Two Years Before the Mast
that belonged to the wife of an American sea-captain who had settled in
San Diego, and had imported the chaotic mass of straw and ribbon, as a
choice present to his new wife. They wear their hair (which is almost
invariably black, or a very dark brown) long in their necks, sometimes
loose, and sometimes in long braids; though the married women often do
it up on a high comb. Their only protection against the sun and
weather is a large mantle which they put over their heads, drawing it
close round their faces, when they go out of doors, which is generally
only in pleasant weather. When in the house, or sitting out in front
of it, which they often do in fine weather, they usually wear a small
scarf or neckerchief of a rich pattern. A band, also, about the top of
the head, with a cross, star, or other ornament in front, is common.
Their complexions are various, depending--as well as their dress and
manner--upon their rank; or, in other words, upon the amount of Spanish
blood they can lay claim to. Those who are of pure Spanish blood,
having never intermarried with the aborigines, have clear brunette
complexions, and sometimes, even as fair as those of English women.
There are but few of these families in California; being mostly those
in official stations, or who, on the expiration of their offices, have
settled here upon property which they have acquired; and others who
have been banished for state offences. These form the aristocracy;
inter-marrying, and keeping up an exclusive system in every respect.
They can be told by their complexions, dress, manner, and also by their
speech; for, calling themselves Castilians, they are very ambitious of
speaking the pure Castilian language, which is spoken in a somewhat
corrupted dialect by the lower classes. From this upper class, they go
down by regular shades, growing more and more dark and muddy, until you
come to the pure Indian, who runs about with nothing upon him but a
small piece of cloth, kept up by a wide leather strap drawn round his
waist. Generally speaking, each person's caste is decided by the
quality of the blood, which shows itself, too plainly to be concealed,
at first sight. Yet the least drop of Spanish blood, if it be only of
quadroon or octoroon, is sufficient to raise them from the rank of
slaves, and entitle them to a suit of clothes--boots, hat, cloak,
spurs, long knife, and all complete, though coarse and dirty as may
be,--and to call themselves Españolos, and to hold property, if they
can get any.
The fondness for dress among the women is excessive, and is often the
ruin of many of them. A present of a fine mantle, or of a necklace or
pair of ear-rings, gains the favor of the greater part of them.
Nothing is more common than to see a woman living in a house of only
two rooms, and the ground for a floor, dressed in spangled satin shoes,
silk gown, high comb, and gilt, if not gold, ear-rings and necklace.
If their husbands do not dress them well enough, they will soon receive
presents from others. They used to spend whole days on board our
vessels, examining the fine clothes and ornaments, and frequently made
purchases at a rate which would have made a seamstress or waiting-maid
in Boston open her eyes.
Next to the love of dress, I was most struck with the fineness of the
voices and beauty of the intonations of both sexes. Every common
ruffian-looking fellow, with a slouched hat, blanket cloak, dirty
under-dress, and soiled leather leggins, appeared to me to be speaking
elegant Spanish. It was a pleasure, simply to listen to the sound of
the language, before I could attach any meaning to it. They have a good
deal of the Creole drawl, but it is varied with an occasional extreme
rapidity of utterance, in which they seem to skip from consonant to
consonant, until, lighting upon a broad, open vowel, they rest upon
that to restore the balance of sound. The women carry this peculiarity
of speaking to a much greater extreme than the men, who have more
evenness and stateliness of utterance. A common bullock-driver, on
horseback, delivering a message, seemed to speak like an ambassador at
an audience. In fact, they sometimes appeared to me to be a people on
whom a curse had fallen, and stripped them of everything but their
pride, their manners, and their voices.
Another thing that surprised me was the quantity of silver that was in
circulation. I certainly never saw so much silver at one time in my
life, as during the week that we were at Monterey. The truth is, they
have no credit system, no banks, and no way of investing money but in
cattle. They have no circulating medium but silver and hides--which
the sailors call "California bank notes." Everything that they buy they
must pay for in one or the other of these things. The hides they bring
down dried and doubled, in clumsy ox-carts, or upon mules' backs, and
the money they carry tied up in a handkerchief;--fifty, eighty, or an
hundred dollars and half dollars.
I had never studied Spanish while at college, and could not speak a
word, when at Juan Fernandez; but during the latter part of the passage
out, I borrowed a grammar and dictionary from the cabin, and by a
continual use of these, and a careful attention to every word that I
heard spoken, I soon got a vocabulary together, and began talking for
myself. As I soon knew more Spanish than any of the crew, (who indeed
knew none at all,) and had been at college and knew Latin, I got the
name of a great linguist, and was always sent for by the captain and
officers to get provisions, or to carry letters and messages to
different parts of the town. I was often sent to get something which I
could not tell the name of to save my life; but I liked the business,
and accordingly never pleaded ignorance. Sometimes I managed to jump
below and take a look at my dictionary before going ashore; or else I
overhauled some English resident on my way, and got the word from him;
and then, by signs, and the help of my Latin and French, contrived to
get along. This was a good exercise for me, and no doubt taught me
more than I should have learned by months of study and reading; it also
gave me opportunities of seeing the customs, characters, and domestic
arrangements of the people; beside being a great relief from the
monotony of a day spent on board ship.
Monterey, as far as my observation goes, is decidedly the pleasantest
and most civilized-looking place in California. In the centre of it is
an open square, surrounded by four lines of one-story plastered
buildings, with half a dozen cannon in the centre; some mounted, and
others not. This is the "Presidio," or fort. Every town has a
presidio in its centre; or rather, every presidio has a town built
around it; for the forts were first built by the Mexican government,
and then the people built near them for protection. The presidio here
was entirely open and unfortified. There were several officers with
long titles, and about eighty soldiers, but they were poorly paid, fed,
clothed, and disciplined. The governor-general, or, as he is commonly
called, the "general," lives here; which makes it the seat of
government. He is appointed by the central government at Mexico, and
is the chief civil and military officer. In addition to him, each town
has a commandant, who is the chief military officer, and has charge of
the fort, and of all transactions with foreigners and foreign vessels;
and two or three alcaldes and corregidores, elected by the inhabitants,
who are the civil officers. Courts and jurisprudence they have no
knowledge of. Small municipal matters are regulated by the alcaldes
and corregidores; and everything relating to the general government, to
the military, and to foreigners, by the commandants, acting under the
governor-general. Capital cases are decided by him, upon personal
inspection, if he is near; or upon minutes sent by the proper officers,
if the offender is at a distant place. No Protestant has any civil
rights, nor can he hold any property, or, indeed, remain more than a
few weeks on shore, unless he belong to some vessel. Consequently, the
Americans and English who intend to remain here become Catholics, to a
man; the current phrase among them being,--"A man must leave his
conscience at Cape Horn."
But to return to Monterey. The houses here, as everywhere else in
California, are of one story, built of clay made into large bricks,
about a foot and a half square and three or four inches thick, and
hardened in the sun. These are cemented together by mortar of the same
material, and the whole are of a common dirt-color. The floors are
generally of earth, the windows grated and without glass; and the
doors, which are seldom shut, open directly into the common room; there
being no entries. Some of the more wealthy inhabitants have glass to
their windows and board floors; and in Monterey nearly all the houses
are plastered on the outside. The better houses, too, have red tiles
upon the roofs. The common ones have two or three rooms which open
into each other, and are furnished with a bed or two, a few chairs and
tables, a looking-glass, a crucifix of some material or other, and
small daubs of paintings enclosed in glass, and representing some
miracle or martyrdom. They have no chimneys or fire-places in the
houses, the climate being such as to make a fire unnecessary; and all
their cooking is done in a small cook-house, separated from the house.
The Indians, as I have said before, do all the hard work, two or three
being attached to each house; and the poorest persons are able to keep
one, at least, for they have only to feed them and give them a small
piece of coarse cloth and a belt, for the males; and a coarse gown,
without shoes or stockings, for the females.
In Monterey there are a number of English and Americans (English or
"Ingles" all are called who speak the English language) who have
married Californians, become united to the Catholic church, and
acquired considerable property. Having more industry, frugality, and
enterprise than the natives, they soon get nearly all the trade into
their hands. They usually keep shops, in which they retail the goods
purchased in larger quantities from our vessels, and also send a good
deal into the interior, taking hides in pay, which they again barter
with our vessels. In every town on the coast there are foreigners
engaged in this kind of trade, while I recollect but two shops kept by
natives. The people are generally suspicious of foreigners, and they
would not be allowed to remain, were it not that they become good
Catholics, and by marrying natives, and bringing up their children as
Catholics and Mexicans, and not teaching them the English language,
they quiet suspicion, and even become popular and leading men. The
chief alcaldes in Monterey and Santa Barbara were both Yankees by birth.
The men in Monterey appeared to me to be always on horseback. Horses
are as abundant here as dogs and chickens were in Juan Fernandez. There
are no stables to keep them in, but they are allowed to run wild and
graze wherever they please, being branded, and having long leather
ropes, called "lassos," attached to their necks and dragging along
behind them, by which they can be easily taken. The men usually catch
one in the morning, throw a saddle and bridle upon him, and use him for
the day, and let him go at night, catching another the next day. When
they go on long journeys, they ride one horse down, and catch another,
throw the saddle and bridle upon him, and after riding him down, take a
third, and so on to the end of the journey. There are probably no
better riders in the world. They get upon a horse when only four or
five years old, their little legs not long enough to come half way over