The California Birthday Book | Page 3

California.
JANUARY 10.
If Mother Nature is indeed as we see her here, broad-browed and broad-bosomed, strong and calm--calm because strong--swaying her vain brats by unruffled love, not by fear; by wise giving, not by privation; by caresses and gentle precepts, not by cuffs and scoldings and hysterics--why, then she shall better justify our memories and the name we have given her. It is well that our New England mothers had a different climate in their hearts from that which beat at their windows. I know one Yankee boy who never could quite understand that his mother had gone home till he came to know the skies of California.
CHARLES F. LUMMIS,?in _The Right Hand of the Continent, Out West,?June_, 1902.
JANUARY 11.
California, the orchid in the garden of the states, the warm motherland of genius, the land of enchantment, the land of romance, the land of magic; California, the beautiful courtezan land, whose ravishing form the enamored gods had strewed with scarlet roses and white lilies, and buried deep in her bosom rich treasure; California began the twentieth century with another tale, fantastic, incredible. * * *
Until the oil was discovered the land had been worth from one to four dollars an acre, but now offers were made for it from five hundred to as many thousands.
MRS. FREMONT OLDER,?in The Giants.
JANUARY 12.
A CALIFORNIAN TO HIS OLD HOME.
I oft feel sad and lone and cold?Here in the Golden West,?When I recall the times of old,?And fond hearts laid to rest;?The gladsome village crowd at e'en,?The stars a-peeping down,?And all the meadows robed in green?Around Claremorris Town.

This is, in truth, a lovely sphere,?A heaven-favored clime,?Here Nature smiles the whole long year,?'Tis summer all the time,?With spreading palms and pine trees tall?And grape-vines drooping down--?But gladly would I give them all?For you, Claremorris Town.
LAURENCE BRANNICK.
JANUARY 13.
The establishment of the Mission of Santa Catarina marks the close of what may well be termed the third period of Lower California history. It is a period remarkable for progress rather than for individual actors. The great Junipero Serra passes quickly across the stage, figuring as a man of physical endurance and a diplomat--not as an explorer or a founder of many missions. His most historic act on the Peninsula was performed when he drew a line of division between the territory of the Dominicans and the Franciscans. He is a link between the two Californias.
ARTHUR W. NORTH,?in The Mother of California.
JANUARY 14.
TO THE U.S. CRUISER CALIFORNIA.
Godspeed our namesake cruiser,?Godspeed till the echoes cease?'Fore all may the nation choose her?To speak her will for peace.?That she in the hour of battle?Her western fangs may show.?That from her broadsides' rattle?A listening world may know--?She's more than a fighting vessel,?More than mere moving steel,?More than a hull to wrestle?With the currents at her keel;?That she bodies a living-spirit.?The spirit of a state,?A people's strength and merit,?Their hope, their love, their fate.
HAROLD S. SYMMES.
JANUARY 15.
CALIFORNIA AND ITALY.
More and more it becomes apparent to me that the Climate of California spoils one for any other in the world. If Californians ever doubt that their winter weather is the finest in the world, let them try that of sunny Italy. If they have ever grumbled at their gentle rains, brought on the wings of mild winds from the south, let them try the raw rain, hail, snow, and sleet storms of sunny Italy. And then forever after let them hold their peace.
JEROME A. HART,?in Argonaut Letters.
JANUARY 16.
I see thee in this Hellas of the West,?Thy youngest, fairest child, upon whose crest?Thy white snows gleam, and at whose dimpled feet?The blue sea breaks, while on her heaving breast?The flowers droop and languish for her smile,?Thy grace is mirrored in her youthful form,?She lifts her forehead to the battling storm,?As proud, as fair as thou.

Like thee, she opens wide her snowy arms,?And folds the Nations on her mother-breast.?The brawny Sons of Earth have made their home?Where her wide Ocean casts its ceaseless foam,?Where lifts her white Sierras' orient peak?The wild exultant love of all that makes?The nobler life; the energy that shakes the Earth?And gives new eons birth.
S.A.S.H. of College of Notre Dame, San Jose,?in Hellas.
JANUARY 17.
THE RETURN TO CALIFORNIA.
Across the desert waste we sped;?The cactus gloomed on either hand,?Wild, weird, grotesque each frowning head?Uprearing from the sand.
Through dull, gray dawn and blazing noon,?Like furnace fire the quivering air,?Till darkness fell, and the young moon?Smiled forth serene and fair.
A single star adown the sky?Shone like a jewel, clear and bright;?We heard the far coyote's cry?Pierce through the silent night.
Then morning--bathed in purple sheen;?Beyond--the grand, eternal hills;?With sunny, emerald vales between,?Crossed by a thousand rills.
Sweet groves, green pastures; buzz of bee?And scent of flower; a dash of foam?On rugged cliffs; the blessed sea,?And then--the lights of home!
MARY E. MANNIX.
JANUARY 18.
Around the Southern Californian home of the loving twain