In the Place of the Two Shrines linger the romance and glory of the golden age of California. There is also found a beauty than which no beauty can be greater. The sweep of the majestic hills is there, and the wondrous fascination of the opulent valley. It is always beautiful, ravished with roses in January as well as in June, and endless with color at all times. But it is in the magic Springtime, when from mountain wall to mountain wall, from the green lomas of Los Gatos to the waters of the Bay, the sea of the blossoms ebbs and flows in tides of perfume, that Santa Clara is by far the most entrancingly beautiful spot in the whole wide world. The trail that Portola and his men made from San Diego in 1769 upon the quest for Monterey leads through the Valley of Santa Clara and on to San Francisco. It is a trail now beaten with the feet of countless wanderers, and you will do well to follow where so many have gone before. Throughout all the Land of Heart's Desire there are innumerable places of majestic beauty-the snow-crowned peaks of the vast Sierra, the stretches of endless, white surf-beaten shores and great, bold headlands challenging the sea. And there are nooks in the hills and among crescent waters where the red and green roofs of the villages are a kindness to the eye. But the country lying around and all about the Golden Gate, to which now you have come, is the place where nature revels in moods of splendor, delighting in vastness that she softens with the magic touches of an affection ever changeful yet never inconstant. From the top of Tamalpais, which rises like a green monolith above the blue ocean, there stretch beneath the eye on every side the kaleidoscopes of hill and valley, plain and river, the two hundred and fifty square miles of the great harbor and the limitless sweep of the stupendous Pacific, the Mother of the Seas. Sometimes the vision beholds a sea of fog, rolling in milky waves and wrapping the world below in deep-hung veils of mystery. Again the veil is lifted and yonder crowd the masts of the ships from near and distant ports, flying the pennants of all nations. The Sacramento and the San Joaquin, like threads of silver, wind down from their native hills, through lush and opulent valleys, to mingle their waters with the salty tides. Bronzed and crypted with iron-throated guns, sleep the pillars of the Golden Gate in the setting sun. The voices of laughing children and the clang of bells rise from the villages nestled at the mountains' feet. Dim in a purple haze lie the Farallones off to sea. Oakland with her busy life, the green meadows of Alameda, the clustering towns of Marin and the sweep of Contra Costa's hills, all send their sunset greetings to the uplifted heights, to the parting ships that put out upon wandering voyages. Then night and its myriad stars in the vaulted blue of the wide, deep overhanging heavens, and the countless lights of the city of St. Francis and her sisters of the waters twinkle in the vibrant dusk. Ofttimes, mayhap, there be those that wander there whom the eyes of mortals cannot see-St. Francis with sandaled feet and Brother Juniper, his beloved disciple, searching for hungry mouths and ragged beggars and tossed, sore-beaten souls; Portola in plumed hat and slashed breeches haunting the brown hill which made him immortal; Father Serra harkening to the Mission bells when the Angelus is ringing; the souls of Argonauts seeking again the golden fleece; deep-sea sailors, tattooed and swart, with rings in their ears; and, in the soft, deep glory of the sum mer night, Juan de Ayala, on the deck of the San Carlos, the first to sail through the Golden Gate. Nor is it here the bright trails end. Still on they lead in sun and shine far beyond the last estuary of the great Bay, past San Rafael and Sonoma in the Valley of the Seven Moons where the Franciscans reared the last outpost of the Missions. And farther still they lead amid vast forests, tumbling rivers and gleaming lakes to Shasta's snowy glory, and yet onward for many another league. And then you shall double on your tracks, backward across the ranges of Siskiyou and Modoc, through orchard land and meadow, in and out of the haunts of the Argonauts, greeting anon the ancient Sequoias as your elder brothers whom time has towered to the skies. The Yosemite shall beckon to you from the vast stretches of the San Joaquin, into which the German Fatherland might be thrown and have room to spare. So shall you wander, with sunny heart, upon the golden trails of the Land of Heart's Desire. A thousand miles the trail shall lead you, and thrice a thousand wonders shall you see-white peaks of glory and sunset shores of dream, yucca and poppy on the upland slopes, gardens deep with roses in each valley's heart, brown roadsides hushed with ruined fanes; and, here and there, a moldered cross upon a haunted hill. |