What is the setting of "The Californian's Tale" by Mark Twain?

The story takes place on the "Stanislaus," a river in Stanislaus county in California's Central Valley. Twain writes that this area "had once been populous, long years before, but now the people had vanished and the charming paradise was a solitude. They went away when the surface diggings gave out." In fact, the place is a kind of ghost town, full of abandoned and overgrown cottages, dotted every now and then with a cabin still inhabited by "the very pioneer who had built [it] . . . he was there because he had once had his opportunity to go home to the States rich, and had not done it." It is in this forlorn landscape that the narrator finds Henry's cottage, neat and well-decorated in contrast to the other cabins in the area, but it soon becomes clear that the cottage's outward appearance of normalcy—the "woman's touch" provided by Henry's missing wife—is an expression of Henry's loss (his wife has been missing 19 years!) and his own mental vacancy, which mirrors the emptiness of his physical surroundings.

“The Californian’s Tale” is located in what Mark Twain called “the Stanislau.” The Stanislau is a national forest located in central California. It is located east of San Francisco, north of Fresno, and south of Reno, Nevada. On the east it borders Yosemite National Park and on the south it borders the Sierra National Forest. Originally, the area was settled by the Mi-Wuk Indians, but with the discovery of gold in 1849, white men came into the territory. It is beautiful area of the country and, today, is a place people bike, camp, and enjoy their vacations. Mark Twain describes it in his story, “The Californian’s Tale” as,

“…..like Heaven on Earth.  It had bright green hills and deep forests where soft winds touched the trees.” (pg 1)

Modesto is the county seat of Stanislau County, and there is actually a city in Stanislau County named Twain Harte. This city was named after Mark Twain and Bret Harte, both authors who wrote tales located in that area of California.

What is the theme of Mark Twain's "The Californian's Tale"?

There are several possible themes to Mark Twain's "The Californian's Tale."  It is a sweet and touching story of a man who lost his beloved wife years before, and each year expectantly awaits her return.  The narrator, a traveller in the parts that eventually settles in the area discussed in the story, comes across this man and slowly discovers his sad delusion throughout the course of the story.

A major theme that is presented is that of grief.  Nineteen years before the narrator met Henry, the man in the house, his wife had been captured by Indians on her way home from a trip.  After that incident,

"Henry lost his mind. He thinks she is still alive. When June comes, he thinks she has gone on her trip to see her parents. Then he begins to wait for her to come back. He gets out that old letter. And we come around to visit so he can read it to us.  On the Saturday night she is supposed to come home, we come here to be with him. We put a sleeping drug in his drink so he will sleep through the night."

So, Henry deals with his grief in an unusual way, through a denial of her death that surfaces once a year.  His kind neighbors are aware of his tendency, and come to keep him company and help him out.  Grief runs as a theme throughout the story.

Another theme is that of settling the west through gold mines.  The narrator opens by describing a gold town that had been deserted after the gold ran out.  That is how many towns and cities in the west were settled, through gold rushes and the people and trade they brought with them.  One last theme present in the tale is the roughness of the frontier west.  The narrator is amazed and awed at the little house that looks so clean and civilized, because he had

"been living for weeks in rough mining camps with other gold miners. We slept on the hard ground, ate canned beans from cold metal plates and spent our days in the difficult search for gold."

Very little civilization, niceties, or comforts were to be found in the frontier west.  Women were rare too, and the dangers were extreme, as was evidenced in Henry's wife's kidnapping by Indians.  It was an interesting time period, and Twain relates many aspects of it in his short story.  I hope that helped; good luck!

What do the furnishings, pictures, and objects symbolize in Mark Twain's "The Californian's Tale"?

In "The Californian's Tale" by Mark Twain, all the furnishings, pictures, and objects symbolize the presence of the woman in the cottage of a forty-five-year-old who calls to Twain's narrator, a prospector.  With all these touches, touches that the narrator has so missed, he has a premonition that he should go away:

'I will go straight away from this place, for my piece of mind's sake.

However, the man convinces the narrator to stay by showing him her photo, an eternal recording of the woman.  He tells the narrator to tell the beautiful picture that he will not stay.  The narrator's "resolution" breaks down; he remains, deluded by the objects that seem real because they all have been preserved by a loving husband and friends. Sadly,the narrator understands his premonition as he learns the tragic truth of the husband's disillusions.