LUCIUS HARWOOD FOOTE, in _A Red-Letter Day._ FEBRUARY 8. A few years ago this valley of San Gabriel was a long open stretch of wavy slopes and low rolling hills; in winter robed in velvety green and spangled with myriads of flowers all strange to Eastern eyes; in summer brown with sun-dried grass, or silvery gray where the light rippled over the wild oats. Here and there stood groves of huge live-oaks, beneath whose broad, time-bowed heads thousands of cattle stamped away the noons of summer. Around the old mission, whose bells have rung o'er the valley for a century, a few houses were grouped; but beyond this there was scarcely a sign of man's work except the far-off speck of a herdsman looming in the mirage, or the white walls of the old Spanish ranch-house glimmering afar through the hazy sunshine in which the silent land lay always sleeping. T.S. VAN DYKE, in _Southern California._ FEBRUARY 9. The surroundings of Monterey could not well be more beautiful if they had been gotten up to order. Hills, gently rising, the chain broken here and there by a more abrupt peak, environ the city, crowned with dark pines and the famous cypress of Monterey (_Cypressus macrocarpa_.) Before us the bay lies calm and blue, and away across, can be seen the town of Santa Cruz, an indistinct white gleam on the mountain side. JOSEPHINE CLIFFORD McCRACKIN, in _Another Juanita._ LOS ALTOS. The lark sends up a carol blithe, Bloom-billows scent the breeze, Green-robed the rolling foot-hills rise And poppies paint the leas. HANNA OTIS BRUN. FEBRUARY 10. SANTA BARBARA. A golden bay 'neath soft blue skies, Where on a hillside creamy rise The mission towers, whose patron saint Is Barbara--with legend quaint. HELEN ELLIOTT BANDINI, in __History of California._ Dare to be free. Free to do the thing you crave to do and that craves the doing. Free to live in that higher realm where none is fit to criticise save one's self. Free to scorn ridicule, to face contempt, to brave remorse. Free to give life to the one human soul that can demand and grant such a boon--one's own self. MIRIAM MICHELSON, in _Anthony Overman._ FEBRUARY 11. In Carmel pines the summer wind Sings like a distant sea. O harps of green, your murmurs find An echoing chord in me! On Carmel shore the breakers moan Like pines that breast the gale. O whence, ye winds and billows, flown To cry your wordless tale? GEORGE STERLING, in _A Wine of Wizardry and Other Poems._ OAKLAND--BERKELEY--ALAMEDA. O close-clasped towns across the bay, Whose lights like gleaming jewels stray, A ruby, golden, splendid way, When day from earth has flown. I watch you lighting night by night, O twisted strands of jewels bright, The altar-fires of home, alight-- I who am all alone. GRACE HIBBARD, in _Forget-me-nots from California._ FEBRUARY 12.