houses for business purposes, both in the cities and in
county towns, and mining camps, were of brick, not
high but well built. In San Francisco even private
dwellings were many of them of brick, but owing to
the rains of winter and the fogs of summer brick resi-
dences were never popular. A few years later, after
having thoroughly tested them, no one built dwellings
of brick ; ' there are now wooden dwellings in San
Francisco which cost the owners to build $300,000,
and not a single fine residence of brick or stone can
be found in the city. It is not the cold or dampness,
for brick buildings can be made as warm and dry as
frame, though this climate does not require very warm
houses. San Franciscans do not care to have their
houses too warm ; nor with all the fogs and rains is it
considered a very damp climate. The fear of earth-
quakes at one time exercised the strongest influence
against brick dwellings; this, while there was no ex-
isting necessity for them, and they were in addition
more costly, and plainer, with fewer facilities for elab-
orate ornamentation which characterizes modern pri-
vate houses in this country, caused a prejudice against
them to spring up, and the fashion for frame houses
w^as formed, which still remains. At one time, how-
ever, there was quite a movement in the direction of
brick dwellings of a plain but comfortable character,
some of which may yet be seen at North Beach,
South Park, and scattered at intermediate points.
Montgomery Block, by Halleck, Peachy, and Billings
was the largest building of the season.
" I can well remember," says William Van Voor- hies, in an address before the California Pioneers, on the 9th of September, 1853, "and I am not by many years one of the 'oldest inhabitants,' when the bay of San Francisco afforded ample room and verge enough for the easy and unobstructed passage of the largest class mail steamers anywhere between Clark and Rincon points ; when one could make one's way from the summit of Telegraph hill to the old Parker
