The Fantastic City

PREFACE

CHAPTER I.
The city of youth — A mission to California — We cross the Atlantic — A London season — Presented to Queen Victoria — The Great Exhibition — The Queen in Crystal Palace — Handsome Prince Albert — English house-parties — The season in Dublin — At the Guinness home — Reversing in the waltz — At the Irish Court — Lord Gough's Castle — Meeting the Iron Duke — Ex-President Van Buren's visit — Lord Cardigan of the 'Light Brigade' — Fanny Kemble reads 'Hamlet' — Married in Dublin — An Irish honeymoon — Back to America — New York in the eighteen-fifties — The first Peacock Alley — Washington Irving and Barnum — Rachel as 'Camille' — Sailing for California — The voyage to Panama — Fellow passengers — Kidnapped on the Isthmus — From Panama to the Golden Gate — A tragedy at sea — News of the Vigilantes.

CHAPTER II.
Through the Golden Gate — Landing in San Francisco — The International Hotel — A future diplomat — Velvet and diamonds — Fashions for gamblers — A Wild West scene — Street crowds — Ships in the streets — Mission Dolores — Lola Montez a bride — Adah Isaacs Menken — Montgomery Street parade — Raphael Weill — A flash forward, Melba at the Bohemian Club — Pony Express inaugurated — Popular resorts — Bishop Kip's Melodeon — Fear of fire — Richard Henry Dana's visit — Lady Franklin and the middie — Mrs. Wood plays at Maguire's — Julia Dean Hayne — Lotta's return — Tetrazzini at Lotta's Fountain — Colonel Ransome's surveying expeditions — The McAllister family — Ward McAllister, Jr., and Senator Clark.

CHAPTER III.
Balls of the eighteen-fifties — Belles and beaux — A sensational murder — At White Sulphur Springs — Admiral Farragut's dancing — A rattlesnake at dinner — Mare Island Navy Yard — A navy wedding — An international episode — Torchlight processions — Women and politics — Buchanan's election — The Wallacks play Shakespeare — General Frémont — First Mechanics' Fair — Sacramento and the gold country — The Overland stage — A generous highwayman — The Placerville Road — Memories of Sibyl Sanderson — Black Bart, knight of the road — In the High Sierras — Eaten by a bear — Covered wagons — Tragedy of a mother-in-law — Colonel Jack Hays makes an offer — Bret Harte's mother — A dark wedding.

CHAPTER IV.
Governor Weller's inaugural ball — A cold party — Dancing in overcoats — We celebrate laying of Atlantic Cable — Launching at Mare Island — Ball at the Presidio Mount Vernon ball — An old romance — Broderick-Terry duel — Josie Mansfield's début — Lone Mountain Hugh Whittell's epitaph — Growth of the city — South Park hospitality — Uncounted calories — Wine for President Washington — A dinner menu of the fifties — New Year calling — Isadora Duncan's childhood — A musician's romance — Bayard Taylor is guest of honor.

CHAPTER V.
Civil War declared — California uncertain — Mass meeting in San Francisco — Thomas Starr King speaks — The city for the Union — Tragedy and comedy — Rev. Mr. Scott is deported — A rebel flag waves — Bounty men — Billy Birch of the minstrels — Bombardment at night — A Gilbertian affair — General Albert Sidney Johnston — A Southern lady's relief work — Suspected of conspiracy — Silver in Nevada — Rush to the Washoe mines — Mourning for Lincoln.

CHAPTER VI.
After the War — New faces — Parepa Rosa's bracelet — Eccentric Dr. Coomb — Street characters — An earthquake — Interesting visitors — Shelley's nephew — Sir Richard Burton's disguises — Meeting the Mesdames Brigham Young — Duc de Panthièvre at Fort Mason — Mark Twain's lecture — Laughs at the wrong time — British admiral among Fenians — Divine service on battleship — Mrs. Paran Stevens — Mr. Kaird and the Alabama — Bret Harte a neighbor — Harte and Lawrence Barrett — Lord Charles Beresford helps buy a bonnet — The Duke in tweeds — A borrowed dress suit — General Beale of El Tejon — The old Cliff House — Driving days — D. O. Mills drives 'San Mateo' — Sutro imports eucalyptus trees — Fashionable equipages of the sixties.

CHAPTER VII.
Bonanza days — The $30,000 brass fence — Nob Hill palaces — The Big Four — Legends of the plutocrats — A royal dais — The Melting Pot's triumph — Through Spain to Italy — Old Taylor Street romance — A house that came around the Horn — Mrs. John W. Mackay — The hotel 'runners' — Old neighborhoods — Chinese peddlers — Chinatown scenes — Anti-Chinese feeling — The cook who was a hatchet-man — Sand-lot riots — Coleman's Pickaxe Brigade — The reign of Ralston — His extravagance — Belmont hospitality — Raiding the Mint — The Palace Hotel opens — Ralston's tragic death — Senator Sharon acquires Belmont — Entertains General Grant — Menlo Park and Major Rathbone's chandelier.

CHAPTER VIII.
Along the Barbary Coast — Memories of the theater — Ristori as Marie Antoinette — Opening of the California Theater — Barrett is host — McCullough in 'Money' — At Ben Holladay's — The popular pallbearer — A famous stock company — Gala night at the old California — General Barnes wins histrionic laurels — Mercantile Library Lottery — 'Dundreary' Sothern — Edwin Adams's Farewell — Mary Anderson at seventeen — In later years — Applauds Maude Adams — Adelaide Neilson talks of her rôles — Hawaiian royalty — A merry monarch — Death finds Kalakaua in San Francisco — Queen Victoria's cousin — First nights at the Baldwin — Rosina Vokes in comedy — Lillian Russell's golden youth — Mrs. James Brown Potter plays Juliet — Georgia Cayvan's glass dress.

CHAPTER IX.
When Patti sang — The diva meets a wit — Coquelin's art — Jane Hading and the 'Hading wave' — The Kendalls — French restaurants — A breakfast for Bernhardt — Clerical teas and delightful bishops — Moody and Sankey save sinners — A son of Charles Dickens — His discretion — The Victoria Regia blooms — Oscar Wilde is bored — His Fauntleroy suit — Irving and Terry — Wild enthusiasm — A great first night — Irving in 'The Bells' — Entertained at Bohemian Club — Stevenson in San Francisco — His quiet wedding — Mrs. Stevenson's independence — A monument to R. L. S. — Midwinter Fair — Grand opera stars — Julia Ward Howe — The Century Club — An advanced woman.

CHAPTER X.
The eighteen-nineties — Lunt's dancing school — Mrs. Langtry buys a ranch — Fin de Siècle — 'The Lark' and 'The Purple Cow' — Mrs. Atherton begins to write — The Trilby craze — The first long-distance call — Horseless carriages — Market Street parade — Poet of the Sierras — Ambrose Bierce — A blind political boss — Mr. Phelan as Mayor — Uncle George Bromley's wit — Mr. Chang of Korea — The Prime Minister from South Park — A lady from Seoul — Spanish War days — The new century — Leaving San Francisco.

ILLUSTRATIONS
Amelia Ransome Neville
Constance Neville, Daughter of the Author, about 1860
Captain Thomas J. Neville
Colonel Leander Ransome
Rachel
Sally Pelham
Arrival of Casey and Cora at the Viligance Committee
A Meeting of the Vigilance Committee on Portsmouth Square, 1856
Panorama of San Francisco
View from Stockton Street in 1856
Raphael Weill as Chef of the Bohemian Club
Lotta
Dr. R. Beverly Cole, Physician of the Vigilance Committee
William T. Coleman, of the Vigilance Committee
Mrs. Hall McAllister
Hall McAllister
Charles, Lord Fairfax
James R. Keene
Admiral David Glasgow Farragut
Mrs. George Pullman
Nellie Gordon
Mass Meeting at the Corner of Market and Post Streets, May 11, 1861
Pierre D'Orléans, Duc de Panthièvre
Captain James Cutting, U.S.A.
Sir Edward Shelley
Lady Shelley
Mrs. Charles Kean
Charles Kean
Bret Harte
Lawrence Barrett
Sir Arthur Farquhar
Lord Charles Beresford
Cliff House and Seal Rock
Mrs. James B. Haggin
James B. Haggin
Mrs. William C. Ralston
William C. Ralston
Flora Sharon, afterwards Lady Hesketh
Ristori as Marie Antonette
Edwin Adams
Edwin Booth and Daughter
Adelaide Neilson
Albani as Else in 'Lohengrin'
Henry Irving
Clarence Greathouse, Advisor to the King of Korea