[Illustration: TORREY PINES, NEAR LA JOLLA From Photograph by Harold Taylor]
Twilight had fallen when we reached Del Mar—our objective for the night. Previous experience had taught us that the Stratford Inn was one of the most comfortable and satisfactory in California—with the added attraction of moderate rates. It is a modern building, in Elizabethan style, situated on the hillside fronting the wide sweep of the Pacific. It is surrounded by lawns with flowers and shrubbery in profusion and there is a wide terrace in front with rustic chairs, a capital place to lounge at one's ease and view the sunset ocean. Inside everything is plain and homelike—in fact, "homelike" best describes the greatest charm of Stratford Inn.
After dinner—which was more like a meal in a well-ordered private home than the usual hotel concoction—I inquired about the roads of the vicinity of a young man whose conversation showed him familiar with the country. He readily gave the desired information and, learning that we were tourists from the East, he put the universal first question of a Californian,
"Very much, indeed," I rejoined. "In fact, it seems to me that anyone who isn't satisfied with California isn't likely to be thoroughly satisfied any place short of the New Jerusalem."
"And that's too—uncertain," he replied. "California is good enough without taking any chances. In the ten years I've been here I've never had any hankering to return to the East, where I came from."
"But honestly, now," I said, "aren't there some people from the East who get sick of California and are anxious to get back home?"
"Yes," he admitted. "I know of several who said it was too monotonous here—that they were going back to God's country and stay there; but in the course of a year I saw them here again; after one good dose of Eastern winter they came back to California and forever after held their peace. Have you been about Del Mar and up to the top of the hill?" he went on. "No? Then I want you to drive about with me a short time in the morning and let me show you the prettiest seaside town and one of the grandest views in California." He was so sincere that we acquiesced and he said he would be on hand with his car at the appointed hour.