USA > California > Santa Barbara County > History of Santa Barbara county, California, with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 15
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" There's nothing for Jack to do but to obey orders, and I went up upon the yard, and there was a worse mess, if possible, than I had left below. The braces had been let go, and the yard was swinging about like a turnpike gate, and the whole sail, having blown out to leeward, the lee leech was over the yard arm, and the sky-sail was all adrift and flying about my bead. I looked down, but it was in vain to attempt to make myself heard, for everyone was busy below, and the wind roared, and the sails were flapping in all directions. Fortunately, it was noon and broad daylight, and the man at the wheel, who had his eyes aloft, soon saw my difficulty, and after number- less signs and gestures got some one to haul the necessary ropes taut. During this interval I took a look below. Everything was in confusion on deck; the little vessel was tearing through the water as it she had lost her wits, the seas flying over her and the masts leaning over at a wide angle from the vertical. At the other royal masthead was Stine- son. working away at the sail, which was blowing from him as fast as he could gather it in. The top- gallant sail below me was soon clewed up, which relieved the mast, and in a short time I got my sail turled and went below; but I lost overboard a new tar a ilin hat, which troubled me more than anything else. We worked for about half an hour with might and main, and in an hour from the time the squall struck us, from having all our flying kites abroad, we came down to double-reefed topsails and the storm-sails.
" The wind had hauled ahead during the squall and we were standing directly in for the point. So, as soon as we had got all snug, we wore round and stood off again, and had the pleasant prospect of beating up to Monterey, a distance of 100 miles, against a violent head-wind. Before night it began to rain. and we had five days of rainy, stormy weather, under close sail all the time, and were blown several hundred miles off the coast. In the midst of this we discovered that our fore topmast was sprung (which, no doubt, happened in the squall), and were obliged to send down the fore top-gallant mast and carry as little sail as possible forward. Our four passengers were dreadfully seasick, so that
Carrillo.
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HISTORY OF SANTA BARBARA COUNTY.
we saw little or nothing of them during the five days. On the sixth day it cleared off and the sun came out bright, but the wind and sea were still very high. It was quite like being in mid-ocean again; no land for hundreds of miles, and the captain taking the sun every day at noon. Our passengers now made their appearanee, and I had for the first time the opportunity of seeing what a miserable and for- lorn creature a seasick passenger is. Since I had got over my own sickness, the third day from Bos- ton, I had seen nothing but hale, hearty men, with their sea-legs on and able to go anywhere (for we had no passengers on our voyage out), and I will own there was a pleasant feeling of superiority in being able to walk the deck, and eat, and go aloft, and compare one's self with two poor, miserable, pale ereatures, staggering and shuffling about decks, or holding on and looking up with giddy heads to see us climbing to the mastheads or sitting quietly at work on the ends of the lofty yards. A well man at sea has little sympathy with one who is seasick; he is apt to be too conseious of a comparison which seems favorable to his own manhood.
CHARACTER OF THE COAST.
" After a few days we made the land at Point Pinos, which is the headland at the entrance of the bay of Monterey. As we drew in and ran down the shore, we could distinguish well the face of the country, and found it better wooded than that to the sonth- ward of Point Concepcion. In fact, as I afterwards discovered, Point Concepcion may be made the divid- ing line between two different faces of the country. As you go to the northward of the point, the country becomes more wooded, has a richer appearance, and is better supplied with water. This is the case with Monterey, and still more so with San Francisco; while to the southward of the point, as at Santa Barbara, San Pedro, and particularly San Diego, there is very little wood, and the country has a naked, level appearance, though it is still fertile.
GENERAL STYLE OF DRESS OF THE PEOPLE.
"The dress of the men was as I have before described it. The women wore gowns of various texture-silks, crape, calicoes, etc .- made after the European style, except that the sleeves were short, leaving the arms bare, and that they were loose about the waist, corsets not being in use. They wore shoes of kid or satin, sashes or belts of bright colors, and almost always a necklace and ear-rings. Bonnets, they had none. I only saw one on the coast, and that belonged to the wife of an American sea captain, who had settled in San Diego, and had imported the chaotic mass of straw and ribbon, as a choice present to his new wife. They wear their hair (which is almost invariably black, or a very dark brown) long in their necks, sometimes loose, and some- times in long braids, though the married women often do it up on a high comb. Their only protection against the sun and weather is a large mantle which they put over their heads, drawing it close round their faces, when they go out of doors, which is gen- erally only in pleasant weather. When in the house, or sitting out in front of it, which they often do in fine weather, they usually wear a small seaif or neckerchief of a rich pattern. A band, also, about the top of the head, with a cross, star, or other ornament in front, is common.
PURE AND MIXED BLOOD.
" Their complexions are various, depending -- as well as their dress and manner-upon the amount of Spanish blood they can lay claim to, which also set- tles their social rank. Those who are of pure Span- ish blood, having never intermarried with the aborig- ines, have clear brunette complexions, and sometimes even as fair as those of English women. There are but few of these families in California, being mostly those in official stations, or who, on the expiration of their terms of office, have settled here upon property they have acquired, and others who have been ban- ished for State offenses. These form the upper class, intermarrying and keeping up an exclusive system in every respect. They can be distinguished, not only by their complexion, dress, and manners, but also by their speech; for, ealling themselves Castilians, they are very ambitious of speaking the pure Castilian, while all Spanish is spoken in a somewhat corrupted dialect by the lower classes. From this upper class they go down by regular shades, growing more and more dark and muddy, until you come to the pure Indian, who runs about with nothing upon him but a small piece of cloth, kept up by a wide leather strap drawn around his waist.
"Generally speaking, each person's easte is decided by the quality of the blood, which shows itself, too plainly to be concealed, at first sight. Yet the least drop of Spanish blood, if it be only of quadroon or octoroon, is sufficient to raise one from the position of a serf, and entitle him to wear a suit of elothes, boots, hat, cloak, spurs, long knife, all complete, though coarse and dirty as may be, and to call him- self Español, and to hold property, if he ean get any. The fondness for dress among women is excessive, and is sometimes their ruin. A present of a fine mantle, or of a necklace or pair of ear-rings gains the favor of the greater part. Nothing is more common than to see a woman living in a house of only two rooms, with the ground for a floor, dressed in span- gled satin shoes, silk gown, high comb, and gilt, if not gold ear-rings and necklace. If their husbands do not dress them well, they will soon receive presents from others. They used to spend whole days on board our vessel, examining the fine clothes and orna- ments, and frequently making purchases at a rate which would have made a seamstress or waiting- maid in Boston open her eyes.
FINE VOICES.
" Next to the love of dress, I was most struck with the fineness of the voiees and beauty of the intonations of both sexes. Every common ruf- fian-looking fellow, with a slouehed hat, blanket eloak, dirty underdress, and soiled leather leggins, appeared to me to be speaking elegant Span- ish. It was a pleasure to listen simply to the sound of the language before I eould attach any meaning to it. They have a good deal of the Creole drawl, but it is varied by an occasional extreme rapidity of utterance in which they seem to skip from consonant to consonant, until, lighting upon a broad, open vowel, they rest upon that to restore the balance of sound. The women carry this peculiarity of speak- ing to a much greater extreme than the men, who have more evenness and stateliness of utterance. A eommon bulloek-driver, on horseback, delivering a me-sage, seemed to speak like an embassador at a royal audience. In fact, they sometimes appeared to me to be a people on whom a curse had fallen, and
THOMAS W. MOORE.
As there were two prominent men of this name in the early years of Santa Barbara, it may be well to explain, for fear of confusion, that the two had no relation to each other, one coming from the State of Ohio, the other from Ireland, one spelling the sur- name with one o, the other with two; the latter being the subject of this sketch.
Thomas W. Moore belongs to an old Irish family that has sent so many eminent men into the world, among whom was Sir Thomas Moore, famous in the war of the Peninsula, and also the Thomas Moore of song, both of whom were near relatives. He was born in Galway, Ireland, in 1819, and was the fourth son of Captain John Moore, of H. B. M. service. Like all younger sons, he had but little of the patri- monial property left to him, and was obliged to rely on his own energies and ability to gain a place in life.
His father being a commander of a man-of-war, a sea-faring life was early planned for him, and he was shipped as cabin boy on a sailing vessel when he was but thirteen. At twenty he had attained the posi- tion of master. When the rebellion of 1848 was terminated it was Captain Moore who carried the rebel, D'Arey McGee, to America, though a reward of $500 was offered for his delivery to the English authorities. MeGee was received with an oration at Philadelphia, Captain Moore sharing the honors. On the breaking out of the California excitement he sailed for the gold region with a load of passengers, but when off the west coast of South America the vessel sprung a leak, which compelled him to put into Valparaiso, where the vessel was condemned as unseaworthy. He was engaged for awhile on a coaster between Callao, Panama, and Mazatlan. In the latter part of 1849 he was put in charge of the steamer McKim, from Panama to Monterey. The steamer, being a fresh-water vessel, proved utterly unfit for sea service, the boilers being burned out before half the voyage was accomplished. The vessel made but slow progress and the passengers were reduced to a state of distress. To add to their horrors, the Panama fever broke out, and proved fatal to 300 out of 460 of the passengers.
The voyage was prolonged to four months, and the daily rations at last became a mouldy cracker and a pint of water per day. The dead were lying around the deck, and the sick were necessarily destitute of
proper attendance. Captain Moore fared the same as the rest, and paid for the attendance of the sick as far as it could'be done out of his own pocket, and even divided his clothing among the needy. He had a tent put upon deck to shelter the sick from the sun. To add to the horrors a terrible storm struck the vessel and continued for several days, and it was only by al- most superhuman exertions that the vessel was saved. At one time the vessel lay on her beam ends, and it was thought that the sea would swallow the victims spared by the fever. When fifty miles out of San Diego, she was sighted, and her signals of distress perceived. The Sea-bird was sent to her assistance. Never was assistance more needed or more welcome. When the situation of the vessel became known, every means was taken to assist them. The hotels were thrown open and the passengers made welcome.
We next hear of him as engaged in catching salmon up the Sacramento River, which he made very profitable for a couple of years. In 1855, his health failing, he came to Santa Barbara, where he engaged in the purchase of hides for the San Fran- cisco market. He also engaged in general mer- chandising near Lompoc, and for many years had the only store between San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara. He also engaged in agriculture, and rented for some years the Salsipuedes Rancho, near Lompoc. In 1859 he purchased the Purificacion Rancho, on the Santa Ynez River, which place he made his home until he built a residence in the city of Santa Barbara. He was married in 1856 to a daughter of John Burke, Miguel Burke being her brother. While in Santa Barbara he held many positions of honor and profit, among others that of Supervisor for the Third District for several terms, the duties of which he discharged to the satisfaction of his constituents.
By his industry and enterprise he accumulated a large estate, embracing 13,000 acres on the Purifica- cion Rancho, and considerable town property.
His death occurred at San Francisco June 13, 1881. His remains were interred at Santa Barbara, the services being conducted by the Rev. Father Mc- Nally, of Oakland, who had long been acquainted with the deceased. Pall-bearers, Charles Pierce, T. B. Dib- blee, John Seollen, John Edwards, D. J. Mehrin, and Dr. J. B. Shaw.
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SANTA BARBARA AS SEEN BY DANA.
stripped them of everything but their pride. their manners, and their voices.
CALIFORNIA MONEV.
" Another thing that surprised me was the quantity of silver in circulation. . The truth is they have no credit system, no banks, and no way of in- vesting money but in cattle. Besides silver. they have no cireulating medium but hides, which the sailors call ' California bank notes.' Everything that they buy must be paid for by one or the other of these means. The hides they bring down dried and doubled. in clumsy ox earts, or upon mules backs, and the money they carry tied up in handkerchiefs, fifty or a hundred dollars and half-dollars.
METHODS OF TRAVEL.
"The men appeared to me to be always on horse- back. Horses are as abundant out here as dogs and chickens were in Juan Fernandez. There are no stables to keep them in, but they are allowed to run wild and graze wherever they please, being branded. and having long leather ropes, called lassos, attached to their necks and dragging along behind them, by which they can be easily taken.
" The men usually eatch one in the morning. throw a saddle and bridle upon him and use him for the day. and let him go at night, catching another the next day. When they go on long journeys, they ride one horse down, and catch another, throw the saddle and bridle upon him, and, after riding him down, take a third and so on to the end of the journey. There are probably no better riders in the world. They are put upon a horse when only four or five years old, their legs not long enough to come half-way over his sides, and may almost be said to keep on him until they have grown to him.
"The stirrups are covered or boxed up in front. to prevent their catching when riding through the woods; and the saddles are large and heavy, strapped very tight upon the horse, and have large pommels, or loggerheads in front. around which the lasso is coiled when not in use. They can hardly go from one house to another without mounting a horse. there being generally several standing tied to the door-posts of the little cottages. When they wish to show their activity they make no use of their stirrups in mount- ing, but, striking the horse, spring into the saddle as he starts, and sticking their long spurs into him, go off on the full run. Their spurs are cruel things, having four or five rowels, each an inch in length, dull and rusty.
" The flanks of the horses are often sore from them. and I have seen men come in from chasing bullocks, with their horse's hind legs and quarters covered with blood. They frequently give exhibitions of their horsemanship in races, bull-baitings. etc .; but as we were not ashore during any holiday, we saw nothing of it.
AMUSEMENTS.
" California is also a great place for eock-fighting. gambling of all sorts, fandangos, and various kinds of amusement and knavery. Trappers and hunters, who occasionally arrive here from over the Rocky Mountains, with their valuable skins and furs, are often entertained with amusements and dissipation, until they have wasted their opportunities and their money, and then go back stripped of everything.
RETURN TO SANTA HARRAR.A.
" Here everything was pretty much as we left it. the large bay without a vessel in it. the surf roaring and rolling in upon the beach, the white mission. the dark town, and the high, treeless mountains. Here, too, we had our southeaster tacks aboard again,-slip-ropes, buoy-ropes, sails furled with reef's in them and rope varns for gaskets.
DULI. TOWN.
" We lay at this place about a fortnight. employed in landing goods and taking off hides, occasionally. when the surf was not high; but there did not appear to be one-halt the business doing here that there was in Monterey. In fact. so far as we were concerned. the town might almost as well have been in the mid- dle of the Cordilleras. We lay at a distance of three miles from the beach. and the town was nearly a mile farther, so that we saw little or nothing of it.
A DAY ASHORE.
" The next Sunday was Easter, and as there had been no liberty at San Pedro, it was our turn to go ashore and misspend another Sunday. Soon after breakfast, a large boat filled with men in blue jackets, scarlet caps, and various colored underclothes, bound ashore on liberty. left the Italian ship and passed under our stern, the men singing beautiful Italian boat-songs, all the way, in fine, full chorus. Among the songs I recognized the favorite . O Peseator dell'onda.' It brought back to my mind piano- fortes, drawing-rooms, young ladies singing, and a thousand other things which as little befitted me, in my situation, to be thinking upon. Supposing that the whole day would be too long a time to spend ashore, as there was no place to which we could take a ride, we remained quietly on board until after dinner. We were then pulled ashore in the stern of the boat .- for it is a point with liberty-men to be pulled off and back as passengers by their ship-mates, -- and. with orders to be taken on the beach at sun- down, we took our way for the town. There. every- thing wore the appearance of a holiday. The people were dressed in their best; the men riding about among the houses, and the women sitting on carpets before the doors. Under the piazza of a pulperia two men were seated, decked out with knots of ribbons and bouquets, and playing the violin and the Spanish guitar. These are the only instruments, with the exception of the drums and trumpets at Monterey, that I ever heard in California, and I suspect they play upon no others, for at a great fand .ugo. at. which I was afterward present. and where they mustered all the music they could find, there were three violins and two guitars, and no other instru- ments. As it was now too near the middle of the day to see any dancing, and hearing that a bull was expected down from the country, to be baited in the presidio square. in the course of an hour or two, we took a stroll among the houses.
SINGULAR FUNERAL.
"Inquiring for an American who. we had been told, had married in the place, and kept a shop. we were directed to a long, low building, at the end of which was a door, with a sign over it, in Spanish. Entering the shop. we found no one in it, and the whole bad an empty, deserted air. In a few minutes the man made his appearance and apologized for having nothing to
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HISTORY OF SANTA BARBARA COUNTY.
entertain us with, saying that he had had a fandango at his house the night before, and the people had eaten and drank up everything.
"'O, yes!' said I, ' Easter holidays!'
"'No!' said he. with a singular expression on his face; 'I had a little daughter die the other day, and that's the custom of the country.' At this I felt somewhat awkwardly, not knowing what to say, and whether to offer consolation or not, and was begin- ning to retire, when he opened a side-door and told us to walk in. Here I was no less astonished; for I found a large room, filled with young girls, from three or four years of age up to fifteen and sixteen, dressed all in white with wreaths of flowers on their heads, and bouquets in their hands. Following our conductor among these girls, who were playing about in high spirits, we came to a table, at the end of the room, covered with a white cloth, on which lay a coffin, about three feet long, with the body of his child. The coffin was covered with white cloth, and lined with white satin, and was strewn with flowers.
" Through an open door we saw in another room a few elderly people, in common dress, while the benches and tables, thrown up in a corner, and the stained walls, gave evidence of the last night's ' high go.' Feeling, like Garrick, between Tragedy and Comedy, an uncertainty of purpose, I asked the man when the funeral would take place, and being told that it would move toward the mission in about an hour, took my leave. To pass away the time we hired horses and rode to the beach, and there saw three or four Italian sailors, mounted, and riding up and down on the hard sand at a furious rate. We joined them and found it fine sport. The beach gave us a stretch of a mile or more, and the horses flew over the smooth. hard sand, apparently invigorated and excited by the salt sea-breeze and by the contin- ual roar and dashing of the breakers.
" From the beach we returned to the town, and finding that the funeral procession had moved, rode on and overtook it, about half-way up to the mission. Here was as peculiar a sight as we had seen before in the house, the one looking as much like a funeral procession as the other did like a house of mourning.
"The little coffin was borne by eight girls, who were continually relieved by others running forward from the procession and taking their places. Behind it came a straggling company of girls, dressed, as before, in white and flowers, and including, I should suppose by their numbers, nearly all the girls between five and fifteen in the place. They played along on the way. frequently stopping and running altogether to talk to some one, or to pick up a flower, and then running on again to overtake the coffin.
"There were a few elderly women in common colors, and a herd of young men and boys, some on foot and others mounted, followed them, or walked or rode by their side, frequently interrupting them by jokes and questions.
" But the most singular thing of all was that two men walked, one on each side of the coffin, carrying muskets in their hands, which they continually loaded and fired into the air. Whether this was to keep off the evil spirits or no I do not know. It was the only interpretation that I could put upon it.
" As we drew near the mission we saw the great gate thrown open, and the padre standing on the steps with a crucifix in his hand. The mission is a large and deserted-looking place, the out-buildings going to ruin, and everything giving one the impres- sion of decayed grandeur. A large, stone fountain threw out pure water from four mouths into a basin
before the church door; and we were on the point of riding up to let our horses drink, when it occurred to us that it might be consecrated, and we forebore. Just at this moment the bells set up their harsh, dis- cordant clangor, and the procession moved into the court. I wished to follow and see the ceremony, but the horse of one of my companions had become frightened and was tearing off toward the town, and, having thrown his rider, and got one of his hoofs caught in the tackling of the saddle, which had slipped, was fast dragging and ripping it to pieces. Knowing that my shipmate could not speak a word of Spanish, and fearing that he might get into diffi- culty, I was obliged to leave the ceremony and ride after him.
"I soon overtook him trudging along, swearing at the horse, and carrying the remains of the saddle, which he had picked up on the road. Going to the owner of the horse, we made a settlement with him and found him surprisingly liberal. All parts of the saddle were bronght back, and being capable of repair, he was satisfied with six reals. We thought it would have been a few dollars. We pointed to the horse which was now half-way up one of the mount- ains, but he shook his head, saying, . No importa,' and giving us to understand that he had plenty more.
COCK FIGHTING.
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