Gwynne looked
about him with much interest. The mainland of the great northern cove
and the eastern side of the Islands were thick with trees: oaks,
buckeye, willows, madrono. And almost as thickly set, although sometimes
half hidden, were the villas: light and airy of architecture, gayly
painted, with broad verandas and overhanging vines. At the foot of
Belvedere and the little town of Tiburon were house-boats, in which
people lived for eight months of the year.

And everywhere, people, people, people. They swarmed in the yachts, on
the house-boats, on the driveways, the verandas. Gwynne twisted about
and looked at San Francisco. The palaces were on the heights and in the
Western Addition--out towards the Presidio and the Golden Gate; but
hundreds of tiny dwellings clung to the precipitous sides of Telegraph
Hill and Russian Hill as if their foundations were talons. And each had
its bit of garden, or its balcony full of flowers. Telegraph Hill, the
great bluff where the city turned almost at a right angle from north to
south, was given over largely to Mexicans and Italians, and was
uncommonly vivid. And the streets were full of people. The city had
turned itself inside out. Everywhere were bright gowns and parasols,
whizzing cars packed to the rails.

And the wealthy class by no means monopolized the bay with their yachts
and luxurious launches. There were fishing-smacks filled with whole
families of Italians and Chinese; in fact every tongue floated over the
water in the course of a brilliant Sunday afternoon. And at the docks
there were steamers, sailing vessels, from all the ports of the world, a
forest of spars and funnels; odd little Italian craft and even a Chinese
junk. A man-of-war was coming down from Mare Island. Gwynne had seen a
big Australian liner flying the Union Jack enter the Golden Gate as the
launch rounded Angel Island. It made him homesick, and he was not sorry
to lose sight of it.

They passed steamboats crowded with holiday seekers coming home from a
day's outing in Sausalito, San Rafael, Mill Valley, sporting parks; the
majority noisy and vulgar, but a mass of color. It was a scene of
surpassing variety, life, gayety, prosperity, importance. Gwynne, as the
light electrical breeze began to prick his veins, experienced a
sensation of pride in the country where his lines were cast, in those
ancestors of his that had memorably helped to develop its vast
resources: a tremendous concession, for he