Chapter VIII

QUILP DEPARTS FOR THE SOUTH--SAN LUIS--RAMSEY--I AM LEFT FOR
DEAD--THE EARLY HISTORY OF CALIFORNIA--DISCOVERY OF SAN
FRANCISCO--SPANISH MISSIONS--A DIGRESSION--DIGRESSION, CONTINUED--A
RAINY SEASON--A LITTLE CRAB.

_April, 1851._

It was long after dark when I arrived at Santa Rosa Valley, perfectly “knocked up.” Englishmen are generally good pedestrians; but there is a great difference between walking on the level in well-made shoes, and dragging through deep sloughs and acres of thick clayey mud in heavy ill-fitting jack-boots, particularly when the boots appear unwilling to proceed in your society, and one or other of them is continually disengaging itself, as if wishing to be left behind regardless of expense.

I found that the Carillo family had left Santa Rosa, and the valley had been purchased by Americans for the purpose of cultivating grain, for which many parts of it were well adapted. The Carillos had departed, with horses, dogs, Indians, and Quilp, for the south, _where the wine came from_, where the temperature was better adapted to their “far-niente” dispositions, and where in particular Quilp was likely to enjoy a longer lease of life than his undisguised hatred of Americans would probably have permitted had he remained much longer at the valley. As slothfulness and ignorance stepped out, intelligence and industry usurped their place, and on the rich plain the wild waving oats fell to the ruthless scythe, whilst the plough upturned the maiden soil on every side.

And so must other lands and other people of this continent succumb to the increasing wants of Anglo-Saxon man. As the red-Indian retires before the pale-face, so will inert bigotry in the new world disappear before the march of energy; and the bounteous riches with which the Creator has strewed this portion of the globe must some day be under a rule that will admit of these benefits being extended to mankind, no longer to be closed to the world, through the petty warfares or restrictive seclusion of a people too inert to seize the advantages around them, and (with a full sense of this) too jealous to admit others to do so.

* * * * *

About five miles from Sonoma is an “embarcadero,” or landing place, situated on a mud creek, which is navigable for small boats, and communicates with the bay of San Francisco. Here are three houses, which conjointly represent the town of San Luis; opposite the town some fishing-boats lay at anchor, and in one of these I bargained for a passage to San Francisco, in company with eight live bullocks, that were now lying on the strand, bound neck and heels together, moaning piteously, as if impatient to get to the butcher’s and have it all over.

With the exception of the owners of the three houses, the population of San Luis was a particularly floating one, being represented for the most part by the crews of the fishing-smacks, of which there were at times a great number in port.

From the centre house there proceeded the sound of a fiddle, and, as no one could be perceived outside, it became evident that the floating population had here assembled to wile away the hours until the tide served to enable the boats to leave.

I entered the house and found it to consist of a store and drinking-shop combined; and, in virtue of its latter attraction, it was filled, as I had anticipated, by the men belonging to the boats, who, already half drunk, were tossing off champagne,[7] out of tin pannikins, and drinking to a speedy voyage across the bay. The proprietor of the establishment was not only an Englishman, but he was one of those plump, rosy-cheeked, good-natured-looking fellows that attract the eye at once, and whose smile is sympathetic; he was a gentleman, that is to say, he had been educated as one, and had lived as one, and was none the less one (as I found afterwards), now that he kept a grog-shop. I shall call him Ramsey; he was one of those men who never make money, for they cannot save; so that when Ramsey left, as he did, a high and very remunerative position of trust on the Pacific coast, and came up to San Francisco with a cargo of flour, in the expectation of making a fortune; and when he determined on taking the flour up the river Sacramento, and the flour was caught in a squall in the bay and went down, Ramsey found that he had done a very foolish thing. However, all smiles and good-humour, he took the grog-shop and store at San Luis, where I found him.

Ramsey had related these adventures to me before we had been an hour acquainted; and on my presenting myself as a countryman (for there was no mistaking his Anglo-Saxon physiognomy), he had immediately relapsed into beaming smiles, and placing a bottle of champagne under each arm, he had ushered me into his little bed-room, leaving his assistant to attend to the wants of the freshwater sailors.

Understanding from him that he had lost all his personal effects when his cargo disappeared, I was surprised to find so many evidences in his bed-room of an English establishment;--a well-browned hunting-saddle and bridle, the stalk of a whip and a pair of spurs, a double-barrelled gun and fishing-rod, with some pairs of “cords,” were observable about the little pig-sty he called his room. In answer to my inquiring look, he said he had just had time to save _these only_ from his wreck, and that they were pleasant things to have about one as reminiscences of old England and happy days spent in fishing and hunting there; the smile forsook his face, as it did mine, when he said this, but it soon returned again to both of us, and as we chatted away I found much to like in my new acquaintance, who was not only intelligent and well-informed, but very humorous. There was to be a ball that night at Sonoma, at the house of one Judge White, and as the boatmen had (from the effects of the champagne) delayed their departure until the next morning, I agreed to accompany Ramsey, who had been especially invited, to this festivity.

At the ball everything appeared to be conducted with great propriety; but the company was composed of honest mechanics, who, with the best intentions, danced quadrilles on a peculiar principle, inasmuch as they cut capers to such an extent as obliged the spectator, however disinclined, to smile. In no uncomplimentary spirit I made a remark in French to Ramsey on the subject, and this being overheard and but half understood, was retaliated in the following manner.

During a pause in the dances, a small gentleman, who had overheard my remark, and who was one of the most active of the _chassez-croisez_ dancers, and was a blacksmith, though apparently small for his profession, informed me audibly, with fire in his eyes, “that if I did not like the company, I might leave it, and that d--d soon.” To this I could only bow my assent, and shortly afterwards, being unable to find Ramsey, I left the room, intending to wait for him at our hotel, that was close by. I had not proceeded very far, when I was suddenly attacked by the small blacksmith and three other gentlemen--blacksmiths, too, I presume; if so, they evidently mistook my head for an anvil, for they so belaboured it with bludgeons and other weapons that they almost killed me, and left me for dead, before I had time to strike a blow in defence.

When I recovered my senses, I found myself alone on the grass, and I then managed to crawl to the hotel, where I found Ramsey awaiting me, quite unsuspicious of the cause of my detention. I returned with him to San Luis, and soon found that, further than having been stunned, I had not suffered any material damage. This delayed, however, my departure for San Francisco; and during this time a circumstance occurred which is characteristic of the easy state of the law in the provincial districts at this time. The house next to Ramsey’s was occupied by a choleric old fellow, who also dispensed “notions.” This old rascal coolly shot a man over his bar on the most trifling provocation; the man died, and the murderer was taken before Judge White (who also kept a store, by the by, and gave his ball with an eye to business); the Judge not only (good, merciful fellow!) refused to detain the prisoner, but discharged him without bail, which, he said, was not requisite; and this was all that justice ever exacted at the hands of this cold-blooded villain.

I started at last, with fair wind and tide, for San Francisco, in a small yawl, with a crew of three men, who were not only half-drunk, but were about the greatest lubbers that ever went afloat. Before we reached the mouth of the creek, they managed to run the boat on the bank, where the ebb tide soon left her high and dry.

Under these circumstances, I cannot do better than introduce a sketch of the early history of California, which, however uninteresting, must be brought in somewhere; and there is no better place, I think, for imposing it on the reader, than whilst we are waiting for the flood tide to take us off, and are spitefully pelting, out of a bag of beans, the muddy little crabs that surround our stranded bark.

It was about the middle of the sixteenth century that stories of the existence of untold wealth first inflamed the minds and excited the ardour of the Mexicans and Spaniards. The expedition of Hernando de Alarcon and Francisco de Ulloa had returned in safety to Mexico, after having visited the river Colorado, and the Pacific coast as high as 30° North. Many and wondrous were the tales these bold adventurers related of precious stones, and gold and pearls; of Amazons, and wealthy cities; so that naturally the attention of the adventurous was turned in one direction only; and the dream of the young, the ambition of the aged, was to discover this Cibola--this undeveloped El-Dorado. The Viceroy of Mexico at this period was one Mendoza, a jealous opponent of the renowned Cortes. This man was sufficiently sagacious to perceive the advantages of obtaining, if possible, possession of the reported gold regions, and fitted out an expedition in the port of Natividad, consisting of two vessels, which were placed under the command of Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, who had with him as lieutenant Bartolomé Ferrelo.

It is no honour to the viceroy that this expedition was set on foot by him, for in those days the discovery of new lands, as is well known, conferred large benefits and rewards on the potentates under whose rule the expeditions originated; whilst the brave fellows who risked their lives in carrying out the work were not only unrewarded then, but in few instances have been considered worthy even of a _name_ in the history of the countries they have discovered. It was no slight proof of courage to undertake this voyage, for it will be remembered that not only were the vessels in use of such a class that the wonder now is that they ever rode out a gale; but the impression was strong in the minds of the mariners of that day, that the world was square, and that to arrive at its limits would bring down the punishment of Heaven for their presumption, even if they did not tumble over the edge. Nor need we wonder that such a belief existed in those superstitious days. Are there not many now among the civilised and enlightened who refuse to investigate the palpable evidences of the power of animal magnetism, from the fixed belief that there should be a limit to man’s inquiry into the mysteries of nature?

The expedition sailed, it appears, in 1542, jogging on at the rate of about ten miles a day. Cabrillo discovered in succession the southern ports of California. At some of these he touched, and found the inhabitants to consist of a half-civilised tribe of Indians, who treated him with kindness. The existence of these Indians is confirmed by later writers. Vizcaino, who visited these shores in 1602, mentions having discovered idolatrous temples on the island of Catalina.

The surveys of this expedition are not of much value to the present age, as the nautical instruments of that period were not very true; but Cabrillo’s explorations none the less assisted those who came after him, who, with instruments equally defective, hit his points with tolerable accuracy, although there was generally an error in _his_ latitude by observation of about a hundred miles.

Cabrillo at last worked up towards San Francisco, but the heavy surf and iron-bound coast, together with the thick fogs that hang about the bay, no doubt prevented his entering, and he resolved on returning and awaiting a more favourable season; but anchoring for repairs in one of the harbours of the Santa Barbara Islands, the old sailor died, probably from fatigue and exposure to the damps and north-west winds.

The command of the expedition then devolved upon Ferrelo, who bravely made another attempt; but failing in effecting a landing, he returned to Natividad, after a voyage of 283 days. Sir Francis Drake next visited California in 1579; Juan de Fuca in 1595, and Sebastian Vizcaino in 1602. This latter entered the bay of San Francisco, though probably he was not its discoverer, and proceeded in boats as far as where Benicia now stands.

In 1769 the settlement of Upper California was commenced by Spanish priests at San Diego, and several small expeditions followed in succession until 1776, when the Roman Catholic missionaries Palou and Cambon landed in San Francisco, and established their head-quarters in that place. The settlement at this period was known by the name of Yerba Buena, from the presence of a medicinal herb which abounded in the neighbourhood, and which was held in high estimation by the Indians. Here the missionaries erected a church and other buildings, of “adobes,” or sun-dried bricks. The Mission flourished rapidly. The Indians soon learnt, under the tuition of the Padres, the advantages of cultivating the earth; and those of them that embraced the Catholic religion began to drink rum, and value beads, as is usual with converted savage tribes. Mexican settlers also made their appearance, and the richest portions of the country were soon appropriated by them. Gradually cattle and sheep were introduced, which in their wild state increased rapidly without much trouble to their owners, who, having nothing to do but to kill their meat and eat it, basked in the sun like lazy dogs as they were, and thought themselves the happiest of men;--and it is difficult for any one to prove they were not.

By the year 1831, the number of Christian baptisms amounted to about 7000. After this period, the Indians, from some cause or other, perhaps from a scarcity of rum, altered their minds on the subject; and although a fresh supply of priests arrived, the number of converts rapidly decreased, so much so that in the eight years preceding the discovery of gold, only 400 savages were caught and converted. And if one may judge from the specimens of converted Indians that are to be found here and there in California at the present date, one has no reason to regret that the efforts of the priests were unattended with success; for, however we may deplore the abject misery and degradation of the aboriginal tribes, it is not by the mummery of a form that such souls can be redeemed, or such unhappy natures be remodeled. On the contrary, their small glimpses of civilisation offer to their view both virtues and vices equally unknown before; then, left untrammeled to choose between the two, we see the baptised savage follow his impulses until he sinks so low in the scale of men, that his original degradation stands out almost as virtue beside him.

A holy task is that of the missionary, and bravely carried out. Let him still strive to reclaim the savage, and bring his soul to God; but yet take heed that the work be finished, for I have seen in my day converted tribes that were a mockery on all that sanctifies the missionary work, and had better, one would think, have eaten each other’s bodies in primeval irresponsibility, than, having been only _half_ awakened to a sense of right, but fully so to a knowledge of all that is wrong, have been left to grovel in the vices that most debase humanity. How much more care does it not require to avert the steps of the _converted savage_ from crime, than that of others of your flock!--is he not naturally more debased, more prone to adopt the broad and easy path that ever lies plain and palpably before him? Can you take a young tiger from the jungle, and having caged him, soften his natural propensities easily? You can do so only by unceasing watchfulness and coercion; cease these, and your tiger is a tiger again, as nature asserts her sway. Somewhat so it is with the savage you allure from the freedom of his hunting-ground; you show him the advantages of domestic life, and the means of applying to his benefit the soil around him; you adapt to his comprehension the simple outlines of religion, by pointing out to him that, to live in brotherhood and amity is good (and beneficial); that to wage war and hate and eat one’s enemy is bad (and detrimental); that a good Supreme Being, who can reward or punish, has said so, and that the evidence of this Supreme Being reigns, as even a savage can see, in all around. The simple aborigine accords you his belief; regretfully, perhaps, he leaves his wild prairie and the baked heads of his enemies, and will worship the “Great Spirit,” whose presence the poetry of his nature enables him to understand; sooner or later you baptise him, and you have your savage in the first stage of Christianity. But now you have a savage nature on your hand; you have implanted innocently what with his impulses may grow to avarice if you leave him to himself; for if he cultivates the land among the _civilised_ he will cheat--if cheat, wrangle--if wrangle, murder; for the steps to crime are rapid in such a constitution; but if he drinks, the savage ever becomes too brutalised for reclamation.

In what does this fault lie? Not so much that the man is so constituted that he must thus err, but that, like the tiger I have used for illustration, his propensities must be ever _watched_ and _guided_. The converted savage is never so alienated from his natural impulses that he can be left;--yet he _is_ left.

If there is fault in this, it is not, I know, on the part of those who _work_; but to those who direct these things it might be said that it is better to convert a few, and _in reality increase Christ’s fold_, than sign a million with His holy symbol, yet bring their souls no nearer heaven. Yet how fruitlessly one may argue. To whom is the reproach, that while we _may_ add our mite to aid the propagation of the Gospel abroad, we dare not relieve gaunt misery in the street at home, for fear of encouraging systematic mendicity; as if, forsooth, the blame of this belonged by right alone to those who practised it.

There are black missionaries who work as faithfully as white, and it is a startling fact to find that many of these, leaving their coloured brethren at home to the care of our white missionaries, are in our midst, attempting to alleviate, by God’s help, the misery and ignorance that exist in our great towns; and if the most festering wounds have the first claim upon the surgeon’s skill, the place of these black missionaries is here, God knows!

Why shall it still be said, and said again of us who are not loth to _relieve_, that our aims are misdirected from want of judgment and from ill-government? And why are the talents and energies of so many churchmen, whose beck and nod the charitable, to a great extent, obey, still turned to the Propagation of the Gospel abroad, when it requires but the opening of a proper channel at home to rid us of this great reproach?

We may condemn the love of political power, that in the main actuated the Jesuits in their efforts to propagate their faith; but how much has not the love of power, equally reprehensible, been a bar to the cure of our evils at home? Would the young and energetic of our young clergy seek a field abroad in which to work, with little reward and great privation, if the field at home was open to them?

* * * * *

About the year 1845, some Americans began to congregate at Yerba Buena, and these increased so rapidly, that San Francisco was in fact an American settlement before California became a territory of the United States.

During the war that broke out between the United States and Mexico in 1846, the settlement appears to have increased in population and prosperity, although the exportation of hides never seems at any time to have been of much importance. In 1847, the population of San Francisco amounted to eight hundred, and everything gave promise that the country would soon be sought for its agricultural advantages; the attention of the Californian settlers was directed towards the supposed mineral wealth of the country, but gold was the last metal thought of. Quicksilver had already been found and worked at San Jose; and the reported existence of veins of copper, silver, coal, and limestone, caused a feverish excitement to disturb this small community.

The first discovery of gold was made in December, 1847, when some of the labourers employed at Sutter’s Mill, near Sacramento, discovered some flakes whilst constructing a ditch; ample evidence soon existed of the truth of the first reports, and the whole population flocked to the gold fields, and shortly afterwards the country became the property of the United States. Events now followed one another with great rapidity: adventurers poured in from all quarters of the globe, and ships arrived in harbour freighted with merchandise which realised tremendous profits.

The rainy season of California commences about November, and the winter of 1849 was more than ordinarily wet. It is said that nine inches of water fell on the night of the 6th of November; the whole town, which had now become important in extent, was a perfect quagmire; all rubbish and hard materials that could be procured were thrown into the streets to form a pathway, but to no purpose, for owing to the peculiar soil of the place, the mud was unfathomable. The streets were impassable to mules, for there were mud-holes large enough to drown them; in those streets which had been connected by means of a pathway of bales of damaged merchandise, it was necessary to exercise great caution in crossing, for one false step would precipitate the unwary passenger into a slough on either side, in which he stood a chance of meeting a muddy grave.

The amount of rain that fell in this winter was undoubtedly so great, that it is much to be regretted no careful record was kept, by some of those who now so eloquently narrate their adventures in connection with it.

The first of the conflagrations for which San Francisco has become so famous, occurred in December, 1849. By this, fifty houses and an immense quantity of merchandise were destroyed. Another occurred a month afterwards, causing an almost equal amount of damage.

The great fire of the fourth of May, 1850, commenced at four in the morning, in a drinking-house, and spreading with great rapidity, was not arrested until it had consumed three hundred houses, and about a million sterling of property.

These were hard blows for the young city, but nothing daunted, the citizens renewed their exertions, and in a few weeks the burnt district was again covered with buildings. Every effort was now made to secure the city against future similar calamities; many brick houses were erected, fire companies on a large scale were organised, and reservoirs for water were constructed in different parts of the town. But on the 14th of June, fate again was relentless, and a fourth conflagration, aided by a high wind, razed three hundred houses to the ground, and scattered three million dollars of property to the winds. It was whilst this fire was raging that (as the reader may remember) I arrived at San Francisco; so here ends my digest of the early history of this brave young city, and as the flood-tide is coming in, I take

a parting shot at a little crab that has not taken his eyes off me since we arrived, and wonders, I suppose, why I don’t pelt one of my own size, and gliding off our mud bank, we make sail for San Francisco.