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diff --git a/17901.txt b/17901.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d1eba13 --- /dev/null +++ b/17901.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2965 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Smiling Hill-Top, by Julia M. Sloane + +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 Smiling Hill-Top + And Other California Sketches + +Author: Julia M. Sloane + +Illustrator: Carleton M. Winslow + +Release Date: March 2, 2006 [EBook #17901] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SMILING HILL-TOP *** + + + + +Produced by jjz, Suzanne Shell and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +THE SMILING HILL-TOP +AND OTHER CALIFORNIA SKETCHES + + + + +The Smiling Hill-Top +and Other California Sketches + +by + +JULIA M. SLOANE + +Illustrated by +CARLETON M. WINSLOW + + +[Illustration] + + +NEW YORK +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +1921 + + + + +Copyright, 1919, by +Charles Scribner's Sons + +_Published October, 1919_ + + + + + TO + +MY THREE COMPANIONS OF THE ROAD + ONE LARGE AND TWO SMALL + THIS LITTLE BOOK + IS LOVINGLY DEDICATED + + + + +CONTENTS + + PAGE +Introduction 1 +The Smiling Hill-Top 5 +A California Poppy 19 +Gardeners 35 +Thorns 55 +The Gypsy Trail 77 +An Adventure in Solitude 94 +A Sabine Farm 116 +The Land of "Whynot" 132 +Where the Trade Wind Blows 155 +Sunkist 176 + + + + +THE SMILING HILL-TOP +AND OTHER CALIFORNIA SKETCHES + +INTRODUCTION + + +The following sketches are entirely informal. They do not cover the +subject of Southern California in any way. In fact, they contain no +information whatever, either about the missions or history--a little, +perhaps, about the climate and the fruits and flowers of the earth, but +that has crept in more or less unavoidably. They are the record of what +happened to happen to a fairly light-hearted family who left New England +in search of rest and health. There are six of us, two grown-ups, two +boys, and two dogs. We came for a year and, like many another family, +have taken root for all our days--or so it seems now. + +The reactions of more or less temperamental people, suddenly +transplanted from a rigorous climate to sunshine and the beauty and +abundance of life in Southern California, perhaps give a too highly +colored picture, so please make allowance for the bounce of the ball. I +mean to be quite fair. It doesn't rain from May to October, but when it +does, it can rain in a way to make Noah feel entirely at home. +Unfortunately, that is when so many of our visitors come--in February! +They catch bad colds, the roses aren't in bloom, and altogether they +feel that they have been basely deceived. + +We rarely have thunder-storms, or at least anything you could dignify by +that name, but we do have horrid little shaky earthquakes. We don't have +mosquitoes in hordes, such as the Jersey coast provides, but we do +sometimes come home and hear what sounds like a cosy tea-kettle in the +courtyard, whereupon the defender of the family reaches for his gun and +there is one rattlesnake less to dread. + +On our hill-top there are quantities of wild creatures--quail, rabbits, +doves, and ground squirrels and, unfortunately, a number of social +outcasts. Never shall I forget an epic incident in our history--the head +of the family in pajamas at dawn, in mortal combat with a small +black-and-white creature, chasing it through the cloisters with the +garden hose. Oh, yes, there is plenty of adventure still left, even +though we don't have to cross the prairies in a wagon. + +People who know California and love it, I hope may enjoy comparing notes +with me. People who have never been here and who vaguely think of it as +a happy hunting-ground for lame ducks and black sheep, I should like to +tempt across the Rockies that they might see how much more it is than +that. It may be a lotus land to some, to many it truly seems the +promised land. + +"Shall we be stepping westward?" + + + + +[Illustration] + +THE +SMILING +HILL-TOP + + +No one should attempt to live on top of an adobe hill one mile from a +small town which has been brought up on the Declaration of Independence, +without previously taking a course in plain and fancy wheedling. This is +the mature judgment of a lady who has tried it. Not even in California! + +When we first took possession of our hill-top early one June, nothing +was farther from my thoughts. "Suma Paz," "Perfect Peace," as the place +was called, came to me from a beloved aunt who had truly found it that. +With it came a cow, a misunderstood motor, and a wardrobe trunk. A +Finnish lady came with the cow, and my brother-in-law's chauffeur +graciously consented to come with the motor. The trunk was empty. It was +all so complete that the backbone of the family, suddenly summoned on +business, departed for the East, feeling that he had left us comfortably +established for the month of his absence. The motor purred along the +nine miles to the railroad station without the least indication of the +various kinds of internal complications about to develop, and he boarded +the train, beautifully composed in mind, while we returned to our +hill-top. + +It is a most enchanting spot. A red-tiled bungalow is built about a +courtyard with cloisters and a fountain, while vines and flowers fill +the air with the most delicious perfume of heliotrope, mignonette, and +jasmine. Beyond the big living-room extends a terrace with boxes of deep +and pale pink geraniums against a blue sea, that might be the Bay of +Naples, except that Vesuvius is lacking. It is so lovely that after +three years it still seems like a dream. We are only one short look from +the Pacific Ocean, that ocean into whose mists the sun sets in flaming +purple and gold, or the more soft tones of shimmering gray and +shell-pink. We sit on our terrace feeling as if we were in a proscenium +box on the edge of the world, and watch the ever-varying splendor. At +night there is the same sense of infinity, with the unclouded stars +above, and only the twinkling lights of motors threading their way down +the zigzag of the coast road as it descends the cliffs to the plain +below us. These lights make up in part for the fewness of the harbor +lights in the bay. The Pacific is a lonely ocean. There are so few +harbors along the coast where small boats can find shelter that yachts +and pleasure craft hardly exist. Occasionally we see the smoke of a +steamer on its way to or from ports of Lower California, as far south as +the point where the curtain drops on poor distracted Mexico, for there +trade ceases and anarchy begins. There is a strip of land, not belonging +to the United States, called Lower California, controlled by a handsome +soldierly creature, Governor Cantu, whose personal qualities and motives +seem nicely adapted to holding that much, at least, of Mexico in +equilibrium. Only last summer he was the guest of our small but +progressive village at a kind of love feast, where we cemented our +friendship with whale steaks and ginger ale dispensed on the beach, to +the accompaniment of martial music, while flags of both countries shared +the breeze. Though much that is picturesque, especially in the way of +food--enciladas, tamales and the like--strays across the border, bandits +do not, and we enjoy a sense of security that encourages basking in the +sun. Just one huge sheet of water, broken by islands, lies between us +and the cherry blossoms of Japan! There is a thrill about its very +emptiness, and yet since I have seen the Golden Gate I know that that +thrill is nothing to the sensation of seeing a sailing ship with her +canvas spread, bound for the far East. From the West to the East the +spell draws. First from the East to the West; from the cold and storms +of New England to our land of sun it beckons, and then unless we hold +tight, the lure of the South Seas and the glamour of the Far East calls +us. I know just how it would be. Perhaps my spirit craves adventuring +the more for the years my body has had to spend in a chaise longue or +hammock, fighting my way out of a shadow. Anyway, I have heard the call, +but I have put cotton in my ears and am content that life allows me +three months out of the twelve of magic and my hill-top. + +There is a town, of course--there has to be, else where would we post +our letters. It's as busy as a beehive with its clubs and model +playgrounds, its New Thought and its "Journal," but I don't have to be +of it. There are only so many hours in the day. I go around "in circles" +all winter; in summer I wish to invite my soul, and there isn't time for +both. I think I am regarded by the people in the village as a mixture of +recluse and curmudgeon, but who cares if they can live on a hill? + +One flaw there was in the picture, and that is where the first +experiment in wheedling came in. A large telegraph pole on our property +line bisected the horizon like one of the parallels on a map. It seemed +to us at times to assume the proportions of the Washington Monument. I +firmly made up my mind to have it down if I did nothing else that +summer, and I succeeded, though I began in July and it was not till +October that it finally fell crushing into the sage brush, and for the +first time we saw the uninterrupted curve of beach melting into the pale +greenish cliffs beyond. + +The property on which the pole stood belonged to a real-estate man. He +was pleasant and full of rosy dreams of a suburban villa resort, the gem +of the Pacific Coast. That part was easy. He and I together visited the +offices of the corporations owning the wires on that pole. As they had +no legal right of way they had to promise to remove it and many others, +to the tune of several hundred dollars. Nothing was left them but the +game of delay. They told me their men were busy, that all the copper +wire was held up by a landslide in the Panama Canal, that the +superintendent was on a vacation, etc. However, the latter gentleman had +to come back some time, and when he did I plaintively told him my +troubles. I said I had had a very hard and disappointing summer, and +that it would soothe me enormously to have one look at that view as the +Lord intended it to be, before I had to go away for the winter, that it +was in his power to give me that pleasure, etc. + +Perhaps it was an unusual method, but it worked so well that I have +often employed it since. I may say incidentally that it is of no use +with the ice man. Perhaps dealing with merchandise below zero keeps his +resistance unusually good. I have never been able to extract a pound of +ice from him, even for illness, except on his regular day and in my +proper turn. I think I should also except the fish man, who always +promises to call Fridays and never does; much valuable time have I lost +in searching the highways and byways for his old horse and white wagon. + +Next to the execution of the telegraph pole I felt a little grass lawn +to be of the utmost importance. Nothing could better show how short a +time I had been in California than not to realize that even if you can +afford to dine on caviar, pate de fois gras, and fresh mushrooms, grass +may be beyond your means. I bravely had the ground prepared and sown. +First, the boys' governess watered it so hard that it removed all the +seed, so we tried again. Then the water was shut off while pipes were +being laid on the highway below, and only at dawn and after dark could +we get a drop. I did the watering in my night-gown, and was soon +rewarded by a little green fuzz. Then all the small rabbits for miles +around gathered there for breakfast. They were so tame you could hardly +drive them away, so I invited the brothers who kept the hardware store +in the village to come up and shoot them. They came gladly and brought +their friends, but were so very anxious to help that I thought they were +going to shoot the children too, and had politely to withdraw my +invitation. The gardener and I then made a luscious compound of bacon +grease and rough-on-rats, which we served on lettuce leaves and left +about the edges of the grass plot. Did you ever hear a rabbit scream? +They do. I felt like Lucretia Borgia, and decided that if they wanted +the lawn they could have it. Oddly enough, a lot of grass came up in +quite another part of the garden. I suppose it was the first planting +that Fraeulein had blown away with the hose! We often have surprises like +that in gardening. We once planted window-boxes of mignonette and they +came up petunias--volunteer petunias at that. Of course, it all adds to +the interest and adventure of life. + +After the water-pipes were laid the gas deserted us, and we had a few +meals cooked on all the little alcohol lamps we could muster. Then the +motor fell desperately ill, and from then on was usually to be found +strewed over the floor of the garage. Jerome K. Jerome says about +bicycles, that if you have one you must decide whether you will ride it +or overhaul it. This applies as well to motors. We decided to overhaul +ours with a few brief excursions, just long enough to give an +opportunity for having it towed home. One late afternoon we were +hurrying across the mesa to supper, when our magneto flew off into the +ditch, scattering screws in all directions. Fortunately, a kind of +Knight Errant to our family appeared just in the nick of time to take us +home and send help to the wreck. I once kept a garage in San Diego open +half an hour after closing time by a Caruso sob in my voice over the +telephone, while my brother-in-law's miserable chauffeur hurried over +for an indispensable part. + +Poppy, the cow, contributed her bit--it wasn't milk, either--to this +complicated month, but deserves a chapter all to herself. + +The backbone of the family found my letters "so entertaining" at first, +but gradually a note of uneasiness crept into his replies after I had +told him that Joedy had fallen out of the machine and had just escaped +our rear wheels, and that the previous night we had had three +earthquakes. I had never felt an earthquake before, and it will be some +time before I develop the nonchalance of a seasoned Californian, whose +way of referring to one is like saying, "Oh, yes, we did have a few +drops of rain last night." One more little tremble and I should have +gathered the family for a night in the garden. + +After an incendiary had set fire to several houses in town, and Fraeulein +had had a peculiar seizure that turned her a delicate sea-green, while +she murmured, "I am going to die," I sat down and took counsel with +myself. What next? I bought a rattlesnake antidote outfit--that, at +least, I could anticipate, and then I went out with the axe and hacked +out the words "Suma Paz" from the pergola. We are now "The Smiling +Hill-Top," for though peace does not abide with us, we keep right on +smiling. + + + + +[Illustration] + +A +CALIFORNIA +POPPY + + +It would doubtless be the proper thing for me to begin by quoting +Stevenson: + + "The friendly cow, all red and white, + I love with all my heart," etc. + +but I'd rather not. In the first place she wasn't, and in the second +place I didn't. The only thing about it that fits is the color scheme; +Poppy was a red-and-white cow, but I'd rather not. In the first place +she wasn't, and in the second place I didn't. The only thing about it +that fits is the color scheme; Poppy was a red-and-white cow, or rather +a kind of strawberry roan. Perhaps she didn't like being inherited (she +came to us with "The Smiling Hill-Top"), or maybe she was lonely on the +hillside and felt that it was too far from town. Almost all the natives +of the village feel that way; or perhaps she took one of those aversions +to me that aren't founded on anything in particular. At any rate, I +never saw any expression but resentment in her eye, so that no warm +friendship ever grew up between us. + +The only other cow we ever boarded--I use the word advisedly--did not +feel any more drawn to me than Poppy. Evidently I am not the type that +cows entwine their affections about. She was Pennsylvania Dutch and +shared Poppy's sturdy appetite, though it all went to figure. Two quaint +maiden ladies next door took care of her and handed the milk over our +fence, while it was still foaming in the pail. Miss Tabitha and Miss +Letitia--how patient they were with me in my abysmal ignorance of the +really vital things of life, such as milking, preserving, and pickling! +They undertook it all for me, but in the end I had a small laugh at +their expense. I gave them my grandmother's recipes for brandied peaches +and pickled peaches, and though rigidly temperance, they consented to do +a dozen jars of each. Alas! they mingled the two--now as I write it down +I wonder if perhaps they did it on purpose, on the principle that drug +stores now put a dash of carbolic in our 95 per cent alcohol. In which +case, of course, the joke is on me. + +To return to Poppy. At first I was delighted with the thought of +unlimited milk, bought a churn and generally prepared to enjoy being a +dairymaid. I soon found out my mistake. Poppy was "drying up" just as +the vegetation was. The Finn woman who milked her morning and night, and +who seemed to be in much closer sympathy with her than I ever hoped to +be, said that what she must have was green food. Having no lawn, for +reasons previously stated, that was a poser. My brother-in-law's +chauffeur, who was lent to me for a month, unbent sufficiently to go to +town and press a bill into the hand of the head gardener of "The Place" +of the village, so that we might have the grass mowed from that lawn. +Alas for frail human nature! It seems that he disappeared from view +about once in so often, and that his feet at that moment were trembling +on the brink. So he slid over the edge, and the next man in charge had +other friends with other cows. I tried the vegetable man next. He was a +pleasant Greek, and promised me all his beet-tops and wilted lettuce. +That was good as far as it went, but Poppy would go through a crate of +lettuce as I would a bunch of grapes, and I couldn't see that we got any +more milk. The Finn woman said that the flies annoyed her and that no +cow would give as much milk if she were constantly kicking and stamping +to get them off. She advised me to get some burlap for her. That seemed +simple, but it wasn't. Nothing was simple connected with that cow. I +found I could only get stiff burlap, such as you put on walls, in art +green, and I couldn't picture Poppy in a kimono of that as being +anything but wretched. Finally, in a hardware store, the proprietor took +an interest in my sad tale, and said he'd had some large shipments come +in lately wrapped in burlap, and that I could have a piece. He +personally went to the cellar for it and gave it to me as a present. + +Much cheered, I hurried home and we put Poppy into her brown jacket, +securing it neatly with strings. By morning, I regret to say, she had +kicked it to shreds. Also the Finn woman decided that she needed higher +pay and more milk as her perquisite. Since we were obviously "city +folks" she thought she might as well hold us up, and she felt sure that +I couldn't get any one in her place. I surprised her by calmly replying +that she could go when her week was up, and I would get some one else. +It was a touch of rhetoric on my part, for I didn't suppose that I could +any more than she did, though I was resolved to make a gallant fight, +even if I had to enlist the services of the dry cleaner, who was the +only person who voluntarily called almost daily to see if we had any +work to be done. + +The joke of it was that I had no trouble at all. A youth of sixteen, who +viewed me in the light of "opportunity knocking at the door," gladly +accepted my terms. He was the son of the foreman at a dairy in the +neighborhood, and rode over night and morning on a staid old mare loaned +him by the dairyman. + +Donald was bright and willing, and eventually was able to get near +enough to Poppy to milk her, though she never liked him. The Finn woman +was the only person with whom she was in sympathy. I think they were +both Socialists. Donald said we must do something about the flies. I +told him about my attempts to dress her in burlap, and we concluded that +a spray was the thing. Donald brought a nice antiseptic smelling +mixture, and we put it on her with the rose sprayer. Probably we were +too impulsive; anyway, the milk was very queer. Did you ever eat saffron +cake in Cornwall? It tasted like that. The children declined it firmly, +and I sympathized with them. After practice we managed to spray her in a +more limited way. + +By this time we were having sherbet instead of ice-cream for Sunday +dinner, and my ideas of a private cow had greatly altered. + +I have a black list that has been growing through life; things I wish +never to have again: tapioca pudding, fresh eggs if I have to hear the +hen brag about it at 5 A.M., tripe, and home-grown milk, and to this +list I have lately added cheese. Every one is familiar with the maxim +that rest is a change of occupation. J----, being tired of Latin verbs, +Greek roots, and dull scholars generally, took up some interesting +laboratory work after we emigrated to California. Growing Bulgarian +bacilli to make fermented milk that would keep us all perennially +amiable while we grew to be octogenarians, was one thing, but when the +company, lured by the oratory of a cheese expert, were beguiled into +making cream cheese--just the sort of cheese that Lucullus and Ponce de +Leon both wanted but did not find--our troubles began. The company is +composed of one minister with such an angelic expression that no one can +refuse to sign anything if he holds out a pen; one aviator with youth, +exuberant spirits, and a New England setness of purpose; one +schoolmaster--strong on facing facts and callous to camouflage, and one +temperamental cheese man. (It turned out afterward, however, that the +janitor could make the best cheese of them all.) Developing a cheese +business is a good deal like conducting a love affair--it blows hot and +cold in a nerve-racking way. It is "the Public." You never can tell +about the Public! Sometimes it wants small packages for a small sum, or +large packages for more, but mostly, what it frankly wants is a large +package for a small sum! Some dealers didn't like the trade-mark. It was +changed. It then turned out that the first trade-mark was really what +was wanted. Then the cheese man fell desperately ill, which was a +calamity, as neither the Book of Common Prayer, an aeroplane, nor a +Latin Grammar is what you need in such a crisis. + +J---- waded dejectedly about in whey until a new cheese man took the +helm. He also fell ill. I always supposed that making cheese was a kind +of healthful, bucolic occupation, but I was wrong. Apparently every one +that tries it steers straight for a nervous break-down. I have gotten to +a point myself where, if any one quotes "Miss Muffet" to me, I emit a +low, threatening growl. + +However, I'm digressing, for our life was not complicated by cheese or +Bulgarian bacilli till much later (and when you think of what the Bulgos +have done to the Balkans we can't really complain). + +That first summer Poppy seemed care enough. A neighbor across the +canyon, who had known her in her girlhood, took too vital an interest +in her daily life. It was maddening to be called on the telephone at +all hours and told that Poppy had had no fresh drinking water since such +and such an hour, or to have Donald waylaid and admonished to give +her plenty to eat. That she had, as my bills at the feed and fuel store +can prove. + +At this juncture the backbone of the family fell desperately ill, and I +flew to the hospital where he was, leaving Poppy to kick and stamp and +lose tethering pins and dry up at her own sweet will. After the danger +and strain were over, I found myself also tucked into a hospital bed, +while a trained nurse watched over the children and Poppy. One morning a +frantic letter arrived. Poppy _had_ dried up! According to what lights +we had to guide us, it was far too soon, but reasoning did not alter the +fact. There was no milk for the boys, and the dairyman had always +declined to deliver milk on our hill, it was outside his route! Two +helpless persons flat on their backs in a hospital are at a disadvantage +in a crisis like that. However, one must always find a way. I think I +have expressed myself elsewhere as to the value of wheedling. It seemed +our only hope. I wrote a letter to the owner of that dairy, in which I +frankly recognized the fact that our hill was steep and the road bad, +that it was out of his way and probably he had no milk to spare, anyway, +but that Billie and Joe had to have milk, and that their parents were +both down and out, and that it was his golden opportunity to do, not a +stroke of business, but an act of kindness! It worked. He has been +serving us with milk ever since, and I'd like to testify that his heart +is in the right place. + +Before I leave the subject of wheedling, I might add that if it is a +useful art in summer, in winter it is priceless. After a week of rain, +such as we know how to have in these parts, adobe becomes very slippery. +This hill is steep, and I have spent a week on its top in February, +feeling like the princess in the fairy tale, who lived on a glass hill +ready to marry the first suitor who reached the top; only in my case +there were no suitors at all; even the telegraph boy declined to try +his luck. + +Speaking of telegrams, I think that as a source of interest we have been +a boon to this village. One departing friend telegraphed in Latin, +beginning "Salve atque vale." This was a poser. The operator tried to +telephone it, but gave that up. He said, "It's either French or a code." +The following season he referred to it again, remarking, "A telegram +like that just gets my goat." + +But to return to the now thoroughly dry Poppy. We determined to sell +her, in spite of the fact that we never are very successful in selling +anything. Things always seem at their bottom price when we have +something to dispose of, while we usually buy when the demand outruns +the supply. Still, I once conducted several quite successful +transactions with an antique dealer in Pennsylvania. I think I was said +to be the only living woman who had ever gotten the best of a bargain +with him, so I was unanimously elected by the family as the one to open +negotiations. A customer actually appeared. We gradually approached a +price by the usual stages, I dwelling on his advantage in having the +calf and trying not to let him see my carking fear that we might be the +unwilling godparents of it if he didn't hurry up and come to terms. At +last the matter was settled. I abandoned my last five-dollar ditch, +thinking that the relief of seeing the last of Poppy would be cheap at +the price. There were four of us, and we would not hesitate to pay two +dollars each for theatre tickets, which would be eight dollars, so +really I was saving money. + +A nice little girl with flaxen pigtails brought her father's check. She +and her brother tied Poppy behind their buggy and slowly disappeared +down the hill. There was the flutter of a handkerchief from the other +side of the canyon, and that was all. + +In the words of that disturbing telegram: + +"Salve atque vale." + + + + +[Illustration] + +GARDENERS + + + "Venite agile, barchetta mia + Santa Lucia, Santa Lucia!" + +accompanied by the enchanting fragrance of burning sage-brush, is wafted +up to my sleeping-porch, and I know that Signor Constantino Garibaldi is +early at work clearing the canyon side so that our Matilija poppies +shall not be crowded out by the wild. It is a pleasant awakening to a +pleasant world as the light morning mist melts away from a bay as +"bright and soft and bloomin' blue" as any Kipling ever saw. It seems +almost too good to be true, that in a perfect Italian setting we should +have stumbled on an Italian gardener, who whistles Verdi as he works. +True, he doesn't know the flowers by name, and in his hands a pair of +clippers are as fatal as the shears in the hands of Atropos, but he is +in the picture. When I see gardeners pruning I realize that that lady of +destiny shows wonderful restraint about our threads of fate--the +temptation to snip seems so irresistible. + +Signor Garibaldi is a retired wine merchant driven out-of-doors by +illness, a most courteous and sensitive soul, with a talent for +letter-writing that is alone worth all the plumbago blossoms that he cut +away last year. The following letter was written to J---- while +Garibaldi was in charge of our hill-top, the bareness of which we strove +to cover with wild flowers until we could make just the kind of garden +we wanted: + + March 15. + + DEAR SIR: + + The last time I had the pleasure of see you in your place, Villa + Collina Ridente, you exclaimed with a melancholic voice, "Only + poppies and mignonette came out of the wild flower seeds." "So it + is," said I in the same tune of voice. Time proved we was both + wrong; many other flowers made their retarded appearance, so + deserving the name of wild flower garden.... + + Your place (pardon _me_ as I am not a violet) could look better, + also could look worse; consequently I consider myself entitled to be + placed between hell and paradise--to have things as one wishes is an + insolvable problem--that era has not come yet. + + Many people come over to the Smiling hills, some think it is not + necessary to go any farther to collect flower to make a bouquet. + With forced gentle manner I reproached some of them, ordering to + observe the rule, "vedere e non toccare." It go in force while I am + present, not so in my absence. Those that made proverbs, their names + ought to be immortal. Here for one, "When the cat is gone, the rats + dance." How much true is in the Say. Every visitor like the place + profane or not profane in artistic matter. + + A glorious rain came last night to the great content of the farmers + and gardeners--others not so. While I am writing from my + Observatorio I can't see any indication of stopping. I don't think + it will rain as much as when we had the universal deluge, but if the + cause of said deluge was in order to get a better generation, it + may. I don't think the actual generation is better than it was the + anti-deluge, pardon me if you can't digest what I say. I am a + pessimist to the superlative grade, and it is not without reason + that I say so. I had sad experience with the World. Thank God for + having doted me with a generous dose of philosophic! Swimming + against the tide, not me, not such a fool I am! + + Here is another pardon that I have to ask and it is to take the + liberty of decorate the Smiling hill with the American flag. La + Bandiera Stellata (note: I am not an American legally, no; to say I + renounce to my country, impossible, but I am an American by heart if + U. Sam can use me. I was not trained to be a soldier, but in matter + of shooting very seldom I fail to get a rabbit when I want it, more + so lately that a box of shells from 60 cents jumped to $1.00). As a + rule the ridents colline are very monotonous, but when I am home, + more so the Sunday, the "Marseillaise" no where is heard more than + here; no animosity against nobody; Cosmopolitan, ardent admirer of + C. Paine! The world is my country; to do good is my religion! + + With fervent wishes of not having need of doctors or lawyers; with + best regards to you and family, I am + + Yours respectfully, + CONSTANTINO GARIBALDI. + +Unquestionably he has humor. After receiving more or less mixed orders +from me, I have heard him softly singing in the courtyard, "Donna e +mobile." I only regret that as a family we aren't musical enough to +assist with the "Sextette" from "Lucia!" + +Ever since we came to California we have been lucky about gardeners. I +don't mean as horticulturists, but from the far more important standard +of picturesqueness. Of course no one could equal Garibaldi with the +romance of a distant relationship to the patriot and the grand manner no +rake or hoe could efface, but Banksleigh had his own interest. He was an +Englishman with pale blue eyes that always seemed to be looking beyond +our horizon into space. There was something rather poetic and ethereal +about him. Perhaps he didn't eat enough, or it may have been the effect +of "New Thought," in one of the fifty-seven varieties of which he was a +firm believer. He told me that his astral colors were red and blue, and +that a phrenologist had told him that a bump on the back of his head +indicated that he ought never to buy mining stock. With the same +instinct that undid Bluebeard's and Lot's wives he had tried it, and +is once more back at his job of gardening with an increased respect +for phrenology. + +I have a grudge against phrenologists myself. I had a relative who +went to one when he was a young man, and was told that he had a +wonderful baritone voice that he ought to cultivate. Up to that time +he had only played the flute, but afterwards he sang every evening +through a long life. + +It distressed Banksleigh to see me lying about in hammocks on the +verandah. He usually managed to give the vines in my neighborhood extra +attention--like Garibaldi, he was a confirmed pruner. He told me that he +wished I would take up New Thought, and was sure that if I thought +strong I'd be strong. I wonder? One summer, lying in bed in a hospital +where the heat was terrific, I found myself repeating over and over: + + "Sabrina fair, + Listen where thou art sitting, + Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave," + +and finding it far more cooling than iced orange juice. Was not I +proving Banksleigh's contention? I was thinking cool and I was cool. In +his own case New Thought seemed to work. He always looked ready to give +up forever, and yet he never did. + +California is full of people with queer quirks and they aren't confined +to gardeners. I haven't had a hair-dresser who wasn't occult or psychic +or something, from the Colonial Dame with premonitions to the last one, +who had both inspirations and vibrations, and my hair keeps right on +coming out. + +I don't quite understand why gardeners should be queer. They say that +cooks invariably become affected in time by so much bending over a hot +stove, and that is easy to understand, but bending over nature ought to +have quite the opposite effect, but it doesn't always. The lady gardener +who laid out the garden that finally replaced our wild-flower tangle, +proved that. She had a voice that would be wonderful in a shipyard, a +firmness and determination that would be an asset to Congress and a very +kind heart, also much taste and infinite knowledge of the preferences +and peculiarites of California plants. Her right-hand man, "Will," was +also odd. Unfortunately, his ideas were almost the opposite of hers. +Before they arrived at our gate sounds of altercation were only too +plain. She liked curves in the walks, he preferred corners; she liked +tangles, he liked regular beds. What we liked seemed to be going to cut +very little figure. All that was lacking was our architect friend, who +had made the sketches and offered various suggestions of "amusing" +things we might do. He also is firm, though his manner is mild, so the +situation would have been even more "amusing" for the family on the side +lines, had he been present. Owing to the placing of the house, we are +doomed to have a lopsided garden whatever we do, but we want it to look +wayward rather than eccentric. After a battle fought over nearly every +inch of the ground the lady was victorious, for Will said to me as he +watched her motor disappear: "I might as well do what she says or she'll +make me do it over." In this J---- and I heartily concurred, for the +simplest of arithmetical calculations would show that it would otherwise +prove expensive. + +Will had a worker whose unhappy lot it was to dig up stumps, apply the +pick to the adobe parts of the soil, and generally to toil in the sweat +of his brow. As a team they made some progress, and I began to have some +hope of enjoying what I had always been led to believe was the treat +of one's life--making a garden. I felt entirely care-free--the lady +gardener was the boss and there was only room for one--directions +were a drug on the market. This state of affairs was short-lived. Will +failed to appear the third day out, and the lady gardener's pumping +system for her nurseries blew up or leaked or lay down on the job in +some way, so that the worker and I confronted each other, ignorant and +unbossed. I will not dwell on the week that followed. The lady gardener +gave almost vicious orders by telephone and the worker did his best, but +it is not a handy way to direct a garden. When the last rosebush is in, +including some that Will is gloomily certain will never grow, I think I +shall go away for a rest to some place where there is only cactus and +sage and sand. + +J---- arrived on the scene in time to save the day, and the garden is +very lovely. Next year it will be worth going a long way to see, for in +this part of the world planting things is like playing with Japanese +water flowers. A wall of gray stucco gently curves along the canyon +side, while a high lattice on the other shows dim outlines of the hills +beyond. In the wall are arches with gates so curved as to leave circular +openings, through which we get glimpses of the sea. It makes me think of +King Arthur's castle at Tintagel. In the lattice there is a wicket gate. +There is something very alluring about a wicket gate--it connotes a +Robin. Unfortunately, my Robin can only appear from Friday to Monday, +but I'm not complaining. Any one is fortunate who can count on romance +two days out of seven. At the far end of the garden is a screen designed +to hide the peculiarites of the garage. The central panel is concrete +with a window with green balusters; below is a wall fountain. The window +suggests a half-hidden senorita. It really conceals a high-school boy +who is driving the motor for me in J----'s absence, but that is +immaterial. The fountain is set with sapphire-blue tiles and the water +trickles from the mouth of the most amiable lion I ever saw. He was +carved from Boise stone by one "Luigi" from a sketch by our architect +friend. He has Albrecht Duerer curls--the lion I mean--four on a side +that look like sticks of peppermint candy and we call him "Boysey." + +The pool below him is a wonderful place for boat sailing. It fairly +bristles with the masts of schooners and yachts, and the guns of torpedo +destroyers, and while the architect and the grown-ups did not have a +naval base in mind when the sketch was made, I do appreciate the +feelings of my sons. + + "There's a fountain in our garden, + With the brightest bluest tiles + And the pleasantest stone lion + Who spits into it and smiles! + It's shaded by papyrus + And reeds and grasses tall, + Just a little land-locked harbor + Beside the garden wall. + + "They talked of water-lilies + And lotus pink and white-- + We didn't dare to say a word + But we _wished_ with all our might, + For how could we manoeuvre + The submarine we've got, + If they go and clutter up the place + With all that sort of rot. + + "But mother said she thought perhaps + We'd wait another year, + 'It's such a lovely place to play, + We ought to keep it clear.' + So there's nothing but a goldfish + Who has to be a Hun, + I don't suppose he likes it, + But gee, it's lots of fun!" + +Some day we are going to have a sun dial. J---- thought of a wonderful +motto in the best Latin, and now he can't remember it, which is +harrowing, because it would be so stylish to have a perfectly original +one. It was something about not wanting to miss the shady hours for the +sake of having all sunny ones. At any rate, we are resolved not to have +"I count none but sunny hours." + +There are all kinds of responsibilities in life, and picking the right +shade of paint for a house you have to live in is a most wearing one. +Painting the trimming of ours in connection with the garden was very +agitating. I had sample bits of board painted and took them about town, +trying them next to houses I liked, and at last decided on a wicked +Spanish green that the storms of winter are expected to mellow. As I saw +it being put on the house I felt panic-stricken. For a nice fresh +vegetable or salad, yes, but for a house--never! And yet it is a great +success! I don't know whether it has "sunk in," as the painter consoled +me by predicting, or whether it is that we are used to it; at any rate, +every one likes it so much that I have cheerfully removed smears of it +from the clothing of all the family, including the puppies' tails. + +As to ourselves in the role of gardeners--there were not two greener +greenhorns when we first resolved to stay in California; we still are, +though I think I do J---- an injustice in classing him with me. We can +make geraniums grow luxuriantly, but we don't want to. I wish they would +pass a law in Southern California making the growing of red geraniums a +criminal offense. So many people love to combine them with bougainvillia +and other brilliant pink or purple flowers, and the light is hard enough +on eyes without adding that horror. We are resolved to progress from the +geranium age to the hardy perennial class, and are industriously +studying books and magazines with that end in view. The worst of garden +literature is that it is nearly all written for an Eastern climate. Once +I subscribed for a garden magazine, lured by a bargain three months' +offer. Never again! At the end of the time, when no regular subscription +came in from me, letters began to arrive. Finally one saying, "You +probably think this is another letter urging you to subscribe. It is +not; it is only to beg that you will confidentially tell us why you do +not." I told him that all our conditions here are so different from +those in the East. People want Italian and Spanish gardens, and there is +the most marvellous choice of flowers, shrubs, and vines with which to +get them, but we want to be told how, and added to this, it is +heart-breaking to love a fountain nymph in the advertisements and to +find that her travelling expenses would bankrupt you. + +One marvellous opportunity we have--the San Diego Exposition, whose +gardens are more lovely than ever, though soldiers and sailors are +feeding the pigeons in the Plaza de Panama instead of tourists. The real +intention of that exposition was to show people in this part of the +world what they could do with the great variety of plants and shrubs +that thrive here. + +I used to wonder why so little has been written about gardeners when +there are shelves and shelves of volumes on gardens. There are no famous +gardeners in literature that occur to me at the moment except Tagore's, +and the three terrified ones in _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_, who +were hurriedly painting the white roses red. I should love to read the +diary of the one who trimmed the borders while Boccaccio's gay company +were occupying that garden; or to hear what the head gardener of the +d'Este's could tell us, but I know now why it is so. With the best of +intentions I haven't been able to avoid the pitfall myself. + + + + +[Illustration] + +THORNS + + +There may be a more smiling hill-top than "La Collina Ridente" somewhere +on the Southern California edge of the Pacific Ocean, but deep down in +my heart I don't believe that there is. It is just the right size +hill-top--except when I first began to drive the motor, and then it +seemed a trifle small for turning around. It's just high enough above +the coast highway and the town to give us seclusion, and it's just far +enough from the waves to be peaceful. It used to be called "Suma +Paz"--perfect peace--but we changed the name, that being so unpleasantly +suggestive of angels, and, anyway, there isn't such a thing. If "The +Smiling Hill-Top" were everything it seems on a blue and green day like +to-day, for instance, it would be a menace to my character. I should +never leave, I should exist beautifully, leading the life of a +cauliflower or bit of seaweed floating in one of the pools in the rocks, +or to be even more tropically poetic, a lovely lotus flower! I should +not bother about the children's education or grieve over J----'s +bachelor state of undarned socks and promiscuous meals, or the various +responsibilities I left behind in town, so it is fortunate that there +are thorns. Every garden, from Eden down, has produced them. + +I haven't catalogued mine, I have just put them down "higgledy-piggledy," +as we used to say when we were children. J----'s having to work in town, +too far to come home except for an occasional week-end, the neighbors' +dogs, servants, Bermuda grass, tenants, ants, the eccentricities of an +adobe road during the rains, and the lapses of the delivery system of +the village. Of course they are of varying degrees of unpleasantness. +J----'s absence is horrid but the common lot, so I have accepted it +and am learning "to possess, in loneliness, the joy of all the earth." +Truth compels me to add that it isn't always loneliness, either, as, +for example, one week-end that was much cheered by a visit from our +architect friend, who rode down from Santa Barbara in his motor, and +made himself very popular with every member of the household. He brought +home the laundry, bearded the ice man in his lair, making ice-cream +possible for Sunday dinner, mended the garden lattice, and drew +entrancing pictures of galleons sailing in from fairy shores with +all their canvas spread, for the boys. As we waved our handkerchiefs +to him from the Good-by Gate on Monday, Joedy turned to me: + +"I wish he didn't have to go!" A little pause. + +"Muvs, if you weren't married to Father, how would you like--" but here +I interrupted by calling his attention to a rabbit in the canyon. + +One thing I do not consider a part of the joy of all the earth--the +neighbors' dogs. On the next hill-top is an Airedale with a voice like a +fog-horn. He is an ungainly creature and thoroughly disillusioned, +because his family keep him locked up in a wire-screened tennis-court, +where he barks all day and nearly all night. He can watch the motors on +the coast road from one corner of his cage, and that seems to drive him +almost wild. He ought to realize how much better off he is than the Lady +of Shalott, who only dared to watch the highway to Camelot in a mirror! +Sometimes he has a bad attack of lamentation in the night--he is quite +Jeremiah's peer at that--and then we all call his house on the +telephone. You can see the lights flash on in the various cottages and +hear the tinkle of the bell, as we each in turn voice our indignation. +Once I even saw a white-robed figure in the road across the canyon, and +heard a voice borne on the night wind, "For heaven's sake, shut that dog +up." We all bore it with Christian resignation when his family decided +to take a motor camping trip, Prince to be included in the party. He is +probably even now waking the echoes on Lake Tahoe, or barking himself +hoarse at the Bridal Veil Falls in the Yosemite, but thank goodness we +can't hear him quite as far away as that. + +I dare say that he might be a perfectly nice, desirable dog if he had +had any early training. Our own "pufflers," as the boys call "Rags" and +"Tags," their twin silver-haired Yorkshire terriers, could tell him what +a restraining influence the force of early training has on them, even on +moonlight nights. + +Prince is the worst affliction we have had, but not the only one. The +people on the mountain-slope above us acquired a yellowish collie-like +dog to scare away coyotes. He ought to have been a success at it, though +I don't know just what it takes to scare a coyote. At any rate, he used +to bark long and grievously about dawn in the road across the canyon. +One morning I was almost frantic with the irregularity of his outbursts. +It was like waiting for the other shoe to drop. Suddenly a rifle shot +rang out; a spurt of yellow dust, a streak of yellow dog, and silence! +I rushed to J----'s room, to find him with the weapon, still smoking, +in his hands. I begged him not to start a neighborhood feud, even if +we never slept after dawn. I even wept. He laughed at me. "I didn't +shoot at him," he said. "I shot a foot behind him, and I've given him +a rare fright!" He had, indeed. The terror of the coyotes never came +near us again. + +As to servants, the subject is so rich that I can only choose. +Unfortunately, the glory of the view does not make up to them for the +lack of town bustle and nightly "movies," so it isn't always easy to +make comfortable summer arrangements. As you start so you go on, for +changing horses in mid-stream has ever been a parlous business. A +temperamental high-school boy who came to drive the motor and water the +garden, though he appeared barefooted to drive me to town, and took +French leave for a day's fishing, pinning a note to the kitchen door, +saying, "Expect me when you see me and don't wait dinner," afflicted me +one entire summer. I tried to rouse his ambition by pointing out the +capitalists who began by digging ditches--California is full of +them--and assuring him that there were no heights to which he might not +rise by patient application, etc. It was no use. He watered the garden +when I watched him; otherwise not. I came to the final conclusion that +he was in love. Love is responsible for so much. + +Another summer I decided to try darkies and carefully selected two of +contrasting shades of brown. The cook was a slim little quadroon, with +flashing white teeth and hair arranged in curious small doughnuts all +over her head. She was a grass widow with quite an assortment of +children, though she looked little more than a child herself. "Grandma" +was taking care of them while the worthless husband was supposed to be +running an elevator in New Orleans. Essie had quite lost interest in +him, I gathered, for I brought her letters and candy from another swain, +who used such thin paper that I couldn't avoid seeing the salutation, +"Oh, you chicken!" + +Mandy was quite different. She was a rich seal brown, large and +determined, and had left a husband on his honor, in town. We had hardly +washed off the dust of our long motor-ride before trouble began. A +telegram for Mandy conveyed the disquieting news that George had been +arrested on a charge of assault at the request of "grandma." It appeared +that after seeing wifey off for the seashore he felt the joy of bachelor +freedom so strongly that he dropped in to see Essie's mother, who gave +him a glass of sub rosa port, which so warmed his heart that he tried to +embrace her. Grandma was only thirty-four and would have been pretty +except for gaps in the front ranks of her teeth. She had spirit as well +as spirits, and had him clapped into jail. Telegrams came in--do you say +droves, covies, or flocks? Night letters especially, and long-distance +telephone calls--all collect. The neighbors, the Masons, the lawyer, and +various relatives all went into minute detail. Grandma, being the +injured party, prudently confined herself to the mail. As we have only +one servant's room and that directly under my sleeping-porch, it made it +very pleasant! The choicest telegram J---- took down late one night. It +was from one of Mandy's neighbors, and ended with the illuminating +statement: "George never had a gun or a knife on him; he was soused at +the time!" Mandy emerged from bed, clad in a red kimono and a pink +boudoir cap, to receive this comforting message. She wept; Essie, who +had followed in order to miss nothing, scowled, while J---- and I wound +our bath-robes tightly about us and gritted our teeth, in an effort to +preserve a proper solemnity. Of course we had to let her go back to the +trial, which she did with the dignity of one engaged in affairs of +state. She and the judge had a kind of mother's meeting about George, +and decided that a touch of the law might be just the steadying +influence he needed. + +The sentence was for three months, which suited me exactly, as I +calculated that his release and our return to town would happily +synchronize. Mandy really stood the gaff pretty well and returned to her +job, and an armed neutrality ensued, varied by mild outbreaks. Essie was +afraid of Mandy. She said that she would never stay in the house with +her alone; Mandy wouldn't stay in the house alone after dark, so it +became rather complicated. We apparently had to take them or else find +them weeping on the hillside, when we came back from a picnic. In +justice to the darky heart I must say that when Billie was taken very +ill they buried the hatchet for the time, and helped us all to pull +him through. + +The summer was almost over when I began to suffer from a strange +hallucination. I kept seeing a colored gentleman slipping around corners +when I approached. As Mandy was usually near said corner, I certainly +thought of George, but calmed myself with the reflection that he was +safe in jail. Not so. George had experienced a change of heart and had +behaved in so exemplary a manner that his sentence had been shortened +two weeks, and what more natural than that he should join his wife? It +wasn't that I was afraid of George; I was afraid for George. I did not +want him to meet Essie, for if Grandma's smile had cost him so dearly, I +hated to think of the effect of Essie's black eyes and unbroken set of +white teeth. I needn't have worried, for George was apparently "sick of +lies and women," and never let go his hold on the apron-string to which +he was in duty bound. + +This summer I am unusually fortunate, owing to a moment of clear vision +that I had forty-eight hours before leaving town. I had a Christian +Science cook, a real artist if given unlimited materials, and she didn't +mind loneliness, as she said that God is everywhere; to which I heartily +agreed. I know that He is on this hill-top. So far so good, but her idea +of obeying Mr. Hoover's precepts was not to mention that any staple was +out until the last moment. At about six o'clock she usually came +pussy-footing to my door in the tennis shoes she always wore, to tell me +that there wasn't a potato in the house, or any butter. Not so bad in +Pasadena, with a man to send to the store, but very trying on a smiling +hill-top, one mile from town, with me the only thing dimly suggestive of +a chauffeur on the place. At 3 A.M. I resolved to bounce her, heavenly +disposition and all. I did, and engaged a cateress for what I should +call a comfortable salary, rather than wages. She can get up a very +appetizing meal from sawdust and candle-ends, when necessary, and that +is certainly what is needed nowadays. Also, she has launched a wonderful +counter-offensive against the ants. There was a time when we ate our +meals surrounded by a magic circle like Brunhilde, but ours was not of +flames, but of ant powder. Not that they mind it much. I'm told that +they rather dislike camphor, but do you know the present price of that +old friend? + +There are singularly few pests or blights in the garden itself. Bermuda +or devil grass is one of our Western specialties, though it may have +invaded the East, too, since we left. It is an unusually husky plant, +rooting itself afresh at every joint with new vigor, and quite choking +out the aristocratic blue grass with which we started our lawn. At first +you don't notice it as it sneaks along the ground, some time above and +some time below, as it feels disposed, and then suddenly you see it's +cobwebby outlines as plainly as the concealed animals in a newspaper +puzzle. If you begin to pull it out you can't stop. It reminds me of the +German system of espionage, and that adds zest to my weeding. The other +day I laboriously uprooted an intricate network of tentacles, all +leading to one big root, which I am sure must have been Wilhelmstrasse +itself. Being able to do so little to help win the war, this is a +valuable imaginative outlet to me! + +Everything about the place, as well as the lawn, seems to get out of +order when we have tenants. No one likes tenants any more than we like +"Central." There is a prejudice against them. They do the things they +ought not to do and leave undone the things they ought to do, and there +is no health in them. I have more often been one than had one, and I +hate to think of the language that was probably used about us, though we +meant well. + +I am not going to tell all I know about tenants after all. I have +changed my mind. I am also going to draw a veil over the adobe road +during the rains, because we really do like to rent the place to help +pay for the children's and the motor's shoes, and it wouldn't be +good business. + +The village delivery system enrages and entertains me by turns. I was +frankly told by the leading grocery store that they did not expect to +deliver to people who had their own motors, and when I occasionally +insist on a few necessities being sent up to my house, they arrive +after dark conveyed by an ancient horse, as the grocery manager is +conservative. A horse doesn't get a puncture or break a vital part often +(if he does, you bury him and get another) and it is about a toss-up +between hay and gasoline. + +Every now and then I am marooned on my hill, if the motor is "hors de +combat," and then I get my neighbour to let me join her in her morning +marketing trip, sometimes with disastrous results. One day the boys and +I sat down to dinner with fine sea-air appetites, to be confronted by a +small, crushed-looking fish. I sent out to ask the cook for more. She +said there was no more, and as no miracle was wrought in our behalf, we +filled up the void with mashed potatoes as best we could. Just as the +plates were being removed the telephone rang, and my neighbor's agitated +voice asked if I had her cat's dinner! Light flooded in on my +understanding. We had just eaten her cat's dinner. She went on to say +that the fish-man had picked out a little barracuda (our household fish +in California) from his scraps and made her a present of it. I faintly +asked if she thought it was a very old one, visions of ptomaine +poisoning rising vividly. Oh, no, she said, "it wasn't old at all, he +had merely stepped on it." My own perfectly good dinner was at her +house. I told her to take off a portion for her cat, and I would send +the boys for the rest. I heaved a sigh of relief--a fresh young fish, +even if crushed, would not have fatal results. + +I will pass rapidly on to my last thorn, which isn't on the list because +I'm not quite sure that it is one. It is a small, second-hand, rather +vicious little motor, which I have learned to drive as a war measure. +After the first time I ever tried to turn it around, and it flew at our +lovely rose-garlanded lattice fence at one hundred miles an hour, I +christened it "the little fury." I missed the fence by revolving the +steering wheel as though I were playing roulette. I almost went round +twice, but J---- rescued me by kicking my foot off the throttle. Since +then I have sufficiently mastered it to drive to town for the laundry +and the newspaper. I am like a child learning to walk by having an +orange rolled in front of it. I must know how far the Allies have driven +the Germans, so I set my teeth and start for town in the "little fury." +Every one told me that I'd have to break something before I really got +the upper hand. I have. I bravely drove out to a Japanese truck garden +for vegetables and came to grief. One of the boys tersely expressed it +in his diary, "Muvs ran into a Japanese barn and rooked the bumper!" Now +that that is over, I begin to feel a certain sense of independence that +is not unpleasant. It is some time since I have stalled the engine or +tried to climb a hill with the emergency brake set. The boys and the +"pufflers" are game and keep me company; we live or die together. + +After all, the loveliest rose in my garden, the Sunburst, lifts its +fragrant flower of creamy orange on a stalk bristling with +wicked-looking mahogany spikes. If I'm very careful about cutting it, I +don't prick my fingers and the thorns really add to the effect. + + + + +[Illustration] + +THE GYPSY TRAIL + + +A friend of mine once wrote an article on motoring in Southern +California for one of the smart Eastern magazines. In it she said that +often a motor would be followed by a trailer loaded with a camp outfit. +What was her surprise and amusement to read her own article later, +dressed for company, so to speak. "A trailer goes ahead with the +servants and outfit, so that when the motoring party arrives on the +scene all is in readiness for their comfort." Great care must be taken +that the sensibilities of the elect should not be offended by the horrid +thought that ladies and gentlemen actually do make their own camp at +times! So the trailer has to go ahead, and that is just where the lure +and magic of Southern California slips through the fingers. + +Most of us have a few drops, at least, of gypsy blood in us, and in +this land of sunshine and the open road we all become vagabonds as far +as our conventional upbringing will let us. When you know that it won't +rain from May to October, and the country is full of the most lovely +and picturesque spots, how can you help at least picnicking whenever +you can? + +Trains are becoming as obsolete in our family as the horse. We wish to +take a trip: out purrs the motor; in goes the family lunch-box, a +thermos bottle, and a motor-case of indispensables, and we are off. No +fuss about missing the train, no baggage, no tickets, no cinders--just +the open road. + +I had heard that every one deteriorated in Southern California, and +after the first year I began earnestly searching my soul for signs of +slackening. Perhaps my soul is naturally easy-going, for somehow I can't +feel that the things we let slip matter so greatly. + +This much I will admit. There is no deadlier drug habit than fresh air! +The first summer on our Smiling Hill-Top kind ladies used to ask me to +tea-parties and card-parties, but I could never come indoors long enough +to be anything but a trial to my partners at bridge, so now I don't even +make believe I'm a polite member of society. Of course, there are people +who carry it further than I do, and can't be quite happy except in their +bathing-suits. I'm not as bad as that. I can still enjoy the sea breezes +and the colors and the sound of the waves with my clothes on. I don't +even wear my bathing-suit to market, which is one of the customs of the +place. It is a picturesque little village; half the houses are mere +shacks, a kind of compromise between dwelling and bath-houses, everyone +being much too thrifty to pay money to the Casino when they can drip +freely on their own sitting-room floor, without the least damage to the +furnishings. Life for many consists largely of a prolonged bath and bask +on the beach, with dinner at a cafeteria and a cold bite for supper at +home or on the rocks. It is surely an easy life and yet a great deal of +earnest effort and strenuous thinking goes on, too, women's clubs, even +an "open forum," and there are many delightful people who live there all +the year for the sake of the perfect climate. Also, there are a few +charming houses perched on the cliffs, most suggestive of Sorrento and +Amalfi. An incident J---- is fond of telling gives the combined +interests of the place. He was on his way to the post-office when he met +two women in very scanty jersey bathing-suits with legs bare, wearing, +to be sure, law-fulfilling mackintoshes, but which, being unbuttoned, +flapped so in the breeze that they were only a technical covering. The +ladies were in earnest conversation as he passed. J---- heard one say, +"I grant all you say about the charm of his style, but I consider his +writing very superficial!" + +It is a wonderful life for small boys. My sons are the loveliest shades +of brown with cheeks of red, and in faded khaki and bare legs are as +good an example of protective coloring on the hillside as any zebra in a +jungle. Quite naturally they view September and the long stockings of +the city with dislike. + +There is a place on the beach by the coast road between Pasadena and San +Diego where we always have lunch on our journeys to and from town. Just +after you leave the picturesque ruins of the Capistrano Mission in its +sheltered valley, you come out suddenly on the ocean, and the road runs +by the sand for miles. With a salt breeze blowing in your face you can't +resist the lunch box long. With a stuffed egg in one hand and a sandwich +in the other, Joedy, aged eight, observed on our last trip south, "This +is the bright side of living." I agree with him. + +One late afternoon a friend of ours was driving alone and offered a lift +to two young men who were swinging along on foot. "Your price?" they +asked. "A smile and a song," was the reply. So in they got, and those +last fifty miles were gay. That is the sort of thing which fits so +perfectly into the atmosphere of this land. Perhaps it is the orange +blossoms, perhaps it is that we have extra-sized moons, perhaps it is +the old Spanish charm still lingering. All I know is that it is a land +of glamour and romance. J---- said he was going to import a pair of +nightingales. I said that if he did he'd have a lot to answer for. + +Places are as different as people. The East, and by that I mean the +country east of the Alleghanies and not Iowa and Kansas, which are +sometimes so described out here, has reached years of discretion and is +set in its way. California has temperament, and it is still very young +and enthusiastic and is having a lot of fun "growing up." I love the +stone walls, huckleberry pies, and johnny cakes of Rhode Island, and I +love the associations of my childhood and my family tree, but there is +something in the air of this part of the world that enchants me. It is a +certain "Why not?" that leads me into all sorts of delightful +experiences. Conventionality does not hold us as tightly as it does in +the East, and a certain tempting feeling of unlimited possibilities in +life makes waking up in the morning a small adventure in itself. It +isn't necessary to point out the dangers of an unlimited "Why not?" +cult--they are too obvious. "Why not?" is a question that one's +imagination asks, and imagination is one of the best spurs to action. I +will give an example of what I mean: When war was declared J---- +suggested putting contribution boxes with red crosses on the collars +of "Rags" and "Tags," the boys' twin Yorkshire terriers, and coaxing +them to sit up on the back of the motor. I never had begged on a +street corner, but I thought at once, "Why not?" The result was much +money for the Red Cross, an increased knowledge of human nature for me, +as well as some delightful new friends. I should never have had the +courage to try it in New York--let us say; I should have been afraid +I'd be arrested. + +At first to an Easterner the summer landscape seems dry and dusty, but +after living here one grows to love the peculiar soft tones of tan and +bisque, with bright shades of ice plant for color, and by the sea the +wonderful blues and greens of the water. No one can do justice to the +glory of that. Sky-blue, sea-blue, the shimmer of peacocks' tails and +the calm of that blue Italian painters use for the robes of their +madonnas, ever blend and ever change. Trees there are few, the graceful +silhouette of a eucalyptus against a golden sky, occasional clumps of +live oaks, and on the coast road to San Diego the Torry pines, relics of +a bygone age, growing but one other place in the world, and more +picturesque than any tree I ever saw. One swaying over a canyon is the +photographer's joy. It has been posing for hundreds of years and will +still for centuries more, I have no doubt. + +Were I trying to write a sort of sugar-coated guide-book, I could make +the reader's mouth water, just as the menu of a Parisian restaurant +does. The canyons through which we have wandered, the hills we have +circled, Grossmont--that island in the air--Point Loma, the southern tip +of the United States, now, alas, closed on account of the war (Fort +Rosecrans is near its point), and further north the mountains and orange +groves--snow-capped Sierras looming above orchards of blooming +peach-trees! + +Even the names add to the fascination, the Cuyamaca Mountains meaning +the hills of the brave one; Sierra Madre, the mother mountains; even Tia +Juana is euphonious, if you don't stop to translate it into the plebeian +"Aunt Jane," and no names could be as lovely as the places themselves. +So much beauty rather goes to one's head. For years in the East we had +lived in rented houses, ugly rented houses, always near the station, so +that J---- could catch the 7.59 or the 8.17, on foot. To find ourselves +on a smiling hill-top--our own hill-top, with "magic casements opening on +the foam"--seemed like a dream. After three years it still seems too +good to be true. + +They say that if you spend a year in Southern California you will never +be able to leave it. I don't know. We haven't tried. The only possible +reason for going back would be that you aren't in the stirring heart of +things here as you are in New York, and the _Times_ is five days old +when you get it. Your friends--they all come to you if you just wait +a little. What amazes them always is to find that Southern California +has the most perfect summer climate in the world, if you keep near the +sea. No rain--many are the umbrellas I have gently extracted from the +reluctant hands of doubting visitors; no heat such as we know it in the +East. We have an out-of-door dining-room, and it is only two or three +times in summer that it is warm enough to have our meals there. In the +cities or the "back country" it is different. I have felt heat in +Pasadena that made me feel in the same class with Shadrach, Meshach +and Abednego, but never by the sea. + +One result of all this fresh air is that we won't even go indoors to be +amused. Hence the outdoor theatre. Why go to a play when it's so lovely +outside? But to go to a play out-of-doors in an enchanting Greek theatre +with a real moon rising above it--that's another matter. I shall never +forget "Midsummer Night's Dream" as given by the Theosophical Society at +Point Loma. Strolling through the grounds with the mauve and amber domes +of their temples dimly lighted I found myself murmuring: "In Xanadu did +Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decree." In a canyon by the sea we +found a theatre. The setting was perfect and the performance was worthy +of it. Never have I seen that play so beautifully given, so artistically +set and delightfully acted, though the parts were taken by students +in the Theosophical School. After the last adorable little fairy had +toddled off--I hope to bed--we heard a youth behind us observe, "These +nuts sure can give a play." We echoed his sentiments. + +I should make one exception to my statement that people won't go indoors +to be amused. They go to the "movies"--I think they would risk their +lives to see a new film almost as recklessly as the actors who make +them. The most interesting part of the moving-picture business is +out-of-doors, however. You are walking down the street and notice an +excitement ahead. Douglas Fairbanks is doing a little tightrope walking +on the telegraph wires. A little farther on a large crowd indicates +further thrills. Presently there is a splash and Charley Chaplin has +disappeared into a fountain with two policemen in pursuit. Once while we +were motoring we came to a disused railway spur, and were surprised to +find a large and fussy engine getting up steam while a crowd blocked +the road for some distance. A lady in pink satin was chained to the +rails--placed there by the villain, who was smoking cigarettes in the +offing, waiting for his next cue. The lady in pink satin had made a +little dugout for herself under the track, and as the locomotive +thundered up she was to slip underneath--a job that the mines of +Golconda would not have tempted me to try. Moving-picture actors have a +very high order of courage. We could not stay for the denouement, as we +had a nervous old lady with us, who firmly declined to witness any such +hair-raising spectacle. I looked in the paper next morning for railway +accidents to pink ladies, but could find nothing, so she probably pulled +it off successfully. + +Every year new theatres are built. We have seen Ruth St. Denis at the +Organ Pavilion of the San Diego Exposition, and Julius Caesar with an +all-star cast in the hills back of Hollywood, where the space was +unlimited, and Caesar's triumph included elephants and other beasts, +loaned by the "movies," and Brutus' camp spread over the hillside as +it might actually have done long ago. There is a place in the back +country near Escondido, where at the time of the harvest moon an +Indian play with music is given every year. At Easter thousands +of people go up Mount Rubidoux, near Riverside, for the sunrise +service. Some celebrated singer usually takes part and it is very +lovely--quite unlike anything else. + +So we have come to belong to what the French would call the school +of "pleine air." I once knew an adorable little boy who expressed +it better than I can: + + "Sun callin' me, sky callin' me, + Comin' sun--comin' sky." + + + + +[Illustration] + +AN ADVENTURE IN SOLITUDE + + +My windows were all wide open one lovely April day, the loveliest time +of all the year in Southern California, filling the house with the +sweetness of wistaria and orange blossoms, but also, truth compels me to +add, with so many noises of such excruciating kinds that I followed +Ulysses' well-known plan and then tried to find quiet for my siesta in +the back spare-room. The worst of this house is that it really has no +back--it has various fronts, like the war. The spinster next door but +one has a parrot--a cynical, tired parrot, but still fond of the sound +of his own voice. The lady across the street is raising Pekinese +puppies, who apparently bitterly regret being born outside of Pekin. She +puts them in baskets on the roof in the sun and lets them cry it out, in +that hard-hearted modern method applied to babies. + +A sight-seeing car had paused while the gentleman with the megaphone +explained to a few late tourists the Arroyo Seco, that great river-bed +with only a trickle of water at the bottom, on whose brink our house +perches. At home two plumbers were playfully tossing bricks about our +courtyard in a half-hearted endeavor to find out why our cellar was +flooded. Hence the back bedroom. No amount of cotton wool in one's ears, +however, could camouflage a telephone bell. + +"The Red Cross Executive Committee will meet at ten on Wednesday." + +A short interval followed. "Will Mr. S---- make a 'four-minute' speech +on Friday at the Strand Theatre for the Liberty Bond Campaign?" + +Another interval during which I began to feel drowsy. "Will Mr. S---- +say a few words of appreciation and present a wrist watch to the Chapter +Secretary just starting for France?" etc. Just here I made a resolve. +Escape I would, for one week, to my lovely hill-top by the sea, and +leave J----, the two boys, the two dogs, the two white mice, the Red +Cross, the Red Star, Food Conservation and Liberty Bonds to manage +beautifully without me. I even had the reckless idea of trying to forget +that there was a war going on! I was furnished with a perfectly good +excuse; we had rented "The Smiling Hill-Top" for two months, and it must +be put in order. Hence my "Adventure in Solitude." + +Everything is called an adventure nowadays, and to me it was a most +exciting one, as I had not gone forth independently for many years. One +chauffeur, one smiling Helen to clean house for the tenants and cook for +me, my worst clothes and my best picnic lunch went into the motor, and I +followed. I think my family expected me back next day, when I bade them +a loving farewell. Not I! My spirit was craving silence. I wanted not to +curl my hair or be neat or polite or a good mother, or any of the things +I usually try to be, for just one week. Longer, and I would be lonely +and homesick. + +It was a lovely day. The coast road to San Diego runs through orange +groves for miles, and the perfume of the blossoms hung about us till we +came to the sea, where a salt breeze blew away the heavy sweetness. I +lunched on the sand and watched the waves for an hour. There, at least, +are endless re-enforcements! As fast as the front ranks break more come +always to fill their places. + +I felt no hurry, as the Smiling Hill-Top is some fifteen miles nearer +Pasadena than San Diego--an easy day's run--and I had no engagements, +but at last my impatience to see how much our garden had grown started +me once more on my way, and we arrived at our wicket gate in the late +afternoon. There were twenty-seven keys on the ring the real-estate +agent gave me--twenty more than caused so much trouble at Baldpate--but +none fitted, so I had the chauffeur lift the gate bodily from its hinges +and I was at home! + +In California things grow riotously. Grandparents who haven't seen their +grandsons for years, and find that they have shot up from toddling +babies to tall youths, must feel as I did when I saw the vines and +shrubs, especially the banana trees planted only six months before! The +lawn over which I had positively wept lay innocent and green--almost +English in its freshness. The patio was entrancing with blooming vines. +The streptasolen, which has no "little name," as the French say, was +like a cascade of flame over one end of the wall. The place was ablaze +with it. The three goldfish in the fountain seemed as calm as ever, and +apparently have solved the present problem of the high cost of living, +for they don't have to be fed at all. The three had picked up what they +needed without human aid. I really felt like patting them on the head, +but that being out of the question, I was moved to rhyme: + + "I wish I were a goldfish, + All in a little bowl; + I wouldn't worry whether + I really had a soul. + I'd glide about through sun and shade + And snatch up little gnats, + My heaven would be summer + My hell--well, call it cats!" + +All this time the chauffeur had been wrestling with the key ring, and +finally had our bare necessities in the way of doors open. I had +telegraphed our agent that I was coming only long enough before for +the house to have what is vulgarly known as "a lick and a promise," +but it looked just as comfortable and pleasant as I knew that it +would, and the terrace--no need to bother about that. The south +wind does the housework there. + +That night I went to sleep between sheets fragrant with lavender from my +own garden, while the ocean boomed gently on the beach below the hill. +In the week that followed I abolished a number of things. First of all, +meal hours. I had my meals when I felt like it; in fact, I didn't wind +the clock till I was leaving. I only did it then on account of the +tenants, as some people find the ticking of a clock and the chirping of +a cricket pleasant and cosy sounds. I don't. Then I cut out the usual +items from my bill of fare, and lived on young peas, asparagus, eggs, +milk, and fruit, with just a little bread and butter--not enough to +agitate Mr. Hoover. I never had had as much asparagus as I really wanted +before. I wore an old smock and a disreputable hat, and I pruned and dug +in my garden till I was tired, and then I lay on the terrace and watched +the waves endlessly gather and glide and spread. Counting sheep jumping +over a wall is nothing to compare with waves for soothing rasped nerves. + +My first solitary day was so clear that the Pasadena Mountains, as we +call that part of the Sierra Madre, rose soft over the water on the far +horizon, so that I couldn't feel lonely with home in sight. Long unused +muscles expostulated with me, but smoothed-out nerves more than balanced +their twinges. Of course I couldn't forget the war. Who could, +especially with flocks of aeroplanes flying over me as I lay on a chaise +longue on the terrace, listening to the big guns of Camp Kearny roaring +behind the hills; but it no longer gave me the sensation of sand-paper +in my feelings. I thought about it all more calmly and realized a little +of what it is doing to us Americans--to our souls!--that is worth the +price; and in addition, how much it is teaching us of economy, +conservation, and efficiency, as well as more spiritual things. + +It has also brought home to me the beauty of throwing away. In a fever +of enthusiasm to make every outgrown union suit and superfluous berry +spoon tell, I have ransacked my house from garret to cellar, and I bless +the Belgians, Servians, and Armenians, the Poles and the French orphans +for ridding me of a suffocating mass of things that I didn't use, and +yet felt obliged to keep. + +My wardrobe is now the irreducible minimum, the French Relief has the +rest, and at last I have more than enough hangers in my closet to +support my frocks. The shoes that pinched but looked so smart that they +kept tempting me into one more trial have gone to the Red Cross Shop. No +more concerts will be ruined by them. The hat that made me look ten +years older than I like to think I do, accompanied them. It was a good +hat, almost new, and it cost--more than I pay for hats nowadays. I do +not need to wear it out. My large silver tea-pot given me by my maid of +honor did good work for the Belgians--I hope if she ever finds out about +its fate that she will be glad that it is now warm stockings for many +thin little Belgian legs. Nora, from Ireland, viewed its departure with +satisfaction--it made one less thing to polish. Many odds and ends of +silver followed, and were put into the melting-pot, being too homely to +survive--I'm saving enough for heirlooms for my grandchildren, of +course. One must not allow sentiment to go by the board; we need it +especially now that we have lost such quantities of it out of the world. +So much was "made in Germany," that old Germany of the fairy tales and +Christmas trees which seems to be gone forever. + +I need not go on enumerating my activities. Every one has been doing the +same thing, and in all probability is now enjoying the same sense of +orderliness and freedom that I feel. Even the children have caught the +spirit. I was just leaving my house the other day when a palatial +automobile stopped at the gate and a very perfect chauffeur alighted and +touched his cap. "Madam," he said, "I have come for a case of empty +bottles that Master John says your little boy promised him for the Red +Cross." There was a trace of embarrassment in his manner, but there was +none in mine as I led him to the cellar and watched with satisfaction +while he clasped a cobwebby box of--dare I whisper it?--empty beer +bottles to his immaculate chest and eventually stowed it in the +exquisite interior of the limousine. How wonderful of the Red Cross to +want my bottles, and how intelligent of my "little boy" to arrange the +matter so pleasantly! + +To do away with the needless accumulations of life, or better still, not +to let them accumulate, what a comfort that would be! Letters? The fire +as rapidly as possible! No one ought to have a good time reading over +old letters--there's always a tinge of sadness about them, and it's +morbid to conserve sadness, added to which, in the remote contingency of +one's becoming famous, some vandalish relative always publishes the ones +that are most sacred. + +J---- has the pigeon-hole habit. He hates to see anything sink into the +abyss of the waste-basket, but I am training him to throw away something +every morning before breakfast. After a while he'll get so that he can +dispose of several things at once, and the time may come when I'll have +to look over the rubbish to be sure that nothing valuable has gone, +because throwing away is just as insidious a habit as any other. + +If only one could pile old bills on top of the old letters, what a +glorious bonfire that would make! But that will have to wait until +the millennium; as things are now, it would mean paying twice for +the motor fender of last year, and never feeling sure of your +relations with the butcher. + +It isn't only things that I am disposing of. I've rid myself of a lot +of useless ideas. We don't have to live in any special way. It isn't +necessary to have meat twice a day, and there is no law about chicken +for Sunday dinner. Butter does not come like the air we breathe. +Numerous courses aren't necessary even for guests. New clothes aren't +essential unless your old ones are worn out--and so on. + +And so I'm stepping forth on a road leading, even the graybeards can't +say where, with surprises behind every hedge and round every corner. +There hasn't been so thrillingly interesting an age to be alive since +that remote time when the Creation was going on. Except for moments of +tired nerves, like this, it is very stimulating, and I find myself +stepping out much more briskly since I threw my extra wraps and bundles +beside the road. Here on my hill-top I have even enjoyed a little of +that charm of unencumberedness that all vagabonds know--and later if I +come to some steep stretches I shall be more likely to make the top, for +I'm resolved to "travel light." + +There is usually one serpent in Eden, if it is only a garter snake. Ours +was a frog in the fountain. He had a volume of sound equal to Edouard de +Reske in his prime. I set the chauffeur the task of catching him, but +after emptying out all the water one little half-inch frog skipped off, +and John assured me that he could never be the offender. But he was +"Edouard" in spite of appearances, for he returned at dusk and took up +the refrain just where he had left off. I decided to hunt him myself. It +was like the game of "magic music" that we used to play as children: +loud and you are "warm"; soft and you are far away. I never caught him. +He was ready to greet the tenants instead of the cosy cricket, and may +have been the reason why they suddenly departed after only a three +weeks' stay, but as it was a foggy May, as it sometimes is on this +coast, that is an open question. J---- tersely put it, "Frog or fog?" + +The smiling Helen smiled more beamingly every day, but the chauffeur +hated it. He was a city product and looked as much at home on that +hill-top as a dancing-master in a hay-field. He smoked cigarettes and +read the sporting page of the paper in the garage, where gasoline rather +deadened the country smells of flowers and hay, and tried to forget his +degrading surroundings, but he was overjoyed when the day to start for +home arrived. I did not share his feelings, and yet I was ready to go. +It had been a great success, and the only time I had felt lonely was in +a crowded restaurant in San Diego, where J---- and I had had many jolly +times in past summers. On the Smiling Hill-Top who could be lonely with +the ever-changing sea and sky and sunsets. I dare not describe the +picture, as I don't wish to be put down as mad or a cubist. Scent of the +honeysuckle, the flutter of the breeze, the song of pink-breasted +linnets and their tiny splashings in the birds' pool outside my +sleeping-porch, the velvet of the sky at night, with its stars and the +motor lights on the highway like more stars below--how I love it all! I +was taking enough of it home with me, I hoped, to last through some +strenuous weeks in Pasadena, until I could come back for the summer, +bringing my family. + +Much bustling about on the part of the smiling Helen and me, much +locking of gates and doors by the bored chauffeur, and we were off for +home! After all is said and done, "home is where the heart is," +irrespective of the view. + +The first part of the way we made good time, but just out of one of the +small seaside towns something vital snapped in the motor's insides. It +happened on a bridge at the foot of a hill, and we were very lucky to +escape an accident. I will say for the chauffeur that while, as a +farmer, he would never get far, as a driver he knew his business. One +slight skid and we stopped short, "never to go again," like +grandfather's clock. It resulted in our having to be towed backwards to +the nearest garage, while the chauffeur jumped on a passing motor bound +for Pasadena, and was snatched from my sight like Elijah in the +chariot--he was off to get a new driving shaft. The smiling Helen +followed in a Ford full of old ladies. I elected to travel by train and +sat for hours in a small station waiting for the so-called "express." In +a hasty division of the lunch I got all the hard-boiled eggs, and of +course one can eat only a limited number of them, though I will say that +a few quite deaden one's appetite. + +I had an amazing collection of bags, coats, and packages, and was +dreading embarking on the train. However, I have a private motto, "There +is a way." There was. The only occupant of the waiting-room besides +myself was a very dapper gentleman of what I should call lively middle +age, with very upstanding gray mustaches. I took him to be a marooned +motorist, also. He was well-dressed, with the added touch of an orange +blossom in his button-hole, and he had a slightly roving eye. His +hand-baggage was most "refined." I had noticed him looking my way at +intervals, and wondered if he craved a hard-boiled egg; I could easily +have spared him one! While I am certainly not in the habit of seeking +conversation with strange gentlemen, there are always exceptions to +everything, and I concluded that this was one. I smiled! We chatted on +the subject of the flora and fauna of California in a perfectly +blameless way till my train whistled, when he said, "I am going to carry +those bags for you, if you will allow me!" I thanked him aloud and +inwardly remarked, "I have known that for a long time!" + +What made it especially pleasant was that I was going north and he was +going south. So ended my Adventure--not all Solitude, if you like, but +as near it as one can achieve with comfort. The amazing thing about it +was how well I got on with myself, for I don't think I'm particularly +easy to live with. I must ask J----. Probably it was the novelty. + + + + +[Illustration] + +A SABINE FARM + + +I once remarked that I thought New York City a most friendly and +neighborly place, and was greeted with howls of derision. I suppose I +said it because that morning a dear old lady in an oculist's office had +patted me, saying, "My dear, it would be a pity to put glasses on you," +and an imposing blonde in a smart Fifth Avenue shop had sold me a hat +that I couldn't afford either to miss or to buy, for half price, because +she said I'd talked to her like a human being, the year before--all of +which had warmed my heart. I think perhaps my statement was too +sweeping. Since we have changed oceans I notice that the atmosphere +of the West has altered my old standards somewhat. There is an +easy-going fellowship all through every part of life on this side +of the Rocky Mountains. + +Take banks, for instance. Can you picture a dignified New York Trust +Company with bowls of wild flowers placed about the desks and a general +air of hospitality? In one bank I have often had a pleasant half-hour +very like an afternoon tea, where all the officers, from the president +down, came to shake hands and ask after the children. Of course, that is +a rather unusually pleasant and friendly bank, even for California. +Always I am carefully, tenderly almost, escorted to my motor. At first +this flattered me greatly, till I discovered that there is a law in +California that if you slip and hurt yourself on any one's premises, +they pay the doctor's bill. Hence the solicitude. I was not to be +allowed to strain my ankle, even if I wanted to. + +Probably the same geniality existed in the East fifty years ago. I have +been told that it did. It is a very delightful stage of civilization +where people's shells are still soft, if they have shells at all. There +is an accessibility, a breeziness and camaraderie about even the +prominent men--the bulwarks of business and public life. We are accused +of bragging and "boosting" in the West. I am afraid it is true. They are +the least pleasant attributes of adolescence. + +Banking isn't the only genial profession. There is real estate. Of +course about half the men in California are in real estate for reasons +too obvious to mention. Providence was kind in putting us into the hands +of an honest man, better still, one with imagination, when we came to +look for a winter bungalow. He saw that we had to have something with +charm, even if the furniture was scarce, and took as much pains over +realizing our dream as if we had been hunting for a palace. It was he +who found our "Sabine Farm," which brought us three of the best gifts of +the gods--health, happiness, and a friend. We had almost decided to take +a picturesque cot that I named "The Jungle," from its tangle of trees +and flowers, even though the cook could reach her abode only by an +outside staircase. The boys had volunteered to hold an umbrella over her +during the rainy season, but I wasn't quite satisfied with this +arrangement. Just then we saw an enchanting bungalow set in a garden of +bamboos, roses and bananas, and looked no further! It belonged to an +English woman who raised Toggenburg goats, which made it all the more +desirable for us as the goats were to stay at the back of the garden, +and provide not only milk but interest for the boys. + +J---- dubbed it "El rancho goato" at once. Our friends in the East were +delighted with the idea, and many were their gibes. One in particular +always added something to the address of his letters for the guide or +diversion of the R. F. D. postman: "Route 2, Box so-and-so, you can tell +the place by the goats"; or during the spring floods this appeared in +one corner of the envelope: "Were the goats above high water?" + +It wasn't just an ordinary farm. There was a certain something--I think +the names of the goats had a lot to do with it--Corella, Coila, Babette, +Elfa, Viva, Lorine, and so on, or perhaps it was the devotion of their +mistress, who expended the love and care of a very large heart on a +family that I think appreciated it as far as goats are capable of +appreciation. If she was a little late coming home (she had a tiny shack +on one corner of the place) they would be waiting at the gate calling +plaintively. There is a plaintive tone about everything a goat has to +say. In his cot on the porch J---- composed some verses one morning +early--I forget them except for two lines: + + "The plaintive note of a querulous goat + Over my senses seems to float." + +Of course that was the difficulty--creatures of one kind or another +do not lie abed late. Our Sabine Farm was surrounded by others and +there was a neighborhood hymn to the dawn that it took us some time +to really enjoy--if we ever did. Sopranos--roosters; altos--pigeons, +and ducks; tenors--goats; bassos--cows, and one donkey. There was +nothing missing to make a full, rich volume of sound. Of course +there is no place where it is so difficult to get a long, refreshing +night's sleep as the country. + +One rarely comes through any new experience with all one's preconceived +ideas intact. Our first season on the Sabine Farm shattered a number of +mine. I had always supposed that a mocking-bird, like a garden, was "a +lovesome thing, God wot." Romantic--just one step below a nightingale! + +There was a thicket of bamboos close to my window, and every night all +the young mocking-birds gathered there to try out their voices. It was +partly elocutionary and partly vocal, but almost entirely +exercises--rarely did they favor me with a real song. This would go on +for some time, then just as I dared to hope that lessons were over, +another burst of ill-assorted trills and shrills would rouse me to fury. +I kept three pairs of boots in a convenient place, and hurled them into +the bamboos, paying the boys a small reward for retrieving them each +morning. Sometimes, if my aim was good, a kind of wondering silence +lasted long enough for me to fall asleep. There is an old song--we all +know it--that runs: + + "She's sleeping in the valley, etc., etc., + And the mocking-bird is singing where she lies." + +That, of course, would be impossible if the poor little thing hadn't +been dead. + +By day I really enjoyed them. To sit in the garden, which smelled +like a perpetual wedding, reading Lafcadio Hearn and listening to +mocking-birds and linnets, would have undermined my New England +upbringing very quickly, had I had time to indulge often in such +a lotus-eating existence. + +Then there was "Boost." He was a small bantam rooster, beloved of our +landlady, which really proves nothing because she was such a +tender-hearted person that she loved every dumb creature that wandered +to her door. Had Boost been dumb I might have loved him too. He had a +voice like the noise a small boy can make with a tin can and a resined +string. He had a malevolent eye and knew that I detested him, so that he +took especial pains to crow under my windows, generally about an hour +after the mocking-birds stopped. I think living with a lot of big hens +and roosters told on his nervous system, and he took it out on me. Great +self-restraint did I exercise in not wringing his neck, when help came +from an unexpected quarter. Boost had spirit--I grant him that--and one +day he evidently forgot that he wasn't a full-sized bird, and was +reproved by the Sultan of the poultry-yard in such a way that he was +found almost dead of his wounds. Dear Miss W----'s heart was quite +broken. She fed him brandy and anointed him with healing lotions, but +to no avail. He died. I had felt much torn and rather doublefaced in +my inquiries for the sufferer, because I was so terribly afraid he +might get well, so it was a great relief when he was safely buried +in the back lot. + +Though I love animals I have had bloodthirsty moments of feeling that +the only possible way to enjoy pets was to have them like those wooden +Japanese eggs which fit into each other. If you have white mice or a +canary, have a cat to contain the canary, and a dog to reckon with the +cat. Further up in the scale the matter is more difficult, of course. +One of our "best seller" manufacturers, in his early original days, +wrote a delightful tale. In it he said: "A Cheetah is a yellow streak +full of people's pet dogs," so perhaps that is the answer. The ultimate +cheetah would, of course, have to be shot and stuffed, as it would +hardly be possible to have a wild-cat lounging about the place. I think +the idea has possibilities. So many of our plans are determined by pets. +"No, we can't close the house and go motoring for a week, because there +is no one with whom to leave the puppies." "Yes, we rented our house to +Mrs. S---- for less than we expected to get for it, because she is so +fond of cats and promised to take good care of Pom Pom"--which recalls +to my mind a dear little girl who had a white kitten that she was +entrusting to a neighbor. The neighbor, a busy person with eight +children, received the kitten without demonstration of any kind. Little +Lydia looked at her for a few moments and then said, "Mrs. F----, that +kitten must be loved." That is really the trouble, not only must they be +loved, but they are loved and then the pull on your heart-strings +begins. We have a pair of twin silver-haired Yorkshire terriers, who are +an intimate part of our family circle. I sometimes feel like a friend of +mine in San Francisco, who has a marvellous Chinese cook, and says she +hopes she will die before Li does. I hope "Rags" and "Tags" will live as +long as I do--and yet they are a perfect pest. If they are outdoors they +want to come in, or vice versa. It is practically impossible to sneak +off in the motor without their escort and they bark at my best callers. +Since they made substantial sums of money begging for the Red Cross, +they have added a taste for publicity to their other insistent qualities +and come into the drawing-room, and sit up in front of whoever may be +calling, with a view to sugar and petting. And the worst of it is I +can't maintain discipline at all. Rags has had to be anointed with a +salve compounded of tar and sulphur. It is an indignity and quite +crushes his spirit, so that after it has been put on he wishes to sit +close to me for comfort. The result is that I become like a winter +overcoat just emerging from moth-balls rather than hurt his feelings. Of +course it makes some difference whether the pet that is annoying you +belongs to you or a neighbor. I doubt whether I could have loved Boost, +however, even if I had known him from the shell. + +In spite of these various drawbacks we led a most happy life. It was so +easy. The bungalow was so attractively furnished; our own oranges and +limes grew at the door. There was just room for us with nothing to +spare, that had to be kept in order, and our landlady was as different +from the cold-hearted ones we had known as the bankers and real-estate +men. She seemed to be always trying to think of what we might need, and +to provide it. Dear Miss W----, she will never be a good business woman +from the world's point of view; she is too generous and too unselfish! +We all loved her. Many were the hours I inveigled her into wasting while +we sat on bales of the goats' hay and discussed life and the affairs of +the country--but mostly life with its curious twists and turns--its +generosities and its stinginesses. The boys spent their time in the +goat-pen making friends of the little kids, whose various advents added +so much interest to the spring, and learning much from Miss W----, whose +attitude towards life was so sane and wholesome for them to know. + +"Buckaboo," the only buck on the ranch when we came, was a dashing young +creature, prancing about and kicking up his heels for the pure joy of +living. Joedy informed J---- that he reminded him of him, "only in a +goat way, father"--a tribute to the light-heartedness that California +had already brought to at least one member of the family. + +If our Sabine Farm's vocation was goats, its avocation was surely roses. +We were literally smothered in them. A Cecil Brunner with its perfect +little buds, so heavily perfumed, covered one corner of the house. The +Lady Bankshire, with its delicate yellow blossoms, roofed our porch, and +the glorious Gold of Ophir, so thorny and with little fragrance, +concealed our laundry from the road. There was a garden of bush roses of +all kinds to cut for the house, and the crowning glory of all was a +hedge of "Tausend Schoen," growing luxuriantly, and a blaze of bloom in +May. After years of illness and worry, it was good to feel life coming +back joyously in a kind of haven--or heaven--of roses. + + + + +[Illustration] + +THE LAND OF WHYNOT + + +When Alice stepped through the looking-glass and ran out into that most +alluring garden, she must have felt much as I did long ago when I +stepped off the Santa Fe Limited and found myself in Southern California +for the first time! It isn't just the palm trees and the sunshine, +though they are part of the charm. It isn't even the mocking-birds and +the orange blossoms altogether. It is something you can't really put +your finger on, that lures you from your old habits and associations. At +first you are simply glad that you have left the cold and snow behind +you, and that the earth is so sweet with flowers, and then you begin to +find a new world of possibilities. There are all sorts of little garden +gates with golden keys on glass tables, and you set about growing +shorter or taller, as the case may be, to make yourself a proper height +to reach the key and slip through the door. You don't even need to +hurry, if you are firm about not grasping the hand of any Red Queen that +may come your way, and yet it isn't a land of manana; it's a land of +"Why Not?" The magic has nothing to do with one's age; I feel it now +even more than I did twenty years ago, and Grandmother felt it at eighty +just as I did at eighteen. Ulysses could have himself lashed to the mast +and snap his fingers at the Sirens, but I know of no protection against +the Southwest except to somehow close the shutters of your imagination. +However, let me not be a Calvinist; because it is enchanting, why should +I fear it? + +I shall never forget my first experience of the spell. I was invited by +my Grandmother to go to California for several months. There were four +of us, and we were all tired, for one reason or another; Grandmother +because she was eighty, and it's a strenuous matter to live eighty +years; my Aunt because she had been desperately ill; C. C. because she +had nursed my Aunt back to comparative health, and I because I had been +a debutante that winter, and every one knows that that is the hardest +work of all. We went as far south as the train would take us, and +settled ourselves at Coronado to bask in the sunshine until the +tiredness was gone and we became a band of explorers, with the world +before us! A pair of buggies drawn by nags of unblemished reputation for +sagacity and decorum, driven by C. C. and me, carried us over many a +picturesque and rough road. It invariably took us all day to get +anywhere and back, irrespective of what the distance was supposed to be. +The outfit was so old that I often had to draw up my steed and mend the +harness with a safety-pin. Trailing Ramona was our favorite game. +Fortunately for that part of the country, she and Allessandro managed to +be born, or sleep, or marry, or die in pretty nearly every little +settlement, ranch, or mission in San Diego County, and it's a great boon +to the country. Now, of course, with a motor you can cover the ground in +a day, but then, with a guaranteed horse and a safety-pinned harness, +Ramona was good for weeks. + +We usually took a picnic lunch, and it was on one of these trips that I +first saw the Smiling Hill-Top and knew it not for my later love. How +often that happens! Jogging home, with the reins slack on the placid +mare's back, Grandmother liked me to sing "Believe Me If All Those +Endearing Young Charms" and "Araby's Daughter," showing that she was a +good deal under the spell of the palm trees and the sunset, for I have +the voice of a lost kitten. It also shows the perfect self-control of +the horse, for no accidents occurred. + +It was a very different Coronado from the present day, with its motors +on earth and water, and in air. I liked ours better and hated to leave +it, but after six weeks of its glory of sunshine I was deputed to go +north to Pasadena to rent a bungalow for two months. It was my first +attempt of the kind, and aided by a cousin into whose care I had been +confided, I succeeded in reducing the rent twenty-five dollars a month +for a pretty cottage smothered in roses and heliotropes and well +supplied with orange and lemon trees. I was rather pleased with myself +as a business woman. Not so Grandmother. She was thoroughly indignant +and announced her firm intention of paying the original rent asked, a +phenomenon that so surprised our landlord, when I told him, that he +insisted on scrubbing the kitchen floor personally, the day of her +arrival. Thus did Raleigh lay down his cloak for the Queen! + +Everything was lovely. It only rained once that spring--the morning +after we had gone up Mount Lowe to see the sun rise, to be sure, but it +would be a carping creature who would complain when only one expedition +had been dampened. For twenty years I cherished the illusion that this +was a land of endless sunshine. I don't know where I thought the +moisture came from that produces the almost tropical luxuriance of the +gardens and the groves. I know better now and, strange to say, I have +come to love a rain in its proper time and place, if it isn't too +boisterous. We discovered a veteran of the Civil War turned liveryman, +who for a paltry consideration in cash was ours every afternoon, and +showed us something new each day, from racing horses on the Lucky +Baldwin Ranch to the shadow of a spread eagle on a rock. Grandmother's +favorite excursion was to a picturesque winery set in vineyards and +shaded by eucalyptus trees. She was what I should call a wine-jelly, +plum-pudding prohibitionist, and she included tastes of port and fruit +cordials as part of the sight-seeing to be done. You can be pretty at +eighty, which is consoling to know. Grandmother, with a little curl over +each ear and the pink born of these "tastes" proved it, and she wouldn't +let us tease her about it either. It was an easy life, and so +fascinating that I even said to myself, "Why not learn to play the +guitar?" for nothing seemed impossible. It shows how thoroughly drugged +I was by this time, for my Creator wholly omitted to supply me with a +musical ear. I always had to have my instrument tuned by the young man +next door, but I learned to play "My Old Kentucky Home" so that every +one recognized it. Now, if years had not taught me some fundamental +facts about my limitations, I should probably render twilight hideous +with a ukelele, for a ukelele goes a guitar one better, and Aloha oee +wailed languorously on that instrument would make even a Quaker relax. + +It was in the late spring that the Great Idea came to Aunty and me. I +don't know which of us was really responsible for it, and there was a +time when neither of us would own it. A course in small "Why Nots?" made +it come quite naturally at the last. Why shouldn't we drive into the +Yosemite Valley before we went home? By the end of May it would be at +its loveliest, with the melted snows from the mountains filling its +streams and making a rushing, spraying glory of its falls. It did seem a +pity to be so near one of the loveliest places on earth and to miss +seeing it. Aunty and I discussed the matter dispassionately under a palm +tree in the back yard. We honestly concluded that it wouldn't hurt +Grandmother a bit, that it might even do her good, so we began to put +out a few conversational feelers, and the next thing we knew she was +claiming the idea as her own and inviting us to accompany her! In her +early married life she was once heard to say to Grandfather, "Edwin, I +have made up our minds." So you can see that Aunty and I were as clay in +her hands! Where we made our great mistake was in writing to the rest of +the family about our plans until after we had started. They became quite +abusive in their excitement. Were we crazy? Had we forgotten +Grandmother's age? What was C. C., a trained nurse, about, to let a +little delicate old lady take such a trip? They were much shocked. We +had to admit her age, but Aunty and I weren't so sure about her +delicacy, and anyway her mind was made up, so we burned their telegrams +and packed the bags. + +It happened twenty years ago, but I can see her sitting in a +rocking-chair on the piazza of Leidig's Hotel in Raymond, surrounded by +miners, all courteously editing their conversation and chewing tobacco +as placidly as a herd of cows, while Grandmother, the only person whose +feet were not elevated to the railing, rocked gently and smiled. Of +course we planned to make the trip as easy as possible, and had engaged +a spring wagon so that we could take more time than the stage, which +naturally had to live up to a Bret Harte standard. We made an early +start from Raymond after a rather troubled night at Leidig's Hotel. You +hear strange sounds in a mining camp after dark. Every one in town saw +us off, as Grandmother was already popular, and looked on as rather a +sporting character. Al Stevens, who drove us, was a bitter +disappointment to me, not looking in the least romantic or like the hero +of a Western story. I shan't even describe him, except to say that he +smoked most evil-smelling cigars, the bouquet of which blew back into +our faces and spoiled the pure mountain air, but we didn't dare say a +word, for fear that he might lash his horses round some hair-pin curve +and scare us to death, even if we didn't actually go over the edge. I +don't think he would really have rushed to extremes, for he turned out +to be distinctly amiable, and our picnic lunches, eaten near some +mountain spring, were partaken of most sociably and Al Stevens didn't +always smoke. How good everything tasted! I don't believe I have ever +really enjoyed apple pie with a fork as I enjoyed it sitting on a log +with a generous wedge in one hand and a hearty morsel of mouse-trap +cheese in the other. + +We spent three days driving into the valley, staying at delightful inns +over night, and stopping when we pleased, to pick flowers, for wonderful +ones grow beside the road; Mariposa tulips with their spotted butterfly +wings, fairy lanterns, all the shades of blue lupin, and on our detour +to see the big trees I found a snow-plant, which looks like a blossom +carved out of watermelon--pink and luscious! It is hard to realize how +big the big trees are! Like St. Peter's, they are so wonderfully +proportioned you can't appreciate their height, but I do know that they +would be just a little more than my tree-climbing sons would care to +tackle. Stevens was a good driver and approved of our appreciation of +"his" scenery, and I think he was proud of Grandmother, who really stood +the trip wonderfully well. At last came the great moment when a bend in +the road would disclose the valley with its silver peaks, its +golden-brown river, and its rainbow-spanned falls. We had never +suspected it, but Stevens was an epicure in beauty. He insisted on our +closing our eyes till we came to just the spot where the view was most +perfect, and then he drew in his horses, gave the word, and we looked on +a valley as lovely as a dream. I am glad that we saw it as we did, after +a long prelude of shaded roads and sentinel trees. Nowadays you rush to +it madly by train and motor. Then it was a dear secret hidden away in +the heart of the forest. + +We spent five days at the hotel by the Merced River, feasting on beauty +and mountain trout, and lulled by the murmur of that gentle stream. +Moonlight illumined the whiteness of the Yosemite Falls in full view of +the hotel verandah as it makes the double leap down a dark gorge. We +could see a great deal with very little effort, but after a day or two I +began to look longingly upward toward the mountain trails. At last a +chance came, and "Why Not" led me to embrace it. A wholesale milliner +from Los Angeles invited me to join his party. We had seen him at +various places along our way, so that it was not entirely out of a clear +sky. He was wall-eyed--if that is the opposite of cross-eyed--which gave +him so decidedly rakish a look that it was some time before I could +persuade my conservative relatives that it would be safe for me to +accept the invitation, but as the party numbered ten, mostly female, +they finally gave me their blessing. Being the last comer, and the mules +being all occupied, I had to take a horse, which I was sorry for, as +they aren't supposed to be quite as sure-footed on the trail. The party +all urged me to be cautious, with such emphasis that I began to wonder +if I had been wise to come, when Charley, our guide, told me not to pay +any attention to them, that I had the best mount of the whole train. +Charley, by the way, was all that Al Stevens was not, and added the note +of picturesqueness and romance which my soul had been craving. He was +young, blond, and dressed for the part, and would have entranced a +moving-picture company! The wholesale milliner called me "Miss Black +Eyes," and was so genial in manner that I joined Charley at the end of +the parade and heard stories of his life which may or may not have been +true. Every now and then Jesse James, an especially independent mule, +would pause, and with deliberation and vigor kick at an inaccessible fly +on the hinder parts of his person, while his rider shrieked loudly for +help, and the procession halted till calm was restored. At last we +reached the end of the trail. Somewhere I have a snap-shot of myself +standing on Glacier Point, that rock that juts out over the valley, +clinging to Charley's hand, for I found that standing there with the +snow falling, looking down thousands of feet, made me crave a hand to +keep the snowflakes from drawing me down. The wholesale milliner and the +rest considered me a reckless soul, and many were the falsetto shrieks +they emitted if I went within ten feet of the edge of the precipice. +They did not realize the insurance and assurance of Charley's hand. + +Of course I endured the anguish of a first horseback ride for the next +day or two, but it was worth it, and by the time we were ready to start +for home I could sit down quite comfortably. The trip was accomplished +without a jolt or jog sufficient to disarrange Grandmother's curls. +Aunty and I were always so thankful that we defied the family and +let her have her last adventure, for soon afterward her mind began +to grow dim. For myself, I treasure the memory both for her sake, +and because I can't climb trails myself any more, and that is +something I didn't miss. Was it Schopenhauer or George Ade who +said, "What you've had you've got"? + +Twenty years later another party of four, consisting of a husband and +two boys, were led by a lady Moses into the promised land, and were met +by an old friend, the Civil War veteran, with a motor instead of his +pair of black horses! He was too old to drive, but he had come to +welcome me back. Billie and Joedy were thrilled. They adored the tales +of his twelve battles and the hole in his knee, even more than their +mother had before them, being younger and boys. It was as lovely a land +as I had remembered it, only, of course, there were changes. The motor +showed that. I should not say that the tempo of life had been quickened +so much as that its radius had been widened, or that the focus was +different; the old spell was the same. To reconcile the past and the +present, I have thought of a beautiful compromise. Why not a motor van? +The family jeered at me when I first suggested that we spend J----'s +next vacation meandering up the coast in one. Of course, the boys adored +the idea at first, but sober second thoughts for mother made them pause. + +Billie: "But, Muvs, you'd hate it, you couldn't have a box spring!" + +Joedy: "And you don't like to wash dishes." + +Quite true. I had thought of all that myself. I don't like to wash +dishes, but we use far more than we really need to use, and anyway I had +rather decided that I wouldn't wash them. As to the bed-spring, I could +have an air mattress, for while it's a little like sleeping on a captive +balloon, it doesn't irritate your bones like a camp cot. + +The family distrust of me, as a vagabond, dates from a camping trip last +August to celebrate Billie's twelfth birthday. It lasted only one night, +so "trip" is a large word to apply to it, but I will say that for one +night it had all the time there could be squeezed into it. We selected a +site on the beach almost within hallooing distance of the Smiling +Hill-Top, borrowed a tent and made camp. I loved the fire and frying the +bacon and the beat of the waves, but I did not like the smell of the +tent. It was stuffy. I had been generously given that shelter for my +own, while the male members of the party slept by a log (not like one, +J---- confessed to me) under a tarpaulin--I mean "tarp"--with stars +above them except when obscured by fog. My cot was short and low and I +am not, so that I spent the night tucking in the blankets. The puppies +enjoyed it all thoroughly. Though they must have been surprised by the +sudden democratic intimacy of the situation, they are opportunists and +curled themselves in, on, and about my softer portions, so that I had to +push them out every time I wanted to turn over, which was frequently. I +urged them to join the rest of the party under the "tarp," but they were +firm, as they weren't minding the hardness of the cot, and they don't +care especially about ventilation. I greeted the dawn with heartfelt +thanksgiving, and yet I'm as keen about my vacation idea as ever. I have +simply learned what to do and what not to do, and it won't matter to me +in the least whether my ways are those of a tenderfoot or not. Why not +be comfortable physically as well as spiritually? Think of the +independence of it! To be able to sit at the feet of any view that you +fancy till you are ready to move on! Doesn't that amount to "free will"? +Yes, I am resolved to try it out and Billie says if I make up my mind to +something I generally get my way (being descended from Grandmother +probably accounts for it), so if you should see a rather fat, lazy green +van with "Why not?" painted over the back door, you may know that two +grown vagabonds, two young vagabonds, and two vagabond pups, are on the +trail following the gypsy patteran. + + + + +[Illustration] + +WHERE THE TRADE WIND BLOWS + + +Mr. Jones meets his friend, Mr. Brown: + +"Surprised to see that your house is for sale, Brown." + +"Oh--er--yes" replies Brown; "that is, I don't know. I keep that sign up +on the lawn." Then with a burst of confidence: "Mrs. Brown meets so many +nice people that way, don't you know!" + +So it is that we have a reputation for being willing to sell anything in +California, even our souls. Of course, it isn't at all necessary to have +a sign displaying "For Sale" to have constant inquiries as to the price +of your place. After the days of "The Sabine Farm" were only a lovely +memory, we bought a bungalow in Pasadena, or, rather, we are buying it +on the instalment plan. It is really an adorable little place with a +very flowery garden, surrounded by arbors covered with roses, wistaria, +and jasmine (I think I should say we have been very fortunate in our +dwelling-places since we emigrated), and passers-by usually stop and +comment favorably. Young men bring their girls and show them the sort of +little place they'd like to own, and often they ring the door-bell for +further inquiries. Driven to bay, I have put a price of half a million +on our tiny estate. When I mention this, the investigators usually +retreat hastily, looking anxiously over their shoulders to see if my +keeper is anywhere in sight. As to the real-estate men, they are more in +number than the sands of the sea, and the competition is razor-edged. If +you have the dimmest idea of ever buying a lot or house, or if you are +comfortably without principle, you won't need to keep a motor at all. +The real-estate men will see that you get lots of fresh air, and they +are most obliging about letting you do your marketing on the way home. +We have an especial friend in the business. He never loses hope, or his +temper. It was he that originally found us "The Sabine Farm." He let us +live there in peace till we were rested, for which we are eternally +grateful, and then he began to throw out unsettling remarks. The boys +ought to have a place to call home where they could grow up with +associations. Wasn't it foolish to pay rent when we might be applying +that money toward the purchase of a house? Of course it told on us in +time and we began to look about. "The Sabine Farm" would not do, as it +was too far from J----'s business, and the lotus-flower existence of our +first two years was ours no longer. Every lot we looked at had +irresistible attractions, and insurmountable objections. At last, +however, we settled on a piece of land looking toward the mountains, +with orange trees on either hand, paid a part of the price, and supposed +it was ours for better or worse. Just then the war darkened and we felt +panicky, but heaven helped us, for there was a flaw in the title, and +our money came trotting back to us, wagging its tail. It was after this +that we stumbled on the arbored bungalow, and bought it in fifteen +minutes. I asked Mr. W---- if he liked bass fishing, and whether he'd +ever found one gamier to land than our family. He will probably let us +live quietly for a little while, and then he will undoubtedly tell us +that this place is too small for us. I know him! + +In case of death or bankruptcy the situation is much more intense. Every +mouse hole has its alert whiskered watcher, and after a delay of a few +days for decency, such pressure is brought to bear that surviving +relatives rarely have the courage to stand pat. Probably a change of +surroundings _is_ good for them. + +If people can't be induced to sell, often they will rent. There is an +eccentric old woman in town who owns a most lovely lot, beautifully +planted, that is the hope and snare of every real-estate man, but, +though poor, she will not part with it. She has a house, however, that +she rents in the season. One day some Eastern people were looking at it, +and timidly said that one bath-room seemed rather scant for so large a +house. + +"Oh, do you think so?" said Mrs. Riddle. "It is enough for us. Mr. +Riddle and I aren't what you'd call bathers. In fact, Mr. Riddle doesn't +bathe at all; I sponge!" + +Real estate isn't the only interest of the West. We all read the +advertising page of the local paper just as eagerly as we do the foreign +news. If I feel at all lonely or bored I generally advertise for +something. Once I wanted a high-school boy to drive the motor three +afternoons a week. The paper was still moist from the press when my +applicants began to telephone. I took their names and gave them +appointments at ten-minute intervals all the following morning, only +plugging the telephone when J---- and I felt we must have some sleep. In +the morning, forgetting the little wad of paper we had placed in the +bell, I took down the receiver to call the market, when a tired voice +started as if I had pressed a button: + +"I saw your 'ad' in the paper last night, etc." When they arrived they +ranged in age from sixteen to sixty. The latter was a retired clergyman, +the Rev. Mr. Bain, who said he drove for his wife, but (here he fitted +his finger-tips together, and worked them back and forth in a manner +that was a blend of jauntiness and cordiality) he thought he could fit +us both in! + +I blush to state that I selected a younger chauffeur! Emboldened by the +success of my first advertising venture, I decided to try again. This +time I wished to sell our superfluous old furniture. The war has made me +dislike anything about the place that isn't really in use. Having lived +some years in Pennsylvania, and having amassed quite a collection of +antique mahogany furniture, I felt justified in thinning out a few +tables and odd pieces that our desirable bungalow is too small to hold. +The results weren't as pronounced as before, but they quite repaid me. I +sold my best table to a general, which gave me a lot of confidence, but +my greatest triumph was a hat-rack. It was a barren, gaunt-looking +affair, like a leafless tree in winter, but it was mahogany, and it was +old. Two ladies who were excitedly buying tables spied it, and exclaimed +in rapture. I rose to the occasion: + +"That is the most unusual piece I have," I unblushingly gushed. "It is +solid mahogany and very old. I never saw another like it. Yes, I would +sell it for twenty-five dollars." + +They both wanted it--I was almost afraid it might make feeling between +them, till I soothed the loser by selling her an old brass tea-kettle +that I had picked up in a curiosity shop in Oxford years ago. It was so +old that it had a hole in it, which seemed to clinch the matter. I sent +for the packer the moment they were out of the house, and had the things +boxed and away before they could change their minds. When I showed +J---- the money, he said I was wasting my time writing, that he was sure +I had a larger destiny. + +Speaking of having furniture boxed carries me back to the time when we +lived in Pennsylvania and I bought many things of a pleasant old rascal +who just managed to keep out of jail. One time he showed me a lovely old +table of that ruddy glowing mahogany that adds so much to a room. I said +I would take it, but told him not to send it home till afternoon. I +wanted time to break it to J---- after a good luncheon. J---- was very +amiable and approving, and urged me to have it sent up, so I went down +to the shop to see about it. To my dismay I found it neatly crated and +just being loaded into a wagon. I called frantically to my rascally +friend, who tried to slip out of the back door unobserved, but in vain. +I fixed him with an accusing eye. + +"What are you doing with my table?" I demanded. + +"Did you really want it?" he queried. + +"Of course I want it. Didn't I say I'd take it?" I was annoyed. + +"Oh, well," to his men, "take it off, boys." "You see," turning to me, +"a man from Seattle was in after you left, and he said he'd take that +round table over there if I'd sell him this one too. I showed him +another one every bit as good as this, but he wouldn't look at it; +still, I guess I'll box it up in that crate with his round one, and when +it gets to Seattle I reckon he won't want to send it way back. It's a +long way to Seattle!" + +"That's your business, not mine," I remarked coldly, though I felt an +unholy desire to laugh. "Just send mine home before any one else tempts +you." + +I still sleep in a Hepplewhite four-poster that he wheedled out of an +old Pennsylvania Dutch woman for a mere song. The posts at the head were +sawed off so that the bed could stand in a room with a sloping ceiling, +but, fortunately, the thrifty owner had saved the pieces instead of +using them for firewood, so I have had them neatly stuck on again. + +I think perhaps a subconscious recollection of his methods was what made +me so successful with the hat-rack. + +War work has brought out much latent ability of this kind. Lilies of the +field, who had never needed to toil or spin for themselves, were glad to +do so for the Red Cross. In Pasadena we had a small Spanish street +(inside a building), with tiny shops on either side, where you could buy +anything from an oil painting to a summer hat. In front was a gay little +plaza with vines and a fountain, where lunch and tea were served by the +prettiest girls in town in bewitching frilled caps with long black +streamers and sheer lawn aprons over blue and green frocks. The Tired +Business Men declined to lunch anywhere else, and there was a moment +when we feared it might have to be given up, as there was some feeling +in town on account of the vacant stools at their old-time counters! It +all went to prove that you don't need to be brought up in "trade" to be +a great success at it. + +No one has stuck to his or her usual role in the past two years, which +has added a piquancy to life. We have all wanted to do our bit and the +"Why not?" that I feel so strongly in California has spread over the +whole country. In order to make the most efficient use of the newly +discovered talents on every side, the Red Cross sent out cards with +blanks to be filled by all those ready to work, asking what they felt +themselves fitted to do, when could they work, and how long. One card +read "willing but nervous, might possibly pray." + +Our Red Cross Street brought in many people full of enthusiasm and +energy, who might never have rolled a bandage. I shan't soon forget the +strenuous days of its opening. J---- and another diplomat, who also has +a talent for pouring oil on troubled waters, were in charge of the +financial part of the enterprise, and theirs was the task of seeing that +none of the chapter funds were used, so that no possible criticism could +arise. A pretty young actress offered to give a premiere of a comedy +which she was about to take on the road, for the benefit of the street, +and every one was delighted until they saw a rehearsal. It was one of +those estranged-husband-one-cocktail-too-many farces, full of innuendo +and profanity. J---- and his partner were much upset, but it was too +late to withdraw. The company, in deference to the Red Cross, agreed to +leave out everything but the plain damns. Even then it wasn't what they +would have chosen, and two very depressed "angels" met in the hall of +the High School Auditorium, on the night of the performance. Nothing had +gone right. The tickets were late coming from the printer, the +advertising man had had tonsilitis, every one was "fed up" with Red +Cross entertainments, and it was pouring in torrents. There was a +sprinkling of gallant souls on the first floor of the big hall, and that +was all. The fact that they wouldn't make much money wasn't what was +agitating the "angels" nearly as much as the wrath of the pink-and-white +lady about to appear. Then came the inspiration. I wish I could say it +was J----'s idea, but it was Mr. M----'s. A night school of several +hundred is in session in that building every evening, and a cordial +invitation to see a play free brought the whole four hundred in a body +to fill the auditorium, if not completely, at least creditably. They +loved it and were loud in their applause. The "damns" didn't bother them +a bit. They encored the lady, which, combined with a mammoth bouquet, +provided by the "management," gave the whole thing quite a triumphant +air. When we all went behind the scenes after the play, the atmosphere +was really balmy. The lady expressed herself as greatly pleased and +gratified by so large and enthusiastic an audience. ("On such a bad +night, too!") I retired behind a bit of scenery and pinched myself +till I felt less hilarious. One thing I know, and that is that if +J---- should ever change his business it won't be to go into any +theatrical enterprise. I don't think even the "movies" could lure +him, and yet she was a very pretty actress! + +It is a far cry from blonde stars to funerals, but J---- feels no change +of subject, however abrupt, is out of place when talking of his "first +night," so I would like to say a few words about that branch of +California business. In the first place, no one ever dies out here until +they are over eighty, unless they are run over or meet with some other +accident. J---- says that old ladies in the seventies, driving +electrics, are the worst menace to life that we have. When our +four-score years and ten have been lived--probably a few extra for good +measure--an end must come, but a California funeral is so different! A +Los Angeles paper advertises "Perfect Funerals at Trust Prices." We +often meet them bowling gayly along the boulevards, the motor hearse +maintaining a lively pace, which the mourners are expected to follow. +The nearest J---- ever came to an accident was suddenly meeting one on +the wrong side of the road, and the funeral chauffeur's language was not +any more scriptural than J----'s. As we were nowhere near eighty, we +felt we had a lot of life still coming to us and gave grateful thanks +for our escape. + +Life is a good thing. I maintain it in the face of pessimists, but it is +a particularly good thing in California, with its sunshine and its +possibilities. I shan't go on because I believe I have said something of +this same sort before. It makes you ready for the next thing, whatever +that may be, and you feel pretty sure that it will be interesting. It's +a kind of perpetual "night before Christmas" feeling. Some time ago when +I picked up my evening paper my eye fell on this advertisement: + +"Wanted: A third partner in a well-established trading business in the +South Seas. Schooner now fitting out in San Francisco to visit the +Islands for cargo of copra, pearls, sandalwood, spices, etc. Woman of +forty or over would be considered for clerical side of enterprise, with +headquarters on one of the islands. This is a strictly business +proposition--no one with sentiment need apply." + +When I read it first I couldn't believe it. I rubbed my eyes and read it +again. There it was next to the Belgian hares, the bargains in orange +groves and the rebuilt automobiles. It was fairly reeking with romance. +I felt like finding an understudy for my job at home, boarding the +schooner and sailing blithely out of the Golden Gate. The South Seas is +the next stop beyond Southern California. I think I could keep their old +books, though I never took any prizes in arithmetic at school. How +amusing it would be to enter in my ledger instead of "two dozen eggs" +and "three pounds of butter," "two dozen pearls at so much a dozen" (or +would they be entered by ounces?) and "fifty pounds of sandalwood," or +should I reckon that by cords? I could find out later. I would wear my +large tortoise-shell spectacles (possibly blinders in addition), and I +should attend strictly to business for a while, but when a full moon +rose over a South Sea lagoon, and the palm trees rustled and the +phosphorescence broke in silver on the bow of the pearl schooner, where +she rode at anchor in our little bay, could I keep my contract and avoid +sentiment? How ridiculous to suppose that stipulating that the lady +should be forty or over would make any difference! What is forty? If +they had said that she must be a cross-eyed spinster with a hare-lip, it +would have been more to the point. I'm not a spinster or cross-eyed, but +why go on? I don't intend to commit myself about the age limit. I don't +have to, because I am not going to apply for the position, after all. I +have a South Sea temperament but as it is securely yoked to a New +England upbringing, the trade wind will only blow the sails of my +imagination to that sandalwood port. + + + + +[Illustration] + +SUNKIST + + +We saw a most amusing farce some time ago which contained much +interesting information concerning the worth of advertising. I forget +the fabulous figure at which "The Gold Dust Twins" trade-mark is valued, +but I know that it easily puts them into Charley Chaplin's class. I am +sure that "Sunkist" cannot be far behind the "Twins," for no single word +could possibly suggest a more luscious, delectable, and desirable fruit +than that. It would even take the curse off being a lemon to be a +"Sunkist" lemon. It contains no hint of the perilous early life of an +orange. Truly that life is more chancey than an aviator's. They say that +in the good old days there were no frosts, but that irrigation is +gradually changing the climate of Southern California. We would not dare +to express an opinion on this much discussed point, as we have never +gone to any new place where the climate has been able to stand the +shock. It is always an unusual season. I do know, however, that bringing +up a crop of oranges is as anxious an undertaking as "raising" a family. +Little black smudge pots stand in rows in the groves, ready to be +lighted at the first hint of frost. The admonition of the hymn applies +to fruit growers as well as to foolish virgins: + + "See that your lamps are burning, + Your vessels filled with oil." + +On sharp mornings the valleys are full of a gray haze still lingering +protectingly over the ranches. Then there are blights. I don't pretend +to know all the ills the orange is heir to. Sometimes it grows too fat +and juicy and cracks its skin, and sometimes it is attacked by scale. +Every tree has to be swathed in a voluminous sheet and fumigated once a +year at great expense. After living out here some time, I began to +understand why even in the heart of the orange country we sometimes pay +fifty cents a dozen for the large fruit. There is a way, however, of +getting around the high cost of living in this particular--you can go to +a packing house and buy for thirty-five cents an entire box of what are +called culls--oranges too large or too small for shipping, or with some +slight imperfection that would not stand transportation, but are as good +for most purposes as the "Sunkist" themselves. + +In California, Orange Day is next in importance to Washington's Birthday +and the Fourth of July. I shall never forget our first experience of its +charms. We were motoring, taking a last jaunt in an old machine which we +had just sold for more than we ever had expected to get for it. It was a +reckless thing to do, for we had no spare tire and it is very like +speculating in oil stocks to start for a run of any length under those +circumstances. It worked out about as it would have done if we had been +trifling with the stock market. A rear tire blew out, and we were put +under the disagreeable necessity of giving our purchaser more nearly his +money's worth. This was a poor start for a holiday, but being near a +delightful inn, we crept slowly to town on our rim and found a fete +awaiting us. We also found friends from the East who asked us all to +lunch, thereby, as one member of the party put it in Pollyanna's true +spirit, much decreasing the price of the new tire. The inn is built in +Spanish style and we lunched in a courtyard full of gaudy parrots, +singing birds in wicker cages and singing senoritas as gay as the +parrots, on balconies above us. The entire menu was orange, or at least +colored orange. It was really charming, and our spirits rose to almost a +champagne pitch, though orange juice--diluted at that--was the only +beverage served. (I believe that there is a Raisin Day, also, but on +account of its horrid association with rice and bread puddings we have +let that slip by unnoticed.) + +Our California color scheme is the very latest thing in decorative art. +There is nothing shrinking about us, for we come boldly forth in orange +and yellows in true cigar-ribbon style--even our motor licenses of last +year had poppies on them. Speaking of poppies, I heard the other day of +a lady who voiced her opinion in all seriousness in the paper, that Mr. +Hoover should have California poppy seeds sent to him for distribution +among the Belgians to sow over the ruins of their country. Of course +there is something in the power of suggestion, and I suppose it would +brighten up the landscape. Joedy is strong on the color idea. We had a +neighbor who had a terrible attack of jaundice, which turned her the +color of a daffodil. I was saying what a pity it was, then Joedy +observed: "Well, Muvs, I think she makes a nice bright spot of color!" + +There is a road leading toward the San Fernando Valley, with fruit +stalls on both sides, very gay with oranges, grape-fruit, and lemons. +One particularly alluring stand is presided over by a colored mammy in +bandana shades, turban and all. + +All this profusion makes one feel that it is no trick to get a living +out of this very impulsive soil, but before buying a plot of one's own, +it is wise to see the seasons through. California is a very unexpected +country. You see a snug little ranch, good soil, near a railroad, just +what you were looking for, but three months of the year it may be under +water. After the spring rains we once went for a change of air to one of +the beaches, which we particularly disliked, because it was the only +place that we could get to, bridges being out in all directions. For the +same reason it was so packed with other visitors, maybe as unwilling as +we, that we had a choice of sleeping in the park or taking a small +apartment belonging to a Papa and Mama Dane. It was full of green plush +and calla lilies, but we chose it in preference to the green grass and +calla lilies of the park. We passed an uneasy and foggy week there. I +slept in a bed which disappeared into a bureau and J---- on a lounge +that curled up like a jelly roll by day. Mama Dane gave us breakfast in +the family sitting-room where a placard hung, saying, "God hears all +that you say." J---- and I took no chances, and ate in silence. Anyway, +the eggs were fresh. We explored the country as well as we could in the +fog, and found quite a large part of it well under water. On one ranch +we met a morose gentleman in hip boots, wading about his property, which +looked like a pretty lake with an R. F. D. box sticking up here and +there like a float on a fishing line, while a gay party of boys and +girls were rowing through an avenue of pepper trees in an old boat. The +gentleman in the hip boots had bought his place in summer! J---- and I +decided then and there that if we ever bought any property in +California, it would be in the midst of the spring rains, but we know +now that even that wouldn't be safe--another element has to be reckoned +with besides water--fire. + +Of course Rain in California is spelled with a capital R. Noah spelled +it that way, but we didn't before we came West. It swells the streams, +which in summer are nothing but trickles, to rushing torrents in no +time. Bridges snap like twigs, dams burst, telegraph lines collapse; +rivers even change their courses entirely, if they feel like it, so that +it would really be a good idea to build extra bridges wherever it seemed +that a temperamental river might decide to go. I have heard of a farmer +who wrote to one of the railroads, saying, "Will you please come and +take your bridge away from my bean-field? I want to begin ploughing." + +This adds natural hazards to the real-estate game. There are +others--Fire, as I said a moment ago. I have a very profound respect for +the elements since we have come West to live. A forest fire is even more +terrifying than a flood, and in spite of the eagle eyes of the foresters +many are the lovely green slopes burned over each year. I have seen a +brush fire marching over a hill across the canyon from us, like an army +with banners--flying our colors of orange and yellow--driving terrified +rabbits and snakes ahead of it, and fought with the fervor of Crusaders +by the property owners in its path. + +The very impulsiveness of the climate seems to give the most wonderful +results in the way of vegetables and fruit. Around Pasadena there are +acres and acres of truck gardens, developed with Japanese efficiency. I +love al fresco marketing. If I can find time once a week to motor up the +valley and fill the machine with beautiful, crisp, fresh green things of +all kinds, it makes housekeeping a pleasure. The little Japanese women +are so smiling and pleasant, with their "Good-by, come gen," the melons +are so luscious, the eternal strawberry so ripe and red, the orange +blossom honey so delectable, and everything is so cheap compared to what +we had been used to in the East! I think that in San Diego one can live +better on a small income than anywhere in the country. Once some +intimate friends of ours gave us a dinner there in January that could +not have been surpassed in New York. The menu included all the +delicacies in season and out of season, fresh mushrooms, alligator pears +and pheasants. J---- and I looked at one another in mingled enjoyment +and dismay that so much was being done for us. Finally our host could +not help telling us how much for each person this wonderful meal was +costing, including some very fetching drinks called "pink skirts." You +wouldn't believe me if I told how little! + +One more delicacy of which we make rather a specialty: I should call it +a climate sandwich. If you live in the invigorating air of the +foothills, to motor to the sea, a run of some thirty miles from where we +live in winter, spend several hours on the sand, and before dark turn +"Home to Our Mountains" gives a mountain air sandwich with sea-breeze +filling--a singularly refreshing and satisfying dainty. + +Perhaps my enthusiasm for California sounds a little like cupboard love. +There is a certain type of magazine which publishes the most alluring +pictures of food, salads and desserts, even a table with the implements +laid out ready for canning peaches, that holds a fatal fascination for +me. I have even noticed J---- looking at one with interest. When my +father comes out to visit us every spring, the truck gardens, the +packing houses, and the cost of living here, I think, affect him in much +the same way that those magazines do me, and I wonder if every one, +except a dyspeptic, doesn't secretly like to hear and see these very +things! Could it be the reason people used to paint so much still +life?--baskets of fruit, a hunter's game-bag, a divided melon, etc. I +frankly own that they would thrill me more if I knew their market price, +so that I might be imagining what delightful meals I could offer my +family without straining the household purse, which is my excuse for the +intimate details concerning food and prices which I have given. + +Surely human beings ought to respond as the fruits do to this climate, +in spirit as well as in body, and become a very mellow, amiable, +sweet-tempered lot of people, and I think they do. Even the "culls" are +almost as good as the rest, though they won't bear transportation. It is +the land of the second chance, of dreams come true, of freshness and +opportunity, of the wideness of out-of-doors--"Sunkist!" + +THE END + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Smiling Hill-Top, by Julia M. Sloane + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SMILING HILL-TOP *** + +***** This file should be named 17901.txt or 17901.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/9/0/17901/ + +Produced by jjz, Suzanne Shell and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +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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