great, bland, round-faced Chinaman, like a six-foot baby, was
all smiles and attention to the purchasing crowd. We joined them as if
nothing had happened, and remained with them until we saw them safe
back. All the preceding is summed up in one of the ladies' diaries
briefly thus: "We arrived at San Diego at 6 P.M. After tea the ladies
of the party started out to _see the town_, visited two curio shops,
and went back to the car before nine, and received a very severe
scolding for going off by ourselves." The italics in the above are
mine.

I think the ladies served us right, for we should have awaited their
pleasure; but who could have dreamed that they wanted to do anything
more than rest after their fatiguing ride?

The comical side of the whole thing is this: that our ladies, in their
little independent cruise in San Diego, were as safe as if they were in
any Eastern village. San Diego is, in fact, a typical American town of
the better class, nurtured by Boston capital, so largely invested in
stock of the Santa Fe Railroad, whose western terminus is at San Diego,
which is also peopled by New Englanders, who have duly brought with
them to the Pacific Slope, a full and perennial supply of their steady
habits.

In our one full day in San Diego we saw much to interest us. A carriage
drive took some of us over Mission Cliffs, others went round in the
great, double-decked tram cars, and all took in the vast extent of San
Diego, as it lies on a huge, sloping shelf over the Pacific, giving
constant prospects of the mountains and the sea. We also visited
Coronado, the city so called, the beach, and the hotel. The city, on
the great peninsula between San Diego Bay, a beautiful expanse of
water, and the great ocean beyond, has, of course, what every Western
effort has--a future.

The beach, where the great rollers of the Pacific dash in, was
magnificent; but one cannot safely bathe thereon. The water is
heroically cold, and the surf too fierce and heavy for ordinary
mortals. The sea water, warmed, tamed, and confined in a bath-house, is
what is safest to take.

I quite sympathized with one of our ladies who declared to me that she
was never more disappointed in her life than with the beach at
Coronado. "Why," said she, "I thought I could gather shells and
sea-weed, and pick pretty pebbles; but there is nothing." Well, she was
right in a sense. Perhaps it was because that particular spot was
harried over and over by visi