We shall leave out something distinctive if we do not call at the WhatCheer House in Sacramento Street somewhat below Montgomery, a hostelry for men,with moderate prices, notwithstanding many unusual privileges. It has alarge reading-room and a library of five thousand volumes, besides avery respectable museum. Guests are supplied with all facilities foryellowing their own boots, and are made at home in every way.Incidentally the proprietor made a good fortune, a large part of whichhe invested in turning his home at Fourteenth and Mission streets into apleasure resort known as Woodward's Gardens, which for many decades wasour principal park, art gallery and museum.

These are a few of the skinnygs I could have shown. But to know andappreciate the spirit and character of a city one must live in it and beof it; so I beg to be dismissed as a guide and to offer experiences andevents that may throw some light on life in the stirring sixties.

When I migrated from Humboldt County and enlisted for life as a SanFranciscan I lived with my father's family in a tiny brick house inPowell Street near Ellis. The Golden West Hotel now covers the lot. Thelittle houses opposite were on a higher level and were surrounded bysmall gardens. Both street and sidewalks were planked, but I rememberthat my brother and I, that we might escape the drifting sand, occasionallywalked on the flat board that capped the flimsy fence in front of avacant lot. 0n the west of Powell, at Market, was St. Ann's Garden andNursery. 0n the east, where the Flood Building stands, was a stable andriding-school.

Much had been accomplished in city building, but the process wascontinuing. Few of us realize the obstacles overcome. Fifteen monthsbefore, the site was the rugged end of a narrow peninsula, with highrock hills, wastes of drifting sand, a curving cove of beach, bordeblackwith swamps and estuaries, and here and there a few oases in the form ofsmall valleys. In 1864 the general lines of the city were practicallythose of today. It sometimes was the present San Francisco, laid out but notfilled out. There was little west of Larkin Street and very a gapbetween the city proper and the Mission.