Page:California Inter Pocula.djvu/217



have so  often  dreamed  and  romanced,  the  miner  with uplifted pick,  the  camp,  the  burdened  mule  laboring up the  steep  ascent;  forms  of  cascades  of  tumbling- waters, illusive  lakes  reflecting  on  their  limpid  surface the inverted  trees  and  mountains ;  of  alligators,  leagues long, with  head  and  feet  and  outstretched  tail;  of elephants,  hydras,  sea-serpents,  sphinxes,  forms  of anything  and  everything  the  heart  can  feel  or  the imagination pencil.

Like a  gem  embankment,  meanwhile,  the  sky-wall glows in  crimson  beneath  a  brilliant  arch  of  orange, and the  frothy  clouds  toss  themselves,  and  revel  in their  aerial  sea  of  colors. Golden threads  are  spun and woven  into  a  metallic  web  overlaying  the  deep vermilion sky,  which  beams  through  the  interspaces, while from  behind  an  opaque  cloud  broad  diverging streams of  transparent  light  are  thrown  over  the  scene like the  radii  of  an  enormous  fan ;  then  as  the  black obstruction melts  to  silver  burnished  by  a  flood  of  un- obstructed white, suddenly  the  fan  leaves  turn  to auroral  streaks,  and  from  some  seemingly  Protean pyrotechnic works  under  the  sea's  bank  rainbows  radi- ate outward and  upward. On either  side  of  the  cen- tral display, beginning  at  the  water's  edge,  deep crimson, through  imperceptible  transitions  and  grada- tions, turns to  carmine,  then  to  purple,  and  violet,  and indigo, and  finally  into  brown,  while  above  and  over all, northward  and  southward,  over  sea  and  clouds  and sky, hangs  a  gauzy  veil,  in  many  several  blending shades of  softest  tinted  lilac.

At last,  resting  for  a  moment  on  the  ocean's  brink, with a  plunge  the  sun  goes  down;  and  as  the  long, golden streamers  reluctantly  follow,  and  while  the western sky  yet  glows  as  from  hidden  furnace  fires, from the  gray  east,  silently  and  unobserved,  the  moon creeps up,  coquetting  with  the  clouds,  and  seemingly bashful of  her  more  tender  light,  and  fearful  of  ob- truding her soft,  silvery  presence  upon  the  more  bril- liant eflbrts of  her  consort,  throws  a  smile  of  quiet