The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, October 22, 1899, Page 32

30 THE SUNDAY CALL. HE WAS A MULTIMILLIONAIRE PHILANTHROPIST OF PIONEER DAYS IH+++-H-H+¥ AND § NOW } B b4t 1 HIS WIDOW A 4+ bR } DWELLS IN§ M++++E \ !( )R_I, §++++_ it your plc- ted women t they had itual food. dis- 1e with the best did _.not care. e useful. alone In San sco of the early ned to her just ry-book little girls: of a deaf old mald. my troubles com- kept me like a work hard. I I was the most ever lived.” upon this eXperience oh “Then menced | mer only unhappy Following child tha close came & romance. She was a mite of a thing to have a romance; but she was motherless, and the ne as fatherless, and so there was nobody to shoo the ro- mance away. The guardian tried to, but tailed. It was during Mrs. W friend, Mr. James Chambers, had res- cued mother and daughter from a burn- ing building. The fire broke out in a Kearny-street house where the Wilsons and Mr. Chambers took them to home, near the ferry of these days. ‘Was he a wealthy man at that time?” “Oh, my dear, yes. He and Mr. Sharon owned most of the water front. He was very good to us. “He went to Europe a little while after that—while my mother still lived, you understand—and when he left he asked me what he should send me for a present. 1 was wild over my muslc lessons at that time, so I said I wanted a plano. But I did not really expect it. I was so sur- prised when it came. It was a thousand dollar plano, & beautifully toned instru- ment.”" “But why di4 he not look after you whon y9ur Motats Gledl" § WaP AU~ Ay deley) bub llson’s life that a | TIME OF HER MARRIAGE-. FROM AN OLD DAGUERRE O-TYPE ted. It was not my turn lved from and tell things happen. The old maid n and she saw that one on the dress. he told me to give it I did s > paper slipped d a corner out. She f the least thing, so she paper and I clutched too, aged to bite off little bits of it gle. was_enough to mak 1 when she he made matters old maid ppen to want 3 and hap- pé light upon the criti pin, I should blas d I should snap at the for a man of cheap d look into Mrs. ( doubt, then and ese the me and took you away ed on, snifing a fairy ladder No; I rar afa away instead and the P to send I took my and I escaped. Mr. Chambers » of me. He who kept lived un- d there I Chambers and I were T ed. He was 43 years old, and husb PPy I watched my patent leather tip dawdling with the tiger tail on the floor. stood abashed. I flirted bisque serenader on the woman before me was strug- gling like mad with a jerking lower lip. I would have slipped thankfully through any loophole of escape, and the four winds take the rest of the sto Then relief came where 1 least looked for it. For with the majesty of her race she drew a tight rein and went on. My husband lived almost eighteen rs after our urringe His wealth, was great at the time I married him, increased through the years, and we lived in luxury. I had everything I wanted before I had a chance to want ft. which “Mr. Chambers owned property every- where and of all kinds. His buildings were all over San Francisco—bulldings that you could not find a stone or a ghingle of now. The rentals from these amounted to $4850 a month. His ranch lands stretched all around. There were acres and acres in the San Joaquin Val- ley, and at one time the whole of what was then the San Pablo ranch was his. “He had mining stocks and water shares—at the time when the water rate was $30 per month. It was because of this interest that Mr. Sharon managed to get my water rate reduced after I was left destitute. “Did Mr. Chambers wealth in California?” “Yes, the whole of 1t. 49 with Mr. Parrott—John Parrott. s without means then. "But California proved a lucky land to acquire all his He came here in He him, ag it did to many others, and he 14 not walit long for a fortune. It came like magic, and went in the same way. “During his prosperity my husband gave —_— WHEN 1\WasS 14 MR CHAMBER §{(Q AND | WERE MARRIED®’ continually. All churches and charitres were remembered. He was not a Roman Catholic, but he gave to the church be- cause It was a means of doing good. Nine AT THE PAPER AND | CLYUTCHED ¥ e, 2 s R -y o @ SHE CLUTCHED TOO, feet of land through the block went to the Presentation Convent. All of this land for blocks around was ours. “Look at my home now. Nothing left but this little cottage and the lot next where you see I have made a garden. “I almost failed to save even that lot. “My husband had become embarrassed In business before he died, and when I was left alone I knew nothing about managing what little was left me. The property in this neighborhood slipped away, and I found everything except this scrap in the hands of the foreigners. ‘“When I wanted to hold the next lot the Ttallans tried to get it away. I could offer $500 for it; they offered $3000. ““The directors of the Hibernia Bank were to settle the matter. At first they 1 WROTE HIM & LETTERD LIFE THAT & FRIEND, MOTHER AND laughed at the idea of $500 over against $3000. “But I had a frfend or two left then, and for the sake of old times concessions were made. So the lot became mine and here I have made my home ever since. “How we entertained In those day There were parties given to the most fashionable people in San Francisco.” She ran over a string of names, among which Scott and Kittle and Sharon and Bowman clung in my memory. I watched her heavy-jointed, red hand idle with a quaint bracelet. It was a gesture full of all that is instinct with carved and cur- tained and chandeliered surroundings. The hands had forgotten for a moment of reminiscence the work & day part they are cast for. N epoch in the history of racial and | national evolution has just been | consummated by the coming into force of the revised treatles be- tween the great powers and Japan. Slow has been the process, and | during silent centuries these peculiar peo- |ple in thelr mystical land have been trending toward the forging of the link predestined to be the bond of union be- tween the peoples of the Orlent and the | Occident. This relationship is potent as a | factor of irresistible force, determining and dominating results of more than in- ternational magnitude. In the inception of union perfect harmony in recognition | and adaptation is not to be expected. Un- | pleasant manifestations are unavoidable, | but such should be regarded as contin- | gencies, and not as evidences of ultimate incompatibility—simply a friction ,natural in the commingling of alien entities—the activity of on preparatory to perfect union. The afiiliation of the peoples of the Hast and the West, fn which is {nexorable, Effo: he logic of events, comes predestined. s made toward opposing Athls result GHE ANGCO-SAXON AND THE JAPANESE By Frederick W. D’Evelyn, President of the Geographical Society of California. diplomacy which would assume the ag- gressive would ultimate in defeat. Bo evident does this relation appear that we consider that the politiclan or states- man of the near future will find the recof- nitlon of this fact a matter of necessily rather than of free will adoption. Further, the potential possibilities of the Orient suggest a recognition which will not assume the characteristics of a craven or suppliant nation, but of a prowess which would render friendship desirability, as it would constitute hos- tility a menace. The supremacy of the Anglo-Saxon is not a tenure of fixity, a monopoly of capabllity; nor does he possess distinotive attributes so essentlally his own as to vironment. Indeed, it may be seriously questioned if there are not indications that his full growth has been alread reached and that the efforts now in evi- dence, brilliant though they be, assume more the character of a struggle than of expansion and Increase of capability. His reserve of power may be overdrawn, his vitality undermined so that while he maintains” an unstable position for the present he will cease to fi‘é the dominant ower in the hybrid nationality of the uture. The close assoctation of races, rendered more possible by facility of travel, inter- change of rec(grocny and commercial in- terests, Insensibly creates an enyironment which tends to produce a less distinctive ferences and thus to initlate raclal changes which harmonize with instead of antagonizing the surrounding influences. The forces tending to these results may not always work with a uniform intensi There will be periods of varying activity some slow, perhaps {ll defined; others so rapid as to appear phenomenal, in which each effect stands out boldly and dis- tinetively. One of the latter character has certainly been forcibly presented by Japan's rise to position, as evidenced in this treaty act, for while by this agreement she has obliterated the line of demarcation be- tween herself and the comity of nations, she has demonstrated something of greater significance than a mere triumph o6 Alelomacy, Zha full eomprehension ef the fact that Japan is now a great power, that no extraterritorial clause hampers the exercise of her laws, that her bor- ders are free to the entrance of all foreign- ers, evidences to us that this result is not an accident but the attainment of a phase of development which has been steadily evolving. Japan, half a century ago con- sidered a pagan land, is to-day abreast of the standard of nations—a giant in innate possibilities, whose reserve power of Valor, intelligence and capability insures a continuance of growth, presaging that insidious approximation 'of relationship which is of most deep portent to the peo- ples of the West. It means a quickening and heralds a serious and prolonged ac- tivity on the part of the latter if they are to successfully maintain existing tenets and characteristics as the paramount power, while far reaching influences will mark the virile activity of Japanese growth and ambition. ‘Will the coalition of Orient and Occident result in a hybrid stock in which racial characteristics will assume new generalf- ties—a new people unified—or will it be a coherence in which exists no bond save that of mere contact—an agreed equality? These are problems the solution of which the future may find interestin; while in the pr ¢t they ast i eRent suggest IT WAS DURING MRS WILSONS DAVUGHTER: . 7 “It is fortunate that you can still Nve in the city of your old friends,” I chirped thoughtfully. “My old friends? Where are they? I might as well be on the other side of the earth. They are nearly all dead, and the few who are left are strangers to me now. My troubles have ma me lose interest in the world, and I have persistently shut myself away from every one.” The pride of it! Oh, the pride of it! Not a whine ahout the world’s cruelty and friendship’s fickleness and all the old tale. “I have shut myself away You notice? There were four childre is dead, another is barel family, the other two are i Of these one supporting the fles. Those four people and the memories live alone in the little brown house at No. 1 She shuts up tight and proud when vou get near the subject of the imbecile c dren. She is a mother. They are both mature in much T know, and they are voung. mind than the youngest baby that won ders. They are too young even to won- der. One of them was in all the hurry to live of his twenty-one years when he forgot about life. He lies helpless in bed now, and his mother feeds him with her own weary hands. The other is a woman, with a woman's strength of body. She follows her mother clumsily about the house. The youngest son is a man of 30. He has learned the carpenter's trade. He cannot find work now, and so the last resort has come. Mrs. Chambers {s offering her en- gagement ring for sale. It is the one thing of great intrinsic value left. It is the sapphire of her girlish whim, chosen when she was tired of diamonds. It has been clung to and cherished and guarded, and now its day has come. In all of Mrs. Chambers’ history there ‘was nothing which im- pressed me so much as the instinctive good taste and self-respect which have led her to make her home what it ‘s. The marvelous way in which the dreari- ness of poverty has been transformed is the strongest clew to her character that I saw. The arrangement of furniture, plc- tures, ornaments, is old-fashioned but ex- quisite. The stooping corner of the white- washed back porch has been roofed with cheap bits of glass by the carpenter’s skill, and it opens from the living room in the guise of a conservatory, where flappy-eared begonias grow and where ferns sprawl in lazy warmth. She herself s neatly threadbare. Her face is no less than ugly with the scars of worry and tears. It is the tone of her voice, the ease of her language and the unconscious- ners of her hands that tell tales. « e e The Presentation Convent is sleek and gray outside, and inside the halircloth chairs stand in sleek order. The sisters tread softly and speak mildly. The sweetest one of all those I saw is gray, I fancy, beneath the black, for she became religious in 1861 “What are your earliest of Mrs. Chambers?" I said. “As the lady who lived in the grand house just bevond the house in whose yard a fountain was always playing and at whose fence I always stopped as a little girl to peep through and admire the fountain.” “And what band?"” “I know that people said he ruined him- self by gambling.” AR! It must be I was not listening attentively when his widow told me that. ‘he. Chambers helped the convent?" remarkable recollections do you know of her hus- “I know that they were always most kind. About giving land I have heard nothing, for the land was already the church’s before my time. But I remem- ber well how the earliest sisters who came from Ireland in '53 used to tell of the great help that Mr. and Mrs, Cham- bers gave them in their struggles to be- come established. I recollect their saying that water was furnished them. “I know that she is in great need. The son is said to be deserving and in need of work. Her lot is certainly very hard, poor lady. I have seen her for years, always followed by that terribly af- flicted daughter.” The convent stands sleekly, calmly prosperous. In the cramped alley behind it crouches little brown No. 1. KATHRYN MARCH. e ——— Canada’s exports of butter to England are rapidly Increasing. This year, to August 19, 215,411 boxes have heen shipped, | as compared with a total of 154,011 in 1896, The American Board of Japanese Mis- sions reports that the chief opposition to Christian missions in that country is not from the heathen priests, but from the Japanese agnostics, An autograph volume of music by Or- lando di Lasso, the great composer of | sacred music of the sixteenth century, | recently discovered i known portrait of the when he was 28 years old. In Germany, as in many other Euro- pean countries, there is s rule that no more_people shall ride on streetcars than can find seats. Consequently, if a car is full, if a woman gets on and if & man 1zlvet! the wWoman hiy seat, the man ia