it was with difficulty I took
a photograph in which any portion of the hotel itself appeared. In the
garden stands a splendid English walnut over forty years old; and on
the porch, the well and pump to which I have before alluded as a
distinguishing feature of the old-time hostelry, add a quaint and
characteristic touch.

Grass Valley and Nevada City are nearly three thousand feet above sea
level. The air, in consequence, is light and pure and the heat seldom
excessive. It would be difficult, the world over, to find a more
agreeable or salubrious climate.

It was with genuine regret that I left Grass Valley the following
morning; not even Sonora possessed for me a stronger attraction. As I
paused on the summit of the hill, for a farewell view of the town, I
mentally resolved--the Fates permitting--I would pay another and more
protracted visit to this land of enchantment.

Chapter VII

Grass Valley to Smartsville. Sucker Flat and its Personal Appeal.

I was heading due west for Smartsville, just across the line in Yuba
County. In four miles, I came to Rough and Ready, once a famous camp.
Save for the inevitable hotel, now used in part as a store, there was
nothing to suggest the cause of its pristine glory or the origin of its
emphatic designation; today it is simply a picturesque, rural hamlet. In
Penn Valley, a mile or two farther on, I passed a smashed and abandoned
automobile, the second wreck I had encountered. I thanked my star I
traveled afoot; heavy going, it is true, in places, but safe and sure.

Notwithstanding the ubiquity of the autocar, it is still a fact that
between the man in the car and the man on foot is set an impassable
gulf. You are walking through a mountainous country, where every bend
of the road reveals some new charm; absorbed in silent enjoyment of
the scene, you have forgotten the very existence of the machine, when a
raucous "honk" jolts you out of your daydream and causes you to jump for
your life. In a swirl of dust the monster engulfs you, leaving you
the dust and the stench of gasoline as souvenirs, but followed by your
anathemas! This doubtless is where the man in the car thinks he has
scored. Perhaps he has. When the dust on the road has settled and you
have rubbed it out of your eyes, once more you forget his existence.

But the very speed with which he travels is the reason why the man in
the car misses nearly all the charm of the country through which he is
passing.