as lights and shadows fall on them, you almost imagine that they are ships from distant shores ploughing their way to the Golden Gate.  But what of the Golden Gate, on which our eyes now rest?  The name naturally recalls to mind the “Golden Gate” in the wall of Theodosius, in Constantinople, with its three arches and twin, marble towers, now indeed walled up to prevent the fulfillment of a prophecy that the Christian Conqueror who is to take the city will enter through it.  A similar belief prevails concerning the Golden Gate of the Temple Area in Jerusalem, which is also effectually barred.  But whoever named it doubtless had in mind the “Golden Horn,” that noble right arm of the Bosphorus, embracing Stamboul and its suburbs for five miles up to the “Sweet Waters of Europe.”  There are indeed some correspondences between the two.  As the wealth of the Orient flows into the Golden Horn, the harbour of Constantinople for many centuries, so the riches of commerce, the products of great states west of the Rocky Mountains, and the treasures of the Pacific, pass through the Golden Gate.  The Golden Gate too is about five miles in length, although at its entrance it is a little over a mile wide and widens out as you sail into the great Bay of which it is the outlet.  This is located in latitude 37 deg. 48’ north and in longitude 122 deg. 24’ 32” west of Greenwich, and has a depth of thirty feet on the bar while inside of its mouth it ranges from sixty to one hundred feet.  The shores are a striking feature, and on the south side range from three hundred to four hundred feet in height, while on the north the hills, in places, attain an altitude of two thousand feet; and these adamantine walls, witnesses of many a stirring event in the history of California, are clothed in green in spring-time, while in autumn they are brown, and from the distance resemble huge lions, couchant, guardians of the Gate.  But who gave it its name, and why is it so called?  These were my questions.  Among the residents of San Francisco, whom I asked, was a Senora whose countenance plainly indicated her Spanish descent, and she said it took its name from the Golden Poppy of California.  This was the Gateway to the land of the Golden Poppy.  The Poppy is called Chryseis at times, after one of the characters of Homer; and it is also known by the Spanish name, especially in the early days, Caliz de Oro, Chalice of Gold.  Another designation, used by the poets, is Copa de Oro, Cup of Gold; while in Indian legends it has sometimes been styled, “Fire-Flower” and “Great Spirit Flower.”  It was the belief among the Indians, when they saw the people flocking for gold from all directions, that the petals of the “Great Spirit Flower,” dropping year after year into the earth, had been turned into yellow gold.  The Golden Poppy, the State Flower of California, blooms in great profusion and with marvellous beauty on hillside in plain and valley, in field and garden, by lake and river, from the Sierras to the shores of the Pacific, and it is especially abundant on the hills which skirt the shores of the Golden Gate.  Indeed in spring time these are one mass of gold; and hence it would not require much imagination to coin the magic name by which the gateway to one of the grandest Bays in the world is known.  An old Californian song well describes the beauty and luxuriance of this suggestive Flower.