The California Explorer Did
Not, It Is True, Have To Fight His Way Through Hordes Of Fierce Natives.
The California
Indians, as a rule, received the white adventurers
gladly, and entertained them with such hospitality as they had to offer,
But the Indians north of the Santa Barbara Channel were but a poor lot.
In a country abounding in game of all kinds, a sea swarming with fish, a
soil capable of growing every character of foodstuff, these miserable
natives lived in a chronic state of starvation.
As in heroic qualities, so also in skill and judgment, Portola upholds
the best traditions of Spain. The success of an expedition depends upon
the character of the leader. Panfilo de Narvaez landed on the coast of
Florida in April, 1528, with a well-equipped army of three hundred men
and forty horses, just half the force he sailed with from Spain the
previous June, and of the three hundred men whom he led into Florida,
only four lived to reach civilization - the rest perished. That is but
one example of incompetent leadership. When Portola organized his
expedition for the march from San Diego Bay to Monterey, many of his
soldiers were ill from scurvy, and at one time on the march the sick
list numbered nineteen men, including the governor and Rivera, his chief
officer. Sixteen men had to be carried, and to three, in extremis, the
viaticum was administered; but he brought them all through, and returned
to San Diego without the loss of a man.
There are two full diaries of this expedition, one by Father Crespi and
the other by Alferez Costanso. There is, besides, a diary of Junipero
Serra of the march from Velicata to San Diego Bay, a translation of
which is printed in Out West magazine (Los Angeles), March-July, 1902.
It is of small value to the student of history. There is a diary by
Portola, quoted by Bancroft, and a Fragmento by Ortega, also used by
Bancroft. These we have not seen. There are letters from Francisco
Palou, Juan Crespi and Miguel Costanso, printed in Out West for January
1902. The diary of Father Crespi is printed in Palou's Noticias de la
Nueva California. Documentos para la Historia de Mexico, re-printed San
Francisco, 1874. The diary of Miguel Costanso is in the Sutro library.
It has never been printed. It is prefaced by an historical narrative, a
poor translation of which was published by Dalrymple, London, 1790, and
a better one by Chas. F. Lummis in Out West, June-July, 1901. In
Publications of the Historical Society of Southern California, Vol. II,
Part 1, Los Angeles, 1891, a number of documents of the Sutro collection
are printed, with translations by George Butler Griffin. These relate to
the explorations of the California coast by ships from the Philippines,
the two voyages of Vizcaino, with some letters of Junipero Serra, and
diaries of the voyage of the Santiago to the northern coast in 1774.
The sketch here submitted is the result of much study of original
documents, and the route of the expedition is laid down after careful
survey of the physical geography where possible, and in other cases, by
the contoured maps of the Geological Survey, following the directions
and language as given by the diarists.
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