Footnotes:
[1] The final e was added to Henry Hart’s name in the last years of his life, and the family tradition is that this was done to distinguish him from another Henry Hart who, like himself, was very active in the political campaign of the year 1844.
[2] For the spelling of Henry Hart’s name, see the footnote on page 1.
[3] The Crusade of the Excelsior contains some reminiscences of the voyage.
[4] The following account of a ride in a California stage is given by Borthwick: “All sense of danger was lost in admiration of the coolness and dexterity of the driver as he circumvented every obstacle without going one inch farther out of his way than was necessary to save us from perdition. With his right foot he managed a brake, and, clawing at the reins with both hands, he swayed his body from side to side, to preserve his equilibrium, as now on the right pair of wheels, now on the left, he cut the outside edge round a stump or a rock; and when coming to a spot where he was going to execute a difficult manœuvre on a slanting piece of ground, he trimmed the wagon, as we would a small boat in a squall, and made us all crowd up to the weather side to prevent a capsize.”
[5] Cressy. The paragraph quoted is only a part of the description.
[6] A Phyllis of the Sierras.
[7] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 102.
[8] Side-meat is the thin flank of a pig, cured like a ham. It was the staple article of food in the Southwest.
[9] This poem is included in the author’s collected poems under the title, The Return of Belisarius.
[10] Bret Harte in the General Introduction to his works.
[11] The proof-sheets of the Heathen Chinee are preserved in the University of California, and they show many changes in Bret Harte’s writing. See “Bret Harte’s Country,” an interesting illustrated article by Will. M. Clemens, in “The Bookman,” vol. xiii, p. 224.
[12] The Society upon the Stanislaus first appeared in the “News Letter.”
[13] See Hittell’s “History of California.” This book, the best and fullest on the subject, contains ample evidence of our author’s accuracy.
[14] A Forty-Niner, as defined by the California Society of Pioneers, is an immigrant who, before midnight of December 31, 1849, was within the State of California, or on shipboard within three miles of the coast, that being the extent of the maritime jurisdiction of the State.
[15] There was, however, a miner of seventy at Sonoma who had left a wife and six children at home in the East; and on October 1, 1850, there arrived in Sacramento a veteran of the Revolutionary War, ninety years of age. He had come all the way from Illinois to seek the fortune which fate had hitherto denied him. Unfortunately, he was so feeble that it became necessary to send him to a hospital, and history does not record his subsequent career, if indeed he survived to have one.
[16] “Pioneer Times in California.”
[17] Mr. Kipling, who visited California in the year 1898, speaks of “the remarkable beauty” of the women of San Francisco,—descendants in most cases of the Pioneers.
[18] The Reverend Walter Colton, “Three Years in California.”
[19] Just across the river, in the State of Illinois, is another Pike County, similar in soil and population; and this Illinois county was the scene of John Hay’s “Pike County Ballads.”
[20] Eliza W. Farnham, “California, Indoors and Out.”
[21] Bayard Taylor, “El Dorado.”
[22] Edwin Bryant, “California.”
[23] See Thornton’s “Oregon and California in 1848.”
[24] A Waif of the Plains.
[25] When the Waters Were Up at “Jules’.”
[26] In A First Family of Tasajara he gives the same explanation for the beauty of Clementina, which is described as “hopelessly and even wantonly inconsistent with her surroundings.”
[27] “The coarse, the horny-handed, the bull-throated were the most successful. They set the fashion, those great men of the pickaxe and the pistol, and a fine, fire-eating, antediluvian, reckless fashion it was.”—W. M. Fisher, “The Californians.”
[28] How long this continued to be the California point of view is shown by an interesting reminiscence of Professor Royce’s. “I reached twenty years of age without ever becoming clearly conscious of what was meant by judging a man by his antecedents, a judgment that in an older and less isolated community is natural and inevitable, and that, I think, in most of our Western communities grows up more rapidly than it has grown up in California, where geographical isolation is added to the absence of tradition.”
[29] D. B. Woods, “Sixteen Months at the Gold Diggings.”
[30] G. K. Chesterton, in “The Critic.”
[31] “Perils, Pastimes and Pleasures of an Emigrant,” by J. W.
[32] Eliza W. Farnham, “California, Indoors and Out.”
[33] Dancing was a common amusement among the miners even when there were no women to be had as partners. “It was a strange sight to see a party of long-bearded men, in heavy boots and flannel shirts, going through all the steps and figures of the dance with so much spirit, and often with a great deal of grace; hearty enjoyment depicted on their dried-up, sun-burned faces, and revolvers and bowie-knives glancing in their belts; while a crowd of the same rough-looking customers stood around, cheering them on to greater efforts, and occasionally dancing a step or two quietly on their own account.”—Borthwick’s “Three Years in California.”
[34] The Romance of Madroño Hollow.
[35] The Reverend Walter Colton, “Three Years in California.”
[36] W. M. Fisher, “The Californians.”
[37] Mrs. D. B. Bates, “Incidents on Land and Water.”
[38] J. M. Letts, “California Illustrated.”
[39] “Our Italy.”
[40] This quality seems to have persisted, if we can trust Mr. Rudyard Kipling, who wrote in the year 1899: “San Francisco is a mad city.... Recklessness is in the air. I can’t explain where it comes from, but there it is. The roaring winds off the Pacific make you drunk, to begin with.”
[41] Stephen J. Field, “Personal Reminiscences of California.”
[42] William Grey, “Pioneer Times in California.”
[43] See the San Francisco “Herald” of May 19, 1856.
[44] D. B. Woods, “Sixteen Months at the Gold Diggings.”
[45] The Captain calmly directed the transfer of the women and children, kept his place on the paddle-box, and went down with the others. He was James Lewis Herndon, a Commander in the United States Navy, and the explorer of the Amazon. A monument to his memory was erected by brother officers in the grounds of the Naval Academy at Annapolis. The steamer was bringing $2,000,000 in gold, and the loss of this treasure increased the commercial panic then prevailing in the Atlantic States.
[46] Baron Fairfax of Cameron in the Peerage of Scotland. Many stories are told of his adventures in California.
[47] Bayard Taylor, who visited the mining camps in the winter of ’49, found them well organized under the rule of an Alcalde. “Nothing in California,” he wrote, “seemed more miraculous to me than this spontaneous evolution of social order from the worst elements of anarchy.”
[48] William Grey, “Pioneer Times in California.”
[49] “Seeking the Golden Fleece.”
[50] Shucks, “Bench and Bar of California.”
[51] William Grey, “Pioneer Times in California.”
[52] S. J. Field, “Personal Reminiscences of Early Days in California.”
[53] Journalistic affrays were frequent. See page 192 infra.
[54] C. W. Haskins, “The Argonauts of California.”
[55] “Emerson in Concord,” page 94.
[56] Introduction to volume ii of Bret Harte’s works.
[57] “Alta California” of July 21, 1851.
[58] The Reverend William Taylor, “California Life.”
[59] In one day two women, crazed by the sufferings of their children, drowned themselves in the Humboldt River.
[60] E. W. Farnham, “California Indoors and Out.”
[61] Before the Civil War, the treatment of women, even in the Eastern cities, was almost invariably courteous and respectful. It was the exception, in New York or Boston, when a man neglected to give up his seat in a public conveyance to a woman; whereas, nowadays the exception is the other way. Profound respect shown to woman as woman is incompatible with a society founded upon an aristocratic, plutocratic, or caste system. It was never known in England. It is the product of a real democracy and of that alone; and in this country, as we become more and more plutocratic, the respect for women diminishes. The great cities of the United States are fast approaching, in this regard, the brutality of London, Paris and Berlin.
[62] In the poem, Concepcion de Arguello.
[63] H. A. Wise, “Los Gringos.”
[64] H. R. Helper, “The Land of Gold.”
[65] Horace Greeley, “An Overland Journey from New York to San Francisco.”
[66] How Santa Claus came to Simpson’s Bar.
[67] A Ward of the Golden Gate.
[68] S. C. Upham, “Scenes in El Dorado.”
[69] Volume xv, page 466.
[70] See also page 103, supra.
[71] The late Sherman Hoar of Concord, whose name is inscribed on the tablet in Memorial Hall devoted to those Harvard Graduates who lost their lives in the Spanish War, was almost exactly such a character as Bret Harte described,—long to be remembered with affection.
[72] H. H. Bancroft, “Chronicles of the Builders.”
[73] C. W. Haskins, “The Argonauts of California.”
[74] Benton, “The California Pilgrim.”
[75] A Passage in the Life of Mr. John Oakhurst.
[76] Delano, “Life on the Plains.”
[77] “The Virginia Editor is a young, unmarried, intemperate, pugnacious, gambling gentleman.”—George W. Bagby, “The Old Virginia Gentlemen and Other Sketches.”
[78] They were the Reverend Walter Colton, Chaplain in the United States Navy, and Alcalde, as already mentioned, and Dr. Robert Semple, a well-known Pioneer politician.
[79] “Men and Memories of San Francisco,” by Barry and Patten.
[80] “California: its Characteristics and Prospects.”
[82] It must be admitted that the ministers were placed in a difficult situation, being obliged to cope with the hardy, humorous materialism of Pioneer life. The following dialogue is an authentic illustration:—
“Mr. Small, do not you believe in the overruling Providence of God?”
“Which God?”
“There is but one God.”
“I don’t see it, Parson. On this yere Pacific Coast gods is numerous—Chinee gods, Mormon gods, Injin gods, Christian gods, an’ the Bank o’ Californy!”—“The Californians,” by W. M. Fisher.
[83] A traveller passing through Dolores in Mexico was the witness of a marriage like that of Stephen Masterton: “Whilst stopping here I saw a smart-looking Yankee and a Spanish girl married by the priest, whose words were interpreted to the bridegroom as the ceremony proceeded. The lady was of rather dark complexion but extremely pretty; and although she knew scarcely a word of English, and the bridegroom knew still less of Spanish, it was evident from the eloquence of the glances which passed between them, that they were at no loss to make themselves understood.”—“Personal Adventures in Upper and Lower California,” W. R. Ryan.
[84] Mrs. Kemble, on the other hand, as the Reader may remember, described him as “tall.” His real height, already mentioned, was five feet, eight inches.
[85] W. D. Howells, “Literary Friends and Acquaintance.”
[86] See Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 228.
[87] My Friend the Tramp, written in 1872.
[88] Samuel Bowles, famous as Editor of the “Springfield Republican.”
[89] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 133.
[90] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 136.
[91] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” pp. 137-142.
[92] These lectures, with a short address delivered in London, have recently been published in a volume entitled “The Lectures of Bret Harte,” by Charles Meeker Kozlay, New York.
[93] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 145.
[94] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” pp. 168-170.
[95] It was now a Commercial Agency, the grade next below that of a Consulship.
[96] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 173.
[97] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 186.
[98] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 181.
[99] See footnote on page 244, supra.
[100] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” p. 265.
[101] St. Kentigern established a Bishopric in the year 560 in the place which afterward became Glasgow, and thus he is regarded as the founder of the city. His monument is shown beneath the choir of the Cathedral where his body was interred A. D. 601.
[102] By the regulations then in force Consuls were forbidden to be absent from their posts for a period exceeding ten days, without first obtaining leave from the President.
[103] Pemberton’s “Life of Bret Harte,” page 334.
[104] Mary Stuart Boyd. See “Harper’s Magazine,” vol. 105, page 773.
[105] His friend and travelling companion, Colonel Arthur Collins.
[108] When news of the death of Dickens reached Bret Harte he was camping in the Foot-Hills, far from San Francisco, but he sent a telegram to hold back for a day the printing of the “Overland,” then ready for the press, and his poem was written that night and forwarded the next morning. A week or two later Bret Harte received a cordial letter from Dickens, written just before his death, complimenting the California author, and requesting him to write a story for “All the Year Round.”
[109] A miner, writing in August, 1850, from the Middle Fork of the American River, said: “When I came up here, the river was a roaring torrent, and its sombre music could plainly be heard upon the tops of the mountains rising to a height of about three thousand feet.”
[110] G. H. Denny, President of Washington and Lee University.
[111] Thomas E. Cramblet, President of Bethany College.
[112] Gerard Fowke, author of the “Archæological History of Ohio.”
[113] R. H. Crossfield, President of Transylvania University.
[114] J. I. D. Hinds, Dean of the University of Nashville.
[115] For the meaning of “Pike,” see supra, page 59.
[116] Through the Santa Clara Wheat.
[117] How Santa Claus Came to Simpson’s Bar.
[118] R. L. Stevenson.
[119] The author had described this scene before in prose, though he may have forgotten it. In the story called Who Was My Quiet Friend? he wrote: “The pines in the caftan below were olive gulfs of heat, over which a hawk here and there drifted lazily, or, rising to our level, cast a weird and gigantic shadow of slowly moving wings on the mountain-side.”
Transcriber’s Notes:
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Punctuation has been corrected without note.
Other than the corrections noted by hover information, inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation have been retained from the original.