TRAVELS IN THE CALIFORNIAS. 
101 
furrow, whenever the bells called the Indian to his duties. 
But prayers are no longer heard in San Carmelo ; the tower 
no longer commands obedience to God; the buildings are 
crumbling to dust; the rank grass is crowding its courts ; the 
low moss is creeping over its gaping walls ; and the ox and 
mule are running wild on its hills. 
The walls of the church are of stone masonry; the roof 
of brick tiles. The whole structure is somewhat lofty, 
and looks down upon the surrounding scenery, like an old 
baronial castle, from which the chase, the tournament, and 
the reign of beauty have departed. An oaken arm-chair, 
brown and marred with age, stood on the piazza, proclaiming 
to our lady of Guadaloupe and a group of saints rudely 
sketched upon the walls, that Carmelo was deserted by living 
men. 
My respect for the profession of “ glorious uncertainties,” 
will not permit me to leave this valley without introducing to 
the kind regards of the reader a brother lawyer. He lived 
on the banks of the Carmelo in a little mud hut, surrounded 
by some beautiful fields under good cultivation. His stock 
consisted of a number of tame cows, a few goats, uncounted 
flocks of domestic fowls, and a dozen dogs. When about a 
quarter of a mile distant, the dogs opened their artillery in a 
running fire upon us ; the cocks flew upon the fences and crow¬ 
ed terribly; the pullets cackled; and altogether, the commotion 
surprised our horses into a general snort, and ourselves into a 
laugh, prolonged and loud as our lungs could sustain, at such 
a welcome to the residence of the only professional lawyer in 
the Californias! 
We rode up briskly in the midst of this cackling, crowing 
and barking, and dismounted before the door of a tolerably 
comfortable hut, in the standing presence of the brown, flat¬ 
nosed, broad-cheeked, ragged Indian Esquire. His head was 
bare, his leathern pants full of holes and glazed with grease, 
his blanket hung in tatters. His wife hobbled out as blind as 
a fire-dog, and decrepid with years and hard labor. One or 
