily wished it every success. The differences existing between them and the firm should have nothing to do with this undertaking, which must be regarded from a totally different standpoint. 332 325 I need not say that the daily papers of San Francisco spoke well of the Native Races.

Publishing having been my business, and the Native Races being my first book, persons have asked me if it paid pecuniarily; and when I answered No, they seemed at a loss what to make of it. Samuel Johnson says, “no man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money.” I will admit myself a blockhead to the extent that I did not write for money, but not so great a one as not to know, after a publishing experience of a quarter of a century, that work like mine never returns a money profit. And with due deference to the learned doctor I hold rather with John Stuart Mill, who says that “the writings by which one can live are not the writings which themselves live, and are never those in which the writer does his best. Books destined to from future thinkers take too much time to write, and when written, come, in general, too slowly into notice and repute to be relied on for subsistence.” Or, as Mrs Browning more tersely puts it, “In England no one lives by books that live.” The Native Races did not pay pecuniarily, though the returns were greater than I had anticipated. The book was wholly written and put in type on the Market-street premises.

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CHAPTER XIV.

A LITERARY PILGRIM. Freuden von ausnehmendem Geschmack wie Ananas haben das Schlimme, dass sie wie Ananas das Zahnfleisch bluten machen.

Jean Paul Richter.

I SET out on my pilgrimage the 3d of August, 1874, taking with me my daughter Kate, to place in school at Farmington, Connecticut. After a few days' stay at Buffalo with my two sisters, Mrs Palmer and Mrs Trevett, I proceeded to New York.

The one hundred author's copies of volume I. had been printed at our establishment in San Francisco, and the plates sent east before my departure. Twenty-five copies of the work accompanied the plates; besides these I carried in my trunk printed sheets of the Native Races so far as then in type, namely the whole of volume I., one hundred and fifty pages of volume II., four hundred pages of volume III., and one hundred pages of volume IV.

Beside seeking the countenance and sympathy of scholars in my enterprise, it was part of my errand to find a publisher. As the plates had not arrived when I reached New York I concluded to leave the matter of publishing for the present, direct my course toward Boston, and dive at once in luminis oras.

It was Saturday, the 15th of August, and I had promised to spend Sunday with some friends at Bridgeport.

At the New Haven railway station I encountered President Gilman, to whom I made known the nature of my mission, and asked if he deemed it the proper 334 327 thing for me to do. He thought that it was, and named several persons whom I should see. Further than this, he spoke of a meeting of the scientific association to be held in Hartford the following Tuesday, and advised me to attend, saying that he would be there and would take pleasure in introducing me to those whose acquaintance might be advantageous. I thanked him and we parted.

I was very restless in the company of my friends; I could not remain in Buffalo, I could not remain quietly a day or two in Bridgeport. It seemed that the kinder they were the less I could endure inaction. On Monday I went to New Haven. There I saw Mr James Walker, who had married my cousin Martha Johnstone. Walker was a pleasant, genial fellow, had lived long in New Haven, and was well acquainted with many of the college professors. He took a lively interest in my work, and was ever ready to serve me.

We started immediately to call on some of those more prominent in literature. I then found that the very worst time in the year had been selected to make these visits, for it was the summer vacation, and most of the college professors and literary workers were away.

Therefore I concluded to leave New Haven for the present and call again on my return. Residing there was my aunt Mrs Johnstone and my favorite cousin, Villa, a cheerful, enduring little piece of independence and self-sacrifice, whose bright face ever greeted me with radiant smiles, so that to call again at New Haven was not an unpleasant task. The Johnstones were returned missionaries from Smyrna, where the best years of their lives had been spent in the service of the Lord, as managed by the protestant board of foreign missions; and having now become aged and worthless in this service they were turned loose upon the common to shift for themselves. Unaided by any one this mother in Israel educated her sons and 335 328 daughters, and kept the wolf from the door, but how she did it God knoweth.

In Hartford, Tuesday, President Gilman introduced me to Professor Brewer of Yale, Doctor Asa Gray of Harvard, and others. He also spoke of me to several, among them Mr Warner of the Courant, who, when I called upon him subsequently, treated me with a scarcely anticipated kindness. I was then in a humor to be won for life by any man who would take the trouble. It may seem weak, this supersensitiveness, but I was in a feverish state of mind, and my nerves were all unstrung by long labor. I was callous enough to ignorance and indifference, for amongst these I had all along been working, but intelligent sympathy touched me, and Mr Warner's manner was so courteous, and his words so encouraging, that they sank at once into my heart, where they have remained ever since. He entered warmly into my plans, gave me strong, decided letters to several persons, which proved of the greatest advantage, and on leaving his office I carried with me the benediction which I know came from an honest pen. “God bless such workers!”

While attending the meetings of the association my attention was called to one Porter C. Bliss, whose name was on the programme for several papers on Mexico. Mr Gilman said I should know him, and introduced me. He was a singular character both without and within. Yankee in inquisitive push and everlasting memory, he had been lately secretary of the American legation in Mexico, and sometime famous in Paraguay. I now remembered that his name had been frequently mentioned to me as one interested in Mexican antiquities and literature.

Universal looseness was the air of him, stiffened somewhat by self-conceit. Though plain, or even homely, in appearance, there was nothing servile in his carriage, and the awkwardness of his address was partially concealed by his assurance. Of a light 336 329 complexion, a little above medium height, with chin well up and head thrown back, his large, gray, glassy eyes looked straight before him, and his walk was as one just started on a journey round the world. His light clothes were neither neat nor well-fitting. His small pantaloons, which crooked with his crooked legs, stopped on reaching the tops of his low shoes, while a short-skirted coat displayed his gaunt limbs to their most unfavorable advantage. A tan-colored, broad-brimmed slouched hat, set well back upon the head, completed his attire, the tout-ensemble, including the figure, having the appearance of the Wandering Jew overtaken by Mexican highwaymen and forced to a partial exchange of apparel with them.

His mind was no less disjointed than his manner. Genealogy filled every available nook of his brain, and constituted about nine tenths of his earthly interests; the Bliss family's first, then that of any other on earth above the rank of ape, it made no difference whose or what, so long as listeners could be found to his interminable stringings of sires and sons. His was a disinterested devotion to other men's madness such as is seldom seen. The American aborigines had given him some little trouble, more particularly in the tumuli they left scattered about Mexico, and in their languages, these being the subjects of his lectures in Hartford. The Native Races appeared to confuse him somewhat in this quarter, for after seeing my proof-sheets he had nothing to remark upon the subject, thinking probably that if he did know more about those peoples than any one else, I had anticipated all that he would say of them. Self was not least in his esteem; although his personality he seemed to regard in the abstract rather than as concreted body and soul. He was one thing and Bliss another. Of himself he thought little, talked little, cared little how he was fed, lodged, or clothed; but for Bliss he had much concern, regarding him as of good family, who had not been well treated in Paraguay, and who had 337 330 done much work for little pay in Mexico. He gave one the impression of an extract from a vellum-bound Nahua vocabulary, a half-civilized cross between an aboriginal American and an Englishman.

Yet all these peculiarities were but the alloy which was to enable the good gold of his nature to endure the wear of the world. After all, there was more of the serpent's wisdom than cunning in him; and although he entertained a wholesome respect for money he was not mercenary; neither was his mind accustomed to measure men by their wealth. To different classes and conditions of men he seemed to apply different standards of merit. He delivered his lectures in a clear loud voice, without hesitancy or embarrassment, and with his eyes fixed upon the opposite wall. The words came from his mouth like the studied composition of a school-boy. His features wore an expression of happy immobility. He loved to talk; he loved to hear the sound of his voice; and whether the benches were empty or full, whether people came or went, admired or condemned, made no difference to him. His piece he would speak, and when spoken that was the end of it. His appetite for reading was omnivorous and gluttonous. He devoured every newspaper that came under his eye. In the reading-rooms of the hotels he was like a boa-constrictor among rabbits, except that no matter how many were swallowed he never lay dormant. He was a walking waste-basket. Off-hand he could tell you anything; but go with him below the surface of things and he knew little.

I invited Bliss to dine with me. He took to dinner kindly, fed fast and liberally, and, the meal finished, seemed satisfied. This augured well: the inner Bliss knew what it wanted; sought it straightway; knew when it had enough. A new philosophy might be based on Bliss' feeding. I liked his movements under the clatter of crockery. Mr Bliss informed me that he had collected while in Mexico some three thousand 338 331 volumes, which he was offering in whole or in part to libraries. The books were then in New York, and I might accompany him thither to select at pleasure. The opportunity was too tempting to let slip; and, while it was inconvenient for me to return to New York at that moment, I did not like to lose sight of my new and apparently erratic-minded friend.

“Where do you reside?” I asked.

“Nowhere,” was the reply.

“At what are you engaged?”

“Nothing.”

“If you will accompany me to Boston on this mission of mine, I will pay your expenses, and leave you in New York with many thanks.”

“I will attend you with pleasure.”

I do not know that this was a very wise move. Myself, solus, cut a sorrowful figure enough, but my companion doubled the dolor without adding much diplomatic ability. True, he could assist me somewhat in advising whom to see and how to find them. But this was not my main object in the arrangement. He might have his books sold and be in Nova Scotia, where indeed he talked of going on somebody's genealogic business, before I had finished my New England errand; and I took him with me so that I might continue my pilgrimage without losing him.

Friday, the 21st of August, saw us at the Bellevue house, the establishment of Dio Lewis, a cross between a water-cure institution and a hotel. Bliss had been there before, and recommended the rooms as better than those of the hotels. I had a letter from Mr Warner to Mr Howells of the Atlantic Monthly, and next day I went over to Cambridge, where he lived, to see him. He was absent from home, and not expected back for a week. Inquiries as to the whereabouts of certain persons revealed that most of them were away, so that little was done till the following Tuesday, when we started out in earnest. Proceeding 339 332 to Cambridge, the centre of the class to be visited, at the suggestion of Mr Bliss we called on J. G. Palfrey. Mr Gilman had also mentioned Mr Palfrey as one whom I should see. We were shown into a long room, crowded with massive furniture, a bookcase at one end, and books and pictures scattered about the room in orthodox New England fashion. Grim portraits adorned the walls; a thick, soft, flabby, faded carpet covered the floor; and the place and its belongings struck the visitor with a dismal dimmish sensation most unprofitable.

This is a long way from my fifth floor, thought I, with its plain pine tables, its bare floor, its dust and disorder, its army of hard-headed young workers, and its direct and practical way of doing things; a century away, at least, if not two. For fifty years this man has handled literature, sacred and profane, while less than a score tell all the ups and downs of my wanderings in the field of letters. Student, professor, preacher, postmaster, reviewer, historian, all within cannon-shot of these impressive premises, surely here if anywhere a literary pilgrim from the new unlettered west should find broad sympathy and catholicity of sentiment. Here was godliness with great gain, learning with its reward; where should the humble aspirant find encouragement, where should the untutored ambition of the wilderness shores of the Pacific find direction if not beneath the classic shades of Harvard!

Now by Burritt, Le Brun, and Wild, blacksmith, painter, and tailor, learned without alma mater labors, what is this that comes? It is the antiquated genius of this antiquated place. One glance is enough. In that weazen face, in those close-fisted features, in that pinched form and muck-worm manner, I see no excellence for me to study. Such rubrics we of the fifth floor erase, finding in them no worshipful superstition worthy our adulation.

My chief concern now was to beat a respectable 340 333 retreat, which I was proceeding to do forthwith, after a few commonplace remarks intended to cover any apparent rudeness, and without saying a word of my work, when Bliss broke in, told the whole story, and asked if the learned historian of New England would be pleased to look at the unlearned efforts of one who aspired to write the record of the last and mightiest west.

The shook the attenuated form with its antiquated apparel, and loud lamentations broke from the learned lips. “O talk not to me of new fields and new efforts!” he cried. “I am finished; I am laid upon the topmost library shelf; the results of my life fill a space against a few house-walls hereabout, and that is all. Forgotten am I among men. Ask me to look at nothing, to say nothing, to do nothing.” This was exactly what in my heart I was praying he would do—nothing. So we gat ourselves upon the street.

Plodding feverishly along in a hot sun, with my bundle of proof-sheets under my arm, we next encountered on the street one of those deities of whom we were in search. In appearance he bore the similitude of a man, but made and regulated with line and plummet. His gait was angular, his dress exact, and his glance geometrical; in fact he was in the mathematical line. I forget his name, else I would give it, for he struck me as the latest improvement in automatic construction. Nor was I mistaken or disappointed when from his equilateral mouth there came the words, “No; I have not time for such things, know nothing about them, have no interest in them.”

I began to think I had mistaken my calling; that with clerical cant and conventionalisms I might obtain a hearing from these men, though for my life I cannot now see what it would have advantaged me if they had listened till nightfall and praised until morning.

However, we were destined in due time to come upon men with hearts as well as heads; and first 341 334among these was Doctor Asa Gray. We found him in the botanic garden, and he heard us with attentive interest. I presented him with a copy of my book, which he said with my permission he would place upon the shelves of the Harvard library. I objected. The book was for him, if he would accept it. This fashion of giving public libraries presented books I do not relish. It is a sort of cheat practised upon the author, who, if he wishes a library presented with a copy of his book, prefers giving it direct instead of through another; if he does not, another has no right to so dispose of a book which was given him to keep.

It was my intention to ask eastern scholars to examine my book and give me an expression of their opinion in writing; but in talking the matter over with Dr Gray he advised me to delay such request until the reviewers had pronounced their verdict, or at all events until such expression of opinion came naturally and voluntarily. This I concluded to do; though at the same time I could not understand what good private opinions would do me after public reviewers had spoken. Their praise I should not care to supplement with feebler praise; their disapprobation could not be averted after it had been printed.

And so it turned out. What influence my seeing these men and presenting them copies of my book had on reviewers, if any, I have no means of knowing. Directly, I should say it had none; indirectly, as for example, a word dropped upon the subject, or a knowledge of the fact that the author had seen and had explained the character of his work to the chief scholars of the country, might make the reviewer regard it a little more attentively than he otherwise would. On the receipt of the fifth volume of the Native Races Doctor Gray wrote me: “I am filled more and more with admiration of what you have done and are doing; and all I hear around me, and read from the critical judges, adds to the good opinion I had formed.”

Doctor Gray gave me letters to Francis Parkman, 342 335 Charles Francis Adams, and others. While at Cambridge we called on Mrs Horace Mann, but she being ill, her sister, Miss Peabody, saw us instead. With eloquence of tongue and ease and freedom she dissected the most knotty problems of the day.

James Russell Lowell lived in a pleasant, plain house, common to the intellectual and refined of that locality. Longfellow's residence was the most pretentious I visited, but the plain, home-like dwellings, within which was the atmosphere of genius or culture, were most attractive to me. How cold and soulless are the Stewart's marble palaces of New York beside these New England abodes of intellect with their chaste though unaffected adornments!

Lowell listened without saying a word; listened for three or five minutes, I should think, without a nod or movement signifying that he heard me. I was quite ready to take offence when once the suspicion came that I was regarded as a bore.

“Perhaps I tire you,” at length I suggested.

“Pray go on,” said he.

When I had finished he entered warmly into the merits of the case, made several suggestions and discussed points of difference. He bound me to him forever by his many acts of sympathy then and afterward, for he never seemed to lose interest in my labors, and wrote me regarding them. What, for example, could have been more inspiring at that time than to receive from him, shortly after my return to San Francisco, such words as these: “I have read your first volume with so much interest that I am hungry for those to come. You have handled a complex, sometimes even tangled and tautological subject, with so much clearness and discrimination as to render it not merely useful to the man of science, but attractive to the general reader. The conscientious labor in collecting, and the skill shown in the convenient arrangement of such a vast body of material, deserve the highest praise.”

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In Cambridge I called on Arthur Gilman, who went with me to the Riverside Press, the establishment of H. O. Houghton and Company, where I saw Mr Scudder, who wrote for Every Saturday. Mr Scudder asked permission to announce my forthcoming work in his journal, but I requested him to say nothing about it just then. I was shown over the buildings, obtained an estimate for the printing and binding of my book, and subsequently gave them the work, sending the electrotype plates there. One thousand copies only were at first printed, then another thousand, and a third; the three thousand sets, of five volumes each, being followed by other thousands.

Wednesday, the 26th of August, after calling on several journalists in Boston, we took the boat for Nahant to find Mr Longfellow, for he was absent from his home at Cambridge. Neither was he at Nahant. And so it was in many instances, until we began to suspect that most Boston people had two houses, a city and a country habitation, and lived in neither. From Nahant we went to Lynn, and thence to Salem, where we spent the night undisturbed by witches, in a charming little antique hotel.

During the afternoon we visited the rooms of the scientific association, and in the evening Wendell Phillips, who gave me a welcome that did my heart good. A bright genial face, with a keen, kindly eye, and long white hair, a fine figure, tall but a little stooped, I found him the embodiment of shrewd wisdom and practical philanthropy. There was no cant or fiction about him. His smile broke upon his features from a beaming heart, and his words were but the natural expression of healthy thoughts.

He comprehended my desires and necessities on the instant, and seating himself at his table he dashed off some eight or ten letters in about as many minutes, keeping up all the time a rattling conversation, neither tongue nor pen hesitating a moment for a 344 337 word; and it was about me, and my work, and California, and whom I should see, that he was talking. Nor was this all. Next morning, in Boston, he handed me a package of letters addressed to persons whom he thought would be interested in the work, and whose names had occurred to him after I had left.

Later he writes me: “Your third volume has come. Thanks for your remembrance of me. I read each chapter with growing interest. What a storehouse you provide for every form and department of history in time to come. I did you no justice when you first opened your plan to me. I fancied it was something like the French Mémoires pour Servir. But yours is a history, full and complete; every characteristic amply illustrated; every picture preserved; all the traits marshalled with such skill as leaves nothing further to be desired. Then such ample disquisitions on kindred topics, and so much cross-light thrown on the picture, you give us the races alive again and make our past real. I congratulate you on the emphatic welcome the press has everywhere given you.”

How different in mind, manner, heart, and head are the men we meet!

John G. Whittier was a warm personal friend of Phillips, and to him among others the latter sent me. We went to Amesbury, where the poet resided, the day after meeting Phillips in Boston. A frank, warm-hearted Quaker, living in a plain, old-fashioned village house. He gave me letters to Longfellow, Emerson, and Doctor Barnard. “I have been so much interested in his vast and splendid plan of a history of the western slope of our continent,” he writes to Mr Longfellow, “that I take pleasure in giving him a note to thee. What material for poems will be gathered up in his volumes! It seems to me one of the noblest literary enterprises of our day.”

“This I will deliver,” said I, picking up the one addressed to Longfellow, “if I am permitted to retain it; not otherwise. We in California do not see a letter 345 338 from Whittier to Longfellow every day.” He laughed and replied: “My letters are getting to be common enough now.” I did not see Mr Longfellow, but he wrote me very cordially, praising my book and regretting he should have missed my call.

Informed that Professor Henry Adams, editor of the North American Review, was staying a few miles from Salem, I sought him there, but unsuccessfully. Next day I met accidentally his father, Charles Francis Adams, to whom I expressed regrets at not having seen his son. He said he would speak to him for me, and remarked that if I could get Francis Parkman to review my book in the North American it would be a great thing for it, but that his health and preoccupation would probably prevent. He gave me several letters, and I left full copies of my printed sheets with him.

Now of all things, ‘great things' for my book I coveted. So to Parkman I went. I found him at Jamaica Plains, where he resided during summer, deep in his literary work. After all, the worker is the man to take work to, and not the man of leisure. Mr Parkman was a tall spare man, with a smiling face and winning manner. I noticed that all great men in the vicinity of Boston were tall and thin, and wore smiling faces, and indications of innate gentleness of character.

“This shows wonderful research, and I think your arrangement is good, but I should have to review it upon its merits,” said Mr Parkman.

“As a matter of course,” I replied.

“I do not know that I am competent to do the subject justice,” he now remarked.

“I will trust you for that,” said I.

And so the matter was left; and in due time several splendid reviews appeared in his important journal as the different volumes were published.

I was told to call on the Rev. James Freeman Clarke. I did so, but he was not at home.

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Returning to Boston, we took the train for Concord and sought Mr Emerson. He was gracious enough, and gave me some letters, one to Doctor Draper, and one to Mr Bryant; but in all his doings the great philosopher was cold and unsympathetic. He was the opposite of Wendell Phillips, who won the hearts of all that stood before him. Bliss touched a responsive chord when he broke out upon genealogy. Of course Bliss knew all about the Emerson family, and easily established a distant relationship. There were few families in New England with whom the Blisses could not claim kinship. My companion seemed to warm with the subject. It was his practice now, the moment the topic of Native Races was exhausted, to break forth on genealogy. That I grew restless, took up my hat, or even rose to leave, made no difference with him; when once launched upon his subject he must go through all the generations, root, trunk, and branches. He quite thawed Emerson before he left him. In my present frame of mind I was quite ready to quarrel with any person whose hobby came in conflict with my hobby, or who did not regard my efforts with the consideration I thought they deserved. I was possessed of an idea.

From Concord we went again to Cambridge, to see Mr Howells of the Atlantic Monthly. After some conversation upon the subject it was finally arranged that Bliss was to write an article of some ten pages on my work for this magazine. There were many others we called on, some of whom were at home and some absent, among the latter much to my regret Oliver Wendell Holmes, Edward Everett Hale, and James T. Fields. From Doctor Holmes I subsequently received many letters, which brought with them a world of refreshing encouragement. So genial and hearty were his expressions of praise that the manner of bestowal doubled its value to me. Few can appreciate the worth to an author of encouraging 347 340 words at such a time and from such a source. “The more I read in your crowded pages the more I find to instruct and entertain me,” he writes. “I assure you that Robinson Crusoe never had a more interested reader among the boys than I have been in following you through your heroic labor.”

And later he writes: “I have never thanked you for the third volume of your monumental work. This volume can hardly be read like the others; it must be studied. The two first were as captivating as romances, but this is as absorbing as a philosophical treatise dealing with the great human instincts repeat themselves in spiritual experience as in common life. Your labor is, I believe, fully appreciated by the best judges; and you have done, and are doing a work for which posterity will thank you when thousands of volumes that parade themselves as the popular works of the day are lost to human memory.”

I very much regretted not seeing Mr Hale, though I was gratified to receive a letter toward Christmas in which he wrote: “At this time the subject has to me more interest than any other literary subject. I have for many years intended to devote my leisure ot an historical work to be entitled The Pacific Ocean and Its Shores. But I shall never write it unless I have first the opportunity of long and careful study among your invaluable collection.” The library was placed at Mr Hale's free disposal, as it was always open to every one, but the leisure hours of one man, though it should be for several lifetimes, I fear would not make much showing beside the steady labors of ten to twenty men for years. One Saturday we went to Martha's Vineyard, where President Grant was enjoying the intellectual feasts spread before him by the encamped methodists.

I had seen all the chief literary editors of Boston, and was well enough satisfied with the results. I knew by this time that my book would receive some 348 341 good reviews in that quarter. So I concluded to leave Boston.

On our way to New York we stopped at Newport, and called on T. W. Higginson, who like Gilman aspired to the popular side of things. The result of this interview was half a dozen letters, in which he took care to state, that he might show, I suspect, how guarded he was in avoiding imposition, that President Gilman had introduced me, and that Clarence King endorsed me. Afterward came a review of the Native Races in Scribner's Monthly Magazine.

None were kinder or more cordial than Higginson, who on several occasions went out of his way to serve me. As I was on my way to New York, I saw his letters were directed to Mr Reid, Mr Ripley, Curtis, Holland, Parton, Godkin, Ward, and others. The first read as follows: “I wish to introduce a gentleman whom I count it an honor to know, Mr H. H. Bancroft, of San Francisco, who has been giving wealth and time for years to a work on the wild races of the Pacific States. His first volume shows a research very rare in America, and is founded on his own remarkable library of sixteen thousand volumes, collected for the purpose. The book, if carried out as it is begun, will be an honor to our literature. Mr Bancroft asks nothing from us but sympathy and Godspeed. I have been most favorably impressed by what I have seen of him personally, and am assured by Mr Clarence King that he is thoroughly respected and valued in San Francisco.”

And again later in Scribner's Monthly: “It is safe to say that there has not occurred in the literary history of the United States a more piquant surprise than when Mr Hubert Bancroft made his appearance last autumn among the literary men of the Atlantic cities, bearing in his hand the first volume of his great work. That California was to be counted upon to yield wit and poetry was known by all; but the deliberate result of scholarly labor was just the product not 349 342 reasonably to be expected from a community thirty years old. That kind of toil seemed to belong rather to a society a little maturer, to a region of public libraries and universities. Even the older states had as yet yielded it but sparingly; and was it to be expected from San Francisco? Had Mr Bancroft presented himself wearing a specimen of the sequoia gigantea for a button-hole bouquet it would hardly have seemed more surprising.”

Now in all this surely there was nothing very difficult. It was as the Boston correspondent of the Springfield Republican had said: “Little or nothing has been heard here of his labors, and the surprise and pleasure with which so magnificent an undertaking has been welcomed by eastern scholars must have gratified Mr Bancroft.”

It was no great achievement to visit these men and command their attention. In one sense, no. And yet in the state of mind in which I was then laboring, it was one of the most disagreeable tasks of my life, and strong as I usually was physically, it sent me to bed and kept me there a fortnight.

I had been entirely successful; but success here was won not as in San Francisco, by years of tender devotion to an ennobling cause, but by what I could no but feel to be an humiliating course. I sought men whom I did not wish to see, and talked with them of things about which of all others it was most distasteful to me to converse. It was false pride, however, and my extreme sensitiveness that kept alive these feelings. Good men assured me that I was not overstepping the bounds of literary decorum in thus thrusting my work forward upon the notice of the world; that my position was peculiar, and that in justice to my undertaking in San Francisco I could not do otherwise.

I had met with much that was assuring, but I had likewise encountered much that was disheartening. I found here, as elsewhere in the affairs of mankind, 350 343 hypocrisies and jealousies. Literature has its coteries and conventionalisms as well as all other forms of human association. Had I been able at this juncture to adopt for a time bohemian life,—I do not mean in its lowest aspects, but to have mingled with the better class of book-fanciers, to have eaten and hobnobbed with the dilettanti in literature, such a course would for a time have had an effect on my undertaking; but it would have been of little lasting advantage, for the work must stand, if at all, on its merits alone.

There are various cliques whose members regard nothing, new or old, except through the eye-glasses of the fraternity; religious cliques, some of which were ready to take exception to anything which may be said about religion in general, but all ready to pardon much that was not orthodox provided some sect other than their own is severely enough criticised. Then there are science cliques, and science fanatics, which, when they get off on some pet theory, are as bad as the religious fanatics. All the world must see with their eyes, and reach conclusions in undemonstrable proportions as they have done, or be anathematized. A book, therefore, which touches religion is sure to be roughly handled by some of religion's many opposing champions, or if it conflicts with any of the pet opinions of science, certain members of that fraternity are obliged to rush to the rescue of some of its immutable truths.

Besides these are newspaper parties and prejudices, business and political cliques, all of which have their codes of ethics, which signify self and party interests, so that a book or author undergoing judgment must be regarded from one or more of these points of view before the matter of merit can be taken into consideration. But in coming from the remote and unlettered west I was free from any of these trammels, which, though they might have helped me in one way, would have hampered me in another.

From the beginning of civilization, I believe, by 351 344 the east the west has been considered barbaric in learning and literature. Greece first taught Rome, Rome western Europe, Europe America, and eastern America the western. Thus the east has always held the west in some sort of contempt, so far as religion and learning were concerned. The east was the original seat of civilization, whence radiated the more refined religion, with art, science, and literature. The west has always been illiterate, infantile in learning, with crude ideas in relation to all that creates or regulates the higher intellectual life.

All through the dark age the east hid learning, lest peradventure it might be harmful to the west. Religions always arose in the east, and every western prophet in all times and places has been without honor. We are likewise indebted to the east for all of our dark clouds of tyranny, superstition, priestcraft, and kingcraft, for all the horrors of religious wars and persecution for opinion's sake, for the murder of millions of human beings, for conceptions as absurd and void of reason as any which ever flitted through the savage mind. The opinions, dogmas, and practices which the stronger race has from the first endeavored to inflict upon the weaker, the superior culture on the inferior, have been for the most part false and iniquitous. The inquisitorial rack and thumb-screw have not been employed for the propagation of truth but of error. Witches were burned not because the victims were witches, but because the superior power pronounced them such. And all this time the west has been fighting out its salvation, fighting for deliverance from the tyrannies and superstition of the east. Mingled with enforced errors of the east have been some grains of truth which the west has in due time come to accept, winnowing away the rest. The chaff has been mountainous, the truth in scattered grains.

Therefore, lest the east should become too arrogant and domineering in its superior culture, it may profitably bear in mind two things: first, that as the west rises 352 345 into supremacy the east decays, and that there is now no further west for restless learning to reach. Palestine and Egypt are dead; the greatness of Athens and Rome dates two thousand years back; London is growing old; if New York and Boston do not some time die of old age, they will prove exceptions to the rule; so that if the glory of the world be not some day crowded into San Francisco, it will be by reason of new laws and new developments. In a word, Massachusetts and Connecticut may yet go to school to Michigan and California.

In New York I met George Bancroft—with whom, by the way, I am in no way related—who gave me a letter to Doctor Draper, and was kind enough afterward to write:

“To me you render an inestimable benefit; for you bring within reach the information which is scattered in thousands of volumes. I am glad to see your work welcomed in Europe as well as in your own country. In the universality of your researches you occupy a field of the deepest interest to the world, and without a rival. Press on, my dear sir, in your great enterprise, and bring it to a close in the meridian of life, so that you may enjoy your well earned honors during what I hope may be a long series of later years.”

Doctor Draper was a man well worth the seeing; from first to last he proved one of my warmest and most sympathizing friends. After my return to San Francisco he wrote me: “I have received your long expected first volume of the Native Races of the Pacific States, and am full of admiration of the resolute manner in which you have addressed yourself to that most laborious task. Many a time I have thought if I were thirty years younger I would dedicate myself to an exploration of the political and psychological ideas of the aborigines of this continent; but you are doing not only this, but a great deal more. Your work has taught me a great many things. It needs no praise 353 346 from me. It will be consulted and read centuries after you are gone.”

On Friday, the 11th of September, I had an interview with Charles Nordhoff, during which he agreed to review my work, and requested me to appoint some day to spend with him at Alpine, on the Hudson, when we could talk the matter over. I named the following Thursday. The day was rainy, but within his hospitable doors it passed delightfully. I had lately seen George Ripley of the Tribune, whom Wendell Phillips pronounced the first critic in America, Mr Godkin of the Nation, and several others, who had given me encouraging words, so that I felt prepared to enjoy the day, and did most heartily enjoy it.

I had likewise, the Tuesday before, completed arrangements with Messrs D. Appleton and Company of New York to act as my publishers, upon terms satisfactory enough. I was to furnish them the work printed and bound at my own cost, and they were to account for the same at one half the retail prices. The contract was for five years.

It is perhaps one of the severest trials of an author's life, the first coming in contact with a publisher. It certainly would have been so with me in this instance, had I felt dependent on any of them. After having spent all this time, money, and brain-work on my book, had the printing and publishing of it been at the mercy of others, I should have felt very unhappy over the prospect. But as I proposed printing the work myself I had no fear regarding a publisher.

But there was still enough of negotiating to make me feel more keenly than ever before what it is to bring one's brains to market. There before the august magnate lies for dissection the author's work, the results of years of patient toil, representing innumerable headaches and heartaches, self-sacrifice, weariness of soul, and ill-afforded money. Author and publisher are in solemn deliberation. One regards this unborn book with that fond enthusiasm by which 354 347 alone a writer is sustained in his work, the value of which he measures by the pains and sufferings it has cost him. The other eyes it with suspicion, looks upon the author and his work with a cold commercial eye, concerned not a whit for the worth of the man or for the value of the book to mankind. The dollars that are in it, that is all the brain-dealer cares about.

Since I should require some copies in San Francisco, and some in London, Paris, and Leipsic, I had concluded to do my own printing, and arrange with certain publishers to act for me. Mr James C. Derby, brother of George H. Derby, to whom I was indebted for my initiation into the book business, was then manager of Appleton's subscription department, and under his direction my book fell. Very little work was put upon it, for the subscription department was crowded with books in which the house had deeper pecuniary interest than in mine; yet I was satisfied with the sales and with the general management of the business.

One of the first things to be done on my return to New York from Boston was to examine the collection of books Mr Bliss had made while in Mexico and select such as I wanted. This was the agreement: I was to take every book which my collection lacked, and should I select from his collection copies of some books which were in mine, such duplicates were to be returned to him. In a private house near Astor place, Bliss had taken rooms, and there he had his books brought and the cases opened. We looked at them all systematically, and such as I was not sure of possessing were laid aside. The result was an addition to the library of some four or five hundred volumes, sent to San Francisco in six cases. To make sure of these books, I looked after them myself; I would not intrust them to the care of any one until they were safely delivered to the railway company, with the shipping receipt in my pocket.

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The 30th of September saw me again in New Haven. President Porter and most of the professors had returned. By this time the enthusiasm with which I was wont to tell my story during the earlier stages of my pilgrimage had somewhat waned. Nevertheless I must make a few calls. President Porter I found exceptionally warm-hearted and sincere. He gave me letters of strong commendation to President Eliot of Harvard and to Robert C. Winthrop. At the next commencement he likewise enrolled my name among the alumni of Yale as master of arts.

Thence I proceeded to see professors Marsh, Brewer, and others. While wandering among these classic halls I encountered Clarence King, who, young as he was, had acquired a reputation and a position second to no scientist in America. He was a man of much genius and rare cultivation. In him were united in an eminent degree the knowledge acquired from books, and that which comes from contact with men. His shrewd common-sense was only surpassed by his high literary and scientific attainments, and his broad learning was so seasoned with unaffected kindness of heart and fresh buoyant good humor as to command the profound admiration of all who knew him.

He was my ideal of a scholar. There was an originality and dash about him which fascinated me. He could do so easily what I could not do at all; he was so young, with such an elastic, athletic brain, trained to do his most ambitious bidding, with such a well employed past, a proud present, and a brilliant future, and withal such a modest bearing and genial kind-heartedness, that I could not but envy him. His descriptions of scenery are as fine as Ruskin's and far more original.

He had often been in my library, and meeting me now at Yale he shook my hand warmly as I thanked him for speaking so kindly of me to Mr Higginson at Newport a few days before. After some further conversation I was about to pass on when he spoke again:

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“How are you getting along?”

“Very well,” said I, “better than I had anticipated.”

“Can I do anything for you?” he asked.

“No, I thank you,” I replied. Then suddenly recollecting myself I exclaimed, “Yes, you can; review my book in some journal.”

“I will do so with pleasure, if I am competent.”

“If you are not,” said I, “with all your personal observations upon the Pacific slope, I may as well cease looking for such men in these parts.”

“Well, I will do my best,” he replied.

I then asked him for what journal he would write a review. He suggested the North American or the Atlantic. I told him Parkman was engaged for one and Bliss for the other. Then he said he would contribute a series of short articles to the Nation. When I returned to New York I saw Godkin. Any journalist was glad to print anything Clarence King would write, so that Mr Godkin readily assented to admit in the columns of the Nation Mr King's review of my work.

I was greatly disappointed, now that King had agreed to write, that his article could not appear in the Atlantic, where were first published his matchless chapters on Mountaineering in the Sierra Nevada. That, however, was out of the question, as Bliss was engaged for that article, and probably had it finished by this time.

Meanwhile Mr Howells wrote me: “I have not heard a word from Mr Bliss, and it is quite too late to get anything about your book into the November number.” I immediately called on Bliss. He was buried deep in some new subject. The money I had given him for his books had made him comparatively independent, and when he had revelled in reading and tobacco smoke for a time, and had concluded his literary debauch, there would be time enough left to apply himself to the relief of corporeal necessities.

“Bliss, how progresses that article for the Atlantic?” I asked him.

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“Finely,” he replied. “I have it nearly completed.”

“Show me some of it, will you? I want to see how it reads.”

“I cannot show it you in its present state,” he stammered. “Next time you come in you shall see it.”

I was satisfied he had not touched it, and I wrote Howells as much, at the same time mentioning my interview with King.

“I wrote you some days ago,” Howells replied, under date of October 7, 1874, “that Mr Bliss had not sent me a review of your book, after promising to do so within ten days from the time when he called with you. So if Mr King will review it for me I shall be delighted.” At the same time Howells telegraphed me, “Ask Clarence King to write review.” Again I sought the retreat of Bliss. I found him still oblivious. The fact is, I think my peripatetic friend trembled somewhat at the responsibility of his position, and he had betaken himself to a vigorous literary whistling to keep his courage up.

When once cornered, he admitted he had not written a word of the proposed review. I then told him of Clarence King's offer and Mr Howells' wishes, and asked him if he would be willing to give his review, which I knew he would never write, to some other journal. He cheerfully expressed his willingness to do so, and congratulated me on having secured so able a writer as Mr King. Therein he acted the gentleman. The 7th of December Mr Howells writes me: “I've just read the proof of Clarence King's review of you for the Atlantic—twelve pages of unalloyed praise.” Concerning this review Mr King wrote from Colorado the 6th of November: “Believe me, I have found great pleasure and profit in twice carefully reading the Wild Tribes. Of its excellence as a piece of critical literary combination I was fully persuaded from the first, but only on actual study do I reach its true value. Although the driest of the 358 351 five volumes, it is simply fascinating to the student who realizes the vital value of savage data. Appreciating and enjoying your book as much as I do, I yet find a difficulty I have never before experienced in attempting to review it. The book itself is a gigantic review, and so crammed and crowded with fact that the narrow limits of an Atlantic review are insufficient to even allude to all the classes of fact. To even intimate the varied class of material is impossible. I rather fall back to the plan of following you from the Arctic coast down to Panamá, tracing the prominent changes and elements of development, giving you of course full credit for the good judgment and selection you have shown.”

Professor J. A. Church reviewed the work in an able and lengthy article in the Galaxy; and for the Nation the book was intrusted to Mr Joseph Anderson of Waterbury, Connecticut, a most able critic.

I failed to see Mr Bryant, but was gratified by the receipt of a letter in which he expressed himself in the following words: “I am amazed at the extent and the minuteness of your researches into the history and customs of the aboriginal tribes of western North America. Your work will remain to coming ages a treasure-house of information on that subject.” The Californian journals printed many of the eastern and European letters sent me, and Mr Bryant's commanded their special admiration, on account of its chirography, which was beautifully clear and firm for a poet, and he of eighty years. When will men of genius learn to write, and those who aspire to greatness cease to be ashamed of fair penmanship?

The 2d of October I ran down to Washington to see Mr Spofford, librarian of congress, and John G. Ames, librarian and superintendent of public documents. I had been presented with many of the government publications for my library for the last ten years and had bought many more. What I wanted now was to have all the congressional documents and 359 352 government publications sent me as they were printed. Mr Ames informed me that he could send certain books from his department. Then, if I could get some senator to put my name on his list, I should receive every other public document printed, twelve copies of which were given each senator for distribution. This Mr Sargent kindly consented to do for me, and to him I am indebted for constant favors during his term in Washington.

Calling at the library of congress, I was informed by Mr Spofford that for some time past he had intended to ask my permission to review the Native Races for the New York Herald in an article some four columns in length. I assured him that for so distinguished honor I should ever hold myself his debtor. I then looked through a room crammed with duplicates, to ascertain if there were any books among them touching my subject which I had not in my library. I found nothing. The regulations of the congressional library required two copies of every book published in the United States to be deposited for copyright, and these two copies must always be kept. Any surplus above the two copies were called duplicates, and might be exchanged for other books.

Early in the writing of the Native Races I had felt the necessity of access to certain important works existing only in manuscript. These were the Historia Apologética and Historia General of Las Casas, not then printed, the Historia Antigua de Nueva España of Father Duran, and others. These manuscripts were nowhere for sale; but few copies were in existence, and besides those in the library of congress I knew of none in the United States. I saw no other way than to have such works as seemed necessary to me copied in whole or in part, and this I accomplished by the aid of copyists through the courtesy of Mr Spofford. The labor was tedious and expensive; but I could not go forward with my writing and feel 360 353 that fresh material existed which I had the money to procure.

Several months previous to my journey to Washington Mr H. R. Coleman, who had long been in the employ of our firm, and who in the spring of 1874, while on a visit to the east, had kindly consented to attend to some business for me, had been there with letters of introduction to senators and others, and had secured me many advantages.

From Philadelphia, under date of the 24th of April, Mr Coleman made a full report. His mission was to examine the works in the congressional library touching the Pacific coast and ascertain what material was there not in my collection. Then he must set men at work extracting certain matter which was described to him, and finally secure all the public documents, either by gift or purchase, possible for the library. I need only say that all this was accomplished by him to my entire satisfaction. “I found there were plenty of copyists, mechanical geniuses, in Washington,” he writes, “but few who could do this work. The two manuscripts you spoke of I found to consist of eight bulky quarto volumes, written in a good clear hand. One of the persons I engaged through the advice and assistance of Mr Spofford was a Frenchman, quite old, a man of experience, and teacher of the French and Spanish languages in Washington.” Senator Sargent rendered Mr Coleman most valuable assistance, helping him to several hundred volumes of books. The difficulty in collecting government documents lies not in obtaining current publications but in gathering the old volumes, since few of the many departments retain in their offices back volumes. I and my agents have visited Washington many times on these missions.

Before leaving San Francisco I had placed the management of the Native Races in London in the hands of Mr Ellis Read, agent in San Francisco for Scotch and English firms. Mr Read's London agent 361 354 was Mr John Brown of Woodford, Essex, an intelligent and wealthy gentleman, who from the first took a warm interest in the work. After consultation with a literary friend the publication of the book was offered Messrs Longmans and Company of Paternoster Row, and accepted on their usual terms: namely, ten per cent. commission on trade sale price, I to furnish them the printed copies unbound, with twenty-five copies for editors. A cable despatch from Mr Brown to Mr Read in San Francisco which was forwarded to New York, conveyed to me the welcome intelligence—welcome because publishers so unexceptionable had undertaken the publication of my book on terms so favorable.

Longmans advised Brown to spend thirty pounds in advertising, and if the book was well received by the press to add twenty to it, and suggested that fifty pounds should be deposited with him for that purpose. Expenses in London were coming on apace; so that almost simultaneously with the news that the Messrs Longmans were my publishers, appeared a request from Mr Brown for one hundred pounds. I was in New York at the time, and not in the best of spirits, and since I must bear all the expense of publication, and furnish the publishers the book already printed, the further demand of five hundred dollars for expenses which one would think the book should pay if it were worth the publication, struck me peculiarly.

Nevertheless, I sent the money. I was resolved that nothing within my power to remove should stand in the way of a first and complete success. Again and again have I plunged recklessly forward in my undertakings regardless of consequences, performing work which never would be known or appreciated, and but for the habit of thoroughness which had by this time become a part of my nature, might as well never have been done, spending time and paying out money with a dogged determination to spend as long as time or money lasted, whether I could see the end or not. After all, the business in London was well and 362 355 economically managed. It would have cost me five times as much had I gone over and attended to it myself, and then it would have been no better done. I was specially desirous my work should be brought to the attention of English scholars and reviewers. I explained to Mr Brown what I had done and was doing in America, and suggested he should adopt some such course there. And I must say he entered upon the task with enthusiasm and performed it well.

Englishman-like, Mr Brown thought the London edition should be dedicated to some Englishman prominent in science or letters. I had no objections, though it was a point which never would have occurred to me. But it has always been my custom to yield to every intelligent suggestion, prompted by the enthusiasm of an agent or assistant, provided his way of doing a thing was in my opinion no worse than my way.

Mr Brown suggested the name of Sir John Lubbock, and sent me a printed page: “I dedicate this work to Sir John Lubbock, Bart., M.P., F.R.S., as a tribute of my high esteem.” In this I acquiesced, and so the dedication was made. In a neat note Sir John acknowledged the compliment, writing Mr Brown the 10th of February, “I am much gratified at the honor of having so valuable a work dedicated to me.”

To Mr Brown I had sent from San Francisco copies of volume I., with letters enclosed, to about a dozen prominent men in England, among them Herbert Spencer, Sir Arthur Helps, E. B. Tylor, R. G. Latham, Sir John Lubbock, Tyndall, Huxley, Max Müller, Lecky, Carlyle, and Murchison. These volumes, being ‘author's copies,’ bore no imprint, and my publishers objected to their being given out without the London imprint. So these copies were returned to me by Messrs Longmans, and others given the gentlemen I had named.

The acknowledgments made me by these men, received of course after my return to San Francisco, were hearty and free.

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Mr Herbert Spencer writes me: “In less than a year I hope to send you the first volume of the Principles of Sociology, in which you will see that I have made frequent and important uses of your book;” and indeed nothing could be more flattering than the references therein made to the Native Races. “During my summer trip in Europe,” says Mr Gilman in a letter from Baltimore, “I have frequently heard your great work spoken of, but nowhere with more commendation than I heard from Herbert Spencer. I am sure you must be more than paid for your labor by the wide-spread satisfaction it has given.”

Doctor Latham, the eminent etnologist and linguist, writes: “The first thing I did after reading it with pleasure and profit—for I can't say how highly I value it—was to indite a review of it for the Examiner.” I was greatly pleased with Mr W. E. H. Lecky's letters, regarding him, as I did, as one of the purest writers of English living. “I rejoice to see the book advancing so rapidly to its completion,” he says, “for I had much feared that, like Buckle's history, it was projected on a scale too gigantic for any single individual to accomplish. It will be a noble monument of American energy, as well as of American genius.” And again, “I was talking of your book the other day to Herbert Spencer, and was gratified to hear him speak warmly of the help he had found in it in writing his present work on sociology. I always think that to take a conspicuous position in a young literature is one of the very highest intellectual aims which an ambitious man could aspire to; and whenever the history of American literature comes to be written, your book will take a very high place among the earliest works of great learning America has produced.” I was glad also to have so graceful a writer as the author of European Morals speak encouragingly of my style, which more than any one thing connected with my work I had lamented. “I must add, too,” he concludes his first letter to me, 364 357 “that your style is so very vivid and flowing that the book becomes most readable even to those who take no special interest in the subject.”

Sir Arthur Helps, writing just before his death, remarks: “I think that the introductory chapter is excellent; and what strikes me most in it is the exceeding fairness with which he treats the researches and the theories of other inquirers into subjects akin to his own.”

I well remember with what trepidation I had thought of addressing these great men before I began to publish. I wondered if they would even answer my letters, or take the trouble to tell me to go to the devil. Then I thought upon it, and said to myself, Though smaller than many you are bigger than some, and the lowest polypus of a scribbler who should address you, you would not hesitate to answer kindly. Then I took heart and said again, Is not a pound of gold as good to me brought by a donkey as by a sage? I know these facts of mine are valuable to men of science. They are the base of all their fabrics; they must have them. And in the form I serve them no great amount of discernment is necessary to assure me that this material, when well winnowed, is in a shape more accessible than it was before.

Of the newspapers and magazines containing the best reviews and descriptions of the library, Mr Brown purchased from fifty to five hundred copies, and distributed them among the libraries, journalists, and literary men of the world. Not having a proper list of selected newspapers and of the libraries in Europe and America, I employed the mercantile and statistical agency association of New York to prepare me such a list, writing them in two blank-books. There were eight hundred and twenty European, Asiatic, and colonial libraries written in one book, and the European and American newspapers and United States libraries in the other book.

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It was through Mr Edward Jackson, correspondent in San Francisco of the London Times, that the Native Races was first brought to the notice of that journal. Mr Jackson could not assure me positively that the review would appear. Mr Walter, the editor, would not enlighten Mr Jackson on the subject. I wished to purchase four hundred copies of the issue containing the notice of the Native Races, provided there should be such an issue. And in this way I was obliged to give my order to Mr Brown.

From London the 3d of April 1875 Mr Brown writes: “At last the Times has spoken, and I have succeeded in securing four hundred copies of the paper by dint of close watching. When I saw the publishers some time ago, with the usual independence of the Times they would not take an order for the paper, or even the money for four hundred copies to be struck off for me when a review did appear, and all I could get was this,—that on the day a review appeared, should a review appear at all, if I sent down to the office before 11 A.M. they would strike off what I wanted. So I kept a person watching—as I was sometimes late in going to town—with money for the review, and he luckily saw it in the morning, rushed down to the office, and, he tells me, in less than a quarter of an hour the extra four hundred copies were struck off and made over to him. The copies are now being posted according to the addresses you sent me.”

In October 1874 one of the editors of the Könische Zeitung was in San Francisco and visited the library frequently. He wrote for his paper a description of the library and the Native Races, besides giving me a list of the German magazines and reviews to which the book should be sent, and much other valuable information. Dr Karl Andree of the Globus, Dresden, expressed great admiration for the work, and inserted several articles concerning it in that most valuable and influential journal.

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In September 1875 the eminent English scholar W. Boyd Dawkins called at the library, giving me great pleasure in his visit. When I parted with him, after showing him the attention within my power, I supposed, as was usually the case, that I should never see him again. It was with great pleasure, therefore, that I received a letter the following spring. “Your wonderful book on the native races of the Pacific States,” he writes from Owens College, Manchester, the 14th of February 1876, “has been handed to me for review in the Edinburgh, and before I review it I should be very much obliged if you could give me information as to the following details: You will perhaps have forgotten the wandering Englishman who called on you at the end of last September, and who had just a hurried glance at your library. Then I had no time to carry away anything but a mere general impression, which has haunted me ever since. And strangely enough your books awaited my return home. I want details as to your mode of indexing. How many clerks do you employ on the work, and what sort of index cards? You shewed all this to me, but I did not take down any figures. Your system seems to me wholly new.”

“Pray accept my heartiest thanks,” writes Edward B. Tylor the 25th of February 1875, “for your gift of the first volume of your great work. I need not trouble you with compliments, for there is no doubt that you will find in a few months' time that the book has received more substantial testimony to its value in the high appreciation of all European ethnologists. I am writing a slight notice for the Academy, particularly to express a hope that your succeeding volumes may throw light on the half-forgotten problem of Mexican civilization, which has made hardly any progress since Humboldt's time. Surely the Old and New Worlds ought to join in working out the question whether they had been in contact, in this district, before Columbus' time; and I really believe that 367 360 you may, at this moment, have the materials in your hands to bring the problem on to a new stage. May I conclude by asking you, as an ethologist, not to adhere too closely to your intention of not theorizing, while there are subjects on which you evidently have the means of forming a theory more exactly and plentifully in your hands than any other anthropologist.”

Before making arrangements with Messrs Longmans I had said nothing about a publisher for the Native Races in France and in Germany. I now requested Mr Brown to ask those gentlemen if they had any objections to my adopting such a course, and on receiving information that they had not, I made proposals to Maisonneuve et Cie, Paris, and F. A. Brockhaus, to act for me, which were accepted, and copies of the volumes were sent them as printed by Messrs Houghton and Company. All the European publishers were anxious to have their copies in advance, so as to publish simultaneously; particularly were they desirous of bringing out the book at least on the very day it was issued in New York.

On accepting the publication of the Native Races for France, Messrs Maisonneuve et Cie promised to announce the work with great care in the bibliographical journals of France and elsewhere, deliver copies to the principal reviews, and use every exertion in their power to extend its influence. Lucien Adam of the Congrès International des Américanistes reviewed the volumes in the Revue Littéraire et Politique, and kindly caused to be inserted in the Revue Britannique of M. Picot a translation of Mr Parkman's review in the North American. An able article of twenty-five pages from the pen of H. Blerzy appeared in the Revue des Deux Mondes of the 15th of May 1876. Extended reviews likewise appeared in Le Temps, La République Française, and other French journals. Mr Brockhaus, the German publisher, took an unusual interest in the book, pronouncing it from the first a work of no ordinary importance.

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I cannot enter more fully into the detail of reviewers and reviews; suffice it to say that two large quarto scrap-books were filled to overflowing with such notices of the Native Races as were sent me. Never probably was a book so generally and so favorably reviewed by the best journals in Europe and America. Never was an author more suddenly or more thoroughly brought to the attention of learned and literary men everywhere.

Among the reviews of which I was most proud were two columns in the London Times, some thirty or forty pages in the Westminster Review, two columns in the London Standard, lengthy articles in the North American Review, the New York L'Eco d'Italia, Hartford Courant, Boston Post, Advertiser, and Journal; Springfield Republican, New York Tribune, Christian Union, Nation, and Post; British Quarterly, Edinburgh Review, London Nature, Saturday Review, Spectator, Academy, Philadelphia North American, Atlantic Monthly; Scribner's Magazine, The Galaxy, Revue Politique, Revue des Deux Mondes, Hongkong Press; Zeitschrift für Länder,Mittheilungen der Kais., etc., Europa und das Ausland, Germany; and La Voz del Nuevo Mundo. I might mention a hundred others, but if I did, all would not be unadulterated praise. A few so-called honors fell upon me after publication, such as being made honorary member of the Massachusetts historical society, the American Antiquarian society, the Philadelphia Numismatic society, and the Buffalo Historical society, for which due thanks were given. Flattering recognitions came also in form of diplomas and complimentary certificates. Probably there was no subject connected with this western coast which would have attracted the attention of so many of the first scholars of America and Europe, which would have brought the author into such prominence throughout the learned world, which would have secured him such unlimited and unqualified praise from every source.

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It was a subject in which all were interested. The study of society was the new and most attractive study of the age. Everything relating to man, his habitation and his habits, his idiosyncrasies and his peculiarities, national, social, and individuals, all taught a lesson. The sage sat at the feet of the savage, and there studied man as he is in a state of nature, before he is disguised by the crusts and coverings of society. “I could wish that the whole five volumes were already available,” writes Herbert Spencer to me in February 1875, “and had been so for some time past; for the tabular statements and extracts made for the Descriptive Sociology by Professor Duncan would have been more complete than at present.”

Among my warmest friends was Charles C. Jones Jr. of New York, who reviewed the Native Races in the Independent, devoting several articles to each volume. These articles, besides being critical reviews, were analytical and descriptive essays, dividing and taking up the subject-matter of each volume, with a view of popularizing the theme. Mr Jones was fully imbued with the subject, and his articles were very interesting. To me he writes: “Your fifth volume, ex dono auctoris, reached me to-day. Fresh from the perusal of its charming pages, I offer you my sincere congratulations upon the completion of your magnum opus. Great have been the pleasure and profit which I have experienced in the perusal of the volumes as they have been given to the public.” The attention of the American Ethnological society was likewise drawn to the work by Mr Jones, and the author was promptly made an honorary member of that body, with the resolution “that the volumes which have already appeared indicate patient study, careful discrimination, and exhaustive research, and constitute a monument of industry and merit alike honorable to their author and creditable to the literary effort of our country.”

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Thus each great man found in it that which was new and interesting to him in his special investigations, whatever those might have been, while the attention of lesser scholars and the general reader was attracted by a variety of topics. The statesman found there the incipient stages of government; the clergyman the early mythologies; the merchant, the agriculturist, the physician, each might there learn something of his occupation or profession and institute comparison between then and now. It did not fail to touch even one of those several chords which in the breast of the greatest of American humorists vibrate for the gaieté de cœur of mankind. Of Mark Twain and the Native Races says Charles Dudley Warner, writing me the 11th of October 1876: “Mr Clemens was just in and was in an unusual state of enthusiasm over the first volume, especially its fine style. You may have a picture of his getting up at two o'clock this morning and, encased in a fur overcoat, reading it till daylight.”

In another respect the subject was a most happy choice for me. While it attracted much more attention than pure history would have done, its imperfections of substance, style, and arrangement were much more readily overlooked. In precise history critics might have looked for more philosophy, more show of learning, or more dignity of style. All I claimed in the premises was faithfully to have gathered my facts, to have arranged them in the most natural manner, and to have expressed them in the clearest language. These were its greatest charms with scholars, and where so few pretensions were made reviewers found little room for censure.

Thus it was that I began to see in my work a success exceeding my wildest anticipations. And a first success in literature under ordinary circumstances is a most fortunate occurrence. To me it was everything. I hardly think that failure would have driven 371 364 me from my purpose; but I needed more than dogged persistency to carry me through herculean undertakings. I needed confidence in my abilities, assurance, sympathy, and above all a firm and lofty enthusiasm. I felt with Lowell, that “solid success must be based on solid qualities and the honest culture of them.”

Then again to accomplish my purpose, which was to do important historical work, it seemed necessary for me to know wherein I had erred and wherein I had done well. From the first success fell upon me like refreshing showers, cleansing my mind and my experiences, and watering all my subsequent efforts. To the stream of knowledge which I had set flowing through divers retorts and condensers from my accumulations to the clearly printed page, I might now confidently apply all my powers. As the king of the Golden River told Gluck, in Ruskin's beautiful story, whoever should cast into the stream three drops of holy water, for him the waters of the river should turn into gold; but any one failing in the first attempt should not succeed in a second; and whoso cast in unholy water should become a black stone. Thus sparkled my work in the sunshine of its success, and the author, so far as he was told, was not yet a black stone.

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CHAPTER XV.

THE TWO GENERALS. Ever since there has been so great a demand for type, there has been much less lead to spare for cannon-balls.

Bulwer.

CAME to the library the 21st of October 1873 Enrique Cerruti, introduced by Philip A. Roach, editor and senator, in the terms following: “He speaks Italian, French, Spanish, and English. He can translate Latin. He has been a consul-general and secretary of legation. He is well acquainted with Spanish-American affairs and the leading men in those states.”

The bearer of the letter stood before me, a man three or four years under forty, slightly built, of medium height, with a long thin face, prominent square forehead, dark protruding eyes, and full mouth drawn down at the corners, long neatly brushed black hair and long thin mustache. His complexion was a dark sallow; and there was a general flatness of features and a drooping Quixotic melancholy pervading his entire physique. In his hand he held a glossy new beaver, matching his glossy black hair, but further than these there was nothing new or bright about him, except his boots, which were well polished. His clothes were cheap rather than shabby, and the crevices of his coarse linen shirt-bosom were well filled with clean white starch. Eyes, mouth, and melancholy mustache, features and form, were now all on the qui vive to know what destiny would next do with him. He was a unique copy, as Dibdin remarked of the Dieppe postilion.

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In answer to my queries concerning his nationality, education, and late occupation, he informed me that he was a native of Turin, of an old and highly respected Italian family, that at the age of fourteen he had deserted college and fled to Genoa, where he embarked on a vessel bound for Gibraltar. In time he found himself in South America, where for five years he was consul-general in the United States of Colombia, which position he resigned to rescue his friend General Mariano Melgarejo, then president of Bolivia, from his falling fortunes. Appearing in arms, his attempts in that direction failed. Besieged in the seaport of Cobija he was forced to capitulate, and finally to depart the country. After a tour of observation through the eastern United States he proceeded to Mexico, and after crossing every one of the isthmuses of America, he came to California.

Although the applicant, either in his person or in his history, did not impress me as one specially adapted to literary labors, yet I had long since learned that superficial judgments as to character and ability, particularly when applied to wanderers of the Latin race, were apt to prove erroneous. Further than this, while not specially attractive, there was something winning about the fellow, though I scarcely could tell what it was. At all events he secured the place he sought.

Turning him over to Mr Oak, for the next three or four months I scarcely gave him a thought. He attempted at first to extract notes for the Native Races, devoting his evenings to filing Pacific coast journals, recording the numbers received, and placing them in their proper places on the shelves. He was not specially successful in abstracting material, or in any kind of purely literary work; the newspapers he kept in good order, and he could write rapidly from dictation either in Spanish or English.

Quickly catching the drift of things, he saw that first of all I desired historical material; and what next 374 367 specially drew my attention to him was his coming to me occasionally with something he had secured from an unexpected source. When the time came for my book to be noticed by the press he used to write frequent and long articles for the Spanish, French, and Italian journals in San Francisco, New York, Mexico, France, Spain, and Italy. I know of no instance where one of his many articles of that kind was declined. He had a way of his own of making editors do about as he desired in this respect.

Gradually I became interested in this man, and I saw him interest himself more and more in my behalf; and with time this interest deepened into regard, until finally I became strongly attached to him. This attachment was based on his inherent honesty, devotion, and kindness of heart, though on the surface he was bubble and bombast. Within was the strictest integrity, and that loyalty which makes one literally die for one's friend; without was fiction, hyperbole, and empiricism.

He was a natural adept in certain subtleties which, had his eye been evil, would have made him a first-class villain; but with all his innocent artifices, and the rare skill and delicate touch employed in playing upon human weaknesses, he was on the whole a pure-minded man. I used to fancy I despised flattery, but I confess I enjoyed not more Nemos' caustic criticisms than Cerruti's oily unctions, which were laid on so gracefully, so tenderly, and withal so liberally, and with the air of one to whom it made little difference whether you believed him in earnest or not; for he well knew that I understood him thoroughly, and accepted his compliments at their value. He was the only man whose flummery, even in homœopathic doses, did not sicken me. There was something so princely in his blandiloquence that I could not but forgive him as fast as it was uttered. He was not in the least a flunky; there was no fawning about him; he was a man and a gentleman, a high and honorable personage, 375 368 with possibly an equal in America, but not a superior, that is to say, taken at his own estimation.

Erect in his carriage, with chin up and glossy hat thrown well back on the head, his demeanor was often in strange contradiction to his somewhat withered appearance. In his movements he was as lithe and active as a cat, and of as tireless endurance. He was a very early riser, and often had a half day's work done before others were up. I do not know that I ever heard him complain of being fatigued.

Montaigne's mistake is great when he exclaims, “How much less sociable is false speaking than silence!” To Cerruti, lying was the greatest luxury. Neither wealth, station, nor learning could have yielded him half the enjoyment. With Socrates, he seemed to hold that the mendacious man of all others is capable and wise, and if a man cannot tell a lie upon occasion he displays glaring weakness.

He did not require, like Marryatt, duty to country to warrant the practice. A half truth was worse than the whole truth. Falsehood spun itself of its own volition in his whirling brain, and he amused himself by flinging off the fabric from his tongue. It was habit and amusement; to have been forced always to speak the truth would have been to stop the play of the healthful vital organism. With Maximus Tyrius he seemed to hold that “a lie is often profitable and advantageous to men, and truth hurtful.”

Lying with him was a fine art. He used often to talk to me as long as I would listen, while knowing that I regarded every word he uttered as false. But he took care to make it palatable. If one liked one's praise thickly spread, he enjoyed nothing so much as giving a friend his fill of it. And no one was quicker than he to detect the instant his sweetness nauseated. Praise is always acceptable if ministered with skill; but as Horace says of Cæsar, “Stroke him with an awkward hand and he kicks.”

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Every man's face was to Cerruti a barometer, indicating the weather of the mind, and as with swiftly selected words he played his variations upon the expectations, the passions, or aspirations of his listener, he read it with ease, and by the weight or pressure of the soul-inspired atmosphere there indicated he regulated each succeeding sentence of his speech. Herein lay a strange power which he possessed over many men. His mind was no less elastic than it was active. Acute observation was a habit with him.

And yet in his lying, as in everything else about him, he was harmless. He did not intend to deceive. He did not expect his lies to be believed. Exaggeration came to him so naturally that he was for the most part unconscious of it, and nothing surprised or shocked him more than for a friend to construe his speech literally and so act upon it.

He did not lie for gain; indeed, should so unpalatable a thing as truth ever force his lips you might suspect something of personal benefit at the bottom of it. In his economy of deceit he would not waste a good falsehood upon himself. Reversing Byron's statement, the truth with him was a lie in masquerade. He was one of those of whom Pascal says: “Quoique les personnes n'aient point d'intéreêt à ce qu'elles disent, il ne faut pas conclure de là absolument qu'elles ne mentent point, car il y a des gens qui mentent simplement pour mentir.”

Sheridan admitted that he never hesitated to lie to serve a friend; and that his conscience was troubled about it only when he was discovered. Cerruti was far before Sheridan in this respect, that he was troubled in mind about his lies only when they were taken for truth. And yet blood must flow if ever the words ‘you lie’ were spoken.

Some tongues are so long that the lightest breeze of brain will wag them; some brains so light, and so full of light conceits, yet so heavily resting on the consciousness, that, like the ancient mariner, a woful 377 370 agony wrenches the possessor until his tale is told. Cerruti finally came to be regarded a privileged character among those that knew him, liberty being given him to talk as he pleased, his aberrations of speech being charged to his genius and not to deliberate intention. Solon counterfeited madness that he might recite verses on Salamis in the market-place, to speak which otherwise by law was death; Cerruti's madness was constitutional.

He ate, drank, smoked, and slept: yet as to the manner he was quite indifferent. He cared much more for his personal appearance, and would wear as good clothes as he could get; that is, they must look passably well, though as to quality he was not particular. To sleep amongst old lumber in a garret, and coolly assert he was stopping at the Grand Hotel; to dine on three bits, and then talk of seven thousand dollar bills of exchange which he carried in his pocket; to parade his illustrious connections, his daring deeds in battle or on the ocean, the offices he had held, the influence he had wielded, and the crushing effect at all times of his enkindled wrath—these were among his constant themes.

He would drink or not, as it happened; but I never saw him drunk. Cigars, five for a quarter, seemed to satisfy him as well as the purest Habana at twenty-five cents each. A little sleep was acceptable, if convenient; if not, it was no matter.

He liked to be called general, even though he had been but consul-general, even though he had been but consul, even though he had slept but a fortnight in a consulate. To ears so attuned there is something pleasing in high-sounding titles, it making little difference whether the mark of distinction be rightfully employed or not.

General Cerruti's ears were so attuned. He knew that everybody knew there was no ground for applying such a title to him, and yet it pleased him. At 378 371 times he used greatly to enjoy boasting his present poverty, flaunting it in most conspicuous colors, comparing what he was with what he had been, well knowing that everyody knew he never had been anything in particular. He used to carry a galvanized watch, a large double-cased yellow stem-winder, which he would sport ostentatiously and then boast that it was bogus.

He well knew that he was not a great man, and never by any possibility could be regarded as such, though like Parrhasius he dubbed himself king of his craft, and assumed the golden crown and purple robe of royalty; and yet above all things earthly he adored the semblance of greatness, and arrayed himself so far as he was able in its tattered paraphernalia. Of his brave deeds while acting the part of revolutionist in southern America he was as proud as if he had fought at Marathon or Waterloo. He was an air-plant, rooted to no spot on earth, without fixedness of purpose sufficient to become even parasitic. He would not admit himself ever to have been in the wrong, but the results of his follies and mistakes he charged to a cruel and relentless fate. Forever the world turned to him its shady side.

Notwithstanding his aggressive disposition he was extremely sensitive. His pride was supreme, exposing him to tortures from every defamatory wind. Touch him in certain quarters, call in question his antecedents, criticise his past life, his family connections, his present conduct, and you aroused him almost to frenzy. Yet he was as quickly brought from the storm into calm waters. Often with one kind word I have cooled in him a tempest which had been raging perhaps for days. Indeed, here as everywhere in life, clouds were not dispelled by lightning and the thunderbolt, nor by hurling at them other clouds, but by permeating them with soft sunshine.

Under a brusque demeanor, and a gasconade obnoxious to some, he veiled an humble, kind, and loving 379 372 heart. In his affections he displayed a womanly tenderness, and was exceedingly careful and considerate with the feelings of his friends. As Leigh Hunt said of Charles Lamb, he was a compound of the Jew, the gentleman, and the angel.

At first the young men in the library used to laugh at him; but I pointed to the signal results which he was achieving, and even should he prove in the end knave or fool, success was always a convincing argument. A habit of talking loud and grandiloquently, especially among strangers, made Oak fearful that Cerruti, while making an ass of himself, would bring us all into ridicule among sensible men. But, said I, no sensible man brings us the material that he brings. Indeed, to this quality of nervous ecstasy or semi-madness the world owes much, owes its Platos, its Newtons, and its Shakespeares; to the madness of eccentric times civilization owes its longest strides.

Though keen-scented and bold in his search after historical knowledge, he was neither impertinent nor vulgar. Curiosity is the mainspring of all our intellectualities, of all our civilities; but there is a curiosity which tends to ignorance, which finds its highest qualification in gossip and coarse personalities. There is a vulgar and debasing curiosity, and there is an elevating and improving curiosity. To pry into the commonplace affairs of commonplace men and women is a mean and morbid curiosity; to study for purposes of emulation and improvement the exalted characters of the great and good is a noble curiosity.

Of all studies, the analysis of human nature is to me the most deeply interesting. And of all such investigations I find none more prolific than the anatomizing of the characters connected with these historical efforts. Every man of them represents one of a hundred; one success to ninety-nine failures. It would 380 373 seem, then, that in this field certain qualities are requisite to success; yet to attempt in every instance to describe those essential qualities would involve the writing of a volume.

Take, for example, this same warm-hearted genial friend Cerruti. To see him in his quick, nervous comings and going; to hear him rattling away in his off-hand, free, and fearless manner, on one subject and another, apparently at random, apparently careless and indifferent as to the correctness of his statements, apparently as effervescent in mental qualities as a bottle of champagne, one not knowing him might take him as the last person to prove a valuable assistant in precise historic investigation. Yet there were few men truer, more conscientious, or more efficient in their way.

He did what no one else connected with the work could do, what but for him never would have been done. He had not the scope and comprehensiveness, or the literary culture, or the graceful style, or steady application, or erudition to achieve for himself. But he had what all of them together could not command, power over the minds of men, consummate skill in touching the springs of human action and in winning the wary to his purpose.

I do not mean to say that he could not write, and in the Latin languages write eloquently; the many manuscript volumes of history and narrative which have emanated from his pen under the dictation of eminent Californians and others prove the contrary. His chief talent, however, lay in awakening an interest in my labors.

But how was this necessary? What need of special efforts to make proselytes to a cause so palpably important; a cause neither asking nor accepting subsidy nor pecuniary aid from state, society, or individual; a cause absolutely private and independent, and having no other object in view than pure investigation and an unbiassed recording of the truth? Surely, one 381 374 would think, such an enterprise would not require an effort to make men believe in it.

Nevertheless it did. There were those, mercenary minds, who could see nothing but money in it, who having documents or knowledge of historical events would not part with their information but for a price. ‘Ah!’ said they, ‘this man knows what he is about. He is not fool enough to spend time and money without prospective return. He is a book man, and all this is but a dodge to make at once money and reputation. No man in this country does something for nothing. No man pours out his money and works like a slave except in the expectation that it will come back to him with interest. He may say he is not working for money, but we do not believe it.’ Others, although their judgment told them that by no possibility could the outlay be remunerative, and that my experience in book-publishing was such that I could not but know it, yet, in view of the interest I took in the subject, and the money I was spending, in every direction, in the accumulation of material, they thought I might perhaps be induced to pay them for their information rather than do without it.

No man of common-sense or of common patriotism thought or talked thus; but I had to do with individuals possessed of neither sense nor patriotism, common or uncommon. I had to do with men in whose eyes a dollar was so large that they could not see beyond it; in whose eyes money was not alone the chief good, but the only good; whose dim intelligence ran in channels so muddy that no sunlight could penetrate them. Thank God such men were few in California. And let their names die; let them bespatter no page of mine, nor may my pen ever damn such a one to immortality.

Another class, a large and highly respectable one, was composed of men who for a quarter of a century had been importuned time and again by multitudes of petty scribblers, newspaper, interviewers, and quasi 382 375 historians, for items of their early experience, until they tired of it. So that when a new applicant for information appeared they were naturally and justly suspicious; but when they came to know the character and quality of the work proposed, and were satisfied that it would be fairly and thoroughly done, they were ready with all their powers and possessions to assist the undertaking.

In some instances, however, it required diplomacy of a no mean order to convince men that there was no hidden or ulterior object in thus gathering and recording their own deeds and the deeds of their ancestors. The Hispano-Californians particularly, many of them, had been so abused, so swindled, so robbed by their pretended friends, by unprincipled Yankee lawyers and scheming adventurers, that they did not know whom to trust, and were suspicious of everybody. Often had letters and other papers been taken from their possession and used against them in court to prove the title to their lands defective, or for other detrimental purpose. Then there were individual and local jealousies to be combated. One feared undue censure of himself and undue praise of his enemy; one family feared that too much prominence would be given another family. Then there were rival authors, who had collected little batches of material with a view of writing the history of California themselves. I suppose there were no less than fifty brains which had been tenanted by the dim intention of some day writing the history of California. All these had to be won over and be made to see the great advantage to the present and to future generations of having all these scattered chapters of history brought into one grand whole.

To accomplish somewhat of this was the work of General Cerruti. Chameleon-like he would shift his opinions according to the company, and adapt his complex nature to the colors of time and place; with the serious he could be grave, with the young merry, 383 376 and with the profligate free. With equal grace he could simulate virtue or wink at vice. Hence, like Catiline planning his conspiracy, he made himself a favorite equally with men the best and the basest.

Another general: though likewise of the Latin race, with all its stately misdirection, yet broader in intellect, of deeper endowment, and gentler sagacity. Among the Hispano-Californians Mariano de Guadalupe Vallejo deservedly stands first. Born at Monterey the 7th of July 1808, of prominent Castilian parentage, twenty-one years were spent in religious, civil, and military training; after which he took his position at San Francisco as comandante of the presidio, collector, and alcalde. In 1835 he established the first ayuntamiento, or town council, at Yerba Buena cove, where was begun the metropolis of San Francisco; the same year he colonized Sonoma, situated at the northern extremity of San Francisco bay, which ever after was his home.

While Vallejo was general, his nephew Alvarado was governor. In their early education and subsequent studies, for citizens of so isolated a country as California then was, these two hijos del pais enjoyed unusual advantages. To begin with, their minds were far above the average of those of any country. Alvarado might have taken his place beside eminent statesmen in a world's congress; and as for literary ability, one has but to peruse their histories respectively, to be impressed with their mental scope and charm of style.

As a mark of his intellectual tastes and practical wisdom, while yet quite young, Vallejo gathered a library of no mean pretensions, consisting not alone of religious books, which were the only kind at that time regarded with any degree of favor by the clergy of California, but liberally sprinkled with works on general knowledge, history, science, jurisprudence, and state-craft. These he kept under lock, admitting none to his rich feast save his nephew Alvarado.

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Thus were these two young men, destined to exercise so marked an influence upon the impressible society of California, blest beyond parallel by this admission into the great school of free and interchangeable thought.

General Vallejo was a man of fine physique, rather above medium height, portly and straight as an arrow, with a large round head, high forehead, half-closed eyes, thin black hair, and side-whiskers. Every motion betrayed the military man and the gentleman. His face wore usually a contented and often jovial expression, but the frequent short quick sigh told of unsatisfied longings, of vain regrets and lacerated ambitions.

And no wonder. For within the period of his manhood he had seen California emerge from a quiet wilderness and become the haunt of embroiling civilization. He had seen arise from the bleak and shifting sand-dunes of Yerba Buena cove a mighty metropolis, the half of which he might have owned as easily as to write his name, but of which there was not a single foot he could now call his own, and where he wandered well nigh a stranger; he had seen the graceful hills and sweet valleys of his native land pass from the gentle rule of brothers and friends into the hands of foreigners, under whose harsh domination the sound of his native tongue had died away like angels' music.

Look in upon him at Sonoma, at any time from five to ten years after his settling there, and for a native Californian you find a prince, one who occupies, commands, and lives in rustic splendor. His house, a long two-story adobe, with wing and out-houses, was probably the finest in California. Besides his dusky retainers, who were swept away by diseases brought upon them by the white man, he had always on the premises at his command a company of soldiers, and servants without number. There he had his library, and there he wrote a history of California, covering 385 378 some seven or eight hundred manuscript pages; but, alas! house, history, books, and a large portion of the original documents which he and his father and his grandfather had accumulated and preserved, were almost in a moment swept away by fire. This was a great loss; but few then or subsequently knew anything of the papers or the history.

He was stately and stiff in those days, for he was the first power in northern California; to meet an equal he must travel many leagues; afterward he became less pretentious. The United States treated him badly, and the state treated him badly, or rather sharpers, citizens of the commonwealth, and in the name of the state and of the United States, first taking from him his lands, and then failing to keep faith with him in placing the state capital at Vallejo, as they had agreed.

Often have I regarded thee in mute and aweinspired astonishment, oh thou man of lost opportunities, that with all thy crushed ambitions, thy subverted patrimony, and thy metamorphosed life, thou shouldst still be so serenely happy! Lord of all this immensely wealthy peninsula of San Francisco; lord of all the vast domain toward the illimitable north, thou gavest to thy servants leagues of unencumbered land and kept scarcely enough in which to bury thyself!

Prodigal to a fault were almost all this race of Hispano-Californians; charging the results of their improvidence meanwhile upon those who had winked at their ruin. Yet this Timon of Sonoma was never Misanthropos, hating mankind.

When gold was discovered, three thousand tamed natives answered to his call; in the hall of his dwelling at Sonoma, soon after, were stacked jars of the precious metal, as though it had been flour or beans. When one had leagues of land and tons of gold; when lands were given away, not sold and bought, and gold 386 379 came pouring in for cattle and products which had hitherto been regarded of scarcely value enough to pay for the computation; when, for aught any one knew, the Sierra was half gold, and gold bought pleasure and adulation, and men liked adulation and pleasure, what was to stay the lavish hand? For holding the general's horse the boy was flung a doubloon; for shaving the general the barber was given an ounce and no change required; at places of entertainment and amusement, at the festive board, the club, the gathering, ounces were as coppers to the New Englander, or as quarters to the later Californian.

Thus these most magnificent of opportunities were lost; for native retainers could not breathe the blasted air of civilization, nor was the Sierra built of solid gold.

A cloud would sometimes pass across his sunny features in speaking of these things, and in moments of special relaxation I have seen a tear in the bright black eye; but like a child with its toy the merry-making of the hour was never for more than a moment marred by melancholy regrets.

Singular, indeed, and well nigh supernatural must have been the sensations which crept over the yet active and vigorous old gentleman as he wandered amidst the scenes of his younger days. Never saw one generation such change; never saw one man such transformation. Among them he walked like one returned from centuries of journeying.

“I love to go to Monterey,” the old general used to say to me, “for there I may yet find a little of the dear and almost obliterated past. There is yet the ocean that smiles to me as I approach, and venerable bearded oaks, to which I raise my hat as I pass under them; and there are streets still familiar, and houses not yet torn down, and streams and landscapes which I may yet recognize as part of my former belongings. But after all these are only the unfabricated 387 380 gravegear that tell me I am not yet dead.” However, if his was the loss somebody's must have been the gain. As one pertinently remarks: “Nations grow in greatness only through the sacrifice, the immolation of the individual.”

In his family and among his friends he was an exceedingly kind-hearted man. Before the stranger, particularly before the importunate if not impudent Yankee stranger, he drew close round him the robes of his dignity. In all the common courtesies of life he was punctilious, even for a Spaniard; neither was his politeness affected, but it sprang from true gentility of heart. It was his nature when in the society of those he loved and respected to prefer them to himself; it was when he came in contact with the world that all the lofty pride of his Castilian ancestry came to the surface.

Indeed, the whole current of his nature ran deep; his life was not the dashing torrent, but the still silent flow of the mighty river.

In his younger days he was a model of chivalry, a true Amadis of Gaul; and when age had stiffened his joints somewhat, and had thickened the flesh upon his graceful limbs, he lost none of his gallantry, and was as ready with his poetry as with his philosophy. Indeed, he wrote verses with no common degree of talent, and there are many parts of his history which might better be called poetry than prose. And now he comes upon us like a courtier of Philip II., awakened from a century-sleep upon a desert island.

His philosophy was of the Pythagorean type; he was not always to tell all that he knew, and in determining whom to trust he was to be governed greatly by his physiognomical discernment. He liked or disliked a person usually upon sight or instinct. He was a close and shrewd observer, and was usually correct in his estimates of human character. His wisdom, though simple and fantastic, was deep. He respected the forms of religion from ancient association and 388 381 habit rather than from strong internal convictions as to their efficacy. There was not the slightest asceticism in his piety; his was far too intelligent a mind to lie under the curse of bigotry. Without being what might be termed a dreamer in philosophic matters, he possessed in a happy degree the faculty of practical abstraction; there was to him here in the flesh a sphere of thought other than that answering to the demands of the body for food and covering, a sphere which to him who might enter it was heaven's harmony hall. Thither one might sometimes escape and find rest from every-day solicitudes.

In imperial Rome, had he not been born Octavius, he would have been Mæcenas, Cæsar's chief adviser, the friend of Virgil and Horace, politician, and patron of art and literature, dilettante and voluptuary. In his later life General Vallejo enjoyed that state of calm and cheerful resignation which brings the strongest endurance.

Altogether brave and bluff as a soldier, stern and uncompromising as a man of the world, I have seen him in his softer moods as sensitive and as sentimental as a Madame de Staël. He was in every respect a sincere man. To his honesty, but not to his discretion, a friend might trust his fortune and his life. He never would betray, but he might easily be betrayed. Ever ready to help a friend, he expected his friend to help him.

In common with most of his countrymen, his projects and his enthusiasms swayed violently between extremes. He was too apt to be carried away by whatever was uppermost in his mind. Not that his character lacked ballast, or that he was incapable of close calculation or clear discrimination; but never having been accustomed to the rigid self-restriction which comes from a life of plodding application, he was perhaps too much under the influence of that empressement which lies nearest the affections.

Yet for this same lack of selfish cunning, posterity 389 382 will praise him; for an heroic and discriminating zeal which, though impetuous, always hurried him forward in the right direction, his children's children will rise up and call him blessed. He was the noblest Californian of them all! Among all the wealthy, the patriotic, and the learned of this land he alone came forward and flung himself, his time, his energies, and all that was his, into the general fund of experiences accumulating for the benefit of those who should come after him. His loyalty was pure; and happy the god in whose conquered city are still found worshippers.

Pacheco might promise; Vallejo performed. Alvarado might be entertained into giving; Vallejo went forth like a man, and making the battle his own, fought it at his own cost, fought it not alone for self-aggrandizement, but from motives of patriotism as well. While demagogues were ranting of their devotion to country, offering for a liberal compensation to sacrifice themselves at Sacramento or at Washington, General Vallejo was spending his time and money scouring California for the rescuing of valuable knowledge from obliteration, and in arranging it, when found, in form available to the world. Let Spanish-speaking Californians honor him, for he was their chief in chivalrous devotion to a noble cause! Let English-speaking Californias honor him, for without the means of some he did more than any other for the lasting benefit of the country! Let all the world honor him, for he is thrice worthy the praise of all!

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CHAPTER XVI.

ITALIAN STRATEGY. A few drops of oil will set the political machine at work, when a ton of vinegar would only corrode the wheels and canker the movements.

Colton.

GENERAL VALLEJO was wary; General Cerruit was wily. Rumor had filled all the drawers and chest at Lachryma Montis, the residence of General Vallejo at Sonoma, with priceless documents relating to the history of California, some saved from the fire which destroyed his dwelling, some gathered since, and had endowed the owner with singular knowledge in deciphering them and in explaining early affairs. Hence, when some petty scribbler wished to talk largely about things of which he knew nothing, he would visit Sonoma, would bow and scrape himself into the parlor at Lachryma Montis, or besiege the general in his study, and beg for some particular purpose a little information concerning the untold past. The general declared that rumor was a fool, and directed applicants to the many historical and biographical sketches already in print.

I had addressed to Sonoma communications of this character several times myself, and while I always received a polite reply there was no tangible result. As Cerruti displayed more and more ability in gathering material, and as I was satisfied that General Vallejo could disclose more then he professed himself able to, I directed the Italian to open correspondence with him, with instructions to use his own judgment in storming the walls of indifference and prejudice at Lachryma Montis.

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License being thus allowed him, Cerruti opened the campaign by addressing a letter to General Vallejo couched in terms of true Spanish-American courtesy, which consists of boasting and flattery in equal parts. He did not fail to state the fact that he also was a general, and though but consul-general he had seen service—that is, he would have fought had he not felt constrained to run away. He did not fail to state that he was a professional brewer of revolutions, that he loved revolution better than life, that the normal state of his Bolivia was revolutionary, and that if the people of Sonoma wished their commonwealth placed in an attitude hostile to the United States, if they desired to see the streets of any opposition or neighboring town deluged in the blood of its citizens, he was theirs to command. He had heard of General Vallejo, as indeed all Bolivia, and Italy, and every other country had heard of him. Wherever California was known, there children lisped the name Vallejo; indeed, the terms Vallejo and California were synonymous.

This letter as a matter of course was written in Spanish. General Vallejo's letters to me were always in Spanish, and mine to him were in English. But if you wish to be one with a person, you will address him in his own language. The date of Cerruti's letter was March 24, 1874. The big fish of Lachryma Montis approached the bait in good style and took a bite, but did not fail to discover the hook; accustomed to hooks and baits it was in no wise afraid of them.

To the searcher after Californian truth Vallejo was California, to the student of California's history Vallejo was California; so Cerruti had affirmed in his letter, and the recipient seemed not disposed to resent the assertion. The writer loved truth and history; he loved California, and longed to know more of her; most of all he loved Vallejo, who was California on legs. Not a word said Cerruti about Bancroft, his library, or his work, preferring to appear before him 392 385 whom he must conquer as a late consul-general and an exiled soldier, rather than one holding a subordinate position.

The result was as he had desired. Courteously General Vallejo replied, at the same time intimating that if Cerruti desired historical data he had better call and get it. “Sin embargo,” he says, “por casualidad ó por accidente, ese nombre está relacionado é identificado de tal manera con la historia de la Alta California desde su fundacion hasta hoy, que aunque insignificante, de veras, Sr Consul, la omision de él en ella será como la omision de un punto ó una coma en un discurso escrito ó la acentuacion ortográfica de una carta epistolar.”

So Cerruti went to Sonoma, went to Lachryma Montis almost a stranger, but carrying with him, in tongue and temper at least, much that was held in common by the man he visited. It was a most difficult undertaking, and I did not know another person in California whom I would have despatched on this mission with any degree of confidence.

Introducing himself, he told his tale. In his pocket were letters of introduction, but he did not deign to use them; he determined to make his way after his own fashion. Cerruti's was not the story to which the general was accustomed to turn a deaf ear. Further than this, the Italian had studied well the character of him he sought to win, and knew when to flatter, and how. Spaniards will swallow much if of Spanish flavor and administered in Spanish doses. This Cerruti well understood. He had every advantage. In his rôle of stranger visiting the first of Californians, he could play upon the general's pride of person, of family; he could arouse his wrath or stir up soft sympathy almost at pleasure.

And yet the Spaniard was not duped by the Italian: he was only pleased. All the while General Vallejo knew that Cerruti had a defined purpose there, some 393 386 axe to grind, some favor to ask, which had not yet been spoken; and when finally the latter veered closer to his errand and spoke of documents, “I presently saw,” said the general to me afterward, “the ghost of Bancroft behind him.” Nevertheless, Vallejo listened and was pleased. “After making deep soundings,” writes Cerruti in the journal I directed him to keep, and which under the title Ramblings in California contains much reading, “I came to the conclusion that General Vallejo was anxious for some person endowed with literary talents to engage in the arduous task of giving to the world a true history of California. Having come to this conclusion, I frankly admitted to him that I had neither the intelligence nor the means required for so colossal an enterprise, but assured him that Hubert H. Bancroft,” etc. After a brief interview Cerruti retreated with an invitation to dine at Lachryma Montis the next day.

It was a grand opportunity, that dinner party, for a few others had been invited, and we may rest assured our general did not fail to improve it. Early during the courses his inventive faculties were brought into play, and whenever anything specially strong arose in his mind he threw up his chin, and lifted his voice so that all present might hear it. On whatever subject such remark might be it was sure to be received with laughter and applause; for somewhere interwoven in it was a compliment for some one present, who if not specially pleased at the broad flattery could but be amused at the manner in which it was presented. How well the envoy improved his time is summed in one line of his account, where with charming naïveté he says: “In such pleasant company hunger disappeared as if by enchantment, and the food placed on my plate was left almost untouched”—in plain English, he talked so much he could not eat.

Next day our expert little general was everywhere, talking to everybody, in barber-shops, beer-saloons, and wine-cellars, in public and private houses, offices 394 387 and stores, making friends and picking up information relative to his mission. First he wrote the reminiscences of some half dozen pioneers he had met and conversed with on the boat, at the hotel, and on the street, writings which he did not fail to spread before General Vallejo, with loud and ludicrous declamation on the character of each. Thus he made the magnate of Sonoma feel that the visitor was at once to become a man of mark in that locality, whom to have as a friend was better for Vallejo than that he should be regarded as opposed to his mission. But this was not the cause of the friendship that now began to spring up in the breasts of these two men.

This display of ability on the part of the new-comer could not fail to carry with it the respect of those who otherwise were sensible enough to see that Cerruti was a most windy and erratic talker. But his vein of exaggeration, united as it was with energy, ability, enthusiasm, and honesty, amused rather than offended, particularly when people recognized that deception and harm were not intended, but were the result of habit. Here indeed was one of the secret charms of Cerruti, this and his flattery. All Spaniards delight in hyperbole.

Among Cerruti's earlies acquaintances made at Sonoma was Major Salvador Vallejo, a younger brother of the general, and from whom he took a very interesting dictation. Major Salvador was born in Monterey in 1814. He had been a great Indian-fighter, and had many interesting events to relate of by-gone times.

Often Cerruti would give great names to the shadows of men, and find himself pressed to the wall by the greatness he had invoked; often he was obliged to allay by falsehood anger aroused by indiscretion. Writing on the 29th of November 1874, he says: “Major Salvador Vallejo has perused the Overland, and is very much enraged that the writer of the article on material for California history should have 395 388 given credit to Castro and Alvarado, who as yet have not written a single line, and that nothing was said in reference to his dictation. I told him that the writer in the Overland was not connected with the Bancroft library, but he refused to believe what I said.”

Thus the Italian continued, until a week, ten days, a fortnight, passed without very much apparent headway so far as the main object of his mission was concerned. The minor dictations were all valuable; but anything short of success in the one chief direction which had called him there was not success. Every day Cerruti danced attendance at Lachryma Montis, spending several hours there, sometimes dining, sometimes chatting through the evening. He created a favorable impression in the mind of Mrs Vallejo, made love to the young women, and flattered the general to his heart's content.

This was all very pleasant to the occupants of a country residence. It was not every day there came to Lachryma Montis such a fascinating fellow as Cerruti, one who paid his board at the Sonoma hotel and his bill at the livery stable; and no wonder the Vallejos enjoyed it. Uppermost in the faithful Italian's mind, however, throughout the whole of it was his great and primary purpose. But whenever he spoke of documents, of the Sonoma treasury of original historical material, General Vallejo retired within himself, and remained oblivious to the most wily arts of the tempter. The old general would talk; he liked to talk, for when he could employ his native tongue he was a brilliant conversationalist and after-dinner speaker. And on retiring to his quarters in the town the younger general, Boswell-like, would record whatever he could remember of the words that fell from his lips. Sometimes, indeed, when they were alone Cerruti would take out his notebook and write as his companion spoke.

But all this was most unsatisfying to Cerruti; and 396 389 he now began more clearly to intimate that the spending of so much time and money in that way would be unsatisfactory to Mr Bancroft. Then he plainly said that he must make a better showing or retire from the field. If it was true, as General Vallejo had assured him, that he had nothing, and could not be prevailed upon to dictate his recollections, that was the end of it; he must return to San Francisco and so report.

This threat was not made, however, until the crafty Italian had well considered the effect. He saw that Vallejo was gradually becoming more and more interested in him and his mission. He saw that, although the general was extremely reticent regarding what he possessed, and what he would do, he was seriously revolving the subject in his mind, and that he thought much of it.

But the old general could be as cunning and crafty as the younger one, and it was now the Spaniard's turn to play upon the Italian. And this he did most skilfully, and in such a manner as thoroughly to deceive him and throw us all from the scent.

While reiterating his assurances that he had nothing, and that he could disclose nothing; that when he wrote his recollections the first time he had before him the vouchers in the form of original letters, proclamations, and other papers, which were all swept away by the fire that burned the manuscript he had prepared with such care and labor; and that since then he had dismissed the subject from his mind; that, indeed, it had become distasteful to him, and should never be revived—while these facts were kept constantly before Cerruti, as if firmly to impress them upon his mind, General Vallejo would uncover, little by little, to his watchful attendant the vast fund of information at his command. Some anecdote, apparently insignificant in itself, would be artfully interwoven with perhaps a dozen historical incidents, and in this exasperating manner the searcher after 397 390 historical facts would be shown a fertile field which it was forbidden him to enter.

To keep the Italian within call, and that he might not be so reduced to despair as to abandon further attempts and return to San Francisco, Vallejo now began also to feed his appetite with a few papers which he professed to have found scattered about the premises, granting him permission to take copies of them, and intimating that perhaps he might find a few more when those were returned. There was his office, or the parlor, at the scribe's disposal, where he might write unmolested.

With a will Cerruti began his task. When it was finished a few more papers were given him. At first General Vallejo would on no account permit a single paper to be taken from the premises. But working hours at Lachryma Montis must necessarily be short, and interruptions frequent. Would not General Vallejo kindly repose confidence enough to permit him to take the documents to his hotel to copy, upon his sacred assurance that not one of them should pass out of his hands, but should be returned immediately the copy was made? With apparent reluctance the request was finally granted.

This made Cerruti hilarious in his letters to Oak. General Vallejo was a great and good man, and was rapidly taking him into his friendship, which was indeed every word of it true. And now in some unaccountable way the papers to be copied rapidly increased; more of them were brought to light than had been thought to exist. The hotel was noisy and unpleasant, and the copyist finally determined to rent a room on the street fronting the plaza, where he might write and receive his friends. There he could keep his own wine and cigars with which to regale those who told him their story, and the sums which were now spent at bar-rooms treating these always thirsty persons would pay room rent. Cerruti was a close financier, but a liberal spender of other men's 398 391 money. It is needless to say that as the result of this deeply laid economic scheme the copyist had in his office usually two or three worthless idlers drinking and smoking in the name of literature and at the expense of history, persons whom he found it impossible to get rid of, and whom it was not policy to offend.

Thicker and broader was each succeeding package now given the brave consul-general to copy, until he began to tire of it. He must have help. What harm would there be, after all, if he sent part of each package carefully by express to the library to be copied there? There was no risk. He could represent to me that General Vallejo had given permission, with the understanding that they must be returned at once. Besides, it was absolutely necessary that something should be done. Sonoma was an extremely dull, uninteresting place, and he did not propose to spend the remainder of his days there copying documents.

The method he employed, which would at once enable him to accomplish his object and keep his faith, was somewhat unique. Major Salvador Vallejo once wishing Cerruti to spend the day with him, the latter replied: “I cannot; I must copy these papers; but if you will assume the responsibility and send them to San Francisco to be copied I am at your service.” Salvador at once assented, and ever after all breaches of trust were laid upon his shoulders.

Thus matters continued for two months and more, during which time Oak, Fisher, and myself severally made visits to Sonoma and were kindly entertained at Lachryma Montis. All this time General Vallejo was gaining confidence in my messenger and my work. He could but be assured that this literary undertaking was no speculation, or superficial clap-trap, but genuine, solid, searching work. Once thoroughly satisfied of this, and the battle was won; for General Vallejo was not the man to leave himself, his family, 399 392 his many prominent and unrecorded deeds, out of a work such as this purported to be.

One day while in a somewhat more than usually confidential mood he said to Cerruti: “I cannot but believe Mr Bancroft to be in earnest, and that he means to give the world a true history of California. I was born in this country; I once undertook to write its history, but my poor manuscript and my house were burned together. I was absent from home at the time. By mere chance my servants succeeded in saving several bundles of documents referring to the early days of California, but the number was insignificant compared with those destroyed. However, I will write to San José for a trunk filled with papers that I have there, and of which you may copy for Mr Bancroft what you please.”

“But, General,” exclaimed Cerruti, overwhelmed by the revelation, “I cannot copy them here. Since you have been so kind as to repose this confidence in me, permit me to take the papers to the library and employ men to copy them; otherwise I might work over them for years.”

“Well, be it so,” replied the general; “and while you are about it, there are two other chests of documents here which I have never disturbed since the fire. Take them also: copy them as quickly as you can and return them to me. I shall be more than repaid if Mr Bancroft's history proves such as my country deserves.”

Now it was a fundamental maxim with Cerruti never to be satisfied. In collecting material, where I and most men would be gratefully content, acquisition only made him the more avaricious. As long as there was anything left, so long did he not cease to importune.

“Why not multiply this munificence fourfold,” he said, “by giving Mr Bancroft these documents out and out, and so save him the heavy expense of copying them? That would be a deed worthy General Vallejo. 400 393 Surely Mr Bancroft's path is beset with difficulties enough at best. In his library your documents will be safely kept; they will be collated, bound, and labelled with your name, and this good act shall not only be heralded now, but the record of it shall stand forever.”

“No, sir!” exclaimed the general, emphatically. “At all events not now. And I charge you to make no further allusion to such a possibility if you value my favor. Think you I regard these papers so lightly as to be wheedled out of them in little more than two short months, and by one almost a stranger? You have asked many times for my recollections; those I am now prepared to give you.”

“Good!” cried Cerruti, who was always ready to take what he could get, provided he could not get what he wanted. “All ready, general; you may begin your narrative.”

“My friend,” returned the general, mildly, “you seem to be in haste. I should take you for a Yankee rather than for an Italian. Do you expect me to write history on horseback? I do not approve of this method. I am willing and ready to relate all I can remember, but I wish it clearly understood that it must be in my own way, and at my own time. I will not be hurried or dictated to. It is my history, and not yours, I propose to tell. Pardon me, my friend, for speaking thus plainly, but I am particular on this point. If I give my story it must be worthy of the cause and worthy of me.”

To Cerruti it was easier to write a dozen pages than to think about writing one. In the opinion of Vallejo, such a writer deserved to be burned upon a pile of his own works, like Cassius Etruscus, who boasted he could write four hundred pages in one day.

But this rebuke was not unpalatable, for it lifted the matter at once from the category of personal narrative to the higher plane of exact history. It was history, and nothing beneath it, to be written no less 401 394 from documentary than from personal evidence, and from the documents and experiences of others, as well as from his papers and personal observations.

With June came the two generals to San Francisco. The Vallejo documents were all in the library, and round one of the long tables were seated eight Mexicans copying them. One morning the Spaniard and the Italian entered the library. I think this was General Vallejo's first visit to the fifth floor.

It was to him an impressive sight. Passing the copyists, who, with one accord signified their respect by rising and bowing low, he was conducted to my room. Savage, Nemos, Oak, Harcourt, Fisher, and one or two Spaniards who happened to be acquainted with the general, then came in; cigars were passed and the conversation became general. The history of California, with the Vallejo family as a central figure, was the theme, and it was earnestly and honestly discussed. Two hours were then spent by the distinguished visitor examining the library. He was attended by Mr Savage, who explained everything, giving in detail what we had done, what we were doing, and what we proposed to do.

It was very evident that General Vallejo was impressed and pleased. Here was the promise of a work which of all others lay nearest his heart, conducted on a plan which if carried out would, he was convinced, secure the grandest results. It was a work in which he was probably more nearly concerned than the author of it. If I was the writer of history, he was the embodiment of history. This he seemed fully to realize.

Cerruti saw his opportunity; let my faithful Italian alone for that! He saw Vallejo drinking it all in like an inspiration; he saw it in his enkindled eye, in his flushed face and firm tread. Before the examination of the library was fairly finished, placing himself by the side of his now sincere and devoted friend he whispered, “Now is your time, general. If you are 402 395 ever going to give those papers—and what better can you do with them?—this is the proper moment. Mr Bancroft suspects nothing. There are the copyists, seated to at least a twelvemonth's labor. A word from you will save him this large and unnecessary expenditure, secure his gratitude, and the admiration of all present.”

“He deserves them!” was the reply. “Tell him they are his.”

I was literally speechless with astonishment and joy when Cerruti said to me, “General Vallejo gives you all his papers.” Besides the priceless intrinsic value of these documents, which would forever place my library beyond the power of man to equal in original material for California history, the example would double the benefits of the gift.

I knew General Vallejo would not stop there. He was slow to be won, but once enlisted, his native enthusiasm would carry him to the utmost limit of his ability; and I was right. From that moment I had not only a friend and supporter, but a diligent worker. Side by side with Savage and Cerruti, for the next two years he alternately wrote history and scoured the country for fresh personal and documentary information.

“When I visited San Francisco last week,” writes General Vallejo to the Sonoma Democrat, in reply to a complaint that the Vallejo archives should have been permitted to become the property of a private individual, “I had not the slightest intention of parting with my documents; but my friends having induced me to visit Mr Bancroft's library, where I was shown the greatest attention, and moreover allowed to look at thousands of manuscripts, some of them bearing the signatures of Columbus, Isabel the catholic, Philip II., and various others preëminent among those who figured during the fifteenth century, I was exceedingly pleased; and when Mr Bancroft had the goodness to submit to my inspection seven or eight 403 396 thousand pages written by himself, and all relating to California, the history of which until now has remained unwritten, I could not but admire the writer who has taken upon himself the arduous task of giving to the world a complete history of the country in which I was born; and therefore I believed it my duty to offer to him the documents in my possession, with the certainty that their perusal would in some wise contribute to the stupendous enterprise of a young writer who is employing his means and intelligence for the purpose of carrying to a favorable termination the noble task of bequeathing to the land of his adoption a history worthy of his renown.”

I thanked the general as best I could; but words poorly expressed my gratitude. The copyists were dismissed, all but two or three, who were put to work arranging and indexing the documents preparatory to binding. A title-page was printed, and when the work was done twenty-seven large thick volumes of original material, each approaching the dimensions of a quarto dictionary, were added to the library; nor did General Vallejo cease his good work until the twenty-seven were made fifty.

That night I entertained the general at my house; and shortly afterward he brought his family from Lachryma Montis and stayed a month with me, a portion of which time the general himself, attended by Cerruti, spent at Monterey writing and collecting.

It was in April 1874 that Cerruti began writing in Spanish the Historia de California, dictated by M. G. Vallejo. It was understood from the first that this history was for my sole use, not to be printed unless I should so elect, and this was not at all probable. It was to be used by me in writing my history as other chief authorities were used; the facts and incidents therein contained were to be given their proper place and importance side by side with other facts and incidents.

The two years of labor upon the Vallejo history 404 397 was cheerfully borne by the author for the benefit it would confer upon his country, and that without even the hope of some time seeing it in print. Undoubtedly there was personal and family pride connected with it; yet it was a piece of as pure patriotism as it has ever been my lot to encounter. General Vallejo never would accept from me compensation for his part of the work. I was to furnish an amanuensis in the person of Cerruti, and the fruits of their combined labor were to be mine unreservedly. As it was, the cost to me amounted to a large sum; but had the author charged me for his time and expenses, it would have been twice as much.

This and other obligations of which I shall have occasion to speak hereafter, I can never forget. Posterity cannot estimate them to highly. General Vallejo was the only man on the coast who could have done this if he would; and besides being the most competent, he was by far the most willing person with whom I had much to do.

Yet this obligation did not in the slightest degree bind me to his views upon any question. I trust I need not say at this late date that I was swayed by no palpable power to one side or another in my writings. Knowing how lavish Spaniards are of their praises, how absurdly extravagant their inflated panegyrics sound to Anglo-Saxon ears, and how coldly calculating English laudations appear to them, I never hoped to please Californians; I never thought it possible to satisfy them, never wrote to satisfy them, or, indeed, any other class or person. And I used to say to General Vallejo: “You being a reasonable man will understand, and will, I hope, believe that I have aimed to do your people justice. But they will not as a class think so. I claim to have no prejudices as regards the Hispano-Californians, or if I have they are all in their favor. Yet you will agree with me that they have their faults, in common with Englishmen, Americans, and all men. None of us are perfect, as none of us 405 398 are wholly bad. Now nothing less than superlative and perpetual encomiums would satisfy your countrymen; and, indeed, should I swell their praises to the skies on every page, the most lying trickster of them all would think I had not given him half his due in commendation. I cannot write to please catholic or protestant, to win the special applause of race, sect, or party; otherwise my writings would be worthless. Truth alone is all I seek; that I will stand or fall by. And I believe that you, general, will uphold me therein.”

Thus I endeavored to prepare his mind for any unwholesome truths which he might see; for most assuredly I should utter them as they came, no matter who might be the sufferer or what the cost. Indeed, I felt sure that before long, in some way, I should unintentionally tread upon the general's toes, for on many points he was extremely sensitive. Cerruti felt it his duty to be constantly urging me to write to and wait upon the general; to be constantly reminding me that this would please him, that he would expect such a thing, or if I failed in this attention he would think me offended; and thus my time was severely taxed to keep this man in good humor. True, he was not the fool that Cerruti would have me believe; and yet, in common with all hidalgos, he thought highly of himself and loved attention. It was this untiring devotion which Cerruti could give, but I could not, that first won Vallejo to our cause.

For several years, while busiest in the collection of material, a good share of my time was taken up in concilating those whom I had never offended; that is to say, those ancient children, my Hispano-Californian allies, who were constantly coming to grief. Some of them were jealous of me, some jealous of each other; all by nature seemed ready to raise their voices in notes of disputatious woe upon the slightest provocation.

For example: General Vallejo had no sooner given his papers to the library than one of the copyists, 406 399 Lubiensky, a Polish count he called himself, and may have been so for aught I know, wrote the notary Ramon de Zaldo, a friend of Vallejo, a letter, in which he, the count, called in question the general's motives in thus parting with his papers.

“It was to gain the good-will of Mr Bancroft that these documents were thus given him,” said the count, “and consequently we may expect to see the history written in the Vallejo interest, to the detriment of other Californians.”

When General Vallejo stepped into the notary's office next morning, Zaldo showed him the letter. Vallejo was very angry, and justly so. It was a most malicious blow, aimed at the general's most sensitive spot.

“It is an infamous lie!” the general raved, walking up and down the office. “If ever an act of mine was disinterested, and done from pure and praiseworthy motives, this was such a one. What need have I to court Mr Bancroft's favors? He was as much my friend before I gave the papers as he could be. There was not the slightest intimation of a compact. Mr Bancroft is not to be influenced; nor would I influence him if I could. I felt that he deserved this much at my hands; and I only regret that my limited income prevents me from supplementing the gift with a hundred thousand dollars to help carry forward the good work, so that the burden of it should not fall wholly on one man.”

While the general was thus fuming, Cerruti entered the notary's office, and on learning the cause of his anger endeavored to quiet him. As a matter of course, on being informed of the circumstance I immediately discharged the count, who was among those retained to collate the documents, and who seemed to have been actuated only by a love of mischief in stirring up strife between the general and those of his countrymen who had been thrown out of employment by his gift, which did away with the necessity 407 400 of copying. This, to many a slight thing, was more than enough to upset the equanimity of my Spanish friends. With half a dozen of them effervescing at once, as was sometimes the case, it was no easy matter to prevent revolution.

Of Cerruti's Ramblings there are two hundred and thirteen pages. Portions of the manuscript are exceedingly amusing, particularly to one acquainted with the writer. I will let him speak of a trip to San José, made by him in June, I think, 1874. Just before Cerruti set out on this journey General Vallejo came again to San Francisco, notifying me of his approach in the following words: “El mártes iré á San Francisco á visitar el Parthenon del que Usted es el Pericles.” When we remember how little Cerruti had lived in English-speaking countries, and how little practice he had had in writing and speaking English, his knowledge of the language is remarkable:

“A few days after my arrival in San Francisco I visited San José, well supplied with letters of introduction from General Vallejo. My first steps on reaching that city were directed toward the Bernal farm, where dwelt an aged gentleman who went by the name of Francisco Peralta, but whose real name I could not ascertain. I gave him a letter of introduction from General Vallejo. He read it three or four times; then he went to a drawer and from among some rags pulled out a splendid English translation of the voyages of Father Font. He took off the dust from the manuscript, then handed it to me. I looked at it for a few moments for the purpose of making sure that I held the right document. Then I unbuttoned my overcoat and placed it in my bosom.

“‘What are you doing, my friend?’ shouted Peralta.

“I replied: ‘Estoy poniendo el documento en lugar de seguridad, tengo que caminar esta noche y recelo que el sereno lo moje.’

“He looked astonished, and then said: ‘I will not 408 401 allow you to take it away. General Vallejo requested that I should permit you to copy it. That I am willing to do; but as to giving you my Font, that is out of the question.’

“As I had brought along with me a bottle of the best brandy, I called for a corkscrew and a couple of glasses, and having lighted a segar I presented my companion with a real Habana. Having accepted it, we were soon engaged in conversation.”

The writer then gives a sketch of the settlement and early history of San José as narrated by his aged companion. After which he continues:

“I then tried to induce Mr Peralta to give me a few details about himself, but to no purpose. I kept on filling his glass till the bottle was emptied, but I gained nothing by the trick, because every time he tasted he drank the health of General Vallejo, and of course I could not conveniently refuse to keep him company. The clock of the farm-house having struck two, I bid adieu to Mr Peralta, unfastened my horse that had remained tied to a post during five hours, and then returned to San José. Of course I brought along with me the venerable Father Font! I have heard that Peralta a few days later wrote to General Vallejo a letter in which he said that I had stolen the manuscript from him. He wrote a falsehood, well knowing it to be such at the time he wrote. To speak plainly, I will observe that the person who like Mr Peralta goes under an assumed name is not much to be trusted. His secret, however, is known to General Vallejo; and should I be allowed to live long enough I will surely discover it, because I have a peculiar way of acquiring knowledge of things and persons, things which I ought to know; and surely no person will gainsay my right to know everything that is to be known about my defamer.”

When I learned how far the Italian had been carried by his zeal in my behalf, I returned Peralta the book with ample apologies.

409 402

Cerruti now proceeded to the college at Santa Clara, and thus describes the visit:

“With reverential awe, cast-down eyes, and studied demeanor of meekness, I entered the edifice of learning. As soon as the gate closed behind me I took off my hat and addressed the porter, whom I requested to send my card to the reverend father director. Having said that much I entered the parlor, opened a prayer-book that happened to be at hand, and began to read the Miserere mei Deus secundum magnam misericordiam tuam, which lines recalled to my mind many gloomy thoughts; for the last time I had sung these solemn sentences was at the funeral of President Melgarejo, the man who had been to me a second father. But I was not allowed much time for reflection, because presently a tall priest of pleasing countenance entered the parlor, beckoned me to a chair, and in a voice that reflected kindness and good-will begged of me to explain the object which had procured for him the pleasure of my visit. I then announced myself as the representative of the great historian, H. Bancroft”—I may as well here state that whenever Cerruti mentioned my name in the presence of strangers there were no adjectives in any language too lofty to employ—“notified him that my object in visiting the college was for the purpose of having a fair view of the library and of examining the manuscripts it contained. I likewise assured him that though the history was not written by a member of the church of Rome, yet in it nothing derogatory to the catholic faith would be found. I added, however, that the bigoted priests who had destroyed the Aztec paintings, monuments, and hieroglyphics, which ought to have been preserved for the benefit of posterity, would be censured in due form, and their grave sin against science commented upon with the severity required. He reflected a moment and then said: ‘I see no reason why I should object to have the truth made known. History is the light of truth; and when an impartial writer 410 403 undertakes to write the history of a country we must not conceal a single fact of public interest.’

“After saying this he left the room. In about two minutes he returned with the priest who had charge of the college library. He introduced his subordinate to me and then added: ‘Father Jacobo will be happy to place at your disposal every book and manuscript we possess.’ The father superior having retired, I engaged in conversation with the librarian, who forthwith proceeded to the library, where I perceived many thousand books arranged upon shelves, but found only a few manuscripts. Among the manuscripts I discovered one of about eight hundred pages, which contained a detailed account of the founding of every church built in Mexico and Guatemala. The manuscript was not complete; the first eighty pages were missing. There were also a few pages of a diary kept by one of the first settlers of San Diego, but the rest of the diary was missing. I copied a few pages from this manuscript; then I tied together every document I judged would be of interest to Mr Bancroft, delivered the package to the father librarian, and begged of him to see the father superior and request his permission to forward the bundle to San Francisco. He started to fulfil my request, and assured me that though he had no hope of success, because it was against the rules of the college, he would make known my wishes to his chief. He was absent half an hour, when he returned bearing a negative answer. Among other things he said that the manuscript I wanted to send away did not belong to the college, but were the property of some pious person who had placed them under their charge, with instructions not to let the papers go out of their possession. I felt convinced that my reverend countryman was telling me the truth, so I abstained from urging my petition; but I limited myself to make a single request, namely, that he would be so kind as to keep in a separate place the package I had prepared. He agreed to it. I 411 404 embraced him Italian style, and then directed my steps toward the residence of Mr Argüello.

“I rang the bell of the stately dwelling in which the descendant of governors dwelt, and having been ushered into the presence of Mr Argüello, I stated to him the object of my visit. He listened with the air of one anxious to impress upon my mind the idea that I stood in the presence of a very great man.

“When I concluded my introductory remarks, he said: ‘Well, well, in all this large house, by far the best one in Santa Clara, there does not exist a single scrap of paper that could be useful to an historian. I once found a great many documents that had been the property of my grandfather, also some belonging to my father, but I have set fire to them; I did not like the idea of encumbering my fine dwelling with boxes containing trash, so I got rid of the rubbish by burning the whole lot.’

“Before Mr Argüello had uttered four words I felt convinced that I stood in the presence of a self-conceited fool. With people of that class it is useless to waste sound arguments and good reasoning. I knew it to be the case by experience. Therefore without uttering another word except the commonplace compliments, I left the ‘best house in Santa Clara’ and took the road that led to the telegraph office, and there addressed a telegram to General Mariano G. Vallejo, requesting his presence in Santa Clara. I took that step because I believed that Mr Argüello had told me lies. I thought it so strange that a son who had reached the age of fifty years should be so stupid as to burn the family archives. I also began to fear that my plain talk had given offence; therefore I ventured to send for the good friend of Mr Bancroft, for the admirer of his perseverance, hoping that the high respect in which Mr Argüello held General Vallejo would induce him to place at his disposal any documents he might have in the house.

“After sending the telegram I visited an aged 412 405 Indian, by name José María Flores, so called because in 1837 he was a servant of a gentleman of that name who presented a petition to the general government for the purpose of retaining for the town of San José certain tracts of land, which persons belonging to other parts of the state were trying to get possession of. Indian Flores, as soon as I addressed him, expressed his willingness to give me all the information he could. Before proceeding he observed: ‘You will have to send for a bottle of strong whiskey; nothing like good liquor to refresh the memory of an Indian!’ I took the hint and gave a boy two dollars, with instructions to fetch immediately a bottle of whiskey for Uncle Flores.”

Thus the Italian's narrative rattles along from one thing to another, just like the author, with scarcely pause or period. The aged aboriginal Flores gives him some interesting gossip respecting early times; then Vallejo arrives, and the two generals visit the ‘best house in Santa Clara,’ whose proprietor had in some way evidently ruffled the consul-general's plumes.

The widow of Luis Antonio Argüello, and mother of the burner of the family archives against whom Cerruti had taken a violent dislike, received General Vallejo with open arms, and invited the two generals to dine with her. The invitation was accepted. The paper-burner was there, watching the visitors very closely. When dinner was nearly over, Cerruti, who was so filled with wrath toward the four-eyed Argüello, as he called him, that he found little place for food, exclaimed:

“Madame Argüello, yesterday I asked your eldest son to allow me to copy the family archives; but he assured me that the archives and every other document of early days had been burned by his orders. Can it be possible?”

“Indeed, sir, I am sorry to say that it is true,” she replied. “And as she called to witness the blessed 413 406 virgin,” continued Cerruti, “I felt convinced that such was the case.”

The two generals called on several of the old residents in that vicinity, among them Captain Fernandez, who freely gave all the documents in his possession, and furnished a valuabledictation. Captain West, on whom they next called, at their request sent out to Lick's mills and brought in the aboriginal Marcelo, who laid claim to one hundred and twenty years of this life.

Gradually working south, the two generals did not stop until they had reached Monterey. To the elder there was no spot in the country so pregnant with historical events as this early capital of California. There was no important town so little changed by time and the inroads of a dominant race as Monterey. There General Vallejo was at once thrown back into his past. Every man and woman was a volume of unstrained facts; hedges and thickets bristled with intelligence; houses, fences, streets, and even the stones in them, each had its tale to tell. The crows cawed history; the cattle bellowed it, and the sweet sea sang it. An interesting chapter could easily be written on Cerruti's report of what he and General Vallejo saw and did during this visit to Monterey; but other affairs equally pressing claim our attention.

414 407

CHAPTER XVII.

ALVARADO AND CASTRO. God made man to go by motives, and he will not go without them, any more than a boat without steam or a balloon without gas.

Beecher.

NEXT among the Hispano-Californians in historical importance to Mariano G. Vallejo stood his nephew Juan B. Alvarado, governor of California from 1836 to 1842. At the time of which I speak he lived in a plain and quiet way at San Pablo, a small retired town on the eastern side of San Francisco bay. In build and bearing he reminded one of the first Napoleon. He was a strong man, mentally and physically. Of medium stature, his frame was compact, and well forward on broad shoulders was set a head with massive jawbones, high forehead, and, up to the age of sixty, bright intellectual eyes.

In some respects he was the ablest officer California could boast under Mexican régime. He was born in 1809, which made him a year younger than his uncle General Vallejo. Before he made himself governor he held an appointment in the custom-house, and had always been a prominent and popular man. His recollections were regarded by every one as very important, but exceedingly difficult to obtain.

First of all, he must be brought to favor my undertaking; and as he was poor and proud, in ill health, and bitter against the Americans, this was no easy matter.

Alvarado had been much less Americanized than Vallejo; he had mixed little with the new-comers, and 415 408 could speak their language scarcely at all. In common with all his countrymen he fancied he had been badly abused, had been tricked and robbed of millions of dollars which he had never possessed, and of hundreds of leagues of land which he had neglected to secure to himself. To the accursed Yankees were to be attributed all his follies and failures, all his defects of character, all the mistakes of his life.

Like Vallejo, Alvarado had often been importuned for information relative to early affairs, but he had given to the world less than his uncle, being less in and of the world as it existed in California under Anglo-American domination. Surely one would think so able a statesman, so astute a governor as Alvarado, would have been a match for stragglers into his territory, or even for the blatant lawyers that followed in their wake. The same golden opportunities that Vallejo and the rest had let slip, Alvarado had failed to improve, and the fault was the ever-to-be-anathematized Yankee.

Alvarado was a rare prize; but he was shrewd, and there could be but little hope of success in an appeal to the patriotism of one whose country had fallen into the hands of hated strangers. We had thought Vallejo suspicious enough, but Alvarado was more so. Then, too, the former governor of California, unlike the general, was not above accepting money; not, indeed, as a reward for his services, but as a gift.

Almost as soon as General Vallejo had fairly enlisted in the work he began to talk of Alvarado, of his vast knowledge of things Californian, and of his ability in placing upon paper character and events. And at that time, in regard to this work, action was not far behind impulse. Vallejo began to importune Alvarado, first by letter, then in person, giving him meanwhile liberal doses of Cerruti.

On one occasion the governor remarked to the general, “It seems you insist that Mr Bancroft is to be our Messiah, who will stop the mouth of 416 409 babblers that insult us. I am of the contrary opinion in regard to this, and will tell you why: I do not believe that any American, a well educated literary man, will contradict what the ignorant populace say of the Californians, from the fact that the Cholada Gringa, or Yankee scum, are very numerous, and take advantage of it to insult us, as they are many against few. This is a peculiarity of the American people. To these must be added a great number of Irish and German boors, who unite with them in these assaults. Were we as numerous as the Chinese, it is clear that they would not dare to be wanting in respect to us; but we are merely a few doves in the claws of thousands of hawks, which lay mines charged with legal witcheries in order to entrap us.”

The 24th of August 1874 General Vallejo writes Governor Alvarado: “From the death of Arrillaga in 1814 to the year 1846 there is much material for history. I have in relation to those times much authentic and original matter, documents which no one can refute. To the eminent writer Hubert H. Bancroft I have given a ton of valuable manuscripts, which have been placed in chronological order, under their proper headings, in order to facilitate the labors in which a dozen literary men of great knowledge are actually occupied. That part of the history which cannot be corroborated by documentary evidence I myself can vouch for by referring to my memory; and that without fear of straying from the truth or falling into anachronisms. Besides, my having been identified with upper California since my earliest youth is another assistance, as in no less degree is the record of my public life. What a vast amount of material! No one has spoken, nor can any one know certain facts as thou and I. All the Americans who have dared to write on this subject have lied, either maliciously or through ignorance.” This letter was accompanied by certain questions concerning points which the writer had forgotten.

417 410

Governor Alvarado replied to the queries, corroborating the general's views. At length promises were extracted from the governor that he would write a history, but it should be for his family, and not for Mr Bancroft. There must be something of importance to him in the telling of his story. If there was money in it, none could spend it better than he; if reputation, his family should have it.

So he went to work; for in truth, old and ill as he was, he had more working power and pluck than any of them. All through the autumn of 1874 he wrote history as his health permitted, being all the while in correspondence with Cerruti and Vallejo, who were similarly engaged, sometimes at Sonoma, and sometimes at Monterey. “Up to date,” he writes Vallejo the 4th of December, “I have arranged two hundred and forty-one pages, in twenty-one chapters, forming only three of the five parts into which I have divided this historical compendium.”

Indeed, for a long time past Alvarado had been taking historical notes, with a view to writing a history of California. These notes, however, required arranging and verifying, and in his feeble health it was with great difficulty he could be induced to undertake the work. In writing his history he displayed no little enthusiasm, and seemed specially desirous of producing as valuable a record as that of any one.

“General Cerruti asked of me a narration of the events of my own administration,” again he says, “and also of Sola's and Argüello's. These matters are of great importance, and taken from my work would leave little of value remaining. However, I still go on with my labors, and we shall see what may be done for the petitioners. In my said notes I am forming a chain which begins at Cape San Lúcas and extends to latitude forty-two north, all of which was denominated Peninsula, Territorio, Provincia, or Departamento, de las Californias, under the different governments and constitutions, as well as Nueva y 418 411 Vieja California and Alta y Baja California. I begin with Cortés, who made the first settlement in Baja California, where my father was born. Afterward I come to the Jesuits, and these expelled, to the Dominicans; and on the settlement of Alta California in 1769 I take hold of the Fernandinos, accepting as true what was written by Father Francisco Palou concerning events up to 1784 in his work entitled Noticias de las Misiones. Thence I follow my chain till 1848, when Mexico, through cowardice, fear, or fraud, sold our native land to the United States. In order to go on with this work, I must verify certain dates and references. Finally, as regards the frontier of Sonoma, that remains at your disposition, as I have indicated in my notes, for I am not well acquainted with the events which occurred there after 1834, when Figueroa sent you to direct the colonization of that section of country. There you had for near neighbors the Russians, and the Hudson's Bay Company, and were a sentinel placed to watch that they did not cross the line.”

Every effort was now made to beat down Governor Alvarado's scruples and induce him to dictate a complete history of the country for my use. Considering his age, the state of his health, and the condition of his eyes, which troubled him much of the time, he was making no small progress. In this way he worked until his manuscript reached three hundred and sixty-four pages, but all the time swearing that Bancroft should have nothing from him.

General Vallejo then employed every argument in his power to induce Alvarado to take his place in this history. “Come forward and refute your slanderers,” he said, “not hang back and waste your breath in harmless growls at them.” And again, “If things are wrong, not only go to work and endeavor to make them right, but do it in the best and most effectual way.” The governor was several times brought to the library, where Ook, Savage, and myself might 419 412 supplement Vallejo's and Cerruti's efforts. Finally the general so far prevailed as to extract the promise desired. Alvarado also lent Vallejo his manuscript, and the latter sent it, unknown to Alvarado, for inspection to the library, where it remained for some time.

Cerruti did not fancy the task of writing a second large history of California. “I wish you would get some person in your confidence,” he writes me from Sonoma the 27th of November 1874, “to take down the dictation of Governor Alvarado, because I cannot do it. My private affairs will not allow me to spend one or two years at San Pablo, a dull place, as bad as Sonoma.” Nevertheless, Alvarado insisting upon his attendance, Cerruti was finally induced to undertake the work on my permitting him to rent a room, bring Alvarado to the city, and take his dictation in San Francisco, I paying hotel bills and all other expenses, besides keeping the governor's historical head-quarters plentifully supplied with liquors and cigars.

But this was not all. I had told Alvarado plainly that I would not pay him for his information; indeed, he never asked me to do so. He would accept nothing in direct payment, but he was determined to make the most of it indirectly. Twenty thousand dollars he would have regarded as a small sum for his literary service to me, measured by money; hence all I could do for him must be insignificant as compared with my obligation.

Again on the 11th of December 1874 Cerruti writes from Sonoma: “With reference to Governor Alvarado I beg to observe that I did not think it worth while to cajole him. In my letter of October 20th I expressed myself to the effect that I did not think it worth while to spend five or six thousand dollars to get his dictation; because, with the exception of the notes referring to Lower California, written by his father, anda few incidents which transpired at Monterey while General Vallejo was absent from that 420 413 place, the whole of California's history will be fully embodied in the Recuerdos Históricos of General Vallejo, and I did not see why you should wish for Governor Alvarado's dictation. Such were my views on the 24th of October; but owing to a letter received afterward, and the wish often expressed by General Vallejo that I should maintain friendly relations with Governor Alvarado, I corresponded with him till the receipt of the letter which I forwarded to you last Wednesday. Since then I have abstained from writing, for I did not know what to write. You will not miss Alvarado's notes on Lower California, because General Vallejo has already written to Lower California to Mr Gilbert, and I have no doubt that he will get many documents from him.”

The fact was, as I have said, Cerruti did not covet the task of writing to Alvarado's dictation, and General Vallejo could be easily reconciled to the omission of a record which might tend in his opinion to lessen the importance of his own. In regard to Alvarado's history Mr Oak thought differently, as the following reference in Cerruti's letter will show:

“I do not look at the matter of Governor Alvarado as you do,” he writes Cerruti the 24th of October. “I think we ought to have his dictation at some time, even if it is a repetition of what General Vallejo writes. But perhaps it is as well that you have declined the invitation to San Pablo for the present, for General Vallejo's dictation is certainly more important than all else. Besides, Mr Bancroft will be here during the coming week, and can then himself decide the matter.”

At this juncture came a request from Alvarado. He had a boy for whom he wished to find employment in the store. Anxious to obtain his history, I was ready to do anything which he might reasonably or even unreasonably ask. Alvarado wrote Vallejo requesting his influence with me on behalf of his son. As soon as their wishes were made known to me by Cerruti 421 414 I sent for the young man, and he was assigned a place in the publishing house.

The boy was nineteen years of age, and had about as much of an idea of business, and of applying himself to it, as a gray squirrel. The manager endeavored to explain to him somewhat the nature of the life now before him. Success would depend entirely upon himself. The house could not make a man of him; all it could do was to give him an opportunity of making a man of himself. At first, of course, knowing nothing of business, his services would be worth but little to the business. As at school, a year or two would be occupied in learning the rudiments, and much time would be occupied in teaching. For such business tuition no charge was made; in fact the firm would pay him a small salary from the beginning. The lad was bright and intelligent, and seemed to comprehend the situation, expressing himself as satisfied with what I had done for him.

A few days afterward I learned that the boy was back at San Pablo, and that a general howl had been raised among his countrymen on account of alleged hard treatment of the boy by the house; in fact his position had been worse than that of a Chinaman. He was made to work, to wait on people like a servant, to pack boxes, fold papers, and carry bundles. As a matter of course the old governor was very angry.

I was greatly chagrined, for I feared all was now lost with Alvarado. Instituting inquiries into the boy's case, I learned that in view of the governor's attitude toward the library, and the little need for the boy's services, he had been assigned a very easy place, and treated with every courtesy. Unluckily some ragamuffin from the printing-office, meeting him on the stairs soon after he began work, called out to him:

“I say, gallinipper, how much d'ye git?”

“Twenty dollars a month.”

“You don't say; a Chinaman gits more'n that.”

422 415

That was enough. The boy immediately wrote his father that the manager of the Bancroft establishment had assigned him a position beneath that of a Mongolian. It was the old story of race persecution. All the people of the United States had conspired to crush the native Californians, and this was but another instance of it. Young Alvarado was immediately ordered home; he should not remain another moment where he was so treated.

It required the utmost efforts of Vallejo and Cerruti to smooth the ruffled pride of the governor. A happier illustration of the irrational puerility of these isolated ancients could not be invented.

Among the copyists upon the Vallejo documents, before that collection was given to the library, was one Soberances, a relative of Vallejo. At the request of the general his services were retained after the donation of the documents, though all of us had cause to regret such further engagement, as he was constantly getting himself and others into hot water.

Of all the early Californians we had to encounter, Manuel Castro was among the worst to deal with in regard to his material. He had both documents and information which he wished to sell for money. He was an important personage, but instead of manfully asserting his position, he professed patriotism, love of literature, and everything that any one else professed. Finding that he could not extort money from me, and being really desirous of appearing properly in history, he promised me faithfully and repeatedly all that he had.

But diplomacy was so natural to him that I doubt if it were possible for him to act in a simple, straight-forward manner. He began by borrowing money with which to go to Monterey and bring me his documents. He neither redeemed his promise nor returned the money. Some time afterward he went for them, 423 416 but said that he could not deliver them, for they were required in the dictation which he now professed to be desirous of making.

“Manuel Castro came last night to Monterey,” Cerruti writes the 16th of February 1875, “got the box of documents which his family has been collecting during the last six months, and early this morning returned to San Francisco. If you want his documents don't lose sight of him; Savage knows where he lives. Of course he is ‘on the spec.’! Should you have to pay any money for Castro's documents, you will have to thank Soberanes, Eldridge, and the rest of the boys, who always exerted themselves to undermine the plans of General Vallejo and myself.”

Manuel Castro now sent us word: “Let Soberanes arrange my papers and write for me, and you shall have both my recollections and my documents.”

Accordingly Soberanes for some six weeks waited on him, drawing his pay from me. The agreement had been that he should deliver what was written every week as he drew the money for it; but on one pretext or another he succeeded in putting us off until we were satisfied that this was but another trick, and so discontinued the arrangement. Not a page of manuscript, not a single document was secured by the expenditure.

In some way this Soberanes became mixed up in Alvarado's affairs. I believe he was related to the governor as well as to the general; and he seemed to make it his business just now to bleed me to the fullest possible extent for the benefit of his countrymen and himself. Vallejo quickly cast him off when he saw how things were going; Manuel Castro, the general openly reprobated; and even of Alvarado's venality he felt ashamed.

While in New York I received a letter from General Vallejo, dated the 26th of September 1874, in which he says: “Cerruti writes me from San Francisco that he is very much annoyed and chagrined that after he and myself had so labored to induce Governor 424 417 Alvarado to take an interest in your work, Soberanes, Manuel Castro, and other insignificant persons, went to San Pablo and sadly annoyed him. Undoubtedly Cerruti is right; for it is very well known that demasiado fuego quema la olla. Already on other occasions those same intriguers have thwarted his plans; and he, Cerruti, is fearful that they may also thrust themselves into the affairs of Central America, and cause him to lose his prestige in those countries. Day after to-morrow, when Cerruti returns, I will resume my labors on the history of California.”

In May 1875 Cerruti writes me from Sonoma: “Governor Alvarado is acting very strangely. I attribute his conduct to Soberanes, who has made the old gentleman believe that there is a mountain of gold to be made by squeezing your purse. I would suggest that you send orders which will compel Soberanes to deliver to the library the pages of history for which he received several weekly payments for writing under Castro's dictation. Thus far Soberanes has not delivered into the hands of your agent a single line; and, not satisfied with what he has already obtained, he is trying to cause others to deviate from the path of decency, common-sense, and gratitude. I would also suggest that Alvarado be ‘sent to grass' for the present. If at a future day you should need him or his dictation, either General Vallejo or myself will get it for you without cost. The conduct of Alvarado and Soberanes has greatly displeased General Vallejo, who as you know thinks it the duty of every native Californian to assist you in your noble and self-imposed task.”

Matters seemed to grow worse instead of better during this same May, when some of these mischief-makers told Alvarado that his history was at the library. Then came another convulsion. Conspiracy was abroad; the foul fiend seemed to have entered the history-gatherers in order to hurl destruction upon the poor potentate of San Pablo. Although not a 425 418 word had been taken from his manuscript while it was in the library, nor any use of it made in any way, Judas was a pure angel beside me. Alvarado had telegraphed General Vallejo, and sent messengers hither and thither. Something must be done, or Diablo and Tamalpais would turn somersets into the bay, and the peninsula of San Francisco would be set adrift upon the ocean. The absurdity of all this is still more apparent when I state that the manuscript notes were of no value to any one in their present shape, except indeed as a basis of the proposed narrative of events.

Yet another agony, following hard upon the heels of its predecessors. I will let Cerruti begin the story. I was at Oakville at the time, and under the heading “Something serious and confidential,” he writes me from San Francisco the 7th of April: “Yesterday Governor Alvarado's daughter died in San Rafael. The governor desired the body brought to Oakland. Having no money wherewith to pay expenses, he sent Soberanes to the Bancroft library, with a request that he should see you and if possible induce you to contribute something toward the funeral expenses, three hundred dollars. You were absent. I did not think it proper to refer him to your manager, fearing he would feel annoyed; so making a virtue of necessity I gave Soberanes twenty dollars. I acted as I have just related owing to the fact that Governor Alvarado's narrative is not even commenced. It is true we have on hand four hundred pages of his notes, but said notes only come down to the year 1830, and he has signified his willingness to dictate what he knows to the year 1848. Besides, the small incidents which he remembers are not included in his notes. In one word, I consider Governor Alvarado as one of the persons you need the most in the writing of the history of California, and hence my reason for giving him the twenty dollars. Of course I don't claim the amount back from you. I know full well 426 419 I had no authority to invest in funerals.” The reader will observe that Cerruti's opinions were not always the same.

Closely following this letter came Soberanes to Oakville, begging of me one hundred dollars for Alvarado. Now I was not under the slightest obligations to Alvarado; on the contrary it was he who should be paying me money if any was to pass between us. He had done nothing for me, and judging from the past there was little encouragement that he ever would do anything. Nevertheless, since he was a poor old man in distress, I would cheerfully give him the money he asked, for charity's sake. At the same time I thought it nothing less than my due to have in a somewhat more tangible form the governor's oft-repeated promise to dictate a history of California for me. So I said to Soberanes: “Alvarado is going to dictate for me and give me all his material. Would he be willing to put that in writing?” “Most certainly,” replied Soberanes. “Go, then, and see it done, and Mr Oak will give you the money.”

Now let us hear what is said about it in a letter to me under date of the 19th of May from the library: “The Alvarado matter is in bad shape, like everything in which Soberanes has anything to do. Governor Alvarado simply, as he says, sends Soberanes to ask for one hundred dollars, on the ground that he intends the history he is writing for your collection, and is in hard circumstances. He did not know that any of his manuscript was in our hands, and is offended that General Vallejo and Cerruti delivered it to us contrary to their agreement. Soberanes tells you that Governor Alvarado will give you the four hundred pages in our possession: [there are only two hundred and sixty-four pages;] four hundred pages more that he has written: [there are only one hundred pages more;] and that he will sign an agreement to complete the history down to 1848. Soberanes returns to Governor Alvarado, tells him that you consent, says 427 420 nothing of any conditions, tells him all he has to do is to come up and take his money, and brings him for that purpose. Governor Alvarado comes to-day with Soberanes; is first very much offended to find that we have any part of his manuscripts, and considers it almost an insult to be asked to sign any agreement or to give us any part of his manuscripts, which he says are yet only in a very incomplete condition. He says he will do nothing further in the matter. Soberanes declares that nothing was said between him and you about any agreement whatever, but that you simply consented to give the money. We did our best to make the matter right with Governor Alvarado, but, of course, in vain. He went away, not in an angry mood, but evidently thinking himself ill-used. Soberanes will make the matter worse by talking to him, and making him and others believe that you wish to take advantage of Alvarado's poverty to get ten thousand dollars' worth of history for a hundred dollars.”

Although what Soberanes had reported was deliberate falsehood—it was about the hundredth time he had lied to and of me—and although Alvarado had acted like a demented old woman, and I had really no further hope of getting anything out of him, I ordered the hundred dollars paid, for I fully intended from the first that he should have the money, and I hoped that would be the end of the affair.

But alas! not so. For no sooner is the money paid than up comes a letter from Lachryma Montis, written by Cerruti the 23d of May, in which he says: “I regret very much that you should have given an order to pay one hundred dollars to Governor Alvarado. I am willing that the ex-governor should receive assistance at the present time, but not under the circumstances in which a gang of unscrupulous persons have control of his actions and are using him for the purpose of putting a few coppers into their empty pockets. I fear that your generosity toward Governor Alvarado will interfere with the plans of General 428 421 Vallejo, who a few days ago went to San Francisco for the purpose of obtaining the documents in the possession of Castro. That person made the general a half promise to give to him his papers. But if he happens to hear, as he surely will, that you have given Governor Alvarado a hundred dollars, in all certainty he will hold back his documents until he obtains a sum of money for them. There are many people yet who are in the possession of valuable documents. These persons in due time will be induced by General Vallejo to come to the front and help you without remuneration; but should they hear that you pay money for documents they will hold back until they get cash. No later than two days ago, when General Vallejo was in the city, some Californians approached him, and tried to convince him that he had better give his manuscript to some publisher who would agree to print the work immediately; furthermore they said that it would be better to have his history come out as a whole and not in driblets as quotations. The general, who has a good share of sound sense, told those persons that he would be highly pleased to be quoted in your great work, as your history would be in future ages the great authority on Californian matters, while the history written by him would not carry an equal weight of conviction.”

I should regard these details too trifling to give them a place here, except as a specimen of every-day occurrences during my efforts to obtain from the Hispano-Californians what they knew of themselves. By allowing Alvarado's affairs to rest awhile, the testy old governor was happily brought to see the true way, and to walk therein. He came up nobly in the end and gave a full history of California, written by Cerruti in Spanish, in five large volumes, which is second only in importance as original material to Vallejo's history. Part of the transcribing was performed by Cerruti at San Pablo, but as I before remarked Alvarado dictated the most of his history 429 422 in San Francisco. It was written anew from the beginning. The governor's manuscript notes formed the basis of the complete history, the notes being destroyed as fast as the history was written, lest they should some time fall into wrong hands. This was the Italian's precaution. Taking it altogether, Alvarado's history cost me much time, patience, and money; but I never regretted the expenditure.

Frequently about this time I invited Alvarado, Vallejo, and Cerruti to dine with me at the Maison Dorée, and general good feeling prevailed. Among other things with which the Hispano-Californians were pleased was an article entitled The Manifest Destiny of California, which I contributed to the Sacramento Record-Union, and which was translated and published in a Spanish journal. “We have fallen into good hands,” at last said Governor Alvarado; and Castro promised unqualifiedly everything he had. But this was while their hearts were warm with my champagne; the next day, perhaps, they felt differently. In writing the article I had not the remotest idea of pleasing any one, and had never even thought of the Californians; but it happened that they were kind enough to like it, and this was fortunate, for it greatly assisted me in obtaining material.

It seemed impossible all at once to sever my connection with Soberanes, the fellow had so woven himself into the relations of the library with native Californians, but in due time I managed to get rid of him. After General Vallejo had presented his documents to the library, Soberanes asserted that there were many papers in other hands which he could get to copy. He was encouraged to do so, though Cerruti was jealous of him from the first. Soberanes did, indeed, obtain many documents, some of which he copied, and others were given outright to the library.

Before he spent the six weeks with Manuel Castro he had obtained papers from him to copy. Castro at 430 423 first required Oak to give him a receipt for these papers, but seeing that our enthusiasm in his affairs began to decline, he followed the example of General Vallejo, and gave them outright to the library. This first instalment of Castro's papers was bound in two volumes. The copies of some of them, which Soberanes had made, Castro borrowed to use in court.

Soberanes then obtained more documents from Castro, and some from other sources, portions of which were loaned for copying and part given outright. It seemed the object of both Castro and Soberanes to make the information and material of the former cost me as much as possible. It was when Soberanes could get no more papers from Castro that he induced him to dictate. While this dictation was in progress, every few days Soberanes would bring to the library portions of what he had written, but would carry it away with him again, on the pretext that it was required for reference. Some time after I had closed my relations with Soberanes, Castro sent to me one Peña, who had done copying for me, saying that he was now ready to continue his dictation. I told Peña that I had had enough of such dictating; that if he chose to run the risk he might write down whatever Castro gave him and bring it to the library every Saturday and receive in money its value, whatever that might be.

Meanwhile Cerruti, though heartily hating both Soberanes and Castro, did not lose sight of them, for Manuel Castro and his documents were most important to history. Always on the alert, Cerruti ascertained one day that a box of papers was held by Castro's landlord for room rent.

In September 1876 Castro, who was vice-president of the Junta Patriótica, was appointed one of a committee to collect money for the purpose of defraying the expenses of the fiesta on the glorious Sixteenth. By some ill-luck the money so collected dropped out of Castro's possession before it reached the object for 431 424 which it had been given. Indeed, Castro's pocket, as a depository for current coin, was not as safe as the bank of England.

This left Castro in a bad position. Had the money been donated to defray the expenses of a funeral, and failed in its object, the cry would not have been so great; but for a festival, it was indeed calamitous. As a matter of course Cerruti soon knew all about it, knew that Castro had become bankrupt while carrying the money he had collected for celebration purposes, and that he must immediately restore it or be forever disgraced among his countrymen.

Rushing round to the library, Cerruti saw Oak, and expressed the belief that Castro would pledge his documents for a little ready money, not alone those in the hands of his landlord, whichcould be obtained by paying the rent arrears, but also others which were not in durance.

No matter how simple the transaction, Cerruti could do little without bringing into requisition his diplomatic powers, which were ever overflowing. Thinking that possibly Castro might be prejudiced against the library, and might object to his papers being where they would do so much good, Cerruti told Castro that a friend of his on Market street would lend him the money he required, on the documents. This friend was not Bancroft; indeed, the person was one opposed to the Bancrofts, that being the chief reason of his willingness to lend the money, so that the documents might not fall to the library.

The lie did good service. Castro's papers were delivered to Cerruti, who straightway took them to the library and obtained the money. Under the circumstances Mr Oak did not feel at liberty to examine the documents or to take notes from them, though he might easily have done so had he been inclined. He was satisfied for the present, and willing to await further developments.

Nor had he long to wait. Castro soon required an 432 425 additional sum, and this Oak would advance only on condition that if the papers were redeemed he should have the right to open the box and take such notes as history required, without, however, retaining the original papers or in any way injuring them. This permission was granted. Whether Cerruti now told Castro in whose hands the papers were deposited is not certain.

Mr Oak's way was now clear enough. First he took out all the information I required for California history. Then, long after the time within which the papers were to have been redeemed, he consulted an attorney, that he might act within legal bounds, and addressing a letter to Castro, informed him that the papers were in his possession, subject to a claim for the money advanced, and that although by law his right in them was forfeited, yet, not wishing to take any unfair advantage, he would allow him until the following Saturday to redeem them.

Castro was furious, and talked loudly of having been swindled; but no one was frightened. The fact is, we had long since determined to leave no honorable means untried to obtain those papers, and we were not now disposed to stand upon ceremony with Castro, or to go far out of our way to pacify him. The documents and information in his possession, by every right of honor and decency belonged to the library. Not once but twenty times he had promised them; not once but several times I had given him money, and paid out still more to others on his account. All he was holding back for was more money. I think he always fully inteded I should have his material; but if there was money in it, he wanted it. Besides all this, Castro had given much trouble in exciting other Californians against me, telling them to hold back, and the money would come in due time. As often as he had money to buy wine he would entice Alvarado from his work; but at such times Cerruti was after him like a Scotch terrier, and soon talked him into a state of penitence. 433 426 Furthermore, many of these documents Castro had obtained from different persons with the understanding that they were to be given to the library.

In view of all this, when the Castro papers were once fairly mine I cared little as to their former owner's measure of love for me. I had them collated and bound in five volumes, making seven in all from this source.

One thing more remained, for it was apparently impossible for Manuel Castro to do good except upon compulsion. The dictation for which I had paid, and which was in truth my property wherever I could find it, was still closely held by him. One day it came to the knowledge of Mr Savage that Castro had gone into the country, leaving all his papers in the hands of Felipe Fierro, editor of La Voz del Nuevo Mundo. Now Fierro was a stanch friend of the library; and when Savage explained to him the nature of our relations with Castro, and the trouble we had had with him, and asked the editor the loan of what was already our own, he could not refuse. The dictation was copied, with many original documents, and returned to Fierro, that he might not suffer through his kindness. Thus à droit ou à tort, the gods being with us, the whole of this Philistine's material fell into my hands. Several years later he endeavored to obtain money from me on the remnants, and was surprised to learn that his papeles had no longer a market value.

José Ramon Pico furnished quite a little collection of papers, some of which belonged originally to him; others he had collected from various sources. There was no little difficulty in our dealings with many of these men, who seemed most of the time to be in a strait between their desire to figure in history and a fear lest they should part too easily with what by some possibility might bring them money.

With Alvarado, Cerruti labored in fear and trembling. Writing me the 9th of February 1876, in 434 427 answer to a request to attend to certain work, he said: “Considering that I have promised to complete the third volume of Alvarado's history within eight days, I cannot possibly spare one moment for other work, because Alvarado, who at present is in a working mood, might change his mind at some future time and leave his history incomplete.”

Visiting San Leandro, he obtained the archives of the Estudillo family, accompanied by a very cordial letter from Mr J. M. Estudillo, who, in presenting them, promised to search for more.

I cannot mention a hundredth part of the dictations taken and the excursions made by Cerruti for documents. He was very active, as I have said, and very successful. He loved to dart off in one direction and thence telegraph me, the quickly transfer himself to another spot and telegraph from there; in fact both generals had a great fancy for telegraphing. Often Cerruti wrote me a letter and then telegraphed me that he had done so—that and nothing more.

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CHAPTER XVIII.

CLOSE OF THE CERRUTI-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN. To gather in this great harvest of truth was no light or speedy work. His notes already made a formidable range of volumes, but the crowning task would be to condense these voluminous still-accumulating results, and bring them like the earlier vintage of Hippocratic books to fit a little shelf

George Eliot.

FOR about two and a half years generals Cerruti and Vallejo applied themselves to my work with a devotion scarcely inferior to my own: the latter longer, the former meanwhile with some assistance carrying forward to completion the history by Alvarado. Under the benign influence of the elder general, the quick impatient temper of the Italian was so subdued that he was at length kept almost continuously at confining, plodding work, which secretly he abhorred. He preferred revolutionizing Costa Rica to writing a hundred-page dictation. Yet I am sure for my work he entertained the highest respect, and for me true personal regard.

But after all it was his affection for General Vallejo which cemented him so long to this work. His esteem for the sage of Sonoma was unbounded; his devotion was more than Boswellian; it approached the saintly order. He would follow him to the ends of the earth, cheerfully undertaking anything for him; and almost before Vallejo's wish was expressed Cerruti had it accomplished. Yet withal the Italian never sank into the position of servant. He was as quick as ever to resent a fancied slight, and Vallejo himself, in order to maintain his influence over him, must needs humor many vagaries.

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It was not a little strange to see these two men, so widely separated, both in their past actions and in their present ambitions, fired by the same enthusiasm, and that by reason of a conception which was not theirs, and from which neither of them could hope for any great or tangible personal benefit; and that it should last so long was most remarkable of all. In reality they continued until their work was finished; and although neither of them had been accustomed to continuous application in any direction, they labored as long and as diligently each day as natives of more northern climes are wont to apply themselves. During the years 1874-6 the time of the two generals was divided between Sonoma, San Francisco, and Monterey, and in making divers excursions from these places.

No sooner was it known that General Vallejo was writing history for me than he was besieged by an army of applicants suddenly grown history-hungry. In a letter dated Sonoma, 8th of December 1874, Cerruti says: “General Vallejo and I will go to the city next week. Historical men, newspaper scribblers, and all sorts of curious persons are daily addressing letters to the general asking for information. He is really bothered to death. I enclose one of the petitions so you may judge of the style of persecution he is subject to. On hand one hundred pages of manuscript which I consider very interesting. Mr Thompson, of the Democrat, is in possession of a large amount of useful information with reference to the Russian settlements of Bodega and Ross. He has been collecting material for ten years, during which time he has interviewed nearly sixty ancient settlers.” Mr Thompson very kindly placed at my disposal his entire material. His sketches he had taken in short-hand, and at my request he had the more important written out and sent to me.

From Monterey the 6th of January 1875 General Vallejo wrote as follows: “General Cerruti and I go 437 430 on writing and collecting documents for the history, and since our arrival have written over one hundred pages. We have many venerable documents, which I have not yet looked over, for this dictating and narrating reminiscences stupefies the memory. Moreover, I have to give attention to visitors, who sometimes occupy my time, but who are necessary when the history of their days and mine is written, and whom I need in order to keep my promise of aiding you. I think you would do well to come down here; for although there are no such living accommodations as in San Francisco, lodgings are not wanting, and thus you would change your routine of study life. Here exist two barrels of old papers belonging to Manuel Castro, which I have not been able to obtain, because it is intended to profit by them. However, if you show yourself indifferent, it is probable that you may obtain them at small expense—that is, provided Hittell, or others who take an interest in old papers, do not cross you. Make use of a very Yankee policy, and within two months you will be the possessor of the richest collection in existence with reference to upper California. In the archives of Salinas City, of which my nephew has charge, many documents exist. He has promised to do all in his power to aid your undertaking.”

And again the 16th of January he writes: “I have spent the day in inspecting a lot of very important documents. These I can obtain for the purpose of copying them; but it would be well that you should take a turn this way, in order to see them and resolve the matter. General Cerruti says that they are very important, but does not desire to assume the responsibility of copying them. In every way it seems to me in accordance with your interests that you examine the matter in person.”

The Hartnell papers were regarded as of great importance, and General Vallejo could not rest until they were secured for the library. Hartnell was an 438 431 Englishman, who had come to California at an early date, had married an hija del pais, Teresa de la Guerra, by whom he had been made twenty-five times a father. Failing as a merchant at Monterey, in company with the reverend Patrick Short he opened a boys' academy at El Alisal, his residence near that place. He was appointed visitador general de misiones by Governor Alvarado, and after the arrival of the Americans was for a time state interpreter. He was regarded by many as the most intelligent foreigner who up to that time had arrived on this shore. Applying to the widow of Mr Hartnell, General Vallejo received the following very welcome reply, under date of the 6th of February: “Although most of the papers left by Don Guillermo have been lost, it may be that among the few which I still preserve some may be of use to thee. But as to this thou canst know better than I; perhaps it were well that thou comest to see them. The papers which I have are at thy disposal.” The collection of documents thus so modestly valued and so cheerfully given proved to be of great value, and were duly bound and accredited to the former owner.

Hearing of a deposit of important papers some sixty miles from Monterey, the 6th of March General Vallejo sent Cerruti to secure them. Nine days later Vallejo writes as follows: “To-day I send you a trunk full of documents of very great historic value. Do me the favor to charge your assistants not to open it before my return to San Francisco, for it is necessary for me to give certain explanations before making you a present of its contents. However, from this moment count on the documents as belonging to yourself; and if I die upon the journey, make such disposition of the trunk and the papers which it contains as may seem good to you. The young man Biven, whom in days past I recommended to you, is, I hear, given to drinking; but I also know that he has many ancient documents, a trunkful, which belonged to his deceased grandfather, Ainza. It seems to me that 439 432 some diplomacy is necessary in order to secure them, though he promised at San Francisco to give them.”

Wherever he might be, Cerruti was unremitting in his labors. The 29th of July he writes from Monterey: “I enclose an article written in the Spanish language, which I believe ought to be translated into English. I am certain it would do a great deal of good. To-day General Vallejo has received a lot of documents from Soledad.”

And again the 3d of August: “Yesterday we heard of the existence of a large collection of historical documents.” Being engaged in another direction, it was resolved to send a third person in quest of these papers immediately; and a few days later I received intelligence: “The envoy of General Vallejo left to-day for San Luis Obispo.”

While the warmest friendship existed between the two generals during the whole of their intercourse, they were not without their little differences. Often General Vallejo used to say to me: “Cerruti wishes to hurry me, and I will not be hurried. Often he solemnly assures me that Mr Bancroft will not be satisfied unless a certain number of pages are written every week; and I ask him who is writing this history, myself or Mr Bancroft?” On the other hand, Cerruti in his more petulant moods frequently dropped words of dissatisfaction. “You cannot conceive,” he writes me the 18th of August from Monterey, “how pleased I shall be when the work is complete. It has caused me many unhappy moments and many sacrifices of pride.” On a former occasion he had complained: “The parish priest of Monterey has brought to our office the books of his parish. I could make a good many extracts from them, but I will not undertake the task because I am in a very great hurry to leave Monterey. I am heartily sick of the whole work, and I wish it was already finished. This town is like 440 433 a convent of friars, and the sooner I leave it the better. If I remain in it a month longer I will become an old man. I see only old people, converse as to days gone by. At my meals I eat history; my bed is made of old documents, and I dream of the past. Yet I would cheerfully for your sake stand the brunt of hard times were it not that your agents have wounded me in my pride, the only vulnerable point in my whole nature.” Thus cunning spends itself on folly! Thus follows that tædium vitæ which, like a telescope reversed, makes this world and its affairs look insignificant enough!

The Italian was very ambitious to show results, and frequently complained that Vallejo insisted too much on tearing up each day a portion of the manuscript which had been written the day before. This present effort at Monterey lasted one month and two days, during which time three hundred pages were completed. On the other hand, three months would sometimes slip by with scarcely one hundred pages written.

In bringing from Santa Cruz two large carpet-bags filled with documents collected in that vicinity, by some means they were lost in landing at San Francisco. Vallejo was chagrined; Cerruti raved. The steamship company was informed that unless the papers were recovered the wheels of Californian affairs would cease to revolve. The police were notified; searchers were sent out in every direction; the offer of a liberal reward was inserted in the daily papers. Finally, after two days of agony, the lost documents were found and safely lodged in the library,

Notwithstanding he was at the time suffering from serious illness, José de Jesus Vallejo, brother of General Vallejo, gave me a very valuable dictation of one hundred and seventy-seven pages, taken at his residence at Mission San José, beginning the 13th of April and finishing on the 22d of June 1875. The 441 434 author of this contribution was born at San José in 1798, and in his later years was administrator of the mission of that name.

“The priest of this mission,” writes Cerruti the 11th of April 1875, “the very reverend Father Cassidy, has kindly loaned me the mission books. They are seven in number. From six of them I will make extracts. Number seven is very interesting, and according to my opinion ought to be copied in full.”

The next day Mr Oak wrote me from San Francisco—I was at Oakville at the time—“General Vallejo came to town the last of this week, summoned by a telegram stating that his brother was dying. He and Cerruti immediately left for Mission San José. Cerruti has been back once and reports great success in getting documents. The chief difficulty seems to be to keep the general from killing his brother with historical questionings. He fears his brother may die without telling him all he knows. Cerruti brings a book from the Mission which can be kept for copying. It seems of considerable importance. It will make some two weeks' work, and I have taken the liberty to employ Piña, the best of the old hands, to do the work.”

Again, on the 18th of April from Mission San José Cerruti writes: “Besides the dictation, I have on hand many documents and old books. I am told that in the vicinity of the Mission are to be found many old residents who have documents, but I abstain from going after them because the travelling expenses are very high, and not having seen the documents I cannot judge whether they are worth the expense. Among others, they say that at the Milpitas rancho lives a native Californian, called Crisóstomo Galindo, who is one hundred and three years old, and is supposed to be the possessor of documents. Shall I go to see him?” A week later he says: “The dictation of Don José de Jesus Vallejo is progressing a great deal 442 435 faster than I had anticipated. I have been with him seven days and have already on hand seventy pages of nearly three hundred words each.”

Thomas O. Larkin was United States consul at Monterey when California fell into the hands of the United States; he was then made naval agent. Born at Charlestown, Massachusetts, in 1802, he came hither in 1832 as supercargo of a Boston trading vessel, and was subsequently quite successful as general merchant and exporter of lumber. He made the models for the first double-geared wheat-mill at Monterey at a time when only ship-carpenters could be found there. Wishing to take a wife, and as a protestant being outside the pale of catholic matrimony, he went with the lady on board a vessel on the Californian coast, and was married under the United States flag by J. C. Jones, then United States consul at the Hawaiian Islands.

In 1845 President Polk commissioned him to sound the Californians as to change of flag, and during the year following he was active in his exertions to secure California to the United States; and for his fidelity and zeal in these and other matters he received the thanks of the president.

Into the hands of such a man as Mr Larkin during the course of these years naturally would fall many important papers, and we should expect him to be possessed of sufficient intelligence to appreciate their value and to preserve them. Nor are we disappointed. At his death Mr Larkin left a large and very valuable mass of documents, besides a complete record of his official correspondence from 1844 to 1849. This record comprised two very large folio volumes, afterward bound in one.

Charles H. Sawyer, attorney for certain of the heirs of Thomas O. Larkin, and always a warm friend of the library, first called my attention to the existence of these most important archives. He had 443 436 made copies of a few of them selected for that purpose, and the blank-book in which such selections had been transcribed Mr Sawyer kindly presented. Mr Larkin's papers, he assured me, would be most difficult to obtain, even should the heirs be inclined to part with them, since one was at the east and another too ill to be seen.

Accompanied by Cerruti, I called on Mr Alfred Larkin, one of the sons, whose office was then on Merchant street. I was received by Mr Larkin in the most cordial manner. The papers, he said, were beyond his control. He would use his best endeavors to have them placed in my hands. As the result of this interview I secured the record books, than which nothing could be more important in the history of that epoch.

Some time passed before anything further was accomplished, but in the mean time I never lost sight of the matter. These papers should be placed on my shelves as a check on the Alvarado and Vallejo testimony. At length I learned that Mr Sampson Tams, a very intelligent and accomplished gentleman who had married a daughter of Mr Larkin, had full possession and control of all the Larkin archives. I lost no time in presenting my request, and was seconded in my efforts by several friends. The result was that with rare and most commendable liberality Mr Tams presented me with the entire collection, which now stands upon the shelves of my library in the form of nine large volumes.

While engaged in my behalf at Monterey, General Vallejo's enthusiasm often waxed so warm as almost to carry him away. Shortly before the suspension of the bank of California he had thought seriously of going south on a literary mission. “I have hopes of getting together many ancient documents from persons at Los Angeles who have promised to aid me,” he writes the 13th of July; and again, the 27th of August: “I assure you that two or three 444 437 weeks since I resolved upon the journey to San Diego, stopping at all the missions. This I had resolved to do at my own proper cost, without your being obliged to spend more money; for to me it would be a great pleasure to give this additional proof of the interest I take in your great work. Until yesterday such was my intention; but this morning I find myself obliged to abandon it, on account of the failure of the bank of California, which renders it necessary for me to return to San Francisco in order to arrange my affairs. I have endeavored to persuade Cerruti to undertake the journey, I furnishing him with letters of introduction to all my friends, but he has refused to venture into deep water, until the conclusion of the Historia de California which I am dictating. I know that Cerruti always desires to avoid expense without some corresponding benefit to yourself.”

The original proposal was for General Vallejo to bring his history down to the year 1846, the end of Mexican domination in California. Writing from Monterey the 27th of August he says: “By the 3d of September I shall have finished the fourth volume of the Historia de California; that is to say, the whole history down to 1846, the date which I proposed as its termination, at the time when, yielding to your entreaties, I undertook to write my recollections of the country. But in these latter days I have managed to interest General Frisbie and other important personages acquainted with events in California from 1846 to 1850, so that they agree to contribute their contingent of light; and I have resolved to bring my history down to this later date, in case you should deem it necessary. It is my intention to go to Vallejo, where in the course of three or four weeks I trust to be able to give the finishing stroke to my work, which I trust will merit the approbation of yourself and other distinguished writers.”

“I have caused Captain Cayetano Juarez to come to Lachryma Montis,” says General Vallejo in a letter 445 438 from Sonoma dated the 4th of October, “in order that he may aid me to write all which appertains to the evil doings of the ‘Bears' in 1846-7. Captain Juarez, who was a witness present at the time, and a truthful and upright man, and myself are engaged in recalling all those deeds just as they occurred. What I relate is very distinct from what has been hitherto published by writers who have desired to represent as heroes the men who robbed me and my countrymen of our property. American authors desire to excuse those robbers with the pretext that in some cases the ‘Bear’ captains gave receipts for the articles of which they took forcible possession; but as those receipts were worthless, the Californians have the right to say that the ‘Bears,’ or a majority of them, were robbers.”

War's alarum always threw the mercurial and mettlesome Cerruti into a state of excitement, which rose to the verge of frenzy when his old field of revolutionary failures was the scene of action. Even rumors of war between Mexico and the United States, which were of frequent occurrence, were usually too much for his equanimity. I remember one instance in particular, while he was writing at General Vallejo's dictation, in November 1875, news came of serious troubles in the south, and he gave me notice that he should be obliged to abandon his work and fly to the rescue of something or to death. I requested Vallejo to pacify him, since he might not receive my opinion in the matter as wholly disinterested. Shortly afterward Cerruti returned for a time to San Francisco, and General Vallejo wrote him there. After a lengthy and flowery review of their labors as associates during the last year and a half, General Vallejo goes on to say: “I have heard that the noise made by the press in relation to the annexation of Mexico to the United States has made a deep impression upon you, and that you contemplate going to see the world in those regions. Believe me, general, el ruido es mas que las nueces. If, as is said, it were certain that war 446 439 between the two republics is about to break out, then you might go forth in search of adventures, but not otherwise. Under such circumstances Mexico would play the rôle of the smaller fish, and the consequence would be that manifest destiny would absorb Chihuahua and Sonora. It is necessary to wait until what is passing in the lofty regions of diplomacy be disclosed. My opinion is that you should wait.” Vallejo's arguments were convincing: Cerruti abandoned his project. The general concludes his letter as follows: “To-morrow I shall leave for San Francisco to see you, and if possible we will go to Healdsburg. I believe that there we shall harvest the papers of Mrs Fitch, and obtain from her a very good narration concerning San Diego matters, its siege by the Californians, the imprisonment of Captain Fitch, Bandini, and others.” General Vallejo came down as he proposed; the breast of the hero of Bolivian revolutions was quiet; the two generals proceeded to Healdsburg, and a thick volume of documents lettered as the archives of the Fitch family was thereby secured to the library.

The history by General Vallejo being an accomplished fact, the next thing in order was its presentation to the library. This was done, of necessity, with a great flourish of trumpets. First came to me a letter which I translate as follows:

“LACHRYMA MONTIS, November 16, 1875.

“HUBERT H. BANCROFT, ESQ.:

“Esteemed Friend: Years ago, at the urgent request of many Californians who desired to see the deeds of their ancestors correctly transmitted to posterity, I undertook the pleasant though arduous task of recording my native country's history from the date of its settlement by Europeans to the year 1850, when our California became a state in the American union.

“Fortune, however, did not smile upon my undertaking, since my manuscript, the result of long and careful labor, was destroyed by the flames that on the 13th day of April 1867 consumed my residence at Sonoma.

“Two years ago, impelled by the same motives, with undiminished enthusiasm for the work, and with a higher idea than ever of its importance, I decided to recommence my task. I was aware that a soldier narrating events in which he has figured as a prominent actor, does so at the risk of having 447 440 his impartiality questioned by some; and what made me still more diffident was the conviction that the work should have been done by others among the native Californians more competent to discharge it in a satisfactory manner; but noticing no disposition on the part of any of them to take the duty off my hands, I cheerfully, though with some misgivings as to my success, assumed it.

“The memoranda of my respected father, Don Ignacio Vallejo, who came to California in 1772, for early historical events, together with my own recollections and notes, as well as documents and data kindly furnished by worthy coöperators, have enabled me to do justice, as I hope, to so important a subject.

“Friends have attached, perhaps, an exaggerated value to the result of my efforts, the manuscript not having as yet fallen under the eyes of critics who would pronounce upon its merits uninfluenced by friendship for the author. I am convinced, however, that I have avoided the prejudices so apt to bias the soldier who gives a narrative of his own career, and fairly represented the actions and motives of my countrymen.

“Though I held, during many years, a prominent position in California, I deemed it proper to mention my acts only when I could not possibly avoid it.

“Personal disputes and petty differences among my countrymen in the early times, and with Anglo-Americans in later years, I have touched upon as lightly as is consistent with historical accuracy. I have no wish to contribute to the revival of any national, religious, or personal prejudice; and it is no part of my plan either to flatter friends or abuse enemies.

“I had at first, my friend, intended to give my labors to the world in my own name, but having noticed with much satisfaction the ability and exactness displayed in your work, The Native Races of the Pacific States, I concluded to place my five volumes of manuscripts at your disposal, to use as you may deem best, confident that you will present to us a complete and impartial history of California, having at your command the data and documents furnished you by the best informed native Californians, in addition to all that printed works and public and private archives can supply.

“Your work will be accepted by the world, which already knows you for a trustworthy writer, as a reliable and complete history of my native land. Mine, however favorably received, would perhaps be looked upon as giving, on many points, only M.G. Vallejo's version.

“I think I may safely assert that the most enlightened and patriotic portion of the native Californians will cheerfully place their country's fair fame in your hands, confident that you will do it justice.

“In this trust they are joined by their humble fellow-countryman and your sincere friend,

“M. G. VALLEJO.”

To this I made reply in the following words:

“SAN FRANCISCO, November 26, 1875.

“MY DEAR GENERAL:

“I have carefully examined the five large manuscript volumes upon which you have been occupied for the past two years, and which you have so generously placed at my disposal.

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“In the name of the people of California, those now living and those who shall come after us, permit me to thank you for your noble contribution to the history of this western land.

“You have done for this north-western section of the ancient Spanish-American possessions what Oviedo, Las Casas, Torquemada, and other chroniclers of the Indies did for the New World as known to them. You have saved from oblivion an immense mass of material deeply interesting to the reader and of vital importance to all lovers of exact knowledge.

“The history of your country begins, naturally, with the expeditions directed north-westward by Nuño de Guzman in 1530, and the gradual occupation, during two centuries and a quarter, of Nueva Galicia, Nueva Vizcaya, and the Californias.

“The deeds of Guzman, his companions, and his successors, the disastrous attempts of the great Hernan Cortés to explore the Pacific shore, and the spiritual conquests of the new lands by the Company of Jesus, are recorded in surviving fragments of secular and ecclesiastical archives, in the numerous original papers of the Jesuit missionaries, and in the standard works of such authors as Mota Padilla, Ribas, Alegre, Frejes, Arricivita, and Beaumont, or—on Baja California especially—Venegas, Clavigero, Baegert, and one or two anonymous authorities.

“When the Franciscans so shrewdly gave up Baja California to the rival order of St Dominic, the prize which had fallen into their hands at the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1767, and took upon themselves, two years later, the conversion of the northern barbarians, the records still received due attention from Padre Junípero's zealous missionary band; and, thanks to the efforts of Padre Francisco Palou, the most important of the documents may be consulted in print, together with a connected narrative in the same author's life of Junípero Serra.

“From the period embraced in Palou's writings down to the incorporation of our state into the northern union, the world knows almost nothing of Californian history, from Californian sources. Hundreds of travellers from different lands came to our shores, each of whom gave to the world the result of his observations during a visit or brief residence, the whole constituting a most valuable source of information. Most of these writers gave also an historical sketch; a few read Palou's life of Serra, consulted some of the more accessible documents, in state or mission archives, and obtained fragmentary data from native residents; the rest copied, with mutilations and omissions, the work of the few.

“All these sketches were superficial and incomplete; many were grossly inaccurate; not a few were written with the intent, or at least willingness, to deceive, in the interest of party, clique, or section. The official records of the Anglo-American invasion and conquest were more complete and accurate, but it presented only one side where it were best to have both.

“I desired to treat the subject in all its phases, impartially and exhaustively; of one thing I felt the need above all others—of a history of Spanish and Mexican California, including the Anglo-American invasion, written from a Hispano-American standpoint, by a native Californian of culture, prominent among and respected by his countrymen, possessed of sound judgment, 449 442 a liberal spirit, an enthusiastic love for his subject, and appreciation of its importance. These qualifications, General, you have long been known to possess in a high degree, and more fully than any other living man could have done have you supplied the pressing need to which I have alluded.

“In the conquest of Alta California the missionary and the soldier marched side by side; but the padres for the most part had the telling of the story, and not unlikley claimed more than belonged to them of credit for success.

“Your respected father, Don Ignacio Vallejo, educated for the church, abandoned a distasteful ecclesiastical life when on its very threshold, in spite of prospective priestly honors, and came here to fight the battle of life with the sword instead of the rosary. From the first he was identified with the interests of California, as were his children after him; the two generations embrace all there is, save only three years, of our country's annals. Your father's memoranda, with the work of Governor Pedro Fages—the latter, for the most part, descriptive rather than historical—are about all we have from a secular point of view on the earliest times; and they supply, besides, most useful materials bearing on the later years of Spanish rule down to the time from which your own recollections date, in the rule of the most worthy Governor Pablo Vicente de Sola.

“For a period of thirty years, from 1815 to 1845, your work stands without a rival among your predecessors in its completeness and interest; and I confidently expect to find it as accurate as it is fascinating. Recording hundreds of minor occurrences wholly unknown to previous writers, you also devote chapters to each leading event hitherto disposed of in a paragraph or a page. To specify the points thus carefully recorded would be to give en résumé the annals of our state; suffice it to say that in your pages I find brought out, in comparatively brighter light than ever before, the long continued struggle against aboriginal barbarism; the operations of the unwelcome Russian colonists; Captain Bouchard and his insurgent band at Monterey in 1818; news of the Mexican independence in 1822, and its effect in California; the change from imperial to constitutional government in 1824; opposition of the padres to republicanism; end of the pastoral and inauguration of the revolutionary period; California as a Mexican penal colony; the revolts of Herrera and Solis in 1828-9; the varying policy in Mexico and California on secularization; overthrow of Governor Victoria, and the exile of unmanageable padres; the colonization ‘grab’ of Hijar and Pudrés, defeated by Governor Figueroa in 1835, and saving of the missions for other hands to plunder; conquests on the northern frontier by Alférez Vallejo and Prince Solano; the uprising of Californian federalists against Mexican centralism, and the downfall of governors Chico and Gutierrez; the rule of Governor Juan B. Alvarado and General M. G. Vallejo from 1836 to 1842; rebellion of the south, and long continued strife between the Arribeños and Abajeños; the gradual increase of overland immigration; and, finally, the varied events of a still later period. From 1846 to 1850 your work is brought more into comparison with others—a comparison which, I doubt not, will serve only more full to confirm the value of the whole as an authentic source of knowledge.

“The above is but a mutilated skeleton of the living historic body created by your pen. It is not, however, as a record of dry facts, of the succession 450 443 of rulers, of victories over revolting malcontents or gentile Indians, of the acts of public officials, that your writings impress me as having their highest value; but rather as pictures of early Californian life and character. The functions of the skeleton's larger bones are not more important but rather less interesting then those of the complicated net-work of veins, nerves, and more delicate organs which give symmetry and life to the body. I note with pleasure your evident appreciation of the true historical spirit, which no longer ignores the masses to describe the commonplace acts of rulers. This appreciation is clearly shown in the vivid pictures you present of life among all classes. Rich and poor, official and private, secular and religious, padre, neophyte, and gentile; soldier, sailor, merchant, and smuggler; the wealthy hacendado and humble ranchero; aristocrat and plebeian—all appear to the view as they lived and acted in the primitive pre-gringo times. Besides your delineations of the mission, presidio, and pueblo systems; of secularization schemes; of agricultural, commercial, and industrial resources; of political, judicial, and educational institutions, we have in a lighter vein charming recollections of school-boy days; popular diversions of young and old; the indoor music, dancing, and feasting, and the out-door picnic, race, and bull-fight; ceremonial displays under church auspices, and official receptions of high dignitaries or welcome visitors from abroad; care of the church for the welfare and morality of the people, home customs, interesting incidents of social life, weddings, elopements, and ludicrous practical jokes—the whole constituting a most masterly picture, which no foreigner has ever equalled or ever could equal; a view from the interior which none could paint save an artist-actor in the scenes portrayed.

“I have to thank you not only for this most valuable and timely gift, but for some fifty large folio volumes of original papers to vouch for or correct what you have written, as well as for your generous interest in the task I have undertaken, and your influence among your countrymen in my behalf. I have been able to procure many other original narratives, written by native Californians and old residents—less exhaustive than your own contribution, but still very important—together with thousands of documents from family archives; and my store of material is daily augmenting. I am grateful for the confidence with which you and other distinguished Californians intrust to me the task of transmitting to coming generations the deeds of yourselves and your fathers, and I accept the task with a full realization of the responsibilities incurred. My purpose is to write a complete, accurate, and impartial history of California. With access practically to all that has been written on the subject by natives or by foreigners, and to all the papers of public and private archives, I expect to succeed. In case of such success, to none of the many who have aided or may aid in my work shall I be placed under greater obligations, General, and to none shall I ever more cheerfully acknowledge my indebtedness, than to yourself.

“Very sincerely, HUBERT H. BANCROFT.”

This correspondence was published at the time in all the leading journals, of various languages; after which the sun moved on in its accustomed course.

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On the 9th of October, 1876, at Sonoma, Enrique Cerruti killed himself. I was east at the time, and the painful intelligence was sent me by General Vallejo. The cause of this deplorable act was losses in mining stocks. For a year past he had been gambling in these in-securities, and during the latter part of this time he was much demoralized. The disgrace attending failures was beyond his endurance. He could be brave anywhere but there; but heroes make wry faces over the toothache, and philosophers groan as loudly as others when troubled with pains in the liver. He who is tranquillized by a tempest or a war-trumpet quails before the invocation of his own thoughts.

When I left San Francisco in June he attended me to the ferry, and was outwardly in his usual health and spirits. He continued his work at the library only a few weeks after my departure, so that when he died he had not been in my service for three months; indeed, so nervous and eccentric had become his brain by his speculations that for some time past he had been totally unfit for literary labor.

He wrote me for two thousand dollars; but his letter lay in New York while I was absent in the White mountains, and I did not receive it till too late. The amount he asked for, however, even if I had been in time with it, would not have saved him, for he owed, as was afterward estimated, from fifteen to twenty thousand dollars. He had borrowed this money from his friends, and had lost it; and his inability to pay well nigh maddened him. He talked of suicide for six months previous, but no attention was paid to his threats. Just before leaving for Sonoma he bade all farewell for the last time; some laughed at him, others offered to bet with him that he would not do it; no one believed him. He had quarrelled and made peace alternately with every person in the library; he had denounced every friend he had, one after the other, as the cause of his ruin. Then again it was his fate; he had been so cursed from childhood. 452 445 However, death should balance all accounts, and swallow all dishonor; though his friends failed to perceive how a claim against a dead Cerruti was better than a claim against a live one. O man! Passing the vita pro vita, is the rest nothing but protoplasm?

Why he selected Sonoma as the point of his final departure no one knows, unless it was for dramatic effect. He was a lover of notoriety; and a tragic act would command more attention there than in a large city. Then there were the Vallejos, his dearest friends—he might have chosen to be buried near them. Gunpowder, too, one would have thought nearer akin to his taste than drugs. He was fully determined to die, for, laudanum failing, he resorted to strychnine. Awakened by his groans, the hotel people sent for Mrs Vallejo, who tried to administer an antidote, but he refused to receive it. The coroner telegraphed the firm, and Mr. Savage represented the library at the burial.

Poor, dear Cerruti! If I had him back with me alive, I would not give him up for all Nevada's mines. His ever welcome presence; his ever pleasing speech, racy in its harmless bluster; his ever charming ways, fascinating in their guileful simplicity, the far-reaching round earth does not contain his like. Alas, Cerrutti! with another I might say, I could have better lost a better man!

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CHAPTER XIX.

HOME. There is no happiness in life, there is no misery, like that growing out of the dispositions which consecrate or desecrate a home.

Chapin.

I ALMOST despaired of ever having a home again. I was growing somewhat old for a young wife, and I had no fancy for taking an old one. The risk on both sides I felt to be great. A Buffalo lady once wrote me: “All this time you might be making some one person happy.” I replied: “All this time I might be making two persons miserable.” And yet no one realized more fully than myself that a happy marriage doubles the resources, and completes the being which otherwise fails in the fullest development of its intuitions and yearnings. The twain are, in the nature human, one; each without loss gives what the other lacks.

There were certain qualities I felt to be essential not only to my happiness, but to my continued literary success. I was so constituted by nature that I could not endure domestic infelicity. Little cared I for the world, with its loves and hates, whether it regarded me kindly, or not at all. I had a world within me whose good-will I could command so long as I was at peace with myself. Little cared I for a scowl here, or an attack there; out among men I felt myself equal to cope with any of them. But my home must be to me heaven or hell. There was no room in my head for discord, nor in my heart for bitterness.

To write well, to do anything well, a 454 447 right-intentioned humane man must be at peace with the one nearest him. Many a time in my younger married life has a cross word, dropped upon her I loved on leaving my home in the morning, so haunted me while at my business, so buzzed about my ears, so filmed my eyes, and thumped upon the incrustment within which I had wrapped my heart, that I have flung down my work, gone back and dispelled the offence, after which I might return untroubled to my business. Drop into the heart a sweet word, and it will perch itself and sing all the night long, and all the day; drop into the heart a sharp word, and, rat-like, it will scratch all round, and gnaw, and gnaw, and gnaw!

Nothing so quickly dissipated my ideas, and spoiled a day for me, as domestic disturbances. I had long since accustomed myself to throw off the ever present annoyances of business, even placing my literary peace of mind above the reach of the money-wranglers. But in my home, where my whole being was so directly concerned, where all my sympathies were enlisted and all my affections centred, derangement were fatal.

Hence it was, as the years went by and I found myself day after day alone, after exhaustion had driven me from my writing, that I regarded less hopefully my chances of again having a home.

“I will keep house for you,” my daughter used to say.

“But you will marry,” was my reply.

“Then we will live with you.”

“I would not have you.”

“Then you shall live with us.”

“‘Us' I shall never live with.”

“Then I shall not marry!” was the conclusion commonly arrived at.

I had sold my dwelling on California street for several reasons. It was large and burdensome to one situated as I was. Much of my time I wished to spend out of the city, where I would be removed 455 448 from constant interruption. As long as I had a house I must entertain company. This I enjoyed when time was at my disposal; but drives, and dinners, and late hours dissipated literary effort, and with so much before me to be done, and a score of men at my back whom I must keep employed, I could take little pleasure in pastime which called me long from the library.

My great fear of marrying was lest I should fasten to my side a person who would hurry me off the stage before my task was done, or otherwise so confound me that I never should be able to complete my labors. This an inconsiderate woman could accomplish in a variety of ways—as, for instance, by lack of sympathy in my labors; by inordinate love of pleasure, which finds in society gossip its highest gratification; by love of display, which leads to expensive living, and the like.

Naturally shrinking from general society, and preferring books and solitude to noisy assemblies, like Euripides I was undoubtedly regarded by some as sulky and morose; yet I believe few ever held humanity in higher esteem or carried a kinder heart for all men than I. “When a man has great studies,” says George Eliot, “and is writing a great work, he must, of course, give up seeing much of the world. How can he go about making acquaintances?”

Often had I been counselled to marry; but whom should I marry? I must have one competent, mentally, to be a companion—one in whom my mind might rest while out of harness. Then the affection must have something to feed on, if one would not see the book-writer become a monstrosity and turn all into head. To keep a healthy mind in a healthy body the intellectual toiler of all other men needs sympathy, which shall be to him as the morning sun to the frost-stiffened plant. It is not well to wholly uproot feeling or thrust affection back upon the heart.

As the healthy body seeks food, so the healthy 456 449 mind faints for friendship, and the healthy heart for love. Nor will love of friends and relatives alone suffice. The solitary being sighs for its mate, its other self. Blindly, then, if we shut from our breast the blessed light of heaven, the tendrils of affection stretch forth even though they encounter only the dead wall of buried hopes.

Whom should I marry, then? The question oft repeated itself. Do not all women delight in the fopperies of fashionable life more than in what might seem to them dry, fruitless toil? Where should love be found of such transforming strength as to metamorphose into Me a female mind of fair intelligence, and endow its possessor with the same extravagant enthusiasm of which I was possessed?

No; better a thousand times no wife at all than one who should prove unwilling to add her sacrifice to mine for the accomplishment of a high purpose; who should fail to see things as I saw them, or to make my interest hers; who should not believe in me and in my work with her whole soul; who should not be content to make my heart her home, and go with me wherever duty seemed to call, or who could not find in intellectual progress the highest pleasure.

For years my heart had lain a-rusting; now I thought I might bring it out, clean and polish it, and see if it might not be as good as new. It had been intimated by certain critics that I had allowed love of literature to rival love of woman. But this was not true. I was ready at any time to marry the woman who should appear to me in the form of a dispensation.

Appetite underlies all activity. In the absence of appetite one may rest. Happy he whose intellect is never hungry, whose soul is ever satisfied with its fair round fatness, and the sum of whose activities is confined to the body, to feed, grow, and reproduce. Let him delight in the domestic sanctuary. Let him go forth happily in the morning, and let him send to his 457 450 loved ones their beef and turnips, as tokens of affection. Unto such it is given ever to be joyous, and to disguise sorrow; but let not the man of loftier aspirations seek rest upon this planet, for he shall not find it.

In mirth men are sincere; in sobriety hypocritical. It is behind the mask of gravity that the fantastic tricks which turn and overturn society are performed. Joy is more difficult to counterfeit than sorrow. We may cloud the sun with smoked glass, but we cannot dissipate the clouds with any telescope of human invention.

The higher order of literary character above all things loves simplicity and a quiet life; loves tranquillity of mind and a body free from pain, hates interruptions, controversial wranglings, and personal publicity. Thus it was with Scott, Dugald Stewart, and a host of others. Not the least strange among the contrarieties of human nature are the idiosyncrasies of authors. Why should men of genius so commonly be dissipated, quarrelsome, and void of common sense? Minds the wisest, the most exalted, the most finely strung, seem inseparable from some species of madness. Men of genius usually in some directions are visionary dreamers; in many directions they are often as ingenuous as children, likewise as wayward and as petulant. No wonder women cannot endure them. Meanly selfish, the wayward follies of childhood are intensified by the stubborn will of the man. Like the ever changing waters, now their disposition is as the dew of morning sitting with exquisite daintiness on every web and petal, refreshing every leaf and flower, then bursting forth in merciless storm, beating on all it loves and laying low its own. And yet the moisture is the same and eternally reviving; so that, whether the mood of these men is as the silent vapor or the raging sea, whether their speech is as the dropping of pearly dew or as the beating of the rain-storm, their minds are an exhaustless ocean of life-sustaining thought.

458 451

The wife of a literary man has her own peculiar troubles, which the world knows not of. Much of the time she is left alone while her husband is buried in his studies. She craves more of his society, perhaps, than he feels able to give her; the theatre, the opera, and evening parties in a measure she is obliged to forego. When talking to her, his speech is not always pleasing. From seeming moroseness he sometimes darts off at the angle of an absurd idea, or indulges in a deluge of dialectics upon society, politics, religion, or any subject which happens to fall under his observation. Besides this he may be at times nervous, fretful, whimsical, full of fault-findings and unjust complaints about the very things to which she has devoted her most careful attention. When we consider all this we cannot much wonder at the proverbial domestic infelicities of authors. Lecky affirms that “no painter or novelist, who wished to depict an ideal of perfect happiness, would seek it in a profound student.”

What a catalogue they make, to be sure, taken almost at random. The name of Xanthippe, wife of Socrates, has become a byword in history for a shrew. But not every one is, like the great Athenian sage, possessed of the philosophy to choose a wife as he would make choice of a restive horse, so that in the management of her he might learn the better to manage mankind.

Cicero, after thirty years of married life, divorced Terentia, his darling, the delight of his eyes, and the best of mothers, as he repeatedly called her. Dante, Albert Dürer, Molière, Scaliger, Steele, and Shakespeare were unhappy in their wives. At the age of eight years Byron made love and rhymes to Mary Duff, at eleven to Margaret Parker, and at fifteen to Mary Chaworth. The last named Mary refusing him, he finally married Anne Isabella Milbanke. A year of married life had hardly passed before Lady 459 452 Byron was back in her father's house. He who awoke one morning and found himself famous—such is the irony of fame—was mobbed by his late adorers, and soon quitted England forever. At Venice this most licentious of poets met Teresa Gamba, wife of Count Guiccioli, who kindly winked at a liaison between his countess and the English lord.

Burns made sad work of it; first falling in love with his harvesting companion, a bonnie sweet lass of fourteen, then falling out with Jean Armour, a rustic beauty, leaving her twins to support, next engaging to marry Colonel Montgomery's dairy-maid, Mary Campbell, her whom he made immortal as Highland Mary, singing of her as Mary in Heaven before the nuptials were consummated on earth, and finally returning to his old love, Jean Armour, and marrying her—meanwhile so intemperate that, last of all, he died of overmuch drink.

In the Dowager Countess of Warwick, Addison found an uncongenial wife, and spent the remainder of his life, as Whipple says, in taverns, clubs, and repentance. The Lady Elizabeth Howard, daughter of the earl of Berkshire, added nothing to the happiness of Dryden, whom she married. Montaigne found married life troublesome; La Fontaine deserted his wife; and Rousseau went after strange goddesses.

The refined Shelley separated from Harriet Westbrook, the innkeeper's daughter, two years after their marriage. It seems he preferred to his wife another woman, Mary Godwin, and after living with her for two years, his wife meanwhile kindly drowning herself, he married his mistress; not that he regarded the marriage contract as binding, or in any wise necessary, but because it would give pleasure to Mary. After breaking half a score of hearts, Goethe, before he married her, lived twenty-eight years with the bright-eyed girl whom he had met in the park at Weimar.

At the end of the honeymoon, Mary Powell left John Milton, went back to her father's house, and 460 453 refused to return; though two years later a reconciliation was effected. The wife of Thackeray was overtaken by a fever and put out to be nursed, while the husband and two daughters lived with his mother.

Hazlitt, one of the most brilliant of critics and eloquent of essayists, had a most infelicitous matrimonial experience. In 1808 he married Miss Stoddart. After living with her some ten years, he fell crazily in love with a tailor's daughter. So fiercely burned this flame that he divorced his wife, she nothing loath, and threw himself at the feet of the maid, only to be rejected. Then he espoused a widow, Mrs Bridgewater, who left him within a year after marriage.

Even gentle Charles Lamb broke a marriage engagement, because of a tendency to insanity in his family, and on account of his sister, Mary Lamb, who killed her mother, and was obliged to be confined in a lunatic asylum periodically.

Pope, who dives deep into the human heart and makes its inmost recesses his familiar haunt, is so foolish in his professions of love for Lady Mary Wortley Montagu that she laughs in his face, thereby incurring his deadly enmity forever after.

How much better it would be for literary men to marry as all nature marries, under direction of their harmonies, and then rest in their new relations. There is no question that an evenly balanced mind can labor more steadily, can do more and better work, under the calm and well regulated freedom of the marriage state than when unsettled by restless cravings. But these men of genius seem to have married their woes instead of their pleasures.

The women in many instances seem to be no better than the men. Indeed, the wife bas bleu, one badly affected with cacoëthes scribendi, is about as unlovable a woman as a female doctor. Felicitous Felicia Hemans, after making her sick captain very unhappy, let him go to Italy while she went home; after which they never took the trouble to meet. George Sand, 461 454 finding life with a husband unendurable, began a separation by taking her children to Paris and there spending half the year, the other half being occupied in the direction of divorce.

Divorce alone did not satisfy Rosina Wheeler, wife of Edward Bulwer Lytton, but she must publish books against her former husband, and harangue against him at the hustings when he stood for parliament. At railing and carping she outdid sleepy Momus. Madame de Staël, if she hated not marriage, hated the fruits of it. Said she of her children: “Ils ne me ressemblent pas;” and of her daughter, whom she affected to despise: “C'est une lune bien pâle.” This talented lady should have lived among the Chinese, who maintain that “the happiest mother of daughters is she who has only sons;” just as Saint Paul thought those best married who had no wives. Talents cease to be becoming when they render a mother indifferent or averse to her offspring.

But there is this of Madame de Staël which may be said in her favor: Her life, so far as conjugal happiness was concerned, was a wreck, just as the life of many another woman of intellect and culture has been one long-drawn sigh for companionship. Hollow as is a life for society, and hard as is a life of aloneness, either is preferable to the soul-slavery of a woman tied to a companionless husband. George Eliot, the matchless, the magnificent—but we will drop the curtain!

In this practical scientific age the subtlest science is the science of self. Man is possessed of many vagaries; and of all occupations the writing of books is attended by the most pains and whimsicalities. Extraordinary strngth in one direction is balanced by extraordinary weakness in another; as a rule you may debit a man with folly in proportion as you credit him with wisdom.

Higher and better trained than any we are apt to 462 455 meet must be the intellect that finds in utility alone a sufficient incentive to well-doing. Every day we see men of education wilfully transgressing, regardless of consequences, while the ignorant and superstitious, under religious fear, shun the evil that ends in disaster.

Joaquin Miller admired Byron. Byron treated his wife badly; Joaquin treated his wife badly. Joaquin was satisfied that in no other way could he be Byron—and Joaquin was right. In this respect, as in every other, alas! I may not lay claim to genius.

Though not uniformly even-tempered and amiable, I cannot say that I delight in tormenting my family. Many times I have attempted it and failed. I lack the fortitude to face the consequences; I find defeat less painful than victory. Twelve times groaned Eugene Aram; his murdered victim groaned but twice. Man's inhumanity, not Satan, is man's greatest enemy.

But while we jointly abhor those abnormities of genius which tend to injustice and cruelty, let us not forget that genius is eccentric, and nowhere more so than in its relations with women. Genius, to be genius, must be irregular. He who is charged with the possession of genius, if he be in every respect like every other man, obviously either he is no genius or else all men are men of genius. Therefore the men of sense must exercise their patience while the men of genius make idiots of themselves.

Notwithstanding all that has been said and written concerning the domestic infelicities of authors, and let me add of others, the one thousandth part has not been told. Only a few of the insaner sort have come to the light. Of smothered wrongs and unheralded hates; of thorny marriage beds, and poisoned connubial lives which have never been blazoned abroad, if all were written, the libraries of the world would needs be doubled. Millions have thus lived and died, nevertheless there have been those so seemingly swept onward by the saturnine influence of marital infelicities that escape appeared impossible; and so within 463 456 the month we see the heart-broken Mrs Bluebeard marrying the fascinating Captain Blackbeard.

In the eyes of Demosthenes two qualifications only were essential in a wife; she must be a faithful house-guardian and a fruitful mother. But times have greatly changed since the days of Demosthenes: Irish servants are the house-guardians, and the best wives often those that are not mothers at all.

No one possessed of manliness will marry a woman for money. For unless she voluntarily dispossesses herself of her property, which no woman in her senses will do, and becomes a puppet in her husband's hands, she is apt sooner or later to unloose the reins of womanly decorum and to arrogate to herself not only the management of her own affairs but also her husband's. As Juvenal wrote with the women of Rome before him: “Sure of all ills with which mankind are curst A wife who brings you money is the worst.”

To me the long catalogue of matrimonial infernalisms has no significance other than that of congratulation at my escape from such loving woes. The younger Pliny I will take for my text, and out-swear him double upon his domestic peace. Hear him talk of his Calpurnia: “Her intelligence is very great, very great her frugality; in loving me she shows how good a heart she has. And she has now a fondness for letters, which springs from her affection for me. She keeps my books by her, loves to read them, even learns them by heart. These things make me feel a most certain hope that there will be a perpetual and ever growing harmony between us. For it is not youth or personal beauty that she loves in me—things that by degrees decline with old age—but my fame.”

Her life was one continuous sparkle, like that of good wine whose spirit is immortal. Her face was as a lovely landscape, brightly serene, warmed by 464 457 all-melting sympathy, and lighted by the glow of intellect. Her voice was like the laughing water; her laugh was ringing silver; and through the soft azure of her eye the eye of love might see an ocean of affection. Joyous was her approach, lighting with her sunbeam smile the dismal recesses of reflection; and beaming beautiful as she was without, I found her, as Aristotle says of Pythias, as fair and good within.

Beneath sweet and simple speech in which was no sting, behind a childlike manner in which was no childishness, there was revealed to me, day by day as we walked and talked together, a full developed womanly character, strong, deep, comprehensive. Rallying to my support with ever increasing mental powers, by her ready aid and fond encouragement she doubled my capabilities from the first. For no less in these, than in the good wife's tender trust, lies the strong man's strength.

New Haven had been her home, and of the families of that old university town hers was among the most respected. It was there I first met her, and afterward at Bethlehem, the highest of New England villages. Walking down the dusty road, we turned aside into a rocky field, crossing into a lane which led us to a tangled wood, where, seated on a fallen tree, each spoke the words to speak which we were there. It was the 12th of October, 1876, that I married Matilda Coley Griffing; and from the day that she was mine, wherever her sweet presence, there was my home.

There was no little risk on her part, in thus committing the new wine of her love to an old bottle; but that risk she took, retained her fresh maidenly mood unhackneyed, and never burst the confine of wifely courtesy.

It has been elsewhere intimated that no one is competent to write a book who has not already written several books. The same observation might be not inappropriately applied to marriage. No man—I will not say woman—is really in the fittest 465 458 condition to marry who has not been married before. For obvious reasons, a middle-aged man ought to make a better husband than a very young man. He has had more experience; he should know more, have better control of himself, and be better prepared to have consideration for those dependent upon him for happiness or support. The young man, particularly one who has not all his life enjoyed the noblest and best of female society, does not always entertain the highest opinion of woman, never having reached the finer qualities of her mind and heart, and having no conception of the superiority of her refined and gentle nature over his own. Hence the inexperienced youth, launched upon the untried ocean of matrimony, often finds himself in the midst of storms which might have been with ease avoided, had he been possessed of greater tact or experience.

And the children which come later in the lives of their parents—we might say, happy are they as compared with those who appeared before them. It is safe to say that one half the children born into the world die in infancy through the ignorance or neglect of their parents; and of the other half, their lives for the most part are made miserable from the same cause. The young husband and father chafes under the new cares and anxieties incident to untried responsibilities which interfere with his comfort and pleasure, and the child must suffer therefrom. Often a newly married pair are not ready at once to welcome children; they are perhaps too much taken up with themselves and the pleasures and pastimes of society. Later in life parents are better prepared, more in the humor it may be, more ready to find their chief pleasure in welcoming to the world successive reproductions of themselves, and watching the physical and mental unfolding, and ministering to the comfort and joy of the new and strange little beings committed to them.

There was little lack of sympathy between us, my wife and me, little lack of heart, and head, and hand 466 459 help. After the journeying incident to this new relationship was over, and I once more settled at work, all along down the days and years of future ploddings patiently by my side she sat, her face the picture of happy contentment, assisting me with her quick application and sound discrimination, making notes, studying my manuscript, and erasing or altering such repetitions and solecisms as crept into my work.

At White Sulphur springs, and Santa Cruz, where we spent the following spring and summer, on the hotel porches used to sit the feathery-brained women of fashion from the city—used there to sit and cackle, cackle, cackle, all the morning, and all the evening, while we were at our work; and I never before so realized the advantage to woman of ennobling occupation. Why should she be the vain and trifling thing, intellectually, that she generally is? How long will those who call themselves ladies exercise their influence to make work degrading, and only folly fashionable? At the Springs during this time there was a talented woman of San Francisco, well known in select circles, who had written a volume of really beautiful poems, but who assured me she was ashamed to publish it, on account of the damage it would be to her socially; that is to say, her frivolous sisters would tolerate no sense in her.

But little cared we for any of them. We were content; nay, more, we were very happy. Rising early and breakfasting at eight o'clock, we devoted the forenoon to work. After luncheon we walked, or rode, or drove, usually until dinner, after which my wife and daughter mingled with the company, while I wrote often until ten or eleven o'clock. In this way I could average ten hours a day; which, but for the extraordinary strength of my constitution, must be regarded twice as much as I should have done.

It was a great saving to me of time and strength, this taking my work into the country. In constant communication with the library, I could draw thence 467 460 daily such fresh material as I required, and as often as necessary visit the library in person, and have supervision of things there. Thus was my time divided between the still solitude of the country and the noisy solitude of the city.

Never in my life did I work harder or accomplish more than during the years immediately succeeding my marriage, while at the same time body and mind grew stronger under the fortifying influences of home.

For a year and more before my marriage I had been under promise to my daughter to go east at the close of her summer school term and accompany her to the centennial exhibition at Philadelphia. This I did, leaving San Francisco the 15th of June 1876, and taking her, with her two cousins and a young lady friend, to the great world's show, there to spend the first two weeks in July. Thence we all returned to New Haven. During a previous visit east I had met Miss Griffing, and I now determined to meet her oftener. After a few weeks in New Haven I proceeded to Buffalo; and thence, after a time, to the White mountains, whither Miss Griffing had migrated for the summer.

Immediately after our marriage we went to New York, Philadelphia, and Washington. My newly wedded pleasure did not, however, render me oblivious to my historical aims. In New York I called on General and Mrs Fremont. They were exceedingly gracious, realizing fully the importance of the work which I was doing, wished particularly to be placed right in history, where they had always been under a cloud, they said, and promised their immediate and hearty coöperation; all of which was idle wind. Why cannot the soi-disant great and good always shame the devil?

I found Mrs Fremont a large, fine appearing, gray-haired woman of sixty, perhaps, very animated and shrewdly talkative, thoroughly engrossed in her 468 461 husband's schemes, assisting him now, as she has done for twenty years, by planning and writing for him. The general appeared about sixty-five, slightly built, with closely trimmed gray hair and beard.

From New York we went to Washington, and saw Major and Mrs Powell, George Bancroft, Judge Field, Mr Spofford, and many others. After a day at Mount Vernon we returned to Baltimore, there to meet President Gilman, Brantz Mayer, and other friends. Though both of us had seen the exhibition, as we supposed, we could not pass it by upon the present occasion, and accordingly spent a week in Philadelphia.

With new interest Mrs Bancroft now regarded everything pertaining to the Pacific coast. “The Indian trappings in the government building,” she writes in her journal begun at this time, “the photographs of the Mound-builders and the Cave-dwellers, the stone utensils and curiously decorated pottery of the Pueblos, the glass photographs of views in Colorado and Arizona, so vividly displaying, with its wild fascinations, the scenery of the west, all seemed suddenly clothed in new charms.”

I had long desired a dictation from John A. Sutter. Indeed, I regarded the information which he alone could give as absolutely essential to my history, the first, as he was, to settle in the valley of the Sacramento, so near the spot where gold was first discovered, and so prominent in those parts during the whole period of the Californian Inferno. I knew that he was somewhere in that vicinity, but I did not know where. I telegraphed to San Francisco for his address, and received in reply, ‘Sitig, Lancaster county, Pennsylvania.’ After some search I found the ‘Sitig’ to mean Litiz, and immediately telegraphed both the operator and the postmaster. In due time answer came that General Sutter resided there, and was at home.

Leaving Philadelphia in the morning, and passing 469 462 up the beautiful valley of the Schuylkill, we reached our destination about noon. Why this bold Swiss, who for a dozen years or more was little less than king among the natives of the Sierra foothills, where had been enacted the mad doings of the gold-seekers, why he should leave this land of sunshine, even though he had been unfortunate, and hide himself in a dismal Dutch town, was a mystery to me. Accident seemed to have ruled him in it; accident directed him thither to a Moravian school, as suitable in which to place a granddaughter. This step led to the building of a house, and there he at this time intended to end his days. Well, no doubt heaven is as near Litiz as California; but sure I am, the departure thence is not so pleasant.

At the Litiz Springs hotel, directly opposite to which stood General Sutter's two-story brick house, we were told that the old gentleman was ill, unable to receive visitors, and that it would be useless to attempt to see him. There was one man, the barber, who went every day to shave the general, who could gain me audience, if such a thing were possible. I declined with thanks his distinguished services, and ordered dinner.

“I will go over and see his wife, at all events,” I said to the clerk.

“That will avail you nothing,” was the reply; “she is as deaf as an adder.”

“Who else is there in the family?”

“A granddaughter.”

That was sufficient. I did not propose to lose my journey to Litiz, and what was more, this probably my last opportunity for securing this important dictation. I was determined to see the general, if indeed he yet breathed, and ascertain for myself how ill he was.

After knocking loudly at the portal three several times, the door was slowly, silently opened a little way, and the head of an old woman appeared at the aperture.

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“Is this Mrs Sutter?” I asked.

No response.

“May I speak with you a moment in the hall?”

Still no response, and no encouragement for me to enter. There she stood, the guardian of, apparently, as impregnable a fortress as ever was Fort Sutter in its palmiest days. I must gain admission; retreat now might be fatal. Stepping toward the small opening as if there was no obstacle whatever to my entering, and as the door swung back a little at my approach, I slipped into the hall.

Once within, no ogress was there. Mrs Sutter was a tall, thin, intelligent Swiss, plainly dressed, and having a shawl thrown over her shoulders. Her English wa scarcely intelligible, but she easily understood me, and her deafness was not at all troublesome.

Handing her my card, I asked to see General Sutter. “I know he is ill,” said I, “but I must see him.” Taking the card, she showed me into a back parlor and then withdrew. From Mrs Sutter's manner, no less than from what had been told me at the hotel, I was extremely fearful that I had come too late, and that all of history that house contained was in the fevered brain of a dying man.

But presently, to my great astonishment and delight, the door opened, and the general himself entered at a brisk pace. He appeared neither very old nor very feeble. The chance for a history of Sutter Fort was improving. He was rather below medium height, and stout. His step was still firm, his bearing soldierly, and in his younger days he must have been a man of much endurance, with a remarkably fine physique. His features were of the German cast, broad, full face, fairly intellectual forehead, with white hair, bald on the top of the head, white side whiskers, mustache, and imperial; a deep, clear, earnest eye met yours truthfully. Seventy-five years, apparently, sat upon him not heavily. He was suffering severely 471 464 from rheumatism, and he used a cane to assist him in walking about the house. He complained of failing memory, but I saw no indication of it in the five days dictating which followed.

No one could be in General Sutter's presence long without feeling satisfied that if not of the shrewdest he was an inborn gentleman. He had more the manners of a courtier than those of a backwoodsman, with this difference: his speech and bearing were the promptings of a kind heart, unaffected and sincere. He received me courteously, and listened with deep attention to my plan for a history of the Pacific States as I laid it before him, perceiving at once the difference between my work and that of local historians and newspaper reporters, by whom all the latter part of his life he had been besieged.

“I have been robbed and ruined,” he exclaimed, “by lawyers and politicians. When gold was discovered I had my fortress, my mills, my farms, leagues of land, thousands of cattle and horses, and a thousand tamed natives at my bidding. Where are they now? Stolen! My men were crushed by the iron heel of civilization; my cattle were driven off by hungry gold-seekers; my fort and mills were deserted and left to decay; my lands were squatted on by overland emigrants; and finally I was cheated out of all my property. all Sacramento was once mine.”

“General,” said I, “this appears to have been the common fate of those who owned vast estates at the coming of the Americans. It was partly owing to the business inexperience of the holders of land grants, though this surely cannot apply to yourself, and partly to the unprincipled tricksters who came hither to practise in courts of law. The past is past. One thing yet remains for you to do, which is to see your wonderful experiences properly placed on record for the benefit of posterity. You fill an important niche in the history of the western coast. Of certain events you are the embodiment—the living, walking 472 465 history of a certain time and locality. Often in my labors I have encountered your name, your deeds; and let me say that I have never yet heard the former mentioned but in kindness, nor the latter except in praise.”

Tears came to the old man's eyes, and his utterance was choked, as he signified his willingness to relate to me all he knew.

“You arrived,” said he, “at a most opportune moment; I am but just out of bed, and I feel I shall be down again in a few days, when it will be impossible for me to see or converse with any one.”

I said I had come to Litiz on this special business, and asked how much time he could devote to it each day.

“All the time,” he replied, “if you will conform to my hours. Come as early as you like in the morning, but we must rest at six o'clock. I retire early.”

Ten hours a day for the next five days resulted in two hundred pages of manuscript, which was subsequently bound and placed in the library. Forty pages a day kept me very busy, and at night I was tired enough. Meanwhile my devoted bride sat patiently by, sometimes sewing, always lending an attentive ear, with occasional questions addressed to the general.

Thence we proceeded to New Haven, and shortly afterward to San Francisco, stopping at Stockbridge, Buffalo, Granville, Chicago, and Omaha, at all of which places we had friends to visit, before settling finally to work again.

With kind and womanly philosophy Mrs Bancroft on reaching San Francisco did not look about her with that captious criticism so common among newly made Californian wives, to see if she did not dislike the country. There were some things about the city unique and interesting; others struck her strangely, and some disagreeably. But it seemed never to occur to her to be dissatisfied or homesick. When she 473 466 married a man—so the ghost of the idea must have danced round her heart and brain, for I am sure the thought never assumed tangible form—when she married a man, she married him, and there was the end of it, so far as shipping her happiness upon the accidents of his surroundings was concerned. Sweet subtilties! Happier would be the world if there were more of them.

The Palace hotel for a short time was as curious as a menagerie; then it became as distasteful as a prison. We had many pleasant little dinner parties the winter we were there, made up of widely different characters. First there were our nearest and dearest friends, those who had always been to me more than relatives. Then there were the intellectually social; and a third class were Spanish-speaking Californians and Mexicans, among whom were Pio Pico, General Vallejo, Governor Alvarado, Governor Pacheco, and the Mexican refugees, President Iglesias, and Señores Prieto and Palacio of his cabinet. Mrs Bancroft began the study of Spanish, and made rapid progress; Kate was already quite at home in that language.

It was no part of our plan immediately to domicile ourselves in any fixed residence. Change seemed necessary to my brain, strained as it was to its utmost tension perpetually. It was about the only rest it would take. What is commonly called pleasure was not pleasure so long as there was so much work piled up behind it. It must shift position occasionally, and feed upon new surroundings, or it became restless and unhealthy. Then we had before us much travelling. The vast territory whose history I was writing must be visited in its several parts, some of them many times. There was the great Northwest Coast to be seen, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia; there was Utah, New Mexico, and Arizona; likewise the sunny south, southern California, Mexico, and Central America. Besides, there was much 474 467 searching of archives in Europe yet to be done. So we must content ourselves for the present in making the world our home, any part of it in which night happened to overtake us. Nevertheless, after a year in Oakland, and a winter spent by Mrs Bancroft at New Haven, I purchased a residence on Van Ness avenue, where for many long and busy years echoed the voices of little ones, watched over by a contented mother, whose happy heart was that heavenly sunshine which best pleaseth God. This was indeed Home.

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CHAPTER XX.

SAN FRANCISCO ARCHIVES. There are some who think that the brooding patience which a great work calls for belonged exclusively to an earlier period than ours.

Lowell.

DURING the first ten years of these Ingatherings and Industries a dark cloud of discouragement hung over my efforts, in the form of four or five hundred volumes, with from seven hundred to nineteen hundred pages each, of original documents, lodged in the office of the United States surveyor-general in San Francisco. Though containing much on mission affairs, they constituted the regular archives of the secular government from the earliest period of Californian history. They were nearly all in Spanish, many of them in very bad Spanish, poorly written, and difficult of deciphering.

On the secularization of the missions, that is to say the removal of national property from missionary control, in many instances the ruin and consequent breaking up of mission establishments in California, some few loose papers found their way to the college of San Fernando, in Mexico, which was the parent institution. The clergy still held the mission church buildings, and in some instances the out-houses and orchards; and the mission books, proper, remained naturally in their control. There were likewise left at some of the missions bundles of papers, notably at Santa Bárbara; but these, though of the greatest importance, were not very bulky in comparison to the secular archives.

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More to be considered by the historian were the records and documents of the several municipalities along the southern seaboard, which with the papers kept by retired officials, and those treasured by the old and prominent families, formed a very important element in the marshalled testimony. Thus matters stood when California was made a state of the great American confederation; and when counties were formed by act of legislature of 1850, the correspondence, papers, and records of local officials under Mexican rule, alcaldes, jueces de primera instancia, and others, were ordered deposited with the clerk of each county.

The United States government took possession in 1846-7 of all the territorial records that could be found—an immense mass, though by no means all that existed—and in 1851 the public archives in all parts of California were called in and placed in charge of the United States surveyor-general in San Francisco, and of them Mr R. C. Hopkins was made custodian. Such of the pueblo and presidial archives as were deemed of importance to the general government were held in San Francisco. Many, however, of great historic value were never removed from their original lodgments, and many others were returned to them, for of such material much was found by my searchers in various places at different times. As these archives finally stood they consisted of the official correspondence of the superior and other authorities, civil and financial, military and ecclesiastic, of Mexico and the Californias, from the formation of the first mission in 1769, and even a little further back, to the time California was admitted into the union; not complete, but full during parts of the time and meagre in other parts. As will be seen I was so fortunate as to obtain the missing records from other sources.

When E. M. Stanton came with power from Washington to attend to land and other affairs of the government, he ordered these archives bound. Although 477 470 some divisions of the papers were made, little attention was paid to chronological or other arrangement. Said Mr Savage to me after a preliminary examination: “The whole thing is a jumble; so far as their value to your work is concerned, or your being able to find, by searching, any particular incident of any particular period, the papers might as well be in haystack form.”

What was to be done? The thought of attacking this great dragon of these investigations had been for many years in my mind as a nightmare, and while doggedly pursuing more puny efforts I tried to shake it from me, and not think of it. There was much material aside from that, more than enough for my purpose, perhaps; besides, some one could go through the mass and take from it what I lacked in the usual form of historical notes.

But such reasoning would not do. The monster would not thus be frightened away. All the time, to be honest with myself, I well knew that I must have before me all existing material that could be obtained, and I well knew what ‘going through’ such a stack of papers signified. No; one of the chief differences between my way and that of others in gathering and arranging facts for history, one of the chief differences between the old method and the new, was, in so far as possible, to have all my material together, within instant and constant reach, so that I could place before me on my table the information lodged in the British Museum beside that contained in the archives of Mexico, and compare both with what Spain and California could yield, and not be obliged in the midst of my investigations to go from one library to another note-taking.

And under this method, so far as my daily and hourly necessities were concerned, this immense mass of information might almost as well be in Nova Scotia as on Pine street. To be of use to me it must be in my library. This was the basis on which my 478 471 work was laid out, and only by adhering to this plan could it be accomplished.

But how get it there? The government would not lend it me, though our benign uncle has committed more foolish acts. There was but one way, the way pursued in smaller operations—copy it. But what did that mean, to ‘copy it’? The day in government offices is short; a copyist might return from twenty to forty folios per diem; this, averaged, would amount to perhaps three volumes a year, which would be a hundred years' work for one person; and this merely to transfer the material to my library, where another century of work would be required before it attained the proper form as condensed and classified material for history.

Well, then, if the task would occupy one person so long, put on it ten or twenty—this is the way my demon talked to me. But the surveyor's office would not accommodate so many. Not to dwell upon the subject, however, the matter was thus accomplished: A room was rented near the surveyor-general's office, to which Mr H. G. Rollins, then in charge, had kindly granted permission to have the bound volumes taken as required by the copyists. Tables and chairs were then purchased, and the needed writing-materials sent round. Then by a system of condensation and epitomizing, now so thoroughly understood that no time or labor need be lost, under the efficient direction of Mr Savage fifteen Spaniards were able in one year to transfer from these archives to the library all that was necessary for my purpose. This transfer was not made in the form of notes; the work was an abridgment of the archives, which would be of immense public value in case of loss by fire of the original documents. The title of every paper was given; the more important documents were copied in full, while the others were given in substance only. The work was begun the 15th of May 1876. The expense was about eighteen thousand dollars; and when in the 479 472 form of bound volumes these archives stood on the shelves of the library, we were just ready to begin extracting historical notes from them in the usual way.

This transcribing of the archives in the United States surveyor-general's office was the greatest single effort of the kind ever made by me. But there were many lesser labors in the same direction, both before and afterward; prominent among these was the epitomizing of the archiepiscopal archives.

Learning from Doctor Taylor of Santa Bárbara that he had presented the most reverend Joseph S. Alemany, archbishop of San Francisco, for the catholic church, with a quantity of valuable papers, I applied to the archbishop for permission to copy them. He did not feel at liberty to let the volumes out of his possession. “I shall be most happy, however,” he writes me, “to afford every facility to any gentleman you may choose to send to my humble house to copy from any volume any pieces which may suit your work, taking it for granted that in your kindness you will let me see before publication what is written on religious matters, lest unintentionally something might be stated inaccurately, which no doubt you would rectify.” It is needless to say that neither to the archbishop, nor to any person, living or dead, did I ever grant permission to revise or change my writings. It was my great consolation and chief support throughout my long and arduous career, that I was absolutely free, that I belonged to no sect or party to which I must render account for any expression, or to whose traditions my opinions must bow. Sooner than so hamper myself, I would have consigned my library and my labors to perdition.

It appeared to me a kind of compact, this insinuation of the archbishop, that if he granted me permission to copy documents which were the property of the church, they should not be used in evidence 480 473 against the church. Now with the church I have not at any time had controversy. Theology was not my theme. I never could treat of theology as it is done ordinarily in pulpits, walled about by dogmas, and be compelled to utter other men's beliefs whether they were my own or not. I should have no pleasure in speaking or writing thus; nor is there any power on earth which would compel me to it.

With the doctrines of the church, catholic or protestant, I had nothing to do. With the doctrines of political parties as such, I had nothing to do. It was in men, rather than in abstract opinion, that I dealt. Because a man was priest or partisan, he was not necessarily from that fact good or bad. In so far as the missionaries did well, no churchman was more ready to praise; wherein they did evil, my mouth should speak it, myself being judge. But all this did not lessen my obligation to the good archbiship, who was ever most kind and liberal toward me, and whose kindness and liberality I trust I have not abused.

The documents in question formed five books, bound into several more volumes. They consisted mostly of correspondence by the missionaries of upper and lower California among themselves, or with the authorities, both civil and military, in Mexico or the Californias, or from their college of San Fernando; and also of statistical data on the missions, a large portion of the letters and statistics being of great historical importance.

Mr Savage with three copyists performed this labor in about a month.

Whilst the work of abstracting was going on, the men received occasional visits from attachés of the ecclesiastical offices in the mansion, which at first gave rise to a suspicion in the mind of Mr Savage that he was watched. But nothing occurred to make his stay disagreeable. Some inconvenience was felt by the copyists from the prohibition by Mr Savage 481 474 against smoking in the premises. There had been no objection raised in the house against the practice; but he deemed such abstention a mark of respect to the archbishop even though he was absent a fort-night. On the archbishop's return he occasionally entered the room for some document from his desk, and ever had a kind word for those who occupied it. The result of this work, which was concluded early in May 1876, just before beginning on the United States surveyor-general's archives, may be seen in the Bancroft Library, in three books, entitled Archivo del Arzobispado—Cartas de los Misioneros de California, i. ii. iii.1 iii.2 iv.1 iv.2 v.

Writing of California material for history in the public journals of August 1877, Mr Oak observes: “First in importance among the sources of information are the public archives, preserved in the different offices, of nation, state, county, and city, at San Francisco, Sacramento, San José, Salinas, Los Angeles, San Diego, and to a slight extent in other towns. These constitute something over 500 bulky tomes, besides loose papers, in the aggregate not less than 300,000 documents. Of the nature of these manuscripts it is impossible within present limits to say more than that they are the original orders, correspondence, and act-records of the authorities—secular and ecclesiastical, national, provincial, departmental, territorial, and municipal—during the successive rule, imperial and republican, of Spain, Mexico, and the United States, from 1768 to 1850. After the latter date there is little in the archives of historic value which has not found its way into print. A small part of these papers are arranged by systems which vary from tolerable to very bad; the greater part being thrown together with a sublime disregard to both subject and chronology. Of their value there is no need to speak, since it is apparent that Californian history cannot be written without their aid. They are, however, practically inaccessible to writers. In 482 475 land-commission times the lawyers sought diligently for information of a certain class, and left many guiding references, which the student may find, if patient and long-lived, in countless legal briefs and judicial decisions. The keepers of the archives, besides aiding the legal fraternity, have from time to time unearthed for the benefit of the public certain documentary curiosities; yet the archives as a whole remain an unexplored and, by ordinary methods, unexplorable waste. Mr Bancroft has not attempted, by needle-in-the-hay-mow methods, to search the archives for data on particular points; but by employing a large auxiliary force he has substantially transferred their contents to the library. Every single paper of all the 300,000, whatever its nature or value, has been read—deciphered would in many cases be a better term; important papers have been copied; less important documents have been stripped of their Spanish verbiage, the substance being retained, while routine communications of no apparent value have been dismissed with a mere mention of their nature and date.

“Hardly less important, though much less bulky than the secular records above referred to, are the records of the friars in the mission archives. At most of these establishments—wrecks of former Franciscan prosperity—there remain in care of the parish priests only the quaint old leather-bound records of births, marriages, deaths, etc. At some of the exmissions even these records have disappeared, having been destroyed or passed into private hands. It was common opinion that the papers of the missionary padres had been destroyed, or sent to Mexico and Spain. Another theory was that of men who mysteriously hinted at immense deposits of documentos at the old missions, jealously guarded from secular eyes and hands.

“Both views are absurdly exaggerated. The mission archives were never very bulky, and are still comparatively complete. The largest collections are 483 476 in the possession of the Franciscan order, and of the archbishop of California. Other small collections exist at different places, and not a few papers have passed into private keeping. The archives of Spain and Mexico must be ransacked, but the documents thus brought to light can neither be so many nor so important as has popularly been imagined.

“Not all the records of early California, by any means, are to be found in the public offices. Even official documents were widely scattered during the American conquest or before; the new officials collected and preserved all they could gain possession of, but many were left in private hands, and have remained there. The private correspondence of prominent men on public events is, moreover, quite as valuable a source of information as their official communications. Mr Bancroft has made an earnest effort to gather, preserve, and utilize these private and family archives. There were many obstacles to be overcome; Californians, not always without reason, were distrustful of Gringo schemes; old papeles that had so long furnished material for cigaritos, suddenly acquired a great pecuniary value; interested persons, in some cases by misrepresentation, induced well disposed natives to act against their inclinations and interests. Yet efforts in this direction have not been wasted, since they have already produced about seventy-five volumes, containing at least twenty thousand documents, a very large proportion of which are important and unique.

“I have not included in the preceding class some fifty volumes of old military and commercial records, which are by no means devoid of interest and value, though of such a nature that it would be hardly fair to add them by the page, without explanation, to the above mentioned documents. It must not be understood that these contributed collections of original papers are exclusively Spanish; on the contrary, many of the volumes relate to the conquest, or to the period 484 477 immediately preceding or following, and bear the names of pioneers in whose veins flows no drop of Latin blood—for instance, the official and private correspondence of Thomas O. Larkin, in twelve thick volumes.

“California is a new country; her annals date back but little more than a century; most of her sister states are still younger; therefore personal reminiscences of men and women yet living form an element by no means to be disregarded by the historian. While I am writing there are to be found—though year by year death is reducing their number—men of good intelligence and memory who have seen California pass from Spain to Mexico, and from Mexico to the United States. Many of this class will leave manuscript histories which will be found only in the Bancroft Library.

“The personal memoirs of pioneers not native to the soil are not regarded as in any respect less desirable than those of hijos del pais, although their acts and the events of their time are much more fully recorded in print. Hundreds of pioneer sketches are to be found in book and pamphlet, and especially in the newspaper; yet great efforts are made to obtain original statements. Some hold back because it is difficult to convince them that the history of California is being written on a scale which will make their personal knowledge and experience available and valuable. Others exhibit an indolence and indifference in the matter impossible to overcome.”

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CHAPTER XXI.

HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. Every man must work according to his own method.

Agassiz.

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA was rightly regarded as the depository of the richest historic material north of Mexico. And the reason was obvious: In settlement and civilization that region had the start of Oregon by a half century and more; there were old men there, and family and public archives. The chief historic adventure in that quarter was when, with Mr Oak and my daughter Kate, early in 1874 I took the steamer for San Diego and returned to San Francisco by land.

Indeed, as I became older in the work I felt more and more satisfied that it required of me, both in person and by proxy, much travel. True, mine was neither a small field, nor a narrow epoch highly elaborated, upon the many several scenes of which, like Froude at Simancas, Freeman on his battle-fields, or Macaulay in Devonshire, Londonderry, or Scotland, I might spend months or seasons studying the ground and elucidating the finer points of prospect and position; yet where so much was to be described much observation was necessary.

It was during this journey south that Benjamin Hayes, formerly district judge at Los Angeles, later a resident of San Diego, and for twenty-five years an enthusiastic collector and preserver of historic data, not only placed me in possession of all his collection, but 486 479 gave me his heart with it, and continued to interest himself in my work as if it were his own, and to add to his collection while in my possession as if it was still in his. This was fortunate, for I saw much work to be done at Los Angeles, Santa Bárbara, and elsewhere, and I hardly knew how to perform it.

Of course to me it seemed as if Judge Hayes during his life performed for his country, for the world, for posterity, a work beside which sitting upon a judicial bench and deciding cases was no more than catching flies. For the first quarter-century of this country's history under American rule, beginning with a journal kept while crossing the continent in 1849, he had been a diligent collector of documents touching the history of southern California; and his collection of manuscripts, and especially of scraps from books and early newspapers, systematically arranged, and accompanied frequently by manuscript notes of his own making, was very extensive. It embraced among the manuscript portion a copy of the mission book of San Diego; a copy of an autograph manuscript of Father Junípero Serra, giving a history of the missions up to 1775; a similar manuscript history by Father Lasuen of the mission up to 1784; copies of all the more important documents of the pueblo archives from 1829; a complete index made by himself in 1856 of all the early archives; manuscript accounts of Judge Hayes' own travels in various parts of the southern country; reports of evidence in important law cases, illustrating history, and many other like papers. There were some fifty or sixty scrap-books, besides bundles of assorted and unassorted scraps, all stowed in trunks, cupboards, and standing on book-shelves. The collection was formed with a view of writing a history of southern California, but by this time the purpose on the part of Judge Hayes was well nigh impracticable by reason of age and ill-health.

The pueblo archives which have been preserved do not extend back further than 1829. They consist 487 480 of more or less complete records of the proceedings of military comandantes, alcaldes, ayuntamientos, prefectos, and jueces de paz, together with correspondence between the several town officials, between the officials of this and other towns, and correspondence with the home government of Spain or Mexico, being the originals of letters received and copies of those sent. They include some flaming proclamations by Californian governors, and interesting correspondence relative to the times when American encroachments had begun. Documents referring to the mission are few and brief, and consist of correspondence between the secular and ecclesiastical authorities respecting the capture of escaped native converts. There are yet preserved, however, documents relating to the missions while in the hands of administrators subsequent to their secularization. There are several interesting reports of civil and criminal trials, illustrating the system of jurisprudence during the early times.

These papers were preserved in the county archives, in the clerk's office, in bundles, as classified by Judge Hayes. Copies of all these documents in any wise important for historical purposes formed part of Judge Hayes' collection.

Every mission, besides its books of accounts, its papers filed in packages, and any historical or statistical records which the priests might choose to write, kept what were called the mission books, consisting of records of conversions, marriages, baptisms, confirmations, and burials. By a revolt of the natives in 1775 San Diego mission, with all its records, was destroyed. In opening new mission books, with his own hands Father Junípero Serra wrote on the first pages of one of them an historical sketch of the mission from 1769, the date of its establishment, to 1775, the date of its destruction. He also restored, so far as possible from memory, the list of marriages and deaths. The mission book thus prefaced by the president is preserved by the curate at San Diego.

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The question now was how to transfer this rich mass of historical material to my library, where, notwithstanding the affection with which he who had labored over the work so long must regard it, I could easily persuade myself was the proper place for it. Calling at the house, we fortunately found Judge Hayes at home, and were warmly welcomed. I had often met him in San Francisco, and he was familiar with my literary doings. This call we made a short one, arranging for a longer meeting in the afternoon.

Back from our luncheon, we were again heartily welcomed, and taking our note-books we were soon vigorously at work endeavoring to transfix some small portion of the vast fund of information that fell glibly from the lips of the ancient. Fortunately for us, old men love to talk about themselves; so that while we were noting valuable facts he kindly filled the interludes with irrelevant matter, thus keeping us pretty well together.

In this way we gathered some important incidents relative to early establishments and their records, but soon became dissatisfied with the slowness of the method, for at that rate we could easily spend months there, and years upon our journey back to San Francisco. Finally I approached the subject nearest my heart.

“Judge,” said I, “your collection should be in my library. There it would be of some value, of very great value; but isolated, even should you write your proposed history, the results, I fear, would be unsatisfactory to you. I should not know where to begin or to end such a work.”

“I am satisfied I shall never write a history,” he replied somewhat sadly. “The time has slipped away, and I am now too feeble for steady laborious application; besides, I have to furnish bread for certain mouths,” pointing to a bright black-eyed little girl who kept up an incessant clatter with her companions at the door.

489 482

“Not only should I have the results of your labor up to this time,” I now remarked, “but your active aid and coöperation for the future. It is just such knowledge as yours that I am attempting to save and utilize. Second my efforts, and let me be your historian and biographer.”

“I know that my material should be added to yours,” he replied. “It is the only proper place for it—the only place I should be content to see it out of my own possession. I would gladly give it you, did not I need money so badly. It is not pleasing to me to make merchandise of such labors.”

“I do not ask you to give me your collection,” I returned; “I will gladly pay you for it, and still hold myself your debtor to the same extent as if you gave it. I appreciate your feelings fully, and will endeavor to do in every respect now and in the future as I should wish you to do were our positions changed.”

“It may seem a trifle to give up my accumulations for money, but it is not. It is the delivering, stillborn, of my last and largest hope. Yet it will be some satisfaction to feel that they are in good hands, where their value will be reckoned in other measurement than that of dollars. I cannot die and leave them to be scattered here. You may have them; and with them take all that I can do for your laborious undertaking as long as I live.”

And he was as good as his word. We did not stop long to consider the price I should pay him; and immediately the bargain was consummated we went to work, and took a careful account of every volume, and every package of documents, noting their contents. Those that were complete we packed in boxes and shipped to San Francisco; such as Judge Hayes had intended to make additions to were left with him. The volumes to be completed and sent in due time made their appearance. “Judge Hayes' books, sent up yesterday,” writes Mr Oak the 15th of May 1875, “are in some respects more valuable than anything 490 483 he has done before. One volume contains about two hundred photographs of places and men in southern California.” All unfinished work was well and thoroughly completed, he doing more in every instance than he had promised to do; and when in 1877 he died, he was still engaged in making historical abstracts for me from the county records of Los Angeles. When there shall appear upon Californian soil a race capable of appreciating such devotion, then will the name of Benjamin Hayes be honored.

It was the 23d of February that this important purchase was consummated. San Diego possessed few further attractions for me in the line of literary acquisitions; that is to say, this collection, with so important a man as Judge Hayes enlisted in my behalf, was a sweeping accomplishment, which would amply reward me for the time and money expended in the entire excursion should nothing more come of it. For this collection was by far the most important in the state outside of my own; and this, added to mine, would forever place my library, so far as competition in original California material was concerned, beyond the possibilities. The books, packages, list of copies of the county archives, and manuscripts, as we packed them for shipment, numbered three hundred and seventy-seven; though from number little idea can be formed of value, as, for example, a volume labelled Private Hours, consisting chiefly of manuscripts containing Judge Hayes' notes of travel over the state at different times, written by one thoroughly familiar with public and private affairs, by one who saw far into things, and who at the time himself contemplated history-writing, might be worth a hundred other volumes.

Of all the mission archives none were of more importance than those of San Diego, this being the initial point of early Alta California observation. Besides historical proclivities, Judge Hayes loved science. He had taken meteorological observations 491 484 since 1850, and took an interest in the botany of the country. In all these things he not only collected and arranged, but he digested and wrote.

Several days were occupied in this negotiation, in studying the contents and character of the purchase, and in sending over boxes from New Town, and packing and shipping them. It was a hard day's work, beginning at seven o'clock, and during which we did not stop to eat, to catalogue and pack the collection. Taking up one after another of his companion-creations, fondly the little old man handled them; affectionately he told their history. Every paper, every page, was to him a hundred memories of a hundred breathing realities. These were not to him dead facts; they were, indeed, his life.

When we began we thought to finish in a few hours, but the obsequies of this collection were not to be so hurriedly performed; surely a volume which had cost a year's labor was worthy a priestly or paternal benediction on taking its final departure.

During these days at San Diego I visited and examined everything of possible historic interest. I wandered about the hills overlooking the numerous town sites, crossed to False bay, entered the cemetery, and copied the inscriptions on the stones that marked the resting-place of the more honored dead. In company with Mr Oak I called at the county clerk's office to see what documents were there. No one seemed to know anything about them. Such as were there were scattered loosely in boxes and drawers, some at New Town, and some at Old Town. When we learned in what sad confusion they were, we were all the more thankful we had copies of them. Judge Hayes began copying these archives in 1856.

At night we entered in our journals, of which Mr Oak, Kate, and myself each kept one, the events of the day. Oak and I each wrote about one hundred and fifty pages during the trip, and Kate forty pages. 492 485 On our return to San Francisco these journals were deposited in the library.

Early Wednesday morning we walked over to Old Town to visit Father Ubach, the parish priest, with whom we had an appointment. I was shown the mission books, consisting of the Book of Baptisms, in four volumes, the first volume having three hundred and ninety-six folios and extending down to 1822. The other three volumes were not paged; they continued the record to date. The Book of Marriages was in one volume and complete to date. Three volumes comprised the Book of Deaths, and one volume the Book of Confirmations. Aside from the sketch by Junípero Serra, a copy of which was in the Hayes collection, the volumes were of no historic value, being merely lists of names with dates.

Each year the bishop of the diocese had visited the missions and certified to the correctness of the records; consequently the bishop's signature occurred in all the books at regular intervals, and from which entries many bishops might be named. It is worthy of remark that in the mission books California is always divided into Superior and Inferior, instead of Baja and Alta as by later Spaniards. Father Ubach informed us of a manuscript Indian vocabulary preserved at the mission of San Juan Bautista; also a manuscript of his own on the natives of his parish, of which there were then twelve hundred. This latter manuscript was in the Hayes collection, and hence a part of my purchase. Father Ubach kindly gave us letters to the padres at San Juan Capistrano and San Juan Bautista.

Departing from San Diego, we called at the missions and saw all the early residents possible, notably Cave J. Coutts and John Foster, at their respective ranchos near San Luis Rey, from whom we received encouragement and valuable information.

When the Reverend Thomas Frognall Dibdin was at Havre on his bibliographical tour, he was told by 493 486 the booksellers among whose shops he hunted that he should have been there when the allies first possessed themselves of Paris if he wished to find rarities. Had he been there at the time named, another date still further back would have been mentioned; and so on until he had been sent back to the beginning.

“Who shall restore us the years of the past?” cried Horace, and Virgil, and Livy; cried the first of men, and that before there was scarcely any past at all. The Reverend Thomas Frognall Dibdin was not there, and all the booksellers of France could not restore the occasion, could not arrest the present or call up the past. And I am of opinion that to the collector of rarities there would have been little difference whether he had lived or had been in any particular place fifty or five hundred years ago. These Havre booksellers seemed to have forgotten that at the time what now are rarities were easily obtained; they were not rarities; that all which is rare with us was once common, and that whatever is preserved of that which to us is common will some day be rare and expensive.

Thus it was with me at Los Angeles. Had I been there at the coming of the Americans I might have obtained documents by the bale, so I was told, and have freighted a vessel with them. Had I even been there ten years ago I might have secured no inconsiderable quantity; but during this time many heads of old families had died, and their papers, with the long accumulations of rubbish, had been burned.

Most of this was fiction, or ignorant exaggeration. At the time of the secularization there had accumulated at the several missions the materials from which might have been sifted not only their complete history, but thousands of interesting incidents illustrative of that peculiar phase of society. These once scattered and destroyed, there never was any considerable quantity elsewhere. Old Californian families were not as a rule sufficiently intelligent to write or receive 494 487 many important historical documents, or to discriminate and preserve writings valuable as historical evidence.

Undoubtedly at the death of a paterfamilias, in some instances, the survivors used the papers he had preserved in the kindling of fires, in the wrapping of articles sent away, or in the making of cigarettes; but that during the century of Spanish occupation in California much historical material had accumulated anywhere except in government offices and at the missions I do not believe. And furthermore, wherever it had so happened that a few family papers had been preserved, upon any manifestation of interest in or effort to obtain possession of them, their quantity and importance were greatly magnified. In such cases three documents filled a trunk, and a package a foot square was enlarged by rumor to the size of a bedroom.

Charming Los Angeles! California's celestial city! She of the angels! and, indeed, that very day we found one, a dark-eyed, bediamonded angel, in the shape of a sweet señora with a million of dollars and a manuscript. Chubby as a cherub she was, and graceful for one so short; and though her eyes were as bright as her diamonds when first they encountered yours, lingeringly they rested there until they faded somewhat in dreamy languor. She was a poem of pastoral California, and her life was a song of nature, breathing of aromatic orange groves, of vine-clad hills, and olive orchards, all under soft skies and amid ocean-tempered airs. There was no indication in the warm unwrinkled features of a mind strained by overstudy, such as is frequently seen in a Boston beauty. As it was, suitors were thick enough; there were plenty of men who would take her for a million of dollars, to say nothing of the manuscript.

Aside from lack of intellect, for angels are not specially intellectual, in all candor I must confess that, apart from of her beautiful robes, for she was elegantly dressed, her diamonds, her million of 495 488 dollars, and her manuscript, somewhat of the angelic charm would have been lost, for she was close upon forty, and a widow. He who had been Abel Stearns had called her wife, and Juan Bandini, daughter.

Not far from the Pico house, in a long low adobe whose front door opened from a back piazza, dwelt this lady, to whom Colonel Coutts had given me a letter, with her mother Mrs Bandini. Immediately after dinner we inquired our way to the house, and presenting ourselves asked for Mrs Stearns. She was not in: that is to say, the seraph was sleeping for a pair of bright evening eyes. To the relict of Juan Bandini we did not deign to make known our errand. At seven our eyes should feast upon her of the million and manuscript.

At seven; we were punctual. Radiant as Venus she sat between her mother and a withered lover. The ladies were both of them far too elegant to speak English. We presented our letter, which was to make our path to the papers easy. Ah! the manuscript of her father? It was her mother, Mrs Bandini, to whom we should speak: all the documents of Don Juan belonged to her.

This was a sad mistake; and wonderfully quick with the intelligence shifted the seraphic halo from the sparkling daughter-widow to the now exceedingly interesting and attractive mother-widow. It was a great waste, all the precious ointment of our eloquence poured upon the younger woman, while we were almost ignoring the presence of the elder, until she was made fascinating as the owner of an unpublished history of California.

Yes, there was a trunkful of papers left by the late lamented which had never been disturbed, so sighed the Señora Bandini. People said among them wa a partially written history; but further than this she knew nothing of the contents of the trunk. The letter of Colonel Coutts to Mrs Stearns, the reader must know, strongly urged the placing of these 496 489 documents in my hands, as the most proper place for them.

Mrs Bandini asked if I needed them soon. Yes; I always needed such things immediately. She could not possibly touch the trunk until the return of her son-in-law, Charles R. Johnson, who was then at San Diego. He would not return for a fortnight, and I could not wait. The old lady would not move without him, and there I was obliged to leave it.

It was necessary I should have that material. Bandini was a prominent and important citizen of southern California, one of the few who united ability and patriotism sufficient to write history. I saw by this time that I should have more material on northern than on southern California; that is to say, my nothern authorities would preponderate. I should have at my command, as things were then going, more narratives and individual histories written from a northern than from a southern standpoint. And this was worthy of serious consideration. For a long time the north and the south were in a state of semiantagonism, and their respective statements would read very differently. It was only by having several accounts, written by persons belonging to either side, that anything like the truth could be ascertained.

Obviously it would be very much as the son-in-law should say. I was not acquainted with Johnson personally, but by inquiry I ascertained the names of those who had influence with him, and these next day I did not fail to see. There was then in Los Angeles Alfred Robinson, a resident of San Francisco, and an author. He was intimate at the Stearns-Bandini mansion, and might assist me. I spoke with him upon the subject. I likewise saw Judge Sepúlveda, Governor Downey, Major Truman, and others, who cordially promised their influence in my behalf. Thus for the present I was obliged to leave it. On my return to San Francisco I continued my efforts. I was determined never to let the matter die. I appealed 497 490 again to Colonel Coutts, and to several Californians of influence in various parts of the state. The result was that about six months after my first attempt I succeeded in placing the valuable documents of General Bandini, together with his manuscript history of California, upon the shelves of my library, there to remain. At the suggestion of Mr Robinson, who brought the papers up from Los Angeles, I sent Mrs Bandini a check; but to her credit be it said she returned it to me, saying that she did not want money for the material.

Andrés Pico was our next essay; this was another of the angels, but of a different sort. There were several of these brothers Pico, all, for native Californians, remarkably knowing. Whether they caught their shrewdness from the Yankees I know not; but during this visit experience told me certain things of Don Andrés which I was scarcely prepared to learn, things which laid open in him the bad qualities of all nationalities, but displayed the good ones of none.

Shakespeare's conception of human nature was probably correct, probably the purest inspiration of any on record. With him there was no such thing as absolute and complete wickedness in man. As Coleridge says of him, “All his villains were bad upon good principles; even Caliban had something good in him.”

What Shakespeare would have done with Don Andrés I greatly wonder. We of this latter-day enlightenment cannot afford to be less charitable than Shakespeare; therefore we must conclude that Don Andrés was bad upon good principles. But whether upon good or bad principles, or whether it was a daily custom with him, we know that on this occasion he practised on us peculiarly.

That it was neatly done I cannot deny: for an ancient Californian very neatly; probably better than one Yankee in ten thousand could have accomplished 498 491 it, better than hollow-hearted French politeness, German stolidity, or Chinese legerdemain could have achieved it. And this was the manner of it: His home was the mission of San Fernando, some twenty miles north-west of Los Angeles; but luckily, as we thought, we found him in Los Angeles. Seeking him out, I presented Colonel Coutts' letter. He received it with most complacent reverence; and as he read it I noted his appearance. His age I should say was sixty-five, or perhaps more; he was well built, though slightly bent, and over the loose russet skin of his face the frost of age was whitening the coarse black hair. His head was large and shaped for intellectual strength; his eyes were as sly and crafty in appearance as those of a Turkish porter, and about his mouth played a smile no less insidious.

The letter read, it was devoutly folded and buttoned in the pocket nearest the spot where should have been the heart. All that was Don Andrés'—his property, his life, his soul—was his friend's and his friend's friends'. All Los Angeles was ours to command. Would we to San Fernando? he would accompany us on the instant; and once there the secrets of the century should be spread out before us!

Well, thought I, this surely is easy sailing. Hayes and Bandini were tempestuous seas beside this placid Pico ocean. When I hinted that such generosity was beyond the limit of ordinary patriotism, and that the modest merits of our cause hardly reconciled me to the taxing of his time and patience so heavily, he proudly straightened his large and well developed form, and striking his breast upon the letter there deposited exclaimed, “Talk not to me of trouble; this makes service sacred!”

Again thought I, how noble! One must come south to see the Latin race of California in its true light. But for the high and universal import of my cause I should have hesitated before accepting so serious obligation from a stranger; and I almost 499 492 looked for a tear to drop from the apparently moistening eye upon the grizzled cheek, so full of feeling was this man. It was arranged that Don Andrés should call for us at an early day and assist us in searching the city for historic material, and that on the morning of our departure he would accompany us to San Fernando. After introducing me, at my request, to Señor Agustin Olvera, a learned ancient whom I desired to see, Don Andrés departed, bearing with him the deepest thanks of a heart overflowing with gratitude, and expressed in terms bordering on Spanish extravagance.

At this time I will admit I was too innocent and unsophisticated to cope with the sweet subtleties of Spanish politeness. Dealing only in hard facts, with only honest intent, I was not at all suspicious of persons or protestations, and hence fell an easy victim. Had I met Don Andrés after my two visits to Mexico, instead of before, he would not have misled me. As it was, we had to thank him for a night of happy hopes, even if they were all destined to be dissipated in the morning. I never saw Don Andrés again. Though I sought him diligently the day before our departure from Los Angeles, and learned at his lodgings that he had not left the city, and though I deposited there a letter saying that I should hope to see him on the stage, or at San Fernando the following day, he was nowhere to be found. Cunning Don Andrés! It was the best bit of California comedy we encountered on our travels.

Pio Pico, ci-devant governor of California and a resident of Los Angeles, was not in the city at the time. Subsequently I obtained from him a history of such affairs as came within his knowledge, of which I shall speak again hereafter. Olvera professed to have some documents; professed to be writing a history of California; had long and earnestly sought to obtain possession of Bandini's papers, and laughed at our efforts in a direction where he had so often 500 493 failed. During the short conversation we had with Andrés Pico, he informed us, as Father Ubach had said, that he was the commissioner appointed in early days to take charge of the mission records, and consequently at one time had many of them in his possession, including those of San Luis Rey; but most of them had been scattered and stolen, and now he had only those at San Fernando, which were a small portion of those once in his possession.

The archives in the county clerk's office we found, as reported by Judge Hayes, bound in twelve large volumes, without system or index; nevertheless there was much in them of historic value, and the only thing to be done was to have an abstract made of them for the library. One Stephen C. Foster was recommended to me by several gentlemen as the person most competent in Los Angeles to make the required copies. He was one of the earliest settlers in those parts, and besides being well versed in Spanish, and familiar with these documents, he could supplement many unexplained matters from his own experience.

I found Foster after some search, for he was not a man of very regular habits, and had no difficulty in engaging him to do this work. I agreed to pay him a liberal price, twenty cents a folio I think it was, and he promised to begin the work immediately, and send it to San Francisco and draw his pay as it progressed; but he failed wholly to perform the work, and after spurring him up for more than a year, receiving a fresh promise with every effort, I finally abandoned all hope of inducing him even to attempt the task.

In Los Angeles at this time were many old friends and newly-made genial acquaintances, who rendered me every attention. Tuesday, the 3d of March, accompanied by a pleasant party, I was driven out to San Gabriel mission, some seven miles east of Los Angeles. Awaking the resident priests, Philip Farrel 501 494 and Joaquin Bot by name, we obtained a sight of the mission books. Originally bound in flexible cow-leather, one cover with a flap like a pocket-book and the other without, they were now in a torn condition. I copied the title-page of the Libro de Confirmaciones, in two volumes, 1771-1874, which was signed, as most of the mission books were, Fr Junípero Serra, Preside. In this book were several notes, embodying the church regulations of the sacrament of confirmation, the notes being usually in Spanish, with church rules in Latin. The other books preserved at San Gabriel mission were Matrimonios, two volumes, 1774-1855, and 1858-74, the first entry being April 19, 1774, and signed by Junípero Serra. There is but one entry in this book signed by the president. The Entierros and Bautismos were also there, the latter in five volumes, the first entry being the 17th of March 1796, and signed Miguel Sanches.

A Mr Twitchell, an old resident, told me some things and promised to write more, but failed, like most others, to keep his word. We were introduced to a Californian woman whose age was given us as one hundred and thirty-eight years, though I strongly suspect that at each of her latest birthdays five or six years were added to her age, for several informed me that five years ago she was not as old as now by thirty years; and furthermore, a granddaughter of sixty who was with her said that her grandmother was born the year the padres first came to California, which was in 1769, so that she could have been but one hundred and five years of age. But she was old enough; as old, and as leathery, discolored, and useless as the mission books themselves, and in her withered brain was scarcely more intelligence.

Returning to town by way of the celebrated Rose and Johnson places, we spent the remainder of the day in visits. An important man was J. J. Warner, who agreed to write. To make the promise more real, I purchased a blank-book, and writing on the first page 502 495 Reminiscences of J. J. Warner, I took it with a box of cigars to his office, and received his solemn assurances. By close attention to the matter, I managed to get the book half filled with original material within three years, which, considering the almost universal failure of my efforts of that character, I regarded as something wonderful. Judge Sepúlveda and R. M. Widney promised to write, and I am glad to say both these gentlemen were as good as their word; and further than this, to both of them I am under many other obligations for kind assistance in procuring historical material in the vicinity of Los Angeles. Colonel Howard, not the illustrious Volney E. of Vigilance Committee fame, manifested the kindest interest in our efforts, thought he might bring some influence to bear on Mrs Bandini, and introduced us at the bishops' residence, but unfortunately the bishops, Amat and Mora, were both absent. I do not know that they would have been of any assistance to us; on the contrary, they might have prevented my getting the Bandini papers. Assuredly the church was not disposed to gather mission or other documents for my library; whatever may have been its course formerly, or at various stages of its history, of that kind of substance to-day it keeps all and gets all it can.

The mission books of San Fernando preserved in the possession of the Pico family were found to be as follows: matrimonios, one volume, 1797-1847, first entry October 8, 1797, signed Francisco Dumet; Bautismos, one volume, 1798-1852, first entry April 28, 1798, signed Francisco Dumet; Libro de Patentes y de Ynventario perteneciente á la Mision de Sn Fernando Rey en la Nueva California año de 1806. In my hasty examination of this book it seemed to me to contain information of sufficient value to warrant my sending thither Mr Foster to copy it. In like manner another important work, said by Don Rómulo to be among his father's papers, but which 503 496 he could not at the moment lay his hands on, should be looked after. Its title he thought to be something as follows: La Fundacion de la Mision de San Fernando Rey, por el Padre Francisco Dumet. It was said to contain a full description of the state of the country at the time when the mission was first established. Foster failing, nothing was accomplished toward transferring this information to the library until the visit of Mr Savage to Los Angeles, nearly four years later. We were likewise shown a collection of Spanish printed books left by the missionaries. They were mostly theological works printed in Spain, none of them referring at all to the Pacific States, and none of them of the slightest value to any person for any purpose.

At San Buenaventura we encountered Bishop Amat and Father Comapala, the latter a good fellow enough, but with head lighter than heels. Just now he was in an exceeding flutter, overawed by gathered greatness, so much so as palpably to confuse his foggy brain. He would do anything, but the mission books contained nothing, absolutely nothing; he and his were at my disposal, but all was nothing. When pressed by us for a sight of this nothing, there was the same nervous response, until Oak wrote him down a knave or a fool. Nevertheless we tortured him until the books were produced, fat and jolly blackeyed Bishop Amat meanwhile smiling approvingly.

Comapala promised to write his experiences for me, having come to the country in 1850, but he did not. He said we should by all means see Ramon Valdés, an ancient of San Buenaventura. Likewise he gave me a letter to José de Arnaz, another old resident, and straightway we hastened to find these walking histories and to wring them out upon our pages. But before leaving, Bishop Amat had assured us that his library, which we had not been able to see at Los Angeles on account of his absence, contained nothing relating to our subject save Palou's life of Junípero 504 497 Serra. He had made some researches himself among the missions for historical matter, but without success. He expressed the opinion that most of the mission archives were sent to the college of San Fernando in Mexico, but says he has seen documents on the subject in the royal archives of Seville, in Spain. The bishop also kindly gave me a letter to the padre at San Antonio, the oldest of the California padres. The missions farther north, according to Bishop Amat, were in a miserable state, the building at Santa Inés having been used for the storage of hay, which had been several times fired by malicious persons. At San Cárlos mission the padre who had attempted to reside there was driven away several years previous by threats of shooting.

After taking excellent dictations from Valdés and Arnaz, we drove five miles up a cañon which makes through the hills at this point, and along which were the lands most cultivated by the padres, on account of the superior advantages of this locality for irrigation.

Mounting the stage at four o'clock P.M. the day after our arrival, we reached Santa Bárbara at half-past eight. The hotels were crowded, but the stage agent, unknown to me, had kindly engaged rooms for us, so that we were soon made quite comfortable. The next day being Sunday, we attended church, rested, and wrote up our journals. Early next morning we directed our course first to La Partera, the residence of Doctor Alexander S. Taylor, a literary and historical dabster of no small renown in these parts. For twenty years and more he had been talking and writing. He knew much; but credit was given him for knowing much more than he did know. His was a character bien prononcé. In several departments of letters he was a pioneer.

Turning into a narrow lane six miles north-west of the town, we approached a small tenement something between a hut and a cottage. It was cheaply built of boards, and consisted of one story with three or 505 498 four rooms. The doctor had married a Californian woman for her money, and had not obtained as much as he had expected; hence half a dozen dark-complexioned children, and a house not as comfortable as he could have enjoyed. Nevertheless he found in his wife a most excellent, hard-working, and virtuous woman; and her face was such as rests one to look at, so contentedly serene it was.

Entering, we encountered the mistress of the mansion, a tall, thin lady, apparently as happy amidst her many cares as if her husband was now and ever had been lapped in luxury. Inquiring for Doctor Taylor, we were shown into a back room, containing a stand, some boxes which served instead of chairs, and a bed on which lay stretched a man of about fifty-five years. He was of a sandy complexion, the hair heavily touched with gray, and his face and form were thin but not emaciated.

In a loud hearty voice, with no foreign pronunciation, but with the faintest possible Scotch accent, not at all unpleasant, he bade us enter. A carbuncle on the arm was the malady, and our presence was a diversion rather than an intrusion into a sick-room; so we seated ourselves on the boxes and entered freely into conversation. I stated briefly the purport of my visit to those parts, and expressed my inability to pass him by without calling, and my regrets at finding him ill.

“Oh! it is nothing,” he answered, cheerfully. “I shall be up in a few days.” He was indeed up again in due time; but within two or three years thereafter he was laid low forever. Then I was glad I had seen him. Alas! how rapidly are passing away those who alone can tell us of the past. Within six years after this journey it seemed to me that half the more important men I then met were dead.

Among the earlier literary labors of Doctor Taylor was a bibliography of the Pacific coast, consisting of some twelve hundred titles published in the 506 499 Sacramento Union. Subsequently this list was cut up and pasted in a scrap-book, with changes, additions, and interlineations. As a bibliography it was altogether useless, from the fact that the author was obliged to write his titles from catalogues, and newspaper and other mention, thus making of it a rambling talk about books with a conglomeration of names and partial titles. Then there were vagrant discussions about the Indians and the missions of California, together with snatches of history, biography, and general gossip, with innumerable repetitions and inaccuracies running through thirty or forty numbers of the Farmer newspaper, under the title of Indianology.

The doctor had a horrible fashion of affixing to an English word a Spanish or Latin ending, or giving a Spanish termination to a Latin stem. He delighted in ologies, ografas, and the like abortions, thinking by throwing them in freely to give his work the air of learning. An article on the natives of California, published in Bancroft's Hand-Book Almanac, 1864, he heads Précis India Californicus.

These were his chief works, and these I had in the library; yet so much greater than the man is oftentimes his fame, that from the many accounts I had of Doctor Taylor and his works, I had been led to picture him in my mind as sitting in the midst of literary affluence. I had been taught to regard him, though the happy possessor of many valuable books and manuscripts, as an irascible old man whom misfortune and disease had soured, and who valued his treasures exorbitantly, and guarded them with petulant watchfulness; so that if I should find him possessed of valuable material I could not hope to be able to purchase it.

I had also been told that he had several volumes ready for publication, but was unable to find a publisher. The conversation turning almost immediately on literary matters, I asked to see the result of his labors. Calling his wife, who was at work in the 507 500 adjoining room, he requested her to bring from under his bed a rough unpainted box, about two feet square, having a lid like a chest, and locked.

“There,” said the invalid, turning over in bed so that his eyes could rest upon his treasures, “in that box is twenty-five years of my life.”

Poor man! The box and all its contents were worth intrinsically nothing, and would not bring in open market the equivalent of a month's wages of a common laborer. Nevertheless it was true that a quarter-century of effort was there, a quarter-century of thought and enthusiasm, of love-labor, of hope and confident expectation, the results of a noble life. Yes, a noble life; for a man's life consists in what he attempts to do no less than in what he does.

The wife lifted the cover, and the sick man requested me to examine the contents. First I brought out a pamphlet on the voyages to California of Cabrillo an Ferrelo, of which there were several copies in my library. Then one after another books of scraps were produced: first The Animated Nature of California, in two volumes; next The Discoverers, Founders, and Pioneers of California, being printed scraps interspersed with manuscript biographical notices of about one page to each person; then Bibliografa Californica, the the first of which words belongs to no language, 1542-1872. This was the bibliography before mentioned. Then there was the Odds and Ends of California History, consisting of scraps and manuscript sketches.

In all these there was little which we already had not in some shape; hence the value to the library would be but small. The last named book probably would have been worth most to my collection, but I did not regard any of them as of sufficient importance even to ask him his price. The contents of this box he subsequently presented to the society of California pioneers, in whose hands it was almost as accessible to me as if it had been on my shelves. Some 508 501 time before this he had sold to the university of California his collection of books for six hundred dollars, but after making some inquiries about my collection he expressed the opinion that the lot so sold contained nothing I required.

Of the scrap-books contained in the box, that is to say, of his own works which he desired to publish, he had the utmost faith as to their great value; and when asked as to the best materials to be consulted in the writing of a history of California, he referred to his own prepared volumes as the only reliable source of information.

Some years ago Doctor Taylor obtained from the padre at San Cárlos mission a collection of original manuscripts, composed chiefly of correspondence of the early padres from 1780 to 1846. This collection, bound in seven volumes, was given to Archbishop Alemany, and of it I have had occasion to speak before. The volumes were placed in St Mary's library at the cathedral. Of these letters Doctor Taylor made two synopses, one of which went with the documents to the archbishop and the other was sold with his books to the university of California.

While engaged in the interesting survey of this literary life's work the invalid kept up a rapid conversation. He told his tale of misfortunes: how at first he was successful; how he made money, and then unfortunately lost it, and made and lost again—the old, old story in California. Then he married, and had trouble with his wife's family; and now he found himself stretched helpless upon a sick-bed, with a brood of young children to grow up as best they might. His woes, however, never took him far from his beloved topic, books.

“I will tell you a work you should have,” he exclaimed; “it is the voyage of the Sutil and Mexicana, containing—”

“Yes, we have that,” said Oak.

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“O you have!” he replied, suddenly. Then after a time he broke out again, “There is Cabrillo's voyage, in Buckingham Smith's collection; now, if you could come across that—”

“We secured a copy some time since,” replied Oak.

“Well, I declare!” exclaimed the doctor; “if you have that, you have the only copy in this country, I take it.”

And so on, until the conversation became painful to me. Every book he mentioned, as it happened, was in the library. That these sacred treasures were in their real presence in my library, appeared as strange as if I had claimed to have in my possession Aaron's rod, St Dominick's rosary, or Hector's shield. He did not appear jealous, but rather astounded. Every response of Oak brought a groan of wonderment; every response was like plunging a dagger into benumbed flesh. The pain, though not acute, was palpable, and partook more of the nature of regret than envy. I had no the heart to tell him that I had a work in preparation on the aborigines, filling, after the utmost condensation, five octavo volumes, and referring to hundreds of authorities which he had never heard of, notwithstanding the ponderous presence of the Bibliografa Californica.

Notwithstanding he had been so long living among the missions and the mission people of California, his mind meanwhile dwelling almost constantly on the matter of historical data, I was assured by this sage that absolutely nothing could be found in the Santa Bárbara mission, or in any of the other missions, and that to obtain any historical matter whatever from the Spanish side would be impossible. Of a truth the souls of the dead must be ignorant of doings of the living, else this good man's ghost cannot be far from the large case of original material for the history of California which stands in the library, nearly all of which is from the Spanish side, and gathered after his so positive assertion that none existed.

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Although Doctor Taylor's literary efforts are not to be compared with those of Judge Hayes in point of permanent benefit to society, yet they are by no means to be despised. The wonder is, isolated as he was, not that the somewhat blind and illiterate littérateur did not accomplish more, but that he accomplished so much. He was in a wilderness alone, to him a dark wilderness, and he did what he could. The effort was a noble one, and though the result was small, there was that little something left by him, the first atom perhaps in the building of the mountain, which but for such effort never would have been so left, and which stamps the man in his currents of thought and aspirations as above the common herd.

Returning from La Partera to town we called at the city hall to look after the county archives, but neither the clerk nor recorder knew of the existence of anything of the kind save the copies of a few pueblo land-titles. From Mr Hughes, however, an attorney long friendly to our business, I learned that some years ago the archives were taken to San Francisco, where those of a general nature were retained by the United States surveyor-general, and the rest returned and placed in a tea-chest for safe-keeping. At the next change of county officers the chest with its contents disappeared, no one knew whither.

Our next interview was with the parish priest Padre Jaime Vila, probably the politest man in California. All the padres were polite, but Father Jaime overflowed with politeness. The attitude of obeisance was his natural position. Side by side with his worship of God was his reverence for man, which of a truth is not a bad religion, provided men can be found worthy of priestly adoration.

At all events, Father Jaime was a pleasant gentleman. He seemed more free from that mountain of awful fear under which most of his brother priests labored than any one we had met. As he showed us the mission books there was a refreshing absence of 511 504 that great trepidation common in former cases, which manifested itself as soon as the books were produced and continued until they were hidden again, meanwhile persistently assuring us that their contents were of no importance, and being evidently much averse to our taking notes from them. Father Jaime, like a sensible man, seemed pleased to show his books, and took pains to explain the contents of each, evidently fearing in the operation neither the thunderbolts of the almighty nor the machinations of Satan.

We found here four volumes of Bautismos, 1782-1874, the first entry being signed Pedro Benito Cambon. So far as could be ascertained by a hasty examination the second volume contained the baptisms of aboriginals only. Father Jaime stated that separate lists were kept up to a certain date, and afterward all were entered in one book. The total number of entries in the regular book was 3591, and in the Indian book 4771. The Entierros was in three volumes, the title of volume I. being by Junípero Serra. The first entry, December 22, 1782, was signed Vicente de Santa María. Besides which were two volumes of Matrimonios; two volumes of Confirmaciones; one volume of lists, or invoices of articles furnished the mission of San Buenaventura from 1791 to 1810, with prices; two volumes of alphabetical lists of persons in the mission of Santa Bárbara, with dates of marriage, confirmation, etc., with some miscellaneous tables, including lists of persons transferred to and from the mission; and one volume entitled Libro en que se apunta la Ropa que se distribuye á los Indios de esta Mision de San Buenaventura, 1806-16.

These books were kept at Father Jaime's residence, which was attached to the parish church in town. Thence we proceeded to the mission, about one mile north-east of the town, on the side hill overlooking the Santa Bárbara plain. This mission, unlike any we had hitherto seen, was kept in perfect repair. It was occupied as a Franciscan college and monastery, and 512 505 the monks in gray robes and shaven crowns everywhere seen called to mind the south of Europe in the olden time. Of the college, Father o'Keefe, a determined, man-of-the-world-looking Irish priest, was president. One of the few remaining of the early padres was Father Gonzalez, now almost in his dotage. Some time since he resigned his position as guardian, and was now partially paralyzed. He nevertheless recognized us and our mission; as we were presented to him he insisted upon rising and uncovering his head, and directed that every facility be afforded us. Therefore it is not strange that I was much taken with Father Gonzalez.

But in the present guardian of the Franciscan college, Friar José María Romo, more than in any of the clergy connected with the mission, I found my ideal of a monk. He was arrayed in a long gray gown, tied with a cord round the waist, and beads and cross pendent. His hair was neatly cut, and the crown of the head shaven. His eye was keen and kindly, his features broadly intelligent, and in his air and bearing was a manliness rarely found associated with religious learning. He was one who could at once be true to himself and to his faith, neither demoralizing his humanity to his piety nor sacrificing one jot of piety to any earthly passion. At this time Father Romo had not been long from Rome. Italian, French, and Spanish he spoke fluently, but not English. He was a man of weighty and learned presence, yet modest withal and affable. As successor to Father Gonzalez he was a happy choice.

On asking to see the books and such archives as the mission contained, Father Romo showed us first a large box of miscellaneous contents which had been given to the college by Doctor Taylor in payment for tuition for his son—one hundred and fifty dollars I believe the box represented. Like everything connected with this labor-loving enthusiast, the box contained a not very defined or valuable mass of newspapers and 513 506 booked newspaper scraps, such as copies of the Taylor ology, printed in the ubiquitous Farmer and Union, pamphlets, broken files of newspapers, all well enough in their way, but of no practical value, being only snatches of subjects, throwing but an ignorant light on any of them.

We found the archives of Santa Bárbara mission both bulky and important. They consisted of correspondence of the padres, statistics of the several missions, reports, accounts, inventories, and the like, including some documents of the pueblo and presidio, as well as of the mission. All these were in the form of folded papers, neatly filed in packages, and labelled with more or less distinctness. They were kept in a cupboard consisting of an aperture about two feet square sunk into a partition wall to the depth of about one foot, and covered with plain folding doors. As we had never before heard of this deposit, as Doctor Taylor even had not mentioned it, and as it was apparently not known by any one beyond the mission precincts, we regarded it a rare discovery, the first real literary bonanza we had unearthed during our excursion.

The archives of this mission seemed to have escaped the fate of all the rest. The mission was never wholly abandoned at any time; it was never rifled of its books and papers, either by priests returning to Mexico or by the United States government. Father Gonzalez assured me that this cupboard had never been disturbed, that it was then just as it had been left by the early fathers; and such to every appearance was the fact. That Doctor Taylor with his indefatigable industry should have allowed to escape him this rich treasure can only be accounted for upon the supposition that its existence was kept secret.

Besides the folded papers mentioned, there were the following in the form of manuscript books, pamphlets, and printed government regulations with official signatures: Diario de la caminata que hizo el 514 507 padre prefecto Payeras en union del padre Sanchez por la sierra desde San Diego hasta San Gabriel 1821. Libro que contiene los Apuntes de siembras, cosechas, y demas asuntos propios de una Mision. Catecismo Politico arreglado á la constitucion de la monarquía Española—for the Californian aborigines. Quaderno de estados é Ynformes de estas misiones de la Alta California del año de 1822. Descripcion de la Operacion Cesárea—apparently an extract copied from some medical work. Libro de las Siembras y Cosechas de la Mision de Santa Bárbara que comienza desde el año de 1808—mostly blank. A book of sermons written and preached by the padres in California, with an index. Libro de Quentas que esta Mision de Santa Bárbara tiene con la habilitacion de este presidio del mismo nombre y con otros varios particulares para este año de 1792. A proclamation by Governor Alvarado. Three criminal trials of persons for polygamy. Grammars and vocabularies of the aborigines of different missions, in two volumes, extensive and important, but very difficult to read. Accounts of the different missions, in three volumes, 1816 and subsequently. Informe de la Mision de Santa Bárbara sita, etc., asi de lo espiritual como de lo temporal y comprehende desde el 4 de Diciembre del año de 1786, que fué el de la fundacion, hasta el dia 31 de Diciembre de 1787. Factura de tres tercios de géneros, etc., Ordenes—of the bishops of Sonora and California; important. Testimonio de la Real Junta sobre el nuevo reglamento e¯ instruccion formada por Don Josef de Echeveste para la peninsula de California y Dept. de San Blas, 1773. Quaderno en que se lleva la cuenta de la cera, candeleros, y otras cosas que se han comprado para la Iglesia de Santa Bárbara desde el año de 1850—to 1856.

To examine these documents at any length at this time was impracticable. I asked permission to take the contents of the cupboard to San Francisco to copy, but Father Romo assured me it was impossible, that he could not assume the responsibility of letting 515 508 them go beyond the mission walls. I offered bonds for the safe return of every paper. “Your money could not restore them,” said Father Romo, “in case they were lost by fire or water; then I should be censured.” Permission was freely given me, however, to copy as much as I pleased within the mission buildings, where every facility would be given me; of which kind offer I subsequently made avail, as will be mentioned hereafter, transferring the contents of the cupboard, that is to say, all the valuable part of it, to my library by means of copyists.

At five o'clock A.M. the 10th of March we left Santa Bárbara by stage and were set down at Ballard's about two o'clock. Early next morning in a farm wagon we drove out to the college of Guadalupe, some five miles south-eastward, and thence to Santa Inés mission. The books of Purísima mission being at Santa Inés, we concluded not to visit the former, as there was nothing there specially to be seen.

The mission library at Santa Inés was the largest we had yet seen, but was composed almost exclusively of theological works printed in Spain. Besides the regular Purísima mission books I saw at Santa Inés a curious old book from Purísima, partly printed and partly in manuscript. It was an olla podrida of scraps, notes, accounts, etc., with a treatise on music. Marking such parts of it as I desired, I engaged the priest to make and send me a copy.

A most uncomfortable night ride in the rain brought us to San Luis Obispo. There, as before, we drew plans of the mission buildings, examined the books, took several dictations, and proceeded on our way. As we approached the northern end of the line of early ecclesiastical settlement, the missions lay some distance away from the stage route, and I concluded to leave those nearest home for another occasion. Hence from San Luis Obispo we all returned, reaching San Francisco the 15th of March, well pleased with our excursion.

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In transmitting to me his material, Judge Hayes seemed anxious that it should go forth, like a beloved daughter to her marriage, in its best apparel. And therein he proved himself a high-minded and disinterested lover of history, ready to give himself, his time, and best remaining thoughts to the cause. “I wish to finish up my collection,” he writes me, “so that you may have all the facts in my possession that may in any way be useful to you.”

First he completed and forwarded to me the large quarto volume of Alta California Missions which I had left with him. In a letter dated the 14th of October 1874 he says: “I send by express the two volumes of Indian Traits. Mr Luttrell did not come down with the commission sent by the secretary of the interior. I have therefore no such use for this collection now as I supposed I might have. I have been able to add but a few matters to it. Whatever further information I may collect must go into another volume. Emigrant Notes now only waits for photographs to be completed. The board of supervisors of San Bernardino directed a photographer to furnish me with twelve views which I had designated. Day before yesterday our photographer took for me twenty views around the Old Town, which he will get ready immediately.”

Several visits were made by Judge Hayes to Los Angeles during the following year, at which times he used his utmost influence to obtain from Olvera and others historical information, but without much success. Finally, about the beginning of 1876, I engaged Judge Hayes to drop his professional duties for a time, take up his residence at Los Angeles, and devote his entire thoughts and energies to securing for me the historical information which was so rapidly fading in that vicinity.

Being himself executor and legal adviser for several estates, he was enabled to secure some material from them. In regard to the county archives, he examined 517 510 the entire collection of twelve volumes of original documents which I had seen at Los Angeles, and made abstracts, as he had done with the San Diego archives, except that, these being more voluminous, he employed two copyists to write out in full such documents as he designated. Besides an abstract, he made for me a complete index of those papers, which I found very useful. Thus all that could be valuable to history was taken from these archives and transferred to my library, where it was preserved in large and strongly bound volumes. It was a long and expensive piece of work, but there was no other feasible plan which could place me in possession of the material; and, indeed, I considered myself fortunate in securing the services of one so able, experienced, and enthusiastic as Judge Hayes. But for him, the expense might easily have been doubled, and the work not half so well performed.

I cannot better illustrate the nature of this work than by placing before the reader a few extracts from Judge Hayes' letters:

“I send another package of copies,” he writes Mr Oak the 22d of February 1876. “The bill of Mr Murray is for 28,708 words, amounting to $57.40. This is at twenty cents a folio. Young Mr Bancroft spoke to me as to reducing the charge for copying to fifteen cents per folio. I had some conversation with Mr Murray on this subject, and have thought a good deal about it. Mr Murray is an expert in this matter, and is extremely useful to me in many other ways besides merely copying. I know other persons here who can copy Spanish, but I would have many difficulties in getting along with any of them. In the recorder's office it is almost impossible to obtain room for more than one copyist. I have now examined the large bound volumes, page after page. Much of it is hard to decipher. Yesterday afternoon, in one of our studies of three words combined in one, we had the aid of Ignacio Sepúlveda, district judge, and Juan de Toro, both educated natives, and at last Mr Murray and I solved the problem, he part and I the balance. This occurs very often with these Los Angeles papers. To-morrow we will begin the city records, which, I am informed, have much valuable historical matter. The prefect records I will drop for a while, although I have references to much interesting matter yet to be copied. Besides the city records, there are seven large volumes in the clerk's office, entitled ‘Civil,’ that will have to be looked into, every page, in order to be sure I lose not a single fact of interest. Many Angelinos manifest considerable interest in this work. If I can get access 518 511 to material in the hands of Coronel and others, I doubt not I will find documents often of greater value than these archives I am now examining. If so, such papers I will have to copy myself, for their holders will be cautious in letting any go out of their possession.”

The 13th of April he writes:

“Following your hint that every day is important in your investigations, I send the index, so that my old friend R. C. Hopkins can proceed at once to give you his valuable aid. I will try to extract some valuable leading notes from our old citizens as leisure may permit. Think I will succeed. I send index to vol. iii. Angeles City Archives. I sent index to vol. iv. with my last. My idea is to make a complete index, in about the same style, to each volume of the archives. If you observe anything not copied in full that ought to be copied, please advise me. Mr Murray is at work now on the ayuntamientos of 1838, 1839, and 1844, copying portions in full; the rest I will abridge. We are approaching the end of our full copies. The ayuntamientos, written by Mr Bancroft, I believe would be eminently useful to lawyers of a future day. I doubt if the ayuntamiento records are as full anywhere as at Los Angeles. At Santa Bárbara Mr Packard told me nearly all are lost. Los Angeles appears to have no records back of 1828.”

And again, the 22d of April:

“I sent you indices of the first four volumes of the city archives. The ayuntamientos of 1836, 1837, 1838, 1839, and 1844 are still to be abridged. The nine volumes of civil, and seven volumes of criminal records remain to be analyzed. They present very little, I think, for full copies. I met Colonel Warner day before yesterday, and mentioned the matter of his book and Mr Bancroft's wishes. I remember the book, part of which I read long since in his office. I told him that you relied on him for his Recollections. He said he showed you the book at San Francisco; but that you had made no particular request of him for what he had already written, or for its continuance, but added he would send you his Recollections if so requested by you. It appears to be just as I had imagined, he is waiting to be further coaxed. I send to-day an incident in his life from the city archives; he no doubt can add many of greater interest. I mentioned to Mr Murray your suggestion as to Santa Bárbara. He said he could afford to attend to it at the old price, twenty cents a folio. Probably this would not be too much, for those archives are written by the priests, who always write worse than lawyers.”

May 3d he says:

“I find a more kindly spirit, or greater confidence in me, growing up among the old native Californians. Two very valuable aids were offered me day before yesterday by Leonardo Cota and Agustin Olvera. Antonio Coronel made a similar offer a couple of weeks since. I think I will get from them much useful information.”

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About this time a young fellow named Kelly came to me and represented that he had great influence with the old families, asking a commission from me to obtain narratives and papers. He brought a letter from R. C. Hopkins, of the United States surveyor-general's office, who strongly recommended him. Unfortunately for me, I employed him. In this part of my work one bad man would undo the work of six good men.

This Kelly assured me that all southern California would receive him with open arms. Among others, he mentioned the name of Judge Hayes, and I wrote to the judge about him. But before the following reply came, I had seen enough of Mr Kelly never to wish again to see him. He made a little trip south for me, but I soon recalled and discharged him.

“In respect to Mr Kelly,” writes Judge Hayes the 27th of October, “I hardly know what to say. He told me he had special access to a diary kept through his whole life by Ignacio del Valle. By others who had seen Don Andres' papers, I was led to believe he had left nothing worthy of notice. Mr Kelly also told me he had the privilege of examining the San Fernando Mission records. What these are I know not; I doubt if there are any of value. Mr Kelly seemed to think that San Gabriel, San Luis Rey, and San Juan Capistrano had valuable records. I have never heard of any, and do not believe there are any. I have received two diaries, one from F. Mellus and one from Captain Robbins, besides some papers of Pedro C. Carrillo. I rely much on the Coronel papers. Agustin Olvera died the 6th of this month. His son Cárlos Olvera, took all his papers to his home at Chular, Monterey county, in order to arrange them. He is executor, and I am attorney for him.”

The next most important work to be done in the way of obtaining material was to secure copies of the archives of Santa Bárbara mission. Of the men employed by Judge Hayes in my behalf at Los Angeles, as we have seen, Edward F. Murray proved to be the best. I endeavored to induce Judge Hayes to go to Santa Bárbara and make an abstract of the archives there, as he had done at San Diego and at Los Angeles. But professional duties would not longer be thrust aside; and, besides, his failing health warned 520 513 him to put his house in order for that most unwelcome of visitors, death.

Mr Murray was recommended very highly by Judge Hayes for the Santa Bárbara mission, and as he expressed his willingness to go, an engagement was effected, beginning about the middle of June 1876, and which continued with a few interruptions to 1878.

He was a faithful and competent man, and his abstracts on the whole gave satisfaction. It was no easy matter for a writer in San Francisco to send a stranger to work on a distant mass of papers, concerning which neither had much knowledge, and have the requisite material properly taken out; but Mr Murray, besides being a man of quick perception, thorough education, and wide experience, had served so long and so well under the able directorship of Judge Hayes that there was really less difficulty than I had anticipated.

This was in no small measure due to the careful instructions of Mr Oak, under whose watchful supervision the entire work of Mr Murray, and of all other searchers employed by me, was conducted. Being somewhat unique, and necessarily so, for the work was individual, I give in substance these instructions, which possibly in some measure may prove suggestive to others acting under like circumstances:

The paper on which the copies were to be made was ruled with perpendicular red lines, so as to form a margin on either side, with the view of binding the sheets in volumes. Mr Murray was directed to write only on one side of the paper, between the red lines, and to leave at least one blank line at the bottom of each age. As a rule but one document was to be put upon a page, except in cases of mere titles of short abridgments, when plenty of space was to be left between the documents.

“Arrange the documents for copying,” he continues, “as nearly in chronological order as possible; but do not waste much time in this arrangement, as exact regularity is not of much importance. Write the title of each document, whether it be of any importance of not, with enough of explanation to make it perfectly clear what the document is. In some cases this title will be enough; in others the title should be followed by an abridgment of contents; but in most cases it should be followed by a literal copy.

“Finish one document before beginning another; and let one follow another 521 514 without trying to keep titles, abridgments, and copies separate, as has been done at Los Angeles. But a book of any length, which will make a small volume of itself, may be copied separately, and the work done by assistants may of course be kept separate if more convenient. The old mission books of baptisms, marriages, etc., are in charge of the parish curate; please make from them a list of padres, with the date of the first and last entries made by each padre. There are also a few books of San Buenaventura mission from which you can derive some information. Get all you can from the county archives, but there is very little there. Send up your work with your bill at the end of each week.”

With these general rules may be placed several extracts from letters written at various times, all forming part of the instructions:

“I think, after your experience with Judge Hayes,” he writes, “you will find no difficulty in doing the work satisfactorily, especially as nearly all the Santa Bárbara papers should be copied literally. The only classes of documents which will have to be very much abridged will be mission accounts, in which of course long lists of items should not be copied. In such cases a clear statement of the nature of the account, the parties represented, the general nature of the items—cattle, grain, tools, etc.—and the totals should be given.

“From the San Buenaventura padron you will take totals year by year; but of course we care nothing for mere names of Indian neophytes. From the book of invoices you will take totals and some extracts showing the class of merchandise furnished, and prices. I cannot well specify what information to take from old residents, because we need almost everything relating to a period preceding 1849: Personal reminiscences, amusing anecdotes, biographical notes of prominent men and women, historical events, manners and customs of the Californians, amusements, politics, family history, etc.—in fact all that anybody can remember. Of course you will make this work, at present, secondary to that of the archives. You may, if you like, keep it to fill up spare time. Go first to the eldest and most intelligent persons; and meantime do all you can to interest the old families in the work.

“The town maps need not be copied; neither is it necessary to trace any signatures. Old plans of the mission and presidio should be traced. Always use figures, even in copying, to express numbers. Be careful not to copy in full when all the information can better be conveyed in a few words. Make all work secondary to that at the mission. It would be well always to look forward among the papers and send me a note before copying long and important documents. Mission documents of all kinds between 1784 and 1824 are of greater importance than those before 1784. I will send you a list of the archbishop's documents.”

I will now give a sketch of Mr Murray's labors at Santa Bárbara and vicinity, as nearly in his own 522 515 language as practicable. The 12th of June from Santa Bárbara he writes:

“I arrived at this place this morning. I went at once to the mission, and was received very kindly by Father Sanchez and a young Irish priest whose name I did not learn, Father Romo being absent. They are disposed to afford me every facility in their power, but unfortunately could place at my disposal only a manuscript volume of Memorias, the remainder of the archives being in charge of Father Romo, who is not expected to to return for several days. Padre Sanchez, however, gave me a note to the parish priest, who has kindly consented to allow me to copy from the books in his charge. There are several volumes, records of births, baptisms, confirmations, and deaths, and in these I hope to find enough to keep me busy until the librarian's return.”

Without breaking the narrative with constant references and dates, at the same time adding sufficient connection, I will select from Mr Murray's letters, in their proper order, such items as I deem worthy of record. Mr Murray writes carefully, and his long labor and experience in these parts entitle his words to great weight:

“There are in charge of the curate,” he goes on to say, “two sets of records, one for the Indians and one for the white population. Among these are two volumes of records of San Buenaventura mission, one a padron beginning in the year 1825, the other copies of invoices of the annual remittance of merchandise to the mission. In the county recorder's office there are two volumes, Acuerdos del Ayuntamiento de Santa Barbara desde 13 de Marzo de 1849, and ending April 25, 1850, and Solares y Terrenos de Labranza, this last being grants of land within the city. In the city clerk's office there is one volume of Ordenanzas of the Consejo Municipal from 1850 to 1854. I have already secured one copyist, and have in view another. I have procured a place to board as near as possible to the mission, yet I am nearly three quarters of a mile from it. Shall take my lunch with me, and anticipate a pleasant walk morning and evening.

“The first day I went up to the mission they showed me an old book of Memorias, which they said had been by chance left out of the library, and which I was welcome to use. It was mostly accounts which would have to be very much abridged, and I did not intend taking it up, only as a last resort. I went up a few days after and asked to see the book, and they handed me one of Patentes. I intimated that it was not the same I had seen on my first visit, but they assured me that it was. I was not disposed to dispute it, and after a little examination was pleased to find that it was perhaps the best book that they could have given me, as it contains the reports of the mission from its foundation.

“I send you this week,” writing the 2d of July, “the Acuerdos del 523 516 Ayuntamiento complete, a portion of the Ordenanzas, and Casamientos de Indios, and Casamiertos de los de Razon complete. I have already started one of my assistants at the mission to copy the Patentes. I have ascertained the names of several of the old residents who are most likely to give me information, and I think I have found one who, if so disposed, can give some clew to the city papers of 1835-50, lost several years since. There is an old man by the name of Burke, who has been here, I think, since 1836. He came from Los Angeles, and was concerned in an affair with one María Pegi. She was banished to San Diego, and Burke to Santa Bárbara. You should have a copy of the proceedings in this case among the Los Angeles papers. I propose visiting him this week. I can make a tracing of the old presidio and most of the adjoining houses that existed some forty or fifty years ago. At the mission one afternoon one of the priests asked me if the Mr Bancroft by whom I was employed was not formerly United States minister to Germany, who had written against the Catholics. I assured him that he was not the same Mr Bancroft, whereupon he seemed satisfied.”

A week later he says:

“Father Romo arrived Friday morning. He leaves again to-morrow for San Francisco, and will call on Mr Bancroft. He has placed everything at my disposal, and has given me the room formerly occupied by Father Gonzales, for myself and assistants. Father Romo told me that in the office at the mission there is a board about two feet square with the Lord's prayer in one of the Indian languages written on it, which was used in teaching the Indians the Padre Nuestro.

“There are reports here of all the missions from as early as 1773 to 1836. The earlier reports are very full, many of them giving the date of their establishment, their geographical position, distance from adjoining missions, the names of the fathers in charge, and in some few instances the age, years of service, and place of birth of missionaries. As it is quite probable that the originals, and in some cases the copies of many of the papers of this mission are contained in those of the archbishop, it would, perhaps, save the recopying of some of these documents if you would send me a list of those taken from his library. I would like suggestions as to the copying of correspondence. That of Serra, Lasuen, Duran, and Payeras, presidents of the missions, and also that of the viceroys are for the most part to be copied in full. I presume.”

Passing on to August, I find in his several letters the following items of interest:

“I am very sorry,” he says, “that I should have copied the Representaciones of Padre Serra of 1773, but your mention, in your last, of Father Palou's book was the first intimation I ever had of its existence. I send you a list of several documents of date prior to 1784, as also the titles of a few others of later date, about the copying of which I am in doubt. I find it very slow work, and exceedingly trying to the eyes, reading these papers; and lately the necessity of assorting, arranging, and selecting work for my 524 517 assistants has obliged me to read continually, allowing me no time to do any copying. There seems to be an impression that any one who has a smattering of Spanish and can write is capable of doing this work, which, however, does not agree with my experience, and that the price paid is excessive. Although not a novice, I do not consider myself an expert in this business; and yet, I employ an assistant whose language is Spanish, and whom I have quite frequently had to help along.

“Yesterday I examined the De la Guerra family's papers,” he begins, September, “and think there may be many documents of interest to you among them. There is a large mass of these papers, principally correspondence of the old Comandante de la Guerra, extending from the year 1801 to 1850, accounts and inventories of the presidios of San Diego, Santa Bárbara, and Monterey, aranceles, etc. Have you the account of the cañon perdido, and the quinientos pesos of Santa Bárbara? From the extent of his researches in the mission archives I conclude that Mr Bancroft intends to give a most complete history of the mission system, and that everything relating to the Indians, who were the object of this system, their manners and customs, both in their savage and semi-civilized state, must be subject of interest. This seems to be the first and only formal search that has been made of the mission archives; however, much information may have been derived from other sources. There is more authentic information contained in these records than can possibly be included in any other public or private archives, excepting, perhaps, those of the college of San Fernando de Mexico. My instructions to my assistants are to copy in full the reports of the president, observing the numerical order of questions, and to copy from the reports of the missions respectively the corresponding answers, only, however, when they differ materially from those of the presidents. I wish you to feel that in this work your interest is mine; that I realize fully not only the importance but the imperative necessity of thoroughness and all possible accuracy. It is a matter of pride with me that my work shall give satisfaction. I have a number of reports showing the names of the different fathers, the missions they were assigned to, date of their arrival, and that of their death or return to Mexico. There are many years missing, but with the aid of the reports from the different missions, the general biennial correspondence of the missions, and circulars of the presidents, I hope to produce a complete list.

“Heretofore, agreeably to your suggestions, I have made no attempt to arrange or classify the papers chronologically or with reference to subject; but now that I am about to begin the abridging and condensing, I do not see how it can well be avoided, at least the arranging of subjects. Where there are several documents relating to the same subject, the abridging will be greatly facilitated and accelerated by having them together. In such cases, frequently, by giving one full abridgment, the title, date, and signatures only of the other are required; if their purport be the same, reference can be made to the leading one, and if there be anything additional, a line or two will suffice to show what it is.

“I send herewith the first bundle of general index. I have numbered all the titles and abridgments of documents and arranged them under different heads, and as far as possible in chronological order. All the documents 525 518 I am marking with subjects, title, and number in the same way, so that they will correspond with the index. Father Romo is pleased with this order, which I have explained to him, and assures me that it will not be changed; so that should you at any time require a copy of any of these papers, it can be designated by subject, title, and number, and save all needless delay in searching for it.”

In answer to fears expressed that others might seek to make use of the work he was doing, he writes in October:

“No one has ever examined, copied, or taken notes from the material extracted by me for you; no one has ever applied to me for permission to do so; neither is it possible for any one except the fathers to gain access to the papers. I use as a writing room the same apartment in which the papers were kept when you visited the mission in 1874. I am never absent during the day, and at night the room is locked and the key kept by Father Romo. I am under the impression that some material was derived from these papers for Father Gleeson's work.”

“In my last lot of manuscript I made a copy of Echeandia's bando of 6th of January 1831, with notes by—I should judge—Father Narciso Duran, since his initials, thus, Es copia Fr N. D., occur at the end of the bando, and the writing throughout seems to be his. I intended to abridge it, but did not see how I could well do so. I am finding several documents that I consider too important to be abridged, especially those relating to the Secularizacion de las Misiones. There are yet to be indexed six hundred and thirty-five documents. Of these, about one hundred, perhaps more, will have to be abridged, and less than half that number copied in full. There are also counted in this number, one hundred and twenty-five letters, the correspondence of the mission presidents, and many of the higher military officials. I am sorry to learn that my abridgments have been too full, and would feel very thankful for a few suggestions. This condensing and abridging is very perplexing at times.”

Toward the close of the year he meets with some hinderances:

“I have been unable to get at the papers in the mission for the last three weeks,” he writes the 21st of December, “owing to the diphtheria having made its appearance. There are still several cases, including two of the brothers; and one of the pupils has died.”

In common with all the proud old families of California, the descendants of De la Guerra had to be won from a state of prejudice and disinclination. 526 519 The 25th of January Mr Murray writes from Santa Bárbara:

“There is no disposition on the part of the De la Guerra family to give, or even lend, any of their papers to Mr Bancroft—that is, to send them to San Francisco. It is even doubtful if I can get permission to take them to my room for convenience in copying. There are kept in an old dusty and dimly lighted attic, or alto, and there I expect I shall be obliged to do all my work. I have already spoken to some one of the members of all the principal Californian families, and although they have all offered to furnish me with papers in greater or less numbers for copying here, none of them will consent to their leaving Santa Bárbara. They understand the advantage of furnishing me with information, in order that their families may be fully and creditably represented; yet, although I have offered to give them a receipt for their papers, and have assured them that they would be properly arranged, neatly bound, carefully preserved, or safely returned as soon as the work is completed, it is all to no purpose. Documents that before my inquiry were worthless, and would eventually have been consigned to the flames or have furnished some rat a lining to his nest, have suddenly acquired a value that may be measured by the caprice or cupidity of their holders, or my apparent indifference or eagerness to obtain them. Hundreds of documents, many no doubt of no little historical interest, have been carelessly burned, without any assignable reason. A large number have been used for kindling fires and manufacturing cigarettes. The average Californian is loath to believe that an American, or as they would say, a Yankee, can possibly have any view but that of pecuniary gain in all his undertakings and enterprises; and this, together with his natural antipathy for the race, does not incline him to be disinterestedly obliging. Consequently their willingness to even furnish me with the papers for copying is due entirely to the persuasion that their own interests are greatly served thereby. I do not apprehend any serious difficulty in obtaining any and all papers not of a strictly private nature; for, while I make them believe that these papers are not objects of great or even small solicitude with me, I shall also be careful to make them understand that by their failure to furnish me with whatever information, oral or documentary, of interest to me that they may possess, they will be the losers.”

Nevertheless Mr Murray obtained for me many papers to send to San Francisco, some of which were to be copied and returned, while others were permitted to remain. After a two months' illness he writes, the 13th of March 1877:

“As to my mistake in underestimating the time necessary to complete the mission work, I can only say that the appearance of the papers, their number and their importance, as I supposed without having read them, led me to think two weeks enough for their completion. I proposed to look over all those relating to matters purely ecclesiastical, giving their substance in brief. The 527 520 political correspondence I expected to condense very much, but I found abundance of matter that I could not omit, and in many cases that I dared not abridge lest the meaning should be affected. In letters especially, and in all documents in which reference is made to others, expressions are frequently used in relation to persons and affairs previously mentioned whose full force and precise meaning are somewhat doubtful, and which can be ascertained only by careful study and comparison with those to which they refer. Again, the authors of these letters did not at all times express themselves with clearness and precision, and indeed one cannot but notice that their language is often made purposely vague and obscure. In such cases I prefer that either you or Mr Bancroft interpret their meaning.”

Writing in April, Mr Murray says:

“I am making out a list of the padres and missions, and I have found that it requires much more time than I had at first expected. The list when completed will contain an abridged account of the fathers, their names arranged in alphabetical order, the date of their arrival, the mission or missions to which they were appointed, with the date of such appointments, and that of their transfer, etc.; following this will come a list of the missions in their regular order, and under each the names of the padres who administered them, and the dates of their taking charge, the capacity in which they served, and their duration in the mission. There are thirty-one lists or reports of the padres, the earliest that of 1789 and the latest that of 1832. Between these dates there are missing those corresponding to the years 1790-1, 1794-5, 1797, and 1822-30. I expect to supply them, in part, from the mission reports, especially those from 1822-30. I have already between one hundred and twenty and one hundred and thirty names, and expect to add from ten to twenty more. This done, there remains only the mission accounts, sermons, etc.

“I shall obtain as much information as possible about Father Gonzales. I had expected to be allowed to look over his papers, of which there is a trunkful, but in this I was disappointed. I did succeed in getting a few of them when I first came here, but I was interrupted by one of the fathers while looking over them, and was informed that Father Romo had instructed him to allow no one to examine them. I was at a loss to account for this at that time, and up to within a few months since, when Father Romo mentioned in one of our conversations his intention of writing a biography of Father Gonzales.”

The 5th of May saw the last of the Santa Bárbara mission archives copied or condensed:

“I made no extracts from the Libro de Sermones,” says Mr Murray, “for the reason that there is nothing of special interest in any of the sermons. They are all apparently copies of sermons preached in Mexico or Spain, and contain nothing but what applies to the supposed spiritual condition of the neophyte; and I should judge them to be too deep even for the neophyte educated in the 528 521 mission, and wholly incomprehensible to the adult convert. From the Libro de Siembras I have made no extracts, as I expect the reports will furnish the same facts.

“In making notes of the mission, I propose, as before stated, to give a brief account of its present appearance and condition; the objects of interest within the mission and church, such as the ornamentos y vasos sagrados, of which there still exist several vestments and vessels first used in this mission. In the vault underneath the church are the remains of General Figueroa, if I mistake not; and I have no doubt there are many things about which a brief mention will be acceptable. Without the mission proper there are the orchard, the ruins of the convert houses, the old mill, the tan vats, reservoir, and other objects of interest.

“At San Buenaventura there is an ex-mission chorister, quite old, yet sound in mind, and intelligent. He speaks Spanish fluently, and still retains his native language. He served as interpreter for the fathers. At Santa Inés there are several, and among them one who is reported to have passed his hundredth year. He is still unusually sound in body and mind, is somewhat intelligent, has a good memory, and remembers quite distinctly the founding of that establishment and many of the events connected with it.

“I am close upon the track of the missing city archives, but the prospect of getting my hands on them is by no means encouraging. There is an old Spaniard whose name has been given me, a resident of this place, who told my informant, a professional gentleman whom I consider reliable, that he has papers in his possession which if published would implicate several of the prominent men of Santa Bárbara in frauds in city grants of land, committed while they were in the common council.

“On inquiring into the history of families here, I am inclined to think that the character even of some of the most prominent will have to be patched up to make it appear even respectable. Ther have been practices among the old Californians that are, to say the least, discreditable to their name and family. Illegitimate children abound; and in one of the families of Santa Bárbara, which has, I believe, always been considered among the first, they have brought up, in close companionship with their legitimate offspring, one or more of illegitimate issue. This is but a single instance; there are many more, I am told. There is also abundant material here for another chapter of the Burke and María Pegi affair.

“It is not my desire or purpose to make special inquiry as to the evil acts of those whom I may have occasion to write about; but I suppose that is it quite as desirable to know the evil as he good relating to these persons, in order to form a just opinion of their character. All information of this evil nature I have decided to send you on separate notes, which I will head ‘Black List,’ and which I would prefer to have kept by themselves, that no outside person be allowed access to them, either at present or in the future.

“I have made a note of the reports, which the blanks show to be wanting in your library, and which do not exist here; and should I find any of them at the mission I am about to visit, I will make necessary extracts and send them to you.”

529 522

From San Buenaventura he writes the 12th of June:

“I have been at this place since the 6th instant. I found here at the church the parish records only. From these I have been able to extract a few facts of interest and to complete the list of the padres who served this mission. I shall make a few notes from the records of baptisms, marriages, and deaths, of whatever may be useful relting to the gente de razon.

“There are three old Californian families living in and near this town. Arnaz, the most important, has, I am told, a number of private papers—a whole trunkful, one of the sons told me. Ignacio del Valle, who lives at the Rancho Camulos, some fifty miles distant, is also said to have an abundance of private papers. At Santa Inés I will complete the work as soon as possible.”

The 17th of August Mr Murray sent up copies of the San Buenaventura, Santa Inés, and La Purísima mission papers.

Back to Santa Bárbara again, Mr Murray makes another effort to secure the De la Guerra documents:

“I have not had access to the De la Guerra papers until to-day,” he writes the 15th of October. “I was kept waiting for over a month for the return of Mrs De la Guerra; and upon her arrival here, about two weeks since, they found another pretext, in the absence of Mr Dibblee, for putting me off until to-day. What reason they have for this, after having assured me something like a year ago that I could have the papers for copying whenever I wished, I cannot imagine. There will be no further delay in the work on these papers. I think I shall have no trouble in inducing from five to ten prominent Californians, men or women, to dictate their recuerdos. I have already taken a few notes from two of the oldest men in the place.”

Ten days later he sent an instalment of the De la Guerra papers, and in due time copies of the whole of them.

The results of Mr Murray's long and faithful labors are additions to the library of twelve large manuscript volumes of Santa Bárbara mission archives; one volume of Santa Bárbara county archives; one volume San Buenaventura mission; one volume La Purísima mission; one volume Santa Inés mission; one volume mission correspondence; six volumes De la Guerra documents, besides a number of dictations by old residents, and a large quantity of original 530 523 documents from various sources. Later Mr Murray took his seat in the library as one of my most faithful assistants.

A further most important work in southern California was that performed for me by Mr Thomas Savage, an account of which I now proceed to give:

After a preliminary examination of the county archives at San José and Salinas, and the papers at the Jesuit college and parochial church at Santa Clara, with several copyists, notably Señores Piña, Corona, and Gomez, Mr Savage proceeded in March 1877 to Salinas and began operations in a large room which he rented near the office of the recorder, Jacob R. Leese, who afforded him every facility.

Despatching Gomez in search of native Californians from whom a narrative of recollections was desired, Mr Savage placed before the others books of records, and directed them what and how to abstract. Prominent among those who gave in their testimony at this time were Francisco Arce and Francisco Rico, the latter detailing the particulars of 1845-6, the wars of the revolution, the campaign against Micheltorena, and the actions of the Californians against the United States forces. Thus passed four weeks, when, the work at Salinas being accomplished, the copyists were sent back to San Francisco, and Mr Savage proceeded to Monterey. Here were important personages, for instance, Florencio Serrano, Estévan de la Torre, Mauricio Gonzalez, John Chamberlin, and James Meadows, the last named being one of the prisoners sent from California to Mexico in 1840. These and other dictations, with a bundle of original papers, were the result of four weeks' labor at this place, after which Mr Savage returned to San Francisco.

A second trip began the 21st of May, when with the same copyists Mr Savage went to San José, and after a month's labor secured to the library all that was required from the public archives of that 531 524 place, which consisted of six volumes of records and twenty-five hundred loose documents, every one of which Mr Savage carefully examined for historical data. Among those from whom dictations were then taken was Eusebio Galindo. From the heirs of the late Antonio Suñol a collection of letters by John A. Suter was obtained.

Sending the copyists back to San Francisco, Mr Savage proceeded with Gomez to Santa Cruz, where the books and loose papers of the mission were placed under contribution, and also the public papers, which were mostly of the old town of Branciforte. From Father Hawes and Mr McKinney, county clerk, Mr Savage received many favors. Near Watsonville lived José Amador, son of Pedro Amador, on of the soldiers present at the founding of San Diego and Monterey, and for many years sergeant in the San Francisco presidial company. “I found this man of ninety-six years,” writes Mr Savage, “who had at one time been wealthy, and after whom Amador county was named, living in great poverty under the care of his youngest daughter, who is married and has many children. He granted my request without asking gratuity, and in six days narrated two hundred and forty pages of original information. I used to take every day something to the children, and occasionally a bottle of Bourbon to warm the old man's heart.” The 17th of July Mr Savage was back in San Francisco.

As the history of California progressed it became evident that, notwithstanding the mass of material in hand, namely the Hayes collection, mission, government, municipal, and private archives, transcripts made by Hayes, Murray, Savage, and others, there were gaps which yet more thorough reserch alone would fill; or rather, from a fuller insight into the subject, and the reports of intelligent persons, I was convinced that important information remained yet 532 525 unearthed, and I could not rest satisfied without it. There were church records to be looked into and utilized at nearly all the former missions between San Diego and San Juan; and moreover, it was important to procure the version of old Californians and others in the southern counties on the sectional quarrels there existing, especially between the years 1831 and 1846, and even appearing during the last struggle of the Californians and Mexicans against United States occupation. Till now, though the sureños and norteños were equally represented in the contemporary records obtained, yet too much of the modern dictated testimony had described those occurrences from the northern, or Monterey and Sonoma, points of view. Men and women still lived in the south who had taken an active part in or had been witnesses of those troubles; and from them more or less unbiassed accounts might be obtained. Others possessed knowledge derived from their sires, and old documents worth securing from the careless hands which had destroyed so many.

Mr Savage accordingly, well provided with letters, took passage the 6th of October 1877 on board the steamer Senator, which carried him to Santa Mónica, whence he proceeded to Los Angeles, and was soon at work upon the dictation of Pio Pico, formerly governor of California, carrying on at the same time the examination and copying of the papers of Ignacio Coronel and Manuel Requena. To these experiences original documents were added, some from the estate of Andrés Pico; from J. J. Warner the manuscript volume of his Recollections was obtained. Papers and reminiscenes were further obtained from Pedro Carrillo and José Lugo. To Antonio F. Coronel Mr Savage expressed the highest obligations; also to Governor Downey and Judge Sepúlveda. Bishop Mora, under instructions from Bishop Amat, loaned Mr Savage twelve manuscript books, permitted him free access to the episcopal archives, and furnished 533 526 him a letter authorizing all priests within the diocese in charge of mission records to allow him to make such extracts from them as he might desire.

To the mission of San Gabriel Mr Savage proceeded in the latter part of November, and found Father Bot most obliging. Hereabout dictations were obtained from Benjamin D. Wilson, Victoriano Vega, and Amalia Perez, stewardess of the mission, and well informed upon mission life, habits of the padres, and manners and customs of the Californians.

Spadra next, and a dictation from old Pablo Véjar, famous in military mutinies, for which he had been sent a prisoner to Mexico. Escaping thence, he returned, fought the Americans at San Pascual, and was taken prisoner; once rich, he was now ashamed to ask Mr Savage into his hovel. Then Pomona, to see the Englishman Michael White, who came to the coast in 1817, and settled in Alta California in 1828. Thence Mr Savage returned to San Gabriel. At Los Nietos was seen José María Romero, a Californian of ninety; at San Juan Capistrano the mission books; then followed a dictation from John Foster of Santa Margarita rancho, an examination of the mission books at San Luis Rey, and more dictations from Juan ávila and Michael Kraszewski, and Christmas had come. At San Diego, Juana Osuna and José María Estudillo furnished information. Fortunately the widow of Moreno, government secretary under Pico, was at San Diego, where she had brought from lower California a trunk filled with the papers of her late husband, who used to endorse even ordinary letters “á mi archivo, apuntes para la historia.” It seems here was another dreaming of history-writing. “The papers are indeed interesting in an historical point of view,” says Mr Savage, who so ingratiated himself with the widow as to gain access to the trunk; “Moreno had not only been secretary in upper California, but had taken part in the war against the United States in 1846, and for several years was 534 527 the géfe político of the region called the northern frontier of Lower California.” Señora Moreno returned to her rancho at Guadalupe, leaving her documents in the possession of Mr Savage.

Narciso Botello was a man of character, and though now poor, had held many important positions, as an active participant in public affairs from 1833 to 1847. He was induced to wait on Mr Savage at north San Diego and give his experiences, which were rich in historical events, manners and customs, education, and judicial processes.

Throughout the entire expedition Mr Savage was untiring in his efforts, which were not always attended by encouraging success. But fortune smiled on him during this January of 1878, though the face of the sun was clouded and the roads in bad condition from the rains. At the time of his death Judge Hayes was deep in two large collections of documents which he had shortly before obtained, one from Mr Alexander, son-in-law of Requena, and the other from Coronel, the former containing the valuable diary of Mr Mellus. All then fell into the hands of the son, Mr Chauncey Hayes, who resided at his rancho, five miles from San Luis Rey. From him Mr Savage, now on his homeward way, obtained “two cases pretty well crammed with manuscripts and newspaper slips, every one of which contained some information on the Californias and on other parts of the Pacific coast. They were taken to San Luis Rey under a heavy rain, which, however, did no damage. After some carpentering, to render the cases secure, I arranged for their conveyance to San Diego, thence to be shipped to San Francisco.” Mr Savage does not forget the kindness of Judge Egan, Doctor Crane, Pablo Pryor, Juan ávila, Father Mut, and others.

Back to Los Angeles, and again en route, armed with a letter from the best of our southern friends, Judge Sepúlveda, to Ignacio del Valle. A warm welcome, a dictation, and all the documents the place 535 528 afforded, followed a hard ride to the famous rancho of Camulos. Father Farrelly, the parish priest at San Buenaventura, was a jolly good fellow, as well as a kind-hearted gentleman. Besides extracts from the mission books here obtained, were the reminiscences of José Arnaz, Ramon Valdés, and others.

The 1st of March, at Santa Bárbara, Mr Savage joined Mr Murray, then engaged on the De la Guerra papers, kindly loaned him by Mr Dibblee, administrator of the estate. From early morning until far into the night, Sundays and other days, Mr Savage was soon engaged on the mission books, public and private documents, and in taking dictations from Mrs Ord, one of the De la Guerra daughters, Agustin Janssens, Apolinaria Lorenzana, and Rafael Gonzalez. Small but very valuable collections of papers were received from Concepcion Pico, sister of Governor Pico, and Dolores Dominguez, the two ladies being the widows of Domingo and José Carrillo. Many family archives had here by foolish heirs been wilfully burned or used for making cigarettes. “The results in Santa Bárbara,” Mr Savage writes, “from March 2d to April 4th were about four hundred pages of dictations, over two thousand documents, and two hundred pages of manuscript from the mission books. Much time was spent in vain search for papers not existing.” Subsequently Mr Murray obtained dictations from the American pioneers of that locality, notably from the old trapper Nidever, who came overland to California in 1832.

The usually thorough researches of Mr Savage met with some disappointment at San Luis Obispo, though, through the courteousness of Father Rousel, the widow Bonilla, Charles Dana, María Inocente Pico, widow of Miguel ávila, and José de Jesus Pico, the results were important. These all did much. Inocente García also gave one hundred and ten pages, and Canuto Boronda and Ignacio Ezquer valuable contributions. The very interesting diary of Walter 536 529 Murray was kindly loaned by his widow. On a fearful stormy night, at the risk of his life, driven to it by circumstances, Mr Savage, accompanied by José de Jesus Pico, visited the rancho of Señora de ávila in the interests of history, and there received every kindness.

I have not the space in this chapter to follow Mr Savage further. Many journeys he made for the library, and encountered many experiences; and great were the benefits to history, to California, arising therefrom. Though less ostentatious than some, his abilities were not surpassed by any. In the written narrative given me of his several adventures, which is full of interesting incidents and important historical explanations, the keenest disappointment is manifested over failures; nevertheless his success was gratifying, and can never be repeated. During the remainder of this expedition, which lasted eight months, ending at San Francisco early in June, Mr Savage secured to the library, the collections of Cárlos Olvera fo Chualar, and Rafael Pinto of Watsonville, “containing so much valuable matter,” Mr Savage says, “that the history of California would not have been complete without them.” Pinto was collector of the port at San Francisco at the time of the American occupation; he also gave his reminiscences.

Mr Savage did not cease his present efforts until the missions of San Rafael, San José, and San Francisco were searched, and material extracted from the state library at Sacramento. The old archives at the offices of the secretary of state, and county clerk, at Sacramento, were likewise examined, and notes taken from the several court records.

537 530

CHAPTER XXII.

HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. It is undeniable that the exercise of a creative power, that a free creative activity, is the highest function of man; it is proved to be so by man's finding in it his true happiness.

Matthew Arnold.

IN company with Mrs Bancroft on the 30th of April 1878 I sailed in the steamer City of Panamá, Captain William Seabury, for Vancouver Island, with the view of returning by land. After five days and nights of tempestuous buffeting, though without special discomfort, we safely landed at Esquimalt, and drove over to Victoria, three miles distant. We found a good hotel, the Driard house, and a gentlemanly host, Louis Redon. The day was Sunday, and though old ocean yet billowed through our brain and lifted our feet at every step—or, perhaps, because we were thus dogged by Neptune even after treading firm land—we decided to attend church.

On setting out from the hotel we met Mr Edgar Marvin, who accompanied us to Christ church, where the bishop presided over the cathedral service. Next day Mr Marvin introduced me to several persons whom I wished to see; and throughout our entire stay in Victoria he was unceasing in his kindness Mr T. N. Hibben, an old and esteemed friend, together with highly intelligent wife, were early and frequent in their attentions. Then there were A. C. Elliott, Lady Douglas, Mr and Mrs Harris, Governor and Mrs Richards, and a host of others. Though he did not affect literature, Sir Matthew 538 531 was thoroughly a good fellow, and no one in British Columbia exercised a more beneficial or a greater political and social influence; in fact, I may as well say at the outset that nowhere have I ever encountered kinder appreciation or more cordial and continued hospitality than here. Invitations so poured in upon us as seriously to interfere with my labors, and greatly to prolong our stay. I found it impossible to decline proffers of good-will so heartily made; and no less interest was manifested in furthering the object which had taken me there than in hospitable entertainment.

To examine public archives and private papers, to extract such portions as were useful in my work, to record and carry back with me the experiences of those who had taken an active part in the discovery and occupation of the country—these together with a desire to become historically inspired with the spirit of settlement throughout the great north-west, constituted the burden of my mission.

Engaging two assistants on Monday, the next day, Tuesday, I sat down to work in earnest. One of these assistants, Mr Thomas H. Long, I found a valuable man. The other I discharged at the end of a week. Afterward I tried two more, both of whom failed. The province was in the agonies of a general election, necessitated by the dissolution of the assembly by the governor, on the ground that the Elliott government, as it was called, was not sufficiently strong to carry out its measures. Unfortunately the old Hudson's Bay Company men, whom of all others I wished historically to capture, were many of them politicians. Composed to a great extent of tough, shrewd, clear-headed Scotchmen, the fur company's ancient servants were now the wealthy aristocrats of the province; and although they loved their country well, and were glad to give me every item respecting their early adventures, they loved office also, and would by no means neglect self-interest. But I was presistent. I was determined never to leave the province until 539 532 my cravings for information should be satisfied, and to obtain the necessary information at as early a day as possible.

The governor was absent fishing, and would not return for a week. Mr Elliott, the provincial secretary, was affable, but exceedingly occupied in the endeavor to rise again upon his political legs. He quickly gave me all printed government matter, but when it came to an examination of the archives he manifested no particular haste. His deputy, Mr Thomas Elwyn, offered access to everything in his office, but assured me that it contained nothing, since all the material which could in any wise throw light on history was in the house of the governor. None of the archives had been removed to Ottawa on confederating with Canada, as I had been informed.

When the governor, Mr Richards, as the people of this province called him, returned, I immediately waited upon him and made known my wishes. He was a plain, farmer-like man, with deep, bright, clear eyes and large brain, but by no means strikingly intellectual in appearance, though as much so, perhaps, as many of our own officials. He was a comparative stranger, he said, sent there from Canada; knew little regarding the documents in the governor's office, and proposed that a minute-in-council be passed by the provincial government in order to invest him with the requisite authority to open to me the government archives. Addressing a letter to Mr Elliott asking the passage of such a measure, he put me of once more.

Now Mr Elliott was prime minister, and his associates being absent he was the government, and had only to write out and enter the order to make it valid. I knew very well, and so did they, first that the governor required no such order, and secondly, that Mr Elliott could write it as easily as talk about it.

After a day or two lost by these evasions, I determined to bring the matter to a crisis. These 540 533 northwestern magnates must be awakened to a sense of duty; they must be induced to give me immediate access to the government archives or refuse, and the latter course I not believe they would adopt. Meeting Mr Elliott on the street shortly after, I said to him:

“The benighted republics of Central America not only throw open their records to the examination of the historian, but appoint a commissioner to gather and abstract material. It can hardly be possible that any English-speaking government should throw obstruction in the way of laudable historical effort.”

The minister's apologies were ample, and the order came forth directly. But the order did not suit the governor, who returned it and required in its place another, differently worded; and this at last given him he required that his secretary, the honorable Mr Boyle, a most affable, but somewhat needy and wholly inexperienced, young man, should alone have the making of the copies and abstracts, always, of course, at my expense.

Meanwhile every spare moment was occupied in bringing forward the ancients of this region, and in obtaining information from any and all sources. There were many good writers, many who had written essays, and even books. To instance: Mr G. M. Sproat, who drew up for me a skeleton of British Columbia history, according to his conception of it; Mr J. D. Pemberton, formerly private secretary of Sir James Douglas, and author of a work on British Columbia, who not only brought me a large package of printed material, but gave me some most valuable information in writing, and used his influence with Doctor Helmcken, the eccentric son-in-law of Sir James, and executor of the Douglas estate, to obtain for me the private books and papers in the possession of the family; Dr John Ash likewise wrote for me and gave me material, as did Thomas Elwyn, deputy provincial secretary, Arthur Wellesley Vowel, and Mr Elliott; from P. 541 534 N. Compton, Michael Muir, Alexander Allen, James Deans, and others, I obtained dictations. But most valuable of all were the reminiscences, amounting in some instances to manuscript volumes, and constituting histories more or less complete, of New Caledonia and the great north-west, the recollections of those who had spent their lives within this territory, who had occupied important positions of honor and trust, and were immediately identified not only with the occupation and settlement of the country but with its subsequent progress. Among these were A. C. Anderson, W. F. Tolmie, Roderick Finlayson, Archibald McKinlay, and others, men of mind, able writers some of them, and upon whose shoulders, after the records of Sir James Douglas, the diaries of chief factors, and the government and Hudson's Bay Company's archives, must rest the history of British Columbia.

James M. Douglas, son of Sir James, whose marriage with the daughter of Mr Elliott we had the pleasure of attending, granted me free and willing access to all the family books and papers. “Ah! said everybody, “you should have come before Sir James died. He would have rendered you assistance in value beyond computation.” So it is too often with these old men; their experiences and the benefit thereof to posterity are prized after they are beyond reach.

Lady Douglas was yet alive, and, though a halfbreed, was quite the lady. Her daughters were charming; indeed, it were next to impossible for the wife and daughters of Sir James Douglas to be other than ladies. Scarcely so much could truthfully be said of the sons of some other fur magnates, who as a rule were both idiotic and intemperate. Young Douglas, though kind and polite in the extreme, did not impress me as possessing extraordinary intelligence or energy. So in the family of Chief Factor Worth: the Indian wife, in body and mind, was strong and elastic as steel, 542 535 and while the daughters were virtuous and amiable, the sons were less admirable.

The honorable Amor de Cosmos, né Smith, the historic genius of the place, was absent attending the legislature in Canada. He was one of two brothers who conducted the Standard newspaper, and dabbled in politics and aspired to history-writing. One of these brothers was known as plain Smith; the other had had his name changed by the legislature of California. It was some time before I could realize that the man thus playing a practical joke on his own name was not a buffoon.

Mr William Charles, at this time director of the Hudson's Bay Company's affairs at Victoria, gave me much information, and among other things a journal of the founders of Fort Langley while journeying from Fort Vancouver and establishing a new fort on Fraser river. The record covered a period of three years, from 1827 to 1829. Mr Charles also sent to Fort Simpson for the records of that important post, and forwarded them to me after my return to San Francisco.

From George Hills, bishop of Columbia, I obtained copies of missionary reports giving much new knowledge of various parts. Mr Stanhope Farwell of the Victoria land office gave me a fine collection of maps and charts of that vicinity. Through the courtesy of John Robson, paymaster of the Canadian Pacific railway survey, Victoria, and William Buckingham of the office of the minister of public works, Ottawa, the printed reports of the survey were sent me from Canada. F. J. Roscoe in like manner furnished me with the Canadian blue-books, or printed public documents of British America. These, together with the blue-books found in the public offices at Victoria, and other official and general publications, boxed and shipped to San Francisco from that port, formed extensive and important additions to my library,

Mrs Bancroft begged permission to assist, and took 543 536 from one person, a missionary, the Rev. Mr Good, one hundred and twenty foolscap pages descriptive of the people and country round the upper Fraser. In Mr Anderson's narrative, which was very fine, she took special interest, and during our stay in Victoria she accomplished more than any one engaged in the work. Writing in her journal of Mr Good she says: “His descriptions of scenery and wild life are remarkable for vividness and beauty of expression. His graphic pictures so fascinated met that I felt no weariness, and was almost unconscious of effort.”

It was like penetrating regions beyond the world for descriptions of scenes acted on the other side of reality, this raking up the white-haired remnants of the once powerful but now almost extinct organization. There was old John Tod, tall, gaunt, with a mouth like the new moon, which took kindly to gin and soda, though Tod was not intemperate. He called himself eighty-four, and was clear-headed and sprightly at that, though his friends insisted he was nearer ninety-four. The old fur-factor lived about four miles from the city, and regularly every day, in a flaring cap with huge ears, and driving a bony bay hitched to a single, high-seated, rattling, spring wagon, he made his appearance at our hotel, and said his say. While speaking he must not be questioned; he must not be interrupted. Sitting in an arm-chair, leaning on his cane, or walking up and down the room, his deep-set eyes blazing with the renewed fire of oldtime excitements, his thin hair standing in electric attention, he recited with rapidity midst furious gesticulations story after story, one scene calling up another, until his present was wet with the sweat of the past.

Archibald McKinlay was another, a really brave and estimable character, and a man who had filled with honor to himself and profit to the Hudson's Bay Company many responsible positions, but, while younger than Mr Tod, he was not possessed of so unclouded a 544 537 memory or so facile a tongue. The whiskey he drank was stronger than Mr Tod's gin. He knew enough, but could not tell it. “If it's statisticals ye want I'll give 'em to ye,” he would bring out every few minutes, “but I'll have nothing to do with personalities.” When I hinted to him that history was made by persons and not by statistics, he retorted: “Well, I'll write something for ye.” He had much to say of Peter Skeen Ogden, whose half-breed daughter he had married. The first evening after our arrival he brought his wife to see us, and seemed very proud of her. He was really anxious to communicate his experiences, coming day after day to do so, but failing from sheer lack of tongue. He once interrupted Mr Tod, disputing some date, and the old gentleman never forgave him. Never after that, while McKinlay was in the room, would Mr Tod open his mouth, except to admit the gin and soda.

Doctor W. F. Tolmie, who had been manager of the Puget Sound agricultural company, and subsequently chief factor at Victoria, was of medium height, but so stoutly built as to seem short, with a large bald head, broad face and features, florid complexion, and small blue eyes, which, through their corners and apparently without seeing anything, took in all the world. He had been well educated in Europe, was clever, cunning, and withal exceedingly Scotch. Tolmie knew much, and could tell it; indeed, he did tell much, but only what he pleased. Nevertheless I found him one of my most profitable teachers in the doings of the past; and when I left Victoria he intrusted me with his journal kept while descending the Columbia river in 1833 and for four years thereafter, which he prized very highly.

Roderick Finlayson, mayor of Victoria, and founder of the fort there, was a magnificent specimen of the old-school Scotch gentleman. Upon a fine figure was well set a fine head, slightly bald, with grayish-white hair curled in tight, short ringlets round and behind 545 538 a most pleasing, benignant face. His beard was short and thick, in color brown and gray, well mixed. He tasted temperately of the champagne I placed before him, while Tolmie, who was totally abstinent for example's sake in the presence of his boys, prescribed himself liberal doses of brandy. The Rev. Mr Good, I think, enjoyed the brandy and cigars which were freely placed at his command fully as much as construing elegant sentences. Preferring to write rather than to dictate, Mr Finlayson gave me from his own pen in graphic detail many of the most stirring incidents in the history of British Columbia.

But more than to any other in Victoria, I feel myself indebted to Mr A. C. Anderson, a man not only of fine education, but of marked literary ability. Of poetic temperament, chivalrous in thought as well as in carriage, of acute observation and retentive memory, he proved to be the chief and standard authority on all matters relating to the country. He had published several works of value and interest, and was universally regarded as the most valuable living witness of the past. Tall, symmetrical, and very erect, with a long narrow face, ample forehead, well brushed white hair, side whiskers, and keen, light-blue eyes, he looked the scholar he was. Scarcely allowing himself an interruption, he devoted nearly two weeks to my work with such warm cheerfulness and gentlemanly courtesy as to win our hearts. Besides this, he brought me much valuable material in the form of record-books and letters. He took luncheon with us every day, smoked incessantly, and drank brandy and soda temperately.

Helmcken was a queer one; small in stature, but compactly built, with short black hair and beard, thickly sprinkled with gray, covering a round hard head, with clear eyes of meaningless, measureless depth, nose rose-red, and the stump of a cigar always stuck between tobacco-stained teeth—this for a head and body placed on underpinning seemingly insecure, 546 539 so as to give one the impression of a rolling, uncertain walk as well as manner, and added to most peculiar speech larded with wise saws and loud laughter, could be likened only to a philosopher attempting to ape the fool. One day he came rushing into our parlor at the hotel in a state of great excitement, so much so that he forgot to remove either his hat or cigar stub, giving Mrs Bancroft the impression that he was decidedly drunk, and demanded to be shown the papers delivered me by Lady Douglas and Mrs Harris. “They had no business to let them out of their hands!” he exclaimed. “Where are they?” I showed them to him, explained their value and application to history, and assured him they would be speedily copied and returned. Smiles then slowly wreathed the red face; the eyes danced, the hat came off, and loud laughter attended the little man's abrupt disappearance.

I could write a volume on what I saw and did during this visit of about a month at Victoria, but I must hasten forward. After a gentlemen's dinner at Sir Matthew's; a grand entertainment at Mr Marvin's; several visits from and to Lady Douglas, Mrs Harris, Doctor and Mrs Ash, and many other charming calls and parties; and a hundred promises, not one in ten of which were kept; leaving Mr Long to finish copying the Douglas papers, the Fraser papers, the Work journals, and the manuscripts furnished by Anderson, Finlayson, Tod, Spence, Vowel, and others; after a voyage to New Westminster, and after lending our assistance in celebrating the Queen's birthday, on the last day of May we crossed to Port Townsend, having completed one of the hardest months of recreation I ever experienced. But long before this I had reached the conclusion that while this work lasted there was no rest for me.

At every move a new field opened. At Port Townsend, which in its literary perspective presented an aspect so forbidding that I threatened to pass it by 547 540 without stopping, I was favored with the most fortunate results. Judge James G. Swan, ethnologist, artist, author of Three Years at Shoalwater Bay, and divers Smithsonian monographs and newspaper articles, was there ready to render me every assistance, which he did by transferring to me his collection, the result of thirty years' labor in that direction, and supplementing his former writing by other and unwritten experiences. Poor fellow! The demon Drink had long held him in his terrible toils, and when told that I was in town he swore he would first get sober before seeing me. How many thousands of our pioneer adventurers have been hastened headlong to perdition by the hellish comforter! Major J. J. H. Van Bokkelen was there, and after giving me his dictation presented to Mrs Bancroft a valuable collection of Indian relics, which he had been waiting twenty years, as he said, to place in the hands of some one who would appreciate them. There we saw Mr Pettigrove, one of the founders of Portland; Mr Plummer, one of the earliest settlers at Port Towsend; W. G. Spencer, N. D. Hill, John L. Butler, Henry A. Webster, and L. H. Briggs, from all of whom I obtained additions to my historical stores. Dr Thomas T. Minor entertained us handsomely, and showed me through his hospital, which was a model of neatness and comfort. He obtained from Samuel Hancock of Coupeville, Whidbey island, a voluminous manuscript, which was then at the east seeking a publisher. James S. Lawson, captain of the United States coast survey vessel Fauntleroy, took us on board his ship and promised to write for me a history of western coast survey, the fulfilment of which reached me some six months after in the form of a very complete and valuable manuscript. Here, likewise, I encountered Amos Bowman, of Anacortes, Fidalgo island, whom I engaged to accompany me to Oregon and take dictations in short-hand. Bowman was a scientific adventurer of the Bliss type. He remained with me 548 541 until my northern work as far south as Salem was done, when he proceeded to San Francisco and took his place for a time in the library. He was a good stenographer, but not successful at literary work.

After a visit to Fort Townsend, upon the invitation of William Gouverneur Morris, United States revenue agent, we continued our way to Seattle, the commercial metropolis of the territory. Three thousand lethargic souls at this date comprised the town, with a territorial university and an eastern railroad as aspirations. There we met Yesler, sawmill owner and old man of the town; and Horton, who drove us through the forest to the lake; and Mercer, Lansdale, Arthur Denny, Booth, Hill, Spencer, and Haller, from each of whom we obtained valuable information. Mrs Abby J. Hanford subsequently sent me an interesting paper on early times at Seattle. There also I met the pioneer expressman of both California and British Columbia, Billy Ballou, a rare adventurer, and in his way a genius, since dead, like so many others. Had I time and space, a characteristic picture might be made of his peculiarities.

The North Pacific, a neat little steamboat, had carried us across from Victoria to Port Townsend, where the Dakota picked us up for Seattle; thence, after two days' sojourn, we embarked for Olympia on board the Messenger, Captain Parker, an early boatman on these waters. When fairly afloat I took my stenographer to the wheel-house, and soon were spread upon paper the striking scenes in the life of Captain Parker, who, as our little craft shot through the glassy forest-fringed inlet, recited his history in a clear intelligent manner, together with many points of interest descriptive of our charming surroundings.

On board the Messenger was Captain Ellicott of the United States coast survey, who invited us to land 549 542 at his camp, some ten miles before reaching Olympia, and spend the night, which we did, touching first at Tacoma and Steilacoom. After an excellent dinner, Bowman wrote from the captain's notes until eleven o'clock, when we retired, and after an early breakfast next morning the captain's steam yacht conveyed us to the capital of the territory.

Immediately upon our arrival at Olympia we were waited upon by the governor and Mrs Ferry, Elwood Evans, historian of this section, Mrs Evans, and others among the chief ladies and gentlemen of the place. Mr Evans devoted the whole of two days to me, drew forth from many a nook and corner the musty records of the past, and placed the whole of his material at my disposal.

“I had hoped,” said he, “to do this work myself, but your advantages are so superior to mine that I cheerfully yield. I only wish to see the information I have gathered during the last thirty years properly used, and that I know will in your hands be done.”

And so the soul of this man's ambition, in the form of two large cases of invaluable written and printed matter on the Northwest Coast, was shipped down to my library, of which it now constitutes an important part. To call such a one generous is faint praise. Then, as well as before and after, his warm encouraging words, and self-sacrificing devotion to me and my work, won my lasting gratitude and affection.

At Portland we found ready to assist us, by every means in their power, many warm friends, among whom were S. F. Chadwick, then governor of Oregon; Matthew P. Deady, of the United States judiciary; William Strong, one of the first appointees of the federal government, after the treaty, as judge of the supreme court; Mrs Abernethy, widow of the first provisional governor of Oregon, and Mrs Harvey, daughter of Doctor McLoughlin, and formerly wife of William Glenn Rae, who had charge of the Hudson's Bay Company's affairs, first at Stikeen and afterward 550 543 at Yerba Buena. Colonel Sladen, aide-de-camp to General Howard, who was absent fighting Indians, not only threw open to me the archives of the military department, but directed his clerks to make such abstracts from them as I should require. Old Elisha White, the first Indian and government agent in Oregon, I learned was in San Francisco. On my return I immediately sought him out, and had before his death, which shortly followed, many long and profitable interviews with him. I should not fail to mention Governor Gibbs, General Hamilton, Stephen Coffin, Mrs J. H. Couch, Mr McCraken, H. Clay Wood, Mr Corbett, George H. Atkinson, Simeon Reed, W. Lair Hill, and H. W. Scott of the Oregonian. R. P. Earhart kindly supplied me with a set of the Oregon grand lodge proceedings. In company with Dr J. C. Hawthorne we visited his insane asylum, a model of neatness and order. General Joseph Lane, hero of the Mexican war and many northern Indian battles, first territorial governor of Oregon, and first delegate from the territory to congress, I met first at Portland and took a dictation from him in the parlor of the Clarendon hotel, at which we were staying, and subsequently obtained further detail at his home at Roseburg. J. N. Dolph wrote Mr Gray, the historian, who lived at Astoria, to come to Portland to see me, but he was not at home, and my business with him had to be done by letter. Mrs F. F. Victor, whose writings on Oregon were by far the best extant, and whom I wished much to see, was absent on the southern coast gathering information for the revision of her Oregon and Washington. On my return to San Francisco I wrote offering her an engagement in my library, which she accepted, and for years proved one of my most faithful and efficient assistants. Father Blanchet was shy and suspicious: I was not of his fold; but as his wide range of experiences was already in print it made little difference.

We had been but a few hours in this beautiful and 551 544 hospitable city when we were informed that the annual meeting of the Oregon pioneers' association was to open immediately in Salem. Dropping our work at Portland, to be resumed later, we proceeded at once to the capital, and entered upon the most profitable five days' labor of the entire trip; for there we found congregated from the remotest corners of the state the very men and women we most wished to see, those who had entered that region when it was a wilderness, and had contributed the most important share toward making the society and government what it was. Thus six months of ordinary travel and research were compressed within these five days.

I had not yet registered at the Chemeketa hotel in Salem when J. Henry Brown, secretary of the pioneers' association, presented himself, at the instance of Governor Chadwick, and offered his services. He was a fair type of the average Oregonian, a printer by trade, and poor; not particularly pleasing in appearance, somewhat slovenly in his dress, and indifferent as to the length and smoothness of his hair. I found him a diamond in the rough, and to-day there is no man in Oregon I more highly esteem. He knew everybody, introduced me and my mission to everybody, drummed the town, and made appointments faster than I could keep them, even by dividing my force and each of us taking one. He secured for me all printed matter which I lacked. He took me to the state archives, and promised to make a transcript of them. I paid him a sum of money down, for which he did more than he had bargained.

It was a hot and dusty time we had of it, but we worked with a will, day and night; and the notes there taken, under the trees and in the buildings about the fair-grounds, at the hotel, and in private parlors and offices, made a huge pile of historic lore when written out as it was on our return to San Francisco. There was old Daniel Waldo, who, though brought by infirmity to time's border, still stoutly 552 545 stumped his porch and swore roundly at everything and everybody between the Atlantic and Pacific. There was the mild missionary Parrish, who in bringing the poor Indian the white man's religion and civilization, strove earnestly but fruitlessly to save him from the curses of civilization and religion. There was John Minto, eloquent as a speaker and writer, with a wife but little his inferior: the women, indeed, spoke as freely as the men when gathered round the camp fires of the Oregon pioneers' association. For example: Mrs Minto had to tell how women lived, and labored, and suffered, and died, in the early days of Oregon; how they clothed and housed themselves, or, rather, how they did without houses and clothes during the first wet winters of their sojourn; how an admiring young shoemaker had measured the impress of her maiden feet in the mud, and sent her as a present her first Oregon shoes. Mrs Samuel A. Clarke took a merry view of things, and called crossing the plains in 1851 a grand picnic. J. Quinn Thornton, with his long grizzly hair and oily tongue was there, still declaiming against Jesse Applegate for leading him into Oregon by the then untried southern route thirty years before. Still, though somewhat crabbed and unpopular among his fellow-townsmen, Judge Thornton rendered important service by transferring to me valuable material collected by him for literary purposes, for he too had affected history, but was now becoming somewhat infirm. David Newsome knew something, he said, but would tell it only for money. I assured David that the country would survive his silence. Mr Clarke, with his amiable and hospitable wife and daughters, spared no pains to make our visit pleasing as well as profitable. Senator Grover was in Washington, but I caught him afterward in San Francisco as he was passing through, and obtained from him a lengthy and valuable dictation. General Joel Palmer told me all he could remember, but his mind was evidently failing. 553 546 James W. Nesmith related to me several anecdotes, and afterward sent me a manuscript of his own writing. The contribution of Medorem Crawford was important. Among the two or three hundred prominent Oregonians I met at Salem I can only mention further Richard H. Ekin, Horace Holden, Joseph Holman, W. J. Herren, and H. H. Gilfry, of Salem; W. H. Rees, Butteville; B. S. Clark, Champoeg; William L. Adams, Hood River; B. S. Wilson, Corvallis; Joseph Watts, Amity; George B. Roberts, Cathlamet; R. C. Gear, Silverton; Thomas Congdon, Eugene City; B. S. Strahan, and Thomas Monteith, Albany; and Shamus Carnelius, Lafayette. Philip Ritz of Walla Walla gave me his dictation in San Francisco.

On our way back to Portland we stopped at Oregon City, the oldest town in the state, where I met and obtained recitals from S. W. Moss, A. L. Lovejoy, and John M. Bacon, and arranged with W. H. H. Fouts to copy the archives. I cannot fail, before leaving Portland, specially to mention the remarkable dictations given me by Judge Deady and Judge Strong, each of which, with the authors' writings already in print, constitutes a history of Oregon in itself. Indeed, both of these gentlemen had threatened to write a history of Oregon.

After a flying visit to the Dalles, overland by rail from Portland to San Francisco was next in order, with private conveyance over the Siskiyou mountains. It was a trip I had long wished to make, and we enjoyed every hour of it. I have not space for details. We stopped at many places, saw many men, and gathered much new material. At Drain we remained one day to see Jesse Applegate, and he spent the entire time with us. He was a remarkable person, in some respects the foremost man in Oregon during a period of twenty years. In him were united the practical and the intellectual in an eminent degree. He could explore new regions, lay out a farm, and write essays 554 547 with equal facility. He was political economist, mechanic, or historian, according to requirement. His fatal mistake, like that of many another warm-hearted and chivalrous man, was, as he expressed it, in “signing his name once too often.” But though the payment of the defaulter's bond sent him in poverty into the hills of Yoncalla, he was neither dispirited nor dyspeptic. At seventy, with his active and intellectual life, so lately full of flattering probabilities, a financial failure, his eye was as bright, his laugh as unaffected and merry, his form as erect and graceful, his step as elastic, his conversation as brilliant, his realizing sense of nature and humanity as keen, as at forty. Never shall I forget that day, nor the friendship that grew out of it.

The veteran Joseph Lane I found somewhat more difficult of management in his home at Roseburg than at Portland. Congressional honors were on his brain, fostered therein by his friend Applegate. Then he was troubled by his son Lafayette, who though somewhat silly was by no means without ability. The father wished the son to aid him in writing his history for me. The son would promise everything and perform nothing. Nevertheless, in due time, by persistent effort, I obtained from the general all I required.

At Jacksonville I sat through the entire night, until my carriage called for me at break of day, taking a most disgusting dictation from the old Indian-butcher John E. Ross. This piece of folly I do not record with pleasure.

I must conclude this narrative of my northern journey with the mention of a few out of the several scores I met on my way who took an active interest in their history:

At Drain, besides Jesse Applegate, I saw James A. Sterling, who was with Walker in Nicaragua, and John C. Drain, the founder of the place. At Roseburg were A. R. Flint, L. F. Mosher, and others, and at Ashland, O. C. Applegate. By reason of his 555 548 personal devotion I will forgive my old friend B. F. Dowell for employing his copyist, William Hoffman, to write from a newspaper belonging to the historical society of the place a sketch of fifty manuscript pages, at a cost to me of thirty dollars. After I had paid this exorbitant charge without a murmur, and Dowell asked for more similar work for his protegé, I replied that historical information at Jacksonville was too high for any but a ten-millionaire to indulge in; and that it was strange to me a town with public spirit sufficient to boast an historical society should make so great a mistake as unmercifully to fleece one willing to spend time and money in giving it a place in history. The fact is that, although as a rule the men I met were intelligent enough properly to appreciate my efforts, there were everywhere a few who saw in them only mercenary motives, and would impart their knowledge, or otherwise open to me the avenue to their local affairs, only for a price. On the strength of J. B. Rosborough's magnificent promises I gave him a ream of paper and a set of the Native Races, and received in return not a word. This, however, was not so bad as the case of the honorable Mr Justice Crease, of Victoria, and his man Clayton, who besides a liberal supply of stationery secured from me a sum of money for promised writing, not a line of which was ever sent to me.

P. P. Prim, L. J. C. Duncan, J. M. McCall, Lindsay Applegate, J. M. Sutton, Daniel Gaby, William Bybee, David Lin, and James A. Cardwell were also at Jacksonville. Then there were Anthony M. Sleeper, Joseph Rice, D. Ream, A. P. McCarton, Thomas A. Bantz, A. E. Raynes, F. G. Hearn, of Yreka; C. W. Taylor and Charles McDonald of Shasta; Henry F. Johnson and Chauncey C. Bush of Reading, important names in the local history of their respective places. Mrs Laura Morton of the state library, Sacramento, very kindly copied for me the diary of her father, Philip L. Edwards.

556 549

The 7th of July saw me again at my table at Oakville. It was during the years immediately succeeding the return from my expedition to the north that I wrote the History of the Northwest Coast and the History of British Columbia; Oregon and Alaska came in later.

In reviewing this journey I would remark that I found at the head-quarters of the honorable Hudson's Bay Company in Victoria rooms full of old accounts, books, and letters, and boxes and bins of papers relating to the business of the company, and of its several posts. The company's Oregon archives were lodged here, and also those from the Hawaiian islands and the abandoned posts of New Caledonia.

The office of the provincial secretary contained at this time books and papers relative to the local affairs of the government, but I found in them little of historical importance. At the government house, in the office of the governor's private secretary, was richer material, in the shape of despatches between the governors of British Columbia and Vancouver island and the secretary of state for the colonies in London and the governor-general of Canada. There were likewise correspondence of various kinds, despatches of the minister at Washington to the government here in 1856-70, papers relative to the San Juan difficulty, the naval authorities at Esquimalt, 1859-71, letters from Admiral Moresby to Governor Blanchard, and many miscellaneous records and papers important to the historian.

Oregon's most precious material for history I found in the heads of her hardy pioneers. The office of the adjutant-general of the department of the Columbia contained record-books and papers relative to the affairs of the department which throw much light on the settlement and occupation of the country. There are letters-sent-books and letters-received-books since 1858, containing instructions and advices 557 550 concerning the establishment of posts and the protection of the people. The public library, Portland, contained nothing worthy of special mention.

There was once much valuable material for history in the Oregon state library at Salem, but in 1856 a fire came and swept it away. The legislature passed a law requiring a copy of every newspaper published in the state to be sent to the State library, but the lawyers came and cut into them so badly for notices or any article they desired that finally the librarian sold them to Chinamen for wrapping-paper—a shift-less and short-sighted policy, I should say. It had been the intention of the state to preserve them, but as no money was appropriated for binding, they were scattered and destroyed. At the time of my visit in 1878 there was little in the state library except government documents and law-books.

In the rooms of the governor of Oregon were the papers of the provisional government, and others such as naturally accumulate in an executive office. When I saw them they were in glorious disorder, having been thrown loose into boxes without respect to kind or quality. Engaging Mr J. Henry Brown to make copies and abstracts of them for me, I stipulated with him, for the benefit of the state, that he should leave them properly classified and chronologically arranged. Mr Brown had made a collection of matter with a view of writing a statistical work on Oregon, and possessed a narrative of an expedition under Joseph L. Meek, sent by the provisional government to Washington for assitance during the Indian war. He also had a file of the Oregonian. A. Bush possessed a file of the Oregon Statesman. From Mrs Abernethy I obtained a file of the Oregon Spectator, the first newspaper published in Oregon. Mr Nesmith had a file of the journal last mentioned, besides boxes of letters and papers.

The first printing-press ever brought to Oregon was sent to the Sandwich island by the American 558 551 board of commissioners for foreign missions, and was used there for printing books in the Hawaiian language; then, at the request of doctors Whitman and Spaulding, it was transferred to Oregon, to the Nez Percé mission on the Clearwater, now called the Lapwai agency. This was in 1838. The press was used for some time to print books in the Nez Percé and Walla Walla languages, and at the time of my visit it stood in the state house at Salem, a rare and curious relic, where also might be seen specimens of its work under the titles: Nez-Percés First Book; designed for children and new beginners. Clear Water, Mission Press, 1839. This book was prepared in the Nez Percé language, by the Rev. H. H. Spaulding. Matthewnim Taaiskt. Printed at the press of the Oregon Mission under the direction of The American Board, C. F. Missions. Clear Water: M. G. Foisy, Printer—being the gospel of Matthew, translated by H. H. Spaulding, and printed on eighty pages, small 4to, double columns. Another title-page was Talapusapaiain Wanipt Timas. Paul wah sailas hiwanpshina GODNIM wataskitph. Luk. Kauo wanpith LORDIPH timnaki. Paul. Lapwai: 1842—which belonged to a book of hymns prepared by H. H. Spaulding in the Nez Percé language.

Before setting out on my northern journey I had arranged with Mr Petroff to visit Alaska, and continue the northward line of search where my investigations should leave it, thus joining the great northwest to southern explorations already effected.

In all my varied undertakings I have scarcely asked a favor from any one. I never regarded it in the light of personal favor for those having material for history, or information touching the welfare of themselves, their family, or the state, to give it me to embody in my work. I always felt that the obligation was all the other way; that my time was spent for their benefit rather than for my own. As a matter 559 552 of course, my object was to benefit neither myself primarily nor them, but to secure to the country a good history.

From boyhood I have held the doctrine of Fénelon: “I would like to oblige the whole human race, especially virtuous people; but there is scarcely anybody to whom I would like to be under obligations.”

And even among the many who contributed, there was singular lack of consideration and coöperation. I might go to any amount of trouble, spend any amount of money, yet it never seemed to occur to them to furnish me their dictation at their expense instead of mine. Moneyed men of San Francisco have growled to me by the hour about their great sacrifice of valuable time in telling me their experiences. And some of them, instead of offering to pay the copyist, stipulated that I should furnish them a copy of their dictation, which they had been at so much trouble to give. One man, a millionaire farmer, the happy owner of forty thousand acres, with fifty houses on the place, enough to accommodate an army, permitted one of my men to pay his board at the hotel during a ten days' dictation. This was thoughtlessness rather than inherent meanness, for these men did not hesitate to devote themselves to public good in certain directions, particularly where some newspaper notoriety was to be gained by it. It certainly required no little devotion to the cause to spend my time and money in thus forcing unappreciated benefits upon others.

Once only in the whole course of my literary labors I asked free passage for one of my messengers on a sea-going vessel: this was of the manager in San Francisco of the Alaska Commercial company, and it was curtly refused. I was drawn into this request by the seeming friendliness of the man for me and my work. He had gone out of his way to express a willingness to assist me to material for the history of Alaska; so that when Petroff, who knew all about Alaska, assured me of the existence there of valuable 560 553 material, I did not hesitate to ask a pass for him up and back on one of the company's vessels. This uncourteous refusal of so slight a request, aiming at the largest public benefit, the burden of which rested wholly upon me, the cost of Petroff's passage being absolutely nothing to the company, struck me as very peculiar in a man who had been once collector of the port, and at that very moment was not unwilling to spend and be spent for his country as United States senator at Washington. However, we will rest satisfied: for the very first vessel despatched for Alaska after this conversation, the schooner General Miller, on which Mr Petroff would have sailed ha permission been granted him, was capsized at sea and all on board were lost.

I immediately applied through Senator Sargent to the government authorities in Washington for passage for Mr Petroff on board any revenue-cutter cruising in Alaskan waters. The request was granted, on condition that I paid one hundred dollars for his subsistence, which I did.

Mr Petroff embarked at San Francisco on board the United States cutter Richard Rush, Captain Bailey, the 10th of July 1878, touched at Port Townsend the 16th, at Nanaimo for coal on the 17th, and anchored that night in the Seymour Narrows, in the gulf of Georgia. Late on the afternoon of the 18th Fort Rupert was reached, where Mr Petroff met Mr Hunt, in charge of the station, who had resided there since 1849; Mr Hall, a missionary, was also settled there. After sailing from Fort Rupert in the early morning and crossing Queen Charlotte sound, anchorage was made that evening in Safety cove, Fitzhugh sound. Passing Bellabella, another of the Hudson's Bay company's stations, the cutter continued its course until at sundown it reached Holmes bay, on McKay reach. On Sunday, the 21st, the course lay through Grenville channel to Lowe inlet, and the following day was reached 561 554 Aberdeen, Cardena bay, where an extensive salmon cannery was situated.

The first archives to be examined were at Fort Simpson. There Petroff met Mr McKay, agent of the fur company, who placed at his command the daily journals of the post dating back to 1833. Over these papers Petroff worked assiduously from nightfall till half past one, in the quaint old office of the Hudson's Bay company, with its remnants of homemade carpets and furniture. Only eight volumes were examined during his limited stay; but subsequently I had the good fortune to obtain the loan of the whole collection for examination at my library in San Francisco. In inky darkness Petroff then made his way out of the stockade of the fort through a wilderness of rocks and rows of upturned canoes, until he reached the cutter. Mr McKay had taken passage for Fort Wrangel, and during the trip furnished a valuable dictation. The fort was reached on the evening of the 23d. Upon arriving at Fort Sitka, on the morning of July 26th, Petroff immediately began to work upon the church and missionary archives furnished by Father Mitropolski, and spent the evening obtaining information from old residents and missionaries; among the latter, Miss Kellogg, Miss Cohen, and Mr Bredy had interesting experiences to relate. Collector Ball and his deputy were most attentive. July 28th the cutter steamed away for Kadiak, which was reached two days later. The agents of the Alaska company, and of Falkner, Bell, and company, Messrs McIntyre and Hirsch, came on board the steamer, and were very hospitable. Mr McIntyre lent Petroff the company's journals, which were thoroughly examined. Among those who furnished personal data from long residence in this country were Mr Stafeifk, Mr Zakharof, and Father Kasherarof. Others, recently arrived from Cook inlet, also gave considerable information. Mr Pavlof, son of the former Russian governor, and manager at 562 555 this time of the American and Russian Ice company, had much important knowledge to impart.

Mr McIntyre presented Mr Petroff with a mummy, which was sent to the Bancroft Library and placed in a glass case. It was obtained by Mr McIntyre from Nutchuk island, from a cave on the side of a steep mountain very difficult of access. In this cave were the dried bodies of a man and two boys. One was secretly shipped, but when the others were about to be placed in a box the natives interfered, and required their burial for a time. It was Mr Oliver Smith, a trader at Nutchuk, who undertook their removal, and who obtained for Petroff the legend connected with them. The body is well preserved, with finely formed head, bearing little resemblance either to Aleut or Kalosh. The hair is smooth and black; it has the scanty mustache and goatee, sometimes noticeable among Aleuts. The nose has lost its original shape. Brown and well dried, with chin resting on the raised knees, this strange relic has a curious appearance as it surveys its new surroundings. This much of its history is furnished by the natives: Long ago, before the Russians had visited these lands, there had been war between the Nutchuk people and the Medonopky, Copper River people, who were called Ssootchetnee. The latter were victorious, and carried home the women, slaying the men and boys. The conquered Nutchuks waited for many years their turn to avenge themselves. One day, while some of the Ssootchetnees were hunting sea-otter along the shore, several bidarkas from Nutchuk approached, and in the attack which followed captured the hunters. Guided by a smoke column, they went on shore and discovered a woman cooking. She was one of the Nutchuk captives, who had been taken from their island, and was now wife and mother to some of the men just secured. Her father had been a great chief, but was dead; and when she was returned a prisoner to her 563 556 native land the chief of the island refused to recognize her because of her relations with the Ssootchetness. Cruelly he drove her from him, telling her to go to a cave in the side of a mountain if she sought comfort. Obeying, she proceeded thither, and found the naked bodies of her husband and two sons. So copiously flowed her tears that the bottom of the cave was filled with water, which submerged the bodies. Nor were her groans without avail, for they reached the heart of the powerful Wilghtnee, a woman greatly respected for her goodness, and because she controlled the salmon, causing them every year to ascend the river, and bringing other fish from the deep sea near to the shore. Wilghtnee lived in a lake of sweet water above the cave, and soon learned the story of wrongs and injustice from the weeping woman. Commanding her to cease lamenting, and assuring her that she need not grieve for the want of skins in which to sew her dead, as was the custom, Wilghtnee took the bodies where should fall upon them the waters from her mountain lake, and in a short time they became fresh and beautiful, shining like the flesh of the halibut. Then were they returned to the cave, and Wilghtnee promised that they should forever after remain unchanged. Retribution followed the chief's cruelty, for Wilghtnee was as relentless in her anger as she was tender in her sympathy, and not a salmon was permitted to enter the river or lake that year, which caused the death from hunger of the chief and many of his tribe. Then was the woman made his successor, and during her rule never again did Wilghtnee permit the salmon to fail. The new ruler taught the people how to preserve their dead, and closed the cave, in which alone and forever she destined should remain her Ssootchetnee husband and children.

On the 3d of August Mr Petroff reached the tradingpost at Belkovsky, which had existed there for fifty years; thence he passed along the southern extremity 564 557 of the Alaskan peninsula, through Unimak strait into Bering sea, to Ilinlink, Unalaska island, where he remained for two weeks, and where he received cordial assistance in his labors from all who had it in their power to help him. Mr Greenbaum of the Alaska company secured him access to the church and company records, and gave him a desk in his office. Throughout this trip Mr Greenbaum was exceedingly kind, furnishing him means of transportation, and otherwise assisting in his explorations. Bishop Seghers of British Columbia, and Father Montard, the Yukon missionary, furnished much important material concerning the Yukon country. The bishop was an accomplished Russian linguist. Father Shashnikof, the most intelligent and respected of all the representatives of the Greek church, was the oldest priest in Alaska, and chief authority on the past and present condition of the Aleuts, and had in his possession documents of great value, of ancient date, and interesting matter.

Mr Petroff visited, among other places of historic interest, the spot where Captain Levashef wintered in 1768, ten years before Captain Cook, imagining himself its discoverer, took possession for the British crown. A few iron implements left by his party, or stolen from them, are still exhibited by the natives. Again he visited an island where a massacre of Russians by Aleuts took place in 1786; the ground plan of the Russian winter houses is still visible.

Mr Lucien Turner, signal service officer and correspondent of the Smithsonian institution, had been stationed at various points in this vicinity for many years, and had made a thorough study of the languages, habits, and traditions of all tribes belonging to the Innuit and Tinneh families. Petroff found him a valuable informant on many subjects.

Hearing of an octogenarian Aleut at Makushino, on the south-western side of the island, whose testimony it was important to obtain, Petroff went in search of the old man, accompanied by the Ilinlink 565 558 chief Rooff as interpreter, and another Aleut as guide. They encountered great difficulties. Instead of the five or six streams described they waded knee-deep through fifty-two the first day. At five the next morning they started again. It was possible only at low tide to round the projecting points of rock, and at times they jumped from bowlder to bowlder, at others they crept along narrow slippery shelves, while the angry tide roared at their feet, and overhanging rocks precluded the possibility of ascent. Eleven wearisome hours of walking brought them to a lake, through which for two miles they waded, as their only way of reaching Makushino. There the old chief received them well and told all he knew.

Before leaving Ilinlink, Mr Petroff had long interviews with Doctor McIntyre, Captain Erskine, and Mr John M. Morton.

Again the cutter weighed anchor, amidst dipping of flags and waving of handkerchiefs. This was on the 19th of August, and at noon the following day they arrived at St George, where Mr Morgan and Doctor Specting, the agent and physician of the fur company, came on board and gave Mr Petroff some notes. Upon reaching St Paul that evening, Mr Armstrong, an agent of the company, and Petroff landed in whale-boat, passing between jagged rocks through dangerous surf. They were met by Captain Moulton, treasury agent, Doctor Kelley, and Mr McIntyre, who, together with Mr Armstrong, kindly assisted in making extracts that night from their archives and hospitably entertained him. Early the following morning Father Shashnikof placed in his hands bundles of church records, with which the former priest had begun to paper his house, but the present incumbent, recognizing their value, rescued the remainder. The chief of the Aleuts spent some time with him, giving a clear account of the past and present condition of his people. He was very intelligent, and evidently had Russian blood in his veins.

566 559

At Tchitchtagof, on Altoo island, where the cutter anchored the 25th, Mr Petroff found records of the community kept during the past fifty years. Five days after saw the Rush at Atkha, in Nazan bay. Here some interesting incidents of early days were obtained from two old men and one woman of eighty. On all these islands the natives spoke of M. Pinart and his researches. On the 1st of September they landed at Unalaska, where Petroff met Mr Lunievsky, Mr King, Mr Fred Swift, and the Reverend Innocentius Shashnikof, and was at once put in possession of the archives, and materially assisted in his labors by the priest throughout his stay. The Rush was detained here several days on account of the weather. Gregori Krukof, trader from a neighboring village, Borka, on the east side of the island, and the native chief Nikolaï, visited Unalaska during that time, and took Petroff back with them to visit the place where Captain Cook had wintered in 1778. Borka is situated on Beaver bay, between a lake and a small cove. On the arrival of the bidarkas the chief assembled the oldest of the inhabitants and questioned them as to their knowledge of Captain Cook. They related what they remembered as told them by their parents; that once a foreign vessel came into Beaver bay and anchored opposite to their village, off Bobrovskaya, where they remained but a few days, afterward sailing around into what has ever since been called the “English burkhta,” or bay, where the vessel was moored and remained all winter. The foreigners built winter-quarters, and with the natives killed seals, which abounded at that time. The captain's name was Kukha. The following morning Mr Petroff, with the chief as guide, visited the places mentioned. All that remains of Bobrovskaya is a gigantic growth of weeds and grass over the building sites and depressions where houses had stood. A whitewashed cross marks the spot where the chapel was located, and at some distance away, 567 560 on the hill-side a few posts and crosses indicate the ancient graveyard. Two or three miles intervened between the old village and the anchorage, the trail being obliterated by luxuriant vegetation. It is a beautiful landlocked bay, and as a harbor for safety and convenience can not be excelled in all Alaska. Abreast of this anchorage is a circular basin, into which empties the water running over a ledge of rocks. Between the basin and the beach is an excavation in a side hill, twenty feet square, indicating the winter habitation of foreigners, as it is contrary to the custom of the Aleuts to build in that shape or locality.

Mr. Petroff made an expedition to some Indian fortifications, supposed to be two hundred years old, situated on the top of a mountain two thousand feet high and ten miles distant. According to tradition there had been fierce wars between the Koniagas, or Kadiak islanders, and the Unalaska people, and the ruins of fortifications on both islands confirm these traditions.

On the 9th of October the Rush started on the homeward voyage, reaching San Francisco the 27th.

Several other trips to Alaska were made by Mr Petroff during his engagement with me, and while none of them, like the one just narrated, were wholly for historical purposes, material for history was ever prominent in his mind. After the return of the Rush Mr Petroff resumed his labor in the library, which for the most part consisted in extracting Alaska material and translating Russian books and manuscripts for me.

While thus engaged he encountered a notice in the Alaska Times of the 2d of April 1870 that General J. C. Davis had addressed to the secretary of war in Washington five boxes of books and papers formerly belonging to the Russian-American fur company, and had sent them to division head-quarters at San 568 561 Francisco by the Newbern. It was in December 1878 that this important discovery was made. Upon inquiry of Adjutant-general John C. Kelton it was ascertained that the boxes had been forwarded to the war department in Washington. Secretary McCrary was questioned upon the matter, and replied that the boxes had been transferred to the state department. Mr John M. Morton and William Gouverneur Morris, then on their way to Washington, were spoken to on the subject, and promised to institute a search for the archives. On the 13th of February 1879 a letter from Mr Morton announced that the boxes had been found by him among a lot of rubbish in a basement of the state department, where they were open to inspection, but could not be removed. The greater portion of the next two years was spent by Mr Petroff in Washington extracting material for my History of Alaska from the contents of these boxes. The library of congress was likewise examined; also the archives of the navy and interior and coast survey departments, and the geological and ethnological bureaus.

569 562

CHAPTER XXIII.

FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. I worked with patience, which means almost power. I did some excellent things indifferently, some bad things excellently. Both were praised; the latter loudest.

Mrs Browning.

IN treating of the main issues of these industries, I have somewhat neglected library details, which I esteem not the least important part of these experiences. If the history of my literary efforts be worth the writing, it is in the small particulars of every-day labors that the reader will find the greatest profit. The larger results speak for themselves, and need no particular description; it is the way in which things were done, the working of the system, and the means which determined results, that are, if anything, of value here. For, observes Plutarch, “Ease and quickness of execution are not fitted to give those enduring qualities that are necessary in a work for all time; while, on the other hand, the time that is laid out on labor is amply repaid in the permanence it gives to the performance.” And, as Maudsley observes, “To apprehend the full meaning of common things, it is necessary to study a great many uncommon things.” I cannot by any means attempt to give full details, but only specimens; yet for these I will go back to the earlier period of the work.

Regular business hours were kept in the library, namely, from eight to twelve, and from one to six. Smoking was freely allowed. Certain assistants desired to work evenings and draw extra pay. This was 570 563 permitted in some instances, but always under protest. Nine hours of steady work were assuredly enough for one day, and additional time seldom increased results; so, after offering discouragement for several years, a rule was established abolishing extra work.

So rapid was the growth of the library after 1869, and so disarranged had become the books by much handling for indexing and other purposes, that by midsummer 1872, when Goldschmidt had finished a long work of supplementary cataloguing, and the later arrivals were ready to occupy their places on the shelves, it was deemed expedient to drop the regular routine and devote three or four weeks to placing things in order, which was then done, and at intervals thereafter.

Mr Oak spent three months in perfecting a plan for the new index, and in indexing a number of books in order to test it and perfect the system. Goldschmidt's time was given to taking out notes on the subject of languages, with some work on the large ethnographical map, which was prepared only as the work progressed. Harcourt was indexing, Fisher was taking out notes on mythology, some were gathering historical reminiscences from pioneers; and others continued their epitomizing of voyages and other narratives.

Galan, the expatriated governor of Lower California, came to work in the library in July. Some subjects were at first given him to extract from Spanish authorities, but his English, though reading smoothly, was so very diffuse and unintelligible that I was obliged to change his occupation. Even after that I regarded him as a superior man, and he was given some important books to index. I remember that he was obliged to index Herrera's Historia General two or three times, before I was satisfied with it. He was one of a class frequently met with, particularly among Mexicans; he could talk well on almost any subject, but his chain of ideas was sadly broken 571 564 in attempting to write. It is somewhat strange that a person of this kind should have worked for a year before his work was proved wholly valueless.

The books given out to the indexers at this time were such as contained information concerning those tribes which were first to be described; that is, if I was soon to be writing on the peoples of New Caledonia, as the interior of British Columbia was once called, I would give the indexers all books of travel through that region, and all works containing information on those nations first, so that I might have the benefit of the index in extracting the material. In this manner the indexers were kept just in advance of the note-takers, until they had indexed all the books in the library having in them any information concerning the aborigines of any part of the territory. At intervals, whatever the cause of it, the subject came up to me in a new light, and I planned and partitioned it, as it were, instinctively.

In the pursuance of the primary objects of life, it is easier for the man of ordinary ability to perform a piece of work himself than to secure others to do it. I do not say that the proprietor of a manufactory is or should be more skilful than any or all his workmen. It is not necessary that the successful manager of a printing establishment, for example, should know better how to set type, read proof, and put a form on a press than those who have spent their lives at these several occupations; but as regards the general carrying on of the business he can himself perform any part of it to his satisfaction with less difficulty than in seeking the desired results through others. But since civilization has assumed such grand proportions, and the accumulated experiences of mankind have become so bulky, it is comparatively little that one man, with his own brain and fingers, can accomplish. He who would achieve great results must early learn to utilize the brain and fingers of others. As applied 572 565 to the industrial life, this has long been understood; but in regard to intellectual efforts, particularly in the field of letters, it has been regarded as less practicable, and by many impossible.

Often have I heard authors say that beyond keeping the books in order, and bringing such as were required, with some copying, or possibly some searching now and then, no one could render them any assistance. They would not feel safe in trusting any one with the manipulation of facts on which was to rest their reputation for veracity and accuracy. So of old held priests with regard to their religion, and merchants where their money was at stake. I am as zealous and jealous for the truth of my statements, I venture to assert, as any one who ever wrote history; I am exceedingly careful as to the shades of truth presented, holding false coloring of any kind equivalent to downright mendacity; yet, fortunately, there have always been those among my assistants to the accuracy of whose work I would trust as implicitly as to my own. Fortunately, I say; for had it not been so, I could have accomplished but little. This has been conclusively shown in preceding chapters; and the truth of the assertion will be brought into clearer light as further details are given.

The system of note-taking, as perfected in details and supervised by Mr Nemos, was as follows: The first step for a beginner was to make references, in books given him for that purpose, to the information required, giving the place where found and the nature of the facts therein mentioned; after this he would take out the information in the form of notes. By this means he would learn how to classify and how duly to condense; he would also become familiar with the respective merits of authors, their bent of thought, and the age in which they lived, and the fulness and reliality of their works.

The notes were written on half sheets of legal paper, one following another, without regard to length or 573 566 subject, but always leaving a space between the notes so that they could be torn apart. The notes when separated and arranged were filed by means of paper bags, on which were marked subject and date, and the bags numbered chronologically and entered in a book.

After the notes had been used, with all printed matter bearing on the subject, they were returned to the bags to be pasted on sheets of strong brown paper, folded and cut to the required size. This work would require the labor of two men and two boys for over a year. These, bound and lettered, would make some three hundred books, fifteen by eighteen inches, varying in thickness according to contents.

In this it was deemed best to follow the plan of the history, and present the subject much more in detail than the printed volumes. This series would constitute in itself a library of Pacific coast history which eighty thousand dollars could not duplicate even with the library at hand.

Thus qualified, the assistant was given a mass of notes and references covering a certain period, or series of incidents, with instructions to so reduce the subject-matter that I might receive it weeded of all superfluities and repetitions, whether in words or in facts already expressd by previous authors, yet containing every fact, however minute, every thought and conclusion, including such as occurred to the preparer, and arranged in as good an historic order as the assistant could give it.

The method to be followed by the assistant to this end was as follows: He arranged the references and notes that pointed to events in a chronologic order, yet bringing together certain incidents of different dates if the historic order demanded it. Institutionary and descriptive notes on commerce, education, with geography, etc., were then joined to such dates or occurrences as called for their use: geography coming together with an expedition into a new country; 574 567 education, with the efforts of churchmen; commerce in connection with the rule of some governor who promoted certain phases of it; descriptions of towns, when they were founded, destroyed, or prominently brought forward.

This preliminary grouping was greatly facilitated by the general arrangement of all the notes for the particular section of territory, Central America, Mexico, California, etc., already made by an experienced assistant. In connection with both arrangements a more or less detailed list of events and subjects was made to aid in grasping the material.

With the material thus grouped it was found that each small subdivision, incident, or descriptive matter had a number of notes bearing upon it, from different authors, sometimes several score. These must then be divided into three or more classes, according to the value of the authority: the first class comprising original narratives and reports; the second, such as were based partly on the first, yet possessed certain original facts or thoughts; the third, those which were merely copied from others, or presented brief and hasty compilations.

The assistant then took the best of his first-class authorities, the fullest and most reliable, so far as he could judge after a brief glance, and proceeded to extract subject-matter from the pages of the book to which the reference directed him. This he did partly in his own language, partly in a series of quotations. The accurate use of quotation marks and stars consumed much time. Yet I always insisted upon this: the note-taker could throw anything he pleased into his own words, but if he used the exact words of the author he must plainly indicate it. Sometimes he found the extract already made on the slips called notes. The same book might appear to be the best authority for a succession of topics, and the extracting was continued for some time before the book was laid aside. Each extract was indexed in the margin, and 575 568 at the foot of it, or on the page, was written the title of the book or paper from which it had been taken.

The next best authorities were then read on the same topic or series of topics, and any information additional or contradictory to what had already been noted was extracted and placed at the foot of the page bearing on the subject, or on a blank page, on which was indexed a heading similar to that of the original page, so as to bring the same topics together. If these contradictions or additions bore on particular expressions or facts in the original extract, they were subdivided in accordance with and by means of numbers brought in connection with the particular word or line. To each subdivision was added the title of the authority. The titles of all, or of several first-class authorities which agreed with the original extract, were also added to the foot of that extract, with the remark, ‘the same in brief,’ or ‘in full,’ as the case might be. This showed me which authors confirmed and which contradicted any statement, and enabled me readily to draw conclusions. From second-class authors the assistant obtained rarely anything but observations, while the third class yielded sometimes nothing.

As he proceeded in this refining process, or system of condensation, the assistant added in notes to particular lines or paragraphs his own observations on the character of the hero, the incident, or the author.

By this means I obtained a sort of bird's-eye view of all evidence on the topics for my history, as I took them up one after the other in accordance with my own order and plan for writing. It saved me the drudgery and loss of time of thoroughly studying any but the best authorities, or more than a few first-class ancient and modern books.

To more experienced and able assistants were given the study and reduction of certain minor sections of the history, which I employed in my writing after more or less condensation and change.

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The tendency with all the work was toward voluminousness. Not that I am inclined to prolixity, but the subjects were so immense that it often appeared impossible to crowd the facts within a compass which would seem reasonable to the reader. And none but those who have tried it can realize all the difficulties connected with this kind of writing. Besides increasing the labor fourfold, it often interferes with style, dampens enthusiasm, and makes an author feel like one doomed to run a mile race in a peck measure. Just as every horse has its natural gait, from which it is forced to go faster or slower only to its disadvantage, so in writing, a certain number of words are necessary to place before the average mind a subject in its strongest light, additions and subtractions being alike detrimental. While I was resolved to take space enough fairly to present the subject under consideration, I could not but remember that as books multiply, readers demand conciseness, and that no fault can be greater in this present age than verbosity.

In November 1872 I engaged a copperplate engraver, and from that time till the Native Races was completed I had engraves at work at the Market-street end of the library. Besides this, considerable engraving was given out. The cuts for volume IV., such of them as I did not purchase from eastern authors and publishers, were all prepared in the engraving department of the printing-office, on the third floor.

On this floor likewise, a year or two later, the type was set and the first proof read. Matters of no inconsiderable importance and care with me were the type I should use and the style of my page. After examining every variety within my reach, I settled upon the octavo English edition of Buckle's Civilization, as well for the text and notes as for the system of numbering the notes from the beginning to the 577 570 end of the chapter. It was plain, broad-faced, clear and beautiful, and easily read. The notes and reference figures were all in perfect taste and harmony. It is a style of page that one never tires of. I sent to Scotland for the type, as I could find none of it in America.

It was about this time that I studied the question of the origin of the Americans, to find a place in some part of the Native Races, I did not know then exactly where. When I began this subject I proposed to settle it immediately; when I finished it I was satisfied that neither I nor any one else knew, or without more light ever could know, anything about it. I found some sixty theories, one of them about as it. I found some sixty theories, one of them about as plausible or as absurd as another, and hardly one of them capable of being proved or disproved. I concluded to spread them all before my readers, not as of any intrinsic value, but merely as curiosities; and this I did in the opening chapter of volume v. of the Native Races.

Meanwhile indexers were constantly coming and going, attempting and failing. After trying one or two hundred of the many applicants who presented themselves, and securing little more than a dozen capable of doing the work, I concluded to try no more, unless it should be some one manifesting marked ability, but let those already engaged continue until the index was finished. Nine tenths of the applicants were totally unfit fort for the work, though they professed to be able, like Pythagoras, to write on the moon and in as many languages as Pantagruel could speak.

The fact is it operated too severely against me. First, the applicant expected pay for his time, whether he succeeded or not; secondly, no inconsiderable portion of the time of the best indexers was spent in teaching the new-comers; and thirdly, those who attempted and failed were sure to be dissatisfied and charge the cause of failure to any one but themselves.

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During the first half of 1873 work continued about as hitherto. Mr Oak spent some weeks on antiquities, but was occupied a good portion of the time on early voyages. All this time I was writing on northern Indian matter, giving out the notes on the southern divisions to others to go over the field again and take out additional notes.

While the subject of early voyages was under my notice I felt the necessity of a more perfect knowledge of early maps. Directing Goldschmidt to lay out all consmographies, collections of voyages, or other books containing early maps, also atlases of fac-similes, and single maps, together we went over the entire field. Beginning with the earliest map, we first wrote a description of it, stating by whom and when it was drawn, and what it purported to be. Then from some point, usually the isthmus of Panamá, we started, and, following the coast, wrote on foolscap paper the name of each place, with remarks on its spelling, its location, and other points, marking also at the top of the page the name, and taking usually one page for every place. Every geographical name and location, great and small, which we could find on any early map was thus entered, together with the title of the map or source of information. From the next map we would take new information respecting previous names, and also new names. After thus training Goldschmidt I left him to complete the task, and when he had thus gone over all our maps we found before us all information on each place that could be derived from maps. Several months were thus occupied, and when the manuscript was bound in three volumes and lettered, we found added to the library a Cartography of the Pacific Coast, unique and invaluable in tracing the early history and progress of discovery.

The collection of documents obtained from Judge Hayes was gone over by D'Arcy, and the loose papers were pasted in his scrap-books. The judge 579 572 had a way of doing things peculiar to himself, and I was obliged to follow him so far as his documents were concerned. For scrap-books he cut a portion of the leaves out of congressional reports, and journals sent free by congressmen to their constituents. His scraps were then pasted one aginst another and attached to the stubs of these books according to subject. This collection was an olla podrida of southern Californian knowledge.

A fire which broke out in November 1873 in the basement of the western side of the building seemed likely for a moment suddenly to terminate all our labors. At one time there appeared not one chance in ten that the building or its contents would be saved; but thanks to a prompt and efficient fire department, the flames were extinguished, with a loss of twenty-five thousand dollars only to the insurance companies. The time was about half-past five in the evening. I had left the library, but my assistants were seated at their tables writing. A thick black smoke, which rose suddenly and filled the room, was the first intimation they had of the fire. To have saved anything in case the fire had reached them would have been out of the question. They were so blinded by the smoke that they dared not trust themselves to the stairs, and it was with difficulty they groped their way to a ladder at one side of the room, which led to the roof, by which means they mounted and emerged into the open air. In case the building had burned, their escape would have been uncertain. No damage was done to the library, and all were at their places next morning; but it came home to me more vividly than ever before, the uncertainty, not to say vanity, of earthly things. Had those flames been given five minutes more, the Bancroft Library, with the Bancroft business, would have been swept from the face of earth; the lore within would have been lost to the world, and with it mankind would have been 580 573 spared the infliction of the printed volumes which followed. Thus would have ended all my literary attempts, and I should probably have idled my time in Europe for the remainder of my days. Five minutes more and that fire would have saved me much trouble. In the burning of the library, great as would have been my loss, that of posterity would have been greater. Anaxagoras, driven from Athens, exclaimed, “It is not I who lose the Athenians, but the Athenians who lose me.” So I might say without egotism of the literary treasures I had gathered; their loss would have been not so much mine as California's; for in many respects, for example, in respect to time, ease, pleasure, health, length of days, and money, I should have ben the gainer.

In regard to the risk of fire, as my writings increased, and the manuscripts in my room represented more and more the years of my life and the wearing away of my brain, I deemed it wise and prudent to have copies made of all that had been and was to be written. Since it would have been premature to begin printing at tis time, I called in copyists, about twenty, who in three or four months transcribed in copying ink all that I had written; from this a second copy was made by means of a copying-press. This performance completed, I sent one copy to my house, one copy to Oakville, and kept the original in the library; then I went to sleep o' nights defying the elements or any of their actions.

In December 1873, with Goldschmidt's assistance, I made a thorough investigation of aboriginal languages on this coast. The subject was a somewhat difficult one to manage, dialects and affinities running, as they do, hither and thither over the country, but I finally satisfied myself that the plan of treating it originally adopted was not the proper one. The result was tha Goldschmidt was obliged to go over the entire field again, and re-arrange and add to the subject-matter before I would attempt the writing of it.

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Parts of the work seemed at times to proceed slowly. The mythology dragged as though it never would have an end. The temptation to shirk, on the part of certain of my assistants, was too great to be resisted. The system of note-taking, which was then much further from perfection than subsequently, tended to this among the unscrupulous. With one or two years' work before him, abstracting material according to subject instead of by the book, tended in some instances to laxity and laziness on the part of the note-taker. Any one so choosing, in taking out notes on a given subject with the view of making his subject complete, and at the same time not duplicating his notes, could plant himself in the midst of his work and there remain, bidding me defiance; for if I discharged him, as under ordinary circumstances I should have done, it would be at the loss perhaps of six months' or a year's time. This was well understood, and some took advantage of it. But such I discharged as soon as that particular piece of work was done. Thus it always is: those whose integrity cannot withstand every influence drawing them from duty are sure sooner or later to be dismissed from every well ordered work.

No little care was required to keep in order the files of newspapers. As there were so many of them, I did not attempt to keep complete more than the leading journals on the coast. Many country editors sent the library their journals gratuitously. My thanks are none the less due them because in this they showed a high-minded sagacity; for should their own files be destroyed by fire, as is too often the case, it is convenient to know of another file to which they may have free access. No kind of literature goes out of existence so quickly as a newspaper; and of books it is said that the rarest are those which have been the most popular. Collier remarks in his introduction to the Pranks of Robin Goodfellow, “The more frequent the copies originally 582 575 in circulation, the fewer generally are those which have come down to us.”

My chief source of newspaper supply was from the public libraries and advertising agencies of San Francisco. To the latter were sent all interior journals, and by arrangement with the agents these were kept for me. They amounted to several wagon-loads annually. Once or twice a year I sent for them, and out of them completed my files as far as possible. In a large record-book was kept an account of these files, the name of each journal being entered on a page and indexed, the numbers on the shelves being entered, so that by the book might be ascertained what were in the library and what were lacking. In this manner some fifty or sixty thousand newspapers were added to the library annually.

The task of indexing the books was so severe, that at one time it seemed doubtful if ever the newspapers would be indexed. But when it became clearly evident that history needed the information therein contained, twenty more new men were engaged and drilled to the task. I sometimes became impatient over what seemed slow progress, yet, buying another wagon-load of chairs and tables, I would fill all available space with new laborers, all such work being afterward tested by the most reliable persons. For the time covered by them, there is no better historic evidence than several files of contemporaneous newspapers, bitterly opposing each other as is commonly the case.

The leading journals of the United States, Mexico, and Europe, before which I wished to bring my work, I now noted, and directed Goldschmidt to mail to their addresses copies of such descriptions of the library as appeared in the best papers here. These were also sent to scholars in different parts, so that they might know what was going on in California.

The printing of volume II., Native Races, was begun in May 1874, and continued, sometimes very slowly, till February 1875. Matters proceeded during the 583 576 last half of 1874 about as usual. Between one Saturday night and Monday morning my engraver absconded to the east, and the maps immediately required I was obliged to send to Philadelphia to be engraved.

While up to my neck in this most harassing of labors, with three unfinished volumes, embracing several main divisions each, in the hands of the printer, a proposition came from the proprietor of the Overland Monthly to two of my men, Fisher and Harcourt, offering them the editorship of that journal, with larger pay than I could afford to give.

The young men behaved very well about it. They immediately informed me of the offer, asked me to advise them what they should do, and assured me they would not accept unless with my approbation. Although they were deep in my work, although I must lose in a great measure the results of their last year's training, and although I should have to teach new men and delay publication, yet I did not hesitate. I told them to go: the pay was better, the position was more prominent, and their work would be lighter.

I do not recollect ever to have allowed my interests to stand in the way of the advancement of any young man in my service. Whenever my advice has been asked, remembering the time when I was a young man seeking a start, I have set myself aside, and have given what I believed to be disinterested advice, feeling that in case of a sacrifice I could better afford it than my clerk. I could not but notice, however, that, nine times in ten, when a young man left me it was not to better his fortune. If he began business on his own account, he failed; if he accepted another situation at higher salary, his employer failed.

So I told Harcourt and Fisher not to let me stand in their way. They accepted the position, but offered to give me part of their time and complete their notetaking up to a certain point; but so slowly had the work proceeded when their whole time was devoted to 584 577 it, that I had no faith in pieces of time and spasms of attention. the best brains of the best men were poor enough for me, and I wanted no secondary interest or efforts.

The liability at any moment to be called to serve on a jury was a source of no little annoyance to me. To break away from my work and dance attendance on a judge, with nerves unstrung to sit in the foul atmosphere of a court-room and listen to the wranglings of lawyers, was a severe penalty for the questionable privilege of squeezing in a vote between those of a negro and an Irishman for some demagogue on election-day. I cannot longer halloo myself hoarse in July because I may so vote in October. The San Francisco judges, however, were quite lenient, nearly always excusing me. To sit as juryman for a week unnerved me for a month. I could not take up my work where I had left it and go on as if nothing had happened. Besides actual time spent, there was always a severe loss. I felt safest when in the country, away from the reach of the sheriff. The judges in time came to understand this, and ceased altogether to demand of me this senseless service.

In 1875 I declined the republican nomination for member of congress. There were ten thousand ready to serve their country where there was not one to do my work in case I should abandon it. In March 1876 Mr John S. Hittell came to the library and asked permission to propose my name as honorary member of the Society of California pioneers. The rules of the society were such that none might be received as regular members who reached this country for the first time after the 31st of December 1849. There was no historical society, so called, in San Francisco, and Mr Hittell's wish was to unite with the pioneer association the historical element of the community, so that the pioneers' society might be the historical society as well. As the date of one's arrival 585 578 in a country is not always governed by one's love of literature and antiquity, so love of literature does not always flow from early arrivals. Hence it was deemed advisable to attach by means of honorary member-ship the desired element, which could not be reached in the ordinary way under the constitution and by-laws except at the risk of interfering with certain gifts and bequests.

While I fully appreciated the motive, and was duly grateful for the honor conferred, I was unable to perceive how any alliance, even in mere name or imagination, could be formed which would be of the slightest benefit to them or to me. Work like mine never yet was done by a government or a society. No body of men has ever yet been found who would spend both the time and money requisite, laboring a lifetime with the unity of purpose of a single mind. A monarch reigning for life might prosecute such a work at the public expense, were he so disposed, but where heads of governments rule in quick succession, and every legislative body undoes what was done by its predecessor, there is not much hope of public literary accomplishments.

Many letters I received requesting information on every conceivable topic. If I had established an agency on the Pacific coast for the distribution of general knowledge, I should have felt flattered by my success; but as these letters drew heavily on my time, and the labor I bestowed in complying with their requests seemed to be poorly appreciated and seldom acknowledged, the applicant appearing only to care about the information, and now how he obtained it, such letters were not very welcome. Nevertheless, I made it a rule to have them all promptly attended to, trusting the next world for returns.

One wishes to know all about the wines of early California. At which mission were the first vines planted? Where did the cuttings come from —Mexico, South America, or Spain? At which mission and when was 586 579 wine first made? Did the padres make wine for their own use only, or did they export it? Where was most wine made in 1846? Into whose hands fell the vineyards? Mr Lea of Philadelphia desires material on the Inquisition in Mexico; Edward Everett Hale asks information concerning the introduction of the horse in America. Another wants a list of all the medicinal herbs. Mr Packard of Salem, on behalf of the United States entomological commission, makes inquiry regarding the Spanish Jesuit accounts of grasshopper invasions in California; and there were hundreds of such queries, which I deemed it my duty to answer whenever it lay in my power.

To those who best know what it is to make a good book, the rapidity and regularity with which the several volumes of my works appeared was a source of constant surprise. “How you have managed,” writes John W. Draper on receipt of the fifth volume of the Native Races, “in so short a time and in so satisfactory a manner to complete your great undertaking is to me very surprising. The commendations that are contained in the accompanying pamphlet are richly deserved. I endorse them all. And now I suppose you feel as Gibbon says he did on completing his Decline. You know he was occupied with it more than twenty years. He felt as if the occupation of his life was gone. But you are far more energetic than he. You are only at the beginning of your intellectual life: he was near the close. You will find something more to do.” Thus it is ever. Our best reward for having done one work well is that we have another given us to do.

On the completion of the Native Races Oliver Wendell Holmes writes: “I congratulate you on putting the last stone upon this pyramid you have reared. For truly it is a magnum opus, and the accomplishment of it as an episode in one man's life is most remarkable. Nothing but a perfect organization of an immense literary workshop could have effected so 587 580 much within so limited a time. You have found out the two great secrets of the division of labor and the union of its results. The last volume requires rather a robust reader; but the political history of the ixs and the itls is a new chapter, I think, to most of those who consider themselves historical scholars. All the world, and especially all the American world, will thank you for this noble addition to its literary treasures.”

Such are some of the details of my earlier labors. But above all, and beyond all, in breadth of scope and in detail, was the history and the workings of it. It was a labor beside which the quarter-century application to business, and the Native Races with its fifty years of creative work upon it, sink into insignificance; and it was, perhaps, the most extensive effort ever undertaken by a private individual for historical purposes.

I thought before this I had accomplished sometging in life, with my mercantile and manufacturing establishments in full and successful operation, and a literary reputation world-wide and most flattering. I thought I knew what heavy undertakings were, and what it was out of no very great means to accomplish great results; but all seemed Lilliputian in comparison with the seas of performance upon which I now found myself embarked.

The 15th of October 1875 saw the Native Races completed; but long before this, note-taking on the History of the Pacific States had been begun on the plan developed while I wrote several parts of this history years before, and perfected by the experiences gathered in preparing the Native Races. As I have before remarked, my purpose in this latter effort was to take up the same territory covered by the Native Races, and continue its history from the coming of the europeans. This would be the history proper of the country, the Native Races being in reality a 588 581 description of the aborigines; yet the one followed the other in natural sequence. Without the Native Races the history would be incomplete, could not, indeed, be properly written; while the history is in truth but a continuation of the Native Races.

It is an immense territory, this western half of North America; it was a weighty responsibility, at least I felt it to be such, to lay the foundations of history, for all time, for this one twelfth part of the world. It seemed to me that I stood very near to the beginning of a mighty train of events which should last to the end of time; that this beginning, now so clear to me, would soon become dim, become more and more indistinct as the centuries passed by; and though it is impossible for the history of a civilized nation ever to drop wholly out of existence while the printing-press continues to move, yet much would be lost and innumerable questions would arise, then impossible of solution, but which might now be easily settled. Large as my conceptions were of the magnitude of this labor, and with all my business and literary experience, here again, as thrice before in these historical efforts, once in the collecting of the library, once after completing the first writing of the first parts of my history, and once in the writing of the Native Races, I had no adequate idea of the extent of the work before I engaged in it.

Immediately the Native Races was finished, all not yet so engaged were set at work taking out notes for the history. A much more perfect system was employed in abstracting this material than had been used in any of the former work. I do not mean to boast, or if I do, it is with that godly boasting which the cause makes pardonable; and further, it is not of myself but of my assistants I herein boast, for I took out only the notes for the first parts of my history with my own hands; I say, then, without unpardonable boasting, that in my opinion there never in the 589 582 history of literature was performed so consummate a feat as the gathering, abstracting, and arranging of the material for this History of the Pacific States.

It was regarded as a great achievement successfully to handle twelve hundred authorities and compress their contents into five volumes, presenting the list in the first volume of the Native Races. Still more remarkable was it from two thousand authorities to write the three volumes of the History of Central America. But when on making the list of authorities for the six volumes of the History of Mexico I found there were ten thousand, I was literally overwhelmed. They were all employed, in one way or another, every one of them, in writing the history, but I could not afford the space to print all the titles, as was my custom. They would occupy nearly half a volume. It was finally resolved that, referring the reader to the list of authorities printed in the first volumes of Central America and the North Mexican States, it must suffice to print only the more important ones remaining, and to state clearly the omission and the cause at the head of the list.

The task of making references as well as that of taking out material was equivalent to five times the labor of writing; so that at this work, and preparing the material in the rough, I found no difficulty in keeping employed fifteen to twenty persons; for example, in taking out the material for California history alone, eight men were occupied for six years; for making the references, merely, for the History of Mexico, without taking out any of the required information, five men were steadily employed for a period of ten years. Counting those engaged on such work as indexing newspapers, epitomizing archives, and copying manuscript, and I have had as many as fifty men engaged in library detail at one time.

For several reasons I determined to begin this second resumption of the history with California; 590 583 that is to say, although the work was to be a history of the Pacific States from the coming of the Europeans, covering the same territory embraced by the Native Races, and would of chronological necessity begin with its southern extremity, and follow the natural order of discovery and conquest northward, yet I deemed it best, all things considered, to resume in the middle of the work rather than where I left off, for the following reasons: First, of the central division of the subject, embracing northern Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah, following the natural channels of history from the conquest of Cortés, more particularly of California, the centre of their central division, I had in my possession a great mass of original matter, more, proportionately, than of the states lying to the south of the city of Mexico. This material consisted of unpublished manuscript histories and original documents which had lain hidden through-out the entire progress of the country, and which had been by me, little by little, unearthed, assorted, deciphered, and put in order for historical use; material of a value which could not be measured by money, for if once lost it never could be replaced. If lost, it was so much knowledge dropped out of existence, it was so much of human experience withheld from the general storehouse of human experiences; and the loss would remain a loss throughout all time.

Moreover, there was of this more, proportionately, than had ever been collected about any other country; more of original and unused material for the history of California than had ever before been collected and preserved of any country of like extent, population, and age. The richness of this material consisted in the profusion of documentary and personal evidence placed side by side; letters, official papers, and missionary records, united with personal narratives, and complete histories of epochs and localities dictated by eye-witnesses, and written out by men employed by me, and solely for my history.

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Day by day and year by year I had seen these priceless treasures accumulate until the thought of their destruction by fire became unendurable to me, and I determined, long before the Native Races was finished, that to place at least the substance of this material beyond the peradventure of destruction should be my very first work. As I could not then erect a detached fire-proof building for my library, the next most direct and practical method was to melt and draw off from the mass the metal of historic lore, and recast it into permanent form, in which it might be preserved in some place apart from the original material.

To save the contents of this invaluable material, then, was my first consideration. This saved, and all my library swept away, I might possibly, in some way, by the aid of the archives of Mexico and the libraries of America and Europe, complete my history; but the California material once lost, there was an end to all my labors.

Another reason why I would write the central part of the History of the Pacific States first was that I then found myself at the head of a corps of thoroughly competent and trained assistants, very different in points of knowledge and ability from the untutored and unskilled workmen who assisted me at the beginning of these undertakings. They, as well as I, had learned much, had gained much experience in abstracting material for history, and in printing and publishing books.

There were several among my assistants who could now take a book or a manuscript, no matter how obliterated or in what language, and decipher it, and placing themselves at their desks could intelligently, correctly, systematically, and expeditiously take out in the form of notes all the historical matter the volume contained, knowing that the work was properly done, that it was no experiment of which the results might have to be all thrown away and the labor performed anew. This no one of them was capable of doing at first.

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They were likewise familiar with the library, the books and their contents, the index and how to use it, the territory and much of its history. They knew better what to take out; and although the information to be extracted was as undefinable as ever, and the subject-matter as intricate, the note-taking was much more systematic and complete. For five years our minds had been dwelling on these things, and on little else. Our whole intellectual being had, during these years, become saturated with the subject; and although work was now to be taken up in a new form, and conducted on a higher plane, and brought yet nearer to perfect completion than any before, I felt adequate to the task. Three or five years hence I might or might not have as good men in the library. Death and disagreements are inseparable from humanity, and yet of the latter I had seldom experienced one in connection with my literary labors. I believe I never have had a serious misunderstanding with any one of my regular assistants. We worked together as friends, side by side, as in one common interest. This central part of my subject I regarded, I will not say as the most important part, for each part was equally important, but it was the most difficult part, the most intricate and laborious part, and with competent and trained assistants it was the part which I could most thoroughly perform, and most perfectly finish. This was to be the crowning effort of these literary achievements; let me do it, I said, while I am able.

The library was moved to Valencia street the 9th of October 1881, and type-setting was begun on the history the following day. Although opposed in this move by several of my friends, I persisted. The truth is, I was becoming fearful lest it would never be put into type; lest I should not live to complete the work, and I was determined to do what I could in that direction while life lasted. My health at this time was poorer than ever before, and my nerves were by 593 586 no means quieted by reading one day an article on the business, submitted to me by Mr Hittell for his Commerce and Industries, in which he took occasion to remark of my literary undertakings: “The scale on which he has commenced his work is so comprehensive that it is doubtful whether he will be able to complete it even if he should reach the age of three score and ten, with continuous prosperity and good health.” I thercupon resolved to complete it, to postpone dying until this work was done, and I immediately ordered a dozen compositors to be put, upon the manuscript. Matter equivalent to fifteen volumes was then in manuscript, and three fourths of the work on the remainder had been accomplished in the note-taking. I gave out, first, volume I. Central America, and then volume I. History of Mexico, both of which had been written long years before, and rewritten; after that I gave to the printers whatever part of the work appeared convenient, so that they frequently had several volumes in hand at one time. The utmost care was exercised in revising, rewriting, comparing, and verifying, as the work was passed to press, four or five persons devoting their time altogether or in part to this work.

Further than this, not only would I print, but I would publish. I had no delicacy now in placing the imprint of the firm on my title-pages. The world might call it making merchandise of literature if they chose: I knew it was not, that is to say in a mercenary sense. There was no money in my books to the business, hence the business did not specially want them. In the publication of several extensive works the house had acquired a national reputation, and I was convinced that it would do better with this series of Pacific States histories, than any other firm. So I engaged Mr Nathan J. Stone, lately of Japan but formerly of our house, a man of marked ability, of much experience in our establishment and elsewhere, to devote himself to the publication and sale 594 587 of my books. Transferring to him the business connected therewith, I went on with my writing more vigorously if possible than before. I requested the mayor and the governor to visit the library, inspect the work, and then give me a certificate, expressing their belief in the completion of the work as then promised, which was at the rate of three or four volumes a year. I took better care of my health than before, determined to piece out my life to cover the time I now calculated would be required to finish the work. Lastly I revised my will to provide the necessary funds, and appointed literary executors, so that my several books should be completed and published even in the event of my death. Strange infatuation, past the comprehension of man! Of what avail this terrible straining, with my body resolved to dust and my intellect dissipated in thin air! One would fancy the prize a heavenly dukedom at the least; but when I looked up into the heavens I saw no dukedom there. For all that, I would abridge my life by twenty years, if necessary, to complete the work; why, I cannot tell.

After beginning printing, proof-reading was again in order. It was a severe tax; that is, in the way it was done in the library. When the proofs came from the printing-office, where they were read and revised by an expert familiar with this work, one copy was given to me, and one each to Nemos, Oak, and Gilmour. The latter compared and verified both subject-matter and references, comparing with original authorities, and placed the corrections of the others with his own on one proof, when it was returned to me. One of the others besides myself also read the corrected proof in pages, which were gone over by the chief proof-reader for printers' errors.

There is something extremely fascinating to me in the printing of a book. The metamorphoses of mind into manuscript, and manuscript into permanent print; the incarnation of ideas, spreading your thoughts first 595 588 upon paper and then transfixing them by the aid of metal to the printed page, where through the ages they may remain, display a magic beside which the subtleties of Albertus Magnus were infantile. “M. Duputel is smitten with that amiable and enviable passion, the love of printing for private distribution,” remarks Dibdin in his Bibliographical Tour. What this passion is I never stop to consider. With me I think it is the satisfaction of seeing a valuable something growing under my fingers; this and the multiplying power of the types. The masses of mankind clothe with mysterious influence the unseen being who commits his thought to print. And living books are indeed a power; even those that come and go accomplish much. No book ever lived in vain; the black and white of its pages, its paper and pasteboard, may pass into oblivion, as all but the sacred few which spring from the inspiration of genius do and should do, yet the soul thereof never dies, but multiplies itself in endless transmigrations into other books to the end of time.

During the progress of the history through the press there were many maps and plans to be drawn, local and sectional maps to illustrate text or notes, and sometimes a more general map to accompany the volume. These were drawn as required, many of them by Mr Gilmour. The several lists of authorities quoted were prepared in the main by Mr Benson, who also assisted Mr Gilmour in making an index of the several historical as well as supplementary sets. In order to have the use and benefit of the indexes during the progress of the work, the several books or sets were indexed on paper cards about three by four inches, as the pages appeared in type, and when the set, such as the History of Central America or the History of Oregon, was complete, the cards were handed to the printer, who from them put the index in type.

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Though written early, the History of California was not so early to be published, except the first volumes. Originally I thought of the history only as one complete work, the volumes to be written and published in chronological order; but later it occurred to me that there was too great a sweep of territory, climates and governments too several and diverse, for me arbitrarily to cement them in one historical embrace. Many persons would like a history of one or more of the countries, but would not care for them all. Therefore I finally concluded to write and number the volumes territorially, and yet maintain such chronological order as I was able; that is, I would begin with Central America, that part coming first in order of time, and bring the history of those states down to date, numbering the volumes I., II., and III., History of the Pacific States, as well as I., II., and III., History of Central America. The History of the Pacific States, volume IV., would be the History of Mexico, volume I., and so on; and the works might then be lettered under both titles and the purchaser be given his choice; or he might prefer to include the Native Races and the supplemental volumes under the yet more general title of Bancroft's Works. Thus would simplicity and uniformity be preserved, and purchasers be satisfied. With this arrangement it would not be necessary to confine the order of publication to the order of numbering, as the volumes might very properly appear chronologically, which was, indeed, the more natural sequence; and as a matter of fact they were so published.

Thus the History of the Pacific States would comprise a series of histories each complete in itself; yet the whole would be one complete history, each in the requisite number of volumes; viz., the History of Central America; the History of Mexico; the History of the North Mexican States and Texas; the History of Arizona and New Mexico; the History of California; the History of Nevada, Wyoming, and Colorado; the History of 597 590 Utah; the History of the Northwest Coast; the History of Oregon; the History of Washington, Idaho, and Montana; the History of British Columbia; the History of Alaska. The plan was to publish three or four volumes a year, to be issued simultaneously in San Francisco, New York, London, and Paris. In regard to the two volumes of North Mexican States, I should have preferred to include them in the History of Mexico, under the one general title. But they were in reality a separate work, given more in detail than the southern Mexican states, which were treated from national rather than from local standpoints. And this for several reasons: they were newer, so to speak, more native, less subdued, less settled and cultivated, the Mexican frontier being always toward the north and not westward, as in the United States; then they were nearer the United States, more progressive than the southern Mexican states, and in this way they would constitute a stepping-stone in respect of detail to the nations of the south and the states of the north.

Another work of the highest importance later forced itself upon me, and took its place among my labors as part of my history. This was the lives of those who had made the history, who had laid the foundations of empire on this coast upon which future generations were forever to build. Thus far a narrative proper of events had been given, while those who had performed this marvellous work were left in the background. Every one felt that they deserved fuller treatment, and after much anxious consideration of the subject, there was evolved in my mind a separate section of the history under title of Chronicles of the Builders of the Commonwealth, which in a framework of history and industrial record gives to biography the same prominence which in the history proper is given to the narrative of events.

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In addition to the history were the supplemental works, California Pastoral, California Inter Pocula, Popular Tribunals, Essays and Miscellany, and Literary Industries, all of which grew out of the work on the history, and were carried along with it. The first two consist of material left over in writing the history, the one of California under missionary régime, and the other of California during the flush times, too light and sketchy for exact historical narration, and yet more readable in some respects than the history itself. The titles of the last two speak for themselves. Of the third I shall speak further presently. I need not go into detail here regarding their conception and production; suffice it to say that the subjects all came to me of their own accord, and that I wrought them out without aid from any one, there being no notes to be taken or information to be gathered and sifted further than what I was able to accomplish myself while writing the history. And yet I should not say this. Much of the labor on these volumes was performed at my home, where was the sweetest and most sympathizing assistant a literary drudge ever had, constant in season and out of season, patient, forbearing, encouraging, cheering. Many a long day she has labored by my side, reading and revising; many womanly aspirations she has silenced in order to devote her fresh, buoyant life to what she ever regarded as a high and noble object. God grant that she and our children may long live to gather pleasant fruits from these Literary Industries, for I suspect that in this hope lies the hidden and secret spring that moves the author in all his efforts.

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CHAPTER XXIV.

MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. There is a class of authors different from those who cringe to prevalent tastes, and pander to degrading passions; men whom neither power can intimidate, nor flattery deceive, nor wealth corrupt.

Whipple.

HEGEL says of the Germans: Instead of writing history, we are always beating our brains to discover how history ought to be written.” Nor is brain-beating fruitless. Better never write a word of history, or anything else, unless it be done in the best manner possible.

My system of historical work requires a few words of explanation, since not a little of the criticism, both favorable and unfavorable, has been founded on an erroneous conception of its nature.

In order to comprehend clearly the error alluded to, it is well to note that the composition of an historical work involves labor of a twofold nature, the dividing line being very clearly marked. Material in the nature of evidence has first to be accumulated and classified; subsequently from the evidence judgments have to be formed and expressed.

The two divisions might of course be still further subdivided, but such subdivision is not needed for my present purpose. My system—if it be worthy to be termed a system distinct from others—of which I have in my different works had somewhat to say, and others have said still more, has no application whatever to the second and final operation of an historian's task. Every author aims to collect all possible 600 593 evidence on the topic to be treated, and he accomplishes his purpose by widely different methods, of which more anon; but having once accomplished that primary object, in his later work of mind and pen there is little that is tangible in his methods as distinguished from those of another. He studies the evidence profoundly or superficially, according to his habit of study; forms his opinions more or less wisely, according to the strength of his judgment; and expresses them in language diffuse or concise, forcible and graceful, or commonplace and awkward, according to his natural or acquired style.

The philosopher, learned in mental phenomena, may classify to his own satisfaction the minds and mind-workings of authors; the literary critic may form comparisons and broad generalizations upon style. There are as many variations in thoughts as there are in men, in style as there are in writers; but in this part of my work I have no peculiar system or method, and I suppose that other authors have none.

My system, then, applies only to the accumulation and arrangement of evidence upon the topics of which I write, and consists in the application of business methods and the division of labor to those ends. By its aid I have attempted to accomplish in one year what would require ten years by ordinary methods; or on a complicated and extensive subject to collect practically all the evidence, when by ordinary methods a lifetime of toil would yield only a part.

To illustrate: Let us suppose an industrious author, determined to write the history of California, at the start wholly ignorant of his subject. He easily learns of a few works on California, and having purchased them studies their contents, making notes to aid his memory. His reading directs him to other titles, and he seeks the corresponding books in the libraries, public and private, of the city where he resides. His search of the shelves and catalogues of 601 594 the various libraries reveals many volumes of whose existence he had not dreamed at first; but yet he continues his reading and his notes.

His work, even if he devotes his whole attention to it and resides in San Francisco, has at this stage occupied several years, and the author just begins to realize how very many books have been printed about California. His reading, perhaps, has covered two hundred and fifty books, and he has accumulated the titles in different languages of two hundred and fifty more not to be consulted in San Francisco. He makes an effort to secure some of those that seem most important; he induces friends at a distance to send him notes from others; if possible he travels in Mexico and Europe, and thus actually consults many of the missing tomes. But in the mean time he has probably learned, through catalogues and bibliographical lists, that five hundred more works have been printed on his subject, even if he does not yet suspect the truth that besides the one thousand there are yet at least another thousand in existence. He now gives up his original idea of exhausting the subject, understands that it would be impossible in a lifetime, and comforts his conscience and pride with the reflection that he has done much, and that many of the works he has not seen, like many of those he has, are probably of very slight historic value; indeed, it is most likely that long ere this he has allowed himself to glance superficially at some ponderous tome or large collection of miscellaneous pamphlets, almost persuading himself that they contain nothing for him. There are ten chances to one that he has not looked at one volume in twenty of the myriads of the United States government reports, though there is hardly one which does not contain something about California. It has never occurred to him seriously to explore the countless court records and legal briefs, so rich in historical data. He knows that newspapers contain valuable matter; he has even examined a partial file of the 602 595 Californian, and some early numbers of the Alta or Sacramento Union, but being a sane man he has never dreamed of an attack on the two hundred files of California newspapers, even could he find them to attack. He knows that each of these fields of research would afford a labor of several years, and that all of them would fill the better part of his life with drudgery.

Another trackless wilderness of information now opens before him. Our author has before this realized that there are sources of history other than those found in printed matter. He is surrounded by early settlers, whose combined recollections are the country's history in the main; he has talked with several of them, and obtained a few choice anecdotes and reminiscences to be utilized in his book; he has no time to obtain the statements of many, and does not attempt it. He is aware of the desirability of original manuscript authorities; he eagerly deciphers a musty document procured by a friend who knows of his investigations; is delighted at the discovery of a small package of old papers at some mission, mysteriously handed out by the parish priest to furnish choice extracts for the author's note-book; handles gingerly the limited archives of Santa Cruz; obtains from Mr Hopkins, of the United States surveyor-general's office, translations of a few documentary curiosities; tries to flatter himself that he has studied the archives of California, and is a happy man if he escapes being haunted by the four hundred huge folio volumes of manuscripts containing the very essence of the annals he seeks to write, yet which he knows he could not master in fifteen years of hard work. Perhaps he escapes the vision of the papers scattered over the state in private hands, enough to make up sundry other hundreds of similar tomes.

He now realizes yet more fully the utter impossibility of exhausting the material; feels that the work he set out to do has but fairly commenced, and can 603 596 not be completed. Of course he does not feel called upon to make known to the public his comparative failure; on the contrary, he makes the most of his authorities. His notes are brought out and arranged; he has before him the testimony of several good witnesses on most of the prominent points of his subject; he has devoted twenty-five years of industrious research to his work; the book is finished and justly praised.

This writer, whose investigations I have thus followed, is one of a thousand, with whom most of the men who have actually written so-called histories of many nations and epochs are not worthy of comparison. He failed simply because he attempted the impossible.

Now the reader will permit me to trace my own course through a similar routine of investigation, pursued, however, by different methods. I, like my imaginary friend, was determined to write the history of California, and had almost as vague an idea as he of the task assumed. He purchased some books as tools with which to work, selecting such as were known to bear on his subject; I began ten years before i was ready to write, and bought through agents in all parts of the world every book that could be had concerning the Pacific States, thus up to that time or a little later obtaining twenty thousand volumes, sure to include, as I thought, all existing material about California. To search among my twenty thousand for two thousand on California was a less formidable undertaking than for him to search the shelves of different libraries and catalogues for his five hundred volumes; but it was too slow for my purposes, and from ten to fifteen men were employed to index the whole and furnish me a list of California material with reference to volume and page. My imaginary author plods industriously through each work as he finds it, making careful notes of such matter as he deems of value, while I put ten men, each as capable 604 597 in this kind of labor as he or I, at work to extract everything under its proper heading. I, like him, am more and more astonished at the apparently never ending mass of material encountered, but I can see my way through if only the treasury department sustains me. So I tunnel the mountain of court records and legal briefs, bridge the marsh of United States government documents, and stationing myself at a safe distance in the rear, hurl my forces against the solid columns of two hundred files of California newspapers.

I, too, see about me many living witnesses, and from several hundreds of them I obtain, by aid of stenographers, as well as other reporters, detailed statements respecting early times. I more than suspect the existence of important papers scattered in private hands, and I proceed to buy, borrow, and beg, until the product fills a hundred volumes. The six hundred bulky tomes of public and mission archives rise up before me, but there is no such thing as retreat at this point of procedure; I have no fifteen years to spend in plodding through this pathless waste, but fifteen searchers reduce the time to one year, and the archives are transferred to my library. Meanwhile my note-takers continue their labors; each volume, pamphlet, manuscript, and newspaper is made to give up its evidence, little or much, on one point or many, and nothing is omitted or slighted.

At last the preparatory work is ended, and the evidence on each specific point is laid before me, as my friend had his before him, with this difference: I have practically all where he had only part—he hardly realized, perhaps, how small a part. He had two or three witnesses whose testimony he had selected as essential on a certain topic; I have a hundred whose evidence is more or less relevant. From this point our progress lies practically in the same path, and the race is well nigh run. Had he the same data as I, his results would be superior to mine 605 598 if he were my superior as a thinker and as a writer. Our respective methods and systems have little or no influence in the matter, save perhaps that in my experience with many assistants I have been able to select a few to whom I am able to intrust the preparation of systematized notes on special topics, and thus still futher to shorten my labors.

My work at last completed, I have been able to accomplish thoroughly in fifteen years what my friend, quite as zealous, industrious, and able as I, has done superficially in twenty-five years, and what he could not have done as thoroughly as I, in six lifetimes. And yet our respective methods differ after all in degree rather than in kind. I have done scarcely anything that he has not attempted. He has purchased books, studied books, handled newspapers, deciphered manuscripts, and questioned pioneers; I have simply done twenty times as much as he in each of these directions, much more easily and in much less time.

I come now to consider the relative merits of the two methods, the desirability of applying business methods and division of labor to historical and scientific research. The advantages and the disadvantages, if any such there be, of such application should be noted. I claim that mine is the only method by which all the evidence on a great subject or on many smaller subjects can be brought out. Without it the author must confine himself to limited topics or do his work superficially. To thus limiting himself there is no objection, as there can be none that I know of to the more ambitious plan of having help and doing more and better work. I can conceive of no case where it is not desirable for an investigator to have before him all the evidence; though I have had some experience with critics who revere as an historian the man who writes from a study of twenty books with rare and patronizing credit to their authors, and more lightly esteem him who studies a thousand works, and chooses in his notes to leave 606 599 standing the ladder by which he mounted. I have also met critics who apparently could not comprehend that a writer who refers to one thousand authorities does not necessarily use them mechanically, or allow a numerical majority to decide every point, instead of internal evidence. But these objections serve only to show in a clearer light their own absurdity, and that a thorough study is far better than a superficial one.

An industrious author may in a reasonable time collect data and properly record the manners and customs of the Modoc tribe, the annals of Grass Valley, or the events of the Bear Flag revolution; and for the man who thus honestly toils to increase the store of human knowledge I have the greatest respect. Such a man could not by ordinary methods write anything like a complete work on the aborigines of America, or even of California, or on the history of the Pacific States; and for the man who from an acquaintance with Iroquois manners and customs, with the reading of a few books on the North American aborigines, proceeds learnedly on the institutions and history of every tribe and nation from Alaska to Cape Horn, from the Crow reservation in 1875 back to the dwellers of the prehistoric Xibalba—for such a man I have not very much admiration to spare, even if some of his theories are plausible and ingeniously and eloquently supported. Neither am I overburdened with respect for the soidisant historians of California who can in the leisure hours of a few years and within the limits of five hundred pages record all that is worth knowing of the annals of our state; who before 1846 see nothing but the acts of a few padres and ‘greasers,’ of which nobody cares to hear; who glance vaguely and superficially at a few of the many phases of the subject they profess to treat.

The great advantage claimed for my system of literary work is, then, that it renders possible results 607 600 otherwise unattainable. I deem it desirable that the few to whom nature has given the capacity to derive their greatest enjoyment from the hard toil of literary and scientific research should be enabled to embrace in their efforts the broadest fields and accomplish the grandest possible results.

On the other hand, this system of research involves a great pecuniary outlay. In many kinds of labor two working together will accomplish more than four working separately; in other kinds, four will not do twice as much as two. But this is a disadvantage which affects only the author, and not his work, nor the interests of his readers. The same reply might be made to the complaint that assistants cannot be found who will work as carefully and zealously as the employer, since this fact simply renders necessary the extraction of some superfluous or duplicate material. It is true that an investigator in his study of authorities learns much of his subject beyond what is contained in the notes that he preserves, and that at the close of the preparatory studies this knowledge by my system of work exists in several minds rather than in one. This objection is to a certain extent well taken, and I am disposed to admit that on a limited subject which can be really mastered within a period, say, of five years, one man will produce better work than several, although experience has taught me that the application of varied talent, no two men treading in the same path, is not without its advantages. I have always encouraged among my assistants a free expression of their own ideas, and have derived the greatest benefit from frequent conversations and discussions with them on special topics. In long and complicated subjects to which my method is applicable, and which cannot be successfully treated by any other, I am inclined to regard the division of labor as an advantage in itself. I question if the mind which can plod for a long series of years through the necessary preliminary work is the mind properly constituted for 608 601 the best use of the material acquired; or whether the best ability is not injured by long drudgery.

The primary endeavor in all my historical writings has been to exhaust the subject, but presenting it always as condensed as possible. In the text is given the information complete, the full narrative in the fewest words.

It was ever my aim to tell the story clearly and concisely, taking a common-sense practical view of things, and arranging them in natural sequence, giving an episode as much as possible in one place, even though in its relation to other episodes it overlapped a little. Analysis of character, as applied to leading personages, I endeavored to make a feature, giving, with physical description, bent of mind and natural and acquired abilities. In cases where characteristics were not directly specified they might be arrived at from the acts of the individual. A little colloquy was deemed not ineffective when short, terse, and in language appropriate to the persons and the time. A short story, pointedly given, is effective to enliven the text, but it must not be carelessly done. The notes were for reference to authorities, for proof, elucidation, discussion, illustration, balancing of evidence, and for second-class information. To this end quotations from authorities were deemed in order, not as repetitions, but as presenting the subject in its several shades and opposite positions. Though not illustrated—first-class writings are seldom illustrated—maps and plans were inserted in both text and notes wherever needed. In regard to bibliography, it was my aim to give every important book and manuscript formal notice in the most suitable place; the title to be given in full, in italic. The contents of the work were then briefly epitomized, after which a criticism of the work and a biographical notice of the author were given. The biographies of all leading historical characters were of course presented in the text, these of themselves constituting history; inferior characters 609 602 were disposed of in the notes, but of these latter there were few except among pioneers.

Between the old method and the new there is about the same difference that would arise in any undertaking by a practical man of business and by a purely garret philosopher or student. Elsewere in this volume I have drawn certain comparisons between the industrial life and the intellectual life. I desire here to speak more particularly of the effects of a business and a collegiate course on literary labors, the difference in the men produced by these two species of training, and the effects upon my historical efforts of my former business experience.

In the two classes of occupation, while there is much in harmony there is also much that is directly antagonistic one to the other. The elements essential to success are alike in both, but the training suitable for one is not the best for the other. There are certain qualities equally beneficial in both. Honesty, intelligence, application, and the like are as valuable to the professional man as to the business man, and not more so; just as blood, endurance, reliability, are as valuable qualities in the draught-horse as in the racehorse; the training, however, would be quite different in the two cases. Obviously the course pursued in fitting a horse for the turf unfits the animal for the cart.

I never imagined this difference to be so pronounced in the training of young men destined to their different pursuits until I was brought into immediate and constant contact with two distinct sets of assistants, directing both, and part of the time under the same roof. The business I had planted; all its growth and branchings I had directed, engaging and overseeing all those employed in it. This represented one part of me, and of my life. My literary work I had conceived, planned, and was then performing, directing fully every one engaged in it. This represented 610 603 another part of me, my nature, my aspirations, and my life.

A young man or an old man applies to me for a situation. He may be suitable for the business and not for the library; nay, if he is specially fitted for one he is not suitable for the other. My first questions are: What did you last? What have you been doing all your life? What are your aspirations?

If the applicant's time hitherto has been spent as salesman or book-keeper in a mercantile or manufacturing establishment; if his mind be of the color of money, and his chief desires and tastes lie in the direction of buying, and selling, and getting gain, he is worth nothing to me in the library. On the other hand, if he be scholarly in his tastes, of meditative, intellectual habits, careless of money, preferring the merchandise of mind to the accumulations of the warehouse; if he be sensitive, diffident, and retiring, inexperienced in business, with parents and friends intellectually inclined, having spent his whole life at study, having acquired a good collegiate education, and being still ambitious to acquire more, I should never think of placing such a man in the bustle of business. It would be no less distasteful to him than unprofitable to both of us.

The youth's training and experience while in a store are invaluable to him if he means to become a merchant. It is time lost, and often worse than lost, if the intellectual life be his future field; although in my own case, beginning with literature later in life, and prosecuting studies after my own peculiar method, my business experience was of the greatest advantage to me. “Legal training,” remarks George Eliot, “only makes a man more incompetent in questions that require knowledge of another kind.” The activities of business call into play such totally different qualities of mind, drawing it from its content in quiet, thoughtful study, and stirring it to accumulative strife and the passions of acquisition, that it is in 611 604 some respects, but not in all, a positive detriment to intellectual pursuits. On the other hand, study and the thoughtful investigation which should follow it are too apt to engender sensitive, sedentary habits and a distaste for the activities of business. As Mr Herbert Spencer puts it: “Faculty of every kind tends always to adjust itself to its work. Special adjustment to one kind of work involves more or less nonadjustment to other kinds.”

It is not my purpose here to discuss the relative importance of these two pursuits. Both are important, the one no less than the other, and it would be well if one could have the benefit of both. It would be well if in one person could be united twenty different kinds of training. A military training has its advantages; though I must say I see no greater wisdom in introducing the military element in a boys' school than the wood-sawing element or the watch-making element. For instance, the wood-sawyer and the watch-maker, in acquiring or in practising their occupations, derive advantages beneficial to the lawyer or merchant. A medical training is advantageous to a clergyman; every species of training acts beneficially on every other species. There is no occupation in which the learner would not be benefited by the training incident to a dozen other occupations, were it possible to learn the twelve without slighting the one.

In my literary work, at every turn, I found myself deriving the largest benefits from my business experience. Before I had been engaged in my historical labors for five years I found my new work broadly planned and fairly systematized. Accustomed to utilize the labors of others, I found no difficulty in directing a small army of workers here. I found fastened upon me as part of my nature habits of application and perseverance from which I could not tear myself if I would. I was wound up by my mother to work; and so wound that the running down should be with the last tick of time.

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Moreover, I found myself as free as might be from prejudices, though this, I believe, is the opinion of the wildest fanaticism concerning itself; free from sectarianism and party bias, and from the whole catalogue of isms, some of which are apt to fasten themselves on immature minds and there remain through life. I found myself with no cause to battle for, no preconceived rights or wrongs to vindicate or avenge, no so-called belief to establish, no special politics to plead. I had no aim or interest to present aught but the truth; and I cared little what truth should prove to be when found, or whether it agreed with my conceptions of what it was or ought to be. I would as willingly have found the moon in the bottom of the well, were it really there, as in the heavens, where we have always supposed it to be. It was as though I had been born into the world of letters a full-grown man.

He who accumulates facts seldom generalizes them, because no one man has the time and the ability to do both to any great extent. Herbert Spencer could have made little progress weaving his vast and sparkling theories had he not possessed a good store of raw material before he began them. Then again, general speculations spring from habits of thought different from those that regulate the mind-machinery of scientific specialists. Yet the spirit of business activity may be infused into the meditations of mind. The ethics of commerce are not fully appreciated by the student of literature, of law, of divinity. There are in the commercial life more influences at work to form habit, character, opinion, than in almost any other sphere of action. In looking back upon the past the success of my historical undertakings depended no less on business experience than on literary ability.

So long as the spirit incarnate, so long as mind, abides in the body, the body must be cared for; indeed, it is the first care of the mind to provide for the body, but the body once furnished with proper 613 606 food and covering, it is not only enervating, but positively debasing for the mind to go on unnecessarily pampering and providing all its days. Eating only gold will not satisfy hunger; drinking only gold will not quench thirst; a higher and holier appetite than that for wealth should swell men's instincts. Otherwise the simple requirement of nature corrodes, becomes gangrene with greed, and the intellect, the only part of man which lives or is at all progressive, is left to decay.

As to which is the higher, the nobler of these pursuits, there is no question. Philosophers are the mind of society, as agriculturists and manufacturers are the body. “We respect the mercantile mind, as we should,” says Stoddard, “but something tells us that it is inferior to pure intellect. We reverence genius more than gunny bags.”

Like every other animal, man toils for simple existence. Now if wealth increased life, there would be some sense in struggling for it. But this is not so: it absorbs life. Only the multiplication of mind multiplies life; and it is in the exercise of this privilege alone that man is better than a brute. Money and power, at first esteemed as ministers of our pleasure, finally are loved for themselves alone.

A life of business, of acquisition, of struggling to better one's bodily condition, however well it may be, however necessary, never can produce the highest results. Drawn into the whirlpool of money-getting, the mind is lost to nobler efforts. “Every man's aim,” says Higginson, “must either be riches or something better than riches.” And here is one strong plea for a non-accumulating aristocracy, for some units of every society to stand as perpetual reminders to covetous men that there are things in heaven and earth more valuable, more worthy rational consideration, than gold, merchandise, and stocks; that there are such things in this universe as imperishable treasures beyond the reach of moth and rust, and that he who 614 607 dies worth only his ten or twenty millions in money dies poor indeed.

What shall we say of a lifetime of besotted wallowing for wealth, when bright souls are sullied even by the contamination of it? As Jean Paul Richter expresses it: “The pure and upright man is always once, in the earliest time, a diamond of the first water, transparent and colorless; then he is one of the second water, and many and various colors play in its beams, until finally he becomes as dark as the stone which grinds the colors.”

Wealth, if it does not paralyze literary effort, in almost all annihilates all intellectual thinking and living. The highest mental energy springs under the stimulant of necessity, except, indeed, in cases of superabundant genius, which are exceedingly rare.

Pleasure is not the only influence that draws the rich man from his literary devotions. The power which money gives, and which encourages the possessor to employ it in accomplishment, instead of the feebler efforts of personal drudgery, is a stronger temptation even than that of pleasure. Honor and power as well as pleasure are already secured; why should one voluntarily descend to a state of such severe servitude? The man with money can accomplish so much more, and with so much greater ease, by directing the labor of others than by puny personal efforts. Once in a great while, as in the cases of Ruskin and the Humboldts, one sees intellect possessed of gold, and not possessed by it; but the younger Pliny was for the most part right when he said, “Ea invasit homines, habendi cupido, ut possideri magis, quam possidere videantur.”

“Industry, and a taste for intellectual pleasures,” says Lord Macaulay of noble authors, “are peculiarly respectable in those who can afford to be idle and who have every temptation to be dissipated. It is impossible not to wish success to a man who, finding 615 608 himself placed, without any exertion or merit on his part, above the mass of society, voluntarily descends from his eminence in search of distinctions which he may justly call his own.” In his model republic, Plato unites elegance with simplicity, and makes men learned without being weak.

Pride is a great comforter. Some are proud of their wealth, and some of their poverty; some of their noble ancestry, and some of their low origin. While we rejoice to see wealth scattered and the mighty things of this world made useful; while we cry with Lucan, “In se magna ruunt: lætis hunc numina rebus crescendi posuere modum!” yet if these poor gold-ridden plodders are satisfied, I do not see why we should molest them. If Crœsus fancied himself the happiest of mortals, was it not unkind in Solon to attempt to undeceive him?

Horace boasted his humble birth; so did Burns, and so Béranger. Now, while I see nothing to be proud of in wealth or high birth; while I respect a man not one whit more because he happens to have bushels of money, or because his father gave him the privilege of writing lord or count before his name, on the other hand I see nothing glorious in being born in a hovel. Let him praise himself who, born rich or titled, achieves true greatness, rather than the humble person who rises by his own efforts, for poverty drives one on to laborious undertaking, while the rich and great have no such incentive. Of the two, the laudable efforts of poverty or the ennui of wealth, give me the former.

A word with regard to retiring from business. It is well enough understood at this day that he who suddenly exchanges life-long, active occupation for idle happiness seldom finds it. It is only the constitutionally lazy man, he who has never done anything, who enjoys doing nothing. If the commercial man has a cultivated intellect, he has an unfailing resource 616 609 within himself. But this is not often the case: a man of refined and cultivated literary tastes is seldom a great commercial man. “The tendency of modern business life,” says Doctor Beard, “for one who succeeds in it, is to repress whatever of poetry, or science, or art there may be in the brain.” Yet absolute retirement from an active and successful business life which he loves, even to a purely intellectual life which he loves better, may not be always the best a man can do. The strains of study and writing are so severe upon the nerves that at times business may be recreation—that is, if the business is well systematized and successful, with plenty to do, with plenty of capital, and without haste, anxiety, or worry.

At all events I never could wholly retire from business, although at times its duties were extremely distasteful and its cares crushing. Some of the happiest associations, some of the warmest friendships, have sprung from my commercial life; and they never left me, but ripened into sweeter fragrance as age crept on apace. Kenny, Colley, Dorland, and my nephew Will, Welch and Mitchell, Maison and Peterson, and all the rest of the little army I used to general with such satisfaction, not only were you diligent and loyal to the business, but you were among those I was ever proud to call my friends! In the midst of the severest literary labors, as I have before mentioned, I have voluntarily taken sole charge of the business when it was largest and most intricate, for months and years at a time, doubling its capabilities and profits with as little effort as that employed by the skilful engineer in adding to the force of his machinery; and I believe I derived only pleasure and benefit from it. It was a relief to my tired brain to step from the library to the office and in a few moments shape the next month's affairs; it was a relief to fingers stiff from writing history to sign checks awhile. Nor is this 617 610 any contradiction to what I earlier remarked about interruptions when deep in literary labors. A man can do much if left to his own way.

It is no new thing to travel and collect data. Four hundred years before Christ the world's first historian was abroad in search of material. But the travels of Herodotus covered an area of not more than seventeen hundred square miles; that is to say, along intersecting lines extending through thirty-one degrees of longitude and twenty-four of latitude, though, indeed, all the world of his day.

The country whose story I proposed to tell, all that was known of it, its physical features as well as its peoples, the aborigines and their supplanters, embraced an area of some three millions of square miles, nearly one twelfth of the earth's land-surface, with twelve thousand miles of sea-coast. The whole earth was ransacked for information touching this territory.

Arnold says: “For the creation of a master-work of literature two powers must concur, the power of the man and the power of the moment.”

Histories of the early nations of Asia and Europe, as I have before said, had been collated by many skilful hands, had been studied with care, greatly to the profit of mankind. The inhabitants of eastern North America likewise had their able chroniclers, men who had spent their lives in studying and portraying aboriginal character as well as modern history. All this I was now attempting to do for the western side of the continent.

History will be written, and men will rise to write it. Nature reports her own progress, reports it in the sandstones, the coal and peat beds, in mountains, rivers, and seas. The migrations and convulsions of society leave not their footprint upon the stones, but the doings of civilization are none the less certain to be reported. In every nation there are some who will gather and communicate from pure love of it.

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All writings are a description of something, either real or imaginary. Thus, history describes nations in their successive events and epochs; poetry paints the passions; the novelist gives a series of imaginary, social, or other occurrences; science and philosophy describe realities, material and immaterial. The different kinds of literature did not originate and develop simultaneously; poetry and philosophy were born before romance and science.

My theme should be the people and their land. Whatever should concern them, their character and comforts, their origin and destiny, surely was not out of place. The burden of the Iliad is not the siege of Troy, but the wrath of Achilles; the burden of Herodotus is not the history of Greece, but the destruction of the Persian armada. But the less significant instruments by means of which civilization cuts her channels should not monopolize all my thoughts. The straightforward truth itself in all its simplicity should be my aim, ever beseeching deliverance from mind-befogging collateral speculations, as well as from great-man worship in every one of its varieties.

Besides the regular subject-matter or historical notes, which were largely taken out by my assistants, there was another class of notes, allusory and illustrative, which I was obliged to take out for myself, in order to obtain satisfactory material for use. I have found these notes exceedingly serviceable. They were made during occasional general readings of from a week to three months in duration. So long as I could write steadily I had neither time nor taste for miscellaneous reading; but feeling that a writer could never have too much familiarity with history and classical literature, whenever I could do nothing else I read vigorously in that direction, taking notes and recording my own ideas. The substantial facts of history are fixed and determined. When the object is to present them all as they are, without theoretical bias or class 619 612 prejudice, with no desire to elevate this person, sect, or party, or to humiliate or debase another, there is something about the work definite, tangible, and common to all minds. But notes for purposes of proof, illustration, or garnishment, such as Buckle presents in his Commonplace Book—though there indeed are notes of every class indiscriminately thrown together—must be abstracted by the person using them, as no two minds think exactly in the same channels; nor would one person undertaking to use notes of this kind made by another be able even to understand in many instances their significance or relevancy.

With the notes for a volume all out and arranged, and the plan of the work clearly defined in my mind, the writing was comparatively rapid. While the writing was actually in progress I avoided as much as possible all outside reading.

But at the completion of every one or two of my written volumes, I ran through some fifty or a hundred books which I had laid aside to read as my eye had fallen upon them from time to time, taking notes and memoranda applicable both to what I had written and to what I had yet to write. Jean Paul Richter was exceedingly careful to preserve all his thoughts. “He was as thought-thrifty and thought-storing,” says one, “as he was thought-wealthy.” Had the time been at my disposal I should have been a great devourer of books, for I scarcely ever could pass a book without looking at it, or look at a book without wanting to read it.

“I have long had it in my mind to speak to you upon the subject of which this letter treats,” writes Mr Harcourt to me the 4th of April 1877, at White Sulphur springs. “You have made literature your profession, and have already attained a position in the world of letters which the vast majority of those who have grown gray-headed and worm-eaten in the cause have failed to reach. This notable success is partly owing to the wise and far-sighted system you have 620 613 adopted of leaving to others the drudgery that is inseparable from literary labor, and thereby keeping your own energies fresh for the part that is expected of genius. You have carried the progressive spirit of the age into a quarter where it is least expected to be found, for you have applied machinery to literature, and have almost done for book-writing what the printing-press did for book dissemination. It is true that few men of literary tastes—for is it not written that they are all miserably poor?—are in a position to avail themselves of your system, and I know of no one but yourself to whom the suggestion I am about to make, which is simply an extension of that system, would be practicable.

“It is of course well known to you that notes of a general character are indispensable to every writer. Their importance and value cannot be overestimated. They are absolutely requisite for the attainment of both brilliancy and accuracy. What makes a man's pages sparkle so brightly as a judicious and appropriate use of those ‘jewels five words long which on the stretched forefinger of all time sparkle forever’? They serve to show the breadth of his reading—a most laudable vanity, I think, if kept within bounds—they inspire respect in the reader, they say things for him that the writer could but indifferently express in his own words, and by obliterating the obnoxious ego for a moment they stamp his work with the mark of authority. But I am sure that you appreciate their value and desirability. Yet how is it possible to have them at hand without the use of notes? A man cannot carry in his head all the books he has read; neither, though he has them all by heart, will the passages and facts which he most admires or which are most appropriate to his present purpose occur to him when he needs them most. The prejudice which exists against a commonplace book in the minds of many who are not writers is absurd in the extreme. What author of eminence has been without one? It 621 614 is true that quotations and allusions as they crop out in the pages do and should appear to have occurred to the writer on the spur of the moment; but that they were in reality carefully drawn from his written archives and not from the calls of a superhuman memory is a compliment to his industry and no slur upon his learning.

“You will think me fearfully long-winded, I know, but I come straight to business when I state that I should like to take general notes of this kind for you, and what I have said was merely to show, first, that my taking them out for you would be perfectly in accordance with your views of the way in which such work must be done, and second, that such notes should be in your possession.

“I have, of course, no doubt that you have already a large collection of your own; but one can never have too many, or even enough of them, and I think that I might materially assist you. To keep himself up with the literature of the day is about all that a man can attend to in these times, and he has little leisure for taking the back-track among the brain-work of the past.”

Few persons were better qualified for this work than Mr Harcourt. No one possessed finer literary tastes than he; no one's reading was of a wider range than his. And yet for him to accomplish this labor for me I deemed impracticable. For his own use his notes would be invaluable. But in a commonplace book made for my use by Mr Harcourt, and one made by Mr Buckle, or any other author for himself, I could see but little practical difference; that is to say, I might almost as well draw my notes of illustration from cyclopædias and quotation dictionaries already in use as to have Mr Harcourt make a collection specially for me. His would be on the whole better, unquestionably, since I could direct him what categories to draw from and in what form to write them out; but after all, the fact would remain that they were quotations, either 622 615 literal or in essence, and in their original conjunctions they were worth far more to me. Moreover, there was too much of sham in the proposition.

After all that may be said of inventions and systems, or even of ability, work, work was ever my chief dependence. That which we call genius is often nothing else than the natural growth of organs and faculties which of necessity grow by their use. All productions are the result of labor, physical or mental, applied to natural objects. Says Sainte-Beuve of the labor expended in writing his inimitable Causeries du Lundi, or Monday-Chats, “I descend on Tuesday into a well, from which I emerge only on Sunday.” It is no small task even to edit another man's work, if it be done thoroughly and conscientiously. John Stuart Mill, in editing Bentham's Rationale of Judicial Evidence, was obliged to condense three masses of manuscript, begun at three several times, into a single treatise; he was likewise to supply any omissions of Mr Bentham, and to that end read several treatises on the law of evidence.

Intellectually, as well as physically, the rule holds good that he who will not work shall not eat. To the rich, therefore, as to the poor, this rule applies, and with greater intensity it rivets the rich man's bonds. The most worthless of us, if poor enough, are hammered by necessity into something useful, even as the cooper hammers the leaky barrel.

Wealth is greatly desired; it is attained only by labor or sacrifice. Learning is greatly desired: it is attained only by labor or sacrifice. So is respectability, fame, or any other fancied good. Air and sunshine, indispensable to all, are not wealth, because they are free to all; that which lifts one in any way above one's fellows comes only from labor or sacrifice.

The work of man is distinguished from that of beasts in that it has intelligence in it. Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as purely manual labor. All human labor is partly physical and partly 623 616 mental; as we descend the scale the physical element increases and the mental decreases.

It is only the ruder forms of labor that bring immediate returns; the more complex productions of the mind are of slower ripening. In the earlier stages of progress muscular exertion is depended upon almost entirely for supplying the wants of mankind. But as the mind acquires strength and experience, natural agents, the falling water, wind, heat, and electricity, are harnessed to mechanical contrivances and made to do duty as labor-saving machines.

Nature abhors immobility. Motion is the normal condition of man as well as of matter. Society is but a stream, ever seeking its level, ever flowing on toward the ocean of eternity. And who wonders at the belief prevalent in certain quarters that on reaching this ocean beyond the shores of time the souls of men are beaten up by the universal sun into new forms of existence, even as the sun of our little system beats the waters of the ocean into cloudy vapor? This is the central idea round which revolves all thought, the central force from which radiate all energies, the germ of all development, the clearest lesson thrown by nature upon the dark economy of providence, that in labor and sorrow are rest and happiness, that in decay there is growth, in the dust of death the budding flowers of immortality.

Experience alone must be the teacher of those who strike out into new paths; meanwhile old ways must satisfy the more conservative. Learning from experience is a different thing from learning by experience. All the wealth of Russia could not teach Peter the Great how to build a ship; but a day-laborer in a Dutch dock-yard could reveal to him the mystery, and speedily it unfolded within him.

Before genius is application. The mind must be fertilized by knowledge and made prolific by industry. With all the marvellous energetic training of his son, which alone made him the man he was, 624 617 the father of John Stuart Mill failed to implant in him practical energy. He made him know rather than do. Many men there have been of great capabilities and zeal who have expended their energies on energy alone; that is to say, they were ready enough to begin a great task, and would begin many such, and labor at them with brave conscientiousness; but so high was their standard and so keen the sense of their own imperfections, that after a lifetime of futile study and elaboration they sank beneath their burden, the child of their excessive labor being still-born and never seeing the light.

Surely each of us may do something; may leave a bequest as beneficial to our race as that of Hierocles, joke-compiler of the fifth century, who after the arduous labors of a lifetime left to the world a legacy of twenty-one jokes which he had collected. And if they were good jokes he might have done worse; like many another of more pretentious wisdom, he might have died and left no joke at all. For, as Goethe says: “Soll doch nicht als ein Pilz der Mensch dem Boden entwachsen, Und verfaulen geschwind an dem Platze, der ihn erzeugt hat, Keine Spur nachlassend von seiner lebendigen Wirkung!”

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CHAPTER XXV.

FURTHER INGATHERINGS. Das Wenige verschwindet leicht dem Blicke, Der vorwärts sieht, wie viel noch übrig bleibt.

Goethe.

WITH Goethe I might truly say at this juncture that the little I had done seemed nothing when I looked forward and saw how much there remained to be done. Whatever else I had in hand, never for a moment did I lose sight of the important work of collecting. Moved by the increasing importance given to facts and points of detail in the inductive, moral, and physical science of the age, I regarded with deep longing the reach of territory marked out, where so much loss and destruction were going on, and at such a rapid rate. My desires were insatiable. So thoroughly did I realize how ripe was the harvest and how few the laborers, how rapidly was slipping from mortal grasp golden opportunity, that I rested neither day nor night, but sought to secure from those thus passing away, all within my power to save before it was too late. With the history of the coast ever before me as the grandest of unaccomplished ideas, I gathered day by day all scraps of information upon which I could lay my hands.

Among my earliest attempts to secure original documents from original sources was the sending of Bosquetti to San José and Sacramento in 1869, as previously related. Long before this, however, while collecting information for the statistical works issued by the firm, I had secured a little material of a local character, but nothing of a very important nature.

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The conception first assumed more definite form in the brief sketches of notable pioneers, or indeed of any one who had come to the country prior to 1849; indeed, at the time of beginning my work the popular idea of a history of California dated in reality from the coming of the Americans. All before that was shadowy, if not, indeed, mythologic. At all events it was generally supposed to be something no one knew much about, and the little that could be ascertained was not worth the writing or the reading. The hijos del pais were regarded as being nothing, as having done nothing, as being able to communicate nothing, and would not tell of themselves or of the past if they could; so that at this period of my investigations a white man who had come to the country in 1846 or in 1848 was a magazine of historical information.

No inconsiderable results attended these efforts even at an early day. Quite a number of pioneers responded to appeals made them by letter, and sent in their written statements. Some called at the library and gave in their testimony there. Up through Napa valley, into the Lake country, and back by Cloverdale and Santa Rosa, I made a hasty trip in 1871. About this time I engaged Mr Montgomery, editor of a Napa newspaper, to furnish some sketches from original sources of the experiences of early settlers. From the secretary of the society of California pioneers I obtained the names of those whose adventures were deemed worthy of record, and sent men to take their statements. “There should be a chronicle kept,” says Doctor Johnson, “in every considerable family, to preserve the characters and transactions of successive generations.”

At Sacramento, at Salt Lake City, and elsewhere in my travels about the Pacific coast, I made additions from time to time to this very valuable part of my collection. Some of the efforts and expeditions made by me and by my assistants in search of historical 627 620 data I give in this volume, but thrice as much must forever remain untold.

Long before I made my memorable journey to the north, where I received such a warm reception and cordial aid in every quarter, particularly in Puget sound, I received from the author, the honorable Elwood Evans of Olympia, early in 1873, a manuscript history of Oregon and the great north-west, with permission to copy the same, and to use it at my discretion. Mr Evans was a highly talented member of the bar, a ripe scholar, a graceful writer, and a man thoroughly familiar with the history of those parts, where he had resided the greater portion of his life. His history had been carefully written, and had many times undergone critical revision by those who had taken part in the development of the country; for example, by Sir James Douglas and W. F. Tolmie, of Victoria, touching the operations of the Hudson's Bay Company, of which those gentlemen were chief officers for a quarter of a century or more. I need not say that this manuscript was of the greatest value to me in writing the History of the Northwest Coast, or that Mr Evans is entitled, aside from my heart-felt thanks, to the highest praise for his singular and disinterested magnanimity in permitting me to copy and use so important a manuscript, which he had written for publication. A stranger to Mr Evans might regard his conduct as peculiar, but one acquainted with him would not. Years before I had any thought of writing history I had known him, and had held him in high esteem. Far above all commonplace or personal views of what affected the general good, his mind, to me, seemed cast in other than the ordinary mould. At all events I was impressed by Mr Evans as by one dwelling apart in an atmosphere of high-mindedness such as few of his fellows could understand, much less attain to.

Mr James G. Swan of Port Townsend, author of 628 621 The Northwest Coast, made the subject of the coast tribes a special study for some twenty years. “I find a deal of error,” he writes me the 22d of February 1875, “in the accounts of the early voyagers, particularly in their speculative theories in relation to the natives; nor is this surprising when we reflect that at that early day the whites and Indians did not understand each other, but conversed mostly by signs and pantomime. None of these early voyagers remained at any one place long enough to acquire the native language; hence we find so much of error. Even most modern writers have passed over this region rapidly, and have jotted down their ideas without knowing or caring whether they were correct or not.”

Mr Stephen Powers gave me the use of an unpublished manuscript on the manners and customs of certain native Californian tribes among which he had spent much time.

For material for the history of Alaska I applied in 1874 by letter to the Russian consul in San Francisco, Martin Klinkofström, who forwarded my communication to the academy of sciences in St Petersburg. It happened at this time that my friend Alphonse Pinart, the distinguished Americaniste who had published several works on the Pacific coast, more particularly of an ethnological and linguistic character, was pursuing his investigations in St Petersburg, and to him the consul's letter was referred. Monsieur A. Schiefner, member of the academy, writing the 6th of June 1875, says: “Si vous trouverez que l' académie vous pourra être utile comme intermédiaire elle sera toujours á vos services.”

M. Pinart had been engaged for two years past in collecting material on the early settlement of the Russians on Bering sea and the north-west coast, and on the establishment and abandonment by the Russians of Fort Ross, in California. For this purpose he had visited Alaska, searched France and Germany, 629 622 and was now in St Petersburg. Writing from that city the 6th of February 1875, he offers to place at my free disposition all such books and documents as he had found upon the subject. Indeed, he was officially notified so to do by M. Schiefner, to whom my best thanks are due, and who granted M. Pinart every facility, both on his own account and mine.

M. Pinart concludes his letter as follows: “I must tell you that the archives of Russia are very poor in documents relating to Russian America, they having been in some way destroyed. I was able to put my hand only on very few of them. Most of the notices relating to the colonies are printed in papers or reviews, some of them exceedingly difficult to find.” Pinart was to be in San Francisco the following autumn, and was to bring with him all his material. This he did, adding rich treasures to my library. Of such books and manuscripts as he had in duplicate, I took one; the rest were copied in full in a translation made for me by Mr Ivan Petroff.

A few words more upon the antecedents and efforts of this savant: Alphonse L. Pinart was born at Marquise, France, and followed the common course of French schools in Lille and Paris. At an early day a strong taste for languages manifested itself, so much so that during his leisure hours at college he applied himself to the study of Sanscrit; later he attended the lectures of Stanislas Julien on the Chinese, and of A. Des Michels on the Cochin Chinese. During the international exposition of 1867 in Paris, he made the acquaintance of the Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg, who had spent a considerable portion of his life as missionary at Rabinal, Guatemala, and was afterward for a time in Mexico. Through this distinguished man M. Pinart became interested in the Nahua and Maya languages; and from that date he turned his attention toward things American, prosecuting his studies in this direction with ever increasing interest until 1869, when he came to California.

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In 1870-2 M. Pinart visited Alaska, and acquired knowledge of the languages and customs of the Aleut and Kolosh nations. Returning to Europe in 1872 he was awarded the gold medal of the French geographical society for his explorations on the northwest coast of America. Afterward M. Pinart spent much time within the territory of the Pacific States, living with the aborigines, and studying their character and languages. During 1874-6 he was in Arizona, Sonora, Utah, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, and the South Sea islands,

In 1873 M. Pinart purchased a portion of the library of Brasseur de Bourbourg, and after the death of the abbé, in January 1874, the rest of his books and manuscripts fell into Pinart's hands. To all of these M. Pinart most generously gave me free access, and further to facilitate my labors, boxed such portions of them as I required for my history and sent them to my library. After I had used them, they were returned to Marquise, where his collection was kept.

To Innokentie, metropolitan of Moscow, Iohan Veniaminof, Russian missionary to the Aleuts, to Admiral Lutke, and to Etholine, formerly governor of the Russian-American possessions, I am likewise indebted for favors.

At an early date in these annals I placed myself in correspondence with the heads of governments lying within the territory whose history and literature I sought to serve. In every instance my overtures met with a warm response. The presidents of the Mexican and Central American republics, and all governors of states to whom I deemed it advisable to explain the character of my work, replied by offering me every facility at their command. My object in this correspondence had a much broader significance than the outpouring of compliments. As this was some time previous to my acquisition of the valuable works from the collection of E. G. Squier, 631 624 I had felt the lack of Central American material more than of any other kind. In writing the first volumes of my history, while I had abundance of material for a history of the conquest of Mexico, I found myself in the possession of less bearing upon the history of the conquest of the more southern parts; and of further material for modern history I was also in want. I therefore directed Cerruti to make energetic appeals to the supreme authorities of these extreme southern states of my territory, and to explain the object, progress, and importance of the work. Indeed, I asked no great favors, nothing but access to their historic archives.

Despite the partisan strife which had thrown the Central American states into disorder, it gave me much pleasure to find that my efforts to establish a history of the indigenous and imported races, aboriginal, Latin, and Anglo-Saxon, of western North America, would receive the support of these governments. It was here that aboriginal civilization had attained its fullest proportions, and it was here that the European first placed foot on North American soil. These states were stepping-stones, as it were, to the history of the more northern countries. Here begins our history proper. Replete are the early chronicles with the doings of the conquistadores in this region; and although their prominence is no longer what it once was, although history had troubled itself little of late with their petty conflicts, yet they had followed in the wake of progress, and, what was more to the point, they now displayed a commendable interest in the historical literature of their country. Some went much further than this, even so far as to appoint commissioners to obtain and forward me material. This did the presidents of Salvador and Nicaragua. Gonzalez, president of the republic of Salvador, in his letter of the 22d of August 1874 speaks with regret of the disregard shown in Europe for the history of Central America, 632 625 and the consequent ignorance of Europeans as to the real importance of that magnificent country. He is profuse in his appreciation of my efforts in that direction. “La simple enunciacion del nombre del libro que U. prepara,” he writes, “sería bastante para interesar en su favor á todo buen Americano;” and as such a one he proffers his services. M. Brioso, minister of foreign relations, seemed to share the president's feelings. “Los hombres de saber,” he writes the 26th of May, “los hombres de pensamiento, los hombres de Estado han saludado con entusiasmo su primera entrega.”

No less appreciative was his excellency the president of Nicaragua, Vicente Cuadra. Writing to Cerruti from Managua the 12th of December 1874, he says: “Tengo la satisfaccion de decirle que el comisionado del Gobierno, Señor don Cárlos Selva, para reunir i remitir á U. documentos relativos á Nicaragua cumple fiel i activamente su comision, y que ha hecho ya algunas remesas que deseo sean útiles al ilustrado Bancroft.” I found that civil war had unfortunately swept the country of many of its archives. “Siento verdaderamente,” says President Cuadra, “que los archivos de este país hayan sido destruidos ó deteriorados á consecuencia de las vicisitudes.”

Under date of September 22, 1874, the commissioner Cárlos Selva wrote Cerruti that he had already begun the collecting of documents for the history of Nicaragua, and flattered himself that he should be able to accumulate a number sufficient to enable me to write the history of that country at least from the date of Central American independence. At the same time the commissioner shipped a quantity of documents relating not only to Nicaragua but to her sister republics. Nor did his kindness stop there: for years thereafter he was alive to my wants, not only as regarded manuscripts and original documents, but printed journals and bound books. The 633 626 Nicaraguan secretary of foreign relations, A. M. Rivas, writes the 2d of November that private individuals as well as the public authorities were responding in the most satisfactory manner to the appeal made by the government for historical data for my use. The secretary hoped the documents already sent had safely arrived; and regretted the loss of a great part of the archives of the republic, they having been destroyed when in 1856 Granada was burned by the filibusters.

The 11th of December Vicente Cuadra in an autograph letter expresses the great interest he personally as well as officially takes in my literary efforts, and his satisfaction in knowing that the commissioner appointed by him was most active in the discharge of his duties.

In an autograph letter dated at Guatemala the 4th of December 1874, his excellency J. Rufino Barrios, president of the republic, appeared keenly alive to the importance of the work, and desired detailed information regarding the kind of material sought, in order that he might the more understandingly coöperate. On receiving my reply, he went to work with a zeal second to that of none of his neighbors. After this who shall say that the republics of Central America are one whit behind the foremost nations of the world in their interest and active zeal toward securing a proper record of the annals of their country!

One afternoon in May 1874 Father Fitzsimons, an intelligent and charitable member of the order of St Dominic, called at the library and informed me that the priests of his order lately exiled from Central America, had in many instances, in order to prevent their valuable libraries from falling into the hands of the government, delivered them to the natives to be hidden until they should call for them; and to strangers these custodians would undoubtedly deny the existence of any such books. The superior of the order, Father Villarasa, who resided at Benicia, 634 627 being in correspondence with many of the Central American priests who were then returning from their late exile, kindly interested himself to procure for me through an authorized agent material for history from that source.

As regards historical material at Panamá, Mr H. Lefevre, writing Cerruti from that city the 8th of June 1874, says:

“Had it not been for the late disastrous fire, I could have furnished Mr Bancroft with invaluable data touching the history of the Isthmus from the time of its first settlement, for my father-in-law, Doctor José F. de la Ossa, has given much of his leisure during the last forty years to collecting original documents from all parts, even from Seville, Spain, for a work he had undertaken touching the political history of the Isthmus. However, as it is, the doctor may have saved something; in fact, I myself succeeded in getting several lots of documents and manuscripts out of the burning building. But at present the old gentleman is too much troubled to attend to anything of the kind. I have spoken to him of your request, and he has promised to write you lengthily after he gets a little settled.”

At my request, in 1882 M. Pinart visited Panamá and sent me a well filled trunk of the most important available papers as the result of his efforts on that occasion. Seized by fever then raging, he narrowly escaped from the place with his life.

Soon after the war in Mexico, which grew out of the French intervention, General Plácido Vega, commander under Juarez, brought or sent to San Francisco for safe-keeping two boxes of documents. One was deposited with the California trust company and the other in the Vallejo bank both being subject to charges at the rate of two dollars a month.

The boxes were deposited in the name of General Vallejo in 1872, and for three years thereafter nothing was heard in California from Vega. As there was little probability that the packages would ever be called for, General Vallejo sent to the library the box which was at the Vallejo bank, and sent me an order for the one at the trust company's. I was to pay the charges and hold the documents for a reasonable time subject to Vega's order, in case they 635 628 were ever called for. Should Vega never demand the boxes the contents would be mine.

“I have opened the tin box,” writes Cerruti of one of them the 11th of May 1875, “and found it filled with very important historical letters. Mr Savage, who assisted me in the inspection, leans to the belief that they ought to be copied. But I entertain a different view, because, the box being in debt four hundred dollars”—this was Cerruti's characteristic way of writing one hundred and forty-four dollars, that being the amount due on both the boxes up to this date—“I do not think it likely that the relatives of General Vega will ever claim it. I believe, however, that an index would not be out of place, for it would facilitate the labor of the historian.”

General Vega had taken a prominent part in the public affairs of Mexico. He was intrusted by Juarez with important commissions. These boxes of official and private correspondence, accounts, etc., which were of no small consequence to the history of that period, were never called for.

Between the years 1876 and 1880, with official permission obtained through the efforts of General Vallejo while on a visit to Mexico in company with his son-in-law, Frisbie, I had copies made of some of the more important manuscripts lodged in the government archives of the city of Mexico. This work was superintended by my friend Ellis Read, to whom I tender thanks.

Mr R. C. Corbaley of the law department of the business, attempted in 1881 to obtain legislative sanction to transfer the archives of New Mexico for a time to my library. They were in a deplorable condition, and I offered, if this was done, to collate and bind them at my own cost. The proposal failing, I was obliged to go thither and have extracted such information as I required.

Before the visit of Dom Pedro de Alcántara, 636 629 emperor of Brazil, to San Francisco, I had sent an inquiry through the Italian consul to the imperial library at Rio Janeiro concerning documents for Central American history. When the emperor was in San Francisco in 1876 he several times visited my library, seemd to be much interested in the work, and promised me every assistance in his power.

In the seventh chapter of this volume I have spoken of the sale in 1876 of the Squier collection. Mr E. G. Squier was appointed in 1849 chargé d'affaires to Guatemala. He organized a company for constructing an interoceanic railway through Honduras, and assisted in surveying a route in 1853. In 1868 he acted for a time as United States consul-general to Honduras. Besides his Nicaragua, Serpent Symbol, Notes on Central America, Waikna, and Honduras, he published several minor works.

Squier's collection bore the same relation to Central America that Señor Andrade's did to Mexico. It was by far the best in existence, better than he himself could again make even if he had twenty years more in which to attempt it. Most fortunate was this sale for me, for it enabled me to strengthen my library at its weakest point. I had found it very difficult to gather more than the few current works on this part of my territory; and now were poured into my lap in one magnificent shower treasures which I had never dared to expect. By this purchase I added to the library about six hundred volumes, but the number was not commensurate with the rarity and value of the works.

It was owing to the death of Mr Squier that his collection was sold. It consisted of over two thousand books, sets of pamphlets, maps, and manuscripts.

By this purchase I secured, among other things, a series of bound manuscripts of sixteenth-century documents copied from the Spanish libraries, such as Dávila—reports by this renowned conquistador and 637 630 comrades in 1519 to 1524 on matters relating to the conquest of Panamá and Nicaragua; Cerezeda—letters of 1529-1533 on Nicaragua and Honduras affairs; Grijalva, Relacion de la Jornada, 1533, to the South Sea; Pedro de Alvarado—letters, 1533 to 1541, on the conquest of Guatemala and the projected maritime expedition; Andagoya—letters on a Panamá canal to connect the two oceans; Central America—a collection of letters and reports, 1545 to 1555; beside which were a large number of similar documents, bound under various names, and belonging to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Then there was a large set relating to a more northern district, entitled Materiales para la Historia de Sonora, containing letters and reports from friars and officials copied from the Mexican archives, such as Zurita, Breve y Sumaria Relacion, 1554, Descripcion de la America, 1701-10, and others.

The most noteworthy among the printed works from the Squier collection were Leon Pinelo, Trato de Confirmaciones Reales de Encomiendas, Madrid, 1630, bearing on the encomienda system of New Spain; Relacion sobre...Lacandon, 1638, by the same author, together with Villaquiran's appointment as governor there, 1639, a very rare and unique copy, treating of a journey which created great excitement at the time; Gemelli Carreri, Giro del Mondo, part vi., Napoli, 1721, being a record of his observations in New Spain; Vasquez, Chronica de la Provincia...de Guatemala, Guatemala, 1714, tom. i., a rare work; Juarros, Compendio de la Historia de Guatemala, Guatemala, 1808-18, in two volumes, indispensable to the history of the state; Robles, Memorias para la Historia de Chiapa, Cadiz, 1813; Pelaez, Memorias para la Historia del Antigua Guatemala, in three volumes. In addition to the above were many important works which I cannot enumerate, bearing on history, colonization, politics, and exploration, and narratives of travel and residence, in English, Spanish, French, 638 631 German, and Italian, and several volumes of Central American newspapers.

During the winter of 1881-2 some valuable material was secured and sent to the library by my agents in various parts of the world, as well as by government officials in Washington, Mexico, Central America, and Canada.

At the Hawaiian islands was Samuel E. Damon, one always interested in historical research, who sent me files of the Friend, the Polynesian, and the News, containing information since 1836 on Oregon and California, nowhere else existing. At the suggestion of Stephen H. Phillips I wrote Lawrence McAuley, who gave me information regarding the sale of the Pease library, which occurred in 1871. Ten years later George W. Stewart kindly sent me the numbers of the Saturday Press, containing a series of articles on early California by Henry L. Sheldon, a journalist in California as early as 1848.

Utah was not the easiest of problems with which to deal historically. Not that I had any hesitation about treating the subject when once I came to it, but prejudice against the Mormons was so strong and universal, and of such long standing, that anything I could say or do short of wilful and persistent vituperation would not satisfy the people.

This with me was out of the question. Hate is insane; injustice is the greatest of crimes. At the outset in my writings I was determined that no power on earth should influence me from the path of rectitude; no feeling of dislike or of favor within my control, should sway me from telling the truth. I would do all parties and sects justice, according to the evidence, whichsoever way or into whatsoever pandemonium of criticism or unpopularity such a course might lead me. In treating of the Chinese, a fair statement would satisfy neither one side nor the other; 639 632 in treating of Utah, I well knew that strict impartiality would bring upon me the condemnation of both Mormons and gentiles. If this, then, was the test of truth and fair dealing, I must subject myself to the censure of both sides; at all events, as had been my invariable custom in regard to sects, nationalities, and religions, social and political prejudices, I would not write for the approbation of one side or the other.

My sympathies, if any such existed, were with the Mormons, knowing as I did how common it was to grossly misuse and vilify them; and so I declared, assuring them that I would consider the matter coolly, disinterestedly, and as equitably as in my power lay. But this by no means pledged me to their superstitions, or led me to advocate polygamy as the highest social condition.

The Mormons possessed stores of information that I desired. By means of an historical office and an officially appointed historian, and by other ways, they had preserved the records of their doings to a remarkable degree. Of this I soon became aware; but although I knew I could not write a true and complete history of Utah without their aid, I would in no wise, by insinuation or intimation, commit myself to any course, or hold out any hope to them other than that I would treat the subject fairly, according to my custom, as it presented itself to my mind at the time of writing. Orson Pratt was at that time historian and church recorder, and it had been intimated to me that if I would print “without mutilation” what he should write, he would furnish a complete history of Utah. This only showed that they were wholly mistaken in the character of my work. It was in this state of mind that I indited the following epistle:

“SAN FRANCISCO, January 12, 1880.

“DEAR SIR:

“I am in receipt of your esteemed favor informing me that your historiographer, Mr Orson Pratt, will furnish valuable original material respecting Utah, for my History of the Pacific States, now in progress, provided he might feel assured that a fair and proper use of it would be made.

640 633

“In reply, permit me to lay before you the nature of my work and its aim, which I will do as clearly and disinterestedly as I am able:

“The history, upon which I have been engaged for many years past, will comprise some twenty-eight octavo volumes, of about seven hundred pages each. The work is more than half done, and is being carried forward to completion as rapidly as is consistent with thoroughness and proper condensation. The territory covered is the western half of North America, the same embraced in my Native Races of the Pacific States; namely, Central America and Mexico; California, Arizona, and New Mexico; Texas, Colorado, and Wyoming; Utah and Nevada; Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana; British Columbia and Alaska. The Native Race is a description of the aborigines as first seen by Europeans; the History of the Pacific States will comprise the discovery and conquest of the several parts of the country by the Europeans, settlement, society, the organization of governments, and all the important incidents that followed.

“It is written after a careful weighing of all gathered testimony, and is in the strictest sense of the term digested narration—in a word, exact history. Hence the extract of what Mr Pratt should kindly furnish me would be added to the extracts of all other material within my reach; for from such admixtures, through the alembic of infinite labor and pains, my work is distilled. To what extent Mr Pratt's material would tincture the mass it is impossible for me to tell; I never know beforehand what I am going to write; but that it would palpably affect the work there is no doubt. Its presence would be felt in proportion as it presented new truths and disclosed unknown facts. It would stand upon the same platform as the rest, and would be given every opportunity to exercise its full force in shaping the records of the nation. To write the history of Utah, or of any other commonwealth, on the scale proposed by me, or on any other scale, one wants all the information obtainable: all that is known, and all that can be ascertained; and though the size of the finished work need not necessarily be increased by the increase of raw material, the quality should be assuredly improved thereby.

“What I should like from Utah are narratives of early events, dictations, from different persons, of their several experiences, what they saw and did who made the history of the country. What I should like particularly from Mr Pratt is a manuscript history of Utah from the advent of Europeans to the present time; who and where these people were before their westward migration; what led to their exodus from original quarters; what other objective points beside Utah were considered in seeking a new home; why Utah was finally chosen; the routes pursued by the several detachments; the final destination of each; all the incidents connected with their preparations and journeys, the seemingly trivial as well as the more apparently important; what they severally saw and did on arrival; their condition, discomforts, and sufferings; the selection of sites for settlement; the formation of farms, the laying out of towns, the building of dwellings, churches, and mills; the state of society, its composition and condition; the founding of schools, and all other institutions; church and state organization and relations; by whom conceived and how controlled. Religion lying at the foundation of the movement which 641 634 resulted in a new and isolated community, great care should be taken to give the true and inner life of both leaders and people; what were their longings and ambitions, what they hoped to achieve, and what course they pursued to the accomplishment of that end; the ideas, doctrines, and power that set in motion, and the nature and successful workings of that truly marvellous machinery which sustained and governed them; in a word, ecclesiastical and civil polity and history from first to last. Then I should have the beginning of things, everything, everywhere—the first settlement, the first town, the next, and so on; also the first house, farm, mill, church, store, etc., in the several localities; minerals—gold, silver, etc.; the discovery of metals, the opening of mines, and the effect upon society; the organization and operations of local and subordinate governments; the judicial system—crimes and punishments; something of the resources and possibilities of the country: agriculture, irrigation, commerce, manufactures, education, amusements, and domestic life, together with interesting incidents and episodes.

“I have many such manuscripts relating to this and other parts of my territory, some twelve hundred in all, varying in size from a few pages to five folio volumes, covering the subjects above named in whole or in part, some of them complete histories, written for me and at my request, though never intended to be published, or to be used in the words written—notable among which are: The histories of California, by Mariano G. Vallejo, Juan B. Alvarado, Juan Bandini, Antonio María Osio, and John Bidwell; John A. Sutter's Personal Reminiscences; Diario de Juan B. de Anza; the Relacion of Manuel Castro; Narracion Histórica of Pio Pico; Reminiscencias de California, by José de Jesus Vallejo; Memorias of José María Amador; So que Sabe de California, by Vicente Gomez; Reminiscencias, by Estévan de la Torre; Apuntes para la Historia de la Alta California, by Florencio Serrano; two hundred bound volumes of original documents, archives of Santa Bárbara, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Luis Obispo, Monterey, and San Francisco; thirty volumes on Russian America; twenty-five volumes on Vigilance Committees, by William T. Coleman, C. J. Dempster, Isaac Bluxome, M. F. Truett, and others; William M. Gwin's Memoirs; Walter Murray's Narrative; William A. Streeter's Recollections; Joseph Lane's Autobiography; Jesse Applegate's Historical Views; Joel Palmer's Early Recollections; Female Pioneering, by Mrs. M. A. Minto; P. W. Crawford's Overland Journey to Oregon; Peter H. Burnett's Recollections; James S. Lawson's Autobiography; J. Harry Brown's Oregon Miscellanies; Matthew P. Deady's History of Oregon; Lafayette Grover's Notable Things in Oregon; William Strong's History of Oregon; Finlayson's History of Vancouver Island; Harvey's Life of John McLoughlin; Private Papers of Sir James Douglas; John Tod's History of New Caledonia; A. C. Anderson's History of the Northwest Coast; Elwood Evans' History of Oregon, Washington, and Idaho; Private Papers of John McLoughlin; Sir James Douglas' Journal; Good's British Columbia; Tolmie's Puget Sound; Hudson's Bay Company's Fort Journals; McKay's Sketches; De Cosmos' British Columbia Government; Work's Journal; Ebbert's Trapper's Life; Simon Fraser's Letters and Journal; John Stuart's Journal; Waldo's Critiques; etc.

“It is no more than the truth to say that never before was undertaken the history of so large and important a part of the world, upon so comprehensive 642 635 and thorough a plan. There is no considerable part of the civilized world whose history could have been thus attempted with any possibility of success. We of the Pacific slope are now at the turning-point between civilization's first generation in this domain and the second. The principal facts of our history we can now obtain beyond a peradventure. Some are yet living, though these are fast passing away, whose adventures, counsels, and acts constitute a part of early history. There are men yet living who helped to make our history, and who can tell us what it is better than their sons, or than any who shall come after them. A score of years hence few of them will remain. Twenty years ago many parts of our territory were not old enough to have a history; twenty years hence much will be lost that may now be secured.

“If I succeed in my efforts my work will constitute the foundation upon which future histories of western North America must forever be built. The reason is obvious. I take events from the men who made them. My facts, for the most part, are from original sources; and wherever the desired facts do not appear I tap the fountain for them. He who shall come after me will scarcely be able to undermine my work by laying another or a deeper foundation. He must build upon mine or not at all, for he cannot go beyond my authorities for facts. He may add to or alter my work, for I shall not know or be able to tell everything, but he never can make a complete structure of his own. Therefore, whatever Mr Pratt might favor me with would vitally affect the status of his country before the world—would influence it, in fact, throughout all time. No work of this character which he has ever done, or I believe that any one at present could do, would be so important as this.

“I will now briefly explain to you my method in the use of material:

“To what Mr Pratt, or any other whom you should sufficiently interest in the subject, might write for me, I would give an appropriate title, bearing the author's name. I should then bind it for permanent preservation, and use it as I use other material, giving it due prominence; that is, notes would be first taken; those notes would be put with all other notes upon the same subject, arranged so that all authorities on each point fall together, as I have once or twice explained to you. From such combined information the history is written, with full and constant reference to authorities, and with biographical and bibliographical notes. There is one thing I should have that I forgot to mention—the biographies of all the leading men of Utah from the beginning. Besides this manuscript of Mr Pratt's, which it seems to me would give him very marked prominence in the work, I should like to receive all the printed matter possible to obtain. I have already a considerable amount, but cannot have too much—such as files of papers, books, and pamphlets. You may think this preparation too great for the proposed result, and the allotted space insufficient. But I am accustomed to handling large masses of material; and can promise, with what you may give me, to improve the quality even if I do not increase the bulk.

“Now as to what you can depend upon in regard to myself; you have known me both as a business man and as an author long enough to judge how far to trust in what I say:

“My object in this work is not money. If it does not cost me over 643 636 $200,000 more than ever comes back to me I shall be satisfied. I have no pet theory to sustain; nor will I ever have. I am not in the least sectarian or partisan—that is, so far as I can judge. I am neither catholic nor protestant; neither Mormon, methodist, nor presbyterian. I neither bend the knee to the United States government, nor revile Utah. My religion and my politics, such as I may have, are laid aside, so far as possible when writing, for the occasion.

“I do not hope to satisfy the people of Utah or their opponents, because I cannot espouse the cause of either. But I can promise to give, I think, as fully as lies in the power of most men, a simple, truthful statement of facts. I shall enter as fully into the sympathies, ideas, hopes, and aspirations of the Mormons as into those of any who have ever opposed them. Whether Mormonism as a human or divine institution is right or wrong, I shall not deem it any part of my duty to attempt to determine. Naturally an unbiassed author has an affection for his subject. I shall earnestly endeavor to treat the people of Utah with respect; their ignorance and prejudices I shall not overlook, nor pass by their stern morality and high endeavor. Good actions I shall praise, bad actions condemn, wherever found; and that in the same spirit, and under the same earnest desire to deal only exact justice. In my inmost heart I know of no feeling unduly favoring one side more than the other. I desire the hearty coöperation of the people of Utah, Mormon and gentile, and am determined to make my work worthy of it. This you may regard in me as too strictly judicial. But I hope not. Every truthful writer of history must hold himself absolutely free to be led wherever the facts carry him. The moment he becomes partisan his work is worthless. It is before the eyes of the intelligent and disinterested throughout the world that Utah wishes to stand well. Her own people have already their opinion which no words of mine could change if I so desired. I shall undoubtedly find faults: humanity is heir to them. But better a thousandfold that our faults be told by a friend than by an enemy.

“Here, as elsewhere, I seek neither to please nor to displease. And when for any reason I cannot feel at liberty to write unadulterated truth; when from fear or favor I feel constrained here to cover and there to exaggerate, that moment I prefer to lay down my pen.

“This, then, is the point; fair-minded men, who desire to see placed before the world a true history of Utah, cannot more directly or thoroughly accomplish the purpose, in this generation at least, than by placing within my reach the material necessary for the building of such a work.

“Very sincerely,

“HUBERT H. BANCROFT.”

“Mr James Dwyer, Salt Lake City.”

In answer to this were sent to me the following:

“SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH, January 27, 1880.

“H. H. BANCROFT, ESQ.:—

“My Dear Sir: I received your answer to my former letter some days ago, and have read the outline of your work on Utah with much interest. I 644 637 hastened to see Mr Taylor, president of the Mormon church, and read your letter to him. He was very much pleased with your ideas. Mr Taylor held a council yesterday with the members of the twelve apostles, and it was agreed that the material and all the information you need for your history of Utah should be furnished you. The council talked of sending Mr Pratt to San Francisco soon after the adjournment of the legislature, which is now in session, Mr Pratt being speaker of the house of representatives. You will find Mr Pratt a genial gentleman. Please accept my thanks for your kindness. Yours truly,

“JAMES DWYER.”

“SALT LAKE CITY, U.T., Feb. 26, 1880.

“HUBERT H. BANCROFT, ESQ., San Francisco, Cal.:—

“Dear Sir: Your communication of January 12th to Mr James Dwyer of this city, pertaining to your desire to obtain original material through our church historian, Prof. Orson Pratt, respecting the history of Utah for your History of the Pacific States, has been handed to me for perusal and consideration. I have given the matter some attention, and consulted with Prof. O. Pratt and others of our leading citizens pertaining thereto. In consequence of Prof. Pratt being engaged for some time past as speaker of the house of representatives of our territorial legislature, he has not been able to give the subject that attention he has desired to, and which must be our excuse for not writing you sooner.

“We fully realize your position and ability to accomplish this much-desired work; and from the manner represented by you of what is needed, and of obtaining the required data from which to compose this history, we find it will be considerable expense to us to furnish and put in proper shape such data and facts that we are in possession of; yet feel encouraged to proceed with the work, in view of the great good we anticipate will be accomplished in placing before the world those facts, of which the majority are more or less ignorant.

“I shall be pleased to place myself in direct communication with you on this subject, and to be informed what period of time we can have to gather this material to meet your necessities for writing, and shall be pleased to receive any further suggestions you may have to offer.

“Respectfully yours,

“JOHN TAYLOR.”

“SALT LAKE CITY, June 10, 1880.

“HUBERT H.BANCROFT,ESQ., San Francisco, Cal.:—

“Dear Sir: I am reminder by our mutual friend, Mr Dwyer, that you are quite ready for the material which we design to furnish for your forthcoming history of Utah.

“I have found that to collate the facts for such a work with certainty, covering the broad grounds indicated in your letter of suggestions dated Jan. 12, 1880, is a great labor; and that we are liable to expend much time over items that might prove of little or no value to you when obtained. 645 638 With a view to avoid this, and to come immediately and as efficiently as possible to your aid, I propose to furnish you at once with the current documentary history of our territory and church as we have it in print, believing that this, with such oral information as I might be able to give, would let you at once to the labor; and any necessary information not thereby available could be directly aimed at and probably obtained as soon and as fast as needed for the work.

“It is our desire to furnish you all that you may wish, while we are too closely occupied to spend much time and labor unnecessarily.

“Should this method suit your purpose, an early reply to that effect will cause the material to be placed befor you without delay.

“Yours very respectfully,

“ORSON PRATT, Sen.”

“SALT LAKE CITY, U.T., July 1, 1880.

“HUBERT H. BANCROFT, ESQ., San Francisco, Cal.:—

“Dear Sir: On account of the very feeble state of my health I find myself obliged to decline the labor of supplying material for a history of our territory.

“This duty is transferred to the Hon. Franklin D. Richards, one of our leading influential citizens, who has been one of the most active and zealous laborers in assisting to found Utah and to establish her institutions. Mr Richards has labored much abroad on foreign missions, as well as on home service, and is familiar with the genius, spirit, and polity of our institutions, whether ecclesiastical or civil—he having served in both houses of the legislature for many years, and for the last ten years as probate and county judge of Weber county. My own personal acquaintance and association with Mr Richards enable me to introduce and recommend him to you as one who is both competent and zealously inclined to render you the necessary aid to get out such a history of Utah as shall do credit to the head and heart of its author, and justice to an honest and virtuous, but a greatly maligned and misrepresented, people.

“Permit me to make very grateful acknowledgment of your kindness in offering me the hospitality of your own house, and to say that any kindness you may show to my friend and brother Richard will be very truly appreciated.

“With consideration of respect,

“I am, yours truly,

“ORSON PRATT, Sen.”

“SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH, July 1, 1880.

“HUBERT H. BANCROFT, ESQ., San Francisco, Cal.:—

“Dear Sir: In consequence of the feeble health of the Hon. Orson Pratt, he will not be able, as was contemplated, to attend with you in your researches of material pertaining to the history of Utah, which we propose to furnish you for your History of the Pacific States.

“I, however, take great pleasure in informing you that the Hon. Franklin 646 639 D. Richards has been requested to represent the Hon. Orson Pratt and myself in this matter. He is one of our leading and respected citizens, and a gentleman who is fully conversant in literary and legal matters; and has served as a member in both branches of our territorial legislature during several sessions, and officiated as probate judge for Weber county for the past ten years. He has travelled extensively in Europe and in this country, and has an experience which makes him fully competent and adequate to render all the information requisite pertaining to the rise and progress of the territory of Utah; also of our institutions, either religious or civil. He is now nearly prepared to start for San Francisco, and will take with him the historical data referred to.

“With feelings of the highest esteem,

“I am, yours truly,

“JOHN TAYLOR.”

Mr Richards came, and I found him everything I could desire. With him, and in hearty sympathy, was Mrs Richards, who had been married and joined to the church prior to the divine revelation of polygamy. He was a man of varied experience, who had seen much of the world, and had at his command a vast fund of information. He was of singularly humane and benevolent mien, and, except on points pertaining to his faith, posses of broad views and liberal ideas. He held to his faith as other men hold to theirs, and I fully accorded him this liberty. I would not say that he was any more a hypocrite that the catholic priest or the presbyterian preacher. It did not concern me what were his ideas regarding the divine mission of Joseph Smith, or the inspiration of the book of Mormon; and if with three or six women he had entered into marriage relations, I did not propose to follow public sentiment and fight him for it. In fact each of us entertained too much respect for the other to attempt coercion or conversion. I desired the facts concerning the coming of his people to Utah, and their settlement; I wanted them for a beneficial purpose, and the Mormon leaders believed I would use them properly. They were satisfied, on my assurance to that effect, that I would not warp these facts to their prejudice, that I would spare them that vilification to which they were so accustomed; and although 647 640 they knew that I was not a Mormon, that my nature was as foreign to the reception of the doctrines of Joseph Smith as oil to water, and that I was not at all likely to advocate the policy of plurality of wives, yet they believed I would do what they claimed had never yet been done by a gentile, namely, give them friendly and fair treatment.

Mr and Mrs Richards spent the greater part of July in San Francisco, most of the time as my guests. While Mr Richards was giving a fortnight's dictation to my reporter at the library, Mrs Richards imparted to Mrs Bancroft much information concerning female life and society in Utah, which was also preserved in writing. In addition to this, and to many manuscript reminiscences, and county and local histories, the Mormon church furnished me with a great mass of material printed since 1832, and contained in the Millennium Star, the Deseret News, Times and Seasons, political and religious pamphlets, the Frontier Guardian, Pratt's Works, and other like publications.

“The council were pleased with the report given of our visit and labors in San Francisco,” writes Mr Richards from Ogden the 8th of August, “and desire to give all needful information for your use.” In a second letter, dated November 26th, he says: “Pursuant to suggestions in your note of the 21st inst., I have the pleasure to forward to your address historical sketches of thirty-six settlements, towns, or counties from various parts of this territory. Of this number the following are county seats: Toquerville, Beaver, Grantsville, Heber City, Provo, St George, Brigham City, Nephi, and Richfield. Salt Lake City and Logan are in preparation, while Ogden, unfinished, you have; these are each county town also. Gunnison Massacre, by Bishop Anson Call; Autobiography of Parley P. Pratt; Report of Jubilee Conference April 6, 1880, and Utah Pioneers' Celebration July 24th; Travels and Ministry of President Orson Hyde; Fugitive Poems, by Mary J. Tanner, with manuscript accounts of her 648 641 experience, and those of Mrs Nancy N. Tracy and Mrs Martha H. Brown.”

Among others to whom I am indebted for information on Utah are Governor Wood, Mayor Little, William Clayton, A.P. Rockwood, George Q. Cannon, Summer Howard, Daniel Tyler, Miss Snow, E. W. Tullidge, Christopher Diehl, P. E. Connor, H. S. Eldridge, O. H. Riggs and George A. Black.

Granville Stuart interested himself in my behalf in Montana, and through him, and by various other means, I was enabled to secure from that quarter, including Idaho, sufficient for my purpose. I insert the following letter from Wilbur F. Sanders, who is entitled to the highest praise for untiring efforts, under singular discouragements, to secure to his country something of its history:

“HELENA, MONTANA, March 4, 1874.

“SIR: The historical society of Montana recently met with a serious disaster; on the 9th of January its archives, library, and property were destroyed by fire. The loss was as sudden as it was remarkable. The building in which it had its rooms had survived the destruction of an adjoining frame building by fire, which, having been replaced with brick, left us confident of security, which the event has shown was fancied. We had labored under many disadvantages, but had gathered much material having relation to the mountains and plains generally, as well as much pertaining to what is now Montana territory. Our library, if not large, contained many rare books. Having had opportunities to compare with other like societies what we had done, we felt we had abundant reason to congratulate ourselves, at least. The interest in our society had greatly increased within the last two years, and I feel sure our disaster will but serve to intensify it; indeed, we contemplate the erection of a building of our own the coming spring. It was not of these matters, however, I had intended to write. With renewed energy we trust to replace what we so suddenly lost, and while absorbed in some other business to-day, I glanced my eye over the Overland, and saw that you had taken a wide interest in subjects of historical research pertaining to the Pacific coast. I am glad of it, for in my visits to your city it occurred to me that it was the most inviting field I knew; and notwithstanding your historical society, which had the misfortune to fall into the hands of the fathers, who are not worldly enough, and to be located outside San Francisco, I am still of that opinion. I thought perhaps you might have a catalogue of your library or some description of it which you could furnish us, and that your suggestions would be of great advantage to us. The upper 649 642 Columbia, Yellowstone, and Missouri are our specialties, but all this region on either side of the mountains has a history of most absorbing and romantic interest. If you can aid us in the manner I have indicated, you will place us under lasting obligations, which we shall be pleased to reciprocate as we may be able.

“Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

“W. F. SANDERS, President.

“H. H. BANCROFT, ESQ., San Francisco, Cal.”

To Mr Charles L. Mast, for many years of the law department of the business, I am indebted for a full file of the San Francisco Post, besides unremitting exertions throughout the period of my entire work, in gathering from many sources public documents and other material for my work.

These ingathering experiences, as may well be surmised, were not always smooth and pleasant. Much that was annoying, much that was exasperating, has been left unsaid. There is one case, however, that should not be passed unnoticed.

All their lives John Charles and Jessie Frémont had been railing against the world, all their lives had they been complaining of the injustice done them. Their own conduct had always been beyond reproach; only the rest of mankind were desperately wicked. Loudly for thirty years they had clamored for justice, without pausing to consider whether the gods in answering their prayers might not lead them to chastisement.

I did not care for much about themselves—they are not particularly pleasing historical subjects; and besides, they had already told what they knew, and perhaps more than they knew. But aware that they felt aggrieved, and desirous of treating their case, like all others, with strict impartiality, I called upon them, explained fully the character of my work, and invited them to place before me the data for a correct statement of their grievances. They affected great interest. Mrs Frémont, as the regnant avenger of her husband's wrongs, vowed she would incontinently bring 650 643 John Charles to the front, open his mouth, and catch the fury flowing thence upon her pure paper; likewise John Charles roused himself to say it should be done.

Thus matters stood for two or three years, the Frémonts always promising but never performing. I could not understand it; it seemed to me so grand an opportunity to accomplish what they had always pretended to covet, namely, their proper place in history. I had no earthly object in approaching them other than the ascertaining of simple honest truth. I did not believe with them that they had been so badly maligned; all the world do not unite in condemning a good man. But I would hear and weigh well what they had to say.

At last it came out: they wanted money. Marriott of the News Letter, who was their special friend in San Francisco, saw their opportunity, which he urged them to embrace; he even hinted, unknown to me, that I would pay them to write. He knew them better than I, for I had never suspected their mighty wrongs would creep for lucre; besides, it was their affair, not mine. It was not pure or original material for history they were to give me, for of that they had none; they had published their story, and it was already in my library. If, indeed, they were in the possession of knowledge belonging to their country, it could scarcely be called praiseworthy to keep it back for a price, when they had been, the greater part of their lives, fed and clothed at public expense.

Let us see the effect the bare prospect of glittering gold had upon this chivalrous and public-spirited pair. Writing Marriott from Staten Island the 18th of October, 1877, Mrs Frémont says:

“I fully appreciate the trouble you took to write me so long a letter, but it was not needed to convince either the general or myself of the importance of the writing of which you speak. Everything, for some years past, has been put aside for the one purpose of obtaining justice, and to do this, making money enough to keep wheels moving and gain that power which only money gives...Just now ready money is the most essential point, and therefore the end of your letter is one that makes it possible to do this, 651 644 writing...It did not fall to the lot of many women to be ‘so fathered and so husbanded’ as I have been...Will you assure Mr Bancroft this work shall be done?”

Likewise John Charles, upon hearing the distant clink of coin, lifts his voice like an old war-horse at the alarm of battle:

“It certainly would be a most pleasant work,” he writes Marriott three days after the date of Mrs Frémont's letter, “to occupy a little time in setting the past right, and no part of my life has for me the same interest that attaches to the period about which you write; and nowhere could those transactions be set out with the enduring authority of Mr Bancroft's great work. Chance threw me into the midst of those events. It was a fortunate chance for me, and it would be an equally fortunate one for me if the part which fell to me could be freely set out in his work. The question is, how can I avail myself of the opportunity? As you say, it will presently be too late, and the narrow things at home just now are rigidly inflexible on me. You say in the postscript that Mr Bancroft would willingly pay some reasonable sum for the manuscript compiled as he would wish. Would he be willing to advance something of this to enable me to give it the time now? If he would do so, I would immediately set myself in a quiet corner, get my papers into order, and go at the work without the loss of a day. Will you speak of it to him? If he decides for it, I should like to know what interval of time he would wish it to cover, and how full he would wish it written. I think I could make it of itself an interesting work. I have always had in mind the publishing of a work to embrace the unplublished journeys of 1845-7, '48-9, and '53, and not long since had some conferences with publishers on the subject.

“I have the material, and some years ago had some thirty plates engraved on copper and steel, and some twenty wood-cuts. If I should write the sketch for Mr Bancroft, I would abandon the idea of any publication, for the reason that his work sets the historical past right, and this is all I care for. Perhaps he might use, if his work permits it, some six or ten of the plates, which were the work of the best artists in Paris, London, and Philadelphia. Would be glad if it should suit Mr Bancroft to make the arrangement. We should all of us deeply regret to stand wrong in his work. It would be a great misfortune. To be right there, would be most valuable to me in every way, and it would constitute a rallying-point for every other part of my life, such as it was. Pray give the earliest convenient attention to this, and if you have occasion to write or telegraph me, do so to the address at the head of this note.”

Now of all cool propositions ever made me, this of John Charles was the most frigid. In the first place, I did not want a “manuscript compiled” by him, and would scarcely pay money for such a document 652 645 The most I ever cared for from him was some explanation on certain disputed points, on matters not clearly settled, and which for the most part called in question his own fair fame. Secondly, why should I pay him money for patching his tattered reputation? But most ridiculously extravagant of all was the proposition that I should send him payment in advance. Mr Frémont was always a man of great expectations; had I sent him a check for five thousand dollars at the beginning of his work, and a like amount at the completion of it, he would never have dreamed himself overpaid for throwing together and commenting upon, to the furtherance of his individual reputation, a quantity of matter the most of which was already in my hands in much better shape for my purpose. At this rate five millions of dollars would not have sufficed for the knowledge to which the public was justly entitled without the payment of a dollar; what this man did for the United States, while in the pay of the United States, the People of the United States had a right to know.

To the magnificent proposal of John Charles I paid not the slightest attention. Thinking, however, that the Frémont family might be led astray by Marriott's money proposals, I wrote to Mrs Frémont as follows, the 30th of October:

“Mr Marriott has shown me your letter of recent date, or that part of it bearing upon my former request. I see that he has spoken of compensation for such material as you may furnish. While I deem it very important to General Frémont, to the public, and to myself, that the general's own version of certain events be under my eye as I record California's annals, yet I would by no means obtain that version at the cost of possible future dissatisfaction on your part. I have never paid, and cannot pay for original historical testimony. I have, however—and it was to this that Mr Marriott referred in his letter to you—paid in some cases, at a maximum rate of twenty cents per folio, for the actual labor of writing down such testimony. This I will gladly do in the case of General Frémont, if he will give me a complete narrative of events in California from March to July 1846, including full details of his own acts and motives.”

I would here state that in saying I did not pay and had never paid for original historical testimony, 653 646 I did not refer to books, manuscripts, or documents, but to knowledge in the mouths of living withnesses. Thousands of dollars had I expended in committing such knowledge to writing, and I would cheerfully have remunerated the copyist fairly in the case of General Frémont; but to pay the narrator money, except by way of charity, as in the case of Alvarado, or in the way of expenses or entertainment, I never could make up my mind to do.

Intellectual wealth can only exist as the common property of the body social. Knowledge as a means of civilization is valueless except it be promulgated. It matters little how high the state of cultivation arrived at by the individual, unless he impress it in some form upon his age. Hoarded facts, like hoarded coin, are absolutely worthless. He who having knowledge of public events valuable to posterity withholds it for gain, is beyond the reach of words condemnable. Bringing into the world absolutely nothing, the preserved experiences of all men and ages are freely placed at his disposal, while he, stingily grudging his poor pittance, carries it with him into the realm eternal, where it is not of the slightest use to him. Later we learned that Frémont really had little to say.

In my comments upon those with whom I came more immediately in contact while searching for material, it should be understood that I am pronouncing judgment purely from a collector's point of view. I would not have it appear that frowns, surly refusals, and withholding information of a public character for money, governed my opinion of a man's character in other respects. Because a man did not regard me or my work with favor, it did not necessarily follow—that he was a bad husband or citizen, that he was dishonest or of base instincts. I believe I may truthfully say with Martial, “Parcere personis, dicere de vitiis.” It has been my constant aim in all my writings to lash vice, but to spare persons. 654 647 I speak only of their conduct in such connection, and pronounce my opinion upon it. Of those who said plainly they would have nothing to do with my literary affairs I never complained. There were several such in Vigilance Committee matters, and I do not even mention their names. I grant every one the right to exercise his own pleasure, and do not expect all to think on every subject as I do. There was Pacheco, who pledged me in faithful promises, which he faithlessly broke. He said he had papers and would give them to me; I do not know that he had them, as I never saw them. He pretended to personal friendship, to friendship for my work, which rendered his failure to keep faith with me all the more exasperating. Frémont's record, in many respects, is not such as to command the respect of any fair-minded man. My treatment of him in history was made up purely from the records, and was in no way affected by his failure to fulfil his promises.

From Mission San José Cerruti writes the 18th of April 1875:

“A few days ago Mr Osio, a resident of California in 1826, arrived in San Francisco, dragging along with him a manuscript history of the early times in California. I believe he originally intended to give it to your library, but certain persons whose acquaintance he happened to make induced him to reconsider his resolution, and made him believe that there was money in it. Actuated by that belief, he has given his manuscript to Mr Hopkins, keeper of the archives in San Francisco, with a prayer for enough subscribers to pay for printing it. I believe, with judicious diplomacy and a little coin, you could get some person to purchase the manuscript for your library. I think Mr Knight would be the right man. If I thought I could gain a point by going to San Francisco I would cheerfully do so; but I fear my mixing in the matter would cause a rise in the price of the manuscript.”

Being in San José one day in November 1877, I called on Juan Malarin in relation to the Osio history, which Vallejo, Cerruti, Savage, and others, had at various times during the past three years endeavored to obtain. The original of this important work belonged to J. R. Arques of Lawrence station, into whose hands it fell as executor of the estate 655 648 of Argüello, to whom the manuscript was presented by the author. Osio was then living in Lower California.

Malarin was non-committal: said he had no ownership in the manuscript, but did not think Arques would regard favorably the proposition to lend me the manuscript, though he did not say why. Mr John T. Doyle had taken a copy of it; likewise James A. Forbes. From the latter Malarin thought I might obtain a copy if I was prepared to pay down money enough. On returning to San Francisco I immediately called on Mr Doyle, who, as soon as I had stated my errand, exclaimed: “You shall have the manuscript, and may copy it; and anything else that I have is at your disposal. You have fairly earned the right to any historical material in California, and I for one am only too glad to be able to acknowledge that right in some beneficial way.” That settled the matter.

About this time I found myself greatly in need of a manuscript history of the Bear Flag movement by Mr Ford, a prominent actor in the scene. The manuscript was the property of the reverend doctor S. H. Willey of Santa Cruz, to whom I applied for it. Doctor Willey responded cheerfully and promptly, not only sending me the Ford manuscript, with permission to copy it, but also other valuable material. “I take pleasure in lending it to you,” he writes, “that it may contribute possibly to accuracy and incident in your great work. The manuscript needs considerable study before it can be read intelligently. Mr Ford was not much accustomed to writing. General Bidwell says he was a very honest man, but a man liable to be swayed in opinion by the prejudices of his time. His manuscript seems to modify the current opinion touching Mr Frémont's part in Bear Flag matters.” Doctor Willey also gave me a very valuable manuscript narrative of his own recollections.

Notwithstanding all that had been done up to this 656 649 time, I felt that I should have more of the testimony of eye-witnesses. Particularly among the pioneers of and prior to 1849, and among the native Californians inhabiting the southern part of the state, there was information, difficult and costly to obtain, but which I felt could not be dispensed with.

Mr Oak suggested we should make one more appeal, one final effort, before finishing the note-taking for California history; and to this end, the 25th of August 1877, he addressed over his own signature a communication to the San Francisco Bulletin, reviewing what had been done and sketching what was still before us.

Extra copies of this article were printed and sent to school-teachers and others throughout the coast, with the request that they should call upon such early settlers as were within their reach and obtain from them information respecting the country at the time of their arrival and subsequently. For writing out such information, for one class would be paid twenty cents a folio, and for another less desirable class and one more easily obtained, fifteen cents a folio was offered. Not less than five thousand direct applications were thus made, and with the happiest results; besides which Mr Leighton, my stenographer, took some sixty additional dictations in and around San Francisco, and Mr Savage made a journey south, a full account of which is given in another place. Thus I went over the ground repeatedly, and after I had many times congratulated myself that my work of collecting was done; in truth I came to the conclusion that such work was never done.

657 650

CHAPTER XXVI.

PRELIMINARY AND SUPPLEMENTAL VOLUMES. Periculosae plenum opus aleae, Tractas; et incedis per ignes Suppositos cineri doloso.

Horace.

AS I have elsewhere remarked, the soul and centre of this literary undertaking was the History of the Pacific States; the Native Races being preliminary, and the California Pastoral, Inter Pocula, Popular Tribunals, Essays and Miscellany, and Literary Industries supplemental thereto. To the history appears a biographical section entitled Chronicles of the Builders of the Commonwealth.

Of the inception and execution of the Native Races I give elsewhere the full history. The California Pastoral, if not born so absolutely of necessity, was none the less a legitimate offspring. In the history of California under the dominion of Mexico, many of the most charming features in the precincts of home and minor matters, in the peculiarities of the people, and regarding their social and political behavior under the influence of their isolation and strange environment, were necessarily omitted. Of that remaining from this superabundance of material, I took the best, and weaving with it some antique foreign facts and later fancies of my own, I embodied the result in a separate volume, and in a more attractive form than could be presented in condensed history.

In like manner into a volume entitled California Inter Pocula were thrown a multitude of episodes and incidents following or growing out of the gold 658 651 discovery, which could not be vividly portrayed without a tolerably free use of words, and could not be condensed into the more solid forms of history without, to some extent, stifling the life that is in them, and marring their originality and beauty. Indeed, of this class of material, engendered during the flush times and afterward, I had enough left over of a good quality to fill a dozen volumes.

It is difficult to imagine a more miraculous transformation of human affairs, upon the same soil and under the same sky, than that which occurred in California during the years 1848 and 1849. Prior to this time, the two stretches of seaboard five hundred miles on either side of San Francisco bay and running back to the summit of the Sierra, was occupied by races of two several shades of duskiness, and divers degrees of intelligence, the one representative of the lowest depths of savagism, and the other the most quiescent state of civilization. The former went naked, or nearly so, ate grasshoppers and reptiles, among other things, and burrowed in caves or hid themselves away in brush huts or in thickets. The latter dreamed life lazily away, lapped in every luxury bounteous nature could offer, unburdened by care, delighting in dress and display, but hating work and all that self-denying effort which alone brings superiority. These migrated Mexicans attended with scrupulous regularity alike on all the ordinance of the priests of Christ and the disciples of Satan, and then passed into the hereafter without ever knowing how completely they had been deceived.

On all sides there was a condition of things which seems to have set at defiance the laws of evolution, and to have turned backward the wheels of progress. While enjoying the most favorable surroundings, even savagism appears to have degenerated, while the civilization of Spain was rapidly falling into a kind of catholic savagism. In the place of those new necessities which are usually generated by new activities 659 652 when predatory tribes cease from dissipating their whole time in war, there was here utter stagnation among those both of the American and the Latin race. As matters then stood there was no more likelihood of immediate improvement in the way of art or science than that a spinning-wheel or steam-engine should be constructed by a people to whom cotton or iron was unknown. Instead of higher forms being here evolved from lower, it would seem that reptiles were springing from birds and monkeys from men. Theology, though dogmatic, was in a measure stripped of its sting. Whatever their practice, their code of ethics was as far as possible removed from the domain of common sense. And even in the more advanced communities, if social, moral, and religious prejudices were analyzed instead of blindly cherished, what a world of folly would be revealed!

In the far north, along this same coast, at this very time were two other phases of life, both of which were abnormal and individual, one being represented by the Muscovite, the other by the Anglo Saxon. While Baranof sat in Sitka, John McLughlin on the Columbia ruled, to the full measure of life and death, a hundred savage nations, occupying an area five times as large as that of the British Isles. Socrates said that parents should not marry their children because of the discrepancy in their ages. One would think so great a philosopher as Socrates might have found a better reason for forbidding so monstrous a crime against nature. The autocrat of Fort Vancouver advocated the marriage of chief factors and traders with the daughters of Indian chiefs, setting the example himself by mingling his blood with that of the American aboriginal. One would think that so grand a gentleman as McLoughlin should need a better reason than wealth, power, position, or the mandate of a monopoly to compel him to forego noble succession and spawn upon the world a hybrid race. “It is the rich who want most things,” says the Chinese 660 653 proverb; the blessed poor of New Caledonia, besides the hope of heaven, might have children of their own race. If God made me for bright immortality, well; if for opaque gloom, why then well also; I am not a grub that may transform itself into a butterfly; but while in this world, whatever betides, I may always be a man, and father none who can justly lay at my door the cause of their degeneration, mental or physical.

In regard to the volumes entitled Essays and Miscellany and Literary Industries they shall speak for themselves. But of my two volumes called Popular Tribunals I will here make a few explanations.

The publication of the Native Races began the 1st of October, 1874, and continued with the appearance of a volume every three months until Christmas, 1875, at which time complete sets of the whole five volumes were for sale in the several styles of binding.

Never at any time was I in a state of great anxiety to publish. There was ever before me a healthy fear of the consequences. I could always wait a little longer before seeing my fondest ambition, perhaps, dashed to earth. There was, no doubt, some feverish eagerness prior to the publication of the Native Races, regarding the manner in which it would be received; but ever after that, it was in the quality and progress of my writings that I chiefly concerned myself, the end being a matter to be regretted rather than a consummation devoutly to be longed for. There was with me a constant anxiety to press forward my writing; I had but a short time to live and very much to do. But when I saw how my first work was received, and how I should stand with the literary world after its publication, I determined to print nothing more for several years. I had several reasons for adopting such a resolution.

In the first place I had nothing ready to publish; and no one ever realized more fully than myself that 661 654 it takes time and work to make a good book. History writing cannot be hurried. Certain years of time are necessary for the preparation of every volume, some more and some less, and twenty men for five years I estimate as equivalent to one man one hundred years. It is true I could carry forward certain volumes collateral to the history whose publication I had planned, but all these I thought best to hold back until after the history proper was pulished.

In the next place I thought it better to give the public a little rest. I did not wish to weary people of the subject.

My books were heavy and expensive, and to issue them too rapidly might cheapen them in the eyes of some. But more than any other reason why I would publish nothing more for several years was this: I had now, so to say, the ear of the public. I stood as well as the author of a first book could stand. Whatever of good opinion there was abroad for me and for my work I would keep and give all the benefit of it to my history.

It was my ambition to do for this last western earth's end what Homer did for Greece, with these differences: Homer dealt in myths, I should deal in facts; Homer's were the writings of poetical genius, mine of plodding prose. And yet as Herder says of it, “Als Homer gesungen hatte, war in seiner Gattung kein zweiter Homer denkbar; jener hatte die Blüthe des epischen Kranzes gepflückt und wer auf ihn folgte, muszte sich mit einzelnen Blättern begnügen. Die griechischen Trauerspieldichter wählten sich also eine andere Laufbah; sie aszen, wie æschylus sagt, vom Tische Homer's, bereiteten aber für ihr Zeitalter ein anderes Gastmal.”

Right well I knew that often literary failure had been followed by literary success and vice versa. Now I would not that my second attempt should prove inferior to the first. When once the ultimate of my capabilities was attained I would stop. I labored for 662 655 the strength it gave me; when it should result in mental or moral weakness then my life's work was done.

In the supplementary works I indulged in a wider latitude as to the choice of subjects, the expression of opinion, and giving my faculties free play in the execution. Consequently, while they were more myself than almost any of my other work, they were more open to criticism, and would be, I felt sure, severely viewed in certain quarters. Hence it was that, all things considered, I resolved to write some twenty volumes before printing further, and rewrite until I should be satisfied, when I would have them copied so as to divide the risk of fire,—which was done.

During the two years and more my assistants were engaged in taking out notes on California history, I wrote the two volumes entitled Popular Tribunals, making of it at first three volumes and then reducing it. I began this work in 1875, finished the first writing of it in 1877; revising and publishing it ten years later. I began it as an episode of Californian history which would occupy three or four chapters, and which I could easily write during the three or four months in which I supposed the note-takers would be engaged. The note-taking was six times the labor I had anticipated, and so was Popular Tribunals.

As I did not like to interrupt the note-taking, which was being done under the direction of Mr Oak, I derived little help on this work from my assistants. When at Oakville, White Sulpher springs, or Santa Cruz, such material as I lacked I wrote for and it was sent to me.

The method I adopted in this writing was as follows: The subject seemed to divide itself about equally between the outside or public workings of the institution, and the inner or secret doings. For the former, there were the journals of the day, and a few disordered and partial statements printed in books. There was no history of the vigilance committee movement in existence.

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As a rule newspaper reports are not the most reliable testimony upon which to base history. But in this instance this class of evidence was the very best that could exist. Spreading before me six or eight of the chief journals of the day, I had in them so many eye-witnesses of the facts, written by keen fact-hunters while the incidents were yet warm, and thrown out among a people who knew as much of what was going on as the newspaper reporters themselves, so that every misstatement was quickly branded as such by jealous, competing journals and by a jealous public. Here was every advantage. For the transactions of each day, and each hour, I could marshal my witnesses, taking the testimony of each as it was given according to actual occurrence, taking it with a full knowledge of the prejudices and proclivities of each witness. Thus for a review of each day's doings, radical on the side of vigilance, I took the Bulletin. For description of the same events from the rabid law and order point of view, I examined the Herald. For more moderate expression of facts and opinions still leaning to the side of vigilance, I looked through the Alta California, the Sacramento Union, the Courier, Chronicle, and Town Talk.

Thus at my command were a dozen or twenty reporters to search the city for items and give them to me; and thus I went over the several years of this episode, point by point, bringing in, connecting, condensing, until I had a complete narrative from the beginning to the end, of all these strange doings.

This for the outside of the subject. But there yet remained an inner, hidden, and hitherto obstinately veiled part, which was now for the first time to be revealed. There had been at various times, both before and after the disbandment of the committee, proposals for publishing a history of the movement, but none of them had been seriously entertained by the committee. Indeed it was not regarded as safe to reveal their secrets. These men had broken the law, 664 657 and while in truth they were law-abiding citizens, they were subject to punishment by the law. Secrecy had been from the beginning the cardinal virtue of the association. Absolute good faith, one toward another; it was herein their great strength and efficiency lay.

There might be some members more fearless, and with broader and more intelligent views than the others, who could see no objection to placing on record for the benefit of mankind, in subsequent ages, the whole truth and details of the tragical affairs of the association, who yet did not feel at liberty to do so as long as others interposed objections. Such objections were interposed, and such denials given, many times, until at last the question arose: Should these things ever be revealed? or should the secrets of the executive committee die with the death of the members? I sent Cerruti after these men, but Italian blandishments seemed to have greater effect upon his more volatile brothers of the Latin race, than upon these hard-headed, cold-blooded Yankees. One of them when spoken to by Cerruti drew his finger across his throat significantly saying “that would be to pay if I told all.” Then I waited upon them myself.

“You have no right,” I said, “to withhold these facts forever from the world. History belongs to society. To our children belong our experiences; and if we hide the knowledge we have gained we rob them of a rightful inheritance. Nearly a quarter of a century has now passed. You have not always to live. Are you willing to bear the responsibility of so gross a barbarism as the extinguishment of this knowledge?”

Some were convinced, others obstinate. In vain Mr Dempster, now wholly with me, called upon these latter, one after another, assured them that this history would be written, and asked if it were not better it should be done fully, truthfully, than with only half the evidence before the writer. No. They did 665 658 not wish to talk about it, to think about it. It was a horrid night-mare in their memory, and they would rather their children should never know anything about it.

For a time the matter thus stood, so far as the men of 1856 were concerned. Meanwhile the grim inquisitors who had so closely sealed their own lips could not wholly prevent their former associates from talking upon the subject. Little by little I gathered from one and another information which it had not been hitherto deemed proper to reveal. By reporting to one what another had said, I managed to gain from each more and more.

Thus, gradually but very slowly, I wedged my way into their mysteries, and for over a year I made no further progress than this. Then I began operations with a stenographer, making appointments with those who had taken an active part in one committee or the other, for the purpose of taking down a narrative of their early experiences. Many of these, once started on the line of their lives, seemed unable to stop until they had told all they knew, as well about vigilance committees as other matters.

This so broke the crust that I at length succeeded in persuading Mr Bluxome, the ‘67 secretary’ of the first committee, and the yet more famous ‘33 secretary’ of the second, to let me have the books and papers of the committee of 1851. All these years they had been locked in an old iron safe to which he had carried the key. The executive committee of that tribunal had never been so strict as that of the second; there had been less opposition, less law, less risk in the first movement than in the second; and such of the first committee as were not dead or absent manifested more indifference as to the secrets of their association.

Bluxome tells a story how orders of court were wont to be eluded when vigilance papers were ordered produced.

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In one of the many cases for damages which followed the period of arbitrary strangulations and expatriations, the judge ordered the records of the stranglers brought into court. Bluxome obeyed the summons in person, but nothing was seen of books or papers in his possession.

“Where are the documents you were ordered to bring?” demanded the judge.

“I do not know,” replied Bluxome.

“Are they not in your possession?”

“No.”

“You had them?”

“Yes.”

“What did you do with them?”

“I delivered them to Schenck.”

“Where are they now?”

“I do not know.”

Dismissed, Bluxome lost no time in hurrying to Schenck, and informing him of what had happened. Scarcely had Schenck passed the document to a third person, before he was summoned to appear in court, and bring with him the required papers. After testifying as Bluxome had done, the person to whom he had delivered them was summoned with like result; and so on until all concerned were heartily tired of it and so let the matter drop.

It was a great triumph, all the archives of the first committee safely lodged in the library, and it proved a great advantage to me in opening the way to the books and papers of the second committee. These were in the keeping of Mr Dempster, to be held in trust by him; and while he would gladly have placed them all in my hands at the first, he felt that he could not do so without the permission of his associates.

I found it less difficult after this to obtain dictations. Members of the committee of 1856 were not particularly pleased that I should have so much better facilities placed before me for writing the history of the first committee than the second.

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Many of them now came forward of their own accord and told me all they knew. The 15th of February, 1876, Mr. Coleman, president of the committee of 1856, wrote me, I being then at Oakville, that he was ready to give me data. A long and exceedingly valuable narrative of all the events from the beginning to the end was the result. It was in fact, a history of the movement, and from the one most able to furnish it. This was supplemented by a no less valuable and even more thoughtful and philosophical a document by Mr. Dempster. Likewise from Truett, Smiley, Bluxome, and twenty others, I obtained interesting narratives.

When I had written the narrative of the first committee and had fairly begun the history of the movement of 1856, the absurdity of the position assumed by certain members struck me with more force than ever, and I was determined, if possible, to have the records and papers of the second committee. I went first to Coleman.

“I want all the archives of your committee,” I said. “It is the irony of folly to compel a man, at this day, to make brick without straw when you have abundance of material in your possession.”

“Had it rested with me you should have had everything long ago,” said Mr. Coleman.

Then I went to Dempster.

“Did I stand where you do,” I ventured to affirm, “I would not permit the history of the vigilance committee to be written while those books and papers were unrevealed.”

“What would you do?” he asked.

“I would pay no attention,” I replied, “to the wishes of those few wise men of Gotham who would arbitrate this matter between eight thousand vigilants and their posterity. They are not the vigilance committee; they are not a majority of the executive committee.”

“I cannot give them up until I am authorized to 668 661 do so” said Dempster, “but I'll tell you what I will do. Come to my house where the papers are kept; take your time about it, and select and lay aside such as you would like. I will then take such documents and show them first to one and then to another of these men, and they shall designate such as they object to your having.”

And this he did; and the result was that no one threw out anything. But even this did not satisfy me. I wanted the records and all material extant on the subject. I wanted these spread out before me while I was writing; and I finally obtained all that I asked.

Thus I found at my command three distinct sources of information, namely, printed books and newspapers, unpublished material and the personal narratives of the more conspicuous of those who participated in the events.

The time of my writing this episode was most opportune. Had I Undertaken it sooner,—had I undertaken it without the reputation the authorship of the Native Races gave me,—I am sure I could have obtained neither the vigilance archives, nor the dictations. At all events, no one had been able to secure these advantages, and many had so endeavored. On the other hand, had the matter been delayed much longer, those who gave in their testimony would have passed beyond the reach of earthly historians. And the same might be said regarding all my work. Probably never did opportunity present so many attractions for writing the history of a country. Time enough had elapsed for history to have a beginning, and yet not all were dead who had taken part in prominent events.

In studying the vigilance question, I began with unbiased views. I had never given the subject serious thought, nor had I heard the arguments on either side. I had not proceeded far in my investigations before I became convinced that the people were not only right, but that their action was the only thing they could have done under the circumstances. I 669 662 arrived at this conclusion in summing up the arguments of the opposite side. The more I examined the grounds taken by the law and order party, the more I became convinced that they were untenable, and so I became a convert to the principles of vigilance through the medium of its enemies, and before I had heard a word in their own vindication. Further than this, my veneration for law, legal forms, and constitutions gradually diminished as the sophisms of their worshippers became more palpable. I see nothing more sacred in the statutes men have made than in the men who made them. I claim that the majority of any people possess the right to revolutionize; otherwise ours would still be the dark ages. At all events, however worshipful written laws and constitutions may be, people will overturn them or set them aside when necessity demands it, whether they have the right or not. What is right? Were the framers of antique laws so immaculate that they should be able to provide for every future emergency? But the vigilance movement was no revolution; neither did any member of the committee wish to subvert or overthrow the laws. They merely aimed to assist impotent courts in the administration of the law. As I proceeded in my investigations, I saw on the one side crime rampant, the law prostituted, the ballot-box under the control of villains of various dye, the tools of men of intellect and education high in office. I saw between the two extremes, between the lower and upper strata of this fraternity of crime, between the whilom convict, now election inspector, poll-fighter, supervisor, and petty political thief, between these and the governor and supreme judges, a multitude anxious to maintain the existing state of things. These were lawyers, whose living was affected by such disturbance; judges, whose dignity was outraged; sheriff's, whose ability was called in question, and with them all the skum of society, hangers on about courts, policemen, pettifoggers, 670 663 and thieves,—all who played in the filthy puddle of politics.

When I saw this element banded in support of law, or rather to smother law, and opposed to them the great mass of a free and intelligent people, representing the wealth and industry of the state, merchants, mechanics, laboring men, bankers, miners, and farmers, men who troubled themselves little about political technicalities and forms of law, except when caught in it meshes—when I saw these men drop their farms and merchandise and rise as one man to vindicate their dearest rights, the purity of the polls, safety to life and property—when I saw them rise in their single-heartedness and integrity of purpose, carefully counting the cost before taking the stand, but, once taken, ready to lay down their lives in support of it, and then with consummate wisdom and calm moderation, tempering justice with mercy, pursue their high purpose to the end—when I saw them villified, snarled at, and threatened with extermination by pompous demagogues who had placed themselves in power,—I was moved to strong expression, and found myself obliged repeatedly to go over my writing and weed out phrases of feeling which might otherwise mar the record of that singular social outburst which I aimed to give in all honesty and evenly balanced truthfulness.

As to the separate section of the history, the Chronicles of the Builders of the Commonwealth, I may truthfully say that it was evolved from the necessities of the case. The narrative of events could not be properly written with the biographies of those who had made the country what it is included, and it was not complete without them; hence the separate work.

Among other lessons learned while writing this work was never to come too near the object about which you wish to write well.

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CHAPTER XXVII.

BODY AND MIND. Hard students are commonly troubled with gowts, catarrhs, rheums, cachexia, bradypepsia, bad eyes, stone, and collick, crudities, oppilations, vertigo, winds, consumptions, and all such diseases as come by overmuch sitting; they are most part lean, dry, ill-colored...and all through immoderate pains and extraordinary studies. If you will not believe the truth of this, look upon the great Tostatus and Thomas Aquinas' works; and tell me whether those men took pains.

Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy.

AMONG general physiological and psychological principles these truths are now regarded elementary—that the brain is indispensable to thought, volition, and feeling; that the brain is the seat of thought, of intellect; that the brain being affected by the blood, the mind is influenced by the quality or condition of the blood; that with the quickening of cerebral circulation thoughts, feelings, and volitions are quickened, even up to the pitch sometimes of vehement mental excitement, or delirium, and that the quality of the blood depends upon food, air, exercise, and rest.

Under great mental strain blood of the best quality, pure, rich, and plentiful may be drawn from the muscles, to the detriment of the muscular system, to meet the pressing emergencies of the brain and of the nervous system; and vice versa excessive physical exertion draws from the mental faculties nourishment rightly belonging to them. Therefore both mind and muscle are alike dependent not less upon food than upon the blood-purifying organs, lungs, liver, intestines, and the rest.

The influence of the mind upon the body, through its three-fold states of intellect, emotion, and volition, is no less great than the influence of the body upon 672 665 the mind. These reciprocal influences are exactly balanced. A pound of one presses as heavily upon the organism as a pound of the other. When the equilibrium is destroyed, the system is soon out of balance.

For good and for evil the influence of each upon the other is great. To the imagination we may refer much of the otherwise unexplainable morbid phenomena springing from mesmerism, spiritualism, and the like. The imagination of St Francis d'Assisi so revelled in Christ's sufferings as to bring upon his body the pains under which Christ labored. While the automatic action of the brain upon the body is the occasion of many disorders, the will exercises no small power over the body, and even on the mind itself.

Lucretius plainly perceived that with the body the mind strengthens and decays, when he said “Cum corpore mentem, crescere sentimus pariterque senescere.” Likewise Ovid expresses the same opinion: “Vitiant artûs aegrae contagia mentis;” so that in all this there is nothing new.

Mind is not that incorporeal essence which theology once declared it, but a tangible entity which may be reached through the nervous system. The derangements of mind are no longer regarded as exceptional disease. That which directs my fingers in writing is no less a subordinate and governable part of me than the fingers which guide my pen. Between the wide extremes of automatic acts reflected from the brain and, a priori, intutions, there is a vast field in which the impulse of will exercises full sway.

Of all organs the brain alone sleeps. Other organs may become paralyzed, and their functions cease while yet the body lives, but the first sleep of the body is its last sleep.

Were it not that men conduct themselves as if they 673 666 knew it not it would seem superfluous at this late day to talk about exercise as a requisite to health. We all know that brain-work dissipates the nervous forces with greater rapidity than the most arduous physical labor; that the nervous substance of the body is exhausted by thought just as physical exertion exhausts the muscles. And yet how few regard the fact. How few enthusiastic workers succeed in schooling their habits in that happy equilibrium which secures health, and enables them to make the most of both mind and body. Often it is the most difficult part of the daily task, at the appointed hour to drop the work in which the mind is so deeply engrossed, and to drive one's self forth to those mechanical movements of the body which are to secure strength for another day.

Some strength and stores of health had been laid in for me, thanks to my father who gave me first an iron constitution, and supplemented it with that greatest of earthly blessings, work, in the form of plowing, planting, harvesting, and like farm occupation. And I doubt if in all the range of educational processes, mental and physical, there is any which equals the farm. In farm labor and management there are constantly at hand new emergencies to cultivate readiness of resource, and the adaptation of means to ends. Five years of steady work on a farm is worth more to most boys than a college education. Later in life it was only by excessive physical exercise that I could bear the excessive strain on my nervous system. By hard riding, wood-sawing, long walks and running, I sought to draw fatigue from the over-taxed brain, and fix it upon the muscles. Often the remedy was worse than the disease; as, for example, when recreating, after long and intense application, I invariably felt worse than while steadily writing. Rest and recreation are pleasurable no less ideally than by contrast; no work is so tedious as play when we are driven to it by necessity.

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Although culture is so much less necessary to happiness than health, yet so fascinating is the acquisition of knowledge, that we are ready to sacrifice all for it. But never is one so beguiled as when one attempts to beguile health. For a day, or a year, or five years, one may go on without respite, but always having to pay the penalty with interest in the end.

In all aids to physical well-being, the trouble is to become sufficiently interested in any of them to escape weariness. Irksome exercise produces little benefit. The instincts of activity must not be opposed by mental aversion. Wearisome amusements are flat pastimes.

On seating myself to years of literary labor, I sought in vain some intellectual charm in muscle-making. Though I loved nature, delighting in the exhilaration of oxygen and sunlight, and in the stimulus of contrary winds, and although I well knew that liberal indulgence was the wisest economy, yet so eager was I to see progress in the long line of work I had marked out, that only the most rigid resolution enabled me to do my duty in this regard. I felt that I had begun my historical efforts late in life, and there was much that I was anious to do before I should return to dust. In my hours of recreation I worked as diligently as ever. I sought such exercise as hardened my flesh in the shortest time. If I could have hired some person to take exercise and indulge in recreation for me, every day and all day, I would have been the healthiest man in California. Yet though I sought thus to intensify my exercise so as to equal my desires, I could not concentrate the benefits of sunshine, nor condense the air I breathed. La Rochefoucauld calls it a wearisome disease to preserve health by too strict a regimen. “C'est une ennuyeuse maladie de conserver sa santé par un trop grand régime.”

Nor is the benefit to the mind of bodily exercise any greater than the benefit to the body of mental 675 668 exercise. Bodily disease is no less certainly engendered when the mind is left unengaged and the body placed at hard labor, than when the mind is put to excessive labor and the body left in a state of inactivity. A sound mind in a sound body is only secured by giving both body and mind their due share of labor and of rest. We are told that we cannot serve two masters; yet the intellectual worker while in the flesh seems to be under such obligation. If man were all animal or all intellect, he could live completely the animal or the intellectual life, living one and ignoring the other; but being man and under the dominion both of the animal and of the mental, there is no other way than to divide his allegiance in such a way as to satisfy, so far as possible, both. Further than this, between the different mental faculties and between the different physical faculties, in like manner as between mental and physical faculties, there are antagonisms. One organ or faculty is cultivated, in some measure, at the expense of some other organ or faculty. The human machine is capable of manufacturing a given quantity only of nervous force, or brain power, and in whatsoever direction this is applied, there will be the growth. Exact equality in the distribution of this force would be to the advantage of the man as a whole, but not to society which is progressional, as leading members crowd certain faculties at the expense of the others. “Extreme activity of the reflective powers,” says Hebert Spencer, “tends to deaden the feelings, while an extreme activity of the fellings tends to deaden the reflective powers.”

Excessive brain-work is undoubtedly injurious to bodily health; but all the evil effects so charged are not due to this cause. Previous disease, confinement, or other indirect agency often lies back of the evils laid at the door of mental labor. Indeed, it has been questioned by physiologists, whether a perfectly healthy organization could be broken down by 676 669 brainwork; but as there is no such thing in nature as a perfectly healthy organism, the matter can never be tested. As brain-work rests on a physical base, and as there is constant breaking down in intellectual labor, just how much should be attributed to the direct influence of mind, and how much to extrinsic influences one cannot say. The body may be already in a shattered state; mind may direct the body into bad ways, and so bring it to grief; but that the mind, by fair and honest pressure on a perfect organism, can crush it, is denied. But I am satified that it is the confinement attending brain-work, rather than brain-work itself that does the damage.

Worry is infinitely more consuming than work. Doctor Carpenter charges worry and consequent mental strain as the cause of the premature death of business and professional men of the present day. Care is the sword which Damocles sees suspended over him by a hair, which dispelsall happiness. Scott, Southey, and Swift worried themselves to death; so did Thackeray, Greeley, and ten thousand others. The chafings of the mind are far worse than those of the body. He who would live long and perform much mental work must fling care to the winds. Some can do this; others cannot. A sensitive mind is subject to greater wear than a mind of coarser texture. The finer the intellectual fibre the more care strains it. “The happiness of the great majority of men,” says Lecky, “is far more affected by health and by temperament, resulting from physical conditions, which again physical enjoyments are often calculated to produce, than by any mental or moral causes, and acute physical sufferings paralyze all the energies of our nature to a greater extent than any mental distress.”

The tension such as attends wild speculation is much more wearing than the severest study. “It is not pure brain work, but brain excitement, or brain distress, that eventuates in brain degeneration and disease,” says Doctor Crichton Browne. “Calm, 677 670 vigorous, severe mental labor may be far pursued without risk or detriment; but, whenever an element of feverish anxiety, wearing responsibility, or vexing chagrin is introduced then come danger and damage.” Excessive fatigue results in a weakening of the faculties and loss of memory.

Francis Galton claims that bone and muscle as well as genius are praiseworthy and hereditary. Hence in his catalogue of great men along with judges, statesmen, commanders, scientists, literati, poets, musicians, and divines, we have oarsmen and wrestlers.

Obviously the powerful physique needs more exercise to keep it in health than the puny one. The weak, delicate woman is satisfied with little moving about, while the strong man's muscles ache if they are long kept idle. Often we see a powerful brain in a weak body; but that is usually when the mind has been cultivated at the expense of the body. A strong muscular physique absorbs the nervous force which might otherwise be employed for brain work. It draws in several ways: first, in bodily exertion; then if the exercise has been vigorous the mind is correspondingly fatigued, or at least unfit to resume its labors until the forces of the body resume, to some extent, their equilibrium. Again, the intellectual energies, a great portion of the time, are drowned in the sleep, the system being meanwhile occupied in the great work of digestion, which obviously draws upon the nervous forces.

As thought is influenced by the material changes of the brain, so the brain is influenced by the material changes of the body. Food and the cooking of it claim no unimportant part in the chemistry of mind. The psychological effect of diet is not less marked than the physiological effect. Cookery colors our grandest efforts. The trite saying of the French “C'est la soupe qui fait le soldat,” applies as well to literature as to war. It is a significant fact that with the revival of learning in Italy was the revival of cookery.

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For the influence of externals, of extrinsic agencies, of bodily conditions, and changes on states of mind, we have only to notice how our moods are affected by hunger, cold, heat, fatigue, by disease, stimulants, and lack of sleep. Very sensibly Doctor Fothergill remarks: “When the brain is well supplied by a powerful circulation, and a rich blood supply from a good digestion furnishes it with an abundance of pabulum, the cares of life are borne with cheerfulness and sustained with equanimity. But when the physical condition becomes affected, a total and complete change may be and commonly is induced.” And again, “a disturbance of the balance betwixt the wastes of the tissues and the power to eliminate such waste products is followed by distinct mental attitudes, in which things appear remote from their ordinary aspect. This condition is much more common than is ordinarily credited by the general public, or even by the bulk of the profession. The physical disturbances so produced are distinct irritability and unreasonableness, which is aggravated by a consciousness that there is an element of unreason present—a tendency to be perturbed by slight exciting causes, the mental disturbance being out of all proportion to the excitant.”

Yet we must not forget that between the body and mind there are essential differences, so far as the acquisition of strength from exercise is concerned. Undoubtedly the mind, like the body, enlarges and strengthens with exercise, but not in the same proportion. Every arm, like the blacksmith's, by proper and persistent effort may be made to swell and harden, though not all in the same degree; and to a greater or less extent, beginning with the child, and avoiding over-strains, any mind may be trained into something approaching that of an intellectual athlete. Toward the accomplishment of such a purpose, necessity and ambition, in that happy mixture found usually in the intermediate state between riches and poverty, are 679 672 most conducive to intellectual gymnastics. The very rich and the very poor are alike removed, —the one by lack of opportunity and the other by lack of inclination, —from long and severe mental effort.

A single glance along the line of names conspicuous in the empire of letters is sufficient to excite wonder in us how the strong and swelling intuitions of genius are warped by the weather of environment. Inspiration itself seems but a part of that divine machine of which body and mind are the more tangible enginery.

Does not nature make a mistake in placing a strong and subtle intellect in such a little crazy withered body as De Quincey's? So weak and insignificant was it that its owner despised it, often neglecting its vulgar cravings beyond the limits of endurance, and then feeding it opium to keep it quiet. Indeed opiates and stimulants play no small part in the economy of inspiration. While the intellect of the great opium eater was inspired by the insidious drug, Poe's genius was enlarged by rum, and Dryden's by a dose of salts. So ill-suited to each other were De Quincey's mind and body that while the one was absorbed in some social problem, the other was left to starve or given ten borrowed shillings to satisfy its hunger, the owner offering to put up a fifty pound note as security. For twenty years he was a slave to a vice. Then he made a fight against it and conquered it. This was his greatest achievement.

Back among the Athenians we find in the comedy-writer, Cranitus, another noble example of victory on the better side. As his years increased his fondness for wine grew upon him so as to impair his intellect. For several years his pen produced nothing, and it was thought his writing days were over. But when very old he appeared before the public with a comedy which was a satire upon himself, called The Bottle, in which he acknowledges his desertion of the muse for a new mistress, and promised reformation. So 680 673 pleased were the Athenian critics at this singular production of their old favorite, that they awarded him the prize, though Aristophanes had brought forward in competition The Clouds which he regarded as one of his best plays. Theogins found inspiration in potations which left him, as he himself says, not absolutely drunk, nor yet quite sober. The details of Poe's forty years of life are not attractive. Befriended as an orphan, he was court-martialed at West Point, and returning to his benefactor, he was kicked out of his house for improper conduct toward the young hostess. After a series of swindling transactions, and brief low living, he was picked from the gutter drunk, and in a few hours was dead.

Once or twice or thrice to risk all to win immortal honors is not so strange; but to risk all habitually, with the one fatal failure certain sooner or later to come, is more befitting insanity than genius.

A sad fate was that of William Collins, a foolish fate, who, because his books did not sell, became disheartened, then took to drink and finally died insane. How many, among the multitudes of unsuccessful and broken-hearted, whose epitaph might be written in the same words.

Pope drank coffe; Byron, gin; Newton smoked; Napoleon took snuff; Lord Erskine, opium; and Wedderburne, when he wished to rouse emotion in some great speech, put a blister on his breast. Coleridge, the poet preacher, made himself drunk with opium, and for the last eighteen years of his life was under the care of a surgeon, in whose house he lived. Fitzhugh Ludlow ate opium and wrote the Hasheesh Eater. Mangan drank liquor and ate opium.

Pope was delicate, irritable, unhappy. At the age of sixteen a literary temperament manifested itself in him as fully as at any later period. Far past midnight Charles Lamb pored over his beloved books, the ebbing of the brandy in the decanter which was ever before him, marking the departing hours. 681 674 Impatience under confinement, a moral inability to curb conduct with common-place conventionalisms appears to be the usual attendant on genius. As Patmore says of Lamb, “he would joke or mystify, or pun, or play the buffoon; but he could not bring himself to prose, or preach, or play the philosopher.” Hence it was he “often passed for something between as imbecile, a brute, and a buffoon.” In trivial things great minds may find diversion, though fools take pleasure in nothing else. Some can accomplish more drunk than can others sober.

Human nature has two sides, a sensual and an intellectual one. To the former, even in rude communities, some slight degree of shame intuitively attaches, while a corresponding pride appears upon the side of the latter.

Most men come honestly enough by their propensity for drink. With some it is an inheritance, with others the result of circumstances, of association, of unconquerable ills. The drinking man is by no means necessarily a sensualist. The man of large appetite or lust may be his superior in that direction. There may be a sensualism of dress more disgusting than the sensualism of drink.

Literary men are somewhat prone to excesses, and the greater their talents, oftentimes the greater their intemperance. If prone to eat, they are gluttons; if to drink, they are drunkards; if given to domestic quarrelling, they are anything but saints in their households. Deep depression, often bordering desperation, follows great or prolonged effort. In the reaction which follows, happy he who can lapse into comfort without the aid of drink.

The Asiatic we condemn for bringing to the poor and sorrow laden the divine drug. Very justly we condemn them, though England first thrust it upon them, for this portable happiness is woe unutterable. And yet it is a more refined madness than that which comes from intoxicating drink. One engenders 682 675 intellectual bliss, while the other, after lifting the brutish part of man into the heaven of sensuous gratification, plunges it into an abyss of besotted stupidity.

Whose is the greater wisdom, I ask; or rather, the greater folly, —the greater madness? Which brings to man the most joy? which cures and kills the most? Wine colors, warps, disorganizes, and degrades mind, exalting passion and fleshly lusts; opium stimulates the diviner part, elevates and enlarges intellect, and gives brilliancy and harmony to ideas. Before we quarrel with our Asiatic brother for stimulating the better part of himself, let us abandon this pluralizing of our baser part.

The intellectual torpor produced by opium never, like that produced by wine, reaches absolute moral insensibility. Throughout all the splendid imagery brought to the brain by the divine drug, the imperial pomp of nature as displayed in dark tremulous forests, in broad plains, lighted by a spectral sun, in the eternity of sparkling ocean, the gorgeous sky pictures, and the symphonies of heavenly harpings borne to the dreamer's ear upon the wind, conscience is ever present with its duties and apprehensions mingled with an oppressive sense of growing incapacity. All the faculties of mind and body are prostrate in the Circean spell, and yet the nightmare of moral responsibility is ever present, and though lifted into celestial realms, from himself the dreamer cannot escape.

The most muscular men are not always capable of the greatest endurance; neither are the strongest men always the healthiest. He whose arm measures ten inches and lifts with ease six hundred pounds, is not necessarily twice as healthy as the man whose arm, five inches round, raises, with difficulty, three hundred pounds. The fat, sound man, of ruddy complexion, being in a state of perfect health, is seldom capable of accomplishing as much labor, or of enduring as great fatigue, as the thin cadaverous person of deranged digestion, or imperfect breathing apparatus.

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The pigmy Pope, whose spectral form every morning must be wrapped in flannels to hold it together during the day, and the diminutive and unsubstantial opium-eater, with his alabaster flesh, and whose frail tabernacle was taught to withstand the effects of three hundred and twenty grains of the drug daily, were by their intellects made giants capable of outlasting formidable physiques.

It was once the fashion for that tremblingly sensitive mixture of love, hate, ecstatic joy, misanthropy and misery called by the gods to poesy, to die young. Like the coral, whose life is the swallowing of carbonate of lime, while the upper part is growing, the lower part is dying. Beginning with Chatterton who died at eighteen, the list continues with Keats' death at twenty-five, Marlowe's at twenty-eight, Shelley's at twenty-nine, Byron's at twenty-six, and so on. But both before and since the appearance of this divine epidemic, there were men who did not deem inspiration incompatible with either common sense or length of years. Homer lived until long past eighty; over his wine cup leered Anacreon at eighty-five; King David was not young when he sorrowfully sang his sins away; Chaucer died at seventy-two. Then there was a list of earlier departures, such as Shakespeare at fifty-three, Ben Jonson at sixty-four, Massenger and Milton at sixty-six, Dryden and Southy at sixty-eight, though indeed Wordsworth reached eighty. The crop of latter day poets, however, bids fair to outlast them all. Beginning with Bryant, past eighty, there were Whittier, Longfellow, Tennyson, Holmes, Lowell, and others who saw no reason why poets should not live as long as other men.

It should not be forgotten that while engaged in a difficult and confining work, a writer is scarcely himself or anything else. Body and mind both are in an abnormal state. Thus it is that we find the lives of authors in direct contrast to their teachings. Yet this 684 677 inspiration, this abnormity, or what you will, must be his who would aspire to an intellectual seat very far above his fellows. Few are educated into greatness; and though genius of any quality short of inspiration must have cultivation before it has completeness, acquisition alone never yet made a man famous. Nor do great men make primary use of education in building their ladder to fame.

Glance over the names of those most eminent in England during the last three centuries, and we find remarkably few of them who went through a regular course of instruction at a public school. The Edinburgh Review gives the names of twenty poets, a dozen philosophers, and a score or so of the first writers in morals and metaphysics who were not educated at what that journal calls a public school.

Now mental cultivation is a good thing, a grand thing, but it is not everything. It is what our mother nature does for us, as well as what we do for ourselves that makes us what we are. All great men are men of natural abilities. If they are cultivated so much the better. It is only cultivated genius that reaches the highest realms of art; but if the genius be not there, no amount of cultivation will produce it. You may dig and dung your garden through twelve successive springs, if there are no seeds in the ground there will be no flowers. You may rub, and blanket, and train your horse until doomsday, if there be no speed in him he wins no race. Cultivation, in the absence of natural abilities, is like undertaking to kindle the edge of ocean into a flame; there is no blaze from it.

Genius itself cannot tell what it does not know. One must learn before one can instruct; nor is it wise to attempt to define a thing without knowing what it is. Better that the orations of Demosthenes shoull smell of the lamp, as Pytheas, from the manifest labor bestowed upon them complained, than that they should fall unheeded to the ground. Historical and 685 678 scientific facts do not spring from inspiration. Yet there is such a thing as stifling genius by an overweight of learning. The Paradise Lost begun by Milton in his fifty-eighth year is an example. The subject is wholly ideal, and if undertaken in the author's younger days, before his mind was buried beneath a mountain of classical machinery which marred his supernatural conceptions, would have been as matchless as any of Shakespeare's productions.

Nevertheless, let all men beware of genius. We cannot judge fairly of genius by its work. As well determine the slimy bottom of a pool by the silver sky reflected from its surface. A genius is a cross between an angel and an ape. Genius is a disease which blossoms like the measles or small-pox. It is an intellectual excrescence, wart, or bunion. A hair divides its destiny; the road on one side leading to the insane asylum, that on the other to immortal intellectuality. One thing is certain; genius may ripen and burst without aid, but the result depends upon labor. Never yet a genius made a lasting impression upon the world without work. All great men are workers. Who ever heard of a painter, sculptor, musician, or author, who was not burdenbearer and laborer, beside which occupations hodcarrying and sand-shovelling are pastimes?

Hence men should be careful how they affect the eccentricities of genius, lest, failing, they should show what they are—fools. Striking out of the beaten path in dress, belief, or behavior, one may reach a picturesque eminence or fall into a quagmire. As a rule we may be pretty sure that those who find themselves forced by internal enginery to cast off traditional circumlocution, and strike at once at the root of things, are not the men to study long over the latest tie of the cravat, or shape of the boot-toe. And so eccentricity of dress and behavior always attend men of genius. But that which in the brainless dandy is affectation, in the man of genius is individuality, 686 679 as much a part of the man as folly is of the fool. A genius is one who is singular in great things; and this is scarcely possible without being singular in little things.

Pure genius displays its presence the moment opportunity offers, whether at the age of six or sixty years. Nothing however denotes more plainly genius malgré soi, than its manifestation in childhood and youth. Sir Walter Scott's little favorite Marjorie Fleming displayed a most peppery power with tongue and pen at the age of six. Bryant wrote Thanatopsis at eighteen, and published a History of the United States at eighty, thus disputing the adage cito maturum, cito putridum.

“Southey,” said Coleridge, “possessed, but was not possessed by his genius.” So it was with Daniel Webster. The man was more than the talents; the inspired forces were held in subjection by a trained indomitable will. All his vast brain resources were under command of a disciplined mind, and quickly responded to its call. Here is an instance where a commanding frame comes into play; put Webster's mind into De Quincey's body, and the man never would be heard from.

In Campbell and Goldsmith were mingled, in an extraordinary degree, the sublime and the ridiculous. To great fastidiousness, Campbell added intense self-consciousness which well-nigh destroyed his poetic talents. Goldsmith, after having failed in divinity, law, and medicine, after having repeatedly gambled away, his last farthing, and after having tramped the continent as an itinerant flute-player, finally took to literature, at which, for the remainder of his days, he eked out a precarious existence, his poverty nauseated now and then by a gorgeous suit of silk or satin. Strange that the same man can be at once so wise and so foolish!

Of what sort of stuff was made the brain of Theodore Hook? As a diner-out, rather than as a 687 680 writer, his genius shone brightest. As musician and improvisatore in extemporaneous melodramas, and in which, not unfrequently, every stanza contained an epigram, he never was equalled. With exquisite humor and inexhaustible prodigality he showered puns, bon-mots, and anecdotes on every side. Vainly have others tried to imitate him; the counterfeit of genius is easily detected.

By living simply and writing only when in the mood, Whittier attained a ripe and peaceful old age. M. Thiers was worried to death; he did an immense amount of work, but it was not labor but nervous anxiety that killed him. He hated noisy men and noisy nature.

Mortimer Collins worked until two o'clock at night and rose at eight. The forenoon he took for recreation. Most men of genius attribute success in any direction to severe application rather than to any special talent. Says Doctor Johnson, “Excellence in any department can now be attained by the labor of a lifetime, but it is not to be purchased at a lesser price.” “Nothing is impossible to a man who can and will,” says Mirabeau. “This is the only law of success.” “The difference between one man and another is not so much in talent as in energy,” writes Doctor Arnold; and Reynolds remarks, “Nothing is denied well-directed labor, and nothing is attained without it.” Turner when asked, “What is the secret of your success?” replied, “I have no secret but hard work.” Of the great army who plan, comparatively few accomplish anything; in the brain even of the hardest worker are conceived many more volumes than are ever brought forth. Sir William Hamilton had a dozen unwritten volumes in his mind when he died; in fact it would be more difficult to find one writer who had not died with unfinished projects, than one hundred who had. As Charles Lamb said of Coleridge, that he died leaving “forty thousand treatises on metaphysics and divinity, not one of 688 681 them complete.” Unwritten books cut no figure in literature.

Far above the creature is the creator. Who would not rather be Shakespeare than the living embodiment of any even of his grandest or most enviable heroes or heroines?

John Stuart Mill's habit was to write every book over at least twice. At the first writing was infused the fresh vigor of conception; the second, which secured greater strength and precision, incorporated the better part of the first writing with whatever occurred to the mind subsequently.

Dickens wrote only four hours, namely, from ten till two. His sentences were often very labored, being in this respect in marked contrast to the ease and rapidity with which Sir Walter Scott wrote. The banker-poet, Rogers, in whom talent and wealth were found united to laborious application in a rare degree, spent seventeen years writing the Pleasures of Memory.

James Hogg, the Ettrick shepherd, wrote while sitting on the hills tending his sheep. His knees were his desk, and his ink-bottle he carried suspended from his buttonhole. With him writing was no small physical feat. Taking off his coat and rolling up his sleeves, he went at it as if about to knock down men instead of ideas. Hazlitt wrote under immediate inspiration, without study of the subject or fore-thought. As his pen was inspired he could write when and as much as he chose. He wrote with incredible rapidity, often equivalent to fifteen octavo printed pages at a sitting of three or four hours; and he seldom made any alteration. Indeed, he could scarcely bring himself to read over what he had written, and he never derived any pleasure from reading anything of his own in print. Unlike Pygmalion, he never was guilty of falling in love with an object of his own creating.

For prodigious work commend me the German. Besides utilizing the brains of others he makes the most of his own, holding rigidly to early rising, 689 682 simple diet, and regular hours. Eating and drinking he postpones in a great measure until after his day's work is done, and hence among its other burdens, the brain does not have the horrors of indigestion laid upon it. The afternoon he spends with his family and friends. “What a comment on our spasmodic authorship!” exclaims Hurst. “Many an American when he gets through his work is actually half dead from the absence of all social relaxation. He became shy of society, and considered every hour among his friends as so much lost time. The result was that he lost flesh, spirits, and the indispensable pluck for new undertakings. The German, on the other hand, knows the high science of compressing as much work as possible into his mornings, and as much play as possible into his afternoons and evenings.”

For years it was my custom to rise at seven, breakfast at half past seven, and write from eight until one, when I lunched or dined. The afternoon was devoted to recreation and exercise. Usually I would get in an hour's writing before a six o'clock tea or dinner, as the case might be, and four hours afterwards, making ten hours in all for the day; but interruptions were so constant and frequent, that including the many long seasons during which I hermited myself in the country, where I often devoted twelve and fourteen hours a day to writing, I do not thin I averaged more than eight hours a day, taking twenty years together.

When I first began to write, composing was a very labored operation. My whole mind was absorbed in how, rather than what. But gradually I came to think less of myself and the manner of expression, and more of what I was saying. Comparatively little of my work was of a character which admitted of fast writing. When full of my subject I could write rapidly, that is to say from twenty to thirty manuscript pages in a day; or counting by hours and measuring by another's capabilities, about one quarter as 690 683 much as Hazlitt, though three times above the average. Including getting out and arranging my material, and studying my subject, I could not average during the year more than eight badly scratched manuscript pages a day, or at the rate of one an hour. In preparing for me the rough material from the notes, my assistants would not average over four manuscript pages a day.

“En écrivant ma pensées, elles m'echappe quelquefois,” says Pascal. Sometimes a flood of thought would come rushing in upon me, like a torrent overwhelming its banks, and I would lose the greater part of it; at other times so confused and slothful would be my brain, that in turning over the leaves of my dictionary I would forget the word I was looking for. This was more particularly the case during the earlier part of my literary career; later my mind became more tractable, and I never waited for either ideas or words.

There are many methods of gathering and arranging information and putting it into readable shape. The novelist has one way, the specialist another, the historian a third, necessarily different, each varying individually according to cast of mind and habit. As a rule the best plan is to imbue the mind so thoroughly with the subject to be treated as to be able first to arrange the matter properly in the mind, and then commit it to paper.

Another way, not perhaps the best way, is to write reading, and read writing; that is, it is not the best way, provided one has the memory and mental discipline to gather, arrange, and retain the necessary facts and produce them as required. In certain kinds of writing, I first draw from my own brain until its resources are exhausted; then taking up one author after another, I learn what others have thought and said upon the subject. In the intercourse of my mind with other minds, new thoughts are engendered, which are likewise committed to paper, after which 691 684 all is, or should be, re-arranged and re-written. Pliny and others have said that one should read much but not many books. This was well enough as a doctrine before history and science had extended the range of knowledge beyond the limits of a few books. Now, to be well read, one must read many books; buying a cyclopedia will not answer the purpose. Hamilton says, “An intellectual man who is forty years old, is as much at school as an Etonian of fourteen.”

The first presentiment of a subject, the first flush of an idea, is the one a writer should never fail to seize. Like the flash and report of the signal gun to the belated hunter, lost after night-fall in the dark forest, the way for the moment seems clear, but if not instantly and earnestly followed it is soon lost. Says Goethe in Faust: “Wenn ihr'o nicht fühlt, ihr werdet's nicht erjagen.”

In diet and drink every one should be governed by his own experience. To universal rules of health I pay little attention. Nature has given me a physician in every organ of my body, which, if the appetite be natural, prescribes only what is best, and cries loudly against unwelcome guests. If I pay heed to these friendly admonitions I am well; if carried away by excitement, pleasure, or morbid appetite, I commit excesses, either by over-doing or under-doing I must pay the penalty.

In the free and natural flow of ideas in writing, the position must be neither too easy nor too constrained; as the former tends to inanity, while the latter distracts the mind from the subject in hand and fixes it upon muscular discontent. A person can write better in one chair than another, in one room than another, in one locality than another. In changing one's locality there is always some loss of time. Thought is sometimes a little freaky. Change of room, a rearrangement of books and papers often breaks the current of thought, and severs the subtle 692 685 connection between mind and its surroundings. Seating myself at my table in the morning and seeing all my papers as they were left, I take up the thread where I dropped it the night before.

Interruptions are fatal to good work. Even though one has the faculty of taking up the thread of thought where it was laid down, there is still a great difference in the results of a whole day and of a broken day.

While at the library my time was greatly broken by callers. Frequently I have begun on Monday morning to write and by the time I was fairly seated and my thoughts arranged, I would be compelled to break off. After an interval of a half hour, perhaps, I might be permitted to try it again, and with the same results. So passed Monday, Tuesday, half the week, or the whole of it, and not five pages written. Often in a fit of desperation I have seized a handful of work and rushed into the country, where I could count with some degree of certainty upon my time. Truly, says Florence Nightingale “I have never known persons who exposed themselves for years to constant interruptions who did not muddle away their intellects by it at last.”

In January, 1876, I left San Francisco in one of these moods suddenly, and while under a sense of something akin to dispair. It seemed as though my work would stretch out to all eternity. While in the city, week after week passed by with nothing accomplished, and I determined to cut loose from these interruptions at whatever cost. So, bundling the papers before me, chiefly memoranda for general chapters, I stepped aboard the boat and that night slept at my father's. The next day I sent down for a box of Popular Tribunals and other material, and during the next six weeks of a simple life, without interruptions, accomplished more in a literary way than during any other six weeks of my life. I worked from ten to twelve hours, and averaged twenty pages of manuscript a 693 686 day, rode two hours, except rainy days and Sundays; ate heartily, drank from half a bottle to a bottle of claret or sherry before retiring, and smoked four or five cigars daily. This, however, was more of a strain than my system could bear for any length of time. I did not break down under it; I only shifted my position. The mind fatigued with one class of work often finds almost as much rest in change as in repose; just as the laborer by change of occupation brings into play a new set of muscles, giving rest to the others.

The glare from white paper seemed at times more trying to my eyes than even constant daily and nightly use of them when writing on a dark surface. It was not until after several years of suffering that a simple remedy occurred to me. My eyes had always been good. I believed them capable of any endurance, and consequently paid little attention to them until they began to fail me. In smoked glass I found some relief. But the best thing by far was the use of dark paper.

There were two possibilities which would force themselves upon my mind at intervals: One was fire, and the other death before the completion of my work. So unmannerly are these ruthless destroyers that I could hope for no consideration from either of them on the ground of necessity. Imperious death seemed indeed to regard my labors grudgingly; not less than eleven of my library men died during the progress of my work; I could only solace myself by working the harder. I often thought of Cuvier, whose paralysis struck him while actively engaged in the arranging of a large accumulation of scientific material. Said he to M. Pasquier, “I had great things still to do; all was ready in my head. After thirty years of labor and research, there remained but to write, and now the hands fail, and carry with them the head.” Oh! thou great shame of nature; will no Hercules ever rise and strangle thee? “On n'a point pour la mort de dispense de Rome,” sighs Molière.

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At certain periods of my life my breast has been torn by conflicting pain and passion preying like a vulture on the undecaying vitals of a Tityos. At such times when I would write of grief I had only to dip my pen in my own heart, and bitterness would flow from it. Yet all this sprung from the coloring which temperament threw on outward things. As Wordsworth said of Turner's picture of Jessica on exhibition in Somerset house, so I would say of certain creations of my fancy. “It looks to me as if the painter had indulged in raw liver until he was very unwell.”

“Bodily affliction,” says Bain, “is often the cause of a total change in the moral nature.” So might we say of mental affliction, or of any kind of misfortune or woe. Under mental torment not less than when in fleshy pains, the devil whispers us, like the comforters of Job, to curse God and die. Among the most miserable of men that ever lived was William Hazlitt; and that not because of bodily infirmities, from which he was not for a moment free, but chiefly because those strong affections which constantly burned within him were left unfed by fitting objects, and so consumed the cankered and corroded frame that bound them. As Saint Beuve says: “One does not appreciate the beautiful to such a degree of intensity and delicacy, without being terribly shocked at the bad and the ugly.”

I do not set up for a man of sorrows. I am not given to sourness and moroseness. I have often through weariness fallen into discouragement; but such blueness was only momentary. Whenever I returned to my work after necessary rest it was always with cheerful hope. Rest removes mountains. I would not have about me in my family, my library, or my business a sighing, despondent, croaking individual. Until I began literary life I never thought of such things as nervousness, mental strain, or scarcely of general health. Most of all I despised 695 688 the thought of laying infelicities of temper at the door of mental labor. I regarded it cowardly and untrue. But after a time I was forced to change these opinions.

Sometimes the fire of disease so kindles the brain as to cause it to throw off sparkling thoughts, just as I have heard vocalizers say that they could sing best with a cold or sore throat, and speakers that they were never so fluent as when under the influence of fever—instance Douglass Jerrold whose wit was never keener, or his thoughts more poetical than when his body lay stretched in suffering. For fifteen years Edward Mayhew was unable to use his limbs, and yet with brains alone did he so successfully fight life's battle as to leave an undying name.

Often one is heard to say that inspiration comes not at the bidding, that Pegasus will not always respond to the whip; that one's best is bad enough, and that the tired worker should stop; that literary labor is different from mechanical labor, and that the head should be made to work only when it feels inclined. There is truth in this doctrine, but there is likewise error. At every turn in my literary labors I found method essential; not alone to utilize the labor of others, but to accomplish results satisfactory in my own producing. Unable to work entirely by the clock like Southey, who had not only his hours for writing but his hour in each day for the several kinds of literary occupation resulting in his hundred and more volumes, it would not answer for me to trust like Coleridge to inspiration, lest it should not come when needed, nor to fly from one piece of work to another, like Agassiz, as fancy dictated.

Yet while method is above all things necessary in any great undertaking, there is such a thing in literary effort as excess of system, which tends to painful monotony, particularly in the execution of a plan.

It is all very well to lay down rules, to write with watch and mirror before one's face, like Dickens, ready 696 689 to stop whenever the hour is up, or the veins begin to swell—that is to say for those who can keep such rules. It is by no means difficult for me to tell myself the best things to do; it is easy to tell the locomotive it had better stop instantly when a wheel cracks.

There is no end to the rules and regulations I have made to govern my writing. I believe in them. Yet as it is impossible for man to make laws more powerful than himself, I do not hesitate to break my rules whenever occasion seems to demand it. Often I have said to myself, I will continue while I am in the spirit, I will write while I can, and rest when I cannot write. A writer with a strong constitution can indulge in those insane excesses which would kill a weaker man.

Self-knowledge is the sum of all knowledge. Man is to man the central mystery, the unravelling of which would give him the key to the universe. Were it possible to photograph a human soul, to display in visible portraiture the ethereal light and shade which cheer and darken a human life, to see for one brief moment the transfixed workings of that subtle chemistry which now impelled by passion, and now restrained by prejudice regulates the thoughts and doings of the man, there would be no further need of lessons from our great teacher,—nature.

It has seemed to me at times as if I was filled with the poetic instinct but wihout poetic expression; that my poor inspiration was born dumb. Often after the close of business, before I had ever thought of writing books, have I walked out alone, up one street and down another, for hours and far into the night, star-gazing, thinking, communing, the dim and palpitating light singing me a soul-song, and playing with the dim and palpitating light which so feebly filled my brain.

I have no such flooding fantasy now as then. 697 690 Perhaps the brain wearies of its fruitless scintillations as one grows older, and the ideal ether of youth is cleared of many crude imaginings, or else the mind has found some relief in words. These were intense longings for I know not what; unintelligible somethings, it appeared to me, floating on the confines of thought, dimly discernible to a vivid imagination, but imperceptible to sober meditation; murmurings they sometimes appeared as they came floating over the sea of conscience from the far distant horizon; heavenly heart-burnings, or the soul-rumblings of an eternal unrest, the unconscious respiration of the immortal in us—myriads of formless perceptions thus come struggling to find expression, like the disembodied soul spiritualists tell us of, that hover near their friends endeavoring to hold communion with them.

Then again it would seem as if all the powers of my brain were held in solution, my thoughts all airy nothings without sequence or continuity, unintelligible communion with unintelligible nature, and without the alchemist at hand which should change to useful metal or compact crystal this incoherent mixture.

Day-dreaming, however, was never profitable to me; nor, so far as I could judge, were these star-light musings. The real has always been more satisfying than the fanciful. Yet I must confess I sometimes found these longings delicious, significant as they were of the warm breathings of immortal affections.

Not unfrequently the most unaccountable freaks of indisposition seize the steady literary worker. Even the iron constitution of Mr Oak was not free from them, and, indeed toward the end he almost broke down. On one occasion while I was at White Sulphur springs he wrote me—it was the 3d of April, 1877—“I feel as well in most respects as I ever did, and my head is as clear as a bell, but I cannot sleep—even in the morning! I find it impossible to fix my mind on any definite point of my work. For several 698 691 days I have done but little more than sit at my table and wonder why, feeling so well, I cannot work. I have tried writing all night, but I cannot get sleepy; have walked the skin off my feet, and have ridden all day Sunday, but I cannot get fatigued. I presume the affair will come to a focus, however, very soon.”

Again the 24th of May he writes—“Although my general health is much improved, in fact as good as usual, or even better, yet I still find myself unable to work otherwise than mechanically. My active and real interest in your work which for many years, through sickness and health, laziness and its opposite, despondency and good spirits has never weakened, and which has I hope made my services of some value to you, has now for the most part gone, and I find that mere industry will not take its place, especially in the work I have now in hand.”

Rest was all that he needed, however, for after a few weeks in the country he was himself again. Insomnia has often been complained of by the men in the library.

As regards society and solitude both are necessary, but here as elsewhere extremes should be avoided. Goethe says, “in solitude talents are best nurtured, in the stormy billows of the world character is best found.” The tendency with me during my periods of severest labor, as with every hard-worker, was more and more towards aloneness. And the less I met and conversed with men the more distasteful was it to me. It is true I was peculiarly situated. With hundreds of highly intellectual persons on every side of me, there were few whose tastes or habits led them in the direction of my labors. Those from whom I could learn the most, who were most familiar with the direct line of my investigations, I sometimes cultivated; but as a rule I found books more profitable than social intercourse, so much so that the time spent talking with men and women seemed to me lost. It 699 692 is only when a man is alone that he is wholly himself. The presence of others throws him upon his guard and teaches him for the sake of their good opinion to don the most pleasing mask at his command. “It is a great error,” says Hamerton, “to encourage in young people the love of noble culture in the hope that it may lead them more into what is called good society. High culture always isolates, always drives men out of their class, and makes it more difficult for them to share naturally and easily the common class-life around them. They seek the few companions who can understand them, and when these are not to be had within any traversable distance, they sit and work alone.”

I could not separate myself entirely from solitude or from society; yet neither in themselves were wholly satisfying. Of the two I preferred the former; but when I was without a family I felt the need of something to which I might anchor the time that exhaustion would not permit me to fill in with mental application, and which was occupied with recreations that gave a sinister bias to what should have been strength-restoring pastime.

Say what you will of the benefits of social intercourse, an intellectual man can spend but little time in unintellectual society except to his disadvantage. He who seeks true culture should seek the society of his superiors, or, at all events, of those whose studies in certain directions have made them more than ordinarily familiar with their respective specialties. To a sensible person current society is a lame affair; an intellectual man finds it specially insipid. It is a sham of every depth and coloring. Like everything simulated and artificial there is enough of sincerity to hold it in form, and no more. Men and women, prompted by vanity or ambition, meet and call it pleasure, or improvement.

To most of them it is a bore, but they feel it a kind of obligation in return for their title of 700 693 respectability. Every form of conversation approaching the intellectual is tabooed, even should learned and intelligent people thus chance to meet.

England, by law, makes sleeping in the open air punishable as an act of vagrancy. California has no such law. It has been rather the fashion here to sleep à la belle étoile from the first. The aborigines never wasted much time building houses; the padres and their followers thought it no great hardship to sleep under the trees; the miners made it constant practice, and during the last decade the custom has grown upon pleasure-seekers.

Every summer the dells and openings of the Coast range are merry with the voices of those who, tired of luxury and of the monotony of a quiet life, abandon their comfortable homes for the fascinations of savagism. Some have their regular camping-ground which they occupy year after year, either owning the land or having some arrangement with the owner; others with teams, cooking utensils, and blankets, sometimes with and sometimes without tents, travel in various directions, up and down the Coast range or across to Yosemite or other parts of the Sierra.

Camping is quite an art. Let not the inexperienced treat lightly its mysteries. No great talent is necessary for one, or two, or three men to start on an excursion, hunt all day, and at night cook their supper and roll themselves in their blankets for sleep; but a well regulated first-class camp is quite a different affair.

First a site must be selected with due regard to water, game, and general surroundings. The further removed it is from the highways of civilization, the more communication and conveniences will have to be given up. Then to provide for the necessities of a party of men, women, and children for weeks or months, to prepare sleeping accommodations, lay in stock of provisions, and get all upon the ground in proper shape is no small matter. The party once in 701 694 camp, the idiosyncrasies of each are brought out in bold relief; the strong men appear stronger, the silly girls sillier, the efficient matron more efficient, and if the boy has any manliness it is sure to show itself now. The good and bad qualities of both old and young force themselves in spite of their owners to the front.

Camping tries the strings of friendship. It does not do as a rule for those who would retain a chivalrous respect for one another long to remain in camp together. It is easier for the civilized man to play the savage than for the savage to play a civilized part.

Not all can throw off even the outer trappings of conventionalism and still display a smooth symmetrical figure. Not all can be themselves gracefully. Not all can let in upon their true selves the unobstructed light to their credit.

There is reality to camp life as well as romance; pain as well as pleasure. To leave the dusted fog of the city for some warm sylvan retreat; to lay aside the chains of society and be free for a time; to roam the hills by day with death-dealing breech-loaders, lord of the ground-squirrel and the hare; to lie at night upon the ground watching the twinkling stars peep through the buckeye branches, to sleep fanned by the cool, dry, invigorating air, and in the morning to be wakened by bands of feathered songsters, whose music no human strains can equal; to plunge into the stream and play fish, mingling with the respective members of the fish family, now with crab and now with trout, gulping and spouting and splashing with the best of them, looking down upon the variegated pebbly bottom, looking up the sides of the cañon walls whose summits reach the skies, becoming one with nature, becoming nature herself, the chief difference between us and our companion, gears and alligators, being that we know how to cheat—all this is most exquisite; but every human heaven has its Acheron-pit not far hence.

The Californian camper for his sins is placed beneath a broiling sun so hot as to melt bones and 702 695 evaporate brain; streams come panting from the hills bereft of every refreshing quality save wetness, and the noiseless breeze is stifling as from an oven; lizards creep over the blistering stones, and the heated sands in treading on them feel to the feet like the newly emptied ashes of a furnace; glistening snakes trail through the silvery incandescent grass, and bloodless winged insects dance through the short day of their existence. Every cool shade is preëmpted by musquitos, and every inviting nook entertains with poison oak. Before the tired hunter who, with blistered feet and lacerated limbs climbs the craggy hills, the game flees yet weary miles away, and the patient fisherman sits by the stream all day without a nibble. Add to these evils rats and reptiles as bed-fellows, the burnings of indigestion arising from the poorly cooked meats, and the little bickerings and disagreements inseparable from all but the most sensible or amiable of associates, and the universal law of compensation appears here as elsewhere in human affairs.

Often have I thrown myself weary upon a grassy bank inviting to repose, only to find myself stung with nettles and buzzing bugs about my ears, or ants and reptiles crawling over me. Physical enjoyment is not the highest or most refined species of pleasure; yet of all physical pleasures none display tastes so savage or which are in themselves so debasing as the hunting and killing of animals.

I never was much fascinated with the bloody, though I have no doubt necessary, occupation of butchering. The excitements of the chase have fascinations for me, and where game is plenty I can lose myself in slaying it, but I cannot but feel that next to killing men killing beasts is the most brutalizing of pastimes. But most lamentable of all is the wanton slaughter of birds, beasts, and fishes, without regard either to human necessities or any considerations of parent and offspring.

But you say it is according to nature. That may 703 696 be true, but there are many things in nature debasing. Civilization is a constant war on nature. Only tamed men and tamed beast kill more than they need for food—a propensity in man it were well not to cultivate. It is the taking of that mysterious life which in man is the most highly prized of all things. It is gratifying oneself at the expense of another. To kill a sweet songster for a mouthful of meat is vandalism on nature. Why should I carry my Cain-accursed propensity for robbing and killing into the families of nature's innocents when there are so many human scorpions yet undestroyed? Rather let the humane man in the country look at life and see God's cretures enjoy it; or if he must slay something let him hunt the legislative halls, the marts of commerce, and other busy haunts of men for things fittest for slaughter.

Most of all other, he who lives enveloped in the mists of sensitiveness needs a friend. Most of all others, he whose retiring instincts unfold interests and ambitions, draw him from his fellows, shut him within himself, and wrap round him a non-conducting covering of crushed egoism, clouding that social sunshine which of all things his soul covets, imprisoning mind and heart affections within the dark, dank walls of a detestable mauvarse honte, and dooming him while surrounded by those whose hearts warm toward him and toward whom his heart warms, to a life of unutterable aloneness, needs one near him who shall be to him an alter ego before whom he may appear unrestrained even by his own consciousness, and to whom he may open and air the musty chambers of his inmost being.

Such a friend need not be rich, or great, or intellectual, or learned, he must be simply fitting. He should be one not already bound to his lover by family ties or business obligations; he should be a man whom manliness might marry in all true inwardness and without the bias of externals.

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Such a friend I had and lost, but not by death. I never knew how much he was to me until he was nothing to me. Then I saw how, during all the glad seasons, all the long years of swiftly-passing hours I had enjoyed him, my soul had fed upon his friendship—how my hungry soul had fed, and was satisfied.

He was a bon-vivant of the right honorable order of brokers, and a model member of the mad fraternity. As a man of the world, he was acute, bold, clear-headed, lively. He was the soul of honor, and so careful of his clients' interests that I have known him repeatedly to pocket a loss arising through no fault of his, and never reveal the fact.

Nervous, highly-strung, quick as unchained lightning, and fiery as Lucifer, he was specially adapted to his arduous calling, and was one of the most efficient members of the board. The work so wore upon him, however, that at times I could discern from day to day a sinking under it, until he was forced to take rest. Then he would want me, and I was usually ready to attend him, for at that time I had no family at hand to break the dead weight of mental application.

He was peculiar in many ways, but his little singularities I loved. I never knew a more open-hearted or freer-handed man. I never knew one more pure-minded, or further removed from littleness. He knew not what meanness was, except as he encountered it in others, and then it was so repugnant to his nature that he seldom referred to the subject, no matter how exasperating had been the circumstance. Of exquisite sensibilities, his whole being seemed attuned to the most refined strains of soul and sense. Everything that he touched must be of the best. He was scrupulously neat in his habits, and his heart was as clean as his hand. He loved good company, a good table, good wine and cigars, and good horses; and no matter how times were, or whether he was making or losing money, whether he was flush or bankrupt, 705 698 these things he would have, and to his friends he poured them out like water.

Never man so wound himself round all my thoughts and purposes; never was friend so intertwined among affection's heart-strings. Full of electrical joy to me was the air he breathed; full of gladness was my heart when the sound of his voice struck my ear, and his smile sent the warm, thrilling sunlight into my soul. His was one of the most happy, cheerful dispositions I ever encountered. In his hours of recreation he was as joyous as a child, and as free and frolicsome. It were worth one term of torture, —the happy hours I have spent with him.

Because our daily occupations were so widely different, I enjoyed his company the more. The mysteries of stock-boards were as unfathomable to me as those of history-writing were to him. On the firm, clean, common ground of pleasurable emotion we met; on the ground of spontaneous liking for each other—this, and nothing more. He was married, and he husbanded and fathered a charming family, whose members lived in him and he in them.

About their home was an air of refinement, mingled with a joyous ease and freedom which nature herself might envy. Few homes were ever happier, few more fascinating. Though not as rich as some, whatever pleasures money could buy were lavishly bestowed by the indulgent father, and sad indeed must be the distress that should cloud the radiant features of the loving wife and mother.

And he is lost to me! Surely my cup of pleasure never seemed to overflow before; was it, then, necessary to mix wormwood in the only draught tasteful to me? Nay, never was foul mixture proffered by him; rather, was it necessary to dash this cup from my lips and leave me forever thirsty for a friend?

Lost! And yet, we never quarreled. We had never aught to bring disagreement between us. Neither sought advantage over the other. Neither 706 699 wished anything the other would not gladly grant, were it in his power. Money? He would pour out gold like water for me, and delight in doing it.

Lost! And never an unkind word! And all the while my heart going out toward him like that of mother or brother.

Lost to me! and as effectually as if he were dead; and I have wished that one of us were dead, that the separation might be consecrated by the inexorable. I have mourned him as dead, and to my dying day I will so mourn him. He was the light of my days—the only light that penetrated certain dark corners within; why should I not mourn the darkness that shall never again be dissipated?

Lost! And the undoing all my own, all by my own fault; by no fault of his, for he never had a fault of friendship. It is pitiful; it is damnable! A sacrifice, I might call it, laid by the high-priest of friendship upon the altar of idolatry. It was a martyrdom which I was called upon to suffer, with misery as the only crown. From the point our path divided, on to eternity, I find no other friend. For me, among men there is no other. In none who walk the earth does my presence kindle the enchanting flame; none who walk the earth warm the cold chambers of my heart as did his presence.

Throughout the wide universe there is not that object, aspiration, or being to take his place. One cannot make friends as one makes money, off-setting loss by gain, and striking a balance. Once a string of the heart's sounding-board snapped, and there is no mending it. You may insert another, but it gives not forth the old music.

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CHAPTER XXVIII.

EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. By the mess, ere these eyes of mine take themselves to slomber, ay'll do gud service, or ay'll lig i' the grund for it; ay, or go to death.

King Henry the Fifth.

HAVING read and written so much about Mexico, it was but natural that I should wish to go there. I had completed the history of all that region, with abundance of material, down to the year 1800, and for the present century I knew that there existed houses full of information which I did not possess.

Accordingly on the 1st day of September, 1883, I set out, accompanied by my daughter and a Mexican servant, for the great city of the table-land, proceeding via San Antonio and Laredo, Texas. I took copious notes of everything I encountered, the table spread of frijoles, tortillas, olla podrida, and the rest, cooked with garlic and onions in rancid oil, sending forth a stygian smell not at all appetizing; the muddy Rio Bravo, now angry and swollen with late rains, which we had to cross in a scow at the peril of our lives; the general and universal dirtiness pervading people, houses, and streets; the currency, being mostly silver, and at a discount of about twenty-five per cent below United States money; the mixed Spanish and Indian population and architecture, the former of all shades of color and beastliness, most of the people being ugly looking, and many of them deformed and absolutely hideous, the latter of every grade, from the Andalusian dwelling of stone or adobe, surrounding a court, to the suburban hut of sticks and straw; the soil, climate, and resources of the country; 708 701 commerce, agriculture, and manufactures; society, politics, etc., all of which I utilized at good advantage in Volume vi of my History of Mexico, and which I shall not have space to touch upon here. One thing, however, I did not present there, which I will give here, it being, indeed, the chief object of my visit to ascertain, namely, about libraries and literature, and the amount and quality of material for history existing in the republic.

I did not find at Monterey the archives so historic a place might lead one to expect. There were the usual state and municipal documents, of little value and limited extent, and in answer to a call of the governor, the nucleus of a state library had been made by donations. The best library in this region was that of the bishop of Linares, I. Montes de Oca, renowned throughout the republic for his ability and learning.

Zacatecas has one of the finest private libraries in the country, in the possession of Señor Ortega.

Saltillo has even less to boast of than Monterey in archives and libraries. With unsurpassed facilities for saving great masses of valuable historical and statistical information, almost all has been allowed to be carried away or destroyed through sheer ignorance and stupidity.

As we penetrate the country we are more and more struck with the phenomenon of a republic without a people. There is here no middle class. The aristocracy are the nation. The low are very low; they are poor, ignorant, servile, and debased; with neither the heart nor the hope ever to attempt to better their condition. I have never before witnessed such squalid misery, and so much of it. It surpasses Europe, and with this difference: in Europe the miserable know they are miserable, here they do not. Sit at the door of your so-called hotel, and you will see pass by, as in a panorama of the accurst, the withered, the deformed, the lame, and the blind, deep in debasement, their humanity 709 702 well-nigh hidden in their dingy, dirty raiment, form bent and eyes cast down, as if the light of heaven and the eyes of man were equally painful—hunchbacks and dwarfs; little filthy mothers with little filthy babes, the former but fourteen years old; grizzly men and women with wrinkled tanned skin, bent double, and hobbling on canes and crutches, and so on. Into such pits of deep abasement does man thrust his fellow man in the name of Christ and civilization, grinding him into the dust, under pretext of benefiting him. Infinitely happier and better off, and far less debased and wretched were the people of this plateau before ever a European saw it.

Saltillo being at this time the terminus of the railway, we took private conveyance to San Luis Potosí, and thence to Lagos by stage. This, really, is the only way to see a country, if one does not mind hard fare. For a fine city, beautiful, prosperous, somewhat primitive, being as yet unmarred by railroads, San Luis Potosí has few equals. Art and education are likewise here well advanced, the state supporting 577 schools, with 12,620 attendance.

I found here a man who had visited my library while in the United States, Doctor Barroeta, a practising physician, and professor of botany and zoology in the Scientific Institute of this city, which has quite an extensive and valuable museum. The state and municipal archives, consisting of proceedings since 1658, fill a room thirty feet square. The state archives are kept in bundles on shelves, and the city archives in cupboards. El Seminario, or the catholic college, has a well-kept library of 4500 volumes of theology, law, philosophy, and history.

But by far the best and most important collection thus far seen since leaving San Francisco was the San Luis Potosí state library, called the Biblioteca Publica del Cientifico y Literario, of which I obtained a printed catalogue of about 3,000 titles, under the headings, Jurisprudence, Ecclesiastical Laws, Science and Art, 710 703 Belles Lettres, History, and Theology. The collection dates from 1824. The laws and legislative documents are incomplete, owing to frequent revolutions. The whole of the year 1834 is a blank, also the period of the so-called empire, or French intervention. Besides the Diario Oficial of the general United States Mexican government from 1872, was La Sombra de Zaragoza from 1867, giving full information of political affairs in this section to the overthrow of the administration of Lerdo de Tejada, which administration it sustained. Thus will be seen, without further enumeration and description, what one might reasonably expect to find in the state capitals throughout the republic, that is to say, from very fair collections down to nothing. The keeper of the state library gathered for me a bundle of documents containing the most important information concerning the state of San Luis Potosí, so that, by purchase and otherwise, I was able here, and at other places along my route before reaching the federal capital, to add about 500 titles to my library.

There is much that is fascinating in this quaint old town, with its historic buildings, its mule-mint, and shops, and signs over the doors such as El Nuevo Eden, a billiard saloon; Al Fiel Pastor, a toy-shop; La Sensitiva, a wine and cigar store; La Elegancia, a barber's shop. I will leave to others a description of the cathedral, and present to the reader this barber's shop, where I did myself the honor to get shaved. Attendant on the operator was a man and a boy. The man held a towel and the boy a brush; if the grand knight dropped his comb, the boy sprang for it, if he snapped his finger for a napkin, the man bowed low before him with the desired cloth. I brought away with me a printed slip detailing the advantages of this tonsorial temple and the merits of its accomplished high priest. Freely translated, it reads: “The Elegance. Hair-dressing. Principal Plaza. Cleanness and elegance, attention, and promptness. Cenobio 711 704 Santos Velazquez, professor in phlebotomy of the faculty of this capital, has the honor to inform his numerous clients that this establishment has a regular price for shaving, by which one can get twenty tickets at the moderate price of five for a dollar, the bearer being able to use them when he likes. Besides this, all the operations relating to the science of phlebotomy are practised, such as bleeding with a lancet, application of leeches, cupping or scarifying with glass, caustics, blisters, jets, setons, vaccination. In operations of the mouth, to clean, file, straighten, fill, and extract molars, roots, and teeth. Here are found leeches of the best kind, which are used only once, for the greater guaranty of the public. The works of hair-dressing, as big wigs, little wigs, helmet wigs, braids, diadems, frizzes, beards, mustaches, whiskers, and all the various branches of the art will be performed with the greatest attention and promptness.” Perfumery is the advertised, and finally, dyeing. The document concludes: “To the solemn poor, work is free,”—that is, to the poor of good standing, the poor of grave aspect, the pious poor, the highly respectable poor, the poor who never would ask.

Staging in Mexico is an experience few care to repeat. And yet it has its fascinations. Passing down over the plateau, the traveller finds vast areas covered with hojasen, a kind of sage-brush, mezquite, gobernadora, and agrita, and he experiences a sense of loneliness, or of something lacking, away from the leading lines of traffic. An occasional band of sheep or herd of cattle, accompanied by a herder or vaquero, alone breaks the monotony. It is the absence of this same middle class, before discussed, which should be overspreading the land with their myriads of happy homes. This land is fertile, and needs only irrigation to support a large population. He journeys league after league through silent, untenanted fields, with here and there a hut or a cluster of adobes, and at intervals an hacienda and a town. It is always an hacienda or a 712 705 hut. The owner of the former, who spends little of his time on the premises, holds from five to fifty, and sometimes a hundred, square leagues of lands; the occupant of the latter is essentially his serf, though not legally or literally so. Around the large, fortress-like adobe buildings of the hacendero are grouped the jacales, or thatched huts of the laborers, the occasional herders' huts being scattered over the plains.

Everything strikes a stranger as old, exceedingly old, and dirty. The towns of thatched huts and tile-roofed adobes, with their central plaza and church, market-place, little shops, and poor inn, are all of the same pattern as the more pretentious cities which display more stone in their construction; when you have seen one of them, you have seen them all.

The cosey plaza in the centre of the town, with its paved walks leading to the fountain in the centre, orange-tree borders, and beds of shrubs and flowers, is usually quite attractive, and in fact, throughout Mexico the plaza, where at dusk the people gather to listen to music by the band, walk and talk, flirt and gossip, is at once a unique and charming feature of Mexican life.

Few have suburbs drawn out in filthy huts or elegant homes, but stop short, as if at a wall, which, indeed, has encircled many of them at some period of their existence as protection against surprise by marauding bands of Indians or guerrillas. The region round is too often a dreary waste, with stretches of sand, or with bare-looking cultivated strips.

In most of the cities, the Asiatic style of architecture is conspicuous, the Moorish, perhaps, predominating. The houses with their solid walls are usually of one story, low, with flat tiled roof, the better class built round a court, with a wide entrance, closed at night with double doors, and having iron-barred windows devoid of glass looking into the court and street, or as often without windows. The palaces, as they are called, and the better class of dwellings are usually 713 706 of two stories, with colonnades, arched, perhaps, in masonry below and roofed with wooden rafters above. The floors are usually of burnt-clay tiles, and bare. Outside run narrow stone sidewalks, frequently worn hollow by centuries of use. Though everywhere with plain and often forbidding exteriors, there are dwellings in the chief cities with interiors of oriental luxury and splendor.

Land and vegetation and cultivation improve as the central and southern portions of the republic are reached. Here are seen vast stretches as fertile and beautiful as any in the world, producing three crops a year by irrigaiton and attention; and places are found of pronounced character, displaying marked individuality, such as Mexico City, Vera Cruz, Querétaro, Oajaca, Guadalajara, and others, some owing their origin to missionary convents, some to the will of a rich landholder, others to the course of trade. Elegant villas can be seen in the suburban towns of the capital, but there is scarcely in the republic what would be known in the United States as a country-seat or a farm-house.

Notwithstanding the monotony, the observer finds much that is exceedingly picturesque. The towns and the country, the people and their surroundings, all present studies. Here is foliage filled with blossoms and loaded with fruit; here are fragrant flowers and fantastic parasites, palms, orange and lemon trees, and a thousand other offshoots of redundant nature—this for the tierra caliente, and also for the footland cities; and for the table-lands, colored hills and plains covered with a peculiar vegetation.

The statuesque is everywhere. Over thousands of leagues you may go and see ten thousand weird and fantastic images in the palm and the cactus, in the mirage and in the mountain. The southern sierras are grand, and of every hue and height and contour.

In the cities the churches stand conspicuous, and on the streets are figures of every form and pose. Drive 714 707 into any town in any hour of the day or night, be it in scorching summer or freezing winter, and standing by the roadside and in the doorways are grim figures wrapped in serapes and rebozos, motionless and silent, but always graceful and picturesque. You see them when you come and when you go, as if they had stood there since Mexico was made, and were now waiting for the last trump to sound.

In travelling far by diligencia, race colors approach each other, the dark skin being lightened and the light skin darkened by dirt. I sit on top behind the drivers, for there are two, the cochero and his deputy, who are wholly oblivious of my presence until a few reales to each make me known to them. So stationed, and watching their movements for three days, having little else to do but to hold on and keep my face from blistering, I come to know them well, and to be able to count upon my fingers their distinguishing characteristics.

The cochero was a small man, weighing but little over one hundred pounds, and measuring not over five feet four, but his muscles were steel. He wore white cotton breeches, leathern leggings, untanned leather boots, white cotton jacket, slouched straw sombrero with the orthodox four dents in the high-pointed crown, and a colored hankerchief round his neck or waist. He was the most diabolically happy fellow I ever met; he used to find vent for his high spirits in cutting with his whip at the passing cart-mules and their drivers. Yet his voice was low and plaintive, as gentle as that of any woman, scarcely above a whisper even when issuing orders to his assistant and stablemen, of which there were usually half a score in attendance at the stations. His mules he would curse gently and with a smile.

His wife rode with him for a day and a night. She had a child in her arms. The night was cold—the early morning specially so. A gown each, one 715 708 thickness of cheap cotton, and a flimsy rebozo between them was all their clothing; and while I shivered in a heavy overcoat, she made no sign of being cold. Cochero was very kind to his wife and child, but that did not prevent the usual delicate attentions to his dozen other girls along the road.

Soto cochero, he called his assistant, a boy of sixteen, who was a lithe and active as a cat, jumping off to hitch up a trace, free the rein, instil diligence into a forgetful animal, or replenish his stock of stones for use while crossing a creek or river, running and clambering upon the stage and crawling all over it while going at breakneck speed, or bouncing about the rocky road with such force that the wonder was how wood and iron could be put together so as to stand the blows. Not the least of the soto cochero's duties was to keep his superior in cigarettes, lighting them and taking a few puffs himself to be sure they were in order. He in turn was allowed to hold the reins occasionally, and dream of days when he would be cochero. Both of these fellows had to be up at three in the morning and work frequently till eight or ten at night, the one receiving therefor thirty dollars a month and the other fifteen. Frequently the boy gets no more than eight or ten dollars, and has to board himself at that. They drove eight mules; two at the pole, then four abreast, and two leaders. Each carried a whip, one with a short lash, and one with a lash sixteen feet long and an inch thick at its thickest. In using the large whip the driver would let the lash drag out at full length for a moment; a twist of his arm would then bring it perfectly coiled high into the air, when it would roll off in one long wave and descend with unerring accuracy upon the off leader's ear, or under the belly of a nearer animal, the latter being the more difficult feat. If by good luck he peeled the skin from some lazy leg, the faithful lash with merciless accuracy was sure ever after to find the bloody spot.

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It was a sight to see this gentle creature handle a bucking team in starting from the station. The noses of the wheelers are lashed to the pole, their mouths bleeding, their legs striking out in every direction, the leaders and others being held each by a man. At a low word form the driver the men all let go their hold and step back. Then comes the jumping and plunging and kicking and running of the brutes, while the cutting lash descends in rapid blows, the driver attending to the leaders, while the assistant makes forcible suggestions to the wheelers with his short heavy whip. True to their instincts, the animals presently rebel against being thus urgently pressed forward; they drop down into a trot, and let wag their ears in humble docility. Then the assistant lets fly still further solid arguments in the shape of stones, of which he has provided a supply for the occasion. A kicking mule is the delight of a cochero, who whips until the animal kicks himself out of the traces, and then whips until he kicks himself back again. Some of these mules are very mulish. I saw at one station a wheel-mule squat on all fours and refuse to move, allowing the coach to pass over it, turning its harness over its head, and cutting deep gashes in its back with the projecting bolts under the axles, rather than take his daily jaunt. A substitute was found, and the mule walked away, shaking his head, to enjoy his hard-earned holiday.

I should not be doing my duty by Mexico were I to pass by without notice that most useful and devoted production, the burro—a faithful companion, a patient servant. Behold his ears—his long hairy ears, lying horizontal with his large hairy head! He wags them as the flies and bugs crawl in—slowly, solemnly wags them, while a settled air of sullen silence overspreads his features, which the lash of the driver fails greatly to disturb. His unshod feet make little more noise on the stone pavement than a cat's, notwithstanding he may be jogging along under a load 717 710 bigger than himself. For centuries this little brute has been carrying the wood from the hills, the water from the rivers, the produce from the lowlands, and the ore from the mines, the omnipresent link of all industry. He may be seen singly bringing to market the wares of the mountaineer, with wife and baby perched atop, or in trains at night laden with the products of nature or industry, seeking the early market; for poor indeed is he who cannot keep a burro. Overworked, underfed, beaten, kicked, and cursed, he remains the same serene and stoical beast to the last. To the steam-cars on their firs arrival he lifted up his voice in welcome, thinking his troubles at an end. But alas! for man's ingenuity, which finds for him now more work than ever. So with a somewhat deepened melancholy he relapses into the philosophic mood, and accepts each day its proportion of the foreordained number of blows, never allowing one of them to disturb his serenity, or cause him to move in any degree the faster. Happy burro!

We pass on the way long trains of large-wheeled carts piled high with merchandise, the native products going one way and foreign products the other way. The whole is covered with white canvas, and has the appearance of a lime-kiln on wheels. Each cart is drawn by nine or twelve mules, driven by dark mozos, the lighter-skinned conductor, or perhaps owner of the train, attending in gay trappings on horseback.

In the carrying trade the arrieros, or the drivers of pack-trains, play an important part. They are honest people, conveying cargoes from one city to another with scrupulous care. Owing to bad roads and deep ravines pack-mules are employed, on the whole, more than wagons or carts. In past years the immense carrying trade has been done almost entirely by mules, and not unfrequently thousands might be seen starting from the capital or a seaport laden for a journey of a thousand or fifteen hundred miles into 718 711 the interior. La conducta, the treasure train, which transported the products of the mints and the coin of the merchants from the interior to the capital, frequently carried from half a million to several million dollars in coin and bullion. These trains were heavily guarded by soldiers, and with them the merchants and their families travelled to and from the large cities. With the advent of the railroads and express companies all this has become a thing of the past, and with the custom has gone the prosperity of many of the interior towns whose life depended on the trade of these caravans. In compensation, the railroad builds new towns and develops fresh industries.

The way-stations between the towns are the characteristic haciendas every now and then encountered, and consisting sometimes of a large adobe dwelling and outhouses, surrounded by a whitewashed wall, and sometimes of the wall and small buildings without the large dwelling, with usually a muddy artificial lake, fed by the rains and drainage, with milky, muddy, limy, slimy water, and also a well and pump, worked by mule or man power, or a large, square tank of masonary, to which the water is conducted by an underground aqueduct. Some hacienda buildings present a very palatial appearance; instance those of Hacienda de Bocas of the Farías brothers, eleven leagues from San Luis Potosí, which is valued at half a million dollars, has 600 retainers, plants 1,000 bushels of wheat and 3,000 of corn, and has had expended in artesian-well experiments $200,000.

On the northern central table-land, the corn is usually small and poorly cultivated. In other localities farming is better done, the rich plantations attaining high culture, and the natives presenting a better appearance. Yet we see, in most instances, the same primitive ploughs of wood drawn by oxen, the yoke tied to the horns. With one hand the ploughman holds the plough, which has but one handle, while in the other hand is a long goad. This fashion prevails 719 712 also with the American ploughs now widely displacing the native, for all are preferred made with one handle. What, indeed, is the use of two handles, when one answers every purpose?

Nearly everything is done in pairs. Sometimes one person is sent to watch another, sometimes to help. Women go usually in pairs. On the stages are two drivers, and I have seen on the cars two conductors, one taking the tickets while the other checked them off. Men and mules are cheap in this country, and women also, but they seem to get things mixed a little. For often is seen the man doing the mule's work, and the woman taking the man's task; and too often, indeed, man, woman, and mule all doing nothing.

The city of Mexico is the Paris of America. Although ensconced in the heart of the country, it is less Mexican in type than might be expected, owing to the efforts of the early Spanish viceroys, as well as to the concentration there of a society largely trained by residence and travel in Europe.

It has been subject to the most remarkable changes of a natural as well as of a social and political character. Once it was the Venice of the continent, enthroned out in the lake, while at a respectful distance swept the sheltering circle of forest-crowned knolls and green meadows, studded with tributary settlements that peeped in gleaming whiteness out of their garden foliage.

The imperial courts of the Montezumas lent their splendor, swelled by the partly enforced presence of caciques and nobles from all parts, with their host of retainers and their palatial residences on rising terraces with colonmades, battlemented parapets, stucco adornments, and hanging gardens. Around spread the dwellings of traders, artisans, and serfs, to the number of 60,000, equivalent to a population of 300,000, and covering an area never since equalled.

Canals crossed the city in every direction, teeming with market canoes and stately barges. On gala days 720 713 the lake itself swarmed with pilgrims and pleasure-seekers, especially to witness the imposing ceremonies at the many temples, raised high above the dwellings of mortals upon lofty pyramids. Appropriate stages were there to heighten the effect of mystic rites, and lend additional horror to the immolation of human beings upon the sacrificial stone; while priests in gorgeous pageantry circled with chant and smoking censers round the ascending path of the huge pedestal.

And night veiled not the enchantment, for eternal vestal fires shone from every summit, and humbler tributaries flickered below from light-houses and street beacons to guide the traveller and call devout attention to the sacred abode of deities, reflected also in the starry sky and peaceful waters of the lake.

Whither has flown this splendor? Everywhere now we meet the withering as well as renewing influence of a new civilization: in the defective drainage system for the lakes, which has left unsightly marshes instead of green swards to fringe their ever-narrowing expanse; in the wanton destruction of forests which covered the hills and shaded the settlements; in the razing of ancient structures and outlying suburbs by early conquerors; and in the ravages of later civil wars.

Now the city lies at some distance from the lake, with mere traces of its waters in th few canals, and in disfiguring moats before the remnants of frowning walls and ramparts. Canals have given way to roads, with here and there a shady avenue; the solid pyramidal temples to turrets, domes, and spires, which shelter saintly images and pale tapers in lieu of grim Huitzilopochtli and flaming brasiers, and with clanging bells drown the dread notes of the famed Teponastli. Terraced and garden-covered palaces have yeilded before the less romantic structures of moresque, gothic, and renaissance styles.

The sights in and about the capital are numerous and interesting. Besides the government palace, 721 714 rebuilt from the ancient structure represented above, occupying two blocks with immense courts, and making up in extent and solidity what it lacks in style of architecture, there are the cathedral, which, from an architectural point of view, is considered by some the finest in America, the libraries, the museum, the art galleries, the school of mines, and the many other industrial, religious, and benevolent institutions, the zócalo, or government plaza, with a fine stand for the musicians in the centre, surrounded by trees, shrubs, and flowers in profusion. On the east is the palace, on the north the grand cathedral, on the west are commercial houses, and on the south the offices of the municipal governement. The zócalo is often illuminated at night, and there the best bands play and the élite of the city promenade. There are also the alameda, a beautiful foot-park, ten acres in extent, with shady walks and bowers, fountains sparkling at every turn, and towering trees shading all from the heat of the sun; the race-track, the bull-ring, and at a little distance, the Guadalupe and Loreto shrines, the floating gardens, and famed Chapultepec, the residence successively of Aztec monarchs, Spanish viceroys, and Mexican presidents, a castle on a hill rising out of the dense forest, approached by the Paseo de la Reforma, the drive of Mexico. Many strange scenes these venerable cypresses have witnessed; history unwritten and never to be known of aboriginal wars, of statecraft and priestcraft, of love-makings and merry-makings, for these trees were hoary, and of heavy, flowing beard when Quauhtemotzin was born, though still vigorous now, and of majestic mien.

While the city of Mexico is well laid out, the streets for the most part being straight and regular, so that from one point can be seen the hills bordering either side of the valley, they are peculiarly named and numbered, a change occuring sometimes at every block. Occasionally the same name is retained for a longer distance, when the several blocks are designated, 722 715 for instance, as primera calle de San Francisco, segunda calle de San Francisco, etc. About the old church and plaza of Santo Domingo, the site of the dread Inquisition building, is noticeable what a hold the name has on the vicinity. There are not only primera, segunda, and tercera Santo Domingo, but Puerta falsa de Santo Domingo, or False gate of Santo Domingo street, and Cerca de Santo Domingo, or Near Santo Domingo street.

But this will soon be changed. Already they have widened into a beautiful avenue the thoroughfare running from the cathedral to the opera-house, giving it the one name, calle del Cinco de Mayo, or Fifth of May street, a standing compliment to General Diaz and the gallant soldiers under him for the defeat of the French before Puebla in 1862.

Almost every one on first coming to the capital falls ill. The change is so great that some part of the system is sure to be affected by it in greater or less degree. Even natives of the city, returning after an absence, have chills and fever, or some other trouble. The air of the city is thin, and in places bad, and the climate essentially treacherous. The houses, with their thick walls and solid masonry and stone floors and inner courts, are cool, often cold; the sun is tropical and its rays penetrating. In passing from the house to the sunshine and back the change is great, and care must be taken of the throat and lungs.

The city is lower than several of the lakes, and in digging anywhere three or four feet through the upper strata of century débris and mouldering Aztec remains, water is reached. This sponginess is a common feature of the upland valleys. There are in some localities stygian smells, which would infect the entire city did they not rise so quickly and pass away in the thin, pure air without—as the theory goes—as to prevent spreading. Still, the city is not considered unhealthy.

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During winter the streets of the capital are covered with a fine dust, and railway travel is as bad as in the United States in summer. The climate of the city of Mexico is very like that of San Francisco, with the seasons reversed, and leaving out the fogs of the latter place. Thus, in Mexico the rainy season is in the summer and the dry season in the winter, with winds corresponding to the summer winds of San Francisco. The temperature varies but slightly during the rainy and dry seasons.

The question of draining the valley has been discussed for two centuries or more, and much work has already been done. It will some day be finished, and when cleanliness shall be added, the city of Mexico will be one of the healthiest capitals in the world.

There is always more or less danger to foreigners from yellow-fever on either seaboard; though during the winter months with proper care the risk is reduced to a minimum.

Small-pox is common in greater or less degree at all seaons throughout most parts of the republic, so that strangers coming in cannot be too careful with regard to vaccination. The multitude of scarred faces one everywhere sees tells the story.

There are feast-days and religious holidays without end; and if not a curse, they are at least a nuisance. Why take so much of this world's little span of time for the next world's affairs, with its eternity for their arrangement? Most of the shops, except those of the barber, the grocer, the dram-seller, and the food dispenser, close on such occasions, as well as on Sunday, and even the street stand is withdrawn at two or three o'clock, while the venders of fruits, dulces, and trinkets, in the plazas and market-places, prosecute their calling till dusk or far into the night.

Yet the poor people do not suffer from an excess of religion. They indeed appear to derive great comfort from it; and it is doubtful if many of them would 724 717 be better employed were there no such celebrations; at all events, they are ready to employ any excuse to escape from labor. Even courtesans, gamblers, and highwaymen stay their course for a moment to direct a prayer and devote an offering, though their object may be doubtful. Then the day is so happily helped out by drink and the bull or cock fight. Between religion and morality there seems to be slight connection; and though great crowds, drunk with pulque, gather in and round the churches and throng the streets, there is seldom any quarrelling, or even boisterous talk. The police are strict in their watch, and he who creates a disturbance is quickly arrested and marched off to jail, this promptness of punishment exercising a most healthy influence also on that class of foreigners which frequents bar-rooms and indulges in fiery drinks.

The hotel accommodations in the city of Mexico are good of their kind, but the travelled stranger will not like them. The rooms as a rule are too cold and cheerless, and the restaurant method of having your food served is not the most attractive for Americans, who are accustomed to the best hotels in the world. Rooms in the best hotels can be obtained at from two to four dollars a day, with a reduction for longer occupancy. In a private family furnished rooms rent at from twenty to thirty dollars a month. There are plenty of unfurnished rooms and houses to rent, but furniture is scarce and expensive. There are fine opportunities for establishing in Mexico first-class hotels on the American plan, and in certain country towns first-class hotels may be found with rates for room and board at from two to three dollars a day. The buildings should be constructed of brick, stone, and iron, with bay-windows and ornaments, with ventilation, elevators, fireplaces, bath-rooms, and all the latest improvements. Such establishments, properly conducted, are much needed, and would pay well in the capital if not in other places. Till then the 725 718 transient dweller must suffer discomfort and be exposed to the outrageous extortions of restaurateurs. The best procedure is to bargain to be fed after the desired mode for so much a month, including everything; then if not more than twenty-five per cent be added to the agreed price for pretended additions and variations, one may rest satisfied.

The Mexicans of the better class have adopted the European style of living: the desayuno consisting of coffee or chocolate on rising, after which horseback riding; almuerzo, or breakfast, usually between nine and twelve, equivalent to a full dinner in some countries, with a great variety of dishes from soup to dessert, with wine and cigars, to be followed by professional duties; comida, or dinner, from two to four, and after this the siesta, less observed in the capital than formerly, and wholly unnecessary, though usually observed on the table-land. Then the ladies have a merienda, or luncheon, from four to six, in which the men, who are supposed to be at business, do not indulge. Last of all is the cena, or supper, from eight to eleven. Professional men close their offices at six; then after supper stroll in the plaza or call on friends, and after chocolate and cigars, retire.

Descending the scale of wealth and refinement to a commoner class, the cooking becomes more Mexican, until tortillas supply the place of bread, and pulque supplants even the cheap vile stuff of the country called wine. Probably fruit comes first as the staple food of the poor; particularly the tuna, or cactus fruit, which is palatable and wholesome, and after that corn, beans, with now and then eggs and goat's meat.

In many ways they produce comparatively great results from small means, which is the highest achievement of science. For example, in their cookery, with a bit of meat and a few vegetables, two or three earthen pots and a handful of charcoal, they will make up for the table half a dozen dishes which may be pronounced excellent.

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The markets upon the table-land are attractive; although tropical fruits and other products of the lowlands are not what a stranger expects to find, excepting the delicious pineapples and certain kinds of oranges; but drop down to the tierra caliente, and the difference, not only in the fruits but in the people, is remarkable.

Mexican money, consisting of bank notes and silver at the capital, and away from there of silver chiefly, is usually rated at from twelve to eighteen per cent less than American money, which can readily be changed. There is little gold in circulation.

National bank notes and Monte de Piedad paper are coming into general use about the capital, and gradually spreading in the country. On the border good paper money is rare; but between most inland cities local bills of exchange can be brought, so as to avoid the risk and trouble of carrying silver over the country. A person making an extensive tour through distant parts, however, must still have a mule to carry the purse. Exchange on New York or London for an equal amount of silver commands in the city of Mexico a large premium.

From the highest to the lowest of the Mexicans there is an extreme politeness which soon permeates the less pliant nature of their northern neighbors on coming hither. I have even seen a Yankee railway conductor take off his hat in speaking to a Mexican passenger, and him of no extraordinary quality. Men often embrace on meeting, each putting his arm round the other and patting his back; and the youth occasionally kisses the hand of the elder, who rises while undergoing the ceremony. On meeting and parting, ladies kiss their very dear friends on both cheeks, and on the street there is no end of finger-wiggling one to another. This latter mode of recognition at a distance is likewise indulged in by the men, and consists, with uplifted hand, of plying vigorously the two middle fingers.

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The reception-room in every house of pretensions, and in public offices, has a sofa, with rug in front, and at either end chairs, placed at right angles to it, other chairs being ranged about the room. This, as in Germany, is the place of honor, to which on entering the guest is bowed, the host seating himself in one of the chairs at the side. Ladies receive in the same way. Fashionable people would as soon think of getting along without a house as without a sofa.

On taking your departure after a visit you make your adieus. The host then follows you to the top of the stairs—for the reception and drawing rooms are usually on the second floor—where hasta luego is said again. As you turn the corner in descending the stairs to the court, you for the third time bow and raise your hat, the ladies again repeating their adieus. In beckoning for a person to come to them, they move the hand downward and outward, instead of toward themselves, as common among Anglo-Saxon races. If you are of the gentler sex, the host, offering his arm, escorts you down the stairs, and to the never-absent carriage.

There is a reason for all things, though not in all things is there reason.

There is no reason in women going barefoot while the men wear sandals, as do the lowest class in Mexico. The reason may be found by going back to aboriginal times, when the men as lords paramount tramped the forest while the women as inferior beings drudged at home.

There is no reason in the ladies of the capital driving to the alameda at precisely six o'clock every evening, rain or shine, often permitting a magnificent day to pass by without fresh air or sunshine, and then going out after dark to get neither. Nature has her moods, though usually fixed in her habits. Fashionable women have their ways, which do not always accommodate themselves to the ways of nature. During the months of October and November there is in the 728 721 city of Mexico a regular five o'clock shower. All the same, at five o'clock the world of fashion must turn out of their houses for a drive, dowagers and damsels declining all other exercise, and closeting themselves at home until from inactivity a peculiar anæmic malady results. The reason is that during former troublous times a guard was placed at the paseo for the protection of health and pleasure seekers, and the habit once formed, common sense has not been able to overcome it.

There is no reason in employing men to do the work of donkeys, driving them from the sidewalk into the street while staggering under burdens which might better be drawn in carts; imposing upon human beings work which would almost disgrace a beast, and that with plenty of available beasts. Yet even a cheap burro may probably be regarded as worth more than the man at no marketable value. This and the half-starved, half-naked children, sitting or sleeping upon the cold damp stones that send deadly disease through their poor little bodies, are among the saddest sights I ever beheld. Better a thousand battles and butcheries, that however cruel terminate quickly, than this long-drawn agony of man's deep debasement. For the reason here we must go back to aboriginal times, when there were no beasts of burden on this northern continent. Under the successive administrations which followed those of the Montezumas, the descendants of the carriers, having found nothing better to do, must continue to carry till the end of time, despite the presence of horses and donkeys, and steam and iron, unless benevolent men force them into other channels of labor.

Take not too much unction to your soul at a person's telling you that his house is yours, that he and all his are at your full and free disposal, that he kisses your hand and kisses your feet, and will live for you or die at your pleasure, for he well knows, and you should know, that he would do nothing of the kind. 729 722 Consider the many meaningless forms among other nations, which are the relics of by-gone ages, when society was rigorously separated into castes and classes, masters and servants, lords and serfs, when strangers were scarce and suspicious personages, and the visits of friends were few, and take not literally what are intended merely as polite expressions, indicative of good-will and friendly feeling.

There is no reason in going out of one's way to make one's self uncomfortable. A prejudice prevails among Mexicans of all classes against artificial heat in houses. There are probably fewer stoves of any kind than pianos in Mexico to-day. The walls, either of adobe, brick, or stone, are so thick that the interior is cooler in summer than the atmosphere without, and warmer in winter. Yet upon the high table-land the houses in winter are not comfortable; but rather than have a fire the occupants will shiver the cold months through, because, they say, the air, already rarefied by altitude, deteriorates when further rarefied by heat. When absolutely necessary to heat a room, a brasier with charcoal is used. The assertion is not proved, however, either by this line of reasoning or by experience. It has never been shown that for purposes of respiration it is worse to warm the air on the top of a mountain than to warm that at the base. The thin air when made thinner by the sun in summer is still healthful; but the superstition remains. And I notice that Mexicans on passing from an inner room into the open air often pause for a few moments in an ante-room, so that the change may not be too sudden. Visitors are warned against a golpe del aire—blow from the air—in going from the darkened interior into the strong light of the street, many receiving injury to the eyes by so doing. It is common to see persons walking the streets with a handkerchief over the mouth.

The bull-fight still obtains, except in places where 730 723 the authorities have reached the conclusion that a slaughter-house with its cheap display of bravery in tawdry colors amidst the bellowings of a bull as it gores to death a ten-dollar horse is not the most intellectual or refined of Sunday occupations, or the best means of raising funds for charitable purposes, even if directed by the mayor and presided over by the governor.

The drama has often been encouraged by the government, no less than twenty thousand dollars being contributed to support the theatre in 1831-2, and again during the rules of Santa Anna and Maximilian.

The Mexicans are natural musicians. Every military company and every town has its band, or several of them, whose members have never had regular instruction. The son picks up something from the father, and the leader does the rest, the result being very satisfactory, filling the thousands of plazas with sweet music all through the soft tropical evenings. Their specialty is the dance-music, with its weird, rhythmic movement, played in perfect time and tune. The Mexican ear is remarkably correct, and although for the most part untaught, their musical taste and instinct are unerring.

The Mexican musician, though not wholly mortal, is still subject to the frailties of mortals. Fond of his pulque, and in need of constant refreshment to keep him up to the inspired pitch, he sometimes imbibes too freely, and one of the ever-ready substitutes has to be called, while the overcome performer lies down on the floor, and slumbers peacefully, revelry still mingling with his dreams.

The national dance, the danza, taking the place of the more pronounced Cuban habanera, has a slow, swaying movement, conforming well to the music. Mexican songs partake of the same character, often with the danza movement running through them. In fact, the music of the Mexicans is as individual in its way as that of the Neapolitan airs or German Volkslieder.

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A striking feature is its melancholy strain. Even the songs and street cries and strains of laughter are in a minor key. Listen to the plaintive voice of the people in common conversation, and you would imagine them in conference over a dying comrade!

The Mexican gambles upon instinct, if such a term has any meaning. He has in him superstition enough to believe in luck; he will not work; he frequently is sorely in need of money; how else is he to get it?

Notwithstanding the laws existing in the capital, there is gambling for all grades, tables on which nothing but copper is seen, others of silver with some gold, and still others where gold alone is used, the lowest bet here allowed being an ounce.

A law of 1828 closed many of the gambling-houses, throwing many professional gamblers out of employment and depriving thousands of their accustomed amusement. The proceeding showed at once the material strength of the government able to enforce so unpopular a measure, and the moral strength of the rulers, who believed gambling to be iniquitous and pernicious. Nevertheless, the inherent and oldtime passion was not thus to be quenched. As in religion, there was much comfort in it. So the following year we find written: “From the highest to the lowest, all gamble; and it is no uncommon thing to see the senators, and even higher officers, in the cockpit or at the gaming-table betting and staking their money against the half-clothed laborer.” Measures have since been frequently taken to diminish the evil, but with little effect.

In some countries the business of pawnbroker is deemed disgraceful as well as pernicious; but in Mexico it is, under government auspices, a source of government revenue, and the management of the Monte de Piedad, as it is called, is confided to a person of the first integrity. It receives whatever effects the poor people can bring, loans them a large percentage 732 725 of their value, and charges a small percentage for the use of the money when the loan is paid. If allowed to remain unredeemed for six months the effects are then sold at auction, a sale taking place every month. The institution is largely patronized by the lower classes, and the establishments are indeed veritable curiosity shops. It has branches all over the republic, and does also a banking and brokerage business, to which impulse was given by the confused state of the laws from colonial times concerning property and collection of debts. It may be an institution of the greatest beneficence, as declared; but if there were savings banks—a rare thing in Mexico—and the people were taught to patronize them, pawnbrokers would be less needed. So with regard to lotteries, of which there are both state and national, and from which the government derives revenue. They are no doubt well managed; but with less gambling and more labor, it might be better for the government, or at least for the commonwealth. Visitors are accosted at every turn by ticket venders, who inquire, Do you not wish ten thousand dollars this afternoon? If you suggest that the seller improve the opportunity to benefit himself, he takes it good humoredly, and turns to the next intended victim.

Female beauty seems to be distributed by sections. In some parts of the republic attractive young women abound, mestizas as a rule having better features than the Indians, and being more robust than the creoles; in other parts there are scarcely any who, even by courtesy, can be called beautiful—only little girls from eight to twelve, then little old wrinkled mothers from thirteen to twenty-five, and after that old women, almost if not quite grandmothers. But an attractive timidity stamps all the maidens, and even the boys, which lingers far into maturity.

Notwithstanding women are so plentiful, wives are high-priced in Mexico, and so the poor often go unmarried. For a marriage license the Mexican laborer 733 726 must give from five to fifteen dollars, equivalent to the hard savings of several months, and have a god-father. While civil marriage has been made legal, so that poor people might marry without great cost, so devoted are the lower classes, especially the women, to the church, that they consider no marriage better than one not solemnized by the priest, who, as a rule, charges for his services as much as the means of the participants admit. Better let them marry freely and cheaply, and so raise the standard of morality; the clerical revenue will not suffer.

Mexican love-making, although very pretty and romantic, would not be at all satisfying to the English or American idea of the fitness ef things. Randar la casa, that is, to patrol the house, is a favorite way of showing affection. The admirer of a señorita, elaborately arrayed in his best, presents himself, mounted on a mustang, which, unless fiery by nature, is made to prance with great spirit by due manipulation of the cruel Mexican bit. He rides up and down before her balcony, where she is stationed at a certain hour for the purpose, occasionally dashing furiously by, and then suddenly pulling up short, throwing the horse back on his haunches. This maneuvre is repeated until the recipient of the delicate flattery designs to cast an approving glance on her adorer. Or the love-sick youth will stand patiently for hours, talking with his inamorata through the iron-barred windows, if perchance for reward he may touch his lips to the tips of her tiny fingers, and will stand for hours on the sidewalk opposite, gazing at the window where the fair one ought to be, but alas! oftentimes is not. Sometimes flowers, or even notes, are thrown up to her, or her waiting-maid is bribed to transport the communication. A cool pair of lovers it must be who cannot keep at least one confidential servant thus employed. But a man only too often does not obtain or seek the entrée to her father's house until he goes as her accepted lover, and then only meets his fiancée in 734 727 company with her family, never a tête-a-tête by themselves. The offer is usually made through the mediation of a friend, the suitor not appearing on the scene until all preliminaries are arranged. The dueña, however, never abates her restraining watch upon them until the marriage-day.

The poor work-woman, in city and country, will carry her child with her all day, however heavily tasked or burdened. The children are often stunted in their growth, if not actually deformed, by the unnatural positions in which they are borne.

The Mexican housewife, whether she be high or low, glories in an extensive stock of dishes, although too often she has little to put into them. I have seen in one place the walls thickly covered with cheap pottery, and in another cupboards stored with a thousand superfluous pieces with gilt rim and monogram. Earthenware of a soft red clay is made, especially at Guadalupe and Guadalajara, but the best ware comes from Cuautitlan, and he who brings and sells it is an ollero. The type usually is pure Indian.

Strangers, on the other hand, patronize the seller of clay figures, representing types from all handicrafts with no little plastic skill and admirable elaboration. At several points, but notably at San Pedro, near Guadalajara, the Indians exercise great skill in taking likenesses, either by sittings or from photographs. The work is done entirely by the eye, no measurements being taken, and the material employed is a peculiar oily clay of dark color, which when baked turns a lighter hue. I have seen an image made by Pantaleon Panduro, a full-blooded Indian, from a photograph, which, considering that the artist never saw the original, is a remarkable likeness, and shows great artistic skill. Among the natives special figures are in demand for different occasions, in connection with religious celebrations.

Feather-work also is a specialty in which the 735 728 Indians excel. They not only produce exact imitations of the feathered tribes which inhabit the country, mounted in relief on cardboard, but also make wreaths, and intricate designs in different colored feathers, producing wonderful results.

The plastic artists also manipulate wax and a variety of stones with great success.

The tecali marble near Puebla is worked into forms of fruits, fishes, and slabs for tables and bureaus. A large industry, which would soon gain a world-wide reputation, might here be built up, for the tecali marble, besides being peculiar, is sometimes very beautiful. Feather-work and gold and silver ornaments are among the many artistic industries dating before the conquest. Then there are opals, shell-work, pearls, coral, and lava ornaments, the shawls of Guanajuato, the saddles of Leon, the horn-work and rebozos of San Luis Potosí.

Home manufactures are indeed more widely spread throughout the republic than may be imagined from a mere glance at the import lists. Some have a certain fame, even if limited in extent, and others supply the wants of ten million inhabitants; such as the several score of cotton and twist mills with an average invested capital of nearly a million dollars for each; woollen factories with an annual output of about five million dollars, or one fourth of the preceding; silk factories which thirty years ago already numbered twenty-one; paper-mills which a quarter of a century ago were producing paper worth six million dollars; ten iron-works were then yielding at the rate of seven and a half million dollars annually; and so along the list, till we reach piano factories, two in number.

The lower orders are divided into multitudinous trade distinctions, each having to some extent its own peculiar dress and customs. For instance, there are the bateiteros, or wooden-tray sellers; the petatero, or seller of reed mats at a medio apiece, brought from 736 729 Xochimilco, near the canal, and used by very poor people as beds, twenty of them in a sleeping-room sometimes; the jaulero or bird-cage seller; the cadaceros or sieve seller; the canasteros, or basket sellers, being for the most part of pure Indian blood; and many others of the same class, who manufacture articles and carry them from town to town in huge loads on their backs, manufacturing and selling as they go.

Then there are the cabezeros, who cry “Good heads of sheep hot!” along the street; the cafetero, who keeps a coffee-stand; the velero, or candle seller; the mercillero, or hardware pedler; the tripero, who sells intestines to be filled with sausage meat; the pollero, or chicken seller; the escobero, or broom-corn seller; the nevero, or ice-cream seller; the mantequero, or lard carrier; the pirulero, or seller of pirú, a red berry for feeding to birds.

There are men who spend their lives in gathering sticks to make charcoal; they are called lenadores; and basureras, or women who collect rags. These and other venders are not sparing of their voice with which to allure customers. The lower class have their lavandera, or washerwoman, as well as the upper class; she of the former wears a hat over her rebozo, while the other goes bareheaded. There is a good Yankee steam laundry now in the capital.

Poor Judas! After having been done to death so long ago, his soul is not allowed rest to this day. On the Saturday which follows Good Friday in holy-week, little images of fantastic shapes with heads of men, devils, and animals, all very like Judas as he feels now at different times, and containing powder, are sold about the streets by the judero, and hung up in the balconies, or strung across the street. There are effigies larger, six or eight feet high, brought out by those who wish to give the traitor particular punishment. At ten o'clock at night, while the cathedral bell is striking the hour, fire is set to these images all over the city; and the noise of the barking of dogs, 737 730 and the shaking of the rattles sold by the matraqueros to frighten the devil away, is enough to make the unhappy ghost go forth and hang itself anew.

The street cries have not varied much for a century or two. In passing from the aboriginal tongue the tone became somewhat changed; but all through the period of Spanish domination, and even to the present day, there is the same mournful song, the same long-drawn note of woe terminating every cry, even as it struck upon the ears of Montezuma.

All through the night, in the chief cities, the shrill, doleful whistle of the policeman is heard every quarter of an hour, giving notice that they are watchful. The belated traveller is quite likely to hear the challenge, Quien va? who goes there? from the sentry-box of a cuartel, and most promptly respond, Amigo! a friend; and if further questioned, Donde vive? where do you live? replies with the name of his hotel, or room, and passes on. Unsatisfactory replies tend to the guard-house.

Early in the morning the people are astir, this being the best part of the day for work; then comes the noon siesta, and the short afternoon of business or pleasure. The venders alone observe no respite. All day long from dawn till dark their discordant voices are heard from hundreds of throats—first the coalmen's carbosiu-u-u! which being translated signifies carbon senor! then the mantequi-i-illa! of the butterman; and cecina buena! from the seller of good salt beef. And now before the door is heard the prolonged and melancholy note of a woman, Hay cebo-o-o-o-o-o! whose business is the purchase of kitchen suet. Another shorter, quicker cry is heard, likewise that of a woman in shrill soprano, who has little hot cakes to sell, Gorditas de horno calientes!

Thus the day wears along with ever-fresh variations, perhaps from a seller of Puebla mats, and from an aborigmal Jew pedler in Turkish dress, fresh from the holy land, with beads and crosses and trinkets 738 731 made from the crosses of all the saints, not to mention numberless beggars whose only capital is some deformity. And at all times men, women, and children of all grades are selling lottery-tickets. After noon the men of honey-cakes and cheese and honey appear; the dulce men, Caramelos de esperma! bocadillo de coco! Tortillas de cuajada! come on toward night; then nuts, and “Ducks, O my soul, hot ducks!” There are many more cries than these, some of late origin, though the “new development” little changes the native Mexican in this or many other respects. Whenever a railroad train pulls up at a station it is immediately surrounded by sellers of everything eatable and drinkable, whose babel of cries is irritating to those not disposed to look on the amusing side of it.

Speaking of lying Mexicans—and there are few of them who are not proficient in the art—my man Friday, whom I took from San Francisco, is deserving of special mention. He did not lie for profit, but from principle. I thought Cerruti a good liar, but the Italian was a novice beside this Mexican. His mendacity took the direction of omniscience. Whatever he wished to be was; whatever I wished to know I asked him—then went and found out for myself. The governor was not in town if my fellow did not feel like going out. Or if my fellow desired time for his own pleasure, nothing can be done on a holiday, he would demurely observe.

Ask the average Mexican anything, and he always has an answer ready; there is nothing he does not know. He will spin you off a string of lies as naturally and as gracefully as a duck takes to water. And if you are wise, you will keep your temper; and if you want anything out of him, pretend to believe him, for if you tell him he lies, he only shrugs his shoulder, as much as to say, “What else could you expect?” As well find fault with a mustang for bucking, as with a Mexican for lying.

739 732

The Mexicans have a way of their own of manifesting their displeasure. While I was with General Diaz one day, a messenger from President Gonzalez came with tidings of a revolution on the zócalo. I have often observed that whenever trouble approached General Diaz was sure to be sent for. I noticed as I entered the house that day that the horses, harnessed to the carriage, stood tied in the stable ready for instant use. In less than one minute from the time he received notice from the president, with a hasty apology to me, General Diaz was rolling off for the scene of action. As I walked down the street from his house to my hotel, I found the sidewalk strewed with glass, the shops all closed, and mounted police patrolling the principal avenues. Presently I met General Diaz returning, who laughingly took me into his carriage and back to his house. The poor fellows in the vicinity of the zócalo, not liking the shave of eight or ten cents on the dollar which the nickel business subjected them to, knew of no other way of manifesting their displeasure than going about the streets in bands of fifty or one hundred, the mounted police marching after them brandishing their drawn swords, but not preventing the mob from breaking lamps and windows.

It is remarkable how soon Americans living in Mexico become Mexican in many of their ways. The sharp, eager look of the typical Yankee is soon lost, his activity and energy subside, and he sinks into the constitutional repose of the Latin race. Between the sluggish Englishman or the stolid German and the Mexican there is less difference in the outset, but all these and others lose their native characteristics sooner than they are aware.

Nor is it altogether example by which this change is wrought; they are forced to it in a great measure by climate and custom. If on the table-land, they must moderate their natural pace, ascend flights of stairs slowly and with measured tread, while in lower latitudes they must keep out of the sun. They can 740 733 transact no business during the many pleasure-hours and feast-days the Mexican chooses to absent himself; while the native takes his siesta, the foreigner must sit and wait. Amid these and similar new conditions the man becomes new; he learns to take life easy, to procrastinate, to fail in his appointments, to speak smooth words without meaning, and finally, to become proficient in all the vices of the Mexican without absorbing a corresponding quota of his virtues. Though the Mexicans have paid their money to bring the Chinaman to their door, they have never yet bought his proverb, which affirms that for him who does everything in its proper time, one day is worth three. Rather, the Mexican might say, if one day is worth nothing, what is the value of three?

On the whole, after having said many fine words about the Mexicans, having thought well of them and become greatly interested in them, working in their interests as few among their own number ever worked, I must admit that they are not exactly what I wish they were; they are not a human article of which I should be very proud were I a world-maker.

First of all, I would make them better-looking on the outside. What is the use of cumbering the earth with such an ill-visaged race, all that is dark and ugly in the Spaniard and Indian united? Their forms are well enough where developed by work and holding their heads erect, but their faces, in youth ruddy and flabby or pale and sinister, assume the aspect of dried tobacco leaves.

On reaching the city of Mexico, I took up my quarters at the hotel Iturbide, where I remained four months, ransacking the city, and making excursions in various directions.

I had letters of introduction, and being desirous of seeing and learning all I could and making the most of my time among a notoriously slow, formal, and conventional people, I at once sent them out, requesting 741 734 the recipient to name time and place for an interview.

“I cannot see why you want to make the acquaintance of these people,” said Morgan, the American minister, to me one day. “If it is to be entertained by them, you will be disappointed. Here am I these three or four years representing the great American republic, and they pay not the slightest attention to me. Aside from official intercourse with the minister of foreign relations, there is nothing between us. When I came, the chief officials called when I was out and left their card; I returned the call when they were out and left my card, and that was the end of it.”

“My dear sir,” I said, “it is the last thing on earth I desire—to be entertained by these or any other people. I come to Mexico for a far different purpose. Still, if I am so let alone as to feel slighted, it will be for the first time in my life.”

The fact is, Mr Morgan could not understand what it was I wanted in Mexico; nevertheless, he was always cordial and accommodating.

For about two weeks my time was chiefly occupied in making and receiving calls. One of the first to visit me was Ygnacio M. Altamirano, one of the chief literary men in Mexico, who boasts his pure Aztec blood uncontaminated by any European intermixture. In form he is well proportioned, a little below medium height, features clear-cut and of pronounced type, bright, black eyes, and skin not very dark, intellect brilliant, and tongue fluent of speech.

Altamirano divided the leading literary honors of the capital with Alfredo Chavero, who was also quite talented. Altamirano wrote for La Libertad, La Republica, and El Diario del Hogar; any paper was glad to get anything from Chavero. These men showed me every attention, and introduced me to the members of the Sociedad de Geografia y Estatística, at a meeting called specially for that purpose.

Another very agreeable littérateur was Ireneo Paz, 742 735 member of congress, and proprietor of La Patria, which has a daily, and an illustrated weekly edition, on the front page of which Señor Paz did me the honor to place my portrait, with a biographical notice, reviewing my books in the other edition.

Most of the leading journals and journalists in Mexico are under the immediate pay of the government. There has always been one notable exception, however, in El Monitor Republicano, of which Vicente García Torres was proprietor. The government offered $350 a month to this journal as subsidy, but Torres thought he could do better to keep himself free and independent. He was a shrewd old fellow, Señor Torres, being about seventy, with sharp, grizzly features, and a man whose kind services I shall ever hold in grateful remembrance. Morgan introduced me to him, and besides offering me his columns, he went out of his way to gather material for me.

I found in Francisco Sosa, author of several works, and editor of El Nacional, a man of talents, of affable modest demeanor, such as makes a stranger wish to know him further.

Indeed, I met so many, who treated me so cordially, seeming to count it a pleasure to serve me, that while I cannot pass them by without mention, I still have not the space to devote to them which their merits deserve. There was Vicente Riva Palacio, of an old and aristocratic family, occupying a palatial residence, with a fine library, and many superb Maximilian and other relics, such as the chair of Hidalgo, and the sword of Mina. Here were the archives of the Inquisition, in fifty-four manuscript volumes, from the founding of the institution in Mexico in 1570, to the time of Independence, say 1814. His house was a workshop like my library, the owner exercising great diligence, with men about him extracting, arranging, and condensing material for his use.

I met Amador Chimalpopoca, one of the race of aboriginal rulers, one night at the rooms of the 743 736 geographical society. Native American intelligence, ability, brain power, genius, or whatever it may be called, is apparently no whit behind the European article.

On another occasion I encountered a man no less remarkable in another direction, J. E. Hernandez y Dávalos, who for thirty-one years had been collecting from all parts of the country, Mexico, Michoacan, Chihuahua, Jalisco, Oajaca, and elsewhere, documents relative to the war of Independence, and from that time to the French war. He states that he copied everything relating to the subject out of the Biblioteca National, and had two copyists in the National Archives for four years. He was a poor man holding some inferior government position with a small salary; but out of it he supported his family and achieved this great work, while high officials stole millions and did nothing—not a single self-denying or praiseworthy act for their country. Hernandez y Dávalos was often promised government aid, but government officials here, as elsewhere, are too prone to promise with no intention of keeping their word. In fact Mexicans, of high or low degree, are not remarkable for their reliability. In 1870 this man had a little cigar factory in the calle de Dontoribio, worth $700, the profits from which gave himself and family a fair support. He had already in his possession many precious papers, when along came one more valuable than them all. It was regarding Hidalgo, and was offered to him for $250. But where was the money to come from? He felt that he could not let slip from his grasp so priceless a treasure, but this was a large amount for him to raise. He tried in vain to borrow it; Hidalgo's paper was worth less in the market than that of any pulque-seller. At last he actually sold out his business in order to secure this document. What would become of the wise and wealthy of this world were there no enthusiasts or fools! At this time, 1883, six large volumes of these documents had been 744 737 printed by Hernandez y Dávalos, and 700 subscribers obtained; but unluckily, a paper adverse to the character of the virgin of Guadalupe slipped in, and straightway the subscription list dropped down to fifty. Men have been immortalized, with piles of masonry erected to their honor, for far less benefits to their country than those conferred by this poor cigarmaker

No small commotion this same virgin of Guadalupe has made in Mexico first and last. Her shrine is at a small town not far from Mexico city, Guadalupe Hidalgo, a place of some political fame, the treaty with the United States concluding the war of 1846 and transfer of California, among other things, having been done there. It was here, if we may believe the holy men who have written volumes on the subject, that the virgin appeared to the poor Indian, Juan Diego, imprinting her image in his blanket, that the aborigines of America as well as the aristocratic foreigners might have her effigy to worship, and build her a church on the spot of her present appearing. The priests pretended to be incredulous at first, but finally permitted the natives to have their own particular virgin, as the latter were inclined to neglect the deities of Spain for those of Mexico. It is not an attractive place on a holiday for a person of refined organs or sensitive nerves, as the crowds drawn thither are not of the best behavior. The gambling and drinking of the worshippers after church service are of a rather low order, the bets being small and the drink pulque. There was one highly respectable den of infamy, however, where the superior class, the upper strata of society, statesmen, military officers, and commercial men, might indulge in larger stakes at the tables representing the more popular European games, with French wine and brandy. For everywhere in Mexico, as in most other places, it is not vice itself that is scourged so much as the manner of indulgence. Any amount of wickedness is anywhere tolerated so 745 738 that it be conventional. It is quite orthodox for the common people of Mexico to get drunk on pulque, while the upper strata may indulge without limit in wine, so long as they do not drink in bar-rooms or tipple throughout the day. So with regard to gambling, cheating, law-breaking, unbelief, licentiousness, and all the crimes and vices flesh is heir to—let them be done decently and in order, in such a way as to avoid exposure or punishment, and all is well.

General Cárlos Pacheco, minister of Fomento, who lost an arm and a leg in the war, is a man of sterling worth, and highly respected throughout the republic. Francisco de Garay, an engineer of great reputation and ability, in a series of conversations gave me the coloring for the several phases of Mexican history during the present century, such as could not be found in books.

I found in the prominent lawyer and statesman, Francisco L. Vallarta, a most serviceable friend. Then there were President Iglesias and his cabinet whom I entertained in San Francisco during their flight to the United States, who were most cordial in their greetings and attentions. The venerable and learned Prieto was of their number. I may also mention José María Vigil, director of the Biblioteca National; Alberto Lombardo, one of the best families; Doctor Ramon Fernandez, governor of the district General Naranjo, acting secretary of war and navy; Juan Toro, postmaster general; Vicente E. Manero, architect and engineer; Felipe Gerardo Cazeneuve, proprietor of El Mundano; Joaquin García Icazbalceta, with a beautiful house and fine library, whose works were freely used and quoted by me in my Native Races; José Ceballos, president of the senate; Jesus Fuentes y Muñiz, minister of the Hacienda; Luis Siliceo; Juan Yndico, keeper of the archives of the district of Mexico; Jesus Sanchez, director of the 746 739 museum, and a host of others. Icazbalceta is more bibliographer than writer; he cleans the pages of his old books, restores lost and faded cuts with pen and ink, and he even set up with his own hands the type for one of his reprints. Manuel Romero Rubio, father-in-law of the late president, introduced me to Porfirio Diaz, and he to President Gonzalez. From General Diaz, the foremost man in the republic, I took a two weeks' dictation, employing two stenographers, and yielding 400 pages of manuscript. Naturally, during this time, and subsequently, I became well acquainted with the Diaz family, dining frequently there, and with the father of the charming wife of the president, whose home was one of the most elegant in the capital.

Romero Rubio, then president of the senate, formerly minister of foreign affairs, and subsequently minister under Diaz, is a fine specimen of a wealthy and aristocratic Mexican; grave and somewhat distant in his demeanor, yet kind and cordial among friends, and punctilious in the performance of every duty, public and private.

Porfirio Diaz appears more American than Mexican. In the hall of the municipality and district of Mexico are portraits of all the rulers, regal and republican, from Cortés to Diaz. And between the first and the last are some points of resemblance. Cortés made the first conquest, Diaz the last. The former chose Oajaca as his home; the latter was born there. In this portrait of Cortés, the finest I have seen, the conqueror is represented as quite old, toward the end of life, when the pride of gratified ambition had been somewhat obliterated by the machinations of enemies, the neglect of his sovereign, and the jealousy of courtiers. There is present less of the strong man triumphant than of the strong man humiliated. Diaz has had his triumphs; perhaps his humiliations are yet to come. Few great men escape them toward the end of their career; indeed they 747 740 seem necessary, in the economy of politics, to terminate the too ambitious man's efforts, whose pretentions otherwise would know no bounds.

The two great receptacles of knowledge, ancient and modern, historical, scientific, and religious, in the Mexican capital, and which make the heart of the student, investigator, or collector, to quail before them, are the Biblioteca Nacional, or national library, and the Archivo General y Publico de la Nacion, or national archives.

The Biblioteca Nacional occupies a large building, formerly a church, part of the walls of one portion of it having been worked over until it has quite a modern and imposing aspect. To enter the library, as at this time arranged, you pass through a well-kept garden to the door of the untouched portion of the antique, passing which you find yourself in a large room, with irregular sides and angles, well filled with books. At tables are usually ten or twenty persons reading or writing.

Thence through a small door in the wall you may pass into the main building, or rather the main library room, on either side of which are ranges of lesser rooms; each holding one of the sections, or part of a section, into which the library is divided. The volumes nominally number 130,000, folios in vellum largely predominating, nine tenths of which are of no value from any point of view. Throw out these, and the many duplicates, and the number is not so imposing.

The sections, or principal divisions, are eleven namely, bibliography, theology, philosophy, jurisprudence, mathematics, natural science and physics, medical science, technology, philology and belles lettres, history, and periodical literature.

Señor Vigil wrote out for me a very interesting historical description of this institution. The library was formed, to a great extent, from the old libraries of the university, the cathedral, and the several convents of the city. The edifice was the ancient temple 748 741 of San Augustin, and is still undergoing changes and repairs to meet the present purpose. On the posts of the fence surrounding the grounds are busts of notable authors, Veytia, Navarrete, Alzate, Peña, Alaman, and Clavijero; also Cardoso, Gongora, Pesado, Couto, Najera, Ramirez, Tafle, Gosostiza, Gaspio; and the illustrious aboriginals, displaying features fully as refined and intelligent as the others, Nezahualcoyotl, Ixtlilxochitl, and Tezozomoc. In the reading room are statues of persons whose names mark the devolopment of human thought, according to the estimate hereabout: Confucius, Ysarias, Homer, Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Virgil, Saint Paul, Origen, Dante, Alarcon, Copernicus, Descartes, Cuvier, and Humboldt.

The library is open from ten to five, and free; annual revenue for new books $8000; the attaehés are one director, two assistants, four book clerks, a chief of workmen, a paleogeafo, eight writers, a conserje, gardener, porter, and three mozos.

All the work on the building, ornamentation, statues, and furniture, has been done by Mexican artisans and artists. The labor of classifying and arranging the books was long and severe. It was found on opening boxes which had been packed and stored for fifteen years, that there were many broken sets which never could be completed.

Far more important for history, if not, indeed, the most important collection on the continent, is the Archivo de la Nacion. I found here in charge my old friend Justino Rubio, under whose superintendence much extensive copying of manuscripts and documents, no where else existing, has been done in times past for my library. It did not require the permission of the secretary of foreign relations, so readily accorded to me, to enable me to visit and extract from these archives at pleasure.

The national archives occupy eleven rooms in one section of the palace, pretty solidly filled with 749 742 materials for history, mostly in documentary form, though there are some printed books. The first or main room contains something over 3,000 volumes, relating to land-titles and water-rights from 1534 to 1820. Among the many points of interest in this collection are 200 volumes relating to the Spanish nobility in Mexico; the branch of Merced, or concessions of lands to private persons; a royal cédula branch, comprising 227 volumes from 1609. Some rooms are filled entirely with manuscripts. The section on history contains much material relating to California and the internal provinces, from which I have largely copied. There are no less than 200 volumes on northern history alone, and 1,000 volumes of military reports to viceroys, little from which has ever been published.

The founding of this institution may properly date from 1823, though it has a more extended history before than after that time, while for some time subsequent to the independence little attention was paid to it.

I believe it was the Count Revillagigedo who, in 1790, conceived the idea of establishing in Mexico a depository similar to the Archives of the Indies in Spain Chapultepec was talked of as the place for it, and two years later, through his minister, the Marques de Bajamar, the king ordered the thing done. It seems that the government documents had been mostly destroyed in the fire of 1692, and for a half century thereafter few were saved.

Copious indices were early made of the material, thus adding greatly to its value. I notice some of the headings, as tobacco, excise, duties, pulque, ayuntamiento, department of San Blas, of the Californias, audiencia, mines, military, etc. To Revillagigedo, likewise, the world is indebted for the important work in 32 folio volumes, begun in 1780, and entitled Memorias para la Historia Universal de la America Septentrional, sent by the viceroy to Spain. For some time after Revillagigedo's rule, his successors paid little attention to the archives, so that little more was done 750 743 until after independence had been achieved.

The first building occupied by the archives was the old Secretaria del Verreynato, later used by the ministry of Relaciones. Part of the collection was deposited in the convent of Santo Domingo, whence many were stolen.

Among those to fully appreciate the value of these treasures, and the importance of having them properly arranged and cared for, was José Mariano de Salas, who in 1846 printed in Mexico a Reglamento, setting forth their value, not alone for the protection of the rights of property, but as a nucleus for a vast amount of further information which might b secured and saved.

An inventory was ordered, and a schedule made of material elsewhere existing that should be lodged there. The latter included ministerial affairs, government and war correspondence, etc. Appropriations were made for annual expenses, the first official receiving $1500, the second $1200, the third $1000, a secretary $500, a second $450, a third $400, and a porter, $300. Salaries and expenses were modified and changed from time to time. The material was now divided into two parts, one relating to affairs before the declaration of independence, and one subsequent thereto. Both epochs were then divided into four parts corresponding to the four secretaries of state, namely, memoirs, law, landed property, and war. Each of these subjects were divided into sections, the first external and internal government, the second law and ecclesiastical, the third property rights, and the fourth war and maritime matters. All these were again divided, and subdivided, into affairs civil, commercial, political, and so on.

The office hours are from nine till three. Great care is taken against theft; no document may be removed from its place without an order, and no document must be left out of its place over night.

Of this institution I obtained direct and important information, far more than I can print. I learn, for 751 744 instance, that to the 3000 volumes of land matters there is an index of four volumes; under the title of gifts are 279 volumes; entails, 181 volumes; civil code, 1299 volumes; Indians, 76 volumes; treasons, 182 volumes; intestates, 309 volumes; drainage, 44 volumes.

Under title of the Inquisition are 218 volumes of procesos against priests for temptation in the confessional, for matrimonial deceits, blasphemies, heresies, and upon genealogy and purity of blood. Under the heading Jesuits, is a volume telling of the extinction of the order in Mexico. Under title of the religious orders of California, is a volume on their foundation in 1793. Then there are the archives of the mint, of the renta de tabaco, etc.

Out of 262 volumes of the national archives relating, to a great extent, to what was once the northern frontier of the republic, but now the domain of the United States, I extract the following:

Historia Tomo XXI., Establecimiento y progreso de la Antigua California. Tomo XXII., Id., por el Padre Fray Francisco Palou. Tomo XXIII., Nueva California por id. id. Tomo XXXI., Puerto de Nootka. Tomo XXXVI., Entrada á California del Padre Salvatierra de la Compañía de Jesus. Tomo XLIV., Extracto de la navegacion desde el puerto de Nootka y reconocimiento de la Costa del Sur. Tomo LVII., Expediente histórico de las navegaciones hechas á las Costas Septentrionales de Californias para descubrir y determinar la extension de sus distritos é Islas Adyacentes. Tomo LXI., Diario de la exploracion del Alférez Don Juan Perez á los Puertos de San Diego y Monterey, 1774, No. 7. Id., del Piloto Estéban José Martinez al Puerto de Monterey, 1774, no. 8. Tomo LXII., Id. de los R. R. P.P. Fray Francisco Atanasio Dominguez y Fray Silvestre Velez de Escalante para descubrir el camino de Santa Fé del Nuevo México al de Monterey en la California Septentrional, 1776, No. 1. Tomo LXIII., Exploracion hecha el año de 1779 á las Costas de Californias por el Teniente de Navio Don Ignacio de Arteaga. Diario del mismo Arteaga, No. 531. Tomo LXIV., Diario de navegacion del Teniente de Navio Don Fernando Bernardo de Quirós y Miranda, 1779, No. 1. Diario del Piloto Don José Camacho, 1779, No. 2. Id. de Don Juan Pantoja y Arteaga, 1779, No. 3. Id. de D. Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Cuadra, 1779, No. 4. Diario y navegacion del Alférez de Fragata Don José de Cañizares, 1779, No. 5. Tomo LXVII., Expediente sobre limites de las Costas Septentrionales de California encargada al Capitan de Navio Don Juan de la Bodega y Cuadra, 1792, Nos. 24-5. Convencion entre España é Inglaterra sobre la pesca, navegacion y comercio en el océano Pacífico y los Mares del Sur, 28th Oct. de 1790, y expediente de limites al hacer la entrega de Nootka, No. 6. Instruccion de los comerciantes propietarios á Mr Jn. Mares, Comandante de los Buques, ‘La Feliz y la Ifigenia,’ en Inglés y traducida al Español. Tomo LXVIII., Ocupacion del puerto de Nootka, 1790, estrecho de Fuca, Costas del Príncipe Guillermo, Entrada de Cook é islas de Sandwich, 1791, No. 1. Tomo LXIX., Descubrimiento en las costas Septentrionales de Californias desde los 48 grados 26' hasta los 49 grados 50', No. 7. Diario é Informes del Teniente de Fragata Don Manuel Quimper desde su salida de San Blas á Nootka, 1791, No. 8, con varios planos de Fúca, Puertos de Clayucuat, San Lorenzo de Nootka, 752 745 Buena Esperanza, Bruks, San Jaime é islas de San Anie. Tomo LXX., Llegada del Comandante de la Expedicion á Nootka y remision de su diario con los planos, dibujos y noticias esenciales de su comision, 1792, No. 1. Fortificacion del Presidio de Californias, 1794, No. 4. Reconocimiento de la Costa desde el Puerto de Bucareli hasta el de Nootka por el Teniente de Navio D. Jacinto Caamaño. Tomo LXXI., Lista de los planos que incluye el diario del Capitan de Navio don Francisco Juan de la Cuadra, hecho en su viaje de Nootka, 1. Vista de las islas Manas, 2. Isla de San Benedicto, 3. Entrada á Nootka, 4. Plano del Puerto de Nootka, 5. Vista del establecimiento de Nootka, 6. Bahía de Nootka, 7. Plano de las Bahías de Nootka, y Buena Esperanza, 8. Carta de la costa comprendida entre el grado 49° y el 56 Lat. Norte, etc., etc. Nuevo Reconocimiento de la Costa de California, dictámen de los Oficiales de Marina Galiano, Valdés Bernardo y Salamanca sobre ir hasta el grado 60°, No. 2. Resultas del descubrimiento de la Costa entre San Francisco y Fuca por Don Francisco Eliza y el piloto Juan Martinez Bayos, No. 8. Extracto de las navegaciones hechas en la América Septentrional por D. Jacinto Caamaño, Teniente de Navio desde el puerto de San Blas de donde salió el 20 de Marzo de 1792, No. 11. Planos de la Costa de la Nueva Cantabria, sus islas desde San Lorenzo de Nootka á Bucareli y Puerto de Bucareli. Tomo LXXII., Provincia de Californias. Resúmen general que manifiesta el estado en que se hallan los nuevos establecimientos de la provincia y expresa los presidios, pueblos, indios, etc., de que se compone, 1804, No. 15.

123 Californias, Minas de 1773, No. 1.

JUSTINO RUBIO.

MEXICO, Noviembre 7 de 1883.

Anotacion de los asuntos principales contenidos en el ramo de ‘Californias,’ en el Archivo general y público de la Nacion.

California, Tomo I., Informe sobre el estado de las fincas que administra D. Florentino Martinez, 1832, No. 6. Sobre saber si el superintendente de la casa de Moneda pagó una fianza de $3,400, con calidad de reintegro para la hacienda pública, No. 8. Que se pasen á la junta directiva del fondo piadoso de Californias todos los títulos y documentos de su propiedad No. 9. Reglamento de la junta, No. 10. Tomo II., Primera parte, índice de los documentos y expedientes relativos á las provincias de California, 1777, No. 1. Segunda parte, minas del Real de Santa Ana, 1713, No. 11. Gobernador de la Nueva California Teniente Coronel José Joaquin de Arrillaga, sobre su juramento y posesion y saca del Real Título para lo político, año de 1805, No. 19. Tomo III., Id. para la antigua California Don Felipe Goycochea, su juramento y posesion, 1805, No. 20. Tomo VIII., Navegacion de San Blas, á la Costa Septentrional de California hasta el grado 61, 1779, No. 1. Diario de navegacion de San Blas á Sn Diego y sn retorno, 1778, No. 2. Viage á la América Meridional desde el puerto de San Diego de Acapulco y regreso del Callao de Lima al puerto de San Blas por D. Juan Francisco Bodega y Cuadra, 1776, No. 3. Ocupacion de Nootka por Martinez, 1807, No. 4. Arríbo al puerto de San Francisco de la Alta California de la fragata de S. M. B. Racoon, 1814, No. 5. Diario de navegacion de D. Estéban José Martinez del viage que hizo á los puertos de San Francisco, San Diego, y Monterey, 1779, No. 6. Tomo IX., Fortificacion de los puertos de San Francisco, Monterey, y San Diego, con artillería y pertrechos, 1792, No. 3. Estragos causados por los temporales en las baterias de San Francisco, 1799, No. 8. Tomo XV., Dictámen del R. P. F. Juan Agustin Morfi sobre el diario y derrotero de los R. R. P.P. Dominguez y Velez de Escalante desde la Villa de Santa Fé hasta Monterey y puerto de San Francisco, 1852, No. 7. Proyecto remitido con Real órden sobre poblar la costa de Monterey en la Nueva California. 1801, No. 8. Tomo XVIII., El jefe político de Californias acompañando un plano para convertir en pueblos las misiones, 1829, No. 33. Lasteri, D. Luis, informando sobre el estado actual del fondo piadoso de Californias y de cada una de sus fincas, 1829, No. 34. Tomo XXI., Real órden de 13 de Enero de 1779, para que se atienda y favorezca á Don Antonio de Osio y se informe 753 746 a cerca del punto que trata sobre ganados mostrencos de Californias, 1801, No. 6. Estragos que en Diciembre de 1812 causaron los temblores en la Alta California, 1813, No. 15. Tomo XXVI., Reales órdenes á los vireyes sobre el gobierno de las misiones de Californias, 1747, No. 1. Tomo XXXV., Segunda expedicion por tierra á la Nueva California, ocupacion y poblacion de San Francisco, 1777, No. 1. Real órden mandando formar nuevo reglamento para San Blas y Californias, 1777, No. 2. Instruccion dada al comandante de los nuevos establecimientos de Californias 1775, No. 4. Diario de Martinez y Pantoja y Meneses remitidos por Don Ignacio Arteaga siendo el punto de partida San Blas y de término San Diego, 1782, No. 7. Diario de navegacion que acaba de hacer el Paquebot de S. M. el Príncipe al puerto de Monterey al cargo de su Captian y Piloto Don José Cañizares, 1774, No. 8. Diario de navegacion de D. José Cañizares, segundo Capitan y Piloto del Paquebot de S. M. San Cárlos, el cual sale á hacer viage a los puertos de Monterey y San Diego en la costa Occidental de la California al mando del capitan y piloto D. Miguel del Pino llevando en conserva al paquebot de S. M. San Antonio (alias) el Príncipe bajo del comando del alférez de Fragata y primer piloto de dicho buque D. Juan Perez, 1782, No. 9. Diario de navegacion del alférez de fragata D. Estéban José Martinez, 1783, No. 9, comandando el paquebot de S. M. San Cárlos (A) el Philipino y la fragata Nuestra Señora de los Remedios (A) Favorita del mando del segundo piloto D. Juan Bautista de Aguirre á los nuevos establecimientos de San Francisco, Monterey, Ensenada del Príncipe en el canal de Santa Bárbara y San Diego, No. 9. Diario de viages á la costa Septentrional de California, 1782, No. 10. Diario de navegacion del segundo piloto Juan de Pantoja y Arriaga, 1782, de San Blas á San Diego. Plano 1, Ensenada de la Purísima Concepcion; 2, Ensenada Mescaltitan; 3, Ensenada del Príncipe; 4, Pequeña carta que contiene el canal de Santa Bárbara en la costa Septentrional de California; 5, Puerto de San Diego, No. 12. Salida del puerto de San Diego para el de San Blas, No. 12. Diario de navegacion de Don Estéban José Martinez, primer piloto de la Real Armada y capitan de la fragata de S. M. nombrada Nuestra Señora del Rosario (a) la Princesa, de San Blas á los puertos de San Francisco, canal de Santa Bárbara, y puerto de San Diego, 1782, No. 13. Tomo XXXVI., Descubrimiento del paraje nombrado Viñadoco en Californias y fundacion de cinco misiones por los padres Domínicos, 1777, Nos. 4 y 13. Se vuelve á poblar el presidio de Loreto y se ordena que las misiones del mismo presidio se reduzcan á pueblos, 1777, No. 5. Reglamento provisional para las atenciones de San Blas y Californias, 1780. Tomo XXXIX., Se remiten á la comandancia general diarios y mapas de exploraciones, No. 28. Tomo XLI., Remision de expósitos á California, 1799, No. 3. Tomo XLIV., Traslacion de la mision de San Francisco y extincion de la de Santa Cruz, 1823, No. 8. Tomo XLVI., Monterey, presidio, incendio de la mayor parte de él 1789, No. 2. Tomo XLVII., Navegacion hecha por el alférez de navio comandante de la Princesa desde el puerto de Manila á las Islas Filipinas, cabo de San Lucas en Californias 1783, No. 1. Diario de navegacion de Don José Antonio Vazquez, primer piloto de Manila á las islas Filipinas y á las costas de Nueva España, 1780, No. 2. Esplanadas, Guardia, y Casa Mata de Monterey, cuenta de su costo, 1792, No. 5. Plano del puerto de San Francisco por D. José Joaquin de Arteaga año de 1792, No. 8. Diario de navegacion del alférez de fragata y primer piloto D. José Camacho desde el puerto de San Blas al Callao de Lima en la fragata Nuestra Señora de los Remedios (a) Favorita, 1781, No. 9. Tomo XLVIII., Estragos causados en el presidio de San Francisco por los temporales de los dias 13 y 18 de Enero, 1804, No. 3. Nuevo establecimiento de un rancho de ganado menor en el presidio de San Francisco por cuenta de la Real Hacienda, 1797, No. 12. Tomo XLIX., Pobladores voluntarios para la Villa de Branciforte José Timoteo Vasquez y otros; Pensamiento del Gobierno de la antigua California de trasladar á San Quintin el apostadero de San Blas, 1803, No. 2. Informes de los Religiosos de San Fernando sobre poblacion y aumento de la peninsula de California, 1796, No. 4.

MEXICO Nov. 10 de 1883.

754 747

The municipal archives, or the archives of the district of Mexico, Juan Yndico keeper, consists of city documents accumulated during the past 200 years. The greater portion of what existed prior to 1692 was at that time burned.

A day or two after my arrival in the capital, I stumbled into a queer place, which threw me back in imagination three hundred years or so, about as effectually as the actually occurrence would have done. Everything was apparently in the last stages of decay, books, building, street, and people. It was called the Biblioteca Popular del 5 de Mayo. The building was a very old church, around the sides of which were rude shelves filled mostly with old parchment bound folios, made by foolish priests, and not worth five dollars a ton for any practical use. On the floor were placed rows of tables, seated at which were representatives of the meagre middle class, engaged for the most part in reading newspapers. Doubtless the folios of the priests, which had been flung out of churches and convents, added greatly to the interest of the newspapers, and facilitated the acquisition of knowledge in so far as it can be absorbed from such surroundings. But before these aspirants for republican glory load up the intellect much more heavily, I would recommend them to put some stronger boards in the floor, lest they fall through. The edifice was erected in 1687, and of the 8,000 books probably 80 are worth shelf room.

Among other libraries of historic interest, I may mention those of Basalio Perez, Agreda, and San Ildefonso, the last named formerly the collection of the cathedral.

The public library of Toluca, comprising some 8,000 volumes, is prolific in chronicles of the old convents. Indeed, Mexico has many libraries containing important historic data, notwithstanding the chaff the monks imbedded it in. In this sense there are many rare and valuable books throughout the 755 748 republic; but of the class commonly called rare by collectors and bibliographers, valuable only as specimens of early printing, most of these have been carried away. Señor Olaguibel printed a book entitled Impresiones Célebres y Libros Raros. In it is a chapter devoted to rare books in Mexico, which indeed says little except that there are no rare books in Mexico. We are soberly told, however, that some one has reprinted the life of Junípero Serra, which is the foundation of California history!

In the beautiful and very religious city of Puebla is the Colegio de Estado, with a library of 20,000 volumes, the institution having the usual departments of natural history, chemistry, Latin, Greek, etc. The buildings, formerly a convent, are antique and cover a large area, having among other attractions a well shaded and watered garden, with fountains and gold fish. Here are 200 students, male; the place could easily accommodate a thousand.

Another large building in another part of the city is called the school of medicine, in which is a general library of 26,000 volumes, but containing, as most of them do, more theology than anything else.

On a cool, dry, December evening, as the sun was sinking behind the skirts of Popocatepetl, I found myself standing upon the summit of the hill of Cholula, amidst the porcelain-planted graves, drooping pines, and stunted rose-bushes, in front of the church with its dilapidated wall and large open reservoir. It is a rugged, uneven elevation, rising solitary some two hundred feet above the plain, and is evidently partly the work of nature and partly of man. The winding roadway, half of it paved smooth with stones and half in form of broad steps, is bordered by thrifty grass, which also crops forth upon little benches, and the thick shrubbery that covers the hillside is freely sprinkled with the cactus and pepper-tree. Popocatepetl, or Smoking Mountain, rises before me, and next to it the scarcely less imposing peak of Iztaccihuatl, 756 749 The White Woman, she of the recumbent figure; while in the opposite direction, over the glittering domes of distant Puebla, stands Orizaba, also white-crested, and winged by fleecy clouds.

At my feet lies the town of Cholula, with its long lines of intersecting ditches, as Cortés first saw them, marking the divisions of cornfields, and garden-patches lined with maguey. It is a miserable place, made up of hovels, churches, and cornfields, one view of which tells the story of life here—how the poor, in the small uncomfortable houses, pinch themselves to sustain a costly service in the great temples, and add to their splendor. If I mistake not, God would be better pleased with smaller churches, fewer priests, and larger and more comfortable dwellings for his people.

The whole of this immense and rich valley, alternately the prey of contending armies since the advent of Cortés, and now for the first time learning the arts of peace, is greatly given to religion, as it used to be even in the remote times of Toltec sway, when pilgrims flocked from afar to the shrine of the Feathered Serpent. Casting my eyes around over one of the most beautiful scenes in Mexico, I count two score villages marked by the tall, white towers of thrice as many churches; some indeed being nothing more than hamlets with half a dozen dingy little houses cringing beside a great dingy church, some sheltered by trees and shrubbery, others standing solitary in the open plain.

I thought Puebla had houses of worship enough for all, with her sixty or seventy temples of every imaginable style, high-doomed and broad-spreading edifices, about one for every thousand of the half-naked and barefooted natives who are called upon to support them and their three hundred priests. The state prison is part church; in the house of maternity is a church; the state college was once a convent forming part of a church edifice; and the cathedral, 757 750 though smaller than the one in Mexico, accounted richer within.

But for all this, famous, squalid little Cholula, according to the population, outdoes Puebla. There is the little church with its two towers and large bells on the historic hill, rusty without, but elaborately gilded within, and the large church amidst the houses below, near where the worshippers congregate to see the bull-fight after service, and one to the right and another to the left, and half a dozen more on every side, the simultaneous ringing of whose bells at the hour of blazing, tropical afterglow might lead one to suppose the world to be on fire. This must indeed have been a foul spot of Satan's to require such long and elaborate cleansing; for hereabout once stood no less than four hundred heathen temples; but I would rather see restored and preserved some of these architectural monuments, albeit in good truth temples of Satan, which capped this pyramid in aboriginal times, than a thousand of the earth-bestrewed edifices reared to his confounding at the cost of pinched toilers.

As I thus stood, I fancied I could see marching through the same long white, radiating streets the ancient processions with their dismal chant and clang of instruments, coming hither from all directions to the sacrifice. I fancied I could see the bodies of the victims tumbled over the steeps as the blood-besmeared priests held aloft the palpitating heart, while all the people raised their voices in loud hosannas. And I could easily imagine the good god Quetzalcoatl here taking leave of his people, even as did Christ, promising meantime to return with new and celestial benefits.

In the Puebla state library, before mentioned, is a volume of original letters of Morelos, and several other volumes of valuable documents relating to the days of independence, 1810-21. General documents run from 1764 to 1858. There are two volumes of 758 751 royal cédulas 1527 to 1818; also two volumes of papers relating to the trial of the priest Mier, who preached against the Guadalupe virgin.

There is a worm in Mexico that bores its hole straight through the volume, going through a dozen books standing on the shelf without deviation; there is another that takes a zig-zag course, one worm confining its operations chiefly to one volume. On some of my purchases I found a thing the Mexicans call a gorgojo, which descends into books perpendicularly; death was too mild a fate for such investigators.

All the while I was in Mexico I gathered books, took dictations, and wrote down my thoughts and observations. With some difficulty I succeeded in obtaining enough of the leading journals published in Mexico since 1800 to make a continuous file of the events of the day from the opening of the century to the present time. These series of newspapers, each taking up the thread where in another it was broken off, proved of the greatest advantage to my work.

This expedition added to my library some 8,000 volumes. Three years later I made a second trip to Mexico, chiefly to verify certain statements and add a few points prior to closing the last volume of my History of Mexico. The railway being completed, the journey was nothing; and being brief and without special significance, I will inflict no further detail on the reader.

759 752

CHAPTER XXIX.

TOWARD THE END. Careless of censure, nor too fond of fame; Still pleased to praise, yet not afraid to blame; Averse alike to flatter, or offend; Not free from faults, nor yet too vain to mend.

Pope.

I had hoped to close my library to general work, and dismiss my assistants by January 1, 1887. I had yet several years of work to do myself, in any event, but I thought if I could get rid of the heavy library outlay of one or two thousand dollars a month, I should feel more inclined to take life easier, with less nervous haste and strain in my work.

Several causes combined to prevent this. As is usually the case, the completion of my history consumed more time than I had anticipated, the necessary rewriting and revision, not to mention numberless delays growing out of the cares and vicissitudes of business, being beyond calculation. The truth is, in looking back upon my life and its labors, I cannot but feel that I never have had a full and fair opportunity to do my best, to do as good work as I am capable of doing, certainly not as finished work as I might do with less of it and more time to devote to it, with fewer cares, fewer interruptions. I have often wondered what I might do were I not forced to “write history on horseback,” as General Vallejo terms it. On the other hand, I have had much to be thankful for, and can only submit my work to the world for what it is worth. Again, it was found to be an absolute necessity for the proper completion of my historical series to provide a place for the many 760 753 biographies of important personages, to which I have elsewhere alluded.

Notwithstanding all that I had thus far done, there was yet this one thing lacking to make my work all that it should be. As the end of my labors was drawing near, and I was looking forward to a period of cessation, this thought forced itself more and more upon my mind, giving me no rest. I did not desire to do more. Some thought the histories already too extended, not fully realizing the time and territory covered. If they will consider each work separately, they will at once see that this is not the case. Five volumes devoted to hundreds of Native Races inhabiting one twelfth of the earth's surface, or three volumes on the five republics of Central America for a period of nearly four centuries, surely are not too many in which to do the subject justice. And so with the rest. The great trouble was to condense without injury to the work.

During all my historical labors, particularly toward the latter part of the term, the necessity was more and more forced upon my mind, of some method whereby the men who had made this country what it is should receive fuller treatment.

The development and conditions here were peculiar, and in their historical elucidation must be met in the plainest, most practical, and fitting way. Within the present half century a vast wilderness had been transformed into fields of the foremost civilization, by men many of whom were yet living. No such achievement since the world began had ever been done within so short a time; obviously none such could ever be done again, the engendering conditions not being present. Thousands of years were occupied in building Greece and Rome, and other thousands in carrying civilization to Germany and England; and all midst fanatical wars and horrible human butcheries such as should put to blush the face of man.

Among the various nations and at various epochs 761 754 great men were evolved from the fierce frictions of the times, soldiers, priests, and princes, some of them conspicuous because of their good deeds, but more of them by reason of their wickedness. Evil, in fact, was apparently a more powerful factor than good in all these kneadings and seasonings and polishing of mankind. But in the development of our own thrice-favored land, this westernmost America, there was little else than good accomplished, and by good men. There were no wars, except the war of mind over matter, of civilization over savagism. There was no physical bondage or intellectual coercion. Yet, turning to our towns and cities, our fruitful fields and orchards and gardens, with their thousands of happy homes; our railways, irrigating canals; our mines, manufactures, and commerce; our government and our social condition, we find accomplished within fifty years what elsewhere has taken other people five, ten, or a hundred times as long to do.

True, we had a record of their experiences as a foundation upon which to build our new experiences in this fair wilderness; otherwise it could not have been done. But for all that it was a great and good thing to build here as we have built, thus making proper avail of our high privileges. And are not the men who have quietly and patiently wrought out this grand accomplishment, each laboring after his own fashion and for his own immediate purposes—are they not as much entitled to prominence and praise as Alexander or Napoleon? Is it not as interesting to us, the study of their characters? Is it not as profitable for us to follow them in their good deeds as to follow the others in their good and evil deeds?

It was therefore deemed absolutely essential, before it could be said that a proper historical presentation of the country and those who had made it, of the empire and builders of empire, had been made, that the history have a biographical section, devoted primarily to the men as the historical section proper is devoted 762 755 primarily to the events. For it is as impossible to stop the natural and proper flow of the narrative of events with a too lengthy and elaborate analysis of character, as it is to break into an entertaining and instructive biography with a too lengthy narrative of events.

At the same time, here was an opportunity to do much better than simply to present a collection of detached biographies of the most influential and prominent personages after the usual form, howsoever good and valuable such a work would be in connection with the history. But what would make it tenfold more interesting and valuable would be to take one each of the more important of these men of strength and influence, and after a thorough character study, place his portrait in artistic form and colors in the midst of the work which he has done, and in company with kindred industries accomplished by others, and round the whole throw a frame-work of history. Here, then, are embalmed in the annals of his own time and country the man and his deeds, there to remain, the benefits and blessings conferred during life thus being made perpetual.

In the text and foot-notes of the history proper I had interwoven much material of a biographical nature—all that the narrative could carry without being made to suffer thereby. But this was not enough. The work which had been performed in the subjugation of this western wilderness was not that of any potentate or general; it was not a conquest or a colonization. This last and fairest piece of temperate zone, unoccupied by civilization, had seemingly been kept back for a special purpose of progress. Then, when all was ready, the great bells of time were sounded, and from every quarter of the world intelligent and energetic young men came flocking in—the cry of gold was rung out, the cry of American occupation and intercommunication; and after some wild doings incident to suchan unprecedented huddling of 763 756 humanity, this land of hitherto poor, brutish men and ferocious beasts found itself blooming serenely under a new influence. Of the vast army who came hither for gold many returned, and many, alas! laid down their lives in the struggle. But some persevered in their efforts and prospered, success coming out of great tribulation. Others came later and accomplished great things. Meanwhile all were gaining experience, and constantly adding to their store of practical knowledge. It was in this way that development over this vast area came so rapidly about. It was owing primarily to the original and ever-groving intelligence of certain individuals, one working here, one there, until the whole ground was covered, and each locality made to yield up some portion of its natural wealth, while the arts and sciences of older communities were applied toward increasing the posibilities of primeval nature.

Now, it seemed not exactly right or proper, in a history of this country giving the full details of industrial and social development, to allow the events to render subordinate to so large an extent the men who had made the events. Had some Cæsar or Scipio crossed the Rocky mountains with an army, taken possession of this land, and planted here the institutions of foreign culture, as a matter of course a history of this country would have dealt largely in the characteristics and doings of those men, military and civil. The fact that in the subjugation of this country there were engaged not one Cæsar or Scipio, but several, and that their work was in building up rather than tearing down, makes certainly not less interesting or important a chronicle of the characteristics and doings of these builders of the commonwealth.

The importance of biography is not everywhere fully appreciated. Every man of strength or influence in the community should have prepared during his lifetime his biography, for the benefit of those now living, and of those who shall come after him. 764 757 The man of energy and ability is a factor in the affairs of his country. No one can achieve high and permanent success without benefiting others. Upon the events and actualities which surround the individual, and which he himself has made, he leaves his impress, which is his life, his true being, the crystallization of his thoughts, the material expression of his feelings. Whether he be living or dead, there is the man in the spot where he live and moved, and where he left himself, his true and material existence, when the immaterial took its departure. He may soon be forgotten, and his place filled by others, but his successors, whether they know it or not, are continuing the work which he began, and building on the foundation which he had laid. A record of personal experiences is of importance to the country as showing by what means the man has accomplished certain results, thus enabling others to do likewise or better. “A noble life put fairly on record acts like an inspiration to others,” says Samuel Smiles. And again, “The great lesson of biography is to show what a man can do and be at his best”; while Beacher would have biography called the home aspect of history.

After securing all the comforts and luxuries of life for himself and his family, for what does a man further labor? If of a miserly disposition, he works for the mere pleasure of accumulating money. But if intelligent and public-spirited, he continues his labors for their general beneficial effects, and for the interest and pride he takes in them. Now, it is evident that if these beneficial effects of a man's life can be doubled or trebled, can indeed be rendered perpetual, nothing can be of more transcendent importance than to have it done. This can be done only by writing out the acts and experiences of a man's life in the form of a biography, and placing that biography in history.

The advantages of history are manifold and obvious. Without the recorded experiences of the race there could be no accumulation of knowledge; without a 765 758 knowledge of the past there could be no improvement in the future. So with biography, which is but a part of history. With a knowledge of the means by which men become great and prosperous we may learn to adopt their virtues and avoid their errors. Therefore, not only should every man who has helped to make history have his biography fully and carefully prepared, but it should be placed in history. The next question is, who has helped to make history? Every man of intelligence, wealth, and influence assists in making history in a greater or less degree, according to what he accomplishes. He cannot help doing this, for history is the record of what men do. Nor can it be delayed until we have passed away, for other reasons. No one can call up the facts and intuitions of his life, the theory and practice of his achievements, so well as the man himself; no one can arrange those facts, analyze the intuitions, elucidate the benefits of what has been accomplished, and weave the whole into an instructive and entertaining narrative, except a writer possessed of ability, enthusiasm, and experience. And granting that the most proper place for the preservation of such a record is upon the pages of history, the history of the place and times during which the work was done, it cannot be delayed on that account, for the pages of the only history upon which it could be placed in a proper manner will then be closed.

the reasons, then, why the lives and experiences of certain men should be embalmed in history are: First, for the benefit of the community and the world. Without a preserved record of human actions there can be no progress, no civilization. Second, as a matter of duty to one's family. In the building up of this country each important personage has performed a great work, not a tenth part of which, in significance and extent, will ever otherwise be known to his descendants, who will thereby be deprived of some portion of that honest pride, high stimulant, and 766 759 bright example which is their most valued heritage. Third, it is a duty a man owes to himself. All his life he has been working for a purpose, and if when it is accomplished he permits to die the ways and means by which he attained important results, half his life, to say the least, is lost. The wealth one has acquired is not all nor the most important part of life's work, but the abilities exercised, the lessons acquired, and the nobleness of soul which has been elevated and strengthened.

During the earlier part of the long period the history was going into type, the movements of the family were regulated to a great extent by my youngest boy, Philip. Being naturally not very strong, and the penetrating winds driving him from San Francisco, we would visit the several springs and health districts of the coast as fancy or interest dictated, never being wholly out of reach of the printer.

I had long had in view a visit to Salt Lake City and the Colorado region, so that when, in August 1884, the boy began to cough in accents so familiar that there was no mistaking their significance, we picked him up—his mother and I—and planted ourselves with the whole family at the Continental hotel in the city of the saints, there remaining for six weeks.

There was much feeling existing at the time between the Mormons and the gentiles, the government being apparently in earnest in putting down polygamy, while the Mormons were just as determined to maintain the institution or die in the attempt. It was just upon the border, in point of time, of the long season of prosecution and persecution, of litigations and imprisonments which has not a parallel in the history of American morals.

We were not there, however, to take part in any controversy, to enter the fight either on the side of Christ or Belial; we had come simply to gather facts, observe, study, and meditate upon the strange social 767 760 problem. I should probably have known long ere this how to answer the question, What is Mormonism? but I did not. Nor would there be entire unanimity among divines in answering the questions, What is Methodism? or Mohammedism? Very shallow ideas the world has in relation to the dogmas it fights and bleeds for, on one side or the other. There was fighting enough for dogmas in Salt Lake City in the year 1884. There were few like Christ, few to love their enemies, or turn the other cheek when one was smitten.

We saw much of the leaders on both sides, were entertained by gentiles and Mormons, and entertained them in return; we listened attentively, but said little; it was no wonder, therefore, that we were regarded somewhat suspiciously by both sides. All this was of small consequence, however, beside the accomplishment of our mission, which was fully done in every particular. There was little the Mormons would not do for us; there was little we desired at the hands of the gentiles.

Notwithstanding the large mass of material, printed matter, manuscripts, journals, dictations, and special investigations which had been sent to me, there were still gaps in my work that I wanted filled. John Taylor, who was present and severely wounded at the assassination of Joseph Smith, was at this time president of the church, and Wilford Woodruff, one of the twelve apostles and possible successor of Taylor, had charge of the historian's office.

For these people had had a historian's office and an historian from near the beginning of their existence as a religious sect. The acts of the apostles, and the doings of president and people from the beginning, had been minutely written down and preserved. And, indeed, far back of the history of their present organization they went—back to babel and the origin of things. The book of Mormon comprises largely their history, as the bible is the history of the Jews. Some 768 761 of the babel-builders, after the grand scattering, found their way to America, and were the aborigines of this continent, among whom long lay hidden the metal plates eventually found by Joseph Smith.

Mr Woodruff had an elaborately written journal in some twenty manuscript volumes, if I remember rightly, giving a history of the church and the doings of its members from the days of Nauvoo to date. Never before had such work been done for any people, not even the children of Israel; for there was not one important incident or individual herein omitted. Mr Woodruff and Mr Richards gave up most of their time to me during this visit. Besides my labors with them, I took many lengthy dictations from others. I met frequently George Q. Cannon, first counsellor; Joseph F. Smith, nephew of Joseph Smith; Brigham Young, eldest son of the second president; Moses Thatcher, W. B. Preston, William Jennings, Feramorz Little, Heber J. Grant, H. S. Eldridge, Erastus Snow, C. W. Penrose, John R. Park, and a hundred others.

While I was laborously engaged in this office during most of my time in Salt Lake City, Mrs Bancroft saw many of the Mormon women, making their acquaintance, winning their friendship, and taking dictations from them. Polygamy with them was a sacred institution, a state not to be lightly entered, but only after due preparation, prayer, and holy living; a cross, perhaps, but one which only the blessed might bear. Hovering in space all round the revolving earth were myriads of disembodied spirits, for whom it pleased God that men should manufacture flesh. Nor with the men was polygamy the product of sensuality; your true sensualist will have many women but no wife.

From Utah we went to Colorado, stopping at Cañon City, Leadville, Pueblo, Colorado Springs, and other points of historic interest and importance. We were everywhere received with the utmost cordiality. 769 762 It would be difficult to find anywhere pleasanter people, or a more intelligent or refined society than at Denver. I shall never forget the kindness of Doctor Bancroft, governors Pitkin, Grant, and Routt, and judges Stone, Bennett, Beck, and Helm.

Colorado was at this time in a very prosperous condition, and the people were justly proud of their state, of its history, its resources, and its possibilities. By supplying myself pretty freely with help in the form of stenographers and statisticians, I secured the experiences of several hundred of those who had had the most to do in making the early history of this region. Among the manuscripts thus resulting was one which must ever constitute the corner-stones of Colorado history. Nearly two months were occupied in writing it, and the work on it was done in this way: Taking a full file of the Rocky Mountain News, the first journal published in the country and still running, I sat down before it with a stenographer and its first editor, who, while I questioned and commented, told the history of the state, turning over the leaves of the newspaper to refresh his memory, and give him the desired information.

Judge Stone's ideas and experiences form a very interesting historical manuscript. He assured me that the topography of Colorado was in his mind's eye as clear as if seen at one view from the corner of a cloud; and I found his knowledge of political and commercial affairs, and the resources and industries of the state no less lucid and interesting.

While my family were at Denver, enjoying the generous hospitality of the good people of the place, I spent a fortnight at Cheyenne, going through files of newspapers, and writing out the experiences of the prominent men. In this and subsequent labors in relation to the history of Wyoming I was greatly assisted by John Slaughter, territorial librarian, A. S. Mercer, of the Live Stock Journal, John W. Hoyt, J. M. Carey, J. R. Whitehead, F. J. Stanton, E. S. 770 763 N. Morgan territorial secretary, A. T. Babbitt, Thos. Sturgis, W. W. Corlett, and others. Then at Laramie were S. W. Downey and T. H. Hayford; at Lander, N. Baldwin and H. G. Nickerson; not to mention the commanding officers of the military at forts Russell, Steele, Laramie, McKinney, and Bridger.

Part of the winter of 1884-5 I spent in New Mexico, where I had interviews with most of the leading men, and obtained a large mass of material which was an absolute necessity to my work. At Santa Fé I examined the archives thoroughly, and engaged Samuel Ellison, the keeper, to go through them and make extracts from some, and complete copies of all of the important papers and manuscripts. After a time, however, finding the task too slow and irksome for him, being an old man and somewhat averse to labor, he finally consented, contrary to the regulations, but greatly to my satisfaction, to send to me in San Francisco in bundles, by express, a portion at a time, of such material that I wanted copied, that I might have the work done in my library.

I cannot refrain from mentioning, among those who rendered me valuable assistance at Santa Fé, the names of C. B. Hayward, W. G. Ritch, Francis Downs, Archbishop Lamy, Defouri, Prince, Thayer, Fiske, Phillips, and the Chaves; at Albuquerque and Taos, the Armijos and the Valdez; and at Las Cruces, Cunniffe and Van Patten.

I cannot mention in this volume a hundredth part of the journeys made, the people seen, and the work done in connection with the labors of over a quarter of a century, collecting material and writing history, but enough has been presented to give the reader some faint conception of the time, labor, and money necessary for such an historical undertaking.

Referring once more to my method of writing 771 764 history, which originated wholly with me, and grew out of the necessities of the case, I would remark on the general shyness of the wise men of the east at first to see any good in it, or ever admit that work so done could properly be placed in the category of history; then, finally, to see them come round, and not only acknowledge its advantages, and assert that it was the only feasible way to accomplish certain results, but to adopt the system themselves, apply it to important work, and give it out as of their own invention, or at least to take good care not to give the credit where it properly belonged.

The men of Harvard particularly, always slow to acknowledge the existence of any good thing outside of their own coterie, least of all to admit that a San Francisco bookseller could teach them how to write history, were puzzled how they might sometime apply this system to important work and send it forth as their own. They did it cleverly enough, for them, when the occasion arose, but they did not deceive many. They were obliged to modify my method somewhat, thereby almost spoiling it; for they were not prepared to spend the necessary time and money to give ten or twenty assistants ten or twenty years schooling. So they adopted a middle course, which was neither one thing nor the other, neither the oldfashioned individual way, where no work of any kind is admitted unless performed by the historian in person, thereby reducing the possibilities of his performance to a minimum, nor the modern scientific method, as the Sacramento Record-Union at once pronounced it, where the assistance of others is utilized to a common-sense extent.

Some ten years after the publication of my Native Races, began to appear in Boston what the prospectus called “History by a new method.” With two exceptions the opening line of the prospectus might be accepted; it was not history, nor was the method new. It was by Justin Winsor, of the Harvard 772 765 university library, and was called Narrative and Critical History of America.

Great stress is placed upon the method, which is called the “coöperative.” That is to say, one man acting as editor, gives to twenty or fifty men each a topic on American history for him to write up, the intention being that all the topics given out shall be made to cover the entire range of American history. As these monographs are finished and handed in they are printed, each under the name of the writer, and sent forth in volumes which are dignified by the name of history.

“The magnitude of the undertaking,” the prospectus goes on to say, “the dignity of the subject, and the acknowledged ability of the writers employed, give the work a strong claim upon public attention; yet, without undervaluing these considerations, it will be found that they are overshadowed by the surpassing value of the method employed in its construction. The inductive method of Bacon, and the comparative method in the applied sciences, are examples of possibilities contained in a true method; they have revolutionized modern civilization. It is claimed for this work that it embodies a true method for historical investigation, which must prove far-reaching in its results Adherence to this method of investigation will gradually tend to bring history into line with the sciences, instead of leaving it as a subject for debate among rival historians. We shall have less of speculation and theory, and more of verifiable facts. The temptation to warp the truth will be lessened by increased danger of detection. The practical value of this is apparent, when we consider how often our course is determined by precedent. When the superiority of the coöperative method is fully understood, the individual historian, if he ventures forth at all, will be read for entertainment rather than profit.

Again: “The great advantage of this method in historical research must be apparent. The outcome 773 766 of conflicting statement when they are brought together, analyzed, and compared, must be a closer approach to the truth. History as heretofore written has failed to accomplish these results, for two reasons: First, the labor and special knowledge required to secure all relevant evidence have been beyond the powers of any individual however able. The coöperation of specialists is needed for this work just as in the writing of a cyclopedia. The subject covers too much ground for the researches of a single individual. To fully possess the field an army must be organized and act under competent leadership. The day is not far distant when the attempt to write a history or a cyclopedia single-handed will be regarded as equally futile. Individuals may philosophize on history in the future as they have in the past with excellent results, but the presntation of the facts, with a complete analysis and digest of the evidence collected, must be made by the coöperation of many minds. Second, in attempting to deduce correct conclusions, the individual can only report an event as it appears to him from his point of observation. In other words, he can give but a one-sided, partial view of the matter. A synthesis of opinion is what is needed to secure a complete presentation of the case. Therefore many witnesses must be summoned to testify independently, and this is manifestly impossible under the old method, where the reader is not permitted to judge of the relative merits of conflicting statements, upon which the writer bases his views, but must accept or reject as a whole his author's dictum.”

This is indeed high praise of my method coming from such a source, and all the more significant not being intended,—all the more significant in coming from a quarter where this kind of work was not long since ridiculed as “machine-made history,” and from those who were endeavoring to secure to themselves the credit justly belonging to another. True, they claim that by permitting the several writers to speak for 774 767 themselves and independently, instead of having their work recast and made symmetrical by one master mind, that they have invented a new system; but it is the same system as my own, though on a somewhat different plan, in my opinion not nearly so good a one, and one that will not produce the same results.

But the strangest part of it all to me is, that men who can expatiate so well and so learnedly on the benefits of this system, should understand it so little as not to know when they themselves were or were not applying it. They speak of the advantages of what they kindly call the coöperative method. But surely any one can see that there is no coöperation in their work. Each one working alone, in his own closet, after his own fashion, presents in his own way and words, his ideas of some previously selected topic or episode of American history; and because these several essays are printed in one volume, or series of volumes bearing a common title, the labor is called coöperative, each laborer seeming to think that while working entirely alone, he has been greatly assisted by the others, likewise working alone, and that the general work is greatly benefited thereby.

Coöperation, one would think it scarcely necessary to say, is where all the workmen contribute of their intellegence and skill to one grand result, not to a series of results. An architect may build a house, utilizing the labor of a hundred artisans, all coöperating to one end; it makes queer work of it when each of the artisans constructs a section of a building after his own fancy, expecting a symmetrical edifice to come out of it. In historical efforts, as in any other kind of labor, coöperation is where several persons unite to labor as one man, for the accomplishment of a single work. Writing me September 21, 1886, A. W. Tourgée says: “I tried to get an article into an eastern magazine, on Coöperative Historical Work, comparing your system, which is homogeneous and comprehensible, with Justin Winsor's hotch-pot, 775 768 every mouthful of which is a surprise, but which leaves no uniformity of impression or coherence of thought; but I found the idea was sacrilegious in this latitude.”

776 769

CHAPTER XXX.

BURNED OUT! Mercury. “What's best for us to do then to get safe across?“ Charon. “I'll tell you. You must all strip before you get in, and leave all those encumbrances on shore; and even then the boat will scarce hold you all. And you take care, Mercury, that no soul is admitted that is not in light marching order, and who has not left all his encumbrances, as I say, behind. Just stand at the gang-way and overhaul them, and don't let them get in till they've stripped.“ Lucian.

Here was a pretty how-do-you-do! While I was buying farms and building houses in San Diego, and dreaming of a short period of repose on this earth before being called upon to make once more an integral part of it, in the twinkling of an eye I was struck down, as if by a thunderbolt from heaven.

For twenty years past I had been more than ordinarily interested in this southern extremity of the state, with its soft sunshine and beautiful bay, the only break in the California coast-line south of San Francisco that could be properly called a harbor, and I had chipped in from time to time a few thousands for lots and blocks, until satisfied that I had enough, when the great commercial metropolis of the south should arise upon the spot, to ruin all my children.

Many times before this I had temporarily sought shelter for myself and family from the cold winds and fogs of San Francisco, often in the Napa country, and many times in the Ojai valley, and elsewhere. Then I wondered if there was not some place more accessible to my work, which would answer the purpose as well.

Ever since 1856 I had been gazing on the high hills back of Oakland and Berkeley, wondering what was on the other side; and one day I said I will go and 777 770 see. So I mounted a horse, and wound round by San Pablo and through the hills until I came to Walnut creek, and beyond there to Ignacio valley, near the base of Monte Diablo, where I bought land, and planted it in trees and vines.

It was a broad and beautiful patch of earth, flat as possible, and covered with large scattering oaks, looking like many other parts of primeval California, only that the trees were larger, indicating unusual depth and strength of soil. The sun rises over the Devil's mountain, and the cool southwest wind comes over the high Oakland hills fresh from the ocean, the infrequent dry, hot, north winds alone taking advantage of the open country toward Martinez. It went against the grain to grub up the venerable oaks; but oak trees and fruit trees do not affiliate, and Bartlett pears are better than acorns, so all were cleared away except a group left for building sites and shelter of stock.

For the most part it was a perfect climate, the heat of summer seldom being enervating, and but little frost in winter; but I was growing querulous over California airs, and said I wanted them quieter and softer than those which followed me even here, carrying their thick fog-banks to the summit of the highest westerly hills, and scattering them in finest mists filled with sunshine over the valleys below. So we took the train, my wife and I, and started south, stopping at Pasadena, Riverside, and elsewhere, all of which were too settled, too civilized for us. Then we came to San Diego, native enough for any one, the cobbley country around looking so dry and barren and forbidding that a week of exploration in every direction was passed, setting out from our hotel in the early morning and driving till night before we found a place in which were seemingly united all the requisite possibilities. There we were satisfied to rest, and then we made our purchase.

Spring valley it was called, from a large perpetual 778 771 spring nature had formed there; and it was the most attractive of any spot within ten miles of the future metropolis. The nominal proprietor was Captain R. K. Porter, who wrote for the papers, drove two humble-mustangs to town with eggs and butter, and was of an easy and amiable disposition; but the true owner was his most excellent wife, under whose management the farm and husband barely made ends meet.

El aguaje de San Jorge the place had been named by the early Mexicans, and by the first Americans the St George water-hole. In common with the country thereabout it had been used as a sheep range, the springs serving as a herding point and watering place, an old Mexican camping there with his family. The padres also here raised vegetables and fruit for the mission. Not long after the year 1860 a San Diego lawyer, Judge Ensworth, who was in ill health, obtained a possessory claim, and spent a portion of his time at this charming spot. He walled up the spacious springs, and purchasing from Captain Bogert a portion of the lately broken up coal ship, Clarissa Andrews, with difficulty had it hauled over to the ground, and used it in the erection of an adobe house.

Upon the death of Ensworth, Porter purchased the place and moved his family there from San Pedro in 1865. Around him subsequently settled Burbeck, Campbell, and Crosby, from whom I purchased land, which with the Porter place made up a tract of five hundred acres and more. The place I called the Helix Farms, and entered in my book of life to spend my latter days there. I then returned north.

Keep at hard work too long an old horse and he becomes worthless, but if care be taken to lighten his burdens as strength and endurance fail, he will perform much good service during his latter days. I was now reaching the period when I felt it absolutely necessary to turn myself out to grass or succumb entirely.

I was born on a farm; my earliest recollections 779 772 were of farm life; my childhood home had been there, and if there were any rest and recuperation for me on earth I was sure it would be under like conditions. My work was nearly done. I had no further desire to mingle with the affairs of the world. I was content with what I had accomplished; or at least all I could do I had done, and I was sure that in no way could I better become young again than in spending much time with my little ones, in teaching them how to work and be useful, as my devoted parents had taught me.

It was on the 30th of April, 1886, that I was standing on the steps of the Florence hotel, at San Diego, when my wife drove up in her phaeton and handed me a telegram. “They said it was important,” she remarked, and eyed me earnestly as I opened and read it. “What is it?” she asked. “Is it bad?” “About as bad as can be,” I replied. It was from Mr N. J. Stone, manager of the History department of the business, and it read, “Store burning. Little hope of saving it.” Half an hour later came another despatch, saying that nothing was saved but the account books.

The full effect of this calamity flashed through my brain on the instant: my beautiful building, its lofts filled to overflowing with costly merchandise, all gone, the results of thirty years of labor and economy, of headaches and heart-aches, eaten up by fire in an hour! I say the full effect of it was upon me; yet the blow—though it felled me, seemed to strike softly, as if coming from a gloved hand, I was so powerless to oppose it. I continued the duties of the day as usual. I was then building for my wife a summer residence overlooking the charming bay; but many days of sorrow and anguish were in store for me by reason of this infernal fire.

In this same hotel, seven months before, I had read of the Crocker fire, a similar catastrophe happening to a house of like business to ours. And I then 780 773 thought, “this might as well have been Bancroft, but how different the result to me and hundreds of others.” As La Rochefoucauld says: “Nous avous tous assez de force pour supporter les maux d'autrui.” We are all strong enough to endure the misfortunes of others. And now it was indeed Bancroft, and all their fine establishment, the largest and finest in western America, swept away in the midst of a desperate struggle to properly place my histories upon the market. Twenty volumes had been issued, and the firm was still $200,000 behind on the enterprise. But it was gaining. Daylight shone as through a tunnel in the distance; the last month's business had been the most encouraging of all; when suddenly, office, stock, papers, correspondence, printing-presses, type and plates, and the vast book-bindery, filled with sheets and books in every stage of binding, were blotted out, as if seized by Satan and hurled into the jaws of hell. There was not a book left; there was not a volume of history saved; nine volumes of history plates were destroyed, besides a dozen other volumes of plates; two car loads of history paper had just come in, and 12,000 bound volumes were devoured by the flames. There was the enterprise left, and a dozen volumes of the history plates in the library basement, and that was all.

The loss thus in a moment, of over half a million of dollars, above all that any policies of insurance would cover, was not the worst of it. Our facilities for work were gone, machinery destroyed, and business connections suddenly snapped; at noon with one of the largest stocks in America, at night with nothing to sell! I went down to the train, stowed myself away in a sleeper, and came to San Francisco, knowing I had to face the brunt of it, and endure the long-drawn agony of the catastrophe. My daughter was with me. Friends and sympathizers met me at Martinez. It was Sunday when I arrived and went to my city quarters. I kept my room until Tuesday; 781 774 then pulled myself together and went down among the boys, who, poor fellows, were ready to cry when they saw me enter the miserable rooms on Geary street, to which they had been forced to fly with their books. I really felt more for them than for myself, as many of them had been dependent on the business for a livelihood for a quarter of a century, and they had wives and little ones to feed. And my poor wife! I felt for her, from whom I was forced to part so abruptly. But most touching of all was the sympathy of the children. Paul said, “Papa shall have my chicken-money to help build his store,” as he turned his face from his mother to hide his tears. At another time, looking at a new shot-gun, he said, “I am glad we have that gun, for now papa will not have to buy one.” Little Philip would work all day and all night, and another bantling persisted in going about gathering nails in an old tin can for two days for his father.

It is such testimonials as these that touch the strong man to the quick, and not the formal letters of sympathy and condolence that he gets.

It takes time to get accustomed to the new order of things. I wander about the city and note the many changes of late; I admire the new style of architecture, and not the lavish expenditure of the big bonanza men and others in the immediate vicinity of my still smoking ruins, and I feel sad to think that I have no longer a stake in this proud and wealthy city. For my ground must go. It is heavily mortgaged for money with which to print and publish my history. Seventeen years ago I gathered it up piece by piece, as I could get it, and pay for it, paying for one piece $6,000, and for the one of like dimensions and equal value adjoining $12,000, thus buying seven lots in order to make up one of the size I wanted. And now it must all go into the capacious maw of some one not foolish enough to write and publish history. 782 775

It makes one's heart sore thus to walk about old familiar haunts and feel one's self a thing of the past. Neither the streets nor the sunshine have the same significance as formerly. They are not my streets; it is not my sunshine; I am an interloper here; I am the ghost of a dead man stalking about the places formerly frequented while living.

Death is nothing, however. Every silent stab of the innumerable incidents that every day arise brings its death pang. To die once is to get off cheaply; to die fifty times a day even, one may become somewhat accustomed to, and so endure it without flinching. But the wife and little one's; ah! there's the rub; all through my life of toil and self-abnegation I had looked forward to the proud position in which I might leave them, prouder by far than any secured by money alone, for I might easier have made ten millions than have collected this library and written this history. I must come down in my pretensions, however, there is no help for it.

For thirty years I have had a bookstore in this town, and the first and finest one here, or within two thousand miles of the place. Whenever I walked the streets, or met an acquaintance, or wanted money, or heard the bells ring for church, or drove into the park, or drew to my breast my child; whenever I went home at night, or down to business in the morning, or out to my library, or over to my farm, I had this bookstore. And now I have it not. I have none. I never shall have one again. It is I who should have been destroyed, and not this hive of industry which provided food for five hundred mouths.

I drop into a system of rigid economy in personal expenses, though I well know that the little I can save in this way will make no difference. But there must have been a comfort in stinting myself, and making my body feel the pinchings of poverty that my soul felt.

For days and weeks I studiously avoid passing by 783 776 the charred remains of my so lately proud establishment. I never liked looking on a corpse, and here was my own corpse, my own smouldering remains, my dead hopes and aspirations, all the fine plans and purposes of my life lying here a heap of ashes, and I could not bear to look upon them.

Half of the time during these days I was sick in bed with nervous prostration. Day after day and far into the night I lay there with an approximate statement of the condition of my finances in my hand, holding it before my eyes until I could not see the figures. It seemed as long as I had it, and held it where I could see it, that I was thus meeting the issues which I must presently fight out as soon as I could stand on my legs. It was the long and lingering suspense that piled up the agony; if I was to be hanged, and could know it at once, face it, and have it over, I could nerve myself for the emergency; but to keep myself nerved to meet whatever might come, not knowing what that would be, required all my fortitude and all my strength.

So far as the mere loss of money was concerned, or that I should be held in less esteem by my fellowmen, I cared nothing for that. I never loved money; few and simple were my wants; I desired to be held only in such esteem as I deserved, and that estimation most men have in the community, themselves or their enemies to the contrary notwithstanding.

A sense of obligation in regard to the duties of life rests to a greater or less degree upon most men. We do not like to see wrong-doing truimph, or the innocent made to suffer; we do not like to see peculation in office, bribery among officials, or the greed of monopolists eating up a community; we do not like to see the young squander their inheritance, or women and preachers gambling in stocks. Somewhat similarly, we do not like to see an old established business, a credit and almost a necessity to the community, which year after year lives and grows, giving 784 777 support to scores of families, become obliterated.

There are persons, particularly among women, who seem able to endure no end of life's buffetings and never know it. They do not seem to realize that their lot is so much harder than that of others, never having tasted the superior joys. From birth to death theirs is the golden mean of sorrow, their woes being so well distributed by a kind heavenly father, that without some great woe to rouse them they never are aware of their current misery.

“What a blessing your library was not burned,” the old-womanish men would say. “It was providential that you had moved it.” “Blessing! There was no blessing about it. It was altogether a curse; a cursed and contemptible dispensation of providence, if that is the orthodox term for bad luck. And of a truth I should have felt relieved if the library had gone too, and so brought my illustrious career to a close. I felt with Shylock, as well take my history as take from me the means of completing my history. I could curse my fate; but with more show of reason curse the management which, unknown to me, had crammed full to overflowing eight large floors with precious merchandise in order to take advantage of low freights, at the same time cutting down the volume of insurance, so that when the match was applied in the basement of the furniture store adjoining, and a two-hours' blaze left only a heap of ashes, the old business should be killed as dead as possible. Oh! there was plenty to curse about in those days, but hard to see any good come of it.

The business had not been very popular of late; it had not been conducted upon the most liberal or high-minded basis; it had many competitors and consequently many enemies; hence thousands were made happy by its fall. I do not know how we all could have gone to work to confer the greatest pleasure upon the greatest number so effectually as in burning up our establishment. Yet some were kind enough 785 778 to say that it was a public calamity; that there was nothing now in the country which might properly be called a bookstore, as compared with what our was, and all that.

We knew better than others what such words signified; that mercantile houses like ours, as it lately stood, could not be built, any more than mountains could be made, or systems of knowledge evolved, in a day. I had been thirty years in this work of creation; I had not another thirty years to devote to a similar work; therefore I knew I never should have another such a bookstore.

But there were other things in the world besides bookstores; if I could get rest from severe strain I would be satisfied; but I could do anything now but rest. To be or not to be was the question. Should I make a struggle to recuperate my fortunes, or should I lay down my weary bones and drift as comfortably as I might into the regions of the unconscious. Were I to consider myself alone; had I no work to do affecting others, other persons, other principles than the best preservation of self, I could tell quickly what I would do. I would choose some sunny hillside and there follow with my eyes the rising and settin of the sun, until the evening should come when I might go down with it.

The question was not what I would like to do, but what ought I to do. To be influenced by what would make me the most happy or miserable was putting it upon rather a low plane. One man's happiness or misery for a few years is a small matter; small to his fellow-men, who are thinking of themselves, small to his maker, who has set up the universe, apparently upon the principle of the greatest misery to the greatest number; and need not be of surpassing solicitude to himself, if he stops thinking about himself, his happiness or misery, and goes about his business in the spirit of doing in the best manner he can the thing which most of all requires next to be done. 786 779

To be or not to be, that was the question. Being dead, were it not better to be buried? I was tired, as I said; I could easily sink out of sight, and lie at rest beside my sepulchred hopes. This would be the easiest way out of the difficulty. But I had never been accustomed to the easiest way, or to regard my pleasure as the first consideration in life. To do as best I was able, every day and every hour, the thing nearest me to be done, whether I liked it or not—that had been the unwritten code by which I had regulated my conduct; and all, whether I would or not, and all without knowing it, I could now no more deviate from that course than I could change my nature. Except in moments of deepest depression, and then for only a moment, did I think of such a thing as giving up. To face the detail of going over the dead business to save what could be saved sickened me beyond measure, but I had to swallow the dose. I offered to give the remnant of the business to any one who would assume the responsibility, and save me the trouble and annoyance of cleaning it up; but no one would take it, and I was therefore compelled to do it myself.

I say there were other things than myself to be considered; indeed, myself was but a small part of it. There was the history, and the men engaged on it, and the pledges which had been made to the public and to subscribers. “Ah, yes,” they would say, “this might have been expected, and so we are left with a broken set of books on our hands.” There was the business, and a large body of creditors that must be paid. There was my family, and all who should come after me; if I should fail myself and others now, who would ever after rise up and retrieve our fallen fortunes? No; I could do now a hundred times more than any one of them could probably do at any time hereafter, and I would try to do it, though the effort should grind me to powder. Then, too, it was not in the power of man so constituted and so disciplined as I had been to sit down beside the business I had 787 780 established in my boyhood, and labored to sustain and build up all throughout my life, and see the light of it go out, become utterly extinguished, making no effort to save it.

After all, the burning of gunpowder is but the sudden change of a solid into a gas, though the effect is sometimes terrible; the burning of a bookstore is but the changing of merchandise into smoke and ashes, but a thousand hearts and minds and lives may be affected or wholly changed thereby. So I set about considering as coolly as I could the position of things, what might be done, what might not be done, and what it were best to try to do.

The situation must be considered from several points of view. Building and business being both cut off, I had not a dollar of income in the world. I did not deem it possible to reërect the store, the former building being heavily mortgaged. I offered the lot for sale, but no one would buy at a fair price. It took two months to ascertain whether the business was solvent or not; for although most of the account-books had been saved, there were goods and invoices in transit, and new statements of accounts had to be obtained from every quarter.

Until the state of the business could be definitely known, I could make no calculations about anything. I might have to sell all I had to pay the debts of the firm. Above all, it might be utterly beyond the question to continue the publication of the history. This would be indeed the greatest calamity that could befall; for in that event, without flattering myself that the world at large would regard the matter in a serious light, to me, and to those more immediately interested in and dependent upon me, all would be lost, not only property and life, but that for which life and property had been given. A half-finished work would be comparatively valueless; and not only would no one take up the broken threads and continue the several narratives, but there would be 788 781 little hope of the work ever being again attempted by any one on the extensive and thorough plan I had marked out. It is true that much of the work that I had accomplished would be useful in the hands of another, whether working in conjunction with or under the direction of some society or government, or in a private capacity; the question was, however, would any government or individual undertake it? The collected materials would never diminish in importance, but rather increase in value as time passed by, and the indices, prepared at such a large expenditure of time and labor, would always be regarded of primary necessity, as the only means by which vast stores of knowledge could be reached.

As I have before remarked, it is a matter worthy of some thought how the great libraries of the future are to be made, when the rare and valuable books which constitute the choicest feature of all the more important collections cannot be obtained. Of some of the apparently essential early works, it is only at wide intervals that a copy can now be obtained. As time goes by the intervals will become wider, and the books impossible to obtain will increase in number, until even large collections will be made up of books which are now easily obtained. Some of these will in time become scarce; and so it will continue, until in a hundred years, when America will have fifty fine libraries for every one which now exists, comparatively few of the books which form the basis of the best libraries to-day will be found in them.

But to return to my affairs so greatly disarranged by this unfortunate fire. I kept the old store lot, for the reason before intimated, because I could not sell it, buyers seeming to think it a special imposition if they could not profit by the fire. When, finally, I saw that I need not sell it, the savings banks sending me word that if I wanted to rebuild to come around and get the money, I saw in it a hundred thousand dollars better for me than any offer I could get for 789 782 the lot. Then I determined to go on and rebuild, and at once started out to do so.

Then there was the library work to be considered. While comparatively speaking I was near the end, so near that I could begin to think of retiring to farm life, and a voyage of several years around the world as an educating expedition for my children, yet I had much to do, and this fire added a hundred fold to that, even should it be proved possible to complete the work at all. I had them make out for me at the library a schedule showing the exact condition of the work, what had been done, what remained to be done, what plates had been destroyed and what remained, and an estimate of the probable time and expense it would require to complete the history. Two years and twelve thousand dollars were the time and money estimated, but both time and money were nearly doubled before the end came.

It was interesting to observe the diverse attitudes assumed by different persons after the fire, the actions of various persons, friends and enemies, in the business and out of it. I will enumerate some of them by classes and individuals. First, and by far the largest class, to the honor of humanity be it said, were honest and hearty sympathizers, of high and low degree, who regarded our business as a useful one, its objects in the main praiseworthy, and its loss a public calamity. Another class, large enough, but not so large as the other, was our enemies, mostly business competitors, who had long been envious of us, and were now delighted at our discomfiture. As I have said before, few fires, of a private nature, ever occurred which made more people happy.

A singular phenomenon was a shoal of business sharks which sailed in around us, seeking something to devour. It is useless citing examples, but I was surprised beyond expression to find among the commercial and industrial ranks, doing business with every 790 783 claim to honesty and respectability, those scarcely inferior to highway robbers; real estate sharpers, swindling contractors, and lawyers, hunting for some loop-hole to get a finger in—men who by rights should be within the walls of a penitentiary. It was then that I first learned that there were business men in our midst whose principles and practices were worse that those of any three-carde monte men, or other cheats; who lived and did business only to get the better of people by some catch, trick, swindle, or other indirection.

Best of all were the true and noble fellows of our own establishment, who stood by us regardless of any consequences to themselves. All were not of this true stamp, however; there were some from whom we expected most, for whom we had done the most, but who now returned us only evil, showing bad hearts—but let them pass. It is a matter for self-congratulation rather than regret, the discovery of a traitor in the camp, of an unprincipled person in a position of trust and confidence, one held in high esteem, not to say affectionate regard,—to find him out, to know him that he might be avoided. It is not the open enemy that does us serious injury, but the treacherous friend. And in truth I have encountered few such during my life, either in the business or out of it, few comparatively. Most young men, if ever they have once felt the impressions of true nobility and integrity, will not depart from them. Some forget themselves and fall into evil ways, but these are few. There is no higher or nobler work, no more pleasing sight, than to watch and assist the unfolding of true nobleness of character in young men of good impulses. And while there are so many of inferior ability seeking situations, and so many situations waiting for competent persons, it seems a pity the standard of excellence and intelligence is not raised.

There were in the ranks of the old business instances of loyalty and devotion which will remain 791 784 graven on my heart forever—men who, regardless of their own interests, stood by the wreck, determined at any personal hazard, any self-sacrifice, to lend their aid as long as hope remained. I noticed with pride that most of the heads of departments thus remaining had begun their business career with me in the original house of H. H. Bancroft and Company, and had been in full accord with me and my historical work from first to last; and I swore to myself that if the business survived, these men should never regret their course, and I do not think they ever have. Nor should my assistants at the library be forgotten, several of whom, besides quite a number at the store, voluntarily cut down their salary in order to make as light as possible the burden of completing my work.

In many vaired moods were we met by different persons with whom we had dealings. We did not propose to fail, or compromise, or ask an extension, as long as we had a dollar wherewith to pay our debts; but there was no use disguising the fact that the business had received a severe blow, and might not survive it. Among the publishers and manufacturers of the eastern United States are men of every breadth of mind and size of soul. During this memorable year we took an inventory of them, sizing them up at about their value. Nearly all of them extended to us their sympathy, some of which was heart-felt. Quite a number went further, and manifested a disposition to help us regain our feet; but this amounted to little, practically, though the feelings which prompted kind acts are never to be despised.

There was a man in Massachusetts, with whom we had no intimate acquaintance, and on whom we had no special claim. We had bought goods from him as from others; but he was not like some others of his locality, wholly given to gain, with bloodless instincts and cold worship of wealth. He met us openly, frankly, with something more than machine-made 792 785 sympathy, and asked to share with us our loss. Never will we forget the courtesy and kindness of this man, or the firm he represents, the minds and hearts of whose members are so far above the millions they command, ennobling themselves, their families, and whatsoever merchandise their fingers touch.

Magnanimity, however, cuts no very great figure in business ethics. It seems that the good gold of commercial morals must have a reasonable alloy to make it wear. A certain amount of cold-blooded calculation, not to say downright meanness, is essential to business success. It will not do for a man of affairs, if he would achieve any marked success, to allow any feelings of humanity, benevolence, or kindness of heart to stand in his way. Religion he may bend to his purpose, but must not permit himself to be bent by it. The easiest and most economical way, as a rule, in matters of public opinion and policy is to drift with the tide. The most successful men, in any direction, are not the best men. They may be best for civilization, but civilization is not the highest or holiest good, nor does it seem to be conducive to the greatest happiness. Civilization is not best served by the best men. Take from progress and the highest and keenest intellectual refinement the rascalities attending their development, and the development would be far less than it is.

The publishers and book-sellers of New York and Boston as business men are very like other business men, rather above than below the average. A certain amount of intelligence, or even learning, may be rubbed off from the outside of books, coming in life contact with them as book-men do. Yet by the more successful, books are handled as others handle bales of dry-goods or barrels of groceries. A true lover of books is not usually found among the more prominent booksellers, to whom their merchandise is like the merchandise of any dealer to him. There is some little business courtesy among the eastern booksellers, but 793 786 this does not amount to much; if one treads upon the toes of another, the offended one strikes back if he is able, if not, he submits to the inevitable. At the same time the spirit of clannishness is not wholly absent, as instanced by the way they all look upon any attempt at book-publishing outside of their circle, or rather, beyond the limits of their western horizon. Like some of the machine-made presidents and professors of eastern colleges and universities, they seem to think that all learning and literature, book-making and book-selling, should by rights be confined to the eastern sea-board. But all of them as they grow older will learn better; or at least the rising generation should learn, though some of these seem more ready to adopt their father's vices than to emulate his virtues.

More pertinent than these antiquated ideas is the fact that the west lacks business intercourse and connections, the channels of trade radiating for the most part from the east. But this is being rapidly overcome. Chicago is fairly in the field in the publication of miscellaneous books, and to-day San Francisco is sending more law-books of her own manufacture east than she receives from that quarter. And in the near future there will be on this western sea-board more than one Mount Hamilton, telling the world of new stars.

As a rule, the eastern publishers of books stand high in the community as men of morals, honesty, integrity, religion, and respectability. And as a rule they deserve it, as I have said. There are some among them, however, who cannot be placed so high, notably some of the educational book-publishers, who do not hesitate to resort to any and every kind of bribery and corruption to get their books adopted. Many will not do this, but many again will. Surely there should not be anything so very damaging to business morals in the printing and placing in use books for school-children. But seldom do business 794 787 and politics meet except to the injury of both. Fair and honest dealing asks no aid from politics, and when office-holders begin to handle the business man's money, he may bid farewell to honesty and integrity.

On the whole, we considered ourselves very fairly treated, both at the west and at the east, in the adjustment of difficulties arising from the fire. The insurance companies were entitled to every praise, paying their losses promptly before they were due. New friendships were made, and old friendships widened and cemented anew. I was specially gratified by the confidence moneyed men seemed to repose in me, granting me all the accommodations I desired, and thus enabling me quickly to recuperate my fortunes, as I will more fully narrate in the next and final chapter.

795 788

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE HISTORY COMPANY AND THE BANCROFT COMPANY. ‘Nihil infelicius est cui nihil unquam evenit adversi, non licuit enim illi se experiri.’ Seneca. Prosperity inspires an elevation of mind even in the mean-spirited, so that they show a certain degree of high-mindedness and chivalry in the lofty position in which fortune has placed them; but the man who possesses real fortitude and magnanimity will show it by the dignity of his behavior under losses, and in the most adverse fortune. Plutarch.

As the goods arrived which were in transit at the time of the fire, they were put into a store in the Grand hotel, on Market street, of which we took a lease for a year. Orders came in and customers called, making their purchases, though in a limited way. Considering the crippled condition of the business and the general prostration of its affairs, the result was more favorable than might have been expected. In due time after the fire I was able to ascertain that with close collections, and making the most of everything, the business was not only solvent, but had a margin of one hundred thousand dollars of resources above liabilities. To bring about this happy state of things, however, the utmost care and watchfulness, with the best of management were necessary; for while returns from resources were slow and precarious, the liabilities were certain and defined.

A number of fragmentary concerns sprang up, thrown off from the parent institution in the whirl of the great convulsion. Our law department was united with the business of Sumner Whitney, and a large and successful law-book publishing house was thus established under the able management of good men from both houses, who were less inclined, however, to yield proper credit to those who had laid the 796 789 foundation for them to build upon, than to vote themselves large salaries, and derive all the personal profit therefrom possible. The history department was segregated from the old business, and reorganized and incorporated under the name of The History Company.

The bare fact of loss of property,—not being able to count myself worth as much as formerly by so many thousand,—as I have before intimated, never gave me a moment's pang or uneasiness. All through the whole of it the main question, and the only question, was, could the publishing business pay its debts? If the Market street lot, the library, my farms, and all other property had to be sacrificed to liquidate the indebtedness of the business, thereby arresting the publication of the history, and sending me forth empty-handed to earn my bread,—I frankly admit that I could not face this possibility without flinching. But when it was ascertained that the old business was solvent, and would pay its debts without the further sacrifice of my resources, I wrote my wife, who was still in San Diego attending to affairs there, that she need have no fear of the future, for if I lived we would yet have enough and to spare, without considering what might happen in southern California.

Buying an additional lot, so as to make a width of one hundred feet on Stevenson street, having still seventy-five feet frontage on Market street, in something over a year I had completed on the old site a strong and beautiful edifice, a feature of Market street, and of the city, which I called The History Building. Its architecture was original and artistic, the structure monumental, and it was so named in consideration of my historical efforts.

I had seen from the first that it would be necessary as soon as possible, if I expected to get another start in the world, to secure some steady income, both at San Diego and San Francisco. In the former place, property was so rapidly increasing in value, with increased 797 790 taxation and street assessments, that unless it could be made productive a portion of it would have to be sold. Some of it, the outside lands, were sold, and with the proceeds, and what I could scrape together in San Francisco, we managed to erect a business building there, which brought in good returns. Then there was the ground-rent from a hundred lots or so, which helped materially. No money which I had ever handled gave me half the pleasure as that which I was able to send to my wife at this time; for although it lessened and made more difficult my chances of success in San Francisco, it removed my family further every day from possible want, and thus gave me renewed strength for the battle.

Up to this time the publication and sale of my historical series had been conducted as one of the departments of the general business, under the management of Nathan J. Stone. As this business had assumed large proportions, sometimes interfering with the other departments, not always being in harmony with them or with the general management, it was finally thought best to organize an independent company, having for its object primarily the publications of my books, together with general book-publishing, and acting at the same time as an agency for strictly first-class eastern subscription publications.

It may be not out of place to give here some account of the manner in which the publication and sale of this historical series was conducted, with a brief biography of the man who managed it; for if there had been anything unusual in gathering the material and writing these histories, the method by which they were published and placed in the hands of readers was no less remarkable.

Ordinarily, for a commercial man formally to announce to the world that he was about to write and publish a series of several histories, which with preliminary and supplemental works would number in all thirty-nine volumes, would be regarded, to say the 798 791 least, as a somewhat visionary proposition. Those best capable of appreciating the amount of time, money, labor, and steadfastness of purpose involved, would say that such an one had no conception of what he was undertaking, did not know in fact what he was talking about, and the chances were a hundred to one he would never complete the work.

Still further out of the way would it seem for the publishers of the series to bring forward a prospectus and invite subscriptions beforehand for the whole thirty-nine volumes at once. Such a proceeding had never been heard of since publishing began. It could not be done. Why not adopt the usual course, announce the first work of the series and take subscriptions therefor? This done, publish the second; and so on. People will not subscribe for so large a work so far in advance of its completion, with all the attendant uncertainties. So said those of widest experience, and who were supposed to be the best capable of judging.

We well knew that no New York or London publisher would undertake the enterprise on such terms. We also knew that no book, or series of books, had ever been written as these had been. We did not know that the publication and sale could be successfully effected on this basis, but we determined to try, and for the following reasons:

First, properly to place this work before men of discrimination and taste in such a way as to make them fully understand it, its inception and execution, the ground it covers with every how and why, required strong men of no common ability, and such men must receive adequate compensation for superior intelligence and energy. To sell a section of the work would by no means pay them for their time and labor.

Secondly, when once the patron should understand the nature and scope of the work, how it was originated and how executed, as a rule, if he desired any of 799 792 it, he would want it all. As is now well known, any one section of the series, though complete in itself, is but one of a number, all of which are requisite to the completion of the plan.

Thirdly, considering the outlay of time and money on each section, a subscription to only one volume, or one set of volumes, would in no way compensate or bring a fair return to the publisher. Throughout the series are constant references and cross-references, by means of which repetitions, otherwise necessary for the proper understanding of each several part, are saved, thus making the history of Mexico of value to California, and vice versa, so that if the citizen of Oregon places upon his shelves the history of Colorado, the Coloradan should reciprocate.

When a book is published, clearly the purpose is that it should be circulated. Publishing signifies sending forth. Print and stack up in your basement a steamboat load of books, and until they are sent out they are not published. And they must be sent out to bona fide subscribers, and placed in the hands of those who value them sufficiently to invest money in them. To print and present does not answer the purpose; neither individual wealth nor the authority of government can give a book influence, or cause it to be regarded as of intrinsic value. It must be worth buying in the first place, and must then be bought, to make it valued.

In the matter of patronage, I would never allow myself to be placed in the attitude of a mendicant. I had devoted myself to this work voluntarily, not through hope of gain, or from any motive of patriotism or philanthropy, or because of any idea of superior ability, or a desire for fame, but simply because it gave me pleasure to do a good work well. Naturally, and very properly, if I might be permitted to accomplish a meritorious work, I would like the approbation of my fellow-men; if I should be able to confer a benefit on the country, it would be pleasant 800 793 to see it recognized; but to trade upon this sentiment, or allow others to do so, would be most repugnant to me

Therefore, it was my great desire that if ever the work should be placed before the public for sale, it should be done in such a manner as to command and retain for it the respect and approbation of the best men. It would be so easy for an incompetent or injudicious person to bring the work into disfavor, in failing to make its origin, its plan, and purpose, properly understood. In due time fortune directed to the publishers the man of all others best fitted to the task.

Nathan Jonas Stone was born in Webster, Merrimac county, New Hampshire, June 11, 1843, which spot was likewise the birth-place of his father, Peter Stone. Both of his grandfathers were captains in the army, one serving in the revolutionary war, and the other in the war of 1812.

Mr. Stone's early life was spent on a farm, working during summer, and attending school or teaching in winter. No better training can be devised for making strong and self-reliant men; no better place was ever seen for laying the foundations of firm principles, and knitting the finer webs of character, than a New England country home.

In 1863, being then twenty years of age, Mr. Stone came to California by the way of Panamá, arriving in San Francisco on the 18th of August, with just ten cents in his pocket. Investing his capital in Bartlett pears, he seated himself on the end of a log, near the wharf where he had landed, and ate them. Thus fortified for whatever fate might have in store, he set out to find work. He knew not a soul in the city, having thus cast himself adrift upon the tide of his own native resources, in a strange country, at this early age, with cool indifference parting from his last penny, well knowing that there was no such thing as starvation in store for a boy of his metal. 801 794

Times were very dull, and easy places with good pay were not abundant. Nor did he even search for one; but after walking about for the greater part of the day, making his first tour of observation in the country, about five o'clock he saw posted on Kearny street a notice of workmen wanted, and was about making inquiries concerning the same, when he was accosted by a man driving a milk-wagon, who asked him if he was looking for employment. Stone replied that he was; whereupon the man engaged him on the spot, at forty dollars a month and board. Three months afterward he was offered and accepted the superintendence of the industrial school farm, acting later as teacher and deputy superintendent.

In 1867, he entered the house of H. H. Bancroft and company, acting as manager first of the subscription department, and then of the wholesale department. In 1872, he became interested in the awakening of civilization in Japan, and opened business on his own account in Yokohama, where his transactions soon reached a million of dollars a year, importing general merchandise and exporting the products of the country. He placed a printing-press in the mikado's palace, which led to the establishment of a printing-bureau, and the cutting out and casting into type of the Japanese characters.

Obliged by ill-health to abandon business, he returned to San Francisco in 1878 completely prostrated; but after a summer at his old home, he recuperated, his health still further improving during a four years' residence at Santa Rosa, California.

Mr Stone had followed me in my historical efforts with great interest from the first. He had watched the gradual accumulation of material, and the long labor of its utilization. He believed thoroughly in the work, its plan, the methods by which it was wrought out, and the great and lasting good which would accrue to the country from its publication. He was finally induced to accept the important 802 795 responsibility of placing the work before the world, of assuming the general management of its publication and sale, and devoting his life thereto. No one could have been better fitted for this arduous task than he. With native ability were united broad experience and a keen insight into men and things. Self-reliant, yet laborious in his efforts, bold, yet cautious, careful in speech, of tireless energy, and ever jealous for the reputation of the work, he entered the field determined upon success. A plan was devised wholly unique in the annals of book-publishing, no less original, no less difficult of execution than were the methods by which alone it was made possible for the author to write the work in the first place. And with unflinching faith and loyalty, Mr Stone stood by the proposition until was wrought out of it the most complete success.

Among the most active and efficient members of The History Company is George Howard Morrison, a native of Maine, having been born at Calais November 8, 1845. His ancestors were of that Scotch-Irish mixture, with a tincture of English, which produces strong men, mentally and physically. On the father's side the line of sturdy Scotch farmers and manufacturers, with a plentiful intermixture of lawyers and doctors, may be traced back for generations; the mother brought to the alliance the Irish name of McCudding and the English Sinclair. George was one of nine children. Owing to failures in business their father was unable to carry out his design of giving them a liberal education, but in New England there is always open the village school, which many a prominent American has made suffice. It certainly speaks volumes for the self-reliance and enterprise of the boy George, when we find him in 1859, at the age of fourteen, alone, without a friend or an acquaintance in the country, applying for a situation at the office of a prominent lawyer in Sacramento.

“What can you do?” asked the lawyer. 803 796

“Anything that any boy can do who is no bigger or abler than I am,” was the reply.

The lawyer was pleased, took the lad to his home, gave him a place in his office, and initiated him in the mysteries of the law. There he remained, until the growing importance of the silver development drew him to Nevada, where he made and lost several fortunes. Entering politics, he was made assessor of Virginia City in 1866, represented Storey county in the legisloture in 1873, and was chief clerk of the assembly, introducing a bill which greatly enlarged the usefulness of the state orphan asylum. In 1870 Mr Morrison married Mary E. Howard, the most estimable and accomplished daughter of John S. Howard, type-founder of Boston, four children, Mildred, Lillie, George, and Helen, being the fruits of this union.

Mr Morrison was one of the first subscribers to the history, in which he became deeply interested, finally joining his fate with that of The History Company, of which he is secretary, and of The Bancroft Company, in both of which companies he is a director.

As The History Building drew near completion, the proposition arose to move the business back into its old quarters; but it had become so crippled in its resources and reduced in its condition, that I did not feel like assuming the labor, risk, and responsibility of the necessary increased expenses.

I had long been anxious to get out of business rather than go deeper into it. The thought lay heavy upon me of taking again upon my already well-burdened shoulders the care and responsibility of a wide-spread business, with endless detail and scant capital; I did not care for the money should it succeed; I wanted nothing further now than to get myself away from everything of the kind.

Yet there was my old business which I had established in my boyhood, and worked out day by day and year by year into magnificent and successful proportions; for there had never been a year since its 804 797 foundation that it had not grown and flourished, and that as a rule in ever-increasing proportions. I had for it an affection outside of any mercenary interest. Through good and evil times it had stood bravely by me, by my family, my history, my associates, and employés, and I could not desert it now. I could not see it die or go to the dogs without an effort to save it; for I felt that such would be its fate if it neglected the opportunity to go back to its old locality, and regain somewhat of its old power and prestige. The country was rapidly going forward. There must soon be a first-class bookstore in San Francisco. There was none such now, and if ours did not step to the front and assume that position, some other one would. Immediately after the fire the remarks were common, “It is a public loss”; “We have nowhere, now, to go for our books”; “Your store was not appreciated until it was gone.”

My family were now all well provided for, through the rise of real estate in San Diego. What I had besides need not affect them one way or the other. I felt that I had the right to risk it in a good cause—every dollar of it, and my life in addition, if I so chose. After all, it was chiefly a question of health and endurance. I determined to try it; once more I would adventure, and succeed or sink all.

So I laid my plans accordingly, and in company with W. B. Bancroft, Mr Colley, and Mr Dorland, all formerly connected with the original house of H. H. Bancroft and Company, I organized and incorporated The Bancroft Company, and moved the old business back upon the old site, but into new and elegant quarters. Behold the new creation! Once more we had a bookstore, one second to none in all this western world—an establishment which was a daily pride and pleasure, not so widely spread as the old one, but in many respects better conditioned. Above all, we were determined to popularize it, and place it in many respects upon a higher plane than ever it had before enjoyed. and we succeeded.

805 798

The management of The Bancroft Company was placed in the hands of my nephew, W. B. Bancroft, who had been well instructed in the business, and had ever been loyal to it. At the time of the fire he was at the head of the manufactory, having under him two or three hundred men. Husbanding his influence and resources, he started a printing-office on his own account, and was on the broad road to success when he was invited to unite his manufactory with the old business under the new name, and assume the management, which he finally consented to do. Thus he, with the others, passed through the fiery furnace unscathed, and with them deserved the success which he achieved. No small portion of his success as a manufacturer has been due to the devoted efforts of James A. Pariser, the able and efficient superintendent of the printing department. Thus, with fresh blood, good brains, and ample capital, there was no reason apparent why the new business should not in time far outstrip the old, and on its centennial in 1956 stand unapproached by any similar institution in the new and grandest of empires on the shores of the Pacific.