With simple materials and unskilled Indian workers, these exiled men had
striven to reproduce in the far, lonely West the architecture of the East,
loved and lost by them forever. The very simplicity of the church made its
beauty.
[Illustration: "_Santa Barbara Mission, with its history and romance_"]
The scar of Santa Barbara Mission had been patched up, while at San
Gabriel the bandages were vines and flowers; but the sunset light lent to
the cloisters all the stateliness and glory of some old monastery in
Southern Spain; the octagonal fountain on the bare terrace dripped silver;
and an embroidery of lichen had gilded the rose-coloured tiles of the
sloping roof with all shades and tints of gold. The sun, bidding good-bye
to the day, gave back for an hour the splendour of the past.
The three went up into the bell tower and looked down; upon the old garden
of the monks, then away to the sheltering hills, with the far-off rampart
of mountains. It was beautiful there, and the bells in their open,
window-like arches, had the kindly beauty of age and experience. Angela
tapped them with pink finger-nails, and brought out a faint, musical
whisper, which seemed to breathe some secret, if only she could
understand. But she could not! She felt dull and unhappy, she could not
tell why.
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