OH, SHOOT! 



canned fish, it is because the trip itself was a 

 digression, an experiment in applied idleness, 

 and one incident, one place, was about as 

 diverting to us as another. 



Before recrossing the gulf, a word more 

 regarding that queer, little-known peninsula 

 of Lower California which we were leaving. 

 It is one of the last frontiers. It is a region 

 at once amazingly fertile and as sterile as the 

 moon, a land both rich in resource and readily 

 accessible, and yet almost unpeopled and un- 

 touched. Mexico will not consent to sell it 

 to us talk along that line offends every in- 

 stinct of the Mexican. Strategically, it would 

 be a tremendous asset to the United States, 

 and it would probably yield many products of 

 great value, but further discussion of a pur- 

 chase can serve only to inflame and antagonize 

 and international antagonisms we can very 

 well do without for a while. 



Angel de la Guardia Island lay just abreast 

 of our anchorage, a vast, mountainous mass, 

 as bare and infertile as the head of a sledge 

 hammer, but we lacked time in which to ex- 

 plore it for that old paved road and the city of 

 stone houses. Instead, we took advantage of 

 the first decent day to run back across the gulf. 



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