Riverside and Finis. 319 



But I was saying that the break-up was by no means agreeable to us. 

 We had been together much longer than it requires to cross the ocean, at 

 least that little ocean called the Atlantic.' We had formed such ties as peo- 

 ple do a-shipboard, and they did not break without a pang. Strange is that 

 necessity which drives us ever onward— strange are the forces blowing up 

 from the unseen world, driving us first into association and then asunder. 

 All the animals except man may be classified according to a certain pre- 

 dominating disposition to live together in groups or live singly. Of the 

 former sort, sheep among the quadrupeds, and pigeons among the birds, 

 furnish the best examples ; and of the latter, our brother bear is the anti- 

 type of all. For downright solitude and selfishness, for compact enjoyment 

 of his own company and cynical disregard of all other living things, 

 including his own wife and children, the American brown bear stands pre- 

 eminent over all the creatures that walk or crawl or sprawl. But man is 

 neither the one nor the other. He is neither gregarious nor non-grega- 

 rious. Sometimes he swarms, and sometimes he hibernates by himself. 

 Hence, our tribe has two great fields of activity, society and solitude. These 

 reflections, however, obstruct the narrative ; and I hasten to say that our 

 formal work was completed on the evening of the 9th of February, and an 

 adjournment without day ended our union as a body. 



Meanwhile, however, several invitations had come in to visit other cities 

 in Southern California. The principal of these was the call to make an 

 excursion to San Diego, and this was formally accepted. A large number 

 of our friends gathered at the station on the following morning, and were 

 away to the southwest angle of the State. It is a hundred and twenty miles, 

 and requires a larger part of the day. Arriving at Col ton, we take a taste 

 ■of riding on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe. As we turn to the south, 

 and the Riverside valley drops behind us, we enter a country somewhat 

 different from any which we have hitherto traversed. The mountain 

 ranges in this part of California sink to a lower level. They are now only 

 the spurs of the Coast Range, trending out here and there toward the 

 Pacific. I noticed another feature different quite from the aspect of any of 

 the northern valleys. The lowlands of the country, as you approach San 

 Diego, grow green with pastures ; and, though the scene has not a familiar 

 aspect, there is something analogous in it to what one might see in Penn- 

 sylvania or Kentucky. Occasionally the train passes between rounded 

 heights that rise on either side and are green to the summit. Here again, 

 as in the Sonoma valley, I noticed small herds of cattle of good breeds help- 

 ing themselves to rich pasturage. There is, also, a more plentiful distribu- 

 tion of water on the surface — a running stream here and there, or a pond 

 that a Californian might dignify by the name of lake. In these low parts 

 there is everywhere an abundance of water-fowl. As the train passes they 

 skim out on the surface at a right angle and leave an agitation on the water 

 like a rippling harrow drawn by the bird. We shoot at them now and then, 

 a sport which is doubtless more amusing to the ducks than to ourselves. 



