The Forty-Niners | Page 3

was lost
and what was saved was foul."
General shiftlessness and inertia extended also to those branches
wherein the Californian was supposed to excel. Even in the matter of
cattle and sheep, the stock was very inferior to that brought into the
country by the Americans, and such a thing as crossing stock or
improving the breed of either cattle or horses was never thought of. The
cattle were long-horned, rough-skinned animals, and the beef was
tough and coarse. The sheep, while of Spanish stock, were very far
from being Spanish merino. Their wool was of the poorest quality,
entirely unfit for exportation, and their meat was not a favorite food.
There were practically no manufactures on the whole coast. The
inhabitants depended for all luxuries and necessities on foreign trade,
and in exchange gave hide and tallow from the semi-wild cattle that
roamed the hills. Even this trade was discouraged by heavy import
duties which amounted at times to one hundred per cent of the value.
Such conditions naturally led to extensive smuggling which was
connived at by most officials, high and low, and even by the monks of
the missions themselves.
Although the chief reason for Spanish occupancy was to hold the
country, the provisions for defense were not only inadequate but
careless. Thomes says, in _Land and Sea_, that the fort at Monterey
was "armed with four long brass nine-pounders, the handsomest guns
that I ever saw all covered with scroll work and figures. They were
mounted on ruined and decayed carriages. Two of them were pointed
toward the planet Venus, and the other two were depressed so that had
they been loaded or fired the balls would have startled the people on the
other side of the hemisphere." This condition was typical of those
throughout the so-called armed forts of California.

The picture thus presented is unjustly shaded, of course, for Spanish
California had its ideal, noble, and romantic side. In a final estimate no
one could say where the balance would be struck; but our purpose is
not to strike a final balance. We are here endeavoring to analyze the
reasons why the task of the American conquerors was so easy, and to
explain the facility with which the original population was thrust aside.
It is a sometimes rather annoying anomaly of human nature that the
races and individuals about whom are woven the most indestructible
mantles of romance are generally those who, from the standpoint of
economic stability or solid moral quality, are the most variable. We
staid and sober citizens are inclined to throw an aura of picturesqueness
about such creatures as the Stuarts, the dissipated Virginian cavaliers,
the happy-go-lucky barren artists of the Latin Quarter, the fiery
touchiness of that so-called chivalry which was one of the least
important features of Southern life, and so on. We staid and sober
citizens generally object strenuously to living in actual contact with the
unpunctuality, unreliability, unreasonableness, shiftlessness, and
general irresponsibility that are the invariable concomitants of this
picturesqueness. At a safe distance we prove less critical. We even go
so far as to regard this unfamiliar life as a mental anodyne or antidote
to the rigid responsibility of our own everyday existence. We use these
historical accounts for moral relaxation, much as some financiers or
statisticians are said to read cheap detective stories for complete mental
relaxation.
But, the Californian's undoubtedly admirable qualities of generosity,
kindheartedness (whenever narrow prejudice or very lofty pride was
not touched), hospitality, and all the rest, proved, in the eyes of a
practical people confronted with a large and practical job, of little value
in view of his predominantly negative qualities. A man with all the
time in the world rarely gets on with a man who has no time at all. The
newcomer had his house to put in order; and it was a very big house.
The American wanted to get things done at once; the Californian could
see no especial reason for doing them at all. Even when his short-lived
enthusiasm happened to be aroused, it was for action tomorrow rather
than today.

For all his amiable qualities, the mainspring of the Californian's
conduct was at bottom the impression he could make upon others. The
magnificence of his apparel and his accoutrement indicated no feeling
for luxury but rather a fondness for display. His pride and
quick-tempered honor were rooted in a desire to stand well in the eyes
of his equals, not in a desire to stand well with himself. In consequence
he had not the builder's fundamental instinct. He made no effort to
supply himself with anything that did not satisfy this amiable desire.
The contradictions of his conduct, therefore, become comprehensible.
We begin to see why he wore silks and satins and why he neglected