THE APPROACHES TO THE 

 PACIFIC COAST 



BY FREDERICK J. TEGGART 



Associate Professor of Pacific Coast 

 History, University of California 



THE name "California" antedates the discovery 

 of the territory to which it is now applied. It 

 seems to have been created by a Spanish ro- 

 mancer to signify an island lying beyond the Indies, 

 remarkable alike for its women and its gold — a 

 last effort, apparently, to find a home upon the map 

 for the Hesperides and their golden apples. Viewed 

 from Europe, indeed, California was the most re- 

 mote, the farthest of all lands, and some remnant 

 of the wonder of the voyages of Bran, of Hercules, 

 and of Pantagruel even yet lingers about the west- 

 ward Thule. 



Now, however, that Europeans have actually 

 reached and settled this ultimate coast, the outlook 

 changes, and we may survey the eff'orts of the long 

 line of adventurous explorers from a new point 

 of view. To appreciate the significance of these 

 endeavors it is necessary to disabuse one's mind 

 of the idea, expressed in its accepted form by 

 Bishop Berkeley, that the expansion of the nations 

 follows the path of the setting sun. This idea may 

 suitably interpret the experience of the nations that 

 border upon the Atlantic, but in no circumstances 

 could it have originated upon the shores of the 

 Pacific Ocean. For as we stand here facing the 

 Orient the old conception of a westward line of 

 advance gives place to another view — that of civili- 

 zation spreading east and west from some original 

 seat in eastern Asia, traversing the world in opposite 

 directions, and drawing at length to a new focus 

 on this opposite side of the globe. From this stand- 

 point the picture is not merely that of Spaniards, 

 English, French, and Dutch crossing the Atlantic 

 Ocean and founding settlements^ upon its American 

 seaboard; it includes the far more arduous struggles 

 of these same Europeans to find a way around the 

 land masses of America and Asia. What is of equal 

 importance, moreover, is that this newer outlook 

 includes also the sight of oriental peoples over- 

 flowing into the great emptiness of the west, and 

 the spectacle of Russians making their way with 

 an irresistible sweep across Asia, to leave, above 

 high-water mark as it were, the wreckage of a 



1 



