ld like to stay till every ship that had
sailed out of Monterey in the last three years had returned. Whenever he
heard of one coming into harbor, he hastened to the shore, and closely
watched the disembarking. His melancholy countenance, with its eager,
searching look, became a familiar sight to every one; even the children
knew that the pale gentleman was looking for some one he could not find.
Women pitied him, and gazed at him tenderly, wondering if a man could
look like that for anything save the loss of a sweetheart. Felipe made
no confidences. He simply asked, day after day, of every one he met, for
an Indian named Alessandro Assis.

Finally he shook himself free from the dreamy spell of the place,
and turned his face southward again. He went by the route which the
Franciscan Fathers used to take, when the only road on the California
coast was the one leading from Mission to Mission. Felipe had heard
Father Salvierderra say that there were in the neighborhood of each of
the old Missions Indian villages, or families still living. He thought
it not improbable that, from Alessandro's father's long connection with
the San Luis Rey Mission, Alessandro might be known to some of these
Indians. He would leave no stone unturned; no Indian village unsearched;
no Indian unquestioned.

San Juan Bautista came first; then Soledad, San Antonio, San Miguel, San
Luis Obispo, Santa Inez; and that brought him to Santa Barbara. He
had spent two months on the journey. At each of these places he found
Indians; miserable, half-starved creatures, most of them. Felipe's heart
ached, and he was hot with shame, at their condition. The ruins of the
old Mission buildings were sad to see, but the human ruins were sadder.
Now Felipe understood why Father Salvierderra's heart had broken, and
why his mother had been full of such fierce indignation against the
heretic usurpers and despoilers of the estates which the Franciscans
once held. He could not understand why the Church had submitted,
without fighting, to such indignities and robberies. At every one of the
Missions he heard harrowing tales of the sufferings of those Fathers who
had clung to their congregations to the last, and died at their posts.
At Soledad an old Indian, weeping, showed him the grave of Father
Sarria, who had died there of starvation. "He gave us all he had, to the
last," said the old man. "He lay on a raw-hide on the ground, as we did;
and one morning, before he had fi