Page:The Tourist's California by Wood, Ruth Kedzie.djvu/45

 GENERAL INFORMATION 27 Cisco's mists " beautify " but never depress, her west winds which blow tantalisingly ten months of the year " refresh," rather than chill. . . . Bos- ton confesses to her nor'easters, Chicago to her lake winds and fogs of smoke, St. Louis to her July heat. Of climatic defects the Californian may complain one native son to another but never openly if a possible " home-seeker " or a tourist be near enough to hear. This is because the State is still hungry for population, and sea- sonal perfection is California's lure. The stranger is to blame for much of this con- certed discretion. He demands that unlimited sun- shine and gentle zephyrs without cessation shall at- tend his every step once he has crossed California's borders. In defence he will depose that his ex- pectations have been nourished on the pap of the too-hospitable pamphlet and the orange-tinted product of discriminating and optimistic cameras. Forewarned as to certain precautions in regard to the California climate, the traveller need not suffer disillusion, and winter ills. First among the deceptions practised upon the Easterner (an Easterner being any resident of that considerable territory east of Nevada) are temperature rec- ords as gauged by the thermometer. Columns of tabulated figures prove that it is unusual for the mercury to fall below 32 degrees during an entire Southern California winter, that the mean Janu-