At your feet, along a well-kept road of pounded shells, and across bridges framed of the skeletons of whales buttressed with moss-grown rocks, roll automobiles and victorias in the pursuit of pleasure. Follow them blithely, if you will, waving your hand to the past; or, in the true spirit of historic pilgrimage, kneel in this place of burial and spell the imperfectly chiselled story of the Spanish pioneers who, despite their visionary dreams, held, for the government Washington was founding, a highway to the Pacific. [Illustration] LOS ANGELES THE CITY OF THE ANGELS BY FLORENCE E. WINSLOW "Very near the terrestrial paradise," said the old Spanish explorer of the sunlit country, where stood in a later century the pueblo of Los Angeles. Very near the terrestrial paradise has it seemed to weary travellers, hopeful invalids, and delighted home-makers, who have from year to year wandered across the desert to find rest, health, and comfort in a climate where the terms winter and summer are misnomers, where snows are seen only on the mountain-tops above the flowering plain, where severe heats are unknown, and where Nature rewards those who seek her gifts in largest measure. Climate and situation are the environing elements which count for most in the development of the history of Los Angeles. These are responsible both for the easy, courteous, pleasure-loving lives of the Spanish rancheros, and the strenuous, vivid, progressive, municipal experiences of the Americans in this modern "pleasure city." Los Angeles treasures the memory of ancient Spanish days of daring and romance, among which lie the beginnings of its civil life. All that is left of the old Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles may be seen now clustered about the old plaza, with its church, in what is known as Sonora town. Here the sun-baked adobe walls of the houses nestle, with their Mexican residents, in the midst of the bustling city, awaiting the final decay which marks the passing of the Pueblo. [Illustration BELLS OF SAN GABRIEL.]