Their music, no doubt of the most primitive sort, was produced by means of “a small whistle, sometimes double, sometimes single, about the size and length of a common fife. It was held in the mouth by one end, without the aid of the fingers, and only about two notes could be sounded on it.”—(Bancroft, from Cal. Farmer.)
Along the Santa Bárbara channel the festivities in honor of the strangers were especially lively. At Asunción (Ascension), a point on the coast five leagues below Carpintería, they received a reception of which we read in Costansó’s diary of the Portolá expedition of 1769, date of August 14: “We reached the coast, and came in sight of a real town, situated on a tongue or point of land, right on the shore, which it dominated, seeming to command the waters. We counted as many as thirty large and capacious houses, spherical in form, well built and thatched with grass. We judged there could not be less than four hundred souls in the town. These natives are well built and of a good disposition, very agile and alert, diligent and skillful. Their handiness and ability were at their best in the construction of their canoes, made of good pine boards, well joined and calked, and of a pleasing form. They handle these with equal skill, and three or four men go out to sea in them to fish, for they will hold eight or ten men. They use long, double-bladed paddles, and row with indescribable agility and swiftness. All their work is neat and well finished, and what is most worthy of surprise is that to work the wood and stone they have no other tools than those made of flint.... We saw, and obtained in exchange for strings of glass beads, and other trinkets, some baskets or trays made of reeds, with different designs; wooden plates, and bowls of different forms and sizes, made of one piece, so that not even those turned out in a lathe could be more successful. They presented us with a quantity of fish, particularly the kind known as bonito; it had as good a flavor as that caught in the tunny-fisheries of Cartegena de Levante, and on the coasts of Granada. We gave it the name of La Asunción de Nuestra Señora (the Ascension of Our Lady), because we reached it on the eve of that festival.”—(Translation edited by Frederick T. Teggart.)
EL BAILARÍN
El Bailarín (the dancer). This spot, one league from Carpintería, was named in honor of a nimble-footed Indian, who cheered the weary travelers on their way, as thus told by Father Crespi, in his diary of the Portolá expedition: “This place was named through the notable fact of an Indian having feasted us extraordinarily two leagues beyond (always coasting the sea-shore), where there is a large town on a point of land on the same shore; which Indian was a robust man of good form, and a great dancer; through respect for him we called this town, of which our friend was a resident, El Pueblo del Bailarín (the Town of the Dancer).”
Ranchería del Baile de las Indias (Village of the Dance of the Indian Women). As a rule, the women seemed to take no part in the dances, but Costansó tells of one occasion when they joined in the festivities: “They honored us with a dance, and it was the first place where we saw the women dance. Two of these excelled the others; they had a bunch of flowers in their hands, and accompanied the dance with various graceful gestures and movements, without getting out of time in their songs. We called the place the Ranchería del Baile de las Indias.”
This place was about five leagues from Point Pedernales.
CARPINTERÍA
Carpintería is the name of a little cluster of houses near the shore about ten miles east of Santa Bárbara. It lies in a region once densely populated with natives of very “gentle and mild disposition.” The story of its naming is told by Father Crespi, of the Portolá party: “Not very far from the town we saw some springs of asphaltum. These Indians have many canoes, and at that time were constructing one, for which reason the soldiers named this town Carpintería (carpenter shop), but I baptized it with the name of San Roque.”
MONTECITO
Montecito (little hill or little wood), is the name of a small village about six miles from Santa Bárbara. The country in this vicinity, through its extraordinary charm of climate and scenery, has attracted a large number of very rich people, whose splendid country houses, in bizarre contrast, now occupy the self-same spots where the Indians once raised their flimsy huts of straw.