A Truthful Woman in Southern California - Kate Sanborn (interesting novels in english .txt) 📗

this, few have the energy even to go a-fishing.

Now, as a truthful "tourist," I must admit that in the winter there are many days when the sun does not shine, and the rainy season is not altogether cheerful for the invalid and the stranger. Sunshine, glorious golden sunshine, is what we want all the time; but we do not get it. I noticed that during the heavy rains the invalids retired to their rooms, overcome by the chill and dampness, and some were seriously ill. But then they would have been in their graves if they had remained in the East. There are many charming people residing in San Diego, well, happy, useful, who know they can never safely return to their old homes.

There has been such a rosy glamour thrown over southern California by enthusiastic romancers that many are disappointed when they fail to find an absolute Paradise.

Humboldt said of California: "The sky is constantly serene and of a deep blue, and without a cloud; and should any clouds appear for a moment at the setting of the sun, they display the most beautiful shades of violet, purple, and green."[1]

[Footnote 1: Humboldt had never been in Alta California, and procured this information in Mexico or Spain.]

Now, after reading that, a real rainy day, when the water leaks through the roof and beats in at the doors, makes a depressed invalid feel like a drenched fowl standing forlornly on one leg in the midst of a New England storm. With snow-covered mountains on one side and the ocean with its heavy fogs on the other, and the tedious rain pouring down with gloomy persistence, and consumptives coughing violently, and physicians hurrying in to attend to a sudden hemorrhage or heart-failure, the scene is not wholly gay and inspiriting. But when the sun comes forth again and the flowers (that look to me a little tired of blooming all the time) brighten up with fresh washed faces, and all vegetation rejoices and you can almost see things grow, and the waves dance and glitter, and the mountains no longer look cold and threatening but seem like painted scenery, a la Bierstadt, hung up for our admiration, and the valleys breathe the spicy fragrance of orange blossoms, we are once more happy, and ready to rave a little ourselves over the much-talked-of "bay 'n' climate." But there are dangers even on the sunniest day. I know a young physician who came this year on a semi-professional tour, to try the effects of inhalations on tuberculosis, and it was so delightfully warm that he straightway took off his flannels, was careless about night air, and was down with pneumonia.

The tourist or traveller who writes of San Diego usually knows nothing of it but a week or two in winter or early spring.

Southern California has fifty-two weeks in the year, and for two thirds of this time the weather is superb.

I can imagine even a mission Indian grunting and complaining if taken to our part of the country in the midst of a week's storm. We flee from deadly horrors of climate to be fastidiously critical. If, in midsummer, sweltering sufferers in New York or Chicago could be transported to this land they would not hurry away. The heat is rarely above eighty-five degrees, and nearly always mitigated by a refreshing breeze from the bay. I am assured that there have not been five nights in as many years when one or more blankets have not been necessary for comfort. In summer everything is serene. No rain, no thunder-storms, no hail, or water-spouts. (The dust pest is never spoken of!) The picnic can be arranged three weeks ahead without an anxious thought about the weather. The summer sunsets are marvellously beautiful.

One must summer and winter here before he can judge fairly, and the hyper-sensitive should tarry in New Mexico or in the desert until spring. I believe that rheumatic or neuralgic invalids should avoid the damp resorts to which they are constantly flocking only to be dissatisfied. Every sort of climate can be found in the State, so that no one has the right to grumble.

Do not take off flannels, although the perspiration does trickle down the side of your face as you sit in the sun. A fur cape is always needed to protect one shoulder from a chilling breeze while the other side is toasted. It is not safe for new-comers to be out-of-doors after four or five o'clock in the afternoon, nor must they ride in open cars except in the middle of the day. These innocent diversions give the doctors their support.

Bill Nye, with his usual good sense, refused to drive in a pouring rain to view the scenery and orchards when visiting San Diego in March, and says: "Orange orchards are rare and beautiful sights, but when I can sit in this warm room, gathered about a big coal fire, and see miles of them from the window, why should I put on my fur overcoat and a mackintosh in order to freeze and cry out with assumed delight every half-mile while I gradually get Pomona of the lungs?"

There are many places worth visiting if you can rouse yourselves for the effort. Point Loma, twelve miles distant, gives a wonderful view, one of the finest in the world. I warrant you will be so famished on arriving that you will empty every lunch-basket before attending to the outlook. National City, Sweet Water Dam, Tia Juana (Aunt Jane), La Jolla - you will hear of all these. I have tried them and will report.

The Kimball brothers, Warren and Frank, who came from New Hampshire twenty-five years ago and devoted their energies to planting orchards of oranges, lemons, and olives, have made the desert bloom, and found the business most profitable. You will like to watch the processes of pickling olives and pressing out the clear amber oil, which is now used by consumptives in preference to the cod-liver oil. Many are rubbed with it daily for increasing flesh. It is delicious for the table, but the profits are small, as cotton-seed oil is much cheaper. Lemons pay better than oranges, Mr. Kimball tells me. Mrs. Flora Kimball has worked side by side with her husband, who is an enthusiast for the rights of woman. She is progressive, and ready to help in every good work, with great executive ability and a hearty appreciation of any good quality in others.

It does not pay to take the trip to Mexico if time is limited, there is so little of Mexico in it. After leaving the train and getting into an omnibus, the voluble darkey in charge soon shouts out, "We are now crossing the line," but as no difference of scene is observed, it is not deeply impressive. One young fellow got out and jumped back and forth over the line, so that if asked on his return if he had been to Mexico he could conscientiously answer, "Oh yes, many times." We were then taken to the custom-house, where we mailed some hastily scribbled letters for the sake of using a Mexican stamp, - some preferred it stamped on a handkerchief. And near by is the curio store, where you find the same things which are seen everywhere, and where you will doubtless buy a lot of stuff and be sorry for it. But whatever other folly you may be led into, let me implore you to wholly abstain from that deadly concoction, the Mexican tamale . Ugh! I can taste mine now.

A tamale is a curious and dubious combination of chicken hash, meal, olives, red pepper, and I know not what, enclosed in a corn-husk, steamed until furiously hot, and then offered for sale by Mexicans in such a sweet, appealing way that few can resist the novelty. It has a more uncertain pedigree than the sausage, and its effects are serious.

A friend of mine tasted a small portion of one late at night. It was later before she could sleep, and then terrible nightmares intruded upon her slumber. Next morning she looked so ill and enfeebled, so unlike her rosy self, that we begged to know the cause. The tale was thrilling. She thought a civil war had broken out and she could not telegraph to her distant spouse. The agony was intense. She must go to him with her five children, and at once. They climbed mountains, tumbled into cañons, were arrested in their progress by cataracts and wild storms, and even the hostile Indian appeared in full war-paint at a point above. This awoke her, only to fall into another horrible situation. An old lover suddenly returned, tried to approach her; she screamed, "I am now a married woman!" - he lifted his revolver, and once again she returned to consciousness and the tamale , and brandy, and Brown's Jamaica ginger. If she had eaten half the tamale the pistol would doubtless have completed its deadly work. A kind old gentleman of our party bought a dozen to treat us all. We were obliged to refuse, and it was amusing to watch him in his endeavor to get rid of them. At last he made several journeys to the car door, throwing out a few each trip in a solemn way. He didn't want to hurt the feelings of the natives by casting them all out at once.

Sweet Water Dam is a triumph of engineering, one of the largest dams in the world, holding six million gallons of water, used for irrigating ranches in Sweet Water Valley; and at La Jolla you will find pretty shells and clamber down to the caves. There the stones are slippery, and an absorbing flirtation should be resisted, as the tide often intrudes most unexpectedly, and in dangerous haste. Besides the caves the attractions are the fishing and the kelp beds. These kelp beds form a submarine garden, and the water is so clear that one can see beautiful plants, fish, etc., at forty or fifty feet below the sea surface - not unlike the famous sea-gardens at Nassau in the Bahamas. There is a good hotel, open the year round.

Lakeside is a quiet inland retreat twenty-two miles from San Diego, where many go for a little excursion and change of air. The Lakeside Hotel has seventy large rooms and complete appointments. The table is supplied with plenty of milk and real cream from their own cows, vegetables and fruit from the neighboring ranches, game in its season, shot on the lake near by, and, in the valleys, meats from homegrown stock. The guests who are not too invalidish often go out for long drives, never forgetting the lunch-baskets. One day we try the Alpine stage. Winding across the mesa at the rear of the hotel, we have a lovely view of the little lake half hidden in the trees, reflecting in its quiet surface the mountains that rise up beyond it. Gradually climbing upward, we come to a tract of land that is watered by the Flume. To our surprise we learn that this is practically frostless, and that since this has been discovered many young orchards of oranges and lemons have been planted. The red mesa land on the side-hills will not be touched by the frosts of a cold night when the valley at its foot will have enough frost to kill all tender growth. This is a new discovery, and has placed thousands of acres on the market as suitable for the culture of citrus fruits. Do you notice how the appearance of the landscape is changing? The nearer hills are much sharper and steeper, and their sides are studded by