Thus we traveled on, over rolling hills covered with grass and wild
flowers, and I was much pleased with all that I could see. For the first
two days we did not pass a house, which shows how thinly settled the
country was. Cattle were often seen, and sometimes horses, but people
were very scarce. In time we went down a long, steep hill, then across a
wide valley that supported a rank growth of vegetation, and came to a
Mission called San Buena Ventura (good luck.) Here the men seemed
scarce, but Indians and dogs plenty. The houses were of the same sort as
at Los Angeles, except the church, all made of dried mud, and never more
than one story high.
As we journeyed along we came to the sea shore, the grandest sight in
the world to me, for I had never before seen the ocean. What a wide
piece of water it was! Far out I could see small waves coming toward the
shore, and the nearer they came the faster they seemed to rush and at
last turned into great rollers and breakers which dashed upon the rocks
or washed far up the sandy shore with a force that made the ground
tremble. There was no wind and I could not see what it could be that so
strangely agitated the water. Here the waves kept coming, one after
another, with as much regularity as the slow strokes of a clock. This
was the first puzzle the great sea propounded to me, and there under the
clear blue sky and soft air I studied over the ceaseless, restless
motion and the great power that was always beating on the shore.
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