374 
VOYAGE TO THE 
dress consisted of a round blue cloth jacket with red cuffs 
collar ; blue velvet breeches, which being unbuttoned at the knees, 
3820 greater display to a pair of white cotton stockings, cased more 
than half way in a pair of deer-skin boots. A black hat, as broad in 
the brim as it was disproportion ably low in the crown, kept in order, 
by its own weight, a profusion of dark hair, which met behind, and 
dangled half way down the back in the form of a thick queue. A long 
musket, with a fox skin bound round the lock, was balanced upon the 
pummel of the saddle ; and our hero was further provided for defence 
against the Indians with a bull’s hide shield, on which, notwithstanding 
the revolution of the colony, were emblazoned the royal arms of Spain, 
and by a double-fold deer-skin cuirass as a covering for his body. Thus 
accoutred he bestrode a saddle, which retained him in his seat by a 
high pummel in front and a corresponding rise behind. His feet were 
armed at the heels with a tremendous pair of iron spurs, secured by a 
metal chain ; and were thrust through an enormous pair of wooden 
box-shaped stirrups. Such was the person into whose charge our ship- 
mates were placed by the governor, with a passport which commanded 
him not to permit any person to interfere with the party either in its 
advance or on its return, and that it was to be escorted from place to 
place by a soldier. 
Leaving the mission of S4n Francisco, the party receded from the 
only part of the country that is wooded for any considerable distance, 
and ascended a chain of hills about a thousand feet in height, where 
they had an extensive view, comprehending the sea, the Farallones 
rocks, and the distant Punta de los Keyes, a headland so named by the 
expedition under Sebastian Viscaino in 1602. The ridge which afforded 
this wide prospect was called Sierra de San Bruno, and for the most 
part was covered with a burnt-up grass ; but such places as were bare 
presented to the eye of the geologist rocks of sandstone conglomerate, 
intersected by a few veins of jaspar. Winding through the Sierra de 
San Bruno, they crossed a river of that name, and opened out the broad 
arm of the sea which leads from the port to Sdnta Clara, and is confined 
between the chain they were traversing and the Sierra de los Bolbones, 
distinguishable at a distance by a peaked mountain 3,783 feet high by 
