CHAPTER XXII. The Southern part of Upper California-Lower California-The Coast of Mexico, and Gulf of California. EARLY in February, 1847, we sailed from San Diego, in the Portsmouth, for the coast of Mexico. We hoisted the American flag at Cape St. Lucas and San José, in March following, and, with the exception of three visits to Upper California, we remained on the Mexican coast until the month of January, in the year 1848. During this period, we visited both shores of the Gulf of California, going around from Cape St. Lucas to Guayamas and San Blas, blockading, cruising, &c. We took several valuable prizes, and annoyed the enemy in a variety of ways. The climate, in the southern part of Upper California, is the most delightful that can be imagined. In Los Angeles and San Diego, the thermometer ranges from fifty-eight to seventy-five degrees Fahr. in the day-time, during the whole year. The nights are always cool, and the total absence of miasmatic influences, renders the atmosphere dry, transparent and balmy. The country is only tolerably watered. In the vicinity of Los Angeles, the coast range towers above the plain, with its lofty and serrated mountain peaks, which are covered with snow during a considerable portion of the year. The peculiar clearness of the air, probably from its extreme dryness, almost wholly divests the landscape of those effects which are called "atmospheric." Stand here! and look at those lofty mountain peaks which seem so metallic that you might suppose they were covered with burnished silver. Mark those mighty mountains, which are impending almost over your head, and seem as if they might perchance topple over and crush you. The illusion is perfect. You can scarcely believe that those mountains are very distant from you, and that mortal man has never yet attained their summits. But so it is. So clear and distinct are those ultra-marine tints, that space is annihilated; and the remote mountain is brought so near, that you seem to stand directly at its base. In the plain itself, the richest and most brilliant wildflowers flourish in boundless profusion, and with a rank luxuriance which far transcends all the efforts of art. All colors, all shades of colors, all hues, all tints, all combinations are there to be seen; and the endless varieties bewilder the senses. Perennial incense ascends to heaven from these fragrant plains; and the size which some of these gorgeous wild-flowers attain, would seem fabulous to an eastern florist. Among them are a poppy and a tulip, whose flaunting and gaudy hues attract the eye in all directions, and the scale descends to the humblest daisy and the meekest violet. In the glens and recesses of the mountains are said to exist the most romantic streams, watering the finest tablelands, dashing down awful precipices, and winding through richly-wooded ravines. The timber is said to be of surpassing excellence, and the country of a very peculiar character. Here live thousands of Indians-miles de Indiosand here, before many years shall pass away, will ring the woodman's axe, and the smoke will ascend from a thousand domestic altars. It may be that the accounts of these mountains are exaggerated; but all agree that they abound in the most lovely and romantic scenery, and contain vast quantities of fertile land and valuable timber. The GRAPE is the principal, and indeed, at present, almost the sole production of this part of our California. The vineyards of the Pueblo de los Angeles are as luxuriant and productive as any in the world. The species of grape. chiefly cultivated, appears to be of the variety known to us of the Atlantic coast as the Hamburg grape. It produces two kinds of wine. One is a white wine, clear and transparent, and of a light amber tint, and in taste resembling hock. The other is a tinto, or red wine, and its taste and bouquet are something like the La Malque of Marseilles. The vineyards also produce great quantities of agua ardiente or Spanish brandy, of a very pure and colorless description, of an agreeable taste, superior quality, and the highest proof. A most delicious cordial is likewise made, called Angelica, and if the old Olympian gods could get a drop of it, they would soon vote Nectar a bore, and old Jupiter would instantly order Master Ganymede to change his goblet, and charge it with the new tipple to the brim. Wolfskill's vineyard, in the Pueblo de los Angeles, contains forty acres of land and about five thousand vines. It produces a crop of twenty casks of wine, and an equal amount of "aguadiente." The grape likewise grows in the San Francisco district, and so luxuriantly, that Mr. Leese made from only two acres of vines, in the year I was there, no less than twenty-six barrels of wine, and eight barrels of aguadiente. The wild grape, which I have seen throughout all the valleys, is, when ripe, of the size of ounce balls, and of an excellent flavor. The olive, date, palm, and other tropical productions, are sparsely found in San Diego. The grape will, hereafter, be a vast source of wealth to the people of California. The volcanic soil favors the growth of the vines, and the varieties of soil and climate will unquestionably produce varieties of wine. As yet but a single species of grape is cultivated, and that is said to have been originally indigenous. Beyond all doubt, every variety of grape will grow in that magnificent region, and when all the standard varieties shall be introduced from TEDIUM OF A CRUISE. 283 Europe, and grafting and scientific cultivation resorted to, who shall predict the result? Let those who, ten years hence, shall be drinking a bottle of California Champaigne at Delmonico's, remember that "I told them so." Perhaps the friends of temperance will mourn at the vinous prospects of California; but they should take comfort in the reflection that wine countries are not addicted to intemperance nearly so much as beer countries, and that the introduction of pure liquors will, in time, drive away the poisonous manufactured stuff, whose ravages are unjustly laid at the door of the unadulterated product of the grape. It must be set down as a fixed fact that brandy, wine, and raisins, are to be soon added to our vast productions. The nature of our service while on the coast of Mexico, and in the Gulf of California, was not of a kind to interest the general reader. We were chiefly engaged in blockading, and I was occasionally absent on duty in charge of prizes, which were captured without wasting much of Uncle Sam's gunpowder. To the inmates of a ship at sea, months, and even years, seem, in the retrospect, like a very short period, as few incidents occur to mark time as it rolls on in its monotonous course. One day is entirely like another; and while the dim vista of the future stretches far away beyond the reach of imagination, we wonder at the nothingness of the past, so carelessly do we mark the ebbing sands of the present. Meanwhile, thousands of miles are passed over, with scarcely a change in our usual habits of thought or action-nothing novel appealing to our consciousness, save the variations of climate which we experience while pursuing our track in the watery waste, alternately "scorched in the tropics, and frozen at the pole." Some men there are, however, whose systematic and regular habits of mind, render this vegetable existence not only tolerable, but even pleasant. I remember being on an Indian voyage, during which we had been more than 284 MAGDALENA BAY. three months at sea, when we had a celebrated mathematician for a shipmate. He had been occupied in some abstruse calculations of great length, and the quiet monotony of ship-life agreed perfectly well with the absorbing nature of his studies. On making land, every one else, having exhausted all means of amusement, was delighted, and the prospect before us was announced with great glee to our friend, as he sat absorbed in his mathematics. But the old gentleman, evidently displeased at being disturbed before his long ciphering' was finished, started up suddenly and pettishly exclaimed, "What a little world it is! One can hardly turn round in it." We had, since leaving port, almost circumnavigated the earth. As few will care to be lugged about with us in our wearisome cruise, I shall merely give my impressions of the country around which we hovered so long a time. All great peninsulas extend longitudinally from north to south, with trifling deviations to the east and west; and such, of course, is the case with regard to the peninsula of Lower California. South of San Diego, and in full view from that town and harbor, is a high and well defined table mountain. It is called the Mesa de Navaez, and the parallel of 32 deg. of north latitude passes over its summit, marking the line between Upper and Lower California. South of this line, the lofty serrania, occupying the centre of the peninsula like a back-bone, has never been explored, or even visited save by a few Indians, to whom its recesses are familiar. It is not known, however, to be inhabited by any considerable or populous rancherias of even this primitive people. Near the coast, on the west or Pacific side, there are a few fine ranchos owned by persons living in the upper district. There is, likewise, a small settlement at Ensiñada, forty or fifty miles from San Diego. Magdalena Bay is the next place in point of commercial or national importance. It has a spacious and commodious harbor, well sheltered and easy of ingress and egress. The |