p>The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864 / A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics
THE QUEEN OF CALIFORNIA
I can see the excitement which this title arouses as it is flashed across the sierras, down the valleys, and into the various reading-rooms and parlors of the Golden City of the Golden State. As the San Francisco "Bulletin" announces some day, that in the "Atlantic Monthly," issued in Boston the day before, one of the articles is on "The Queen of California," what contest, in every favored circle of the most favored of lands, who the Queen may be! Is it the blond maiden who took a string of hearts with her in a leash, when she left us one sad morning? is it the hardy, brown adventuress, who, in her bark-roofed lodge, serves us out our boiled dog daily, as we come home from our water-gullies, and sews on for us weekly the few buttons which we still find indispensable in that toil? is it some Jessie of the lion-heart, heroine of a hundred days or of a thousand? is it that witch with gray eyes, cunningly hidden,—were they puzzled last night, or were they all wisdom crowded?—as she welcomed me, and as she bade me good-bye? Good Heavens! how many Queens of California are regnant this day! and of any one of them this article might be written.
No, Señores! No, Caballeros! Throng down to the wharves to see the Golden Era or the Cornelius's Coffin, or whatever other mail-steamer may bring these words to your longing eyes. Open to the right and left as Adams's express-messenger carries the earliest copy of the "Atlantic Monthly," sealed with the reddest wax, tied with the reddest tape, from the Corner Store direct to him who was once the life and light of the Corner Store, who now studies eschscholtzias through a telescope thirty-eight miles away on Monte Diablo! Rush upon the newsboy who then brings forth the bale of this Journal for the Multitude, to find that the Queen of California of whom we write is no modern queen, but that she reigned some five hundred and fifty-five years ago. Her precise contemporaries were Amadis of Gaul, the Emperor Esplandian, and the Sultan Radiaro. And she flourished, as the books say, at the time when this Sultan made his unsuccessful attack on the city of Constantinople,—all of which she saw, part of which she was.
She was not petite, nor blond, nor golden-haired. She was large and black as the ace of clubs. But the prejudice of color did not then exist even among the most brazen-faced or the most copper-headed. For, as you shall learn, she was reputed the most beautiful of women; and it was she, O Californians, who wedded the gallant prince Talanque,—your first-known king. The supporters of the arms of the beautiful shield of the State of California should be, on the right, a knight armed cap-à-pie, and, on the left, an Amazon sable, clothed in skins, as you shall now see.
Mr. E. E. Hale, of Boston, sent to the Antiquarian Society last year a paper which shows that the name of California was known to literature before it was given to our peninsula by Cortés. Cortés discovered the peninsula in 1535, and seems to have called it California then. But Mr. Hale shows that twenty-five years before that time, in a romance called the "Deeds of Esplandian," the name of California was given to an island "on the right hand of the Indies." This romance was a sequel, or fifth book, to the celebrated romance of "Amadis of Gaul." Such books made the principal reading of the young blades of that day who could read at all. It seems clear enough, that Cortés and his friends, coming to the point farthest to the west then known,—which all of them, from Columbus down, supposed to be in the East Indies,—gave to their discovery the name, familiar to romantic adventurers, of California, to indicate their belief that it was on the "right hand of the Indies." Just so Columbus called his discoveries "the Indies,"—just so was the name "El Dorado" given to regions which it was hoped would prove to be golden. The romance had said, that in the whole of the romance-island of California there was no metal but gold. Cortés, who did not find a pennyweight of dust in the real California, still had no objection to giving so golden a name to his discovery.
Mr. Hale, with that brevity which becomes antiquarians, does not go into any of the details of the life and adventures of the Queen of California as the romance describes them. We propose, in this paper, to supply from it this reticency of his essay.
The reader must understand, then, that, in this romance, printed in 1510, sixty years or less after Constantinople really fell into the hands of the Turks, the author describes a pretended assault made upon it by the Infidel powers, and the rallying for its rescue of Amadis and Perion and Lisuarte, and all the princes of chivalry with whom the novel of "Amadis of Gaul" has dealt. They succeed in driving away the Pagans, "as you shall hear." In the midst of this great crusade, every word of which, of course, is the most fictitious of fiction, appear the episodes which describe California and its Queen.
First, of California itself here is the description:—
"Now you are to hear the most extraordinary thing that ever was heard of in any chronicles or in the memory of man, by which the city would have been lost on the next day, but that where the danger came, there the safety came also. Know, then, that, on the right hand of the Indies, there is an island called California, very close to the side of the Terrestrial Paradise,1 and it was peopled by black women, without any man among them, for they lived in the fashion of Amazons. They were of strong and hardy bodies, of ardent courage and great force. Their island was the strongest in all the world, with its steep cliffs and rocky shores. Their arms were all of gold, and so was the harness of the wild beasts which they tamed and rode. For, in the whole island, there was no metal but gold. They lived in caves wrought out of the rock with much labor. They had many ships with which they sailed out to other countries to obtain booty.
"In this island, called California, there were many griffins, on account of the great ruggedness of the country, and its infinite host of wild beasts, such as never were seen in any other part of the world. And when these griffins were yet small, the women went out with traps to take them. They covered themselves over with very thick hides, and when they had caught the little griffins, they took them to their caves, and brought them up there. And being themselves quite a match for the griffins, they fed them with the men whom they took prisoners, and with the boys to whom they gave birth, and brought them up with such arts that they got much good from them, and no harm. Every man who landed on the island was immediately devoured by these griffins; and although they had had enough, none the less would they seize them and carry them high up in the air, in their flight, and when they were tired of carrying them, would let them fall anywhere as soon as they died."
These griffins are the Monitors of the story, or, if the reader pleases, the Merrimacs. After this description, the author goes on to introduce us to our Queen. Observe, O reader, that, although very black, and very large, she is very beautiful. Why did not Powers carve his statue of California out of the blackest of Egyptian marbles? Try once more, Mr. Powers! We have found her now. Ευρηκαμεν!
"Now at the time when those great men of the Pagans sailed with their great fleets, as the history has told you, there reigned in this island of California a Queen, very large in person, the most beautiful of all of them, of blooming years, and in her thoughts desirous of achieving great things, strong of limb and of great courage, more than any of those who had filled her throne before her. She heard tell that all the greater part of the world was moving in this onslaught against the Christians. She did not know what Christians were, for she had no knowledge of any parts of the world excepting those which were close to her. But she desired to see the world and its various people; and thinking, that, with the great strength of herself and of her women, she should have the greater part of their plunder, either from her rank or from her prowess, she began to talk with all of those who were most skilled in war, and told them that it would be well, if, sailing in their great fleets, they also entered on this expedition, in which all these great princes and lords were embarking. She animated and excited them, showing them the great profits and honors which they would gain in this enterprise,—above all, the great fame which would be theirs in all the world; while, if they stayed in their island, doing nothing but what their grandmothers did, they were really buried alive,—they were dead while they lived, passing their days without fame and without glory, as did the very brutes."
Now
When Columbus sailed on his fourth voyage, in which he hoped to pass through what we now know as the Isthmus of Panama, and sail northwestward, he wrote to his king and queen that thus he should come as near as men could come to "the Terrestrial Paradise."
