lted for the day, to
let the sailors, who suffered dreadfully from sore feet, recruit a
little. This building is one which, for magnitude, convenience, and
durability of architecture, would do honour to any country.

"The walls are adobe, and the roofs of well-made tile. It was built
about sixty years since by the Indians of the country, under the
guidance of a zealous priest. At that time the Indians were very
numerous, and under the absolute sway of the missionaries. These
missionaries at one time bid fair to christianize the Indians of
California. Under grants from the Mexican government, they collected
them into missions, built immense houses, and began successfully to
till the soil by the hands of the Indians for the benefit of the
Indians.

"The habits of the priests, and the avarice of the military rulers of
the territory, however, soon converted these missions into instruments
of oppression and slavery of the Indian race.

"The revolution of 1836 saw the downfall of the priests, and most of
these missions passed by fraud into the hands of private individuals,
and with them the Indians were transferred as serfs of the land.

"This race, which, in our country, has never been reduced to slavery,
is in that degraded condition throughout California, and does the only
labour performed in the country. Nothing can exceed their present
degradation."

The general closing remarks of Lieutenant Emory are as follow:

"The region extending from the head of the Gulf of California to the
parallel of the Pueblo, or Ciudad de los Angeles, is the only portion
not heretofore covered by my own notes and journal, or by the notes and
journals of other scientific expeditions fitted out by the United
States. The journals and published accounts of these several
expeditions combined will give definite ideas of all those portions of
California susceptible of cultivation or settlement. From this remark
is to be excepted the vast basin watered by the Colorado, and the
country lying between that river and the range of Cordilleras,
represented as running east of the Tulare lakes, and south of the
parallel of 36 deg., and the country between the Colorado and Gila rivers.

"Of these regions nothing is known except from the reports of trappers,
and the speculations of geologists. As far as these accounts go, all
concur in representing it as a waste of sand and rock, unadorned with
vegetation, poorly watered, and unfit, it is believed, for