TRAVELS IN THE CAL1F0RNIAS. 
35 
perty, his carefully preserved license. It is examined by the 
court and if found to have been granted by the political par¬ 
ty then in power, it is declared sufficient, and the hunter and 
his furs are leleased. But if it unfortunately proceeded from 
the antagonist political sect, the court, with a wisdom by no 
means peculiar to themselves, pronounce that act of their 
predecessors of no effect, and declare the furs forfeited to 
the government. Nor is the hunter rendered secure from de¬ 
predation by the adjudged legality of his acquisition. Nu¬ 
merous instances have occurred in which the officials of New 
Mexico, after they have rendered judgment in his favor, 
have hired the partially civilized Indians to follow the poor 
hunter, on his way over the plains towards his home, and 
rob him of every skin he has taken, even his wardrobe, food, 
animals, rifle, and left him to perish or return to the cold hos¬ 
pitality of those whose creatures have ruined him. 
Instances of another manner of committing these robberies 
have occurred. An American hunter obtained his license in 
Chihuahua, went to Upper California, and after a very suc¬ 
cessful hunt among the TMares’ lakes in the valley of the San 
Joaquin, went down to Monterey for rest and supplies. On 
his arrival he was summoned before the Alcalde to show by 
what right he had entered the country and trapped the beaver. 
He had lost some of his animals while fording a mountain 
torrent, and with them his passport and license. He there¬ 
fore, could show no authority for his presence, nor cause why 
the furs in his possession should not be declared contraband. 
He was not permitted to send to Chihuahua for evidence. 
The loss of some three thousand dollars’ worth of furs, and 
seven years imprisonment, at Monterey, was the result. 
Another American by the name of Young, who appears m 
in the narrative of my travels across the continent, was, by 
means like these robbed of some thousands of beaver-skins, 
the avails of many years’ toil. But this iniquitous plundering 
has not been confined to the whites. The civilized Indians 
on our western frontier, who make frequent excursions over 
