a charming girl has fits.
_Crescencia_ became calmer after this trifling ebullition, and was put
to bed. I was anxious to sit up with the party during the night, but the
_rieja_ declined my services, and I retired to another dormitory, where
I slept tolerably well on a table, wrapped in a blanket, with holsters
for pillow. Arising at daybreak, I was concerned to find my horses had
disappeared from the corral, which I had reason to attribute to the kind
offices of the Gascon. However, I paid him a dollar to have them caught,
and upon bidding adios I gave him a _souvenir_ from the thick lash of my
riding-whip, which was no doubt serviceable to other travellers who have
succeeded me.

We reached the Salinas Plains at noon; half way across my horse dropped
with me into a ditch, so I scrambled out, packed saddle and duds on my
own back, gained the molino, procured a Spanish brute from the
proprietor thereof, and the same night arrived in Monterey. I regret to
add, this was my last interview with Anderson--he was assassinated a few
months later, by a person named Callagan.

CHAPTER XVIII.

The latter part of July found the frigate again moored off Yerbabuena,
in the waters of San Francisco. A number of us had long anticipated the
pleasure of a trip to the northward; and a fine prize schooner, the
Julia, being unemployed, she was accordingly made ready, and, early one
morning, our party, with a few trifling kits, were all snugly stowed
away on board. With the broad pennant fluttering at the main, and all
sails spread, we soon lost sight of the anchorage. The Julia's cabin had
four berths sufficiently capacious for grown people, and two others,
which were, in reality, intended for minors, or any adult under three
feet in length; a settee ran crosswise, and the intermediate space
filled in with a cozy table. Our mess amounted to seven, and the caterer
had been careful to provide servants and cooks, cold hams and tongues,
potted oysters and biscuits, silver-topped bottles of ale and stout,
cases of pale sherry, bundles of havannas, and what with a haunch or two
of venison, and lots of edibles, indiscriminately packed in huge
baskets, we counted upon a sufficiency of _viveres_ to allay thirst and
famine for a week to come. Indeed, there's nothing answers so well as a
profusion of "provender," to promote good humor and agreeable
conversation. Major Dalgetty understood this practically and
philosophically. Guitars, prett