ishing until it reaches four. Into this bay flow several
rivers, as is demonstrated by the fact that, leaving the salt
water, one is able to drink fresh water from where the rivers
come as if into a lake. One river comes from the east-northeast
(this is the largest, the width of which will be about 250
varas), and the other, which is formed from quite small arms,
flows from the northeast through a very low-lying region among
swamps and sand dunes. Its depth does not reach two fathoms.
These rivers have at their mouths some sand bars (as the
commotion demonstrated to me) at a depth of half a fathom. The
reason why I do not consider them navigable is principally that
the second time I went to explore them I penetrated into the
interior and ran aground both in the rivers and on the sand
bars. In the bay into which these rivers discharge is another
port more extensive than that of la Asumpta in which it is
possible to moor any vessel whatever, but it would be difficult
to get wood because of the remoteness of its shores. From the
rancheria at the entrance which communicates with them, to the
rivers themselves, all the coast of the east is covered with
trees and all that on the west is arid, dry, full of locusts,
and incapable of ever being populated.

The foregoing is what I discovered in this part of the north,
and proceeding from the above-mentioned Island of Los Angeles
the reconnoissance of the estuary to the southeast I describe as
follows.

To the east of this island at a distance of two leagues there is
another, rough, craggy, and of no value, which divides the mouth
of the bay into two passages through which the sea penetrates
about twelve leagues. The width in places is one, two and three
leagues. The channel of this sound does not exceed four fathoms.
Its width is adequate but on departing from it the distance of a
pistol shot the depth does not reach two fathoms. The tip of
this sound, which faces the east, forms, with a horseshoe-shaped
headland, a pocket which, at low tide, is mostly dry. In this
inlet are some logs to which are fastened black feathers,
bunches of reeds and snail shells, which gave me the idea that
they are fishing floats, since they are in the middle of the
water. Beyond three leagues from the entrance of this estuary I
estimate that nowhere