But it formerly bore
the more euphonious title, Yerba Buena, which means in Spanish
"Good Herbs." Later in my journeyings to and fro I overheard a lady
instructing another person as to the proper way in which to pronounce
it, and she made sad work of it. She gave the "B" the sound of the
letter G. It also had another name, as you may learn from an old
Spanish map of Miguel Costanso, where it is called--Ysla de Mal
Abrigo, which means that it afforded poor shelter. It is a government
possession, as also the other islands, Alcatraz and Angel. Alcatraz,
which Costanso styles, White Island, is smaller than Yerba Buena. In
its greatest elevation it is 135 feet above the Bay, and it embraces
in its surface about thirty-five acres, about the same area as the
Haram Esh-Sherif, or sacred enclosure of the Temple Hill in Jerusalem,
with the Mosque of Omar and the Mosque el-Aksa. On its top is a
lighthouse, which, on a clear night, sailors can see twelve miles
outside of the Golden Gate. Nature, with her wise forethought, seems
indeed to have formed this island opposite the Golden Gate, far
inside, in the Bay, as a sentinel to watch that pass into the Pacific,
and to guide the returning voyager after his perilous journeyings to
safe moorings in a land-locked haven.
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