This feeling of the miners, roughly expressed in the incidents of the sunbonnet and skirt, was poetically treated by Bret Harte in the story called The Goddess of Excelsior,—another example of that “perverse romanticism” which has been discovered in his California tales.
Said the “Sacramento Transcript,” in April, 1850, “May we not hope soon to see around us thousands of happy homes whose genial influences will awaken the noble qualities that many a wanderer has allowed to slumber in his heart while absent from the objects of his affection!”
In the same strain, but in the more florid style which was common in the California newspapers, another writer thus anticipated the coming of women and children: “No longer will the desolate heart seek to drown its loneliness in the accursed bowl. But the bright smiles of love will shed sunshine where were dark clouds and fierce tornadoes, and the lofty spire, pointing heavenward, will remind us in our pilgrimage here of the high destiny we were created to fulfil.” This has the ring of sincerity, and yet, as we read it, we cannot help thinking that when the writer laid down his pen, he went out and took one more drink from the “accursed bowl”; and who could blame him!
A loaf of home-made cake sent all the way around Cape Horn from Brooklyn to San José was reverently eaten, a portion being given to the local editor who duly returned thanks for the same.
The arrival of the fortnightly mail steamer was always the most important event of those early years; and Bret Harte thus described it: “Perhaps it is the gilded drinking saloon into which some one rushes with arms extended at right angles, and conveys in that one pantomimic action the signal of the semaphore telegraph on Telegraph Hill that a side-wheel steamer has arrived, and that there are letters from home. Perhaps it is the long queue that afterward winds and stretches from the Post Office half a mile away. Perhaps it is the eager men who, following it rapidly down, bid fifty, a hundred, two hundred, three hundred, and even five hundred dollars for favored places in the line. Perhaps it is the haggard man who nervously tears open his letter, and falls senseless beside his comrade.”[56]
Thus far Bret Harte. In precisely the same vein, and with a literary finish almost equal, is the following paragraph from a contemporary newspaper: “This other face is well known. It is that of one who has always been at his post on the arrival of each steamer for the past six months, certain at each time that he will get a letter. His eye brightens for a moment as the clerk pauses in running over the yellow-covered documents, but the clerk goes on again hastily, and then shakes his head, and says ‘No letter.’ The brightened eye looks sad again, the face pales, and the poor fellow goes off with a feeling in his heart that he is forgotten by those who knew and loved him at home.”[57]
Anxious men sometimes camped out on the steps of the Post Office, the night before a mail steamer was due, in order that they might receive the longed-for letter at the earliest possible moment.
The coming of three women on a steamer from New York in 1850 was mentioned by all the newspapers as a notable event. In May of that year the “Sacramento Transcript” contained an advertisement, novel for California, being that of a “Few fashionably-trimmed, Florence braid velvet and silk bonnets.” A month later a Sydney ship arrived at San Francisco, having on board two hundred and sixty passengers, of whom seventy were women. As soon as this vessel had anchored, there was a rush of bachelors to the Bay, and boat-loads of them climbed the ship’s side, trying to engage housekeepers.
In 1851 women began to arrive in somewhat larger numbers, and the coming of wives from the East gave rise to many amusing, many pathetic and some tragic scenes. “You could always tell a month beforehand,” said a Pioneer, “when a man was expecting the arrival of his real or intended wife. The old slouch hat, checked shirt and coarse outer garments disappeared, and the gentleman could be seen on Sunday going to church, newly rigged from head to foot, with fine beaver hat, white linen, nice and clean, good broadcloth coat, velvet vest, patent-leather boots, his long beard shaven or neatly shorn,—he looked like a new man. As the time drew near many of his hours were spent about the wharves or on Telegraph Hill, and every five minutes he was looking for the signal to announce the coming of the steamer. If, owing to some breakdown or wreck, there was a delay of a week or two, the suspense was awful beyond description.”[58]
