There is of course crime in San Francisco as in all other cities. Indeed crime is universal, whether in the Orient or the Occident. The Chief of Police Wittman accounts for highway robbery, to the extent in which it prevails, from the fact that San Francisco is a garrison city. Here are numerous recruits and discharged soldiers, and, as a seaport, it draws to itself the scum and offscourings of all nations, Hindoos, Chinese, Malays, and all other kinds of people.
The police force is hardly adequate to patrol the entire city. It consists only of 589 men all told, and they are fine, manly looking guardians of the law, always ready to do their duty, always courteous to strangers, answering all questions intelligently. It is claimed, moreover, that the criminal element of the country drifts to San Francisco in the winter on account of the climate and also through the attractions of the racetrack. The police also find that the places where poker-games are played are a rendezvous for criminals. In 1887 and 1888 there was an outbreak of highway robbery, but the grand jury acted promptly in the matter and the courts soon suppressed it. Property and life therefore are jealously guarded in the City of the Golden Gate, and bad characters who go thither to prey on the public soon get their deserts. In this respect then San Francisco is a desirable place in which to live.
One evening in company with a party of friends, Rev. Dr. Ashton of Clean, N.Y., Rev. Dr. Reynold Marvin Kirby of Potsdam, N.Y., Rev. Clarence Ernest Ball of Alexandria, Va., Rev. Henry Sidney Foster of Green Bay, Wis., the Rev. William Barnaby Thorne of Marinette, Wis., and Doctor Robert J. Gibson, surgeon in the United States Army, stationed at San Francisco, I visited the police headquarters, situated on the east side of Portsmouth Square. This is a large building of several stories with numerous offices. The chief in his office on the main floor, on the right hand of the entrance, received us courteously and assigned to us a detective according to an arrangement previously made with Ashton. In the office were portraits of police commissioners and the chiefs and others who had been connected with the department for many years. Entering an elevator we were soon on the topmost floor where were the cells in which prisoners just arrested and waiting for trial were confined. The doors of the cells, all of iron, were opened or closed by moving a lever. It was now about 9:30 P.M., and officers were bringing in such persons as had been arrested for theft, for assault and battery, for drunkenness and other kinds of evil doing. Towards daybreak the cells are pretty well filled, but now they were nearly empty. How true His words who knows what is in man. "Men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil!"
One young man who had killed another in a quarrel was pointed out to us. The woman who loved him and who expected to be his wife, and still had faith in him, was at his side, with her sister, conversing with him between her sobs, in a low earnest tone. He seemed greatly agitated. A detective stood a little way off from the trio. The evidence was strong against the murderer, and an officer said to us that there was no chance for him to escape from the penalty of the law. In a cell was a young Chinese woman, just brought in, possibly for disorderly conduct. She could not have been more than fifteen or sixteen years old. She was pretty and refined in appearance and handsomely dressed, and she wept as if her heart would break. Not yet hardened by sin, and probably imprisoned for the first time, she felt the shame and degradation of her lot. I could not but feel pity for her, and expressed sorrow for her, though she may not have understood my words. At least she could interpret the signs of sympathy in voice and expression. These are a universal language. Maybe she was more sinned against than sinning,—and that Divine One Who reads all hearts and knows the temptations and snares which beset unwary feet, would say to her—"Go, and sin no more!"
In another cell was an old offender who had a face furrowed with sin. As we looked at her I could see that she regarded our presence as an intrusion. I recalled Dr. Watt's lines:
"Sinners who grow old in sin
Are hardened in their crimes."
Yet there is an awakening of the conscience at last, and even a prison house with its corrections may be a door of escape from that other prison of the sinful soul from which no one can go forth, be he culprit or juror, counsellor or judge, until his pardon is pronounced by Him who can forgive sins.
CHAPTER VI
FROM STREET NOMENCLATURE TO A CANNON
The Streets of the City—Numbers and Names—Example of Athens—Names of Men—Names of States and Countries—American Spirit—Flowers and Trees—Market Street—Pleasantries—Mansions of California Avenue—Grand Reception—Art in California—Cost of Living in 1849—Hotels and Private Houses now—Restaurants—New City Hall—Monumental Group—Scenes and Representations—History of a Cannon—Chance Meeting with General Shafter—Mission of the Republic.