Literary Landmarks on the Pacific Coast 

 haps the most beautifuL In the center of that dingy 

 little park, oddlj^ set between Chinatown and the old 

 courthouse and jail, a place that seems provided for 

 the down and outers to drift to and rest in, the 

 swelling sails of a little Spanish galleon take the 

 breeze in search of brave adventure, and on a ped- 

 estal are graved the words of Stevenson's well- 

 known message of kindliness and fortitude. (See 

 PI. XXIX.) 



We can follow Stevenson, too, to Monterey, 

 where he came on first reaching California to be 

 near his future wife, and though the town is some- 

 what changed, Simoneau dead, and the little restau- 

 rant gone where he used proudly to display his 

 autograph set of his patron's works, the Stevenson 

 home is still pointed out; and, what is best, the old 

 adobe Custom House still stands at the point, exactly 

 as Dana found it in his Pacific voyaging before the 

 American occupation. The woods are there, too, 

 where we can wander in hearing of the beating 

 surf. But it would not do to set fire to one of the 

 forest redwoods! 



A Stevenson pilgrimage would take us also north 

 of San Francisco to Calistoga, near St. Helena, 

 whither he went in May, 1880, to spend the first 

 months of his married life. A little shack, — "three 

 rooms plastered against the hill," in a "deserted 

 mining camp eight miles up the mountain," now 

 reduced to a few boards marked by a memorial 

 tablet, — was the house that later he described under 

 the title of The Silverado Squatters. And one does 

 not know California until he knows at first hand the 

 eff'ects of hill and fog so vividly described in those 

 sketches. 



Here and there through central California are 

 other places that we connect with well known or 

 well remembered names. On the crest of the hills 

 overlooking Oakland, Joaquin Miller built the char- 

 acteristic home in which he lived his later years. 

 And it was in Oakland that Edwin Markham pre- 

 sided over his influential little school; here also that 

 Edward Rowland Sill served in the high school, be- 

 fore he took the chair of English literature in the 

 State University. Beyond the upper stretches of the 

 bay is Martinez, where John Muir lived on his farm; 

 though it is the whole Sierra range, particularly the 

 region about Yosemite, that we think of as more 

 truly his home. Jack London has a residence at 

 Glen Ellen, some miles north of San Francisco; 

 while on the coast, a few miles below Monterey, is 

 Carmel, where in recent years has gathered a little 

 colony of writers including in its number George 

 Sterling and Mary Austin. 



265 



