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Chapter XXI
Chapter XXI
California and Its Inhabitants
We kept up a constant connection with the Presidio, and by the close of
the summer I had added much to my vocabulary, beside having made the
acquaintance of nearly everybody in the place, and acquired some knowledge of
the character and habits of the people, as well as of the institutions under
which they live.
California was first discovered in 1536, by Cortes and was subsequently
visited by numerous other adventurers as well as commissioned voyagers of the
Spanish crown. It was found to be inhabited by numerous tribes of Indians, and
to be in many parts extremely fertile; to which, of course, was added rumors
of gold mines, pearl fishery, etc. No sooner was the importance of the country
known, than the Jesuits obtained leave to establish themselves in it, to
Christianize and enlighten the Indians. They established missions in various
parts of the country toward the close of the seventeenth century, and
collected the natives about them, baptizing them into the church, and teaching
them the arts of civilized life. To protect the Jesuits in their missions, and
at the same time to support the power of the crown over the civilized Indians,
two forts were erected and garrisoned, one at San Diego, and the other at
Monterey. These were called Presidios, and divided the command of the whole
country between them. Presidios have since been established at Santa Barbara
and San Francisco; thus dividing the country into four large districts, each
with its presidio, and governed by the commandant. The soldiers, for the most
part, married civilized Indians; and thus, in the vicinity of each presidio,
sprung up, gradually, small towns. In the course of time, vessels began to
come into the ports to trade with the missions, and received hides in return;
and thus began the great trade of California. Nearly all the cattle in the
country belonged to the missions, and they employed their Indians, who became,
in fact, their slaves, in tending their vast herds. In the year 1793, when
Vancouver visited San Diego, the mission had obtained great wealth and power,
and are accused of having depreciated the country with the sovereign, that
they might be allowed to retain their possessions. On the expulsion of the
Jesuits from the Spanish dominions, the missions passed into the hands of the
Franciscans, though without any essential change in their management. Ever
since the independence of Mexico, the missions have been going down; until, at
last, a law was passed, stripping them of all their possessions, and confining
the priests to their spiritual duties; and at the same time declaring all the
Indians free and independent Rancheros. The change in the condition of the
Indians was, as may be supposed, only nominal: they are virtually slaves, as
much as they ever were. But in the missions, the change was complete. The
priests have now no power, except in their religious character, and the great
possessions of the missions are given over to be preyed upon by the harpies of
the civil power, who are sent there in the capacity of administradores, to
settle up the concerns; and who usually end, in a few years, by making
themselves fortunes, and leaving their stewardships worse than they found
them. The dynasty of the priests was much more acceptable to the people of the
country, and indeed, to every one concerned with the country, by trade or
otherwise, than that of the administradores. The priests were attached
perpetually to one mission, and felt the necessity of keeping up its credit.
Accordingly, their debts were regularly paid, and the people were, in the
main, well treated, and attached to those who had spent their whole lives
among them. But the administradores are strangers sent from Mexico, having no
interest in the country; not identified in any way with their charge, and, for
the most part, men of desperate fortunes - broken down politicians and
soldiers - whose only object is to retrieve their condition in as short a time
as possible. The change had been made but a few years before our arrival upon
the coast, yet, in that short time, the trade was much diminished, credit
impaired, and the venerable missions going rapidly to decay. The external
arrangements remain the same. There are four presidios, having under their
protection the various missions, and pueblos, which are towns formed by the
civil power, and containing no mission or presidio. The most northerly
presidio is San Francisco; the next Monterey; the next Santa Barbara,
including the mission of the same, St. Louis Obispo, and St. Buenaventura,
which is the finest mission in the whole country, having very fertile soil and
rich vineyards. The last, and most southerly, is San Diego, including the
mission of the same, San Juan Campestrano, the Pueblo de los Angelos, the
largest town in California, with the neighboring mission of San Gabriel. The
priests in spiritual matters are subject to the Archbishop of Mexico, and in
temporal matters to the governor-general, who is the great civil and
military head of the country.
The government of the country is an arbitrary democracy; having no common
law, and no judiciary. Their only laws are made and unmade at the caprice of
the legislature, and are as variable as the legislature itself. They pass
through the form of sending representatives to the congress at Mexico, but as
it takes several months to go and return, and there is very little
communication between the capital and this distant province, a member usually
stays there, as permanent member, knowing very well that there will be
revolutions at home before he can write and receive an answer; if another
member should be sent, he has only to challenge him, and decide the contested
election in that way.
Revolutions are matters of constant occurrence in California. They are
got up by men who are at the foot of the ladder and in desperate
circumstances, just as a new political party is started by such men in our own
country. The only object, of course, is the loaves and fishes; and instead of
caucusing, paragraphing, libelling, feasting, promising, and lying, as with
us, they take muskets and bayonets, and seizing upon the presidio and
custom-house, divide the spoils, and declare a new dynasty. As for justice,
they know no law but will and fear. A Yankee, who had been naturalized, and
become a Catholic, and had married in the country, was sitting in his house at
the Pueblo de los Angelos, with his wife and children, when a Spaniard, with
whom he had had a difficulty, entered the house, and stabbed him to the heart
before them all. The murderer was seized by some Yankees who had settled
there, and kept in confinement until a statement of the whole affair could be
sent to the governor-general. He refused to do anything about it, and the
countrymen of the murdered man, seeing no prospect of justice being
administered, made known that if nothing was done, they should try the man
themselves. It chanced that, at this time, there was a company of forty
trappers and hunters from Kentucky, with their rifles, who had made their
head-quarters at the Pueblo; and these, together with the Americans and
Englishmen in the place, who were between twenty and thirty in number, took
possession of the town, and waiting a reasonable time, proceeded to try the
man according to the forms in their own country. A judge and jury were
appointed, and he was tried, convicted, sentenced to be shot, and carried out
before the town, with his eyes blindfolded. The names of all the men were then
put into a hat and each one pledging himself to perform his duty, twelve names
were drawn out, and the men took their stations with their rifles, and, firing
at the word, laid him dead. He was decently buried, and the place was restored
quietly to the proper authorities. A general, with titles enough for an
hidalgo, was at San Gabriel, and issued a proclamation as long as the
fore-top-bowline, threatening destruction to the rebels, but never stirred
from his fort; for forty Kentucky hunters, with their rifles, were a match for
a whole regiment of hungry, drawling, lazy half-breeds. This affair happened
while we were at San Pedro, (the port of the Pueblo,) and we had all the
particulars directly from those who were on the spot. A few months afterwards,
another man, whom we had often seen in San Diego, murdered a man and his wife
on the high road between the Pueblo and San Louis Rey, and the foreigners not
feeling themselves called upon to act in this case, the parties being all
natives, nothing was done about it; and I frequently afterwards saw the
murderer in San Diego, where he was living with his wife and family.
When a crime has been committed by Indians, justice, or rather vengeance,
is not so tardy. One Sunday afternoon, while I was at San Diego, an Indian was
sitting on his horse, when another, with whom he had had some difficulty, came
up to him, drew a long knife, and plunged it directly into the horse`s heart.
The Indian sprang from his falling horse, drew out the knife, and plunged it
into the other Indian`s breast, over his shoulder, and laid him dead. The poor
fellow was seized at once, clapped into the calabozo, and kept there until an
answer could be received from Monterey. A few weeks afterwards, I saw the poor
wretch, sitting on the bare ground, in front of the calabozo, with his feet
chained to a stake, and handcuffs about his wrists. I knew there was very
little hope for him. Although the deed was done in hot blood, the horse on
which he was sitting being his own, and a great favorite, yet he was an
Indian, and that was enough. In about a week after I saw him, I heard that he
had been shot. These few instances will serve to give one a notion of the
distribution of justice in California.
In their domestic relations, these people are no better than in their
public. The men are thriftless, proud, and extravagant, and very much given to
gaming; and the women have but little education, and a good deal of beauty,
and their morality, of course, is one of the best; yet the instances of
infidelity are much less frequent than one would at first suppose. In fact,
one vice is set over against another; and thus, something like a balance is
obtained. The women have but little virtue, but then the jealousy of their
husbands is extreme, and their revenge deadly and almost certain. A few inches
of cold steel has been the punishment of many an unwary man, who has been
guilty, perhaps, of nothing more than indiscretion of manner. The difficulties
of the attempt are numerous, and the consequences of discovery fatal. With the
unmarried women, too, great watchfulness is used. The main object of the
parents is to marry their daughters well, and to this, the slightest slip
would be fatal. The sharp eyes of a duena, and the cold steel of a father or
brother, are a protection which the characters of most of them - men and women
- render by no means useless; for the very men who would lay down their lives
to avenge the dishonor of their own family, would risk the same lives to
complete the dishonor of another.
Of the poor Indians, very little care is taken. The priests, indeed, at
the missions, are said to keep them very strictly, and some rules are usually
made by the alcaldes to punish their misconduct; but it all amounts to but
little. Indeed, to show the entire want of any sense of morality or domestic
duty among them, I have frequently known an Indian to bring his wife, to whom
he was lawfully married in the church, down to the beach, and carry her back
again, dividing with her the money which she had got from the sailors. If any
of the girls were discovered by the alcalde to be open evil-livers, they
were whipped, and kept at work sweeping the square of the presidio, and
carrying mud and bricks for the buildings; yet a few reals would generally buy
them off. Intemperance, too, is a common vice among the Indians. The
Spaniards, on the contrary, are very abstemious, and I do not remember ever
having seen a Spaniard intoxicated.
Such are the people who inhabit a country embracing four or five hundred
miles of sea-coast, with several good harbors; with fine forests in the
north; the waters filled with fish, and the plains covered with thousands of
herds of cattle; blessed with a climate, than which there can be no better in
the world; free from all manner of diseases, whether epidemic or endemic; and
with a soil in which corn yields from seventy to eighty fold. In the hands of
an enterprising people, what a country this might be! we are ready to say. Yet
how long would a people remain so, in such a country? The Americans (as those
from the United States are called) and Englishmen, who are fast filling up the
principal towns, and getting the trade into their hands, are indeed more
industrious and effective than the Spaniards; yet their children are brought
up Spaniards, in every respect, and if the "California fever" (laziness)
spares the first generation, it always attacks the second.
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