STATISTICAL }XV.Intendancy of New California. the valley of Mexico, or the oils of Andalusia. The very cold winds which blow with impetuosity from the north and north-west, sometimes prevent the fruits from ripening along the coast; but the small village of Santa Clara, situated nine leagues from Santa Cruz, and sheltered by a chain of mountains, has better planted orchards and more abundant harvests of fruit than the presidio of Monterey. In this last place, the monks show travellers, with satisfaction, several useful vegetables, the produce of the seeds given by M. Thouin to the unfortunate Laperouse. Of all the missions of New Spain those of the north-west coast exhibit the most rapid and remarkable progress in civilization. The public having taken an interest in the details published by Laperouse, Vancouver, and two recent Spanish navigators, MM. Galiano and Valdes *, on the state of these distant regions, I endeavoured to procure during my stay at Mexico the statistical tables drawn up in 1802 on the very spot (at San Carlos de Monterey) by the present president of the missions of New California, Father Firmin Lasuent. From the comparison which I made * Viage de la Sutil, p. 167. See the extract from these tables in note D, at the end of this work. STATISTICAL XV. Intendancy of NewCalifornia. of the official papers preserved in the archives of the archbishopric of Mexico, it appears that in 1776 there were only 8 and in 1790 11 villages; while in 1802 the number amounted to 18. The population of New California, including only the Indians attached to the soil who have begun to cultivate their fields, was Thus the number of inhabitants has doubled in 12 years. Since the foundation of these missions, or between 1769 and 1802, there were in all, according to the parish registers, 33,717 baptisms, 8009 marriages, and 16,984 deaths. We must not attempt to deduce from these data the proportion between the births and deaths, because in the number of baptisms the adult Indians (los neofitos) are confounded with the children. The estimation of the produce of the soil, or the harvests, furnishes also the most convincing proofs of the increase of industry and prosperity of New California. In 1791, according to the tables published by M. Galiano, the Indians sowed in the whole province only 874 fanegas of wheat, which yielded a harvest of 15,197 fanegas. The cultivation doubled in 1802; for STATISTICAL XV.Intendancyof New California. ANALYSIS. the quantity of wheat sown was 2089 fanegas, and the harvest 33,576 fanegas. The following table contains the number of In 1791 there were only 24,958 head of black cattle (ganado mayor) in the whole of the Indian villages. This progress of agriculture, this peaceful conquest of industry is so much the more interesting, as the natives of this coast, very different from those of Nootka and Norfolk bay, were only thirty years ago a wandering tribe, subsisting on fishing and hunting, and cultivating no sort of vegetables. The Indians of the bay of S. Francisco were equally wretched at that time with the inhabitants of Van Diemen's Land. The natives were found somewhat more advanced in civili zation in 1769 only in the canal of Santa Barbara. They constructed large houses of a pyramidal form close to one another. They appeared benevolent and hospitable; and they presented the Spaniards with vases very curiously wrought of stalks of rushes. M. Bonpland possesses several of these vases in his collections, which are STATISTICAL ANALYSIS. }XV. Intendancy of New California. covered within with a very thin layer of asphaltus," that renders them impenetrable to water, or the strong liquors which they may happen to contain. The northern part of California is inhabited by the two nations of the Rumsen and Escelen*. They speak languages totally different from one another, and they form the population of the presidio and the village of Monterey. In the bay of San Francisco the languages of the different tribes of the Matalans, Salsen, and Quirotes, are derived from a common root. I have heard several travellers speak of the analogy between the Mexican or Aztec language, and the idioms of the northwest coast of North America. It appeared to me, however, that they exaggerated the resemblance between these American languages. On examin ing carefully the vocabularies formed at Nootka and Monterey, I was struck with the similarity of tone and termination to those of Mexico in several words, as, for example, in the language of the Nootkians: apquixitl (to embrace), temextixitl (to kiss), cocotl (otter), hitlzit (to sigh), tzitzimitz (earth), and imcoatzimitl (the name of a month). However, the languages of New California and the island of Quadra differ in general *Manuscript of Father Lasuen. M. de Galeano calls them Rumsien and Eslen. STATISTICAL } XV. Intendancy of New California. essentially from the Aztec, as may be seen in the cardinal numbers brought together in the following table. Mexican. 1. Ce 2. Ome 3. Jei 4. Nahui Escelen. Ulhai Rumsen. Nootka. Sahuac Atla Catza IEEE 5. Macuilli 6. Chicuace 7. Chicome 8. Chicuei Enjala 9. Chiucnahui Jamajusjualanai Pakke 10. Matlactli Tomoila Sutcha Tzahuacuatl Tamchaigt · Ayo The Nootka words are taken from a manuscript of M. Mozino, and not from Cook's vocabulary, in which ayo is confounded with haecoo, nu with mo, &c. &c. Father Lasuen observed that on an extent of 180 leagues of the coast of California from San Diego to San Francisco, no fewer tlian 17 languages are spoken, which can hardly be considered as dialects of a small number of motherlanguages. This assertion will not astonish those who know the curious researches of MM. Jefferson, Volney, Barton, Hervas, William de Humboldt, Vater, and Frederic Schlegel*, on the subject of the American languages. * See the classical work of M. Schlegel on the language, philosophy, and poetry of the Hindoos, in which are to be |