"But you didn't do it," returned Mary Lee, more quiet in her judgments.
"But my country did."
"Well, you couldn't help that."
"I'd like to help it."
"But they say the Indians have become miserable, disgusting, filthy creatures, not at all like they used to be."
"So much the more pity. They might have been kept respectable, and have grown still more so if they had not been robbed of everything."
"We can't tell what they might have been," said Mary Lee, determined to have the last word.
But Nan was equally determined. "If you feel that way about it I shouldn't think you would care to visit the missions," she remarked as she made her exit from the room.
However, Mary Lee was quite as interested as the others when they started out on their pilgrimage to the mission of San Diego, which was the first to be founded by good Father Junipero Serra. The six mile drive to the spot was a pleasant one, for though November winds were wailing through the Virginia woods scattering the brown leaves over the ground, here the sun was shining warm, and the first rain of a week earlier had given place to bright pleasant weather. The dry fields were turning to a vivid green as if it were spring rather than winter which was coming and the landscape was freshening up after the rainless summer.
"It is lovely, lovely," cried Mrs. Corner. "To think there will be no cold snows to chill one to the marrow, and that we shall see fruit and flowers growing the winter long."