Part 19

Out of the city we ran straight away on Santa Clara Street for a distance of five or six miles to Junction House, where the mountain road begins. It was built nearly forty years ago by Santa Clara County at a cost of eighty thousand dollars, the work being authorized to secure the location of the Lick Observatory on the mountain. It is a smooth, well-engineered road, with grades not exceeding ten per cent excepting a few steep pitches near the summit. It swings upwards in wide arcs or narrow loops as the topography of the mountain demands. It is broad enough for vehicles to pass easily, presenting no difficulty to a moderate-powered motor, though in places a sheer precipice falls away from its side and there are abrupt turns around blind corners which call for extreme care.

The winding course of the road up the mountainside affords vantage for endless panoramas of the surrounding country. Indeed, were there no observatory on Mount Hamilton the views alone would well repay the ascent and we paused frequently to contemplate the scene that spread out beneath us. The day was not perfectly clear, yet through the shimmering air we could see the hazy waters of San Francisco Bay some twenty miles to the northwest, and beyond the valley to the southwest, the blue Santa Cruz Range which we crossed the previous day. Just beneath us lay the wide vale of the Santa Clara—surely one of the most beautiful and prosperous of the famous valleys of the Golden State—diversified by orchards and endless wheatfields, with here and there an isolated ranch-house or village. The foothills nearer at hand were studded with oaks and sycamores, with an occasional small farm or fruit orchard set down among them. It was a beautiful day—the partial cloudiness being atoned for by many striking cloud effects and the play of light and color over the landscape.

Midway of the ascent is a little settlement in a pleasant grassy dell, where a plain though comfortable-looking hotel—the Halfway House—offers the wayfarer an opportunity for refreshments, which can not be obtained at the summit. Here we arranged for a lunch on our return, but we had no idea of eating it in the hotel with the delightful nooks we had passed still fresh in mind. The last three or four miles of the climb are by far the most difficult, reminding us not a little of the Mount Wilson ascent; but we experienced no trouble and soon came to the open summit with the vast dome of the observatory crowning it. Around this clusters a village of about fifty people who live here permanently—the families and assistants of the men who devote their lives to the study of the stars. One of the ladies whom we met in the observatory office said, when we asked her of life on the mountain,

"We get used to it, though it is cold and lonely at times and we feel a kind of desperation to get back to the world. But we do not complain; the views from the mountain under varying conditions of night and day are enough to atone for our isolation. You can not even imagine the glories of the sunrise and sunset; the weird effects of the sea of clouds that lie beneath us at times, glowing in the sun or ghostly white in the moonlight; the vast wilderness of mountain peaks losing themselves in the haze of distance or mantled in the glaring whiteness of the winter snows. All these and many other strange moods of the weather bring infinite variety, even to this lonely spot." And yet, for all this, she confessed to an intense longing to make a trip to "the earth" whenever occasion presented itself.

The obliging janitor shows visitors about the observatory, telling of its work and explaining the instruments with an intelligence and detail that might lead you to think him one of the astronomers—if he had not confessed at the outset to being an Englishman in the humble position of caretaker. And we might have known that he was an Englishman, even if he had not told us so, by his thoroughness and pride in his job. Among the instruments which interested us most was the seismograph, which records earthquakes from the faintest tremor hundreds of miles away to the most violent shock—or perhaps this is not strictly correct, for the great quake of 1906 threw the needle from the recording disk and left the record incomplete.

"There is seldom a day," said our guide, "that a quake is not registered and so long as they occur regularly we have little to fear, but an entire absence of tremors for several days is likely to precede a violent shock."

The great refracting telescope is the prime "object of interest" to the visitor and we were shown in minute detail how this is operated. It stands on a granite pedestal—underneath which rests the body of the donor, James Lick—in the center of the great dome which one sees for many miles from the valley and which revolves bodily on a huge platform to bring the opening to the proper point. This, at the time of its construction, was the largest telescope in the world, the great lens, the masterpiece of Alvan Clark & Sons, being thirty-six inches in diameter. It is equipped with the latest apparatus for photographing the heavens and some of the most remarkable astronomical photographs in existence have been taken by the observatory. The telescope and dome are operated by electric motors and our guide gave exhibitions of the perfect control by the operator. Besides this there is a large reflecting telescope housed in a separate building and several smaller instruments. Visitors are allowed to look through the great telescope on Saturday night only, but are shown about the observatory on any afternoon of the week. No other great observatory is so accommodating to the public in this regard; and the annual number of visitors exceeds five thousand. The official handbook states that "while the observatory has no financial gain in the coming of visitors, no pains are spared to make the time spent here interesting and profitable to them." The same book gives a list of the important achievements of the Lick Observatory, with other information concerning the institution and may be had upon application to the managing director.

James Lick, who devoted three quarters of a million dollars to found the observatory, was a California pioneer who left his whole fortune of more than three millions to public benefactions. He was born in Fredericksburg, Pa., in 1796 and died in San Francisco in 1876. He came to California in 1847 and engaged in his trade of piano-making, but his great wealth came from real estate investment. He was a silent and somewhat eccentric man—a pronounced freethinker in religious matters. The observatory is now under the control of the University of California, which supplies the greater part of the finances for its maintenance.

Returning to the city, we found there was still time to visit the mission, about fifteen miles due north on the Oakland road. This is a macadam boulevard through a level and prosperous-looking country skirting San Francisco Bay and the run was a delightful one. Mission San Jose is a tiny village of a dozen houses and a few shops, bearing little resemblance to its bustling namesake to the southward. The dilapidated monastery is all that is left of the old-time buildings and the rude timber arcade stands directly by the roadside. We found a young fellow working on the place who gladly undertook to act as guide. He proved an ardent Catholic and an enthusiast for the restoration of the mission. This work, he said, had been undertaken by the Native Sons of California and they were organizing a carnival to raise funds. The building through which he led us is a series of dungeonlike adobe cells, with earthen floors and cracked and crumbling walls; it is roofed with willows tied to the roughly hewn rafters with rawhide. The tiles from the ruined church are carefully piled away to be used in the restoration and our guide declared that a wealthy Spanish family of the vicinity had a quantity of these which they would gladly return when needed. The church was destroyed by the earthquake of 1868 and has been replaced by a modern structure. This suffered but little in the great quake of 1906, but we were shown the curious spectacle in the cemetery of several marble shafts broken squarely in two by the shock. To the rear of the church and leading up to the orphanage conducted by the Dominican sisters, is a beautiful avenue bordered by olive trees planted by the padres in mission days. This is crossed by a second avenue running at right angles and no doubt these served as a passageway for many a solemn procession in days of old.

The location is charming indeed; one can stand in the rude portico of the dilapidated building and look over as pleasant a rural scene as can be found in California. The green meadows slope toward the bay, which gleams like molten silver in the late afternoon sun. Beyond it is a dark line of forest trees, the rounded contour of the green foothills, and, last of all, the rugged outlines of the Santa Cruz Mountains shrouded in the amethyst haze of evening. To the rear, rolling hills rise above the little hamlet and southward stands the sturdy bulk of Mission Peak.

No wonder, with such beautiful, fertile surroundings, San Jose Mission prospered in its palmy days. Founded in 1797—the fruitful year of Padre Lasuen's activity—it reached its zenith in 1820, when its Indian population numbered seventeen hundred and fifty-four. Its property at secularization exceeded one hundred and fifty thousand dollars in value and it even seemed to prosper for a while under the Mexican regime. Its decline began in 1840 and five years later less than two hundred and fifty natives were to be found in its precincts. Of the wreck and rebuilding of the church we have already told; in the new structure may be seen two of the original bells, nearly a century old. The baptismal font of hammered copper is still in use. It is about three feet in diameter and is surmounted by a small iron cross.

A few miles out of San Jose on the San Francisco road, at the pretty town of Santa Clara, was formerly the mission of that name. It has totally disappeared and on its site stands the new church and the buildings of Santa Clara College, the principal Catholic university of California. We drove into the large plaza in front of the church and walked in at the open door. The interior is that of a modern Catholic church, with an unusual number of paintings and images, among the latter a gorgeously painted Santa Clara with her bare foot on a writhing snake. The paintings are of little artistic merit and the effect of the interior is rather tawdry. The slightly unfavorable impression speedily fades from mind when through an open side door one gets a glimpse into the garden around which run the college cloisters. It is a beautiful green spot, with olives planted in mission days, palms, and masses of flowers. About it are slight remains of the old cloisters; hewn beams still form the roof, and portions of the walls some three feet thick still stand.

Santa Clara College, the oldest on the coast, was founded in 1855, and is now the largest Catholic school west of the Rockies. The buildings are quite extensive and the mission style of architecture appropriately prevails. In its museum is a good collection of relics once belonging to the ancient mission; furniture, candlesticks in silver and brass, vessels in gold and silver, crucifixes, bells, the mighty key to the oaken door, embroidered vestments, and a very remarkable book. This is an old choral on heavy vellum, hand-written in brilliant red and black; the covers are heavy leather over solid wood, and the corners and back are protected with ornamental bronze. It originally came from Spain and is supposed to be five hundred years old.

Santa Clara Mission, the tenth in order, was founded in 1777, twenty years earlier than its neighbor, San Jose, and the close proximity caused heart-burnings among the padres of Santa Clara when its rival was first projected. They declared that there was no necessity for it; that it was not on the beaten route of El Camino Real, and that it encroached on Santa Clara's lands and revenues. The dispute assumed such proportions that a special survey was made in 1801 to prevent further controversy. Despite the contention of Santa Clara that there was no room for its rival, it did not lack for prosperity, since in 1827 its population numbered fourteen hundred and twenty-four—about the same as San Jose, so there seems to have been ample room for both. At secularization, in 1835, there were less than half as many and after that the decline was rapid. This is only another instance showing that the regime of the padres had begun to decay before the interference of the Mexican Government. The mission fell into ruin after the American conquest and the debris was gradually removed to make way for the college buildings.

Santa Clara is a quiet, beautiful town of about five thousand—really a suburb of San Jose, since they are separated by only a mile or two. Its streets are broad and bordered with trees and its residences have the trim neatness and beautiful semi-tropical surroundings so characteristic of the better California towns.

Northward out of Santa Clara a fine macadam road follows the shore of the bay at a distance of a mile or two. In the days of the padres this country was a vast swamp, but it is now a prosperous fruit and gardening section which supplies the San Francisco markets. At Palo Alto we turned aside into the grounds of Leland Stanford Jr. University, which sprang into existence like Minerva of old—full armed and ready for business—with nearly thirty millions of endowment behind it. It immediately took high rank among American universities, but as its attendance is limited by its charter to about two thousand, it can not equal its rivals in this regard.

Everyone knows its pathetic story—how Senator Stanford, the man of many millions, lost his only son, a boy of sixteen, and determined to leave the fortune to "the boys and girls of California" as a memorial to the idolized youth. A little strain of selfishness in the project, one may think, since if Leland Stanford Jr. had lived it is unlikely that his father would have remembered the boys and girls of his state, but you forget all about this when you enter the precincts of this magnificent institution. It is free from the antiquated buildings and equipment of the schools of slow growth, and full scope was given to architects to produce a group of buildings harmonious in design and perfectly adapted to the purposes which they serve. The mission design properly prevails, carried out in brown stone and red tiles. The main buildings are ranged round a quadrangle 586 x 246 feet, upon which the arches of the cloisters open and in the center of this was a bronze group of the donor, his wife, and son, since removed to the University Museum.

The earthquake of 1906 dealt severely with Stanford University, destroying the library building, the great memorial arch, and wrecking the memorial chapel, said to be the finest in America. The latter was being restored at the time of our visit, a timber roof replacing the former stone-vaulted ceiling. The structure both inside and out bears many richly colored mosaics representing historic and scriptural subjects; in this particular it is more like St. Mark's of Venice than any other church that I know of. It is said that a large part of the destruction done by the earthquake was due to flimsy work on the part of the builders. Fortunately, the low, solid structures around the quadrangle were practically unharmed, and the damage done is being repaired as rapidly as possible. The grounds occupied by the University were formerly Senator Stanford's Palo Alto estate and comprised about nine thousand acres. From the campus there are views of the bay, of the Coast Range, including Mount Hamilton with the Lick Observatory, and of the rolling foothills and magnificent redwood forests toward Santa Cruz. The university is open to students from everywhere and owing to its vast endowment, instruction is absolutely free.

Palo Alto is a handsome town of about six thousand people. Its climate is said to be much pleasanter the year round than that of San Francisco. A local advertising prospectus gives this pleasing description of the climatic conditions:

"There is no extreme cold, and there are no severe storms. Even the rainy season, between December and March, averages about fifteen bright warm days in each month; and flowers blossoming on every hand make the winter season a delightful part of the year. The acacia trees begin blooming in January, the almonds in February, and the prunes, peaches, and cherries are all in bloom by the last of March or the first of April, when the blossom festival for the whole valley is held in the foothills at Saratoga, a few miles by electric line from Palo Alto."

From Palo Alto we followed the main highway—El Camino Real—to San Francisco. It is a broad macadam road, but at the time in sad disrepair, unmercifully rough and full of chuck-holes. It was being rebuilt in places, compelling us to take a roundabout route, which, with much tire trouble, delayed our arrival in San Francisco until late in the afternoon, though the distance is but fifty-two miles from San Jose.

It looked as if our troubles were going to have a still more painful climax when, as we entered the city, a policeman dashed at us, bawling,

"What on earth do you mean by driving at that crazy rate? Do you want to kill all these children?"

As we were not exceeding twenty miles and were quite free from any homicidal designs against the children—of whom not a single one was in sight on the street—we mildly disclaimed any such cruel intention as the guardian of the law imputed to us. We had learned the futility of any altercation with a policeman and by exceeding humility we gained permission to proceed. A little back-talk in self-defense would doubtless have resulted in a trip to the station house, where we should have been at every disadvantage. I attribute in some degree our lucky escape from arrest to the fact that we always adopted an exceedingly conciliatory attitude towards any policeman who approached us, even if we sometimes thought him over-officious or even impudent. A soft answer we found more efficient in turning away his wrath and gaining our point than any attempt at self-justification could possibly have been—even though we knew we were right.

XIII

TO BEAUTIFUL CLEAR LAKE VALLEY

A splendid view of the Golden Gate, through which, between opposing headlands, the tides of the Pacific pour into the waters of San Francisco's great inland bay, may be had from the ferry between the city and Sausalito. The facilities for carrying motor cars were good and charges reasonable. We were speedily set down on the northern side and, without entering the little town, took to the road forthwith, closely following the shores of the bay.

A dozen miles of rough going brought us to San Rafael, where in 1817 the padres from Mission Dolores in San Francisco founded the twentieth, and last but one, of the California missions. George Wharton James declares that this mission was really intended as a health resort for neophytes from San Francisco who had fallen ill of consumption, which had become a terrible scourge among the Indians around the bay. During the first three years after the founding of San Rafael, nearly six hundred neophytes were transferred to the new establishment, and in 1828 its population had reached eleven hundred and forty. Its buildings were never very substantial and the total value of all property at secularization was reckoned at only fifteen thousand dollars. Fremont took possession of the town in 1846 without opposition. After his departure the mission buildings were unoccupied and speedily fell into ruin.

In response to our inquiries, a citizen directed us to the Catholic parsonage. The priest greeted us courteously and told us that not a trace of the mission now remained. In his garden he pointed out some old pear trees planted by the padres of San Rafael Mission in early days—almost the sole existing relics. The church near by is modern and of no especial interest. The site was an ideal one and the sheltered valley, with the green wooded hills that encircle it, was a fit place of rest for the invalid neophytes. San Rafael is now a substantially built, prosperous-looking town of about six thousand people and a favorite suburban residence place for San Francisco business men.

A well-improved highway leads through rolling hills from San Rafael to Petaluma, whence a detour of a dozen miles eastward takes us to historic Sonoma—the farthest outpost of Spanish civilization in California. Here the twenty-first and last mission of the chain was founded in 1823, with a view of checking the influence of the Russians, who were filling the country to the north. It never attained great importance, though during the short period of its existence its population reached about seven hundred. In 1834 the presidio or military establishment of San Francisco was transferred here to counteract Russian and American encroachments. The governor, Vallejo, took command of the post in person and, it is recorded, supported the enterprise at his own expense. He appears to have been a fine type of the old-time Spanish grandee, and his hacienda or residence still stands, though now deserted, about five miles northwest of the town. This is of the usual Spanish type, but on a much grander scale than any other of the early California homes still standing. Its facade is three hundred feet in length and two wings extend to the rear, enclosing a spacious patio which overlooks the valley from its open side. Double balconies supported by heavy timbers run around the entire outside. The house is solidly built; its walls, no less than six feet in thickness, are constructed of adobe. Its hewn beams are bound together with rawhide thongs and the lighter timbers are fastened with wooden pegs, not a nail being used. Stout iron grilles and heavy wooden shutters protect the windows and the doors are provided with wickets so that the house could easily be converted into a defensive fortress.

Vallejo also had a town house in Sonoma, but this has nearly disappeared. There are still many old adobes surrounding the spacious plaza—for the village was laid out on regal scale; many date from mission days, though none of them has any especial historic importance.

The mission church stands at the northeast angle of the plaza; it was in use until about twenty-five years ago, when it was wrecked by an earthquake, and since then neglect and winter rains nearly completed the work of ruin. The property was acquired by the Landmarks Club, which, having no funds for restoration, offered it to the state as an historic monument. It was accepted by a special act of the legislature and a small fund provided to restore and maintain the buildings. At the time of our visit work was in progress and was being carried out on original lines as nearly as possible. The old tiles had been restored to the roof and the rents in the walls repaired with sun-dried adobes. But there was no one to show us about or to preserve the relics and traditions of the mission. In this regard there will always be an advantage in having the original owner—the Catholic church—in charge, for it means that "open house" to visitors will be kept at all times. We were gratified to learn, however, that historic Sonoma will not be allowed to fall into ruin, as we had been led to expect from descriptions by recent visitors.