A motley five or six hundred whites
have gathered. The alcalde begins to fear that the town limits are
crowded.
None of the wise men of the epoch dare to dream that in less than
three years two hundred vessels will lie tossing, deserted in the
bay; that the cove will be filled with ships from the four corners
of the earth in five years.
Frowning hills and rolling sand dunes are to be thrown bodily into
the reentrant bay. They are future coverings for sunken hulks.
Where for twenty square miles coyote and fox now howl at night,
the covert oaks and brambles will be shaved off to give way to a
city, growing like a cloud-land vision.
Active and energetic, Valois coasts down to Monterey. He finds
Fremont gone, already on his way east. His soldier wrists are bound
with the red tape of arrest. The puppet of master minds behind the
scenes, Fremont has been a "pathfinder" for others.
Riding moodily, chafing in arrest, at the rear of the overland
column, the explorer receives as much as Columbus, Pizarro, or
Maluspina did--only obloquy. It is the Nemesis of disgrace, avenging
the outraged and conquered Californians.
A dark shade of double dealing hangs around the glories of the
capture of California.
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