F 864 
 .H89 
 Copy 1 
 
 THK 
 
 CalUbnla of tto Padres; 
 
 OR, 
 
 FOOTPRINTS OF /NCIENT COMMUNISM 
 
 By Mrs. Elizabeth Hughes. 
 
 San ^rancisco ; 
 
 PUBLISHED BY I. N. CHOYNSKI, CoBNKB SKCONK AND JkSSIR Sl'S. 
 
 1875- 
 

 51596 
 
 [Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand eight hundred and 
 seventy-four by 
 I. N. CHOYNSKI, 
 in the offi ce of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.] 
 
H FOOTPRINTS OF /NCIENT COMMU^I 
 
 
 
 tit 
 
 Bv Mrs. Elizabeth Hughes. 
 
 M 
 
 i 
 
 m 
 
 
 ^AN j^RANCISCO ; 
 
 Published ky I. N. CHOYNSKI, Cornkr Second and Jessie Sts 
 1875- 
 
ANTIQUARIAN BOOK STORE. 
 
 ; W. emfmm 
 
 IMPORTER OF 
 
 OLD AM) NEW BOOKS, 
 
 School Books, Novels, 
 
 ^TATIONEf^Y AND fy^cY floODf,, 
 
 AT WHOLESALE AND RETAIL, 
 
 Corner of Second and Jessie Streets, 
 
 Subscriptions received for all Eastern and EuropeafPub- 
 hcations. Old Books bought, sold and exchanged. Liberal 
 Books and Periodicals always on hand. 
 
 AH the latest Novels and New Books received as soon as 
 published. Orders for Books, Stationery Music, Fancy Ar- 
 mies, etc., filled promptly. Purchases of all kinds outside 
 regular business, promptly and faithfully attended to at 
 vest market prices. Subscriptions payable invariably in 
 Books imported to order from the East or Europe, 
 supplied. 
 
 « and Counting House Stationery constantly^ 
 * to order. i 
 
DEDICATION. 
 
 To all those whose interest in the present of our noble State, 
 and hopes for its rapidly unfolding future, lead them to look back 
 to its singular and remarkable past, this little work is dedicated. 
 
 With no party feeling, no sectarian bias, to the great heart of 
 humanity, I confide these pages, and should any chord throb in 
 unison with mine, as we retrace the marvellous history of our 
 State, and point to the possibilities of its future — in that I shall 
 find my best reward. 
 
 From all those to whom familiar scenes and places may be en- 
 deared by the associations of unselfish effort and brave endeavor, 
 I invite a hearing, and from those to whom in any land California 
 is dear as the homes or resting place of some loved being, I be- 
 speak a kindly welcome for these pages. 
 
 K. H. 
 
THE 
 
 CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES; 
 
 OR, 
 
 FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 
 
 By Mrs. ELIZABETH HUGHES. 
 
 Looking at the progressive and liberal movement of the 
 present century, it appears, superficially considered, like a 
 vast process of disintegration, which alike menaces danger 
 to the individual and destruction to present political and 
 social systems. It is only when we look deeper that we see 
 that this young, new and glowing life throbbing in the veins 
 of the present century, means neither death nor decomposi- 
 tion, but struggle to throw off effete conditions, which shall 
 result in a more complete return to spiritual and physical 
 health, both on the part of society and of the individual. 
 Still, how much we have to learn, how deep the necessity of 
 taking counsel with God in us, with God in each other, that 
 we may know whither we are going and at what we are 
 aiming, and do not fall into the many snares that beset us in 
 the uncertain twilight of the day in which we live. To re- 
 ceive truth and light as naturally as the earth receives rain 
 and sunshine is the soul's happy normal condition. In the 
 conflicts of the present day it is sometimes interesting to turn 
 1 
 
2 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 for a while to the past, to remember what was before us on 
 the land we now tread — we, the pilgrims of a day, so soon to 
 pass away, even as those who preceded us have passed away 
 in the long procession of the centuries, leaving behind them 
 the memorials of their existence, their ideas in concrete mat- 
 ter, even as we enstamp ourselves on the images we ourselves 
 create, and we are visible long after we cease to be so. 
 
 Will the reader now accompany me for a short time to the 
 early days of California, long previous to '49, and make some 
 acquaintance with the land and people, while the gold still 
 slept in the hills, and herds strayed and fed over the 
 millions which the strong hand of the Anglo-Saxon has torn 
 from the soil? Scattered up and down our rapidly growing 
 State, monuments of an epoch already past, stand the rudely 
 built, yet picturesque edifices known as Missions. These 
 consist of a church, generally substantially built of adobe 
 and plastered, of a peculiar, but not ungraceful style of archi- 
 tecture, and various outbuildings subserving the purposes of 
 barns, granaries or dwellings. These Missions, from their 
 attractive situations, have often become the sites of towns, 
 and, in many cases, the pueblos or villages formed by the 
 settlement of the Spanish soldiers attached to the garrison of 
 the Mission, the germs of cities. 
 
 Such is Los Angeles, the seeds of whose prosperity were sown 
 by the grape culture introduced by the Padres, and whose 
 flocks and herds, covering hill and valley, were mainly due to 
 the enterprise and energy of men who, in the 17th and 18th 
 centuries, worked not for themselves but for their idea of 
 duty. That idea might not be yours or mine. It might not 
 have been theirs, had they lived to-day, but they were faith- 
 ful to it, and to-day the world reaps the fruit of the trees 
 that they planted, and of the seed that they sowed. Father 
 Ugarte, in 1701, imported cattle and breeding animals, and 
 was the first white man who broke ground in California, for 
 the purpose of raising grain. The Mission San Gabriel is 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 8 
 
 niue miles from Los Angeles. It is built on slightly elevated 
 ground, a noble structure overlooking the whole valley 
 towards the east. The orange orchard of the Padres is still 
 in full bearing. Father Zelueda first planted the vine in 
 San Gabriel. He planted 75,000 stocks. This Mission was 
 founded in 1771. 3000 Indians were attached to it. It pos- 
 sessed 100,000 cattle, 20,000 horses, and more than 40,000 
 sheep. There were superb orchards, aud kitchen gardens 
 well fenced bj r hedges of prickly pear, the remains of which 
 exist to-day. And now, at this date, 1875, after an Ameri- 
 can occupation of so many years, the traveller as he passes 
 along that beautiful and fertile valley, watered by its two 
 rivers, the San Gabriel and the Los Angeles, on casting 
 his eye on to the gentle slope of the beautiful mountain, 
 sees an edifice that, at the distance, looks princely. On no 
 other such building does the eye rest. American enterprise 
 has reared nothing that so attracts the eye. It is the antique 
 Mission of San Gabriel. On approaching nearer, you see 
 that it is coarsely, though substantially built, as might be 
 expected from its Indian workmanship ; but it was planned 
 from the soul, and still speaks to the soul. 
 
 Father Zelueda had negotiated with an American house to 
 make a fence round the vineyard, aud was on the point of hav- 
 ing all the materials ready when the secularization took place. 
 This community sent a ship to San Bias every year, loaded 
 with oil, hemp and flax. Occasionally, one was despatched 
 to Lima with soap and tallow. Bret Harte and others sneer 
 at their treatment of the Indians. But are the Indians any 
 better off to-day, lying around the streets of Los Angeles like 
 masterless dogs, and half the time in the calaboose or chain- 
 gang ? There are races that seem never to rise beyond 
 childhood, and need wise training. San Diego was the first 
 Mission founded by the Franciscans in Upper California, and 
 was called the Mother Mission; it is now called old San 
 Diego, and is three miles from the shore. New Town, or 
 
4 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 South San Diego is on the Bay, a beautifully situated and 
 pleasant town. The Franciscans took possession of the coun- 
 try after the expulsion of the Jesuits, and founded most of 
 the Missions in Upper California, as far north as San Fran- 
 cisco, which queen city of the Pacific was named after their 
 patron saint. Lying in one of the most beautiful valleys 
 south of the Tejon Pass, are the remains of the Mission of 
 Santa Isabel. Where once the bell summoned the Indians 
 to church, all is now silent. The American ranchero does 
 not keep Sunday as a general thing. He sits and calculates 
 the time when his earnings shall enable him to enter tem- 
 porarily or permanently into the life of cities, or he enjoys in 
 his isolation the glories and advantages which nature pours 
 around him: — the unequalled climate, the mountain chase, 
 the savage freedom, the independent life. The ruined church 
 and buildings are now occupied as dwellings and storehouses, 
 and the beautiful valley, with its gently rising hills, is a cat- 
 tle ranch. 
 
 San Fernando, about twelve miles from Los Angeles, 
 is remarkable for picturesque and tropical beauty. A widely 
 extended valley, with nearly a level surface, bounded by 
 distant ranges of mountains, at first presents itself. These 
 mountains have a peculiarly barren look, but this defect is 
 almost compensated for by the various and beautiful shades 
 of color they assume — blue, brown and purple — contrasting 
 finely with the clear transparent skies and with the even sur- 
 face of the valley. The road is bordered by a low growth 
 of shrubbery and cactus. On turning the point of a hill, you 
 come suddenly upon the Mission buildings, which, with their 
 surrounding gardens, stand seemingly isolated in the midst 
 of a desert plain, and produce a most beautiful effect. The 
 gardens were enclosed by walls, but the graceful palm rose 
 above them, and groves of olive, lemon and orange trees 
 could be seen within. Outside the walls, the surface is bar- 
 ren and gravelly, and the fertility within is the result of irri- 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 5 
 
 gatiou. The building presented an imposing appearance, 
 having a long portico formed by a colonnade with twenty 
 arches, built of brick or adobe, plastered and whitewashed. 
 The floor was paved with tiles, and a pleasant promenade in 
 front of the edifice was afforded. In the days of the pros- 
 perity of the Mission, a large fountain, with a circular basin 
 ten feet or more in diameter, rose directly in front of the main 
 building. This fountain is now in ruins. Its beautiful jet 
 no longer refreshes the palm trees, and is blown back upon 
 the flowers. A great variety of tropical fruits still exist 
 there, bearing testimony to the skillful horticulture and in- 
 dustry of the community; and though the forms of the men 
 who reared the colonnade and sought refreshment and relaxa- 
 tion in these walks, from the cares of business or from the 
 labors of their mission, have long since passed away, their 
 memory still survives in the breath of the orange blossoms, 
 in the melancholy and sweetness of the palm, the tree of the 
 desert, the tree of the solitary, communing more with the 
 heavens than with the earth, disdaining to spread its branches 
 near the soil, but lifting up in the blue air far above our 
 heads, its flowers and its fruit. The message of peace and 
 good will to man still flows forth from the vines which they 
 planted, and the new plants with which they enriched the 
 soil. I seem to see them yet, those men of peace and earnest- 
 ness, those pioueers of the first Missions — Ugarte and Salva 
 Tierra. Smilingly they greet the Franciscan, and congratu- 
 late him on his success. Can we not fancy that love for a 
 spot so endeared by long years of toil and endeavor may yet 
 draw them near a place sacred to so many recollections ? 
 Has Ugarte forgotten his beloved California, for which his 
 hands and head toiled so willingly ? Has Salva Tierra for- 
 gotten the privations of La Paz, which were crowned by the 
 abundance of San Fernando ? No. I think that in the 
 glorious moonlights of that southern clime, the eyes of the 
 seer might discern the forms of the Franciscans, as they 
 
6 THE CALIFORNIA OP THE PADRES ; 
 
 glide through the colonnade or steal down the deserted walks, 
 white with the rain of orange blossoms, to the ruined foun- 
 tain. As they converse together they seem to smile, for with 
 eyes unsealed and annointed with eternal day, they descry a 
 brighter and happier time for the pleasant land of their adop- 
 tion, when united effort shall bring back peace and plenty, 
 and the laws of God written on the heart, brain and body of 
 man shall be reverenced as much as that which is written in 
 books, and they are in peace, requiescat in pace, for they are 
 in love, and hope, and faith. 
 
 Let us go farther north. Near the city of San Francisco 
 is the Mission Dolores, built about a hundred years ago. It 
 consists of a church with quite extensive out-buildings. The 
 adobe walls of the church are three or four feet thick. The 
 church is still used for divine service. The screen behind 
 the altar is decked with gilding and an harmonious mixture 
 of colors, figures of saints in relief, rude but not unpleas- 
 ing, suggestive of former times and of an earlier age. The 
 ceiling is stained, the seats are of oak, and there are little 
 pictures of saints upon the walls. A spirited fresco, the 
 work of some artist-priest, some California Fra Bartolomeo, 
 occupies part of one side the building. The church joins the 
 cemetery. You enter a little wicket gate which leads to the 
 field of the dead. It is a quiet, peaceful place. I know not 
 where there is a pleasanter rest for weary flesh and aching 
 hearts. It fronts the south, and the hills, covered in winter 
 aad spring with velvety verdure, close round it, and, as it 
 were, shelter it. Roses creep around the tombs and run up 
 the walls of the church. A low wall fences it in from the 
 adjoining meadows. The Mission is the terminus of the 
 street cars. Through low-lying sand-hills, following the car- 
 track, you arrive at San Francisco. On arriving at Market 
 street, a somewhat stately building faces you — a church and 
 college dedicated to St. Ignatius, the founder of the Order of 
 the Jesuits. This feared and detested Order, then, again asserts 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 7 
 
 itself. Expelled from California, and replaced by the Fran- 
 ciscans, it rears its head again, and shows its indomitable 
 front. Still we must confess that for us the interest attaches 
 to the antique church, the simple shrine, the homely Mission. 
 The new buildings are substantial and convenient. They 
 strike the eye but do not touch the heart. We feel instinc- 
 tively that the monastery and the church belong to the past; 
 that the religious sentiment must have its supreme place in 
 the grand coronal arch, but must not crush out, but rather 
 guard and protect the other attributes of man's sacred and 
 complex nature; for there is not one of these that can be 
 spared or ignored without visiting its neglect or extinction 
 with the severest and most tremendous penalties. 
 
 The Mission of Santa Barbara is still a picturesque and 
 attractive object in the landscape, whether from the sea or 
 from the shore. The church is of stone, one hundred and 
 sixty feet long by sixty wide; the walls are eight feet in 
 thickness; the height of the nave is forty feet. It was 
 flanked with two towers, with rich-toned bells brought from 
 Spain. The altar is adorned with the images of Saints, and 
 before the altar is a trap door, leading to vaults where are 
 deposited the remains of the Mission Fathers who died at 
 the station. The Fathers' house adjoined the church, and 
 looked toward the sea. Rows of Indian huts in adobe 
 were at a little distance from the house. A pleasant garden 
 was laid out near the church, in which flourished the fruits 
 of the tropics with those of the temperate zone. The orange 
 grew beside the apple; the pear mingled its white blossoms 
 with the almond. But the expense and taste with which 
 the water was brought into the Mission is what most attracted 
 the eye and showed the love of beauty which, in the wilder- 
 ness, still clung to the men who had passed their youth and 
 manhood in courts, camps or cities. I use the past tense in 
 6peaki ng of this, as it is very possible that, in the rapid 
 march of improvements in the now flourishing town of Santa 
 
8 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 Barbara, many of these traces may be obliterated. Water 
 was brought from beyond the church, around the brow of a 
 gently rising hill, to a square reservoir of beautiful masonry. 
 Near this were the ruins of a grist mill, and not far from the 
 mill a small stone edifice, surmounted with a cross, which 
 appears to have been used as a bath. Outside the door of 
 the bath was a lion's head, from which poured a beautiful 
 jet of water. In front of the church was a fountain, with a 
 series of circular basins of simple yet elegant shape, from the 
 top of which the water burst and fell from one to the other, 
 till it reached a larger basin below. From this it was led 
 off a short distance to the statue of a grizzly bear, from 
 whose mouth it was ejected into a reservoir of solid masonry, 
 six feet wide and seventy long. Around these fountains were 
 solid, cemented stone pavements and ducts to convey off the 
 the surplus water. In a climate where fertility as well as 
 comfort depends upon irrigation, nothing could be more 
 judicious or in better taste. 
 
 Such were some of the relics of early California. To me 
 they possess a peculiar charm. The work done in them was 
 done in the face of many dangers, aud oftentimes in suffering 
 and privation. The large ranch houses, of a date coeval 
 with the latter period of the history of the Missions, have 
 also their own peculiar and picturesque interest. Life was 
 carried on there in a grand, old, patriarchal fashion. There 
 was room for the development of strong and powerful natures, 
 who made .themselves known far and wide, like the brave 
 and eccentric Col. "Williams of the Rancho del Chino, whose 
 p-enerosity almost kept alive, at one time, the starving Mor- 
 mon emigration of San Bernardino. Mr. Rubidoux's ranch 
 is another picturesque dwelling among the hills, where, at 
 one time, riding alone and caught in a severe storm, I was 
 hospitably received. Mr. Rubidoux was a French gentle- 
 man, a cotemporary of Col. Williams, with one of those fine 
 aristocratic countenances that seem to belong to the ancient 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 9 
 
 regime. He was unable to leave his room from an accident, 
 which illustrates the primitive mode of living of even the 
 wealthy rancheros. He had not slept in a bed for many 
 years; but one night, from some unforeseen circumstance, 
 he was induced to occupy one. Hearing some unusual noise, 
 he turned out very suddenly, and, not being prepared for so 
 unusual a descent, lamed himself for life. The calm which 
 the contemplation of these peaceful communities, faulty as 
 they might be in many respects, has shed into my soul is 
 very delightful. ' ; Feace I leave with you, my peace I give 
 unto you," is breathed into our souls at times with accents 
 sweet as a gale from heaven. The conflict of interests in 
 present conditioned society is unfavorable to the develop- 
 ment of the supreme satisfaction of life, and everywhere an- 
 tagonisms are becoming more bitter and more pronounced. 
 The fight between starvation on the one hand, and the ple- 
 thora of riches on the other; between the voluptuous satiety 
 of the rich and the terrible lone starvation of multitudes who 
 are going mourning through life, orphaned in the midst of 
 plenty; the desperate fatality which makes the rich grow 
 richer and the poor poorer every day; and the crowding of 
 all these volcanic elements into our large cities, where, at 
 any moment, a spark may light on the powder magazine of 
 all these pent-up feelings and cause an explosion — all this 
 makes the social atmosphere heavy, even for those who are 
 out of the vortex of present suffering. What must it be, 
 then, for those who see no hope before them — whose outlook 
 in life is as blank as a prison court-yard. For this reason, 
 there is a very wide and growing interest felt on the subject 
 of community life, and these interesting relics may suggest 
 some thoughts on that subject. 
 
 THE CONQUEST OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 We will now go back some three hundred years and see 
 by what steps the conquest of California was effected, the 
 2 
 
10 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 kind of people that were then living there, and what part the 
 Missions played therein. In the year of our Lord 1526, the 
 country now called California was as much unknown as the 
 interior of Africa is to us at present. The restless and all-in- 
 quiring spirit was just beginning to awaken in man, which 
 seeks to know and explore every nook and corner of his 
 grand inheritance, the globe, with all its diverse climates 
 and conditions. At that time the Viceregal Court of Spain 
 and New Mexico was the seat of great power and splendor. 
 The daring Spanish conqueror, Cortez, was then in the zenith 
 of his power, married to a noble Spanish lady, and having at 
 his control the vast wealth of the conquered countries. De- 
 siring to discover and subject still more territory, he fitted 
 out two ships at Acapulco, commanded by Don Juan Xime- 
 nes, which sailed to La Paz; but on landing, himself and 
 twenty others were killed. Cortez, hearing of this, under- 
 took an expedition, but returned without success. No less 
 than seven expeditions sailed from New Spain for California, 
 all of which were failures. These various expeditions in- 
 cluded the space from 1526 to 1683, which was the date of 
 Admiral Ontondo's expedition, with whom came Father 
 Rino to La Paz. But even this last expedition was a failure, 
 for he gave an account to the Viceroy of New Mexico that, 
 besides wasting three whole years, there had been expended 
 225,000 crowns of the royal revenue. It was decided that 
 the conquest of California was impracticable by these means, 
 and that the reduction should be offered to the Society of 
 Jesuits, with the offer of the necessary sums. There does 
 seem something strange in this, when you reflect upon what 
 Spain was at that time — flushed with success, mad for con- 
 quest, in the most haughty and proud period of the whole 
 Spanish monarchy — in the lifetime of such men as Cortez 
 and Pizzaro, the plumed darlings of success and conquest, 
 before whom the civilized empire of Mexico, its traditions 
 and government had melted away as a dream of the night. 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 11 
 
 And these men and their peers to be foiled before the iso- 
 lated, unknown and northerly California, and call its conquest 
 impracticable, is a singular fact in history and in the pro- 
 gramme which higher powers arrange for nations and indi- 
 viduals, must have had some wise and determinate purpose. 
 The General of the Jesuits decided that, though they were 
 willing to supply missionaries, that they did not wish to take 
 upon themselves the temporal concerns of the conquest; and, 
 in short, looked upon it much as did the temporal powers, 
 as an impracticable and not feasible undertaking. 
 
 The Mission settlements of the Jesuits in California were 
 not so much the work of the Order as of the invincible en- 
 ergy of three men, directed hither by some powerful spiritual 
 impression, who, in the midst of all discouragements and dif- 
 ficulties, never lost heart, ready and willing at any time to 
 die at their post, and of rare practical ability. These men were 
 Father Rino, Father Juan Ugarte, and Father Salva Tierra. 
 Father Rino had been Professor of Mathematics at Ingol- 
 stadt, where his liberality of feeling and sweetness of disposi- 
 tion won great respect. He had considerable scientific 
 training, and was quite a practical man. It was he who first 
 ascertained that Lower California was a peninsula, and not 
 an island. Father Salva Tierra was a Jesuit Missionary in 
 Pimeria, Sonora. Him Father Rino interested in the Cali- 
 fornia work. His perseverance and energy in this undertak- 
 ing were remarkable. Several times he applied to the So- 
 ciety for a license to undertake the work, and was refused, the 
 General looking upon it as impracticable. At last he got a 
 license, and, in 1697, came to Mexico to raise collections for 
 beginning the work. There he met Father Ugarte, who 
 was then Professor of Philosophy in the College there. 
 Many an interview did these two men have in that grand old 
 city of Mexico, till Salva Tierra, fresh from his wild pastorate 
 of Sonora, influenced the mind of Urgate with the desire to 
 participate with him in the toils and dangers of his unknown 
 
12 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 but glorious Mission, and relinquish the calm ease of his stu- 
 dent's life and the enjoyment of the revenues of his chair of 
 philosophy in the richest city of the New World for the dan- 
 gers, hardships, labors and privations which were to consti- 
 tute the basis of the life laid out before him. 
 
 Father Tierra then left Mexico and went to Sinaloa, ap- 
 pointing Ugarte as his agent in Mexico. He set sail from 
 Mexico with an escort of ten soldiers, commanded by Don 
 Juan Tortoleros. On the third day they made California, 
 and landed not tar from the site of the present town of Loreta, 
 where the coast forms itself into a half-moon, five leagues 
 from point to point. A convenient spot near a watering 
 place, about a league and a half from the shore, was chosen 
 as an encampment, and the provisions and animals were 
 landed, together with the baggage ; the Father, though the 
 head of the expedition, bearing the first load on his shoul- 
 ders. The barracks for the little garrison were then built, 
 and a line of circumvallatiou was thrown up. In the centre 
 a tent was pitched for a temporary chapel, and before the 
 tent was erected a crucifix, with a garland of the beautiful 
 and brilliant flowers of the country. Everything being dis- 
 posed of in the best way possible, the image of our Lady of 
 Loreto, as patroness of the conquest, was brought from the ship 
 and placed with proper solemnity in the chapel. Such was 
 the first successful attempt at the conquest of California; the 
 image of a woman, the simple faith of a man, a man of works 
 as well as of prayer and faith! May we not be proud of 
 such a conquest and such a history? No battle drum sounded 
 the alarm, no flag was lowered, no blood was spilt; but from 
 a quiet ship, on a serene day, under these glorious heavens, 
 came a chief with no sword but that of the Spirit and the 
 image of a lovely woman engarlanded with flowers. What 
 other nation has had such a conquest and such a history ? 
 
 Possession was then taken of the country in the name of 
 the king, after the manner of European voj^agers. They 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 13 
 
 were dependent on New Spain for subsistence, as no supplies 
 were then procurable in the country. Provisions ran so short 
 that there were only three small sacks of maize and three of 
 meal left, and these were full of maggots, but before they 
 quite got to starvation point, the " San Joseph," with supplies 
 from Father Ugarte, hove in sight. Father Tierra says, in 
 his journal: " I write this narrative, uncertain whether I shall 
 live to make an end of it, for our necessity from want of sup- 
 plies is very great." Encouraged and strengthened by the 
 timely aid, they erected works of defence and buildings 
 within the camp, which was enlarged and fortified with a 
 palisade and the strong branches of trees. A chapel for 
 placing our Lady in was built of stone and clay, besides 
 three little dwelliugs, one for the Fathers, another for the Cap- 
 tain, and the third for a magazine. Hardly were these pre- 
 parations completed, when an attack was made on the Mis- 
 sions by the natives, incited by the Hecherosos or Sorcerers, 
 in which the latter were defeated. It was not until later 
 that the enterprise and energy of Father Ugarte made the 
 Missions independent of the constant danger of extinction by 
 famine. Father Tierra petitioned the Government that the 
 garrison should be paid on the burgs' account, as others on 
 the frontiers were; saying, however, that happen what 
 would, he and Father Piccolo should remain, even though 
 left alone with the savages. Still, as they had indulged in 
 the hope of the submission of the country to the dominion 
 of Spain, he requested that they would bestow on California 
 a small vessel. The Viceroy treated this very coldly, and 
 offered one thousand crowns for the use of the Missions; but 
 Ugarte declined receiving it. He said that 30,000 crowns 
 per annum had been offered to the Order, and much had 
 been accomplished by them already without aid from Gov- 
 ernment. About this time tidings of the California enter- 
 prise reached the Court of Spain, and some interest was ex- 
 cited; large sums were promised but were never paid. Re- 
 
14 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 ports were spread that the Fathers had found great treasures 
 in California. This was not enough; troubles almost always 
 come together. Mendoza, the Captain of the garrison, see- 
 ing no chance of making a fortune, and being weary of the 
 restraints the Fathers imposed upon him, with regard to em- 
 ploying Indians in the pearl fishery, wrote to Spain in this 
 manner: " I see no other remedy for putting a stop to these 
 " romantic and rash schemes, than to give an account to the 
 " General of the Order, desiring him that he would order 
 " home these two religious fanatics, and secure them in a 
 " place where they may receive the punishment they de- 
 " serve;" and he adds, " for my part, imprison me and chain 
 " me in a castle, as a warning to those that come after me, 
 " that they may not be carried away by such delusions." 
 These reports, which were widely circulated, cooled the zeal 
 of a great many contributors, and placed the Fathers in a 
 worse position than ever. They only now waited to dismiss 
 their garrison, and remain alone among Indians often hostile, 
 until they heard news from Mexico. Iu the meantime, hav- 
 ing given up all hopes of further assistance, but still undis- 
 mayed and hopeful, Ugarte resolved to take his share in the 
 labors and dangers of his brethren, and having collected 
 what he could, left Mexico on the 3d of December, 1700, and 
 commenced the life of pioneer, missionary and explorer, 
 which was to be his to the end. 
 
 MISSIONARY WORK. 
 
 Ugarte went by way of Guadalajara, and gave orders to 
 send the long boat with provisions to Loreto. There he found 
 the Fathers not only bearing the weight ot neglect and disap- 
 pointment, but also on very short allowance of provisions, no 
 supplies having been received since October. However, in 
 a few days, the boat with provisions from Sinaloa arrived. 
 Tierra was then absent, having gone to Sonora to collect as- 
 sistance. There he met Rino, and they sent on from Guay- 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 15 
 
 mas beasts for breeding and provisions. Rino, who was by 
 nature a geographer and explorer, discussed with SalvaTierra 
 schemes for subjecting these vast and unknown regions to the 
 king of Spain; and they decided that while one should carry 
 his spiritual conquests along Upper California, the other should 
 penetrate and subjugate the interior of the country. 
 
 These men must have had heroic souls. Poor, unsupported, 
 characterized as insane fools deserving restraint by the Cap- 
 tain of their own garrison, they agitate these projects as 
 calmly and quietly as if within the shadow of the college 
 walls at Ingolstadt or Mexico. 
 
 Rino informed his friend of the long and perilous journey 
 in which he had discovered that Lower California was not an 
 island but a peninsula; how he came to the junction of the 
 great river Colorado with the Gila, and came within sight of 
 the great Southern Sea, as they called the Pacific Ocean. 
 Tierra desired him to undertake a second journey, to cross 
 from Sonora to the Colorado, and then to proceed along the 
 coast of Lower California on the shores of the gulf, to the 
 Mission of Loreto. When they arrived at San Marcalo, Rino 
 remarked it as the only place on the coast proper for settling 
 a mission, the soil being fit- for tillage and pasture, and 
 abounding in water. They continued their journey until 
 they had a clear view of the cordillera of California. Pro- 
 visions now grew short, so they decided to return, Father 
 Rino to San Marcalo, to establish a Mission there, and Salva 
 Tierra back to Souora to collect for his Mission, and from 
 thence to sail to Loreto. 
 
 Ugarte and Salva Tierra met at Loreto, in the spring of 
 the year 1701. Ugarte had, at first, no license to remain, but 
 obtained one through his colleague, and the friends so united 
 in their work, faith and zeal, had the privilege of remaining 
 together for awhile, as it was necessary for Ugarte to learn 
 the language. 
 
 Mendoza, the choleric Captain, became more and more 
 
16 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 troublesome ; he still hankered after the pearl fishery, for 
 which the gulf of California is celebrated, but the Fathers 
 would not allow the Indians to be oppressed, and after a series 
 of appeals to the authorities, and recriminations with the 
 Fathers, Mendoza resigned his post. 
 
 At the end of the year, Ugarte having become somewhat 
 familiar with the language, established a Mission in the 
 Yigge mountains, called St. Xavier. He set out with a few 
 soldiers, but the soldiers gave him so much trouble, that he 
 preferred to remain alone among the Indians, committing 
 himself to Providence. He spent the whole day alone. At 
 night an Indian boy came to the door of his humble dwell- 
 ing. He received him kindly, entertained him and sent a 
 message by him to the tribe, desiring that they should come 
 and see him, as the soldiers were all gone. 
 
 The ex-Professor of Philosophy had work enough before 
 him in his new home; not only to teach religious truth as he 
 understood it, but to teach them to live as a self-supporting 
 community, to discipline these fierce, untamed, nomadic 
 people into the strictest form of obedience. This is a very 
 interesting part of the social problem the Fathers attempted 
 to solve. They builded wiser than they knew, and though 
 the contact of advanced races with those less progressed in- 
 evitably discourages and oppresses the latter, still, these 
 peaceful conquerors sacrificed no lives, made holocaust of no 
 whole tribes, as did the military conquerors of Mexico and 
 Peru. They sought to gather together and bind, not to tear 
 apart and destroy, and their memory has a soothing charm, 
 a magnetic influence that is felt in approaching the places 
 where they lived and worked; for the spirit of no thought, no 
 deed, no effort, ever transacted on this earth is lost, but remains 
 forever, and is as perceptible in its effluence as is the mush 
 which was used in building certain chambers in the Pyra- 
 mids. Ugarte had to alienate these Indians from their ca- 
 reer and change their modes of life. He taught them to 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 17 
 
 work, as well by example as by precept, was himself ever 
 first and foremost; farmer, bricklayer, carpenter, as well as 
 priest. He seemed to be everywhere present, and had need 
 of all his mildness and gentleness, as well as energy, to sus- 
 tain him in his labors with an unthrifty and lazy people. 
 Then was first developed by civilized man the fertility of 
 this wondrous California soil. Ugarte made choice of good 
 land, which produced abundantly. He planted vines, raised 
 plentiful harvests of wheat, maize, and other grains, bred 
 horses and sheep, and not only supplied the wants of his own 
 people, but was able to assist the mother Mission at Loreto. 
 When New Spaiu was suffering from scarcity occasioned by 
 want of rain, he says, " We eat here good bread of our own 
 harvests." Then he bethought himself of clothing. His 
 sheep being sufficiently increased, he himself made the dis- 
 taff, spinning-wheel and looms, and sent to Tepique for a 
 master weaver, to teach the Indians and superintend the 
 manufacture. 
 
 In the meantime, Salva Tierra had been summoned to 
 Mexico on business. The Government felt that the missiona- 
 ries were a power, and wished to have some understanding 
 with them for its own purposes, but how is it possible for 
 politicians and tricksters to understand the aims and hopes 
 of men who have risen far above their times, and above them- 
 selves, who have borne the burden and heat of the day, who 
 have communed with the stars in their lonely night watches, 
 who have been accustomed to rely ou God and on themselves, 
 to whom all forms of danger and hardship are familiar, whose 
 daily bread is self-denial, and who are so accustomed to it 
 that, by degrees, that bitter bread that seasons all their meat 
 is become palatable to them. 
 
 Salva Tierra was almost worn out with labor, his health 
 was failing, and he was afflicted with the stone, which made 
 travelling very painful to him. But he obeyed the sum- 
 mons. He landed in an almost dying state, and was carried 
 
18 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 to Guadalajara on a litter by the Indians. There he lay sick 
 for two months, unable to proceed farther, but attended by 
 some of his beloved California converts. Visions rose before 
 him in his parting hour of the land of his adoption, such as 
 he had forseen it would be, the scene of peace and cheerful 
 industry. The day was dawning ; the day star had arisen in 
 his soul ; and on a beautiful summer day, in presence of his 
 children and his colleagues, he was received into his heavenly 
 home. 
 
 That year a terrible hurricane swept over California. The 
 fathers thought that the reason why the hills were so bare, 
 was that these hurricanes swept the vegetation and soil clear 
 off them. Ugarte's church and house were blown down, 
 and he onty saved his life by remaining twenty-four hours 
 under a rock, exposed to all the severity of the weather. 
 
 Two more Missions were founded. The first ship ever 
 built in California was built and named by Ugarte, " The 
 Triumph of the Cross." What resolution ! What patience ! 
 what knowledge of the savage heart it must have taken to 
 make of these Indians, whom no one else has ever known 
 how to utilize, farmers, weavers, and even shipbuilders. 
 Surely that was a great social problem to solve, to unite ele- 
 ments so diverse in a common aim. There were many mistakes 
 made, doubtless ; we are all making them ; but the attempt 
 was made, and to a certain extent, successfully. In six years, 
 at La Paz, there was a congregation of 800 Indians ; many 
 savqges were persuaded to live in friendship, and considerable 
 land was cultivated. In 1721, Ugarte surveyed the Gulf of 
 California in his ship " Triumph of the Cross." He verified 
 Rinos' discoveries, and ascertained the position of the best ports 
 and harbors; but he suffered severely from inflammatory rheu- 
 matism, contracted from exposure and fatigue in bad weather. 
 He also made many charts and maps. Father Lugardo con- 
 secrated the whole of his private fortune to found the Mis- 
 sion of San Ignacio, and planted vines, olive trees, figs, and 
 sugar-cane. 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 19 
 
 THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS. 
 
 And who were the people who held their own against the 
 conquerors of Mexico? The scattered remnants exist at pres- 
 ent ; the gentle, silent Indians of the Mission, generally 
 found with a great admixture of Spanish blood ; the scat- 
 tered dwellers of the rancherias ; and sometimes scattered 
 families building their little brush houses, as we see them in 
 Los Angeles, on the laud where they are employed, but 
 which they no longer own. Melancholy and scattered waifs 
 of the great human family, calmly fronting an inevitable des- 
 tiny with the patience aud resignatiou peculiar to the dark 
 races, and those races whose doom is written, who belong 
 not to the future, but to the past. They had their day too ; 
 and it may be interesting to know what they were in their 
 primitive condition, when they were the natural lords of all 
 their surroundings, and could develop their peculiar life and 
 idiosyncracies as freely as the deer of their mountains, or the 
 pine trees which they so love. Many has been the piteous 
 appeal to the white man to spare the pine, the Indian's bread 
 and food, whose shadow is so sweet to him, and whose rich 
 nuts nourish him. With the stern footsteps of destiny, as 
 the white man advances, the Indian recedes and perishes. 
 Individually, what does the white man gain? A life of 
 fevered ambition for the attainment of an uncertain end, the 
 cares which attach to the battle of life in the hand to hand 
 fight which we call civilization. Is the Indian, sitting 
 in the sun, with his natural wants measurably supplied, 
 surrounded by his dusky family, less happy than his 
 white brother, though he fronts the setting instead of the 
 rising suu, whose long level rays are leading him on to the 
 starlighted land of shadow, which we must all pass through, 
 to hail the rising of a better and more enduring day ? 
 
 During the time when the Indians reigned undisturbed in 
 California, they had no chief whom they acknowledged, or 
 to whom they paid tribute. Every family governed itsel£ 
 
20 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 In the rancherias, or even in the nations, there were one, two, 
 or more who gave orders for the harvest, or for military 
 expeditions, conducted them to the forests or sea coasts in 
 search of food, and headed them in wars, ravages and depre- 
 dations. These children of nature instinctively recognized 
 the right of the ablest to govern, and as there was not much 
 political intriguing among them, which is the curse and can- 
 cer of our degenerate day, that was probably one reason why 
 they were so successful in repulsing the expeditions sent out 
 against them. In all other particulars than this concession 
 of the right of the ablest to govern, every one was master 
 of his own liberty. They had neither temples nor altars, nor 
 any fixed vows, prayers or expiations. They had an idea 
 of the unity of God as a pure spirit, and believed that there 
 was a vast universe of spiritual beings. They said that there 
 were many more inhabitants in heaven than on earth, by 
 heaven meaning the great universe of spiritual beings ; and 
 they had an idea that there had formerly existed great wars 
 there. They had priests who were called Hecherosos or 
 Socerers, who had great influence among them. These men 
 claimed to hold intercourse with spirits, after the fashion of 
 the classic oracles, and the modern mediums. These men 
 were also physicians. They claimed that they were not only 
 inspired^by spirits, but were identified with the very spirits 
 themselves, who used their organs for a mouthpiece. Some- 
 times they said that they had been to heaven, and communed 
 with deities. It was very difficult to detach the natives from 
 the influence of these spiritual guides. The boys belonging 
 to the Missions would often disappear, and join in their 
 mystic rites, at the time of the gathering of the Pityhayas 
 nuts ; and the greatest danger to the Missions arose from 
 their influence. 
 
 Such were the people who listened to the murmur of the 
 pines in the Sierras, ere the axe of the woodman had felled 
 one goodly tree — who roamed in the fertile plains of the 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 21 
 
 Sacramento, and celebrated their mystic rites in the deep 
 recesses of the Yosemite. 
 
 But the hour struck in that wonderful clock of destiny, 
 which measures our lives and our days, and the greater days 
 of the rise and fall of nations, in the eternal procession of 
 all things ; and the men were about to appear, who, in some 
 strange, inexplicable manner, were to subdue and utilize 
 them, subdue them not by the sword of the flesh, but by 
 that of the spirit, and utilize them as they have never been 
 utilized before or since. There was a ferocity, too, about 
 these formidable savages, only equalled by the almost hyena- 
 like savageness of the Fiji Islanders. 
 
 During the period of disturbance which occurred soou 
 after the death of Father Ugarte, a ship put in for for fresh 
 provisions. The scurvy was on board very badly. The pin- 
 nace went on shore with a whole boat's crew. They had no 
 sooner landed than they were killed and torn to pieces by a 
 host of furious savages ; and the pinnace was quickly demol- 
 ished for the sake of the nails and iron. And yet these men 
 could be tamed and set to work by a few unarmed priests ! 
 What could the spell be ? It was this : — That aside from 
 their creed, aside from their churchiauity, these men were 
 possessed of a living faith, and the submission to the Divine 
 Will, not to their own will, that characterizes sincerely reli- 
 gious minds; and this faith is, after all, the only power in the 
 human soul that has ever been able to move political or 
 social mountains. The immense power of the human will, 
 energized by the Divine, has hitherto been quite under- 
 estimated as a factor in the great movement of current events. 
 The power that one man or one woman can exercise in this 
 way is truly remarkable ; and in proportion to their numbers, 
 and the closeness of their union on any one given point, 
 grows the power. The California Indians, as we have shown 
 from the most authentic records into which we have searched 
 carefully, were a nation of spiritualists, governed by their 
 
22 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 mediums, as the Hecherosos really were. Thence the secret 
 of their power to resist even the conqueror of Mexico ; 
 thence the foiling of sucessive armaments. As in ancient 
 times, at the advent of Christ, that central man through 
 whose human form so much of the Divine God Light 
 radiated, the Oracles became dumb. 
 
 "Apollo from his shrine could no more divine, 
 With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving, 
 No nightly trance or breathed spell inspired 
 The pale-eyed priest in the prophetic cell." 
 
 So these three earnest men that I have named, and their 
 compeers, coming with their hearts full of a higher aspira- 
 tion, were able to subdue the inferior spiritual forces, which 
 the brute force of the Spanish government was unable to 
 tame, even under such men as Cortez. 
 
 I am no advocate of Romanism, but we have to free our- 
 selves of all prejudice, even against Romanism. The divine 
 groupings of the future will draw to us out of the Roman 
 Church, out of the Protestant Church, out of the infidel and 
 Spiritualist meetings, out of the kingdoms of the East and 
 India, out of the farthest isles of the sea, those who may fitly 
 tread the aisles of the Catholic Universal Church, which has 
 no head, but our common Father, no limit, but universal 
 humanity. 
 
 REVOLT OF THE TRIBES. 
 
 In 1730 Father Ugarte died, after thirty years labor in 
 California. He entered into rest within the walls of the 
 mother Mission at Loreto. A noble man was Juan Maria 
 Ugarte. The inspiration of his memory will not depart as 
 long as the velvet hills of California sleep in the sun, or the 
 great stream of the Colorado flows into the gulf whose boun- 
 daries he surveyed. He was the most energetic and practi- 
 cal of the triumvirate of the three earliest pioneers of Cali- 
 fornia. The loss of his powerful arm and personal influence 
 was severely felt. 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 23 
 
 A beautiful young girl was growing up in one of the Indian 
 families attached to the church. She attracted the notice of 
 an influential man of another tribe outside its pale, who had 
 already several wives. The practice of polygamy was dis- 
 couraged by the Fathers, but he succeeded in carrying her 
 off, and was so enraged with the manner in which the Fath- 
 ers remonstrated with him that he stirred up a general rebel- 
 lion, which resulted in the destruction of several Missions, 
 and the death of two Fathers. An attack was made upon 
 San Ignacio, which was repulsed by the soldiers and con- 
 verted Indians, and thirty prisoners were marched into 
 Loreto. The Mission Indians, who had a hankering after 
 their native customs, hoped to have had the pleasure of kill- 
 ing them, and were disappointed when the sentence was 
 commuted into the public whipping of the chief offender. 
 These Indians remained for some time at the Mission, and 
 were kindly treated. 
 
 Perhaps it may not be uninteresting here to get a glimpse 
 of the daily life at the Mission. Homely and simple details, 
 made picturesque by their grouping and location. The 
 Indians assembled at the sound of the bell in the church to 
 hear mass. Then breakfast of a preparation of boiled corn, 
 called atole. Then all went to work till noon. At noon 
 there was a dinner of boiled corn, meat and vegetables. At 
 night, devotion and more atole. It was a sort of devotional 
 industrial school, in which the Fathers were head laborers, 
 head cooks, physicians and priests; and each Father was at- 
 tended by a soldier, who was vicegerent in the priest's ab- 
 sence. Small faults were punished with whipping, for 
 greater ones the penalty was the stocks. They were fur- 
 nished with coarse clothes and blanket^ Everywhere the 
 children were the first care. They were taught reading, 
 writing, singing, and Spanish. The children from six to ten, 
 the sick and the aged were provided for, and a certain allow- 
 ance was given to outsiders, provided they came for instruc- 
 
24 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 tion. It was found that the best of these people would, with 
 characteristic carelessness, waste all they gathered. So store- 
 houses were built, in which the crops were placed and dis- 
 tributed as necessity required, or used in helping out some 
 other Mission. As we might imagine, many would prefer 
 the free and vagrant life, drifting up and down the plains and 
 mountains; but, after all, there was a degree of solid com- 
 fort at the Mission, where, thanks to the wise forethought of 
 the Fathers, the meals were regular, the clothing coarse, 
 though comfortable, and a shelter from the chilly nights was 
 provided, to say nothing of the aesthetic charm of the music, 
 in which the sweet, melancholy modulations of the trained 
 Indian voice mingled in the music of the mass, and the charm 
 of color, always so attractive to the savage eye, in the vest- 
 ments and ceremonies of the church. 
 
 You might have seen, a hundred and fifty years ago, in 
 some solitary valley, or creeping through a trail in the foot- 
 hills, a singular cavalcade. Two priests riding foremost, 
 grave, weather-beaten men; then, an escort of a few soldiers, 
 in the Spanish costume of the period, and a small train of 
 mules, packed with the necessaries of a journey and the fur- 
 niture of a church. So they wandered through the moun- 
 tains and surveyed the valleys until a suitable place was 
 found. When this was done, the bells were hung on trees, 
 and the call was made, " Hear ye, gentiles, come to the 
 Holy Church." The mules were unpacked, the church fur- 
 niture arranged in a temporary building, and the Padres, 
 with their grave Spanish simplicity, would set earnestly to 
 work to hunt up parishioners. In this case it was not the 
 church who called the clergyman, but the clergy who called 
 together the church. And it may here be worthy of remark 
 that the first of those grants of land called Spanish grants, 
 made in California, was to a Spanish soldier who had mar- 
 ried a native convert. 
 
 It took men of some force, physical as well as mental, to 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 25 
 
 control these kind of parishioners. On one occasion, after 
 the foundation of a Mission, and when things were just begin- 
 ning to get into working order, some outside Indians came 
 to mass, who permitted themselves some jesting and smoth- 
 ered laughter at these novel ceremonies. One man, who 
 seemed to be the wit of the party, stood within arms length 
 of the Father who was performing the service; and, after 
 enduring the interruption quietly for some time, the Padre at 
 last stretched forth his hand, seized the offender, swayed him 
 gently backward and forward two or three times, and set 
 him down a sadder and a wiser man. 
 
 As the signs of revolt began to threaten, word was sent to 
 Mexico of their precarious condition, but it was treated with 
 the usual indifference. The Viceroy communicated with 
 Spain on the subject, but they all might have been extermi- 
 nated ere succor could arrive, had it not been for the Indians 
 themselves. Those not concerned in the revolt appeared to 
 be seized with grief and regret, like children left without a 
 father, and the head men of each friend]} 7 tribe, taking from 
 the different Missions the crucifixes and ornaments which 
 had been left behind, came in procession to Loreto and stood 
 outside the gates of the garrison, as if making a testimony of 
 their innocence of any unfriendly intentions. "You have 
 "baptized us," they said, "you have taught us the name 
 "and worship of the true God; you have gathered us from 
 " the dry mountains to the watered vales; you have made us 
 " believe that good acts bring happiness; you have made us 
 " your children. Will you now forsake us? Is it just that a 
 " whole nation should suffer for the sins of a few?" The 
 Fathers were touched at this friendly demonstration, but 
 they thought it wise to defer a few days to test their since- 
 rity. The conspirators from the revolted tribes were given 
 up; some were flogged, and others banished from the Mis- 
 sions. One tribe, the Yaquis, assembled five hundred men 
 for the relief of the Fathers. 
 4 
 
26 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADEES ; 
 
 "We see, then, that upon our California the curse of no 
 bloodshed and massacre of native races rests, as it does upon 
 the dark record of Mexico and Peru. And to what are we in- 
 debted for this? Principally to the faithfulness and spiritual 
 power of three men and their compeers, who devoted unre- 
 servedly the whole of their life and energies to the Indians of 
 California — abilities and energies that might have made their 
 mark anywhere in the civilized world, and which we, who 
 have inherited their labors and come into possession of a 
 land freed from the terrible curse which the oppression and 
 destruction of the innocent ever entails, ought never to for- 
 get. They were meek, gentle, scholarly men, who could be 
 very firm and very brave; geographers, explorers, tillers of 
 the soil, brick-layers, handicraft-men, tailors, weavers, vine- 
 dressers and priests. Well did they understand and practice 
 the old monastic proverb, Laborare est orare — "To labor is to 
 pray." 
 
 THE EXPULSION OF THE JESUITS. 
 
 We must not forget that these men were Jesuits. Nor 
 can we forget all that the word Jesuitry implies — of dark 
 intrigue, of unscrupulous greed for the advancement of the 
 Order, or the tremendous power wielded by its compact and 
 perfect discipline; but let us not, also, forget that use and good 
 may reside even in the most apparently mean and false thing. 
 Let us look to the spirit and not to the letter, and try, each 
 individual by his or her works. The Jesuits have been ex- 
 pelled in turn from almost every country in Europe. And 
 why? Because they were so strong, so united in the power 
 of unconditional personal surrender, that they were feared by 
 the powers that be. r j ^There is hardly any limit to the power 
 of an idea which becomes a religious conviction, embodied 
 in ever so small a company. Its power of multiplication is 
 infinite, its resources almost boundless. But the position 
 taken must be affirmative, not negative; hence the weakness 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 27 
 
 of all simply Protestant communities, though that element 
 has been needed, even down to the verge of the extremest 
 radicalism. Yet there is no power there, and it is felt if 
 not confessed. Spiritualism also sadly tails on that side, and 
 is weak for want of the grand centralization of definite, posi- 
 tive power, focalized on a great religious idea suited to the 
 wants of this day and generation, and more particularly 
 adapted to the needs of this great American people, the ad- 
 vance guard of the whole world. We have had imported 
 religion as well as imported fashions. It is for this people 
 yet to realize one of the highest religious and divine mani- 
 festations that has yet dawned on the world. It might be 
 called, as an inspired one now passed away called it, " The 
 Unity Dispensation," a comforter to head and heart in the 
 fierce struggles that are at hand, and the only ark that can 
 safely ride on the waters that are already white with angry 
 surges. Then will come organization: then will come order; 
 then will come power — a power only to be attained by putting 
 ourselves on one side, so that God may shine through us, and 
 combining together on that principle. I will quote from some 
 thoughts of Mr. Judd Pardee, published in May, 1862, some 
 prophetic words on this subject: "The end of this war is 
 " not peace. A bitterer struggle ensues then. The battle- 
 " fields are transferred; for the God in man is roused to arms 
 " by bugle blasts of inspiration against the devil in conven- 
 " tionality. A three-fold conventionality, the parents of a 
 " plenteous brood, oppresses, depresses, and continually im- 
 " presses us. A deliverance from this saddening psychology 
 " is absolutely dependent on a stronger force. The spirit of 
 " conservatism, the spirit of militaryism, and the .spirit of the 
 " spiritual new — these three will be wrestlers. I see that 
 " the second spirit will be the greatest for a season, and a 
 u military dictatorship takes the rule when Abraham Liu- 
 *« coin's time is out, if not before. If the long man is not 
 " ousted by assassination or a natural death ere his Presiden- 
 
28 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES J 
 
 " tial close, at least afterwards comes in the iron man. A 
 " known chieftain, to become yet more known, will take the 
 " reins by big acclaim. Why will it be? For the reason 
 " that this constitutional government is too inefficient in the 
 " tightening adversity; because too flaccid in the muscles of 
 "its own right arm; for exigency's sake altogether too cen- 
 "treless; and, next, because a military rule must be the 
 " bridge between republicanism and theocracy." 
 
 The pulse of to-day beats at a fever heat, and men seem to 
 be walking in a dream. There is little true, natural life- 
 The system is either lashed up into the excitements of busi- 
 ness or pleasure or braced up with stimulants toward off the 
 dreaded reaction. We pass through life in a vain show, 
 with only passing glimpses of our own possibilities. Will 
 the kind reader pardon this digression from the calm quiet 
 of the California of the Padres to our more stormy period? 
 
 The Jesuits had now become a power; they had achieved 
 that which the government failed to achieve, and thence a 
 dull jealousy, a feeling of suspicion, a petty spite on many 
 quarters. Still the circumstance of the loss of the boat's 
 crew made it expedient to send out more succor to the Mis- 
 sions. The Order also sent out some new laborers. In 1745 
 there were sixteen Mission stations and 25,000 converts. 
 Once established, success was sure. 
 
 The good taste and judgment of the church in selecting 
 building sites is proverbial. Peace and plenty crown their 
 efforts. Flocks and herds, corn, wine and oil were sustained 
 and produced by the genial and fertile soil. The word, 
 home, so dear to the heart must have been realized by these 
 priests in the land of their adoption. Happy those who were 
 laid at rest in the sunny soil they loved so well, ere the gath- 
 ering tempest broke and they were expelled, banished, 
 driven from the familiar gardens, the familiar faces, the fa- 
 miliar haunts so dear to the studious and the solitary. Ban- 
 ishment, expulsion, is a bitter word. When we have made 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 29 
 
 a place of repose, after great effort and privation, it is hard 
 at once to abandon it. 
 
 The Jesuits labored in the footsteps of Ugarte till 1776, 
 unsuspicious, undisturbed, increasing in wealth and influence. 
 Almost every year brought ships from the Phi Hi pine Islands, 
 with crews sick of the scurvy, for them to feed and succor. 
 Commodore Anson, among others, paid them a visit, but 
 spoke very discouragingly of the country, saying that there 
 was no other commodity but a little wine there, nor any 
 hopes of there ever being any. But they were abundantly 
 supplied with the necessaries, and even some of the luxuries 
 of life. 
 
 The government, in the meantime, knowing that the Order 
 were more masters in California than they were, sent ships 
 with secret and sealed orders; and so well did they accom- 
 plish their design that in one night every Jesuit was seized 
 and made ready to leave the province. These men, so va- 
 liant for their work, were not valiant for themselves. They 
 went away as quietly as they came, leaving their works be- 
 hind them. This was in 1766. 
 
 THE ADVENT OF THE FRANCISCANS. 
 
 In 1767 came the Franciscans, with Father Jumpero Lerra, 
 a scholar, an earnest and sincere man, who was actuated by 
 the spirit, and trod in the footsteps of Ugarte and Salva 
 Tierra. Most of the Missions in Upper California were 
 founded by the Franciscans, and the founding of these new 
 Missions was necessarily attended with more or less privation. 
 In 1770 the Mission of San Diego was founded — old San 
 Diego — and provisions ran so short, that Lerra had recourse 
 to prayer; but, most opportunely, the "San Antonio" ar- 
 rived, and he sailed in her for Monterey. In a letter, which 
 is still preserved, he says, " On the 3d of June, 1771, being 
 " Pentecusl, WW assembled under the shade of a large oak 
 " tree. The Veni Creator was sung, and mass said, after 
 
30 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 " which, we all dined together in a shady place by the 
 " beach." After many inquiries for absent friends, he says, 
 " I have not had a letter from any Christian country for more 
 " than a year." In 1772, the Mission of San Gabriel, near 
 Los Angeles, was founded. Father Lerra writes from'thence: 
 " The milk of the cows, and the vegetables of the garden, are 
 " our two great sources of subsistence, but even these begin 
 " to get scarce. But it is not for this I feel mortified, but 
 " because we have not been able to go on with more Mis- 
 sions." After asking that more missionaries may be sent, he 
 adds, as if in a moment of discouragement: " but let those 
 " who come here come well provided with patience and 
 " charity, and let them pass on in good humor, and they may 
 " become rich — I mean in troubles." 
 
 In 1772, San Luis Obispo was founded. In the same year 
 San Diego was attacked, and one of the Fathers killed. In 
 1776, that year so remarkable as the era of republican lib- 
 erty in this country, while "Washington, Jefferson and the 
 rest of their illustrious compeers were laying wide and deep 
 the foundations of our republican institutions in the East, 
 Jumpero Lerra founded the Mission of San Francisco, and 
 surveyed the harbor. At the time of the secularization in 
 1835, forty leagues of land were attached to the mission of 
 San Francisco, there was 25,000 dollars of specie in the trea- 
 sury, and 35,000 dollars worth of merchandize; its hills were 
 covered with cattle, its barns well filled. Jumpero Lerra 
 died at the Mission of San Francisco at the age of 71. He 
 was a man of various and extensive learning; had known the 
 life of Courts and the amenities of polished society, but he 
 kept before him the same undeviating purpose and unswerv- 
 ing aim which had marked his predecessors. Shortly after 
 the founding of the Mission of San Francisco, the Mission of 
 Santa Clara, Santa Barbara and five others were founded. 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 31 
 
 THE DEPARTURE OF THE FRANCISCANS. 
 
 The seed sown was now beginning to produce its result in 
 a harvest of temporal prosperity. What was the capital with 
 which these enterprises were started ? In the first place, 
 voluntary contributions were invested by trustees in Mexico 
 under the name of the California Pious Fund. Four hun- 
 dred dollars a year was the salary of each priest. 
 
 Such was the capital with which these establishments were 
 started, and from which they grew in wealth and prosperity, 
 so as to make them too tempting a prey to a needy and un- 
 scrupulous Government to be left untouched. During the 
 time of the prosperity of these great self-supporting commu- 
 nities, they each possessed from 30,000 to 100,000 head of 
 cattle, besides sheep. They exported large quantities of 
 hides, tallow, grain and wine. So much confidence did they 
 inspire, that the word of a Padre was good to the American 
 and English houses with whom they had dealings. They 
 only were capable of throwing all this produce into the mar- 
 ket. The Indians had all their wants supplied, and lived in 
 peace and plenty. 
 
 After the period of prosperity we have indicated, the time 
 drew nigh when the Franciscans too must quit the soil where 
 their unremitting labors had not been able to secure them 
 either a home or a country. In 1825, Mexico threw oft' her 
 allegiance to the Spanish crown, and became an independent 
 nation. The Mexican General, Echuadra, arrived in Monte- 
 rey, Upper California, with full power to receive the submis- 
 sion of California to the Mexican Government. The Fran- 
 ciscans were requested to take the oath of allegiance to the 
 new Government. This they could not do without the con- 
 sent of the Prefecto, as the head of the Order was styled. 
 The Spanish Prefecto declared himself unwilling to take the 
 oath, until his king had abandoned the sovereignty of Cali- 
 fornia. Upon this, Echuadra had him arrested and banished 
 to Manilla. He also told the Padres that their yearly stipend 
 
32 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 of 400 dollars was withheld, and that they were subject to 
 his orders. The California Pious Fund, which had been in- 
 vested in Mexico, formed but a small morsel for the hungry 
 office-seekers and politicians who beset the new Government. 
 The Mexican authorities in California assigned lands to the 
 Indians employed on the Missions, and told the Padres that 
 they would relieve them of the burden of their temporal 
 affairs; that they might better attend to their spiritual 
 functions. The Fathers thus lost their influence on the com- 
 munity, and everything went to decay. The small stipend 
 which supplied their wants had placed them in a position to 
 command respect and to labor for the world. They saw, now 
 that their work here was ended, that their pleasant fields 
 must soon be desolate, their gardens deserted, their hearths 
 solitary. Fearing starvation for the Indians, and seeing how 
 they were likely to be defrauded, they even encouraged them 
 in the yearly branding of the cattle, when the animals were 
 coralled, and each proprietor had his private mark branded 
 on tlxe shoulder of the animal, to let some go wild in the 
 woods as a resource in time of need. 
 
 At Santa Monica, 17 or 18 miles from Los Angeles, along 
 the coast, there were, seven or eight years ago, wild cattle in 
 the woods. Father Antonio Pera came to San Luis Rey in 
 1798. He built a small thatched cottage, and asked for some 
 Indians and soldiers from another Mission. After a residence 
 of 34 years, he left the place stocked with 60,000 head of 
 domesticated animals of all sorts, fields yielding 13,000 bushels 
 of grain per year, a church and a complete set of buildings, 
 and yet, after all these years of labor, he left with only suffi- 
 cient funds to join his convent in Mexico, and throw himself 
 upon the charity of his Order. In 1827, some of the Padres 
 left in American ships for Boston, and thence to Spain. In 
 1835, others left for Mexico. Some died in the country, and 
 were buried under the churches of their Missions. This 
 year the power of the priests was transferred to Government 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 33 
 
 officers, called Administradores — one on each Mission. Any 
 one who understands the general style and manner of acting 
 of Government officials, with some rare exceptions, can realize 
 that this was not a beneficial change. Appointed generally 
 by favoritism, subject to be displaced at an uncertain date, 
 the system otters a premium to all the greed and selfishness 
 of our nature. From 1835 to 1848, a period of thirteen years, 
 California was under the rule of Mexican and Spanish Gover- 
 nors. Don Pio Pico, one of the last of these Governors, still 
 resides near Los Angeles. In 1848, the great year of revolu- 
 tions, California was ceded to the United States, together 
 with Texas and ISTew Mexico, in consideration of fifteen millions 
 in money, the assumption of the Mexican debt to United 
 States citizens, and the right to the navigation of the gulf. 
 
 RESUME OF THE WHOLE. 
 
 Our survey is completed. Very rapid and very much con- 
 densed it has necessarily been. The slow, tranquil years 
 drifted by in the sunny Missions of the Pacific slope, rightly 
 so called, while in the East, on the Atlantic slope, a great 
 empire was being born; and while the Padres were doing 
 their work on the Pacific, Washington, Jefferson, Paine, and 
 their illustrious compeers, were building up with sword and 
 pen, as God's own appointed ministers, the foundations of the 
 mighty American Nation, whose dominion spans the continent, 
 and is only terminated by the Pacific Ocean. The torch of 
 liberty lighted here j>assed over to Europe, and created the 
 wars of the Revolution and the Empire; thence, the begin- 
 ning of a series of convulsions that has not yet terminated, 
 but is only gathering strength for another and more tremen- 
 dous outbreak. 
 
 We do not claim for our friends, the Padres, that they were 
 
 perfect, any more than we ourselves are; we simply say that 
 
 they were in earnest, which is more than some of us are. 
 
 The ranks of reform are to-day filled with a clamorous crowd 
 
 5 
 
34 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADEES ; 
 
 who all claim to be leaders, masters, teachers. Individual 
 
 sovereignty is running as wild as individual despotism did in 
 
 former times. The true leader and organizer in our ranks, 
 
 the Christos of the nineteenth century, must be the servant, 
 
 not the master; the servant of man and the servant of God, 
 
 for how can he command who has never learned to obey? 
 
 We have set before you a lesson in two parts, clearly defined 
 
 and full of instruction. Part 1st. The Jesuits in California. 
 
 Part 2d. The Franciscans. The world is a great school, in which 
 
 • 
 millions of souls are being educated, and all there is of any real 
 
 worth in life is the education our souls get out of its ex- 
 periences. Two classes were called up on the Pacific Coast, 
 and our friends the Padres were the monitors. The great 
 schoolmaster knew when it was best the lessons should be 
 ended; he knows also what other classes he designs to call 
 up. There is more order in the great world history than 
 some are disposed to admit. 
 
 The best and most enduring part of the teachings of the 
 Padres, is what they themselves suspected least. It has left 
 its lessons on every stone of their deserted dwellings, every 
 tree which their hands planted, and consists in the example 
 which they havejleft to the world of the practical success and 
 self-supporting nature of great industrial organizations, even 
 when commenced and carried on in the face of the greatest 
 disadvantages, and with comparatively small means. The 
 problem of industrial organization and social reform, will be 
 that in which the generations that are to follow us, our chil- 
 dren and our children's children, will be most deeply inte- 
 rested. The Padres gave some good and wise hints in this 
 direction; for this will their names live when conquerors and 
 kings are forgotten. The silent influence of the peaceful 
 Spaniards will inaugurate new industrial organizations on 
 soil already consecrated to that purpose; not in vain, to our 
 State, yet in its infancy, but commanding in an almost un- 
 exampled manner the elements of success, has the lesson of 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 85 
 
 the great industrial and self-supporting communities, known 
 as the Missions of California, been given. The religious ele- 
 ment has been admirably adapted to sustain man in the sea- 
 sons of darkness through which he has passed the night and 
 twilight of the world's more perfect day. In prosperity, the 
 same religious element is the great regulating element. The 
 spiritual or coronal region is at the summit; like heaven's 
 overarching dome, it presides over intellect, affection, passion. 
 And yet all these must have their place; in denying these, 
 we in so tar deny God. Yet our' friends, the Padres, were 
 not to blame in the denial they inflicted on the two latter 
 elements. They saw that the God man, that is Humanity, 
 personified by their familiar emblem, the lacerated and suf- 
 fering Christ of the Crucifix, was still in a state of crucifixion, 
 but they did not fully realize that a complete renewal and 
 consecration of all his attributes must follow upon his entrance 
 into new and higher phases of existence. When, instead of 
 the stereotyped crucifix, we look to the risen, ascended and 
 spiritual Christ, the ideal God man, that is humanity, repre- 
 sented by Him, the regeneration of the world will have be- 
 gun. The time is not distant. Tempests and storms will 
 usher in a brighter day. Nowhere more strikingly than in 
 our own State, are the workings of the great volcanic forces 
 manifest. Nowhere is earth adorned with a fresher garland 
 of beauty. Mighty canons are split through huge rocks, 
 revealing their hidden secrets. Metalliferous rocks are per- 
 meated with precious metals, marble, coal and health-giving 
 mineral springs. Nature has prepared the place for a labora- 
 tory of new ideas, and a new social order. Providence has 
 given it a history to match with its strange and singular 
 beauty, its magnificent opulence, its wonderful ferti lity . Who 
 were its conquerors? Ask Cortez. No, the proud Spaniard 
 turns away humiliated. In the serene mansions of the just 
 made perfect, shall we invoke the benignant presence of 
 Salva Tierra and Ugarte. They smile with an ineffable smile, 
 
36 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 
 
 those men of gentle and heroic endurance, at whose hearths 
 no woman smiled, as they point to the beautiful form of her 
 whom they call the conqueror of California — the beautiful 
 symbol of divinely regenerated woman, idealized in Mary of 
 Galilee. To-day the emancipation and divine regeneration 
 of Woman, is the great question to which all other issues are 
 comparatively trivial. This must inaugurate new departures 
 both in social and governmental science. I Cannot refrain 
 from adding a few thoughts suggested by the above facts, 
 which open a wide and brilliant perspective. 
 
 THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 
 
 The first idea suggested is the necessity of a true idea of 
 government as a necessity of well-being. The most god-like 
 minds have either terminated their career by a violent death, 
 as Christ did, or they have led lives of poverty and obscurity 
 in an age that did not recognize their truth, because the 
 power of selfishness, the animal in man, was too strong for 
 the spiritual, and quenched its heaven-sent light. The idea 
 of government has been exclusively masculine, as the idea 
 of God has been. Now, the idea of the entire masculinity of 
 God is, as F. R. McKinley said, "a swell of presumptuous 
 vanity in the mere male mind." The God-head is bi-sexual, 
 whether a principle or a personality, or it could not exist — 
 could not permeate all nature and be represented in all na- 
 ture by the divine sexual element in all its various combina- 
 tion and modification. " All things, by a law divine," 
 says Shelly, "with one another's being mingle." The idea 
 of God in the Romish Church is essentially bi-sexual. Mary 
 represents the feminine side of God; hence another element 
 of power. In the last century an obscure English woman, 
 Ann Lee, for the first time in any Protestant community, 
 proclaimed the idea of a father and mother God. She came 
 to America and founded the now wealthy Order of .Sha- 
 kers, among whom the first spiritual manifestations took place 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 37 
 
 long previous to those at Rochester. The idea of God the 
 Supreme, or whatever man believes in as such, creates and 
 modifies all our ideas of government, so that the recognition 
 of woman in the government of the community by the 
 Shakers, was a natural consequence of their religious belief. 
 
 You ask, Whence had the best ideas of government their 
 rise? I answer, From the highest inspirations of men in some 
 critical moment. Such was Magna Charta, such the Declara- 
 tion of Independence and the Constitution of the United States. 
 But as time rolls on, with the progress of development fresh 
 necessities arise and fresh inspiration is given. The water of 
 a river gets turbid and muddy near a large city where many 
 people and factories are congregated; but let us make a pil- 
 grimage to its source — leave the haunts of men for the home 
 of the beaver; and then up higher, leaving the hemlocks to 
 where the pines point straight to heaven; what do you find? 
 A gentle, lovely rill, fed from the clouds and dews of heaven; 
 and it so happy up there with the birds and the wind and 
 the sweet shade of trees, that it murmurs a low song of sweet 
 content. As in case of war aud devastation men flee to the 
 mountains to hide until the scourge is passed over, so in 
 times of extreme necessity, when the birth or death of a 
 nation or civilization is in question, then are men driven to 
 the high places of divine and elevated thought to seek inspi- 
 rations for the emergency. How can any of us tell how near 
 such a time may be at hand, and how are we prepared for 
 it? 
 
 I feel very certain that all governments founded on force, 
 must sooner or later fall into a chaotic condition. Force is 
 the supremely masculine element, and must go to its utmost 
 — almost to the destruction of the human race, if it were pos- 
 sible — ere he will invoke the aid of the feminine element, 
 the other side of God. 
 
 The uneasiness of the feminine element is affecting socie- 
 ties — it is affecting governments. A new idea is always a 
 
38 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES J 
 
 disturbing element, no matter in how beautiful and mild a 
 form it comes. Even the gentle and sweet words of the man 
 of Nazareth were as burning coals and firebrands to existing 
 governments. Justice, love and truth, not force, must be 
 the strength of a true government. And how is it possible 
 for man to be evenly balanced on these divine principles 
 alone? A solitary man or woman may be indeed oftentimes 
 alone; lonely as was Elijah in the desert, and yet so near the 
 father heart or mother heart of God that they can draw 
 down from the skies the very elements they need for their 
 succor. The voice of the Comforter is never absent if we 
 are only in a condition to hear it. "Peace I leave with you; 
 my peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth give I 
 unto you." Great leaders, great organizers, germinal centres 
 of thought, are God's greatest gift to man. 
 
 Our friends the Padres proved themselves capable of 
 utilizing very intractable elements in the face of the greatest 
 difficulties, not so much by the masculine power of force as by 
 the feminine power of love and inspiration. For this are 
 their efforts interesting to the student of social science. 
 
 The great life of humanity, as a whole, may be compared 
 to a tree, wide and branching and bearing various and goodly 
 fruits, according as the 'influences of the sky, the sun, the 
 moon, the rains, the dews are favorable to its growth and de- 
 velopment, and as the deep striking roots draw nourishment 
 in the rich, moist earth below. Still, all the possibilities of 
 humauity are in the seed, the germ. Not one of rich and 
 beautiful fruits that has blossomed so sweetly and fruited so 
 grandly on the life tree of the nations, but was in essence in 
 the rough kernel, the undeveloped seed, planted here on the 
 earth ages and ages ago. One after another the conspicuous 
 fruits appeared which made the glory of this life-tree of the 
 nations. And these were the few men who have swayed the 
 earth, not only while they lived, but ages after their disap- 
 pearance from the scene of action. Moses in Egypt, Brahma 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 39 
 
 in India, Confucius in China, Socrates in Greece, Mahomet 
 in Arabia, were conspicuous century flowers in this tree of 
 the ages. Their possibilities were all in the common seed of 
 our humanity. Everything that they have reached or that 
 has yet beeu reached is not equal to the capacities of hu- 
 manity in ages yet to come. 
 
 A great man, a great hero, a great prophet, is God's repre- 
 sentative here on earth. He appears ; he grows ; he becomes 
 a centre to millions of minds ; he shines in the light of God 
 like a steady, fixed star, while the tides of humanity go fluc- 
 tuating and ebbing, now into light, through the gate of birth, 
 and then into that other eternity whither we all are hastening. 
 These guiding lights in the world's march have been few 
 and tar between. 
 
 Nearly 1900 years ago the world tree flowered and bore 
 its tairest fruit. No such fruit has it borne before or since. 
 Its perfume has sweetened the world's air. Its gentle aroma 
 has been preserved as a divine benediction, not only in indi- 
 vidual lines which it has made brighter and better, but it has 
 permeated governments, and with subtle sweetness given life 
 to new ideas. Where should we have been to-day if Christ 
 had not lived? Certainly, not where we are now. His life 
 was just the opposite of the selfish accumulation of forces by 
 one man for his own benefit. It was the giving up of self to 
 God ; and then a giving of God to the world, the hungry 
 world, the dying world, the world that is dying for just such 
 life. He lived, and loved, and died ; and the heart of the 
 most advanced portion of the world has gone after him ever 
 since — the Christos consolator ! the consoling Christ! 
 There is a throbbing hope felt everywhere of some new 
 light, some new hope breaking from the spheres beyond. 
 
 In the burning plains of India, the Hindoo is waiting for 
 Vishnu. 
 
40 THE CALIFORNIA OP THE PADRES ; 
 
 " Nine times hath Brahma's wheels of lightning hurled 
 
 " His awful presence o'er a prostrate world. 
 
 " Nine times hath guilt through all her giant frame, 
 
 " Convulsive trembled, as the mighty came ; 
 
 " But Heaven shall burst her starry gates again; 
 
 " He comes ; dread Brahma shakes the sunless sky 
 
 " With lightning speed, and thunders from on high, 
 
 " Heaven's fiery horse beneath his warrior form, 
 
 " Paws the light clouds, and flickers in the storm." 
 
 The Zuni Indian upon the plains of Mexico every mora- 
 ine 1 turns his face to the East and calls for the return of his 
 lost Montezuma. We are all waiting for the great life-tree 
 of the world to put forth another great century blossom, to 
 bear another wondrous fruit, which shall be to other ages 
 what Christ has been to us — a reappearance of the glory of 
 God in the shape of man. "I am the way, the truth and 
 "the life," said Christ. "No man cometh to the Father 
 but by me." But now we have got to draw nigh also to the 
 infinite and ineffable tenderness of the Divine Mother. 
 
 This same indwelling divine power, blossoming out through 
 humanity, may produce fruits more gloriously conspicuous 
 than any that have yet appeared. What will be the shape 
 and hue of the next great flower that the tree of humanity 
 will put forth after so many years' repose? From our pres- 
 ent needs, I should say that we require an organizer, a judge, 
 a ruler, a leader, a divine law giver. He will, then, perhaps, 
 at no distant date, appear, declare himself, and be recognized 
 as one of the world's great saviours. After a while he will 
 disappear, and his memory will be embalmed in loving grati- 
 tude for hundreds of years, till his work, too, is done, and the 
 growing needs of humanity call for a fresh manifestation. By 
 that time the laws of our nature will have been learned more 
 thoroughly, much of the discipline the world needs in its 
 present childish and ignorant state will have been gone 
 through with, and the world's great heart will pant for some 
 further manifestation. They will wait then as we are wait- 
 ing now, only in a much more advanced state. Order will 
 have taken the place of disorder, the laws of life will be bet- 
 
OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 4 1 
 
 ter understood, and still there will be a waiting even then, 
 a desiring and aspiring for something higher. It will be 
 again answered, and a golden fruit of divinest love will bless 
 and cheer the world. We are not prepared for this manifes- 
 tation yet. That will be a joyous time. Still, looking into 
 the sunlighted splendors of that happy day, I can see a time 
 when there will come a longing for something more; when 
 the happy earth will wait and watch again, not in sadness 
 and almost in fear, as we are waiting now, but with the sunny 
 hope of the child who is called to the grander rooms of its 
 father's mansion, where more glorious guests are assembled. 
 At last, then, the great life-tree will blossom from its very 
 central stem, filling earth with the fragrance of the heavens, 
 and this last great flower, beyond, which I can see no farther, 
 will be called Harmony. A sweet daj 7 will then bless the 
 earth, so cool, so calm, so bright, the true bridal of the earth 
 and sky. 
 
 Bonnard &■ Daly, Printers, 536 Clay street. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 017 064 137 1 
 
 *