The California Birthday Book Part 25

JULY 11.

THE WOODS OF THE WEST.

Oh, woods of the west, leafy woods that I love.

Where through the long days I have heard The prayer of the wind in the branches above, And the tremulous song of the bird.

Where the cl.u.s.t'ring blooms of the dog-wood hang o'er-- White stars in the dusk of the pine, And down the dim aisles of the old forest pour The sunbeams that melt into wine!

Oh, woods of the west, I am sighing today For the sea-songs your voices repeat, For the evergreen glades, for the glades far away From the stifling air of the street, And I long, ah, I long to be with you again And to dream in that region of rest.

Forever apart from this warring of men-- Oh, wonderful woods of the west!

HERBERT BASHFORD, in _At the Shrine of Song._

JULY 12.

The Mohave yucca is a remarkable plant, which resembles in its nature both the cactus and the palm. It is found nowhere save in the Mohave Desert. It attains a height of thirty or forty feet, and the trunk, often two or three feet in diameter, supports half a dozen irregular branches, each tipped with a cl.u.s.ter of spine-like leaves. The flowers, which are of a dingy white color, come out in March and last until May, giving off a disagreeable odor. The fruit, however, which is two or three inches long, is pulpy and agreeable, resembling a date in flavor.

ARTHUR J. BURd.i.c.k, in _The Mystic Mid-Region._

JULY 13 AND 14.

Throughout the coast region, except in the extreme north, this Live Oak is the most common and characteristic tree of the Coast Range valleys which it beautifies with low broad heads whose rounded outlines are repeated in the soft curves of the foothills. Disposed in open groves along the bases of low hills, fringing the rich lands along creeks or scattered by hundreds or thousands over the fertile valley floors, the eyes of the early Spanish explorers dwelt on the thick foliage of the swelling crowns and read the fertility of the land in these evergreen oaks which they called Encina. The chain of Franciscan Missions corresponded closely to the general range of the Live Oak although uniformly well within the margin of its geographical limits both eastward and northward. The vast a.s.semblage of oaks in the Santa Clara Valley met the eyes of Portola, discoverer of San Francis...o...b..y, in 1769, and a few years later, Crespi, in the narrative of the expedition of 1772, called the valley the "Plain of Oaks of the Port of San Francisco." Then came Vancouver, Englishman and discoverer. Although he was the first to express a just estimate of the Bay of San Francisco, which he declared to be as fine as any port in the world, nevertheless it is his felicitous and appreciative description of the groves of oaks, the fertile soil (of which they were a sign), and the equable climate that one reads between his lines of 1792 the prophecy of California's later empire.

W.L. JEPSON, in _Silva of California._

JULY 15.

Huge live-oaks, silvered with a boar of lichen, stretched their boughs in fantastic frenzies. Gray fringes of moss hung from them, and tangled screens of clematis and wild grape caught the sunlight in their flickering meshes or lay over mounds of foliage like a torn green veil. * * *

For nearly two miles the carriage drive wound upward through this sylvan solitude. As it approached the house a background of emerald lawns shone through the interlacing branches, and brilliant bits of flower beds were set like pieces of mosaic between gray trunks.

GERALDINE BONNER, in _The Pioneer._

JULY 16.

The Yellow Pine is the most abundant and widely distributed tree of the forests of California and is particularly characteristic of the Sierra Nevada, where it attains its finest development. The largest trees most commonly grow along the ridges and it is the ridges which the trails ordinarily follow. Here the traveler may journey day after day, over needle-carpeted or gra.s.sy ground, mostly free of underbrush, amidst great clean shafts 40 to 150 feet high, of really ma.s.sive proportions but giving a sense of lightness by reason of their color, symmetry, and great height. No two trunks in detail of bark are modeled exactly alike, for each has its own particular finish; so it is that the eye never wearies of the fascination of the Yellow Pine but travels contentedly from trunk to trunk and wanders satisfyingly up and down their splendid columns--the finest of any pine.

W.L. JEPSON, in _Silva of California._

JULY 17.

MENDOCINO.

A vast cathedral by the western sea, Whose spires G.o.d set in majesty on high, Peak after peak of forests to the sky, Blended in one vast roof of greenery.

The nave, a river broadening to the sea: The aisles, deep canyons of eternal build; The transepts, valleys with G.o.d's splendor filled; The shrines, white waterfalls in leaf-laced drapery; The choir stands westward by the sounding sh.o.r.e; The cliffs like beetling pipes set high in air; Roll from the beach the thunders crashing there; The high wind-voices chord the breakers' roar; And wondrous harmonies of praise and prayer Swell to the forest altars evermore.

LILLIAN H. SHUEY, in _Among the Redwoods._

JULY 18.

They were pa.s.sing an orange-grove, and they entered a road bordered with scarlet geraniums that wound for a mile through eucalyptus trees, past artificial lakes where mauve water-lilies floated in the sun, and boats languorously invited occupants. Finally they came upon a smooth sward like that of an English park, embellished with huge date-palms, luxuriant magnolias, and regal banana-trees. Then they pa.s.sed a brook tumbling in artificial cascades between banks thick with mossy ferns, and bright with blossoms. The children led their companion beneath fig and bay trees through an Italian garden; all of this splendid luxury of verdure had sprung from the desert as the result of a fortune patiently spent in irrigation.

MRS. FREMONT OLDER, in _The Giants._

JULY 19.

Some men have an eye for trees and an inborn sympathy with these rooted giants, as if the same sap ran in their own veins. To them trees have a personality quite as animals have, and, to be sure, there are "characters" among trees. I knew a solitary yellow pine which towered in the landscape, the last of its race. Its vast columnal trunk seemed to loom and expand as one approached. Always there was distant music in the boughs above, a n.o.ble strain descending from the clouds. Its song was more majestic than that of any other tree, and fell upon the listening ear with the far-off cadence of the surf, but sweeter and more lyrical, as if it might proceed from some celestial harp. Though there was not a breeze stirring below, this vast tree hummed its mighty song. Apparently its branches had penetrated to another world than this, some sphere of increasing melody.

C.H. KIRKHAM, in _In the Open._

JULY 20.

You will think the gentlemen were fine dandies in those Mexican days, when I tell you that they often wore crimson velvet knee trousers trimmed with gold lace, embroidered white shirts, bright green cloth or velvet jackets with rows and rows of silver b.u.t.tons and red sashes with long streaming ends. Their wide-brimmed _sombreros_ (hats) were trimmed with silver or gold braid and ta.s.sels. * * * Each gentleman wore a large Spanish cloak of rich velvet or embroidered cloth, and if it rained, he threw over his fine clothes a _serape_, or square woolen blanket, with a slit cut in the middle for the head.

ELLA M. s.e.xTON, in _Stories of California._

JULY 21.

ON THE PLANTING OF THE TREES AT THE PACIFIC THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY, OAKLAND.