The day after our arrival, November 4th, dawned bright and beautiful, but the haggard faces and the sleep-laden eyes of the tourists when they assembled at a late hour in the Baldwin Hotel rotunda boded ill for a good exhibition of the art of playing base-ball that we were to give that day.
My forebodings in this respect proved true. The Haight grounds were crowded, 10,500 people paying admission to see the game, and great crowds lined the streets and greeted us with cheers as we drove in carriages to the scene of action. The practice work on both sides prior to the opening of the game was of a most encouraging character, but as for the game itself—well, the least said the better. Tired out with travel and the late hours of the night before, we were in no condition to do ourselves justice. We were over-anxious, too, to put up a great game, and this also told against us. Baldwin who pitched for us had no control of the ball, and the stone wall infield of the Chicagos, which included yours truly, was way off and could not field a little bit. The score, All-American 14 and Chicago 4, tells the story of the game. That the crowd was disappointed was easy to see. They were good-natured about it, however, and it is safe to say that they did not feel half so badly as we did. Our reputation was at stake and theirs was not. That was the difference.
Two days afterward the All-Americans played the Greenwood and Morans on the same grounds, and the 3,000 people who had assembled to witness the game saw the All-Americans get a most disgraceful trouncing at the hands of the local team, the score at the end of the game standing at 12 to 2. It was my misfortune to umpire this game, and I have often been accused since of having given the All-Americans the worst of the decision. It is always the privilege of the losers to kick at the umpire, however, and I have even been known to indulge in a gentle remonstrance myself when I thought the circumstances were justifiable. The truth of the matter is that it was the old story of late hours and a lack of condition, Crane being unsteady and the support accorded him not up to the standard, while the local club played a good game throughout, getting their hits in where they were needed and playing a really strong game in the field.
Before another crowd of 4,000 people, on November 6th, the All-Americans played the Pioneers, another local organization, and though Healy pitched a good game for the visitors they were beaten this time by a score of 9 to 4. Ward did not take part in the game on this occasion, he having taken a day off to shoot quail, and the defeat was largely chargeable to the costly errors divided up among Hanlon, Crane, Manning, Von Haltren, Wood and Fogarty.
In the meantime I had taken the Chicago team to Stockton, where on the same grounds as the All-Americans and Pioneers played we stacked up against the Stockton Club, then one of the strongest organizations in the Golden State. The 4,000 people assembled at the grounds there saw on that occasion as pretty a game as they could wish to see, the fielding on both sides being of the prettiest sort, and the work of the opposing pitchers, Tener for Chicago and Daly for Stockton, of the most effective character. At the end of the ninth inning the score was tied at 2 each, and the darkness coming on we were obliged to let it go at that, the people of Stockton being well pleased with the exhibition that they had been treated to by both teams, and especially jubilant over the fact that their own boys had been able to tie a nine of our calibre. The next day the Stockton team came down to San Francisco to measure strength with the All-Americans, Baker and Albright being their battery on this occasion, as opposed to Crane and Earle. The All-Americans, smarting under their two defeats at the hands of the local team, simply wiped up the ground with the Stockton boys on this occasion, pounding Baker all over the field and running up a score of 16 as against a single for their opponents. The showing made by the visitors on that occasion opened the eyes of the Californian ball-players and from that time on both the Pioneers and the Stocktons fought shy of both the visiting teams.
On the afternoon of November 10th we, and by that I mean the Chicago team, played the Haverlys before 5,000 spectators and defeated them after a pretty contest by a score of 6 to 1, Baldwin pitching an excellent game for the Chicagos, and Incell, who was at that time the idol of the Pacific Coast, a good game for the local team, though his support was weak.
The following day 6,000 people passed through the gates at the Haight street grounds to witness the second game between Chicago and All-American teams, and though this was marred by poor work here and there, the fielding was of such a brilliant character, especially the work of Chicago's stone wall, as to work the enthusiasm of the crowd up to the highest pitch. Tener and Von Haltren did the twirling on this occasion for Chicago and All-Americans respectively, and both of them were at their best. The All-Americans showed strongest at the bat, however, and as a result we were beaten by a score of 9 to 6. During the next week the team made a flying trip to Los Angeles, where two games were played, we being white-washed in the first one and beaten by a score of 7 to 4 in the second. This ended our ball-playing in California, for though it had been the intention to play a farewell game prior to our sailing for Australia, a steady rain that set in made this impossible.
When we were not playing ball we were either sightseeing in the neighborhood of San Francisco or else being entertained by some of the numerous friends that we made during our stay in "the glorious climate of California," the first supper at Marchand's being followed by a host of others, and dinner parties, banquets and theater parties were so thickly sandwiched in that it was a matter of wonderment that we were ever able to run the bases at all.
There was scarcely a single place of interest accessible to the city that we did not visit, from the Cliff House, which is one of the most popular resorts that Sari Francisco boasts of, its spacious grounds and verandas being thronged with people on Sundays and holidays, to the Chinese quarter, a portion of the city that no visitor to the Golden State should miss seeing, even if he has to make a journey of one hundred miles to do so.
The Chinese quarter of San Francisco is a city in itself, and one in which the contrasts between wealth and poverty is even more marked than it ever was in the Seven Dials of London.