ich he did, but the beast was
half devoured by coyotes and gallinazos, so that it was impossible to
save the skin. It was of a verity the most formidable beast I ever saw
outside the bars of a cage: covered with long grizzly hair, dark upon
the spine, and inclining to a yellowish tinge along the shoulders. He
must have weighed fourteen hundred pounds.

At noon, my escort and cavallada having come up, and all ready for the
road, fully appreciating the honest kindness of the Murphys, I threw
myself in the saddle, and departed for Monterey. We had but four
horses--miserable beasts they were--one gave up the ghost before the
spur had made a hole in his hide, and another was brutally murdered by
my illustrious soldier, who being unable, in his stupidity, to noose
him, brought the poor animal lifeless to the ground with two ounces of
buck-shot from the musket. Apart from these annoyances, we had the
utmost difficulty in urging those we rode into the settlement of San
Juan. On the road I was favored by a specimen of native rusticity. A
youthful vacuero accosted me, and walked his cavallo at my side;
familiarly placing his hand on the barrel of my rifle, he frankly opened
a discourse by asking if I had any tobacco; not fancying his
impertinence, and thinking I detected a mischievous expression in his
visage, I quickly replied, with my rifle at half-cock, _No tengo. Que
tienes pues?_ he added, with a sneer. _Dinero_, I responded, chinking
the coin in my pocket, upon which he made a jocose grasp at that
receptacle of my treasure, whereupon the solid tube of the rifle came in
forcible contact with his nose, with such a violent collision that the
claret spirted over the mane of his steed. He reined quickly back--the
water standing in his eyes--made a demonstration of taking a whirl at me
with his lasso, but observing the dark hole of my rifle staring him in
the face, he contented himself by yelling _punetero!_ and galloped away.

I found St. Johns a detestable spot--half a score dwellings--the
church, and long ranges of buildings of the Mission, more than half in
ruins, and rapidly crumbling to the ground. Thirty years before, this
abode of the Frayles possessed twenty thousand head of horses, three
times that number of horned cattle, and a thousand Indian serfs to till
their broad acres. Meeting the intelligent priests who had officiated in
Santa Clara, they directed me to a house where a lodging was procurable.
Crossing the dese