Saturday, Feb. 6. We have another rain; not a cloud is to be seen; but the whole atmosphere is filled with a thick mist, which dissolves in a soft perpetual shower. It seems as if nature had relinquished every other occupation, and given herself up to this moist business. She calls up no thunder, throws out no lightning; she only squeezes her great sponge, and that as quietly as a mermaid smooths her dripping locks.
Sunday, Feb. 7. Com. Shubrick has ordered the barricades removed. Thank God! we are at last relieved of martial law. It is one of the greatest calamities that can fall on a civilized nation. It tramples on private rights, trifles with responsibility, and cuts the conscience adrift from its moorings. Men are thrown into this eddy of excess, and then act like rudderless ships in a tempest-tost sea. Years will elapse before the moral sentiments which have been unhinged by military violence can be restored. Even California, where revolutions come and go like the shadows of passing clouds, will long show the traces of the one which has now passed over her. Its lightning has shivered the tree before the fruit was ripe, and blasted a thousand buds that might have bloomed into fragrant beauty.
Monday, Feb. 8. Much to the relief of the citizens, Com. Shubrick has given orders that the volunteers on service here shall be paid off and discharged. They are principally sea-beachers and mountain-combers, and some of them are very good men; but others seem to have no idea of the proprietorship of property. They help themselves to it as canvas-back ducks the grass that grows in the Potomac, or migratory birds the berries which bloom in the forests through which they wander. They hardly left fowl enough here on which to keep Christmas. Could dismembered hens lay eggs, they would have more chickens in their stomachs than they ever had dollars in their pockets.
CHAPTER XII.
RETURN OF T. O. LARKIN.—THE TALL PARTNER IN THE CALIFORNIAN.—MEXICAN OFFICERS.—THE CYANE.—WAR MEMENTOES.—DRAMA OF ADAM AND EVE.—CARNIVAL.—BIRTH-DAY OF WASHINGTON.—A CALIFORNIA CAPTAIN.—APPLICATION FOR A DIVORCE.—ARRIVAL OF THE COLUMBUS.
Tuesday, Feb. 9. The U. S. ship Cyane, S. F. Dupont commander, is just in from San Diego. She was dispatched to bring up General Kearny and suit, and our consul, T. O. Larkin, Esq. The arrival of the Independence was not known at San Diego when the Cyane sailed. The return of Mr. Larkin was warmly greeted by our citizens. Even the old Californians left their corridors to welcome him back. He was captured by those engaged in the outbreak some three months since, and has been closely guarded as a prisoner of war. Still, in the irregularities of the campaign, and the easy fidelity of those who kept watch, he has had many opportunities of effecting his escape, but declined them all. He was on the eve, at one time, of being taken to Mexico, and got ready for the long and wearisome journey; but some of his captors relented, and he was allowed to remain at the town of the Angels, when the success of the American arms relieved him. He experienced during his captivity many acts of kindness. Even the ladies, who in California are always on the side of those who suffer, sent him many gifts, which contributed essentially to his comfort. But he is once more with his family, and long may it be before he takes another such trip as his last.
Wednesday, Feb. 10. My tall partner in the Californian is back at last from his three months’ trip to San Francisco. I excused his long absence, and cheerfully endured all the toil of getting out the paper, with only the assistance of a type-setting sailor, under the vague impression that he was hunting up a wife. But he has come back as single as he came into the world. Whether his solitude is a thing of choice or necessity I have not inquired. A man’s celibacy is a misfortune, with which it seems wicked to trifle. It is too selfish for pity and too serious for mirth. But let my partner go; he will get a wife in due time; indeed he has had one already; and that is about the number which nature provides. Some, it is true, take a second, and a few totter on to a third, seemingly that they may have company when they totter into the grave. Go down to your narrow house alone in the majesty of an unshaken faith, and trust to meet the partner of your youth in heaven. She waits there to beckon you to the hills of light. Meet her not with a harem of spirits at your side, but singly, as on earth,
When first beneath the hawthorn’s shade,
The love she long had veiled from view,
Her soft, uplifted eyes betrayed,