USA > California > Monterey County > History of Monterey County, California : with illustrations descriptive of its scenery, farms, residences, public buildings, factories, hotels, business houses, schools, churches, and mines : with biiographical sketches of prominent citizens > Part 25
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But the old plaza was thoroughly Spanish. Dusky beauties stole along under the baleonies and copings. Plaintive airs, trolled by soft voices, to an accompanying guitar, welled at intervals out from the little col de sacs beyond the foot-bridge. Up shadowy by-ways children prattled in the musical aeeents of the Mexicano; and even in the busy thoroughfares English was a foreign tongue.
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.
A visit to the Cathedral should not be omitted. The tourist passes on the way several old adobes, one of which, with its remnants of fancy stueeoing, its great rafters tethered to pro- jecting beams with thongs of rawhide-not a nail or spike about the whole structure-and its massive flaring roof of varigated red tiles, will especially attraet attention. The approach to the church is curiously paved with the disjointed vertebræ of whales caught in the harbor. The facade is highly ornamented, after the old Spanish style, and its eurious bell tower painted with warm buff is execedingly picturesque seen from a little distance. The interior, though eold, rude and plain. is possessed of one considerable attraction-a very old
picture, an importation, representing the Court of Heaven hanging just under the choir. The effeet seems somewhat marred by the attitude of the angelic herald resting upon the crowns of two eherubs. But for their eestatic expression, one would think the hopeless innocents were being trampled baek to the Stygian realms below. The faces are all exceedingly natural, characterized by truthfulness and individuality of expression, and wear the holy ealm of exalted lives.
AN EVENING STROLL.
I elimbed to the Presidio one evening at sunset. The view well repaid the trouble. My only companion was the solitary little six-pounder, pointing its puny muzzle over the bay in the grimmest mockery of defense. Defense ! Who would think of attacking the sleepy forgotten old burgh at my feet ? There, at his post, stood the "outlook " for chance whales, on his wind- swept knoll, darkly shadowed against the flushed waters of the bay. To the right stretched the Sauta Lucia range, waving with pines that looked, a league off, like palms. To the south- ward rose the olive-green domes of barer suminits, theu. hases resting in the emerald plush of a mat of pines and live-oak. Up the blue trough hollowing dimly away towards the Palo Eserito hills, towered the grand bulk of El Toro, elosing in the lovely seene. Twenty miles over the golden blue of the bay the dim-peneiled Santa Cruz mountains reared their wall of airy purple, while the sails of the nearer fishing-smacks burned like fire against them. Gradually the breezy waters subsided, and lay, a dimpled plain of liquid malachite, fringed with the booming surf. The brightest spot in the whole eanvas of sky, wave and wold, was the hated sand-dunes of a few days before. Nature leaves uo waste places .- Elmo Willwood.
CURIOSITIES OF THE TOWN.
Fred Somers says : "I could tell yon of quaint and eurious relics ; of romantically walled-in gardens, hard for a lover to elimnb, like those in Spain ; of sidewalks made of the vertebræ of whales, and the mammoth bones piled high in fantastie pyra- mids, and covered with flowers ; of the strange sights at the whaling station, but never of the siekening smell; of China- town aud its bales of dried fish, and the junks built by the heathen themselves, and equipped with great bat-winged sails ; of the light-house at Pinos Point ; of the Methodist camp- inceting ground where the brethren aunually shout; of Cypress Point, where the guarled and knotted trunks and delirious looking branches actually reach for you, and tangle up your thoughts, and shake long disheveled loeks of fog- soaked moss, and point at you reprovingly with their twisted and devilishly suggestive fiugers, and stretch on high, with almost a human moan, their deformed and distressing arms; of the bathing beaches, and the dives from the end of the
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SUPERIORITY OF SCENERY AND CLIMATE.
wharf down into the water fifty feet deep, crisp as broken glass and as cold as the glance of a mother-in-law ; of the wonderful natural aquariums among the rocks, visited at low tide, and fascinating enough to keep you chained to the place till the incoming waters cut off all chance of getting back to land; of the natural caves and bridges, where the requiem of the ocean is played by the waves, and sung by mournful, sigh- ing, sepulehral winds; of the trolling trips for barracouta on the bay, perch fishing in the surf, and snipe, quail, and squirrel slaughter on the land ; of plumaged sea-birds, and flashing dol- phins, and shelving beaches, and sand-banks you might mistake for snow. All this I might amplify, and assert, and, affirm, and then you might come down here, getting sea-sick on the way; finding nothing to eat or drink; no comfortable place to sleep, no one to black your boots; a shivering fog to greet you in the early morning, and an atmosphere of dreary dis- content."
BEAUTIFUL MONTEREY.
BY MRS. ANNIE E. MERRITT.
Where the hlue waves kiss the sand, As they leap a joyous band ; Where the mountains towering high, Seem to touch the azure sky ; Where the young vines meekly twine Round the tall, majestic pine ; Half inclosed in rocks of gray, Gently Blumhers Monterey.
Beautiful as poet's dream, When its hills with verdure tcem ; When the balmy air is filled With incense from Heaven distilled, And sweet nature seeks repose Where the murmuring streamlet flows, Like aome gem of brightest ray There enthroned is Monterey.
Flowers of the brightest hue, Laden with the morning dew ; Velvet grass and clinging vine, Groves of oak, and stately pine, Fleecy clouds that lightly rest On the evening's gentle breast, All these hold their quiet sway On the shores of Monterey.
But more beautiful at even In the mystic light of heaven, When the moon's pale, silvery shaen Lends ita heauty to the scene, And a holy calm o'er all Settles lightly as a pall, And the night seems changed to day 'Neath the skies of Monterey.
Talk not of the atoricd Rhine, Nor Italia's sunny clime, Nor the Orient's so fair With its halmy perfumed air. Crowned with old historic lore, Well I love this rock-bound shore ; "Tis to thee I sing my lay- Queen of Beauty, Monterey.
WEATHER AT MONTEREY.
The weather at Monterey is not so warm, either in summer or winter, as in other parts of California further south, but there is an even temperature that can be found nowhere else. From January to December, year in and year out, there is no summer nor winter weather. Indeed, the weather at Monterey, from one year's end to another, partakes of that delightful interlude known in the East and South as Indian summer. The same balmy zephyrs breathe a delicious atmos- phere all the year round, and summer and winter, so-called, serenely face each other and exchange compliments. The west wind, moist with the spray of Pacific billows, and laden with the suggestions of spices in the far Cathay, comes in every evening with ozone and healing upon its wings.
Monterey has only one rival (Honolulu) in equability of temperature. It must be understood, however, that there is a great deal of hot, disagreeable weather on the islands, and a multiplicity of drawbacks which Monterey does not possess. There are seldom any high, cold winds at and around Mont- erey, and never any hot ones. There is more or less foggy weather in the spring months, as there is all along the coast, and onee in a while a foggy morning in summer. The latter, however, are really agreeable, as they infuse new life and fresh- ness into tree and shrub and flower, and are not in the least detrimental in their influences upon human beings at that sea- VIEJO. son of the year.
TEMPERATURE OF MONTEREY.
The following table shows the temperature for 1877-8-9:
Dec. 1877, 51°. . Jan. 1877, 49° Feb. 1877, 50° 1878, 55° 1878, 51º 1878, 53°
1879, 51° 1879, 51º " 1879, 54°
Purity of atmosphere is the great desideratum of the seeker after health. During the warm season, or summer months, from May to October, the mercury seldom rises to 65°, as the heat from the valleys and mountain sides is tempered by eool- ing winds from the ocean between meridian and sunset, and by breezes from the mountain gaps during the night. During what may be termed the winter months 50° will mark, on an average, the mean temperature, and water is never congealed. The very fact that many persons wear overcoats at night and sleep in blankets the year round, and that all field work from January to December is performed by laborers in their shirt sleeves, presents a better and more unequivocal illustration of the equability of the weather, perhaps, than any other inci- dent that might be presented. The healthfulness of this sec- tion is simply unquestionable, and is second to none in the world. What is generally known as the rainy season com- mences in November, and lasts three or four months.
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MONTEREY A HEALTH GIVING PLEASURE RESORT.
The Renaissance of Monterey.
BY MAJOR BEN. C. TRUMAN.
Cypress Point.
THE reader is invited to accompany the author to an Arcadian scene, where sea and sky and sunshine and sylvan surroundings majestically meet, and where a rare equability of
temperature and healthfulness of c.imate beckon alike the seeker after recreation and reenperation-I mean Monterey --- the queen of American watering-places.
Monterey has long been known for its equable temperature and for its health-giving atmosphere and breezes. It was the first capital of California, and has always enjoyed, amongst old Californians, the reputation of being the healthiest and most delightful spot in their State ; and it is, undoubtedly, the most perfect place for the invalid and the valetudinarian to winter in, and for the seeker after pleasure and recuperation to sum- mer at, upon the Pacific coast, and perhaps in the world. Fully realizing these facts, the Southern Pacific Railroad Company some two years ago, built a road from a point on their main coast-line, and now run two trains daily each way between San Francisco and this charming city hy the sea.
There is prohahly no place upon the Pacific coast so replete with natural charms as Monterey. Its exquisite beauty and variety of scenery is diversified with ocean, bay, lake and steamlet ; mountain, hill and valley, and groves of oak, cypress, spruce, pine and other trees. The mountain views are very beautiful, particularly the Gabilan and Santa Cruz spurs. That which will the quickest engage the observation of the visitor, however, is the pine-fringed slope near town and the grove that surrounds the " Hotel del Monte."
FASHIONABLE SEA-SIDE RESORT.
As some requirement of the public at large has always had a hand either in pointing out almost every well-known spot of picturesque heauty in the world, or at least in developing it, so it was the fact that San Francisco needed a fashionable sea- shore resort that brought Monterey into celebrity after it had swung around the circle of civilization almost into oblivion. As I have spoken of it as a resort, it is not difficult to prove its claims. It has an ideal atmosphere and temperature-it is in California and is not that enough ?- in a section of country where winter never visits, and where summer, too, is forgotten ; and in their place the lucky inhabitants have that blissful
climate which contains all the attractions of the fickle element and none of its drawhacks. It is a purified, idealized climate; never cold, never hot ; always balmy, never enervating; and possessing in its moderation the rare quality of being hracing. Too dry for malaria or fever, too mild and even for pneu- monia and its near blood relation, consumption, cannot one forgive any amount of enthusiasm. upon such a climate ? But Monterey is not all climate; it is scenie as well. It is a spot to inspire poets, and to nerve the artist's hand ; and it is also an all-the-year-round resort, as the thermometer varies only about six degrees from January to June. It was California's first capital city, but its situation being hardly adapted to that honor, it was stripped of that prominent position and became simply Monterey. But its thousands of happy visitors can support. its loss of political importance, and perhaps he thank- ful that its beautiful location was not monopolized hy husiness, or its fine bay and sea view marred hy the inevitable disfig- urement of traffic and its adjuncts. Besides being climatic and scenic, Monterey is likewise historical. We were all taught at school, if you will recollect, that many parts of the Pacific coast were made picturesque hy ruins; but in this instance they are not the ruins of barbarie splendor.
PICTURESQUE RUINS OF CARMELO.
The architecture of the Mission challenges admiration. It is vast, solid and dignified, bearing, intentionally, a decided resemblance to the Syrian Mount Carmel ; the mound-like effeet is arrived at by a gentle slope of the walls of the com- pact main huildings from the ground to the roof. It is a noble edifice, even now, and fitted well to its surroundings. Iu no land in the world does verdure reach a higher state of perfec- tion than in California ; trees and plants alike grow to fabu- lous sizes, while the coloring in the landscape effects, and the hues of ocean and sky rival the tropics, and in the midst of this is Monterey ; and four miles away through pleasant roads and bewildering groves of cypress is the picturesque Mission, framed in a landscape unlikely to mar the thoughts which this stately ruin will inspire, as one looks npon its noble towers, its ruined, grass-grown stairs, all the handiwork of this little body of men, who left their own country, not to mend their fortunes or earn riches, but true to a principle, and in a spirit deserving of devout respect, however antagonistic it may seem to inany. In those narrow cells they said their pater- noster; up and down those moss-eucrusted stairs they went upon their daily rounds of work and prayer ; and to whatever · duties their snecessors in faith may now devote themselves, that drooping structure demands for the co-workers of Father Junipero Serra profound respect.
The Bay of Monterey is a magnificent sheet of water, and is twenty-eight miles from point to point. It is delightfully adapted to boating and yachting ; and many kinds of fish (and
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تعيين شحن
Sughun den standard dar
W. W., ELLIOTT & CO, LITH.S. F.
تحديد
ـنائسـ
بشطبـ
HOTEL DEL MONTE BATHING PAVILION.
.06 .3.2
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ELEGANT SEA-SIDE HOTEL AND BATHING BEACH.
especially rock-cod, barracuda, pompino, Spanish maekeral, and flounder) may be taken at all times of the seasons, and sal- mon during portions of the summer months. For bathing pur- poses. the beach is all that could be desired-one long, bold sweep of wide, gently sloping, clean white sand-the very per- feetion of a bathing beach, and so safe that children may play and bathe upon it with entire security. There are also great varieties of sea mosses, shells, pebbles, and agates scattered here and there along the rim of the bay, fringed as it is at all times with the ereamy ripples of the surf.
THE HOTEL DEL MONTE.
To those who resort to Monterey as a fashionable watering- place during the summer, or as a health resort during winter, the " Hotel del Monte" is looked upon as one of the greatest of all the attractions, not only on account of its being the most magnificent structure of the kind on the Pacific coast, but because it is one of the largest, hand- somest, and ore of the most elegantly furnished sea-side hotels in the world. Indeed, no ocean house upon the At- lantie approaches it in its plan of ex- terior, while its in- terior finish, aceom- modations and ap- pointments are much superior to those of any like establishment in the United States. It is built in the modern Gothie style, and is 385 feet in length and 115 in width, with wings; there are two full stories, an attie story, and several floors in the eentral tower or observatory. Its ground floor in some respeets resembles that of the Grand Union at Saratoga ; and as in that and other Eastern summer hotels, the lady guests have access to all the public rooms, and especially to the office or lobby in the front eenter of the building, which is 42x48 feet; connecting with the lobby is a reading-room, 24x26; then a ladies' billiard room, 25x62; then a ladies' parlor, 34x42, and then, with a hall or covered veranda between, a ball-room 36x72. There is a corridor extending the whole length of the building, twelve feet wide. The dining-room is 45x70; a ehil- dren's and servant's dining-room is attached, and apartments for parties who may prefer dejeuners u la fourchette. The kitchen is 33x40 feet. There are twenty-eight suites of rooms on this floor, each with bath-room and all other modern improvements. There are three staircases, one at the inter-
HOTEL DEL MONTE- MONTEREY
section of each of the end wings, and a grand stairease leading from the lobby. In the second story there are forty-eight suites, or about one hundred rooms, and all other modern improvements. There is also a promenade the whole lengtli of the building, twelve feet in width. In the attic story there are thirteen suites and twenty nine single rooms, sixty-five apartments iu all. The eentral tower or observatory is 25x30, and about eighty feet in height; there are ten rooms in the observatory; the end towers are about fifty feet in height. The hotel is lighted throughout with gas made at the works upou the grounds, and supplied with water from an artesian well upon the premises. No pains were spared in its erection to provide against fire, both in the perfect construction of flues and in the apparatus for extinguishing flames. The house is elegantly furnished throughout. The ladies' billiard parlor is one of the largest and most elegantly appointed in the United States. Adjacent to the hotel building is a bar-room and bowling alley and smoking rooms for gentlemen. At a short distance from the hotel is a stable and carriage - house, large enough to ae- commodate sixty horses and as mauy carriages ; there is telephonie eommu- uieation between the hotel and the stable. There is
hot and cold water throughout the ho- tel, and all other modern appliances
and improvements. 'The grounds, consisting of about one hundred and twenty-six acres, are entirely enclosed and are beautifully wooded with pine, oak, cedar and eypress. There have been about one thousand two hundred young trees added, most of which are English walnut.
BEAUTIFUL SURROUNDINGS.
Croquet plats, swings, an enelosure for lawn tennis, ete., are provided, and ehoiee flowers, shrubs and grasses are grow- iug under the eye of an experienced gardener. The hotel accommodates four hundred people; It is only a stone's throw from the station, which is connected with it by a wide gravel and cement walk. The company also own seven thousand aeres of land, through which there are many excellent drives, and over which roam an abundance of game, ineluding innum- erable deer. There are also several trout streams near by, from which the gamey fish may be taken at all times in the year, except when the rivers are swollen by rains.
126
THE BATHING ADVANTAGES OF MONTEREY.
SUPERIOR AND SAFE BATHING.
The beach is only a few minutes' walk from the Hotel del Monte, and is a very fine one. Mr. W. H. Daily, the eham- pion swimmer of the Pacific coast, and who has made himself well acquainted with the character of several of the most noted beaches from San Francisco to Santa Monica, says, in a letter dated Monterey, December 15, 1879, "I have made a careful examination of the beach at this place, as to its fitness for purposes of bathing. I find it an easy, sloping beaeh of fine sand ; no gravel, no stones anywhere below high-water mark. I waded and swam up the beach a quarter of a inile, that is, toward the east, and also westward toward the warehouse, and found a smooth, sandy bottom all the way; no rocks, no sea- wced and no undertow. The whiteness of the sand makes the water beautifully clear. I consider the beach here the finest on the Pacific coast. I was in the water an hour yesterday, and found it, even at this time of the year, none too cold for enjoyable bathing."
LARGE AND COMPLETE BATH HOUSE.
The bathing establishment is the largest and most complete on the Pacific coast, and contains warm salt water plunge and swimining baths, four hundred rooms, and a swimming tank one hundred and fifty feet by fifty, varying in depth from three to six feet, heated by steam pipes and supplied with a constant flow of water from the sea ; and in addition thereto a number of rooms for those who prefer individual batbs of hot and cold salt water-with ample douche and shower facilities.
BEAUTIFUL PLEASURE DRIVES.
The drives over the new macadamized roads throughout the seven thousand acres owned by the company, and elsewhere about the old eity, reveal countless attractions of shore and grove. Civilization and modern ingenuity and wealth of means have aided nature ; and not only invalids, tourists and artists flock to Monterey, but the fashionable have elaimed it as their own under the impression, as usual, that the best of this world's pleasures is fashion's birthright-indeed, if one would but think of it, it is probably very fortunate that health resorts are usually capable of being made attractive, or else the great giddy world would be in danger. And thus Monterey's long dream has been permanently broken. As Mr. W. H. Mills, editor of the Sacramento Record-Union, in a letter to his paper, about a year ago, said : " Her destiny is not that of a trading center. She will produce no millionaires. No stock exchanges will establish themselves in her peaceful old streets. It is her lot to be the fashionable and favorite watering-place of California; the resort of invalids from less genial elimes ; a winter as well as a summer haunt for people in delicate health;
in fact, a sanitarium of the prosperous kind that has received the imprimatur of fashion.
"The Hotel del Monte has settled this question, and the pos- sibilities of the place. It has lifted it out of the rut in which it had lain so long and so contentedly, and has, in conjunction with the railroad, brought it within easy reach of everybody. Its pleasant climate, its interesting associations, its natural beauties, its fine bathing, will all eombine to render it more popular from year to year, and we may be sure that in a little while its elaims will be recognized by that steady extension of country-house building in the neighborhood which always attends such revivals." MONTEREY HAS THUS REACHED HER RENAISSANCE.
PACIFIC GROVE RETREAT.
Pacific Grove Retreat is on the beautiful Bay of Monterey, one and a half miles from the ancient eapital of the State. It will be open annually for the reception of visitors, tourists, and eampers from June 1st till about the end of September. As a healthful place of resort it is not surpassed by any loeality in the State. For beauty of location it eannot be excelled, its magnificent pine grove affording pleasant shade and extending to the water's edge. For all forms of bronchial or throat affeetions, it is a well-recognized fact that residence in pine groves is peculiarly beneficial. There are in the Grove, mineral waters of the very highest excellence, and reference ean be given to persons well known throughout the State, as to the advantage to be derived from their use.
SEA-BATHING.
Sea-batbing can be indulged in with safety and eomfort on a beautiful, sandy beach. A large number of entirely new bathing suits for ladies, gentlemen aud children have been pro- vided, and every attention will be paid to the wants of bathers. A new bath-house has also been erected.
We wish to call the attention of those who often have a few days at their disposal for recreation, to the peculiar advantages possessed by this peerless sea-side resort. It is easily aceessible either by land or water, has a most healthful and invigorating elimate, splendid sea-bathing, beautiful drives, salt and fresh water fishing and game at easy distances, and for the ladies and children no more pleasant occupation ean be found than in gathering the exquisite mosses and shells with which the beach abounds; while for invalids its mineral waters are second to none in the State. Besides all these advantages, there are none of the disturbing influenees whiel exist at so many watering- places, as no immorality of any kind is permitted on the grounds.
Parties wishing to visit this pleasant sea-side resort will please notice that they have the right to provide themselves with everything needful for sleeping and eating during their
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BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICES OF RESIDENTS.
Biographical.
HON. JOHN KING ALEXANDER.
HON. JOHN KING ALEXANDER, Superior Judge of Monterey county, is a native of Brandon, Rankin county, Mississippi, and was born Octoher 8, 1839. His parents' names were B. F. and Caroline W. Alexander. His early life was spent in Jackson, Mississippi, from 1841 until July, 1854.
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