178 EAST PRUSSIA TO THE GOLDEN GATE 



"globe trotters' yams," were I to assure the good people 

 that all the signs and inscriptions of the whole French 

 street (Franzosische Strasse) would, in some instances, 

 not suffice to cover the display of three houses in Com- 

 mercial or Montgomery street, as they appear at present. 

 If the streets and houses of San Francisco make a strange 

 impression upon the European immigrant, the magnifi- 

 cent harbor and its gigantic improvements fill him with 

 amazement. The wharves and docks are such immense 

 structures that one can hardly find words to describe 

 their extent and importance. These wharves, of which 

 there may be ten or twelve, are seldom less than one hun- 

 dred feet in width, while the California street wharf, 

 Long wharf, Pacific, Broadway and Cunningham wharf, 

 which are among the largest, measured three-quarters 

 of a mile (one-quarter of a German mile in length). You 

 will readily understand that it took milliards of piles, 

 beams and planks to complete these structures, while 

 available means at hand are often limited, as may well 

 be imagined, if one considers the comparative newness 

 of the country, and, in many respects, the primitive means 

 of communication. 



As the people fill up the waters along the shore of the 

 bay in the manner I have described, the long piers grow 

 shorter in places, as the so-called water front extends fur- 

 ther and further into the bay. When one considers that 

 the wage scale at the time of the construction of these 

 enormous wharves demanded no less than six or eight 

 dollars for the common day laborer, while carpenters, for 

 instance, received from ten to twelve dollars a day, a 

 faint estimate of the original cost may be obtained. It 

 is well indeed to marvel at the great spirit which con- 

 ceived and executed the plans for this unique American 

 undertaking; it fills one with a degree of respect, which 

 no other nation in the wide world can command.* 



*And this from a youth of twenty! What a lesson for the 

 multitudes of foreigners who land on these shores and, having 

 found the individual liberty which was denied them in their own 



