beauty and order out of the last night's chaos, made us better
than new men, and it taught us a lesson we never shall forget--though
from that hour to this, neither one nor the other of us, in any way,
shape, or fashion whatever, has referred in the remotest degree to that
eventful night in a Californian bungalow.

PRIMEVAL CALIFORNIA

"Primeval California" was inscribed on the knapsack of the Artist, on
the portmanteau of Foster, the Artist's chum, and on the fly-leaf of the
note-book of the Scribe. The luggage of the boisterous trio was checked
through to the heart of the Red Woods, where a vacation camp was
pitched. The expected "last man" leaped the chasm that was rapidly
widening between the city front of San Francisco and the steamer bound
for San Rafael, and approached us--the trio above referred to--with a
slip of paper in his hand. It was not a subpoena; it was not a dun; it
was a round-robin of farewells from a select circle of admirers, wishing
us joy, Godspeed, success in art and literature, and a safe return at
last.

The wind blew fair; we were at liberty for an indefinite period. In
forty minutes we struck another shore and another clime. San Francisco
is original in its affectation of ugliness--it narrowly escaped being a
beautiful city--and its humble acceptation of a climate which is as
invigorating as it is unscrupulous, having a peculiar charm which is
seldom discovered until one is beyond its spell. Sailing into the
adjacent summer,--summer is intermittent in the green city of the
West,--we passed into the shadow of Mount Tamalpais, the great landmark
of the coast. The admirable outline of the mountain, however, was
partially obscured by the fog, already massing along its slopes.

The narrow-gauge of the N.P.C.R.R. crawls like a snake from the ferry on
the bay to the roundhouse over and beyond the hills, but seven miles
from the sea-mouth of the Russian River. It turns very sharp corners,
and turns them every few minutes; it doubles in its own trail, runs over
fragile trestle-work, darts into holes and re-appears on the other side
of the mountains, roars through strips of redwoods like a rushing wind,
skirts the shore of bleak Tomales Bay, cuts across the potato district
and strikes the redwoods again, away up among the saw-mills at the
logging-camps, where it ends abruptly on a flat under a hill. And what a
flat it is!--enlivened with a first-class hotel, some questionable
hostelries,