t~r* I OOIv/l Nk3 ^CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST Class T$7 Q. . Book _i££ Copyright If COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. The Missions of California and The Old Southwest Photo, by Hallett-Taylor Co., Corona Jo Front Patio, San Juan Capistrano Mission The Missions of California AND The Old Southwest BY JESSE S. HILDRUP With 35 Illustrations from Photographs * CHICAGO A. C. McCLURG & CO. 1907 Copyright A. C. McClurg & Co. 1907 Published March t6, 1907 Horary of congress! | Two Copies Received I I MAH 21 1907 I ._ Copyright Entry * CLASS A XXC.No, COPY B THE photographs used for illustrating this volume have been procured largely through the assistance of The Hallett -Taylor Co., Coronado, California, who have given permission for the inclusion of a number of their own views, as have also Messrs. Putnam & Valentine, Los Angeles, and the Detroit Photographic Co. JTfjt lafefgffte $rtss R. R. DONNELLEY & SONS COMPANY CHICAGO CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. California and its Early Inhabitants . . 13 II. First Attempts to Christianize the Natives 18 III. The Franciscans 20 IV. The Advent of Junipero Serra .... 23 V. The First Missionary Expedition .... 26 VI. The Indians of the Missions 28 VII. The Padres as Agriculturists 30 VIII. The Wealth of the Missions 32 IX. San Diego 34 X. San' Carlos Borremeo 38 XI. San Antonio de Padua .... . . 40 XII. San Gabriel, Arcangel 42 XIII. San Luis Obispo de Tolosa ...... 45 XIV. San Francisco de Asis . 48 XV. San Juan Capistrano -49 XVI. Santa Clara 51 XVII. San Buenaventura 55 CHAPTER PAGE XVIII. Santa Barbara 57 XIX. La Purisima Concepcion 60 XX. Santa Cruz 62 XXI. La Soledad 63 XXII. San Jose • . . 65 XXIII. San Juan, Bautista 67 XXIV. San Miguel 68 XXV. San Fernando, Rey de Espagna ... 69 XXVI. San Luis, Rey de Francia 71 XXVII. San Jose de Guadalupe 74 XXVIII. Santa Inez 75 XXIX. San Rafael, Arcangel , 76 XXX. Chapels 77 XXXI. The Missions of Lower California . '. 79 XXXII. The Missions of Texas .91 XXXIII. The Missions of New Mexico .... 96 XXXIV. The Missions of Arizona ...... 99 [v] ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Front Patio, San Juan Capistrano Mission Frontispiece The Father Superior at Santa Barbara Mission 16 The Sacred Garden, Santa Barbara Mission . . 18 Interior, San Gabriel Mission 24 Tower, San Carlos Mission, Carmel Valley . . 24 San Carlos Mission, Carmel Valley 28 > A Corridor, San Juan Capistrano Mission . . . 32 San Diego Mission 34 San Carlos Mission, Monterey 38 y San Antonio de Padua Mission 40 San Gabriel Mission 42 Campanile, San Gabriel Mission 42 San Luis Obispo Mission 46 Musical Wheel, Matracha, and Music Books, San Juan Capistrano Mission 48 Dolores, or San Francisco de Asis, Mission ... 48 Two Views of San Juan Capistrano Mission . . 50 -. PAGE Santa Clara Mission 52 San Buenaventura Mission 56 Santa Barbara Mission 58 La Purisima Concepcion Mission 60 Ruins of La Soledad Mission 64 San Juan Bautista Mission 66 San Miguel Mission 68 San Fernando Mission 70 San Luis Rey Mission 72 Santa Inez Mission 74 Los Angeles Chapel, from the Plaza ..... 78 The Belfry, Pala Chapel 80 San Xavier Mission, Tucson, Arizona .... 88 Concepcion La Purisima de Acuna Mission, Texas 92 San Jose de Aguayo Mission, Texas 94 Exterior View and Altar, San Xavier Mission, Tucson, Arizona 98 [ vii ] INTRODUCTORY IN musing over the history of the old Missions, the mind is led to inquire as to the benefits that have been conferred upon mankind by the labors, triumphs, and defeat of the padres during their brief sojourn in the Southwest. Though their work was confined to a few heathen tribes, its pure and unselfish purpose and beneficent results cannot be questioned, for these are attested in the annals of those days. The fact that great and lasting benefits were thus bestowed upon the Indian is conclusively established by reference to his primitive life, and to his subsequent condition under the care and tutelage of the Missions. The degree and importance of such benefits are evident in that they affected favorably his earthly, and provided for his immortal, welfare. Moreover, that which promotes the progress of one portion of mankind works ultimately for the benefit of the entire race. The wonderful amelioration of the moral and social lives of wild men living in a Western wilderness, which was effected by the padres during a short period of sixty-odd years in California, is known throughout the world, and millions of the family of man have both rejoiced and mourned over the bright career of the Fathers and its fateful ending. Regret for the sad fate of the Missions is almost universal. The philanthropic American grieves over the defeat of pious efforts and a grand purpose, that surviving, would have elevated the Indian races and preserved them from extinction. All who read and reflect, if they have an instinctive sense of right and of love for humanity, must deplore the passing of the Missions; for their spiritual power and influence not only reclaimed the savage, but still lived after their suppression, to prepare the way for the civilization which came later under American sovereignty. What more could be said for those heroes who sacrificed themselves that the pariahs of an unexplored region might be saved? May honor and glory ever rest upon the names of the old padres of the Missions of California and the Old Southwest! J. S. H. Chicago, January i, 1907. The Missions of California and The Old Southwest THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER I CALIFORNIA AND ITS EARLY INHABITANTS CALIFORNIA, the land of golden sunshine and skies of ineffable blue, starlit at night by a glittering host; of most genial climate, tempered alike to the old and the young, the delicate and the vigorous, — a climate equalled nowhere on earth but along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea; the garden of the olive, the myrtle, the orange, and the vine; the primitive home of the most stupendous trees, — trees that lift their heads among the clouds, and reach maturity only when thousands of years have passed since their sprouting from the soil; the home of the stately redwood and the pine, the oak, the sycamore, the pepper, the manzanita, and almost every species of arboreal growth in all the realms of nature; — California was in 1767 selected by the Catholic Church as a most promising vineyard for the gathering of souls to its bosom from among the wild heathen that inhabited the lands in the southern half of Alta California. This chosen land, so wonderfully endowed by Nature, made possible the spiritual and civilizing purposes of the Church by the very configuration of its surface, the fertility of its soil, its temperate and subtropical climates, and its abundant waters, which were stored in natural reservoirs and available for lowland cultivation [13] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST by the process of irrigation, and by rivers, creeks, and streams running to the sea and to inland lakes from every point of the compass. In California there are very many kinds of local climate, and all within the limits of the temperate zone. A contour map most strikingly illustrates the causes of the variation in temperature in different localities. Heat, moisture, and soil give vitality to every germ within the bosom of the earth; and the direction of the sun's rays determines the degree of heat. The general trend of the principal mountain ranges is from northwest to southeast, enclosing several great valleys. The lesser ranges and their spurs, with foot-hills, canons, and arroyos, penetrate the country everywhere, twisting and turning in endless confusion. These ranges enclose innumerable pocket-like depressions of various dimensions, and valleys, where the rays of the sun enter at different angles; and thus the heat is increased or diminished to a degree that is equivalent to a change in the general climate. This natural adaptation of the surface for modifying the solar heat is accountable for the exuberance and the great variety of the products of the earth, which gave joy to the hearts of the old padres as they wrought out in these primeval wilds a paradise for the Indians and themselves. The conquest of Mexico in the dawn of the sixteenth century by Hernando Cortes opened to the Spanish Empire, the Church, and the people a vast vision of boundless possessions along the coast of the Pacific from the Arctic Circle to the Straits of Magellan. All were eager to gather the fabulous wealth of the American continents, and to reap a great harvest of the souls of heathen tribes abiding there. The Missions were a logical consequence of the conquest. The Californias were adjacent to Mexico. They were in climate, soil, and mineral riches the gems of the coast lands most accessible. The Indians of the valleys and plains bordering the ocean were separated into small tribes, with limited territory, usually bounded by creeks that ran from the mountains to the sea. They were gentle and peaceable, and easily converted to the Catholic faith. The food [14] CALIFORNIA AND ITS EARLY INHABITANTS of those near the coast was fish, seals, and sea-otters, and these were in great abundance and variety; but there was a scarcity of native products of the soil. The great and luxuriant production of fruits, vegetables, and cereals now grown there is due mainly to the labors and creature tastes of the old padres. Animal food was a rarity among the Indians, owing to their inability to hunt their game with effective weapons. Their powers of invention were feebly developed in that direction, yet the forests furnished deer and bear, and the open country the bison in limited quantities. The Indians of the plains had crude methods of tilling the soil, and they domesticated the bison, which they herded and reared upon their pasture lands. Using only natural irrigation, their farming was restricted to a few products and small areas. They were skilful in building canoes of pine, with many oars. These boats were remarkably seaworthy and resembled somewhat the ancient galleys. Their skill in working in wood was also apparent in their domestic and fishing utensils. They were of good stature and fair complexion. The women were small, of pleasant countenance and disposition. The clothing of these coast Indians was mostly made from the skin of the sea-wolf, rudely tanned. Their habits and morals were better than those of many tribes of mountain Indians, living more remote from the ocean. They were not warlike, and usually escaped in their canoes to the coast islands when their lands were invaded by the mountain tribes. There is an oval mound at Santa Barbara near the sea, of about fifty feet in altitude, and three acres in extent; it was formed in the course of ages by the collection of fish bones deposited by Indians after the banquets which they held at gatherings of the coast tribes in council. A Portuguese admiral who navigated the coast in 1540 tarried here for several months, and finally died and was buried on the Island of Santa Rosa. He named this locality the City of Fleets, by reason of the great number of canoes that met him at his anchorage, the natives having rowed to the spot to give him a warm welcome. They seemed to be natural sailors, made so by the necessities of life, as their principal means of subsistence came from the [i5] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST waters. The next navigator in these regions, Vizcaino, who appeared in 1602, explored the coast of California and Mexico for more than eight hundred leagues. He investigated the history of the coast and inland tribes, and in his reports to the Spanish Government, furnishes the most reliable information in regard to the country and its inhabitants. It was upon his statements and his experience that the home authorities, civil and ecclesiastical, based their plans for the possession of the lands and the regeneration of the natives. For these purposes they provided for the founding of a series of presidios guarded by soldiers, and of Missions from San Diego to Monterey — the former to hold and protect, and the latter to do the work of developing and civilizing, the country and the aborigines. The old padres found by experience that Vizcaino had painted too vividly, but without doubt for a good purpose; yet the Missions atoned in results for all the errors of judgment. If the mountain and more inland tribes had been of the pacific nature of the coast tribes, the work of the Missions would have been much less perilous and more effective. One of the few murders, that of Padre Jayme, committed by the mountain tribes, and the burning of the Mission building at San Diego on the third of October, 1775, indicate to some extent the difference in character and habits between the cruel and warlike tribes of the interior and mountain regions, and those of the coast and the pastoral tribes of the valleys and plains. It is doubtless the fact that the Mission labors were largely confined to these latter tribes, in consequence of their more docile nature and habits, which made them readily respond to religious influence, and far less dangerous than the bloodthirsty natives of the interior. Locality, food, climate, and other forms of environment in the course of time make a radical difference in the characteristics, manners, habits, and disposition of mankind, so that traces of connection with the generic stock may be entirely lost, except in the language, which preserves the roots of the mother tongue. Hence the variety in the life records, as found in the actual history of these native races. It is impossible to know much about [16] Photo, by Hallett-Taylor Co., Coronado The Father Superior at Santa Barbara Mission CALIFORNIA AND ITS EARLY INHABITANTS them, comparatively nothing of their past. We know of them only what we are taught by those who discovered them about four centuries ago, and by contact with them in more recent times. When we found them, we called them all heathen, though they manifested various grades of morals and intelligence, from the low degree of the Digger Indian to the greater development exemplified by the most enlightened tribes. The origin and settlement of the aborigines of the Pacific coast wilds are veiled in the mists of forgotten ages, which are impenetrable to the eye of historic research. The subject may interest the speculative mind, with its instinctive longing to learn the unknown in the past and the future; but such knowledge is not necessary to this sketch of a unique civilization, and it must remain concealed until the lifting of the curtain which shall reveal the work and the plans of the Creator. O] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER II FIRST ATTEMPTS TO CHRISTIANIZE THE NATIVES IN 1767 King Charles III. of Spain organized an expedition to sail to Mexico, to proceed thence to the Californias and take possession of them, to build Missions for the conversion of the Indians there, and to protect and defend the country from the Russians. Before this time hordes of these semibarbarians had come down from Siberia and Alaska, and occupied Northern California down to the. Bay of San Francisco; had established forts, churches, and settlements along the coast and inland; opened the fur trade with the natives; begun cultivation of the lands, and engaged in those industries incident to development and permanent occupancy. Here appears not only a vital collision between two European powers to gratify "their lust of con- quest, but the first germ of antagonism between the Catholic and the Greek Church in the wilds of, North America. About one hundred and ninety years earlier than this time, and long before the Russian occupancy, Sir Francis Drake anchored near the bay and planted the English flag upon the coast, claiming the country for the crown of England. The chaplain of the expedition read the services of the Anglican Church, and invoked the blessing of Providence on the claim then made for the lands discovered; but it does not appear that England ever perfected her claim by permanent possession, or ever attempted to renew the same until 1847, at tne Bay of Monterey, when she most signally failed. It is a most significant fact that these are the only instances, except an attempt made by the Jesuits in 1688, where the light of Christianity, in even a single ray, ever penetrated the moral darkness of innumerable [18] Photo, by Hailett-Taylor Co., Corona Jo The Sacred Garden, Santa Barbara Mission FIRST ATTEMPTS TO CHRISTIANIZE THE NATIVES tribes of savages, who roamed, lived, and died in and among the forests, mountains, and valleys, along the rivers, creeks, and sea coast, from the Bering Strait to the Gulf of California. The Order of the Jesuits, with their usual zeal, energy, and daring, in 1683 explored Lower California from Cape St. Lucas to the mouth of the Colorado River, and commenced missionary work among the natives; they likewise in 1540 penetrated the hot and forbidding wilds of Arizona and New Mexico, among the ruthless Apaches and kindred savage tribes, seeking to win heathen to the Church, and a harvest of gold in the fabled regions of the seven cities of Cebola, along the Gila River. Fathers Kukus and John Maria Salvo Tierra travelled more than one thousand miles on foot in the heart of the deserts, mountains, and scorching plains, until, worn out with hardships, they died prematurely, leaving behind them no monuments of their enthusiasm, or of the saving grace of the Church. [19] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER III THE FRANCISCANS IN Lower California the Jesuits labored for eighty years with much greater immediate results than in other regions of the Southwest; but in Alta California they had at least sowed the seeds of a harvest which is being reaped by the Church to-day, through the growth and beneficence of the noted Pious Fund cre- ated by them. This fund was the child of their economy, and for it they had toiled until their expulsion from their field of labors, in 1767. The Franciscans assumed the task of the Jesuits; under the direction of Padre Junipero Serra, the president and spiritual father of the proposed Missions, they entered the abandoned regions in 1767, where in less than two generations they wrought out a redemption for the souls of wild men, and a unique civilization so marvellous in its benevolence and elevating tendencies, its Christianizing and ameli- orating influences, and its progressive life, that all enlightened lovers of humanity have wondered at, while revering, Serra's fame and works. Junipero Serra was born at Petra, on the Isle of Majorca, November 29, 17 13. He became a novice on September 14, 1730, and entered a convent at Palma, the capital city of Majorca. He became a broad and finished scholar, was made professor of philosophy, and later received the degree of D. D. He was splendid, in oratory : " Literary men listened to him with infatuation at the brilliancy of his style and the power of his speech. An enemy once said that his sermons should be printed in letters of gold." He was possessed in early life of an intense desire to go among the Indians. He loved to preach among the poor and lowly ; his highest aspiration was to labor and live out his days amid the wild countries [20] THE FRANCISCANS * and peoples of the earth, and do them all the good in his power. He might have shone and grown great in the high places of Europe, but he turned from these alluring prospects with no sigh of regret. His hope, now ripening into a definite purpose, was that he should move in these grooves of labor and usefulness. It involved sacrifice, piety, and the dedication of all his powers to the salvation of those human beings who by some inscrutable plan seemed to have been ignored in the progress of mankind. It was not a freakish impulse born of pious enthusiasm, but the logical offspring of his education and the traditions of the monastic order to which he belonged. Besides this, he believed most intensely in the theology of his time, and the burning thought with him was to save the Indian, who was denied the atonement of divine grace by no fault of his own, from the yawning circles of Dante's Hell. St. Francis of Assisi, in the early part of the thirteenth century, founded the Society of Franciscans. He was a pious enthusiast of great learning and an unquenchable love for the lower classes of humanity. The cultured and the great could care for themselves, but the poor peasantry were in a pitiable condition everywhere in Europe; and he became impressed with the idea that the Church had a most solemn duty, through some special agency, to exert her potent influence to uplift into a better secular and spiritual life these down-trodden members of her fold. He cast about him for some choice spirits in the priesthood, who like himself could be inspired with a sense of the importance of this duty, and would devote their lives zealously to its fulfilment. He did not search in vain, and under the authority of the Church he organized a society. Its declared object was to shun wealth, ease, and luxury, as well as worldly rank and power, the members to give all the energies of their being to the work they had undertaken. They would be clothed in humble garb, gladly enduring hardships and the reproaches of men, that they might the more effectually labor among the lowly, the degraded, the down-trodden, the ignorant, and the superstitious in all lands. They pledged the Order to perpetual [21] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST poverty, that they might not be diverted from their holy mission by earthly pleasures. Upon the cross they avowed a determination to labor for the cause of the divine Master alone, without self-aggrandizement or hope of earthly reward, and to bring to all the degraded and unfortunate the joys of His redemption. They became learned, knowing that knowledge is power, that they might call it into requisition for the better execution of their task. They studied those practical sciences and arts which might help them to meet every emergency that might arise within the scope of their mission. They were temperate in all things, that they might be able to rely on their mental and physical powers in times of trial and danger. They subjected themselves to severe tests, and trained all their faculties for success. [M] THE ADVENT OF JUNIPERO SERRA CHAPTER IV THE ADVENT OF JUNIPERO SERRA JUNIPERO SERRA came into possession of the most exalted qualifications for his marvellous work in Alta California by the inheritance of a loving soul and wonderful intellectual powers; he acquired remarkable erudition; his lofty ideals were nurtured in the discipline, precepts, and traditions of his monastic order; he attained an eloquence which alike convinced the minds and enraptured the hearts of men, were they civilized or heathen; and his gentle kindness made permanent his conquests. He had no peer among the disciples of his order since the day of its birth. With such a character, such training, and with a zeal for the conversion of the Indian more intense than the mystical fires upon the altars of the gods, it is less astonishing to enlightened faith that he fashioned a marvellous civilization in the dark realms of our Western coast. Yearning for the souls of the heathen, he was fated to find his call at last as a redeemer of the pagans of California. On August 28, 1749, he sailed from Cadiz with a select band from the convent in Palma, who were in sympathy with his life purpose; on the seventh of December he arrived at Vera Cruz, and on New Year's Day, 1750, he entered the Apostolic College of San Fernando, in the City of Mexico, which subsequently became the headquarters of the new Missions. His earnest soul could brook no delay, and the authorities appointed him and Father Palou to work among the Indians of Cerro Gordo, one hundred miles from Queretaro, a province many leagues in extent, a mountainous and wild region without a vestige of civilization. From here in the dawn of triumph among the natives he was withdrawn to labor among the faithless and [>3] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST murderous Apaches far to the north, a race with many branches, which outstripped in fiendish traits of character all other tribes of this continent. Other missionaries preceding him had been subjected to the greatest hardships and maltreatment and finally had been murdered by these savages ; but with full knowledge of such perils he immediately began preparation to enter upon his dangerous mission. Yet the kindly Providence that guarded his destiny interposed; his orders were recalled, and he retired temporarily to his convent. From this centre his labors were ceaseless, extending their influence everywhere for the good of the cause, with the most astonishing results, and proclaiming him a leader of men in this crusade in the unknown wilds. In 1767 he was commissioned to take the command of the mission work in California. At fifty-four years of age he began there the great chapter of the record of his life. He had found his life work; and with what supreme energy of mind and body he toiled, suffered, and triumphed is one of the marvels of human history. In exalted thought, Christian kindness, devotion to his God, and in energetic action he was without a rival in the mission field. In seventeen years of arduous labor and severe trials he wore out the gifts nature had so lavishly bestowed upon him, and he died at the Mission of San Carlos, on the twenty-eighth day of August, 1784, at the age of seventy years, nine months, and four days. Father Palou, his friend of a lifetime, said at his death: "Here is one of whom posterity will say, 'He was the greatest man that ever trod the sands of Alta California.' By sincere respect for the nature and rights of the Indian, he conquered; but he led him through love. Force was foreign to his mind. His courage was heroic as that of a martyr. He had led a noble life: untiring labor, devotion to duty, and care for the lowly and the degraded were his ceaseless duties. He educated, controlled, guided, loved, and helped all; he gave them occupation and a spiritual and practical Photos, by Hallctt-Taylor Co , Coronado Interior, San Gabriel Mission. — Tower, San Carlos Mission, Carmel Valley THE ADVENT OF JUNIPERO SERRA purpose in life; while ministering to the sick, feeding the hungry, and clothing the naked, he taught them to be self-supporting. His was the first civilization that ever dawned upon the benighted natives of heathen California, and improved the conditions of their lives by showing them how to obtain the various and generous products of their rich soil by cultivation. It is a singular and noteworthy fact that Nature had ill provided for the sustenance of the natives in these coast regions, by the fruits and vegetables of the soil, the animals of the forests, or the birds of the air. She was bountiful only in the foods found in her waters. In a wonderful manner the trite adage, "History repeats itself," is exemplified in the missionary work in California. Every act, emotion, thought, and experience of mankind is engraved here in the lives and labors of the padres. Their fitness for the great task before them was sufficient for every emergency. Their marvellous efficiency as instructors was shown in their teaching by precept and example to the ignorant natives more than fifty different arts, professions, and occupations known to European civilization, and with considerable skill in the adoption of models for their practical use. I>5] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER V THE FIRST MISSIONART EXPEDITION JOSE DE GALVEZ, the Visitador-General of New Spain, was the practical head of the first missionary expedition of the Franciscans, and was a man of extraordinary energy, forethought, and practical ability He fashioned and controlled the enterprise, with Junipero Serra as President of the Missions, both in Lower and Upper California. Galvez deserves a more extended notice than the limits of this sketch permit, for without his promotion and supervision the founding of these Missions might have been, to this day, a pious dream of the Church. Great force of character, wisdom, and executive ability in carrying into effect the schemes of the Missions were as necessary as pious zeal and enthusiasm. The first plan evolved in the light of the crude knowledge of Vizcaino was to locate a Mission at San Diego, one at Monterey, and another between them at Buenaventura, on the southern coast, about equally distant from each. Galvez' foresight provided for everything essential to the success of the enterprise — provisions, transportation, explorations, garrisons, education, ornaments, pictures, holy vessels for the c'hurches; materials, architects, and artisans for construction; and all incidentals needful to a scheme of colonization and the redemption of the aboriginal savages of that wild, rugged, unexplored country. To provide for the future, he directed the taking of two hundred head of cattle from the old Jesuit Mission in Lower California, and a full supply of seeds of vegetables, grains, flowers, and fruits that grew in Spain, and could be reproduced in the new region. Thus he not only benefited the Missions, but bequeathed rich gifts to later generations in California. The Missions and farms were his nurslings. He selected and packed the furnishings for the churches, and left nothing undone to secure success. [26] THE FIRST MISSIONARY EXPEDITION From 1769 to 1822 California, like Mexico, was under the rule of Spain. On achieving her independence Mexico made California a part of her own territory. During that half-century the Missions had their happy and prosperous era. They were not interfered with by the Spanish, or in any way oppressed, but rather encouraged, as the pride of the Church; and the boast of the State was that they had checked the encroachments of the Russians on the north. It is true that the Greek Church never found a proselyte south of the Bay of San Francisco after the old padres had well begun their work. In this latter period the principal pueblos, or towns, founded were San Diego, Los Angeles, San Juan Capistrano, San Luis Rey, San Gabriel, San Buenaventura, San Luis Obispo, San Fernando, San Pedro, Santa Barbara, and Monterey. These towns, though small, were important as centres of trade, intelligence, and mission work. They were simply clusters of adobe houses around the greater Missions, but from them radiated a most powerful influence, that dominated all things from the Mexican line to the great bay. This is perhaps the most conclusive proof of their claim to be the original colony of California. January 9, 1769, the ship "San Carlos" sailed for San Diego; on February 15 the "San Antonio" sailed from Cape St. Lucas; and on June 16 the "San Jose" sailed. Some of the padres were with the "San Carlos." The "San Jose" was probably lost at sea, for no tidings were ever heard of her after she left port. The other ships safely anchored in the Bay of San Diego. The land expedition was separated into two divisions. One, commanded by Captain Rivera of the Company of Cuesa, left Santa Ana, Lower California, in September, 1768, and after some delay at Vellicata, in that province, resumed its journey. It reached San Diego in about two months, finding the "San Carlos" and the "San Antonio" awaiting them at their anchorage in the bay. Serra left with the second division, which tarried on the route while he founded the Mission of San Fernando at Vellicata; after which, with Don Portola, the Royal Governor of California, the expedition started for San Diego. It arrived in about forty-five days, on July 1, 1769. [27] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER VI THE INDIANS OF THE MISSIONS THE Mission Indians, that constituted the flocks belonging to the various Missions, are and ever will be a problem to the antiquarians. Of their history before the time of the colonization we have no definite knowledge; but this much seems unquestionable: a great difference in character, disposition, and habits existed between the natives of the valleys and plains of the coast and those of the deserts and moun- tains of the interior. The former were by nature peaceable, gentle, and amenable to progressive influences ; the latter were untamable, warlike, cruel, and unresponsive to any civilizing or moral forces. Locality, climate, food, and the struggle for existence may reasonably account for these opposite traits of character and habits of life in the coast and interior Indians. If this be true, then the lines of the Missions were so laid as best to promote the conversion of souls, and to effect a great practical improvement in their lives. The general trend and localizing of the Missions, from north to south, brought within their vicinities and easy reach the vast majority of the valley and plain tribes of the coast, and excluded by distance and the rugged barriers erected by nature the inland tribes. Be these reflections true or false, the early history of the native races of the Pacific coast is an enigma that never will be satisfactorily solved. The coast Indians had advanced in some things beyond the Stone Age; they were adepts in the construction of wooden vessels for domestic use, idols of gold and silver, and weapons, offensive and defensive, and for hunting. For fishing their canoes and implements were very ingenious. The tanning of skins of sea wolves for garments was more perfect than in Castile. Doubtless the Indians varied in character and life in California as they did everywhere along the coast and [28] Photo, by Hallctt-Taylor Co., Coronado San Carlos Mission, Carmel Valley THE INDIANS OF THE MISSIONS contiguous territory, subject to like natural laws and conditions. The pastoral Indians of California closely resembled in their peaceful habits and tastes the Pueblos of the lands east of them, but the latter were more advanced in their ability to command the wealth of the soil by their rude arts of cultivation. The mountain Indians east of San Diego were warlike and cruel, and never came within the influence of the padres; in fact, they destroyed the first Mission built there, and were controlled only by the soldiers. Out of such crude material to form communities of Christians enjoying civilized life with all its comforts, luxuries, and refinements, would seem an impossible undertaking; but holy and indomitable purpose prevailed. In ten years from the founding of the first Mission at San Diego in 1769, the padres had thirty-five hundred converted Indians under their instruction and control, and solving the problems of a new and progressive life. In the year 1800 their flock of converts had increased to fifteen thousand, all under the ameliorating influences of eighteen Missions, conducted in all their affairs by about forty padres. The significance of their immense labors appears more prominently in results; they had by most assiduous training converted tribes of savages into skilful silversmiths, millers, saddlers, bakers, vintagers, shoemakers, tailors, hatters, guitar-makers, masons, winemakers, fishermen, wood-cutters, stone-cutters, weavers, sacristans, musicians, hunters, farmers, herders, tilemakers, physicians, mariners, and workers in more than thirty other occupations, arts, and industries known to the Spaniards. When taught, the Indian became the principal factor in all the labors, improvements, and progress of Mission life. This introduction of the arts of civilized life prepared the way for the coming of the white race, and the b.irth of the Golden State. [29] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER VII THE PADRES AS AGRICULTURISTS OF all the heritage enjoyed by the present generation in California, descending from the old padres, the greatest corporeal blessings are the fruits, wines, foods, flowers, seeds, plants, and trees — natural products of the soil and climate of Old Spain, the Garden of the Ancients. Without these the far- famed land would be shorn of her beauty and her food products, and as ill fitted for sustaining a numerous population as when occupied by tribes of primitive red men. The old padres made it possible for the white man to make her the Garden of the Moderns. All this advancement was accomplished in about thirty years after the establishment of the first Mission in San Diego in 1769. Another equal period of mission work and great results by this band of holy men followed. The harvest of souls received into the Church was commensurate with the progress made in material, corporeal, and social life. Then blight and ruin fell upon them; life under the regime of the Franciscans ceased forever. To that period of progress and enlightenment California may turn with amazement, love, and gratitude, as the foundation of her greatness and glory of to-day. These achievements, strenuously made and suddenly lost, all in about sixty years' time, were the first lessons in the reclaiming of savage races in California. Looking backward to prehistoric times, we see the forefathers of the Mission Indians, rude, uncouth, river-drift men, wandering through the valleys, along the rivers and streams, in search of the food that Nature had stored for them in her waters more generously than upon the land, and more readily within reach of their feeble powers. [3o] THE PADRES AS AGRICULTURISTS Pastoral and agricultural industries were the principal means upon which the Missions depended for their support and maintenance, and for the acquisition of wealth. The vineyards were planted for the pleasures of the table, as the pious padres did not deny themselves creature comforts; hunting and fishing were to them sources of very considerable revenue; in short, all the products of nature and art were made to subserve their sustenance, their comfort, and their pleasure. The spiritual life first; the temporal life next. And neither was neglected. In all the greater Missions, the holy temple was the most prominent building. Over the main entrance was reared the tower with its bells; then came the residences, the quarters and guardhouse for the soldiers, houses for the Indian converts; after which the warehouses, granaries, prisons, and cemeteries. The Indian houses were set apart by themselves within a walled inclosure, called a rancheria. The orchards and gardens, both flower and vegetable, were properlv located. The industrial establishments were also in a place by themselves. The entire Mission and grounds were laid out with streets and alleys after the forms of civilized life; everywhere regularity and system were strictly observed. The full measure of the progress made among the primitive fields, valleys, and mountains in the material things of life during a period covering only two generations of time, may be estimated in the amount of property acquired by the padres. In 1830 they had more than one million head of cattle pasturing on Mission lands, one hundred thousand horses, and almost innumerable other domestic animals. Their yearly crop of wheat averaged one hundred and fifty thousand bushels; and barley, oats, and other crops were in like proportion. Corn was not a climatic favorite, but was cultivated to some extent. The general and unfailing products — agricultural and manufactured — were wheat, barley, oats, beans, tallow, soap, leather, hides, wool, oil, cotton, hemp, linen, wine, brandy, tobacco, salt, and soda. The fruits raised were as great in variety, as rich in qualitv, and profuse in quantity then as now, subject to the restriction of acreage only. [3i] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER VIII THE WEALTH OF THE MISSIONS IN the latter days of their prosperity, when all the Missions had been founded and their surroundings completed, two hundred thousand head of cattle were killed yearly, netting a profit usually of ten dollars each. The hides and tallow were the chief articles of commerce with cities on the Atlantic coast, Boston leading in the early thirties of the last century. The flesh of the cattle found consumers among the Mission Indians and the needy elsewhere. The padres permitted none to want for food in the regions around them. Their hospitality, like their faith, was boundless. All the Missions from San Diego to San Francisco were enriched by the planting and cultivation of extensive orchards, gardens, and vineyards around them; while they were beautiful with flowers of every variety, hue, and fragrance, some of native origin, and some brought as seeds or plants, from other lands within the limits of the temperate and tropical belts. In truth, California was then to a limited extent, and within the lines of Mission endeavor, the garden of the earth. Blossoms and perfumes were hanging on and emitted from every vine, plant, shrub, and tree capable of bloom and odor; for the old padres loved beauty of nature and art, as they loved purity and beauty of soul, and all other good things. The annual revenues of the Missions from sales and trade, tithes and rents, would aggregate in their latter and fully prosperous days nearly three million dollars; and it is stated upon authority that the padres sent to the Church in Spain and Mexico during the time of their existence more than twenty million dollars from their surplus accumulations of wealth. A still greater amount was taken from them in property and treasures by the Photograph by S. L Willard A. Corridor, San Juan Capistrano Mission THE WEALTH OF THE MISSIONS Mexican Government under the orders of confiscation, which were finally passed by the Mexican Congress on the seventeenth of August, 1833. The religion and morals of the Missions were swept away at this time, with their material progress and the monuments thereof. Under the curse of greed, the better life of the Indian neophyte, with his hopes in the future, passed into oblivion with the wreck of his Mission home. The padres could protect him no longer. He fled a fugitive to the mountains, where his short-lived civilization disappeared forever. Avarice, bred in the hearts of the Mexican authorities and people in the era of reckless lawlessness that succeeded the revolt of that country from Spain, extinguished old-time reverence for the Church and its precepts, and produced a breed of rascally officials. Soldiers of fortune who had served in the recent wars were now without regular occupation; and these, with other adventurous men, united in a general invasion of Alta California, to seize and possess the rich properties which the Franciscans had created through toil, privation, and danger, but now were powerless to defend when the merciless hand of spoliation was laid upon them. The old padres fled like the Indians, and left behind them all the fruits of their glorious labors and triumphs to the fate that overwhelmed them. The vandal destroyed that which he could not create. A most benign and unique civilization disappeared for a time under the superstition and ignorance of the Mexican and his rule; but to him even it imparted an influence which chastened and elevated him into a new and better life. [ 33 1 THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER IX SAN DIEGO WHEN land and ship expeditions arrived at San Diego a real experience in the great colonizing schemes was encountered. The men were in bad condition from poor food and water, thirty or more had died. The Indians had turned from friendliness to hostility and thieving. But zeal and energy were irresistible. On July 16 the cross was erected; in a temporary shelter of branches and reeds, in the presence of soldiers and sailors, mass was celebrated by Serra, and the bell was rung from the branch of a tree. All sung "Veni Creator"; the standard of royalty was planted and given to the winds, the water of the San Diego River running by the locality was blessed, firearms were discharged for the want of music, and the "smoke of powder was incense"; and so the ceremony of founding a mission was performed, and the land was claimed for God and the King of Spain, while the poor' Indian, dazed at the wonderful doings, stood helpless, while his hunting grounds and his personal liberty were taken from him without his consent, and without compensation. This was followed by the founding of a Mission. The location is in the San Diego canon, which runs from the south extension of the Santa Ana Range to the sea, a distance of sixty miles due east and west; the Mission is about ten miles from its mouth. The canon is enclosed the entire length by lines of high and precipitous bluffs; the bed is nearly a flat surface of one-half to three miles in width, watered by the river. From the neighboring mountains came the wild Indians who murdered Father Jayme. There is a grand and awe-inspiring view from the spot where the cross of the Redeemer was first raised, with its face to the ocean and its rear to the mountains in California. It is two miles north of the old town, and four miles from the new town on the T34] Photo, by Hallett-Taylor Co., Co San Diego Mission SAN DIEGO bay. These old fathers knew almost by inspiration how to select the best Mission sites, elevated on high tablelands, surrounded by large areas of fruitful soil, abundance of pasture, vallevs well watered by nature's irrigation canals, and with the Mission zanjas to complete the system. Wherever practicable, the Missions were in view of the ocean, but always beyond the reach of the hostile guns of passing rovers sailing under a free flag. For the coast line was not well protected bv the international police in those days. About the middle of August the Indians made an attack on Serra and his assistants. They killed one Jose Maria, but were quickly repelled by the soldiers of the Mission. Subsequently they brought in their wounded to be cared for, and were won to amity and conversion by the kindness of Serra. In October, 1775, the wild Indians from the mountains east of the Mission, to the number of one thousand or more, attacked the settlement; they burned the buildings, robbed the church, and murdered Padre Jayme and two others. Again the kindness and forbearance of Serra prevailed against the spirit of vengeance inflaming the hearts of the viceroy and soldiers. He received orders to rebuild the Mission, and it was protected by a stronger garrison: Captain Rivera ordered twelve more soldiers to protect the workmen. The Mission Indians proved not to be of much account in fighting the wild Indians. Evidently the influence of Serra had weakened them for aggressive purposes. The new buildings were dedicated November 12, 1777, but improvements were going on for a series of years, and the establishment became, next to San Luis Rey, the leading Mission. Its old palms, germinated one hundred and thirty-six years ago, still stand in full vigor, waving their long, graceful branches and leaves aloft in the gentle winds from mountain and sea. They stand as silent sentinels, who have beheld very many deeds of good and evil, misery and happiness; but they unburden their memories to none. The principal building is about one hundred feet in length, from north to south. It stands upon a broad THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST mesa, fifty miles from the mountains, and ten miles from the ocean; its main entrance faces the south line of bluffs. Its walls of adobe are four feet thick at the foundation, and its windows and doorways are lined with burnt tiles. The architecture is Moorish, which is a blending of the various styles of many tribes of Northern Africa, modified by Spanish art. The main entrance was at the southern extremity. j^.11 the Missions of California were constructed after the Moorish style in general, but differing often in ground plans. The long, arched porch, sheltering the inmates from the noonday sun, and for resort in the cool evenings, was everywhere an important feature of the Mission. Fine and well-cultivated gardens and shaded walks were indispensable, as were also the orchards with their luxuriant fruits. The quarters of the Indians were in some convenient place contiguous to the Mission,' a walled-in space of sufficient area to give comfortable homes to all the neophytes that belonged to each Mission; and they were kept scrupulously clean. In 1800 the presidio of San Diego had a population of about two hundred, including officers, soldiers, and their families. These persons possessed property in horses, cattle, and domestic animals and fowls necessary to a life of comfort and plenty, and likewise had ample time for all the rude sports and plays characteristic of their times. Indeed, those were halcyon days for the soldier compared with the days in which the ordinary duties of his profession called him to other parts of the Spanish empire. And the humble Indian also had his days of delight in play and sports, intermixed in liberal profusion with his days of labor under the gentle rule of the padres. It has been a benevolent practice of the Church for centuries in every land where the cross prevailed to give its deserving devotees many days of festival in each year, which are instructive object lessons for their good, and promote the cause of the Church. Who would question its wisdom when not indulged to excess? In 1828 the Mission itself had in its care fifteen hundred Indians, and owned about twenty-eight thousand SAN DIEGO head of horses, cattle, and sheep, while it raised annually more than six thousand bushels of wheat, barleys and oats. All this was soon lost to the padres and converts, and to thousands of others who drew the very bread of life from the Missions, by the malevolent policy of the Mexican Government. All that now remains of this great and beneficent Mission, after a lapse of seventy years from the time when its wealth and its glory departed, is a small school for the education of Indian children, conducted by a loyal representative of the old padres, living in poverty, but faithful to duty and reverent toward the past. All else around the ill-fated locality is desolation and ruin. [37] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER X SAN CARLOS BORREMEO ON June 3, 1770, the second Mission according to Serra's plan, San Carlos Borremeo, was founded at Monterey. Serra himself was present and celebrated mass, at the conclusion of which Governor Portola proclaimed possession of the Bay of Monterey in the names of God and the King of Spain. 'The celebration of mass, the burning of incense, the ringing of bells (in this case hung from the branches of a tree), the chanting of " Veni Creator," and the blessing of the adjacent waters and land, with the formal proclamation of proprietorship in the names of God and the King, constituted the usual ceremony incident to the founding of a Mission. The chime of bells was ever an important feature with the padres in the founding and life of a Mission. These bells were brought from Spain, and were of the best Castile metal and workmanship. Their tones called the Indians to assemble at the Mission, and marked the hours for labor. By the melodies which they chimed the padres and their Indian followers chanted hymns of praise and songs of thanksgiving. Serra often said that he would have their ringing sound heard from the mountains to the sea, as it was God's invitation to the souls of heathen men and women to flee to Him and escape the wrath to come. These bells were of silver and bronze and other metallic mixtures, to give variety to their tones. San Carlos was the home Mission of Serra. For seventeen years he labored among the Missions, founding, advising, and encouraging; and when he at last returned, worn out with advancing years and care, [38] Photo, by Hallett-Taylor Co., Coronado San Carlos Mission, Monterey SAN CARLOS BORREMEO he came but to die. His end came peacefully on the twenty-eighth of August, 1784, and he was buried with becoming honors, at San Carlos, by the side of his life-long friend, Padre Crespi. His was a fine nature and noble soul, and he had devoted his life unselfishly and exhausted his energies for the well-being of his fellow-man. When the decree of secularization was issued in 1845, San Carlos was already considered an abandoned Mission. The priest in charge resided at Monterey, and though a sale of the property was ordered, there remained but little of value to dispose of in this manner. From that time until 1882 San Carlos remained an untenanted ruin ; but in that year the work of restoration was begun, and two years later the Mission was rededicated. Both of the church buildings — the one in Monterey and the one on the site of the old Mission in the Carmelo Valley — represent the finest type of Mission architecture. [39-] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XI SAN ANTONIO DE PADUA SAN ANTONIO DE PADUA was the third Mission in the order of founding, and was located in the beautiful valley of Santa Margarita, now called Los Robles, in the heart of the Santa Lucia range, on the fourteenth of July, 177 1 . This range runs from the San Fernando Mountains, twenty miles north of Los Angeles, northwest, to the Bay of Monterey. It is a wild and rugged region, far away from the ocean, and east of San Luis Obispo. The face of nature in all California can nowhere entertain the mind and please the eye of the tourist with a greater variety of scenery, from the most beautiful to the grand and sublime, than in the vicinity of this old Mission. The padres well knew how to worship the God of Nature in his works. "Los Robles" means the oak trees. There are many valleys and tablelands in California covered with stately oaks from fifty to one hundred feet apart, giving vistas for miles in every direction. They are called glade lands, and would gladden the hearts of ancient Druids. Such was the valley of the Mission of St. Anthony, with a mountain river winding through it, not affected by' the summer drought and famous for its hot medicinal springs. This Mission was on the regular line (though inland) from San Diego to Monterey, a deflection from the ocean route. Serra with his party left San Carlos and travelled south until he discovered the favored location, and then the ceremonies soon settled the question. In all the cases of founding Missions, the padres were necessarily dependent on Spain for supplies, except in the use of heavy building material, which was in the country around them. These supplies were brought to the padres at the few coast ports, mainly San Diego and Monterey, but in later years San Pedro was opened [4o] Photo, by Putnam Sf Valentine, Los Angele. San Antonio de Padua Missioi SAN ANTONIO DE PADUA to ships. The trained workmen were sent from Spain until the Indians had been made skilled mechanics, and it is a remarkable fact that they were very quick in imitation, and soon learned anything that was taught them. Many of them excelled in the finest art work, and in the course of time there was no limit to their usefulness. The soldier was necessary as a protection, but when the padres had gained influence and their converts became numerous, the occupation of the military was rendered useless. The "San Antonio" and the "San Carlos" were the chief reliance for supplies for the Missions in the incipiency of the scheme of civilization. The Mission never became rich and great, but was fairly prosperous until the decree of secularization. Its inland location was a hindrance to its development. It is now in a reasonable state of preservation, being visited monthly by a priest from old San Miguel, and occasionally by priests from other Missions. If it never was a great Mission, it has compensation in the minds of the imaginative by a tinge of romance hanging about its history such as none of the old Missions can surpass. [4i] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XII SAN GABRIEL, ARCANGEL THIS Mission was founded September 8, 1771. It is perhaps the most noted of all the Missions at this time, in that it comes often under the eye of both citizen and tourist. Located at the western entrance of a great and most lovely valley, and in the centre of population and travel in Southern California, it commands the attention of every one who would look upon desirable scenes and store the mind with happy pictures for the future. The valley is surpassingly beautiful, the lavishness of nature vying with the deftness of art in creating a pleasing picture. All who visit the temporal home of San Gabriel, the Archangel, muse with wonder upon its past, and go away with hearts enraptured with the romance and spiritual fictions of its history. At the College of San Fernando, in the City of Mexico, it was determined to dedicate a leading Mission to the Archangel, and for that purpose two prominent priests were instructed especially to visit Serra and indicate the purpose, besides assisting him in the task. The Mission was to be worthy of its exalted object. The priests arrived, and after an extensive search for the best location, they came at last to the San Gabriel River. A Mission was founded, after a change of plan and site, at the present locality. This was about the year 1775, neaI "ly a generation before the elaborate and commodious building now standing was finished. But the Mission work went on, and some five thousand Indians were taken into the Church in this period. The first convert was made about November, 1771. In 1806, Father Jose Maria Zalvidea, from San Fernando Mission, a man of great zeal and energy and kindly purpose, was installed at the head of the Mission, and under his directing care it entered upon a fine [42] Photos, by Hallett-Taflor Co , Coronado San Gabriel Mission. — Campanile, San Gabriel Mission SAN GABRIEL, ARCANGEL career of prosperity; its accumulations of wealth made it a Mission of the first class in power and influence. This choice spirit is represented by the padre so popular in "Ramona." All these Missions had a prominent feature in their architectural design, that of a great square tower at the main entrance of the large building, wifeh a dome roof; and in this tower were hung the bells, from three to six, according to the character of the Mission in respect to wealth and influence. The great building was in every case rectangular, with porches and corridors arranged for convenience. The Moorish plans and style always dominated the construction. This Mission is in very good condition, and cared for by the proper custodians, being used for regular services of the Church. Its surroundings are well kept, and it is really a picture to remember for a lifetime. The old mill about two miles north, in the hills, is a quaint structure as solid as the hills around it, but not in use for the original purpose. The pond and dam are as nearly intact as such relics of the past may be. The Mission is about four miles from Pasadena and nine from Los Angeles. It can be reached by electric roads and the railway from each of these cities, through orange groves, orchards, and vineyards, unrivalled in loveliness even in California. In its immediate vicinity eastward is the famous ranch of "Lucky Baldwin," Santa Anita, containing sixty thousand acres, in a scenic region as fair as the Garden of Eden. In 1898 there lived at the Mission an old priest of Spanish descent, but born at the Mission in 1807. He was educated there, entered the Church, and took orders. He was a man of medium height, slender, dark-complexioned, with fine forehead and countenance, courteous manner, and characteristic speech, which indicated his ancestry. He was learned and intellectual, with a mind stored with the events and legends of Mission days. Often, while seated at the table under the old Mission grape-vine, in a garden near the Mission building, then a pleasure resort, with a drop of the juice of the vine to warm the currents of life, he would relate story after story of the old times; and at the conclusion of each, with pathos in tone and solemnity in look, he would turn his [43] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST face upward and say, "My home is yonder in the skies. I have been waiting so long; when shall I go?" The memories of other days, when he had experienced so much of joy and sadness, — for he had seen the glory and shame of the brethren of his order, who had all departed, leaving him a solitary wreck behind, — seemed to overwhelm him with a sense of the burdens of his life, and he longed for his eternal rest. He had always lived at the Mission, and he clung to its fortunes through good and ill report. He occupied the apartments of the old padres, living and floating like a waif upon the sea of pious charity that in these latter days restored the decayed Mission to a faint semblance of its former condition. There was no bigotry in his nature. His love for humanity was boundless, and he prayed, hoped, and believed that all would in some way be finally saved. He had been a boyhood companion of Pio Pico, the last Mexican Governor of California. They had often played together under the old grape-vine, planted one hundred and thirty-four years ago, which now covers a framework sixty feet square. [44] SAN LUIS OBISPO DE TOLOSA CHAPTER XIII SAN LUIS OBISPO DE TOLOSA IN September, 1772, the great Mission of San Luis Obispo de Tolosa was founded on the coast, about one hundred and twenty miles south of the Gulf of Monterey. This port subsequently became important to commerce and trade. Padre Serra and Padre Cavalier, with a small party of soldiers such as invariably accompanied similar expeditions, started from Monterey in the latter part of August, and located the Mission on the first of September. The ceremonies were performed and the building was begun without delay. The Indians, trained by the Jesuits, and under the direction of Cavalier, were given the task of construction. A chapel, barracks for the five soldiers and corporal, and the house for the padres, were completed in a few months, and the natives were attracted to the place. Then followed the real work, and a nucleus of twenty converts was formed within a year. The soldier seldom interfered to ward off danger. He was, like the padre, a friend of the Indian, and such was his peaceful nature that trouble seldom occurred to call him into action. The native food products of the soil and the forest were furnished by the Indians in abundance, with no compensation asked except religious instruction and kind treatment at the Missions. An Arcadian atmosphere seemed to pervade all these spiritual outposts of the Church in California. The successful hunting of the terrible grizzly bear by the Spanish sharpshooters during the previous famine year at Monterey and the country about San Luis Obispo, and the feeding of the Indians, doubtless paved the way to kindly feeling between them and the Mission people. Harmony was promoted by the manner of ruling the Indians. The padres chose some natural leader among them in whom confidence could be reposed, and consigned to him control of a specified number, [45] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST holding him responsible for their good behavior. All offences against the laws and regulations of the Mission were reported by the leader, or alcaide, as he was designated, to the padres, who adjusted the penalty therefor. Much depended upon the moral force of the alcaide in this personal government, but results were in the main satisfactory. In classifying the Mission Indians, it must be remembered that there was found in the hidden places and caves of the mountains an Indian race known as the "Digger Indians," whose condition was far below that of the generality of tribes that peopled California and came within the range of Mission* influences. The Digger was an absolute savage, living upon seeds, herbs, and roots, and flesh that could be obtained with bows and arrows; when in extremity he would eat any living or dead thing, even reptiles and insects. He had the most debasing habits, was without morality or religion. He was inferior in the scale of being to even the Chuckchee of Siberia, or the tree dwarf of Central Africa. The Diggers must not be reckoned among the Mission Indians; they never were or could be such; they were never sought for by the padres, but were adjudged as beyond the redemptive influences of civilization. The infancy of this Mission was disastrous, although it was favorably planted in a naturally rich country, amid plenty of open and arable land, well watered, and ever enjoyed genial ocean breezes and temperate climate. Three different times were the buildings destroyed by fire, and as often rebuilt with indefatigable energy. In the consequent periods of adversity supplies were furnished generously from the common storehouses at San Diego and Monterey. These misfortunes aroused the inventive faculties of one of the old padres, whose name is now lamentably forgotten. He discovered, after many trials and failures, a method of making roof tiles, which were substituted for the former combustible coverings made from tules and willows. This insured safety for the future. Then commenced a long period of progress, prosperity, the gathering of wealth, and the winning of hundreds of heathen souls for the vineyard of Mother Church. [46] Photo, by Putnam £f Valentine, Los Angeles San Luis Obispo Mission SAN LUIS OBISPO DE TOLOSA Padre Luis Martinez was the popular hero of that day among the worldly class. He had keen, practical sense, genial humor, and was given to generous hospitality that made him many friends. But alas, his rascally prudence in providing for his expected "rainy day" brought him into ill-favor with the more spiritual and elect. He was sent away from the Mission and from the Indians, whom he reallv loved and for whom he had labored. He closed his kindly but somewhat misguided life in Madrid, in some disrepute. But it goes far in his favor that around the neighborhood of the old Mission, at this distant day, local tradition still whispers words of praise in behalf of the much-loved old padre. The Mission overlooks La Canada de los Osos, the Valley of the Bears, — the grizzlies. It was a very beautiful and fertile expanse, the mountains bordering closely on the east, and the seacoast several miles away to the west. Those who would like to know more of the happy scenes which sometimes enlivened the old Mission life would do well to read in Helen Hunt Jackson's "Ramona" the description of a procession of domestic animals and fowls, organized by Father Martinez. The great Mission now lies in ruins, its good work nearly forgotten, and like the fame of "Our Lord the Bishop" to perpetuate which in a pious spirit it was erected, it is silently passing into utter oblivion. [47] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XIV SAN FRANCISCO DE ASIS SAN FRANCISCO DE ASIS was founded by Padre Palou on the ninth of October, 1776, on the Bay of San Francisco. The name was bestowed in honor of the founder of the Franciscan Order. For the first year the little band which formed the nucleus of the Mission experienced hard treatment at the hands of the Indians, still on the arrival of Serra in 1777 there were presented before him seventeen converts for baptism. The first church built was not precisely on the Mission's present site, and the Lake Dolores of that day has disappeared as the city of San Francisco has grown up about its shores. In 1782 the corner-stone of a new church edifice was laid. The Mission was twice visited by the discoverer Vancouver, and he has left a full account of the condition in which he found the Mission Indians and the industries in which they had been instructed by the padres. The Indians and the Spanish authorities were continually at war with one another, and in the years preceding the secularization of San Francisco, in 1835, tnere was a great falling away in the number of neophytes attached to the Mission. At the passing of San Francisco into the hands of the Americans, in 1845, there remained but a remnant of the old Mission Dolores. [48] Photos, by Hallett-Taylor Co., Corona Jo Musical Wheel, Matracha, and Music Books, San Juan Capistrano Mission. — Dolores, or San Francisco de Asis, Mission SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO CHAPTER XV SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO was founded November i, 1776, by Serra, assisted by Amirrio. A commission of priests was sent from Monterey the year before to find a place for another Mission north of San Diego, in pursuance of a modified plan of establishing a line of Missions between the two points, of such distance apart as to make the journeys convenient and easy. The original plan was to found but one Mission. This was subsequently considered inadequate for the general purposes of colonization and the work of the Church, and several Missions had already been founded under the plans as modified. This commission was instructed to name the Mission San Juan Capistrano, and they selected the location upon a circle of hills overlooking a beautiful valley running to the ocean, sixty-five miles south of Los Angeles. The outbreak of the Indians at San Diego occurred at this time, the report of which deferred further action until about a year later. Then the work of construction was commenced, and was carried on mostly by the Indians under the direction of the padres. But two buildings were begun; however, they were extensive, and the long line of corridors with triple archwork, though in ruins, is still the wonder of the engineer and the architect. The walls are massive and constructed of stone and mortar, but the earthquake of December 8, 18 12, did much damage. The tower and one of the great domes fell in upon the Indian congregation at prayer, crushing about forty under the weight of masonry. The same earthquake also wrecked other Missions. All this constructive work was the result of training heathen brains and hands to carry out the designs of the educated padres. The main building, the church, is in the form of a Roman cross, and its construction [49] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST and decoration place San Juan Capistrano in the forefront as the finest example of Mission-building now standing. The carvings and cut-stone work indicate that only masters of their craft were employed in the building here. The quadrangle was surrounded by lines of arches which present features not to be found in the arches of any other Mission. The honor of conferring the name was given to Don Portola, the first Governor, who discovered the locality on his trip of observation from San Diego to Monterey in 1770. He was struck with the beauty of the region, the fertility of the soil, its contiguity with the sea, and a natural port for the anchorage of ships. The place is one of the most remarkable of this productive State. San Juan Capistrano, even after the earthquake shock and a century of decay, surpasses many of the Missions. In progress, wealth, and spiritual harvest it kept pace in the days of its prosperity with other leading Missions. A chapel still remains, restored from the ruins, and services are held there by an itinerant priest. It is one of the favorite resorts of tourists. [5o] Photo, by Hallett-Taylor Co., Coronado Two Views of San Juan Capistrano Missioi SANTA CLARA CHAPTER XVI SANTA CLARA SANTA CLARA was founded in the following year, 1777. Padre Tomas de la Pena officiated at the ceremonies, seven years before the death of Junipero Serra. This Mission is in Santa Clara County, three miles from San Jose, the county seat. The two places are connected by an old boulevard made by the padres, and lined on each side by a triple row of trees, planted in the last quarter of the eighteenth century, equidistant from each other, on opposite sides of the roadway. They are now of great height, shading the entire route. An old legend says that they were intended as a hedge to protect the traveller from the wild cattle. The boulevard is one hundred feet wide, and in the days of the padres the surface was kept clean and smooth as a promenade. It was called "Alameda," — the pleasant way. The location of this Mission affords another example of the excellent judgment and taste of the old padres in the selection of sites for their Mission homes. There is no more enchanting valley on earth than this one in Santa Clara County. On the sixth of January, Padre Tomas and Lieutenant Moraga, with ten soldiers, selected the site; another padre, Jose Murguia, with a party soon came from San Carlos with provisions and supplies for the little colony, but Padre Tomas de la Pena with becoming ceremony founded the Mission ; and the buildings were completed in due course. Here again the trained heathen's hand and brain were utilized in the construction of this, as they were in that of all the Missions, except the first few that were built, before the necessary educational process and experience had prepared the Indian for the work. Conversion and baptism went on apace, and the padres were made happy by the salvation of many native souls. [SO THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST The Mission thrived from the beginning until the Spring of 1779, when excessive rains and floods caused by the melting of the heavy snows in the mountains destroyed their buildings and improvements, causing great loss. In consequence, other buildings, including a very beautiful church on more elevated ground, were constructed, and President Serra, with Padre Pena and his old friend and biographer, Padre Palou, led in the ceremonies of dedication. The architect, Father Murguia, died after the completion of the structure, and now lies buried under its walls. An earthquake wrecked these buildings in 181 8, but the Mission was restored by erections on a more generous scale in 1825 and 1826. -All now lie in moss-grown ruins, which stir mournful memories and regretful thoughts in the minds of those who visit them in these latter days. Santa Clara Mission had an exciting experience with its Indian converts not realized to any extent by the other Missions. Yoscolo, who was educated at the Mission, — a strong character, — was named the alcaide, or chief of the Indians controlled by the Mission, but rebelled against the authority of the padres; with a thousand Indians, armed with bows and arrows, he attacked the Mission and robbed it of such stores and supplies as the rebels cared for and could take with them. Meeting with no serious opposition, they invaded the convent where the Indian girls lived, and ignoring the padres' system, which allowed the girls to select for themselves if they were inclined to matrimony, they adopted the method of the Romans who seized the Sabine women, and captured more than three hundred of them, many of whom may have been willing victims. Then, herding three thousand head of cattle and five hundred horses, they fled to the mountains near Mariposa, afterwards General John C. Fremont's noted ranch claim. About the same time Stanislaus, another Indian leader, deserted from the Mission of San Jose, gathered some three thousand Indians at Mariposa, and united his forces with those of Yoscolo, who was chief of the native armies. General Vallijo of the Mexican army, and resident commander, with about three hundred soldiers, started after the rebels, but Photo, by Putnam &> Valentine, Los Angeles Santa Clara Mission From an Old Print SANTA CLARA was outwitted by them, and they escaped into the hidden recesses of the mountains, and were lost to the Mexicans. Later, Yoscolo, who seems to have been something of a strategist and fighter, and doubtless encouraged by his good fortune, made another raid on the Santa Clara Mission, and was again successful in looting and carrying away large quantities of stores and valuable goods. He retreated to the Santa Cruz Mountains, near Los Gatos, at the mouth of a great cation leading through these mountains. The locality of Los Gatos ("the home of the cats") appears to have been the rendezvous and breeding-place of innumerable wild cats, dangerous even to the hunter. Still later Yoscolo, exalted by his good fortune, and destitute of gratitude toward the Mission fathers for their former kindness, made another raid. This last adventure awoke the sleeping and peaceful energies of the Mission and the native Californians, so that Juan Prado Mesa, the commander of the Mission, organized a force and followed the rebels to the mountains. A battle ensued; with the true tactics of a good soldier, Yoscolo formed a square, ordered his Indians to fight lying down, and behind rocks and trees. 'A fierce conflict resulted, but bows and arrows could not compete with the flintlock arms of the time. A day's battle, in which the Indians evinced great courage and tenacity of purpose, until their rude weapons were exhausted, ended in surrender to the Mission forces. Yoscolo was wounded and taken, and according to the usages of those times, he and the leading members of his army were at once beheaded; the others were taken to the Mission to undergo anew the process of conversion after due punishment for their sins. Yoscolo's head was set on the top of a pole planted near the front door of Santa Clara church, to terrorize other Indians inclined to evil-doing and rebellion against Mission authority. In 1839, in execution of the decree of secularization, issued some years prior to this time, Don Jose Ramon [SSI THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST Estrada, the legally constituted commissioner, gave away, or sold to his friends and followers, the rich lands and other property of the Mission. The padres voluntarily abandoned their homes in most instances when they saw their work destroyed and their opportunity gone. The Indians, vainly protesting, were driven away to encounter poverty, suffering, and ultimate extinction. Decay and speedy ruin came to the Mission. This, in brief, was the end of all the heroic, sublime, and unselfish labors of the Franciscan fathers to redeem and civilize the savage tribes of California. The bitter experience of the Santa Clara Mission with the rebels was without doubt due to the fact that the greater portion of the converts were mountain-bred Indians, whose nature and habits were more savage, cruel, and warlike than those of tribes living in other localities, more favorable by nature to their support. The modern Santa Clara has, within sight of the old Mission ruins, a Catholic College, with extensive grounds and magnificent buildings, and a faculty famed for its piety and learning. Within its boundary lines are many acres adorned with statuary, and planted with trees shading pleasant walks; fountains refreshing the air and pleasing 'the eye; flowers everywhere lending their fragrance to the breath of life; vines laden with the nectar of the gods; rare plants and beautiful shrubbery; while here and there, standing in stately height and native vigor, widely spreading its branches, is the antique oak, whose length of days extends to centuries. This picture of beauty, power, and progress represents the Mother Church of our times; the old ruins near by represent the same Church more than a hundred years ago; this, the loss of a rude but precious civilization ; that, the achievements of a living race with a splendid civilization alike precious and, we trust, far more enduring. The Church has made her record in each. [54] SAN BUENAVENTURA CHAPTER XVII SAN BUENAVENTURA IN 1779 Serra — after many political changes in the officials and plans for California, in which Governqr Portola was displaced by Don Teodore de Croix as Governor-General, with residence in Sonora — and his good friend, Viceroy Bucarelidead, received orders to found three Missions on the Channel of Santa Barbara. Captain Rivera recruited eighty men for that purpose, and to help Serra in locating and building the Missions. San Buenaventura was so situated as to form a link in the original chain of Missions which Serra ardently desired along the two hundred leagues of coast from Mexico northward, so as to meet the necessities of all the Indians living there, who he learned were more readily reclaimed than inland tribes and mountain Indians. Governor Portola, on his return from Monterey, reported to Serra very favorably of the Channel Indians, as being peaceable, some of them advanced in stonework and quite skilful in woodwork, living in decent houses, and expert with canoes. They had informed him, by tracings in the sand, of Vizcaino's visit nearly one hundred and seventy-five years before. Serra was greatly interested, but he did not finally get permission to build until Governor Neve informed him in February, 1783, that he would help in founding the Missions of San Buenaventura and Santa Barbara. He proceeded to the former place, and on the twenty-ninth of March, 1783, with imposing ceremony and a great attendance of soldiers and Indians, and Padre Cambon from the Philippine Islands, he dedicated San Buenaventura Mission to God and St. Joseph. In 1802 this Mission had greater and finer herds, fields of grain, gardens, and orchards than any other. Fathers Dumertz and Vicente de Santa Maria were in control, and for many years they made the enterprise a [55] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST success, and the Mission rapidly increased in wealth and importance. They were on the seacoast in the midst of a country most prolific in all the products of the soil. They controlled the great Santa Clara Valley; they likewise controlled other rich valleys between the Santa Inez Mountains and the ocean, and from Newhall to Monticello. San Buenaventura Mission has suffered from fire and earthquake, the former during the life of Padre Senan, when the buildings were all but completely destroyed; and the latter during the general disturbance in 1812, when so many of the Missions experienced serious damage. For a time the padres dared not trust their lives beneath the shattered walls, and in the end the church and tower were razed and built anew. These walls were so massive that they resisted the cannon shots with hardly a scar, in the battle between Carrillo and Alvarado in the Spring of 1838. The beautiful altar in the chapel was the envy of all the Missions. The buildings are now in a good state of preservation. The church is finely decorated and painted outside and in, but the decorations have so modernized it that the mediaeval character of the structure is lost except in the doorways, confessional, baptistery, and bell vaults in the tower. Services are held here regularly as of old. The place is a glorious relic, recalled from the past to bless with its memories the present and the future. [56] Photo, by Putnam & Valentine, Los Angeles San Buenaventura Mission SANTA BARBARA CHAPTER XVIII SANTA BARBARA IN April, 1782, Governor Neve, with sixty soldiers, arrived at Santa Barbara, thirty miles west by north of the new Ventura, so named, and built a presidio for the military protection of the Mission near the beach, which here curves to form a small bay. The site selected was not far from the old Indian mound, on a high mesa, upwards of a mile from the coast, commanding a view of the Santa Inez Mountains on the north, and the ocean in other directions for more than a hundred miles on a clear day. An electric railway now extends from the coast to the Mission. Monticello, to the east, is as sunny and romantic an incline of foothills as the eye rests upon in a thousand leagues of coast land. April 29, 1782, the Governor and soldiers and a great mass of wondering Indians looked on, while Padre Serra celebrated the usual mass and preached a sermon ; and then the Governor took possession of the country in the names of God and the King, the poor natives not realizing that they had so lost the hunting and fishing grounds possessed by them for ages. Serra expected the immediate building of the Mission, but the Governor determined that the presidio should first be built, to insure protection against the possibility that the aboriginal owners, when their wonderment had ceased, would raise the question of title. Serra, sad and grieved at the Governor's decision, submitted, called for a priest from San Juan Capistrano, and departed for Monterey. Once again he visited the site of the Mission, and even then no steps had been taken toward building. He shed many tears and in great earnestness prayed the Lord to "send forthwith laborers to His vineyard." Again he departed [57] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST on foot, — his usual mode of travelling throughout his missionary's life. He was never able to see the seed planted by him in Santa Barbara bear blossom and fruitage, for he died on the twenty-eighth of August, 1784, yielding up to God a glorious life, which was nevertheless full of bitterness and disappointment. Father Palou, the biographer and dearest friend of Serra, was most fittingly appointed President of the Missions, but not until December 15, 1786, after Padre Fermin Francisco de Lasuen succeeded Palou, was the Mission of Santa Barbara in reality founded. In the ensuing year the buildings were erected, — a chapel, a kitchen, a servants' room, a granary, a house for the padres, and a house for unmarried women. All walls were three feet thick, of adobe, with heavy pole rafters and thatched roofs. Then many Indians were converted and joined the Mission. In 1788 the buildings were tiled, others erected, and three hundred and ten Indians were entered upon the register of the Mission. For several years the process of erection continued, until 1794, when a large church, in which- were several small chapels of elaborate construction and decorative design, completed the Mission buildings. Eight years later a massive stone reservoir of sufficient capacity for storing water for the gardens and orchards was built, receiving its supply of water from an aqueduct leading from the reservoir to the confluence of the East and West Mission creeks, having their sources high upon the Santa Inez Mountains, about two and a half miles distant, and supposed to form what the Spaniards at the time called the Pedragosa Creek. Some time later a dam was constructed across the creek a mile away, to hold water for operating a mill erected on a hill east of the Mission, and conducted there through the aqueduct. The reservoir used for irrigating the gardens and orchards was in front of the Mission buildings across the roadway, running past them to the mountains and east to Monticello and west to the old Mission of San Miguel, two leagues away, and to various points along the coast westward. The dam and conduits — as much of them as is not in ruins — are now used to furnish water for the city. The work served well the [58] Photo, by Hallett-Taylor Co., Coronado Santa Barbara Mission SANTA BARBARA original purpose, and suggested to the future generations the most advantageous lines upon which to draw their waters from the clouds and snows of the mountains. The quarters occupied by the Indians were in the rear and west of the main buildings, surrounded by adobe and stone walls, enclosing several acres, with comfortable houses suited to their use. All these are now repre- sented by lines of decayed rubbish and ruin, the last vestiges of the homes of the poor natives. The principal structures are still in good and habitable condition. Regular religious services are held there, and an excellent school is maintained for common and advanced instruction, open to all classes without distinction of creed. The Mission is no longer a ruin, but restored to a semblance of its ancient usefulness, when hundreds of God's prim- itive children clustered around it begging for shelter, food, and blessing. Its former prosperity was great, and tempted the avarice of both Spain and Mexico, until the claims became so extortionate and burdensome that the padres were often driven to the brink of despair, and the Indians brought to poverty. Spain plundered; but Mexico ruined. The wolves of the Government ravaged and devoured until the lambs of the Church became extinct. In 1853, by an order from Rome, the Mission was changed into a hospice, to become later an apostolic college for novitiates ; but having no ecclesiastical fund for support, the college made no progress. In 1885 it was annexed to the Order of the United States, officially centralized in the city of St. Louis, and is a beneficiary of the Province of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The city of Santa Barbara is the favorite residence of the old Mexican aristocracy in Southern California. The fertile plains and valleys and pastures around it, its even, balmy climate, and its location by the sea made it the attractive centre and practically the capital of the State during Mexican occupation succeeding the Mission days, though nominally the seat of the Government was at Monterey. lS9~] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XIX LA PURISIMA CONCEPCION LA PURISIMA CONCEPCION Mission was designed by Serra as one of the Channel series, but was not founded until December 8, 1787, three years after his death; and it was built not upon the coast but upon the Santa Inez River, north and beyond the mountains. The river is about one hundred miles long, rising in the mountains to the eastward, — a sort of nucleus, or hub of mountains at Newhall, into which run the Tehatchipe Range from the Sierra Nevada, the San Gabriel Range from the eastward, the San Fernando Range from the south, the Cuyhengo Range from the southeast, the Santa Inez Range from the west, and the Santa Lucia Range from the northwest, near Monterey. This mountain centre is the wildest and most rugged portion of the State outside of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. It seems to be the breeding-place of all the lesser ranges. The Santa Inez Valley, through which runs the river, is like an immensely wide and most hideously savage canon until it approaches Las Berros, on the river, the site of the Mission, a much wider part of the valley and a more open country. Many canons and smaller valleys enter the Santa Inez along its route from the eastern end to its mouth, where the valley and river reach the ocean. Along the western half of the Santa Inez Valley a wide stretch of open country unfolds to view, embracing many thousands of acres, consisting of valley, flat, rolling, and hill lands, exceedingly fertile, adapted to cultivation and pasturage, and extending to San Luis Obispo and beyond. Such, approximately, is the southwestern part of California available to the Missions for resources and Indian converts; but it is impossible to define clearly and accurately the trend of the ranges and localities of [60] Photo, by Putnam £f Valentine, Los Angeles La Purisima Concepcion Mission LA PURISIMA CONCEPCION the intervening lands without the aid of the contour map. In this region near the Santa Inez, are the Lompoc Colony and lands, one of the finest and most productive portions of the State. The first buildings erected were both crude and small, but in 1802 more extensive ones of adobe, tile-roofed, were completed and dedicated. The earthquake of 18 12 rent and tore the Mission and Indian houses to pieces, and to this were added the destructive forces of a great flood from the river, which completed the ruin. Padre Mariano Payeras was the supervising priest and a man of great energy; with the abiding faith of his Order in the results of indomitable labor, he entered on the work of reconstruction. He soon had provided warehouses for grain, which was in the process of harvesting when the disaster occurred, enclosures for several thousand head of cattle and sheep and horses, and dwellings for his Indians, numbering fifteen hundred or more. He also finished a stone structure, which was dedicated five years later, in 18 17, and used as a chapel, as a padres' house, and for other Mission purposes. It was in style, dimensions, and decoration the most modest of the Mission chapels in California. La Purisima prospered in amassing wealth and in making converts, and its location made it indispensable to the line of Missions, as they were projected and afterwards established. Doubtless its mis- fortunes from natural causes had much to do in subordinating its fortunes to those of the other Missions, while in time it became, like the others, a victim to the act of confiscation. In 1844 Governor Pio Pico was ordered by the home Government to restore the lands to the Indians, whose number was at that time reduced to about one hundred. But, without faith or hope in the future, the Indians declined the benefit of this belated act of conscience, and the lands were sold and rented. The United States Commissioners in 1856 restored the Mission buildings to the Church. They are now partially reconstructed and used for Mission purposes. The old Mission is reached from the south by the San Marco and the Goleta Passes through the Santa Inez Mountains, the one being ten and the other forty miles west of Santa Barbara. [61] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XX SANTA CRUZ SANTA CRUZ, on the Bay of Monterey, was inspired and planned by President Lasuen in his home in the San Francisco Mission. It was founded in the Autumn of 1791, with the .accustomed ceremony of a mass, chanting by neophytes from another Mission, and the raising of a cross on the spot over which the altar was designed to rest. Chief Sugert and a large following of his tribe attended, themselves representing the very people from which the good padres planned to recruit the company of their converts. The church was dedicated in May, 1794, in the presence of these same Indians, who on this occasion came as devotees. The Mission reached its zenith of influence five years after its founding, although it continued to acquire property in cattle and herds. Settlers encroached upon the lands of the Mission, and the padres retaliated upon the authorities who had permitted such a condition, until, eventually, in the Bouchard rising in 18 18, the Mission was robbed of every removable effect. A padre was murdered here in 18 12 by neophytes who pleaded having been most cruelly punished, but their claims were never established. In 1835 Ig na cio del Valle was commissioned to dispose of the property under the act of confiscation. The personal property inventoried fifty thousand dollars, of which it was agreed that ten thousand dollars should be given to the Indians. It is said that this amount was actually divided among them; but it is usually added, ironically, that the only apparent evidence of the division was to be found in their wretched condition. The tower fell in 1840, eleven years later the walls were wrecked, and since then the Mission has dropped into utter obscurity, and none so poor to do it reverence. [62] LA SOLEDAD CHAPTER XXI LA SOLEDAD LA SOLEDAD, Our Lady of Solitude, was founded on the ninth of October, 1791, midway between the Missions of San Antonio de Padua and Santa Clara. The site was located in a region of arid plains, which depended largely upon irrigation to make them fruitful. Padre Lasuen, who chose the site and later instituted the Mission, had abundant confidence in the possibilities of the region to produce good pasturage and crops when the padres and their Indian neophytes should have introduced a system of irrigation to supplement the insufficient rainfall. On the day when the Mission was founded a company of perhaps twelve earnest men gathered about a cross and altar, set upon the bare and deserted plain, — the sole human creatures in the vast barren waste which stretched away in all directions league upon league. Their faith must indeed have been large, that they chose this drear spot as the point at which to create a centre of usefulness and about which to gather the wretched and impoverished savages, who knew no jov, no hope, no comfort, — as civilized man knows such. At once the work of erecting adobe buildings was begun, and the padres proved indefatigable in their efforts to increase the holdings upon which the temporal welfare of the Mission depended. They found the pasturage for cattle and sheep fairly good, and well-nigh limitless in extent. Either the soil was not so good, or they were unable to introduce sufficient water for irrigating, for their crops seem not to have flourished as did those of other Missions. Surely there is no question concerning the faithful, persistent work of the padres and their Indian converts, who gathered about the Mission and threw in their destinies with it. Of these the [63] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST number steadily grew larger, in spite of an epidemic which made great ravages among them. As years went on the flocks and herds increased, until La Soledad reached a place among the prosperous Missions, proving the padres most excellent men of business. From its zenith of wealth and influence, about the year 1820, the Mission fell into decline, owing to the political chicanery which succeeded the just and gentle rule of the padres. When the decree of secularization took effect, in 1835, litt^ or no property remained, and La Soledad Mission passed into the hands of the Soberanes family. Padre Sarria, who had made his home at La Soledad during the years of its decline, — and his own as well, for he had quitted the high place he formerly held and had grown aged and feeble, — fell dead before the altar while upon his knees in prayer. Truly, the Mission house of Our Lady of Solitude had become desolate! The ruins of La Soledad Mission lie about four miles from the town of that name. The roof of the church has fallen in, and but a solitary arch remains of the once fine colonnade. Little remains but heaps of debris to tell its story to the visitor; but ruins have ever been eloquent to speak to the imagination of the active life which once stirred within walls now enclosing naught but empty solitude. [64] Photo, by Putnam fif Valentine, Los Angeles Ruins of La Soledad Mission SAN JOSE CHAPTER XXII SAN JOSE SAN JOSE Mission was dedicated to St. Joseph, the spouse of the Holy Virgin, June 11, 1797, by direct order from the Apostolic College at San Fernando. Padre. Lasuen founded it, and appointed Padres Isadore Barcenilla and Augustine Morino as priests in control of the Mission. It was the sister to Santa Clara, and situated three miles away, on the foothills of the Coast Range, where the beautiful city of San Jose is now located, and fifty miles south of San Francisco. The region is noted for its immense stretch of fertile and well-watered lands, upon which the flocks and herds could graze and wander in native pastures without limit, summer and winter. These were the resources from which the Missions prospered and amassed their wealth. Here Nature, again, with but little care, yielded bountifully her products to minister to the comfort and luxury of man. This Mission at an early day led many others in riches and in the influence these bestowed upon it. Hunting in the mountains and trapping on the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers were sources of considerable wealth. The great mountains around the open country tempered the climate and promoted health and vigor, while they stirred the soul with their awe-inspiring scenery. Stanislaus, the renegade leader, like Yoscolo of the Santa Clara Mission, was educated here. But he too, like his ingrate associate, turned on the hands that nurtured him, and in 1825, with a band of about one hundred Indians, raided the ranches and drove away hundreds of cattle and horses. The animals were some days afterwards recovered as a result of a battle between the robbers and a small force of twenty men led by Guillermo Castro, who subsequently became a Mexican General, and commanded the Mexican army against General John C. Fremont [65] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST in his famous bear campaign for the conquest of that part of California. It was a species of guerilla warfare in which Castro excelled by reason of his ability to hide in the mountain recesses beyond the reach of Fremont, who at last turned away to pursue his campaign more effectively in Southern California. San Jose Mission was originally a small wooden erection, roofed with mats made by the Indians, of strands of woven grasses stitched together; but about the year 1800 a new building was constructed. These ruins, although the Mission was simple and modest, and in no sense comparable with some others in size, cost, number, or magnificence of structure, have received more attention and been described in more glowing colors by writers and visitors than many another more extensive Mission. General Vallejo, the Comisionado, took possession of the Mission property in 1834, and found ten thousand head of cattle, four thousand horses, and twelve thousand sheep; there were also about two thousand converted Indians, — a most remarkable showing for a small Mission in thirty-seven years of existence. [66] Photo, by Putnam & Valentine, Los Angeles San Juan Bautista Mission SAN JUAN, BAUT1STA CHAPTER XXIII SAN JUAN, BAUTISTA SAN JUAN, Bautista, was founded in June, 1797. Its church, now in ruins, was built in 1800. Its site is at San Benito, in a beautiful locality in that county, and on the road from Castroville to Gilroy. President Lasuen and Padre Martianena performed the usual ceremony of dedication. The original buildings were of wood, with pole roofs; but in the beginning of the next century erections of adobe, stone, and mortar, with massive walls and tile roofs, were substituted. The charming feature of this Mission was its numerous bells, with their sweetness and variety of tone, from treble of light weight to bass of several thousand pounds. Some old master, skilled in the art of music and the manufacture of bells, had so contrived the relation and intermingling of tones that they resulted in composing a chime of incomparable sweetness. The bells were cast in Peru, — nine of them in the series. Subsequently some of the bells were recast, but the secret of the relation of metals, temper, and tones was lost, and the charm was broken. The fame of these bells was greater than that of the Mission. The bells have disappeared, and the ruins only remain. [67] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XXIV SAN MIGUEL NEARLY forty leagues north of Santa Barbara the Mission of San Miguel was founded on the twenty-fifth of July, 1797, in honor of the "Prince of the Heavenly Militia." The ceremonies were performed by President Lasuen and Padre Sitjar, and baptism was administered to fifteen children at the time. The Indians did not respond generally to the invitations of the padres; so Padre Martin went to the Chief Guchapa and begged him to send his Indians to the Mission, but met prompt refusal. Thereupon Commander de la Guerra sent a file of his soldiers and took the old chief prisoner. Then he came to terms, and promised to send his people, leaving his son as a hostage. But this method of forced conversion did not succeed well : the Mission made but little progress in its spiritual labors, and in truth not much in the acquisition of wealth. The country available was good, and extensive for sheep-pasturing, and a proper attention to this industry would have proven a sure road to riches. Yet the padres gave too much labor to raising grapes and making wine, and their section and climate were not well adapted to this fruit and this industry. In consequence, they were unable to pay their annual tribute to Mexico. They owned, in time, large flocks of sheep, but never pushed the industries of wool-raising and weaving, which would have produced their fortunes. San Miguel played a humble part in Mission life, but its reputation was spotless. [68] Photo, by Putnam & Valentine, Los Angeles San Miguel Mission SAN FERNANDO, REY DE ESPAGNA CHAPTER XXV SAN FERNANDO, RET DE ESPAGNA SAN FERNANDO was founded September 8, 1797. President Lasuen was in harmony with the plans of Serra to establish a series of Missions from the Mexican border to Monterey, and he dedicated this Mission to the King of Spain. The ruins of the adobe building now seen date back to 1806, when the erection thereof was completed. They stand in a valley as fertile and sunny as any in the State, a valley that is very great in extent and susceptible to cultivation throughout. Enclosed mainly by the San Fernando and Cuvhengo Ranges, it opens eastward through La Canada Pass to Pasadena and the San Gabriel Valley, and southward through Glendale Valley to Los Angeles. As a grain and fruit region it compares favorably with the other great valleys in the State. Thus it may be seen that the old Mission had exhaustless natural resources in soil, climate, and expansive lands to draw on in the development of its object, and for raising supplies for the padres and the native converts. The buildings, like many others, were badly shaken or destroyed by the earthquake of 18 12. The Mission was restored; and, as in some others of the first class, a magnificent corridor was attached like a wing to the principal building, which enclosed the chapel. The corridor was arched, and under its shade the padres were protected from the sun; here, too, they spent the cool evening hours in repose. The courtyard was refreshed by running water and a fine stone fountain. Shade trees of every description, indigenous to the soil and climate, and such as could be transplanted, or raised from imported seed, everywhere surrounded and interspersed the Mission grounds. Flowers indescribable in variety and perfume allured the vision and gave exquisite pleasure to the senses. Fruits of every kind were plentiful as the native [69] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST grasses. Indeed, this was one of the great Missions in all that nature and art could contribute to its growth and maturity. Founded in honor of a king who had been canonized by the pope, it could not be permitted to degenerate into inferiority and obscurity. It flourished and gathered property in flocks, herds, grain, wine, money, and other effects, until, in 1825, it was estimated to rank almost without a rival in wealth among its sister Missions. Its treasury held from one hundred and fifty to two hundred thousand dollars in cash and assets. The site of the Mission commands a view of nearly the entire valley, and to the ocean, and the islands from forty to eighty miles away. In 1846 the Mission was sold by Governor Pio Pico to Don Eulogio Celis for about twenty thousand dollars, and the sale was confirmed ultimately by the United States Commissioners, closing out the Mission forever. Its lands are now owned by many different people, and the entire valley is modernized by all the improvements of a higher civilization. Its location is about fifteen miles north of Los Angeles, and near the mountains. There is an old tradition that the padres found gold in these mountains; their mines are sometimes pointed 01ft, but no one cares to work them. Yet it is no doubt true that the Mexicans discovered gold here in considerable quantities before it was revealed in Sutter's Creek in 1848. However authentic the traditions, may be, the pursuit of gold in these localities has long since been abandoned. [7o] Photo, by Tutnam Gf Valentine, Los Angeles San Fernando Mission SAN LUIS, REY DE FRANCIA CHAPTER XXVI SAN LUIS, RET DE FRANCIA SAN LUIS, Rey de Francia, was founded June 13, 1798. This was the greatest, richest, and grandest of the old Missions, located in a most picturesque section, upon a beautiful site, not far from the ocean, at Oceanside, — now a little gem of a modern city. In the day of its glory and wealth it was the pride of all the Missions. Father Peyri during his long service of more than thirty 'years made it his home. The Mission possessed more than two hundred thousand acres, and as much more became subject to its control as its energies expanded. It owned and pastured upon its lands an annual average of twenty thousand head of cattle, and nearly as many sheep, with three thousand Indians to perform the various kinds of work needful to a self-supporting colony. All Missions once well started were expected to produce from their lands and industries all the comforts and as many of the luxuries as such primitive conditions of life made possible. In these respects all were successful. No Mission lived upon the charity of another, though their hospitality was proverbial. The annual crops of wheat, oats, barley and corn, potatoes, beans, and other products of the soil, were very many thousand bushels. In the year 1834, the Mission had thirty-five hundred Indians to support, and, as an old record shows, more than twenty-five thousand head of cattle, ten thousand horses, and ninety thousand sheep. It raised and harvested from its arable lands annually, in the zenith of its prosperity, more than sixty thousand bushels of grain, and two hundred and fifty barrels of wine from its vineyards. The grand and imposing structure was the church, one hundred and sixty feet long, fifty feet wide, and sixty feet in height, with walls four to five feet thick. The great tower in front had three stories, the upper [7i] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST two each containing four bells in a square room formed by the walls of the tower, where archways were cut in all sides; and a bell, hung back of these openings and vibrating in the air, could be heard for many miles. These bells performed all kinds of service in Mission work and worship, and were indispensable to the padres. The ornaments of the church in gold and silver were many and beautiful. In the chancel and behind the altar stood the cross, and upon it the image of Christ, of life size, modelled in wood, exquisitely painted and fashioned, to make the resemblance to life nearly perfect. The altar was approached by steps made to resemble red granite. An old pulpit of wood, curiously made, said to have been used in a church in Constantinople during the Middle Ages, and occupied at different times by several of the most learned and pious of the priesthood that have since been canonized by the popes, hung upon the wall to the right of the altar, facing the Indians. It was entered by a stairway from the space at the end of the altar. It was revered as a most precious relic, and richly trimmed in gold. The walls and ceiling of the structure were adorned with many and various images, mottoes, and precepts illustrating the creed, ceremonies, and history of the Church. On one side of the structure extended a corridor of two hundred and fifty arches. This alone certainly indicates the vast space covered by the buildings. In the rear of the church was a great square containing several acres, enclosed by a row of buildings on each side. The front and rear lines were constructed in the form of corridors with superb arches. The ground enclosed was used as one of the gardens of the Mission, and entered from the corridors, a favorite resort of the padres. The air therein was moistened by the waters of an immense stone fountain in the centre, — water brought through a conduit from the mountains. San Luis Rey was known as "the kingly Mission." Its boundless possessions of land, great number of converts, vast riches in almost every kind of personal property, great influence in the councils of the Church, and perhaps its wonderful success in the management of its resources, spiritually and otherwise, gave it a [72] Photo, by Halktt-Taylor Co., Coronado San Luis Rey Mission SAN LUIS, REY DE FRANCIA celebrity surpassing that of all other Missions. When the order of" secularization was about to be carried into effect, and notice was sent to Padre Peyri, he determined at once to leave his home of thirty years, with all its loved and bitter memories. Dreading the parting with his Indians, who had become to him as dear as children, he started away in the night for San Diego, forty-five miles distant, unknown to them, and hoped thus to escape the agony of separation. The secret of his flight was soon known, and several hundred of them rushed to their horses and hastened in pursuit. They reached the Bay of San Diego in time to see Father Peyri on board the ship, then weighing anchor for Spain. From the deck he blessed them, and bade them farewell in tears and lamentations. Some of them swam to the ship, and were taken on board; they went to Rome, never to return again. None but Serra in all this noble band endeared himself to the poor Indian like Peyri. The process of restoration of the Mission began in 1892. Father O'Keefe, the popular priest who long presided over the reviving fortunes of Santa Barbara Mission, and was so kindly known to tourists, became the manager at San Luis Rey in the period of reconstruction. The work advanced so rapidly that on the twelfth of May, 1894, the Mission was again dedicated, and title thereto delivered to the Franciscan Order. It is stated that some old Indian women were there who had been present at the dedication ceremonies nearly one hundred years before. The old Moorish dome over the chancel in the church has been restored, and such other buildings added as would serve the new purpose of the Mission, all resembling as nearly as possible the original designs in the arrangement of grounds and erections. The brown mountains, the lovely valley, and the pure snow waters of the river flowing around the elevation upon which the white-domed and tile-roofed homes of the old padres in far-off days rested, will remain in their beauty and grandeur until the end of time, but will not outlive the pious memories and pathetic fate of San Luis, which was destroyed while nourishing a civilization that promised so much to pagan races. [73] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XXVII SAN JOSE DE GUADALVPE SAN JOSE DE GUADALUPE Mission was founded June n, 1797. It was situated about twenty miles northeast of what is now the city of San Jose, in the foothills. The first building was of wood, with a thatched roof; the adobe church was not completed and dedicated until 1809. The number of converts promised success from the first, and steadily increased until, in 1824, the population settled about the Mission amounted to nearly two thousand souls. In 1805 a padre and a small escort of soldiers and Indians were attacked, one soldier being killed. This was the first overt act of hostility on the part of the Indians, and swift retaliation was meted out to the offenders. Although situated in a territory continually embroiled in petty warfare between the Indians and settlers, San Jose enjoyed great prosperity. Little remains of the old structures, but many fine old olive-trees of the padres' planting still yield a considerable income to local institutions belonging to the Church. [74] Photo, by Futnam & Valentine, Los Angeles Santa Inez Mission I SANTA INEZ CHAPTER XXVIII SANTA INEZ THE Santa Inez Mission was not comprehended in the original plan of the padres, but nearly thirty years after the founding of the first three Missions, a colony of several families that had years before located on lands in the valley of the Santa Inez, about forty miles northwest of Santa Barbara, and beyond the mountains, appealed to the President of the Missions for the founding of one in their vicinity. They argued that they, being baptized families, were entitled to the rites of divine worship without undergoing the hardship and inconvenience of frequent trips to Santa Barbara, or La Purisima, each of which was many miles away from them. The petition was granted, and on September 17, 1804, the new Mission of Santa Inez was founded in that valley, and dedicated to St. Agnes. One hundred and fifty persons were entered on the records, and a church was immediately started. The new colony flourished, but the earthquake of 1812 so shattered the walls of their buildings that they had to be rebuilt. The Mission prospered in flocks and herds for about fifteen years, when it appeared by one record that it had accumulated twenty-five thousand cattle, fifteen thousand sheep, and twenty-five hundred horses, and a great deal of other personal property, the flocks and herds and lands at all times constituting the basis of its wealth. The Indians in 1824 became discontented and troublesome, and many of them left the Mission. The buildings were burned and otherwise destroyed to a great extent and never fully restored. Many Indians left and never returned. The work of conversion languished, but the riches of the Mission grew in magnitude until the day of secularization. [75] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XXIX SAN RAFAEL, ARC ANGEL SAN RAFAEL, founded December 17, 18 17, by Father Luis Taboada, was intended to be but a temporary abiding-place, on the north side of the bay, in a nook sheltered from the rough ocean winds by the mountains around it. At the time a great pestilence prevailed among the Indian converts at Yerba Buena, — the old Spanish name for San Francisco, — and the sick were removed to San Rafael to be refreshed by its balmy breezes. It was designed to be a part — an asistencia — of San Francisco Mission, or the Mission Dolores, across the bay. Although no written evidence remains that it ever was raised to the status of a Mission, it was so occupied for seventeen years, and then became a parish of the first class. General John C. Fremont spent a week here in 1846. The buildings were never pretentious, and have ill withstood neglect and the passage of years. Only a part of the pear orchard planted by the padres remains of the old Mission property. The former site of San Rafael is now a beautiful city, the home of many persons who are engaged in business across the bay. [76] CHAPELS CHAPTER XXX CHAPELS OUTLYING among the Missions, stations among the far-distant ones, or on the frontiers, were chapels, or asistencias, such as were not organized as Missions. The principal ones were as follows: San Antonio de Pala was an offshoot of San Luis Rey, built in 1 8 1 6 by Father Peyri as a chapel for the Indians who lived in the mountains twenty miles away. Bells were hung in the tower to call them to worship. It had none of the buildings necessary to a Mission, nor ever made pretensions to the name. It remains there still, kept in habitable condition for service by a few families of natives living in a neighboring village. Old paintings are hanging on the walls, and there is an image of Antonio Pala, the soldier-priest, its patron saint; also a statue in olivewood, made in Spain, of St. Louis, the French king of pious fame and memory in earlier centuries. There are still left old copper, brass, iron, and wood mementos of the past, some of which do not indicate their use, but are precious to the Indian worshippers. The building is long, narrow, and dark within, but serves for the purpose of divine worship. Now, after the lapse of a hundred years, the few descendants of the old Mission converts gather there on Sundays and fete days to do reverence and to rehearse the joys and glories that are gone. San Francisco Solano, dedicated to the patron saint of the Indies, April 4, 1814, was from its birth under the shadow of those events which doomed all the Missions. Its life was blameless, and not without beneficent results. Its ruins are scarcely traceable, and only dim memory holds record of its former existence. San Miguel Chapel, some six miles from Santa Barbara, was built in 1803. San Miguelito Chapel, built [77] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST in 1809, was one of several asistencias appertaining to San Luis Obispo. Santa Isabel, forty miles from San Diego, was built in 1822. At the Indian village of Mesa Grande is a chapel dedicated to Santo Domingo. Los Angeles Chapel was never a Mission, but a chapel designed for the veteran soldiers of the King as a place of worship. The first movement in their behalf was made in 1 811, and in August, 18 14, the corner-stone was laid and blessed. Years passed, nothing occurring but agitation from time to time. At last a chapel was built, and dedicated on the eighth of December, 1822. Los Angeles was then a small village of less than one thousand inhabitants. San Bernardino, or Politana, Chapel was established by the padres from San Gabriel Mission as a stopping- place and supply station for travellers overland across the desert. In 18 10 the buildings and cultivated lands were destroyed and laid waste by fanatical Indians, incited to revolt by the medicine men of a mountain tribe Ten years later a new site, eight miles from the old, was chosen, and new buildings were erected. For eleven years this establishment prospered, when the fate which had befallen its predecessor swept it alike to ruin. It was rebuilt directly and in such a manner and with walls of such strength that it became the proud boast of its constructors that it would never again need to fear an attack, ever so fierce, from its Indian foes. But a force of unheard-of strength for that day and country came against it in 1834, and destroyed the buildings and put their defenders to flight. No further attempt has ever been made to rebuild or rehabilitate the old Chapel, and even the ruins are fast disappearing. One more of these old Chapels was built, in the Santa Margarita Valley, in San Luis Obispo County. The Sierra Santa Lucia encircles the valley, which presents a rural landscape lovely beyond comparison." This chapel probably consisted of several buildings, erected solely for the Indians who lived far from the Mission of that region. [78] Photo, by Putnam & Valentine, Los Angeles Los Angeles Chapel, from the Plaza THE MISSIONS OF LOWER CALIFORNIA CHAPTER XXXI THE MISSIONS OF LOWER CALIFORNIA LOWER California was the field of the greatest and most patient efforts of the Jesuit missionaries for nearly a century. Their work was very systematic, and more successful than that of other Missions in the Southwest, except in some portions of central Mexico, where greater enlightenment prevailed among the natives. The country is a waste of mountains, sand plains, canons, gulches, valleys, and broken surfaces, with but few, small, and scanty streams, and rivers oftentimes waterless. One hundred degrees is a common temperature in summer, and much of the time it is higher. The tribes that peopled this hideous wilderness were as degraded as the reptile-eaters among the wilds of the Amazon. Their religion was a crude necromancy, and they had no rational ideas of a Supreme Being. In 1683 an expedition consisting of one hundred settlers of the poorer classes, led by three Jesuit priests, sailed for the peninsula. They found fresh water — a rarity — and a safe harbor. The natives, who looked like starved wolves, soon became hostile, and collisions occurred in which several were killed. The colonists deserted the fort and made another settlement sixty miles up the gulf. The natives here gathered daily for instruction, and some five hundred desired to be Christians. But the exploring parties which went into the outer districts found desolation everywhere, and the colony was abandoned. Thus the heroic and loyal Jesuits met their first defeat on the desert peninsula. About 1688, Spain succeeded in effecting the colonization of the peninsula. Mission work was carried on [79] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST for nearly a hundred years, under the control of the Jesuits, or until their removal by Charles III, in 1767. Mission work continued five years under the Franciscans, but its energies were steadily ebbing away. Thereafter, under the authority of the Dominicans in a brief and troublous period, it ceased to exist. Under the Jesuits the Missions were a triumph against nature. Father Kuehn was the master spirit that accomplished the result. He was daring to the utmost of his convictions. In zeal, ability, and practical energy he was perhaps without a peer among the missionaries. He wandered alone, or with a few docile Indians, in the wilds of northern Mexico, and mapped out regions never before trodden by the foot of the white man, and that with an accuracy not questioned in modern geography. He only knew that souls there were perishing for the bread of life. To save them was his inspiring motive. During three generations many Missions were planted, and they prospered beyond measure; then a spirit of unrest came, and culminated in a general war against civilization. The Apaches were raiding everywhere; many Missions were destroyed, and the reclaiming influences of a century were obliterated. Thereafter Father Salvatierra, who was experienced by previous mission work, promptly assumed the responsibility of carrying on the work of the Missions in the peninsula. Father Kuehn, who had been removed to the opposite side of the gulf, labored unceasingly, became the supreme leader among white men and Indians, translated languages of several tribes, founded villages and churches, and within a few years had converted more than fifty thousand savages and reduced them to orderly life. Even the fierce Apaches esteemed him as their good and trusted friend. All this time Salvatierra was fruitlessly working to obtain authority and help for his Mission movement. The Superiors were against it; the Government detested it. At last the General of the Order directed the Provincial in Mexico to allow Salvatierra to found the Missions, and after a long and tedious struggle, the [80] Photo, by Putnam £jf Valentine, Los Angeles The Pelfry, Pala Chapel THE MISSIONS OF LOWER CALIFORNIA Father raised donations from pious individuals, and converted them into a fund for the support of the Missions. This was called the Pious Fund of California, a fund that has been subject to many vicissitudes during two hundred years. It had increased in 1842 to about $ 1,700,000, when it was confiscated for the Mexican Government. Later, when the terms of peace between Mexico and the United States were being adjusted, the former held that the United States had become liable for the fund, and should account for it to the Catholic Church of California. A few years ago the question of liability was submitted to the Hague Tribunal, which decided that payment must be made by the Government of Mexico, and such payment to the Church was accordingly made. Salvatierra had builded better than he knew with the Pious Fund. The Viceroy and council were prevailed upon to issue the license, and at last the heathen of the peninsula were to know the white man's God. In 1697 Salvatierra, with another priest, Father Piccolo, selected a Mission site on a small bay at Carmen, near an island of that name. There was a spring of fresh water here, and quite a growth of vegetation indigenous to the locality. Salvatierra gave his settlement the name of Loretto, in honor of Our Lady of Loretto, whose special blessing he had invoked to aid him in his mission work. By irrigation from the spring he could have a little garden and a fruit orchard. His colony consisted of himself, Piccolo, six men, and three Mission Indians, each of a different race or tribe. Salvatierra supervised everything and joined in all labors but bearing arms for defence. A big tent was used as a chapel, where Salvatierra said mass. The natives made no demonstrations of friendship or hostility. Salvatierra tried to talk with the Indians, explaining his own language and acquiring theirs. They often made sport of him, which he bore with patience. When the conversation was closed, he would feed them with boiled corn. This was ever the substantial food of the Missions and always in use, like [81] . THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST our wheat bread, but was grown on lands across the gulf. The natives, after the meal was over, would steal whatever they could reach, and escape with it. Several hundred natives who attacked the settlement were driven off; and a vessel arrived a few days afterwards with more men and a supply of provisions. This increased the colony to twenty-five men. Some pious citizen gave the Mission a small schooner for permanent use. The most serious obstacle to prosperous Mission labor was the nature and poverty of this wild country. Practically, the support of these Missions came from the Mexican provinces east of the gulf. At all times the supplies were scanty, and when the Pious Fund was not sufficient to meet emergencies, dependence was solely upon donations. Yet the Fund accumulated in the course of years ; it was so carefully managed by the Jesuit commission that, with occasional gifts, it supplied Palou, the Franciscan, to the extent of fifteen thousand dollars yearly. But the Missions were crippled for means of support and extension. The daily experience at Loretto was somewhat monotonous. The Indians came there to be taught. Piccolo took care of the children for instruction within the walls, for he seemed most adapted to this work, being gentle and affectionate toward the little ones; while Salvatierra discoursed outside with the adult natives about the doctrine of Christ and the customs of civilized life. Mass was recited on certain days, and every one could take part in an orderly way. After the exercises were over, boiled corn was given to the natives, and the hungry creatures probably relished this more than they did the services; but in time they appeared interested and desired to be accepted as converts. Religious progress was slow. When early summer came cactus berries were ripe; this was the most exuberant and delicious crop in those vast fields of desolation. No inducement could withhold the natives from the harvest. They were heedless of the salvation of their souls, and even of boiled corn, until they had feasted to repletion [82] THE MISSIONS OF LOWER CALIFORNIA upon the food of their gods. When this happv season was ended, they would turn their attention to the missionaries and listen to instruction, and the mission work again advanced. Loretto had become the spiritual luminary, and the only one in that benighted wilderness, but it could not enlighten the entire peninsula. Distant territory was therefore explored with a view to the founding of other Missions. Water was discovered about forty miles from Loretto sufficient to irrigate several acres, and it was utilized at once. Salvatierra had a house built for the priests' home, and a chapel. He likewise opened a road from the locality to Loretto. Father Piccolo took possession and began work among the natives. In 1700, Father Ugarte, who had been a prominent factor in Jesuit life in the City of Mexico, joined the Loretto Mission, and to his energy was attributed largely the creation of the Pious Fund. He was, like every member of his Order who was intended for important service, a finished scholar. Of gigantic build and incredible strength and daring, he was a terror to unruly natives; yet kind of heart and of gentle manners. It is said that, unable to find the Mission vessel after wandering on the coast for several hundred miles on foot, he procured a castaway boat, repaired it, and made the trip across the gulf to Loretto Bav, amid adverse currents, diverse winds, and perilous waters. Loretto was but a humble village at the time, with a storehouse and barracks, cottages for the workmen, and an adobe house for the priest. A few cattle and sheep from Sonora fed upon natural herbage near the springs and coast; but the land would yield to tillage. Such was the condition of these Missions at the close of the third year of their existence. When Ugarte arrived at the new Mission with soldiers and men, the natives fled to the hills. They were afraid, for they deserved punishment, and kept away until Ugarte quieted their fears and feasted them with boiled corn. He soon learned their language by the assistance of the children, who were ever ready to help him. Then he began to instruct them in his doctrines in a plain manner, and how to [83] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST form good habits, finishing each discourse with the toothsome boiled corn. Indeed, this was about the only food he had for his own use. He dug ditches for irrigation with his own hands, and taught the natives how to use the tools. This was fun to them for a time; and thus several acres were watered and cultivated. He bore their caprices with patience, treating them as wayward children. The founding of San Jose de Comondu, about sixty miles from Loretto, took place at this time. Water was available here; and Father Mayorga, who was in control, cleared land, made a farm with a vineyard, and built schools and a hospital. He established other settlements in the region, and visited them twice a week, with great benefit to the natives. After nearly thirty years of faithful work he died and was buried here among his Christian converts. About this time the old Mission hero, Father Kuehn, passed away. He is said to have converted more than fifty thousand Indians, travelled over twenty-five thousand miles in the wilderness of the Southwest, generally on foot, often alone, at all times shelterless but for the heavens above him. The schools at Loretto educated natives for the work of teaching, because there were not enough priests for the duty. The tribes of the North were most inclined to Christian instruction; those of the extreme South were disposed to be hostile. Through illness, Salvatierra could not visit these tribes, and while on his sick-bed he was called to Mexico by the Viceroy for consultation and full information of California. The brave old man, at seventy-two years of age, rose from his bed and started for the capital of Mexico, more than a thousand miles away. He made the journey on horseback and in a litter until he arrived at Guadalajara, but could go no farther. He sent Father Bravo to the Viceroy with full instructions in regard to his Missions, and then his spirit departed to God, who had inspired him with devotion to His cause in California for twenty years. This was in 1718. [84] THE MISSIONS OF LOWER CALIFORNIA Father Ugarte was left as Superior. He built a brig at Mulege, which lasted many years and was the best and safest on the gulf. This made it practicable to found a Mission at La Paz, one hundred miles south of Loretto. Father Bravo was placed in charge. He converted over one thousand there in a few years, until he was called to Loretto to relieve Father Piccolo. Another Mission was founded at this time on the Pacific coast, west of Mulege one hundred miles, — San Purisima Concepcion. Father Tamaral presided over its fortunes. He opened a road between these Missions, and the natives responded from every adjoining rancheria and from long distances into the north to their influence. In truth, Christianity seemed be in the atmosphere everywhere, and the Missions prospered greatly for many years. Like Ugarte, Tamaral laid out farms and made the old desert fruitful. At Huasiuipi Everard Heleu settled and, with his men, built a church and house. This became the Mission of San Guadalupe. The Governor (former Ensign Lorenzo) left five soldiers for protection because of the wildness and remoteness of the country where it was located. During the eight years Father Heleu labored he converted many hundred natives. At that time Father Guilen founded a Mission settlement between Malabat and La Paz and named it Dolores. The Indians were hostile, but Governor Lorenzo subdued them by burning their canoes. Many years afterwards almost every native had been converted, and defended Father Guilen and the Mission loyally in the war against the Pericus. Father Napoli was directed to found the Mission Santa Rosa at the Bay of Palms among the Pericus. They were belligerent, and against the new faith. They were likewise polygamists, though polygamy was not general on the peninsula. The Father had entered a sterile field for souls, and in several years converted less than a hundred Pericus. [8 5 ] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST New Missions were now formed by the Marquis de Villa and the Mexican Luyando, who joined the Society of Jesus and devoted his life to the Mission his family had endowed. Ugarte removed his headquarters two hundred miles to the north and founded the Mission of San Ignacio, near Kada Kaaman. This became the Mission of Father Luyando. He was received in joy by hundreds of the natives, and some partook of the sacrament. There were, however, some who practised necromancy, and were in deadly enmity with the Missions, which they told the Indians would destroy the faith of their fathers and had already made the country accursed by driving away the game. The Jesuits in time rooted these superstitions from the minds of the natives in a great degree. Water in abundance was found here and the soil was cultivated broadly; wheat, fruits, flocks, and herds blessed the Mission and gave food to the converts in plenty. There were several stations connected with the Mission, and fair roads led out to them. The Indians built adobe houses for their families and learned to clothe themselves. One more great soul departed to his reward. In 1730, Ugarte, worn out, died at Loretto in his seventy- first year. The heroic triumvirate, Kuehn, Salvatierra, and Ugarte, founders of the Missions of Lower California, rested from their labors at about the same age. They were of different races, but the warmest friends, very much alike in temperament, in leading traits of character, and united in the single purpose of redeeming California. Some months after Ugarte's death, Father Eechevarri, in charge of the Missions as Visitor, began a Mission at Cape St. Lucas, which he called San Jose del Cabo ; this was among the Pericus, the most warlike and degraded of all the tribes. Father Tamaral conducted the Mission. During many years he accumulated facts upon which the most complete history of the peninsula was long afterwards written. [86] . THE MISSIONS OF LOWER CALIFORNIA About this time Father Guilen was appointed Superior of the Missions in succession to Ugarte. The Pericus gathered in hundreds and destroyed the Santa Rosa Mission, the Santiago, the La Paz, and the Del Cabo, and the whole south coast region was involved in turmoil and peril from petty wars that ensued. But as evidence that Indian nature was not entirely depraved, the first assurance of better days came from the heathen themselves. Converts and those friendly to mission work arrived at Loretto in great numbers, informing the priests that they were still loyal, and loved the cause of Christ. Only a trifling punishment was awarded the hostiles. At the time of Ugarte's death there were fifteen Missions on the peninsula, some prosperous and the others in fair condition, with several thousand natives directly or indirectly under their influence. To push the system north and into Alta California was the aim of the Jesuit priesthood, but the war and the expulsion of the Jesuits hopelessly defeated it. It was the happy fortune of the Franciscan Order to enter the Golden State and make the memory of their lives and labors immortal. The indomitable Jesuits toiled on until 1767, when the order of the King expelled them. It came suddenly, like the lightning's stroke. For nearly a century the Jesuit had toiled and suffered without hope of earthly reward, to establish Missions for the benefit of the savages in Lower California. Fifteen of these had been founded before the native war. Four of them were destroyed at that time, but afterwards restored. Salvatierra had founded six, and Ugarte seven, in twenty years. Two more were added to the list after the death of these padres, by Eechevarri, the Visitor. St. Ignacio was at this time the most northerly Mission; but a priest was sent north from San Ignacio to found the Mission of Santa Gertrude. Father Retz was in charge there, and in a few years it became very [87] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST prosperous; in fact it excelled in converts — had about twelve hundred — and produced from the soil more wealth than any other Mission. Water was abundant and the land fertile. Five years after this Fathers Cousaq and Retz, who were the energetic explorers of that day in the cactus districts, discovered a hot sulphur spring at Adac, and chose it as the site of a Mission; but Cousaq died immediately afterwards. He had been nearly thirty years on the peninsula. Three years later the Mission was founded at Adac and endowed in 1762 by the munificence of the Countess of Granada, and was dedicated in respect to the pious memory of St. Francis Borgia. It was about one hundred miles north of Santa Gertrude, in the Cocopah desert. Father Link was conductor of this Mission. He found a large flowing spring some distance away and cultivated a number of acres, raising all food products and fruits incident to sub-tropical climate and soil. It grew into an important Mission, with some two thousand Christian converts, clothed and fed from its resources. The last Mission north — the Santa Maria — was founded in 1767, on the thirty-first parallel of latitude, twenty-five miles west of the gulf. Father Arnes was the resident priest here, but his services soon closed, for the order of expulsion was issued that year. Captain Portola, afterwards Governor of Alta California, went there with the Franciscans, with a company of soldiers from Spain, and carried out the decree. The Franciscans were ordered by the King to take control of these Missions. Junipero Serra, as Superior, with sixteen priests from the College of San Ferdinand, in the City of Mexico, arrived at Loretto in the Spring of 1768. Father Palou, the boyhood friend of Serra, was assistant. The priests were at once sent to their Missions, travelling on foot, — the custom of these men. Immediately trouble began. The soldiers insisted on the right to control the property, but would permit the priests to possess the churches and homes built for them, and to manage spiritual matters. This was [88] Copyright, iq02, Detroit Photographic Co. San Xavier Mission, Tucson, Arizona THE MISSIONS OF LOWER CALIFORNIA against the orders of the King, who gave the priests absolute control of the Missions. Serra was left practically without rights, except to instruct the natives and conduct religious services. Irrigation and cultivation ceased, the provisions were wasted, the flocks recklessly slaughtered; the Indians, being ill-treated and poorly fed, fled to the mountains. The Missions were on the way to swift dissolution. At this perilous hour Don Jose Galvez, the ruling official above the Viceroy, arrived. He investigated affairs, turned the soldiers out of power, and ordered the Missions under the control of Serra. But matters did not prosper. Galvez, with the best of motives, interfered with the Missions. He suppressed the San Luis and Dolores Missions. He likewise changed the Mission of Santiago to a parish under a secular priest, thus deranging the entire Mission system by introducing two forms of government, in their nature antagonistic. He sought to average the populations at the Missions by removing hundreds from their old homes to new ones and distant Missions, to begin life over again. The consequences were that many were made destitute, and epidemics dotted the land with new-made graves. He applied the Pious Fund to other purposes than the support of Mission life. Had he listened to the advice of Serra and Palou, who had been trained in the Cerro Gordo Missions in the dark mountains of Mexico, the intelligent convictions thus formed would have led to beneficial results. But in Alta California he redeemed all the mistakes he had made in the peninsula, and became the organizing and practical power that made possible the great success of the Franciscans there. An expedition was ordered and prepared by Galvez to enter the Bay of San Diego in the Spring of 1769, to take possession of Alta California. Junipero Serra was appointed President of the Missions to be founded there, and Padre Palou was left as President in the peninsula. Father Palou found serious difficulty in conducting the Missions that had been so disorganized. An epidemic occurred in the South, and a hundred died at Dolores and San Luis Gonzago Missions; a hundred [89] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST more escaped to the mountains. The following year the crops were devoured by locusts, and the next year by drought. Many of the flocks and herds were, by the order of Galvez, driven to Alta California. In 1 77 1 Sergeant Barri was made Governor of the peninsula, and claimed control of the Missions. He was so violent and obstructive that Father Palou decided that it was useless for the Franciscans to remain in the peninsula; accordingly, it was arranged that the Order of Dominicans should assume charge of the Missions on the peninsula. They were transferred in 1772, but they could not restore energy to the decaying Missions. Constant interference by Governor Barri and his successors baffled the priests, and so discouraged the natives that they left the Missions to return to their wild life. In 1825 Mission life had almost disappeared from the peninsula. In i860 the buildings had fallen into ruins, and the cultivated lands had become barren wastes. [90] THE MISSIONS OF TEXAS CHAPTER XXXII THE MISSIONS OF TEXAS THE Franciscans had almost exclusively the field of Texas Missions. The three principal Orders of the Church that founded and operated the Missions of New Spain were the Franciscans, the Jesuits, and the Dominicans. The first had their chief fields in Texas, Alta California, Sonora, and Chihuahua; the second, in Lower California, Old and New Mexico, and Arizona; the third in Old Mexico and Lower California. Large tracts were conveyed to the Missions, and such privileges as were needful for their purposes. The following are the Missions of Texas. Adaes, in honor of Our Lady del Pilar, is supposed to have been founded in 171 8, on the Sabine River, by Governor Alarcon, of the Province of Coahuila and Texas, near the French fort at Natchitoches. A presidio was built for the soldiers and garrisoned strongly to watch the French. In 17 16 Captain Domingo Ramon was sent to Texas with a small squad of soldiers and friars to establish Missions, and it is sometimes asserted that he founded this Mission, on the Honda Creek, fifteen miles from the fort. It was always an inferior Mission, and never prospered much. In 1768 it had a church and some thirty houses. The presidio was probably more important than the Mission at that time, as there was another fortress on the Trinity. Spain and France both claimed the province. In 1790 the Mission was about deserted, but Bishop Maria and Governor Cardero were there in 1805, and the prelate is said to have baptized two hundred neophytes in the old chapel. The site can now be found by none but zealots. [9i] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST Our Lady de Los Dolores, on the Acs Bayou, was not far from San Augustine, and appeared in priestly records as a living Mission about 17 15. It is not now known who founded it, and it never brought forth much fruit — not enough to make history. It was abandoned in 1772. The Alamo is the most noted Mission of all in Texas, not for its sanctity, but because it was besieged and taken by Mexico from those that revolted against her government in 1836. As a Mission it was not a success. From the hour of its location on the Rio Grande almost to its final location at San Antonio, it was a restless and movable shrine. Founded in 1700, under the name of San Francisco Solano, it was removed in 1703 to Ildephonso ; again in the year 1710 it was returned to the Rio Grande. Still again it was transferred to San Antonio, and dedicated in the name of San Antonio de Valero, the duke who was Viceroy of Mexico. Yet more restless, it was moved to the Military Plaza in the city in 1732; and lastly, in 1744, it took its final departure over the river to another site in the city, where it has since been quietly anchored. It assumed the name of Alamo, and was used as a church for the populace. It was a misnomer to call it a Mission, unless it belongs to a class of itinerant Missions. Concepcion La Purisima de Acuna is located on the left bank of the river, about two miles below the city,, It was projected by the Viceroy in 1722, after whom it was named, but no steps were taken to build it until 173 1, when Captain Perez and Father Bergaro laid the corner-stone. It never developed into a prosperous Mission, and was closed to work when Zebulon Pike visited it in 1807, while exploring the West and Arkansas River regions. San Francisco de La Espada — meaning the Mission of the Sword — was first located on the Medina River in 173 1, but was removed in 1750 to San Antonio, to escape the raids of the Apaches. Like many other Missions in Texas, this was but a dwarf in the Mission fields, and is not interesting except for its pious purpose, and because it is one of the links in the chain. Life among the Apaches for twenty years raises the Photograph by S. L. Willard Concepcion La Purisima de Acuna Mission, Texas THE MISSIONS OF TEXAS presumption that the priests had courage ; but it was a fruitless field, where none were converted but by Father Kuehn, and that but transiently. Our Lady of Guadalupe, in Victory County, known sometimes as Mission Valley, was projected, it is said, by Don Domingo Ramon; but this is mere tradition. His plan was supposed to be to open up ditches for the irrigation of the valley and to protect it by a presidio, and in time he would develop a prosperous Mission. Little is known about it, except that there are extensive ruins in the valley. La Bahia Mission — Del Espiritu Santo — -at Goliad, was begun in 171 8. It is supposed to have been projected by Domingo Teran, who founded many Missions. The presidio always had a Mission connected with it, either within its grounds or outside as a separate establishment ; so the priests were ever present. The old Mission of Aranama, on the east side of the river, was nearly opposite La Bahia. Both these Missions had their day and did their work of beneficence among the Indians, but it is impossible to give details of either their history or traditions. The Goliad Chapel still shelters the pious. La Trinidad. Tradition says that this Mission was founded by Governor Teran, in 1691, when he explored Texas with a party of priests for that purpose. He and Don Domingo Ramon, who where favorites with the Indians, at this time devoted a few busy years projecting and founding presidios and Missions in various places. The site was on the Trinity River, near the town of Alabama, but this site was deserted in a short time for another at Nacogdoches. The Indians made trouble; the river became troublesome by overflows; and the malarial climate completed the causes of removal. Our Lady of Loretto. This Mission, projected by Don Ramon in 1 621, on Matagorda Bay, was soon given up. Our Lady of Nacogdoches. This Mission was founded by Don Ramon in 1716, and prospered until [93] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST 1772, when contentions between the French and Spanish made it necessary to remove the Indians to San Antonio. The Mission was then garrisoned to hold the French in check at Nacogdoches. The stone fort of 1778 still remains. Our Lady of Orgnizacco. This Mission was founded in 1716, on the San Jacinto River, to instruct and convert a tribe of that name; but in 1772 the Indian converts were removed to San Antonio. Rosario. In 1730 this Mission was started near Goliad, but soon abandoned. San Fernando was a chapel in San Antonio in 1730, amplified into a cathedral in 1868, but did net develop into a Mission. San Jose de Aguayo was founded in honor of Governor Aguayo of Texas, in 1720. The buildings were begun two years earlier, but not completed until fifty-one years afterwards. When finished they were magnificent, and surpassed every Mission east of the Rio Grande. They were located on the river, about four miles below San Antonio. The Mission was noted for its beautiful statues and decorative paintings. It was built in the Moorish style of architecture, and its great, glittering dome was visible on a clear, sunny day for more than a hundred miles. The Indians called it the Day-Star of their Manitou, and many of them worshipped it. The • carving and painting were the work of a Moorish artist from Seville, whose ancestor, centuries before, ornamented and chiselled the statues for the halls of the Alhambra; so runs the legend. The grand dome has long since fallen. The statues of the Queen of the Angels, and many others, have been mutilated by barbaric hands. The beautiful sculptured figures and decorations upon the outer walls have suffered the same fate. Wealth, beauty, and art strove to make it the wonder of those days, and still the love of the wonderful draws to it scores of visitors every year to gaze and meditate upon its grand ruins, beauty of location, and fateful history. It now stands upon the elevated tableland overlooking the river, a solitary [94] Photograph by S. L. JVillard San Jose de Aguayo Mission, Texas THE MISSIONS OF TEXAS monument of the sad fortunes of the old padres. This in its time was the kingly Mission of Texas, like San Luis, Rey de Francia, of Alta California, but it has not, like that, been restored. San Juan Capistrano is six miles below San Antonio, on the east side of the river. It was founded in 1732. It was never a leading and important Mission, but simply a colony, founded as an experiment. It was one of the unfortunates that were abandoned from poverty or other causes ; yet its buildings as studied and viewed from the ruins would indicate wealth at the time of construction. San Saba was founded in 1734, in Menard County. This was among the Comanches, a powerful and war-like tribe. During twenty years the padres made many converts. When the silver mine, the Las Almagres, was discovered in 1752, the Indians became victims of the rapacious miners and adventurers. The Comanches turned in defence of their rights, and with no sense of discrimination, killed the missionaries and burned the Mission. Many obscure Missions in the Southwest, for real or fancied wrongs against the Indians, not committed by the padres or their followers, were destroyed. In the regions ranged by the Apaches are still found ruins believed to be on the sites of old Missions. Among the priesthood Father Kuehn was the exception who won the friendship of these savages. On the upper Nueces, Brazos, Texas, and Colorado Rivers are found these ruins without a living name. In Texas all operative Missions were secularized by Governor Don Pedro de Navo in 1794; then their property and control were transferred to the clergy of the parishes. San Antonio de Bexar, the first important settlement by the Spaniards in Texas, was the central point around which clustered the great Missions of this province. Some of them are now restored sufficiently for the use of the secular clergy. The Order of Franciscans did a noble work here, but not comparable with their success in Alta California. The continual raids of the Comanches and the hostility of France were serious obstructions to Mission progress. THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST CHAPTER XXXIII THE MISSIONS OF NEW MEXICO THE ' Missions of New Mexico in 1680 showed a population of twenty-five thousand, of which probably twenty-five hundred were Spaniards. Neither in importance, wealth, nor influence did they compare with the great Missions of the eighteenth century, established in other provinces of Mexico. From the records of the Church, made mainly of the reports of the priests in control at the time, is derived what knowledge is available on the subject, and these give but little information in regard to each of these quasi Missions. The following notes are taken from the reports of 1680 and 1691. Seneca (San Antonio), above Guadalupe del Paso, founded in 1630 by P. Arteaga, succeeded by P. Garcia de Zuniga, or San Francisco, who is buried there. Piros nation ; Convent of San Antonio ; vineyard ; fish stream. Socorro, above Semern ; of Piros nation ; 600 inhabitants. Founded by P. Garcia. Alamillo (Santa Ana), 3 1 miles above Socorro ; 300 Piros. Sevilleta, 51 miles from Alamillo across river; Piros. Isleta (San Antonio), where a small stream, with the Rio del Norte, encloses a fertile tract. Convent built by P. Juan de Salos; 2,000 inhabitants of Tiguas nation; named for the alamo trees which shade the road. Puray, or Purnay (San Bartolome), 1 1 miles from Sandia (Alameda) ; aoo Tiguas. Sandia (San Francisco), 11 miles from Puray; 3,000 Tiguas. Convent, where P. Estevan de Perea, the founder, is buried; also the skull of P. Rodrigues, the first martyr, is venerated. [96] THE MISSIONS OF NEW MEXICO San Felipe, on the river, on a height (apparently on east bank) ; 300 inhabitants with the little pueblo of Santa Ana ; of Zures (Queres) nation ; Convent founded by Quinones, who, with P. Geron Pedraza, is buried here. Santo Domingo, above San Felipe; 150 inhabitants. One of the best convents, where the archives are kept, and where in 1661 was celebrated an auto da fe by order of the Inquisition. P. Juan de Escalona is buried here. Padres in 1680 — Talaban (one custodio), Lorenzana, and Mondesdeoca. Santa Fe Villa, 81 miles from Domingo; residence of the Governor and soldiers, with four padres. Tesuque (San Lorenzo), 21 miles from Santa Fe, in a forest; 200 Tiguas (Tehuas) ; P. Juan Bautista Pio. Nambe (San Francisco), 31 miles east of Tesuque; 51 miles from Rio del Norte; two little settlements of Jacono and Cuya Manque ; 600 inhabitants. P. Thomas de Tirres. San Ildefonso, near the river, and 21 miles from Jacona, in a fertile tract, with 20 farms; 800 inhabitants. PP. Morales, Sanches, De Pro. and Fr. Luis. Santa Clara. Convent on height by the river; 300 inhabitants; a visit a of San Ildefonso. Sun Juan.de los Cabelleros. Three hundred inhabitants; visita of San Ildefonso. In sight are the buildings of the Villa de San Gabriel, the first Spanish capital. All the padres named in the above fifteen Missions were killed in the revolt of the Indians in 1680, as they were in eighteen other Missions at the same time. The revolt was attributed to demoniac influences upon a people given to idolatry. It is said that a girl, several years before miraculously raised from the dead, foretold the uprising and massacre. The tribes were deeply devoted to their primitive faith, and resorted to old rites and forms of worship in secret on every opportunity. The priests destroyed their idols and punished them severely whenever detected in their devotions. The State taxed heavily ; the soldier had no [97] THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST regard for native rights, and no mercy. Had the Missions been in absolute control of the situation the rebellion might not have happened, but the curse of Spanish misrule was upon all, and the padres were held responsible by the natives for the tyranny of Church and State. The Pueblo, or Zuni Indians, occupied the central region of revolt. They had been a peaceful agricultural people for ages, and had a civilization above the Aztecs and equal to the Mayas, except in architecture and written language. The soldier entered the Zuni country one hundred and forty years before the rebellion and subdued it with fire and sword. The priests came immediately in his rear, and vigorously attacked the Zuni creed and worship ; they suppressed it for a century, but did not eradicate it; and when the flames of war burst out, the Indian was conquered again, but the progress of the Missions was stayed forever. The parish church was substituted, and remains to-day administering the rites of the Church and teaching its creed to a population less enlightened than the Zuni. [98] Copyright, IQ02, Detroit Photographic Co. Exterior View and Altar, San Xavier Mission, Tucson, Arizona THE MISSIONS OF ARIZONA CHAPTER XXXIV THE MISSIONS OF ARIZONA THE first Mission settlement in Arizona was made in 1732. Father Felipe Segesser founded San Xavier del Bac, and Juan Bautista founded San Miguel de Guevavi. These were regular Missions ; the Indian rancherias in that region were only visitas. In 1750 a presidio was located at Guevavi. The settlements formed by Father Kuehn forty years before had disappeared. Pimeria Alta was the name of Arizona at this time. During this year a revolt among the Pimas resulted in the murder of two priests of the Missions and nearly one hundred Spaniards. The Missions were deserted, but again occupied three years later. This blow from the natives destroyed the prospects and usefulness of all Missions in Pimeria. The Moquis in the Northeast were a bone of contention between the Jesuits and Franciscans, and this, with the hostility of these cliff dwellers, defeated mission labors with them until the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1768. Pimeria was a portion of eastern Sonora, and assumed the name of Arizona in 1846. The annals of events in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and early part of the eighteenth century of these changing provinces and their boundary lines are so meagre and confused that Mission history is very indistinct and unreliable. The Franciscans had sole possession of this field after 1768. There were no Missions in Arizona until many years after Father Kuehn's death in 171 1; in fact, there were no Spanish Missions save in Santa Cruz Valley. Bac and Guevavi were the only Missions there, yet there were several visitas de rancherias in this locality, protected by the garrison at Tubac. The Indian settlements founded or visited bv Kuehn have been called Missions by the Spanish historians. The Missions and visitas de [ 99 1 THE MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST rancherias were transferred to the Franciscans, but their property had been confiscated from the Jesuits by the Government. The friars who took control of the Indian settlements had no means of their own, but lived upon pensions. They held their little Mission communities together by labors of love, teaching, caring for the sick, ministering to the dying, and instructing the children, whom they won by presents. Into their rude chapels, built of brush, stone, or adobe, they induced the Indian by persuasion and promises to enter and listen to divine service; but they had little influence on his life. The good padres found him heathen and left him heathen. As late as 1829 there were no records to show of the existence of Missions in Arizona. Many efforts had been made in the Gila River regions since 1640 to establish Missions; but the vastness of this wilderness, and its entire control by fierce and savage tribes, made the task of the missionary practically hopeless. The visitas de rancherias were resorted to as substitutes for regular Missions, and these were at all times subject to every danger and hardship incident to savage life. The progress made in Mission life in Arizona from 1768 to 1846, a period of seventy-eight years, is shown by the fact that twenty-two visit a stations were permanently established, as well as the two regular Missions already referred to. The American invasion of those regions gave the movement greater vigor, until in 1 901 the census revealed a membership of forty thousand Catholic women within a large district, of which Tucson was the centre. THE END [ IO °] MAR 21 1907