On rejoining our companions, we decided to continue here the remainder of the day, and to start off the next morning in pursuit. We informed Colonel Mason of the circumstance, and he stated that he would have furnished us with a guard to accompany us, if he did not feel certain that the men would desert to the mines directly they got outside the town.

At four o'clock the next morning we commenced the journey, each of us taking a stock of provisions sufficient to last for a fortnight; although we hoped, and fully expected, that we should be back to Monterey several days before that time had expired. It was purely a question of hard riding. Andreas and his party had started, as far as we could learn, three days in advance of us, and no doubt knew the track better than the old trapper who had undertaken to accompany us as guide. He had never penetrated further than the foot of the Sierra, so that if we were compelled to cross the mountains we should have to seek for some Indians to guide us on our course. By pressing our horses hard we succeeded in crossing the hills of the coast range that night, and encamped some slight way down the descent, in as sheltered a spot as we could manage to select. The night was quite frosty, but we made up a blazing fire, and, well wrapped up in our serapes, slept till morning, without feeling much inconvenience from the cold. Next day we struck the river of the lakes, and found it thickly hemmed in with timber along its whole course. We soon found a fording place, and encamped at night a few miles from the east bank. The following morning we fell in with some civilized Indians, who informed us, in answer to our inquiries, that a party of three whites passed along the trail the evening before last, and that they would have encamped not far from this spot.

These Indians, Don Luis informed me, had all of them been attached to the Californian Missions; but, since the downfall of these establishments, they had moved across the coast range, and had located themselves in the neighbourhood of the Tule Lakes, subsisting chiefly on horseflesh. To gratify their appetites, however, instead of giving chase to the number of wild horses—here called mustangs—that are scattered over the extensive prairies in the neighbourhood of the lakes, they adopt a much lazier method of supplying their larder. This is, to make predatory excursions across the mountains, and to drive off a large herd of tame horses, belonging to some poor ranchero, at a time; these they slaughter, and subsist on as long as the flesh lasts, when they set out again on a similar expedition. Sometimes they are pursued, and, if overtaken, butchered forthwith; but, in general, they manage to escape some little distance into the interior, where they are safe not to be followed.

We put spurs into our horses, and soon cleared the marshy ground intervening between us and the Fork, which we forded, and rode for several miles through a country thickly covered over with oak trees and intersected by numerous small rivulets. Large herds of elk were frequently started, and during the whole day their shrill whistle was continually being heard.

We encamped to-night without having heard anything more of Andreas Armjo and his companions. Several parties of Indians we met a few hours before sundown stated that they had not seen any white men along the trail. I felt disposed, as far as I was myself concerned, to give over the pursuit, as my horse was already worn out by the journey; but my companions would not listen to it, and determined, at any rate, to see what would result from following it up briskly during the next day. We had all noticed that there were no new signs of horses that had been shod passing along the trail, but Bradley was of opinion that the party would be mounted on unshod beasts, as very few of the native Californians had their horses shod, unless they were going a journey across a rough broken country.

Next day we fell in with several more parties of Indians, from whom we learnt that the men we were in pursuit of were full two days journey before us. One party, who had seen them encamped the preceding evening more than forty miles ahead, told us that they had inquired of them where the trail turned off to Los Angelos. As this town was at least five or six days' journey distant, and as the Sierra had to be crossed to reach it, we concluded among ourselves that it would be best for us to return to Monterey forthwith. This decision was readily come to, as there was now no hope of overtaking the party, and every step we proceeded we were getting into a more hostile country. In all probability, if we had pursued them to Los Angelos, we should have discovered that they had struck off on to the great Spanish Trail, as was their original intention, or else have found that they had been to Los Angelos and had taken their departure for some other place.

We therefore turned our horses' heads, and retraced our steps towards the coast in no merry mood. We rode along, in fact, in sullen silence, only broken to mutter out our expressions of disappointment at the escape of those who had robbed us of the fruits of so many months of toil, exposure, and hardship. We encountered nothing very remarkable during our three days' journey to Monterey. There were the same prairies to cross, the same thickets to penetrate, and the same streams to ford. Herds of elk and mustangs were continually seen upon the heights, and every now and then we met with some small parties of Indians, many of the chiefs dressed in the Spanish fashion. We were too well armed, and too many in number, for any of them to venture to attack us, had they been so inclined; but generally their intentions seemed to be perfectly pacific.

CHAPTER XXIV.

We had previously determined, on arriving at the sea-coast, to part company. There was now no object for keeping together in a party, and our future plans were, of course, very undecided. It was, therefore, clearly advisable that we should, at least for the present, separate. This resolution was not come to without something like a pang—a pang which I sincerely felt, and which I believe was more or less experienced by us all. We had lived for four months in constant companionship—we had undergone hardships and dangers together, and a friendship, more vivid than can well be imagined in civilized lands to have been the growth of so short a period, had sprung up betwixt us. There had been a few petty bickerings between us, and some unjust suspicions on my part in respect to Bradley; but these were all forgotten. Common sense, however, dictated the dissolution of our party. When we reached Monterey, we went to an inferior sort of hotel, but the best open; and the following day we arranged the division of the proceeds arising from the sale of the gold that Bradley had left with Captain Sutter for consignment here. The same night we had a supper, at which a melancholy species of joviality was in the ascendant, and the next day shook hands and parted. Don Luis went back to his own pleasant home, and Bradley started for San Francisco. As for the others, I hardly know what were their destinations. All I know is, that on waking the next morning, I found that I was alone.