THE BEGINNING OF THE BALL AT SEÑOR MENDOZA'S HACIENDA HOUSE If taste and industry had been used in decorating the exterior of Señor Mendoza's mansion for the great ballroom function, the interior gave evidence of no lack of these same qualities. The artistic spirit of the Latin is to the manner born, and the early Californian developed his inheritance by daily communings with the beauties of earth, and air, and sky. Mendoza, moreover, had seen the wonder spots from Paris to Madrid and Vienna; and the fruits of his experience had ripened and mellowed in the years of wealth and leisure he had spent on his estate at Mission San José. For smaller parties he had reception room, dining room and dancing hall finished in the oak that his own forests furnished, peons having skillfully hewed the wood, then, under the master's directions, polishing the grain until the markings stood out prominently. It was the ballroom used for the baile--large party--that showed the resource of California and the cleverness of Mendoza at the best. This room, reaching the length of one side of the house, was built in redwood, of which California is sole producer. Mammoth trees, grown on the mountains near Santa Cruz, had been felled and split from end to end. The exposed sections were trimmed and smoothed, showing, in many a curious layer of etching, the centuries these monarchs had lived. Oxen by the score and Indians by the hundreds had been engaged for months in bringing to Mission San José these timbers which, placed side by side, made the walls and ceiling of the apartment. "Of the many wood grains," Mendoza often said, "I prefer the redwood for broad effects. The convolutions run in ampler curve and build themselves readily into large dimensions." The room was looking its best to-night. Chandeliers, fed by sperm-oil, gave subdued light through delicately tinted shades. Candles branched from the walls, playing their softened brightness everywhere. The reddish wood glistened and showed in strong relief the story of its years. In the corners were grouped potted plants and flowers and shrubs. Radiant bougainvilleas and flaunting hibiscus were side by side with delicate maidenhair ferns modestly featuring the mossy rocks on which they first saw life. Rare orchids from Japan, grown robust in the kindlier air of California, strove to surpass in beauty their indigenous relatives. Poinsettias, vivid in their tintings, stood unabashed with the modest lily of the valley and the shrinking violet. The California poppy, lover of both hill and lowland, drooped its head and half folded its petals, diffident in the presence of the grandees of the floral kingdom.