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diff --git a/516-h/516-h.htm b/516-h/516-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9ef4feb --- /dev/null +++ b/516-h/516-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,3740 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>The Silverado Squatters, by Robert Louis Stevenson</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + P.gutsumm { margin-left: 5%;} + P.poetry {margin-left: 3%; } + .GutSmall { font-size: 0.7em; } + H1, H2 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + } + H3, H4, H5 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + table { border-collapse: collapse; } +table {margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto;} + td { vertical-align: top; border: 1px solid black;} + td p { margin: 0.2em; } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .pagenum {position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: small; + text-align: right; + font-weight: normal; + color: gray; + } + img { border: none; } + img.dc { float: left; width: 50px; height: 50px; } + p.gutindent { margin-left: 2em; } + div.gapspace { height: 0.8em; } + div.gapline { height: 0.8em; width: 100%; border-top: 1px solid;} + div.gapmediumline { height: 0.3em; width: 40%; margin-left:30%; + border-top: 1px solid; } + div.gapmediumdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 40%; margin-left:30%; + border-top: 1px solid; border-bottom: 1px solid;} + div.gapshortdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 20%; + margin-left: 40%; border-top: 1px solid; + border-bottom: 1px solid; } + div.gapdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 50%; + margin-left: 25%; border-top: 1px solid; + border-bottom: 1px solid;} + div.gapshortline { height: 0.3em; width: 20%; margin-left:40%; + border-top: 1px solid; } + .citation {vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: none;} + img.floatleft { float: left; + margin-right: 1em; + margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } + img.floatright { float: right; + margin-left: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; + margin-bottom: 0.5em; } + img.clearcenter {display: block; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0.5em; + margin-bottom: 0.5em} + --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Silverado Squatters, by Robert Louis +Stevenson, Illustrated by Joseph D. Strong + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Silverado Squatters + + +Author: Robert Louis Stevenson + + + +Release Date: January 29, 2013 [eBook #516] +[This file was first posted on March 12, 1996] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SILVERADO SQUATTERS*** +</pre> +<p>Transcribed from the 1906 Chatto & Windus edition by David +Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org</p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/fpb.jpg"> +<img alt= +"Picture of the squatters by Joseph D. Strong. The title page +incorrectly claims it was by Joseph A. Strong" +title= +"Picture of the squatters by Joseph D. Strong. The title page +incorrectly claims it was by Joseph A. Strong" +src="images/fps.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<h1>THE<br /> +SILVERADO SQUATTERS</h1> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">BY</span></p> +<p style="text-align: center">ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON</p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/p0b.jpg"> +<img alt= +"Decorative graphic" +title= +"Decorative graphic" +src="images/p0s.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">A NEW +IMPRESSION</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">WITH A FRONTISPIECE BY JOSEPH D. +STRONG</span></p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center">LONDON<br /> +CHATTO & WINDUS<br /> +1906</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<blockquote><p>“Vixerunt nonnulli in agris, delectati re +sua familiari. His idem propositum fuit quod regibus, ut ne +qua re agerent, ne cui parerent, libertate uterentur: cujus +proprium est sic vivere ut velis.”</p> +<p style="text-align: right">—<span +class="smcap">Cic.</span>, <i>De Off.</i>, I. xx.</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> +<table> +<tr> +<td colspan="3"><p><span class="smcap">In the Valley</span>:</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right">I.</p> +</td> +<td><p>Calistoga</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page13">13</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right">II.</p> +</td> +<td><p>The Petrified Forest</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page24">24</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right">III.</p> +</td> +<td><p>Napa Wine</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page34">34</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right">IV.</p> +</td> +<td><p>The Scot Abroad</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page48">48</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="3"><p><span class="smcap">With the Children of +Israel</span>:</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right">I.</p> +</td> +<td><p>To Introduce Mr. Kelmar</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page59">59</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right">II.</p> +</td> +<td><p>First Impressions of Silverado</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page68">68</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right">III.</p> +</td> +<td><p>The Return</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page92">92</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><span class="smcap">The Act of +Squatting</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page103">103</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><span class="smcap">The Hunter’s +Family</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page127">127</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><span class="smcap">The Sea Fogs</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page153">153</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><span class="smcap">The Toll House</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page171">171</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><span class="smcap">A Starry Drive</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page185">185</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><span class="smcap">Episodes in the Story of a +Mine</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page197">197</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><span class="smcap">Toils And +Pleasures</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page223">223</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<h2><a name="page1"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 1</span>THE +SILVERADO SQUATTERS</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">The</span> scene of this little book is on +a high mountain. There are, indeed, many higher; there are +many of a nobler outline. It is no place of pilgrimage for +the summary globe-trotter; but to one who lives upon its sides, +Mount Saint Helena soon becomes a centre of interest. It is +the Mont Blanc of one section of the Californian Coast Range, +none of its near neighbours rising to one-half its +altitude. It looks down on much green, intricate +country. It feeds in the spring-time many splashing +brooks. From its summit you must have an excellent lesson +of geography: seeing, to the south, San Francisco Bay, with +Tamalpais on the one hand and Monte Diablo on the other; to the +west and thirty miles away, the open ocean; eastward, across the +corn-lands and thick tule swamps of Sacramento Valley, to where +the Central Pacific railroad begins to climb the sides of the +Sierras; and northward, for what I know, the white head of Shasta +looking down on Oregon. Three counties, Napa County, Lake +County, and Sonoma County, march across its cliffy +shoulders. Its naked peak stands nearly four thousand five +hundred feet above the sea; its sides are fringed with forest; +and the soil, where it is bare, glows warm with cinnabar.</p> +<p>Life in its shadow goes rustically forward. Bucks, and +bears, and rattlesnakes, and former mining operations, are the +staple of men’s talk. Agriculture has only begun to +mount above the valley. And though in a few years from now +the whole district may be smiling with farms, passing trains +shaking the mountain to the heart, many-windowed hotels lighting +up the night like factories, and a prosperous city occupying the +site of sleepy Calistoga; yet in the mean time, around the foot +of that mountain the silence of nature reigns in a great measure +unbroken, and the people of hill and valley go sauntering about +their business as in the days before the flood.</p> +<p>To reach Mount Saint Helena from San Francisco, the traveller +has twice to cross the bay: once by the busy Oakland Ferry, and +again, after an hour or so of the railway, from Vallejo junction +to Vallejo. Thence he takes rail once more to mount the +long green strath of Napa Valley.</p> +<p>In all the contractions and expansions of that inland sea, the +Bay of San Francisco, there can be few drearier scenes than the +Vallejo Ferry. Bald shores and a low, bald islet inclose +the sea; through the narrows the tide bubbles, muddy like a +river. When we made the passage (bound, although yet we +knew it not, for Silverado) the steamer jumped, and the black +buoys were dancing in the jabble; the ocean breeze blew killing +chill; and, although the upper sky was still unflecked with +vapour, the sea fogs were pouring in from seaward, over the +hilltops of Marin county, in one great, shapeless, silver +cloud.</p> +<p>South Vallejo is typical of many Californian towns. It +was a blunder; the site has proved untenable; and, although it is +still such a young place by the scale of Europe, it has already +begun to be deserted for its neighbour and namesake, North +Vallejo. A long pier, a number of drinking saloons, a hotel +of a great size, marshy pools where the frogs keep up their +croaking, and even at high noon the entire absence of any human +face or voice—these are the marks of South Vallejo. +Yet there was a tall building beside the pier, labelled the +<i>Star Flour Mills</i>; and sea-going, full-rigged ships lay +close along shore, waiting for their cargo. Soon these +would be plunging round the Horn, soon the flour from the <i>Star +Flour Mills</i> would be landed on the wharves of +Liverpool. For that, too, is one of England’s +outposts; thither, to this gaunt mill, across the Atlantic and +Pacific deeps and round about the icy Horn, this crowd of great, +three-masted, deep-sea ships come, bringing nothing, and return +with bread.</p> +<p>The Frisby House, for that was the name of the hotel, was a +place of fallen fortunes, like the town. It was now given +up to labourers, and partly ruinous. At dinner there was +the ordinary display of what is called in the west a <i>two-bit +house</i>: the tablecloth checked red and white, the plague of +flies, the wire hencoops over the dishes, the great variety and +invariable vileness of the food and the rough coatless men +devoting it in silence. In our bedroom, the stove would not +burn, though it would smoke; and while one window would not open, +the other would not shut. There was a view on a bit of +empty road, a few dark houses, a donkey wandering with its shadow +on a slope, and a blink of sea, with a tall ship lying anchored +in the moonlight. All about that dreary inn frogs sang +their ungainly chorus.</p> +<p>Early the next morning we mounted the hill along a wooden +footway, bridging one marish spot after another. Here and +there, as we ascended, we passed a house embowered in white +roses. More of the bay became apparent, and soon the blue +peak of Tamalpais rose above the green level of the island +opposite. It told us we were still but a little way from +the city of the Golden Gates, already, at that hour, beginning to +awake among the sand-hills. It called to us over the waters +as with the voice of a bird. Its stately head, blue as a +sapphire on the paler azure of the sky, spoke to us of wider +outlooks and the bright Pacific. For Tamalpais stands +sentry, like a lighthouse, over the Golden Gates, between the bay +and the open ocean, and looks down indifferently on both. +Even as we saw and hailed it from Vallejo, seamen, far out at +sea, were scanning it with shaded eyes; and, as if to answer to +the thought, one of the great ships below began silently to +clothe herself with white sails, homeward bound for England.</p> +<p>For some way beyond Vallejo the railway led us through bald +green pastures. On the west the rough highlands of Marin +shut off the ocean; in the midst, in long, straggling, gleaming +arms, the bay died out among the grass; there were few trees and +few enclosures; the sun shone wide over open uplands, the +displumed hills stood clear against the sky. But by-and-by +these hills began to draw nearer on either hand, and first +thicket and then wood began to clothe their sides; and soon we +were away from all signs of the sea’s neighbourhood, +mounting an inland, irrigated valley. A great variety of +oaks stood, now severally, now in a becoming grove, among the +fields and vineyards. The towns were compact, in about +equal proportions, of bright, new wooden houses and great and +growing forest trees; and the chapel bell on the engine sounded +most festally that sunny Sunday, as we drew up at one green town +after another, with the townsfolk trooping in their +Sunday’s best to see the strangers, with the sun sparkling +on the clean houses, and great domes of foliage humming overhead +in the breeze.</p> +<p>This pleasant Napa Valley is, at its north end, blockaded by +our mountain. There, at Calistoga, the railroad ceases, and +the traveller who intends faring farther, to the Geysers or to +the springs in Lake County, must cross the spurs of the mountain +by stage. Thus, Mount Saint Helena is not only a summit, +but a frontier; and, up to the time of writing, it has stayed the +progress of the iron horse.</p> +<h2>PART I—IN THE VALLEY</h2> +<h3><a name="page13"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +13</span>CHAPTER I—CALISTOGA</h3> +<p><span class="smcap">It</span> is difficult for a European to +imagine Calistoga, the whole place is so new, and of such an +accidental pattern; the very name, I hear, was invented at a +supper-party by the man who found the springs.</p> +<p>The railroad and the highway come up the valley about parallel +to one another. The street of Calistoga joins the +perpendicular to both—a wide street, with bright, clean, +low houses, here and there a verandah over the sidewalk, here and +there a horse-post, here and there lounging townsfolk. +Other streets are marked out, and most likely named; for these +towns in the New World begin with a firm resolve to grow larger, +Washington and Broadway, and then First and Second, and so forth, +being boldly plotted out as soon as the community indulges in a +plan. But, in the meanwhile, all the life and most of the +houses of Calistoga are concentrated upon that street between the +railway station and the road. I never heard it called by +any name, but I will hazard a guess that it is either Washington +or Broadway. Here are the blacksmith’s, the +chemist’s, the general merchant’s, and Kong Sam Kee, +the Chinese laundryman’s; here, probably, is the office of +the local paper (for the place has a paper—they all have +papers); and here certainly is one of the hotels, +Cheeseborough’s, whence the daring Foss, a man dear to +legend, starts his horses for the Geysers.</p> +<p>It must be remembered that we are here in a land of +stage-drivers and highwaymen: a land, in that sense, like England +a hundred years ago. The highway robber—road-agent, +he is quaintly called—is still busy in these parts. +The fame of Vasquez is still young. Only a few years go, +the Lakeport stage was robbed a mile or two from Calistoga. +In 1879, the dentist of Mendocino City, fifty miles away upon the +coast, suddenly threw off the garments of his trade, like +Grindoff, in <i>The Miller and his Men</i>, and flamed forth in +his second dress as a captain of banditti. A great robbery +was followed by a long chase, a chase of days if not of weeks, +among the intricate hill-country; and the chase was followed by +much desultory fighting, in which several—and the dentist, +I believe, amongst the number—bit the dust. The grass +was springing for the first time, nourished upon their blood, +when I arrived in Calistoga. I am reminded of another +highwayman of that same year. “He had been +unwell,” so ran his humorous defence, “and the doctor +told him to take something, so he took the +express-box.”</p> +<p>The cultus of the stage-coachman always flourishes highest +where there are thieves on the road, and where the guard travels +armed, and the stage is not only a link between country and city, +and the vehicle of news, but has a faint warfaring aroma, like a +man who should be brother to a soldier. California boasts +her famous stage-drivers, and among the famous Foss is not +forgotten. Along the unfenced, abominable mountain roads, +he launches his team with small regard to human life or the +doctrine of probabilities. Flinching travellers, who behold +themselves coasting eternity at every corner, look with natural +admiration at their driver’s huge, impassive, fleshy +countenance. He has the very face for the driver in Sam +Weller’s anecdote, who upset the election party at the +required point. Wonderful tales are current of his +readiness and skill. One in particular, of how one of his +horses fell at a ticklish passage of the road, and how Foss let +slip the reins, and, driving over the fallen animal, arrived at +the next stage with only three. This I relate as I heard +it, without guarantee.</p> +<p>I only saw Foss once, though, strange as it may sound, I have +twice talked with him. He lives out of Calistoga, at a +ranche called Fossville. One evening, after he was long +gone home, I dropped into Cheeseborough’s, and was asked if +I should like to speak with Mr. Foss. Supposing that the +interview was impossible, and that I was merely called upon to +subscribe the general sentiment, I boldly answered +“Yes.” Next moment, I had one instrument at my +ear, another at my mouth and found myself, with nothing in the +world to say, conversing with a man several miles off among +desolate hills. Foss rapidly and somewhat plaintively +brought the conversation to an end; and he returned to his +night’s grog at Fossville, while I strolled forth again on +Calistoga high street. But it was an odd thing that here, +on what we are accustomed to consider the very skirts of +civilization, I should have used the telephone for the first time +in my civilized career. So it goes in these young +countries; telephones, and telegraphs, and newspapers, and +advertisements running far ahead among the Indians and the +grizzly bears.</p> +<p>Alone, on the other side of the railway, stands the Springs +Hotel, with its attendant cottages. The floor of the valley +is extremely level to the very roots of the hills; only here and +there a hillock, crowned with pines, rises like the barrow of +some chieftain famed in war; and right against one of these +hillocks is the Springs Hotel—is or was; for since I was +there the place has been destroyed by fire, and has risen again +from its ashes. A lawn runs about the house, and the lawn +is in its turn surrounded by a system of little five-roomed +cottages, each with a verandah and a weedy palm before the +door. Some of the cottages are let to residents, and these +are wreathed in flowers. The rest are occupied by ordinary +visitors to the Hotel; and a very pleasant way this is, by which +you have a little country cottage of your own, without domestic +burthens, and by the day or week.</p> +<p>The whole neighbourhood of Mount Saint Helena is full of +sulphur and of boiling springs. The Geysers are famous; +they were the great health resort of the Indians before the +coming of the whites. Lake County is dotted with spas; Hot +Springs and White Sulphur Springs are the names of two stations +on the Napa Valley railroad; and Calistoga itself seems to repose +on a mere film above a boiling, subterranean lake. At one +end of the hotel enclosure are the springs from which it takes +its name, hot enough to scald a child seriously while I was +there. At the other end, the tenant of a cottage sank a +well, and there also the water came up boiling. It keeps +this end of the valley as warm as a toast. I have gone +across to the hotel a little after five in the morning, when a +sea fog from the Pacific was hanging thick and gray, and dark and +dirty overhead, and found the thermometer had been up before me, +and had already climbed among the nineties; and in the stress of +the day it was sometimes too hot to move about.</p> +<p>But in spite of this heat from above and below, doing one on +both sides, Calistoga was a pleasant place to dwell in; +beautifully green, for it was then that favoured moment in the +Californian year, when the rains are over and the dusty summer +has not yet set in; often visited by fresh airs, now from the +mountain, now across Sonoma from the sea; very quiet, very idle, +very silent but for the breezes and the cattle bells +afield. And there was something satisfactory in the sight +of that great mountain that enclosed us to the north: whether it +stood, robed in sunshine, quaking to its topmost pinnacle with +the heat and brightness of the day; or whether it set itself to +weaving vapours, wisp after wisp growing, trembling, fleeting, +and fading in the blue.</p> +<p>The tangled, woody, and almost trackless foot-hills that +enclose the valley, shutting it off from Sonoma on the west, and +from Yolo on the east—rough as they were in outline, dug +out by winter streams, crowned by cliffy bluffs and nodding pine +trees—wore dwarfed into satellites by the bulk and bearing +of Mount Saint Helena. She over-towered them by two-thirds +of her own stature. She excelled them by the boldness of +her profile. Her great bald summit, clear of trees and +pasture, a cairn of quartz and cinnabar, rejected kinship with +the dark and shaggy wilderness of lesser hill-tops.</p> +<h3><a name="page24"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +24</span>CHAPTER II—THE PETRIFIED FOREST</h3> +<p><span class="smcap">We</span> drove off from the Springs Hotel +about three in the afternoon. The sun warmed me to the +heart. A broad, cool wind streamed pauselessly down the +valley, laden with perfume. Up at the top stood Mount Saint +Helena, a bulk of mountain, bare atop, with tree-fringed spurs, +and radiating warmth. Once we saw it framed in a grove of +tall and exquisitely graceful white oaks, in line and colour a +finished composition. We passed a cow stretched by the +roadside, her bell slowly beating time to the movement of her +ruminating jaws, her big red face crawled over by half a dozen +flies, a monument of content.</p> +<p>A little farther, and we struck to the left up a mountain +road, and for two hours threaded one valley after another, green, +tangled, full of noble timber, giving us every now and again a +sight of Mount Saint Helena and the blue hilly distance, and +crossed by many streams, through which we splashed to the +carriage-step. To the right or the left, there was scarce +any trace of man but the road we followed; I think we passed but +one ranchero’s house in the whole distance, and that was +closed and smokeless. But we had the society of these +bright streams—dazzlingly clear, as is their wont, +splashing from the wheels in diamonds, and striking a lively +coolness through the sunshine. And what with the +innumerable variety of greens, the masses of foliage tossing in +the breeze, the glimpses of distance, the descents into seemingly +impenetrable thickets, the continual dodging of the road which +made haste to plunge again into the covert, we had a fine sense +of woods, and spring-time, and the open air.</p> +<p>Our driver gave me a lecture by the way on Californian +trees—a thing I was much in need of, having fallen among +painters who know the name of nothing, and Mexicans who know the +name of nothing in English. He taught me the madrona, the +manzanita, the buck-eye, the maple; he showed me the crested +mountain quail; he showed me where some young redwoods were +already spiring heavenwards from the ruins of the old; for in +this district all had already perished: redwoods and redskins, +the two noblest indigenous living things, alike condemned.</p> +<p>At length, in a lonely dell, we came on a huge wooden gate +with a sign upon it like an inn. “The Petrified +Forest. Proprietor: C. Evans,” ran the legend. +Within, on a knoll of sward, was the house of the proprietor, and +another smaller house hard by to serve as a museum, where +photographs and petrifactions were retailed. It was a pure +little isle of touristry among these solitary hills.</p> +<p>The proprietor was a brave old white-faced Swede. He had +wandered this way, Heaven knows how, and taken up his +acres—I forget how many years ago—all alone, bent +double with sciatica, and with six bits in his pocket and an axe +upon his shoulder. Long, useless years of seafaring had +thus discharged him at the end, penniless and sick. Without +doubt he had tried his luck at the diggings, and got no good from +that; without doubt he had loved the bottle, and lived the life +of Jack ashore. But at the end of these adventures, here he +came; and, the place hitting his fancy, down he sat to make a new +life of it, far from crimps and the salt sea. And the very +sight of his ranche had done him good. It was “the +handsomest spot in the Californy mountains.” +“Isn’t it handsome, now?” he said. Every +penny he makes goes into that ranche to make it handsomer. +Then the climate, with the sea-breeze every afternoon in the +hottest summer weather, had gradually cured the sciatica; and his +sister and niece were now domesticated with him for +company—or, rather, the niece came only once in the two +days, teaching music the meanwhile in the valley. And then, +for a last piece of luck, “the handsomest spot in the +Californy mountains” had produced a petrified forest, which +Mr. Evans now shows at the modest figure of half a dollar a head, +or two-thirds of his capital when he first came there with an axe +and a sciatica.</p> +<p>This tardy favourite of fortune—hobbling a little, I +think, as if in memory of the sciatica, but with not a trace that +I can remember of the sea—thoroughly ruralized from head to +foot, proceeded to escort us up the hill behind his house.</p> +<p>“Who first found the forest?” asked my wife.</p> +<p>“The first? I was that man,” said he. +“I was cleaning up the pasture for my beasts, when I found +<i>this</i>”—kicking a great redwood seven feet in +diameter, that lay there on its side, hollow heart, clinging +lumps of bark, all changed into gray stone, with veins of quartz +between what had been the layers of the wood.</p> +<p>“Were you surprised?”</p> +<p>“Surprised? No! What would I be surprised +about? What did I know about petrifactions—following +the sea? Petrifaction! There was no such word in my +language! I knew about putrifaction, though! I +thought it was a stone; so would you, if you was cleaning up +pasture.”</p> +<p>And now he had a theory of his own, which I did not quite +grasp, except that the trees had not “grewed” +there. But he mentioned, with evident pride, that he +differed from all the scientific people who had visited the spot; +and he flung about such words as “tufa” and +“scilica” with careless freedom.</p> +<p>When I mentioned I was from Scotland, “My old +country,” he said; “my old country”—with +a smiling look and a tone of real affection in his voice. I +was mightily surprised, for he was obviously Scandinavian, and +begged him to explain. It seemed he had learned his English +and done nearly all his sailing in Scotch ships. “Out +of Glasgow,” said he, “or Greenock; but that’s +all the same—they all hail from Glasgow.” And he was +so pleased with me for being a Scotsman, and his adopted +compatriot, that he made me a present of a very beautiful piece +of petrifaction—I believe the most beautiful and portable +he had.</p> +<p>Here was a man, at least, who was a Swede, a Scot, and an +American, acknowledging some kind allegiance to three +lands. Mr. Wallace’s Scoto-Circassian will not fail +to come before the reader. I have myself met and spoken +with a Fifeshire German, whose combination of abominable accents +struck me dumb. But, indeed, I think we all belong to many +countries. And perhaps this habit of much travel, and the +engendering of scattered friendships, may prepare the euthanasia +of ancient nations.</p> +<p>And the forest itself? Well, on a tangled, briery +hillside—for the pasture would bear a little further +cleaning up, to my eyes—there lie scattered thickly various +lengths of petrified trunk, such as the one already +mentioned. It is very curious, of course, and ancient +enough, if that were all. Doubtless, the heart of the +geologist beats quicker at the sight; but, for my part, I was +mightily unmoved. Sight-seeing is the art of +disappointment.</p> +<blockquote><p>“There’s nothing under heaven so +blue,<br /> +That’s fairly worth the travelling to.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But, fortunately, Heaven rewards us with many agreeable +prospects and adventures by the way; and sometimes, when we go +out to see a petrified forest, prepares a far more delightful +curiosity, in the form of Mr. Evans, whom may all prosperity +attend throughout a long and green old age.</p> +<h3><a name="page34"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +34</span>CHAPTER III—NAPA WINE</h3> +<p>I <span class="smcap">was</span> interested in Californian +wine. Indeed, I am interested in all wines, and have been +all my life, from the raisin wine that a schoolfellow kept +secreted in his play-box up to my last discovery, those notable +Valtellines, that once shone upon the board of Cæsar.</p> +<p>Some of us, kind old Pagans, watch with dread the shadows +falling on the age: how the unconquerable worm invades the sunny +terraces of France, and Bordeaux is no more, and the Rhone a mere +Arabia Petræa. Château Neuf is dead, and I have +never tasted it; Hermitage—a hermitage indeed from all +life’s sorrows—lies expiring by the river. And +in the place of these imperial elixirs, beautiful to every sense, +gem-hued, flower-scented, dream-compellers:—behold upon the +quays at Cette the chemicals arrayed; behold the analyst at +Marseilles, raising hands in obsecration, attesting god Lyoeus, +and the vats staved in, and the dishonest wines poured forth +among the sea. It is not Pan only; Bacchus, too, is +dead.</p> +<p>If wine is to withdraw its most poetic countenance, the sun of +the white dinner-cloth, a deity to be invoked by two or three, +all fervent, hushing their talk, degusting tenderly, and storing +reminiscences—for a bottle of good wine, like a good act, +shines ever in the retrospect—if wine is to desert us, go +thy ways, old Jack! Now we begin to have compunctions, and +look back at the brave bottles squandered upon dinner-parties, +where the guests drank grossly, discussing politics the while, +and even the schoolboy “took his whack,” like +liquorice water. And at the same time, we look timidly +forward, with a spark of hope, to where the new lands, already +weary of producing gold, begin to green with vineyards. A +nice point in human history falls to be decided by Californian +and Australian wines.</p> +<p>Wine in California is still in the experimental stage; and +when you taste a vintage, grave economical questions are +involved. The beginning of vine-planting is like the +beginning of mining for the precious metals: the wine-grower also +“Prospects.” One corner of land after another is +tried with one kind of grape after another. This is a +failure; that is better; a third best. So, bit by bit, they +grope about for their Clos Vougeot and Lafite. Those lodes +and pockets of earth, more precious than the precious ores, that +yield inimitable fragrance and soft fire; those virtuous +Bonanzas, where the soil has sublimated under sun and stars to +something finer, and the wine is bottled poetry: these still lie +undiscovered; chaparral conceals, thicket embowers them; the +miner chips the rock and wanders farther, and the grizzly muses +undisturbed. But there they bide their hour, awaiting their +Columbus; and nature nurses and prepares them. The smack of +Californian earth shall linger on the palate of your +grandson.</p> +<p>Meanwhile the wine is merely a good wine; the best that I have +tasted better than a Beaujolais, and not unlike. But the +trade is poor; it lives from hand to mouth, putting its all into +experiments, and forced to sell its vintages. To find one +properly matured, and bearing its own name, is to be +fortune’s favourite.</p> +<p>Bearing its own name, I say, and dwell upon the innuendo.</p> +<p>“You want to know why California wine is not drunk in +the States?” a San Francisco wine merchant said to me, +after he had shown me through his premises. “Well, +here’s the reason.”</p> +<p>And opening a large cupboard, fitted with many little drawers, +he proceeded to shower me all over with a great variety of +gorgeously tinted labels, blue, red, or yellow, stamped with +crown or coronet, and hailing from such a profusion of +<i>clos</i> and <i>chateaux</i>, that a single department could +scarce have furnished forth the names. But it was strange +that all looked unfamiliar.</p> +<p>“Chateau X—?” said I. “I never +heard of that.”</p> +<p>“I dare say not,” said he. “I had been +reading one of X—’s novels.”</p> +<p>They were all castles in Spain! But that sure enough is +the reason why California wine is not drunk in the States.</p> +<p>Napa valley has been long a seat of the wine-growing +industry. It did not here begin, as it does too often, in +the low valley lands along the river, but took at once to the +rough foot-hills, where alone it can expect to prosper. A +basking inclination, and stones, to be a reservoir of the +day’s heat, seem necessary to the soil for wine; the +grossness of the earth must be evaporated, its marrow daily +melted and refined for ages; until at length these clods that +break below our footing, and to the eye appear but common earth, +are truly and to the perceiving mind, a masterpiece of +nature. The dust of Richebourg, which the wind carries +away, what an apotheosis of the dust! Not man himself can +seem a stranger child of that brown, friable powder, than the +blood and sun in that old flask behind the faggots.</p> +<p>A Californian vineyard, one of man’s outposts in the +wilderness, has features of its own. There is nothing here +to remind you of the Rhine or Rhone, of the low <i>côte +d’or</i>, or the infamous and scabby deserts of Champagne; +but all is green, solitary, covert. We visited two of them, +Mr. Schram’s and Mr. M’Eckron’s, sharing the +same glen.</p> +<p>Some way down the valley below Calistoga, we turned sharply to +the south and plunged into the thick of the wood. A rude +trail rapidly mounting; a little stream tinkling by on the one +hand, big enough perhaps after the rains, but already yielding up +its life; overhead and on all sides a bower of green and tangled +thicket, still fragrant and still flower-bespangled by the early +season, where thimble-berry played the part of our English +hawthorn, and the buck-eyes were putting forth their twisted +horns of blossom: through all this, we struggled toughly upwards, +canted to and fro by the roughness of the trail, and continually +switched across the face by sprays of leaf or blossom. The +last is no great inconvenience at home; but here in California it +is a matter of some moment. For in all woods and by every +wayside there prospers an abominable shrub or weed, called +poison-oak, whose very neighbourhood is venomous to some, and +whose actual touch is avoided by the most impervious.</p> +<p>The two houses, with their vineyards, stood each in a green +niche of its own in this steep and narrow forest dell. +Though they were so near, there was already a good difference in +level; and Mr. M’Eckron’s head must be a long way +under the feet of Mr. Schram. No more had been cleared than +was necessary for cultivation; close around each oasis ran the +tangled wood; the glen enfolds them; there they lie basking in +sun and silence, concealed from all but the clouds and the +mountain birds.</p> +<p>Mr. M’Eckron’s is a bachelor establishment; a +little bit of a wooden house, a small cellar hard by in the +hillside, and a patch of vines planted and tended single-handed +by himself. He had but recently began; his vines were +young, his business young also; but I thought he had the look of +the man who succeeds. He hailed from Greenock: he +remembered his father putting him inside Mons Meg, and that +touched me home; and we exchanged a word or two of Scotch, which +pleased me more than you would fancy.</p> +<p>Mr. Schram’s, on the other hand, is the oldest vineyard +in the valley, eighteen years old, I think; yet he began a +penniless barber, and even after he had broken ground up here +with his black malvoisies, continued for long to tramp the valley +with his razor. Now, his place is the picture of +prosperity: stuffed birds in the verandah, cellars far dug into +the hillside, and resting on pillars like a bandit’s +cave:—all trimness, varnish, flowers, and sunshine, among +the tangled wildwood. Stout, smiling Mrs. Schram, who has +been to Europe and apparently all about the States for pleasure, +entertained Fanny in the verandah, while I was tasting wines in +the cellar. To Mr. Schram this was a solemn office; his +serious gusto warmed my heart; prosperity had not yet wholly +banished a certain neophite and girlish trepidation, and he +followed every sip and read my face with proud anxiety. I +tasted all. I tasted every variety and shade of +Schramberger, red and white Schramberger, Burgundy Schramberger, +Schramberger Hock, Schramberger Golden Chasselas, the latter with +a notable bouquet, and I fear to think how many more. Much +of it goes to London—most, I think; and Mr. Schram has a +great notion of the English taste.</p> +<p>In this wild spot, I did not feel the sacredness of ancient +cultivation. It was still raw, it was no Marathon, and no +Johannisberg; yet the stirring sunlight, and the growing vines, +and the vats and bottles in the cavern, made a pleasant music for +the mind. Here, also, earth’s cream was being skimmed +and garnered; and the London customers can taste, such as it is, +the tang of the earth in this green valley. So local, so +quintessential is a wine, that it seems the very birds in the +verandah might communicate a flavour, and that romantic cellar +influence the bottle next to be uncorked in Pimlico, and the +smile of jolly Mr. Schram might mantle in the glass.</p> +<p>But these are but experiments. All things in this new +land are moving farther on: the wine-vats and the miner’s +blasting tools but picket for a night, like Bedouin pavillions; +and to-morrow, to fresh woods! This stir of change and +these perpetual echoes of the moving footfall, haunt the +land. Men move eternally, still chasing Fortune; and, +fortune found, still wander. As we drove back to Calistoga, +the road lay empty of mere passengers, but its green side was +dotted with the camps of travelling families: one cumbered with a +great waggonful of household stuff, settlers going to occupy a +ranche they had taken up in Mendocino, or perhaps Tehama County; +another, a party in dust coats, men and women, whom we found +camped in a grove on the roadside, all on pleasure bent, with a +Chinaman to cook for them, and who waved their hands to us as we +drove by.</p> +<h3><a name="page48"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +48</span>CHAPTER IV—THE SCOT ABROAD</h3> +<p>A <span class="smcap">few</span> pages back, I wrote that a +man belonged, in these days, to a variety of countries; but the +old land is still the true love, the others are but pleasant +infidelities. Scotland is indefinable; it has no unity +except upon the map. Two languages, many dialects, +innumerable forms of piety, and countless local patriotisms and +prejudices, part us among ourselves more widely than the extreme +east and west of that great continent of America. When I am +at home, I feel a man from Glasgow to be something like a rival, +a man from Barra to be more than half a foreigner. Yet let +us meet in some far country, and, whether we hail from the braes +of Manor or the braes of Mar, some ready-made affection joins us +on the instant. It is not race. Look at us. One +is Norse, one Celtic, and another Saxon. It is not +community of tongue. We have it not among ourselves; and we +have it almost to perfection, with English, or Irish, or +American. It is no tie of faith, for we detest each +other’s errors. And yet somewhere, deep down in the +heart of each one of us, something yearns for the old land, and +the old kindly people.</p> +<p>Of all mysteries of the human heart, this is perhaps the most +inscrutable. There is no special loveliness in that gray +country, with its rainy, sea-beat archipelago; its fields of dark +mountains; its unsightly places, black with coal; its treeless, +sour, unfriendly looking corn-lands; its quaint, gray, castled +city, where the bells clash of a Sunday, and the wind squalls, +and the salt showers fly and beat. I do not even know if I +desire to live there; but let me hear, in some far land, a +kindred voice sing out, “Oh, why left I my hame?” and +it seems at once as if no beauty under the kind heavens, and no +society of the wise and good, can repay me for my absence from my +country. And though I think I would rather die elsewhere, +yet in my heart of hearts I long to be buried among good Scots +clods. I will say it fairly, it grows on me with every +year: there are no stars so lovely as Edinburgh +street-lamps. When I forget thee, auld Reekie, may my right +hand forget its cunning!</p> +<p>The happiest lot on earth is to be born a Scotchman. You +must pay for it in many ways, as for all other advantages on +earth. You have to learn the paraphrases and the shorter +catechism; you generally take to drink; your youth, as far as I +can find out, is a time of louder war against society, of more +outcry and tears and turmoil, than if you had been born, for +instance, in England. But somehow life is warmer and +closer; the hearth burns more redly; the lights of home shine +softer on the rainy street; the very names, endeared in verse and +music, cling nearer round our hearts. An Englishman may +meet an Englishman to-morrow, upon Chimborazo, and neither of +them care; but when the Scotch wine-grower told me of Mons Meg, +it was like magic.</p> +<blockquote><p>“From the dim shieling on the misty +island<br /> + Mountains divide us, and a world of seas;<br /> +Yet still our hearts are true, our hearts are Highland,<br /> + And we, in dreams, behold the Hebrides.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>And, Highland and Lowland, all our hearts are Scotch.</p> +<p>Only a few days after I had seen M’Eckron, a message +reached me in my cottage. It was a Scotchman who had come +down a long way from the hills to market. He had heard +there was a countryman in Calistoga, and came round to the hotel +to see him. We said a few words to each other; we had not +much to say—should never have seen each other had we stayed +at home, separated alike in space and in society; and then we +shook hands, and he went his way again to his ranche among the +hills, and that was all.</p> +<p>Another Scotchman there was, a resident, who for the more love +of the common country, douce, serious, religious man, drove me +all about the valley, and took as much interest in me as if I had +been his son: more, perhaps; for the son has faults too keenly +felt, while the abstract countryman is perfect—like a whiff +of peats.</p> +<p>And there was yet another. Upon him I came suddenly, as +he was calmly entering my cottage, his mind quite evidently bent +on plunder: a man of about fifty, filthy, ragged, roguish, with a +chimney-pot hat and a tail coat, and a pursing of his mouth that +might have been envied by an elder of the kirk. He had just +such a face as I have seen a dozen times behind the plate.</p> +<p>“Hullo, sir!” I cried. “Where are you +going?”</p> +<p>He turned round without a quiver.</p> +<p>“You’re a Scotchman, sir?” he said +gravely. “So am I; I come from Aberdeen. This +is my card,” presenting me with a piece of pasteboard which +he had raked out of some gutter in the period of the rains. +“I was just examining this palm,” he continued, +indicating the misbegotten plant before our door, “which is +the largest sp<i>a</i>cimen I have yet observed in +Califoarnia.”</p> +<p>There were four or five larger within sight. But where +was the use of argument? He produced a tape-line, made me +help him to measure the tree at the level of the ground, and +entered the figures in a large and filthy pocket-book, all with +the gravity of Solomon. He then thanked me profusely, +remarking that such little services were due between countrymen; +shook hands with me, “for add lang syne,” as he said; +and took himself solemnly away, radiating dirt and humbug as he +went.</p> +<p>A month or two after this encounter of mine, there came a Scot +to Sacramento—perhaps from Aberdeen. Anyway, there +never was any one more Scotch in this wide world. He could +sing and dance, and drink, I presume; and he played the pipes +with vigour and success. All the Scotch in Sacramento +became infatuated with him, and spent their spare time and money, +driving him about in an open cab, between drinks, while he blew +himself scarlet at the pipes. This is a very sad +story. After he had borrowed money from every one, he and +his pipes suddenly disappeared from Sacramento, and when I last +heard, the police were looking for him.</p> +<p>I cannot say how this story amused me, when I felt myself so +thoroughly ripe on both sides to be duped in the same way.</p> +<p>It is at least a curious thing, to conclude, that the races +which wander widest, Jews and Scotch, should be the most clannish +in the world. But perhaps these two are cause and effect: +“For ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.”</p> +<h2>PART II—WITH THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL</h2> +<h3><a name="page59"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +59</span>CHAPTER I.—TO INTRODUCE MR. KELMAR</h3> +<p><span class="smcap">One</span> thing in this new country very +particularly strikes a stranger, and that is the number of +antiquities. Already there have been many cycles of +population succeeding each other, and passing away and leaving +behind them relics. These, standing on into changed times, +strike the imagination as forcibly as any pyramid or feudal +tower. The towns, like the vineyards, are experimentally +founded: they grow great and prosper by passing occasions; and +when the lode comes to an end, and the miners move elsewhere, the +town remains behind them, like Palmyra in the desert. I +suppose there are, in no country in the world, so many deserted +towns as here in California.</p> +<p>The whole neighbourhood of Mount Saint Helena, now so quiet +and sylvan, was once alive with mining camps and villages. +Here there would be two thousand souls under canvas; there one +thousand or fifteen hundred ensconced, as if for ever, in a town +of comfortable houses. But the luck had failed, the mines +petered out; and the army of miners had departed, and left this +quarter of the world to the rattlesnakes and deer and grizzlies, +and to the slower but steadier advance of husbandry.</p> +<p>It was with an eye on one of these deserted places, Pine Flat, +on the Geysers road, that we had come first to Calistoga. +There is something singularly enticing in the idea of going, +rent-free, into a ready-made house. And to the British +merchant, sitting at home at ease, it may appear that, with such +a roof over your head and a spring of clear water hard by, the +whole problem of the squatter’s existence would be +solved. Food, however, has yet to be considered, I will go +as far as most people on tinned meats; some of the brightest +moments of my life were passed over tinned mulli-gatawney in the +cabin of a sixteen-ton schooner, storm-stayed in Portree Bay; but +after suitable experiments, I pronounce authoritatively that man +cannot live by tins alone. Fresh meat must be had on an +occasion. It is true that the great Foss, driving by along +the Geysers road, wooden-faced, but glorified with legend, might +have been induced to bring us meat, but the great Foss could +hardly bring us milk. To take a cow would have involved +taking a field of grass and a milkmaid; after which it would have +been hardly worth while to pause, and we might have added to our +colony a flock of sheep and an experienced butcher.</p> +<p>It is really very disheartening how we depend on other people +in this life. “Mihi est propositum,” as you may +see by the motto, “id quod regibus;” and behold it +cannot be carried out, unless I find a neighbour rolling in +cattle.</p> +<p>Now, my principal adviser in this matter was one whom I will +call Kelmar. That was not what he called himself, but as +soon as I set eyes on him, I knew it was or ought to be his name; +I am sure it will be his name among the angels. Kelmar was +the store-keeper, a Russian Jew, good-natured, in a very thriving +way of business, and, on equal terms, one of the most serviceable +of men. He also had something of the expression of a Scotch +country elder, who, by some peculiarity, should chance to be a +Hebrew. He had a projecting under lip, with which he +continually smiled, or rather smirked. Mrs. Kelmar was a +singularly kind woman; and the oldest son had quite a dark and +romantic bearing, and might be heard on summer evenings playing +sentimental airs on the violin.</p> +<p>I had no idea, at the time I made his acquaintance, what an +important person Kelmar was. But the Jew store-keepers of +California, profiting at once by the needs and habits of the +people, have made themselves in too many cases the tyrants of the +rural population. Credit is offered, is pressed on the new +customer, and when once he is beyond his depth, the tune changes, +and he is from thenceforth a white slave. I believe, even +from the little I saw, that Kelmar, if he choose to put on the +screw, could send half the settlers packing in a radius of seven +or eight miles round Calistoga. These are continually +paying him, but are never suffered to get out of debt. He +palms dull goods upon them, for they dare not refuse to buy; he +goes and dines with them when he is on an outing, and no man is +loudlier welcomed; he is their family friend, the director of +their business, and, to a degree elsewhere unknown in modern +days, their king.</p> +<p>For some reason, Kelmar always shook his head at the mention +of Pine Flat, and for some days I thought he disapproved of the +whole scheme and was proportionately sad. One fine morning, +however, he met me, wreathed in smiles. He had found the +very place for me—Silverado, another old mining town, right +up the mountain. Rufe Hanson, the hunter, could take care +of us—fine people the Hansons; we should be close to the +Toll House, where the Lakeport stage called daily; it was the +best place for my health, besides. Rufe had been +consumptive, and was now quite a strong man, ain’t +it? In short, the place and all its accompaniments seemed +made for us on purpose.</p> +<p>He took me to his back door, whence, as from every point of +Calistoga, Mount Saint Helena could be seen towering in the +air. There, in the nick, just where the eastern foothills +joined the mountain, and she herself began to rise above the zone +of forest—there was Silverado. The name had already +pleased me; the high station pleased me still more. I began +to inquire with some eagerness. It was but a little while +ago that Silverado was a great place. The mine—a +silver mine, of course—had promised great things. +There was quite a lively population, with several hotels and +boarding-houses; and Kelmar himself had opened a branch store, +and done extremely well—“Ain’t it?” he +said, appealing to his wife. And she said, “Yes; +extremely well.” Now there was no one living in the town +but Rufe the hunter; and once more I heard Rufe’s praises +by the yard, and this time sung in chorus.</p> +<p>I could not help perceiving at the time that there was +something underneath; that no unmixed desire to have us +comfortably settled had inspired the Kelmars with this flow of +words. But I was impatient to be gone, to be about my +kingly project; and when we were offered seats in Kelmar’s +waggon, I accepted on the spot. The plan of their next +Sunday’s outing took them, by good fortune, over the border +into Lake County. They would carry us so far, drop us at +the Toll House, present us to the Hansons, and call for us again +on Monday morning early.</p> +<h3><a name="page68"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +68</span>CHAPTER II—FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF SILVERADO</h3> +<p><span class="smcap">We</span> were to leave by six precisely; +that was solemnly pledged on both sides; and a messenger came to +us the last thing at night, to remind us of the hour. But +it was eight before we got clear of Calistoga: Kelmar, Mrs. +Kelmar, a friend of theirs whom we named Abramina, her little +daughter, my wife, myself, and, stowed away behind us, a cluster +of ship’s coffee-kettles. These last were highly +ornamental in the sheen of their bright tin, but I could invent +no reason for their presence. Our carriageful reckoned up, +as near as we could get at it, some three hundred years to the +six of us. Four of the six, besides, were Hebrews. +But I never, in all my life, was conscious of so strong an +atmosphere of holiday. No word was spoken but of pleasure; +and even when we drove in silence, nods and smiles went round the +party like refreshments.</p> +<p>The sun shone out of a cloudless sky. Close at the +zenith rode the belated moon, still clearly visible, and, along +one margin, even bright. The wind blew a gale from the +north; the trees roared; the corn and the deep grass in the +valley fled in whitening surges; the dust towered into the air +along the road and dispersed like the smoke of battle. It +was clear in our teeth from the first, and for all the windings +of the road it managed to keep clear in our teeth until the +end.</p> +<p>For some two miles we rattled through the valley, skirting the +eastern foothills; then we struck off to the right, through +haugh-land, and presently, crossing a dry water-course, entered +the Toll road, or, to be more local, entered on “the +grade.” The road mounts the near shoulder of Mount +Saint Helena, bound northward into Lake County. In one +place it skirts along the edge of a narrow and deep canyon, +filled with trees, and I was glad, indeed, not to be driven at +this point by the dashing Foss. Kelmar, with his unvarying +smile, jogging to the motion of the trap, drove for all the world +like a good, plain, country clergyman at home; and I profess I +blessed him unawares for his timidity.</p> +<p>Vineyards and deep meadows, islanded and framed with thicket, +gave place more and more as we ascended to woods of oak and +madrona, dotted with enormous pines. It was these pines, as +they shot above the lower wood, that produced that pencilling of +single trees I had so often remarked from the valley. +Thence, looking up and from however far, each fir stands separate +against the sky no bigger than an eyelash; and all together lend +a quaint, fringed aspect to the hills. The oak is no baby; +even the madrona, upon these spurs of Mount Saint Helena, comes +to a fine bulk and ranks with forest trees—but the pines +look down upon the rest for underwood. As Mount Saint +Helena among her foothills, so these dark giants out-top their +fellow-vegetables. Alas! if they had left the redwoods, the +pines, in turn, would have been dwarfed. But the redwoods, +fallen from their high estate, are serving as family bedsteads, +or yet more humbly as field fences, along all Napa Valley.</p> +<p>A rough smack of resin was in the air, and a crystal mountain +purity. It came pouring over these green slopes by the +oceanful. The woods sang aloud, and gave largely of their +healthful breath. Gladness seemed to inhabit these upper +zones, and we had left indifference behind us in the +valley. “I to the hills lift mine eyes!” +There are days in a life when thus to climb out of the lowlands, +seems like scaling heaven.</p> +<p>As we continued to ascend, the wind fell upon us with +increasing strength. It was a wonder how the two stout +horses managed to pull us up that steep incline and still face +the athletic opposition of the wind, or how their great eyes were +able to endure the dust. Ten minutes after we went by, a +tree fell, blocking the road; and even before us leaves were +thickly strewn, and boughs had fallen, large enough to make the +passage difficult. But now we were hard by the +summit. The road crosses the ridge, just in the nick that +Kelmar showed me from below, and then, without pause, plunges +down a deep, thickly wooded glen on the farther side. At +the highest point a trail strikes up the main hill to the +leftward; and that leads to Silverado. A hundred yards +beyond, and in a kind of elbow of the glen, stands the Toll House +Hotel. We came up the one side, were caught upon the summit +by the whole weight of the wind as it poured over into Napa +Valley, and a minute after had drawn up in shelter, but all +buffetted and breathless, at the Toll House door.</p> +<p>A water-tank, and stables, and a gray house of two stories, +with gable ends and a verandah, are jammed hard against the +hillside, just where a stream has cut for itself a narrow canyon, +filled with pines. The pines go right up overhead; a little +more and the stream might have played, like a fire-hose, on the +Toll House roof. In front the ground drops as sharply as it +rises behind. There is just room for the road and a sort of +promontory of croquet ground, and then you can lean over the edge +and look deep below you through the wood. I said croquet +<i>ground</i>, not <i>green</i>; for the surface was of brown, +beaten earth. The toll-bar itself was the only other note +of originality: a long beam, turning on a post, and kept slightly +horizontal by a counterweight of stones. Regularly about +sundown this rude barrier was swung, like a derrick, across the +road and made fast, I think, to a tree upon the farther side.</p> +<p>On our arrival there followed a gay scene in the bar. I +was presented to Mr. Corwin, the landlord; to Mr. Jennings, the +engineer, who lives there for his health; to Mr. Hoddy, a most +pleasant little gentleman, once a member of the Ohio legislature, +again the editor of a local paper, and now, with undiminished +dignity, keeping the Toll House bar. I had a number of +drinks and cigars bestowed on me, and enjoyed a famous +opportunity of seeing Kelmar in his glory, friendly, radiant, +smiling, steadily edging one of the ship’s kettles on the +reluctant Corwin.</p> +<p>Corwin, plainly aghast, resisted gallantly, and for that bout +victory crowned his arms.</p> +<p>At last we set forth for Silverado on foot. Kelmar and +his jolly Jew girls were full of the sentiment of Sunday outings, +breathed geniality and vagueness, and suffered a little vile boy +from the hotel to lead them here and there about the woods. +For three people all so old, so bulky in body, and belonging to a +race so venerable, they could not but surprise us by their +extreme and almost imbecile youthfulness of spirit. They +were only going to stay ten minutes at the Toll House; had they +not twenty long miles of road before them on the other +side? Stay to dinner? Not they! Put up the +horses? Never. Let us attach them to the verandah by a wisp +of straw rope, such as would not have held a person’s hat +on that blustering day. And with all these protestations of +hurry, they proved irresponsible like children. Kelmar +himself, shrewd old Russian Jew, with a smirk that seemed just to +have concluded a bargain to its satisfaction, intrusted himself +and us devoutly to that boy. Yet the boy was patently +fallacious; and for that matter a most unsympathetic urchin, +raised apparently on gingerbread. He was bent on his own +pleasure, nothing else; and Kelmar followed him to his ruin, with +the same shrewd smirk. If the boy said there was “a +hole there in the hill”—a hole, pure and simple, +neither more nor less—Kelmar and his Jew girls would follow +him a hundred yards to look complacently down that hole. +For two hours we looked for houses; and for two hours they +followed us, smelling trees, picking flowers, foisting false +botany on the unwary. Had we taken five, with that vile lad +to head them off on idle divagations, for five they would have +smiled and stumbled through the woods.</p> +<p>However, we came forth at length, and as by accident, upon a +lawn, sparse planted like an orchard, but with forest instead of +fruit trees. That was the site of Silverado mining +town. A piece of ground was levelled up, where +Kelmar’s store had been; and facing that we saw Rufe +Hanson’s house, still bearing on its front the legend +<i>Silverado Hotel</i>. Not another sign of +habitation. Silverado town had all been carted from the +scene; one of the houses was now the school-house far down the +road; one was gone here, one there, but all were gone away.</p> +<p>It was now a sylvan solitude, and the silence was unbroken but +by the great, vague voice of the wind. Some days before our +visit, a grizzly bear had been sporting round the Hansons’ +chicken-house.</p> +<p>Mrs. Hanson was at home alone, we found. Rufe had been +out after a “bar,” had risen late, and was now gone, +it did not clearly appear whither. Perhaps he had had wind +of Kelmar’s coming, and was now ensconced among the +underwood, or watching us from the shoulder of the +mountain. We, hearing there were no houses to be had, were +for immediately giving up all hopes of Silverado. But this, +somehow, was not to Kelmar’s fancy. He first proposed +that we should “camp someveres around, ain’t +it?” waving his hand cheerily as though to weave a spell; +and when that was firmly rejected, he decided that we must take +up house with the Hansons. Mrs. Hanson had been, from the +first, flustered, subdued, and a little pale; but from this +proposition she recoiled with haggard indignation. So did +we, who would have preferred, in a manner of speaking, +death. But Kelmar was not to be put by. He edged Mrs. +Hanson into a corner, where for a long time he threatened her +with his forefinger, like a character in Dickens; and the poor +woman, driven to her entrenchments, at last remembered with a +shriek that there were still some houses at the tunnel.</p> +<p>Thither we went; the Jews, who should already have been miles +into Lake County, still cheerily accompanying us. For about +a furlong we followed a good road alone, the hillside through the +forest, until suddenly that road widened out and came abruptly to +an end. A canyon, woody below, red, rocky, and naked +overhead, was here walled across by a dump of rolling stones, +dangerously steep, and from twenty to thirty feet in +height. A rusty iron chute on wooden legs came flying, like +a monstrous gargoyle, across the parapet. It was down this +that they poured the precious ore; and below here the carts stood +to wait their lading, and carry it mill-ward down the +mountain.</p> +<p>The whole canyon was so entirely blocked, as if by some rude +guerilla fortification, that we could only mount by lengths of +wooden ladder, fixed in the hillside. These led us round +the farther corner of the dump; and when they were at an end, we +still persevered over loose rubble and wading deep in poison oak, +till we struck a triangular platform, filling up the whole glen, +and shut in on either hand by bold projections of the +mountain. Only in front the place was open like the +proscenium of a theatre, and we looked forth into a great realm +of air, and down upon treetops and hilltops, and far and near on +wild and varied country. The place still stood as on the +day it was deserted: a line of iron rails with a bifurcation; a +truck in working order; a world of lumber, old wood, old iron; a +blacksmith’s forge on one side, half buried in the leaves +of dwarf madronas; and on the other, an old brown wooden +house.</p> +<p>Fanny and I dashed at the house. It consisted of three +rooms, and was so plastered against the hill, that one room was +right atop of another, that the upper floor was more than twice +as large as the lower, and that all three apartments must be +entered from a different side and level. Not a window-sash +remained.</p> +<p>The door of the lower room was smashed, and one panel hung in +splinters. We entered that, and found a fair amount of +rubbish: sand and gravel that had been sifted in there by the +mountain winds; straw, sticks, and stones; a table, a barrel; a +plate-rack on the wall; two home-made bootjacks, signs of miners +and their boots; and a pair of papers pinned on the boarding, +headed respectively “Funnel No. 1,” and “Funnel +No. 2,” but with the tails torn away. The window, +sashless of course, was choked with the green and sweetly +smelling foliage of a bay; and through a chink in the floor, a +spray of poison oak had shot up and was handsomely prospering in +the interior. It was my first care to cut away that poison +oak, Fanny standing by at a respectful distance. That was +our first improvement by which we took possession.</p> +<p>The room immediately above could only be entered by a plank +propped against the threshold, along which the intruder must foot +it gingerly, clutching for support to sprays of poison oak, the +proper product of the country. Herein was, on either hand, +a triple tier of beds, where miners had once lain; and the other +gable was pierced by a sashless window and a doorless doorway +opening on the air of heaven, five feet above the ground. +As for the third room, which entered squarely from the ground +level, but higher up the hill and farther up the canyon, it +contained only rubbish and the uprights for another triple tier +of beds.</p> +<p>The whole building was overhung by a bold, lion-like, red +rock. Poison oak, sweet bay trees, calcanthus, brush, and +chaparral, grew freely but sparsely all about it. In front, in +the strong sunshine, the platform lay overstrewn with busy +litter, as though the labours of the mine might begin again +to-morrow in the morning.</p> +<p>Following back into the canyon, among the mass of rotting +plant and through the flowering bushes, we came to a great crazy +staging, with a wry windless on the top; and clambering up, we +could look into an open shaft, leading edgeways down into the +bowels of the mountain, trickling with water, and lit by some +stray sun-gleams, whence I know not. In that quiet place +the still, far-away tinkle of the water-drops was loudly +audible. Close by, another shaft led edgeways up into the +superincumbent shoulder of the hill. It lay partly open; +and sixty or a hundred feet above our head, we could see the +strata propped apart by solid wooden wedges, and a pine, half +undermined, precariously nodding on the verge. Here also a +rugged, horizontal tunnel ran straight into the unsunned bowels +of the rock. This secure angle in the mountain’s +flank was, even on this wild day, as still as my lady’s +chamber. But in the tunnel a cold, wet draught +tempestuously blew. Nor have I ever known that place +otherwise than cold and windy.</p> +<p>Such was our fist prospect of Juan Silverado. I own I +had looked for something different: a clique of neighbourly +houses on a village green, we shall say, all empty to be sure, +but swept and varnished; a trout stream brawling by; great elms +or chestnuts, humming with bees and nested in by song-birds; and +the mountains standing round about, as at Jerusalem. Here, +mountain and house and the old tools of industry were all alike +rusty and downfalling. The hill was here wedged up, and +there poured forth its bowels in a spout of broken mineral; man +with his picks and powder, and nature with her own great blasting +tools of sun and rain, labouring together at the ruin of that +proud mountain. The view up the canyon was a glimpse of +devastation; dry red minerals sliding together, here and there a +crag, here and there dwarf thicket clinging in the general +glissade, and over all a broken outline trenching on the blue of +heaven. Downwards indeed, from our rock eyrie, we behold +the greener side of nature; and the bearing of the pines and the +sweet smell of bays and nutmegs commanded themselves gratefully +to our senses. One way and another, now the die was +cast. Silverado be it!</p> +<p>After we had got back to the Toll House, the Jews were not +long of striking forward. But I observed that one of the +Hanson lads came down, before their departure, and returned with +a ship’s kettle. Happy Hansons! Nor was it +until after Kelmar was gone, if I remember rightly, that Rufe put +in an appearance to arrange the details of our installation.</p> +<p>The latter part of the day, Fanny and I sat in the verandah of +the Toll House, utterly stunned by the uproar of the wind among +the trees on the other side of the valley. Sometimes, we +would have it it was like a sea, but it was not various enough +for that; and again, we thought it like the roar of a cataract, +but it was too changeful for the cataract; and then we would +decide, speaking in sleepy voices, that it could be compared with +nothing but itself. My mind was entirely preoccupied by the +noise. I hearkened to it by the hour, gapingly hearkened, +and let my cigarette go out. Sometimes the wind would make +a sally nearer hand, and send a shrill, whistling crash among the +foliage on our side of the glen; and sometimes a back-draught +would strike into the elbow where we sat, and cast the gravel and +torn leaves into our faces. But for the most part, this +great, streaming gale passed unweariedly by us into Napa Valley, +not two hundred yards away, visible by the tossing boughs, +stunningly audible, and yet not moving a hair upon our +heads. So it blew all night long while I was writing up my +journal, and after we were in bed, under a cloudless, starset +heaven; and so it was blowing still next morning when we +rose.</p> +<p>It was a laughable thought to us, what had become of our +cheerful, wandering Hebrews. We could not suppose they had +reached a destination. The meanest boy could lead them +miles out of their way to see a gopher-hole. Boys, we felt +to be their special danger; none others were of that exact pitch +of cheerful irrelevancy to exercise a kindred sway upon their +minds: but before the attractions of a boy their most settled +resolutions would be war. We thought we could follow in +fancy these three aged Hebrew truants wandering in and out on +hilltop and in thicket, a demon boy trotting far ahead, their +will-o’-the-wisp conductor; and at last about midnight, the +wind still roaring in the darkness, we had a vision of all three +on their knees upon a mountain-top around a glow-worm.</p> +<h3><a name="page92"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +92</span>CHAPTER III. THE RETURN</h3> +<p><span class="smcap">Next</span> morning we were up by +half-past five, according to agreement, and it was ten by the +clock before our Jew boys returned to pick us up. Kelmar, +Mrs. Kelmar, and Abramina, all smiling from ear to ear, and full +of tales of the hospitality they had found on the other +side. It had not gone unrewarded; for I observed with +interest that the ship’s kettles, all but one, had been +“placed.” Three Lake County families, at least, +endowed for life with a ship’s kettle. Come, this was +no misspent Sunday. The absence of the kettles told its own +story: our Jews said nothing about them; but, on the other hand, +they said many kind and comely things about the people they had +met. The two women, in particular, had been charmed out of +themselves by the sight of a young girl surrounded by her +admirers; all evening, it appeared, they had been triumphing +together in the girl’s innocent successes, and to this +natural and unselfish joy they gave expression in language that +was beautiful by its simplicity and truth.</p> +<p>Take them for all in all, few people have done my heart more +good; they seemed so thoroughly entitled to happiness, and to +enjoy it in so large a measure and so free from after-thought; +almost they persuaded me to be a Jew. There was, indeed, a +chink of money in their talk. They particularly commanded +people who were well to do. “<i>He</i> don’t +care—ain’t it?” was their highest word of +commendation to an individual fate; and here I seem to grasp the +root of their philosophy—it was to be free from care, to be +free to make these Sunday wanderings, that they so eagerly +pursued after wealth; and all this carefulness was to be +careless. The fine, good humour of all three seemed to +declare they had attained their end. Yet there was the +other side to it; and the recipients of kettles perhaps cared +greatly.</p> +<p>No sooner had they returned, than the scene of yesterday began +again. The horses were not even tied with a straw rope this +time—it was not worth while; and Kelmar disappeared into +the bar, leaving them under a tree on the other side of the +road. I had to devote myself. I stood under the +shadow of that tree for, I suppose, hard upon an hour, and had +not the heart to be angry. Once some one remembered me, and +brought me out half a tumblerful of the playful, innocuous +American cocktail. I drank it, and lo! veins of living fire +ran down my leg; and then a focus of conflagration remained +seated in my stomach, not unpleasantly, for quarter of an +hour. I love these sweet, fiery pangs, but I will not court +them. The bulk of the time I spent in repeating as much +French poetry as I could remember to the horses, who seemed to +enjoy it hugely. And now it went—</p> +<blockquote><p>“O ma vieille Font-georges<br /> +Où volent les rouges-gorges:”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>and again, to a more trampling measure—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Et tout tremble, Irun, Coïmbre,<br /> + Sautander, Almodovar,<br /> +Sitôt qu’on entend le timbre<br /> + Des cymbales do Bivar.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The redbreasts and the brooks of Europe, in that dry and +songless land; brave old names and wars, strong cities, cymbals, +and bright armour, in that nook of the mountain, sacred only to +the Indian and the bear! This is still the strangest thing +in all man’s travelling, that he should carry about with +him incongruous memories. There is no foreign land; it is +the traveller only that is foreign, and now and again, by a flash +of recollection, lights up the contrasts of the earth.</p> +<p>But while I was thus wandering in my fancy, great feats had +been transacted in the bar. Corwin the bold had fallen, +Kelmar was again crowned with laurels, and the last of the +ship’s kettles had changed hands. If I had ever +doubted the purity of Kelmar’s motives, if I had ever +suspected him of a single eye to business in his eternal +dallyings, now at least, when the last kettle was disposed of, my +suspicions must have been allayed. I dare not guess how +much more time was wasted; nor how often we drove off, merely to +drive back again and renew interrupted conversations about +nothing, before the Toll House was fairly left behind. +Alas! and not a mile down the grade there stands a ranche in a +sunny vineyard, and here we must all dismount again and +enter.</p> +<p>Only the old lady was at home, Mrs. Guele, a brown old Swiss +dame, the picture of honesty; and with her we drank a bottle of +wine and had an age-long conversation, which would have been +highly delightful if Fanny and I had not been faint with +hunger. The ladies each narrated the story of her marriage, +our two Hebrews with the prettiest combination of sentiment and +financial bathos. Abramina, specially, endeared herself +with every word. She was as simple, natural, and engaging +as a kid that should have been brought up to the business of a +money-changer. One touch was so resplendently Hebraic that +I cannot pass it over. When her “old man” wrote +home for her from America, her old man’s family would not +intrust her with the money for the passage, till she had bound +herself by an oath—on her knees, I think she said—not +to employ it otherwise.</p> +<p>This had tickled Abramina hugely, but I think it tickled me +fully more.</p> +<p>Mrs. Guele told of her home-sickness up here in the long +winters; of her honest, country-woman troubles and alarms upon +the journey; how in the bank at Frankfort she had feared lest the +banker, after having taken her cheque, should deny all knowledge +of it—a fear I have myself every time I go to a bank; and +how crossing the Luneburger Heath, an old lady, witnessing her +trouble and finding whither she was bound, had given her +“the blessing of a person eighty years old, which would be +sure to bring her safely to the States. And the first thing +I did,” added Mrs. Guele, “was to fall +downstairs.”</p> +<p>At length we got out of the house, and some of us into the +trap, when—judgment of Heaven!—here came Mr. Guele +from his vineyard. So another quarter of an hour went by; +till at length, at our earnest pleading, we set forth again in +earnest, Fanny and I white-faced and silent, but the Jews still +smiling. The heart fails me. There was yet another +stoppage! And we drove at last into Calistoga past two in +the afternoon, Fanny and I having breakfasted at six in the +morning, eight mortal hours before. We were a pallid +couple; but still the Jews were smiling.</p> +<p>So ended our excursion with the village usurers; and, now that +it was done, we had no more idea of the nature of the business, +nor of the part we had been playing in it, than the child +unborn. That all the people we had met were the slaves of +Kelmar, though in various degrees of servitude; that we ourselves +had been sent up the mountain in the interests of none but +Kelmar; that the money we laid out, dollar by dollar, cent by +cent, and through the hands of various intermediaries, should all +hop ultimately into Kelmar’s till;—these were facts +that we only grew to recognize in the course of time and by the +accumulation of evidence. At length all doubt was quieted, +when one of the kettle-holders confessed. Stopping his trap +in the moonlight, a little way out of Calistoga, he told me, in +so many words, that he dare not show face therewith an empty +pocket. “You see, I don’t mind if it was only +five dollars, Mr. Stevens,” he said, “but I must give +Mr. Kelmar <i>something</i>.”</p> +<p>Even now, when the whole tyranny is plain to me, I cannot find +it in my heart to be as angry as perhaps I should be with the +Hebrew tyrant. The whole game of business is beggar my +neighbour; and though perhaps that game looks uglier when played +at such close quarters and on so small a scale, it is none the +more intrinsically inhumane for that. The village usurer is +not so sad a feature of humanity and human progress as the +millionaire manufacturer, fattening on the toil and loss of +thousands, and yet declaiming from the platform against the greed +and dishonesty of landlords. If it were fair for Cobden to +buy up land from owners whom he thought unconscious of its proper +value, it was fair enough for my Russian Jew to give credit to +his farmers. Kelmar, if he was unconscious of the beam in +his own eye, was at least silent in the matter of his +brother’s mote.</p> +<h2><a name="page103"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 103</span>THE +ACT OF SQUATTING</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">There</span> were four of us +squatters—myself and my wife, the King and Queen of +Silverado; Sam, the Crown Prince; and Chuchu, the Grand +Duke. Chuchu, a setter crossed with spaniel, was the most +unsuited for a rough life. He had been nurtured tenderly in +the society of ladies; his heart was large and soft; he regarded +the sofa-cushion as a bed-rook necessary of existence. +Though about the size of a sheep, he loved to sit in +ladies’ laps; he never said a bad word in all his blameless +days; and if he had seen a flute, I am sure he could have played +upon it by nature. It may seem hard to say it of a dog, but +Chuchu was a tame cat.</p> +<p>The king and queen, the grand duke, and a basket of cold +provender for immediate use, set forth from Calistoga in a double +buggy; the crown prince, on horseback, led the way like an +outrider. Bags and boxes and a second-hand stove were to +follow close upon our heels by Hanson’s team.</p> +<p>It was a beautiful still day; the sky was one field of +azure. Not a leaf moved, not a speck appeared in +heaven. Only from the summit of the mountain one little +snowy wisp of cloud after another kept detaching itself, like +smoke from a volcano, and blowing southward in some high stream +of air: Mount Saint Helena still at her interminable task, making +the weather, like a Lapland witch.</p> +<p>By noon we had come in sight of the mill: a great brown +building, half-way up the hill, big as a factory, two stories +high, and with tanks and ladders along the roof; which, as a +pendicle of Silverado mine, we held to be an outlying province of +our own. Thither, then, we went, crossing the valley by a +grassy trail; and there lunched out of the basket, sitting in a +kind of portico, and wondering, while we ate, at this great bulk +of useless building. Through a chink we could look far down +into the interior, and see sunbeams floating in the dust and +striking on tier after tier of silent, rusty machinery. It +cost six thousand dollars, twelve hundred English sovereigns; and +now, here it stands deserted, like the temple of a forgotten +religion, the busy millers toiling somewhere else. All the +time we were there, mill and mill town showed no sign of life; +that part of the mountain-side, which is very open and green, was +tenanted by no living creature but ourselves and the insects; and +nothing stirred but the cloud manufactory upon the mountain +summit. It was odd to compare this with the former days, +when the engine was in fall blast, the mill palpitating to its +strokes, and the carts came rattling down from Silverado, charged +with ore.</p> +<p>By two we had been landed at the mine, the buggy was gone +again, and we were left to our own reflections and the basket of +cold provender, until Hanson should arrive. Hot as it was +by the sun, there was something chill in such a home-coming, in +that world of wreck and rust, splinter and rolling gravel, where +for so many years no fire had smoked.</p> +<p>Silverado platform filled the whole width of the canyon. +Above, as I have said, this was a wild, red, stony gully in the +mountains; but below it was a wooded dingle. And through +this, I was told, there had gone a path between the mine and the +Toll House—our natural north-west passage to +civilization. I found and followed it, clearing my way as I +went through fallen branches and dead trees. It went +straight down that steep canyon, till it brought you out abruptly +over the roofs of the hotel. There was nowhere any break in +the descent. It almost seemed as if, were you to drop a +stone down the old iron chute at our platform, it would never +rest until it hopped upon the Toll House shingles. Signs +were not wanting of the ancient greatness of Silverado. The +footpath was well marked, and had been well trodden in the old +clays by thirsty miners. And far down, buried in foliage, +deep out of sight of Silverado, I came on a last outpost of the +mine—a mound of gravel, some wreck of wooden aqueduct, and +the mouth of a tunnel, like a treasure grotto in a fairy +story. A stream of water, fed by the invisible leakage from +our shaft, and dyed red with cinnabar or iron, ran trippingly +forth out of the bowels of the cave; and, looking far under the +arch, I could see something like an iron lantern fastened on the +rocky wall. It was a promising spot for the +imagination. No boy could have left it unexplored.</p> +<p>The stream thenceforward stole along the bottom of the dingle, +and made, for that dry land, a pleasant warbling in the +leaves. Once, I suppose, it ran splashing down the whole +length of the canyon, but now its head waters had been tapped by +the shaft at Silverado, and for a great part of its course it +wandered sunless among the joints of the mountain. No +wonder that it should better its pace when it sees, far before +it, daylight whitening in the arch, or that it should come +trotting forth into the sunlight with a song.</p> +<p>The two stages had gone by when I got down, and the Toll House +stood, dozing in sun and dust and silence, like a place +enchanted. My mission was after hay for bedding, and that I +was readily promised. But when I mentioned that we were +waiting for Rufe, the people shook their heads. Rufe was +not a regular man any way, it seemed; and if he got playing +poker—Well, poker was too many for Rufe. I had not +yet heard them bracketted together; but it seemed a natural +conjunction, and commended itself swiftly to my fears; and as +soon as I returned to Silverado and had told my story, we +practically gave Hanson up, and set ourselves to do what we could +find do-able in our desert-island state.</p> +<p>The lower room had been the assayer’s office. The +floor was thick with <i>débris</i>—part human, from +the former occupants; part natural, sifted in by mountain +winds. In a sea of red dust there swam or floated sticks, +boards, hay, straw, stones, and paper; ancient newspapers, above +all—for the newspaper, especially when torn, soon becomes +an antiquity—and bills of the Silverado boarding-house, +some dated Silverado, some Calistoga Mine. Here is one, +verbatim; and if any one can calculate the scale of charges, he +has my envious admiration.</p> +<table> +<tr> +<td colspan="3"><p>Calistoga Mine, May 3rd, 1875.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="3"><p>John Stanley<br /> + To S. Chapman, Cr.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>To board from April 1st, to April 30</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right">$25</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right">75</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p> ,, +,, ,, May 1st, to 3rd . . .</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right">2</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right">00</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p> </p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right">27</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right">75</p> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<p>Where is John Stanley mining now? Where is S. Chapman, +within whose hospitable walls we were to lodge? The date +was but five years old, but in that time the world had changed +for Silverado; like Palmyra in the desert, it had outlived its +people and its purpose; we camped, like Layard, amid ruins, and +these names spoke to us of prehistoric time. A boot-jack, a +pair of boots, a dog-hutch, and these bills of Mr. +Chapman’s were the only speaking relics that we disinterred +from all that vast Silverado rubbish-heap; but what would I not +have given to unearth a letter, a pocket-book, a diary, only a +ledger, or a roll of names, to take me back, in a more personal +manner, to the past? It pleases me, besides, to fancy that +Stanley or Chapman, or one of their companions, may light upon +this chronicle, and be struck by the name, and read some news of +their anterior home, coming, as it were, out of a subsequent +epoch of history in that quarter of the world.</p> +<p>As we were tumbling the mingled rubbish on the floor, kicking +it with our feet, and groping for these written evidences of the +past, Sam, with a somewhat whitened face, produced a paper +bag. “What’s this?” said he. It +contained a granulated powder, something the colour of +Gregory’s Mixture, but rosier; and as there were several of +the bags, and each more or less broken, the powder was spread +widely on the floor. Had any of us ever seen giant +powder? No, nobody had; and instantly there grew up in my +mind a shadowy belief, verging with every moment nearer to +certitude, that I had somewhere heard somebody describe it as +just such a powder as the one around us. I have learnt +since that it is a substance not unlike tallow, and is made up in +rolls for all the world like tallow candles.</p> +<p>Fanny, to add to our happiness, told us a story of a gentleman +who had camped one night, like ourselves, by a deserted +mine. He was a handy, thrifty fellow, and looked right and +left for plunder, but all he could lay his hands on was a can of +oil. After dark he had to see to the horses with a lantern; +and not to miss an opportunity, filled up his lamp from the oil +can. Thus equipped, he set forth into the forest. A +little while after, his friends heard a loud explosion; the +mountain echoes bellowed, and then all was still. On +examination, the can proved to contain oil, with the trifling +addition of nitro-glycerine; but no research disclosed a trace of +either man or lantern.</p> +<p>It was a pretty sight, after this anecdote, to see us sweeping +out the giant powder. It seemed never to be far enough +away. And, after all, it was only some rock pounded for +assay.</p> +<p>So much for the lower room. We scraped some of the +rougher dirt off the floor, and left it. That was our +sitting-room and kitchen, though there was nothing to sit upon +but the table, and no provision for a fire except a hole in the +roof of the room above, which had once contained the chimney of a +stove.</p> +<p>To that upper room we now proceeded. There were the +eighteen bunks in a double tier, nine on either hand, where from +eighteen to thirty-six miners had once snored together all night +long, John Stanley, perhaps, snoring loudest. There was the +roof, with a hole in it through which the sun now shot an +arrow. There was the floor, in much the same state as the +one below, though, perhaps, there was more hay, and certainly +there was the added ingredient of broken glass, the man who stole +the window-frames having apparently made a miscarriage with this +one. Without a broom, without hay or bedding, we could but +look about us with a beginning of despair. The one bright +arrow of day, in that gaunt and shattered barrack, made the rest +look dirtier and darker, and the sight drove us at last into the +open.</p> +<p>Here, also, the handiwork of man lay ruined: but the plants +were all alive and thriving; the view below was fresh with the +colours of nature; and we had exchanged a dim, human garret for a +corner, even although it were untidy, of the blue hall of +heaven. Not a bird, not a beast, not a reptile. There +was no noise in that part of the world, save when we passed +beside the staging, and heard the water musically falling in the +shaft.</p> +<p>We wandered to and fro. We searched among that drift of +lumber-wood and iron, nails and rails, and sleepers and the +wheels of tracks. We gazed up the cleft into the bosom of +the mountain. We sat by the margin of the dump and saw, far +below us, the green treetops standing still in the clear +air. Beautiful perfumes, breaths of bay, resin, and nutmeg, +came to us more often and grew sweeter and sharper as the +afternoon declined. But still there was no word of +Hanson.</p> +<p>I set to with pick and shovel, and deepened the pool behind +the shaft, till we were sure of sufficient water for the morning; +and by the time I had finished, the sun had begun to go down +behind the mountain shoulder, the platform was plunged in quiet +shadow, and a chill descended from the sky. Night began +early in our cleft. Before us, over the margin of the dump, +we could see the sun still striking aslant into the wooded nick +below, and on the battlemented, pine-bescattered ridges on the +farther side.</p> +<p>There was no stove, of course, and no hearth in our lodging, +so we betook ourselves to the blacksmith’s forge across the +platform. If the platform be taken as a stage, and the +out-curving margin of the dump to represent the line of the +foot-lights, then our house would be the first wing on the +actor’s left, and this blacksmith’s forge, although +no match for it in size, the foremost on the right. It was +a low, brown cottage, planted close against the hill, and +overhung by the foliage and peeling boughs of a madrona +thicket. Within it was full of dead leaves and mountain +dust, and rubbish from the mine. But we soon had a good +fire brightly blazing, and sat close about it on impromptu +seats. Chuchu, the slave of sofa-cushions, whimpered for a +softer bed; but the rest of us were greatly revived and comforted +by that good creature-fire, which gives us warmth and light and +companionable sounds, and colours up the emptiest building with +better than frescoes. For a while it was even pleasant in +the forge, with the blaze in the midst, and a look over our +shoulders on the woods and mountains where the day was dying like +a dolphin.</p> +<p>It was between seven and eight before Hanson arrived, with a +waggonful of our effects and two of his wife’s relatives to +lend him a hand. The elder showed surprising +strength. He would pick up a huge packing-case, full of +books of all things, swing it on his shoulder, and away up the +two crazy ladders and the breakneck spout of rolling mineral, +familiarly termed a path, that led from the cart-track to our +house. Even for a man unburthened, the ascent was toilsome +and precarious; but Irvine sealed it with a light foot, carrying +box after box, as the hero whisks the stage child up the +practicable footway beside the waterfall of the fifth act. +With so strong a helper, the business was speedily +transacted. Soon the assayer’s office was thronged +with our belongings, piled higgledy-piggledy, and upside down, +about the floor. There were our boxes, indeed, but my wife +had left her keys in Calistoga. There was the stove, but, +alas! our carriers had forgot the chimney, and lost one of the +plates along the road. The Silverado problem was scarce +solved.</p> +<p>Rufe himself was grave and good-natured over his share of +blame; he even, if I remember right, expressed regret. But +his crew, to my astonishment and anger, grinned from ear to ear, +and laughed aloud at our distress. They thought it +“real funny” about the stove-pipe they had forgotten; +“real funny” that they should have lost a +plate. As for hay, the whole party refused to bring us any +till they should have supped. See how late they were! +Never had there been such a job as coming up that grade! +Nor often, I suspect, such a game of poker as that before they +started. But about nine, as a particular favour, we should +have some hay.</p> +<p>So they took their departure, leaving me still staring, and we +resigned ourselves to wait for their return. The fire in +the forge had been suffered to go out, and we were one and all +too weary to kindle another. We dined, or, not to take that +word in vain, we ate after a fashion, in the nightmare disorder +of the assayer’s office, perched among boxes. A +single candle lighted us. It could scarce be called a +housewarming; for there was, of course, no fire, and with the two +open doors and the open window gaping on the night, like breaches +in a fortress, it began to grow rapidly chill. Talk ceased; +nobody moved but the unhappy Chuchu, still in quest of +sofa-cushions, who tumbled complainingly among the trunks. +It required a certain happiness of disposition to look forward +hopefully, from so dismal a beginning, across the brief hours of +night, to the warm shining of to-morrow’s sun.</p> +<p>But the hay arrived at last, and we turned, with our last +spark of courage, to the bedroom. We had improved the +entrance, but it was still a kind of rope-walking; and it would +have been droll to see us mounting, one after another, by +candle-light, under the open stars.</p> +<p>The western door—that which looked up the canyon, and +through which we entered by our bridge of flying plank—was +still entire, a handsome, panelled door, the most finished piece +of carpentry in Silverado. And the two lowest bunks next to +this we roughly filled with hay for that night’s use. +Through the opposite, or eastern-looking gable, with its open +door and window, a faint, disused starshine came into the room +like mist; and when we were once in bed, we lay, awaiting sleep, +in a haunted, incomplete obscurity. At first the silence of +the night was utter. Then a high wind began in the distance +among the treetops, and for hours continued to grow higher. +It seemed to me much such a wind as we had found on our visit; +yet here in our open chamber we were fanned only by gentle and +refreshing draughts, so deep was the canyon, so close our house +was planted under the overhanging rock.</p> +<h2><a name="page127"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 127</span>THE +HUNTER’S FAMILY</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">There</span> is quite a large race or +class of people in America, for whom we scarcely seem to have a +parallel in England. Of pure white blood, they are unknown +or unrecognizable in towns; inhabit the fringe of settlements and +the deep, quiet places of the country; rebellious to all labour, +and pettily thievish, like the English gipsies; rustically +ignorant, but with a touch of wood-lore and the dexterity of the +savage. Whence they came is a moot point. At the time +of the war, they poured north in crowds to escape the +conscription; lived during summer on fruits, wild animals, and +petty theft; and at the approach of winter, when these supplies +failed, built great fires in the forest, and there died stoically +by starvation. They are widely scattered, however, and +easily recognized. Loutish, but not ill-looking, they will +sit all day, swinging their legs on a field fence, the mind +seemingly as devoid of all reflection as a Suffolk +peasant’s, careless of politics, for the most part +incapable of reading, but with a rebellious vanity and a strong +sense of independence. Hunting is their most congenial +business, or, if the occasion offers, a little amateur +detection. In tracking a criminal, following a particular +horse along a beaten highway, and drawing inductions from a hair +or a footprint, one of those somnolent, grinning Hodges will +suddenly display activity of body and finesse of mind. By +their names ye may know them, the women figuring as Loveina, +Larsenia, Serena, Leanna, Orreana; the men answering to Alvin, +Alva, or Orion, pronounced Orrion, with the accent on the +first. Whether they are indeed a race, or whether this is +the form of degeneracy common to all back-woodsmen, they are at +least known by a generic byword, as Poor Whites or +Low-downers.</p> +<p>I will not say that the Hanson family was Poor White, because +the name savours of offence; but I may go as far as +this—they were, in many points, not unsimilar to the people +usually so-cared. Rufe himself combined two of the +qualifications, for he was both a hunter and an amateur +detective. It was he who pursued Russel and Dollar, the +robbers of the Lake Port stage, and captured them the very +morning after the exploit, while they were still sleeping in a +hayfield. Russel, a drunken Scotch carpenter, was even an +acquaintance of his own, and he expressed much grave +commiseration for his fate. In all that he said and did, +Rufe was grave. I never saw him hurried. When he +spoke, he took out his pipe with ceremonial deliberation, looked +east and west, and then, in quiet tones and few words, stated his +business or told his story. His gait was to match; it would +never have surprised you if, at any step, he had turned round and +walked away again, so warily and slowly, and with so much seeming +hesitation did he go about. He lay long in bed in the +morning—rarely indeed, rose before noon; he loved all +games, from poker to clerical croquet; and in the Toll House +croquet ground I have seen him toiling at the latter with the +devotion of a curate. He took an interest in education, was +an active member of the local school-board, and when I was there, +he had recently lost the schoolhouse key. His waggon was +broken, but it never seemed to occur to him to mend it. +Like all truly idle people, he had an artistic eye. He +chose the print stuff for his wife’s dresses, and +counselled her in the making of a patchwork quilt, always, as she +thought, wrongly, but to the more educated eye, always with +bizarre and admirable taste—the taste of an Indian. +With all this, he was a perfect, unoffending gentleman in word +and act. Take his clay pipe from him, and he was fit for +any society but that of fools. Quiet as he was, there +burned a deep, permanent excitement in his dark blue eyes; and +when this grave man smiled, it was like sunshine in a shady +place.</p> +<p>Mrs. Hanson (<i>née</i>, if you please, Lovelands) was +more commonplace than her lord. She was a comely woman, +too, plump, fair-coloured, with wonderful white teeth; and in her +print dresses (chosen by Rufe) and with a large sun-bonnet +shading her valued complexion, made, I assure you, a very +agreeable figure. But she was on the surface, what there +was of her, out-spoken and loud-spoken. Her noisy laughter +had none of the charm of one of Hanson’s rare, +slow-spreading smiles; there was no reticence, no mystery, no +manner about the woman: she was a first-class dairymaid, but her +husband was an unknown quantity between the savage and the +nobleman. She was often in and out with us, merry, and +healthy, and fair; he came far seldomer—only, indeed, when +there was business, or now and again, to pay a visit of ceremony, +brushed up for the occasion, with his wife on his arm, and a +clean clay pipe in his teeth. These visits, in our forest +state, had quite the air of an event, and turned our red canyon +into a salon.</p> +<p>Such was the pair who ruled in the old Silverado Hotel, among +the windy trees, on the mountain shoulder overlooking the whole +length of Napa Valley, as the man aloft looks down on the +ship’s deck. There they kept house, with sundry +horses and fowls, and a family of sons, Daniel Webster, and I +think George Washington, among the number. Nor did they +want visitors. An old gentleman, of singular stolidity, and +called Breedlove—I think he had crossed the plains in the +same caravan with Rufe—housed with them for awhile during +our stay; and they had besides a permanent lodger, in the form of +Mrs. Hanson’s brother, Irvine Lovelands. I spell +Irvine by guess; for I could get no information on the subject, +just as I could never find out, in spite of many inquiries, +whether or not Rufe was a contraction for Rufus. They were +all cheerfully at sea about their names in that generation. +And this is surely the more notable where the names are all so +strange, and even the family names appear to have been +coined. At one time, at least, the ancestors of all these +Alvins and Alvas, Loveinas, Lovelands, and Breedloves, must have +taken serious council and found a certain poetry in these +denominations; that must have been, then, their form of +literature. But still times change; and their next +descendants, the George Washingtons and Daniel Websters, will at +least be clear upon the point. And anyway, and however his +name should be spelt, this Irvine Lovelands was the most +unmitigated Caliban I ever knew.</p> +<p>Our very first morning at Silverado, when we were full of +business, patching up doors and windows, making beds and seats, +and getting our rough lodging into shape, Irvine and his sister +made their appearance together, she for neighbourliness and +general curiosity; he, because he was working for me, to my +sorrow, cutting firewood at I forget how much a day. The +way that he set about cutting wood was characteristic. We +were at that moment patching up and unpacking in the +kitchen. Down he sat on one side, and down sat his sister +on the other. Both were chewing pine-tree gum, and he, to +my annoyance, accompanied that simple pleasure with profuse +expectoration. She rattled away, talking up hill and down +dale, laughing, tossing her head, showing her brilliant +teeth. He looked on in silence, now spitting heavily on the +floor, now putting his head back and uttering a loud, discordant, +joyless laugh. He had a tangle of shock hair, the colour of +wool; his mouth was a grin; although as strong as a horse, he +looked neither heavy nor yet adroit, only leggy, coltish, and in +the road. But it was plain he was in high spirits, +thoroughly enjoying his visit; and he laughed frankly whenever we +failed to accomplish what we were about. This was scarcely +helpful: it was even, to amateur carpenters, embarrassing; but it +lasted until we knocked off work and began to get dinner. +Then Mrs. Hanson remembered she should have been gone an hour +ago; and the pair retired, and the lady’s laughter died +away among the nutmegs down the path. That was +Irvine’s first day’s work in my employment—the +devil take him!</p> +<p>The next morning he returned and, as he was this time alone, +he bestowed his conversation upon us with great liberality. +He prided himself on his intelligence; asked us if we knew the +school ma’am. <i>He</i> didn’t think much of +her, anyway. He had tried her, he had. He had put a +question to her. If a tree a hundred feet high were to fall +a foot a day, how long would it take to fall right down? +She had not been able to solve the problem. “She +don’t know nothing,” he opined. He told us how +a friend of his kept a school with a revolver, and chuckled +mightily over that; his friend could teach school, he +could. All the time he kept chewing gum and spitting. +He would stand a while looking down; and then he would toss back +his shock of hair, and laugh hoarsely, and spit, and bring +forward a new subject. A man, he told us, who bore a grudge +against him, had poisoned his dog. “That was a low +thing for a man to do now, wasn’t it? It wasn’t +like a man, that, nohow. But I got even with him: I pisoned +<i>his</i> dog.” His clumsy utterance, his rude +embarrassed manner, set a fresh value on the stupidity of his +remarks. I do not think I ever appreciated the meaning of +two words until I knew Irvine—the verb, loaf, and the noun, +oaf; between them, they complete his portrait. He could +lounge, and wriggle, and rub himself against the wall, and grin, +and be more in everybody’s way than any other two people +that I ever set my eyes on. Nothing that he did became him; +and yet you were conscious that he was one of your own race, that +his mind was cumbrously at work, revolving the problem of +existence like a quid of gum, and in his own cloudy manner +enjoying life, and passing judgment on his fellows. Above +all things, he was delighted with himself. You would not +have thought it, from his uneasy manners and troubled, struggling +utterance; but he loved himself to the marrow, and was happy and +proud like a peacock on a rail.</p> +<p>His self-esteem was, indeed, the one joint in his +harness. He could be got to work, and even kept at work, by +flattery. As long as my wife stood over him, crying out how +strong he was, so long exactly he would stick to the matter in +hand; and the moment she turned her back, or ceased to praise +him, he would stop. His physical strength was wonderful; +and to have a woman stand by and admire his achievements, warmed +his heart like sunshine. Yet he was as cowardly as he was +powerful, and felt no shame in owning to the weakness. +Something was once wanted from the crazy platform over the shaft, +and he at once refused to venture there—“did not +like,” as he said, “foolen’ round them kind +o’ places,” and let my wife go instead of him, +looking on with a grin. Vanity, where it rules, is usually +more heroic: but Irvine steadily approved himself, and expected +others to approve him; rather looked down upon my wife, and +decidedly expected her to look up to him, on the strength of his +superior prudence.</p> +<p>Yet the strangest part of the whole matter was perhaps this, +that Irvine was as beautiful as a statue. His features +were, in themselves, perfect; it was only his cloudy, uncouth, +and coarse expression that disfigured them. So much +strength residing in so spare a frame was proof sufficient of the +accuracy of his shape. He must have been built somewhat +after the pattern of Jack Sheppard; but the famous housebreaker, +we may be certain, was no lout. It was by the extraordinary +powers of his mind no less than by the vigour of his body, that +he broke his strong prison with such imperfect implements, +turning the very obstacles to service. Irvine, in the same +case, would have sat down and spat, and grumbled curses. He +had the soul of a fat sheep, but, regarded as an artist’s +model, the exterior of a Greek God. It was a cruel thought +to persons less favoured in their birth, that this creature, +endowed—to use the language of theatres—with +extraordinary “means,” should so manage to misemploy +them that he looked ugly and almost deformed. It was only +by an effort of abstraction, and after many days, that you +discovered what he was.</p> +<p>By playing on the oaf’s conceit, and standing closely +over him, we got a path made round the corner of the dump to our +door, so that we could come and go with decent ease; and he even +enjoyed the work, for in that there were boulders to be plucked +up bodily, bushes to be uprooted, and other occasions for +athletic display: but cutting wood was a different matter. +Anybody could cut wood; and, besides, my wife was tired of +supervising him, and had other things to attend to. And, in +short, days went by, and Irvine came daily, and talked and +lounged and spat; but the firewood remained intact as sleepers on +the platform or growing trees upon the mountainside. +Irvine, as a woodcutter, we could tolerate; but Irvine as a +friend of the family, at so much a day, was too bald an +imposition, and at length, on the afternoon of the fourth or +fifth day of our connection, I explained to him, as clearly as I +could, the light in which I had grown to regard his +presence. I pointed out to him that I could not continue to +give him a salary for spitting on the floor; and this expression, +which came after a good many others, at last penetrated his +obdurate wits. He rose at once, and said if that was the +way he was going to be spoke to, he reckoned he would quit. +And, no one interposing, he departed.</p> +<p>So far, so good. But we had no firewood. The next +afternoon, I strolled down to Rufe’s and consulted him on +the subject. It was a very droll interview, in the large, +bare north room of the Silverado Hotel, Mrs. Hanson’s +patchwork on a frame, and Rufe, and his wife, and I, and the oaf +himself, all more or less embarrassed. Rufe announced there +was nobody in the neighbourhood but Irvine who could do a +day’s work for anybody. Irvine, thereupon, refused to +have any more to do with my service; he “wouldn’t +work no more for a man as had spoke to him’s I had +done.” I found myself on the point of the last +humiliation—driven to beseech the creature whom I had just +dismissed with insult: but I took the high hand in despair, said +there must be no talk of Irvine coming back unless matters were +to be differently managed; that I would rather chop firewood for +myself than be fooled; and, in short, the Hansons being eager for +the lad’s hire, I so imposed upon them with merely affected +resolution, that they ended by begging me to re-employ him again, +on a solemn promise that he should be more industrious. The +promise, I am bound to say, was kept. We soon had a fine +pile of firewood at our door; and if Caliban gave me the cold +shoulder and spared me his conversation, I thought none the worse +of him for that, nor did I find my days much longer for the +deprivation.</p> +<p>The leading spirit of the family was, I am inclined to fancy, +Mrs. Hanson. Her social brilliancy somewhat dazzled the +others, and she had more of the small change of sense. It +was she who faced Kelmar, for instance; and perhaps, if she had +been alone, Kelmar would have had no rule within her doors. +Rufe, to be sure, had a fine, sober, open-air attitude of mind, +seeing the world without exaggeration—perhaps, we may even +say, without enough; for he lacked, along with the others, that +commercial idealism which puts so high a value on time and +money. Sanity itself is a kind of convention. Perhaps +Rufe was wrong; but, looking on life plainly, he was unable to +perceive that croquet or poker were in any way less important +than, for instance, mending his waggon. Even his own +profession, hunting, was dear to him mainly as a sort of play; +even that he would have neglected, had it not appealed to his +imagination. His hunting-suit, for instance, had cost I +should be afraid to say how many bucks—the currency in +which he paid his way: it was all befringed, after the Indian +fashion, and it was dear to his heart. The pictorial side +of his daily business was never forgotten. He was even +anxious to stand for his picture in those buckskin hunting +clothes; and I remember how he once warmed almost into +enthusiasm, his dark blue eyes growing perceptibly larger, as he +planned the composition in which he should appear, “with +the horns of some real big bucks, and dogs, and a camp on a +crick” (creek, stream).</p> +<p>There was no trace in Irvine of this woodland poetry. He +did not care for hunting, nor yet for buckskin suits. He +had never observed scenery. The world, as it appeared to +him, was almost obliterated by his own great grinning figure in +the foreground: Caliban Malvolio. And it seems to me as if, +in the persons of these brothers-in-law, we had the two sides of +rusticity fairly well represented: the hunter living really in +nature; the clodhopper living merely out of society: the one bent +up in every corporal agent to capacity in one pursuit, doing at +least one thing keenly and thoughtfully, and thoroughly alive to +all that touches it; the other in the inert and bestial state, +walking in a faint dream, and taking so dim an impression of the +myriad sides of life that he is truly conscious of nothing but +himself. It is only in the fastnesses of nature, forests, +mountains, and the back of man’s beyond, that a creature +endowed with five senses can grow up into the perfection of this +crass and earthy vanity. In towns or the busier country +sides, he is roughly reminded of other men’s existence; and +if he learns no more, he learns at least to fear contempt. +But Irvine had come scatheless through life, conscious only of +himself, of his great strength and intelligence; and in the +silence of the universe, to which he did not listen, dwelling +with delight on the sound of his own thoughts.</p> +<h2><a name="page153"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 153</span>THE +SEA FOGS</h2> +<p>A <span class="smcap">change</span> in the colour of the light +usually called me in the morning. By a certain hour, the +long, vertical chinks in our western gable, where the boards had +shrunk and separated, flashed suddenly into my eyes as stripes of +dazzling blue, at once so dark and splendid that I used to marvel +how the qualities could be combined. At an earlier hour, +the heavens in that quarter were still quietly coloured, but the +shoulder of the mountain which shuts in the canyon already glowed +with sunlight in a wonderful compound of gold and rose and green; +and this too would kindle, although more mildly and with rainbow +tints, the fissures of our crazy gable. If I were sleeping +heavily, it was the bold blue that struck me awake; if more +lightly, then I would come to myself in that earlier and fairier +fight.</p> +<p>One Sunday morning, about five, the first brightness called +me. I rose and turned to the east, not for my devotions, +but for air. The night had been very still. The +little private gale that blew every evening in our canyon, for +ten minutes or perhaps a quarter of an hour, had swiftly blown +itself out; in the hours that followed not a sigh of wind had +shaken the treetops; and our barrack, for all its breaches, was +less fresh that morning than of wont. But I had no sooner +reached the window than I forgot all else in the sight that met +my eyes, and I made but two bounds into my clothes, and down the +crazy plank to the platform.</p> +<p>The sun was still concealed below the opposite hilltops, +though it was shining already, not twenty feet above my head, on +our own mountain slope. But the scene, beyond a few near +features, was entirely changed. Napa valley was gone; gone +were all the lower slopes and woody foothills of the range; and +in their place, not a thousand feet below me, rolled a great +level ocean. It was as though I had gone to bed the night +before, safe in a nook of inland mountains, and had awakened in a +bay upon the coast. I had seen these inundations from +below; at Calistoga I had risen and gone abroad in the early +morning, coughing and sneezing, under fathoms on fathoms of gray +sea vapour, like a cloudy sky—a dull sight for the artist, +and a painful experience for the invalid. But to sit aloft +one’s self in the pure air and under the unclouded dome of +heaven, and thus look down on the submergence of the valley, was +strangely different and even delightful to the eyes. Far +away were hilltops like little islands. Nearer, a smoky +surf beat about the foot of precipices and poured into all the +coves of these rough mountains. The colour of that fog +ocean was a thing never to be forgotten. For an instant, +among the Hebrides and just about sundown, I have seen something +like it on the sea itself. But the white was not so +opaline; nor was there, what surprisingly increased the effect, +that breathless, crystal stillness over all. Even in its +gentlest moods the salt sea travails, moaning among the weeds or +lisping on the sand; but that vast fog ocean lay in a trance of +silence, nor did the sweet air of the morning tremble with a +sound.</p> +<p>As I continued to sit upon the dump, I began to observe that +this sea was not so level as at first sight it appeared to +be. Away in the extreme south, a little hill of fog arose +against the sky above the general surface, and as it had already +caught the sun, it shone on the horizon like the topsails of some +giant ship. There were huge waves, stationary, as it +seemed, like waves in a frozen sea; and yet, as I looked again, I +was not sure but they were moving after all, with a slow and +august advance. And while I was yet doubting, a promontory +of the some four or five miles away, conspicuous by a bouquet of +tall pines, was in a single instant overtaken and swallowed +up. It reappeared in a little, with its pines, but this +time as an islet, and only to be swallowed up once more and then +for good. This set me looking nearer, and I saw that in +every cove along the line of mountains the fog was being piled in +higher and higher, as though by some wind that was inaudible to +me. I could trace its progress, one pine tree first growing +hazy and then disappearing after another; although sometimes +there was none of this fore-running haze, but the whole opaque +white ocean gave a start and swallowed a piece of mountain at a +gulp. It was to flee these poisonous fogs that I had left +the seaboard, and climbed so high among the mountains. And +now, behold, here came the fog to besiege me in my chosen +altitudes, and yet came so beautifully that my first thought was +of welcome.</p> +<p>The sun had now gotten much higher, and through all the gaps +of the hills it cast long bars of gold across that white +ocean. An eagle, or some other very great bird of the +mountain, came wheeling over the nearer pine-tops, and hung, +poised and something sideways, as if to look abroad on that +unwonted desolation, spying, perhaps with terror, for the eyries +of her comrades. Then, with a long cry, she disappeared +again towards Lake County and the clearer air. At length it +seemed to me as if the flood were beginning to subside. The +old landmarks, by whose disappearance I had measured its advance, +here a crag, there a brave pine tree, now began, in the inverse +order, to make their reappearance into daylight. I judged +all danger of the fog was over. This was not Noah’s +flood; it was but a morning spring, and would now drift out +seaward whence it came. So, mightily relieved, and a good +deal exhilarated by the sight, I went into the house to light the +fire.</p> +<p>I suppose it was nearly seven when I once more mounted the +platform to look abroad. The fog ocean had swelled up +enormously since last I saw it; and a few hundred feet below me, +in the deep gap where the Toll House stands and the road runs +through into Lake County, it had already topped the slope, and +was pouring over and down the other side like driving +smoke. The wind had climbed along with it; and though I was +still in calm air, I could see the trees tossing below me, and +their long, strident sighing mounted to me where I stood.</p> +<p>Half an hour later, the fog had surmounted all the ridge on +the opposite side of the gap, though a shoulder of the mountain +still warded it out of our canyon. Napa valley and its +bounding hills were now utterly blotted out. The fog, sunny +white in the sunshine, was pouring over into Lake County in a +huge, ragged cataract, tossing treetops appearing and +disappearing in the spray. The air struck with a little +chill, and set me coughing. It smelt strong of the fog, +like the smell of a washing-house, but with a shrewd tang of the +sea salt.</p> +<p>Had it not been for two things—the sheltering spur which +answered as a dyke, and the great valley on the other side which +rapidly engulfed whatever mounted—our own little platform +in the canyon must have been already buried a hundred feet in +salt and poisonous air. As it was, the interest of the +scene entirely occupied our minds. We were set just out of +the wind, and but just above the fog; we could listen to the +voice of the one as to music on the stage; we could plunge our +eyes down into the other, as into some flowing stream from over +the parapet of a bridge; thus we looked on upon a strange, +impetuous, silent, shifting exhibition of the powers of nature, +and saw the familiar landscape changing from moment to moment +like figures in a dream.</p> +<p>The imagination loves to trifle with what is not. Had +this been indeed the deluge, I should have felt more strongly, +but the emotion would have been similar in kind. I played +with the idea, as the child flees in delighted terror from the +creations of his fancy. The look of the thing helped +me. And when at last I began to flee up the mountain, it +was indeed partly to escape from the raw air that kept me +coughing, but it was also part in play.</p> +<p>As I ascended the mountain-side, I came once more to overlook +the upper surface of the fog; but it wore a different appearance +from what I had beheld at daybreak. For, first, the sun now +fell on it from high overhead, and its surface shone and +undulated like a great nor’land moor country, sheeted with +untrodden morning snow. And next the new level must have +been a thousand or fifteen hundred feet higher than the old, so +that only five or six points of all the broken country below me, +still stood out. Napa valley was now one with Sonoma on the +west. On the hither side, only a thin scattered fringe of +bluffs was unsubmerged; and through all the gaps the fog was +pouring over, like an ocean, into the blue clear sunny country on +the east. There it was soon lost; for it fell instantly +into the bottom of the valleys, following the water-shed; and the +hilltops in that quarter were still clear cut upon the eastern +sky.</p> +<p>Through the Toll House gap and over the near ridges on the +other side, the deluge was immense. A spray of thin vapour +was thrown high above it, rising and falling, and blown into +fantastic shapes. The speed of its course was like a +mountain torrent. Here and there a few treetops were +discovered and then whelmed again; and for one second, the bough +of a dead pine beckoned out of the spray like the arm of a +drowning man. But still the imagination was dissatisfied, +still the ear waited for something more. Had this indeed +been water (as it seemed so, to the eye), with what a plunge of +reverberating thunder would it have rolled upon its course, +disembowelling mountains and deracinating pines! And yet +water it was, and sea-water at that—true Pacific billows, +only somewhat rarefied, rolling in mid air among the +hilltops.</p> +<p>I climbed still higher, among the red rattling gravel and +dwarf underwood of Mount Saint Helena, until I could look right +down upon Silverado, and admire the favoured nook in which it +lay. The sunny plain of fog was several hundred feet +higher; behind the protecting spur a gigantic accumulation of +cottony vapour threatened, with every second, to blow over and +submerge our homestead; but the vortex setting past the Toll +House was too strong; and there lay our little platform, in the +arms of the deluge, but still enjoying its unbroken +sunshine. About eleven, however, thin spray came flying +over the friendly buttress, and I began to think the fog had +hunted out its Jonah after all. But it was the last +effort. The wind veered while we were at dinner, and began +to blow squally from the mountain summit; and by half-past one, +all that world of sea-fogs was utterly routed and flying here and +there into the south in little rags of cloud. And instead +of a lone sea-beach, we found ourselves once more inhabiting a +high mountainside, with the clear green country far below us, and +the light smoke of Calistoga blowing in the air.</p> +<p>This was the great Russian campaign for that season. Now +and then, in the early morning, a little white lakelet of fog +would be seen far down in Napa Valley; but the heights were not +again assailed, nor was the surrounding world again shut off from +Silverado.</p> +<h2><a name="page171"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 171</span>THE +TOLL HOUSE</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">The</span> Toll House, standing alone by +the wayside under nodding pines, with its streamlet and +water-tank; its backwoods, toll-bar, and well trodden croquet +ground; the ostler standing by the stable door, chewing a straw; +a glimpse of the Chinese cook in the back parts; and Mr. Hoddy in +the bar, gravely alert and serviceable, and equally anxious to +lend or borrow books;—dozed all day in the dusty sunshine, +more than half asleep. There were no neighbours, except the +Hansons up the hill. The traffic on the road was +infinitesimal; only, at rare intervals, a couple in a waggon, or +a dusty farmer on a springboard, toiling over “the +grade” to that metropolitan hamlet, Calistoga; and, at the +fixed hours, the passage of the stages.</p> +<p>The nearest building was the school-house, down the road; and +the school-ma’am boarded at the Toll House, walking thence +in the morning to the little brown shanty, where she taught the +young ones of the district, and returning thither pretty weary in +the afternoon. She had chosen this outlying situation, I +understood, for her health. Mr. Corwin was consumptive; so +was Rufe; so was Mr. Jennings, the engineer. In short, the +place was a kind of small Davos: consumptive folk consorting on a +hilltop in the most unbroken idleness. Jennings never did +anything that I could see, except now and then to fish, and +generally to sit about in the bar and the verandah, waiting for +something to happen. Corwin and Rufe did as little as +possible; and if the school-ma’am, poor lady, had to work +pretty hard all morning, she subsided when it was over into much +the same dazed beatitude as all the rest.</p> +<p>Her special corner was the parlour—a very genteel room, +with Bible prints, a crayon portrait of Mrs. Corwin in the height +of fashion, a few years ago, another of her son (Mr. Corwin was +not represented), a mirror, and a selection of dried +grasses. A large book was laid religiously on the +table—“From Palace to Hovel,” I believe, its +name—full of the raciest experiences in England. The +author had mingled freely with all classes, the nobility +particularly meeting him with open arms; and I must say that +traveller had ill requited his reception. His book, in +short, was a capital instance of the Penny Messalina school of +literature; and there arose from it, in that cool parlour, in +that silent, wayside, mountain inn, a rank atmosphere of gold and +blood and “Jenkins,” and the “Mysteries of +London,” and sickening, inverted snobbery, fit to knock you +down. The mention of this book reminds me of another and +far racier picture of our island life. The latter parts of +<i>Rocambole</i> are surely too sparingly consulted in the +country which they celebrate. No man’s education can +be said to be complete, nor can he pronounce the world yet +emptied of enjoyment, till he has made the acquaintance of +“the Reverend Patterson, director of the Evangelical +Society.” To follow the evolutions of that reverend +gentleman, who goes through scenes in which even Mr. Duffield +would hesitate to place a bishop, is to rise to new ideas. +But, alas! there was no Patterson about the Toll House. +Only, alongside of “From Palace to Hovel,” a sixpenny +“Ouida” figured. So literature, you see, was +not unrepresented.</p> +<p>The school-ma’am had friends to stay with her, other +school-ma’ams enjoying their holidays, quite a bevy of +damsels. They seemed never to go out, or not beyond the +verandah, but sat close in the little parlour, quietly talking or +listening to the wind among the trees. Sleep dwelt in the +Toll House, like a fixture: summer sleep, shallow, soft, and +dreamless. A cuckoo-clock, a great rarity in such a place, +hooted at intervals about the echoing house; and Mr. Jenning +would open his eyes for a moment in the bar, and turn the leaf of +a newspaper, and the resting school-ma’ams in the parlour +would be recalled to the consciousness of their inaction. +Busy Mrs. Corwin and her busy Chinaman might be heard indeed, in +the penetralia, pounding dough or rattling dishes; or perhaps +Rufe had called up some of the sleepers for a game of croquet, +and the hollow strokes of the mallet sounded far away among the +woods: but with these exceptions, it was sleep and sunshine and +dust, and the wind in the pine trees, all day long.</p> +<p>A little before stage time, that castle of indolence +awoke. The ostler threw his straw away and set to his +preparations. Mr. Jennings rubbed his eyes; happy Mr. +Jennings, the something he had been waiting for all day about to +happen at last! The boarders gathered in the verandah, +silently giving ear, and gazing down the road with shaded +eyes. And as yet there was no sign for the senses, not a +sound, not a tremor of the mountain road. The birds, to +whom the secret of the hooting cuckoo is unknown, must have set +down to instinct this premonitory bustle.</p> +<p>And then the first of the two stages swooped upon the Toll +House with a roar and in a cloud of dust; and the shock had not +yet time to subside, before the second was abreast of it. +Huge concerns they were, well-horsed and loaded, the men in their +shirt-sleeves, the women swathed in veils, the long whip cracking +like a pistol; and as they charged upon that slumbering hostelry, +each shepherding a dust storm, the dead place blossomed into life +and talk and clatter. This the Toll House?—with its +city throng, its jostling shoulders, its infinity of instant +business in the bar? The mind would not receive it! +The heartfelt bustle of that hour is hardly credible; the thrill +of the great shower of letters from the post-bag, the childish +hope and interest with which one gazed in all these +strangers’ eyes. They paused there but to pass: the +blue-clad China-boy, the San Francisco magnate, the mystery in +the dust coat, the secret memoirs in tweed, the ogling, well-shod +lady with her troop of girls; they did but flash and go; they +were hull-down for us behind life’s ocean, and we but +hailed their topsails on the line. Yet, out of our great +solitude of four and twenty mountain hours, we thrilled to their +momentary presence gauged and divined them, loved and hated; and +stood light-headed in that storm of human electricity. Yes, +like Piccadilly circus, this is also one of life’s +crossing-places. Here I beheld one man, already famous or +infamous, a centre of pistol-shots: and another who, if not yet +known to rumour, will fill a column of the Sunday paper when he +comes to hang—a burly, thick-set, powerful Chinese +desperado, six long bristles upon either lip; redolent of +whiskey, playing cards, and pistols; swaggering in the bar with +the lowest assumption of the lowest European manners; rapping out +blackguard English oaths in his canorous oriental voice; and +combining in one person the depravities of two races and two +civilizations. For all his lust and vigour, he seemed to +look cold upon me from the valley of the shadow of the +gallows. He imagined a vain thing; and while he drained his +cock-tail, Holbein’s death was at his elbow. Once, +too, I fell in talk with another of these flitting +strangers—like the rest, in his shirt-sleeves and all +begrimed with dust—and the next minute we were discussing +Paris and London, theatres and wines. To him, journeying +from one human place to another, this was a trifle; but to +me! No, Mr. Lillie, I have not forgotten it.</p> +<p>And presently the city-tide was at its flood and began to +ebb. Life runs in Piccadilly Circus, say, from nine to one, +and then, there also, ebbs into the small hours of the echoing +policeman and the lamps and stars. But the Toll House is +far up stream, and near its rural springs; the bubble of the tide +but touches it. Before you had yet grasped your pleasure, +the horses were put to, the loud whips volleyed, and the tide was +gone. North and south had the two stages vanished, the +towering dust subsided in the woods; but there was still an +interval before the flush had fallen on your cheeks, before the +ear became once more contented with the silence, or the seven +sleepers of the Toll House dozed back to their accustomed +corners. Yet a little, and the ostler would swing round the +great barrier across the road; and in the golden evening, that +dreamy inn begin to trim its lamps and spread the board for +supper.</p> +<p>As I recall the place—the green dell below; the spires +of pine; the sun-warm, scented air; that gray, gabled inn, with +its faint stirrings of life amid the slumber of the +mountains—I slowly awake to a sense of admiration, +gratitude, and almost love. A fine place, after all, for a +wasted life to doze away in—the cuckoo clock hooting of its +far home country; the croquet mallets, eloquent of English lawns; +the stages daily bringing news of—the turbulent world away +below there; and perhaps once in the summer, a salt fog pouring +overhead with its tale of the Pacific.</p> +<h2><a name="page185"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 185</span>A +STARRY DRIVE</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">In</span> our rule at Silverado, there was +a melancholy interregnum. The queen and the crown prince +with one accord fell sick; and, as I was sick to begin with, our +lone position on Mount Saint Helena was no longer tenable, and we +had to hurry back to Calistoga and a cottage on the green. +By that time we had begun to realize the difficulties of our +position. We had found what an amount of labour it cost to +support life in our red canyon; and it was the dearest desire of +our hearts to get a China-boy to go along with us when we +returned. We could have given him a whole house to himself, +self-contained, as they say in the advertisements; and on the +money question we were prepared to go far. Kong Sam Kee, +the Calistoga washerman, was entrusted with the affair; and from +day to day it languished on, with protestations on our part and +mellifluous excuses on the part of Kong Sam Kee.</p> +<p>At length, about half-past eight of our last evening, with the +waggon ready harnessed to convey us up the grade, the washerman, +with a somewhat sneering air, produced the boy. He was a +handsome, gentlemanly lad, attired in rich dark blue, and shod +with snowy white; but, alas! he had heard rumours of +Silverado. He know it for a lone place on the +mountain-side, with no friendly wash-house near by, where he +might smoke a pipe of opium o’ nights with other +China-boys, and lose his little earnings at the game of tan; and +he first backed out for more money; and then, when that demand +was satisfied, refused to come point-blank. He was wedded +to his wash-houses; he had no taste for the rural life; and we +must go to our mountain servantless. It must have been near +half an hour before we reached that conclusion, standing in the +midst of Calistoga high street under the stars, and the China-boy +and Kong Sam Kee singing their pigeon English in the sweetest +voices and with the most musical inflections.</p> +<p>We were not, however, to return alone; for we brought with us +Joe Strong, the painter, a most good-natured comrade and a +capital hand at an omelette. I do not know in which +capacity he was most valued—as a cook or a companion; and +he did excellently well in both.</p> +<p>The Kong Sam Kee negotiation had delayed us unduly; it must +have been half-past nine before we left Calistoga, and night came +fully ere we struck the bottom of the grade. I have never +seen such a night. It seemed to throw calumny in the teeth +of all the painters that ever dabbled in starlight. The sky +itself was of a ruddy, powerful, nameless, changing colour, dark +and glossy like a serpent’s back. The stars, by +innumerable millions, stuck boldly forth like lamps. The +milky way was bright, like a moonlit cloud; half heaven seemed +milky way. The greater luminaries shone each more clearly +than a winter’s moon. Their light was dyed in every +sort of colour—red, like fire; blue, like steel; green, +like the tracks of sunset; and so sharply did each stand forth in +its own lustre that there was no appearance of that flat, +star-spangled arch we know so well in pictures, but all the +hollow of heaven was one chaos of contesting luminaries—a +hurry-burly of stars. Against this the hills and rugged +treetops stood out redly dark.</p> +<p>As we continued to advance, the lesser lights and milky ways +first grew pale, and then vanished; the countless hosts of heaven +dwindled in number by successive millions; those that still shone +had tempered their exceeding brightness and fallen back into +their customary wistful distance; and the sky declined from its +first bewildering splendour into the appearance of a common +night. Slowly this change proceeded, and still there was no +sign of any cause. Then a whiteness like mist was thrown +over the spurs of the mountain. Yet a while, and, as we +turned a corner, a great leap of silver light and net of forest +shadows fell across the road and upon our wondering waggonful; +and, swimming low among the trees, we beheld a strange, +misshapen, waning moon, half-tilted on her back.</p> +<p>“Where are ye when the moon appears?” so the old +poet sang, half-taunting, to the stars, bent upon a courtly +purpose.</p> +<blockquote><p>“As the sunlight round the dim earth’s +midnight tower of shadow pours,<br /> + Streaming past the dim, wide portals,<br /> + Viewless to the eyes of mortals,<br /> +Till it floods the moon’s pale islet or the morning’s +golden shores.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>So sings Mr. Trowbridge, with a noble inspiration. And +so had the sunlight flooded that pale islet of the moon, and her +lit face put out, one after another, that galaxy of stars. +The wonder of the drive was over; but, by some nice conjunction +of clearness in the air and fit shadow in the valley where we +travelled, we had seen for a little while that brave display of +the midnight heavens. It was gone, but it had been; nor +shall I ever again behold the stars with the same mind. He +who has seen the sea commoved with a great hurricane, thinks of +it very differently from him who has seen it only in a +calm. And the difference between a calm and a hurricane is +not greatly more striking than that between the ordinary face of +night and the splendour that shone upon us in that drive. +Two in our waggon knew night as she shines upon the tropics, but +even that bore no comparison. The nameless colour of the +sky, the hues of the star-fire, and the incredible projection of +the stars themselves, starting from their orbits, so that the eye +seemed to distinguish their positions in the hollow of +space—these were things that we had never seen before and +shall never see again.</p> +<p>Meanwhile, in this altered night, we proceeded on our way +among the scents and silence of the forest, reached the top of +the grade, wound up by Hanson’s, and came at last to a +stand under the flying gargoyle of the chute. Sam, who had +been lying back, fast asleep, with the moon on his face, got +down, with the remark that it was pleasant “to be +home.” The waggon turned and drove away, the noise +gently dying in the woods, and we clambered up the rough path, +Caliban’s great feat of engineering, and came home to +Silverado.</p> +<p>The moon shone in at the eastern doors and windows, and over +the lumber on the platform. The one tall pine beside the +ledge was steeped in silver. Away up the canyon, a wild cat +welcomed us with three discordant squalls. But once we had +lit a candle, and began to review our improvements, homely in +either sense, and count our stores, it was wonderful what a +feeling of possession and permanence grow up in the hearts of the +lords of Silverado. A bed had still to be made up for +Strong, and the morning’s water to be fetched, with +clinking pail; and as we set about these household duties, and +showed off our wealth and conveniences before the stranger, and +had a glass of wine, I think, in honour of our return, and +trooped at length one after another up the flying bridge of +plank, and lay down to sleep in our shattered, moon-pierced +barrack, we were among the happiest sovereigns in the world, and +certainly ruled over the most contented people. Yet, in our +absence, the palace had been sacked. Wild cats, so the +Hansons said, had broken in and carried off a side of bacon, a +hatchet, and two knives.</p> +<h2><a name="page197"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +197</span>EPISODES IN THE STORY OF A MINE</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">No</span> one could live at Silverado and +not be curious about the story of the mine. We were +surrounded by so many evidences of expense and toil, we lived so +entirely in the wreck of that great enterprise, like mites in the +ruins of a cheese, that the idea of the old din and bustle +haunted our repose. Our own house, the forge, the dump, the +chutes, the rails, the windlass, the mass of broken plant; the +two tunnels, one far below in the green dell, the other on the +platform where we kept our wine; the deep shaft, with the +sun-glints and the water-drops; above all, the ledge, that great +gaping slice out of the mountain shoulder, propped apart by +wooden wedges, on whose immediate margin, high above our heads, +the one tall pine precariously nodded—these stood for its +greatness; while, the dog-hutch, boot-jacks, old boots, old +tavern bills, and the very beds that we inherited from bygone +miners, put in human touches and realized for us the story of the +past.</p> +<p>I have sat on an old sleeper, under the thick madronas near +the forge, with just a look over the dump on the green world +below, and seen the sun lying broad among the wreck, and heard +the silence broken only by the tinkling water in the shaft, or a +stir of the royal family about the battered palace, and my mind +has gone back to the epoch of the Stanleys and the Chapmans, with +a grand <i>tutti</i> of pick and drill, hammer and anvil, echoing +about the canyon; the assayer hard at it in our dining-room; the +carts below on the road, and their cargo of red mineral bounding +and thundering down the iron chute. And now all +gone—all fallen away into this sunny silence and desertion: +a family of squatters dining in the assayer’s office, +making their beds in the big sleeping room erstwhile so crowded, +keeping their wine in the tunnel that once rang with picks.</p> +<p>But Silverado itself, although now fallen in its turn into +decay, was once but a mushroom, and had succeeded to other mines +and other flitting cities. Twenty years ago, away down the +glen on the Lake County side there was a place, Jonestown by +name, with two thousand inhabitants dwelling under canvas, and +one roofed house for the sale of whiskey. Round on the +western side of Mount Saint Helena, there was at the same date, a +second large encampment, its name, if it ever had one, lost for +me. Both of these have perished, leaving not a stick and +scarce a memory behind them. Tide after tide of hopeful +miners have thus flowed and ebbed about the mountain, coming and +going, now by lone prospectors, now with a rush. Last, in +order of time came Silverado, reared the big mill, in the valley, +founded the town which is now represented, monumentally, by +Hanson’s, pierced all these slaps and shafts and tunnels, +and in turn declined and died away.</p> +<blockquote><p>“Our noisy years seem moments in the wake<br +/> +Of the eternal silence.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>As to the success of Silverado in its time of being, two +reports were current. According to the first, six hundred +thousand dollars were taken out of that great upright seam, that +still hung open above us on crazy wedges. Then the ledge +pinched out, and there followed, in quest of the remainder, a +great drifting and tunnelling in all directions, and a great +consequent effusion of dollars, until, all parties being sick of +the expense, the mine was deserted, and the town decamped. +According to the second version, told me with much secrecy of +manner, the whole affair, mine, mill, and town, were parts of one +majestic swindle. There had never come any silver out of +any portion of the mine; there was no silver to come. At +midnight trains of packhorses might have been observed winding by +devious tracks about the shoulder of the mountain. They +came from far away, from Amador or Placer, laden with silver in +“old cigar boxes.” They discharged their load +at Silverado, in the hour of sleep; and before the morning they +were gone again with their mysterious drivers to their unknown +source. In this way, twenty thousand pounds’ worth of +silver was smuggled in under cover of night, in these old cigar +boxes; mixed with Silverado mineral; carted down to the mill; +crushed, amalgated, and refined, and despatched to the city as +the proper product of the mine. Stock-jobbing, if it can +cover such expenses, must be a profitable business in San +Francisco.</p> +<p>I give these two versions as I got them. But I place +little reliance on either, my belief in history having been +greatly shaken. For it chanced that I had come to dwell in +Silverado at a critical hour; great events in its history were +about to happen—did happen, as I am led to believe; nay, +and it will be seen that I played a part in that revolution +myself. And yet from first to last I never had a glimmer of +an idea what was going on; and even now, after full reflection, +profess myself at sea. That there was some obscure intrigue +of the cigar-box order, and that I, in the character of a wooden +puppet, set pen to paper in the interest of somebody, so much, +and no more, is certain.</p> +<p>Silverado, then under my immediate sway, belonged to one whom +I will call a Mr. Ronalds. I only knew him through the +extraordinarily distorting medium of local gossip, now as a +momentous jobber; now as a dupe to point an adage; and again, and +much more probably, as an ordinary Christian gentleman like you +or me, who had opened a mine and worked it for a while with +better and worse fortune. So, through a defective +window-pane, you may see the passer-by shoot up into a +hunchbacked giant or dwindle into a potbellied dwarf.</p> +<p>To Ronalds, at least, the mine belonged; but the notice by +which he held it would ran out upon the 30th of June—or +rather, as I suppose, it had run out already, and the month of +grace would expire upon that day, after which any American +citizen might post a notice of his own, and make Silverado +his. This, with a sort of quiet slyness, Rufe told me at an +early period of our acquaintance. There was no silver, of +course; the mine “wasn’t worth nothing, Mr. +Stevens,” but there was a deal of old iron and wood around, +and to gain possession of this old wood and iron, and get a right +to the water, Rufe proposed, if I had no objections, to +“jump the claim.”</p> +<p>Of course, I had no objection. But I was filled with +wonder. If all he wanted was the wood and iron, what, in +the name of fortune, was to prevent him taking them? +“His right there was none to dispute.” He might +lay hands on all to-morrow, as the wild cats had laid hands upon +our knives and hatchet. Besides, was this mass of heavy +mining plant worth transportation? If it was, why had not +the rightful owners carted it away? If it was, would they +not preserve their title to these movables, even after they had +lost their title to the mine? And if it were not, what the +better was Rufe? Nothing would grow at Silverado; there was +even no wood to cut; beyond a sense of property, there was +nothing to be gained. Lastly, was it at all credible that +Ronalds would forget what Rufe remembered? The days of +grace were not yet over: any fine morning he might appear, paper +in hand, and enter for another year on his inheritance. +However, it was none of my business; all seemed legal; Rufe or +Ronalds, all was one to me.</p> +<p>On the morning of the 27th, Mrs. Hanson appeared with the milk +as usual, in her sun-bonnet. The time would be out on +Tuesday, she reminded us, and bade me be in readiness to play my +part, though I had no idea what it was to be. And suppose +Ronalds came? we asked. She received the idea with +derision, laughing aloud with all her fine teeth. He could +not find the mine to save his life, it appeared, without Rufe to +guide him. Last year, when he came, they heard him +“up and down the road a hollerin’ and a raisin’ +Cain.” And at last he had to come to the Hansons in +despair, and bid Rufe, “Jump into your pants and shoes, and +show me where this old mine is, anyway!” Seeing that +Ronalds had laid out so much money in the spot, and that a beaten +road led right up to the bottom of the clump, I thought this a +remarkable example. The sense of locality must be +singularly in abeyance in the case of Ronalds.</p> +<p>That same evening, supper comfortably over, Joe Strong busy at +work on a drawing of the dump and the opposite hills, we were all +out on the platform together, sitting there, under the tented +heavens, with the same sense of privacy as if we had been cabined +in a parlour, when the sound of brisk footsteps came mounting up +the path. We pricked our ears at this, for the tread seemed +lighter and firmer than was usual with our country +neighbours. And presently, sure enough, two town gentlemen, +with cigars and kid gloves, came debauching past the house. +They looked in that place like a blasphemy.</p> +<p>“Good evening,” they said. For none of us +had stirred; we all sat stiff with wonder.</p> +<p>“Good evening,” I returned; and then, to put them +at their ease, “A stiff climb,” I added.</p> +<p>“Yes,” replied the leader; “but we have to +thank you for this path.”</p> +<p>I did not like the man’s tone. None of us liked +it. He did not seem embarrassed by the meeting, but threw +us his remarks like favours, and strode magisterially by us +towards the shaft and tunnel.</p> +<p>Presently we heard his voice raised to his companion. +“We drifted every sort of way, but couldn’t strike +the ledge.” Then again: “It pinched out +here.” And once more: “Every minor that ever +worked upon it says there’s bound to be a ledge +somewhere.”</p> +<p>These were the snatches of his talk that reached us, and they +had a damning significance. We, the lords of Silverado, had +come face to face with our superior. It is the worst of all +quaint and of all cheap ways of life that they bring us at last +to the pinch of some humiliation. I liked well enough to be +a squatter when there was none but Hanson by; before Ronalds, I +will own, I somewhat quailed. I hastened to do him fealty, +said I gathered he was the Squattee, and apologized. He +threatened me with ejection, in a manner grimly +pleasant—more pleasant to him, I fancy, than to me; and +then he passed off into praises of the former state of +Silverado. “It was the busiest little mining town you +ever saw:” a population of between a thousand and fifteen +hundred souls, the engine in full blast, the mill newly erected; +nothing going but champagne, and hope the order of the day. +Ninety thousand dollars came out; a hundred and forty thousand +were put in, making a net loss of fifty thousand. The last +days, I gathered, the days of John Stanley, were not so bright; +the champagne had ceased to flow, the population was already +moving elsewhere, and Silverado had begun to wither in the branch +before it was cut at the root. The last shot that was fired +knocked over the stove chimney, and made that hole in the roof of +our barrack, through which the sun was wont to visit slug-a-beds +towards afternoon. A noisy, last shot, to inaugurate the +days of silence.</p> +<p>Throughout this interview, my conscience was a good deal +exercised; and I was moved to throw myself on my knees and own +the intended treachery. But then I had Hanson to +consider. I was in much the same position as Old Rowley, +that royal humourist, whom “the rogue had taken into his +confidence.” And again, here was Ronalds on the +spot. He must know the day of the month as well as Hanson +and I. If a broad hint were necessary, he had the broadest +in the world. For a large board had been nailed by the +crown prince on the very front of our house, between the door and +window, painted in cinnabar—the pigment of the +country—with doggrel rhymes and contumelious pictures, and +announcing, in terms unnecessarily figurative, that the trick was +already played, the claim already jumped, and Master Sam the +legitimate successor of Mr. Ronalds. But no, nothing could +save that man; <i>quem deus vult perdere</i>, <i>prius +dementat</i>. As he came so he went, and left his rights +depending.</p> +<p>Late at night, by Silverado reckoning, and after we were all +abed, Mrs. Hanson returned to give us the newest of her +news. It was like a scene in a ship’s steerage: all +of us abed in our different tiers, the single candle struggling +with the darkness, and this plump, handsome woman, seated on an +upturned valise beside the bunks, talking and showing her fine +teeth, and laughing till the rafters rang. Any ship, to be +sure, with a hundredth part as many holes in it as our barrack, +must long ago have gone to her last port. Up to that time I +had always imagined Mrs. Hanson’s loquacity to be mere +incontinence, that she said what was uppermost for the pleasure +of speaking, and laughed and laughed again as a kind of musical +accompaniment. But I now found there was an art in it, I +found it less communicative than silence itself. I wished +to know why Ronalds had come; how he had found his way without +Rufe; and why, being on the spot, he had not refreshed his +title. She talked interminably on, but her replies were +never answers. She fled under a cloud of words; and when I +had made sure that she was purposely eluding me, I dropped the +subject in my turn, and let her rattle where she would.</p> +<p>She had come to tell us that, instead of waiting for Tuesday, +the claim was to be jumped on the morrow. How? If the +time were not out, it was impossible. Why? If Ronalds +had come and gone, and done nothing, there was the less cause for +hurry. But again I could reach no satisfaction. The +claim was to be jumped next morning, that was all that she would +condescend upon.</p> +<p>And yet it was not jumped the next morning, nor yet the next, +and a whole week had come and gone before we heard more of this +exploit. That day week, however, a day of great heat, +Hanson, with a little roll of paper in his hand, and the eternal +pipe alight; Breedlove, his large, dull friend, to act, I +suppose, as witness; Mrs. Hanson, in her Sunday best; and all the +children, from the oldest to the youngest;—arrived in a +procession, tailing one behind another up the path. Caliban +was absent, but he had been chary of his friendly visits since +the row; and with that exception, the whole family was gathered +together as for a marriage or a christening. Strong was +sitting at work, in the shade of the dwarf madronas near the +forge; and they planted themselves about him in a circle, one on +a stone, another on the waggon rails, a third on a piece of +plank. Gradually the children stole away up the canyon to +where there was another chute, somewhat smaller than the one +across the dump; and down this chute, for the rest of the +afternoon, they poured one avalanche of stones after another, +waking the echoes of the glen. Meantime we elders sat +together on the platform, Hanson and his friend smoking in +silence like Indian sachems, Mrs. Hanson rattling on as usual +with an adroit volubility, saying nothing, but keeping the party +at their ease like a courtly hostess.</p> +<p>Not a word occurred about the business of the day. Once, +twice, and thrice I tried to slide the subject in, but was +discouraged by the stoic apathy of Rufe, and beaten down before +the pouring verbiage of his wife. There is nothing of the +Indian brave about me, and I began to grill with +impatience. At last, like a highway robber, I cornered +Hanson, and bade him stand and deliver his business. +Thereupon he gravely rose, as though to hint that this was not a +proper place, nor the subject one suitable for squaws, and I, +following his example, led him up the plank into our +barrack. There he bestowed himself on a box, and unrolled +his papers with fastidious deliberation. There were two +sheets of note-paper, and an old mining notice, dated May 30th, +1879, part print, part manuscript, and the latter much +obliterated by the rains. It was by this identical piece of +paper that the mine had been held last year. For thirteen +months it had endured the weather and the change of seasons on a +cairn behind the shoulder of the canyon; and it was now my +business, spreading it before me on the table, and sitting on a +valise, to copy its terms, with some necessary changes, twice +over on the two sheets of note-paper. One was then to be +placed on the same cairn—a “mound of rocks” the +notice put it; and the other to be lodged for registration.</p> +<p>Rufe watched me, silently smoking, till I came to the place +for the locator’s name at the end of the first copy; and +when I proposed that he should sign, I thought I saw a scare in +his eye. “I don’t think that’ll be +necessary,” he said slowly; “just you write it +down.” Perhaps this mighty hunter, who was the most +active member of the local school board, could not write. +There would be nothing strange in that. The constable of +Calistoga is, and has been for years, a bed-ridden man, and, if I +remember rightly, blind. He had more need of the emoluments +than another, it was explained; and it was easy for him to +“depytize,” with a strong accent on the last. +So friendly and so free are popular institutions.</p> +<p>When I had done my scrivening, Hanson strolled out, and +addressed Breedlove, “Will you step up here a bit?” +and after they had disappeared a little while into the chaparral +and madrona thicket, they came back again, minus a notice, and +the deed was done. The claim was jumped; a tract of +mountain-side, fifteen hundred feet long by six hundred wide, +with all the earth’s precious bowels, had passed from +Ronalds to Hanson, and, in the passage, changed its name from the +“Mammoth” to the “Calistoga.” I had +tried to get Rufe to call it after his wife, after himself, and +after Garfield, the Republican Presidential candidate of the +hour—since then elected, and, alas! dead—but all was +in vain. The claim had once been called the Calistoga +before, and he seemed to feel safety in returning to that.</p> +<p>And so the history of that mine became once more plunged in +darkness, lit only by some monster pyrotechnical displays of +gossip. And perhaps the most curious feature of the whole +matter is this: that we should have dwelt in this quiet corner of +the mountains, with not a dozen neighbours, and yet struggled all +the while, like desperate swimmers, in this sea of falsities and +contradictions. Wherever a man is, there will be a lie.</p> +<h2><a name="page223"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +223</span>TOILS AND PLEASURES</h2> +<p>I <span class="smcap">must</span> try to convey some notion of +our life, of how the days passed and what pleasure we took in +them, of what there was to do and how we set about doing it, in +our mountain hermitage. The house, after we had repaired +the worst of the damages, and filled in some of the doors and +windows with white cotton cloth, became a healthy and a pleasant +dwelling-place, always airy and dry, and haunted by the outdoor +perfumes of the glen. Within, it had the look of +habitation, the human look. You had only to go into the +third room, which we did not use, and see its stones, its sifting +earth, its tumbled litter; and then return to our lodging, with +the beds made, the plates on the rack, the pail of bright water +behind the door, the stove crackling in a corner, and perhaps the +table roughly laid against a meal,—and man’s order, +the little clean spots that he creates to dwell in, were at once +contrasted with the rich passivity of nature. And yet our +house was everywhere so wrecked and shattered, the air came and +went so freely, the sun found so many portholes, the golden +outdoor glow shone in so many open chinks, that we enjoyed, at +the same time, some of the comforts of a roof and much of the +gaiety and brightness of al fresco life. A single shower of +rain, to be sure, and we should have been drowned out like +mice. But ours was a Californian summer, and an earthquake +was a far likelier accident than a shower of rain.</p> +<p>Trustful in this fine weather, we kept the house for kitchen +and bedroom, and used the platform as our summer parlour. +The sense of privacy, as I have said already, was complete. +We could look over the clump on miles of forest and rough +hilltop; our eyes commanded some of Napa Valley, where the train +ran, and the little country townships sat so close together along +the line of the rail. But here there was no man to +intrude. None but the Hansons were our visitors. Even +they came but at long intervals, or twice daily, at a stated +hour, with milk. So our days, as they were never +interrupted, drew out to the greater length; hour melted +insensibly into hour; the household duties, though they were +many, and some of them laborious, dwindled into mere islets of +business in a sea of sunny day-time; and it appears to me, +looking back, as though the far greater part of our life at +Silverado had been passed, propped upon an elbow, or seated on a +plank, listening to the silence that there is among the +hills.</p> +<p>My work, it is true, was over early in the morning. I +rose before any one else, lit the stove, put on the water to +boil, and strolled forth upon the platform to wait till it was +ready. Silverado would then be still in shadow, the sun +shining on the mountain higher up. A clean smell of trees, +a smell of the earth at morning, hung in the air. +Regularly, every day, there was a single bird, not singing, but +awkwardly chirruping among the green madronas, and the sound was +cheerful, natural, and stirring. It did not hold the +attention, nor interrupt the thread of meditation, like a +blackbird or a nightingale; it was mere woodland prattle, of +which the mind was conscious like a perfume. The freshness +of these morning seasons remained with me far on into the +day.</p> +<p>As soon as the kettle boiled, I made porridge and coffee; and +that, beyond the literal drawing of water, and the preparation of +kindling, which it would be hyperbolical to call the hewing of +wood, ended my domestic duties for the day. Thenceforth my +wife laboured single-handed in the palace, and I lay or wandered +on the platform at my own sweet will. The little corner +near the forge, where we found a refuge under the madronas from +the unsparing early sun, is indeed connected in my mind with some +nightmare encounters over Euclid, and the Latin Grammar. +These were known as Sam’s lessons. He was supposed to +be the victim and the sufferer; but here there must have been +some misconception, for whereas I generally retired to bed after +one of these engagements, he was no sooner set free than he +dashed up to the Chinaman’s house, where he had installed a +printing press, that great element of civilization, and the sound +of his labours would be faintly audible about the canyon half the +day.</p> +<p>To walk at all was a laborious business; the foot sank and +slid, the boots were cut to pieces, among sharp, uneven, rolling +stones. When we crossed the platform in any direction, it +was usual to lay a course, following as much as possible the line +of waggon rails. Thus, if water were to be drawn, the +water-carrier left the house along some tilting planks that we +had laid down, and not laid down very well. These carried +him to that great highroad, the railway; and the railway served +him as far as to the head of the shaft. But from thence to +the spring and back again he made the best of his unaided way, +staggering among the stones, and wading in low growth of the +calcanthus, where the rattlesnakes lay hissing at his +passage. Yet I liked to draw water. It was pleasant +to dip the gray metal pail into the clean, colourless, cool +water; pleasant to carry it back, with the water ripping at the +edge, and a broken sunbeam quivering in the midst.</p> +<p>But the extreme roughness of the walking confined us in common +practice to the platform, and indeed to those parts of it that +were most easily accessible along the line of rails. The +rails came straight forward from the shaft, here and there +overgrown with little green bushes, but still entire, and still +carrying a truck, which it was Sam’s delight to trundle to +and fro by the hour with various ladings. About midway down +the platform, the railroad trended to the right, leaving our +house and coasting along the far side within a few yards of the +madronas and the forge, and not far of the latter, ended in a +sort of platform on the edge of the dump. There, in old +days, the trucks were tipped, and their load sent thundering down +the chute. There, besides, was the only spot where we could +approach the margin of the dump. Anywhere else, you took +your life in your right hand when you came within a yard and a +half to peer over. For at any moment the dump might begin +to slide and carry you down and bury you below its ruins. +Indeed, the neighbourhood of an old mine is a place beset with +dangers. For as still as Silverado was, at any moment the +report of rotten wood might tell us that the platform had fallen +into the shaft; the dump might begin to pour into the road below; +or a wedge slip in the great upright seam, and hundreds of tons +of mountain bury the scene of our encampment.</p> +<p>I have already compared the dump to a rampart, built certainly +by some rude people, and for prehistoric wars. It was +likewise a frontier. All below was green and woodland, the +tall pines soaring one above another, each with a firm outline +and full spread of bough. All above was arid, rocky, and +bald. The great spout of broken mineral, that had dammed +the canyon up, was a creature of man’s handiwork, its +material dug out with a pick and powder, and spread by the +service of the tracks. But nature herself, in that upper +district, seemed to have had an eye to nothing besides mining; +and even the natural hill-side was all sliding gravel and +precarious boulder. Close at the margin of the well leaves +would decay to skeletons and mummies, which at length some +stronger gust would carry clear of the canyon and scatter in the +subjacent woods. Even moisture and decaying vegetable +matter could not, with all nature’s alchemy, concoct enough +soil to nourish a few poor grasses. It is the same, they +say, in the neighbourhood of all silver mines; the nature of that +precious rock being stubborn with quartz and poisonous with +cinnabar. Both were plenty in our Silverado. The +stones sparkled white in the sunshine with quartz; they were all +stained red with cinnabar. Here, doubtless, came the +Indians of yore to paint their faces for the war-path; and +cinnabar, if I remember rightly, was one of the few articles of +Indian commerce. Now, Sam had it in his undisturbed +possession, to pound down and slake, and paint his rude designs +with. But to me it had always a fine flavour of poetry, +compounded out of Indian story and Hawthornden’s +allusion:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Desire, alas! I desire a Zeuxis new,<br /> +From Indies borrowing gold, from Eastern skies<br /> +Most bright cinoper . . .”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Yet this is but half the picture; our Silverado platform has +another side to it. Though there was no soil, and scarce a +blade of grass, yet out of these tumbled gravel-heaps and broken +boulders, a flower garden bloomed as at home in a +conservatory. Calcanthus crept, like a hardy weed, all over +our rough parlour, choking the railway, and pushing forth its +rusty, aromatic cones from between two blocks of shattered +mineral. Azaleas made a big snow-bed just above the +well. The shoulder of the hill waved white with +Mediterranean heath. In the crannies of the ledge and about +the spurs of the tall pine, a red flowering stone-plant hung in +clusters. Even the low, thorny chaparral was thick with +pea-like blossom. Close at the foot of our path nutmegs +prospered, delightful to the sight and smell. At sunrise, +and again late at night, the scent of the sweet bay trees filled +the canyon, and the down-blowing night wind must have borne it +hundreds of feet into the outer air.</p> +<p>All this vegetation, to be sure, was stunted. The +madrona was here no bigger than the manzanita; the bay was but a +stripling shrub; the very pines, with four or five exceptions in +all our upper canyon, were not so tall as myself, or but a little +taller, and the most of them came lower than my waist. For +a prosperous forest tree, we must look below, where the glen was +crowded with green spires. But for flowers and ravishing +perfume, we had none to envy: our heap of road-metal was thick +with bloom, like a hawthorn in the front of June; our red, baking +angle in the mountain, a laboratory of poignant scents. It +was an endless wonder to my mind, as I dreamed about the +platform, following the progress of the shadows, where the +madrona with its leaves, the azalea and calcanthus with their +blossoms, could find moisture to support such thick, wet, waxy +growths, or the bay tree collect the ingredients of its +perfume. But there they all grew together, healthy, happy, +and happy-making, as though rooted in a fathom of black soil.</p> +<p>Nor was it only vegetable life that prospered. We had, +indeed, few birds, and none that had much of a voice or anything +worthy to be called a song. My morning comrade had a thin +chirp, unmusical and monotonous, but friendly and pleasant to +hear. He had but one rival: a fellow with an ostentatious +cry of near an octave descending, not one note of which properly +followed another. This is the only bird I ever knew with a +wrong ear; but there was something enthralling about his +performance. You listened and listened, thinking each time +he must surely get it right; but no, it was always wrong, and +always wrong the same way. Yet he seemed proud of his song, +delivered it with execution and a manner of his own, and was +charming to his mate. A very incorrect, incessant human +whistler had thus a chance of knowing how his own music pleased +the world. Two great birds—eagles, we +thought—dwelt at the top of the canyon, among the crags +that were printed on the sky. Now and again, but very +rarely, they wheeled high over our heads in silence, or with a +distant, dying scream; and then, with a fresh impulse, winged +fleetly forward, dipped over a hilltop, and were gone. They +seemed solemn and ancient things, sailing the blue air: perhaps +co-oeval with the mountain where they haunted, perhaps emigrants +from Rome, where the glad legions may have shouted to behold them +on the morn of battle.</p> +<p>But if birds were rare, the place abounded with +rattlesnakes—the rattlesnake’s nest, it might have +been named. Wherever we brushed among the bushes, our +passage woke their angry buzz. One dwelt habitually in the +wood-pile, and sometimes, when we came for firewood, thrust up +his small head between two logs, and hissed at the +intrusion. The rattle has a legendary credit; it is said to +be awe-inspiring, and, once heard, to stamp itself for ever in +the memory. But the sound is not at all alarming; the hum +of many insects, and the buzz of the wasp convince the ear of +danger quite as readily. As a matter of fact, we lived for +weeks in Silverado, coming and going, with rattles sprung on +every side, and it never occurred to us to be afraid. I +used to take sun-baths and do calisthenics in a certain pleasant +nook among azalea and calcanthus, the rattles whizzing on every +side like spinning-wheels, and the combined hiss or buzz rising +louder and angrier at any sudden movement; but I was never in the +least impressed, nor ever attacked. It was only towards the +end of our stay, that a man down at Calistoga, who was +expatiating on the terrifying nature of the sound, gave me at +last a very good imitation; and it burst on me at once that we +dwelt in the very metropolis of deadly snakes, and that the +rattle was simply the commonest noise in Silverado. +Immediately on our return, we attacked the Hansons on the +subject. They had formerly assured us that our canyon was +favoured, like Ireland, with an entire immunity from poisonous +reptiles; but, with the perfect inconsequence of the natural man, +they were no sooner found out than they went off at score in the +contrary direction, and we were told that in no part of the world +did rattlesnakes attain to such a monstrous bigness as among the +warm, flower-dotted rocks of Silverado. This is a +contribution rather to the natural history of the Hansons, than +to that of snakes.</p> +<p>One person, however, better served by his instinct, had known +the rattle from the first; and that was Chuchu, the dog. No +rational creature has ever led an existence more poisoned by +terror than that dog’s at Silverado. Every whiz of +the rattle made him bound. His eyes rolled; he trembled; he +would be often wet with sweat. One of our great mysteries +was his terror of the mountain. A little away above our +nook, the azaleas and almost all the vegetation ceased. +Dwarf pines not big enough to be Christmas trees, grew thinly +among loose stone and gravel scaurs. Here and there a big +boulder sat quiescent on a knoll, having paused there till the +next rain in his long slide down the mountain. There was +here no ambuscade for the snakes, you could see clearly where you +trod; and yet the higher I went, the more abject and appealing +became Chuchu’s terror. He was an excellent master of +that composite language in which dogs communicate with men, and +he would assure me, on his honour, that there was some peril on +the mountain; appeal to me, by all that I held holy, to turn +back; and at length, finding all was in vain, and that I still +persisted, ignorantly foolhardy, he would suddenly whip round and +make a bee-line down the slope for Silverado, the gravel +showering after him. What was he afraid of? There +were admittedly brown bears and California lions on the mountain; +and a grizzly visited Rufe’s poultry yard not long before, +to the unspeakable alarm of Caliban, who dashed out to chastise +the intruder, and found himself, by moonlight, face to face with +such a tartar. Something at least there must have been: +some hairy, dangerous brute lodged permanently among the rocks a +little to the north-west of Silverado, spending his summer +thereabout, with wife and family.</p> +<p>And there was, or there had been, another animal. Once, +under the broad daylight, on that open stony hillside, where the +baby pines were growing, scarcely tall enough to be a badge for a +MacGregor’s bonnet, I came suddenly upon his innocent body, +lying mummified by the dry air and sun: a pigmy kangaroo. I +am ingloriously ignorant of these subjects; had never heard of +such a beast; thought myself face to face with some incomparable +sport of nature; and began to cherish hopes of immortality in +science. Rarely have I been conscious of a stranger thrill +than when I raised that singular creature from the stones, dry as +a board, his innocent heart long quiet, and all warm with +sunshine. His long hind legs were stiff, his tiny forepaws +clutched upon his breast, as if to leap; his poor life cut short +upon that mountain by some unknown accident. But the +kangaroo rat, it proved, was no such unknown animal; and my +discovery was nothing.</p> +<p>Crickets were not wanting. I thought I could make out +exactly four of them, each with a corner of his own, who used to +make night musical at Silverado. In the matter of voice, +they far excelled the birds, and their ringing whistle sounded +from rock to rock, calling and replying the same thing, as in a +meaningless opera. Thus, children in full health and +spirits shout together, to the dismay of neighbours; and their +idle, happy, deafening vociferations rise and fall, like the song +of the crickets. I used to sit at night on the platform, +and wonder why these creatures were so happy; and what was wrong +with man that he also did not wind up his days with an hour or +two of shouting; but I suspect that all long-lived animals are +solemn. The dogs alone are hardly used by nature; and it +seems a manifest injustice for poor Chuchu to die in his teens, +after a life so shadowed and troubled, continually shaken with +alarm, and the tear of elegant sentiment permanently in his +eye.</p> +<p>There was another neighbour of ours at Silverado, small but +very active, a destructive fellow. This was a black, ugly +fly—a bore, the Hansons called him—who lived by +hundreds in the boarding of our house. He entered by a +round hole, more neatly pierced than a man could do it with a +gimlet, and he seems to have spent his life in cutting out the +interior of the plank, but whether as a dwelling or a +store-house, I could never find. When I used to lie in bed +in the morning for a rest—we had no easy-chairs in +Silverado—I would hear, hour after hour, the sharp cutting +sound of his labours, and from time to time a dainty shower of +sawdust would fall upon the blankets. There lives no more +industrious creature than a bore.</p> +<p>And now that I have named to the reader all our animals and +insects without exception—only I find I have forgotten the +flies—he will be able to appreciate the singular privacy +and silence of our days. It was not only man who was +excluded: animals, the song of birds, the lowing of cattle, the +bleating of sheep, clouds even, and the variations of the +weather, were here also wanting; and as, day after day, the sky +was one dome of blue, and the pines below us stood motionless in +the still air, so the hours themselves were marked out from each +other only by the series of our own affairs, and the sun’s +great period as he ranged westward through the heavens. The +two birds cackled a while in the early morning; all day the water +tinkled in the shaft, the bores ground sawdust in the planking of +our crazy palace—infinitesimal sounds; and it was only with +the return of night that any change would fall on our +surroundings, or the four crickets begin to flute together in the +dark.</p> +<p>Indeed, it would be hard to exaggerate the pleasure that we +took in the approach of evening. Our day was not very long, +but it was very tiring. To trip along unsteady planks or +wade among shifting stones, to go to and fro for water, to +clamber down the glen to the Toll House after meat and letters, +to cook, to make fires and beds, were all exhausting to the +body. Life out of doors, besides, under the fierce eye of +day, draws largely on the animal spirits. There are certain +hours in the afternoon when a man, unless he is in strong health +or enjoys a vacant mind, would rather creep into a cool corner of +a house and sit upon the chairs of civilization. About that +time, the sharp stones, the planks, the upturned boxes of +Silverado, began to grow irksome to my body; I set out on that +hopeless, never-ending quest for a more comfortable posture; I +would be fevered and weary of the staring sun; and just then he +would begin courteously to withdraw his countenance, the shadows +lengthened, the aromatic airs awoke, and an indescribable but +happy change announced the coming of the night.</p> +<p>The hours of evening, when we were once curtained in the +friendly dark, sped lightly. Even as with the crickets, +night brought to us a certain spirit of rejoicing. It was +good to taste the air; good to mark the dawning of the stars, as +they increased their glittering company; good, too, to gather +stones, and send them crashing down the chute, a wave of +light. It seemed, in some way, the reward and the +fulfilment of the day. So it is when men dwell in the open +air; it is one of the simple pleasures that we lose by living +cribbed and covered in a house, that, though the coming of the +day is still the most inspiriting, yet day’s departure, +also, and the return of night refresh, renew, and quiet us; and +in the pastures of the dusk we stand, like cattle, exulting in +the absence of the load.</p> +<p>Our nights wore never cold, and they were always still, but +for one remarkable exception. Regularly, about nine +o’clock, a warm wind sprang up, and blew for ten minutes, +or maybe a quarter of an hour, right down the canyon, fanning it +well out, airing it as a mother airs the night nursery before the +children sleep. As far as I could judge, in the clear +darkness of the night, this wind was purely local: perhaps +dependant on the configuration of the glen. At least, it +was very welcome to the hot and weary squatters; and if we were +not abed already, the springing up of this lilliputian +valley-wind would often be our signal to retire.</p> +<p>I was the last to go to bed, as I was still the first to +rise. Many a night I have strolled about the platform, +taking a bath of darkness before I slept. The rest would be +in bed, and even from the forge I could hear them talking +together from bunk to bunk. A single candle in the neck of +a pint bottle was their only illumination; and yet the old +cracked house seemed literally bursting with the light. It +shone keen as a knife through all the vertical chinks; it struck +upward through the broken shingles; and through the eastern door +and window, it fell in a great splash upon the thicket and the +overhanging rock. You would have said a conflagration, or +at the least a roaring forge; and behold, it was but a +candle. Or perhaps it was yet more strange to see the +procession moving bedwards round the corner of the house, and up +the plank that brought us to the bedroom door; under the immense +spread of the starry heavens, down in a crevice of the giant +mountain these few human shapes, with their unshielded taper, +made so disproportionate a figure in the eye and mind. But +the more he is alone with nature, the greater man and his doings +bulk in the consideration of his fellow-men. Miles and +miles away upon the opposite hill-tops, if there were any hunter +belated or any traveller who had lost his way, he must have +stood, and watched and wondered, from the time the candle issued +from the door of the assayer’s office till it had mounted +the plank and disappeared again into the miners’ +dormitory.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SILVERADO SQUATTERS***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 516-h.htm or 516-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/5/1/516 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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