The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, February 9, 1896, Page 15

4 »> F only it were not for the everlasting hills!” This is whata San Franciscan said to me, recently, when I spoke of the picturesque charm which this won- derful City has ever had for me. I exclaimed atthe heresy. Did he realize what San Francisco would be without the hills, investing her with a beauty that has made her famous? Yes, he knew. She would be a city where suburban life would have some com- fort and uptown building lots some value. As though city realty, uptown or down, were not already higher than any of our city hills! Then he swung aboard a Clay-street car to ride from Montgomery street to Taylor. ‘What will be the fate of the human race & few generations hence if we continue, as we are doing at present, to neglect the natural uses of the body and to rely upon artificial substitutes for the organs nature has vrovided for our use? We have covered our heads with hats until our hair has grown sparse and in- sufficient for the purposes it was meant to fill. We have augmented our sight by a spectacles until we have greatly lessened the power of the eyes. We have so re- duced to a science the preparation, mace- ration and lubrication of food that our teeth are falling into decay, and the sali- vary glands, through inactivity and abuse, are becoming the seat of queer afflictions. We have almostly entirely lost the use of our toes, once useful, active mem- bers of the body, and the majority of us are in a fair way to forget for what lungs and legs and arms were given human beings. We are ren- dered breathless by ascending a flight of stairs. We are exhausted after climbing one of our city’s hilly blocks, and we are quite worn out when it comes to carrying a moderately heavy packace any distance. In fact, we are in a fair way to realize that scientific picture of the twentieth century man as a too s, hairless, sightless ed power of self-loco- creature, with li motion, with an enormous nervous devel- opme Elevators, cable and electric cars, bicycles and horses, are all combin- ing to make us comparatively helpless creatnres as regards nature’s methods of locomotion. In time Yankee ingenuity may invent a creature that can carry on the work of the world independently of human effort, and when this happy time arrives we can sit down quietly to the leisurely task of growing our bomes out- side our bodies, for the better protection of the soft, feeble organisms they are likely to become. But while the race at large may be con- to permit its physical faculties to fall innocuous desuetude,” the fortunate 1lers in San Francisco will have to bear a Leavier weight of responsibility than falls to their fellows’ share, for, in neglect- ing the natural exercise for lack of which we are becoming a feebler folk than were our progenitors, we are sinning against cir- cumstance, as well as against ourselves, « and against the richest environment nature ever bestowed upon a happy people. The “everlasting hills’ that lift our cit heavenward on their broad, service-loving shoulders; *the heart-breaking and back- breaking hills,” I heard them called re- cently, by one who knew not the wrong she did them. The beneficent hills they are, if we only knew how to use them, are, could we but understand it and know its value, sending us perpetual invitation to let them help us to health and strength and beauty and inspiration. We are poor, tame-spirited creatures, that we are con- tent, day after day, with letting ourselves be draeged up and down them, elbowing each other in crowded cars, breathing stale air and cowering before drafts, when we might climb them of ourselves, to the expansion of our lungsand the develop- ment of muscle and digestive power, to say nothing of the greater mental and moral force that comes from a free use of the body. If we patronize the cable-cars at all, it should be to bring us down the hills, for the actual jar, upon back and nerves, of coming down a steep, flagged grade, is greater than the muscular exertion and demand upon the lung power of ascending the same grade. This is not wholly true of an unpaved hill road, although, in any case, the descent, while apparently easier, is a greater strain in the long run than the ascent. In this, as in some other things, it is easier to go .down than up, but it is harder upon you in the end. But, going down or up hills, even San Francisco hills, should not unduly tax the strength of an ordinarily well person. We make a terrible bugbear of them, we who A A~ A~ A | | wonderful THE SA a N FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 1896. 15 dwell among them, when we should find { them a help and a blessing. Only from the hills can we note the real majesty and beauty which this city has, hateful though most of its buildings are to the eye, and this beauty can by no means be rightly seen, and appreciated when seen, even from the dummy of a hurrying cable- car. It is a matter of belief with me that, could the majority of our busi- ness men and women walk downtown in the morning, noting from the various ele- vations the city to which they were de- scending, thinking upon it seriously, of its beauty, its possibilities, its wonderful power, spread out thus before the be- holder; or, walking back, at night, could turn and gaze upon the deserted markets, the closed stores, the quiet streets wherein is stilled for a time the clamor of the day, there would grow up in their hearts a deeper, more real love for their city, that would manifest itself in bettercitizenship, a more earnest endeavor to makeit worthy of its noble surroundings. It would probably not be possible for many people to start out, at once, to walg up and down our hills without great fa- tigue to unused muscles and lungs, but beginning by slow degrees a training could be thus acquired that would be of lasting benefit to the woole system. There is something absolutely pathetic in the sight of San Franciscans repairing to the quarters of the various athletic clubs, for exercise, when nature’s own gymnasium is open to them day and night, free as the sunlight and the stars. And then, the joy of the special visiv one may make to the hills! One need not go to Lone Mountain or the Twin Peaks to find green and joyous spots or magnifi- cent outlooks. Iknow a view from a low- walled approach to a home on Broadway, that is like a vision in Italy for beauty and color, and that quaint, foreign suggestion that one so often comes upon in this queer, a heavy grade, pausing on the crest of some height, silhouetted against the sky for a single instant, then rushing dizzily | down to the nextlevel. There is, to me, an endless fascination about this peculiar feature of our fascin- ating city’s streets. I watched the down- ward career of a Sacramento-street car, sweeping, stately, from the serene heights, past beautiful homes, great schools and goodly churches, to plunge, at last, through Chinatown’s weird squalor, into | the hurrying rush of the business quarter, until it swung around the curve at the water front, to begin its upward flight. Gray and countless, standing shoulder to shoulder along the hills, hiding behind their uncommunicative walls endless sug- gestions of human love and hate, joy and sorrow and boundless hope, the homes of the city spread, rising, tier upon tier, until they ranged against the sky, reced- ing, row upon row, to the further line of the peninsula. On the other side the bay were Berkeley, Oakland and Alameda, and an on-reaching vista of further blue | hillg on the Marin and Alameda shores, and lending its own beauty to all the bay smiled in:the sun, bearing upon its | broad bosom the ships from far lands and near. Could .any other city on this continent | spread such vision of wonder for the be- holder? It will be a day for the Civic Fed- | eration and all thelaw and order leagues in the city to take Holiday and rejoice when the people of San Francisco come really to know the strength and order, the | ood government and helpful strength | hat lie in our city’s blessed hills. ApELINE KNaPP. Solled Bank Notes. A well-known bank cashier was talking | the other day about the possibilities of | contagion in soiled bank notes, and took Administration of President Monroe.” In the beginning he stated that his paper was composed largely of extracts from private letters written by Thomas H. Hubbard. In the years 1817 to 1824 he was Repre- sentative at Washington from the Con- gressional district embracing Madison and Herkimer counties of this State during the administration of President Monroe. Mr. Hubbard had been presented to President James Monroe, who occupied the “palace,” as the President’s house was called, in 1817, and spoke of him as a plain, unassuming man, who acted as any other well-bred man would do. The Pres- ident received callers on the 1st of Janu- ary, 1818. - At 2 o'clock the doors were opened and the crowd poured in. A corps of marines was drawn up in front of the house, bright in all the trappings of mili- tary dress. The President received with Mrs. Monroe. One followed in the current which bore him to his distinguished hosts, | who bowed gracefully to each guest—much more dignified, certainly, than the more democratic custom of handshaking which prevails in our own time. Simple refreshments were passed by the servants, consisting of sweetmeats, ice cream, hot punch and lemonade. The President was dressed on this occasion in a blue coat and buff waistcoat and small clothes and white silk stockings. Mrs, Monroe had on a silk or satin gown of light color, almost white, close around the neck and a large bunch of artificial flowers at the bosom. Her hat or bonnet was of the same material, surmounted with three nodding plumes. She was about 50 years of age, rather handsome and very gracious and polite in her manners. This good couple stood on their feet, nodding, bow- ing, smiling and talking with about 1000 persons. On February 21,1818, Mr. Hubbard dined with the President, in company with Messrs. Cushman, Palmer and Drake. They went at6:30. The President’s brother and private secretary received them in a most awkward manner and ushered them in Indian fiie into the drawing-room, where there were some twenty gentiemen, sitting in a row in a solemn state, mute as fishes, they having undergone the grand state ceremony. “Mrs. Monroe.” he writes, *‘was seated at the further end of the room with other ladies. On our ap- proach she arose and received us hand- somely. After being myself presented, I introduced the other gentlemen. I now ex- pected to be led to the President, but my pilot, the private secretary, had vanished. “We beat a retreat, each to hisrespective chair. Observing the President sitting very demurely by the chimney-corner I rose and advanced to him. He got up and shook me by the hand, as he did the other gentlemen. This second ceremony occasion to remark that a much cleaner over, all again was silence, and each once A [Sketched by a “Call’ artist.] i il VIEW FROM THE GROUNDS OF THE STONE RESIDENCE. more moved to his seat. of great solemnity. “The dinner was good and the table most richly furnished. There were about thirty guests in all. It became more lively as the dishes rattled. The plateau in the center of the table was very elegant. It was fully twelve feet long and two feet wide, oval at the ends, and figures, eight inches high, with extended arms com- posed of a mirror surrounded by gold fe- males holding candlesticks. The table was garnished with artificial flowers. The plate was very handsome china, highly gilt, and the dessert knives, forks and spoons were of beaten gold. The dinner was ended at about hali-past 8 o’clock.” Mr. Hubbard attended another dinner ‘at the *‘palace” and spoke of it as a grave and serious affair.—Utica Herald. It was a period A VIEW OF THE CITY FROM RUSSIAN HILL. [From a sketch made by a “Call” artist.] y. One must see them to believe the bits of almost rural loveliness, reminders of meadow, almost within a stone’s throw of the city’s business center. It is worth a stout climb up any one of the high hills | out toward North Beach and Barbary Coast to come upon the unexpected and delightful surprises sure to zreet one. Such a hill I climbed one day, not so long ago. It was a crisp, clearday. *Over- head the fleckless sky was radiantly blue, and the February sun mellowed, without heating, the sea-scented air. From Alca- traz came faintly, above the hum of the city and ‘the nearer shrilling of children’s voices at their play, the sound of a gun. The skirling cry of the gulls as they fol- lowed a Pacific liner bound out through the gate reached me musically. Looking across the city I could see nest- ling against the ultimate purple hill line the shaded greens and browns that mark the park and its surroundings. Between it and the silver gleam of the bay the city lay before me. I could count a score of cable lines, their clanging cars running, with the apparent purposelessness of so many ants, over the hills, now climbing orchard and | { lot of paper money was now in circulation than formerly. The banks, he said, now | send their soiled notes to the United States | Treasury to be destroyed as soon as a suffi- cient quantity accumulates to justify it, and new notes are issued in their place. This has been rendered not only possible, | but advisable, owing to the increased fa- | cilities for printing bank notes. One never sees a soiled bank note in London. They are all crisp and white and new, simply because the Bank of England never lets a note go out a second time. Although the average life of a Bank of England note is said to be five days, the notes which find their way to the colonies are kept in circu- lation for years, and these are found to be in an even worse condition than ourown greenbacks.—Philadelphia Record. WHITE ROUSE DINNER IN 1818, Described by a Congressman Who Was a Guest of President Monroe. Th2 December meeting of the Oneida Historical Society was held in the Arcade. The speaker of the evening was Robert J. Hubbard of Cazenovia. Mr. Hubbard’s subject was “Political and Social Life in Washington During the | comment throughout the valley. |PERCHED ON A MOUNTAIN TOP WHERE A YOUNG MAN WAS EXILED TO EXPIATE His ForLy. ‘WAY up on the very pinnacle of a small peak of the first rise of the Santa Ynez Mountain range, in full sight of Santa Barbara, a tiny cabin hasrecently appeared, which has been the subject of general How did it get up there? What could be the object of anybody in seeking such a dizzy height and isolated location for a residence ? Who were its occupants? These are a few of the questions that have been asked and that no one could answer. Few suspected that in the lonely cabin perched on the heights could be found the solution of a mystery which perplexed not only Santa Barbara, but the country at large, last spring, It will be reniembered by the readers of TrE CALL that considerable commotion il 1 i /gf;:/lg; = 122- A BIT OF COUNTRY WITHIN THE CITY. THE FRUIT ORCHARD ADJOINING THE STONE RESIDENCE ON RUSSIAN HILL. [From a sketch made by a ** Call” artist.] was caused last May by the announcement that Francis Lord of Santa Barbara, the son of a retired officer of the British Roval Engineers Corps, who was still an Enelish | citizen and drawing a pension from her Majesty’s Government, had received the, appointment of cadet to Annapolis Naval Academy, although some of the candi- dates who had presented themselves to the Congressman of young Lord’s district to take the competitive examination in- sisted that another lad had been appointed and that Lord had ranked decidedly below other Santa Barbara boys in his record at that time. Congressman McLachlan was requested to explain his reasons for ap- pointing young Lord in defiance of the rules governing such appointments and indignantly disclaimed baving done so, naming the young man whom he had se- lected for the position. Yet there was Lord’s official appointment, made out in due official form and bearing the signa- ture of the Secretary of the Navy, along with other collateral documentary evi- dence. It was then decided thai the ap- pointment must have been one of the thirteen in the privilege of the President of the United States. By this time the mat- ter had been very thoroughly dis- cussed, and a strong opposition arose re- specting the appointment of an English- man’s son to a position which it is the dearest ambition of loyal American boys, the sons of patriotic fathers, to secure. The newspapers took up the question, and it was discussed not only by all the promi- nent journals on the Pacific Coast, but by the Eastern press as well. Prominent men on this coast and patriotic - organizations sent protests:to Washington. It shoutd be understood that this. opposition was based purely on broad principles of public policy, and was in no sense due to any per- sonal feeling. For the entire Lord family, personally, the highest esteem was felt in this ‘community. The fact was even ‘brought forward that Captain Lord, the father, had made his preliminary declara- tion of intention to become an American citizen some seven years before, but that although for two years past he had been competent to complete his naturalization, he had not chosen todoso. To remove this objection Captain Lord, in the height of the discussion, took out bis final papers as an American citizen, and in so doing sacrificed the pension he was receiving from her Majesty, = | Meantime the bero of this National com- motion was riding on the top wave of local popularity in Santa Barbara’s most fash- ionable circles. Local society boasts quite a contingent of retired naval and military officers, and a boy who was on his way to a cadetship in the great National academy where naval officers are made became an object of more than ordinary interest. The cruiser Monterey was then in port, and Krancis Lord was a frequent and hon- ored guest on the big battle-ship, being carried off to days of target practice and junketing of the jolliest kind. The fiesta guests, including the Monterey, departed, and a week or so later Francis Lord, en- vied by every Santa Barbara boy, leit for the north in response to an official sum- mons, which he displayed, calling him up to Mare Island for his final examination, which it was understood was to be little more than a formal ceremony. For nearly a year he has been supposed to be enjoy- ing the privileges of life at Annapolis. This reads like a disjointed tale. There would seem to be little connection between a lucky young cadet enjoying the privileges of one of the first schools of the land and a lonely cabin on the mountain top along the shores of the Pacific. But a few days ago a CALn correspondent climbed the | rugged trail leading to this cabin, a trail that makes an ascent of 2000 feet in the course of a mile and a half, and on the very summit of the mountain, in the little building whose timbers were dragged by lariat up the mountain side and which is now anchored down by wire stays to keep the winds from sweeping it away, clad in the regimentals of a mountaineer ranch- man, was young Francis Lord. He made a clean breast of the whole story and was perhaps a little relieved to feel that the scribe was no malevolent corre- spondent of a sensational journal who had sought him out to ‘“‘roast’” him, after the current phrase. \ “I deserve all I've suffered and more,” he frankly said, “and I don’t want to shirk any of the responsibility of what I did, when I say that it had its beginning in a8 mistake—a mistake about a telegram. You see when I went down to Los Angeles to take the examination my number was ‘41, and the telegram announcing the re- sult read that ‘41’ was appointed, when it should have been ‘42." For five daysI be- lieved I had the appointment and told peo- ple about it, and when I found out the mis- take I hated toown up. Sol tried to make peovle think I had it anyhow. Yes, that paper that purported to come from Wash- ington was forged, and so were all the ‘other letters. There was a man in town—I wish I had never met him—who got up those letters for me, just for the lark of the thing, and it seemed as if the deeper I went the harder it was to pull out, so [ just kept on. I'm sorrieston account of my family. It’s been hard on them.”’ And the boy hung his head in honest contrition. “Yes, I've been up here ever since,” he replied, in answer to another question. “There are just two of us here —both boys—and sometimes it is a little lonely.« We thought our cabin would go over in the high windstorm the other night, but we're pretty comfortable, on the whole. We grub out chaparral, attend to a few head of stock, milk a couple of cows night and morning, and get our own meals. That's about the sum of it. We’re really very comfortable.” The cabin is comfortably fitted up, and a woman’s taste has had something to do with the furnishings of the lonely place to which this young exile is condemned. There are a gouple of charming bay-win- dows with rugs, a couple of easy chairs, soft blue draperies with white dragon pattern, cur- | taining off an alcove; a little set of book- shelves, a pleasant reading-table with al Somebody wants to | Rochester lamp. make this boy’s lot as easy as it may be, Bat oh, the barrenness and isolation! Nothing but rooks and brush and bleak mountain-tops around, not a single neigh- bor within sight or hail, and the only com- munication with civilization that long, steep, dangerous trail, washing away in places with every rain, so that only a treacherous footrest in sliding shale or eep seats, pretty Japanese | slippery earth, above a precipitous gulchr makes passage possible! When Francis Lord rounded off his little season of deception with a gay time in San Francisco, at the time of his sup- posed trip to Mare Island, there was noth- ing. left but to come home and face the music. The honor of the old English father was grievously wounded. For three weeks the boy was shut up in the barn on the grounds of the pleasant residence of the family on Arlington Heights and fed on prison diet, and he was only released to be sent into this curious exile. But the old father’s judgment was a wise one. The shamed and guilty boy who climbed the mountain heights last Juneis a man now, with a man’s honest purpose to re- trieve his error. He hopes soon to find a berth, no matter how humble, on an ocean-going steamer, where he will have an opportunity to earn advancement and prove that he has the making of a sailorin him, even if he never wears the uniform of the United States navy. The lesson has been a bitter one to him, but out of the reckless boy’s mistake may come the man’s growth and salvation. And America has gained a loyal citizen in the person of Captain Lord. Frora H. LoUGHEAD. REMEMBRANCES OF LONGFELLOW, Mary Anderson de Navarro Writes of the Beloved Bard. In writing of her early days on the stage, and telling the incidents of her first tour of the Eastern cities, in February Ladies’ Home Journal, Mary Anderson de Na- varro dwells at some length and affection- ately upon- her reminiscences of Longfel- low, the poet, for whom she had the great- est admiration. The actress was invited to meet Longfellow at his Cambridge home, James T. Fields bearing the grace- ful letter of invitation. Of the sweet singer she writes: “Surrounded by the calm of his peaceful home it seemed as though the hand of evil could not reach him. Every conversation with him leit some good result. His first advice to me, which I have followed for vears, was: ‘See some good picture—in nature if pos- sible—or on canvas; hear a page of the best music, or read a great poer daily. You will always tind a free hali hour for one or the other, and at the end of the year your mind will shine with such an accumulation of jewels as to astonish even yourself.” “He loved to surround himseif with beautiful things. 1 have seen him kneel before a picture which had fust been pre- sented him and study every detail and beauty of his ‘new toy,” as he called it, with a minutenessand appreciation which few would understand. However infested with care or work a day might be, a visit from him was sure to beautify it. A few months before his death, being unable, through illness, to leave the house, he sent 'for us again. The usual warm welcome awaited us. Luncheon over he showed me a ‘new toy,’ and tried to be amusing, but there was a veil of sadness over him, and I noticed how feeble he had grown. ‘Uatil the spring, then,’ he said, as we parted, ‘if I am still here. I wonder if we shall ever meet again! I am old and not very well!’ He apologized for not see- ing us to the carriage, as was his wont, | but stood at the window watching us leave. | 1ts sash was covered with snow. His face looked like a picture set 1n a white, glisten- | ing frame, for the sun was shining and his | hair and beard was nearly as white as the | snow itself. Icansee him still standing | there, waving his last farewell. Soon after the English-speaking world was sad- dened by the loss of one of its sweetest bards.” gt General William Booth originated the name “Salvation Army” in 1878 after he | had been engaged in evangelical work for | seventeen years. The first name of nis re- ligious organization formed upon military | lines was “The Christian Mission,” which he started in a small way in 1865. DWELLING WHERE FRANCIS LORi) NOW RESIDES. [From a photograph.] -