At the foot of Telegraph Hill is the largest Chinese quarter in the United States. It was completely destroyed during the fire, but is now rebuilt and much improved. Its temples, joss houses, and theaters, its markets, bazaars, and restaurants, with their strange life and customs and their oriental architecture, attract crowds of visitors. There are now about 10,000 Chinese in San Francisco, but their number has been steadily decreasing since the Exclusion Act was passed, prohibiting Chinese laborers from entering this country. It was thought necessary to have this law in order to protect the American workingman on the Pacific coast, as the Chinese laborers who had already been admitted were working for wages upon which no white man could live. [Illustration: FISHERMAN'S WHARF] At the foot of Market Street, on the water front, stands the Union Ferry Building, a large stone structure with a high clock tower. Only one of the cross-continent railroads--a branch of the Southern Pacific--lands its passengers in the city of San Francisco. All the other roads, which include the main line of the Southern Pacific, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé, the Union Pacific, and the Western Pacific, terminate on the eastern shore of the bay and send the travelers to San Francisco by ferry. In consequence, San Francisco has developed the best ferry service in the world, all lines meeting at the Union Ferry Building. [Illustration: MT. TAMALPAIS FROM NOB HILL] North and south of the Union Ferry Building stretch eight miles of wharves and docks and many factories, lumber yards, and warehouses. At the docks, ships are being loaded and unloaded continually. In March and April each year a fleet of forty or fifty vessels starts out for the Alaskan fisheries. San Francisco is the leading salmon port of the United States, distributing millions of dollars' worth of salmon yearly. Fisherman's Wharf, at the northern end of the water front, is full of interest, with its brown, weather-beaten fishermen and their odd fishing boats. To the south of the Union Ferry Building is "Man-of-war Row," where United States and foreign battleships ride at anchor. [Illustration: PRESIDIO TERRACE] The cities of Alameda, Oakland, Richmond, and Berkeley are directly across the bay from San Francisco, on the east shore. Like New York, San Francisco is the center of a large metropolitan district, and the residents of these neighboring cities daily travel to their work in San Francisco on the ferries. For several years there has been talk of uniting these cities with San Francisco. If this plan were carried out, it would add over 350,000 to San Francisco's present population, which is between 400,000 and 500,000. [Illustration: THE TOWER OF JEWELS OF THE PANAMA-PACIFIC EXPOSITION]