Junipero Serra and five other priests, Lieutenant Pedro Fages and thirty
soldiers. The settlement was at once made capital of Alta California,
and Portola appointed the first governor. The Presidio (an enclosure
about three hundred yards square, containing a chapel, store-houses,
offices, residences, and a barracks) was the nucleus of the city; but
the mission was soon removed to a beautiful valley about six miles
distant, where there was more room, better shelter from the cold west
winds, and an unrivalled prospect. The valley is now known as Carmelo.

A fort was built upon a little hill commanding the settlement, and life
began in good earnest. What followed? Mexico threw off the Spanish yoke;
California was hence forth subject to Mexico alone. The news spread;
vessels gathered in the harbor, and enormous profits were realized on
the sale and shipment of the hides of wild cattle lately roaming upon a
thousand hills.

Then came gradual changes in the government; they culminated in 1846
when Captain Mervin, at the head of two hundred and fifty men, raised
the Stars and Stripes over Monterey, and a proclamation was read
declaring California a portion of the United States.

The Rev. Walter Colton, once chaplain of the United States frigate
_Congress_, was appointed first alcalde; and the result was the erection
of a stone courthouse, which was long the chief ornament of the town;
and, somewhat later, the publication of Alcalde Colton's highly
interesting volume, entitled "Three Years in California."

II.

In 1829 Captain Robinson, the author of "Life in California" in the good
old mission days, wrote thus of his first sight of Monterey: "The sun
had just risen, and, glittering through the lofty pines that crowned the
summit of the eastern hills, threw its light upon the lawn beneath. On
our left was the Presidio, with its chapel dome and towering flag-staff
in conspicuous elevation. On the right, upon a rising ground, was seen
the _castillo_, or fort, surmounted by some ten or a dozen cannon. The
intervening space between these two points was enlivened by the hundred
scattered dwellings that form the town, and here and there groups of
cattle grazing.

"After breakfast G. and myself went on shore, on a visit to the
Commandant, Don Marian Estrada, whose residence stood in the central
part of the town, in the usual route from the beach to the Presidio. In
external appearance, notwithstanding it was built of ad