262 A CALIFORNIA TRAMP. 



as a novelist so popular as Dickens set him the example, we 

 will suppose he did not feel so, but adopted the style for popu- 

 larity. At that time no occidental Bancroft had come upon 

 the scene to rival his Eastern namesake in historic research. 

 But the harvest, though hidden, was there and ready for the 

 gleaner. 



At that time the Indian was considered as a nuisance to be 

 abated by bullet and starvation ; the Chinese as objects of 

 oppression and robbery; the old-time Spanish aristocracy as 

 proprietors of stealable lands; and the remnant of mission 

 priests as pious frauds. A Californian historian said in sub- 

 stance: "The Indians are in the way of State progress; the 

 sooner they are out of the way the better. Should their pro- 

 tectors, the Fathers, try to preserve them, well, then sweep the 

 Fathers away too!" Such was the sentiment of the American- 

 Californian. Everybody and everything which did not 

 minister to greed for wealth must be stamped out. 



I stayed in San Francisco two weeks waiting for the steamer 

 for the States. With the Geysers, the Big Trees and the Yo- 

 semite within my reach (these curiosities which Eastern tourists 

 now go thousands of miles to see) within a hundred miles or so, 

 I confined my travels to the boundaries of the city. My humble 

 way of life in the State had prevented me from hearing of 

 them, and, had it been different, I was so anxious to go home 

 on my earnings that I doubt if I would have visited these 

 noted scenes. I did not even go to Sacramento, although the 

 competition had reduced the fare to fifty cents. I have many 

 times regretted that I did not make better use of my oppor- 

 tunities, but 'tis ever thus ! But then this neglect of oppor- 

 tunities has its compensation. The reader is spared a reiter- 

 ated account of the above-named wonders, with a chance of it 

 being a guide-book rehash of scenery afflicted with lacka- 

 daisical names, of trees of unbelievable sizes, and so on to the 

 bitter end. Nowadays these descriptions are generally "skipped," 



