A DAY ON THE LOS GATOS.
The brightest stream which bubbles out of the mountains in the Coast Range, and loses itself on the plains of Santa Clara, ought to have had a more poetical name. Its feline etymology is probably owing to the fact that as many wild cats rendezvous about its headwaters as are congregated within the same limits in any place on these mountain-slopes. This superabundance of savage life, which so incontinently runs to white teeth and claws, is an indication that there is much game in this region. Pussy likes a good bill of fare, and makes it up of hares, cotton-tail rabbits, ground-squirrels, quails, doves, and a great number of singing birds, not omitting an occasional rattlesnake, which is killed so deftly that there is no chance for a venomous bite. If the unlovely creatures had been more industrious in this line, the thrushes would have had a better chance, and that dry, reedy sound in the brush—the one drawback to the pleasure of crawling on all-fours through the chaparral—would not have started a cold chill along the spine quite so often.
That little square-looking dog, loaned by a settler at the foot of the mountain, with his ears split in a dozen places in his encounters with these animals, goes along for the fun and excitement of another clinch with his old enemy. The warfare is, after all, conducted on scientific principles. The wild cat is as strong as a young tiger, and you see by the depth of the shoulders and the size of the head, that he will fight terribly. He does not run well, and cannot catch a hare in any other way than by stealth. The dog runs him to a tree; the cat ascends to the highest strong limb, goes out on that, and gets an adjustment by which the smallest possible mark will be presented for a rifle or pistol-shot. If you want to do the handsome thing, let the head alone; for that is well defended by the limb on which it is resting. The wind blowing strong at an oblique angle to your line, will make a difference of at least an inch in sending that light ball 180 feet; it will also drop from a right ascending line nearly two inches. Remember, a shrewd woodsman never forgets these things. Getting your margin adjusted, plant the ball into the shoulder, just under the spine. He will drop from the tree with only one foreleg in fighting condition. The dog is on his back in a second, and there will be the liveliest rough-and-tumble fight you have seen in many a day. Never mind the wild screams that echo from the canyon. That fellow's time has come. He will not steal your best game-chicken out of the top of the tree again.
The dog has won the battle; but he has got some ugly scars along his sides and flank. Observe that, overheated as he is, he does not rush into that clear stream. He takes his bath in that shallow spring with a soft mud bottom. Note how he plasters himself, laying the wounded side underneath, and then, setting down on his haunches, buries all the wounded parts in the ooze. The mud has medicinal properties. The dog knows it. No physician could make so good a poultice for the wounds of a cat's claws as this dog has made for himself. Pray, if you had been clawed in that way by either feline or feminine, would you have found anything at the bottom of your book philosophy so remedial as this dog has found.
Now that this striped rascal has had his light put out, it is hard to justify the act after all. He was a thief, stealthy, cowardly, blood-loving, and cruel. But then his education had been neglected. And while his moral sentiments had been lapsing for generations, note what a gain there has been in his animal development; for he is next of kin to the common house-cat. You cannot upset this theory by pointing to his abbreviated tail. How long do you suppose it is since every one of your hair-splitting casuists had a tail more than twice as long as this fellow, whose descendants, in two generations more, may have none at all? Taking him up by his enormous jowls, rounding off a head suggesting diabolical acquisitiveness, it is only necessary to carry a Darwinian rush-light in the other hand to go straight to the right man and say: Here is a link in your chain of development, only three removes from the point you have reached. What a pity that this diminution of tail and claws does not signify a corresponding decrease of cruel and stealthy circumvention! You wag your tail approvingly to this proposition, Samson. But this business of exterminating pests had better cease. Because, if carried out honestly, it would be inconvenient to some thousands of men and women who are just now cumbering the world to no purpose. It goes against the grain mightily to admit that a wild cat might ever become an angel; but if there is any obscure law tending to such a result, it is better to interfere with it as little as possible. If both moral and physical perfectibility are only a question of time, the fellow who sells his fiery potations close by that sweet mountain spring, and is never conscious of its perpetual rebuke, ought to have a margin, at least, of five million years.
There is a cleft in the mountain, about ten miles to the southwest of Santa Clara. That engineering was done by the Los Gatos. Entering this defile, the stage road winds along the mountain side for six or seven miles, and then turns to the right and goes down the mountain slope to Santa Cruz. But as long as there are any stage roads in sight, or signs of abrading wheels, you will find no trout. Turning to the left and following the ridge, at the height of about two thousand feet, a walk of three or four miles brings one to a point where civilization runs out with the disappearance of the last trail. That mountain lifting its dark crest so kingly into the clouds, is Loma Prieta, the highest crest of the Coast Range. On the north side of that intervening slope, and nearly a thousand feet higher, you will find the source of the Los Gatos. It is six miles away. There a great fountain bubbles out of the mountain side, and the stream, clear and strong, and singing for very joy, goes bounding on to the gorges below. The upper stream has never been defiled by sawdust; and no lout in shining boots ever went up to its head. It is best to go into camp here and take a fresh start the next morning. In the early dawn—before the sun glares on the land and sea—town and hamlet, valley and mountain, have a morning glory, which it were better not to miss. Looking oceanward, the fir and the redwood send up their spires of eternal green from all the valleys. At midnight, the full moon was flooding all the mountain top with light, and was apparently shining upon the still ocean, which had come quite to the base of the mountain. The fog had come in during the night, but hugged the earth so closely that every hillock appeared like an island resting on the calm, white sea. All night long the moon shone on this upper stratum, revealing with wonderful distinctness the tops of the tallest redwoods, while the trunks appeared to be submerged. It was not easy to dispel the illusion that one with a skiff might have paddled from wooded islet to another, treading a thousand intricate channels, drifting past the homes of strange peoples, whose lives were symbolized by this serene and silent sea. But the illusion would not hold water, when, at early dawn, a clumsy two-horse wagon went lumbering down the mountain and disappeared under this white stratum. When the sun came up, all the ragged and fleecy edges rolled in upon the center, and there was a silent seaward march, until at mid-day the fog banked up with perpendicular walls, about a dozen miles from the land. A little farther down the valley the trees were dripping with the moisture of this migratory ocean. But not a drop was collected on the glistening leaves of the madrono which gave us friendly shelter that night. It was a good place enough to sleep; but if one is to take an observation every half-hour during the night, he will have no difficulty in getting up at the call of the birds.
The first sound heard in the morning was the yelp of a miserable coyote. The intrusive rascal had pitched his key in advance of thrush, or lark, or robin. It was easy enough to silence him with a shotgun; but as the birds, also, would have been frightened into silence, this ill-favored vagabond was moderated by pitching two stones at him, with no other result than securing a lame shoulder for a week. The thing was entirely overdone; and if the fellow had any perception of the ridiculous, he went into his hole and laughed for the space of half an hour.
The altitude was too great for the home of robin and linnet. But the woodpeckers went screaming by, and the shy yellow-hammers flitted noiselessly from tree to tree; while, in the thicket, the cock quails were calling out the coveys for an early breakfast. Two deer had come down the mountain slope, and finally halted at half rifle-shot, looking stupidly at the camp-fire. If they understood the statute made in their behalf, they were perfectly safe. But Samson, who had stood for three minutes with one fore-leg raised in an intensely dramatic way, made a spring at last, and, without warrant of law, ran them down the canyon; and ten minutes later they were seen going up the opposite slope, but with many redundant antics, indicating contempt for the cur which had sought to worry them. Later in the day three or four more were seen, and one half-grown fawn was following the roe, the latter finally taking the wind and bounding off handsomely, while the fawn, less keen of scent, turned about and looked inquiringly, without any clear perception of danger. It was evident that so long as the fawn depends upon the mother for protection, it has not a very keen scent nor a quick apprehension of approaching danger. These are only perfected later, when the fawn is left to care for itself. The cub is very foolish; the young fox has no more of cunning than a common puppy; and a young ground-squirrel, in time of danger, rashly bobs his head out of the hole long before his venerable parents venture to take an observation. We might have had a smoking haunch of venison that morning, but it would have lacked that fine moral quality which the game law withheld. If you want to know the terrible power of temptation, breakfast on bacon when two deer are within rifle-shot.