The Sun.
London, England, 1849-01-11 00:00:00

for towns, villages, and farms, with which it is be-
beginning to be dotted. A low alluvial bottom land,
several miles in breadth, with occasional open woods
of oak, borders the foot of the mountains around the
southern arm of the bay, terminating on a breadth of
twenty miles in the fertile valley of the St. Joseph, a
narrow plain of rich soil, lying between ranges from
two to three thousand feet high. The valley is
openly wooded with groves of oak, free from under-
brush, and after the spring rains covered with grass.
Taken in connexion with the valley of San Juan,
with which it forms a continuous plain, it is fifty- five
miles long, and one to twenty broad, opening into
smaller valleys among the hills. At the head of the
bay it is twenty miles broad, and about the same at
the southern end, where the soil is beautifully fertile,
covered in summer with four or five varieties of
wild clover several feet high. In many places it
is overgrown with wild mustard, growing ten or
twelve feet high, in almost impenetrable fields,
through which roads are made like lanes. On
both sides the mountains are fertile, wooded, or
covered with grasses and scattered trees. On the
west it is protected from the chilling influence of the
north-west winds by the cuesta de los qatos (wild-cat
ridge), which separates it from the coast. This is a
grassy and timbered mountain, watered with small
streams, and wooded on both sides with many varities
of trees and shrubbery, the heavier forests of pine
and cypress occupying the western slope. Timber
and shingles are now obtained from this mountain,
and one of the recently discovered quicksilver mines
i 3 on the eastern side of the mountain, near the
Pueblo of San Jose. This range terminates on the
south in the Anno Nuevo point of Monterey, by and
on the north declines into a ridge of broken hills about
five miles wide, between the bay and the sea, and
having the town of San Francisco on the bay shore,
near its northern extremity.
Sheltered from the cold winds and fogs of the sea,
and having a soil of remarkable fertility, and the
valley of St. Joseph (San Jose) is capable of pro-
ducing in great perfection many fruits and grain
hich do not thrive on the coast in its immediate vi-
cinity. Without taking into consideration the extra-
wdinary yields which have sometimes occurred, the
f iir average product of wheat is estimated fiftyfold,
or iitty for one sown. The mission establishments of
auta Clara and Santa Jose, in the north end of the
valley, were formerly, in the prosperous days of the
missions, distinguished for the superiority of their
wheat crops.
The slope of alluvial land continues entirely around
the eastern shore of the bay, intersected by small
itreains, and offering some points which good landing
and deep water, with advantageous positions between
the sea and interior country, indicate for future
settlement.
The Strait of Carquines, about one mile wide and
eight or ten fathoms deep; connects the San Pablo
Suisoon bays. Around these bays smaller val-
us open into the bordering country, and some of
he streams have a short launch navigation, which
serves to convey produce to the bay. Missions and
large farms were established at the head of navigation
on these streams, which are favourable sites for towns
or villages. The country around Suisoon bay pre-
sents smooth low ridges and rounded hills, clothed
with wild oats, and more or less openly wooded on
their summits. Approaching its northern shores
from Sonoma, it assumes, though in a state of nature,
a cultivated and beautiful appearance. Wild oats
cover it in continuous fields, and herds of cattle and
bands of horses are scattered over low hills and partly
isolated ridges, where blue mists and openings among
the abruptly terminating hills indicate the neighbour-
hood of the bay.
The Suisoon is connected with an expansion of
the river formed by the junction of the Sacramento
and San Joaquin, which enter the Francisco Bay in
the same latitude nearly as the mouth of the Tagus at
Lisbon. A delta of twenty-five miles in length,
divided into islands by deep channels, connects the
bay with the valley of the San Joaquin and Sacra-
mento, into the mouths of which the tide flows, and
which enter the bay together as one river.
Such is the bay, and the proximate country and
shores of the bay, of San Francisco. It is not a mere
indentation of the coast, but a little sea to itself., con-
nected with the ocean by a defensible gate, opening
out between seventy and eighty miles to the right
and left, upon a breadth of ten to fifteen, deep
enough for the largest ships, with bold shores suitable
for towns and settlements, and fertile adjacent country
for cultivation. The head of the bay is about • forty
miles from the sea, and there commences its connec-
tion with the noble valleys of Saa Joaquin and
Sacramento.