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SCENES IN THE PACIFIC. 
that is to say, Alvarado remained in Monterey, three hun¬ 
dred miles from powder and hall, and Jose Castro marched 
towards Santa Barbara with an army of six men. 
The Don meanwhile was not inactive. He wisely deter¬ 
mined, as a first step, to take military possession of Santa 
Barbara. Accordingly, from the balcony of his habitation, 
which the foreign residents had fitted up for him at El Pueblo 
de los Angelos, he gave notice to his veteran army assem¬ 
bled one hundred strong-, that he should march immediately 
upon that devoted town and sack it according to the rules of 
war. After a long and tedious forced march on horseback, 
of thirty miles, in a single day, over a grassy and undulating 
country, during which they endured more, if possible, than 
their forefathers did in all their wars with the Moors, they 
arrived on the 20th of March, 1838, upon a hill about two 
miles from that village, encamped, held a council of war, and 
hnmanely determined to send in a flag, and an expression of 
their unwillingness to shed blood; but the messenger was 
especially instructed to announce, that the town of Santa 
Barbara must be surrendered, or the veteran army would take 
possession of it, if, in so doing, they “ trode at every step 
upon the pulseless hearts of the dying inhabitants !” 
The Commandant of the place was not so much frightened 
by this announcement as he ought to have been. But, on 
the contrary, knowing probably that the old Don was a man 
of his word and not of deed, sent back the following reply. 
“ Senor Carlos Antonio Carrillo had better not be in haste to 
enter Santa Barbara. Alvarado will soon make his grand 
entrance. If, however, the Don should deem it his duty to 
sack Santa Barbara, it will be mine to yield to the disagree¬ 
able necessity of preventing such a catastrophe, by firing on 
his ranks and destroying the lives of fellow-countrymen. God 
and Liberty 1” This message was more terrific than satisfac¬ 
tory to the commander of the invading army. But as night 
soon cast its protecting mantle over the fierce brows of the 
immortal one hundred, it was never known to the fullest 
