Part 11

From Del Mar on the following day we glided through winding byroads to Escondido, which we had visited several times previously in course of our rambles. It is a pretty little town of two thousand people, in the center of a fertile valley exploited as the "Garden Spot of Southern California"—a claim which might be quite correct if limited to San Diego County. The valley is seven hundred feet above the sea, surrounded by a circle of rugged hills with huge granite boulders jutting from the dense green chaparral that clothes their sides. It produces small grain, alfalfa, citrus fruits, apples, grapes, and berries of all kinds. There is much truck-farming for the San Diego markets, and cattle and sheep raising are carried on to a limited extent.

Out of this pleasant valley we followed the course of San Pasqual River toward Ramona, and recalled that in this canyon a fight took place in 1846 between the Mexicans and Americans during the wild dash of Kit Carson's rangers to summon aid from San Diego. The road was a quiet one, winding among splendid trees and passing an occasional ranch-house surrounded by fruit orchards in full bloom. Along the clear little river were grassy glades carpeted with myriads of wild flowers—poppies, Mariposa lilies, primroses, delicate bluebells, and others nameless to us. Crossing the magnificent San Pasqual grade to Ramona we had a glorious retrospect down the valley. It was typical of a large number of valleys in the Back Country which constitute the agricultural resources of San Diego County, and we could not help being impressed with the small proportion that the tillable land bears to the rugged hills. The city of San Diego can hardly base its hope of greatness on the country lying behind it—always excepting the Imperial Valley.

Beyond Ramona to Santa Ysabel and Warner's Hot Springs the characteristics of the country were quite the same. We pursued our way through pleasant valleys between great oak-studded hills clothed with lawnlike verdure to the very summit. Nowhere did we see larger or more symmetrical oaks and in places our road ran under their overarching branches. Every mile between Ramona and Warner's presented some phase of scenic beauty; the road winds through virgin forests, courses through wide, flower-spangled meadows and follows a clear stream for many miles. A lonely ranch-house occasionally reminded us that we were still in the confines of civilization. The only village, Santa Ysabel, is a little supply station for the Indian reservation of the same name. The natives here seemed prosperous and happy and we noticed a little vine-covered church surmounted by the Catholic emblem, which told of their religious preferences.

Warner's Hot Springs proved to be only a country store and post office with a dozen or two adobe cottages which serve as guest-rooms. Substantial meals were served in country style in a large central dining-hall and if accommodations were primitive, charges were correspondingly low. The springs have a good flow of mineral-impregnated water at a temperature of one hundred forty-eight degrees and strong claims are made for their medical properties. It is a very quiet, rural spot and from our cottage veranda we had a fine view of the sunset mountains beyond the wide plain of Mesa Grande. The air was vocal with the song of birds—the trees about our cabin were alive with hundreds of strawberry finches.

They told us that the country about the springs was once a famous hunting-ground and though there is still sport in season, it does not compare with that of a few years since. The beautiful California quail are still numerous, but they have become so shy that it is difficult to bag them. Water fowl are plentiful on the lakes of Warner's Ranch and deer and antelope may be found in the mountains. Fishing is good in the neighboring streams and these attractions bring many sportsmen to Warner's during the season.

For the average motorist, whose chief mission is to "see the country," the attractions of the resort will be quite exhausted in a night's sojourn; indeed, were there a first-class hotel within easy reach he might be satisfied with even a shorter pause. There is nothing nearer northward than Hemet, fifty miles distant, and Riverside is eighty-five miles away. There is a direct road leading through the rugged hills to these points, a third "San Diego route," little used and unknown to motorists generally. It goes by the way of Oak Grove and Aguanga—and the traveler is quite likely to pass these points in blissful ignorance of their existence if he does not keep a sharp lookout. The road is a mere trail winding through sandy river washes, fording streams and finally taking to rugged hills with many steep, rough grades. The signs of the Southern California Auto Club will see you safely through; though there are many places where one would be in a sad quandary were it not for their friendly counsel. The wild beauty of the country, the wide panoramas from the hill crests, the infinite variety and color of the flowers along the way, the giant oaks in the canyons, the stretches of the desert with cactus and scrub cedar, the variegated meadows, and other interesting natural phenomena, will atone for the rough roads and heavy grades, though it is a trip that we would hardly care to make a second time. Beyond Hemet a perfect boulevard to Riverside gave opportunity to make up for time lost in the hills.

Hemet and San Jacinto, two clean little towns about four miles apart, are situated in a lovely valley beneath the snow-crowned peak that gives its name to the latter village. Alfalfa meadows, grain fields and fruit orchards surround them and give an air of peace and prosperity to the pleasant vale. But when we visited the towns a few years later, most of the brick buildings had been leveled to the ground by an earthquake shock—an experience the same places had undergone about twenty years before. It was a sad scene of desolation and destruction, but as the shock occurred on a Sunday, when the brick buildings which suffered most were unoccupied, there was no loss of life. It was noted that concrete and frame structures were little injured and the towns have been rebuilt in such a manner as to be nearly proof, it is believed, against future quakes.

But we were not yet through with the Back Country. They told us at Warner's that there was no more beautiful road in the county than the one following the San Luis Rey River between Pala and Santa Ysabel. It was closed by the landslide at the time, but a few days later we again found ourselves in the quiet streets of Pala, intent on making the trip. We had come direct from Temecula over the "big grade," a little-used road across the great hill range between the Santa Margarita and San Luis Rey Valleys. In all our wanderings I doubt if we found a dozen miles of harder going than our climb over the Pala grade. A rough, narrow trail, badly washed by recent rains, twisted around boulders and among giant trees and pitched up and down frightful grades, often along precipitous slopes. There were several stony fords to be crossed and a wide stretch of heavy sand on the western side of the range. It is a route to be avoided by people inclined to nervous qualms or who dislike strenuous mountain work. No wonder the regular route to Pala runs by way of Fall Brook and Bonsal, though the distance is greater by thirty or forty miles.

The San Luis Rey river road presented a repetition of much scenery such as we saw on our Warner's Hot Springs trip. It does not leave the stream for any considerable distance, often pursuing its course through a tangle of forest trees. At times it comes out into the open and affords picturesque views of the mountains that guard the valley on either hand. A few miles from Pala a road branches off to Mount Palomar, from whose summit, about four thousand feet high, may be seen on clear days one of the famous panoramas of San Diego County. We were deterred from the ascent by the lowering day, which shrouded the peak in heavy clouds. There is a long though easy climb over the hill range on the edge of "Valle de San Jose," from which we had a glorious outlook over a long succession of ranges stretching away to the red glow of the sunset. For the sun had struggled through the mists which obscured it most of the day and was flooding the breaking clouds with deep crimson. Far below us lay the valley with its patchwork of cultivated fields and red-roofed ranch-houses at wide intervals. Beyond the crest of the grade the road again descends to the river, which we followed to Santa Ysabel. From here we pursued our way over familiar roads to San Diego, experiencing no little satisfaction in having covered all the main highways—and many of the byways—of the county.

VIII

THE SAN DIEGO COAST ROUTE

Like many a pious pilgrim of old, we set out on the King's Highway—the storied Camino Real of the Golden State. We shall follow in the footsteps of the brown-robed brothers of St. Francis to the northernmost of the chain of missions which they founded in their efforts to convert and civilize the red men of California. Not with sandals and staff, nor yet with horse or patient burro shall we undertake the journey, but our servant shall be the twentieth century's latest gift to the traveler—the wind-shod motor car. And we shall not expect a night's lodging with a benediction and Godspeed such as was given the wayfarer at each link in the mission chain as he fared forth in days of old. We shall behold loneliness and decay at these ancient seats of hospitality and good cheer. But we are sure that we shall find in the crumbling, vine-covered ruins a glamour of romance and an historic significance that would make our journey worth while even if it did not take us through some of the loveliest and most impressive scenery in the world.

When to beauty of country and perfection of clime are added the touch of human antiquity and romantic association, the combination should prove attractive to even the most prosaic. The memory of human sacrifice and devotion, and the wealth of historic incident that lends such a charm to England's abbeys, is not wanting in these cruder remnants of the pious zeal and tireless industry of the Spanish padres to be found in so many delightful nooks of the Sunset State. The story of the Franciscan missions is a fascinating one, despite its chapters of strife, heavy toil, and ultimate failure. From their inception in weakness and poverty and their rise to affluence, to the time of their decadence and final abandonment, these offshoots of the old religious system of Europe, transplanted to the alien soil of the New World, afford a colorful chapter of American history. The monk, always in the vanguard of Spanish exploration and civilization, came hither, as we have already seen, a little after the middle of the eighteenth century. The Franciscan order had received from the Castilian throne a grant of certain properties in California. Junipero Serra, a monk of true piety and energetic character, gladly accepted the hard and laborious task of founding missions in this new field. How he finally succeeded we have already told. Others followed him and between the years of 1769 and 1823 twenty-one missions were established within the present limits of California, extending along the Pacific Coast from San Diego to Sonoma, about seventy-five miles north of San Francisco.

Like the English monks, the Spanish padres when locating their establishments always selected sites with pleasant surroundings and commanding views of beautiful scenery, always in the most fertile valleys and adjacent to lake or river. Many of the California missions are within a short distance of the Pacific, whose blue waters are often visible through the arcades, lending a crowning touch of beauty to the loveliness of the semi-tropical surroundings. And in sight of many of them snow-capped mountains rear their majestic forms against a sky matched only by that of Italy itself. Surrounding the buildings were fertile fields, with flowers, fruit trees, and palms, usually watered by irrigation as well as by winter rains, and, indeed, the Arcadia of the poets was well-nigh made a reality under the sway of the California padres. The missions were located, presumably, a day's journey apart, so that the traveler might find entertainment at the close of each day, for the hospitality of the Franciscan fathers never waned.

I shall give a short sketch of each of the missions as we reach them in course of our pilgrimage, and will therefore omit further historic details here. The building, as a rule, was done solidly and well; adobe, hard-burned brick, hewn stone, heavy timbers, and roof tiles being so skillfully combined that many of the structures are still in fair state of preservation in spite of winter rains, earthquake, and long neglect.

No doubt the equable climate has been a factor in retarding their decay. Adobe structures have naturally suffered most, but even these were so massively built that had it not been for earthquakes nearly all would still stand almost intact. This agency more than any other contributed to the ruined condition of the mission buildings. Several have been more or less restored and are in daily use, and it is to be hoped that all which are not past rehabilitation will finally be rescued from the fate which threatens them.

The old notion that the red man will not perform hard manual labor is contradicted in the history of mission building. The work was done by the natives under the direction of the padres—and hard work it was, for the stone had to be quarried and dressed, brick and tiles moulded and burned or dried in the sun, and heavy timbers brought many miles, often on the men's shoulders. Just how heavy some of these oaken beams were is shown by several in the San Fernando chapel, fifteen inches square and thirty or forty feet long. Some of the churches were roofed with arched stone vaults which must have required great labor and not a little architectural skill, though the latter was no doubt supplied by the monks.

The Indians were generally reduced to a mild state of peonage, but it seems that the padres' policy was one of kindness and very seldom was there rebellion against their rule on the part of converted Indians. The missions suffered, of course, from attacks by savages who refused to come under their sway, but the priests had few difficulties with the neophytes who worked under them. Taken altogether, there are few other instances where white men had so little trouble with Indians with whom they came in daily contact for a considerable period.

The priests not only looked after the religious instruction of their charges, but taught them to engage in agriculture and such arts and manufactures as were possible under the conditions that then existed. The chief occupation was farming and, considering the crude implements at their disposal, the mission Indians did remarkably well. The plough was composed of two wooden beams—one of them shod with iron; the soil was merely scratched and it was necessary to go over a field many times. A large bough, dragged over the soil to cover the seed, served as a harrow. The carts were primitive in the extreme—the heavy wheels were cut from a single block of solid oak and the axle and frame were of the same clumsy construction. Grain was harvested by hand-sickles and threshed on hard earth by driving oxen over the sheaves. Flour was ground by the women with pestles in stone mortars, though in a few cases rude water-wheels were used to turn grinding-stones.

Live stock constituted the greater part of the mission's wealth. Horses, cattle, and sheep were raised in large numbers, though these were probably not so numerous as some of the ancient chroniclers would have us believe. The Indians were exceedingly skillful in training horses and very adept in the use of the "riata," or lariat. They became efficient in caring for and herding cattle and sheep, a vocation which many of their descendants follow to-day. The mild climate made this task an easy one and the herds increased rapidly from year to year.

Vineyards were planted at most of the missions and the inventories at the time of secularization showed that the fathers kept a goodly stock of wines, though this was probably for their own consumption, the natives being regaled with sweetened vinegar-and-water, which was not intoxicating. The mission grape first developed by the padres is to-day one of the most esteemed varieties in California vineyards.

The missions were necessarily largely dependent on their own activities for such manufactured products as they required and, considering their limited facilities, they accomplished some wonderful results in this direction. Brick, tile, pottery, clothing, saddles, candles, blankets, furniture, and many other articles of daily necessity were made under the padres' tutelage and such trades as masonry, carpentry, blacksmithing, tanning, spinning, and weaving were readily acquired by the once ignorant and indolent Indians.

Under such industry and businesslike management, the mission properties in time became immensely valuable, at their zenith yielding a total revenue estimated at not less than two million dollars yearly. This prosperity was greedily watched by the Mexican government, which in its straits for funds conceived the idea of "secularization" of the missions, a plan which ultimately led to confiscation and dissolution. Shortly after this came the American conquest and the conditions were wholly unfavorable to the rehabilitation of the old regime, which speedily faded to a romantic memory. The once happy and industrious natives were driven back to the hills and their final extinction seems to be near at hand. The story of their hardship and desolation and the wrongs they suffered at the hands of the American conqueror forms the burden of Mrs. Jackson's pathetic story of "Ramona."

Justice may never be done to these bitterly wronged people—indeed, most of them have passed beyond reach of human justice; but of later years there has come a deeper realization of the importance of the work of the California missionary and a greater interest in the crumbling relics of his pious activities. It has awakened a little late, you may say, but the old adage, "Better late than never," is doubly applicable here. We who have traversed the length and breadth of Britain have seen how lovingly nearly every ancient abbey and castle is now guarded—though in many cases it was painfully apparent that the spirit was too long in coming. Many a noble pile had nearly vanished from neglect and vandalism ere an enlightened public sentiment was created to guard and preserve its scanty remnants. And I fear that this sentiment was more the result of selfish interest than of any high conception of altruistic duty—the strangers who came to see these ancient monuments and left money behind them probably did more to awaken Britons to the value and importance of their storied ruins than any strong sense of appreciation on their own part. California should be moved by a higher motive than mere gain to properly care for and preserve her historic shrines. They represent the beginning of her present civilization and enlightenment, which has placed her in the forefront of the states. Her history, literature, and architecture have been profoundly affected by the Franciscan missions and their great influence in this direction is yet to come. They should be restored and preserved at public cost, even though they continue in charge of the Catholic Church. Their claims as historic monuments far outweigh any prejudice that may exist against contributing to any secular institutions and if the Catholic Church is willing to occupy and guard them, so much the better. It insures that they will be kept open to the public at all times and that visitors will be gladly received and hospitably treated. In all our journey along the King's Highway we experienced nothing but the utmost courtesy and kindness from the Catholic priests who may now be found at many of the missions. The padre acts as custodian and guide and can always tell you the story of the mission in his charge. These men have already done much to restore several of the missions and to reclaim them from complete destruction. The church is struggling to carry this work still farther, but she has not the means at her disposal to accomplish it before some of the landmarks will have entirely vanished. And I may say here that although not a Catholic myself, I believe that the Catholics deserve commendation and assistance in this great work.

And if California is not influenced by the higher consideration we have enumerated, selfish reasons are strong for the preservation of the missions. Already they are proving an attraction to a great number of discerning tourists and with the increasing prevalence of the motor car, El Camino Real will become one of the most popular routes in the world. People will bring their cars from the Eastern States—instead of taking them to Europe—and will pass their vacations in California. They will spend money freely and many will become enamored of the country to the extent of becoming permanent residents. The missions are one of the greatest attractions to bring the tourist class to California—she can not afford to allow them to disappear. They form a valuable asset in more ways than one and now is the time to awaken to the fact.

Perhaps I have lingered too long on this subject, but it seems to me like a necessary preface to a trip over the King's Highway. We left San Diego in the late afternoon and reached the beautiful suburb of La Jolla just as the declining sun was flooding the broad expanse of the ocean with golden glory. The town is situated on a promontory beneath which there is a lovely little park and one can enter several caves from the ocean which, under favorable conditions, are almost as beautiful as the Blue Grotto of Capri. Here is a favorite resort of artists and a permanent colony has been established, the vicinity affording never-ending themes for their skill. One of these is to be seen a few miles farther on the road—the group of Torrey pines on a headland overlooking the sea. Here is the only spot on this continent where these weird but beautiful trees are to be found, and our illustration gives some idea of their picturesque outlines against the sky. They were named for one of our earliest naturalists, John Torrey, who was the first to describe them in a scientific way. The few wind-swept patriarchs of this rare tribe straggle over the bold headland or crouch on its edges in fantastic attitudes. At this point the road leaves the cliff which it has traversed for several miles and descends by a long winding grade to the seashore. There is a fairly steep pitch just at the top, but for most of the descent the gradient is easy, though sharp turns and blind corners make careful driving necessary.