That, however, which attracted our attention most of all was the great grey stone cross on the crest of the highest point of the Golden Gate Park.  This, chiseled after the fashion of the old crosses of lona and linked with the name of St. Columba, is the monument erected by the late George W. Childs, of Philadelphia, Pa., to commemorate the first use of the Book of Common Prayer on the Pacific coast, when, in 1579, under Admiral Drake, Chaplain Fletcher read Prayers in this vicinity, either in San Francisco Bay, or a little further north in what is called Drake’s Bay.  But more of this anon.  As we walked from the carriage road, beneath some spreading trees, to get a nearer view of the Prayer Book Cross, numerous partridges were moving about, without fear, in our pathway; and had we been minded to frighten them or do them harm we would have been restrained by yonder symbol of our redemption, which teaches us ever to be tender and humane towards bird and beast and all others of God’s helpless creatures.  The Prayer Book Cross is seen from afar.  It looks down on the city with its innumerable homes, on the cemeteries within its shadow, on the Presidio with its tents and munitions of war, on the Golden Gate and on the waters of the Pacific, and it brings a blessing to all with its message of love and peace.  It is a guide too, to the sailor coming over the seas from distant lands.  As he strains his eyes to catch a glimpse of the coast the Cross stands out in bold relief against the eastern sky, and it tells him that he will find a hospitable welcome and safe harbourage within the Golden Gate.  So it is dear to him after his voyage over stormy seas as was of old

  “Sunium’s marbled steep”

to the Greek sailor nearing home.

Near Stone Lake we met the head commissioner of the Park who saluted us with all the easy grace of the Californian; and on the way we had the opportunity of receiving a Scotch gentleman and his wife into our carriage; and, later, a clergyman who had been wandering about in the midst of sylvan scenes, rode with us to the entrance of the Park, where we bade our new found friends good-bye, each to go his own way, at eventide.

The third day after our arrival in San Francisco I had a longing to gaze on the Pacific ocean which I had never seen.  There were no laurels for us to win, such as Balboa justly deserved when he discovered the Pacific and first beheld its wide waters in the year 1513; but it was a natural desire to look on its broad expanse and to stand on its shores, along which bold navigators had sailed since the days of Cabrillo and Drake.  Taking a line of cars running out to the Presidio, Ashton and I walked the rest of the way.  A young man named Logan, a cousin of the famous General Logan, who was in the service of the government as a mail carrier, but off duty that afternoon, volunteered most courteously to be our guide.  He accompanied us for more than a mile and a half of the distance beyond the Presidio, but