Rezanov by Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
page 127 of 289 (43%)
page 127 of 289 (43%)
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They stood out through the straits between Point
Tiburon and the Isle of the Angels, where the tide ran fast. Then, for the first time, was Rezanov able to form a definite idea of the size and shape of this great natural harbor. To the south it extended be- yond the peninsula in an unbroken sheet for some forty English miles. Ten miles to the north there was a gateway between the lower hills which Luis had alluded to as leading into the bay of Saint Pablo, another large body of tidewater, but inferior in depth and beauty to the Bay of San Francisco. The mist had dissolved. The greens were vivid where the sun shone on island and hill. The woods of Bellissima, the groves of Point Sausalito, the for- ests in the northern canyons, deepened to purple like that of the great bare sweep of Tamalpais. Only the farther peaks remained a pale misty blue, and were of an indescribable floating delicacy. Concha pointed to the eastern double cone. "That is Monte del Diablo. Once they say it spouted fire, but that was long ago, and all our volcanoes are dead. But perhaps not so long ago. The Indians tell the strange story that their grandfathers remem- bered when this bay was a valley covered with oak trees, and the rivers of the north flowed through and emptied into Lake Merced and a rift by the Fort. Then came a tremendous earthquake and rent the mountains apart where you came through |
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