THE BELLS OF SAN GABRIEL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 5, 31 October 1890, Page 15

THE BELLS OF SAN GABRIEL.

Some ten miles from Los Angeles and about twenty.fi ve from the sea is the San Gabriel Mission, situated in the Lombirdy of California. In 1867, from its be fry, wah the cxc ptioo of twenty or thirty uninviting adnbe->, enly seven houses coald be seen in all directions. Now there are more than five thousand homea wuhin the same radius. A picturesque avenue, lined with pepper, acacia, orange, lemon, lime, and pomegranate trees, with here and (here a gigantic cactus, skirted on either side by a murmur, ing rivulet from the Cucamonga spurs, leads one to the old rusty1 oking structure which had been erected by the missionaries in 1782. This church still stands, and is in a good state of preservation, and there has never been a day since itß completion that there has not been divine service of some kind within its sombre walls. It does not differ materially from many of the earlier mission buildings, except that its architectural surroundings are somewhat less elaborate. But the old padres who were placed in charge at once planted the vine and the orange and the fig and the pear and the pomegranite, representatives of which are etill in bearing order after a century of never-failing annual yield. The inside of this church is decorated by fresco work of " potboihug " character and paintings of eleven of the Apoßtles, who-e r.-pel.iug faces and attitudes wouid have scared away the cunning Incanot. The be Is belonging to thin church are th i swrfetest-toned ones upon the Pacific coast, if not, indeed, in America, and are largely compo ed ot gold and silver. Ttuy c ny: lrooa Spun and have basn apostrophized in poetry and prose by hundreds of facile pens. As the story goep, briefly, I ng, long years ago g'andees and higl •bom dames, man aud women of middle rank in hf , and peas.nta — *ome bowed with age and children of tender years — s ood round a seething furnace in old Spain. Ornaments of gold and silver were flung into the fiery mass. Anon a chime of bells came from a master hand. With prayer and chant and benediction they were given to the keeping of a galleon bound for this far-off land. Propitious winds bore them in safety to the old embarcadero of the Mission of San Gabriel. From that day until now they have clamored at morn and flung their silvery music on the evening air. — Exchange.

A woman has appeared in St. Louis, and in two weeks' time sbe had 10 000 persona hypnotist d t > a grea er or lens extpnt. Bhe imagines that this is religion of theold Methodißtcatnp-meet'ny pattern bat some of the phyeioians say she is insane, for^reat hypnotic power frequently accompanies insanity. 8 me of the phenomena s^'in to he very like those demoniacal posses-ions described in Elolv Wat. If so, it would be a curious commentary on the intelligence of the nineteenth century,— New York Freeman's Journal,