TRAVELS IN THE CALIFO.INI AS. 
55 
Don Quixote came into the bay, Alvarado and his officers 
were deeply in debt, and distressed only to select means of 
paying them, accordant with Californian honor. The arrival 
of a ship in port furnished just these means. The manner 
in which it did so may be unworthy of specification. 
El Alta California is a department of the Mexican Repub¬ 
lic ; and by law the moneys collected for port-dues and duties 
belong to the revenue of the central government. But as the 
right to life, property, and the pursuit of happiness is, among 
the Californian Spaniards, construed to authorize both indi¬ 
viduals and States to defraud, plunder and murder, if they find 
it safe and lucrative to do so, the freemen, or rather the Gov¬ 
ernor of California and his subalterns, were in the habit of 
commuting a large portion of the port-dues and duties, for 
certain sums of money and quantities of goods for their own 
personal use. Their capacity for this kind of plundering 
formed in part the basis of their credit with foreign mer¬ 
chants and traders, from whom they obtained their supplies. 
Hence the anxieties of Sa Excellentissimo about the bark. 
If she had come to anchor there must necessarily be a small 
chance for robbery in the tonnage dues ; and if richly laden 
with goods subject to duties, she would be quite a mine, 
which he already dreamed himself plundering with golden 
success. As soon as we could turn his attention from these 
hopes of gain, Mr. Larkin informed him of my wishes, and 
with much deference suggested the humanity of transferring 
me from idleness on shipboard to the enjoyment of Castilian 
industry ashore ; to wit, lounging, grinning, sleeping, and 
smoking rolls of paper tinctured with “the weed.” 
Sa Excellentissimo found it difficult to comprehend the 
necessity of the request, inasmuch as the bark might come 
to anchor for my quiet and health, in which case I would be 
permitted as seamen were, to be on shore during her stay in 
port. But being informed that there were no goods on board 
the bark, that it was not intended to bring her to anchor, and 
that, consequently, neither bribes nor Mexican tribute would 
