January 10th, 1860. I am again in San Francisco, and my revisit to
California is closed. I have touched too lightly and rapidly for
much impression upon the reader on my last visit into the
interior; but, as I have said, in a mere continuation to a
narrative of a sea-faring life on the coast, I am only to carry
the reader with me on a revisit to those scenes in which the
public has long manifested so gratifying an interest. But it
seemed to me that slight notices of these entirely new parts of
the country would not be out of place, for they serve to put in
strong contrast with the solitudes of 1835-6 the developed
interior, with its mines, and agricultural wealth, and rapidly
filling population, and its large cities, so far from the coast,
with their education, religion, arts, and trade.
On the morning of the 11th January, 1860, I passed, for the eighth
time, through the Golden Gate, on my way across the delightful
Pacific to the Oriental world, with its civilization three
thousand years older than that I was leaving behind. As the shores
of California faded in the distance, and the summits of the Coast
Range sank under the blue horizon, I bade farewell-- yes, I do not
doubt, forever-- to those scenes which, however changed or
unchanged, must always possess an ineffable interest for me.
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