OCCUPATION OF LOWER CALIFORNIA
BY THE JESUITS
Why a partial
history of Lower California is given - Father Kino or Kuhn - His great
undertaking - His plan - The means - The mode of applying the means -
His exalted qualities - Cost to Spain of a failure to occupy - The
difficulties that beset the enterprise - Father Kino joined by Salva
Tierra and Ugarte - The order given permitting the Jesuits to enter upon
the Conquest - The Expedition sails - It Lands and takes possession of
the country - The Indians attack the mission - They are defeated and sue
for peace - How the priests induced them to work - The plan of
operations acted upon by the priests - It proved to be a success - They
became the pioneers in manufacturing, ship-building, wine-culture,
martyrdom and civilization before they were banished - The reason why a
complete history of the peninsula is not given.
It may occur to the mind of the
reader, that any part of a history of the settlement of Lower
California, one of the states of Mexico, is not a pertinent subject to
be reckoned properly among the events constituting the history of our
California. Yet it would seem important, when one comes to understand
that the peninsula was the door through which, in after time,
civilization was to enter our golden land. It was the nursery where
experience taught a religious sect how to enter, then exist, and finally
subdue the land.
In the preceding chapter is noted the
last expedition before the final abandonment by Spain of any further
attempt to occupy a part of California. With that expedition was a monk
who had voluntarily abandoned a lucrative and honorable position as a
professor in Ingolstadt College. He had made a vow, while lying at the
point of death, to his patron saint, Francis Xavier, that if he should
recover, he would, in the remaining years of his life, follow the
examples set in the lifetime of that patron. He did recover, resigned
his professorship, and crossed the sea to Mexico, and eventually became
the one who, as a missionary, accompanied that last expedition. He was a
German by birth, and his name in his native land was Kuhn, but the
Spaniards have recorded it as Father Eusebio Francisco Kino.
Father Kino had become strongly
impressed in his visit to the country with the feasibility of a plan by
which the land might be taken possession of and held. His object was
not the conquest of a kingdom, but the conversion of its inhabitants,
and the saving of souls. His plan was to go into the country and teach
the Indians the principles of the Catholic faith, educate them to
support themselves by tilling the soil, and improvement through the
experience of the advantages to be obtained by industry; the end of all
being to raise up a Catholic province for the Spanish crown, and people
paradise with the souls of converted heathen. The means to be employed
in accomplishing this were the priests of the order of Jesuits,
protected by a small garrison, a storehouse and church could be erected
that would render the fathers' maintenance and life comparatively
secure. This would give them an opportunity to win the confidence of the
Indians, by a patient, long-continued, uniform system of affectionate
intercourse and just dealing, and then use their appetites as
the means by which to convert their souls.
It is difficult for us of the
nineteenth century to appreciate the grand conception, to realize the
magnitude of the task undertaken by that monastic Hercules. With a heart
that loved humanity because it had a soul, with a charity that forgave
all things except a death in sin, infolding with affection all the
images of the Creator, with a tongue that made the hearer listen for the
voice of angels, with a faith in success like one of the chosen twelve,
he became an enthusiast, and was to California what John the Baptist was
to Christianity, the forerunner of a change to come. And the end is not
yet - it will never be, for eternity will swallow it up.
Spain had spent vast treasures in that
century and a half of unsuccessful effort to survey and occupy the upper
Pacific coast. The first colony, established in 1536 by Cortez, had cost
$400,000; the last, by Otondo, 1683, $225,400, to which add all the
expensive efforts that occurred between those dates, and the total foots
among the millions. So vast an outlay, followed by no favorable result,
rendered the subject one of annoyance, and clothed with contempt any
that were visionary enough to advocate a further prosecution of such an
enterprise, so repeatedly demonstrated to be but a "delusion and a
snare."
With such an outlook, uncheering,
unfriendly, with no reward to urge into action, except beyond the grave,
with a prospect of defeat, and a probability of martyrdom as a result,
Father Kino started, on the twentieth of October, 1686, to travel over
Mexico, and, by preaching, urge his views and hopes of the enterprise.
He soon met on the way a congenial spirit, Father Juan Maria Salva
Tierra; and then another, Father Juan Ugarte, added his great executive
ability to the cause. Their united efforts resulted in obtaining
sufficient funds by subscription. Then they procured a warrant from the
king for the order of Jesuits to enter upon the conquest of California,
and their own expense, for the benefit of the crown. The order was given
February 5, 1697, and it had required eleven years of constant urging to
procure it. October 10, of the same year, Salva Tierra sailed from the
coast of Mexico to put in operation Kino's long-cherished scheme of
conquest. The expedition consisted of one small vessel and a long-boat,
in which were provisions, the necessary ornaments and furniture for
fitting up a rude church, and Father Tierra, accompanied by six soldiers
and three Indians. It was an unpretentious army, going forth to
Transcribed by Sally Kaleta