quote
The sand of the beach began to be cold to our bare feet; the frogs set up their croaking in the
marshes, and one solitary owl, from the end of the distant point, gave out his melancholy note,
mellowed by the distance.....
Two Years Before The Mast
Richard Henry Dana
unquote
I was looking for the passages in Two Years about the Santa Ana Winds...Dana describes them, and how Ships back then were blown out to Sea for hundreds of miles...anyway...
Here in the Valley it has been windy off and on, causing some consternation--oh..a gust just shook the Cedar--Roads closed off and on, Campo 4 evacuated, Cabin and Tents in Siberia too...tomorrowmorrow I'll walk about and looksee...sunnybluebluewindywindy, warm...hereabout, the Santa Ana Winds are called Mono Winds....
Reading Dana, I was reminded just how well Nineteenth Century writers wrote!! And that might be first report of Owl in California...I'll have to start a new thoughtHobby, culling critter reports in early California literature, beginning with this one by John Muir....oh, bit above is from when Dana first arrives at Santa Barbara...those old ships were living things...
Muir Link:
http://digital.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=atla;cc=atla;rgn=full%20text;idno=atla0082-6;didno=atla0082-6;view=image;seq=00757;node=atla0082-6%3A1
Muir's Atlantic Monthy articles are in a book hereabout, I think, and will find it so I can put up some quotes from them...Muir is very quotable...
1 comment:
I look forward to your sharing early California histories and writers...did you read the book review of the one I did recently? It is on my "other" blog which you can access via my complete profile. It is a book about robert Louis Stevenson's four months in Monterey that is so annotated it is a delightful picture of life in those day.
Glad you weren't blown away!
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