TRAVELS IN THE CALIFORNIAS. 
357 
day in sloth, or in stealing a bullock’s hide on which to throw 
their lazy carcasses at night. Their dress, when they chance 
to have any, is compose:! of neat’s hide tanned and stamped 
like certain species of saddle-leather. This is made into short 
roundabouts, which are buttoned up tightly in front. Of the 
same material they make loose pantaloons, leaving the outer 
seam open to the knee, and at intervals higher up, for the 
purpose, as it seemed, from what I daily saw, of enabling 
them with greater facility to kill their fleas and lice. On 
their feet they wear sandals of raw bull’s hide; their heads 
are generally without any other covering than their long dark 
hair, usually in anything but a cleanly condition. In some 
instances, however, they don an ancient sombrero, long ago 
worn out in the service of some ragged cavallero. These 
people generally speak both the Indian and Spanish tongues, 
and are equally familiar with the ignorance accompanying 
the one, and the arrogance and self-conceit inherent in the 
other. 
A jolly set of people are these meztizos, when found awake 
with a little brandy in their heads. The elasticity of their 
importance is then a very perceptible trait in their notions of 
themselves. I have but to imagine myself under the large 
tree near the Bay of Monterey, among a group of them which 
I once met there, in order to give the reader a peep at them. 
It is a fine day in April, the flowers cover the ground, and the 
leaves of the trees on the hills are large enough to make the 
forests -green; the swells of the Pacific are breaking on the 
shore hard by, and a half-dozen meztizos are dancing 
and vomiting as occasion or inclination appears to require. 
Look at them; when it chances to be possible to retain any¬ 
thing in their mouths long enough to afford a transit to the 
interior, the native brandy from the Missions is whispering 
and babbkng its way over the palate and downward; a gur¬ 
gling stream full of Lethe, hiccoughs, and other precious 
commodities that anon reappear. 
They talk and sing of their parentage; the one is proud 
