The herald., 1895-03-18
A LAND OF ROnANcE

Southern California is pre-eminently a
land of romance. and the possibilities,
from literary point of view, are illimt-
able. All that is required is the master
mind to colate and discriminate the
material lying all around us, and the
master hand to write the story. 1t is a
virgin field. Those who have already
made exploration have merely penetrated
the outskirts of this wondrous region.
Only one or two have caught the flavor of
our environment. and they have told us
but little-glimpsed the prospect, as it
were, and sketchcd the mere outlines of
nearby subjects embossed and prominent
on the broad surface of a history and a
character reaching back to the Conquest.
That the world is interested in whatever
may be told of this history is evil
denced in the pronounced popularity
of Helen Hunt Jackson's Ramona.
And yet Mrs. jackson touched only
ON a single phase of the life of pc
culiar people. appealing only to the
sympathies of her readers without elabor-
ate effort at detail even in her chara cteri-
cation. Charles +. Iummis. who loves
the desert and the people living therein,
has given us accurate descriptive sketches
full of that indetinable element vaguely
termed local color but Mr. Lummis
has not yet told the story of the mingling
of the races. That he could do so If so
minded. we do not doubt, and that he
will do so is very probable, for he is satur-
ated with the truth of the picture that we
would have him paint for us. Such
4 l Il,
of detail that underles all of Mr.. Lum-
mis- effort-it is not improbable that the
value and interest of the product would
be enhanced by its very truthfulness. 1t
is not so certain that Gertrude Anterior
will ever successfully depict the life she
seems prone to atte npt in some OF her
writing. Mrs. Anterior possesses linn
tied degree of knowledge, and sometimes
she evnces a prettiness in portraiture.
but outside the ephemeral pages of
magazine the result of her effort is abso-
lutely vaueless. We believe that Margaret
Collier Graham could accomplish as much
in this direction as any woman writer. 1t
may be that her disposition to intro
spective analysis would hamper some
what but aside from that she is emil
nently qualified for the task. Especially
is Mrs. Graham fitted to present the
softer, gentler. more picturesque phases
of the Latin character upon which ro-
nance of this timbre must base.
But the man or woman-preferably
man-who is destined to tell this story
successfully must have the fire of a Stan
ley Weyman, the force and virility of
Kiping and the vvacity OF the elder
Dumas. The writer my select any of a
hundred stirring episo les-the history of
a California family; the founding of a
mission; the personal adventure of a
Spanish cavalier of the Conquest; the
story of a prince OF the house of Monte
yuma chronicle of the Aztec or Inca;
q omance founded on the expedition of
Coronado or the voyage OF Cabrillo or
best OF all, containing, as it does, the
germs of modern human interest the pc
cularly romantic narration of the events
preceding and succeeding the invasion of
the gringo-the meeting of the Saxon and
the Latn-on the plains of California.
Here the novelist will find his richest
field; in the folklore of the countryside
he will find inexhaustible material for
: local color, in the ballads crooned by
ancient women in the patlos of adobes
still more ancient he will get the drift of
the local character: from the lips of oil
men he will hear the story of Fremont
and Stockton and Kit Carson, and the
filibusters of Walker and Crabb--the in
cursion of the Argonaut and the fading
Of the pastoral race that held the title to
leaoueS under Grant of the Me ican gov
eminent, deeming it of little worth, save
for the pasturing of countless herds val
liable only for their hides and tallow On
this basis, in this field, and of this epoch
and people will some master of the pen
Of romance some day achieve lasting
fame.