headquarters for the hide business. "On the smooth sand were four large houses, built of rough boards, and looking like the huge barns in which ice is stored on the borders of the large ponds near Boston, with piles of hides standing around them, and men in red shirts and large straw hats walking in and out of the doors. These were the hide houses.' The one used by the Pilgrim had a capacity of forty thousand hides, and would have to be filled before the ship should be ready to sail for home. Three thousand five hundred skins were taken out of the vessel's hold, piled outside the house, and part of the men left to care for them while the Pilgrim got ready for another cruise along the coast, “chock up to windward," which meant, in the hide trader's parlance, San Francisco.

When the last cruise up coast was ended, and the vessel lay again at San Diego, she was thoroughly cleaned out, smoked, and then loaded with the forty thousand hides and got ready for the long voyage "round the Horn." It was the month of May, 1836, when the ship raised anchor at San Diego, and on the 16th of September following she arrived safely at Boston.

The development of a freer commerce favored the growth of colonizing enterprise in California, and the government in 1828 adopted regulations intended to promote settlement. By these, the Governor of California was empowered to make grants of vacant lands to any person, Mexican or foreigner, who might petition for them. It was also lawful, with the consent of the supreme government, to make extensive grants to "contractors," who should bind themselves to settle at least twelve families upon them. After fulfilling all conditions with reference to living upon the lands and cultivating them, a full title was to pass to the colonist. In case of failure to comply with the regulations, the grant was invalidated. Under these liberal provisions, which continued in force until 1846, and stimulated by the commercial opportunities presented, several hundred Mexican families. settled in California, some of them in the pueblos, others

upon grazing lands, or ranches. There was no large immigration, because the Mexican territory had but few people who cared to make the long journey to the northern territory, even when all expenses were paid by the government. Criminals, indeed, could be readily spared, and, unfortunately for California, some two hundred of these were sent at various times and forced upon its unwilling communities. It has been estimated that the territory had a white population of four thousand two hundred and fifty by 1830, and about six thousand by 1840.

While the majority of these were Spaniards, Mexicans, or a mixture of these with the natives in varying proportions, there were also, by this latter date, numbers of foreigners who had drifted in mainly by sea, and who can be set down to the account of the new commercial influence. The earliest arrival of this description was the Englishman John Gilroy, left at San Francisco by the ship Isaac Todd on her way to the Columbia in the spring of 1814. Two years later, an American named Doak was left in the country. As trade increased under the Mexican régime, and the number of vessels touching at California ports became greater, the foreign element was gradually augmented by desertions, by shipwreck, and by deliberate immigration. The newcomers were almost invariably single men, who found wives among the former inhabitants, joined the Catholic Church, and received citizenship and lands. They became an integral part of each little community, introducing new ideas, and often showing ability for trade or speculation. When Dana visited the coast he found foreigners at all the ports. Monterey had a number of them, mainly Englishmen and Americans, who controlled nearly all the trade and had become property owners of some consequence. At San Pedro the only human habitation in sight was occupied by three Englishmen, who, while sailing on a Mexican vessel, "had been driven ashore-in a southeaster." When the Pilgrim's crew were allowed a "liberty day" on shore at San Diego, and "sailor-like steered for the first grog-shop,"

the establishment they entered was found to be in charge of "a Yankee, a one-eyed man, who belonged formerly to Fall River, came out to the Pacific in a whale-ship, left her at the Sandwich Islands, and came to California and set up a pulperia." He was selling, besides liquors, dry goods, "west India goods, shoes, bread, fruits," etc. About the hide houses was a motley collection of humanity, including many Sandwich Islanders and a giant Frenchman left on the coast by a wrecked vessel. While the Pilgrim lay at San Pedro a revolt occurred at the pueblo of Los Angeles in which a group of twenty or thirty resident Americans and Englishmen were engaged, and also a company of some forty American trappers, who chanced to be in the country. At Yerba Buena (San Francisco) there was a board shanty, soon replaced by a one story adobe house, owned by the English captain, Richardson, the first regular trader of the port.

CHAPTER XIV

THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION OF CALIFORNIA

Up to the time when Oregon became an object of interest to American pioneers as a place for settlement, the history of California had little in common with the history of the Northwest. But it was not long before the attractions of California were advertised along the frontier.

The first Americans to make the journey overland to California were traders or trappers. Jedediah Smith, in 1826, led a party of trappers westward across the desert from near Salt Lake to California. He is supposed to have entered the territory by a southern route, from Colorado River, arriving at the mission of San Gabriel toward the end of the year. Being taken to San Diego, Smith convinced the governor that his errand was a peaceful one, and he was allowed to purchase supplies for his return journey, which must be, he said, by a new route, since the one by which he entered would be impracticable. Before finally quitting the territory, however, Smith conducted trapping operations along the streams of the great interior valley, apparently meeting with success. He started for Salt Lake in May, 1827, crossing the Sierras somewhere near the later emigrant route from Humboldt River to the Sacramento. Several of his companions who remained in California, probably were the first American colonists to reach the country overland.

The fur trade of St. Louis was directed not only to the northwest, along the Missouri, the Yellowstone, and

the Platte toward Oregon, but equally to the southwest, along the streams flowing into the Red and the Arkansas. It was not long before traders had crossed the southwestern boundary line into Spanish territory, and there are cases on record of Americans being imprisoned for this crime, and left to languish for months or even years before securing a release. When the Mexican government came into control of the territories the more arbitrary of these restrictions were removed, and a freer intercourse established with the Americans, to the mutual advantage of the two peoples. In the first year of Mexican independence, 1821, the road was opened from Boone's Lick, Missouri, to Santa Fé on the Rio Grande. This was an achievement of so much importance as to justify more extended notice.

The leader of the pioneer party was Captain William Becknell, whose journal, published in the Missouri Intelligencer of April 22, 1823, is the source of our knowledge of this enterprise. The first trip was begun on the 1st of September, 1821, the company travelling with a pack train. They passed Fort Osage, crossed the Arkansas, and ascended its course for many days; then followed the Canadian Fork, and finally crossed the mountains, reaching Santa Fé about the middle of November. They found the inhabitants hospitable, and glad to exchange their silver and their mules for such goods as they needed or fancied, and at prices which made the trade exceptionally profitable to the Americans. The next year, in May, Captain Becknell left Missouri again, with a party of twenty-one men, a large number of horses, and three wagons. He was able to take these vehicles through successfully, and reported on his return that a good wagon road could be opened with very little labor. This work was gradually performed by a succession of wagon trains which followed the course marked out by Becknell.

The opening of this "Santa Fé Trail," was felt to be of great importance. Floyd alluded to it in Congress, deriving from it encouragement with reference to the