64 RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA. 



and is superior, if report be true, to the dining hall of the 

 Grand Hotel at Paris. The restaurants of San Francisco are 

 unequaled in the United States. 



44. Sacramento. Sacramento City, the political capital 

 and second town of California, is situated near the center of 

 the Sacramento basin and of the State is one hundred and 

 twenty-five miles by the course of navigation, and seventy-five 

 miles in a direct line, distant from the ocean, on the southeast- 

 ern corner of land formed by the junction of the Sacramento 

 and American Rivers, at an elevation of fifty feet above the 

 sea, in latitude 38 33' and longitude 121 20'. The business 

 part of the city is about twenty feet above low-water mark in 

 the Sacramento River, which, in front of the town, during the 

 dry season, rises and falls about a foot with the tide. The 

 site is level, and in the midst of a wide plain, most of 

 which is bare of trees. The streets are wide and straight, run 

 with the cardinal points of the compass, and are designated 

 only by numbers and letters. Those parallel with the Sacra- 

 mento are first, second, third, and so forth ; those parallel with 

 the American are A, B, C, and so on. The main business part 

 of the city is near the Sacramento, extending from First to 

 Sixth, and from H to L streets. The houses and stores there 

 are mostly built of brick, one or two stories high. The streets 

 are gravelled or planked ; the side- walks are planked or paved 

 with brick, and covered with awnings to give protection against 

 the sun. In those parts of the town used for dwellings, the 

 houses are chiefly of wood, neatly painted, and surrounded by 

 gardens ; and the streets are lined with shade-trees, such as cot- 

 tonwood, willow, sycamore, elm, and locust. There are water- 

 works and gas-works. The water is pumped up from the 

 Sacramento River, which is so turbid, even at its clearest 

 stage, that six inches of mud are deposited monthly in the 

 reservoir. 



The first settlement by white men on the site of Sacramento 

 was made in 1839, by John A. Sutter, a Swiss by birth, who, 



