SCENERY. 153 



maison, the Perfection, the Saffrano, and a hundred others) 

 the geraniums, the fuchsias, the floripondios, the heliotropes, 

 the verbenas, the laurustinus, and the Australian acacias, 

 give a beauty to our gardens not to be found in any of the 

 larger Eastern American cities. The external architecture 

 of our dwellings, too, is more graceful, the wooden material 

 allowing a liberal use of ornament at little expense. Although 

 the buildings on our main business streets are not so high as 

 at the East, still, in general appearance, Montgomery and 

 Kearny will compare favorably with the most fashionable 

 streets of the Eastern cities generally, and can surpass any- 

 thing outside of New York and Chicago. 



But to see the most attractive features of San Francisco, 

 we must look not at the city herself, but at her surroundings 

 and suburbs. In these she is unsurpassed. She stands upon 

 the shore of a magnificent bay, which attracted the admira- 

 tion and the praise of every navigator who visited it, even 

 before it had attained any commercial importance. The bay 

 is skirted by fertile plains several miles wide, beyond which rise 

 mountain ridges from two to three thousand feet high. A 

 spur runs through the city, within ten minutes' walk from the 

 Merchants' Exchange, and has various peaks three hundred 

 feet high ; and also within the city limits, but three miles from 

 the City Hall, are the Mission Peaks, with an elevation of 

 eight hundred feet. Eight miles further south is Mount San 

 Bruno, twelve hundred feet high ; fifteen miles to the north- 

 ward, beyond the Golden Gate, is Tamalpais, twenty-^ix hun- 

 dred feet high ; thirty-five miles to the eastward Mount Diablo, 

 three thousand eight hundred and seventy-six feet high, and 

 fifty-five miles to the southward Mount Hamilton, six hun- 

 dred feet higher yet. These are the corner ornaments to the 

 mountain framing of our landscape. Diablo and Tainalpais 

 are very beautiful mountains, and the former is as. high as 

 Vesuvius. 



The bay has a fine contour, and romantic shores. Goat Is- 

 land, Angel Island, Seal Rock, and Alcatraz,add much to the 



