THE NATIVE SON By Inez Haynes Irwin TO THOSE PROUD NATIVE SONS James W. Coffroth Meyer Cohn Porter Garnett John Crowley Willie Ritchie J. Cal Ewing James Wilson Andrew J. Gallagher AND TO THOSE APOLOGETIC ADOPTED SONS Albert M. Bender Austin Lewis Sam Berger Xavier Martinez Gelett Burgess Perry Newberry Michael Casey Patrick O'Brien Perry Newberry Patrick Flynn Fremont Older Will Irwin Lemuel Parton Anton Johansen Paul Scharrenberg Waldemar Young All of Whom Have Played Some Graceful Part In Translating California To Me This Appreciation is Dedicated THE NATIVE SON The only drawback to writing about California is that scenery andclimate--and weather even--will creep in. Inevitably anything youproduce sounds like a cross between a railroad folder and a circusprogram. You can't discuss the people without describing theirbackground; for they reflect it perfectly; or their climate, because ithas helped to make them the superb beings they are. A tendency manifestsitself in you to revel in superlatives and to wallow in italics. Youfind yourself comparing adjectives that cannot be compared--unique forinstance. Unique is a persistent temptation. For, the rules of grammarnot-withstanding, California is really the most unique spot on theearth's surface. As for adjectives like enormous, colossal, surpassing, overpowering and nouns like marvel, wonder, grandeur, vastness, they areas common in your copy as commas. Another difficulty is that nobody outside California ever believesyou. I don't blame them. Once I didn't believe it myself. If there wasanything that formerly bored me to the marrow of my soul, it was talkabout California by a regular dyed-in-the-wool Californiac. But I gotmine ultimately. Even as I was irritated, I now irritate. Even as Iwas bored, I now bore. Ever since I first saw California, and became, inevitably, a Californiac, I have been talking about it, irritating andboring uncounted thousands. I begin placatingly enough, "Yes, I know youaren't going to believe this, " I say. "Once I didn't believe it myself. I realize that it all sounds impossible. But after you've once beenthere--" Then I'm off. When I've finished, there isn't an hystericalsuperlative adjective or a complimentary abstract noun unused in myvocabulary. I've told all the East about California. I've told many ofthe countries of Europe about California. I even tell Californians aboutCalifornia. I will say to the credit of Californians though that theylisten. Listen! did I say listen? They drink it down like a childabsorbing its first fairy tale. In another little volume devoted to the praise of California, WillieBritt is on record as saying that he'd rather be a busted lamp-post onBattery Street than the Waldorf-Astoria. I said once that I'd rather besick in California than well anywhere else. I'm prepared to go further. I'd rather be in prison in California than free anywhere else. SanQuentin is without doubt the most delightfully situated prison in thewhole world. Besides I have a lot of friends--but I won't go intothat now. Anyway if I ever do get that severe jail-sentence whicha long-suffering family has always prophesied for me, I'm going topetition for San Quentin. Moreover, I would rather talk about Californiathan any other spot on earth. I'd rather write about California thanany other spot on earth. Is it possible that any Californian Chamber ofCommerce has to pay a press agent? Incredible! Inexplicable! Iwonder that local millionaires don't bid their entire fortune for theprivilege. Now what has Willie Britt to say? Yes, my idea of a pleasant occupation would be listing, cataloguing, inventorying, describing and--oh joy!--visiting the wonders ofCalifornia. But that would be impossible for any one enthusiast toaccomplish in the mere three-score-and-ten of Scriptural allotment. Methusalah might have attempted it. But in these short-lived days, ridiculous to make a start. And so, perforce, I must share this joyoustask with other and more able chroniclers. I am willing to leave thebeauty of the scenery to Mary Austin, the wonder of the weather to JesseWilliams, the frenzy of its politics to Sam Blythe, the beauty of itswomen to Julian Street, the glory of the old San Francisco to WillIrwin, the splendor of the new San Francisco to Rufas Steele, itscare-free atmosphere to Allan Dunn, if I may place my laurel wreath atthe foot of the Native Son. Indeed, when it comes to the Native Son, Iyield the privilege of praise to no one. For the Native Son is an unique product, as distinctively andcharacteristically Californian as the gigantic redwood, the flowerfestival, the ferocious flea, the moving-picture film, the annual boxingand tennis champion, the golden poppy or the purple prune. There is onlyone other Californian product that can compare with him and that's theNative Daughter. And as for the Native Daughter---- But if I start upthat squirrel track I'll never get back to the trail. Nevertheless someday I'm going to pick out a diamond-pointed pen, dip it in wine andon paper made from orange-tawny POPPY petals, try to do justice to theNative Daughter. For this inflexible moment, however, my subject is theNative Son. But if scenery and climate--and weather even--do creep in, don't blame me. Remember I warned you. Besides sooner or later I shallbe sure to get back to the main theme. In the January of 1917 I made my annual pilgrimage to California. Onthe train was a Native Son who was the hero of the following astonishingtale. He was one of a large family, of which the only girl had married aGerman, a professor in an American university. Shortly before the GreatWar, the German brother-in-law went back to the Fatherland to spend hissabbatical year in study at a German university. Letters came regularlyfor a while after the war began; then they stopped. His wife was verymuch worried. Our hero decided in his simple western fashion to go toGermany and find his brother-in-law. He traveled across the country, cajoled the authorities in Washington into giving him a passport, crossed the ocean, ran the British blockade and entered the forbiddenland. Straight as an arrow he went to the last address in hisbrother-in-law's letters. That gentleman, coming home to his lunch, tired, worried and almost penniless, found his Californian kinsmansmoking calmly in his room. The Native Son left money enough to pay forthe rest of the year of study and the journey home. Then he started onthe long trip back. In the English port at which his ship touched, he was mistaken for adisloyal newspaper man for whom the British Secret Service had long beenseeking. He was arrested, searched and submitted to a very disquietingthird degree. When they asked him in violent explosive tones whathe went into Germany for, he replied in his mild, unexcited Westernvoice--to give his brother-in-law some money. All Europe is accustomedto crazy Americans of course, but this strained credulity to thebreaking point; for nobody who has not tried to travel in the warcountries can realize the sheer unbelievability of such guilelessness. The British laughed loud and long. His papers were taken away and sentto London but in a few days everything was returned. A mistake had beenmade, the authorities admitted, and proper apologies were tendered. But they released him with looks and gestures in which an abashedbewilderment struggled with a growing irritation. That is a typical Native Son story. If you are an Easterner and meet the Native Son first in New York(and the only criticism to be brought against him is that he sometimeschooses--think of that--chooses to live outside his native State!) youwonder at the clear-eyed composure, the calm-visioned unexcitabilitywith which he views the metropolis. There is a story of a San Francisconewspaper man who landed for the first time in New York early in themorning. Before night he had explored the city, written a scathingphilippic on it and sold it to a leading newspaper. New York had notdaunted him. It had only annoyed him. He was quite impervious to itshydra-headed appeal. But you don't get the answer to that imperviousnessuntil you visit the California which has produced the Native Son. Thenyou understand. Yes, Reader, your worst fears are justified; I'm going to talk aboutscenery. But don't say that I didn't warn you! However, as it's got tobe done sometime, why not now? I'll be perfectly fair, though; so-- For the Native Son has come from a State whose back yard is two hundredthousand square miles (more or less) of American continent and whosefront yard is five hundred thousand square miles (less or more) orPacific Ocean, whose back fence is ten thousand miles (or thereabouts)of bristling snow-capped mountains and whose front hedge is ten thousandmiles (or approximately) of golden foam-topped combers; a State thatlooks up one clear and unimpeded waterway to the evasive North Pole, anddown another clear and unimpeded waterway to the elusive South Pole andacross a third clear and unimpeded water way straight to the magical, mystical, mysterious Orient. This sense of amplitude gives the NativeSon an air of superiority. .. Yes, you're quite right, it has a touch ofsuperciliousness--very difficult to understand and much moredifficult to endure when you haven't seen California; but completelyunderstandable and endurable when you have. --Californiacs read every word, Easterners skip this paragraph-- Man helped nature to place Italy, Spain, Japan among the wonder regionsof the world; but nature placed California there without assistancefrom anybody. I do not refer alone to the scenery of California which isduplicated in no other spot of the sidereal system; nor to the climatewhich matches it; nor to its super-mundane fertility, nor to itssuper-solar fecundity. The railroad folder with its voluble vocabularyhas already beaten me to it. I do not refer solely to that richyellow-and-violet, springtime bourgeoning which turns California intoone huge Botticelli background of flower colors and sheens. I do notrefer to that heavy purple-and-gold, autumn fruitage, which changes itto a theme for Titian and Veronese. I am thinking particularly ofthose surprising phenomena left over from pre-historic eras; the"big" trees--the sequoia gigantea, which really belong to the earlyfairy-tales of H. G. Wells, and to those other trees, not so bigbut still giants--the sequoia sempivirens or redwoods, which make ofCalifornia forests black-and-silver compositions of filmy flutteringlight and solid bedded shade. I am thinking also of that patch ofpre-historic cypresses in Monterey. These differ from the straight, symmetrical classic redwoods as Rodin's "Thinker" differs from theApollo. Monstrous, contorted shapes--those Monterey cypresses looklike creatures born underground, who, at the price of almost unbearabletorture, have torn through the earth's crust, thrusting and twistingthemselves airward. I refer even to that astonishing detail in thegeneral Californian sulphitism, the seals which frequent beach rocksclose to the shore, a short car ride from the heart of a city as big asSan Francisco. --and this-- California, because of rich gold deposits, and a richer golden, sunshine, its golden spring poppy and its golden summer verdure, seemsboth literally and figuratively, a golden land golden and gay. It is aland full of contradictions however. For those amazing memorials from aprehistoric past give it in places a strange air of tragedy. I challengethis grey old earth to produce a strip of country more beautiful, alsomore poignant and catastrophic in natural connotation, than the onewhich includes these cypresses of Monterey. Yet this same mordant areaholds Point Lobos, a headland which displays in moss and lichens allthe minute delicacy of a gleeful, elfin world. I challenge the earthto produce a region more beautiful, yet also more gay and debonair innatural connotation, than the one which enfolds San Francisco. For herethe water presents gorgeous, plastic color, alternating blue and gold. Here Mount Tamalpais lifts its long straight slopes out of the seaand thrusts them high in the sky. Here Marin County offers contours ofdimpled velvet bursting with a gay irridescence of wildflowers. Yet thatsame gracious area frames the grim cliff-cup which holds San Franciscobay--a spot of Dantesque sheerness and bareness. --and this. This is what nature has done. But man has added his deepening touchin one direction and his enlivening touch in another. The earlyfathers--Spanish--erected Missions from one end of the State to theother. These are time-mellowed, mediaeval structures with bell-towers, cloisters and gardens, sunbaked, shadow-colored; and in spots they makeCalifornia as old and sad as Spain. Later emigrants--French--have builtin the vicinity of San Francisco many tiny roadside inns where one candrink the soft wines of the country. Framed in hills that are garlandedwith vineyards, these inns are often mere rose-hidden bowers. They makeCalifornia seem as gay as France. I can best put it by saying that Iknow of no place so "haunted" in every poetic and plaintive sense asCalifornia; yet I know of no place so perfectly suited to carnival andfestival. All of this is part of the reason why you can't surprise a Californian. This looks like respite, but there's no real relief in sight Easterners. Keep right on reading, Californiacs! Yes, California is beautiful. Once upon a time, a Native Son lay dying. He did not know that he wasgoing to die. His physician had to break the news to him. He told theCalifornian that the process would not be long or painful. He would goto sleep presently and when he woke up, the great journey would havebeen accomplished. His words fulfilled themselves. Soon the Native Sonfell into a coma. When he opened his eyes he was in Paradise. He raisedhimself up, gave one look about and exclaimed, "What a boob that doctorwas! Whad'da he mean--Paradise! Here I am still in California. " Man has of course, here as elsewhere, chained nature; set her to toilfor him. She is a willing worker everywhere, but in California she putsno stay nor stint on her productive efforts. California produces--Now upto this moment I have held myself in. Looking back on my copy I seeonly such meager words as "beauty", "glory", "splendor", such pale, inadequate phrases as "super-mundane fertility" and "super-solarfecundity". What use are words and phrases when one speaks ofCalifornia. It is time for us to abandon them both and resort to somebright, snappy sparkling statistics. Reader, I had to soft-pedal here. If I gave you the correct statistics, You wouldn't believe me. So here goes! California produces forty per cent of the gold, fifty per cent of thewheat, sixty per cent of the oranges, seventy per cent of the prunes, eighty per cent of the asparagus and (including the Native Daughters)ninety-nine and ninety-nine one-hundredths per cent of the peaches ofthe world. I pause to say here that none of these figures is true. Theyare all made up for the occasion. But don't despair! I am sure that theydon't do California justice by half. Any other Californiac--with themathematical memory which I unfortunately lack--will provide the correctdata. Somebody told me once, I seem to recall, that the Santa Claravalley produces sixty per cent of the worlds prunes. But I may bemistaken. What I prefer to remember is one day's trip in that springtideof prune bloom. For hours and hours of motor speed, we glided through asnowy world that showed no speck of black bark or fleck of green leaf;a world in which the sole relief from a silent white blizzard of blossomwas the blue of the sky arch, the purple of distant lupines alternatingwith the gold of blood-centered poppies, pouring like avalanches downhills of emerald green. Getting out of the scenery zone only to fall into the climate zone. Reader, it's just the same with the climate as the scenery. It's got tobe done some time, so why not now? That's what California produces in the way of scenery and fodder. Sonow, let's consider the climate, even if I am invading Jesse Williams'sterritory. For it has magical properties--that climate of California. Itmakes people grow big and beautiful and strenuous; it makes flowers growbig and beautiful; it makes fleas grow big and--strenuous. It offers, except in the most southern or the most mountainous regions, no suchextremes of heat or cold as are found elsewhere in the country. Itsmarvel is of course the season which corresponds to our winter. The visitor coming, let us say in February, from the ice-bound andfrost-locked East through the flat, dreary Middle West, and stalledpossibly on the way, remains glued in stupefaction to the car window. In a very few hours he slides from the white, glittering snow-coveredheights of the evergreen-packed Sierras through their purple, hazy, snow-filled depths into the sudden warmth of California. It is like waking suddenly from a nightmare of winter to a poets or apainter's vision of spring. Who, having seen this picture in January, could resist describing it?Easterners, I appeal to your sense of justice. At one side, perhaps close to the train, near hills, on which the liveoaks spread big, ebon-emerald umbrellas, serpentine endlessly into thedistance. On the other side, far hills, bathed in an amethystine mist, invade the horizon. Between stretches the flat green field of thevalley, gashed with tawny streaks that are roads and dotted with soft, silvery bunches that are frisking new-born lambs. Little white houses, with a coquettish air of perpetual summer, flaunt long windows andwooden-lace balconies, Early roses flask pink flames here and there. The green-black meshes of the eucalyptus hedges film the distance. Themadrone, richly leaved like the laurel, reflects the sunlight from abole glistening as though freshly carved from wet gold. Cheer up! We're getting out of scenery and climate into The race--a blend of many rich bloods--that California has evolvedwith the help of this scenery and climate is a rare brew. The physicalbackground is Anglo-Saxon of course; and it still breaks through in theprevailing Anglo-Saxon type. To this, the Celt has brought his poetryand mysticism. To it, the Latin has contributed his art instinct; andnot art instinct alone but in an infinity of combinations, the dignityof the Spaniard, the spirit of the French, the passion of the Italian. --into-- All the foregoing is put in, not to make it harder, but because--as aCaliforniac--I couldn't help it, and to show you what, in the way of aState, the Native Son is accustomed to. You will have to admit thatit is some State. The emblem on the California flag is singularlyapposite--it's a bear. --oh boy!--San Francisco! And if, in addition to being a Californian, this Native Son visiting theEast for the first time, is also a San Franciscan, he has come from acity which is, with the exception of peacetime Paris, the gayest andwith the exception of none, the happiest city in the world; a cityof extraordinary picturesqueness of situation and an equally notablecosmopolitanism of atmosphere; a city which is, above all cities, aparadise for men. San Francisco, which invents much American slang, must have providedthat phrase--"this man's town. " For that is what San Francisco is--amans town. I dare not appeal to Easterners; but Californiacs, I ask you how could Iforbear to say something about "the city"? San Francisco, or "the city"', as Californians so proudly and lovinglyterm her, is peculiarly fortunate in her situation and her weather. Riding a series of hills as lightly as a ship the waves, she makes realexercise of any walking within her limits. Moreover the streets aretied so intimately and inextricably to seashore and country that SanFrancisco's life is, in one sense, less like city life than that ofany other city in the United States. Yet by the curious paradox of herclimate, which compels much indoor night entertainment, reinforced bythat cosmopolitanism of atmosphere, life there is city life raised tothe highest limit. Last of all, its size--and personally I think thereshould be a federal law forbidding cities to grow any bigger thanSan Francisco--makes it an engaging combination of provincialism andcosmopolitanism. Not scenery this time, Reader, nor climate, but weather. Like sceneryand climate, it must be done. Hurdle this paragraph, Easterners! Keep onreading, Californiacs! The "city" does its best to put the San Franciscan in good condition. And the weather reinforces this effort by keeping him out of doors. Because of a happy collaboration of land with sea, the region aboutSan Francisco, the "bay" region--individual in this as in everythingelse--has a climate of its own. It is, notwithstanding its briefrainy season, a singularly pleasant climate. It cannot be described as"temperate" in the sense, for instance, that New England's climateis temperate. That is too harsh. Neither can it be described as"semi-tropical" in the way that Hawaii, for example, is semi-tropical. That is too soft. It combines the advantages of both with thedisabilities of neither. You may begin to read again, Easterners; for at last I've returned tothe Native Son. That sparkling briskness--the tang--which is the best the temperateclimate has to offer, gives the Native Son his high powered strenuosity. That developing softness--lush--(every Native Son will admit the lush)which is the best the semi-tropical element has to contribute, gives himhis size and comeliness. The weather of San Francisco keeps the NativeSon out of doors whenever it is possible through the day time. To takecare of this flight into the open are seashore and mountain, city parksand country roads. That same weather drives him indoors during theevenings. And to meet this demand are hotels, restaurants, theatres, moving-picture houses, in numbers out of all proportion to thepopulation. Again, the weather permits him to play baseball and footballfor unusual periods with ease, to play tennis and golf three-quartersof the year with comfort, to walk and swim all the year with joy. Notwithstanding the combination of heavy rains with startling hillheights, he never ceases to motor day or night, winter or summer. Theweather not only allows this, but the climate drives him to it. These are the reasons why there is nothing hectic about the hordes ofNative Sons who nightly motor about San Francisco, who fill its theatresand restaurants. An after-theatre group in San Francisco is as differentfrom the tallowy, gas-bred, after-theatre groups on Broadway as it ispossible to imagine. In San Francisco, many of them look as though theyhad just come from State-long motor trips; from camping expeditions onthe beach, among the redwoods, or in the desert; from long, cold Arcticcruises, or long, hot Pacific ones. Moreover the Native Son's clubencourages all this athletic instinct by offering spacious and beautifulgymnasium quarters in which to develop it. Lacking a club, he can turnto the public baths, surely the biggest and most beautiful in the world. Just as there is a different physical aspect to the Native Son, thereis, compared to the rest of the country, a different social aspect tohim. California is still young, still pioneer in outlook. Society hasnot yet shaken down into those tightly stratified layers, typical of theEast. There is a real spirit of democracy in the air. The first time I visited San Francisco I was impressed with the remarksof a Native son of moderate salary who had traveled much in the East. "This here and now San Francisco is a real man's town", he said. "Idon't know so much about the women, but the men certainly can have abetter time here than in any other city in the country. And then again, a poor man can live in a way and do things in a style that would beimpossible in New York. At my club I meet all kinds of men. Many of themare prominent citizens and many of them have large fortunes. I mix withthem all. I don't mean to say I run constantly with the prom. Cits. Andthe millionaires. I don't. I cant afford that. But they occasionallyentertain me. And I as often entertain them. So many restaurants hereare both inexpensive and good that I can return their hospitalityself-respectingly and without undue expense. In New York I would notonly never meet that type of man, but I could not afford to entertainhim if I did. " Allied to this, perhaps, is a quality, typical of San Francisco, which Ican describe only as promiscuity. That promiscuity is in its best phasea frankness; a fearlessness; a gorgeous candor which made possible theepigram that San Francisco has every vice but hypocrisy. Civically, two cross currents cut through the city's life; one of, a high visionedenlightenment which astounds the visiting stranger by its force, itswhite-fire enthusiasm; the other a black sordidness and soddenness whichdisplays but one redeeming quality--the characteristic San Franciscancandor. That openness is physical as well as spiritual. The city, dropped over its many hills like a great loose cobweb weighted thicklywith the pearl cubes of buildings, with its wide streets; its frequentparks; its broad-spaced residential areas; its gardened houses in whichhigh windows crystallize every view and sun parlors or sleeping porchescatch both the first and last hint of daylight--the city itself hasthe effect of living in the open. Everybody is frankly interested ineverybody else and in what is going on. Of all the cities the country, San Francisco is by weather and temperament, most adapted to thepleasant French habit of open-air eating. The clients in the barbershops, lathered like clowns and trussed up in what is perhaps the leastheroic posture and costume possible for man, are seated at the windows, where they may enjoy the outside procession during the boresomeprocesses of the shave and the hair-cut. In the windows of the downtownshops, with no pretence whatever of the curtains customary in the East, men clerks disrobe and re-robe life-sized female models of an appallingnude flesh-likeness. They dress these helpless ladies in all thefripperies of femininity from the wax out, oblivious to the flippantcomments of gathering crowds. It's all a part of that civic candorsomehow. Nowhere I think are eyes so clear, glances so direct andexpressions so frank as in California. Nowhere is conversation anddiscussion more straightforward and courageous. All that I have written thus far is only by way of preliminary toshowing you what the background of the Native Son has been and toexplaining why Europe does not dazzle him much and the East not atall. Remember that he is instinctively an athlete and that he has neverdissipated his magnificent strength in fighting weather. If he is alittle--mind you, I say only a little--inclined to use that strength onmore entertaining dissipation, he is as likely to restore the balance bymuch physical exercise. There I go again! Enormous! Superb! Splendid! Spacious! You see howimpossible it is to keep your vocabulary down when California is yoursubject. Another moment and I shall be saying more unique. Remember that all his life he has gazed on beauty--beauty tragic andhaunting, beauty gorgeous and gay. Remember he is accustomed to enormoussizes; superb heights; splendid distances; spacious vistas. ThatCalifornia does not produce an annual crop of megalo-maniacs is the bestargument I know for the superiority of heredity over environment. Remember, too, that all his life the Native Son has soaked in an artatmosphere potentially as strong and individual as ancient Greece orrenaissance Italy. The dazzling country side, the sulphitic brew ofraces, the cosmopolitan "city" have taken care of that. That art-spiritaccounts for such minor California phenomena as photography raisedto unequalled art levels and shops whose simple beautiful interiorsresemble the private galleries of art collectors; it accounts for suchmajor phenomena as the Stevenson monument, the "Lark", the annual GrovePlay of the Bohemian Club, and the Exposition of 1915. The tiny monument to Stevenson, tucked away in a corner soaked withromantic memories--Portsmouth Square--compares favorably with thecharming memorials to the French dead. It is a thing of beautifulproportions. A little stone column supports a bronze ship, its sailsbellying robustly to the whip of the Pacific winds. The inscription--awell known quotation from the author--is topped simply by "To rememberRobert Louis Stevenson. " Perhaps you will object that some of these are not Native Sons. Buthush! Californians consider anybody who has stayed five minutes in theState--a real Californian. And believe us, Reader, by that time most ofthem have become not Californians but Californiacs. The "Lark" is perhaps the most delicious bit of literary fooling thatthis country has ever produced. It raised its blythe song at the GoldenGate, but it was heard across a whole continent. For two years, GelettBurgess, Bruce Porter, Porter Garnett, Willis Polk, Ernest Peixotto, and Florence Lundborg performed in it all the artistic antics thattheir youth, their originality, their high spirits suggested. ProfessorNorton, speaking to a class at Harvard University, and that the twoliterary events of the decade between 1890 and 1900 were the fiction ofthe young Kipling and the verse that appeared in the "Lark. " The Grove-Play is an annual incident of which I fancy only Californiacould be capable. Of course the calculable quality of the weatherhelps in this possibility. But the art-spirit, born and bred in theCalifornian, is the driving force. Every year the Bohemian Club producesin its summer annex--a beautiful grove of redwoods beside the Russianriver--a play in praise of the forest. The stage is a natural one, acleared hill slope with redwoods for wings. The play is written, staged, produced and acted by members of the club. The incidental music is alsowritten by them. Scarcely has one year's play been produced before therehearsals for the next begin. The result is a performance of a finishedbeauty which not only astounds Easterners, but surprises Europeans. Although undoubtedly it is the best, it is only one of numberlessout-of-door masques, plays and pageants produced all over California. As for the Exposition of 1915, when I say that for many Californians, itwill take the edge off some of the beauty of Europe, I am quite serious. For it was colored in the gorgeous gamut of the Orient, clamant yellows, oranges, golds, combined with mysterious blues, muted scarlets. And itwas illuminated as no Exposition has ever before been illuminated; withlights that dripped down from the cornices of the buildings; or shotup from their foundations; or gleamed through transparent pillars; orglistened behind tumbling waters; or sparkled within leaping fountains. Some of this light even floated from enormous braziers, thereby fillingthe night with clouds of mist-flame; or flooded across the bay fromreservoirs of tinted glass, thereby sluicing the whole dream-world withfluid color. All this was reflected in still lakes and quiet pools. Theprocession of one year's seasons gradually subdued its gorgeousnessto an effect of antiquity, toned but still colorful. The quick-growingCalifornia vines covered it with an age-old luxuriance of green. As forthe architecture--I repeat that the Californian, seeing for the firsttime the square of St. Peter's in Rome and of St. Mark's in Venice, islikely to suffer a transitory but definite sense of disappointment. Forthe big central court of the Exposition held suggestions of both thesesquares. It seemed quite as old and permanent. And it was much morestriking in situation, with the bay offering an immense, flat blueextension at one side and the city hills, pricked with lights, slantingup and away from the other. By day, the joyous, whimsical fantasy of thecolossal Tower of Jewels, which caught the light in millions of rainbowsparkles, must, for children at least, have made of its entrance thedoor to fairyland. At night, there was the tragedy of old history aboutthose faintly fiery facades. .. Those enormous shadow-haunted hulks. . . Remember, last of all, as naturally as from infancy the Native Son hasbreathed the tonic and toxic air of California, he has breathed thespirit of democracy. That spirit of democracy is so strong, indeed, thatthe enfranchised women of California give intelligent guidance to thefeminists of a whole nation; public opinion is so enlightened that itsets a pace for the rest of the country and labor is so progressive thatit is a revelation to the visiting sociologist. Indeed, nowhere in the whole world, I fancy, is labor so healthy, sohappy, so prosperous. California brings to the workers' problems thefree enlightened attitude characteristic of her. As between on the onehand hordes of unemployed; huge slums; poverty spots; and on the othera well-paid laboring class with fair hours, she chooses the latter, thereby storing up for herself eugenic capital. I have always wished that California would strike off a series of medalssymbolic of some of the Utopian conditions which prevail there. I wouldlike to suggest a model for one. I was walking once in the vicinity ofthe Ferry with a woman who knows the labor movement of California aswell as an outsider may. Suddenly she whispered in my ear, "Oh look!Isn't he a typical California labor man?" It was his noon hour and, in his shirt sleeves, he was leaning againstthe wall, a pipe in his mouth. He was tall and lean; not an ounce ofsuperfluous flesh on his splendid frame, but a great deal of muscle thatlay in long, faintly swelling contours against it. He was black hairedand black-mustached; both hair and mustache were lightly touchedwith grey. His thicklashed blue eyes sparkled as clear and happy as achild's. In their expression and, indeed, in the whole relaxed attitudeof his fine, long figure, was an entertained, contented interest, anamused tolerance of the passing crowd. You will see this type, amongothers equally fine, again and again, in the unions of California. Yes, that spirit of democracy is not only strong but militant. Militant! I never could make up my mind which made the fightingestreading in the San Francisco papers, the account of Friday's boxingcontest or of Monday's meeting of the Board of Supervisors. They dosay that a visiting Easterner was taken to the Board of Supervisorsone afternoon. In the evening he was regaled with a battle royal. And, and--they do say--he fell asleep at the battle royal because it seemedso tame in comparison with the Board of Supervisors. The athletic instinct in the Native Son accounts for the star athletes, boxers, tennis players, ball players; that art instinct for thepainters, illustrators, sculptors, playwrights, fiction writers, poets, actors, photographers, producers; that spirit of democracy for the laborleaders and politicians with whom California has inundated the rest ofthe country. I started to make a list of the famous Californians in all theseclasses. But, when I had filled one sheet with names, realizing thatno matter how hard I cudgelled my memory, I would inevitably forgetsomebody of importance, I tore it up. Take a copy of "Who's Who" andcut out the lives of all those who don't come from California and seewhat a respectable-sized volume you have left. If any woman tourist should ask me what was the greatest menace to thepeace of mind of a woman travelling alone in California, I should answerinstantly--the Native Son. I wish I could draw a picture of him. Perhaps he's too good looking. Myself, I think the enfranchised womenof California should bring injunctions--or whatever is the proper legalweapon--against so dangerous a degree of male pulchritude. Of coursethe Native Son could reply that, in this respect, he has nothing on theNative Daughter, she being without doubt the most beautiful woman in theworld. To, this, however, she could retort that that is as it should be, but it's no fair for mere men to be stealing her stuff. This is misleading! That agglomeration of the Anglo-Saxon, the Celt and the Latin, hasendowed the Native Son with the pulchritude of all three races. Ineugenic combination with Ireland, California is peculiarly happy. Theclimate has made him tall and big. His athletic habits has made himshapely and strong. Both have given him clear eyes, a smooth skin, swiftgrace of motion. Those clear eyes invest him with a look of innocenceand unsophistication. He is as rich in dimples as though they hadbeen shaken onto him from a salt-cellar. One in each cheek, one in hischin--count them--three! The Native Daughter would have a license tocomplain of this if she herself didn't look as thou she'd been sprinkledwith dimples from a pepper-caster. In addition--oh, but what's the use?Who ever managed to paint the lily with complimentary words or gildrefined gold with fancy phrases? The region bounded by Post, Bush, Mason and Taylor Streets contains San Francisco's most famous clubs. AnyCongress of Eugenists wishing to establish a standard of male beautyfor the human race has only to place a moving-picture machine at theentrance of any one of these--let us say the Athletic Club. The resultswill at the same time enrapture and discourage a dazzled world. I willprophesy that some time those same enfranchised women of California aregoing to realize the danger of such a sight bursting unexpectedly on theunprepared woman tenderfoot. Then they'll rope off that dangerous area, establish guards at the corners and put up "Stop! Look! Listen!" signswhere they'll do the most good. And as proof of all these statements, I refer you to that array of young gods, filing endlessly over thesporting pages of the California newspapers. And I'll pay for the privilege. What the Chamber of Commerce oughtto do, though, is to advertise that this concession will be put up atauction. Indeed, if this sale were made an annual event, women bidderswould flock to California from all over the world. A Native Son told me once that he had been given the star-assignmentof newspaper history. Somebody offered a prize to the most beautifuldaughter of California. And his job was to travel all over the Stateto inspect the candidates. He said it was a shame to take his pay andI agreed that it was sheer burglary. All I've got to say is thatif anybody wants to offer a prize for the handsomest Native Son inCalifornia, I'll give my services as judge. I will add that after nearlytwo years of war-time Europe, in which I have had an opportunity tostudy some of the best military material of England, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland--the Native Son leads them all. I aminclined to think he is the best physical specimen in the world. But there is a great deal more to the Native Son than mere comeliness. That long list of nationally-famous Californians proves this in one way, the high average of his citizenship in another. Physically he is abig, strong, high-geared, high-powered racing machine; and he has aninexhaustible supply of energy for motive fluid and an extraordinarydegree of initiative and enterprise for driving forces. That initiativeand enterprise spring part from his inalienable pep, his vivid interestin life; and part from that constructive looseness of the socialstructure, which gives them both full play. If the Native Son seesanything he wants to do, he instantly does it. If he sees anything thathe wants to get, he promptly takes it. If he sees anything that he wantsto be, he immediately is it. He saunters into New York in a degage wayand takes the whole city by storm. He strolls through Europe with aninsouciant air and finds it almost as good as California. All this, supplemented by his abiding conviction that California must have themost and best and biggest of everything, accounts for what Californiahas done in the sixty-odd years of her existence, accounts for what SanFrancisco has done in the decade since her great disaster, accounts forthat wartime Exposition; perhaps the most elaborate, certainly the mostbeautiful the world has ever seen. The Native Son has a strong sense of humor and he invents his own slang. He expresses himself with the picturesqueness of diction inevitableto the West and with much of its sly, dry humor. But there is a joyousquality to the San Francisco blague which sets it apart, even in theWest. You find its counterpart only in Paris. Perhaps it is that, beingreenforced by wit, it explodes more quickly than the humor of the restof the country. The Californian with his bulk, his beauty, his boast andhis blague descending on New York is very like the native of the Midiwho with similar qualities, is always taking Paris by storm. Marseilles, the chief metropolis of the Midi, has a famous promenade--less than halfa dozen blocks, packed tight with the peoples and colors and odors oftwo continents--called the Cannebiere. The Marseillais, returning fromhis first visit to Paris, remarks with condescending scorn that Parishas no Cannebiere. Of course Paris has her network of Grand Boulevardsbut--So the Californiac patronizingly discovers that New York has noMarket Street, no Golden Gate Park, no Twin Peaks, no Mt. Tamalpais, noseals. Above all--and this is the final thrust--New York is flat. Somebody ought to invent a serum that renders the victim immune. Some day medical journals will give the same space to the victimsof California hospitality that they now allot to victims of Orientalfamines. For with Californians, hospitality is first an instinct, thenan art, then a religion and finally a mania. It is utterly impossible toresist it, but it takes a strong constitution to survive. Californianswill go to any length or trouble in this matter; their hospitality isall mixed up with their art instinct and their sense of humor. For nomatter what graceful tribute they pay to famous visiting aliens, itsformality is always leavened by their delicious wit. And no matterhow much fun they poke at departing or returning friends, it is alwaysaccompanied by some social tribute of great charm and originality. A loyal Adopted Son of California, a novelist and muckraker, returned afew years ago to the beloved land of his adoption. His arrival was madethe occasion of a dinner by his Club. He had come back specifically on amuckraking tour. But it happened that during his absence he had writtena series of fiction stories, all revolving about the figure of amiddle-aged woman medium. In the midst of the dinner, a fellow clubmandisguised as a middle-aged woman medium began to read the future ofthe guests. She discoursed long and accurately on the personal New Yorkaffairs of the returned muckraker. To get such information, the wiresbetween the committee who got up the dinner and his friends in New Yorkmust have been kept hot for hours. Moreover, just after midnight, anewsboy arrived with editions of a morning paper of which the wholefirst page was devoted to him. There were many, highly-colored accountsof all-night revelries; expense accounts, of which every second item waschampagne and every fifth bromo-selzer, etc. , etc. Of course but a limited number of papers with this extraneous sheet wereprinted and those distributed only at the dinner. One, however, was sentto the Eastern magazine which had dispatched our muckraking hero to theGolden Gate. They replied instantly and heatedly by wire to go on withhis work, that in spite of the outrageous slander of the opposition, they absolutely trusted him. This was only one of an endless succession of dinners which dot thesocial year with their originality. During the course of the Exposition, the governing officials presentedso many engraved placques to California citizens and to visitingnotabilities that after a while, the Californians began to josh thesystem. A certain San Franciscan is famous for much generous andunobtrusive philanthropy. Also his self-evolved translation of theduties of friendship is the last word on that subject. He was visitedunexpectedly at his office one day by a group of friends. With muchceremony, they presented him with a placque--an amusing plasterburlesque of the real article. He had the Californian sense of humor andhe thoroughly enjoyed the situation. Admitting that the joke was on him, he celebrated according to time-honored rites. After his friendshad left, he found on his desk a small uninscribed package which hadapparently been left by accident. He opened it. Inside was a beautifulleather box showing his initials in gold. And within the box was a smallbronze placque exquisitely engraved by a master-artist. .. Bearing amessage of appreciation exquisitely phrased. .. The names of all hisfriends. I know of no incident more typical of the taste and the humorwith which the Native Son performs every social function. That sense ofhumor does not lessen but it lightens the gallantry and chivalry whichis the earmark of Westerners. It makes for that natural perfection ofmanners which is also typical of the Native Son. Touching the matter of their manners. .. A woman writer I know very wellonce went to a boxing-match in San Francisco. Women are forbidden toattend such events, so that a special permission had to be obtainedfor her. She was warned beforehand that the audience might manifest itsdisapproval in terms both audible and uncomplimentary. She enteredthe arena in considerable trepidation of spirit. It was an importantmatch--for the lightweight championship of the world. She occupied aring-side box where, it is likely, everybody saw her. There were tenthousand men in the arena and she was the only woman. But in all thetwo hours she sat there, she was not once made conscious, by a word orglance in her direction, that anybody had noticed her presence. That Ithink is a perfect example of perfect mob-manners. Perhaps that instinct, not only for fair but for chivalrous play, whichalso characterizes the Native Son, comes from pioneer days. Certainly itis deepened by a very active interest in all kinds of sports. I drawmy two examples of this from the boxing world. This is a story that SamBerger tells about Andrew Gallagher. It happened in that period when both men were amateur lightweights andMr. Gallagher was champion of the Pacific Coast. Mr. Berger challengedMr. Gallagher and defeated him. The margin of victory was so narrow, however, that Mr. Gallagher felt justified in as asking for anothermatch, and got it. This time Mr. Berger's victory was complete. In a letter, Mr. Bergersaid, "A woman cannot possibly understand what being a champion means toa man. It isn't so much the championship itself but it's the slap onthe shoulder and the whispered comment as you pass, 'There goes ourchampion!' that counts. Looking back at it from the thirties, it isn'tso important; but in the twenties it means a lot. My dressing room wasnear Gallagher's, so that, although he didn't know this, I could nothelp overhearing much that was said there. After we got back to ourrooms, I heard some friend of Gallagher's refer to me as 'a damn Jew'. What was my delight at Gallagher's magnanimity to hear him answer, 'Whydo you call him a damn Jew? He is a very fine fellow and a better boxerthan me, the best day I ever saw. '" That incident seems to me typical of the Native Son; and the longunbroken friendship that grew out of it, equally so. A few years ago an interview with Willie Ritchie appeared in a New Yorkpaper. He had just boxed Johnny Dundee, defeating him. In passing I maystate that Mr. Ritchie was, during that winter, taking an agriculturalcourse at Columbia College, and that this is quite typical of the kindof professional athlete California turns out. You would have expectedthat in a long two-column interview, Mr. Ritchie would have devoted muchof the space to himself, his record, his future plans. Not at all. Itwas all about Johnnie Dundee, for whom personally he seems to havean affectionate friendship and for whose work a rueful and decidedlyhumorous appreciation. He analyzed with great sapience the psychologicaleffect on the audience of Mr. Dundee's ring-system of perpetual motion. He described with great delight a punch that Mr. Dundee had landed onthe very top of his head. In fact Mr. Dundee's publicity managercould do no better than to use parts of this interview for advertisingpurposes. I began that last paragraph with the phrase, "A few years ago". Butsince that time a whole era seems to have passed--that heart-breakingera of the Great War. And now the Native Son has entered into andemerged from a new and terrible game. He has needed--and I doubt notdisplayed--all that he has of strength, natural and developed; ofkeenness and coolness; of bravery and fortitude; of capacity to endureand yet josh on. Perhaps after all, though, the best example of the Native Son's fairnesswas his enfranchisement of the Native Daughter and the way in which hedid it. Sometime, when the stories of all the suffrage fights are told, we shall get the personal experiences of the women who worked in thatwhirlwind campaign. It will make interesting reading; for it is bothdramatic and picturesque. And it will redound forever and ever and everto the glory of the Native Son. The Native Son--in the truest sense of the romantic--is a romanticfigure. He could scarcely avoid being that, for he comes from themost romantic State in the Union and, if from San Francisco, the mostromantic city in our modern world. It is, I believe, mainly his senseof romance that drives him into the organization which he himself hascalled the Native Sons of the Golden West; an adventurous instinctthat has come down to us from mediaeval times, urging men to form intocongenial company for offence and defence, and to offer personality theopportunity for picturesque masquerade. That romantic background not only explains the Native Son but the longline of extraordinary fiction, with California for a background, whichCalifornia has produced. California though is the despair of fictionwriters. It offers so many epochs; such a mixture of nationalities; somany and such violently contrasted atmospheres, that it is difficult tomake it credible. The gold rush. .. The pioneers. .. The Vigilantes . .. The Sand Lot days. .. San Francisco before the fire. .. The period ofreconstruction. As for the drama lying submerged everywhere in the labormovement. .. The novelists have not even begun to mine below the surface. To the fiction-writer, the real, everyday life is so dramatic that thetemptation is to substitute for invention the literal records of someliterary moving-picture machine. In fact, all the time you stay in California you're living in a story. The San Franciscans will inundate you with stories of that old SanFrancisco. And what stories they are! The water-front, Chinatown, theBarbary Coast and particularly that picturesque neighborhood, south ofMarket Street--here were four of the great drama-breeding areas of theworld. The San Franciscans of the past generation will tell you that thenew San Francisco is tamed and ordered. That may be all true. But to oneat least who never saw the old city, romance shows her bewildering faceeverywhere in the new one. Almost anything can happen there and almosteverything does. Life explodes. It's as though there were a romanticdynamite in solution in the air. You make a step in any directionand--bang!--you bump into adventure. There is something about thesparkle and bustle and gaiety of the streets. .. There is something aboutthe friendliness and the vivacity of the people. .. There is somethingabout the intimacy and color and gaiety of the restaurants. .. . Let me tell some stories to prove my point. Anybody who has lived in SanFrancisco has heard them by scores. I pick one or two at random. A group of Native Sons were once dining in one of the little Bohemianrestaurants of San Francisco. Two of them made a bet with the othersthat they could kiss every woman in the room. They went from table totable and in mellifluous accents, plus a strain of hyperbole, explainedtheir predicament to each lady, concluding with a respectful demandfor a kiss. Every woman in the room (with the gallant indulgence ofher swain) acceded to this amazing request. In fifteen minutes all thekisses were collected and the wager won. I don't know on which thisstory reflects the greater credit--the Native Daughter or the NativeSon. But I do know that it couldn't have happened anywhere but inCalifornia. The first time I visited San Francisco shortly after the fire, I waswalking one day in rather a lonely part of the city. There were manyburnt areas about: only a few pedestrians. Presently, I saw a man andwoman leaning against a fence, absorbed in conversation. Apparently theydid not hear my approach; they were too deep in talk. They did not lookout of the ordinary and, indeed, I should not have given them a secondglance if, as I passed, I had not heard the woman say, "And did you killanyone else?" A man told me that once early in the morning he was walking throughChinatown. There was nobody else on the street except, a little distanceahead, a child carrying a small bundle. Suddenly just as she passed, a panel in one of the houses slid open. .. A hand came out. .. The childslipped the bundle into the hand. .. The hand disappeared. .. The wallpanel closed up. The child trotted on as though nothing had happened. .. Disappeared around the corner. When my friend reached the house, it wasimpossible to locate the panel. A reporter I know was leaving his home one morning when there came aring at his telephone. "There is something wrong in apartment numberblank, house number blank, on your street, " said Central. "Will youplease go over there at once?" He went. Somehow he got into the house. Nobody answered his ring at the apartment; he had to break the dooropen. Inside a very beautiful girl in a gay negligee was lying dead ona couch, a bottle of poison on the floor beside her. He investigated thecase. The dead girl had been in the habit of calling a certain number, and she always used a curious identifying code-phrase. The reporterinvestigated that number. The rest of the story is long and thrilling, but finally he ran down a group of lawbreakers who had been selling thedead girl drugs, were indirectly responsible for her suicide. Do yousuppose such a ripe story could have dropped straight from the Tree ofLife into the hand of a reporter anywhere except in California? A woman I know was once waiting on the corner for a car. Near, shehappened casually to notice, was a Chinaman of a noticeable, driedantiquity, shuffling along under the weight of a bunch of bananas. Shewas at that moment considering a curious mental problem and, in herpreoccupation, she drew her hand down the length of her face in agesture that her friends recognize as characteristic. Did she, byaccident, stumble on one of the secret signals of a great secrettraffic? That is her only explanation of what followed. For suddenly theold Chinaman shuffled to her side, unobtrusively turned his back towardsher. One of the bananas on top the bunch, easy to the reach of her hand, was opened, displaying itself to be emptied of fruit. But in its placewas something--something little, wrapped in tissue paper. Her completeastonishment apparently warned the vendor of drugs of his mistake. Hescuttled across the street; in a flash had vanished in a back alley. One could go on forever. I cannot forbear another. A woman was passingthrough the theatrical district of San Francisco one night, just beforethe theatres let out. The street was fairly deserted. Suddenly shewas accosted by a strange gentleman of suave address. Obviously he haddallied with the demon and was spectacularly the worse for it. He wascarrying an enormous, a very beautiful--and a very expensive--bouquet. In a short speech of an impassioned eloquence and quite as floweryas his tribute, he presented her with the bouquet. She tried to avoidaccepting it. But this was not, without undue publicity, to be done. Finally to put an end to the scene, she bore off her booty. She hasoften wondered what actress was deprived of her over-the-foot-lightstrophy by the sudden freak of an exhilarated messenger. I know that the Native Son works and works hard. The proof of that isCalifornia itself. San Francisco twice rebuilt, the progressive city ofLos Angeles, all the merry enterprising smaller California cities andtowns. But, somehow, he plays so hard at his work and works so hardat his play that you are always wondering whether it's all the timehe works or all the time he plays. At any rate, out of his work comesgaiety and out of his play seriousness. His activities are so many thatwhen I try to make my imagined program of his average day, I shouldprovide one not of twenty-four hours, but of seventy-two. I imagine him going down to his office at about nine in the morning, working until noon as though driven by steam and electricity; thenlunching with a party of Native Sons, all filled with jocund japefuljoshing Native Son humor which brims over in showers of Native Sonwit. I imagine him returning to an afternoon of brief but concentratedstrenuous labor, then going for a run in the Park, or tennis, or golf, ending with a swim; presenting himself fine and fit at his club atfirst-cocktail time. I imagine him dining at his club or at a restaurantor at a stag-dinner, always in the company of other joyous Native Sons;going to the Orpheum, motoring through the Park afterwards; and finallyindulging in another bite before he gets to bed. Sometime during theprocess, he has assisted in playing a graceful practical joke ona trusting friend. He has attended a meeting to boost a big, newdeveloping project for California. He has made a speech. He hascontributed to some pressing charity. He has swung into at least twopolitical fights. He has attended a pageant or a fiesta or a carnival. And he has managed to conduct his wooing of that beautiful (andfortunate) Native Daughter who will some day become Mrs. Native Son. Really my favorite hour is every hour. Every hour in San Francisco is a charming hour. Perhaps my favoritecomes anywhere between six and eight. Then "The City" is brilliant withlights; street lamps, shop windows, roof advertising signs. The hotelsare a-dance and a-dazzle with life. Flowers and greens make mats andcushions of gorgeous color at the downtown corners. At one end of MarketStreet, the Ferry building is outlined in electricity, sometimes incolor; at the other end the delicate outlines of Twin Peaks are mergingwith night. Perhaps swinging towards the horizon there is a crescentmoon--that gay strong young bow which should be the emblem ofCalifornia's perpetual youth and of her augmenting power. Perhaps closeto the crescent flickers the evening star--that jewel on the brow ofnight which should be a symbol of San Francisco's eternal sparkle. And, perhaps floating over the City, a sheer high fog mutes the crescent'sgold to a daffodil yellow; winds moist gauzes over the thrilling eveningstar. At the top of the high hill-streets, the lamps run in straightstrings or pendant necklaces. Down their astonishing slopes slide carslike glass boxes filled with liquid light; motors whose front lampsflood the asphalt with bubbling gold. If it be Christmas--and nowhereis Christmas so Christmasy as in California--the clubs and hotels showfacades covered with jewel-designs in red and green lights; mistletoe, holly, stack high the sidewalks on each side of the flower stands. Thebeautiful Native Daughter, eyes dancing, lips smiling, dressed with muchcolor and more chic, is everywhere. And everywhere too, crowding thestreets, thronging the cafes, jamming the theatres, flooding the parks, filling the endless files of motor-car, until before your very eyes, "the city" seems to spawn men, is-- Generous, genial, gay; handsome; frank and fine; careless and care-free;vital, virile, vigorous; engaging and debonair; witty and winningand wise; humorous and human; kindly and courteous; high-minded, high-hearted, high-spirited; here's to him! Ladies, this toast must bedrunk standing--the Native Son.