In the Footprints of the Padres written by Charles Warren Stoddard
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Charles Warren Stoddard >> In the Footprints of the Padres
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15 [Illustration: Life at the Mission of Dolores, 1855]
IN THE
FOOTPRINTS OF
THE PADRES
BY
CHARLES WARREN STODDARD
NEW AND ENLARGED EDITION
INTRODUCTION BY
CHARLES PHILLIPS
SAN FRANCISCO
A.M. Robertson
MCMXII
TO MY FATHER
SAMUEL BURR STODDARD, ESQ.
FOR HALF A CENTURY
A CITIZEN OF SAN FRANCISCO
THOUGH THE KINDNESS OF THE EDITORS
OF THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE,
THE CENTURY MAGAZINE, THE
OVERLAND MONTHLY, THE
AVE MARIA, NOTRE DAME, INDIANA,
THE VICTORIAN REVIEW, MELBOURNE
INTRODUCTION
Since the first and second editions of "In the Footprints of the Padres"
appeared, many things have transpired. San Francisco has been destroyed
and rebuilt, and in its holocaust most of the old landmarks mentioned in
the pages that follow as then existing, have been obliterated. Since
then, too, the gentle heart, much of whose story is told herein, has
been hushed in death. Charles Warren Stoddard has followed on in the
footprints of the Padres he loved so well. He abides with us no longer,
save in the sweetest of memories, memories which are kept ever new by
the unforgettable writings which he left behind him. He passed away
April 23, 1909, and lies sleeping now under the cypresses of his beloved
Monterey.
Charles Warren Stoddard was possessed of unique literary gifts that were
all his own. These gifts shine out in the pages of this book. Here we
find that mustang humor of his forever kicking its silver heels with the
most upsetting suddenness into the honeyed sweetness of his flowing
poetry. Here, too, we find that gift of word-painting which makes all
his writings a brilliant gallery of rich-hued and soft-lighted wonder.
Of the green thickets of the redwood forests he says, in "Primeval
California": "A dense undergrowth of light green foliage caught and held
the sunlight like so much spray." So do Stoddard's pages catch and hold
the lights and shadows of a world which is the more beautiful because he
beheld it and sang of it--for sing he did. His prose is the essence of
poetry.
In my autograph copy of "The Footprints of the Padres" Stoddard wrote:
"A new memory of Old Monterey is the richer for our meeting here for the
first time in the flesh. We have often met in spirit ere this." Whenever
we would go walking together, he and I, through the streets of that old
Monterey, old no longer save in memory, he would invariably take me to a
certain high board fence, and looking through an opening show me the
ruins of an adobe house--nothing but a broken fireplace left, moss-grown
and crumbling away. "That is my old California," he would say, while his
sweet voice was shaken with tears. That desolated hearth seemed to him
the symbol of the California which he had known and loved.... But no,
the old California that Stoddard loved lives on, and will, because he
caught and preserved its spirit and its coloring, its light and life and
music. As the redwood thicket holds the sunlight, so do Stoddard's words
keep bright and living, though viewed through a mist of tears, the
California of other days.
In this new edition of "The Footprints" some changes will be found,
changes which all will agree make an improvement over the original
volume. "Primeval California," first published in October, 1881, in the
old Scribner's (now The Century) Magazine, when James G. Holland was its
editor, is at times Stoddard at his best. "In Yosemite Shadows" shows us
the young Stoddard full of boyish enthusiasm--he could not have been
more than twenty when it was written and published, in the old Overland,
then edited by Bret Harte. It is more than a gloriously poetic
description of Yosemite, when Yosemite still dreamed in its virgin
beauty; it is the revelation of a poet's beginnings, for it gives us in
the rough, just finding their way to the light, all those gifts which
later won Stoddard his fame.
The third addition to this volume is "An Affair of the Misty City," a
valuable chapter, since it is wholly autobiographical, and at the same
time embodies pen portraits of all the celebrities of California's first
literary days, that famous group of which Stoddard was one. Of all the
group, Ina Coolbrith was closest and dearest to Stoddard's heart. The
beautiful abiding friendship which bound the souls of these two poets
together has not been surpassed in all the poetry and romance of the
world. These last added chapters are taken from "In the Pleasure of His
Company," which is out of print and may never be republished.
The "Mysterious History," included in the original editions of "The
Footprints" has wisely been left out. It had no proper place in the
book: Stoddard himself felt that. The additions which have been supplied
by Mr. Robertson, who was for years Stoddard's publisher, and in whom
the author reposed the utmost confidence, make a real improvement on the
original book.
"We have often met in spirit ere this," Stoddard wrote me. We had; and
we meet again and again. I feel him very near me as I write these words;
and I feel, too, that his gentle soul will visit everyone who reads the
chronicles he has here set down, so that even though no shaft rise in
marble glory to mark his last resting place, still in unnumbered hearts
his memory will be enshrined. With his poet friend, Thomas Walsh, well
may we say:
"Vain the laudation!--What are crowns and praise
To thee whom Youth anointed on the eyes?
We have but known the lesser heart of thee
Whose spirit bloomed in lilies down the ways
Of Padua; whose voice perpetual sighs
On Molokai in tides of melody."
CHARLES PHILLIPS.
San Francisco,
September first,
Nineteen hundred and eleven.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Old Days in El Dorado--
I. "Strange Countries for to See"
II. Crossing the Isthmus
III. Along the Pacific Shore
IV. In the Wake of Drake
V. Atop o' Telegraph Hill
VI. Pavement Pictures
VII. A Boy's Outing
VIII. The Mission Dolores
IX. Social San Francisco
X. Happy Valley
XI. The Vigilance Committee
XII. The Survivor's Story
A Bit of Old China
With the Egg-Pickers of the Farallones
A Memory of Monterey
In a Californian Bungalow
Primeval California
Inland Yachting
In Yosemite Shadows
An Affair of the Misty City--
I. What the Moon Shone on
II. What the Sun Shone on
III. Balm of Hurt Wounds
IV. By the World Forgot
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Life at the Mission of Dolores, 1855
View of Montgomery, Post and Market Streets, San Francisco, 1858
Fort Point at the Golden Gate
The Outer Signal Station at the Golden Gate
City of Oakland in 1856
Interior of the El Dorado
Warner's at Meigg's Wharf
The Old Flume at Black Point, 1856
Lone Mountain, 1856
Russ Gardens, 1856
Certificate of Membership, Vigilance Committee, 1856
West from Black Point, 1856
"China is Not More Chinese than this Section of Our Christian City."
"Rag Alley" in Old Chinatown
The Farallones
Murre on their Nests, Farallone Islands
Monterey, 1850
San Carlos de Carmelo
"The Huge Court of that Luxurious Caravansary."
"The Gallery Among the Huge Vases of Palms and Creepers."
Meigg's Wharf in 1856
Telegraph Hill, 1855
Sentinel Hotel, Yosemite, in 1869
San Francisco in 1856
THE BELLS OF SAN GABRIEL
Thine was the corn and the wine,
The blood of the grape that nourished;
The blossom and fruit of the vine
That was heralded far away.
These were thy gifts; and thine,
When the vine and the fig-tree flourished,
The promise of peace and of glad increase
Forever and ever and aye.
What then wert thou, and what art now?
Answer me, O, I pray!
And every note of every bell
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Oil of the olive was thine;
Flood of the wine-press flowing;
Blood o' the Christ was the wine--
Blood o' the Lamb that was slain.
Thy gifts were fat o' the kine
Forever coming and going
Far over the hills, the thousand hills--
Their lowing a soft refrain.
What then wert thou, and what art now?
Answer me, once again!
And every note of every bell
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Seed o' the corn was thine--
Body of Him thus broken
And mingled with blood o' the vine--
The bread and the wine of life;
Out of the good sunshine
They were given to thee as a token--
The body of Him, and the blood of Him,
When the gifts of God were rife.
What then wert thou, and what art now,
After the weary strife?
And every note of every bell
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Where are they now, O, bells?
Where are the fruits o' the mission?
Garnered, where no one dwells,
Shepherd and flock are fled.
O'er the Lord's vineyard swells
The tide that with fell perdition
Sounded their doom and fashioned their tomb
And buried them with the dead.
What then wert thou, and what art now?--
The answer is still unsaid.
And every note of every bell
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Where are they now, O tower!
The locusts and wild honey?
Where is the sacred dower
That the bride of Christ was given?
Gone to the wielders of power,
The misers and minters of money;
Gone for the greed that is their creed--
And these in the land have thriven.
What then wer't thou, and what art now,
And wherefore hast thou striven?
And every note of every bell
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
CHARLES WARREN STODDARD.
IN THE FOOTPRINTS OF THE PADRES
[Illustration: View of Montgomery, Post and Market Streets, San
Francisco, 1858]
OLD DAYS IN EL DORADO
I.
"STRANGE COUNTRIES FOR TO SEE"
Now, the very first book was called "Infancy"; and, having finished it,
I closed it with a bang! I was just twelve. 'Tis thus the
twelve-year-old is apt to close most books. Within those pages--perhaps
some day to be opened to the kindly inquiring eye--lie the records of a
quiet life, stirred at intervals by spasms of infantile intensity. There
are more days than one in a life that can be written of, and when the
clock strikes twelve the day is but half over.
The clock struck twelve! We children had been watching and waiting for
it. The house had been stripped bare; many cases of goods were awaiting
shipment around Cape Horn to California. California! A land of fable! We
knew well enough that our father was there, and had been for two years
or more; and that we were at last to go to him, and dwell there with the
fabulous in a new home more or less fabulous,--yet we felt that it must
be altogether lovely. We said good-bye to everybody,--getting friends
and fellow-citizens more or less mixed as the hour of departure from our
native city drew near. We were very much hugged and very much kissed and
not a little cried over; and then at last, in a half, dazed condition,
we left Rochester, New York, for New York city, on our way to San
Francisco by the Nicaragua route. This was away back in 1855, when San
Francisco, it may be said, was only six years old.
It seemed a supreme condescension on the part of our maternal
grandfather that he, who did not and could not for a moment countenance
the theatre, should voluntarily take us, one and all, to see an alleged
dramatic representation at Barnum's Museum--at that time one of the
features of New York city, and perhaps the most famous place of
amusement in the land. Four years later, when I was sixteen, very far
from home and under that good gentleman's watchful supervision, I asked
leave to witness a dramatic version of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," enacted by a
small company of strolling players in a canvas tent. There were no
blood-hounds in the cast, and mighty little scenery, or anything else
alluring; but I was led to believe that I had been trembling upon the
verge of something direful, and I was not allowed to go. What would that
pious man have said could he have seen me, a few years later, strutting
and fretting my hour upon the stage?
Well, we all saw "Damon and Pythias" in Barnum's "Lecture Room," with
real scenery that split up the middle and slid apart over a carpet of
green baize. And 'twas a real play, played by real players,--at least
they were once real players, but that was long before. It may be their
antiquated and failing art rendered them harmless. And, then, those
beguiling words "Lecture Room" have such a soothing sound! They seemed
in those days to hallow the whole function, which was, of course, the
wily wish of the great moral entertainer; and his great moral
entertainment was even as "the cups that cheer but not inebriate." It
came near it in our case, however. It was our first matinee at the
theatre, and, oh, the joy we took of it! Years afterward did we children
in our playroom, clad in "the trailing garments of the night" in lieu of
togas, sink our identity for the moment and out-rant Damon and his
Pythias. Thrice happy days so long ago in California!
There is no change like a sea change, no matter who suffers it; and
one's first sea voyage is a revelation. The mystery of it is usually not
unmixed with misery. Five and forty years ago it was a very serious
undertaking to uproot one's self, say good-bye to all that was nearest
and dearest, and go down beyond the horizon in an ill-smelling,
overcrowded, side-wheeled tub. Not a soul on the dock that day but fully
realized this. The dock and the deck ran rivers of tears, it seemed to
me; and when, after the lingering agony of farewells had reached the
climax, and the shore-lines were cast off, and the Star of the West
swung out into the stream, with great side-wheels fitfully revolving, a
shriek rent the air and froze my young blood. Some mother parting from a
son who was on board our vessel, no longer able to restrain her emotion,
was borne away, frantically raving in the delirium of grief. I have
never forgotten that agonizing scene, or the despairing wail that was
enough to pierce the hardest heart. I imagined my heart was about to
break; and when we put out to sea in a damp and dreary drizzle, and the
shore-line dissolved away, while on board there was overcrowding, and
confusion worse confounded in evidence everywhere,--perhaps it did
break, that overwrought heart of mine and has been a patched thing ever
since.
We were a miserable lot that night, pitched to and fro and rolled from
side to side as if we were so much baggage. And there was a special
horror in the darkness, as well as in the wind that hissed through the
rigging, and in the waves that rushed past us, sheeted with foam that
faded ghostlike as we watched it,--faded ghostlike, leaving the
blackness of darkness to enfold us and swallow us up.
Day after day for a dozen days we ploughed that restless sea. There were
days into which the sun shone not; when everybody and everything was
sticky with salty distillations; when half the passengers were sea-sick
and the other half sick of the sea. The decks were slimy, the cabins
stuffy and foul. The hours hung heavily, and the horizon line closed in
about us a gray wall of mist.
Then I used to bury myself in my books and try to forget the world, now
lost to sight, and, as I sometimes feared, never to be found again. I
had brought my private library with me; it was complete in two volumes.
There was "Rollo Crossing the Atlantic," by dear old Jacob Abbot; and
this book of juvenile travel and adventure I read on the spot, as it
were,--read it carefully, critically; flattering myself that I was a lad
of experience, capable of detecting any nautical error which Jacob, one
of the most prolific authors of his day, might perchance have made. The
other volume was a pocket copy of "Robinson Crusoe," upon the fly-leaf
of which was scrawled, in an untutored hand, "Charley from
Freddy,"--this Freddy was my juvenile chum. I still have that little
treasure, with its inscription undimmed by time.
Frequently I have thought that the reading of this charming book may
have been the predominating influence in the development of my taste and
temper; for it was while I was absorbed in the exquisitely pathetic
story of Robinson Crusoe that the first island I ever saw dawned upon my
enchanted vision. We had weathered Cape Sable and the Florida Keys. No
sky was ever more marvellously blue than the sea beneath us. The density
and the darkness that prevail in Northern waters had gone out of it; the
sun gilded it, the moon silvered it, and the great stars dropped their
pearl-plummets into it in the vain search for soundings.
Sea gardens were there,--floating gardens adrift in the tropic gale;
pale green gardens of berry and leaf and long meandering vine, rocking
upon the waves that lapped the shores of the Antilles, feeding the
current of the warm Gulf Stream; and, forsooth, some of them to find
their way at last into the mazes of that mysterious, mighty, menacing
sargasso sea. Strange sea-monsters, more beautiful than monstrous,
sported in the foam about our prow, and at intervals dashed it with
color like animated rainbows. From wave to wave the flying fish skimmed
like winged arrows of silver. Sometimes a land-bird was blown across the
sky--the sea-birds we had always with us,--and ever the air was spicy
and the breeze like a breath of balm.
One day a little cloud dawned upon our horizon. It was at first pale
and pearly, then pink like the hollow of a sea-shell, then misty
blue,--a darker blue, a deep blue dissolving into green, and the green
outlining itself in emerald, with many a shade of lighter or darker
green fretting its surface, throwing cliff and crest into high relief,
and hinting at misty and mysterious vales, as fair as fathomless. It
floated up like a cloud from the nether world, and was at first without
form and void, even as its fellows were; but as we drew nearer--for we
were steaming toward it across a sea of sapphire,--it brooded upon the
face of the water, while the clouds that had hung about it were
scattered and wafted away.
Thus was an island born to us of sea and sky,--an island whose peak was
sky-kissed, whose vales were overshadowed by festoons of vapor, whose
heights were tipped with sunshine, and along whose shore the sea sang
softly, and the creaming breakers wreathed themselves, flashed like
snow-drifts, vanished and flashed again. The sea danced and sparkled;
the air quivered with vibrant light. Along the border of that island the
palm-trees towered and reeled, and all its gardens breathed perfume such
as I had never known or dreamed of.
For a few hours only we basked in its beauty, rejoiced in it, gloried in
it; and then we passed it by. Even as it had risen from the sea it
returned into its bosom and was seen no more. Twilight stole in between
us, and the night blotted it out forever. Forever?
I wonder what island it was? A pearl of the Antilles, surely; but its
name and fame, its history and mystery are lost to me. Its memory lives
and is as green as ever. No wintry blasts visit it; even the rich dyes
of autumn do not discolor it. It is perennial in its rare beauty,
unfading, unforgotten, unforgettable; a thing immutable, immemorial--I
had almost said immortal.
Whence it came and whither it has gone I know not. It had its rising and
its setting; its day from dawn to dusk was perfect. Doubtless there are
those whose lives have been passed within its tranquil shade: from
generation to generation it has known all that they have known of joy or
sorrow. All the world that they have knowledge of has been compassed by
the far blue rim of the horizon. That sky-piercing peak was ever the
centre of their universe, and the wandering sea-bird has outflown their
thoughts.
All this came to me as a child, when the first island "swam into my
ken." It was a great discovery--a revelation. Of it were born all the
islands that have been so much to me in later life. And even then I
seemed to comprehend the singular life that all islanders are forced to
live: the independence of that life--for a man's island is his fortress,
girded about with the fathomless moat of the sea; and the dependence of
it--for what is that island but an atom dotting watery space and so
easily cut off from communication with the world at large? Drought may
visit the islander, and he may be starved; the tornado may desolate his
shore; fever and famine and thirst may lie in wait for him; sickness and
sorrow and death abide with him. Thus is he dependent in his
independence.
And he is insecluded in his seclusion, for he can not escape from the
intruder. He should have no wish that may not be satisfied, provided he
be native born; what can he wish for that is beyond the knowledge he has
gained from the objects within his reach? The world is his, so far as he
knows it; yet if he have one wish that calls for aught beyond his
limited horizon he rests unsatisfied.
All that was lovely in that tropic isle appealed to me and filled me
with a great longing. I wanted to sing with the Beloved Bard:
Oh, had we some bright little isle of our own,
In the blue summer ocean, far off and alone!
And yet even then I felt its unutterable loneliness, as I have felt it a
thousand times since; the loneliness that starves the heart, tortures
the brain, and leaves the mind diseased; the loneliness that is
exemplified in the solitude of Alexander Selkirk.
Robinson Crusoe lived in very truth for me the moment I saw and
comprehended that summer isle. He also is immortal. From that hour we
scoured the sea for islands: from dawn to dark we were on the watch. The
Caribbean Sea is well stocked with them. We were threading our way among
them, and might any day hear the glad cry of "Land ho!" But we heard it
not until the morning of the eleventh day out from New York. The sea
seemed more lonesome than ever when we lost our, island; the monotony of
our life was almost unbroken. We began to feel as prisoners must feel
whose _time_ is near out. Oh, how the hours lagged!--but deliverance was
at hand. At last we gave a glad shout, for the land was ours again; we
were to disembark in the course of a few hours, and all was bustle and
confusion until we dropped anchor off the Mosquito Shore.
II.
CROSSING THE ISTHMUS
We approached the Mosquito Shore timidly. The shallowing sea was of the
color of amber; the land so low and level that the foliage which covered
it seemed to be rooted in the water. We dropped anchor in the mouth of
the San Juan River. On our right lay the little Spanish village of San
Juan del Norte; its five hundred inhabitants may have been wading
through its one street at that moment, for aught we know; the place
seemed to be knee-deep in water. On our left was a long strip of
land--the depot and coaling station of the Vanderbilt Steamship Company.
It did not appear to be much, that sandspit known as Punta Arenas, with
its row of sheds at the water's edge, and its scattering shrubs tossing
in the wind; but sovereignty over this very point was claimed by three
petty powers: Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and "Mosquito." Great Britain
backed the "Mosquito" claim; and, in virtue of certain privileges
granted by the "Mosquito" King, the authorities of San Juan del
Norte--the port better known in those days as Graytown, albeit 'twas as
green as grass--threatened to seize Punta Arenas for public use.
Thereupon Graytown was bombarded; but immediately rose, Phoenix-like,
from its ashes, and was flourishing when we arrived. The current number
of _Harper's Monthly_, a copy of which we brought on board when we
embarked at New York, contained an illustrated account of the
bombardment of Graytown, which added not a little to the interest of the
hour.
While we were speculating as to the nature of our next experience,
suddenly a stern-wheel, flat-bottom boat backed up alongside of the Star
of the West. She was of the pattern of the small freight-boats that
still ply the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. If the Star of the West was
small, this stern-wheel scow was infinitely smaller. There was but one
cabin, and it was rendered insufferably hot by the boilers that were set
in the middle of it. There was one flush deck, with an awning stretched
above it that extended nearly to the prow of the boat. It was said our
passenger list numbered fourteen hundred. The gold boom in California
was still at fever heat. Every craft that set sail for the Isthmus by
the Nicaragua or Panama route, or by the weary route around Cape Horn,
was packed full of gold-seekers. It was the Golden Age of the Argonauts;
and, if my memory serves me well, there were no reserved seats worth the
price thereof.
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