Part 9 (1/2)
For hundreds of years poets have written and singers have sung of the loveliness of a country life, where there is no gathering together of the inhabitants in great cities, no struggle to make money, where the people live much out of doors, are simple in their tastes, healthy and happy.
These dreams of an ideal life the Spanish-speaking settlers of early California made real. In this land of balmy airs, soft skies, and gentle seas there lived, in the old days, a people who were indifferent to money, who carried their religion into their daily pleasures and sorrows, were brotherly toward one another, contented, beautiful, joyous.
About the time that the mission of San Francisco was founded, the Spanish government decided to lay out two towns, or pueblos, where it was thought the fertile character of the soil would lead the settlers to raise grain and other supplies, not only for themselves but for the people of the presidios. Up to this time a large part of the food had been brought, at a considerable cost, from Mexico.
We know that the governor, Felipe de Neve, chose the town sites with care, for in the whole state there are nowhere more beautiful and fertile spots than San Jose, near the southern end of San Francis...o...b..y, and Los Angeles, near the famous valley of the San Gabriel River. In founding these two pueblos, and a third which was located where Santa Cruz now stands, the plan pursued was interesting and somewhat different from the methods of settlement on the eastern coast of our country.
First there was chosen a spot for the plaza, or central square, care being taken that it was not far from good grazing land suitable for the settlers' stock. Around the plaza, lots were set apart for the courthouse, town hall, church, granaries, and jail. Next were the lots for the settlers, who each had, besides his home spot, several acres of farming land with water, and the right to use the pasture lands of the town. To each family was given, also, two horses, two cows, two oxen, a mule, several goats, sheep, chickens, farming implements, and a small sum in money.
Instead of asking tax money of the town people, some of the land was reserved as public property to be rented out, the proceeds to be used for the expenses of the government. Many people believe that this is the wisest plan man has yet discovered for managing the expenses of a city, town, or country.
Los Angeles had for many years a large amount of this land near the center of the town, belonging to the city government. Gradually it was taken up by settlers or appropriated by officials until, when the place grew large and thriving, it was found that the land had become private property; and finally the city had to pay large sums for parks and land for public buildings.
Each pueblo was ruled by an alcalde, or mayor, and council, chosen by the people. To advise with these officers, there was a commissioner who represented the governor of the country. During the first few years the pueblo was governed largely by the commissioner. Presidios, which were, at first, forts with homes for the commander, officers, soldiers, and their families, and were ruled by the commanding officer or comandante, gradually became towns; and then they, too, had their alcalde and council. There were four presidios--Monterey, San Francisco, San Diego, and Santa Barbara.
In spite of all the gifts of free land, stock, and money, it was hard to secure a suitable cla.s.s of settlers. Many of those who came up from Mexico to live in the pueblos were idle or dissipated, and nearly all uneducated. When, after several years, a Spanish officer was sent down from Monterey to convey to the Los Angeles settlers full t.i.tle to their lands, he found that not one of the twenty-four heads of families could sign his name. Later a much better cla.s.s of people came into the country--men of education, brave, hardy members of good Spanish families, who obtained grants of land from the government, bought cattle from the mission herds, and began the business of stock raising.
This was the beginning of the pastoral or shepherd life. Each rancho was miles in extent, its cattle and horses numbered by thousands. The homes were generally built around a court into which all the rooms opened, and were constructed of adobe bricks such as were used at the missions. In the better cla.s.s of homes several feet of the s.p.a.ce in the courtyard next the wall were covered with tile roofing, forming a shaded veranda, where the family were accustomed to spend the leisure hours. Here they received visitors, the men smoked their cigaritos, and the children made merry. In the long summer evenings sweet strains of Spanish music from violin and guitar filled the air, and the hard earthen floor of the courtyard resounded to the tap-tap of high-heeled slippers, the swish of silken skirts, and the jingle of silver spurs, as the young people took part in the graceful Spanish dances.
It was no small matter to rule one of these great households. La Patrona (the mistress) was generally the first one up. ”Before the sun had risen,” said a member of one of the old families, ”while the linnets and mocking birds were sounding their first notes, my mother would appear at our bedside. 'Up, muchachos, up, muchachas, and kneel for your Alba!'
The Alba was a beautiful prayer of thanksgiving for care during the night, with a plea for help through the dangers and temptations of the day. No excuse for lying abed was accepted; up, and on the floor we knelt, then she pa.s.sed on to where the mayordomo, or foreman, and his men were gathering in the courtyard. Here, too, was the cook with the Indian maids, busy making tortillas for the morning meal. 'Your Albas, my children,' my mother would say in her clear, firm voice. Down would drop mayordomo, vaqueros, cook, and Indian girls, all devoutly reciting the morning prayer.
”After their prayer the children might, if they chose, return to their beds, but before sleep could again overtake them there would probably come from a distant room the voice of their aged grandfather asking them questions from the Spanish catechism.
”'Children, who made you?' he would call in a quavering voice.
”A chorus of small voices would sing-song in response, 'El Dios' [G.o.d].
”Again he would question, 'Children, who died for you?'
”Again the reply, 'El Dios.'
”By the time the questions were all answered there was no chance for more sleep.”
Nothing was taken with the morning coffee but the tortilla. This was a thin cake made of meal from corn ground by Indian women who used for the grinding either a stone mortar and pestle, or a metate. The metate was a three-legged stone about two feet in length and one in breadth, slightly hollowed out in the center; grain was ground in this by rubbing with a smaller stone. It took a great number of tortillas to serve the large household. One Indian maid, kneeling beside a large white stone which served as table, mixed the meal, salt, and water into b.a.l.l.s of dough.
These she handed to another girl, who spatted them flat and thin by tossing them from one of her smooth bare arms to the other until they were but a little thicker than a knife blade. The cook then baked them on a hot dry stone or griddle, turning them over and over to keep them from burning.
El Patron (the master) usually rose early, and after his coffee, put on his high, wide-brimmed sombrero, and, attended by his sons, if they were old enough, and his mayordomo, rode over his estate, looking after the Indian vaqueros and workmen. One gentleman, a member of a fine Spanish family which lived in the southern part of the state, used to ride out with his sixteen sons, all of whom were over six feet in height.
Generally the families were large, often comprising twelve children or more. These made merry households for the little people.
After breakfast it was the duty of the mistress to set the host of Indian girls to their tasks. The padres were always glad to let the young Indian girls from the mission go into white families where there was a wise mistress, that they might be trained in both religious and domestic duties. Going to the gate of the courtyard, the Patrona would call, ”To the brooms, to the brooms, muchachas,” adding, if it were foggy, ”A very fine morning for the brooms, little ones;” and out would come running a cl.u.s.ter of Indian girls carrying each a broom. At the work they would go, sweeping as clean as a floor the courtyard and ground for a large s.p.a.ce about the house.
Next they flocked to the sewing room, often sixteen or eighteen of these girls, to take up their day's work under the mistress's eye. Some made garments for the ranch hands, those who were better work women attended to the making of clothing for the family, while the girls who were the most skillful with the needle fas.h.i.+oned delicate, fine lace work and embroidery.
The children were seldom indoors unless it rained. There were no schools; there were few ranches where there were teachers, and the fathers and mothers generally had their hands too full to devote themselves to their children's education, so in the early days it was all playtime. Later, schools were started for boys, and dreadful places they were.
As General Vallejo describes them, they were generally held in a narrow, badly lighted room, with no adornment but a large green cross or some picture of a saint hanging beside the master's table. The master was often an old soldier in fantastic dress, with ill-tempered visage. The scholar entered, walked the length of the room, knelt before the cross or picture, recited a prayer, then tremblingly approached the master, saying, ”Your hand, Senor Maestro,” when with a grunt the hand would be extended to him to be kissed. Little was taught besides the reading of the primer and the catechism.
Ranch boys early learned to ride, each having his own horse and saddle.
Every year there was a rodeo, or ”round-up,” held in each neighborhood, where cattle from all the surrounding ranches were driven to one point for the purpose of counting the animals and branding the young. Each stock owner had to be there with all the men from his ranch who could ride, nor must he forget his branding irons. These brands were recorded in the government book of the department, and any one changing the form of his iron in any manner without the permission of the judge was guilty of a crime.