ght nor
obscurity; how could man divide the time and the seasons? It may have
been only the life of a worm; it may have been the long age of a snake.

"The struggle was fearful, but at last the good Master of Life broke his
bonds. The sun shone again. It was too late! the Shoshones had been
crushed and their heart had become small; they were poor and had no
dwellings; they were like the deer of the prairies, hunted by the
hungry panther.

"And a strange and numerous people landed on the shores of the sea: they
were rich and strong; they made the Shoshones their slaves, and built
large cities, where they passed all their time. Ages passed: the
Shoshones were squaws; they hunted for the mighty strangers; they were
beasts, for they dragged wood and water to their great wigwams; they
fished for them, and they themselves starved in the midst of plenty.
Ages again passed: the Shoshones could bear no more; they ran away to
the woods, to the mountains, and to the borders of the sea; and, lo! the
great Father of Life smiled again upon them; the evil genii were all
destroyed, and the monsters buried in the sands.

"They soon became strong, and great warriors; they attacked the
strangers, destroyed their cities, and drove them like buffaloes, far in
the south, where the sun is always burning, and from whence they did
never return.

"Since that time, the Shoshones have been a great people. Many, many
times strangers arrived again; but being poor and few, they were easily
compelled to go to the east and to the north, in the countries of the
Crows, Flat-heads, Wallah Wallahs, and Jal Alla Pujees (the
Calapooses)."

I have selected this tradition out of many, as, allowing for metaphor,
it appears to be a very correct epitome of the history of the Shoshones
in former times. The very circumstance of their acknowledging that they
were, for a certain period, slaves to that race of people who built the
cities, the ruins of which still attest their magnificence, is a strong
proof of the outline being correct. To the modern Shoshones, and their
manners and customs, I shall refer in a future portion of my narrative.

CHAPTER V.

Every point having been arranged, I received my final instructions, and
letters for the Governor of Monterey, to which was added a heavy bag of
doubloons for my expenses. I bade farewell to the Prince and my father,
and with six well-armed Indians and the Padre Marini, I embarked in a
long canoe on th