Because we have such faith in the charms of California; because we have such faith in the future of our city that we believe that once strangers come here they will remain in it, as of old the hero remained in the land of the ever-young; because we believe that this state can support ten, aye, twenty times its present population, we extend an invitation to all home-seekers, no matter where found.  Come to California!  Its valleys are wide open for all to come through and build therein their homes of peace.  Its coasts teem with wealth.  The riches of its mountains have not been half exploited.  We believe that all that is necessary to fill this State with a great and prosperous population is that the people should see the State and know it as it is.

FATHER P.C.  YORKE,
in The Warder of Two Continents.

JUNE 15.

EL CAMINO REAL.

  It’s a long road and sunny, and the fairest in the world—­
  There are peaks that rise above it in their sunny mantles curled,
  And it leads from the mountains through a hedge of chaparral,
  Down to the waters where the sea gulls call. 
  It’s a long road and sunny, it’s a long road and old. 
  And the brown padres made it for the flocks of the fold;
  They made it for the sandals of the sinner-folk that trod
  From the fields in the open to the shelter-house of God.

* * * * *

  We will take the road together through the morning’s golden glow,
  And will dream of those who trod it in the mellowed long ago.

JOHN S. MCGROARTY,
in Just California.

JUNE 16.

Mrs. Bryton surveyed the coarse furnishings of the adobe with disgust as she was led to the one room where she could secure sleeping accommodation.  It contained three beds with as many different colored spreads, queer little pillows, and drawn-work on one towel hanging on a nail.  The floor had once been tiled with square mission bricks; but many were broken, some were gone, and the empty spaces were so many traps for unwary feet.

MARAH ELLIS RYAN,
in For the Soul of Rafael.

JUNE 17.

Of all the old grandees who, not forty years before, had called the Californias their own; living a life of Arcadian magnificence, troubled by few cares, a life of riding over vast estates clad in silk and lace, botas and sombreros, mounted upon steeds as gorgeously caparisoned as themselves, eating, drinking, serenading at the gratings of beautiful women, gambling, horse-racing, taking part in splendid religious festivals, with only the languid excitement of an occasional war between rival governors to disturb the placid surface of their lives—­of them all Don Roberto was a man of wealth and consequence today.