Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 18.djvu/313



Hall Jackson {Celley T!tJ

The principal harbors which I visited on the Pacific coast of this province (and I speak only of what I actually saw) are Santa Cruz and San Francisco. The former, about lat. 37 deg. north, is open to the sea, and exposed at times to a tremendous surf. On the northern side of the harbor lies the small town of Santa Cruz.

San Francisco bay or harbor is very spacious, and furnishes several safe and convenient havens and roadsteads. It lies some forty miles north of Santa Cruz. Its entrance, latitude 37 deg. 49 min., is two miles wide, and admits ships of the largest draught and burden. From its entrance it stretches twenty miles towards the north, and thirty miles [SO] south- easterly, the southern branch of the bay being sheltered by a range of high hills. Throughout the bay the anchorage is safe, so that a more commodious harbor could not be desired. Excepting one in De Fuca straits, it is considered the best in Northwestern America. A number of important streams find an outlet in the harbors above named. Of these, the St. Joaquin may be particularized. It rises in a large lake near the 36th deg. north, moves with a deep, slow, and tranquil current through several hundred miles of praine, receiving the tribute of many lesser streams from the mountains on the east, and at last discharges its transparent waters into the northerly part of the bay of San Francisco. This tranquil river must eventually become productive of vast benefit to California, not merely as a convenient and ready inlet for commercial purpose, but as a great outlet through which shall be drained diose superfluous waters by which so much of the prairie is converted into a marsh, and rendered fruitful only of disease and death. It is indeed a vast canal, constructed by an Abnighty Architect, and destined, I doubt not, in future ages, to transport the countless products of a mighty empire.

Another river of note is called the Sacrament. Next to the Columbia it is the largest stream on the western side of the continent. Its head waters are in the Snowy mountains (of which I have already spdcen), and almost mingle with those