Page:Mexico, California and Arizona - 1900.djvu/315

 295

is the way of sea-coasts, as observed from the water, maintain a close reserve. If they allow us a cliff or two, a suggestion of green forests, or a mountain in the background, it is as much as they do. All their natural projections, from a steamer's deck, retire into a straight line. "You have chosen your element," they seem to say, and you shall not enjoy at once the pleasures of both. If you can do without me, so can I without you, and until you take the pains to disembark you shall know nothing of the attractions I purposely keep out of sight just over the surf-whitened margin."

The coast of California seems of even an especial moroseness in this respect. You pass some few islands, inlets at San Diego and Wilmington, the Santa Barbara Channel, and the bays of Santa Monica, San Luis, and Monterey; but for the most part the coast of the land of stretches on unbroken, low, brown, and bare. Search is vain for any suggestion of range-grove or palm. It is foreign-looking to one who arrives from the east of the United States. Lions might come prowling down such slopes. It might be Morocco, and we, on our travels,