He taught me the madrona, the manzanita, the buck-eye,
the maple; he showed me the crested mountain quail; he showed me
where some young redwoods were already spiring heavenwards from the
ruins of the old; for in this district all had already perished:
redwoods and redskins, the two noblest indigenous living things,
alike condemned.
At length, in a lonely dell, we came on a huge wooden gate with a
sign upon it like an inn. "The Petrified Forest. Proprietor: C.
Evans," ran the legend. Within, on a knoll of sward, was the house
of the proprietor, and another smaller house hard by to serve as a
museum, where photographs and petrifactions were retailed. It was
a pure little isle of touristry among these solitary hills.
The proprietor was a brave old white-faced Swede. He had wandered
this way, Heaven knows how, and taken up his acres--I forget how
many years ago--all alone, bent double with sciatica, and with six
bits in his pocket and an axe upon his shoulder. Long, useless
years of seafaring had thus discharged him at the end, penniless
and sick. Without doubt he had tried his luck at the diggings, and
got no good from that; without doubt he had loved the bottle, and
lived the life of Jack ashore. But at the end of these adventures,
here he came; and, the place hitting his fancy, down he sat to make
a new life of it, far from crimps and the salt sea.
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