NOTES OF ENTERPRISE. 
47 
had heard from home but once in six months, and my anxiety 
and pleasure can well be imagined, when, in answer to my 
inquiry, I was handed a half-dozen letters. I went to a restau¬ 
rant, read my letters, ate a $3.50 beefsteak, and felt as rich as 
men are generally supposed to feel after a six months’ residence. 
I could neither get room nor lodgings in town. Many of the 
business men, and all the transient people, lived in tents. My 
tent was still on board the ship, and my friend above spoken of, 
offered me the hospitalities of his own for the night. 
In the morning I took my writing-desk, and climbed to an 
eminence in the vicinity of the city, to write to my friends at 
home. Seating myself under a cluster of small trees which pro¬ 
tected me from the sun, I commenced, and, with the exception 
of an interval for dinner, spent the day in writing. The scene 
around me was animated. Everything appeared to be propelled 
by the most indomitable perseverance. The frame of a house 
would be taken from the ship in the morning, and at night it 
was fully tenanted. The clatter of the innumerable hammers, 
each answered by a thousand echoes, seemed the music by 
which the city was being marshalled into existence. Ships 
were constantly arriving; coming to anchor a mile out, they 
would immediately disgorge their cargoes, which, taken by 
lighters, were conveyed to the shore, and thrown into heaps, 
their owners running about to contract for their immediate 
transportation into the interior. Others were seen rowing off 
to vessels, which, after receiving their complement of passengers, 
would weigh anchor and stand for the strait, which is the joint 
mouth of the Sacramento and San Joaquin Eivers. 
Towards evening the scene became less animated, and the 
noise more subdued. I could but look with admiration upon 
the heightened beauty of the scene, as Nature was about to 
repose. A smile of approbation seemed to play upon her 
countenance as she was taking the last view of this, the perfec¬ 
tion of her works. 
t 
The sun is almost down, tinging only some of the highest 
peaks of the surrounding mountains. The city, extending from 
the bay up the left base and side of the mountain, is about to 
cease her notes of enterprise, and light her lamps. At the base, 
directly under my feet, is an encampment of one hundred tents, 
