Semi-weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1853-18??, 1854-04-01
We are indebted. to { friend for the following

3 DEAR E:ss Chaos is tleslonl5 word 1 have to
describe in any ineligible way those first impress
ssions'' of California You have asked me for IF +
could send you by Adams e. Co.'S, a Daguerrotype
of my inner the seat of the sensations and per-
cepfions i would be very much ike those blurred
pctJres of babies who can never hold themselves
still long enough for the sun to write them down.
Like those uneasy cherubs, such as We often see
pinned to the bosorns, worn at the wrists of hap
by parents, my thoughts have been all double head
ed-half given to an admiration of this active life
half fearing for the results of its tremendous vita
tyhalf delighted, too, with the whir of this busy
street.-the of 1nan--half tempted away to an idle
dreamy enjoyment of the beautiful nature that is
around it all for San Francisco and its life full
of all sorts of contradictions. Nature seems never
to have intended this beautiful spot, where the set
ting sun daily paints landscape such as only the
man of leisure quiet occupation can thoroughly
enjoy, for field of the g battle of life" The beau
ty of this Pacific coast seems to me in strange con-
trast with the fierce Atlantic spirit that has taken
hold of. 1T. wonder whether meditative Indians
or meditatiye smoking RancheroS ever curse the
ergy of these barbarous Atlantic men they go on
dragging down their soft Pacific slopes into level
streets and filing up their shining waters with brick
and granite buildings. 1 wonder whether this out
rageous war Of Atlantic energy upon the gentler
genius of the Pacific, is not the beginning of war
which will bring over all the spirit of the East and
harness il to a new service What momentous
thing it will be to put the two parts of America
asunder by Isthmus railroad ship canal, and
let full tide of Atlanticism in upon the Pacfcl No
Chinaman will feel his pigs'-ta secure, and no river
mountNin side will be safc-the one from taxing
its waves that have flowed so long in luxurious ease
in the service of odious mills, and the other from the
energetic sitting of pans and washers. Already the
Pacific influence has been driven away from San
Francisco, fingers about it only in a charming eli
mate and an atmosphere of beauty that nothing can
cheat OF frighten away from its coast and hill sides
All else, though, is thoroughly Atlantic-Wall ST
intensified. You may imagine the contrasts, the
phases of chrysals life the hourly anachronisms that
are thus presented when Wall St and the Sandwich
Islands blend together To me it is still only Chaos.
see II, however, in epitome IN that native OF the
Celestial empire, who is buying pair of Yankee
boots opposite to my window now he wears
American sack and felt hat but these envelopes
vainly seek hide his celestial nature which is gro
tesque, through its wrappings; Oh! for new Santa
Resastus
To do justice to San Francisco in a more orderly
spirit of description, should have to invoke more
patience than feel authorised in demanding besides
taxing your creduty very largely and gaining the
reputation of an enthusiast which you and those Of
your longitude doubtless regard the worst term
ofreproach you could bestow upon one of my sober
years. So enough of descriptions-San Francisco
beggars description. If to send you picture
of her now it would be false before it reached you.
What water fourteen feet deep now will be store
house drinking house when you read this. I'm
derstand me-foureen feet of water will not be fro
or petried filled up in month that would be
somewhat ultra Californian, but a house will stand
up there stills and pay $500 month rent, busy
life going above and the water still flowing quiet
ly below 1t is a very interesting thing live in the
midst of such rapid development. The brick and
morter and granite that every day shaping them
selves into proper and permanent forms only
expression of what is going on in every department
here. Opinion, and law, and society all settling
themselves down in the way, going through
many strange phases, bringing forth sometimes many
a5ortions; but always bravely going on, bringing
forth light Every day is suggesting questions which
have had solution heretofore solution for these
circumstances; and one seems to sec life vsby shap-
ing itself into definite form; improving, in many
things, upon old precedents, and rising above old
l,.lc Add hro.r and oil
restless activity that makes the life of kindred
to the life of those insects that crowd many hopes
and joys, and passions into an instant of time.
No ezaggerate what has been done in
California. This whole gold emigration and its at
tendant enterprises epoch in history not unlike
that which stirred the blood of Cortes and Pzarro
ard De Soto and the wild hosts of Spain and Portu
gal who built up Spanish America. The difference
between the two stages is the difference between a
child and giant with steam-engine sinews. The
secret history, the moving spring. always the same;
time and distance i've grandeur to enterprises and
they doubtless great all of thcm for energy and
strength of will and persevering exertion but they
all receivable into the private spirit OF gain which
makes revolutions to give credit to bonds and over
turns empires on private speculation
Tmid men (for there few such here, their
blood being slow to change,) croak about inflated
prices in San Francisco, unnatural stimulus, over
stocked markets. &C., &c. There is doubtless much
reason to think that slight corrective pinch is now
and then necessary to regulate trade IN all new and
isolated places. Such are going to feel We
nv soon San Francisco has been overwhelmed with
goods from all parts of the worid-each distant Mer
chant thinking to get ahead of his neighbour in the
Samaritan charity of feeding and clothing us. And
the consequence is that cursed with food and
clothing to such an extent that Merchants are
all in Notwithstanding over lost occupations and
high rents and our landed trembling .est
those high rents should be infected by the times and
fall better companionship with the price of NOR
chandise. But there is confidence eyerywhere--an
abiding confidence in the supply of god in the stea
dy flow of emigration, in the capacity of consump-
ton of adult population, and the wastefuness OF
an enterprising one in the influx of foreign capital
and in the spirit of people who have brought civil
zation out here. And so we shall weather the Storm
and when we have trimmed our sails again shall
be all the better for the force of the breeze
We hope soon to hear confirmation of the news,
now current in the Streets that Col. Gadsden has
given S23 00O 900 for Sonora and Lower California
and the Mesilla Valley and the whole bunch of Mex
lean difficulties Such acquisition would give
great impulse to Pacific emigration. A new Port
upon the Pacific (Guaymas) and confidence in
this Western trade, the chances of Southern Rail-
road to the Pacific-these things will bring the East
and the West together and open the way for the
great social commerce of nations to which look as
what Young America would call, " the mission of
California" Meantime this future, which seems to
hold the solution of all chronological questions is the
play thing of Capt. Walker and few hundred men
cncamped at Ensanada in Lower California. It's
hard to speak with seriousness of an expedition
which undertook, with SO men, to two States
Nothing anywhere, from Shakespeare to Cervantes,
has equallcd the burlesque of Walkers conquest of
Sonora. few magnificent pronunciamentos have
raised up new Republic and divided it into pro-
vinces and given it official name, and all this with
out of the conquerors having put his foot upon
the soil For Sonora is yet unseen of her invaders.
She is what Madame de Seviene yyod call their Re-