^^;
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 RIVERSIDE
 
 ^^-VNXVSS
 
 LITERARY INDUSTRIES 
 
 H /iDemoir 
 
 BY 
 
 HUBERT HOWE BANCROFT 
 
 All my life I have followed few and simple aims, but I have always 
 known my own purpose clearly, and that is a source of infinite strength. 
 
 lyUlutm Waldorf Astor. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 HARPER & BROTHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE 
 
 1891
 
 e 
 
 2 ^ - 
 
 Copyright, 1890, by Hubert II. Bancroft. 
 
 Copyright, 1S91, by Hubert II. Bancroft. 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 
 Elcctrotypcd by T. L. DE VINNE & CO., New York.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 INTRODUCTION vii 
 
 Chapter I. 
 
 THE FIELD I 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 t^ THE ATMOSPHERE 8 
 
 W CHAPTER III. 
 
 cr 
 
 § SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS 25 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 
 THE country BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER 41 
 
 z 
 
 5 Chapter V. 
 
 5 hail CALIFORNIA ! ESTO PERPETUA ! 56 
 
 . Chapter VI. 
 
 THE HOUSE OF H. H. BANCROFT AND COMPANY 73 
 
 ^ Chapter VII. 
 
 * FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE 87 
 
 O 
 
 i« Chapter VIII. 
 
 t Q 
 
 ^ the LIBRARY I08 
 
 Chapter IX. 
 
 DESPERATE ATTEMPTS AT GREAT THINGS 12$ 
 
 \ Chapter X. 
 
 A LITERARY WORKSHOP 134 
 
 §34606
 
 . IV . . ^ CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Chapter XI. 
 
 MY FIRST BOOK 146 
 
 Chapter XII. 
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING 168 
 
 Chapter XIII. 
 
 THE TWO GENERALS I92 
 
 Chapter XIV. 
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY 202 
 
 Chapter XV. 
 
 GOVERNOR ALVAR ADO 222 
 
 Chapter XVI. 
 
 CLOSE OF THE CERRUTI-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN 230 
 
 Chapter XVII. 
 
 HOME 242 
 
 Chapter XVIII. 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO ARCHIVES 250 
 
 Chapter XIX. 
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH 259 
 
 Chapter XX. 
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD 282 
 
 Chapter XXI. 
 
 FURTHER library DETAIL 308 
 
 Chapter XXII. 
 
 MV METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY 330 
 
 Chapter XXIII. 
 
 FURTHER INGATHERINGS 349
 
 CONTENTS. V 
 
 PACE 
 
 Chapter XXIV. 
 
 PRELIMINARY AND SUPPLEMENTAL VOLUMES 363 
 
 Chapter XXV. 
 
 BODY AND MIND 373 
 
 Chapter XXVI. 
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO , 384 
 
 Chapter XXVII. 
 
 TOWARD THE END 403 
 
 Chapter XXVIII. 
 
 BURNED OUT ! 412 
 
 Chapter XXIX. 
 
 the history company AND THE BANCROFT COMPANY. 426
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 WHEN we contemplate a great work of any kind we are 
 naturally led to inquire into the origin of it. We ask 
 ourselves how it was conceived; how the germ-idea of it 
 was developed; how it grew to its full proportions; and 
 above all, what manner of man it was to whom the accom- 
 plishment of such a work was given. In this volume of 
 memoirs the genesis, evolution, and completion of one of 
 the most remarkable literary undertakings of the age are de- 
 scribed, and in the most interesting of forms, namely, the auto- 
 biographic. The life and work of Hubert Howe Bancroft, 
 moreover, afford a study of one of the rarest and most potent 
 of combinations — that of the faculties which belong to the 
 scholar and to the man of action. For the most part these 
 faculties are found apart. The scholar is seldom a man of 
 action ; the man of action is seldom a scholar. The devotion 
 of all available energies to business has usually been thought 
 incompatible with the development and pursuit of any high 
 intellectual aim. The devotion of all available energies to 
 intellectual work has as a rule appeared incompatible with 
 success in what are called practical affairs. Mr. Bancroft's 
 memoirs not only prove him to be possessed of both these 
 capacities, but they clearly show that this rare and peculiar 
 combination could alone have enabled him to carry out his 
 life-work as he has done. 
 
 For it will be seen that to accomplish the historical enter- 
 prise to which he devoted himself for thirty years, there were 
 required not only high literary qualities, but power of co-or- 
 dination, administration, and systematization as great as would 
 be demanded for the execution of some vast work of improve- 
 ment — some continental railway, or extensive scheme of 
 irrigation, of reclamation, or the development of some new
 
 VIU INTRODUCTION. 
 
 line of commerce. No mere scholar could have done this 
 work. Emerson has said that " the scholar is unfurnished 
 who has only literary weapons," and this would assuredly 
 have proved true in Mr. Bancroft's case had he not supple- 
 mented the ambition of a man of letters with the executive 
 capacity of a man of affairs. It is therefore in the just balance 
 of these distinct sets of faculties that we are to seek the ex- 
 planation of the most remarkable triumph of intellect and 
 industry ; and it is not claiming too much to assert that the 
 union of these qualifications in one individual may be rightly 
 regarded as in an especial manner the product of American 
 civilization. For there is no other country the conditions of 
 life in which tend to encourage and to ripen the divine ten- 
 dencies and capacities here concerned. However similar 
 human nature may be everywhere, all history shows that it is 
 modified by its environments in the most important manner. 
 Take away the opportunities for intellectual growth and for the 
 free evolution of thought, as the Inquisition took them away 
 from Spain, and in a few centuries one of the boldest, most 
 energetic, and progressive of peoples will be reduced to stag- 
 nation. Remove all barriers to free development, physical and 
 intellectual, as in the United States, and there is no combina- 
 tion of energies and abilities Avhich will not become possible. 
 Even the fullest political and legal emancipation cannot com- 
 pensate for the social pressure, the tyrannies of caste, custom, 
 and tradition, and the constraining influences of closely packed 
 population, which affect England, for example. 
 
 Youth in nationality, space in territory, the breadth of op- 
 portunity belonging to rapid, vigorous growth, and ample 
 room for expression — are specially American advantages; 
 and to them must be ascribed phenomena so striking and un- 
 exampled as are illustrated in the career recorded in the 
 following pages. It might i)crhaj)S be said that the story of 
 the Ohio farmer's son, so simply yet grajihically told here, 
 affords no indication of special capacity or bent. But even 
 in the account of that farmer boy's early days, there may be 
 perceived a force of imagination, a blind yearning for high
 
 INTRODUCTION. IX 
 
 things, sufficiently noticeable to furnish grounds of expectation. 
 The writer of the memoirs, himself, is indeed perfectly candid in 
 his chronicle. We never find him posing for effect, or reading 
 new meanings into old and insignificant incidents, or taking 
 credit for feelings, impulses, or aspirations in advance of his 
 years. As described by himself, his mental development 
 was easy, natural, and by no means rapid. It was that of a 
 healthy nature, brought up under thoroughly wholesome con- 
 ditions. But if there is in these early years comparatively 
 little to indicate special endowments or predilections, the evi- 
 dence that these had been latent is clear enough when the 
 critical moment arrives. In his apprenticeship, as it may well 
 be termed, Mr. Bancroft appears very like other lads and 
 young men, crude, unformed, awkward, yet withal showing a 
 certain resolution and will-force suggestive of decided charac- 
 ter at maturity. A little business experience developed a httle 
 confidence and independence. The young book-store clerk 
 felt an inclination to try his own hand at trade, and poor suc- 
 cess in the beginning did not daunt him. 
 
 Then came the idea of California — at that time a very 
 general one among spirited youths. But Avhereas the ma- 
 jority who went to California did so with the sole purpose of 
 making money by mining, Hubert Howe Bancroft had clear 
 and practical business views. Already one side of his char- 
 acter — the commercial — was opening out. Once in Cali- 
 fornia, he sought to utilize time and opportunity. He suffered 
 some failures at the outset, of which he gives entertaining ac- 
 counts, but he never permitted himself to be dismayed, and, 
 when his invoices of books came, he opened a store and forth- 
 with prospered. Perhaps it might have been found particu- 
 larly interesting had he thought fit to dwell more upon this 
 period of his hfe. But he has himself put on record the fact 
 that he ** never found any difficulty in making money," and 
 the very extent of his business and financial capacities seems 
 to have been regarded by him as scarcely requiring notice or 
 consideration. This, however, is a most interesting point in 
 his career. Money-making is the most seductive, fascinating,
 
 X INTRODUCTION, 
 
 and absorbing of occupations, and it tends always to usurp 
 larger areas in the minds given over to it. The instances in 
 which able men of business have, in the full current of pros- 
 perity, deliberately paused and resolved to devote, if neces- 
 sary, all their remaining years to some enterprise from which, 
 in the nature of things, little or no money-profit could be 
 expected, yet which could demand great, constant, and pro- 
 tracted expenditure, — are few indeed. Yet this is what Mr. 
 Bancroft did. 
 
 It is not to be imagined that his undertaking issued from 
 his mind complete and full panoplied, like IMinerva from the 
 brain of Jove. Such enterprises are never thus suddenly 
 conceived. Nature does not proceed by leaps and bounds. 
 Precisely how the germ-idea of his life-work was evolved, Mr. 
 Bancroft relates in these memoirs. His firm was prepar- 
 ing a Pacific coast almanac, and local statistics and facts were 
 demanded by the compiler of the publication. Mr. Bancroft 
 went through his stock of books and found from fifty to 
 seventy-five works dealing with California and the coast in 
 some way. These he brought together in one place, and sur- 
 veying them expressed the opinion that they made quite a 
 respectable showing. Subsequently, he picked up several 
 more books of the same class in second-hand bookstores, 
 and he found a number of pamphlets in lawyers' ofiices. 
 Slowly the idea began to dawn upon him that the subject 
 was larger than he had thought it. He went east on busi- 
 ness, and in New York and Boston and Philadelphia -he 
 sought for books on California and the Pacific coast. Thus 
 his collection grew until it had something hke a thousand 
 volumes ; and at this point, he for the moment thought his 
 labor finished. But by this time he was beginning to obtain 
 definite views as to the subject, and a visit to Europe com- 
 pletely opened his eyes. When he examined the vast stocks 
 of second-hand books in London and other great cities, he 
 realized that hitherto he had been merely gleaning, and that 
 if he was to accomplish anything both his scope and method 
 must be altered.
 
 INTRODUCTION. XI 
 
 Ninety-nine men out of every hundred would in all prob- 
 ability have abandoned the afitair at precisely this stage, and 
 that Mr. Bancroft did not do so sufficiently testifies to the ex- 
 ceptional character of his mind. Here was a business man 
 who had, so most people would think, every incentive to con- 
 fine himself strictly to his affairs. He had built up a large, 
 growing, and highly profitable business, which might well have 
 engrossed him. He had before him a reasonable certainty of 
 wealth, '• beyond the dreams of avarice," as Dr. Johnson has 
 put it. It was now perfectly apparent that to secure anything 
 like all that had been written about California and the Pacific 
 coast he would have to spend large sums, and it was not 
 at all clear that when he had collected all these books he 
 could do with them anything that would prove remunerative. 
 But none of these considerations affected his course. On the 
 contrary, step by step, as the field opened out before his re- 
 search, his ambition and his resolve expanded and mounted. 
 Accident threw in his way an unrivaled collection of early 
 Mexican literature. The perusal of the catalogue showed 
 him the depth of the vistas that lay before him, but the grow- 
 ing importance and difficulty of the task did not discourage 
 him. He bought, bought largely, and reached out in all 
 directions for more material. His little collection was now 
 swelling rapidly. It continued to expand : it grew from one 
 to five thousand : then to ten thousand ; and by that time he 
 had made arrangements with European dealers, established i 
 agencies, provided for representatives at all the important 
 book sales, and generally made such provision as resulted in 
 a steady flow of books, setting in from all parts of Europe and 
 discharging at San Francisco. , 
 
 Long before this Mr. Bancroft had made up his mind that i 
 his chief business in life thenceforth should be the exploitation i 
 of this immense mass of literary, historic, archccological, and , 
 ethnological material. Exactly after what plan he should 
 proceed was not yet shown to him. The first object to be 
 attained was the completion of the library. Only such an 
 enthusiasm as now possessed him could have carried him
 
 XU INTRODUCTION. 
 
 through this preHminary period, during which his expendi- 
 tures were continually increasing and there was absolutely 
 nothing to show for them but a mass of books. But Mr. 
 Bancroft persevered, and the day came when he felt that his 
 collection was relatively complete : that it was ready for use : 
 and that he must determine how it should be used. The 
 memoirs are exceedingly interesting at this stage. Naturally 
 Mr. Bancroft consulted literary friends and sometimes busi- 
 ness ones. Many advised him to employ his material in the 
 preparation of a Pacific coast encyclopedia. Doubtless such 
 a Avork would have been valuable and interesting, but had he 
 undertaken it the oppc)rtunity of his life would have been 
 ruined, and the world would have lost the admirable and 
 monumental work so fittingly completed by this volume of 
 autobiography. It is not to be supposed that while the 
 Bancroft Library was being so laboriously gathered, its owner 
 was not thinking to the purpose about its possible literary 
 use. As the extent of the field covered became clearer with 
 each addition to its magazine of facts, his conceptions crys- 
 tallized more and more definitely into a gigantic scheme of 
 history. This, it was borne in upon him, was the natural end 
 to which, and to which alone, such a library should be put. 
 It was now beyond doubt that he had brought together an 
 absolutely unrivalled collection for such a purpose, and though 
 a history of Mexico, at least, had been recently written, and 
 by a historian of distinction, it could not be disputed that the 
 data now obtained very fully exceeded, both in extent and 
 significance, what had been available by Prescott. 
 
 But it is one thing to determine that a library of twenty- 
 five or thirty thousand volumes, in a dozen languages, shall 
 be devoted to a definite literary end, and it is quite another 
 thing to make such an end attainable. The very size of the 
 library threatened at first to smother the undertaking. It was 
 very soon realized by Mr. Bancroft that it would be mere 
 midsummer madness for him to attempt alone the work he 
 contemplated. The utmost industry, steadily exerted during 
 a liundrcd years, would not suffice to reduce into manageable
 
 INTRODUCTION. XllI 
 
 shape the contents of the collection in his hands. The ne- 
 cessity of bringing that material into some kind of systematic 
 and easily available arrangement, indeed, constituted in itself 
 a problem of the most difficult character. There was, more- 
 over, no tradition or precedent that could be referred to for 
 guidance. The whole scheme was a new departure. Mr. 
 Bancroft was about to attempt what had never been attempted 
 by an individual before. With characteristically American 
 audacity he had determined to take upon himself a work the 
 like of which, if ever approached in the past, had been con- 
 fined to some learned body or some monastic order, carried on 
 at the cost of some wealthy government and extended over 
 several generations in time. That one man, and he first a 
 man of business and but incidentally a rnan of letters, should 
 undertake to write the history of the greater part of the New 
 World, should project a literary series of thirty-nine large 
 octavo volumes, and should consider it possible to carry out 
 this colossal enterprise within his own life-time may well have 
 seemed chimerical and even preposterous to the average ob- 
 server. 
 
 So probably it would have proved had not the projector in 
 this instance differed essentially from the typical scholar and 
 man of letters. For at the very threshold of the undertaking 
 there was a demand for that power of organization, that ad- 
 ministrative analytic capacity which is so much more com- 
 mon in active than in contemplative life. But Mr. Bancroft's 
 duality of resources stood him in good stead. The initial 
 problem — how to use the library — had to be solved before 
 the work could be begun ; and he solved it. Not the least 
 brilliant among his feats is this invention of the beautifully 
 scientific, simple, and practical system of indexing which he 
 devised for his own use, and which may be said to have in- 
 troduced principles and methods which, if intelligently and 
 faithfully applied, must immensely increase the productive 
 powers of authors and the utilization of great libraries. By 
 this system of indexing — which is fully described by Mr. 
 Bancroft in the present volume — it was made comparatively
 
 XIV INTRODUCTION. 
 
 easy to get the required information out of every book in his 
 collection, and no matter how that collection might grow, this 
 system v/ould adjust itself infallibly to the process. One ele- 
 ment of uncertainty and embarrassment alone remained, but 
 experience only could correct that. Human nature is always 
 a most dubious factor, and no system which is not absolutely 
 'mechanical and automatic can be made independent of the 
 personal equation. This Mr. Bancroft was forced to realize 
 by vexatious experience. When one of his assistants was in- 
 structed to extract certain specified information from certain 
 books, it was only of the veterans that definite results could 
 be predicted. The undisciphned mind, however well educated 
 theoretically, frequently found itself unable to grasp the sig- 
 nificance of the great plan, and much precious time and money 
 was wasted before a thoroughly drilled staff was brought 
 together. 
 
 No difficulties, however, were permitted to stand long in 
 the way, and when the executive triumph of overcoming the 
 inertia of the library's mass had been achieved, and patient 
 work on the lines so clearly laid down by Mr. Bancroft had 
 accumulated a quantity of well-arranged matter on such a 
 wide range of subjects as rendered the beginning of the work 
 of authorship possible, the literary side of this remarkable man's 
 character came to the front, and vindicated the genuineness 
 of that powerful bent which by some might be regarded as 
 the sign of a foreordained mission, and others would con- 
 sider evidence of that specialization, concentration, and ele- 
 vation of intellectual energy which the world has agreed to 
 call genius. The practical man, the man of affairs, the enter- 
 prising publisher and manufacturer might strike out a new 
 system of indexing, and bring it to a working test with suc- 
 cess. But it did not follow that such a man would be capable 
 of ])utting his own machinery to the literary uses for which it 
 v/as intended. It did not indeed follow the theory, but the 
 fact soon appeared that the man of action in Mr. Bancroft 
 was no stronger than the man of letters. They worked to- 
 gether in perfect harmony, in short, each taking on his proper
 
 INTRODUCTION. XV 
 
 functions when the occasion appeared, and neither infringing 
 upon the other's domain. When the need was for planning, 
 the man of action planned. When the time came for writing, 
 the man of letters wrote. 
 
 Not that the great enterprise proceeded smoothly and in 
 strict conformity with prearranged purposes. To have as- 
 serted that would almost have justified suspicion of charlatan- 
 ism. In this volume Mr. Bancroft lays bare the genesis of 
 his work, and is careful to set forth all the hesitation and un- 
 certainty which beset him at the beginning. There was a 
 time when his library almost stifled him : when the enormous 
 labor to be undergone in extracting the gold from all this 
 crude ore seemed so hopeless, so insuperable, that he was 
 tempted in specially despondent moments to abandon his hope 
 and ambition. It may be said with truth that at such mo- 
 ments he did not know himself, for his whole career demon- 
 strates that perseverance is one of his dominant characteristics, 
 and that it was not in him to withdraw his hand from the 
 work for which he had already made so many sacrifices. When 
 the indexing system was perfected the work of extraction 
 was begun, but it was long before the author could de- 
 termine the direction in which to break ground. It appears, 
 indeed, from his own statement, that he wished to leave the 
 treatment of the Native Races to a later period, and that the 
 subject was somewhat uncongenial to him. Its complexity 
 and extent, the mass of new facts to be examined, classified, 
 and commented upon, the difficulty of the ethnological prob- 
 lems to be involved, and, perhaps above all, the lack of trust- 
 worthy pioneers and guides in this comparatively virgin field, — 
 m.ight v/ell have daunted a much more experienced investi- 
 gator, and Avould surely have wrought confusion in a weaker 
 brain. But Mr. Bancroft, having once resolved upon the 
 course to be followed, proceeded to lay down for himself cer- 
 tain principles and rules. " In all my work," he writes, " I 
 was detennined to keep upon firm ground, to avoid meaning- 
 less and even technical terms, to avoid theories, speculations, 
 and superstitions of every kind^ and to deal only in facts.
 
 XVI INTRODUCTION. 
 
 This I relied on more than on any other one thing. My work 
 could not be wholly worthless if I gathered only facts, and 
 arranged them in some form which should bring them within 
 reach of those who had not access to my material, or who 
 could not use it if they had : whereas theories might be over- 
 thrown as worthless." Upon these lines the first five volumes 
 entitled Native Races were written, and because they were 
 so written they must ever constitute the most valuable and 
 absolutely indispensable magazine of facts. 
 
 In his account of the production of this part of his histor- 
 ical series Mr. Bancroft introduces the reader to his library 
 and his staff of assistants, shows the machinery of extraction 
 and compilation in operation, describes the entire process, and 
 furnishes much interesting information concerning the band 
 of more or less faithful assistants whose services could alone 
 enable him to carry out, in a single life-time, plans the ac- 
 complishment of which upon the old methods of authorship 
 would have required centuries. In the course of these con- 
 fidences one is made to see how many unexpected incapacities 
 are likely to be developed in an undertaking testing so severely 
 the fitness of all engaged upon it. Mr. Bancroft's staff had 
 to be made, and the process of making was both tedious and 
 costly. But when all the inefficient aspirants had been elim- 
 inated, he had under his hands a band of literary workmen 
 perhaps unmatched for effective ability. The Native Races 
 proved a stubborn task, and by the time it was finished the 
 whole literary machinery was in magnificent working order. 
 Whoever examines the work carefully will see that it is one 
 which might in itself have served for the labor of a life-time; 
 but to Mr. Bancroft it was merely the introduction to a long 
 series of historical productions. What is still more remarkable, 
 it was not the result of undisturbed leisure and closely con- 
 centrated employment. All through his literary career this 
 author has been accustomed to turn from purely intellectual 
 to executive affairs. When most closely engaged with his 
 literary enterprises he would detach himself long enough to 
 grasp the whole ramification of a great and growing business,
 
 INTRODUCTION. XVU 
 
 to clear up difficult financial or other problems, to straighten 
 out commercial tangles, and to put everything in the best con- 
 dition. That done, he would plunge again into his books, 
 and think no more about the business until his intervention 
 and supervision were again needed. 
 
 At this point he halted for a while in order that he might 
 obtain the judgment of competent writers upon what he had 
 accomplished; and he determined to visit the eastern states 
 personally, and submit his work to the leading literary and 
 scientific men, as a test of the value of the whole undertaking. 
 The chapters in which this visit is described are full of a new 
 kind of attraction. It is impossible not to sympathize with 
 the sensitive man who, absorbed in his great scheme, recounts 
 his experience with men of letters, men of science, poets, 
 professors, and critics whom he visited at the east. Remem- 
 bering what poor human nature is, and how inevitable it is 
 that the majority of men should be wrapped up in their own 
 affairs, and consequently offer little more than lip-service to 
 even the most deserving of their neighbors, — it may be 
 thought that the reception encountered by Mr. Bancroft was 
 uncommonly cordial and appreciative. It is, however, evi- 
 dent that at this juncture he was in a somewhat abnormal con- 
 dition. His sensibility was unduly excited by overwork, and 
 every show of even relative indifference wounded him cruelly. 
 
 There Avas, as he makes fully manifest, the best reason for 
 satisfaction with the effect which the Native Races pro- 
 duced ; for not only from every part of the United States but 
 from every civilized country in Europe, expressions of delight, 
 admiration, and approval soon began to pour in upon the 
 author. In short, those five initial volumes really made his 
 hterary reputation, and secured him a world-wide hearing for 
 whatever else he might pubhsh. The two prime essentials 
 for belief in him had now been fully determined. It was 
 known that he possessed all the available material : it was 
 proved that he knew how to use it to the greatest advantage. 
 Henceforth it was only necessary that he should maintain the 
 standard of work he had himself established. 
 B
 
 XVm INTRODUCTION. 
 
 It is unnecessary to enumerate here the titles of the histories 
 which steadily proceeded from the Bancroft Library after this. 
 No interruptions occurred in the publication, and year after 
 year the chronicles were emitted until the whole Pacific coast, 
 including Mexico and Central America, had been dealt with 
 in a manner so exhaustive that no room was left for any 
 further exploitations of the subjects treated in these volumes. 
 It was inevitable that the first really thorough research ever 
 made into the past of these regions should bring to light 
 many facts which either threw doubt upon or entirely dis- 
 proved representations made previously by less thoroughly 
 equipped investigators. In all cases the fullness of Mr. 
 Bancroft's information, and the rigorous impartiality of his 
 methods, resulted in the nearest approach possible in human 
 history to definite settlement. The presumption against the 
 probability of more penetrating or comprehensive research at 
 any future time was too strong to afibrd much encourage- 
 ment to controversy, and Mr. Bancroft's facts and methods 
 together made him too formidable an adversary to be lightly 
 challenged. 
 
 When in writing the history of American states such as 
 California, Oregon, Nevada, Colorado, Montana, etc., he 
 found himself approaching the present day, an entirely new 
 task was forced upon him. A less conscientious author might 
 have contented himself with collecting extant authorities, but 
 that was not enough for Mr. Bancroft. He felt that in all 
 
 ' these cases it was his duty to procure both written and oral 
 evidences wherever possible from the still living actors in 
 
 ' every important event. Everywhere the American pioneers 
 of the Pacific coast were dying out. In a few years they 
 .would all be gone, and then many weighty questions must 
 remain unanswered, or doubtfully answered, unless the actual 
 
 ^ truth was obtained from the lips or pens of these state-makers. 
 The project was magnificent, but it involved labor which to 
 
 I any man without his prior experience in the collection and 
 handling of facts might well have seemed colossal. It would 
 be necessary to employ a small army of agents to visit and
 
 INTRODUCTION. XIX 
 
 examine hundreds of people v.ho v/ere scattered all over thej 
 Pacific coast. Each one of these agents must be perfectly! 
 trustworthy, more than commonly intelhgent, and gifted with 
 tact, judgment, and patience. For to get the essential facts 
 from old pioneers is not the easiest business, especially when 
 they are illiterate and liable to those imaginative eccentrici- 
 ties which have done so much to confuse history, and to 
 subject it to the stigma of unreliability. In a less extended 
 enter|3rise the simplest method might have been to issue in- 
 structions to the travelling agent to take down everything 
 and send it all to headquarters for sifting and arrangement. 
 This plan, however, would have so magnified the work to be 
 done that even with the admirable machinery of the Bancroft 
 Library the time required would have been almost indefinitely 
 extended. 
 
 The system adopted by Mr. Bancroft seemed probably the 
 closest approximation to the truth attainable. When the ver- 
 sions of any affair given by contemporaries were hopelessly 
 discordant, he determined to publish both accounts rather 
 than to attempt the impracticable feat of deciding between 
 them. Of course this expansion of the general scheme in- 
 creased the cost as well as the labor, and necessitated the 
 addition of several volumes to the series. But, carried out as 
 it has been, it has enhanced the value of all these histories be- 
 yond computation, and has secured the permanent preserva- 
 tion of a mass of most important — it maybe said even price- 
 less — original information, the collection of which would by 
 the end of this century have become altogether impossible, 
 and which, it may be confidently asserted, never would or 
 could have been gathered in any other way. In the present 
 volume Mr. Bancroft gives a lively and clear description, 
 which may be accepted as typical, of the shifts and contri- 
 vances which frequently had to be employed to induce old 
 settlers and pioneers to relate what they knew. Indeed, in 
 the case of generals Alvarado and Vallejo, which is here told 
 at length, there is all the excitement of a campaign, and the 
 display of generalship is by no means contemptible. Much
 
 XX INTRODUCTION. 
 
 of the difficulty encountered in disinterring reminiscences and 
 records of past times arose from the greed of the persons 
 holding the information sought. Not infrequently they looked 
 upon their special knowledge or their documentary evidence 
 as property to be held for the highest market, and if Mr. 
 Bancroft had once accepted this view he would have needed 
 the revenue of the United States to carry out his plans. Of 
 course, the better class of old settlers were willing and ready 
 to tell all they knew, but there Avas one notable exception 
 even here. 
 
 It was necessary that in writing the history of California 
 the truth should be told about the two great vigilance com- 
 mittee campaigns of San Francisco. But the vigilance com- 
 mittee was compelled to do many things the strict legality of 
 which was open to question. They had moreover incurred 
 the enmity of a great many people who had survived those 
 troubled times, and had since become in some cases Avealthy 
 and influential. It was apprehended, consequently, that any 
 disclosure of the inmost secrets of the old organization would 
 produce a revival of enmities which had lapsed by the mere 
 passage of time, and that possibly litigation of a vexatious 
 and costly character might ensue. The result of such fears 
 was that when Mr. Bancroft tried to get at the truth, he was 
 met by obstinate refusals to make any disclosures, and that 
 for a time it looked as though he might be compelled to slur 
 over this important period in his history of California. But 
 he persevered, despite the discouraging outlook, and by per- 
 suasion and adroit management finally overcame the reticence 
 of those who knew all the facts, and was then able to present 
 a complete and fully authoritative record of all the proceed- 
 ings. It may be worth while to add that no little courage 
 was required to put on record the naked truths concerning 
 many things which had to be discussed in the historical series 
 dealing with those states and territories whose early periods 
 had been more or less stormy and anarchic. In all these 
 young and unformed settlements there had been much of a 
 character to cause humiliation to those concerned in looking
 
 INTRODUCTION. XXI 
 
 back upon the past. Bold crime, factional plots scarcely 
 bearing the color of legality, rapacious seizures of land, cruel 
 and cowardly raids upon the weak elements of the commu- 
 nity extend into the common annals, and these things were 
 too recent for it to be possible to revive the memory of them 
 without striking severe blows at many persons. 
 
 In Europe, when a public personage who has moved con- 
 spicuously in diplomacy or statecraft dies, leaving memoirs 
 behind him, it has been customary for his executors to post- 
 pone the publication of such matter as may incriminate the 
 living. Not until a generation has passed away are such 
 memoirs usually permitted to see the light, and occasionally, 
 as in the case of Talleyrand, the delay has been still longer. 
 While there can be no doubt that such an arrangement is 
 convenient for people who have uneasy consciences and vul- 
 nerable records, it is evident that it is diametrically opposed 
 to the interests of history, and that its most obvious conse- 
 quence is to remove all those opportunities for correction and 
 verification wliich the submission to contemporaries of his- 
 torical reminiscences most certainly affords. Timid historians 
 naturally refrain from protesting against a custom which re- 
 lieves them of many apprehensions; but the general result is 
 the incorporation of serious misrepresentations into the his- 
 tory of the period. Now Mr. Bancroft could not afford to 
 wait twenty or thirty years before publishing his histories of 
 the newer states, and he would not soften the truth lest it 
 should offend those who were exposed or discredited by it. 
 The principle which he adopted as his guide and as the sol- 
 vent of difficulties, when preparing to write the Native Races, 
 was indeed the principle upon which his whole career had 
 been directed. To cleave to the facts, to tell the truth as 
 the facts revealed it, without regard to consequences, was his 
 simple but sufficient resolve, and well and nobly has he held 
 to this rule of action. 
 
 There have been times when his inherent sympathy for the 
 oppressed and wronged, his inherent resentment of all tyraimy 
 and bullying and fraud and wrong, have led him to the expres-
 
 XXU INTRODUCTION. 
 
 . sion of opinions in stronger terms than can be reconciled with 
 philosophic calm and dispassionateness. But those who most 
 disapprove of the infusion of such heat into historical writing 
 must admit, if they are candid, that Mr. Bancroft never loses 
 his temper in endeavoring to make the worse appear the 
 better cause. On the contrary, in every instance of this ve- 
 hemence in his works, it will be found that his indignation 
 is excited by, and follows, the complete establishment of a 
 formidable case of wrong-doing against the persons or the 
 community he condemns. The distinction is important : it 
 might be said that it is vital. It is the distinction between 
 the functions of the advocate and those of the judge : yet it 
 is a distinction which, in politics, is almost invariably lost sight 
 of, and which is confused, to the lasting injury of their work, 
 by too many otherwise capable historians. It is always much 
 easier to question Mr. Bancroft's literary tact than the lucidity 
 and honesty of his judgments : and not seldom these arc the 
 most honorable to him, and the least open to serious contra- 
 vention, when they defy in the boldest manner the current 
 conventionalities which are at bottom only base and craven 
 compromises with unpalatable because discreditable truths. 
 
 A common man would have thought himself amply justified 
 in glossing over the awkward places in state history, in palli- 
 ating past iniquities, in suppressing damaging facts not allow- 
 ing investigation, — in short, in " making things pleasant" for 
 everybody. Not so Mr. Bancroft. His view of the historian's 
 duty and responsibility was embarrassingly high : embarrass- 
 ingly, that is, for those who had causes for desiring conceal- 
 ment, repression, or silence in regard to their past. It was 
 for him to state the facts as they occurred, after he had taken 
 every means possible to verify his information. This course 
 he pursued with undeviating consistency ; and the time will 
 come, if it is not already here, when this quality of his his- 
 torical works — this devotion to truth and justice — will be 
 prized as one of the most precious characteristics of his writ- 
 ings. It may be safely asserted that American history has 
 been written by no other author after this manner. The plea
 
 INTRODUCTION. XXUl 
 
 of patriotism has been employed to justify the misrepresenta- 
 tion of facts far too frequently, and when that has not been the 
 case partisan bias has been suftered to intrude and give the 
 color to everything. Mr. Bancroft, however, allows nothing 
 to divert or deflect him from his purpose, which is the ascer- 
 tainment and presentation of the truth. In regard to style, 
 grace, and fluency of expression, and literary effectiveness of 
 statement, fault may sometimes be found with him. In all 
 the qualities of the honorable, self-respecting, courageous, and 
 judicial historian, he is without a superior : and nowhere has 
 he shown these sterling qualities so clearly as in his treatment 
 of the early periods of the younger states. 
 
 Many readers will no doubt find particular pleasure in the 
 parts of this book which describe Mr. Bancroft's literary ar- 
 rangements and the methods of his work. It was only in 
 iSSo that his invaluable library was placed beyond the reach 
 of fire. Up to that time it occupied the top floor of the Ban- 
 croft building on Market street, and while there it sustained 
 one fearful peril, the store below being on fire. With the 
 transfer of the books to the fire-proof library building on 
 Valencia street, a new epoch may be said to have opened in 
 the great enterprise, and thenceforward the various sections 
 of the history of the Pacific coast continued to be issued 
 steadily, and at a rate which betokened the industry and 
 energy engaged. Of course this comparative rapidity of 
 publication could only have been maintained by the co- 
 operative system which Mr. Bancroft devised and so success- 
 fully operated : but some critics have made it a reproach to 
 him that he did not prepare every line himself, while others 
 have insinuated that his personal relation to the Avork was 
 that of the editor of a great modern newspaper, who as a 
 rule writes nothing himself for publication, but only directs 
 and controls the actual literary producers. The frank and 
 full statements of these memoirs sufliiciently meet and refute 
 such representations. The truth is that Mr. Bancroft has 
 always been the most persevering and indefatigable of writers, 
 and a few sentences from his own narrative will demonstrate
 
 XXIV INTRODUCTION. 
 
 this conclusively. Describing his personal habits he says: 
 " For years it was my custom to rise at seven, breakfast at half- 
 past seven, and write from eight until one, when I lunched or 
 dined. The afternoon was devoted to recreation and exercise. 
 Usually I would get in one hour's writing before six o'clock 
 tea or dinner, as the case might be, and four hours after- 
 wards, making ten hours in all for the day ; but interruptions 
 were so constant and frequent, that including the many long 
 seasons during which I hermited myself in the country, where 
 I often devoted twelve and fourteen hours a day to writing, 
 I do not think I averaged more than eight hours a day, taking 
 twenty years together." This passage is especially interest- 
 ing because it shows that Mr. Bancroft's power of persistence 
 was very far beyond that of the generality of writers. An 
 average of eight hours a day for twenty years in writing his- 
 tory is an almost unparalleled amount of work to do. To 
 write ten hours a day for several consecutive days would 
 break down nine-tenths of the most fluent authors; and 
 twelve to fourteen hours a day would kill the majority, sup- 
 posing them capable of accomplishing such a task. Only an 
 iron will working in an iron frame could have kept up this 
 extraordinary strain and made it a life -habit. But to pro- 
 duce the long series of histories which were issuing from the 
 press during these years, ceaseless activity was needed, and 
 here again Mr. Bancroft rose to the occasion with the prompt- 
 ness and determination which have marked all his movements 
 since he reached maturity. 
 
 When his hand grew stiff from holding the pen, and his 
 brain began to feel tired, he had his own methods of relief 
 and rest. At such times he would drop the history for a few 
 days and take up the superintendence of the great business 
 of his house. This, which might have been more than enough 
 for most people, seems to have refreshed our author, and to 
 have enabled him to return with renewed power and energies 
 to his ten hours a day of desk-work. The most remarkable 
 fact, however, is that in these strange transitions from literature 
 to commerce he really appears to have been able to call 
 
 1
 
 INTRODUCTION. XXV 
 
 upon an unused and fresh set of capacities : for his changes 
 were almost invariably advantageous to the business, to wb.icli 
 he brought new ideas, clear insight, and such a fertility of re- 
 source as — reasoning upon conventional principle — no one 
 would expect to find behind the brow of a man who for 
 months had been doing double work in an entirely different 
 direction. It is axiomatic that energy is a fixed quantity, and 
 that whatever proportion may be expended on one object is 
 lost to other objects. But as if in defiance of natural law, 
 the story of Mr. Bancroft seems to present an instance of a 
 dual endowment of energy, so arranged that both engines — 
 so to speak — could be worked to their highest power in dif- 
 ferent duties. He himself recognizes the use his business 
 training and capacity have been to him in his literary arrange- 
 ments, and also in arriving at the principles upon which he 
 should base his histories. As regards the latter, however, 
 there seems to be a slight confusion in his mind : for the prin- 
 ciples to which he refers are to be traced, not to any mechan- 
 ical business training, but to his inherent nature and character, 
 which alone could determine the use he should make of busi- 
 ness rules and practices. The way in which a man does busi- 
 ness affords insight to the man's character : only in a second- 
 ary manner to the nature of his training. In this instance we 
 find the character influencing and giving color and shape to 
 both business and literature : the innate capacities manifesting 
 themselves in each direction with an equality of force which 
 is, as has been remarked, one of the most remarkable traits 
 in his career. This combination indeed is so rare that it is 
 difficult to recall a similar example outside of fiction. In one 
 of Charles Reade's novels he has a very powerful creation, a 
 man of tremendous will and resource, who, having resolved 
 to go to Austraha in pursuit of his plans, in a few hours ma- 
 tures and carries out a crafty speculation by which he obtains 
 the funds needed for his projected journey. In much the same 
 way we see Mr. Bancroft rushing from history to business in 
 order to secure the funds necessary for carrying on his literary 
 enterprise ; and in every case his efforts are crowned with the
 
 XXVI INTRODUCTION. 
 
 same success. Once, as he relates, the business prospect was 
 very depressing. Everything in the near future had been dis- 
 counted. The completion of new lines of communication 
 had revolutionized business. A general sense of insecurity 
 and mistrust prevailed, and a widespread disaster seemed to 
 be possible. At such a juncture Mr. Bancroft was called 
 to the helm again, and succeeded in steering his house safely 
 through the storm : not without anxiety, but apparently with- 
 out great effort, for the gift of administration was strong within 
 him. 
 
 It is clear that he must possess also a rare power of detach- 
 ment and concentration, for it will be seen by the reader of 
 this volume that he was able even in the most disturbing cir- 
 cumstances to proceed with Hterary work, and that the direct 
 menace of absolute and final ruin could not overcome him 
 more than for the moment. He declares that nothing has 
 been able to hinder him from pursuing his life-work for a sin- 
 gle day since he first devoted himself to it, and this too is a 
 striking indication of character, pointing once more to the cu- 
 rious completeness of that dualism to which reference has been 
 made above, and intimating the reality of a double life on an 
 entirely different arrangement from anything known to ex- 
 perts in hypnotism and alienism, or to the imagination of 
 Mr. Robert Louis Stevenson. 
 
 Those who hope to derive from Mr. Bancroft's literary 
 experience practical guides for the formation of habits will, 
 it is to be feared, find very uncertain indications here. For 
 he appears to have followed no system ; and though he says 
 that he believes in rules for writing, there is little to show that 
 he allowed himself to be controlled by anything of the kind. 
 To use his own words : " There is no end to the rules and 
 regulations I have made to govern my writing. I believe in 
 them. Yet as it is impossible for man to make laws more 
 powerful than himself, I do not hesitate to break my rules 
 whenever occasion seems to demand it." Few men could 
 imitate his bursts of speed at times. For instance, he tells 
 how on one occasion, finding the constant interruptions at
 
 INTRODUCTION. , XXVll 
 
 tlie libraiy becoming intolerable, he rushed off into the coun- 
 try, and there, for six weeks, he worked twelve hours a day. 
 accomplishing more than in any other six weeks of his life. 
 With delightful unconsciousness that there was anything un- 
 usual in this performance, he remarks : " This, however, was 
 more of a strain than my system could bear for any length of 
 time. I did not break down under it : I only shifted my po- 
 sition. The mind fatigued with one class of work often finds 
 almost as much rest in change as in repose." Clearly his 
 mind did, but it is not commonly found that after such a 
 tremendous excess of work as he reports so lightly, there is 
 enough energy left to turn with profit from one employment 
 to another. That he could do this, and that he really expe- 
 rienced the relief he sought in doing it, proves the excep- 
 tional nature of his physical and mentrd qualities. 
 
 For such a labor as he had undertaken these exceptional 
 qualifications fitted and fortified him. In default of such 
 support it may well be doubted whether even the admirable 
 system by which the work was so facilitated and quickened 
 could have sufficed to secure the accomplishment of the task. 
 It was truly a labor of love, and that stood for much, but 
 merely average robustness and vigor would hardly have borne 
 the continuous strain and pressure. When the greater part 
 of the history was written, Mr. Bancroft refreshed himself by 
 various journeys in search of fresh materials, the most inter- 
 esting having been an expedition to Mexico. There, and in 
 several of the new states, he had experiences which he has 
 narrated with animation, and on returning home he threw 
 himself into the work of writing again with renewed spirit 
 and industr}\ He was away from home, at San Diego, where 
 he had bought an estate and was building, when a hurried 
 dispatch informed him that his store in San Francisco — the 
 great Bancroft building — was burning, and that there was 
 little hope of saving anything. The news was stunning. This 
 disaster occurred — as disasters so often do — under condi- 
 tions which enhanced its effect. It happened that the firm 
 had recently laid in a heavier stock than ever before of all
 
 XXVm INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the material in which it dealt, either by sale or by manufac- 
 ture. The liabilities were at their maximum, therefore, and 
 the crippling effect of the fire was much gi-eater than it would 
 have been earlier or later. The account given by Mr. Ban- 
 croft of this heavy blow is moving. It is clear that it was the 
 most staggering shock to his whole life-work. Fortunately 
 the library was saved, but all the printed books, all the stereo- 
 type plates, all the printing material had been destroyed, and 
 it was quite possible that when an exact estimate had been 
 made of the status of the house, it would appear that no 
 means remained either for the resumption of the business or 
 the carrying on of the history. 
 
 It is no wonder that for several days Mr. Bancroft felt in- 
 capable of doing anything, or that he could not bring him- 
 self to visit the ruins of the burned building. But it was 
 impossible for him to remain crushed and despondent. After 
 a little breathing-time he as ever rose to the occasion, assumed 
 the direction of everything, took measures to ascertain his 
 financial condition, and prepared to avail himself of every 
 means of extrication and recovery. After nearly thirty years 
 of unexampled toil ; after having — according to the common 
 measurements of human endurance — expended the best years 
 of his life and the reserve power of his constitution upon 
 the history, he found himself threatened with complete ruin, 
 yet he continued to plan and calculate coolly and with judg- 
 ment, and to hope obstinately. It was a time to try the soul, 
 not only of the chief sufferer, but of his creditors and business 
 rivals and connections. Evidently some of the experiences 
 encountered left bitter recollections, though Mr. Bancroft has 
 not enlarged upon these disappointments. Happily the oc- 
 casion also called forth many generous and noble movements, 
 and served to convince him that he had many real friends 
 and sympathizers. Presently, too, he knew exactly how he 
 stood, and then it became evident that the house was still 
 solvent, and that, however heavy the loss, it was possible to 
 write it off and take a fresh start. For a time he seems to 
 have hesitated, and to have had thoughts of winding up the 
 business. But serious considerations (and probably in chief
 
 INTRODUCTION. XXIX 
 
 his commercial interest) determined him not only to resume 
 business but to build again ; and though this decision involved 
 a great deal of very hard work, and the resumption of burdens 
 from which he had hoped to be finally relieved, nothing was 
 allowed to obstruct the programme, which was carried out to 
 the end, and with satisfactory results. 
 
 Little has been said in this Introduction of the domestic 
 side of Mr. Bancroft's life, though he has not vvithheld infor- 
 mation concerning it. The reader, however, will there judge 
 best unaided. No little light is incidentally thrown upon the 
 historian's temperament and character by his home annals, 
 restricted though they may be. It is evident, for example, 
 that he has always been a lover of that foundation and fos- 
 terer of all wholesome civilization and progress, the family 
 life; and that he has felt the need and the comfort of this 
 form of social existence. Not less evident is it that his rela- 
 tions have been happy and strengthening, and that he has 
 appreciated the benefits derived from them. Literature is a 
 jealous mistress, and those who follow her do not always find 
 it possible to maintain other attachments. It is not for noth- 
 ing that tradition brands men of letters as notoriously unfit 
 for marriage. The genus irritabilc natum includes more than 
 poets ; and women whose amiability could not be contested 
 have found it impossible to live with authors who in their 
 books appeared full of the milk of human kindness. Perhaps 
 there are fewer failures of this kind at present because the 
 old-fashioned man of letters has in a manner ceased to exist. 
 Mr. Bancroft, however, comes nearer to the ancient type of 
 literati, in the fervor and completeness of his devotion, and 
 in the scope and continuity of his labors, than perhaps any 
 of his contemporaries. That under the circumstances he 
 should have been able to lead a life of repose and harmony 
 in his home may consequently be very well considered as 
 another proof of the exceptional nature of the man, and 
 especially of that dualism of character which has enabled 
 him to separate so absolutely the different and incompatible 
 roles he has been required to play. 
 
 The memoirs themselves will furnish whatever other infer-
 
 XXX INTRODUCTION. 
 
 mation may be needed for the building up of a tolerably- 
 complete picture of the historian of the Pacific coast, and 
 will, it may be predicted with confidence, lead unprejudiced 
 and clear-minded readers to the conclusion that they have 
 been the materials for forming a correct estimate of a human 
 soul deserving particular study. An effort has been made in 
 these preliminary pages to point out what seem to be the 
 most significant features in the character and career of an au- 
 thor whose qualities are in several respects distinctly typical, 
 and products of conditions which, as they do not exist else- 
 where, or do not exist elsewhere in the same combinations, 
 may justly be called American. It would be improper, how- 
 ever, to ascribe everything in this or any other case to environ- 
 ment alone. Heredity no doubt plays an important part in 
 the formation of character, and Mr. Bancroft's memoirs suffi- 
 ciently indicate from which of his ancestors he derived at 
 least some of his dominant characteristics. Yet neither en- 
 vironment nor heredity, nor both together, will account for 
 the whole man. There remains to be estimated the individu- 
 ality, which reacts upon the older internal and newer external 
 influences ; and whicli controls the combinations composing 
 the entity as it finally appears. The origin of this factor can- 
 not be traced ; and though we try to account for every faculty 
 and disposition by postulating unknown and hypothetical re- 
 mote ancestors, when no other explanation offers for puzzling 
 and apparently original characteristics, no approximation to 
 demonstration can be thus obtained, and the difficulty is merely 
 shifted, not removed. 
 
 In the case before us the actual facts are fortunately not 
 beyond easy perception. The French proverb, " Bon chien 
 chasse de race," applies. Blood will tell, in other words. 
 Mr. Bancroft descends from a clean, sound, religious ancestry : 
 a race of sturdy, conscientious, healthy, and industrious men 
 and women. His own constitution was built up by living much 
 in the open air during his youth. To this he probably owes 
 that intolerance of wrong and oppression and chicanery and all 
 mean and base causes, which marks his writings so strongly.
 
 INTRODUCTION. XXXI 
 
 Somewhat of this spirit too he may have breathed in, for 
 it was in the air of his country. But in that which most 
 sharply distinguishes him from the majority of men, is that 
 rarest of combinations — a high capacity for money -making 
 with a devotion to a cause higher and better than money-mak- 
 ing — it may properly be contended that the individual is 
 manifest. Certainly this kind of character does not appear in 
 the forebears of whom he gives portraits in this volume ; and it 
 need not be further insisted upon that such a union of op- 
 posed quahties has always been so uncommon as to attract 
 instant attention whenever and wherever it appears. This, 
 then is to be regarded as intrinsically Mr. Bancroft's own char- 
 acter, and assuredly it is a very interesting one, and of a kind 
 to repay examination. That precisely such a rare and infre- 
 quent combination should apparently have been necessary to 
 the carrying out of the great literary work to which he has 
 devoted himself is worth considering also, and it is tolerably 
 clear that tliis is really the case. A man- less gifted with finan- 
 cial capacity could not possibly have collected the noble 
 library which formed the basis of the enterprise, nor could 
 he, even if he had possessed the library, have so utilized it. 
 A man with a more decided bent toward money-making could 
 not have been induced to give up material ambitions to liter- 
 ature, but would have been content with the vulgar goal of 
 wealth. Strength, skill,, perseverance, and judgment have 
 been joined to constitute the preeminent fitness which is 
 proved beyond controversy by the completion of that historj'- 
 of the Pacific States which is one of the noblest literary mon- 
 uments not only of the countrj^ but of the century. 
 
 George Frederick Parsons.

 
 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE FIELD. 
 
 Which gives me 
 A more content in course of true delight 
 Than to be thirsty after tottering honor, 
 Or tie my pleasure up in silken bags, 
 To please the fool and death. 
 
 — Pericles. 
 
 THIS volume closes the narrative portion of my historical 
 series ; there yet remains to be completed the biographi- 
 cal section. 
 
 It is now over thirty years since I entered upon the task 
 to-day accomplished. During this period my efiforts have 
 been continuous. Sickness and death have made their pres- 
 ence felt; financial storms have swept over the land, leaving 
 ghastly scars; calamities more or less severe have at various 
 times called at my door ; yet have I never been wholly over- 
 whelmed, or reached a point where was forced upon me a 
 cessation of library labors, even for a single day. Nor has 
 my work been irksome ; never have I lost interest or enthu- 
 siasm ; never have I regretted the consecration of my life to 
 this cause, or felt that my time might have been better em- 
 ployed in some of the enterprises attending the material de- 
 velopment of this western world, or in accumulating property, 
 which was never a difficult thing for me to do. It has been
 
 2, , , , , , . LTTERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 froW first to last a labor of love, its importance ever standing 
 before me paramount to that of any other undertaking in 
 which I could engage, while of this world's goods I have felt 
 that I had always my share, and have been ready to thank 
 God for the means necessary to carry forward my work to 
 its full completion. And while keenly alive to my lack of 
 ability to perform the task as it ought to be done, I have all 
 the time been conscious that it were a thousand times better 
 it should be done as I could do it than not at all. 
 
 What was this task ? It was first of all to save to the world 
 a mass of valuable human experiences, which otherwise, in 
 the hurry and scramble attending the securing of wealth, 
 power, or place in this new field of enterprise, would have 
 dropped out of memory. These experiences were all the 
 more valuable from the fact that they were new ; the con- 
 ditions attending their origin and evolution never had before 
 existed in the history of mankind, and never could occur 
 again. There was here a display of what man can do at his 
 best, with all the powers of the past united, and surrounded 
 by conditions such as had never before fallen to his lot. 
 
 Secondly, having secured a vast amount of valuable 
 material which would otherwise have passed into oblivion, 
 my next task was to extract from it what would be most 
 interesting in history and biography, properly to classify and 
 arrange it, and then to fashion it as a historical series, in the 
 form of clear and condensed narrative, and so place within 
 reach of all this gathered knowledge, which were else of as 
 little avail to the outside world as if it had never been saved. 
 Meanwhile the work of collecting continued, while I erected 
 for the safer preservation of the library a fire-proof brick 
 building on Valencia street, in the city of San Francisco. 
 Finally, it was deemed advisable to add a biographical sec- 
 tion to the history proper, in order that the builders of the 
 commonwealths on this coast might have as full and fair 
 treatment as the work of their hands deserved. 
 
 Not that the plan in all its completeness arose in my mind 
 as a whole in the first instance. Had it so presented itself,
 
 THE FIELD. 3 
 
 and with no alternative, I should never have had the courage to 
 undertake it. It was because I was led on by my fate, follow- 
 ing blindly in paths where there was no turning back, that I 
 finally became so lost in my labors that my only relief was to 
 finish them. Wherefore, although I am not conscious of super- 
 stition in my nature, I cannot but feel that in this great work I 
 was but the humble instrument of some power mightier than I, 
 call it providence, fate, environment, or what you will. 
 
 And now, while presenting here a history of my history, an 
 account of my life, its efforts and accomplishments, it is neces- 
 sary first of all that there should be established in the mind of 
 the reader a good and sufficient reason for the same. For in 
 the absence of such a reason, the author is guilty of placing 
 himself before the world in the unenviable light of one who 
 appears to think more highly of himself and his labors than 
 the world thinks, or than the expressions and opinions of the 
 world would justify him in thinking. 
 
 In any of the departments of literature, he alone can reas- 
 onably ask to be heard who has either some new ideas or some 
 new application of ideas ; something to say which has never 
 been said before ; or, if said before, then something which can 
 be better said this second or twentieth time. Within the latter 
 clause of this proposition my eftbrts do not come. All ancient 
 facts are well recorded ; all old ideas are already clothed in 
 more beautiful forms than are at my command. It therefore 
 remains to be shown that my historical labors, of which this 
 volume is an exposition, come properly within the first of these 
 conditions. And this I hope to make apparent, that 1 not 
 only deal in new facts, but in little else ; in facts which are 
 the outcome of a development as marvellous in its origin and 
 as magical in its results as any that marked the breaking up 
 of the dark age preceding the world's enlightenment. Every 
 glance westward was met by a new ray of intelligence ; every 
 breath of western air brought inspiration ; every step was over 
 an untried field; every experiment, thought, aspiration, and 
 act was original and individual ; and the recorder of the 
 events in which this character was expressed had no need of
 
 4 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 old and beaten paths, of legendary lore, or of grandfather's 
 tales. 
 
 Not only should here be established a sufficient reason for 
 the appearance of this volume, as the record of a lifetime of 
 earnest endeavor, but the appearance of its predecessors should 
 be justified in the opinion of the learned and intelligent world, 
 of all who have so fully and freely bestowed their praise in 
 the past ; for the two propositions must stand or fall together. 
 If my historical efforts have been superfluous or unnecessary ; 
 if it were as well they had never been undertaken, then not 
 only have they no right to exist, to cumber the earth and 
 occupy valuable room upon the shelves of libraries, but this 
 volume must also be set down as the product of the mistaken 
 zeal that has deceived the author in regard to the merit, origi- 
 nality, and value claimed for the series. In a word, if the 
 work is nothing, the explanation is worse than nothing ; but 
 if the work is worthy of its reputation, as one that is individ- 
 ual, important, and incapable of reproduction, then is this 
 history and description of it something which should also be. 
 done, something imperatively demanded of the author as due 
 to those whose kindness and sympathy have sustained him in 
 his long and arduous undertakings. 
 
 The proposition stands thus : As the author's life has been 
 mainly devoted to this labor, and not his alone but the lives 
 of many others, and as the work has been extensive and alto- 
 gether different from any which has hitherto been accom- 
 plished, he has thought that there would be interest and 
 value in a report setting forth what he has accomplished and 
 how he accomplished it. Coming to this coast a boy, he has 
 seen it transformed from a wilderness into a garden of latter- 
 day civilization, vast areas between the mountains and the 
 sea which were at first pronounced valueless unfolding into 
 homes of refinement and progress. As upon the territory 
 covered by his work there is now planting a civilization des- 
 tined in time to be superior to any now existing ; and as to 
 coming millions, if not to those now here, everything con- 
 nected with the efforts of the builders of the commonwealths
 
 THE FIELD, 5 
 
 on these shores will be of vital interest — it seems not out of 
 place to devote the last volume of the historical series, proper, 
 to an account of his labors in this field. 
 
 By the middle of the nineteenth century there was scarcely 
 a nation or a civilized state on the globe whose history had 
 not been vividly portrayed, some of them many times. That 
 part of the north temperate zone whose western verge looks 
 across the Pacific to the ancient east, the last spot occupied 
 by European civilization, and the final halting-place of west- 
 ward-marching empire, was obviously the least favored in 
 this respect; while the tropical plateaux adjoining, in their 
 unjDublished annals, offered far more of interest to historical 
 research than many other parts of which so many accounts 
 had already been written. A hundred years before John 
 Smith saw the spot on which Jamestown was planted, or the 
 English pilgrims placed foot on the rock of Plymouth, thou- 
 sands of Spaniards had crossed the high sea, achieved mighty 
 conquests, seized vast tracts of the two Americas, and placed 
 their peoples under tribute. They had built towns, worked 
 mines, established plantations, and solved many of the prob- 
 lems attending European colonization in the New World. 
 Yet, while the United States of North America could spread 
 before English readers their history by a dozen authors of 
 repute, the states of Central America and Mexico could pro- 
 duce comparatively few of their annals in English, and little 
 worthy of their deeds even in the Spanish language. Canada 
 was better provided in this respect, as were also several of 
 the governments of South America. Alaska belonged to 
 Russia, and its history must come through Russian channels. 
 British Columbia still looked toward England, but the begin- 
 ning, aside from the earliest coast voyages, was from Canada. 
 Washington, Oregon, and the inland territory adjacent were 
 an acknowledged part of the United States, whose acquisi- 
 tion from Mexico, in 1847, of the territory lying between the 
 parallels of 32° and 42^ left the ownership of the coast essen- 
 tially as it is to-day. Enticingly stood these neglected Pacific 
 states before the historian ; for it is safe to say that there was
 
 6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 no part of the globe equal in historic interest and importance 
 to this western half of North America, including the whole 
 of Mexico and Central America, which at the time had 
 not its historical material in better form and its history well 
 written by one or more competent persons. Before him who 
 was able to cultivate it, here lay The Field. 
 
 In the unfoldings of my fate, I found myself in the year 
 1856 in the newly Americanized and gold-burnished country 
 of California, in the city of San Francisco, which stands on 
 a narrow peninsula, about midway between either extreme 
 of the mighty stretch of western seaboard, beside a bay un- 
 equalled as a harbor by any along the whole seven thousand 
 miles of shore line, and unsurpassed by any in the world. 
 Out of this circumstance, as from omnipotent accident, sprang 
 the Literary Industries of which this volume is a record. 
 
 For California reaction after the flush of the discovery of 
 gold had fairly set in. Agriculture had not yet assumed 
 great importance ; manufactures were still more insignificant. 
 Placer mining returns had fallen from an ounce of gold to 
 half an ounce, then to a quarter of an ounce a day to the 
 digger ; quartz mining was as ruinous as gambling. Most 
 of the merchants had already failed once, some of them sev- 
 eral times. As a rule they had begun business on nothing, 
 had conducted it recklessly, with large profits expecting still 
 larger, until, from overtrading, from repeated fires and fail- 
 ures, they awoke as from a commercial delirium to find them- 
 selves bankrupt, and their credit and standing destroyed. A 
 maladic du pays seized upon some, who thereupon departed; 
 others set about reforming their ideas and habits, and so be- 
 gan the battle of life anew. 
 
 There was little thought of mental culture at this time, of 
 refinement and literature, or even of great wealth and luxury. 
 The first dream was over of ships laden with gold-dust and 
 of palaces at convenient intervals in various parts of the 
 world, and humbler aspirations followed. 
 
 Slowly as were unlocked to man the wealth and mysteries 
 of this Pacific seaboard, so will be the intellectual possibilities 
 
 \
 
 THE FIELD. 7 
 
 of this cradle of the new civilization. Just as this country, 
 once deemed unproductive, can now from its surplus feed 
 other countries, so from our intellectual products shall we 
 some day nourish the nations. In the material wealth and 
 beauty with which nature has endowed this land we may find 
 the promise of the wealth and beauty of mind. The metal- 
 veined mountains are symbolic of the human force that will 
 shortly dwell beneath their shadows. 
 
 Civilization as the stronger element supplants savagery, 
 drives it from the more favored spots of earth, and enters in 
 to occupy. The aspects of nature have no less influence on 
 the distribution or migration of civilized peoples than upon 
 indigenous development. It is a fact no less unaccountable 
 than pleasing to contemplate, that these western shores of 
 North America should have been so long reserved, that a 
 land so well adapted to cosmopolitan occupation, which has 
 a counterpart for all that can be found in other lands, which 
 presents so many of the beauties of other climes and so few 
 of their asperities — that so favorable a spot, the last of tem- 
 perate earth, should have been held unoccupied so long, and 
 that then it should have been settled in such a way, the only 
 possible way it would seem for the full and immediate accom- 
 plishment of its high destiny — I say, though pleasing to con- 
 template, it is passing strange. Here the chronic emigrant 
 must rest ; there is for him no farther west. From its Asiatic 
 cradle westward round the globe to the very threshold of its 
 source, the march of civilization has ever been steadily and 
 constantly leaving in its track the expended energies of dead 
 nations. A worn-out world is re-animated as it slowly migrates 
 toward the setting sun.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE. 
 
 The true, great want is of an atmosphere of sympathy in intellectual 
 aims. An artist can afford to be poor, but not to be companionless. It 
 is not well that he should feel pressing on him, in addition to his own 
 doubt whether he can achieve a certain work, the weight of the public 
 doubt whether it be worth achieving. No man can live entirely on his 
 own ideal. — Higgitison. 
 
 OFTEN during the progress of my literary labors ques- 
 tions have arisen as to the influence of California cli- 
 mate and society on the present and future development of 
 letters. Charles Nordhoff said to me one day at his villa 
 on the Hudson : " The strangest part of it is how you ever 
 came to embark in such a labor. The atmosphere of Cali- 
 fornia is so foreign to literary pursuits, the minds of the 
 people so much more intent on gold-getting and social 
 pleasures than on intellectual culture and the investigation 
 of historical or abstract subjects, that your isolation must 
 have been severe. I could not help feeling this keenly 
 myself," continued my entertainer, " while on your coast. 
 With a host of friends ready to do everything in their 
 power to serve me, I was in reality without companionship, 
 without that broad and generous sympathy which charac- 
 terizes men of letters everywhere ; so that it amazes me to find 
 a product like yours germinating and developing in such a 
 soil and such a climate." 
 
 While it was true, I replied, that no great attempts were 
 made in the field of letters in California, and while com- 
 paratively few of the people were specially interested in lit- 
 erature or literary men, yet I had never experienced the 
 feeling of which he spoke.
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE. 
 
 My mother used to say that she never felt lonely in her 
 life ; and yet she was most companionable, and enjoyed society 
 as much as any one I ever knew. But her heart was so sin- 
 gle and pure, her mind so clear, intelligent, and free, that to 
 commune with her heart, and allow her mind to feed on its own 
 intelligence, filled to the full the measure of her soul's require- 
 ments. A healthy cultivated mind never can be lonely ; all 
 the universe is its companion. Yet it may be alone, and may 
 feel that natural craving for companionship, of which it is not 
 good for man long to remain deprived. Though for different 
 reasons, I can say Avith my mother that I never have experi- 
 enced loneliness in my labors. If I was ever alone it was in 
 an atmosphere of dead forms and conventionalisms crushing 
 to my nature, and where something was expected of me that 
 I had not to give. Thus have I been lonely for my work, 
 but not in it. Once engaged, all else was forgotten ; as the 
 sublime Jean Paul Richter expresses it, " Ein Gelehrter hat 
 keine lange Weile." Nor can I truly say that I have ever 
 felt any lack of appreciation on the part of the people of Cali- 
 fornia. As a matter of fact, my mind has had little time to 
 dwell on such things. What chiefly has concerned me these 
 twenty or thirty years has been, not what people were think- 
 ing of me and of my efforts, but how I could best and most 
 thoroughly perform my task. I have never stopped to con- 
 sider whether my labors were appreciated by my neighbors, 
 or whether they knew aught of them, or concerned themselves 
 about them. I have never felt isolation. To be free, free in 
 mind and body, free of business, of society, free from inter- 
 ruptions and weariness, this has been my chief concern. 
 
 True, I could not overlook the fact that although I was in the 
 midst of many warm friends, and surrounded by a host of 
 hearty well-wishers, my motives were not fully understood 
 nor my work appreciated. Had it been otherwise I should 
 not entertain a very high opinion of either. If that which 
 engaged me, body and soul, was not above the average of 
 aspiration, or even of sympathy, there was nothing flattering 
 in the thought, and I had better not dwell upon it. I was
 
 lO LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 an individual Avorker, and my task was individual; and I 
 solaced myself with the reflection that the ablest and most 
 intelligent men manifested the most interest in the work. I 
 had never expected very wide recognition or appreciation, 
 and I always had more than I deemed my due. Surely I 
 could find no fault with the people of the Pacific coast for at- 
 tending to their business, each according to his interest or 
 taste, while I followed what best pleased me. Further than 
 this, I did not regard my fate as resting wholly in their hands ; 
 for unless I could gain the approval of leading men of letters 
 throughout the world, of those wholly disinterested and most 
 competent to judge, my efforts would prove in my own eyes 
 a failure. Thus, from the outset, I learned to look on my- 
 self and the work, as the products not of California, or of 
 America, but of the world ; therefore isolation signified only 
 retirement, for which I felt most thankful. 
 
 Perhaps men of letters are too critical ; sensitive as a rule 
 they have always been, though less so than men in some 
 other professions. Hawthorne complained of a lack of sym- 
 pathy during twelve years of his young manhood, in which 
 he failed to make the slightest impression on the public 
 mind, so that he found " no incitement to literary effort in a 
 reasonable prospect of reputation or profit ; nothing but the 
 pleasure itself of composition — an enjoyment not at all amiss 
 in its way, and perhaps essential to the merit of the work in 
 hand, but which, in the long-run, will hardly keep the chill 
 out of the writer's heart or the numbness out of his fingers." 
 It is scarcely to be expected that the unappreciative masses 
 should be deeply interested in such work. And as regards 
 the more intelligent, each as a rule has something specially 
 commanding his attention, which being of paramount interest 
 to himself, he naturally expects to command the attention of 
 others. The attention of the great heedless public will neces- 
 sarily be caught by that which makes the plainest and most 
 direct appeal, that which most easily and instantly can be 
 measured by big round dollars, or by pleasures which they 
 appreciate and covet.
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE. II 
 
 I can truthfully say that from the very first I have been 
 more than satisfied with the recognition my fellow-citizens of 
 Cahfomia have given my attempts at authorship. If, by 
 reason of preoccupation or other cause, their minds have not 
 absorbed historical and literary subjects as mine has done, it 
 is perhaps fortunate for them. Indeed, of what is called the 
 culture of letters there was none during my working days in 
 California. The few attempts made to achieve literature met 
 a fate but little superior to that of a third-rate poet in Rome 
 in the time of Juvenal. 
 
 Peoples rapidly change ; but what shall we say when so 
 esteemed a writer as Grace Greenwood adds to the social a 
 physical cause why literature in California should not pros- 
 per? " I really cannot see," she writes, "how this coast can 
 ever make a great record in scientific discoveries and attain- 
 ments, and the loftier walks of literature — can ever raise 
 great students, authors, and artists of its own. Leaving out 
 of consideration the fast and furious rate of business enter- 
 prise, and the maelstrom-like force of the spirit of specula- 
 tion, of gambling, on a mighty, magnificent sweep, I cannot 
 see how, in a country so enticingly picturesque, where three 
 hundred days out of every year invite you forth into the 
 open air with bright beguilements and soft blandishments, 
 any considerable number of sensible, healthy men and women 
 can ever be brought to buckle down to study of the hardest, 
 most persistent sort ; to ' poring over miserable books ' ; to 
 brooding over theories and incubating inventions. California 
 is not wanting in admirable educational enterprises, originated 
 and engineered by able men and fine scholars ; and there is 
 any amount of a certain sort of brain stimulus in the atmos- 
 phere. She will always produce brilliant men and women 
 of society, wits, and ready speakers; but I do not think 
 she will ever be the rival of bleak little Massachusetts or 
 stony old Connecticut in thorough culture, in the produc- 
 tion of classical scholars, great jurists, theologians, histo- 
 rians, and reformers. The conditions of life are too easy. 
 East winds, snows, and rocks are the grim allies of .serious
 
 12 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 thought and plodding research, of tough brain and strong 
 Avills." 
 
 On the other hand, the author of Greater Britain, after 
 speaking of the weirdly peaked or flattened hills, the new 
 skies, and birds, and plants, and the warm, crisp air, unlike 
 any in the world but those of South Australia, thinks " it will 
 be strange if the Pacific coast does not produce a new school 
 of Saxon poets," affirming that " painters it has already given 
 to the world." " For myself," exclaims Bayard Taylor, " in 
 breathing an air sweeter than that which first caught the 
 honeyed words of Plato, in looking upon lovelier vales than 
 those of Tempe and Eurotas, in wandering through a land 
 whose sentinel peak of Shasta far overtops the Olympian 
 throne of Jupiter, I could not but feel that nature must be 
 false to her promise, or man is not the splendid creature he 
 once was, if the art, the literature, and philosophy of ancient 
 Greece are not one day rivalled on this last of inhabited 
 shores ! " 
 
 " What effect the physical climate of California may have 
 on literary instincts and literary efforts," says Walter M. 
 Fisher, " I am afraid it would be premature, from our present 
 data, exactly to say or predict. Its general Laodicean equa- 
 bility, summer and winter through, may tend to a monotony 
 of tension unfavorable to that class of poetic mind developed 
 in and fed by the fierce extremes of storm or utter calm, of 
 fervent summers, or frosts hke those of Niflelheim. It is gen- 
 erally held, however, that the mildness of the Athenian cli- 
 mate had much to do with the ' sweet reasonableness ' of her 
 culture, and it is usual to find a more rugged and less artistic 
 spirit inhabit the muses of the Norse zone; while the liHes 
 and languors of the tropics are doubtfully productive of any- 
 thing above the grade of pure ' sensuous caterwauling.' Fol- 
 lowing this very fanciful line of thought the Golden State 
 should rejuvenate the glories of the City of the Violet Crown 
 and become the alma mater of the universe. As to the effects 
 of the social climate of California on literary aspiration and 
 effort, little that is favorable can be said for the present, little
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE. 1 3 
 
 that is unfavorable should be feared from the future. Cali- 
 fornia /i^/r is ^.pametni, making money, fighting his way into 
 society, having no time or taste for studying anything save 
 the news of the day and perhaps an -occasional work of broad 
 humor. It is for his heir, Californiayf/jr, to be a gentleman 
 of leisure and wear ' literary frills.' For the present, a taste 
 in that direction is simply not understood, though it is tol- 
 erated, as the worship of any strange god is. The orthodox 
 god of the hour is Plutus : sandi/s, sanc/us, sancfus, domijins 
 dens sabaoth : cxaltat cornu populi sui : selah ! All this, how- 
 ever, is but for a moment. Let us put our fancy apocalyp- 
 tically, after the fashion of Dr. Gumming : ' And the first 
 beast was like a lion, and the second beast was like a calf, 
 and the third beast had a face as a man, and the fourth beast 
 was like a flying eagle ! ' California past, present, and to 
 come. The lion-hearts of reckless '49 are cold. The golden 
 calf bestrides the land, belittling man. To-moiTOw they will 
 make it a beast of burden, not a god. And when the lion's 
 heart is joined to riches, and riches to pure manhood, and 
 manhood to a high and far-reaching culture in letters, and 
 science, and art, then no symbol of eagle eye or eagle wing 
 will be unapt to the sunward progress of the State." 
 
 So might we go on with what twenty or fifty others have 
 imagined regarding the effect of social and physical surround- 
 ings, on literature and art in California or elsewhere, and be 
 little the wiser for it all. With the first coming to Oregon of 
 New England propagandists, books began to be written which 
 should tell to the East what the unrevealed West contained. 
 And this writing continued and will continue as long as there 
 are men and women who fancy that knowledge as it first 
 comes to them first comes to the world. 
 
 We may fully recognize the mighty power of environment 
 without being able to analyze it. As Goldoni observes, " II 
 mondo e un bel libro, ma poco serve a chi non lo sa leggere " ; 
 and as Hegel says, " nature should not be rated too high nor 
 too low. The mild Ionic sky certainly contributed much to 
 the charm of the Homeric poems, yet this alone can produce
 
 14 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 no Homer." While literature is an increment of social intel- 
 ligence and the resultant of social progress, it is certainly in- 
 fluenced by the effect on the mind of man of climate and 
 scenery, of accident and locality, which act both positively 
 and negatively, partly in harmony, partly in antagonism. Some 
 atmospheres seem to absorb the subtle substance of the brain ; 
 others feed the mental powers and stimulate them to their 
 utmost capabilities. 
 
 The idyllic picture of his life at Scillus, as presented by 
 Xenophon, not wholly in the bustling world nor yet beyond 
 it, is most charming. Sophocles retired from busy Athens to 
 lovely Colonus. Horace in gay, luxurious Rome renounced 
 wealth and social distinction, preferring few friendships and 
 those of the purest and best — Maecenas, Virgil, Varius — pre- 
 ferring pleasures more refined, with temperance in all things, 
 and above all contentment, that content which knows not the 
 lust of gain and the gnawing, disquietudes of social rivalry. 
 
 Maecenas loved the noisy streets of Rome, but Horace 
 his little Sabine farm, the gift of his devoted friend. It was 
 there in free and undisturbed thought that he found that lei- 
 sure so necessary to his soul's health. At times he felt the 
 need of the stir and excitement of the capital, but soon again 
 he longed for the stillness of the country, so that his ambling 
 mule was kept in exercise carrying him forth and back. 
 
 Dugald Stewart clung to his quiet home ; Scott found re- 
 pose among his antiquated folios ; but Jeffreys disdained lit- 
 erary retirement, and sought comfort in much company. Pope 
 loved his lawn at Twickenham, and Wordsworth the solitude 
 of Grasmere. Heine, cramped in his narroAv Paris quarters, 
 sighed for trees and verdure. Dr. Arnold hated Rugby, but, 
 said he, " it is very inspiring to write with such a view before 
 one's eyes as that from our drawing-room at Allen Bank, 
 where the trees of the shrubbery gradually run up into the 
 trees of the cliff, and the mountain-side, with its infinite va- 
 riety of rocky peaks and points, upon which the cattle expa- 
 tiate, rises over the tops of the trees." Buckle preferred the
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE, 15 
 
 city, while Tycho Brahe, and the brothers Humboldt, with 
 shrewder wisdom, established themselves in suburban quar- 
 ters near a city, where they might command the advantages 
 and escape the inconveniences of both. 
 
 Exquisite, odd, timidly bold, and sweetly misanthropic 
 Charles Lamb could not endure the glare of nature, and so 
 must needs hide himself between the brick walls of busy 
 London, where he lived alone with his sister, shrinking alike 
 from enemy and friend. " To him," says a biographer, " the 
 tide of human life that flowed through Fleet street and Lud- 
 gate Hill was worth all the Wyes and Yarrows in the uni- 
 verse ; there were to his thinking no green lanes to compare 
 with Fetter Lane or St. Bride's; no garden like Covent 
 Garden; and the singing of all the feathered tribes of the 
 air grated harsh discord in his ear, attuned as it was only to 
 the drone or the squall of the London ballad-singer, the 
 grinding of the hand-organ, and the nondescript London 
 cries, set to their cart-wheel accompaniment." And Dr. 
 Johnson, too, loved dingy, dirty Fleet street and smoky Pall 
 Mall above any freshness or beauty nature could aftbrd in the 
 country. " Sir," he says, after his usual sententious fashion, 
 " when you have seen one green field you have seen all 
 green fields. Sir, I like to look upon men. Let us walk 
 down Cheapside." 
 
 How different had been the culture of Goethe, less diver- 
 sified, perhaps, but deeper, if instead of the busy city of 
 Frankfort his life had been spent in rural districts. What 
 would Dickens have been, confined for life to the mountains 
 o-f Switzerland ? or Ruskin, shut between the dingy walls of 
 London ? No St, John would find heaven in the New York 
 of to-day; nor need Dante, in the California Inferno of 
 'forty-nine, have gone beneath the surface to invent a hell. 
 A desultory genius is apt to be led away by city life and 
 bustle; a bashful genius is inclined to bury himself in the 
 country, away from wholesome society and knowledge of the 
 world ; a healthy genius finds the greatest benefit in spending 
 part of his time in each.
 
 l6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Thus we find that different conditions best suit different 
 temperaments. Some enjoy scenery, others care Httle for it ; 
 some prefer the country, others the city. To many, while 
 ardently loving nature, and having no predilection for coal 
 smoke and the rattle of vehicles, time and place are still 
 nothing while they are wholly absorbed in active occupation. 
 Scenery, other than the scenery within, has little to do with 
 true work. If not called to consciousness by some external 
 agent, the absorbed worker hardly knows or cares whether 
 he occupies a tent in the wilderness or a parlor in the city. 
 On the whole, the country offers superior advantages, but 
 more on account of freedom from interruption than from 
 any other cause. 
 
 Change, always beneficial, is to many essential. With an 
 exquisite sense of relief one 'escapes from the din and clatter 
 of the city, and the harassing anxieties of business, to the 
 soft, sensuous repose of the country, with its hazy light, aro- 
 matic air, and sweet songs of birds. Thus freed for a time 
 from killing care, and wrapped in delicious reverie in some 
 sequestered nook, thought is liberated, sweeps the universe, 
 and looks its maker in the face. Sky, hill, and plain are all 
 instinct with eloquence. And best of all, the shelter there ; 
 no one to molest. All day, and all night, and the morrow, 
 secure. No buzzing of business about one's ears ; no curious 
 callers nor stupid critics to entertain. Safe with the world 
 walled out, and heaven opening above and around. Then 
 ere long the bliss becomes tame ; the voluptuous breath of 
 nature palls, her beauties become monotonous, the rested 
 energies long for exercise, and with Socrates the inconstant 
 one exclaims : " Trees and fields tell me nothing ; men are 
 my teachers ! " 
 
 Yet, after all, the city only absorbs men, it does not create 
 them. Intellect at its inception, like forest-trees, must have 
 soil, sunshine, and air; afterward it may be worked into 
 divers mechanisms. The city consumes mind as it consumes 
 beef and potatoes, and must be constantly replenished from 
 the country, otherwise life would there exhaust itself. Its
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE, 1 7 
 
 atmosphere, physically and morally deleterious from smoke 
 and dust and oft-repeated breathings, from the perspirations 
 of lust and the miasmatic vapors arising from sink-holes of 
 vice, exercises as baneful an influence on the young poetic 
 soul as does the abnormal excitement of business and society. 
 The passions of humanity concentrated in masses, like ill 
 cured hay in the stack, putrefy and send forth, in place of 
 the sweet odor of new-mown grass, a humid, musty smell, 
 precursor of innumerable fetid products. In the country 
 the affections harmonize more Avith nature, engender purer 
 thoughts, and develop lovelier forms than in the callous, un- 
 sympathetic crowds of a city. 
 
 A life in closets and cloisters leads to one-sided fixedness 
 of ideas. Yet, though retirement often produces eccentricity, 
 it likewise promotes originality. To thoughtful, sensitive na- 
 tures it is absolutely essential. Every man must follow his 
 own bent in this respect. Method is good in all things, but 
 it is perhaps better to be without method than to be the slave 
 of it. Distance from the object dwelt upon often lends clear- 
 ness to thought. Distinctly audible are the solemn strokes 
 of the town clock beyond the limits of the village, though 
 near at hand they may be drowned by the hum of the 
 multitude. 
 
 There are minor conditions peculiar to individual writers 
 which stimulate or retard intellectual labor. There is the lazy 
 man of genius, like Hazlitt, who never wrote till driven to it 
 by hunger; unless, indeed, surcharged with some subject, he 
 threw it off to find relief Hensius says: "I no sooner come 
 into the library but I bolt the door to me, excluding lust, am- 
 bition, avarice, and all such vices whose nurse is idleness, the 
 mother of ignorance and melancholy. In the very lap of 
 eternity, amongst so many divine souls, I take my seat with 
 so lofty a spirit and sweet content, that I pity all our great 
 ones and rich men that know not this happiness. If favor- 
 able surroundings are so necessary, what shall we say of the 
 great works engendered under unfavorable conditions ? But 
 for the imprisonment of Cervantes, who can tell if ever the 
 2
 
 l8 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 world would have known the inimitable Don Quixote and 
 his servant Sancho ? Bunyan's grand allegory was likewise 
 a prison plant, with the Bible and Fox^s Martyrs as the 
 author's library of reference. Writing is not the soft, languid 
 reverie that luxurious fittings and furnishings suggest ; it is 
 the hardest and most wearing of occuiDations, and it seems a 
 mockery, when the temples throb and the bones ache, for 
 the eye to meet at every turn only invitations to idleness and 
 ease. 
 
 To the critics previously quoted I would say that it is folly 
 sweepingly to assert of this or that strip of temperate zone 
 that it is physically conducive to the growth of letters or 
 otherwise. Variety of food, of scenery, of entertainment is 
 the essential need of the mind. As for the stone fences and 
 east winds of Mrs. Lippincott, I never knew them to be 
 specially stimulating to brain work; no better, at all events, 
 than the sand and fog of San Francisco, or the north winds 
 and alternations of heat and cold in the valley of California, 
 If to become a scholar requires no discipline or self-denial 
 greater than to withstand the allurements of her bewitching 
 climate, California shall not lack scholars. When most rav- 
 ished by the charms of nature many students find it most 
 difticult to tear themselves from work. Invigorating air and 
 bright sunshine, purple hills, misty mountains, and sparkling 
 waters may be enticing, but they are also inspiring. 
 
 Where were bleak Massachusetts and rocky Connecticut 
 when Athens, and Rome, and Alexandria flourished ? If 
 barrenness and stones are most conducive to literature, the 
 Skye Islands should be the best place for men of letters. I 
 can hardly believe that unless culture is beaten into us by 
 scowling nature we must forever remain savages. Oxygen is 
 oxygen, whether it vitalizes mind on the Atlantic or on the 
 Pacific seaboard ; and to the student of steady nerves, absorbed 
 in his labors, it matters little whether his window overlooks 
 a park or a precipice. If I remember rightly the country 
 about Stratford-on-Avon is not particularly rugged, neither 
 is London remarkable for picturesque scenery. And surely
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE. 1 9 
 
 there can be little in the climate of California antagonistic 
 to intellectual attainments. In San Francisco there is no 
 incompatibility, that I can discover, between philosophic in- 
 sight and sandhills. On the other hand, throughout the 
 length and breadth of these Pacific States there are thousands 
 of elements stimulating to mental activity. 
 
 Agassiz insists that the climate of Europe is more favorable 
 to literary labors than that of America. This I do not be- 
 lieve ; but if we admit it, California is better than Massachu- 
 setts, for the climate of California is European rather than 
 eastern. It is a thinking air, this of California, if such a thing 
 exists outside of the imagination of sentimentalists ; an air 
 that generates and stimulates ideas ; a dry, elastic air, strong, 
 subtile, and serene. It has often been noticed in going back 
 and forth across the continent ; and may be safely asserted 
 that one can do more and better work in California than in 
 the east. At the same time another might prefer the eastern 
 extremes of heat and cold. The temperature of the Pacific 
 slope is exceptionally mild, the thermal lines bending north- 
 ward as they cross the Rocky Mountains. Extreme cold we 
 never have, except on alpine altitudes. On the seaboard the 
 atmosphere throughout the entire year is uniform, cool, and 
 bracing. There is little difference between summer and 
 winter, between night and day ; here one can work all the 
 time. Indeed, so stimulating and changeless is this ocean 
 air that men are constantly lured to more protracted efforts 
 than they can endure, and a sudden breaking up of health or 
 a softened brain is in many instances the end of excessive 
 and prolonged labor. In the east men are driven from their 
 work by the heat of summer, and the cold of winter compels 
 some to rest; here, while nature rests, that is during the dry 
 season, man can labor as well as at any other time, but when 
 driven on by ambition or competition he is apt to lay upon 
 his body and mind more than they can long sustain. 
 
 I do not think there is anything in the cHmate that ab- 
 sorbs strength unduly, or that breaks up the constitution 
 earlier than elsewhere; it is rather that the system wears
 
 20 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 out and falls to pieces. If this happens earlier in life than 
 it should, the cause is to be found in continuous and restless 
 application, and not in the climate. Before the gold dis- 
 covery Californians usually attained a ripe age; in many 
 cases four or five score years being reached, after bringing 
 into the world from fifteen to twenty-five children. In the 
 interior, during the rains of winter, the climate is similar to 
 that of the coast — fresh and bracing; in summer the air is 
 hot and dry during the day, but cool and refreshing at night. 
 A moist, hot climate is enervating ; if the air under a ver- 
 tical sun is dry the effect of the heat is much less unfavor- 
 able. In the warm valleys of the Coast range students can 
 work without discomfort from morning till night throughout 
 the entire summer, while in the east, the temperature being 
 the same, or even lower, they would be completely pros- 
 trated. Yet, with its incessant strain, the friction of the 
 machinery wears heavily upon the system. There is little 
 danger for the present of rusting out, with such an exhila- 
 rating climate to feed energy, and such cunning ingenuity 
 to direct it. Extremes, the bane of humanity, are here as 
 nicely balanced as in the classic centers of the Old World. 
 Excessive heat and cold, humidity and dryness, redundancy 
 and steriHty, are so far uncommon as not to interfere with 
 progress. 
 
 With reference to the oft-repeated objections to the pur- 
 suit of wealth because of its influence on letters, much may 
 be said. From necessary labor, and from such honorable 
 and praiseworthy enterprise as is required to gain an inde- 
 pendence, to an avaricious pursuit of wealth for the sake of 
 wealth, the progress is so imperceptible and the change so 
 unconscious that few are able to realize it. And if they were, 
 it would matter not. All nature covets power. Beasts, and 
 men, and gods, all place otliers under them so far as they 
 are able ; and those so subordinated, whether by fair words, 
 fraud, or violence, will forever after bow in adoration. 
 Money is an embodiment of power : therefore all men covet
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE. 21 
 
 money. Most men desire it with an inordinate craving 
 wholly beyond its true and relative value. This craving 
 fills their being to the exclusion of higher, nobler, and what 
 would be to them, if admitted, happier sentiments. This is 
 the rule the world o\'er; the passion is no stronger in Cali- 
 fornia than in many other places. But it has here its peculi- 
 arities. Society under its present regime was established on 
 a gold-gathering basis. In the history of the world there 
 never was founded so important a commonwealth on an 
 interest so exclusively metallic. Most of the colonial attempts 
 of Asia and Europe have been made partly with the object 
 of religion, empire, agriculture, commerce. It is true that 
 these avowed objects were often little more than pretences, 
 money lying at the root of all; yet even the pretence was 
 better in some respects than the bald, hard-visaged fact. 
 But during the earlier epoch in California's history three 
 hundred thousand men and women came hither from vari- 
 ous parts of the world with no other object, entertained or 
 expressed, than to obtain gold and carry it away with them. 
 Traditionary and conventional restraints they left at home. 
 They would get money nov/, and attend to other things at 
 another time. 
 
 Some degree of wealth in a community is essential to the 
 culture of letters. Where all must work constantly for bread 
 the hope of literature is small. On the other hand excess of 
 wealth may be an evil. The sudden and enormous accumu- 
 lation of riches exercises a most baneful influence. Brave 
 indeed must be the struggles that overcome the allurements 
 of luxury, the subtle, sensuous influence of wealth, entering 
 as it does the domains alike of intellect and the affections, 
 commanding nature, expanding art, and filling enlarged 
 capacities for enjoyment. Yet he who would attain the 
 highest must shake from him these entrancing fetters, if ever 
 fortune lays them on him, and stand forth absolutely a free 
 man. Poor as was Jean Paul Richter, he deemed his burden 
 of poverty less hard for genius to bear than the comparative 
 wealth of Goethe.
 
 22 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Call upon a man given body and soul to business, a man 
 who has already a thousand times more than ever he will 
 rightly use ; visit him in his hours of business ; he deems his 
 time precious, and knits his brow if the interruption lasts. 
 His time is precious ? Yes. How much is it worth ? Fifty 
 dollars, five hundred dollars an hour. How much are fifty or 
 five hundred dollars worth ? Go to, bhnd maggot ! Will 
 you not presently have millions of years of leisure ? Oh wise 
 rich man, oh noble mind and aspiration, to measure moments 
 by money ! 
 
 The remedy lies in the disease. Excess of avarice that 
 sinks society so low, nauseates. Thus the right-minded man 
 will argue : If Plutus is always to remain a pig in intellect 
 and culture, is always to be a worshipful pig, the only ador- 
 able of his fellow-pigs, to his marble-stepped gilded sty with 
 him and his money. I '11 none of him. God and this bright 
 universe beaming with intelligence and love ; mind that lifts 
 me up, and makes me a reasoning creature, and tells me 
 what I am, withholding not the sweet perfume thrown round 
 me by the flowers of unfolding knowledge ; immortal soul, 
 breathing upon mind the divine breath ; and its mortal case- 
 ment, the body, limited to a few short days of this blessed 
 sunlight, of drinking in soft, sweet air and nature's many 
 melodies — these will not let me sink. The commercial or 
 mechanical plodder again will say : What are these pitiful 
 thousands, or tens or hundreds of thousands, which by a life- 
 time of faithful toil and economy I have succeeded in getting 
 together, when men infinitely my inferior in ability, intellect, 
 and culture, by a lucky stroke of fortune make their millions 
 in a month ? Surely money is no longer the measure of 
 intelligent industry ; it is becoming a common and less 
 creditable thing : I '11 worship it no longer. Even envy is 
 bafiled, overreached. These many and mammoth fortunes, 
 ■made by stock-gambling and railway manipulations, so over- 
 shadow and belittle legitimate efforts that men are constrained 
 to pause and consider what is the tendency of all this, and to 
 begin comparisons between material wealth beyond a com-
 
 THE ATMOSPHERE. 23 
 
 petency and that wealth of mind which alone elevates and 
 ennobles man. 
 
 San Francisco has absorbed well-nigh all that is left of the 
 Inferno. Take the country at large, and since the youthful 
 fire that first flashed in our cities and canons California in 
 some respects has degenerated. Avarice is a good flint on 
 which to strike the metal of our minds, but it yields no steady 
 flame. The hope of sudden gain excites the passions, whets 
 the brain, and rouses the energies ; but when the effort is 
 over, whether successful or otherwise, the mind sinks into 
 comparative listlessness. It must have some healthier pabu- 
 lum than cupidity, or it starves. The quality of our Califor- 
 nian mind to-day may be seen displayed in our churches and 
 in the newspaper press. The most intellectual and refined 
 of our pulpit orators are not always the most popular. Hard 
 study, broad views of life and the times, thorough investiga- 
 tion of the mighty enginery that is now driving mankind so 
 rapidly forward materially and intellectually, deep and im- 
 partial inquiry into the origin and tendency of things, do not 
 characterize clergymen as a class. There are, however, some 
 noble exceptions in California as well as elsewhere ; but there 
 must be many more if Christians would retain their hold on 
 the minds of men, and stay the many thinking persons who 
 are forsaking their accustomed places in the sanctuary. 
 
 In reviewing the effect of the social atmosphere of Califor- 
 nia on intellectual culture we should glance at the body so- 
 cial, its origin and its destiny, the character of the first comers, 
 the cause of their coming, the apprenticeship to which they 
 were subjected on their arrival, and finally the triumph of the 
 good and the confusion of the evil. It was no pilgrim band, 
 these gold-seeking emigrants, fleeing from persecution ; it was 
 not an expedition for dominion or territory ; nor was it a mis- 
 sionary enterprise, nor a theoretical republic. It Avas a stam- 
 pede of the nations, a hurried gathering in a magnificent 
 wilderness for purposes of immediate gain by mining for gold, 
 and was unprecedented in the annals of the race. Knowing 
 all this as we now do ; knowing the metal these men were
 
 24 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 made of, the calibre of their minds, the fiery furnace of ex- 
 perience through which they passed; knowing what they 
 are, what they have done, what they are doing, is it not 
 idle to ask if men like these, or the sons of such men, can 
 achieve literature ? They can do anything. They halt not 
 at any obstacle surmountable by man. They pause discom- 
 fited only upon the threshold of the unknowable and the 
 impossible. The literary atmosphere of which we speak is 
 not here to-day ; but hither the winds from the remotest 
 comers of the earth are wafting it; all knowledge and all 
 human activities are placed under contribution, and out of 
 this alembic will in due time be distilled the fine gold of 
 Letters. 
 
 I
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. 
 
 On fait presque toujours les grandes choses sans savoir comment on 
 les fait, et on est tout surpris qu'on les a faites. Demandez a Cesar 
 comment il se rendit le maitre du monde ; peut-etre ne vous repondra-t-il 
 pas aisement. — FojitcncUe, 
 
 SERMONIZE as we may on fields and atmospheres, internal 
 agencies and environment, at the end of life we know 
 little more of the influences that moulded us than at the 
 beginning. Without rudder or compass our bark is sent 
 forth on the stormy sea, and although we fancy we know 
 our present haven, the trackless path by which we came 
 hither we cannot retrace. The record of a life written — 
 what is it ? Between the lines are characters invisible which 
 might tell us something could we translate them. They 
 might tell us something of those ancient riddles, origin 
 and destiny, free-will and necessity, discussed under various 
 names by learned men through the centuries, and all without 
 having penetrated one hair's-breadth into the mystery, all 
 without having gained any knowledge of the subject not 
 possessed by man primeval. In this mighty and universal 
 straining to fathom the unknowable, Plato, the philosophic 
 Greek, seems to succeed no better than INIoncacht Ape, the 
 philosophic savage. 
 
 Thus much progress, however, has been made : there are 
 men now living who admit that they know nothing about 
 such matters; that after a lifetime of study and meditation 
 the eyes of the brightest intellect can see beyond the sky no 
 farther than those of the most unlearned dolt. And they are 
 the strongest who acknowledge their weakness in this i^egard ;
 
 26 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 they are the wisest who confess their ignorance. Even the 
 ancients understood this, though by the mouth of Terentius 
 they put the proposition a httle differently : " Faciunt n^ in- 
 telHgendo, ut nihil intelhgant"; by too much knowledge 
 men bring it about that they know nothing. Confining our 
 investigations to the walks of hterature, surely one Avould 
 think genius might tell something of itself, something of its 
 inceptions and inspirations. But what says genius ? " They 
 ask me," complains Goethe of the critics who sought in vain 
 the moral design of his play, " what idea I wished to incor- 
 porate with my Faust. Can I know it ? Or, if I know, can 
 I put it into words ? " 
 
 Why we are what we are, and not some other person or 
 thing; why we do as we do, turning hither instead of thither, 
 are problems which will be solved only with the great and 
 universal exposition. And yet there is little that seems 
 strange to us in our movements. Things appear wonderful 
 as they are unfamiliar; in the unknown and unfathomed we 
 think we see God ; but is anything known or fathomed ? 
 Who shall measure mind, we say, or paint the soul, or rend 
 the veil that separates eternity and time ? Yet, do we but 
 think of it, everything relating to mankind and the universe 
 is strange, the spring that moves the mind of man not more 
 than the mechanism on which it presses. " How wonderful is 
 death ! " says Shelley; but surely not more wonderful than life 
 or intellect which brings us consciousness. We sec the youth's 
 stark body carried to the grave, and wonder at the absence 
 of that life so lately animating it, and question what it is, 
 whence it came, and whither it has flown. We call to mind 
 whatever there may have been in his nature of promise or of 
 singular excellence ; but the common actions of the youth, 
 the while he lived, we deem accountable, and pass them by 
 because of our familiarity with similar acts in others. We 
 see nations rise and die, worlds form and crumble, and won- 
 der at the universe unfolding, but the minutiae of evolution, 
 the proximate little things that day by day go to make up the 
 great ones, we think we understand, and we wonder at them
 
 SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. 27 
 
 not at all. It was regarded an easy matter a century ago 
 to define a mineral, plant, or animal, but he is a bold man 
 indeed who attempts to-day to tell what these things are. 
 
 Therefore, in answer to that part of Mr. Nordhoff's won- 
 derings why I left business and embarked in literature, I say 
 I cannot tell. Ask the mother why she so lo\angly nurses her 
 little one, watching with tender solicitude its growth to youth 
 and manhood, only to send it forth weaned, perhaps indiffer- 
 ent or ungrateful, to accomplish its destiny. Literature is 
 my love, a love sprung from my brain, no less my child than 
 the offspring of my body. In its conception and birth is 
 present the parental instinct, in its cultivation and develop- 
 ment the parental care, in its results the parental anxiety. 
 There are those, says Hamerton, " who are urged toward 
 the intellectual life by irresistible instincts, as water-fowl are 
 urged to an aquatic life. ... If a man has got high mental 
 culture during his passage through life, it is of little consequence 
 where he acquired it, or how. The school of the intellectual 
 man is the place where he happens to be, and his teachers 
 arc the people, books, animals, plants, stones, and earth 
 round about him." 
 
 From a family sketch written by Curtis Howe in 1857 I 
 quote as follows : " My grandfather, John Howe, was born 
 in London in the year 1650, and remained there through his 
 juvenile years. Nothing is known of his parents, and very 
 little of him, only that some time after he became a man he 
 came to this country with a brother whose name is not 
 known. He purchased a farm in New Haven, Connecticut, 
 acquired a handsome property, and married at the age of 
 sixty a girl of nineteen. My fathCiT, Ephraim Howe, was their 
 youngest, born in April, 1730, his father being at that time 
 eighty years old. December 2, 1756, my father married 
 Damaris Seaward, he being twenty-seven and she seventeen. 
 According to the family record I was born INIay 10, 1772; 
 I remained very small and grew but little until I arrived 
 at my teens, and reaching my full size, I suppose, only when 
 nearly twenty-one."
 
 28 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 My grandfather's children to the third and fourth genera- 
 tions became scattered from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and 
 as he advanced in years there was a growing desire in him to 
 see them all and leave with them his blessing ere he died. 
 Many of them he did see, making long journeys in his wagon 
 rather than trust himself to a railway. Strange caution this, 
 it always seemed to me. The good patriarch could trust his 
 God implicitly in most matters ; indeed he was confident of 
 his protection everywhere except on steam-cars and steam- 
 boats. He could go to him in trouble, he could leave his 
 cares with him, knowing that whatever was meted out to him 
 was right and best; but he was a little doubtful about the 
 new method of travelling, and he preferred the old fashion 
 with horses and wagons, such as had brought him and his 
 household safely from St. Albans to Granville and such as he 
 had ever since employed. The spirit of steam had not yet 
 fallen on him. Nevertheless, so great was the desire to see 
 his children in California, that he finally summoned courage 
 or faith sufiicient to brave both railway and steamship, 
 making the fatiguing, and for him dangerous, passage by the 
 Isthmus at the advanced age of ninety-four. 
 
 From family records I have ascertained that a grandmother 
 of my father and a grandmother of my mother were born in 
 the same town the same year; both died the same year at the 
 advanced age of ninety-six. My grandfathers Bancroft and 
 Howe were both born in Granville, Massachusetts; the 
 former died in Ohio, the latter in Kansas. 
 
 Both my parents were born in the year 1799. ^^Y i^^'i'-ive 
 place was Granville, Ohio, and the day the fifth of May, 1832, 
 just two centuries after the arrival of my ancestor John in 
 America. The town of Granville was settled by a colony 
 from New England, and took its name from Granville, Mas- 
 sachusetts, whence many of its settlers came. It Avas in 1805 
 that a company was formed to emigrate to what was then the 
 far west, and two of the number went to search the Avilder- 
 ness for a suitable location. They selected a heavily timbered 
 township in Ohio, in the county of Licking, so called from
 
 SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. 29 
 
 the deer-licks found there. The year following the colony 
 was organized, not as a joint-stock company, but as a congre- 
 gational church. At starting a sermon was preached from 
 the text : " If thy presence go not with me, carry us not up 
 hence." Then, after baking much bread, a portion of which 
 was dried to rusk and coarsely ground at the flouring mill, 
 the cattle were hitched to the wagons, and driving their cows 
 before them they moved off in the direction of the star of 
 empire. It was quite a different thing, this New England 
 colony, from an ordinary western settlement. Though emi- 
 nently practical, it partook rather of the subjective and rational 
 element than of the objective and material. Though unlike 
 their forefathers fleeing from persecution — only for more and 
 better land than they could find at home would they go — 
 they nevertheless, with their households, transplanted their 
 opinions and their traditions, without abating one jot or tittle 
 of either. With their ox teams and horse teams, with all their 
 belongings in covered wagons, these colonists came, bearing 
 in their bosoms their love of God, their courageous faith, 
 their stern morahty, their dehght in sacrifice ; talking of these 
 things by the way, camping by the road-side at night, resting 
 on the Sabbath when all the religious ordinances of the day 
 were strictly observed, consuming in the journey as many 
 days as it now occupies half-hours, and all with thanksgiving, 
 prayer, and praise. 
 
 On reaching their destination our New England emigrants 
 camped on a picturesque bench, the rolling forested hills on 
 one side, and on the other a strip of timbered bottom, through 
 which flowed a clear, quiet stream. Arranging their wagons 
 in the way best suited for convenience and defence, they 
 felled a few of the large maple and other trees and began to 
 prepare material for building. Then came the warm Sabbath 
 morning, when no sound of the axe was heard, but instead 
 the voice of prayer, never more to be new or strange among 
 these consecrated hills. Houses were quickly erected, and 
 a church, Timothy Hanis being the first pastor. Schools 
 quickly followed ; and all thus far being from one place, and
 
 30 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 of one faith, and one morality, no time was lost in sage dis- 
 cussions, so that Granville grew in solid comforts and intel- 
 ligence, outstripping the neighboring communities, and ere 
 long sending forth hundreds of young men and women to 
 educate others. 
 
 The Phelps family was among the earliest to leave Vermont 
 for the Ohio Granville, thus established by the Massachusetts 
 men. Then came the Bancrofts from Pennsylvania and the 
 Howe family from Vermont. Among the first acts of the 
 colonists was to mark out a village and divide the surrounding 
 lands into hundred-acre farms. Now it so happened that the 
 farms of Azariah Bancroft and Curtis Howe adjoined. Both 
 of these settlers were blessed with numerous children; my 
 father was one of eleven, four boys and five girls reaching 
 maturity. It was not the custom in that slow age for parents 
 to shirk their responsibility. Luxury, pleasure, ease, had not 
 yet usurped the place of children in the mother's breast ; and 
 as for strength to bear them, it was deemed disgraceful in a 
 woman to be weak who could not show just cause for her 
 infirmity. As I have said before, work was the order of the 
 day — work, by which means alone men can be men, or 
 women women ; by which means alone there can be culture, 
 development, or a human species fit to live on this earth. 
 Men and women, and boys and girls, all worked in those 
 days, worked physically, mentally, and morally, and so 
 strengthened hand, and head, and heart. Thus working in 
 the kitchen, field, and barn-yard, making hay and milking 
 cows, reaping, threshing, spinning, weaving, Ashley Bancroft 
 and Lucy Howe grew up, the one a lusty, sinewy, dark-eyed 
 youth, the other a bright, merry maiden, with golden hair, 
 and the sweetest smile a girl ever had, and the softest, purest 
 eyes that ever let sunlight into a soul. And in due time they 
 were married, and had a hundred-acre farm of their own ; had 
 cattle, and barn, and farm implements, and a substantial two- 
 story stone house, with a bright tin roof; and soon there were 
 six children in it, of whom I was the fourth. And all these 
 comforts were paid for, all save the children, for Avhich debt
 
 SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. 31 
 
 the parents ceased not to make acknowledgments to Al- 
 mighty God morning and evening to the end. 
 
 On the 2 1 St of February, 1872, at my house in San Fran- 
 cisco, my parents celebrated their golden wedding, probably 
 the most joyous event of their long and happy lives. Two 
 of my father's brothers have likewise celebrated their golden 
 weddings, one before this date and one afterward. While I 
 am now writing, my father at the age of eighty-five is talking 
 with my children, Paul, Griffing, Philip, and Lucy, aged six, 
 four, two, and one, respectively, telling them of things hap- 
 pening when he was a boy, which, were it possible for them 
 to remember and tell at the age of eighty-five to their grand- 
 children, would be indeed a collating of the family book of 
 life almost in century-pages. 
 
 Thus it happened that I was born in an atmosphere of 
 invigorating puritanism, such as falls to the lot of few in these 
 days of material progress and transcendental speculation. 
 This atmosphere, however, was not without its fogs. Planted 
 in this western New England oasis, side by side with the 
 piety and principles of the old Plymouth colony, and indeed 
 one with them, were all the antis and isms that ever con- 
 founded Satan — Calvinism, Lutheranism, Knoxism,and Huss- 
 ism, pure and unadulterated ; abolitionism, once accounted a 
 disgrace, later the nation's proudest honor: anti-rum, anti- 
 tobacco, anti tea and coftee, anti sugar and cotton if the en- 
 slaved black man grew them, and anti-sensualism of every 
 kind, opposition even to comforts if they bordered on luxury. 
 Multitudinous meetings and reforms were going on, whether 
 wise or unwise, whether there was anything to meet for or to 
 reform, or not. As my mother used to say, " to be good and 
 to do good should constitute the aim and end of every life." 
 Children particularly should be reformed^ and that right 
 early ; and so Saturday night was " kept," preparatory to the 
 Sabbath, on which day three meetings were always held, 
 besides a Sunday-school and a prayer-meeting, the intervals 
 being filled with Saturday-cooked repasts, catechism, and 
 Sunday readings.
 
 32 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Preparations were made for the Sabbath as for a solemn 
 festival. The garden was put in order, and the sheep and 
 Idne were driven to their quiet quarters. The house was 
 scrubbed, and in the winter fuel prepared the day before. 
 All picture-books and scraps of secular reading which might 
 catch the eye and offend the imagination were thrust into a 
 closet, and on the table in their stead were placed the Bible, 
 MejHoirs of Payson, and Baxter'' s Saints' Rest. The morn- 
 ing of the holy day crept silently in ; even nature seemed 
 subdued. The birds sang softer; the inmates of the farm- 
 yard put on their best behavior; only the sun dared show 
 himself in his accustomed character. Prayers and breakfast 
 over, cleanly frocked, through still streets and past closed 
 doors each member of the household walked with downcast 
 eyes to church. 
 
 Often have I heard latter-day progressive fathers say : 
 " For myself, I care not for dogmas and creeds, but something 
 of the kind is necessary for women and children ; society 
 else would fall in pieces." Without subscribing to such a 
 sentiment, I may safely say that from my heart I thank God 
 for strict religious training; and I thank him most of all for 
 emancipation from it. It is good to be born in a hotbed of 
 sectarianism ; it is better, at some later time, to escape it. 
 
 Excess of any kind is sure, sooner or later, to defeat its 
 own ends. Take for instance, the meetings inflicted on the 
 society into which destiny had projected me. There were 
 pulpit meetings, conference meetings, missionary meetings, 
 temperance meetings, mothers' meetings, young men's meet- 
 ings, Sunday-school meetings, inquiry meetings, moral-reform 
 meetings, ministers' meetings, sunrise and sunset meetings, 
 anti-slavery meetings — these for the ordinary ministrations, 
 with extra impromptu meetings on special occasions, and all 
 intermingled with frequent and fervid revivals. The conse- 
 quence was that the young men of Granville were noted in 
 all that region for their wickedness. Home influence and the 
 quiet but effectual teachings of example were overshadowed 
 by public exhortations to piety. The tender plant was so
 
 SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. 33 
 
 watered, and digged about, and fertilized, that natural and 
 healthy growth was impeded. A distaste for theological dis- 
 course was early formed, arising, not from a distaste for relig- 
 ion, nor from special inherent badness, but from the endless 
 unwholesome restraints thrown upon youthful unfoldings, 
 which led in many instances to the saddest results. 
 
 It is not to' be wondered at that, after such an excess of 
 piety and exalted contemplation, to the young elastic mind an 
 interview with the devil was most refreshing ; and as these 
 boys were taught that in tobacco, small-beer, and the painted 
 cards that players used, he lurked, there the pious urchins 
 sought him. Clubs were formed and meetings held for the 
 purpose of acquiring proficiency in these accomplishments. 
 Often after leaving our "inquiry" meeting — that is to say, a 
 place vv'here young folks met ostensibly for the purpose of 
 inquiring what they should do to be saved — have I gone 
 home and to bed; then later, up and dressed, in company 
 with my comrades I would resort to a cellar, garret, or bam, 
 with tallow candle, cent cigars, and a pack of well-worn, greasy 
 playing-cards, and there hold sweet communion with infernal 
 powers ; in consequence of which enthusiasm one barn was 
 burned and several others narrowly escaped burning. Strange 
 to say, later in life, as soon as I learned how playing-cards 
 were made, and that no satanic influences were employed in 
 their construction or use, they ceased to have any fascination 
 for me. 
 
 Nevertheless, I say it is better to be righteous overmuch 
 than to be incorrigibly wicked. And so the puritans of 
 Granville thought as they enlarged their meeting-houses, and 
 erected huge seminaries of learning, and called upon the 
 benighted from all parts to come in and be told the truth. 
 Likewise they comforted the colored race. 
 
 The most brilliant exploit of my life was performed at the 
 tender age of eleven, when I spent a whole night in driving 
 a two-horse wagon load of runaway slaves on their way from 
 Kentucky and slavery to Canada and freedom — an exploit 
 which was regarded in those days by that community with 
 3
 
 34 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 little less approbation than that bestowed by a fond Apache 
 mother upon the son who brandishes before her his first scalp. 
 The ebony cargo consisted of three men and two women, 
 who had been brought into town the night before by some 
 teamster of kindred mind to my father's, and kept snugly 
 stowed away from prying eyes during the day. 'About nine 
 o'clock at night the large lumber-box wagon filled with straw 
 was brought out, and the black dissenters from the American 
 constitution, who so lightly esteemed our glorious land of 
 freedom, were packed under the straw, and some blankets 
 and sacks thrown carelessly over them, so that outwardly 
 there might be no significance of the dark and hidden mean- 
 ing of the load. My careful mother bundled me in coats and 
 scarfs, to keep me from freezing, and with a round of good- 
 bys, given not without some apprehensions for my safety, and 
 with minute instructions, repeated many times lest I should 
 forget them, I climbed to my seat, took the reins, and drove 
 slowly out of town. Once or twice I was hailed by some 
 curious passer-by with, " What have you got there ? " to which 
 I made answer as in such case had been provided. This was 
 the first time in my life I had ever attempted to keep my eyes 
 open all night, and more than once, as my horses jogged 
 along, I was brought to my senses by a jolt, and Avithout any 
 definite idea of the character of the road for some distance 
 back. My freight behaved very well ; once fairly out in the 
 country, and into the night, the negroes straightened up, 
 grinned, and appeared to enjoy the performance hugely. 
 During the night they would frequently get out and walk, 
 always taking care to keep carefully covered in passing 
 through a town. About three o'clock in the morning I 
 entered a village and drove up to the house whither I had 
 been directed, roused the inmates, and transferred to them 
 my load. Then I drove back, sleepy but happy. 
 
 Once my father's barn was selected as the most available 
 place for holding a grand abolition meeting, the first anni- 
 versary of the Ohio State Anti-Slavery Society, Rotten eggs 
 flew about the heads of tlie speakers, but they suffered no
 
 SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. 35 
 
 serious inconvenience from them until after the meeting was 
 over and they had begun their homeward journey. Beyond 
 the precincts of the village they were met by a mob, and 
 although spurring their horses they did not escape until the 
 foul flood had drenched them. Those were happy days, 
 when there was something to suffer for; now that the slavery 
 monster is dead, and the slayers have well-nigh spent their 
 strength kicking the carcass, there is no help for reformers 
 but to run off into woman's rights, free-love, and a new 
 string of petty isms which should put them to the blush after 
 their doughty deeds. 
 
 I cannot say that my childhood v/as particularly happy; 
 or, if it was, its sorrows are deeper graven on my memory 
 than its joys. The fault, if fate be fault, was not my parents', 
 who were always most kind to me. Excessive sensitive- 
 ness has ever been my curse; since my earliest recollec- 
 tions I have suffered from this defect more than I can tell, 
 and my peace of mind has ever been in hands other than 
 my own. 
 
 My boyhood was spent in v/orking during the summer, 
 and in winter attending school, where I progressed so far as 
 to obtain a smattering of Latin and Greek, and some insight 
 into the higher mathematics. No sooner had my father 
 placed in a forward state of cultivation his hundred acres, 
 and built him a large and comfortable stone house — which 
 he did with his own hands, quarrying the blocks from a hill 
 near by — and cleared the place from debt, than, seized by 
 the spirit of unrest, he sold his pleasant home and moved his 
 family to the ague swamps of New Madrid, Missouri, where 
 rich land, next to nothing in price, with little cultivation 
 would yield enormous returns, worth next to nothing when 
 harvested, through lack of any market. 
 
 After three years of ague and earthquake agitations in that 
 land of opossums and persimmons, fearing lest the very flesh 
 would be shaken from our bones, we all packed ourselves 
 back, and began once more where we left off, but minus the 
 comfortable stone house and farm.
 
 36 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Lovely little Granville ! dear, quiet home-nook ; lovely in 
 thy summer smiles and winter frowns ; lovely, decked in danc- 
 ing light and dew pearls, or in night's star-studded robe of 
 sleep. Under the soft sky of summer we ploughed and 
 planted, made hay, and harvested the grain. Winter was the 
 time for study, while nature, wrapped in her cold covering, 
 lay at rest. Fun and frolic were also abroad on those soft 
 silvery nights, when the moon played between the brilliant 
 sky and glistening snow, and the crisp air earned far over the 
 hills the sound of bells and merry laughter. Then winter 
 warms into spring, that sun-spirit which chases away the snow, 
 and swells the buds, and fills the air with the melody of birds, 
 and scatters fragrance over the breathing earth ; and spring 
 melts into summer, and summer sighs her autumn exit — 
 autumn, loved by many as the sweetest, saddest time of the 
 year, when the husbandman, after laying up his winter store, 
 considers for a moment his past and future, when the squirrel 
 heaps its nest with nuts, and the cries of birds of passage in 
 long angular processions are heard high in air, and the half- 
 denuded forest is tinged with the hectic flush of dying fohage. 
 
 I well remember, on returning from my absence, with 
 what envy and dislike I regarded as interlopers those who 
 then occupied my childhood home ; and, child as I was, the 
 earliest and most determined ambition of my life was to work 
 and earn the money to buy back the old stone house. Ah 
 God ! how with sv/elling heart, and flushed cheek, and brain 
 on fire, I have later tramped again that ground, the ground 
 my boyhood trod ; how I have skirted it about, and wan- 
 dered through its woods, and nestled in its hedges, listening 
 to the rustling leaves and still forest murmurings that seemed 
 to tell me of the past ; uncovering my head to the proud 
 old elms that nodded to me as I passed, and gazing at the 
 wild-flowers that looked uj) into my face and smiled as I 
 trod them, even as time had trodden my young heart ; whis- 
 pering to the birds that stared strangely at me and would 
 not talk to mc — none save the bickering blackbird, and the 
 distant turtle-dove to whose mournful tone my breast was
 
 SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. 37 
 
 tuned; watching in the httle stream the minnows that I 
 used to fancy waited for me to come and feed them ; loit- 
 ering under the golden-sweet apple-tree where I used to loll 
 my study hours away ; eying the ill-looking beasts that oc- 
 cupied the places of my pets, while at every step some famil- 
 iar object would send a thousand sad memories tugging at 
 my heartstrings, and call up scenes happening a few years 
 back but acted seemingly ages ago, until I felt myself as old 
 as Abraham. There was the orchard, celestial white and 
 fragrant in its blossoms, whose every tree I could tell, and 
 the fruit that grew on it ; the meadow, through whose brist- 
 ling stubble my naked feet had picked their way when carry- 
 ing water to the haymakers and fighting bumblebees; the 
 cornfield, where I had ridden the horse to plough ; the barn- 
 yard, where from the backs of untrained colts I had en- 
 countered so many falls; the hillock, down Avhich I had 
 been tumbled by my pet lamb, aftenvard sacrificed and 
 eaten for its sins — eaten unadvisedly by the youthful feast- 
 ers, lest the morsels should choke them. There was the 
 garden I had been made to weed, the well at which I had 
 so often drunk, the barn where I used to search for eggs, 
 turn somersets, and make such fearful leaps upon the hay ; 
 there were the sheds, and yards, and porches ; every fence, 
 and shrub, and stone stood there, the cause of a thousand 
 heart-throbs. 
 
 From the grassy field where stood conspicuous the stone- 
 quarry, how often have I driven the cows along the base 
 of the wooded hill separating my father's farm from the vil- 
 lage, to the distant pasture where the long blue-eyed grass 
 was mixed with clover, and sprinkled with buttercups, and 
 dotted with solitary elms on whose limbs the crows and 
 blackbirds quarrelled for a place. And under the beech- 
 trees beneath the hill where wound my path, as my bare 
 feet trudged along, how boyish fancies played through my 
 brain while I was all unconscious of the great world beyond 
 my homely horizon. On the bended bough of that old oak, 
 planted long before I was bom, and which these many years 
 
 434608
 
 38 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 has furnished the winter's store and storehouse to the thrifty 
 woodpecker, there sits the robin where sat his father, and 
 his father's father, singing the self-same song his grandfather 
 sang when he wooed his mate, singing the self-same song 
 his sons and his sons' sons shall sing. 
 
 Sweet were those days, clouded perhaps a little with boy- 
 ish melancholy, and now brought to my remembrance by 
 the play of sunshine and shadow in and round familiar 
 nooks, by the leafy woodbine under the garden wall, by 
 the sparkling dewy grass-blades and the odor of the breath- 
 ing woods, by the crab-appletree hedge, covered with grape- 
 vines, and bordered with blackberry bushes, and inclosing 
 the several fields, each shedding its own peculiar fragrance ; 
 by the row of poplars lining the road in front of the house, 
 by the willows drinking at the. brook, the buckeyes on the 
 hill, and the chestnut, hickory, butternut, and walnut trees, 
 whose fruit I gathered every autumn, storing it in the garret, 
 and cracking it on Sundays after sunset, as a reward for 
 "keeping" Saturday night. 
 
 There is something delicious in the air, though the ground 
 be wet and the sky murky ; it is the air in which I first cried 
 and laughed. There, upon the abruptly sloping brow of the 
 hill yonder, is where I buried myself beneath a load of wood, 
 overturned from a large two-horse sled into the snow. And 
 in that strip of thicket to the right I used to hide from thun- 
 der-showers on my way from school. Behind that stone wall 
 many a time have I crept up and frightened chanticleer in 
 the midst of his crow, raising his wrath by breaking his tune, 
 and thereby instigating him to thrice as loud and thrice as 
 long a note the moment my back was turned. Near by was 
 tlie grove of sugar-maple, to me a vast and trackless forest 
 infested with huge reptiles and ravenous beasts, when there 
 I slept all niglit by the camp-fire boiling the unsubstan- 
 tial sap to sweeter consistency. Away across a four-acre 
 lot still stands the little old bridge wherefrom I fished for 
 minnows in the brook it spans, with pork-baited i)ins for 
 liooks.
 
 SPRINGS AND LITTLE BROOKS. 39 
 
 There is something painfully sweet in such memories. 
 How sorrows the heart over its lost friendships; how the 
 breath of other days whispers of happiness never realized; 
 how the sorrowful past plays its exquisite strains upon the 
 heartstrings ! Things long gone by, deemed httle then and 
 joyless, are magnified by the mists of time and distance into 
 a mirage of pleasurable remembrances. How an old song 
 sometimes stirs the whole reservoir of regrets, and makes the 
 present well-nigh unbearable ! Out of my most miserable past 
 I draw the deepest pain pleasures, beside which present joys 
 are insipid. There is no sadder sound to the questioner's 
 ear than the church bell which sometime called him to 
 believing prayer. At once it brings to mind a thousand holy 
 aspirations, and rings the death-knell of an eternity of joy. 
 
 Like tiny tongues of pure flame darting upward amidst the 
 mountain of somber smoke, there are many bright memories 
 even among the most melancholy reveries. The unhappiest 
 life contains many happy hours, just as the most nauseating 
 medicine is made up of divers sweet ingredients. Even there, 
 golden run life's golden sands, for into the humble home 
 ambition brings as yet no curse. 
 
 But alas ! the glowing charm thrown over all by the half- 
 heavenly conceptions of childhood shall never be revived. 
 Every harvesting now brings but a new crop of withered 
 pleasures, which with the damask freshness of youth are flung 
 into the storehouse of desolation. 
 
 Never is there a home like the home of our youth ; never 
 such sunshine as that which makes shadows for us to play 
 in, never such air as that which swells our youthful breasts 
 and gives our happy minds free expression, never such water 
 as the laughing, dancing streamlet in which we wade through 
 silvery bubblings over glittering pebbles, never such music 
 as the robin's roundelay and the swallow's twittering that wake 
 us in the morning, the tinkling of the cow bells, the rustling 
 of the vines over the window, the chirrup of the cricket, and 
 the striking of the old house clock that tells us our task is 
 done. The home of our childhood, once abandoned, is for-
 
 40 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 ever lost. It may have been a hut, standing on the rudest 
 patch of ground the earth affords, yet so wrapped round the 
 heart is it, so charged with youthful image^ is every stick 
 and stone of it, that the gilded castle bililt in after life, with 
 all the rare and costly furnishings that art and ingenuity can 
 afford, is but an empty barn beside it !
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER. 
 
 No man is born into the world whose work is not born with him ; 
 there is always work and tools to work withal, for those who will. 
 
 — Lowell. 
 
 CROSSING a muddy street one rainy day on her way to 
 school, my eldest sister, dark-eyed and tender of heart, 
 encountered a sandy-haired but by no means ill-looking youth 
 who made way for her by stepping back from the plank which 
 served pedestrians. The young man was a member of the 
 Derby family of booksellers, afterward noted for their large 
 establishments in various cities. Of course these two young 
 persons, thus thrown together on this muddy crossing, fell in 
 love ; how else could it be ? and in due time were married, 
 vowing thenceforth to cross all muddy streets in company, 
 and not from opposite directions. And in this rain, and 
 mud, and marriage, I find another of the causes that led me 
 to embark in literature. The marriage took place in 1845, 
 when I was thirteen years of age, and the happy couple made 
 their home in Geneva, New York, where Mr. Derby was then 
 doing business. Subsequently he removed his bookstore and 
 family to Buffalo. 
 
 On our return from the land of milk and honey, as we at 
 first soberly and afterward ironically called our southern 
 prairie home, my father entered into copartnership with one 
 Wright, a tanner and farmer. The tasks then imposed upon 
 me were little calculated to give content or yield profit. 
 Mingled with my school and Sunday duties, interspersed with 
 occasional holidays for shooting, fishing, swimming, skating, 
 sleighing, and nut and beny gathering, was work, such as
 
 42 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 grinding bark, sawing wood, chopping, clearing, fencing, 
 milling, teaming, ploughing, planting, harvesting, and the 
 like, wherein I could take but little interest and make no 
 progress, and which consequently I most heartily hated. 
 
 To my great delight, a year or two after the marriage of 
 my sister, I was offered the choice of preparing for college or 
 of entering the Buffalo bookstore. The doctrine was just 
 then coming into vogue that in the choice of a profession or 
 occupation youthful proclivities should be directed, but the 
 youth should not be coerced. This, within the bounds of 
 reason, is assuredly the correct idea. 
 
 This marriage of my sister's changed the course not only 
 of my own destiny but of that of every member of my family. 
 It was the hinge on which the gate swung to open a new 
 career to all of us. Puritan Granville was a good place to be 
 reared in, but it was a better place to emigrate from. It was 
 in the world but not of the world. Success there would mean 
 a hundred acres of land, a stone house, six children, an interest 
 in a town store or a grist-mill, and a deaconship in the church. 
 
 But how should I decide the question before me ? What 
 had I upon which to base a decision ? Nothing but my feel- 
 ings, my passions, and propensities — unsafe guides enough 
 when coupled with experience, but absolutely dangerous when 
 left to shift for themselves. Study had always strong fasci- 
 nations for me, and the thought of sometime becoming a great 
 lawyer or statesman set heart and head in a whirl. I cannot 
 remember the time when I could not read, recite the cate- 
 chism, and ride and drive a horse. I am told that I was quick 
 to learn when young, and that at the age of three I could 
 read the New Testament without having to spell out many 
 of the Avords. If that be true the talent must have ended with 
 my childhood, for later on taking up study I found it almost 
 impossible to learn, and still more difficult to remember, what- 
 ever talent I may have possessed in that direction having 
 been driven out of me in the tread-mill of business. 
 
 One winter I was sent to the brick school-house, a rusty red 
 monument of rusty red efforts, long since torn down. I'here
 
 THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER. 43 
 
 presided over the boys at one time my mother's brother. The 
 Howes engaged in school-teaching naturally, they and their 
 children, boys and girls, without asking themselves why. The 
 family have taught from the Atlantic to the Pacific, in New 
 York, Ohio, Iowa, Nevada, Oregon, and California. They 
 were good teachers, but they were good for little else. The 
 one who taught in Granville had written a grammar, and all 
 the boys were compelled to study it. It consisted chiefly of 
 rules which could not be understood, and contained little of the 
 kind of examples which remained fastened in the mind to be 
 afterward of practical value. It is safe to say that children 
 now learn twice as much with half the trouble. Then the 
 study of grammar under a grammar-making uncle did me 
 litde good. 
 
 Those Howe grammar lessons were the curse of that winter. 
 Often I wept over the useless and distasteful drudgery, but 
 in vain. Tears were a small argument with my parents 
 where they deemed duty to be concerned; and the brother 
 made my mother believe that if I failed in one jot or tittle of 
 his grammar there would be no hope for me afterward in any 
 direction. Mathematics I enjoyed. Stretched on the hearth 
 before a blazing fire, with book and slate, I worked out my 
 problems during the long evenings, and then took the Hov/e 
 grammar lesson as I would castor-oil. 
 
 My studies were mixed with house and bam duties, such 
 as paring apples, pounding rusk, feeding and milking the 
 cows, and scores of like occupations. Long before daylight 
 I would be called from my slumber to work and study, a 
 summons I usually responded to with alacrity. Then my 
 mother called me good, and my home life was happy. Soon 
 after breakfast, with books, and tin pail well stored with 
 luncheon, I was out into the sharp morning air and over the 
 hill to school. But still the Howe grammar hung over all 
 my joys like a grim shadow, darkening all delights. For, in 
 that I did not love the grammar, the Howe did not love me, 
 and he made the place exceedingly uncomfortable, until 
 finally my mother became satisfied that I was injudiciously
 
 44 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 and unfairly treated, and to my great joy took me from this 
 purgatory. 
 
 I was passionately fond of music, not so much of listening 
 as performing. The intensest aspirations of my life seem to 
 have taken this form; I longed to do rather than to enjoy. 
 Purposeless pleasure was not pleasant to me. To-day I find 
 [neither satisfaction nor profit in reading or writing, or doing 
 I anything for my own personal enjoyment. There must be 
 an aim, and a high, immediate, and direct one, if in my 
 doing or being I am to find satisfaction. 
 
 In the matter of music, there was within me something 
 which sighed for expression, and to throw it off in song or 
 through the melodies of an instrument was the simplest 
 method of relief. This restless desire to unburden my heart 
 was present in my earliest consciousness. It was ahvays in 
 some way stifled in my younger days. There were schools 
 which I could and did attend, but singing in concert Avith a 
 class of boys and girls was not what I wanted. By saving 
 up dimes and half-dollars I succeeded in buying an old 
 violin. I paid four dollars for it ; and I remember with 
 what trepidation I invested my entire capital in the instru- 
 ment. For several years I scraped persistently and learned 
 to play badly a few tunes. I had no teacher and no encour- 
 agement; I was laughed at and frowned at, until finally I 
 abandoned it. Fiddling in that staid society was almost as 
 much a sin as card-playing ; for if cards were for gamblers, 
 fiddles were for dancers, and both were a pastime invented 
 by Satan. Christ never danced ; and although David did, 
 our minister used to apologize for him by saying that his was 
 a slow, measured, kingly step, something of a Shaker dance — 
 at all events nothing like the whirling embracements of these 
 later times. 
 
 To return to the matter of choosing between study and 
 business. Finding myself possessed of these and many other 
 burning aspirations, without stopping to count the cost, child- 
 like I struck at once for the prize. If self-devotion and hard 
 study could win, it should be mine. So I chose the life of a
 
 THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER. 45 
 
 student, and spent another year in preparing for college. 
 There was an academy as well as a college in the place ; 
 indeed, as I have before remarked, my native town was, in 
 its way, quite a seat of learning. 
 
 It was now the winter of 1847-8, and bravely I set about 
 my self-imposed task, studying hard, and for a time making 
 fair progress. I was still obliged to work morning and even- 
 ing, and, with now and then a holiday, during the vacations. 
 I was much alone in my studies, although I listened to my 
 teacher as earnestly as if I had been under competitive 
 influence. My nearest and indeed almost the only com- 
 panion I had at this time was my cousin Edgar Hillyer, 
 afterward United States judge for Nevada. In age he was a 
 year my senior, but in ability and accomplishments many 
 years. He was a good student, apt in debate, well read in 
 classical literature, nimble on the violin, a rollicking, jolly 
 companion, muscular, active, and courageous, and could 
 hold his own with the best of them on the play-ground. 
 When viohn-playing became fashionable in churches he 
 sawed away at a base-viol behind the church choir, read- 
 ing a novel under cover of his huge instrument during the 
 sermon. He was given a little to sarcasm at times, which 
 cut me somewhat ; otherwise we were true and stanch friends. 
 He it was who aided and influenced me more than any other 
 in many things. In advance of me in studies, he entered 
 college and I was left alone. Still I toiled on, notwithstand- 
 ing occasional letters from Buffalo which tended to unsettle 
 my plans. Before the time for entering college arrived I 
 had lost something of my interest in study : without the 
 stimulus of sympathizing friends and competition, the unfed 
 fire of my ambition died away. 
 
 Meanwhile Mr. Derby, who was an enthusiast in his busi- 
 ness, had made occasional visits to my father's house, and 
 in hstening to his conversation I became attracted toward 
 Buffalo. There was, moreover, in me a growing desire for 
 independence ; not that I was dissatisfied with my home so
 
 46 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 much as with myself. I longed to be doing something that 
 would show results; I wanted to be a man, to be a great 
 man, to be a man at once. The road to learning was slow 
 and hard; besides, my father was not rich, and although 
 ready to deny himself anything for me, I could see that to 
 continue my plan of study would be a heavy tax on him. 
 Yet I loved it, and, as the sequel will show, left it here only 
 to take it up at a future time. Now I wanted money, I felt 
 the need of money, and I determined to have money. Not 
 to hug and hoard, not to love and cherish as a thing admira- 
 ble in itself, not as a master to bid me fetch and carry all my 
 days, nor as a god to fall before and worship, sealing the heart 
 from human sympathy, but as a servant to do my bidding, as 
 an Aladdin lamp to buy me independence, leisure, culture. 
 
 Thus unsettled in my mind by the allurements of active 
 business and city life, my attention distracted from studies, 
 discontented in the thought of plodding a poverty-stricken 
 path to fame, and unwilling to burden my father for a term 
 of years, I asked and obtained leave to enter the shop ; selling 
 books, for the nonce, offering stronger attractions than study- 
 ing them. Nor am I now disposed to regret my final decis- 
 ion. Commercial and industrial training offers advantages 
 in the formation of mind, as well as scientific and literary 
 training. School is but a mental gymnasium. Little is there 
 learned except the learning how to learn; and the system 
 that aims at this gymnastic exercise of mind, rather than 
 cramming, is the best. He who studies most does not always 
 learn most, nor is he who reads most always the best read. 
 Understanding, and not cramming, is education. Learn how 
 to form opinions of your own rather than fill your head with 
 the opinions of others. 
 
 About the ist of August, 1848, I left Granville for Buffalo, 
 where I arrived on the 9th. I was now sixteen years of age, 
 and this may be regarded as my starting out in life. Then 
 I left my father's house, and ever since have I been my own 
 master, and made my own way in tlic world. There was no
 
 THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER. 47 
 
 railway from my native town, and my journey was made in 
 a canal-boat as far as Cleveland, and thence by steamboat 
 over Lake Erie to Buffalo. The captain of the canal-boat 
 was a brother of my Uncle Hillyer, and permission was 
 given me to ride on the towpath in lieu of paying fare. I 
 gladly availed myself of the opportunity, and took my turn 
 night and day during the whole journey. The day after my 
 arrival in Buffalo I was permitted a view of the bookseller's 
 shop. It would not be regarded as much of a store nowa- 
 days, but it was the largest establishment I had ever seen, 
 and the, to me, huge piles of literature, the endless ranges of 
 book-shelves, the hurrying clerks, the austere accountants, 
 the lord paramount proprietor, all filled me with awe not un- 
 accompanied by heart-sinkings. A day or so was spent in 
 looking about the city, accompanying my sister to the market, 
 and attending a great poHtical convention which was then in 
 full blast. On the Monday foUoAnng my arrival I was put 
 to work in the bindery over the counting-room, and initiated 
 into the mysteries of the book business by folding and stitch- 
 ing reports of the aforesaid convention. There I was kept, 
 living with my sister, and undergoing in the shop a vast 
 amount of unpalatable though doubtless very necessary train- 
 ing, till the following October, when the bindery was sold. 
 I was then left for a time in an uncertain, purposeless state, 
 with nothing in particular to occupy me. After being given 
 plainly to understand by my brother-in-law that my pres- 
 ence was not at all necessary to his happiness, I was finally 
 thrust into the counting-house at the foot of the ladder, as 
 the best means of getting rid of me. 
 
 The fact is, I was more ambitious than amiable, and my 
 brother-in-law was more arbitrary than agreeable. I was 
 stubborn and headstrong, impatient under correction, chafing 
 over every rub against my country angularities ; he distant, 
 unsympathizing, and injudicious in his management of me. 
 I felt that I was not understood, and saw no way of making 
 myself kno\\Ti to him. Any attempt to advance or to rise 
 above the position first assigned me was frowned down ; not
 
 48 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 because he hated, or wished to injure, or persecute me, but 
 because he thought boys should not be presumptuous, that 
 they should be kept in the background — especially pale, 
 thin, thoughtful, supersensitive brothers-in-law. 
 
 For some six months I held this anomalous position, till 
 one day the chief bookkeeper intimated to me that, in the 
 opinion of the head of the house, nature had never designed 
 me for a bookseller — a species of divinity in the eyes of 
 these men born but not made — and that should I retire 
 from active duty no one about the premises would be over- 
 whelmed with sorrow. In plain English, I was discharged. 
 The blood which mantled my face under a sense of what I 
 deemed indignity and wrong was my only response ; yet in 
 my heart I was glad. I saw that this was no place for me, 
 that my young hfe was being turned to wormwood, and that 
 my bosom was becoming a hell of hatefulness. 
 
 I have never in my life, before that time or since, enter- 
 tained a doubt of reasonable success in any reasonable under- 
 taking. I now determined to start in business on my own 
 account. Since I could not work for the Buffalo booksell- 
 ing people, I would work for myself. I was entirely without 
 money, having received nothing for my services — which in- 
 deed were worth nothing — yet I borrowed enough to take 
 me back to Ohio, and Mr. Derby, it appears, had sufficient 
 confidence to trust me for a few cases of goods. Shipping 
 my stock up the lake to Sandusky, and thence by rail to 
 Mansfield, the terminus of the road, I hurried on to Granville 
 for a horse and wagon, with which I proceeded back to 
 Mansfield, loaded up, and began distributing my goods 
 among the country merchants of that vicinity. For about 
 four months I traveled in this manner over different parts of 
 my native State, selling, remitting, and ordering more goods, 
 and succeeding in the main very well ; that is to say, I paid 
 my expenses, and all the obligations I had before contracted, 
 and had enough left to buy a silver watch, and a suit of black 
 broadcloth. Never was watch like that watch, fruit as it was 
 of my first commercial earnings.
 
 THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER. 49 
 
 Winter approaching, I sold out my stock, paid my debts, 
 and went home. Owing to my success, it seems, I had risen 
 somewhat in the estimation of the Buffalo book magnates, 
 and just as my mind was made up to enter school for the 
 winter I was summoned back to Buffalo, with instructions to 
 bring my youngest sister, Mary, afterward INIrs. Trevett. We 
 embarked at Sandusky, encountering the first night out a 
 storm, and after beating about among the short jerky waves 
 of the lake for two days, we reached Buffalo on the 8th of 
 December, 1849. This time I was to enter the store as a 
 recognized clerk, and was to receive a salary of one hundred 
 dollars a year from the first of January, 1850. 
 
 I now began to look upon myself as quite a man. A hun- 
 dred dollars was a great deal of money ; I was over seven- 
 teen years of age, had traveled, had been in business, and 
 was experienced. So I relaxed a Httle from puritanical 
 ideas of propriety. I bought a high hat and a cane ; smoked 
 now and then surreptitiously a cigar; a gaudy tie adorned 
 my neck, and a flashy ring encircled my finger. I do not 
 think I ever held myself in higher estimation before or since ; 
 at no time of my life did I ever presume so much on my 
 knowledge, or, as I imagined, present so fine an appearance. 
 
 Soon I found myself more in sympathy with my employer, 
 and felt that he now began somewhat to understand me. 
 And here I will pay my tribute of respect to the memor)^ of 
 Mr. Derby. He was of unblemished reputation, thoroughly 
 sound in morals, sincere in religion, honest in his business, 
 kind in his family, warm and lovable in his friendships, patri- 
 otic as a citizen, and liberal, chivalrous, and high-spirited as 
 a man and a gentleman. He was among the best friends I 
 ever had — he, and his wife, my sister. He seemed to repose 
 the utmost confidence in me, trusted me, a green boy, in the 
 midst of the whirlpool of the Califomian carnival, with prop- 
 erty which he could ill afford to lose, the risk being regarded 
 as little less than madness on his part by business acquaint- 
 ances. His death I felt more keenly than that of any other 
 man who ever died. His goodness will remain fresh in my 
 4
 
 50 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 memory to my dying day. Yet, when thrown together as 
 under our first relations — he the master, I the boy — our 
 dispositions and natures were strangely out of tune. He 
 held his own pecuHar views regarding the training and treat- 
 ment of relatives. He seemed to delight in tormenting, in a 
 business way, all who were in any wise allied to him by blood 
 or marriage, and the nearer the relationship the greater the 
 persecution. He was particularly severe with me; and it 
 was only when a younger brother of his was with him, one 
 nearer to him than I, and on whom his merciless words were 
 showered, that I found relief While but a child, and before 
 I went to Buffalo, or had ever been away from home, I was 
 sent into the backwoods of Ohio to obtain subscriptions for 
 a work on the science of government. Of course I made a 
 failure of it, enduring much head-sickness and heart-sickness 
 thereby, and was laughed to scorn as a youth who would 
 never succeed at anything. My father, totally inexperienced 
 in the book business, but having a little money wherewith to 
 make the purchase, was induced to take a cargo of books 
 down the Mississippi river, which proved to be another fail- 
 ure and a severe loss. 
 
 With a sister ever kind to me, and an employer really desir- 
 ous of advancing my best interests, the training I underwent 
 at this period of my life was about as injudicious for an ambi- 
 tious, sensitive youth as could well have been devised. Even 
 after my return from Ohio I was at times headstrong, impa- 
 tient of restraint, impudent, angry, and at open war with my 
 brother-in-law ; yet I was eager to learn, quick, and intelli- 
 gent, and would gladly have worked, early and late, with 
 faithful and willing diligence in any advancing direction. 
 But it seemed that my employer still considered it best for 
 me to be kept down; to be censured much and never praised; 
 to have one after another placed above me whom I very nat- 
 urally deemed no more cai)al)le than myself The consequence 
 was that during the greater i)art of my stay in Buffalo I was 
 in a sullen state of exasperation. I was hateful, stubborn, 
 and greatly to be blamed, but the discipline I received only
 
 THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER. 51 
 
 intensified these faults, and tended in no wise to remove them. 
 One word of kindness, and I would have followed this man 
 to the death ; yet while he crucified me he did not mean to 
 be cruel, and sometimes I was really happy in his society. I 
 know he was full of generous feeling for me even while I tried 
 him most; for when, after leaving for CaUfornia, I sent him 
 a letter, opening my heart as I had never done before, on 
 receipt of it, as my sister told me, he threw himself upon the 
 sofa and wept like a child. 
 
 The mould destined for me ill-fitting my nature, which 
 would not be melted for recasting, or even made to assume 
 comeliness by attrition, I fell into my own ways, which were 
 very bad ways: tramping the streets at night with jovial 
 companions, indulging in midnight suppers and all-night 
 dancings. Lo, how the puritan's son has fallen ! Conscience 
 pricked faithfully at first; but I soon grew easier in mind; 
 then reckless ; and finally neglecting my Bible, my prayers, 
 and all those Sabbath restraints which hold us back from 
 rushing headlong to destruction, I gave myself over to hard- 
 ness of heart. Yet all this time I usually listened with enjoy- 
 ment and profit to one sermon on Sunday ; I also attended 
 lectures given by Park Benjamin, G. P. R. James, John B. 
 Gough, and others; these and novel-reading comprised my 
 intellectual food. 
 
 Into that bookseller's shop I went with all the untempted 
 innocence of a child ; out of it I came with the tarnish of so- 
 called manly experience. There I plucked my first forbidden 
 fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil ; yet the 
 sense of right remained, and that remorse which ever mixes 
 bitter with the sweets of sin. 
 
 Every now and then I would turn over a new leaf; bravely 
 begin a diary, scoring the first page with high resolves, such 
 as total abstinence from every species of wickedness, deter- 
 mined to think, speak, and do no evil, to walk always as be- 
 fore the eye of Omniscience, clean in heart, pure in mind, 
 and strong in body ; in short, to be a perfect man — which 
 sublime state of things, wrought up beyond human endur-
 
 52 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 ance, would last sometimes for three days or three weeks, and 
 end in a collapse. Sometimes I would keep my diary up 
 during the year; then again I would open a blank book, 
 without fixed dates, and discharge my burning thoughts into 
 it in the hope of relief. No sooner had I departed from 
 Buffalo on my way to California than all desire left me to 
 commit these foolish boyish excesses. There was then no 
 one to hoodwink, no watchful eye to circumvent; it ceased 
 to be amusing when I was my own master ; so when thrown 
 into the pandemonium at San Francisco I had not the sHght- 
 est inclination to make a beast or a villain of myself. 
 
 But the time thus lost ! How have I longed to live again 
 those years. Six years of my young life as good as squan- 
 dered, in some respects worse, for instead of laying the 
 foundation for health, purity, intellect, I was crushing my 
 God-given faculties, damming the source of high thoughts 
 and ennobling affections, and sowing by Stygian streams the 
 wild seeds of perdition. At the time when of all others the 
 plant needs judicious care, when the hard soil needs soften- 
 ing, the ill-favored branches pruning, the destroyer steps in 
 and places locusts on the leaves and worms about the roots. 
 
 How I have longed to go back and place myself with a 
 riper experience under my own tuition, and see what would 
 come of it ! How I would gather in those golden oppor- 
 tunities which were so ruthlessly thrown away; how I would 
 prize those hours, and days, and years so flippantly regarded ; 
 how I would cherish and cultivate that body and mind so 
 well-nigh wrecked on the shoals of youthful folly ! Why could 
 we not have been born old, and from decrepitude with learn- 
 ing and wisdom have grown young, and so have had the 
 benefit of our wealth of experience in the enjoyment of our 
 youth ! It seems that if I had only known something of 
 what life is and the importance of right. living, I could have 
 made almost anything of myself. So has thought many 
 another ; and so thinking, life appears such a delusion — the 
 life which to know requires living, and which is lived only to 
 know that it is lost !
 
 THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER, 53 
 
 It was a few months before I left my home for the first 
 time that gold had been discovered in California; but not 
 until a year later did the news so overspread the country as 
 to cause any excitement in the quiet town of Granville. 
 Scarcely had I reached Buffalo the second time when letters 
 informed me that my father was thinking of going to the new 
 El Dorado. The ancient leaven of industry and enterprise 
 still worked in him, and although far past the average age 
 of those who joined the pilgrimage to the golden shrine, he 
 could not resist the temptation. Though but little over fifty, 
 he was called an old man in those days in California. By the 
 I St of February it was settled that he would go, and in March, 
 1850, he set sail from New York. I had a boyish desire to 
 accompany him, but did not think seriously of going at the 
 time. I was more absorbed in flirtations, oyster suppers, and 
 dancing parties than fascinated by the prospect of digging for 
 gold. 
 
 Nevertheless the wheel of my destiny was turning. In Jan- 
 uary, 1 85 1, Mr. Derby received a letter from an uncle of 
 mine, my mother's brother, then in Oregon, ordering a large 
 quantity of books. This demand, coming from a new and 
 distant market, made quite an impression upon the mind of 
 the ardent young bookseller. Visions filled his brain of mam- 
 moth warehouses rising in vast cities along the shores of the 
 Pacific, of publication offices and manufacturing establish- 
 ments, having hundreds of busy clerks and artisans, buying, 
 making, and selling books, and he would walk the floor excit- 
 edly and talk of these things by the hour, until he was well- 
 nigh ready to sell out a safe and profitable business, pack up, 
 and go to California himself. These visions were prophetic ; 
 and through his instrumentality one such establishment as he 
 had dreamed of was planted in the metropolis of this western 
 seaboard, although he did not live to know of it. 
 
 My nearest companion at this time was a fellow-clerk, 
 George L. Kenny, the son of an Irish gentleman. He had 
 come to seek his fortune in America, and found his way al- 
 most direct from the mother country to the Buffalo bookstore,
 
 54 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 where he had been engaged but a few months when I first 
 arrived there. From that day for over a third of a century 
 his Hfe and mine were closely linked. In physique he was tall, 
 thin, and muscular, somewhat awkward in his movements, 
 with an open countenance, as we used to call his large mouth, 
 which in laughing he displayed to its widest extent. I have 
 occasion to remember both the awkwardness and the strength 
 of my ancient comrade ; for one day in Buffalo, " skylarking," 
 as Ave termed it, with his huge fist he placed my nasal organ 
 out of line, where it ever after remained. In disposition and 
 character he was generous almost to a fault ; affectionate, 
 warm-hearted, and mild, though passionate and stubborn 
 when roused; jovial and inspiriting as a companion, stanch 
 and reliable as a friend, and honest as a man. He it was who 
 introduced me into the mysteries of bookselling, and other 
 and more questionable mysteries, when first I went to Buffalo. 
 
 Mr. Derby was a man of many ideas. Though practical 
 and conservative in the main, the fertility of his brain and 
 his enthusiasm often gave him little rest. Once seized with 
 the thought of California in connection with his business, he 
 could not dispossess his mind of it. There it fastened, causing 
 him many a restless day and sleepless night. He talked of 
 sending out one, then another, then he thought he would go 
 himself; but much of what was said he knew to be impracti- 
 cable, and all the while his ideas were dim and shadowy. 
 Finally he talked more directly of me as the one to go — why 
 I do not know, unless it was that I could best be spared, and 
 also that I had friends there, who, if it should be needed, 
 might supply me with money. Oregon was the point at this 
 time talked of. I was ready to go, but had as yet no special 
 enthusiasm for the adventure. 
 
 Meanwhile Mr. Derby had sent three shipments of goods 
 to the Pacific; one small lot sold at seventy-five per cent, 
 above the invoice, and although the other two were lost, one 
 by fire and the other by failure of the consignee, the success 
 was sufficient to excite great hopes. This, together with a
 
 THE COUNTRY BOY BECOMES A BOOKSELLER. 55 
 
 letter from my father received toward the latter part of 
 December, 1851, determined me to go to California. I was 
 anxious to have Mr. Kenny accompany me. He would like 
 much to go, he said, but had not the money. I urged him 
 to speak to Mr. Derby about it. He did so, when our now 
 most gracious employer replied : " For a long time I have 
 been desirous of your going to California ; only I would not 
 propose it." He then entered heartily into our plans and 
 opened the way for both of us. 
 
 I felt by no means eager for gold ; it was rather boyish love 
 of adventure that prompted me. California was pictured in 
 my mind as a nondescript country on the other side of huge 
 mountains, which once overstepped, with most that I cared 
 for left behind, there was little hope of return. I was not so 
 weaned but that I must see my mother before I departed, 
 perhaps never to return; and although it involved an un- 
 pleasant and expensive journey over the snow in the dead 
 of winter, I immediately performed it. Then bidding all a 
 long farewell, and calling on the way upon Mr. James C. 
 Derby of Auburn, my comrade Kenny and I went down to 
 New York, entered our names at the Irving House, and were 
 ready to embark by the next steamer.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA ! ESTO PERPETUA ! 
 Never despair ; but if you do, work in despair. — Burke. 
 
 A DETAILED description of an early voyage from New- 
 York to Chagres, across the Isthmus to Panama, and 
 thence to San Francisco, belongs rather to the time than to 
 the individual. During the first fifteen years of my residence 
 on the western coast I made the passage between New York 
 and San Francisco by way of Panama no less than eleven 
 times, thus spending on the water nearly one year, or what 
 would be almost equivalent to every other Sunday during 
 that time. Many made the voyage twice or thrice as often, 
 and life on the steamer was but apart of California life. It was 
 there the beginning was made ; it was sometimes the ending. 
 It was there the angular eccentricities were first filed off, and 
 roughly filed, as many a soft-bearded fledgling experienced. 
 
 In my California Inter Pocula I have given a description of 
 my first voyage. I have there given it in detail, not because 
 of anything particularly striking, but to show what the voy- 
 age in those days was ; for, excepting shipwrecks, epidemics, 
 or other special calamities, they were all very much alike. I 
 shall not therefore repeat the narrative here, but merely say 
 that on the 24th of February, 1852, in company with Mr. 
 Kenny, I embarked at New York on the steamer George Law, 
 bound for Habana. On reaching this port the sixth day, pas- 
 sengers, mails, and freight were transferred, with those of the 
 steamer from New Orleans, to the Georgia, which that night 
 sailed for Chagres, touching at Jamaica. Arrived at Chagres 
 we were sent to Aspinwall to disembark, so that we might 
 pay the fare over some six or eight miles of the Panama rail- 
 
 s6
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA ! 57 
 
 way just then opened for that distance. After the usual delay- 
 on the Isthmus we went on board the steamer Patiamd the 
 1 2th of March, touched at several ports on the Pacific, and 
 reached San Francisco at twelve o'clock the first day of April. 
 
 When I arrived in California John Bigler was governor. 
 The capital had just been removed from Vallejo to Sacra- 
 mento. In San Francisco the troubles with squatters, Peter 
 Smith tides, and water-lot frauds were attracting the chief 
 attention. Portions of the street were brilliantly lighted from 
 the glare of gambling-saloons ; elsewhere all was thick dark- 
 ness. On Montgomery street, indeed, lamps were posted by 
 the occupants, but there was no system of street lights, and 
 in the dark places about the docks, in the back streets, and 
 round the suburbs, many dark deeds were committed. Crime, 
 driven into holes and hiding-places by the Vigilance Com- 
 mittee of 185 1, was beginning to show its face again, but the 
 authorities, roused to a sense of duty by the late arbitrary 
 action of the citizens, were more on the alert than formerly, 
 and criminals were caught and punished with some degree 
 of certainty. Agriculture was attracting more attention than 
 at any previous time. Bull and bear fights at the Mission, 
 and the childhke game of A B C on Long wharf, were in 
 vogue. Gambling was somewhat on the decline ; but it was 
 the day of grand raffles, grand auction sales, grand quartz- 
 mining schemes, and Biscaccianti concerts. Fire and flood 
 held alternate sway over the destinies of town and country, 
 aiding other causes to accomplish business disruptions and 
 failures. 
 
 It was the day of long annual sessions of the legislature, 
 of fighting ofiicials, and anti-Chinese meetings — though con- 
 cerning this last named fermentation the question arises. 
 When in Cahfomia was it not? The most striking feature 
 of the town was still the gambling-houses, the more aristo- 
 cratic establishments being then situated on the plaza and 
 Commercial street, and the lower dens principally on Long 
 wharf. The better class supported a fine orchestra of five 
 or six wnd instruments, while in others a dissonant piano
 
 S8 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 or violin gave the invitation to enter. The building was 
 usually a mere shell, while the interior was gorgeously dec- 
 orated and illumined with chandehers presenting a mass of 
 ghttering glass pendants. Monte, faro, roulette, lansquenet, 
 vingt-et-un, and rouge-et-noir were the favorite games, 
 though many others were played. During week-days these 
 places were usually quiet, but at night and on Sundays the 
 jingling of coin and the clinking of glasses were mingled with 
 the music of the orchestra in hellish harmony. Above all 
 voices was heard that of the dealer : " Make your game, gen- 
 tlemen, make your game ! All down ? Make your game ! 
 All down ? The game is made ! no more ; deuce, black 
 wins." 
 
 Then followed the raking-in process, and the paying-out, 
 after which came a new shuffle and a new deal ; and thus 
 the performance was repeated and the excitement kept up 
 throughout the fleeting hours of the night. Round the tables 
 sat beautiful wom.en in rustling silks and flaming diamonds, 
 their beauty and magnificent attire contrasting strangely with 
 the grizzly features, slouched hats, and woollen shirts of their 
 victims. The license for a single table was fifty dollars per 
 quarter. In some saloons were eight or ten of these tables, 
 in others but one; and there were hundreds of saloons, so 
 that the revenue to the city was large. A bill prohibiting 
 gambling was introduced in the legislature just before I ar- 
 rived, but it was lost in the senate. 
 
 Two days and nights amid scenes like these in San Fran- 
 cisco were sufficient to prepare the boyish mind for the pan- 
 demonium of the mines. The days were spent in wandering 
 about the business parts of the town, wading through muddy 
 streets, and climbing sand-hills; the nights in going fropi 
 one gaming-house to another, observing the crowds of peo- 
 ple come and go, watching the artistic barkeepers in their 
 white coats mixing fancy drinks and serving from gorgeously 
 decorated and mirrored bars fiery potations of every kind, 
 gazing in rapt bewilderment upon the fortune-turning table 
 with its fatal fascinations, marking the piles of money in-
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA ! 59 
 
 crease and lessen, and the faces behind them broaden and 
 lengthen, and listening to the music that mingled with the 
 chinking of gold, the rattling of glasses, and the voices of 
 rough, loud-laughing men. " There are indeed but very- 
 few," says Addison, " who know how to be idle and inno- 
 cent." Two days and nights of this ; then from Long wharf 
 we boarded a steamboat and went to Sacramento. 
 
 Having letters to Barton Reed and Grimm, commission 
 merchants of Sacramento, to whom Mr. Derby had made 
 one or two consignments of books on a venture, we imme- 
 diately called on them and talked over the relative business 
 chances in San Francisco and Sacramento. The idea of 
 going to Oregon had been long since abandoned, and now 
 Sacramento seemed to offer more attractions for the open- 
 ing of a small shop than any other place. 
 
 Sacramento having been decided on, the next thing was 
 to write Mr. Derby and inform him of our decision. This 
 done we took the boat for Marysville, en route for Long bar, 
 in search of my father. There I was initiated into the mys- 
 teries of mining and mining life. The placer diggings of 
 this locality were then good, and so remained for several 
 years, but the population changed every {q\n months, the 
 dissatisfied leaving and new adventurers coming in. Ten 
 dollars a day was too little in the eyes of those accustomed 
 to make twenty, and so they sold or abandoned their claims 
 and prospected for richer diggings. Wandering thus from 
 placer to placer for years, they lost their opportunity, if not 
 their lives, and usually ended their mining career where they 
 began, without a dollar. 
 
 When my father came to the country, my eldest brother, 
 Curtis, who had preceded him, was keeping a store and 
 hotel at Long bar. He was doing well, was making money 
 steadily and safely. At one time he had five thousand dollars 
 surplus capital, with which he started for San Francisco, there 
 to invest it in city lots. Had he done so, buying judiciously 
 and holding, he might now be worth his millions. Unfortu-
 
 6o LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 nately, he communicated the plan to John C. Fall, then one 
 of the leading merchants of Marysville, and by him he was 
 induced to make a venture which involved his leaving Long 
 bar, and ultimately ended in financial ruin. Rich bar, on 
 Feather river, had lately been discovered, and was drawing 
 multitudes of fortune-seekers from every quarter. It was not 
 difficult for Mr. Fall to persuade my brother, with abundance 
 of means and unlimited credit, to buy a band of mules and 
 load them with goods for that place. Once there he erected 
 a building, and opened a hotel and store. For a time all 
 went well. Up and down the river the diggings were rich, 
 and gold dust was poured into his coffers by the quart. The 
 establishment at Long bar seemed insignificant in comparison, 
 and he sold it and moved his family to Rich bar. My father 
 remained at Long bar. He had been in the country now 
 about two years, had accumulated a little sum, and meant 
 soon to return home. But shortly before setting out an 
 opportunity offered whereby he might increase his little for- • 
 tune tenfold, and without a risk of failure — so it seemed to 
 him and to others. 
 
 Quartz mining was about this time attracting attention, 
 and the prospect was very flattering. The ledge was dis- 
 covered and staked off, its dimensions told, its rock assayed, 
 the cost of crushing estimated, and the number of years cal- 
 culated before the mine would be exhausted. Surely this was 
 no vain speculation, it was a simple arithmetical problem, the 
 quantity, the quality, the cost of separation, and the net prof- 
 its. Yet it was a problem which wrecked thousands. The 
 gold was in the mine, and rock enough of an ascertained 
 grade to last for years, but the cost of extracting was more 
 than had been anticipated, and, what was worst of all, the 
 methods of saving the gold after the rock was crushed were 
 imperfect, so that even good rock failed to pay expenses. 
 
 Two miles from Long bar, near the Marysville road, was 
 a place called Brown valley, and through this ran a quartz 
 ledge, long known but regarded as valueless, because no one 
 could extract the gold from the hard white rock which held
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA! 6l 
 
 it. When, however, quartz mining became the fashion, and 
 every one who owned a share was sure of a fortune, this ledge 
 was taken up and staked off into claims under the names of 
 different companies. One of these companies was called the 
 Plymouth, always a pleasing name to the ear of my father, 
 and as the lode held an abundance of gold, he was induced 
 to invest — not venture — the greater part of the money he 
 had made, before returning home. 
 
 Midway between Long bar and the mine ran a little 
 stream, whose name. Dry creek, was significant of its charac- 
 ter, for like many other streams in California, though flush 
 with water in the winter, it was dry as a parlor floor in the 
 summer. This stream had been dammed, a race dug, and a 
 quartz mill with eight or ten stamps constructed, all in work- 
 ing order; and at the time of my arrival it was just ready, as 
 it had been at any time since its erection, to make every 
 shareholder rich. It was necessary merely to effect some 
 little change in the method of extracting and saving the gold, 
 and this was receiving attention. 
 
 I found my father, in connection with other members of the 
 Plymouth association, busily engaged in working this mine. 
 He occupied a little cloth house in the vicinity of the ledge, 
 and being the owner of a good mule team, employed himself 
 in hauling rock from the mine to the mill, about one mile 
 apart, and in gathering wood with which to burn the rock, so 
 that it could be the more easily crushed. The first night I 
 spent with him in the hotel at Long bar. Foremost among 
 my recollections of the place are those of the fleas, which to- 
 gether with the loud snorings and unpleasant odors proceeding 
 from the crowd of men strewn about on bunks, benches, tables, 
 and floor, so disturbed my sleep that I arose and went out to 
 select a soft place on the hill-side above the camp, where I 
 rolled myself in a blanket and passed the night, my first in the 
 open air in California. 
 
 The next day found me settled down to business. As eight 
 or nine months must elapse before my letter from Sacramento 
 could be received by Mr. Derby, and goods reach me by way
 
 62 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 of Cape Horn, it was arranged that T should work with niy 
 father for the Plymouth company. In the morning we climbed 
 the oak trees scattered about the valley, and with an axe 
 lopped off the large brittle branches, adding them to the 
 already huge pile of wood beside the mill. At noon we pro- 
 ceeded to the little cloth house, unharnessed and fed the ani- 
 mals, and then cooked and ate our dinner. Beefsteak, beans, 
 bread, and potatoes, with coffee, canned fruits, pancakes, or 
 anything of the kind we chose to add, constituted the fare of 
 self-boarding miners in those days ; but with all our culinary 
 talents we could not offer Mr. Kenny a meal sufficiently tempt- 
 ing to induce him to partake of it, and so he obtained his 
 dinner from a boarding-house near-by, and left shortly after- 
 ward for Rich bar. 
 
 I cannot say that I enjoyed this kind of life, and could 
 scarcely have endured it but for the thought that it was only 
 temporary. At night the animals were turned loose to graze. 
 Early in the morning, long before the sun had risen, I was 
 up and over the hills after them. Stiff and sore from the 
 previous day's work, wet with wading through the long, damp 
 grass, I was in no humor to enjoy those glorious mornings, 
 ushered in by myriads of sweet songsters welcoming the 
 warm sunlight which came tremblingly through the soft misty 
 air. To the clouds of top-knotted quails which rose at my 
 approach, the leaping hare, the startled deer, and the thick 
 beds of fresh fragrant flowers which I trampled under my feet, 
 I was ahke indifferent. How I loaded and lashed the poor 
 dumb beasts, and gritted my teeth with vexation over the un- 
 welcome task ! The sharp rocks cut my hands, the heavy logs 
 of wood strained my muscles ; and my temper, never one of 
 the sweetest, fumed and fretted like that of a newly chained 
 cub. Were it in my power I would have multiplied those 
 mules so as to smite the more. 
 
 The night before leaving Buffalo I had danced until morn- 
 ing. It happened that about the only clothes saved from the 
 thieves of the Isthmus were what I had used on that occa-
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA ! 63 
 
 sion. These I wore until work turned them into rags. In 
 the pocket I found one day a pair of white kid gloves, relic 
 of past revelries, and putting them on I gathered up the reins, 
 mounted the load, and beating my mules into a round trot, 
 rode up to the mill laughing bitterly at the absurdity of the 
 thing. Ten or twelve loads was a fair day's work ; I hauled 
 twenty or twenty-five. A dollar a load was the price allowed 
 — but it was not money, it was wrath, that made me do it. 
 My father, though mild in his treatment of me, expostulated. 
 He feared I would kill the animals. I said nothing, but when 
 out of his sight I only drove them the harder. Little cared 
 I whether the mules or myself were killed. Sunday was a 
 day of rest, but on Monday I felt sorer in body and mind 
 than on any other day. I had brought plenty of books with 
 me, but could not read, or if I did it was only to raise a flood 
 of longings which seemed sometimes to overwhelm me. My 
 soul was in harmony with nothing except the coyotes which 
 all night howled discordantly behind the hills. 
 
 After two months of this kind of hfe the hot weather was 
 upon us. The streams began to dry up ; water was becoming 
 scarce. We had heaped up the wood and the rock about 
 the mill, and my tally showed a long score against the com- 
 pany for work. But the mill did not pay. There was always 
 something wrong about it, some little obstacle that stood in 
 the way of immediate success: the stamps were not heavy 
 enough, or they did not work smoothly; the rest of the 
 machinery was inadequate, and the rock was harder than had 
 been anticipated. That it was hard enough, I who had 
 handled it well knew. There was no money, but there were 
 plenty of shares. 
 
 I cannot tell why neither my father nor I should have seen 
 by this time that the enterprise was a failure. But we did 
 not see it. We had schooled ourselves in the belief that the 
 rocky bank contained a mint of money which must some day 
 enrich the possessor. But there was then nothing more to be 
 done, and my father concluded to pay a parting visit to my 
 brother at Rich bar and set out for home. For our work we
 
 64 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 took more shares, and still more in exchange for the team and 
 the scattering eftects, and abandoned it all forever. Several 
 years afterwOvrd I learned that a new company had taken 
 possession of the claim and was doing well. After leaving 
 the place I firmly resolved that thenceforth, whatever specu- 
 lation I might at any time engage in, it should be not with 
 my own labor. I might stake money, but if I worked with 
 my hands I would have pay for such labor. 
 
 Behold us now ! my aged father and myself, tramping over 
 the plains beneath a broiling sun about the middle of June, 
 each with a bundle and stick, mine containing my sole pos- 
 sessions. In the early morning, fresh from sleep, with glad- 
 ness of heart at leaving the valley of hateful memories behind, 
 we marched away over the hills at a round pace. But as the 
 sun above our heads neared the point from which it poured 
 its almost perpendicular rays, I became excessively fatigued. 
 My feet blistered ; my limbs ached ; water was to be had only 
 at intervals ; the prayed-for breath of air came hot and suffo- 
 cating, like a sirocco, mingled with clouds of dust from the 
 parched plain. Thinking over my short experience in the 
 country and my present position, I exclaimed, " If this be 
 California, I hope God will give me little of it." As we trod 
 slowly along, stepping lightly on the burning ground, I began 
 to think the mules would have been better for our purpose 
 than the shares, but I said nothing. 
 
 That day we walked thirty miles, crossed the river at Bid- 
 well bar, intending to stop over night at a rancho some 
 distance beyond in the mountains; but we had not ascended 
 far before I persuaded my father to camp, for rest I must. 
 He willingly complied, aiid selecting a sheltered place well 
 covered with dry leaves we spread our blankets. In a moment 
 I was asleep, and knew nothing further till morning, when I 
 awoke almost as fresh as ever. We had food with us, but the 
 night before I had been too tired to eat. The first day was 
 the worst. We were now in the cool, fragrant air of the Sierra, 
 travelling a well-beatcn ])ath intersected by numerous rivulets 
 of melted snow. The third day we reached Rich bar in good
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA ! 65 
 
 condition. My father, after a visit of about a week, returned 
 with a train of mules to Marysville, where he took the boat 
 for San Francisco, and thence the steamer homeward. 
 
 As I had still six months or thereabout to wait for my goods, 
 I agreed to remain with my brother Curtis for such compen- 
 sation as he could afford to give. My duties were to carry on 
 the store and look after the business generally in his absence. 
 Mr. Kenny was likewise engaged by my brother for an estab- 
 lishment at Indian bar, a few miles down the river. There 
 we remained until November, when we went to San Francisco. 
 
 Shortly before leaving Rich bar I had received intelHgence 
 of the death of Harlow Palmer, eldest son of George Palmer, 
 a wealthy and highly respected citizen of Buffalo. Harlow 
 Palmer had married my sister Emily. Away in the heart of 
 the Sierra I received the mournful tidings as a message from 
 another world. I said nothing to any one ; but when the 
 sun had buried itself in the granite waves beyond, and had 
 left the sky and earth alone together, alone to whisper to each 
 other their old-time secrets, with my own sad secret I wan- 
 dered forth beside the transparent river, where gold-diggers 
 had honeycombed the pebbly bottom and opened graves for 
 myriads of hopes, and there, down in the deep canon, I sped 
 my longings upward, the only window of escape for pent-up 
 trouble. 
 
 But this was only the beginning of sorrow. Scarcely had 
 I reached Sacramento when the death of George H. Derby 
 was announced. Surely, said I, there must be a mistake. It 
 is Mr, Palmer they mean ; they have confused the husbands 
 of the two sisters. I would not believe it ; it could not be. 
 Letters, however, soon confirmed the report. The two 
 brothers-in-law, young, high-spirited, active, intelligent, prom- 
 ising men, the warmest of friends, had both been smitten by 
 the cholera in the same month. 
 
 All my plans and purposes I saw at once were at an end. 
 I knew very well that no one else, now that Mr. Derby was 
 dead, would do so foolish a thing as to continue shipments 
 of goods to an inexperienced, moneyless boy in California.
 
 66 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Indeed, directly after receiving the first sad intelligence came 
 a letter from the executor, requesting the speedy sale of the 
 consignment about to arrive and the remittance of the money. 
 Accompanying this order was an urgent but most unneces- 
 sary appeal to my sympathies in behalf of my sister, Mrs, 
 Derby. The estate, it afifirrned, would net little else than the 
 property in my hands, without which the widow and children 
 must suffer. 
 
 Having no further business in Sacramento, I went down 
 to the bay and stopped at the Rassette house, where also 
 Kenny was domiciled, I was determined that, whatever the 
 cost, Mrs. Derby should have the full amount of the invoice, 
 with commissions added, as soon as the goods could be con- 
 verted into money and the proceeds remitted to her. To sell 
 in the market, at that time, a miscellaneous assortment of 
 books and stationery in one lot, without a sacrifice, was im- 
 possible. I determined there should be no sacrifice, even if 
 I had to peddle them from door to door. I possessed only 
 one hundred and fifty dollars, the result of my services at 
 Rich bar, and began to look about for employment till the 
 goods should arrive. At none of the several book and 
 stationery shops was there any prospect. I was thin, young, 
 awkward, bashful, had no address, and was slow of wit. 
 Besides, merchants were shy of a clerk with shipments of 
 goods behind him; for why should he desire a situation 
 except to learn the secrets of his employer and then use them 
 to his own advantage ? I explained the poverty of my pros- 
 pects and declared the purity of my intentions. All was in 
 vain ; nobody would have my services, even as a gift. 
 
 Mr. Kenny was more fortunate. In his nature were 
 blended the siiaviter in modo and the fortiter in re. He was 
 older than I, and possessed of an Irish tongue withal ; so that 
 he made friends wherever he went. An equal partnership was 
 offered him by William B. Cooke, who had lately dissolved 
 with Josiah J, Le Count, and was then establishing himself 
 anew at the corner of Merchant and Montgomery streets. 
 The terms were that Kenny should place upon Cooke's
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA ! 67 
 
 shelves the stock sent out to me ; that the proceeds should 
 be remitted east as fast as sales were made, or, if possible, 
 payments should be even faster than this; in any event 
 not less than five hundred dollars was to be paid on each 
 steamer day. Meanwhile I must provide for myself; but 
 this did not trouble me. I readily consented, stipulating 
 only for immediate control of the stock if the firm did not 
 remit as promised. In no surer or quicker way could I 
 realize the invoice price for the whole shipment, and this was 
 now my chief ambition. 
 
 Presendy the goods amved, and the firm of Cooke, Ken- 
 ny, and Company was organized, the company being a young 
 friend of Mr. Cooke. I had free access to the premises, and 
 watched matters closely for a while. Everything went on 
 satisfactorily, and the whole amount was remitted to the ex- 
 ecutors of Mr. Derby's estate according to agreement. Mean- 
 time I had applied myself more earnestly than ever to obtain 
 work of some kind. I must stay in San Francisco at least 
 until my account with the estate was settled, and I greatly 
 preferred remaining in the city altogether. Mines and the 
 miners, and country trading of any kind, had become exceed- 
 ingly distasteful to me. I felt, if an opportunity were offered, 
 that I would prove competent and faithful in almost any capac- 
 ity ; for though diffident I had an abundance of self-reliance, 
 and would do anything. Accustomed to work all my life, 
 idleness was to me the greatest of afflictions, and I envied 
 the very hod-carriers. 
 
 Thus for six months, day after day, I tramped the streets 
 of San Francisco seeking work and finding none. Hundreds 
 have since in like manner applied to me, and remembering 
 how the harsh refusals once cut my sensitive nature, I try 
 to be kind to applicants of whatsoever degree, and if not 
 able to give work I can at least offer sympathy and advice. 
 Finally, sick with disappointment, I determined to leave the 
 city: but not for the Sierra foothills; rather China or Aus- 
 tralia. The choice must be made quickly, for the last dollar 
 from Rich bar was gone, and I would not live on others, or
 
 68 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 run in debt with nothing wherewith to pay. Often I wan- 
 dered among the shipping and scanned the vessels for differ- 
 ent ports. I knew httle of the various parts of the world, 
 and had little choice where to go. My future turned upon a 
 hair. 
 
 In the spring of 1853 the San Francisco papers began to 
 notice a new town on the California shore of the Pacific, 
 some fifteen or twenty miles from the Oregon boundary line. 
 Crescent City the place was called, from a long sweep taken 
 by the shore inward between Trinidad bay and Point St. 
 George. Only a few tents and split-board houses, trembling 
 between the sullen roar of ocean at the front door and the 
 ofttimes whistling wind in the dense pine forest at the back 
 door, marked the site of what was to be the most important 
 town of northern California. 
 
 On both sides of the boundary line were extensive mining 
 districts, at various distances from the coast, access to which 
 had hitherto been from Oregon only by way of Portland and 
 Scottsburg, and from the Sacramento valley through Shasta. 
 Most of the country hereabout might have been traversed in 
 wagons but for one difficulty — there were no wagon roads ; 
 consequently most of the merchandise carried to this port 
 by steamers and sailing vessels was conveyed into the interior 
 on the backs of mules. There was plenty of good agricultural 
 land round Crescent City, and forests of magnificent timber, 
 but few thought of farming in those days, and lumber could 
 be more easily obtained at other points along the coast. The 
 mines and their traffic offered the chief inducements for estab- 
 lishing a city. Nor was it to depend so much on the mines 
 already discovered as on those which were sure to be found 
 as soon as the country was fairly prospected. The color of 
 gold, they said, had been seen on Smith river, only twelve 
 miles distant; and farther up, at Althouse and Jacksonville, 
 was gold itself, and men at work digging for it. As other 
 parts boasted their Gold lakes and Gold bluffs, so here was 
 an unsolved mystery wherein gold was the fitful goddess — a 
 lone cabin that men talked of in whispers, where treasure-
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA ! 69 
 
 diggers long since departed had filled bags and bottles and 
 tin cans with the glittering dirt that made glad the hearts of 
 those awaiting them in eastern homes. Several parties went 
 in search of this lone cabin at various times. It was con- 
 fidently believed that some day it would be found, and when 
 that day should come, a seaport town, with railways, wharves, 
 and shipping, would be absolutely necessary to furnish the 
 diggers in that \'icinity mth food and clothing, tents, whiskey, 
 and playing-cards, and receive and export for the honest 
 miners the tons of heavy metal which they would unearth. 
 
 Knowing of no better place, I determined to try my fortune 
 at Crescent City ; so, Avith fifty dollars borrowed, and a case 
 of books and stationery bought on credit, I embarked on 
 board the steamer Columbia about the middle of May, Two 
 days and one night the voyage lasted — long enough, with 
 the crowded state of the vessel and the poor comforts at my 
 command, to leave me on landing completely prostrated with 
 sea-sickness and fatigue. Taken ashore in a whale-boat, I 
 crawled to a hotel and went to bed. My box was landed in 
 a lighter, but for a day or two I made no attempt at business. 
 Adjoining the hotel was the general merchandise store of 
 Crowell and Fairfield, and there I made the acquaintance of 
 Mr, Crowell, which developed into mutual confidence and 
 esteem. As our friendship increased, he occasionally re- 
 quested me to attend the store during his absence, and also 
 to enter in the day-book the sales which he had made. At 
 length, on learning my purpose, he made me an offer of fifty 
 dollars a month to keep his books, ■with the privilege of pla- 
 cing my stock on his shelves and selling from it for my own 
 account free of charge. I gladly accepted, and was soon 
 enrolled as book-keeper and book-seller. As I slept in the 
 store, indulged in little dissipation, and was not extravagant 
 in dress, my expenses were very light, while the profits on 
 my goods, which I sold only for cash, were large. Mean- 
 while, as the business of the firm augmented and the duties 
 became more responsible, my salary was from time to time 
 increased, until at the expiration of eighteen months, with
 
 70 LITERARY INDUSTRIES, 
 
 the savings which I had accumulated and allowed to remain 
 at interest with the firm, I found myself the recipient of two 
 hundred and fifty dollars monthly. Some six months later 
 the firm failed. I bought a portion of the stock and tried 
 merchandising on my own account for a short time, but 
 being dissatisfied with my life there, I disposed of the busi- 
 ness, built a brick store, which I leased to some hardware 
 merchants, and leaving my aftairs in the hands of an agent 
 returned to San Francisco. 
 
 Though it was a trading rather than a mining town, life 
 at Crescent City was in most respects similar to life in the 
 mines. There was the same element in the community, the 
 same lack of virtuous women, the same species of gaming- 
 houses, drinking-saloons, and dens of prostitution. The 
 Reverend Mr. Lacy, afterward pastor of the first Congre- 
 gational society in San Francisco, essayed to build a 
 church and reform the people, but his efforts were at- 
 tended with poor success. 
 
 A rancheria of natives occupied the point that formed the 
 northern horn of the Crescent, and with them the citizens 
 endeavored to live in peace. But one night the rancheria 
 took fire, and a serious commotion was threatened. The 
 natives thought the white men intended to bum them out, 
 and the white men began to fear an emeute, and perhaps a 
 general massacre. Morning, however, threw light upon the 
 matter. It appeared that a drunken white man had taken 
 lodgings in a native hut, and feeling cold, in the absence of 
 the accustomed alcoholic fires had built a fire of wood to warm 
 himself withal ; but, being drunk, he built it after the white 
 man's fashion, at one end of the room against the bark boards 
 of the house, and not where the sober savage would have 
 placed it, in the centre of the room. The pioneer citizens of the 
 Crescent were orderly, well-meaning men, who prided them- 
 selves on emptying a five-gallon keg of the most fiery spirits 
 San Francisco could send them, and on carrying it respect- 
 ably, with eyes open, head up, and tongue capable of articu- 
 lating, even though it did thicken and crisp a little sometimes
 
 HAIL CALIFORNIA! ESTO PERPETUA ! 7 1 
 
 toward morning after a night at poker. They could not there- 
 fore silently pass by the affront cast on their dusky neighbors 
 by an unworthy member of their own color ; and in the ab- 
 sence of a court of law they held a court of inquiry, whose 
 finding was that the vile white man who could not drink 
 without making himself drunk, should first pay the natives 
 blankets, beads, and knives enough fully to satisfy them for 
 loss and damage to their property, and then should leave the 
 place. Well done, noble topers of the Crescent, who would 
 not see even the poor savages wronged by one of their 
 number ! 
 
 The two and a half years I spent at Crescent City were 
 worse than thrown away, although I did accumulate some 
 six or eight thousand dollars. With an abundance of time on 
 my hands, I read httle but trashy novels, and though from 
 diffidence I did not mingle greatly with the people, I im- 
 proved my mind no better than they. One bosom friend I 
 had, Theodore S. Pomeroy, county clerk and editor of the 
 Herald, probably the most intelligent man in the place, and 
 much of my time outside of business I spent with him at cards 
 or billiards. On Sundays there was horse-racing, or foot-racing, 
 or cock-fighting on the beach ; and often a party, composed 
 of the most respectable citizens, would start out at any time 
 between midnight and daybreak, and with horns, tin pans, and 
 gongs, make the round of the place, pounding at every door, 
 and compelling the inmates to rise, administer drink to all, 
 and join the jovial company. Knives and pistols v/ere almost 
 universally carried and recklessly used. In a drunken brawl 
 a man was shot dead one night in front of my store. I did 
 not rush out with others to witness the scene, and so saved 
 myself a month's time, and the heavy expense of a journey to 
 Yreka to attend the trial of the murderer. During my resi- 
 dence I made several trips on business to San Francisco, and 
 on the whole managed my affairs with prudence and economy. 
 I well remember the first five hundred dollars I made. The 
 sum was deposited with Page, Bacon, and Company, so that 
 whatever befell me I might have that amount to carry me
 
 72 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 back to my friends, for I never ceased longing to see them. 
 Fortunately, Crowell and Fairfield being in need of money, 
 I drew it out for their use just before the bank failed, I have 
 never felt so rich before or since. Having great faith in the 
 ultimate growth of Crescent City, I invested my earnings 
 there, though after the lapse of several years I was glad to 
 realize at thirty cents on the dollar. 
 
 My sisters had often urged me strongly to return to the 
 east, Mrs, Derby, particularly, was quite alone, and she 
 wished me to come, and if possible settle permanently near 
 her, I now felt quite independent, and consequently proud 
 and happy, for my brick store at Crescent City, worth, as I 
 counted it, eight thousand dollars, and rented for two hun- 
 dred and fifty dollars a month, seemed at that time sufficient 
 to make me comfortable without work. Hence I resolved to 
 go home — the eastern side was always home then, whether 
 one lived there or not — and my friend Pomeroy promised to 
 accompany me. Meanwhile the firm of Cooke, Kenny, and 
 Company had failed, from lack of capital, and Mr. Kenny 
 was doing business for another house. Often have I thought 
 how fortunate it was that I did not open a store in San Fran- 
 cisco or Sacramento at that time, since the inevitable result 
 would have been failure. As I have said, almost every firm 
 then doing business failed ; and if men with capital and ex- 
 perience, with a large trade already established, could not 
 succeed, how could I expect to do so ? In November, 1855, 
 with Mr, Pomeroy as a companion, I sailed from San Fran- 
 cisco for New York, where we safely arrived, and shortly after 
 separated for the homes of our respective friends.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE HOUSE OF H. H. BANCROFT AND COMPANY. 
 
 Seest thou a man diligent in business, he shall stand before kings ; 
 he shall not stand before mean men. — Proverbs. 
 
 HOME again ! None but a wanderer, and a youthful wan- 
 derer, can feel those words in their fullest import. 
 Back from the first three years in California. Out of the 
 depths and into paradise. Away from harassing cares, from 
 the discordant contentions of money-getting, from the con- 
 taminations of filthy debaucheries, beyond the shot of pistol 
 or reach of bowie-knife, safe home, there let me rest. Nor 
 does the prestige of success lessen the pleasure of the re- 
 turned Califomian. Even our warmest friends are human. 
 Those who would nurse us most kindly in sickness, who 
 would spare no self-denial for our comfort, who, unworthy 
 as we might be of their affection, would die for us if neces- 
 sary, the hearts of even these in their thanksgiving are 
 warmed Avith pride if to their welcome they may add " Well 
 done ! " 
 
 I found my sister, Mrs. Derby, wnth her three daughters, 
 cosily keeping house in Auburn, New York. My youngest 
 sister, Mary, was with her. Soon Mrs. Palmer, my second 
 sister, came down from Buffalo to see her Califomian brother. 
 It was a happy meeting, though saddened by the recollection 
 of bereavements. Between Auburn and Buffalo I passed the 
 winter delightfully, and in the spring visited my friends in 
 Granville. I tried my best to like it at the east, to make up 
 my mind to abandon California and settle permanently in 
 Buffalo or New York, to be a comfort to my sisters, and 
 a solace to my parents ; but the western coast, with all its 
 
 73
 
 74 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 rough hardships, had fastened itself too strongly upon me to 
 be shaken off. And so round many a poor pilgrim California 
 has thrown her witcheries, drawing him back to her bright 
 shores whenever he attempted to leave them, like the magnetic 
 mountain of Arabian story. The east, as compared with the 
 west, was very comfortable, very cultivated, soothing to the 
 senses and refining to the intelligence; but society was so 
 proper, so particular, and business ways seemed stale and flat. 
 
 Suddenly, in April, 1856, 1 made up my mind no longer to 
 remain there. I had visited enough and wasted time enough. 
 I was impatient to be doing. So, without saying a word at 
 first, I packed my trunk, and then told my sister of the resolve. 
 I appreciated her kindness most fully. I regretted leaving 
 her more than words could tell, but I felt that I must go ; 
 there was that in California which harmonized with my aspi- 
 rations and drew forth energies which elsewhere would remain 
 dormant. I must be up and doing. 
 
 On one side of the continent all was new, all was to be 
 done; on the other there was no such attraction. To the 
 satisfied and unambitious an eastern or European life of doke 
 far iiientc might be delicious ; to me if I had millions it would 
 be torment. The mill must needs grind, for so the maker 
 ordained ; if wheat be thrown into the hopper it sends forth 
 fine flour, but if unfed it still grinds, until it grinds itself away. 
 I must be something of myself, and do something by myself; 
 for to me some worthy aim in life was ever a necessary con- 
 dition. 
 
 " One thing do for me," said my sister, " and you may go." 
 
 " I will ; what is it ? " 
 
 " You remember the money sent from California in return 
 for goods shipped by Mr. Derby ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "The money is now so invested that I am fearful of losing 
 it. Help me to get it, then take it and use it in any way you 
 think best." 
 
 " I will help you to get it," said I, " most certainly, but I 
 could not sleep knowing that your comfort depended on my
 
 THE HOUSE OF H. H, BANCROFT AND COMPANY. 75 
 
 success. I may be honest and capable, and yet fail. I may 
 woo fortune, but I cannot command her. The risk is alto- 
 gether too great for you to take." 
 
 " Nevertheless I will take it," replied my noble sister, and 
 in that decision she fixed my destiny. 
 
 After some little difficulty we succeeded in drawing the 
 money, five thousand five hundred dollars, which sum was 
 placed in my hands. I then asked her if she would accept a 
 partnership in my proposed undertaldng; but she answered 
 no, she would prefer my note, made payable in five or six 
 years, with interest at the rate of one per cent, a month. 
 
 Now it was that I determined to execute the original plan 
 formed by Mr. Derby, in pursuance of which I first went to 
 California ; and that with the very money, I might say, em- 
 ployed by him, this being the proceeds of his original ship- 
 ments — only, I would lay the foundations broader than he 
 had done, establish at once a credit, for without that my 
 capital would not go far, and plant myself in San Francisco 
 with aspirations high and determination fixed, as became one 
 who would win or die in the first city of the Pacific seaboard. 
 
 There was a man in New York, Mr. John C. Barnes, who 
 had been a warm friend of Mr. Derby. To him my sister gave 
 me a letter of introduction, with which, and drafts for fifty- 
 five hundred dollars, she sent me forth to seek my fortune. 
 Mr. Barnes was partner in the large stationery house of Ames, 
 Herrick, Barnes, and Rhoads. I found him very affable, 
 stated to him my plans, deposited with him my drafts, and 
 received the assurance that everything possible should be 
 done to forward my wishes. First of all, I wanted to estab- 
 lish business relations with the leading publishers of the east. 
 I wanted the lowest prices and the longest time — the lowest 
 prices so that what I was necessarily obliged to add should 
 not place my stock beyond the reach of consumers, and the 
 longest time because four or six months were occupied in 
 transportation. 
 
 California credit in New York at that time rated low, as 
 elsewhere I have observed. Nearly every one I met had
 
 76 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 lost, some of them very heavily, either by flood, or fire, or 
 failure. Some of their customers had proved dishonest, 
 others unfortunate, and a curse seemed attached to the 
 country from which at one time so much had been expected. 
 I told them I was starting fresh, untrammelled, with every- 
 thing in my favor, and I believed I could succeed; that they 
 had met with dishonest men did not prove every man dis- 
 honest ; and because they had lost it did not follow that they 
 were always to lose. I might have added, if at that time I 
 had known enough of the manner of eastern merchants in 
 dealing with the California market, that for nine-tenths of their 
 losses they had only themselves to blame, for after selling to 
 legitimate dealers all the goods necessary for the full supply 
 of the market, they would throw into auction on their own 
 account in San Francisco such quantities of merchandise as 
 would break prices and entail loss on themselves and ruin on 
 their customers. All the blame attending California credit 
 did not belong to Californians, although the disgrace might 
 be laid only on them; but the shippers of New York and 
 Boston knew a trick or two as well as the merchants of San 
 Francisco. 
 
 At all events, before these croakers decided against me, or 
 persisted in their fixed purpose never to sell a dollar's worth 
 of goods to Californians^ without first receiving the dollar, I 
 begged them to see Mr. Barnes and ascertain what he thought 
 of it. This they were ready to promise, if nothing more ; and 
 the consequence was that when I called the second time 
 almost every one was ready to sell me all the goods I would 
 buy. From that day my credit was established, becoming 
 firmer with time, and ever afterward it Avas my first and con- 
 stant care to keep it good. " A good credit, but used spar- 
 ingly ; " that was my motto. At this time I did not buy 
 largely, only about ten thousand dollars' worth, preferring to 
 wait till I became better acquainted with the market before 
 ordering heavily. This was in June. My goods shipped, I 
 returned to Auburn, there to sj)end the few months pending 
 the passage of the vessel round Cape Horn rather than await
 
 THE HOUSE OF H. H. BANCROFT AND COMPANY. 77 
 
 its arrival in California. And very pleasantly passed this 
 time with the blood warm and hope high. 
 
 October saw me again en route for San Francisco. I found 
 Mr. Kenny occupying his old store with a small stock of 
 goods belonging to Mr. Le Count. I told him to settle his 
 business and come with me, and he did so. We engaged the 
 room adjoining, near the corner of Montgomery and Mer- 
 chant streets, where ten years before a yerba-buena bordered 
 sand-bank was washed by the tide-waters of the bay. Our 
 stock arriving shortly after in good order, we opened it and 
 began business under the firm name of H. H. Bancroft and 
 Company about the first of December, 1856. There was 
 nothing peculiar in the shop, its contents, business, or pro- 
 prietors, that I am aware of. During the closing weeks of 
 the year, and the opening months of the year following, the 
 inside was exposed to the weather while the building was 
 taking on a new front ; but in such a climate this was no 
 hardship. At night we closed the opening with empty boxes, 
 and I turned into a cot bed under the counter to sleep ; 
 in the morning I arose, removed the boxes, swept the prem- 
 ises, put the stock in order, breakfasted, and was then ready 
 to post books, sell goods, or carry bundles, according to the 
 requirements of the hour. 
 
 We let two offices, and thus reduced our rent one third, 
 the original sum being two hundred and fifty dollars a month. 
 With the constant fear of failure before me, I worked and 
 watched unceasingly. Mr. Kenny was salesman, for he was 
 much more familiar with the business than I ; he possessed 
 many friends and had already a good trade established. 
 Affairs advanced smoothly; we worked hard and made 
 money, first slowly, then faster. Times were exceedingly 
 dull. Year after year the gold crop had diminished ; or if 
 not diminished, it required twice the labor and capital to pro- 
 duce former results. Stocks had accumulated, merchants had 
 fallen in arrears, and business depression was far greater than 
 at any time since the discovery of gold. In the vernacular
 
 78 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 of the day, trade had touched bottom. But hard times are 
 the very best of times in which to plant and nourish a perma- 
 nent business. Hard times lead to careful trading and thrift; 
 flush times to recklessness and overdoing. On every side of 
 us old firms were falling to pieces, and old merchants were 
 forced out of business. The term " old " was then applied to 
 firms of five or six years' standing. This made me all the 
 more nervous about success. But we had every advantage ; 
 our stock was good and well bought, our credit excellent, 
 our expenses light, and gradually the business grew. 
 
 Toward the end of the first year the idea struck me that 
 I might use my credit further, without assuming much 
 more responsibility, by obtaining consignments of goods in 
 place of buying large quantities outright. But this would 
 involve my going east to make the arrangenients, and, as 
 Mr. Kenny would thus be left alone, I proposed to Mr. 
 Hunt, whose acquaintance had ripened into friendship, to 
 join us, contribute a certain amount of capital, and take 
 a third interest in the partnership. The proposition was 
 accepted. Mr. Hunt came into the firm, the name of 
 which remained unchanged, and soon after, that is to say 
 in the autumn of 1857, I sailed for New York. My plan 
 was successful. I readily obtained goods on the terms 
 asked to the amount of sixty or seventy thousand dollars, 
 which added largely to our facilities. 
 
 Before returning to California, which was in the spring 
 of 1858, I visited my parents, then hving as happily as 
 ever in Granville. My views of life had changed some- 
 what since I had left my boyhood home, and later they 
 changed still more. I was well enough satisfied then with 
 the choice I had made in foregoing the benefits of a col- 
 lege course, and my mind is much more clear upon the sub- 
 ject now than then. 
 
 While stopping in Buffalo once more I made the acquaint- 
 ance of Miss Emily Ketchum, daughter of a highly respected 
 and prominent citizen of the place, whom later I married.
 
 THE HOUSE OF H. H. BANCROFT AND COMPANY, 79 
 
 In January, 1863, my wife made a visit to her friends at 
 home, and the following summer I took a hurried trip to 
 London, Paris, New York, and Buffalo, bringing her back 
 with me. 
 
 Shortly after my return to San Francisco, on account of 
 the large additions to our stock, we rented two rooms fronting 
 on Merchant street, in the rear of our store, cutting through 
 the partition wall to give us access from the Montgomery 
 street store. Subsequently we occupied the whole building 
 on Merchant street, forty by sixty feet, three stories. 
 
 But erelong the business had assumed such proportions that 
 more room was absolutely necessary. My friends had long 
 desired that I should build, and had been looking for a suit- 
 able place for years without finding one. In the selection of 
 a site two points were to be regarded, locality and depth of 
 lot. Without the one our trade would suffer, and without the 
 other, in order to obtain the amount of room necessary, so 
 much frontage on the street would be taken up as to make 
 the property too costly for the business to carry. In regard 
 to the site, if we could not obtain exactly what we would like 
 we must take what we could get. 
 
 Following Montgomery and Kearny streets out to Market, 
 we examined every piece of property and found nothing ; 
 then out Market to Third street, and beyond, where after 
 some difficulty, and by paying a large price to five different 
 owners, I succeeded in obtaining seven lots together, three 
 on Market street and four on Stevenson street, making 
 in all a little more than seventy- five by one hundred and 
 seventy feet. This was regarded as far beyond business 
 limits at the time, but it was the best I could do, and in six 
 or seven years a more desirable location could not be found 
 in the city. 
 
 It was one of the turning-points of my life, this move to 
 Market street. Had I been of a temperament to hasten 
 less rapidly ; had I remained content to plod along after the old 
 method, out of debt and out of danger, with no thought of 
 anything further than accumulation and investment, for self
 
 8o LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 and family, the map of my destiny, as well as that of many 
 others, would present quite a different appearance. The truth 
 is, my frequent absence from business had weaned me from 
 it — this, and the constantly recurring question which kept 
 forcing itself on my mind, " Is he not worse than a fool who 
 labors for more when he has enough; worse than a swine 
 who stuffs himself when he is already full ? " If I could turn 
 my back upon it all, it would add to my days, if that were 
 any benefit. Had I known what was before me I should 
 probably have retired from business at the time, but in my 
 employ were as fine a company of young men, grown up un- 
 der my own eye and teachings, as ever I saw in any mercan- 
 tile establishment, and I had not the heart to break in pieces 
 the commercial structure which with their assistance I had 
 reared, and turn them adrift upon the world. 
 
 In Europe, for the first time in my life, I had encountered 
 a class of people who deemed it a disgrace to engage in trade. 
 Many I had seen who were too proud or too lazy to work, 
 but never before had come to my notice those who would 
 not if they could make money, though it involved no manual 
 labor. Here the idea seemed first to strike me, and I asked 
 myself. Is there then in this world something better than 
 money that these men should scorn to soil their fingers with 
 it ? Now I never yet was ashamed of my occupation, and I 
 hope never to be ; otherwise I should endeavor speedily to 
 lay it aside. Nor do I conceive any more disgrace attached 
 to laboring with the hands than with the head. I feel no 
 more sense of shame when carrying a bundle or nailing up a 
 box of goods than when signing a check, or writing history, 
 or riding in the park. The consuming of my soul on the al- 
 tar of avarice I objected to, not work. I have worked twice, 
 ten times, as hard writing books as ever I did selling books. 
 But for the occasional breaking away from business, long 
 enough for my thoughts to form for themselves new chan- 
 nels, I should have been a slave to it till this day, for no one 
 was more interested and absorbed in money-making while 
 engaged in it than I.
 
 THE HOUSE OF H. H. BANCROFT AND COMPANY. 8 1 
 
 In accordance with my purposes, then, historical and pro- 
 fessional, in 1S69 I began building. Already I had in 
 contemplation a costly dwelling, parts of which had been 
 constructed in England and at the east, and shipped hither 
 from time to time, till a great mass of material had accumu- 
 lated which must be put together. I resolved, somewhat 
 recklessly, to make one affair of it all, and build a store and 
 dwelling-house at the same time, and have done with it. 
 Times were then good, business was steady, and with the 
 experience of thirteen years behind me I thought I could 
 calculate closely enough in money matters not to be troubled. 
 Consequently my plans were drawn, I ordered my material, 
 gave out contracts for the several parts, and soon a hundred 
 men or more were at work. 
 
 And now began a series of the severest trials of my life, 
 trials which I gladly would have escaped in death, thanking 
 the merciless monster had he finished the work which was 
 half done. In December, 1869, my wife died. Other men's 
 wives had died before, and left them, I suppose, as crushed 
 as I was ; but mine had never died, and I knew not what it 
 w^as to disjoin and bury that part of myself 
 
 Occupation is the antidote to grief; give me work or I 
 die ; work which shall be to me a nepenthe to obliterate all 
 sorrows. And work enough I had, but it was of the exas- 
 perating and not of the soothing kind. If I could have shut 
 myself up, away from the world, and absorbed my mind in 
 pursuit of whatever was most congenial to it, that would 
 have been medicine indeed. But this was denied me. It 
 was building and business, grown doubly hateful now that 
 she for whom I chiefly labored had gone. I stayed the work- 
 men on the house, and let it stand, a ghastly spectacle to 
 the neighborhood for over a year, and then I finished it. 
 
 The business was now one of the most extensive of the 
 kind in the world. It was divided into nine departments, 
 each in charge of an experienced and responsible head, with 
 the requisite number of assistants, and each in itself as large 
 as an ordinary business in our line of trade. But this was 
 6
 
 82 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 not enough. Thus far it was purely a mercantile and publish- 
 ing house. To make it perfect, complete, and symmetrical, 
 manufacturing must be added. This I had long been am- 
 bitious of doing, but was prevented by lack of room. Now 
 this obstacle was removed, and I determined to try the 
 experiment. The mercantile stock was brought up and 
 properly arranged in the different departments on the first 
 and second floors and basement, on one side of the new 
 building. These rooms were each thirty-five by one hundred 
 and seventy feet. On the third and fourth floors respectively 
 were placed a printing-office and bookbindery, each covering 
 the entire ground of the building, seventy-five by one hundred 
 and seventy feet. To accomplish this more easily and eco- 
 nomicaUy several small establishments were purchased and 
 moved with their business into the new premises, such as 
 a printing, an engraving, a lithographing, and a stationery 
 establishment. A steam-engine was placed in the basement 
 to drive the machinery above, and an artesian well was dug 
 to supply the premises with water. A department of music 
 and pianos was also added. My library of Pacific coast 
 books was alphabetically arranged on the fifth floor, which 
 was of the same dimensions as the rooms below. Then I 
 changed the name of the business, the initial letters only, my 
 responsibility, however, remaining the same. The idea was 
 not eminently practicable, I will admit, that I should expect 
 to remain at the head of a large and intricate business, in- 
 volving many interests and accompanied by endless detail, 
 see it continue its successful course, and at the same time 
 Avithdraw my thoughts and attention from it so as to do 
 justice to any literary or historical undertaking. " How dared 
 you undertake crossing the Sierra ? " the pioneer railroad 
 men were asked. " Because we were not railroad men," was 
 the reply. 
 
 Thus, I felt, was ended the first episode of my life. T had 
 begun with nothing, building up by my own individual ef- 
 forts, in sixteen years, a great business of which I might justly
 
 THE HOUSE OF H. H. BANCROFT AND COMPANY. 83 
 
 feel proud. I had schooled from the rudiments, and carried 
 through all the ramifications and complications of that busi- 
 ness, a score and more of active and intelligent young men, 
 each competent to take the lead in his department, and of 
 them I was proud. Arrived at that estate where money-mak- 
 ing had ceased to be the chief pleasure, I might now retire 
 into idleness, or begin life anew. 
 
 But this was not yet to be. I must first pay tlie penalty 
 of overdoing, a penalty which in my business career I have 
 oftener paid than the penalty arising from lack of energy. 
 That I had built simultaneously a fine store and an expensive 
 dwelling was no mark of folly, for I could afford it. That I 
 had reorganized the business, spread it out upon a new basis, 
 doubled its capacity, and doubled its expenses, was no mark 
 of folly, for every department, both mercantile and manufac- 
 turing, was in a thriving condition. There was nothing about 
 the establishment theoretical, fanciful, or speculative in char- 
 acter. All was eminently practical, the result of natural 
 growth. The business extended from British Columbia to 
 Mexico, and over to the Hawaiian Islands, Japan, and China, 
 and reports from the heads of the several departments showed 
 its status every month. That it should successfully carry us 
 through the trying time which was to follow, amply proves 
 that its condition was not unsound, nor its establishment on 
 such a basis impracticable. 
 
 But evil days were at hand, following closely on the open- 
 ing of the Pacific railway. This grand event, so ardently 
 desired, and so earnestly advocated on both sides of the 
 continent since the occupation of the country by Anglo- 
 Americans, was celebrated as if the millennium had come ; 
 and every one thought it had. There were many afterward 
 who said they knew and affirmed it at the time that at first 
 this road would bring nothing but financial disaster and ruin 
 to Cahfomia, but before such disaster and ruin came I for 
 one heard nothing of its approach. On the contrary, though 
 prices of real estate were already inflated, and the city had 
 been laid out in homestead lots for a distance of ten miles
 
 84 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 round, and sold at rates suitable to a population of three mil- 
 lions, the universal impression was that prices would go 
 higher, and that every one on the completion of the railway 
 would be rich. But every one did not become rich. Every 
 one wanted to sell, and could not, and there was a general 
 collapse. For five years the best and most central property 
 remained stationary, with scarcely a movement in all that 
 time, while outside property fell in some cases to one-tenth 
 of its former estimated value. 
 
 Business was likewise revolutionized. As soon as the railway 
 was in running order the attention of buyers throughout the 
 country, large and small, was turned toward the east. " We 
 can now purchase in New York as well as in San Francisco," 
 they said, " and save one profit." Consequently prices in 
 San Francisco fell far below remunerative rates, and the ques- 
 tion with our jobbers was, not whether they could make as 
 much money as formerly, but whether they could do business 
 at all. Some classes of business were obliged to succumb, 
 and many merchants failed. Large stocks accumulated at 
 low rates during the war, when currency was at a discount of 
 from twenty-five to fifty per cent., were thrown upon the 
 market, and prices of many articles ruled far below the cost 
 of production. Thus, with heavy expenses and no profits, 
 aftairs began to look ominous. At such times a large broadly 
 extended business is much more unwieldy than a small one. 
 Certain expenses are necessary; it is impossible to reduce 
 them in proportion to the shrinkage of prices and the stag- 
 nation of trade. 
 
 More was yet to come. As all Californians well know, the 
 prosperity of a season depends on the rainfall. Sometimes 
 the effects of one dry winter may be bridged over by a pros- 
 perous year before and after. But when two or three dry 
 seasons come together the result is most disastrous, and a 
 year or two of favorable rains are usually required before the 
 State entirely recovers. As if to try the endurance of our mer- 
 chants to the utmost, three dry winters and five long years 
 of hard times followed the opening of the railway. That so
 
 THE HOUSE OF H. H. BANCROFT AND COMPANY. 85 
 
 many lived through them is the wonder. That my business 
 especiaUy did not fail, with such an accumulation of untoward 
 circumstances, proved conclusively that it was sound and well 
 managed. Building has ruined many a man ; I had built. 
 Branching out has ruined many a man; I had branched. 
 The fall in real estate, the revolution in profits incident to the 
 opening of the railway, and the dry seasons, each of these 
 severally has ruined many men. All these came upon me at 
 one time, and yet the house lived through it. 
 
 It may easily be seen that to draw one's mind from business 
 at such a time and fix it on literary pursuits was no easy mat- 
 ter. Cares, like flies, buzz perpetually in one's ears ; lock the 
 door, and they creep in tlirough invisible apertures. Yet I at- 
 tempted it, though at first with indifferent success. The work 
 on the fifth floor, hereafter to be described, was not always 
 regarded with favor by those of the other floors. It drew 
 money from the business, which remaining might be the means 
 of saving it from destruction. It allured the attention of one 
 whose presence might be the salvation of the establishment. 
 After all it was but a hobby, and would result in neither profit 
 nor honor. Of course I could do as I liked with my own, 
 but was it not folly to jeopardize the life of the business to 
 gain a few years of time for profitless work ? Would it not 
 be better to wait till times were better, till money could be 
 spared, and danger was passed ? 
 
 Although the years of financial uncertainty that followed 
 the completion of the railway were thus gloomy and depress- 
 ing, yet I persisted. Day after day, and year after year, I 
 lavished time and money in the vain attempt to accomplish 
 I knew not what. It was something I desired to do, and I 
 was determined to find out what it was, and then to do it if 
 I could. Although my mind was in anything but a suitable 
 condition for the task, I felt in no mood to wait. Every day 
 or month or year delayed was so much taken from my life. 
 My age — thirty-seven or thereabout — was somewhat ad- 
 vanced for undertaking a literary work of great magnitude, 
 and no time must be lost. Such was my infatuation that I
 
 86 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 would not have hesitated, any moment these dozen years, 
 had the question arisen to abandon the business or my plan, 
 I did not consider it right to bring disaster on others, but I 
 never believed that such a result would follow my course. 
 True, it is one thing to originate a business and quite another 
 to maintain it ; yet I felt that the heads of departments were 
 competent to manage affairs, reporting to me every month. 
 The business was paying well, and I would restrict my ex- 
 penditure in every way rather than forego or delay a work 
 which had become dearer to me than life. So I toiled on 
 with greater or less success, oftentimes with a heavy heart 
 and a heated brain, tired out, discouraged, not knowing if ever 
 I should be permitted to complete anything I had under- 
 taken, in which event all would be lost. 
 
 In time, however, the clouds cleared away ; the wheels of 
 business revolved with smoothness and regularity ; my work 
 assumed shape, part of it was finished and praised ; letters 
 of encouragement came pouring in like healthful breezes to 
 the heated brow; I acquired a name, and all men smiled 
 upon me.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. 
 
 Still am I besy bokes assemblynge ; 
 
 For to have plenty, it is a pleasaunt thynge. — Brandt. 
 
 IN 1859, one William H. Knight, then in my service as edi- 
 tor and compiler of statistical works relative to the Pacific 
 coast, was engaged in preparing the Hand-Book Almanac for 
 the year i860. From time to time he asked me for certain 
 books required for the work. It occurred to me that we 
 should probably have frequent occasion to refer to books on 
 California, Oregon, Washington, and Utah, and that it might 
 be more convenient to have them altogether. I always had 
 a taste, more pleasant than profitable, for publishing books, 
 for conceiving a work and having it wrought out under my 
 direction. To this taste may be attributed the origin of half 
 the books published in California during the first twenty years 
 of its existence as a State, if we except law reports, legislative 
 proceedings, directories, and compilations of that character. 
 Yet 1 have seldom published anything but law-books that did 
 not result in a loss of money. Books for general reading, 
 miscellaneous books in trade vernacular, even if intrinsically 
 good, found few purchasers in California. The field was not 
 large enough ; there were not enough book buyers to absorb 
 an edition of any work, except a law-book, or a book intended 
 as a working tool for a class. Lawyers like solid leverage, 
 and in the absence of books they are powerless ; they cannot 
 afford to be without them ; they buy them as mill-men buy 
 stones to grind out toll withal. Physicians do not require so 
 many books, but some have fine libraries. Two or three medi- 
 cal books treating of climate and diseases peculiar to California 
 
 87
 
 88 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 have been published in this country with tolerable success ; 
 but the medical man is by no means so dependent on books 
 as the man of law — that is to say, alter he has once finished 
 his studies and is established in practice. His is a profession 
 dependent more on intuition and natural insight into charac- 
 ter and causations, and above all, on a thorough understanding 
 of the case, and the closest watchfulness in conducting it 
 through intricate and ever-changing complications. Poetry 
 has often been essayed in California, for the most part dog- 
 gerel ; yet should Byron come here and publish for the first 
 time his Childe Harold, it would not find buyers enough to 
 pay the printer. Even Tuthill's History of California, vigor- 
 ously offered by subscription, did not return the cost of 
 plates, paper, presswork, and binding. He who dances 
 must pay the fiddler. Either the author or the publisher 
 must make up his mind to remunerate the printer; the 
 people will not till there are more of them, and with dif- 
 ferent tastes. 
 
 By having all the material on California together, so that 
 I could see what had been done, I w^as enabled to form a 
 clearer idea of what might be done in the way of book-pub- 
 lishing on this coast. Accordingly I requested Mr. Knight 
 to clear the shelves around his desk, and to them I transferred 
 every book I could find in my stock having reference to this 
 country. I succeeded in getting together some fifty or 
 seventy-five volumes. This was the origin of my library, 
 sometimes called the Pacific Library, but latterly the Ban- 
 croft Library. I looked at the volumes thus brought to- 
 gether,* and remarked to Mr. Knight, " That is doing very 
 well ; I did not imagine there were so many." 
 
 I thought no more of the matter till some time afterward, 
 happening in at the bookstore of Epes Ellery, on Washington 
 street, called antiquarian because he dealt in second-hand 
 books, though of recent dates, my eyes lighted on some 
 pamphlets, printed at different times in California, and it 
 occurred to me to add them to the Pacific coast books over 
 Mr. Knight's desk. This I did, and then examined more
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. 89 
 
 thoroughly the stocks of EUery, Carrie and Damon, and the 
 Noisy Canier, and purchased one copy each of all the books, 
 pamphlets, magazines, and pictures touching the subject. 
 Afterward I found myself looking over the contents of other 
 shops about town, and stopping at the stands on the side- 
 walk, and buying any scrap of a kindred nature which I did 
 not have. Frequently I would encounter old books in auc- 
 tion stores, and pamphlets in lawyers' offices, which I imme- 
 diately bought and added to my collection. The next time 
 I visited the east, Avithout taking any special trouble to seek 
 them, I secured from the second-hand stores and bookstalls 
 of New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, whatever fell under 
 my observation. 
 
 Bibliomaniac I was not. Duplicates, fine bindings, and- 
 rare editions seemed to me of less importance than the'\ 
 subject-matter of the work. To collect books in an object- 
 less, desultory manner is not profitable to either mind or 
 purse. Book collecting without a purpose m.ay be to some 
 a fascinating pastime, but give it an object and you endow 
 it with dignity. Not half the books printed are ever read ; 
 not half the books sold are bought to be read. Least of 
 all in the rabid bibliomaniac need we look for the w^ell-read 
 man. It is true that thus far, and for years afterward, I 
 had no well defined object, further than the original and 
 insignificant one, in gathering these books; but with the 
 growth of the collection came the purpose. Accident first 
 drew me into it, and I continued the pastime with vague 
 intent. " Very generally," says Herbert Spencer, •' when a 
 man begins to accumulate books he ceases to make much 
 use of them " ; or, as Disraeli puts it : "A passion for col- 
 lecting books is not ahvays a passion for literature." 
 
 I had a certain vague purpose at the beginning, though 
 that was speedily overshadowed by the magnitude the mat- 
 ter had assumed as the volumes increased. I recognized 
 that nothing I could ever accomplish in the way of publish- 
 ing would warrant such an outlay as I was then making. 
 It was not long before any idea I may have entertained in
 
 90 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 the way of pecuniary return was abandoned ; there was no 
 money in making the collection, or in any literary work con- 
 nected with it. Yet certain books I knew to be intrinsi- 
 cally valuable ; old, rare, and valuable books would increase 
 rather than diminish in value, and as I came upon them 
 from time to time I thought it best to secure all there were 
 relating to this coast. After all the cost in money was not 
 much; it was the time that counted; and the time, might 
 it not be as profitable so spent as in sipping sugared water 
 on the Paris boulevard, or in the insipid sweets of fashion- 
 able society ? It was understood from the first that nothing 
 in my collection was for sale; sometime, I thought, the 
 whole might be sold to a library or public institution; but 
 I would wait, at least, until the collection was complete. 
 
 I had now, perhaps, a thousand volumes, and began to 
 be pretty well satisfied with my efforts. When, however, in 
 1862 I visited London and Paris, and rummaged the enor- 
 mous stocks of second-hand books in the hundreds of stores 
 of that class, my eyes began to open. I had much more yet 
 to do. And so it was, when the collection had reached one 
 thousand volumes I fancied I had them all ; when it had 
 grown to five thousand I saw it was but begun. As my 
 time was short I could then do little beyond glancing at the 
 most important stocks and filling a dozen cases or so ; but I 
 determined as soon as I could command the leisure to make 
 a thorough search all over Europe and complete my collection, 
 if such a thing were possible, which now for the first time I seri- 
 ously began to doubt. 
 
 This opportunity occurred in 1866, when I was fortunate 
 enough to have in every department others competent to take 
 charge of the business. On the 17th of August I landed 
 with my wife at Queenstown, spent a week in Dublin, passed 
 from the Giant's causeway to Belfast and Edinburgh, and 
 after the tour of the lakes proceeded to London. In Ireland 
 and Scotland I found little or nothing; indeed I visited those 
 countries for pleasure rather than for books. In London, 
 however, the book mart of the world — as in fact it is the
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIDLIOPHILE. 9I 
 
 mart of most other things bought and sold — I might feed 
 my desires to the full. 
 
 During all this time my mind had dwelt more and more 
 upon the subject, and the vague idea of merely collecting 
 materials for history, which originally floated through my 
 brain, began to assume more definite proportions, though I 
 had no thought, as yet, of ever attempting to write history 
 myself. But I w^as obliged to think more or less on the mat- 
 ter in order to determine the limits of my collection. So 
 far I had searched little for Mexican literature. Books on 
 Lower California and northern Mexico I had bought, but 
 Mexican history and archaeology proper had been passed 
 over. Now the question arose, Where shall I draw the divid- 
 ing line ? The history of California dates back to the days 
 of Cortes ; or more properly, it begins with the expeditions 
 directed northward by Nuho de Guzman, in 1530, and the 
 gradual occupation, during two and a quarter centuries, of 
 Nueva Galicia, Nueva Vizcaya, and the Cahfomias. The 
 deeds of Guzman, his companions, and his successors, the 
 disastrous attempts of the great Hernan Cortes to explore the 
 Pacific seaboard, and the spiritual conquests of the new lands 
 by the Society of Jesus, I found recorded in surviving frag- 
 ments of secular and ecclesiastical archives, in the numerous 
 original papers of the Jesuit missionaries, and in the standard 
 works of such writers as Mota Padilla, Ribas, Alegre, Frejes, 
 Arricivita, and Beaumont, or, of Baja California especially, 
 in Venegas, Clavigero, Baegert, and one or two important 
 anonymous authorities. The Jesuits were good chroniclers ; 
 their records, though diffuse, are very complete; and from 
 them, by careful work, may be formed a satisfactory picture 
 of the period they represent. 
 
 Hence, to gather all the material requisite for a complete 
 narrative of events bearing on California, it would be neces- 
 sary to include a large part of the early history of Mexico, 
 since the two were so blended as to make it impossible to 
 separate them. This I ascertained in examining books for 
 California material alone. It was my custom when collect-
 
 92 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 ing to glance through any book which I thought might 
 contain information on the territory marked out. I made 
 it no part of my duty at this time to inquire into the nature 
 or quahty of the production; it might be the soundest 
 science or the sickHest of sentimental fiction. I did not 
 stop to consider, I did not care, whether the book was 
 of any value or not; it was easier and cheaper to buy it 
 than to spend time in examining its value. Besides, in 
 making such a collection it is impossible to determine at 
 a glance what is of value and what is not. The most 
 worthless trash may prove some fact wherein the best book 
 is deficient, and this makes the trash valuable. In no other 
 way could I have made the collection so speedily perfect; 
 so perfect, indeed, that I have often been astonished, in 
 Avriting on a subject or an epoch, to find how few impor- 
 tant books were lacking. An investigator should have be- 
 fore him all that has been said upon his subject; he will 
 then make such use of it as his judgment dictates. Nearly 
 every work in existence, or which was referred to by the 
 various authorities, I found on my shelves. And this was 
 the result of my method of collecting, which was to buy 
 everything I could obtain, with the view of winnowing the 
 information at my leisure. 
 
 Gradually and almost imperceptibly had the area of my 
 eftbrts enlarged. From Oregon it was but a step to British 
 Columbia and Alaska; and as I was obliged for authorities 
 on California to go to "Mexico and Spain, it finally became 
 settled to my mind to make the western half of North Amer- 
 ica my field, including in it the whole of Mexico and Cen- 
 tral America, And thereupon I searched the histories of 
 Europe for information concerning their New World rela- 
 tions; and the archives of Spain, Italy, France, and Great 
 Britain were in due time examined. 
 
 In London I spent about three months, and went faithfully 
 through every catalogue and every stock of books likely to 
 contain anything on the Pacific coast. Of these there were
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. 93 
 
 several score, new and old. It was idle to enter a shop and 
 ask the keeper if he had any works on California, Mexico, or 
 the Hawaiian islands : the answer was invariably No. And 
 though I might pick up half a dozen books under his very 
 eyes, the answer would still be, if you asked him, No. Cali- 
 fornia is a long way from London, much farther than London 
 is from California. None but a very intelligent bookseller 
 in London knows where to look for printed information con- 
 cerning California. The only way is to examine catalogues 
 and search through stocks, trusting to no one but yourself. 
 
 Believing that a bibliography of the Pacific States would 
 not only greatly assist me in my search for books but would 
 also be a proper thing to publish some day, I employed a man 
 to search the principal libraries, such as the library of the 
 British Museum and the library of the Royal Geographical 
 Society, and make a transcript of the title of every book, 
 manuscript, pamphlet, and magazine article, touching this 
 territory, with brief notes or memoranda on the subject-mat- 
 ter. It was necessary that the person employed should be a 
 good scholar, familiar with books, and have at his command 
 several languages. The person employed v.^as Joseph Walden, 
 engaged by my agent, J. Whitaker, proprietor of 77/,? Book- 
 seller, who also superintended the work, which was continued 
 during the three months I remained in London, and for about 
 eight months thereafter. The titles and abstracts were en- 
 tered upon paper cards about four inches square ; or, if one 
 work contained more matter than could be properly de- 
 scribed within that space, the paper would be cut in strips of 
 a uniform width, but of the requisite length, and folded to 
 the uniform size. The cost of this catalogue was a little over 
 a thousand dollars. In consulting material in these libraries, 
 which contain much that exists nowhere else, this list is in- 
 valuable as a guide to the required information. It might 
 be supposed that the printed catalogues of the respective 
 libraries would give their titles in such a way as to designate 
 the contents of the v/orks listed, but this is not always the 
 case. The plan adopted by me was to have any book or
 
 94 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 manuscript, and all periodicals and journals of societies, likely 
 to contain desired information, carefully examined, the leaves 
 turned over one by one, and notes made of needed material. 
 By this means I could at once learn where the material was, 
 what it was, and turn to the book and page. 
 
 From London I went to Paris, and searched the stalls, an- 
 tiquarian warehouses, and catalogues, in the same careful 
 manner. I found much material obtainable in no other way, 
 but it was small in comparison with what I had secured in 
 London. Dibdin speaks of a house in Paris, the Debures, 
 bibliopohsts, dealers in rare books, who would never print a 
 catalogue. It was not altogether folly that prompted the 
 policy, for obvious reasons. Leaving Paris the 3d of January, 
 1867, I proceeded to Spain, full of sanguine anticipations. 
 There I expected to find much relating to Mexico at the stalls 
 for old books, but soon learned that everything of value found 
 its way to London. It has been said that in London articles 
 of any description will bring a price nearer their true value 
 than anywhere else in the world. This I know to be true 
 of books. I have in my library little old worthless-looking 
 volumes that cost me two or three hundred dollars each in 
 London, and which, if oftered at auction in San Francisco, 
 would sell for twenty-five or fifty cents, unless some intelligent 
 persons who understood books happened to be present, in 
 which case competition might raise the price to five dollars. 
 On the other hand, that which cost a half dollar in London 
 might sell for five dollars in San Francisco. 
 
 There were not three men in Cahfornia, I venture to say, 
 who at that time knew anything either of the intrinsic or 
 marketable value of old books. Booksellers knew the least. 
 I certainly have had experience both as dealer and as collec- 
 tor, but I profess to know little about the value of ancient 
 works, other than those which I have had occasion to buy. 
 Let me pick up a volume of the Latin classics, for example, 
 or of Dutch voyages, and ask the price. If the book were as 
 large as I could lift, and the shopman told me half a crown, 
 I should think it much material for the money, and I should
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. 95 
 
 not question the integrity of the shopman ; if the book were 
 small enough for the vest pocket, and the seller charged me 
 twenty pounds for it, I should think it right, and that there 
 must be real value about it in some way, otherwise the man 
 would not ask so much. There may be six or eight dealers 
 in New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, who know something 
 of the value of ancient books ; but aside from these, among 
 the trade throughout America, I doubt if there are three. A 
 collector, devoting himself to a specialty, may learn something 
 by experience, by looking over his bills and paying them, re- 
 garding the value of books in the direction of his collecting, 
 but that must be a small part of the whole range of the science 
 of bibliography. 
 
 I thought the London shopkeepers were sufficiently apa- 
 thetic, but they are sprightly in comparison with the Spanish 
 bookseller. To the average Spanish bookseller Paris and 
 London are places bordering on the mythical; if he really 
 believes them to exist, they are mapped in his mind with the 
 most vague indistinctness. As to a knowledge of books 
 and booksellers' shops in those places, there are but few 
 pretensions. 
 
 Opening on the main plaza of Burgos, which was filled 
 with some of the most miserable specimens of muffled 
 humanity I ever encountered — cutthroat, villainous-looking 
 men and women in robes of sewed rags — were two small 
 shops, in which not only books and newspapers were sold, 
 but traps and trinkets of various kinds. There I found a 
 few pamphlets which spoke of Mexico. Passing through a 
 Californian-looking country we entered Madrid, the town of 
 tobacco and bull-fights. If bookselling houses are signifi- 
 cant of the intelligence of the people, then culture in Spain 
 is at a low ebb. 
 
 The first three days in Madrid I spent in collecting and 
 studying catalogues. Of these I found but few, and all con- 
 taining about the same class of works. Then I searched the 
 stalls and stores, and gathered more than at one time I 
 thought I should find, sufficient to fill two large boxes ; but
 
 g6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 to accomplish this I was obliged to work diligently for two 
 weeks. 
 
 To Saragossa, Barcelona, Marseilles, Nice, Genoa, Bo- 
 logna, Florence, and Rome ; then to Naples, back to Venice, 
 and through Switzerland to Paris. After resting a while I 
 went to Holland, then up the Rhine and through Germany 
 to Vienna; then through Germany and Switzerland again, 
 Paris and London, and finally back to New York and Buf- 
 falo. Everywhere I found something, and seized upon it, 
 however insignificant, for I had long since ceased to resist 
 the malady. Often have I taken a cab or a carriage to drive 
 me from stall to stall all day, without obtaining more than 
 perhaps three or four books or pamphlets, for which I paid 
 a shilling or a franc apiece. Then again I would light upon 
 a valuable manuscript which relieved my pocket to the ex- 
 tent of three, five, or eight hundred dollars. 
 
 Now, I thought, my task is done. I have rifled America 
 of its treasures; Europe have I ransacked; and after my 
 success in Spain, Asia and Africa may as well be passed by. 
 I have ten thousand volumes and over, fifty times more than 
 ever I dreamed were in existence when the collecting began. 
 My library is d. fait accompli. Here will I rest. 
 
 But softly ! What is this inch-thick pamphlet that comes to 
 me by mail from my agent in London ? By the shade of 
 Tom Dibdin, it is a catalogue ! Stripping off the cover I read 
 the title-page : Catalogue de la Riche Bibliotheqiic dc D. Jose 
 Maria Andrade. Livres maniiscrits et imprimes. Litteratiire 
 Frangaise et Espagjiole. Histoire de LAfrique, de L'Asie, et 
 de L'Amcnque. 'jooo pieces et volumes ayant rapport an 
 Mexique on imprimes dans ce pays. Dont la vente sefera 
 Lwidi, 1 8 Ja?ivier, j86g, et Jours suiva7its, a Leipzig, dans la 
 salle de ventes de MM. List 6^ Francke, 15 me de E Univer- 
 site,par le ministere de M. Hermann Francke, conunissaire 
 prisctir. 
 
 Seven thousand books direct from Mexico, and probably 
 half of them works which should be added to my collection !
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. 97 
 
 What was to be done ? Here were treasures beside which 
 the gold, silver, and rich merchandise found by Ali Baba 
 in the robbers' cave were dross. A new Hght broke in upon 
 me. I had never considered that Mexico had been printing 
 books for three and a quarter centuries — one hundred years 
 longer than Massachusetts^— and that the earlier works were 
 seldom seen floating about book-stalls and auction-rooms. 
 One would think, perhaps, that in Mexico there might be a 
 rich harvest ; that where the people were ignorant and indif- 
 erent to learning, books would be lightly esteemed, and a 
 large collection easily made. And such at times and to some 
 extent has been the case, but it is not so now. It is charac- 
 teristic of the Mexican, to say nothing of the Yankee, that 
 an article which may before have been deemed worthless, 
 suddenly assumes great value when one tries to buy it. The 
 common people, seeing the priests and collectors place so 
 high an estimate on these embodiments of knowledge, invest 
 them with a sort of supernatural importance, place them 
 among their Lares and Penates, and refuse to part with them 
 at any price. Besides, Mexico as well as other countries has 
 been overrun with book collectors. In making his collec- 
 tion Senor Andrade had occupied forty years; and being 
 upon the spot, with every facility, ample means at his com- 
 mand, a thorough knowledge of the literature of the country, 
 and famiharity with the places in which books and manu- 
 scripts were most likely to be found, he surely should have 
 been able to accomplish what no other man could. 
 
 And then again, rare books are every year becoming rarer. 
 In England particularly this is the case. Important sales are 
 not so frequent now as fifty years ago, when a gentleman's 
 library, which at his death was sold at auction for the benefit of 
 heirs, almost always offered opportunities for securing some rare 
 books. Then, at the death of one, another would add to his 
 collection, and at his death another, and so on. During the 
 past half century many new public libraries have been fonned 
 both in Europe and America, until the number has become 
 very large. These, as a rule, are deficient in rare books ; but 
 7
 
 98 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 having with age and experience accumulated funds and the 
 knowledge of using them, or having secured all desirable 
 current literature, the managers of public libraries are more 
 and more desirous of enriching their collections with the 
 treasures of the past ; and as institutions seldom or never die, 
 when once a book finds lodgment on their shelves the auc- 
 tioneer rarely sees it again. Scores of libraries in America 
 have their agents, with lists of needed books in their hands, 
 ready to pay any price for any one of them. Since there is 
 but a limited number of these books in existence, with a 
 dozen bidders for every one, they are becoming scarcer and 
 dearer every year. 
 
 There were no fixed prices for rare and ancient books in 
 Mexico, and they were seldom or never to be obtained in the 
 ordinary way of trade. Until recently, to make out a list of 
 books and expect a bookseller of that country to procure 
 them for you was absurd, and you would be doomed to dis- 
 appointment. It was scarcely to be expected that he should 
 be so much in advance of his bookselling brother of Spain, 
 who would scarcely leave his seat to serve you with a book 
 from his own shelves, still less to seek it elsewhere. 
 
 Book collecting in Mexico at the period of my visit was a 
 trade iojiibe des ni/cs, the two parties to the business being, 
 usually, one a professional person, representing the guardian- 
 ship of learning, and the other the recipient of his favors. 
 The latter, ascertaining the whereabouts of the desired vol- 
 ume, bargained with a politician, an ecclesiastic, or a go- 
 between, and having agreed on the price, the place and time 
 were named — which must be a retired spot and an hour in 
 which the sun did not shine — whereupon the book was pro- 
 duced and the money paid; but there must be no further 
 conversation regarding the matter. Should the monastic 
 lil)raries occasionally be found deficient in volumes once in 
 their possession, in the absence of catalogues and responsible 
 librarians their loss could not be charged to the guardian. 
 
 Jose Maria Andrade combined in himself the publisher, 
 journalist, Ulteratcur, bibliopole, and bibliophile ; and the te-
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. 99 
 
 nacity with which he dung to his collection was remarkable. 
 Nor was he induced to part with it except for the consumma- 
 tion of a grand purpose. It was ever the earnest desire of 
 the unfortunate Maximilian to advance the interests of the 
 country in every way in his power; and prominent among 
 his many praiseworthy designs was that of improving the 
 mental condition of the people. No sooner had he estab- 
 lished himself in the government than he began the formation 
 of an imperial library. This could not be better accomplished 
 than by securing the collection of Sehor iVndrade, while the 
 intelligent and zealous collector in no other way could reap 
 a reward commensurate with his long and diligent researches. 
 It was therefore arranged that, in consideration of a certain 
 sum to be paid the owner of the books, this magnificent col- 
 lection should form the basis of a Biblioicca Iiupcnal de Me- 
 j'ico. But unfortunately for Mexico this was not to be. The 
 books were to be scattered among the libraries of the world, 
 and the rare opportunity was forever lost. Evil befell both 
 emperor and bibliophile. The former met the fate of many 
 another adventurer of less noble birth and less chivalrous and 
 pure intention, and the latter failed to secure his money. 
 
 When it became certain that Maximilian was doomed to 
 die at the hands of his captors, Andrade determined to se- 
 cure to himself the proceeds from the sale of his library as 
 best he might. Nor was there any time to lose, for the friends 
 of the emperor could scarcely hope to see their contracts rati- 
 fied by his successor. Consequently, v/hile all eyes were 
 turned in the direction of Queretaro, immediately after the 
 enactment of that bloody tragedy, and before the return wave 
 of popular fury and vandalism had reached the city of Mex- 
 ico, Andrade hastily packed his books into two hundred 
 cases, placed them on the backs of mules, and hurried them 
 to Vera Cruz, and thence across the water to Europe. 
 
 Better for Mexico had the bibliophile taken with him one 
 of her chief cities than that mule-train load of literature, 
 wherein for her were stores of mighty experiences, Avhich, 
 left to their own engendering, would in due time bring forth
 
 lOO LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 healing fruits. Never since the burning of the Aztec manu- 
 scripts by the bigot Zumarraga had there fallen on the coun- 
 try such a loss. 
 
 Says M. Deschamps of the Andrade collection : " The 
 portion of this library relating to Mexico is incontestably 
 unique, and constitutes a collection which neither the most 
 enlightened care, the most patient investigation, nor the 
 gold of the richest placers could reproduce. The incuna- 
 bula of American typography, six Gothic volumes head the 
 list, printed from 1543 to 1547, several of which have re- 
 mained wholly unknown to bibliographers ; then follows a 
 collection of documents, printed and in manuscript, by the 
 help of which the impartial writer may reestablish on its 
 true basis the history of the firm domination held by Spain 
 over these immense territories, from the time of Cortes to 
 the glorious epoch of the wars of Independence. The 
 manuscripts are in part original and in part copies of val- 
 uable documents made with great care from the papers pre- 
 served in the archives of the empire at Mexico. It is well 
 known that access to these archives is invariably refused to 
 the public, and that it required the sovereign intervention 
 of an enlightened prince to render possible the long labors 
 of transcription." 
 
 Such is the history of the collection of which I now re- 
 ceived a catalogue, with notice of sale beginning the i8th of 
 January, 1869. Again I asked myself, What was to be done ? 
 Little penetration was necessary to see that this sale at Leip- 
 sic was most important ; that such an opportunity to secure 
 Mexican books never had occurred before and could never 
 occur again. It was not among the possibihties that Senor 
 Andrade's catalogue should ever be duplicated. The time 
 was too short for me to reach Leipsic in person; yet I was 
 determined not to let the opportunity slip without securing 
 something, no matter at what hazard or at what sacrifice. 
 
 Shutting my eyes to the consequences, therefore, I did the 
 only thing possible under the circumstances to secure a portion 
 of that collection : I telegraphed my agent in London five
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO B-IBLIOPt?ILf,. I^I 
 
 thousand dollars earnest money, with instructions to attend 
 the sale and purchase at his discretion. I expected nothing 
 else than large lots of duplicates, with many books which I 
 did not care for; but in this I was agreeably disappointed. 
 Though my agent, Mr. Whitaker, was not very familiar with 
 the contents of my library, he was a practical man, and 
 thoroughly versed in the nature and value of books, and the 
 result of his purchase was to enrich my collection with some 
 three thousand of the rarest and most valuable volumes 
 extant. 
 
 There were, of course, in this purchase a certain number 
 of duplicates, and some books bought only for their rarity, 
 such as specimens of the earliest printing in Mexico, and cer- 
 tain costly linguistic works. But on the whole I was more 
 than pleased ; I Avas delighted. A sum five times larger than 
 the cost of the books would not have taken them from me, 
 for the simple reason that though I should live a hundred 
 years I would not see the time when I could buy any con- 
 siderable part of them at any price. And furthermore, no 
 sooner had I settled doA\'n to authorship than experience 
 taught me that the works thus collected and sold* by Senor 
 Andrade included foreign books of the highest importance. 
 There were among them many books and manuscripts invalu- 
 able for a working library. It seemed after all as though Mr. 
 Whitaker had instinctively secured what was most vranted, 
 allowing very few of the four thousand four hundred and 
 eighty-four numbers of the catalogue to slip through his fin- 
 gers that I would myself have purchased if present in person. 
 
 But this was not the last of the Andrade-Maximilian 
 episode. Another lot, not so large as the Leipsic catalogue, 
 but enough to constitute a very important sale, was disposed 
 of by auction in London, by Puttick and Simpson, in June 
 of the same year. The printed list was entitled : Bibliotheca 
 Mcjicana. A Catalogue of an extraordinary collection of books 
 relating to Mexico and North and South America, from the 
 first introduction of printing in the New World, A. D. 1544, 
 to A. D. 1868. Collected during 20 years' official 7'esidence in 
 
 IWnfERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
 
 10^ .LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Mexico. Mr, Whitaker likewise attended this sale for me, 
 and from his purchases I was enabled still further to fill gaps 
 and perfect the collection. 
 
 Prior to these large purchases, namely in December, 1868, 
 Mr. Whitaker made some fine selections for me at a public 
 sale in Paris. This same year was sold in New York the 
 library of A. A. Smet, and the year previous had been sold 
 that of Richard W. Roche. The library of George W. Pratt 
 was sold in New York in March, 1868; that of Amos Dean, 
 at private sale, in New York the same year; that of W. L. 
 Mattison in New York in April, 1869; that of John A. Rice 
 in New York in March, 1870; that of S. G. Drake in Boston 
 in May and June, 1876; that of John W. Dwindle in San 
 Francisco in July, 1877; that of George T. Strong in New 
 York in November, 1878; that of Milton S. Latham in San 
 Francisco in April, 1879; that of Gideon N. Searing in New 
 York in May, 1880; that of H. R. Schoolcraft in New York 
 in November, 1880; that of A. Oakey Hall in New York in 
 January, 188 1; that of J. L. Hasmar in Philadelphia in 
 March, 1881; that of George Brinley in New York at dif- 
 ferent dates; that of W. B. Lawrence in New York in 188 1-2 
 that of the Sunderland Library, first part, in London in 1881 
 that of W. C. Prescott in New York in December, 1881 
 and that of J. G. Keil in Leipsic in 1882; — from each of 
 which I secured something. Besides those elsewhere enu- 
 merated there were to me memorable sales in Lisbon, New 
 York, and London, in 1870; in London and New York in 
 1872; in Paris, Leipsic, and New York, in 1873, and in New 
 York in 1877. '^^^ several sales in London of Henry G. 
 Bohn, retiring from business, were also important. 
 
 The government officials in Washington and the officers 
 of the Smithsonian Institution have always been very kind 
 and liberal to me, as have the Pacific coast representatives in 
 Congress. From members of the Canadian cabinet and parlia- 
 ment I have received valuable additions to my library. From 
 the many shops of Nassau street. New York, and from several 
 stores and auction sales in Boston, I have been receiving
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. I03 
 
 constant additions to my collection for a period of over a 
 quarter of a century. 
 
 From the Librairie Tross of Paris in April, 1870, I obtained 
 a long list of books, selected from a catalogue. So at various 
 times I have received accessions from Maisonneuve et C'% 
 Paris, notably a considerable shipment in September, 1878. 
 From Triibner, Quaritch, Rowell, and others, in London, the 
 stream was constant, though not large, for many years. 
 Asher of Berlin managed to offer at various times valuable 
 catalogues, as did also John Russell Smith of London; F. 
 A. Brockhaus of Leipsic; Murguia of Mexico, and Madrilena 
 of Mexico; MuUer of Amsterdam; Weigel of Leipsic; 
 Robert Clarke & Co. of Cincinnati; Scheible of Stuttgart; 
 Bouton of New York; Henry Miller of New York, and 
 Olivier of Bruxelles. Henry Stevens of London sold in 
 Boston, through Leonard, by auction in April, 1870, a col- 
 lection of five thousand volumes of American history, cata- 
 logued under the title of Bibliotheca Ilistofka, at which time 
 he claimed to have fifteen thousand similar volumes stored 
 at 4 Trafalgar square. 
 
 In April, 1876, was sold by auction in New York the col- 
 lection of Mr. E. G. Squier, relating in a great measure to 
 Central America, where the collector, when quite young, was 
 for a time United States minister. A man of letters, the 
 author of several books, and many essays and articles on 
 ethnology, histor}% and politics, and a member of home and 
 foreign learned societies, Mr. Squier was enabled by his posi- 
 tion to gratify his tastes to their full extent, and he availed 
 himself of the opportunity. His library was rich in manu- 
 scripts, in printed and manuscript maps, and in Central 
 American newspapers, and political and historical pamphlets. 
 There were some fine original drawings by Catherwood 
 of ruins and monoHth idols, and some desirable engravings 
 and photographs. Books from the library of Alexander Von 
 Humboldt were a feature, and there was a section on Scan- 
 dina\dan literature. In regard to his manuscripts, which he 
 intended to translate and print, the publication of Falacio,
 
 I04 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Cartas, being the beginning, Mr. Squier said : " A large part 
 of these were obtained from the various Spanish archives and 
 depositories by my friend Buckingham Smith, late secretary 
 of the legation of the United States in Spain. Others were 
 procured during my residence in Central America either in 
 person or through the intervention of friends." I gladly 
 availed myself of the opportunity to purchase at this sale 
 whatever the collection contained that was lacking in my 
 library. Of the Squier library Mr. Sabin testified : " In the 
 department relative to Central America the collection is not 
 surpassed by any other within our knowledge; many of 
 these books being published in Central America, and having 
 rarely left the land of their birth, are of great value, and are 
 almost unknown outside the localities from which they were 
 issued," 
 
 The next most important opportunity was the sale, by 
 auction, of the library of Caleb Cushing in Boston, in Oc- 
 tober, 1879. This was attended for me by Mr. Lauriat, and 
 the result was in every way satisfactory. 
 
 Quite a remarkable sale was that of the library of Ramirez, 
 by auction, in London in July, 1880, not so much in regard 
 to numbers, for there were but 1290, as in variety and prices. 
 The title of the catalogue reads as follows : Bibliotheca Afex- 
 icana. A catalogue of the Libra)"}' of rare books and important 
 manuscripts, relating to Mexico and other parts of Spanish 
 America, formed by the late Scfior Don Jose' Fer?iando Ra- 
 mirez, presidcfit of the late E?nperor Maximilian' s first minis- 
 try, comprising fuie specifnens of the presses of the early Mex- 
 ican typographers, Juan Cromberger, Juan Pablos, Anto7iio 
 Espinosa, Pedro Ocharte, Pedro Balli, Antonio Ricardo, Mel- 
 chior Ocharte ; a large number of works, both printed and 
 ma7iuscript, on the Mexican Indian languages afid dialects ; 
 the civil and ecclesiastical history of Mexico and its provinces ; 
 collections of laws and ordinances relating to the Indies. Val- 
 uable unpublished manuscripts relating to the Jesuit jnissions 
 in Texas, California, China, Peru, Chili, Brazil, etc.; collec- 
 tions of documctits ; sermons preached in Mexico; etc., etc.
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE. 1 05 
 
 Ramirez was a native of the city of Durango, where he had 
 been educated and admitted to the bar, rising to eminence as 
 state and federal judge. He was at one time head of the 
 national museum of Mexico ; also minister of foreign affairs, 
 and again president of Maximilian's first ministry. After the 
 withdrawal of the French he went to Europe and took up his 
 residence at Bonn, where he died in 187 1. The books com- 
 prising the sale formed the second collection made by this 
 learned bibliographer, the first having become the foundation 
 of a state library in the city of Durango. The rarest works 
 of the first collection were reserved, however, as a nucleus for 
 the second, which was formed after he removed to the capital. 
 His high public position, his reputation as scliolar and bibliog- 
 rapher, and his widely extended influence afforded him the 
 best facilities. Many of his literary treasures were obtained 
 from the convents after the suppression of the monastic orders. 
 From the collection, as it stood at the death of Ramirez, his 
 heirs permitted A. Chavero to select all works relating to 
 Mexico. " We believe we do not exaggerate," the sellers 
 affirmed, " when we say that no similar collection of books 
 can again be brought into the English market." 
 
 This opinion was endorsed by Mr. Whitaker, who wrote to 
 me in 1869 regarding the Paris and London sales of that 
 year : " If I may argue from analogy, I do not think that 
 many more Mexican books will come to Europe for sale. I 
 remember some twenty-five years ago a similar series of sales 
 of Spanish books which came over here in consequence of 
 the revolution, but for many years there have been none to 
 speak of." Thus we find the same idea expressed by an ex- 
 pert eleven years before the Ramirez sale. In one sense both 
 opinions proved true ; the collections were different in char- 
 acter, and neither of them could be even approximately 
 duplicated. With regard to prices at the sales of 1869 Mr. 
 Whitaker remarks: "Some of the books sold rather low 
 considering their rarity and value, but on the whale prices 
 ruled exceedingly high." Had Mr. Whitaker attended the 
 Ramirez sale he would have been simply astounded. If ever
 
 Io6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 the prices of Mexican books sold prior to this memorable 
 year of 1880 could in comparison be called high, such sales 
 have been wholly outside of my knowledge, I had before 
 ■paid hundreds of dollars for a thin i2mo volume; but a bill 
 wherein page after page the items run from $50 to $700 is 
 apt to call into question the general sanity of mankind. And 
 yet this was at public sale, in the chief book mart of the 
 world, and it is to be supposed that the volumes Avere sold 
 with fairness. 
 
 Notice of this sale, with catalogue, was forwarded to me 
 by Mr. Stevens, who attended it in my behalf I made out 
 my list and sent it on with general instructions, but without 
 special limit ; I did not suppose the whole lot would amount 
 to over $10,000 or $12,000. The numbers I ordered brought 
 nearer $30,000. Mr. Stevens did not purchase them all, pre- 
 ferring to forego his commissions rather than subject me to 
 such fearfully high prices. My chief consolation in drawing 
 a check for the purchase was that if books were worth the 
 prices brought at the Ramirez sale the value of my library 
 must be a million of dollars. And yet Mr. Stevens writes : 
 " On the whole you have secured your lots very reasonably. 
 A few are dear; most of them are cheap. The seven or 
 eight lots that you put in your third class, and which Mr. 
 Quaritch or Count Heredia bought over my bids, you may 
 rest assured went dear enough." There were scarcely any 
 purchasers other than the three bidders above named, though 
 Mr. Stevens held orders likewise for the British Museum 
 library. There was no calling off or hammering by the auc- 
 tioneer. The bidders sat at a table on which Avas placed the 
 book to be sold ; each made his bid and the seller recorded 
 the highest. 
 
 Thus it was that in 1869, after the Maximilian sale, but 
 before those of Ramirez, Squicr, and many others, I found in 
 my possession, including pamphlets, about sixteen thousand 
 volumes; and with these, which even before its completion 
 I placed on the fifth floor of the Market-street building, I 
 decided to begin work. As a collector, however, I con-
 
 FROM BIBLIOPOLIST TO BIBLIOPHILE, I07 
 
 tinued lying in wait for opportunities. All the new books 
 published relative to the subject were immediately added to 
 the collection, with occasional single copies, or little lots of 
 old books secured by my agents. Before leaving Europe I 
 appointed agents in other principal cities besides London to 
 purchase, as opportunity offered, whatever I lacked. There 
 were many other notable additions to the library from sources 
 not yet mentioned, of which I shall take occasion to speak 
 in later chapters of this volume.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE LIBRARY. 
 
 Could a man be secure 
 
 That his days would endure 
 
 As of old, for a thousand long years, 
 
 What things might he know ! 
 
 What deeds might he do ! 
 
 And all without hurry or care. 
 
 — Old Song. 
 
 IF as Plato says knowledge is goodness, and goodness God, 
 then libraries occupy holy ground, and books breathe the 
 atmosphere of heaven. Although this philosophy may be too 
 transcendental for the present day, and although the agency 
 of evil sometimes appears in the storing of knowledge as well 
 as the agency of good, thus making scholars not always heirs 
 of God, we have yet to learn of a collection of books having 
 been made for purposes of evil, or the results of such efforts 
 ever having been otherAvise than beneficial to the race. Par- 
 ticularly is such the case where the main incentive has been 
 the accumulation of facts for the mere love of such accumu- 
 lation, and not from devotion to dogma, or for the purpose 
 of pleading a cause — for something of the instinct of accu- 
 mulation inherent in liumanity may be found in the garnering 
 of knowledge, no less than in the gathering of gold or the 
 acquisition of broad acres. 
 
 My library, when first it came to be called a librar)', occu- 
 pied one comer of the second story of the bookstore building 
 Ion Merchant street, which connected with the front room on 
 1 Montgomery street, as before described. When placed on 
 •the fifth floor of the Market-street building, it occupied room 
 ;equivalcnt to thirty-five by one hundred and seventy feet, 
 
 io8
 
 THE LIBRARY. 
 
 [09 
 
 being about fifty feet wide at the south end, and narrowing 
 irregularly towards the north end. The ceiling was low, and 
 the view broken by, the enclosures under the skylights, and 
 by sections of standing supports with which it was found 
 necessary to supplement the half-mile and more of shelving 
 against the walls. Following the works of reference, the 
 books were arranged alphabetically by authors, some seventy- 
 five feet at the north end, both walls and floor room being 
 left for newspapers. On the east side were four rooms, two 
 occupied as sleeping apartments by Mr. Oak and Mr. Nemos, 
 and two used as working rooms by Mrs. Victor and myself. 
 There was one large draughtsman's working-counter, with 
 drawers, and a rack for maps. The desks and writing tables 
 stood principally at the south end of the main library room, 
 that being the best locality for light and air. A large, high, 
 revolving table occupied the centre of my room. Attached 
 to it was a stationary stand into which it fitted, or rather of 
 which it formed part. At this table I could stand, or by 
 means of a high chair Avith revolving seat I could sit, and 
 write on the stationary part. The circular or revolving por- 
 tion of the table was some eight or nine feet in diameter. 
 Besides this there were usually two or three common plain 
 tables in the room. On the walls were maps, and drawings of 
 various kinds, chiefly referring to early history; also certificates 
 of degrees conferred, and of membership of learned societies. 
 
 In the main room, in addition to long tables, there were a 
 dozen or so small movable tables, and also a high table and 
 a high desk, the two accommodating four or five persons, 
 should any wish to stand. All was well arranged, not only 
 for literary but for mechanical work, for close at hand were 
 compositors, printers, and binders. No place could better 
 have suited my purpose, except for interruptions, for I was 
 never entirely free from business. 
 
 Yet, all through the dozen years the library was there I 
 trembled for its safety through fear of fire, as indeed did 
 many others who appreciated its historical value to this coast, 
 well knowing that once lost no power on earth could repro-
 
 no LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 , duce it. Hence its place in this building was regarded as 
 temporary from the first. We all thought constantly of it, 
 and a hundred times I talked over the question of removal 
 with Mr. Oak and others. Now and then the danger would 
 be more vividly brought home to us by an alarm of fire on 
 the premises ; and once in particular, when a fire broke out 
 in the basement of a furniture store occupying the western 
 side of the building, filling the library with dense smoke, and 
 driving the inmates to the roof. The furniture store was 
 almost destroyed, and the bookstore suffered serious damage. 
 It was a narrow escape for the library. 
 
 Thus, when in the autumn of 1881 William B. Bancroft, 
 my nephew, in charge of the manufacturing department, 
 required the use of the floor for his increasing business, and 
 as the money could be spared, I lent a willing ear. 
 
 First to be considered in choosing a new locality was 
 whether the library should remain on the peninsula of San 
 Francisco, or take its place at some point across the bay. 
 Oakland was seriously considered, and San Rafael, not to 
 mention Sonoma, where, long before, my enthusiastic friend, 
 General Vallejo, had offered to furnish land and all the build- 
 ing requirements free. There were pleasant places in the 
 direction of San Mateo and Menlo Park; but we finally con- 
 cluded to remain in the city. 
 
 After some search a place was found uniting several ad- 
 vantages, and which on the whole proved satisfactory. It 
 was on Valencia street, the natural continuation of Market 
 street, on the line of the city's growth, and reached by the 
 same line of cars which passed the store. There, on the west 
 side, near its junction with Mission street, I purchased a lot 
 one hundred and twenty by one hundred and twenty-six feet, 
 and i)rocecded forthwith to erect a substantial two story and 
 basement brick structure forty by sixty feet. In order that 
 the building might be always detached it was placed in the 
 centre of the lot, and to make it more secure from fire all the 
 openings were covered with iron. A high fence was erected 
 on two sides for protection against the wind, and the grounds
 
 THE LIBRARY. Ill 
 
 were planted with trees, grass, and flowers. On the door was 
 placed a plate lettered in plain script, The Bancroft 
 Library. 
 
 The building proved most satisfactory. No attempt was 
 made at elaboration, either without or within; neatness and 
 good taste, with comfort and convenience, were alone aimed 
 at. Every part of it was ordered with an eye single to the 
 purpose; the rooms are spacious, there are plenty of large 
 windows, and the building is v/ell ventilated. From the front 
 door the main room, lower floor, is entered, which, though 
 almost without a break in its original construction, became at 
 once so crowded as to render its proper representation in a 
 drawing impossible. Ample space, as was supposed, had 
 been allowed in planning the building, but such a collection 
 of books is susceptible of being expanded or contracted to a 
 wonderful extent. On the wall shelves of this apartment are 
 sets and collections aggregating 16,000 volumes. The sets 
 are conveniently lettered and numbered, in a manner that 
 renders each work readily accessible, as will be described in 
 detail elsewhere. They consist of collections of voyages and 
 travels ; of documents, periodicals, legislative and other public 
 papers of the federal government and the several states and 
 territories of the Pacific slope ; of law-books, statutes, briefs, 
 and legal reports ; series of scrap-books, almanacs, directories, 
 bound collections of pamphlets, cumbersome folios, Mexi- 
 can sermons, papeles vafios, and other miscellaneous matter. 
 Three lofty double tiers of shelving, extending across the room 
 from north to south, are loaded with 500 bulky files of Pacific 
 states newspapers, amounting, if a year of weeklies and three 
 months of daihes be accounted a volume, to over 5000 volumes. 
 It is a somewhat unwieldy mass, but indispensable to the local 
 historian. Also was built and placed here a huge case, Avith 
 drawers for maps, geographically arranged; also cases con- 
 taining the card index, and paper bags of notes, all of which 
 are explained elsewhere. 
 
 To the room above, the main library and working-room, 
 the entrance is by a staircase rising from the middle of the
 
 112 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 first floor. Here, seated at tables, are a dozen literary ^^'ork- 
 , men, each busy with his special task. The walls are filled 
 ! with shelving nine tiers high, containing four classes of books. 
 Most of the space is occupied by works of the first class, 
 the working library proper of printed books, alphabetically 
 arranged, each volume bearing a number, and the numbers 
 running consecutively from one to 1 2,000 under alphabetical 
 arrangement, and afterward without arrangement, as addi- 
 tions are made indefinitely. The second class consists of rare 
 books, of about 400 volumes, set apart by reason of their 
 great value, not merely pecuniary, though the volumes will 
 bring from $35 to $800 each in the book markets of the 
 world, but for their literary value, as standard authorities, 
 bibhographic curiosities, specimens of early printing, and 
 rare linguistics. The third class is composed entirely of 
 manuscripts, in 1200 volumes of three subdivisions, relating 
 respectively to Mexico and Central America, to California, 
 and to the Northwest Coast — the Oregon and interior 
 territory, British Columbia, and Alaska. The fourth class is 
 made up of 450 works of reference and bibliographies. 
 When the collection was placed in the library building it 
 numbered 35,000 volumes, since which time additions have 
 steadily been made, until the number now approaches 
 50,000. On the eastern side of the upper room is situated 
 my private apartment, while at the opposite side are other 
 rooms. All otherwise unoccupied wall space, above and 
 below, is filled with portraits, plans, drawings, engravings, 
 and curios, all having reference to the territory covered by 
 the collection. 
 
 Considerable inconvenience had been experienced during 
 the past twelve years' use of the library, for want of proper 
 numbering and cataloguing. Mr. Oak had made a card 
 catalogue which about the time of removal to Market street 
 was copied in book form ; but though the former kept pace 
 with the increase of books, the latter was soon out of date. 
 For a time an alphabetical arrangement answered every pur-
 
 THE LIBRARY. II3 
 
 pose, but under this system books were so often out of place, i 
 and losses so frequent, that it was deemed best on removing 
 to Valencia street to adopt a book-mark, a system of number- 
 ing, and make a new catalogue. The book-mark consisted 
 of a lithographed line in plain script letters, The Bancroft 
 Library, with the number. Preparatory to numbering, the 
 several classes before mentioned were separated from the 
 general collection, the whole weeded of duplicates, and every 
 book and pamphlet put in place under the old alphabetical 
 arrangement. The main working collection was then num- 
 bered from one to 12,000 consecutively. This prohibited 
 further alphabetical arrangement, and thereafter all subse- 
 quent volumes were added at the end as they came in, and 
 were covered by new numbers. In regard to the other 
 classes, letters were employed in the numbering to distinguish 
 one from the other. The first catalogue was written on narrow- 
 ruled paper, six by nine inches when folded, and then bound; 
 the second was written on thick paper, fourteen by eighteen 
 inches when folded, and ruled for the purpose with columns, 
 and with subsidiary lines for numbers and description. This 
 catalogue indicates the shelf position of every book in the 
 library; and the plan admits of additions almost limitless 
 without breaking the alphabetic order. In copying it from 
 the original cards an assistant was engaged for over a year. 
 When completed it was strongly bound in thick boards and 
 leather. 
 
 No one can know, not having had the experience, the end- 
 less labor and detail attending the keeping in order and under 
 control of a large and rapidly growing collection of historical 
 data. Take newspapers, for example. The newspaper is 
 the first and often the only printed matter pertaining directly 
 to the local affairs sometimes of a wide area. As such its his- 
 torical importance is obvious. It is the only printed record 
 of the history of the section it covers. No collection of early 
 historic data can be deemed in any degree complete with- 
 out liberal files of the daily and weekly journals. But when 
 these files of periodicals reach the number of five hundred, as 
 8
 
 114 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 before mentioned, equivalent in bulk and information to five 
 thousand volumes of books, with large daily additions, it be- 
 comes difficult to know how to deal with them, for these too 
 must be indexed and put away in their proper place before 
 the knowledge they contain can be reached or utilized. The 
 course we pursued was first of all after collocation to enter 
 them by their names, and arranged territorially, in a ten-quire 
 demy record book, writing down the numbers actually in the 
 library, chronologically, with blank spaces left for missing 
 numbers, to be filled in as those numbers were obtained and 
 put in their places. But before putting away in their proper 
 places either the files or the incoming additional numbers, all 
 were indexed, after the manner of indexing the books of the 
 library, and desired information extracted therefrom in the 
 usual way. 
 
 In describing the contents of the library, aside from its ar- 
 rangement in the building, one would classify it somewhat 
 difterently, territory and chronology taking precedence of 
 outward form and convenience. Any allusion in this volume 
 must be necessarily very brief, for any approach to biblio- 
 graphical analysis is here out of the question. We can merely 
 glance at the several natural divisions of the subject, namely, 
 aboriginal literature, sixteenth-century productions, works of 
 the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, nineteenth-century 
 publications, maps, manuscripts, and, by way of a specialty, 
 the material for California and Northwest Coast history. 
 
 Passing the annals of the savages, as displayed by the 
 scattered picture-writings of the wilder northern tribes, which 
 indeed have no place even in the category first named, we 
 come to the more enduring records of the southern plateaux. 
 
 First there arc the picture records of the Aztec migrations, 
 from Gemclli Carreri and the Boturini collection, and repre- 
 sentations of the education of Aztec children, from the Codex 
 Mcndoza. Specimens of the next aboriginal class, superior 
 to the Aztec i)icture writing, may be found in the sculptured 
 hieroglyphics covering the tablets of Palcnque, and the 
 statues of Copan. Among the works of Lord Kingsborough
 
 THE LIBRARY. II5 
 
 and of Brasseur de Bourbourg are volumes of free discussion, 
 which leave the student at the end of his investigations 
 exactly where he stood at the beginning. Then there are the 
 Maya alphabet of Bishop Landa, and the specimens pre- 
 served in the Dresden codex, which so raise intelligent curi- 
 osity as to make us wish that the Spanish bigots had been 
 burned instead of the masses of priceless aboriginal manu- 
 scripts of which they built their bonfires. In the national 
 museum of the University of Mexico were placed the rem- 
 nants of the aboriginal archives of Tezcuco; and we may 
 learn much from the writings of some of their former posses- 
 sors, Ixtlilxochitl, Sigiienza, Boturini, Veytia, Ordaz, Leon y 
 Gama, and Sanchez. Clavigero has also used this material with 
 profit in writing his history. The calendar stone of the Aztecs, 
 a representation of which is given in the Native Races, may 
 be examined with interest; also the paintings of the Aztec 
 cycle, the Aztec year, and the Aztec month. Some remains 
 of Central American aboriginal literature are preserved in 
 the manuscript Troano, reproduced in lithography by the 
 French government. 
 
 The sixteenth-century productions relating to America, taken 
 as one class, begin with the letters of Columbus written during 
 the last decade of the fifteenth century. Of these there were 
 printed two, with one by a friend of the admiral, and the 
 papal bull of Alexander VI., in 1493, making four plaquettes 
 printed prior to 1500. Then came more papal bulls and 
 more letters, and narratives of voyages by many navigators ; 
 there were maps, and globes, and cosmographies, and numer- 
 ous " mundus novus " books, conspicuous among their writers 
 being Vespucci, Peter Martyr, the authors of Ptolemfs 
 Gcographia, and Enciso, who printed in 15 19 his Siuna de 
 Geografia. After these were iiinerarios and relaciones by 
 Juan Diaz, Cortes, and others. The doughty deeds of Pe- 
 drarias Davila were sung in 1525, and not long afterward 
 the writings of the chronicler Oviedo began to appear in 
 print. In 1532 appeared the Dc Insulis of Cortes and Mar-
 
 Il6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 tyr, and in 1534 the Chrojiica of Aniandus, and some letters 
 by Francisco Pizarro. Between 1540 and 1550 were divers 
 plaquettes, besides the Relaciones of Cabeza de Vaca, the 
 Comentarios of Pedro Hernandez, and the Apologia of 
 SeiDulveda, 
 
 The chief works touching the Pacific States territory which 
 appeared during the last half of the sixteenth century were 
 those of Las Casas, Gomara, Benzoni, Monardes, Fernando 
 Colon, Palacio, Acosta, Perez, and Padilla. The many ac- 
 counts of voyages and collections of voyages, such as Ramu- 
 sio, Huttich, and Hakluyt, appearing during this period, and 
 the hundreds of ordena7izas, niievas kyes, and cedu/as, I can- 
 not here enumerate. Nor is it necessary to mention here the 
 oft-described earliest books printed in America. 
 
 New chroniclers, historians, compilers of voyages, cosmog- 
 raphers, and geographers came forward during the seven- 
 teenth and eighteenth centuries. Among these were Ens, 
 Philoponus, the author of IVest-Indisc/ie Spieghei, Gottfried, 
 D'Avity, Ogilby, Montanus, Garcia, Herrera, Torquemada, 
 Villagra, Simon, De Bry, Purchas, Bernal Diaz, Pizarro y 
 Orellana, De Laet, Gage, Soils, Cogolludo, Piedrahita, Ve- 
 tancurt, and some English books on the Scots at Darien; 
 there were likewise innumerable sermons, and the De Indi- 
 arum Ivre of Solorzano Pereira, the views of Grotius, the 
 Teatro Eclesidstico of Gil Gonzalez Davila, and other kindred 
 works. The mission chronicles were a literary feature of the 
 times, and toward the latter part of the epoch come the Eng- 
 lish, French, and Dutch voyages of circumnavigation. 
 
 The name of Humboldt stands prominent at the begin- 
 ning of nineteenth-century Pacific States literature ; and near 
 him the Mexican liistorian Bustamante. Then follow Escu- 
 dero, Prescott, Irving, Alaman, Carbajal Espinosa, Chevalier, 
 Brantz Mayer, Domenech, — among voyagers and collections 
 of voyages, Krusenstern, Langsdorff, Lisiansky, Kotzebue, 
 Roquefcuil, Beechy, Petit-Thouars, Laplace, Duhaut-Cilly, 
 Belcher, Simpson, and Wilkes, Burney, Pinkerton, Richard- 
 crie. La Harpe, and Aiinalcs dcs Voyages.
 
 THE LIBRARY. II7 
 
 Collections of original documents are a feature of this cen- 
 tury, conspicuous among which are those of Navarrete, Ter- 
 naux-Compans, Buckingham Smith, Icazbalceta, Calvo, Pa- 
 checo and Cardenas, and of somewhat kindred character the 
 works of Sahagun, Veytia, Cavo, Tezozomoc, Scherzer, Bras- 
 seur de Bourbourg, Palacio, Landa, Duran, IMota Padilla, 
 Mendieta, — and more relating to the aborigines, the works 
 of Cabrera, Leon y Gama, Morton, Bradford, Catlin, Bos- 
 cana, Holmberg, Miiller, Baldwin, Dupaix, Waldeck, Nebel, 
 Catherwood, Charnay, Adelung, Du Ponceau, Veniamino, 
 Ludewig, Pimentel, Orozco y Berra, Arenas, Amaro, Molina, 
 Avila, and many others. The century presents a lengthy list 
 of valuable books of travel, and physical and political de- 
 scriptions, such as the works of Lewis and Clarke, James, 
 Hunter, Cox, Stephens, Squier, Strangeways, Montgomery, 
 Dunlop, Byam, MoUhausen, Robinson, Biyant, Bayard Tay- 
 lor, De Mofras, and a thousand others, covering the entire 
 range of territory from Alaska to Panama. Periodical litera- 
 ture likewise assumes importance. 
 
 With regard to maps, the field resembles that of the books 
 in these respects, that it dates from the fifteenth century and 
 is without end. It would appear that somewhere such labors 
 should end ; yet I suspect that my works, as full and complete 
 as I can make them, Avill prove only the foundation of a hun- 
 dred far more attractive volumes. In our examination of 
 maps we may if we like go back to the chart of the brothers 
 Zeno, drawn in. 1390, following with Behaim's globe in 1492, 
 Juan de la Cosa's map in 1500, and those by Ruysch in 1508, 
 Peter Martyr, 151 1, that in the Ptolemy's Cosmography of 
 1 5 13, those in the Munich Atlas and Schoner's globe, 1520, 
 Colon's and Ribero's, drawn in 1527 and 1529 respectively, 
 Orontius Fine in 1531, and Castillo, 1541, showing the penin- 
 sula of California, after which the number becomes numerous. 
 
 In my collection of manuscripts, taken as a whole, perhaps 
 the ConciUos Provinciaks Afexicanos should be mentioned first.
 
 Il8 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 It is in four volumes, and is a record of the first three eccle- 
 siastical councils held in Mexico ; in comparison with which 
 a number of more strictly religious works are hardly worth 
 mentioning — for example, the Catecismo hecho por el Concilio 
 IV. Mexicaao; the Explicacion de la dodrina hecha por el Con- 
 cilio IV.; Qumarraga, Joannes de, Pastoral, in Latin ; the Mo- 
 ralia S. Gregorii Papa, and the like. 
 
 Of more value are the Scrinones, of the discwsos panegiri- 
 cos stamp, and other branches of the religio-historical type, 
 while the worth of such works as Materiales para la Historia 
 de Sonora, the same of Texas, Nueva Galicia, Nueva Vizcaya, 
 and other provinces thereabout, secured mostly from the Max- 
 imiUan collection, is past computation. Among the hundreds 
 of titles which present themselves having greater or less claims 
 to importance are Memorias de Mexico ; Rivera, Diario Qi- 
 rioso ; Mexico, Archivo General ; Beaumont, Cronica de la 
 Provincia de S. Pedro y S. Pablo de MccJwacan ; Cartas 
 Auiericanas j Gomez, Diario de Mexico. Some of the Squier 
 manuscripts are Grijalva, Relacion ; Andagoya, Carta ; Yza- 
 giiirre, Relacion j Alvarado, Cartas ; Cerezeda, Carta, and Re- 
 lacion ; Viana, Gallego, and Cadena, Relacion ; Criado de 
 Castilla, Relacion ; Ddvila, Relacion ; Documentos relativos a 
 la Historia de la Audiencia de los Confines ; Leon Pinelo, Re- 
 lacion, and Velasco, Capitulos de Carta. From the Ramirez 
 collection I obtained Rcales Cedillas, Realcs Ordenanzas, 
 Leyes, etc. ; Adas Provinciates ; Albieuri, Historia de las Mi- 
 siones ; Autos formados a Pcdimento de esta Nobles sima ciit- 
 dad ; Figueroa, Vindicias ; Papeles de Jesuitas ; Disturbios de 
 Frailes ; Noticias de la Nueva California ; Morfi, Apuntes 
 sobre el Nuevo Mexico ; Montevcrde, Memoria sobre Sonora ; 
 Monumentos Historicos ; Relacion de la Orden de San Fran- 
 cisco en la Nueva EspaHa ; Memorias para la Historia de la 
 Provincia de Sinaloa ; Tamaron, Visiia del obispado de Du- 
 rango ; Tumultos de Mexico, and many others. 
 
 As to the hundreds of manuscript volumes of copied ar- 
 chives, histories, and narratives upon which the histories of 
 the northern luilfof the i'acific territory are based, it is useless
 
 THE LIBRARY. II9 
 
 here to attempt any mention ; I can only refer the reader to 
 the bibhographical notices in my histories of that region, and 
 to other places, where somewhat more space is devoted to 
 the subject. It is impossible to give in a few chapters any 
 adequate idea of the vast army of authors, arranged in bat- 
 talions, regiments, and companies, quartered in the library 
 building on Valencia street. The best exposition of the con- 
 tents of the books of the Hbrary may be found in my volume 
 of £ssaj's and Miscellany, where I devote four chapters to 
 the literature of the territory covered by my writings, entitled, 
 respectively, Literature of Central America; Literature of 
 Colonial Mexico; Literature of Mexico during the Present 
 Century; and Early California Literature. These chapters, 
 together with the bibliographical notes carried through all 
 my historical works, and which I have endeavored to make 
 systematic, thorough, and complete, constitute not only a 
 description of the contents of the library, but a very fair his- 
 tory and analysis of Pacific States literature, the library con- 
 taining as it does the entire literature of these lands. While 
 thousands of authors must obviously remain unmentioned, yet 
 in spirit and in essence the writings of the place and time are 
 fairly presented, the object being to tell so far as possible all 
 that has been done in the various fields of learning and letters. 
 
 In these chapters are presented not only results, but 
 causes, whence emerged, under conditions favorable or un- 
 favorable, natural or abnormal developments. The colonial 
 literature of Central America and Mexico was some advance 
 on the aboriginal, though not so great as many imagine ; but 
 when we reach the republican era of material and mental 
 development, we find a marked change. The Pacific United 
 States are bringing forth some strong men and strong books, 
 if thus far authors of repute have come as a rule from beyond 
 the border-line, and are not sons of the soil. 
 
 A collection of books, like everything else, has its history 
 and individuality. Particularly is this the case in regard to 
 collections limited to a special subject, time, or territory. 
 Such are the result of birth and growth ; they are not found
 
 I20 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 in the market for sale, ready made ; there must have been 
 sometime the engendering idea, followed by a long natural 
 development. 
 
 From the ordinary point of view there is nothing remarkable 
 in gathering 50,000 volumes and providing a building for their 
 reception. There are many libraries larger than this, some of 
 them having been founded and carried forward by an individ- 
 ual, who, without government or other aid, likewise erected a 
 building for his books. Nevertheless, there are some remark- 
 able features about this collection, some important points in 
 connection therewith, which cannot be found elsewhere. 
 
 First, as a historical library it stands apart from any other, 
 being the largest collection in the world of books, maps, and 
 manuscripts relating to a special territory, time, or subject. 
 There are larger masses of historical data lodged in certain 
 archives or libraries, but they are more general, or perhaps 
 universal, relating to all lands and peoples, and not to so 
 limited an area of the earth. And when the further facts 
 are considered, how recently this country was settled, and 
 how thinly peopled it now is as compared with what it will 
 be some day, the difference is still more apparent. 
 
 Secondly, it gives to each section of the area covered more 
 full, complete, and accurate data concerning its early history 
 than any state or nation in the civiHzed world, outside of this 
 territory, has or ever can have. So long as this collection is 
 kept intact, and neither burned nor scattered, California, 
 Oregon, and the rest of these Pacific commonwealths may 
 find here fuller material regarding their early history than 
 Massachusetts, New York, or any other American state, than 
 England, Germany, Italy, or any other European nation. 
 The reason is obvious : they missed their opportunity ; not 
 one of them can raise the dead or gather from oblivion that 
 which is lost and forgotten. 
 A Third, it has been put to a more systematic and practical 
 ; use than any other historical library in the world. I have 
 never heard of any considerable collection being indexed 
 according to the subject-matter contained in each volume,
 
 THE LIBRARY. 121 
 
 as has been the case here; or of such a mass of crude his- 
 toric matter being ever before worked over, winnowed, and 
 the parts worth preserving written out and printed for general 
 use, as has been done in this instance. 
 
 Says an eminent writer: "Respecting Mr. Bancroft's 
 Pacific Library as a storehouse of historic data, pertaining 
 to this broad and new western land, but one opinion has 
 been expressed during the twenty years that the existence of 
 such an institution has been known to the world. In all that 
 has been said or written, at home or abroad, by friend or foe, 
 by admirers, indifl:erent observers, conservative critics, or 
 hypercritical fault-finders, there has been entire unanimity of 
 praise of the library as a collection of historic data. Disin- 
 terested and impartial visitors, after a personal inspection, 
 have invariably shown a degree of admiration far exceeding 
 that of the warmest friends who knew the library only from 
 description. The praise of those who might be supposed to 
 be influenced to some extent by local pride has never equalled 
 that of prominent scholars from the east and Europe. 
 
 "There is no American collection with which this can 
 fairly be compared. There are other large and costly private 
 libraries; but the scope, plan, and purpose of the Bancroft 
 Library place it beyond the possibility of comparison. It is 
 made up exclusively of printed and manuscript matter per- 
 taining to the Pacific States, from Alaska to Panama. To 
 say that it is superior to any other in its own field goes for 
 little, because there are lui others of any great magnitude; 
 but when we can state truthfully that nowhere in the world 
 is there a similar collection equal to it, the assertion means 
 something. And not only does this collection thus excel all 
 others as a whole, but a like excellence is apparent for each 
 of its parts. In it may be found, for instance, a better library 
 of Mexican works, of Central American works, of Pacific 
 United States works, than elsewhere exists. And to go fur- 
 ther, it may be said to contain a more perfect collection on 
 Alaska, on New Mexico, on Texas, on Colorado, on Utah, 
 on Costa Rica, and the other individual states or govern-
 
 122 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 ments than can be found outside its walls. Not only this, 
 but in several cases, notably that of Cahfomia, this library is 
 regarded as incomparably superior to any state collection 
 existing, or that could at this date be formed in all the United 
 States or Europe. 
 
 " There is no other state or country whose historic data 
 have been so thoroughly collected at so early a period of its 
 existence, especially none whose existence has been so varied 
 and eventful, and its record so complicated and perishable. 
 Mr. Bancroft has attempted, and successfully as is believed, 
 to do for his country a work which in the ordinary course of 
 events would have been left for a succession of historical 
 societies and specialists to do in a later generation, after the 
 largest part of the material had been lost, and the accomplish- 
 ment of the purpose would be absolutely impossible. Then, 
 too, from such work the resulting stores of data, besides their 
 comparative paucity, would be scattered, and not accessible 
 as a whole to any single investigator. The advantage of 
 having such historic treasures in one place rather than in 
 many is almost as obvious as that of preventing the loss of 
 valuable material." 
 
 In this connection it is worthy of our serious consideration 
 how the future great libraries of the world will procure those 
 ancient and important works which constitute at once the 
 foundation and the treasure of every great collection. How- 
 ever it may be some time hence, it is certain that at the 
 present day no collection of books, is worthy of the name of 
 library without a fair share of these rare and valuable works. 
 Particularly is this the case in our own country, where the 
 value and importance of every library must depend, not on 
 Elzevir editions, elaborate church missals, or other old-world 
 curiosities, often as worthless as they are costly, but on works 
 of material interest and value relating to the discovery, con- 
 quest, settlement, and development of America, in its many 
 parts from south to north, and east to west, from the days of 
 Columbus to the present time — books becoming every day 
 rarer and more costly.
 
 THE LIBRARY. I23 
 
 A prominent New York bookseller thus prints in his cata- 
 logue, in regard to old and valuable books as an investment : 
 " We have often, in the course of our experience as book- 
 sellers, heard more or less comment on our prices. ' You 
 have good books and rare books,' our customers will say, 
 * but your prices are high.' And yet there is not a collector 
 in the country who would not be glad to have books in his 
 line at prices catalogued by us three or four years ago, could 
 we supply them at the same prices now. So it may be safely 
 affirmed that in rare books the tendency of prices is upward, 
 the number of collectors increasing, and the difficulty in 
 finding good books also increasing. We have always found 
 it more difficult to obtain a really rare book in good condi- 
 tion than to sell it. To the genuine lover of books it may be 
 said : First find the book you want, then buy it, and if you 
 think you have been extravagant, repent at your leisure, and 
 by the time you have truly repented the book will have 
 increased sufficiently in value to give you full absolution," 
 
 The time will come, indeed, when men will cease their 
 efforts to measure the value of knowledge by money. 
 
 Thus in these various forms and attitudes the magnitude 
 and importance of my work were constantly urging me on. 
 This western coast, it seemed to me as I came to know and 
 love it, is the best part of the United States, a nation occupy- 
 ing the best part of the two Americas, and rapidly becoming 
 one of the most intellectual and powerful in the world. Its 
 early history and all the data connected with it which can be 
 gathered are of corresponding importance. 
 
 Nor is this view so extravagant as to some it may appear. 
 Already New England is physically on the decline, while 
 there is surely as much mental vigor west as east. Along the 
 Atlantic seaboard are thousands of farms which will not 
 sell for what the improvements cost, while the extremes of 
 climate are killing and driving away. Work has only as yet 
 begun on the Pacific seaboard, where are millions of unoc- 
 cupied acres, ten of which with proper cultivation will sup-
 
 124 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 port a family in comfort. The com^monwealths of the New 
 World are becoming more and more united under the benefi- 
 cent influences of peace and progress ; and the Monroe doc- 
 trine, at first negative rather than positive in its assertions, is 
 pointing the way toward world-wide domination by American 
 brotherhood. The greatest of republics has entered upon its 
 second century of national existence under circumstances 
 more favorable than have ever before been vouchsafed to 
 man. The integrity of the Union has been tried and preserved ; 
 the stain of slavery has been eradicated ; and while there is 
 yet enough of corruption and licentiousness, political and 
 social, there is more than enough of good to counterbalance 
 the evil. In moral health 'and intellectual freedom we are 
 second to none, and so rapidly is our wealth increasing that 
 England will soon be left behind in the race for riches. Give 
 to the United States one half of the five centuries in which 
 Rome was established as the mistress of the world, and the 
 American republic cannot be otherwise if she would than the 
 most powerful nation on earth. And when that time comes, 
 California and the commonwealths on this Pacific seaboard 
 will be a seat of culture and power to which all roads shall 
 lead. 
 
 Therefore I give myself no concern as to the importance 
 or ultimate appreciation of my work, however humble or im- 
 perfect may be the instrument of its accomplishment. And 
 of the two sections, the historical narrative proper and the 
 biographical section, in the latter I should say have been pre- 
 served even more of the invaluable experiences of the build- 
 ers of these commonwealths than in the former. The biogra- 
 phies and characterizations of the eminent personages who, 
 during the first fifty years of the existence of the Pacific com- 
 monwealths, laid the foundations of empire, built upon them 
 with such marvellous rapidity, skill and intelligence, and sur- 
 rounded them with the framework of the material conditions 
 out of which was evolved their magnificent destiny, contain 
 vast magazines of valuable knowledge almost entirely new 
 and nowhere else existing.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 DESPERATE ATTEMPTS AT GREAT THINGS. 
 
 Some have been scene to bite their pen, scratch their head, bend their 
 brovves, bite their lips, beat the boord, teare their paper, when they were 
 faire for somewhat, and caught nothing therein. — Cavidcn. 
 
 HEAPS and heaps of diamonds and — sawdust ! Good gold 
 and genuine silver, pearls and oyster-shells, copper and 
 iron mixed with refuse and debris — such was the nature and 
 condition of my collection in 1869, before any considerable 
 labor had been bestowed upon it. Surrounded by these accu- f 
 mulations, I sat in an embarrassment of wealth. Chaff and ( 
 wheat; wheat, straw, and dirt; where was the brain or the ' 
 score of brains to do this winnowing ? .j 
 
 What winnowing ? I never promised myself or any one ^1 
 to do more than to gather ; never promised even that, and i 
 probably, had I known in the beginning what was before me, 
 I never should have undertaken it. Was it not enough to 
 mine for the precious metal without having to attempt the 
 more delicate and difficult task of melting down the mass j 
 and refining it, when I knew nothing of the process ? But \ 
 I could at least arrange my accumulations in some kind of | 
 order, and even dignify them by the name of library. ' 
 
 During my last visit abroad Mr. Knight had been clipping 
 in a desultory manner from Pacific coast journals, and classi- 
 fying the results under numerous headings in scrap-books and 
 boxes; and I had also at that time an arrangement with the 
 literary editor of the New York Evcnmg Post, whereby he 
 clipped from European and American journals, and for- 
 warded to San Francisco, monthly, such articles of value 
 touching the Pacific slope as fell under his eye. By this
 
 126 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 means much pertinent matter was saved which I should 
 never otherwise have seen. These cHppings were all arranged, 
 as nearly as possible, under such divisions as suggested them- 
 selves. 
 
 While we were thus engaged, which was for little less than 
 a year, there came to our establishment a young man, a 
 native of New England, Henrj L. Oak by name, recom- 
 mended by Mr. S. F. Barst'ow for the position of office-editor 
 of a journal called The Occident, which our firm was then 
 publishing for a religious association. 
 
 Knight was then manager of the publishing department, 
 and to him Mr. Oak was introduced. I had not yet returned 
 from the east, where I remained some time on my way back 
 from Europe, After talking the matter over with the persons 
 interested, Mr. Oak was finally installed in the position. His 
 predecessor remained a few weeks, to instruct him in his 
 duties, and thereafter he filled the position to the satisfaction 
 of all concerned. These duties consisted at first of writing 
 the news items and minor editorial notes, making selections 
 from printed matter, reading proof, folding and mailing 
 papers, keeping accounts, corresponding with contributors 
 and subscribers, and collecting bills. Gradually the whole 
 burden of editing the journal fell on him. The persons inter- 
 ested failing to carry out their agreement, the firm declined 
 further publication of the journal, and the young editor was 
 thrown out of employment. Thus the matter stood on my 
 return from the east, and then my attention was first directed 
 to Mr. Oak. 
 
 Meanwhile I had engaged as assistant, and finally suc- 
 cessor, to Mr. Knight, an Englishman of erratic disposition, 
 who called himself Bosquctti. He was remarkably quick 
 and clear-headed in some directions, and a good talker on 
 almost any subject. Large additions had lately been made 
 to the library; there were some wagon loads of old musty 
 books, apparently unfit for anything, wliich had been thrust 
 promiscuously as received into large bins in a corner of the
 
 DESPERATE ATTEMPTS AT GREAT THINGS. 1 27 
 
 second floor wareroom of the Merchant-street building, before 
 mentioned. 
 
 Bosquetti was directed to arrange and catalogue these 
 volumes. He had some knowledge of books and even of 
 cataloguing, but his mind was not remarkable for breadth or 
 depth; the capabihty to produce finished results was want- 
 ing. He had been thus occupied about a month when I 
 engaged Mr. Oak to assist him. Oak knew little of books 
 except such as he had studied at college, and professed to 
 know nothing of cataloguing; but he possessed to an emineiit 
 degree that rarest of qualities, common sense. Within a few 
 weeks he had familiarized himself with the best systems, im- 
 proving on them all in many respects, or at least he had 
 taken from them such parts as best suited his purpose and 
 had applied them to it. Thick medium writing paper was 
 cut to a uniform size, three and a half by five inches, and the 
 full titles were written thereon; these were then abridged on 
 smaller cards, two and a half by four inches, and finally 
 copied alphabetically in a blank book made for that purpose. 
 The United States Government documents were examined, 
 a list of volumes needed to fill sets was made out, and the 
 contents of those at hand determined. A copy was likewise 
 made of the catalogue of the San Diego archives, kindly 
 furnished by Judge Hayes, which subsequently fell to me as 
 part of the collection purchased from him. Shortly afterward 
 Bosquetti decamped, leaving Oak alone in his work, which 
 he pursued untiringly for over a year. Indeed, he may be 
 said to have done the whole of the cataloguing himself, for 
 what his coadjutor had "written was of little practical benefit. 
 
 The flight of Bosquetti was in this v\dse : First I sent him 
 to Sacramento to make a list of such books on California as 
 were in the state library. This he accomplished to my satis- 
 faction. On his return, having heard of some valuable mate- 
 rial at Santa Clara college, I sent him down to copy it. A 
 month passed, during which time he wrote me regularly, re- 
 porting his doings, what the material consisted of, what the 
 priests said to him, and how he was progressing in his labors.
 
 125 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 He drew his pay religiously, the money both for salary and ex- 
 penses being promptly sent him. It did not occur to me that 
 there was anything wrong. He had been with me now for 
 several months and I had never had cause to distrust him, 
 until one day the proprietor of the hotel at which he lodged 
 wrote me, saying that he understood the gentleman to be in 
 my service, and he thought it but right to inform me that 
 since he came to his house he had been most of the time in 
 a state of beastly intoxication and had not done a particle 
 o£work. When his bottle became low he would sober up 
 enough to make a visit to the college, write me a letter, 
 receive his pay, and buy more liquor. 
 
 In some way Bosquetti learned that I had been informed 
 of his conduct, and not choosing to wait for my benediction, 
 he wrote me a penitent letter and turned his face southward, 
 seemingly desirous above all to widen the distance between 
 us. I was satisfied to be rid of him at the cost of a few hun- 
 dred dollars. 
 
 Oak was thus left in sole charge of the literary accumula- 
 tions, of which he was duly installed librarian. When the 
 card copying was nearly completed the books were alphabeti- 
 cally arranged, tied up in packages, and placed in one hun- 
 dred and twenty-one large cases, in which shape, in May, 
 1870, they were transferred to the fifth floor of the new and 
 still unfinished building on Market street. After superintend- 
 ing their removal the librarian daily climbed a series of ladders 
 to one of the side rooms of the new library, where a floor had 
 been laid and a table placed. There he continued copying 
 into a book the contents of the small cards previously pre- 
 pared, and thus made the first manuscript catalogue of the 
 library, which was in daily use for a period of twelve years. 
 He was assisted during part of the time by a cousin of mine, 
 son of my most esteemed friend and uncle, W. W. Bancroft, 
 of Granville. Shelving was then constructed; the cases were 
 opened, and the books placed alphabetically upon the shelves. 
 During this time I made some passes at literature, writing for 
 the most part at my residence. Shortly after we had fairly
 
 DESPERATE ATTEMPTS AT GREAT THINGS. 1 29 
 
 moved into the Market-street building, my brother returned 
 with his family from their European tour. The business out- 
 look was not flattering, but nevertheless we pressed forward, 
 well knowing that to falter was to be lost. 
 
 During the autumn of 1870 Mr. Oak continued his labors 
 on the fifth floor, cataloguing new lots of books as they came 
 in, arranging maps, briefs, and newspapers, copying and clip- 
 ping bibliographical notes from catalogues, and taking care 
 of the books. It was still my intention in due time to issue 
 a bibliography of the Pacific coast, which should include all 
 of my own collection and as many more titles as I could find. 
 Before the end of the year there was quite a pile of my 
 own manuscript on my table and in the drawers, mono- 
 graphs, mostly, on subjects and incidents connected with the 
 Pacific coast. All my thoughts were on history, and kindred 
 topics. Pacific States history, and the many quaint and curious 
 things and remarkable and thrilling events connected with it, 
 I was passionately fond of writing ; I would take up a subject 
 here or an episode there and write it up for the pure pleas- 
 ure it gave me, and every day I found myself able to place 
 my thoughts on paper with greater ease and facility. But 
 even yet I had no well-defined intentions of writing a book 
 for publication. The responsibility was greater than I cared 
 to assume. I had seen in my business so many futile attempts 
 in that direction, so many failures, that I had no desire to add 
 mine to the number. While I was wavering upon this border 
 land of doubt and hesitancy, Mr. Oak concluded to visit his 
 old home and pass the winter with his friends at the east. 
 
 I continued Avriting, though in a somewhat desultory man- 
 ner ; the idea of anything more systematic at this time was 
 somewhat repugnant to me. As yet my feebly kindled enthu- 
 siasm refused to bum brightly. I longed to do something, I 
 did not know what ; I longed to do great things, I did not 
 know how ! I longed to say something, I had nothing to 
 say. And yet I would write as if my life depended on it, 
 and if ever what seemed to me a bright thought or happy 
 9
 
 130 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 expression fell from my pen my breast would swell as if I 
 saw it written in the heavens, though the next moment I 
 consigned it to a dungeon, there to remain perhaps forever. 
 Much of what I last published was thus first written. The 
 difficulty, so far as more systematic effort was concerned, was 
 to flee the incubus of care and of pecuniary responsibility 
 that leech-like had fastened themselves upon me these twenty 
 years, and now threatened destruction to any plans I might 
 make. For weeks at a time I would studiously avoid the 
 library, like a jilted lover hating the habitation of his mis- 
 tress ; and the more I kept away the more the place became 
 distasteful to me. Then I would arouse myself, resolve and 
 re-resolve, dissipate depressing doubts, shut my eyes to former 
 slights, and turn to the dwelling of my love. 
 
 Long before I had a thought of writing anything myself 
 for pubUcation, the plan of an encyclopaedia of the Pacific 
 States had been proposed to me by several gentlemen of 
 California, who had felt the need of such a work. The idea 
 presented itself thus : My collection, they said, was composed 
 of every species of matter relating to the coast — physical 
 geography, geology, botany, ethnology, history, biography, 
 and so on through the whole range of knowledge. Was it 
 not desirable to give to the world the fruits of such a field in 
 the most compact shape, and was not an encyclopaedia the 
 natural, and indeed the only feasible, form? 
 
 I did not at all fancy the task which they would thus lay 
 upon me. It was not to my taste merely to manipulate 
 knowledge. To write and publish a treatise on every subject 
 embraced within the categories of general information would 
 be a task almost as impracticable as to reproduce and offer 
 to the world the books of the library in print. Yet it was 
 true that an encyclopaedia of knowledge relating wholly to 
 the territory covered by the collection, which should supple- 
 ment eastern and European encyclopaedias, would certainly 
 be desirable. The volumes should be rather small, and the 
 articles which treated purely of Pacific coast matters longer 
 than those contained in other encyclopaedias. Some subjects
 
 DESPERATE ATTEMPTS AT GREAT THINGS. 131 
 
 might occupy a whole volume — as, for example, bibhogra- 
 phy, mines and mining, physical geography, ethnology — and 
 might be published separately, if necessary, as well as in the 
 series. The matter was discussed, with rising or falling en- 
 thusiasm, for some time. 
 
 Mr. Oak returned in May, 187 1, and resumed his duties 
 as librarian. He spent ten days in attending to the prepara- 
 tion of two guide-books for tourists, the publication of which 
 I had undertaken, and in discussing the scheme of an ency- 
 clopaedia, which I finally consented to edit. I then began 
 to look about for contributors. It was desirable at once to 
 draw out as much as possible of the talent latent on this coast, 
 and to secure the best writers for the work. Circulars were 
 accordingly issued, not only to men eminent in literature and 
 the professions, but to pioneers, and to all likely to possess 
 information, stating the purpose and requesting cooperation. 
 To several of the judges, lawyers, physicians, clergymen, and 
 others in San Francisco of known literary tastes and talents, 
 I made personal appeals, and received flattering assurances. 
 
 I appointed an agent in New York, Mr. Henry P. John- 
 ston, then of the editorial staff of the Sun, to call on Califor- 
 nians and others able and willing to write, and engage their 
 contributions. Many in the east and at the west placed their 
 services freely at my disposal. 
 
 A number of other projected works at various times com- 
 manded my attention, and to execute them would have given 
 me great pleasure, but I was obliged to forego the attempt, 
 a thousand years of life not having been allotted me. Among 
 them were A History of Gold; Physical Features of the 
 Pacific States; a volume on Interoceanic Communication; 
 one on Pacific Railways; a series of volumes of condensed 
 Voyages and Travels; a Geography in small 8vo; also a 
 similar volume on Ethnology, and one on History, all of a 
 popular nature embodying certain ideas which I have never 
 seen worked out. On this last mentioned project, and indeed 
 on some of the others, considerable work was done. I likewise 
 intended to print fifty or one hundred of the most valuable
 
 132 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 of my manuscripts as material for Pacific States history. 
 Who has ever Hved and labored under the pressure of the 
 cacoethes scribendi, without promising himself to write a dozen 
 books for every one actually written ! 
 
 For the first time in my life, health now began to fail. 
 The increasing demands of the vast mercantile and manufac- 
 turing structure which I had reared drew heavily upon my 
 nervous system. I grew irritable, was at times despondent, 
 and occasionally desperately indifferent. I determined on 
 a change of scene. Accordingly the loth of May I started 
 for a visit to the east, stopping at Salt Lake City for the 
 purpose of enlisting the Mormons in my behalf. President 
 Young and the leading elders entered heartily into my pro- 
 ject, and a scheme was devised for obtaining information from 
 every part of Utah. A schedule of the material required 
 was to be forwarded through the channels of the govern- 
 ment, with such instructions from the chief authorities as 
 would command the immediate and careful attention of their 
 subordinates throughout the territory. With the intention of 
 calling on my return for the purpose of carrying out the plan 
 I continued my journey. Then I fell into despondency. 
 The state of my nerves, and the uncertainty of my financial 
 future, had so dissipated ambition that much of the time I 
 found myself in a mood fitter for making my exit from the 
 world than for beginning a new life in it. 
 
 At this time the chances that any important results would 
 ever emanate from the library through my efforts were very 
 slight. Gradually I abandoned tlie idea of having anything 
 to do with an encyclopaedia. My energies were sapped. My 
 grip on destiny seemed relaxing. I had steered the ship of 
 business until I was exhausted, and the storm continuing, I left 
 it to others, little caring, for my own part, whether it weathered 
 the gale or not. The agony had been too long drawn out ; if 
 I was to be hanged, let me be hanged and have done with it. 
 Such was my humor during the summer of 187 1, as I lounged 
 about among my friends at the cast, listless and purposeless.
 
 DESPERATE ATTEMPTS AT GREAT THINGS. 1 33 
 
 From this lethargy I was awakened by an accidental remark 
 of a friend, who said to me : " The next ten years will be the 
 best of your life ; what are you going to do with them ? " A 
 leading question, truly, and one I had often asked myself of 
 late without finding an answer; yet the way of putting these 
 few simple words brought them home to me in a manner 
 I had never before felt. I was standing by, waiting to see 
 whether I might proceed with my literary undertaking, or 
 whether I should have to go to work for my bread. 
 
 What was I to do ? I did not know ; but I would do some- 
 thing, and that at once. I would mark out a path and follow 
 it, and if in the mean time I should be overwhelmed, let it be 
 so ; I would waste no more time waiting. Once more I rubbed 
 my lamp and asked the genius what to do. In due time the 
 answer came ; the v/ay was made clear, yet not all at once ; 
 still, from that time I was at less loss as to what next I should 
 do, and how I should proceed to do it. From that day to this 
 I have known less wavering, less hesitation. I Avould strike 
 at once for the highest, brightest mark before me. I would 
 make an effort, whatever the result, which should be enno- 
 bling, in which even failure should be infinitely better than 
 listless inaction. Exactly what I would undertake I could 
 not now determine. History- writing I conceived to be among 
 the highest of human occupations, and this should be my 
 choice, were my ability equal to my ambition. There was 
 enough with which to wrestle, under these new conditions, to 
 strengthen nerve and sharpen skill. 
 
 Thus roused I vv^ent back to California. I entered the 
 library. Oak was faithfully at work cutting up dupUcate cop- 
 ies of books and distributing the parts upon the previous 
 plan, thus adding to the numerous scraps hitherto collected 
 and arranged. It was a sorrowful attempt at great things; 
 nevertheless it was an attempt. To this day the fruits of 
 many such plantings in connection with these Literary 
 Industries remain unplucked. Yet, if never permitted by 
 my destiny to accomplish great things, I could at least die 
 attempting them.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 A LITERARY WORKSHOP. 
 
 We were the first that ever burst 
 Into that silent sea. — Coleridt^e. 
 
 IT was the 20th of August, 187 1, that I returned from my 
 eastern trip, being summoned to the support of a greatly 
 imperiled business. My friends had become fearful for the 
 safety of the firm, and had telegraphed me to return. Wicked 
 reports of things undreained of by ourselves had been so long 
 and so persistently circulated by certain of our competitors, 
 who feared and hated us, that the confidence of even those 
 slow to believe ill of us began to be shaken. 
 
 The fact of my changing the name of the firm, the reason 
 for which I had some delicacy about loudly proclaiming, 
 was perverted by our enemies into a fear as to the ultimate 
 success of the business, and a determination on my part in 
 case of failure not to be brought down with it. And this, 
 notwithstanding they knew, or might have known, that I 
 never shirked any part of the responsibility connected with 
 the change of name, and that every dollar I had was pledged 
 for the support of the business. To their great disappoint- 
 ment we did not succumb ; we did not ask for an extension, 
 or for any favors from any one. Nevertheless my friends 
 desired me to return, and I came. 
 
 But I was in a bad humor for business. I never thought 
 it possible so to hate it, and all the belitdings and soul- 
 crushings connected with it. Iwcn the faint glimpse of the 
 Above and Beyond in my fancies had been sufficient to spoil 
 me for future money grubbings. " Only those who know the 
 supremacy of the intellectual life," says George Eliot, " the
 
 A LITERARY WORKSHOP. 135 
 
 life which has a seed of cnnobhng thought and purpose within 
 it, can understand the grief of one who falls from that serene 
 activity into the absorbing soul-wasting struggle with worldly 
 annoyances." Had I been alone, with only myself to suffer, 
 and had not even my literary aspirations been dependent on 
 the success of the shop, I should have turned my back on it 
 forever to let it sink or swim, as it would or might. 
 
 This, however, was not to be. My duty was too plain 
 before me. The business must have my attention ; it must 
 have more money, and this I must provide. Into the breach 
 I threw myself, and stood there as well as I was able, though 
 at such a cost of feeling as no one ever knew, and as few 
 could ever appreciate. Having done this, all that I could 
 do, and in fact all that was necessary to save the business, I 
 mentally consigned tiie whole establishment to oblivion, and 
 directed my attention once more, and this time in desperate 
 earnest, to literary interests. 
 
 At the very threshold of my resolve, however, stared me 
 in the face the old inquiry. What shall I do, and how shall I 
 do it ? One thing was plain, even to a mind as unskilled in 
 the mysteries of book-making as mine. On my shelves were 
 tons of unwinnowed material for histories unAvritten and 
 sciences undeveloped. In the present shape it was of little 
 use to me or to the world. Facts were too scattered ; in- 
 deed, mingled and hidden as they were in huge masses of 
 debris, the more one had of them the worse. A little truth 
 in such a form as one could use, a quantity such as one could 
 grasp, was better than uncontrollable heaps. Much knowl- 
 edge out of order is little learning; confusion follows the 
 accumulation in excess of ungeneralized data. 
 
 To find a way to the gold of this amalgam, to mark out a 
 path through a wilderness of knowledge to the desired facts, 
 was the first thing to be done. He who would write at the 
 greatest advantage on any practical subject must have before 
 him all that has been written by others, all knowledge ex- 
 tant on that subject. To have that knowledge upon his 
 shelves, and yet be unable to place his hand upon it, is no
 
 136 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 better than to be without it. If I v/ished to write fully on 
 the zoology, for example, of the Pacific slope, nine tenths of 
 all the books in my library containing reference to the ani- 
 mals of the coast might as well be at the bottom of the 
 ocean as in my possession unless I was prepared to spend 
 fifteen years on this one subject. And even then it could not 
 be thoroughly done. Fancy an author with thirty or fifty 
 thousand volumes before him, sitting down to read or look 
 through ten thousand of them, for every treatise or article he 
 wrote ! De Quincey gives a close reader from five to eight 
 thousand volumes to master between the ages of twenty 
 and eighty; hence a man beginning at thirty-seven with 
 twenty thousand volumes, soon increased to forty thousand, 
 could scarcely hope in his lifetime even to glance through 
 them all. 
 
 This was the situation. And before authorship could 
 begin a magic wand must be waved over the assembled 
 products of ten thousand minds, which would severalize what 
 each had said on all important topics and reduce the other- 
 wise rebellious mass to form and system. This, after the 
 collection of the material, was the first step in the new 
 chemistry of literary reduction. Here, as elsewhere in the 
 application of science, facts must be first collected, then 
 classified, after which laws and general knowledge may be 
 arrived at. 
 
 How was this to be accomplished ? It is at the initial pe- 
 riod of an undertaking that the chief difficulty arises. I had 
 no guide, no precedent by which to formulate my operations. 
 I might write after the ordinary m.ethod of authors, but in 
 this field comparatively little could come of it. To my knowl- 
 edge, authorship of the quality to which I aspired had never 
 before been attempted by a private individual. A mass of 
 material like mine had never before been collected, collocated, 
 eviscerated, and re-created by one man, unassisted by any 
 society or government. The great trouble was to get at and 
 abstract the information. Toward the accomplishment of 
 this my first efforts were crude, as may well be imagined. I
 
 A LITERARY WORKSHOP. 137 
 
 attempted to read or cursorily examine such volumes as were 
 likely to contain information on the subjects to be written, 
 and to mark the passages to be extracted. A system of fig- ' 
 ures was adopted, one of which, pencilled on the margin of 
 the page, denoted the subject-heading under which the ex- 
 tracted page or paragraph should appear. These passages 
 were then copied. Of course it would have been easier to 
 purchase two copies of every important book, and to have 
 cut them up, as in fact was done in many instances ; but 
 much of the collection could not be dupHcated at any 
 cost, and to destroy a book or even a newspaper of which I 
 could not buy another copy was not for a moment to be 
 thought of. 
 
 But what was one man, one reader, among so many thou- 
 sand authors ! After going over a dozen volumes or so in 
 this manner, and estimating the time required for reading and 
 marking all the books of the library, I found that by constant 
 application, eight hours a day, it would take four hundred 
 years to get through them, and that in a superficial way. 
 Altogether I concluded that other men must also be set to 
 reading, and others again to copying literatim all informa- 
 tion likely to be required in the study of any subject. Thus 
 these literary industries began gradually to assume broader 
 proportions, and so they continued till December of this 
 same year. 
 
 On trial, however, the plan proved a failure. The copied 
 material relating to the same or kindred topics could indeed 
 be brought together, but on beginning to write I found the 
 extracts unsatisfying, and felt the necessity of the book itself. 
 The copyist might have made a mistake; and to appraise the 
 passage at its full value I must see the connection. Any ex- 
 perienced author could have told me this; but there was no 
 experienced author at hand. 
 
 After some twenty-five reams of legal cap paper had thus 
 been covered on one side, to consign the labors of these six 
 or eight men for these several months to the waste heap was 
 but the work of a moment. There was too much involved,
 
 138 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 the enterprise was projected on too large a scale, to admit 
 of a wrong beginning; and prepared as I was to stake past, 
 present, and future on this literary adventure, it appeared 
 folly to continue a path shown to be wrong. La Fontaine's 
 idea was not a bad one : " Le trop d'expediens pent gater 
 une affaire : on perd du temps au choix, on tente ; on veut 
 tout faire. N'en ayons qu'un; mais qu'il soit bon." 
 
 Meanwhile, after frequent and protracted discussions, I 
 determined to have the whole library indexed as one would 
 index a single book. This surely would bring before me all 
 that every author had said on any subject about which I 
 should choose to write. This, too, would give me the authors 
 themselves, and embody most of the advantages of the former 
 scheme without its faults. In pursuance of this plan Oak 
 took up the voyage collections of Hakluyt and Navarrete, 
 while less important works were distributed to such of the 
 former readers and copyists as were deemed competent. For 
 example, one Gordon made an index of California legislative 
 documents. Albert Goldschmidt's first work was to make an 
 index, on a somewhat more general plan than that of Navar- 
 rete, of the Atlantic Monthly, and other magazines and reviews. 
 He afterward catalogued a large quantity of Mexican books. 
 To Cresswell, since in the Nevada senate, Pointdexter, and 
 others, was given similar work. 
 
 Among other parts of the outlined encyclopsedia was a 
 collection of voyages and travels to and throughout the Pa- 
 cific States. As the more comprehensive programme was 
 gradually set aside, my attention became more and more 
 concentrated on these several parts. True, history was ever 
 the prominent idea in my mind, but, audacious as was my 
 ambition, I had not the presumption to rush headlong into 
 it during the incipient stages of my work. At the beginning 
 of my literary pilgrimage, I did httle but flounder in a slough 
 of despond. Until my feet touched more solid ground, I did 
 not dare essay that which appeared to me no less difficult 
 than grand.
 
 A LITERARY WORKSHOP. 1 39 
 
 A collection of voyages and travels such as I projected 
 offered many attractions as an initial step in my literary under- 
 takings. Incident and instruction were therein so combined 
 as under skillful handling to awaken and retain the liveliest 
 interest. Here was less risk of failure than in more ambitious 
 attempts ; I alone possessed the material, and surely I could 
 serve it in a style not wholly devoid of attractions. If this 
 were not within the scope of my accomplishment nothing 
 Avas. So, during the first half of 1872, in conjunction with 
 the indexing, under a devised system of condensation, several 
 persons were employed in extracting Pacific coast voyages 
 and travels. Walter M. Fisher wrote out the travels of 
 Bryant, Bayard Taylor, Humboldt, and others. This work 
 altogether lasted about a year, and resulted in — nothing. 
 
 Long before this I had discovered the plan of the index 
 then in progress to be impracticable. It was too exact ; it 
 was on too minute a scale. Besides absorbing an enormous 
 amount of time and money in its making, when completed it 
 would be so voluminous and extended as to be cumbersome, 
 and too unwieldy for the purjDOse designed. 
 
 Others realized this more fully than myself, and from them 
 came many suggestions in perfecting the present and more 
 practical system. This is a modification and simplification 
 of the former, a reduction to practice of what before was 
 only theory. Three months were occupied in planning and 
 testing this new system. When we became satisfied with the 
 results, we began indexing and teaching the art to the men. 
 As the work progressed and the plan inspired confidence, 
 more indexers were employed. Hundreds were instructed, 
 and the efficient ones retained. Mr. William Nemos came 
 in, and as he quickly mastered the system and displayed 
 marked abiUty in various directions, the indexing and the 
 indexers were placed under his supervision. 
 
 The system as perfected and ever since in successful and 
 daily operation, I will now describe : 
 
 Forty or fifty leading subjects were selected, such as 
 Agriculture, Antiquities, Botany, Biography, Commerce,
 
 140 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 I Drama, Education, Fisheries, Geology, History, Indians, 
 Mining, etc., which would embrace all real knowledge, and 
 cover the contents of the whole collection, except such parts 
 as were irrelevant. For example, a writer's ideas of religion 
 were considered of no value, as was anything he saw or did 
 outside of our Pacific States territory ; or his personal affairs, 
 unless of so striking a character as to command general 
 interest. These forty or fifty subjects formed the basis of 
 the index, while excluding tons of trash, with which every 
 
 ' author seems bound in a greater or less degree to dilute his 
 
 ■ writings. 
 
 Now as to the collection of minor subjects or sub-topics 
 under the general headings, so as to permit a ready use of 
 the material with the least possible friction. The device is at 
 once ingenious, simple, and effectual. The lists of subjects 
 were so chosen that each might be made to embrace a variety 
 of subdivisions. Thus under the head Agriculture are in- 
 cluded stock raising, soils, fruits, and all other products of 
 farm cultivation. Under Antiquities are included ruins, relics, 
 hieroglyphics, and all implements and other works of native 
 Americans before the coming of the Europea,ns; also ancient 
 history, traditions, migrations, manners and customs before 
 the conquest, and speculations, native and European, con- 
 cerning the origin of the Americans. The same system was 
 observed with Architecture, Art, Bibliography, Biography, 
 Ethnology, Jurisprudence, Languages, Manufactures, Medi- 
 cine, Meteorology, Mythology, and all the other chief 
 subject-headings, including states and localities. A list of 
 abbreviations was then made, and the plan was ready for 
 application. 
 
 The operation of indexing was as follows : A list of sub- 
 jects, with their subdivisions and abbreviations, was placed 
 before an assistant, who proceeded to read the book, also 
 given him, indexing its contents upon cards of heavy writing 
 paper three by five inches in size. When he came to a fact 
 bearing on any of the subjects in the list he wrote it on a 
 card, each assistant following the same form, so as to produce
 
 A LITERARY WORKSHOP. 141 
 
 uniform results. For example, the top line of all the cards 
 was written on tliis pattern : 
 
 Agric. Cal., Silk Culture, 1867. 
 
 Antiq. Chiapas, Palenque. 
 
 Biog. Cortes (H.) 
 
 Hist. Mexico. 15 19. 
 
 Ind. Nev. Shoshones (Dwellings). 
 
 Ogn. Portland. 1870. 
 
 The second line of each card gave the title of the book, 
 with the volume and page where the information was to be 
 found ; and, finally, a few words were given denoting the 
 character of the information. Herewith I give a specimen 
 card complete : 
 
 Ind. Tehuan. Zapotecs. 1847. 
 
 Macgregor, J. Progress of America. London, 1847. 
 Vol. I., pp. 848-9. 
 
 Location, Character, Dress, Manufactures. 
 
 Here we have a concise index to a particular fact or piece 
 of information. It happens to relate to the aborigines, and 
 so falls under the general heading Indians. It has reference 
 especially to the natives of Tehuantepec. It is supposed to 
 describe them as they were in the year 1847. It concerns 
 the Zapotec tribe particularly. It has to do with their loca- 
 tion, character, dress, and manufactures, and it is to be found 
 on pages 848 and 849 of the first volume of a book entitled 
 Progress of America, written by J. Macgregor, and published 
 in London in 1847. Of course, when the cards are put 
 away in their case all the cards on Indians are brought to- 
 gether. Of the Indian cards all those relating to Tehuante- 
 pec are brought together. Of the Tehuantepec natives all 
 in the library that relate to the Zapotec tribe will be found 
 together ; and so on.
 
 142 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Thus the writer is directed at once to all the sources of 
 information concerning his subject, and the orderly treating 
 of innumerable topics, otherwise impossible, becomes easily 
 practicable. If, for example, a person wishes to study or 
 write upon the manners and customs of all the aborigines in- 
 habiting the territory covered by the library, he takes all the 
 cards of the index bearing the general heading Indians, and 
 is by them directed immediately to all the sources of infor- 
 mation, which else would take him ten years at least to col- 
 lect. If information is desired of Tehuantepec, take the 
 Tehuantepec cards ; or if of the Zapotec tribe only, the Zapo- 
 tec cards. So it is with any subject relating to mining, his- 
 tory, society, or other category within the range of knowledge. 
 
 Thus book by book of the authorities collected was 
 passed through the hands of skilled assistants, and with 
 checks and counter-checks an immense and comprehensive 
 system of indexing was applied to each volume. Physical, 
 moral, geographical, historical, from the fibre of an Eskimo's 
 hair to the coup de maitre of Cortes, nothing was too insig- 
 nificant or too great to find its place there. With the index 
 cards before him, the student or writer may turn at once to 
 the volume and page desired ; indeed, so simple and yet so 
 effectual are the workings of the system that a man may seat 
 himself at a bare table and say to a boy, Bring me all that is 
 known about the conquest of Darien, the mines of Nevada, 
 the missions of Lower California, the agriculture of Oregon, 
 the lumber interests of Washington, the; state of Sonora, the 
 town of Queretaro, or any other information extant, or any 
 description regarding any described portion of the western 
 half of North America, and straightway, as at the call of a 
 magician, such knowledge is spread before him, with the 
 volumes opened at the page. Aladdin's lamp could pro- 
 duce no such results. That commanded material wealth, but 
 here is a sorcery that conjures up the wealth of mind and 
 places it at the disposition of the seer. 
 
 Hundreds of years of profitless, uninteresting labor may be 
 saved by this simple device ; and a prominent feature of it
 
 A LITERARY WORKSHOP. 143 
 
 is that the index is equally valuable in connection with any- 
 other library where copies of my material may exist. The 
 cost of this index was about thirty-five thousand dollars, but 
 its value is not to be measured by money. 
 
 After the explanation given, one would think it easy to 
 find men who could make this index. But it was not so. 
 Never was there man or woman who looked at it but in- 
 stantly knew or thought they knew all about it ; yet nineteen 
 out of twenty who attempted it failed. The difficulty was 
 this : to be of value, the work must all be done on a uniform 
 plan. If one competent person could have done the whole, 
 the index would be all the better. But one person could not 
 do all ; from five to twenty men were constantly employed 
 upon it for years. Many of the books were indexed two or 
 three times, owing to the incompetency of those who first 
 undertook the task. 
 
 It was extremely difticult to make the indexers comprehend 
 what to note and what not. Rules for general guidance 
 could be laid down, yet in every instance something must be 
 left to the discretion of the individual. All must work to a 
 given plan, yet all must use judgment. In attempting this, 
 one would adhere so rigidly to rule as to put down a subject- 
 heading whenever a mere word was encountered, even though 
 unaccompanied by any information. If, for example, the 
 sentence occurred, " The machinery of government had not 
 yet been set in motion along the Sierra foothills," such an in- 
 dexer would make a card under Machinery, to the infinite 
 disgust of the investigator of rhechanical affairs. At the 
 same time, most important facts might be omitted, simply 
 because they were not expressed in words which broadly 
 pointed to a subject on the list. Then, too, there was much 
 difference between men in aptness, some finding it neces- 
 sary to plod through every line before grasping the pith 
 of the matter, while others acquired such expertness that 
 they could tell by merely glancing down a page whether 
 it contained any useful information. But by constant ac- 
 cessions and eliminations a sufficient number of compe-
 
 144 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 tent persons was found to cany the work forward to 
 completion. 
 
 When a volume was finished the indexer would hand it 
 with his cards to Mr. Oak or Mr. Nemos, who glanced over 
 the work, testing it here and there to see that it was properly 
 done, and then gave out another book. Finally the cards 
 were all classified under their distinguishing title, and placed 
 in alphabetical order in upright cupboard-hke cases made for 
 the purpose. The cases are each about five feet in height, 
 four feet in width, and less than six inches in thickness, with 
 board partitions, and tin shelves slanting inward to hold the 
 cards in place. The partitions are the length of the card 
 apart, and the depth of the case is equal to the width of the 
 card. In other words, the receptacles were made to fit the 
 cards. 
 
 In special work of great magnitude, such as exhaustive 
 history, it is necessary to invest the system of indexing with 
 greater detail, more as it was first established, making innu- 
 merable special references, so that when done and arranged 
 according to subject and date, all that has been said by every 
 author on every point is brought together in the form of 
 notes. I shall have occasion to refer to this subject again. 
 
 Such was the machinery which we found necessary to con- 
 trive in order to extract the desired material from the cumber- 
 some mass before us. And by this or other similar means 
 alone can the contents of any large library be utilized ; and 
 the larger the collection the more necessity for such an index. 
 A universal index, applicable to any library, or to the books 
 of the world collectively, might be made with incalculable 
 advantage to civilization ; but the task would be herculean, 
 involving the reading of all the books and manuscripts in 
 existence. Such an instrument in the hands of a student may 
 be likened to the dart given by Abaris, the Hyperborean 
 priest, to Pythagoras, which carried the possessor over rivers 
 and mountains whithersoever he listed. This will probably 
 never be done, although theoretically the plan is not so pre- 
 posterous as might at first glance appear. No individual
 
 A LITERARY WORKSHOP. 145 
 
 possessed of reason would undertake it as a private scheme ; 
 necessarily it must be a national, or rather an international, 
 work; and the number of persons of different climes and 
 tongues to be employed would probably prove fatal to it. 
 Yet I believe the time will come when all the chief libraries of 
 the world will have their indexes. Surely in no other way 
 can scholars command the knowledge contained in books; 
 and as books multiply, the necessity increases.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 
 
 Two strong angels stand by the side of History as heraldic support- 
 ers : the angel of research on the left hand, that must read millions of 
 dusty parchments, and of pages blotted with lies ; the angel of medita- 
 tation on the right hand, that must cleanse these lying records with fire, 
 even as of old the draperies of asbestos were cleansed, and must quicken 
 them into regenerated life. — De Quhicey. 
 
 HOW many of the works of authors may be attributed 
 purely to accident ! Had not Shakespeare been a play- 
 actor we might have had no Shakespeare's plays. Had not 
 Bunyan been imprisoned and Milton blind we might look in 
 vain for the Pilgrim'' s Progress and Paradise Lost. Robert 
 Pearse Gillies says of Sir Walter Scott, " I have always been 
 persuaded that had he not chanced, and in those days it was 
 a rare chance, to get some German lessons from a competent 
 professor, and had he not also chanced to have Leitora and 
 The Wild HiintsmaJi played before him as exercises, we 
 should never have had The Lay of the Last Minstrel or The 
 Lady of the Lake." More than any other one effort, Thack- 
 eray's writing for Punch taught him wherein his strength lay. 
 The great satirist at the beginning of his literary career was 
 not successful, and it is a question whether he ever would 
 have been but for a certain train of circumstances which 
 crowded application upon his genius. Apelles, unable to 
 delineate to his satisfaction the foam of Alexander's horse, 
 dashed his brush against the canvas in angry despair, when 
 lo! upon the picture, effected thus by accident, appeared 
 what had baffled his most cunning skill. Turning-points in 
 life are not always mere accident. Often they arc the result 
 
 146
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 147 
 
 of teachings or inborn aspirations, and always they are fraught 
 with some moral lesson of special significance. 
 
 Although my Nalive Races cannot be called a chance crea- 
 tion, its publication as my first work was purely accident. 
 Following my general plan, which was a series of works on 
 the western half of North America, I must of necessity treat 
 of the aborigines at some time. But now, as ever, I was in- 
 tent only on history, whose fascinations increased with my 
 ever-increasing appreciation of its importance. All our learn- 
 ing we derive from the past. To-day is the pupil of yester- 
 day, this year of last year; drop by drop the activities of 
 each successive hour are distilled from the experiences of the 
 centuries. 
 
 And the moment was so opportune. Time enough had 
 elapsed for these western shores to have a history, yet not 
 enough, since civilization lighted here, for any considerable 
 part of that history to be lost. Then, strange as it may seem, 
 from the depths of despair I would sometimes rise to the firm 
 conviction that with my facilities and determined purpose I 
 could not only do this work, but that I could save to these 
 Pacific States more of their early incidents than had been pre- 
 served to other nations; that I could place on record annals 
 exceptionally complete and truthful ; that I could write a his- 
 tory which as a piece of thorough work, if unaccompanied 
 by any other good quality, would command a place among 
 the histories of the world. 
 
 Nor was the idea necessarily the offspring of egotism. I 
 do not say that I regarded this country as the greatest whose 
 history had ever been written, or myself as an able historian. 
 Far, very far from it. There were here no grand evolutions 
 or revolutions of mankind, no mighty battles affecting the 
 world's political balance, no ten centuries of darkness and 
 stationary torpidity, no pageantry of kings, or diplomacy of 
 statesmen, or craft of priestly magnates Avith which to embel- 
 lish my pages and stir to glowing admiration the interest of 
 my readers. The incidents of history here were in a meas- 
 ure tame, and for that reason all the more difficult of dra-
 
 I40 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 matic presentation. The wars of conquest were mostly with 
 savages, or with nations palsied by superstition; and since 
 the conquest no such spasms of progress have been made 
 as to command the world's attention or admiration for any 
 length of time. Not that fighting is the fittest subject for 
 record, or that without social convulsions the nation has no 
 history. The time has come when war should be deemed 
 the deepest disgrace, a brutal method of settling differences, 
 and the evolution of arts, industries, and intellect the fairest 
 flowers of progress. That which is constant is history, that 
 which is elevating and ennobling, no less than debasing war 
 and social disruptions. The philosophic or didactic writer 
 of the present day is of opinion that to form correct concep- 
 tions of a people one should know something of the state of 
 the society and institutions that evolved them. The devel- 
 opment of a nation's institutions, their structure and func- 
 tions, are of no less importance than a narrative of a nation's 
 fortunes in other respects, or the sayings and doings of its 
 great men. Yet, if ever fancy whispered I could write well, 
 I had but to read a page of Shakespeare, whose pencil was 
 dipped in colors of no earthly extraction, and Avhose every 
 finished sentence is a string of pearls, and the fountains of 
 my ambition would dwindle to insignificance. What were 
 my miserable efforts beside the conceptions of a Dante, the 
 touch of a Dor6, the brilliant imagery of a St. John ! How 
 powerful are words to him who can handle them, and yet 
 how insignificant in tlie hands of weaklings to describe these 
 subtile shades of human qualities! What are the many thou- 
 sand different words, made by the various combinations of 
 the twenty-six letters of the alphabet, and of which many 
 more might be made, since the i:)Ossible combination of these 
 words into others and into sentences is practically infinite — 
 what are all these word-fitting possibilities in the hands of a 
 bungler, or of one who lacks the ideas to call them forth 
 and array them ? And yet, were the scope of human lan- 
 guage a thousand times more varied, and should there arise 
 one capable of wielding this enlarged vocabulary, the varied
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. I49 
 
 thought and feehng incident to humanity would still be but 
 inadequately expressed. 
 
 Not only the thoughts of a great poet but the language in 
 which his thoughts are clothed displays his genius. Under- 
 take to express his ideas in words of your own, and you will 
 find its essence evaporated. Coleridge says you " might as 
 well think of pushing a brick out of the wall with your fore- 
 finger as attempt to remove a word out of any of the finished 
 passages of Shakespeare." Become possessed with an idea, 
 and you will then find language according to your ability to 
 express it; it is poverty of ideas that makes men complain 
 of the poverty of language. In the writings of Shakespeare 
 imagination and experience, wisdom, wit, and charity, com- 
 mingle and play upon and into each other until simple words 
 glow like fire illuminated by supernatural significance. 
 
 And as thought becomes elevated, the simpler and plainer 
 becomes expression. The seed of eloquence lies in the con- 
 ception of the thought, and the simplicity with which it is ex- 
 pressed gives the sublime soul-stirring power. It is significant 
 that the books which have held their highest place in literature 
 for centuries have been written iathe purest and simplest Saxon. 
 The English language as used by Shakespeare and Milton 
 shows amazing strength, flexibility, delicacy, and harmony. 
 
 Thus the billows of despondency passed over me, and at 
 times it seemed as if my life and all my labors were empty 
 air. Overwhelmed by the magnitude of my task, I sat for 
 hours and brooded, heart-sick and discouraged. What 
 profiteth me this heavy labor ? My mind is vapid, my nerves 
 unstrung; I have not the strength, physical or intellectual, 
 for a work of such magnitude. I may succeed or I may fail. 
 In either case some will approve, others will ridicule. And 
 what is approval or ridicule to me ? Even if success comes, 
 what good will it do me? I must toil on, denying myself 
 companionship; I must deprive myself of every pleasure, 
 even of the blessed air and sunshine, the sweetest gifts of 
 nature, and which are freely bestowed upon the meanest of
 
 150 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 created things. These and nine tenths of the joys of associ- 
 ation and recreation I must yield to musty books and dusty 
 garret; I must hug this heaviness, and all because of an idea. 
 AH the powers of mind and body must be made captive 
 to this one purpose; passion, prejudice, and pleasure, where 
 they interfere. And yet must the worker often grope in vain 
 for the power of mental concentration, while progress laughs 
 mockingly. For such work, such self-denial, I cannot take 
 my i^ay in praise. There must be some higher, some nobler 
 aim. Ah! these failures, these heart-sicknesses. But write! 
 write! write! The fiend is at my elbow and I must write. 
 Maudlin stuff it may be, but I must write it down. Death 
 alone can deliver me from these toils, can open a current for 
 my stagnant thoughts and leaden sensibilities. Still my 
 prayer shall be, Let me die like Plato, at my table, pen in 
 hand, and be buried among the scenes of my labors. 
 
 There have been men, and many of them, who felt that 
 they must write, and yet who wrote with difficulty, and from 
 no desire for fame, who wrote neither from a pretended anx- 
 iety to make men better, nor under necessity. Why, then, 
 did they write ? Perhaps from the pressure of genius, perhaps 
 from a lack of common sense. No person knows less of the 
 stuft' he is made of than he who takes pen in hand and has 
 nothing to say. 
 
 What profiteth it me ? again I ask. Money ? I shall die 
 a poor man, and my children will have only their father's folly 
 for an inheritance. Does God pay for such endeavor ? I 
 should have more heart did I but feel assured of some com- 
 pensation hereafter, for this life seems almost lost to me. But 
 even such assurance is denied me. Posthumous fame is but 
 a phantom, the off-float from scarcely more solid contempo- 
 raneous opinion, the ghost of a man's deeds. In looking over 
 my writings I sometimes doubt whom I serve most, Christ or 
 Belial, or whether either will acknowledge me his servant. 
 And yet the half is not told, for if it Avere, with the good Cid 
 Hamete I might be applauded less for Avhat I have written 
 than for what I have omitted to write.
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 151 
 
 Before my cooler judgment my self-imposed task presented 
 itself in this form : Next after gathering the material was the 
 power of handling it. From being slave of all this knowledge, 
 I must become master. This was already accomphshed in 
 part by means of the index, as before explained, which placed 
 at my command whatever my authors had said on any subject. 
 To know anything perfectly, one must know many things 
 perfectly. Then surely with all the evidence extant on any 
 historical point or incident before me I should be able with 
 sufficient study and thought to determine the truth, and in 
 plain language to write it down. My object seemed to be the 
 pride and satisfaction it would aftbrd me to improve some- 
 what the records of my race, save something of a nation's 
 history, which but for me would drop into oblivion ; to catch 
 from the mouths of living witnesses, just ready to take their 
 final departure, important facts explaining new incidents and 
 strange experiences ; to originate and perfect a system by 
 which means alone this history could be gathered and written ; 
 to lay the comer-stone of this fair land's literature while the 
 land was yet young and ambitious. Hereupon turns all pro- 
 gress, all human advancement. One of the main differences 
 between civilization and savagery is that one preserves its ex- 
 periences as they accumulate and the other does not. Sav- 
 agery ceases to be savagery and becomes civilization the 
 moment the savage begins a record of events. 
 
 Aline was a great work that could be performed by a small 
 man. As Beaumarchais says : " Mediocre et rampant, et 
 Ton arrive a tout." Vigorous and persistent effort for twenty 
 or thirty years, with sufficient self-abnegation, a liberal out- 
 lay of money, and an evenly balanced mind, not carried 
 away by its enthusiasm, could accomplish more at this time 
 than would be later possible under any circumstances. And 
 although in my efforts, like the eagle, which mistook the bald 
 head of ^schylus for a stone, I sometimes endeavored to crack 
 the shell of my tortoise on the wrong subject; and although 
 much of the time the work was apparently stationary, yet in 
 reality like a glacier it was slowly furrowing for itself a path.
 
 152 
 
 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 " Good aims not always make good books," says Mrs. 
 Browning. So with mind well tempered and ambition held 
 in strict control, I determined to work and wait. Some men 
 live in their endeavors. Unless they have before them intri- 
 cate work they are not satisfied. The moment one difficult 
 undertaking is accomplished they straightway pine for an- 
 other. Great pleasure is felt in finishing a tedious and difficult 
 piece of work, but long before one was done by me I had a 
 dozen other tedious and difficult pieces planned. Early in 
 my efforts the conquest of Mexico attracted my attention. 
 This brilhant episode lay directly in my path or I never 
 should have had the audacity to grapple with it after the 
 graceful and philosophic pen of Prescott had traced its his- 
 tory. This story of the conquest possessed me with a thrilling 
 interest; and before me lay not only the original authorities, 
 with much new and unused collateral information, but com- 
 plete histories of that epoch, in English, Spanish, French, 
 Italian, and German — careful histories from able and elo- 
 quent pens. These might be the guide of the literary fledg- 
 ling. Ah ! there was the trouble. Had there been any need 
 for such a work ; had the work not been done better than I 
 could hope to do it; had I not these bright examples all 
 before me, seemingly in derision of my puny efforts, I should 
 have been better able to abstract the facts and arrange them 
 in readable order. 
 
 My first concern Avas the manner of fitting words together ; 
 the facts seemed for the moment of secondary consideration. 
 To array in brilliant colors empty ideas was nearer model 
 history-writing than the sharpest philosophy in homely garb. 
 The consequence was, this mountain of my ambition after 
 hard labor brought forth a few chapters of sententious noth- 
 ings, which a second writing seemed only to confuse yet 
 more, and which after many sighings and heart-sinkings I 
 tore up, and cleared my table of authorities on the grand 
 conquest. The result brought to my mind the experience of 
 Kant, Avho for the second edition of his Critique of Pure 
 Rcasoji re-wrote some parts of it in order to give them greater
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 1 53 
 
 perspicuity, though in reahty the explanation was more 
 enigmatical than what had been first written. 
 
 Now, I said, will I begin at the beginning, where I should 
 have begun. The Pacific States territory, as by this time I 
 had it marked, extended south to the Atrato river, so as to 
 include the whole of the Isthmus of Darien. I would notice 
 the first appearance of the Spaniards along these shores. I 
 would make my first volume the conquest of Darien, bring- 
 ing the history down from the discovery by Columbus and 
 the first touching of the North American continent at the 
 isthmus by Rodrigo de Bastidas in 1501, to about the year 
 1530, to be followed by a chapter on the expedition of 
 Pizarro from Panama to Peru. 
 
 So I entered upon a thorough study of the discovery of 
 America, of society and civilization in Europe at and prior 
 to the discovery ; paying particular attention to Spanish char- 
 acter and institutions. At this time I was almost wholly 
 occupied in handling the ideas of others ; but it was not long 
 before I began to have ideas of my own ; just as Spinoza in 
 writing a synopsis of^he system of Descartes threw into the 
 principles of Cartesian philosophy much original thought and 
 speculation while scarcely conscious of it. I wrote a long 
 dissertation for what I conceived a fit introduction to a his- 
 tory of the Pacific States. To follow this introduction, with 
 some assistance I prepared a summary of voyages and dis- 
 covery from the earliest times to about 1540. 
 
 Over these two summaries I labored long and faithfully, 
 spending fully six months on them with all the assistance I 
 could utilize. Oftentimes work arose where assistance was 
 impracticable ; I could perform it better alone ; with a dozen 
 good men at my elbow I have nevertheless written many 
 volumes alone, taking out all notes myself, because I could 
 not profitably employ assistants. And further than this, I 
 often carried on no less than four or five distinct works pari 
 passu. 
 
 To my help in writing this introduction I called a man 
 well informed in all mediaeval knowledge. In all science and
 
 154 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 regarding all schools his opinions were modem, yet he could 
 readily explain the theories of those who held opposite doc- 
 trines. Surely, I thought, in preparing such an essay as I 
 desired, such a person would be invaluable. So I instructed 
 him to study the subject, particularly that part of it relating 
 to literature, language, and learning, with the view of his 
 gathering some pertinent facts for me. He read, and read, 
 eagerly devouring all he could lay hands on. And he would 
 have continued reading to this day had I been willing to 
 pay him his salary for it. He liked to read. And I said to 
 myself, surely, as the result of such enthusiasm I shall have a 
 bushel of invaluable notes. 
 
 Meanwhile I labored hard myself, studying carefully over 
 two hundred volumes bearing upon the subject, taking notes 
 and committing my ideas to paper. The trouble was — as 
 was always the trouble — to limit the sketch, yet make it 
 symmetrical and complete. Occasionally I would urge my 
 assistant to biing his investigations to some practical result, 
 for after reading two months he had not half a dozen pages 
 of written matter to show. 
 
 " Let me get it fairly into my head," said he, '•' and I will 
 soon commit it to paper." 
 
 And so for another month he continued reading, until I 
 became tired of it, and told him plainly to give me what he 
 had gathered and leave the subject. A fortnight later he 
 handed me about thirty pages of commonplace information, 
 in which there was hardly a note that proved any addition to 
 my own researches. And this was the result of his three 
 months' hard work, for he really applied himself diligently 
 to the task, and thought all the time that he was making pro- 
 gress until he came to the summing up, which disappointed 
 him as much as myself. While engaged in the study his mind 
 had absorbed a vast amount of information, which might 
 some time prove valuable to him, but was of no use to me. 
 And so it often happened, particularly at the first, and before 
 I had applied a thorough system of drilling; months and 
 years were vainly spent by able men in the effort to extract
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 1 55 
 
 material for me. With regard to the introduction, as was yet 
 often the case, I had vague conceptions only of what I should 
 require, for the reason that I could not tell what shape the 
 subject would assume when wrought out. This was the case 
 with many a chapter or volume. Its character I could not 
 altogether control ; nay, rather than control it I would let 
 fact have free course, and record only as directed by the sub- 
 ject itself. One is scarcely fit to write upon a subject until 
 one has written much upon it. That which is I would re- 
 cord; yet that which is may be differently understood by 
 different persons. I endeavored always to avoid planting 
 myself upon an opinion, and saying thus and so it is, and shall 
 be, all incidental and collateral facts being warped accord- 
 ingly ; rather would I write the truth, let the result be what 
 it might. 
 
 He who aims at honesty will never leave a subject on which 
 he discourses without an eftbrt at a judicial view, or without 
 an attempt to separate himself from his subject and to marshal 
 the arguments on the other side. He will contradict his own 
 statement, and demur to his conclusions, until the matter is 
 so thoroughly sifted in his owm mind that a highly prejudiced 
 view would be improbable. He who warps fact or fails to 
 give evidence against himself is not entided to our respect. 
 The writer of exact history must lay aside, so far as possible, 
 his emotional nature. Knowing that his judgment is liable 
 to prejudice, and that it is impossible to be always conscious 
 of its presence, he will constantly suspect himself and rigidly 
 review his work. If there was one thing David Hume piqued 
 himself on more than another, it was his freedom from bias ; 
 and yet the writings of no historian uncover more glaring 
 prejudices than do his in certain places. A classicist of the 
 Diderot and Voltaire school, he despised too heartily the 
 writings of the monkish chroniclers to examine them. Macau- 
 lay sacrificed truthfulness to an epigrammatic style. It has 
 always been my custom to examine carefully authorities cur- 
 rently held of little or no value. Not that I ever derived, or 
 expected to derive, much benefit from them, but it was a
 
 156 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 satisfaction to know everything that had been written on the 
 subject I was treating. And as for bias, though not pretend- 
 ing to be free from it — who that hves is ? — yet were I ever 
 knowingly to reach the point where pride of opinion was 
 preferred before truth, I should wish from that moment to lay 
 down my pen. 
 
 The introduction to my history was exclusively my own 
 theme; in some subjects others might to some extent partici- 
 pate with me, but not in this. Hence, during the fourteen 
 weeks my really talented assistant was floundering in a sea 
 of erudition, with little .or nothing available in the end to 
 show for it, I myself had taken out material from which I 
 easily wrote three hundred pages, though after twice re- 
 arranging and re-writing I reduced it one half, eliminated 
 half of what was left, and printed the remainder. 
 
 And now was fully begun this new life of mine, the old life 
 being dead; a sea of unborn experiences which I prayed 
 might be worth the sailing over, else might I as well have 
 ceased to be ere myself embarking. This change of life was 
 as the birth of a new creature, a baptism in a new atmo- 
 sphere. With the chrysalis of business was left the ambition 
 of ordinary acquisition, so that the intellect might rise into 
 the glorious sunshine of nobler acquisition. The Avealth which 
 might minister to sensual gratification was made to subserve 
 the wealth of intellectual gratification. Literature is its own 
 recompense. "The reward of a good sentence is to have 
 written it," says Higginson, And again, "The literary man 
 must love his art, as the painter must love painting, out of all 
 proportion to its rewards; or rather, the delight of the work 
 must be its own reward." Whatever I undertook to do 
 seemed long, interminably long it seemed to me. In the 
 grammar of mankind it requires nearly half a centuiy of 
 study to learn that the present tense of life is now. Nay, not 
 only is the present tense now, but the present is the only tense; 
 the past for us is gone; the future, who shall say that it is his? 
 
 I had now become fully imbued with the idea that there 
 was a work to do, and that this was my work. 1 entered
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 157 
 
 upon it with relish, and as I progressed it satisfied me. 
 Following a fit of despondency, a triumph was like the danc- 
 ing of light on the icy foliage after a gloomy storm. In plan- 
 ning and executing, in loading my mind and discharging it 
 on paper, in finding outlet and expression to pent-up thought, 
 in the healthful exercise of my mental faculties, I found relief 
 such as I had never before experienced, relief from the cor- 
 roding melancholy of stifled aspirations, and a pleasure more 
 exquisite than any I had hitherto dreamed of. There is a 
 pivot on which man's happiness and unhappiness not unevenly 
 balance. How keen this enjoyment after an absence or break 
 of any kind in my labors ! Back to my work, my beloved 
 work, surrounded by wife and children; away from hates and 
 heart-burnings, from brutish snarlings, law courts, and rounds 
 of dissipating society; back to the labor that fires the brain 
 and thrills the heart. 
 
 Though ever steadfast in my purpose, I was often obliged 
 to change my plans. I kept on, however, at the history until 
 I had completed the first volume, until I had written fully 
 the conquest of Darien and the conquest of Peru — until I 
 had rewritten the volume, the first writing not suiting me. 
 This I did, taking out even most of the notes myself. But 
 long before I had finished this volume I became satisfied that 
 something must be done with the aborigines. Wherever I 
 touched the continent with my Spaniards they were there, a 
 dusky, disgusting subject. I did not fancy them. I would 
 gladly have avoided them. I was no archaeologist, ethnolo- 
 gist, or antiquary, and had no desire to become such. My 
 tastes in the matter, however, did not dispose of the subject. 
 The savages were there, and there was no help for me; I 
 must write them up to get rid of them. 
 
 Nor was their proper place the general history, or any of 
 the several parts thereof; nor was it the place to speak of 
 them where first encountered. It would not do to break off 
 a narrative of events in order to describe the manners and 
 customs, or the language, or the mythology of a native 
 nation. The reader should know something of both peoples
 
 158 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 thus introduced to each other before passing the introduction ; 
 he should know all about them. 
 
 Once settled that the natives must be described in a work 
 set apart for them, the question arose, How should they be 
 treated ? Uppermost in the mind when the words " Indian " 
 and " Digger " appeared were the ragged, half-starved, and 
 half-drunken prowlers round the outskirts of civilization, 
 cooped in reservations or huddled in missions; and a book 
 on them would treat of their thefts, massacres, and capture. 
 Little else than raids, fightings, and exterminations we heard 
 concerning them; these, coupled with opprobrious epithets 
 which classed them as cattle rather than as human beings, 
 tended in no wise to render the subject fascinating to me. 
 
 In fact the subject was not popularly regarded as very 
 interesting, unless formed into a bundle of thrilling tales, and 
 that was exactly what I would not do. Batdes and adven- 
 tures belonged to history proper ; here was required all that 
 we could learn of them before the coming of the Europeans : 
 some history, all that they had, but mostly description. They 
 should be described as they stood in all their native glory, 
 and before the withering hand of civilization was laid upon 
 them. They should be described as they were first seen by 
 Europeans along the several paths of discovery, by the con- 
 querors of Darien, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Guatemala, and 
 Mexico, during the first half of the sixteenth century ; by the 
 missionaries to the north ; by the American fur-hunters, the 
 French Canadian trappers, the Hudson's Bay Company's 
 servants, and the Russian voyagers and seal-catchers on the 
 shores of Alaska ; also by circumnavigators and travellers in 
 various parts — thus the plan presented itself to my mind. 
 
 As a matter of course, much personal investigation in such 
 a work was impossible. For the purpose of studying the 
 character and customs of hundreds of nations and tribes I 
 could not spend a lifetime with each; and to learn the six 
 hundred and more dialects which I found on these shores was 
 impracticable, even had they all been spoken at the time of 
 my investigations. I must take the word of those who had
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 1 59 
 
 lived among these people, and had learned during the three 
 centuries of their discovering whatever was known of them. 
 
 Spreading the subject before me with hardly any other 
 guide than practical common-sense, I resolved the question 
 into its several divisions. 'What is it we wish to know about 
 these people ? I asked myself. First, their appearance, the 
 color of the skin, the texture of the hair, fonn, features, phy- 
 sique. Then the houses in which they lived, the food they 
 ate, how they built their houses, and obtained and preserved 
 their food, their implements and weapons, their ornaments 
 and dress ; what constituted wealth with them ; their govern- 
 ment, laws, and religious institutions ; the power and position 
 of rulers, and the punishment of crimes ; the arts and intel- 
 lectual advancement; family relations, husband and wife, 
 children, slaves ; the position of woman, including courtship, 
 marriage, polygamy, childbirth, and chastity; their amuse- 
 ments, dances, games, feasts, bathing, smoking, drinking, 
 gambling, racing ; their diseases, treatment of the sick, medi- 
 cine-men ; their mourning, burial, and many other like topics 
 relating to life and society among these unlettered denizens 
 of this blooming wilderness. 
 
 Manners and customs being the common term employed 
 by ethnologists for such description, unable to find, after 
 careful study and consideration of the question, a better one, 
 I adopted it. The first division of my subject, then, was the 
 manners and customs of these peoples. But here a difficulty 
 arose. In points of intellectual growth and material progress, 
 of relative savagery and civilization, there were such wide 
 differences between the many nations of the vast Pacific sea- 
 board that to bring them all together would make an incon- 
 gruous mass, and to fit them to one plan would be far-fetched 
 and impracticable. 
 
 For example, there were the snake-eating Shoshones of 
 Utah, and the cloth-makers and land-tillers of the Pueblo 
 towns of New Mexico; there were the blubber-eating 
 dwellers of the subterranean dens of Alaska, and the civilized 
 city -builders of the Mexican table-land; the coarse, brutal
 
 l6o LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 inhabitants of British CoUimbia, and the refined and intelligent 
 Mayas and Quiches of Central America. What had these in 
 common to be described more than Arab, Greek, and African ? 
 
 Obviously there must be some division. The subject 
 could not be handled in such a form. Whatever might be 
 their relation as regards the great continental divisions of the 
 human family, the terms race and species as applied to the 
 several American nations I soon discovered to be meaning- 
 less. As convincing arguments might be advanced to prove 
 them of one race as of twenty, of three as of forty. Some 
 call the Eskimos one race, and all the rest in America from 
 Hudson's Bay to Tierra del Fuego one race. Some segregate 
 the Aztecs; others distinguish the Californians as Malays, 
 and the natives of Brazil as Africans. I soon perceived that 
 ethnologists still remained mystified and at variance, and I 
 resolved not to increase the confusion. 
 
 This I could do : I could group them geographically, and 
 note physique, customs, institutions, beliefs, and, most im- 
 portant of all, languages ; then he who would might classify 
 them according to race and species. In all my work I was 
 determined to keep upon firm ground, to avoid meaningless 
 and even technical terms, to avoid theories, speculations, and 
 superstitions of every kind, and to deal only in facts. This 
 I relied on more than on any other one thing. My work 
 could not be wholly worthless if I gathered only facts, and 
 arranged them in some form which should bring them within 
 reach of those who had not access to my material, or who 
 could not use it if they had ; whereas theories might be over- 
 thrown as worthless. I had not studied long the many ques- 
 tions arising from a careful survey of the material brought 
 forth and arranged for my Native Races before I became 
 aware that many things which were long since supposed to 
 be settled were not settled, and much which I would be ex- 
 pected to decide never could be decided by any one. The 
 more I thought of these things the stronger became an in- 
 herent repugnance to positiveness in cases where nothing 
 was positive.
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. l6l 
 
 Many complained because I did not settle insoluble ques- 
 tions for them, because I did not determine beyond perad- 
 venture the origin of the Americans, where they came from, 
 who their fathers were, and who made them. But far more 
 found tliis absence of vain and tiresome speculation com- 
 mendable. 
 
 Finally, after much deliberation to enable me to grasp the 
 subject which lay spread over such a vast territory, I con- 
 cluded to divide manners and customs into two parts, making 
 of the wild or savage tribes one division, and of the civilized 
 nations another. The civilized nations all lay together in 
 two main families, the Nahuas of central Mexico and the 
 Mayas of Central America. The savage tribes, however, 
 extended from the extreme north to the extreme southern 
 limits of our Pacific States territory, completely suiTOunding 
 the civilized nations. The wild tribes, therefore, must be 
 grouped ; and I could think of no better plan than to adopt 
 arbitrarily territorial divisions, never dividing, however, a 
 nation, tribe, or family that seemed clearly one. There were 
 the Pueblos of New Mexico, who could be placed among the 
 savage or civilized nations according to convenience. I placed 
 them among the wild tribes, though they were as far in ad- 
 vance of the Nootkas of Vancouver Island as the INIayas were 
 in advance of the Pueblos. Indeed, like most of these ex- 
 pressions, the terms savage and civilized are purely relative. 
 Where is the absolute savage on the face of the earth to-day; 
 where the man absolutely perfect in his civilization ? What 
 we call civilization is not a fixed state, but an irresistible and 
 eternal moving onward. 
 
 The groupings I at last adopted for the Manners and Cus- 
 toms of the Wild Tribes Avere : Beginning at the extreme north, 
 all those nations lying north of the fifty-fifth parallel I called, 
 arbitrarily, Hyperboreans ; to those whose lands were drained 
 by the Columbia river and its tributaries I gave the name Cohim- 
 biaus; the California7is included in their division the inhab- 
 itants of the great basin ; then there were the New Mexicans, 
 the Wild Tribes of Mexico, and the Wild Tribes of Central 
 II
 
 l62 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 America. There was no special reason in beginning at the 
 north rather than at the south. Indeed, in treating the sub- 
 ject of antiquities I began at the south, but this was partly 
 because the chief monumental remains were in Central 
 America and Mexico, and few of importance north of Mexico. 
 And there were other topics to be examined, such as lan- 
 guages, myths, and architectural remains; and the civilized 
 nations had their own written history to be given. 
 
 It was my purpose to lay before the world absolutely all 
 that was known of these peoples at the time of the appear- 
 ing among them of their European exterminators. All real 
 knowledge of them I would present, and their history, so far 
 as they had a history. I had little to say of the aborigines or 
 their deeds since the coming of the Europeans, of their wars 
 against invaders and among themselves; of repartimientos, 
 presidios, missions, reservations, and other institutions for 
 their conquest, conversion, protection, or oppression. My 
 reason for this was that all these things, so far as they pos- 
 sessed importance, belonged to the modern history of the 
 country where they were to receive attention. The wild 
 tribes in the absence of written records had very little his- 
 tory, and that little was mingled with the crudest of super- 
 natural conceptions. 
 
 Besides these several branches of the subject I could think 
 of no others. These included all that related in any wise to 
 their temporahties or their spiritualities ; everything relating 
 to mind, soul, body, and estate, language, and literature. 
 The last mentioned subjects, namely, myths, languages, 
 antiquities, and history, I thought best to treat separately, 
 and for the following reasons : The myths of these peoples, 
 their strange conceptions of their origin, their deities, and 
 their future state, would present a much more perfect and 
 striking picture placed together where they might the better 
 be analyzed and compared. And so with languages and the 
 others. These might or might not be taken up territorially; 
 in this respect I would be governed by the subject-matter at 
 the time I treated it. It resulted that as a rule they were so
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 1 63 
 
 treated; that is, beginning at one end or the other of the 
 territory and proceeding systematically to the other end. 
 Myths and languages both begin at the north; antiquities 
 proceed from the south ; history is confined mostly to the 
 table-lands of Mexico and Central America, and had no 
 need of territorial treatment. 
 
 All this I hoped to condense, at the outset, into two vol- 
 umes, the first of which would comprise the manners and 
 customs of both savage and civilized tribes, the other divisions 
 filling the second volume. But I soon saw that, after the 
 severest and most persistent compressing, the manners and 
 customs of the wild tribes alone would fill a volume. In 
 each of the six great tenitorial divisions of this branch of the 
 subject there was much in common with all the rest. A cus- 
 tom or characteristic once mentioned was seldom again 
 described, differences only being noticed ; but in every nation 
 there was much which, though generally similar to like 
 characteristics in other tribes, so differed in minor if not in 
 main particulars as to demand a separate description. Hence 
 I was obliged either to take more space or to let the varying 
 customs go unnoticed, and the latter course I could not make 
 up my mind to adopt. 
 
 So the first volume became two almost at the outset ; for it 
 was soon apparent that the portraiture of the civilized nations 
 — a description of their several eras ; their palaces, house- 
 holds, and government ; their castes and classes, slaves, tenure 
 of land, and taxation ; their education, marriage, concubinage, 
 childbirth, and baptism ; their feasts and amusements ; their 
 food, dress, commerce, and war customs ; their laws and law 
 ■courts, their arts and manufactures ; their calendar and picture- 
 writing ; their architecture, gardens, medicines, funeral rites, 
 and the like — would easily fill a volume. 
 
 Proceeding further in the work it was ascertained that myths 
 and languages would together require a volume ; that the sub- 
 ject of antiquities, with the necessary three or four hundred 
 illustrations, would occupy a volume, and that the primitive 
 history of the Nahuas and Mayas, with which Brasseur de
 
 1 64 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Bourbourg filled four volumes, could not be properly written 
 in less than one. 
 
 Thus we see the two volumes swollen to five, even then 
 one of the principal difficulties in the work being to confine 
 the ever swelling subjects within these rigidly prescribed limits. 
 So great is the tendency, so much easier is it, when one has 
 an interesting subject, to write it out and revel in description, 
 rather than to cramp it into a sometimes distorting compass, 
 that whatever I take up is almost sure to overrun the first 
 calculations. 
 
 Five volumes, then, comprised the Native Races of the 
 Pacific States : the first being the Wild Tribes, their manners 
 and customs; the second, the Civilized Nations of Mexico 
 and Central America; the third. Myths and Languages of 
 both savage and civilized nations; the fourth, Antiquities, 
 including Architectural remains ; and the fifth, Primitive His- 
 tory and Migrations. A copious index, filling one hundred 
 and sixty-two pages, and referring alphabetically to each of 
 the ten or twelve thousand subjects mentioned in the five 
 volumes, completed the work. 
 
 Maps showing the locations of the aborigines according 
 to their nation, family, and tribe, were introduced wherever 
 necessary, the first volume containing six, one for each of the 
 great territorial divisions. 
 
 Such was the plan; now as to the execution. As the 
 scheme was entirely my own, as I had consulted with no one 
 outside of the library about it, and with my assistants but 
 little, I had only to work it out after my own fashion. 
 
 The questions of race and species settled, to my own satis- 
 faction at least, in an Ethnological Introduction, which con- 
 stitutes the first chapter of the first volume, I brought together 
 for following chapters all the material touching the first main 
 division, the Hyperboreans, and proceeded to abstract it. It 
 was somewhat confusing to me at first to determine the sub- 
 jects to be treated and the order in which I should name 
 them; but sooner than I had anticipated there arose in my 
 mind what I conceived to be natural sequence in all these
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 165 
 
 things, and there was httle difficulty or hesitation. Above 
 all things I sought simplicity in style, substance, and arrange- 
 ment, fully realizing that the more easily I could make myself 
 understood, the better my readers would be pleased. 
 
 One of the most difficult parts of the work was to locate 
 the tribes and compile the maps. Accurately to define the 
 boundaries of primitive nations, much of the time at war and 
 migrating with the seasons, is impossible, from the fact that, 
 although they aim to have the limits of their lands well de- 
 fined, these boundaries are constantly shifting. The best I 
 could do was to take out all information relative to the loca- 
 tion of every tribe, bring together what each author had said 
 upon the different peoples, and print it in his own language, 
 under the heading Tribal Boundaries, in small type at the 
 end of every chapter. 
 
 Thus there were as many of these sections on tribal boun- 
 daries as there were divisions ; and from these I had drawn a 
 large ethnographical map of the whole Pacific States, from 
 which were engraved the subdivisions inserted at the begin- 
 ning of each secrion. In this way every available scrap 
 of material in existence was used and differences as far as 
 possible were reconciled. 
 
 When my first division was wholly v/ritten I submitted it 
 in turn to each of my principal assistants, and invited their 
 criticism, assuring them that I should be best pleased with 
 him who could find most fault with it. A number of sug- 
 gestions were made, some of which I acted on. In general 
 the plan as first conceived was carried out; and to-day I do 
 not see how it could be changed for the better. I then ex- 
 plained to my assistants how I had reached the results, and 
 giving to each a division I requested them in like manner to 
 gather and arrange the material, and place it before me in 
 the best form possible for my use. During the progress of 
 this work I succeeded in utilizing the labors of my assistants 
 to the full extent of my anticipations ; indeed, it was neces- 
 sary I should do so. Otherwise from a quarter to a half 
 century would have been occupied in this one work. With-
 
 1 66 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 out taking into account the indexing of thousands of volumes 
 merely to point out where material existed, or the collecting 
 of the material, there was in each of these five volumes the 
 work of fifteen men for eight months, or of one man for ten 
 years. This estimate, I say, carefully made after the work 
 was done, showed that there had been expended on the 
 N'aiive Races labor equivalent to the well directed efforts of 
 one man, every day, Sundays excepted, from eight o'clock in 
 the morning till six at night, for a period of fifty years. In 
 this estimate I do not include the time lost in unsuccessful 
 experiments, but only the actual time employed in taking out 
 the material, writing the work, preparing the index for the 
 five volumes, which alone was one year's labor, proof-reading, 
 and comparison with authorities. The last two requirements 
 consumed an immense amount of time, the proof being read 
 eight or nine times, and every reference compared with the 
 original authority after the work was in type. This seemed 
 to me necessary to insure accuracy, on account of the many 
 foreign languages in which the authorities were written, and 
 the multitude of native and strange words which crowded my 
 pages. Both text and notes were rewritten, compared, and 
 corrected without limit, until they were supposed to be per- 
 fect; and I venture to say that never a work of that character 
 and magnitude went to press finally with fewer errors. 
 
 Fifty years ! I had not so many to spare upon this work. 
 Possibly I might die before the time had expired or the vol- 
 umes were completed ; and what should I do with the two 
 or three hundred years' additional work that was already 
 planned ? 
 
 When the oracle informed Mycerinus that he had but six 
 years to live, he thought to outwit the gods by making the 
 night as day. Lighting his lamps at nightfall he feasted 
 until morning, thus striving to double his term. I must 
 multiply my days in some way to do this work. I had at- 
 tcmi^tcd the trick of Mycerinus, but it would not succeed 
 with me, for straightway the outraged deities ordained that 
 for every hour so stolen I must repay fourfold. The work
 
 MY FIRST BOOK. 1 67 
 
 of my assistants, besides saving me an immense amount of 
 drudgery and manual labor, left my mind always fresh, and 
 open to receive and retain the subject as a whole. I could 
 institute comparisons and indulge in generalizations more 
 freely, and I believe more effectually, than with my mind 
 overwhelmed by a mass of detail, I do not know how far 
 others have carried this system. Herbert Spencer, I believe, 
 derived much help from assistants. German authors have 
 the faculty of multiplying their years with the aid of others 
 in a greater degree than any other people. Besides having 
 scholars in various parts of the country at work for him, 
 Bunsen employed five or six secretaries. Professors in the 
 German universities are most prolific authors, and almost to 
 a man they have each the assistance of one or two students. 
 Thus says Hurst : " While the real author is responsible 
 for every word that goes out under his own name, and can 
 justly claim the parentage of the whole idea, plan, and scope 
 of the work, he is spared much of the drudgery incident to 
 all book-making which is not the immediate first fruit of 
 imagination. Where history is to be ransacked, facts to be 
 grouped, and matters of pure detail to be gleaned from 
 various sources, often another could do better service than 
 the author." The young Germans who thus assist authors 
 highly prize the discipline by means of which they often be- 
 come authors themselves. At Halle, during his half century 
 of labor, Tholuck had several theological students at work 
 for him, some of whom were members of his own family. 
 And thence proceeded several famous authors, among whom 
 were Kurtz and Held. So Jacobi and Piper started forth 
 from Neander. And the system is growing in favor in the 
 United States.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 
 
 Murcielagos literarios 
 Que haccis a pluma y a pelo, 
 Si quereis vivir con todos 
 Miraos en este espejo. 
 
 — Iriarfe. 
 
 ALL the anxiety I had hitherto felt in regard to the Native 
 Races was as author thereof; now I had to undergo the 
 trials of publishing. 
 
 Business experience had taught me that the immediate 
 recognition, even of a work of merit, depends almost as much 
 on the manner of bringing it forth as upon its authorship. So 
 easily swayed are those who pass judgment on the works of 
 authors; so greatly are they ruled by accidental or incidental 
 causes who form for the public their opinion, that actual 
 worth is seldom alone the thing considered. 
 
 Experience had told me that a book written, printed, and 
 published at this date on the Pacific coast, no matter how 
 meritorious or by whom sent forth, that is to say, if done by 
 any one worth the castigating, would surely be condemned 
 by some and praised coldly and critically by others. There 
 are innumerable local prejudices abroad which prevent us from 
 recognizing to the fullest extent the merits of our neighbor. 
 Least of all would a work of mine be judged solely upon its 
 merits. Trade engenders competition, and competition creates 
 enemies. There were hundreds in California who had thus 
 become my ill-wishers, and to please this class as well as 
 themselves there were newspaper Avriters who would like 
 nothing better than, by sneers and innuendoes, to consign the 
 fruits of laborious years to oblivion. 
 
 iC8
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 169 
 
 I have seen through jealousy, or conscienceless meanness, 
 the fruits of a good man's best days thrown to the dogs by 
 some flippant remark of an unprincipled critic. Tuthill's 
 History of California was a good book, the best by far which 
 up to its time had been written on the subject. It was in 
 the main truthful and trustworthy. The author was a con- 
 scientious worker ; Ipng was foreign to his nature ; he spent 
 his last days on this work, and on his death-bed corrected 
 the proofs as they passed from the press. And yet there were 
 those among his brother editors in California who did not 
 scruple, when the book was placed in their hands for review, 
 to color their criticism from some insignificant flaws which 
 ■ they pretended to have discovered, and so consign a faithful, 
 true history of this coast to perdition, because the author had 
 taken a step or two above them. 
 
 To local fame, or a literary reputation restricted to CaH- 
 fomia, I did not attach much value. Not that I was indif- 
 ferent to the opinions of my neighbors, or that I distrusted 
 Pacific-coast journalists as a class. I had among them many 
 warm friends whose approbation I coveted. But at this 
 juncture I did not desire the criticism either of enemies or 
 friends, but of strangers; I was desirous above all that my 
 book should be first reviewed on its merits and by disinter- 
 ested and unprejudiced men. Adverse criticism at home, 
 where the facts were supposed to be better known, might injure 
 me abroad, while, if prejudiced in my favor, the critic might 
 give an opinion which would be negatived by those of New 
 England or of Europe. Besides, I could not but feel, if my 
 work was worth anything, if it was a work worth doing, that 
 the higher the scholar, or the literary laborer, the higher 
 would appear to him its value. 
 
 The reason is obvious. I dealt in facts, gathered from new 
 fields and conveniently arranged. These were the raw ma- 
 terial for students in the several branches of science, and for 
 philosophers in their generalizations. My theories, if I in- 
 dulged in any, would be worse than thrown away on them. 
 This was their work; they would theorize, and generalize,
 
 lyo LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 and deduce for themselves ; but they Avould not despise my 
 facts. Hence it was by the verdict of the best men of the 
 United States, of England, France, and Germany, the world's 
 ripest scholars and deepest thinkers, that my contributions to 
 knowledge must stand or fall, and not by the wishes of my 
 friends or the desire of my enemies. This is why, I say, a 
 home reputation alone never would have satisfied me, never 
 would have paid me for my sacrifice of time, money, and 
 many of the amenities of life. 
 
 On the 3d of August, 1874, I started east on a hterary 
 pilgrimage. One hundred author's copies of volume i. had 
 been printed at our establishment in San Francisco, and the 
 plates sent east before my departure. Twenty-five copies of 
 the work accompanied the plates ; besides these I carried in 
 my trunk printed sheets of the Native Races so far as then in 
 type, namely the whole of volume i., one hundred and fifty 
 pages of volume 11., four hundred pages of volume iii., and 
 one hundred pages of volume iv. 
 
 Besides seeking the countenance and sympathy of scholars 
 in my enterprise, it was part of my errand to find a publisher. 
 As the plates had not arrived when I reached New York I con- 
 cluded to leave the matter of publishing for the present, direct 
 my course toward Boston, and dive at once in himinis eras. 
 
 It was my intention to ask eastern scholars to examine my 
 book and give me an expression of their opinion in writing ; 
 but in talking the matter over with Dr. Gray, of Cambridge, 
 he advised me to delay such request until the reviewers had 
 pronounced their verdict, or at all events until such expression 
 of opinion came naturally and voluntarily. This I concluded 
 to do ; though at the same time I could not understand what 
 good private opinions would do me after public reviewers had 
 spoken. Their praise I sliould not care to supplement with 
 feebler praise ; their disapprobation could not be averted after 
 it had been printed. 
 
 And so it turned out. What influence my seeing these men 
 and presenting them copies of my book had on reviewers, if
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 171 
 
 any, I have no means of knowing. Directly, I should say it 
 had none ; indirectly, as, for example, a word dropped upon 
 the subject, or a knowledge of the fact that the author had 
 seen and had explained the character of his work to the chief 
 scholars of the country, might make the reviewer regard it a 
 little more attentively than he otherwise would. On the re- 
 ceipt of the fifth volume of the Native Races Dr. Gray wrote 
 me : " I am filled more and more with admiration of what 
 you have done and are doing ; and all I hear around me, and 
 read from the critical judges, adds to the good opinion I had 
 formed." 
 
 Doctor Gray gave me letters to Francis Parkman, Charles 
 Francis Adams, and others. While at Cambridge we called 
 on Mrs. Horace Mann, but she being ill, her sister, Miss 
 Peabody, saw us instead. With eloquence of tongue and 
 ease and freedom she dissected the most knotty problems of 
 the day. 
 
 James Russell Lowell lived in a pleasant, plain house, 
 common to the intellectual and refined of that locality. 
 Longfellow's residence was the most pretentious I visited, 
 but the plain, home-like dwelhngs, within which was the 
 atmosphere of genius or culture, were most attractive to me. 
 How cold and soulless are the Stewart's marble palaces of 
 New York beside these New England abodes of intellect 
 with their chaste though unaffected adornments ! 
 
 Lowell hstened without saying a word ; listened for three 
 or five minutes, I should think, without a nod or movement 
 signifying that he heard me. I was quite ready to take 
 offence when once the suspicion came that I was regarded 
 as a bore. 
 
 " Perhaps I tire you," at length I suggested. 
 
 " Pray go on," said he. 
 
 When I had finished he entered warmly into the merits of 
 the case, made several suggestions and discussed points of 
 difference. He bound me to him forever by his many acts 
 of sympathy then and afterward, for he never seemed to lose 
 interest in my labors, and wrote me regarding them. What,
 
 172 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 for example, could have been more inspiring at that time 
 than to receive from him, shortly after my return to San 
 Francisco, such words as these : " I have read your first 
 volume with so much interest that I am hungry for those to 
 come. You have handled a complex, sometimes even tan- 
 gled and tautological subject, with so much clearness and 
 discrimination as to render it not merely useful to the man 
 of science but attractive to the general reader. The con- 
 scientious labor in collecting, and the skill shown in the 
 convenient arrangement of such a vast body of material, 
 deserve the highest praise." 
 
 In Cambridge I called on Arthur Oilman, who went with 
 me to the Riverside Press, the establishment of H. O. Hough- 
 ton and Company, where I saw INIr. Scudder, who wrote for 
 Every Saturday. Mr. Scudder asked permission to announce 
 my forthcoming work in his journal, but I requested him to 
 say nothing about it just then. I was shown over the build- 
 ings, obtained an estimate for the printing and binding of my 
 book, and subsequently gave them the work, sending the 
 electrotype plates there. One thousand copies only were at 
 first printed, then another thousand, and a third; the three 
 thousand sets, of five volumes each, being followed by other 
 thousands. 
 
 Wednesday, the 26th of August, after calling on several 
 journalists in Boston, we took the boat for Nahant to find 
 Mr. Longfellow, for he was absent from his home at Cam- 
 bridge. Neither was he at Nahant. And so it was in many 
 instances, until we began to suspect that most Boston people 
 had two houses, a city and a country habitation, and lived in 
 neither. From Nahant we went to Lynn, and thence to 
 Salem, where we spent the night undisturbed by witches, in 
 a charming little antique hotel. 
 
 During the afternoon we visited the rooms of the scientific 
 association, and in the evening Wendell Phillips, who gave 
 me a welcome that did my heart good. A bright genial face, 
 with a keen, kindly eye, and long white hair, a fine figure,
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 1 73 
 
 tall but a little stooped, I found him the embodiment of 
 shrewd wisdom and practical philanthropy. There was no 
 cant or fiction about him. His smile broke upon his fea- 
 tures from a beaming heart, and his words were but the 
 natural expression of healthy thoughts. 
 
 He comprehended my desires and necessities on the instant, 
 and seating himself at his table he dashed off some eight or 
 ten letters in about as many minutes, keeping up all the time 
 a rattling conversation, neither tongue nor pen hesitating a 
 moment for a word ; and it was about me, and my work, and 
 California, and whom I should see, that he was talking. Nor 
 was this all. Next morning, in Boston, he handed me a 
 package of letters addressed to persons who he thought would 
 be interested in the work, and whose names had occurred to 
 him after I had left. 
 
 Later he writes me : " Your third volume has come. 
 Thanks for your remembrance of me. I read each chapter 
 with growing interest. What a storehouse you provide for 
 every form and department of history in time to come ! I did 
 you no justice when you first opened your plan to me. I 
 fancied it was something like the French Mcmoircs pour Sctvir. 
 But yours is a history, full and complete ; every characteris- 
 tic amply illustrated ; every picture preserved ; all the traits 
 marshalled with such skill as leaves nothing further to be 
 desired. Then such ample disquisitions on kindred topics, 
 and so much cross-light thrown on the picture, you give us 
 the races alive again and make our past real. I congratu- 
 late you on the emphatic welcome the press has everywhere 
 given you." 
 
 How different in mind, manner, heart, and head are the 
 men we meet ! 
 
 John G. Whittier was a warm personal friend of Phillips, 
 and to him among others the latter sent me. We went to 
 Amesbury, where the poet resided, the day after meeting 
 PhilHps in Boston. A frank, warm-hearted Quaker, living in 
 a plain, old-fashioned village house. He gave me letters to 
 Longfellow, Emerson, and Doctor Barnard. " I have been
 
 174 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 SO much interested in his vast and splendid plan of a his- 
 tory of the western slope of our continent," he writes to Mr. 
 Longfellow, " that I take pleasure in giving him a note to 
 thee. What material for poems will be gathered up in his vol- 
 umes ! It seems to me one of the noblest literary enterprises 
 of our day." 
 
 '' This I will deliver," said I, picking up the one addressed 
 to Longfellow, " if I am permitted to retain it ; not otherwise. 
 We in California do not see a letter from Whittier to Long- 
 fellow every day." He laughed and replied : '' My letters 
 are getting to be common enough now." I did not see Mr. 
 Longfellow, but he wrote me very cordially, praising my 
 book and regretting he should have missed my call. 
 
 Informed that Professor Henry Adams, editor of the North 
 American Review, was staying a {q.-\n miles from Salem, I 
 sought him there, but unsuccessfully. Next day I met acci- 
 dentally his father, Charles Francis Adams, to whom I ex- 
 pressed regrets at not having seen his son. He said he would 
 speak to him for me, and remarked that if I could get Fran- 
 cis Parkman to review my book in the Norih American it 
 would be a great thing for it, but that his health and preoc- 
 cupation would probably prevent. He gave me several let- 
 ters, and I left full copies of my printed sheets with him. 
 
 I went to Mr. Parkman, I found him at Jamaica Plains, 
 where he resided during summer, deep in literary work. 
 After all, the worker is the man to take work to, and not the 
 man of leisure. Mr. Parkman was a tall, spare man, with a 
 smiling face and winning manner. I noticed that all great 
 men in the vicinity of Boston were tall and thin, and wore 
 .smiling faces, and indications of innate gentleness of char- 
 acter. 
 
 " This shows wonderful research, and I think your arrange- 
 ment is good, but I should have to review it upon its merits," 
 said Mr. Parkman. 
 
 " As a matter of course," I replied. 
 
 " I do not know that I am competent to do the subject 
 justice," he now remarked.
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 1 75 
 
 " I will trust you for that," said I. 
 
 And so the matter was left ; and in due time several splen- 
 did reviews appeared in the North Aincrican as the different 
 volumes were published. 
 
 From Doctor Holmes I received many letters, which 
 brought with them a world of refreshing encouragement. So 
 genial and hearty were his expressions of praise that the 
 manner of bestowal doubled its value to me. Few can ap- 
 preciate the Avorth to an author of encouraging words at such 
 a time and from such a source. " The more I read in your 
 crowded pages the more I find to instruct and entertain me," 
 he writes. " I assure you that Robinson Crusoe never had a 
 more interested reader among the boys than I have been in 
 following you through your heroic labor." 
 
 And later he writes : " I have never thanked you for the 
 third volume of your monumental work. This volume can 
 hardly be read like the others ; it must be studied. The two 
 first were as captivating as romances, but this is as absorb- 
 ing as a philosophical treatise dealing with the great human 
 problems, for the reason that it shows how human instincts 
 repeat themselves in spiritual experience as in common life. 
 Your labor is, I believe, fully appreciated by the best judges ; 
 and you have done, and are doing, a work for which posterity 
 will thank you when thousands of volumes that parade them- 
 selves as the popular works of the day are lost to human 
 memory." 
 
 I very much regretted not seeing Mr. Hale, though I was 
 gratified to receive a letter toward Christmas in which he 
 wrote : " At this time the subject has to me more interest 
 than any other literary subject. I have for many years 
 intended to devote my leisure to an historical work to be 
 entitled The Pacific Ocean and Its Shores. But I shall never 
 write it unless I have first the opportunity of long and care- 
 ful study among your invaluable collection." The library 
 was placed at Mr. Hale's free disposal, as it was always open 
 to every one, but the leisure hours of one man, though it 
 should be for several lifetimes, I fear would not make much
 
 176 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 showing beside the steady labors of ten to twenty men for 
 years. One Saturday we went to Martha's Vineyard, where 
 President Grant was enjoying the intellectual feasts spread 
 before him by the encamped Methodists. 
 
 I had seen all the chief literary editors of Boston, and was 
 well enough satisfied with the results. I knew by this time 
 that my book would receive some good reviews in that 
 quarter. 
 
 In New York, a few days later, I met George Bancroft — 
 to whom, by the way, I am in no way related — who gave 
 me a letter to Doctor Draper, and was kind enough afterward 
 to write : 
 
 " To me you render an inestimable benefit ; for you bring 
 within reach the information which is scattered in thousands 
 of volumes. I am glad to see your work welcomed in Europe 
 as well as in your own country. In the universality of your 
 researches you occupy a field of the deepest interest to the 
 world, and without a rival. Press on, my dear sir, in your 
 great enterprise, and bring it to a close in the meridian of life, 
 so that you may enjoy your well-earned honors during what 
 I hope may be a long series of later years." 
 
 Doctor Draper was a man well worth the seeing ; from first 
 to last he proved one of my warmest and most sympathizing 
 friends. After my return to San Francisco he wrote me : " I 
 have received your long expected first volume of the Native 
 Races of the Pacific States, and am full of admiration of the 
 resolute manner in which you have addressed yourself to that 
 most laborious task. Many a time I have thought if I were 
 thirty years younger I would dedicate myself to an explora- 
 tion of the political and psychological ideas of the aborigines 
 of this continent; but you are doing not only this, but a great 
 deal more. Your work has taught me a great many things. 
 It needs no praise from me. It will be consulted and read 
 centuries after you are gone." 
 
 On Friday, tlie nth of September, I had an interview with 
 Charles Nordhoff, during which he agreed to review my work, 
 and requested me to appoint some day to spend with him at
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 177 
 
 Alpine, on the Hudson, when we could talk the matter over. 
 I named the following Thursday. The day was rainy, but 
 within his hospitable doors it passed delightfully. I had 
 lately seen George Ripley of the Tribicne, whom Wendell 
 Phillips pronounced the first critic in America, Mr. Godkin 
 of the Naiio)i, and several others, who had given me encour- 
 aging words, so that I felt prepared to enjoy the day, and 
 did most heartily enjoy it. 
 
 The Tuesday before I had completed arrangements with 
 D. Appleton and Company of New York to act as my pub- 
 lishers, upon terms satisfactory enough. I was to furnish 
 them the work printed and bound at my own cost, and they 
 were to account for the same at one half the retail prices. 
 The contract was for five years. 
 
 But since I should require some copies in San Francisco, 
 and some in London, Paris, and Leipsic, I had concluded to 
 do my own printing, and arrange with certain pubHshers to 
 act for me. Mr. James C. Derby, brother of the late George 
 H. Derby, to whom I was indebted for my initiation into the 
 book business, was then manager of Appleton's subscription 
 department, and under his direction my book fell. Very 
 litrie work was put upon it, for the subscription department 
 was crowded with books in which the house had deeper 
 pecuniary interest than in mine ; yet I was satisfied with the 
 sales and with the general management of the business. 
 
 One of the first things to be done on my return to New 
 York from Boston was to examine the collection of books Mr. 
 Bliss had made while in Mexico and select such as I wanted. 
 This was the agreement : I was to take every book which 
 my collection lacked, and should I select from his collection 
 copies of some books which were in mine, such dupHcates 
 were to be returned to him. In a private house near Astor 
 place. Bliss had taken rooms, and there he had his books 
 brought and the cases opened. We looked at them all sys- 
 tematically, and such as I was not sure of possessing were 
 laid aside. The result was an addition to the library of 
 some four or five hundred volumes, sent to San Francisco in 
 12
 
 178 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 six cases. To make sure of these books I looked after them 
 inyself ; I would not intrust them to the care of any one 
 until they were safely delivered to the railway company, 
 with the shipping receipt in my pocket. 
 
 The 30th of September saw me in New Haven, President 
 Porter and most of the professors had returned. By this time 
 the enthusiasm with which I was wont to tell my story dur- 
 ing the earlier stages of my pilgrimage had somewhat waned. 
 Nevertheless I must make a few calls. President Porter I 
 found exceptionally warm-hearted and sincere. He gave me 
 letters of strong commendation to President Eliot of Har- 
 vard and to Robert C. Winthrop. At the next commence- 
 ment he likewise enrolled my name among the alumni of 
 Yale as master of arts. 
 
 While wandering among these classic halls I encountered 
 Clarence King, who, young as he was, had acquired a repu- 
 tation and a position second to no scientist in America. He 
 was a man of much genius and rare cultivation. In him 
 were united in an eminent degree the knowledge acquired 
 from books, and that which comes from contact with men. 
 His shrewd common sense was only surpassed by his high 
 literary and scientific attainments, and his broad learning was 
 so seasoned with unaffected kindness of heart and fresh 
 buoyant good-humor as to command tlie profound admi- 
 ration of all who knew him. 
 
 He was my ideal of a scholar. There was an originality 
 and dash about him which fascinated me. He could do so 
 easily what I could not do at all; he was so young, with 
 such an clastic, athletic brain, trained to do his most ambi- 
 tious bidding, with such a well-employed past, a jiroud present, 
 and a brilliant future, and withal such a modest bearing and 
 genial kind-heartedness, that I could not but envy him. His 
 descriptions of scenery are as fine as Ruskin's and far more 
 original. 
 
 He had often been in my library, and meeting me now at 
 Yale he shook my hand warmly as I thanked him for speak- 
 ing so kindly of me to Mr. Higginson at Newport a few days
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 179 
 
 before. After some further conversation I was about to pass 
 on when he spoke again: 
 
 " How are you getting along ? " 
 
 " Very well," said I ; " better than I had anticipated." 
 
 " Can I do anything for you ?" he asked. 
 
 " No, I thank you," I replied. Then suddenly recollecting 
 myself I exclaimed, " Yes, you can ; review my book in some 
 journal." 
 
 " I will do so with pleasure, if I am competent." 
 
 " If you are not," said I, " with all your personal obser- 
 vations upon the Pacific slope, I may as well cease looking 
 for such men in these parts." 
 
 " Well, I will do my best," he replied. 
 
 I then asked him for what journal he would write a re- 
 view. He suggested the North Ajnerican or the Atlantic. 
 
 I was greatly disappointed, now that King had agreed to 
 write, that his article could not appear in the Atlantic, where 
 were first pubhshed his matchless chapters on Mountaineering 
 in the Sierra Nevada. That, however, was out of the question, 
 as Bliss was engaged for that article, and probably had it 
 finished by this time. 
 
 Meanwhile Mr. Howells wrote me : " I have not heard a 
 word from Mr. Bliss, and it is quite too late to get anything 
 about your book into the November number." I immediately 
 called on Bliss. He v/as buried deep in some new subject. 
 The money I had given him for his books had made him 
 comparatively independent, and when he had revelled in 
 reading and tobacco smoke for a time, and had concluded 
 his literary debauch, there would be time enough left to apply 
 himself to the relief of corporeal necessities. 
 
 " Bliss, how progresses that article for the Atlantic ? " I 
 asked him. 
 
 " Finely," he replied. " I have it nearly completed." 
 
 " Show me some of it, will you ? I want to see how it 
 reads." 
 
 " I cannot show it you in its present state," he stammered, 
 " Next time you come in you shall see it."
 
 l8o LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 I was satisfied he had not touched it, and I wrote Howells 
 as much, at the same time mentioning my interview with 
 King. 
 
 " I wrote you some days ago," Howells replied, under date 
 of October 7, 1874, "that Mr. Bliss had not sent me a re- 
 view of your book, after promising to do so within ten days 
 from the time when he called with you. So if Mr. King will 
 review it for me I shall be delighted." At the same time 
 Howells telegraphed me, " Ask Clarence King to write re- 
 view." Again I sought the retreat of Bliss. I found him 
 still oblivious. The fact is, I think my peripatetic friend 
 trembled somewhat at the responsibility of his position, and 
 he had betaken himself to a vigorous literary whistling to 
 keep his courage up. 
 
 When once cornered, he admitted he had not written a 
 word of the proposed re\aew. I then told him of Clarence 
 King's offer and Mr. Howells' wishes, and asked him if he 
 would be willing to give his review, which I knew he would 
 never write, to some other journal. He cheerfully expressed 
 his Avillingness to do so, and congratulated me on having 
 secured so able a writer as Mr. King. Therein he acted the 
 gentleman. The 7th of December Mr. Howells writes me : 
 " I've just read the proof of Clarence King's review of you 
 for the Atlantic — twelve pages of unalloyed praise." Con- 
 cerning this review Mr. King wrote from Colorado the 6th 
 of November : " Believe me, I have found great pleasure and 
 profit in twice carefully reading the Wild Tribes. Of its 
 excellence as a piece of critical literary combination I was 
 fully persuaded from the first, but only on actual study do I 
 reach its true value. Although the driest of the five volumes, 
 it is simply fascinating to the student who realizes the vital 
 value of savage data. Appreciating and enjoying your book 
 as much as I do, I yet find a difliculty I have never before 
 experienced in attempting to review it. The book itself is a 
 gigantic review, and so crammed and crowded with fact that 
 the narrow limits of an Atlantic review are insufficient to 
 even allude to all the classes of fact. To even intimate the
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. l8l 
 
 varied class of material is impossible. I rather fall back to 
 the plan of following you from the Arctic coast down to 
 Panama, tracing the prominent changes and elements of 
 development, giving you of course full credit for the good 
 judgment and selection you have shown." 
 
 Professor J. A. Church reviewed the work in an able and 
 lengthy article in the Galaxy ; and for the Nation the book 
 was intrusted to Mr. Joseph Anderson of Waterbury, Con- 
 necticut, a most able critic. 
 
 I failed to see Mr, Bryant, but was gratified by the receipt 
 of a letter in which he expressed himself in the following 
 words : " I am amazed at the extent and the minuteness of 
 your researches into the history and customs of the aboriginal 
 tribes of western North America. Your work mil remain to 
 coming ages a treasure-house of information on that subject." 
 The Califomian journals printed many of the eastern and Eu- 
 ropean letters sent me, and Mr. Bryant's commanded their 
 special admiration, on account of its chirography, which was 
 beautifully clear and firm for a poet, and he of eighty years. 
 
 The 2d of October I ran down to Washington to see ]\Ir. 
 Spofford, librarian of Congress, and John G. Ames, librarian 
 and superintendent of public documents. I had been pre- 
 sented with many of the government pubhcations for my 
 library for the last ten years and had bought many more. 
 What I Avanted now was to have all the congressional docu- 
 ments and government publications sent me as they were 
 printed. Mr. Ames informed me that he could send certain 
 books from his department. Then, if I could get some sena- 
 tor to put my name on his list, I should receive every other 
 public document printed, twelve copies of which were given 
 each senator for distribution. This Mr. Sargent kindly con- 
 sented to do for me, and to him I am indebted for constant 
 favors during his term in Washington. 
 
 Calling at the library of Congress, I was informed by Mr. 
 Spofiford that for some time past he had intended to ask my 
 permission to review the Native Races for the New York 
 Herald in an article some four columns in length. I assured
 
 l82 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 him .that for so distinguished honor I should ever hold 
 myself his debtor. I then looked through a room crammed 
 with duplicates, to ascertain if there were any books among 
 them touching my subject which I had not in my library. 
 I found nothing. The regulations of the congressional 
 library required two copies of every book published in the 
 United States to be deposited for copyright, and these two 
 copies must always be kept. Any surplus above the two 
 copies were called dupHcates, and might be exchanged for 
 other books. 
 
 Early in the writing of the Native Races I had felt the 
 need of access to certain important works existing only in 
 manuscript. These were the Historia Apologctica and Historia 
 General of Las Casas, not then printed, the Historia Afitigua 
 de Niieva Espaiia of Father Duran, and others. These 
 manuscripts were nowhere for sale ; but few copies were in 
 existence, and besides those in the library of Congress I knew 
 of none in the United States. I saw no other way than to 
 have such works as seemed necessary to me copied in whole 
 or in part, and this I accomplished by the aid of copyists 
 through the courtesy of Mr. Spofford. The labor was tedious 
 and expensive, but I could not go forward with my writing 
 and feel that fresh material existed which I had the money 
 to procure. 
 
 Several months previous to my journey to Washington Mr. 
 H. R. Coleman, who had long been in the employ of our 
 firm, and who in the spring of 1874, while on a visit to the 
 east, had kindly consented to attend to some business for me, 
 had been at the capital with letters of introduction to senators 
 and others, and had secured me many advantages. 
 
 From Philadelphia, under date of the 24th of April, Mr. 
 Coleman made a full report. His mission was to examine 
 the works in the congressional library touching the Pacific 
 coast and ascertain what material was there that was not in 
 my collection. Then he must set men at work extracting 
 certain matter whicli was described to him, and finally secure 
 all llie i>ublic documents possible for the library. I need
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 183 
 
 only say that all this was accomplished by him to my entire 
 satisfaction. Senator Sargent rendered Mr. Coleman most 
 valuable assistance, helping him to several hundred volumes 
 of books. The difficulty in collecting government documents 
 lies not in obtaining current pubHcations but in gathering 
 the old volumes, since few of the many departments retain 
 in their offices back volumes. My agents and I have visited 
 Washington many times on these missions. 
 
 Before leaving San Francisco I had placed the manage- 
 ment of the Native Races in London in the hands of Mr. 
 Ellis Read, who represented in San Francisco certain Scotch 
 and English firms. Mr. Read's London agent was Mr. John 
 Brown of Woodford, Essex, an intelligent and wealthy gen- 
 tleman, who from the first took a warm interest in the work. 
 After consultation with a literary friend the pubHcation of the 
 book was offered to Messrs. Longmans and Company of 
 Paternoster Row, and accepted on their usual terais : namely, 
 ten per cent, commissions on trade sale price, I to furnish 
 them the printed copies unbound, with twenty-five copies for 
 editors. A cable despatch from Mr. Brown to Mr. Read in 
 San Francisco was forwarded to me at New York, and con- 
 veyed the welcome intelligence — welcome because pubhshers 
 so unexceptionable had undertaken the publication of my 
 book on terms so favorable. 
 
 Longmans advised Brown to spend thirty pounds in adver- 
 tising, and if the book was well received by the press to add 
 twenty to it, and suggested that fifty pounds should be de- 
 posited with him for that purpose. Expenses in London were 
 coming on apace; so that almost simultaneously with the news 
 that the Messrs. Longmans were my publishers, appeared a 
 request from Mr. Brown for one hundred pounds. I Avas in 
 New York at the time, and not in the best of spirits, and since 
 I must bear all the expense of publication, and furnish the 
 pubhshers the book already printed, the further demand of 
 five hundred dollars for expenses, which one would think the 
 book should pay if it were worth the publicntion, appeared to 
 me somewhat unreasonable.
 
 184 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Nevertheless, I sent the money. I was resolved that noth- 
 ing within my power to remove should stand in the way of a 
 success. Again and again have I plunged recklessly forward 
 in my undertakings regardless of consequences, performing 
 work which never would be known or appreciated, and but 
 for the habit of thoroughness which had by this time become 
 a part of my nature, might as well never have been done, 
 spending time and paying out money with a dogged deter- 
 mination to continue spending as long as time or money 
 lasted, whether I could see the end or not. After all, the 
 business in London was v/ell and economically managed. It 
 would have cost me five times as much had I gone there and 
 attended to it myself, and then it would have been no better 
 done. I was specially desirous my work should be brought 
 to the attention of English scholars and reviewers. I ex- 
 plained to Mr. Brown what I had done and was doing in 
 America, and suggested he should adopt some such course 
 there. And I must say he entered upon the task with en- 
 thusiasm and performed it well. 
 
 Mr. Brown thought the London edition should be dedi- 
 cated to some Englishman prominent in science or letters. 
 I had no objections, though it was a point which never 
 would have occurred to me. But it has always been my 
 custom to yield to every intelligent suggestion, prompted 
 by the enthusiasm of an agent or assistant, provided his 
 way of doing a thing was in my opinion no worse than 
 my way. 
 
 Mr. Brown suggested the name of Sir John Lubbock, and 
 sent me a printed page : " I dedicate this work to Sir John 
 Lubbock, Bart., M. P., F. R. S., as a tribute of my high 
 esteem." In this I acquiesced, and so the dedication was 
 made, and gracefully acknowledged by Sir John. To Mr. 
 Brown I had sent from San Francisco copies of volume i., 
 with letters enclosed, to about a dozen prominent men in 
 P^ngland, among them Herbert Spencer, Sir Arthur Helps, 
 E. B. Tylor, R. G. Latham, Tyndall, Huxley, Max Miillcr, 
 Lccky, Carlyle, and Murchison. The acknowledgments
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 185 
 
 made by all these gentlemen, received of course after my 
 return to San Francisco, were hearty and free. 
 
 Mr. Herbert Spencer writes me : " In less than a year I 
 hope to send you the first volume of the Principles of Soci- 
 ology, in which you will see that I have made frequent and 
 important uses of your book ; " and indeed nothing could be 
 more flattering than the references therein made to the Native 
 Races. " During my summer trip in Europe," says Mr. Gil- 
 man in a letter from Baltimore, " I have frequently heard 
 your great work spoken of, but nowhere with more commen- 
 dation than I heard from Herbert Spencer. I am sure you 
 must be more than paid for your labor by the wide-spread 
 satisfaction it has given." 
 
 Doctor Latham, the eminent ethnologist and linguist, 
 writes : " The first thing I did after reading it with pleasure 
 and profit — for I can't say how highly I value it — was to 
 indite a review of it for the Examiner^ I was greatly 
 pleased with Mr. W. E. H. Lecky's letters, regarding him, 
 as I did, as one of the purest writers of English living. " I 
 rejoice to see the book advancing so rapidly to its comple- 
 tion," he says, " for I had much feared that, like Buckle's 
 history, it was projected on a scale too gigantic for any single 
 individual to accomphsh. It will be a noble monument of 
 American energy, as well as of American genius." 
 
 I well remember with what trepidation I had thought of 
 addressing these great men before I began to publish. I 
 wondered if they would even answer my letters ; then I took 
 heart and said, I know these facts of mine are valuable to 
 men of science, and in the form I present it this material, 
 well winnowed as it has been, is in a shape far more accessi- 
 ble than it could have been before. 
 
 Of the newspapers and magazines containing the best 
 reviews and descriptions of the library, Mr. Brown purchased 
 from fifty to five hundred copies, and distributed them among 
 the libraries, journalists, and literary men of the world. Not 
 having a proper list of selected newspapers and of the 
 Ubrarians in Europe and America, I employed the mercantile
 
 1 86 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 and statistical agency association of New York to prepare 
 me such a list, writing them in two blank-books. There 
 were eight hundred and twenty European, Asiatic, and 
 colonial libraries written in one book, and the European and 
 American newspapers and United States libraries in the 
 other. 
 
 It was through Mr. Edward Jackson, correspondent in 
 San Francisco of the London Times, that the Native Races 
 was first brought to the notice of that journal. Mr. Jackson 
 could not assure me positively that the review would appear. 
 Mr. Walter, the editor, would not enlighten Mr. Jackson on 
 the subject. I wished to purchase four hundred copies of 
 the issue containing the notice of the Native Races, provided 
 there should be such an issue. And in this way I was obliged 
 to give my order to Mr. Brown. 
 
 From London the 3d of April, 1875, Mr. Brown writes: 
 " At last the Tii7ies has spoken, and I have succeeded in se- 
 curing four hundred copies of the paper by dint of close 
 watching. When I saw the publishers some time ago, with 
 the usual independence of the Times they would not take an 
 order for the paper, or even the money for four hundred cop- 
 ies to be struck off for me when a review did appear, and all 
 I could get was this, — that on the day a review appeared, 
 should a review appear at all, if I sent down to the office 
 before 1 1 a. m. they would strike off what I wanted. So I 
 kept a person watching — as I was sometimes late in going to 
 town — with money for the review, and he luckily saw it in 
 the morning, rushed down to the office, and, he tells me, in 
 less than a quarter of an hour the extra four hundred copies 
 were struck off and made over to him. The copies are now 
 being posted according to the addresses you sent me." 
 
 In October, 1874, one of the editors of the Kolnische Zei- 
 tung was in San Francisco and visited the library frequently. 
 He wrote for his paper a description of the library and the 
 Native Races, besides giving me a list of the German mag- 
 azines and reviews to which the book should be sent, and
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 187 
 
 much Other valuable information. Dr. Karl Andree of the 
 Globus, Dresden, spoke very kindly of the work, and inserted 
 several articles concerning it in that most valuable and influ- 
 ential journal. 
 
 In September, 1875, the eminent English scholar, W. Boyd 
 Dawkins, called at the library, giving me great pleasure in 
 his visit, and from him, a few months later, I received a letter 
 from which the following is an extract : " Your v/onderful 
 book on the native races of the Pacific States," he writes 
 from Owens College, Manchester, "has been handed to me 
 for review in the Edinburgh, and before I review it I should 
 be very much obliged if you could give me infonnation as to 
 the following details : You v/ill perhaps have forgotten the 
 wandering Englishman who called on you at the end of last 
 September, and who had just a hurried glance at your library. 
 Then I had no time to carry away anything but a mere 
 general impression, which has haunted me ever since. And 
 strangely enough your books awaited my return home. I 
 want details as to your mode of indexing. How many clerks 
 do you employ on the work, and what sort of index cards ? 
 You shewed all this to me, but I did not take down any fig- 
 ures. Your system seems to me wholly new." 
 
 " Pray accept my heartiest thanks," writes Edward B. 
 Tylor, the 25th of February, 1875, "for your gift of the first 
 volume of your great work. I need not trouble you with 
 compliments, for there is no doubt that you will find in a few 
 months' time that the book has received more substantial 
 testimony to its value in the high appreciation of all European 
 ethnologists. I am writing a slight notice for the Academy, 
 particularly to express a hope that your succeeding volumes 
 may throw light on the half-forgotten problem of Mexican 
 civilization, which has made hardly any progress since Hum- 
 boldt's time. Surely the Old and New Worlds ought to join 
 in working out the question whether they had been in con- 
 tact, in this district, before Columbus's time ; and I really 
 believe that you may, at this moment, have the materials in 
 your hands to bring the problem on to a new stage. May I
 
 1 88 LITERARY" INDUSTRIES. 
 
 conclude by asking you, as an ethnologist, not to adhere too 
 closely to your intention of not theorizing, while there are 
 subjects on which you evidently have the means of forming 
 a theory more exactly and plentifully in your hands than any 
 other anthropologist." 
 
 Before making arrangements with Messrs. Longmans I 
 had said nothing about a publisher for the Native Races in 
 France and Germany. I now requested Mr. Brown to ask 
 those gentlemen if they had any objections to a French or 
 German edition, and hearing that they had not, I made pro- 
 posals to Maisonneuve et C''^, Paris, and F. A. Brockhaus, 
 to act for me, which were accepted, and copies of the volumes 
 were sent them. All the European publishers were anxious 
 to have their copies in advance, so as to publish simultane- 
 ously; particularly were they desirous of bringing out the 
 book at least on the very day it was issued in New York. 
 
 On accepting the publication of the Native Races for 
 France, Messrs. Maisonneuve et C''' promised to announce 
 the work with great care in the bibliographical journals of 
 France and elsewhere, deliver copies to the principal reviews, 
 and use every exertion in their power to extend its influence. 
 Lucien Adam of the Congres International des Americanistes 
 reviewed the volumes in the Revue Litteraire et Politique, and 
 kindly>caused to be inserted in the Revue Britannique of M. 
 Picot a translation of Mr. Parkman's review in the North 
 American. An able article of twenty-five pages from the pen 
 of H, Blerzy appeared in the Revue des Deux Mondes of the 
 15th of May, 1876. Extended reviews Hkewise appeared in 
 Le Temps, La Rcpublique Fran^aise, and other French jour- 
 nals. Mr. Brockhaus, the German publisher, took an unusual 
 interest in the book, pronouncing it from the first a work of 
 no ordinary importance. 
 
 I cannot enter more fully into the detail of reviewers and 
 reviews ; suffice it to say that two large quarto scrap-books 
 were filled to overflowing with such notices of the Native 
 Races as were sent me. Never perhaps was a book so 
 generally and so favorably reviewed by the best journals in
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. 189 
 
 Europe and America. Among the reviews of which I was 
 most proud were two coUimns in the London Times, some 
 thirty or forty pages in the JVestmiiister Revietu, two columns 
 in the London Standard ; lengthy articles in the North Amer- 
 ican Review, the New York BEco d' Italia, Hartford Courant, 
 Boston Post, Advertiser, and Journal; Springfield Republican, 
 New York TrihuJic, Christian Ujtion, Nation, an6. Post ; British 
 Quarterly, Edinburgh Revieiu, London Nature, Saturday Re- 
 view, Spectator, Academy ; Philadelphia North American, At- 
 lantic Monthly, Scribner's Magazine, The Galaxy; Revue 
 Politique, Revue des Deux Mondes, Hongkong lYess; Zeit- 
 schrift fi'ir Lander, Mittheilungender Kais., etc., Europa und 
 das Ausland, Gennany ; and La Voz del Nuevo Mundo. I 
 might mention a hundred others, but if I did all would not be 
 unadulterated praise. Honors fell upon me after publication, 
 such as being made honorary member of the Massachusetts 
 Historical Society, the American Antiquarian Society, the 
 Philadelphia Numismatic Society, and the Buffalo Historical 
 Society, for which due thanks were given. Flattering recog- 
 nitions came also in form of diplomas and complimentary 
 certificates. 
 
 It v/as a subject in which all were interested. The study 
 of society v,-as the new and most attractive study of the age. 
 Everything relating to man, his habitation and his habits, his 
 idiosyncrasies and his peculiarities, national, social, and in- 
 dividual, all taught a lesson. The sage sat at the feet of the 
 savage, and there studied man as he is in a state of nature, 
 before he is disguised by the crusts and coverings of society. 
 " I could wish that the whole five volumes were already 
 available," writes Herbert Spencer to me in February, 1875, 
 " and had been so for some time past ; for the tabular state- 
 ments and extracts made for the Descriptive Sociology by 
 Professor Duncan would have been more complete than at 
 present." 
 
 Among my warmest friends was Charles C. Jones, Jr., of 
 New York, who reviewed the Native Races in the Independent, 
 devoting several articles to each volume. These articles,
 
 IQO LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 besides being critical reviews, were analytical and descriptive 
 essays, dividing and taking up the subject-matter of each 
 volume, with a view of popularizing the theme. Mr. Jones 
 was fully imbued with the subject, and his articles were very 
 interesting. To me he writes ; " Your fifth volume, ex dono 
 auctoris, reached me to-day. Fresh from the perusal of its 
 charming pages, I offer you my sincere congratulations upon 
 the completion of your magnum opus. Great have been the 
 pleasure and profit which I have experienced in the perusal 
 of the volumes as they have been given to the public." The 
 attention of the American Ethnological Society was like- 
 wise drawn to the work by Mr. Jones, and the author was 
 promptly made an honorary member of that body, with the 
 resolution *' that the volumes which have already appeared 
 indicate patient study, careful discrimination, and exhaustive 
 research, and constitute a monument of industry and merit 
 alike honorable to their author and creditable to the literary 
 effort of our country." 
 
 Thus each great scholar found in the work that which ^vas 
 new and interesting to him in his special investigations, what- 
 ever those might have been, while the attention of the general 
 reader was attracted by a variety of topics. In another respect 
 the subject was a most happy choice for me. While it attracted 
 much more attention than pure history would have done, its 
 imperfections of substance, style, and arrangement were much 
 more readily overlooked. In precise history critics might have 
 looked for more philosophy, more learning, and more dignity 
 of style. All I claimed in the premises was faithfully to have 
 gathered my facts, to have arranged them in a natural manner, 
 and to have expressed them in the clearest language at my 
 command. Where so few pretensions were made reviewers 
 found little room for censure. 
 
 Thus it was that I began to see m my work a success 
 exceeding my highest anticipations. And a first success in 
 literature under ordinary circumstances is a most fortunate 
 occurrence. To me it was everything. I hardly think that
 
 THE PERILS OF PUBLISHING. I91 
 
 failure would have driven me from my purpose ; but I needed 
 more than dogged persistency to carry me through herculean 
 undertakings. I needed confidence in my abilities, assurance, 
 sympathy, and above all enthusiasm. I felt with Lov/ell, that 
 " solid success must be based on solid qualities and the honest 
 culture of them," 
 
 Then again to accomplish my further purpose, which was 
 to do important historical work, it seemed necessary for me 
 to know wherein I had erred and wherein I had done well. 
 From the first, success fell upon me like refreshing showers, 
 invigorating all my subsequent efforts. To the stream of 
 knowledge which I had set flowing through divers retorts 
 and condensers from my accumulations to the clearly printed 
 page, I might now confidently apply all my powers. As the 
 king of the Golden River told Gluck, in Ruskin's beautiful 
 story, whoever should cast into the stream three drops of 
 holy water, for him the waters of the river should turn into 
 gold ; but any one failing in the first attempt should not suc- 
 ceed in a second; and whoso cast in other than holy water 
 should become a black stone. Thus sparkled my work in the 
 sunshine of its success, and the author, so far as he was told, 
 was not yet a black stone.
 
 CHAPTER XIIL 
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 
 
 Ever since there has been so great a demand for type, there has l)een 
 much less lead to spare for cannon-balls. — Biikuer. 
 
 CAME to the library the 21st of October, 1873, Enrique 
 Cerruti, an Itahan, introduced by PhiHp A. Roach, editor 
 and senator, in the terms following: "He speaks Italian, 
 French, Spanish, and English. He can translate Latin. He 
 has been a consul-general and secretary of legation. He is 
 well acquainted with Spanish- American affairs and the lead- 
 ing men in those states." 
 
 Although neither in his person, nor in his history, did the 
 applicant impress me as one specially adapted to literary 
 labors, yet I had long since learned that superficial judg- 
 ments as to character and ability, particularly when applied 
 to wanderers of the Latin race, were ai:»t to prove erroneous. 
 Further than this, while not specially attractive, there was 
 something winning about him, though I scarcely could tell 
 what it was. At all events he secured the place he sought. 
 
 Turning him over to Mr. Oak, for the next three or four 
 months I scarcely gave him a thought. He attempted at 
 first to extract notes for the Native Races, devoting his even- 
 ings to filing Pacific coast journals, recording the numbers 
 received, and placing them in their proper places on the 
 shelves. He was not specially successful in abstracting 
 material, or in any kind of purely literary work ; the news- 
 papers he kept in good order, and he could write rapidly 
 from dictation either in Spanish or English, 
 
 Quickly catching the drift of things, he saw that first of all 
 I desired historical material ; and what next specially drew
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 1 93 
 
 my attention to him was his coming to me occasionally with 
 something he had secured from an unexpected source. When 
 the time came for my book to be noticed by the press he 
 used to write frequent and long articles for the Spanish, 
 French, and Italian journals in San Francisco, New York, 
 Mexico, France, Spain, and Italy. I know of no instance 
 where one of his many articles of that kind was declined. He 
 had a way of his own of making editors do about as he 
 desired in this respect. 
 
 Gradually I became interested in this man, and I saw him 
 interest himself more and more in my behalf; and with time 
 this interest deepened into regard, until finally I became 
 strongly attached to him. This attachment was based on his 
 inherent honesty, devotion, and kindness of heart, though on 
 the surface was too much of display. 
 
 He was a natural adept in certain subtleties which, had his 
 eye been evil, would have made him a first-class villain ; but 
 with all his innocent artifices, and the rare skill and delicate 
 touch employed in playing upon human weaknesses, he was 
 on the whole a well-meaning man. I used to fancy I despised 
 flattery, but I confess I enjoyed not more Nemos's caustic 
 criticisms than Cerruti's oily unctions, which were laid on so 
 gracefully, so tenderly, so liberally, and with the air of one 
 to whom it made little difference whether you believed him 
 in earnest or not ; for he well knew that I understood him 
 thoroughly, and accepted his compliments at their value. 
 Finally, he came to be regarded a privileged character among 
 those who knew him, liberty being given him to talk as he 
 pleased, his aberrations of speech being charged to his genius 
 and not to deliberate intention. 
 
 At first the young men in the library used to laugh at him ; 
 but I pointed to the signal results which he was achieving, 
 and even should he prove in the end knave or fool, success 
 was always a convincing argument. A habit of talking loud 
 and grandiloquently, especially among strangers, made Oak 
 fearful that Cerruti, while making an ass of himself, would 
 
 13
 
 194 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 bring us all into ridicule among sensible men. But, said I, 
 no sensible man brings us the material that he brings. 
 
 He did what no one else connected with the work could 
 do, what but for him never would have been done. He had 
 not the scope and comprehensiveness, or the literary culture, 
 or the graceful style, or steady application, or erudition to 
 achieve for himself. But he had what all of them together 
 could not command : power over the minds of men, consum- 
 mate skill in touching the springs of human action and in 
 making them serve his purpose. 
 
 I do not mean to say that he could not write, and in the 
 Latin languages write eloquently ; the many manuscript vol- 
 umes of history and narrative Avhich have emanated from his 
 pen under the dictation of eminent Califomians and others 
 prove the contrary. His chief talent, however, lay in awaken- 
 ing an interest in my labors. 
 
 But how was this necessary ? What need of special efforts 
 to make proselytes to a cause so palpably important ; a cause 
 neither asking nor accepting subsidy nor pecuniary aid from 
 state, society, or individual ; a cause absolutely private and 
 independent, and having no other object in view than pure 
 investigation and an unbiassed recording of the truth ? Surely, 
 one would think, such an enterprise would not require an 
 effort to make men believe in it. 
 
 Nevertheless it did. There were mercenary minds, who 
 could see nothing but money in it, who having documents 
 or knowledge of historical events would not part with their 
 information but for a price. " Ah ! " said they, " this man 
 knows what he is about. He is not fool enough to spend 
 time and money without prospective return. He is a book 
 man, and all this is but a dodge to make at once money and 
 reputation. No man in this country does something for 
 nothing. No man pours out his money and works like a 
 slave except in the expectation that it will come back to him 
 with interest. He may say he is not working for money, but 
 we do not believe it." Others, although their judgment told 
 them that by no possibility could the outlay be remunerative,
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 1 95 
 
 and that my experience in book-publishing was such that I 
 could not but know it, yet thought, in view of the interest I 
 took in the subject, and the money I was spending, in every 
 direction, in the accumulation of material, that I might per- 
 haps be induced to pay them for their information rather 
 than do without it. No man of common-sense or of common 
 patriotism thought or talked thus ; but I had to do with indi- 
 viduals possessed of neither sense nor patriotism. 
 
 Another class, a large and highly respectable one, was 
 composed of men who for a quarter of a century had been 
 importuned time and again by multitudes of petty scribblers, 
 newspaper interviewers, and quasi historians, for items of 
 their early experience, until they tired of it. So that when a 
 new applicant for information appeared they were naturally 
 and justly suspicious; but when they came to know the 
 character of the work proposed, and were satisfied that it 
 would be fairly and thoroughly done, they were ready with 
 all their powers and possessions to assist the undertaking. 
 
 In some instances, however, it required diplomacy of a no 
 mean order to convince men that there was no hidden or 
 ulterior object in thus gathering and recording their own 
 deeds and the deeds of their ancestors. The Hispano-Cali- 
 fornians particularly, many of them, had been so abused, so 
 swindled, so robbed by their pretended friends, by unprinci- 
 pled Yankee lawyers and scheming adventurers, that they did 
 not know whom to trust, and were suspicious of everybody. 
 Often had letters and other papers been taken from their pos- 
 session and used against them in court to prove the title to 
 their lands defective, or for other detrimental purpose. Then 
 there were individual and local jealousies to be combated. 
 One feared undue censure of himself and undue praise of his 
 enemy ; one family feared that too much prominence would 
 be given another family. Then there were rival authors, 
 who had collected little batches of material with a view 
 to writing the history of California themselves. All these 
 had to be won over and be made to see the great advan- 
 tage to the present and to future generations of having all
 
 196 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 these scattered chapters of history brought into one grand 
 whole. 
 
 To accomphsh something of this was the work of General 
 Cerruti. Chameleon-like he would shift his opinions accord- 
 ing to the company, and adapt his complex nature to the 
 colors of time and place ; with the serious he could be grave, 
 with the young merry, and with the profligate free. With 
 equal grace he could stimulate virtue or wink at vice. Hence, 
 like Catiline planning his conspiracy, he made himself a 
 favorite equally with the best men and the basest. 
 
 Another general : though likewise of the Latin race, yet 
 broader in intellect, of deeper endowment, and gentler sagacity. 
 Among the Hispano-Californians, Mariano de Guadalupe 
 Vallejo deservedly stands first. Bom at Monterey the 7th of 
 July, 1808, of prominent Castilian parentage, twenty-one 
 years were spent in his rehgious, civil, and military training ; 
 after which he took his position at San Francisco as coman- 
 dante of the presidio, collector, and alcalde. In 1835 he 
 established the first ayimtamienio, or town council, at Yerba 
 Buena cove, where was begun the metropolis of San Fran- 
 cisco ; the same year he colonized Sonoma, situated at the 
 northern extremity of San Francisco bay, which ever after 
 was his home. 
 
 While Vallejo was general, his nephew Alvarado was 
 governor. In their early education and subsequent studies, 
 for citizens of so isolated a country as California then was, 
 these two hijos del pais enjoyed unusual advantages. To 
 begin with, their minds were for above the average of those 
 of any country. Alvarado might have taken his place beside 
 eminent statesmen in a world's congress ; and as for literary 
 ability, one has but to peruse their histories respectively, to 
 be impressed with their mental scope and charm of style. 
 
 As a mark of his intellectual tastes and practical wisdom, 
 while yet quite young, Vallejo gathered a library of no mean 
 pretensions, consisting not alone of religious books, which 
 were the only kind at that time regarded with any degree of
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 197 
 
 favor by the clergy of California, but liberally interspersed 
 with works on general knowledge, history, science, juris- 
 prudence, and state-craft. These he kept under lock, ad- 
 mitting none to his rich feast save his nephew Alvarado. 
 
 General Vallejo was a man of fine physique, rather above 
 medium height, portly but straight as an arroAv, with a large 
 round head, high forehead, half-closed eyes, thin black hair, 
 and side-whiskers. Every motion betrayed the military 
 man and the gentleman. His face wore usually a contented 
 and often jovial expression, but the frequent short, quick sigh 
 told of unsatisfied longings, of vain regrets and lacerated 
 ambitions. 
 
 And no wonder, for within the period of his manhood he 
 had seen California emerge from a quiet wilderness and 
 become the haunt of embroiling civilization. He had seen 
 rise from the bleak and shifting sand-dunes of Yerba Buena 
 cove a mighty metropolis, the half of which he might have 
 owned as easily as to write his name, but of which there was 
 not a single foot he could now call his own ; he had seen the 
 graceful hills and sweet valleys of his native land pass from 
 the gentle rule of brothers and friends into the hands of 
 foreigners, under whose harsh domination the sound of his 
 native tongue had died away Uke angels' music. 
 
 Call upon him at Sonoma, at any time from five to ten 
 years after his setding there, and for a native Californian you 
 find a prince, one who occupies, commands, and Hves in 
 rustic splendor. His house, a long two-story adobe, with 
 wing and out-houses, was probably the finest in California. 
 Besides liis dusky retainers, who were swept away by diseases 
 brought upon them by the white man, he had always on the 
 premises at his command a company of soldiers, and servants 
 without number. There he had his library, and there he 
 wrote a history of California, covering some seven or eight 
 hundred manuscript pages ; but, alas ! . house, history, books, 
 and a large portion of the original documents which he and 
 his father and his grandfather had accumulated and pre- 
 served, were almost in a moment swept away by fire. This
 
 198 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 was a great loss ; but few then or subsequently knew any- 
 thing of the papers or the history. 
 
 He was stately and stiff in those days, for he was the first 
 power in northern CaHfornia, and to meet an equal he must 
 travel many leagues. The United States treated him badly, 
 and the state treated him badly, or rather sharpers, citizens 
 of the commonwealth, and acting in the name of the state 
 and of the United States, first took from him his lands, and 
 then failed to keep faith with him in placing the state capital 
 at Vallejo, as they had agreed. 
 
 When gold was discovered, three thousand natives answered 
 to his call ; in the hall of his dwelling at Sonoma, soon after- 
 ward, were stacked jars of the precious metal, as though it 
 had been flour or beans. When one had leagues of land and 
 tons of gold; when lands were given away, not sold and 
 bought, and gold came pouring in for cattle and products 
 which had hitherto been regarded of scarcely value enough 
 to pay for the computation ; when, for aught any one knew, 
 the Sierra was half gold, and gold bought pleasure and adu- 
 lation, what was to stay the lavish hand ? For holding the 
 general's horse the boy was flung a doubloon ; for shaving 
 him the barber was given an ounce and no change required ; 
 at places of entertainment and amusement, at the festive 
 board, the club, the gathering, ounces were as coppers to the 
 New Englander, or as quarter-dollars to the later Californian. 
 
 Singular, indeed, and well-nigh supernatural must have 
 been the sensations which crept over the yet active and vig- 
 orous old gentleman as he wandered amidst the scenes of his 
 younger days. Never saw one generation such change; never 
 saw one man such transformation. Among them he walked 
 like one returned from centuries of journeying. 
 
 " I love to go to Monterey," he used to say to me, "for 
 there I may yet find a litde of the dear and almost obliter- 
 ated past. There is yet the ocean that smiles to me as I 
 approach, and venerable bearded oaks, to which I raise my 
 hat as I pass under them ; and there are streets still familiar,
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 1 99 
 
 and houses not yet torn down, and streams and landscapes 
 which I may yet recognize as part of my former belongings. 
 But after all these are only the unfabricated grave-gear that 
 tell me I am not yet dead." 
 
 In his family and among his friends he was an exceedingly 
 kind-hearted man. Before the stranger, particularly before 
 the importunate Yankee stranger, he drew close round him 
 the robes of his dignity. In all the common courtesies of 
 life he w^as punctilious, even for a Spaniard ; neither was his 
 politeness affected, but it sprang from true gentleness of 
 heart. It was his nature, when in the society of those he 
 loved and respected, to prefer them to himself; it was when 
 he came in contact with the world that all the lofty pride of 
 his Castilian ancestry came to the surface. 
 
 Indeed, the whole current of his nature ran deep; his life 
 was not the dashing torrent, but the still, silent flow of the 
 mighty river. 
 
 In his younger days he w'as a model of chivalry, a true 
 Amadis of Gaul; and when age had stiftened his joints some- 
 what, he lost none of his gallantry, and was as ready with his 
 poetry as with his philosophy. Indeed, he wrote verses with 
 no common degree of talent, and there are many parts of his 
 history which might better be called poetry than prose. 
 
 His philosophy was of the Pythagorean type ; he was not 
 always ready to tell all that he knew, and in determining whom 
 to trust he was governed greatly by his physiognomical dis- 
 cernment. He liked or disliked a person usually upon sight 
 or instinct. He was a close and shrevv'd observer, and was 
 usually correct in his estimates of human character. His 
 wisdom, though simple and fantastic, was deep. He respected 
 the forms of religion from ancient association and habit rather 
 than from strong internal convictions as to their efficacy. 
 There was not the slightest asceticism in his piety ; his was 
 far too intelligent a mind to lie under the curse of bigotry. 
 Without being what might be called a dreamer in philosophic 
 matters, he possessed in a happy degree the faculty of prac- 
 tical abstraction ; there was to him here in the flesh a sphere
 
 200 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 of thought other than that answering to the demands of the 
 body for food and covering. Thither one might sometimes 
 escape and find rest from every-day sohcitudes. 
 
 Although brave and bluff as a soldier, stem and uncom- 
 promising as a man of the world, I have seen him in his 
 softer moods as sensitive and as sentimental as a Madame 
 de Stael. He was in every respect a sincere man. To his 
 honesty, but not to his discretion, a friend might trust his for- 
 tune and his life. He never would betray, but he might 
 easily be betrayed. Ever ready to help a friend, he expected 
 his friend to help him. 
 
 In common with most of his countrymen, his projects and 
 his enthusiasms swayed violently bet^veen extremes. He was 
 too apt to be carried away by whatever was uppermost in his 
 mind. Not that his character lacked ballast, or that he was 
 incapable of close calculation or clear discrimination; but 
 never having been accustomed to the rigid self-restriction 
 which comes from a life of plodding application, he was per- 
 haps too much under the influence of that emprcssement which 
 lies nearest the affections. 
 
 Yet for this same defect, posterity will praise him ,- for an 
 heroic and discriminating zeal which, though impetuous, al- 
 ways hurried him forward in the right direction, his children's 
 children will rise up and call him blessed. He was the no- 
 blest Califomian of them all ! Among all the wealthy, the 
 patriotic, and the learned of this land he alone came forward 
 and flung himself, his time, his energies, and all that was his, 
 into the general fund of experiences accumulating for the 
 benefit of those who should come after him. His loyalty 
 was pure; and haj^py the god in whose conquered city are 
 still found worshippers. 
 
 Pachcco might promise ; Vallcjo performed. While dema- 
 gogues were ranting of their devotion to country, offering for 
 a liberal compensation to sacrifice themselves at Sacramento 
 or at Washington, General Vallejo was spending his time and 
 money scouring California for the rescuing of valuable knowl- 
 edge from obliteration, and in arranging it^ when found, in
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 20I 
 
 form available to the world. Let Spanish-speaking CaUfor- 
 nians honor him, for he was their chief in chivalrous devotion 
 to a noble cause ! Let English-speaking Califomians honor 
 him, for without the means of some he did more than any- 
 other for the lasting benefit of the country ! Let all the 
 world honor him, for he is thrice worthy the praise of all !
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 
 
 A few drops of oil will set the political machine at work, when a ton 
 of vinegar would only corrode the wheels and canker the movements. 
 
 — Co I ion. 
 
 GENERAL Vallejo was wary ; General Cerruti was wily. 
 Rumor had filled all the drawers and chests at La- 
 chryma Montis, the residence of General Vallejo at Sonoma, 
 with priceless documents relating to the history of Cahfornia, 
 some saved from the fire which destroyed his dwelling, some 
 gathered since, and had endowed the owner with singular 
 knowledge in deciphering them and in explaining early 
 affairs. Hence, when some petty scribbler wished to talk 
 largely about things of which he knew nothing, he would 
 visit Sonoma, would bow himself into the parlor at Lachryma 
 Montis, or besiege the general in his study, and beg for some 
 particular purpose a little information concerning the untold 
 past. The general declared that rumor was a fool, and 
 directed applicants to the many historical and biographical 
 sketches already in print. 
 
 I had addressed to Sonoma communications of this charac- 
 ter several times myself, and while I always received a polite 
 reply there was no tangible result. As Cerruti displayed 
 more and more ability in gathering material, and as I was 
 satisfied that General Vallejo could disclose more than he 
 professed himself able to, I directed the Italian to open cor- 
 respondence with him, with instructions to use his own judg- 
 ment in storming the walls of indifference and prejudice at 
 Lachryma Montis. 
 
 License being thus allowed him, Cerruti opened the cam- 
 paign by addressing a letter to General Vallejo couched in
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 203 
 
 terms of true Spanish- American courtesy, which consists of 
 boasting and flattery in equal parts. 
 
 To the searcher after CaUfornian truth Vallejo was CaHfor- 
 nia, to the student of California's history Vallejo was Cali- 
 fornia ; so Cerruti had affirmed in his letter, and the^ecipient 
 seemed not disposed to resent the assertion. The writer 
 loved truth and history; he loved Cahfomia, and longed to 
 know more of her ; most of all he loved Vallejo, who was 
 Cahfomia in the flesh. Not a word said Cerruti about Ban- 
 croft, his library, or his work, preferring to appear before him 
 whom he must conquer as a late consul-general and an exiled 
 soldier, rather than as the subordinate of another. 
 
 The result was as he had desired. Courteously General 
 Vallejo replied, at the same time intimating that if Cerruti 
 desired historical data he had better call and get it. " Sin 
 embargo," he says, " por casualidad 6 por accidente, ese 
 nombre esta relacionado e identificado de tal manera con la 
 historia de la Alta California desde su fundacion hasta hoy, 
 que aunque insignificante, de veras, Sr. Consul, la omision 
 de el en ella sera como la omision de un punto 6 una coma 
 en un discurso escrito 6 la acentuacion ortografica de una 
 carta epistolar." 
 
 So Cerruti. went to Sonoma, went to Lachryma Montis 
 almost a stranger, but carrying with him, in tongue and 
 temper at least, much that was held in common by the man 
 he visited. It was a most difticult undertaking, and I did 
 not know another person in California whom I would have 
 despatched on this mission with any degree of confidence. 
 
 Introducing himself, he told his tale. In his pocket were 
 letters of introduction, but he did not deign to use them ; he 
 determined to make his way after his own fashion. Cerruti's 
 was not the story to which the general was accustomed to 
 turn a deaf ear. Further than this, the Italian had studied 
 well the character of him he sought to win, and knew when to 
 flatter, and how. Spaniards will swallow much if of Spanish 
 flavor and administered in Spanish doses. This Cerruti well
 
 204 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 understood. He had every advantage. In his role of stran- 
 ger visiting the first of CaUfornians, he could play upon the 
 general's pride of person, of family; he could arouse his wrath 
 or stir up soft sympathy almost at pleasure. 
 
 And yet the Spaniard was not duped by the ItaHan; he 
 was only pleased. All the while General Vallejo knew that 
 Cerruti had a definite purpose there, some axe to grind, some 
 favor to ask, which had not yet been spoken ; and when finally 
 the latter veered closer to his errand and spoke of documents, 
 " I presently saw," said the general to me afterward, " the 
 ghost of Bancroft behind him." Nevertheless, Vallejo listened 
 and was pleased. "After making deep soundings," writes 
 Cerruti in the journal I directed him to keep, and which, under 
 the title Rainblings in California, contains much good read- 
 ing, " I came to the conclusion that General Vallejo Avas 
 anxious for some person endowed with literary talents to 
 engage in the arduous task of giving to the world a true his- 
 tory of California. Having come to this conclusion, I frankly 
 admitted to him that I had neither the intelligence nor the 
 means required for so colossal an enterprise, but assured him 
 that Hubert H. Bancroft," etc. After a brief interview Cer- 
 ruti retreated with an invitation to dine at Lachryma Montis 
 the next day. 
 
 It was a grand opportunity, that dinner party, for a few 
 others had been invited, and we may rest assured our gen- 
 eral did not fail to improve it. Early during the courses his 
 inventive faculties were brought into play, and whenever any- 
 thing specially strong arose in his mind he threw up his chin, 
 and lifted his voice so that all present might hear it. On 
 whatever subject such remark might be, it was sure to be 
 received with laughter and applause ; for somewhere inter- 
 woven in it was a compliment for some one present, who if 
 not specially pleased at the broad flattery could but be 
 amused at the manner in which it was presented. How well 
 the envoy improved his time is summed in one line of his 
 account, where with charming naivete he says : " In such 
 pleasant company hunger disappeared as if by enchant-
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 205 
 
 ment, and the food placed on my plate was left almost 
 untouched" — in plam English, he talked so much he could 
 not eat. 
 
 Next day our expert little general was everywhere, talking 
 to everybody, in barber-shops, beer-saloons, and wine-cellars, 
 in public and private houses, offices and stores, making friends 
 and picking up information relating to his mission. First he 
 wrote the reminiscences of some half-dozen pioneers he had 
 met and conversed with on the boat, at the hotel, and on the 
 street, writings which he did not fail to spread before Gen- 
 eral Vallejo, with loud and ludicrous declamation on the 
 character of each. Thus he made the magnate of Sonoma 
 feel that the visitor was at once to become a man of mark 
 in that locality, whom to have as a friend was better for Val- 
 lejo than that he should be regarded as opposed to his mis- 
 sion. But this was not the cause of the friendship that now 
 began to spring up in the breasts of these two men. 
 
 This display of ability on the part of the new-comer could 
 not fail to carry with it the respect of those who otherwise 
 were sensible enough to see that Cerruti was a most windy 
 and erratic talker. But his vein of exaggeration, united as it 
 was with energy, ability, enthusiasm, and honesty, amused 
 rather than offended, particularly when people recognized 
 that deception and harm were not intended. Here indeed 
 was one of the secret charms of Cerruti, this and his flattery. 
 All Spaniards delight in hyperbole. 
 
 Among Cerruti's earliest acquaintances made at Sonoma 
 was Major Salvador Vallejo, a younger brother of the gen- 
 eral, and from whom he took a very interesting dictation. 
 Major Salvador was born in Monterey in 1814. He had 
 been a great Indian-fighter, and had many interesting events 
 to relate of by-gone times. 
 
 Often Cerruti would give great names to the shadows of 
 men, and find himself pressed to the wall by the greatness he 
 had invoked ; often he was obHged to allay by falsehood 
 anger aroused by indiscretion. Writing on the 2gth of 
 November, 1874, he says: "Major Salvador Vallejo has
 
 206 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 perused the Overland, and is very much enraged that the 
 writer of the article on material for California history should 
 have given credit to Castro and Alvarado, who as yet have 
 not written a single line, and that nothing was said in refer- 
 ence to his dictation. I told him that the writer in the Over- 
 land was not connected with the Bancroft library, but he 
 refused to believe what I said." 
 
 Thus the Italian continued, until a week, ten days, a fort- 
 night, passed without very much apparent headway so far as 
 the main object of his mission was concerned. The minor 
 dictations were all valuable ; but anything short of success 
 in the one chief object which had called him there was not 
 success. Every day Cerruti danced attendance at Lachryma 
 Montis, spending several hours there, sometimes dining, some- 
 times chatting through the evening. He created a favorable 
 impression in the mind of Mrs. Vallejo, made love to the 
 young women, and flattered the general to his heart's content. 
 
 This was all very pleasant to the occupants of a country 
 residence. It was not every day there came to Lachryma 
 Montis such a fascinating fellow as Cerruti, one who paid his 
 board at the Sonoma hotel, and his bill at the livery stable ; 
 and no wonder the Vallejos enjoyed it, Uppermost in the 
 faithful Italian's mind, however, throughout the whole of it 
 was his great and primary purpose. But whenever he spoke 
 of documents, of the Sonoma treasury of original historical 
 material. General Vallejo retired within himself, and remained 
 oblivious to the most wily arts of the tempter. The old 
 general would talk ; he liked to talk, for when he could em- 
 ploy his native tongue he was a brilliant conversationalist 
 and after-dinner speaker. And on retiring to his quarters the 
 younger general would record whatever he could remember 
 of the words that fell from his elder's lips. Sometimes, indeed, 
 when they were alone Cerruti would take out his note-book 
 and write as his companion spoke. 
 
 But all this was most unsatisfying to Cerruti : and he now 
 began more clearly to intimate that the spending of so much
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 207 
 
 time and money in that way would be unsatisfactory to 
 Mr. Bancroft. Then he plainly said that he must make a 
 better showing or retire from the field. If it was true, as 
 General Vallejo had assured him, that he had nothing, and 
 could not be prevailed upon to dictate his recollections, that 
 was the end of it; he must return to San Francisco and 
 so report. 
 
 This threat was not made, however, until the crafty Italian 
 had well considered the effect. He saw that Vallejo was 
 gradually becoming more and more interested in him and his 
 mission. He saw that, although the general was extremely 
 reticent regarding what he possessed, and what he would do, 
 he was seriously revolving the subject in his mind, and that 
 he thought much of it. 
 
 But the old general could be as cunning and crafty as the 
 younger one, and it was now the Spaniard's turn to play upon 
 the Italian. This he did most skilfully, and in such a manner 
 as thoroughly to deceive him and throw us all off the scent. 
 
 While reiterating his assurances that he had nothing, and 
 that he could disclose nothing ; that when he wrote his recol- 
 lections the first time he had before him the vouchers in the 
 form of original letters, proclamations, and other papers, 
 which were all swept away by the fire that burned the manu- 
 script he had prepared with such care and labor; and that 
 since then he had dismissed the subject from his mind ; that, 
 indeed, it had become distasteful to him, and should never 
 be revived — while these facts were kept constantly before 
 Cerruti, as if firmly to impress them upon his mind. General 
 Vallejo would uncover, little by little, to his watchful atten- 
 dant the vast fund of information at his command. Some 
 anecdote, apparently insignificant in itself, would be artfully 
 interwoven with perhaps a dozen historical incidents, and in 
 this exasperating manner the searcher after historical facts 
 would be shown a fertile field which it was forbidden him to 
 enter. 
 
 To keep the Italian within call, and that he might not be 
 so reduced to despair as to abandon further attempts and
 
 208 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 return to San Francisco, Vallejo now began also to feed his 
 appetite with a few papers which he professed to have found 
 scattered about the premises, granting him permission to take 
 copies of them, and intimating that perhaps he might find a 
 few more when those were returned. There was his office, or 
 the parlor, at the scribe's disposal, where he might write un- 
 molested. 
 
 With a will Cerruti began his task. When it was finished 
 a few more papers were given him. At first General Vallejo 
 would on no account permit a single paper to be taken from 
 the premises. But working hours at Lachryma Montis must 
 necessarily be short, and interruptions frequent. Would not 
 General Vallejo kindly repose confidence enough to permit 
 him to take the documents to his hotel to copy, upon his 
 sacred assurance that not one of them should pass out of his 
 hands, but should be returned immediately the copy was 
 made? With apparent reluctance the request was finally 
 granted. 
 
 This made Cerruti hilarious in his letters to Oak. General 
 Vallejo was a great and good man, and was rapidly taking 
 him into his friendship, which was indeed every word of it 
 true. And now in some unaccountable way the papers to be 
 copied rapidly increased; more of them were brought to 
 light than had been thought to exist. The hotel was noisy 
 and unpleasant, and the copyist finally determined to rent a 
 room on the street fronting the jilaza, where he might write 
 and receive his friends. There he could keep his own wine 
 and cigars with which to regale those who told him their 
 stories, and the sums which had before been spent at bar- 
 rooms treating these always thirsty persons would pay room 
 rent. Cerruti was a close financier, but a liberal spender of 
 other men's money. It is needless to say that as the result 
 of this deeply laid economic scheme the copyist had in his 
 office usually two or three worthless idlers drinking and 
 smoking in the name of literature and at the expense of his- 
 tory, persons whom he found it impossible to get rid of, and 
 whom it was not politic to offend.
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 209 
 
 Thicker and broader was each succeeding package now 
 given the brave consul-general to copy, until he began to 
 tire of it. He must have help. What harm would there be, 
 after all, if he sent part of each package carefully by express 
 to the library to be copied there ? There was no lisk. He 
 could represent to me that General Vallejo had given per- 
 mission, with the understanding that they must be returned 
 at once. Besides, it was absolutely necessary that something 
 should be done. Sonoma was an extremely dull, uninter- 
 esting place, and he did not propose to spend the remainder 
 of his days there copying documents. 
 
 The method he employed, which would at once enable 
 him to accomplish his object and keep his faith, was some- 
 what unique. Major Salvador Vallejo once wishing Cerruti 
 to spend a day with him, the latter replied : " I cannot ; I 
 must copy these papers ; but if you will assume the responsi- 
 bihty and send them to San Francisco to be copied I am at 
 your service." Salvador at once assented, and ever after all 
 breaches of trust were laid upon his shoulders. 
 
 Thus matters continued for two months and more, during 
 which time Oak, Fisher, and myself severally made visits to 
 Sonoma and were kindly entertained at Lachryma Montis. 
 All this time General Vallejo was gaining confidence in my 
 messenger and my work. He could but be convinced that 
 this literary undertaking was no speculation, or superficial 
 clap-trap, but genuine, soHd, searching work. Once thor- 
 oughly satisfied of this, and the battle was won ; for General 
 Vallejo was not the man to leave himself, his family, his 
 many prominent and unrecorded deeds, out of a work such 
 as this purported to be. 
 
 One day while in a somewhat more than usually confiden- 
 tial mood he said to Cerruti : " I cannot but believe Mr. 
 Bancroft to be in earnest, and that he means to give the 
 world a true history of California. I was bom in this coun- 
 try; I once undertook to write its history, but my poor 
 manuscript and my house were burned together. I was 
 absent from home at the time. By mere chance my servants 
 14
 
 210 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 succeeded in saving several bundles of documents referring 
 to the early days of California, but the number was insignifi- 
 cant compared with those destroyed. However, I will write 
 to San Jose for a trunk filled with papers that I have there, 
 and of which you may copy for Mr. Bancroft what you please." 
 
 " But, General," exclaimed Cerruti, overwhelmed by the 
 revelation, " I cannot copy them here. Since you have been 
 so kind as to repose this confidence in me, permit me to take 
 the papers to the library and employ men to copy them; 
 otherwise I might work over them for years." 
 
 " Well, be it so," replied the general ; " and while you are 
 about it, there are two other chests of documents here which 
 I have never disturbed since the fire. Take them also ; copy 
 them as quickly as you can, and return them to me. I shall 
 be more than repaid if Mr. Bancroft's history proves such as 
 my country deserves." 
 
 Now it was a fundamental maxim with Cerruti never to be 
 satisfied. In collecting material, where I and most men would 
 be gratefully content, acquisition only made him the more 
 avaricious. As long as there was anything left, so long did 
 he not cease to importune. 
 
 " Why not multiply this munificence fourfold," he said, 
 " by giving Mr. Bancroft these documents out and out, and 
 so save him the heavy expense of copying them? That 
 would be a deed worthy of General Vallejo. Surely Mr. 
 Bancroft's path is beset with difficulties enough at best. In 
 his library your documents will be safely kept ; they will be 
 collated, bound, and labelled with your name, and this good 
 act shall not only be heralded now, but the record of it shall 
 stand forever." 
 
 " No, sir ! " exclaimed the general, emphatically. . " At all 
 events not now. And I charge you to make no further 
 allusion to such a possibility if you value my favor. Think 
 you I regard these papers so lightly as to be wheedled out 
 of them in little more than two short months, and by one 
 almost a stranger? You have asked many times for my 
 recollections ; those I am now prepared to give you."
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 211 
 
 " Good ! " cried Cerruti, who was always ready to take 
 what he could get, provided he could not get what he wanted. 
 " All ready, General ; you may begin your narrative." 
 
 " My friend," returned the general mildly, " you seem to 
 be in haste. I should take you for a Yankee rather than for 
 an Italian. Do you expect me to write history on horseback ? 
 I do not approve of this method. I am willing and ready 
 to relate all I can remember, but I wish it clearly understood 
 that it must be in my own way, and at my own time. I will 
 not be hurried or dictated to. It is my history, and not 
 yours, I propose to tell. Pardon me, my friend, for speaking 
 thus plainly, but I am particular on this point. If I give my 
 story it must be worthy of the cause and worthy of me." 
 
 To Cerruti it was easier to write a dozen pages than to 
 think about writing one. In the opinion of Vallejo, such a 
 writer deserved to be burned upon a pile of his own works, 
 like Cassius Etruscus, who boasted he could write four hun- 
 dred pages in one day. 
 
 But this rebuke was not unpalatable, for it lifted the matter 
 at once from the category of personal narrative to the higher 
 plane of exact history. It was history, and nothing beneath 
 it, to be written no less from documentary than from personal 
 evidence, and from the documents and experiences of others, 
 as well as from his papers and personal observations. 
 
 With June came the two generals to San Francisco. The 
 Vallejo documents were all in the librar)', and round one of 
 the long tables were seated eight Mexicans copying them. 
 One morning the Spaniard and the Italian entered the li- 
 brary. I think this was General Vallejo's first visit to the fifth 
 floor. 
 
 It was to him an impressive sight. Passing the cop)dsts, 
 who with one accord signified their respect by rising and 
 bowing, he was conducted to my room. Nemos, Oak, and 
 others who happened to be acquainted with the general, 
 then came in; cigars were passed, and the conversation 
 became general. The history of California, with the Vallejo 
 family as a central figure, was the theme, and it was earnestly
 
 212 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 and honestly discussed. Two hours were then spent by the 
 distinguished visitor examining the Hbrary. He was attended 
 by one of my assistants, who explained everything, giving in 
 detail what we had done, what we were doing, and what we 
 proposed to do. 
 
 It was very evident that General Vallejo was impressed 
 and pleased. Here was the promise of a work which of all 
 others lay nearest his heart, conducted on a plan which if 
 carried out would, he was convinced, secure the grandest 
 results. It was a work in which he was probably more 
 nearly concerned than the author of it. If I was the writer 
 of history, he was the embodiment of history. This he 
 seemed fully to realize. 
 
 Cerruti saw his opportunity ; let my faithful Italian alone 
 for that! He saw Vallejo drinking it all in like an inspira- 
 tion; he saw it in his enkindled eye, in his flushed face and 
 firm tread. Before the examination of the library was fairly 
 finished, placing himself by the side of his now sincere and 
 devoted friend he whispered, " Now is your time. General. 
 If you are ever going to give those papers — and what better 
 can you do with them ? — this is the proper moment. Mr. 
 Bancroft suspects nothing. There are the copyists, seated to 
 at least a twelvemonth's labor. A word from you Avill save 
 him this large and unnecessary expenditure, secure his grati- 
 tude, and the admiration of all present." 
 
 " He deserves them ! " was the reply. " Tell him they are 
 his." 
 
 I was literally speechless with astonishment and joy when 
 Cerruti said to me, " General Vallejo gives you all his papers." 
 Besides the priceless intrinsic value of these documents, which 
 would forever place my library beyond the power of man to 
 equal in original material for California history, the example 
 would double the benefits of the gift. 
 
 I knew General Vallejo would not stop there. He Avas 
 slow to be won, but once enlisted, his native enthusiasm 
 would carry him to the utmost limit of his ability ; and I was 
 right. From that moment I had not only a friend and sup-
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 213 
 
 porter, but a diligent worker. Side by side with Savage and 
 Cerruti, for the next two years he alternately wrote history 
 and scoured the country for fresh personal and documentary 
 information. 
 
 " When I visited San Francisco last week," writes General 
 Vallejo to the Sonoma Democrat, in reply to a complaint that 
 theVallejo archives should have been permitted to become 
 the property of a private individual, " I had not the slightest 
 intention of parting with my documents; but my friends hav- 
 ing induced me to visit Mr. Bancroft's library, where I was 
 shown the greatest attention, and moreover allowed to look 
 at thousands of manuscripts, some of them bearing the sig- 
 natures of Columbus, Isabel the Catholic, Philip II., and vari- 
 ous others pre-eminent among those who figured during the 
 fifteenth century, I was exceedingly pleased ; and when Mr. 
 Bancroft had the goodness to submit to my inspection seven 
 or eight thousand pages written by himself, and all relating 
 to California, the history of which until now has remained 
 unwritten, I could not but admire the writer who has taken 
 upon himself the arduous task of giving to the world a com- 
 plete history of the country in which I was bom ; and there- 
 fore I believed it my duty to offer to him the documents in 
 my possession, with the certainty that their perusal would in 
 some wise contribute to the stupendous enterprise of a young^ 
 writer who is employing his means and intelligence for the 
 purpose of carrying to a favorable termination the noble task 
 of bequeathing to the land of his adoption a history worthy 
 of his renown." 
 
 I thanked the general as best I could ; but words poorly 
 expressed my gratitude. The copyists were dismissed, all 
 but two or three, who were put to work arranging and index- 
 ing the documents preparatory to binding. A title-page was 
 printed, and when the work was done twenty-seven large 
 thick volumes of original material, each approaching the 
 dimensions of a quarto dictionary, were added to the library ; 
 nor did General Vallejo cease his good work until the twenty-- 
 seven were made fifty.
 
 214 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 That night I entertained the general at my house; and 
 shortly afterward he brought his family from Lachryma 
 Montis and stayed a month with me, a portion of which 
 time the general himself, attended by Cerruti, spent at 
 Monterey writing and collecting. 
 
 It was in April, 1874, that Cerruti began writing in Spanish 
 the Hisioria de California, dictated by M. G. Vallejo. It 
 was understood from the first that this history was for my 
 sole use, not to be printed unless I should so elect, and that 
 my sanction was not probable. It was to be used by me in 
 writing my history as other chief authorities were used; the 
 facts and incidents therein contained were to be given their 
 proper place and importance side by side with other facts 
 and incidents. 
 
 The two years of labor upon the Vallejo history were cheer- 
 fully borne by the author for the benefit it would confer upon 
 his country, and that without even the hope of some time 
 seeing it in print. Undoubtedly there was personal and 
 family pride connected with it ; yet it was a piece of as pure 
 patriotism as it has ever been my lot to encounter. General 
 Vallejo never would accept from me compensation for his 
 part of the work. I was to furnish an amanuensis in the 
 person of Cerruti, and the fruits of their combined labor were 
 to be mine unreservedly. As it was, the cost to me amounted 
 to a large sum ; but had the author charged me for his time 
 and expenses, it would have been twice as much. 
 
 This and other obligations of which I shall have occasion 
 to speak hereafter, I can never forget. Posterity cannot 
 estimate them too highly. General Vallejo was the only man 
 on the coast who could have done this if he would; and 
 besides being the most competent, he was by far the most 
 willing person with whom I had much to do. 
 
 Yet this obligation did not in the slightest degree bind me 
 to his views upon any question. I trust I need not say at 
 this late date that I was swayed by no palpable power to one 
 side or another in my writings. Knowing how lavish 
 Spaniards are of their praises, how absurdly extravagant their
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 215 
 
 inflated panegyrics sound to Anglo-Saxon ears, and how 
 coldly calculating English laudations appear to them, I never 
 hoped to please Californians ; I never thought it possible to 
 satisfy them, never wrote to satisfy them, or, indeed, any one 
 class or person. And I used to say to General Vallejo : 
 " You being a reasonable man will understand, and will, I 
 hope, believe that I have aimed to do your people justice. 
 But they will not as a class think so. I claim to have no 
 prejudices as regards the Hispano-Californians, or if I have 
 they are all in their favor. Yet you will agi-ee with me that 
 they have their faults, in common with Englishmen, Ameri- 
 cans, and all men. None of us are perfect, as none of us 
 are wholly bad. Now nothing less than superlative and 
 perpetual encomiums would satisfy your countrymen, I 
 cannot write to please or win the special applause of race, 
 sect, or party; if I did my writings would be worthless. 
 Truth alone is all I seek ; that I will stand or fall by. And 
 I believe that you, General, will uphold me in this." 
 
 Thus I endeavored to prepare his mind for any unwhole- 
 some truths which he might see ; for most assuredly I should 
 utter them as they came, no matter who might be the sufferer 
 or what the cost. 
 
 For several years, while busiest in the collection of mate- 
 rial, a good share of my time was taken up in conciliating 
 those whom I had never offended ; that is to say, those ancient 
 children, my Hispano-Californian aUies, who were constantly 
 coming to grief. Some of them were jealous of me, some 
 jealous of each other ; all by nature seemed ready to raise 
 their voices in notes of disputatious woe upon the slightest 
 provocation. 
 
 For example : General Vallejo had no sooner given his 
 papers to the library than one of the copyists wrote the 
 notary Ramon de Zaldo, a friend of Vallejo, a letter, in which 
 he called in question the general's motives in thus parting 
 with his papers. 
 
 " It was to gain the good-will of Mr. Bancroft that these 
 documents were thus given him," he said, " and consequently
 
 2l6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 we may expect to see the history written in the Vallejo inter- 
 est, to the detriment of other CaUfomians." 
 
 When General Vallejo stepped into the notary's office next 
 morning, Zaldo showed him the letter. Vallejo was very 
 angry, and justly so. It was a most malicious blow, aimed 
 at the general's most sensitive spot. 
 
 " It is an infamous lie ! " the general raved, walking up and 
 down the office. "If ever an act of mine was disinterested, 
 and done from pure and praiseworthy motives, this was such 
 a one. What need have I to court Mr. Bancroft's favors? 
 He was as much my friend before I gave the papers as he 
 could be. There was not the slightest intimation of a com- 
 pact. Mr. Bancroft is not to be influenced ; nor would I 
 influence him if I could. I felt that he deserved this much 
 at my hands ; and I only regret that my limited income pre- 
 vents me from supplementing the gift with a hundred thou- 
 sand dollars to help to carry forward the good work, so that 
 the burden of it should not fall whofly on one man." 
 
 Of Cenuti's jRamMugs there are two hundred and thirteen 
 pages. Portions of the manuscript are exceedingly amusing, 
 particularly to one acquainted with the writer. I will let him 
 speak of a trip to San Jose, made, by him in June, I think, 
 
 1874- 
 
 " A few days after my arrival in San Francisco I visited 
 San Jose, well supplied with letters of introduction from Gen- 
 eral Vallejo. My first steps on reaching that city were directed 
 toward the Bernal farm, where dwelt an aged gentleman who 
 went by the name of Francisco Peralta, but whose real name 
 I could not ascertain. I gave him a letter of introduction 
 from General Vallejo. He read it three or four times; then 
 he went to a drawer and from among some rags pulled out a 
 splendid English translation of the voyages of Father Font. 
 He took off the dust from the manuscript, then handed it to 
 me. I looked at it for a few moments for the purpose of 
 making sure that I held the right document. Then I unbut- 
 toned my overcoat and placed it in my bosom. 
 
 " ' What arc you doing, my friend? ' shouted Peralta.
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 21 7 
 
 " I replied : ' Estoy poniendo el documento en lugar de 
 seguridad, tengo que caminar esta noche y recelo que el 
 sereno lo moje.' 
 
 " He looked astonished, and then said : ' I will not allow 
 you to take it away. General Vallejo requested that I should 
 permit you to copy it. That I am willing to do ; but as to 
 giving you my Font, that is out of the question.' 
 
 " As I had brought along with me a botde of the best 
 brandy, I called for a corkscrew and a couple of glasses, and 
 having lighted a segar I presented my companion with a real 
 Habana. Having accepted it, we were "soon engaged in 
 conversation." 
 
 The writer then gives a sketch of the settlement and early 
 history of San Jose as narrated by his aged companion. 
 After which he continues: 
 
 " I then tried to induce Mr. Peralta to give me a few details 
 about himself, but to no purpose. I kept on filling his glass 
 till the bottle was emptied, but I gained nothing by the trick, 
 because every time he tasted he drank the health of General 
 Vallejo, and of course I could not conveniently refuse to 
 keep him company. The clock of the farm-house having 
 struck two, I bid adieu to Mr. Peralta, unfastened my horse 
 that had remained tied to a post during five hours, and then 
 returned to San Jose. Of course I brought along with me 
 the venerable Father Font ! " 
 
 When I learned how far the Italian had been carried by 
 his zeal in my behalf, I returned Peralta the book with ample 
 apologies. 
 
 Cerruti now proceeded to the college at Santa Clara, and 
 thus describes the visit : 
 
 " With reverential awe, cast-down eyes, and studied de- 
 meanor of meekness, I entered the edifice of learning. As 
 soon as the gate closed behind me I took off my hat and 
 addressed the porter, whom I requested to send my card to 
 the reverend father director. Having said that much I 
 entered the parlor, opened a prayer-book that happened to 
 be at hand, and began to read the Miserere mei Deiis se-
 
 2l8 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 cundutn magnam viisericordlain tuaiii, which Hnes recalled to 
 my mind many gloomy thoughts; for the last time I had 
 sung these solemn sentences was at the funeral of President 
 Melgarejo, the man who had been to me a second father. 
 But I was not allowed much time for reflection, because 
 presently a tall priest of pleasing countenance entered the 
 parlor, beckoned me to a chair, and in a voice that reflected 
 kindness and good-will begged of me to explain the object 
 which had procured for him the pleasure of my visit. I then 
 announced myself as the representative of the great historian, 
 H. Bancroft" — I may as well here state that whenever Cer- 
 ruti mentioned my name in the presence of strangers there 
 were no adjectives in any language too lofty to employ — 
 " notified him that my object in visiting the college was for 
 the purpose of having a fair view of the library and of exam- 
 ining the manuscripts it contained. I likewise assured him 
 that though the history was not written by a member of the 
 church of Rome, yet in it nothing derogatory to the Catholic 
 faith would be found. I added, however, that the bigoted 
 priests who had destroyed the Aztec paintings, monuments, 
 and hieroglyphics, which ought to have been preserved for 
 the benefit of posterity, would be censured in due form, and 
 their grave sin against science commented upon with the 
 severity required. He reflected a moment and then said : 
 ' I see no reason why I should object to have the truth made 
 known. History is the light of truth ; and when an impartial 
 writer undertakes to write the history of a country we must 
 not conceal a single fact of public interest,' 
 
 " After saying this he left the room. In about two minutes 
 he returned with the priest who had charge of the college li- 
 brary. He introduced his subordinate to me and then added: 
 ' Father Jacobo will be happy to place at your disposal every 
 book and manuscript we possess.' The father superior hav- 
 ing retired, I engaged in conversation with the librarian, who 
 forthwith proceeded to the library, where I perceived many 
 thousand books arranged upon shelves, but found only a few 
 manuscripts. Among tlic manuscripts I discovered one of
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 219 
 
 about eight hundred pages, which contained a detailed ac- 
 count of the founding of every church buih in Mexico and 
 Guatemala. The manuscript was not complete; the first 
 eighty pages were missing. There were also a few pages of 
 a diary kept by one of the first settlers of San Diego, but the 
 rest of the diary was missing. I copied a few pages from 
 this manuscript; then I tied together every document I 
 judged would be of interest to Mr. Bancroft, delivered the 
 package to the father librarian, and begged of him to see the 
 father superior and request his permission to forward the bun- 
 dle to San Francisco. He started to fulfil my request, and 
 assured me that though he had no hope of success, because 
 it was against the rules of the college, he would make known 
 my wishes to his chief. He was absent half an hour, when 
 he returned bearing a negative answer. Among other things 
 he said that the manuscripts I wanted to send away did not 
 belong to the college, but were the property of some pious 
 person who had placed them under their charge, with instruc- 
 tions not to let the papers go out of their possession. I felt 
 convinced that my reverend countryman was telling me the 
 truth, so I abstained from urging my petition ; but I limited 
 myself to make a single request, namely, that he would be so 
 kind as to keep in a separate place the package I had pre- 
 pared. He agreed to it. I embraced him Italian style, and 
 then directed my steps toward the residence of Mr. Argiiello. 
 
 " I rang the bell of the stately dwelling in which the de- 
 scendant of governors dwelt, and having been ushered into 
 the presence of Mr. Argiiello, I stated to him the object of 
 my visit. He listened with the air of one anxious to impress 
 upon my mind the idea that I stood in the presence of a very 
 great man. 
 
 " When I concluded my introductory remarks, he said : 
 ' Well, well, in all this large house, by far the best one in 
 Santa Clara, there does not exist a single scrap of paper that 
 could be useful to an historian. I once found a great many 
 documents that had been the property of my grandfather, 
 also some belonging to my father, but I have set fire to them ;
 
 220 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 I did not like the idea of encumbering my fine dwelling with 
 boxes containing trash, so I got rid of the rubbish by burning 
 the whole lot.' 
 
 " Without uttering another word except the usual compli- 
 ments, I left the 'best house in Santa Clara' and took the 
 road that led to the telegraph office, and there addressed a 
 telegram to General Mariano G. Vallejo, requesting his pres- 
 ence in Santa Clara. I took that step because I believed that 
 Mr. Argiiello had not told me the truth. I thought it so 
 strange that a son who had reached the age of fifty years 
 should be so stupid as to burn the family archives. I also 
 began to fear that my plain talk had given offence ; therefore 
 I ventured to send for the good friend of Mr. Bancroft, hoping 
 that the high respect in which Mr. Argiiello held General 
 Vallejo would induce him to place at his disposal any docu- 
 ments he might have in the house." 
 
 The widow of Luis Antonio Argiiello, and mother of the 
 burner of the family archives against whom Cerruti had taken 
 a violent dislike, received General Vallejo with open arms, 
 and invited the two generals to dine with her. The invita- 
 tion was accepted. The paper-burner was there, watching 
 the visitors very closely. When dinner was nearly over, 
 Cerruti, who was so filled with wrath toward the four-eyed 
 Argiiello, as he called him, that he found little place for food, 
 exclaimed : 
 
 " Madame Argiiello, yesterday I asked your eldest son to 
 allow me to copy the family archives ; but he assured me that 
 the archives and every other document of early days had 
 been burned by his orders. Can it be possible ? " 
 
 " Indeed, sir, I am sorry to say that it is true," she replied. 
 " And as she called to witness the blessed Virgin," continued 
 Cerruti, " I felt convinced that such was the case." 
 
 The two generals called on several of the old residents in 
 that vicinity, among them Captain Fernandez, who freely 
 gave all the documents in his possession, and furnished a 
 valuable dictation. C'aptain West, on whom they next called, 
 at their request sent out to Lick's mills and brought in the
 
 ITALIAN STRATEGY. 221 
 
 aboriginal Marcelo, who laid claim to one hundred and 
 twenty years of this life. 
 
 Gradually working south, the two generals did not stop 
 until they had reached Monterey. To the elder there was 
 no spot in the country so pregnant with historical events as 
 this early capital of California. There was no important town 
 so little changed by time and the inroads of a dominant race 
 as Monterey. There General Vallejo was at once thrown 
 back into his past. Every man and woman was a volume of 
 unstrained facts ; hedges and thickets bristled with intelli- 
 gence; houses, fences, streets, and even the stones in them, 
 each had its tale to tell. The crows cawed history; the 
 cattle bellowed it, and the sweet sea sang it. An interesting 
 chapter could easily be written on Cerruti's report of what he 
 and General Vallejo saw and did during this visit to Monte- 
 rey ; but other affairs more pressing claim our attention.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 GOVERNOR ALVARADO. 
 
 God made man to go by motives, and he will not go without them, 
 any more than a boat without steam or a balloon without gas. 
 
 — Beccher. 
 
 NEXT among the Hispano-Californians in historical impor- 
 tance to Mariano G. Vallejo stood his nephew Juan B. 
 Alvarj.do, governor of CaUfomia from 1836 to 1842. At the 
 time of which I speak he Hved in a plain and quiet way at 
 San Pablo, a small retired town on the eastern side of San 
 Francisco bay. In build and bearing he reminded one of 
 the first Napoleon. He was a strong man, mentally and 
 physically. Of medium stature, his frame was compact, and 
 well forward on broad shoulders was set a head with massive 
 jawbones, high forehead, and, up to the age of sixty, bright 
 intellectual eyes. 
 
 In some respects he was the ablest officer California could 
 boast under Mexican regime. He was born in 1809, which 
 made him a year younger than his uncle General Vallejo. 
 Before he made himself governor he held an appointment in 
 the custom-house, and had always been a prominent and 
 popular man. His recollections were regarded by every one 
 as very important, but exceedingly diflicult to obtain. 
 
 First of all he must be brought to favor my undertaking; 
 and as he was poor and proud, in ill health, and bitter against 
 the Americans, this was no easy matter. 
 
 Alvarado had been much less Americanized than Vallejo ; 
 he had mixed little with the new-comers, and could speak 
 their language scarcely at all. In common with all his coun- 
 trymen he fancied he had been badly abused, had been
 
 GOVERNOR ALVARADO. 223 
 
 tricked and robbed of millions of dollars which he had never 
 possessed, and of hundreds of leagues of land which he had 
 neglected to secure to himself. 
 
 Like Vallejo, Alvarado had often been importuned for 
 information relative to early affairs, but he had given to the 
 world less than his uncle, being less in and of the world as 
 it existed in California under Anglo-American domination. 
 Surely, one would think so able a statesman, so astute a 
 governor as Alvarado, would have been a match for strag- 
 glers iuto his territory, or even for the blatant lawyers that 
 followed in their wake, but the same golden opportunities 
 that Vallejo and the rest had let slip, Alvarado had failed to 
 improve. 
 
 Alvarado was a rare prize; but he was shrewd, and there 
 could be but little hope of success in an appeal to the patriot- 
 ism of one whose country had fallen into the hands of hated 
 strangers. We had thought Vallejo suspicious enough, but 
 Alvarado was more so. Then, too, the former governor of 
 California, unlike the general, was not above accepting 
 money; not, indeed, as a reward for his services, but as a 
 gift. 
 
 Almost as soon as General Vallejo had fairly enlisted in 
 the work he began to talk of Alvarado, of his vast knowledge 
 of things Californian, and of his abiHty in placing upon paper 
 character and events. And at that time, in regard to this 
 work, action was not far behind impulse. Vallejo began to 
 importune Alvarado, first by letter, then in person, giving 
 him meanwhile liberal doses of Cerruti. 
 
 On one occasion the governor remarked to the general : 
 " It seems you insist that Mr. Bancroft is to be our Messiah, 
 who will stop the mouth of babblers that insult us. I am of 
 the contrary opinion in regard to this, and will tell you why; 
 I do not believe that any American, a well-educated literary 
 man, will contradict what the ignorant populace say of the 
 Californians, from the fact that the Cholada Gringa, or 
 Yankee scum, are very numerous, and take advantage of it 
 to insult us, as they are many against few. This is a peculi-
 
 224 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 arity of the American people. To these must be added a 
 great number of Irish and German boors, who unite with 
 them in these assauUs. ^\^ere we as numerous as the Chinese, 
 it is clear that they would not dare to be wanting in respect 
 to us ; but we are merely a few doves in the claws of thou- 
 sands of hawks, which lay mines charged with legal witcheries 
 in order to entrap us," 
 
 The 24th of August, 1874, General Vallejo writes Governor 
 Alvarado : " From the death of Arrillaga in 1814 to the year 
 1846 there is much material for history. I have in relation 
 to those times much authentic and original matter, docu- 
 ments which no one can refute. To the eminent writer Hu- 
 bert H. Brancroft I have given a ton of valuable manuscripts, 
 which have been placed in chronological order, under their 
 proper headings, in order to facilitate the labors in which a 
 dozen literary men of great knowledge are actually occu- 
 pied. That part of the history which cannot be corroborated 
 by documentary evidence I myself can vouch for by referring 
 to my memory ; and that without fear of straying from the 
 truth or falling into anachronisms. Besides, my having been 
 identified with upper California since my earliest youth is 
 another assistance, as in no less degree is the record of my 
 public life. What a vast amount of material ! No one has 
 spoken, nor can any one know certain facts as thou and I. All 
 the Americans who have dared to write on this subject have 
 lied, either maliciously or through ignorance." This letter was 
 accompanied by certain questions concerning points which 
 the writer had forgotten. 
 
 Governor Alvarado replied to the queries, corroborating 
 the general's views. At length promises were extracted from 
 the governor that he would write a history, but it should be 
 for his family, and not for Mr. Bancroft. There must be 
 something of importance to him in the telling of his story. 
 If there was money in it, none could spend it better than he; 
 if reputation, his family should have it. 
 
 So he went to work : for in truth, old and ill as he was, he 
 had more working power and pluck than any of them. All
 
 GOVERNOR ALVARADO. 225 
 
 through the autumn of 1874 he wrote history as his health 
 permitted, being all the while in correspondence Avith Cerruti 
 and Vallejo, who were similarly engaged, sometimes at So- 
 noma, and sometimes at Monterey. " Up to date," he writes 
 Vallejo the 4th of December, " I have arranged two hundred 
 and forty-one pages, in twenty- one chapters, forming only 
 three of the five parts into which I have divided this histor- 
 ical compendium." 
 
 Indeed, for a long time past Alvarado had been taking his- 
 torical notes, with a view to writing a history of California. 
 These notes, however, required arranging and verifying, and 
 •in his feeble health it was with great difficulty he could be in- 
 duced to undertake the work. In writing his history he dis- 
 played no little enthusiasm, and seemed specially desirous of 
 producing a valuable record. 
 
 " General Cerruti asked of me a narration of the events of 
 my own administration," again he says, " and others one of 
 Sola's and Arguello's. These matters are of great importance, 
 and taken from my work would leave little of value remain- 
 ing. However, I still go on with my labors, and we shall see 
 what may be done for the petitioners. In my said notes I 
 am forming a chain which begins at Cape San Lucas and 
 extends to latitude forty-two north, all of which was denom- 
 inated Peninsula, Territorio, Provincia, or Dcpartamento, de 
 las Califoniias, under the difterent governments and consti- 
 tutions, as well as Niieva y Vieja California and Alia y Baja 
 California. I begin with Cortes, who made the first settle- 
 ment in Baja California, where my father was bom. After- 
 ward I come to the Jesuits, and these expelled, to the 
 Dominicans; and on the settlement of Alta California in 
 1769 I take hold of the Fernandinos, accepting as true what 
 was written by Father Francisco Palou concerning events up 
 to 1784 in his work entitled Noticias de las Misiones. Thence 
 I follow my chain till 1848, when Mexico, through cowardice, 
 fear, or fraud, sold our native land to the United States. In 
 order to go on with this work, I must verify certain dates and 
 references. Finally, as regards the frontier of Sonoma, that 
 
 15
 
 226 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 remains at your disposition, as I have indicated in my notes, 
 for I am not well acquainted with the events which occurred 
 there after 1834, when Figueroa sent you to direct the colo- 
 nization of that section of country. There you had for near 
 neighbors the Russians, and the Hudson's Bay Company, and 
 were a sentinel placed to watch that they did not cross the 
 line." 
 
 Every effort was now made to beat down Governor Alva- 
 rado's scruples and induce him to dictate a complete history 
 of the country for my use. Considering his age, the state of 
 his health, and the condition of his eyes, which troubled him 
 much of the time, he was making no small progress. In this 
 way he worked imtil his manuscript reached three hundred 
 and sixty-four pages, but all the time persisted that Bancroft 
 should have nothing from him. 
 
 General Vallejo then employed every argument in his 
 power to induce Alvarado to take his place in this history. 
 " Come forward and refute your slanderers," he said, " not 
 hang back and waste your breath in harmless growls at them." 
 And again, " If things are wrong, not only go to work and 
 endeavor to make them right, but do it in the best and most 
 effectual way." The governor was several times brought to 
 the library, where Oak and myself might supplement Valle- 
 jo's and Cerruti's efforts. Finally the general so far prevailed 
 as to exact the promise desired. Alvarado also lent Vallejo 
 his manuscript, and the latter sent it, unknown to Alvarado, 
 for inspection to the library, where it remained for some time. 
 
 Cerruti did not fancy the task of writing a second large 
 history of California. " I wish you would get some person 
 of your confidence," he writes me from Sonoma the 27th of 
 November, 1874, "to take down the dictation of Governor 
 Alvarado, because I cannot do it. My private affairs will 
 not allow me to spend one or two years at San Pablo, a dull 
 place, as bad as Sonoma." Nevertheless, Alvarado insisting 
 upon his attendance, Cerruti was finally induced to under- 
 take the work on my permitting him to rent a room, bring 
 Alvarado to the city, and take his dictation in San Francisco,
 
 GOVERNOR ALVARADO. 227 
 
 I paying hotel bills and all other expenses, besides keeping 
 the governor's historical headquarters plentifully supplied 
 with liquors and cigars. 
 
 But this was not all. I had told Alvarado plainly that I 
 would not pay him for his information ; indeed, he never 
 asked me to do so. He would accept nothing in direct pay- 
 ment, but he was determined to make the most of it indi- 
 rectly. Twenty thousand dollars he would have regarded 
 as a small sum for his literary service to me, measured by 
 money ; hence all I could do for him must be insignificant as 
 compared with my obligation. 
 
 Again on the nth of December, 1874, Cerruti writes from 
 Sonoma : " With reference to Governor Alvarado I beg to 
 observe that I did not think it worth while to cajole him. In 
 my letter of October 20th I expressed myself to the effect 
 that I did not think it worth while to spend five or six thou- 
 sand dollars to get his dictation ; because, with the exception 
 of the notes referring to Lower California, written by his 
 father, and a few incidents which transpired at Monterey 
 while General Vallejo was absent from that place, the whole 
 of California's history will be fully embodied in the Recucrdos 
 Histoncos of General Vallejo, and I did not see why you 
 should wish for Governor Alvarado's dictation. Such were 
 my views on the 24th of October; but owing to a letter 
 received afterward, and the Avish often expressed by General 
 Vallejo that I should maintain friendly relations with Gov- 
 ernor Alvarado, I corresponded with him till the receipt of 
 the letter which I forwarded to you last Wednesday. Since 
 then I have abstained from writing, for I did not know what 
 to write. You will not miss Alvarado's notes on Lower Cali- 
 fornia, because General Vallejo has already written to Lower 
 California to Mr. Gilbert, and I have no doubt that he will 
 get many documents from him." 
 
 The fact was, as I have said, Cerruti did not covet the 
 task of writing to Alvarado's dictation, and General Vallejo 
 could be easily reconciled to the omission of a record which 
 might tend in his opinion to lessen the importance of his
 
 228 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 own. In regard to Alvarado's history Mr. Oak thought 
 differently, as the following reference in Cerruti's letter will 
 show : 
 
 " I do not look at the matter of Governor Alvarado as you 
 do," he writes Cerruti the 24th of October. " I think we 
 ought to have his dictation at some time, even if it is a 
 repetition of what General Vallejo writes. But perhaps it is 
 as well that you have declined the invitation to San Pablo 
 for the present, for General Vallejo's dictation is certainly 
 more important than all else. Besides, Mr. Bancroft will be 
 here during the coming week, and can then himself decide 
 the matter." 
 
 At this juncture came a request from Alvarado. He had 
 a boy for whom he wished to find employment in the store. 
 Anxious to obtain his history, I was ready to do anything 
 which he might reasonably or even unreasonably ask. Alva- 
 rado wrote Vallejo requesting his influence with me on behalf 
 of his son. As soon as their wishes were made known to me 
 by Cerruti I sent for the young man, and he was assigned a 
 place in the publishing house. 
 
 The boy was nineteen years of age, and had about as 
 much of an idea of business, and of applying himself to it, as 
 a gray squirrel. The manager endeavored to explain to him 
 somewhat the nature of the life now before him. Success 
 would depend entirely upon himself The house could not 
 make a man of him ; all it could do was to give him an oppor- 
 tunity of making a man of liimself At first, of course, know- 
 ing nothing of business, his services would be worth but little 
 to the business. As at school, a year or two would be occu- 
 pied in learning the rudiments, and much lime would be 
 occupied in teaching. For such business tuition no charge 
 was made; in fact the firm would pay him a small salary 
 from the beginning. The lad was bright and intelligent, and 
 .seemed to comprehend the situation, expressing himself as 
 satisfied with what I had done for him. 
 
 A few days afterward I learned that the boy was back at 
 San Pablo, and that a general howl had been raised among
 
 GOVERNOR ALVARADO. 229 
 
 his countrymen on account of alleged hard treatment of the 
 boy by the house ; in fact his position had been worse than 
 that of a Chinaman. He was made to work, to wait on 
 people like a servant, to pack boxes, fold papers, and carry 
 bundles. As a matter of course the old governor was very 
 angry. 
 
 I was greatly chagrined, for I feared all was now lost 
 with Alvarado. Instituting inquiries into the boy's case, I 
 learned that in view of the governor's attitude toward the 
 library, and the little need for the boy's services, he had been 
 assigned a very easy place, and treated with every courtesy. 
 Unluckily some lad from the printing-office, meeting him on 
 the stairs soon after he began work, had made a remark at 
 which he took offence. 
 
 That was enough. The boy immediately wrote his father 
 that the manager of the Bancroft establishment had assigned 
 him a position beneath that of a Mongolian. It was the old 
 story of race persecution. All the people of the United 
 States had conspired to crush the native Californians, and 
 this was but another instance of it. Young Alvarado was 
 immediately ordered home; he should not remain another 
 moment where he was so treated. It required the utmost 
 efforts of Vallejo and Cerruti to smooth the ruffled pride of 
 the governor.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 CLOSE OF THE CERRUTl-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN. 
 
 To gather in this great harvest of truth was no light or speedy work. 
 His notes already made a formidable range of volumes, but the crowning 
 task would be to condense these voluminous still-accumulating results, 
 and bring them like the earlier vintage of Hippocratic books to fit a 
 little shelf. — George Eliot. 
 
 FOR about two and a half years Generals Cerruti and 
 Vallejo applied themselves to my work with a devotion 
 scarcely inferior to my own : the former meanwhile with some 
 assistance carrying forward to completion the history by 
 Alvarado. Under the benign influence of the elder general, 
 the quick impatient temper of the Itahan was so subdued 
 that he was at length kept almost continuously at confining, 
 plodding work, which secretly he abhorred. He preferred 
 revolutionizing Costa Rica to writing a hundred-page dic- 
 tation. Yet I am sure for my work he entertained the highest 
 respect, and for me true personal regard. 
 
 But after all it was his affection for General Vallejo which 
 bound him so long to this work. His esteem for the sage of 
 Sonoma was unbounded ; his devotion was more than Bos- 
 wellian ; it approached the saintly degree. He would follow 
 him to the ends of the earth, cheerfully undertaking any- 
 thing for him ; and almost before Vallejo's wish Avas expressed 
 Cerruti had it accomplished. Yet withal the Italian never 
 sank into the position of servant. He was as quick as ever 
 to resent a fancied slight, and Vallejo himself, in order to 
 maintain his influence over him, must needs humor many 
 vagaries. 
 
 It was not a little strange to see these two men, so Avidely 
 separated, both in their past actions and in their present
 
 CLOSE OF THE CERRUTI-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN. 23 1 
 
 ambitions, fired by the same enthusiasm, and that by reason 
 of a conception which was not theirs, and from which neither 
 of them could hope for any great or tangible personal bene- 
 fit; and that it should last so long was most remarkable of 
 all. In reality they continued until their Avork was finished ; 
 and although neither of them had been accustomed to con- 
 tinuous application in any direction, they labored as long and 
 as diligently each day as natives of more northern climes are 
 wont to apply themselves. During the years 1874-6 the 
 time of the two generals was divided between Sonoma, San 
 Francisco, and Monterey, and in making divers excursions 
 from these places. 
 
 No sooner was it known that General Vallejo was writing 
 history for me than he was besieged by an army of applicants 
 suddenly grown history-hungry. In a letter dated Sonoma, 
 8th of December, 1874, Cerruti says: " General Vallejo and 
 I will go to the city next week. Historical men, newspaper 
 scribblers, and all sorts of curious persons are daily address- 
 ing letters to the general asking for information. He is 
 really bothered to death. I enclose one of the petitions so 
 you may judge of the style of persecution he is subject to. 
 On hand one hundred pages of manuscript which I consider 
 very interesting. Mr. Thompson, of the Democrat, is in pos- 
 session of a large amount of useful information with reference 
 to the Russian settlements of Bodega and Ross. He has 
 been collecting material for ten years, during which time he 
 has interviewed nearly sixty ancient settlers." Mr. Thomp- 
 son very kindly placed at my disposal his entire material. 
 His sketches he had taken in short -hand, and at my request 
 . he had the more important written out and sent to me. 
 
 From Monterey, the 6th of January, 1875, Vallejo wrote 
 as follows : " General Cerruti and I go on writing and col- 
 lecting documents for the history, and since our arrival have 
 written over one hundred pages. We have many venerable 
 documents, which I have not yet looked over, for this dic- 
 tating and narrating reminiscences stupefies the memory.
 
 232 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Moreover, I have to give attention to visitors, who sometimes 
 occupy my time, but who are necessary when the history of 
 their days and mine is written, and whom I need in order to 
 keep my promise of aiding you. I think you would do well 
 to come down here ; for although there are no such living 
 accommodations as in San Francisco, lodgings are not want- 
 ing, and thus you would change your routine of study life, 
 j Here exist two barrels of old papers belonging to Manuel 
 I Castro, which I have not been able to obtain, because it is 
 intended to profit by them. However, if you show yourself 
 indifferent, it is probable that you may obtain them at small 
 expense — that is, provided Hittell, or others who take an 
 interest in old pajDers, do not cross you. Make use of a very 
 Yankee policy, and within two months you will be the pos- 
 sessor of the richest collection in existence with reference to 
 upper California. In the archives of Salinas City, of which 
 my nephew has charge, many documents exist. He has 
 , promised to do all in his power to aid your undertaking." 
 ' The Hartnell papers were regarded as of great impor- 
 tance, and General Vallejo could not rest until they were 
 secured for the library. Hartnell was an Englishman, who 
 had come to California at an early date, and had married an 
 hija del pais, Teresa de la Guerra, by whom he had been 
 made twenty-five times a father. Failing as a merchant at 
 Monterey, in company with the Reverend Patrick Short he 
 opened a boys' academy at El Alisal, his residence near that 
 place. He was appointed visitador geficral de misiones by 
 Governor Alvarado, and after the arrival of the Americans 
 was for a time state interpreter. He was regarded by many 
 as the most intelligent foreigner who up to that time had 
 arrived on this shore. Applying to the widow of Mr. Hart- 
 nell, General Vallejo received the following very Avelcome 
 reply : " Although most of the papers left by Don Guillermo 
 have been lost, it may be that among the few which I still 
 preserve some may be of use to thee. But as to this thou 
 canst know better than I ; perhaps it were well that thou 
 comest to see tliem. Tlie papers which I have arc at thy
 
 CLOSE OF THE CERRUTI-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN. 233 
 
 disposal." TRe collection of documents thus so modestly- 
 valued and so cheerfully given proved to be of great value, 
 and were duly bound and accredited to the former owner. 
 
 Hearing of a deposit of important papers some sixty miles 
 from Monterey, the 6th of March General Vallejo sent Cer- 
 ruti to secure them. Nine days later Vallejo writes as fol- 
 lows : " To-day I send you a trunk full of documents of 
 very great historic value. Do me the favor to charge your 
 assistants not to open it before my return to San Francisco, 
 for it is necessary for me to give certain explanations before 
 making you a present of its contents. However, from this 
 moment count on the documents as belonging to yourself; 
 and if I die upon the journey, make such disposition of the 
 trunk and the papers which it contains as may seem good to 
 you. The young man Biven, whom in days past I recom- 
 mended to you, is, I hear, given to drinking; but I also 
 know that he has many ancient documents, a trunkful, which 
 belonged to his deceased grandfather, Ainza. It seems to 
 me that some diplomacy is necessary in order to secure them, 
 though he promised at San Francisco to give me them." 
 
 Wherever he might be, Cerruti was unremitting in his la- 
 bors. The 29th of July he writes from Monterey : " I enclose 
 an article written in the Spanish language, which I believe 
 ought to be translated into English. I am certain it would 
 do a great deal of good. To-day General Vallejo has re- 
 ceived a lot of documents from Soledad." 
 
 And again the 3d of August : " Yesterday we heard of the 
 existence of a large collection of historical documents." Be- 
 ing engaged in another direction, it was resolved to send a 
 third person in quest of these papers immediately ; and a few 
 days later I received intelligence : " The envoy of General 
 Vallejo left to-day for San Luis Obispo." 
 
 While the warmest friendship existed between the two gen- 
 erals during the whole of their intercourse, they were not with- 
 out their little differences. General Vallejo used to say to 
 me : " Cerruti wishes to hurry me, and I will not be hurried.
 
 234 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Often he solemnly assures me that Mr. Bancroft will not be 
 satisfied unless a certain number of pages are written every 
 week ; and I ask him who is writing this history, myself or 
 Mr. Bancroft ? " On the other hand, Cerruti in his more 
 petulant moods frequently dropped words of dissatisfaction. 
 "You cannot conceive," he writes me the i8th of August 
 from Monterey, " how pleased I shall be when the work is 
 complete. It has caused me many unhappy moments and 
 many sacrifices of pride." On a former occasion he had 
 complained : " The parish priest of Monterey has brought to 
 our office the books of his parish. I could make a good 
 many extracts from them, but I will not undertake the task 
 because I am in a very great hurry to leave Monterey. I am 
 heartily sick of the whole work, and I wish it was already fin- 
 ished. This town is like a convent of friars, and the sooner 
 I leave it the better. If I remain in it a month longer I will 
 become an old man. I see only old people, converse as to 
 days gone by. At my meals I eat history; my bed is made 
 of old documents, and I dream of the past. Yet I would 
 cheerfully for your sake stand the brunt of hard times were 
 it not that your agents have wounded me in my pride, the 
 only vulnerable point in my whole nature." 
 
 The Italian was very ambitious to show results, and fre- 
 quently complained that Vallejo insisted too much on tearing 
 up each day a portion of the manuscript which had been 
 written the day before. This present effort at Monterey 
 lasted one month and two days, during which time three 
 hundred pages were completed. On the other hand, three 
 months would sometimes slip by with scarcely one hundred 
 pages written. 
 
 In bringing from Santa Cruz two large carpet-bags filled 
 with documents collected in that vicinity, by some means 
 they were lost in landing at San Francisco. Vallejo was 
 chagrined ; Cerruti raved. The steamship company was 
 informed that unless the papers were recovered the wheels 
 of Californian affairs would cease to revolve. The pohce 
 were notified; searchers were sent out in every direction;
 
 CLOSE OF THE CERRUTI-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN. 235 
 
 the offer of a liberal reward was inserted in the daily papers. 
 Finally, after two days of agony, the lost documents were 
 found and safely lodged in the library. 
 
 Notwithstanding he was at the time suffering from serious 
 illness, Jose de Jesus Vallejo, brother of General Vallejo, 
 gave me a very valuable dictation of one hundred and 
 seventy-seven pages, taken at his residence at Mission San 
 Jose. The author of this contribution was bom at San Jose 
 in 1798, and in his later years was administrator of the mis- 
 sion of that name. 
 
 "The priest of this mission," writes Cerruti the nth of 
 April, 1875, " the Very Reverend Father Cassidy, has kindly 
 loaned me the mission books. They are seven in number. 
 From six of them I will make extracts. Number seven is 
 very interesting, and according to my opinion ought to be 
 copied in full." 
 
 The next day Mr. Oak wrote me from San Francisco — I 
 was at Oakville at the time — "General Vallejo came to 
 town the last of this week, summoned by a telegram stating 
 that his brother was dying. He and Cerruti immediately left 
 for Mission San Jose. Cerruti has been back once and 
 reports great success in getting documents. The chief diffi- 
 culty seems to be to keep the general from killing his 
 brother with historical questionings. He fears his brother 
 may die without telling him all he knows. Cerruti brings a 
 book from the Mission which can be kept for copying. It 
 seems of considerable importance. It will make some two 
 weeks' work, and I have taken the liberty to employ Piiia, the 
 best of the old hands, to do the work." 
 
 Again, the i8th of April, from Mission San Jose, Cerruti 
 writes : " Besides the dictation, I have on hand many docu- 
 ments and old books. I am told that in the vicinity of the 
 IMission are to be found many old residents who have docu- 
 ments, but I abstain from going after them because the 
 travelling expenses are very high, and not having seen 
 the documents I cannot judge whether they are Avorth the 
 expense. Among others, they say that at the Milpitas ran-
 
 236 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 cho lives a native Californian, called Crisostomo Galindo, 
 who is one hundred and three years old, and is supposed to 
 be the possessor of documents. Shall I go to see him ? " 
 A week later he says : " The dictation of Don Jose de Jesus 
 Vallejo is progressing a great deal faster than I had antici- 
 pated. I have been with him seven days and have already 
 on hand seventy pages of nearly three hundred words each." 
 
 Thomas O. Larkin was United States consul at Monterey 
 when California fell into the hands of the United States ; he 
 was then made naval agent. Born at Charlestown, Massa- 
 chusetts, in 1802, he came hither in 1832 as supercargo of a 
 Boston trading vessel, and was subsequently quite successful 
 as general merchant and exporter of lumber. He made the 
 models for the first double-geared wheat-mill at Monterey 
 at a time when only ship-carpenters could be found there. 
 Wishing to take a wife, and as a Protestant being outside the 
 pale of Catholic matrimony, he went with the lady on board 
 a vessel on the Californian coast, and was married under the 
 United States flag by J. C. Jones, then United States consul 
 at the Hawaiian Islands. 
 
 In 1845 President Polk commissioned him to sound the 
 Californians as to change of flag, and during the year fol- 
 lowing he was active in his exertions to, secure California to 
 the United States ; and for his fidelity and zeal in these and 
 other matters he received the thanks of the president. 
 
 Into the hands of such a man as Mr. Larkin during the 
 course of these years naturally would fall many important 
 papers, and we should expect him to be possessed of suffi- 
 cient intelligence to appreciate their value and to preserve 
 them. Nor were we disappointed. At his death Mr. Larkin 
 left a large and very valuable mass of documents, besides 
 a complete record of his official correspondence from 1844 
 to 1849. This record comprised two very large folio vol- 
 umes, afterward bound in one. 
 
 Charles H. Sawyer, attorney for certain of the heirs of 
 Thomas O. Larkin, and always a warm friend of the library,
 
 CLOSE OF THE CERRUTI-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN. 237 
 
 first called my attention to the existence of these most im- 
 portant archives. He had made copies of a few of them 
 selected for that purpose, and the blank-book in which such 
 selections had been transcribed Mr. Sawyer kindly presented. 
 Mr. Larkin's papers, he assured me, would be most difficult 
 to obtain, even should the heirs be inclined to part witli 
 them, since one was at the east and another too ill to be 
 seen. 
 
 Accompanied by Cerruti, I called on Mr. Alfred Larkin, 
 one of the sons, whose office was then on Merchant street. 
 I was received in the most cordial manner. The papers, 
 he said, were beyond his control. He would use his best 
 endeavors to have them placed in my hands. As the result 
 of this interview I secured the record books, than which 
 nothing could be more important in the history of that epoch. 
 
 Some time passed before anything further was accom- 
 plished, but in the mean time I never lost sight of the 
 matter. These papers should be placed on my shelves as a 
 check on the Alvarado and Vallejo testimony. At length I 
 learned that Mr. Sampson Tams, a very intelligent and 
 accomplished gentleman who had married a daughter of Mr. 
 Larkin, had full possession and control of all the Larkin 
 archives. I lost no time in presenting my request, and was 
 seconded in my efforts by several friends. The result was 
 that with rare and most commendable liberality Mr. Tams 
 presented me with the entire collection, which now stands 
 upon the shelves of my library in the form of nine large 
 volumes. 
 
 While engaged in my behalf at Monterey, General Val- 
 lejo's enthusiasm often waxed so warm as almost to carry 
 him away. Shortly before the suspension of the Bank of Cali- 
 fornia he had thought seriously of going south on a literary 
 mission. " I have hopes of getting together many ancient 
 documents from persons at Los Angeles who have promised 
 to aid me," he writes the 13th of July; and again, the 27th 
 of August : " I assure you that two or three weeks since I 
 resolved upon the journey to San Diego, stopping at all the
 
 238 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 missions. This I had resolved to do at my own proper cost, 
 without your being obliged to spend more money ; for to me 
 it would be a great pleasure to give this additional proof of 
 the interest I take in your great work. Until yesterday such 
 was my intention ; but this morning I find myself obliged to 
 abandon it, on account of the failure of the Bank of Cali- 
 fornia, which renders it necessary for me to return to San 
 Francisco in order to arrange my affairs. I have endeavored 
 to persuade Cerruti to undertake the journey, I furnishing 
 him with letters of introduction to all my friends, but he has 
 refused to venture into deep water, until the conclusion of the 
 Historia de California which I am dictating. I know that 
 CeiTuti always desires to avoid expense without some cor- 
 responding benefit to yourself." 
 
 The original proposal was for General Vallejo to bring his 
 history down to the year 1846, the end of Mexican domina- 
 tion in California. Writing from Monterey the 27 th of August 
 he says : " By the 3d of September I shall have finished the 
 fourth volume of the Historia de California; that is to say, 
 the whole history down to 1846, the date which I proposed 
 as its termination, at the time when, yielding to your entrea- 
 ties, I undertook to write my recollections of the country. 
 But in these latter days I have managed to interest General 
 Frisbie and other important personages acquainted with 
 events in California from 1846 to 1850, so that they agree to 
 contribute their contingent of light ; and I have resolved to 
 bring my history down to this later date, in case you should 
 deem it necessary. It is my intention to go to Vallejo, where 
 in the course of three or four weeks I trust to be able to give 
 the finishing stroke to my work, which I trust will merit the 
 approbation of yourself and other distinguished writers." 
 
 " I have caused Captain Cayetano Juarez to come to 
 Lachryma Montis," says General Vallejo in a letter from 
 Sonoma dated the 4th of October, •' in order that he may 
 aid me to write all which appertains to the evil doings of 
 the ' Bears' in 1846-7. Captain Juarez, who was a witness 
 present at the time, and a truthful and upright man, and
 
 CLOSE OF THE CERRUTI-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN. 239 
 
 myself are engaged in recalling all those deeds just as they 
 occurred. What I relate is very distinct from what has been 
 hitherto published by writers who have desired to represent 
 as heroes the men who robbed me and my countrymen 
 of our property. American authors desire to excuse those 
 robbers with the pretext that in some cases the 'Bear' cap- 
 tains gave receipts for the articles of which they took for- 
 cible possession ; but as those receipts were worthless, the 
 Califomians have the right to say that the ' Bears,' or a 
 majority of them, were robbers." 
 
 A\'ar's alarum always threw the mercurial and mettlesome 
 Cerruti into a state of excitement, which rose to the verge of 
 frenzy when his old field of revolutionary failures was the 
 scene of action. Even rumors of war between Mexico and 
 the United States, which were of frequent occurrence, were 
 usually too much for his equanimity. I remember one in- 
 stance in particular, while he was writing at General Vallejo's 
 dictation, in November, 1875, news came of serious troubles in 
 the south, and he gave me notice that he should be obliged 
 to abandon his work and fly to the rescue of something or 
 to death. I requested Vallejo to pacify him, since he might 
 not receive my opinion in the matter as wholly disinterested. 
 Shortly afterward Cerruti returned for a time to San Fran- 
 cisco, and General Vallejo wrote him there. After a lengthy 
 and flowery review of their labors as associates during the 
 last year and a half. General Vallejo goes on to say: "I have 
 heard tha*" the noise made by the press in relation to the 
 annexation of Mexico to the United States has made a deep 
 impression upon you, and that you contemplate going to see 
 the world in those regions. Believe me. General, cl ruido cs 
 mas que las niicces. If, as is said, it were certain that war be- 
 tween the two republics is about to break out, then you might 
 go forth in search of adventures, but not otherwise. Under 
 such circumstances Mexico would play the role of the smaller 
 fish, and the consequence would be that manifest destiny 
 would absorb Chihuahua and Sonora. It is necessary to 
 wait until what is passing in the lofty regions of diplomacy
 
 240 LITERARY INDUSTRIES, 
 
 be disclosed. My opinion is diat you should wait." Vallejo's 
 arguments were convincing : Cerruti abandoned his project. 
 The general concludes his letter as follows : " To-morrow I 
 shall leave for San Francisco to see you, and if possible we 
 will go to Healdsburg. I believe that there we shall harvest 
 the papers of Mrs. Fitch, and obtain from her a very good 
 narration concerning San Diego matters, its siege by the Cal- 
 ifornians, the imprisonment of Captain Fitch, Bandini, and 
 others." General Vallejo came down as he proposed; the 
 breast of the hero of Bolivian revolutions was quiet ; the two 
 generals proceeded to Healdsburg, and a thick volume of 
 documents lettered as the archives of the Fitch family was 
 thereby secured to the library. 
 
 On the 9th of October, 1876, at Sonoma, Enrique Cerruti 
 killed himself I was east at the time, and the painful intel- 
 ligence was sent me by General Vallejo. The cause of this 
 deplorable act was losses in mining stocks. For a year past 
 he had been gambling in these in-securities, and during the 
 latter part of this time he was much demoralized. The dis- 
 grace attending failures was beyond his endurance. 
 
 When I left San Francisco in June he attended me to 
 the ferry, and was outwardly in his usual health and spirits. 
 He continued his work at the library only a few weeks after 
 my departure, so that when he died he had not been in my 
 service for three months; indeed, so nervous and eccentric 
 had become his brain by his speculations that for some time 
 past he had been totally unfit for literary labor. 
 
 He wrote me for two thousand dollars; but his letter lay 
 in New York while I was absent in the White Mountains, 
 and I did not receive it till too late. The amount he asked 
 for, however, even if I had been in time with it, would not 
 have saved him, for he owed, as was afterward estimated, 
 from fifteen to twenty thousand dollars. He had borrowed 
 this money from his friends, and had lost it ; and his inability 
 to pay well-nigh maddened him. He talked of suicide for 
 six months previous, but no attention was paid to his threats.
 
 CLOSE OF THE CERRUTI-VALLEJO CAMPAIGN. 241 
 
 Just before leaving for Sonoma he bade all farewell for the 
 last time ; some laughed at him, others offered to bet with 
 him that he would not do it ; no one believed him. He had 
 quarrelled and made peace alternately with every person in 
 the library ; he had denounced every friend he had, one after 
 the other, as the cause of his ruin. Then again it was his 
 fate; he had been so cursed from childhood. However, 
 death should balance all accounts, and swallow all dishonor; 
 though his friends failed to perceive how a claim against a 
 dead CeiTuti was better than a claim against a live one. 
 
 Why he selected Sonoma as the point of his final depart- 
 ure no one knows, unless it was for dramatic effect. He 
 was a lover of notoriety ; and a tragic act Avould command 
 more attention there than in a large city. Then there were 
 the Vallejos, his dearest friends — he might have chosen to 
 be buried near them. Gunpowder, too, one would have 
 thought nearer akin to his taste than drugs. He was fully 
 determined to die, for, laudanum failing, he resorted to 
 strychnine. Awakened by his groans, the hotel people sent 
 for Mrs. Vallejo, who tried to administer an antidote, but he 
 refused to receive it. The coroner telegraphed the firm, and 
 the library was represented at the burial. 
 
 Poor, dear Cerruti ! If I had him back with me alive, I 
 would not give him up for all Nevada's mines. His ever 
 welcome presence ; his ever pleasing speech, racy in its 
 harmless bluster; his ever charming ways, fascinating in 
 their guileful simplicity, the far-reaching round earth does 
 not contain his like. Alas, Cerruti ! with another I might 
 say, I could have better lost a better man ! 
 
 16
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 HOME. 
 
 There is no happiness in life, there is no misery, like that growing out 
 of the dispositions which consecrate or desecrate a home. — Chapm. 
 
 I ALMOST despaired of ever having a home again. I was 
 growing somewhat old for a young wife, and I had no 
 fancy for taking an old one. The risk on both sides I felt to 
 be great. A Buffalo lady once wrote me : " All this time 
 you might be making some one person happy." I replied : 
 " All this time I might be making two persons miserable." 
 And yet no one realized more fully than myself that a happy 
 marriage doubles the resources, and completes the being 
 which otherwise fails in the fullest development of its intui- 
 tions and yearnings. The twain are, in the nature human, 
 one; each without loss gives what the other lacks. 
 
 New Haven had been the home of her whom I made my 
 wife, and of the families of that old university town hers was 
 among the most respected. It was there I first met her, and 
 afterward at Bethlehem, the highest of New England villages. 
 Walking down the dusty road, we turned aside into a rocky 
 field, crossing into a lane which led us to a tangled wood, 
 where, seated on a fallen tree, each spoke the words to speak 
 which we were there. It was the 12th of October, 1876, 
 that I married Matilda Coley Griffing ; and from the day 
 that she was mine, wherever her sweet presence, there was 
 my home. 
 
 For obvious reasons, a middle-aged man ought to make a 
 better husband than a very young man. He has had more 
 experience ; he should know more, have better control of 
 himself, and be belter jjrepared to have consideration for
 
 HOME. 243 
 
 those dependent upon him for happiness or support. The 
 young man, particularly one who has not all his life enjoyed 
 the noblest and best of female society, does not always enter- 
 tain the highest opinion of woman, never having reached the 
 finer qualities of her mind and heart, and having no concep- 
 tion of the superiority of her refined and gentle nature over 
 his own. Hence the inexperienced youth, launched upon 
 the untried ocean of matrimony, often finds himself in the 
 midst of storms which might have been with ease avoided, 
 had he been possessed of greater tact or experience. 
 
 And the children which come later in the lives of their 
 parents — we might say, happy are they as compared with 
 those who appeared before them. It is safe to say that one- 
 half the children bom into the world die in infancy through 
 the ignorance or neglect of their parents ; and of the other 
 half, their lives for the most part are made miserable from the 
 same cause. The young husband and father chafes under the 
 new cares and anxieties incident to untried responsibilities 
 which interfere with his comfort and pleasure, and the child 
 must suffer therefrom. Often a newly married pair are not 
 ready at once to welcome children ; they are perhaps too 
 much taken up with themselves and the pleasures and pas- 
 times of society. Later in life parents are better prepared, 
 more in the humor it may be, more ready to find their chief 
 pleasure in welcoming to the world successive reproductions of 
 themselves, and watching the physical and mental unfolding, 
 and ministering to the comfort and joy of the new and strange 
 little beings committed to them. 
 
 There was no lack of sympathy between us, my wife and 
 me, no lack of heart, and head, and hand help. After the 
 journeying incident to this new relationship was over, and 
 I once more settled to work, all through the days and years 
 of future ploddings patiently by my side she sat, her face 
 the picture of happy contentment, assisting me with her quick 
 application and sound discrimination, making notes, studying 
 my manuscript, and erasing or altering such repetitions and 
 solecisms as crept into my work.
 
 244 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 At White Sulphur Springs, and Santa Cruz, where we spent 
 the following spring and summer, on the hotel porches used 
 to sit the feather-brained women of fashion from the city — 
 used there to sit and gossip all the morning, and all the 
 evening, while we were at our work ; and I never before so 
 realized the advantage to woman of ennobling occupation. 
 Why should she be the vain and trifling thing, intellectually, 
 that she generally is ? How long will those who call them- 
 selves ladies exercise their influence to make work degrading, 
 and only folly fashionable ? 
 
 But little cared we for any of them. We were content ; 
 nay, more, we were very happy. Rising early and breakfast- 
 ing at eight o'clock, we devoted the forenoon to work. After 
 luncheon we walked, or rode, or drove, usually until dinner, 
 after which my wife and daughter mingled with the company, 
 Avhile I wrote often until ten or eleven o'clock. In this way 
 I could average ten hours a day ; which, but for the extraor- 
 dinary strength of my constitution, was twice as much as I 
 should have done. 
 
 It was a great saving to me of time and strength, this 
 taking my work into the country. In constant communica- 
 tion with the library, I could draw thence daily such fresh 
 material as I required, and as often as necessary visit the 
 library in person, and have supervision of things there. Thus 
 was my time divided between the still solitude of the coun- 
 try and the noisy solitude of the city. 
 
 Never in my life did I work harder or accomplish more 
 than during the years immediately succeeding my marriage, 
 while at the same time body and mind grew stronger under 
 the fortifying influences of home. 
 
 • For a year and more before my marriage I had been 
 under promise to my daughter to go east at the close of her 
 summer school-term and accompany her to the centennial 
 exhibition at Philadelphia. This I did, leaving San Francisco 
 the 15th of June, 1876, and taking her, with her two cousins 
 and a young lady friend, to the great world's show, there to
 
 HOME. 245 
 
 spend the first two weeks in July. Thence we all returned to 
 New Haven. 
 
 Immediately after my marriage we went to New York and 
 thence to Washington, where we saw Major and jVIrs. Powell, 
 George Bancroft, Judge Field, Mr. Spofford, and many others. 
 After a day at Mount Vernon we proceeded to Baltimore, 
 there to meet President Oilman, Brantz Mayer, and other 
 friends. Though both of us had seen the exhibition, we 
 could not pass it by upon the present occasion, and accord- 
 ingly spent a week in Philadelphia. 
 
 I had long desired a dictation from John A. Sutter. In- 
 deed I regarded the information which he alone could give 
 as absolutely essential to my history, as he was the first to 
 settle in the valley of the Sacramento, so near the spot where 
 gold was discovered, and was so prominent in those parts 
 during the whole period of the Califomian Inferno. 
 
 Leaving Philadelphia in the morning, and passing up the 
 beautiful valley of the Schuylkill, about noon we reached our 
 destination at the Litiz Springs. Why this bold Swiss, who 
 for a dozen years or more was little less than king among the 
 natives of the Sierra foothills, should leave that land of sun- 
 shine, and hide himself in a dismal Dutch village, was a mys- 
 tery to me. Accident seemed to have directed him thither 
 to a Moravian school, as suitable in which to place a grand- 
 daughter. This step led to the building of a house, and 
 there he intended at this time to end his days. Well, no 
 doubt heaven is as near Litiz as Cahfomia ; but sure I am, 
 the departure thence is not so pleasant. 
 
 At the Litiz Springs hotel, directly opposite to which stood 
 General Sutter's two-story brick dwelling, we were told that 
 the old gentleman was ill, unable to receive visitors, and 
 that it would be useless to attempt to see him. There was 
 only one man, the barber, who went every day to shave the 
 general, who could gain me audience, if such a thing were pos- 
 sible. I declined with thanks his services, and ordered dinner. 
 
 " I will go over and see his wife, at all events," I said to 
 the clerk.
 
 246 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 " That will not help you," was the reply; " she is deaf." 
 
 " Who else is there in the family ? " 
 
 "A granddaughter." 
 
 That was sufficient. I did not propose to lose my journey 
 to Litiz, and what was more, this, probably my last opportu- 
 nity for securing an important dictation. I was determined 
 to see the general, and ascertain for myself how matters stood. 
 
 After knocking loudly at the portal three several times, the 
 door was slowly, silently opened a little way, and the head of 
 an old woman appeared at the aperture. 
 
 " Is this Mrs. Sutter ? " I asked. 
 
 No response. 
 
 " May I speak with you a moment in the hall ? " 
 
 Still no response, and no encouragement for me to enter. 
 There she stood, the guardian of, apparently, as impregnable 
 a fortress as ever was Fort Sutter in its palmiest days. I 
 must gain admission ; retreat now" might be fatal. Stepping 
 toward the small opening as if there was no obstacle what- 
 ever to my entering, as the door swung back a little at my 
 approach, I slipped into the hall. 
 
 Once within, no ogress was there. Mrs. Sutter was a tall, 
 thin, intelligent woman, plainly dressed, and with a shawl 
 thrown over her shoulders. Her English was faulty, but she 
 readily understood me, and her deafness was not at all 
 troublesome. 
 
 Handing her my card, I asked to see General Sutter. 
 " I know he is ill," said I, " but I must see him." Taking 
 the card, she showed me into a back parlor, and then with- 
 drew. From Mrs. Sutter's manner, no less than from what 
 had been told me at the hotel, I was extremely fearful that I 
 had come too late, and that all of history that house contained 
 was in the fevered brain of a dying man. 
 
 But presently, to my great astonishment and delight, the 
 door opened, and the general himself entered at a brisk j)ace. 
 He appeared neither very old nor very feeble. He was rather 
 below medium height, and stout. His step was still firm, his 
 bearing soldierly, and in his younger days he must have been
 
 HOME. 247 
 
 a man of much endurance, with a remarkably fine physique. 
 His features were of the German cast, broad, full face, intel- 
 lectual forehead, with white hair, bald on the top of the head, 
 white side -whiskers, mustache, and imperial; and a deep, 
 clear, earnest eye. Seventy-five years, apparently, sat not 
 heavily upon him. He was suffering severely from rheuma- 
 tism, and used a cane to assist him in walking about the house. 
 He complained of failing memory, but I saw no indication 
 of it in the five days' dictating which followed. 
 
 No one could be in General Sutter's presence long with- 
 out feeling satisfied that he was a natural born gentleman. 
 He had more the manners of a courtier than of a backwoods- 
 man, but with this difference : his speech and bearing were 
 the promptings of a kind heart, unaffected and sincere. He 
 received me kindly, and listened with deep attention to my 
 plan for a history of the Pacific States as I laid it before him, 
 perceiving at once the difference between my work and that 
 of local historians and newspaper reporters, by whom all the 
 latter part of his life he had been besieged. 
 
 " I have been robbed and ruined," he exclaimed, " by 
 lawyers and politicians. When gold was discovered I had 
 my fortress, my mills, my farms, leagues of land, thousands 
 of cattle and horses, and a thousand tamed natives at my 
 bidding. Where are they now ? Stolen ! My men were 
 crushed by the iron heel of civilization ; my cattle were 
 driven off by hungry gold-seekers ; my fort and mills were 
 deserted and left to decay ; my lands were squatted on by 
 overland emigrants; and finally I was cheated out of all 
 my property. All Sacramento was once mine." 
 
 " General," said I, " this appears to have been the com- 
 mon fate of those who owned vast estates at the coming of 
 the Americans. It was partly owing to the business inexpe- 
 rience of the holders of land grants, though this surely can- 
 not apply to yourself, and partly to the unprincipled tricksters 
 who came hither to practise in courts of law. The past is 
 past. One thing yet remains for you to do, which is to see 
 your wonderful experiences properly placed on record for
 
 248 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 the benefit of posterity. You fill an important niche in the 
 history of the western coast. Of certain events of a certain 
 era and locality you are the living embodiment. Often in 
 my labors I have encountered your name, your deeds ; and 
 let me say that I have never yet heard the former mentioned 
 but in kindness, nor the latter except in praise." 
 
 Tears came to the old man's eyes, and his utterance was 
 choked, as he signified his willingness to relate to me all he 
 knew. 
 
 " You arrived," said he, " at a most opportune moment; I 
 am but just out of bed, and I feel I shall be ill again in a few 
 days, when it will be impossible for me to see or converse 
 with any one." 
 
 I said I had come to Litiz on this special business, and 
 asked how much time he could devote to it each day. 
 
 "All the time," he rephed, "if you will conform to my 
 hours. Come as early as you like in the morning, but we 
 must rest at six o'clock. I retire early." 
 
 Ten hours a day for the next five days resulted in two hun- 
 dred pages of manuscript, which was subsequently bound and 
 placed in the library. Forty pages a day kept me very busy, 
 and at night I was tired enough. Meanwhile my devoted 
 wife sat patiently by, sometimes sewing, always lending an 
 attentive ear, with occasional questions addressed to the 
 general. 
 
 For a short time after our return to San Francisco the 
 Palace Hotel appeared to us as curious as a menagerie ; then 
 it became as distasteful as a prison. Nevertheless we had 
 many pleasant little dinner parties the Avinter we were there, 
 made up of widely different characters. First there were our 
 nearest and dearest friends, those who had always been to 
 me more than relatives. Then there were the intellectually 
 social ; and a third class were Spanish-speaking Californians 
 and Mexicans, among whom were Pio Pico, General Vallejo, 
 Governor Alvarado, Governor Pacheco, and the Mexican 
 refugees, President Iglesias, and Senorcs Prieto and Palacio
 
 HOME. 249 
 
 of his cabinet. Mrs. Bancroft began the study of Spanish, 
 and made rapid progi-ess ; my daughter Kate was already 
 quite at home in that language. 
 
 It was no part of our plan immediately to domicile our- 
 selves in any fixed residence. Change seemed necessary to 
 my brain, strained as it was to its utmost tension perpetually. 
 It was about the only rest it would take. What is commonly 
 called pleasure was not pleasure so long as there was so much 
 work piled up behind it. I must change position occasion- 
 ally, and feed upon new surroundings, or I became restless 
 and out of health. Then we had before us m.uch travelling. 
 The vast territory whose history I was writing must be visited 
 in its several parts, some of them many times. There was 
 the great Northwest Coast to be seen, Oregon, Washington, 
 and British Columbia; there were Utah, New Mexico, and 
 Arizona ; likewise the sunny south, southern California, Mex- 
 ico, and Central America. Besides, there was much search- 
 ing of archives in Europe yet to be done. So we must 
 content ourselves for the present with making the world our 
 home, any part of it in which night happened to overtake 
 us. Nevertheless, after" a year in Oakland, and a winter 
 spent by Mrs. Bancroft at New Haven, I purchased a resi- 
 dence on Van Ness avenue, where for many long and busy 
 years echoed the voices of little ones, watched over by a 
 contented mother in Avhose heart was that perpetual sunshine 
 which best pleaseth God. This was indeed Home.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO ARCHIVES. 
 
 There are some who think that the brooding patience which a great 
 work calls for belonged exclusively to an earlier period than ours. 
 
 — Lo-.cell. 
 
 DURING the first ten years of these Ingatherings and 
 Industries a dark cloud of discouragement hung over 
 my efforts, in the form of nearly four hundred volumes, with 
 from seven hundred to nineteen hundred pages each, of 
 original documents, lodged in the office of the United States 
 surveyor-general in San Francisco. Though containing much 
 on mission affairs, they constituted the regular archives of the 
 secular government from the earliest period of Californian 
 history. They were nearly all in Spanish, many of them in 
 very bad Spanish, poorly written, aiid difficult to decipher. 
 
 On the secularization of the missions, that is to say the 
 removal of their property from missionary control, in many 
 instances to its ruin and the breaking up of mission estab- 
 lishments in California, some few loose papers found their 
 way to the college of San Fernando, in Mexico, which was 
 the parent institution. The clergy still held the mission 
 church buildings, and in some instances the out-houses and 
 orchards ; and the mission books, proper, remained naturally 
 in their control. There were likewise left at some of the 
 missions bundles of papers, notably at Santa Barbara; but 
 these, though of the greatest importance, were not very 
 bulky in comparison to the secular archives. 
 
 More to be considered by the historian were the records 
 and documents of the several municipalities along the south- 
 em seaboard, which with the papers kept by retired officials,
 
 SAN FRANCISCO ARCHIVES. 25 1 
 
 and those treasured by the old and prominent famihes, 
 formed a very important element in the marshalled testimony. 
 Thus matters stood when California was made a state of 
 the great American confederation ; and when counties were 
 formed by act of legislature of 1850, the correspondence, 
 papers, and records of local officials under Mexican rule, al- 
 caldes, jueccs de priiuera instancia, and others, were ordered 
 deposited with the clerk of each county. 
 
 The United States government took possession in 1846-7 
 of all the territorial records that could be found — an im- 
 mense mass, though by no means all that existed — and in 
 185 1 the public archives in all parts of California were called 
 in and placed in charge of the United States surveyor-gen- 
 eral in San Francisco, and of these Mr. R. C. Hopkins was 
 made custodian. Such of the pueblo and presidial archives 
 as were deemed of importance to the general government 
 were also held in San Francisco. Many, however, of great 
 historic value were never removed from their original lodg- 
 ments, and many others Avere returned to them, for of such 
 material much was found by my searchers in various places 
 at different times. As these archives finally stood they con- 
 sisted of the official correspondence of the superior and other 
 authorities, civil and financial, military and ecclesiastic, of 
 Mexico and the Californias, from the formation of the first 
 mission in 1769, and even a little further back, to the time 
 California was admitted into the Union; not complete, but 
 full during parts of the time and meagre in other parts. As 
 will be seen, I was so fortunate as to obtain the missing 
 records from other sources. 
 
 When E. M. Stanton came with power from Washington 
 to attend to land and other affairs of the government he 
 ordered these archives bound. Although some divisions of 
 the papers were made, little attention was paid to chronolog- 
 ical or other arrangement. Said one of my assistants to me 
 after a preliminary examination : " The whole thing is a jum- 
 ble ; so far as their value to your work is concerned, or your 
 being able to find, by searching, any particular incident of
 
 252 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 any particular period, the papers might as well be in hay- 
 stack form." 
 
 What was to be done ? The thought of attacking the 
 great dragon of these investigations had been for many years 
 in my mind as a nightmare, and while doggedly pursuing 
 more puny efforts I tried to shake it from me, and not tiiink 
 of it. There was much material aside from that, more than 
 enough for my purpose, perhaps; besides, some one could 
 go through the mass and take from it what I lacked, in the 
 usual form of historical notes. 
 
 But such reasoning would not do. The monster would 
 not thus be frightened away. All the time, to be honest with 
 myself, I well knew that I must have before me all existing 
 material that could be obtained, and I well knew what 
 " going through " such a stack of papers signified. No ; one 
 of the chief differences between my method and that of others 
 in gathering and arranging facts for histor}^, was, in so far as 
 possible, to have all my material together, within instant and 
 constant reach, so that I could place before me on my table 
 the information lodged in the British Museum beside that 
 contained in the archives of Mexico, and compare both with 
 what Spain and California could yield, and not be obliged in 
 the midst of my investigations to go from one library to 
 another note-taking. 
 
 And under this method, so far as my daily and hourly 
 necessities were concerned, this immense mass of information 
 might almost as well be in Nova Scotia as in a public office. 
 To be of use to me it must be in my library. This was the 
 basis on which my work was laid out, and only by adhering 
 to this plan could it be accomplished. 
 
 But how get it there ? The government would not lend 
 it to me, though our benign " uncle " has committed more 
 foolish acts. There was but one way, the way pursued in 
 smaller operations — copy it. But what did that mean, to 
 ' copy it ' ? The day in government offices is short ; a copy- 
 ist might return from twenty to forty folios per diem ; this, 
 averaged, would amount to perhaps throe volumes a year,
 
 SAN FRANCISCO ARCHIVES. 253 
 
 which would be a hundred years' work for one person ; and 
 this merely to transfer the material to my library, where an- 
 other century of work would be required before it attained 
 the proper form as condensed and classified material for his- 
 tory. 
 
 Well, then, if the task would occupy one person so long, 
 put on it ten or twenty — this is the way my demon talked 
 to me. But the surveyor's office would not accommodate so 
 many. Not to dwell upon the subject, however, the matter 
 was thus accomplished : A room was rented near the sur- 
 veyor-general's office, to which Mr. H. G, Rollins, then in 
 charge, had kindly granted permission to have the bound 
 volumes taken as required by the copyists. Tables and chairs 
 were then purchased, and the needed writing-materials sup- 
 plied. Then by a system of condensation and epitomizing, 
 now so thoroughly understood that no time or labor need be 
 lost, under the efficient direction of Mr. Savage, one of my 
 most valued assistants, fifteen Spaniards were able in one year 
 to transfer from these archives to the library all that was 
 necessary for my purpose. This transfer was not made in 
 the form of notes ; the work was an abridgment of the archives, 
 which would be of immense public value in case of loss by 
 fire of the original documents. The title of every paper was 
 given; the more important documents were copied in full, 
 while the others were given in substance only. The work 
 was begun the 15th of May, 1876. The expense was about 
 eighteen thousand dollars ; and when in the form of bound 
 volumes these archives stood on the shelves of the library, we 
 were just ready to begin extracting historical notes from them 
 in the usual way. 
 
 This transcribing of the archives in the United States sur- 
 veyor-general's office was the greatest single efibrt of the 
 kind ever made by me. But there were many lesser labors 
 in the same direction, both before and afterward; promi- 
 nent among these was the epitomizing of the archiepiscopal 
 archives.
 
 254 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Learning from Doctor Taylor, of Santa Barbara, that he 
 had presented the Most Reverend Joseph S. Alemany, Cath- 
 ohc archbishop of San Francisco, Avith a quantity of valuable 
 papers, I applied to the latter for permission to copy them. 
 He did not feel at liberty to let the documents pass out of 
 his possession. " I shall be most happy, however," he writes 
 me, " to afford every facility to any gentleman you may 
 choose to send to my humble house to copy from any papers 
 any pieces which may suit your work, taking it for granted 
 that in your kindness you will let me see before publication 
 what is written on religious matters, lest unintentionally some- 
 thing might be stated inaccurately, which no doubt you 
 would rectify." It is needless to say that neither to the 
 archbishop, nor to any person, living or dead, did I ever 
 grant permission to revise or change my writings. It was 
 my great consolation and chief support throughout my long 
 and arduous career, that I was absolutely free, that I be- 
 longed to no sect or party to which I must render account 
 for any expression, or to whose traditions my opinions must 
 bow. Sooner than so hamper myself, I would have con- 
 signed my library and my labors to perdition. 
 
 It appeared to me a kind of compact, this insinuation of 
 the archbishop, that if he granted me permission to copy 
 documents which were the property of the church, they 
 should not be used in evidence against the church. Now 
 with the church I have not at any time had controversy. 
 Theology was not my theme. I never could treat of the- 
 ology as it is done ordinarily in pulpits, walled about by 
 dogmas, and be compelled to utter other men's behefs whether 
 they were my own or not. I should have no pleasure in 
 speaking or writing thus ; nor is there any power on earth 
 which would compel me to it. But all this did not lessen 
 my obligation to the good archbishop, who was ever most 
 kind and liberal toward me, and whose kindness and liberal- 
 ity I trust I have not abused. 
 
 The documents in question formed five books, bound into 
 several more volumes. They consisted mostly of correspon-
 
 SAN FRANCISCO ARCHIVES. 255 
 
 dence by the missionaries of upper and lower California 
 among themselves, or with the authorities, both civil and 
 military, in ]\Iexico or the Californias, or from their college 
 of San Fernando ; and also of statistical data on the mis- 
 sions, a large portion of the letters and statistics being of 
 great historical importance. 
 
 Finally, the condition was withdrawn, and Mr. Savage with 
 three copjists performed this labor in about a month. 
 
 While the work of abstracting was going on, the men 
 received occasional visits from attaches of the ecclesiastical 
 offices in the mansion, which at first gave rise to a suspicion 
 in the mind of Mr. Savage that he was watched. But nothing 
 occurred to make his task disagreeable. The archbishop 
 occasionally entered the room for some document from his 
 desk, and ever had a kind word for those who occupied it. 
 The result of this work, which was concluded early in May, 
 1876, just before beginning on the United States surveyor- 
 general's archives, may be seen in the Bancroft Library, in 
 three books, entitled Archivo del Arzobispado — Cartas de los 
 Misioneros de California, i. ii. iii.^ iii.2 iv.i iv.- v. 
 
 Writing of California material for history in the public 
 journals of August, 1877, Mr. Oak observes: "First in im- 
 portance among the sources of information are the public 
 archives, preserved in the different offices of nation, state, 
 county, and city, at San Francisco, Sacramento, San Jose, 
 Salinas, Los Angeles, San Diego, and to a slight extent in 
 other towns. These constitute something over 500 bulky 
 tomes, besides loose papers, in the aggregate not less than 
 300,000 documents. Of the nature of these manuscripts it 
 is impossible within present Hmits to say more than that they 
 are the original orders, correspondence, and act-records of the 
 authorities — secular and ecclesiastical, national, provincial, 
 departmental, territorial, and municipal — during the succes- 
 sive rule, imperial and republican, of Spain, ]\Iexico, and the 
 United States, from 1768 to 1850. After the latter date 
 there is little in the archives of historic value which has not 
 found its way into print. A small part of these papers are
 
 256 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 arranged by systems which vary from tolerable to very bad ; 
 the greater part being thrown together with a sublime disre- 
 gard to both subject and chronology. Of their value there 
 is no need to speak, since it is apparent that Californian his- 
 tory cannot be written without their aid. They are, however, 
 practically inaccessible to writers. In land-commission times 
 the lawyers sought diligently for information of a certain class, 
 and left many guiding references, which the student may find, 
 if patient and long-lived, in countless legal briefs and judicial 
 decisions. The keepers of the archives, besides aiding the le- 
 gal fraternity, have from time to time unearthed for the benefit 
 of the public certain documentary curiosities ; yet the archives 
 as a whole remain an unexplored and, by ordinary methods, 
 unexplorable waste. Mr. Bancroft has not attempted, by 
 needle-in-the-haymow methods, to search the archives for 
 data on particular points ; but by employing a large auxiliary 
 force he has substantially transferred their contents to the 
 library. Every single paper of all the 300,000, whatever its 
 nature or value, has been read — deciphered would in many 
 cases be a better term ; important papers have been copied ; 
 less important documents have been stripped of their Spanish 
 verbiage, the substance being retained, while routine commu- 
 nications of no apparent value have been dismissed with a 
 mere mention of their nature and date. 
 
 " Hardly less important, though much less bulky than the 
 secular records above referred to, are the records of the friars 
 in the mission archives. At most of these establishments — 
 wrecks of former Franciscan prosperity — there remain in 
 care of the parish priests only the quaint old leather-bound 
 records of births, marriages, deaths, etc. At some of the 
 ex-missions even these records have disappeared, having 
 been destroyed or passed into private hands. It was com- 
 mon opinion that the papers of the missionary padres had 
 been destroyed, or sent to Mexico and Spain. Another the- 
 ory was that of men who mysteriously hinted at immense de- 
 posits of docu7nc?itos at the old missions, jealously guarded 
 from secular eyes and hands.
 
 SAN FRANCISCO ARCHIVES. 257 
 
 " Both views are absurdly exaggerated. The mission ar- 
 chives were never very bulky, and are still comparatively com- 
 plete. The largest collections are in the possession of the 
 Franciscan order, and of the archbishop of California. 
 Other small collections exist at different places, and not a 
 few papers have passed into private keeping. The archives 
 of Spain and Mexico must be ransacked, but the documents 
 thus brought to light can neither be so many nor so impor- 
 tant as has popularly been imagined. 
 
 " Not all the records of early California, by any means, are 
 to be found in the public offices. Even official documents 
 were widely scattered during the American conquest or be- 
 fore ; the new officials collected and preserved all they could 
 gain possession of, but many were left in private hands, and 
 have remained there. The private correspondence of prom- 
 inent men on public events is, moreover, quite as valuable a 
 source of information as their official communications. Mr. 
 Bancroft has made an earnest effort to gather, preserve, and 
 utilize these private and family archives. There were many 
 obstacles to be overcome; Californians, not always without 
 reason, were distrustful of Gringo schemes ; old papdes, that 
 had so long furnished material for cigaritos, suddenly acquired 
 a great pecuniary value ; interested persons, in some cases by 
 misrepresentation, induced well disposed natives to act against 
 their inclinations and interests. Yet efforts in this direction 
 have not been wasted, since they have already produced 
 about seventy-five volumes, containing at least twenty thou- 
 sand documents, a very large proportion of which are impor- 
 tant and unique. 
 
 " I have not included in the preceding class some fifty vol- 
 umes of old military and commercial records, which are by 
 no means devoid of interest and value, though of such a na- 
 ture that it would be hardly fair to add them by the page, 
 without explanation, to the above mentioned documents. It 
 must not be understood that these contributed collections of 
 original papers are exclusively Spanish; on the contrary, 
 many of the volumes relate to the conquest, or to the period 
 17
 
 258 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 immediately preceding or following, and bear the names of 
 pioneers in whose veins flows no drop of Latin blood — for 
 instance, the official and private correspondence of Thomas 
 O. Larkin, in twelve thick volumes. 
 
 " California is a new country ; her annals date back but 
 little more than a century ; most of her sister states are still 
 younger ; therefore personal reminiscences of men and women 
 yet living form an element by no means to be disregarded by 
 the historian. While I am writing there are to be found — 
 though year by year death is reducing their number — men 
 of good intelligence and memory who have seen California 
 pass from Spain to Mexico, and from Mexico to the United 
 States. Many of this class will leave manuscript histories 
 which will be found only in the Bancroft Library. 
 
 " The personal memoirs of pioneers not native to the soil 
 are not regarded as in any respect less desirable than those 
 of hijos del pais, although their acts and the events of their 
 time are much more fully recorded in print. Hundreds of 
 pioneer sketches are to be found in book and i^amphlet, and 
 especially in the newspaper; yet great efforts are made to 
 obtain original statements. Some hold back because it is 
 difficult to convince them that the history of California is 
 being written on a scale which will make their personal 
 knowledge and experience available and valuable. Others 
 exhibit an indolence and indifference in the matter impossible 
 to overcome."
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 
 Every man must work according to his own method. — Agassiz. 
 
 SOUTHERN California was rightly regarded as the deposi- 
 tory of the richest historic material north of Mexico. And 
 the reason was obvious : In settlement and civilization that 
 region had the start of Oregon by a half century and more ; 
 there were old men there, and family and public archives. 
 The chief historic adventure in that quarter was when, with 
 Mr. Oak and my daughter Kate, early in 1874 I took the 
 steamer for San Diego and passed several months in collect- 
 ing material in the south. 
 
 It was during this journey south that Benjamin Hayes, 
 formerly district judge at Los Angeles, later a resident of 
 San Diego, and for twenty-five years an enthusiastic collector 
 and preserver of historic data, not only placed me in pos- 
 session of all his collection, but gave me his heart with it, 
 and continued to interest himself in my work as if it were 
 his own, and to add to his collection while in my possession 
 as if it was still in his. This was fortunate, for I saw much 
 work to be done at Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and else- 
 where, and I hardly knew how to perform it. 
 
 For the first quarter-century of this country's history under 
 American rule, beginning with a journal kept while crossing 
 the continent in 1849, the judge had been a diligent collector 
 of documents touching the history of southern Cahfoniia; and 
 his collection of manuscripts, and especially of scraps from 
 books and early newspapers, systematically arranged, and ac- 
 companied frequently by manuscript notes of his own making, 
 was very extensive. It embraced among the manuscript por-
 
 26o LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 tion a copy of the mission book of San Diego ; a copy of 
 an autograph manuscript of Father Junipero Serra, giving a 
 history of the missions up to 1775 ; a similar manuscript his- 
 tory by Father Lasuen of the mission up to 1784; copies of 
 all the more important documents of the pueblo archives from 
 1829; a complete index made by himself in 1856 of all the 
 early archives ; manuscript accounts of Judge Hayes' own 
 travels in various parts of the southern country ; reports of 
 evidence in important law cases, illustrating history, and many 
 other like papers. There were some fifty or sixty scrap-books, 
 besides bundles of assorted and unassorted scraps, all stowed 
 in trunks, cupboards, and standing on book-shelves. The 
 collection was formed with a view of writing a history of 
 southern California, but by this time the purpose on the part 
 of Judge Hayes was well-nigh impracticable by reason of age 
 and ill-health. 
 
 The pueblo archives which have been preserved do not 
 extend back further than 1829. They consist of more or less 
 complete records of the proceedings of military comman- 
 dantes, alcaldes, ayuntamientos, prefectos, and jueccs de paz, 
 together with correspondence between the several town offi- 
 cials, between the officials of this and other towns, and cor- 
 respondence with the home government of Spain or Mexico, 
 being the originals of letters received and copies of those 
 sent. They include some flaming proclamations by Cahfor- 
 nian governors, and interesting correspondence relative to the 
 times when American encroachments had begun. Documents 
 referring to the mission are few and brief, and consist of cor- 
 respondence between the secular and ecclesiastical authorities 
 respecting the capture of escaped native converts. There are 
 yet preserved, however, documents relating to the missions 
 while in the hands of administrators subsequent to their secu- 
 larization. There are several interesting reports of civil and 
 criminal trials, illustrating the system of jurisprudence during 
 the early times. 
 
 These papers were preserved in the county archives, in the 
 clerk's office, in bundles, as classified by Judge Hayes.
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 261 
 
 Copies of all these documents in any wise important for his- 
 torical purposes formed part of Judge Hayes' collection. 
 
 Every mission, besides its books of accounts, its papers 
 filed in packages, and any historical or statistical records 
 which the priests might choose to write, kept what were 
 called the mission books, consisting of records of conversions, 
 marriages, baptisms, confirmations, and burials. By a revolt 
 of the natives in 1775 San Diego mission, with all its records, 
 was destroyed. In opening new mission books, with his 
 own hands Father Junipero Serra wrote on the first pages of 
 one of them a historical sketch of the mission from 1769, the 
 date of its establishment, to 1775, the date of its destruction. 
 He also restored, so far as possible from memory, the list of 
 marriages and deaths. The mission book tlius prefaced by 
 the president is preserved by the curate at San Diego. 
 
 It was the 23d of February that this important transfer or 
 rather purchase was consummated, for of course I insisted 
 on paying the judge for his collection. San Diego possessed 
 few further attractions for me in the line of literary acquisi- 
 tions ; that is to say, this collection, with so important a man 
 as Judge Hayes enHsted in my behalf, was an accomphsh- 
 ment which would amply reward me for the time and money 
 expended in the entire excursion should nothing more come 
 of it. For this collection was by far the most important in 
 the state outside of my own ; and this, added to mine, would 
 forever place my library beyond competition so far as origi- 
 nal California material was concerned. The books, packages, 
 list of copies of the county archives, and manuscripts, as we 
 packed them for shipment, numbered three hundred and sev- 
 enty-seven; though from number little idea can be formed 
 of value; for example, a volume labelled Private Hours, con- 
 sisting chiefly of manuscripts containing Judge Hayes' notes 
 of travel over the state at different times, written by one 
 thoroughly familiar with public and private matters, by one 
 who saw far into men and affairs, and who at the time him- 
 self contemplated history-writing, might be worth a hundred 
 other volumes.
 
 262 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Of all the mission archives none were of more importance 
 than those of San Diego, this being the initial point of early 
 Alta California observation. Besides historical proclivities, 
 Judge Hayes loved science. He had taken meteorological 
 observations since 1850, and took an interest in the botany 
 of the country. In all these things he not only collected and 
 arranged, but he digested and wrote. 
 
 During these days at San Diego I visited and examined 
 everything of possible historic interest. I wandered about 
 the hills overlooking the numerous town sites, crossed to 
 False bay, entered the cemetery, and copied the inscriptions 
 on the stones that marked the resting-place of the more 
 honored dead. In company with Mr. Oak I called at the 
 county clerk's office to see Avhat documents were there. No 
 one seemed to know anything about them. Such as were 
 there were scattered loosely in boxes and drawers, some at 
 New Town and some at Old Town. When we learned in 
 what sad confusion they were we were all the more thank- 
 ful we had copies of them. Judge Hayes began copying 
 these archives in 1856. 
 
 Early one morning we walked over to Old Town to visit 
 Father Ubach, the parish priest, with whom we had an 
 appointment. I was shown the mission books, consisting of 
 the Book of Baptisms, in four volumes, the first one extend- 
 ing down to 1822, and the others to date. The Book of Mar- 
 riages was in one volume and complete to date. Three 
 volumes comprise the Book of Deaths, and one the Book of 
 Confirmations. Aside from the sketch by Junfpcro Scrra, a 
 copy of which was in tlie Hayes collection, the volumes were 
 of little historic value. Father Ubach informed us of a man- 
 uscript Indian vocabulary j)reserved at the mission of San 
 Juan Bautista; also a manuscript of his own on the natives 
 of his parish, of which there were then twelve hundred. He 
 kindly gave us letters to the padres at San Juan Capistrano 
 and San Juan Bautista. 
 
 Departing from San Diego, we called at the missions and saw 
 all the early residents possible, notably Cave J. Coutts and John
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH, 263 
 
 Foster, at their respective ranchos near San Luis Rey, from 
 whom we received encouragement and valuable information. 
 
 On reaching Los Angeles, had I been there at the coming 
 of the Americans I might have obtained documents by the 
 bale, and freighted a vessel with them. Had I even been there 
 ten years before I might have secured no inconsiderable quan- 
 tity ; but during this time many heads of old families had 
 died, and their papers, with the long accumulations of rub- 
 bish, had been burned. 
 
 Most of this was fiction or exaggeration. At the time of 
 the secularization there had accumulated at the several mis- 
 sions the materials from which might have been sifted not 
 only their complete history, but thousands of interesting inci- 
 dents illustrative of that peculiar phase of society. These 
 once scattered and destroyed, there never was any consider- 
 able quantity elsewhere. Old Califomian families were not 
 as a rule sufficiently intelligent to write or receive many im- 
 portant historical documents, or to discriminate and preserve 
 writings valuable as historical evidence. 
 
 Undoubtedly at the death of a paterfamilias, in some 
 instances, the survivors used the papers he had preserved in 
 the kindling of fires, in the wrapping of articles sent away, or 
 in the making of cigarettes ; but that during the century of 
 Spanish occupation in California much historical material 
 had accumulated anywhere except in government offices and 
 at the missions I do not believe. And furthermore, wherever 
 it had so happened that a few family papers had been pre- 
 served, upon any manifestation of interest in or effort to 
 obtain possession of them, their quantity and importance 
 were greatly magnified. In such cases three documents filled 
 a trunk, and a package a foot square was enlarged by rumor 
 to the size of a sea chest. 
 
 Not far from the Pico house, in a long low adobe whose 
 front door opened from a back piazza, dwelt the fair widow 
 to whom Colonel Coutts had given me a letter. 
 
 CaUing on her one evening we presented our letter, which 
 was to make our path to the papers easy. Ah ! the manu-
 
 264 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 script of her father? It was her mother, Mrs. Bandini, to 
 whom we should speak: all the documents of Don Juan 
 belonged to her. 
 
 Mrs. Bandini asked if I needed them soon. Yes ; I always 
 needed such things immediately. She could not possibly touch 
 the trunk until the return of her son-in-law, Charles R. John- 
 son, who was then at San Diego. He would not return for a 
 fortnight, and I could not wait. The old lady would not 
 move without him, and there I was obliged to leave it. 
 
 It was necessary I should have that material. Bandini 
 was a prominent and important citizen of southern California, 
 one of the few who united abihty and patriotism sufficient to 
 write history. I saw by this time that I should have more 
 material on northern than on southern California ; that is to 
 say, my northern authorities would preponderate. I should 
 have at my command, as things were then going, more nar- 
 ratives and individual histories written from a northern than 
 from a southern standpoint. And this was worthy of serious 
 consideration. For a long time the north and the south were 
 in a state of semi-antagonism, and their respective statements 
 would read very differently. It was only by having several 
 accounts, written by persons belonging to either side, that 
 anything like the truth could be ascertained. 
 
 Obviously it would be very much as the son-in-law should 
 say. I was not acquainted with Johnson personally, but by 
 inquiry I ascertained the names of those who had influence 
 with him, and these next day I did not fail to see. There 
 was then in Los Angeles, Alfred Robinson, a resident of San 
 Francisco, and ^n author. He was intimate at the Bandini 
 mansion, and might assist me, I spoke with him upon the 
 subject. I likewise saw Judge Sepulveda, Governor Downey, 
 Major Truman, and others, who cordially promised their influ- 
 ence in my behalf. Thus for the present I was obliged to 
 leave it. On my return to San Francisco I continued my 
 efforts. I was determined never to let the matter die. I 
 appealed again to Colonel Coutts, and to several Californians 
 of influence in various parts of the State. The result was that
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 265 
 
 about six months after my first attempt I succeeded in plac- 
 ing the valuable documents of General Bandini, together with 
 his manuscript history of CaUfornia, upon the shelves of my 
 library, there to remain. At the suggestion of Mr. Robinson, 
 who brought the papers up from Los Angeles, I sent Mrs. 
 Bandini a check ; but she returned it to me, saying that she 
 did not want money for the material. 
 
 Pio Pico, ci-devaiit governor of California and a resident 
 of Los Angeles, Avas not in the city at the time. Subse- 
 quently I obtained from him a history of such affairs as came 
 within his knowledge, of which I shall speak again hereafter. 
 Olvera professed to have some documents ; professed to be 
 writing a history of California; had long and earnestly sought 
 'to obtain possession of Bandini's papers, and laughed at our 
 efforts in a direction where he had so often failed. During 
 the short conversation we had with Andres Pico, he informed 
 us, as Father Ubach had said, that he was the commissioner 
 appointed in early days to take charge of the mission records, 
 and consequently at one time had many of them in his pos- 
 session, including those of San Luis Rey ; but most of them 
 had been scattered and stolen, and now he had only those at 
 San Fernando, which were a small portion of those once in 
 his possession. 
 
 In Los Angeles at this time were many old friends and 
 newly-made genial acquaintances, who. rendered me every 
 attention. Tuesday, the 3d of March, accompanied by a 
 pleasant party, I was driven out to San Gabriel mission, 
 some seven miles east of Los Angeles. Awaking the resi- 
 dent priests, Philip Farrel and Joaquin Bot by name, we 
 obtained a sight of the mission books. Originally bound in 
 flexible cow-hide, one cover with a flap like a pocket-book 
 and the other mthout, they were now in a torn condition. I 
 copied the title-page of the Libro de Co?iJin?iacio/ies, in two 
 volumes, 1771-1874, which was signed, as most of the mis- 
 sion books were, Fr Junipero Serra, Presid". In this work 
 were several notes embodying the church regulations of the 
 sacrament of confirmation, the notes being usually in Span-
 
 266 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 ish, with church rules in Latin. The other books preserved 
 at San Gabriel mission were Mairimonios, two volumes, 1 774- 
 1855, and 1858-74, the first entry being April 19, 1774, and 
 signed by Junipero Serra. There is but one entry in this 
 book signed by the president. The Entierros and Bautis- 
 inos were also there, the latter in five volumes, the first entry 
 being the 17th of March, 1796, and signed Miguel Sanches. 
 
 Returning to town by way of the celebrated Rose and 
 Johnson places, we spent the remainder of the day in visits. 
 An important man was J. J. Warner, who agreed to write. 
 To make the promise more real, I purchased a blank-book, 
 and writing on the first page Reminiscences of J. J. Warner, 
 I took it Vith a box of cigars to his office, and received his 
 solemn assurances. By close attention to the matter, I man- 
 aged to get the book half filled with original material within 
 three years, which, considering the a,lmost universal failure 
 of my efforts of that character, I regarded as something won- 
 derful. Judge Sepiilveda and R. M. Widney promised to 
 write, and I am glad to say both these gentlemen were as 
 good as their word ; and further than this, to both of them 
 I am under many other obligations for kind assistance in 
 procuring historical material in the vicinity of Los Angeles. 
 Colonel Howard, not the illustrious Volney E. of Vigilance 
 Committee fame, manifested the kindest interest in our 
 efforts, thought he might bring some influence to bear on 
 Mrs. Bandini, and introduced us at the bishops' residence, 
 but unfortunately the bishops, Amat and Mora, were both 
 absent. I do not know that they would have been of any 
 assistance to us; on the contrary, they might have pre- 
 vented my getting the Bandini papers. Assuredly the 
 church was not disposed to gather mission or other docu- 
 ments for my library ; whatever may have been its course 
 formerly, of that kind of substance to-day it keeps all and 
 gathers all it can. 
 
 The mission books of San Fernando preserved in the pos- 
 session of the Pico family were found to be as follows : Matri- 
 inonios, one volume, 1797-1S47, first entry October 8, 1797,
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 267 
 
 signed Francisco Dumet; Baiitismos, one volume, 1 798-1 852, 
 first entry April 28, 1798, signed Francisco Dumet; Libro de 
 Patenies y de Ynventario pcrteneciente a la Mision de S" Fer- 
 fia/ido Rey en la Nueva California aiio de 1S06. In my hasty 
 examination of this book it seemed to me to contain infor- 
 mation of sufficient value to warrant my sending thither 
 Mr. Foster to copy it. In like manner another important 
 work, said by Don Romulo to be among his father's papers, 
 but which he could not at the moment lay his hands on, 
 should be looked after. Its title he thought to be some- 
 thing as follows : La Fundacion de la Mision de San Fer- 
 najido Rey, por el Padre Francisco Dumet. It was said to 
 contain a full description of the state of the country at the 
 time when the mission was first established. Foster failing, 
 nothing was accomplished toward transferring this infor- 
 mation to the library until the visit of Mr. Savage to Los 
 Angeles, nearly four years later. 
 
 At San Buenaventura we encountered Bishop Amat and 
 Father Comapala. The latter was a good fellow enough, but just 
 now in an exceeding flutter. He would do anything he could 
 for us, but the mission books contained nothing, absolutely 
 nothing ; he and his were at my disposal, but all was nothing. 
 When pressed by us for a sight of this nothing, there was the 
 same nervous response. Nevertheless, we tortured him until 
 the books were produced, fat and jolly black-eyed Bishop 
 Amat meanwhile smiling approvingly. 
 
 Comapala promised to write his experiences for me, having 
 come to the country in 1850, He said we should by all 
 means see Ramon Valdes, an ancient of San Buenaventura. 
 Likewise he gave me a letter to Jose de Amaz, another old 
 resident, and straightway we hastened to find these walking 
 histories and to wring them out upon our pages. But before 
 leaving. Bishop Amat had assured us that his librar}-, which 
 we had not been able to see at Los Angeles on account of 
 his absence, contained nothing relating to our subject save 
 Palou's life of Junipero Serra. He had made some researches 
 himself among the missions for historical matter, but without
 
 268 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 success. He expressed the opinion that most of the mis- 
 sion archives were sent to the college of San Fernando in 
 Mexico, but said he had seen documents on the subject in the 
 royal archives of Seville, in Spain. The bishop also kindly 
 gave me a letter to the padre at San Antonio, the oldest of 
 the Californian padres. The missions farther north, accord- 
 ing to Bishop Amat, were in a miserable state, the building 
 at Santa Ines having been used for the storage of hay, 
 and several times fired by malicious persons. At San Carlos 
 mission the padre who had attempted to reside there was 
 driven away several years previous by threats of shooting. 
 
 Mounting the stage at four o'clock p. m. the day after our 
 arrival, we reached Santa Barbara at half-past eight. The 
 hotels were crowded, but the stage agent, unknown to me, 
 had kindly engaged rooms for us, so that we were soon 
 made quite comfortable. The next day being Sunday, we 
 attended church, rested, and wrote up our journals. 
 
 A day or two afterward I called at the city hall to look 
 after the county archives, but neither the clerk nor the re- 
 corder knew of the existence of anything of the kind save 
 the copies of a few pueblo land-titles. From Mr. Hughes, 
 however, an attorney long friendly to our business, I learned 
 that some years ago the archives Avere taken to San Fran- 
 cisco, where those of a general nature were retained by the 
 United States surveyor-general, and the rest returned and 
 placed in a tea-chest for safe-keeping. At the next change 
 of county officers the chest with its contents disappeared, no 
 one knew whither. 
 
 Our next interview was with the parish priest, Padre Jaime 
 Vila, probably the politest man in California. All the padres 
 were polite, but Father Jaime overflowed with politeness. 
 As he showed us the mission books there was a refreshing 
 absence of the trepidation common with other j^adres which 
 manifested itself as soon as the books were produced and 
 continued until they were hidden again, meanwhile persist- 
 ently assuring us that their contents were of no importance, 
 and being evidently much averse to our taking notes from
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 269 
 
 them. Father Jaime, Hke a sensible man, seemed pleased to 
 show his books, and took pains to explain the contents of 
 each, evidently fearing in the operation neither the thunder- 
 bolts of the Almighty nor the machinations of Satan. We 
 found here four volumes o{ Baieiisfnos, 1 782-1874, the first 
 entry being signed Pedro Benito Cambon. So far as could 
 be ascertained by a hasty examination the second volume 
 contained the baptisms of aboriginals only. Father Jaime 
 stated that separate lists were kept up to a certain date, and 
 afterward all were entered in one book. The total number 
 of entries in the regular book was 3591, and in the Indian 
 book 4771. The E7iticrros was in three volumes, the title 
 of volume i. being by Junipero Serra. The first entry, De- 
 cember 22, 1782, was signed Vicente de Santa Maria. Be- 
 sides which were two volumes of Alatrimonios ; two volumes 
 of Confirmaciones ; one volume of lists, or invoices of articles 
 furnished the mission of San Buenaventura from 1791 to 1810, 
 with prices ; two volumes of alphabetical lists of persons in 
 the mission of Santa Barbara, with dates of marriage, con- 
 firmation, etc., v\'ith some miscellaneous tables, including 
 lists of persons transferred to and from the mission ; and one 
 volume entitled Libra en que se apiinta la Ropa que se dis- 
 tribuye d los Indios de esta Mision de San Buenaventura, 
 1806-16. 
 
 These books were kept at Father Jaime's residence, which 
 was attached to the parish church in town. Thence we pro- 
 ceeded to the mission, about one mile north-east of the town, 
 on the side hill overlooking the Santa Barbara plain. This 
 mission, unlike any we had hitherto seen, was kept in perfect 
 repair. It was occupied as a Franciscan college and mon- 
 astery, and the monks in gray robes and shaven crowns 
 called to mind those of the south of Europe in the olden time. 
 Of the college, Father O'Keefe, a determined, man-of-the- 
 world-looking Irish priest, was president. One of the few 
 remaining of the early padres was the aged Father Gonzalez. 
 Some time since he resigned his position as guardian, and 
 was now partially paralyzed. He nevertheless recognized us
 
 270 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 and our mission; as we were presented to him he insisted 
 upon rising and uncovering his head, and directed that every 
 facihty be afforded us. 
 
 But in the present guardian of the Franciscan college, 
 Friar Jose Maria Romo, more than in any of the clergy con- 
 nected with the mission, I found my ideal of a monk. He 
 was arrayed in a long gray gown, tied with a cord round the 
 waist, and beads and cross pendent. His hair was neatly 
 cut, and the crown of the head shaven. His eye was keen 
 and kindly, his features broadly intelligent, and in his air and 
 bearing was a manliness rarely found associated with religious 
 learning. He was one who could be true at once to himself 
 and to his faith, neither sacrificing his humanity to his piety nor 
 one jot of piety to any earthly passion. At this time Father 
 Romo had not been long from Rome. Italian, French, and 
 Spanish he spoke fluently, but not English. He was a man 
 of weighty and learned presence, yet modest withal and affa- 
 ble. As successor to Father Gonzalez he was a happy choice. 
 
 We found the archives of Santa Barbara mission both 
 bulky and important. They consisted of correspondence of 
 the padres, statistics of the several missions, reports, accounts, 
 inventories, and the like, including some documents of the 
 pueblo and presidio, as well as of the mission. All these 
 were in the form of folded papers, neatly filed in packages, 
 and labeled with more or less distinctness. They were kept 
 in a cupboard consisting of an aperture about two feet square 
 sunk into a partition wall to the depth of about one foot, and 
 covered with plain folding doors. As we had never before 
 heard of this deposit, and as it was apparently not known by 
 any one beyond the mission precincts, we regarded it a rare 
 discovery, the first real literary bonanza we had unearthed 
 during our excursion. 
 
 The archives of this mission seemed to have escaped the 
 fate of all the rest. The mission was never wholly abandoned 
 at any time; it was never rifled of its books and papers, 
 either by priests returning to Mexico or by the United States 
 government. Father Gonzalez assured me that this cupboard
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 27 1 
 
 had never been disturbed, that it was then just as it had been 
 left by the early fathers ; and such to every appearance was 
 the fact. That Doctor Taylor with his indefatigable industry 
 should have allowed to escape him this rich treasure can only 
 be accounted for upon the supposition that its existence w^as 
 kept secret. 
 
 Besides the folded papers mentioned, there were the follow- 
 ing in the form of manuscript books, pamphlets, and printed 
 government regulations with official signatures : Diario de la 
 caniinata que hizo el padre prefecto Pay eras en union del padre 
 Sanchez por la sierra desde San Diego hasia San Gabriel 182 1. 
 Libro que coniiene los Apuntes de siembras, cosechas y demas 
 asuntos propios de U7ia Misiofi. Catecismo Politico arreglado a 
 la constitucion de la vionarquia Espaiiola — for the Califomian 
 aborigines. Qiiaderno de estados e Ynformes de esias misiones 
 de la Alia California del afio de 1822. Descripcion de la Ope- 
 racion Cesdrea — apparently an extract copied from some 
 medical work. Libro de las Siembras y Cosechas de la Mision 
 de Santa Barbara que comienza desde el ano de 1808 — mostly 
 blank. A book of sermons w^ritten and preached by the padres 
 in California, with an index. Libro de Quenias que esta Mi- 
 sion de Santa Barbara tiene con la habilitacion de este presidio 
 del mismo nombre y con otros varios particulares para este am 
 de I7g2. A proclamation by Governor Alvarado. Three 
 criminal trials of persons for polygamy. Grammars and vo- 
 cabularies of the aborigines of different missions, in two vol- 
 umes, extensive and important, but very difficult to read. 
 Accounts of the different missions, in three volumes, 181 6 
 and subsequently. Lnforme de la Mision de Santa Barbara 
 sita, etc., asi de lo c spiritual como de lo temporal y comprehende 
 desde el 4 de Diciembre del a ho de 1786, que fuc el de la fuii- 
 dacion, hasta el dia ji de Diciembre de 1787. Factura de ires 
 tercios de ge'neros, etc. Ordenes — of the bishops of Sonora 
 and California; important. Testimojiio de la Real Junta 
 sobrc el nuevo reglaniento e instruccion formada por Don Josef 
 de Echeveste para la peninsula de California y Dept. de San 
 Bias, 1773. Qiiaderno en que se llcva la cuenta de la cera,
 
 272 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 candelcros, y o/ras cosas que se han coiii^rado para la Iglesia 
 de Santa Barbara desdc el afio de i8jO — to 1856. 
 
 To examine these documents at any length at this time 
 was impracticable. I asked permission to take the contents 
 of the cupboard to San Francisco to copy, but Father Romo 
 assured me it was impossible, that he could not assume the 
 responsibility of letting them go beyond the mission walls. 
 I offered bonds for the safe return of every paper. " Your 
 money could not restore them," said Father Romo, "in case 
 they were lost by fire or water; then I should be censured." 
 Permission was freely given me, however, to copy as much 
 as I pleased within the mission buildings, where every facility 
 would be given me ; of which kind offer I subsequently made 
 avail, as will be mentioned hereafter, transferring the contents 
 of the cupboard, that is to say, all the valuable part of it, to 
 my library by means of copyists. 
 
 At five A. M. the loth of March we left Santa Barbara by 
 stage, and were set down at Ballard's about two o'clock. 
 Early next morning in a farm wagon we drove out to the 
 college of Guadalupe, some five miles south-eastward, and 
 thence to Santa Ines mission. The books of Purisima mis- 
 sion being at Santa Ines, we concluded not to visit the former, 
 ' as there was nothing there specially to be seen. 
 
 The mission library at Santa Ines was the largest we had 
 yet seen, but was composed almost exclusively of theological 
 works printed in Spain. Besides the regular Purisima mis- 
 sion books I saw at Santa In6s a curious old book from 
 Purisima, partly printed and partly in manuscript. It was 
 an olla podrida of scraps, notes, accounts, etc., with a treatise 
 on music. Marking such parts of it as I desired, I engaged 
 the priest to make and send me a copy. 
 
 A most uncomfortable night-ride in the rain brought us to 
 San Luis Obispo. There, as before, we drew plans of the 
 mission buildings, examined the books, took several dicta- 
 tions, and i)roceeded on our way. As we approached the 
 northern end of the line of early ecclesiastical settlement, the 
 missions lay some distance away from the stage route, and I
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 273 
 
 concluded to leave those nearest home for another occasion. 
 Hence from San Luis Obispo we all returned, reaching San 
 Francisco the 15th of March, well i:)leased with our excur- 
 sion. 
 
 In transmitting to me the remainder of his material, Judge 
 Hayes proved himself a high-minded and disinterested lover 
 of history, ready to give himself, his time, and thoughts to 
 the cause. " I wish to finish up my collection," he writes 
 me, " so that you may have all the facts in my possession 
 that may in any way be useful to you." 
 
 First he completed and forwarded to me the large quarto 
 volume of Alta Califoynia Missions which I had left with 
 him. In a letter dated the 14th of October, 1874, he says: 
 " I send by express the two volumes of Indian Traits. Mr. 
 Luttrell did not come down with the commission sent by the 
 secretary of the interior. I have therefore no such use for 
 this collection now as I supposed I might have. I have 
 been able to add but a few matters to it. Whatever further 
 information I may collect must go into another volume. 
 Emigrant Notes now only waits for photographs to be com- 
 pleted. The board of supervisors of San Bernardino directed 
 a photographer to furnish me with twelve views which I had 
 designated. Day before yesterday our photographer took 
 for me twenty views around the Old Town, which he will get 
 ready immediately." 
 
 Several visits were made by Judge Hayes to Los Angeles 
 during the following year, at which times he used his ut- 
 most influence to obtain from Olvera and others historical 
 information, but without much success. Finally, about the 
 beginning of 1876, I engaged Judge Hayes to drop his pro- 
 fessional duties for a time, take up his residence at Los 
 Angeles, and devote his entire thoughts and energies to se- 
 curing for me the historical information which was so rapidly 
 fading in that vicinity. 
 
 Being himself executor and legal adviser for several estates, 
 he was enabled to secure some material from them. In re- 
 gard to the county archives, he examined the entire collection 
 18
 
 274 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 of twelve volumes of original documents which I had seen 
 at Los Angeles, and made abstracts, as he had done with the 
 San Diego archives, except that, these being more voluminous, 
 he employed two copyists to write out in full such documents 
 as he designated. Besides an abstract, he made for me a 
 complete index of those papers, which I found very useful. 
 Thus all that could be valuable to history was taken from 
 these archives and transferred to my library, where it was 
 preserved in large and strongly bound volumes. It was a 
 long and expensive piece of work, but there was no other 
 feasible plan which could place me in possession of the ma- 
 terial ; and, indeed, I considered myself fortunate in securing 
 the services of one so able, experienced, and enthusiastic as 
 Judge Hayes. But for him, the expense might easily have 
 been doubled, and the work not half so well performed. 
 
 The next most important work to be done in the way of 
 obtaining material was to secure copies of the archives of 
 Santa Barbara mission. Of the men employed by Judge 
 Hayes in my behalf at Los Angeles, Edward F. Murray 
 proved to be the best. I endeavored to induce Judge Hayes 
 to go to Santa Barbara and make an abstract of the archives 
 there, as he had done at San Diego and at Los Angeles. 
 But professional duties would not longer be thrust aside ; and, 
 besides, his failing health warned him to put his house in 
 order for that most unwelcome of visitors, death. 
 
 Mr. Murray was recommended very highly by Judge 
 Hayes for the Santa Barbara mission, and as he expressed 
 his willingness to go, an engagement was effected, beginning 
 about the middle of June, 1876, and which continued with a 
 few interruptions to 1878. 
 
 He was a faithful and competent man, and his abstracts 
 on the whole gave satisfaction. It was no easy matter for a 
 writer in San Francisco to send a stranger to work on a 
 distant mass of papers, concerning which neither had much 
 knowledge, and have the requisite material properly taken 
 out; but Mr. Murray, besides being a man of quick percep-
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 275 
 
 tion, thorough education, and wide experience, had served 
 so long and so well under the able directorship of Judge 
 Hayes that there was really less difficulty than I had antici- 
 pated. 
 
 A further most important work in southern California was 
 that performed for me by Mr. Thomas Savage, an account 
 of which I now proceed to give : 
 
 After a preliminary examination of the county archives 
 at San Jose and Salinas, and the papers at the Jesuit college 
 and parochial church at Santa Clara, with several copyists, 
 notably Sehores Piha, Corona, and Gomez, Mr. Savage pro- 
 ceeded in March, 1877, to Salinas and began operations in a 
 large room which he rented near the office of the recorder, 
 Jacob R. Leese, who afforded him every facility. 
 
 Despatching Gomez in search of native Californians from 
 whom a narrative of recollections was desired, INIr. Savage 
 placed before the others books of records, and directed them 
 what and how to abstract. Prominent among those who 
 gave in their testimony at this time were Francisco Arce and 
 Francisco Rico, the latter detailing the particulars of 1845-6, 
 the wars of the revolution, the campaign against IMichel- 
 torena, and the actions of the Californians against the 
 United States forces. Thus passed four weeks, when, the 
 work at Salinas being accomplished, the copyists were sent 
 back to San Francisco, and Mr. Savage proceeded to Mon- 
 terey. Here were important personages, for instance, Flo- 
 rencio Serrano, Estevan de la Torre, Mauricio Gonzalez, 
 John Chamberlin, and James Meadows, the last named 
 being one of the prisoners sent from California to Mexico in 
 1840. Their and other dictations, with a bundle of original 
 papers, were the result of four weeks' labor at this place, after 
 which Mr. Savage returned to San Francisco. 
 
 A second trip began the 21st of May, when with the same 
 copyists Mr. Savage went to San Jose, and after a month's 
 labor secured to the library all that was required from the 
 public archives, consisting of six volumes of records and 
 twenty-five hundred loose documents, every one of which
 
 276 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Mr. Savage carefully examined for historical data. Among 
 those from whom dictations were then taken was Eusebio 
 Galindo. From the heirs of the late Antonio Sunol a collec- 
 tion of letters by John A. Sutter was obtained. 
 
 Sending the copyists back to San Francisco, Mr. Savage 
 proceeded with Gomez to Santa Cruz, where the books and 
 loose papers of the mission were placed under contribution, 
 and also the public papers, which were mostly of the old 
 town of Branciforte. From Father Hawes and Mr. McKin- 
 ney, county clerk, Mr. Savage received many favors. Near 
 Watsonville hved Jose Amador, son of Pedro Amador, one 
 of the soldiers present at the founding of San Diego and 
 Monterey, and for many years sergeant in the San Fran- 
 cisco presidial company. " I found this man of ninety-six 
 years," writes Mr. Savage, " who had at one time been 
 wealthy, and after whom Amador county was named, living 
 in great poverty under the care of his youngest daughter, 
 who is married and has many children. He granted my re- 
 quest without asking gratuity, and in six days narrated two 
 hundred and forty pages of original information. I used to 
 take every day something to the children, and occasionally 
 a bottle of Bourbon to warm the old man's heart." The 17th 
 of July Mr. Savage was back in San Francisco. 
 
 As the history of California progressed it became evident 
 that, notwithstanding the mass of material in hand, namely 
 the Hayes collection, mission, government, municipal, and 
 private archives, transcripts made by Hayes, Murray, Savage, 
 and others, there were gaps which yet more thorough research 
 alone would fill ; or rather, from a fuller insight into the sub- 
 ject, and the reports of intelligent persons, I was convinced 
 that important information remained yet unearthed, and I 
 could not rest satisfied without it. There were church records 
 to be looked into and utilized at nearly all the former mis- 
 sions between San Diego and San Juan ; and moreover, it 
 was important to procure the version of old Californians and 
 others in the southern counties on the sectional quarrels there 
 existing, especially between the years 1831 and 1846, and
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 277 
 
 even appearing during the last struggle of the Califomians 
 and Mexicans against United States occupation. Till now, 
 though the surefios and iiortcfws were equally represented in 
 the contemporary records obtained, yet too much of the 
 modern dictated testimony had described those occurrences 
 from the northern, or Monterey and Sonoma, points of view. 
 Men and women still lived in the south who had taken an 
 active part in or had been mtnesses of those troubles ; and 
 from them more or less unbiassed accounts might be obtained. 
 Others possessed knowledge derived from their sires, and old 
 documents worth securing from the careless hands which had 
 destroyed so many. 
 
 Mr. Savage accordingly, well provided with letters, took 
 passage the 6th of October, 1877, on board the steamer 
 Senator, which carried him to Santa Monica, whence he pro- 
 ceeded to Los Angeles, and was soon at work upon the 
 dictation of Pio Pico, formerly governor of California, carry- 
 ing on at the same time the examination and copying of the 
 papers of Ignacio Coronel and Manuel Requena. To these 
 experiences original documents were added, some from the 
 estate of Andres Pico ; from J. J. Warner the manuscript 
 volume of his Recollections was obtained. Papers and rem- 
 iniscences were further procured from Pedro Carrillo and 
 Jose Lugo. To Antonio F. Coronel, Mr. Savage expressed 
 the highest obligations ; also to Governor Downey and Judge 
 Sepulveda. Bishop Mora, under instructions from Bishop 
 Amat, loaned Mr. Savage twelve manuscript books, permitted 
 him free access to the episcopal archives, and furnished him 
 a letter authorizing all priests within the diocese in charge of 
 mission records to permit such extracts from them as he 
 might desire. 
 
 To the mission of San Gabriel Mr. Savage proceeded in 
 the latter part of November, and found Father Bot most 
 obliging. Hereabout dictations were obtained from Benjamin 
 D. Wilson, Victoriano Vega, and Amalia Perez, stewardess 
 of the mission, and well informed upon mission life, habits 
 of the padres, and manners and customs of the Cahfomians.
 
 278 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Next came Spadra, and a dictation from old Pablo Vejar, 
 famous in military mutinies, for which he had been sent a 
 prisoner to Mexico. Escaping thence, he returned, fought 
 the Americans at San Pascual, and was taken prisoner ; once 
 rich, he was now ashamed to ask Mr. Savage into his cabin. 
 Then to Pomona, to see the Englishman, Michael White, who 
 came to the coast in 181 7, and settled in Alta CaHfomia 
 in 1828. Thence Mr. Savage returned to San Gabriel. At 
 Los Nietos was seen Jose Maria Romero, a Californian of 
 ninety; at San Juan Capistrano, the mission books; then 
 followed a dictation from John Foster, of Santa Margarita 
 rancho, an examination of the mission books at San Luis 
 Rey, and more dictations from Juan Avila and Michael 
 Kraszewski. At San Diego, Juana Osuna and Jose Maria 
 Estudillo furnished information. Fortunately the widow of 
 Moreno, government secretary under Pico, was at San Diego, 
 where she had brought from lower California a trunk filled 
 with the papers of her late husband, who used to endorse 
 even ordinary letters "A mi archive, apuntes para la his- 
 toria." It seems here was another dreaming of history-writing. 
 " The papers are indeed interesting in an historical point of 
 view," says Mr, Savage, who so ingratiated himself with the 
 widow as to gain access to the trunk ; " Moreno had not only 
 been secretary in upper California, but had taken part in the 
 war against the United States in 1846, and for several years 
 was the gefe politico of the region called the northern frontier 
 of lower California." Sehora Moreno returned to her rancho 
 at Guadalupe, leaving her documents in the possession of 
 Mr. Savage. 
 
 Narciso Botello was a man of character, and though now 
 poor, had held many important positions, and was an active 
 l)articipant in public affairs from 1833 to 1847. He was in- 
 duced to wait on Mr. Savage at north San Diego and give 
 his experiences, which were rich in historical events, manners 
 and customs, education, and judicial processes. 
 
 Throughout the entire expedition Mr. Savage was untiring 
 in his efforts, which were not always attended with encourag-
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 279 
 
 ing success. But fortune smiled on him during January of 
 1878, though the face of the sun was clouded and the roads 
 in bad condition from excessive rains. At the time of his 
 death Judge Hayes was deep in two large collections of 
 documents which he had shortly before obtained, one from 
 Mr. Alexander, son-in-law of Requena, and the other from 
 Coronel, the former containing the valuable diary of Mr. 
 Melius. All then fell into the hands of the son, Mr. Chaun- 
 cey Hayes, who resided at his rancho, five miles from San 
 Luis Rey. From him Mr. Savage, now on his homeward 
 way, obtained " two cases pretty well crammed with manu- 
 scripts and newspaper slips, every one of which contained 
 some information on the Californias and on other parts of 
 the Pacific coast. They were taken to San Luis Rey under 
 a heavy rain, which, however, did no damage. After some 
 carpentering, to render the cases secure, I arranged for their 
 conveyance to San Diego, thence to be shipped to San Fran- 
 cisco." Mr. Savage does not forget the kindness of Judge 
 Egan, Doctor Crane, Pablo Pryor, Juan Avila, Father Mut, 
 and others. 
 
 Back to Los Angeles, and again en route, armed with a 
 letter from the best of our southern friends, Judge Sepulveda, 
 to Ignacio del Valle. A warm welcome, a dictation, and all 
 the documents the place afibrded, followed a hard ride to the 
 famous rancho of Camulos. Besides extracts from the mis- 
 sions here obtained were the reminiscences of Jose Arnaz, 
 Ramon Valdes, and others. 
 
 The I St of March, at Santa Barbara, Mr. Savage joined 
 Mr. Murray, then engaged on the De la Guerra papers, kindly 
 loaned him by Mr. Dibblee, administrator of the estate. 
 From early morning until far into the night, Sundays and 
 other days, Mr. Savage was soon engaged on the mission 
 books, pubUc and private documents, and in taking dicta- 
 tions from Mrs. Ord, one of the De la Guerra daughters, 
 Agustin Janssens, Apolinaria Lorenzana, and Rafael Gon- 
 zalez. Small but very valuable collections of papers were 
 received from Concepcion Pico, sister of Governor Pico, and
 
 28o LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Dolores Dominguez, the two ladies being the widows of 
 Domingo and Jose Carrillo. Many family archives had here 
 by foolish heirs been wilfully burned or used for making 
 cigarettes. "The results in Santa Barbara," Mr. Savage 
 writes, " from March 2d to April 4th were about four hun- 
 dred pages of dictations, over two thousand documents, and 
 two hundred pages of manuscript from the mission books. 
 Much time was spent in vain search for papers not existing." 
 Subsequently Mr. Murray obtained dictations from the Ameri- 
 can pioneers of that locality, notably from the old trapper 
 Nidever, who came overland to California in 1832. 
 
 The researches of Mr. Savage met with some disappoint- 
 ment at San Luis Obispo, though, through the courteousness 
 of Father Roussel, the widow Bonilla, Charles Dana, Maria 
 Inocente Pico, widow of Miguel Avila, and Jose de Jesus 
 Pico, the results were important. These all did much. 
 Inocente Garcia also gave one hundred and ten pages, and 
 Canuto Boronda and Ignacio Ezquer valuable contributions. 
 The very interesting diary of Walter Murray was kindly lent 
 by his widow. On a fearfully stormy night, at the risk of his 
 life, Mr. Savage, accompanied by Jose de Jesus Pico, visited 
 the rancho of Senora de Avila in the interests of history, 
 and there received every kindness. 
 
 I have not the space in this chapter to follow Mr. Savage 
 further. Many journeys he made for the library, and en- 
 countered many experiences ; and great were the resulting 
 benefits to Califomian history. Though less ostentatious 
 than some, his abilities were not surpassed by any. In the 
 written narrative given me of his several adventures, which is 
 full of interesting incidents and important historical expla- 
 nations, the keenest disappointment is manifested over fail- 
 ures ; nevertheless his success was gratifying, and can never be 
 repeated. During the remainder of this expedition, which 
 lasted eight months, ending at San Francisco early in June, 
 Mr. Savage secured to the library the collections of Carlos 
 01 vera of Chualar, and Rafael Pinto of Watsonville, " con-
 
 HISTORIC RESEARCHES IN THE SOUTH. 201 
 
 taining so much valuable matter," he says, " that the history 
 of California would not have been complete without them." 
 Pinto was collector of the port at San Francisco at the time 
 of the American occupation ; he also gave his reminiscences. 
 Mr. Savage did not cease his efforts until the missions of 
 San Rafael, San Jose, and San Francisco were searched, and 
 material extracted from the state Ubrary at Sacramento. The 
 old archives at the offices of the secretary of state and county 
 clerk, at Sacramento, were likewise examined, and notes 
 taken from the several court records.
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 
 
 It is undeniable that the exercise of a creative power, that a free cre- 
 ative activity, is the highest function of man ; it is proved to be so by 
 man's finding in it his true happiness. — Matthew Arnold. 
 
 IN company with Mrs. Bancroft, on the 30th of April, 1878, 
 I sailed for Vancouver Island, with the view of returning 
 by land. After five days and nights of tempestuous bufifet- 
 ings, though without special discomfort, we safely landed at 
 Esquimalt, and drove over to Victoria, three miles distant. 
 We found a good hotel, the Driard House, and a gentlemanly 
 host, Louis Redon. The day was Sunday, and though old 
 ocean yet billowed through our brain and lifted our feet at 
 every step, we decided to attend church. 
 
 On setting out from the hotel we met Mr. Edgar Marvin, 
 who accompanied us to Christ church, where the bishop pre- 
 sided over the cathedral service. Next day Mr. Marvin in- 
 troduced me to several persons whom I wished to see ; and 
 throughout our entire stay in Victoria he was unceasing in 
 his kindness. Mr. T. N. Hibben, an old and esteemed friend, 
 together with his highly intelligent wife, were early and fre- 
 quent in their attentions. Then there were Sir Matthew B. 
 Begbie, Dr. Ash, the Honorable A. C. Elliott, Lady Douglas, 
 Mr. and Mrs. Harris, Governor and Mrs. Richards, and a 
 host of others. Though he did not affect literature, Sir 
 Matthew was a thoroughly good fellow, and no one in British 
 Columbia exercised a more beneficial or a greater political 
 and social influence ; in fact, I may as well say at the outset 
 that nowhere have I ever encountered kinder appreciation 
 or more cordial and continued hospitality than here. In- 
 
 282
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 283 
 
 vitations so poured in upon us as seriously to interfere with 
 our labors, and greatly to prolong our stay. I found it im- 
 possible to decline proffers of good- will so heartily made; 
 and no less interest was manifested in furthering the object 
 which had taken me there than in hospitable entertainment. 
 
 To examine public archives and private papers, to extract 
 such portions as were useful in my work, to record and carry 
 back with me the experiences of those who had taken an 
 active part in the discovery and occupation of the country — 
 these, together with a desire to become historically inspired 
 with the spirit of settlement throughout the great northwest, 
 constituted the burden of my mission. 
 
 Engaging two assistants, I sat down to work in earnest. 
 One of these assistants, Mr. Thomas H. Long, I found a 
 valuable man. The other I discharged at the end of a 
 week. Afterward I tried two more, both of whom failed. 
 The province was in the agonies of a general election, ne- 
 cessitated by the dissolution of the assembly by the governor, 
 on the ground that the Elliott government, as it was called, 
 Avas not sufficiently strong to carry out its measures. Un- 
 fortunately the old Hudson's Bay Company men, whom of 
 all others I wished historically to capture, were many of them 
 politicians. For the greater part tough, shrewd, clear-headed 
 Scotchman, the fur company's ancient servants were now the 
 wealthy aristocrats of the province ; and although they loved 
 their country well, and were glad to give me every item re- 
 specting their early adventures, they loved office also, and 
 would by no means neglect self-interest. But I was persistent. 
 I was determined never to leave the province until my cra- 
 vings for information should be satisfied, and to obtain the 
 necessary information at as early a date as possible. 
 
 The governor was absent fishing, and would not return for 
 a week. Mr. Elliott, the proAdncial secretary, was affable, 
 but exceedingly occupied in the endeavor to rise again upon 
 his political legs. He quickly gave me all printed govern- 
 ment matter, but when it came to an examination of the 
 archives he manifested no particular haste. His deputy, Mr.
 
 284 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Thomas Elwyn^ offered access to everything in his office, but 
 assured me that it contained nothing of value, since all the 
 material which could in any wise throw Hght on history was 
 in the house of the governor. None of the archives had been 
 removed to Ottawa after confederation with Canada, as I 
 had been informed. 
 
 When the governor, Mr, Richards, as the people of this 
 province called him, returned, I immediately waited upon 
 him and made known my wishes. He was a comparative 
 stranger, he said, sent there from Canada ; knew little regard- 
 ing the documents in the governor's office, and proposed 
 that a minute-in-council be passed by the provincial govern- 
 ment in order to invest him with the requisite authority to 
 open to me the government archives. Addressing a letter to 
 Mr. Elliott asking the passage of such a measure, he put me 
 off once more. 
 
 Now Mr. Elliott was prime minister, and his associates 
 being absent he was the government, and had only to write 
 out and enter the order to make it valid. I knew very well, 
 and so did they, first, that the governor required no such 
 order, and secondly, that Mr. Elliott could write it as easily 
 as talk about it. 
 
 After a day or two lost by these evasions, I determined to 
 bring the matter to a crisis. These northwestern magnates 
 must be awakened to a sense of duty ; they must be induced 
 to give me immediate access to the government archives or 
 refuse, and the latter course I did not believe they would 
 adopt. Meeting Mr. Elliott on the street shortly afterward, 
 I said to him : 
 
 " The benighted republics of Central America not only 
 throw open their records to the examination of the historian, 
 but appoint a commissioner to gather and abstract material. 
 It can hardly l)c possible that any English-speaking govern- 
 ment should throw obstruction in the way of laudable his- 
 torical effort." 
 
 The minister's apologies were ample, and the order came 
 forth directly. But the order did not suit the governor, who
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 285 
 
 returned it and required in its place another, differently 
 worded ; and this at last given him he required that his secre- 
 tary, the Honorable Mr. Boyle, a most affable, but wholly 
 inexperienced, young man, should alone have the making of 
 the copies and abstracts, always, of course, at my expense. 
 
 Meanwhile every spare moment was occupied in bringing 
 forward the ancients of this region, and in obtaining informa- 
 tion from any and all sources. There were many good 
 writers, many who had written essays, and even books. To 
 instance : Mr. G. M. Sproat, who drew up for me a skeleton 
 of British Columbia history, according to his conception of 
 it; Mr. J. D. Pemberton, formerly private secretar}' of Sir 
 James Douglas, and author of a work on British Columbia, 
 who not only brought me a large package of printed material, 
 but gave me some most valuable information in writing, and 
 used his influence with Doctor Helmcken, the eccentric son- 
 in-law of Sir James, and executor of the Douglas estate, to 
 obtain for me the private books and papers in the possession 
 of the family. Dr. John Ash likewise wrote for me and gave 
 me material, as did Thomas Elwyn, deputy provincial secre- 
 tary, Arthur Wellesley Vowel, and Mr. Elliott. From P. N. 
 Compton, Michael Muir, Alexander Allen, James Deans, 
 and others, I obtained dictations. But most valuable of 
 all were the reminiscences, amounting in some instances 
 to manuscript volumes, and constituting histories more or 
 less complete, of New Caledonia and the great northwest, 
 the recollections of those who had spent their lives within 
 this territory, who had occupied important positions of honor 
 and trust, and were immediately identified not only with 
 the occupation and settlement of the country but with its 
 subsequent progress. Among these were A. C. Anderson, 
 W. F. Tolmie, Roderick Finlayson, Archibald McKLinlay, 
 and others, men of mind, able writers some of them, and 
 upon whose shoulders, after the records of Sir James Douglas, 
 the diaries of chief factors, and the government and Hudson's 
 Bay Company's archives, must rest the history of British 
 Columbia.
 
 286 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Jam,es M. Douglas, son of Sir James, whose marriage with 
 the daughter of Mr. ElHott we had the pleasure of attending, 
 granted me free and wilhng access to all the family books 
 and papers. " Ah! " said everybody, " you should have come 
 before Sir James died. He would have rendered you assist- 
 ance in value beyond computation." So it is too often with 
 these old men ; their experiences and the benefit thereof to 
 posterity are prized after they are beyond reach. 
 
 Lady Douglas was yet alive, and, though a half-breed, 
 was a perfect lady. Her daughters were charming ; indeed, 
 it were next to impossible for the wife and daughters of 
 Sir James Douglas to be other than ladies. Scarcely so 
 much could truthfully be said of the sons of some other fur 
 magnates. 
 
 The honorable Amor de Cosmos, ne Smith, the historic 
 genius of the place, was absent attending the legislature in 
 Canada. He was one of two brothers who conducted the 
 Standard newspaper, and dabbled in politics and aspired to 
 history- writing. One of these brothers was known as plain 
 Smith; the other had had his name changed by the legislature 
 of- California, It was some time before I could realize that 
 the man thus playing a practical joke on his own name was 
 not a buffoon. 
 
 Mr. William Charles, at this time director of the Hudson's 
 Bay Company's affairs at Victoria, gave me much information, 
 and among other things a journal of the founders of Fort 
 Langley while journeying from Fort Vancouver and estab- 
 lishing a new fort on Fraser river. The record covered a 
 period of three years, from 1827 to 1829. Mr, Charles also 
 sent to Fort Simpson for the records of that important post, 
 and forwarded them to me after my return to San Francisco. 
 
 From George Hills, bishop of Columbia, I obtained copies 
 of missionary reports giving much new knowledge of various 
 parts. Mr. Stanhope Farwell of the Victoria land ofiice 
 gave me a fine collection of maps and charts of that vicinity. 
 Through the courtesy of John Robson, paymaster of the 
 Canadian Pacific railway survey, Victoria, and William Buck-
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 287 
 
 ingham of the office of the minister of public works, Ottawa, 
 the printed reports of the survey were sent me from Canada. 
 F. J. Roscoe in hke manner furnished me with the Canadian 
 blue-books, or printed public documents of British America. 
 These, together with the blue-books found in the public 
 offices at Victoria, and other official and general publications, 
 boxed and shipped to San Francisco from that port, formed 
 extensive and important additions to my library. 
 
 Mrs. Bancroft came as usual to my assistance, and took 
 from one person, a missionary, the Rev. Mr. Good, one hun- 
 dred and twenty foolscap pages descriptive of the people 
 and country round the upper Fraser. In Mr. Anderson's 
 narrative, which was especially good, she took special in- 
 terest, and during our stay in Victoria she accomplished more 
 than any one engaged in the work. Writing in her journal 
 of Mr. Good, she says : " His descriptions of scenery and 
 wild life are remarkable for vividness and beauty of expres- 
 sion. His graphic pictures so fascinated me that I felt no 
 Aveariness and was almost unconscious of eftbrt." 
 
 It was like penetrating regions beyond the world for 
 descriptions of scenes acted on the other side of reality, this 
 raking up the white-haired remnants of the once powerful 
 but now almost extinct organization. There was old John 
 Tod, tall, gaunt, calling himself eighty-four, and clear-headed 
 and sprightly at that, though his friends insisted he was 
 nearer ninety-four. The old fur-factor lived about four 
 miles from the city, and regularly every day, in a cap with 
 huge ears, and driving a bony bay hitched to a single, high- 
 seated, spring wagon, he made his appearance at our hotel, 
 and said his say. While speaking he must not be questioned; 
 he must not be interrupted. Sitting in an arm-chair, leaning 
 on his cane, or walking up and down the room, his deep-set 
 eyes blazing with the renewed iire of old-time excitements, 
 his thin hair standing in electric attention, he recited with 
 rapidity midst furious gesticulations story after story, one 
 scene caUing up another, until his present was wet with the 
 sweat of the past.
 
 288 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Archibald McKinlay was another, a really brave and esti- 
 niable character, and a man who had filled with honor to 
 himself and profit to the Hudson's Bay Company many 
 responsible positions, but, while younger than Mr, Tod, he 
 was not possessed of so unclouded a memory or so facile a 
 tongue. He knew enough, but could not tell it. " If it's 
 statistical ye want I'll give 'em to ye," he would bring out 
 every few minutes, " but I'll have nothing to do with person- 
 alities." When I hinted to him that history was made by 
 persons and not by statistics, he retorted : "Well, I'll write 
 something for ye." He had much to say of Peter Skeen 
 Ogden, whose half-breed daughter he had married. The first 
 evening after our arrival he brought his wife to see us, and 
 seemed very proud of her. He was really anxious to com- 
 municate his experiences, coming day after day to do so, 
 but failing from sheer lack of tongue. He once interrupted 
 Mr. Tod, disputing some date, and the old gentleman never 
 forgave him. Never after that, while McKinlay was in the 
 room, would Mr. Tod open his mouth. 
 
 Doctor W. F. Tolniie, who had been manager of the Puget 
 Sound Agricultural Company, and subsequently chief factor at 
 Victoria, was of medium height, but so stoutly built as to 
 seem short, with a large bald head, broad face and features, 
 florid complexion, and small blue eyes, which, through their 
 corners and apparently without seeing anything, took in all 
 the world. He had been well educated in Europe, was 
 clever, cunning, and withal exceedingly Scotch. Tolmie 
 knew much, and could tell it; indeed, he would tell 
 much, but only what he pleased. Nevertheless I found 
 him one of my most profitable teachers in the doings of 
 the past; and when I left Victoria he intrusted me with his 
 journal kept while descending the Columbia river in 1833 
 and for four years thereafter, which he prized very highly. 
 
 Roderick Finlayson, mayor of Victoria, and founder of the 
 fort there, was a magnificent specimen of the old-school 
 Scotch gentleman. Upon a fine figure was well set a fine 
 head, slightly bald, with grayish-white hair curled in tight,
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 289 
 
 short ringlets round and behind a most pleasing, benignant 
 face. His beard was short and thick, in color brown and 
 gray, well mixed. He tasted temperately of the champagne 
 I placed before him, while Tolmie, who was totally abstinent 
 for example's sake in the presence of his boys, prescribed 
 himself doses of brandy. The Rev. Mr. Good, I think, 
 enjoyed the brandy and cigars which were freely placed at his 
 command fully as much as constructing elegant sentences. 
 Preferring to write rather than to dictate, Mr. Finlayson gave 
 me from his own pen in graphic detail many of the most 
 stirring incidents in the history of British Columbia. 
 
 But more than to any other in Victoria, I feel myself 
 indebted to Mr. A. C. Anderson, a man not only of fine 
 education, but of marked literary ability. Of poetic tempera- 
 ment, chivalrous in thought, of acute observation and retentive 
 memory, he proved to be the chief and standard authority on 
 all matters relating to the country. He had published several 
 works of value and interest, and was universally regarded as the 
 most valuable living witness of the past. Tall, symmetrical, 
 and very erect, with a long, narrow face, ample forehead, well 
 brushed white hair, side-whiskers, and keen, light-blue eyes, 
 he looked the scholar he was. Scarcely allowing himself an 
 interruption, he devoted nearly two weeks to my work with 
 such warm cheerfulness and gentlemanly courtesy as to win 
 our hearts. Besides this, he brought me much valuable 
 material in the form of record-books and letters. 
 
 I could write a volume on what I saw and did during this 
 visit of about a month at Victoria, but I must hasten forward. 
 After a dinner at Sir Matthew's; a grand entertainment at 
 Mr. Marvin's ; several visits from and to Lady Douglas, Mrs. 
 Harris, Doctor and Mrs. Ash, and many other charming calls 
 and parties, and a hundred promises, not one in ten of which 
 was kept; leaving Mr. Long to finish copying the Douglas 
 papers, the Fraser papers, the Work journals, and the man- 
 uscripts furnished by Anderson, Finlayson, Tod, Spence, 
 Vowel, and others ; after a voyage to New Westminster, and 
 after lending our a'^sistance in celebrating the Queen's birth- 
 19
 
 290 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 day, on the last day of IMay we crossed to Port Townsend, 
 having completed one of the hardest months of recreation I 
 ever experienced. But long before this I had reached the con- 
 clusion that while this work lasted there was no rest for me. 
 At every move a new field opened. At Port Townsend, 
 which in its literary perspective presented an aspect so for- 
 bidding that I threatened to pass it by without stopping, I 
 was favored with the most fortunate results. Judge James 
 G. Swan, ethnologist, artist, author of Three Years at Shoal- 
 water Bay, and divers Smithsonian monographs and news- 
 paper articles, was there ready to render me every assistance, 
 which he did by transferring to me his collection, the result 
 of thirty years' labor in that direction, and supplementing 
 his former writing by other and unwritten experiences. Ma- 
 jor J. J. H. Van Bokkelen was there, and after giving me his 
 dictation, presented to Mrs. Bancroft a valuable collection of 
 Indian relics, which he had been waiting twenty years, as he 
 said, to place in the hands of some one who would appreci- 
 ate them. There we saw Mr. Pettigrove, one of the found- 
 ers of Portland ; Mr. Plummer, one of the earliest settlers at 
 Port Townsend ; W. G. Spencer, N. D. Hill, John L. Butler, 
 Henry A. Webster, and L. H. Briggs, from all of whom I 
 obtained additions to my historical stores. Dr. Thomas T. 
 Minor entertained us handsomely, and showed me through 
 his hospital, which was a model of neatness and comfort. 
 He obtained from Samuel Hancock of Coupeville, Whidbey 
 island, a voluminous manuscript, which was then at the east 
 seeking a publisher. James S. Lawson, captain of the United 
 States coast survey vessel Fauntlcroy, took us on board his 
 ship and promised to write for me a history of western coast 
 survey, the fulfilment of which reached me some six months 
 after in the form of a very complete and valuable manuscript. 
 Here, likewise, I encountered Amos Bowman, of Anacortes, 
 Fidalgo island, whom I engaged to accompany me to Ore- 
 gon an A take dictations in short-hand. He remained with 
 me until my northern work as far south as Salem was done, 
 when he proceeded to San Francisco and took his place for
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 29 1 
 
 a time in the library. He was a good stenographer, but not 
 successful at literary work. 
 
 After a visit to Fort Townsend, upon the invitation of 
 William Gouverneur Morris, United States revenue agent, 
 continued our way to Seattle, the commercial metropolis of 
 the territory. Three thousand lethargic souls at this date 
 comprised the town, with a territorial university and an 
 eastern railroad as aspirations. There we met Yesler, saw- 
 mill owner and old man of the town; and Horton, who 
 drove us through the forest to the lake ; and Mercer, Lans- 
 dale, Arthur Denny, Booth, Hill, Spencer, and Haller, from 
 each of whom we obtained valuable information. Mrs. Abby 
 J. Hanford subsequently sent me an interesting paper on 
 early times at Seattle. There also I met the pioneer express- 
 man of both California and British Columbia, Billy Ballou, 
 a rare adventurer, and in his way a genius, since dead. 
 
 The North Pacific, a neat littie steamboat, had carried us 
 across from Victoria to Port Townsend, where the Dakota 
 picked us up for Seattle ; thence, after two days' sojourn, we 
 embarked for Olympia on board the Messenger, Captain 
 Parker, an early boatman on these waters. When fairly afloat 
 I took my stenographer to the wheel-house, and soon were 
 spread upon paper the striking scenes in the life of Captain 
 Parker, who, as our little craft shot through the glassy forest- 
 fringed inlet, recited his history in a clear intelligent manner, 
 together Avith many points of interest descriptive of our 
 charming surroundings. 
 
 On board the Messenger was Captain Ellicott of the United 
 States coast survey, who invited us to land at his camp, some 
 ten miles before reaching Olympia, and spend the night, which 
 we did, touching first at Tacoma and Steilacoom. After an 
 excellent dinner, Bowman wrote from the captain's notes 
 until eleven o'clock, when we retired, and after an early 
 breakfast next morning the captain's steam yacht conveyed 
 us to the capital of the territory.
 
 292 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Immediately upon our arrival at Olympia we were waited 
 upon by the governor and Mrs. Ferry, Elwood Evans, his- 
 torian of this section, Mrs. Evans, and others among the 
 chief ladies and gentlemen of the place. Mr. Evans devoted 
 two days to me, drew forth from many a nook and corner 
 the musty records of the past, and placed the whole of his 
 material at my disposal. 
 
 " I had hoped," said he, " to do this work myself, but your 
 advantages are so superior to mine that I cheerfully yield. 
 I only wish to see the information I have gathered during the 
 last thirty years properly used, and in your hands I know 
 that will be done." 
 
 And so the soul of this man's ambition, in the form of two 
 large cases of invaluable written and printed matter on the 
 Northwest Coast, was shipped down to my library, of which 
 it now constitutes an important part. To call such an act 
 generous is faint praise. Then, as well as before and after, 
 his warm encouraging words, and self-sacrificing devotion to 
 me and my work, won my lasting gratitude and affection. 
 
 At Portland we found ready to assist us, by every means 
 in their power, many warm friends, among whom were S. F. 
 Chadwick, then governor of Oregon ; Matthew P. Deady, of 
 the United States judiciary ; William Strong, one of the first 
 appointees of the federal government, after the treaty, as 
 judge of the supreme court ; Mrs. Abernethy, widow of the 
 first provisional governor of Oregon, and Mrs. Harvey, 
 daughter of Doctor McLoughlin, and formerly wife of Wil- 
 liam Glenn Rae, who had charge of the Hudson's Bay 
 company's affairs, first at Stikeen and afterward at Verba 
 Buena. Colonel Sladen, aide-de-camp to General Howard, 
 who was absent fighting Indians, not only threw open to me 
 the archives of the military dci)artment, but directed his 
 clerks to make such abstracts from them as I should require. 
 Elisha White, the first Indian and government agent in 
 Oregon, I learned was in San Francisco. On my return I 
 immediately sought him out, and had many long and profit- 
 able interviews with him. I should not fail to mention
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD, 293 
 
 Governor Gibbs, General Hamilton, Stephen Coffin, Mrs. J. 
 H. Couch, Mr. McCraken, H. Clay Wood, Mr. Corbett, 
 George H. Atkinson, Simeon Reed, W. Lair Hill, and H. 
 W. Scott of the Oregonian. R. P. Earhart kindly supplied 
 me with a set of the Oregon grand lodge proceedings. In 
 company with Dr. J. C. Hawthorne we visited his insane 
 asylum, a model of neatness and order. General Joseph 
 Lane, hero of the Mexican war and many northern Indian 
 battles, first territorial governor of Oregon, and first delegate 
 from the territory to Congress, I met first at Portland and took 
 a dictation from him in the parlor of the Clarendon hotel, at 
 which we were staying, and subsequently obtained further 
 detail at his home at Roseburg. J. N. Dolph wrote Mr. 
 Gray, the historian, who lived at Astoria, to come to Portland 
 to see me, but he was not at home, and my business with him 
 had to be done by letter. Mrs. F. F. Victor, whose writings 
 on Oregon were by far the best extant, and whom I wished 
 much to see, was absent on the southern coast gathering in- 
 formation for the revision of her Oregofi and Washington. 
 On my return to San Francisco I wrote offering her an en- 
 gagement in my library, which she accepted, and for years 
 proved one of my most faithful and efficient assistants. 
 Father Blanchet was shy and suspicious : I was not of his 
 fold ; but as his wide range of experiences was already in print 
 it made little difference. 
 
 We had been but a few hours in this beautiful and hospi- 
 table city when we were informed that the annual meeting 
 of the Oregon pioneers' association was to open immediately 
 in Salem. Dropping our work at Portland, to be resumed 
 later, we proceeded at once to the capital, and entered upon 
 the most profitable five days' labor of the entire trip ; for there 
 we found congregated from the remotest comers of the state the 
 very men and women we most wished to see, those who had 
 entered that region when it was a wilderness, and had con- 
 tributed the most important share toward making the society 
 and government what it was. Thus six months of ordinary 
 travel and research were compressed within these five days.
 
 294 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 I had not yet registered at the Chemeketa hotel in Salem 
 when J. Henry Brown, secretary of the pioneers' association, 
 presented himself, at the instance of Governor Chadwick, 
 and offered his services. He was a fair type of the average 
 Oregonian, a printer by trade, and poor, as is apt to be the 
 case with printers. I found him a diamond in the rough, and 
 to-day there is no man in Oregon I more highly esteem. He 
 knew everybody, introduced me and my mission to every- 
 body, drummed the town, and made appointments faster 
 than I could keep them. He secured for me all printed 
 matter which I lacked. He took me to the state archives, 
 and promised to make a transcript of them. I paid him a 
 sum of money, for Avhich he afterward did more than he had 
 bargained. 
 
 It was a hot and dusty time we had of it, but we worked 
 with a will, day and night; and the notes there taken, under 
 the trees and in the buildings about the fair- grounds, at the 
 hotel, and in private parlors and ofifices,. made a huge pile of 
 historic lore when written out as it was on our return to 
 San Francisco. There was old Daniel Waldo, who, though 
 brought by infirmity to time's border, still stoudy stumped his 
 porch and swore roundly at everything and everybody be- 
 tween the Atlantic and Pacific. There was the mild missionary 
 Parrish, who in bringing the poor Indian the white man's reli- 
 gion and civilization, strove earnestly but fruitlessly to save 
 him from the curses of civilization and religion. There was 
 John Minto, eloquent as a speaker and writer, with a wife but 
 litde his inferior : the women, indeed, spoke as freely as the men 
 when gathered round tlie camp fires of the Oregon pioneers' 
 association. For example : Mrs. Minto had to tell how 
 women lived, and labored, and suffered, and died, in the early 
 days of Oregon ; how they clothed and housed themselves, 
 or, rather, how they almost dispensed with houses and clothes 
 during the first wet winters of their sojourn; how an admir- 
 ing young shoemaker had measured the impress of her 
 maiden feet in the mud, and sent her as a present her first 
 Oregon shoes. Mrs. Samuel A. Clarke took a merry view
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD, 295 
 
 of things, and called crossing the plains in 1851 a grand pic- 
 nic. J. Quinn Thornton, with his long grizzly hair and oily 
 tongue, was there, still declaiming against Jesse Applegate for 
 leading him into Oregon by the then untried southern route 
 thirty years before. Judge Thornton rendered important 
 service by transferring to me valuable material collected by 
 him for literary purposes, for he too had affected history, but 
 was now becoming somewhat infirm. David Newsome 
 knew something, he said, but would tell it only for money. 
 I assured David that the country would survive his silence. 
 Mr. Clarke, with his amiable and hospitable wife and 
 daughters, spared no pains to make our visit pleasing as well 
 as profitable. Senator Grover was in Washington, but I 
 caught him afterward in San Francisco as he was passing 
 through, and obtained from him a lengthy and valuable dic- 
 tation. General Joel Palmer told me all he could remember, 
 but his memory was evidently failing. James W. Nesmith 
 related to me several anecdotes, and afterward sent me a 
 manuscript of his own writing. The contribution of Medorem 
 Crawford was important. Among the two or three hundred 
 prominent Oregonians I met at Salem I can only mention 
 further Richard H. Ekin, Horace Holden, Joseph Holman, 
 W. J. Herren, and H. H. Gilfry, of Salem; W. H. Rees, 
 Butteville; B. S. Clark, Champoeg; William L. Adams, 
 Hood River ; B. S. Wilson, Corvallis ; Joseph Watts, Amity ; 
 George B. Roberts, Cathlamet; R. C. Gear, Silverton; 
 Thomas Congdon, Eugene City ; B. S. Strahan and Thomas 
 Monteith, Albany ; and Shamus Carnelius, Lafayette. Philip 
 Ritz of Walla Walla gave me liis dictation in San Francisco. 
 On our way back to Portland we stopped at Oregon City, 
 the oldest town in the state, where I met and obtained re- 
 citals from S. W. Moss, A. L. Lovejoy, and John M. Bacon, 
 and arranged with W. H. H. Fouts to copy the archives. I 
 cannot fail, before leaving Portland, specially to mention the 
 remarkable dictations given me by Judge Deady and Judge 
 Strong, each of which, with the author's writings already 
 in print, constitutes a history of Oregon in itself. Indeed,
 
 296 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 each of these gentlemen had intended to write a history of 
 Oregon. 
 
 After a flying visit to the Dalles, overland by rail from 
 Portland to San Francisco was next in order, with private 
 conveyance over the Siskiyou mountains. It was a trip I 
 had long wished to make, and we enjoyed every hour of it. 
 I have not space for details. We stopped at many places, 
 saw many men, and gathered much new material. At Drain 
 we remained one day to see Jesse Applegate, and he spent 
 the entire time with us. He was a remarkable person, in 
 some respects the foremost man in Oregon during a period 
 of twenty years. In him Avere united the practical and the 
 intellectual in an eminent degree. He could explore new 
 regions, lay out a farm, and write essays with equal facility. 
 He was pohtical economist, mechanic, or historian, according 
 to requirement. His fatal mistake, like that of many another 
 warm-hearted and chivalrous man, was, as he expressed it, in 
 " signing his name once too often." But though the payment 
 of the defaulter's bond sent him in poverty into the hills of 
 Yoncalla, he was not dispirited. At seventy, with his active 
 and intellectual life, so lately full of flattering probabilities, a 
 financial failure, his eye was as bright, his laugh as unaffected 
 and merry, his form as erect and graceful, his step as elastic, 
 his conversation as brilliant, his realizing sense of nature and 
 humanity as keen, as at forty. Never shall I forget that day, 
 nor the friendship that grew out of it. 
 
 The veteran Joseph Lane I found somewhat more diflicult 
 of management in his home at Roseburg than at Portland. 
 Congressional honors were on his brain. Nevertheless, in 
 due time, I obtained from him all I required. 
 
 I must conclude this narrative of my northern journey with 
 the barest mention of a few out of the hundreds I met on my 
 way who took an active interest in the history of their native 
 or adopted land : 
 
 P. P. Prim, L. J. C. Duncan, J. M. McCall, Lindsay 
 Applegate, J. M. Sutton, Daniel Gaby, William Bybee, 
 David Lin, and James A. Cardwell, whom I met at Jackson-
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 297 
 
 ville; Anthony M. Sleeper, Joseph Rice, D. Ream, A. P. 
 McCarton, Thomas A. Bantz, A. E. Raynes, F. G. Hearn, 
 ofYreka; C. W. Taylor and Charles McDonald, of Shasta; 
 Henry F. Johnson and Chauncey C. Bush, of Reading, 
 important names in the local history of their respective places. 
 Mrs. Laura Morton of the state hbrary, Sacramento, very kindly 
 copied for me the diary of her father, Phihp L. Edwards. 
 
 The 7 th of July saw me again at my table at Oak ville. It 
 was during the years immediately succeeding the return from 
 my expedition to the north that I wrote the Histoy of the 
 Northwest Coast and the History of British Columbia ; Oregon 
 and Alaska came later. 
 
 In reviewing this journey, I would remark that I found at 
 the headquarters of the Hudson's Bay Company in Victoria 
 rooms full of old accounts, books, and letters, and boxes and 
 bins of papers relating to the business of the company, and 
 of its several posts. The company's Oregon archives were 
 lodged here, and also those from the Hawaiian islands and 
 the abandoned posts of New Caledonia. 
 
 The office of the provincial secretary contained at this time 
 books and papers relative to the local affairs of the govern- 
 ment, but I found in them little of historical importance. 
 At the government house, in the office of the governor's pri- 
 vate secretary, was richer material, in the shape of despatches 
 between the governors of British Columbia and Vancouver 
 island and the secretary of state for the colonies in London 
 with the governor-general of Canada. There were likewise 
 correspondence of various kinds, despatches of the minister 
 at Washington in 1856-70, papers relative to the San Juan 
 difficulty, the naval authorities at Esquimalt, 1859-71, letters 
 from Admiral Moresby to Governor Blanchard, and many 
 miscellaneous records and papers important to the historian. 
 
 Oregon's most precious material for history I found in the 
 heads of her hardy pioneers. The office of the adjutant- 
 general of the department of the Columbia contained record- 
 books and papers relative to the affairs of the department
 
 298 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 which throw much hght on the settlement and occupation 
 of the country. There were letters-sent-books and letters- 
 received-books since 1858, containing instructions and advices 
 as to the establishment of posts and the protection of the 
 people. The public library, Portland, contained nothing 
 worthy of special mention. 
 
 There was once much valuable material for history in the 
 Oregon state library at Salem, but in 1856 a fire swept it 
 away. The legislature passed a law requiring a copy of 
 every newspaper published in the state to be sent to the state 
 library, but the lawyers cut into them so badly for anything 
 they desired that finally the librarian sold them to Chinamen 
 for wrapping-paper — a shiftless and short-sighted policy, I 
 should say. It had been the intention of the state to preserve 
 them, but as no money was appropriated for binding, they 
 were scattered and destroyed. At the time of my visit in 
 1878 there was little in the state library except government 
 documents and law-books. 
 
 In the rooms of the governor of Oregon were the papers 
 of the provisional government and such others as naturally 
 accumulate in an executive office. When I saw them they 
 were in glorious disorder, having been thrown loose into 
 boxes without respect to kind or quality. Engaging Mr. J. 
 Henry Brown to make copies and abstracts of them, I stipu- 
 lated that, for the benefit of the state, he should leave them 
 properly classified and chronologically arranged. Mr. Brown 
 had made a collection of matter with a view of writing a 
 statistical work on Oregon, and possessed a narrative of an ex- 
 pedition under Joseph L. Meek, sent by the provisional gov- 
 ernment to Washington for assistance during the Indian war. 
 He also had a file of the Oregonian. A. Bush possessed a 
 file of the Oregon Statesman. From Mrs. Abernethy I 
 obtained a file of the Oregon Spectator, the first newspaper 
 published in Oregon. Mr. Nesmith had a filcof the journal 
 last mentioned, besides boxes of letters and papers. 
 
 The first printing-press ever brought to Oregon was sent 
 to the Sandwich Islands by the American board of commis-
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 299 
 
 sioners for foreign missions, and was used there for printing 
 books in the Hawaiian language ; then, at the request of 
 doctors Whitman and Spaulding, it was transferred to Oregon, 
 to the Nez Perce mission on the Clearwater, now called the 
 Lapwai agency. This was in 1838. The press was used 
 for some time to print books in the Nez Perce and Walla 
 Walla languages, and at the time of my visit it stood in the state 
 house at Salem, a rare and curious relic, where also might be 
 seen specimens of its work under the titles : Nez Perch First 
 Book; designed for children and new beginners. Clear 
 Water, Mission Press, iSjg. The latter was prepared in the 
 Nez Perce language, by the Rev. H. H, Spaulding. Mat- 
 theivjiim Taaiskt. Printed at the press of the Oregon Mission 
 under the direction of The American Board, C. F. Missions. 
 Clear Water : M. G. Foisy, Printer — being the gospel of Mat- 
 thew, translated by H. H. Spaulding, and printed on eighty 
 pages, small 4to, double columns. Another title-page was 
 Talapusapaiain Wanipt Tinias. Paul wah sailas Jmoan- 
 pshina Godnim wataskitph. Luk. Kauo tvanpith Lordiph 
 tininaki. Paul. Lapwai : 1842 — which belonged to a book 
 of hymns prepared by Mr. Spaulding in the Nez Perce lan- 
 guage. 
 
 Before setting out on my northern journey I had arranged 
 with Mr. Petroff, a member of the library staff, to visit Alaska, 
 and continue the northward line of search where my investi- 
 gations should leave it, thus joining the great northwest to 
 southern explorations already effected. 
 
 I applied through Senator Sargent to the government 
 authorities in W^ashington for passage for Mr. Petroff on 
 board any revenue-cutter cruising in Alaskan waters. The 
 request was granted. 
 
 Mr. Petroff embarked at San Francisco on board the 
 Richard Rush, Captain Bailey, the loth of July, 1878, touched 
 at Port Townsend the i6th, at Nanaimo for coal on the 17th, 
 and anchored that night in the Seymour Narrows, in the 
 gulf of Georgia. Late on the afternoon of the i8th Fort
 
 300 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Rupert was reached, where Mr. Petroff met Mr. Hunt, in 
 charge of the station, who had resided there since 1849 ; Mr. 
 Hall, a missionary, was also settled there. After sailing from 
 Fort Rupert in the early morning and crossing Queen Char- 
 lotte sound, anchorage was made that evening in Safety cove, 
 Fitzhugh sound. Passing Eellabella, another of the Hudson's 
 Bay company's stations, the cutter continued its course until 
 it reached Holmes bay, on McKay reach. On Sunday, the 
 2 1 St, the course lay through Grenville channel to Lowe inlet, 
 and the following day was reached Aberdeen, Cardena bay, 
 where an extensive salmon cannery was situated. 
 
 The first archives to be examined were at Fort Simpson. 
 There Petroff met Mr. McKay, agent of the fur company, 
 who placed at his command the daily journals of the post 
 dating back to 1833. Over these papers Petroff worked 
 assiduously from nightfall till half-past one, in the quaint old 
 office of the Hudson's Bay company, with its remnants of 
 home-made carpets and furniture. Only eight volumes were 
 examined during his limited stay ; but subsequently I had 
 the good fortune to obtain the loan of the whole collection 
 for examination at my library in San Francisco. In inky 
 darkness Petroff then made his way out of the stockade of 
 the fort through a wilderness of rocks and rows of upturned 
 canoes, until he reached the cutter. Mr. McKay had taken 
 passage for Fort Wrangel, and during the trip furnished a 
 valuable dictation. The fort was reached on the evening of 
 the 23d. Upon arriving at Fort Sitka, on the morning of July 
 26th, Petroff immediately began to work upon the church 
 and missionary archives furnished by Father Mitropolski, and 
 spent the evening obtaining information from old residents 
 and missionaries ; among the latter, Miss Kellogg, Miss 
 Cohen, and Mr. Bredy had interesting experiences to relate. 
 Collector Ball and his deputy were most attentive. July 28th 
 the cutter steamed away for Kadiak, which was reached two 
 days later. The agents of the Alaska commercial company, 
 and of Falkner, Bell, and company, Messrs. Mclntyre and 
 Hirsch, came on board the steamer, and were very commu-
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 301 
 
 nicative. Mr. Mclntyre lent Petrofif the company's journals, 
 which were thoroughly examined. Among those who fur- 
 nished personal data from long residence in this country 
 were Mr. Stafeifk, Mr. Zakharof, and Father Kasherarof. 
 Others, recently arrived from Cook inlet, also gave consider- 
 able information. Mr. Pavlof, son of the former Russian 
 governor, and manager at this time of the American and 
 Russian Ice company, had much important knowledge 
 to impart. 
 
 Mr. Mclntyre also presented Petrofif with a mummy, which 
 was sent to the Bancroft library and placed in a glass case. 
 It was obtained by Mr. Mclntyre from Nutchuk island, from 
 a cave on the side of a steep mountain very difficult of access. 
 The body is well preserved, with a finely formed head, bear- 
 ing little resemblance either to Aleut or Kalosh. The hair 
 is smooth and black ; it has the scanty mustache and goatee, 
 sometimes noticeable among Aleuts. The nose has lost its 
 original shape. Brown and well dried, with chin resting on 
 the raised knees, this strange relic has a curious appearance 
 as it surveys its new surroundings. This much of its history 
 is furnished by the natives : Long ago, before the Russians 
 had visited these lands, there had been war between the 
 Nutchuk people and the Medonopky, Copper River people, 
 who were called Ssootchetnee. The latter were victorious, 
 and carried home the women, slaying the men and boys. 
 The conquered Nutchuks waited for many years their turn 
 to avenge themselves. One day, while some of the Ssoo- 
 tchetnees were hunting sea-otter along the shore, several 
 bidarkas from Nutchuk approached, and in the attack which 
 followed captured the hunters. Guided by a smoke column, 
 they went on shore and discovered a woman cooking. She 
 was one of the Nutchuk captives, who had been taken from 
 their island, and was now wife and mother to some of the 
 men just secured. Her father had been a great chief, but was 
 dead; and when she was returned a prisoner to her native land 
 the chief of the island refused to reco2;nize her because of her
 
 302 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 relations with the Ssootchetnees. Cruelly he drove her from 
 him, telling her to go to a cave in the side of a mountain if 
 she sought comfort. Obeying, she proceeded thither, and 
 found the naked bodies of her husband and two sons. So 
 copiously flowed her tears that the bottom of the cave was 
 filled with water, which submerged the bodies. Nor were 
 her groans without avail, for they reached the heart of the 
 powerful Wilghtnee, a woman greatly respected for her good- 
 ness, and because she controlled the salmon, causing them 
 every year to ascend the river, and bringing other fish from 
 the deep sea near to the shore. Wilghtnee lived in a lake of 
 sweet water above the cave, and soon learned the story of 
 wrongs and injustice from the weeping woman. Command- 
 ing her to cease lamenting, and assuring her that she need 
 not grieve for the want of skins in which to sew her dead, as 
 was the custom, Wilghtnee took the bodies where should fall 
 upon them the waters from her mountain lake, and in a short 
 time they became fresh and beautiful, shining like the flesh 
 of the halibut. Then were they returned to the cave, and 
 Wilghtnee promised that they should forever after remain 
 unchanged. Retribution followed the chief's cruelty, for 
 Wilghtnee was as relentless in her anger as she was tender in 
 her sympathy, and not a salmon was permitted to enter the 
 river or lake that year, which caused the death from hunger 
 of the chief and many of his tribe. Then was the woman 
 made his successor, and during her rule never again did 
 Wilghtnee permit the salmon to fail. The new ruler taught 
 the people how to preserve their dead, and closed the cave, 
 in which alone and forever she destined should remain her 
 Ssootchetnee husband and children. 
 
 On the 3d of August Mr. Petroff reached the trading-post 
 at Belkovsky, and thence passed along the southern extrem- 
 ity of the Alaskan peninsula, through Unimak strait into 
 Bering sea, to Iliuliuk, Unalaska island, where he remained 
 for two weeks, and where he received cordial assistance in 
 his labors from all who had it in their power to help him.
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 303 
 
 Mr. Greenbaum, of the Alaska Commercial company, ob- 
 tained for him access to the church and company records, 
 and gave him a desk in his office. Throughout this trip Mr. 
 Greenbaum was exceedingly kind, furnishing him means of 
 transportation, and otherwise assisting in his explorations. 
 Bishop Seghers of British Columbia, and Father Montard, 
 the Yukon missionary, furnished much important material 
 concerning the Yukon country. The bishop was an accom- 
 plished Russian linguist. Father Shashnikof, the most intelli- 
 gent and respected of all the representatives of the Greek 
 church, was the oldest priest in Alaska, and chief authority on 
 the past and present condition of the Aleuts, and had in his 
 possession documents of great value, of ancient date, and 
 interesting matter. 
 
 Mr. Petroff visited, among other places of historic interest, 
 the spot where Captain Levashef wintered in 1768, ten years 
 before Captain Cook, imagining himself its discoverer, took 
 possession for the British crown. A few iron implements left 
 by the earlier party, or stolen from them, are still exhibited 
 by the natives. Again he visited an island where a massacre 
 of Russians by Aleuts took place in 1786; the ground plan 
 of the Russian winter houses is still visible. 
 
 Mr. Lucien Turner, signal service officer and correspondent 
 of the Smithsonian institute, had been stationed at various 
 points in this vicinity for many years, and had made a 
 thorough study of the languages, habits, and traditions of 
 all tribes belonging to the Innuit and Tinneh families. Petroff 
 found him a valuable informant on many subjects. 
 
 Hearing of an octogenarian Aleut at Makushino, on the 
 southwestern side of the island, whose testimony it was 
 important to obtain, Petroff went in search of the old man, 
 accompanied by the Iliuliuk chief Rooff as interpreter, and 
 another Aleut as guide. They encountered great difficulties. 
 Instead of the five or six streams described they waded knee- 
 deep through fifty-two the first day. At five the next morning 
 they started again. It was possible only at low tide to round 
 the projecting points of rock, and at times they jumped from
 
 304 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 bowlder to bowlder, at others they crept along narrow slip- 
 pery shelves, while the angry tide roared at their feet, and 
 overhanging cliffs precluded the possibility of ascent. Eleven 
 wearisome hours of walking brought them to a lake, through 
 which for two miles they waded, as their only way of reaching 
 Makushino. There the old chief received them well and told 
 all he knew. 
 
 Before leaving Iliuliuk, Mr. Petroff had long interviews with 
 Doctor Mclntyre, Captain Erskine, and Mr. John M. Morton. 
 
 Again the cutter weighed anchor, amidst dipping of flags 
 and waving of handkerchiefs. This was on the 19th of 
 August, and at noon the following day they arrived at St. 
 George, where Mr. Morgan and Doctor Specting, the agent 
 and physician of the fur company, came on board and gave 
 Mr. Petrofif some notes. Upon reaching St. Paul that evening, 
 Mr. Armstrong, an agent of the company, and Petroff landed 
 in a whale-boat, passing between jagged rocks through dan- 
 gerous surf. They were met by Captain Moulton, treasury 
 agent. Doctor Kelley, and Mr. Mclntyre, who, together with 
 Mr. Armstrong, kindly assisted in making extracts that night 
 from their archives and hospitably entertained him. Early 
 the following morning Father Shashnikof placed in Petroff 's 
 hands bundles of church records, with which the former 
 priest had begun to paper his house, but the present incum- 
 bent, recognizing their value, rescued the remainder. The 
 chief of the Aleuts spent some time with him, giving a clear 
 account of the past and present condition of his people. 
 He was very intelligent, and evidently had Russian blood in 
 his veins. 
 
 At Tchitchtagof, on Altoo island, where the cutter an- 
 chored the 25th, Petroff found records of the community 
 kept during the past fifty years. Five days later saw the 
 Rush at Atkha, in Nazan bay. Here some interesting inci- 
 dents of early days were obtained from two old men and one 
 woman of eighty. On all these islands the natives spoke of 
 M. Pinart and his researches. On the ist of September 
 they landed at Unalaska, where Petrofif met Mr, Lunievsky,
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 305 
 
 Mr. King, Mr. Fred Swift, and the Reverend Innocentius 
 Shashnikof, and was at once put in possession of the archives, 
 and materially assisted in his labors by the priest throughout 
 his stay. The Rush was detained here several days on 
 account of the weather. Gregori Krukof, trader from a 
 neighboring village, named Borka, on the east side of the 
 island, and the native chief Nikolai, visited Unalaska during 
 that time, and took Petroiif back with them to visit the place 
 where Captain Cook had wintered in 1778. Borka is situated 
 on Beaver bay, between a lake and a small cove. On the 
 arrival of the bidarkas the chief assembled the oldest of the 
 inhabitants and questioned them as to their knowledge of 
 Captain Cook. They related what they remembered as told 
 them by their parents, that once a foreign vessel came into 
 Beaver bay and anchored opposite to their village, off Bob- 
 rovskaya, where it remained but a kw days, afterward 
 sailing around into what has ever since been called the 
 '' English burkhta," or bay, where the vessel was moored 
 and remained all winter. The foreigners built winter- quar- 
 ters, and with the natives killed seals, which abounded at that 
 time. The captain's name was Kukha. The following 
 morning Petroff, with the chief as guide, visited the places 
 mentioned. All that remains of Bobrovskaya is a gigantic 
 growth of weeds and grass over the building sites and depres- 
 sions where houses had stood. A whitewashed cross marks 
 the spot where the chapel was established, and at some dis- 
 tance away, on the hill-side, a few posts and crosses indicate 
 the ancient graveyard. Two or three miles intervened 
 between the old village and the anchorage, the trail being 
 obliterated by luxuriant vegetation. It is a beautiful land- 
 locked bay, and as a harbor for safety and convenience can- 
 not be excelled in all Alaska. Abreast of this anchorage is a 
 circular basin, into which empties the water running over a 
 ledge of rocks. Between the basin and the beach is an exca- 
 vation in a side hill, twenty feet square, indicating the winter 
 habitation of foreigners, as it is contrary to the custom of the 
 Aleuts to build in that shape or situation. 
 20
 
 3o6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Mr. Petroff made an expedition to some Indian fortifica- 
 tions, supposed to be two hundred years old, situated on the 
 top of a mountain two thousand feet high and ten miles 
 distant. According to tradition there had been fierce wars 
 between the Koniagas, or Kadiak islanders, and the Unalas- 
 ka people, and the ruins of fortifications on both islands 
 confirm these traditions. 
 
 On the 9th of October the Rush started on the homeward 
 voyage, reaching San Francisco the 27 th. 
 
 Several other trips to Alaska were made by Mr. Petroff 
 during his engagement with me, and while none of them 
 were wholly for historical purposes, hke the one just narrated, 
 material for history was ever prominent in his mind. After 
 the return of the Rush Mr. Petroff resumed his labor in the 
 library, which for the most part consisted in extracting Alaska 
 material and translating Russian books and manuscripts 
 for me. 
 
 While thus engaged he saw a notice in the Alaska Times 
 of the 2d of April, 1870, that General J. C. Davis had ad- 
 dressed to the secretary of war in Washington five boxes of 
 books and papers, formerly belonging to the Russian-American 
 fur company, and had sent them to division headquarters 
 at San Francisco by the Newbern. It was in December, 
 1878, that this important discovery was made. Upon inquiry 
 from Adjutant-general John C. Kelton it was ascertained 
 that the boxes had been forwarded to the war department in 
 Washington. Secretary McCrary was questioned upon the 
 matter, and replied that the boxes had been transferred to 
 the state department. Mr. John M. Morton and William 
 Gouvemeur Morris, then on their way to Washington, were 
 spoken to on the subject, and promised to institute a search 
 for the archives. On the 13th of February, 1879, a letter 
 from Mr. Morton announced that the boxes had been found 
 by him among a lot of rubbish in a basement of the state 
 department, where they were open to inspection, but could not 
 be removed. The greater portion of the next two years was 
 
 1
 
 HISTORIC EXPLORATIONS NORTHWARD. 307 
 
 spent by Mr. Petroff in Washington extracting material for 
 my History of Alaska from the contents of these boxes. The 
 library of congress was likewise examined ; also the archives 
 of the navy and interior and coast survey departments, and 
 the geological and ethnological bureaus.
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 
 
 I worlced with patience, which means ahnost power. I did some 
 excellent things indifferently, some bad things excellently. Both were 
 praised ; the latter loudest. — Mrs. Browning. 
 
 IN treating of the main issues of these industries, I have 
 somewhat neglected library details, which I esteem not 
 the least important part of these experiences. If the history 
 of my literary efforts be worth the writing, it is in the small 
 particulars of every-day labors that the reader will find the 
 greatest profit. The larger results speak for themselves, and 
 need no particular description ; it is the way in which things 
 were done, the working of the system, and the means which 
 determined results, that are, if anything, of value here. . 
 
 Regular business hours were kept in the library, namely, 
 from eight to twelve, and from one to six. Smoking was 
 freely allowed. Certain assistants desired to work evenings 
 and draw extra pay. This was permitted in some instances, 
 but always under protest. Nine hours of steady work were 
 assuredly enough for one day, and additional time seldom 
 increased results ; so, after oftering discouragement for several 
 years, a rule was established abolishing extra work. 
 
 So rapid was the growth of the library after 1869, and 
 so disarranged had become the books by mucli handling 
 for indexing and other purposes, that by midsummer, 1872, 
 when Goldschmidt had finished a long work of supple- 
 mentary cataloguing, and the later arrivals were ready to 
 occupy their places on the shelves, it was deemed expedient 
 
 308
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 309 
 
 to drop the regular routine and devote three or four weeks 
 to placing things in order, which was done not only then 
 but at intervals thereafter. 
 
 Mr. Oak spent three months in preparing a plan for the 
 new index, and in indexing a number of books in order to 
 test it and perfect the system. Goldschmidt's time was given 
 to taking out notes on the subject of languages, with some 
 work on the large ethnographical map, which was prepared 
 only as the work progressed. Others were taking out notes 
 on mythology, gathering historical reminiscences from pio- 
 neers; epitomizing voyages and narratives. 
 
 The books given out to the indexers at this time were such 
 as contained information concerning those tribes which were 
 first to be described ; that is, if I was soon to be writing on 
 the peoples of New Caledonia, as the interior of British 
 Columbia was once called, I would give the indexers all books 
 of travel through that region, and all works containing infor- 
 mation on those nations first, so that I might have the benefit 
 of the index in extracting the material. In this manner the 
 indexers were kept just in advance of the note-takers, until 
 they had indexed all the books in the library having in them 
 any information concerning the aborigines of any part of the 
 territory. At intervals, whatever the cause of it, the subject 
 came up to me in a new light, and I planned and partitioned 
 it, as it were, instinctively. 
 
 The system of note-taking, as perfected in details and 
 supervised by Mr. Nemos, was as follows : The first step for 
 a beginner was to make references, in books given him for 
 that purpose, to the information required, giving the place 
 where found and the nature of the facts therein mentioned ; 
 after this he would take out the information in the form of 
 notes. By this means he would learn how to classify and 
 how duly to condense ; he would also become familiar with 
 the respective merits of authors, their bent of thought, and 
 the age in which they lived, and the fulness and trustworthi- 
 ness of their works.
 
 3IO LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 The notes were written on half sheets of legal folios, one 
 following another, without regard to length or subject, but 
 always leaving a space between the notes so that they could 
 be torn apart. When separated and arranged they were 
 placed in paper bags, on which were marked subject and 
 date, and the bags numbered chronologically and entered in 
 a book. 
 
 After the notes had been used as arranged, according to 
 subject and date, with all printed matter at hand bearing on 
 the subject, they were pasted on sheets of strong brown 
 paper, folded and cut to the required size. On this work 
 alone two men and two boys were engaged for over a year. 
 These, bound and lettered, made some three hundred books, 
 fifteen by eighteen inches, varying in thickness according to 
 contents. 
 
 The contents were arranged after the plan of the history, 
 and present the subject much more in detail than the printed 
 volumes. This series constitutes in itself a library of Pacific 
 coast history which eighty thousand dollars could not duplicate 
 even with the library at hand. 
 
 Thus qualified, the assistant was given a mass of notes and 
 references covering a certain period, or series of incidents, 
 with instructions to so reduce the subject-matter that I might 
 receive it weeded of all superfluities and repetitions, whether 
 in words or in facts already expressed by previous authors, 
 yet containing every fact, however minute, every thought and 
 conclusion, including such as occurred to the preparer, and 
 arranged in as good a historic order as the assistant could 
 give it. 
 
 The method to be followed by the assistant to this end was 
 as follows : He aiTanged the references and notes that pointed 
 to events in a chronologic order, yet bringing together certain 
 incidents of different dates if the historic order demanded 
 it. Institutionary and descriptive notes, on commerce, educa- 
 tion, with geography, etc., were then joined to such dates 
 or occurrences as called for their use : geography coming 
 together with an expedition into a new country ; education,
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 3II 
 
 with the efforts of churchmen ; commerce in connection with 
 the rule of some governor who promoted certain phases of it; 
 descriptions of towns, when they were founded, destroyed, or 
 prominently brought forward. 
 
 This prehminary grouping was greatly facilitated by the 
 general arrangement of all the notes for the particular sec- 
 tion of territory, Central America, Mexico, California, etc., 
 already made by an experienced assistant. In connection 
 with both arrangements a more or less detailed list of events 
 and subjects was made to aid in grasping the material. 
 
 With the material thus grouped it was found that each 
 small subdivision, incident, or descriptive matter had a num- 
 ber of notes bearing upon it, from different authors, sometimes 
 several score. These must then be divided into three or more 
 classes, according to the value of the authority: the first class 
 comprising original narratives and reports; the second, such 
 as were based partly on the first, yet possessed certain original 
 facts or thoughts ; the third, those which were merely copied 
 from others, or presented brief and hasty compilations. 
 
 The assistant then took the best of his first-class authorities, 
 the fullest and most reliable, so far as he could judge after a 
 brief glance, and proceeded to extract subject-matter from 
 the pages of the book to which the reference directed him. 
 This he did partly in his own language, partly in a series of 
 quotations. The accurate use of quotation marks and stars 
 consumed much time. Yet I always insisted upon this : the 
 note-taker could throw anything he pleased into his own 
 words, but if he used the exact words of the author he must 
 plainly indicate it. Sometimes he found the extract already 
 made on the slips called notes. The same book might appear 
 to be the best authority for a succession of topics, and the 
 extracting was continued for some time before the book was 
 laid aside. Each extract was indexed in the margin, and at 
 the foot of it, or on the page, was written the title of the book 
 or paper from which it had been taken. 
 
 The next best authorities were then read on the same topic 
 or series of topics, and any information additional or con-
 
 312 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 tradictory to what had already been noted was extracted and 
 placed at the foot of the page bearing on the subject, or on 
 a blank page, on which Avas indexed a heading similar to 
 that of the original page, so as to bring the same topics 
 together. If these contradictions or additions bore on par- 
 ticular expressions or facts in the original extract, they were 
 subdivided in accordance with and by means of numbers 
 brought in connection with the particular word or line. To 
 each subdivision was added the title of the authority. The 
 titles of all, or of several first-class authorities which agreed 
 with the original extract, were also added to the foot of that 
 extract, with the remark, " the same in brief," or " in full " as 
 the case might be. This showed me which authors confirmed 
 and which contradicted any statement, and enabled me read- 
 ily to draw conclusions. From second-class authors the assis- 
 tant obtained rarely anything but observations, while the third 
 class yielded sometimes nothing. 
 
 As he proceeded in this refining process, or system of con- 
 densation, the assistant added in notes to particular hnes or 
 paragraphs his own observations on the character of the hero, 
 the incident, or the author. 
 
 By this means I obtained, as it were, a bird's-eye view of 
 all evidence on the topics for my history, as I took them up 
 one after the other in accordance with my own order and 
 plan for writing. It saved me the drudgery and loss of time 
 of thoroughly studying any but the best authorities, or more 
 than a few first-class ancient and modern books. 
 
 To more experienced and able assistants were given the 
 study and reduction of certain minor sections of the history, 
 which I employed in my writing after more or less conden- 
 sation and change. 
 
 The tendency with all the work was toward voluminous- 
 ness. Not that I am inclined to prolixity, but the subjects 
 were so immense that it often appeared impossible to crowd 
 the facts within a compass which would seem reasonable to 
 the reader. And none but those who have tried it can realize 
 all the difticulties connected with this kind of writing. Besides
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 313 
 
 increasing the labor fourfold, it often interferes with style, 
 checks enthusiasm, and makes an author feel like one doomed 
 to run a mile race in a peck measure. But while I was 
 resolved to take space enough fairly to present the subject 
 under consideration, I could not but remember that as books 
 multiply, readers demand conciseness, and that no fault can 
 be greater in this present age than verbosity. 
 
 In November, 1872, 1 engaged a copperplate engraver, and 
 from that time till the Native Races was completed I had 
 engravers at work at the Market-street end of the library and 
 elsewhere. The cuts for volume iv., such of them as I did 
 not purchase from eastern authors and publishers, were all 
 prepared in the engraving department of the printing-oflice, 
 on the third floor. 
 
 On this floor likewise, a year or two later, the type was set 
 and the first proof read. Matters of no inconsiderable im- 
 portance and care with me were the type I should use and 
 the style of my page. After examining every variety within 
 my reach, I settled upon the octavo English edition of 
 Buckle's Civilization, as well for the text and notes as for the 
 system of numbering the notes from the beginning to the end 
 of the chapter. It was plain, broad-faced, clear, and easily 
 read. The notes and reference figures were all in perfect 
 taste and harmony. It is a style of page that one never tires 
 of. I sent to Scotland for the type, as I could find none of 
 it in America. 
 
 It was about this time that I studied the question of the 
 origin of the Americans, to find a place for it in some part of 
 the Native Races, I did not know then exactly where. When 
 I began this subject I proposed to settle it immediately ; when 
 I finished it I Avas satisfied that neither I nor any one else 
 knew, or without more light ever could know, anything about 
 it, I found some sixty theories, one of them about as 
 plausible or as absurd as another, and hardly one of them 
 capable of being proved or disproved. I concluded to 
 spread them all before my readers, not as of any intrinsic
 
 314 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 ■ value, but merely as curiosities ; and this I did in the opening 
 chapter of volume v. of the Native Races. 
 
 Meanwhile indexers were constantly coming and going, at- 
 tempting and failing. After trying a hundred or more of the 
 applicants who presented themselves, and securing little more 
 than a dozen capable of doing the work, I concluded to try 
 no more, unless it should be some one manifesting marked 
 ability, but let those already engaged continue until the index 
 Avas finished. Nine tenths of the applicants were totally unfit 
 for the work, though some professed to be able, like Pytha- 
 goras, to write on the moon and in as many languages as 
 Pantagruel could speak. 
 
 The fact is these constant experiments operated too severely 
 against me. First, the applicant expected pay for his time 
 whether he succeeded or not; secondly, no inconsiderable 
 portion of the time of the best indexers was spent in teach- 
 ing the new-comers ; and thirdly, those who attempted and 
 failed were sure to be dissatisfied and to charge the cause of 
 failure to any one but themselves. 
 
 During the first half of 1873 work continued about as 
 before. Mr. Oak spent some weeks on antiquities, but was 
 occupied a good portion of the time on early voyages. . All 
 this time I was writing on northern Indian matter, giving out 
 the notes on the southern divisions to others to go over the 
 field again and take out additional notes. 
 
 While the subject of early voyages was under my notice I 
 felt the necessity of a more perfect knowledge of early maps. 
 Directing Goldschmidt to lay out all cosmographies, collec- 
 tions of voyages, or other books containing early maps, also 
 atlases oi facsimiles^ and single maps, together we went over 
 the entire field. Beginning with the earliest map, we first 
 wrote a description of it, stating by whom and when it was 
 drawn, and what it purported to be. Then, from some point, 
 usually the isthmus of Panama, we commenced, and, follow- 
 ing the coast, wrote on foolscap paper the name of each 
 place, with remarks on its spelling, its location, and other 
 points, marking also at the top of the page the name, and
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 315 
 
 taking usually one page for every place. Every geographical 
 name and location, great and small, which we could find on 
 any early map was thus entered, together with the title of the 
 map or source of infoiTiiation. From the next map we would 
 take new information respecting previous names, and also 
 new names. After thus training Goldschmidt I left him to 
 complete the task, and when he had thus gone over all our 
 maps we found before us all information on each place that 
 could be derived from maps. Several months were thus 
 occupied, and when the manuscript was bound in three vol- 
 umes and lettered, there was added to the library a Carto- 
 graphy of the Pacific Coast, unique and invaluable in tracing 
 the early history and progress of discovery. 
 
 A fire which broke out, as I have said, in November, 1873, 
 in the basement of the western side of the building seemed 
 likely for a moment suddenly to terminate all our labors. 
 At one time there appeared not one chance in ten that the 
 building or its contents Avould be saved; but thanks to a 
 prompt and efficient fire department, the flames were extin- 
 guished, with a loss of twenty-five thousand dollars only to 
 the insurance companies. The time was about half-past five 
 in the evening. I had left the library, but my assistants 
 were seated at their tables writing. A thick black smoke, 
 which rose suddenly and filled the room, was the first intima- 
 tion they had of the fire. To have saved anything in case 
 the fire had reached them would have been out of the ques- 
 tion. They were so blinded by the smoke that they dared 
 not trust themselves to the stairs, and it was with difliiculty 
 they groped their way to a ladder at one side of the room, 
 which led to the roof, by which means they mounted and 
 emerged into the open air. In case the building had burned, 
 their escape would have been uncertain. No damage was 
 done to the library, and all were at their places next morn- 
 ing ; but it came home to me more vividly than ever before, 
 the uncertainty, not to say vanity, of earthly things. Had 
 those flames been given five minutes more, the Bancroft
 
 31 6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 library, with the Bancroft business, would have been swept 
 from the face of earth, and the lore within would have been 
 lost to the world. 
 
 In regard to the risk of fire, as my writings increased, and 
 the manuscripts in my room represented more and more the 
 years of my life and the wearing away of my brain, I deemed 
 it wise and prudent to have copies made of all that had been 
 and was to be written. Since it Avould have been premature 
 to begin printing at this time, I called in copyists, about 
 twenty, who in three or four months transcribed in copying 
 ink all that I had written ; from this a second copy was made 
 by means of a copying press. This performance completed, 
 I sent one copy to my house, one copy to Oakville, and kept 
 the original in the library; then I went to sleep o' nights 
 defying the elements or any of their actions. 
 
 In December, 1873, witla Goldschmidt's assistance, I made 
 a thorough investigation of aboriginal languages on this 
 coast. The subject was a somewhat difficult one to manage, 
 dialects and affinities running, as they do, hither and thither 
 over the country, but I finally satisfied myself that the plan 
 of treating it as originally adopted was not the proper one. 
 The result was that Goldschmidt was obliged to go over the 
 entire field again, and re-arrange and add to the subject- 
 matter before I would attempt the writing of it. 
 
 Parts of the work seemed at times to proceed slowly. The 
 mythology dragged as though it never would have an end. 
 The temptation to shirk, for certain of my assistants, was too 
 great to be resisted. Witli one or two years' work before 
 them, abstracting material according to subject instead of by 
 the book tended in some instances to laxity and laziness on 
 the part of the note-taker. Any one so choosing, in taking 
 out notes on a given subject with the view of making his 
 subject complete, and at the same time not duplicating 
 his notes, could plant himself in the midst of his work and 
 there remain, bidding me defiance ; for if I discharged him, 
 as under ordinary circumstances I should have done, it would 
 be at the loss perhaps of six months' or a year's time. This
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 317 
 
 was well understood, and some took advantage of it. But such 
 I discharged immediately that particular piece of work was 
 done. 
 
 No little care was required to keep in order the files of 
 newspapers. As there were so many of them, I did not 
 attempt to keep complete more than the leading journals 
 on the coast. Many country editors sent the library their 
 journals gratuitously. 
 
 My chief source of newspaper supply was from the public 
 libraries and advertising agencies of San Francisco. To the 
 latter were sent all interior journals, and by arrangement 
 with the agents these were kept for me. They amounted 
 to several wagon-loads annually. Once or twice a year I 
 sent for them, and out of them completed my files as far as 
 possible. In a large record-book was kept an account of 
 these files, the name of each journal being entered on a page 
 and indexed and the numbers on the shelves entered, so that 
 by the book might be ascertained what were in the library 
 and what were lacking. In this manner some fifty or sixty 
 thousand newspapers were added to the library annually. 
 
 The task of indexing the books was so severe, that at one 
 time it seemed doubtful if ever the newspapers would be in- 
 dexed. But when it became clearly evident that history 
 needed the information therein contained, twenty new men 
 were engaged and drilled to the task. I sometimes became 
 impatient over what seemed slow progress, yet, buying 
 another wagon-load of chairs and tables, I would fill all 
 available space with new laborers, all their work being after- 
 ward tested by the most reHable members of my staff. 
 
 The leading journals of the United States, Mexico, and 
 Europe, before which I wished to bring my work, I now 
 noted, and directed Goldschmidt to mail to their addresses 
 copies of such descriptions of the library as appeared in the 
 best papers here. 
 
 The printing of volume 11., Native Races, was begun in 
 May, 1874, and continued, sometimes very slowly, till Feb- 
 ruary, 1875. Matters proceeded during the last half of 1874
 
 3l8 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 about as usual. Between one Saturday night and Monday 
 morning my engraver absconded to the east, and the maps 
 immediately required I was obliged to send to Philadelphia 
 to be engraved. 
 
 While up to my neck in this most harassing of labors, with 
 three unfinished volumes, embracing several main divisions 
 each, in the hands of the printer, a proposition came from 
 the proprietor of the Overland Monthly to two of my men, 
 offering them the editorship of that journal, with larger pay 
 than I could afford to give. 
 
 The young men behaved very well about it. They im- 
 mediately informed me of the offer, asked me to advise them 
 what they should do, and assured me they would not accept 
 unless with my approbation. Although they Avere deep in 
 my work, although I must lose in a great measure the results 
 of their last year's training, and I should have to teach new 
 men and delay publication, yet I did not hesitate. I told 
 them to go : the pay was better, the position was more prom- 
 inent, and their work would be lighter. 
 
 I do not recollect ever to have allowed my interests to 
 stand in the way of the advancement of any young man in 
 my service. Whenever my advice has been asked, remem- 
 bering the time when I was a young man seeking a start, I 
 have set myself aside, and have given what I believed to be 
 disinterested advice, feeling that in case of a sacrifice I could 
 better afford it than my clerk. I could not but notice, how- 
 ever, that, nine times in ten, when a young man left me it 
 was not to better his fortune. 
 
 To those who best know what it is to make a good book, 
 the rapidity and regularity with which the several volumes of 
 my works appeared was a source of constant surprise. " How 
 you have managed," writes John W. Draper on the receipt of 
 the fifth volume of the Native Races, " in so short a time and in 
 so satisfactory a manner to complete your great undertaking 
 is to me very surprising. The commendations that are con- 
 tained in the accompanying pamphlet arc richly deserved. 
 I endorse them all. And now I suppose you feel as Gibbon
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 319 
 
 says he did on completing his Decline. You know he was 
 occupied with it more than twenty years. He feh as if the 
 occupation of his hfe was gone. But you are far more ener- 
 getic than he. You are only at the beginning of your intellec- 
 tual life : he was near the close. You will find something 
 more to do." Thus it is ever. Our best reward for having 
 done one work well is that we have another given us to do. 
 And thus writes Oliver Wendell Holmes on the com- 
 pletion of the Native Races : " I congratulate you on put- 
 ting the last stone upon this pyramid you have reared. For 
 truly it is a magJium opus, and the accomplishment of it as an 
 episode in one man's life is most remarkable. Nothing but 
 a perfect organization of an immense literary workshop could 
 have effected so much within so limited a time. You have 
 found out the two great secrets of the division of labor and 
 the union of its results. The last volume requires rather a 
 robust reader ; but the political history of the ixs and the itls 
 is a new chapter, I think, to most of those who consider 
 themselves historical scholars. All the world, and especially 
 all the American world, will thank you for this noble addi- 
 tion 4:0 its literary treasures." 
 
 Such are some of the details of my earlier labors. But 
 above all, and beyond all, in breadth of scope and in detail, 
 was the history and the workings of it. It was a labor beside 
 which the quarter-century application to business, and the 
 Native Races with its fifty years of creative work upon it, 
 sink into insignificance; and it was, perhaps, the most ex- 
 tensive effort ever undertaken by a private individual for 
 historical purposes. 
 
 I thought before this I had accomplished something in life, 
 with my mercantile and manufacturing establishments in full 
 and successful operation, and with such literary effort as I had 
 already put forth. I thought I knew what heavy undertakings 
 were, and what it was out of no very great means to accom- 
 plish great results ; but all seemed Liliputian in comparison 
 with the monumental task which the history had laid upon me.
 
 320 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 The 15th of October, 1875, saw the Native Races com- 
 pleted ; but long before this, note-taking on the History of 
 the Pacific States had been begun on the plan already de- 
 scribed. As I have before remarked, my purpose in this latter 
 effort was to take up the same territory as was covered by 
 the Native Races, and continue its history from the coming 
 of the Europeans. This would be the history proper of the 
 country, the Native Races being in reality a description of 
 the aborigines ; yet the one followed the other in natural 
 sequence. Without the Native Races the history would be 
 incomplete, could not, indeed, be properly written ; while the 
 history is in truth but a continuation of the Native Races. 
 
 It is an immense territory, this western half of North 
 America ; it was a weighty responsibility, at least I felt it to 
 be such, to lay the foundations of history for this one twelfth 
 part of the world. It seemed to me that I stood very near 
 to the beginning of a mighty train of events which should 
 last to the end of time ; that this beginning, now so clear to 
 me, would soon become dim, become more and more indis- 
 tinct as the centuries passed by ; and though it is impossible 
 for the history of a civilized nation ever to drop wholly out 
 of existence while the printing-press continues to move, yet 
 much would be lost and innumerable questions would arise, 
 which might ere-long become impossible of solution, but 
 which might now be easily settled. Large as my conceptions 
 were of the magnitude of this labor, and with all my business 
 and literary experience, here again, as thrice before in these 
 historical efforts, once in the collecting of the library, once 
 after completing the first writing of the first parts of my his- 
 tory, and once in the writing of the Native Races, I had no 
 adequate idea of the extent of the work before I engaged in it. 
 
 The Native Races finished, the entire staff was set to work 
 taking out notes for the history. A much more perfect sys- 
 tem had been developed for abstracting this material than 
 had been used in any of the former work. I do not mean to 
 boast, or if I do, it is only witli a boasting which the cause 
 
 J
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 32 1 
 
 makes pardonable ; and further, it is not of myself but of my 
 assistants that I speak, for I took out only the notes for the 
 first parts of my history with my own hands ; I say, then, 
 without unpardonable boasting, that among all the achieve- 
 ments of literature, there are few that will compare in magni- 
 tude with this, the gathering, abstracting, and arranging of the 
 material for the History of the Facific States. 
 
 It was regard^ as a great achievement successfully to 
 handle twelve hundred authorities and compress their con- 
 tents into five volumes, presenting the list in the first volume 
 of the Native Races. Still more remarkable was it from two 
 thousand authorities to write the three volumes of the History 
 of Central America. But when on making the list of authori- 
 ties for the six volumes of the History of Mexico I found there 
 were ten thousand, I was literally overwhelmed. All of them 
 were more or less consulted in writing the history, but I 
 could not afford the space to print all the titles, as was my 
 custom. They would occupy nearly half a volume. It was 
 finally resolved that, referring the reader to the list of authori- 
 ties printed in the first volumes of Central America and the 
 N'orth Mexican States, it must suffice to print only the more 
 important ones remaining, and to state clearly the omission 
 and its cause at the head of the list. 
 
 The task of making references as well as that of taking out 
 material was equivalent to five times the labor of writing ; so 
 that before a line was written I found no difficulty in keeping em- 
 ployed fifteen to twenty persons; for example, in taking out the 
 material for California history alone, eight men were occupied 
 for six years ; for making the references, merely, for the His- 
 tofy of Mexico, without taking out any of the required informa- 
 tion, five men were steadily employed for a period of ten years. 
 Counting those engaged on such work as indexing newspapers, 
 epitomizing archives, and copying manuscript, and I have had 
 as many as fifty men engaged in library detail at one time. 
 
 Although the work was to be a history of the Pacific States 
 from the coming of the Europeans, covering the same terri- 
 21
 
 322 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 tory as was embraced in the Native Races, and would in 
 chronological sequence begin with its southern extremity, 
 and follow the natural order of discovery and conquest 
 northward, yet for several reasons I deemed it best to resume, 
 rather than where I left off, the task vvdth the history of Cali- 
 fornia : First of all, for the central division of the subject, 
 embracing northern Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada, 
 and Utah, following the natural channels of history from the 
 conquest of Cortes, more particularly of California, the centre 
 of their central division, I had in my possession a great mass 
 of original matter, more, proportionately, than of the states 
 lying to the south of the city of Mexico, This material con- 
 sisted of unpublished manuscript histories and original docu- 
 ments which had lain hidden throughout the entire progress of 
 the country, and which I had, little by little, unearthed, assorted, 
 deciphered, and put in order for historical use ; material of a 
 value which could not be measured by money, for if once lost 
 it never could be replaced. If lost, it was so much knowledge 
 dropped out of existence, it was so much of human experience 
 withheld from the general storehouse of human experiences ; 
 and the loss would remain a loss throughout all time. 
 
 Moreover, there was more original and unused material for 
 the history of California than had ever before been collected 
 and preserved of any country of like extent, population, and 
 age. The richness of this material consisted in the profusion 
 of documentary and personal evidence placed side by side ; 
 letters, official papers, and missionary records, united with per- 
 sonal narratives, and complete histories of epochs and locali- 
 ties dictated by eye-witnesses, and written out by men employed 
 solely for my history. 
 
 Day by day and year by year, I had seen these priceless 
 treasures accumulate, until the thought of their destruction by 
 fire became unendurable, and I determined, long before the 
 Native Races was finished, that to place at least the substance 
 of this material beyond the peradventure of destruction should 
 be my very first work. As I could not then erect a detached 
 fire-proof building for my library, the next most direct and
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 323 
 
 practical method was to melt and draw off from the mass the 
 metal of historic lore, and recast it into permanent form, in 
 which it might be preserved apart from the original material. 
 
 To save the essence of this invaluable collection was then 
 my first consideration. This preserved, and all my library 
 swept away, I might possibly, in some way, by the aid of the 
 archives of Mexico and the libraries of America and Europe, 
 complete my history; but the California material once lost, 
 there was an end to all my labors. 
 
 Another reason why I should first write the central part of 
 the Ilisto?y of the Pacific States was that I now found myself 
 at the head of a corps of thoroughly competent and trained 
 assistants, very different in point of knowledge and ability 
 from the untutored and unskilled workmen who assisted me 
 at the beginning of these undertakings. They, as well as I, 
 had learned much, had gained much experience in abstract- 
 ing material for history, and in all that is included in the 
 preparation of a book. 
 
 There v,ere several among my assistants who could now 
 take a book or manuscript, no matter how obliterated or in 
 what language, decipher it, and placing themselves at the 
 desk could intelligently, correctly, systematically, and ex- 
 peditiously take out in the form of notes all the historical 
 matter the volume contained. When placed in their hands I 
 had every confidence that the work would be properly done, 
 that it would be no experiment of which the results might 
 have to be all thrown away and the labor performed anew. 
 This no one of them was capable of doing at first. 
 
 They were likewise familiar with the library, the books and 
 their contents, the index and how to use it, the territory and 
 much of its history. They knew better what to take out; 
 and although the information to be extracted was as undefin- 
 able as ever, and the subject-matter as intricate, the note- 
 taking was much more systematic and complete. For five 
 years our minds had been dv.-elling on these things, and on 
 little else. Our whole intellectual being had, during these 
 years, become saturated with the subject; and although work
 
 3^4 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 was now to be taken up in a new form, and conducted on a 
 higher plane, and brought yet nearer to perfect completion 
 than any before, I felt adequate to the task. Three or five 
 years hence I might or might not have as good men in the 
 library. Death and disagreements are inseparable from 
 humanity, and yet of the latter I had seldom experienced 
 one in connection with my literary labors. I believe I never 
 have had a serious misunderstanding with any one of my 
 regular assistants. We worked together as friends, side by 
 side, as in one common interest. This central part of my 
 subject I regarded, I will not say as the most important part, 
 for each part was equally important, but it was the most 
 difficult part, the most intricate and laborious part, and with 
 competent and trained assistants it was the part which I could 
 most thoroughly perform, and most perfectly finish. This 
 was to be the crowning effort of these literary achievements ; 
 let me do it, I said, while I am able. 
 
 The library was moved to Valencia street the 9th of Octo- 
 ber, 1 88 1, and type-setting was begun on the history the fol- 
 lowing day. Although opposed in this removal by several 
 of my friends, I persisted. The truth is, I was becoming 
 fearful lest it would never be put into type ; lest I should not 
 live to complete the work, and I was determined to do what 
 I could in that direction while life lasted. My health at this 
 time was weaker than ever before, and my nerves were by 
 no means quieted by reading one day an article on the busi- 
 ness, submitted to me by Mr. Hittell for his Commerce and 
 Industries, in which he took occasion to remark of my literary 
 undertakings : " The scale on which he has commenced his 
 work is so comprehensive that it is doubtful whether he will 
 be able to complete it even if he should reach the age of 
 three score and ten, with continuous prosperity and good 
 health." I thereupon resolved to complete it, to postpone 
 dying until this work was done, and I immediately ordered a 
 dozen compositors to be put upon the manuscript. Matter 
 equivalent to fifteen volumes was then in manuscript, and
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 325 
 
 three fourths of the work on the remainder had been accom- 
 phshed in the note-taking. I gave out, first, volume i. Cen- 
 tral America^ and then volume i. History of Mexico, both of 
 which had been written long years before, and rewritten. 
 Thereafter I gave to the printers whatever part of the work 
 appeared convenient, so that they frequently had several vol- 
 umes in hand at one time. The utmost care v/as exercised 
 in revising, re-writing, comparing, and verifying, as the work 
 was passed to press, four or five persons devoting their time 
 altogether or in part to this task. 
 
 Further than this, not only would I print, but I would 
 publish. I had no delicacy now in placing the imprint of 
 the firm on my title-pages. The world might call it making 
 merchandise of literature if they chose : I knew it was not, 
 that is to say, in a mercenary sense. There was no money in 
 my books to the business, hence the business did not specially 
 want them. In the publication of several extensive vv'orks 
 the house had acquired a national reputation, and I was con- 
 vinced that it would do better with this series of Pacific 
 States histories than any other firm. So I engaged Mr. Na- 
 than J. Stone, lately of Japan, but formerly of our oa\ti house, 
 a man of marked ability, of much experience in our establish- 
 ment and elsewhere, to devote himself to the publication and 
 sale of my books. Transferring to him the business con- 
 nected therewith, I continued writing more vigorously if pos- 
 sible than before. I requested the mayor and the governor 
 to visit the library, inspect the work, and then give me a 
 certificate, expressing their belief in its completion as then 
 promised, which was at the rate of three or four volumes a 
 year. I took better care of my health than before, deter- 
 mined to piece out my life to cover the time I now calculated 
 would be required to finish the series. Lastly I revised my 
 will to provide the necessary funds, and appointed literary 
 executors, so that my several books should be completed 
 and published even in the event of my death. 
 
 Strange infatuation, past the comprehension of man! 
 Of what avail this terrible strain, Avith my body resolved to
 
 326 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 dust and my intellect dissipated in air ! One would fancy the 
 prize a heavenly dukedom at the least ; but when I looked 
 up into the heavens I saw no dukedom there. For all that, 
 I would abridge my life by twenty years, if necessary, to 
 complete the work ; why, I cannot tell, except to me there 
 is something extremely fascinating in the printing of a 
 book. The metamorphosis of mind into manuscript, and 
 manuscript into permanent print ; the incarnation of ideas, 
 spreading your thoughts first upon paper and then transfixing 
 them by the aid of metal on the printed page, where through 
 the ages they may remain, possess a magic beside which the 
 subtleties of Albertus Magnus were infantile. In former days 
 the masses of mankind clothed with mysterious influence the 
 unseen being who committed his thoughts to print. And 
 books are indeed a power; even the most ephemeral. No 
 book ever lived in vain ; the black and white of its pages, 
 its paper and pasteboard, may pass into oblivion, as all but 
 the sacred few which spring from the inspiration of genius 
 do and should do, yet the soul thereof never dies, but mul- 
 tiplies itself in endless transmigrations to the end of time. 
 
 After printing had begun, proof-reading was again in order. 
 It was a severe tax ; that is, in the way it was done at the 
 library. When the proofs came from the printing-office, where 
 they were read and revised by an expert familiar with this 
 work, one copy was given to me, one each to Nemos and 
 Oak, who verified both subject-matter and references, com- 
 paring them with original authorities, and placing the cor- 
 rections of the others with his own on one proof, when it 
 was returned to me. One of the staff besides myself also 
 read the corrected proof in pages, which were finally revised 
 by the chief proof-reader for printers' errors. 
 
 Though written early, the History of California was not 
 among the earliest to be published, except for the first volumes. 
 Originally I thought of the history only as one complete 
 work, the volumes to be written and published in chrono- 
 logical order ; but later it occurred to me that there was too
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 327 
 
 great a sweep of territory, climates and governments too 
 several and diverse, for me arbitrarily to cement them in one 
 inseparable narrative. Many persons would like a history 
 of one or more of the countries, but would not care for them 
 all. Therefore I finally concluded to write and number the 
 volumes territorially, and yet maintain such chronological 
 order as I was able ; that is, I would begin with Central 
 America, that part coming first in order of time, and bring 
 the history of those states down to date, numbering the 
 volumes i., ii., and in.. History of the Pacific States, as well 
 as I., II., and in., History of Central America. The Histoiy 
 of the Pacific States, volume iv., would be the History of 
 Mexico, volume i., and so on; and the works might then be 
 lettered under both titles and the purchaser be given his 
 choice ; or he might prefer to include the Native Races and 
 the supplemental volumes under the yet more general title 
 of Bajicroffs Works. Thus would simplicity and uniformity 
 be preserved, and purchasers be satisfied. With this arrange- 
 ment it would not be necessary to confine the order of pub- 
 lication to the order of numbering, as the volumes might 
 very properly appear chronologically, which was, indeed, the 
 more natural sequence ; and as a matter of fact they were so 
 published. 
 
 Thus the History of the Pacific States would comprise a 
 series of histories each complete in itself; yet the whole would 
 be one complete history, each in the requisite number of 
 volumes: viz., \hQ History of Central America / the History 
 of Mexico ; the History of the North Mexican States and 
 Texas ; the History of Arizona and Neiu Mexico; the History 
 of California ; the History of Nevada, Wyoming, and Colo- 
 rado ; t\iQ Histo?y of Utah; the History of the Northwest 
 Coast ; the History of Oregon ; the History of Washington, 
 Idaho, and Montana ; the History of British Columbia ; the 
 History of Alaska. The plan was to publish three or four 
 volumes a year, to be issued simultaneously in San Francisco, 
 New York, London, and Paris. As to the two volumes of 
 North Mexican States, I should have preferred to include
 
 - 328 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 them in the History of Mexico, under the one general title. 
 But they were in reality a separate work, given more in 
 detail than the southern Mexican states, which were treated 
 from national rather than from local points of view. And 
 this for several reasons : they were newer, so to speak, more 
 native, less subdued, less settled and cultivated, the Mexican 
 frontier being always toward the north, and not toward the 
 west as in the United States; then they were nearer the 
 United States, more progressive than the southern Mexican 
 states, and in this way they would constitute a stepping-stone 
 in respect of detail, both to the nations of the south and to 
 the states of the north. 
 
 Another work of the highest importance later forced itself 
 upon me, and took its place among my labors as part of my 
 history. This was the lives of those who had made the his- 
 tory, who had laid the foundations of empire on this coast 
 upon which future generations were forever to build. Thus 
 far a narrative proper of events had been given, while those 
 who had performed this marvellous work were left in the 
 background. Every one felt that they deserved fuller treat- 
 ment, and after much anxious consideration of the subject, 
 there was evolved in my mind a separate section of the history 
 under title of Chronicles of (he Builders of the Commonwealths, 
 which in a framework of history and industrial record gives 
 to biography the same prominence which in the history 
 proper is given to the narrative of events. 
 
 In addition to the history were the supplemental works, 
 California Pastoral, California Inter Pocula, Popular Tri- 
 bunals, Essays and Miscellany, and Literary Industries, all of 
 which grew out of the work on the history, and were carried 
 along with it. The first two consist of material left over in 
 writing the history, the one of California under missionary 
 re'i:;ime, and the other of California during the flush times, too 
 light and sketchy for exact historical narration, and yet more 
 readable in some respects than the history itself The titles 
 of the last two speak for themselves. Of the third I shall
 
 FURTHER LIBRARY DETAIL. 329 
 
 speak further presently. I need not go into detail here re- 
 garding their conception and production; suffice it to say 
 that the subjects all came to mc of their own accord, and that 
 I wrought them out without aid from any one, there being 
 no notes to be taken or information to be gathered and 
 sifted further than what I was able to accomplish myself 
 while writing the history. And yet I should not say this. 
 Much of the labor on these volumes was performed at my 
 home, where was the sweetest and most sympathizing assis- 
 tant a literary drudge ever had, constant in season and out of 
 season, patient, forbearing, encouraging, cheering. Many a 
 long day she has labored by my side, reading and revising ; 
 many womanly aspirations she has silenced in order to devote 
 her fresh, buoyant life to what she ever regarded as a high 
 and noble object. God grant that she and our children may 
 long live to gather pleasant fruits from these Literary Indus- 
 tries, for I suspect that in this hope lies the hidden and 
 secret spring that moves the author in all his efforts.
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 
 
 There is a class of authors different from those who cringe to preva- 
 lent tastes, and pander to degrading passions; men whom neither power 
 can intimidate, nor flattery deceive, nor wealth corrupt. — Whipple. 
 
 HEGEL says of the Germans : " Instead of writing history, 
 we are always beating our brains to discover how his- 
 tory ought to be written." Nor is brain-beating fruitless. 
 Better never write a word of history, or anything else, unless 
 it be of the best. 
 
 My system of historical work requires a few words of ex- 
 planation, since not a little of the criticism, both favorable 
 and unfavorable, has been founded on an erroneous concep- 
 tion of its nature. 
 
 In order to comprehend clearly the error alluded to, it is 
 well to note that the composition of an historical work in- 
 volves labor of a twofold nature, the dividing line being very 
 clearly marked. Material in the nature of evidence has first 
 to be accumulated and classified ; subsequently from the evi- 
 dence judgments have to be formed and expressed. 
 
 The two divisions might of course be still further sub- 
 divided, but such subdivision is not needed for my present 
 purpose. My system — if it be worthy to be termed a system 
 distinct from others — of which I have in my different works 
 had somewhat to say, and others have said still more/has 
 no application whatever to the second and final operation of 
 an historian's task. Every author aims to collect all possible 
 evidence on the topic to be treated, and lie accomplishes his 
 purpose by widely different methods, of which more anon ; 
 but having once accomplished that primary object, in his 
 
 33°
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 33 1 
 
 later work of mind and pen there is little that is tangible 
 in his process as distinguished from that of another. He 
 studies the evidence profoundly or superficially, according to 
 his habit of study ; forms his opinions more or less wisely, 
 according to the strength of his judgment; and expresses them 
 in language diffuse or concise, forcible and graceful, or com- 
 monplace and awkward, according to his natural or acquired 
 style. 
 
 The yhilosopher, learned in mental phenomena, may clas- 
 sify to his own satisfaction the minds and mind- workings of 
 authors ; the literary critic may form comparisons and broad 
 generalizations upon style. There are as many variations in 
 thoughts as there are in men, in style as there are in writers ; 
 but in this part of my work I have no peculiar system or 
 method, and I suppose that other authors have none. 
 
 My system, then, applies only to the accumulation and 
 arrangement of evidence upon the topics of which I write, 
 and consists in the application of business methods and the 
 division of labor to those ends. By its aid I have attempted 
 to accomplish in one year what would require ten years by 
 ordinary methods ; or on a' complicated and extensive sub- 
 ject to collect practically all the evidence, when by ordinary 
 methods a lifetime of toil would yield only a part. 
 
 To illustrate : Let us suppose an industrious author, de- 
 termined to write the history of California, at the start wholly 
 ignorant of his subject. He easily learns of a few works on 
 California, and having purchased them studies their contents, 
 making notes to aid his memory. His reading directs him 
 to other titles, and he seeks the corresponding books in the 
 libraries, pubHc and private, of the city where he resides. 
 His search of the shelves and catalogues of the various 
 libraries reveals many volumes of whose existence he had not 
 dreamed at first; but yet he continues his reading and his 
 notes. 
 
 His work, even if he devotes his whole attention to it and 
 resides in San Francisco, has at this stage occupied several 
 years, and the author just begins to realize how very many
 
 332 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 books have been printed about California. His reading, 
 perhaps, has covered two hundred and fifty books, and he 
 has accumulated the titles in different languages of two hun- 
 dred and fifty more not to be had in San Francisco, He 
 makes an effort to secure some of those that seem most 
 important ; he induces friends at a distance to send him notes 
 from others; if possible he travels in Mexico and Europe, 
 and thus actually consults many of the missing tomes. But 
 in the mean time he has probably learned, through catalogues 
 and bibliographical lists, that five hundred more works have 
 been printed on his subject, even if he does not yet suspect 
 the truth that besides the one thousand there are yet at least 
 another thousand in existence. He now gives up his original 
 idea of exhausting the subject, understands that it would be 
 impossible in a lifetime, and comforts his conscience and 
 pride with the reflection that he has done much, and that 
 many of the Avorks he has not seen, like many of those he 
 has, are probably of very slight historic value ; indeed, it is 
 most likely that long ere this he has allowed himself to glance 
 superficially at some ponderous tome or large collection of 
 miscellaneous pamphlets, almost persuading himself that they 
 contain nothing for him. There are ten chances to one that 
 he has not looked at one volume in twenty of the myriads of 
 the United States government reports, though there is hardly 
 one which does not contain something about California. It 
 has never occurred to him seriously to explore the countless 
 court records and legal briefs, so rich in historical data. He 
 knows that newspapers contain valuable matter ; he has even 
 examined a partial file of the Ca/(fonnau, and some early 
 numbers of the A/^a or Sacramento Union, but being a sane 
 man he has never dreamed of an attack on the two hundred 
 files of California newspapers even could he find them. He 
 knows that each of these fields of research Avould require the 
 labor of several years, and that all of them would fill the 
 better part of his life with drudgery. 
 
 Another trackless wilderness of information now opens 
 before him. Our author has before this realized that there
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 333 
 
 are sources of history other than those found in printed 
 matter. He is surrounded by early settlers, whose combined 
 recollections are the country's history in the main; he has 
 talked with several of them, and obtained a few choice 
 anecdotes and reminiscences to be utilized in his book ; he 
 has no time to obtain the statements of many, and does not 
 attempt it. He is aware of the desirability of original manu- 
 script authorities; he eagerly deciphers a musty document 
 procured by a friend avIio knows of his investigations ; is 
 delighted at the discovery of a small package of old papers 
 at some mission, mysteriously handed out by the parish priest 
 to furnish choice extracts for the author's note-book ; handles 
 gingerly the limited archives of Santa Cruz ; obtains from 
 the United States surveyor-general's office translations of a 
 few documentary curiosities; tries to flatter himself that he 
 has studied the archives of Cahfornia, and is a happy man 
 if he escapes being haunted by the four hundred huge folio 
 volumes of manuscripts containing the very essence of the 
 annals he seeks to write, yet which he knows he could not 
 master in fifteen years of hard work. Perhaps he escapes the 
 vision of the papers scattered over the state in private hands, 
 enough to make up other hundreds of similar tomes. 
 
 He now realizes yet more fully the utter impossibility of 
 exhausting the material ; feels that the work he set himself 
 to do has but fairly commenced, and can never be completed. 
 Of course he does not feel called upon to make known to the 
 public his comparative failure ; on the contrary, he makes 
 the most of his authorities. His notes are brought out and 
 arranged ; he has before him the testimony of several good 
 witnesses on most of the prominent points of his subject; 
 he has devoted twenty-five years of industrious research to 
 his v/ork; the book is finished and justly praised. 
 
 This writer, whose investigations I have thus followed, is 
 one of a thousand, with whom most of the men who have ac- 
 tually written so-called histories of many nations and epochs 
 are not worthy of comparison. He failed simply because he 
 attempted the impossible.
 
 334 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Now the reader will permit me to trace my own course 
 through a similar routine of investigation, pursued, however, 
 by different methods. Like my imaginary friend, I was de- 
 termined to write the history of California, and had almost 
 as vague an idea as he of the task assumed. He purchased 
 some books as tools with which to work, selecting such as 
 were known to bear on his subject; I began ten years before 
 I was ready to write, and bought through agents in all parts 
 of the world every book that could be had concerning 
 the Pacific States, thus obtaining twenty thousand volumes, 
 sure to include, as I thought, all e>dsting material about 
 California. To search among my twenty thousand for two 
 thousand on California was a less formidable undertaking 
 than for him to search the shelves of different libraries and 
 catalogues for his five hundred volumes ; but it was too slow 
 for my purposes, and from ten to fifteen men were employed 
 to index the whole and furnish me a list of California mate- 
 rial with reference to volume and page. My imaginary au- 
 thor plods industriously through each work as he finds it, 
 making careful notes of such matter as he deems of value, 
 while I put ten men at work, each as capable for this kind 
 of labor as he or I, to extract everything under its proper 
 heading. Like him, I am more and more astonished at the 
 apparently never ending mass of material encountered, but I 
 can see my way through it if only the treasury department 
 sustains me. So I tunnel the mountain of court records and 
 legal briefs, bridge the marsh of United States government 
 documents, and stationing myself at a safe distance in the 
 rear, hurl my forces against the solid columns of two hundred 
 files of California newspapers. 
 
 Like him, I see about me many living witnesses, and from 
 several hundreds of them obtain, by aid of stenographers, as 
 well as reporters, detailed statements respecting early times. 
 I more than suspect the existence of important papers scat- 
 tered in private hands, and proceed to buy, borrow, and beg, 
 until the product fills a hundred volumes. The six hundred 
 bulky tomes of public and mission archives rise up before me,
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 335 
 
 but there is no such thing as retreat at this point of pro- 
 cedure ; I have no fifteen years to spend in plodding through 
 this pathless waste, but fifteen searchers reduce the time to 
 one year, and the archives are transferred to my library. 
 Meanwhile my note-takers continue their labors ; each vol- 
 ume, pamphlet, manuscript, and newspaper is made to give 
 up its evidence, little or much, on one point or many, and 
 nothing is omitted or slighted. 
 
 At last the preparatory work is ended, and the evidence on 
 each specific point is laid before me, as my friend had his 
 before him, but with this difference : I have practically all 
 where he had only part — he hardly realized, perhaps, how 
 small a part. He had two or three witnesses whose testi- 
 mony he had selected as essential on a certain topic ; I have 
 a hundred whose evidence is more or less relevant. From 
 this point our progress lies practically in the same path, and 
 the race is well-nigh run. Had he the same data as I, his 
 results would be superior to mine if he w-ere my superior as 
 a thinker and as a writer. Our respective methods and 
 systems have little or no influence in the matter, save per- 
 haps that in my experience with many assistants I have 
 been able to select a few to whom I can intrust the prepara- 
 tion of systematized notes on special topics, and thus still 
 further to shorten my labors. 
 
 My work at last completed, I have been able to accom- 
 plish thoroughly in fifteen years what my friend, quite as 
 zealous, industrious, and able as myself, has done superficially 
 in twenty-five years, and what he could not have done as 
 thoroughly as myself in half a dozen lifetimes. And yet our 
 respective methods differ after all in degree rather than in 
 kind. I have done scarcely anything that he has not at- 
 tempted. He has purchased books, studied books, handled 
 newspapers, deciphered manuscripts, and questioned pioneers; 
 I have simply done twenty times as much as he in each of these 
 directions, much more easily and in much less time. 
 
 I come now to consider the relative merits of the two 
 methods, the desirability of applying business methods and
 
 336 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 division of labor to historical and scientific research. The 
 advantages and the disadvantages, if any such there be, of such 
 application should here be noted. I claim that mine is the 
 only method by which all the evidence on a great subject or 
 on many smaller subjects can be brought out. Without it 
 the author must confine himself to limited topics or do his work 
 superficially. To thus limiting himself there is no objection, 
 as there can be none that I know of to the more ambitious 
 plan of engaging help and doing more and better work. I 
 can conceive of no case where it is not desirable for an in- 
 vestigator to have before him all the evidence; though I 
 have had some experience with critics who revere as an his- 
 torian the man who writes from a study of twenty books 
 giving patronizing credit to their authors, and more lightly 
 esteem him who studies a thousand works, and chooses in his 
 notes to leave standing the ladder by which he mounted. I 
 have also met critics who apparently could not comprehend 
 that a writer who refers to one thousand authorities does not 
 necessarily use them mechanically, or allow a numerical 
 majority to decide each point rather than internal evidence. 
 But these objections serve only to show in a clearer light 
 their own absurdity. 
 
 An industrious author may in a reasonable time collect 
 data and properly record the manners and customs of the 
 Modoc tribe, the annals of Grass Valley, or the events of 
 the Bear Flag revolution ; and for the man who thus honestly 
 toils to increase the store of human knowledge I have the 
 greatest respect. But such a man could not by ordinary 
 methods write anything like a complete work on the aborig- 
 ines of America, or even of California, or on the history of 
 the Pacific States ; and for the man who from an acquaintance 
 with Iroquois manners and customs, with the reading of a 
 few books on the North American aborigines, proceeds 
 learnedly on the institutions and history of every tribe and 
 nation from Alaska to Cape Horn, from the Crow reservation 
 in 1875 ^^ck to the dwellers of the prehistoric Xibalba — for 
 such a man I have not very much admiration to spare, even
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 337 
 
 if some of his theories are plausible and ingeniously and elo- 
 quently supported. Neither am I overburdened with respect 
 for the soi-disant historians of California who can in the 
 leisure hours of a few years and within the limits of five hun- 
 dred pages record all that is worth knowing of the annals 
 of our state; who before 1846 see nothing but the acts of a 
 few padres and ' gi'easers,' of which nobody cares to hear ; 
 who glance vaguely and superficially at a few of the many 
 phases of the subject they profess to treat. 
 
 The great advantage claimed for my system of literary 
 work is, then, that it renders possible results otherwise un- 
 attainable. I deem it desirable that the iQ.\i to whom nature 
 has given the capacity to derive their 'greatest enjoyment from 
 the hard toil of literary and scientific research should be 
 enabled to embrace in their efforts the broadest fields and 
 accomplish the greatest results. 
 
 On the other hand, this system of research involves a great 
 pecuniary outlay. But this is a disadvantage which aftects 
 only the author, and not his work, nor the appreciation of 
 his readers. The same reply might be made as to the ob- 
 jection that assistants cannot be found who will toil as care- 
 fully and zealously as the employer; this is to a certain 
 extent well taken, and I admit that on a limited subject 
 which can be really mastered within a period, say, of five 
 years, one man will produce better work than several, al- 
 though experience has taught me that the application of 
 varied talent, no two men treading in the same path, is not 
 without its advantages. I have always encouraged among 
 my assistants a free expression of their own ideas, and have 
 derived the greatest benefit from frequent conversations and 
 discussions with them on special topics. In long and com- 
 plicated subjects to which my method is applicable, and 
 which cannot be successfully treated by any other, I am in- 
 clined to regard the division of labor as an advantage in 
 itself. I question if the mind which can plod for a long 
 series of years through the necessary preliminary work is the 
 mind properly constituted for the best use of the material
 
 338 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 acquired ; or whether the best abihty is not injured by long 
 drudgery. 
 
 The primary endeavor in all my historical writings has 
 been to exhaust the subject, but presenting it always in as 
 condensed a form as possible. In the text is given the infor- 
 mation complete, the full narrative in the fewest words. 
 
 It was ever my aim to tell the story clearly and concisely, 
 taking a common-sense practical view of things, and arrang- 
 ing them in natural sequence, giving an episode as much 
 as possible in one place, even though in its relation to other 
 episodes it overlapped a little. Analysis of character, as ap- 
 plied to leading personages, I endeavored to make a feature, 
 giving, with physical description, bent of mind and natural 
 and acquired abilities. In cases where characteristics Vv-ere 
 not directly specified they might be arrived at from the acts 
 of the individual. A little colloquy was deemed not ineffec- 
 tive when short, terse, and in language appropriate to the 
 persons and the time. A short story, pointedly given, is 
 effective to enUven the text, but it must not be carelessly 
 done. The notes were for reference to authorities, for proof, 
 elucidation, discussion, illustration, balancing of evidence, 
 and for second-class information. To this end quotations 
 from authorides were deemed in order, not as repedtions, but 
 as presenting the subject in its several shades and opposite 
 positions. Though not illustrated, maps and plans were in- 
 serted in bodi text and notes wherever needed. In regard 
 to bibliography, it was my aim to give every important book 
 and manuscript formal notice in the most suitable place ; the 
 title to be given in full and in italic characters. The contents 
 of the work were then briefly epitomized, after which a criti- 
 cism and a biographical notice of the author were given. The 
 biographies of leading historical characters were of course pre- 
 sented in the text, these of themselves constituting history ; 
 thougli for want of space some may have been crowded into 
 notes, where also were given those of the pioneers. 
 
 Between the old method and the new there is about the 
 same difference tliat would arise in any undertaking by a
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 339 
 
 practical man of business and by one who was purely a 
 philosopher or student. Elsewhere in this volume I have 
 drawn certain comparisons between the industrial life and 
 the intellectual life. I desire here to speak more particularly 
 of the effects of a business and a collegiate course on literary 
 labors, the difference produced by these two species of train- 
 ing, and the effects upon my historical efforts of my former 
 business experience. 
 
 In business and literature, while there is much in harmony 
 there is also much that is directly antagonistic. Some of the 
 elements essential to success are alike in both, but the train- 
 ing suitable for one is not the best for the other. There are 
 certain qualities equally beneficial in both. Honesty, intelli- 
 gence, application, and the like are as valuable to the pro- 
 fessional man as to the business man, and not more so ; just 
 as blood, endurance, reliability, are as valuable qualities in 
 the draught-horse as in the race-horse; the training, how- 
 ever, would be quite different in the two cases. Obviously 
 the course pursued in fitting a horse for the turf unfits the 
 animal for the cart. 
 
 I never imagined the difference between the effects of a 
 college and business training to be so pronounced in the 
 training of young men destined to their different pursuits 
 until I was brought into immediate and daily contact with 
 two distinct sets of assistants, directing both, and part of the 
 time under the same roof. The business I had planted ; all 
 its growth and branchings I had directed, engaging and 
 overseeing all those employed in it. This represented one 
 part of me, and of my life. My literary work I had con- 
 ceived, planned, and was then performing, with the full 
 direction of every one engaged in it. This represented an- 
 other part of me, of my nature, my aspirations, and my life. 
 
 A young man or an old man applies to me for a situation. 
 He may be suitable for the business and ijot for the library ; 
 nay, if he is specially fitted for one he is probably not suitable 
 for the other. My first questions are : What did you last ? 
 What have you been doing all your life? What are your 
 aspirations ?
 
 340 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 If the applicant's time hitherto has been spent as salesman 
 or book-keeper in a mercantile or manufacturing establish- 
 ment ; if his mind be of the color of money, and his chief 
 desires and tastes lie in the direction of buying, and selling, 
 and getting gain, he is worth nothing to me in the library. 
 On the other hand, if he be scholarly in his tastes, of medi- 
 tative, intellectual habits, careless of money, preferring the 
 merchandise of mind to the accumulations of the warehouse ; 
 if he be sensitive, diffident, and retiring, inexperienced in 
 business, v/ith parents and friends intellectually inclined, hav- 
 ing spent his whole life at study, having acquired a good col- 
 legiate education, and being still ambitious to acquire more, 
 I should never think of placing such a man in the bustle of 
 business. It would be no less distasteful to him than un- 
 profitable to both of us. 
 
 The youth's training and experience while in a store are 
 invaluable to him if he means to become a merchant. It is 
 time lost, and often worse than lost, if the intellectual life be 
 his future field. The activities of business call into play such 
 totally different qualities of mind, drawing it from its content 
 in quiet, thoughtful study, and stirring it to the strife and 
 passion of acquisition, that it is in some respects, but not in 
 all, a positive detriment to intellectual pursuits. On the other 
 hand, study and the thoughtful investigation which should 
 follow it are too apt to engender sensitive, sedentary habits 
 and a distaste for the activities of business. As Herbert 
 Spencer puts it : " Faculty of every kind tends always to 
 adjust itself to its work. Special adjustment to one kind of 
 work involves more or less non-adjustment to other kinds." 
 
 In my own case, however, beginning with literature late in 
 life and studying after my own peculiar method, I found 
 my business experience of the greatest advantage. Before I 
 had been engaged in my historical labors for five years I 
 found my new work broadly planned and fairly systematized. 
 Accustomed to utilize the labors of others, I found no diffi- 
 culty in directing a small army of workers here. I found, 
 fastened upon me as part of my nature, habits of application
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 341 
 
 and perseverance from which I could not tear myself if I 
 would. I was, so to speak, wound up to work, and so wound 
 that the running down should be with the last tick of time. 
 
 Moreover, I found myself as free as might be from preju- 
 dices, though this, I believe, is the opinion of the wildest 
 fanaticism concerning itself; free from sectarianism and party 
 bias, and from the whole catalogue of isms, some of which 
 are apt to fasten themselves on immature minds and there 
 remain through life. I found myself with no cause to battle 
 for, no preconceived rights to vindicate or wrongs to avenge, 
 no so-called belief to establish, no special politics to plead. 
 I had no aim or interest to present aught but the truth; and 
 I cared little what truth should prove to be when found, or 
 whether it agreed v/ith my conceptions of what it was or 
 ought to be. I would as willingly have found the moon in 
 the bottom of the well, were it really there, as in the heavens, 
 where we have always supposed it to be. It was as though 
 I had been bom into the world of letters a full-grown man. 
 
 He who accumulates facts seldom generalizes them, because 
 no one man has the time and the ability to do both to any 
 great extent. Herbert Spencer could have made little prog- 
 ress weaving his vast and sparkling theories had he not pos- 
 sessed a good store of raw material before he began them. 
 Then again, general speculations spring from habits of 
 thought different from those that regulate the mind-machinery 
 of scientific specialists. Yet the spirit of business activity 
 may be infused into the meditations of mind. The ethics of 
 commerce are not fully appreciated by the student of litera- 
 ture, of law, of divinity. There are in the commercial life 
 more influences at work to form habit, character, opinion, 
 than in almost any other sphere of action. In looking back 
 upon the past the success of my historical undertakings de- 
 pended no less on business experience than on such literary 
 ability as I might possess. 
 
 A word with regard to retiring from business. It is well 
 enough understood at this day that he who suddenly ex-
 
 342 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 changes life-long, active occupation for idle, indolent leisure 
 seldom finds satisfaction therein. It is only the constitution- 
 ally lazy man, he who has never done anything, that enjoys 
 doing nothing. If the commercial man has a cultivated 
 intellect, he has an unfailing resource within himself. But 
 this is not often the case : a man of refined and cultivated 
 literary tastes is seldom a great commercial man. " The ten- 
 dency of modern business life," says Doctor Beard, " for one 
 who succeeds in it, is to repress whatever of poetry, or science, 
 or art there may be in the brain." Yet absolute retirement 
 from an active and successful business life which he loves, 
 even to a purely intellectual life which he loves better, may 
 not be always the best a man can do. The strains of study 
 and writing are so severe upon the nerves that at times 
 business may be recreation — that is, if the business is well 
 systematized and successful, with plenty to do, with plenty of 
 capital, and without haste, anxiety, or worry. 
 
 At all events I never could wholly retire from business, 
 although at times its duties were extremely distasteful and its 
 cares crushing. Some of the happiest associations, some of 
 the warmest friendships, have sprung from my commercial 
 life; and they never left me, but ripened into sweeter fra- 
 grance as age crept on apace. Kenny, Colley, Borland, and 
 my nephew Will, Welch and Mitchell, Maison and Peterson, 
 and all the rest of the little army I used to general with such 
 satisfaction, not only were you diligent and loyal to the 
 business, but you were among those I was ever proud to call 
 my friends! In the midst of the severest literary labors, as 
 I have before mentioned, I have voluntarily taken sole charge 
 of the business when it was largest and most intricate, for 
 months and years at a time, increasing its capabilities and 
 profits with as little effort as that employed by the skillful 
 engineer in adding to the force of his machinery ; and I 
 believe I derived only pleasure and benefit from it. It was 
 a relief to my tired brain to step from the library to the office 
 and in a few moments shape the next month's affairs; it was 
 a relief to fingers stiff from writing history to sign checks
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 343 
 
 awhile. Nor is this any contradiction to what I earher re- 
 marked about interruptions when deep in literary labors. A 
 man can do much if left to do it his own way. 
 
 To return to our subject. Besides the regular subject-mat- 
 ter or historical notes, which were largely taken out by my 
 assistants, there was another class of notes, allusory and illus- 
 trative, which I was obliged to take out for myself, in order 
 to obtain satisfactory material for use. I have found these 
 notes exceedingly serviceable. They were made during oc- 
 casional general readings of from a week to three months in 
 duration. So long as I could write steadily I had neither 
 time nor taste for miscellaneous reading ; but feeling that a 
 writer could never have too much familiarity with history 
 and classical literature, whenever I could do nothing else 
 I read vigorously in that direction, taking notes and record- 
 ing my own ideas. The substantial facts of history are fixed 
 and determined. When the object is to present them all 
 as they are, without theoretical bias or class prejudice, with 
 no desire to elevate this person, sect, or party, or to hu- 
 miliate or debase another, there is something about the 
 work definite, tangible, and common to all minds. But notes 
 for purposes of proof, illustration, or garnishment, such as 
 Buckle presents in his Commonplace Book — though there 
 indeed are notes of every class indiscriminately thrown to- 
 gether — must be abstracted by the person using them, as no 
 two minds think exactly in the same channel ; nor would one 
 person undertaking to use notes of this kind made by another 
 be able even to understand in many instances their signifi- 
 cance or relevancy. 
 
 With the notes for a volume all arranged, and the plan of 
 the work clearly defined in my mind, the writing was com- 
 paratively rapid. While the writing was actually in progress 
 I avoided as much as possible all outside reading. 
 
 But at the completion of every one or two of my written 
 volumes, I ran through some fifty or a hundred books which 
 I had laid aside to read as my eye had fallen upon them from
 
 344 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 time to time, taking notes and memoranda applicable both 
 to what I had written and to what I had yet to write. Jean 
 Paul Richter was exceedingly careful to preserve all his 
 thoughts. " He was as thought-thrifty and thought-storing," 
 says one, " as he was thought- wealthy." Had the time been 
 at my disposal I should have been a great devourer of books, 
 for I scarcely ever could pass a book without looking at it, or 
 look at a book without wanting to read it. 
 
 " I have long had it in my mind to speak to you upon the 
 subject of which this letter treats," writes Mr. Harcourt to 
 me the 4th of April, 1877, at White Sulphur springs. "You 
 have made literature your profession, and have already at- 
 tained a position in the world of letters which the vast 
 majority of those who have grown gray-headed and worm- 
 eaten in the cause have failed to reach. This notable success 
 is partly owing to the wise and far-sighted system you have 
 adopted of leaving to others the drudgery that is inseparable 
 from literary labor, and thereby keeping your own energies 
 fresh for the part that is expected of you. You have carried 
 the progressive spirit of the age into a quarter where.it is 
 least expected to be found, for you have applied machinery 
 to literature, and have almost done for book-writing what 
 the printing-press did for book dissemination. It is true that 
 few men of literary tastes — for is it not written that they 
 are all miserably poor? — are in a position to avail them- 
 selves of your system, and I know of no one but yourself to 
 whom the suggestion I am about to make, which is simply 
 an extension of that system, would be practicable. 
 
 " It is of course well known to you that notes of a general 
 character are indispensable to every writer. Their impor- 
 tance and value cannot be overestimated. They are abso- 
 lutely requisite for the attainment of both brilliancy and 
 accuracy. What makes a man's pages sparkle so brightly as 
 a judicious and appropriate use of those 'jewels five words 
 long which on the stretched forefinger of all time sparkle 
 forever' ? They serve to show the breadtli of his reading — 
 a most laudable vanity, I think, if kept within bounds — they
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 345 
 
 inspire respect in the reader, they say things for him that the 
 writer could but indifferently express in his own words, and 
 by obliterating the obnoxious ego for a moment they stamp 
 his work with the mark of authority. But I am sure that you 
 appreciate their value and desirability. Yet how is it possible 
 to have them at hand without the use of notes ? A man can- 
 not carry in his head all the books he has read ; neither, 
 though he has them all by heart, will the passages and facts 
 which he most admires or which are most appropriate to his 
 present purpose occur to him when he needs them most. 
 The prejudice v/hich exists against a commonplace book in 
 the minds of many who are not writers is absurd in the ex- 
 treme. What author of eminence has been without one ? It 
 is true that quotations and allusions as they crop out in the 
 pages do and should appear to have occurred to the writer 
 on the spur of the moment; but that they were in reality 
 carefully drawn from his written archives and not from the 
 calls of a superhuman memory is a compliment to his industry 
 and no slur upon his learning. 
 
 " You will think me fearfully long-winded, I know, but I 
 come straight to business when I state that I should like to 
 take general notes of this kind for you, and what I have said 
 was merely to show, first, that my taking them out for you 
 would be perfectly in accordance with your views of the way 
 in which such work must be done, and second, that such 
 notes should be in your possession. 
 
 " I have, of course, no doubt that you have already a large 
 collection of your own; but one can never have too many, 
 or even enough of them, and I think that I might materially 
 assist you. To keep himself up with the literature of the day 
 is about all that a man can attend to in these times, and he 
 has little leisure for taking the back-track among the brain- 
 work of the past." 
 
 Few persons were better qualified for this work than Mr. 
 Harcourt. No one possessed finer literary tastes than he; 
 no one's reading was of a wider range than his. And yet 
 for him to accomplish this labor for me I deemed impracti-
 
 346 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 cable. For his own use his notes would be invaluable, but I 
 might almost as well draw my notes of illustration from 
 cyclopaedias and quotation dictionaries already in use as to 
 have Mr. Harcourt make a collection specially for me. His 
 would be on the whole better, unquestionably, since I could 
 direct him what categories to draw from, and in what form 
 to write them out ; but, after all, the fact would remain that 
 they were quotations, either literal or in essence, and in their 
 original conjunctions they were worth far more to me. More- 
 over, there was too much of sham in the proposition. 
 
 After all that may be said of inventions and systems, or 
 even of ability, work, work was ever my chief dependence. 
 That which we call genius, not that I ever laid claim to it, 
 is often nothing else than the natural growth of organs and 
 faculties which of necessity grow by their use. All produc- 
 tions are the result of labor, physical or mental, applied to nat- 
 ural objects. Says Sainte-Beuve of the labor expended in writ- 
 ing his inimitable Causeries du Lundi, or Monday-Chats : " I 
 descend on Tuesday into a well, from which I emerge only on 
 Sunday." It is no small task even to edit another man's work, 
 if it be done thoroughly and conscientiously. John Stuart 
 Mill, in editing Bentham's Rationale of Judicial Evidence, 
 was obliged to condense three masses of manuscript, begun 
 at three several times, into a single treatise ; he was likcAvise 
 to supply any omissions of Mr. Bentham, and to that end 
 read several treatises on the law of evidence. 
 
 Intellectually, as well as physically, the rule holds good 
 that he who will not work, neither shall he eat. To the rich, 
 therefore, as to the poor, this rule applies, and with greater 
 intensity it rivets the rich man's bonds. The most worthless 
 of us, if poor enough, are hammered by necessity into some- 
 thing useful, even as the cooper hammers the leaky barrel. 
 
 The work of man is distinguished from that of beasts in 
 that it has intelligence. Strictly speaking, there is no such 
 thing as purely manual labor. All human labor is pardy 
 physical and partly mental ; as we descend the scale the phy- 
 sical element increases and the mental decreases.
 
 MY METHOD OF WRITING HISTORY. 347 
 
 It is only the ruder forms of labor that bring immediate 
 returns ; the more complex productions of the mind are of 
 slower ripening. In the earlier stages of progress muscu- 
 lar exertion is depended upon almost entirely for supplying 
 the wants of mankind. But as the mind acquires strength 
 and experience, natural agents, the falling water, wind, heat, 
 and electricity, are harnessed to mechanical contrivances and 
 made to do duty as labor-saving machines. 
 
 Nature abhors immobility. Motion is the normal condi- 
 tion of man as well as of matter. Society is but a stream, 
 ever seeking its level, ever flowing on toward the ocean of 
 eternity. And who Avonders that some men should believe 
 that on reaching this ocean beyond the shores of time the 
 souls of men are beaten up by the universal sun into new 
 forms of existence, even as the sun of our little system beats 
 the waters of the ocean into cloudy vaj^or? This is the 
 central idea round which revolves all thought, the central 
 force from which radiate all energies, the germ of all develop- 
 ment, the clearest lesson thrown by nature upon the dark 
 economy of Providence, that in labor and sorrow are rest 
 and happiness, that in decay there is growth, in the dust of 
 death the budding flowers of immortality. 
 
 Experience alone must be the teacher of those who strike 
 out into new paths; meanwhile old ways must satisfy the 
 more conservative. Learning from experience is a different 
 thing from learning by experience. All the wealth of Russia 
 could not teach Peter the Great hoAv to build a ship ; but a 
 day-laborer in a Dutch dock-yard cOuld reveal to him the 
 mystery, and speedily it unfolded within him. 
 
 Before genius is application. The m.ind must be fertilized 
 by knowledge and made prolific by industr}^ With all the 
 marvellous energetic training of his son, which alone made 
 him the man he was, the father of John Stuart Mill failed 
 to implant in him practical energy. He made him know 
 rather than do. ]\Iany men there have been of great capa- 
 bilities and zeal who have expended their energies on energy 
 alone ; that is to say, they were ready enough to begin a
 
 348 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 great task, and would begin many such, and labor at them 
 with brave conscientiousness ; but so high was their standard 
 and so keen the sense of their own imperfections, that after 
 a lifetime of futile study and elaboration they sank beneath 
 the burden, the child of their excessive labor being stillborn 
 and never seeing the light. 
 
 Surely each of us may do something ; may leave a bequest 
 at least as beneficial to our race as that of Hierocles, joke- 
 compiler of the fifth century, who after the arduous labors of 
 a lifetime left to the world a legacy of twenty- one jokes which 
 he had collected. And if they were good jokes he might 
 have done worse; like many another of more pretentious 
 wisdom, he might have died and left no joke at all. For, 
 as Goethe says : 
 
 " Soil doch nicht als ciii Pilz der Mensch dem Boden entwachsen, 
 Und verfaulen geschwind an dem Platze, der ilm eizeugt hat, 
 Keine Spur naclilassend von seiner lebendigeu Wirkung !"
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 FURTHER INGATHERINGS. 
 
 Das Wenige verschwindet leicht dem Blicke, 
 Der vorwiirts sieht, wie viel noch iibrig bleibt. 
 
 — Goethe. 
 
 WITH Goethe I might truly say at this juncture that the 
 Uttle I had done seemed nothing when I looked forward 
 and saw how much there remained to be done. Whatever 
 else I had in hand, never for a moment did I lose sight of 
 the important work of collecting. Moved by the increasing 
 importance given to facts and points of detail in the inductive, 
 moral, and physical science of the age, I regarded with deep 
 longing the reach of territory marked out, where so much 
 loss and destruction were going on, and at such a rapid rate. 
 My desires were insatiable. So thoroughly did I realize how 
 ripe was the harvest and how few the laborers, how rapidly 
 was slipping from mortal grasp golden opportunity, that I 
 rested neither day nor night, but sought to secure, from those 
 thus passing away, all within my power to save before it was 
 too late. With the history of the coast ever before me as the 
 grandest of unaccomplished ideas, I gathered day by day all 
 scraps of information upon which I could lay my hands. 
 
 Among my earliest attempts to secure original documents 
 from original sources was the sending of Bosquetti to San 
 Jose and Sacramento in 1869, as previously related. Long 
 before this, however, while collecting information for the sta- 
 tistical works issued by the firm, I had secured a little material 
 of a local character, but nothing of a very important nature. 
 
 The conception first assum.ed more definite form in the 
 brief sketches of notable pioneers, or of any one at all who
 
 35° LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 had come to the country before 1849; indeed, at the time of 
 beginning my work the popular idea of a history of CaHfor- 
 nia dated in reaUty from the coming of the Americans. All 
 before that was shadowy, if not, indeed, mythologic. At all 
 events it was generally supposed to be something no one knew 
 much about, and the little that could be ascertained was not 
 worth the writing or the reading. The hijos del pais were 
 regarded as being nothing, as having done nothing, as being 
 able to communicate nothing, and would not tell of them- 
 selves or of the past if they could ; so that at this period of 
 my investigations a white man who had come to the country 
 in 1846 or in 1848 was a magazine of historical information. 
 
 No inconsiderable results attended these efforts even at an 
 early day. Quite a number of pioneers responded to appeals 
 made them by letter, and sent in their written statements. 
 Some called at the library and gave in their testimony there. 
 Up through Napa valley, into the Lake country, and back 
 by Cloverdale and Santa Rosa, I made a hasty trip in 1871. 
 About this time I engaged Mr. Montgomery, editor of a 
 Napa newspaper, to furnish some sketches from original 
 sources of the experiences of early settlers. From the secre- 
 tary of the society of California pioneers I obtained the names 
 of those whose adventures were deemed worthy of record, 
 and sent men to take their statements. " There should be a 
 chronicle kept," says Doctor Johnson, " in every considerable 
 family, to preserve the characters and transactions of succes- 
 sive generations." 
 
 At Sacramento, at Salt Lake City, and elsewhere in my 
 travels about the Pacific coast, I made additions from time to 
 time to this very valuable part of my collection. Some of 
 the efforts and expeditions made by me and by my assistants 
 in search of historical data I give in this volume, but thrice 
 as much must remain untold. 
 
 Long before I made my journey to the north, where I re- 
 ceived such a warm reception and such cordial aid in every 
 quarter, I received from the author, the Honorable Elwood
 
 FURTHER INGATHERINGS. 351 
 
 Evans of Olympia, early in 1S73, his manuscript history of 
 Oregon and the great northwest, with permission to copy 
 the same, and to use it at my discretion. Mr. Evans was 
 a highly talented member of the bar, a ripe scholar, a grace- 
 ful writer, and a man thoroughly famihar with the history of 
 those parts, where indeed he had resided for most of his life. 
 His history had been carefully written, and had many times 
 undergone critical revision by those who had taken part in the 
 development of the country; for example, by Sir James Doug- 
 las and W. F. Tolmie, of Victoria, touching the operations of 
 the Hudson's Bay company, of which those gentlemen were 
 chief officers for a quarter of a century or more. I need not 
 say that this manuscript was of the greatest value to me in 
 writing the History of the NortJnuest Coast, or that Mr. Evans 
 is entitled, aside from my heart-felt thanks, to the highest 
 praise for his singular and disinterested magnanimity in per- 
 mitting me to copy and use so important a manuscript, 
 which he had written for publication. A stranger to Mr. 
 Evans might regard his conduct as peculiar, but one ac- 
 quainted vrith him would not. Years before I had any 
 thought of writing history I had known him, and had held 
 him in high esteem. Far above all commonplace or personal 
 views of what affected the general good, his mind, to me, 
 seemed cast in other than ordinary mould. At all events I 
 was impressed by Mr. Evans as by one dwelling in an atmos- 
 phere of ethereal high-mindedness such as few of his fellov/s 
 could understand, much less attain to. 
 
 Mr. James G. Swan of Port Townsend, author of The 
 Northwest Coast, made the subject of the coast tribes a special 
 study for some twenty years. '* I find a deal of error," he 
 writes me the 22d of February, 1875, " in the accounts of the 
 early voyagers, particularly in their speculative theories in re- 
 lation to the natives; nor is this suiprising v/hen we reflect 
 that at that early day the whites and Indians did not under- 
 stand each other, but conversed mostly by signs and panto- 
 mime. None of these early voyagers remained at any one 
 place long enough to acquire the native language; hence we
 
 352 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 find SO much of error. Even most modern writers have passed 
 over this region rapidly, and have jotted down their ideas 
 without knowing or caring whether they were correct or not." 
 Mr. Stephen Powers gave me the use of a valuable unpub- 
 lished manuscript on the manners and customs of certain 
 native Californian tribes among v/hich he had spent much 
 time. 
 
 For material for the history of Alaska I applied in 1874 by 
 letter to the Russian consul in San Francisco, Martin Klink- 
 ofstrom, who forwarded my communication to the academy 
 of sciences in St. Petersburg. It happened at this time that 
 my friend Alphonse Pinart, the distinguished Americardstc 
 who had published several works on the Pacific coast, more 
 particularly of an ethnological and linguistic character, was 
 pursuing his investigations in St. Petersburg, and to him the 
 consul's letter was referred. Monsieur A. Schiefner, mem- 
 ber of the academy, writing the 6th of June, 1875, says: "Si 
 vous trouverez que I'acadcmie vous pourra etre utile comme 
 intermediaire elle sera toujours a vos services." 
 
 M. Pinart had been engaged for two years past in collecting 
 material on the early settlement of the Russians on Bering 
 sea and the northwest coast, and on the cstabhshment and 
 abandonment by the Russians of Fort Ross, in California. 
 For this purpose he had visited Alaska, searched France and 
 Germany, and was now in St. Petersburg. Writing from that 
 city the 6th of February, 1875, he offers to place at my free 
 disposition all such books and documents as he had found 
 upon the subject. Indeed, he was officially notified so to do 
 by M. Schiefner, to whom my best thanks arc due, and who 
 granted M. Pinart every facility, both on his own account 
 and mine. 
 
 M. Pinart concludes his letter as follows : " I must tell 
 you that the archives of Russia are very poor in documents 
 relating to Russian America, they having been in some way 
 destroyed. I was able to put my hand only on very few of 
 them. Most of the notices relating to the colonies are printed
 
 FURTHER INGATHERINGS. 353 
 
 in papers or reviews, some of them exceedingly difficult to 
 find." Pinart was to be in San Francisco the following 
 autumn, and was to bring with him all his material. This 
 he did, adding rich treasures to my library. Of such books 
 and manuscripts as he had in duplicate, I took one ; the rest 
 were copied in full in a translation made for me by Mr. Ivan 
 Petroff. 
 
 In 1870-2 M. Pinart visited Alaska, and acquired a knowl- 
 edge of the languages and customs of the Aleut and Kolosh 
 nations. Returning to Europe in 1872 he was awarded the 
 gold medal of the French geographical society for his explo- 
 rations on the northwest coast of America. Afterward he 
 spent much time within the territory of the Pacific states, liv- 
 ing with the aborigines, in order to study their character and 
 languages. During 1874-6 he was in Arizona, Sonora, Utah, 
 Idaho, Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, and the South 
 Sea islands. 
 
 In 1873 he purchased a portion of the library of Brasseur 
 de Bourbourg, and after the death of the abbe, in January, 
 1874, the rest of his books and manuscripts fell into the hands 
 of M. Pinart. To all of these he most generously gave me 
 free access, and, further to facilitate my labors, boxed such 
 portions of them as I required for my history and sent them 
 to my library. After I had used them, they were returned 
 to Marquise, where his collection was kept. 
 
 To Innokentie, metropolitan of Moscow, lohan Venia- 
 minof, Russian missionary to the Aleuts, to Admiral Lutke, 
 and to Etholen, formerly governor of the Russian-American 
 possessions, I am likewise indebted for favors. 
 
 At an early date in these annals I placed myself in corre- 
 spondence with the heads of governments lying within the 
 territory whose history and literature I sought to serve. In 
 every instance my overtures met with a warm response. 
 The presidents of the Mexican and Central American repub- 
 lics, and all governors of states to whom I deemed it advis- 
 able to explain the character of my work, replied by offering 
 23
 
 354 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 me every facility at their command. My object in this cor- 
 respondence had a much broader significance than the out- 
 pouring of comphments. As this was some time previous to 
 my acquisition of the valuable works from the collection of 
 E. G. Squier, I had felt the lack of Central American mate- 
 rial more than of any other kind. In writing the first vol- 
 umes of my history, while I had abundance of material for a 
 history of the conquest of Mexico, I found myself in the 
 possession of less bearing upon the history of the conquest 
 of the more southern parts ; and of further material for mod- 
 em history I was also in need. I therefore directed Cerruti 
 to make energetic appeals to the supreme authorities of these 
 extreme southern states of my territory, and to explain the 
 object, progress, and importance of the work. Indeed, I 
 asked no great favors, nothing but access to their historic 
 archives. 
 
 Despite the partisan strife which had thrown the Central 
 American states into disorder, it gave me much pleasure to 
 find that my efforts to establish a history of the indigenous 
 and imported races, aboriginal, Latin, and Anglo-Saxon, of 
 western North America, would receive the support of these 
 governments. It was here that aboriginal civilization had 
 attained its fullest proportions, and it was here that the Euro- 
 pean first placed foot on North American soil. These states 
 were stepping-stones, as it were, to the history of the more 
 northern countries. Here begins our history proper. Replete 
 are the early chronicles with the doings of the conqiiistadorcs 
 in this region; and although their prominence is no longer 
 what it once was, although history had troubled itself little 
 of late with their petty conflicts, yet they had followed in the 
 wake of progress, and they now displayed a commendable 
 interest in the historical literature of their country. Some 
 went much further than this, even so far as to appoint com- 
 missioners to obtain and forward me material. This did the 
 presidents of Salvador and Nicaragua. Gonzalez, president 
 of the former republic, in his letter of the 2 2d of August, 
 1874, speaks with regret of the disregard shown in Europe
 
 FURTHER INGATHERINGS. 355 
 
 for the history of Central America, and the consequent igno- 
 rance of Europeans as to the real importance of that magni- 
 ficent country. He is profuse in his appreciation of my 
 efforts in that direction. " La simple enunciacion del nombre 
 del libro que U. prepara," he writes, " seria bastante para in- 
 teresar en su favor a todo buen Americano " ; and as such 
 a one he proffers his services. M. Brioso, minister of foreign 
 relations, seemed to share the president's feelings. " Los 
 hombres de saber," he writes the 26th of May, '• los hombres 
 de pensamiento, los hombres de Estado han saludado con en- 
 tusiasmo su primera entrega." 
 
 No less appreciative Avas his excellency the president of 
 Nicaragua, Vicente Cuadra. Writing to Cerruti from Mana- 
 gua, the 12th of December, 1874, he says: " Tengo la sat- 
 isfaccion de decirle que el comisionado del Gobierno, Senor 
 don Carlos Selva, para reunir i remitir a U. documentos re- 
 lativos a Nicaragua cumple fiel i activamente su comision, y 
 que ha hecho ya algunas remesas que deseo sean utiles al 
 ilustrado Bancroft." I found that civil war had unfortunately 
 swept the country of many of its archives. " Siento verda- 
 deramente," says President Cuadra, " que los archivos de este 
 pais hayan sido destruidos 6 deteriorados a consecuencia de 
 las vicisitudes." 
 
 Under date of September 22, 1874, the commissioner 
 Carlos Selva wrote Cerruti that he had already begun the 
 collecting of documents for the history of Nicaragua, and 
 flattered himself that he should be able to accumulate a num- 
 ber sufficient to enable me to write the history of that country 
 at least from the date of Central American independence. 
 At the same time the commissioner shipped a quantity of 
 documents relating not only to Nicaragua but to her sister 
 republics. Nor did his kindness stop there : for years there- 
 after he was alive to my wants, not only as regarded manu- 
 scripts and original documents, but printed journals and 
 bound books. The Nicaraguan secretary of foreign relations, 
 A. M. Rivas, writes the 2d of November that private individ- 
 uals as well as the public authorities were responding in the most
 
 356 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 satisfactory manner to the appeal made by the government 
 for historical data for my use. The secretary hoped the doc- 
 uments already sent had safely arrived ; and regretted the loss 
 of a great part of the archives of the republic, destroyed when 
 in 1856 Granada was burned by the filibusters. 
 
 The nth of December Vicente Cuadra in an autograph 
 letter expresses the great interest he takes personally as well 
 as officially in my literary efforts, and his satisfaction in know- 
 ing that the commissioner appointed by him was most active in 
 the discharge of his duties. 
 
 In an autograph letter dated Guatemala the 4th of De- 
 cember, 1874, his excellency J. Rufino Barrios, president of 
 the republic, appeared keenly alive to the importance of the 
 work, and desired detailed information regarding the kind of 
 material sought, in order that he might the more under- 
 standingly cooperate. On receiving my reply, he went to 
 work with a zeal second to that of none of his neighbors. 
 Thus it appears that the republics of Central America are 
 not one whit behind the other nations of the world in their 
 interest and zeal in securing a proper record of the annals of 
 their country. 
 
 One afternoon in May, 1874, Father Fitzsimons, an intelli- 
 gent and charitable member of the order of St. Dominic, 
 called at the library and informed me that the priests of his 
 order lately exiled from Central America had in many in- 
 stances, in order to prevent their valuable libraries from 
 falling into the hands of the government, delivered them to 
 the natives to be hidden until they should call for them ; and 
 to strangers these custodians would undoubtedly deny the 
 existence of any such books. The superior of the order, 
 Father Villarasa, who resided at Benicia, being in corre- 
 spondence with many of the Central American priests who 
 were then returning from their late exile, kindly interested 
 himself to procure for me through an authorized agent mate- 
 rial for history from that source. 
 
 Soon after the war in Mexico, which grew out of the 
 French intervention. General Placido Vega, commander
 
 FURTHER INGATHERINGS. 357 
 
 under Juarez, brought or sent to San Francisco for safe-keep- 
 ing two boxes of documents. One was deposited with the 
 California trust company and the other in the Vallejo bank, 
 both being subject to charges at the rate of two dollars a 
 month. 
 
 The boxes were deposited in the name of General Vallejo 
 in 1872, and for three years thereafter nothing was heard in 
 California from Vega. As there was little probability that the 
 packages would ever be called for, General Vallejo sent to 
 the library the box which was at the Vallejo bank, with an 
 order for the one at the trust company's. I was to pay 
 the charges and hold the documents for a reasonable time 
 subject to Vega's order, in case they were ever called for. 
 Should Vega never demand the boxes the contents would 
 be mine. 
 
 " I have opened one of the boxes," writes Cerruti the nth 
 of May, 1875, "and found it filled with very important his- 
 torical letters. Mr. Savage, who assisted me in the inspec- 
 tion, leans to the belief that they ought to be copied. But I 
 entertain a different view, because, the box being in debt four 
 hundred dollars" — this was Cerruti's characteristic way of 
 writing one hundred and forty-four dollars, that being the 
 amount due on both the boxes up to this date — " I do not 
 think it likely that the relatives of General Vega will ever 
 claim it. I believe, however, that an index would not be out 
 of place, for it would facilitate the labor of the historian." 
 
 General Vega had taken a prominent part in the public 
 affairs of Mexico. He was intrusted by Juarez with impor- 
 tant commissions. These boxes of official and private corre- 
 spondence, accounts, etc., which were of no small consequence 
 to the history of that period, were never called for. 
 
 Between the years 1876 and 1880, with official permission 
 obtained through the eftbrts of General Vallejo while on a 
 visit to Mexico in company with his son-in-law, Frisbie, I 
 had copies made of some of the more important manuscripts 
 lodged in the government archives of the city of Mexico.
 
 358 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 This work was superintended by my friend Ellis Read, to 
 whom I tender thanks. 
 
 A representative from the law department of the business 
 attempted in 1881 to obtain legislative sanction to transfer 
 the archives of New Mexico for a time to my library. They 
 were in a deplorable condition, and I offered, if this were done, 
 to collate and bind them at my own cost. The proposal failing, 
 I was obliged to go thither and have extracted such informa- 
 tion as I required. 
 
 Before the visit of Dom Pedro de Alcantara, emperor of 
 Brazil, to San Francisco, I had sent an inquiry through the 
 Italian consul to the imperial library at Rio Janeiro concern- 
 ing documents for Central American history. When the em- 
 peror was in San Francisco in 1876 he several times visited 
 my library, seemed to be much interested in the work, and 
 promised me every assistance in his power. 
 
 Another word as to Mr. Squier and his collection. E. 
 G. Squier was appointed in 1849 charge d'affaires for Gua- 
 temala. He organized a company for constructing an 
 inter-oceanic railway through Honduras, and assisted in 
 surveying a route in 1853. In 1868 he acted for a time as 
 United States consul-general to Honduras. Besides his Nica- 
 ragua, Serpent Symbol, Notes on Cejitral America, Waikna, 
 and Honduras, he published several minor works. 
 
 Squier's collection bore the same relation to Central 
 America that Senor Andrade's did to Mexico. It was by 
 far the best in existence, better than he himself could again 
 make even if he had twenty years more in which to attempt 
 it. Most fortunate was diis sale for me, for it enabled me to 
 strengthen my library at its weakest point. I had found it 
 very difficult to gather more than the few current works on 
 this part of my territory ; and now were poured into my lap 
 in one magnificent shower treasures which I had never 
 dared to expect. By this purchase I added to the library 
 about six hundred volumes, but tlie number was not com- 
 mensurate with the rarity and value of the works.
 
 FURTHER INGATHERINGS. 359 
 
 It was owing to the death of Mr. Squier that his collection 
 was sold. It consisted of over two thousand books, sets of 
 pamphlets, maps, and manuscripts. 
 
 By this purchase I secured, among other things, a series of 
 bound manuscripts of sixteenth-century documents copied 
 from the Spanish libraries, such as Ddvila — reports by this 
 renowned conquistador and comrades from 1519 to 1524 on 
 matters relating to the conquest of Panama and Nicaragua; 
 Cerezeda — letters of 1529-1533 on Nicaragua and Hon- 
 duras affairs; Grijalva, Rclacion de la Jornada, 1533, to the 
 South Sea; Pedro de Alvarado — letters, 1533 to 1 541, on 
 the conquest of Guatemala and the projected maritime ex- 
 pedition ; Andagoya — letters on a Panama canal to connect 
 the two oceans; Central America — a collection of letters 
 and reports, 1545 to 1555; beside which there was a large 
 number of similar documents, bound under various names, 
 and belonging to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. 
 
 Then there was a large set relating to a more northern dis- 
 trict, entitled Materiales para la Historia de So/iora, contain- 
 ing letters and reports from friars and officials copied from the 
 Mexican archives, such as Ziaita, Breve y Sumaria Relacioii, 
 1554, Dcscripcion de la America, 1 701-10, and others. 
 
 The most noteworthy among the printed works from the 
 Squier collection were Leon JPinelo, Trato de Confirmaciones 
 Reales de Encojuiendas, Madrid, 1630, bearing on the en- 
 comienda system of New Spain ; Relaciofi sabre , . . Lacandon, 
 1638, by the same author, together with Villaquiran's ap- 
 pointment as governor there, 1639, a very rare and unique 
 copy, treating of a journey which created great excitement 
 at the time ; Gemelli Carreri, Giro del Mondo, part vi., Napoli, 
 1721, being a record of his observations in New Spain; 
 Vasquez, Chronica de la Provincia . . . de Guatemala, Guate- 
 mala, 17 14, tom. i., a rare work ; Jiiarros, Compendia de la His- 
 toria de la Guatemala, Guatemala, 1808-18, in two volumes, 
 indispensable to the history of the state ; Rohles, Memoiras 
 para la Historia de Chiapa, Cadiz, 18 13; Pelaez, Memorias 
 para la Historia del Antigua Guatemala, in three volumes.
 
 360 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 In addition to the above were many important works which 
 I cannot enumerate, bearing on history, colonization, pohtics, 
 and exploration, and narratives of travel and residence, in 
 English, Spanish, French, German, and Italian, and several 
 volumes of Central American newspapers. 
 
 During the Avinter of 1881-2 some valuable material was se- 
 cured and sent to the library by my agents in various parts 
 of the world, as well as by government officials in Washing- 
 ton, Mexico, Central America, and Canada. 
 
 At the Hawaiian islands was Samuel E. Damon, one always 
 interested in historical research, who sent me files of the Friend, 
 the Polynesian, and the JVeu's, containing information since 
 1836 on Oregon and California, nowhere else existing. At 
 the suggestion of Stephen H. Phillips I wrote Lawrence Mc- 
 Auley, who gave me information regarding the sale of the 
 Pease library, which occurred in 1 87 1 . Ten years later George 
 W. Stewart kindly sent me the numbers of the Saturday Press, 
 in which was a series of articles on early California by Henry 
 L. Sheldon, a journalist in California as early as 1848. 
 
 From Mission San Jose Cerruti writes the i8th of April, 
 
 1875: 
 
 "A few clays ago Mr. Osio, a resident of California in 1826, arrived 
 in San Francisco, dragging along with him a manuscript history of the 
 early times in California. I believe he originally intended to give it to 
 your library, but certain persons whose acquaintance he happened to make 
 induced him to reconsider his resolution, and made him believe that there 
 was money in it. Actuated by that belief, he has given his manuscript 
 to Mr. Hopkins, keeper of the archives in San Francisco, with a prayer 
 for enough subscribers to pay for printing it. I believe, with judicious 
 diplomacy and a little coin, you could get some person to purchase the 
 manuscript for your library. I think Mr. Knight would be the right 
 man. If I tliought I could gain a i)oint by going to San Francisco I would 
 cheerfully do so ; but I fear my mixing in the matter would cause a rise 
 in the price of the manuscript." 
 
 Being in San Jose one day in November, 1877, 1 called on 
 Juan Malarin in relation to the Osio history, which Vallejo,
 
 FURTHER INGATHERINGS. 361 
 
 Cerruti, Savage, and others had at various times during the 
 past three years endeavored to obtain. The original of this 
 important work belonged to J. R. Arques of Lawrence station, 
 into whose hands it fell as executor of the estate of Argiiello, 
 to whom the manuscript was presented by the author. Osio 
 was then living in Lower California. 
 
 Malarin was non-committal : said he had no ownership in 
 the manuscript, but did not think Arques would regard 
 favorably the proposition to lend it to me, though he did not 
 say why. Mr. John T. Doyle had taken a copy of it, and on 
 returning to San Francisco I immediately called on him. 
 As soon as I had stated my errand, he replied : " You shall 
 have the manuscript, and may copy it ; and anything else 
 that I have is at your disposal. You have fairly earned the 
 right to any historical material in California, and I for one 
 am only too glad to be able to acknowledge that right in 
 some beneficial way." Thus the matter was settled. 
 
 About this time I found myself greatly in need of a manu- 
 script history of the Bear Flag movement by Mr. Ford, a 
 prominent actor in the scene. It was the property of the 
 reverend doctor S. H. Willey, of Santa Cruz, to whom I ap- 
 plied for it. Dr. Willey responded cheerfully and promptly, 
 not only sending me the Ford manuscript, with permission 
 to copy it, but also other valuable material. " I take plea- 
 sure in lending it to you," he writes, " that it may contribute 
 possibly to accuracy and incident in your great work. The 
 manuscript needs considerable study before it can be read 
 inteUigently. Mr. Ford w as not much accustomed to writ- 
 ing. General Bidwell says he was a very honest man, but 
 a man liable to be swayed in opinion by the prejudices of 
 his time. His manuscript seems to modify the current opin- 
 ion touching Mr. Fremont's part in Bear Flag matters." The 
 doctor also gave me a very valuable manuscript narrative of 
 his owTi recollections. 
 
 Notwithstanding all that had been done up to this time 
 I felt that I should have more of the testimony of eye-
 
 362 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 witnesses. Particularly among the pioneers of and prior to 
 1849, and among the native Californians inhabiting the 
 southern part of the state, there was information, difficult 
 and costly to obtain, but which I felt could not be dispensed 
 with. 
 
 Mr. Oak suggested that we should make one more appeal, 
 one final effort, before finishing the note-taking for California 
 history; and to this end, the 25th of August, 1877, he ad- 
 dressed over his own signature a communication to the San 
 Francisco Bullet'm, reviewing what had been done and sketch- 
 ing what was still before us. 
 
 Extra copies of this article were printed and sent to school- 
 teachers and others throughout the coast, with the request 
 that they would call upon such early settlers as were within 
 their reach and obtain from them information respecting the 
 country at the time of their arrival and subsequently. For 
 writing out such information, for one class would be paid 
 twenty cents a folio, and for another less desirable class and 
 one more easily obtained, fifteen cents a folio. Not less than 
 five thousand direct applications were thus made, and with 
 the happiest results. Besides this Mr. Leighton, my steno- 
 grapher, took some sixty additional dictations in and around 
 San Francisco, and Mr. Savage made a journey south, an ac- 
 count of which has already been given. Thus I went over the 
 ground repeatedly, and after I had many times congratulated 
 myself that my work of collecting was done ; in truth I came 
 to the conclusion that such work was never done.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 PRELIMINARY AND SUPPLEMENTAL VOLUMES. 
 
 Periculosae plenum opus aleae, 
 Tractas; et incedis per ignes 
 Suppositos cineri doloso. — Horace. 
 
 AS I have elsewhere remarked, the soul and centre of this 
 literary undertaking v/as the History of the Pacific States; 
 the Native Races being preliminary, and the California Pas- 
 toral, Inter Pociila, Popular Tribunals, Essays and Miscellany, 
 and Literary Industries supplemental to this. To the history 
 belongs a biograpliical section entitled Chronicles of the 
 Builder's of the Commonwealth. 
 
 Of the inception and execution of the Native Paces I have 
 already given a full description. The California Pastoral was 
 also a necessary part of the series. In the history of the 
 Califomians under the dominion of Mexico, many of the most 
 charming features in home life, in the peculiarities of the 
 people, and their social and political behavior under the 
 influence of their isolation and strange environment, were 
 necessarily omitted. Of what remained from this superabun- 
 dance of material, I took the best, and weaving with it some 
 antique foreign facts and later fancies of my own, I embodied 
 the result in a separate volume, and in a more attractive form 
 than could be presented in condensed history. 
 
 In like manner into a volume entitled California Inter Po- 
 cula was thrown a multitude of episodes and incidents follow- 
 ing or growing out of the gold discovery, which could not be 
 vividly portrayed without a tolerably free use of words, and 
 could not be condensed into the more solid forms of history 
 
 363
 
 364 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 without, to some extent, stifling the life that is in them, and 
 marring their originahty and beauty. Indeed, of this class 
 of material, engendered during the flush times and after- 
 ward, I had enough left over of a good quaUty to fill a dozen 
 volumes. 
 
 It is difficult to imagine a more miraculous transformation 
 of human affairs, upon the same soil and under the same sky, 
 than that which occurred in California during the years 1848 
 and 1849. Prior to this time, the two stretches of seaboard 
 five hundred miles on either side of San Francisco bay and 
 running back to the summit of the Sierra were occupied by 
 races of two several shades of duskiness, and divers degrees 
 of intelligence, the one representative of the lowest depths 
 of savagism, and the other of the most quiescent state of 
 civilization. The former went naked, or nearly so, ate grass- 
 hoppers and reptiles, among other things, and burrowed in 
 caves or hid themselves away in brush huts or in thickets. 
 The latter dreamed life lazily away, lapped in every luxury 
 bounteous nature could offer, unburdened by care, delighting 
 in dress and display, but hating work and all that self-denying 
 effort on which the progress of communities and individuals 
 depends. 
 
 In the far north, along this same coast, at this very time 
 were two other phases of life, both of which were abnormal 
 and individual ; one being represented by the Muscovite, the 
 other by the Anglo-Saxon. While Earanof ruled in Sitka, 
 John McLoughlin ruled on the Columbia, to the full measure 
 of life and death, a hundred savage nations, occupying an 
 area five times as large as that of the British isles. Socrates 
 said that parents should not marry their children because of 
 tlic discrepancy in their ages. One would think so great a 
 philosopher as Socrates might have found a better reason for 
 forbidding so monstrous a crime against nature. The auto- 
 crat of Fort Vancouver advocated the marriage of chief 
 factors and traders with the daughters of Indian chiefs, set- 
 ting the example himself by mingling his blood with that of 
 the American aboriginal.
 
 PRELIMINARY AND SUPPLEMENTAL VOLUMES. 365 
 
 In regard to the volumes entitled Essays and Aliscdlaiiy 
 and Literary Industries they shall speak for themselves. But 
 as to my two volumes called Popular Tribunals I will here 
 make a few remarks. 
 
 During the two years and more that my assistants were en- 
 gaged in taking out notes on California history, I wrote the 
 work entitled Popular Tribunals, making of it at first three 
 volumes and then reducing it. I began this task in 1875; 
 finished the first writing in 1877; revising and publishing it 
 ten years later. I began it as an episode of Califomian his- 
 tory which would occupy three or four chapters, and which 
 I could easily write during the few months for which I sup- 
 posed the note-takers would be engaged. The note-taking 
 was six times the labor I had anticipated, and so was the 
 Popular Tribunals. 
 
 As I did not wish to interrupt the note-taking, which was 
 being done under the direction of Mr. Oak, I derived little 
 help on this work from my assistants. When at Oakville, 
 White Sulphur springs, Santa Cruz, or elscAvhere, such material 
 as I lacked I wrote for and it was sent to me. 
 
 The method I adopted was as follows : The subject seemed 
 to divide itself about equally between the outside or pubhc 
 workings of the vigilance committee, and the inner or secret 
 doings. For the former, there were only the journals of the 
 day, and a few disordered and partial statements printed in 
 books. There was no history of the vigilance committee 
 movement in existence. 
 
 As a rule newspaper reports are not the most reliable tes- 
 timony upon which to base history. But in this instance they 
 were the very best that could exist. Spreading before me 
 six or eight of the chief journals of the day, I had in them so 
 many eye-witnesses of the facts, Avritten by keen fact-hunters 
 while the incidents were yet warm, and thrown out among a 
 people who knew as much of what was transpiring as the 
 newspaper reporters themselves, so that every misstatement 
 was quickly branded as such by jealous, competing journals 
 and by a jealous pubHc. Here was every advantage. For
 
 366 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 the transactions of each day and hour, I could marshal my 
 witnesses, taking the testimony of each as it was given accord- 
 ing to actual occurrence, taking it with a full knowledge of 
 the prejudices and proclivities of each witness. Thus for a 
 review of the day's doings, as a newspaper radically on the 
 side of vigilance, I took the Bulletin. For description of the 
 same events from the extreme law and order stand-point, I 
 examined the Herald. For more moderate expressions of 
 facts and opinions, though still leaning to the side of vigil- 
 ance, I looked through the Alta California, the Sacrametito 
 Uiiion^ the Courier, Chronicle, and Town Talk. 
 
 Thus at my command were a dozen or twenty reporters to 
 search the city for items and give them to me ; and thus I 
 went over the several years of this episode, point by point, 
 bringing in, connecting, condensing, until I had a complete 
 narrative, from the beginning to the end, of all these strange 
 events. 
 
 This for the outside of the subject. But there yet remained 
 an inner, hidden, and hitherto veiled portion, which was now 
 for the first time to be revealed. There had been at various 
 times, both before and after the disbandment of the commit- 
 tee, proposals for publishing a history of the movement, but 
 none of them had been seriously entertained. Indeed it 
 was not regarded as safe to reveal their secrets. These men 
 had broken the law, and while in truth they were law-abiding 
 citizens, they were none the less subject to punishment by 
 the law. Secrecy had been from the beginning a cardinal 
 virtue of the association. Absolute good faith, one toward 
 another ; it was herein their great strength and efficiency lay. 
 
 There might be some members more fearless, and with 
 broader and more intelligent views than the others, who 
 could see no objection to placing on record for the benefit 
 of mankind, in subsequent ages, the whole truth and details 
 of the tragical affairs of tlic association, but who yet did not 
 feel at liberty to do so as long as others interposed objec- 
 tions. Such objections were interposed, and such denials 
 given, many times, until at last the question arose : Should
 
 PRELIMINARY AND SUPPLEMENTAL VOLUMES. 367 
 
 these things ever be revealed, or should the secrets of the 
 executive committee die with the death of the members ? I 
 sent Cerruti after these men, but Italian blandishments 
 seemed to have greater eftect upon his more volatile brothers 
 of the Latin race, than upon these hard-headed and com- 
 paratively cold-blooded Yankees. One of them when spoken 
 to by Cerruti drew his finger across his throat significantly 
 saying, " That would be to pay if I told all." Then I waited 
 upon them myself. 
 
 " You have no right," I said, " to withhold these facts for- 
 ever from the world. History belongs to society. To our 
 children belong our experiences ; and if we hide the knowl- 
 edge we have gained we rob them of a rightful inheritance. 
 Nearly a quarter of a century has now passed. You cannot 
 always live. Are you willing to bear the responsibility of so 
 gross a barbarism as the extinguishment of this knowledge ?" 
 
 Some were convinced, others obstinate. In vain Mr. 
 Dempster, now wholly with me, called upon these latter, one 
 after another, assured them that this history would be writ- 
 ten, and asked if it were not better it should be done fully, 
 truthfully, than with only half the evidence before the writer. 
 No. They did not wish to talk about it, to think about it. 
 It was a horrid nightmare in their memory, and they would 
 rather their children should never know anything about it. 
 
 For a time the matter thus stood, so far as the men of 1856 
 were concerned. Meanwhile the grim inquisitors who had so 
 closely sealed their own lips could not wholly prevent their 
 former associates from talking upon the subject. Little by 
 little I gathered from one and another information which it- 
 had not been hitherto deemed proper to reveal. By report- 
 ing to one what another had said, I managed to gain from 
 each more and more. 
 
 Thus, gradually but very slowly, I wedged my way into 
 their mysteries, and for over a year I made no further prog- 
 ress than this. Then I began operations with a stenographer, 
 making appointments with those who had taken an active 
 part in one committee or the other, for the purpose of taking
 
 368 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 down a narrative of their early experiences. Many of these, 
 once started on the line of their lives, seemed unable to stop 
 until they had told all they knew, as well about vigilance 
 committees as other matters. 
 
 This so broke the crust that I at length succeeded in per- 
 suading Mr. Bluxome, the "67 secretary" of the first commit- 
 tee, and the yet more famous " 33 secretary " of the second, to 
 let me have the books and papers of the committee of 185 1. 
 All these years they had been locked in an old iron safe to 
 which he had carried the key. The executive committee of 
 this tribunal had never been so strict as that of the second; 
 there had been less opposition, less law, less risk in the first 
 movement than in the second; and such of the first committee 
 as were not dead or absent manifested more indifference as 
 to the secrets of their association. 
 
 Bluxome tells a story how orders of court were wont to be 
 eluded when vigilance papers were ordered to be produced. 
 
 In one of the many cases for damages which followed the 
 period of arbitrary strangulations and expatriations, the judge 
 ordered the records of the vigilants brought into court. 
 Bluxome obeyed the summons in person, but nothing was 
 seen of books or papers in his possession. 
 
 ''Where are the documents you were ordered to bring?" 
 demanded the judge. 
 
 " I do not know," replied Bluxome. 
 
 " Are they not in your possession ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 "You had them?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " What did you do with them ? " 
 
 " I delivered them to Schenck." 
 
 " Where are they now ? " 
 
 " I do not know." 
 
 Dismissed, Bluxome lost no time in hurrying to Schenck, 
 and informing him of what had happened. Scarcely had 
 Schenck passed the documents to a third person, before he 
 was summoned to appear in court, and bring with him the
 
 PRELIMINARY AND SUPPLEMENTAL VOLUMES. 369 
 
 required papers. After testifying as Bluxome had done, the 
 person to whom he had dehvered them was summoned with 
 hke result ; and so on until all concerned were heartily tired 
 of it and let the matter drop. 
 
 It was a great triumph when all the archives of the first 
 committee were safely lodged in the library, and it proved a 
 great advantage to me in opening the way to the books and 
 papers of the second committee. These were in the keeping 
 of Mr. Dempster, to be held in trust by him ; and while he 
 would gladly have placed them all in my hands at the first, 
 he felt that he could not do so without the permission of his 
 associates. 
 
 I found it less difficult after this to obtain dictations. Mem- 
 bers of the committee of 1856 were not particularly pleased 
 that I should have so much better facilities placed before me for 
 writing the history of the first committee than for the second. 
 
 Many of them now came forward of their own accord 
 and told me all they knew. The 15th of February, 1876, 
 Mr. Coleman, president of the committee of 1856, wrote me, 
 at Oakville, that he was ready to give me data. A long and 
 exceedingly valuable narrative of all the events from the be- 
 ginning to the end was the result. It was, in fact, a history 
 of the movement, and from the one most able to furnish it. 
 This was supplemented by a no less valuable and even more 
 thoughtful and philosophical document by Mr. Dempster. 
 Likewise from Truett, Smiley, Bluxome, and twenty others, 
 I obtained interesting narratives. 
 
 When I had written the narrative of the first committee and 
 had fairly begun that of the movement of 1856, the absurd- 
 ity of the position assumed by certain members struck me 
 with more force than ever, and I was determined, if pos- 
 sible, to have the records and papers of the second committee. 
 I went first to Coleman. 
 
 " I want all the archives of your committee," I said. 
 " It is the irony of folly to compel a man, at this day, to 
 make brick without straw when you have abundance of 
 material in your possession." 
 24
 
 370 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 " Had it rested with me you should have had everything 
 long ago," said Mr. Coleman. 
 
 Then I went to Dempster, 
 
 " Did I stand where you do," I ventured to affirm, " I 
 would not permit the history of the vigilance committee to 
 be written until those books and papers were consulted." 
 
 " What would you do ? " he asked. 
 
 " I would pay no attention," I replied, " to the wishes of 
 those few wise men of Gotham who would arbitrate this mat- 
 ter between eight thousand vigilants and their posterity. 
 They are not the vigilance committee ; they are not even a 
 majority of the executive committee." 
 
 " I cannot give them up until I am authorized to do so," 
 said Dempster, " but I'll tell you what I will do. Come to 
 my house where the papers are kept ; take your time about 
 it, and select and lay aside such as you would like. I will 
 then take such documents and show them first to one and 
 then to another of these men, and they shall designate such 
 as they object to your having." 
 
 And this he did; with the result that no one threw out 
 anything. • But even that did not satisfy me. I wanted the 
 records and all material extant on the subject. I wanted these 
 spread out before me while I was writing; and I finally ob- 
 tained all that I asked. 
 
 Thus I found at my command three distinct sources of in- 
 formation, namely, printed books and newspapers, the archives 
 of the committees, and the personal narratives of the more 
 conspicuous of those who participated in the events. 
 
 The time of my writing this episode was most opportune. 
 Had I undertaken it sooner, — had I undertaken it without 
 the reputation which the Native Races gave me, — I am sure 
 I could have obtained neither the vigilance archives, nor the 
 dictations. At all events, no one had been able to secure 
 these advantages, and many had so endeavored. On the 
 other hand, had the matter been delayed much longer, those 
 who gave in their testimony would have passed beyond the 
 reach of earthly historians. And the same might be said re-
 
 PRELIMINARY AND SUPPLEMENTAL VOLUMES. 37 1 
 
 garding all my work. Probably never did opportunity present 
 so many attractions for writing the history of a country. Time 
 enough had elapsed for history to have a beginning, and yet 
 many were alive who had taken part in prominent events. 
 
 In studying the vigilance question, I began with unbiased 
 views. I had never given the subject serious thought, nor 
 had I heard the arguments on either side. I had not pro- 
 ceeded far in my investigations before I became convinced 
 that the people were not only right, but that their action v/as 
 the only thing they could have done under the circumstances. 
 I arrived at this conclusion in summing up the arguments of 
 the opposite side. The more I examined the grounds taken 
 by the law and order party, the more I became convinced 
 that they were untenable, and so I became a convert to the 
 principles of vigilance through the medium of its enemies, and 
 before I had heard a word in their own vindication. Further 
 than this, my veneration for law, legal forms, and constitutions 
 gradually diminished as the sophisms of their worshippers 
 became more palpable. As I proceeded in my investigations, 
 I saw on the one side crime rampant, the law prostituted, the 
 ballot-box under the control of villains of various dye, the 
 tools of men high in office. I saw between the two extremes, 
 between the lower and upper strata of this fraternity of crime, 
 between the whilom convict, now election inspector, poll- 
 fighter, supervisor, and petty political thief, between these and 
 the governor and supreme judges, a multitude anxious to 
 maintain the existing state of things. These were lawyers, 
 whose living was affected by such disturbance; judges, whose 
 dignity was outraged ; sherifis, whose ability was called in 
 question, and with them all the scum of society, hangers on 
 about courts, policemen, pettifoggers, and thieves — all who 
 played in the filthy puddle of politics. 
 
 \yhen I saw this element banded in support of law, or 
 rather to smother law, and opposed to them the great mass 
 of a free and intelligent people, representing the wealth and 
 industry of the state, merchants, mechanics, laboring men, 
 bankers, miners, and farmers, men who troubled themselves
 
 372 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 little about political technicalities and forms of law, — when I 
 saw these men drop their farms and merchandise and rise as 
 one man to vindicate their dearest rights, the purity of the 
 polls, safety to life and property, — when I saw them rise in 
 their single-heartedness and integrity of purpose, carefully 
 counting the cost before taking their stand, but, once taken, 
 ready to lay down their lives in support of it, and then with 
 consummate wisdom and calm moderation, tempering justice 
 with mercy, pursue their high purpose to the end, — when I 
 saw them vilified, snarled at, and threatened with extermina- 
 tion by pompous demagogues who had placed themselves in 
 power, — I was moved to strong expression, and found myself 
 obliged repeatedly to revise my writing and weed out phrases 
 of feeling which might otherwise mar the record of that sin- 
 gular social outburst which I aimed to give in all honesty and 
 evenly balanced truthfulness. 
 
 As to the separate section of the history, the Chronicles of 
 the Builders of the Commomvealth, I may truthfully say that 
 it was evolved from the necessities of the case. The narra- 
 tive of events could not be properly written side by side with 
 full biographies of those who had made the country what it 
 is, and it was not complete without them; hence the separate 
 work. 

 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 BODY AND MIND. 
 
 Hard students are commonly troubled with gowts, catarrhs, rheums, 
 cachexia, bradypepsia, bad eyes, stone, and coUick, crudities, oppilations, 
 vertigo, winds, consumptions, and all such diseases as come by overmuch 
 sitting; they are most part lean, dry, ill-colored. . . . and all through im- 
 moderate pains and extraordinary studies. If you will not believe the 
 truth of this, look upon the great Tostatus and Thomas Aquinas' works ; 
 and tell me whether those men took pains. 
 
 — Burton'' s Anatojiiy of MclancJwly. 
 
 WERE it not that men conduct themselves as if they knew 
 it not it would seem superfluous at this late day to talk 
 about exercise as a requisite to health. We all know that 
 brain-work dissipates the nervous forces with greater rapidity 
 than the most arduous physical labor* that the nervous sub- 
 stance of the body is exhausted by thought just as physical 
 exertion exhausts the muscles. And yet how few regard the 
 fact. How few enthusiastic workers succeed in schooling 
 their habits into that happy equilibrium which secures health, 
 and enables them to make the most of both mind and body. 
 Often it is the most difficult part of the daily task, at the 
 appointed hour to drop the work in which the mind is so 
 deeply engrossed, and to drive one's self forth to those 
 mechanical movements of the body which are to secure 
 strength for another day. 
 
 Some strength and stores of health had been laid in for 
 me, thanks to my father who gave me first an iron constitu- 
 tion, and supplemented it with that greatest of earthly bless- 
 ings, work, in the form of plowing, planting, harvesting, and 
 like farm occupation. And I doubt if in all the range of 
 educational processes, mental and physical, there is any
 
 374 LITERARY INDUSTRIES, 
 
 which equals the farm. In farm labor and management 
 there are constantly at hand nev/ emergencies to cultivate 
 readiness of resource, and the adaptation of means to ends. 
 Five years of steady work on a farm is worth more to most 
 boys than a college education. Later in life it was only by 
 excessive physical exercise that I could bear the excessive 
 strain on my nervous system. By hard riding, v/ood-sawing, 
 long walks and running, I sought to draw fatigue from the over- 
 taxed brain, and fix it upon the muscles. Often the remedy 
 was worse than the disease ; as, for example, when recreating, 
 after long and intense application, I invariably felt worse 
 than while steadily writing. Rest and recreation are pleas- 
 urable no less ideally than by contrast ; no work is so tedious 
 as play when we are driven to it by necessity. 
 
 Although culture is so much less necessary to happiness 
 than health, yet so fascinating is the acquisition of knov/ledge 
 that we are ready to sacrifice all for it. But never is one so 
 beguiled as when one attempts to beguile health. For a 
 day, or a year, or five years, one may go on without respite, 
 but always having to pay the penalty with interest in the end. 
 
 In all aids to physical well-being, the trouble is to become 
 sufficiently interested in any of them to escape weariness. 
 Irksome exercise produces little benefit. The instincts of 
 activity must not be opposed by mental aversion. Weari- 
 some amusements are but an apology for pastimes. 
 
 On seating myself to years of literary labor, I sought in 
 vain some intellectual charm in muscle-making. Though I 
 loved nature, delighting in the exhilaration of oxygen and 
 sunlight, and although I well knew that liberal indulgence was 
 the wisest economy, yet so eager was I to see progress in the 
 long line of work I had marked out, that only the most rigid 
 resolution enabled me to do my duty in this regard. I felt 
 that I had begun my historical efforts late in life, and there 
 was much that I was anxious to do before I should return to 
 dust. In my hours of recreation I worked as diligently as 
 ever. I sought such exercise as hardened my flesh in the 
 .shortest time. If I could have hired some person to take
 
 BODY AND MIND, 375 
 
 exercise and indulge in recreation for me, every day and 
 all day, I would have been the healthiest man in California. 
 Yet, though I sought thus to intensify my exercise so as to 
 equal my desires, I could not concentrate the benefits of sun- 
 shine, nor condense the air I breathed. 
 
 Nor is the benefit to the mind of bodily exercise any 
 greater than the benefit to the body of mental exercise. Bod- 
 ily disease is no less certainly engendered when the mind is 
 left unengaged and the body placed at hard labor, than 
 when the mind is put to excessive labor and the body left in 
 a state of inactivity. A sound mind in a sound body is only 
 secured by giving both body and mind their due share of 
 labor and of rest. We are told that we cannot serve two 
 masters ; yet the intellectual worker while in the flesh seems 
 to be under such obligation. If man were all animal or all 
 intellect, he could live completely the animal or the intel- 
 lectual life, living one and ignoring the other; but being man 
 and under the dominion both of the animal and of the men- 
 tal, there is no other way than to divide his allegiance in such 
 a way as to satisfy both, so far as possible. Further than 
 this, between the different mental faculties and between the 
 different physical faculties, in like manner as between men- 
 tal and physical faculties, there are antagonisms. One organ 
 or faculty is cultivated, in some measure, at the expense of 
 some other organ or faculty. The human machine is capable 
 of manufacturing a given quantity only of nervous force, or 
 brain power, and in v.-hatsoever direction this is applied, there 
 will be the growth. Exact equality in the distribution of 
 this force would be to the advantage of the man as a whole, 
 but not to society, which is progressional, as leading members 
 crowd certain faculties at the expense of the others. " Extreme 
 activity of the reflective powers," says Herbert Spencer, 
 " tends to deaden the feelings, while an extreme activity of 
 the feelings tends to deaden the reflective powers." 
 
 Excessive brain- work is undoubtedly injurious to bodily 
 health ; but all the evil effects so charged are not due to this 
 cause. Previous disease, confinement, or other indirect
 
 376 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 agency often lies back of the evils laid at the door of men- 
 tal labor. Indeed, it has been questioned by physiologists, 
 whether a perfectly healthy organization could be broken 
 down by brain- work; but as there is no such thing in nature 
 as a perfectly healthy organism, the matter can never be 
 tested. As brain-work rests on a physical base, and as there 
 is constant breaking down in intellectual labor, just how 
 much should be attributed to the direct influence of mind, 
 and how much to extrinsic influences, one cannot say. The 
 body may be already in a shattered state; mind may direct 
 the body into bad ways, and so bring it to harm ; but that 
 the mind, by fair and honest pressure on a perfect organism, 
 can crush it, is denied. I am satisfied that it is the confine- 
 ment attending brain-work, rather than brain- work itself, that 
 does the damage. 
 
 The tension such as attends wild speculation is much more 
 wearing than the severest study. " It is not pure brain- 
 work, but brain excitement, or brain distress, that eventuates 
 in brain degeneration and disease," says Dr. Crichton Brovv^ne. 
 " Calm, vigorous, severe mental labor may be far pursued 
 without risk or detriment; but whenever an element of 
 feverish anxiety, wearing responsibility, or vexing chagrin is 
 introduced then come danger and damage." 
 
 Obviously the powerful physique needs more exercise to 
 keep it in health than the puny one. The weak, delicate 
 woman is satisfied with little moving about, while the strong 
 man's muscles ache if they are long kept idle. Often we see 
 a powerful brain in a weak body; but that is usually when 
 the mind has been cultivated at the expense of the body. A 
 strong muscular physique absorbs the nervous force which 
 might otherwise be employed for brain-work. It draws in 
 several ways : first, in bodily exertion ; then if the exercise 
 has been vigorous the mind is correspondingly fatigued, or at 
 least unfit to resume its labors until the forces of the body 
 resume, to some extent, their equilibrium. Again, the intel- 
 lectual energies, a portion of the time, arc drowned in sleep, 
 the system being meanwhile occupied in the great work of 
 digestion, which obviously draws upon the nervous forces.
 
 BODY AND MIND. 377 
 
 As thought is influenced by the material changes of the 
 brain, so the brain is influenced by the material changes of 
 the body. Food and the cooking of it claim no unimportant 
 part in the chemistry of mind. The psychological effect of 
 diet is not less marked than the physiological effect. Cookery 
 colors our grandest efforts. The trite saying of the French, 
 " C'est la soupe qui fait le soldat," applies as well to litera- 
 ture as to war. It is a significant fact that with the revival 
 of learning in Italy came the revival of cookery. 
 
 For the influence of externals, of extrinsic agencies, of 
 bodily conditions and changes on states of mind, we have 
 only to notice how our moods are affected by hunger, cold, 
 heat, fatigue, by disease, stimulants, and lack of sleep. Very 
 sensibly Dr. Fothergill remarks: "When the brain is well 
 supplied by a powerful circulation, and a rich blood supply 
 from a good digestion furnishes it with an abundance of pab- 
 ulum, the cares of life are borne with cheerfulness and sustained 
 with equanimity. But when the physical condition becomes 
 affected, a total and complete change may be and commonly 
 is induced." And again, " A disturbance of the balance be- 
 twixt the wastes of the tissues and the power to eliminate 
 such waste products is followed by distinct mental attitudes, 
 in which things appear widely remote from their ordinary as- 
 pect. This condition is much more common than is ordinarily 
 credited by the general public, or even by the bulk of the 
 profession. The physical disturbances so produced are dis- 
 tinct irritability and unreasonableness, which is aggravated by 
 a consciousness that there is an element of unreason present, — 
 a tendency to be perturbed by sHght exciting causes, the men- 
 tal disturbance being out of all proportion to the excitant." 
 
 Yet we must not forget that between the body and mind 
 there are essential dift'erences, so far as the acquisition of 
 strength from exercise is concerned. Undoubtedly the mind, 
 like the body, enlarges and strengthens with exercise, but not 
 in the same proportion. Every arm may, like the black- 
 smith's, by power and persistent effort be made to swell and 
 harden, though not all in the same degree ; and to a greater 
 or less extent, beginning with childhood, and avoiding over-
 
 378 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Strains, any mind may be trained into something approaching 
 that of an intellectual athlete. Toward the accomplishment 
 of such a purpose, necessity and ambition, in that happy mix- 
 ture found usually in the intermediate state between riches 
 and poverty, are most conducive to intellectual gymnastics. 
 The very rich and the very poor are alike removed — the one 
 by lack of opportunity and the other by lack of inclination — 
 from long and severe mental effort. 
 
 It should not be forgotten that while engaged in a difficult 
 and confining work, a writer is scarcely himself. Body and 
 mind are both in an abnormal state. Thus it is that we find 
 the lives of authors in direct contrast to their teachings. Yet 
 this inspiration, this abnormity, or what you will, must be his 
 who would aspire to an intellectual seat above his fellows. 
 Few are educated into greatness ; and though genius of any 
 quality short of inspiration must have cultivation before it 
 has completeness, acquisition alone never yet made a man 
 famous. Nor do great men make primary use of education 
 in building their ladder to fame. 
 
 Glance over the names of those most eminent in England 
 during the last three centuries, and we find remarkably few 
 who went through a regular course of instruction at a public 
 school. The Edinburgh Review gives the names of twenty 
 poets, a dozen philosophers, and a score or so of the first 
 writers in morals and metaphysics who were not educated 
 at Eton, Rugby, or others which in England are termed pub- 
 lic schools. 
 
 Now mental cultivation is a good thing, a grand thing, but 
 it is not everything. It is what our mother nature does for 
 us, as well as what we do for ourselves, that makes us what 
 we are. All great men are men of natural abilities. If they 
 are cultivated so much the better. It is only cultivated 
 genius that reaches the highest realms of art; but if the 
 genius be not there, no amount of cultivation will produce it. 
 You may dig and dung your garden through twelve succes- 
 sive springs, if there are no seeds in the ground there will be
 
 BODY AND MIND. 379 
 
 no flowers. You may rub, and blanket, and train your horse 
 until doomsday, if there be no speed in him he wins no race. 
 Cultivation, in the absence of natural abilities, is like under- 
 taking to kindle the edge of ocean into a flame. 
 
 As to the personal habits of authors, they differ as widely as 
 their writings; for my own part it was for years my custom to 
 rise at seven, breakfast at half-past seven, and write from eight 
 until one, when I lunched or dined. The afternoon was de- 
 voted to recreation and exercise. Usually I would write for 
 an hour or two before a six o'clock tea or dinner, as the case 
 might be, and then would work for four hours afterward, 
 making about ten hours in all for the day ; but interruptions 
 were so constant and frequent, that including the many long 
 seasons during which I hermited myself in the country, where 
 I often devoted twelve and fourteen hours a day to writing, 
 I do not think I averaged more than eight hours a day, tak- 
 ing twenty years together. 
 
 When I first began to write, composing was a very labored 
 operation. My whole mind was absorbed in how, rather 
 than what, to write. But gradually I came to think less of 
 myself and the manner of expression, and more of what I 
 Avas saying. Comparatively little of my work was of a char- 
 acter which admitted of fast writing. When full of my sub- 
 ject I could write rapidly, that is to say from twenty to thirty 
 short manuscript pages in a day ; or counting by hours and 
 measuring by another's capabilities, about one quarter as 
 much as Hazlitt, though three times above the average. But 
 including getting out and arranging of my material, and 
 studying my subject, I could not average during the year 
 more than eight badly scratched manuscript pages a day, or 
 at the rate of one an hour. In preparing for me the rough 
 material from the notes, my assistants would not average 
 over four manuscript pages a day. 
 
 " En ecrivant ma pensees, elles m'echappe quelquefois," 
 says Pascal. Sometimes a flood of thought would come 
 rushing in upon me, like a torrent overwhelming its banks,
 
 380 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 and I would lose the greater part of it ; at others so confused 
 and slothful would be my brain, that in turning over the 
 leaves of my dictionary I would forget the word I was look- 
 ing for. This was more particularly the case during the 
 earlier part of my literary career; later my mind became 
 more tractable, and I never waited for either ideas or 
 words. 
 
 There are many methods of gathering and aiTanging infor- 
 mation and putting it into readable shape. The novelist has 
 one way, the specialist another, the historian a third, neces- 
 sarily different, and each varying individually according to 
 cast of mind and habit. As a rule the best plan is to imbue 
 the mind so thoroughly with the subject to be treated as to 
 be able first to arrange the matter properly, and then commit 
 it to paper. 
 
 Another method, though not perhaps to be commended, is 
 to write reading, and to read while writing ; that is, it is not 
 to be commended, provided one has the memory and mental 
 discipline to gather, arrange, and retain the necessary facts 
 and produce them as required. In certain kinds of writing, 
 I first draw from my own brain until its resources are ex- 
 hausted ; then taking up one author after another, I learn 
 what others have thought and said upon the subject. In the 
 intercourse of my mind with other minds, new thoughts are 
 engendered, which are likewise committed to paper, after 
 which all is, or should be, re- arranged and re-written. Pliny 
 and others have said that one should read much but not 
 many books. This was well enough as a doctrine before his- 
 tory and science had extended the range of knowledge be- 
 yond the limits of a few books. Now, to be well read, one 
 must read many books ; buying a cyclopedia will not answer 
 the purpose. 
 
 The first presentiment of a subject, the first flush of an 
 idea, is the one a writer should never fail to seize. Like the 
 flash and report of the signal gun to the belated hunter, lost 
 after night-fall in the dark forest, the way for the moment 
 seems clear, but if not instantly and earnestly followed it is
 
 BODY AND MIND. 38 1 
 
 soon lost. Says Goethe in Faust : " Wenn ihr'o nicht fiihlt, 
 ihr werdet's nicht erjagen." 
 
 Interruptions are fatal to good work. Even though one 
 has the faculty of taking up the thread of thought where it 
 was laid down, there is still a great difference in the results 
 of a whole day and of a broken day's work. 
 
 While at the library my time was greatly broken by callers. 
 Frequently I have begun on Monday morning to write, and 
 by the time I was fairly seated and my thoughts arranged, 
 I would be compelled to break off After an interval of a 
 half hour, perhaps, I might be permitted to try it again, and 
 with the same results. So passed Monday, Tuesday, half the 
 week, or the whole of it, and not five pages written. Often 
 in a fit of desperation I have seized a handful of work and 
 rushed into the country, where I could count with some de- 
 gree of certainty upon my time. Truly says Florence Night- 
 ingale, " I have never known persons who exposed themselves 
 for years to constant interruptions who did not muddle away 
 their intellects by it at last." 
 
 On a certain day in January, 1876, 1 left San Francisco in 
 one of these moods suddenly, and while under a sense of 
 something akin to despair. It seemed as though my work 
 would stretch out to all eternity. While in the city, week 
 after week passed by with nothing accomplished, and I de- 
 termined to cut loose from these interruptions at whatever 
 cost. So, sending the papers before me, chiefly memoranda 
 for general chapters, I stepped aboard the boat and that 
 night slept at my father's. The next day I sent for a box of 
 Popular Tribunals and other material, and during the next 
 six weeks of a simple life, without interruptions, accomplished 
 more in a literary way than during any other six weeks of 
 my life. I worked from ten to twelve hours, and averaged 
 twenty pages of manuscript a day; rode two hours, except 
 rainy days and Sundays ; ate heartily, drank from half a 
 bottle to a bottle of claret before retiring, and smoked four 
 or five cigars daily. This, however, was more of a strain 
 than my system could bear for any length of time. I did
 
 382 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 not break down under it ; I only shifted my position. The 
 mind fatigued with one class of work often finds almost as 
 much rest in change as in repose j just as the laborer by 
 change of occupation brings into play a new set of muscles, 
 giving rest to the others. 
 
 The glare from white paper seemed at times more trying 
 to my eyes than even constant daily and nightly use of them 
 when writing on a dark surface. It was not until after several 
 years of suffering that a simple remedy occurred to me. My 
 eyes had always been good. I believed them capable of 
 any endurance, and consequently paid little attention to them 
 until they began to fail me. In smoked glass I found some 
 relief. But the best thing by far was the use of dark paper. 
 
 There were two possibilities which would force themselves 
 upon my mind at intervals : One was fire and the other death 
 before the completion of my work. So unmannerly are these 
 ruthless destroyers that I could hope for no consideration from 
 either of them on the ground of necessity. Imperious death 
 seemed indeed to regard my labors grudgingly : not less than 
 eleven of my library men died during the progress of my 
 work; I could only solace myself by working the harder. 
 I often thought of Cuvier, whose paralysis struck him while 
 actively engaged in the arranging of a large accumulation of 
 scientific material. Said he to M. Pasquier, " I had great 
 things still to do ; all was ready in my head. After thirty years 
 of labor and research, there remained but to write, and now 
 the hands fail, and carry with them the head." Oh ! thou 
 great shame of nature; will no Hercules ever rise and strangle 
 thee? 
 
 I do not pretend to be a man of sorrows, nor am I given to 
 sourness and morosencss. I have often through weariness fallen 
 into discouragement ; but this was only momentary. When- 
 ever I returned to my work after necessary rest it was always 
 with cheerful hope. I would not have about me in my family, 
 my library, or my business a sighing, despondent, croaking 
 individual. Until I began literary life, I never thought of 
 such things as nervousness, mental strain, and rarely of my
 
 BODY AND MIND. 383 
 
 general health. Most of all I despised the thought of laying 
 infelicities of temper at the door of mental labor. I regarded 
 it as cowardly and untrue. But after a time I was forced to 
 change these opinions. 
 
 Sometimes the fire of disease so kindles the brain as to 
 cause it to throw off sparkling thoughts, just as I have heard 
 vocalists say that they could sing best with a cold or a sore 
 throat, and speakers that they were never so fluent as v/hen 
 under the influence of fever. Instance Douglas Jerrold, 
 whose wit was never keener, or his thoughts more poetical, 
 than when his body lay stretched in suffering. For fifteen 
 years Edward Mayhew was unable to use his limbs, and yet 
 with brains alone did he so successfully fight life's battle as 
 to leave an undying name. 
 
 Often one is heard to say that inspiration comes not at the 
 bidding, that Pegasus will not always respond to the whip; 
 that one's best is bad enough, and that the tired worker should 
 stop; that literary labor is different from mechanical labor, 
 and that the head should be made to work only when it feels 
 inclined. There is truth in this doctrine, but there is likewise 
 error. At every turn in my literary labors I found method 
 essential ; not alone to utilize the labor of others, but to ac- 
 comphsh satisfactory results of my own. Though unable to 
 work entirely by the clock like Southey, who had not only 
 his hours for writing but his hour in each day for the several 
 kinds of literary occupation resulting in his hundred and more 
 volumes, it would not answer for me to trust, like Coleridge, 
 to inspiration, lest it should not come when needed, nor to fly 
 from one piece of work to another, like Agassiz, as fancy 
 dictated. 
 
 Yet while method is above all things necessary in any great 
 undertaking, there is such a thing in literary effort as excess 
 of system, which tends to painful monotony, particularly in 
 the execution of a plan which is to absorb the best years of 
 a lifetime.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 
 
 By the mess, ere these eyes of mine take themselves to slomber, ay'U 
 do gud service, or ay'll lig i' the grund for it ; ay, or go to death. 
 
 — King Henry the Fifth. 
 
 SINCE I had read and written so much about Mexico, it was 
 but natural that I should wish to go there. I had com- 
 pleted the history of all that region, down to the year 1800, 
 having at my disposal an abundance of material, but for the 
 present century I knew that there existed a mass of informa- 
 tion which I did not possess. 
 
 Accordingly on the ist day of September, 1883, 1 set forth, 
 accompanied by my daughter and a Mexican servant, for the 
 great city of the table-land, proceeding via San Antonio and 
 Laredo, Texas. I took copious notes of everything I en- 
 countered, the table spread with frijoles, tortillas, oUa po- 
 drida, and the rest, cooked with garlic and onions in rancid 
 oil, sending forth an odor the reverse of appetizing; the 
 muddy Rio Bravo, now angry and swollen \\\\\\ late rains, 
 which we had to cross in a scow at the peril of our lives ; the 
 general and universal dirtiness pervading people, houses, and 
 streets ; the currency, mostly silver, and at a discount of about 
 twenty-five per cent, below United States money ; the mixed 
 Spanish and Indian population and architecture, the former 
 of all shades of color, most of the people ugly, and many of 
 them deformed and absolutely hideous, the latter of every 
 grade, from the Andalusian dwelling of stone or adobe, sur- 
 rounding a court, to the suburban hut of sticks and straw; 
 the soil, climate, and resources of the country ; commerce, 
 agriculture, and manufactures; society, politics, etc., all of 
 
 384
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 385 
 
 which I utiHzed in volume vi. of my History of Mexico^ and 
 Avhich I have not space to touch upon here. One thing, how- 
 ever, I did not mention, though it formed the chief object of 
 my visit, and that was hbraries and hterature, and the amount 
 and quahty of material for history existing in the republic. 
 
 I did not find at Monterey such archives as one would 
 expect to find in that historic city. There were the usual 
 state and municipal documents, of little value and limited 
 extent, and, in answer to the call of the governor, the nucleus 
 of a state library had been formed by donations. The best 
 library in this region was that of the bishop of Linares, I. 
 Monies de Oca, renowned throughout the republic for his 
 ability and learning. 
 
 Zacatecas has one of the finest private libraries in the 
 country, in the possession of Senor Ortega. 
 
 Saltillo has even less to boast of than Monterey in archives 
 and libraries. With unsurpassed facilities for saving great 
 masses of valuable historic and statistical information, almost 
 all has been allowed to be carried away or destroyed through 
 sheer ignorance and stupidity. 
 
 As we penetrate the country we are more and more struck 
 with the phenomenon of a republic without a people. There 
 is here no middle class. The aristocracy are the nation. The 
 low are very low; they are poor, ignorant, servile, and de- 
 based, with neither the heart nor the hope ever to attempt 
 to better their condition. I have never before witnessed 
 such squalid misery, and so much of it. It surpasses Europe, 
 and with this difference : in Europe the miserable know they 
 are miserable, here they do not. Sit at the door of your 
 hotel, and you will see pass by, as in a procession of the 
 accursed, the withered, the deformed, the lame, and the blind, 
 deep in debasement, their humanity well-nigh hidden in their 
 dingy, dirty raiment, form bent and eyes cast down, as if the 
 light of heaven and the eyes of man were equally painful — 
 hunchbacks and dwarfs ; little filthy mothers with little filthy 
 babes, the former but fourteen years old ; and grizzly men 
 and women with tanned and wrinkled skins, bent double, 
 25
 
 386 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 and hobbling on canes and crutches. Into such pits of deep 
 abasement does man thrust his fellow man in the name of 
 civilization. Infinitely happier and better off were the people 
 of this plateau before ever a European saw it. 
 
 Saltillo being at this time the terminus of the railway, we 
 took private conveyance to San Luis Potosi, and thence pro- 
 ceeded to Lagos by stage. For a beautiful and prosperous 
 city, though somewhat primitive, being as yet without rail- 
 road communication, San Luis Potosi has few equals in Mex- 
 ico. Art and education are likewise well advanced, the 
 state supporting, at the time of my visit, 577 schools, with 
 12,620 pupils in attendance. 
 
 I found here a man who had visited my library while in the 
 United States, Dr. Barroeta, a practising physician, and pro- 
 fessor of botany and zoology in the Scientific Institute, Avhich 
 has quite an extensive and valuable museum. The state and 
 municipal archives, dating back to 1658, fill a room thirty feet 
 square. El Seminario, or the Catholic college, has a well- 
 kept library of 4500 volumes of theology, law, philosophy, 
 and history. 
 
 But by far the best and most important collection was the 
 San Luis Potosi state library, called the Biblioteca Puhlica del 
 Cientifico y Literario, of which I obtained a printed catalogue 
 of about 3000 titles, under the headings. Jurisprudence, Ec- 
 clesiastical Laws, Science and Art, Belles Lettres, History, 
 and Theology. The collection dates from 1824. The laws 
 and legislative documents are incomplete, owing to frequent 
 revolutions. The whole of the year 1834 is a blank, also the 
 period of the so-called empire, or French intervention. Be- 
 sides the Diario Oficial of the general United States Mexican 
 government from 1872, was La Sombra de Zara^oza from 
 1867, giving full information of political affairs in this section 
 to the overthrow of the administration of Lerdo de Tejada, 
 which administration it sustained. Thus will be seen, without 
 furtlicr enumeration and description, what one might reason- 
 ably expect to find in the state capitals throughout the republic. 
 The keeper of the state library gathered for me a bundle of
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 387 
 
 documents containing the most important information con- 
 cerning the state of San Luis Potosi, so that, by purchase 
 and otherwise, I was able here, and at other places along my 
 route before reaching the federal capital, to add about 500 
 titles to my library. 
 
 Staging is in Mexico the best way to see the country, 
 though an experience that few care to repeat. And yet it 
 has its attractions. Passing down over the plateau, the 
 traveller finds vast areas covered with hojasen, a kind of 
 sage-brush, mezquite, gobernadora, and agrita, and he ex- 
 periences a sense of loneliness, or of something lacking, away 
 from the leading lines of traffic. An occasional band of 
 sheep or herd of cattle, accompanied by a herder or vaquero, 
 alone breaks the monotony. The land is fertile, and needs 
 only irrigation to support a large population ; but one jour- 
 neys league after league through silent, untenanted fields, 
 Avith here and there a few huts or a cluster of adobes, and at 
 intervals an hacienda and a town. The owner of the haci- 
 enda, who spends little of his time on the premises, holds 
 from five to fifty, and sometimes a hundred, square leagues 
 of lands ; the occupants of the surrounding huts are virtually 
 liis serfs, though not legally or literally so. 
 
 Everything strikes a stranger as old, exceedingly old, and 
 dirty. The towns of thatched huts and tile-roofed adobes, 
 with their central plaza and church, market place, little shops, 
 and poor inn, are all of the same pattern as in the more 
 pretentious cities; when you have seen one, you have seen 
 them all. 
 
 The trim plaza in the centre of the town, with its paved 
 walks leading to the fountain in the centre, orange-tree 
 borders, and beds of shrubs and flowers, is usually quite at- 
 tractive, and in fact, throughout Mexico, the plaza, where at 
 dusk the people gather to listen to the music of the band, to 
 walk and talk, flirt and gossip, is at once a unique and 
 charming feature of Mexican life. 
 
 Few of the towns have suburbs, but stop short, as if at 
 a wall, which, indeed, has encircled many of ihem at some
 
 388 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 period of tlieir existence, as protection against surprise by 
 marauding bands of Indians or guerrillas. The region round 
 is too often a dreary waste, with stretches of sand, or with 
 bare-looking cultivated strips. 
 
 In most of the cities. Oriental modes of architecture are 
 conspicuous, the Moorish, perhaps, predominating. The 
 houses with their solid walls are usually of one story, low, with 
 flat tiled roof, the better class built round a court, with a wide 
 entrance, closed at night with double doors, and having iron- 
 barred windows, devoid of glass, looking into the court and 
 street, or often they are without windows. The palaces, as 
 they are called, and the better class of dwellings are usually 
 of two stories, with colonnades, arched, perhaps, in masonry 
 below and roofed with wooden rafters above. The floors 
 are usually of burnt-clay tiles, and bare. Outside run narrow 
 stone sidewalks, frequently worn hollow by centuries of use. 
 Though everywhere with plain and often forbidding exteriors, 
 there are dwellings in the chief cities with interiors of Oriental 
 luxury and splendor. 
 
 Land, vegetation, and cultivation improve as the central 
 and southern portions of the republic are reached. Here are 
 seen vast stretches as fertile and beautiful as any in the world, 
 producing three crops a year with irrigation ; and places are 
 found of pronounced character, displaying marked individu- 
 ality, such as Mexico City, Vera Cruz, Qucretaro, Oajaca, 
 Guadalajara, and others, some owing their origin to mis- 
 sionary convents, some to the will of a rich landholder, some 
 to the course of trade. Elegant villas can be seen in the 
 suburban towns of the capital, but there is scarcely in the re- 
 public what would be known in the United States as a coun- 
 try-seat or a farm-house. 
 
 Notwithstanding the monotony, the observer finds much 
 that is exceedingly picturesque. The towns and the coun- 
 try, the people and their surroundings, all present studies. 
 Here is foliage filled with blossoms and loaded with fruit; 
 here are fragrant flowers and fantastic parasites, palms, orange 
 and lemon trees, and a thousand other oftshoots of redun-
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 389 
 
 dant nature, — this for the tierra caliente, and also for the 
 footland cities; and for the table-lands, colored hills and 
 plains covered with a peculiar vegetation. Over thousands 
 of leagues you may travel and see ten thousand weird and 
 fantastic images in the palm and the cactus, in the mirage 
 and in the mountain. The southern sierras are grand, and 
 of every hue and height and contour. 
 
 In the cities the churches stand conspicuous, and on the 
 streets are figures of every form and pose. Drive into any 
 town in any hour of the day or night, be it in scorching 
 summer or freezing winter, and standing by the roadside and 
 in the doorways are grim figures wrapped in scrapes and re- 
 bozos, motionless and silent, but always graceful and pictu- 
 resque. You see them when you come and when you go, as 
 if they had stood there since Mexico was made, and were 
 now waiting for the last trump to sound. 
 
 On reaching the city of Mexico, I took up my quarters at 
 the hotel Iturbide, where I remained four months, ransacking 
 the city, and making excursions in various directions. 
 
 I had letters of introduction, and being desirous of seeing 
 and learning all I could and making the most of my time 
 among a notoriously slow, formal, and conventional people, I 
 at once sent them out, requesting the recipient to name time 
 and place for an interview. 
 
 " I cannot see why you want to make the acquaintance 
 of these people," said Morgan, the American minister, to me 
 one day. " If it is to be entertained by them, you will be 
 disappointed. Here am I these three or four years represent- 
 ing the great American republic, and they pay not the sHght- 
 est attention to me. Aside from official intercourse with the 
 minister of foreign relations, there is nothing between us. 
 When I came, the chief officials called Avhen I was out and 
 left their cards; I returned the call when they were out and 
 left my card, and that was the end of it." 
 
 " My dear sir," I said," it is the last thing on earth I desire, 
 to be entertained by these or any other people. I come
 
 390 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 to Mexico for a far different purpose. Still, if I am so let 
 alone as to feel slighted, it will be for the first time in my 
 hfe." 
 
 The fact is, Mr. Morgan could not understand what it was 
 I wanted in Mexico ; nevertheless, he was always cordial and 
 accommodating. 
 
 For about two weeks my time was chiefly occupied in 
 making and receiving calls. Among the first to visit me was 
 Ygnacio M. Altamirano, one of the chief literary men in 
 Mexico", who boasts his pure Aztec blood uncontaminated by 
 any European intermixture. In form he is well proportioned, 
 a little below medium height, features clear-cut and of pro- 
 nounced type, bright, black eyes, and skin not very dark, 
 intellect briUiant, and tongue fluent of speech. 
 
 Altamirano divided the leading hterary honors of the cap- 
 ital with Alfredo Chavero, who was also a writer of talent. 
 Altamirano wrote for La Libcrtad, La Repiiblka, and El 
 Diario del Hogar; any paper was glad to get anything from 
 Chavero. These men showed me every attention, and intro- 
 duced me to the members of the Sociedad de Geografia y 
 Estatistica, at a meeting called specially for that purpose. 
 
 Another very agreeable litierateur Avas Irenco Paz, member 
 of congress, and proprietor of La Patria, which has a daily, 
 and an illustrated weekly edition, on the front page of which 
 Senor Paz did me the honor to place my portrait, with a bio- 
 graphical notice, reviewing my books in the other edition. 
 
 Most of the leading journals and journalists in Mexico are 
 under the immediate pay of the government. There has al- 
 ways been one notable exception, however, in El Monitor 
 Republicano, of which Vicente Garcia Torres was proprietor. 
 The government ofiered $350 a month to this journal as sub- 
 sidy, but Torres thought he could do better to keep himself 
 free and independent. He was a shrewd man, Seiior Torres, 
 about seventy years of age, with sharp, grizzly features, and 
 a man wliose kind services I shall ever hold in grateful re- 
 membrance. Besides offering me his columns, he went out 
 of his way to gather material for my use.
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 39 1 
 
 I found in Francisco Sosa, author of several works, and 
 editor of El Nacional, a man of ability and affable, modest 
 demeanor, such as makes a stranger wish to know him further. 
 
 Indeed I met so many, who treated me so cordially, seem- 
 ing to count it a pleasure to serve me, that while I cannot 
 pass them by without mention, I still have not the space to 
 devote to them which their merits deserve. There was Vicente 
 Riva Palacio, of an old and aristocratic family, occupying a 
 palatial residence, with a fine library, and many superb Maxi- 
 milian and other relics, such as the chair of Hidalgo, and the 
 sword of Mina. Here were the archives of the Inquisition, 
 in fifty-four manuscript volumes, from the founding of the 
 institution in Mexico in 1570, to the time of Independence, say 
 1 8 14. His house was a workshop like my library, the owner 
 exercising great diligence, with men about him extracting, 
 arranging, and condensing material for his use. 
 
 I met Amador Chimalpopoca, one of the race of aboriginal 
 rulers, one night at the rooms of the geographical society. 
 Native American intelligence, ability, brain power, genius, or 
 whatever it may be called, is apparently no whit behind the 
 European article. 
 
 On another occasion I encountered a man no less remark- 
 able in another direction, J. E. Hernandez y Davalos, v/ho 
 for thirty-one years had been collecting from all parts of the 
 country, Mexico, JMichoacan, Chihuahua, Jalisco, Oajaca, and 
 elsewhere, documents relative to the war of Independence, 
 and from that time to the French war. He states that he 
 copied everything relating to the subject out of the Biblioteca 
 Nacional, and had two copyists in the national archives for 
 four years. He was a poor man holding some inferior gov- 
 ernment position with a small salary ; but out of it he sup- 
 ported his family and achieved this great work, while high 
 officials stole millions and did nothing — not a single self- 
 denying or praiseworthy act for their country. Hernandez y 
 Davalos was often promised government aid, but government 
 officials here, as elsewhere, are too prone to promise with no 
 intention of keeping their word. In fact, Mexicans, of high
 
 392 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 or low degree, are not remarkable for their reliability. In 
 1870 this man had a small cigar factory in the calle de Don- 
 toribio, worth $700, the profits from which gave himself and 
 family a fair support. He had already in his possession many 
 precious papers, when there came one more valuable than 
 all the rest. It was regarding Hidalgo, and was offered to 
 him for $250. But where was the money to come from ? He 
 felt that he could not let slip from his grasp so priceless a 
 treasure, but this was a large amount for him to raise. He 
 tried in vain to borrow it ; the paper was worth no more in 
 the market than that of any pulque-seller. At last he actually 
 sold out his business in order to secure this document. What 
 would become of the wise and wealthy of this world were 
 there no enthusiasts ! At this time, 18S3, six large volumes of 
 these documents had been printed by Hernandez y Davalos, 
 and 700 subscribers obtained; but unluckily a paper adverse 
 to the character of the Virgin of Guadalupe slipped in, and 
 straightway the subscription list dropped down to fifty. Men 
 have been immortalized, with piles of masonry erected to their 
 honor, for far less benefits to their country than those con- 
 ferred by this poor cigarmaker. 
 
 No small commotion this same Virgin of Guadalupe has 
 made in Mexico first and last. Her shrine is at a small town 
 not far from Mexico city, Guadalupe Hidalgo, a place of some 
 political fame, the treaty with the United States concluding the 
 war of 1846, together with the transfer of California, having, 
 among other things, been accomplished there. It was here, 
 if we may believe the holy men who have written volumes 
 on the subject, that the Virgin appeared to the poor Indian, 
 Juan Diego, imprinting her image on his blanket, that the ab- 
 origines of America as well as the aristocratic foreigners might 
 have her effigy to worship, and build her a church on the 
 spot of her appearing. The priests jiretendcd to be incred- 
 ulous at first, but finally permitted the natives to have their 
 own particular Virgin, as the latter were inclined to neglect the 
 deities of Spain for those of Mexico. It is not an attractive 
 place on an holiday for a person of refined organs or sensitive
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO, 393 
 
 nerves, as the crowds drawn thither are by no means well be- 
 haved. The gambling and drinking of the worshippers after 
 church service are of a rather low order, the bets being small 
 and the drink pulque. There was one highly respectable 
 gambling place, however, where the superior class, the upper 
 strata of society, statesmen, mihtary officers, and com_mercial 
 men might indulge in larger stakes at the tables representing 
 the more popular European games. For everywhere in 
 Mexico, as in most other places, it is not vice itself that is 
 scourged so much as the manner of indulgence. Any amount 
 of wickedness is anywhere tolerated so that it can be conven- 
 tional. It is quite orthodox for the common people of Mexico 
 to get drunk on pulque, while the upper classes may indulge 
 without limit in wine, so long as they do not drink in bar-rooms 
 or tipple throughout the day. So with regard to gambling, 
 cheating, law-breaking, unbelief, licentiousness, and all the 
 crimes and vices flesh is heir to — let them be done decently 
 and in order, in such a way as to avoid exposure or punish- 
 ment, and all is well. 
 
 General Carlos Pacheco, minister of Fomento, who lost 
 an arm and a leg in the war, is a man of sterling worth, and 
 highly respected throughout the republic. Francisco de 
 Garay, an engineer of great reputation and ability, in a series 
 of conversations gave me the coloring for the several phases 
 of Mexican history during the present century, such as could 
 not be found in books. 
 
 I found in the prominent lawyer and statesm.an, Francisco 
 L. Vallarta, a most serviceable friend. Then there were 
 President Iglesias and his cabinet, whom I entertained in 
 San Francisco during their flight to the United States, and 
 v/ho Avere most cordial in their greetings and attentions. The 
 venerable and learned Prieto was of their number. I may 
 also mention Jose Maria Vigil, director of the Biblioteca 
 Nacional ; Alberto Lombardo, belonging to one of the best 
 families; Doctor Ramon Fernandez, governor of the district; 
 General Naranjo, acting secretary of war and navy ; Juan 
 Toro, postmaster general ; Vicente E. Manero, architect and
 
 394 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 engineer ; Felipe Gerardo Cazeneuve, proprietor of El Mun- 
 da?io ; Joaquin Garcia Icazbalceta, with a beautiful house 
 and fine library, whose works were freely used and quoted 
 in my Native Races ; Jose Ceballos, president of the senate; 
 Jesus Fuentes y Muhiz, minister of the Hacienda; Luis 
 Siliceo ; Juan Yndico, keeper of the archives of the district 
 of Mexico ; Jesus Sanchez, director of the museum, and a 
 host of others. Icazbalceta is more bibliographer than writer; 
 he cleans the pages of his old books, restores lost and faded 
 cuts with pen and ink, and even set up with his own hands 
 the type for one of his reprints. Manuel Romero Rubio, 
 father-in-law of the late president, introduced me to Porfirio 
 Diaz, and he to President Gonzalez. From General Diaz, 
 the foremost m.an in the republic, I took a two weeks' dicta- 
 tion, employing tv/o stenographers, and yielding 400 pages 
 of manuscript. Naturally, during this time, and subsequently, 
 I became well acquainted with the Diaz family, dining fre- 
 quently there, and with the father of the charming wife of 
 the president, whose home was one of the most elegant in 
 the capital. 
 
 Romero Rubio, then president of the senate, formerly 
 minister of foreign affairs, and subsequently minister under 
 Diaz, is a fine specimen of a wealthy and aristocratic Mexi- 
 can; grave and somewhat distant in his demeanor; yet kind 
 and cordial among friends, and punctilious in the perform- 
 ance of every duty, pubhc and private. 
 
 Porfirio Diaz appears more like an American than a Mexi- 
 can. In the hall of the municipality and district of Mexico 
 arc portraits of all the rulers, vice-regal and republican, 
 from Cort6s to Diaz. And between the first and the last are 
 some points of resemblance. Cortes made the first conquest, 
 Diaz the last. The former chose Oajaca as his home; the 
 latter was born there. In the portrait of Cortes, the finest I 
 have seen, the conqueror is represented as quite old, toward 
 the end of life, when the pride of gratified ambition had been 
 somewhat obliterated by the machinations of enemies, the 
 neglect of his sovereign, and the jealousy of courtiers. There
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 395 
 
 is present less of the strong man triumphant than of the strong 
 man humihated. Diaz has had his triumphs; perhaps his 
 humihations are yet to come. Few great men escape them 
 toward the end of their career ; indeed they seem necessary, 
 in the economy of poHtics, to terminate the efforts of over- 
 ambitious men, whose pretensions would otherwise know no 
 bounds. 
 
 The two great receptacles of knowledge, ancient and 
 modern, historical, scientific, and religious, in the Mexican 
 capital, and which make the heart of the student, investiga- 
 tor, or collector, to quail before him, are the Biblioteca Na- 
 cional, or national library, and the Archivo General y Publico 
 de la Nacion, or national archives. 
 
 The Biblioteca Nacional occupies a large building, for- 
 merly a church, part of the walls of one portion of it having 
 been worked over until it has quite a modern and imposing 
 aspect. To enter the library, as at this time arranged, you 
 pass through a well-kept garden into a large room, with ir- 
 regular sides and angles, well filled with books. At tables are 
 usually ten or twenty persons reading or writing. Thence 
 through a small door in the wall you may pass into the main 
 building, or rather the main library room, on either side of 
 which are ranges of lesser rooms ; each holding one of the 
 sections, or part of a section, into which the library is divided. 
 The volumes nominally number 130,000, folios in vellum 
 largely predominating, nine tenths of which are of no value 
 from any standpoint. Throw out these, and the many dupli- 
 cates, and the number is not so imposing. 
 
 The sections, or principal divisions, are eleven, namely, bib- 
 liography, theology, philosophy, jurisprudence, mathematics, 
 natural science and physics, medical science, technolog}^, 
 philology and belles lettres, history, and periodical literature. 
 
 Senor Vigil wrote out for me a very interesting historical 
 description of this institution. The library was formed, to a 
 great extent, from the old libraries of the university, the ca- 
 thedral, and the several convents of the city. The edifice was 
 the ancient temple of San Augustin, and is still undergoing
 
 396 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 changes and repairs to meet the present purpose. On the 
 posts of the fence surrounding the grounds are busts of nota- 
 ble authors, Veytia, Navarrete, Alzate, Pena, Alaman, and 
 Clavijero; also Cardoso, Gongora, Pesado, Couto, Najera, 
 Ramirez, Tafle, Gosostiza, Gaspio ; and the illustrious abor- 
 iginals displaying features fully as refined and intelligent 
 as the others, Nezahualcoyotl, Ixtlilxochitl, and Tezozomoc. 
 In the reading room are statues of those whose names mark 
 the development of human thought, according to the esti- 
 mate hereabout : Confucius, Ysarias, Homer, Plato, Aristotle, 
 Cicero, Virgil, Saint Paul, Origen, Dante, Alarcon, Coperni- 
 cus, Descartes, Cuvier, and Humboldt. 
 
 The library is open from ten to five, and free ; annual 
 revenue for new books $8000 ; the attaches are one director, 
 two assistants, four book clerks, a chief of workmen, a paleo- 
 grafo, eight writers, a conserje, gardener, porter, and three 
 mozos. 
 
 All the work on the building, ornamentation, statues, and 
 furniture, has been done by Mexican artisans and artists. 
 The labor of classifying and arranging the books was long 
 and severe. It was found, on opening boxes which had been 
 packed and stored for fifteen years, that there were many 
 broken sets which never could be completed. 
 
 Far more important for history, if not, indeed, the most 
 important collection on the continent, is the Archive de la 
 Nacion. I found here in charge my old friend Justino 
 Rubio, under whose superintendence extensive copying of 
 manuscripts and documents, nowhere else existing, has been 
 done in times past for my library. It did not require the 
 permission of the secretary of foreign relations, so readily 
 accorded to me, to enable me to visit and extract from these 
 archives at pleasure. 
 
 The national archives occupy eleven rooms in one section 
 of the palace, pretty solidly filled with materials for history, 
 mostly in documentary form, though there are some printed 
 books. The first or main room contains something over 3000 
 volumes, relating to land-titles and Vt'ater-rights from 1534 to
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 397 
 
 1820. Among the many points of interest in this collection 
 are 200 volumes relating to the Spanish nobility in Mexico; 
 the branch of Merced, or concessions of lands to private per- 
 sons; a royal cedula branch, comprising 227 volumes from 
 1609, Some rooms are filled entirely with manuscripts. 
 The section on history contains much material relating to 
 California and the internal provinces, from which I have 
 largely copied. There are no less than 200 volumes on 
 northern history alone, and 1000 volumes of military reports 
 to viceroys, little from which has ever been published. 
 
 The founding of this institution may properly date from 
 1823, though it has a more extended history before than after 
 that time, while for some time subsequent to the independence 
 little attention was paid to it. 
 
 I believe it was the Count Revillagigedo who, in 1790, 
 conceived the idea of establishing in Mexico a depository 
 similar to the Archives of the Indies in Spain. Chapultepec 
 Avas talked of as the place for it, and two years later, through 
 his minister, the Marques de Bajamar, the king ordered the 
 thing done. It seems that the government documents had 
 been mostly destroyed in the fire of 1692, and for a half cen- 
 tury thereafter few were saved. 
 
 Copious indexes were early made of the material, thus ad- 
 ding greatly to its value. I notice some of the headings, as 
 tobacco, excise, duties, pulque, ayuntamiento, department of 
 San Bias, of the Californias, audiencia, mines, military, etc. 
 To Revillagigedo, likewise, the world is indebted for the im- 
 portant work in 32 folio volumes, begun in 1780, and entitled 
 Memorias para la Historia Uftiversal de la America Septen- 
 trional, sent by the viceroy to Spain. For some time after 
 Revillagigedo's rule, his successors paid little attention to the 
 archives, so that little more was done until after independence 
 had been achieved. 
 
 The first building occupied by the archives was the old 
 Secretaria del Verreynato, later used by the ministry of Re- 
 laciones. Part of the collection was deposited in the convent 
 of Santo Domingo, whence many were stolen.
 
 398 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Among those who fully appreciated the value of these trea- 
 sures, and the importance of having them properly arranged 
 and cared for, was Jose Mariano de Salas, who in 1846 printed 
 in Mexico a Reglamento, setting forth their value, not alone 
 for the protection of the rights of property, but as a nucleus 
 for a vast amount of further information which might be se- 
 cured and saved. 
 
 An inventory was ordered, and a schedule made of material 
 elsewhere existing that should be lodged there. The latter 
 included ministerial affairs, government and war correspon- 
 dence, etc. The material was now divided into two parts, 
 one relating to affairs before the declaration of independence, 
 and one subsequent thereto. Both epochs were then divided 
 into four parts corresponding to the four secretaries of state, 
 namely, memoirs, law, landed property, and war. Each of 
 these subjects was divided into sections, the first external and 
 internal government, the second law and ecclesiastical, the 
 third property rights, and the fourth war and maritime mat- 
 ters. All these were again divided, and subdivided, into affairs 
 civil, commercial, political, and so on. 
 
 Of this institution I obtained direct and important infor- 
 mation, far more than I can print. I learned, for instance, 
 that under title of the Inquisition are 218 volumes of procesos 
 against priests for temptation in the confessional, for matri- 
 monial deceits, blasphemies, heresies, and upon genealogy 
 and purity of blood. Under the heading Jesuits, is a volume 
 telling of the extinction of the order in Mexico. Under title 
 of the religious orders of California, is a volume on their 
 foundation in 1793. Then there are the archives of the mint, 
 of the renta de tabaco, etc. 
 
 The municipal archives, or the archives of the district of 
 Mexico, Juan Yndico keeper, consist of city documents ac- 
 cumulated during the past 200 years. The greater portion of 
 those which previously existed were burned in the fire of 1692. 
 
 Among other libraries of historic interest, I may mention 
 those of Basalio Perez, Agreda, and San Ildefonso, the last 
 named formerly the collection of the cathedral.
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 399 
 
 The public library of Toluca, comprising some 8000 vol- 
 umes, is prolific in chronicles of the old convents. Indeed, 
 Mexico has many libraries containing important historic data, 
 notwithstanding the chaft' the monks imbedded them in. In 
 this sense there are many rare and valuable books throughout 
 the republic ; but of the class commonly called rare by col- 
 lectors and bibliographers, most have been carried away. 
 Seiior Olaguibel printed a book entitled Impresioncs Celebres 
 y Libros Raros. In it is a chapter devoted to rare books in 
 Mexico, which indeed says little except that there are no rare 
 books in Mexico. We are soberly told, however, that some 
 one has reprinted the life of Junipero Serra, which is the 
 foundation of California History ! 
 
 In the beautiful and very religious city of Puebla is the 
 Colegio de Estado, with a library of 20,000 volumes, the 
 institution having the usual departments of natural history, 
 chemistry, Latin, Greek, etc. The buildings, formerly a 
 convent, are antique and cover a large area, having among 
 other attractions a well shaded and watered garden, with 
 fountains and gold fish. Here are 200 students ; the place 
 could easily accommodate a thousand. 
 
 In the Puebla state library, before mentioned, is a volume 
 of original letters of Morelos ; also several other volumes of 
 valuable documents relating to the days of independence, 
 1810-21. General documents run from 1764 to 1858. 
 There are two volumes of royal cedulas 1527 to 1818; also 
 two volumes of papers relating to the trial of the priest Mier, 
 who preached against the Guadalupe Virgin. 
 
 Another large building in another part of the city is called 
 the school of medicine, in which is a general library of 26,000 
 volumes, but containing, as most of them do, more theology 
 than anything else. 
 
 On a cool, dry, December evening, as the sun was sinking 
 behind the skirts of Popocatepetl, I found myself standing 
 upon the summit of the hill of Cholula, amidst the porcelain- 
 planted graves, drooping pines, and stunted rose-bushes, in
 
 400 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 front of the church with its dilapidated wall and large open 
 reservoir. It is a rugged, uneven elevation, rising solitary- 
 some two hundred feet above the plain, and is evidently partly 
 the work of nature and partly of man. The winding roadway, 
 half of it paved smooth with stones and half in form of broad 
 steps, is bordered by a thrifty growth of grass, which also crops 
 forth upon little benches, and the thick shrubbery that covers 
 the hillside is freely sprinkled with the cactus and pepper-tree. 
 Popocatepetl, or Smoking Mountain, rises before me, and next 
 to it the scarcely less imposing peak of Iztaccihuatl, The 
 White Woman, she of the recumbent figure; while in the op- 
 posite direction, over the glittering domes of distant Puebla, 
 stands Orizaba, also white-crested, and winged by fleecy clouds. 
 
 At my feet Hes the town of Cholula, with its long lines of 
 intersecting ditches, as Cortes first saw them, marking the di- 
 visions of corn-fields, and garden-patches lined with maguey. 
 It is a miserable place, made up of hovels and churches, one 
 view of which tells the story of life, — how the poor, in the 
 small, uncomfortable houses, pinch themselves to sustain a 
 costly service in the great temples, and add to their splendor. 
 If I mistake not, God would be better pleased with smaller 
 churches, fewer priests, and larger and more comfortable 
 dwellings for his people. 
 
 The whole of this immense and rich valley, alternately the 
 prey of contending armies since the advent of Cortes, and 
 now for the first time learning the arts of peace, is greatly 
 given to religion, as it used to be even in the remote times 
 of Toltec sway, when pilgrims flocked from afar to the shrine 
 of the Feathered Serpent. Casting my eyes around over one 
 of the most beautiful scenes in Mexico, I count two score 
 villages marked by the tall, white towers of thrice as many 
 churches; some indeed being nothing more than hamlets with 
 half a dozen dingy little houses cringing beside a great dingy 
 church, some sheltered by trees and shrubbery, others standing 
 solitary in the open plain. 
 
 I thought Puebla had houses of worship enough for all, 
 with her sixty or seventy temples of every imaginable style,
 
 EXPEDITIONS TO MEXICO. 40 1 
 
 high-domed and broad-spreading edifices, about one for every 
 thousand of the half-naked and barefooted natives who are 
 called upon to support them and their three hundred priests. 
 The state prison is part church ; in the house of maternity is 
 a church ; the state college was once a convent forming part 
 of a church edifice ; and the cathedral, though smaller than 
 the one in Mexico, is accounted richer within. 
 
 But for all this, famous, squalid little Cholula, according 
 to the population, outdoes Puebla. There is the little church 
 with its two towers and large bells on the historic hill, rusty 
 without, but elaborately gilded within, and the large church 
 amidst the houses below, near where the worshippers congre- 
 gate to see the bull-fight after service, and one to the right 
 and another to the left, and half a dozen more on every side, 
 the simultaneous ringing of whose bells at the hour of blazing, 
 tropical afterglow might lead one to suppose the world to be 
 on fire. This must indeed have been a foul spot of Satan's 
 to require such long and elaborate cleansing ; for hereabout 
 once stood no less than four hundred heathen temples ; but I 
 would rather see restored and preserved some of those archi- 
 tectural monuments, albeit in good truth temples of Satan, 
 which capped this pyramid in aboriginal times, than a thou- 
 sand of the earth-bestrewed edifices reared to his confounding 
 at the cost of pinched toilers. 
 
 As I thus stood, I fancied I could see marching through 
 the same long white, radiating streets the ancient processions 
 with their dismal chant and clang of instruments, coming 
 hither from all directions to the sacrifice. I fancied I could 
 see the bodies of the victims tumbled over the steeps as the 
 blood-besmeared priests held aloft the palpitating heart, while 
 all the people raised their voices in loud hosannas. And I 
 could easily imagine the good god Quetzalcoatl here taking 
 leave of his people, even as did Christ, promising meantime 
 to return with new and celestial benefits. 
 
 All the while I was in Mexico I gathered books, took dic- 
 tations, and wrote down my thoughts and observations. With 
 some difiiculty I succeeded in obtaining enough of the leading 
 26
 
 402 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 jouiTials published in Mexico since 1800 to make a continu- 
 ous file of the events of the day from the opening of the 
 century to the present time. These series of newspapers, 
 each taking up the thread where in another it was broken off, 
 proved of the greatest advantage to my work. 
 
 This expedition added to my library some 8000 volumes. 
 Three years later I made a second trip to Mexico, chiefly to 
 verify certain statements and add a few points prior to closing 
 the last volume of my History of Mexico. The railway being 
 completed, the journey was nothing ; and being brief and 
 without special significance, I will inflict no detail of it on 
 the reader.
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 TOWARD THE END. 
 
 Careless of censure, nor too fond of fame ; 
 
 Still pleased to praise, yet not afraid to blame ; 
 
 Averse alike to flatter, or offend ; 
 
 Not free from faults, nor yet too vain to mend. — Pope. 
 
 I HAD hoped to close my library to general work, and dis- 
 miss my assistants by January i, 18S7. I had yet several 
 years of work to do myself, in any event, but I thought if I 
 could stop the heavy library outlay of one to two thousand 
 dollars a month, I should feel more inclined to take life 
 easier, with less nervous haste and strain in my work. 
 
 Several causes combined to prevent this. As is usually 
 the case, the completion of my history consumed more time 
 than I had anticipated, the necessary re-writing and revision, 
 not to mention numberless delays growing out of the cares 
 and vicissitudes of business, being beyond calculation. The 
 truth is, in looking back upon my life and its labors, I cannot 
 but feel that I never have had a full and fair opportunity to 
 do my best, to do as good work as I am capable of doing, 
 certainly not as finished work as I might do with less of it 
 and more time to devote to it, with fewer cares, fewer inter- 
 ruptions. I have often wondered what I might have accom- 
 plished, had I not been forced to " write history on horse- 
 back," as General Vallejo terms it. On the other hand, I 
 have had much to be thankful for, and can only submit my 
 work to the world for what it is worth. 
 
 Notwithstanding all that I had thus far done, there was yet 
 this one thing lacking, and as the end of my labors was 
 drawng near, and I was looking forward to a period of rest,
 
 404 LITERARY INDUSTRIES, 
 
 the thought forced itself more and more upon my mind. 
 This was the necessity of a work supplementary to the history 
 proper, in which the lives of those who had made the country 
 what it is should receive fuller treatment. 
 
 The development and conditions here were peculiar, and 
 in their historical elucidation must be met in the plainest, 
 most practical, and fitting way. Within the present half 
 century a vast wilderness had been transformed into fields of 
 the foremost civilization, by men of whom many were yet 
 living. Since the world began no such feat had ever been 
 accomplished within so short a time; obviously none such 
 could ever occur again, the engendering conditions not being 
 present. Hundreds of years Avere required to build up Greece 
 and Rome, and other hundreds to carrying civilization into 
 Germany and England; and all midst fanatical wars and 
 horrible human butcheries such as should put to blush the 
 face of man. 
 
 But in the development of our own thrice-favored land, 
 this westernmost America, there were no wars, except the 
 war of mind over matter, or civilization over savagism. 
 There was no physical bondage or intellectual coercion. 
 Yet, turning to our towns and cities, our fruitful fields and 
 orchards and gardens, with their thousands of happy homes ; 
 our railways, and irrigating canals ; our mines, manufactures, 
 and commerce; our government and social condition, we 
 find accomplished within these fifty years what has taken 
 other nations ten or twenty times as long. 
 
 True, we had a record of their experiences as a foundation 
 upon which to build our new experiences in this fair wilder- 
 ness; otherwise it could not have been done. But for all 
 that it was a great and good thing to build here as we have 
 built, thus making proper avail of our high privileges. And 
 are not the men who have quietly and patiently wrought out 
 this grand accomplishment, each laboring after his own fash- 
 ion and for his own immediate purposes — are they not as 
 much entitled to prominence and praise as the greatest of 
 conquerors or statesmen ? Is it not as interesting to us, the
 
 TOWARD THE END. 405 
 
 Study of their characters ? Is it not as profitable for us to 
 follow them in their good deeds as to follow the others in 
 their good and evil deeds ? 
 
 It was therefore deemed absolutely essential, before it 
 could be said that a proper historical presentation had been 
 made of the country and those who had made it, of the em- 
 pire and the builders of empire, that the history have a 
 biographical section, devoted primarily to the men as the 
 historical section proper is devoted primarily to the events. 
 For it is as inexpedient to stop the flow of the narrative of 
 events with a lengthy and elaborate analysis of character, as 
 it is to break into an entertaining and instructive biography 
 with a too lengthy narrative of events. 
 
 At the same time, here was an opportunity to do much 
 better than simply present a collection of detached biogra- 
 phies of the most influential and prominent personages after 
 the usual form, howsoever valuable such a work might be in 
 connection with the history. What would make it tenfold 
 more interesting and valuable would be to take one by one 
 the more important of these men of strength and influence, 
 and, after a thorough character study, place their portraits in 
 proper form and color in the midst of the work which they 
 have done, and in company with kindred industries accom- 
 plished by others, and round the whole throw a framework 
 of history. Here, then, are embalmed in the annals of their 
 own time and country the men or their deeds, there to remain, 
 the benefits and blessings conferred during life thus being 
 made perpetual. 
 
 In the text and foot-notes of the history I had interwoven 
 much material of a biographical nature — all that the narra- 
 tive could fairly carry. But this was not enough. 
 
 It seemed not right or just that in a history of this country 
 giving the full details of industrial and social development, 
 the events should render subordinate to so large an extent the 
 men who had made the events. 
 
 The importance of biography is not ever}'where fully ap- 
 preciated. Surely in preserving the annals of a country, and
 
 406 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 especially its earlier annals, it is necessary to posterity that the 
 stories of the lives of men of strength or influence in the com- 
 munity should be told for the benefit of those now living, and 
 of those who shall come after them. The man of energy 
 and ability is a factor in the affairs of his country. No one 
 can achieve high and permanent success without benefiting 
 others. Upon the events and actualities which surround the 
 individual, and which he himself has made, he leaves his im- 
 press, which is his life, his true being, the crystallization of his 
 thoughts, the m.aterial expression of his capability. The man 
 himself may soon be forgotten, and his place filled by others, 
 but his successors, whether they know it or not, are contin- 
 uing the work which he began, and building on the foundation 
 v/hich he had laid. A record of personal experiences is of 
 importance to the country as showing by what means the man 
 has accomplished certain results, thus enabling others to do 
 likewise or better. "A noble life put fairly on record acts 
 like an inspiration to others," says Samuel Smiles. And again, 
 " The great lesson of biography is to show what a man can 
 do and be at his best " ; while Beecher terms biography the 
 home aspect of history. 
 
 After securing all the comforts and luxuries of life for him- 
 self and his family, for what does a man further labor ? If 
 of a miserly disposition, he works for the mere pleasure of ac- 
 cumulating money. But if intelligent and public-spirited, he 
 continues his labors for their beneficial effects, and for the in- 
 terest and pride he takes in them. Now, it is evident that 
 if these beneficial effects of a man's life can be rendered per- 
 petual, it is important that this should be done, and it can be 
 done only by writing out the acts and experiences of a man's 
 life in the form of a biography, and placing that biography 
 in history. 
 
 The advantages of history are manifold and obvious. 
 Without the recorded experiences of the race there could be 
 no accumulation of knowledge ; without a knowledge of the 
 past there could be no improvement in the future. So with 
 biography, which is but a part of history. Every man of
 
 TOWARD THE END. 407 
 
 marked intelligence, wealth, and influence assists in making 
 history in a greater or less degree, according to what he ac- 
 complishes. He cannot help doing this, for history is the 
 record of what men do. Nor should that record be delayed 
 until they have passed away. No one can call up the facts 
 and intuitions of a man's life, the theory and practice of his 
 achievements, so well as the man himself; and to arrange 
 those facts, analyze the intuitions, elucidate the benefits of 
 what has been accomplished, and weave the whole into an 
 instructive and entertaining narrative, requires a writer pos- 
 sessed of ability, enthusiasm, and experience. 
 
 But to return to the history proper. I had long had in 
 view a visit to Salt Lake City and the Colorado region, and in 
 August, 1884, in company with my wife and family, took up 
 my quarters at the Continental hotel in the city of the saints, 
 remaining there for six weeks. 
 
 There was much ill feeling existing at the time between 
 the Mormons and gentiles, the government being apparently 
 in earnest in putting down polygamy, while the Mormons 
 were just as determined to maintain that institution or die in 
 the attempt. It was just upon the border, in point of time, of 
 the long season of prosecution and persecution, of litigations 
 and imprisonments, which has not a parallel in American 
 annals. 
 
 We were not there, however, to take part in any contro- 
 versy; we had come simply to gather facts, observe, study, 
 and meditate upon this strange social problem. I should 
 probably have known long ere this how to answer the ques- 
 tion, What is Mormonism ? but I did not. Nor would there 
 be entire unanimity among divines in answering the questions, 
 What is Methodism ? or Mohammedism ? Very shallow ideas 
 the world has in relation to the dogmas it fights and bleeds 
 for, on one side or the other. There was fighting enough for 
 dogmas in Salt Lake City in the year 1884. There were few 
 like Christ, to love their enemies, or turn the other cheek 
 when one was smitten.
 
 408 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 We saw much of the leaders on both sides, were enter- 
 tained by gentiles and Mormons, and entertained them in 
 return; we listened attentively, but said little; it was no 
 wonder, therefore, that we were regarded somewhat sus- 
 piciously by both sides. All this was of small consequence, 
 however, beside the accomplishment of our mission, which 
 was fully done in every particular. There was little the 
 Mormons would not do for us ; there was little we desired at 
 the hands of the gentiles, since from their standpoint I had 
 already gathered all the information that was to be had. 
 
 Notwithstanding the large mass of material, printed matter, 
 manuscripts, journals, dictations, and special investigations 
 which had been sent to me, there were still gaps in my work 
 that I wanted filled. John Taylor, who was present and 
 severely wounded at the assassination of Joseph Smith, was 
 at this time president of the church, and Wilford Woodruff, 
 afterward his successor, was in charge of the historian's office. 
 
 For these people had had an historian's office and an his- 
 torian almost from the beginning of their existence as a reli- 
 gious sect. The acts of the apostles, and the doings of 
 president and people, had been minutely written down and 
 preserved. And, indeed, much farther back than the story 
 of their present organization they went — back to Babel and 
 the origin of things. The Book of Mormon comprises largely 
 their history, as the Bible is the history of the Jews. Some 
 of the Babel-builders, it relates, after the grand scattering, 
 found their way to America, and were the aborigines of this 
 continent, among whom long lay hidden the metal plates 
 eventually found by Joseph Smith. 
 
 Mr. Woodruff had an elaborately written journal in some 
 twenty manuscript volumes, if I remember rightly, giving a 
 history of the church and the doings of its members from the 
 days of Nauvoo. Never before had such work been done for 
 any people, not even for the children of Israel ; for there was 
 not one important incident or individual omitted. Mr. Wood- 
 ruff and Mr. Richards were kind enough to give me most of 
 their time during tliis visit. licsides my labors with them, I
 
 TOWARD THE END. 409 
 
 took many long dictations from others. I met frequently 
 George Q. Cannon, first counsellor; Joseph F. Smith, nephew 
 of Joseph Smith ; Brigham Young, eldest son of the second 
 president ; Moses Thatcher, W. B. Preston, William Jen- 
 nings, Feramorz Little, Heber J. Grant, H. S. Eldridge, Eras- 
 tus Snow, C. W. Penrose, John R. Park, and a hundred 
 others. 
 
 While I was laboriously engaged in this office during most 
 of my time in Salt Lake City, j\Irs. Bancroft saw many of 
 the Mormon women, making their acquaintance, winning 
 their friendship, and taking dictations from them. Polygamy 
 with them was a sacred institution, a state not to be lightly 
 entered upon, but only after due preparation, prayer, and holy 
 living ; a cross, perhaps, but one which only the blessed might 
 bear. Hovering in space all round the revolving earth were 
 myriads of disembodied spirits, for whom it pleased God that 
 men should manufacture flesh. Nor with the men was poly- 
 gamy the result of sensuality ; your true sensualist will have 
 many women but no wife. 
 
 From Utah we went to Colorado, stopping at Canon City, 
 Leadville, Pueblo, Colorado Springs, and other points of 
 historic interest and importance. We were everywhere re- 
 ceived with the utmost cordiality. It would be difficult to 
 find anyv/here pleasanter people, or a more intelligent or re- 
 fined society, than at Denver. I shall never forget the kind- 
 ness of Doctor Bancroft, Governors Pitkin, Grant, and Routt, 
 and Judges Stone, Bennett, Beck, and Helm. 
 
 Colorado was at this time in a very prosperous condition, 
 and the people were justly proud of their state, of its his- 
 tory, its resources, and its possibilities. By supplying my- 
 self pretty freely with help in the form of stenographers 
 and statisticians, I secured the experiences of several hun- 
 dreds of those whose lives are in great part the history of 
 the state. Among the manuscripts thus resulting was one 
 which must ever constitute the corner-stone of Colorado 
 history. Nearly two months were occupied in writing it, 
 and the work was done in this way : Taking a full file of the
 
 410 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Rocky Mountain News, the first journal published in the 
 country, I sat down before it with a stenographer and its first 
 editor, who, while I questioned and commented, told the his- 
 tory of the state, turning over the leaves of the newspaper to 
 refresh his memory, and give him the desired information. 
 
 Judge Stone's ideas and experiences form a very interest- 
 ing historical manuscript. He assured me that the topo- 
 graphy of Colorado was in his mind's eye as clear as if seen 
 at one view from the corner of a cloud ; and I found his 
 knowledge of political and commercial affairs and the re- 
 sources and industries of the state no less lucid and inter- 
 esting. 
 
 While rny family were at Denver, enjoying the generous 
 hospitality of the good people of the place, I spent a fort- 
 night at Cheyenne, going through files of newspapers, and 
 Avriting out the experiences of the prominent men. In this 
 and subsequent labors in relation to the history of Wyoming 
 I was greatly assisted by John Slaughter, territorial librarian, 
 A. S. Mercer, of the Live Stock Journal, John W. Hoyt, J. 
 M. Carey, J. R. Whitehead, F. J. Stanton, E. S. N. Morgan, 
 territorial secretary, A. T. Babbitt, Thos. Sturgis, W. W. 
 Corlett, and others. Then at Laramie were S. W. Downey 
 and T. H. Hayford; at Lander, N. Baldwin and H. G. 
 Nickerson ; not to mention the commanding officers at forts 
 Russell, Steele, Laramie, McKinney, and Bridger. 
 
 Part of the winter of 1884-85 1 spent in New Mexico, where 
 I had interviews with most of the leading men, and obtained 
 a large mass of material which was an absolute necessity to 
 my work. At Santa Fe I examined the archives thoroughly, 
 and engaged Samuel Ellison, the keeper, to go through them 
 and make extracts from some, and complete copies of all of the 
 important papers and manuscripts. After a time, however, 
 finding the task too slow and irksome, he finally consented, 
 contrary to the regulations, but greatly to my satisfaction, to 
 send to me in San Francisco, by express, a part at a time, 
 such material as I wanted copied, that I might have the work 
 done in my library.
 
 TOWARD THE END. 411 
 
 I cannot refrain from mentioning, among those who ren- 
 dered me valuable assistance at Santa Fe, the names of C. B. 
 Hayward, W. G. Ritch, Francis Downs, Archbishop Lamy, 
 Defouri, Prince, Thayer, Fiske, Phillips, and the Chaves; at 
 Albuquerque and Taos, the Armijos and the Valdez; and at 
 Las Cruces, Cunniffe and Van Patten. 
 
 I have not mentioned in this volume a twentieth part of 
 the journeys made, the people seen, and the work done in 
 connection with the labors of over a quarter of a century, col- 
 lecting material and writing history, but enough has been 
 presented to give the reader some faint conception of the 
 time, labor, and money necessary for such an historical under- 
 taking.
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 BURNED OUT ! 
 
 Mercury. " What's best for us to do then to get safe across ? " 
 Charon. " I'll tell you. You must all strip before you get in, and 
 leave all those encumbrances on shore ; and even then the boat will 
 scarce hold you all. And you take care, Mercury, that no soul is admit- 
 ted that is not in light marching order, and who has not left all his 
 encumbrances, as I say, behind. Just stand at the gang-way and over- 
 haul them, and don't let them get in till lliey 've stripped." — Lucian. 
 
 BUT my troubles were not yet over. While I was buying 
 farms and building houses in San Diego, and dreaming 
 of a short period of repose on this earth before being called 
 upon to make once more an integral part of it, in the twink- 
 ling of an eye I was struck down, as if by a thunderbolt 
 from heaven. 
 
 For twenty years past I had been more than ordinarily in- 
 terested in this southern extremity of the state, with its soft 
 sunshine and beautiful bay, the only break in the California 
 coast-line south of San Francisco that could be properly called 
 a harbor, and from time to time I had invested a few thousands 
 in lots and blocks, until satisfied that I had enough, when 
 the commercial metropolis of the south should be further de- 
 veloped, to make a goodly addition to my private fortune. 
 
 Many a time before this I had temporarily sought shelter 
 for myself and family from the cold winds and fogs of San 
 Francisco, often in the Napa and Ojai valleys, and elsewhere. 
 Then I wondered if there was not some place more accessi- 
 ble to my work, which would answer the purpose as well. 
 
 Ever since 1856 I had been gazing on the high hills back 
 of Oakland and Berkeley, wondering what was on the other
 
 BURNED OTTT! 413 
 
 side ; and one day I said, I will go and see. So I mounted 
 a horse, and wound round by San Pablo and through the hills 
 until I came to Walnut creek, and beyond there to Ignacio 
 valley, near the base of Monte Diablo, where I bought land, 
 and planted it in trees and vines. 
 
 It was a broad and beautiful patch of earth, covered with 
 large scattering oaks, looking like many other parts of 
 primeval California, only that the trees were larger, indicat- 
 ing unusual depth and strength of soil. The sun rises over 
 the Devil's mountain, and the cool southwest vv'ind comes 
 over the high Oakland hills fresh from the ocean, the infre- 
 quent, dry, hot, north winds alone taking advantage of the 
 open country toward Martinez. It was not without regret 
 that I cut down the venerable oaks ; but oak trees and fruit 
 trees do not affiliate, and Bartlett pears are better than 
 acorns, so all were cleared away except a group left for 
 building sites and shelter of stock. 
 
 For the most part it was a perfect climate, the heat of sum- 
 mer seldom being enervating, with but little frost in winter; 
 but I was gro\ving querulous over California airs, and said I 
 wanted them quieter and softer than those which followed 
 me even here, carrying their thick fog-banks to the summit 
 of the highest westerly hills, and scattering them in finest 
 mists filled with sunshine over the valleys below. So we 
 took the train, my wife and I, and started south, stopping at 
 Pasadena, Riverside, and elsewhere, all of which were too 
 settled, too civilized for us. Then we came to San Diego, 
 and found there a country virgin enough for any one, and 
 Avithal so dry, barren, and forbidding, that a week of explor- 
 ation in every direction was passed, setting out from our hotel 
 in the early morning and driving till night before we found a 
 place in which were seemingly united all the requisite ad- 
 vantages. There we were satisfied to rest, and then we 
 made our purchase. 
 
 Spring valley it was called, from a large perpetual spring 
 nature had formed there ; and it was the most attractive spot 
 within ten miles of the future metropolis.
 
 414 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 El aguaje de San Jorge it had been named by the early- 
 Mexicans, and by the first Americans the St. George water- 
 hole. In common with the country thereabout it had been 
 used as a sheep range, the springs serving as a herding point 
 and Avatering place, though the padres also here raised vege- 
 tables and fruit for the mission. Not long after the year i860 
 a San Diego lawyer. Judge Ensworth, who was in ill health, 
 obtained a possessory claim to the property at this charming 
 spot, on which he spent a portion of his time. He walled up 
 the spacious springs, and purchasing from Captain Bogert a 
 portion of the lately broken up coal ship, Clarissa Ajidrews, 
 with difficulty had it hauled over to the ground, and used it 
 in the erection of an adobe house. The place, in all some 
 500 acres, including other purchases, I named the Helix 
 Farms, and entered it in my book of hfe to spend my latter 
 days there. I then returned north. 
 
 I was now reaching the point where I felt it absolutely 
 necessary to rest, or I must succumb entirely, through the 
 simple failure of strength and endurance. 
 
 I was born on a farm; my earliest recollections were of 
 farm life ; my childhood's home had been there, and if there 
 was any rest for me on earth, I was sure it would be under 
 like conditions. My work was nearly done. I had no fur- 
 ther desire to mingle with the affairs of the world. I was 
 content with what I had accomplished ; or at least all I could 
 do I had done, and I was sure that in no way could I better 
 become young again than in spending much time with my 
 little ones, in teaching them how to work and be useful, as 
 my devoted parents had taught me. 
 
 It was on the 30th of April, 1886, that I was standing on 
 the steps of the Florence hotel, at San Diego, when my wife 
 drove up in her phaeton and handed me a telegram. "They 
 said it was important," she remarked, and eyed me earnestly 
 as I opened and read it. " What is it ? " she asked, " Is it 
 bad ? " " About as bad as can be," I replied. It was from 
 Mr. N. J, Stone, manager of the History department of the
 
 BURNED OUT! 415 
 
 business, and it read, " Store burning. Little hope of saving 
 it." Half an hour later came another despatch, saying that 
 nothing was saved but the account books. 
 
 The full effect of this calamity flashed through my brain 
 on the instant : the building in which I took much pride, its 
 lofts filled to overflowing witli costly merchandise, all gone, 
 the results of thirty years of labor and economy, of headaches 
 and heart-aches, eaten up by fire in an hour ! I say the full 
 effect of it was upon me ; yet the blow — though for a time 
 it prostrated me, seemed to strike softly, as if coming from a 
 gloved hand, for at the moment I was powerless to oppose it. 
 I continued the occupation of the day as usual, for I was then 
 building for my wife a summer residence overlooking the 
 bay ; but many days of sorrow and anguish were in store for 
 me by reason of this fire. 
 
 In this same hotel, seven months before, I had read of the 
 Crocker fire, a similar catastrophe happening to a house of 
 like business to ours. And I then thought, " This might as 
 well have been Bancroft, but how different the result to 
 me, and hundreds of others." As La Rochefoucauld says : 
 " Nous avons tous assez de force pour supporter les maux 
 d'autrui." And now it was, indeed, Bancroft, and all their 
 fine establishment, the largest of its kind in western America, 
 swept away in the midst of a struggle to place my histories 
 fairly upon the market. Twenty volumes had been issued, 
 and the firm was still $200,000 behind on the enterprise. 
 But it was gaining. Daylight shone as through a tunnel in 
 the distance ; the last month's business had been the most 
 encouraging of all ; when suddenly, office, stock, papers, cor- 
 respondence, printing-presses, type and plates, and the vast 
 book-bindery, filled with sheets and books in every stage of 
 binding, were blotted out, as if seized by Satan and hurled 
 into the jaws of hell. There was not a book left ; there was 
 not a volume of history saved ; nine volumes of history plates 
 were destroyed, besides a dozen other volumes of plates; 
 two carloads of history paper had just come in, and 12,000
 
 4l6 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 bound volumes were devoured by the flames. There was 
 the enterprise left, and a dozen volumes of the history plates 
 in the library basement, and that was all. 
 
 The loss thus in a moment of over half a million of dollars, 
 above all that any policies of insurance would cover, was not 
 the worst of it. Our facilities for work were gone, machinery 
 destroyed, and business connections suddenly snapped; at 
 noon with one of the largest stocks in America, at night with 
 nothing to sell ! I went down to the train, stowed myself 
 away in a sleeper, and came to San Francisco, knowing I had 
 to face the brunt of it and endure the long-drawn agony of 
 the catastrophe. My daughter was with me. Friends and 
 sympathizers met me at Martinez. It was Sunday when I 
 arrived and went to my city quarters. I kept my room until 
 Tuesday; then pulled myself together and went down among 
 the printers and bookbinders, who, poor fellows, were ready 
 to cry when they saw me enter the miserable rooms on Geary 
 street, to which they had been forced to fly with their books. 
 I really felt more for them than for myself, as many of them 
 had been for many years dependent on the business for a live- 
 lihood, and they had wives and little ones to feed. And my 
 poor wife ! I felt for her, from whom I was forced to part so 
 abruptly. But most touching of all was the sympathy of the 
 children. Paul said, " Papa shall have my chicken-money to 
 help build his store," as he turned his face from his mother 
 to hide his tears. At another time, looking at a new shot-gun, 
 he said, " I am glad we have that gun, for now papa will not have 
 to buy one." Little Philip would work all day and all night, 
 and another bantling persisted in going about gathering nails 
 in an old tin can for two days for his father. 
 
 It is such testimonials as these that touch the strong man 
 to the quick, and not formal letters of sympathy and condo- 
 lence. 
 
 It took time to get accustomed to the new order of things. 
 I wandered about the city and noted the many changes of 
 late ; I admired the new style of architecture, and noted the 
 lavish expenditure of the big bonanza men and others in the
 
 BURNED OUT! 417 
 
 immediate vicinity of my still smoking ruins, and I felt sad 
 to think that I had no longer a stake in this proud and wealthy 
 city. For my ground must go. It was heavily mortgaged 
 for money with which to print and publish my history. Seven- 
 teen years before I gathered it up, as I have said, piece 
 by piece, as I could get it, and pay for it, paying for one 
 piece $6000, and for one of like dimensions and equal value 
 adjoining $12,000, thus buying seven lots in order to make 
 up one of the size I wanted. And now it must all go into 
 the capacious maw of some one not foolish enough to write 
 and publish history. 
 
 It makes one's heart sore thus to walk about old familiar 
 haunts and feel one's self a thing of the past. Neither the 
 streets nor the sunshine have the same significance as form- 
 erly. They are not my streets ; it is not my sunshine ; I am 
 an interloper here ; I am the ghost of a dead man stalking 
 about the places formerly frequented while living. 
 
 Death is nothing, however. Every silent stab of the in- 
 numerable incidents that every day arise brings its death 
 pang. To die once is to get off cheaply ; to die fifty times a 
 day even, one may become somewhat accustomed to and so 
 endure it without flinching. But the wife and little ones ; ah ! 
 there's the rub ; all through my life of toil and self-abnegation 
 I had looked forward to the proud position in v/hich I might 
 leave them, prouder by far than any secured by money alone, 
 for I might easier have made ten millions than have collected 
 this library and written this history. I must come down in 
 my pretensions, however, there is no help for it. 
 
 For thirty years, I thought, I have had a bookstore in this 
 town, and the first and finest one here, or within two thousand 
 miles of the place. Whenever I walked the streets, or met 
 an acquaintance, or wanted money, or heard the bells ring 
 for church, or drove into the park, or drew to my breast my 
 child ; whenever I went home at night, or down to business 
 in the morning, or out to my library, or over to my farm, I 
 had this bookstore. And now I have it not. I have none. 
 I never shall have one again. It is I who should have been 
 27
 
 4l8 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 destroyed, and not this hive of industry which provided food 
 for five hundred mouths. 
 
 I dropped at once into a system of rigid economy in per- 
 sonal expenses, though I well knew that the little I could 
 save in this way would make no difference. But there must 
 have been a comfort in stinting myself and making my body 
 feel the pinchings of poverty that my soul felt. 
 
 For days and weeks I studiously avoided passing by the 
 charred remains of my so lately proud establishment. I 
 never liked looking on a corpse, and here was my own 
 corpse, my own smouldering remains, my dead hopes and 
 aspirations, all the fine plans and purposes of my life lying 
 here a heap of ashes, and I could not bear to look upon 
 them. 
 
 Half of the time during these days I was sick in bed mth 
 nervous prostration. Day after day and far into the night I 
 lay there with an approximate statement of the condition of 
 my finances in my hand, holding it before my eyes until I 
 could not see the figures. It seemed, while I held it in my 
 hands, that I was thus meeting the issues which I must pres- 
 ently fight out as soon as I could stand on my legs. It was 
 the long and lingering suspense that piled up the agony ; if I 
 was to be hanged, and could know it at once, face it, and 
 have it over, I could nerve myself for the emergency ; but to 
 keep myself nerved to meet whatever might come, not know- 
 ing what that would be, required all my fortitude and all my 
 strength. 
 
 So far as the mere loss of money was concerned, or that I 
 should be held in less esteem by my fellow-men, I cared noth- 
 ing for that. I never loved money ; few and simple were my 
 wants ; I desired to be held only in such esteem as I deserved, 
 and that estimation most men have in the community, them- 
 selves or their enemies to the contrary notwithstanding. 
 
 A sense of obligation in regard to the duties of life rests 
 to a greater or less degree upon most men. We do not like 
 to see wrong-doing triumph, or the innocent made to suffer ; 
 we do not like to see peculation in office, bribery among of-
 
 BURNED OUT! 419 
 
 ficials, or the greed of monopolists eating up a community ; 
 Ave do not like to see the young squander their inheritance, or 
 women and preachers gambling in stocks. Somewhat simi- 
 larly, we do not like to see an old estabhshed business, a credit 
 and almost a necessity to the community, which year after 
 year lives and grows, giving support to scores of families, 
 become obliterated. 
 
 '• What a blessing your library was not burned," the old- 
 womanish men would say. " It was providential that you had 
 moved it." Blessing ! There was no blessing about it. It 
 was altogether a curse ; and of a truth I should almost have 
 felt relieved if the library had gone too, and so brought my 
 career to a close. I felt as did Shylock, about his money and 
 his life : as well take my history as take from me the means 
 of completing my history. I could curse my fate ; but with 
 more show of reason curse the management which, unknown 
 to me, had crammed full to overflowing eight large floors with 
 precious merchandise in order to take advantage of low 
 freights, at the same time cutting down the volume of insu- 
 rance, so that when a match was carelessly dropped in the 
 basement of the furniture store adjoining, and a two-hours' 
 blaze left only a heap of ashes, the old business was killed as 
 dead as possible. 
 
 The business had not been very popular of late; it had 
 many competitors and consequently many enemies; hence 
 thousands were made happy by its fall. I do not know how 
 we all could have gone to work to confer the greatest pleasure 
 upon the greatest number so effectually as in burning up our 
 establishment. Yet some were kind enough to say that it was 
 a pubUc calamity ; that there was nothing now in the country 
 which might properly be called a bookstore, as compared 
 with what ours was. 
 
 We knew better than others what the calamity signified ; 
 that mercantile houses like ours, as it lately stood, could not 
 be built, any more than mountains could be made, or systems 
 of knowledge evolved, in a day. I had been thirty years in 
 this work of creation ; I had not another thirty years to de-
 
 420 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 vote to a similar work ; therefore I knew I never should have 
 such another bookstore. 
 
 But there were other things in the world besides book- 
 stores ; if I could get rest from severe strain I would be satis- 
 fied; but I could do anything now but rest. The question 
 was : Should I make a struggle to re -build my fortunes, or 
 should I lay down my weary bones and drift as comfortably 
 as I might into the regions of the unconscious ? Were I to 
 consider myself alone ; had I no work to do affecting others, 
 no other principles than the best preservation of self, I could 
 tell quickly what I would do. I would choose some sunny 
 hillside and there follow with my eyes the rising and setting 
 of the sun, until the evening should come when I might go 
 down with it. 
 
 The question was not what I would like to do, but what 
 I ought to do. To be influenced by what would make me 
 the most happy or miserable was putting it upon too low a 
 plane. One man's happiness or misery for a few years is a 
 small matter ; small to his fellow-men, who are thinking mainly 
 of themselves, small to himself, if he stops thinking about him- 
 self, his happiness or misery, and goes about his business in 
 the spirit of doing in the best manner he can the thing which 
 most of all requires next to be done. 
 
 I was tired, as I said ; I could easily sink out of sight, and 
 lie at rest beside my sepulchred hopes. This would be the 
 easiest way out of the difficulty. But I had never been ac- 
 customed to the easiest way, or to regard my pleasure as the 
 first consideration in life. To do as best I was able, every 
 day and every hour, the thing nearest me to be done, whether 
 I liked it or not — that had been the unwritten code by which 
 I had regulated my conduct; and whether I would or not, 
 and all without knowing it, I could now no more deviate 
 from that course than I could change my nature. Except 
 in moments of deepest depression, and then for only a mo- 
 ment, did I think of such a thing as giving up. To face the 
 detail of going over the dead business to save what could be 
 saved sickened me beyond measure, but I had to swallow
 
 BURNED OUT! 42 I 
 
 the dose. I offered to give the remnant of the business to any- 
 one who would assume the responsibihty, and save me the 
 trouble and annoyance of cleaning it up ; but no one would 
 take it, and I was therefore compelled to do it myself. 
 
 I say there were other things than myself to be considered ; 
 indeed, myself was but a sm^H part of it. There was the his- 
 tory, and the men engaged on it, and the pledges which had 
 been made to the public and to subscribers. " Ah, yes," 
 they would say, " this might have been expected, and so we 
 are left with a broken set of books on our hands." There 
 was the business, and a large body of creditors that must be 
 paid. There was my family, and all who should come after 
 me ; if I should fail myself and others now, who would ever 
 after rise up and retrieve our fallen fortunes ? No ; I could 
 do now a hundred times more than any one of them could 
 probably do at any time hereafter, and I would try to do it, 
 though the effort should grind me to powder. Then, too, it 
 was not in the power of a man so constituted and so disci- 
 plined as I had been to sit down beside the business I had 
 established almost in my boyhood, and labored to sustain and 
 build up all through my life, and see the light of it go out, 
 become utterly extinguished, making no effort to save it. 
 
 Building and business being both cut off in an instant, I had 
 not a dollar of income in the world. I did not deem it pos- 
 sible to re-erect the store, the former building being heavily 
 mortgaged. I offered the lot for sale, but no one would buy 
 at a fair price. It took two months to ascertain whether the 
 business was solvent or not ; for although most of the account- 
 books had been saved, there were goods and invoices in tran- 
 sit, and new statements of accounts had to be obtained from 
 every quarter. 
 
 Until the state of the business could be definitely known, 
 I could make no calculations about anything. I might have 
 to sell all I had to pay the debts of the firm. Above all, it 
 might be utterly beyond the question to continue the publi- 
 cation of the history. This would be indeed the greatest 
 calamity that could befall ; for in that event, without flatter-
 
 422 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 ing myself that the world at large would regard the matter in 
 a serious light, to me, and to those more immediately inter- 
 ested in and dependent upon me, all would be lost, not only 
 property and life, but that for which life and property had 
 been given. A half-finished work would be comparatively 
 valueless; and not only would.no one take up the broken 
 threads and continue the several narratives, but there would 
 be little hope of the work ever being again attempted by any 
 one on the extensive and thorough plan I had marked out. 
 It is true that much of the work that I had accomplished 
 would be useful in the hands of another, whether working in 
 conjunction with or under the direction of some society or 
 government, or in a private capacity ; the question was, how- 
 ever, would any government or individual undertake it ? The 
 collected materials would never diminish in importance, but 
 rather increase in value as time passed by, and the indexes, 
 prepared at such a large expenditure of time and labor, would 
 always be regarded as of primary necessity, as the only means 
 by which vast stores of knowledge could be reached. 
 
 But to return to my affairs so greatly disarranged by this 
 unfortunate fire. I kept the lot, for the reason before inti- 
 mated, because I could not sell it, buyers seeming to think it 
 a special imposition that they could not profit by my calamity. 
 When, finally, I knew that I need not sell it, the savings 
 banks sending me word, if I wanted to rebuild to come around 
 and get the money, I found that in accepting their offer I 
 should save at least $100,000, as the difference between the 
 real value of the lot and what, at the moment, I could get 
 for it. Then I determined to go on and rebuild, and at once 
 I began to do so. 
 
 There was now the library work to be considered. While 
 comparatively speaking I was near the end, so near that I 
 could begin to think of retiring to farm life, and a voyage of 
 several years around the world as an educating expedition 
 for my children, yet I had much to do, and this fire added 
 to it a hundred fold, even should it be possible to complete 
 the work at all. I had made out at the library a schedule
 
 BURNED OUT! 423 
 
 showing the exact condition of the work, what had been done, 
 what remained to be done, what plates had been destroyed 
 and what remained, and an estimate of the probable time and 
 expense it would require to complete the history. Two years 
 and $12,000 were the time and money estimated, but both 
 time and money were nearly doubled before the end came. 
 
 It was interesting to observe the diverse attitudes assumed 
 by different persons after the fire, the actions of friends and 
 enemies, in the business and out of it. First, and by far the 
 largest class, were honest and hearty sympathizers, of high 
 and low degree, who regarded our business as a useful one, 
 its objects in the main praiseworthy, and its loss a public ca- 
 lamity. Another class, large enough, but not so large as the 
 other, was our enemies, mostly business competitors, who had 
 long been envious of us, and were now delighted at our dis- 
 comfiture. 
 
 A singular phenomenon was a shoal of business sharks 
 which sailed in around us, seeking something to devour. It 
 is useless citing examples, but I was surprised beyond expres- 
 sion to find among the commercial and industrial ranks, doing 
 business with every claim to honesty and respectabiHty, those 
 scarcely inferior to highway robbers; real estate sharpers, 
 swindling contractors, and lawyers, hunting for some loop- 
 hole to get a finger in — men who by rights should be within 
 the walls of a penitentiary. It was then that I first learned 
 that there were business men in our midst whose principles 
 and practices were worse than those of any three-card monte 
 men, who lived and did business only to get the better of 
 people by some catch, trick, swindle, or other indirection. 
 
 Best of all were the true and noble fellows of our ou^n es- 
 tablishment, who stood by us regardless of any consequences 
 to themselves. All were not of this stamp, however; there 
 were some from whom we expected the most, for whom we 
 had done the most, but who now returned us only evil, show- 
 ing bad hearts — but let them pass. It is a matter for self- 
 congratulation rather than regret, the discovery of a traitor in
 
 424 LITERARY INDUSTRIES, 
 
 the camp, of an unprincipled person in a position of trust 
 and confidence, one held in high esteem, not to say affection- 
 ate regard, — to find him out, to know him that he might be 
 avoided. It is not the open enemy that does us serious injury, 
 but the treacherous friend. And in truth I have encountered 
 few such during my life, either in the business or out of it, 
 few comparatively. Most young men, if ever they have once 
 felt the impressions of true nobility and integrity, will not de- 
 part from them. Some forget themselves and fall into evil 
 ways, but these are few. There is no higher or nobler work, 
 no more pleasing sight, than to watch and assist the un- 
 folding of true nobility of character in young men of good 
 impulses. And while there are so many of inferior ability 
 seeking situations, and so many situations waiting for compe- 
 tent persons, it seems a pity the standard of excellence and 
 intelligence is not raised. 
 
 There were in the ranks of the old business instances of 
 loyalty and devotion which will remain graven on my heart 
 forever — men who, regardless of their own interests, stood 
 by the wreck, determined at any personal hazard, any self- 
 sacrifice, to lend their aid as long as hope remained. I noticed 
 with pride that most of the heads of departments thus re- 
 maining had begun their business career with me in the original 
 house of H. H. Bancroft and company, and had been in full 
 accord with me and my historical work from first to last ; and 
 I swore to myself that, if the business survived, these men 
 would never regret their course, and I do not think they ever 
 have. Nor should my assistants at the library be forgotten, 
 several of whom, besides quite a number at the store, volun- 
 tarily cut down their salaries in order to make as light as 
 possible the burden of completing my work. 
 
 In many varied moods were we met by different persons 
 with whom we had dealings. We did not propose to fail, or 
 compromise, or a.sk an exten.sion, as long as we had a dollar 
 wherewith to pay our debts ; but there was no use disguising 
 the fact that the business had received a severe blow, and 
 might not survive it. Among the publishers and manufac-
 
 BURNED OUT! 425 
 
 turers of the eastern United States are men of every breadth 
 of mind and size of soul. During this memorable year we 
 took an inventory of them, sizing them up, so to speak, at 
 about their value. Nearly all extended to us their sympathy, 
 most of which was heart-felt. Quite a number went further, 
 and manifested a disposition to help us to regain our feet ; 
 but this amounted to little, practically, though for the feelings 
 which prompted it we were grateful. 
 
 There was one man especially, a Massachusetts merchant, 
 with whom we had no intimate acquaintance, and on whom 
 we had no special claim. We had bought goods from him 
 as from others; but he was not like some of his locality, 
 wholly given to gain, with bloodless instincts and cold wor- 
 ship of wealth. He met us openly, frankly, with something 
 more than machine-made sympathy, and asked to share with 
 us our loss. Never shall we forget the courtesy and kind- 
 ness of this gentleman, or the firm he represents, the minds 
 and hearts of whose members are so far above the millions 
 they command. 
 
 On the whole, we considered ourselves very fairly treated, 
 both at the west and at the east, in the adjustment of diffi- 
 culties arising from the fire. The insurance companies were 
 entitled to every praise, paying their losses promptly before 
 they were due. New friendships were made, and old friend- 
 ships widened and cemented anew. I v/as specially gratified 
 by the confidence moneyed men seemed to repose in me, 
 granting me all the accommodations I desired, and thus en- 
 abling me quickly to improve my fortunes, as I will more 
 fully narrate in the next and final chapter.
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 THE HISTORY COMPANY AND THE BANCROFT COMPANY. 
 
 Nihil infelicius est cui nihil unquam evenit adversi, non llcuit enim 
 illi se experiri. — Seneca. 
 
 Prosperity inspires an elevation of mind even in the mean-spirited, so 
 that they show a certain degree of high-mindedness and chivalry in the 
 lofty position in which fortune has placed them ; but the man who pos- 
 sesses real fortitude and magnanimity will show it by the dignity of his 
 behavior under losses, and in the most adverse fortune. — Plutarch. 
 
 AS the goods arrived which were in transit at the time of the 
 fire, they were put into a store of which we took a year's 
 lease in the Grand hotel, on Market street. Orders came in 
 and customers called, making their purchases, though in a 
 limited way. Considering the crippled condition of the busi- 
 ness and the general prostration of its aftairs, the result was 
 more favorable than might have been expected. In due time 
 I was able to ascertain that with close collections, and mak- 
 ing the most of everything, the business was not only solvent, 
 but had a margin of $100,000 above all liabilities. To bring 
 about this happy state of things, however, the utmost care and 
 watchfulness, with the best of management, were necessary; 
 for, while returns were slow and precarious, liabilities were 
 certain and defined. 
 
 Meanwhile a number of detached concerns sprang up, 
 thrown off from the parent institution in the whirl of the 
 great convulsion. The history department was segregated 
 from the old business, and reorganized and incorporated 
 under the name of The History Company. 
 
 The bare fact of loss of property, — not being able to count 
 myself worth as much as formerly by so many thousands, — 
 
 426
 
 THE HISTORY COMPANY AND THE BANCROFT COMPANY. 427 
 
 as I have before intimated, never gave me a moment's pang or 
 uneasiness. From the first the main question, and the only- 
 question, was, could the publishing business pay its debts? 
 If the Market street lot, the library, my farms, and all other 
 property had to be sacrificed to liquidate the indebtedness of 
 the business, thereby arresting the publication of thf histor}', 
 and sending me forth empty-handed to earn my bread, — I 
 frankly admit that I could not face this possibility without 
 flinching. But when it was ascertained that the old business 
 was solvent, and would pay its debts without further sacrifice 
 of my resources, I wrote my wife, who was still in San Diego 
 attending to my affairs in that city, that she need have no 
 fear of the future, for if I lived we would yet have enough 
 and to spare, without considering what might happen in south- 
 em California. 
 
 Buying an additional lot, so as to make a width of one 
 hundred feet on Stevenson street, having still seventy-five feet 
 frontage on Market street, in something over a year I had 
 completed on the old site a neat and substantial edifice, a 
 feature of Market street, and of the city, which I called The 
 History Building. Its architecture was original and artistic, 
 the structure roomy and commodious, and it was so named 
 in consideration of my historical efforts. 
 
 I had seen from the first that it would be necessary as soon 
 as possible, if I expected to get another start in the world, to 
 secure some steady income, both in San Diego and San Fran- 
 cisco. In the former place, property was so rapidly increasing 
 in value, that on account of increased taxation and street as- 
 sessments a portion of it would have to be sold unless it could 
 be made productive. Some of it, the outside lands, was sold, 
 and with the proceeds, and what I could scrape together in 
 San Francisco, we managed to erect a business building there, 
 which brought in good returns. Then there was the ground 
 rent from a hundred lots or so, which helped materially. No 
 money which I had ever handled gave me half such pleasure 
 as that which I was able to send to my wife at this time ; for 
 although it lessened and made more dilficult my chances of
 
 428 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 success in San Francisco, it removed my family further every 
 day from possible want, and thus gave me renewed strength 
 for the battle. 
 
 Up to this time the publication and sale of my historical 
 series had been conducted as part of the general business, 
 under the management of Nathan J, Stone. As this business 
 had assumed large proportions, sometimes interfering with 
 the other departments, and not always in harmony with them 
 or with the general management, it was finally thought best 
 to organize an independent company, having for its principal 
 object the publication of my books, together with general 
 book-publishing, and acting at the same time as an agency 
 for selected eastern publications. 
 
 It may be not out of place to give here some account of 
 the manner in which the publication and sale of this historical 
 series was conducted, with a brief biography of the man who 
 managed it ; for if there was anything unusual in gathering 
 the material and writing these histories, the method by which 
 they were published and placed in the hands of readers was 
 no less remarkable. 
 
 Ordinarily, for a commercial man formally to announce to 
 the world that he was about to write and publish a series of 
 several histories, which with preliminary and supplemental 
 works would number in all thirty-nine volumes, would be 
 regarded, to say the least, as a somewhat visionary proposi- 
 tion. Those best capable of appreciating the amount of time, 
 money, labor, and steadfastness of purpose involved, would 
 say that such an one had no conception of what he was un- 
 dertaking, did not know in fact what he was talking about, 
 and the chances were a hundred to one he would never com- 
 plete the work. 
 
 Still further out of the way would it seem for the publishers 
 of the series to bring forward a prospectus and invite sub- 
 scriptions beforehand for the whole thirty-nine volumes at 
 once. Such a i)roceeding had never been heard of since pub- 
 lishing began. It could not be done. Why not adopt the 
 usual course, announce the first work of the series and take
 
 THE HISTORY COMPANY AND THE BANCROFT COMPANY. 429 
 
 subscriptions therefor ? This done, publish the second ; and 
 so on. People will not subscribe for so large a work so far 
 in advance of its completion, Avith all the attendant uncertain- 
 ties. So said those of widest experience, and who were sup- 
 posed to be the best capable of judging. 
 
 We well knew that no New York or I^ondon publisher 
 would undertake the enterprise on such terms. We also 
 knew that no book, or series of books, had ever been written 
 as these had been. We did not know that the publication 
 and sale could be successfully effected on this basis, but we 
 determined to try, and for the follo\\ang reasons : 
 
 First, properly to place this work before men of discrimi- 
 nation and taste in such a way as to make them fully under- 
 stand it, its inception and execution, the ground it covers, 
 and its peculiar methods, required men of no common ability 
 and persistence, and such men must receive adequate com- 
 pensation for superior intelligence and energy. To sell a 
 section of the work would by no means pay them for their 
 time and labor. 
 
 Secondly, when once the patron should understand the 
 nature and scope of the work, how it was originated and how 
 executed, as a rule, if he desired any of it, he would want it 
 all. As is now well known, any one section of the series, 
 though complete in itself, is but one of a number, all of which 
 are requisite to the completion of the plan. 
 
 Thirdly, considering the outlay of time and money on each 
 section, a subscription to one volume only, or one set of vol- 
 umes, would in no way compensate or bring a fair return to 
 the publisher. Throughout the series are constant references 
 and cross-references, by means of which repetitions, otherwise 
 necessary for the proper understanding of each several part, 
 are avoided, thus making, for instance, the history of Mexico 
 of value to California, and vice versa. 
 
 When a book is published, clearly the purpose is that it 
 should be circulated. PubHshing implies sending forth. Print 
 and stack up in your basement a steamboat load of books, 
 and until they are sent out they are not published. And they
 
 430 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 must be sent out to bona fide subscribers, and placed in the 
 hands of those who value them sufficiently to pay for them. 
 To print and present does not answer the purpose ; neither 
 individual influence nor the authority of government can give 
 a book circulation, or cause it to be regarded as of intrinsic 
 value. It must be worth buying in the first place, and must 
 then be bought to make it valued. 
 
 In the matter of patronage, I would never allow myself to 
 be placed in the attitude of a mendicant. I had devoted 
 myself to this work voluntarily, not through hope of gain, or 
 from any motive of patriotism or philanthropy, or because of 
 any idea of superior ability, or a desire for fame, but simply 
 because it gave me pleasure to do a good work well. Nat- 
 urally, and very properly, if I might be permitted to accom- 
 plish a meritorious work, I would like the approbation of my 
 fellow-men ; if I should be able to confer a benefit on the 
 country, it would be pleasant to see it recognized; but to 
 trade upon this sentiment, or allow others to do so, would be 
 most repugnant. 
 
 Therefore, it was my great desire that if ever the work 
 should be placed before the public for sale, it should be done 
 in such a manner as to command and retain for it the re- 
 spect and approbation of the best men. It would be so 
 easy for an incompetent or injudicious person to bring the 
 work into disfavor, in failing to make its origin, its plan, 
 and purpose, properly understood. In due time fortune 
 directed to the publisliers the man of all others best fitted 
 for the task. 
 
 Nathan Jonas Stone was born in Webster, Merrimac coun- 
 ty. New Hampshire, June ii, 1843, which spot was likewise 
 the birthplace of his father, Peter Stone. Both of his grand- 
 fathers were captains in the army, one serving in the revolu- 
 tionary war, and the other in the war of 181 2. 
 
 Mr. Stone's eariy life was spent on a farm, working during 
 summer, and attending school or teaching in winter. No 
 better training can be devised for making strong and self- 
 reliant men; no better place was ever seen for laying the 
 
 I
 
 THE HISTORY COMPANY AND THE BANCROFT COMPANY, 43 1 
 
 foundations of firm principles, and knitting the finer webs of 
 character, than a New England country home. 
 
 In 1863, being then twenty years of age, Mr. Stone came 
 to California by way of Panama, arriving in San Francisco 
 on the 1 8th of August, with just ten cents in his pocket. In- 
 vesting his capital in Bartlett pears, he seated himself on the 
 end of a log, near the wharf where he had landed, and ate 
 them. Thus fortified for whatever fate might have in store, 
 he set forth to find work. He knew not a soul in the city, 
 having cast himself adrift in a strange country, at this early 
 age, with nothing to depend on but his own native resources, 
 though knowing full well that there was no such thing as star- 
 vation for a man of his metal. 
 
 Times were very dull, and easy places with good pay were 
 not abundant. Nor did he even search for one; but after 
 walking about for the greater part of the day, making his 
 first tour of observation in the country, about five o'clock he 
 saw posted on Kearny street a notice of workmen wanted, 
 and was about making inquiries concerning the same, when 
 he was accosted by a man driving a milk-wagon, who asked 
 him if he was looking for employment. Stone replied that 
 he was : whereupon the man engaged him on the spot, at 
 forty dollars a month and board. Three months afterward 
 he was offered and accepted the superintendence of the in- 
 dustrial school farm, acting later as teacher and deputy super- 
 intendent. 
 
 In 1867 he entered the house of H. H. Bancroft and com- 
 pany, acting as manager first of the subscription department, 
 and then of the wholesale department. In 1872 he became 
 interested in the awakening civilization of Japan, with its 
 manifold opportunities, and opened business on his own ac- 
 count in Yokohama, where his transactions soon reached a 
 million of dollars a year, importing general merchandise and 
 exporting the products of the country. He placed a printing- 
 press in the mikado's palace, which led to the establishment 
 of a printing bureau, and the cutting out and casting into 
 type of the Japanese characters.
 
 432 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 Obliged by ill-health to abandon business, he returned to 
 San Francisco in 1878 completely prostrated; but after a 
 summer at his old home, he recovered, his health still fur- 
 ther improving during a four years' residence at Santa Rosa, 
 California. 
 
 Mr. Stone had followed me in my historical efforts with 
 great interest from the first. He had watched the gradual 
 accumulation of material, and the long labor of its utilization. 
 He believed thoroughly in the work, its plan, the methods by 
 which it was wrought out, and the great and lasting good 
 which would accrue to the country from its publication. He 
 was finally induced to accept the important responsibility of 
 placing the work before the world, of assuming the general 
 management of its publication and sale, and devoting his life 
 thereto. No one could have been better fitted for this ar- 
 duous task. With native ability were united broad experience 
 and a keen insight into men and affairs. Self-reliant, and tire- 
 less in his efforts, bold, yet cautious, careful in speech, of un- 
 flagging energy, and ever jealous for the reputation of the 
 work, he entered the field determined on success. A plan was 
 devised wholly unique in the annals of book-publishing, no 
 less original, no less difficult of execution than were the meth- 
 ods by which alone it was possible for the author to write the 
 work in the first place. And with unflinching faith and loy- 
 alty, Mr. Stone stood by the proposition until he made of it 
 a most complete success. 
 
 Among the most active and efficient members of The His- 
 tory Company is George Howard Morrison, a native of Calais, 
 Maine, where he was born November 8, 1845. His ancestors 
 were of that Scotch-Irish mixture, with a tincture of English, 
 which produces strong men, mentally and physically. On 
 the father's side the line of sturdy Scotch farmers and man- 
 ufacturers, with a plentiful intermixture of lawyers and doctors, 
 may be traced back for generations ; the mother brought to 
 the alliance the Irish name of McCudding. George was one 
 of nine children. Owinfr to failures in business their father
 
 THE HISTORY COMPANY AND THE BANCROFT COMPANY. 433 
 
 was unable to carry out his design of giving them a liberal 
 education, but in New England there is always open the vil- 
 lage school, which many a prominent American has made suf- 
 fice. It certainly speaks volumes for the self-reliance and 
 enterprise of the boy, when we find George, at the age of 
 fourteen, alone, and without a friend or acquaintance in the 
 country, applying for a situation at the office of a prominent 
 lawyer in Sacramento. 
 
 " What can you do ? " asked the lawyer. 
 
 " Anything that any boy can do who is no bigger nor abler 
 than I am," was the reply. 
 
 The law^yer was pleased, took the lad to his home, gave him 
 a place in his office, and initiated him in the mysteries of the 
 profession. There he remained, until the growing importance 
 of the Comstock development drew him to Nevada, where 
 he made and lost several fortunes. Entering politics, he was 
 made assessor of Virginia City in 1866, represented Storey 
 county in the legislature in 1873, and was chief clerk of the 
 assembly, introducing a bill which greatly enlarged the use- 
 fulness of the state orphan asylum. In 1870 Mr. Morrison 
 married Mary E, Howard, the estimable and accomplished 
 daughter of John S. Ho\vard, type-founder, of Boston, four 
 children, Mildred, Lillie, George, and Helen, being the fruits 
 of this union. 
 
 Mr. Morrison was one of the first subscribers to the history, 
 in which he became deeply interested, finally joining his fate 
 with that of The History Company and of The Bancroft 
 Company, of both of which companies he is a director, and, 
 of the former, secretary. 
 
 As The History Building drcAV near completion, the pro- 
 position arose to move the business back into its old quarters ; 
 but it had become so crippled in resources and condition that 
 I did not care to assume the labor, risk, and responsibility of 
 its resuscitation. 
 
 I had long been anxious to withdraw from business rather 
 than go deeper into it. The thought lay heavily upon me 
 of taking again upon my already well-burdened shoulders the 
 28
 
 434 LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 
 
 risks and duties of a wide-spread business, with endless detail 
 and scant capital ; I did not care for the money should it 
 succeed; I wanted nothing further now than to get away 
 from everything of the kind. 
 
 Yet this was my old business which I had established in 
 my boyhood, and worked out day by day and year by year 
 into vast and successful proportions ; for there had never been 
 a year since its foundation that it had not grown and flour- 
 ished, and that as a rule at a steady rate of increase. I had 
 for it an affection outside of any mercenary interest. Through 
 good and evil times it had stood bravely by me, by my fam- 
 ily, my history, my associates, and employes, and I could not 
 desert it now. I could not see it die or go to the dogs with- 
 out an effort to save it ; for I felt that such would be its fate 
 if I neglected the opportunity to restore it to its old locality, 
 and regain somewhat of its old power and prestige. The 
 country was rapidly going forward. There must soon be a 
 first-class bookstore in San Francisco. There was none such 
 now, and if ours did not step to the front and assume that 
 position, some other one would. Immediately after the fire 
 the remarks were common, " It is a public loss " ; " We have 
 nowhere, now, to go for our books " ; " Your store was not 
 appreciated until it was gone." 
 
 My family were now well provided for, through the rise 
 of real estate in San Diego. What I had besides need not 
 affect them one way or the other. I felt that I had the right 
 to risk it in a good cause — every dollar of it, and my life in 
 addition, if so I chose. After all, it was chiefly a question of 
 health and endurance. I determined to try it; once more I 
 would adventure, and succeed or sink all. 
 
 So I laid my plans accordingly, and in company with W. 
 B. Bancroft, Mi-. CoUey, and Mr. Borland, all formerly con- 
 nected with the original house of H. H. Bancroft and Com- 
 pany, I organized and incorporated The Bancroft Company, 
 and moved the old business back upon the old site, but into 
 new and more elegant quarters. 
 
 I 
 
 I
 
 THE HISTORY COMPANY AND THE BANCROFT COMPANY. 435 
 
 And now my story is told, the story of my works, and the 
 story of my life. Looking back over all the long stretch of 
 years that I have carried this heavy burden, though I should 
 not care to assume it again, yet I am not sorry to have borne 
 it. Of the various motives which urge men to the Avriting of 
 books, perhaps the most worthy, worthier by far than love of 
 fame, is the belief that the author has something to say which 
 will commend itself to his fellow-man, which perchance his 
 fellow-man maybe the better for hearing. If I have fulfilled 
 in some measure even the first of these conditions, then has 
 my labor not been in vain.
 
 I
 
 INDEX. 
 
 B 
 
 Adams, C. F., meeting with, 174. 
 Alaska, material for hist, of, 299- 
 
 307, 352-3- 
 
 Alcmany, J. S., archiepiscopal ar- 
 chives, 254-5. 
 
 Allen, A., dictation of, 285. 
 
 Altamirano, Ign. M., his literary- 
 standing in Mex., 390. 
 
 Alvarado, J. B., his important dic- 
 tation, xix ; biog., 222-3; Val- 
 lejo's negotiations with, 223-6 ; 
 material furnished by, 225-8, 
 230. 
 
 Amador, Chimalpopoca, his talents, 
 
 391- 
 Amat, Bishop, meeting with, 267-8, 
 
 277- 
 
 American Antiquarian Society, 
 hon. member of, 189. 
 
 American Ethnological Society, 
 hon. member of, 189. 
 
 Ames, J. G., meeting with, 181. 
 
 Anderson, A. C, reminiscences of, 
 285, MS., 289. 
 
 Andrade, J. M., library of, 96-101. 
 
 Applegate, J., meeting with, 296. 
 
 Archive Gen. y Publico de Mex. — 
 descript. of, 396-8. 
 
 Armijo (family) of N, Max., kind- 
 ness of, 411. 
 
 Arnaz, J., reminiscences of, 279. 
 
 Ash, J., material furnished by, 285. 
 
 'Atlantic Monthly,' reviews 'Na- 
 tive Races,' 180. 
 
 Authors, characteristics of, 14-18 ; 
 habits of, 379-83 ; several nota- 
 
 ^ ble Mexicans, 396. 
 
 Avila, J., dictation of, 278. 
 
 Avila, M., courtesy of, 280. 
 
 Babbitt, A. T., mention of, 410. 
 
 Bacon, J. M., dictation of, 295. 
 
 Baldwin, N., mention of, 410. 
 
 Bancroft Company, The, organ- 
 ization of, 434. 
 
 Bancroft, Geo., meeting with, 176. 
 
 Bancroft, H. H., early mental de- 
 velopment, ix ; business capac- 
 ity, ix-xx ; literary aspirations, 
 methods and work, xx-xxvii ; pe- 
 cuniary difficulties surmounted, 
 xxviii-xxix ; family relations, 
 xxix ; character, xxix-xxxi ; de- 
 votion to his work, 2-4 ; works, 
 appreciation of, in Cal., 9-1 1; 
 ancestry and relatives, 27-31; 
 boyhood, 31-46; education, 35, 
 42-6; early career, 46-55 ; char- 
 acter, 47, 50-1 ; goes to Cal., 
 1852, 56-7; at the mines, 62-4; 
 disappointments, 65-8 ; at Cres- 
 cent City, 1853-5, 69-71 ; home 
 again, 1855, 72-4; return to Cal., 
 1856, 76-7; firm established by, 
 77-8; first marriage, 78; busi- 
 ness affairs, 78-86; books and 
 material collected by, 89-107, 
 177-8, 182, 207-14, 259-62, 
 263-5 ; library building, 108-12 ; 
 literary projects, 129-32 ; ill 
 health, 132-3 ; resolves to write, 
 133-5 ; preparation of material, 
 136-45; assistants, 138, 154; 
 scope of the work, 147, 153; 
 despondency, 149 ; impulse to 
 write, 150; literary efforts, 152- 
 4, 157; 'History of the Pa- 
 cific States,' 153 ; ' Native Races 
 of the Pacific States,' 158-66;
 
 438 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 eastern tour, 1874, 170-83 ; meet- 
 ing with Gray, 170-1 ; with 
 Lowell, 171-2; with Phillips, 
 172-3; with Whittier, 173-4; 
 with Adams, 174; with Park- 
 man, 174-5 > correspondence 
 with Holmes, 1 75 ; meeting with 
 G. Bancroft, 176; with Draper, 
 176; with Nordhoff, 176-7; with 
 Porter, 178; with King, 178-9; 
 with Spofford, i8i-2; with Ames, 
 181 ; agreement with Longmans 
 & Co., 183 ; correspondence with 
 Lubbock, 184; with Spencer, 
 185 ; with Latham, 185 ; with 
 Lecky, 185 ; with Dawkins, 187; 
 with Tylor, 187-8; made hon. 
 member of societies, 189 ; nego- 
 tiations, etc., with Vallejo, 202- 
 14 ; manuscripts procured by, 
 207-14, 220, 226-8, 230-3, 235-6, 
 263-81, 285-96 ; negotiations 
 with Vallejo, 202-14; second 
 marriage, 242-4; visit to Sutter, 
 245-8; archives collected by, 
 251-3,254-8; meeting, etc.,v/ith 
 Judge Hayes, 259-62, 273-4; 
 with Amat, 267; with Vila, 
 268-9 > with Gonzalez, 269-70 ; 
 Romo, 270-2 ; northern trip, 
 282-97 ; meeting with Begljie, 
 282 ; with Elliott, 282-4 ; with 
 Richards, 284; with Tod, 287; 
 with McKinlay, 285 ; with Tol- 
 mie, 285 ; with Finlayson, 285 ; 
 with Anderson, 285 ; with Evans, 
 292 ; with Brown, 294 ; fire in 
 1873, 315-6; newspapers, col- 
 lection of, 317; Draper's letter 
 to, 318-9; Plolmes's letter to, 
 319; literary method, 330-48; 
 on retiring from business, 34 1-3 ; 
 correspondence with Swan, 
 351-2; with Gonzalez, 354-5; 
 with Brioso, 355 ; with Cuadra, 
 355-6; with Barrios, 336; hab- 
 its and regulations of, 373-83 ; 
 trip to Mexico, 1883-4, 384-6 ; 
 conversation with U.S. minister 
 in Mexico, 389-90; meetings 
 with prominent Mexicans, 390-5; 
 
 with Mormons in Utah, 408-9; 
 with prom, men in Col., Wy., 
 and N. Mex., 409-11; acquisition 
 ofproperty, and future plans, 412- 
 4 ; San Francisco establishment 
 burned, 414-22 ; loyalty vs. dis- 
 loyalty, 423-4 ; plans of recon- 
 struction, 424-5 ; organization 
 of new business houses, 426-34. 
 
 Bancroft, W. B., mention of, 434. 
 
 Barrios, President, correspondence 
 with, 356. 
 
 Barroeta, Dr. and Prof., kindness 
 at San Luis Potosi, 386. 
 
 Begbie, Sir, M. B., courtesy of, 282. 
 
 Biblioteca Nacional de Mex., ex- 
 tensive description of, 395-6. 
 
 Bokkelen, J. J. H. Van, dictation 
 of, 290. 
 
 Bookstores, Eng. and cont., 92-6. 
 
 Boronda, C, dictation of, 280. 
 
 Bosquetti, career of, 126-8; 349. 
 
 Brioso, Minister, correspondence 
 with, 355. 
 
 British Columbia, material for hist, 
 of, 263-91. 
 
 'British Quarterly' reviews * Native 
 Races', 189. 
 
 Brown, J., London agent for 
 ' Native Races,' 183-6. 
 
 Brown, J. H., material furnished 
 by, 294. 
 
 Buckingham, W., material fur- 
 nished by, 286-7. 
 
 Buffalo Hist. Soc, hon. member 
 of, 189. 
 
 Burgos, bookstores of, 95. 
 
 ' California,' hist, of, its impartiality 
 and cxhaustiveness, xviii-xxi ; 
 development of, 4, 13 ; condition 
 of, 1856,6; NordhotT's remarks 
 on, 8; Grace Greenwood's re- 
 marks on, I1-12; literature in, 
 II-12; effect of climate, 1I-I2, 
 19-20; mining in, 60-I ; arch- 
 ives of, 250-8 ; material for his- 
 tory of, 322.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 439 
 
 'California Inter Pocula,' mention 
 of, 328 ; reason for publication 
 
 of, 363-4- 
 
 * California Pastoral,' mention of, 
 
 32S ; reason for publication of, 
 
 363- 
 
 Cannon, Geo. Q., mention of, 409. 
 
 Carey, J. M., prom, man of Wyom- 
 ing, mention of, 410. 
 
 Carrillo, P., papers and reminis- 
 cences of, 277. 
 
 • Cartography of the Pacific Coast,' 
 
 compilation of, 314-5. 
 
 Cazeneuve,F. G., Mexican journal- 
 ist, mention of, 394. 
 
 Ceballos, J, Mexican statesman, 
 mention of, 394. 
 
 Central America, authorities for 
 hist, of, 321 ; material for hist, 
 of, 354-8. 
 
 Cerruti, E., character and abilities, 
 192-6; at library work, 192-6; 
 negotiations with Vallejo, 202- 
 14; ' Ramblings ' MS., '216-20; 
 intercourse with Alvarado, 
 226-8; with Vallejo, 230-1, 
 233-4 ; death, 240. 
 
 Chad wick, S. F., meeting with, 292. 
 
 Charles, W., material furnished bv, 
 2S6. 
 
 Chavero, Alfredo,his literary stand- 
 ing, 390. 
 
 Chaves, of Santa Fe, kindness of, 
 411. 
 
 Cholula, descript. of, 399-402. 
 
 ' Chronicles of the Builders of the 
 Commonwealth,' necessary com- 
 plement to the historical series, 
 1-2, 363, 372 ; value of to future 
 generations, 4-5 ; magazine of 
 knowledge, 124; importance of 
 living witnesses, 151 ; justice to 
 founders of empire, 32S. 
 
 Church, J. A., reviews ' Native 
 Races,' 181. 
 
 Coleman, W. T. , material furnished 
 by, 369. 
 
 Colorado, hist, of, xviii ; cond. of, 
 409 ; data for her hist., 409-10. 
 
 Colley, F. A., mention of, 434. 
 
 Cook, Capt., in Alaska, 303, 305. 
 
 Compton, P. N., dictation of, 285. 
 Comapala, Father, meeting with, 
 
 267. 
 Corlett, W. W., mention of, 410. 
 Coronel, I., papers of, 277. 
 Crescent City, early times there, 
 
 68-71. 
 Cuadra, President, correspondence 
 
 with, 355-6. 
 Cushing, C, sale of his library, 104. 
 Cunniffe, of Las Cruces, kindness 
 
 of, 411. 
 
 D 
 
 Damon, S. E., material supplied 
 
 by, 360. 
 Dana, C, courtesy of, 280. 
 Dawkins, W. B., correspondence 
 
 with, 187. 
 Deady, M. P., dictation of, 295-6. 
 Deans, J., dictation of, 285. 
 Defouri, of Santa Fe, kindness of, 
 
 410. 
 Dempster, C. J., material furnished 
 
 by, 369-70- 
 
 Derby, G. H., mention of, 44, 45 ; 
 character, 49, 51 ; business ven- 
 tures, 54; death of, 65. 
 
 Derby, J. C, mention of, 55, 177. 
 
 Derby, Mrs., marriage of, 41 ; 
 death of husband, 65 ; business 
 relations with, 74-5. 
 
 Deschamps, remarks on the An- 
 drade collection, 100. 
 
 Diaz, Porfirio, presid. of Mex., re- 
 marks on, 394-5. 
 
 Dominguez, D., material furnished 
 by, 279-80. 
 
 Dorland, Thomas A. C, mention 
 of, 434. 
 
 Douglas, J. M., material furnished 
 by, 286. 
 
 Douglas, Lady, mention of, 2S2, 
 2S6, 2S9. 
 
 Douglas, Sir J., mention of, 2S5-6. 
 
 Downey, J. G., kindness of, 277. 
 
 Downey, S. \V., mention of, 410. 
 
 Downs, Francis, service of, 411. 
 
 Doyle, J. T., material furnished by, 
 361.
 
 440 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Draper,J. W., interview with, 176; 
 
 correspondence with, 318-19. 
 Dry Creek, mining on, 1852, 61-3. 
 
 E 
 
 ' Edinburgh Review,' article on 
 
 'Native Races,' 189. 
 Egan, Judge, kindness of, 279. 
 Eldridge, H. S., mention of, 409. 
 EllicoLt, Capt., dictation of, 291. 
 Ellison, Sam., keeper of archives at 
 
 Santa F^, 410. 
 Elwyn, T., material furnished by, 
 
 285. 
 Elliott, A. C. , meeting with, 2S2-4 ; 
 
 material furnished by, 285. 
 • Essays and Miscellany,' mention 
 
 of, 328. 
 Estudillo, J. M., dictation of, 278. 
 Etholen, Gov., courtesy of, 353. 
 Evans, Elwood, materials supplied 
 
 by, 292 ; manuscript furnished by, 
 
 ,350-1- 
 Ezquer, I., dictation of, 2S0. 
 
 Farwcll, S., material furnished by, 
 286. 
 
 Fernandez, R., gov. of Mex., men- 
 tion of, 393. 
 
 Finlayson, R., reminiscences of, 
 285 ; manuscript of, 289. 
 
 Fiske, of Santa Fe, kindness of,4ii. 
 
 Filzsinions, Father, information 
 furnished by, 356. 
 
 Ford, manuscript of, 361. 
 
 Foster, J., dictation of, 278, 
 
 Fuentes y Muniz, J., Mcx'n min. 
 of the treasury, mention of, 394. 
 
 •Galaxy' reviews ' Native Races,' 
 
 iSi. 
 Garay, F. dc, Mcx'n engineer of 
 
 ability, 393. 
 
 Garcia Torres, V., character, and 
 kind assistance, 390. 
 
 Garcia, I., dictation of, 280. 
 
 'Globus, 'articles on' Native Races,' 
 187. 
 
 Gonzalez, President, correspond- 
 ence with, 354-5. 
 
 Gonzalez, R., dictation of, 279. 
 
 Gonzalez, Father, visit to, 269-70. 
 
 Good, Rev., manuscript of, 287. 
 
 Grant, Heber J., mention of, 409. 
 
 Greenwood, Grace, remarks on 
 Cab, 11-12. 
 
 Greenbaum, kindness of, 303. 
 
 Grover, Senator, dictation of, 295. 
 
 Guadalupe, Virgin of, information 
 on, 392-3- 
 
 Guerra, De la, papers of, 279. 
 
 H 
 
 Hale, E. E., correspondence with, 
 
 175-6. 
 Hancock, S., manuscript of, 290. 
 Hanford, Mrs. A. J., manuscript of, 
 
 291. 
 Hartnell, W., papers of, 232-3; 
 
 biog, 232-3. 
 Harvey, Mrs. mention of, 292. 
 Hawes, Father, kindness of, 27^^. 
 Hawthorne, J. C., mention of, 
 
 293- 
 
 Hayes, Benj., collection of, 259-61 ; 
 arrangement with, 273-4; mate- 
 rial supplied by, 279. 
 
 Hayford, J. H., mention of, 410. 
 
 Hayward, C. B., kindness of, 411. 
 
 Helmcken, Dr., material supjjlicd 
 by, 285. 
 
 Hernandez y Ddvalos, J. E., Mex. 
 writer, biograph. sketch, 391-2. 
 
 Hills, George, material furnished 
 by, 286. 
 
 History Building, construction of, 
 427; occupation, 433-4. 
 
 History Company, The, organiza- 
 tion and oljjcct, 426-33 ; occupi'CS 
 the History Building, 433-4. 
 
 ' History of the Pacific States,' 
 method of preparation, xviii-
 
 INDEX. 
 
 441 
 
 xxxi; primary object, 2 ; origin- 
 ality of plan, 3-4; field for, im- 
 portance of, 5-6; appreciation of 
 in Cal., 9-1 1; books and mate- 
 rial collected for, 8-107, 177-8, 
 182, 231-3, 259-62, 280, 299-307, 
 317, 322,349-6^. 368-70; prep- 
 aration of material, 136-45 ; 
 scope of work, 147,153; intro- 
 duction to, 153, 156; manuscripts 
 procured for, 207-14, 220, 226-8, 
 230-3. 235-6, 263-5, 266,275-81, 
 300 ; selection of type, 313; mag- 
 nitude of the task, 319-21 ; plan 
 of work, 321-3, 326-8; printing 
 and publication of, 326—8; further 
 search for material, 403-1 1 ; pe- 
 cuniary condition after fire of 
 April, 1886, 415-16; pub. and 
 sale, how conducted, 426-30. 
 
 Holmes, Oliver Wendell, corre- 
 spondence with, 175, 319. 
 
 Howells, W. H., correspondence 
 with, 179-80. 
 
 Hoyt, John W., mention of, 410. 
 
 Hudson's Bay Company, headquar- 
 ters of, 297. 
 
 Icazbalceta, Joaq. Garcia, Mex'n 
 antiquary and bibliographer, 394. 
 
 Iglesias, Jose M., Mex'n states- 
 man, 393. 
 
 ' Independent ' reviews * Native 
 Races,' 189-90. 
 
 Indico, J., keeper of Mex'n ar- 
 chives, mention of, 394, 398. 
 
 Innokentie, Bishop, courtesyof,353. 
 
 Inquisition, records ofinMex., 398. 
 
 Jackson, E., mention of, 186. 
 Janssens, A., dictation of, 279. 
 Jennings, W., mention of, 409. 
 Jesuits, on extinction of, in Mex., 
 
 398. 
 Journals and journalists in Mex. 
 
 under gov. pay, 390. 
 
 K 
 
 Kasherarof, Father, information 
 
 furnished by, 301. 
 Kenny, G. L., character, etc., of, 
 
 53-4; goes to Cal., 1852, 56-7; 
 
 mention of, 62,65 5 partnerships, 
 
 66-7, 77. 
 King, Clarence, character of, 178 ; 
 
 meeting with Bancroft, 178-9; 
 
 reviews' Native Races,' 179-80; 
 
 correspondence with, 180-9. 
 Klinkofstrom, Mr., mention of, 
 
 3S2-. 
 
 ' Kolnische Zeitung ' reviews ' Na- 
 tive Races,' 186. 
 Kraszewski, M., dictation of, 278. 
 
 Lamy, Archbishop of N. M., kind- 
 ness of, 411. 
 
 Lane, Gen. Jo., dictations of, 293. 
 
 * La Republique Fran^aise ' re- 
 views ' Native Races,' 188. 
 
 Latham, Dr., correspondence with, 
 185. 
 
 Lawson, J. S., manuscript of, 290. 
 
 Lecky, W. E. H., correspondence 
 with, 185. 
 
 ' Le Temps ' reviews ' Native 
 Races,' 188. 
 
 Levashef, Capt., in Alaska, 303. 
 
 Libraries, in Nuevo Leon and Zac- 
 atecas, 385 ; San Luis Potosi, 
 386-7; Riva Palacios in Mex., 
 391 ; Biblioteca Nacional, and 
 Archivo General y Publico de 
 la Nacion, in Mex., 395-8; Ba- 
 salio Perez, Agreda, San Ilde- 
 fonso, 398 ; Toluca, Puebla, 399. 
 
 Library, The Bancroft, formation 
 of, x-xi ; how it was utilized, 
 xi-xxiii ; removal to a place of 
 safety, xxiii ; origin of, 88 ; col- 
 lecting books and material 
 for, 89-107, 125-6; note-taking, 
 93-4; number of vols, in 1869, 
 106; description of, 108-12; 
 classification and arrangement
 
 44 : 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 of vols., III-I2; system of cata- 
 loguing, 112-13; contents of, 
 1 14-19; remarkable features of, 
 120-23; work at, 308-24; sys- 
 tem of work, 308-24 ; rapid 
 growth of, 308 ; system of note- 
 taking, 309-13 ; incompetent in- 
 dexers, 314; fireof 1873,315-6 ; 
 removal of, 324; fortunate move, 
 419, 422-3. 
 
 * Literary Industries,' origin of, 
 vii. ; accomplishment, viii-ix ; 
 author's qualifications, ix ; his 
 literary aspirations and meth- 
 ods, x-xxxi ; publication of, 4. 
 
 Literature, evolution of, in Cal., 
 8-20; effect of climate, I1-14- 
 19-20; of surroundings, 14-19; 
 of wealth, 20-4. 
 
 Little, Feramorz, mention of, 409. 
 
 ' Live Stock Journal ', mention of, 
 410. 
 
 Lombardo, Alberto, mention of, 
 
 393- 
 London, book-collecting in, 92. 
 Longmans & Co., publishers for 
 
 ' Native Races, ' 183. 
 Loreiizana, A., dictation of, 279. 
 Lovejoy, A. L., dictation of, 295. 
 Lowell, J. R., interview with, 
 
 1 71-2. 
 Lubbock, Sir John, * Native Races' 
 
 dedication, 184. 
 Lugo, J., papers and reminiscences 
 
 of, 277. 
 Lutke, Admiral, courtesy of, 353. 
 
 M 
 
 Madrid, bookstores of, 95. 
 
 Maisonneuve et'Cie. publish 'Na- 
 tive Races,' 188. 
 
 Makushino, old chief, 303-4. 
 
 Mancro, Vic. L., Mexican architect 
 and engineer, mention of, 393-4. 
 
 Manuscripts, M. G. Vallcjo's, 207- 
 14; Fernandez's, 220; Alvarado's, 
 226-8, 230 ; Thompson's, 231 ; 
 Castro's, 232 ; Hartncll's, 232-3 ; 
 J. dc J. Vallejo's, 235-6; Lar- 
 
 kin's, 236; Sutter's, 248; Ban- 
 dini's, 263-5 > Warner's, 266, 2 77; 
 Sepulveda's, 266; Widney's, 266 ; 
 Valdes', 267, 279 ; Arnaz's, 267, 
 279; Hayes', 259-61, 273-4, 279 ; 
 Coronel's, 277; Requena's, 277; 
 Lugo's, J. ,277; Perez's, 277; Car- 
 rillo's, 277; Wilson's, 277; Ve- 
 ga's, 277 ; Foster's, 278 ; Vejar's, 
 278; White's, 278; Romero's, 
 27S; Avila's, 278; Kraszevvski's, 
 278; Osuna's, 278; Estudillo's, 
 278; Ord's, 279; Guerra's, 279; 
 Janssens', 279; Lorenzana's,279; 
 Gonzalez's, 279; Pico's, 277,279- 
 80; Nidever's, 280; Garcia's, 280; 
 Boronda's, 280; Ezquer's, 280; 
 Murray's, 2S0 ; Sproat's, 285 ; 
 Pemberton's, 2S5 ; Helmcken's, 
 2S5 ; Elwyn's, 285; Vowel's, 285; 
 Elliott's, 285 ; Compton's, 285 ; 
 Muir's,285; Allen's, 285; Dean's, 
 285 ; Anderson's, 285, 289; Tol- 
 mie's, 285, 288; Charles', 286; 
 Hill's, 286; Good's, 287; Tod's, 
 287; Swan's, 290; Bokkelen's, 
 290 ; Hancock's, 290 ; Lawson's, 
 290; Hanford's, 291 ; Parker's, 
 291 ; Ellicott's, 291 ; Evans', 292; 
 Lane's, 293 ; Grover's, 295 ; Pal- 
 mer's, 295 ; Nesmitli's, 295 ; 
 Moss', 295 ; Lovejoy's, 295 ; 
 Fouts', 295 ; Strong's, 295-6 ; 
 Deady's, 295-6; McKay's, 300; 
 Evans', 250-1 ; Powers', 352 ; 
 Oslo's, 360-1 ; Ford's, 361 ; Wit- 
 ley's, 361; Dempster's, 369; 
 Coleman's, 369; President Diaz's 
 dictation, 394 ; Vigil's description 
 of Mexican National library, 395 ; 
 copies from Mexico's National li- 
 brary, 396 ; Stone on Colorado, 
 410 ; copies of N. Mcx. archives, 
 410. 
 
 Massachusetts Hist. Soc, hon. 
 member of, 1S9. 
 
 Maximilian, Emperor, library of, 
 99. 
 
 Mclntyrc, material furnished by, 
 301, 304; inummy presented by, 
 301.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 443 
 
 McKay, material furnished by, 300. 
 
 McKinlay, A., reminiscences of, 
 285 ; manuscript of, 288. 
 
 McKinney, clerk, courtesy of, 276. 
 
 Mercer, A. S., journalist ofWyo. 
 mention of, 410. 
 
 Mexico, libraries of, 97-101 ; au- 
 thorities in hist, of, 321 ; mate- 
 rial for hist, of, 357-8; condition 
 of the people, 385-6 ; appear, of 
 the country, 387-9; Biblioteca 
 Nacional, and Archivo Gen. y 
 Pub. de la Nacion, full descrip- 
 tion of, 395-6; municipal ar- 
 chives, 398. 
 
 Minto, Mrs., information furnished 
 by, 294-5. 
 
 Mitropolski, Father, material fur- 
 nished by, 300. 
 
 Montana, hist, of, xviii. 
 
 Montard, Father, material fur- 
 nished by, 303. 
 
 Monterey, archives and libraries, 
 
 385- 
 Mora, Bishop, material furnished 
 
 by, 277. 
 Moreno, Secretary, mention of, 
 
 278; material furnished by his 
 
 widow, 278. 
 Morgan, E. S. N., sec. of state of 
 
 Wyo., 410. 
 Mormon, material for history, 
 
 407-9. 
 Morrison, Geo. Howard, biogra- 
 phy of, 432-3- 
 Moss, S. W., dictation of, 295. 
 Muir, M., dictation of, 285. 
 Murray, W., diary of, 280. 
 Mut, Father, courtesy of, 279. 
 
 64 ; elaboration of, 63-4 ; execu- 
 tion of plan, 164-6; publication 
 of, 168-71, 177; reviews and 
 opinion of, 172-6; 180-1, 185- 
 90; dedication of, 184; cuts, 313; 
 type, 313 ; origin of the Ameri- 
 cans, 313-14; completion of, 
 317-20. 
 
 Nemos, W., at library, 309-13. 
 
 Nesmith, J. W., manuscript of, 295. 
 
 Nevada, hist, of, xviii. 
 
 New Mexico, material for hist, of, 
 358,410-11. 
 
 Newspapers, collection of, 317. 
 
 ' New York Tribune ' reviews 
 • Native Races,' 189. 
 
 Nickerson, H, G., mention of, 410. 
 
 Nidever, pioneer, dictation of, 280. 
 
 Nordhoff, C, remarks on Gal., 8 ; 
 interview with, 176-7. 
 
 ' North American Reviev/ ' on 
 'Native Races,' 175. 
 
 Nutchuks, legend of, 301-2. 
 
 O 
 
 Oak, H. L., editor ' Occident,' 125 ; 
 
 librarian, 12S, 131,133, 138,314- 
 Olaquibel, impresiones celebres y 
 
 libros raros, 399. 
 01 vera, C., collection of, 280. 
 Oregon, hist, of, xviii; material for 
 
 hist, of, 292-9 ; 350-1. 
 Ord, Mrs., dictation of, 279. 
 Osio, manuscript of, 260- 1. 
 Osuna, J., dictation of, 278. 
 
 N 
 
 Naranjo, Gen., Mexican statesman, 
 mention of, 393. 
 
 ' Nation ' reviews ' Native Races,' 
 181. 
 
 ' Native Races of the Pacific States,' 
 preparation of, xvi-xvii; opin- 
 ions of competent critics, xvii ; 
 truthfulness, xxi ; plan of, 158- 
 
 Pacheco, Carlos, sterling worth and 
 milit. services, 393. 
 
 ' Pacific Coast Almanac,' publica- 
 tion of, X. 
 
 Pacific States, hist, of, how pre- 
 pared, xviii-xxxi. 
 
 Palmer, Joel, dictation of, 295. 
 
 Park, John R., mention of, 409. 
 
 Parker, Capt., dictation of, 291. 
 
 Parkman, Francis, reviews, 1 74-5.
 
 444 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Parrish, Missionary, mention of, 
 
 294. 
 Parsons, Geo. F., introduction to 
 
 the * Literary Industries,' vii- 
 
 xxxi. 
 Pavlof, information furnished by, 
 
 301- 
 
 Paz, Ireneo, his biograph. notice 
 of H. H. Bancroft, 390. 
 
 Pedro, Emperor Dom, visits to 
 library, 358. 
 
 Pemberton, J. D., material sup- 
 plied by, 285. 
 
 Penrose, C. W., mention of, 409. 
 
 Peralta, F., Cerruti's meeting with, 
 216-17. 
 
 Perez, A., dictation of, 277. 
 
 Petroff, I., visit to Alaska, 299- 
 
 307- 
 
 Phil. Numismatic Soc, hon. mem- 
 ber of, 189. 
 
 Phillips, Wendell, correspondence 
 with, 172-3. 
 
 Phillips, of Santa Fe, kindness of, 
 411. 
 
 Pico, A., documents of, 277. 
 
 Pico, C, material furnished by, 
 279-80. 
 
 Pico, P., books preserved in fam- 
 ily, 266-7; dictation of, 277. 
 
 Pico, J. de J., courtesy of, 280. 
 
 Pinart, A. L., biog., 352-3; mate- 
 rial furnished by, 353. 
 
 Pinto, R., collection of, 280. 
 
 Polygamy, how held l)y Mormon 
 women, 409. 
 
 ' Popular Tribunals,' mention of, 
 328 ; preparation of, 365-8 ; ma- 
 terial for, 36S-70. 
 
 Porter, President, interview with, 
 178. 
 
 Powers, S., material furnished by, 
 
 352. 
 Preston, W. B., mention of, 409. 
 Prieto, Guillermo, mention of, 
 
 393- 
 
 Prince, Gov. L. Bradford, kindness 
 of, 411. 
 
 Pryor, P., kindness of, 279. 
 
 Puebla, description of, and libra- 
 ries, 399-401. 
 
 R 
 
 Railroad, Pacific, effect of it on 
 business, 83-4. 
 
 Ramirez, J. F,, sale of his library, 
 104-6. 
 
 Requena, M., papers of, 277, 
 
 Revillagigedo,Conde de, viceroy of 
 Mex., his efforts to preserve ar- 
 chives, and contributions to gen. 
 hist, of North America, 397. 
 
 ' Revue Britannique ' on ' Native 
 Races,' 188. 
 
 ' Revue des Deux Mondes ' on 
 'Native Races,' 188. 
 
 ' Revue Litteraire et Politique ' on 
 ' Native Races,' 188, 
 
 Richards, F. D., mention of, 40S. 
 
 Richards, Gov., interview with, 282. 
 
 Rico, F., mention of, 275. 
 
 Ritch, W. G., services of, 411. 
 
 Riva Palacio, V., his library and 
 literary labors, 391. 
 
 Rivas, Secretary, material furnished 
 by, 355-6. 
 
 Robson, J., material furnished by, 
 286-7. 
 
 ' Rocky Mountain News,' 410. 
 
 Romero, J. M., dictation of, 278. 
 
 Romero Rubio, M., character, abil- 
 ity, and polit. standing, 394. 
 
 Romo, Friar J. M., interview with, 
 270-2. 
 
 Roussell, Father, courtesy of, 280. 
 
 Roscoe, F. J., material furnished 
 by, 287. 
 
 Rubio, Justino, mention of, 396. 
 
 Salas, Jose Mariano, 39S. 
 Sanclicz, Jesus, mention of, 394. 
 San Fernando college, archives at, 
 
 250, 268. 
 San Francisco, description of, 1852, 
 
 57-9- 
 
 San Luis Potosi, archives and li- 
 l)rary, 386-7. 
 
 ' Saturday Review,' article on ' Na- 
 tive Races,' 189.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 445 
 
 Savage, T., material collected by, 
 
 275-81. 
 Schiefner, A., mention of, 352. 
 * Scribner's Magazine' reviews 
 
 * Native Races,' 189. 
 Seghers, Bishop, material furnished 
 
 by. 303- . ^ 
 
 Selva, C, material furnished by, 
 
 355- 
 
 Sepiilveda, Y., kindness of, 266, 
 277-9. 
 
 Serra, Father J., mention of, 260-1 ; 
 265. 
 
 Shashnikof, Father, material fur- 
 nished by, 303-4. 
 
 Siliceo, Luis, Mex. writer, 394. 
 
 Sladen, Colonel, material furnished 
 by, 292. 
 
 Slaughter, John, mention of, 412. 
 
 Smith, Jos. F., mention of, 409. 
 
 Snow, Erastus, mention of, 409. 
 
 Sociedad de Geografia y Estatis- 
 tica, introduction to its mem- 
 bers, 390. 
 
 Sosa, F., litterateur and journalist, 
 
 391. 
 
 Spencer, Herbert, correspondence 
 
 with, 185, 1S9. 
 ' Spectator,' article on ' Native 
 
 Races,' 1S9. 
 Spofford, hbrarian of Congress, 
 
 interview with, 181-2. 
 Sproat, G. M., material supplied 
 
 by, 285. 
 Squier, E. G., library of, 103-4; 
 
 purcliase of his collection, 354, 
 
 358-60. 
 Stafeifk, information furnished by, 
 
 301. 
 Stanton, E. M., mention of, 251. 
 Stanton, F. J., mention of, 410. 
 Stone, Judge, historical manuscript 
 
 on Colorado, 410. 
 Stone, N. J., manager of publishing 
 
 department, 325 ; mention of, 
 
 414; hisconnection with theHist. 
 
 of the Pacific States, 428 ; biog. 
 
 sketch, 430-32. 
 Strong, W., dictation of, 295-6. 
 Stevens, PI., books procured from, 
 
 103-6. 
 
 Stargis, T., mention of, 410. 
 
 Sutter, J. A., visit to, 245-S; manu- 
 script furnished by, 248. 
 
 Swan, J. G., collection and manu- 
 scripts of, 290 ; correspondence 
 with, 351-2. 
 
 Thatcher, Moses, mention of, 409. 
 
 Thayer, of Santa Fe, kindness of, 
 411. 
 
 ' Times,' London, reviews ' Nat- 
 ive Races,' 186. 
 
 Tod, J., manuscript of, 287. 
 
 Tolmie, W. F., reminiscences of, 
 285-8. 
 
 Toro, Juan, mention of, 393. 
 
 Turner, L., information furnished 
 
 by, 303- 
 Tylor, E. B., correspondence with, 
 187-8. 
 
 U 
 
 Ubach, Father, collection of, 262. 
 Utah, hist, of, 407-11. 
 
 Valdes, R., mention of, 267. 
 
 Valdez, of N. Mex., kindness o*", 
 411. 
 
 Vallarta, F. L., mention of, 393. 
 
 Valle, I. del., dictation of, 279. 
 
 Vallejo, J. de J., dictation of, 235-6. 
 
 Vallejo, M. de G., his biog., 196- 
 201; library of, 196-7; charac- 
 ter, 199-201 ; negotiations with, 
 202-14 ; ' Historia de Califor- 
 nia,' MS., 214, 238-9 ; tour of 
 220-1,230-40; negotiations with 
 Alvarado, 223-6. 
 
 Vallejo, S., mention of, 205-6, 209. 
 
 Van Fatten, of Las Cruces, kind- 
 ness of, 411. 
 
 Vega, v., dictation of, 277. 
 
 Vega, Gen. P., his collection of 
 documents, 356-7. 
 
 Vejar, P., dictation of, 278.
 
 446 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Veniaminof, I., courtesy of, 353. 
 
 Vigil, J. M., director of the Mex'n 
 National Library, mention of, 
 393 ; his descript. of the library, 
 
 395- 
 
 Vila, Father J., Bancroft s visit to, 
 268-9. 
 
 Villarasa, Father, material fur- 
 nished by, 356. 
 
 Vowel, A. W., material furnished 
 by, 285. 
 
 W 
 
 Waldo, Daniel, mention of, 294. 
 Walden, J., catalogue prepared, 
 
 93- 
 
 Warner, J. J., reminiscences, 266; 
 
 ' Recollections ' manuscript, 277. 
 ' Westminster Review ' on ' Native 
 
 Races,' 189. 
 White, E., interviews with, 292. 
 Whitehead, J. R., mention of, 
 
 410. 
 
 Whitaker, J., purchasing agent, 93 ; 
 books selected by, 101-2; corre- 
 spondence with, 105. 
 
 Whittier, J. G., interview with, 
 
 173-4- 
 
 White, M., dictation of, 278. 
 
 Willey, S. H., courtesy of, 361 ; 
 material furnished by, 361. 
 
 Wilson, B. D., dictation of, 277. 
 
 Woodruff, W., interview with, 408. 
 
 Wyoming, data for hist, of, how ob- 
 tained, 410. 
 
 Young, Brigham, mention of, 409. 
 
 Zacatecas, Ortega's priv. libr., 385. 
 Zaldo, R. de, mention of, 215-16. 
 Zakarof, information furnished by, 
 301. 
 
 I
 
 SCOTT'S JOURNAL. 
 
 The Journal of Sir Walter Scott, 1825-1832. From the Ori^•i- 
 nal Manuscript of Abbotsford. With Two Portraits and En- 
 graved Title-padres. Two Volumes. 8vo, Cloth, Uncut Edges 
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 The "Journal" presents a varied and vivid picture of Sir Walter Scott's 
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 are prized as English classics. — London Times. 
 
 Full of interesting glimpses into the great author's mind, and reveals in 
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 The manner in which the "Journal" has been prepared for publication 
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 A better tempered, less morbid diary never was published. . . . No ex- 
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