But the Southern politicians forge to the front. The majority is still with them. They carry local measures. Their hands are only tied by the admission of California, as a free State. Too late! On the far borders of Missouri, the contest of Freedom and Slavery begins. It excites all America. Bleeding Kansas! Hardin explains that the circle of prominent Southerners, leading ranchers, Federal officials, and officers of the army and navy, are relied on for the future. The South has all the courts. It controls the legislature. It seeks to cast California's voice against the Union in the event of civil war. As a last resort they will swing it off in a separate sovereignty—a Lone Star of the West.
"We must control here as we did in Texas, Valois. When the storm arises, we will be annexed to the Southern Confederacy."
Even as he spoke, the generation of the War was ripening for the sickle of Death. Filled with the sectional glories of the Mexican war, Hardin could not doubt the final issue.
"Get land, Valois," he cries. "Localize yourself. When this State is thrown open to slavery, you will want your natural position. Maxime, you ought to have a thousand field-hands when you are master at Lagunitas. You can grow cotton there."
Valois muses. He revolves in his mind the "Southern movement." Is it treason? He does not stop to ask. As he journeys to Stockton he ponders. Philip Hardin is about to accept a place on the Supreme Bench of the State. Not to advance his personal fortunes, but to be useful to his beloved South.
While the banks, business houses and factories are controlled by Northern men: while the pothouse politicians of Eastern cities struggle in ward elections, the South holds all the Federal honors. They govern society, dominate in the legislature and in the courts. They dictate the general superior intercourses of men. The ardent Southrons rule with iron hand. They are as yet only combated by the pens of Northern-born editors, and a few fearless souls who rise above the meekly bowing men of the free States.
All see the approaching downfall of lawless pleasure and vicious license in San Francisco. Slowly the tide of respectable settlement rises. It bears away the scum of vice, swept into the Golden Gates in the first rush. The vile community of escaped convicts and mad adventurers cannot support itself. "The old order changeth, yielding slowly to the new."
At the head of all public bodies, the gentleman of the South, quick to avenge his personal honor, aims, with formal "code," and ready pistol, to dragoon all public sentiment. He is sworn to establish the superiority of the cavalier.
The first Mayor of San Francisco, a Congressman elect, gifted editor Edward Gilbert, has already fallen in an affair of honor. The control of public esteem depends largely on prowess in the duelling field. Every politician lives up to the code.
Valois ponders over Hardin's advice. Averse to routine business, fond of a country life, he decides to localize himself. His funds have increased. His old partner, Joe Woods, is now a man of wealth at Sacramento. Maxime has no faith in quartz mines. He has no desires to invest in ship, or factory. He ignores commerce. To be a planter, a man of mark in the legislature, to revive the glories of the Valois family, is the lawyer's wish. While he passes the tule-fringed river-banks, fate is leading him back to Lagunitas. He has led a lonely life, this brilliant young Creole. In the unrest of his blood, under the teachings of Hardin, Valois feels the future may bear him away to unfought fields. The grandsons of those who fought at New Orleans, may win victories, as wonderful, over the enemies of that South, even if these foes are brothers born.