They climbed stiffly from their seats and stood on the ridge peak and looked down into the Pastures of Heaven. And the air was as golden gauze in the last of the sun. The land below them was plotted in squares of green orchard trees and in squares of yellow grain and in squares of violet earth. From the sturdy farmhouses, set in their gardens, the smoke of the evening fires drifted upward until the hillbreeze swept it cleanly off. Cowbells were softly clashing in the valley; a dog barked so far away that the sound rose up to the travelers in sharp little whispers. Directly below the ridge a band of sheep had gathered under an oak tree against the night.
“It's called Las Pasturas del Cielo,” the driver said. “They raise good vegetables thereâgood berries and fruit earlier here than any place else. The name means Pastures of Heaven.”
The passengers gazed into the valley.
The successful man cleared his throat. His voice had a tone of prophecy. “If I have any vision, I tell you this: Some day there'll be big houses in that valley, stone houses and gardens, golf links and big gates and iron work. Rich men will live thereâmen that are tired of working away in town, men that have made their pile and want a quiet place to settle down to rest and enjoy themselves. If I had the money, I'd buy the whole thing. I'd hold on to it, and sometime I'd sub-divide it.” He paused and made a little gathering gesture with his hand. “Yes, and by God I'd live there myself.”
His wife said: “Sh!” He looked guiltily around and saw that no one was listening to him.
The purple hill-shadow was creeping out toward the center of the valley; somewhere below a pig screamed angrily. The young man raised his eyes from the land and smiled a confession to his new wife, and she smiled firmly and reprovingly back at him. His smile had said: “I almost let myself think of it. It would be niceâbut I can't, of course.”
And hers had answered: “No, of course you can't! There's ambition to think of, and all our friends expect things of us. There's your name to make so I can be proud of you. You can't run away from responsibility and cover your head in a place like this. But it would be nice.” And both smiles softened and remained in their eyes.
The young priest strolled away by himself. He whispered a prayer, but practice had taught him to pray and to think about something else. “There might be a little church down there,” he thought. “No poverty there, no smells, no trouble. My people might confess small wholesome sins that fly off with the penance of a few Hail Marys. It would be quiet there; nothing dirty nor violent would ever happen there to make me sorry nor doubtful nor ashamed. The people in those houses there would love me. They would call me Father and I'd be just with them when it was kindly to be just.” He frowned and punished the thought. “I am not a good priest. I'll scourge myself with the poor, with the smell of them and with their fighting. I can't run from the tragedies of God.” And he thought, “Maybe I'll come to a place like this when I am dead.”
The old man stared into the valley with his eager eyes, and in his deafened ears the silence surged like a little wind blowing in a cypress tree. The farther hills were blurred to him, but he could see the golden light and the purple dark. His breathing choked and tears came into his eyes. He beat his hands helplessly against his hips. “I've never had time to think. I've been too busy with troubles ever to think anything out. If I could go down there and live down there for a littleâwhy, I'd think over all the things that ever happened to me, and maybe I could make something out of them, something all in one piece that had a meaning, instead of all these trailing ends, these raw and dragging tails. Nothing would bother me down there and I could think.”
The bus driver dropped his cigarette in the road and stepped it into the dirt. “Come on, folks,” he called. “We ought to be getting along.” He helped them in and shut the doors on them, but they crowded close to the windows and looked down into the Pastures of Heaven where the air lay blue like a lake now, and the farms were submerged in the quiet.
“You know,” the driver said, “I always think it would be nice to have a little place down there. A man could keep a cow and a few pigs and a dog or two. A man could raise enough to eat on a little farm.” He kicked the starter and the motor roared for a moment before he throttled it down. “I guess it sounds kind of funny to you folks, but I always like to look down there and think how quiet and easy a man could live on a little place.” He thrust the gear lever; the car gathered speed and swept down the grade toward the long Carmel Valley and toward the sun where it was setting in the ocean at the valley's mouth.
EXPLANATORY NOTES
3 Carmelo Mission: One of the Franciscan missions established in California by the Spanish. Initially known as Mission San Carlos Borromeo and now called Mission Carmel, it dates from 1770 and was moved to its present site, in the Carmel Valley, in 1771.
3
manzanita:
Also known as the madrona shrub, an evergreen indigenous to California bearing edible red berries called madrona apples.
15
Melachrino cigarettes:
Brand name of a Turkish-tobacco cigarette produced by M. Melachrino and Company, popular in the early decades of the twentieth century.
18
Furies:
From Greek and Roman mythology, the Furies were female deities of vengeance who punished the perpetrators of unavenged crimes.
29
Dresden vase:
Valuable vase of hard porcelain, usually highly decorative, produced in the area of Dresden, Germany.
43
troglodytic
Primitive, bestial, or primeval in appearance; the troglodytes were prehistoric people who lived in caves.
47 Ivanhoe and The Talisman: Historical novels by Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832).
Ivanhoe
(1820) details the chivalric exploits of the disinherited Wilfred of Ivanhoe and his efforts to win the hand of the Lady Rowena.
The Talisman
(1825) offers an account of the Third Crusade, including a story of forbidden love between the Scottish knight Sir Kenneth and the English Lady Edith Plantagenet.
47
Zane Grey:
A popular author of western novels. Grey's Riders
of the Purple Sage
was published in 1912.
47
James Oliver Curwood:
A writer of adventure and nature fiction, Curwood was born in 1878 and died in 1927. Among his novels is
The Valley of the Silent Men
(1920).
47 The Sea Wolf, The Call of the Wild: Adventure novels by Jack London (1876-1916).
The Sea Wolf
(1904) tells the story of Humphry Van Weyden, an unwilling cabin boy who sails on the seal-hunting voyage of the Ghost to the waters off Alaska.
The Call of the Wild
(1903), the most popular of London's works, recounts the adventures of a dog who is sold to gold-rushers and becomes wild, living in the forests of Alaska. Both works were popular among young boys.
48
changelings:
Children of elves and fairies secretly substituted for human children.
48
gnomes:
Ageless creatures, resembling dwarves, who dwell in the Earth and guard treasure.
54
Napa:
City at the southern end of the fertile Napa Valley, approximately thirty-five miles northeast of San Francisco.
55
Russian Hill:
Upper-class residential area of San Francisco with many large houses and gardens; it is located on the burial grounds of Russian seal hunters.
61
cinerarias:
Perennial herb-related plants originally from the Canary Islands, cinerarias have heart-shaped leaves and clustered flowers, usually tinted white, red, blue, or purple.
73 Travels with a Donkey: Published in 1879, this book by Robert Louis Stevenson recounts his travels with a donkey and his encounter with a Trappist monk in the Cévennes region of the French highlands. Probably a source for Steinbeck's title
Travels with Charley.
74
Velasquez'
Cardinal: The painter Diego Velázquez (1599- 1660) completed his
Cardinal Astalli
between 1650 and 1651. This portrait is noted for the animated features of the Cardinal's face.
75 Kidnapped: A novel by Robert Louis Stevenson, published in 1886, which details the adventures of David Balfour, an orphan sold by his uncle to a slave ship. David becomes a cabin boy, joins in taking over the ship, and finds himself in the Scottish Highlands after the ship runs aground.
75
essays of David Grayson:
David Grayson, the pen name of Ray Stannard Baker (1870-1946), was a journalist, popular essayist, and the authorized biographer of President Woodrow Wilson.
75 Adventures in Contentment: Published in 1907, this book by David Grayson purports to be the journal of a farmer offering didactic stories and essays.
75
influenza epidemic:
The most severe outbreak of influenza in modern times, the epidemic of 1918 claimed 20 million lives worldwide, including approximately 550,000 in the United States.
76 Treasure Island: Immensely popular Robert Louis Stevenson novel, published in 1883. It presents the adventures of Jim Hawkins in search of treasure aboard the
Hispaniola.
A mutiny led by Long John Silver is eventually overcome by Jim and his friends, the treasure is secured, and Jim returns to England.
77
Atlantis
: Legendary island mentioned in two of Plato's dialogues. Atlantis was swallowed up by the ocean after its inhabitants became wicked.
77
Incas:
A Native American people centered in Peru and dominant in South America between 1100 and the Spanish conquest of the continent in the sixteenth century.
78
Parthenon:
Temple of the Greek goddess Athena, located in Athens on the Acropolis. The temple was constructed in the mid-fifth century B.C.
79
Junius' Encyclopedia:
Perhaps a reference to the
Etymologicum Anglicanum (English Etymology),
composed by Franciscus Junius the Younger. It stimulated interest in Old English. The reference here may refer simply to a set of encyclopedias owned by Junius Maltby.
82
Carthaginians:
Inhabitants of Carthage, one of the greatest cities of antiquity. Carthage, a trading center, was located on the North African coast, near the present-day city of Tunis.
84
Gallic wars:
Military campaigns between 58 and 50 B.C. in which the Roman emperor Julius Caesar conquered Gaul, or modern-day France.
84
Trafalgar.
At the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, Admiral Nelson's British ships defeated Napoleon's fleet. Trafalgar is on the Atlantic coast of Spain, just north of the Strait of Gibraltar.
88
Hengest and Horsa:
Brothers who were leaders of the first Anglo-Saxon settlers of Great Britain between A.D. 446 and 454.
88
Gato Amarillo:
Spanish for “yellow cat.”
89
auto-da-fé:
Punishment administered by the Inquisition (religious trials in Spain between 1478 and 1834), usually burning at the stake for heretics.
90
Guinevere:
Wife of King Arthur and lover of Sir Lancelot in the Arthurian legends; her affair with Lancelot precipitates the destruction of Camelot.
90
Bastille
: The storming in 1789 of the Bastille, a medieval fortress in Paris used as a prison, marked the beginning of the French Revolution.
91
Lacedaemonians
: More commonly “Spartans,” a people known for their stoicism and skill at warfare.
Thermopylae
is a narrow mountain pass in Greece where the Spartans held off the greatly superior Persian force for several days before being killed to the last man. Thermopylae has since been associated with heroic valor in the face of great odds.
102 hombre fuerte: Spanish for “strong man.”
102
General Vallejo
: A soldier, born in Monterey in 1808, who protected northern California from Russian expansion and Indian raids. He was also instrumental in establishing a California independent from Mexico in 1836.
123
Vasquez
: A famous highwayman in Monterey county, Tiburcio Vasquez (1835-1875) was captured in Los Angeles in 1874 and executed for murder in San Jose the following year.
131
Leviathan:
A reference to the sea monster in the Old Testament (Psalms 74:14). The word has come to designate anything of a large, monstrous size.
150
Millet's “Angelus”:
A painting by the French artist Jean-Francois Millet (1814â1875) depicting a peasant couple praying in a field in response to the churchbells announcing the prayer of “The Angelus.”
150
Elaine:
In Arthurian legend, her love for Sir Lancelot is platonic and pure, as opposed to Guinevere's sensual and adulterous desires. Elaine dies from her ardor for Lancelot, and her body is transported to Camelot, where her tale is told to King Arthur.
169
Aztecs:
A Native-American civilization in Mexico, the Aztecs were conquered by the Spanish conquistador Hemando Cor-tes in 1519.
173
the Michelangelo
David: Michelangelo's most famous sculpture, completed in 1504, depicts the biblical hero David with a sling over his left shoulder, presumably preparing to face Goliath.
174
Herodotus
...
Xenophon
...
Thucydides
: Greek historians. The
History
of Herodotus (ca. 484-420 B.C.), the first account of the ancient world, provides the details of the Greco-Persian wars. The works of Xenophon (ca. 431-352 B.C.) provide insight into the culture of ancient Greece; his
Anabasis
covers the march of Greek soldiers from Sardis to Babylon. Thucydides (died ca. 401 B.C.) is best known for his
History of the Peloponnesian War,
an account of the conflict between the city-states of Athens and Sparta.