A Truthful Woman in Southern California

Still, above all, and permeating every other interest, is the orange. As to dampness, a physician threatened with consumption, and naturally desirous of finding the driest air, began while at Coronado Beach a simple but sure test for comparative degrees of “humidity” by just hanging a woolen stocking out of his window at night. At that place it was wet all through, quite moist at Los Angeles, very much less so at Pasadena, dry as a bone or red herring or an old-fashioned sermon at Riverside. Stockings will tell! (From April to September is really the best time to visit Coronado.) I experienced a very sudden change from a warm, delightful morning to an afternoon so penetrating by cold that I really suffered during a drive, although encased in the heaviest of Jaeger flannels, a woolen dress, and a heavy wrap. I thought of the rough buffalo coat my uncle, a doctor, used to put on when called out on a winter night in New Hampshire, and wished I was enveloped in something like it, with a heated freestone, for feet and a hot potato for each hand. If I can make my readers understand that these sudden changes make flannels necessary, and that one needs to be as careful here as in Canada as regards catching cold from night air and these unexpected rigors, I shall feel, as the old writers used to say, “that I have not written entirely in vain.”

In one day you can sit under the trees in a thin dress and be too warm if the sun is at its best, and then be half frozen two hours later if the wind is in earnest and the sun has retired. In the sun, Paradise; in shade, protect yourself!

CHAPTER X.

A LESSON ON THE TRAIN.

“The Schoolmistress Abroad.”

All through Southern California I hear words of whose meaning I have no idea until they are explained. For instance, a friend wrote from San Diego in February: “Do not longer delay your coming; the mesas are already bright with wildflowers.” A mesa is a plateau, or upland, or high plain. And then there are fifty words in common use retained from the Spanish rule that really need a glossary. As, arroyo, a brook or creek; and arroyo seco, a dry creek or bed of extinct river.

Alameda, an avenue.

Alamitos, little cotton-wood.

Alamo, the cotton-wood; in Spain, the poplar.

Alma, soul.

That is all I have learned in A’s. Then for B’s.

I asked at Riverside what name they had for a big, big rock that rose right out of the plain, and was told it was a “butte.” That gave a meaning to Butte City, and was another lesson.

Banos means baths, and barranca is a small ravine.

Then, if we go on alphabetically, cajon, pronounced cahone, is a box.

Calaveras, skull.

Campo, plain.

Cienaga, a marshy place.

Campo sancto, cemetery.

Canyon or canon, gulch.

Cruz, cross.

Colorado, red.

Some of the Spanish words are so musical it is a pleasure to repeat them aloud; as:

Ensenada, bright.

Escondido, hidden.

Fresno means ash.

I inquired the meaning of “Los Gatos,” and was kindly informed it was “The Gates,” but it really is “The Cats.”

Goleta, the name of another town, means schooner.

The Spanish j nearly always has the sound of h.

Jacinto, Hyacinth.

Jose, Joseph.

Lago is lake; pond, laguna; and for a little lake the pretty name lagunita. “Lagunita Rancho” is the name of an immense fruit ranch in Vacaville—and, by the way, vaca is cow.

Madre is mother; nevada, snowy.

San Luis Obispo is San Luis the Bishop.

El Paso is The Pass.

Pueblo, a town.

Pinola is parched corn ground fine between stones, eaten with milk.

Pinoche, chopped English walnuts cooked in brown sugar—a nice candy.

Rancho, a farm; and rio, river.

Everything is a ranch out here; the word in the minds of many stands for home. A little four-year-old boy was overheard praying the other day that when he died the Lord would take him to His ranch.

Sacramento is the sacrament.

Sierra, saw-toothed; an earthquake is a temblor.