RAINS IN CALIFORNIA.—FUNCTIONS OF THE ALCALDE OF MONTEREY.—ORPHANS IN
CALIFORNIA.—SLIP OF THE GALLOWS ROPE.—MAKING A FATHER WHIP HIS
BOY.—A CONVICT AS PRISON COOK.—THE KANACKA.—THOM. COLE.—A MAN
ROBBING HIMSELF.—A BLACKSMITH OUTWITTED.
MONDAY, FEB. 7. The rains in California are mostly confined to the three
winter months—a few showers may come before, or a few occur after, but
the body of the rain falls within that period. The rain is relieved of
nearly all the chilling discomforts of a winter’s storm in other climes;
it falls only when the wind is from a southern quarter, and is
consequently warm and refreshing. It is by no means continuous; it pays
its visits like a judicious lover—with intervals sufficient to keep up
the affection; and like the suitor, brings with it flowers, and leads
the fair one by the side of streamlets never wrinkled with frost, and
into groves where the leaf never withers, and where the songs of birds
ever fill the warbling air.
THURSDAY, FEB. 10. By the laws and usages of the country, the judicial
functions of the Alcalde of Monterey extend to all cases, civil and
criminal, arising within the middle department of California. He is also
the guardian of the public peace, and is charged with the maintenance of
law and order, whenever and wherever threatened, or violated; he must
arrest, fine, imprison, or sentence to the public works, the lawless and
refractory, and he must enforce, through his executive powers, the
decisions and sentences which he has pronounced in his judicial
capacity. His prerogatives and official duties extend over all the
multiplied interests and concerns of his department, and reach to every
grievance and crime, from the jar that trembles around the domestic
hearth, to the guilt which throws its gloom on the gallows and the
grave.
THURSDAY, FEB. 17. There is no need of an Orphan Asylum in California.
The amiable and benevolent spirit of the people hovers like a shield
over the helpless. The question is not, who shall be burdened with the
care of an orphan, but who shall have the privilege of rearing it. Nor
do numbers or circumstances seem to shake this spirit; it is triumphant
over both. A plain, industrious man, of rather limited means, applied to
me to-day for the care of six orphan children. I asked him how many he
had of his own; he said fourteen as yet. “Well, my friend,” I observed,
“are not fourteen enough for one table, and especially with the prospect
of more?” “Ah,” said the Californian, “the hen that has twenty chickens
scratches no harder than the hen that has one.” So I told him I would
inquire into the present condition of the children, and then decide on
his application. His claim lay in the fact that his wife was the
godmother of the orphans.
WEDNESDAY, FEB. 23. One of my Indian prisoners, sentenced to the works
for theft, managed this morning to effect his escape, but was overtaken
by the constable on the Salinas, and brought back. When asked by me what
he ran for, he said the devil put it into his head. I asked him if he
thought a ball and chain would keep the evil one off; he said it might,
but then if he once got at him, he should stand no chance with one of
his legs chained. I told him I should let his leg go for the present,
but if he attempted to run again, I should chain both of them. “And my
hands too,” said the Indian, to assure me of his good conduct.
FRIDAY, MARCH 3. There is an old Mexican law, or usage, here, which has
sometimes exempted from death the murderer who has reached the sanctuary
of the church, or been favored with some accident, in the execution of
the extreme sentence. Two desperadoes, of Mexican and Indian blood, were
brought before me, charged with a wilful, deliberate murder. A jury of
twelve citizens, the largest scope of challenge having been allowed, was
empannelled. The prisoners were convicted and sentenced to be hung. But
by some strange accident, or design, both knots slipped, and down they
came, half imagining themselves still swinging in the air. The priest
who confessed them, and who was present among the great crowd,
immediately declared the penalty paid and the criminals absolved, and
started post-haste to Gen. Mason for his mandate to that effect. The
general told him the prisoners were sentenced to be hung by the neck
till dead, and when this sentence had been executed, the knot-slipping
business might perhaps be considered. This may seem to have been
dictated by a want of humanity, but had the accident or stratagem in
question rescued the criminals, not a noose in California would have
held. The murderers were executed, and the crime for which they suffered
vanished from the future records of the court.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 15. A lad of fourteen years was brought before me
to-day charged with stealing a horse. The evidence of the larceny was
conclusive; but what punishment to inflict was the question. We have no
house of correction, and to sentence him to the ball and chain on the
public works, among hardened culprits, was to cut off all hope of
amendment, and inflict an indelible stigma on the youth; so I sent for
his father, who had no good reputation himself, and placing a riata in
his hand, directed him to inflict twenty-four lashes on his thieving
boy. He proceeded as far as twelve, when I stopped him; they were
enough. They seemed inflicted by one attempting to atone in this form
for his own transgressions. “Inflict the rest, Soto, on your own evil
example; if you had been upright yourself, you might expect truth and
honesty in your boy; you are more responsible than this lad for his
crimes; you can never chastise him into the right path, and continue
yourself to travel in the wrong.” With these remarks I dismissed the
parties.
SATURDAY, MARCH 18. Horse-stealing has given me more trouble than any
other species of offence in California. It has grown out of a loose
habit of using the horses of other people without their consent, at a
time when they were of very little account; and what was once a venial
trespass has become a crime. It is very difficult to arrest it; much
must be left to time, the higher influences of moral sentiments, and the
administration of more specific laws. Nor are the Americans here a whit
better than the natives; they have a facility of conscience which easily
suits itself to any prevailing vice. Many of them appear to have left
their good principles on the other side of Cape Horn, or over the Rocky
Mountains. They slide into gambling, drinking, and cheating, as easily
as a frog into its native pond. They seem only the worse for the
restraints, which law at home partially exerted. They are like a froward
urchin who retaliates the wholesome visits of the birch by some act of
fresh audacity the moment he is beyond its reach. But they will find a
little law even in California, and this little enforced with some
steadiness of purpose. It is not the law which threatens loudest that
always exerts the greatest restraint. Thunder, with all its uproar,
don’t strike; it is the lightning that cleaves the gnarled oak.
THURSDAY, MARCH 23. A clergyman, who had just arrived in California,
called on me to-day, with letters of introduction from several of the
first rectors in New York. They spoke of him in high terms of
commendation, and invited that confidence and regard which might secure
him success in his foreign adventure; while they knew him to be a
loquacious shallow booby. They had probably been so much annoyed by him
in one shape and another, that they had taken this method of getting rid
of him, thinking that the afflictions of Providence, like his blessings,
should be more equally distributed.
SATURDAY, MARCH 25. To-day I remitted the sentence of my prison cook. He
is a Mulatto, a native of San Domingo; had drifted into California; was
attached, in a subordinate capacity, to Col. Fremont’s battalion; and
while the troops were quartered in town, had robbed the drawer of a
liquor shop of two hundred dollars. For this offence, I had sentenced
him to two years on the public works. Discovering early some reliable
traits about the fellow, I began to confide in him, soon made him cook
to the rest of the prisoners, and allowed him the privileges of the
town, so far as his duties in that capacity required. He has never
betrayed my trust, and has always been the first to communicate to me
any stratagem on the part of the prisoners to effect their escape. I
have trusted him with money to purchase provisions, and he has
faithfully accounted for every shilling. He has always been kind and
attentive to the sick. For these faithful services, I have remitted the
remainder of his sentence, which would have confined him nine months
longer, and have put him on a pay of thirty dollars per month as cook.
There is a string in every man’s breast, which, if you can rightly
touch, will “discourse music.”
THURSDAY, APRIL 6. I met a little California boy to-day in tattered
garments, and without hat or shoes. He had a small fish in his hand,
which he had just hooked up from the end of the wharf. I offered him
half a dollar for it; he said no, he wanted it himself. I offered him a
dollar; he still said no, he was going to make a dinner on it. The
result would probably have been the same had I offered him five dollars.
No one here is going to catch fish for you or any one else while he
wants them himself.
SATURDAY, APRIL 15. I made another pounce this evening on the gamblers,
and captured their bank; but most of the players had slipped their money
into their pockets before I could reach the table. No one rescued a
dollar after my cane, with its alcalde insignia, had been laid on the
boards. The authority of that baton they always respect. How comfortable
it is for one to carry his moral power on the top of his cane. It almost
justifies the Roman Catholic exegesis—and Jacob worshipped the top of
his staff.
MONDAY, APRIL 17. I had sent one of my constables to the Salinas river,
and the other to San Juan, and retired to rest; but about midnight was
startled from my dreams, by a loud rap at my office door. Throwing my
cloak around me, I unbolted the portal, and there stood, in the clear
moonlight, a tall Kanacka, who reverently lifted his hat, and observed,
“The town, sir, is perfectly quiet.” I thanked him for the information,
and closed the door. The fellow had been drinking, and in the importance
which liquor sometimes imparts, had imagined himself at the head of the
police.
THURSDAY, APRIL 27. Thom. Cole, whose moral vision could never yet
discover any difference between possession and ownership, where a horse
was concerned, was brought before me this morning, mounted on a fleet
steed belonging to a citizen of the town. He had removed the brand of
the rightful owner and substituted his own; but the disguise was easily
penetrated, and the horse identified. Thom. averred the horse was found
on his rancho; but he was ordered to deliver him to his proper owner,
who stood by to receive him. At this moment Thom. sprung into his saddle
and was off, horse and all, in the twinkling of an eye. I applied to
Gen. Mason for a file of soldiers; they were promptly ordered, and
stationed on the three streets, through one of which Thom. must make his
egress from town. He soon came sweeping on at the top of his speed, when
he suddenly found three muskets levelled at him, with an order to
dismount. There was no discharge in that war, and down he jumped, and
was soon delivered over to me. How changed! a moment before setting the
whole world at defiance; and now praying to be saved from the fleas of
the prison. As the flea could only punish him without benefiting the
town, I determined to reach him through another channel, by which both
purposes should be answered; and fined him fifty dollars for contempt of
court. So Thom. lost his horse and fifty dollars, and got a lesson of
humiliation which quelled his spirit like a wet blanket thrown on a
flaxen flame.
TUESDAY, MAY 2. I was roused from my sleep last night by a loud, hurried
knocking at my door, and a voice exclaiming, “Alcalde, alcalde!” On
reaching the door I found there a young Mexican, the clerk of a store
near by, without hat or shoes, and only a blanket wrapped around him. He
told me the volunteers had broken into his store, and were robbing the
money-chest. By this time my constable was up, and, throwing on our
clothes, we hastened with the clerk to his store; but not a human being
was to be seen. He showed us the bolt that had been forced, the chest
that had been broken, the pistol that he had snapped, and the wound that
he had received on the head. I sent the constable to the captain of the
volunteers, who immediately searched his quarters, where he found every
man in his berth, except those on guard. With these unsatisfactory
results I returned to my office and bed, and directed the constable to
keep an eye on the clerk.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 3. This morning I examined into all the circumstances
connected with the robbery. The wound of the clerk, which he says he
received from a cudgel, is a slight cut, apparently made by some sharp
instrument. The chisel, with which the chest was forced, corresponds in
width to one for sale on the shelf. Of the thousand dollars locked up in
the chest and drawers, not one, it seems, escaped; not a quarter or fip
fell to the floor; all went into the sack of the robbers, though they
worked in the dark. And then, as he alleges, the robbers were volunteers
without their uniform, and with their faces blacked. If so thoroughly
disguised, how could he know they were volunteers? From these
circumstances I have no doubt the rogue robbed himself, and raised the
hue and cry to cover the transaction. But we shall see; the thing will
out yet.
SUNDAY, MAY 9. This is my birth-day. I am on the shaded side of that
hill which swells midway between the extremities of life. The past seems
but a dream, and the future will soon be so. To what has been and to
what may be, I seem to myself almost indifferent. I know the vanities in
which human hopes end; I know that life itself is only a bubble that has
caught the hues of some falling star. And yet this airy phantom is not
all such as it would seem; there is something besides shadow in its
evanescent form. Our visions of happiness may prove an illusion, but our
sorrows are real. It is no fancied knell that shakes the bier; no
imaginary pall that wraps the loved and the lost. The grave is invested
with the awful majesty of the real.
MONDAY, MAY 10. I had directed the constable to get a pair of iron
hinges made for one of the doors of the prison. He gave the order to a
blacksmith, a crabbed old fellow, who charged eight dollars for his
coarse work. As the charge was an imposition, I told the constable not
to take the hinges; when up came the blacksmith with them to the office,
and, in a fit of passion, hurled them at my feet, as I stood in the
piazza. I handed the constable eight dollars, and told him to call on
the blacksmith, pay him for the hinges, take his receipt, and then bring
him before me. All which was done, and before me stood the smith, with
his choler yet up. I told him that his violence and indignity would not
be passed over; that I should fine him ten dollars for the benefit of
the town, which he might pay or go to prison. After a few moments’
hesitation, he laid the ten dollars on the table, and took his departure
without uttering a word. When clear of the office he grumbled out to the
constable, “For once in my life I have been outwitted; that Yankee
alcalde has not only got my hinges for nothing, but two dollars besides.
I don’t wonder he can swing his prison doors at that rate; I would have
tried the calaboose but for the infernal fleas.” The constable told him
the next time he made hinges he must charge what they were worth, and
curb his towering temper.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 17. The ire of a Californian of hidalgo extraction
flashes from his dark eyes like heat-lightning on a July cloud—you see
the blaze, but hear no thunder; while the wit of a California lady
glances here and there like the sun-rays through the fluttering leaves
of a wind-stirred forest. We have several ladies here celebrated for
their brilliant sallies, but Donna Jimeno carries off the palm. A friend
showed her this morning a picture of the Israelites gathering manna.
“Ah! they are the Californians,” said the Donna, “they pick up what
heaven rains down.” He showed her Moses smiting the rock. “And there,”
said the Donna, “is a Yankee; he can bring water out of a rock.” But
humor and wit are not the highest characteristics of this lady. She
possesses a refinement and intelligence that might grace any court in
Europe; and withal, a benevolence that never wearies in reaching and
relieving the sick. Her care of Lieut. Miner, one of the officers
attached to this post, will long live in grateful remembrance. She
hovered over him till his spirit fled, and wept as she thought of his
mother.