T HOSE who have visited the markets of San Francisco during the egg season may have noticed the abundance of large and singularly marked eggs, that are offered for sale by the bushel. The shells of these eggs are pear-shaped, parti-colored, and very thick. They range in color from a light green to grey or brown, and are all of them profusely spotted, or blotted, I might say spattered, with clots of black or brown. Some are beautiful, with soft tints blended in a delicate lace-like pattern. Some are very ugly, and look unclean. All are a trifle stale, with a meat of coarse texture and gamy flavor. But the Italians and the Coolies are fond of them, and doubtless many a gross finds its way into the kitchens of the popular cheap restaurants, where, disguised in omelets and puddings, the quantity compensates for the lack of quality, and the palate of the rapid eater has not time to analyze the latter. These are the eggs of the sea-gull, the gull that cries all day among the shipping in the harbor, follows the river boats until meal-time, and feeds on the bread that is cast upon the water.[2] How true it is that this bread returns to us after many days!
The gulls, during incubation, seek the solitude of the Farallones, a group of desolate and weather-beaten rocks that tower out of the fog about thirty miles distant from the mouth of the harbor of San Francisco. Nothing can be more magnificently desolate than the aspect of these islands. Scarcely a green blade finds root there. They are haunted by sea-fowl of all feathers, and the boom of the breakers mingles with the bark of the seals that have colonized on one of the most inaccessible islands of the group. It is here that myriads of sea-birds rear their young, here where the very cliffs tremble in the tempestuous sea and are drenched with bitter spray, and where ships have been cast into the frightful jaws of caverns and speedily ground into splinters.
The profit on sea-eggs has increased from year to year, and of late speculators have grown so venturesome that competition among egg-gatherers has resulted in an annual naval engagement, known to the press and the public as the egg-war. If two companies of egg-pickers met, as was not unlikely, the contending factions fell upon one another with their ill-gotten spoils—the islands are under the rule of the United States, and no one has legal right to take from them so much as one egg without license—and the defeated party was sure to retire from the field under a heavy shower of shells, the contents of which, though not fatal, were at least effective.
I have before me the notes of a retired egg-picker; they record the brief experience of one who was interested in the last campaign, which, as it terminated the career of the egg-pirates, is not without historical interest. I will at once introduce the historian, and let him tell his own tale.
"5 p.m.—There are ten of us all told; most of us strangers to one another, but Tom and Jim, and Fred, that's me, are pals, and have been these many months. So we conclude to hang together, and make the most of an adventure perfectly new to each. At our feet lie our traps; blankets, woolen shirts, heavy boots, with huge nails in the soles of them, tobacco in bulk, a few novels, a pack of cards, and a pocket flask, for the stomach's sake. A jolly crew, to be sure, and jollily we bade adieu to the fellows who had gathered in the dock to wish us God-speed. Casting loose we swung into the stream, and then slowly and clumsily made sail. The town never looked prettier; it is always the way and always will be; towns, like blessings, brighten just as they get out of reach. Drifting into the west we began to grow thoughtful; what had at first seemed a lark may possibly prove to be a very serious matter. We have to feed on rough rations, work in a rough locality, among rough people, and our profits, or our share of the profits, will depend entirely upon the fruitfulness of the egg-orchard, and the number of hundred gross that we are able to get safely into the market. No news from the town, save by the schooner that comes over at intervals to take away our harvest. No society, save our own, good enough always, provided we are not forcibly confined to it. No amusements beyond a novel, a pipe, and a pack of cards. Ah well! it is only an experience after all, and here goes!
"Sea pretty high, as we get outside the Heads, and feel the long roll of the Pacific. Wind, fresh and cold; we are to be out all night and looking about for bunks, we find the schooner accommodations are limited, and that the captain and his crew monopolize them. We sleep anywhere, grateful that we are able to sleep at all.
"10 p.m.—A blustering head wind, and sea increasing. What little supper we were able to get on board was worse than none at all, for it did not stay with us—anything but fun, this going to sea in a bowl, to rob gull's nests, and smuggle eggs into market.
"Woke in the early dawn, everything moist and sticky, clammy is the better word, and that embraces the whole case; stiff and sore in every joint; bacon for dinner last night, more bacon for breakfast this morning, and only half-cooked at that. Our delicate town-bred stomachs rebel, and we conclude to fast until we reach the island. Have sighted the Farallones, but are too miserable to express our gratitude; wind and sea still rising; schooner on beam ends about once in forty seconds, between times standing either on her head or her tail, and shaking herself 'like a thing of life.'
"At noon off the landing, a buoy bobbing in the billows, to which we are expected to make fast the schooner, and get to shore in the exceedingly small boat; captain fears to tarry on account of heavy weather; concludes to return to the coast and bide his time; consequently makes for Bolinas Bay, which we reach about 9 p.m., and drop anchor in comparatively smooth water; glad enough to sleep on an even keel at last; it seems at least six months since we left the shining shores of San Francisco, yet it is scarce thirty hours—but such hours, ugh!
"Wind blowing a perfect gale; we are lying under a long hill, and the narrow bay is scarcely rippled by the blast that rushes over us, thick with flying-scud. Captain resolves to await better weather; some of the boys go on shore, and wander out to a kind of reef at the mouth of the bay, where in a short time they succeed in gathering a fine mess of mussels; the rest of us, the stay-on-boards, rig up a net and catch fifteen large fat crabs; with these we cook a delicious dinner, which we devour ravenously, like half-starved men; begin to realize how storm-tossed mariners feel, and have been recounting hair-breadth escapes, over our pipes on deck; there will be much to tell the fellows on shore, if we are ever so fortunate as to get home again.
"Though the weather is still bad enough to discourage us landsmen, we put to sea, and once more head for the Farallones. They are hidden in mist, but we beat bravely about, and by-and-by distinguish the faint outlines of the islands looming through the fog! We try to secure the buoy, tacking to and fro; just at the wrong moment our main halyards part, and the sail comes crashing to the deck. To avoid being cast on the inhospitable shore, we put to sea under jib and foresail, and are five miles away before damages are repaired and we dare venture to return; head about, and make fast this time. Hurrah! After several trips of the small boat, succeed in landing luggage and provisions above high-water mark on the Farallones; each trip of the boat is an event, for it comes in on a big breaker, and grounds in a torrent of foam and sand.
"We find two cabins at our disposal; the larger one containing dining-room and kitchen, and chambers above; seven of our boys store their blankets in the rude bunks that are drawn by lot. Tom, Jim, and I secure the smaller cabin, a single room, with bunks on three sides, a door on the fourth.
"9 p.m.—We have dined and smoked and withdrawn to our respective lodges; the wind moans without, a thin, cold fog envelopes us; the sea breaking furiously, the night gloomy beyond conception, but the captain and his crew on the little schooner are not so comfortable as the egg-pickers whom they have left behind.
"We all rose much refreshed, and after a hearty breakfast, such as would have done credit to a mining-camp in pioneer days, set forth on a rabbit chase. The islands abound in rabbits. Where do they come from, and on what do they feed? These are questions that puzzle us.
"We resolve to attack them. Having armed ourselves with clubs about two feet in length, we proceed in a body until a rabbit is sighted, then, separating, we surround him and gradually close him in, pelt him with stones or sticks until the poor fellow is secured; sometimes three or four are run down together; it is cruel sport, but this is our only hope of fresh meat during the sojourn on the islands; a fine stew for dinner, and some speculation on the prospect of our egg-hunt to-morrow.
"We did the first work of the season to-day. At the west end of the islands is a chasm, through which the wind whistles; the waves, rushing in from both sides, meet at the centre and leap wildly into the air. Across this chasm we threw a light suspension bridge about forty feet in length and two in width; one crosses it by the aid of a life-line. On the further rock the birds are nesting in large numbers, and to-morrow we begin the wholesale robbery of their nests.
"When the bridge was completed, being pretty well fagged and quite famished, we returned to the cabin, lunched heartily, and spent the afternoon in highly successful rabbit chasing. Plenty of stew for all of us. If Robinson Crusoe had been cast ashore on this island, I wonder how he would have lived? As it is, the rabbits sometimes succeed in escaping us, and without powder and shot it would be quite impossible for one or two persons to bag them. We are beginning to lose faith in the delightful romances of our youth, and to realize what a desert island is.
"In front of us we each carry a large sack in which to deposit eggs; our boots are clumsy, and the heavy nails that fill their soles make them heavy and difficult to walk in. We also carry a strong staff to aid us in climbing the rugged slopes. About us is nothing but grey, weather-stained rocks; there are few paths, and these we cannot follow, for the sea-birds, though so unused to the presence of man, are wary and shy of his tracks; the day's work has not proved profitable. Few of us gathered any eggs; one who was more successful, and had secured enough to make it extremely difficult for him to scale the rocks, slipped, fell on his face, and scrambled all his store. His plight was laughable, but he was scarcely in the mood to relish it, as he washed his sack and blouse in cold water, while we indulged in cards.
"Built another bridge over a gap where the sea rushes, and which we call the Jordan. If the real Jordan is as hard to cross, heaven help us. Eggs not very plentiful as yet; we are rather early in the season, or the crop is late this year. More rabbits in the p.m.; more wind, more fog; and at night, pipes, cards, and a few choruses that sound strange and weird in the fire lights on this lonely island.
"Eggs are so very scarce. The foreman advises our resting for a day. We lounge about, looking off upon the sea; sometimes a sail blows by us, but our islands are in such ill-repute with mariners, they usually give us a wide berth, as they call it. A little homesick towards dusk; wonder how the boys in San Francisco are killing time; it is time that is killing us, out here in the wind and fog.
"Have been hunting abalones all day, and found but a baker's dozen; their large, shallow shells are glued to the rock at the first approach of danger, and unless we can steal upon these queer fish unawares, and thrust something under their shells before they have shut down upon the rock, it is almost impossible to pry them open. Some of the boys are searching in the sea up to their waists—hard work when one considers how tough the abalone is, and how tasteless.
"This morning all our egg-pickers were at work; took in the west end, only the high rock beyond the first bridge; gathered about forty dozen eggs, and got them safely back to camp; in some nests there were three eggs, and these we did not gather, fearing they were stale. In the p.m. tried to collect dry grass enough to make a thin mattress for my bunk; barely succeeded; am more than ever convinced that desert islands are delusions.
"It being Sunday, we rest from our labors; by way of varying the monotony of island life, we climb up to the lighthouse, 300 feet above sea level. The path is zig-zag across the cliff, and is extremely fatiguing. While ascending, a large stone rolled under my foot, and went thundering down the cliff. Jim, who was in the rear, heard it coming, and dodged; it missed his head by about six inches. Had it struck him, he would have been hurled into the sea that boiled below; we were both faint with horror, after realizing the fate he had escaped. Were cordially welcomed by the lighthouse keeper, his wife, and her companion, a young woman who had come to share this banishment. The keeper and his wife visit the mainland but twice a year. Everywhere we saw evidence of the influence of these charming people. The house was tidy—the paint snow-white. The brass-work shone like gold; the place seemed a kind of Paradise to us; even the machinery of the revolving light, the multitude of reflectors, etc., was enchanting. We dreaded to return to our miserable cabins, but were soon compelled to, and the afternoon was spent in the customary rabbit chase, ending with a stew of no mean proportions.
"More eggs, and afterwards a fishing excursion, which furnished us material for an excellent chowder. We are beginning to look for the return of the schooner, and have been longing for news from shore.
"A great haul of abalones this p.m. We filled our baskets, slung them on poles over our shoulders Coolie fashion, and slowly made our way back to camp. The baskets weighed a ton each before we at last emptied them by the cabin door. Built a huge fire under a cauldron, and left a mess of fish to boil until morning. The abalones are as large as steaks, and a great deal tougher. Smoke, cards, and to bed; used up.
"Same program as yesterday, only the novelty quite worn off, and this kind of life becoming almost unendurable.
"More eggs, more abalones, more rabbits. No signs of schooner yet. Wonder, had Crusoe kept a diary, how many days he would have kept it before closing it with chagrin.
"Spent the p.m. in getting the abalone shells down to the egg-house at the landing. We have cleaned them, and are hoping to find this speculation profitable; for the shells, when polished and cut, are much used in the market for inlaying and setting in cheap jewelry. We loaded a small tram, pushed it to the top of an incline, and let it roll down the other side to the landing, which it reached in safety. This is the only labor-saving machine at our command.
"We seem to be going all to pieces. The day commenced badly. Two of the boys inaugurated it by a violent set-to before breakfast—an old grudge broke out afresh, or perhaps the life here has demoralized them. I have lamed my foot. Tide too high for abalone fishing. Eggs growing scarce, and the rabbits seem to have deserted the accessible parts of the island. Everybody is disgusted. We are forgetting our table-manners, it is 'first come first served' now-a-days. I wonder if Robinson—oh, no! he had no one but his man Friday to contend against. No schooner; no change in the weather; tobacco giving out, and not a grain of good humor to be had in the market. To bed, very cross.
"No one felt like going to work this morning. Affairs began to look mutinous. We have searched in vain for the schooner, now considerably overdue, and are dreading the thought of having to fulfill a contract which calls for six weeks' labor on these islands. Some of the other islands are to be visited, and are accessible only in small boats over a sea that is never even tolerably smooth. This expedition we all dread a little—at least, I judge so from my own case—but we say nothing of it. While thus gloomily brooding over our plight, smoke was sighted on the horizon; we ascended the hill to watch it. A steamer, doubtless, bound for a sunnier clime, for no clime can be less sunny than ours of the past fortnight.... It was a steamer, a small Government steamer, making directly for our island. We became greatly excited, for nothing of any moment had occurred since our arrival. She drew in near shore and cast anchor. We gathered at the landing-cove to give her welcome. A boat was beached in safety. An officer of the law said, cheerfully, as if he were playing a part in a nautical comedy, 'I must beg you, gentlemen, to step on board the revenue cutter, and return to San Francisco.' We were so surprised we could not speak; or were we all speechless with joy, I wonder? He added, this very civil sheriff, 'If you do not care to accompany me, I shall be obliged to order the marines on shore. You will pardon me, but as these islands are Government property, you are requested to immediately withdraw from them.' We withdrew. We steamed away from the windy rocks, the howling caverns, the seething waves, the frightful chasms, the seabirds, the abalones, the rabbits, the gloomy cabins, and the pleasant people at the top of the cliff within the white walls of the lighthouse. Joyfully we bounded over the glassy waves, that grew beautiful as the Farallones faded in the misty distance, and, having been courteously escorted to the city dock, we were bidden farewell, and left to the diversions of the hour. Thus ended the last siege of the Farallones by the egg-pickers of San Francisco. (Profits nil.)"
And thus I fear, inasmuch as the Government proposes to guard the sea-birds until a suitable license is secured by legitimate egg-pickers, the price of gulls' eggs will go up in proportion, and hereafter we shall have to look upon them as luxuries, and content ourselves with the more modest and milder-flavored but undecorated products of the less romantic barn-yard fowl.
O LD Monterey"? Yes, old Monterey; yet not so very old. Old, however, inasmuch as she has been hopelessly modernized; the ancient virtue has gone out of her; she is but a monument and a memory. It is the Monterey of a dozen or fifteen years ago I write of; and of a brief sojourn after the briefer voyage thither. The voyage is the same; yesterday, to-day and forever it remains unchanged. The voyager may judge if I am right when I say that the Pacific coast, or the coast of California, Oregon and Washington, is the selvage side of the American continent. I believe this is evidenced in the well-rounded lines of the shore; the smooth meadow-lands that not infrequently lie next the sea, and the comparatively few island-fragments that are discoverable between Alaska and Mexico.
I made that statement, in the presence of a select few, on the promenade deck of a small coaster then plying between San Francisco and Monterey; and proved it during the eight-hour passage, to the seeming edification of my shipmates. Even the bluffs that occasionally jutted into the sea did the picturesque in a half-theatrical fashion. Time and the elements seemed to have toyed with them, and not fought with them, as is the annual custom on the eastern coast of the United States. Flocks of sheep fed in the salt pastures by the water's edge; ranch-houses were perched on miniature cliffs, in the midst of summer-gardens that even through a powerful field-glass showed few traces of wear and tear.
And the climate? Well, the sunshine was like sunshine warmed over; and there was a lurking chill in the air that made our quarters in the lee of the smoke-stack preferable to the circular settee in the stern-sheets. Yes, it was midsummer at heart, and the comfortable midsummer ulster advertised the fact.
What a long, lonesome coast it is! Erase the few evidences of life that relieve the monotonous landscape at infrequent intervals, and you shall see California exactly as Drake saw it more than four centuries ago, or the Argonaut Friars saw it a century later, and as the improved races will see it ages hence—a little bleak and utterly uninteresting.
California secretes her treasures. As you approach her from the sea, you would scarcely suspect her wealth; her lines, though fine and flowing, are not voluptuous, and she certainly lacks color. This was also a part of our steamer-talk under the lee of the smoke-stack; and while we were talking we turned a sharp corner, ran into the Bay of Monterey, and came suddenly face to face with Santa Cruz.
Ah, there was richness! Perennial groves, dazzling white cottages snow-flaking them with beauty; a beach with afternoon bathers; and two straggling piers that had waded out into deep water and stuck fast in the mud. A stroll through Santa Cruz does not dissipate the enchantment usually borrowed from usurious distance; and the two-hours'-roll in the deep furrows of the Bay, that the pilgrim to Monterey must suffer, is apt to make him regret he left that pleasant port in the hope of finding something pleasanter on the dim opposite shore.
We re-embarked for Monterey at dusk, when the distant horn of the Bay was totally obscured. It is seldom more than a half-imagined point, jutting out into a haze between two shades of blue. Stars watched over us,—sharp, clear stars, such as flare a little when the wind blows. But the wind was not blowing for us. Showers of sparks spangled the crape-like folds of smoke that trailed after us; the engine labored in the hold, and the sea heaved as it is always heaving in that wide-open Bay.
In an hour we steamed into a fog-bank, so dense that even the head-light of our ship was as a glowworm; and from that moment until we had come within sound of voices on the undiscovered shore, it was all like a voyage in the clouds. Whistles blew, bells rang, men shouted, and then we listened with hungry ears. A whistle answered us from shore—a piercing human whistle. Dim lights burned through the fog. We advanced with fearful caution; and while voices out of the air were greeting us, almost before we had got our reckoning, we drifted up under a dark pier, on which ghastly figures seemed to be floating to and fro, bidding us all-hail. And then and there the freedom of the city was extended to us, saturated with salt-sea mist. Probably six times in ten the voyager approaches Monterey in precisely this fashion. 'Tis true! 'Tis pity!
Having been hoisted up out of our ship—the tide was exceeding low and the dock high; having been embraced in turn by friends who had soaked for an hour and a half on that desolate pier-head—for our ship was belated, groping her way in the fog,—we were taken by the hand and led cautiously into the sand-fields that lie between the city and the sea.
Of course our plans had all miscarried. Our Bachelors' Hall fell with a dull thud when we heard that the chief bachelor had turned benedict three days before. But he was present with his bride, and he knew of a haunt that would compensate us for all loss or disappointment. We crossed the desert nursing a faint hope. We threaded one or two wide, weedy, silent streets; not a soul was visible, though it was but nine in the evening,—which was not to be wondered at, since the town was divided against itself: the one half slept, the other half still sat upon the pier, making a night of it; for old Monterey had but one shock that betrayed it into some show of human weakness. The cause was the Steam Navigation Co. The effect was a fatal fondness for tendering a public reception to all steamers arriving from foreign ports, after their sometimes tempestuous passages of from eight to ten hours. This insured the inhabitants a more or less festive night about once every week or ten days.
With rioutous laughter, which sounded harsh, yea, sacrilegious, in the sublime silence of that exceptional town, we were piloted into an abysmal nook sacred to a cluster of rookeries haggard in the extreme. We approached it by an improvised bridge two spans in breadth. The place was buried under layers of mystery. It was silent, it was dark with the blackness of darkness; it was like an unholy sepulchre that gave forth no sound, though we beat upon its sodden door with its rusted knocker until a dog howled dismally on the hillside afar off.
Some one admitted us at the last moment, and left us standing in the pitch-dark entrance while he went in search of candles, that apparently fled at his approach. The great room was thrown open in due season and with solemnity. It may have been the star-chamber in the days when Monterey was the capital of the youngest and most promising State in the Union; but it was somewhat out of date when we were ushered into it. A bargain was hastily struck, and we repaired to damp chambers, where every sound was shared in common, and nothing whatever was in the least degree private or confidential. We slept at intervals, but in turn; so that at least one good night's rest was shared by our company.
At nine o' the clock next morning we were still enveloped in mist, but the sun was struggling with it; and from my window I inspected Spanish or Mexican, or Spanish-Mexican, California interiors, sprinkled with empty tin cans, but redeemed by the more picturesque débris of the early California settlement—dingy tiles, forlorn cypresses, and a rosebush of gigantic body and prolific bloom.
We breakfasted at Simoneau's, in the inner room, with its frescos done in beer and shoeblacking by a brace of hungry Bohemians, who used to frequent the place and thus settle their bill. Five of us sat at that uninviting board and awaited our turn, while Simoneau hovered over a stove that was by no means equal to the occasion. It was a breakfast such as one is reduced to in a mountain camp, but which spoils the moment it is removed from the charmed circle of ravenous foresters. We paid three prices for it, but that was no consolation; and it was long before we again entered the doors of one of the chief restaurants of old Monterey.
Before the thick fog lifted that morning we had scoured the town in quest of lodgings. The hotels were uninviting. At the Washington the rooms were not so large as the demands of the landlord. At the St. Charles'—a summer-house without windows, save the one set in the door of each chamber—we located for a brief season, and exchanged the liveliest compliments with the lodgers at the extreme ends of the building. A sneeze in the dead of night aroused the house; and during one of the panics which were likely to follow, I peremptorily departed, and found shelter at last in the large square chamber of an adobe dwelling, the hospitable abode of one of the first families of Monterey. Broad verandas surrounded us on four sides; the windows sunk in the thick walls had seats deep enough to hold me and my lap tablet full in the sunshine—whenever it leaked through the fog.
Two of these windows opened upon a sandy street, beyond which was a tangled garden of cacti and hollyhock and sunflowers, with a great wall about it; but I could look over the wall and enjoy the privacy of that sweet haunt. In that cloistered garden grew the obese roses of the far West, that fairly burst upon their stem. Often did I exclaim: "O, for a delicate blossom, whose exquisite breath savors not of the mold, and whose sensitive petals are wafted down the invisible currents of the wind like a fairy flotilla!" Beyond that garden, beyond the roofs of this town, stretched the yellow sand-dunes; and in the distance towered the mountains, painted with changeful lights. My other window looked down the long, lonesome street to the blue Bay and the faint outline of the coast range beyond it.
Here I began to live; here I heard the harp-like tinkle of the first piano brought to the California coast; here also the guitar was touched skillfully by her grace the august lady of the house, who scorned the English tongue—the more eloquent and rhythmical Spanish prevailed under her roof. One of the members of the household was proud to recount the history of the once brilliant capital of the State, and I listened by the hour to a narrative that now reads to me like a fable.
In the year of Our Lord 1602, when Don Sebastian Viscaino—dispatched by the Viceroy of Mexico, acting under instructions from Philip III. of Spain—touched these shores, Mass was celebrated, the country taken possession of in the name of the Spanish King, and the spot christened Monterey in honor of Gaspar de Zuniga, Count of Monterey, Viceroy of Mexico. In eighteen days Viscaino again set sail, and the silence of the forest and the sea fell upon that lonely shore. That silence was unbroken by the voice of the stranger for one hundred and sixty-six years. Then Gaspar de Portola, Governor of Lower California, re-discovered Monterey, erected a cross upon the shore, and went his way.
In May, 1770, the final settlement took place. The packet San Antonio, commanded by Don Juan Perez, came to anchor in the port, "which"—wrote the leader of the expedition to Padre Francisco Palou—"is unadulterated in any degree from what it was when visited by the expedition of Don Sebastian Viscaino in 1602. After this"—the celebration of the Mass, the Salve to Our Lady, and a Te Deum,—"the officers took possession of the country in the name of the King (Charles III.) our lord, whom God preserve. We all dined together in a shady place on the beach; the whole ceremony being accompanied by many volleys and salutes by the troops and vessels."
When the San Antonio returned to Mexico, it left at Monterey Padre Junipero Serra and five other priests, Lieutenant Pedro Fages and thirty soldiers. The settlement was at once made capital of Alta California, and Portola appointed the first governor. The Presidio (an enclosure about three hundred yards square, containing a chapel, store-houses, offices, residences, and a barracks) was the nucleus of the city; but the mission was soon removed to a beautiful valley about six miles distant, where there was more room, better shelter from the cold west winds, and an unrivalled prospect. The valley is now known as Carmelo.
A fort was built upon a little hill commanding the settlement, and life began in good earnest. What followed? Mexico threw off the Spanish yoke; California was hence forth subject to Mexico alone. The news spread; vessels gathered in the harbor, and enormous profits were realized on the sale and shipment of the hides of wild cattle lately roaming upon a thousand hills.
Then came gradual changes in the government; they culminated in 1846 when Captain Mervin, at the head of two hundred and fifty men, raised the Stars and Stripes over Monterey, and a proclamation was read declaring California a portion of the United States.
The Rev. Walter Colton, once chaplain of the United States frigate Congress, was appointed first alcalde; and the result was the erection of a stone courthouse, which was long the chief ornament of the town; and, somewhat later, the publication of Alcalde Colton's highly interesting volume, entitled "Three Years in California."
I N 1829 Captain Robinson, the author of "Life in California" in the good old mission days, wrote thus of his first sight of Monterey: "The sun had just risen, and, glittering through the lofty pines that crowned the summit of the eastern hills, threw its light upon the lawn beneath. On our left was the Presidio, with its chapel dome and towering flag-staff in conspicuous elevation. On the right, upon a rising ground, was seen the castillo, or fort, surmounted by some ten or a dozen cannon. The intervening space between these two points was enlivened by the hundred scattered dwellings that form the town, and here and there groups of cattle grazing.
"After breakfast G. and myself went on shore, on a visit to the Commandant, Don Marian Estrada, whose residence stood in the central part of the town, in the usual route from the beach to the Presidio. In external appearance, notwithstanding it was built of adobe—brick made by the mixture of soft mud and straw, moulded and dried in the sun,—it was not displeasing; for the outer walls had been plastered and whitewashed, giving it a cheerful and inviting aspect. Like all dwellings in the warm countries of America, it was but one story in height, covered with tiles, and occupied, in its entire premises, an extensive square.
"Our Don was standing at his door; and as we approached, he sallied forth to meet us with true Castilian courtesy; embraced G., shook me cordially by the hand, then bowed us ceremoniously into the sala. Here we seated ourselves upon a sofa at his right. During conversation cigarritos passed freely; and, although thus early in the day, a proffer was made of refreshments."
In 1835 R.H. Dana, Jr., the author of "Two Years before the Mast," found Monterey but little changed; some of the cannon were unmounted, but the Presidio was still the centre of life on the Pacific coast, and the town was apparently thriving. Day after day the small boats plied between ship and shore, and the population gave themselves up to the delights of shopping. Shopping was done on shipboard; each ship was a storehouse of attractive and desirable merchandise, and the little boats were kept busy all day long bearing customers to and fro.
In 1846 prices were ruinously high, as the alcalde was free to confess—he being a citizen of the United States and a clergyman into the bargain. Unbleached cottons, worth 6 cents per yard in New York, brought 50 cents, 60 cents, 75 cents in old Monterey. Cowhide shoes were $10 per pair; the most ordinary knives and forks, $10 per dozen; poor tea, $3 per pound; truck-wheels, $75 per pair. The revenue of these enormous imposts passed into the hands of private individuals, who had placed themselves by violence or fraud at the head of the Government.
In those days a "blooded" horse and a pack of cards were thought to be among the necessaries of life. One of the luxuries was a rancho sixty miles in length, owned by Captain Sutter in the valley of the Sacramento. Native prisoners, arrested for robbery and confined in the adobe jail at Monterey, clamored for their guitars, and the nights were filled with music until the rascals swung at half-mast.
In August, 1846, The Californian, the first newspaper established on the coast, was issued by Colton & Semple. The type and press were once the property of the Franciscan friars, and used by them; and in the absence of the English w, the compositors on The Californian doubled the Spanish v. The journal was printed half in English and half in Spanish, on cigarette paper about the size of a sheet of fools-cap. Terms, $3 per year in advance; single copies, 12-1/2 cents each. Semple was a man just suited to the newspaper office he occupied; he stood six feet eight inches in moccasins, was dressed in buckskin, and wore a foxskin cap.
The first jury of the alcaldean court was empanelled in September, 1846. Justice flourished for about three years. In 1849 Bayard Taylor wrote: "Monterey has the appearance of a deserted town: few people in the streets, business suspended," etc. Rumors of gold had excited the cupidity of the inhabitants, and the capital was deserted; elsewhere was metal more attractive. The town never recovered from that shock. It gradually declined until few, save Bohemian artists and Italian and Chinese fishermen, took note of it. The settlement was obsolete in my day; the survivors seemed to have lost their memories and their interest in everything. Thrice in my early pilgrimages I asked where the Presidio had stood; on these occasions did the oldest inhabitant and his immediate juniors vaguely point me to three several quarters of the town. I believe in my heart that the pasture in front of the old church—then sacred to three cows and a calf—was the cradle of civilization in the far West.
The original custom-house—there was no mistaking it, for it was founded on a rock—overhung the sea, while the waves broke gently at its base, and rows of sea-gulls sat solemnly on the skeletons of stranded whales scattered along the beach. A Captain Lambert dwelt on the first floor of the building; a goat fed in the large hall—it bore the complexion of a stable—where once the fashionable element tripped the light fantastic toe. In those days the first theatre in the State was opened with brilliant success, and the now long-forgotten Binghams appeared in that long-forgotten drama, "Putnam, or the Lion Son of '76." The never-to-be-discourteously-mentioned years of our pioneers, '49 and '50, "were memorable eras in the Thespian records of Monterey," says the guide-book. They were indeed; for Lieutenant Derby, known to the literary world as "John Phoenix" and "Squibob," was one of the leading spirits of the stage. But the Thespian records came to an untimely end, and it must be confessed that Monterey no longer tempts the widely strolling player.
I saw her in decay, the once flourishing capital. The old convent was windowless, and its halls half filled with hay; the barracks and the calaboose, inglorious ruins; the Block House and the Fort, mere shadows of their former selves. As for Colton Hall—the town-hall, named in honor of its builder, the first alcalde,—it is a modern-looking structure, that scarcely harmonizes with the picturesque adobes that surround it. Colton said of it: "It has been erected out of the slender proceeds of town lots, the labor of the convicts, taxes on liquor shops, and fines on gamblers. The scheme was regarded with incredulity by many; but the building is finished, and the citizens have assembled in it, and christened it after my name, which will go down to posterity with the odor of gamblers, convicts and tipplers." Bless his heart! he need not have worried himself. No one seems to know or care how the building was constructed; and as for the name it bears, it is as savory as any.
The church was built in 1794, and dedicated as the parish church in 1834, when the missions were secularized and Carmelo abandoned. It is the most interesting structure in the town. Much of the furniture of the old mission is preserved here: the holy vessels beaten out of solid silver; rude but not unattractive paintings by nameless artists—perhaps by the friars themselves,—landmarks of a crusade that was gloriously successful, but the records of which are fading from the face of the earth.
Doubtless the natives who had flourished under the nourishing care of the mission in its palmy days, wagged their heads wittingly when the brig Natalia met her fate. Tradition says Napoleon I. made his escape from Elba on that brig. It was by the Natalia that Hijar, Director of Colonization, arrived for the purpose of secularizing the missions; and his scheme was soon accomplished. But the winds blew, and the waves rose and beat upon the little brig, and laid her bones in the sands of Monterey. It is whispered that when the sea is still and the water clear, and the tide very, very low, one may catch faint glimpses of the skeleton of the Natalia swathed in its shroud of weeds.
There are two attractions in the vicinity, without which I fear Monterey would have ultimately passed from the memory of man. These are the mission at Carmelo, and the Druid grove at Cypress Point. In the edge of the town there is a cross which marks the spot where Padre Junipero Serra sang his first Mass at Monterey. It was a desolate picture when I last saw it. It stood but a few yards from the sea, in a lonely hollow. It was a favorite subject with the artists who found their way thither, and who were wont to paint it upon the sea-shells that lay almost within reach. Now a marble statue of Junipero Serra, erected by Mrs. Leland Stanford, marks the spot.
Six miles away, beyond the hills, above the shallow river, in sight of the sparkling sea, is the ruin of Carmelo. From the cross by the shore to the church beyond the hills, one reads the sacred history of the coast from alpha to omega. This, the most famous, if not the most beautiful, of all the Franciscan missions, has suffered the common fate. In my day the roof was wanting; the stone arches were crumbling one after another; the walls were tufted with sun-dried grass; everywhere the hand of Vandalism had scrawled his initials or his name. The nave of the church was crowded with neglected graves. Fifteen governors of the territory mingle their dust with that consecrated earth, but there was never so much as a pebble to mark the spot where they lie. Even the saintly Padre Junipero, who founded the mission, and whose death was grimly heroic, lay until recent years in an unknown tomb. Thanks to the pious efforts of the late Father Cassanova, the precious remains of Junipero Serra, together with those of three other friars of the mission, were discovered, identified, and honorably reentombed.
From 1770 to 1784 Padre Junipero Serra entered upon the parish record all baptisms, marriages, and deaths. These ancient volumes are carefully preserved, and are substantially bound in leather; the writing is bold and legible, and each entry is signed "Fray Junipero Serra," with an odd little flourish of the pen beneath. The last entry is dated July 30, 1784; then Fray Francesco Palou, an old schoolmate of Junipero Serra, and a brother friar, records the death of his famous predecessor, and with it a brief recital of his life work, and the circumstances at the close of it.
Junipero Serra took the habit of the order of St. Francis at the age of seventeen; filled distinguished positions in Spain and Mexico before going to California; refused many tempting and flattering honors; was made president of the fifteen missions of Lower California—long since abandoned; lived to see his last mission thrive mightily, and died at the age of seventy—long before the fall of the crowning work of his life.
Feeling the approach of death, Junipero Serra confessed himself to Fray Palou; went through the Church offices for the dying; joined in the hymn Tantum Ergo "with elevated and sonorous tones," saith the chronicle,—the congregation, hearing him intone his death chaunt, were awed into silence, so that the dying man's voice alone finished the hymn; then he repaired to his cell, where he passed the night in prayer. The following morning he received the captain and chaplain of a Spanish vessel lying in the harbor, and said, cheerfully, he thanked God that these visitors, who had traversed so much of sea and land, had come to throw a little earth upon his body. Anon he asked for a cup of broth, which he drank at the table in the refectory; was then assisted to his bed, where he had scarcely touched the pillow when, without a murmur, he expired.
In anticipation of his death, he had ordered his own coffin to be made by the mission carpenter; and his remains were at once deposited in it. So precious was the memory of this man in his own day that it was with the utmost difficulty his coffin was preserved from destruction; for the populace, venerating even the wooden case that held the remains of their spiritual Father, clamored for the smallest fragment; and, though a strong body-guard watched over it until the interment, a portion of his vestment was abstracted during the night. One thinks of this and of the overwhelming sorrow that swept through the land when this saintly pioneer fell at the head of his legion.
The California mission reached the height of its prosperity forty years later, when it owned 87,600 head of cattle, 60,000 sheep, 2,300 calves, 1,800 horses, 365 yoke of oxen, much merchandise, and $40,000 in specie. Tradition hints that this money was buried when a certain piratical-looking craft was seen hovering about the coast.
This wealth is all gone now—scattered among the people who have allowed the dear old mission to fall into sad decay. What a beautiful church it must have been, with its quaint carvings, its star-window that seems to have been blown out of shape in some wintry wind, and all its lines hardened again in the sunshine of the long, long summer; with its Saracenic door!—what memories the Padres must have brought with them of Spain and the Moorish seal that is set upon it! Here we have evidence of it painfully wrought out by the hands of rude Indian artisans. The ancient bells have been carried away into unknown parts; the owl hoots in the belfry; the hills are shown of their conventual tenements; while the wind and the rain and a whole heartless company of iconoclasts have it all their own way.
Once in the year, on San Carlos' Day, Mass is sung in the only habitable corner of the ruin; the Indians and the natives gather from all quarters, and light candles among the graves, and mourn and mourn and make a strange picture of the place; then they go their way, and the owl returns, and the weeds grow ranker, and every hour there is a straining among the weakened joists, and a creaking and a crumbling in many a nook and corner; and so the finest historical relic in the land is suffered to fall into decay. Or, perhaps I should say, that was the sorry state of Carmelo in my day. I am assured that every effort is now being made to restore and preserve beautiful Carmelo.