Part 4

Fearless, they plunged into the thickets, swam the streams, hunted game, caught the bear and bison, trapped the fowl, and dauntlessly lived on in fear of neither nature, beast nor man--primitive--just a savage, but possessing the fundamental requisites from which all civilizations, sects, isms, or communities have been evolved--a human being with a soul.

Therefore the red man is to America what the cave man is to Europe--the father of his country.

In the history of our State the aborigines played an all-important part, as the founding of the missions by the Friars was with the avowed intention of reclaiming these children of the wilderness, to teach them civilization.

The first mention made of the Indians in Marin County is found in an old legend which states that about the time of the erection of the Mission at San Francisco a party of Spaniards crossed the Straits at what is now known as Lime Point and traveled northward. It was late in the season, and they found no streams of running water until they arrived at Olompali, so named from a great and powerful tribe of Indians who dwelt at this place, the Olompalis. Here they were kindly received by the natives, and all their wants were supplied as far as it lay in their power. The party was so well entertained that the leaders decided to remain a fortnight and recruit their horses and become thoroughly rested, preparatory to proceeding on their arduous journey. In return for the kindness received, they taught the Indians how to make adobe brick and construct a house.

That history corroborates this legend is shown in an old chronicle by the biographer of Junipero Serra, Father Palou, which says that "in 1776, after the Presidio and before the Mission (in San Francisco) were established, an exploration of the interior was organized as usual by sea (the bay), and land."

Thus, in the northeast corner of the County, near Novato, was built the first adobe house north of San Francisco Bay, on the Olompali Rancho, owned by the late Dr. Burdell.

The first adobe has long since disappeared, the last mention found of it being a remark of General Vallejo's when, some thirty years ago, on passing the Olompali Rancho and pointing to a crumbling adobe he remarked to a companion, "That is over a hundred years old."

But the adobe that concerns us, the long, low, rambling adobe, is still standing in good condition and occupied by Dr. Burdell's family. This was supposedly the second built and is accredited to have been constructed by the last chief of the tribe, Camillo Ynitia.

Camillo, after obtaining three successive patents for the Rancho, first from Spain, then from Mexico, and lastly from the United States, sold it for five thousand dollars, which he was believed to have buried in the vicinity. Refusing to divide the proceeds of the Rancho, and furthermore to disclose the spot where the gold was buried, Camillo was subsequently murdered by his brother.

The Olompali Rancho is beautifully situated, lying as it does at the base of Mt. Olompali which is believed to be an extinct volcano.

Mortars found five feet under ground in the river bed, together with sand, mud, gravel, pebbles, and cement strata on the mountain side, testify to volcanic action.

From this mountain which formerly, in unknown ages emitted hot, sulphuric gases from its bosom, now runs a clear and limpid stream, a perpetual penance to nature for the havoc it once wrought.

When the Spaniards first visited the County, there were said to be thirty distinct tribes of Indians, each with its separate chief; while their language or dialect differed materially.

That they lived on mussels, sturgeon, and game from the marshes, is evidenced by the remains found in the huge shell mounds distributed throughout the County.

What these mounds are and how they became so, is merely a matter of conjecture, although the scientists of the University of California and Stanford are revealing additional clues from time to time as new deposits are discovered.

In the Marin mounds have been found mortars and pestles, queer old pipes, beads of wampum, oyster picks, skulls, and in many instances entire skeletons, while the arrow-points testify to certain warlike propensities, although on the whole they were said to be peaceful tribes.

The bows which they used with such celerity and skill were uniquely fashioned; the cord consisting of the nerves taken from a deer's back. The Marin Indians and in fact all the California tribes, dwelt in small huts built of willows with tules or rushes, and formed by taking a few poles, placing them in a circle, and finally weaving them together to a conical point, giving, when completed, the appearance of inverted baskets.

They were usually constructed on the banks of streams, and, being small, were easily warmed in winter.

The aborigines' knowledge of the proper treatment of disease was very limited. Roots and herbs were sometimes used as remedies but the "sweat-house" (temescal) was the principal reliance in desperate cases.

One of these sweat-houses was found on the Nicasio Rancheria, just over the Olompali Mountains.

It consisted of a large circular excavation, covered with a roof of boughs, plastered with mud, having a hole on one side for an entrance, another in the roof to serve as a chimney.

A fire having been lit in the center, the sick were placed there to undergo a sweat bath for many hours, to be succeeded by a plunge in the ice-cold waters of a neighboring stream.

This treatment was their cure-all, and whether it killed or relieved the patient depended upon the nature of his disease and his constitution.

It seems but fitting that this County, which formerly was a favorite rendezvous of the Indians, should derive its name from a famous chief of the Lacatuit Indians, who frequented the southern part of the Peninsula.

Between the years 1815 and 1824 Chief Marin, aided by his people, is said to have vanquished the Spaniards in several skirmishes for supremacy. Being finally captured by his enemies, and making his escape, Marin took shelter on a tiny island in upper San Francisco Bay. This island being subsequently called after him, communicated its name to the adjacent mainland.

Falling into the hands of his foes a second time, he barely escaped being put to death through the interference of the priests at the Mission San Rafael.

While surveying the County several years ago, Mr. Jacob Leese had with him as assistants the old Indian chief, Marin, and some of his followers. It became necessary for the surveyor to establish an initial point on the top of Mt. Tamalpais, and he wished Marin and some others to go up with him. To this they made strong objections, stating that the top of the Mountain was inhabited by evil spirits, and no one could go up there and come back alive. After vainly trying to persuade them to accompany him, Mr. Leese, finally decided to go up alone, which he did, the Indians prophesying that they never expected to see him again.

On reaching the top and accomplishing his purpose, he was puzzled to know how he could convince the redskins of having reached the summit. To do this he placed a large limb across an old dead tree, thus forming a cross which could be seen in the Valley below. He then descended and directed the attention of the Indians to the cross.

Prior to this, Marin had been considered by his followers as the bravest man in the world. He therefore found that it would never do for him to be afraid to attempt what a white man had accomplished.

Marin then determined, against the most earnest entreaties of his men, to go up where the white man had been. Tearing himself from his men he ascended the Mountain alone and when there had to study how he should convince his followers of the fact.

Unwinding his outer blanket he suspended it on the arm of Mr. Leese's cross, having done which, he descended the Mountain.

On seeing him without his garment, his followers concluded that he had been robbed by the Devil himself; but pointing out to them his blanket waving upon the cross, much joy was expressed over his restoration to them as the bravest of the brave.

The foregoing tale is only one of many which illustrate the profound superstitions prevailing among the Indians.

Certain rocks and mountains were regarded as sacred, while the grizzly was held in superstitious awe, nothing inducing them to eat its flesh.

The idea of a future state was universal among the California Indians, for as they expressed it, "as the moon died and came to life again so man came to life after death," and they believed that "the hearts of good chiefs went up to the sky and were changed into stars to keep watch over their tribes on earth."

A short distance from the Olompali Rancho is Novato, a small town which until a few years ago possessed the largest apple orchard in the world.

At the present time the New York and the Novato French cheese factories are its only noteworthy industries. The latter, which is representative of a thriving, modern cheese-factory, is conveniently located beside the California Northwestern Railway on whose cars the local shipments are made twice each day.

But this local trade is by no means the factory's sole outlet, for besides supplying the Coast and the East as far as Iowa (where another branch is located), cheese is exported to the Hawaiian Islands, Japan, China and other foreign countries.

In this unpretentious building, in which but twelve men are employed, fifty thousand five-pound cases of cheese are manufactured a year, or a little more than four thousand (cases) a month. In the spring from twelve hundred to fourteen hundred pounds of cheese are manufactured each day.

Besides its famous Circle Brand Breakfast Cheese, the Novato French Cheese Factory manufactures large quantities of Fromage de Brie, Neufch, Sierra, Fromage de Chanembert, Schlosskase and Kummelkase.

On a tiny island amid the marshes in this, the extreme northeastern corner of Marin, is located the Miramonte Club. A sportsman's club in every particular, it is very advantageously situated, for around these northern marshes the game is very plentiful and the sportsman is usually rewarded for his labor.

Besides the fowl for the larder, there are many other birds about the marshes. In summer redwinged blackbirds, each with its scarlet shoulder-patch, may frequently be seen, while the herons with their long, ungainly legs are often visible wading in the pools, or standing on some lonely reef, like solitary sentinels.

In the winter, great flocks of little sandpipers frequent this region; their white breasts gleaming in the sun in the course of their graceful evolutions. Then there are the slender beaked curlews which, like the heron, wade about the pools in search of food.

In the fall and winter the salt-water marshes have a peculiar charm not only for the sportsmen who delight in the abounding bird-life, but for the humble excursionists who, gunless, admire the marvelous diversity of coloring displayed in the grotesquely shaped marshland.

For no other weed, grass or vine assumes a greater variety of tints than the marsh vegetation, which from the dull russet of summer changes to a combination of olive, purple, magenta, copper, and violet, so harmoniously blended that, besides charming the observer, it lures many a local artist from his studio in town.

In Marin the feathered songsters hold a unique place, for, as the county is sparsely populated, possessing many wild, secluded valleys, and unnumbered rolling hills covered with virgin forests, it is but natural that the birds should congregate in great numbers, reveling in the solitude which man invariably destroys.

If the traveler is interested in these woodland tenants, and would learn something of their haunts and life, he should visit one who knows them as Thoreau knew all the wild and untamed things of nature.

A short distance from Fairfax the San Geronimo Valley, nestling among the hills, is a fitting location for this naturalist and bird-lover.

Though a taxidermist of much skill, Mr. Charles Allen is more widely known among ornithologists by that little fairy creature which makes its appearance in the early spring, known as Allen's Hummingbird.

Although similar in point of size, it is in its coloring that Allen's Hummer may be distinguished from other hummingbirds, for its green back, ruffus-tail, streaked with black, dark-wings and ruffus head, easily separate it from other varieties.

To a reflective mind there is no time of the year more joyous than spring. All nature seems gay and full of promise. Hope is vibrant in the air, and enters into the nature of the receptive man through more senses than science has yet named or discovered--an unnamed sense which is neither sight, nor sound, nor touch, nor intuition, a vibrant unseen force which is current throughout the universe, connecting man, unknowingly, to every tree, shrub, and atom. Thus, in the spring one feels that:

"There's a chorus in the valleys and an anthem on the hills There's an echo from the music which our inner being thrills Till we long to journey outward where no other foot has trod, And join in the song of worship at the shrine of Nature's God."

Spring is synonymous with the return of the birds, and their blythe little songs are but another promise of hope and expectation.

Following close upon the return of Allen's Hummingbird is the little piliolated warbler with his green back, pale, sulphur yellow breast, and tiny "pee wit" call.

When the climbing roses are becoming gay with blossoms, our old friends, the linnets, returning from their winter's sojourn in lower California, begin to build their nests.

A walk in the woods in the early morning or evening will acquaint one with another spring bird, Vaux's Swift, invariably seen about the streams.

In our hasty glimpse of the birds, it is impossible to enumerate all the feathered flock, and the renewal of a few old acquaintances will have to suffice. A very characteristic summer inhabitant of Marin's woodlands is the Red Shafted Flicker, a large bird, conspicuous when flying for its gay plumage, and often seen about the stumps of rotten trees, in the holes of which it makes its nest. While strolling in the woods we are often startled by a sharp rat-tat-tat on a neighboring alder, and on close approach a flutter of wings discloses a black-and-white creature with a dash of scarlet on his head. This is Harris's Woodpecker which makes the silent woods resound to its noisy rapping. A harsh, squawking call, a swift flight of blue wings, and an ensuing, noisy chatter announce the saucy California jay--the least lovable to my mind of all the California birds. He is the Rockefeller of the bird-world, consuming and destroying the eggs of his fellow birds, leaving destruction and ruin in his wake in the shape of desolate, broken nests. A pleasing contrast to this sharp, unruly bird, is the large, beautiful orange mottled Bullock's Oriole, who fills the air near sundown, with his rich, melodious warble, which he repeats with never-tiring zeal.

Of the fall birds, the crows and Brewer's Blackbirds are the most notable. Though the former are with us the entire year, it is in the fall, in flocking time, that their loud caw-caw-caw is heard as in bands they circle above the tree-tops; while Brewer's Blackbirds, sleek, glossy fellows, after foraging throughout the day in the valleys, soar to some huge dead pine tree and chatter through the twilight hours, flying when night arrives, with one accord, to a patch of tules in some pond where they settle for the night.

Of the non-migrating birds, the little dark brown Wren Tit, inhabitant of thickets; the dull gray and white Titmouse, frequenter of oaks; the friendly little California Chickadee; not to mention the great horned Owls with their deep hoo-hoo-hoo, the barn-owls with their treble screech, and lastly the beautiful oft-abused Quail, are but a few of the interesting native inhabitants of Marin.

Owing to the widely scattered population in the northern part of Marin County, this section is consequently more wild and natural in appearance than the southern half.

Lying at the base of a range of high hills which slope somewhat abruptly to the Ocean are the most interesting natural phenomena in this region. This is a chain of sparkling lakes, three in number, which at first view on descending the precipitous roadway seem to be connected with the Ocean so near its edge do they appear.

Upon close approach, however, we discovered them to be of fresh water and at an elevation of nine hundred feet above sea level, but their close proximity to the Ocean and the cavernous inlets opening from the sea would intimate their former connection.

On the shore of the largest of these, Shafter Lake, is located, amid the luxuriant copse wood, the Point Reyes Sportsmen's Club House. As the lakes are stocked with black bass, land-locked salmon, and various kinds of trout the angler is a familiar figure in the vicinity; and the abounding deer, quail, ducks, and snipe, attract the huntsman, while the beauty of these unique lakes and their picturesque environs, though little known to the general public, induce many a local pedestrian to take the twelve-mile tramp from Olema, through the forests over the steep ridges and down among the chemisal and sagebrush to this Ocean retreat.

Some four miles northwest of the lakes a narrow valley, lined by massive barren hills, winds its way to the Pacific. Mammoth oaks adorn its wild and tangled glades, huge redwoods lift their lofty tops to the sky, while ferns and trailing vines festoon the banks and rocks with such luxuriance that the whole seems a riot of contending greens.

Winding in and out like a silver thread among the stately trees and saplings is a little stream which fills the air with freshness and the cadence of a song, while hanging in fantastic, airy festoons from the trees which look in consequence like bearded Druids, covering trunks and branches, spreading its delicate traceries on the rocks, and abounding on every conceivable object are such masses of vari-colored moss that one would feign exclaim, "Surely this should be called Moss, not Bear Valley!" for while the latter roving inhabitants have long since disappeared, the former is and no doubt will remain, in evidence until the forest is no more.

It is necessary to see this Valley in order to comprehend its beauty.

One can drive through its cool depths on a finely graded road amid thousands of majestic trees, while here and there an open space reveals the sunlight and the blue sky overhead in contrast with the dim, uncertain light pervading its woodland stretches.

No lover of the beautiful can regret a jaunt to this delightful spot, for the charm and witchery of its unique beauty remain in the memory long after the excursion is a thing of the past; even as the perfume of a rose remains after the flower has faded.

The sole habitation in Bear Valley, located in a charming sunny exposure with imposing trees and garden surrounding it, is the Country Club, famous in local circles.

The deep baying of hounds from its extensive kennels forms the only discordant note in the Valley, reminding one that even near to nature's heart man's inherent primitiveness asserts itself. If, when wandering in these woodland fastnesses, he (man) would hunt the wild creatures with a camera it would require greater patience, skill and acumen than making the ground wet with the blood of fawns and quail.

But "civilization has ever developed the physical and the intellectual at the expense of the psychic, the humane, and the spiritual."

Notwithstanding its small area, numerable excursions offer themselves to the ambitious tourist in Marin, while the diversity of its surface and climate, and the ease with which one can explore its remaining primeval stretches, make this tiny northern peninsula a necessary adjunct to San Francisco, which, with its ever-increasing population, needs an outlet for recreation, relaxation, and repose.

Moreover, as the other Bay counties are less rugged in formation, more inhabited, and consequently more conventional in appearance, true nature-lovers find an outing in Marin a solace and an inspiration.

A short distance from Bear Valley the road, after passing a stretch of low marsh-land covered with tules, reeds, and willows, comes suddenly to a sheet of water which at first sight appears to be an inland lake, so peaceful and protected are its waters.

This is none other than Tomales Bay--a long, narrow inlet from the Ocean.

At the base of the range of lofty hills which shelter it on the west is situated Inverness, the location of the tract of three thousand and three hundred acres which was recently sold, constituting, it is said, the largest single transaction in suburban lands ever made in this part of California, or in fact anywhere else in this State. It involved over half a million dollars, and is reputed to be the beginning of a new movement in Marin.

The land is to be divided for summer homes and cottages; and as the nearest station is Point Reyes, it is planned to operate a ferry across Tomales Bay, which would shorten the distance to the railroad where a new station is to be erected.

Extensive plans are also on foot to extend the electric road from its present northern terminus at Fairfax to Inverness, and once that is accomplished, the new summer resort and suburban town will be brought within a little more than an hour's ride of San Francisco.

Besides its many rural attractions there are more than six miles of sand beach at Inverness, and the tide on going out exposes the sand to the sun, which warms the water on its return, and insures delightful bathing during the summer.

Unlike many of the counties of California, Marin, during the gold period, attracted very little attention among the miners. Her chief, and, in fact, only industry in those days was the raising of stock. About the year 1860 the people in the northern part of the County, especially in the Tomales district, located on the eastern part of upper Tomales Bay, began growing potatoes with such successful results that the County soon gained the name of an unusually fertile potato-raising region.