Part 10

Chinatown in the daytime may be freely visited by the “Melican” man and woman. At night it is advisable to take a policeman or a guide, and leave the women at home, unless their nerves are shock-proof. The scene at night differs from that in the daytime; for whereas in the morning Chinatown seems little more than a big market-place, at night it is one vast barber-shop in which half the population seems to be engaged in shaving and mutilating the other half. There are no curtains; and if you stop a minute and look into one of the tiny shops on the ground floor or in the cellar, you will see a tonsorial artist deftly shaving his victim’s head, chin, eyebrows, lashes, nose, clean his ears, etc. Perhaps you are standing this moment over a Chinese dormitory; for space is expensive in so large a city, and John utilizes every inch of it by making his bed under the sidewalks. We follow the guide into subterranean haunts, down several flights of rickety stairs, to get a peep at the opium-dens. It is estimated that there is only one Chinaman out of every five in San Francisco who does not revel in his daily opium debauch, and even that fifth man uses it occasionally as a sedative. Some manage to get drunk on ten cents’ worth a day, while others need as much as a dollar’s worth, of a superior quality. It was the ten-cent variety we saw on this tour. The guide occasionally drops a quarter in certain places, and is in return allowed free access with his protégés. In dingy little rooms, not much larger than a state-room in a steamer, there are several bunks, in each of which lies or sits a Chinaman, in varying stages of stupid intoxication. Some are already asleep, others are just lighting their pipes, and not one of them pays the slightest attention to the intruders, unless spoken to. One helpless old wreck lies on a bundle of rags, which, the guide said, he has not left for five years. His hands and face are mere bones covered with yellow parchment, but he still has strength and brains enough left to obey the guide when commanded to show us the process of opium-smoking by holding a little lump of the drug in the flame of a small lamp, where it burns and is turned round like sealing-wax, and then stuffed into the small pipe and smoked, the fumes being inhaled through the lungs and puffed out through the nose. It is not a pleasant odor, but it doubtless serves to disguise other odors infinitely worse. The only ventilation in these rat-holes is a little slit, six inches by two, above the door: yet here these Asiatics spend the whole night, the lodging being included in the price of the opium. In one place we passed through a kitchen with a closet in the middle of it, but as a general thing we did not find subterranean Chinatown as filthy as it has often been described; certainly not so bad as some of the places visited in New York and London on “slumming” excursions. The fear that Chinatown might become a breeding-place of bacterial epidemics leads the sanitary authorities to look well to their duties; and besides, San Francisco never has any “hot waves,” and its climate is in other respects unfavorable to pestilential diseases, so that Chinatown has not proved such a plague spot as it might become under less favorable conditions.

Many tourists who are anxious to see the opium-dens feel inclined to draw the line at the restaurants, at least so far as eating there is concerned. But there are Chinese restaurants in San Francisco which vie in elegance of furnishing and fine gilded carvings with the most famous Parisian cafés. A good cup of tea can here be obtained, and there can be no harm in tasting the half-dozen kinds of preserves and cake served with it—all for twenty-five cents. There is preserved ginger, and small oranges, and pickled melon, China nuts and other delicacies, and a sort of oyster-fork to eat them with. In one of the rooms you will probably see several Chinamen eating a sort of ragout out of a large bowl, with chopsticks—every mouthful being first dipped into a kind of sauce. The bowl is held close to the mouth, to make the chopsticks less elusive substitutes for spoons. Eating with chopsticks is exciting and somewhat like fishing: you never know when you will get the next bite.

The thing to visit next is one of the temples, or Joss Houses, of which there are dozens in the city, some belonging to trade associations. Visitors are allowed to go behind the altars as close to the hideous idols as they please, the keepers themselves seeming to look upon their charge as a sort of dime museum; and as the admission is free, they try to earn an honest penny by selling little bundles of incense tapers to visitors.

It is getting late, and they are ready to lock the door after we are out; but the theatre is still a-going, and to that we now repair. As the floor is crowded, we walk right on to the stage, through a side gate, and sit down near the actors. Our presence does not jar with the scenery, as there is none of that commodity visible, unless it be the band, which occupies the centre of the stage and fills the air with Mongolian noise and dissonance. The instruments may be described as a gong or cymbals, a stick struck rapidly on a noisy board, and an embryonic banjo and violin which sounds like a hysterical oboe. Yet there is melody and harmony occasionally in these last two instruments, which almost incessantly accompany the actors’ words, as in a modern music-drama, leaving their noisy neighbors to emphasize the murders and other striking episodes. The actors sometimes stand on the stage floor, sometimes on a chair or table. Their declamation is a sing-song in a high falsetto voice. There are no women, but the best actor is an impersonator of female rôles, and has his face painted and his hair combed back in the most “stylish” way. The faces of these actors are utterly void of expression. Having heard enough of their play, we went into the green-room, where one of the actors explained to us his costumes and their prices in China. In a corner there was tea on tap, to which every one seemed to resort at intervals of five minutes. We went out by the other stage door, and stood in the very centre of the stage, watching the musicians; yet our presence there did not seem in the least to disconcert the spectators, who, with hats on, were attending to the play with open-mouthed interest, though they never applauded or laughed or gave any other signs of approval or disapproval. Sometimes, however, they do throw cigar-ends and other objects at actors who offend them by their art or sentiments.

Dime museums, shooting-galleries, dirty little restaurants, cheap drug and clothing stores, and similar places generally mark the transition from Chinatown to San Francisco proper. In one or two streets the transition is of a different sort, leading gradually through more elegant Chinese stores and wholesale houses to the American quarters. San Francisco has many fine streets, in strolling through which one can easily believe the statements that the city has one-third of all the wealth on the Pacific Coast, harbors fifty millionaires, and has exports including treasure to the value of more than a hundred million dollars a year. Such streets as Market, Kearney, Montgomery, and Post would attract attention even in Paris or London, and there is evidence of general prosperity in the numerous elegant residences as well as in the thronged business streets. Of late, an uneasy feeling has betrayed itself over the rivalry of the Canadian Pacific Railway and its harbor town, Vancouver, in attempting to secure the trade with Japan and China, the distance being somewhat in favor of Vancouver. But there is plenty of room for several large cities on the Pacific Coast; and San Francisco, having the only good harbor between San Diego and Puget Sound, need not be afraid of retrograding if the Canadians get some of the tea trade. Even if they should get the whole of the Asiatic trade, which is impossible, the handling and shipping of California wine, fruit, and agricultural products would suffice always to make San Francisco one of the three or four largest cities in America; and the opening of the Nicaragua Canal will give its trade a new and great impetus.

Market Street is the Broadway of San Francisco, but it differs from Broadway in New York in being as crowded in the evening as in the daytime. Yet the evening crowd is not the same as the day crowd, being bent on pleasure merely, like the multitudes which promenade in the alamedas of Spanish cities, late in the afternoon. San Franciscans are too busy to give up the afternoon hours to pleasure, so they have their daily street review and reception between eight and ten o’clock in the evening, during which hours Market Street is as crowded as Fifth Avenue on Sunday afternoons. The throng comes to an abrupt end a block or two above the Palace Hotel, and visitors stepping thence into a comparatively deserted street are apt to be surprised on suddenly finding that they have to elbow their way through a dense, moving mass of men and women. It seems strange that the crowd should not include the Palace Hotel in its promenading line, so as to give the guests in the large bay-windows, which make up the entire front of this immense structure, a chance to review it. San Franciscans are fond of boasting of this as being the largest hotel in the world, and one of the most sumptuously furnished, having cost about seven million dollars. Few cities, indeed, are so well supplied with good hotels as San Francisco, which has four of the first rank besides the Palace. There are accommodations and prices to suit all purses, but I do not believe there is another city in the world where one can get such an elegantly furnished, spacious room, with board, for three dollars a day, as on the upper floors of the Palace, where the air, light, and view are better than on the more expensive lower stories. The fare is generally good in these hotels, as it ought to be in the metropolis of a State which furnishes all the staples and delicacies of the table in abundance and always in season. Butcher’s meat, however, as elsewhere on the coast, is frequently tough, and poultry seems to be exceedingly scarce or expensive, for it is seldom seen on the bill of fare. There are some restaurants, too, where good meals can be obtained; but it makes one indignant to find that even here in the chief city of California, some of the restaurateurs are too idiotic, or dishonest, or both, to furnish California wines under California labels at sensible prices. The California wines are there, of course, but under French labels and at fancy prices, varying from two to five dollars; whereas, if the wine (which is really much better and purer than nine-tenths of all imported French clarets) were honestly labelled, it could be sold at a quarter of those prices. The same humbug flourishes in most Eastern restaurants, but here one would think the mob would rise in its patriotic indignation and State pride, and summarily expel these short-sighted, swindling restaurateurs. Claret is so cheap by the gallon that it ought to be served free with meals, as in Spain, instead of that deadly American drink, ice-water.

There are cheap eating-houses in San Francisco where a poor man can get soup, meat, a dish of vegetables, and a glass of claret or beer,—all for ten cents. There is no exaggeration in Mr. J. S. Hittell’s statement that “the wages of labor are still fifteen to thirty per cent higher than on the other side of the continent, and fifty to one hundred per cent higher than in Europe, while the cost of living is lower than in either.” Notwithstanding Chinese competition (about which a great deal too much fuss is made in California, since the Chinamen are absolutely needed, especially in harvest-time), it is doubtless true that there are few places in the world where the laboring-man fares so well as here, owing to the cheapness of provisions and the ease with which a cheap suburban residence on the back hills or across the bay may be reached.

In the matter of picturesque suburbs, San Francisco is admirably supplied. Cross the bay in any direction, and you will find no end of fine sites for villas or towns, and the suburban capabilities of the islands which beautify the bay have hardly begun to be exploited. Every half-hour a large and comfortable ferry crosses the bay directly east to Oakland, noted as a city of elegant homes. A few miles beyond lies Berkeley, the Cambridge of California, being the site of the University of California. But neither Cambridge in New England nor in Old England has a view to compare with that obtainable from Berkeley University and the hills rising up behind it,—a view which includes San Francisco, the bay, looking like a large lake, and some fine mountain groups. Here is some of the best society to be found in the West, and connected with the University is a gallery and good library for the use of the students, whose ranks generally include seventy or eighty young women.

Another ferry runs from the city northward to the charming suburb of Saucelito, which, although but a few miles away, has a climate eight degrees warmer in winter than San Francisco, being sheltered by a high hill from the violent trade winds and the fogs which find free access through the Golden Gate, where they enter in order to take the place of the vacant spaces left by the rising of the air in the heated Sacramento Valley of the interior. Saucelito is the favorite picnic ground of San Franciscans, and it commands superb views of the bay and its islands, the city, and the Golden Gate, but its building-ground is limited, since the parts unsheltered by the wall of the hill are exposed, more even than the city opposite, to wind and weather. These trade winds and fogs constitute the greatest drawback of the climate of San Francisco, and make it unsuited for invalids, even in summer. For owing to the trade winds and the effect of the Japan current, arriving via Alaska, there are only seven days in a year when the thermometer rises to 80°; and the mean temperature of July is 60°, or 17° lower than in New York. Hence sea-bathing is a pleasure rarely indulged in near San Francisco, the temperature of the water being only 53° in July,—10° or 12° lower than at Santa Barbara.

Eastern people, and especially Europeans, coming to California for climatic reasons are too apt to forget the immense size of this State and its infinite variety of climates. California, if transferred to the Atlantic Coast, would extend from Boston to Charleston, having as much coast line as in the East is divided between ten States. A year ago I crossed the ocean with an Englishman who was apparently in the last stages of bronchitis, and we agreed to meet in January at San Diego. He had not appeared in April, and I concluded he had died on the way across the Continent. But he had gone to San Francisco, where his trouble at once increased so much that he found himself in a worse condition than ever, and cursed the climate and the London physician who had sent him to California. Fortunately, a friend enlightened him on the diversity of climate in California, and he went to Santa Barbara, where I accidentally came across him, looking hale and vigorous, gaining weight, climbing hills, and eating like a bear. For persons with weak lungs, therefore, San Francisco is not a desirable residence; but for healthy folk it is an ideal climate, because the temperature is hardly ever oppressively warm or uncomfortably cold for those who are well supplied with flannels. If there are only seven days a year when the thermometer rises above 79°, there are, on the other hand, only five days in a year when it falls to the freezing-point. Such a climate breeds no numbness, lassitude, sultriness, _dolce far niente_; hence the San Franciscan is energetic, quick in his movements, but not morbidly nervous. The pale-faced fragile clerks and dudes of New York and Philadelphia would either die here of lung disease, or if “fit to survive” would soon assume the healthy, robust appearance of San Franciscans, to whose strong lungs the trade winds, which sweep the city and ever renew its atmosphere, are a tonic and a luxury.

IX.

LAKE TAHOE AND VIRGINIA CITY.

CLIMATIC PARADOXES IN SAN FRANCISCO—A LONG FERRY-BOAT—SNOW-SHEDS AND DONNER LAKE—TRUCKEE RIVER—LOGGING AND FISHING—TAHOE CITY—ROUND TRIP ON A BOAT—A LAKE AMIDST SNOW MOUNTAINS—A CINNAMON BEAR—BUTTERFLIES, SNOW, AND A BLUE SKY—LARGE TROUT, AND HOW TO CATCH THEM—SUNSETS REFLECTED IN THE LAKE—OTHER COLOR PHENOMENA—THE FLUME TO CARSON VALLEY—A MOUNTAIN RAILWAY—DESOLATE NEVADA MOUNTAINS—MINING UNDER A CITY—GOLD HILL.

The climatic conditions of San Francisco are anomalous and curious; shade trees, for instance, which are the greatest desideratum and blessing in Los Angeles, are not desired by San Franciscans, because the air is cool enough in summer without artificial shade. On the other hand, it is never so cold but that many semi-tropical plants will survive a whole winter in a sheltered situation outdoors; and San Francisco has in its public places some palm-trees high enough to attract attention even in San Diego. The avoidance of extremes is what constitutes the charm and value of the climate of San Francisco. But if the natives tire of this “golden mean,” and desire to experience the extremes for the sake of variety, they can gratify their wish by a few hours’ ride on the Central Pacific Railroad. At Sacramento they may find the thermometer above ninety in May, and just beyond it a place where oranges ripen six weeks sooner than at Los Angeles; while the station of Summit, a few hours further on, may be buried under four or five feet of snow,—an article almost unknown in San Francisco. Californians, however, are not greatly addicted to the habit of seeing the wonderful sights of their State, and such places as the Yosemite Valley, the Big Tree Groves, and Lake Tahoe owe their fame and vogue chiefly to Eastern and foreign tourists. There are now half-a-dozen transcontinental routes to choose between, so that it does not necessarily follow that every one crosses by the Central Pacific; but those who prefer the Northern or the Canadian Pacific should not neglect at least to patronize the Central Pacific to the extent of twenty dollars for a round-trip ticket, which includes the finest scenery along the whole road,—the semi-tropical Sacramento Valley, the sudden transition to the snow-crowned summit of the Sierra Nevada, the snow-sheds, Donner Lake, with a side excursion to Lake Tahoe, and the silver mines in Virginia County, Nevada. Lake Tahoe has been as often described as San Francisco; but as every pair of eyes looks at the world from its own point of view, perhaps I may be allowed to tell briefly what I saw. Lake Tahoe has only been known a few decades, while the sights of Greece and Egypt were described two thousand years ago, and are still “written up” in newspapers and periodicals.

Until two years ago the time-tables of the Central Pacific were so arranged that the passengers lost all the fine mountain scenery between Sacramento and Reno in the darkness of the night, unless they took an emigrant train. Now, however, Donner Lake and the snow at Summit and Cape Horn, where the train rounds a mass of precipitous rock over an abyss two thousand feet below, and the thirty-four miles of snow-sheds, which cost the company three hundred and fifty thousand dollars, can be seen by getting up at five o’clock. Previous to this we come upon one of the curiosities of California,—a ferry-boat four hundred and twenty-four feet long and one hundred and sixteen wide, which carries the whole train across a branch of the San Francisco Bay, thirty miles from the city. It is dark, and the motion is imperceptible. “What are we stopping here for so long?” asks a lady of the porter. “We are on a ferry.” “But why don’t they start?” “Why, we are half-way over!” It must be admitted that although the change in the time-table is an improvement, much of the Sierra scenery still remains unseen, being hidden by the snow-sheds in which the train moves along mile after mile, as in an interminable tunnel. There are a few gaps and window-holes here and there, but not nearly enough to give the passengers a satisfactory view of either the mountains, or of the lovely Donner Lake. This lake is otherwise unfortunate in having the attention drawn from its fine elongated outlines and mountainous surroundings by the eternal tale which some one in every seat is sure to tell of the unfortunate Donner party of emigrants who were snowed in here, and lost thirty-four of their eighty-one members through cold and starvation; or else some one will begin to tell of big hauls of trout recently made, for Donner Lake is as full of trout as Tahoe, and more convenient to the city markets.

At Truckee we leave the train to connect with the Tahoe stage. This is only a rough, lumbering town, but the laws of etiquette are enforced all the same; for in the hotel office a notice is posted, that “Gents are Requested to wear their Coats in the Dining-room.” We comply with this rule the more readily as the temperature at this early morning hour, and at this height, offers no inducement for sitting in our shirt-sleeves. We find that although our train was on time, the stage with which we were to connect had left without us. The stage company is in an evil predicament. It has fifteen miles to cover between Truckee and Tahoe; and if it waits for the train, the boat at Tahoe City probably will not wait for it. However, an extra stage was provided for our party, and the driver informed us that if we had come a day sooner we should have been caught in a first-class snow-storm (this was about the middle of May). To-day, however, the sun was out bright and warm, melting the snow rapidly, without thereby improving the road. The trees still had on a snow-costume, fitting as snugly as if tailor-made, so that while there was not a speck in the blue sky, every gust of wind sprinkled us with a shower of loose snow and solid crystals. The extraordinary difference in California between shade and sunshine was prettily demonstrated by the fact that although the sun had already melted the snow on and near the small shrubs, little patches of it remained wherever a tiny isolated plant of six inches cast its little streak of shade.

The road keeps alongside of the rapid Truckee River, which forms the outlet of Lake Tahoe and connects it with the great Pyramid Lake in Nevada,—being, therefore, like the Niagara, not a river in the ordinary acceptation of the term, having its source directly in the springs or melting snows and its mouth in the ocean, but a mere connecting link between two fresh-water lakes entirely isolated from the ocean. As both these lakes are alive with trout,—Pyramid even more than Tahoe, owing to its greater size and difficulty of access,—it may be imagined that the Truckee is good fishing-ground. Not so good, however, as it used to be; for whereas formerly the trout used to come up the Truckee from Pyramid Lake in great numbers to spawn in Tahoe, a dozen dams are now in the way, impeding their progress; and the difference this makes is already so perceptible that last year the fish commissioners had to place half a million young trout in Tahoe, and this year a still larger number was to be put in, since in a lake twenty-two miles long and ten wide, half a million is after all a mere handful. Besides trout, there are many whitefish, suckers, chubs, and other fish in this river, and the driver showed us a deep pool in which some law-breaking Chinamen once killed over three thousand pounds of fish by a dynamite explosion.