A WORLD OF WONDERS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IV, Issue 189, 10 November 1876, Page 5

A WORLD OF WONDERS.

Among the many sights and scenes in California, the following, we think it will be admitted, is one of the most graphic and realistic. It is from the pen of B. P. Shillaber, Esq., of Boston, Mass., known to the world as " Mrs. Partington," and composed a part of a recent private letter to one of the editors of the ' Times and Despatch,' Reading, Pa. The account is brief, but was considered so happy and interesting that the author's consent to its publication was requested and kindly granted. Mr. Shillaber had just returned home from a two months' tour through this great Commonwealth when hia letter was written. During all thi3 time he was enabled to see everything worthy of note, under the most favorable auspices. Here is what he says :

" I have had a great .time in California, and have seen more in the brief space of two months than ordinary tourists would in six. I had friends there with means and disposition to have me see the State at its best, and so I was on the go continually, seeing the grandest objects and enjoying everything 'to the top of my bont/ I cannot give you, even in brief, an idea of that great State, with but little more than half as many inhabitants as there are in the city of New York. As the old gentleman said of matrimony, who was married at sixty, 'Itis a big thing.' Big waters, big mountains, big mines, big wheat fields, big people — everything massive and mountainous. All are grandly hospitable, and wealth puts on no airs on account of plethoric pockets. We call people wealthy here who have attained a competency. There an income of 500,000 dols. a month is somewhat common, and one I was told touched 1,000,000 dols. I saw piled up in a private bank silver bricks enough to equal, in cubic measurement, a half cord of wood, sawed in threes. I saw one wheat field of 14,000 acres, owned by one man, and this was but part of a continuous valley of such, without a fence, extending for thirty miles, with a width of from twelve to twenty miles. I saw the big trees of Calaveras and brought home with me diameters from twenty-two to thirty-two feet — saw them measured myself. I went down among* the orange groves of Southern California, with which were growing almonds , grapes, pomegranates, figs, coffee, pepper, alongside of fruits of the North, growing luxuriantly. I saw here a woman 137 year 3 old, who was mother of several children when the old church there was dedicated in 1771. I rode over 700 miles of the Pacific Ocean, so-called, but such a sea I never saw see-saw as I saw in that. I saw a petroleum well gushing to the ocean's surface and spreading for miles, with a smell like 500,000 kerosene lamps. I went through the Golden Gate, which in this day of office-making and office-holding has no one to take charge of it. I rode to the top of Mount Diablo in a carriage, and saw from the summit as much, as Thackeray's 'Little Billee' did from the mast — ' Jerusalem' and Madagascar and North and South Amerikee." One of the sublimest views I ever saw from 4,000 feet above the level of the sea. The atmosphere was clear and the view uninterrupted for hundreds of miles, comprehending the ocean, the Sierras, Mount Shasta, and the vast wheat plains, veined by rivers, stretching at our feet, with bays and lakes sparkling in the sun, and towns dotted along, with individual clearings that seemed like gardens in the distance, and beautiful with green and blossom. What a picture this was ! When I reached the summit I felt an emotion akin to that of Ensign Stebbings when he stood for the fir&t time on Mount Washington — waving his hat he exclaimed, * Attention, the universe V It was a scene never to be forgotten. I hardly dare to tell these wonders lest lam met as lagoo was in Hiawatha, ' Kaw ! what lies you tell us ; do not think we believe them,' " — ' Sun.'